#[another edit i thought i already put the readmore................sorry ^^;]
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next week :)
#VERY LONG ONE LMAO#serirei#love day#gotta be honest when i in the making this comic my brain goes empty so im sorry if it sounds ooc and words badly ^^;#BUT AT LEAST you know where this going#reigen arataka#serizawa katsuya#mob psycho 100#mp100#FORGOT TO ADD SOME OTHER CHARACTERS HI#kageyama shigeo#kageyama ritsu#hanazawa teruki#suzuki shou#dimple#ekubo#[another edit i thought i already put the readmore................sorry ^^;]
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WWDITS Fic Recs Masterlist
Yes, I made two of these already, but I thought I’d organize all the fics I’ve read now into proper categories.
Putting under a readmore because it’ll be obnoxiously long and I also want to be able to edit if I read more fics which I inevitably will
I’ve put this masterlist into a bunch of categories and subcategories, so choose which categories and subcategories intrigue you. I’ll add the ratings of each fic in parentheses after the title.
I’m also gonna mark the ones that are my absolute favorites for gorgeous writing or perfect characterization with bold italic lettering if you don’t care about specifics and just want the best most perfectest fics overall. I do stand by my opinion that these are ALL good and they all have at least one of the following: excellent writing, on-point characterization, funny humor, or heartwarming emotions. otherwise I would be my usual judgy self and not include them lol
Shipping/Romance
Nandor/Guillermo (this is gonna be the largest category. I am sorry to shippers of other ships- keep scrolling! and maybe write some more Laszlo/Nadja fics for me)
Road trip fics
Do you want...
...Guillermo being turned into a vampire on the banks of the river Tigris? Read The Beginning After the End (M) by machinewithoutfeelings OR Upon Thy Native Soil (T) by rallamajoop
...A long fic where they inevitably have huge communication issues but figure it out by the end? Read i lied about the whales (M) by morian
...A stunningly written sex scene followed by a love confession? Read come and break me down (E) by inkstainedwretch
...A multi-chapter road trip fic with plot twists and emotions? Read you can run away with me anytime you want (E) by partiallyobscure
...A fic that explores the complications of sexual intimacy, featuring trans Guillermo? Read it’s only sex (no it’s not) (E) by CaptainAFAB
...A fic where Nandor rescues Guillermo from the coffin? Read and i wish i could run to you- (M) by softgals
Fics that develop their emotions over a long time period
Do you want...
...Beautiful sunlight metaphors? Read sunshine (T) by owlinaminor OR Farewell to sunlight (T) by Lizluz, both equally beautiful
...Nandor having to deal with a physical manifestation of his repressed feelings? Read roses that come without seeking (E) by givemebaretrees
...Nadja revealing to Guillermo that Nandor’s in love with him? Read begging for you to take my hand (T) by returnsandreturns
...Dumbasses having trouble communicating but being in love anyway? If you want a beautiful long fic where they get together at the end, read enough of the brutal and the border (E) by morian. If you want a short fic where they keep things ambiguous, read something here will eventually have to explode (M) by returnsandreturns. And if you want another long fic where they get together at the end, read Let’s Pull the Curtains Down (M) by singing_to_shipwreck OR there will be no divorce (T) by the milkcartonkids
...A pre-season 3 established relationship where they have to figure out what they actually feel for each other? Read Suck It and See (M) by Vulcanodon
...Just a full alternate version of season 3 with fucked-up emotions leading to an excellent conclusion? Read there is a shortage in the blood supply, but there is no shortage of blood (E) by zarya
...a fic about repression that ends with a season 3 finale aftermath get-together? Read you know what is unspoken (E) by arielmagicesi
...them hooking up as a result of sparring together? Read Body Count (E) by sunflowerprince (a one-shot sparring-together-into-feelings fic that also is amazing is To Ease This Precious Ache (E) by sistermichael)
Love confessions that take place over one scene
Do you want the love confession to take place...
...Near the end of season 3? Read Through Early Morning Fog (E) by holograms for a version of the finale where the house properly grieves Colin Robinson and Nandor and Guillermo properly address their feelings OR if it was with you (not rated) by milesofregrets for a version of the finale where The Fight goes differently
...After Guillermo gets back from England? Read I design disasters (T) by Lizluz OR it’s only love... it’s not like she’s bleeding out of me (G) by ariereii
...After the Nouveau Theatre de Vampires? Read Everything Stays (E) by Charlubby or We Need to Talk (T) by riskylatte
...Early season 3? Read swim to me, let me enfold you (T) by singing_to_shipwreck OR Slip (G) by Nandors Wizard Hat (enter_the_gloaming) OR There Was Only One Coffin (E) by kookaburrito
...After Guillermo saving Nandor in an assassin attempt taking place during season 2? Read stupid gay thoughts.docx (M) by adrian (MxDucktective)
...not as an actual love confession, but Nandor talking to Guillermo about how he finds his blood tempting but finds him too important to eat him? Read Confession (T) by walkwithursus
Hookups taking place before season 3
Do you want...
...sex that “totally doesn’t involve feelings”? Try one of the following:
-been saving it all for you (E) by returnsandreturns, a “let’s help get rid of the virginity issue” one
-5 times Nandor thought he was protecting Guillermo’s virginity + 1 time he did not (E) by Vhett (what it says)
-Business As Usual (And Other Lies We Tell Ourselves) (E) by singing_to_shipwreck, a requisite Memo’s Man Milk related fic. Alternately, same concept with say you’re hungry (i’ll give you meat) (M) by ringfinger
-Strange Effect (E) by lauze, where they hook up while drunk and are happy about it
-Punishment (E) by Vhett, where Nandor finds out that Guillermo is apparently into light BDSM and decides to help out with this
-Seize the Crown (E) by chiaroscure for hair-brushing that turns into Guillermo lightly dominating Nandor
...sex that definitely does involve feelings? Try one of the following:
-To Ease This Precious Ache (E) by sistermichael where they swordfight after the Nouveau Theatre
-Mutually Assured Destruction (M) by CapriDolce, also set after Nouveau Theatre
-all the spells we cast without trying (E) by ghostoftonantzin, which is very fluffy
-The Sketchbook series (T-E) by singing_to_shipwreck, which starts with Nandor finding Guillermo’s sketchbook that has drawings of himself in it
Jealousy-related
Do you want...
...Guillermo attempting to date normally and that not going well? Read Trying hard not to smile, though I feel bad (T) by Lizluz OR it’s strange what desire will make foolish people do (M) by nativeportlandian (which also now has a fantastic sequel called nobody else but me (M) OR Human Touch (T) by beautifulmagick
...The Guide offering to turn Guillermo? Read torture devices from an old best friend (T) by pazu
...Nandor being jealous of various people? Read The Feather and the Camel’s Back (M) by Garden_Beast
Thirst-related/straight-up horny (not that there isn’t horny content in other categories lol)
Do you want...
...Nandor noticing that Guillermo is attractive? Read Deluge (T) by Interrobam or He Wants (E) by Anonymous or Just Like Side-Boob (T) by I_NEED_DOPAMINE for a Guillermo-POV crack-y version of this
...A fic where it turns out there’s a genre of vampire erotica about vampire slayers? Read Let’s Play (Master and Servant) (E) by Dracothelizard
...Guillermo manipulating his way into an attempted shared-ether moment while he’s taking a bath? Read wetdream (E) by adrian (MxDucktective)
...idk how else to put this, a fic about masturbation? Read i’ll be your blank slate baby (E) by animatedpileofbones OR Witness (E) by walkwithursus OR By my very own hands (E) by Lizluz
...established-relationship kinky sex? Read put your loving hand out darlin’ (E) by animatedpileofbones OR Control (E) by Anonymous OR More Than Okay (E) by humorless_hexagon (mind the tags on these because, you know, specific kinks). I would also put darling, if you smell something burning (E) by howlikeagod here, which is also down in the fluff/slice-of-life category. it’s both! and it’s very good
...established-relationship non-kinky but intense sex? Read Need (E) by beautifulmagick
...Guillermo accidentally revealing his feelings by talking during a sex dream? Read I’m dreaming of... (E) by Jackie_Gaytona
AUs
Do you want...
...F/F Nandermo? Read The Orgy (off-camera) (E) by freydient OR A Special Treat (E) by poppy_plant for a smut fic of this, or An Al Quolanudarian Vampire in the Bronx (T) by Interrobam for a fluff fic of this
...A 100k+ slow burn set in a completely different medieval fantasy style world with an arranged marriage but it’s insanely well-written and fun? Read Scenes from An Alliance (M) by Interrobam
...A horny role reversal fic? Read Day Into Night (M) by riskylatte or Bait (E) by Interrobam
...A canon-divergent fic? Read Maintain Cover (M) by Interrobam for a fic where Guillermo joins a vampire slayer group to take them down from within and Nandor almost blows his cover and it is all an excuse for them to have to have sex, OR Lyssavirus (M) by CaptainAFAB for a fic where Guillermo has to be turned for emergency reasons
Angst and Wellness Center fics
Do you want...
...to cry a lot because Nandor is being tortured but then to cry happy tears because the family gets back together? Read the Sense Memory series (M) by telm_393
...to first be like “oh good, they’re getting together” but then be sad? Read Hanging On Past the Last Exit (E) by PeonyRosa
...to read a Wellness Center aftermath fic? Read Terms and Conditions (T) by colazozo OR Living in an Age that Calls Darkness Light (M) by holograms OR set me off, see what I’m worth (T) by arielmagicesi OR What We Do in the Dungeons (T) by sunflowerprince. Or if you want one where Guillermo turns into a vampire by accident during it, read Joy Be the Consequence (E) by machinewithoutfeelings
Fluff or slice-of-life
Do you want...
...hair-brushing? Read Empty Threats (M) by Notthedrones or Intricate Rituals (G) by Perpetually_Confused or You’re a Great Familiar (T) by OrangeChickenPillow or Seize the Crown (E) by chiaroscure
...talking about religious trauma? Read re-crown the creation (T) by adrian (MxDucktective)
...general cute fluff? Read A Soft Touch (G) by tired_teeth or Punch Drunk Love (T) by Doctorinblue or Against the Wind (T) by Anonymous or waste away the year (G) by readandwritesilver or falling forward (T) by owlinaminor or Any Other Name (G) by DarlingImBroken
...Nandor shapeshifting into a cat to get cuddles pre-relationship? Read here kitty, kitty (G) by EnsignDru
...a short but excellently written piece with a bloody kiss? Read obedience, if not control (M) by holograms
...a short but excellently written piece with a kiss-to-shut-you-up kiss? Read Monarch (T) by haventacluewhatimdoing
...a hilarious fic written in the documentary style with lots of cute ridiculous moments? Read my heart is in my hand (yeech!) (T) by howlikeagod
...established-relationship smut? Read darling, if you smell something burning (E) by howlikeagod or Cross My Heart (E) by toraguru or Warmth in Winter (E) by HeartlessMemo (which is also really fluffy)
...Nandor thinking he’s erasing Guillermo’s memory to try and create perfect cute moments? Read Getting It Right (T) by sapphicjasper
...a fic where Nandor deals with age regression (not a kink thing, but a psychological thing) and Guillermo helps take care of him? Read Everything Stays (not rated) by mothmerchant
Other
Do you want...
...outsider perspectives on what the hell is going on with these two? Read One Point Perspective (T) by ghostoftonantzin or like a ghost, i’ll be gone (M) by kyrilu
...a Cloak of Duplication fic? Read love is the red, the rose on your coffin door (M) by partiallyobscure
...I genuinely don’t know where to put this, but this series, The One Where the Crew Has a Betting Pool (M/E) by sistermichael is a masterpiece that starts as a fic that develops the documentary crew as characters who ship Nandor and Guillermo, then develops one of the OCs as a love interest for Guillermo, becomes a polyamory fic, and everyone ends up summoning a god. Highly recommend
...Nandor being anxious about kissing Guillermo because fangs? Read Cuspid (M) by singing_to_shipwreck
Nadja/Laszlo
Do you want...
...makeup sex after the Witches episode? Read Apologize Like You Mean It (E) by DarklyGleaming or The Curious Incident of the Goat in the Nighttime (M) by Cousin Shelley or Imitations of a Masterpiece (E) by StarryEyedDaydreamer
...their first meeting? Read From the Moment I First Saw You (G) by Lesbian_in_leather
...Laszlo talking about gender with Nadja? Read laughing away through my feeble disguise (T) by spacemanrhys
...adorable fluff? Read A Night to Forget (G) by fangingout or They Will Find Me In Your Arms (T) by Ellienerd14
...post-season 3 angst? Read A Letter (G) by fangingout if you want Nadja being sad alone, or Salt (M) by nea9 if you want a bittersweet reunion
...adorable fluff AND post-season 3 angst? Read you were a storm and I a sail (M) by arielmagicesi
...a role-reversal AU where Laszlo is Nadja’s familiar? Read A Familiar Foxtrot (M) by Whatwewrote
Other/rarepairs
Nadja and women
Do you want...
...Jenna/Nadja? Read two neat divots (E) by estherroberts OR she had a chassis like an xjs (a skull necklace like a high priestess) (E) by ghostoftonantzin (which has both Laszlo and Nadja training Jenna for an orgy)
...Lilith/Nadja? Read Old Habits (not rated) by fangingout or Eventually (G) by Lesbian_in_leather or Burn the witch (E) by nea9
...Charmaine/Nadja? Read Neighborly Relations (T) by Red Eyes Black Scythe or just because i have bad hair doesn’t mean that I’m polyamorous (T) by arielmagicesi
Other
Do you want...
...a Laszlo/Guillermo fic? Read Lending a Hand (E) by Dracothelizard or Six Ways ‘Til Chelsea (M) by sistermichael
...a Laszlo/Nandor/Guillermo fic? Read Before Dawn (E) by Jackie_Gaytona
...a fic where Laszlo and Guillermo fake-date to make Nandor jealous? Read Better Get a Chaperone (T) by ghostoftonantzin
...a Nadja/reader fic? Read Stake It or Leave It (E) by mileskaane
...a Colin/Guillermo fic? (this is not my thing lol but it’s a funny and well-written fic) Read Bad News Gets Worse (M) by returnofthelu
...a Nandor/Laszlo/Nadja/Guillermo fic (with both Nadja/Laszlo and Nandor/Guillermo feelings)? Read they’re gonna make me into sweet red wine (E) by inkstainedwretch
Ensemble/Gen Fics (which may include romantic elements)
Season 3 finale related
Do you want...
...a finale fix-it featuring Nadja and Guillermo being friends, Nandor and Laszlo fighting, Laszlo and Nadja reuniting and making up, and Nandor and Guillermo getting together? and baby Colin? Read if i die here tonight, i die in my sleep (M) by arielmagicesi. Yes that’s my fic and I’m very proud of it
...on-point sad emotions from everyone in the finale? Read Abandon All Hope, Ye Who Enter Here (G) by Lesbian_in_leather
Gender and sexuality time
Do you want...
...the gang goes to pride? Read they come out at night (T) by spacemanrhys
...the gang is all trans and Nandor is questioning his gender? Read Fighting Between a Rock and Why Bother (not rated) by mothmerchant
Friendship
Do you want...
...Nadja & Guillermo friendship? Read Crying in the Club (T) by LaCroixWitch or Ship to wreck (M) by nea9
...Laszlo & Guillermo friendship? Read A Heart of Gold (G) by OrangeChickenPillow OR we all bleed the same damned blood (T) by readandwritesilver (which features trans Laszlo and trans Guillermo)
Found family/full ensemble
Do you want...
...taking care of a kid? If it’s baby Colin Robinson, read Uncle Afanas (G) by letek. If it’s the whole gang taking care of an OC baby, read the Accidental Baby Acquisition series (M) by cosmicocean
...all three night-walkers revealing that they care for Guillermo very much? Read Salt in the Wound (T) by nativeportlandian
...a cute fic where we see both couples navigating their relationships while also trying to help out teenage Colin Robinson? Read Vampire Vignettes (E) by arielmagicesi
...everyone in the house grooming each other platonically? Read A Meaningful Touch (G) by tired_teeth
Individual Character Focus
Nandor
Do you want...
...a short fic about Nandor’s mortality issues (featuring Nandor having pointy ears)? Read Like a thunderstorm, everything erupts (T) by MrSpockify
...a fic that addresses Nandor’s mental illness (warning for eating disorder and cult issues)? Read sick city (M) by kyrilu
...a long fic of Nandor’s whole life (or un-life, rather) story? Read It’s a Terrible Habit (E) by Rainbow Smite (apathys_whore)
...a fic that is more about an OC that’s one of his 37 wives, exploring his time in Al-Quolinudar and is genuinely really interesting? Read The First Wife of the Last Vampire of Al-Quolindar (T) by secretsofluftnarp
Guillermo
Do you want...
...a Panera Bread origin story? Read How to Be Goth at Panera Bread (M) by howlikeagod which I maintain is the best fic in the fandom, or Despite the Warning Signs (M) by Lizluz, or Behind the Breads of the Panera (T) by rallamajoop
...trans Guillermo? Read The Name of a Warrior (T) by Manfred_stone or Time Off (T) by colormehappy or i’ll be your mirror (T) by CaptainAFAB or Portraits (G) by TheOceanIsMyInkwell
...an absolutely hilarious and perfect crack fic which is also a crossover with My Brother, My Brother, and Me (you don’t have to be familiar with the podcast to read it though)? Read But Not Too Not Familiar (not rated) by howlikeagod
...Guillermo hanging out with the Mosquito Collectors? Read A Fine, Unnatural Sight (T) by howlikeagod
...a fic that explores Guillermo’s religious trauma? Read thorn in my side / stake in your heart (T) by adrian (MxDucktective) who also has another excellent fic on this premise that is more Nandor/Guillermo focused
...a fic where Guillermo is incidentally immortal/invincible without vampire powers whoops? Read You’re Dead (and Outta this World) (T) by TheOceanIsMyInkwell
Nadja
Do you want just an amazing fic of Nadja’s full life (or un-life, rather) story? Read Blessed with beauty and rage (M) by nea9
Crack
For a fic where Colin takes Laszlo and Nadja to an asexual meetup to feed off their misunderstanding: Coming Up Aces (M) by Heather N
For a fic that includes the vampires from the movie: Transcript of a Lost Tape (T) by selfindulgences
And I’d also include Neighborly Relations (T) by Red Eyes Black Scythe as a crack fic (it’s also listed in the Nadja/Charmaine category above) as well as But Not Too Not Familiar by howlikeagod which is listed in the Guillermo category above
I’ll add to this if I read more! and if you have recommendations for me, please let me know! There’s less than 1500 fics in the AO3 tag at the moment so it was easy for me to read a good chunk of them with my obsession and procrastination skills being what they are, but I’m sure there’s some amazing ones I missed. I’d LOVE to read more Nadja-centric fic if anyone has any!
Thanks for reading through this behemoth. It’s the result of me being insane
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About IZ’s fandom policies, and why they are like this
Ok, since I’ve seen people taking screenshots of my tweets on this subject, I thought it’d be better for me to just make a Tumblr post.
I’m sorry for not putting this under a readmore, but I want people who visit the tag to read it all.
tl;dr: No, IZ isn’t LGBTQIA+phobic, nor do they hate your hcs and AUs. It’s just literally how JP fandom works.
-
JP fandom etiquette functions as thus: the main tag is ONLY for content that complies with canon. This is done so anyone who searches for it has accurate information and the right “image” of the fandom they’re looking at.
“Image”, in this context, is not “oh I want new people to think this series is good and not icky like the icky fanart those fans make”. The “image” is, quite literally, a reflection what you see in official media. JP authors, while ok with headcanons, want people who get into the main tag to get what their series is about from the getgo, without confusion.
This is why shipping, “hard” headcanon content and AUs go into separate tags on Twitter: # whnoc (WH non-official content) and # whnos (WH non-official shipping)
What got IZ splitting hairs was not the headcanons themselves, but people using official art and the main tag to claim characters have canon sexualities when they do not.
In JP fandom, the notion of “fantasy” is prevalent: fill in the gaps left by canon, and project anything you want in there. Characters having ambiguous sexualities and identities is something authors do on purpose, in order for a fan’s “fantasy” to take control in fandom.
What we see when someone edits official art to include a sexuality/identity flag and going “X is gay now! It’s canon!” is a fan acting on “fantasy”; semi-ironically declaring a character’s sexuality to express their love for the idea.
What a person engaged in JP fandom sees when someone does that is someone willingly breaking the ambiguity the creator put there on purpose just to selfishly declare their headcanon as truth, denying everything else. The main tags are for canon information, so if something like this is there, it’s seen as a declaration of canon truth.
Same with AUs! What a JP person thinks when they see an unspecified AU in the main tag, they go “oh that must happen in canon at some point”. It causes confusion due to the different views on tag etiquette, and that’s something IZ wants to avoid.
(JP fandom has certain keywords to help them identify AUs, but we don’t have that system.)
About art edits, well. As an artist myself, not editing someone’s art should be pretty damn obvious. Not only do edits in the canon tag cause confusion, but it’s also the defacing of someone else’s art!
About that, IZ has said cropping and resizing their art for video thumbnails, headers and such is ok, along with very light edits (like brightness or saturation, nothing that distorts the characters at all) that are positive towards the characters.
(Also, I know they don’t hate AUs and hcs because they’ve liked a bunch of them on Twitter, including when I made Wilardo and Ashe in FFXIV. If they’re fine with my ugly ass FFXIV models they’re fine with anything.)
The rumors of IZ hating LGBT fancontent were born from an earlier declaration of theirs, where they said “any LGBT content is not official nor intentional”. People took that as meaning IZ was denouncing shipping and sexuality headcanons as bad, but it was just them trying to reiterate the point about authors leaving sexualities vague. If I recall correctly, this was shortly after the whole siri/claire debacle, so people already wanted to pick a fight with them. A lot of the people who spread this rumor had blocked both Aster and myself, the two people who translate IZ’s tweets into English: so they had no source of translation except machine translators, which predictably enough did not do their job very well.
In summation: This is all a misunderstanding, JP fandom etiquette is literally just like that, and IZ just wants canon compliance in the main Twitter tag. You’re free to post hcs and AUs in another tag, and IZ even encourages it.
Edits are banned though.
#witch's heart#witchs heart#again sorry for not putting it under a readmore#but i need people to read this#also i don't talk about the tumblr tags bc iz doesn't seem to care about tumblr
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@adampage tumblr did a dumbass thing and messed up the read-more to where I couldn’t put it under one so I had to delete your ask and I’m making a separate post for this disaster of a ramble hoooo boy i hope you’re ready for what you’ve unleashed
adampage asked:
ma’am I know you’re high off your rocker but if you have time would you please critique hangman’s playlist for me bc I want to know your thoughts 🥰 anyway yeehaw
OH MY GOD yes???? yes I fucking WILL?????? let’s just pump the breaks on what i was doing right the fuck now, get his playlist in front of me (even though ive been listening to it nonstop and have so many things to ALREADY SAY) and talk about this shit. im sorry if this isn’t coherent im pry just gonna ramble. (edit to add now that I’m done: ITS FREAKING 3252 WORDS LONG LMAO OH MY GOD)
first and foremost. I Love It. let’s just slap that down. get that out of the way. ITS SO GOOD. SO FUCKING GOOD. also this is going under a readmore cause YEAH. it’s THAT LONG.
let’s start first with mr. adam ‘i taught graphic design when i was 20 and learned adobe illustrator and photoshop to design my own tshirts when i was an indie wrestler’ page’s cover image. wait. no. back up - look at the profile image he chose for his profile. it’s not a selfie. it’s not a picture he snapped with his camera. it’s a screenshot of the “has been drinking” moment on aew dynamite. what a lovable FOOL. he really saved that and put that as his profile pic im skjdfkjfd okay now swing back to the anxious millenial design with the signed hangman adam page for the cover. he designed that. I swear he did. I swear he did that. I could be wrong but I just feel it in my bones. that was him. also, THAT should have been the vintage shirt. cowboy shit is cute but ANXIOUS MILLENNIAL COWBOY? I NEED THAT AS THE SHIRT!
okay now let’s get into the songs. wait. before i go through it I do want to say something about the playlist overall.
I can’t decide if this is because he shares so many similarities to the character hangman adam page, but so many of these songs apply to his character like, this fucking playlist plays like a hangman adam page THE CHARACTER playlist. like this is the playlist i’d find on 8tracks back when that was the “thing” in fandom where every song makes me go “OMG THAT IS THAT CHARACTER” like. I don’t know if he did that purposefully as an extension of the character? or if it just happens to line up because of how similar he is and his story is to his character but SOME of these songs wooooo boy they get deep dont they? when you compare them to the character?
okay. songs.
so I know some of these, especially the classics, summertime of course, but for the ones I didn’t know I love them so much. they have such a vibe that just fits him, and they’re all so good???
rather low by nick shoulders is one I didn’t know and I fucking LOVE it. and look. it goes from Long Time Gone by the Dixie Chicks. Long Time Gone about being away from the country life, from home and if my THEORY is right about this playlist hitting the character, hangman is struggling with being lost, without a family. it goes from that to rather low, which talks about not being welcome at home. like “I told you once I told you twice, I’m steeped in verse and cursed in vice” ajdskjds GOOD lyrics. beat slaps. song slaps. I love it.
okay so we go roll on mississippi which is soft compared to the two upbeat songs that just hit us before. calms you down after that high energy beat rather low had. lets you breathe. AND it’s got a sad, soft, longing pull to it, falling in with more of those “lost” from home themes. “You're the childhood dream that I grew up on. Roll on Mississippi, carry me home. Now I can see I've been away too long.” UGH! and also, it’s just a good fucking song.
then we go to a song i haven’t heard and love, going places by aubrie sellers. it’s a little bit funkier, but still soft. also groovy as FUCK. and it obv talks about GOING places. so maybe the first three songs were about the home he’s left behind, but now it’s about where he’s going. and man this song just SLAPS.
A CLASSIC is next, 1970 something illegal smile by john prine. it has that classic soft croon, such a good country sound and it’s a little bit playful. it makes you wanna smile and sway back and forth. it’s a good song. fun. but it’s almost a little bit. dark? “ Won't you please tell the man I didn't kill anyone. No, I'm just tryin' to have me some fun. Well, I sat down in my closet with all my overalls, tryin' to get away from all the ears inside my walls. I dreamed the police heard everything I thought, what then?” it just makes me think of when his character “killed” joey ryan. I could be looking too far into it but, that’s what popped into my head.
OKAY NOW this next one. fuck yeah I DIG this song. I hadn’t heard this song and it quickly went into my liked songs. and if we’re following his character, the lyrics hit HARD. “ I've lost the will to try this worthless lullaby. Its melody won't fly me past oblivion. I bet it would be nice to find that paradise, a world of sparkling light beyond the setting sun. But I don't dream anymore” ugh !!!!!!! UGGGHH!! SO GOOD?? and even the slight upbeat to it. “would if I could but I don’t dream anymore” uuuuggghhh SO GOOD. love this song. one of my faves of the whole list for sure.
the next two back-to-back are CLASSICS and fit the hangman adam page character so damn perfect. i’ve even looked at lyrics from merle haggard’s i don’t want to sober up to night for adam in the past akjfdkjdsf it’s fucking perfect. and then followed by dwight yoakam’s honky tonk man?! amazing. we go from from fucking heart-wrenching lyrics if you think about them for him: “ I don't want to sober up tonight. I don't want to act like things are alright, and I don't want to change just to make you think I'm happy. That's my right, I don't want to sober up tonight. I want to keep my mind a little hazy. I don't care if all my friends think I'm crazy. The way I treat myself I might be a little crazy But that's alright, I don't want to sober up tonight. I'm here to drown another day of misery. I'm in here to spend one night without a mem'ry and the way I'm drinking now there won't be any memory. But it's alright, I don't want to sober up tonight” to HONKY TONK MAN. HONKY. TONK. MAN. “ Well I'm a honky tonk man and I can't seem to stop. I love to give the girls a whirl to the music of an old jukebox, but when my money's all gone, I'm on the telephone singing, hey hey mama can your daddy come home?” ajhsdjksdjkf like. look. partying hangman, drunk, swinging a girl around in the country bar???? cause he refused to sober up and just wanted to have fun? anyways regardless if there’s a connection or if im reaching, these are some good classics to pull out right here. honky tonk man will ALWAYS bring the party back up.
another song I didn’t know but now love? happy reunion by colter wall? this is a good freaking cowboy song??? and it’s a cute story???? about what a cowboy does during his day??? what the fuck? riding along the range with his dog, helping the cow, getting the calf back that’d gotten lost???? CUTE? anyways this is a vibin as HELL song and if it’d come out when I was still raising cows my ass woulda been blasting this shit as I drove to feed the herd for SURE. this song is a whole ass vibe and I’m digging it.
okay. walk through fire by yola? another i didn’t know (which - so far it seems all the songs that arent classics - spare dixie chicks - are from 2019) and I am obsessed with???? it’s so good? and fuck just such a good love song??? “Standing on the side of the river. Staring across the great divide. I'd give all my gold and silver just to get to the other side. Your love is like a rescue vessel, carries me through the night through these flames of destruction. I know you're gonna make it right. I know, I know you're gonna save my life.“ LIKE? HENLO????????? FUCK!!!! THATS SO GOOD. that whole song I could post all the lyrics tbh. and the way she CROONS it ugh. yeah. I love that song.
FUCKIN YES. DOLLY FUCKIN PARTON. youre not gonna make a country playlist and not include a dolly parton song boy i KNOW IT. and the song choice??? hm? remind you of a CERTAIN COWBOYS STRUGGLE WITH NOT HAVING A HOME???? “What difference does it make which way I go, got an empty feelin' down inside. Still I need to stay alive and who can tell what waits beyond this road. I'm a drifter” ajdfshjsd god I love dolly. and of COURSE he does too. i’m so pleased by this choice I can’t stop smiling. ugh. love this. love dolly.
sandpaper oneside, rubber other by the bobby tenderloin universe what do you know? another 2019 song I didn’t know and yet absolutely LOVE. I also am loving how he does a mix of classics with newer (but still almost classic-country sounding, maybe like. classic meets modern) country music in this playlist. AND WHAT A SONG. it’s so good? and again, just makes me think of the character. “there are two minds inside me. that’s one life too many. but i keep moving slow on both sides, strong as I can be.” tell me that doesnt make you think of hangman adam page. and it has such a... sad vibe. “i cant believe the things i am. as much a lion as a lamb” !!!!!!!!!!! ugh such a GOOD LINE. THAT SLAPS. LOVE THAT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ugh this song. especially the back vocals of the woman that comes in later on? it’s like. ethereal. beautiful. fucking beautiful and almost haunting. paired with the sad lyrics? UGH. gorgeous.
long white line by sturgill simpson i do know and LOVE and it’s got a fun, uplifting cowboy beat following the more slow, sad croon of the last song. it’s SO COUNTRY. the way it’s sung? SO COUNTRY. and also ajdfskjsd adam. “I woke up my baby was gone without her I don't need no home” and “Gonna' push this rig 'til I push that girl out of my mind. If somebody wants to know what's become of this so and so tell em' I'm somewhere looking for the end of that long white line” kjdjkfdkjf this is just such a country song, and it fits SO well, especially after that previous pick.
now we go from two new songs to another classic. another (i think) 1970s country hit. lonesome, on’ry and mean is SUCH a classic country song. it has that good old sound, and the story it tells too. and just, I can’t stop thinking about hangman just “ Been driving these highways, been doing things my way. It's been making me lonesome on'ry and mean.” ajdskjflkf it’s fair to say that character IS lonesome, on’ry and mean right now. anyways, fun country song regardless and I DIG the addition.
okay back to a newer song and holy shit. this is my personal favorite of the new songs he introduced me to. this song I LOVE this song. fuuun FUN beat, makes me want to fucking GROOVE. I love love love this, and I love the way the singer sings? it just makes me wanna UGH. just wanna sway to it. the whine in the croon I just love. and the BEAT. the beat is so fucking good. and the lyrics? “I'm that wholesome Midwestern boy that you want to bring home to your mama. Even though I bring you joy, baby I'm not the toy you wanna play with at night. Too many things I've seen. Too many people and places I've been. I'm thinking about doing those things I shouldn't be doing. Something I've never done before. I want something to fuck me up. Need somebody to fuck me up. Everyone feels like it. Fuck me up, fuck me up, fuck me up” ajdsjkds I LOVE THIS SONG SO MUCH “Well I might go and get drunk and stoned 'cause it's better than being only crazy. If I ever come back, wherever I end up at is where I was supposed to be.” it’s so perfect for his character it drives me crazy. this is a song I’d listen to and first, groove to, and then be like THIS SONG IS HANGMAN. love this song. absolutely a favorite.
the next song though. the next song. fucking hangman adam page and his love of biscuits. southern biscuits by seasick steve oh. my. god. this BOY. THIS COUNTRY BOY. THIS BISCUIT LOVIN COUNTRY BOY. this is such a damn good addition. not only is it so fucking country, almost. spoken/sung? the soft hum with the fucking banjo??? and of COURSE of course he knows and loves this song I can’t with him. and it hits you with the: “ Southern biscuits, nothin' better in the world 'less they're made for you, by your southern girl.” and I go UWU!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
two new songs so guess what? classic time. BALANCE. HE’S KEEPING BALANCE. I swear he’s done this purposefully and I could be crazy I could be giving him more credit than is due but I swear he’s picked the arrangement of songs too. because this is too coincidental. so, we’ve got our classic livin on the run by david allan coe. what a DARK song to go with. about a man who murders a woman and lives on the run (again, can’t help but think of the joey ryan murder thing, but hey. that’s just me grasping for straws) regardless if it ties or not, it’s a good classic and it’s fun to croon to even if its uh. dark but sung like. upbeat? almost???
okay, another classic and, to me, one of the sexiest songs on this playlist. I fucking love this song. it’s sexy with an underlying of dark. she literally seduces and knocks the guy out and robs him blind and he’s STILL craving her summer wine like. this song is SO GOOD. so fucking good. the way the music swells with the storytelling is beautiful. “Strawberries cherries and an angel's kiss in spring, my summer wine is really made from all these things. Take off your silver spurs and help me pass the time, and I will give to you summer wine” is just so ajkdfskjdfs ugh i love this song
and guess what? two classics so we’re swinging to a newer song. left turn on a red light by blackfoot. oof. I didn’t know this song and it hit me, it’s so good and I know im saying that about all of them but Honestly. “ Sun shines down on the desert, and it seems to make my life a haze, and I dream of my childhood sweetheart,and the freedom that I had in those days.” UGH. “ Will I always be a rambler? Will the ones I love always keep tellin' me, "You stare too long in the mirror, son, someday you'll be too blind to see.” HELLO???? those lyrics? SO GOOD. and again applying them to hangman just makes me FERAL SCREAM.
cowboys and hippies by cody jinks is such a hangman song it’s almost unreal. if I was going to REALLY reach I’d say it almost reminds me of the way the crowd pulls him back. “At some old honkytonk bar that I know by the smell, some old drunk on a barstool on a Merle Haggard tune. That's my kind of room. Raising hell with the hippies and the cowboys. They don't care about no trends, they don't care about songs that sell. Yeah, tomorrow I'll be gone, so tonight everybody just sing along, raising hell with the hippies and the cowboys” GOOD LYRICS. this has the same sad undertones too as a lot of these songs have too.
ugh. I love him sincerely for this next one. blue skies is one of my favorite songs, but blue skies by willie nelson? YES. my grandpa used to play willie nelson ALL THE TIME and I love this version. an uplifting song to follow the heavier songs. I’d like to think of a hangman who has the blue skies from now on. all of his blue days gone. this song is such a classic (cover) that just. good pick. I love this.
alright, so we’ve got a classic but he’s chosen the version from bojack horseman which makes me think that might’ve been the first time he heard it, but that’s neither here nor there. stars is a BEAUTIFUL song. and boy am I happy we had blue skies before this cause fuck. how sad? how emotional?????? “People lust for fame like athletes in a game, we break our collarbones and come up swinging, some of us are downed some of us are crowned, and some are lost and never found” fuck. fuck fuck fuck. and the last two lines, thinking about hangman? “So if you don't lose patience with my fumbling around, I'll come up singing for you, even when I'm down.” FUCK. my HEART. good pick but OUCH. good but ow.
summertime by orville peck is next BLESS finally an orville song I was gonna lose it on him if he put a playlist and DIDN’T include an orville song. interesting though he went with summertime, the newest, and not any of the ones off pony. but! it follows stars well. its soft, lull, and the lyrics are so hangman now that I put it in this context. “Catch 'em by surprise and chasin' the horizon, nothing holds me down. Askin', "Where the time's gone?" Dreamin' with the lights on, tryna keep your eyes on something along the rise" anyways I know YOU know this song well it’s so fucking good. has that same soft pull a lot of these songs have. the way that chorus swells though? the secondary vocals??? ugh. yeah this was a great choice, I’m glad he went with summertime. it fits the vibe of this playlist so well.
we’re ending on a song with such a country sound to it (i mean all of these do), a bit more upbeat, a bit more funky. “Some say I'm a wild man, drink too much nectar from the corn” and also “Oh the school, it wasn't for me. I earned my stripes a different way I learned to sing harmony and go play out on the stage” definitely makes me think of hangman for SURE. it’s a funky song to end on, and if you keep listening to the playlist on repeat like I do, it even falls into long time gone really well.
and of course this is assuming you’re meant to listen to them one after the other and not on shuffle. I’m sure it still works on shuffle but I LOVE the flow of this playlist listening to it one after the other.
love this whole playlist. and my identifying it with the character could TOTALLY be reaching, but of course I’m going to think of him and analyze his selection of *these* songs specifically to put out to all of us. out of EVERY song he likes. he didn’t include... hmm cowboy take me away, for example? shoulda been a cowboy??? the vibe of the overall playlist FITS “anxious millenial cowboy” it has an underbelly of sadness to it. and I dig the fuck out of that.
overall 10/10 I love this fucking playlist thank you goodnight
#hangman page#ashley answers#ashleys talking again#tw: weed#tw: alcohol#ANYWAYS what i'd said before is#if you read this whole thing i think im obligated to marry you#also. i forget to mention the title of some of the songs i talk about but it follows the list the whole way down#sorry how non-coherent it is i just. lose it.
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Hmm... 18 (soul eater au), 52 (roommate), 42 (marvel), 98 (leverage), and or 14 (lantern lights)
babe……….you’re my Favourite™
also, under a readmore because this got LONG as SHIT
8. Soul Eater au
the soul eater au is really scattered because my wifi sucked on that particular day and I was posting it in the mas chat (sunshinepunks) BUT the basis is weapons ace & sabo and meister Marco. It’s a lot of “dumbasses refuse to accept New Friends (because TraumaTM)” and Ace/Sabo being dicks to Marco because he refuses to give up on them. (ahhh my favourite dynamic //swoons)
Part of the plot - my favourite part of the plot - is that Sabo spends a lot of time spying on Marco to try and catch him out as Secretly A Dick and Manipulating Them, and ends up finding out that Marco really really cares about him and Ace? And the way to Sabo’s heart is thrrrroooough his besssstieeeee lmao. So Sabo ends up crushin’ hard first, but then SPYING BACKFIRES and paranoia kicks his butt and he Feels Bad because he was ONLY MEANT TO TRUST ACE and Marco HURT HIS FEELINGS (sabo you moron it’s your own fault). Anyway Ace and Marco pair up to try and make Sabo feel better and it drives Sabo even Nuttier until there is battle couple stuff and a mid-fight Feelings Fight and then a confession and then they become the DMCA power couple. Ta-da!
Ace was a pipe and Sabo was a knife! Or…..you know, something in that realm pft. Basically hitty-stick and stabby-stabby, because you could make a) an argument for their personalities Being Like That (ace is blunt and strong and easy to just hit with but if you’re clever about it he’s awesome, and has the reach to be a longer weapon, sabo is more…well a knife can be used for a lot but also it’s very….vicious. There is very little you can do to Incapacitate with a knife that is not Wow Stabbed. Which I feel is very Sabo, he’s kinda…harsh??? in his way of handling battle, I think.) and b) because in canon, Sabo’s weapon is a pipe and Ace has that knife, and I thought it’d be cool to match that.
42. New Roommate Wanted
an OC-based commission!! James moves in with a shape-shifting thief and her GF and accidentally Falls In Love snickers
It is………..I wrote it a while ago so you can definitely see the self-projection of “I want cute rich gfs to love and adore me so I don’t have to stress about a job”
52. 5+1 Marvel AU
in the actual word document the title is “If you’re broken I will mend you” (Or 5 Times Sabo was There for his Team (and one time histeam was there for him). Sabo is Coulson and Marco is Hawkeye and Ace is a Black Widow (codename: Redback). It fluctuates between sorta implying MAS (but with a definite focus on Marco/Ace) and Coby/Sabo mainly because I made Coby Captain America (YOU CAN’T!!! ARGUE!!! WITH ME!!! HE IS!!!! PERFECT!!! AS CAP!!!) and I love fics that have the lowkey “Coulson has a fanboy crush on Cap.” lol.
(also coby/sabo is. fun? crackship but So Fun.)
Here’s the shortest one haha
It takes about five minutes after the comms. go silent forSabo to know that something is wrong, and two minutes afterwards to gear up.
It takes him approximately four seconds to tear through the people trying to keep him from helping Ace and Marco.
(It takes two weeks for them to heal, no matter how fastSabo was, and a month for Sabo to get off desk duty, but Ace and Marco refuseto do missions when he’s not their handler. They refuse to do anything thatinvolves leaving his side until after he assures them he’s fine, and that hewasn’t just a S.H.I.E.L.D agent because he had a pretty face - though that hadprompted an argument about Sabo’s ‘pretty face’ that he’d had to steadfastlyignore.)
88. LEVERAGE AU MOTHERFUCKER
THIEVES! CON ARTISTS! So this one is actually three different aus in one file - there’s a “MAS but as Leverage” and it starts out as “Ace and Sabo who fill in Every Job They Can (but their specialties are Ace = grifter/hacker and Sabo = hitter/thief and I have reasons, okay) and then they try and run a con on Marco but he’s like Um Excuse Me? And then he gets dragged into their Bullshit snickers. Oh ALSO they ONE THOUSAND PERCENT do not realise they are Madly In Love With Him (but he does. And he’s trying to be patient. But also. Dying. Because wow it’s kinda awkward being in love with. two daredevil thieves)
The second one in the doc is the Leverage trio in the OP world, ‘cause duh, and Parker starts off like…trying to steal kids from being SMILE experiments? and hires Eliot and Hardison to help her. Um I think I wanted to give Hardison a DF?? But I had a whole list: there was altering people’s sight/perceptions, being able to edit vision/specifics of reality in lines of like, code?? (aka he could do Little Changes but they could affect Big Things, a butterfly effect sort of DF). A lot of them were trying to give him a way to…manipulate stuff in a world where tech wasn’t as big a thing.
And the third one is ASL leverage! Marco still gets dragged into the disaster but it’s more found family stuff.
14. Lantern Lights
Lantern Lights is technically posted [here] under “all the light we cannot hold” BUT I have MORE. I wanted to make it longer when I originally posted it - mainly because Lea asked for angst - but I ended up running out of time (I am………so bad at deadlines, jfc). Plus, with all the things I wanted to include it honestly would’ve turned into something RIDICULOUSLY long and I was already pushing 5k when gifts were a minimum of 1k.
This was the original start / end bracketing.
START:
HiAce.
Hispencil hesitated above the empty page, only a single lead smudge marring theotherwise blank paper, and Sabo sighed softly. Eraser nub ticking against thedesk, he bit his lower lip and tried to think of what else to write. He had somuch to say – about Marco, and the Whitebeards, and about the new friends he’dslowly been making, like Koala and Hack and even the standoffish, arrogant Law,but it’d been so long since he sat down to write Ace a letter that the wordsseemed to have vanished.
Hi Ace, heread, as though the greeting would organise what he wanted to say intoneat lines for him to write. He heaved another sigh, resting his chin in hispalm. Casting his eyes up to the window above his desk he watched as theburning dusk faded into twilight blue and the stars began to shine, silverglints of light that were mirrored by the compound’s lanterns flaring to life.The gleamed against the darkness and Sabo couldn’t help but be reminded ofAce’s fire. How it glowed beneath his skin, lighting him bright red in fury orembarrassment or glorious gold in his joy. Sometimes Sabo couldn’t help butwish – but hope – that Ace was still burning, somewhere out there. In the sky,with the stars-
Hecouldn’t help but selfishly hope that Ace had given part of his fire to Sabo’sheart, to burn within him.
Sabogrowled, burying his face in his hands to try and stop the subtle sting formingin his eyes. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair that so many simple things couldremind him of Ace, that undeniable frustration at his uselessness still restedheavy in his every thought, that the feelings he wanted to put to paper wereimpossible to articulate.
Thesharp tip of his pencil cracked as he pressed it into the paper, and the threewords he wrote turned from his usual neat cursive into a jagged scrawl.
I miss you.
END:
-Marco thinks that ouranniversary is the battle, but I don’t like it there. Besides, having ouranniversary on your birthday? You’d expect double gifts, and we can’t havethat.
Sabo’slips quirked into a bitter smile, his eyes drawn up to the small gift stillwrapped on his desk, bow deflated from his constant touches but nonethelessstill stubbornly holding onto the silver wrapping. He’d never had a chance togive Ace his birthday gift, and was sure that Ace wouldn’t have expected it.Would he have even been given gifts, when he’d been kept on the candle wick? Orwould the gift have been an extra moment of freedom, so painfully perfect in its rarity?
Pullinghis hair away from his face, Sabo gently bit his lip and scanned what he’dalready written, trying to figure out what else to say. His fringe curled infront of his eyes when he took up his pen again, but he barely paid attentionto the soft brush of hair against his scar tissue. Two years of having them hadgotten him used to his limited vision and things in front of his face that hecouldn’t see.
He’d never seen Ace’sflustered thoughts, nor known what each fleeting touch had meant until it had beenfar too late, and couldn’t help but wonder just how blind he’d been back then.
Did I tell you thatMarco finally stopped being chickenshit and used the word ‘boyfriend’? I feellike that counts more as our anniversary than the battle, especially consideringI wasn’t much better about speaking up about “feelings” after you left. Twomonths of not talking over the topic because one third of the topic up and-
It’s pretty stupid ofus, huh?
I mean, you werepretty fucking stupid when you-
Sabocrossed out the last few words with two strokes of thick black ink, his teethgrit in a way that made his head pound.
Regardless, everythingis going fine, now. I’m sure you’d be happy to know that Marco and I havegotten past awkwardly refusing to admit to holding hands and have nowprogressed to awkwardly kissing each other on the cheek (and then refusing toadmit to it, of course. Got to keep consistency). You’d think that as someoneso attention-starved I’d be better at this, but it always feels…not wrong, persay, but, like something is missing because you’re not here.
You’re a dick forthat, Ace.
Anyway, this will bemy last letter for a while. I’m sorry it’s short, but I’m already running late;Koala and I are set to sail with the afternoon tide, for Flevance, and Marco isgoing troll hunting. Whitebeard heard there was trouble with the gnomes in thefar north mountains, so he’s going to check them out and I want to say goodbyebefore we part ways.
As always;
With love, Sabo.
#marcoacesabo#ask meme#tag games#wip meme#wip list#12freddofrogs#ask aussie#bip bop nari drops#I feel like I should have put a limit on what I'd post in the whole 'snippet' section pft#I have NO!!!! self control!!!!#maracebo
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edit sorry this post is both long (if the readmore fails i am truly truly sorry) & longwinded im just reflecting and thinking; (another edit: u can probably just read the tl dr and get it)
anyway allow me to spin some very personally based theory here for a mo while i put off/warm my fingers up from the cold in preparation to email my therapist
so growing up i had, i think only, het ships, but i never quite had the ones you were (narratively speaking) “supposed to” have
in most media i recall when i was a kid, there were like, 2 diff structures of character romance plot arcs in media i consumed, there was the main lead and 2 best friends model, where thered be the star of the show who had outside romantic leads and the 2 best friends (who were always a boy and a girl) would have their secondary romance, OR there were ensemble shows where there was a more clear romance set up between the main boy and main girl, then side characters whod pair off in whatever ways ended up happening. in the first, see: hannah montana, the second, see: zoey 101. obv this isnt a hard rule and there were loads of exceptions but like, lets just say i tended not to care for the romances set up for the main girls in the trio models, or quite as hard for the main boy and girl in the ensembles, and in general if there was an obvious romance between two leads i either didnt care or outright hated it
basically i never liked the ships they set up for us in straight media, as a kid (namely, a girl) i liked being that “ew pink!” “i hate valentines day” sort of contrarian, but what i remember actually disliking was the predictability of it, because i clearly still shipped characters, so it wasnt /really/ that i hated romance, per se
looking back on it i think it was probably or at least to a degree more like that i hated the hetero expectation of it- i can nit pick down to more specific examples of why i disliked the main pairings (kataang, for example, i thought was weird bc katara acted like a mother/older sister figure to aang, and i didnt feel like there was romance between them at all except where it felt shoehorned in) - maybe it was also that i thought it made more sense for a main character to be with someone they clearly already spent a lot of time with and not some random new hot boy in town (i very distinctly remember shipping miley and oliver on hannah montana, and i believe that was the first time i ever read fanfiction @ age like... 11 lol) as is often the case w like these things.
theres another level to this though, which is that i notice i tended to ship characters who were more vaguely similar to each other, like, physically (ie, similar heights, or hair colors mainly) obviously this is funny now since my main pairing is johnlock which is such a physically different ship we can construct them from basic shapes and colors and theyre still recognizable as who they are, but i have some thoughts about this- but i think there might be two interesting things about this again in retrospect
first of all, this sounds silly ik, but shipping the vaguely similar ones as a child’s way of queering heterosexuality is an interesting concept and not that difficult, like, two boys are also vaguely similar to each other in a similar way a boy and a girl with the same hair color and height might be, which is something i thought of a while ago
the other way in which this is really interesting to me now, that i think might have been more actually pertinent to myself as a trans child, is that i think i shipped the characters i did in an attempt to morph the concept of boy and girl? to find the boy counterpart to every girl??? that second one makes more sense actually. anyway, i digress
2 start off i definitely had gender feelings starting from a very young age so i think these observations ring more true than just reflections, PERHAPS
so the first thing i remember shipping, ie wanting them to be together, thinking about it an inordinate amount of time outside watching the films, even imagining them eating ice cream together in their pjs (i was NINE DHFJGghfkg) was jack sparrow & elizabeth swan from potc (basically my franchise of choice as a kid bc i never read harry potter) now this doesnt quite fit the “visually similar” thing bc actually orlando bloom looks more like kiera knightly and is prob due to them like making out in one movie, but i think this works for the “shipping as gender expression” theory, because elizabeth swan dressed up as a boy, spent most of that movie wearing boy’s clothes, etc- meanwhile jack was a wacky pirate which like hello duh i’d want to be. so i wonder if beyond the fact that they kissed and flirted, there was something to this concept of me wanting two characters to be together, meant i wanted to marry together two conceptual things happening with two characters, or absorb the cool dude and the boyish girl characters into each other to make one whole archetype for myself? i likewise shipped aang and toph (toph who, normally doesnt really have anyone to be shipped with, since she likes sokka but he has a gf) who we all know is the VERY boyish girl character, so boyish im p sure her actually being a trans dude later in life is a p decently accepted headcanon (i dont actually delve into aatla fandom though so i can only hope)
another thing about this ship thing, is most of my ships had brown hair (like miley and oliver), just like i always have, and in certain cases the girl character would look a LOT like me (i also shipped logan and quinn on zoey 101, which to my surprise n delight actually came true later (although looking back im like... 11 yr old me is glad they made out a lot but adult me is like uhhh why were the kids on this show making out a lot? anyway thats another issue) and i def was a weirdo girl with glasses and long brown wavy hair) which sort of further fuels my feeling that this was an attempt by my brain to do 1 of 2 things, if my own involvement really was a greater motivating factor in this thing, 1. ship MYSELF with a boy (which is like def possible for my gay kinnie ass, but not quite my thesis here) or 2. morph these boy and girl counterparts by imagining them together, seeing them together, etc
for example, i realize now, when i was a kid i drew an avatar sona for myself and said sona looked an awful lot like how id imagine a katara/zuko fusion would be, and the fact that i shipped zutara (very hard lol) was what lead me down this thought path rn
i feel like even to me this concept sounds weird and far fetched but like, gem fusion made enough sense for someone to write with its clearly, usually, romantic implications and we all “get” that, so whom knows???
another thing ive noticed while writing this is for a good few of these ships you can argue the boys in them can be read gay, like jack sparrow and zuko and aang, which feels even more strongly like me trying to marry my gay boy feelings to my tomboy realities [thinking emoji]
the biggest reason i think this makes sense to me is because when i was 10 i became obsessed with the idea that this boy i was friends with and i were secretly twins separated at birth, like i was so into the concept that we looked alike, i like hoped and wished so hard for it to be true, i wished a christmas miracle would happen for fucking real and a magic door in my house would open and be his new room and itd all work out perfectly! and you might think this was a manifestation of my difficulties with my family and wishing to leave it, but in my dream world my parents were still my parents and he came to live with us- which makes me think the obsession of ME looking like this BOY was a manifestation of my gender feelings, which i think can maybe be traced to this concept of pairing a visually similar, possibly gay, brunette boy to every brunette and/or tomboyish girl
anyway. if you actually read all of this id love it if you lmk somehow (doesnt need to be a like) like this is clearly very long and strange but i hope it makes sense. i think i stop myself a lot from ever commenting on gender or theory or whatever but i am a living breathing trans person who has experienced things and i have opinions and i dont think im claiming anything destructive with this lol i think its not unusual to reflect on the way you interacted with the world as a gay/trans kid
also im obviously not saying that shipping straight things is somehow inherently queer, im not trying to retroactively claim something about straight ships, like, those two characters are still functionally straight, and i definitely also shipped probably all of them for normal shipping reasons (although, kid ones, so less “oh theres a lot of ACTUAL romantic subtext between these two” but rather “oh theyre friends and would be cute together!” (or like they kissed and i was like O: )) but im just trying to theorize about something its possible my tiny trans brain was trying to express- and who knows maybe im not the only one!
anyway i guess the TL;DR is: when i was a kid i had a lot of “unconventional” straight ships- i already observed that i eschewed the main canon pairings in kids media in what was probably my tiny baby brains rejection of hetero culture, but i also actively shipped side characters who looked like me, and also looked like each other (ie, both tall and brunette, a boy and girl counterpart of Each Other) OR characters who seemed to be a gayish boy and a tomboyish girl, and im theorizing that maybe the reason that was was my tiny trans brain wanting to gem fusion those two together because of my Gender Feelings and fuse the boy with the girl and this desire manifested in shipping therefore thinking about a lot these pairings of boy and girl counterparts
#please dont be weird about this post i hope its like understandable what im trying to think about here?#like i dont think its that weird to consider nor am i claiming anything bad or destructive about ppls lives n genders n whatever#purely an observation about myself and the way i consumed media ages like 8-12#in reflection as a gay/trans adult and thinking about what those things might have potentially been expressing or something#i dont know any official queer theory stuff n i dont think that should stop me from thinking my own thoughts so here u go#also i am TRULY sorry if this readmore doesnt work
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hey yall you may or may not have noticed that i havent been on a lot lately and now the mukbang video and some other things in my life have made me decide to go on an indefinite hiatus from tumblr. i might occasionally post an edit or something every now and again, but i wont actually be on reblogging things or anything so see you all again who knows when. i might come back someday or maybe not idk but thanks for being there for me and showing me the phandom side of tumblr, i’ve met some really great people here and if you’re wondering if i mean you, i absolutely do, youre all incredible <3
this will probably get long and for that i apologize, but im a sentimental person and i cant leave without a proper goodbye. im putting it under a readmore so you dont have to suffer through it if you dont want to lol
before i get heavy with the unnecessary backstory, let me just thank you all so much for following me. ive only had this blog for less than a year but you guys have already shown me so much love and that means so much to me. i met a lot of good people here in the phandom and i feel sorry that i never talked to more of you. words dont even begin to cover how thankful i am to have gotten to interact with all of you <3
okay next of all this is not because of something bad, its actually bc i feel like ive outgrown tumblr? lol but like i said this is gonna be long and youre the one who clicked on the readmore so youre committed sorry alsfdkjalgh anyway yo long backstory warning here we go okay so like if you saw that super long reflection post i made like two months or whenever, you will know that i used to have a tumblr four years ago and tldr i left it and put it on a pedestal for all these years and it wasnt until two months ago when i went back through the entire thing that i realized i had just romanticized it blah blah weve been over this. my point is, tumblr for me has always been an escape from real life and a place where i could talk to people because in real life there was no one for me to interact with at all. but now,,,,,,, i dont really need that. im in college. i see and talk to people usually almost every day. im no longer an isolated little girl stuck in her room all day.
now that im in college, i realized i am in control of my own life. things have been happening and ive been doing things ive never even imagined possible. i am a human with one life and its up to me to make it the best life i can. its my birthday today and i am starting on a new decade of my life whether i want to or not. i recently went through a long thought process vaguely how i think the one dan went through when he decided he hated law school and dropped out. prepare yourself for another backstory dump lol. so all my life ive been like told that im so smart and everyone has always expected me to be smart and so i decided to be a chemistry major because ive always like chemistry i guess and wow everyone expects me to do something super “”smart”” like that and theres been so much pressure by people and by myself to live up to this expectation of being an exceptional student and incredibly smart and now im out here being in college and struggling with the reality that im,,,,, not that smart,,,,, and that i dont even enjoy chemistry like i thought i did,,,,,, ive been battling with my own expectations of myself to be this person that ive always expected myself to be my entire life but ive realized now that thats just not realistic. and ive decided that those old expectations just dont matter. im not who i thought i was and thats okay. im trying to learn to accept the past but not let it rule me anymore and just let go. im changing my major and not letting myself be upset that im not living up to who i once thought i would be. id rather be happy and enjoy what i choose for myself than keep up the appearance of who ive always been told to be.
i dont know who i am anymore. i dont know what the future holds. but i do know that im going to stop letting my past define me and just live my life how i want it to be and not how i thought it should be.
and as a result of this, i no longer feel like i need tumblr as a crutch. i used to sit on this website for hours and not be able to stop. now i come on tumblr and get bored within minutes. i thought i would never be able to get off of this site. i thought i would always need it. but i dont think i do anymore.
so goodbye tumblr. weve had some good times, and weve had some bad. this site has seen me through five tumultuous years of my life. ive met some incredible people because of my time here and im honestly glad ive had this website to hold me for all these years. so long and goodnight, tumblr.
embrace the void and have the courage to exist
love,
eloise xoxo
#i know this is kind of out of the blue but what isnt in life tbh#anyway im excited for how uncertain things are#like now that ive decided to abandon my old life 'plan'#anything goes#there are no rules anymore#it will take a long time to train my brain to not automatically think the old thoughts#of living up to high expectations#but ill get there#anyway if any of you want to keep in touch#my kik is catfacepen#and my instagram is @frozenalabaster#so gather round piggies and kiss this goodbye#id encourage your smiles and expect you wont cry#i hope you all have fantastic lives#goodbye#eloise is being loud
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Neutral Element - I Am Well
Installment Masterlist/what am I looking at here || Relationships: FINALLY; Characters: Tarvek and Gil, Agatha; Length: 2k; Content notes: Just when including this section was starting to feel overly precious - Medical stuff! Dissociation! Flashbacks! Body horror? Aaronev Wilhelm leaving sticky residue on things that persists after his death. All conveyed through experimental formatting. This segment was fun. Readmores are still broken on mobile and I’m still sorry.
Tarveka and Gil maintain a careful balance of, ‘Well, it would upset Agatha if something happened to you,’ and not addressing that they can feel each other’s lies of omission.
*
“We’ve got to put her in a different head,” Agatha declares, staring into the dead eyes of Tarveka’s empty chassis with an air of diagnosis and tsking quietly. “This one’s no good.”
“We can maybe fix up some other things for her, while we’re in there....” adds Gil, pressing close to Agatha to look too.
I will not stand by while you — came the impression of Tarveka in her head, only to pause. Gil was reminded of a finicky bumacat deciding whether to put her paw down after sticking it outside her cave. Hm, that is a good idea. Zengil feels Tarveka shuffling through the half-formed ideas for improvements floating at the top of her mind, which manifests as them rising to precedence without her input. To someone with pretty strong mental control, it’s unusual and somewhat disorienting. Hm, I like that one. Oh, now that is lovely.
Gil wants to tease her for being as vain as a cat too, in this moment where she won’t have to explain the reference and Tarveka will understand and not be able to deny she’s joking, but Tarveka’s appreciation is more that of an enthusiastic connoisseur. Even Tarveka’s interest in clothing that Gil has noted has surprisingly little of the covetous impulse that Ooh, that would look lovely on me. And Tarveka would know she knew that, and know she knew she knew, and...
Ack.
“Told you,” Gil settles on.
You’re such a mess, impresses Tarveka, plainly referring to the entire train of thought.
*
I’ll have to commission a whole new wardrobe, of course,” Tarveka coughs. Being able to edit herself to fit clothes could certainly be convenient. The taste alerts her that blood is dripping from her mouth.
Soon she won’t be bothered by concerns like —
Zengil yanks herself out of the blood-red flash of recollection, reeling. Half of her scrambles to place when that happened to her, before it settles in that it never did.
I didn’t see anything?? she thinks at Tarveka, desperate and sheepish.
Tarveka, sick and sulky, doesn’t send more than a mild sense of irritation at Gil, but Zengil still retreats, embarrassed at having accidentally intruded on something so profoundly personal, to lurk sheepishly in the corner of her own head.
*
Asking me to ride along like this... Tarveka begins eventually, out of the blue and awkward. I would think you of all people...
Gil, for once, is sure of what Tarveka is getting at. She’s kind of cheating right now. “You aren’t like Lucrezia, okay? I invited you in. So stop fretting.”
Gil, mercifully for the both of them, cannot actually see most of Tarveka’s thoughts, but she doesn’t need to to put together stories about Lucrezia with Tarveka’s own manner of conducting herself and see why the clank girl might be uncomfortable, snagged by hooks of misplaced guilt.
Tarveka’s presence retreats into a sulky, defensive ball, trying to shrink into itself and lash out defensively at the same time.
“Of course,” says Gil, voice growing irritated, “you could always just try being a better person instead of a manipulative sneak —”
Oh, don’t you start with me, you brutish, pathetic excuse for a diplomat! You wouldn’t know subtlety if it struck you in the face!
“That wouldn’t be very subtle of it, would it?”
*
Tarveka considers her body, cracked open on a lab table, for the second time in her existence.
(At this point she isn’t sure she dares call it her life. It almost feels like she’ll jinx herself.)
For the first time, she’s doing so through another’s eyes. The optics of her clank were hers from the start, of course. And the eyes she saw it through were her very own, the originals, slightly myopic and a dull brown color she needs only look at Anevke to see these days, but still somewhat misses.
Her clank body’s first face didn’t move. She just didn’t have the skill or the time, and she would have needed at least one.
Tarveka had already studied the art of dollmaking before she sent her brother for the Muse, and applied those arts when she couldn’t replicate the incredible lifelike quality of Tinka, fighting her own body and racing to beat its inevitable shutdown, damn her father. She made the clank’s face so its expression could seem to change with a tilt of the head, or through association with subtle posture or a tone of voice.
Tinka’s help was invaluable with the more critical problems, before Tarveka’s father broke her too. Aaronev left the world scattered with broken women.
She is staring down at her own corpse and thinking, I don’t want to believe that I am dead, but what if —
Gil yanks them away from the memory with increasingly thoughtless ease — more of a nudge than a yank now, really, a gentle redirect — and tries not to mull on how she now knows Tarveka snuck her own body into her family castle’s medical waste.
She wasn’t bragging about knowing mental disciplines, so instead of letting herself start thinking about how she shouldn’t be thinking about things she shouldn’t be thinking about, inevitably defeating the purpose of the whole thing, she starts teaching Tarveka the Skiff alphabet. Then she moves on to their measuring system.
Base 9? thinks Tarveka. Really?
The number was sacred to an ancient simek—
Waͪrͤrͬiͦorˢᵖᵃʳᵏ, conveys the helpful impression Tarveka gets.
— so it’s sort of a thing. Don’t start. You count time by twenty-four. Twenty-four and sixty.
Yes, but that’s...
Normal here? Gil interrupts sarcastically.
Alright, touché.
*
Gil is stripped open and vulnerable too, like this. There’s a kind of balance to it that settles the part of Tarveka that wants to be defensive. She’s shocked by the open, raw care the other woman feels, and the soft thread of doubt and hurt she put there.
*
Tubing twists from the palanquin’s molded container like organs spilling from a fresh Coptic jar and isn’t it isn’t she dead so much to do trapped in this castle trapped —
They emerge with a gasp and Gil forces their attention back to the present project, which is strikingly reminiscent but not the same. It’s not you, you’re with me, please, Tarveka. If we don’t focus you will die.
We will die, corrects Tarveka. Suicidal idiot.
*
Tarveka is getting better at taking the reins from Gil, remembering how to be flesh. Given all the factors, this is probably a bad thing.
*
Gil fancies that Agatha is like one of her goddessess — a war queen who built herself wings of iron and sunlight, flew to the realm of the gods, and situated herself among them.
That is the best thing I’ve ever seen, says Tarveka. Really? Do you mind if I use that comparison? I’ve thought of her as like the sun before, you know, but we don’t have any sun goddesses.
She was reading associations out of Gil’s mind, then. Sometimes the queen was associated with Ishana, the punishing burning bringer of life.
Do you think —
That the legend could refer to some solar-powered vehicle? finishes Gil. Yes. I’ve incorporated that idea into some of my designs —
It says iron, but —
It must be from some old word that just means metal, I think.
Ah, like the “apple” of knowledge.
The what?
Now, fͭoͪuͤr of the sͫeͦvͬeͤnᶠᵒʳʷᵃʳᵈ ᵗʰᶤᶰᵏᶤᶰᵍ popes disagree about this strongly, but...
*
She grips her right hand with her right hand and feels for a pulse and this is the part where her heartrate should kick up but that’s the entire problem isn’t i —
“You two are spacing out again, aren’t you,” says Agatha, grabbing Gil by the chin and forcing them to look her in the eyes.
Focusing on Agatha is easy. “I’m not going to die on you, I — I promise,” Gil reassures her. Or one of them does.
“Don’t you dare,” Agatha says, uses her grip to tilt Gil’s head, then leans forward and kisses them softly.
Then she bustles back to work. There’s still ever so much of it.
*
Tarveka resents the ways the project of building a clank to puppet got away from her.
Tarveka has always placed a high value on her control over her own person. It is a representation of her personal strength which she feels, paradoxically, is both a testament to her indomitable will and an absolute lowest-bar basic achievement everyone should be expected to adhere to. After all, she does.
Tarveka administered as close to total control over her body as possible through the teachings of the Way of the Smoke. She controlled her own reactions. She controlled others’ perceptions of her.
But the incident of losing her body was a mad dash wresting control back from where the void devoured it from the very start, and she did not emerge entirely victorious|took heavy losses in her victory. Yes, she built her new body from its gears up, and it’s a masterwork, certainly, but she didn’t make it her new body on purpose. She didn’t mean to give that much to her father in her first move.
Overplayed her hand.
This single error is representative of a veritable cascade of them. She’s different, now, in ways she’s still only cataloguing. She was never as comfortable around biomatter as some sparks, but she finds she’s less fussed about it now. It took her months to connect that to a new aversive reaction to gutted machines and rust on old wires it takes a light fugue to push away.
Like many things, it’s nothing she ever constructed, not something she programmed. She’d very much like to put on airs and compare herself to Van Rijn with his famous bafflement at his own marvelous creations, but she would be more comfortable with this if she hadn’t created herself.
Is she even still herself?
“Did you know the fundamental components of an organic body experience a massive turnover rate?” says Gil.
“What?” snaps Tarveka, grabbing control of Gil’s own mouth to do it, which is becoming easier the longer she has to grow used to not being in a clank. She isn’t in the mood for a biology lesson.
“You know, the primary building components, uh, they’re round in animals and square in plants —”
“I know what cells are, Zengil.”
Instead of acting called out for being a patronizing know-it-all, Gil snaps her fingers and says, “Right, that’s what it is. Like little rooms. Thank you. I haven’t had reason to brush up on all the basic terminology in the local language. Didn’t usually have anyone to talk to about it, for one thing. Anyway, hundreds of millions —” She picks a flitting thought from Tarveka carelessly “— billions, thank you — of cells die off in a healthy person every day. On purpose! It’s great, really.” She finishes with a bit of the telltale distraction of a spark espousing on their specialty.
“...They do not,” says Tarveka.
“Well,” says Gil, “only some of them.” Tarveka gets a ghost impression, a diagram of the human body forged through in-depth understanding picked out in hot and cold spots. “We’re never the same for long, even if we’re sitting still. We’re not supposed to be. That’s what being alive is!”
Tarveka thinks about this. “Are you talking about necrosis?”
“I’m talking about apoptosis, you morbid little tit.”
“Seriously? You forgot ‘cell’, but you know that word?”
Gil mutters, but the impression Tarveka gets — a stack of secondhand books, at once familiar and foreign and exciting, stacked on a rock in an empty waste — is much more indicative than the actual words, which include “dare defy me”, “show them all”, and “then they’ll see, they’ll all see”, in an impressive but pat three-for-three.
Tarveka chews on a response. “If this is a clumsy attempt to make me feel better —”
“Who, me?” says Zengil. “Be nice to you? Never.”
“— Then it’s working,” finishes Tarveka. “But only a little. ...Shut up, don’t —” stare at me like that? No, that’s not right. This is getting very confusing. “Stop — stop having feelings at me, get back to work.”
“You’re not actually the boss of me, Sturm —”
“If you don’t connect that octave coupler it’s going to catch fire.”
“Ack!”
*
“Do they realize how weird that looks?” asks Violetta, watching what appears to be Zengil talking to herself while they wait for someone madder than they are to hand them another task.
“They’re sparks,” says Moloch, shrugging. “Do they care?”
*
For a week Tarveka maintains the frequency of checking on her body she had when she’d thought something was wrong. (She’d been right.) She doesn’t have the opportunity to miss her heart pounding and her breath coming fast as she carries on the deception, because her gears whir and grind, and her vision shifts too amber, then too blue.
She goes through the motions of her normal routines, paring them down slowly. She doesn’t really know why she’s bothering when her audience is mostly the palanquin’s bearers. (Pallbearers.) She could order them away for maintenance and only seem like a snappish spark — she could bite, It’s a spark thing, get lost! when she doesn’t open the container, when she drops off the frequency of all her biological maintenance to a dead stop. But they avert their eyes and she doesn’t ever need to.
*
Agatha grips them by the chin again but this time she just stares them in the eyes, whips out a flashlight and stares more, then says, “You’re integrating too strongly. You two can’t even be trusted to stay fighting?” She tsks. “Incredible.” Then she wanders off and begins writing out papers. They will only find out what’s on them later.
Si vales valeo is an abbreviation of si vales bene est ego valeo, which means “If you are well, I am well.”
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Exit Interview for a Fic
(or: 10 Questions Every Fic Writer Secretly Wants to be Asked)
I’ve decided that I’m going to do one of these whenever I finish a fic as a sort of exit interview with myself. It’s too easy to forget stuff as you move on and time passes, you know? I want to remember what I felt as soon as it was finished.
So here’s a bunch of questions about Losing Time.
Under a readmore because again, it’s long and pretty really self indulgent! (There are some behind the scenes/further explanation of things if you are interested though.)
1. Of the fics you’ve written, which is your favorite and why? I’m still going to say the unfinished Barry POV even though that’s awful of me. I know I keep saying this but there’s a section in that story that I’m just so freaking proud of and can’t wait to share... But I have to wait because the fic is unfinished and I can’t put that one up episodically. So even though it’s unfinished that section makes it my favorite.
Having said that? I’m really damn proud of this! Putting up something one chapter/part/episode at a time was nerve wracking. Hoping I’ve laid down enough pieces to pick up later? And I didn’t know what I was doing for at least the first third, and only an idea for the next third. And I FINISHED IT! So yeah, proud of all of that. Plus there was a lot of stuff that’s outside my wheelhouse. So I pushed my boundaries in a lot of ways that I’m also proud of.
2. Which scene was your favorite to write in Losing Time? This is going to sound awful but... part 10 - the scene where Barry/Sildar goes through the portal. That’s when it felt to me like the story changed gears if that makes sense. Up to that point it was just so. much. talking. It was necessary! But I felt like I was doing a really crappy job telling a story when it was just so much standing around talking.
And just for an early scene that made me have hope there was something good here: Lup helping Barry/Sildar with the panic/asthma attack. Lup is so ferocious and caring and just this amazing force of nature and that moment between the two of them answered the question “what would happen if they met and he didn’t know her?” Obviously the answer was: he’d fall instantly in love with her of course. She came in and terrified him and still he was putty in her hands thirty seconds later.
3. Which part of Losing Time was hardest to write? I think part 11 was hardest. Like I just said, it felt like the story had just changed gears and I knew where things needed to go but only in the vaguest sense. I sat looking at an empty page for the longest with that section, for sure.
And then of course the end of part 14. That scene needed to carry weight and the whole time I was writing it, right up until that last line showed up, I felt like I was failing miserably.
4. If you could change anything in Losing Time, what would it be? I wish I were better at writing Taako. I feel like I understand his thinking and motivations? But his speaking style is really hard for me to emulate. I don’t want to lean into it too hard and make him ridiculous because he’s not! So I probably err too hard the other way, unfortunately.
5. Did you make an outline for Losing Time? Did you stick to it? No outline at all. I started this thing with a vague “what if” idea: what if Barry were suddenly younger? It turned into more what ifs. What if Barry was suddenly - after canon, with Lup there - alive without his memories? How would everyone else deal with it? How would that effect he and Lup? I certainly didn’t write part one with any clue what was going to happen - I didn’t even know it was going to become a full fic.
6. Which scenes did you cut, and which were added in Losing Time? There was another scene with Merle but it was giving too much information too soon. I pushed it back and then it just didn’t fit anymore. I also had a brief conversation with Magnus but I knew I wanted this to be the four of them - Barry, Lup, Taako, and Kravitz - so that didn’t go very far before I cut it.
Also, originally they were not going to tell him what was going on. Then I was like... hold up. He’s an adult. Lup would respect him more than that. She would absolutely argue to tell him the truth. So there was more of them keeping things from him that got cut out.
7. Who was your favorite character to write in Losing Time? Lup. I think at this point in the timeline she’s still struggling with the last decade and trying to figure out what their lives are like now. I think she’s just starting to figure that stuff out and then this knocks her for a loop. (heh) I was a little worried in the earlier parts when she and Taako were talking and just kept having this friction. I didn’t want it to seem like I was having her just be this emotional ping pong ball bouncing all over but... she kind of is? She and Taako are butting heads there. It’s for the same reason though - they are scared and worried and neither are dealing with their emotions very well. Taako has seen that he’s got the tendency to try to cut out people before they can lead to pain and at one point he’s reminding himself not to do that with Kravitz but then he’s totally doing that with Kravitz. And he’s doing it with Barry. To part of him, he’s decided this is already a failure and he is going to shut that part of himself down and stop caring about Barry before it hurts. But dude, it’s too late! And that attitude - like Lup understands but also she can. not. take. it. But then it spirals back around to her feeling like if she’d been around he wouldn’t have gotten this bad about things. So she’s feeling so many things. I really hope I handled it well enough to make that clear but I suspect it’s a weak point.
OH WAIT I FORGOT. Favorite character to write? THE RAVEN QUEEN. I can’t imagine trying to write her for more than brief glimpses but good grief, she is SO much fun to write. My favorite scene ever (as yet unshared sorry) involves her and I just... ahhh. I feel like there is ALWAYS so much going on behind her words. She is absolutely an enigmatic deity. Also, yeah, totally ship her and Istus like for real. But also I think she plays it cool. She plays EVERYTHING cool. Unless she’s mad.
8. Which came first, the title or the fic? The title was basically me going: okay if I’m going to start putting this on AO3 it has to have a name so... It was the best I could come up with.
9. Which idea came to you first in Losing Time? Just the general idea of de-aged Barry.
10. What are some facts readers may not know about Losing Time? Apologies, this is gonna get really long!
I really struggled with a few things:
Lup’s emotions, like I mentioned above.
The Barry/Sildar name thing. It just started as part of his confusion when Lup first comes in. I headcanon hard the thing about Barry was a typo and the twins never let it go and then they added the Bluejeans part. I feel like for a little while it maybe bothered him but then he realized it came from a place of love - the twins tease everyone about everything and that was the earliest sign they accepted him - and so he embraced the name to the point that Lucretia didn’t try to erase it with the void fish. (In my Barry POV story he tries to give his ‘real’ name when alive and memory-less but it just doesn’t feel right so he goes by Barry. So when the coin says “Your name is Barry Bluejeans” it’s not just saying: here’s proof I know what I’m talking about. It’s saying: here’s proof you know what I’m taking about.) Then in this story, the name thing became a bigger issue. It was him standing up for himself, making himself a full fledged part of things, not just a wounded bird they were dragging along and looking out for. (Which is also why he knocks out the guy with the empty health pot. Even without magic, Barry is a fucking scrapper who will try his damnedest to hold his own.) And I felt like Lup would absolutely respect his wishes on that. Taako slips up not because he doesn’t care but because he’s so much more off the cuff about things. It’s not coming from disrespect, it’s habit. But what I really went back and forth on was how does the narrative refer to him? Is it confusing to switch in the middle? I decided it would be more confusing to call him Barry while the characters called him Sildar. Also, obviously, it was going to be part of the conclusion. The most confusing was when they’re talking about things that happened to Barry before he was de-aged. Kravitz goes back and forth then just calls that person Barry-of-three-days-ago which seemed a very Kravitz way to handle things.
Writing that scene at the end of part 14. I knew that was coming for a while. Sildar had to make the decision that saving the innocent mattered. I knew there’d be a happy ending. I knew what the Raven Queen was up to. I knew pretty quickly (though not immediately!) that Lup referencing him saying “last first kiss” would come back. But that scene... it was important! It needed to be big! It needed to feel like a sacrifice! And I was writing it and it was... okay. And then, without thought or plan I typed “and then he let her go.” And reader, I fucking cried. I cried and I shut my laptop. I’ve NEVER cried at my own writing. Now, I’m well aware that the line only has power because of GRIFFIN’S words and I’m fine with that. I’m not trying to claim any skill or effectiveness. I’m saying it was a gift that finally gave the scene the weight it needed. The scene got better on editing but I could work on it for a hundred years and never get it to where I wanted it to be. But that line redeemed it, got it as close as it was going to get. Having said all that? I know that people will HATE me for cliffhanger-ing there. I honestly thought for a long time that it would end on a very long part 14. And then it kept getting longer and longer and I scrolled back up going... where can I break this and... yeah. I’m sorry. That’s where it needed to break. That’s the shift in things. That’s where the pause belonged.
And then...... Sildar stabs himself. I knew that dagger was coming a long time back. I was pretty sure when Taako asked Angus to research he was going to find info on the dagger. I knew the dagger - this ancient magic weapon that actually belonged to The Raven Queen (part of why she was SO FURIOUS) - was the magic explanation for what was happening. And I knew that he’d already been hit with it. (I hope it’s implied clearly enough in the story that is what happened even though the specific events of 3 days ago are never clearly explained.) And look, it’s rough stuff. I knew and I know. But I literally could not think of any other way for it to work. He had to make that decision. This was not him committing suicide. I realize that’s a fucking razor thin margin but that was not my intent. This was him saying, I fucked up and while it’s not entirely my fault I now take responsibility for this innocent and will do what I can to fix the situation. And since he wasn’t a reaper anymore... His touch didn’t work, his blood didn’t work... because literally his soul was the key. Also... in case it’s not clear I’ll say it here: The Raven Queen totally knew this was the best case secnario but she couldn’t say that. Her hands were tied. That’s why she’s ANGRY AS HELL. Someone fucked with her people and she’s furious. Sildar is out of her hands. He really was clear of his lichdom and his service to her and had he died without the ‘decision’ between him and Istus going the way that it did, his soul would have released to the Primordial Soup/Sea of Souls. The Queen knew this was the only way this could work out and she couldn’t influence it. That’s why she couldn’t manipulate space to get him on that path. She only did it the first time to protect him. She booked out of her court because she could not participate any further in the proceedings without influencing things she wasn’t allowed to alter. In the Stockade, she’s the one who opened the portal for the innocent. The string disappeared (Istus’s dominion over him) and she regifted him the feather (her dominion over him and all that entailed.)
Oh, and one last, small thing. Just for bookending, when Barry checks to see if he can summon his staff? He says the exact same thing he said before he went through the portal. Only this time, of course, it works. I hoped that was proof enough that everything was fixed.
If you’ve read all this, thank you! I feel like I owe you a prize or something. Thanks so much for sticking with me through this project. It was fun. I hope there’s more stuff like this to come!
#mystuff#fanfic questions#losing time#this may well be of interest to no one but myself#but i liked the idea of the exit interview#so this will probably come back any time i finish a thing#exit interview for a fic#taz fic#also hey if you have any questions feel free to ask!
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EDIT: IDK HOW TO MAKE A READMORE ON MOBILE SORRY FOR A WALL
hey hey guys ive been super inactive and theres a reason for that and that reason finally worked out and i cannot fucking begin to explain how good it is ghjklljhgfdghjkljhgfdghjkljhgfdghjklhgfhjkl
read more for a super lengthy overshare of angst and ecstasy
i kno w its fuckin long, its not for anybody but myself bc ye i have adhd myself and dont know how to read sh i t and dont expect anybody to have the patience for this
so, if i start at the beginning, ive had, the hardest period of my life starting around fall 2016. ive been in community college for about 4 years now, and i dont want to list all of the things ive done because it wouldnt reflect the mental emotional and physical exhaustion ive put myself through for all of this work. and all this time i thought it would amount to nothing because a lot of what i was supposed to be doing was pushed away out of fear. i filled up my time with a million impressive things that i genuinely loved and enjoyed, but knew it wasnt the actual work to get into the universities i was so desperate for. i pushed,, all my applications to the week or day before the due date. i had to give up three out of seven universities because of the deadline pressures.
but my main school, the one that i returned to as the ideal place, but a laughable pipe dream, was the one i worked the absolute hardest for
i needed to do two different applications with a total of uh, 8 or 9 essays? the first round of 5ish essays i submitted the day before, and then the second application, i started the week before and completed the essays and storyboard, and hit the submit button 2 minutes before the deadline. i had two winter semester classes (which both kept me under a no-sleep schedule) and i juggled the application work by night. i ended up with like 3 total hours of sleep in that week. i almost gave up like three times but i remember crying after finding this song which coincidentally reflects the acceptance into the university im now somehow attending. it was the moment to myself that i decided i wanted to push through and grow up
the third round where i almost gave up was when my professor couldnt recieve my emails and i had no other way to contact him during the winter. i came to his office the week school started in spring with a deadline of three days to get my letter completed, and he submitted it an hour and a half before the deadline. i spent that weekend convinced i would just take another year at community college and at home and prepare myself more. i cried after checking my phone when i was walking out of Black Panther because he hadnt submitted it with less than two hours left before my application would have been thrown out. he submitted once i got into the car and refreshed the tab
last month i got an interview with the school of my dreams. i looked up the real statistics and they choose 30 transfer applicants for interview and accept 15. that moment was a rush of disbelief and brief sobbing as i realized that maybe im not crazy and not stupid and maybe just doing good things
that was the longest week of my life, but it wasnt a nervous thing at all. i knew i could nail an interview, it just was practicing. i spent each car ride to school talking to myself for 30 minutes.
i literally could not have done anything as amazingly as i did in that interview without my friend’s help (hey dude), i was literally hearing that skype notification and have never had my heart pound as hard in my life. two seconds thinking about my friends and everything theyve done for me was like, a reminder that ppl care and have my back and istg that power of friendship anime bs is real my dudes and i couldnt ask for better people in my life
i rocked it like some kind of word virtuoso person and waited a month for a notification
limbo is wierd
i spent so long knowing i was so, close, but not in a place to celebrate
the day i found out was Of Course as wild as it was, where i was having a panic attack out of everything in the morning that accumulated, i was like near crying in class because the prof was kinda yelling at me and i almost lost my project and had to run about a mile in heels to look for it and i was being hit on by a guy twice my age and i had 2 hours of sleep
but????????? i got into ucIa in their theater film and television school, which is harder than any ivy league school. me and 14 other transfer students. 92 total undergrads in that entire film school. ill be nineteen into my junior year. ill be at the heart of the industry going into animation and able to do practically anything.
a n d i learned that not only my tuition room and board will be covered, but likely a ridiculous amount beyond that too.
i just. got to a point in my life last year that i knew that i was setting myself up for failure and i thought that if i wasnt improving i was failing and so i put so much onto myself in terms of working that i literally had no time for myself. no time for anything leisurely and no time for shows or movies or games or even friends. the only thing i felt like was my escape was cosplay and i still had that shamed by my family for wasting money and time. i of course had many moments and opportunities to do a few things that i regard very fondly, but overall i had no time to genuinely reflect on the damage that everything had caused. it felt like i had no time to cry ultimately, like some kind of hamster wheel of responsibility and fear. im still recovering now, and i want to be better. i want to do my best for myself and everyone around me. and i want to become someone that can be healthy and be myself. and yknow what im pretty damn proud of where im already at right now
trying hard to keep coherency but i gotta wake up at 5 for an 8am class tomorrow so this is a lil rushed. its probably corny as hecc, but hell i feel just ok for a second and thats nice. i would never have gotten here with the support around me and like, my friends and family have done so much for me and i could write ten of these rambles on each one of you. you care about me and i care about you guys beyond anything these words can express. (*cough*quinn keira kevin cece*cough* not to say everyone else i know hasnt impacted me because gOd so many lives have done so much for me, i just, hey, love yall)
my life is finally feeling like something big, ive never believed in the destined for greatness thing, ive just felt Capable of greatness and afraid beyond words of wasting it. and i want to be great for me, i want to be great to others, and i want to be great to the big picture.
just, holy fuck i love you guys so much and thank you
things are finally looking ok and i would repay you guys back in to the fullest extent of my hearts adoration and appreciation
#ive been low on online conversational executive functioning and online existing forever#but im working on it#ill be around the corner soon#i have a month left of school tho#and then im done and moving on#and have time for me#ily guys#thank you.
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Anon prompt! I did Voltron:Legendary Defender for this.
Contains vomiting, minor anxiety descriptions, and cheesiness. Its set in the start of the Garrison time when Lance, Hunk, and Pidge all meet up. Using he/him for Pidge because thats what was used for them at the time in series. Im putting the readmore before the fic starts this time because it goes into the content pretty quickly. Its just shy of 1500 words (or just over after some editing)
“Thats it. If you throw up one more time we’re going to the hospital” Any pairing/person you can think of is all good with me, thank you so much in advance!
Hunk coughed harshly and spat into the sink. The lingering taste of sick was turning his stomach still, but he had promised himself he would be quick. Nobody needed to have their schedule thrown off because of him. He wiped the cold sweat from his forehead, it had been a rough week. Garrison training really ramped up this semester.
He cupped a handful of cold water to rinse his mouth with before washing his face with haste. When he turned to leave, his newly assigned teammate was standing behind him, staring- or glaring? Whatever he was doing it was making Hunk’s palms sweat with anxiety.
“You okay?” That was it. Hunk waited a second, staring blankly. No berating came, no scoffing, no ‘if-you-can’t-take-the-training-leave’ spiel like he got from some of the others when he threw up during the pacer test.
“Uh, yeah. Sorry.” His voice stung and was thin and cracking from the abuse of being so violently sick just a few minutes ago. He cleared his throat. “Yeah. I’m okay.”
“Cool. Um, I’m Lance. It- we didn’t really get properly introduced.” He smiled at Hunk, a thousand kilowatt smile that made Hunk’s own face crack into a grin even though he still felt shaky.
“I’m Hunk.”
————-
“Simulation complete.” The pneumatic door locks hissed as they disengaged and Hunk pushed his way through as fast as he could manage. Today was even worse than the day before. They finished a hard obstacle course with him barely keeping his stomach in line- even a few of the other students had tapped out or thrown up on the sidelines from the strain of it. Then they ran simulations. Then more simulations. This was their introduction. No sit down, here is the manual these are your controls. Blindly being thrown into three different cockpit styles with different layouts and jostled around inside. Every mistake being berated by Commander Iverson, even though they all had never set foot in a cockpit before.
“At least he knows to hide his face after such a disgraceful display!” Hunk could hear the lecture on the peripheral of his attention. He was going to be sick, and right there in front of everyone if he wasn’t fast. That thought sent a jolt of panic through him, making the nausea spike. He left his new team there to take the flack all by themselves. Oh, god what kind of team member was he? He gagged into his hand. Times up. He pushed the lid off of one of the bins just around the corner- recycling or garbage who cared in a bin was better than on the floor.
The distant shouting faded out of his awareness entirely, his head was swimming and he felt like his skin was buzzing. A heady wave of heat rolled down his shoulders and ice cold sweat dripped down his face. He felt his shoulders roll forward before he was aware he was gagging into the bin. It was rather quiet, save for the harsh cough at the end that tore his throat. His stomach bubbled and he felt choked, he couldn’t breathe. Saliva pooled in his mouth and he choked on it trying to hold back. He tried to swallow again but it caught and he coughed harshly again, bringing up a bitter taste.
Somewhere off there was an explosion of sound, and he wanted to look but his eyes were stinging, his face ached with pressure from the unwilling exertion his body was taking. Loud, slapping footsteps crossed behind him and his face burned with humiliation. He couldn’t help it. He retched again, the spit and a small spurt of vomit mixing together and splattering on the cans below him. His body tingled with another wave of nausea crashing over him like an icy bucket of water.
He coughed up a huge wave of half digested breakfast and it didn’t seem to stop. He tried to breathe, really, he did. It hitched after he tried to inhale and he curled further forward as his stomach clenched so harshly it made his muscles scream. And again, barely a breath and he was sent forward with another gush of sickness. Something patted at his back, knocking the air back into him. He gasped, greedily sucking in as much as his lungs could hold before coughing. He swiped his wrist under his eyes carefully. They were streaming, his nose was running like a sieve and he could feel the tacky strings of mucus and vomit trailing from his mouth and nose.
“That’s it,” the smacks to his back turned into someone rubbing smooth circles as he shuddered in breath after breath, “You got it, now.”
His face burned, someone was there. This was not him wishing one of his moms was there, this was most definitely a real person. He tried to spit, but ended up coughing again and bringing up another string of sick. He could breathe, though, that’s what mattered. He finally spat, and blew through his nose to try and dislodge the, no doubt charming, mess dripping from his face.
“You okay now, uh Hunk, was it?” Lance’s face was in his peripheral vision, hand still on his back. Hunk nodded, but stayed hovering over the, yep that was the recycling bin. He was scared to respond, his throat felt thick and burned so badly.
“Good. Here.” He handed over a wad of napkins from the Garrison cafeteria. He pulled another fresh wad out of his other pocket too, as Hunk started swiping them under his nose.
“Thank-“ Hunk tried, but it caught in his throat and he coughed until he gagged again. He threw up. Again. He heaved a shaky sigh after it was over and went back to wiping his face in silence.
“That’s it. If you throw up one more time we’re going to the hospital.”
“It’s the Garrison, there’s no hospital for miles.” Hunk croaked. “It’ll be fine.”
“Then I’ll take you to whatever passes for a medical centre here. You’ve thrown up, like, every day this week.” Hunk straightened up a little and looked down at his shoes, best to avoid looking at the mess. He could feel his face going red again. “Come on, Iverson told me to take off for the day anyway.”
“What?” Hunk blinked up at him.
“I kind of told him to stuff it and walked off. He was getting way too much enjoyment out of us suffering, and I mean…” Lance took his hand off Hunk’s back, content the taller boy was going to be able to hold his own for a moment. He shrugged. “We’re a team now or whatever, so, you’re more important than an ego driven tirade.”
“Aww geeze,” Hunk ran his hand through his damp hair, “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to get you guys in trouble.”
“Its fine, seriously, you okay?”
“Its embarrassing,” Hunk looked up and down the hall. It was surprisingly, and thankfully, empty. “I’m okay, for real. I just get sick to my stomach really easily. I got kicked off the bus coming up here because I kept throwing up, actually.” He rubbed the back of his neck. “Motion sickness, and stuff.”
“That’s all? Thank God,” Lance held his hand to his chest as he sighed, “We can work with that, man. Come on, you look trashed. How are you even standing? If you get sick like that every time, you have to have some serious strength.”
“Hey, can I stop running interference now? I swear one of these older guys is gonna deck me!” A new voice grumbled from behind Hunk. His other new team mate- small kid with glasses, what was his name?
“Thanks, Pidge. Sorry about that,” Lance shot the smaller boy a smile past Hunk’s arm. “You’re a real cool kid, you know that?”
“Shut up,” Pidge rolled his eyes, “You okay there, guy?” Hunk nodded, he shifted from side to side under their attention. It felt so weird, they were already willing to get in trouble on his behalf, after only, what? A day and a half maybe?
“Yeah, I’m good. Thanks.” He cleared his throat again, his voice was so wrecked, “Didn’t catch your name, sorry.”
“Its Pidge. Come on, you look like crap. Lance, don’t stand there and talk to him all day, we had a plan.”
“What?”
“Yeah, sorry,” Lance gently pulled on Hunk’s arm. “C’mon. We’re kidnapping you to get some rest and some ice cream- if you’re feeling up to it. Vanilla ice cream does wonders for a sore throat, and isn’t so bad on an upset stomach either.”
“Not to be rude, but it was kind of obvious you’ve been sick. You’ve been looking pretty wrung out for a couple days now.” Hunk smiled sheepishly. He knew that, everyone was looking rough. He kept that to himself, even though the small boy in front of him looked pretty haggard and had dark circles on his own pale face.
“Aw, geeze. Thanks guys.” Hunk smiled, he could feel his eyes prickling. Okay, maybe they weren’t totally like his moms, but this was really bringing back some memories. If he could get his throat to feel a bit better, and sound a little less awful, maybe he could call home and tell them about this. They’d be so proud to know their son was lucky enough to be teamed up with some pretty alright guys.
#voltron legendary defender#voltron sickfic#tw vomit#hunk vld#lance vld#pidge vld#sick hunk#garrison era#fh fic
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MUN UPDATE please read?
As you guys have seen, my activity hasn’t been the greatest mainly because of school. Now it’s a bit more lax since all marks are being sent to universities tomorrow, but I’m still not going to be around as often during the group’s hiatus.
As of this moment, my remaining muses ( @facebeetred, @foolslittlesister, and @sailingaway) are on hiatus until further notice.
However, this doesn’t mean I won’t be checking in from time to time. While I may have archived all of my threads on the RP Thread Tracker, stupid move on my part, I know now and have to go fishing for them again, I am still more than willing to continue threads during the group’s hiatus. I’ll message everyone I currently have threads with, and ask whether or not you want me to reply during this period. If you don’t mind me taking a break and not replying, I thank you. I also thank you if you’ll want me to continue the thread, because then I’ll see that you enjoy it. No matter what your response is, I’ll be happy with it!
I’m also up for starting new threads, whether they’re still set in Rouves or if it’s an AU. For this I won’t be asking around, and this is the only post I’ll make about it. If you’d like a new thread, please send an ask to my personal ( @cheekblown), not an IM because I won’t see it! Just send the info with which muse and what kind of starter and I’d be more than happy to write it up~
If anybody needs to contact me, whether if it’s for threads or questions in general or just to talk, the easiest ways will be either through my Skype (if you don’t already have it, my Skype name is the same as my personal), my personal, or another one of my RP blogs ( @fenneirologist) that is affiliated with a different group totally not promoing that group here, but you should check it out ;)
I wish everyone the best of luck during the group’s hiatus! And remember: it’s a hiatus, not the end of the world, so don’t get discouraged! It will be back (along with moi~) at the beginning of June, with something a bit more... interesting... To make sure that everyone sees this, I will reblog this to all of my RP blogs affiliated with this group, so sorry not sorry for the spamming.
☆ Mod E ~ / Lia
P.S. On second thought, I’ll put a link to this post in each of my muses’ descriptions.
P.S.S. Also now that there’s no modding going on, nobody will get annoying messages from me to make sure you tag things correctly! Feel free to use your own tagging systems~ But when the group is off of hiatus, you can bet I’ll make sure everyone tags everything properly again mwahahaha.
P.S.S.S. I’m not putting this under a readmore because I’m evil and there are no rules.
Edit: I’m kinda tired since it’s 22:30 (it’s not that late, but I leave the house on a daily basis at 7:00) so I’ll message people tomorrow.
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An Act of Rebellion - Chapter 3 - Converge
Chapter summary: Keith goes to meet the Champion. Fic can also be found on AO3. Edit- fixed the readmore, since it didn’t work the first time. Sorry about that!
———–
The area where they kept the prisoners was dark and cheerless. The air smelled of dried blood and urine, afflicting Keith’s sensitive nose and causing him to gag until he remembered to breathe through his mouth. At least it wasn’t hard to find the human’s cell. A quick check on the computer pulled up a map of the prison, and another few keystrokes brought him to the controls for the cameras and sentries. A technique learned from Ulaz let him tap into the cameras and replace the live feed with a loop of old footage. There. Now he had at least half a varga before anyone noticed something was up with the camera system. Longer, if the lieutenant on duty managed to live up to expectations and not even look at the vid screens for the rest of his shift. All that was left was to slip around the sentry patrols until he found the human’s cell.
Keith was in luck. The prisoner was already back in his cell, and because of his status as Champion (or perhaps because they were afraid he would attack other prisoners if left alone with them) he was given his own unit. From where he was lurking in the shadows, Keith could see the human slumped against the wall, head on his knees. He looked so vulnerable there; far cry from the angry, dangerous man that had so easily destroyed hundreds of opponents in the arena.
Then the Champion raised his head and looked directly in Keith’s direction. The Galra froze. Hidden in the shadows as he was it would be difficult for anyone to spot him, but even a small sound might have alerted a being with sensitive hearing to his presence in the otherwise deserted passageway. He watched the human scan the area and noticed the bandage across his nose. The healers must have worked their magic on him, because he didn’t seem to be in any pain. The wound would probably scar though, giving him an older, more dangerous look.
“I know you’re there, whoever you are.” The prisoner’s voice was tired and resigned, not at all what Keith had expected from the fighter he’d seen in the arena. He kept still, unsure of what to do now that he’d been spotted. Ticks passed, and the man sighed. “You can come out, you know. I can’t hurt you from in here.”
Keith slowly stepped into the light, hands raised and empty. The human followed Keith’s approach with his gaze but didn’t move from his position against the wall. He just watched as if waiting for whatever would happen next. So Keith moved carefully, trying to project a nonthreatening demeanor until he stood next to the force shield. Then he waited, unsure of what to say.
The Champion looked up at him with those beautiful grey eyes, and once again Keith was lost. This close his sharp sight could pick up on the threads of darker and lighter grey that ran through them, and he wondered if this was what the sky on Earth looked like before a storm.
“What is it now? Or are you just here to stare at ‘The Champion’,” the human asked, voice flat with a hard edge of sarcasm creeping in at the end.
Keith shook his head, breaking the hold of that wonderful gaze and mentally berating himself for behaving like a stunned tree-rat from that planet with the three suns.
“I, um. Here.” He dropped a bag he’d had slung over his shoulder and pressed a few buttons on the force shield controls, opening the small door in the bottom that was used to feed the prisoners. Then he pushed the bag through with his foot and closed it again. “Its medicine, should help with your wounds. Ah, and ease the pain. And there’s some food. I know they don’t give you much. You’ll probably want to hide it from the guards, but what you don’t eat should keep for a while. It’s just standard ration bars, which, I know they taste awful but… I’ll shut up now.” Keith trailed off as he noticed the human staring at him as if he’d suddenly grown an extra head.
“Why?” he asked, frowning at the bag and then back up at Keith.
“Why what?” Keith cocked his head to the side, watching a series of expressions cross the human’s face as he thought.
“Why give me this?” He pulled the bag closer and carefully reached in, pulling out a meal pack and a box of painkillers that Keith had appropriated from an unwatched supply room.
“I…” Keith blinked, and then shrugged. “Honestly, it was my friend’s idea. Said I’d need to earn your trust. I figure food’s as good a way as any.”
Surprisingly, the human laughed. “And telling me that is supposed to help?”
“Well… no.” The spy shook his head and slid down the wall extending from the opposite side of the cell, pulling up his knees as he sat in a mirror of the Champion’s posture. “But lying didn’t seem like the best idea to start off with.”
The man narrowed his eyes, watching Keith’s face with suspicion. “You people seem to prefer torture to get what you want. Why the change?”
“They’re not ‘my people’,” Keith said, ears going back in irritation. “And everyone knows torture is a terrible way to get information.”
“Not your people?” He raised an eyebrow.
Keith glowered. “That’s not important. What do you know about Voltron?”
The champion sighed. “Look, like I’ve told everyone else that’s ‘asked’, I have no idea what a Voltron even is.”
“Huh.” It was rare that they came across any race in the galaxy that didn’t know what Voltron was, at least as a legend told to children. Either the human was lying, or his species hadn’t encountered any other sentient beings before he was taken prisoner. If he truly didn’t know what it was, that might be why all interrogations so far had failed to yield results. At least that would be an easy thing to test, all Keith had to do was tell him what Voltron was.
“It’s the most powerful weapon in the universe. It was created by the Altean king Alfor, and lost ten thousand years ago. Sendak believes you know where part of it is.” Hatred leaked into Keith’s voice at the mention of Sendak’s name, his ears going flat against his head until he forced himself to relax. He’d hated the man for years, but being so closely linked to him, having to spend every day in his presence, had brought about a kind of loathing that permeated his thoughts on the commander. It was a relief to let it out, even a little, in front of someone who wouldn’t reprimand him for it.
“How would I know that?” The human was leaning forward now, resting his elbows on his knees as he watched Keith. “Even if it’s on Earth, it’s a big planet. It could be anywhere.”
“It’s big then?” At the mention of Earth, Keith’s eyes lit up and he shifted, leaning towards the other man. All mention of Voltron was forgotten at the mention of his father’s planet.
The Champion stared at him. “It- Earth? Yeah. I mean, it’s not the biggest planet in our solar system, but it’s not the smallest either.”
“Does it have many people? How many sentient races? How advanced are they? Do you have oceans? Deserts?” Questions he had always wanted to know poured out of him like water from an upturned bucket.
“Uh, it’s… why do you need to know?” confusion morphed into suspicion on the Champion’s face, his eyes going hard and cold.
Quiznak. He’d let his excitement run away with him, forgetting that he human would likely see his questions as another interrogation. Keith forced himself to settle back against the wall, palms open and facing upwards on his knees, doing his best to appear non-threatening. “I’m curious. I’ve never seen a human before, and I’ll probably never see Earth.” It wasn’t quite a lie at least. Not that he had ever considered telling the man the true reason for his curiosity.
Suspicion turned to anger and the human glared at him. “You’re trying to get information out of me so you can invade my planet,” he accused. “Looking for this Voltron thing, or whatever it is that you people want.”
Keith shook his head, annoyed at himself. He’d screwed up by asking those questions, and he knew it. “That’s not why I asked. If I was trying to get information out of you for Zarkon, I’d already have it, and you’d be dead.”
The Champion leaned back against the wall, studying Keith’s face. “And this is supposed to get me to trust you?”
“Yes!” Keith snapped. Then, “No. I’m not good at this, okay?” He sighed and ran a hand through his hair, letting his ears droop in frustration and embarrassment.
“Look,” the human said, corners of his lips turning up in what might be the beginning of a smile. “Let’s start simple. I’m Shiro.”
“…” Keith looked down. It was too risky to tell this man either of his names. Anyone who found out that Lieutenant Kogane was visiting the prisoner would be sure to mention it to Sendak, which would put both Keith and the Champion - Shiro - in serious danger. And Ulaz had a point about his real name. If anyone ever connected it to him, it would cost the Blade of Marmora years of effort, not to mention the death sentence it would get Keith.
“Hard question?” Shiro asked.
Keith shook his head. “Not exactly. I just can’t risk Sendak finding out I’m down here.” He carefully bit his lower lip, cursing himself for not coming up with a plan for this. He wasn’t the type of agent that could just come up with a new cover right on the spot, and he should have known the Champion would ask for his name.
“You’re not here on his orders?” the human sounded surprised. Keith glanced up to see him frowning again.
“If he finds me down here he’ll kill me,” he told the man honestly. “And that would waste all the hard work we did to get me here.”
“We?”
Keith swallowed a growl, annoyed at himself for the slip. This conversation was getting more dangerous by the second, and he didn’t have any good answers for the Champion. “This was a mistake,” he muttered, pushing himself up off the ground. He’d have to come back later, once he’d had a chance to think of better responses to any dangerous questions.
“Wait,” Shiro called, extending a hand as if to reach for him. “You don’t have to tell me.”
“You’re right,” Keith told him. “I don’t. Use the medicine if you want. There’s another match tomorrow. Try not to die. Sendak bet three hundred GAC you’d finally be beaten this weekend, and I’d hate to see him win.” Before the human could say anything more, Keith had disappeared back into the shadows.
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hi! im a huge fan of your long haul fic and i remember you saying you had a few deleted scenes you could post if asked? Could you? Your writing is my favourite! lots of love
awww thanks anon
oh and its ambiguously 1859 fanservicey ish hahahha.imo dealing with a drunk person is very not sexy but i know the shipper mindset HAHAHAAH
its about 3k words long so pls click the readmore to get all of it! if its less than 3k and you dont see the readmore you might need to view the post on my blog
===/\===
“Goodevening Gale!”
FUCK gokudera shot out of his chair SCRAMBLEAGAIN Hibari’s going to kill him
Hibari looks up from the floor and dragshimself two steps to the sofa and stretches out there.
Well, looks like gokudera’s just given him afree pass to the sofa then. Shit next thing you know gokudera’ll be sleeping inthe bathtub.
“Hello!” she says and she breezes in as soonas gokudera opened the door.
“Hi Ma’am, Angel, uh, Kaoru’s sleeping.”
“Oh whoops, sorry,” she said, and she creptover to check. “Wow, he looks super young like this!”
Was hibari actually sleeping haha no waydumb question.
“Hey Gale hon, what’s this?” thelandlord asked, picking up the photo of the Costeggiarefamily member bastard son they’d been having trouble looking for since thebombing
Dropped on the floor, the picture ofDario/duilio which hibari kept in his pocket.
Shit shit shit, cover story quick.
“Well, right now we’re looking for thatguy. Hoping to interview him. You know him from somewhere?“
“Oh yeah, hon. He’s a regular at mywork for two months now, sometimes comes on too strong to the staff or othercustomers, but he spends big, so,” she shrugged. “What can Ido?”
The door opened and Hibari dropped his keyson the table before turning to lock the door. “Kaoru,” Gokuderacalled. The dark haired man looked up from where he was taking off his outdoorshoes.
Hibari opened an eye. When it was convenientfor him huh, bastard.
“Where,” he asked, sitting up.
“good morning Kaoru,” she says. He eyes herfunny, then dips his head.
“Angel found our mark,” headded in Japanese.
“Who?” Hibari asked. Gokuderawaved the photo of the Costeggiare familymember. “Not that,” Hibari said. Gokudera rolled his eyes. Why was heunsurprised by Hibari not bothering to remember who Angel was when she’d beenwaltzing in and out ever since they started the mission? “Thelandlady.”
“I see,” Hibari answered,setting the shopping on the kitchen counter and walking over to the table. Hemet the landlady’s eyes.
“Boungiourno,”he greeted stiffly before turning back to Gokudera. “Where.” Herepeated.
“He is a regular at herworkplace,” Gokudera said, passing Hibari the photo.
“you can speak Italian just fine why don’tyou ask her”
“people say a lot when they think you don’tunderstand them,” hibari answered irritably. “Where.”
“Say Angel, you never said exactly where youwork.”
“Well, it’s not an uppity sort of place.” She bites her painted lip. “aw hell with it.It’s a dance place. We have girls dance on tabletops if you know what I mean.”
“ah,” gokudera says. “should be fun. For meat least.”
“Oh, that reminds me,” thelandlady said, pointing at Hibari. “That guy in the photo? He’s a regularof one of our girls, and she looks a lot like you. You know, exotic, pale, darkhair, dark eyes,” she added helpfully. Hibari looked at Gokudera.
“You should really stop pretendingthat you don’t understand Italian,” there’s no way im actually goingto translate for you, Gokudera said dryly. Hibari smirked.
“If that’s true, then I’ll bite him todeath,” Hibari said, eyes sparking with anticipation, completely ignoringGokudera’s input. It looked like his weeks of boredom were over, and he didn’teven have to resort to visiting the Chiavarone house.
“If it helps, he stops by to watch Kikievery Friday night– Kiki’s that dancer Kaoru-san looks like– and he alwayssits in booth twelve. She comes on at eight, so if you boys get there a bitearlier, you could get yourselves a seat nearby.”
Hibari stands gracefully, one fluid motionand is already walking to the kitchen.
“Ask the landlord if he wantstea.” He says, businesslike.
“That’s nice of you,” gokudera says,trying and failing to keep his incredulous tone out of his voice.
"If you don’t tip informants, you won’thave informants.” Hibari said, and he put the kettle on.
Gokudera sighed. Of course Hibari would beso mercenary. "He wants to know if you would like tea.“ He tellsAngel and he laughs
"Oh, so all I had to do to getKaoru-san to open up was to invite him to the club? "Sure, I’d lovetea.”“ she laughed. And gokudera winced laughed along. A club is thelast place hibari would want to be. He is crossing his fingers that that nightwont be a disaster.
"And I think I’ll need another coffee,I need to run more background.” Gokudera calls to him
“Milk?”
Wow that’s amazing.
“No thanks, it’s two already.”
“Oh, and no offense if you alreadyknow this, but just tell Kaoru-san, because he doesn’t look like he’s ever beento a club in his life. STRIP CLUB ETTIQUETTE
Alright boys, now the real reason I’m here,
Right, gokudera pulls her money from hiswallet, exact amount, and she drinks her tea. Hibari doesn’t even comment onthe lipstick stain.
Well, see you boys [tonight] then! She saysand leaves. Clack clack lack of her boots on the way to the lift. Gokudera andhibari and chiavarone are the only weirdos who take the stairs.
Gokudera drinks his coffee and marvels athis luck.
Hibari washes the cups.
"Not bad, miser,” Hibari saidbefore he disappeared into the room, and the clack of plastic on wood meantthat he had gotten his laptop out.
Good morning Tenth. It’s a day of goddamnmiracles. –59
Heh. Good to hear, Gokudera-kun—27
===/\===
The good streak of course couldn’t last.
“We need to come off as young, cockyfirst floor trash so he won’t take us too seriously, got it?”
“Yes,” Hibari said, and Gokuderacould hear the eye rolling in his voice. at least he was still replying? Butnow gokudera wasn’t sure if hibari would LISTEN and what’s the use of aconfirmation that might not actaly be what he means.
“I’m serious,” Gokudera said, using everyounce of self-control to not snap at him. “I want us to look so young that weget carded.”
There we go. Hibari’s stopped answering.
Gokudera wore an amalgamation of his clothesfrom his high school days and his current wardrobe. The button down was Galeand the three belts and the graphic tee were all teenage-Gokudera.
Hibari wore a full suit, crisp black overdeep purple and perfectly tailored. Gokudera was this close to introducing hisown face to the coffeetable.
“Are you really going to a club dressedlike that?” Gokudera asked incredulously.
… Yes “This is how I normallydress,” Hibari answered, frowning.
You know what kind of club this is?
… a looooong pause.
“Well, there’s your problem,”Gokudera said under his breath. “Why don’t you just break out your shinycredit cards and get yourself a clubbing outfit?”
Hibari observed him for a moment. “Idon’t want to,” he answered simply.
Coffeetable was too far. Gokudera put hisdespairing head into his hand.
“Dammit, just change, I don’t want towalk into any club if you’re wearing that,” Gokudera sighed, running onehand through his hair. Hibari raised an eyebrow as if he truly believed that asuit was the perfect attire to go to a strip club in while undercover.
“Change to what.”
Oh dear lord all the talk about dressingHibari up was going to become a real thing. Maybe he could shoot himself andget this over with.
“Alright, I’ll see if I can work a miraclewith your closet,“ Gokudera sighed, walking over to the window side of theroom and opening the bedside drawer. A quick rummage proved that yes,everything was office shirts and black suit wear. So Hibari wearing the purpleshirt with the suit was his idea of interesting. Gokudera closed the drawer.
"Looks like you don’t have much ofchoice,” Gokudera said, looking over Hibari’s outfit once more.
Lose the jacket and tie,“ he directed,but Hibari’s eyes just narrowed in defiance.
"Work with me here, damn you,”Gokudera cursed, walking over to the other bedside drawer and pulling out a fewaccessories of his own. Looking at Hibari then at the items he’d laid out, hepicked a fang on a black leather strip and an accompanying leather wristband.
“This is stupid,” Hibari intoneddryly, unbuttoning his top button. His blazer and tie were draped over thechair, and his sleeves had been rolled up. Without the extra padding of hissuit, his slight build was obvious, barely changed from his middle school days.Still, with an aura that fierce, it was unlikely he’d have too much trouble.Besides, any story that involved Hibari getting picked on in a strip club wouldbound to be interesting to tell to the guys back in Japan.
“One more button,” Gokudera toldhim, before turning to look for a suitable belt. “And wear those,” headded, waving absently at the pieces he laid out on the bed. “Andthis,” he added as he pulled out a belt. It had two teeth and metaleyelets in twos, with another strap hanging from it like half suspenders.
“That would be a liability,”Hibari critiqued as he fastened the wristband on his left wrist.
“Just wear it and give the poor suckerswho try to make trouble with you a fighting chance,” Gokudera snickered,closing the drawer. Hibari scoffed quietly as he removed the belt he wascurrently wearing.
“A straightjacket would be moreappropriate,” Hibari said, threading Gokudera’s belt around his waist andcomfortably cinching it at the innermost set of eyelets.
“Nice to know that the cloud guardianof Vongola is a humble man,” Gokudera remarked cynically.
Hibari bowed his head in humourous? Assent.
If you wear your boots we’re good to go. No,wait there a second.“ Gokudera stepped into the bathroom to grab some hairwax. He passed it to Hibari, who looked at it then gave Gokudera a deadpan lookas if to ask ‘and what do you expect me to do with this?’
"Style your hair a bit,” Gokuderatold him. At Hibari’s blank look, Gokudera decided that it wasn’t any goodexplaining. He grabbed the bottle and opened it, scooping out just a littlewith his fingers. “Now stay still and for the love of God, don’t goberserk on me, alright?”
Hibari flinched and glared as Gokudera’shands came up to his head, but otherwise took the fussing well.
Kind of punk looking. But hey, punk’s notdead right. Yeah.
“Hah, not bad,” Gokuderacongratulated himself.
“Disgusting,” Hibari commented, ashe touched his hair lightly, the slightly sticky texture of the waxbrushing off on his fingers.
“boots. Boots, lets go.”
Angel worked in walking distance in the notso nice part of town. Hibari was more acquainted with the place than Gokuderaexpected. Two turns later and he slowed.
“C’mon it’s almost time.”
“What is this place?” Hibariasked, stopping in his tracks. From the neon lit street, booming music and theunmistakable noise of throngs of people emerged. Gokudera sighed, and turned.
“That’s Angel’s bar.” When Hibarimade no sign of recognition, Gokudera elaborated. “The landlord’sworkplace.”
“There’s a crowd,” Hibari stated,refusing to carry on walking.
“Yes, it’s a Friday night, but this isalso work, so let’s go.”
“If I go anywhere near that place, it’sto bite everyone there to death,” Hibari said, mouth curling into a silentsnarl.
“Well, suck it up. This is work.”
Hibari walked at a steady pace, cut throughthe crowd and Gokudera had to follow.
Second floor less so. They didn’t actuallyget carded. Gokudera was much disappoint.
Murderous aura and the nearest patronslooked nervous.
“Just be glad we’re in a booth.”
Kiki wasn’t on yet, but Bambi was. Or atleast that’s what she said her name was. Bambi was a sultry brunette withshoulder length hair and hazel eyes. Gold glitter painted stripes and spotsdown her back, arms and legs, highlighting the tan skin.
“You just missed me, handsome,” she says toyou. you smile and wave.
“Next time then,” you say casually. You areso not good with women especially when they don’t have all their clothes on.You blame your sister.
“Hey, we booked this booth,” someone saysbehind you.
“Oh?” Hibari says and he’s spoiling for afight so hard that you level a warning glance at him instead of turning to seewho it was.
“Let the boys stay,” an amusedvoice.
Goddamn, Dario himself. He looked IDK HOWDOES HE LOOK WHO ARE HIS GOONIES
Hibari’s grin was wicked.
“I’m Darren,” he lies smoothly. MIGHT WANTTO CHANGE HIS ALIAS.
“Kaoru,” Hibari said.
“Is that your real name?”
Hibari gave the man a look. Whut you smokingbruh
He laughed. “Could I buy you adrink?”
“No need, I have a tab open.”
“I insist.”
“Then, if you must.”
Kiki was a petite woman, with raven hairspilling freely over her shoulders down to her waist. She didn’t look anything like Hibari, she was justAsian.
If this guy had yellow fever you were goingto laugh your ass off.
===/\===
(missing scene)
“Don’t touch me.”“What’s wrong with you?”“It was crowded. And noisy. There was something in my cranberry juice.That man kept talking to me and I couldn’t kill anyone. I hate that place. Youcan go alone next time, pervert.”
“He’s a pervert. You’re a pervert too.” Hibari’s eyes narrowed.“I should bite you to death.”“Yeah, yeah, tomorrow alright? Just try to stay conscious until we reachthe house." "Wait,” Hibari said, suddenly throwing his weight back.“What?” Gokudera asked tiredly. “Outside clothes, don’t touch the bed, herbivore,” Hibari mumbled disjointedly. “Nice to know you follow your own rules,” Gokudera sighed, pullingdown the bedcovers and dumping Hibari on the bed. “I said not to touch the bed,” Hibari protested, sitting up. Gokuderagave him a light shove and collapsed on the bed himself.“Shut up and go to sleep,” Gokudera said, words muffled by thesheets. He couldn’t even be bothered to get his pillow from the couch outside.He fully expected some sort of retort or a threat from Hibari, but none came,testament to how far gone the other man was. Yawning, Gokudera decided hazilythat he would take whatever nonsense he’d get for ‘crowding’ the bed and justwent to sleep where he was.
===/\===
Gokudera woke like a man struggling not todrown in molasses, slowly, with a lot of effort and a little pain. He hadn’tdrawn the curtains the night before and he was in a strange place betweenfeeling ‘rested’ and ‘like crap’. He’d slept on his front last night and therewas a kink in his neck as due punishment. Of course, there was also the matterof him smelling like sweat, cheap perfume, alcohol and cigarette smoke. It wasamazing that Hibari hadn’t just thrown him out the window for daring to so muchas touch the bed in this state.
Gokudera turned to his side to stretch andfroze. Hibari hadn’t rudely kicked him out of bed, not from some sense ofgratitude for Gokudera hauling him back from the club, but because he hadn’t woken up yet. Gokudera gaped atthe thought, but before his eyes was the undeniable.
Hibari was curled up on his side, back tothe light, and face shielded by the crook of his elbow. Gokudera felt a grinbreak through his usual morning grogginess. The sight was almost endearing,except this was Hibari, and the onlythings associated with Hibari and the word ‘endearing’ were either a highlyintelligent messenger bird that could be carrying a spy-cam that sealed yourdoom or a personalised box weapon that could decimate an army and reduce askyscraper to rubble within five minutes. Gokudera could almost see thehedgehog curled up in the exact same way as its owner in the empty space nearHibari’s stomach, and Hibird nestled between the man’s wrist and hair. Heresisted the urge to take a photo and send it to the Tenth and got up asquietly as possible. As much amusement as he got from seeing the violentmisanthrope sleeping all tucked into a ball, photographic evidence wasn’t worththe broken bones he knew he would get afterwards. Hibari appeared in the doorway of the bedroom, arms full of sheets. He took onelook at Gokudera and the landlord sitting at the kitchen counter, then steppedback into the room and shut the door.“Oh my, I think that’s the first time I’ve ever seen him half dressed,”she commented. Then she gave Gokudera a knowing smile. “Changing thesheets are we? Good going." "Ah, yeah,” Gokudera tried to smile casually while mentally screamingno. She must have picked up on Gokudera’s uneasiness, because she patted hisarm reassuringly. “Be more confident, sweetie. You’re good looking, smart and you have awonderful disposition. You’re a right saint,” she smiled.“Besides,” she whispered. “I don’t think anyone but you has thepatience to deal with his temper.”Gokudera laughed. “You should see our boss,” he replied. Tsunacould smile genuinely all the time while talking Hibari down off a rampage andpersuading the man to do something other than stalk around Namimori or sit inhis house and drink tea. It never failed to amaze Gokudera each and every time.Heck, Tsuna even managed to get Hibari and Mukuro to go on a mission togetherwithout one of them coming back dead.
He placed the plate on top of the glass tofree one hand. “Hibari?” Gokudera asked, knocking on the door.“Go away.”“If you can’t drink, you shouldn’t,” Gokudera said matter-of-factly.He opened the door then took the plate back into his hand, pushing the dooropen the rest of the way with his foot. Hibari was sitting in the tub, water upto his chest and dark hair plastered to his skull. It vaguely reminded Gokuderaof bathing his cat.“Who said you could come in?” Hibari asked, not turning to faceGokudera. “If you’re too out of it to even lock the door, then I’d better come inbefore you drown or something,” Gokudera retorted. “Here.”“Don’t want it,” Hibari muttered without even looking at whatGokudera was holding. “It’s just toast, water and aspirin,” Gokudera said, starting to getannoyed. “How badly could I fuck up toast?" "I’m not going to eat in the bath,” Hibari said, leaning against theside of the wall and grimacing. “Leave it outside.”“Seriously, you alright?” Gokudera felt the need to ask again. “Must I bite you to death before you are convinced?” Hibari snipped. “Hah, you must be fine if you’re making threats. Don’t drown, bastard.”
#1859#khr#khr fanfiction#long haul fic#1859 friendship fic#replies#answers#previews#deleted scenes#my writing#Anonymous#im still working on the other asks slowly if youre the many ask anon!! sorry was out of the country and now its event season
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