#She still likes being off-putting in a harmless way but her goal is never to hurt just to toy - I mean she literally is one lol | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

exhaslo · 4 months

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Here me out….Miguel x femvillian reader who gets defeated in a fight by him. She has a rough life and turned to crime just to try to do anything to better her situation…it doesn’t.

Before Miguel can take her to custody she tells him to kill her. This strikes a cord with Miguel so he takes her to HQ instead to keep an eye on her. Maybe after so time they see past their differences and bond over them having bad home lives or trauma or something.

She starts to turn her life around and Miguel still checks in on her, they have a banter and friendship despite everything.

Then maybe they fall in love confessing to each other….👉👈 idk just some sweet romance maybe smut? Honestly whatever you think.

Awe, I can totally do this. I think it would be best to keep it fluff due to how I plan on writing the beginning of this story, but hell, if I ever get time for a part 2, smut all the way!!

Also, I'm so sorry this was so late. Now that the holidays are over with, I was able to get back to requests!!!

Warning: Thoughts of suicide, depression, language, praise, fluff

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Why?

Why did everything always happen to you?

Why couldn't you just live an easy life for once?! Why couldn't anything go your way for once?! You screamed at the top of your lungs as you watched your small shabby apartment building burn down to the ground.

It wasn't fair.

What was the point of even living at this point? You had no family to go back to. No home to live at and no friends to crash with. Your job was absolute dog shit and you barely made enough to afford the apartment that just got destroyed.

Everything you owned was gone. Everything that you had was gone. All you had left were the clothes on your back. Like that was enough to survive these streets.

As much as you thought about the sweet embrace of death, you also feared it. You still wanted to live and there were still things you wanted to do. Cussing under your breathe, you decided to turn to a life of crime. How else were you going to build yourself back up?

At least you were until you got caught.

Not even on your third night of stealing, you got webbed up by the one and only, Spiderman. You tried your best not to cry because this was all you had left. You were going to steal to try and better your life and now you couldn't.

"Alright, want me to drop you off at the station or have them find you here?" Spiderman asked with a bit of sarcasm in his tone. You sniffed, unable to hold back,

"Just kill me," You begged.

--------

Miguel flinched at your request. You were sincere. Normally his enemies said that just to trick him or have him pity them, but not you. Miguel could sense how true you meant those words and how hurt you were.

"C'mon," He sighed.

Miguel had no choice but to take pity on you. How could you leave you to rot in a cell if you were going to kill yourself? It wouldn't be heroic of him to do so. That and Miguel would probably eat himself alive at the thought of you being dead because of him.

Instead, Miguel was going to take a different approach with you. You seemed harmless enough, that and you were clumsy. Obviously, you had never stolen anything before and it showed.

Watching you follow him defeated, Miguel let out another sigh. He picked you up and threw you over his shoulder before swinging off. You weren't even complaining, just whimpering and sniffling. Honestly, Miguel might have to put this in the list of saddest captures.

By the time he reached HQ, Miguel made sure to use a secret entrance. He informed Lyla to keep everyone out of his office as he brought you inside. It was fair to say that you looked confused, yet amazed.

"This is the Spider Society, it's where every Spiderman and woman from every universe come to help stop a common goal."

"Common goal?" You whispered, taking in the scenery of the city from a large window. Miguel brought you attention back to him,

"Classified. Think of it as a hang out," He said instead and motioned you to follow him, "I will allow you to stay here under certain conditions."

------

Was this really going to be your second chance at life? Who would have thought Spiderman was this generous to someone like you? You had expected him to just toss you in jail since you've never actually seen the hero kill anyone.

You were ready to die.

Listening to all of Spiderman's conditions, you just agreed. What other choice was there? At least he was giving you a place to stay, even if you were going to be watched the whole time.

"I'll check up on you every day to see how you're keeping." Spiderman added as he showed you a room. You just furrowed your brows, avoiding tears,

"Why are you doing so much for me? You just met me..."

"Because I don't want you turning around and killing yourself. It's my job to save people, and that includes you." He said honestly. You nearly shuddered a breathe,

"...Thank you..." Was all you could whisper.

"If you need anything, just call for Lyla and she will inform me of anything you need."

"Thanks...but...how did you know-" You were cut off as Spiderman revealed Lyla and a hologram of your burnt down apartment building, "Wow."

"Just let me know."

Right as Spiderman left, you finally felt the weight of everything come crashing down. You fell on your knees and started sobbing. This was not how you expected the night to go, but honestly, this could be for the best.

Who knows, maybe Spiderman will give you a reason to live after all.

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You had been staying at the Spider Society for a few weeks now. Spiderman aka Miguel, had been helping you get back on your own two feet. The two of you had been getting comfortable with each other to the point where Miguel revealed his identity.

And lord did you feel like it was love at first sight. You had already started to fall for the masked hero with just his wit and personality alone. It was a great surprise to see that matched with such a handsome face.

The only thing you were worried about was if your feelings were one sided. Miguel always checked up on you, making sure that you weren't still down in the dumps. Honestly, some days you were, but they grew less thanks to him.

Today, you were feeling great. Thanks to Miguel's help, you had gotten a job and finally saved enough for a place of your own again. This time in a better location that won't burn down so easy. There was no need for you to go back to stealing.

"I heard you were apartment hunting?" Miguel questioned as he entered your room. You felt your cheeks flush as you stared at the handsome man,

"Um....Yea...I've done so much better thanks to you."

"Do you not like it here?" Miguel whispered as his eyes soften towards you.

"I do, but...aren't I a burden just being here all the time?"

"No," Miguel sat beside you, glancing at the website you were on, "I just think that it's safer here. I can take care of you...if you don't mind," His voice grew lower as he looked away.

"Miguel..." You felt embarrassed to ask, but hell, he was acting strange as hell too, "Do you want me to stay?"

"..." Miguel stayed quiet for a moment, "Yes."

You couldn't stop your heart from racing as the two of you stayed quiet for a moment. You were shaking from nervousness. Perhaps, Miguel did like you back? Trying to control your breathing, you hesitating grabbed his hand,

"T-Then...I'll stay," You said, nearly stuttering on your words.

Miguel fixed his hand to intertwine with yours. He scooted closer to you and finally faced in your direction. You nearly squeaked, surprised by how close he was.

"(Y/N), you're such a clumsy thief," Miguel said with a sigh as he cupped your cheek and stole your lips with a kiss, "But, you're my thief...If you'd let me have you."

"Yes." You said so fast with no hesitation. Rolling your lips inward, you watched as Miguel just stared at you before laughing, "W-What I meant was...I-I am totally fine with, garh, stop laughing at me! I'm nervous!"

"Sorry, sorry," Miguel chuckled softly as he stroked your flustered cheeks, "I promise to take good care of you, (Y/N)."

You huffed your cheeks out slightly, "How on earth can I take care of the one and only Spiderman? This seems a little unfair." You said with a whine. Miguel chuckled once more,

"Just...be there for me like you always are,"

Confused, you went to look at Miguel, but he stole your lips again in another kiss. You closed your eyes, melting into the kiss before Miguel had to break it due to an anomaly. He let out a heavy sigh and stood,

"Dinner?"

"By the beach?"

"That place is so greasy," Miguel grumbled. You just grinned from ear to ear,

"I'll be ready when you get back."

"It's a date then."

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AGAIN SO SORRY THIS WAS LATE!!! I'M TRYING TO COMPLETE THE REMAINING REQUESTS I HAD LEFT!!!!!

HOPE YOU ENJOYED!!!

#miguel o'hara x reader #miguel spiderverse #spiderman 2099 #miguel o'hara #miguel o'hara smut #miguel o’hara x reader #miguel spiderman #atsv miguel #across the spiderverse #miguel x y/n #miguel x you #miguel x reader

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set-wingedwarrior · 1 year

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After today’s episode I saw, well within reason, a lot of people talking about Prospera’s brainwashing of Suletta, and I wanted to share my two cents.

First of all, my (probably) unpopular opinion: Prospera was kinda right this time.

DON’T KILL ME, LET ME EXPLAIN PLS.

So, Prospera’s technically right: they are being attacked my terrorists, they are in mortal danger, and they need to fight back to survive and save everybody, and that will mean most likely taking lives. Like, that’s fair. War isn’t pretty and survival demands sacrifice.

What’s really wrong and fucked up is:

1) the way she says and explaines it. Her whole voice and behaviour, the words she chooses, so calm and chill and apparently comforting but actually really dismissive (and kinda creepy imo). She approaches Suletta and the whole situation as if it’s not a big deal.

But at the same time, she does underline that they’re in danger, even pressing on Suletta’s rightful fear in order to have her move forward and fight.

This isn’t a “this is unfortunate, but it’s either us or them” kind of speech, but a “we must get to our goal at all cost”. The line is thin, but there’s a difference. And, most importantly, it is portrayed as if it’s a natural progression and not just a situational thing.

The thing is, we saw Suletta impacted by death, and these words alone aren’t enough to wipe away your morals. That brings me at point two, the most fucked up and vicious:

2) how Suletta has been raised and educated until then. She’s always following her motto with a smile, and helping others, never letting anyone (aside her mother) see her sad or overwhelmed. And what’s her mother’s answer every time she comes to her? “If you run, gain one. Move forward, gain two”.

After Miorine confronting her, we know that Suletta is scared every time and every time her motto is her way to cheer herself up, wear a smile, and keep going. The focus is always on moving forward, on the goal, and it NEVER AKNOWLEDGES OR QUESTIONS HER PRESENT FEELINGS.

It’s very likely that growing up, every time Suletta had to face something scary (harmless growing up stuff), she’s always been encouraged to move forward with that stupid motto instead of processing her feelings and thinking things through. Prospera just never taught her.

So, what does Suletta do instead? Say her motto like a mantra, and move forward withouth questioning anything, actively ignoring and burying her unprocessed feelings under a smile to the point that she doesn’t even realize it (it’s no surprise why she’s also so terrible at social cues and stuff).

Her whole bubbly happy persona is the product of her whole life having to face scary things withouth learning how to process how that made her feel, ignoring everything in favor of putting up her happy persona.

The result? Going from this

to this

because she doesn’t know any other way to “keep moving forward” that isn’t “do what you must and brush everything else off with a smile”. But what’s the result? Saving Miorine at the cost of their relationship because she’s rightfully horrified.

The problem isn’t even that Suletta killed a man; we already estabilished that this is a survival, and even if you can argue that she could have simply incapacitate the terrorist, considering that she’s been fighting for their lives until then it isn’t too unbelievable that instinct woul kick in and end it all the same way.

The problem is, obviously, how she reacted to it. I’d bet anything that, despite being still shocked, if Suletta just stayed serious (maybe still ignoring what she did in in favor of checking on and take care of Miorine because, again, this is a “live or die” situation) then Miorine would have understood and seen Suletta’s actions differently (”she made a sacrifice by doing something terrible to protect me”). But Suletta fucking laughed! How fucked up is that? Was she having fun?

All of this isn’t caused by Prospera’s words alone because they do have some merit in the given circumstances. No, this is about the way she speaks them and the way she knows how Suletta would perceive them.

She spent years raising her to move forward no matter what, withouth ever questioning if moving forward even is the smartest choice (and we saw with Guel the consequences that come from not thinking it through). Raising her to make her the perfect little soldier.

And she succeeded.

#gundam: the witch from mercury #g witch #mobile suit gundam #gwitch #g-witch #gundam the witch from mercury #prospera mercury #suletta mercury #miorine rembran #gundam wfm #wfm spoilers #gundam spoilers #gwitch spoilers #episode 12 #witch from mercury #spoiler #spoilers #long post #thanks for coming to my ted talk

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obeymebutnotlikethat · 2 months

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Dreadfast: The Divine Hellbent

"Listen, you can introduce yourself as many times as you want, however, I have a one track mind."

"Uh and that means?" He narrowed his eyes.

"If my plan doesn't involve you or your name then I don't care. Now, suck it up boy scout and move."

"Never had many friends, bad with people, hard to believe with how much of a ray of sunshine she is," he grumbled into his bag.

"Now you're trying to insult me?"

"No."

"Good, cause I ain't putting no skirt or bows in for you," they huffed before pondering, "Oh, you like snakes, right?"

Was this a joke or a hint? It couldn't be a hint, she wasn't nice enough.

Regarding her, he placed his hand on the ground to steady himself. Except the ground wasn't steady...or ground-like...

"Fuck! What do I do?"

"Play dead, boy scout," they cackled, "It's a garter snake. A harmless little thing unless you upset it which you probably did."

So, she was trying to help...while also not. He couldn't help but scowl. This wasn't a game to him being stuck with some psycho who just so happened to be a wannabe villain. Actually, that was very much like his comic book "Dreadfast: The Divine Hellbent."

"Listen, I'm trying to be the bigger person when I say this," not really, he scuffed," but, if we're going to be stuck together then we need to be on the same side."

This caught their attention and they sent a heavy stare his way. Was this kid stupid or was it the brain damage from the sun on him too long?

"Is your brain an egg," they tsked, "last I check, we're on the same side with the same-ish goals. Also, no one is stuck to anything. You can leave whenever you want but if you do..."

He hated her look. They loved his spiral.

"You might end up with a knife at your throat," they laughed lightly.

She was making a promise not some sick joke to him. Which was absurd to him. How could he even separate from her much less think of it! Well, he had thought of it many times but the point still stands...where nothing else is.

He was stuck to her in a deserted place he had never been to before. A few rusting cars, a loud car alarm maybe a block away, the humming of machinery, and the freezing wind sweeping through abandoned houses made him stick close. He was stuck with an unperturbed being who for a moment reminded him of darker villains. Or perhaps, the lacky of comic book #54 "Delirium: Steadfast Falter, The Return of Laquor the Crynical" who built a resistance until page 25...his death.

"No, that isn't necessary, but...why are we here?"

"Parks are lovely," came the simple reply.

"Sure," he closed his eyes, "they're lovely, great, amazing. I meant why are we in an abandoned city."

They studied him for a moment before flopping back onto the grass.

"Car alarms die out over time, you know."

He paused before tensing up. Was it irrational to look around like a mentally unstable person who escaped from the ward or jail? Yes, was it less worrying than the fact a car alarm had just started going off not too long ago but he was too distracted by her irritating nature to notice? They would say no.

"We're...not alone."

They plucked some grass and grinned at something he could never tell.

"We never were."

#writing #comics #superhero #villains

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linkspooky · 4 years

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TogaChako - Good Girl and Bad Girl

Toga Himiko and Uraraka Ochako embody the classic good girl slash bad girl dynamic. It’s a classic dynamic in which one girl will represent what is the traditionally held notions of what a “good girl is” ie/ pure, nice, friendly and the other girl will embody the opposite of that a��“bad girl” impure, mean, slutty. Inevitably, these two girls will fight. However, the crux of the good girl bad girl dynamic is that while the girls are total opposites on the outside, inside they’re the same, cuz they’re both girls after all.

Uraraka and Toga are written to be compared, they’re character foils, because the conclusion we’re supposed to come to isn’t one of them is good, one of them is bad, one of them is selfless, one is selfsh. Rather, they’re written so we see it’s the difference in circumstances that made them who they were. Toga became bad because bad things happened to her. Uraraka is good, because she was born into a good life. What makes a bad girl bad and what makes a good girl good? More under the cut.

1. Good Girl

Describe Uraraka Ochako. She’s a normal girl. She’s spunky. She puts other people first. She became a hero to help her parents make money, and feels bad because her motivations aren’t as selfless as say her close friend Izuku Midoriya’s. (But that’s wrong because she literally is being selfless, her reason for becoming a hero has entirely to do with benefitting someone else and not herself). She’s supportive, and friendly. She’s always cheerful and never lets herself get too down.

Uraraka represents the standard of a good girl in hero society. She’s always ready to help her friends, but ultimately she’s kind of passive. She works hard but is not too ambiitous. She’s selfless and always thinks of other people before herself. She has all of these good qualities.

However, I would argue Uraraka is a lot more complex then this. On the surface she seems to be just a good, nice girl who wants to help others, but her internal mechanisms are complex. While yes I agree Uraraka doesn’t have much of an arc so far due to lack of focus, there’s a difference between not having an arc and not being a complex character.

A simple character - what you see is what you get. A complex character - Has internal mechanisms that show the surface isn’t as simple as you thought.

A simple arc - character moves through the plot without changing who they are. A complex arc - character struggles in a way that fores them to change.

Uraraka’s inner mechanisms are complex in that there’s more too her in what we see at the surface, it’s just she hasn’t been challenged in any way. The plot doesn’t address her flaw and try to force her to change.

With that in mind let’s get into Uraraka’s character. Uraraka is defined to her goodness. Uraraka pushes herself to always be good to others. The reason being is that Uraraka is a very sensitive girl who is attune to the feelings of other people.

Uraraka gets serious for just a second, and people remark that she doesn’t seem like her normal self.

Uraraka then immediately backs up and gets embarrassed. She goes out of her way to beat herself up and denigrate herself in front of others, insisting her motivations are much more selfish than people like Ida and Deku.

Uraraka then tells Deku and Iida that she’s not becoming a hero for her own sake, but for someone else’s. Her entire motivation is to help both of her parents live easier lives, because she feels like she’s been a burden on them and pursuing her own dreams would be too selfish.

Uraraka is very secretive of her own feelings. She’s almost afraid to come off as selfish which is why she doesn’t share what her real goal is. Also, when she starts to get a little motivated to accomplish something for herself, everybody around her remarks how different this is from the fun-loving Uraraka they all know. Also, one last detail Uraraka never even talks about herself, and her friends don’t really think to ask, because Uraraka just so naturally makes things about others and not herself.

It’s already been elaborated why the reason Uraraka grew so perceptive. Uraraka’s parents were struggling to make ends meet and she grew up in poverty, and even if she has good parents that try really hard not to let the effect of this struggle show in front of her, Uraraka saw it anyway because kids are always watching their parents.

Uraraka learned to be sensitive to her parents needs, to never demand too much for her parents, her behaviors all became centered around not becoming a burden to others.

Uraraka thinks it’s only natural to put others first and help others before helping herself. That other people’s happiness is more important than her own. Because she’s someone naturally empathic. Because she’s someone naturally able to see the pain and struggle other people go through, because she grew up seeing it. However, the problem with this behavior is it makes Uraraka essentially a support to everyone else.

Uraraka is constantly putting others up on a pedestal and using that as an excuse to lower herself further and further. As cute as her admiration for Deku is, it’s also a bit unhealthy - as she uses it as an excuse to beat herself up. She sees Deku as this amazing person, whose always struggling to help everyone, whose always saving everyone for completely selfless reasons and she always suffers in the comparison.

I think part of Uraraka wants to stand out like Deku does, and has the same desire to go all out to save people, but Uraraka is so used to being secondary in her own life she can’t bring herself to.

Uraraka can’t even cry in front of others. I think, the most telling behavior she has in the entire series is the moment where she breaks down on the phone describing everything she did wrong because this is how Uraraka sees herself. She’s so extremely critical of herself, and constantly apologizing for herself, while at the same time hiding what she really feels from others.

Uraraka has all these self esteem issues that she basically just shelves so she can play the good, nice girl, that gets along well and is friends with everyone.

Uraraka assigns the role of group placater and peacemaker for herself because it’s something she’s so naturally good at and she’s always thinking of others, but because of that, Uraraka herself suffers. Uraraka only knows how to help people by belittling herself and her own role in things.

Uraraka’s greatest fear is being selfish. She doesn’t want to look like a bad girl. That’s the connection between Toga and Uraraka, because what Uraraka is afraid of ultimately is living her life the way Toga does.

2. Bad Girl

Toga is everything that Uraraka is afraid of being, and lives the life that Uraraka is afraid of living. Uraraka is someone so afraid of being selfish, and getting distracted that she is not even allowed to have a crush on a boy. Whereas, Toga lives her life chasing what she loves. Everything Uraraka represses about herself, Toga expresses. That’s the difference between the two of them.

When Uraraka first encounters Toga, her willingness to chase what she loves looks from Uraraka’s perspective to be entirely monstrous. Uraraka sees Toga as a selfish monster, because in part she is afraid of appearing that way.

Toga Himiko the bad girl.

However that’s far from the whole picture of Toga. When we see her away from Uraraka’s perspective she’s entirely different. She’s someone empathic, capable of being kind to others, and thinking about others feelings.

Toga’s just as capable of reading other people and addressing their feelings as Uraraka is. However, there’s still a key difference in their behavior. Uraraka acts to avoid conflict. When she intervenes, what she usually does is act in a way that avoids stepping on toes, and touts the “we should all get along and be friends’ line. Whereas, Toga is someone who directly addresses the conflict and the hurt feelings of others.

For Uraraka the most important thing is getting along with others. For Toga the most important thing is being true to her own emotions. Which is why she’s able to directly address the problem with Twice, she didn’t tell him to bear with it, she told him she knew he was in pain but that the two of them could take down the mafia together.

Even Himiko’s most selfish monster moments aren’t really that monstrous. Himiko’s reason for stalking both Uraraka and Deku is not because she’s weird and creepy, but because she wants to be a normal kid just like them.

Himiko’s reason for sucking the blood of high school girls and taking on their appearances isn’t because she’s preadtory, it’s because she’s been a runaway with no home for two years and she’s terrified of getting caught.

Himiko who is framed as a selfish monster, is actually quite the normal girl. She’s a normal girl reacting to the pressures of the society around her. The kicker is that Himiko isn’t someone who just decided to flip and turn out this way, she is only the way she is because she tried to live like Uraraka did at first.

Himiko tried to push everything down and live like a normal girl. She tried to lie about herself so she’d be a good, nice, harmless girl. She only became so selfish, because she tried to live selflessly first. She only prioritizes herself, because she was used to putting herself down before this. We see her classmates react to her, they all describe Himiko was the kind of girl that Uraraka is right now.

However, behaviors in Uraraka that are self-defeating and unhealthy, are absolutely ruinous in Himiko. Himiko has no sense of self, because she spent so long trying to be what others wanted her to be. Himiko is who she is, in reaction to the pressures of everyone around her.

When Himiko tries to figure herself out, she always gets the same response. Why do you have be so selfish? Why can’t you just act normal? Which completely ignores the fact that she TRIED and that’s what got her here.

The main difference between Uraraka and Toga is not one of them being good, and the other being bad. Toga’s been through way harsher life circumstances. Uraraka has parents that affirm her identity, and Toga’s parents deny her over and over again.

The point of the good girl bad girl dynamic is that they’re both girls in the end. Yes, Uraraka’s never reacted as badly as Himiko has. However, Uraraka’s also never been pushed so far. In fact someone as empathic as Uraraka can be oblivious to the suffering of others.

Uraraka doesn’t see what Himiko is going through, because she hasn’t suffered the way Himiko has.

It’s like. When you have a good sibling and a bad sibling. The good sibling always behaves because they conform to the pressure their parents put on them. The bad sibling acts out in response to that pressure, and because of that their parents have to discipline them and they end up soaking up most of the parent’s attention. In that situation the good sibling can come to ressent the bad sibling for acting out and needing attention in the first place.

Reasonable child and unreasonable child. There exist these black and white categories to define children into where one looks good and one looks bad, that actually totally fail to address the child’s behavior because people are complex and therefore don’t fit into black and white categories. But, Uraraka is still working with that black and white logic when it comes to heroes and villains. Even though she’s usually so good at sussing out the complex nuance of other people’s feelings.

This is what’s happening here in this chapter. You can apply the dynamic between the two of them to the conflict at large. Toga is selfish for acting out and causing problems for others, because she wants her own personal grievances to be addressed. Uraraka is sefless because all she cares about right now is helping the most amount of people. Uraraka is willing to repress herself, and put others needs before her own, because what’s most important is everybody gets along.

However, Uraraka insinuates, the same way that Himiko’s parents once insinuated that Himiko’s acting out just makes her selfish.

We’ve seen this conflict before. Himiko literally went into the conflict to ask this question. Do problem children like her count as “everyone”. However, no matter what happens this arc, no matter what critcisisms the villains levvy against the heroes we get the same hollow repettition of “Heroes save everyone”. Which is why Himiko looks just about to snap here.

Uraraka who is used to brushing conflicts aside and avoiding them for the sake of “everyone gettling along” sees the girl who can’t get along with “everyone” and calls her selfish. To Himiko, this is the same words she’s been hearing her entire life. “Why are you making a fuss? Why can’t you just be normal.”

From one perspective, yes Uraraka is the one fighting seflessly because she’s just trying to save as many people as she can and Himiko is getting in the way of things. However, Himiko is someone who grasps the bigger picture. Himiko addresses the problem directly rather than sweeping it under the rug, there are people who aren’t saved by the hero system. Those people are just as in need of saving as what heroes deem to be innocent people. You can’t claim to save everyone and then ignore the suffering of people you deem as “bad”. Himiko seems like she’s acting selfishly, but then again she’s acting for the sake of people like Jin who died because heroes insisted that his life was less important.

Uraraka is at the same time very perceptive to the suffering of others, and also very oblivious, and it has much more to do with personal hangups than anything else. She doesn’t want to see Himiko as someone similiar to her, because Uraraka is someone so deathly afraid of coming off as selfish. To the point that she treats people with genuine grievances against society as selfish childrens making demands for atttention.

Uraraka is the one who can’t face herself, and therefore the answer she gives Himiko is to the effect of “Shut up and deal with it.” It’s a very personal thing for Uraraka once you realize that Uraraka has also been shutting herself up all this time, pushing herself down, always letting people walk all over. Uraraka is capable of putting herself aside for the sake of others, so as a result she sees people who can’t put themselves aside as selfish.

“I can do it, so why can’t you? Why can’t you be normal?”

I hammer down so hard on this point because there’s a difference between placating and conflict resolution.

Placating comes from a place of “I want the conflict to go away” or “I want the hurt feelings to go away.” Placating is just saying whatever you think the person you’re talking to wants to hear in order to please them. It’s behavior that’s based entirely around avoiding conflict. Uraraka placates, she sweeps it under the rug, she swallows her grievances for the point of everyone happily getting along together.

This placating also applies to the hero system at large. It’s not really designed to save everyone, so much as make the vast majority of people feel safe at the cost of the minority.

When there is a problem does Hero society directly address the issue? Or do they sweep it under the rug for the appearance of everyone getting along?

I think the fact that every time a villain brings up a problem this arc, the heroes just shout “Heros save everyone” and “Heroes never give up” is evidence of the latter. That’s why, when Uraraka says it, when Hawks says it, “Heroes save everyone” just comes off as hollow because in the very same breath they both make it clear that Toga and Twice are not part of the everyone who gets saved.

#himiko toga #uraraka ochako #mha meta #my hero academia meta #my hero academia #mha 288 #mha 288 spoilers #bnha 288 #bnha 288 spoilers #himiko #uraraka #ochaco #ochaco uraraka #toga himiko

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cheshiresartblog · 3 years

Text

Quirk Ranking AU Stuff

Au based on @hey-hamlet ‘s Quirk Ranking au that stole my heart a while back. This au was the base for many a good roleplays with me and my friend. I love all of your aus btw. They’re all fun af.

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So basically in this au in the beginning of the rooftop squad’s second year in UA the laws for the systematic ranking of quirks on a color coded danger scale was passed. This being said everyone had to have their quirks tested with the ranks being the following:

Gray - Quirkless Green - Benign/harmless quirks Blue - Quirks that cause temporary and mild effects on others Yellow - When quirks start to get a bit more dangerous but are still controllable Orange - Quirks start to get more uncontrollable here and restrictions start being placed on people here. Red - The straight out dangerous quirks. There’s lots of restrictions. They’re both revered in a sense since they can make powerful heroes, but discriminated against because they are feared. Then there’s probably special rankings for those beyond the scope of Red, like All Might, but I’ve been focusing on the Rooftop Squad so...

Ranks are told through a metal bracelet on the left wrist. It need to placed over a scanner to enter places and people who own businesses can set the scanner on what ranks they allow in. There’s also a glowing strip of color going through the center of the bracelet showing the person’s rank color. It’s waterproof and very durable so it’s almost never removed unless there’s a rank change or it needs to be removed by a doctor. The ones on heroes are special because they also act as trackers and can measure the hero’s vitals. Ranking bracelets, though, can be faked and a lot of villains do this to get by in life without detection. Some people make good money supplying these fake bracelets.

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So the conflict begins with the ranking tests, which marks the squad as the following:

Shouta - Blue Rank due to the fact Erasure is only in effect as long as Shouta doesn’t blink and has his eyes on someone.

Oboro - Yellow Rank after further quirk testing, which revealed his ability to make (unstable) storm clouds.

Hizashi - Red Rank upon being taken for further testing and being pushed to his limits.

Nemuri - Yellow Rank due to the fact she sends people to sleep and that can cause dangerous situations and it does not wear off right away.

For some backstory, Oboro, Hizashi and Nemuri all knew each other before UA and are very very close knit. Shouta’s the latest member to their little group after being pretty much dragged into the group by Hizashi and Oboro in their first year. At the point of the ranking tests Shouta and Hizashi are also dating, having gotten together at the end of their first year.

That being said, Hizashi finds out really really quickly that his Red rank now dictates his life, where he can go and how he’s treated. He’s treated like a ticking timebomb basically. He first starts to realize this when a music store he used to go to to get CDs’s door won’t open for him. He keeps trying and eventually the owner tells him to leave. Also his training as a hero starts to become overwelmingly intensive and they expect so much more out of him than the other students ranked below him.

Needless to say Hizashi is not happy whatsoever. Neither are Oboro and Nemuri. The three of them start to privately plan to leave UA entirely. They can’t support a system like this.

Shouta, meanwhile, is in a different kind of situation. The ranking tests was another way for the Commission to stake out those with quirks that could be useful to them, and what could be more useful than a quirk that can turn off others? So, Shouta’s approached about a week after the tests by a Commission official (that gives off Umbridge vibes honestly) and she basically blackmails a 16 year old kid into signing a contract. Shouta’s mother in this is very ill, they’re going into debt for her hospital bills and she’s only receiving what she can afford as treatment. The Commission offers Shouta not only to pay his bills but to pay for the best possible treatment for his mother. Just, “You want to be a hero, don’t you? You can start by helping your mother.” And other things like that. He basically is blackmailed into signing on to be one of the Commission’s dogs...they own him after he puts that pen to paper.

It happens super quickly, honestly. A bit after Shouta signs Hizashi and the others approach Shouta with their plan and ask him to run away with them. Shouta tries to tell them he can’t, but the minute he hesitates and says he can’t they never don’t give him the moment to explain why. So used to discrimination due to his rank now Hizashi impulsively assumes that it’s because he’s a Red Shouta doesn’t want to join them and effectively puts words in his boyfriend’s mouth. It’s a huge 3 vs 1 verbal fight and it ends with a rough break up and Shouta being basically left there in shock, and the trio disappearing about a week later.

From there Shouta’s life quickly spirals into hell. The training is cruel and grueling. His handler (The Umbridge vibes lady) is awful and single handedly drives Shouta back into the closet. She starts to control his diet, how he dresses and how he presents himself. He’s thrust from being a future underground hero into being a future limelight hero. He learns how to fake a smile really really fast and starts outwardly acting like the modest and eager hero hopeful his handler wants him to be. She changes his hero outfit to have a bit more “appeal”, aka be a bit more skin tight and streamline, throws out his goggles and replaces them with a visor because “They were ugly” and makes him wear his rank color in his costume to flaunt it. Even has his hair cut because his hair is an “disgusting bird’s nest”.

Shouta also keeps everyone at arms length due to what happened between him and the trio and also the very few times afterwards he gotten close enough to someone again to be honest with some things like his opinions on the ranking system (it’s stupid and illogical) and his sexuality, it got back to his handler and the punishment was harsh to say the least. Right now the only people he kind of considers friends are Tensei, Emi, Hawks and somewhat Fat Gum due to working together a bit. Also it doesn’t help that every time he gets into a conflict with one of the trio, who are now big time villains, they’re either quite cold or very harsh.

Shouta is literally two steps from having a mental breakdown by the time it gets to the point where class 1-A’s a thing.

Meanwhile, Hizashi, Oboro and Nemuri ran away from everything, surviving on the streets for a while before being picked up by a villain gang and being taken in by them, all getting fake ranking bracelets and beginning their careers as villains. They left that gang to strike it out as a villain trio once they were sure of themselves since they had a different goal. They aim to take down the commission and abolish the ranking system once and for all. They became known as Overcast, Reverb and Nightfall.

Nemuri, being protective of her boys and especially Hizashi at this point, is honestly the most harsh to Shouta when they occasionally face off, meanwhile Oboro is cold but hits hard and Hizashi is just absolutely frigged.

LOV does approach them but they do not join them...at least probably not at first.

There it is, there’s the AU :)

Enjoy the pain.

#ranking system au #bnha au #erasermic #shouta aizawa #aizawa shouta #shirakumo oboro #oboro shirakumo #villain oboro shirakumo #hizashi yamada #yamada hizashi #villain present mic #bnha villian au #bnha midnight #nemuri kayama #kayama nemuri #villain midnight #lovers to enemies to lovers

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momota-kaiharem · 3 years

Text

maybe this is just my kinnie speaking but i think a lot about the way that shuichi and maki interact with kaito. let me take an interaction from the talent development plan as an example.

just rewatching this interaction made me pretty mad again FLKJDSLKFJ i love training trio and i freaking love their relationship, but god, the way that maki and shuichi treat kaito here just drives me absolutely crazy, so let’s break it down.

i think maki is the more egregious offender here (because shuichi is a simp with manners) but throughout the interaction she’s very dismissive towards kaito, asking why he brought them out there (when shuichi says it’s something they do a lot) and then saying he was useless when he went with them to the novoselic, and saying he didn’t need to go along at all. but up until here shuichi does defend kaito a bit, even if it’s in a bit of a patronisng way (remarking that kaito “does this a lot” but “isn’t it fun” and remarking that kaito’s use on the novoselic mission was to invite maki).

and then kaito says that when he goes to space, he wants to see if he can see shuichi and maki from up there, which is a really sweet sentiment, albeit unrealistic. maki shuts him down pretty fast saying he couldn’t see them from that far, and shuichi says that he might be able to see the general region, and then kaito says that he’d like to take them up to space, and THIS is the thing that really frustrates me.

kaito loves shuichi and maki. romantically, platonically, however you’d like to describe it, it’s obvious that he cares about them a LOT. i mean, he tries to convince kaede to become an astronaut too in his ftes with her, but you could argue that kaito was trying to convince her to go to space because he really respects her (as indicated by the way kaito was the only one to consistently stand up for kaede through chapter one, and the way he was willing to fight the exisals to keep monokuma from executing her, and the way he was crying after she got executed... also he asks her for hugs a lot and it’s really cute kaito you simp ilu) so again, it shows, kaito says he wants to take people to space because he loves them. space is what kaito has always been most passionate about. it’s his longest standing goal and something he wants to share with the most important people in his life.

obviously he’s being unrealistic here!! but maki and shuichi have been friends with kaito for three years by now, and they should be used to it-- they are used to it, actually, as shown by maki’s response-- but maki’s response is mean!!! it’s mean. kaito shared a sweet sentiment about wanting to share his most treasured thing with them and maki responded by calling him stupid-- which, if you remember, kaito really doesn’t like being called!!! i’d go grab screenshots, but i don’t want to go sit and watch trials until i can find it, but often when kaito is called an idiot he responds by yelling that he’s not, and that he doesn’t like being called that. i know with maki a lot of it is just banter, but still, the utter disregard for kaito’s feelings just because he’s a hahaha positive himbo man hee hee hoo hoo is... ugh. it happens a LOT throughout the game and it’s really upsetting to me.

and then shuichi’s response is what really upsets me. i know it’s just meant as a tease, but let’s think about everything that kaito has done for shuichi and maki for a moment, here. sure, his practical abilities might not be on par with theirs. he’s not a detective and he’s not an assassin, so he can’t solve murders or fight off danger, but his EQ is INCREDIBLY high. he saw maki and shuichi, and he saw that they were struggling, and he decided to take them under his wing and help them to grow. he didn’t have to do that!!! he didn’t owe them anything. maki and shuichi could’ve grown at their own paces, of course, i believe in them, but a large part of their becoming more comfortable with who they are was owed to kaito’s help and love and guidance that he showed them over the years.

so the implication that kaito, an ASTRONAUT, would need them to go to space to save him, is utterly ridiculous. and mean!! it’s really mean. it implies that kaito is useless without them, that he needs them to go up there to save him (like they’re always saving him or whatever, which i find really stupid because there are absolutely no tdp events where they help him even SLIGHTLY) when he’s literally been training to be an astronaut and go to space for the last three years!!! it’s his special interest, and it’s so invalidating, to take kaito wanting to share that with them and imply that he’s useless at it, and that he needs assistance that they’ve never offered him because of it.

and maki’s response is really gross to me too, like kaito doesn’t have any other friends, which is totally stupid. i’m sure kaede would jump to his aid if he needed her, and gonta, and any other members of their class-- i mean, kaito is a nice guy!!! he helps people!!! it was easy to rally everyone in chapter five to save kaito because he was inspiring them!!! kokichi took him because if he didn’t, kaito would be there making everyone want to keep going. maki saying that implies that kaito is so annoying that they’re the only ones who would put up with him, that they’re these two skilled people who are just there because they pity him-- which isn’t true at all, i mean they’re totally talented but ALSO i know for a FACT that maki and shuichi really appreciate kaito, so why don’t they just act like it??

actually, i have thoughts on the reason why they behave that way. it’s something that happens a lot when you get comfortable with people. kaito projects confidence, this really strong, self-satisfied demeanour. it’s clear (or at least it seems to be clear) that he has a lot of self respect. so the teasing, to maki and shuichi, feels harmless, because kaito has high self esteem, he can take it. besides, he clearly has an inflated ego, right? so he needs them to take him down a peg.

except that’s not true, and you can tell that kaito has low self esteem because of what happens in chapter four. all throughout that chapter people rag on kaito, calling him an idiot, saying he’s useless during trials, saying shuichi is the only smart one. kokichi calls him an idiot and antagonises him over and over and over and shuichi NEVER sticks up for him, never once sticks his neck out and says “hey, i really appreciate kaito, and i need you to stop talking bad about him”. instead he just lets kaito fend everyone off alone, and of course maki doesn’t stick up for him either. that’s part of what fuels kaito’s turn on shuichi in chapter five. sure, you could argue that it was about gonta-- but shuichi also turned the tables on kaede, who kaito showed more consistent affection/respect towards, and he didn’t hate shuichi for that. no, the problem was that shuichi was getting all the credit and appreciation from everybody (which was fine!!! he led the trials) and kaito was getting dumped on over and over and over and shuichi was just letting it happen, soaking in all the admiration and letting kaito be called useless.

and i mean, that’d be hard for anyone, being called stupid over and over, getting forcefully logged out of the simulation twice, once by your own sidekick who didn’t even bother asking you permission first, but it’s clear to me that kaito feels inadequate, especially as compared to shuichi, who is so intelligent and composed. kaito projects outwards, he puts on this big grin and calls himself a hero, and that must stem from a place of insecurity. there’s no way that someone who gave himself a dorky title like luminary of the stars is super secure in himself and his relationships.

there’s another reason why maki and shuichi probably treat kaito that way, and that’s because when you respect and appreciate someone that much, and you struggle expressing it, struggle with vulnerability, it becomes... hard to express. maki hasn’t been close to someone like she’s close to kaito for as long as she remembers. she’s never had a freaking nickname before, i mean, her life is really sad. clearly some of the teasing comes from a place of love, of “i respect and admire you so much, you helped me come out of my shell, idk what i would’ve done without you” and not knowing how to express it. i’ve been there. we’ve all been there. when you love a person but don’t know how to say it, sometimes you just end up playfully ragging on them.

and that’s fine, if it’s two-sided. banter has to be mutual, it has to be something that everyone is enjoying and is comfortable with. you choose things that they’re not sensitive about, that they’re fine with you taking the piss out of them over-- that they take the piss out of themself over. but let’s think about kaito for a minute here, and whether this is really banter.

1. does kaito ever jokingly call himself an idiot? does he ever say he’s useless, or he needs people to save him, or he’s dumb? how does he react when other people do it to him? even when maki calls him a dumbass ingame he gets upset about it, but then he brushes it off, because genuinely being hurt over something like that requires vulnerability and kaito doesn’t really DO vulnerability lmao

2. how does kaito respond? does he tease them back? i think if this was a case of healthy banter, kaito would’ve gone with a jab of his own, like, “haha, you two are hilarious, you know you love me” sorta thing, and then moved on to talk about the moon like he does in his next line. he doesn’t, though, and you never really see kaito making fun of those two. he calls maki a coward in chapter three, but he’s just being honest with her, being blunt about her weaknesses to help her grow. kaito doesn’t sugar coat things, doesn’t hold your hand and walk you through your problems. he’s a tough love sort of guy and that doesn’t work for everyone but it does really work for shuichi and maki, to the point where both of them become pretty confident in themselves, owed at least in part to the way that kaito guided them through becoming the people they wanted to be. but he doesn’t really tease them, never calls shuichi out on wearing his hat (he doesn’t even notice it) and never makes fun of maki for being an assassin/having a kill count/whatever stuff they’re insecure about. of course he doesn’t! kaito is a good friend.

i think it’s important to mention here that kaito does respond with lighthearted indignation before he brushes it off, but i just don’t feel like this is healthy, two-sided banter. you see maki and shuichi acting dismissive of kaito a lot, despite everything that he does for them. he puts up with it, but if anything that just shows to me more how everything in the relationship flows one way. all the care, love, and respect goes from kaito to shuichi and maki. he takes care of them, he helps them, he doesn’t mock them. in return they tease him (even if their intentions are good!!!) and don’t ever really push him to open up, nor do they stand up for him when people put him down, nor do they particularly try and get him to be honest with his emotions. take chapter four, for example, after kokichi punches kaito and he doubles over, coughing up blood. maki and shuichi just buy that it’s a cold when kaito says that, they don’t push, even though they’re both clearly skeptical. respecting boundaries is important, but you NEED to push sometimes, you need to make people open up, because in that case kaito was literally dying, and he had to spend the rest of his life putting up a front.

i mean, even when he was dying he was holding back the urge to cough, acting brave and strong, putting on a hero face so that the two of them could go on to defeat the mastermind and focus on things that mattered. not on him.

i love training trio, i think these three work so well together and they can bring out each other’s strengths and weaknesses, but i just think that shuichi and maki do NOT treat kaito well, and unless he opens up and communicates about it, it’s going to lead to building resentments and an increased lowering of kaito’s self esteem. maybe this wasn’t intentional on the part of the game, but if it wasn’t, clearly it just shows that dr is incapable of writing healthy friendships. i’d love to write a character study someday about these guys, where kaito talks about his feelings and maki and shuichi realise they treat him like crap, but until then i guess i’ll just sit here and scream about it.

#kaito momota #shuichi saihara #maki harukawa #momota kaito #saihara shuichi #harukawa maki #training trio #ndrv3 spoilers #saimota #kaimaki #harumota #u know u know #can you tell that i think about this a lot #character analysis #relationship analysis

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h2bakugou · 4 years

Note

Hi there! Can I please request the main three + Kirishima with an s/o who has younger siblings and is used to them buttering them up thinking it’ll help them avoid getting into trouble so when their boyfriend compliment them they instinctively turn to him and is all like “Alright you demons, what did you do this time?” Before realizing that it’s just their boyfriend? Thanks!

a/n: hi!! of course! this request is super cute, having siblings is both a treasure and a nightmare lmfao. thank you for the request love!!

headcanon: them with an s/o who has younger siblings

key: (y/n) - your name / (f/n) - first name / (l/n) - last name / (e/c) - eye color / (h/c) - hair color / (y/q) - your quirk

warnings: fluff, swearing

»»————-　★　————-««

izuku midoriya

»»————-　★　————-««

Having younger siblings is truly a blessing. Sometimes.

You love your siblings, you do, but they are pure chaos.

“Did we ever tell you how pretty you are?” Your younger sister’s voice rang out. You were just shopping for some snacks and they wanted to come with you.

You knew they’d done something. They always buttered you up so you wouldn’t get mad. But no matter what they did, you’d still love them. Being stern was just a way of teaching them, you wouldn’t go as far as actually hurting them if they did something bad.

“What’d you do this time?” You question, turning around to eye both your younger sister and brother.

Covered almost head to toe in what you assumed was baking flour, your brother and sister smiled back up at you. You let out a small laugh before returning to your older sibling instinct.

“What were you guys even doing?!” You placed the snack you’d picked up in your basket and sighed, taking both of their hands and walking over an aisle where the opened bags of flour laid, covering the floor.

“We wanted to get the sugar you needed! So we stood on the shelves to get it.” Your younger sister spoke softly, smiling.

“I see. Well next time, if you can’t reach something, ask first okay? You could get hurt if you fall back.”

No matter the situation, you always try to make the moment a teachable lesson. They’re still growing, they’re going to make mistakes. That’s okay.

If there’s anything you can do, you just want to teach them the right way to do things, or at least the best of the options.

“We will!” Your brother promises, hugging you, coating you in flour from your waist down.

“You’re going to need to pay for the bags of flour.” A store employee speaks, already bringing the equipment to clean it up.

“Of course, here you go.” You hand over the money and head to check out, bringing your flour-coated siblings along.

“We’re gonna get a bubble bath after this!” Your younger sister spoke up, which started your brother.

“Bubble bath! Bubble bath!”

It’s a long day of cleaning up before you can relax.

You sometimes forget you’re at the dorms. Despite not actually having your siblings around, you still feel like whipping Mineta into shape is about as close as you can get.

It never works, but maybe one day it will.

“You look beautiful, (Y/n).” The comment totally throws you off. And you’re quick to come with a response.

“What’d you demons do this time-”

Realizing it was Izuku who complimented you, you immediately started to feel flustered.

“What?!” Izuku’s a bit confused. You waved your hands and eventually hid your face.

“My younger siblings always butter me up and compliment me when they’ve done something. I forgot I was at the dorms for a second.” You laugh. Midoriya smiles and gives you a hug.

“That’s so cute. I didn’t know you had siblings.” You hug Midoriya back and sigh.

“I love them to death, they’re little shits but I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

»»————-　★　————-««

katsuki bakugou

»»————-　★　————-««

Your younger brother reminds you a lot of Bakugou. He’s loud and obnoxious, but he can be sweet.

It doesn’t change the fact that the little devil practically butters you up when he knows he’s done something to get in trouble.

For example, the time he put superglue on his teacher’s chair.

“You know I love you so so much and I wouldn’t have anyone else be the best older sibling?” Your brother smiled at you, even handing you a store-bought cupcake.

“Something seems...suspicious. Is there hot sauce in this cupcake?” You eye the cupcake.

“No.” Your brother laughs.

“What’d you do then?” You quirk an eyebrow up at him, waiting for what line of trouble you’d have to get him out of now.

“I sorta put superglue on my teacher’s chair and now they’re going to call home and I don’t want mom to be mad at me, it was just a harmless prank and no one got hurt!” Your brother explained. Despite wanting to burst out laughing, you knew where he was coming from.

“Alright. I’ll talk to them, and I imagine I’ll have to sign something too?” You set the cupcake down on the counter and look at your brother.

“Yup!”

You extended a hand for a high-five which your brother joyfully completes.

“Good prank, but let’s not do it again. I might not always be able to pick up the calls made home.” You gave him a hug, ruffling his hair.

“Thank you for being honest with me.” You smiled.

“You’re welcome!”

Your brother, while being a little devil, was honest. You’d tried your best to help teach him while he was growing up that honesty was a good quality in someone strong, and your brother wanted to be the strongest.

Answering the phone call, you sat beside your brother, telling them how it wouldn’t happen again and that if need be, you’d replaced the pants his teacher had been wearing that day as a sort of apology.

Also signing the note that ‘proper punishment’ would be distributed for his actions, you packed it up in his bag for the next day.

Being in the dorms was honestly a bit lonely. You loved your brother, albeit he was chaotic, you missed him coming to you with his tales of how he was king of the schoolyard.

Walking down the seemingly empty hallway toward your dorm, a compliment threw you off.

“Did I ever tell you how much I loved you?” The voice didn’t belong to your brother but your first instinct was to ask what the hell he’d done now.

“What’d you do this time?” You turn and see your blonde boyfriend staring at you with a funny look on his face.

“I mean uh...hey Bakugou!” You can feel your face heat up.

“I was saying I loved you, I didn’t do anything.” Bakugou confronted you. You nodded and let out a laugh.

“I have a brother who says the same thing to me when he gets into trouble.” You lay your arms across his shoulders.

“He reminds me a lot of you actually. He wants to be the strongest hero ever one day.” You smile, knowing that Bakugou’s goal was pretty close to that.

“Oh really? Well, he’ll have to surpass me!”

“I think you’d really get along with one another. He’s a secret All Might fanboy too.”

»»————-　★　————-««

shoto todoroki

»»————-　★　————-««

Todoroki knows what it’s like to have siblings, but being the youngest himself, he wasn’t aware of what it was like to be an older sibling.

You, on the other hand, were an older sibling. You had a younger sister that was quite devious.

She usually found herself getting into trouble out and about, whether it be in school, or whenever you went out to the store with her, she always caused some chaos.

Like the time she ‘laid a trap’ in one of the grocery store aisles.

She’d spilled some water and waited for someone to come and walk through the puddle. But she was caught before someone did something.

The store attendant brought her over to you where she proceeded to butter you up.

“You’re so beautiful, I love you so much you know that right?” She smiled, grabbing onto your hand.

“Oh yeah, what’d you do this time?” You ask, turning your attention toward her.

“She spilled water all over the floor which could’ve lead to an accident. I’m going to have to ask you both to check out and leave.” The attendant wasn’t happy. You were a little upset but you’d make this moment memorable.

“Just a second please.” You spoke to the attendant before bending down to your sister’s level.

“Why did you spill water on the floor?” You asked, waiting for her response.

“I was laying a trap!”

“Yes, but what could’ve happened if someone got caught up in the trap?” You asked, holding her hands as she starts to come to a realization.

“They could’ve gotten hurt.” She speaks softly.

“Mhmm, and would you want someone to get hurt?” You tilt your head to the side.

“No. Only bad guys hurt people.” She nodded, her smaller fingers looping with yours.

“That’s right, and you want to be a hero one day right? Like All Might?” You smile.

“Yup! He’s the coolest!”

“Alright, so no more laying traps! Let’s apologize okay?” You turn to the store attendant who seems almost impressed by how fast you’d turned the interaction to positive instead of negative.

“I’m sorry Mr. Man! It won’t happen again! I’m gonna be the next All Might!” Your sister cheers as you head out of the store, not buying anything.

You take your sister with you to the dorms on one of your days off. You promised she could meet All Might, and while they’re playing in the common room, you completely blank at a compliment made to you.

“You’re so beautiful.” Todoroki says softly.

“What’d you do- Sho!” You try not to embarrass yourself. You look over and see that your sister is still playing with All Might, holding his action figure and zipping around imaginatively.

“I didn’t do anything. Why do you ask?” Shoto hugs you briefly before looking at you with concern.

“No no, my sister usually compliments me before telling me she got into trouble. I blanked for a second.” You reassure him that he hadn’t done anything. You give him a quick kiss on his cheek before looking back to watch your sister.

“I didn’t know you had a sister until today.” Todoroki smiles, holding your hand.

“She’s a little rascal but I love her. You’re the youngest of your family aren’t you?” You nudge him.

“I am-”

“Awe you’re the baby!” You hug him, poking his cheek and teasing him lightly.

“I’m 16, not an infant-”

»»————-　★　————-««

eijiro kirishima

»»————-　★　————-««

Your little brother is quite spirited. He’s chaotic but as sweet as can be.

But he never fails to butter you up when he gets into trouble.

“You’re so pretty, red really is your color!” He smiles as he stands before you, holding something behind his back.

“Mhm, what trouble did you find yourself in now?” You ask, sitting down in a chair at your kitchen table.

“I need someone to sign my report card, and my grades are low.” He says softly. He’s a bit sad, and for some reason, you feel upset.

“I can sign it for you, but why are your grades low?” You ask, looking at his report card. His math grade was dangerously close to failing, and his science grade wasn’t too high either.

“I fell behind.” He speaks quietly, ready for a scolding.

“I’ll sign your report card, but can you promise me something?” You ask, getting a pen ready.

“Mhm!” He lights up, a half-smile on his lips, still worried he’s about to get yelled at.

“If you need help, ask for it. There’s nothing wrong or unmanly about asking for help.” Quoting your boyfriend, you feel a bit silly. You sign off on his report card and hand it back to him, ruffling his hair.

“I have a study group you can come to if you want, you could meet Eijiro!” You know it’s probably a bit overwhelming to study with a bunch of high schoolers while being so young, but you’re positive Bakugou would help him out.

“Yes! I wanna go!” He smiles, vibrating with excitement.

On the day of the study group, Kirishima compliments you like he usually does. But being so focused on picking your brother up for the study group you space out.

“You’re so pretty, and wow red is so you’re color!” Kirishima comments, his favorite red sweater resting over your shoulders.

“What’d you do this time...” You freeze when you notice it’s Kirishima complimenting you instead of your younger brother.

“I just complimented you is all!” Kirishima smiles, his toothy grin making you smile as well. You hug him and laugh.

“I know, my brother tends to call me pretty when he gets into trouble. He’s coming to the study group tonight actually.”

“Awesome! wait you have a brother?” Kirishima’s excited, probably more excited to meet your brother than he is.

When you return with your brother and arrive at the study group, everyone is happy to meet him.

“This is Ei, my boyfriend.” You introduce your brother to Kirishima.

“What’s up, little man?!” Kirishima gives your brother a fist bump and smiles.

“I see why you chose him.” Your brother comments. You turn red, shaking his head.

“He’s about as red as you are!” Your brother teases you, poking fun at your blush. You sigh and sit down with him, showing him the basics.

“Bakugou can you help me with number four?” Your brother bravely approaches the blonde who isn’t exploding for once.

It’s the most calm you’ve seen Bakugou in a while. But your brother learns a lot from him, and from Kirishima.

Kirishima loves your little brother and he’s happy he got to meet him.

»»————-　★　————-««

masterlist

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demonicheadcanons · 3 years

Text

The Problem With Trusting A Human

Spoilers for lessons up to and including lesson 16!

CW for: Angst, Blood, Being Injured / Attacked, Death and Trauma Mentions, Violence, and more. Please ask me to tag anything else!!

Honestly, Belphegor wasn’t sure what he was expecting. How long had it been since he’d had a human come looking for him, and how much longer since he’d intentionally tried to lure one? It was easy to throw his voice, to tempt them and eat at their curiosities, and of course this human exchange student was no different. In fact, they seemed even more inclined to listen to him and come searching with no resistance at all, even with Lucifer himself so violently blocking their path.

But there you were, standing outside the attic with a wary and horrified look on your face, as concerned as you were distrustful. Belphie probably looked as pathetic to you as you did to him, locked away in the House of Lamentation of all places, in the attic where no one was allowed to come search and where your path was blocked multiple times when you’d tried to come here before. Maybe you’d fallen for it, when Lord Diavolo preached of creating peace, but surely even as a human you weren’t so foolish as to believe all demons would be working towards his goal; not even all of the brothers would be, after all. But to think! Diavolo’s right hand man, Lucifer, was keeping a prisoner captive in the same house you were staying in.

Whatever is racing through your mind comes to a halt as you ask if he’s okay, if he’s been trapped for long. And finally, about what he is. Maybe you could sense it, the difference between you and him, or even the seething hatred he was only just able to conceal with his powers. It was taking so much energy to appear harmless and peaceful; demons were just too different from humans. They could blend in only so much before a human came along who could feel it, the way the air turned cold and they shivered, gut twisting and skin prickling as if the spirits lost to the air were reaching out to touch it. You could be one of those humans, one who could sense that difference.

Or maybe not, because you settled relatively quickly. You didn’t trust him, of course; it would take longer than one conversation for that. But you come time and time again, and relax a little more as Belphegor feeds you small truths and sweet lies, using the knowledge Lucifer has been feeding him to convince you of his innocence as he bleeds lies into fact, things you can’t refute because you’d seem them happening.

You soon discover one of his lies, and through Beel of all people. He wasn’t human, after all, but the seventh brother. Still, even as you tell him you can’t trust him, there’s pity in your eyes and a pain in your chest, and he knows he’s won. It was boring waiting, horrifying that the only company he had was the older brother who locked him away and a human just out of his reach whom he desperately wanted to crush. He could shatter your bones with a flick of his hand if he wished, but his plans were too big for that, so instead he settled for watching you sit closer and closer to the locked door each time you visited, and listening to your voice as you told him what his brothers were up to.

Things change when you show up and sit as far away as maybe the first week. Or the second one? Belphie had lost track; it was hard to measure time passing in the Devildom anyway, where the night stretched on for eternity and he slept too irregularly to bother with counting days. Your voice breaks Belphie out of his daydreams. Its weak and shaky, and there are drops of blood on the carpet where you’d passed to get to your hiding place.

How misguided of you to try and hide it from a demon. Belphie could smell the fear as if he were a hound trained to do just that. Past that, there are traces of anger, of another demon he couldn’t place and oh, so much blood. The day’s events were trapped in the air and would be irregardless of what you tried to do, and you were blind to it. But Belphegor wasn’t, and he was starting to put the pieces together already, made easier when you came closer to his cage to check on him.

It was satisfying and frustrating at once. Someone had done what he’d been hoping to do, they attacked you and put you back in your place, using fear and pain to guide you there. But something bit at him, swelled in his throat and clogged it, and it only gets thicker when he catches a glimpse of you and you lower your head as if ashamed, smiling through it all. Your arm was already bandaged, but so poorly done that blood was still trickling through in places. He could see torn skin from here, from sharp, sharp claws, and the way you flinched when you accidentally hit a sore spot as you rubbed at your arm to soothe yourself.

His breath catches, and he startles himself as he almost reaches forward, wonders if he should try to redo the bandages through the bars of the attic. He could break your arm in the process, and wouldn’t it ruin his plans? And wouldn’t it get his thoughts across? He feels something that’s foreign but not, something he should know well but has rejected too heavily to place it. Is it you sitting outside the bars? Because its not you he can see, not with that look on your face and the way you curl up into yourself and stare off into the distance, not wanting to bother him or ask for help or comfort.

Belphie almost calls out then, but of course, not to you, because surely you’ve left. Surely its Lilith there in your place, borrowing your smile, laughing as she promises she’s just fine. You weren’t careful enough, you’d made a mistake, but it hadn’t disrupted your plan, you were still going to help him.

Belphie watches as you stop rubbing your arm and hide both hands behind your back, and he barely stops the growl that locks itself in his chest from bubbling up and escaping. There’s blood on your hands, too, right? That’s why you were hiding them from him. Because maybe you didn’t trust him, or maybe you trusted him too much, and expected him to be worried, and he couldn’t do anything about it from the other side of this stupid locked door and god he was going to end Lucifer when he was out of there.

He feels like there are two people standing outside, feels like he’s been here before and knows he hasn’t, because it wasn’t red last time. It was red dripping down onto the carpet and staining it, as much as it wasn’t red that stained her hands and wings when she fell, watching him all the while as if calling out to him, calling him to come after her. Or to stay far, far away and never make the same mistake, and rather to stay safe. Isn’t that what your expression said? Hadn’t you slid further away from him so he wouldn’t come closer, wouldn’t end up hurting like you?

Belphegor doesn’t know what he feels, and when he finally does hiss you only look at him with pathetic sympathy, as if you understood. How could you? How could you know what he was feeling, what was burning up in his chest and fuelling the fire he’d use to end your life the first chance he got, whilst simultaneously trying to douse it?

He can’t bring himself to hide the glare on his face, so instead, he only looks down and stares at the red splatters you’d left on the floor.

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xpeachesncream · 3 years

Text

restart | four

[ SEQUEL TO PERFECTLY WRONG ] | [ series masterlist ]

summary: as you and taehyung start to build your life together post graduation, things become more complicated than what you expected it to be. while taehyung struggles with his inner demons, you’ve become the sole supporter, the pillar, juggling different jobs to keep you two afloat. your love for each other has been put to the test as your relationship continues to face hurdles - hurdles that have you questioning whether or not your relationship will make it through.

pairing: reader x fiancé!kth

genre: post grad au, established relationship au | fluff, angst, smut

words: 4.8k

warnings: cussing/mature language, jealousy, lots of insecurities and overthinking, angst, crying, bar scene, alcohol consumption, flashback scene in the middle of the chapter, a lil sprinkle of fluff, implied sexual content, bickering/arguments

note: honestly, this was ALSO not supposed to get this long but like… 🙃 here we are lol

tags: @enchantaeduniverse @thedarkwinterrose @sapphirejeon @jwlmnbt @bluesharksandfish @ra-mun-e @brightcolorsoffendme @jungcrookthecookbook @sunniejinnie (please message me if you would like to be added to the taglist!)

"Okay, I think that's it." You said, hands on your hips as you and Jungkook walked through your door for the final time.

"What are you selling, the world?" He huffs and puffs.

"For someone who works out often, you complain a lot." He rolls his eyes playfully.

"Where's Tae?"

"Sleeping still." He nods.

"Oh, okay. Ready to go then?" You nodded silently as you grabbed your bag to hitch a ride to the café with Jungkook since he was working today. He starts to talk about the girl who works with you two and how he thinks she's a little cutiepie. He has such a silly crush on her that his cheeks are lightly rose tinted every time he talks about certain encounters they've had. You're happy to see him happy, and you tell him to keep pursuing it since she's a super sweet girl. However, part of you is sad solely because you couldn't say you were 100% happy at this moment. You wish you were, but these problems were hindering you from feeling complete. You just wanted to get past this page in the book.

As soon as you both get to the cafe, you start unloading his trunk and getting everything inside. Jungkook claims he has the last two bags covered, so you walk to the back and take breather just to gather yourself before setting up. But you truly didn't expect to lose it right then and there.

"Okay! I got all the— Y/N?" Jungkook instantly worries when he sees you crying into your hands in the backroom and hurries over to you. "Hey, woah. What's going on?" He gets in front of you, gently trying to pry your hands off of your face.

"Fuck, I'm sorry." You continue to cry as he successfully removes your hands from your face.

"Sorry for what? What's going on?" He wipes your tears with his sweater and lifts your chin to look at you in the eye.

"Nothing."

"The day barely started and you're already crying in the backroom." He says softly. "Don't try and lie to me."

"I just don't know what's going on between me and Tae and it's stressing me out."

"What's going on? Same stuff?" You nod, tears still streaming down your cheeks. You tell him about how he had been super weird about taking Jimin's help and how you both got into a huge argument about it. Then, you told him how last night ended [sparing your poor bestfriend the details] and how you couldn't help but feel used because he simply dismissed you, which is very unlike Taehyung when it comes to arguments and disagreements. "I'm sorry, Y/N. I know he's going through a rough time, but Tae also needs to respect you and look at you as his partner, not someone who's also attacking him or against him. Do you want me to talk to him?"

"No." Simply, no. Because you never get your friends involved like that. You just don't, no matter how much they wanna help. "He looks at me like I am, especially after this whole Jimin thing. I don't wanna say it's stupid because I don't wanna discredit his feelings, but god. Like, should I just do this on my own? Tell Jimin to forget it?"

"No." Jungkook shakes his head. "You're already getting a good start on your goals, Y/N. Don't let that go because of everything going on. Give him some time and space."

"I have been. For awhile now." You sat, feeling completely defeated already, tears still coming down your cheeks.

"Here, I'll go set up and I can take over the table for a bit. I'll ask Isabella if she can cover for a quick second." He stands in front of you, hands out to help support you as if you had lost your footing.

"No, I'll be fine—"

"Y/N, just sit. Okay?" He gives off a small sigh. "Just sit for a second and let yourself take a breather." He gently sits you down and makes sure you don't get up by slowly backing away from you.

"Kook, this isn't Marco Polo."

"I'm just trying to make sure you don't run off because you're stubborn!"

"Hey!" Isabella comes running in, a little confused as to what's happening.

"Hey, can you cover me at the front for a bit?" Jungkook stands back upright in a normal position to ask her sweetly, hands tucked behind his back as he bounced on his feet. This boy.

"Yeah, of course Jungkook." She blushes.

"Thanks. I'll be right back." He gives you a quick look before dashing off. You lay your head onto your arms as they rest on the table, a small headache forming at the center of your forehead.

"You okay, Y/N?" Isabella asks softly as she puts her things away.

"Yeah, sorry. Just a really weird day yesterday."

"I'm sorry." You feel her hand caress your back. "Let me know if you need anything, okay?" She says before shuffling herself out of the room. To be honest, you had no idea what was going on with you, and why you were feeling this way. You were just so sick and tired. Sick and tired of being sick and tired.

This was slowly taking a toll on you, and you weren't even sure if Taehyung realized what he was doing was hurting you in the process.

He can't say he does.

Tae set the weights down back onto the rack aggressively before sitting on the bench, watching Jimin finish his set. They had been working out after lunch, Jimin calling him shortly after Taehyung had fully woken up.

"Are you gonna go to the café after this?" Tae shrugged.

"I don't know, Y/N said she didn't need help and wouldn't be there all day."

"You won't even visit for a bit?" Jimin asks. Usually Tae was rushing to get back to you, but he knew everything that had been going on had been affecting your relationship to an extent.

"We'll see."

"You two coming to the bars tonight then?"

"What are we celebrating again?"

"Nothing. Just getting together like old times. I told Kook, Hobi and Yoongi. They're down." Tae nodded.

"Joon, too?"

"Joon, too."

"Me and Y/N will probably go but I don't think we'll stay long. She has to do that thing at the school—" He scratched his head. "The thing— the exhibit and talking to incoming art students or whatever." Jimin chuckled at how Tae couldn't get his words out.

"It's not whatever."

"You know that's not what I mean." Tae rolled his eyes at him, annoyed all over again at how Jimin had been kissing your ass lately. Cause fuck, the way Jimin had been painting himself as a knight in shining armor, an angel even, was pissing him the fuck off. It made him feel like he wasn't doing enough to support you, or like you couldn't turn to him for help. He hated that feeling, even though he had been rude as hell and showing it in a different way.

"That's fine. Just come out and hang out for a bit." Jimin sighed as he sat on the bench next to him, drinking some water before placing the bottle back down on the ground. "You two doing okay?"

"Yeah, what makes you think we aren't?" Tae asks, getting defensive. Jimin quickly eyes him, reading his body language. He knew Taehyung so well - so fucking well that he knew almost immediately when things were taking a toll on him. Things liiiike.. his parents. As a prime example. Jimin knew Taehyung and his parents obviously didn't have the best relationship, and he knew he took things to heart whenever his father got on him about stupid shit [just like he did over that dinner]. Taehyung wasn't one to show emotion much; he liked showing people he was mentally tough and that he could handle whatever came his way. For the most part, it was true. But, Jimin and Namjoon also knew he wasn't always like that, especially when it came to things that mattered the most to him - his family and you. Taehyung hated to admit it but his family's opinion of him was important no matter what. He was hard on himself because he wanted them to be proud. He wanted to actually feel like he had been doing something good for once. He was still longing for that feeling no matter what he said or did. It was a never-ending battle; like a plot with no happy ending in sight.

"I'm just asking." Jimin threw up his hands, showing that he wasn't suggesting anything behind the harmless question.

"We're fine. I know she's been stressed lately because of work and her art."

"Mmm."

"It's funny." Taehyung chuckles at himself.

"What's funny?" Jimin laughed a bit, confused.

"I didn't expect to be caught up in her like this. After Hana, messing around with all these girls. She's my fucking fiancé."

"Yeah and you better not fuck that up." Jimin stands to gather his things.

"You sound like my dad." Tae jokes, even though he was pretty offended.

"I'm sorry, didn't mean to." Jimin instantly apologizes, knowing everyone had been walking on eggshells around Taehyung lately. "She's a good girl, you've got it good."

Taehyung softly smiles at the thought of you, but he wasn't gonna lie, he was hurt by Jimin's statement. Call him sensitive or whatever, but he wasn't feeling the fact that people were constantly looking at him as a fuck up and hinting at it. It seemed to be a reoccurring theme lately. "You ready?" Tae sighs before grabbing his stuff. They get into his car, departing from the gym to make their way to Jimin's so he can get dropped off before Tae heads home. Taehyung replays yesterday's events in his head, which instantly irks him all over again. But, he has such a soft spot for you that he feels terrible for having been too harsh about it. He was still upset, and he wasn't gonna let up on his feelings. But he knew he should have been better about how he approached it. He knew better than that. He's learned to do better.

➤ FLASHBACK

Taehyung excitedly parks his car at the café to surprise you for your pop up today. He had been working endlessly to finish off finals strongly, and he had been so busy that he hadn't really gotten a chance to help you or support you. He felt terrible about it because you were his babygirl and he wanted nothing but to spoil you for all the hardwork you've been putting in.

He creeps up behind you, bouquet of flowers hidden behind his back. "Excuse me, miss." He says lowly near your ear.

"Holy fuck!" You say as he startles you. "Babe, what the hell! Don't do that!" He laughs.

"What's cookin', goodlookin'?" He wiggles his eyebrows, making you chuckle. "These are for you." He smiles toothlessly as he hands you the pretty bouquet. "And your favorite!" He hands you a Mcflurry cup.

You squeal. "Oreo Mcflurry! Aw, thank you baby." You place a quick kiss on his lips. "But don't ever scare me like that!" You playfully hit his chest, causing him to erupt in laughter.

"You should've seen your face."

"Ha-ha, very funny." You rolled your eyes, causing him to pinch your cheeks.

"How's it going?"

"Welp, I'm almost out for the day." You giggle. "I, uh, may have underestimated." You look down at his hoodie, realizing it was one of the hoodies you had made for a previous collection you sold at Jin's. "Waaaow, cute sweater, who made it?"

"Mm, I don't know if you know her. Her name's Y/N."

"Uh huh?" You nod, hand on your hip, waiting to hear more.

"She stands about this tall." He lowers himself close to the ground, causing you to laugh. "Cute, right? She's beautiful, incredibly smart and sexy. Brilliant visual designer and illustrator. Packed with hella attitude." He pretends to ponder on his thoughts. "I could go on about her, really. She's one of a kind."

"Cute. She must feel lucky." You smile.

"I know, I'd feel lucky if I knew me too." You roll your eyes and playfully hit him. "Ah, I'm kidding." He pulls you into a hug. "I keep this sweater in my trunk."

"Oh, so you keep it in your trunk just for emergency wear?" You sarcastically ask as he holds you from behind.

"Yeah, and cause it's the only sweater I'd choose to wear out of the hundreds I own." You smile up at him. "Mhm, not gonna try and win that one." He places a big, sloppy kiss on your cheek before pulling away. "Show me. How can I help my pretty baby today?"

➤ END FLASHBACK

"Hey, I can't stay out late tonight because of the event tomorrow."

"Yeah, I know." Taehyung says softly.

"Please don't drink too much."

"I wooooooon't." He whines with a small sigh, also slightly offended at that statement. He didn't know what it was, maybe it was the fact that his own father painted him in such a negative light that everything seemed off to him lately. Like people were just out to get him or constantly looking down at him and his actions. A personal attack at who he was. It was slowly piling up for him and he wasn't sure how much more of it he could take.

You prepared a quick dinner while he hopped in the shower. You set his plate aside before taking a look at the mail that had come in today.

Bills, bills and more bills.

You sighed to yourself as it felt like you had just paid things off, but clearly not. Moving into Taehyung's wasn't the greatest idea, being that his space was much more expensive than yours. But, he did have the space you needed for your work. There was money left, but you knew it wouldn't last forever. You hated tapping into your savings and whipping out your credit cards because you wanted to keep yourself clean as much as possible. However, that was proven difficult as of late. It was a sacrifice, especially since Taehyung had cut off his mother's help. Taehyung's pride was such a curse sometimes.

You shook your head, already finalizing the fact that you would deal with it later. You had began to set your things aside for the new student event tomorrow morning. You figured you'd get there early to set up and make your table at neat and cute, so you didnt have to worry much about it right now.

Taehyung comes out of the bathroom with a towel wrapped around his waist, hair slicked back and wet. You turn to face him, your eyes wandering down to his chest and bottom area. God, why was he so beautiful? It wasn't fair. You loved him so much that you could crumble even being upset. He talks a whole lot about you being the death of him, when really, this man is going to be the death of you. Truly. There's no debate about it.

Getting to the bar, you both immediately spot your friends in the corner, a huge tower of beer decorating the center of the table. Jimin is the first to stand, coming towards you two with a huge smile on his face.

"Friends!" Jimin yells. "Drink!" He says, holding up two shot glasses.

"Fuck, man." Taehyung says taking the glass. "We just got here."

"So! Y/N needs to be home early remember?" He watches wide-eyed as you two take the shot and make sour faces at each other.

"Okay, I'm good." You say, being that you were the DD tonight. Taehyung could enjoy himself if he wanted to [to an extent], but you definitely needed to be in tip top shape to be a good role model to those incoming art students tomorrow.

Throughout the night, the bar starts to get packed from end to end, you and your friends staying at the table and keeping to yourselves. You could tell Taehyung was crossing the line of pretty fucking drunk, which somewhat bothered you. You literally just told him to take it easy tonight - just for one night - so you could do what you need to do tomorrow.

"Hey." Jimin comes next to you, swinging his arm over your shoulder like he always does. "One more shot?" You give him a toothless smile. Ugh, why the hell not? Your man was drunk, and Jimin had only been helpful lately. You could at least return the favor by taking a shot with him.

"What are we drinking to?"

"You." He smiles. "Your shop. Your art. It'll only go up from here, yeah?" He rose his shot glass up before clinking it against yours and taking it to the neck.

"Mkay, that does it for me." You chuckle. "Thanks for the shot."

"No problem. You doing okay?"

"Yeah, I'm good." You looked at your watch. "Should probably get out of here soon, but Tae looks like he's enjoying himself. I don't wanna drag him out of here."

"We can just bring him home." You shake your head worriedly.

"I don't wanna leave without him." Jimin chuckles and looks over at Taehyung.

"He'll be okay and you'll be just fine tomorrow. Besides, you can make up all the bullshit in the world to tell the incoming students, they'll believe it either way."

"That's mean." You chuckle.

"Come. Let's dance!" Jimin says, leading the way to the empty space near the table. Everyone gets up to dance, Taehyung slipping himself behind you, whispering sweet nothings in your ear.

"Can I at least get one minute with my lady without Jimin interrupting?" He says in your ear.

"Taehyung." You flatly say, looking back at him.

"That's your mad face." He holds you tightly from behind as he sways you from side to side.

"I'm not mad."

"Mhm." He kisses the back of your head. "Why don't you have fun with me for a little? We'll go home after this." You couldn't even stay mad at him, with that fucking frustratingly handsome face of his. He was definitely drunk though, you could smell the whiskey lingering on his breath as he danced with you for a bit. You let him be, just so you wouldn't trigger anything within drunk Taehyung. Everyone around you was having a good time, the feeling of nostalgia hitting you pretty hard. You missed the days where you could get together and go to parties after a long week of school. Or, when you would tease the fuck out of Taehyung as his fuckbuddy during parties, or at the clubs. You know, before graduation and responsibilities happened.

But as one hour turned into two, and two turned into three, you found yourself getting restless. It was nearing 2AM and you had to be at the school by 8am - even earlier just to set your table up. You made your way to the bathroom, hoping Tae would get the point and start getting himself ready to leave.

Right.

Once you were out the bathroom, he'd realize you had been gone for a little and start saying his goodbye's. He'd realize time got to the best of him. Right?

"It's a fucking good time tonight!" Jimin tells Namjoon, laughing with him as he watches Joon act a fool with his dance moves.

"I'm sure it is, since you've been in Y/N's space the entire night." Taehyung says it jokingly, but he doesn't realize it only comes off that way in his head. Jimin furrows his brows at him, his high quickly dying with Taehyung's unnecessary comment.

"Don't start with all that. Not tonight. Everyone's having a good time--"

"Or what, Jimin?" Taehyung chuckles like the petty ass he can be. "You know it's true. Don't you think it's a little disrespectful to be crossing boundaries?"

"Hey, let's step back for a bit." Jungkook lightly tugs on Taehyung's arm as he hears the conversation going south quickly. But Taehyung breaks from his grip, stepping forward towards Jimin.

"You really think I would do that to you?"

"Haven't you already? Swinging your arms around her and shit, being all angelic--"

"Tae, come on. That's enough. Don't." Namjoon steps in the middle. "Let's go outside to get some air."

"You really wanna make me look that bad in front of my own girl?" Jimin lightly pushes him away, Taehyung getting too into his space.

"Enough." Namjoon shakes his head, aggressively stepping in the way to create distance. Taehyung shakes his head and walks off, the rest of the group watching as he walks. You finish off in the bathroom, assuming Tae was already getting ready to go. However, you realize your assumption of leaving by the time you're back is absolutely incorrect because when you get to the table, Taehyung is nowhere to be seen.

"Where's Tae?" Kook looks at you frazzled, before his eyes begin to pan the room again.

"Look, don't freak out, but him and Jimin just got into it and he walked off."

"What the hell do you mean they got into it and he walked off?"

"It's nothing, Tae is just drunk—" Kook squeezes your wrist and shakes his head.

"No, it's not just nothing because you and I both know how he's been feeling lately." You run your hand through your hair. "What did he say?"

"He just got into it about Jimin getting close to you lately, and how he felt like he was disrespecting boundaries." You sigh heavily.

"Fuck."

"We have an issue." Namjoon comes back from out of the blue. "He's not around."

"What do you mean?! Where did he go?" You run your hand through your hair.

"Okay, let's not panic." Jungkook tries to relax you. "Let me go check the bathrooms." Namjoon nods as he continues to look around the room.

"Please? We should get home." He nods to you before he's off to check for Tae in the bathroom. You stand near the table awkwardly, worry filling you quickly the more time passes.

"Hey, you okay? What can I do?" Hobi squeezes your arm, his face flushed with a red tint from how tipsy he is. You give him a small, reassuring smile and nod to try and keep calm.

"I honestly don't know anymore, but I'll be good. I think. We're just gonna look for him and head home."

"Is Kookie looking in the bathroom?" You nod. At this point, you catch a glimpse of Jungkook coming back alone.

"Jungkook?"

"I'm sorry, I couldn't find him in there. I swear I tried."

"So, where the hell is he?" Jungkook shrugs.

"Lets check around again. I won't leave until we find him."

"Have you tried to call him?" You had already beaten Yoongi's question, calling Taehyung's phone only to see his phone vibrating and ringing on the fucking table. "Hm, okay. Maybe not."

"Fuck." You snatch Taehyung's phone from the table. "Is he serious right now? It's about to be 2:30AM. How the fuck can he get lost at this time?"

"Y/N just go home, we'll find him and bring him home." Jimin says, coming back from roaming around the place.

"No, I'm not leaving here without him."

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean for this to happen." He says, looking at you in the eye. Although he was pretty fucking pissed, he couldn't help but worry about him either. No matter what, that was still his bestfriend. He didn't want anything to happen to him.

"It's not your fault."

"We need to check around the neighborhood." Jungkook suddenly comes back and grabs your arm. You follow him, Yoongi, Hobi, Namjoon and Jimin outside of the bar, the cold hitting your skin harshly.

"Let's split." Namjoon says. Jimin and Hobi split, Namjoon and Yoongi sticking together to go down a different path. You kept yourself close to Jungkook, knowing there were all sorts of drunk ass men out at this hour and you weren't helping wearing a tiny ass skirt and a deep cut shirt.

"Cutiepie, let me come holla!" A dude yells as he tries to swing his arm around your waist. Jungkook easily pushes him off, glaring at him.

"Back the fuck up." He spits out, your bestfriend coming to your rescue amongst the sea of men you're encountering on the sidewalk right now. He throws his jacket over your shoulders, hoping to shield you from them and the cold. "Your outfit." Jungkook frowns, a little worried.

"I mean, I didn't expect to lose Tae tonight." Once you had gotten to a quieter part of the street, you come from behind to walk beside him. "Where the hell could he have gone?" You whine. You're more worried for his safety and wellbeing right now more than anything and all you wanted to do was find him and bring him home, even though you were slightly worrying about yourself and how things would go tomorrow. You could give him an earful later. It could wait.

"He couldn't have gone far." You both continue down the street, heading towards your car, hoping he may be around the area. Jimin calls to check in, saying him and Hobi hadn't caught sight of him yet, and the same thing goes for Yoongi and Joon. You almost want to cry when you don't see Taehyung near your car, but Jungkook ends up walking further down towards the park near your parking spot. "Y/N! Here!" He calls out, running towards an individual slumped over on their knees on a bench. "Taehyungie?" Jungkook sits next to him and shakes him a bit.

"Shit dude, I just kept walking then I suddenly had no idea where I was at." He drunkily says as you sit next to him and sigh heavily.

"No one said you had to do that, Tae."

"I just needed some air."

"Yeah and look where that got you, it's close to 3AM." You respond, irritated.

"Y/N." Jungkook says softly, shaking his head at you as if he were signaling for you to quit with your attitude. "Let's go back to the car." Jungkook watches him stand up and wobble a bit, but eases up when he realizes Taehyung is capable of walking himself to the car. You three get back safely, letting the others know that you had found him before driving Jungkook back towards the club so he can meet with everyone else. You quickly thank him for his support before driving off to head home.

The car is incredibly cold, and silent.

"Love, I'm sorry. I just needed air and got lost." He breaks the silence.

"I see that." You say softly as you drive home, keeping your eyes glued to the road in front of you.

3:23AM.

"Please don't be mad." He gives your thigh gentle squeeze. "I just got a little into my head tonight." You sighed, gently removing his hand from your thigh.

"Taehyung, I'm your fiancé, I'm doing this with you and only you. Do you even understand how worried I was? You just walked off, without your phone. Without saying anything to me. Just cause you got in your head for no reason."

"I'm sorry." He repeats at a whisper. You don't say anything else for the rest of the drive home. You silently park the car and head to the apartment, Taehyung sluggishly following behind you. He knows you're bothered, knowing it's closing to 3:30AM and you had an early morning. Honestly, he didn't realize how drunk he was until he had gotten himself into that argument with Jimin then got lost, especially without his phone. The fact that he had made you worry and stress like that made him feel terrible, especially after these past few days. You could have easily left, but you didn't leave without him even if it was this late. He instantly just wanted to cuddle you and tell you how sorry he was.

You quietly get ready for bed and line your things up by the door, just so it would be an easy quick and grab as you head out in the morning. You slip yourself into the sheets, Taehyung following shortly after he gets himself ready for bed. He shuts off all the lights and grabs himself a water bottle to sit by his nightstand before slipping in next to you.

"I love you." He whispers against your ear, wrapping his arms around you. But you don't respond. He peeks over to see your eyes shut, silently sighing to himself as he nuzzled his head against the nape of your neck. He knows you aren't fast asleep yet, and it hurts him that you hadn't said it back. You both just knew exactly how to love each other well, but also push each other's buttons. But, maybe, it was true - he was just fucking up left and right lately. Enough for you to go to bed without saying 'I love you' back.

undefined

youtube

'cause baby if i find a way, i'm sure of it, this love won't stray; just give me a chance to say i love you, and i need you. now are you here to stay, or fade away like every other day? you're the reason that i lie awake

track two: 3AM - finding hope

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cryinginthebackseat · 3 years

Text

you’ve got more poison than sugar - part i

AO3 part ii

Fandom: Call Of Duty

Pairing: Russell Adler x Bell

Words: 4.009

Summary: Russell Adler should have known better that it wouldn’t take an entire nation or continent to bring him to his knees.

Warnings: just swearings, sexual tension, blood, mentions of past abuse and brainwashing. adler being that manipulative asswipe like usual.

Author’s note: i don't know what i'm doing. one moment, i was watching the walkthrough of the new call of duty game, found myself curious, acutely curious by that guy with the scars and shades on- a younger, shadier (no pun intended) Robert Redford in Spy Game and oh my... fast forward to 2 weeks later, here we are.

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A house somewhere on foreign soil,

Where ageless lovers call,

Is this your goal, your final needs,

Where dogs and vultures eat,

Committed still I turn to go.

I put my trust in you.

A Means To An End - Joy Division (1980)

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It's mystifying how little she talks. Or when she does, it's always in fragments. Like a crossword puzzle in your local newspaper, but several letters are missing. He initially thought maybe MK-Ultra fucked her head or worse, if it hasn't worked at all, but the more he watches her, the more he realizes it's just the way she is. And it's ironic because he named her Bell. He expected her to chime like a goddamn goldfinch yet here they are.

But he won't be fazed. Russell Adler is a man who's stopped at nothing in getting what he wanted before, he sure as hell won't stop now for a close-mouthed science project.

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“We've got a job to do, Bell."

It intrigues him, every time, the way the words trigger something deep within her psyche, the way her eyes change, her body stands a little straighter, like a machine ready to function at his disposal. It reminds Adler of one of those cartoons he watched when he was a kid about wizards and magic words, except there are no musical dance numbers playing in the background or a talking cricket perching on his shoulder. This is his power over her, over the USSR, over Perseus. That monstrous filth. It really does take a beast to tame another.

Although he surmises calling Bell one would be superfluous.

She barely looks like one, but Adler knows too well than to underestimate her. Just because Bell hasn’t shown her set of claws, that doesn’t mean she’s harmless, delicate, like a miniature China Doll in his breast pocket.

Bell never offered him her reply before, but now, now, she nods, head almost bows, obedient pretty thing, and says:

“Yes, Adler.”

So it goes.

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It takes West Berlin for Adler to realize she’s left-handed.

She wears her watch on her right hand, smokes with that same said hand only when she’s writing or moving her pieces for an impromptu late-night game of chess against Lazar. And she always wears her gloves all the time- leather, black, lined with silk and pretty, small buttons on the cuffs, covering those striking red nails underneath. Whether it is for the theatrics or an old habit of hers, he can't really tell.

He doesn’t know why he begins to take notice of these mundane details about Bell, but rationalizes because he’s never been in the same room with this version of her, post-brainwash Bell, for more than 10 minutes. And for all intents and purposes, there’s still a lot of question marks surrounding her character; who is she? Where did she come from? What is her connection to Perseus?

Are they in a possession of a walking, breathing bomb about to destroy them all or the West’s only salvation?

He supposes he’ll find out soon enough.

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Adler hears Bell from his table, typing busy on the computer- barely blinking- all soaked up in that caffeine-infused energy at 1 am. She's always like that, he learns, when it comes to working, always with that steel determination, pulling out all the stops as long as it gets the job done- that Soviet discipline at it's finest.

Reminds him a little of himself when he's young.

Adler walks up to her.

“You done for the night?” A shake of her head is her only response. He sighs. “You should go home, Bell.”

“You go. I’ll lock up behind you,” Bell replies, low and monotone; that youthful stubborn.

If she was any other person, he would probably commend her for such fierce willpower, but she is Bell, the walking conundrum, his ace in the hole. Call him paranoid, but the idea of her having the safehouse for herself does nothing but raises every alarm in his head.

“No, we’re going home,” he says instead, tone brooking no argument and she frowns at the screen, her fingers stop moving then looks up at him with those goddamn empty eyes. "Come on, it's late anyway."

She doesn't say anything. Adler wishes he could read her mind- or crack that lovely skull on the back of her head, dissect her brain, learn its secrets and answers.

Adler has his gun with him. It wouldn’t take long. A quick, true shot to the heart to keep the brain intact. He’d have Hudson contact one of his people inside BND and he'd deliver the brain himself if he has to. They could do it. He heard they’ve been studying inmates' brains for decades now, anyway.

Before he has a chance to entertain the idea further, though, Bell nods once and rises up from her seat.

Bell walks past him. Her scent, like honeysuckle on ice, hits him like an uppercut in the face. Adler inhales, as if against his will.

He thinks he could get drunk on it.

“Hop in. I’ll drive you back to the hotel,” he says once they’re outside, regretting the decision the moment the words left his lips, but he knows he can’t just leave her on her own at this late hour.

The irony isn’t lost on him, though, considering he just thought about unspooling her brain a few minutes ago.

Bell complies without a protest. Getting inside the passenger seat, wordless still, fingers toying with the radio. An angry, krautrock music comes blaring all over his car. Adler winces, but at least the riot is loud enough to muffle the one's brewing in his head.

"How's your memory these days?"

Bell shrugs. "Nihil novi sub sole." There's nothing new under the sun.

Good, he muses. The least she knows about herself the better.

Though that doesn't mean he's out of the woods yet.

"Listen, from now on, I want you to keep me informed if there's any new progress about your memory or if you've developed any new symptoms. I want to know everything." He steals a sidelong glance at her, making sure she is listening (she always does, but Adler needs an excuse)

(An excuse for what?)

"Alright, Bell?"

"Of course," replies the woman in question.

"Good." Adler shifts his attention back to the road. "Good." Taking a long drag, he considers trying to appeal to her sentimental side. It's not something you'd improvise last minute- at least not with someone you brainwashed to believe you are her mentor/confidant for the past decade, but he's itching to know where he stands with her.

"You know, I'm just tryin' to look out for you, kid."

Her lips twitch but the rest of her visage remains impassive and faraway, more like a flick knife than a woman. The correlation is uncanny.

That's when she inches closer. The space between them bridged. He freezes. Hyper-aware of just how dangerous this is, but can’t bring himself to pull back, to look the other way. Not when her hand reaches out to pluck the cigarette from his mouth, eyes still glued to his, and curls her lips around the filter. One heavy pull, and then she rolls down the window and tosses it out on the side of the road.

"Thought I'd reciprocate the sentiment."

And with that, she leans back in her seat before Adler could even process what has just transpired.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

“Welcome back to the land of the living, kid,” Adler greeted her, about a month ago.

Park had insisted that he had to be there for her when she woke up (naturally, Adler had balked at the idea, but at the English woman’s fact-of-the-matter explanation, also because it had somewhat dawned on him last minute the logic behind her machinations- “both of you are supposed to have known each other for years now. If she doesn't see you by her side, she’s going to wonder why”- thus, here he was)

“How are you feeling?”

Bell blinked owlishly and stared at the older man with those bottomless, cat-like eyes that had haunted him since January.

Her gaze eventually softened as recognition flickered across her face.

“Like someone just hit me in the chest with a bulldozer,” she said hoarsely. “Where are we?”

“St. Dismas’ hospital, Pittsburgh.” Adler got up and fetched her a glass of water from the table. “Although not a bulldozer, but bullets did. That, and you hit your head really hard on your way down. Thought we’d lost you there, Bell.”

Bell drank in silence. She’s still watching him, thinking. This was the first time he realized that he couldn’t exactly read her expression and somehow that threw him off.

“What happened?” she asked, one hand mid-air, like she was deciding which to touch first, hesitating and abandoned the idea.

“You don’t remember?” She shook her head. Adler pretended to look remotely distressed about it. “The doctors warned me about this. It must have been because of the fall- heck, I could even still hear that sickening crunch from here.” He dragged his chair closer towards her bed.

“We were in Amsterdam. Remember Fohler?” she shook her head again. “Well, we’d been tracking this son of a bitch for months, but we were chasing him in Amsterdam. He was running away and climbed up some scaffolding. You were about to go up after him,” he recited the fabricated story he, Park and Hudson had crafted. “He shot you and you fell and hit your head against the pavement.”

Bell looked away first, silent. Her hand gingerly touched the back of her head and winced, albeit only slightly.

Adler was almost impressed, if not, disarmed by how calm and composed her reaction was to all of this. But then again, after having had witnessed first-hand how the woman barely flinched under any kind of interrogation technique they threw at her- a personality built for wrestling tigers- he really shouldn’t be surprised.

“Bell, what is the last thing you remember?”

Bell frowned. “Not much. I remember ‘Nam, but-”

“Vietnam? Kid, that was thirteen years ago.” Adler watched the way her throat bopped, like she was swallowing her own blood and the color drained from her face, just like the first time he’d seen her, and proceeded to drop the bomb:

“Bell, the year is 1981.”

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"Bell dear, would you mind taking a look at this?"

Park's voice sails from across the room. She says it like it's a compound word: Bell-dear. Like the two words belong together. Bell-dear. 2 syllables, 1 word, 9 characters and that just might be the weirdest thing he hears this year and he heard many things.

"Bell dear?" Adler asks much later, his gravel-and-smoke voice reduced to a whisper, when she delivers a document to his table.

Park shrugs as if that explains everything. "What? I like her."

He's tempted to say you really can't put a term of endearment and someone you brainwashed into submission in the same sentence, but what else is new?

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

They wind up in a bar. It’s called Die Stube and the place’s brimmed with artists and all sorts of leather-clad, Bowie-esque dramatic, chromatic blue eyelids young people chattering over a dirty cloud of smoke.

The two of them colonize a lone booth in the back. It’s dark and the quietest. She orders a beer and he, a scotch and they drink in silence. There are moments where her head would twist to the side, as subtle as a needle and survey the phantasmagorical scene before them, like studying something from a petri dish.

While he’s watching her.

Only to tear his gaze away to the nearest object he can find.

It lands on his watch.

"It’s almost ten. Hudson's contact should be here soon," he announces, if anything to distract himself. She nods mutely in reply, as always, and runs a finger around the rim of her glass.

"The place ain't much of your scene?"

She shrugs, like it's self-evident. "I didn't know this was a scene, though."

"Well, that’s West Berlin for you. A worry-free playground for the hedonists, hipsters and proto-electro NDW enthusiasts with drugs on tap," Adler says, sipping his drink in practiced nonchalance. "Always makes my head spin."

"I guess I remember it differently," Bell replies, tinged with something akin to begrudging.

That warrants his full attention. "What do you remember?”

Bell shrugs again and lights a cigarette instead, menthol, one of those long, skinny cigarettes they only market for women; biding her time, making him wait. She lets the smoke flares from her nostrils so her eyes are veiled.

"It’s hard to explain, but I suppose it’s grittier?” she gesticulates, searching for the right word like she’s skim reading the entire Oxford dictionary in her head. “Bizarrely, infinitely grittier and dimmer? Like being in an underground tunnel and there's not much to see."

Interesting. Maybe she’s recalling one of her ops for Perseus or her mind is confusing her with the world on the other side of the wall.

“Maybe you’re remembering one of our clandestine ops here. It was a few years after Vietnam,” Adler supplies, passing over the tale like bait.

She falls for it, hook, line and sinker.

“Ah, I guess that also explains my fluency in German.”

“I taught you that.” It’s only logical, he decides, that she learned from him. She’s supposed to be his protégé after all.

An elegant brow quirk. "You did?"

"Yeah, though you were already fluent in Latin, Russian, Vietnamese and Portuguese when we first met anyway. You have quite a natural ear, kid.”

She gives him a look. He really can’t categorize it, but it makes it a whole lot harder to fight against her stare.

“What else did you teach me?”

If they were anyone else, the lines could have a potential to entice, to seduce, that winsome, catty-eyelashes coquette, but they aren't anyone else and Bell does not voice it like that. Yet the implication behind the question stirs something in the pit of Adler’s stomach anyway, that tight knot of confusion as it is buried with something else and he finds himself, once again, uncharacteristically speechless.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

That particular question of her stays, even hours later, unbidden. Interspersed with her scent and face.

His emotions are a minefield whenever she’s near now. It evokes that newfound rush of terror within him, like walking on a tightrope or being thrown into the pit to face hundreds of hungry lions, bare hands. It makes Adler questions his every decision, and he can’t have that in his line of work.

Adler lights his sixth cigarette, contemplating everything, nothing. Anything to distract him from her. It's 4 am and he’s exhausted, but his mind won’t stop whirring. This isn’t like him at all- like he's lost somewhere in a Dali-style labyrinth that is his head and he wonders if this is a byproduct of his fear or fascination or confusion for the young woman.

He fears it is all of them.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

(They're only 10 minutes away from East Berlin when he senses it, something akin to burning on his peripheral vision, pulling him like weight.

Bell is staring at him from across the seat.

He cocks his head slightly to the side.

Adler catches the quick, telling quirk of her lips, like she's about to smile but lights a cigarette instead.)

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“Did you hear that?”

Krauss has just crossed the wall and their soles are slippery from the rain. She's panting. Her breath is white like a fog. Adler muses it must be from the running, until his iris trails down to where her hand is clutching his jacket sleeve, the leather creasing like a modulation signal.

“What is it?” Adler asks, hushed. There are no Stasis here, but even one can't be too careful.

“The TV.” She’s gaping at the broken TV next to them. Adler looks at the said object, frowning, then back to her. “Y-you didn’t hear it?”

"Heard what? Bell, the thing's dead."

Bell withdraws from him. Stepping back until her back meets the walls, her eyes seeing and unseeing, like a lens finding focus in the dark, then she closes them, as if trying to regulate her breathing. Adler has never seen her scared shitless of anything before. The sight confuses as it intrigues him.

"Bell, what's going on?" Adler steps closer, but he dares not to touch her.

She shakes her head, dismissive. In just a span of seconds, Bell dons that mask she likes to wear again; deadpan and frustratingly distant. A spike of annoyance drives through him. Just when he thinks he can get through her, there she goes again, retreating behind her palisades.

"Nothing." Bell turns away abruptly and she’s walking again."Let's just go. The others are waiting for us."

He doesn't pry about whatever she heard on the TV- Adler knows better than to beat a dead horse, thank you very much- not even after they save her from Volkov's clutches, after she bashes his head against the steel door and reeks his blood all the way home, it seems superficial at the time.

Until two days later.

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The day starts, as it mostly does for the team, with a briefing.

Fifteen minutes in and something like a gasp pulls his attention to her.

That’s when he notices it; her hands are shaking, coffee spilling out of the mug over her hand. A shatter follows. Her mug smashes to smithereens at her feet. She’s swaying, near collapse, like a house of cards about to fall, a hand on her nose.

Adler catches her before she tumbles to the floor.

“Bell!” His arm around her waist tightens, trying to keep her steady. Lazar rushes to their side in a flash and helps him move her to a nearby chair.

"Jesus Christ," he curses, more to himself than to her as he watches blood, a bead of angry red, trickling down her nose. "Sims, get me a washcloth from the bathroom."

He kneels before her once Sims returns with a damp cloth. Nicotine-stained gloved fingers tentatively grasp her chin, holding her still.

“Kid, you alright?” Adler asks, worry bleeds into his voice without him realizing it. He firmly presses the cloth under her nose, his other thumb touches the pulse at her throat- it's almost sickly affectionate. “Bell, talk to me."

Bell looks at him, discombobulated, like he's a figment of her imagination, then blinks. Again and again until she heaves a deep breath.

"I-" she hisses. One hand flies up to her head. "Fuck. My head.”

Adler’s eyes immediately search for Park’s. A knowing look passes over her face and he knows without saying that she's thinking the same thing, like they're attached to the same brain-wire:

MK-Ultra.

There’s a fraction of pause, then Lazar asks, "Should we give her something?”

Before Park can voice her answer, Bell beats her to it. "I already took an anticonvulsant this morning. It should have helped.”

“Wait, this has happened before?” Adler asks.

Bell looks away, a hesitating look shadowing her face. He fears the worst.

“Bell…” he tries again, a slight warning to his tone.

She sighs loudly, as if mentally preparing herself before walking into a storm.

“Yes. Two days ago."

His mind instantly refers to East Berlin, the TV. Trying to connect the dots in his head. It seems far fetched, but now he wonders if she saw something that triggers this. Although he's never read about this on other subjects before, the correlation is just impossible to ignore.

Fuck. He heaves a breath, willing himself to calm down, to think. They can't afford complications at times like these. Not when there's so much at stake right now.

Adler snaps his attention back to Bell when she tries to scramble awkwardly to her feet, swatting his hand away. The hand on her neck immediately reaches for her waist again and pushes her back down onto the chair. His grip's tight enough to leave marks on her skin, but he doesn't care.

"Bell, for fuck's sake, stay still or so help me," he says, exasperated, not letting go of her waist.

"I feel better now." Stubborn little shit.

He is tempted to scream at her face and grab both of her shoulders and shake. “The hell you’re not. Stop fighting it. You’ll only make things worse.”

Her face sours, if only for a millisecond before it morphs into guilt. “I’m sorry.”

Adler watches her for a long moment. It’s only now that he realizes that he’s still holding her waist and the cloth on her face.

He backs away from her like he’s been burnt.

“You should have told me. I thought I made it clear the other night to keep me informed regarding this,” he scolds.

“I’m sorry,” she utters again and she looks so pliable like this, a blank canvas perfumed with obedience and lethal mind. It makes him almost feel sorry for what he has in plan for her once the shit show is over.

“Look, just go back to the hotel and take a day off.” Her mouth cracks open. He raises a silencing hand. “That’s an order, Bell.” But she merely scowls, looking more like jagged ice than a person. Hudson may have just met his match, after all.

“I told you I’m fine.”

“That’s not how it looks to me.”

“It is. It’s my body and I know what I’m feeling, and I’m telling you, I. Feel. Fine.”

His jaw clenches. “Are you disobeying a direct order, agent?”

Bell doesn’t answer, but her whole face remains challenging and hard. Undeterred.

Adler holds his breath. He feels the whole room collectively does the same. It’s like staring down the barrel of a gun and there’s an awful sort of danger to be found in that.

Just when he thinks an imaginary bullet would dig itself into his skin, however, Bell utters, “Of course not.”

And so the woman resumes to her normal, docile self at a drop of a hat. Even when Park steps in and whisks her out of her seat, drives her back to her hotel with Lazar on shotgun.

It doesn’t assuage his worry, though. He’s still restless throughout the day, like a roaring ocean inside a bell jar. She’s never done this before, openly rebels against him. Now, the situation is just bad. Not casually bad or almost-got-shot bad, this is the-entire-Europe-could-turn-into-a-nuclear-wasteland bad, an-armageddon-waiting-to-happen bad.

What if this is the beginning of her old self trying to scratch her way out of the surface? Adler’s blood goes cold at the thought. He is going to have to keep a close eye on this development.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

West Berlin - 1 am, local time.

“How is she?”

“Stable. I’ve administered another dose of Propranolol before I left the hotel. She should be fit as a fiddle in the morning.”

“Tell me, what do you think happened to her?”

“My theory? Traumatic brain injury. A cumulative product of torture, trauma-based mind control and chronic stress. I've read reports about cases like these before in MI6. None of them is still alive to recount the tale, unfortunately."

Adler grips the phone.

“How long do you think we have?”

“Theoretically, 2-3 weeks tops.”

“But?”

He hears Park sighs on the other line. “But then again, none of the subjects I’ve encountered before were like her. So, I suppose it’s still a little too premature to determine at this point."

Adler kneads his temple, feeling the start of that familiar Bell-induced headache forms in his head. Can things just be fucking simple for once?

“We don’t have that much time anyway, Park. And if Hudson gets a wind of this, he’ll want her gone by morning. I can’t let that happen. Not…” he pauses. “Not when we are this close.”

"What are we going to do about her, then?"

Adler sighs.

"Raise the dosages of her drugs,” he says. “And keep an extra eye on her. I think we may be heading into uncharted waters now.”

Tagging: @mvalentine cause you said to tag you with everything i write so 👁👄👁

#russell adler #russell adler x bell #cod bell #cod #call of duty #call of duty black ops #call of duty cold war #cod cold war #alex mason #frank woods #helen park #lawrence sims #jason hudson #lazar azoulay

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queenofimagines · 3 years

Text

Request: “Hi! Can you do a request where the piggies are at a beach party and the kooks show up and one of them tries to drug you but JJ notices you acting weird around the kooks and takes you back to the chateau and takes care of you? I know it’s weird but I love angst mixed with fluff and ur a really good writer I feel like you can do it! ❤️❤️”

Warnings: Unconsensual drug use

Notes: None

The party is in full swing. With multiple kegs stationed around the beach for everyone and the various drugs that you were sure the kooks brought being graciously distributed, you had no doubt that tonight would be a banger. Oddly enough this party wasn’t planned by you or any of your friends. A kook, one of Rafe’s friends or cousins or something, had decided to throw this party to “promote business”, which you could only guess meant that the illegal substances being passed around were courtesy of him. Since your arrival, numerous people had come up to you offering to share whatever it was they were smoking or taking, but neither you nor the rest of the pogues were very keen on harder drugs. The most that the Pogues had ever really done was weed, and even then you had only smoked once, disliking the tickle in the back of your throat when you smoked. JJ had often suggested edibles but you had heard they were sometimes unpredictable and decided early on to stay away from them. Your friends were very much respectful of your decision and even went so far as to step in when they saw someone peer pressuring you. The amount of times JJ had physically stepped between you and whoever it was trying to coerce you to just try whatever they had was astounding, especially since JJ was basically an advocate for bad behavior. It was just such an instance that landed you where you were now.

JJ was in front of you, shoving the boy that had been a little too pushy when convincing you to try the cocaine he’d bought from Rafe. The boy was harmless, you could tell just by looking at him, but JJ was about ready to rock his shit, so you quickly got in the middle of the two, gently coaxing JJ to back down with the promise of a dance instead. Time seemed to fly by as you and JJ drank one cup of beer after another, both of you beginning to feel the affects early on in the night. After being crashed into by a young girl you didn’t recognize, your beer spilling on your white tank top as the teen profusely apologized, you quickly left to get another beer after telling your accidental assailant not to worry and to keep partying. JJ quickly began to dance with her, both keeping distance as they danced.

With how crowded the area on the beach that had been designated as the dance floor had been, you were surprised to see so many people hanging out near the kegs. The group was so packed you could barely even see the keg, let alone get to it. You tried as politely and unobtrusively as possible to weave your way towards the keg when a heavy hand fell on your shoulder.

“Need some help?” Turning around it was yet another face you didn’t recognize, although you would have to admit he did look a little familiar, at least in the sense that he dressed and held himself in the same manner that many other kooks did. He flashed you a smile, holding out his hand for your cup.

“Oh uh... Yeah thanks.” You replied, handing him your cup. The boy grabbed your cup and made his way through the crowd with ease, filling your cup before making his way back to you. You briefly lost sight of him when someone bumped into you, saying a quick sorry before moving on.

“I haven’t seen you around here before.” He said, still holding your cup.

“Ah, well, I don’t make it up to Figure 8 very often.” You replied awkwardly, waiting for him to hand you your drink.

“Makes sense, I’d definitely remember someone as hot as you.” He said, eying your chest. You felt uncomfortable, quickly realizing that the beer you had spilled on yourself earlier had made your shirt see through and the boy was now blatantly ogling your boobs. The once seemingly unsuspecting boy had now seemed like a sleaze as he made no effort to hide the once over he gave you, even moving to the side n an attempt to get a look at your ass.

“Okay, well I’ll just take my drink and get going.” You said, desperate to get out of the situation. He handed you your drink with a smirk, the complete opposite reaction that you normally would have expected when blowing a guy off.

“See you around.” Was all he said as you turned back to the dance floor to find JJ. When you finally spotted his mop of blonde hair nestled in a dark bandana, you practically ran to him, still feeling the boy’s eyes on you. When you reached him you found all of your friends together, all dancing and drinking and all in all just having a good time. You instantly felt safer and began to dance with them, drinking and laughing along to whatever they were saying, though if you were being honest you couldn’t really tell anymore. As time went on and your cup slowly emptied, you felt like your body was becoming heavy. You found it hard to focus, trying to spot your friends but finding that all the faces surrounding you were unfamiliar. You then felt a hand gently cup your waist, instantly thinking it was JJ, you leaned into the person, only to find the the cologne was much to expensive to be the one JJ usually wore. You looked up and saw the blurred face of the boy who had helped you before, an unsettling smile slinking onto his face at the state you were in. The boy slowly began to lead you away from the crowd. Somewhere in the back of your mind you knew this was a bad idea, but you were much to out of it to put any of your thought together as the boy led you to a more secluded part of the beach.

JJ had noticed you were gone before anyone else had, he figured you must have paired off with someone but when he took a headcount of the Pogues, he realized everyone was still here. He knew you would never let yourself be alone in a sea of strangers in such an inebriated state but as he looked around her couldn’t find you anywhere. His eyes almost skipped over the retreating figure in the distance, but when he took a closer look he realized it was you after you looked back towards him, a confused expression gracing your features. JJ wasn’t sure if the guy you were with was your friend, most people on the island were friendly with you and often hung out with you at these parties, but as you stumbled in the direction the unknown boy was leading you, he felt like something was off. At first he brushed it off, turning back to his friends and trying to dance along to the music, but as time went he felt more and more uneasy, finally deciding to follow you just in case something was wrong. When JJ looked jack to where you had been, you were gone. Panic slowly rose in him as he ran to try and find you. It didn’t take long as JJ had found that you were one of the most easiest people to spot, his eyes always finding you wherever he went if you so happened to be there too. a group of boys were surrounding you, all of them talking to each other and attempting to keep you upright. JJ knew that you would never agree to that many people touching you, especially if you didn’t know them.

“Hey!” He called, quickly walking towards the group of boys.

“Hey! What’s up man?” One boy asked, stepping in front of you.

“What’s going on?” JJ asked, deciding not to answer the boy’s greeting.

“Oh nothing.”

“Nothing? Really?” JJ peered behind the boy to get a look at you. He knew something was wrong and his one goal was to get you out of this as safely as possible. No violence, a mantra that you seemed to repeat to him every time he was about to get into a fight, just like you would be saying now if you could.

“She doesn’t look alright.” JJ said flatly.

“She’s fine.”

“You alright, sweetheart?” JJ asked you. You couldn't answer, barely able to. register much of what was happening around you.

“I said, she’s fine.” The boy insisted.

“Look man, she’s obviously not alright, and you fuckers obviously aren’t from around here. Let her go and I’ll see to it that none of you get arrested for assaulting an unconscious girl.”

“And what makes you so sure we will get arrested?”

“What makes you so sure you won’t?” JJ knew the kind of guys these were. They weren’t from around here and he was sure they weren’t privy to the way the Outer Banks worked. JJ knew that if they did decide to keep going, nothing would happen to them, in which case he wouldn’t heed your no violence policy, but he also knew that if he played the role just right, maybe the boys would think he was the sone of an important official or something. And he was right.

The boy in front of JJ hesitated before calling for his friends, all of them quickly leaving, but not before shoving you towards JJ. You stumbled into him, holding on to his shirt for dear life as you swayed on your feet.

“JJ?” You asked.

“I’m right here, sweetheart.”

“I don’t feel very good. I’m tired.”

“It’s okay, you’re okay. Let’s just get you back to the Chateau and you can have a nice long sleep, okay?” You nodded your head in agreement. JJ began walking towards the Chateau before picking you up bridal style after realizing you could barely walk. The he arrived, he laid you down on the bed that John B had lend him. JJ debated on whether or not he should switch your shirt out for one of his, ultimately deciding to do so, thinking about how gross you’d feel if you woke up with spilled bear still on you. He threw your shirt into a hamper and left to get you a glass of water for the morning. When JJ was done, he stood next to you, gazing down at your peaceful face and reflecting on how odd this whole situation was. You were the one that always made sure everyone else was safe at these parties and here you were, drugged, JJ was sure. He was just relieved that he got to you in time.

JJ turned to leave, when your voice gently disturbed the silence.

“Where are you going?” You asked.

“I’m going to sleep on the couch, I'll be right here.” You shook your head, unceremoniously slapping your arm down next to you.

“Jus’ sleep ‘ere” You slurred. JJ hesitated before slipping under the covers where you immediately curled into his side and fell asleep. JJ softly threaded his fingers through your hair, thinking about how tonight could have gone very differently. He almost cried at the thought of you getting hurt, even moe so at the thought that if he hadn’t been there to stop it from happening, no one else would have. That night JJ promised himself that no matter what, he’d always look out for you the same way you looked out for him.

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hello-im-not-a-possum · 3 years

Text

13. Trust

It’s not fun to be put into a situation where the only person you can count on is the person who wants to kill you, nor is it fun to have to be put in a situation where you have to trust the person that you really want to kill, but Henry and Malice don’t really get a choice in the matter. (Set in an AU Where Allison and Tom capture both Henry and Malice alive.)

When Malice came charging at Henry, she was stopped by being tackled into unconsciousness by an almost identical angel.

His assumed savior hoisted her body up with ease, while the Boris with the mechanical arm had glared at both of them.

Henry tried to explain the situation to the newcomers, but the angry looking wolf simply ignored him as he walked up to the man and whacked him out with the pipe.

Both the angel and the Animator woke up in a cramped, tiny, makeshift prison while one of their kidnappers was singing and painting on the wall.

It was very tense and awkward when that happened.

Malice was clearly pissed off about sharing her cell with Henry (the man had similar opinions on the arrangement as he was rightfully upset about what she did to his Buddy Boris), but the animator could tell that she also seemed scared, outright terrified, of their captor.

While he wasn’t her biggest cheerleader, he did see some flickers of Susie still in there, there were still glimpses of a woman who poured her heart and soul into her role, and loved every minute of it until her betrayal broke her. Seeing the fallen angel so scared, and dare he say, helpless in this instance, reminded him of that tape in the Angel side room.

“Everything feels like it’s coming apart…”

His own heart broke when he first heard that tape, while he had never seen Susie get her role as Alice, he did see her voice some of those talking chairs, dancing chickens, and other minor roles. She always seemed to have fun with them and if Sammy didn’t pick her for Alice first, then he would’ve asked her himself.

The animator reached out, then hesitated, wondering if it was better to try to comfort her or to give her space.

The one who broke the silence between the three was the free angel who noticed that Henry was up when he moved.

“I know her, but who are you? Why are you here?”

“I was invited by an old friend, and now I can’t leave.”

Malice rolled her eye and muttered something under her breath.

“Then you know more than we do. One minute we don’t even exist… just… thoughts. And the next minute, this place.”

“Henry.” Malice whispered in his ear as she grabbed his hand. “I know I’m the last person you’d listen to, but don’t fall for her act! I know her, and I know she’s no better than Joey...”

Henry nodded in acknowledgement and turned back to the captor angel.

“Are you gonna let us out of here?”

“She’s dangerous and down here, strangers aren’t good things. How can we trust you?”

“If we’re so dangerous, then why lock us up instead of killing us when you had the chance to?” Malice spoke through gritted teeth. “Why bother with the cage at all?”

The other angel stayed silent as she did not have an answer, leaving the other two in silence as well.

-----

It’s only for a few hours. No need to worry, I won’t go far… Only up to level six. Just stay here. Keep an eye on them, okay? I’ll be back as soon as I can. I promise.”

The Boris menacingly slapped the axe against his palm while watching over the pair, Malice refused to look him in the eye as he did so.

-----

“You’re drawing him again?” His cellmate asked curiously.

“Yeah, it’s just… I miss him. He was one of the only good things about this studio.”

While he was focused on his work, he did notice the twinge of guilt cross her features before her face fell into thought.

“...If it makes you feel any better, he’s not truly gone. The ink probably spat him back out a while ago and he’s probably wandering the studio looking for you.”

Henry raised an eyebrow.

“What makes you think that?”

“He disintegrated when you defeated him. Have you ever noticed that when you die, you come up somewhere else and you don’t find a corpse of yourself laying around the spot you were killed?”

“Come to think of it… I have noticed that.”

“When the Ink’s done with people, it leaves their bodies alone. When it’s not done with them, then if they die, it disintegrates their bodies and spits them out of the puddles somewhere else.”

“I have a feeling you know this from a lot of experience…”

“How very observant of you.” She deadpanned.

“Thanks, it’s a strong suit of mine.” He also deadpanned.

-----

“Henry? Susie?”

Malice shot the ‘clueless’ angel a glare as she set two bowls of bacon soup on the edge.

“Here, you two must be hungry.” She sheepishly looked down at the bowls. “Sorry, it’s all we have.”

The free angel turned and walked away while the Boris put his arms around the bowls, turned to glare at them, knocked the bowls onto the floor, and made a threatening gesture before leaving himself.

“They never planned on giving us the soup anyway.” Malice whispered to Henry. “It’s just their ‘good cop bad cop’ routine; “miss goody-two shoes” is the good cop who generously gives us dangerous monsters some of her and her guard dog’s limited portions of endless soup, while the “Mean wolf” is the bad cop who knocks over the soup and threatens us, out of her sight, but not out of her earshot.”

“Huh, ...Did they lock you up before?”

“No, I just know what they’re like; the happy little Bonnie and Clyde couple…”

------

“I know you’re watching me, it’s just... a little creepy.”

“It’s not like we have anything else to do.” Malice muttered under her breath.

The animator would’ve stayed silent, but as he watched his vocal captor write on the walls, he noticed how similar her own handwriting was to the messages on the other walls.

“You’re the one who writes on the walls!”

“Everyone does that.”

“-We all do.” The captor angel interjected as if she did not hear her prisoner. “For some poor souls down here, it’s the only way they can be heard. But you don’t want to touch the ink for too long! It can claim you… ...pull you back. That’s how I met Tom. I was messing with things I shouldn’t have been and he... ...he was there.”

“Why do you call him ‘Tom’?”

“He just seems to respond to it.”

“Well I don’t think he’s very fond of either of us.”

“Let me show you something...” She approached the cage. “A while back, I was mapping out one of the upper levels… ...when I noticed something reflecting off a piece of glass. I held up the glass, looked through, and on the wall behind me was a hidden message! Right there! In plain sight! So I kept looking, and found more and more messages everywhere in the studio! But you can’t see them with your eyes. Only through this! Take a look!”

Malice scoffed dismissively as the freed angel handed Henry the seeing eye tool.

‘SHE WILL LEAVE YOU FOR DEAD.’

“I don’t know who’s leaving them, but I think they know how to get out of here.”

“Where does it all lead to?”

“Nowhere.” she sighed. “I followed them for a long time... just leads me in circles. I don’t think I’m meant to leave this place Henry, but maybe… you are.”

“And yet, you keep him locked up like a little bird…” Malice muttered.

“Alice, please let us out of here.”

“...Tom thinks you’re both dangerous.”

“Of course.”

“And what do you think?”

“I… I think… ...you’re the hope I’ve been waiting for. Go to sleep, maybe tomorrow will be better.”

-----

“I Hope you’re not taking everything she says at face value.”

“She seems harmless enough...”

“That’s what she’s trying to do- Look, I know you don’t trust me, and I can’t say I blame you for that. I don’t expect you, or WANT you to trust me. But Listen to me when I say this: I ended up as what you see me as BECAUSE I trusted her. Don’t make the same mistake I did, Henry, if you really want to get involved with her and make it out unscathed, then keep your guard up.”

Henry gestured for Malice to come closer and held the seeing glass up to show her the ‘SHE WILL LEAVE YOU FOR DEAD’ message.

“...Did you write this?”

“Yes Henry.” She sarcastically droned. “While I was working to achieve my perfection and setting up Bendy land’s obstacles, I went down to the secret lair of my worst enemy aside from the Ink Demon, both risking my life in the process and putting my goals into jeopardy, and wrote that message in invisible ink, just on the off chance that if she’d capture both of us alive instead of killing me.”

“I see.”

-----

“That was really stupid Tom! You shouldn’t have gone out there! Now that he’s seen you... it’s only a matter of time…” She grunted through adjusting his arm. “before he finds us here.”

She then waved at her captives, something that Tom noticed and began threateningly slapping the axe against his hand again.

-----

“We can’t just leave them! Not with the Ink Demon right outside the door!”

“What’s going on?”

“He’s coming. We have to move on.” A loud rumble echoed above them as Malice curled up in a corner praying for her safety. “Tom! We have to let them out!”

She pulled on the boards, Tom shook his head.

“...I’m Sorry.”

“No you’re NOT! DON’T LIE TO ME!” Malice Snapped. “YOU HAVE A SWORD! HE HAS AN AXE! IF YOU REALLY CARE ABOUT EITHER OF US EVEN THE TINIEST BIT, YOU’D CUT THE SHIT AND CUT DOWN THE BOARDS!”

Alice hesitated, but ran anyway, with Tom close behind her. Leaving them to their doom.

Malice fell to the ground and started to cry, she was shaking violently and saying things that Henry couldn’t make out because she was bawling so hard, but he could definitely make out the words ‘Ink Demon’ and ‘We’re going to die’ here and there.

“Alice?” He put his hand on her shoulder reassuringly. “Alice, we’re not going to die here.”

“How…” She sniffled. “How do you know that?”

“Well, I think you’re going to have to trust me on this, but...” He held up the seeing eye tool, showing her the messages in their cell itself. “I think whoever’s leaving these is trying to help.”

#Bendy and the Ink Machine #Henry Stein #susie campbell #Malice Angel #allison pendle #Thomas Conner #fanfic #ink demonth

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usergreenpixel · 3 years

Text

Frev writing prompts, Part 5! Seriously, I have no idea how I keep coming up with these. 😅

36. The protagonist was born and raised by a troupe of traveling performers. For as long as they can remember, they have been traveling from place to place, never staying anywhere for a few days at most.

The protagonist’s father is the troupe’s flutist and singer while their mother is a puppeteer so the youth has always had a passion for the performing arts and dreams of traveling all over Europe with their big happy family.

Nicknamed “L’œillet rouge” (The Red Carnation) by the troupe as an homage to their father’s favorite flower, the protagonist enjoys playing the flute and singing with their father, as well as putting on puppet shows with their mother.

With a song in their heart, a smile on their face and their father’s precious flute in their hands, the protagonist travels all over the country with their family, entertaining the people of France but never settling down and they like it that way.

But one day, while the troupe is staying in Paris and putting on a rather satirical puppet show which mocks the current regime, the protagonist’s parents are suddenly arrested by the police. Apparently, the father is a dangerous rebel while the mother is guilty of having sheltered said rebel years ago.

The protagonist is convinced that there must be a mistake and decides to rescue their parents with the help of all the other troupe members, including the protagonist’s older maternal half-brother and their maternal grandparents, all of whom are eager to help.

The time is limited and the rescue will be far from easy, but the protagonist will be damned if they don’t at least try to succeed. So, with that in mind, the young flutist and their family start to concoct the rescue plan...

37. Rumors have it that people who have been murdered tend to become vengeful ghosts and haunt their killers to exact revenge.

This is certainly true for Robespierre and his supporters. Unable to find peace, their souls are brought back to the realm of the living, seeking revenge on the Thermidorians.

This particular circumstance is quite convenient for the protagonist, a spirit medium who summons these ghosts and intends to use them as tools in their plan to torment the Thermidorians and avenge their family that got massacred in Lyon, skillfully using the revolutionaries’ restlessness and anger to achieve their goal.

However, soon certain events make the protagonist question the morality of using these spirits. Perhaps the protagonist is no better than their enemies if they are not above manipulating others. Perhaps there’s another way… Nonsense! It’s not manipulation if the other people also want revenge and are dead anyway...right?

38. The heroine of the story, like many other girls of the noble class, grew up and got her education in a convent in her hometown of Caen, France.

As a result of this upbringing, the young woman is rather used to a sheltered life, her idealism is through the roof and she is rather nostalgic about her life in the convent and her friendship with another noble girl, Charlotte Corday, who is the heroine’s closest friend and confidant.

At first the noblewoman wants to stay out of the events of the revolution, dreaming of taking her vows as a nun and living a quiet life in the convent, but those plans are abruptly thwarted by Corday, whose influence slowly gets the naïve heroine deeper and deeper into the mess that is the French Revolution.

Being idealistic, easily trusting, quiet, pacifistic and devoutly Catholic, the heroine initially follows her best friend’s lead and trusts her judgement since Corday is the closest thing to a big sister that the young woman has.

However, when Corday tries to convince her to kill Jean-Paul Marat and end the revolution, the heroine starts having mixed feelings about her friend’s decisions, despite being angry with Marat for her own personal reasons. After all, her faith teaches to forgive, not to judge and take revenge, so now the heroine must make a choice.

Will she betray her best friend and ruin the plan or will she cast aside her morals to help Corday and, presumably, the rest of the country? Is Marat really the bloodthirsty monster that Corday says he is? Is there another way to deal with the situation at hand without any casualties? And what consequences will the main character face for the choice she makes?

39. The main character is an illegitimate son of a Russian noble and a serf (yes, serfs were still a thing in Russia) who got taken in by his father as a “ward” and sent to France to get a good education, as everything French was very fashionable in the Russian Empire at the time.

There, in Paris of 1789, the young man absorbs all the knowledge he can, learning languages, reading the prominent books written in the Enlightenment era and even befriends a man by the name of Maximilien de Robespierre, a lawyer from Arras and the representative of Artois.

Considering that Robespierre was almost born illegitimate, he is the first person in a long time who doesn’t judge the protagonist for the circumstances of his birth and accepts him for him. Excited to be accepted at long last, the young man begins to look up to Robespierre as a mentor and an older brother of sorts, quickly absorbing his ideas and supporting him.

So, naturally, when the revolution begins and the young man finds himself trapped in Paris, he joins the revolutionaries to fight alongside his mentor.

Thus begin his adventures.

40. The protagonist is a child of criminals forced to survive on the streets after losing their parents until they’re eventually taken in by a seemingly sympathetic Jacobin, given a new name, a home and a fresh start in life. The protagonist essentially becomes the revolutionary’s ward and their guardian even takes them to the Convention so the youth can observe the meetings.

All seems good for the protagonist...almost too good to be true. But eventually certain events force the protagonist to wonder if their new guardian truly cares about them.

Could it be that their Jacobin guardian has some sinister motives? And will the protagonist be able to move away from their “bad” heritage and live an honest life at last?

41. Barras is in love. Again.

Head over heels over a pretty servant he recently hired and she even seems to like her employer back. Even her suspiciously strong resemblance to a certain Jacobin who got executed in 1794 isn’t a dealbreaker for Barras and the smitten man writes said resemblance off as a coincidence.

The other Thermidorians, especially Fouché, are not that blind and they fear that a relative of that particular executed man is here to seek revenge. Fouché decides to investigate this seemingly ordinary and harmless young servant, suspecting that she has quite a few skeletons in her closet.

Are these suspicions going to be confirmed or is Fouché simply being paranoid?

42. Thermidor has just taken place. The Jacobins are imprisoned and it seems like the traitors are going to win. All hope is lost for the Jacobins and their enemies rejoice.

But little do the Thermidorians know that by betraying and imprisoning all the men who stand in their way, they have just acquired new enemies - women.

Revolutionary women.

Wives, daughters, sisters, nieces, goddaughters, lovers, wards, friends and sympathizers of the captured Jacobins who are not going to sit back and give up.

Seeing how bleak things are, these women, led by a mysterious woman who conceals her face behind a mask and calls herself “Citoyenne Liberté” (Citizen Liberty), decide to rescue their imprisoned loved ones from the clutches of the Thermidorians.

They’re running out of time, they’re outnumbered and not equipped with proper weapons, but that is hardly a problem they can’t solve and they’re willing to fight against the odds regardless of the obstacles.

After all, Heaven hath no fury like a woman scorned, which is what the Thermidorians are about to learn the hard way.

43. A singer and actress who used to perform in Venice flees to France after a scandal demolishes her reputation. Having only her voice and her acting to make ends meet, for a while she tries to find work in Paris but barely makes enough money for her and her son to survive.

Her only friend and confidant in this bleak situation is a future revolutionary who happens to admire the heroine’s singing and strongly believes that she deserves better. He even bonds with the actress’s toddler son and is willing to step up and become a proper father figure for the child.

Thanks to said revolutionary, the heroine’s life begins to change for the better and she decides to settle down in Paris. Even when she learns about the approaching revolution, she chooses to stay in the only place where she feels like she can belong.

What’s more, the actress finally finds her new purpose in life. She too can fight for the cause of her new partner and his friends, in her own way.

How is a woman whose main talents are acting and singing supposed to be able fight, you may ask? Why, by becoming a spy for the Jacobins and the singing voice of the revolution of course!

And she might just be able to prove that anyone can be a revolutionary and one doesn’t need to be a fighter nor an orator to help a noble cause.

44. A female servant working for Georges Danton has to practically flee the house of her employer after the latter crosses all the possible boundaries while drunk.

Fearing for her safety and profoundly traumatized by the event, the servant is found and taken in by a seemingly sympathetic man who sees Danton as a sworn enemy for his own reasons. Considering that both have a grudge against Danton and the man is a journalist, he and the servant team up to bring Danton down.

Will they succeed? Why does the journalist hate Danton? And is his desire to aid the heroine genuine?

45. Paris, France. The revolution is in full swing.

The Committee of Public Safety has to deal with multiple issues, the ongoing war is depleting France’s resources and the situation seems dire.

What’s more, a new newspaper, “La Voix de la Justice” (The Voice of Justice), began to circulate in the city. While this particular fact isn’t that surprising by itself, the thing that sets this newspaper apart from the rest is the fact that its author is anonymous.

Nobody knows who writes this newspaper but the articles are quite good and this mysterious person has already exposed several people who were using the Reign of Terror as an excuse for their atrocities.

Naturally, all these details catch the attention of Jean-Paul Marat and Camille Desmoulins, two of the most prominent journalists of that time. Intrigued by this new newspaper and its author, the two revolutionaries team up to track that person down, if only to find out who they are and thank them for helping their cause.

46. The protagonist grew up believing that Robespierre is single handedly responsible for the execution of their beloved aunt and uncle and, as a result, believes that the man deserved to be executed for that betrayal.

However, the protagonist is soon forced to question their judgment when their older cousin, Horace Desmoulins, reaches out to them in a letter, inviting them to Paris and claiming that he found evidence proving that in actuality Robespierre attempted to save Camille and Lucile Desmoulins, Horace’s parents.

Although the protagonist is skeptical at first, since Horace has always defended his godfather, they are still intrigued by their cousin’s invitation and leaves Guise to join Horace in his investigation.

Together, the two cousins are both determined to clear the names of Horace’s parents and figure out what role Robespierre actually played in the family tragedy.

47. The five protagonists are all members of a heavy metal band whose name and songs are an homage to the French Revolution.

Previously little more than a quintet of college misfits determined to rehabilitate this particular event and tell the real story through music, the band finally starts gaining popularity after a successful concert at a music festival in Marseille.

And then things take a turn for the unexpected when the band gets into an accident on their way home, only to wake up in Revolutionary France. Naturally, they now must survive and return home but this adventure might just become the inspiration they needed so much...

48. After the protagonist’s father leaves them and their blind mother behind to move to Paris, the protagonist is naturally upset. Year after year, they wait for their father to return but he never does.

In 1789, after losing their mother to an illness, the protagonist decides that enough is enough and travels to Paris to confront their father. To their disgust, they soon find out that their father is now remarried, with a new family and quite rich while the protagonist is basically a pauper. Moreover, the father seems to have joined the revolutionaries, which is something that the protagonist cannot approve of either.

Now the protagonist wants to make sure that their father faces the music for his betrayal so they contact a journalist who is about to expose said father in an article.

A story of one of his enemies leaving behind his first family will be a nice addition to the already existing accusations of corruption, but the protagonist and the journalist soon realize that they are not immune to the consequences of their actions either and this article might cause more damage than they think it will.

49. (A reimagining of Aladdin) After their flute is broken beyond repair, the protagonist goes to a pawn shop to find a replacement for their practice.

It is there that an old ivory flute catches their attention so the protagonist purchases it, has it professionally restored and decides to keep it, ignoring the warning of the shopkeeper that it’s cursed and the suspiciously low price.

The protagonist is a skeptic and never believed in magic, curses and other occult things.

That is until they play the flute for the first time and a man poofs into existence like a genie from a lamp. Introducing himself as Louis Antoine de Saint-Just, he informs the protagonist that he used to be the owner of the flute but is now trapped in it because of black magic.

Despite their skepticism, the protagonist cannot logically explain anything that’s going on but wants to help so they strike a deal with Saint-Just - he is going to help the protagonist win over their love interest in exchange for freedom.

As for how the spell is supposed to be broken, the protagonist is completely clueless but their mysterious neighbor with a knack for alchemy and the occult might be able to help…

50. Lyon, France.

The future Thermidorians mercilessly massacre innocent people and rule with an iron fist. Just today they massacred several prominent noble families of the city for defying them.

However, what the tyrants do not know is that they didn’t massacre everyone, for the daughters of the executed nobles are currently living at a convent to get education, as was common back then.

Upon receiving the tragic news and fearing that these young girls are going to end up on the death list, two nuns, the heroines of the story, come up with a plan to escort the girls out of the city and get them to a different location where they would be safe.

The plan is daring but the risk is too high to sit there and do nothing. Will the nuns be able to keep their students safe?

Let me know in the comments or DMs if any of my prompts interest you! I can help you with certain prompts if you want! 😊

#louis antoine de saint just #french revolution #writing #writing prompts #frev #paul barras #I still refuse to make a fouche tag #charlotte corday #jean paul marat #camille desmoulins #lucile desmoulins

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darkzonediaries · 2 years

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Is Lyekka a plant? A bio-weapon?

Despite former “Bio-Vizier” Mantrid addressing her as “plant lady” (“End of the Universe”) I don’t think that Lyekka actually is a plant. Rather, I suspect that her species was engineered by weapons scientists (who probably then went the way of the folks behind the Claggia-worm from “Eating Pattern”) to look like plants, as cover for their man-eating ways.

There are a number of clues to this. Perhaps most obvious, Lyekka never, so far as we know, performs photosynthesis. When she gets hungry, as in “791,” she doesn’t ask the crew to find her a sunny planet; she asks them to take her to prey animals. Neither do the “sister-Lyekkas” plant themselves in Earth’s soil and start absorbing rays during season four. Instead, they live in a closed-up asteroid-ship (so, no sun), intend to eat everyone on Earth, and have already destroyed all life on several other planets.

Lyekka herself is semi-benign, or at least not an existential threat to the entire human species. In “Garden,” the dream-derived copy of her shows the forethought to ask who will tend the garden if she eats the gardener. Put together, though, the sister-Lyekkas exhibit a rabid desire to destroy whole ecosystems, regardless of whether it serves their long-term interests. As Kai points out (I’m trying to think of which episode it was; maybe “Lyekka vs. Japan”?), they will, sooner or later, run out of planets. They brush him off by noting that there are still a lot of “tasty” planets out there.

This strikes me as pretty close to how an unethical bioengineer/weapons scientist, operating on an interplanetary level, would want his/her creations to think: Mass cooperation within a hive mind, focused on the goal of devouring everything in sight, even if it leads to their own eventual starvation. The only thing missing is an effective “kill switch” for when they quit being useful. Again, all of this sounds like the backstory of the worms from “Eating Pattern.”

Of course, the Lyekka-sisters have a far more sophisticated design than the worms. Their pods can maneuver through both vacuum (“Lyekka”) and air (“Apocalexx Now”); when not swimming, they look like harmless, stationary plants. Note that only the pod has this static, plant-like form: Lyekka herself can melt into a liquid and assume the form of, at minimum, any humanoid she wants. Sure, evolution produces some amazing disguises, but this is a strangely specific disguise for something that can function, without technological assistance, in environments ranging from Vietnam to outer space. It’s a lot like the disguise you’d make to infiltrate a society of people who 1) knew about plants and 2) considered them stationary and more or less harmless.

TL;DR: I adore Lyekka, but I also think that she’s probably a genocidal science project gone wrong. And I adore LEXX, because where else would the above sentence make perfect sense?

#reposted from my site #lexx #meta #lyekka #lyekka and lyekka-adjacent characters #mine

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missdawnandherdusk · 4 years

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Pureblood!Slytherin x Draco Dating Headcanons:

Requested by the lovely @ghostlytoadalmondhairdo! Here you go, sweetie!!

As a pureblood, you grew up with Draco (Parties, gatherings, dreadful “playdates”). Everyone expected you to grow up and fall in love and you didn’t like Draco like that he was your best friend

And Merlin you two are dorky looking kids

You two start Hogwarts and you’re both in Slytherin and beaming because you’re with someone you know

okay but can you imagine going to Diagon Alley for the first time and getting wands together and books and everything else and just geeking out while you parents roll their eyes and sigh deeply

Draco has Crabbe and Goyle, and you have Pansy and Daphne and good lord you guys are terrifying to everyone else

You and your posse are a force to be reckoned with just like Draco and his posse but you’re not too keen on being ruthless (cue mean girls, you are the Regina George of Hogwarts)

Instead, you really give in to the tradition of being a proper lady you can hear your grandmother’s words in your head all the time. “Don’t slouch, stand up straight, elbows off the table, shoulders back head up, don’t be so loud, don’t walk so loudly, cross your ankles when you sit, punctuality is everything, that skirt is too short...”

Which leads to a lot of people calling you princess as a taunt because you’re just so posh

And Merlin everyone at this school except for your fellow Slytherins is an imbecile with no class

Even Draco who slips into foolish taunts and you just scoff and roll your eyes, not impressed. His smile falls because he misses you. You guys were once best friends and now it seems you’ve parted ways. So he tries to be a better person keyword: tries he loses all composure around Potter

Now he’s defensive. “I can outspell you any day, princess” He snaps. “Bring it, pretty boy” You draw your wand and he stops because he remembers the day you got the wand and how your eyes were shining and now he really misses you

And you miss him too. A lot. Pansy is constantly complaining that you need to go and talk to him but you were never good with words and you didn’t know if Draco wanted to talk to you.

All of your friends are screaming internally because you two just need to talk to each other is locking them in a closet together an option???

But instead, you taunt him, and he snarks back and now it's a competition and the whole school is frustrated and slightly scared because you and Draco are both very powerful and very mad at each other all the time and you do not want to get caught in the crossfire

“You can cast a Patronus?” “What like it’s hard?” Hello Elle Woods

Suddenly you’re not twelve anymore and neither is he and he looks a lot less dorky now... and have his eyes always been that blue? Have your lips always been the perfect shade of pink?

One day you’re snapping at Draco and it starts to turn into a Duel and everyone is just watching in shock and awe at you two going at each other

Somehow you end up inches away from in, nearly growling at another, and you see a glimpse of the little kid you used to know in his eyes

and then you’re kissing him

a cheer goes up and Pansy yells “F*cking finally!” not that you care, you’re very distracted at the moment

Can you say couple goals? Also like can you imagine the sheer DBE between the three couples of you and Dray, Pansy and Daph, Theo and Blaise?

“Girls” night (that include you, Daph, and Blaise) with records and makeovers and “Blaise it’s not fair how do you get your eyeliner so perfect?” and talking trash about your significant others and telling embarrassing stories

“Guys” night (with Pans, Dray, and Theo) that are full of midnight Quidditch matches/flying and goofing off shenanigans and “Pans you have to tell me where you get your cologne”

Shopping trips together probably in Paris that are always over expensive and full of fashion advice from anyone and everyone. “No, Blaise you cannot wear navy and black, you’ll look like a bruise” “Draco put down the shiny cape” “Daph, we have to wear skirts, not ballgowns,” “Merlin Theo, those shoes with that shirt?” “Pansy you are not shaving your head stop thinking about it,”

Going for dinner at fancy restaurants and having proper tea parties that end up with you all mocking your parents and its hysterical

Fifth-year comes and you can finally drop the uniform though you have to remind Daph that she can’t wear ballgowns everywhere but you’re allowed to wear dresses now hello fifties aesthetic and you and Draco look like you walked out of a catalog for Vouge

Can you imagine the Yule Ball? The utter prestige that your group radiates. You all know how to dance and you and Draco waltz across the floor that has girls jealous and guys wishing they could

But whenever you look at Draco you still see that dorky kid who knocked out his loose tooth with a handheld ornate mirror

The softer moments between the two of you where there aren’t expectations or tradition and you talk under the stars about dreams and wishes

He calls you princess now unironically. He’s still your pretty boy.

Behind every great man is no one. A great man knows a great woman stands next to him and is probably rolling her eyes at him

You and Draco breaking harmless rules that still give you a thrill of rebellion: eating dessert before dinner, breaking curfew, walking barefoot outside, not ironing and folding your socks, not making your beds every morning, buying black nail polish, ruffling his coiffed hair at the end of the day and you see the same shining eyes as the boy you grew up with and stars do you love him

But you’re still posh together: horseback riding, playing the piano together, walking along the Manor grounds on Sunday strolls, hosting dinner parties, going to galas and balls, shmoozing just about everyone in the ministry, taking the dark mark together and having to go through that entire ordeal and realizing that maybe tradition on some things is wrong

Which causes a huge fight between you and Draco because you can’t get behind the Dark Lord anymore and he’s just so scared of anyone getting hurt because he doesn’t want to lose you. But in the end, he’s there with the right choice

The lot of you holding your heads high as you walk the halls of Hogwarts during and after the battle fighting for your true home and where your real family is

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