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#(yells into void) helloooo
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me when flores facets: *gently holds them in my hands* I just think they’re neat
!!!!! FLORES FACETS READER!!!! HELLO!!! oh my goodness yes. i just think they're neat <3 my beloveds
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madaboutmunson · 2 years
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Creep - Part 4 of 12 - Eruption
Entering the house, you call out for your parents, "Helloooo, I'm home" no voices reply, just a faint echo of your own bouncing down the cold, tiled, minimalist hallway.
You check your watch. Dad was probably still on his way home. He'd had a pretty successful local car dealership, for your whole life pretty much, until a few years ago. After that, dad said he didn't want the burden of working for himself anymore. It was easier just to work for someone else, "Way less stress, Kiddo", he'd said with a playful side hug, "Plus all that driving time, I can start listening to those Lord of the Rings tapes you got me for Christmas again. Maybe even get to the dragon this time" he'd flopped down in his favourite armchair at that point, rolling his eyes mischievously before disappearing behind The Hawkins Post, you shook your head, and feigned a smile, "That's the Hobbit, Dad".
You knew the real reason he'd taken that job, it was far enough away to be out of reach of Hawkins' gossip, and ultimately the locals just stopped buying from him. He couldn't keep the business afloat...
Mom was probably out with her friends. She went out more these days: the pool, book club, helping at the community centre, jazzercise, Spanish class, anything else. Anything that kept her busy because slowing down meant thoughts, and thoughts lead to memories...painful ones.
The spectres of past arguments between your Mom and dad float around the kitchen and living room like a 360 film screen. You can see them playing out around you. The red from the letters being thrown around, the door slamming, the yelling, the pure frustration and helplessness and not stopping until someone walked away or cried.
Another memory barges its way in now. You're sitting at the kitchen table, embraced by your blanket, being loomed over by Callaghan. Hopper is pacing around the room. The ire is palpable. Exasperated slams his hands on the table, "Where is she?! I know you know something!! Is someone paying you to keep quiet? Did they threaten you?" His finger pointed at your face mere centimetres from contact. This is terrifying. Sure, he's the law around here. That was bad enough, but he was not on your team today. You try to gulp down your feelings and force out a reply. The silence was not helping. It just seemed to be adding fuel to this bonfire of emotions.
"N-n-no, sir", you stammer, "I just don't remember."
"What? Nothing?! Nothing at all? Not where you've been for 2 days, not where Connie has been for the past 3??!!! Her parents are worried sick." Hopper's fist was pounding on the table, punctuating his words. You remember looking into his eyes, and they were purely livid.
"I-I-I'm sorry. I only reme-me-ember what I told you" You tap your hand gently across the table, reflecting the timeline, "I went to the party. I remember water ripples" Hopper scowls into your very soul, but you continue, "I remember my head hurting, the lights of the cop cars and-"
"..and you just happened to be draped in this blanket... Connie's blanket? The one her folks said was missing from her room." He pokes you a little too firmly in the arm.
"I-i'm sor-" you start, but he cuts you off.
"Help me get any of this to make sense, for the love of Christ. She's just what? Poof magically disappeared with no trace, into Oz or whatever. Is that what you are trying to tell me?" He gestures mockingly.
"N-n-n-n...." your stutter worsens as you frantically wrack your brain for anything else, but it's just a void.
"Jesus Christ. I swear to god if I find out you are covering for someone, a two-day party that went wrong, or some other kind of high school bullshit, that your stupid ass thinks is more important than your missing friend, I will make sure you never freely walk this town ever again. I will unleash an unholy amount of hell upon you!" The pungent smell of alcohol on his breath in this next moment will probably live with you forever, "The worst part of all of this is if you had just picked her up and both gone to the movies like she told her Mom, you were gonna do. Maybe we wouldn't be in here having this dumbass conversation right now. Why are kids like this?" He throws his hands up and then lets them slap down by his side in a thud.
You couldn't say anything to that. Hopper was right. If you hadn't gone to that stupid party, you would have picked her up from practice. You would have been on time. She would still be here, sitting on the counter stealing cookies fresh from the baking tray, comedically overplaying how hot they were by passing them back and forth between her hands, whenever your Mom's back was turned.
Hopper fades away, and you can just see Connie in all her radiant joy, being the charismatic friend your folks adored, but at the same time, she's playfully mocking them at any given opportunity.
Your logical brain steps in and shuts down nostalgia cinema. We aren't doing this, not tonight, we've got homework, and we need to attempt to get to sleep earlier to try to at least get some rest.
You manage the rest of the evening successfully, homework done, a long soak in the bath, ensuring your hair is thoroughly free of strawberry syrup. When they arrive, you greet your parents and tell them what a great day you'd had. The mask never slips for them these days. They've endured enough pain. You couldn't make them feel helpless in helping you, on top of all of this shit.
Now the tricky part is sleep. You reach into your bedside drawer and take your prescription sleeping meds. You stare absently into the ceiling waiting for sweet slumber to embrace you.
Party...water...lights...blanket...sirens
You wake up with a start, clutching your chest, your alarm is blaring, you look over and the digital display to check at the time...it blinks a new problem into existence, fuuuuuck I'm gonna be late.
Throwing back the covers, you race around, throwing on a clean t-shirt and jeans, dragging a brush through your hair, speed cleaning your teeth. You catch yourself in the mirror...geez...you know what...it was just going to have to do, the priority is school, get your head down, get through the day. Same as always. You drive by greeting your parents, grab your keys and bag, rush to the car, and head to the hellhole that is Hawkins High School.
You screech parking up in the first spot you see, you are probably going at too great a speed for a parking lot, but you were on a time crunch here. A quick check of your surroundings the car park is virtually free of students milling about, a few scattered here and there. You glance back down at your watch...you might just be in an acceptable lateness zone. Sure, you have to walk past the class to your seat, but it's a one-off, it's ok. You can handle it.
Speed walking to the doors scared a run might be too much for your uncoordinated limbs and result in more obstacles to getting to where you needed to go. You yank the doors open and step in. Your body's momentum meets an abrupt stop as it bumps into something. You nearly fall backwards, only to be caught by your collar and pulled close to Eddie's face, "Play along", he whispers. You try to barge past him. What was he thinking?! He stops you again. Through gritted teeth, he whispers, "Trust me, you do not wanna go in there right now" You scan his face for clues, but there are none. You step back. As he steps out, Munson mode is engaged. He grabs your arm and starts marching you towards his van. "You didn't think I'd find out, huh" he bellows, "Well, unfortunately for yoooou, paint transfers. I know it was you that did it" he starts gesturing wildly at his van, which by the way, had about a billion scratches and scuff marks on it. He's switching between looking furious at you and flitting his eyes around the people in the vicinity. Anyone getting close to where you are, he just gets louder and rants about how special this van is to him, his band, his business, his freedom. They soon avert their course elsewhere, as if getting too close to this entity would pull them into his rage zone. He sharply opens the door to the van and starts moving the door back and forth, "See! It doesn't work like before. I know you dinged it" You look down at the door and notice a multitude of dings and screw up your face in utter confusion.
You just feel bewildered at what on earth is currently happening. You keep trying to communicate with him using your eyes by widening them at him that he should get to the point soon. Eddie looks at you, then back towards the school. He taps his foot like he's waiting for something, his eyes darting around.
"Eddie, what the fuck is going on?!" You say urgently at the quietest volume possible. He's still looking around like a meerkat, hopping around, craning around the van. Capturing his attention is like trying to catch a hummingbird with your bare hands.
He does one more little run around the van, and without warning, he shoves you into the van, jumps in and slams the door behind you. As you fall back into the van, you bump your head on something and stumble backwards. You are both afraid and still very much out of whatever kind of loop this is. In flight or fight mode, you get back to your feet as quickly as possible, fists clenched, glaring at Eddie. Without looking away, you put one hand behind your back and start feeling around frantically for the back door handle, your other hand in front of you pointing at him forcefully as if you were using some kind of hex to keep him away. Tugging hard on anything that feels remotely like a handle. You think you've found it, it's locked, you lose your cool, "ARE YOU OUT OF YOUR FUCKING MIND MUNSON??!! Jesus!" You say, rubbing the sore area on your head, "You know what?! Tell me what the hell is going on right the fuck now, man, or let me out."
You lunge towards the side door handle Eddie is standing in front of, and he catches your arm, "Hey, hey, hey! shh shh shh" he puts his finger to his mouth.
You grunt in frustration and try lunging at the handle again, "Ok, ok, just calm down, I'll tell you, ok, just sit down and be cool for like 5 minutes".
Your furiously terrified stare meets his. He changes his expression to one of apology, your breathing still heavy, and your whole body is still tensed in opposition to his.
"Be cool", he whispers and loosens his grip on your arm. Your primitive brain recognises this as some sort of compromise, I let go, you let go.
You reluctantly let your body relax the finest amount and move a few steps back again, sitting down on the van floor, watching him, "Well? Get on with it, please", you urge him, adrenaline is surging through your body. This was a big mistake, a huge one, thinking you could trust this guy. You feel so stupid right now.
He sits back in a seat and steeples his fingers, tapping the index fingertips together. He looks down at the floor, then the top, clutching his gaunt face and drags his hand from over his mouth to his chin, "I just don't think you should go in there today." He motions vaguely towards the school.
"Are you actually fucking kidding me right now?? I swear to Christ, Munson," you propel yourself towards the door handle again.
"Hey, you said you'd be cool for 5 minutes."
"And you said you'd tell me what the fuck is happening" you push towards the door again.
In desperation, he blurts out, "They've plastered you all over the school, ok. There are posters everywhere."
You're half still pushing past him when your brain finally computes what he just said, "Wh-what?" Then your brain reminds you about yesterday, the flash. The level of spite of that asshole. You hadn't crossed him. He was getting the first punch in before you knew there would be a fight. You'd just assumed you'd go back to not speaking with them, and that would be it. Evidently not.
You sit back, tapping your fist against your mouth, a surge of defiance rushing through you. "Hmmm, yeah, ok, yeah, so I'm going in there."
"Are YOU out of your God damn mind?!" He yells and immediately after bites his lip as if to prevent anything else aggressive from spilling out.
He stoops down, resting on his haunches, and holds the sides of your face, "Listen to me" his eyes search yours for a semblance of understanding, of really hearing him,
"They are clearly on some sort of power trip today, and normally I'd just tell them where to go, but you are not me, ok? Yesterday was not a good day. So just don't go in there, ok? They are baying for blood" his voice is gentle and pleading, "We can go someplace, me and you, right? Tomorrow it won't be as fresh, and I'll get hellfire to replace the posters with our own, K? I would have done it already, only the photocopier was out of action, and that dick wouldn't let me use the one in the office. Or I can get them all taken down today, whatever."
You shake your head and gently remove his hands from your face, "No, Munson, you don't understand. I can't run away from this. I need to get out of this God damn school, into the real world where they don't hold all the power, and I won't let those bitches stop me" he looks half concerned but mildly impressed maybe...at least you think that's what his face is saying.
Logic brain starts packing its bags as it can see it won't be required for the foreseeable future. You reach into your bag and pull out a marker, "I'm gonna go in there, go about my day, and every single one I see, I'm just gonna sign it, with a smile on my fucking face. They wanna make me famous again round here. Let's be famous, right? They do not get to decide my reaction to their reign of terror. I do." You slap at your own chest hard.
"They've been trying to break me for a loooong time now, unsuccessfully by the way, mainly because their combined IQ is less than their individual ages, making it impossible for them to make me feel any worse than I already make myself feel...daily!"
You use the marker pen to tap the side of your head, "In here, there is no safe place. I am haunted by a nothingness. A safe I can't open, even though I desperately want to. I want her home just the same as anyone. No, actually, maybe more than anyone at this godforsaken place. She's my friend!! My best friend! My only friend and I am tired of people giving me shit about something I cannot fix," you yell hoarsely, your voice close to breaking. You choke it down.
Your chest is heaving, your body still surging with adrenaline is shaking, with nearly two years of hate weighing on it. Finally, Eddie bows his head and steps back to let you leave.
As if these jocks didn't try to sabotage your life enough, you've screwed this up too, exposing your feelings and losing your temper. You shut your eyes tightly with frustration and try counting to ten. You manage 3 and aggressively open the van door. No arm springs forward to stop you this time, you.
Jumping down onto the tarmac without looking back at him, you can't face him right now. He now knows you are out of your mind, you don't want to see that on his face too, but he didn't deserve to feel like the outburst was at him. Your body and voice still trembling, "I know you meant well, Munson, I'm sorry if I frightened you, but I felt..just like...scared and frustrated with everything, I mean you did push me into the van...you could have just asked me but...yeah...anyway... what I'm trying to say is..what am I trying to say...I'm just bad news, ok? You'll fair much better around here not being associated with me. Thank you for trying. I'm just not easy to be around."
You solemnly begin to make your way back in there. You feel a tug on your hand as you are spun into the mightiest hug you've felt since Connie was here.
Your body and brain relax as one, and your hand releases the marker, the textures of which are sorely imprinted onto your hand from gripping it so tightly. Your body is shaking against his. It's only in those motions you realise you are sobbing, like never before, into his chest. The tears are flowing so freely, soaking his jean jacket and patches, you can't hold back the sounds of anguish. Quietly crying is not even an option right now. Two years of pent-up emotions are being exorcised from you in the middle of a parking lot, the embrace is so tight it might be uncomfortable for some, but you welcome the pressure and the human contact. He moves a hand up to cradle your head and gently stroke your hair, "It's ok, I got you", he soothes, "I've got you now, man", he repeats over and over. You can hear in his voice it's an emotional situation for him too.
He doesn't lessen his grip around you until your sobbing slows to just deep breaths and sniffles. One arm is still around your torso and the other moves from your head to your face. Then, with a hooked finger, he lifts your chin up and uses his thumb to wipe your tears away, and brushing the hair from your face, the cold metal of his rings at your cheek.
Your eyes begin to sting from the force of the emotional outburst, but you look at his face. He seems almost like an angel now, beautiful, serene, comforting and noble. A hero. Your hero. "Now, I think I mentioned this before, but my name is Eddie", he mutters, looking down into your eyes.
You notice a tear track on his cheek. You raise your hand to wipe it away, mirroring his kindness but unsure of his consent. You stop just before making contact. This moment feels so fragile. One wrong move and it would shatter everything to sand. Concerned, you try to retract your hand, looking at him apologetically. He pushes his face into your hand like a puppy eager to be pet. He smiles slowly as you wipe his tear away. You stay there for maybe a few moments, but it feels like the world has fallen away, and time itself has stopped. Your eyes move between his beautiful eyes and mouth, whilst your hand has decided to abandon all protocol, and you realise you are running your thumb across his bottom lip. You look at him again, checking in to see if it was too far or if you'd read something wrong.
"May I?" He softly asks. You nod without breaking your shared gaze. He turns his head slightly and kisses your palm tenderly.
"Do you still want to go in there?" He asks, slowly blinking at you. You feel a rush of reality come crashing into your perfect moment. Your stomach feels like you just plummeted to earth. You look back over your shoulder. There are people around, some gawping, some going about their business.
He moves your hand over his heart and says again, "Do you still want to go in there?" You can feel his heart beating against your fingertips.
"I have to face this", you added in an already defeated tone turning back to him.
"Mordor it is" he slightly smiles and gives the hand on his chest a slight squeeze.
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sunset-bridge · 10 months
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about ur ake shoo takes like i agree a lot with the fact the fandom tends to focus on the extremes rather than the complexities. either making goro a total innocent baby or an irredeemable evil monster, and making ake shoo either pleasant and romantic or just that they hate each other a lot and thats it. when its really much deeper, and that annoys me about a lot of it. (also them misinterpreting.... so much of canon due to bias)
YEAH YEAH ANON !!!! RRRRAAA Mfw the world is cute shades of gray and not black or white hellooooo isnt that kinda cool guys wouldnt it be cool if a game talked about this a bit a cute bit yeah (not directed at u btw just . Yelling at the void)
Like honestly both extreme takes are soo bad so fucking stupid like helloo did we play the same game. Like ofc woobyfing goro and honestly thinking hes an angel or did nothing wrong is bad but also making him seem heartless and completely evil too like helloooo hi hi . Mr. i want to be needed and wanted and loved helloooo hi
Gonna sound delulu again but yes ur so right its like deeper than that hellooo like goro feels so much shit about joker he feels jealous he feels admiration he feels hate he feels respect he wants joker to need him he wants wants his efforts to go noticed but joker threatens his entire core of being with his mere existence how the hell is someone supposed to be normal about this . I couldnt be normal about it personally
Anyways yeah thats it thats what annoys me a lot too about a loooot of ake shooers shu akeers
Anyways cough thank you
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squidwolfy · 2 years
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Same Rules Apply
If you know my main blog, keep it to yourself.
Feel free to ask me anything. I'm keeping anon on. If i don't like your anon i'm just not answering it so like... have fun yelling at the void
My linktree: click here
As far as blog specific tags (more will be added to this list as time goes on): 
posts that are just me talking about whatever will be tagged “the slime speaks” 
reblogs will be tagged “Squid Reblogs"
Reacting to streams will be tagged "Squid reacts"
Asks will be tagged "Slimey answers"
"Squid’s Hardcore World” things from my main hardcore world
"squid fails at tubnet" self explanatory
"Joycon hardcore world" self explanatory
"squidtok" videos I've also posted on tiktok
Helloooo
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katherines · 2 years
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RUDY PANKOW › ph. Amanda Pelkins (2021)
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legendofzelda4life · 3 years
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Sleepless nights
Helloooo and welcome back to cliche af titles day 16 lmao
Today I present some Legend and Wild fluff.
Yeah, you can already guess how this goes.
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Legend was walking next to an orange-ish hair.
“So, Link, how’s your journey been?” She asked. For some reason - though Legend knew who she was - he couldn’t see her face.
“It’s been great! I’ve- Marin?” The girl was gone.
Legend spun around to be met with an island fading away.
Suddenly he was in Lorule.
Then Holodrum.
Labryna.
Then waking up in his house with his uncle.
He disappeared too.
Legend was alone in darkness.
He dropped to his knees and reached out.
“NO!” He yelled. “DON’T LEAVE!” He clutched either side of his head as he cried.
“I’M SORRY!” He yelled again before growing quieter. “I’m sorry! Is that what you wanted to hear?” He looked up to see everyone he’s ever left behind staring him down.
“I need you…”
“Please.” He whimpered before laying down in the darkness, still clutching his head as he cried, wishing the voices would stop.
“Legend?” That was Wild’s voice.
Why was he awake? Had he yelled out in his sleep and woken everyone? Or just Wild? Maybe Wild was already up.
Legend slowly opened his eyes and was met with Wild shaking his shoulders.
“Hey,” the cook smiled softly, “you okay? You were tossin’ ‘round.” Legend just nodded in response. Failing to find his voice, the boy resorted to signing.
“Did I yell out? Or wake you?” He signed. Wild shook his head. “No, 100 years was a good nap for me so I don’t sleep some nights.” The boy said, sitting next to Legend - who had sat up.
“Oh…” Legend trailed off.
“Wanna talk about it?” Wild asked, tilting his head to the side. Legend gave a dismissive wave. “Nah, just a stupid bad dream.” Legend said.
“Alright, but from now on: I’m your night-time buddy.” Legend tilted his head to the side as Wild stood up enthusiastically. “Can’t sleep? Come see me! Bad dream? Come see me! Wanna beat a bitch? Guess what?!? Come. See. Me.” Wild said the last few words sternly before laughing.
Legend chuckled too. “Thank Wild.” He nudged the boy’s shoulder as they both laughed.
They stared up at the sky in silence.
It was so peaceful that Wild hadn’t even noticed Legend passed out.
Once he did however, he let out a small chuckle before tucking the vet into bed. Wild looked outside before pulling out his slate.
“Three am.” He muttered before looking around the camp. “I could probably get a couple hours of sleep in before Twi wakes up.”
Yeah… he didn’t sleep.
The next night
The next night played out similarly, except Legend nor Wild could sleep.
So they opted to stay awake and walk around camp a little.
A week later
It had been a whole week since the last ‘sleeping-incident’ as Legend called it.
Tonight was another one.
“Wild.” Legend mumbled in his sleep. Said hero heard it and silently wondered what the other was dreaming about.
In Legend’s head, he was walking through a void.
Voices followed him.
The same from last time.
Except eight new voices had added themselves.
This was why Legend didn’t like getting attached.
He was always gonna leave everyone behind.
“Wild!” He called out to one of the voices.
“You left.” It whispered back. “So much for night-buddy, huh, Leg?” It whispered again.
Oh yeah!
Night-buddy!
How could he forget?
Legend shot up in bed and looked around.
Everyone was still here. Good.
He hadn’t abandoned them.
“Vet? You good?” Wild asked, causing Legend to basically jump out of his skin. 
“Y-yeah.” “Nightmare?” Legend shuddered. “Let’s just call them bad dreams.” He said flatly. Wild nodded and went over to Legend.
“You wanna talk about it yet?” Legend thought for a bit before answering with a soft nod. “Yeah.” He mumbled.
Wild grabbed his own blanket and wrapped it around the pair as Legend started to explain.
“So as everyone already knows, I have been on a… few adventures.” Legend said with a sigh. “Yeah, more than any of us.” Wild chuckled. Legend moved a little closer to the hero as he nodded. It was cold and the closer they were, the more blanket he could use.
“Basically, I left behind a lot of people.” He said, looking down. “I can only imagine how you feel.” Wild said, wrapping an arm around Legend. “I didn’t go on as many adventures as you so I doubt I left behind as many people that I cared about.” Legend could see the other hero’s eyes grow distant.
“Sorry, I shouldn’t be venting.” Legend said, making a move to get away. He felt…
Guilty…
He just vented to someone that felt like they let down a whole kingdom.
“No, it’s okay. I was trying to empathise with you and ended up getting lost in thought.” Wild chuckled as he ruffled Legend’s hair. “If you don’t want to talk though, I wont force you.” He said, moving to stand up but was stopped by Legend.
“I just felt guilty for making you think back.” He said, ducking his head.
Wild laughed quietly.
“Who gives a fuck about how it makes me feel? I sure don’t! This is Legend vent time! Not depressed Wild time!” The blue-clad hero laughed as he spoke. “If you want to vent,” he sat down again, “then by all means: vent!”
Legend nodded and wrapped the blanket around the pair, adding his too just in case one of them stole all the blanket from the other.
“Well, on my adventures, I saved the captured princess and travelled to a dark world, I ventured to the distant lands of Holodrum and Labryna to save the oracles, gaining the ability to control seasons and ages, I went into a dream world on the way back from one of them - I can’t quite remember which it was - and I fell in love with an amazing girl…” Legend looked down.
“What was she like?” Wild asked.
“She could sing like a goddess, looked as beautiful as one too, always managed to make me smile, she did.” Legend was beginning to sound like the Old man. He smiled fondly at the memory of Marin.
“Then I went to a whole other world. That’s when I met Ravio. Surprised he managed to leave after Hilda sent my Zelda and I back. The gateways were meant to close…” Legend trailed off once more.
“You feel like you left all those places behind, don’t you?” Wild asked. The red-clad boy nodded. “Mainly Koholint - the dream world.”
“Tell me about it.”
“Okay.”
The boys conversed late into the night, even laughing about how places in Wild’s Hyrule were named after places and people Legend knew. Wild theorised that the wind fish told others about his dream and they decided to name places after it to commemorate a world a hero left behind.
It was gonna be another sleepless night.
END
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Wow I had a lot of fun writing this.
It was a very interesting thing to write about lol.
LEAVE REQUESTS BELOW!
REQUESTS MUST INCLUDE: PAIRING TYPE/GENRE/CATEGORY (fluff, angst, etc) PLATONIC OR NOT
I WILL WRITE ONLY ABOUT THE LINKS (including the ravio, shadow, the zeldas, and requested characters. Will not write about whole other fandoms though)
I CAN DO READER INSERTS IF REQUESTED (no oc’s tho)
CAN DO AN AU IF REQUESTED
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squisherific · 4 years
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Rain Drop Chapter 6
A/N: *yells echoingly into the void* Helloooo therrrre… Man has it been a very long time since I made a tumblr post, let alone wrote any fanfiction. To those who are unaware (which is probably everyone), I had begun a story many years ago about Juvia’s past. It was called Rain Drop, and it has 5 previous chapters up on fanfiction.net
I'm so sorry to those who had liked this story. I both can and can't believe it's been 4 years since I last updated it (and 2 years since I’ve written any fanfiction at all). To be perfectly honest, I didn't think I'd ever continue this story. But something struck me the other day. I reread this fic, and the kind reviews from readers, and I just got the itch to continue, because I really, really miss writing, and I especially missed writing about Gray and Juvia. I can't promise I'm going to end up finishing this, but this is a step in the right direction? This chapter is dedicated to everybody who's ever encouraged me to continue this fic, and to anyone still reading. If there are people still interested in this story, I can not thank you enough for your patience. This is for you. <3
Chapter 6 - A Breezy Visit
Gray felt abnormally aware of his right hand as he made his way through Magnolia, and towards the outskirts of the town. He normally didn't pay this much attention to any particular one of his appendages. He just let them do their thing, and trusted all was well. But on this particular day, his right hand was clutching onto the left hand of Juvia Lockser, and his previous faith in his hand's abilities had all but vanished, resulting in his acute awareness of every bead of sweat currently collecting between his and Juvia's linked palms. It didn't help that he felt like every person they passed on the way to their destination was taking note of their clasp-handed position, and grinning amusedly to themselves as the two mages hurried past.
Why did I grab her hand? I didn't need to do that. She could just follow me to Gildarts' house. I could let go, and carry on as if nothing happened. But would she get upset if I took my hand away? She is holding it pretty firmly, so it would probably be pretty awkward if I just stopped holding her hand back.
These were the thoughts that passed through Gray Fullbuster's mind as he decided he would continue to hold Juvia's hand, not because he enjoyed it - definitely not that- but because he wanted to be emotionally supportive towards his friend, who was going through a rough time right now. Yes, that's why he'd continue to allow his sweaty palm to press up against Juvia's soft grip. He was a very good friend, and that's all there was to it.
"Gray-sama?"
Juvia's voice interrupted Gray's internal dilemma.
"Yeah?"
"Do you really think it's possible Gildarts-san will know something about Juvia's parents?"
"It's worth a shot. That old guy loves to reminisce though, so if we're not careful he might go off on a tangent, and we'll be stuck there until nightfall."
"Juvia won't mind, especially if he did have the answers Juvia has been seeking! Juvia would gladly listen as long as it takes!" she said, excited at the possibility that Gildarts could provide a window into her past at last.
Gray seemed a lot less enthused at that prospect of being stuck in Gildarts' place for hours into the night. But, if it meant keeping Juvia out of harm's way, and preventing her from going off on a hunt for a possibly dangerous Jose Porla instead, he would gladly suffer through Gildarts taking a long, and winding trip down memory lane. He just hoped they weren't walking into a dead end, because Gray had no back up plan to distract Juvia from her desired mission. He had promised Master Makarov he'd keep her safe, and even without that promise, it was something he always strived to do anyway. He could not fail.
They'd reached the far edges of the town, and Gray steered them slightly passed an overgrown forested area, before entering a slight clearing with a cobbled path which led to the S-class mage’s humble cabin. They both took note of the tufts of smoke coming out of the stout chimney, signaling someone was definitely home. They smiled at each other, glad to not have traveled there in vain, and headed towards the door.
Gray knocked a few times and waited.
At first there was no answer, but then a sound of what must have been several pots and pans clattering to the floor reverberated through the open window, before the door burst open.
Standing in the doorway, looking happily expectant, was the auburn-haired, and battled-scarred S- class mage of Fairy Tail. However his expression seemed to falter, and twist into one of polite bemusement at his surprise guests' presence.
"Oh! I thought you two were Cana finally accepting her dad's invitation to a home cooked meal," he said, gesturing inside.
Gray and Juvia peered behind him as the mess that could only be classified as Gildarts' kitchen came into view. He had clearly been attempting to cook, the lit fire within his home waiting patiently for the pot, which he had filled with some mysterious gloopy substance, clearly the subject of Gildarts 'home cooked meal.'
"Nope, we haven't seen Cana today," Gray said, as Gildarts looked hopefully around them, as if Cana was about to pop out of a nearby bush at any moment, to finally fulfill her dad's wish for more bonding time. "It's just us here," Gray assured him.
Gildarts, shaking off his disappointment, finally looked back down at them, giving them both a once over, his eyes lingering on their clasped hands. He grinned.
"You two out on a date?" a playful twinkle in his eye as he observed their flustered reactions.
Gray finally did let go of Juvia's hand at this comment. "No," he said, a little too insistently.
Juvia looked crestfallen.
"Now, now, that's no way to treat a lady, Gray!" He chastised him lightly, as he smoothly brushed past Gray to usher Juvia inside. "Come in,, come in! It's Juvia, isn't it? You're good friends with Cana. I'm sure she won't be too upset if I treat you to a meal in her place. Don't be shy, there's plenty to share. Do you like wine, Juvia?"
Juvia was gently directed inside the warm cabin, a look of bewilderment coloring her features, while Gray had the door slammed in his face, leaving him standing alone outside.
That perverted old fart, Gray thought angrily. He lingered there annoyed for at least a couple of minutes, hoping one of the two would remember he was still there, before knocking on the closed door again, this time much more aggressively than when he had first arrived.
Gildarts reappeared. "Can I help you?" he asked, as if this were the first time he had met Gray, and as if Gray hadn't arrived with Juvia only a few minutes ago.
Speaking of Juvia, Gray could now see she was sitting down with a cup of tea in her hand, likely having refused the wine offer from Gildarts.
Gray ignored him, and irritatedly walked passed Gildarts into the house to join Juvia.
"How rude," Gildarts muttered none too silently to himself, as Gray pulled up a chair next to Juvia, sitting down, arms crossed and scowling.
Closing the door behind him, Gildarts sat down to join them. Apparently after he had guided Juvia inside, he had put the pot filled with the mysterious substance onto the fire, and it was now bubbling away behind them.
"So," Gildarts said after a moment. "What can I do for you. Want some love advice? I've got lots of tips," his eyebrows raised suggestively.
"Stop messing around!" Gray spat, his face reddening. "This is serious, old man! Juvia is here to ask you about her parents!"
"Her parents…" Gidarts said, sobering… He gave Juvia a thorough appraisal, and seemed to go into concentrated revelry. "Oh man, were there any blue-haired ladies…."
"NOT YOU," Gray said quickly.
Juvia blushed.
"Juvia is just trying to find information about her parents. She doesn't remember who they were. Gramps clearly seems to have known them, but he won't tell Juvia anything, so we were wondering if maybe you had met them before, and could tell her something about them, " Gray explained.
Gildarts relaxed, leaning back in his chair. "I was going to say, imagine having two daughters who both happened to end up in the same guild I was a part of. What would be the odds, right?" Gildarts laughed, but then got suddenly serious again, as his eyes fell back on Juvia. He studied her, as she looked back self-consciously.
"You know, come to think of it, you do remind me of someone," he said.
"Juvia does?" she asked, a pang of hope in her heart.
"Where are you from originally?"
"Juvia isn't sure. She was left in an orphanage in Hargeon. The most information the people running the orphanage could tell her, was that an old woman had dropped Juvia off there when Juvia was one-years old, but Juvia never did find the identity of the old woman. She doesn't know if she was a relation, or not."
Gildarts seemed to contemplate this information. "Your last name is Lockser?"
Juvia nodded.
"Hmmmm, well I can tell you I don't know anybody with that name. But you do bear a striking resemblance to an old friend of mine."
Gray didn't like the way Gildarts emphasized the word friend. "Who was this friend?"
"A former member of the magic council. She was a gorgeous girl, dark hair, piercing eyes, really feisty," he said, as his eyes glazed over, clearly having traveled back into some kind of indecent memory.
Gray and Juvia were discomfited.
"Oii! We're still here you know," Gray jolted him out of his reverie.
"Relax," he said, catching a look at their expressions. "It wasn't that type of relationship," he assured them, sighing in a good natured, but dejected sort of way. "Not for lack of trying, of course. She was my friend's girl."
"Your friend?"
"Benny. Benjamin 'Fluid' Dackser," he replied, as he grabbed the bottle of wine he had offered Juvia earlier, and took a sip.
"Fluid?"
"He was a water mage."
Juvia's eyes widened at this information.
"Water?!"
"Yeah. So that was his nickname. Ol' Benny Flu Dackser," a sad smile crossed Gildarts' face. "Man, he was such a pain in the ass," he chuckled. "It's pretty pointless crashing apart water, you know? It just comes right back together again."
"He could turn into water? Like Juvia does?!"
"Yup, it was his specialty. Not a good match for me, as he couldn't help to remind me every time we had a friendly fight. And we were both always trying to impress Sylvi. He won her in the end, that bastard. Ah, we were so young then. Not even twenty."
"Sylvi?" Gray asked.
"Sylvia Loten. A talented ice mage."
It was Gray's turn for his eyes to widen. "Ice?"
"Not on quite the same level as your old master Ur, I'm sure, but really talented all the same. I might not have been able to do much against Benny, but she was more than a match for him. It was great watching that cocky, lovestruck fool get beaten down by her. But she must have liked his persistent approach, because they ended up married."
"Benjamin-san and Sylvia-san…" Juvia mused to herself "did they have any children?"
"I lost touch with them both after they went into politics. They never joined a guild either, as far as I know. Like I said, Sylvi was a council member, and so was Benny - youngest council members ever at that point. It all happened while I was out on a major quest. By the time I came back, years had passed, and Benny and Sylvi had…" he trailed off somberly.
"They died?" Juvia concluded, her face stricken.
"Yeah."
"How?" Gray asked, almost afraid of the answer as he looked over at Juvia.
"Supposedly drowned," he said flatly.
"Drowned?! No way!"
Juvia agreed emphatically with Gray. "Benjamin-san was a water mage, how could he have drowned?"
"Just because you specialize in a type of magic doesn't mean you are immune to it's dangers," he explained, his mood had darkened considerably, the wine bottle's contents now severely depleted as he went on. "But again, that's just what I heard. Their bodies were found off the coast of Akane beach."
"Was the drowning an accident, or…" Gray trailed off.
"I don't know. But let's put it this way, I doubt they suffered a boating incident, and they couldn't save themselves. Doesn't make sense. Not for those two," Gildarts admitted.
"Terrible," was all Juvia could think to say as the three let a silence fall within the messy cabin, the only sound being the bubbling contents of the copper pot in the fireplace.
Juvia couldn't believe there had been another water mage. She'd never met anyone else who could use water magic other than herself. And she had been able to use it for as long as she could remember. It wasn't something she had studied to learn, which is usually the case for mages. People aren't born knowing magic. But for whatever reason, Juvia could instinctively control water, and as used to be the case, there were things she couldn't control about it as well - that constant rain that plagued her for so long. Water had literally been tied into her emotions - her very being - whether she liked it or not. It was a rare ability. A rare magic.
And yet this Benjamin Dackser was also a water mage. And he died. She couldn't imagine this skilled water mage, someone who could best Gildarts, could be drowned - and his talented ice mage wife as well. How? Why? Juvia had so many questions. The greatest of all being, could these two people have been her parents?
"Gildarts-san?" Juvia began, breaking the silence. "You said I remind you of Sylvia-san?"
"Yeah…" he said, studying her again, "the more I look at you, the more I think you look just like her. Same eyes, same pale skin, you even act a little like her. She was real regal, you know? You are very similar. Except for the hair. Her's was a very dark grey, almost black," he recalled, his voice a little slurred from the wine he had been using to dull the pain of his somber recollections.
"What color was this Benny guy's hair?" Gray asked.
Gildarts simply pointed to Juvia's hair in response.
Juvia's heart skipped a beat.
"You think they were Juvia's parents?" Gray came right out and asked what they were all currently wondering.
The question hung heavy in the air.
Juvia's fists clenched in anxiety.
Gildarts looked from Gray to Juvia, a pained expression on his face. He shook his head. "I never heard anything about them having a kid… but, there's a lot I don't know. I was gone for so long. I would think people who were on the council with them would know a lot more about anything like that. I knew them best when we were all still just a bunch of brats."
"How long were they on the council?"
"Not long. A few years, I think. And that was nearly 30 years ago now."
"Who do we know on the magic council who would talk to us?" Gray pondered. "None of them have ever exactly been the biggest fans of Fairy Tail. Plus, so many of them who might have been on the council with Benjamin and Sylvia are now…." Gray's thoughts wandered to the mass murder at the hands of the Tartarus members.
Another heavy silence fell.
"Yajima-san?" Juvia said tentatively, recalling the tiny man who ran the 8-island restaurant she once waitressed at with some of the other Fairy Tail ladies.
"Oh yeah, Gramp's friend. He's ancient, and he was on the council for ages," Gray recalled hopefully. "We could take a trip out to his restaurant in Hargeon and ask him if he knows anything more about these two."
"Let's do so," Juvia agree immediately, so grateful that Gray had suggested they go to Hargeon. This meant he intended to continue to accompany her on this quest of hers. Her heart was so burdened at the thought of possibly finding out who her parents were, only to be left with more devastating questions about their awful fate, and how she might tie into it. So, Gray's companionship served to lift that weight considerably.
"Thank you so much, Gildarts-san. You've been such a great help. Your information was truly invaluable," she said in earnest, getting up from her chair and heading towards the door. Gray followed closely behind.
"Wait! You sure you guys don't want to stay and eat? The stew is almost ready!" he pointed back towards the now overflowing muck bubbling out of his copper pot.
"That's very kind of you, Gildarts-san," Juvia eyed the stew in trepidation, "but we really have much to do if we are going to be leaving for Hargeon soon. But thank you for your hospitality, and the tea!" she added, leaving the warmly lit cabin behind her. The sun was setting as she stepped out into the clear air.
Gray was about to join her when Gildarts caught a hold of his arm and pulled him back.
"Hey!" Gray said, alarmed as Gildarts leaned close to him, his grip vice-like.
"Listen," Gildarts said, his tone uncharacteristically dire, "if Gramps didn't want to tell Juvia anything about her parents, then he likely had a damn good reason for it, and that reason was probably that he thinks there's danger involved. And if Gramps thinks looking for information on her parents is dangerous, then it probably is. I've only heard conspiracy theories about Benny and Sylvi's deaths, but if even one of them is true, Juvia could be headed into some serious trouble. I feel for her, I do. But if Benny and Sylvi were her parents, then there's nothing left to find."
Gray considered Gildarts words of warning. He looked towards Juvia, who was waiting patiently at the end of the cobbled path for him to join her. He again thought back to that night at the guild, and how hurt she was at never having known her family. "Juvia has a right to know the truth. If I can help her find at least that, then I'm going to do so," Gray said firmly. "And if there's danger, I'll protect her no matter what."
A/N: When rereading the previous chapters of this, I honestly didn't think I could continue the story no matter how much I wanted to. I genuinely didn't remember where I was going with the plot since it had been so long. But, thank goodness I had notes for future chapters saved. ;_; Otherwise this chapter would not exist right now. Anyway, if anyone is still reading, please do let me know with a review. But if everyone has abandoned this story, as I once did, then at least I can say I enjoyed writing this again. ^_^
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le-average-ghost · 4 years
Text
Ghost Hunting Trip gone wrong
        Steven sighed happily as he sat on his couch with his cup of hot chocolate. After working nonstop for a whole week he finally had time for himself. Shane and Ryan weren’t here to bother him since they went off on their ghost adventure, Ryan messaged him if he wanted to go with them; he responded with, Hell no. Tonight was Steven's night. He loved the guys but he needed time for himself every now and then. Tonight was perfect, his apartment was basked in the warm light of his table lamp which made the apartment feel cozy. He had his blanket on his lap and felt so damn comfy. Steven proudly raised his cup up high, A toast to me and a relaxing eve-BANG BANG BANG!
“Holy shit!”
        Steven whipped his head behind him to the door, he sighed dejectedly at the drops of hot chocolate that spilled but made his way to the door quickly. He was greeted with Ryan’s wide terrified eyes. He was shivering, but he still gave Steven a small smile.
“Mind if I come in?” Steven didn’t think twice and hurriedly guided him inside. He picked up the fallen blanket as Ryan made his way to the couch.
“There is some hot chocolate on the table man, drink up” He covered him with the blanket, and grabbed a random chair to sit across to Ryan. Steven gasped once he was face to face with him. The man looked terrible, the light illuminated the dried blood stains on his grey shirt and bruises on his body and face.
“What the fuck happened to you!” He saw them leave to do their investigations many times and they never came out bloodied and bruised. Ryan huffed a laugh.
“I don’t think you’ll believe me to be honest”
“Try me”
Ryan looked down at his cup, “You’re gonna think I’m crazy”
“Ryan please, I need to know who did this to you so I can call the poli-”
“You can’t!”
“Why?”
Ryan’s hands began to shake, “They won’t believe you”
“For god's sake, Ryan then tell me please”
“Shaneisademon”
“What?”
Ryan quickly raised his head, “Shane is a demon”
                                                      …….……..
      Trees loomed over them as they made their way through the forest, Ryan could barely see the sky as the pair walked forward. The crunching of dirt pounding Ryan’s skull everytime as he and Shane walked further into the forest. They would be surrounded by total darkness if it wasn’t for the flashlights he brought with them, Ryan was grateful he double-checked his inventory before leaving. He knew Shane would not have reminded him just so he could see him freak out like the dick he is, speaking of the skeptic he turned his head around to see him looking at his surroundings.
“Are you sure we are going the right way Ryan?”
He sighed, “Yes Shane, the map showed that there is a bridge that leads to the campsite”
“Once we find that we’re set”
He hummed in agreement but he was still not convinced. Shane looked around to find a squirrel at least to ease his boredom.
“So the campsite is supposed to be haunted by some child ghost amirite?”
“Yes, I read that she wanders the campsite to look for her family, campers have reported sightings of a little girl in a white dress walking around”
“They also have reported their tents moving and saw small handprints on them”
“That could just be the wind?”
Ryan gawked at Shane’s attempt to debunk it, “Then how did the handprints get on the tent”
The man shrugged, “Could be an animal”
“The hands literally had five fingers, it couldn’t be an animal”
“Many people perceive smudges based on what they want to see like the Rorschach test”
“What about the tents moving violently, it couldn’t be caused by an animal”
“It could be just the wind Ryan or bears”
Ryan groaned at his friend's skepticism, “Are there even bears here?”
Shane smirked, “Well if we do make it to the campsite-”
“We will”
“As I said ‘if’ we do make it do you think the ghost will join us for some smores?”
“We are not eating smores with a ghost”
Ryan’s heart skipped a beat when they both heard a twig snap. He instantly looked behind him to find the source of the noise.
“What was that?”
Shane rolled his eyes, “It's probably an animal”
“You’re right I think I am just paranoid”, the dirt path began to slowly get replaced by wood. Ryan was ecstatic.
“Shane we’re finally at the bridge, we’re almost there”
“Finally”
The pair continued to walk forward, the air felt tense, Ryan didn’t know why. The river looked void of color due to the darkness in the forest. His blood went cold when he saw several figures on the bridge, one of them wearing a cloak.
“Shane do you see-see what I see”
“Yeah it looks like we stumbled to party”
“I don’t like this”
“It’ll be fine, let's just ignore them”
Ryan just nodded and continued to walk forward, as they got closer he saw 4 people on the bridge, 3 men and one woman. They looked fairly normal except the blonde man wearing the cloak. He continued to walk forward until they moved in front of them. Shane raised his eyebrows at the man with the cloak.
“Excuse me sir but you’re in our way,” The blonde didn’t say anything but the raven-haired man on his right spoke up.
“You’re going to the campsite right?”
“Yup”
“I’m sorry but we can’t allow you to go onward, for your own sake I suggest you leave?”
Shane scoffed, “I didn’t hear the campsite was owned by you guys, we’re just here to find some demons or ghosts”
The group's eyes widened, the ashen blonde in the cloak just stared unblinkingly.
“Shane!”
“What?”
Ryan was confused,_ What the hell are these guys doing here?_
       He doesn’t like where this is going. Shane is stubborn, so he won’t back down so easily. He needs to end this nonsense. His thought was caught short when he heard the thumping from the wooden bridge. He quickly turned around and saw no one. I don’t like this. Ryan cleared his throat, beads of sweat falling down his forehead.
“I am sorry for my friend, we’ll be leav-”
“No No Ryan I don’t think so,” Shane smiled innocently,
“Listen guys, we’ll just go on our merry way and you guys will continue fucking around like the edgelords you are” He looked at each and every one of them.
“Ok? And we will pretend this never happened c’mon Ryan”
  Shane’s efforts to go on were thwarted when the men beside the blonde quickly grabbed his arms, his face met the hard wooden floor.
“Shane!”
He tried to move but he felt piercing heat from the men holding him as if they were burning his arms.
“It’s fine Ryan, run”
    Ryan’s heart was beating out of his chest, he tried to move but he couldn’t. His throat was dry, and all he heard were his rapid breathes. He needed to run and get help. The man took off his hood showing his long messy hair and was met with a mocking smile. He gulped.
“We tried to warn you..”
     He finally felt movement in his legs, adrenaline was kicking in and was ready to get the fuck outta here but the footsteps behind him began to rapidly move toward him. Before he could react he felt a large weight make contact with his head. His vision grew fuzzy and the world was spinning, he was losing balance, he was deaf to hear his friend yells or the orders the cloaked man was saying as he fell forward. The world around him went dark before he could say anything.
                                                         …..…… 
_Well this is unfortunate _
       Shane didn’t think those guys would be able to put up a fight but they proved him wrong. They kicked his ass, and now he is on the ground of some sort of jail cell. He tried to move but he realized his legs were chained together, his hands were handcuffed as well.
_Lovely. _
       He moved his head to look at his surroundings. He saw the dark brown walls outside of the cell, and a black desk with a gold star on top of it. Shane concludes that he is in a sheriffs’ office with a jail cell, how did they even get here? He looked around to see if Ryan was somewhere around here, but he wasn’t here. Anxiousness began to fill his heart at the thought that something might have happened to him, they might argue on the paranormal every now and then but he is a good friend. He will miss the short man greatly if he dies, but he won’t let that happen. Shane’s pant pocket felt heavy at the thought of his trump card if he does this everything will-
“You’re awake”
He turned around to see the raven-haired man from the bridge. This time he was wearing a cloak.
He must think he looks so cool. He couldn’t help but sit up and smile.
“Weeell helloooo bridge buddy what brings you into my domain?” The man sighed at his amazing british accent, he should feel honored, he doesn’t do this to everyone.
“Do you ever stop?”
Shane smirked “Nope, and I don’t think I owe you an apology since I’m stuck like this”
The edgelord didn’t respond, the man he must be great at parties. “So buddy, do you mind enlightening me on where am I? And why am I here?”
“Have you heard of cults?”
Shane’s eyebrow rose at the sudden question.
“Of course, pretty interesting stuff to be honest. I always found it interesting how devoted cultists are to their beliefs. To each their own.”
Now that he looked at the man, Shane realized he looks pretty young, probably 21 years old and is extremely pale. Gives vampires a run for their money.
“Well by your getup I can presume you and your buddies are part of this cult yourself”
The man chuckled, “Yes, and to answer your question we’re in an abandoned sheriffs’ office”
“How did you guys even find this place?”
“Beyond the campsite if you walk even deeper in the forest there lies a destroyed town, that is where we conduct our activities”
Shane’s eyes grew wide at this revelation
“What seriously?!”
“So that's why you wouldn’t let us go by, you didn’t want us to ruin your little gathering”
“I saw you two as a nuisance and that we should kill you two but our leader told us that there was an opportunity was presented”
“Oh, you mean the blond guy?”
“Yes and I have to thank you because we don’t have to sacrifice one of our own”
Shane’s stomach twists at the word, “sacrifice”
_ This is bad _
The raven-haired man laughed mockingly at Shane’s silence,
“Wow if I had known this would shut you up I should I have said it from the beginning”
“This is a load of crap, your sacrifice won’t work all you’re doing is wasting time”
“I disagree it is the perfect time for us to open hell’s gate and release Sonneillon into the realm?”
Shane’s heart began to race, but he couldn’t stop his giggles from coming out in response to this guy’s audacity to gloat about summoning a demon.
“What’s so funny?”
“Sorry it’s just so stupid, you guys are going to regret doing that”
“I thought you were a skeptic”
“Yeah I am but I know a stupid idea when I here one”
“If the sacrifice doesn’t work, you will be next”
“That is a mistake buddy, I don’t taste great”
“It is a shame though, I really wanted to see the sacrifice of your friend”
Shane glared at the cultist
“But I will be glad to see your sacrifice if you truly believe the ritual won’t work”
“Prepare to be disappointed”
        Shane heard the loud knocks on the door and the edgelord went to go see who was there. He quickly returned.
“Sorry to cut this conversation short but I am needed to go on patrol, it was a displeasure to talk to you ummm”
“Shane”
“Right, but I won’t be far so if you do escape you won’t go far”
        The edgy cultist made his way to the door, but Shane couldn’t bear it anymore. His stupid curiosity is getting the better of him.
“Ok, but can you answer me one thing?”
“What?”
“You never told me your name”
“Why should I?”
“Well if this will be the last time I see you and your cult buddies I might as well know your name”
Shane laid down, he is pretty sure he lost feeling in his legs,
“You were too busy monologuing”
“It is Oliver”
“Well Oliver let me promise you something if this demon does rise from the depths and attacks Ryan”
Shane clicks his tongue, “You will not come out of this alive, I will make sure of that”
“Ha! Like you are capable of doing that.”
“You’ll be surprised, that's about it, go out and waste your night like the other lunatics here”
“Hmph”
Shane didn’t see him leave but the door slam was evident enough.
_ This is such a pain. _
      He was ready to make fun of Ryan, scare him and then go home and sleep but this threw everything off. He needs to stop these cultists fast but his hands are tied...or handcuffed? Shane huffed out a laugh at his own joke.
This leaves me no choice
     Shane moved his hands toward his right pants pocket and felt a round stone there. Thank god he wasn’t hallucinating. Those guys are fools for not emptying out his pockets. Sweat began to fall and his hands began to shake. He lightly held the stone in his hands and breathed slowly.
How long has it been since I have really let myself go
If he does this Ryan will never let him live this down, but he has to if not things will go down south fast. Shane hopes he can control himself this time.
The moon’s rays enter the cell making the stone on his hands shine brightly. His grip on the stone tightens.
“I hope Ryan doesn’t have a heart attack because of this”
All Shane feels now are the stones pieces piercing his hands as it shatters
                                                    …….…….
Ryan would be lying if he said he wasn’t scared shitless at these cultists chanting some sort of incantation as he was tied at the stake. He tried to move again to see if the gods of fortune smiled upon him but it was futile. He is worried about Shane and hopes he found a way to escape.
He turned to the cultist on his right
“You don’t have to do this, just let me go please”
The cultist didn’t respond, their chants began to grow louder and felt his heartbeat beating out of his chest.
This is where I die
    He looks at the circle they made, he would be impressed by how intricate it was if his life wasn’t on the line. The trees were enveloped by the bright red glow of the circle as the incantation continued, he felt the ground shake side to side violently. Until he saw the red light shoot towards the sky, the cultist chants pounding his skull. He wanted to scream for help but it wouldn’t do anything.
 Ryan’s breath began to quicken as he saw claws come out of the circle they made.
The supernatural exists!
He would gloat but he was distracted by impending doom rising from the depths of hell. The demon lifted himself out, his large stature looking down at them. Its upper body looked sorta human other than the gem on its forehead but it looked like a spider from the bottom.
The ashen blond cultist let down his hood and yelled at the demon,
“Demon of Hatred we offer you this human as a gift from us to you, may we work together to bring the world into chaos”
It lifted his head to stare directly at Ryan, its black eyes staring into his soul. Ryan gulped, and began to move violently, he doesn’t care if it's useless he needs to feel like he is doing something. The monster smelled its fear and began to charge toward Ryan.
Oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh-
The monster’s screech made Ryan open his eyes and saw it lay on the ground unconscious. He couldn’t see who knocked it down but he noticed that it had horns.
Another demon?
The figure disappeared and the cultists began to run away.
It's so fast!
One by one the cultists began to fall.
Holy shit!
     Their limbs were severed and left on the ground. The demon that saved him showed no mercy as he ripped apart the cultists. He saw the ashen blond leader take out his knife and run towards the demon, next thing Ryan knew the man stopped and blood began spewing out of his mouth as he looked at the claws that pierced him.
Ryan felt nauseous as he saw blood spraying everywhere from the figures attacks to the others.
More cultists began to attack him and Ryan looked in horror as it let the body fall and manifested fire from his palms.
It waited until it released a huge blast of fire toward its attackers.
      Ryan turned his head away from the scene but he was haunted by their terrifying screams. He felt the warm spray of blood hit him as he saw one of the cultists die in front of him, his thoughts were scattered about who this guy was and where he came from. Ryan felt the ropes loosen as he shook them off.
It might have been because of the attack
He can see the large spider demon rise in his peripheral and charge toward the horned smaller demon.
Watch out! Ryan tried to warn him but no sound came out.
It seemed the horned figure noticed the attack and leaped into the sky.
Are those wings?
The horned figure managed to land at its head. Fire burst from his palms towards its head jewel and heard the monster's loud roar.
    The monster swung its arm around to try to hit it but the figure was too agile. It landed on the ground and used its claws to tear the demon’s legs from its body. The monster lost its balance but managed to land the blow on the figure, launching it towards the trees.
Ryan’s body was shaking violently as he saw the demon slowly approach him.
It's hurt I can outrun it
But he couldn’t move.
Ryan heard a growl as he looked towards the forest.
The horned figure ran towards the demon and slashed another leg off.
The monster kneeled and the figure slowly approached it to deal with the final blow. The monster was engulfed by the figures' flames. The force of his attack knocked Ryan off his feet.
Ryan felt the heat of the flames around him and tried to approach the demon that saved him.
I must be crazy
The demon was staring at the body of the monster he tore apart, Ryan could see it’s dark wings between the flames that divided them. The demon turned around, and he saw the blood that was splattered on him during this whole massacre. His heart stopped when he got a good look at their face.
“SHANE?!”
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inlogicaveritas · 5 years
Text
// -yells into the void- Helloooo! Anyone alive out there?
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cometmedal · 6 years
Text
Polybius
(AN: After watching an incredible hour-long documentary on the legend of the Polybius arcade cabinet, I was inspired to write something based around the story. This fic is set in the modern day when a Polybius cabinet is suddenly wheeled into Litwak’s. What is described here is based off of visuals and mechanisms from fanmade recreations of the Polybius game, coupled with a few personal changes to make the story more eventful. A special, special thank you to @sgtcalhouns for allowing me to ramble about the plot, pitching ideas and helping me piece it together!)
A mysterious new cabinet is brought into the arcade, and Felix decides he’ll pop by to greet his new neighbor(s).
“Ralph! Do you see this?”
The handyman leans over the edge of the penthouse roof and calls down to his colleague. It was just another day in Litwak’s Family Fun Arcade, and the workday had just ended. As custom dictated, the residents of Fix-It Felix Jr. all got together to clean up the mess of the workday. Where as Ralph and the Nicelanders remained on ground floor to sweep discarded bricks off to the dump, Felix took up position on the rooftops in order to clean up anything that may have been broken on Ralph’s climb up earlier in the day. He’d just been sweeping a pile of broken bricks into a bag when movement beyond the console screen caught his attention. Being elevated so far off the ground allowed for a better view through the console screen, and what he saw piqued his interest.
“What?” The wrecker called up to Felix questioningly, making it clear he hadn’t heard him from so far below the roof. Felix ushers his counterpart upwards towards the roof with a beckoning hand gesture, and just as soon as he had, Ralph was clambering up the side of the building in a very King Kong fashion. Once he was face-to-face with Felix, Felix pointed out towards the console screen.
“See that?”
Ralph looked in the direction of the console screen and squinted. He did see something, but it didn’t seem as particularly interesting as Felix was making it out to be.
“It’s the delivery guy,” he stated, looking back to Felix.
“Right,” Felix began, his eyes still trained on the console screen. “But he’s bringing in something. I think it’s a new cabinet.”
Ralph raises his eyebrows and pulls himself up and over the edge of the penthouse roof, finally settling on solid ground. From there, he leans over the edge of the roof and squints his eyes, and what he sees confirms Felix’s suspicions.
“You’re right, it does look like a new cabinet,” He notes, a look of curiosity on his face. “What game do you think it is?”
Felix shakes his head. “I’m not sure, I’m afraid I can’t really make out the name on the front of the console from here.”
Ralph hums quizzically to himself and runs his tongue along the inside of his lip as he watches, hoping for even the slightest glimpse of a cabinet title decal. As the delivery man outside the Fix-It Felix Jr. cabinet collaborates with Mr. Litwak to position the cabinet properly, one turn of the console allows a quick glimpse of the title decal.
“Puly-bias,” Ralph mumbles, and Felix looks to him with a cocked brow. “Orrr, is it Poly-bias?”
The wrecker continues to squint outwards towards the console screen, where as Felix steps back from the edge of the roof and places his hands on his hips. 
“Well,” Felix begins, a smile forming on his face. “I think I’ll drop by and give our new neighbors a visit n’ welcome em to the arcade. Care to tag along, brother?”
Ralph leans back off the edge of the rooftop that’d begun to threaten breaking under his immense weight and cranes his neck back to face Felix. He shakes his head.
“Sorry, Felix, I promised Vanellope I’d hop over to Sugar Rush and help her...” He brings up his colossal hands and performs a set of air quotes. “Renovate’ the castle. But, hey, extend my greetings to em, alright?”
Felix, still grinning (especially more so at the implication of castle ‘renovation’), nods and gives Ralph a thumbs up. “Can do, brother. Have fun!”
“Thanks, Felix.” Ralph smiles and waves to the handyman as he climbs over the edge of the roof and begins to descend back down the building. Felix watches him with a smile as he squishes himself into the little tram and leaves via the exit cable.
Felix strolls happily through Game Central Station with a pie in his hand and a pep in his step. For every passing game character he walked by, he gave a tip of the hat and a smile, accompanied by a friendly ‘hello!’
As he weaved through the crowd, trying his best to protect the little cherry pie in his hand, he makes his way towards the newly filled game port that’d been empty just hours prior. Other characters had already gathered around the port and stared off into the cable, curious about the new addition. A Surge Protector stood before the entrance to the game, clipboard in hand, keeping a close eye on the curious crowd. Felix squeezed his way through in a flurry of ‘excuse me’s, ‘pardon me’s and ‘sorry’s before he finally came to stop in front of the Surge Protector.
“Name?” the Surge Protector asked, looking down at his clipboard.
“Fix-It Felix Jr.,” Felix replied.
“Where are you coming from?” the Surge Protector asked.
“The game, ‘Fix-It Felix Jr.’,” was Felix’s response as he pointed back towards the distant entrance to his game with a hitchhiker finger.
“Are you bringing any food with you?” was the Surge Protector’s next question, obviously referring to the pie Felix held in his hands.
“Just this cherry pie,” Felix responded, holding it up in clear view to the Surge Protector. “I thought it’d be a nice welcoming gift.”
“Mm,” the Surge Protector hummed, scribbling away on his clipboard. He nods and clicks his pen. “You may pass.”
Felix smiles and tips his hat to the Surge Protector, thanking him and happily making his way into the mysterious game.
“Hello? Helloooo?” Felix calls down the cable corridor as he makes his way into the game. Strangely, the game had no form of transportation in, nor out -- not a tram, train, nothing. It made sense to him, however, considering the game had just been plugged in. He was early, he reckoned, far too early for the game to be assigned any form of transportation. “I’m Fix-It Felix Jr. from the game, Fix-It... Fe...”
As the emerged from the other side of the cable leading into the game, he was met with nothing. Nothing but blackness, an endless dark void stretching on forever. Not a floor beneath him, not a ceiling above him, no walls surrounding him. It was if nothing within the game had come into existence yet.
“...H-, Hello?” 
Felix, beginning to feel a little bit shaken, took an uneasy step into the void. He’d almost expected to fall considering the seeming lack of a solid floor, but to his surprise, a floor connected with the underside of his boot and allowed him to continue forward.
“Is anybody there...?” he called out into the dark as he cautiously continued to walk farther into the game world. “I... I brought cherry pie!”
Nothing. Not a soul in sight, not a sound; his voice didn’t even return an echo. Felix swallowed thickly as he slowly moved forward. He was beginning to become uncomfortable, but it wasn’t like him to get cold feet when it came to greeting new games to the arcade. Surely somebody lived here, right? As he went along, Felix anxiously tapped out the invisible floor with his foot. He’d never been to a game without a floor and, more than anything at the moment, he was afraid of falling into an unseen pit, never to return. However, with as much caution as he put into visualizing his path, he’d neglected to pay attention to how strangely he was moving due to his fear, which sent him tumbling forward and to the floor. He screamed as he went down, and the pie had been flung out of his hands just as soon as he collapsed--
--But he hit the floor. 
Felix, now lying against the black void, shot up and lifted his head to search out the pie he’d lost, just in time to witness it fall through the floor as though the floor he’d just fallen upon didn’t exist.
“NO----!” he yelled, thrusting his arm out towards the pie as it fell into the void, only to be stopped by the invisible floor. He could only watch as the pie fell into the blackness and exploded into vividly flashing rainbow pixels. After the pie fully faded away into the dark, Felix pushed himself up onto his knees and ran his fingers through his hair in distress.
“W-What is this place...?”
He looks up from the vast darkness below him and begins to look around. Nothing around him boasted a sight different from the rest of the nothingness around him, but one thing he’d noticed was how the entrance to the game had vanished behind him. Had it vanished, or had he walked in a little too far?
“...Is...” he furrows his brows, before cupping his hands around his mouth and crying out, “Is anybody there?! Hello---?!”
Silence. And then a beep. Two beeps. A prolonged sine wave. Suddenly, the world burst into eye-burning, strobing rainbow colors.
Ralph pulls into Fix-It Felix Jr. on the tram. It squeaks harshly against the railing and bumps around roughly, but he doesn’t seem bothered. In fact, he was happy to be back. The smile he wore proudly on his face told of a fantastic day in Sugar Rush that he just had to tell somebody about! In fact, he’d already been rearing to hop out of the tram as it slowly screeched to a stop, knocking up against the buffer stop. Just as soon as it’d stopped, Ralph began to squeeze himself out of his seat -- the tram was, just as always, too small to fit him, and it was a little frustrating, but he never worried too much about it anymore.
A little bit of shaking and rocking around later and he finally manages to pull himself out, stepping out onto the grass and inhaling the fresh air. It was good to be home, especially considering how choking the sugar in the air back at Sugar Rush could be at times. Excitement bubbling inside him and fresh air filling his lungs, he begins to make his way towards the apartment.
“Heyoooo,” he greets as he pushes the double doors to the apartment open, careful not to break them. Inside the apartment, Nicelanders made their daily commute, and the smell of freshly baked pie wafted through the corridors. He takes in a deep whiff of the delicious scent before squeezing himself in through the doorway. “I’m back!”
One of the Nicelanders, lil ol’ Mary, happened to be making her way past the door as Ralph stepped in. She pauses and, in her 8-bit jerky way, turns to face Ralph with a sweet smile. 
“Oh! Welcome back, Ralph,” she greets, an enthusiastic tune in her voice.
“Uh, heya, Mary,” Ralph greets back, a grin on his face. “Have you seen Felix? I gotta tell him something.”
Mary pauses, the smile on her face soon overwritten by a confused expression. Truth be told, she hadn’t seen Felix since he left earlier that day, and she didn’t think anybody had seen him since then, either. She shook her head.
“I’m afraid I haven’t seen him, but I’ll ask around,” she replies, a small smile returning to her face. 
“Thanks,” Ralph says, and Mary nods at him before continuing on her way.
The bright light was blinding.
Felix shields his eyes against the flashing lights, but they soon begin to die down, prompting him to crack his eyes and squint through his fingers. What he sees before him is a strange sight -- a various collection of overlapping white wireframe shapes, turning, rotating, morphing and deforming. As it turned and twisted, it let out strange low-frequency beeps and squeaks.
“Wh... what is...?”
Felix took a step back as the amalgamation of shapes began to grow in size, and as it continued to move in its strange ways, shapes were expelled from the rotating mass in different colors. Light green, red and deep purple, the shapes swirled around the original wireframe mass, creating a slowly, but strangely moving pattern. Circles rotated squares, squares rotated diamonds... it was oddly beautiful. 
Almost hypnotizing, even.
Felix, against his better judgement, took a step forward. The shapes twirling around rhythmically in the dark began to spiral out into the distance, just as soon being attracted back in towards the center, as though the wireframe mass controlling them had its own center of gravity. It almost felt as though that was the case, as Felix continued to approach.
And suddenly, it grew exponentially in size, exploding into various pixelated bits and pieces that spread all across the void. The pieces swirled and clumped together, flying past the disorientated handyman at speeds he’d never seen before. They came together to form various shapes - orbs, disks, clumps of multicolored pixels that made the once colorless void appear as though it were an entire galaxy. 
Felix, dazed and confused, stopped dead in his tracks and began to backtrack, eventually turning around and taking off into the distance. Whatever was happening, he didn’t like it. He had to get out, and get out fast, because his gut was yelling to him, ‘You were never supposed to come here. You should've never come here. Everything about this place is wrong.’
He ran as fast as he could, ducking and dodging floating bits of pixels. The noise emitted by the swirling mass of shapes just before it exploded persisted, growing louder, sharper and deeper by the minute. Soon, it was all he could hear over the drum of his heart beating in his ears. Deafening, deafening, loud, bright, he was overwhelmed by everything flying past him, but he dared not pay it attention as he continued to run. It seemed, though, that no matter how much he ran, he never moved.
The screeching sound began to muffle and die off, soon replaced by a gentle but rhythmic pulse. The pixelated planetoids surrounding him flickered and faded, swirling into rainbow pixels and disappearing into the black. He couldn’t see a thing, nor could he hear a thing, but did he dare look back?
He dared.
Felix slowed his pace, though he kept moving forward. He turned to look back over his shoulder and saw a distant purple and white light -- was that the exit? He stopped and turned to face it. It didn’t move, it didn’t make a sound; it simply sat in the distance. Felix stood frozen and stared off into the light for several seconds, and soon he mustered the courage to take a step forward.
The light moved.
The light grew.
And before he realized it, it was far too late -- the light engulfed the world in a rapidly rotating starburst of black and white.
Ralph slowly approached the entrance to Hero’s Duty. After asking around Niceland for tips on Felix’s whereabouts, nothing had come up, so the wrecker simply assumed he was late because he’d decided to drop by and visit his wife.
As Ralph walked in towards the entrance cable, a flickering blue flash of energy zipped across the floor at his feet and stopped to the side of the entrance, pixelating upwards into a full form -- great, another Surge Protector.
“Name?” he asked, which prompted a sigh from Ralph.
“Wreck-It Ralph,” he responded.
“Where are you coming from?” asked the Surge Protector again.
“Uh, Fix-It Felix Jr., of course,” Ralph replied, already fed up. Although life had gotten much better for him back at home, Surge Protectors still treated them as they had from Day 1. He was sick of random security checks.
“Mmkay,” the Surge Protector said, scribbling something on his clipboard. “Have you brought anything with or back with you?”
“No,” Ralph mumbled. “Look, just let me through. I’m looking for my coworker.”
The Surge Protector, sparing Ralph not a single glance, continued to scribble in his clipboard before pulling his pen up off the paper and clicking it. 
“You’re free to go,” he said. “Enjoy your day.”
And without a moment to spare, the Surge Protector pixelated back into a little ball of blue energy and zipped off for the next game plug. Ralph rolled his eyes and made his way into Hero’s Duty.
“Uhh, hello?” Ralph called out as he walked along the war-torn battlefield of Hero’s Duty. “Felix? ...Sarge?”
Several moments of aimlessly wandering around and calling out to no one passed, and eventually, another figure made itself known amidst the sickening green smog of Hero’s Duty. Tall, slim, but bulky, there was no mistaking it---
“Wreck-It,” came a low, but authoritative voice. The unmistakable figure of Sergeant Calhoun slipped out from beneath the veil of ashy smog, appearing as stoic as ever. “State your business.”
“Hey, Sarge,” Ralph greeted, raising a hand to rub the nape of his neck. “I’m, uh, looking for Felix.”
“Haven’t seen him,” she responded, placing a hand on her hip. “Why?”
“Well, I haven’t seen him either, nor has anybody back at our game seen him...”
Calhoun raised an eyebrow, already beginning to feel a strange feeling in her gut, telling her something was wrong.
“I was just wondering if he was here doing, uh...” Ralph trails off for a second, eventually picking back up his train of thought. “Husband stuff.”
Calhoun scrunched up her nose and pursed her lips. She’d let that one pass. “If he’s here, he sure hasn’t told me,” she said, cocking out a hip. “Where did you last see him?”
Ralph furrowed his brows and looked off to the side as he recalled that day’s events. The last he heard of Felix, Felix was off to visit that odd new game that’d come into the arcade...
“Well, last I saw him, he told me he was going to visit this new game that came in today,” he said as he continued to recall what happened. “I just thought he’d be back by now.”
“What game?’ Calhoun asked, her voice taking on a rough tone.
“I don’t know,” Ralph replied, scratching his neck again. “I couldn’t get a good look at the decal on the console. I think it was called ‘Poly-bias’ or something.”
The sergeant fell silent for several seconds as she racked her brain for any potential memory of a game called Poly-bias. Nothing came up, nothing except for a game she’d heard about from passing gamers of Litwak’s years ago that shared a similar name; Polybius.
“...Sarge?” Ralph inquired, breaking the silence between them that’d began to become awkward. Calhoun looked up at him with an expression of mixed confusion, anger, and... fear.
“...Are you sure that cabinet didn’t say Polybius?”
Ralph cocked his head to the side.
“Actually, yeah, now that you say it, I think that’s what it said on the conso--”
Suddenly, a swift fisted blow connected with Ralph’s face, causing him to stumble backwards and cry out in pain. He reaches up to grasp his sore cheek, and looks at Calhoun with a look of wild confusion.
“What was that for?!”
Calhoun took a step towards Ralph and grabbed him by the collar. She glared into his eyes, a fierce fire burning in her own.
“You let him go ALONE?!”
“W-, Well, I---”
Again, she reels back and decks him, causing him to cry out and stumble backwards once more. And, just as last time, she stomps up to him and snatches him up by the collar.
“Do you even KNOW what Polybius is?!” the sergeant snarls behind clenched teeth. Ralph sputters and leans back, hoping to put some kind of distance between his sore, tender face and her terrifying glare, to no avail.
“No, I-- look, what’s the deal with this ‘Polybius’ game?!”
Calhoun releases him and he takes a step back, fearing she may lash out and hit him again. She’s enraged, and he doesn’t wanna push it, so he stays quiet and keeps his distance.
“Polybius,” she began. “Is a game from the early 1980s that grew to fame some time after I was plugged in. They say it was a government conspiracy, a game made to recruit innocent gamers into the army. Gamers who played it fell violently ill shortly after playing, and those who didn’t play it say they occasionally saw men in black suits coming into the arcade to collect data from the cabinet.”
She turns to Ralph, who appears bewildered by the story.
“One day, that cabinet vanished. Nobody ever saw Polybius again. Some swear it was real, while some swear it’s fake. A hoax. A myth.”
She begins to slowly walk towards Ralph, whom at this point isn’t sure if he should stay put or back away. Just as he thinks she’s going to fly off the handle and hit him again, bracing for impact, she gets up in his face.
“And now, the cabinet is in our arcade. And Felix is out there.”
Calhoun steps back and reaches over her shoulder to un-hatch her blaster from her power armor. She cocks it and tucks the back-end into the crook of her arm.
“We’re going to get him. And since this is your fault, you’re coming with me.”
Calhoun stormed towards the entrance to Polybius, with Ralph in tow just behind her. That same flash of blue lightning sparked across the floor and pixelated at the side of the game entrance into the form of the Surge Protector, whom immediately stopped them mere steps from the entrance. Just as he opened his mouth to speak, Calhoun shoved him out of the way, causing him to stumble back and drop his glasses. Ralph stayed silent and followed behind Calhoun, and just before he entered the game alongside her, he shot the blinded Surge Protector an apologetic look. He didn’t like Surge Protectors, but he couldn’t help feeling bad on account of Calhoun’s sour mood.
As the two entered the game, they were met by the sight of an endless black void, the same void Felix had stumbled into hours prior. Ralph looked around, mildly confused by the absence of scenery. Was this really the ‘dangerous game’ Calhoun went on a tangent about?
“Uhh, are you sure this is the game, Sarge?” he asked, digging his fingers into his only remaining overall strap, Calhoun didn’t respond. He understood, but at the same time, her silence was making him uneasy. “...Look, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to---”
“Shut it,” she snapped, and he obeyed, immediately zipping his lips shut. Silence ensued as the two continued further into the game, up until the faint sound of a buzz began to make itself apparent. Calhoun froze, as did Ralph. They listened.
The sound grew faintly louder, up until it began to warble and pulse. Where as Ralph looked around in confusion, Calhoun crinkled her nose in displeasure. 
“What is-” Ralph began, but Calhoun raised a finger to him.
“Hush,” she commanded as she listened for the sound. She noted to herself that although the buzzing surrounded them from all sides, it seemed to emit strongest from the invisible path before them. She began to walk forward, and Ralph followed behind her silently. Sure enough, the farther they progressed, the louder the noise seemed to become until suddenly, it faded out. The silence that ensued didn’t last long until the pulsing buzz was replaced by a single flat sine wave, echoing out into the distance. 
“This game isn’t much of a game,” Ralph whispered as they moved. Soon, they came to approach a distant light, and while Ralph squinted in an attempt to see it better, Calhoun clenched her teeth and cocked her blaster. Whatever that was, there was no doubt it’d spell bad news for the two of them. They approached with caution. The sine wave grew louder as they came closer.
“Is that...”
Within the light stood a darkened figure whom, as the wrecker-sergeant duo came closer, dared not to turn around, and instead chose to continue staring into the light with its back to them. Ralph cocked his head and Calhoun tightened her grip on the barrel of her blaster.
“...Felix?”
Ralph took a few steps out in front of Calhoun, careful not to come too close to the figure. It seemed that with every step they took, the light before the silhouette dimmed, eventually leaving nothing but the figure to stand in the darkness. There was no mistaking its identity, judging by details that could be made out the closer they came -- blue hat, light blue work shirt, petite form and brown work gloves -- it was Felix.
“Felix---”
Ralph extended his hand to Felix, whom seemed oblivious to his and Calhoun’s presence. Calhoun walked to meet with Ralph, standing just steps behind him with her blaster held close to her chest. Something wasn’t right about this whole thing, she thought. This wasn’t Felix.
Just as Ralph made contact with Felix’s shoulder, Felix tensed and let out a loud buzzing noise, causing Ralph to step backwards, squeeze his eyes shut and cover his ears. Calhoun followed suit and grit her teeth, though she kept her eyes open just enough to witness ‘Felix’s’ form ripping apart and exploding into flashing rainbow pixels that swirled hypnotically into the dark and vanished. Just as soon as he had vanished, so did the horrific buzzing noise. Ralph cracked an eye to see that Felix was gone, and that Calhoun was standing there, staring, blaster turned down to the ground.
“What happened?” he asked quietly, removing his hands from his ears. “Where’s Felix?”
Calhoun readied her blaster again and growled. “I’m going to burn this modforsaken game to the ground when I get out of here.” Shortly after speaking, she began to walk. “Come on.”
Ralph sighed and returned to following her lead. Again, it was silent, and it seemed as though the two of them were walking for hours. Ralph often tried to make conversation, but he was almost always shut down by Calhoun. The only time she would answer him was if what he said regarded the current situation, or what more information she had on Polybius. 
Bzzzzzz.
That sound was back. It seemed to ring out whenever something was nearby, so this time, the two of them wasted no time in searching out the direction in which the sound played the loudest. Ralph hoped it’d actually be Felix this time, and Calhoun hoped Felix was even still alive.
Some walking later and they come across another figure. However, this time, this figure was on its knees, directly facing them, but with its head down, they couldn’t make out its face. Calhoun took the lead and held her blaster close, cautiously approaching the figure. As she came closer, she was able to tell that, once again, it was Felix. But was it the real Felix? She would take a chance. Ralph stays back as Calhoun kneels slightly and reaches out to touch the figure, and to his surprise, he doesn’t tense. He doesn’t buzz. He doesn’t glitch and explode into a mess of pixels.
It was him.
She drops her blaster and kneels fully to grab Felix, pulling him closely and digging her fingers gently into his hair. Ralph sighs in relief and smiles at the sight, but just as he’s ready to usher the group back the way they came, he noticed something -- Felix wasn’t moving, nor was he responding. His head simply rested against her shoulder, and his arms hung limply at his sides.
“Uh, Sarge,” he begins. “He’s...”
Calhoun pulls back, and she realizes Ralph’s point before it’s even spoken. She figured Felix hadn’t reacted at first because he was upset or tired, and considering the nature of the game, she hadn’t put it beyond him to feel such a way, especially after being stuck in the game for so long on his lonesome.
Ralph takes a small step forward, eyes trained on the two as Calhoun gently takes her hand to push up Felix’s hat that’d fallen over his eyes when she pulled him towards her. What she saw sent panic racing through her code, as well as Ralph’s.
Felix’s eyes were completely glazed over, occasionally flickering through cycles of static, white and multiple colors as though they were miniature TV screens. The expression upon his face appeared emotionless - brainless, even. 
“Felix,” Calhoun spoke, her heart beginning to race. This wasn’t happening, was it? She held him in her arms and gently shook him, but he didn’t respond, instead slumping as though he were a lifeless rag doll.
Ralph, starting to feel sick at his stomach, knelt on one knee at Calhoun’s side. He plucked Felix’s hat off his head and began to fan Felix with it, hoping it would elicit some kind of reaction. “Felix? Felix! Snap out of it!”
Suddenly, Felix let out a deafening 8-bit screech and his body began to glitch and spasm in Calhoun’s arms, causing Calhoun to jump to her feet and drop him. Ralph followed, shooting up off his knee and covering his ears in a futile attempt to muffle the terrifying screeching. They watch in absolute horror as Felix’s form flickers and bugs, but in the midst of the chaos, he clumsily rises to his feet. The way he stands is unnatural - slumped, limp, as though he were a puppet piloted by an amateur puppeteer. Suddenly, he bursts into pixels and vanishes.
“NO--!!!” Calhoun yells, her voice cracking, as she reaches out towards the pixels that’d already begun to fade, as though she could take hold of them and somehow, prevent him from vanishing into the darkness. But it’s too late -- he’s already gone.
Silence falls.
Calhoun stares blankly into the void. Ralph is completely silent. What he saw, what she held... that was Felix. Unlike the last contrived illusion that’d vanished before they could even get through to it, this Felix was real. Calhoun swore he was real, that what she clung to had been him... and Ralph thought the same. Even the hat he’d taken from Felix’s head had long since dissolved into code. They lost him. They were too late.
...
Suddenly, there’s a spark. A buzz. Calhoun looks up to spy the little light and Ralph, who sees it as well, tenses and holds his breath. A spark. Another spark. A pop, and a wireframe shape pixelates into existence. The sparks continue to appear and pop, each spawning a wireframe shape from their position -- squares, diamonds and circles, each spawn and begin to rotate around a specific center of gravity. The duo are kicked into fight-or-flight mode. Ralph steps back, and Calhoun reaches down to quickly retrieve the blaster she had dropped a few moments earlier. The shapes swirl and in the center, shapes begin to spawn and mend into other shapes.
“What--, What is that?!” Ralph stares on in bewilderment and clenches his fists as Calhoun backs up to join him at his side, blaster loaded and at the ready.
The connecting shapes start to form a mass of twisting wireframe shapes, turning and deforming as another mass begins to pixelate in front of it. The forming mass floats several feet off of the ground, buzzing and flickering until it comes together into one coherent shape, a human figure -- Felix. Calhoun and Ralph stare on in mixed horror. Just moments ago, they thought they’d lost him, but here he was now... lost to the hypnosis of the alluring rotating visuals.
“Felix!” Ralph called out. “Felix, listen to us! Snap out of it!”
Felix is silent, merely looking to Ralph with his blank eyes. He cocks his head, and opens his mouth, but words fall out in a glitched, monotone voice--
“HONOR APATHY.”
Calhoun gripped her blaster. “Fix-It, what the &^#% are you doing?!”
There’s no response. The shapes hanging just behind his floating form continue to swirl and twist. The wireframe mass behind him begins to rotate, slowly at first, and then faster, faster, faster---
“FELIX!”
The scene before them is accompanied by a dull buzzing, and just as soon as the shape mass begins to swirl, it’s encased in a purple light that begins to spread out and swallow the void. Ralph and Calhoun don’t back down. They’d come this far, they had to save him. The purple light quickly overtakes the darkness and before they know it, the world around them begins to rapidly strobe in neon colors; red, purple, blue, green, and white. The display is blinding. Everything swirls together at a tapering point positioned just behind Felix, warping and stretching outward towards infinity. Black and white starburst spreads out before them, winding and spinning. Felix was under its control.
“What do we do?!” Ralph shouts over the humming buzz. “He can’t hear us!”
“Do you think I know what to do?!” Calhoun yells back. “We can’t just fight him, he could die! And in case you didn’t know, if you die outside your game, you DON’T respawn!”
Calhoun backs up as the shapes surrounding Felix start rotating faster around his form. Ralph’s mind races as he grasps for the smallest fragment of a plan -- and then it hits him.
“The rotating thing!” He calls out. “We’ve gotta defeat the rotating thing!”
The shapes begin to spasm and fly out in random directions, flying past the two as though they were projectiles. This was it. This was the final showdown, and it was either win or die.
Calhoun takes the lead by diving backwards and quickly snapping back to shoot her blaster. As the wireframe shapes shoot past her, she guns them down one by one, and one by one, they explode into pixels and fade away. Ralph, on the other hand, makes use of his wrecking prowess by slamming the shapes into bits with his giant fists. Just as soon as a shape is destroyed, another spawns in its place, orbiting Felix’s body like a planet. 
“SURRENDER,” the handyman shouts out in a robotic voice, thrusting out a hand to command the shapes to fly forward. Ralph shields himself behind his arms and jumps to dodge the flying projectiles, while Calhoun attempts to weave her way through the chaos and close the distance between herself and the authoritative wireframe amalgamation. She aims her blaster for the mass, careful not to hit Felix, and begins to fire rapidly at it. The hits connect and a deafening 8-bit screech is emitted from Felix, his body flickering red and green. The world around them flashes along with him, buzzing and changing colors from black and white to yellow and white. The frenzied flying shapes burst into pixels, temporarily clearing the area of any and all projectiles.
Ralph takes advantage of this temporary pause to crack his knuckles and take a deep breath, and Calhoun backs away from the swirling weak spot. Felix’s form relaxes and he recuperates, as do the shapes that begin spawning from behind him and swirling around him twice as fast as before. Once again, the handyman calls out in that haunting robotic voice,
                                                   “OBEY.”
He extends his hand in command, and the shapes are sent flying. Ralph dashes forward into the chaos and springs into the air, where he brings his fists down upon a wireframe square and crushes it into bits. It pixelates into thin air. Calhoun runs around Felix who, this time, turns to face her. He commands a flurry of shapes her way and she throws herself to the floor, pointing her blaster towards and shooting down as many shapes as she possibly can. 
                                                 “SUBMIT.”
She rolls over, pushes herself to her feet and takes off in the opposite direction, passing by Ralph who was currently smashing a shape to pieces. There were too many for him to keep up with, so as he made quick work of his current target, another shape made a beeline for his body from behind and slammed into him at full speed. He yelped and fell to the ground, temporarily down for the count as his body corrupted and bugged.
Having been in earshot of Ralph as he was knocked to the floor and witnessing him subsequently becoming incapacitated, Calhoun cursed under her breath and wove through the winding projectiles as she ran to his side to cover him.
                                              “NO IDEAS.”
Felix directs a burst of speeding shapes in the duo’s direction with the intent to take them down, but these attempts are once again trumped as she guns them down. As she works, Ralph begins to come to, stirring beneath her guard and slowly raising himself up on his arms. He groans and shakes his head, reaching up to dig his fingers into his scalp. This was becoming too much for him, and at this point, he wanted nothing more than to go home.
                                            “CON-NSUME.”
Calhoun, with her focus trained on the oncoming danger, aimed as well as she could for the wireframe fusion behind Felix, firing a single shot directly into it. Again, he let out a horrific screech and every lingering shape exploded into bits, and as his body flickered and flashed, so did the background. It shifted from yellow and white to red and white, and although it continued to swirl, it seemed to lag and glitch.
“Get into position,” Calhoun commanded as she stepped back off of Ralph, and Ralph nodded, backing up and taking a defensive stance. Judging by the way the visuals reacted to Felix having taken damage, much glitcher than the first time, Calhoun had a hunch.
             “D--DDDD-D-O NOT QUEST-TSH-TION AUTHORIT-T-TY.”
Felix’s voice, once completely robotic, took on a more lifelike inflection between each glitch and stutter. Calhoun held dearly to her blaster and Ralph clenched his fists, gritting his teeth and watching as Felix slowly regained ‘control’ of himself. The background flickered and the colors began to swirl rapidly. Wireframe shapes formed around Felix once again, following suite with the background, spinning in a frenzy, crashing into each other, clumping and merging into larger shapes.
This was the final phase.
                                 “OB-BB-EY AUTHORRRR-R-RITY.”
One command and the final phase begins; giant spinning shapes flying erratically and the duo fighting to stay alive. At a time like this, Calhoun and Ralph were glad arcade games were so simple and demanded so few boss phases, for neither knew just how much longer they could bare this. The visuals were headache-inducing, the battle tiring, and the stakes were at an all-time high.
“Sarge!” Ralph’s voice cut through the noise. “Look out!”
Calhoun whipped back just in time to find a shape flying at her at high speeds, and she ducked just in time to avoid it. However, unfortunately, as she recovered, another shape sped past her, clipping her hands and knocking her blaster clean from her grasp. Her blaster fell to the ground, sparked and combusted, where as her hands that’d been struck began to spasm and glitch. She sucked in sharply through her teeth, cursing and retired to a safe distance, occasionally having to duck and dodge a flying shape projectile as she scrambled to grab hold of the gun in her side holster. It was difficult to take hold of and difficult to wield with her hands in this condition, but mod, would she try.
Ralph took on shape after shape, struggling considerably with their larger size. They didn’t stand a chance against his massive wrecking hands, but the increase in size made it difficult to consistently take them down. As he struggled to shove back and crush a shape, several more twisting shapes took its place, soon coming to overwhelm him as he juggled one after one. They flew by faster than he could process, bigger than he could handle, and just when it seemed like he was done for, a shining laser ripped through the dark and embedded itself into one of the shapes, blowing it to bits upon impact. Ralph jumped and whipped back to identify the source of the errant laser, only to see Calhoun, recovered and holding on tightly to her spare gun. 
“What are you gawking at?!” she barked, aiming for oncoming shapes. “Stop staring and get back to work!”
Ralph nodded and turned his attention back to the battle. As he pulverized the incoming wireframe projectiles, he had an idea; the shapes were large, quite large. Even hard to see through at times due to how many colors were swallowing their surroundings at once. This made it difficult for them to fight, he noted, but how could he use this against their assailant? It was time to test his plan.
Calhoun continues to gun down the shapes, occasionally having to throw her self to the side in order to dodge and gain a better leverage over the chaos. She blasts a shape flying towards her from the front, turns to gun down one from the back, and as she whips around to shoot down another, her gun clicks against her will. Click. Click. 
She was out of ammo.
Angered, she tosses her empty gun into the fray and it’s immediately struck by a stray flying shape and destroyed. She reaches down her thigh to rip a combat knife out of a hidden holster, and although she knew it’d do virtually nothing against the opposition, she was not one to back down so easily. Shapes fly and zip through the flickering void and she works her best to dodge them. She tosses herself to the ground on one occasion in order to avoid one, but just as soon as she’s on the ground, Calhoun notices one making its way right for her. She scrambles to push herself off the ground, but it’s coming in too fast--
--And suddenly, the world erupts into a final, ear-splitting pixelated scream. The projectiles flying throughout the area begin to combust, exploding into bits and pieces that fly anywhere and everywhere, and as Calhoun covers her ears and squints through the destruction, she notices a bright light coming from the center where the fusion of twisting wireframe shapes once stood. It flickers and pixelates, flashes in color, and as it does so, the world around her flickers in rapid color succession. Everything is so painfully bright and loud, she squeezes her eyes shut and digs her fingernails into the areas around her ears, grinding her teeth.
The light begins to die down and the sound begins to muffle. At some point, the sergeant opens her eyes to the sight of the light in the center dimming, pulsing and flickering. It eventually flickers out and a single figure falls from within the light suspended within mid-air and hits the ground with a sickening thud. The background begins to blur in a mozaic pattern fashion, eventually fading away into black. She can finally see and what she sees is, standing behind the small collapsed body, a much taller figure standing over it, fists clenched and chest heaving.
Ralph delivered the final blow.
Calhoun brushes back her bangs and immediately jumps up, ignoring the painful migraine that’d begun to settle in her head, and rushes to the sight of the fallen body. She falls to her knees at its side, and begins to scramble to find any evidence the body before her is still living.
“Fuh... Felix...” Ralph huffed, kneeling to the opposite side of his coworker’s limp body, at a loss as to what else to do. He had to trust in Calhoun, trust in himself -- trust that they hadn’t just killed him.
“Fix-It,” Calhoun urged, reaching to gently jostle Felix. “Felix!”
No response. She tries again, once more calling his name, but he doesn’t move or say anything. Her eyes widen and her chest begins to tighten. It couldn’t be... he couldn’t be gone, he just couldn’t! Ralph watches as Calhoun gently lifts Felix’s body up into her lap, gently wrapping her arms around him and burying her face in his neck. He can’t admit it -- won’t admit to it, the fact he was choking up. As Calhoun holds on dearly to Felix and sobs, Ralph raises his hand and buries his face in his palm, surrendering to the tears that threatened to break free.
“...nnh...”
Calhoun pulls her tear-stained face from the crook of Felix’s neck and turns him in just a way so she can see him. His eyes are squeezing tightly and his lip is quivering.
“Felix...”
Ralph looks up from his palm and watches as Felix tenses and shifts in Calhoun’s arms. His eyes slowly flutter open and he blinks against the dazed blur clouding his vision, just barely able to make out his wife’s face.
“Felix!” She exclaims, her voice cracking under the thickness of her throat. 
“T-, Tammy...?” Felix mutters, his voice just barely above a whisper. His head is pounding and his vision is cloudy, prompting him to tightly squeeze his eyes shut. He reopens them to find his vision has bettered ever-so-slightly, allowing him to better make out the details in Calhoun’s face.
“Felix,” comes Ralph’s voice from behind, and although Felix tries to crane his neck in order to look back towards the source of the voice, Ralph scoots from the back and to Calhoun’s side in order to make it easier for the both of them to see each other. His eyes are red and his cheeks are soaked, but a relieved smile is slowly making its way across his face. “Thank mod you’re okay... we thought...”
“What were you thinking,” Calhoun began, a sharpness in her tone, pulling Felix’s attention back to her. “Y-You could’ve gotten yourself killed! You... y-, you...”
She suddenly pulls him close and wraps her arms tightly around his small frame, eliciting a startled squeak from the handyman.
“You’re okay...”
Felix, still somewhat disorientated, slowly brings his arms up to wrap them around his wife’s waist. He rubs her back in slow imperfect circles, and she sighs shakily into his hair.
“We’re so glad you’re okay,” Ralph says, wiping his eyes.
“I-I’m sorry,” is Felix’s only response as he presses his face into Calhoun’s chest.
“It’s fine,” Calhoun replies, bringing a hand up to cup it over his head, “But if you ever pull a stunt like this again, I’ll kill you.”
 Felix nods against her armor breastplate. “Yes, ma’am.”
“Let’s get out of here,” Ralph suddenly interrupts, “I wanna go home.”
Calhoun nods, and as the two lift themselves to their feet, she continues to carry Felix. He nuzzles up against her as she and Ralph make their way out of the game, never to return.
Mysteriously, the game was wheeled out of Litwak’s the next day.
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yourghostcat · 5 years
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Helloooo! I've been meaning to ask you this (as I love your music tag) and I think this is the right time to do so! What are your favorite albums of 2018? (K-Pop or not I just want to know your favorites) Thanks!
OH THERE ARE SO MANY!  Here we go
(not KPop and not in order (or maybe it is in order from FAVE to fave idk … and i’m probably missing some)
Simulation Theory (Muse) /// High as Hope (Florence and the Machine) /// Tranquility Base Hotel & Casino (Arctic Monkeys) /// The Carters Everything Is Love (The Carters) /// Nina Cried Power EP (Hozier) /// Zayn (Icarus Falls) /// Still EP (Mazzy Star) /// Be the Cowboy (Mitski) /// The Now Now (Gorillaz) /// East Atlanta Love Letter (6LACK) /// Origins (Imagine Dragons) /// Marauder (Interpol) /// Sweetener (Ariana Grande) /// Dirty Computer (Janelle Monáe) /// Bad Witch (Nine Inch Nails) /// My Dear Melancholy, (The Weeknd) /// A Brief Inquiry into Online Relationships (The 1975) /// Black Panther the Album Music (and there are songs that I LOVED so much like Lana’s Venice Bitch and Mariners Apartment Complex & Rina Sawayama’s Cherry)
(KPop and not in order,,,, I mean it started off like that but then I just typed my most listened albums sajdkjf )
24 How To Find True Love and Happiness (Hyukoh) /// Poet|Artist (Jonghyun) /// The Story of Light (SHINee) /// Midnight Candy (Fromm) /// TUSM (Yubin) /// Do Worry Be Happy  (Primary, Anda) /// PRISM (CIFIKA) /// Voice (Onew) /// 20 (South Club) /// Warning (Sunmi) /// Blooming Days (EXO-CBX) /// XX (MINO) /// Square Up (Blackpink) /// Remember Us : Youth Part 2 (DAY6) /// Wind (Heize) /// LOVE SHOT (EXO) /// Alone In The City (Dreamcatcher)  /// One & Six (APINK) /// Eau De VIXX (VIXX) /// Everyd4y (Winner) ///  RETURN (iKON) /// Planet Bonds (FTISLAND) /// The Great Seungri (Seungri) /// One Shot, Two Shot & Woman (BOA) /// Wake Me Up (Marmello) /// Red Diary Page.2 (Bolbbangan4) /// Offset (Chungha) /// Void (The Rose) /// Love Yourself: Tear (BTS) /// Line (UNI.T) /// Director’s Cut (Seventeen) /// Faces of Love (Suzy) /// Massive (B.A.P) /// Black Dress (CLC) /// NCT 2018 Empathy (NCT) /// Time for the Moon Night (GFRIEND) /// JiminxJamie (Jimin Park) /// The First Scene (Yuri) /// Dear Me (Baek A Yeon) /// [+ +] (LOONA) /// Refresh (Soyou) /// FACE (KEY) /// Are You There (Monsta X) /// Is Who (Minseo) /// Something New (Taeyeon) /// Jon1 (O3OHN) /// Diary (Park So Eun) ///  Summer Ade (DIA) /// I Am ((G)I-DLE) /// REtro Futurism (Triple H) /// Dream of Paradise (Kriesha Chu) /// I Want Love (Kassy) /// Ride On The Wind (KARD) /// The Perfect Red Velvet (Red Velvet)
[and there are SO MANY great songs that released this year
and here’s a bonus- Japanese;
Taemin (Taemin) /// The Best From Now On (SHINee) /// Countdown (EXO) /// Watashi Kono Mama de Ii no kana (BOA) /// Hatsukoi (Utada Hikaru) /// Magic (EXO-CBX) /// Bunriha no Natsu (Nariaki Obukuro) /// Big Yell (Yuzu) ///  Hologram (KEY)
I didn’t get to keep up with Japanese releases this year :((( I’m sure I missed so many great albums :(((( oooh! and I loved the songs BiSH released this year & and recently Radwimp’s Sokkenai too
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gxddxss-vexta-blog · 6 years
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~* Hello, nb community! ~*
Helloooo~? I might just be yelling into the void here, but hi!! >w<
My name is Vexta, I’m 19, and I am a vaguefluid xoy and juxera. Uwu
My pronouns are she/her, but recently I’ve been trying out fae/faer/faerself and I’ve really been preferring it! Uvu But either works~
Me and my two enby friends Randolf @rando-elf and Vale @venusdemonic have decided to make some tumblrs and come together to make a main one called the @softnsafe-club !
It’ll be a safe space and happy place for all trans, nonbinary, MOGAI, disabled, otherkin, and/or any persons who fall under the lgbt or disabled umbrella! You are all valid and all worthy of appreciation and a safe, happy, encouraging place <3
The blog will consist of posts and reblogs of encouraging messages of validation, quotes, images, and moodboards! We might throw in some witchy/Wiccan related posts too because we’re all pagans~ But it will mainly be lgbt/nb/neurodivergence positivity. >uO
We're opening moodboard requests too if anyone is interested!
In any case, this will be my personal blog where I’ll talk about myself--I’m going to make a post soon about my gender specifically. If you want to stay updated on us, give us a follow and check out @softnsafe-club! 💖🌸✨~
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