#a few of the rarer art works i think
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misguided protectors of the trot
some unique ways are so overwhelmed by tales of woe that if you are joyful in your trot buds appear and say 'you cant exist you must be a parody'. it is amazing how hard it is for neurotypical cis straight buds to accept someone could just joyfully be queer and autistic
entire writing career has obviously had pushback from conservative devils but a few leftwing buds trying to police voices for special online points is always so eyerolling. 'chuck is homophobic a book about queer joy MUST be parody' 'chuck is ableist hes too aware to be autistic'
these scoundrels say ‘wait this is not dramatic tragedy about gay men overcoming discrimination? THEN IT IS NOT REAL QUEER ART’ or ‘wait your story about autism is not about how it was SO HARD but you finally made it when a neurotypical bud took you under their wing? FAKE STORY'
i am betting some who do this (sometimes literally to chuck over the years) will read this and say ‘well thats not me.’ and i have to say… ‘BUD IT IS YOU’. it might not be as obvious and you may think theres more nuance but THIS is the thought process just below surface
so what is point? point is: to all my well meaning leftwing buds, your love and care is appreciated but you do not need to police communities you are not in. support all you want but SUPPORT and POLICING are very different things. gatekeeping is not your job
second. work to accept that your buds CAN MAKE JOYFUL ART. they can also make STRANGE, SILLY, FRIGHTENING, SICKENING, PLAYFUL, or PUNK ROCK art. theres no one APPROVED way to express these perspectives, and if you are outside this community it is not your job to keep the gate
as time goes on and buds realize what i am doing with my creations these bad takes get rarer and rarer. i am DOIN VERY GOOD. my post is mostly out of concern for young buckaroo artists without a big following, who want to build something unexpected and strange and bold
let queer buckaroos write stories with happy endings OR terrible endings that make you squirm. let autistic buckaroos paint with joy and complexity or deep sadness and minimalism. the way these voices get tokenized is by insisting they need to have ONE SPECIFIC WAY
proving love is accepting that we all have our own unique trot, even you. ESPECIALLY YOU. get out there and create YOUR THING buckaroo. thank you for reading buds. LOVE IS REAL
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[Director’s Commentary] a harmony between qin and se
As promised (to like two interested people lol), here’s my commentary to accompany a harmony between qin and se, some of which has been retrieved from discussions in the AO3 comments section.
CHAPTER 1
This being Wei Ying’s story, the first chapter is entirely an introduction to her. I’ll let the text mostly speak for itself, but some additional thoughts:
She is, first and foremost, a very unreliable narrator when it comes to herself.
Despite what she says, as a direct equivalent to “number 4 most eligible bachelor in the Jianghu”, she is actually considered to be a solid choice for a daughter-in-law (mostly because of how well she’s managed to hide all her quirks from the public eye). She also has more than one young male admirer because she is, in fact, an attractive lady The main thing working against her is the circumstances of her birth and the related lack of connections/assets.
Auntie Yu and Uncle Jiang have received a few overtures from interested parties already, but they’re still using the excuse of “Eldest daughter must be married out first” while they figure out the quality of offer they can settle for (which admittedly does include consideration of the potential benefits to the Jiang family).
Her embroidery is fine, if you ignore the fact that she’s constantly embroidering unconventional patterns: Jiang Cheng has most certainly received more than one troll hebao, and there have also been many an embroidered flower or cloud pattern that bears a suspicious resemblance to something outrageous (no penises because Wei Ying is a Proper and Good Girl and has never seen one until the bedroom books, but almost certainly an unflattering caricature of Jin Zixuan’s face, and the occasional rude Chinese character - always with plausible deniability, of course).
Broadmindedness is for women who have become disillusioned with the mortal coil. Which is to say: Nuns. She takes another bite of meat: I’m not sure if I was right in assuming that it was common knowledge that Buddhist nuns are vegetarian, but if I wasn’t - Wei Ying is definitely Making a Statement here. (And also making a secondary reference to the Chinese use of "vegetarian" to mean someone who is easily bullied/taken advantage of, which Wei Ying is most certainly not.)
Girls of the era were sometimes educated at home by private tutors, and were also often educated by their older brothers.
We know that Wei Ying had a private tutor (whom she shared with Nie Huaisang), but I also think Jiang Cheng would have had an influence on her too, despite technically being younger.
Being afforded a much more formal and comprehensive education (despite being perhaps less suited for it), he would have shared all of his books and learnings with Wei Ying, and that is why she so often references martial arts/military writings and ideas (much more so than the Jiang Yanli of this universe would, being older) - a reflection of Jiang Cheng’s interests and their relationship as more-or-less-same-age-peers within a gendered family hierarchy.
On Nie Huaisang and Nie Mingjue, it bears saying that their upbringing and situation in life here is just as unconventional as Wei Ying’s, if not more so.
Whereas in the earlier Tang Dynasty, women often openly ran their own businesses, Song Dynasty society had become more restrictive in relation to women’s freedoms, so that had become a much rarer occurrence.
My rationale for Nie Mingjue bucking the trend is that her mother was a capable woman with no tolerance for harem politics, and so ruled the Nie household with an iron fist. When her health begins to decline, instead of risking the wellbeing of her household and single di daughter on the goodwill of the next-ranked concubine, she simply starts passing responsibilities directly to Nie Mingjue, who proves capable enough that her father starts giving her business-related tasks as well.
By the time Madam Nie dies, Nie Mingjue is acting mistress of the house and there is no room to argue that any of the responsibilities should be taken from her.
Nie Mingjue being the only child in the entire household, her father also thinks it makes sense to involve her in the family business, and he starts preparing to find a man to ru zhui (入贅) marry into their family, thanks to the (universal?) principle that wealthy people can largely afford to do whatever they want.
Then Nie Huaisang is born and her concubine mother dies in childbirth. Nie Mingjue, having inherited her mother’s distaste for harem politics and distrust for her father’s concubines, simply takes Nie Huaisang into her own courtyard and sees to her upbringing herself.
And then their father dies, Lan Xichen takes the opportunity to propose marriage to Nie Mingjue (ostensibly as an elegant way to lend her a man’s countenance and legal authority to run her business, but the successive pregnancies speak for themselves), Nie Mingjue accepts and then decides that the new Nie family heir will be Nie Huaisang and there is no one around to stop her.
There’s definitely social disapproval (e.g. Madam Jin’s “I know she’s always done things differently” in Ch 3), but not enough to matter. Because wealthy people can afford to do whatever they want..
Enter Lan Zhan (in spirit):
Some of the original professions I considered for him were physician and herbalist, but the thought of doing period-accurate traditional Chinese medicine research ended that dream within 2.5 seconds.
In today’s terms I see him as demisexual, but in Song Dynasty mindset, there is no “sexuality”; there is “stuff that I like” and “stuff that I gotta do”. So he’s fully committed to making it work for the sake of his duty to the family, but also his responsibility to provide his wife with a decent quality of life. (And he is particularly sensitive to the latter, having witnessed his mother’s experience.)
While he'd initially hoped to follow in his Uncle's footsteps and stay single for life, now that marriage is unavoidable, his attitude towards it is very similar to Wei Ying’s, in being “That's life, we gotta make the best of it.”
He doesn’t fully appreciate the extent of the problem, but:
To-date, he has had very minimal interaction with any sort of same-age friend or peer.
His brother does most if not all of his emotional processing for him, mostly by talking him through his thoughts and feelings. This started as the very-Chinese “explain to your child after every situation how courtesy and social mores preserve everyone’s feelings and Face”, and just … never stopped. Probably because Lan Zhan didn’t have peer-interaction to do the rest of the emotional educating.
CHAPTER 2
Again, while Wei Ying speaks for herself, some general notes:
The grip of his hand in hers is strong, if a little damp. Which means that her husband is either nervous or also sweating a river in three layers of robes: He is not nervous, only dutiful. It is 100% due to the layers of robes and the hot, hot sun.
Red wedding banners … which are disappointingly standard, with nary a tea pun in sight: When their sons get married in the distant future, there are SO MANY tea puns.
Her groom, she notes, has wiped his hand at some point. Which means that he’s either a thoughtful man, or a fastidious one. Or a man who has thoughtful and fastidious servants: Lan Zhan is absolutely the thoughtful and fastidious one.
“Why does the groom look so grim?” someone asks from somewhere to her right. “Maybe he’s been forced into the marriage,” comes the answer: That is just Lan Zhan’s face, he bears no particular resentment towards the arrangement of the marriage. He trusts that his uncle has made the best decision possible under the circumstances and certainly he thinks that it’s better than either of the other options.
Lan Zhan has never had wine before, so despite knowing that the Lan family doesn’t drink, he doesn’t actually know why. This is part of the reason why he drinks the toast (the other part being the social pressure that Wei Ying successfully employs).
When they have children, there are some that inherit the Lan constitution, and others who can drink two whole cups before also succumbing to the Lan constitution. Wei Ying is very sad about this, but concedes that they do come by it honestly.
Lan Zhan’s wedding night thoughts:
Not sure if it A) was a real thing, B) is a modern-sensibilities thing (like many Cdrama leads being committed to one wife), or C) is a "Complying with TV Codes Thing", but I've seen/read quite a few stories now where the husband chooses not to push for wedding night consummation because his new wife will be scared, stressed, tired, etc. This means that the couple spends a bit of time co-sleeping and getting used to each other before doing anything. I see Lan Zhan starting out along those lines, and his consideration would have been much appreciated if his wife had been someone like Jiang Yanli. Unfortunately it is 100% wasted on Wei Ying.
So he walks into the room with the noblest of intentions, is confronted with the shock of Wei Ying, and PANICS:
First there are the Lan vs Jiang family cultural differences, i.e.
The "We Are Always Decorous" Lan family vs the "Decorum when in public, at-home manners very different" Jiang family
Lan "I will only very gently try to negotiate your boundaries" Xichen vs ...Jiang Cheng/Yanli/Auntie Yu/Uncle Jiang, who are personal-boundary-chaotics in very different ways
Second, in terms of Lan Zhan’s general social experience:
He has one (1) friend, who is his brother and who is very emotionally considerate.
He has not interacted with a woman in an intimate/domestic setting since the death of his mother (excluding servants, but that’s different). His experience with women is probably limited to the branch family aunties, and maybe daughters of their social circle who he sees for two seconds from across the room, when everyone is on their best behaviour, and they never speak.
He has never interacted with any person alive like Wei Ying in any setting. She called him PRETTY and TO HIS FACE, she chases people, she has contraband goods, she has POCKETS-
Third, there is the additional layer of shock provided by the expectations Lan Zhan had of what “a new wife” would be like, which Wei Ying is … not.
She was going to be a shy, retiring maiden (I think the “unkidnappable” fact just did not compute and he just mentally shelved it).
And unlike Wei Ying, who had the whole breadth of her human experience as “possible range for how much of a fucking weirdo my husband might be”, it never occurs to Lan Zhan to be curious about her because his image of his future wife is pretty much a dress wearing a face and it hasn’t really occurred to him that she might have any personality - or UNREPRESSED personality - beyond her role and his obligations towards her.
He had this idea of how he was going to be a Dutiful Husband (making sure his wife doesn't go hungry on the wedding night, making sure that her maidenly sensibilities are respected in negotiating bedroom activities, making sure that she maintains a comfortable position in the household, making sure that she gets the dishes she likes to eat even if he doesn't eat them).
Then they were gonna treat each other "with the respect accorded to honoured guests" (another Ye Olde Chinese Thing), and eventually become a peaceful, comfortable couple.
Almost none of it is going in the way that he'd planned and he doesn't have a Plan B because he DIDN'T KNOW PEOPLE COULD BE LIKE THIS.
And now HIS MAIDENLY SENSIBILITIES ARE BEING OFFENDED-
In regards to Lan Zhan’s Filial Procreative Duty:
It's not that he's unaware of it, but there's not as much urgency for him. He doesn't need a son to solidify his position in the household, his own brother has two sons already so the line isn't in danger and he can always adopt the second nephew as his heir, he knows that WY is only 17 whereas the average age of marriage at the time (according to the english-language internet) was 18-20 for women.
He does intend to try for a child with her eventually (for her sake), but HE JUST REALLY WANTS TO START BY BEING FRIENDS FIRST (*/ω＼*)
CHAPTER 3
On Lan Zhan’s side:
It goes without saying that after Lan Zhan flees his bedroom on the morning after the wedding, he heads straight to his brother for his regular dose of emotional processing.
Lan Xichen spends the entire conversation highly amused and trying to keep it hidden under a suitably sympathetic expression.
And then he gently-but-firmly forces Lan Zhan to go home, which Lan Zhan does mutinously
Upon their arrival home, Lan Zhan only stops briefly in his study before heading straight back out on business (or, as Wei Ying half-suspects: “business”): It is most certainly “business”. Lan Zhan is finding any excuse to avoid her because he does not know how to deal with her and he’s a little bit afraid of her (and the danger she poses to his chastity).
Lan Zhan says nothing to Lan Qiren because it is all too mortifying.
Lan Qiren, who still seems to vaguely disapprove of her, despite being the one to agree to this marriage in the first place: While he hears no specifics, Lan Qiren’s propriety-related spidey-senses are tingling nevertheless, and so he starts to observe Wei Ying with extreme suspicion.
Lan Xichen also finds this highly amusing.
Hence Wei Ying noticing that “There’s something about the curve of his eyes that means he always looks mildly amused…Wei Ying is not sure whether this is how Lan Xichen presents generally, or if it is something specific to her.“
(It’s definitely specific to her. He thinks she’s great for his brother and therefore great in general)
Otherwise, Lan Zhan actually does like Wei Ying, despite all of the shocking things about her (He just doesn’t know that this is what he’s feeling, since he’s never felt this way before :’D).
Also maybe he’s used to the people he likes expressing their affection for him via some level of teasing (his mother, to a lesser level his brother).
Lan Zhan is watching Wei Ying as closely as she’s watching him (or even more so) - enough to know that she’s smart, and that there’s more to her than the incompetent wife image she’s projecting (which is why he’s not interfering … beyond a certain extent).
Other notes:
Wei Ying herself is so fully focused on the branch family aunties and how far she needs to escalate to get them to make a move that she probably hasn't given two thoughts to thing else. So there's almost certainly a parallel Mianmian POV to this story that's filled with constant nail-biting about what everyone else thinks of her mistress and the possibility of Wei Ying escalating so hard that they won't be able to fully reverse the damage afterwards.
Secret tunnel + secret storage room: Wei Ying absolutely finds 193847548495 future uses for these after this story is done.
Babymaking is 100% a genuinely high-key concern for Wei Ying, since producing Lan Zhan’s heir is how she secures lifetime economic/social/etc security for herself (that said it is not the MOST urgent issue at this stage, since she first needs to ensure that there is a safe environment to bring the baby into).
(I am high-key channelling "The Promotion Record of a Crown Princess" and "Greetings Ninth Uncle", here. Dowager is very much the life goal for All Women - when it's not Revenge - as far as my own shameful background in consuming Chinese historical romances is concerned.)
In terms of inheritance (keeping in mind that I am far from an expert, and my main source is a lot of historical Cdramas and Cnovels):
There was some amount of flexibility in when to formally split a family and therefore its shared resources:
If there are enough resources to support a split, then a patriarch dying is a good opportunity for brothers to go their own ways without any negative social implications.
If there's a big enough falling out between brothers or between fathers and sons, then it might happen even while Dad's still around.
If you're collectively funding a scholar to get into government and bring a valuable political connection to the family, then maybe you stay together even after Dad is gone.
And the division of property (including property in common) wasn't automatically an "eldest son takes all" situation either.
For the Lan brothers in this story:
The formal economic rational for them not splitting the business yet is that they need the business to fund a government career (Lan Qiren and Lan-papa were intending to maintain a similar arrangement before Lan-papa prematurely died)
But the actual reason is probably Lan brotherly love :'>
The branch families inherited other things, or maybe a different branch of the business when Great-grandpapa Lan died, but then they fucked it! and had to come crawling back to Lan-papa for a lifeline.
Wei Ying knows enough going in (from Nie Huaisang and general gossip) that whenever the brothers finally split (maybe after proxy-dad Lan Qiren dies), Lan Zhan is walking away with a handsome part of the business. Now that she's seen them in close quarters, she knows that Lan Xichen might even cede all of it, at the end of a soppy and embarrassing "no, you!"-"no, you!" fight between the brothers
Rivalled only by the parallel fight between the Nie sisters about whose kids inherit the restaurant empire, and then Nie Huaisang declares her intention to stay a spinster and adopt Nie Mingjue's second son as the Nie heir and then it's chaos.
Or maybe they can grow a tea empire and someone’s children can stay in Lin An and someone else’s children can go establish dominance over a different city.
CHAPTER 4
Lan Zhan’s side of things is coming through more clearly in the text now (I hope), but some notes nevertheless:
Then, she sends some to her husband’s study to serve him as a mid-afternoon snack, and to remind him of her continued existence: By this point, Lan Zhan has realised that he like-likes Wei Ying, so he’s very much aware of her continued existence already.
This gesture on her part seeds a hope that she might at least be receptive to his overtures, if she doesn’t yet feel the same way about him, and the pork-and-ginger-with-extra-ginger dumplings are him trying to take what he thinks is their courtship forward (“In thanks for the pastries … They were delicious.”).
Growing up with Lan Qiren and Lan Xichen and no other friends, it never occurs to him that Wei Ying might not be fluent in the Lan communication method of “indirect statements from which the audience correctly infers implied meanings”.
That the pastries turn out to be for a plot is a small bump in the road that is overcome by all of the “just for you” foods Wei Ying overcompensates with when he finds out.
“Do you…Never mind”: Lan Zhan would never say ‘DO U LIKE ME’, but this is him starting an overture that is (slightly) more direct and then not knowing how to continue and fleeing the scene.
Wei Ying modestly yields to her husband’s leadership, and that is why they spend the evening stopping in front of every opera singer, acrobat or other street performer who crosses their path: Young Master Lan Zhan conducting a thorough study on “what my wife likes”.
The direct consequence of this outing (as mentioned in Ch 5) that Wei Ying is Seen to have Lan Zhan’s esteem is also very much intentional on his part, because Lan Zhan is also thoughtful and efficient like that.
Other notes:
Since making lotus seed paste is a tedious, thankless task that normal families pay other people to do: My love-hate letter to lotus seed paste. I mostly know about the process for making it because I briefly considered making it myself during the first COVID lockdown. This desire lasted approximately 20 seconds into the first instructional youtube video I watched. But it is still delicious.
They pass yet another group of burly, scruffy men - all of whom are carrying an array of mismatched, chipped and obviously-scavenged weapons: foreshadowing for Wei Ying’s realisation in Ch 8, lol.
CHAPTER 5
Notes on Lan Xichen’s Moon-Viewing Party:
She can at least cow them into submission with Auntie Yu's beady-eyed stare: This is far from the only thing that Wei Ying has picked up from Auntie Yu. If anyone were ever to mention how like a real mother-and-daughter pair they can be sometimes, they would both be extremely appalled.
Lan Zhan has been watching Wei Ying since their arrival at his brother’s house to make sure that no one wrongs his wife (though with a credible amount of discretion, so no one else has picked up on anything beyond the boundaries of what is socially acceptable for a besotted husband). So while she has been busy noticing things going wrong, he has noticed her noticing things going wrong, and as soon as she starts taking action, he moves in to support her.
“Xiao Ping can go.” is the result of Lan Zhan finally finding an opportunity to step in after an extended period of patient waiting.
“Guanren,” she gasps in surprise: The possessive part of Lan Zhan (which is most of him) very much likes it when Wei Ying calls him that.
Lan Zhan discovers this night that he has a massive “bae helping other people” kink, and an equally massive competence kink.
At some point, Lan Zhan goes to his brother for advice on how to court his wife beyond his current “giving her things she likes” strategy, and receives the suggestion that maybe he should show her the things he’s good at too.
This births the “chrysanthemum wine + qin-playing” plan.
Continuing so late into the night that they fall asleep together is not an original part of this plan, but Wei Ying doesn’t seem upset by it and Lan Zhan is not one to retreat when he can advance, so it’s big wins all around.
Worth noting that while Lan Zhan does like his early bedtime in general, his particular insistence on xu shi (as noted by Wei Ying in re: “Her husband has revealed himself to be surprisingly fastidious about the strangest things as of late”) is not actually for health/moral habit reasons.
It also births the “Wei Ying [stumbling] across him in mid-song at an unusually high frequency” plan (which slightly predates the “chrysanthemum wine + qin-playing” plan).
And it is also why ultimate wingman Lan Xichen makes sure to mention poetry and Lan Zhan’s proficiency at it when he visits. It is very much not the only time he does something like this.
Other notes:
Which makes it even funnier that Lan Qiren so very obviously dislikes her: He does not, in fact, dislike her.
But he is experiencing trauma flashbacks from his interactions with Wei Ying’s mother back in ye day (/touches his beard protectively).
He is also burning with the passionate drive created by finally meeting a worthy challenge.
Every time one of his texts comes back annotated, he probably does the Tom-Hanks-Laptop meme of rubbing his hands and wiggling his fingers in preparation for writing his rebuttal. Except instead of "happy", his expression is "happily seething".
It bodes well for her ability to educate his nephew's children before they begin their formal education - if only he can get her to learn restraint and reform her character first!
So he is determined to succeed in fixing this one, this time! (He won’t).
Lan Xichen notices his uncle putting almost more energy into educating Wei Ying than his actual students and is highly amused.
Over time, Lan Qiren notices that verbally sparring with Wei Ying on various topics has improved the quality of his corresponding Academy lessons, and that he sometimes even discusses her takes on texts. This mildly infuriates him, especially when he receives expressions of admiration from students and parents for the depth of his scholarship and teaching.
Sometimes the result is that Lan Zhan gets a sudden and unexpected lecture on controlling/educating his wife and neither he nor Wei Ying can identify what she’s done to deserve it.
(Sometimes this is further complicated by the fact that she has committed too many potential affronts to pick just one.)
Uncoded notes have already been conclusively proven to be a terrible idea, and Wei Ying and Nie Huaisang do not already have an established code (Wei Ying cannot believe that they do not already have an established code; in reflection, it truly is an unforgivable oversight): They establish a code after everything in this story is finished, but they use it so infrequently that they keep forgetting it.
She would have loved to have used the opportunity to discuss Meng Yao instead, but when Wei Ying had mentioned her name, Nie Huaisang had simply hummed noncommittally and made no move to add anything further: Nie Huaisang’s initial reason for not involving Wei Ying in her own counterscheming against Meng Yao/Jin Guangshan is that Wei Ying has enough to deal with in re: the branch aunties and much fewer resources to draw on. This turns into “Wei Ying had better save her energy to focus on growing some emotional understanding of herself and her husband”, because that situation is dire. And then Meng Yao and Jin Guangshan escalate so far that it turns into “this is my personal grievance and requires my personal vengeance, and I will not risk having my bloodthirst restrained”.
Uncle Jiang had stopped him in the street and expressed his wife and daughter’s desire to see Wei Ying: A brief apology to Jiang Yanli who features very minimally in this story because while Wei Ying visits her a lot, she is also taking pains to stop her beloved sister from unnecessarily worrying about her by not mentioning anything serious at all and painting a very rosy picture of her married life where she “only has your run-of-the-mill teething problems, hardly worth talking about, except could you do me this one favour and send this wad of joss paper over to my residence in your name?”.
Jiang Yanli politely keeps up her end of the social fiction but is, in fact, still worrying. She deals with this by making and sending over a lot of nourishing food.
Wei Ying pulls the bundle out from a drawer and is struck by a sudden and completely uncharacteristic wave of self-doubt. This is odd and completely inexplicable - she’d been so confident in the quality of her gift only a shichen prior; she has no idea why she feels so nervous about it now: This is the point at which any other person might notice that their feelings for their husband run deeper than they’d previously thought (if they hadn’t already realised at many points before this), but Wei Ying is special. Lan Zhan, unfortunately, manages to pick up on the “any other person” part, but not the “Wei Ying is special” part.
There’s a sudden clatter, followed by Xiao Ping swearing and they startle apart: This is deliberate on Xiao Ping’s part. There are branch spies watching!
On Scheming Abilities:
Nie Mingjue, as the eldest di-daughter of a wealthy household who has only ever been second to her parents in terms of authority, has never needed to scheme in her life, and is used to dealing with everything straightforwardly. After she marries, Lan Xichen doesn’t have concubines and Nie Mingjue is too wealthy/powerful for the Lan relatives to otherwise interfere with her, so she never has to change (and is therefore completely unprepared for Meng Yao).
Similarly, Lan Xichen has zero scheming skills (although he will need to acquire some to survive in government, probably)
Lan Zhan has acquired more skills than his brother, by way of greater involvement in the family business and having to deal with the branch families. His involvement with Wei Ying, however, is fast teaching him that he is also very much a novice.
Nie Huaisang, a shu-daughter (although I never managed to explicitly say that anywhere in the text) and Wei Ying, a servant-born foster daughter, have acquired scheming skills due to the precariousness of those positions in life. These include:
Being targeted by and winning power games against people within the household
For Nie Huaisang, perhaps her father’s concubines or the servants loyal to them - either as a way to get to Nie Mingjue, or just directly.
For Wei Ying, maybe some of Madam Yu’s close maids feel aggrieved on their mistress’s behalf, maybe some of the servants resent Wei Ying for having a better position despite being equal to them in terms of birth.
Winning power games against people in their social circles who look down on them (Nie Huaisang for being a shu daughter, Wei Ying for being servant-born).
Needing to scheme their way out of feminine hooligan-related scrapes from their youth, of which there were many.
CHAPTER 6
Can’t find much to say about this chapter. Just that:
Treating Wei Ying to almost half a shichen of her own lecture on the importance of rewarding loyalty to old servants: Wei Ying remembers this with great clarity during the confrontation and associated fall-out (“Loyal people are difficult to come by; I would hate to deprive them of such a precious resource.”).
Miss Cang had been diligently using those accomplishments to slowly and subtly appeal to the similarly-accomplished Lan Zhan not one year ago: On the other hand, Lan Zhan could not pick her out of a lineup if his life depended on it. Wei Ying asks him after the first time she and Miss Cang have a run-in and receives a very genuine response of “???” “????????????” She chooses not to mention that to Miss Cang either.
CHAPTER 7
Lan Zhan received a bit of abuse in the comments of this chapter (:’D), which came as a bit of a surprise to me. I suppose I have the benefit of clearly plotting out my son’s perspective for my own understanding of the story, and Wei Ying’s perspective limits the ways in which his side of the story can be conveyed, so that’s what I’ll address.
Lan Zhan is not angry, his feelings are hurt.
He's invested 110% in this relationship and he'd thought Wei Ying felt the same until she hit him with the joke about divorce, and now it's like "she's built herself an exit strategy, is standing with one foot out the door and none of my feelings or actions-to-date have mattered enough to outweigh that".
For any Legend of Minglan viewers, the parallel with Gu Tingye’s “You’re leaving yourself an escape route!!” is very much intentional.
You can see a bit of this hinted at in Lan Zhan’s “You don’t even know”, which indicates that all of Wei Ying’s theories on what she has done are wrong.
While Lan Zhan is particularly sensitive about divorce for some understandable mother-related reasons (which means that there's an additional "how could she think that of me? does she know me at all?" in there), he has an additional contextual defence: most women would not joke about divorce, at least before the marital relationship is solid enough that everyone knows it’s obviously a joke.
Meanwhile, Wei Ying has thrown the joke out there on the back of some solid evidence that she has some real viable alternatives for supporting herself, so for all Lan Zhan knows, she might actually go.
Given his limited emotional-management tools, Lan Zhan is working it out in the best way he knows how:
Firstly going to see his brother
Secondly by hiding away and nursing his wounds while he awkwardly tries to process his feelings, calms down, takes stock of the situation and decides what he wants to do about it.
He can't actually come out and say "I'M UPSET BECAUSE YOU DON'T LOVE ME!", hence: making his brother promise not to tell her, and his brother agreeing because lol yes that's quite embarrassing.
So we can see in: “But her efforts are only met with her brother-in-law - while smiling in a way that seems as if he’s laughing at her even more than usual - simply telling her not to worry, and that his brother’s anger will doubtlessly burn itself out any day now“ that:
Firstly, the problem is something that Lan Xichen can be amused about. We’ve already mentioned the embarrassment factor, but beyond that, the nature of the problem is not that serious. Lan Zhan in the throes of heartbreak is melodramatically thinking “SHE DOESN’T LOVE ME”, but Lan Xichen is astute enough to suspect that Wei Ying is maybe a bit emotionally dense, and is probably not as unmoved as all that.
Secondly, Lan Xichen recognises that the problem is something that Lan Zhan needs space to work through himself, and that there’s nothing to be done on Wei Ying’s side.
Mianmian’s “refusal to tell Wei Ying” is explained in Ch 8, but it’s worth noting here that loyal maidservant Mianmian would never refuse to tell Wei Ying something important. What actually happens of course is that Mianmian keeps insisting that Lan Zhan is in love with Wei Ying, and Wei Ying keeps refusing to believe it and then she finally says “Fine! Don’t tell me then!” and Mianmian is like /o\
Susu genuinely doesn’t know though, lol. She’s a bit younger, not as emotionally mature.
Nie Mingjue also genuinely doesn’t know (Lan Xichen hasn’t told her because he knows she’d just call Lan Zhan an idiot to his face).
Nie Huaisang does know, but after hearing about Mianmian’s valiant attempts, she decides it would be better to take a more slowly-slowly angle and show Wei Ying how much Lan Zhan likes her instead. With mixed results.
Even given all the above, Lan Zhan is very much invested in protecting Wei Ying’s public standing and reputation:
We can see this in his insistence that she stays at home, so she doesn’t become a convenient target or sacrificial fall-guy during the family proceedings.
Nie Mingjue further explains his fears in her conversation with Wei Ying about the Lan elders and their treatment of Lan Zhan’s mother vs herself.
We can also see it in “While he does not ignore her, precisely, Lan Zhan also never lingers in her company a moment longer than strict decorum would require”: Lan Zhan is still demonstrating to the servants and the public that, at the very least, her position as his wife should be respected and all related benefits afforded to her.
And of course he’s still sleeping in their bedroom.
Both the Lan brothers underestimate the emotional impact that this will have on Wei Ying, because neither of them has correctly understood how emotionally invested she is or how emotionally invested she realises she is. (In their defence: neither has she.)
This assumption is shored up by the way that she stays pretty upbeat and flippant, especially in the way she goes about trying to make amends. Not yet understanding her, they take this to mean that she’s feeling sorry and a little awkward, but otherwise is unaffected.
Lan Zhan’s points of realisation that he's hurt her are "Forgive me anyway - I can't bear it" and finding her curled up in bed. “I have an engagement” is true, but it is also him needing some space to process this new knowledge. At this point he:
half-caves to the decision that he'll just love her anyway and not give her any excuse to leave, and
half-comes to the realisation that actually, maybe Wei Ying really doesn't know about his feelings or her own, so he's going to need to recalibrate.
There were a few comments along the lines of “this could have been resolved through direct communication”, and while that’s true to some extent, I feel like direct communication in the context of relationships and feelings is a very modern-Western value that doesn’t necessarily have the same application here.
I do fully accept that despite its setting, this is a modern story, for a modern audience. But even so I think the non-modern setting and context (in addition to Lan Zhan’s particular personal situation) make it a little unfair to blame Lan Zhan for not starting a heart-to-heart outpouring of feelings. (Though of course this is my personal opinion.)
Even in my modern-but-still-Asian family, there’s a much stronger culture of being expected to read unspoken meaning from social situations, and in turn being able to expect that other people do the same. The cultural conflict is, as Jay Chou once sang in the song “Cliff of Love” (lololololol): You say that I am like a child, delighting in always leaving you guessing. I say that you’re the one who is like a child, always needing me to spell things out for you.
Semi-relatedly, I think there’s a “child of asian parents” meme about your parents apologising by bringing sliced fruit to you instead of saying anything with words. I have imputed this to Wei Ying and Lan Zhan.
In very general terms, I would also say that we as a Chinese family have a much weaker culture of “you did this thing that violates my boundaries, I will tell you and expect you to change your behaviour” and a much stronger culture of “you did this thing to violate my boundaries, I must manage myself so that unacceptable boundary violations do not happen in future”. I have on some level imputed this to Lan Zhan.
There is also a much stronger culture of avoiding things that are embarrassing (as the person who might be embarrassed, as the person who might cause someone else to be embarrassed, and as a bystander who might worsen the embarrassment by bearing witness). There’s a lot of “not mentioning and just moving past these things by unspoken agreement”. I have on some level imputed this to … everyone in this story.
The entire story, but this sex scene in particular, have been my manifesto on My Beef with Historical CNovels (which I recognise is sometimes about censorship and not the authors’ artistic vision). In terms of the sex scene this includes, but is not limited to:
Only the dudes or top dudes being horny or up for it (or being the 80 in an 80/20 split in who is horny/up for it)!
The relative passivity of ladies/bottom dudes in bed!
JADE STICKS (didn’t manage to get a reference to CHERRY NIPPLES in, but THOSE TOO)!
Lack of preparation and the resultant pain!
The lady/bottom “not being able to get out of bed for 3 days afterwards”!
The fun relationship tension/dynamics disappearing after a pivotal point where the couple variously gets together/gets married/has sex!
CHAPTER 8
Without guidance from questions in the comments, some general notes:
“It matters not,” he murmurs when they break apart: This is Lan Zhan both recognising that Wei Ying is not mentally/emotionally ready to believe the actual answer, and also genuinely meaning that it doesn’t matter anymore.
It’s also probably quite obvious right now that this Lan Zhan knows he’s not very verbally demonstrative and so he compensates with physical affection instead.
This also means that he’s very cuddly with their children when they’re born, and 100% takes A-Yuan everywhere with him, including on business.
While Lan Zhan directs her from his place behind her, seated with his chest pressed flush against her back: Lan Zhan would have been one of those children who is independent and standoffish in public, but a total cuddlebug with his mum in private. And so in addition to the above, the result of being touch-starved for over a decade following his mother’s death means that he fuses himself to Wei Ying at every (private) opportunity. It’s not that he doesn’t touch her in public, but it’s all very hand-on-elbow proper and decorous - until the moment they cross into a place with any amount of privacy and then FWOOM.
Wei Ying has wondered more than once whether she might one day bully Lan Zhan into sitting in the circle of her arm, while she appreciates fine wine as the ancestors intended: It definitely happens, and takes minimal-to-none bullying.
If her friend is suspicious enough of Meng Yao to interfere in her sister’s household, limit Meng Yao’s access to Nie Mingjue and attack Meng Yao’s father, then why has she done nothing to Meng Yao herself?: Nie Huaisang started out leaving Meng Yao every opportunity to come clean about what Jin Guangshan wanted her to do. If Meng Yao had had a change of heart and done this at any point while her disruptions to the household were still minor, Nie Huaisang would have happily worked with her to get her due from the Jin family (and then relocated her to somewhere suitably removed from Lan Xichen). But then Meng Yao proves that she is willing to completely sell Nie Mingjue out for her own gain, and now Nie Huaisang is giving her enough rope to hang herself.
And so Wei Ying spends the latter part of the evening half-lying on Lan Zhan’s bare chest: This behaviour begins as the result of Wei Ying misunderstanding something she hears (probably from Uncle Jiang’s men) about post-nut clarity. But it is in Lan Zhan’s interests to encourage it, and it doesn’t actually impede the thought process, so it continues.
“I didn’t mean to,” Nie Huaisang says in a small voice, to no one in particular: Going to leave this open as to whether Nie Huaisang is telling the truth or not.
The coroner’s report will attribute the cause to a combination of the incense burning in the room and the herbal tonic that he has been taking to replenish his yang qi for the past year: Meng Yao’s last gift to a father she has known all along was using her too.
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Knives for Commoners
Precious daggers are cool and all, but I’m very fond of simple pocket knives, made to get shit done. So here are a few farmer / peasant knives, ranging from penknife- to sickle-sized.
1. Grafting knife (greffoir) from Thiers, France
This little multi-tool has a curved blade (very used and sharpened, it was originally wider) and a smaller wavy blade. It’s primarily for cutting the stock plant and the plant shoot (or bud) that you mean to graft, though it’s also good for small pruning jobs and general utility. It locks by slipjoint, the standard pocket knife locking mechanism that you’ll find in Swiss army knives. The small flat thing is a bark lifter, it’s made of bone and it’s used for bud grafting: when you insert a bud beneath the bark of a stem, you have to be extra careful to not injure the bark, so you don’t want sharp edges there.
The handle has scales of bone, carved like this in order to look like stag (which is rarer and more expensive). A similar way to accomplish this is “jigged bone” scales, found in a lot of old/classic American and English knives:
Sheffield hunting knife by Joseph Allen / American folding knife by Camillus
which I honestly think is too... regular, sometimes it looks machine-made even when it’s handmade. But this handle here is sculpted, it’s a work of art, I love it.
Manufactured sometime in *waves vaguely* the 20th century (probably 1930s-1960s) by the cutlery A. Bardin-Dozolmé. The blade is stamped “57 BARDIN Garanti”, which tells us nothing useful, this stamp’s been around since the 18th century. It’s 9.2 cm closed and 14.7 cm open. (3.62 / 5.79 inches)
2. Pruning knife (trinxet) from Mallorca, Spain
I’ve shown you this before, it’s got a curved carbon steel blade, a horn handle, and “friction lock” as they call it nowadays i.e. no lock whatsoever, it’s a clasp knife. And it’s the simplest, most convenient tool, I adore it.
Made by the cutlery Hermanos Campins in Consell, Mallorca, stamped “HNOS CAMPINS / CONSELL”, mid-20th century, 9.7 cm closed and 17 cm open. (3.82 / 6.7 inches)
3. Shepherd knife (couteau de berger) from Corsica, France
Another clasp knife (doesn’t lock), different shape, with a ram horn handle. Shepherd knives look like utility or bushcraft knives, their blades are not usually curved but they often have a clip-point shape, and they’re quite sturdy.
This is an outlier, it wasn’t really made for work, it’s for tourists or collectors. However, it’s handmade in the tradition of Corsican knife-making (as opposed to the more famous vendetta knives which were manufactured in mainland France, though I should clarify this shape isn’t uniquely Corsican either, it was widespread in both France and Italy), with a couple of modern touches: the blade is forged with a decorative flair, and the horn is first carved at the ridges (to emphasise it’s ram, I’m guessing) and then polished like a mirror.
It’s a strong, solid knife, and absolutely gorgeous.
Made by a local knife-maker (unfortunately I don’t know the name, the blade is signed but with a symbol) in Sartène, Corsica, maybe a decade ago. 11.5 cm closed and 19 cm open. (4.53 / 7.48 inches)
4. Folding billhook (roncola) from Italy
Billhooks are farming tools for cutting and pruning, though usually they have fixed blades. This one isn’t just folding, it’s an actual picklock, like a switchblade. (I mean with the same locking mechanism, it doesn’t open automatically or anything). The blade is carbon steel (that’s a lot of carbon, folks!) and the handle is beautiful, made of carved wood, with brass (I think) insets, and with a fancy external backspring.
Folding billhooks were exported from Italy to the UK. From 1961, a lot of them were imported by Whitby Knives, stamped “Whitby”, and were made in Maniago by Mauro Mario, a prolific knife-maker who also made a ton of switchblades. They looked like this:
The one I got looks earlier to me, but honestly I have no idea when it’s from. Early 20th? Late 19th? *uncertain noises* In any case, it’s 12 cm closed and 22.5 cm open. (4.72 / 8.86 inches)
5. Huge pruning knife (saca tripas) from Guanajuato, Mexico
And last but not least, a big fuck-off pruning knife, which locks securely with a ratchet and unlocks with a pull-ring. This is basically a folding sickle, you reap stuff with it, and can cut thick branches. The very curved carbon blade (it’s not over-sharpened, that’s its original shape) is stamped with a “J”, and the handle is made of horn, with an iron backspring.
The name is extravagantly bloodthirsty, it means “disemboweller” (saca tripas = “pulls out intestines”), and is of course a misnomer: this isn’t a weapon, it’s a farming tool. (Could it be used as a weapon? Well of course, but so can kitchen knives.) I’m not entirely sure if it’s really called that way, or only as a jest, or for the express purpose of selling one of them to bloodthirsty types, i.e. to morons. [Pet peeve: mislabeling work knives as “military” or “fighting” or “tactical”, when they’re clearly for utility, and often for some specific farming job. I even saw an ad for a knife like this describing it as a torture implement, for fuck’s sake people, IT’S FOR CUTTING PLANTS.]
So anyway, these knives can be found all over Mexico, and this one hails from the city of Guanajuato, or at least it was bought there at some point. It’s 16 cm closed and 28.5 cm open. (6.3 / 11.22 inches)
The lot of them
Despite the fact that all these are work knives (except the Corsican, but only technically: it emulates a specific, older work knife, and it’s still 100% functional), a clear effort has been made to make them pretty. And I LOVE this. Even the trinxet, which has a monochrome handle and no frills at all, is elegant in its simplicity, and they all have something going on, carvings, decorations, handles shaped to please the eye, materials chosen for their nice colour.
Aesthetically speaking, I think knives went to shit when plastic was adopted. (Practically speaking, I admit plastic is a lot more resistant to the elements; a handle of horn or bone must be kept dry or it shrivels, wood must be kept from dryness or it shrinks, bugs and mites eat it, it’s a mess.)
Not one blade here is stainless steel, and it shows.
Only the handle of the grafting knife (the smallest one) has scales riveted on a metal frame. Not coincidentally, it’s the most industrial production, it came out of a Thiers factory. (Thiers is a major cutlery centre, like Sheffield and Solingen.) The rest were hand-made in a workshop or at most a cottage industry (a bunch of people in a village construct parts and someone assembles them), and their handles are solid blocks of material (horn or wood), with a slit in the middle to fit the folded blade. That’s the simpler, older construction.
Folding knives are cool.
@tuulikki. And @victoriansword, @petermorwood, @peashooter85, I know you’re into the fancy stuff, but here I am plying humbler wares and hoping. :)
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In a fascinating turn of events, we've (lore server) recently discovered that the GUILTY GEAR XX SLASH Absolute GUILTY GEAR chronicle DVD (PS2 XX Slash preorder bonus) and Guilty Gear Fragment (Judgment preorder bonus UMD movie) have both been ripped and are somehow in a playable state. Fragment needs converted into something else though as the UMD can only be played with a very specific emulator at the moment.
We're also trying to move the GG wiki off Fandom but that's hit some snags. More on that in the future (hopefully...)
I've also been working on a translation of the Guilty Gear article from Character Designer Issue 1. 2003 (thanks Kat). It's the source of the early male Baiken concept art. Lots of text, slow going.
No work's been done on LtA recently—still about 700 words left in C1P2.
Found some rarer Daisuke GG works in the archives that I'm going to clean and post over the next few days. I already posted one of them today.
Outrage is almost fully smoothed out and ready for primer and then paint. I might actually get it done before the 1 year anniversary of me starting this project gets here (sometime in early January, need to look it up).
Still playing Final Fantasy IV. Just completed the cave with the dark crystal in it. This honestly for real might end up being my favorite FF game.
I think that's everything major that's been going on recently. Busy and tired. So, so, tired...
#textpost#Hope the dog doesn't wake me up literally every two hours tonight PLEASE Murphy let me sleep#I tried taking a nap today and then Thunderdome decided to bang on my door#My spirit is never going to find peace
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hard to break the habit ((g)i-dle yuqi, minnie)
(smut, public sex, degradation, choking, biting, squirting, car sex, anal, threesome, strap-ons, sadomasochism, mentions of blood, sex tapes, fluff, 22k words, technically a companion fic to this but you don’t have to read that one first)
Here’s the thing about this disaster, this whole mess with Minnie and Yuqi - you can’t even go for denial. Oh, it’s all documented: you’ve got all this picture proof. Photos, videos, hidden folders on computers - you’ve got Yuqi’s pink hair all over it, Minnie’s black bangs, skin on skin on skin-
“Wow,” says Yuqi, in front of Minnie’s laptop, with Minnie half in her lap and half in yours. “You’re actually really photogenic, now that I’m looking at all this. It’s kind of crazy.”
“Thanks,” you say. “I’m glad that’s your main takeaway from our sex tapes.”
It’s so crude. You’d never thought yourself the type for it: all the pornographic filth, the focus, the filmography. If you were a more creatively inclined person, you could probably find some art in it, but that’s not your style and you won’t bother. Every video is hard evidence that you three’ll permanently ruin each other one day, if you keep going on like this.
“You know what my main takeaway is?” Minnie asks, a proposition in the way she looks between the two of you. There’s a danger to it, but - well, you can’t really bring yourself to give a fuck.
Yuqi glances at her, lips twitching: there’s a smile she’s suppressing. “What?”
“I think we’d be really great in a sequel.”
-
Well, if you wanna talk main players, settings and scenes, you should know that this is how it all begins:
It’s a weekend - isn’t it always? - and there’s a burlesque club - that one’s a little rarer - but Club Cosmic’s a classic, a stage pointedly set for debauchery. Call it a breeding ground for that kind of shit, or something like that. You’re behind the bar. You’re always a little removed from the action. You’re a professional, but then there’s nights like this.
“Fancy meeting you here,” you tell Jeon Soyeon, as she hops up on a barstool.
“I didn’t know you were working tonight." Soyeon's unaffected by the patented customer service charm - you’ve been friends for long enough that you know all of each other’s tricks. “Is it usually this packed?”
“Yep.” You’ve worked at Club Cosmic as a bartender for a few months now, and there’s always something for everyone, that’s their selling point: there’s the scantily clad women, and then there’s the music. “Saturdays. What are you doing here?”
“My band?” Soyeon waves a hand behind her vaguely, like it’ll somehow summon the rest of her bandmates. “We got booked here because our keyboardist is friends with Lisa.”
“Oh, congrats!” Saturdays, like you said: it’s Club Cosmic’s version of an open mic night, where they let outside performers take the stage. You really have to impress the manager to get a gig here - or at least exercise strategic friendships. Lisa’s the new rookie choreographer, but she’s brilliant, she’s got pull here. Hey, that’s showbiz: all about connections.
“That’s so cool,” you say, and you mean it. “I can’t believe I haven’t seen your band play yet.” Soyeon’s busy, you’re busy: the stars never quite seem to align.
Soyeon’s lips tilt. “Well,” she says, and they’re all aligning now. “I hope we don’t disappoint.”
-
You get swept up in the rush of the night, easily. The music’s great, the club’s dark, the people are chatty and every woman wants something from you, and not just drinks. It’s the whole himbo thing you’ve got going on, Soyeon tells you, and frequently - you just seem dumb as shit, she’d said, and not meanly. Like, so clueless, but in a very well-intentioned way. It’s very compelling, to the right people.
Is that a compliment? you’d said, at the time.
I’d take it as one, Soyeon replied, so you did.
“I swear I don’t mind filling in.” When you check back in with Soyeon, there’s a remarkably pretty blonde girl sitting beside her, barely loud enough to be heard over the music. “Plus,” the blonde girl’s saying, “my boyfriend’s never seen me play before, so for once she did me a favor by being such a flake.”
Onstage, one of the regular performers is charming the crowd, doing some routine with a chair, a blazer she’s peeling off. She strips - the crowd goes wild. Soyeon notices you before the blonde does, says, “Hey, let me get your opinion on something.”
“Sure.”
Soyeon ducks her head, leans in to combat the whooping audience. “Purely hypothetical, here,” she says. “If you were in a band, and you had a member of your band who ditches a ton of your gigs, would you kick them out?”
You’d never be in a band because your musical talent is nonexistent, but that’s neither here nor there. “Well,” you say, genuinely considering. “It depends. Are they my friend? Are they ditching gigs for a good reason? If that’s the case, then I’d probably let it slide.”
Soyeon laughs, like you’re predictable. “That’s sweet,” says the blonde girl, tipping forward. “Hey, you go to our college, right? I’m-”
“Oh my god.”
Like it’s nothing - like she’s not interrupting a damn thing, and if she were, she’d be completely justified - a girl plops herself right into the seat next to Soyeon. “Literally,” she pronounces, smacking both hands palm-down on the bar like she’s readying for war, “the only reason we got the gig is because of her connections - or what-the-fuck-ever - and she can’t even be bothered to show up?”
This is obviously related to Soyeon’s hypothetical - and this girl obviously disagrees with you, vehemently. That’d be enough to strike up a debate, but there’s one thing that’s keeping you from words, from a fight waiting to happen, and it’s the only point more obvious than your conflicting opinions-
See, she’s a huffy whirlwind of pink hair and wild hand gestures and this smoky perfume that carries even across the bar - and she’s unbelievably, insanely, mind-numbingly beautiful. You’d argue your position, but you can’t even speak. You shouldn’t stare but you’re staring. She’s all dark eyes, sparkly eyeshadow, eyebrows furrowed ferociously - she’s got the face of an angel, the cadence of a goddamn chainsmoker - she jams one of her nails straight to the lip of the counter, parts her pink-glossed lips-
“She needs to die,” the girl says. “The next time I see her, I’m beating the shit out of her.”
She’s got this vicious edge that shouldn’t be nearly as captivating as it is. She’s being loud, overdramatic, aggressive, antagonistic. She’s clearly a little batshit, and it’s so fucking stupid - but you’re kind of obsessed on sight.
“Chill,” says Soyeon, admirably unfazed. “I know you’re a lunatic, but dial it back a little.”
“Fine, okay.” The pink-haired girl rolls her eyes up to the ceiling, throat bobbing as she swallows: you’re caught on every single move. “Death is too far. She just needs to get kicked out of the band, stat.”
“You think you could beat the shit out of her?” the blonde asks, mouth in a delicate curl. “Please be serious.”
“I am.” The pink-haired girl leans her elbows back on the counter, suddenly perfectly smug. There’s an visible arrogance to her that shouldn’t be charming and somehow is anyway. “I could do a lot of things to her.”
“Oh, gross-“
Without any warning - and you think there should be, alarms wailing, lights flashing; no one should be expected to face her without at least some prior tip-off - the girl shifts on her stool, and zeroes in on you with sniper-shot precision.
“Eavesdropping is fucking rude,” the girl says. “I should report you to your boss.”
“Uh,“ you say, because she’s so hot head-on that your brain forgets how to string together a sentence.
“Jesus Christ, Yuqi.” Soyeon swivels on her stool. “He’s not eavesdropping. I was having a conversation with him and then you just barged in, so if anyone’s being rude, it’s you.”
“Oh,” says the girl - Yuqi - and she’s delightfully, wholly unapologetic. She shrugs a shoulder at you, unperturbed. “My bad, man.”
“No problem,” you say, and you don’t know how anyone in the room is looking at anything but her.
“I wouldn’t have actually reported you to your boss.” You’re stuck on those night-sky eyes, the alluring fix of her mouth, the way her lip gloss complements the pink of her hair like she’s straight out of a painting, a pointed example of color theory. “I’m not a snitch. Just - you know, making threats is pretty fun sometimes. All the drama. Hey, you’re kind of cute - has anyone ever told you that before?”
You’re not blushing - you don’t do that - but it’s sort of close. You can’t help it; she’s just such a production, the hair and the mouth and the attitude.
“Oh my god,” mumbles the blonde to Yuqi, hands over her eyes, appalled. “Be normal, I’m begging you.”
“Sure,” you say to Yuqi, miraculously keeping your cool. “I’ve heard it once or twice.”
Yuqi’s very conspicuously eyeing your biceps in your shirt. “Do you work out a lot? You look like you work out.”
It’d be flirtatious in any other context - and maybe it still is, in this one - but there’s this matter-of-fact way that she says it that makes it slightly hilarious. You don’t know where you’re going but at least you’re getting somewhere. “Yeah, pretty often.”
“Hmm,” says Yuqi, jutting her bottom lip out approvingly. “Okay. Sick.”
“Yuqi.” The blonde is actually starting to flush pink - you’ve never seen someone feel second-hand embarrassment so acutely. “Please.”
“I’m not doing anything,” says Yuqi, and inclines her head at you, assessing, appraising - she doesn’t smile, more so nods like she’s checked for flaws and found you serviceable. “I’m being super normal. You’re cool,” she says to you, apropos of nothing.
“You don’t know me,” you say, hypnotized.
It’s all in the background - the previous performers on the stage wrapping up their number, Soyeon hopping off her stool, trying to corral both Yuqi and the blonde, the lights and the drinks and the vibe. That’s all faded, and for those few moments, it’s just her: Yuqi’s hair spills over her shoulders like water, and she’s watching you like you’re a challenge to be taken, like you’re something she wants to possess and own and ruin.
(Oh, you’re not nearly as clueless as you seem, on the surface; you’d like to see her try.)
“Nope,” says Yuqi, unbothered. Her mouth tilts steeply, finally, finds a smirk like a weapon. “But I think I’d like to.”
Her fingertips skim the counter. She’s got on ridiculous acrylic nails, like Soyeon, but only some of them are intact; she’s missing one on the thumb on her left hand, missing more on her right: the pointer finger, the middle, the ring. There’s something about her stare that makes you think she’d like to rip you apart, if given the chance; she’d dig in her claws and start tearing, if she ever got you alone.
“Break a leg,” you say, slightly breathless - and now you know exactly where you’re going.
“Thanks,” Yuqi says, the flash of her teeth like fangs, and it hits you like oncoming traffic: she’s gonna get everything she wants from you and then some.
-
Time slips out of order, or maybe that’s just a cliché. You’re behind the bar, and Yuqi’s center stage, shadow and light and her fingers all over this red electric guitar, her lips pressed to the microphone-
The songs are good, all of them. There’s Soyeon on the drums, and the blonde on the keys, and two other girls, both black-haired and gorgeous, on the bass, on another guitar - but the only thing you can look at is her.
It’s that damn outfit she’s in - black and white, patterned, showing off her taut, toned midriff, her sharp collarbones - and it’s the way she moves, like sex itself, a suggestion just in the swing of her hips and the clap of her knee-high boots across the stage - but more than anything, it’s that voice. You’re caught, shellshocked. You’re not even sure you’re doing your job properly. Yuqi’s singing, and it’s a siren calling to shore, or a spell, or a succubus - it’s unreal, the way she sounds, like you could listen to her forever.
Time gets away from you, and Yuqi’s eyes meet yours, glimmering darkly under stage lights.
(You’re not fucking her yet, but you both already know how this ends.)
-
It all happens so fast - everything’s fracturing, fragmentary - one minute you’re staring at Yuqi onstage and the next she’s leaning over the bar, neck and tits all sweat-slick, gaze raking up and down your body, straight-razor sharp.
“You work here,” she says. There’s more music onstage, more people crowding the bar. You’ve got colleagues who’ll cover for you. You’ve got time.
“Yeah,” you say, even though it’s not a question.
“Great.” Yuqi moves like the music’s patterned beneath her skin, a bass line and a beat and a melody. “Then you know a good place we can fuck and not get caught.”
You just met her, and there’s zero reason this should be happening - you’ve been immune to beautiful women who’ve wanted to fuck you before, you’ve kept your composure, you’ve been professional - but Yuqi’s looking at you like she’s already won this game, gun to your temple, knife to your throat. She’s the hottest thing you’ve ever seen, but it’s more than that: it’s the danger, the recklessness. She’ll send you off a cliff and laugh when you hit the bottom.
“Yeah,” you say, again, throat desert-dry. Well, it’s a risk you’re willing to take. “I guess I do.”
-
There’s a single-stall employees-only bathroom that’s always occupied, but you two somehow get lucky.
Yuqi backs up against the counter, tips her chin up at you like she’s cocking a rifle. She’s breathing a little unevenly, wrought with anticipation - she’s trying to hide it, affecting nonchalance. “So?” she asks, licks her bottom lip. Your fingers find the bare strip of skin at her waist between her top and her skirt. “Do you need me to give you an instruction manual, or you think you can figure out how to fuck me all on your own?”
She says it boredly, like she’s trying to go for icy bitchiness, but everything she says is so hot, in every sense of the word - angry and cutting and pissed off, a fire striking in the kindling of her irises. Your grip tightens on her waist and she doesn’t flinch a bit.
“Drop the attitude,” you snap, so harsh that you surprise yourself.
Yuqi’s eyebrows fly up; you’re not the only one startled. “Excuse me?”
“You heard me.” All of a sudden, it’s like you realize how much smaller she is than you - she talks a big game, but she’s got nothing to back it up. “You’re the one who was desperate enough to get a random stranger to fuck you in the bathroom, so drop the attitude or you’re not going to get fucked at all.”
You’re not even sure where the words come from. You’ve had girlfriends before, but all the sex has been sweet, sentimental, loving - you don’t know where the cruel edge to your tone comes from, only that it tosses kerosene to the fire behind Yuqi’s eyes, catches flame at her parted lips. You’re mean and she likes it. If you’re rough, then she’ll-
It’s like you’re a man possessed. In one smooth, deliberate motion you ruck up her tiny skirt around her waist and brush your knuckles against the crotch of her panties, and-
You’ve barely done anything. You’ve touched her waist and you snapped at her. And Yuqi’s so, so wet.
“You,” Yuqi says, vague with a point, a purpose - like oh: you’re about to be more than I bargained for.
“Me,” you agree, and watch her grin turn devilish.
-
Yuqi doesn’t drop the attitude. No, actually, she seems to take your order as a challenge and nothing more, because-
“Jesus fuck,” says Yuqi, like it offends her, her hand on your cock over your pants - when she squeezes, she’s not gentle, and then she’s going for the zipper. “You’re this hard already? I’m not even naked.”
“Look who’s talking.” The moment she gets your cock out, you grab her wrist in your hand, pin it back to the counter. It’s taking all your effort to not go wild on her right now - to not flip her around, rip her underwear, shove your dick deep in her pussy. “You’re creaming your fucking panties just at the thought of my cock inside of you, Yuqi.”
Yuqi’s fierce eyes snap up to yours, cheeks flushing angrily, prettily. “Shut your fucking mouth.”
“Oh, are you gonna make me?”
In a second Yuqi’s fisting the front of your shirt between her fingers - faintly, you register that one of her ridiculous fake nails hooks against your sternum and scrapes, smarting - but that all falls away, because she’s kissing you, and then falls even further, because there’s a much more prevalent pain at your mouth when Yuqi’s teeth sink into your bottom lip, hard.
You almost choke on your breath from the unexpected hurt - you can’t help it - and pull back, heart pounding. There’s something in this: the high, the adrenaline. It hurts - and you don’t think you’ve ever been harder in your life. “What the fuck?”
“What?” asks Yuqi, smile cunning. She’s gorgeous, she’s evil; her fingers twitch like there’s a lot more damage she could be doing.
“You bit me,” you say, incredulous. There’s the metallic taste of blood in your mouth, a red smear on the back of Yuqi’s hand as she presses it to your bottom lip, draws it back in interest. “You actually fucking bit me.”
“Yeah,” replies Yuqi, unabashed. “I’m aware, thanks.”
“I’m bleeding.”
“Great.”
Oh, she’s just begging to rile you up: you can see it in her eyes, in the way her focus drops from your face to your cock, circles back around. It’s a game, for her: to see how far she can push you. To see what you’ll do when she’s got you at the edge.
You’re seething, you’re seeing red; you won’t mind showing her. “You fucking - dumb fucking whore, Yuqi-”
“What?”
You rip her panties down to her knees - there’s her cunt, pretty and pink and dripping wet - and then you’ve got two fingers inside of her, just like that, and the throaty, stunned gasp you get from Yuqi - the way she buckles under you against the bathroom counter - is like you’ve already got her neck between your hands. There’s power here, there’s fury - it’s in your veins, thrumming, it’s in her eyes, her ridiculously tight pussy, dripping-
“I’m not one of your little toys who’s gonna just let you push them around, darling,” you say, and it’s almost a taunt; you’ve never heard yourself like this, callous and cruel even to your own ears. Your other hand slides down the toned curve of her back. “If you act up, you’re gonna get what you earn.”
Yuqi’s chest is heaving, teeth dug hard into her lip, trying to choke down her moans, trying to wrestle back the upper hand. It’s a lost cause: her cunt’s leaking all over your fingers, your wrist. She’s fucking soaked - and there’s all that unadulterated rage in her eyes, irate that you’re the one in control, that she very clearly loves it-
And then just as you draw your fingers out of her pussy, your hand comes down hard on her ass.
Yuqi shrieks - or she would, but your slick hand clamps down over her mouth, the other one ravaging her ass, groping, slapping, getting whatever you can. She’s wild, smacking your shoulder with an open palm, trying to get you to let her go, but then her fingers sneak under the collar of your shirt and-
A stinging pain, right across your collarbone. Immediately, you lose your grip on her. “Shit, you fucking-”
Yuqi takes advantage of your shock, slips out from where you’d had her pinned against the counter. You turn only halfway, struck, and in a second flat she’s shoved you roughly against the counter, the lip digging into your lower back. She’s breathing unevenly, staring - she’ll let you break the lull.
“You scratched me,” you say, astonished. You’re probably bleeding again. “You psycho bitch.”
“Yep,” says Yuqi, simply, pale pink hair a disaster and her underwear tangled at her ankles. You haven’t even gotten your cock in her and she’s already a goddamn mess. “I did.”
“You’re fucking crazy.”
“And you’re the one dying to fuck me.” Yuqi’s hands are curled into tight fists. Her skirt’s shoved unceremoniously up around her waist, and you can see how wet she is - her cunt’s glistening, caught up in the overhead lights. Her thighs gleam with sweat. “What does that say about you?”
It’s all a game you’re playing, in the end - you’re at opposite ends of the battlefield, waiting to see who makes the first move, mapping out weapons, weaknesses. She talks like she’s ten feet tall and she’s tiny. She’s got a mouth on her like she’s bulletproof and you could probably snap her clean in half.
“I think that says I’m gonna get exactly what I want,” you say, and then you shove her chest-first up against the wall, and slide your cock right into her pussy.
Oh, there’s no hiding anything now - Yuqi’s moaning between her stuttered, hiccuped breaths, crying out when you smack at her ass, then at her thighs - it’s so loud, and anyone passing by is going to know - so you might as well take it all the way. Talk about possession, ruination; you’ll show her the definitions, mark them into all that fair, smooth skin, carving like it’s marble. It’s what she wants, what she won’t admit out loud. You’ll make her, in time.
“Look at you,” you growl; you’re barely keeping it together. You’ll never get over this pussy - so tight, and so warm, and so wet. “Moaning like a bitch in heat around my cock. Yuqi, if this is what you wanted-”
“Fuck you,” snaps Yuqi, and jerks her elbow back, sending the sharp point of it right into your ribs. “Shut the fuck up. Don’t talk, useless dipshit-” Her voice breaks off on a whimper, and she’s bucking her cunt right back on your cock - it’s violent, and it must hurt - but then you realize that that’s precisely the point. You hand finds her hair, wraps it up into your fist, tugs hard; you’ll give in. “Just fuck me. Just fuck me.”
Yeah, you’ll give her what she wants, too; it’s so convenient that you just happen to want the exact same thing.
There’s no room for patience, for sweetness - it’s all about cut corners and the ungodly vice grip of her pussy, how Yuqi fucks you like there’s a threat in it, how you’re fucking her just the same - call the blood in your mouth foreplay, the red welts forming on your collarbone setting the mood; you bring your hand down hard on her hip just to see her tremble, trying to do anything but admit how much she’s living for this kind of fucking: rough, ruthless, mean.
“No, I know what you want.” Her shoulder hits the wall; her foot in her platform heel connects with your shin. You tug her head back so you can see her expression, make an example of a demon. “You just want me to cum all over that pretty little face.”
There’s that split second of panic, cracking Yuqi wide open - it’s written all over her features, in how her cunt is gushing around your cock, so tight - she’s so close, and you’ll take it as far as she wants to go. “What? Wait - no, don’t-”
“Is that what you need, Yuqi?” You’ve got your hair in your fist, and you’re pounding her cunt like you’re trying to tear her in two. “Me, cumming all over your fucking face - in all this hair-” You yank her hair harder to make a point, and Yuqi sobs, can’t hold it back. “And make you walk out there, covered in my fucking cum - drag you out there in front of everyone, so they all know that you’re just a worthless fucking cumrag for my cock-”
“You sadistic motherfucker,” Yuqi spits, but it comes out strangled between her raspy moans. She turns her head halfway - the tears glittering in her fiery eyes is like victory, like your name all in lights. “You fucking asshole. I’ll kill you. If you fucking cum on my face and make me go out there, I’ll-”
She never actually finishes her warning, because her back arches, and she’s cumming all over your cock.
“Well,” you say, and you’ll let it go: it all turns out the same, anyway. “Maybe next time, baby.”
And then you pull out of her and spill your load all down her creamy thighs.
For a second, it’s like it all tunnels - you forget where you are, who you are, there’s a girl in front of you and she’s exhausted and stunning and devious, and there’s your cum dribbling down her pale skin - and then clarity returns, and Yuqi’s slumped against the wall, her head tipped sideways so her cheek rests against your shoulder. She’s breathing hard - there’s music outside, somewhere far off - everything’s wet and hot and woozy-
Yuqi huffs out an airy noise, and your eyes flash right to hers.
There’s that fire, sparking, bordering an inferno. For a second, you wait with bated breath: will she scream at you, will she slap you, reprimand you, tell you that you went too far-
It’s none of that, in reality: you’ve picked up on all her signs just like she wanted you to. Yuqi’s head tips back against you, her eyes sliding closed. There’s all that tension between you two, pulling taut, snapping, tying up its ropes. Your hand closes around her waist, gentle - you’re past leaving bruises, here. You’ll mind your edges. You know when a moment falls shut.
“God,” she says, finally, and then she grins so widely you swear she bursts the bathroom lighting, her fingers sliding between yours. “You - holy fuck.”
“Holy fuck,” you agree, spent, euphoric, and you know right then: you’ll never be able to get over this.
-
It’s weird, how easy it is: you grab some paper towels, help Yuqi clean the cum off the backs of her thighs. She inspects herself in the mirror, swivels from side to side. There’s absolutely no reason she should’ve let you - a complete stranger - do half the things you just did to her, but at least that goes both ways.
“Your tattoo’s really cute,” you say, surprised.
“I’m a really cute person,” says Yuqi, pulling her skimpy panties back up around her hips, eyes glittering like gunmetal.
“Uh,” you say - it’s not the first word you’d choose.
“I’m adorable,” reiterates Yuqi, tossing her hair, and she has this loud, brash way of saying things that makes unexpected laughter bubble up from your chest. You’re a little delirious. It’s to be expected.
Yuqi lifts an eyebrow at you. “Are you laughing at me?”
“That was the most insane sex I’ve ever had,” you admit.
Yuqi smiles, suddenly cheeky - and, fine, you see the cute thing, now that she’s not fucking you like she wants you dead. “Honestly?” She shrugs her thin shoulders. “I have a lot of intense sex, but - yeah. You really…” She waves a hand up and down her body - there are the red handprints forming on her thighs, hips, ass. “You did a number on me, dude.”
“You too,” you say, charmed. There’s your bleeding shoulder, your raw bottom lip from where she’d bitten you; you’ll probably wake up with bruises from her shoving you into the counter. “Dude.”
“Everything was…” Yuqi flips you a thumbs-up. “Good? Not too rough?”
(Oh, here’s the kicker: she may fuck you like she’s a demon trying to steal your soul, but that’s all over now; she’s sweet, she’s genuine. You never do this: you’re not someone who has sex with strangers, and not in public, and not like that. There’s no reason she should be as comfortable with you as she clearly seems to be.)
“Good,” you confirm, mesmerized by her face; her dark eyeshadow’s a little smudged, eyeliner messy. It adds to the whole seductive rock star look like it might’ve been pre-planned. “We can work out limits in the future, yeah? Set boundaries.”
Yuqi latches onto it like you figured she would. “Oh,” she says, voice already steeped in ridicule - she can’t pass up giving you shit. “In the future.”
“Uh-huh.”
Yuqi gathers her hair up off her neck, lets it drop, pleased. “You want me so bad.”
“No, I had sex with you because I feel no desire towards you whatsoever.”
Yuqi laughs right before she drives her fist into your shoulder - but it’s too late, by then. She’s got the most gorgeous laugh you’ve ever heard: rich and raspy, so full it engulfs the room, drowns you two in it - and she laughs with her whole body, too, shoulders shaking, head tossed back. She laughs and you’re a fucking goner.
“God damn,” you say, grinning, pressing your hand to your shoulder. That’s another bruise waiting to happen. “You’re so aggressive.”
“Right back at you,” Yuqi says, and she’s got a point, she’s got several. It’s a score to settle at a later date - you’ve been here long enough. Yuqi taps your wrist, gestures to the door, her intent unspoken: time to face the music.
-
See, you’re not expecting to get out entirely unscathed, but you’re not expecting two of Club Cosmic’s veteran performers to just be waiting out there for you two, wrapped up in lingerie and silk robes, guarding the door like they’re particularly slutty angels and it’s Judgment Day.
“Oh my god,” you say. Yuqi, to her credit, looks undaunted - you have no idea how she’s pulling it off. “You guys are creeps. Were you eavesdropping the whole time?”
“We weren’t eavesdropping,” says Bona, tucking her long curtain of dark hair behind her ears. She’s not an inch over five-four and even in heels manages to look delicate. “You were the ones who decided to have very noisy and disruptive sex in the employee bathroom.”
“Yeah,” says Eunseo, leveling you with a very pointed glare. “I have to pee.”
It’s less than convincing. “Right.”
“Okay, fun,” says Yuqi, breaking any sort of suspense in that straightforward, vaguely tactless way you’re quickly realizing is her trademark. Ah, she’s got half a smile on, hands laced in front of her - it somehow manages to come off cute instead of caustic. With a face like that she’s probably never had an issue getting away with the attitude. “So - is there anything else you two needed, or-”
“Jiyeon has a question.”
“Bona,” corrects Bona, elbowing Eunseo. “Christ. I’m on the clock.”
“Sure,” says Yuqi, mildly intrigued. Her chin’s tilted up, slender arms crossing over her chest. She looks exactly like she’s been getting the life fucked out of her and she doesn’t seem a bit self-conscious about it. “Make it quick.”
“Fine, fine.” Yuqi’s being bossy to the point of being rude, but Bona’s lips tilt in a conspiratorial grin, undeterred. “So, what’d you rate it?”
Yuqi quirks an eyebrow. “His dick, or-”
“The bathroom. Like, out of ten, how good is it to have sex in?”
“Bona’s been trying to seduce one of the investors for, like, months,” Eunseo explains.
“Baby,” drawls Yuqi, even though she must be younger than Bona - and miraculously, it sounds suggestive rather than condescending, although that could be the glint in her eye as she gives Bona a languid once-over. “If it’s taking months for you to get this guy to fuck you, he’s obviously either blind or insane. You’re gorgeous. I’d give it up.”
It’s her tone, her expression; Bona, who makes a living off of being drooled over, freezes in place, suddenly a little spellbound. “Um,” she says.
“She’s not wrong,” you add, amused. Well, it’s good to know you’re not the only one so easily dazzled. It’s the arrogance, the husky voice, the disheveled state of Yuqi’s hair, her thighs still red from how rough you were - you’re not sure anyone with a pulse could resist her.
“I’d give it a ten,” says Yuqi, winks, pats your shoulder. She’ll pull out the charisma when it counts. “I’m very satisfied.”
-
“Hey,” Yuqi says, and you’re making your way towards the front, even though you’re technically still supposed to be working. By the doors, the pretty blonde in Yuqi’s band is wrapped up with this guy who’s so much taller than her their height difference is almost comical. “There’s a party next Saturday that you should go to.”
You glance over at her. “Are you asking me or telling me?”
“Telling you,” says Yuqi, stone-faced, radiant eyes alight. “It’s an order.”
“God,” you say, almost inappropriately endeared. She’s so pushy. It’s cute. “Okay.”
She rattles off the address, lets you type it into your phone. “That’s Miyeon’s place,” she explains, nods towards the blonde - “Fairy princess Barbie with the boyfriend, over there.”
“Sure,” you say; the description’s so spot-on, but it also goes largely in one ear and out the other. “Hey, so-”
You’re about to ask her for her number, but at that moment the blonde girl - Miyeon - turns and spots the both of you together, and her jaw drops. Yeah, Yuqi looks thoroughly fucked and she’s wearing it wonderfully; you’re probably not much better off. “Song Yuqi.”
“That’s my name,” says Yuqi, dryly, and then Miyeon’s tugging her towards the entrance.
You sigh, you let it go. It’s for the best, probably; you should get back to work, be responsible. You’ll see her next weekend, anyway. You’ll be inevitable.
By the door, Miyeon’s incredulous, talking loud and completely enthused. “You had sex with a stranger in a dirty club bathroom?” she’s saying to Yuqi. “Who are you, me?”
“You didn’t fuck a stranger, Miyeon. You fucked your teacher.”
“And look how well that turned out.”
Oh, it’s none of your business, it’s Club Cosmic; it’s not the place for a moral compass. Besides, you’ve got all your own problems: Yuqi’s pink hair catches the light, falls to shadow. You’ll have bruises, wounds to clean. You’ll play games: power, control, battle strategy. It’ll be a train wreck waiting to happen.
You smile at Yuqi’s retreating form, and think you'll take whatever she throws at you - it's only fair, because you'll give it right back.
-
Look, it’s not like she’s the only thing you think about: you’ve got responsibilities, obligations. But you let your mind wander and she’s there, straight out of all your dirtiest dreams. You’re thinking it’s a one-in-a-million encounter, a once-in-a-lifetime girl - you already know you’re in deep, in regards to sex and otherwise. You’ll have your hands full with Yuqi. There’s a week to wait for the party, and the whole time you’re on the verge of a one-track mind.
And then suddenly it’s Saturday, and - well, you know what they say about best-laid plans.
-
You’re a party person, but only sometimes. You’re used to low-key things, college dorms and cheap beer. You’ve got friends with sketchy standards, you’ve got a bartending job in a burlesque club - you’re not sure what you were expecting when Yuqi invited you to a party, but-
So, the apartment’s huge. Like, okay, you already forgot whose party this is - it’s been a week, and that’s too long - but whoever it is, their family probably comes from blood money. It’s cool, it’s intimidating. It also means you can’t find anyone: not even Yuqi, not even if you tried.
You make yourself busy in the meantime. The party’s packed, so you do end up running into people you know, eventually: there’s Lisa, the rookie choreographer at Club Cosmic. She’s your age, she’s there with that blonde chick she’s always with - Chaeyoung - and Chaeyoung’s boyfriend, who’s breaking up with her constantly, or something. Campus drama; you try not to get involved. They’re all drunk and hysterically funny, and you get distracted easily.
“So, Club Cosmic, huh?” Chaeyoung’s boyfriend is saying to you. He’s always struck you as a bit of an asshole, but mostly in a harmless way. He pats Chaeyoung’s waist. “Rosie would never let me work in a place like that,” he tacks on, eyebrows raising emphatically. “All that temptation.”
“What?” splutters Chaeyoung.
“Uh,” you say - you’re not getting into it. Plus, it’s occurred to you that Chaeyoung’s boyfriend pushes her buttons on purpose - and after Yuqi, you’re sort of seeing all the appeal of that kind of dynamic.
Lisa, somehow, has gotten way more wasted than the other two, and you, amazingly, have barely even touched a drink. “Who’re you looking for?” Lisa asks, then presses a hand to her temple. “I’m slurring. I can feel it.”
She is, but it’s not the point. “Yuqi,” you say. “Pink hair? From the band last Saturday?”
Lisa snaps her fingers, then keeps snapping, finds the beat of the background music like it’s nothing. “Right. Oh, oh!” Her attention darts to someone behind you, and suddenly she’s gesturing wildly at them. “Then - okay, you know Minnie, right? You must. You have to. Minnie!”
You frown; the name doesn’t ring a bell. “Does she work at the club?”
“What? No. She’s - hey, Minnie!”
“Oh, my god.” The exasperation is startlingly close to you: right over your shoulder, voice silk and velvet and sultrier things. “I’m right here, bitch. You don’t need to scream my name.”
“Minnie,” says Lisa, again, like being blind drunk has started to affect her general comprehension. Er - okay, that’s probably the goal. “You two know each other, right? Minnie, you’ve met-”
It’s supposed to be an introduction, normal, perfunctory - you’re supposed to turn around, wave, smile; you’re good with strangers, you’re a bartender and it’s your job, for fuck’s sake - but the second you swivel and your eyes land on this girl, it’s like every social cue slips right out of your brain and falls straight to the floor.
“Holy shit,” you say.
“You too,” the girl says, rapid-fire, like it’s a sentiment she’s used to getting.
“Uh-oh,” says Lisa; she’s not drunk enough to miss out on the sudden vibe, the instant implications. She is, however, drunk enough to unintentionally snap all the tension, or at least do a very good job at trying. “Oh, no. You think she’s hot.”
“I am hot,” says the girl - Minnie. There’s a curl to her mouth. You’re gawking like an idiot and you can’t even bring yourself to care.
“And you think he’s hot,” Lisa says to her, awed, giving the play-by-play. Chaeyoung’s got her face buried in her boyfriend’s shoulder - so, they’ve reconciled in two seconds flat - laughing half from sheer embarrassment.
“I do,” agrees Minnie, before you can say anything. “What a coincidence."
You can’t help it; you’re stunned, you’re staring. It’s the eyes, more than anything: so preternaturally, absurdly beautiful, a sea-glass green too light and clear to be real. You’ll take it back; despite Lisa’s best efforts, there’s no way she’s breaking off this kind of tension. Minnie’s like something out of a comic, a cartoon, dreamt up by some passionate artist and brought to life gorgeously - it’s so fast, but it’s a party, and she’s the prettiest thing in the room, in any room. You can’t focus on anything but her.
“Do you two know each other?” asks Lisa, bordering confusion. There’s a strange familiarity there, maybe: Minnie’s looking at you like she already knows everything you’ve thought about doing to her in the sixty seconds since you first saw her. “You do, right?”
“No, we don’t.” You can’t tear your gaze off Minnie’s eyes, but when you do, now it’s everywhere - her long, slim legs, her sharp collarbone, her fingers, all capped with eye-catching hot pink acrylics - she’s in the shortest skirt, the tightest top. She’s like sex just standing there and her smirk suggests that she knows it. “But - I mean - it’s nice to meet you. You’re-” You’re tripping over all your words, losing your mind. “Jesus.”
You’re not drunk, but you might as well be - there’s no way you’re thinking straight. Chaeyoung snorts and starts herding her boyfriend and Lisa away, giving you two the illusion of space; the party’s still full, and there’s no escaping it. Minnie tilts her head, eyes curving to half-moons, says, “Thanks. Hey, I think you’re pretty Jesus, too.”
“Get a room,” calls Lisa, loudly.
So, there’s no reason this should be happening - it’s insane, and it’s so soon - but it’s a party, and everything’s dialed up, and Minnie’s so strikingly, unreasonably gorgeous you can’t recall anyone else’s name.
“That’s not a bad idea.” Minnie’s got a hand on her hip and she’s studying you like she can read your mind - well, you’d let her. It’s been two minutes and the only thing you’re thinking about is her. “Maybe we should do that, huh?”
There’s practically zero pretense. She’s got a smile like she’s holding secrets, like she knows you’re just dying to unravel them all - she’s stupid hot, and it’s a party, and you’re helpless. That’s the beginning and the end of it all, or it should be.
“Maybe,” you agree, and all your plans fall through in an instant. There’s really no other way it could go.
-
Here’s the thing, about you and Minnie: façades drop fast.
Minnie’s tall in her sky-high heels, eyes like she could kill a man, body dripping sex appeal like sin - for all intents and purposes, she should be exactly who Yuqi was to you, a week ago. A girl who you’ll fuck like you’re getting into fisticuffs. That’s obviously your type - you’ve had that revelation, now. You like getting marks almost as much as you like leaving them.
Somehow you end up in a bedroom, get horribly distracted by conversation. She’s still impossibly hot, but there’s less seduction, suggestion. See, it occurs to you in record time, after you say something funny and she giggles out this ridiculous, stupid, hilarious laugh: she’s cute. That’s the thing sitting under all the allure, threaded through her laugh and her fast-talking energy: she’s fucking adorable.
“You’re cute,” you say, eventually, because you can’t help it. She’s sitting on the bed, attention flicking from you to the expensive-looking camera on the nightstand. The door’s locked, and you both know what you’re doing here.
“Yeah,” says Minnie, smiling that slightly lopsided smile, a bit too wide to be properly coy. “Well, I think you’re cute, too.”
“Is that why you dragged me into a bedroom within a minute of meeting me?” you prompt, standing at the footboard. Minnie’s platform heels are gone, now, and she’s got her slender legs tucked under her, skirt riding high on her thighs. “Because you think I’m cute?”
“That’s one reason.”
“One?”
“One of many.”
You’re not a one-night stand guy, but this is your second in a week, or it’s about to be. It’s a fever dream, both moments: there’s a risk you’ve never taken, there’s a girl watching you like you fascinate her, inexplicably. If you looked in the mirror you’re not sure you’d recognize yourself - you don’t do this, you don’t.
(You don’t do this, but you’re doing it - again.)
“You’re hot,” Minnie says candidly, nails skimming over the camera on the nightstand. “And I like your smile. And your arms. And everyone at this party is so boring.” She tilts her head, examines you. There’s a shift to the room, the suggestion coming back full-force; she pulls the camera into her lap, and now you’re seated at the corner of the bed, fingertips brushing her bare knees. “And I like how the first thing you said when you saw me was holy shit.”
“That can’t be an uncommon reaction,” you say. “I mean, you’re - you’re fucking gorgeous. Everybody must tell you that.”
“Sure,” says Minnie. “But I guess I like it a lot better coming out of your mouth.”
There’s something new at her lips, wicked; she passes you the camera a beat later. Her top pulls tight against her chest as she moves, her glossy black hair brushing just past her collarbone. “Hey,” she says, and stretches out, leisurely. There are her legs, her thighs, the elegant line of her neck - there’s too much to concentrate on, right in front of you. Minnie nods towards the camera. “Take my picture.”
“What?” you say, startled. The camera feels heavy in your hands. You’re not sure how Minnie got the nerve to use some random person’s bedroom, take their belongings - you’re not sure if you should ask. “Really?”
“Please?” Minnie asks, eyes beseeching, and - oh.
That’s when it clicks in your head: she’s not like Yuqi at all.
Forget the fronts, the forwardness, the sex appeal. Minnie’s not gonna fight back, or make demands. She’s gonna beg and plead and do exactly what you tell her to do. There’ll be no violent standoffs: she’s spread out on the bed, and she’s already surrendering.
“Hmm,” you say - you’re slipping, you’re leaning into it. If she wants you in control then she’ll get it. “Give me something interesting to photograph, then.”
Minnie raises an eyebrow coolly, but her teeth notch into her bottom lip, incriminating. “My face isn’t enough?”
“I don’t think so.” It’s a lie - that face could sell magazines, fit perfectly on billboards. “You got anything else?”
Minnie fixes you with a look, but it’s not really even a question: it’s an order, a test. You’re feeling out your boundaries, unfamiliar territory - and then her hands go to the hem of her skintight shirt and she’s peeling it overhead. Talk about magazines - you’ll find her in dirtier ones, fantasies, obscenities. Her bra’s lacy and black, hair mussed; she waits, lets you drink her in.
“That’ll work,” you say, and that’s only the first picture. You know the very second you take it that there’ll be a lot, lot more.
-
You kiss her and there’s a switch flipped, a bomb dropped - you mind the debris, leave goosebumps every time you touch any part of her - her throat, her tits, her toned midriff. “Look at you,” you say, and there’s something shifted in you, too: it’s your tone, it’s how she reacts to it. “So fuckin’ needy.”
The camera’s forgotten on the nightstand; instead, you go for her bra, get it off, get it to the floor. Your eyes flick up to Minnie’s, and that’s a vision, her striking eyes spilled wide with expectation. She’s slender, breakable - you’re on top of her, and she’s already trembling - so you’ll start slow, first. This is all on your terms and she knows it.
You dip, scrape your teeth across a nipple, and Minnie lets loose the prettiest whine.
“It’s actually kind of incredible,” you say, conversationally, as your bottom lip drags down the defined line of her stomach, stops at the waistband of her tiny skirt. You’ve got a hand on each thigh, spreading them gently; you won’t be nice for long. “We just met, you know? You and me.”
There’s a point here - you’ll make it as you unbutton her skirt, pull the zipper, drag it down her thighs. Minnie hasn’t said a word: you’re not sure she could, even if she tried. Then her skirt’s gone, and it’s all fair game - you hook a finger under the crotch of her panties just to find her soaked.
“Oh,” you say, darkly - you’re testing your limits, testing the flimsy fabric of her underwear. “Here, see - we just met,” you say, and punctuate it by running your finger through the folds of her pussy, “and you’re already so fucking desperate for me that your slutty little cunt’s leaking all over my fingers.”
Minnie inhales so sharply that it’s like she takes all the air out of the room, eyelashes fluttering: that’s your go-ahead. You let your grin tilt cruelly, and then you rip her panties right off of her.
You know the fabric must bite into her hips by the mewling noise she makes, but it’s that same noise that gives it away - she loves it. Maybe it’s good that you’ve taken up a vice like this, these one-night stands - you know the tells and you know what to do with them. There’s a sick kind of power, standing above her like this, undoing your own zipper; Minnie’s almost salivating by now, lips parted, focus trained on your hands and what they’ll do, what they’re already doing-
You drop one hand around her throat just to wrap it in your fist, and in the same beat, you sink your cock straight into her pussy.
It’s pornographic, how Minnie submits, how she dissolves, how she lets you fuck her right into the mattress, stuff her mouthwateringly tight cunt with your cock - “Oh my god,” she chokes out through your grip on her neck, your fingers so rough it’s likely you’ll leave bruises; there’s your thumb under the line of her jaw, nail pressing down-
“Fuck me, please - feels so good, fucking my pussy so good-”
Minnie’s barely getting the words out, but she doesn’t even have to. See, her pleasure’s visible, and it’s everywhere: her hands half-curled to fists, her dazzling, tear-blurred eyes, her whines, her back curving to an archway. She’s so gorgeous getting fucked like this, and you should be thanking God that you even get the chance to feel a pussy this perfect - but you’re not. Instead-
Your hand lets up on her throat just to trap her face between your fingers, pressing hard. “Shut the fuck up,” you snarl, “stupid fucking slut - do you want people outside to hear you acting like a greedy fucking whore for some stranger’s cock? Want them to come running in and see you like this?” Your fingertips dig into her cheeks. “You don’t even know me, baby. You have no idea what the fuck I could do to you.”
You’re really in it now: fucking her like there might be weapons on the table, guns readied, knives unsheathed. The door’s locked, you know that; oh, technicalities. It’s not like it really matters. The idea of it’s enough.
Your cruelty’s a killer. It gets some kind of perverse Pavlovian response from Minnie, something that gets her sobbing with her face in your hand - “I don’t care,” she’s saying, words garbled, slurring at each syllable: “Don’t care, just fuck me, fuck me, please - you’re right, I’m just a stupid slut, just use me, use my cunt-”
Your hands have a motive and they’re leaving marks - she’s so tight, so unbelievably wet. You’re ruining her and you’ll prove it.
“That’s my girl,” you say, and suddenly you land a smack across her cheek. It’s not as rough as you could be - you’re in dangerous territory, you’re toeing lines; there’s a lot more damage you could do - but Minnie yelps anyway, caught on a sob, stares up at you with tears beading her eyelashes, smudging mascara, eyeliner. One of her hands is around your wrist, acrylics leaving indents. “Yeah, yeah, you know what you are. Just a dirty little fuckhole-” There’s another slap, another strangled moan- “for me to use.”
It’s building and it’s building fast - there’s something about how mercilessly you’re fucking her pussy that makes Minnie squeal and shudder and clench tighter - and you know she’s about to cum, so you lean in to bite at her neck, collarbone, tits. You’re sinking your teeth in just to suck, soothe it with your tongue; it’s all about pain thresholds, and you’re pushing her past her limits-
It’s like you feel it before it happens, but then it happens.
“Fucking cum for me,” you order, and then you pull your cock out of her - just as Minnie squirts all over you.
It all unravels, after that - you’re jerking your cock, cumming all over the perfect, flat plane of her midriff, all that pale skin glazed in white - and Minnie’s panting, whining, struck with the aftershocks. Your brain cuts off at the stem. You’re balking, open-mouthed.
You have to understand, she’s the hottest thing you’ve ever seen: Minnie, sprawled out in front of you, her pussy wrecked and raw, her stomach covered in your cum. You can’t help it. You grab her by the throat and drag her mouth to yours.
“You’re so fucking hot,” you exhale, and Minnie melts into your lap, becomes putty in your hands, licking, writhing - you can’t turn off the aggression. You’ve got her throat in your hand and your other slipping down to her chest just to smack hard at her tits, get her squealing. “That’s my dirty fucking slut. Squirting all over me - squirting just ‘cause you love my cock, huh? Just ‘cause you’re a whore for my cock?”
Minnie’s whimpering through your grip on her neck, spine curving when your hand returns to her tits, pulling hard at her nipples. You’ve never, ever been so ruthless - you can’t even describe what it is about Minnie that gets this out of you. It’s her body, her needy, tear-filled eyes - that’s a girl that was made to be fucked hard.
“That’s it.” You move your hand from her neck to her cheeks, gripping her face in your hand. Minnie stares at you, green eyes glassy, baleful, drool falling from her open mouth, her lolling tongue. “There you go. Here, let me-”
There’s that camera, on the nightstand. When you let Minnie’s face go, she tumbles out of your lap, falls back on the soaked sheets - she doesn’t even try to pose and it’s like it comes to her naturally, her legs tucked up to show her dripping cunt, the stain underneath her, her makeup a disaster - and that’s it, right there, something ready to frame and display-
You pull back, and you take the shot.
-
(You’ve never, ever been so ruthless - except a week ago, scathing and sinister, fucking Yuqi in a public bathroom like you wanted to kill her. There’s something in that, a line to be drawn. It’ll come back around, in time.)
-
“So,” you say, after. “Do you usually make a habit of squirting all over random people’s beds?”
Minnie’s recovering, letting you wipe the cum off her stomach with tissues - still, it’s all sort of a lost cause, considering her squirt covers everything. You honestly need a shower, and there’s an on-suite you’re thinking of using. You’re probably past party fouls at this point.
Minnie’s staring at you, eyes narrowed strangely, lips parted - and it’s so cute you get momentarily distracted. “What?” you ask, tugging her towards you, your hands busying themselves fixing her bangs. “What’s that look?”
Minnie tips her head, lets you adjust her in any way she wants; it’s completely natural, instinctual. “Who invited you to this party?”
“What?” you ask, like you’ve forgotten all other words.
Minnie pats the soaked sheets. It’s just then that you notice that there’s a color scheme going on: the bright pink of her acrylic nails, the pale pink of the bedding. “This is my apartment,” she says. “My room. My party. My…” She throws her hand towards the camera, and now she’s laughing her ridiculous, infectious laugh, and all of a sudden your own laughter’s pouring out and you can’t stop it. “How’d you even get here? Where’d you even come from?”
Oh, well - now that makes a lot more sense. “One of my friends - so, it was, like, completely on a whim. I basically had no details before coming.”
“Fate!” concludes Minnie almost instantly, clapping her hands, dropping all other lines of questioning. Clearly, she’s a girl after your own heart: her attention span’s basically nonexistent. “We were so meant to meet. And fuck.”
“No, I agree,” you say, smiling, because she’s so adorable even when she’s not getting fucked into oblivion. So, this is about to be really bad for you. “We have… we’ve got, you know-”
“Sexual chemistry.”
“Absolutely.”
That throws Minnie into another round of delighted giggles, and she’s got you frozen in place, grinning like an idiot. It’s those eyes, so intense until they soften, completely - she’s beyond beautiful. It’s a problem. “I bet our zodiac signs-”
“Here we go.”
“I’m so serious!” Minnie smacks your knee, over-the-top. “I bet we’re, like, cosmically intertwined. No one fucks me that good on the first hook-up.” She’s already reaching for her phone on the nightstand. “Come on, when were you born? No, I said I’m serious, I need to work this out-”
You humor her, give her all the information she asks for. You can’t stop taking pictures of her, now that you know it’s her obnoxiously expensive camera - you’re not even close to being a good photographer, but she’s unbelievable in front of a lens, the eyes and the ruined makeup and the new hickeys spanning her neck, chest - and Minnie just grins, laughs, pays you no mind.
“No, see,” she says, and she’s comparing your birth charts with half-assed sincerity; it’s become increasingly obvious that she knows as much about astrology as you do, which is basically nothing at all. “That’s it. That means our sexual desires - um - run parallel to each other, according to the stars, which means-”
“You’re so full of shit.”
Minnie wrinkles up her nose, gives you a dirty look. There’s a smile flickering at her mouth; that’s another photo, right there. Oh, you’re not sure you’ll be able to leave this room until you’ve got enough to fill a gallery - it’s a good thing that she doesn’t seem to be complaining.
-
You do actually end up taking a shower - it’s probably still some sort of party foul - but at least you’re not alone. When you’re done, Minnie’s working sweet-smelling leave-in conditioner into her damp hair, a towel wrapped around her - her makeup’s gone, and she’s still so gorgeous she belongs somewhere in MoMA - you leave it be.
“I’ll get you a new shirt,” she says. “I mean - least I could do. My roommate’s boyfriend leaves stuff here all the time, so I can just run over to her room and grab you something-”
“Oh,” you say, kind of alarmed. “That’s - um, so that’s-”
Minnie waves you off. “He won’t care,” she says. “Like, not to rub it in, or whatever, but he’s let guys I’ve fucked borrow his clothes before. We have an arrangement. He’s just cool like that.”
“If you say so.” Her blatant unselfconsciousness reads as charming, somehow. There’s still a party going on outside - Minnie actually got to take off her clothes before you fucked her, so her outfit’s fully salvagable. Well, except the panties, obviously.
“You think I would’ve let you rip my underwear if I didn’t have, like, fifty other pairs readily available?” Minnie’s shimmying a new pair of panties up her thighs.
“Yes,” you say, bemused. “You would’ve let me do whatever I wanted to you.”
“Ugh,” says Minnie, eyes feline and luminous, mirth catching at her lips like a wick to a flame. “You’re so…”
“So Jesus, I know. I’ve been told.”
She leaves, comes back eventually, with the shirt, hair still damp and smile still remarkable, radiant. You exchange numbers, and you press her up against the door before you leave, kiss her until you take all the air from her lungs.
“See you around,” says Minnie, pupils blown, panting. “Seriously, get out of here before we end up fucking again. I don’t know if you realized, but I’m kind of having a party right now.”
“Send me copies of those photos I took,” you say, and pat her hip before you leave.
-
(She and Yuqi are nothing alike, not in the slightest, but that’s the thing that makes you realize it: limiting yourself to one type is so fucking stifling.)
-
You’re ready to go, but first - naturally, accidentally - you run into the blonde from Yuqi’s band, Miyeon, and her ridiculously tall, very mature boyfriend. Her teacher, allegedly: okay, it’s none of your business, but the logistics seem sort of sketchy. You’ll have to get the details at some point.
“Hey,” you say.
“Hey,” says Miyeon’s boyfriend; he’s got a half-smile on like he and Miyeon have a private joke that you’re not in on.
“Hi,” says Miyeon, obviously a little drunk. “Uh, nice shirt.”
“Thanks.”
Her dark eyes, attentive even while intoxicated, flick behind you, where Minnie’s probably standing in the doorway of her room. “Oh,” Miyeon says, fine eyebrows raising. “Oh. Well, that makes sense. Don’t worry,” she adds, leans in like she’s sharing a secret. “I won’t tell Yuqi.”
“What?” you say, sort of flustered. “Will Yuqi care that I hooked up with some other girl?”
Miyeon and her boyfriend exchange a brief, coded glance. “Some other girl,” repeats Miyeon, slowly, studying you oddly. “You are talking about Minnie, right?”
“Yeah, but I mean - like, another stranger.”
There’s another glance between them that you can’t even begin to decipher. “No,” says Miyeon, eventually, and suddenly her entire demeanor’s shifted, enthusiastic out of nowhere. “Not at all!” she repeats, chirpier. “She’s not gonna care. Why would she? Like you said - Minnie’s a stranger. Yuqi won’t mind.”
“Miyeon,” says her boyfriend.
“She won’t!” Miyeon nods cheerfully, reassuringly. “She’s totally - you know, totally chill. She doesn’t even - yeah.” Her boyfriend’s nudging her arm, wrapping her hand in his; well, you think it’s cute that they’re so affectionate. “Anyway. Have a good night!”
(In retrospect, Miyeon’s tipsy, and it’s certainly not the most subtle she’s ever been. In retrospect, you just had amazing sex, and it’s not the smartest or most perceptive you’ve ever been, either - ah, well. Call it a combined effort, her fucking with you like this.)
“Have a good night,” you reply, and you let it go. You’re sure it’ll come back around soon enough.
-
It doesn’t, for a bit. It all carries on.
You realize that you missed out on seeing Yuqi again at the party, but there’s Minnie’s texts coming in on your phone, semi-frequently - she has this habit of taking hours to respond, but when she does, it’s twenty texts all in a row, ranting about something either hilariously stupid or genuinely thoughtful; she loves photography (apparently the expensive camera wasn’t just for show), she loves music. It’s fun, it’s light. You’re very easily distracted and this is no exception.
But then it’s a Friday and you’re in the middle of a shift at Club Cosmic, making small talk with some of the performers between numbers. Bona’s still trying to seduce that investor, but they haven’t come around in so long, she tells you.
“Maybe I should give it up,” Bona’s saying, sipping on something fruity, barely alcoholic - the manager doesn’t like the performers to go on drunk. “Maybe your girl-”
“My girl,” you echo, entertained by the prospect - you already know who she’s talking about.
Bona fixes you with a look, catching the tone. “Yeah,” she says. “All I’m saying is that maybe she was right.”
“I usually am.”
It’s as if on cue, or something close to it - there’s a score leading in, there’s a camera, focusing - and suddenly Yuqi’s plopping herself down on the barstool next to Bona, perfectly nonchalant.
“Speak of the devil,” you say, and you mean it.
It just so happens that the devil in question has half of her pale pink hair tied up in a silky black ribbon, so gorgeous it’s heart-stopping, disarming. Too sweet-faced to be so evil, to have all that power right at her fingertips - it’s all about contradictions, with demons; that’s how they reel you in. Yuqi cocks her head, lets her wavy hair waterfall over a slender shoulder; it’s like she’s taken all the light out of the room, leaving the glint of her deep-space eyes and nothing else.
There’s all that instant danger in it: you’re on the edge of a black hole, a void. “I didn’t see you at the party last week,” you say. “Find a better offer?”
Yuqi shrugs. “Maybe.”
“But here you are,” you prompt - you’re waiting for it. “Visiting me at work.”
“Tone down the ego,” says Yuqi, and smiles over at Bona. “I’m just here for the pretty girls.”
Bona’s already faintly flustered, blushing. There’s something so addicting about getting Yuqi’s attention, and it’s something you’ve already become aware of, maybe even since the first second the two of you ever met - she looks at you and it’s always with a risk, a sharp-shooting focus - and you already know what’s happening here.
“Um,” you say, mouth dry; you can only keep up a casual rapport for so long, with Yuqi right here, and looking like that. “I’ll - you know what, let me get someone to cover for me.”
“Dear god,” says Bona, as if she doesn’t understand entirely where you’re coming from.
“Oh, I couldn’t possibly ask you to neglect your job for me,” says Yuqi. She’s going for demure, but the smirk on her mouth gives her away - her lips are blood-red, a preview, a prequel. “I can wait. Patience is a virtue, or whatever.”
“Bullshit,” you say, bluntly, and Bona actually chokes on her drink. “You don’t have any patience.” You nudge your coworker, call her over - “Hey, Sojung, can you-”
“Right,” says Sojung, spotting Yuqi and her grin and every inch of her perfect face, her neck, her collarbone. She gets it like it’s scrawled across the bartop; it might as well be. “Yeah, yeah. You totally owe me, though.”
“Sure,” you say, on edge, obvious, and Yuqi’s brilliant laugh unfurls like she knows she’s got a claim to stake.
It all moves fast, after that - you’re following Yuqi out to her car, and you’re incapable of doing anything more than that, for the time being; she’s in an enticingly short skirt, and you can’t help it. You’ve got her pinned up against the driver’s side, her back hitting the door so hard it could bruise her spine - you’ve got your hands in her hair and her tongue in your mouth; there are angles to consider, possibilities. You’ve got her car and all that fair skin to mark up, every part of her flawless body curving into yours like she’s calling your name-
“Good choice,” says Yuqi, hot against your lips. “I hate waiting.”
“Stop fucking talking,” you reply, and you’re right back where you started.
-
You fuck her in the backseat of her car, and it’s filthy on principle - it’s cramped and she’s on top of you, riding your cock, hands on your chest, ducking so she won’t ram her head into the roof of the car. Yuqi’s hair is all over you, and that’s the succubus in her, or it would be: she’s all-consuming, suffocating. She fucks you like you might not make it out alive, fills the car with the heady scent of sex, sweat, salt.
“I’m gonna cum inside you." You’ve got red handprints scattered across her ass; she knows you’re not asking permission. She’d let it go on its own, probably, but you’ve always got to take it a beat too far - “Gonna fill your dirty little cunt with my cum, make you walk out of here all fucked out and used and filled like a common fucking whore-”
Yuqi slaps you - actually, fully slaps you, the clap of her hand across your cheek shockingly loud. You smirk up at her, all your teeth. It doesn’t matter if she likes it or not; you’re about to make good on every single threat.
“You know,” you say, after. Yuqi’s trying to find wherever you threw her panties, trying to keep your semen from leaking out of her pussy onto her backseat - she’s failing on both counts. “I think we’d make it out of fucking with way less wounds if you’d just admit that it makes you wet when I degrade you.”
“Oh, baby.” Yuqi eyes you, smiling, then reaches behind you to fish out her panties from where they’d been trapped between your back and the door. She’s so close - cheeks flushed, lips slick, pink on pink on pink - it’s like some higher power made her with an aesthetic in mind, hand-crafted with a purpose. “I’m not trying to hide that. Just like you’re not trying to hide that you like it when you come out of sex with some wounds.”
She’s making fun of your word choice. “So do you,” you counter mildly.
Yuqi cards a hand through her hair - she’s lost her ribbon, somewhere, back when you yanked it out, made her yelp with the sting. She tucks her knees under her, observes what a mess you must be in return: your mussed hair, your red cheek, the new welts from her nails across your skin, dangerously close to your jugular.
“Like I said,” she tells you, her grin a forest fire waiting to devour. “Not trying to hide it.”
-
You walk it back, take steps you should’ve taken the first day you met. You’re trading numbers, talking in circles: you’re a bit hung up on the fact that Yuqi made it a point to visit your job just to find you. It’s both insanely flattering and kind of hilarious.
“Like, what’d you do?” you ask, as she puts her number into your phone. You’re outside her car, you’ll have to get back to work eventually - her windows are rolled down, airing it out. “Just come to Club Cosmic every night on the off chance that I might be bartending then?”
You’re joking, but Yuqi takes too long to respond, eyes studiously trained on your phone. It’s a dead giveaway.
“Really?” You stop, stare, enchanted by the information. Okay, it’s flattering, it’s hilarious - it’s also completely fucking adorable. “Yuqi.”
“Shut up,” says Yuqi. She’s not embarrassed, exactly - you’ve yet to see if that’s an emotion she has the capacity to feel - but when she looks up at you, you can tell by the new tint to her cheeks that it’s something close. “Don’t say my name like that.”
“Like what?”
“Ugh,” says Yuqi, and doesn’t bother giving you a direct answer. “And I didn’t come every day, you idiot. I came once earlier in the week and ran into Bona, so I asked her when your next shift was.”
She’s pressed to your side, tiny next to you; she hands you back your phone, then gets distracted with the cuff of your sleeve, fiddling with the button. “Once?” you prompt, unable to tear your gaze off of her.
Yuqi rolls her eyes, but there’s a soft defense to it, caught. “Fine - twice,” she amends, “but only because I got - I got sidetracked, the first time. That’s it. It’s just - not a lot of people can fuck me how you fuck me. And I meant what I said, when we first met.” She shrugs, like she never says things she doesn't mean. “I think you’re cool.”
Yuqi’s thing is all blunt honesty, but it’s here, too, without the impact, landing light and too fond for how little time you’ve truly spent with each other. You’re helpless to do anything but watch her for a second, how her gaze flicks to yours and then up to the stars, the moon.
“You’re cute,” you say, and kiss the top of her head.
“I’m cool,” Yuqi insists - it’s all about keeping it mutual.
“Sure, sure.” You settle your hand low on her back, slip your pinky under the waistband of her skirt; it’s not specifically suggestive, but you feel this need to touch her, so you’ll touch her. You’re teasing, so you’ll soften the blow. “You’re everything. You’re greater than God, baby.”
Yuqi’s eyes match the sky, reflect constellations like she’s got some celestial ownership to them. “You’re so fucking annoying,” she says, “but damn right I am.”
-
“Hey,” you say to Bona, afterwards. “Thanks for breaking our professional code of conduct and telling Yuqi when my shifts are. If I ever get a stalker, I’m glad you have my back.”
“No problem,” says Bona drolly, her silk robe tied loose around her waist, only half-covering the intricate lingerie she’s got on. “Any time. Hey, I would’ve broken our professional code of conduct sooner-”
“Oh, thanks so much-”
“But the other time she came here she brought her really hot friend, and I thought it’d be rude to interrupt.”
There’s an emphasis there, on friend - you’re slow on the uptake, sometimes, but this is one thing you don’t miss. “Yuqi brought someone here?”
“Yeah, and she was fucking gorgeous - like, unbelievable.” Bona shakes her head. “They were all over each other. I was honestly kind of surprised Yuqi still remembered that you existed, after all that.”
You’re not really sure what to make of that, so you don’t really make anything of it. You and Yuqi have only fucked twice - sure, there’s the exchanging numbers, there’s the promise of more - but you’re not expecting you two to be exclusive, for obvious reasons-
Your phone pings, and that’s the first one, blinking right up at you from the screen.
hiii, Minnie’s texted, and she never settles with just one message.
youre working tonight right????
come over after youre done with your shift?
i miss your cock
and you i GUESS…
but mostly your cock
You’d be a raging hypocrite if you were upset about Yuqi hooking up with someone else, so you won’t be. Harmless fun - that’s all. You’ll keep your affairs in order and she’ll keep hers. No exclusivity, no drama: that’s what you signed up for and that’s what you’ll get.
“Uh,” says Bona, and when you look up, she’s raising an eyebrow pointedly. “Hot date?”
Another text: a photo this time. You open it, and - oh.
“It’s not like Yuqi and I are exclusive,” you say, grinning, clicking your phone off. You won’t deny it: this whole thing’s incredible for your ego. “She can fuck around with whoever she wants and so can I. We’re just - you know. Fuckbuddies. That’s all. It’s not serious.”
“Huh,” says Bona, not buying it, but she lets it go. For the best, probably: it doesn’t matter if anyone else understands this, because you’re the only one who really needs to.
-
You’re wiped by the time your shift ends, bone-tired by the time you make it over to Minnie’s. “Hey, you,” she says, when she opens the door; her eyes are dark for once, and somehow just as captivating. “Oh, seriously - you’re barely even awake. Why’d you even come over?”
“You sent me a picture of my cum all over your stomach,” you say, and Minnie cracks up. “Coming over is, like, common courtesy.”
You’re so sleepy you’re not even sure the words are coming out right. Minnie ends up ushering you into the apartment, anyway; her hair’s tied back in two low pigtails, secured with white ribbons, her shirt tight and her shorts pink, so tiny they’re showing off all of her irresistible thighs. She’s so fuckable - but you’re so exhausted. Minnie’s amused and rueful all at once: “You could’ve said no!” she tells you, insistent. “It’s not like you can even fuck me like this.”
“That sounds like a challenge,” you say, but you break into a yawn immediately after.
“Babe,” says Minnie, endeared. “You’re fucking adorable, but don’t even try.”
Somehow, this leads into you showering in Minnie’s bathroom - again - and then it’s mutually agreed upon that you should probably just stay over, because if you try to drive back in this state you’ll definitely end up crashing your car. It’s all logic, really. It’ll be a facet of the fuckbuddy arrangement, so to hell with it - you’ll spend the night in her bed.
It’s all unmasked in the morning, anyway. You wake up to Minnie on top of you, her cunt hotly choking your cock, and there’s not a fucking chance you’re gonna make apologies for getting so comfortable so fast when it leads to all this in the daylight.
“Oh, fuck-"
Minnie’s on top, but she’s already relinquished every bit of power the moment your eyes snapped open. Doesn’t mean she doesn’t ride your cock like it might’ve been something she was trained to do - there’s the hypnotizing roll of her hips, her flat stomach - that’s something that needs to be immortalized in film one day, but for now-
“That’s my fucking cockslut.” You’ve got your fingertips digging bruises into the dip of her waist, pressing tight to her ribs. “Couldn’t even wait for me to wake up - you just had to have my cock inside your needy little pussy. Couldn’t resist, huh?”
It’s not even a question: no, she can’t, and she never, ever could.
“Good morning to you too,” you tell Minnie afterwards, with her hair balled up in your fist and squirt covering your stomach - you’ll have to take another shower, but at least she’ll be right there with you. “Fuck, Minnie. Is it bad to say I could get used to that?”
Minnie hums, spent - she tries to get out of bed and wobbles on unsteady legs. “Nope,” she says, voice raspy with sleep and sex, and you grab her wrist to balance her. Your cum’s dripping down her thigh. “I think we’ve established by now that I don’t mind taking orders.” She shrugs, like it’s the easiest thing she’s ever said, her dark eyes gorgeous, genuine. “Tell me what you want me to do and I’ll do it.”
“You’re my fucking dream girl,” you say, grinning, and Minnie throws her head back and laughs.
-
Oh, you’re kind of a fan of monogamy, historically. You don’t do one-night stands, or two, or four - you’re racking up numbers with both Yuqi and Minnie and there’s no point in keeping count. You don’t do the friends-with-benefits thing. It’s never appealed to you. Except-
“Tell you what: if you somehow manage to finish this puzzle in the next five minutes, I’ll get on my knees and suck your cock to completion.”
“To completion?” You’re on Yuqi’s couch - she has two roommates and every video game console in existence, apparently. You’re playing this horror game that’s way too puzzle-heavy to actually be scary, but your eyes are glued to the screen and Yuqi’s tucked close to your side; you’ll be alright with it. “As opposed to what?”
“I don’t know, stopping halfway through? Giving you blue balls? Dude, I’m just trying to motivate you.”
See, you’re better at video games than she is, in general, but she’s smarter than you, intuitive - when you’re playing convoluted single-player games like this, you always play them together. You make a good team, or something. You don’t do the friends-with-benefits thing, usually, but you’re doing it now - and there’s honestly more emphasis on the friends part of it than you’d originally bargained for. Well, Yuqi’s gorgeous, and hilarious, and gives just as good as she gets. You can’t say that’s something you’re complaining about.
You’re carving out routines, here. Friends-with-benefits is turning out to be something of a major time commitment, especially when-
“Minnie, I gotta be honest: public sex is off the table forever. You’re just gonna squirt everywhere and then we’re both gonna be royally fucked.”
There’s only one thing Minnie likes more than sex, and it’s spending money: that’s something you learn fast. Another thing is that she has more money than she knows what to do with, apparently - wild, considering she’s an unemployed college student, but you’ve seen her apartment; it’s not that much of a surprise. My family’s comfortable, she tells you once, humorous with an understatement. You know, they’re well-off.
They’re filthy rich, you’d interpreted, and the smile you got was all the confirmation you really needed.
It only leads to more routines, in the end: she takes you out shopping with her just to offer to buy you anything you pay even a modicum of attention to. She’s spoiled, but she loves to spoil. It’s cute and you won’t deny it.
“Forever?” Minnie’s got shopping bags lining her thin arms, and you’re carrying more for her - call that a built-in workout. She turns her eyes on you, wide and pleading. “Forever’s a long time.”
“Cut it out,” you say, and she bursts out laughing. “Jesus, I hate it when you do that.”
You’re lying and she knows it. “Do what?”
“You know what I mean. The thing with your eyes.”
Minnie bats her eyelashes, lets all the submissive sweetness fade from her expression. She knows what characters to play and when. “It’s not my fault you find me irresistible,” she says, and you laugh with her because she’s right.
Ah, it’s a problem with both of them, sort of: you might be doing this whole friends-with-benefits thing wrong. It’s too fun, being with them. It’s supposed to be all cool and casual, but it’s possible that you’re getting attached. One minute you’re fucking strangers and the next they’re both your friends.
It’s a bad idea, considering you know both Yuqi and Minnie are fucking around with more people than just you: there’s that thing Bona said about Yuqi bringing someone to the club, and then there’s the fact that Minnie’s always marked up - the telltale scratches of nail marks down her back, thighs; hickeys, bruises. A lot of them are from you, but there are also a good amount that aren’t.
“I’m fucking a demon,” Minnie sighs, when you ask her about it, and for once she’s not talking about you. “Takes up a lot of my time.” She presses her thumb into a particularly nasty hickey right at her inner thigh, smirks, says, “Believe me, it’s nothing that I wasn’t begging for.”
It should be a mistake, crossing lines - but you’re having a great time. You won’t look a gift horse in the mouth; you’re happy right where you are. You won’t complicate it. You’ll take them as long as they’ll have you.
(This is what you’re thinking about, so in hindsight, maybe it makes sense that you miss all the signs.)
-
It’s probably only a month and a half in, or a little longer. There’s this mutual obsession going on, with you and Yuqi, with you and Minnie - your phone’s always blowing up, you’re always, always busy. Your coworkers tease you for it and you couldn’t give less of a fuck. You’re moving fast and it’s exactly your speed.
i’m coming over, you text Minnie - you’d agreed to after both your classes had finished. It’s late afternoon, and yesterday you’d accidentally spent half the day playing some gory new horror release with Yuqi. Minnie’d left you rambly voicemails, like she’s in the habit of doing, and you’d responded in kind. You two are so often on the same wavelength, guessing at moves before they’re made.
So, so often - but not today. You’re about to knock on her front door, but then you realize it’s already unlocked.
“Minnie,” you call. You let yourself in; you’ve done it before. “You really need to stop leaving your door unlocked.” You shut it behind you, round the corner - “Seriously, babe,” you’re saying, making your way into the kitchen, “one of these days someone’s just gonna-”
You stop short.
Because Minnie’s here, but she’s got her eyes screwed shut, and she’s bent over the kitchen counter, moaning, writhing - a mess, hair a wreck like it’s been tugged at, a series of hickeys so raw on her collarbone they look like actual bite marks, like there might’ve been blood drawn - and she’s getting absolutely, completely railed from behind by-
“Yuqi?” you sputter.
Yuqi’s got her hand wrapped around Minnie’s neck, her fingers tight around the column of her throat - she’s so in it, and there’s that look on her face, that vicious way she fucks when she’s fucking you, all over her here, now - and then she looks up, and her dark eyes find yours.
“Oh, fuck,” she says, and pulls her strap-on right out of Minnie in one smooth, slick move.
You’re staring, jaw halfway to the floor. Yuqi’s so thrown she keeps blinking hard at you, like she has no idea what in God’s name you’re doing here right now; the feeling’s mutual, because nothing about this makes sense, not even a little bit - Yuqi and Minnie - Minnie and Yuqi, together-
“What the fuck,” pants Minnie - she hasn’t noticed you yet, somehow. She’s whining, distraught, clinging to the lip of the countertop for dear life. “What the fuck, Yuqi - put it back in.” She reaches blindly behind her, her perky tits bouncing, sweat beading along the curve of her back. “Yuqi, Yuqi-”
“Sweetheart,” says Yuqi, and clamps her hand down on Minnie’s shoulder with the sort of firm, authoritative familiarity that indicates she’s beyond used to leaving marks on Minnie’s body. You recognize it immediately - you do the same thing. “I’m not gonna put my strap-on back in your ass. My fuckbuddy’s here.”
Well, there’s a lot to unpack there - but first-
Your eyes zero in on Minnie’s freshly fucked asshole, just as Minnie turns her head and spots you standing there.
“Oh, fuck,” she echoes, lost for words, for breath. Then: “Wait - your fuckbuddy?”
You’re floored, you’re speechless, you can’t even reconcile it: this whole time the two of them have been occupying opposing corners of your mind, Yuqi hilarious and quick-witted with a bite, a brutality, Minnie with her hysterically funny laugh and her mile-a-minute way of speaking - in your head, they should never connect, they should never cross paths, they should never be here, with Yuqi bending Minnie over her kitchen counter and filling her ass with a strap-on-
“Let’s get some clothes on,” directs Yuqi, and it’s the first time she’s ever made a proposition like that in front of you. “Seems like we have a lot to work out.”
-
“Let me get this straight.”
You’re gathered on Minnie’s couch - Minnie’s in an oversized t-shirt, leaning on the side, consciously avoiding putting any weight on her ass. Yuqi’s got her hands spread out on Minnie’s coffee table like there’s a puzzle she’s putting together. “You first fucked Minnie at the party I invited you to-”
“You invited him?” Minnie asks, startled. “Well - I mean, thanks. I guess we never would have met if it wasn’t for you.” She shoots you a grin, impressively cheeky considering you just walked in on her getting her ass fucked; oh, that’s Minnie for you. When it comes to sex there’s no shame she feels, ever.
“Shut the fuck up,” says Yuqi, not unkindly. “No - what I’m saying-” She locks her gaze on you. “Is that you knew that I invited you to a party at Minnie’s apartment and you still didn’t realize she and I knew each other?”
“Oh,” you say - okay, that’s your bad. “I guess not. To be fair, you didn’t tell me whose apartment it was-”
“Yes, I did, you fucking dumbass. I even pointed at Miyeon, who was, like, a foot away from us-”
“Oh,” you say, again: well, you completely forgot about that part. “Sorry. That’s - yeah, that’s on me. I just remembered that you said it was one of your bandmates, so when I met Minnie, I obviously didn’t think-”
“Dude.” Yuqi has a hand pressed to her temple. “Minnie’s in my band.”
Your mouth falls open. “Really?”
So, it’s all unraveling pretty quickly: Minnie and Miyeon are roommates, which you probably could’ve put together if you’d mustered up an ounce of critical thinking, but - hey, you’ve been having incredible mind-blowing sex, lately; no one’s gonna blame you for that fogging up your brain. Minnie’s the flaky keyboardist that Yuqi complains about constantly, the one Miyeon was replacing the night they performed at Club Cosmic - it’s unraveling, but it’s all coming together. Minnie and Yuqi have been fucking since before you met either of them, apparently. It’s a whole thing, or at least that’s what they tell you. Lust at first sight, claims Minnie - clearly there's a story there, but they're not saying it yet.
“Maybe I’m stupid,” says Yuqi, staring from you to Minnie. “I knew Minnie was fucking someone else because she always had crazy bruises all over her every time I saw her, but she just told me she was having sex with a demon, so I just took that at face value, I guess.”
“She told me she was having sex with a demon,” you say, in disbelief, and Minnie dissolves into her obnoxious, infectious laughter.
“You’re both stupid,” Yuqi decides, pointing an accusatory nail between the two of you, fingers flicking fast. “You’re both morons who only get away with having fucking worms for brains-”
“Jesus,” you say, biting back a smile, because she’s at her best when she’s dishing out insults.
“-because you’re hot. That’s it.” Yuqi sighs, frustrated. “If you weren’t both so sexy you’d never get anywhere in life.”
“Thanks,” chirps Minnie - if there’s one thing she knows how to do, it’s take a compliment.
In the end, maybe it’s not so hard to understand: Minnie loves being bossed around, ordered and roughed up and fucked senseless. Yuqi’s just like you - it’s no wonder she’d love having Minnie like you love having her, whining and submissive, ready to get dragged through hell and back and beg for it. You've kept them separate; they've kept you separate. It's a comedy of errors you're not even sure qualifies as coincidence: you think of Minnie, the night you first met, saying fate with a grin like she knew something you didn't - maybe she's always had a point.
So, that’s where your conclusions land: “I think we can just keep doing what we’re doing,” says Yuqi, eventually, shrugging and rising to her feet. “I guess it shouldn’t really change anything. We can all just keep doing our own thing.” She says it like it doesn’t really faze her, and it’s Yuqi, so it probably doesn’t.
“Yeah,” you say, slowly, because it is happening to faze you - just not in the ways you’d expect. Minnie’s glancing between you and Yuqi like she’s trying to calculate all the combined marks you could leave on her; she’s thinking what you’re thinking, but she won’t say it out loud. “I guess so.”
“Sick,” says Yuqi, in that hilariously flippant way of hers, and Minnie laughs so hard she accidentally rolls onto her clearly sore ass. “Well, see you later.”
Minnie sobers up so quickly it’s almost comical. “Wait, what about-”
“Baby,” says Yuqi, and there’s the sin creeping into her voice, flames flickering in her irises. She loves having the last word, so she’ll take it. “If you wanna still get your ass fucked, ask your other fuckbuddy. I’m sure he’d be happy to take care of you.”
She smiles, too adorable for the filth coming out of her mouth, and leaves you and Minnie to it.
-
Well, she would, except-
“Oh, hey,” says Miyeon, slipping into the living room. “I just passed Yuqi on my way in.” Her gaze lands on you, and she grins. “I guess you guys finally figured it out, huh?”
“Are we dumb?” Minnie asks, genuinely.
“Yeah,” says Miyeon, sweetly, blinking her Bambi eyes at the two of you like every Disney princess personified. “Both of you are stupid as shit. Don’t worry - you’re both pretty enough to make up for it.”
She kisses the top of Minnie’s head as she passes, and that’s when you realize exactly how much Miyeon’s been fucking with you this whole time. These girls - and maybe both Yuqi and Miyeon are right, and there are dots you should’ve connected weeks back, days in.
Well, you’ll give yourself some leeway: you’re here now. Journeys, destinations, whatever the fucking cliché is - you’ll let everything slot right into place.
-
You all know where this is going, but it still takes a week and a half for it to happen, give or take.
Look, you’re all returning to form - you’ve taken out space in your schedule for both Yuqi and Minnie, but it’s still pointedly separate; you know they’re doing the same. You’re still fucking Yuqi in every single public place imaginable, and you’re still making your mark on Minnie like she belongs to you, even though she’s got someone else bruising her neck like she’s trying to leave a collar. There’s a power play there, somewhere, between you and Yuqi: who can ruin Minnie more, who can push her to her breaking points. It’s almost like foreplay. It dials up your sex with Yuqi to something intense, something with sky-high stakes; you fuck like you might be playing for keeps.
“Oh, hey,” says Yuqi, one day, trying to get a rise out of you. It’s a lost cause; she’s taken over for a video game you’re playing together, and her head’s on your shoulder. “Minnie just sent me a text.”
“What?” There’s another reason the rise is unsuccessful: “She just sent me a text. A video, actually.” A video, and then an accompanying message: for your eyes only <3.
“She sent me a video,” says Yuqi. “And she said it’s for my eyes only, so fuck off.”
You wordlessly tip your phone screen towards Yuqi, and that’s the final straw: Yuqi laughs until her shoulders shake and she’s hiding her face in your collarbone, her pink hair tickling your neck. “Shit,” she says, and you can hear her grin in her voice: something you’ve learned is that no matter how much Yuqi teases Minnie, she’s also a little bit obsessed with her, too. “Let’s see what our girl wants, then.”
“Our girl,” you mimic, loving it, and then you both press play.
-
It just so happens that the video’s of Minnie pounding her own pussy with a dildo until she squirts wildly, and every sound is amplified, obscene - her sopping wet pussy, her moans, squeals, screams-
Neither of you are laughing now. “It’s the same video,” Yuqi says, voice suddenly low, husky: it’s a telltale sign, sirens beginning to wail. She looks up at you and you catch that look in her eye, like she’s on the verge of something violent, murderous. “Isn’t it?”
“Yeah,” you say, throat dry - there’s nothing more you can say.
“Well,” says Yuqi, and lets her phone clatter to the coffee table. There’s a tilt to her expression that’d send bystanders running for cover, if they could see her now. “Let’s show her that we can make a little video of our own.”
-
There’s a group chat made just to send the video: you’re slipping, crossing the clear lines between the three of you. Oh, you’re past worrying about propriety - you’re sending a sex tape, sending Yuqi on her back and getting her pussy railed by your cock, the two of you fighting as much as you’re fucking - it’s brutal, and it’s hot.
“Fuck,” says Yuqi, when she watches it back, pulling her clothes on again, mesmerized by how hard you’re fucking her, by how merciless it is - like you could’ve actually hurt her and you wouldn’t have cared. You’re caught on the threats she’s biting out, just as enthralled. “We should film ourselves more often.”
“We should,” you agree - there are fantasies waiting to happen, erotica writing itself - and then you press send.
-
LMFAOOOO, Minnie texts back, once she sees it. the iphone quality…. HAHAHA
its even in portrait mode omfg im crying
wtf, you say; the quality looked great to you.
i’m gonna beat the shit out of you, says Yuqi, somewhat inappropriately. don’t pretend like it didn’t make you wet
oh it def did, Minnie replies. you guys are unbelievably hot when you fuck. im stupid horny im not denying that
im just saying….
if i ever make a sex tape im totally using one of my nice expensive cameras for it
i’m sure the 20 other people you’re regularly fucking would really appreciate that, says Yuqi.
:( says Minnie. dont slut shame me its mean
also you two are the only people im regularly fucking
just
for the record
Yuqi makes an odd, thoughtful sound, out loud, perched on the edge of her bed.
“You’re thinking about it,” you say, knowing.
“I’m not,” Yuqi says, but her bottom lip’s tucked between her teeth. “I keep my fuckbuddies very separate from each other. It’s transactional, or whatever.”
“Right,” you say, amused by her stubbornness. You’re a little too close for you two to convincingly be just strangers who’re hooking up, anymore. You’re too friendly, too comfortable with each other - that’s a hurdle you’ve already cleared. “Transactional. That’s why I’m sleeping over here tonight, right?”
“Shut the fuck up,” Yuqi grumbles - and that’s how you know she doesn’t really have to be convinced.
-
It’s inevitable, and you know it. It’s all that anticipation, stacking to skyscrapers. You’re over at Minnie’s place one day, and you’re drinking coffee at her kitchen counter, sharing some waffles Miyeon’s boyfriend made earlier - it’s all very domestic, kind of. Minnie’s studying you, carefully, her eyes startlingly green and watchful, like there’s a thread she’s tugging at and hard.
“What’s up?” you ask.
“I’ve been thinking,” begins Minnie.
“That’s new.”
“Shh,” says Minnie, mildly, tapping her nails across the table. “I’ve been thinking,” she continues, “that it’s actually fucking ridiculous that you and I and Yuqi haven’t had a threesome yet.”
“Oh,” you say - you’d be more shocked, but like you said, Minnie’s got no shame in regards to anything sexual; she likes what she likes and loudly. “I’ve been thinking that too. But Yuqi seems… you know. She’s really dragging this out.”
“I’ve noticed,” agrees Minnie; she sees how inevitable this all is, too. “It’s crazy. She loves fucking you and she loves fucking me. It’s, like, basic logic.”
She’s gorgeous, she’s scheming: you see Minnie lick her lips, like she’s picturing Yuqi’s touch all over her - you’re thinking of the possessive way Yuqi wrapped her hand around Minnie’s neck when she was fucking her, imagining the way she’d bitten at Minnie’s collarbone - Minnie’s the single most fuckable girl you’ve ever met, and there’s Yuqi who exerts power during sex like she’s taking out her grudges, like she’s wielding weapons - just the concept of it is enough to drive you nuts-
“We can set it up,” you say, and you think Minnie can see your train of thought all over your face. “You and me and her.”
There’s all this new territory to explore, maps to make and trails to mark. “We can,” says Minnie, tilting her head. There are oceans behind her eyes, seafoam and salt, wet and wild and fatal. “What’d you have in mind?”
-
You put your plan in motion a day later, because patience is a foreign concept when it comes to the three of you. “Call her,” you’re mumbling against Minnie’s mouth, her spine already curving to your fingertips. There’s an ambush happening, battle plans being drawn - you’re in Minnie’s living room, and you can’t keep your hands off of her. “Before we get too far.”
“I texted her before you got here,” Minnie says, and you can feel her grin at your lips. “She’ll be here soon. Go as far as you want.”
That’s a request with tempting parameters, so you’ll take it: a split second later and you’ve got Minnie pinned to the couch, her tiny waist in your hands, your teeth scraping across her neck. “I will,” you say, darkly, and you’re already in it. “I’ll do whatever I want with you.”
“Please,” begs Minnie - she’s rapidly losing composure, but she’s always this easy, this wanton and ready. “Please.”
You can’t deny a plea like that, so of course you get carried away: your fingers slip up the hem of her shirt, find her tits; she’s underneath you and then you’re switching to the top of her denim skirt, tugging at belt loops, finding the button and undoing it-
The front door slams.
That’s your cue. You fall into it practically pre-rehearsed: you and Minnie dramatically break apart, you tumbling off of her, her catching her balance on the arm of the couch. “Oh!” gasps Minnie, wiping her mouth, spilling her eyes wide - they’re dark and sweet and guileless, today; she’s playing her parts perfectly. “Yuqi - oh my god, sorry, I-”
Yuqi’s standing with her arms crossed, and maybe your efforts might’ve been in vain - you can tell by the look on her face that you’re already caught.
“You guys think you’re so fucking slick, huh?” she says.
Minnie rakes a hand through her hair, glances slyly over at you. “We’re not?”
“No.” Yuqi’s advancing, distinctly predatory - her eyes are stuck on Minnie’s unbuttoned skirt, on your hands against Minnie’s lithe frame, like you might be minutes from ripping her apart. “You’re stupid, and obvious. If you wanted to seduce me, there are better ways to do it.”
“You’re fucking both of us,” you point out. There’s that fire sparking in her eyes, and it’s already over: you know how she looks right before she gives in. “We don’t need to seduce you, Yuqi. You’re already obsessed with us.”
“Obsessed is a strong word,” says Yuqi, flatly.
She says it, but already her voice has gone gravelly, gained that razor-blade edge. She’s closer now, standing above the two of you sprawled on the couch: you see her fingertips drop, dig under the waistband of Minnie’s skirt, pressing into her hips. Minnie’s mouth has already fallen open, pupils blown - Yuqi’s barely done anything, and Minnie already looks like she’s seconds from begging to get on her knees-
“Bedroom,” Minnie says, climbing to a whine, rising on unsteady legs. Yuqi laughs; she clearly loves Minnie’s desperation just as much as you do. “Please. I have - there’s something - please.”
Yuqi cuts her eyes across at you, takes Minnie’s face in her hand. There’s something so intoxicating about the height difference between them, how Yuqi stands just a little shorter than Minnie and she’s somehow still got her in the palm of her hand, wrapped right around her finger, or several-
“Use your words, gorgeous,” purrs Yuqi, and the way she talks to Minnie makes your head spin, sends a lump to your throat: like she’s so sure of her hold over Minnie, her complete and utter control. You’ve imagined it so many times since you first caught them together - it’s another thing entirely to see it in action. “You got us both here, yeah? We’re right where you want us.”
She tugs on Minnie’s jaw - a demand, not a request - and then Minnie’s ducking her head to kiss her.
It’s instantly sloppy, filthy - they both love it messy and you know that from experience, in every way, every context - and Yuqi’s slipping her tongue into Minnie’s mouth like she’s she’s seconds from ravaging her, and there’s the telltale glint of teeth, raring to annihilate-
Minnie gasps suddenly, pulls away quick. Her hand flies up to her bottom lip. You catch the mix of pain and exhilaration all at once - it’s barely started, and there’s already been blood drawn.
“See?” Yuqi’s looking at you now, smirk pulling sharp like knifepoint. “Someone likes it when I bite.”
“You’re insane,” you say, but you’re standing, now, so caught up in it. You meet her match, blow for blow - Minnie just takes and takes and takes, loves it like she’d drop dead for it. Yuqi makes her bleed and you can see it all over Minnie’s face: she’s never been more turned on in her life, trapped between the two of you. “You’re the fucking devil.”
“Sure,” says Yuqi, and clips Minnie on the hip, knuckles blunt. “C’mon,” she orders. “Talk to us.”
“I have one of my cameras,” Minnie blurts out, thin and high and reedy. “In my room.”
“Oh,” says Yuqi, and raises an eyebrow at you. “That’s an idea.”
It certainly is: it’s one that’s got you straining against your jeans, dropping you right into animal instinct - Yuqi’s similarly riled up, pulling at your wrist, at Minnie’s waist. She’s waited long enough. She never goes far without getting exactly what she wants.
“Then let’s go,” she’s saying, and it’s not something up for debate; with Yuqi, it never is. “Let’s go.”
-
There’s the three of you and all that build-up, all the weeks in the making; Minnie’s already half out of her mind, sprawled on the bed like she knows you and Yuqi are about to fuck her within an inch of her life. There’s a strap-on on the nightstand. You’ve got a lightweight camera in your hands and it’s filming.
“Does this camera have, like, a microphone on it?” you ask, somewhat clueless.
Yuqi snorts, rolls her eyes - it alleviates the moment, but barely. “Don’t worry about it,” says Minnie, hands twitching, eyes flicking from you to Yuqi like she doesn’t know who to start begging for first.
“Nuh-uh,” Yuqi tuts, noticing - she’s so impressively attuned to Minnie’s every move, picking up on giveaways like it’s nothing. You recognize it: she’s the same with you, knowing right when to bite and snap and apply pressure. “You can be patient. You’re the one who was desperate enough to trick me into coming here.”
“No,” says Minnie, and points to you. “I promise you it was totally a team effort."
“Watch it,” you say, tamping down laughter - it’s really not the time.
“Yeah,” agrees Yuqi. “I fucking hate snitches.”
Minnie's infectious giggles fill the room, and you’re seconds away from joining her - but all of a sudden, Yuqi’s shoving Minnie’s shoulder, pushing her farther down the bed. “Like I was saying,” she says, and suddenly her fingers curl around your wrist, “you’re the desperate one here, Minnie. I think we’ll make you wait. Plus,” she adds, to you, and all of a sudden she’s facing you fully - the two of you are standing, and Yuqi’s back is to the footboard of Minnie’s bed, her eyes with a challenge. “She likes to watch.”
“I could’ve guessed that,” you say, and slip Minnie the camera. “She’s always struck me as the voyeuristic type.”
Yuqi’s lips are wickedly red, curled at a corner. “I’m shocked you know what that word means.”
“Okay,” you snap, and you’re in it now, finding your ground - your hand flies to Yuqi’s hair, wraps it around your fist and tugs. Yuqi lets out a sharp noise, somewhere halfway between a yelp and a moan; you hear her breathing start to pick up, the rise and fall of her chest. “I get that you don’t want to seem weak in front of your little pet here-” You jerk Yuqi’s head towards where Minnie’s curled up on the bed, jaw dropped, still and staring- “but that doesn’t mean you can take up an attitude with me, darling.” Your thumb snags at the side of her mouth, scrapes her chin. “So cool it.”
“It’s so fucking funny that you think I take orders from you.”
There’s a time to use words and then there’s a time for force, time to prove how much bigger than Yuqi you actually are - you let your hand drop from her hair and start to go for her face, find a way to manually shut her up - but she gets there first, digs her nails into your forearm and claws-
“Jesus fucking Christ,” you hiss, skin stinging - she’s pushing you farther than normal, she’s putting on a performance. Well, you won’t mind putting one on too.
In seconds you’ve got her twisted around, one elbow knocking against the footboard - and then your hand’s at her ass and you’re spanking, groping. She’s still got her shorts on, panties, but that doesn’t stop you in the slightest; Yuqi’s squirming underneath you, snapping out vulgarities-
“Get the fuck off me,” she snarls, and you won’t, and you hear Minnie’s uneven, stuttered inhalations from her spot on the bed. She’s probably never seen Yuqi like this - never seen her smacked around and helpless. You know firsthand how addicting it is - Yuqi, with her arrogance, being pushed and put in her place-
All of a sudden, Yuqi’s foot knocks right into your knee, hard, and that’s how she worms her way right out of your arms.
“Fuck me or leave me the fuck alone,” she warns, voice low, dangerous. Her tiny hands are going for your cock, unzipping your pants and dragging them down - you help her along, drunk on the ruthless look in her eye. “I’m not some dumb whore that’ll just let you shove her around. You know that.”
“I’ll give you that,” you acquiesce, and you’re peeling off her shorts, she’s slipping off her top - she’s not wearing a bra, and her tits bounce, nipples hardening in the air. “I’ve already got one dumb whore that’ll let me do whatever she wants to her.”
You turn, and you look right at Minnie.
She’s trembling, the camera in her hands and fixed on the two of you - she’s already such a mess, cheeks flushed and every intake of breath fleeting, unsteady - she hasn’t touched herself, not once. She’s being so good, waiting for orders. She’s fucked you and Yuqi long enough, by now - you two may rough up each other, but it’s nothing compared to what you’ll do to Minnie if she misbehaves. Her eyes are wide, saliva collecting at her mouth; she’s so ready to be fucked, owned, ruined.
Your gaze darts to the camera lens, and you smile.
“Baby,” you say, and there’s a go-ahead she’s been waiting for. “Get undressed.”
Minnie moves quick, frantic - she passes the camera from hand to hand, slips out of her skirt, her tank top - you’ve snuck your fingers into Yuqi’s panties, stroking her drooling pussy; so, looks like someone likes having an audience. You’re with her: you do too. Knowing you’re being filmed is nothing compared to the greedy way Minnie’s eyes follow you as you tug Yuqi’s panties down her thighs, let them drop to the floor. Your shirt’s come off in the interim. You hook one of your hands under Yuqi’s knee, push her leg up, zero in on her cunt, dripping wet-
“Minnie.” You snap your fingers at her. “Play with your pussy.” Your cockhead brushes against Yuqi’s slit, earns the whistle of air through Yuqi’s teeth. “I wanna see you squirt before either of us even touches you.”
You don’t even have to look at her to know if she obeys - oh, it’s Minnie, and she always will - and then you’re stuffing Yuqi’s pussy with your cock.
Yuqi chokes on her own moans, head tipping forward; you don’t even give her time to adjust to the stretch before you’re pounding her, thrusting your cock deep, deeper, the pressure of her cunt almost overbearing, overwhelming - she always matches your pace like it’s nothing, her eyes on yours, the intensity something euphoric in itself, watching her eyebrows knit and her breath trap itself in her throat-
Your hand’s back in her hair, keeping her stare locked on yours like a gunfight, watching her try to keep from completely losing it in front of you, or Minnie - it’s all that pride, like it’s the only thing keeping her standing. One of these days you’ll break it out of her, but you won’t deny it: it’s so fucking hot watching her try to keep from falling to a slutty, squealing mess.
“Oh, there you are,” you say, condescending - you’re never gonna pull back from a taunt. “What were you saying about not being a dumb whore?” You tug her face so close to yours that your noses brush. “Because it kind of seems like you’re just all talk now that you’ve got my cock in your dirty fucking cunt.”
“I don’t think I’m the one who’s all talk,” Yuqi bites back, words shot and shattering. She’s so small compared to you that when you bury your dick inside of her it wracks her whole body, makes her shiver: no matter what venom she spits at you, she can’t fight the physical. “You’re barely even fucking me, you limp-dick asshole - are you even trying?”
You laugh out loud - you know Yuqi’s really loving it when her insults get nonsensical, so obviously untrue it’s something straight out of a comedy routine. You thrust harder, dig your fingers underneath her thigh; Yuqi can talk shit all she wants, but you see the way her eyelids flutter, her lips parted in pleasure she’s trying her hardest to deny. It’s no use - she’s clenching, she’s soaking your cock.
“Here you go again.” You hook in your blunt nails to her pale skin, make her gasp with the sudden pain. “Trying to act all high and mighty in front of your little fucktoy.” Minnie whimpers from the bed - she’s got three fingers inside her own cunt, she’s being almost as aggressive as you are with Yuqi - you’re just waiting for her to drench the sheets. “You don’t want her to know that you’re just as much of a greedy little slut as she is, huh?”
“Please.” You pick up the pace - Yuqi cries out, tries to talk herself through the way your cock’s destroying her - it’s a very valiant effort. She’s so close, so fast - her body can’t hide that from you. “No - fuck - no one’s as much of a greedy slut as Minnie is.”
The degradation’s like a return to power, for her: that wild, sharp smile appears on Yuqi’s face, even now, sweating and slick and shuddering tight around your cock. She’s seconds from breaking and she’s still got that ego, slicing through it all. All those jokes about fucking the attitude right out of her - oh, you’ll never be able to truly do it. You fuck her like you want her dead, like you want to kill her - she looks you right in the eye like she’s saying you can’t, and anyone who tries better run.
You’ll do the next best thing, instead: you’ll make her fucking cum.
You drop her hair, slide your hand down to her throbbing clit. “Well,” you say, and match her smirk like you’re trading blows, “you’re sure giving her a run for her money.”
Yuqi opens her mouth - she’s got some poisonous reply ready, or she must - but then she’s rocked with an orgasm so intense that any trace of it melts straight off her tongue. That’s one thing, all on its own - but there’s Minnie, on the bed and taking instruction beautifully, squealing, squirting-
You’ll get to her, in a minute. You fuck Yuqi all the way through it, let her fall pliant, winded, on the verge of collapse - she’s white-knuckling one of your wrists, her collarbone shiny with sweat, and you’re still burying your cock deep in her cunt, overstimulating - you’ll get there, you will-
“Wait,” Yuqi manages, breathless, wavering, cutting her gaze over to Minnie. “Don’t cum inside me. Save it for-” It breaks off, comes back doubly punishing. “For this fucking cumslut.”
You both glance over at Minnie at the same time, at the soaked sheets, at the camera she’s gripping like a lifeline, trained on the two of you. Yuqi gets off your cock, sinks to the end of the bed, thighs damp and shaking - she’ll take her reprieves, her relief. You’ve still got a load to spill. You can handle Minnie all on your own.
Minnie’s wiped from her own orgasm, cum clinging to her fingers, but the moment you get close to her she’s already perking up: she knows what her place is, here. You drag your eyes pointedly from the squirt-stained sheets underneath her to her toned legs, her dripping cunt, her hips, waist, ribs, the hard points of her nipples - Minnie shifts under your scrutiny, like just you looking at her sets her aflame - and your hands find the column of her throat, then the fine line of her jaw. Minnie waits, completely willing, passive - she lets you touch whatever you want like you own her.
“Did you like that, sweetheart?” You brush your palm across Minnie’s sweaty forehead, thread your fingers through her hair. You can’t get over her eyes, when she’s like this, so turned on she’s going out of her mind - so dark and dazed and needy. “You liked seeing Yuqi get put in her place?”
“Shut the fuck up,” Yuqi retorts, still gripping the bedframe - as long as you’re in the moment, it doesn’t matter how hard you fuck her, how many times you make her cum: she’s always going to snap back.
You grin at Minnie, conspiratorial like you’re sharing a secret. “She’s cute when she’s angry, huh?”
You’re not expecting it, so it actually shocks you when Yuqi lurches forward to go for your neck, her fingers wrapping tight around your throat. Her eyes are glimmering, dangerous, some feral animal just waiting for the kill - you stare right on back, pulse pounding in your ears - she’s never sexier than when she’s like this, like she’s right on the brink of murder. She’s seconds from strangling you and you can’t resist her.
“Keep fucking talking,” says Yuqi, remarkably steady for someone who just came all over your cock, “and you’re never gonna fuck me again, you got that?”
That’s a threat she’ll never make good on, but she’s so criminally hot that you let her have it.
“Fine,” you say - you’ll throw up the white flags.
“Great,” says Yuqi, and then she dips to kiss you, loosening her grip, letting you go. “Give her hell.”
The camera trades hands out of necessity alone - Yuqi takes it, rests back against the bedframe - and yours find the flare of Minnie’s hips, thumbs pressed against the raise of her hipbones, against bruises you’ve left before and you’ll leave again. “Alright,” you murmur - Minnie’s blue nails are a flash against the sheets where she’s tangled her fingers in them. You’re canvassing her body, all that ground to cover. “I guess you deserve at least a little bit of a reward for being so patient.”
Then you deliver an open-handed slap against her waiting cunt.
Minnie screams - in the foreground, there’s Yuqi’s cruel, stunning laugh - and you’ll take it as a soundtrack, a lead-in - you smack her cunt again, harder - Minnie wails in pain, in consuming pleasure: that’s how it all starts, and you shove your cock deep inside her.
She’s so fucking wet - between the shrieks spilling from her lips, you can hear the sloppy sounds of her pussy as you’re pounding her, the noise obscene, sin audible like it’s made a home of her voice - and you’re so rough with Minnie that you swear you could rip her in two, or die trying. Oh, maybe you’re showing off - Yuqi’s with that camera, on the corner of the bed, her view picture-perfect-
Maybe - but part of it’s that fucking pussy, part of it’s the writhing, the squealing, part of it’s how Minnie’s begging for more, more, more-
“More?” This time, your hand finds her flawless face instead of her cunt, but the slap’s a lightning strike, just as loud. “Sounds like someone is getting a little spoiled. You do realize that you’re just a stupid fucking toy for Yuqi and I to use - you get that I don’t give a fuck about how you feel, because your slutty fucking pussy is just going to squirt the moment you get a cock inside you-”
Minnie does actually squirt, then, clear liquid spraying everywhere - there’s Yuqi’s laugh, again, so openly delighted-
“Yeah, you hear her laughing at you?” Another slap, and then you bring your attention to Minnie’s throat - you can never keep your hands away from it for long. “It’s because it’s so fucking funny how easy you are, Minnie - how you’re just a dumb, desperate fuckhole-”
Minnie’s eyes squeeze shut, and you feel how it rolls through her whole body, the sheer, stunning humiliation, how she eats it all up-
“And we’ve got it all on camera, baby.” That’s the thing that does it - it’s one thing to fuck her and it’s another thing to fuck with her head, and that’s everything else: the slapping, the choking, the way you talk to her like you couldn’t care less what happens to her - “You can’t go back now, sweetheart. Now we’ve got all this hard proof of just how fucking greedy you are to get fucked like a bitch - now everybody can see for themselves how much you love it.”
Minnie’s got tears rolling down her cheeks, now - you’re gonna cum, and you know it - but you can’t hold back from getting the words out of her.
“Minnie,” you say, expectant, sinister - you press down on her throat, and then you finally let go. “Tell the camera how much you love it.”
You can actually feel Yuqi getting closer, playing her role - she’s not even touching Minnie, and yet the smugness is coming off her in waves, and it’s that ego, that undisputed power, and it’s building up, and up, and up-
“I love it,” sobs Minnie, babbling to the point of incoherence, slurring, weightless - and you think you might’ve finally broken her. “I love it - fucking love it - I’m fucking useless, I’m just a hole for you to fuck and cum in - I don’t care if everybody knows, I want everybody to know, it’s what I deserve-”
“Damn right,” says Yuqi, and she’s right at your shoulder, camera lens doing slow circuits from Minnie’s pussy to her face - there’s her cunt stuffed full of your cock and wrecked, there’s her expression with every profane bit of pleasure written across it, like you might’ve taken a pen and scrawled fuckdoll on her forehead, branded her yours - oh, that’s an idea for a different day, and Yuqi’s eyes are a reckoning, her voice slicing like glass-
“That’s our filthy little fucktoy.” Yuqi’s nails are against your back, claws at your shoulder blades - each time you thrust in and out of Minnie, they scrape against you, stinging - and it’s doubling the senses, the feelings, pushing it all to the edge - “Just dying to get that pussy filled up with cum - he’s ruining your tight fucking cunt, huh? I’ll be surprised if you can even fucking feel anything after this, stupid fucking whore-”
Minnie cries out, shudders, squirts violently around your cock - Yuqi digs her nails into your spine, hard - you’re groaning out loud, cumming like you’ll never stop-
“Oh, you think it’s over?”
All of a sudden, the camera’s getting pushed into your hands, and Yuqi’s shoving you backwards - the moment you pull out, the load you spilled into Minnie’s cunt starts leaking out onto the already drenched sheets - and then Yuqi flips Minnie over, drags her ass to her crotch - and you don’t know what it happened, but Yuqi’s stepped into the strap-on, and she’s positioned the dildo right at Minnie’s leaking cunt, still full of your cum and dripping.
“What do you think?” You pose it like a casual question, conversational - your fingers slip through Minnie’s hair and tug, getting a pained yelp - you’re talking about her like she’s not even there, and she’s obsessed with it. “She hasn’t had enough?”
“I don’t know,” Yuqi says, and places the flat of her palm on the smooth line of Minnie’s back, smirk glittering, treacherous. “I think she can take a little more.”
Minnie’s so far gone, and it’s all over her face - she’s practically limp, eyes glassy - you think if you weren’t both holding her down she’d just float away, mindless, choking on her own overwhelming pleasure - she’s in heaven and hell all at once, and it must be fucking killing her-
“Are you okay with having my sloppy seconds?” you ask, but it’s less malicious than most things you say when you’re pushing Yuqi’s buttons. You’ve struck up an alliance, here. You’ve got a common goal, a girl as your collective property - for once, you’re on the exact same side.
Yuqi laughs like she knows it, the sound gorgeous, godless - in a second she’s kissing you, licking hot into your mouth. “This cunt’s always sloppy,” she says when she pulls back, callous, saliva stringing at your lips. Her hand settles on the curve of Minnie’s ass, smacks down hard like it’s her right. “I think I’ll make my peace with it.”
There’s smoke in the room, or there must be - Yuqi’s hubris is suffocating, cloying, the hottest thing you’ve ever seen - and she jerks her hips sharply, harshly, and buries the dildo deep inside Minnie.
“Oh my fucking god-”
Minnie’s gasping, incoherent; it’s dirty, it’s filthy - Yuqi fucking your cum deeper and deeper into Minnie’s pussy, slapping so hard at Minnie’s ass that you know it’ll turn red and bruise - and Minnie’s drooling, screaming, begging for it-
“You like it when it hurts, huh?” says Yuqi, the devil on her lips, and she’s so unforgiving with her, so careless - you see the way Minnie’s striking eyes roll back in her head and you know it’s the only way to ever properly fuck her. You could treat her nice, but it’d never make her this fucking wet. “You like being used like a worthless fucking cockslut? You like knowing the only thing you’re fucking good for is to be fucked and spanked and filled with cum?”
You’re rounding the bed, you’re at Minnie’s sloppy mouth - it’s a mouth made to be fucked and you’ll get your turn. “I think you should answer her, baby,” you tell her, first, tapping at her pouty bottom lip. “Yuqi doesn’t like being ignored.”
Minnie looks up at you, uncomprehending, and all that comes out is complete fucking nonsense, words without a sentence or sentiment to stick to - “Fuck,” she slurs, and you swear she’s losing more than her voice. “Fuck - cockslut - hurts - I love it, I love - fuck-”
“Sorry, darling,” you say to Yuqi, faking all your sympathies - and then you promptly shove your cock down Minnie’s throat. “I think we might’ve fucked the cognitive functioning out of her for the time being. Oh, fuck-”
See, like you said, you can handle Minnie on your own - but it’s so much more fun handling her with Yuqi.
The look on Yuqi’s face is carnal, devastating - Minnie’s got one cock in her mouth and another in her pussy, and you’re both so messy there’s barely any rhythm to it - and Yuqi latches onto the moment, takes advantage. There’s a thought here, one where the two of you are switching off, filling up the one hole you haven’t touched. Yuqi’s eyes slip down between Minnie’s ass cheeks, then back up to you - you’ll get there in the future, but Minnie’s sobbing, slobbering around your cock, and for now-
“Sure,” replies Yuqi, and cants her hips hard - it’s an image you can’t look away from, her pink hair wild and her thrusts deliberate - she looks like she was made to fuck Minnie like this, like she can do better things with a strap-on than anybody else would be able to do with their real dicks. She’s just got all this control, she’s unbelievable, she’s got the whole world in the palm of her hand, begging to bend to her will-
“But - personally - I think this slut’s always been completely fucking brainless,” Yuqi adds, smirk cutting and crooked - when she fights, she’ll fight dirty - and Minnie squirts for the final time.
You’re jerking your cock, dumping your cum into Minnie’s mouth. She barely swallows any of it, lets creamy white spill down her chin; Yuqi pulls out of her, and she collapses to the bed, entirely limp. Yuqi’s tumbling off to the side, pushing sweaty hair off her forehead, so visibly pleased with her handiwork - she’s fumbling with the strap-on, but you think if given the chance, she’s be tracing every line of Minnie’s body with delicate hands, fingertips trapping sweat and slick-
She gets the strap-on off, and you’ll let her get there - but first, you think she deserves one more orgasm.
“Yuqi,” you say.
Yuqi looks up at you, and for the first time all night she’s lost her guard, let it fall. “Yeah?”
In two seconds flat you’ve tugged her across the bed, and you’ve got your grip on her like there’s a point you’re proving. Three fingers in her cunt, your other hand rubbing furiously at her clit - the camera’s on an angle on the bedspread, and Yuqi’s cunt is wide open for you, already raw and pink and wrecked, already so close to the edge-
“Fucking cum for me,” you demand, and it’s one order she won’t mind following. “Fucking cum.”
There’s those throaty moans, spilling from her lips - there’s her pussy clamping down around your fingers-
She cums, and that’s the finale you’ve been waiting for.
When you slide your fingers out of her, there’s a lull, finally, a peace treaty signed and delivered. It’s not silent - there’s the panting, the loud pull of air into your lungs - but it’s something close, significant. You’re calling a ceasefire. You’re pulling the camera and you’re yelling cut.
Yuqi leans back against the bedframe, her hand finding your wrist; she draws your cum-drenched fingers to her lips, sucks her own orgasm off your fingers. It’s so hot, but you’re past that. Minnie’s not unconscious, but she’s almost there - she’s completely drained, mouth slack and salivating, her cunt and her throat so thoroughly used that she’s got cum spilling from both holes. The sheets are never going to recover from this - you already know that.
You don’t know how long it is before you speak, but then you do.
“Think about it,” you say. Yuqi glances at you - Minnie rolls over, and you’re still not sure if she remembers how to form words. “We could’ve been doing that the whole time.”
“We would’ve killed her,” points out Yuqi, lips tripping up at a corner, gesturing towards Minnie’s virtually lifeless frame.
Minnie’s smiles spreads, shows teeth - so, you’re both wrong: she’s more alive than she’s ever been. “Probably,” she agrees, woozy and wrecked. “But what a fucking way to go.”
-
“Jesus Christ.”
It’s a slow crawl back to clarity; Minnie’s still splayed across the cum-soaked sheets like she doesn’t have a damn care in the world. She’s grinning stupidly, gorgeously. You can’t take your eyes off of her. She says, “I wouldn’t mind making that a habit.”
Her voice is hoarse from screaming, shot and scratchy. You can’t take your eyes off of her - but then Yuqi’s laughing, unruly and intensely beautiful, and now you’re stuck on her like you’d never want to look away. These girls: they’ll be the fucking death of you.
You smooth a hand over Yuqi’s hair, kiss Minnie’s sweaty forehead. “You think we can all fit in your shower?”
“Bitch,” says Minnie, mildly delirious, on the verge of laughter. “I don’t think I can fucking move.”
“Well, she’s gone,” Yuqi says to you. She’s rubbing Minnie’s slender shoulders, expression suddenly soft, something sparking in her dark eyes that’s not nearly as destructive as it was five minutes ago. Her eyes shift to you, and the look doesn’t fade. “I’ll run a bath,” she says, quietly, as Minnie’s eyelids flicker closed. “There’s one in the bathroom down the hall. Can you-”
“Water?” you ask, picking up on it immediately - the ease of it’s just another new habit. “I’ll get you both some.”
“Thanks.” The camera’s on the nightstand, the video stopped: it’s something to revisit at a later date. You’re in an entirely different moment now, and it’s nothing any film will ever get to see - you think you can safely say you’re fine with that.
Yuqi sighs, runs her thumb down Minnie’s collarbone. She says, “I don’t know if you can get dehydrated from squirting too much, but I think Minnie probably made it happen.”
You burst out laughing - it’s so sudden, and so crass. Well, you see the situation you’re in: at least it fits. “You’re so stupid.”
“Minnie’s not the only one who got the cognitive functioning fucked out of her.” Yuqi makes sarcastic air quotes with her fingers - even now, she’ll find a way to tease you. “Cut me a break, dude.”
“Dude,” agrees Minnie, mumbling and barely awake. “Thanks for the sex. Best ever in my life. Ever. Forever. I’m going to sleep.”
“You do that,” you say, standing in the doorway, chest expanding, inexplicably endeared. “Dude.”
“Say dude again and I’ll break your kneecaps,” says Yuqi, and her smile matches Minnie’s exhausted one like it’s a scene straight out of a movie, pre-planned and perfect. “Come back soon or we’ll miss you.”
You’re laughing again as you tumble out the door - you’re only getting water, you’ll be back in two minutes, tops - but somehow, you think you get exactly what she means.
-
There’ll be more days, nights, videos - ruination caught on camera and put on replay. You kind of know, even though you never say it out loud: there’s a next time, here, there’s a future and there’s fantasies, a hundred different ways to fuck the two of them. You’ll fall apart, fall back together. It’ll never be just once. You’ll never be able to let this go.
“Yeah,” says Minnie, in the bath, smiling and sweetly contemplative. Yuqi’s stroking shampoo through her hair - you’re tipping water to her lips. “I’m fucked. I think I’m really fucked. Literally and metaphorically.”
“You know what a metaphor is?” Yuqi asks, feigning shock, and you lose it laughing. Minnie’s right: you’re all completely screwed, but you’re in way too deep now to ever go back.
(Oh, well. That’s the thing about a habit like this: it’d be just so terribly tedious to break - so you won't.)
"You've got us," you tell her, and you mean it. "I think you'll live."
-
<3
#kpop smut#kpop fanfic#idol x male reader#gidle smut#male reader#reader insert#yuqi smut#minnie smut#idol x reader#idol x idol
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Intro
Hey guys! This post is a bit different from what I usually write, but it’s something I’ve been thinking about a lot recently, and that I talk about with fellow fanfic writers. I’ve talked a little before about how self insert fanfic culture has changed over the years, and this post is just an attempt for me to (somewhat) compile and organize my thoughts.
This post (or informal essay) will be divided into two main sections: one on content creators and burnout, which goes into topics such as why writers leave and the difficulty of maintaining a writing blog, and one on what readers and authors owe each other, which delves into the relationships between authors and their audience, and everything that entails. As a disclaimer, all opinions are my own, and anyone is free to agree or disagree. I wouldn’t mind civil discussion on this topic, but I will ignore anything out of line.
Content Creators and Burnout
First up on the agenda: the term content creators. This isn’t a term specific to writers, as other creators such as artists have also fallen under this label. Content creators are people who produce content for fandom, and Merriam-Webster defines content as “the principle substance... offered by a website” (content has several definitions, but this one was what I found most relevant). Though there’s nothing inherently wrong with this definition, but it does have an impersonal connotation. There is power in words, and I think the shift to calling writers content creators reduces their art down to what they produce. It turns writing, a labor of love, creativity and passion, into simple content, something to be consumed. This correlates to a shift in general fandom culture of treating writing (and any art by extension) as something to be passively consumed, instead of interacted with. Of course, lurkers and shy fans have always been a part of any fandom, but it seems like interaction is far rarer than it was even ten years ago (the infamous reblog to like ratio changing to favor likes instead of reblogs being a prime example).
I have seen writers express discontent at how it feels like they’re putting writing into a void. There’s no comments, no replies, no asks; it’s disheartening not to receive any feedback on something you’ve worked hard on. Even if you know people enjoyed it enough to reblog it or leave a like, it doesn’t feel like it if you can’t see actual evidence or read any feedback. Another part of the issue is that reblogs are the only way to share fic; likes on tumblr, unlike on other social media, don’t really do anything other than serve as a bookmark at best. Writers write for their enjoyment, but they also write so their stories can be shared and enjoyed.
The shift to treating writing as “content” and the lack of engagement means that self insert fanfiction blogs have a short-shelf life. Most writers will only stay for as long as they’re interested in a media, and then stop when that interest dries up. Without that personal motivation, the lack of engagement feels even more disheartening. Additionally, most self-insert blogs are also request based, so they rely on people being interested enough to send in a request to thrive. However, this also lends to treating writing as “content,” because there will invariably be some who treat writers as machines, instead of people with their own inner worlds. Insert a request, and get a fic spit out a few business days later. This also demotivates writers, who feel like their work isn’t being enjoyed, but simply taken for granted. Writers will then burnout, and quit their blogs.
Another factor in this conversation is how self-insert fanfiction is self indulgent, and seen as “bottom of the barrel” because of this. It has a reputation for being cringy, in short, and is usually not as respected as other forms of writing. Though people who read self-insert fanfiction might not take this attitude themselves, this could affect how writers are treated regardless. I’ve often jokingly compared self-insert fanfiction to pulpy romance paperbacks: they’re both self-indulgent (and looked down on for being self-indulgent), consumed en mass, and never taken very seriously.
Of course, not all readers view writers as simple content machines, and there are always readers who leave nice comments and send asks. Silent readers are not the issue, either, because engagement isn’t something that can be forced. Readers will also lose interest in media, and fandoms will sometimes die for natural reasons. This not an attempt to pass judgement or blame, but simply an observation on general trends.
What Do Readers and Writers Owe Each Other?
So. Let’s say that you are an inspiring writer, and you start a blog. You receive a request, but it contains a subject matter you don’t feel comfortable writing with. What do you do?
This is a situation I see crop up often when people run request based blogs. Even if you have rules in place to stop this precise situation, there will always be people who either ignore or don’t read your rules. In most cases, people would just delete it and move on, or address it to ensure people do not do it again.
What allows these sorts of situations to happen, though? I believe part of it stems back to the prior section. If writers are seen as content machines, then they aren’t human; it doesn’t matter what you send them, because there isn’t a real person on the other side of the screen, with their own feelings.
I don’t believe requests that want to deal with sensitive subject matter are inherently bad; some writers are comfortable with writing that material, and everyone wants comfort from their favorite character when they’re in a tough situation. I do believe, however, that there should also be care taken to ensure you aren’t overstepping any boundaries with the writer. Perhaps the writer has experience with that particular subject that makes them unable to write about it, feel unequipped to write it, or they simply want to avoid it. Whatever the case, different writers will have different standards and expectations.
I’ve also seen another phenomenon where someone will send the same request to multiple different blogs. Some writers are fine with this, but some are not; for those who are uncomfortable, it feels like another instance of being viewed as a machine. Someone wants a particular idea written, and doesn’t care who writes it. It makes for an awkward situation when you work on a request and realize that a different writer has already posted their version of it.
It’s easy for the relationship between a writer and reader to feel one-sided. A writer doesn’t know who reads their posts, or how many people do, or how others will react to it. A reader can’t truly get to know a writer based solely on what the writer selectively post and reveal about themself on their blog. A reader might know about a writer, but the writer does not know them.
However, I believe that readers are just as important to writers when it comes to fandom community. If you write something, what would you do if there was no one to read it? An audience is vital to the maintenance of community, and writing blogs and fics wouldn’t grow without people to support and read their works. Though there will always be uncomfortable situations or overstepped boundaries, I don’t think it’s true that readers and writers don’t owe each other anything, or that it’s a wholly one-sided relationship. Writers write, and readers read. Readers provide feedback, whether through a comment or ask or message, and writers will be encouraged by their words to write more.
(Of course, if someone is making you uncomfortable or breaking your boundaries, you have every right to take whatever action you deem necessary to prevent this. Readers and writers owe each other basic respect and courtesy, like you would give to any fellow human. You don’t owe anything to anyone who breaks this courtesy).
It was more common in the past for writers to respond to a reader’s comments (and it doesn’t help that tumblr’s system makes it difficult to respond to tags and replies), though some writers still continue to do this. There’s something to be said about how readers will read a piece of writing without responding, and writers might read feedback without engaging in return.
Are these inherently terrible behaviors? I don’t believe so, but it does contribute to the current culture where writing sometimes feels less like a community, and more like an individual pursuit.
Conclusion
Too long of a post for you to read? Skimmed through it? In short, what I’m discussing in this post is this:
(1) how writers are being reduced to the content they produce, and being treated like writing machines. This, as well as the lack of engagement, can cause people to burnout from maintaining blogs and leave,
and
(2) readers and writers owe each other basic respect, and readers are a vital part of any fandom community, even if the writer-reader relationship can feel one-sided at times.
I don’t think any of the situations I bring up have easy answers. If there were easy answers, I wouldn’t be holding a discussion on this in the first place. But I do think it’s necessary to think about them and how we approach each other as writers, readers, and fellow human beings.
#liya chats#THANKS FOR READING if you made it all the way through!!#if anyone has their own opinion on the matter please feel free to share#as a very longtime self insert fic writing#I think about these matters... so much...#I have seen a lot over my tumblr writing career lol
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Today I was looking for NSFW/sexy fanart in one of my fandoms on AO3 and I stumbled upon the works of an artist I think has some seriously AMAZING skills. And guess what? They've done a few incestuous works, too! They may not be for my ships, but I really think at least some people on here will appreciate them.
Bellamy/Octavia (The 100):
https://archiveofourown.org/works/21974173
https://archiveofourown.org/works/20324254
Anthony/Daphne (Bridgerton):
https://archiveofourown.org/works/29799846 (TW: caning)
https://archiveofourown.org/works/29427276
Cordelia/Goneril/Regan (King Lear):
https://archiveofourown.org/works/21030050 (TW: whipping)
Btw, if any of you like what you see at those links and feel like it, do show some appreciation to the artist! I know finding the right words to comment isn't always easy and sometimes you just don't have enough time or mental energy for it (honestly, I understand that too well!) but imo it's always good to leave even just kudos on the works of someone writing or drawing for a rarer ship is always good if you can. <33
Thanks for sharing these, Anon! Some great art to look at and a great artist to follow.
#asks#anonymous#fanart#the 100#bellamy and octavia#bellamy and octavia: fanart#bridgerton#anthony and daphne#king lear#r: brosis#r: sisters#noiv#nr
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The Chalamet Effect: Timothée Talks Fate, Fashion And Being An Old Soul
At 26, Timothée Chalamet is already a consummate, cool-as-they-come movie star. As he gets set to become the actor of his generation, Giles Hattersley goes in search of the real boy wonder. Photographs by Steven Meisel. Styling by Edward Enninful.
BY GILES HATTERSLEY
15 September 2022
He arrives, a princeling in jeans and a rock-metal T-shirt, bounding sprite-like from one of those blacked-out Cadillac tanks preferred by the famous (reluctant or otherwise). It’s June in New York and Timothée Chalamet’s hometown is gently sweltering. But, for once, the paps are nowhere to be seen and so his body language is a joy to behold, as he bounces into Champs, a vegan diner in Brooklyn, somehow channelling both a street-style star and Buster Keaton.
We’re shooting a Vogue video. He enters with curls un-frizzed, a smile that reaches all the way to his eyes and a head to shoulder ratio rarely glimpsed outside of children’s drawings. In a swift half-decade, this publicity-averse, sensitive, ambitious, inscrutable dreamer has become both art-house stalwart (Call Me by Your Name) and box-office king (Dune). Then something odder (certainly rarer) occurred. A baton was placed in his hand, passed down the decades by dint of James Dean and River Phoenix, David Cassidy and Leonardo DiCaprio: Chalamet became boyfriend to an entire generation. In fact, it was DiCaprio (in a moment of near-literal baton passing when they first met in 2018) who bequeathed Timmy his career rule: “No hard drugs and no superhero movies.” So far, so good. Give or take. Oh, to be 26 and Hollywood’s most wanted.
Timothée wears vintage T-shirt, Contemporary Wardrobe. Leather trousers, Balmain. Steven Meisel
And wow do they want him. “I…” he says, laughing, unsure what to do with that information. It should be noted that Chalamet’s default setting is uncertainty. Thoughtful, courteous, smart? Absolutely. Able to articulate a definite opinion about anything? Absolutely not. Never mind. The charm is very real: “We met before,” he says, recalling some 3am dance floor-adjacent small talk we had a few years ago. Far from the navel-gazing “f**k boy” the internet occasionally likes to paint him as, he’s checked my Instagram and read some past interviews. Immediately he wants to talk about Lady Gaga, who he doesn’t know but finds “fascinating!” He is a rare interviewee – albeit a classic deflector – in that he much prefers to ask the questions: “Where are you staying?” “What did you think of [the London production of] Cabaret?” “How are you feeling?” Of course, once the recorder is running, the fidgeting begins in earnest. “But for Luca, anything,” he says of Luca Guadagnino, auteur supreme, in whose Bones & All Chalamet stars this autumn as cannibal drifter Lee. Part road movie, part addiction allegory, he plays opposite Taylor Russell on a bloodied, nomadic flee through America. It is a performance so pristinely heartbreaking, so tenderly horrific, so violent and vulnerable, it feels – as his work so often does – like he’s carved out a new genre of man.
Call it the Timothée effect. It’s everywhere, bewitching fans, directors, fellow actors, fashion houses and now British Vogue, for whom the half-French, half-American, fourth-generation New Yorker becomes the first man to appear solo on the print cover. We meet again the following day in SoHo. He keeps a rental apartment in the city, and his parents only live uptown, but he prefers staying in hotels, so we head up to the pool deck of The Dominick, his current bolthole, where the hostess leads us to some lounge chairs, her eyes bugging silently at the celebrity angel who has touched down to earth in the middle of her shift.
Eyes bug a lot with Timmy. In return, you occasionally spot a flash of kindly exhaustion in his. His manners are almost comically superb and an antenna attuned to the energy of absolutely everyone around him at all times is a terrific resource for an actor – enervating for a human, though. “I hate talking about this kind of stuff, but like the pressure of, you know, being in the public eye, whatever the f**k that means,” he says, annoyed by the concept even. He finds the world too desperate for answers to questions he doesn’t have answers for. “It’s always like, ‘Who are you?’ ‘Do you know who you are?’” It’s possible he does not. To be honest, after a while in his company you start to wonder if you know who you are either. His small talk has this habit of pulling at the fabric of time and space. “You’re the captain of your fate,” he says excitedly at one point. “Master of your fate and captain of your soul. Like those things where you can, like, draw with both knobs.” An Etch A Sketch? “Exactly. You shake it up and then it’s all gone. You can’t just keep building on the same Etch A Sketch.”
This analogy ends up haunting me for days. Not that there aren’t flashes of more earthly self-reflection: “I had a delusional dream in my early teenage years to have, in my late teenage years, an acting career,” he says. “And in my late teenage years, working on Homeland and starting to do theatre in New York, I felt like I reduced my goal to something more realistic, which was to work in theatre and hopefully make enough money doing either a TV show or something I could sustain myself [with]. And then it felt like every dream came true, exponentially. And then life is moving at six million miles per hour.”
Leather waistcoat and leather trousers, Gucci. Cotton vest, Intimissimi. Leather boots, Miu Miu. Bandana, Rockins. Steven Meisel
“When Covid hit, it required me to take a step back and be humbled to the idea that the greatest rock star…” panic suddenly crinkles his features. “No, I don’t want to use that word, sorry, sorry. Scratch rock star. But [everyone has to] deal with, like, taxes and the dentist and real adulting, you know? I should have been trying to get my adult feet under myself a little bit earlier than I did,” he says. “I found myself having to really, you know, be honest with myself that where I’ve been able to get myself to in life was balls to the wall, like throwing everything at [it] at a young age that, by some miracle, got me to where I am. But to then transition to an adulting mindset…” Taxes and the dentist? He laughs. “I’ve always paid my taxes, I always went to the dentist, but I’m suddenly very aware of that.” It’s classic quarter-life stuff, lived at hyper-speed. “So the ways I feel older than 26 I have always felt,” he says, relaxing. “It’s not like I feel like I’ve had some mental breakthrough that has given me perspective. The perspective that feels ‘old man’, I feel like I was born with it.” Such as? “The empath thing, the thinking for everyone in the room, the sort of misplaced idea, this sort of illusion, of control based on trying to feel for everyone.” In Bones & All, reunited with Guadagnino, who directed him to an Oscar nomination for Call Me by Your Name, he wove elements of himself into the character. “With Lee, the illusion of control is based on feeling for no one and not even interacting with anyone.” That Lee’s affliction is cannibalism, not being very famous, perhaps gives some insight into the extreme head-f**k of the latter. “And I guess that’s where I’m at.”
Does the institutionalisation of a film set suit you? “Yeah. But then no, because I want experiences to be unique.” He likes the immediacy, the rough and readiness, of some social media, he says. “There’s a benefit to the TikTok generation that I feel like I’m a part of too: selfies and stuff, and the comfort with the camera.” Are you talking about the two selfies you post a year, I tease? “Oh, man,” he says, chuckling. “You know, you know.” He is of his generation and yet no two-dimensional exemplar. Confessional Instagram Live rambler Timothée is not. Manifestly shy, self-conscious, perhaps a little scared of what people think of him, he does not find a balm for his issues in forging digital intimacy with millions of followers. To be honest, he doesn’t really like to talk about what he had for breakfast.
Or, heaven forbid, his romantic life. Do you ever imagine yourself as a father one day? As a husband? There follows an almighty pause. “You know what, I’m going to get back to you on that.”
Mostly his love life has been revealed in the grainy pixels of paparazzi long lenses. The twin pillars of young celebrity – dating and deals – have not been cashed in on. Is it true he’s never shot a fashion campaign? “Yeah, I haven’t done any.” Surely you’ve been offered everything? He blinks, politely. “When [success] came my way, I felt very particular that I didn’t want people and I really didn’t want to see myself cashing in,” he says. He adores fashion, is close friends with several designers and has worn floral Alexander McQueen and glittering Louis Vuitton on red carpets to internet-breaking effect. Even today, in perfect denim shorts, a simple tee and a smattering of jewellery, he looks spot on. As for his feelings on being British Vogue’s first solo man cover star? “The nature of the world now, you know... It felt right to not make it too statement-y,” he says. He didn’t want to overthink it or overstep. He just wanted to play some characters, to live the fashion. He loved the shooting process, loved incorporating womenswear into the styling and likens working with Steven Meisel to Denis Villeneuve.
Archive chain-mail top, Stella McCartney. Pearl and palladium-plated necklace, Justine Clenquet. Leather and silver stud bracelet, Chrome Hearts. Steven Meisel
For much of the past year, he’s been living in London, filming the upcoming movie musical Wonka, an origin tale of the early life of the Roald Dahl anti-hero. Directed by Paul King, of Paddington fame (be still my beating heart), he leads a cast of Brits including Olivia Colman, Paterson Joseph and Rowan Atkinson. When a first glimpse of him in costume surfaced online – in crimson velvet, smouldering under a top hat – the internet lost its mind. “In this one, Wonka f**ks” read one memorable tweet. Chalamet starts cracking up. “You know what’s really funny about that is it’s so misleading. This movie is so sincere, it’s so joyous.” How many musical numbers do you have? “Seven!” Making it provided a perfect situation for him: escape. “I hate to say it, but the dream as an artist is to throw whatever the f**k you want at the wall, you know? And I guess what I’m realising is that one’s personal life, one’s adult life, can be quite boring and the artist’s life can still be extraordinary.”
With that he pulls his cap down and puts his defences up, ready to weave through the busying bar area and up to his room. In a few weeks he’ll travel to Budapest to film the second instalment of Dune, then to Venice to launch Bones & All, and then ever onwards, up and up and up. But he worries a key point has been missed. “I’m grateful,” he says. He gives me a hug and asks me to be kind. A man caught in the stasis of life’s first quarter, always looking for the answers.
The October 2022 issue of British Vogue is on newsstands on Tuesday 20 September.
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A Last Journey to Lorien~
Or, A Dream Comes True Again.
In October 2019 I wrote a short blog entry about a course of events that I could owe to a book I pulled from a box in eleven years earlier.
The Ape Who Guards the Balance by Elizabeth Peters set the trajectory of my life on that otherwise unremarkable day, and the knowledge that I simply skipped home none the wiser of how deeply it and its author would affect my life still gives me goosebumps.
I have looked back at that moment countless, and at all the moments that stemmed from it, with elated and sometimes stupefied astonishment. Moments that include choosing to attend Hood College because I read MPM lived in Frederick and had an honorary degree from that institution, pursuing my budding interest in archaeology/art history and Egyptology, and even traveling to Egypt.
After graduating college, I discovered and helped cultivate the most amazing community of fans on Twitter, and through that channel TeamRamses and Beth Mertz, MPM’s daughter. The two of them have been such joys to get to know and talk to on social media, the main forum for the MPM fans I know. It’s not often I run across people who know the books in real life, so being able to talk to fans from around the world online is important to me.
Funnily enough, it is rarer for me to find casual fans of MPM’s work than it is for me to find people who actually knew her.
In 2017 with the launch of The Painted Queen, I met the owner of Wonder Book, Chuck, who had been dear friends with MPM, as well as Ray and Jay, Egyptologists who not only knew MPM, but also purchased and moved into her Frederick home a few years after her death.
Eventually I would come to work at Wonder Book, and in that fateful October of 2019, I was invited to see the house and gardens, MPM’s Lorien.
One might suppose with that jewel in my proverbial crown, that this would be the end of a superbly lovely and incredible tale.
Oh, Dear Reader, it was not the end.
At the end of April of this year, I had the privilege to attend Malice Domestic—an annual conference of mystery writers and readers. TeamRamses and myself were kindly invited by Beth to be a part of the fun in honoring her mother, and while I was only able to be there for that Saturday’s events, I had the most wonderful time.
I brought along my mother and one of my best friends—my roommate from college actually, so you could say I kind of owe MPM even more for the push that had me attending Hood—and we had a blast listening to the panels and walking the book room. You all likely know how hard it was for me to not snatch up a million books to buy in that room…
And then it was time for the panel. And here is where I met TeamRamses for the first time in person. There is something so special about meeting someone who loves a book series and author just as much as you do, even if online, and then to finally be able to hug and talk face to face. And TeamRamses is so easy to talk to, and so insightful about books and fandom. Chatting with her on the balcony outside later in the evening while we waited for the banquet was delightful. We talked books and television, and brought up all of our favorite topic: Who is your dream Amelia Peabody cast? Maybe we can run a panel on that someday. Or better yet, a panel about a show itself! Wishful thinking, I know.
The authors gathered on the panel for MPM discussed her amazing characters and her lasting influence over their own works. As soon as Gigi Pandian opened the discussion on Amelia, with an introduction along the lines of, “Peters’ most famous and beloved heroine” I felt a suspicious tingling in my eyes. As Amelia might say, just a bit of dust, nothing more!
But truthfully, I felt briefly overwhelmed. It’s been nearly 10 years since MPM’s passing, but being in a roomful of people celebrating her and thinking of Amelia and seeing her so vividly in my mind as I have for 15 years, sort squeezed the breath from me for a second. All of this culminated when we all realized that Barbara Rosenblatt, the voice of Amelia, was in the crowd and graciously answered a fan’s question, and illuminated us all on MPM’s more mischievous side.
When it was time for the banquet later that evening, I was seated at the same table as Gigi Pandian and some of MPM’s old friends; her veterinarian and her husband and son. It definitely still hits me in hindsight, how incredibly lucky I was to have gotten that seat. To be able to talk to an author so influenced by MPM. To hear first-hand accounts from the friends that knew her so well, including a riveting tale involving a treed raccoon and some rather presumptuous hunters. I have added each little detail I’ve picked up from her friends to my ever-increasing regard for the woman. In hearing these stories, I know I am beyond fortunate.
At the next table, Beth and TeamRamses sat with Beth’s family and Chuck. Barbara Rosenblatt was also in their set, and when I turned suddenly to find Chuck standing with her at my side…Reader, you should have seen how wide my eyes got. I could feel them become starry saucers. I shook her hand and thanked her—in my mind for all of the beautiful narration she has done for the Amelia books and beyond—though in reality it probably looked like I was just thanking her for standing next to me. Let’s be honest, I kind of was. Chalk one up for me being completely calm and smooth, certainly. If you ever read this, Barbara, I promise I’m more eloquent when I’m not star-struck!
Unfortunately, I was unable to stay for the entire award ceremony that night, but I took with me so much from that dinner and the people I shared it with. To them I also wish to say, “Thank you.”
The drive home gave me time to reflect. What a wonderful day. What a wonderful gathering of people. What a wonderful woman MPM had been. I turned to my friend, not for the first time that day mind you, and asked, “So when are you gonna read Amelia?”
On the following Sunday I was invited, along with my mother and TeamRamses, to visit Lorien again once more before Ray and Jay move.
Now, as I said before, I’d been to Lorien once, in the fall of 2019. But coming around that corner and seeing the house on that little rise again…
At this rate, I feel most everyone has seen photos of the house and gardens. I don’t know if I could paint that same scene with words that can’t be gleaned from those images. If you have not seen the photos, you can likely Google the real-estate listing, or find it on the Facebook fan page: Another Shirt Ruined. I recommend it; they’re a feast for the eyes.
Nothing I say could do it justice, but there are a few things that can’t be extricated from photos, and I’ll do my best to explain here.
Once the visual beauty and appeal of the home has settled around you the next thing you notice is the scent. In fact, you may notice it as soon as you enter the solarium, but the architecture and bright glass walls of the room dazzle, where the smell calms. It permeates the air until you can’t help but pay attention, until it ensconces itself in your memory. Weeks later and I can still recall it; I think I always will be able to.
I’m not exactly sure what it was entirely. Lavender, undoubtedly, as Jay had it hanging in the kitchen, but also the earthy smells of the garden and trees outside. And perhaps, the stone itself imparted a lingering trace of aroma. The overall effect was dreamy and sweet and I could only imagine many a quiet, rainy day in that room, sipping coffee and dozing while the rain ran down the windows and accentuated the smell of the air.
The next thing you notice is the love.
It’s in the very bones of that house. It’s in MPM’s desk and chair that were still in situ. It’s in the bookshelves and artwork and posters that were still hanging in the rooms and up the stair case. It’s in the custom Egyptian murals of the bathroom and the tiles on the kitchen floor and backsplash. And of course, it’s in the gardens; where beloved pets were buried and where so much time and care was given to creating a paradise. It’s in the stories I heard about gatherings and exploits her friends and family recalled.
And that’s where the love was most. In the people that gathered at the open house that day.
As we all walked the rooms of the home, listening to Beth and asking questions, I know we all fell into pockets of personal reverie. Where we could just imagine the life of the woman who’d lived there, who’d filled each room with her blazing personality. It felt like that I had actually met her before, in a sense. And it felt like I could turn a corner and find her there, petting a cat or tending a plant, or writing away at her desk.
After a tour of the house, TeamRamses, my mother, and I took a turn through the garden, ruminating on all the reasons why it would be so easy to never leave the property. It’s simply idyllic, even in the misty weather of that day.
And love was to be found lastly in the performance given by Barbara Rosenblatt.
As a delightful treat for all of us, before she had to drive back up to NYC, Barbara read an except from The Curse of the Pharaohs, the second book in the Amelia Peabody series. Fans will know the scene well—where Amelia and Emerson return to Evelyn’s to collect their progeny…little baby Walter Peabody Emerson.
Ramses, to those of us who know him best.
It was surreal to stand there in MPM’s home and listen to Barbara read. I’m still in a daze thinking about it. A little teary, too. I never gave audio books the time of day until I thought to try the Amelia recordings as a reread method. And to hear her voice come alive in the home where so many of the stories were written? To hear Emerson bellow and Evelyn laugh, to hear baby Ramses proclaim in somber, serious tones, “it is a femuw. A femuw of a winocowus…”
I have said before that somewhere in my mind and heart, I am always in the desert of Amarna with Amelia and Emerson. The first book in the series is my favorite for so many reasons, least of which is the nostalgia and peace it brings me. My original copy is well loved, and I know pieces of it by heart. Part of me is sitting with them at the fire, looking at the stars and listening to the jackals, chiding Walter and Evelyn’s young love, and scoffing at Lucas. Part of me is always snickering at the feelings brewing between Amelia and Emerson, even as he sets his own pocket on fire and she bosses him around.
In the same vein, I know part of me will always be standing in that solarium with MPM’s nearest and dearest, listening to Barbara read. The smell of lavender, rain, and stone in the air, the sound of all our laughter, and the sense of MPM just out of eyeshot, chuckling with us all.
I write my own story, from time to time. I’m not very disciplined with it, at least, not as much as I used to be. I have varying feelings about it, and I don’t imagine it will ever be much more than a tale of my own whimsy. But I do feel like every time I add even a little bit to it, that I’m adding to a love letter to MPM. And I do think I could add endlessly to a love letter to MPM. Writing my story, reading her books, talking to fans and friends on Twitter—it’s my way of saying thank you, thank you, thank you a million times over to an author I owe so much to.
So does the story end with the last visit to Lorien, the last glimpse into the sanctuary of a woman I can only wish to have met? Maybe. But so many things have happened these last 15 years that can find threads trailing back to my decision to read that book.
I can’t wait to see where she leads me next.
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X-Men: The Next Mutation (Revised)
I'm sure some of you reading know by now, almost a year ago, as one of my earliest posts on this site, I shared an idea I had for an new cartoon based around the X-Men titled "X-Men: The Next Mutation"
And people really seemed to like it.
But looking back at it, while I don't think its bad by any means, I do feel like I could've gone into more detail on a few things.
So in honor of the recent release of the long-anticipated X-Men '97, I've decided to revised the concept and make it a little more fleshed-out.
So without further ado, let's get started!
A lot of my previous points from my original post still stand, but just to recap....
This series would essentially be a spiritual successor to Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
Just like that series, it feature will an all-new take on the X-Men. Though they wouldn’t nearly as drastically changed. Along with that, the series will make the X-Men more powerful than most of their other iterations through Secondary and Tertiary mutations.
In the comics, from what I’ve read, additional Mutations are rather rare, only happening to few mutants.
Essentially this series will be expanding on the concept of Secondary Mutations, as in this universe, they’re far more common among mutants, with about 90% of the population often experiencing them during early adulthood.
Tertiary Mutations, however, are a lot rarer, with only some mutants experiencing them in their lives.
Though on this case on Mutations, they would be categorized and labeled in a similar fashion to the Quirks from My Hero Academia.
The animation for this series would be done by Flying Bark Studios, the same studio that not only did the animation for Rise, but also other shows like Glitch Techs and Monkie Kid.
And I mean….you seriously wouldn’t want a Marvel cartoon with animation like this?!
youtube
I can already feel the whiplash people would have after seeing something like this (and X-Men '97) after having spent a decade with Marvel cartoons with stiff and cheap animation.
As for the art-style, in contrast to the more realistic (and obviously MCU adjacent) style that Marvel’s previous cartoons had used during most of the 2010s, X-Men will have a far more stylized and exaggerated.
Originally, I choose ArtFrenzyBoris as the one do the art-style for this show.
But after thinking about it, I feel like fellow Deviantart artist Garth2The2ndPower would be a perfect choice as well.
Her art-style just screams that it would translate well to animation.
The best way I could describe her style is like a perfect fusion between Japanese anime and Western cartoons.
Its look is quite reminiscent of anime, but you can clearly tell hat it was made in the West.
Plus, it looks like it came straight out of an action cartoon from the mid-to-late 2000s/early 2010s.
Another awesome thing about her style is just how incredibly expressive it. I love when animated characters are allowed to actually feel, well, animated.
It just makes them feel more alive in my opinion.
And given the animation studio Garth would be working it, that’s a must.
Anyway, here’s just some of the art she's done….
Similar to Rise of the TMNT, the series will sport a more comedic, light-hearted tone than its previous iterations and be more episodic with some story arcs sprinkled about. I know some people are gonna have a problem with the first detail thanks to one particular show that I’m not gonna mention making people think that anything remotely comedic involving long-existing superheroes is automatically bad. But similar to Rise, despite being more light-hearted and comedy focused, it won’t shy away from dramatic or emotional moments. As for the latter, that won’t be problem since the 90s show and X-Men Evolution did the same thing as well.
Also, might be a bit controversial, but the way mutants are viewed in this universe is a bit more neutral than most iterations. While some of humanity still hates and fears them, others are actually fine and even like them. I’ve always liked it when the X-Men actually had human supporters (or at least humans who actually appreciate what they do), which most adaptations almost never really explore.
The series will also feature various romantic relationships. Some iconic, some rare, some that were set up but never explored, some popular with the fans, and even some that have never really been considered. Also, there will be no relationship drama (or at least drama that isn’t melodramatic or shit). Yes…that does mean you-know-what will be not featured in the series in any kind of way…..and I think we will all be better off for it.
As for the X-Men themselves, the roster is a little smaller than I initially shared for the first post.
And unlike the first post, I'll actually be diving into their characters apart from their powers.
But before I do that, I do want to bring up this cool detail.
The X-Men in this series (at first), will be wearing team uniforms similar to their teen years.
And this is what they'll look like.....
Done by TheScarletMercenary, I've always felt these outfits were a perfect modernization of the classic X-Men outfits from the 60s.
Also, there will be some variations on these outfits for some of the X-Men.
Anyway, let's go ahead and actually talk about the team themselves, starting off with the leader himself and the first X-Men, Scott Summers, codename: Cyclops.
This Scott is quite similar to his Evolution counterpart, being far more confident, outgoing and optimistic than most of his other iterations. But he does still have that great sense of discipline and responsibility (which could be the result of his father being an Air Force veteran), that made him the perfect person to be the leader of the team.
Scott himself hails from Anchorage, Alaska, is 18-years old, stands at 6’0 and weighs 187 lbs, has fair skin, a slim (almost gangly-like) but fairly lean build, shaggy brown hair in a curtains style and his eyes are usually covered by either his trademark yellow visor with red lenses or his pair of ruby-quartz sunglasses.
As for his backstory, it's largely the same as in the comics, with only two notable differences.
His younger brother Alex (who I'll touch more on a little later), wasn't separated from him and they actually got to grow up together.
His childhood wasn't tampered/monitored by "you-know-who".
As for what he's capable of....
Scott's Primary Mutation is Optic Blast, which grants him the ability to shoot powerful beams of ruby-colored concussive force from his eyes. However (like in every other iteration), he can’t exactly control them due to a childhood injury. So he has to always wear either his visor or sunglasses in order to keep them at bay. But he does have enough control over them to control the trajectory, size and even density of his beams. From being wide enough to demolish a wall, to light enough to bounce off surfaces. He’s also a surprisingly skilled tactician for someone his age, possesses an uncanny sense of spatial awareness and is trained in hand-to-hand combat.
His Secondary Mutation is Energy Channel, which grants him the ability to harness the energy of his optic beams throughout his body. As you would expect, this grants him new abilities. These including being capable of augmenting his speed and strength to superhuman levels, granting himself the power of flight, and shooting his concussive beams from other parts of his body beside his eyes like his hands and feets.
As for his voice actor, Scott will be voiced once again by his recurring VA, the ironically named Scott Porter.
Next we come to the second member of the X-Men, Jean Grey, codename: Psyche.
Jean is what would expect from any version of the character: spunky, outgoing and caring, she’s sort of like the big sister of the team.
Jean herself hails from Trenton, New Jersey, is 18-years old, stands at 5'5 and weighs 130 lbs, has fair skin, an hourglass figure with a bottom heavy build, red hair in a bob-cut, green eyes and red lips.
As for her backstory, it's largely the same as in the comics and other iterations of the character.
Jean's Mutation is Psionic, which grants her various telepathic and telekinetic abilities. Apart from the obvious reading the thoughts of others and moving things with her mind, she can also project psionic energy (which is colored pink) in the form of concussive blasts, use said energy to also create various constructs and use telekinesis to grant herself the power of flight.
The reason I didn't put down her Primary (which was Telepath) and Secondary Mutations (which was Telekine) is because Psionic is essentially a combination of the two.
Yep! Jean is one of the only two members of the X-Men at the start of the series that already has their Secondary Mutation, since just like in the comics, she was an early bloomer.
As for her voice actor, Jean will be voiced once again by her recurring VA, Jennifer Hale.
Now we come to the third member of the X-Men Henry McCoy, codename: The Beast.
This Henry (along with the 90s animated Henry) is a true return to the Beast we know and love.
He's intelligent, well-mannered, and one of the most mature and level-headed members of the X-Men, due to him being one of the oldest members. But he still has the wit, playfulness and wisecracking nature of a teenager.
Henry hails from San Diego, California, is 19-years old, stands at 6'2 and weighs 302 lbs, has fair skin, a broad and muscular build with a posture and figure akin to that of an ape, abnormally large hands and feet, long blue hair that was tied up in a ponytail and blue eyes.
We also have the first X-Men with some difference to their uniform!
Henry's wouldn't wear any gloves or boots and his uniform wouldn't have any sleeves.
As for his backstory: Henry’s Mutation awakened the earliest out of all the X-Men, with him having it since the day he was born. This unfortunately led Henry to have a rather sheltered childhood. But during his teen years, he would start sneaking out and secretly playing as a star quarterback for the football team of the local high school. But once he joined the X-Men, he finally got the chance to experience life outside his home without having to do it in secret.
Henry's Primary Mutation is Primate Atavism, which granted him the pinnacle of human intelligence along with a body akin to that of an ape, with the physicality to go with it. His physical capabilities seem to be an amalgamation of various primates. He has the strength of a gorilla, the speed of a monkey, the dexterity of a chimpanzee, the agility of a gibbon and the flexibility of a orangutan.
His Secondary Mutation is Genetic Atavism, which allows him to switch between different animalistic forms whose capabilities are an amalgamation of the animal family they represent. These forms include a feline form, a canine form, a bovine form, a bear-like form, a boar-like form, a pachyderm-like form, and a rhino-like form. But his primary form and the look he'll be rocking for the entire series once his Secondary Mutation awaken would be a sasquatch-like form.
This form would grant Henry a muscular, sasquatch-like build, blue skin, blue fur all over his body, large clawed hands, large feet, sharp teeth, pointy ears, long messy blue hair and blue eyes.
It would also increase his height from 6'2 to 7'2 and his weight from 302 to 402 lbs.
The form would also keep the abilities of Henry's Primary Mutation, but enhanced to far greater levels.
As for his voice actor, Henry would be voiced by Yuri Lowenthal, who I've always felt would be perfect for a younger version of the character.
No offense to his recurring VA Fred Tatasciore, but I don't think he has quite the range to pull off an convincing voice for young man.
Next we come the fourth member of the X-Men and the second-in-command Ororo Munroe, codename: Storm.
This version is a mismatch between her typical portrayals and her Ultimate iteration. Being one of the oldest members of the team, Ororo is quite mature and surprisingly wise for her age. She also has a street-smart and witty side to her as well. And for someone who spent most of her life on the streets, Ororo has this odd sense of regalness and composure. These traits have made her essentially the second-in-command of the X-Men.
Ororo hails from Cairo, Egypt (but was originally born in Kenya), is 19-years old, stands at 5'11 and weighs 145 lbs, has dark skin, an hourglass figure, white shoulder-length hair in the form of braids, blue eyes, gold lips, a black headband and gold lightning bolt earrings.
As for her backstory, it's largely the same as in the comics, except she never got worshipped as a goddess among a tribal community.
Ororo's Primary Mutation is Meteorological, which grants her the ability to manipulate all forms of weather. From thunderstorms and tornadoes, to blizzards and tsunamis. She can also generate and manipulate electricity, manipulate wind, water and ice/snow, alter the temperature of an entire environment at will and her own body temperature depending on her current environment, use wind currents to fly, has an uncanny sense that allows her to predict weather patterns, and thanks to her time as a thief, is skilled in picking locks and physical combat.
Her Secondary Mutation is Element Phase, which grants her the ability to transform her entire body into either an electrical, wind, water or icy form. This not only makes her nearly invulnerable to damage (as most physical attacks would just phase right through her), but also enhance her physicality in some ways. Her electrical and wind forms would grant her superhuman speed, agility and reflexes, her water form would grant her elasticity, and her ice form would grant her superhuman strength and resilience. She can also create physical constructs out of the elements, even with her own body, the Secondary Mutation grants her much greater control over the weather than before, and she can even turn into an elemental giant by absorbing the elements (like the air and water) around her.
As for her voice actor, she would be voiced by previous recurring VA, Danielle Nicolet.
Now we come to the fifth member of the X-Men Wren Worthington, codename: The Angel.
You may have already noticed that I referred to Angel as Wren Worthington instead of his full name, Warren Worthington III.
Well that's because in this series, Angel is a female rather than a male.
The reason why I choose to do this is because seen a lot of recent fan reimaginings of the X-Men having Angel either being a female or non-binary, and I thought that would an interesting change to do for the character.
Personality-wise: she’s spirited, carefree and often has her head in the clouds (both figuratively and literally).
Wren hails from New York City, is 18-years old, stands at 5'11 and weighs 145 lbs, has fair skin, an hourglass figure with a muscular build, long blonde hair, blue eyes, sky blue lips, black bird earrings and a pair of big white wings on her back.
As for her backstory: Wren was born into a life of wealth and privilege. However, everything change when her Mutation awakened, which brought her into conflict with her father Warwick, the CEO of Worthington Industries and a hater of mutants. He desperately tried to keep the fact that his daughter was a mutant under wraps. This led to Wren having something of a sheltered life during her adolescence. Thankfully, the X-Men came along and Wren was finally able to be free.
Wren's Primary Mutation is Avian Flight, which granted her bird-like wings that allows her to fly. Her body is also naturally adapted for aerial transversal, can fly at superhuman speeds and possesses enhanced lung capacity and eyesight.
Her Secondary Mutation is Healing Light, which grants the ability to manipulate a special kind of light with healing properties. She can also use the light in an offensive manner and thanks to its properties, Wren also has an accelerated healing factor similar to another member of the X-Men.
As for her voice actor, she would be voiced by Grey Griffin, who I felt would be perfect for a female version of Angel....or any character voiced by LOB.
Next we come to the sixth member of the X-Men Kurt Wagner, codename: Nightcrawler.
He's what you would expect from any version of Kurt: kind-hearted, well-mannered, caring, and a devoted Catholic.
Kurt hails from Germany, is 17-years old, stands at 5'7 and weighs 164 lbs, has blue fur-like skin covering his entire body, a slender build, shaggy dark blue hair, full yellow eyes with no visible pupils, pointy elf-like ears, slightly fanged teeth, three fingered/toed hands and feet and a long pointy demon-like tail.
As for his backstory: Kurt always had it rough. Ever since he was born, he was cursed with the appearance of a demon. He was able to make the most of it by becoming the star of a traveling circus, which made people believe his appearance was just part of the act. However, when the public discovered that wasn’t the case….they didn't really take it well to put it lightly. Luckily, the X-Men came in time to save Kurt him from a slow and painful demise.
Kurt's Mutation is Shadow Move, which grants him the ability to teleport anywhere in a limited radius through a cloud of black brimstone. Thanks to his peculiar physiology, he’s also naturally agile and flexible, can become nearly invisible in shadows, has night vision and is a skilled swordsman.
Yep, Kurt is gonna be showing off his swashbuckling skills here! Three-Sword Style BABY!
As for his voice actor, he'll be voiced again by his recurring VA, the previously mentioned LOB, Liam O'Brien.
Now we come to the seventh member of the X-Men Piotr Rasputin, codename: Colossus.
Piotr is want you would expect from any version of the character: a gentle giant with the heart of the artist.
Piotr hails from Russian, is 17-years old, stands at 6'9 (7'4 in steel form) and weighs 260 lbs (495 lbs in steel form), has fair skin, a broad and muscular build, black hair in a flat-top almost buzz-cut like style and blue eyes (full grey when in steel form).
Also, just like Henry, he doesn't have any sleeves on his uniform.
As for his backstory: Piotr used to live a simple life as a farm boy. But after his Mutation was exposed, he and his family found themselves in great danger. But thanks to the X-Men, the Rasputins found a new home here at the Westchester District, where they could remain safe.
Piotr’s Mutation is Organic Steel, which grants him the ability to convert his flesh and skin tissue into a steel-like substance. This steel form grants Piotr incredible strength and resilience, and when matched with his use of hand-to-hand combat, makes him the team’s resident powerhouse.
As for his voice actor, he'll be voiced by his recurring voice actor, Chris Cox.
Next we come to the eighth member of the X-Men Bobby Drake, codename: Iceman.
Bobby is what would expect from any version of the character: playful, fun-loving and a bit of a prankster and show-off.
Bobby hails from Boston, Massachusetts, is 16-years old, stands at 5'4 and weighs 135 lbs, has light skin, a slim build, shaggy brown hair and light blue eyes.
He also has short sleeves and pant-legs on his uniform, wears no gloves or boots and rocks a black durag with a red X-Men symbol at the center (similar to his Ultimate counterpart).
As for his backstory: Bobby lived a fairly normal life with his family. But when his Mutation awakened, fearing that his family would be put in danger because of it, he ran away from home in order to keep them safe. But he eventually found a new home here at the Westchester District.
Bobby’s Mutation is Moisture Freeze, which grants him the ability to convert the moisture around him into ice and snow. Apart from the obvious freezing objects and creating ice and snow, Bobby also possesses a high resistance to low temperatures (so much so that he can coat himself in a flexible armor of ice) and can create various constructs out of ice. These include the likes of shards, shields, pillars, melee weapons and slides (the latter of which he uses to travel quickly across long distances).
As for his voice actor, he would be voiced by Jason Marsden. I've always felt Jason Marsden would make a great Iceman, and he did a good job as the character in X-Men: Destiny. And chances are, he could've become a recurring voice of the character if Marvel hadn't enter their "the X-Men don't matter anymore" phase because they were huffy about the move rights.
Now we come to the ninth (and the last member of the X-Men with a Secondary Mutation) James Howlett, or Logan as he prefers to be called, codename: The Wolverine.
Personality-wise, he's pretty similar to his iterations from Evolution and Wolverine and the X-Men.
Where still keeps his gruff and tough nature, but he's far more responsible, level-headed and laid-back when compared to most of his other iterations.
Logan hails from Canada, stands at 5'2 and weighs 295 lbs, fair skin, a stocky and muscular build, black hair in his trademark devil horn style, a five-o'-clock shadow and blue eyes.
As for his outfit, it's practically the iconic yellow and blue suit. Mask and all!
Backstory-wise: Most of his past is completely shrouded in mystery to the characters and even himself. But they do know that he’s by far the oldest (in spite of his appearance) and most experienced member of the team, having fought in some of the biggest wars of the 20th century. Not too long ago, Logan was once their enemy, constantly trying to take us out. But after finding out that he was being forced to do so in order to save his family, the X-Men decided to help him and out of gratitude, he joined them team.
Logan's Mutation is Healing Beast, Model: Mustelidae. Similar to Jean, it's the combination of Primary and Secondary Mutation. Initially, this granted Logan an accelerated healing factor, which allows him to heal from injuries much faster than the average human, superhuman physicality, enhanced animalistic senses and a pair of razor bone claws that he can eject from his knuckles. But thanks to Weapon X, government genetic research facility project, Logan was made even stronger than before. His healing factor has made so powerful that he’s able to quickly heal from even the most fatal of injuries, his physicality and senses have enhanced to even greater levels and even his claws are now coated in the near-indestructible metal known as Adamantium. A few years later, his Secondary Mutation finally awakened, which granted him the ability to transform into a man/were-wolverine, which enhanced his physicality and animalistic senses to even greater levels. And even more so with the berserker rage the form gave him. Unfortunately, Logan barely has any control over his form, which puts everyone around him in mortal danger, so he rarely ever uses it.
As for his voice actor, you already know who I have in mind.....the one.....the only.....STEVE BLUM!
Now we've made to the tenth and final member of the X-Men Kitty Pryde, codename Shadowcat.
Kitty is what you would expect from any version of the character: an intelligent social butterfly whose also a massive lovable nerd with a passion for computers.
Kitty hails from Chicago, Illinois, is 14-years old, stands at 5'0 and weights 95 lbs, has slightly tanned skin, a slim and slightly petite build, long curly brown hair tied up in a ponytail, hazel eyes, pink lips and multicolored braces.
As for her backstory: Kitty was a near straight-A student and an expert at computers. However, this often made her the target of bullying, which only got worse after her Mutation got exposed in public. But luckily, she found a new school to attend.
Kitty's Mutation is Phase Shift, which grants the ability to make her entire body intangible, along with anything she touches.
As for her voice actor, she would voiced by Jennie Kwan, who you'll known best as Suki from Avatar: The Last Airbender and Chun Lin from Street Fighter 6.
And accompanying her is none other the little dragon himself, Lockheed!
It's actually to think that this series would mark his first major adaptation in anything.
It's weird how despite being the companion of one of the X-Men's most prominent players, they've never had him appear in anything outside of the comics and video games.
It's sort of like the case of Franklin Richards, where despite being the son of the two of the members of the Fantastic Four and a major character in the cast, he's never made an appearance outside of the comics.
Anyway, Lockheed is what you would expect from any animal companion: Playful, mischievous and loyal to the nth degree.
As you expect: He's a purple dragon with full yellow eyes similar to Kurt, and stands at 2'6 and weighs 20 lbs.
Backstory-wise, it's pretty accurate to how it was in the comics.
Being that Lockheed comes from a race of aliens that resemble dragons known as The Flocks, who've been at war with the ravenous alien race The Broods.
Lockheed end up getting stranded on the Broods' homeworld and was being hunted by the aforementioned Broods.
During that time, he would encounter Kitty, who, along with the rest of the X-Men, were brought to Broodworld by force in order to be experimented on.
And it's history ever since.....
As for his voice actor, he would be voiced by everyone's go-to for providing animalistic vocals, Dee Bradley Baker.
Well that's all I have for now.
This is gonna be a multiple-part series.
For this first part, I did want to cover the recurring characters/allies, the villains and even some potential episodes, but I felt that it would make this post a little too long for most people.
So I decided to just dedicate this first part to just introducing the X-Men of this series.
I hoped you all liked this first part and if there's anything you want to know about this version of the X-Men, let me know!
#x men#scott summers#jean grey#henry mccoy#ororo munroe#warren worthington iii#kurt wagner#piotr rasputin#bobby drake#james logan howlett#kitty pryde#lockheed#x-men#marvel#marvel comics#cartoon idea
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Ok friend you have my curiosity where is this fic you speak of. I am SO ready to have my brain chemistry fundamentally changed
Start here. My recommendation is to read that, maybe read the rest of Turnabout NaNoWriMo, and if you want to know more after that, I can hand you some 200k of fic that is properly formatted with the interludes, because Ao3's formatting really doesn't work with the Sagiverse anthologies. (So what you see here is maybe like a quarter of what we've got. We have a lot, and also lots of art.)
Turnabout NaNoWriMo is the first of three-and-a-half anthologies I've written, and it's only after reading and enjoying all of them do I let people at my fiance's anthologies, which are excellent but a bit more private. (Turnabout Runaways, which was this year's NaNo challenge, is incomplete but at least 50k. I will be slowly working on it probably for a few months, and eventually it'll be done.)
These anthologies take place in a greater crossover AU we refer to as Sagiverse. It started in 2020 in Saint Seiya, and now hosts several different series, eight hundred some-odd characters, upwards of thirty different fantasy worlds (of which Earth is only one), and more plotlines than we can keep track of properly.
Here's the two-sentence pitch: seven hundred years ago, there was a giant war between various magical factions on Earth that ended in a mostly-forgotten pyrrhic victory and the gods choosing to seal magic away from the world. So magic began to slowly die out, and as of present day, magic is rarer and rarer, and mage society is dying out, but it's still holding on as best it can, until one day the gods finally allow magic to return.
Ace Attorney gets involved with this very very simply. Miles Edgeworth is a mage. To be specific, he's a necromage, one of the most powerful currently active on Earth. His father, Gregory Atticus Edgeworth, had never found proof of magic while he was alive. His mother... well, no one knows who his mother is, or anything about the man at all. After DL-6, Miles was taken in by MvK as a ward just as canon says, but the von Karmas themselves are magi of a kind. After DL-6, Atticus finds the proof of magic's existence that he's been looking for all along, and he is not going to leave his son and missing fiance alone in a world that so very much wants the both of them dead.
And so begins a thirty-five year trainwreck to put their wayward, way-finding family back together. They'll do it, no matter what it takes. It just turns out their family's a little bigger than they think it is.
The fic I linked pretty much opens with the identity of Miles' mother, which you learn pretty much as I did, because I didn't plan jack or shit, only let him tell me what was going on. You may raise an eyebrow at the canon ages, don't worry about that. We had to fix the timeline anyway (because the forensics tech was all twenty years out of date so we just changed the years to be twenty years earlier, setting DL-6 on December 28th 1981) so we just didn't pull him back as far. Atticus died at 39, his fiance was 33.
This is because when I first got into AA, I found the IS-7 picture of Gregory and Ray, and I sort of mistook 18-year-old Ray as Atticus' wife. My fiance pointed out the age gap, paused, and went "but they're cute so I'm sure we can make it work" and then we did. If you hesitate a bit on the ship but don't immediately hate the idea, I promise I can sell you on it. At the end of the day, everything comes back to Atticus and Ray's tragic romance. This I can promise you: it ends happily. We're just still writing everything in between.
Sagiverse!Ray is a pretty distinct character from canon!Ray, but they're close enough that if you like one you'll probably like the other. I gave him way more trauma and it's fun. :3c
If you're wondering what happens to other characters, I can answer that. Apollo is dead for a few months, Phoenix a little bit longer. Robot!Athena has Issues. Franziska changes her career from Interpol to Magica Underground mostly because it's a better use of her legal talents. Miles gets to be the chosen one and lead a war against one of his university friends who unfortunately (and semi-accidentally) stole Phoenix's corpse and ran away with it. (Phoenix is fine, don't worry about it.) Atticus gets to be a bounty hunter on the ghostroads with Mia and they do a lot of shooting MvK and causing problems. Ray, uh. Well, at least he only got shot in the head twice?
#asks#relicsongmel#like if i'm going insane in the tags on something AA that doesn't make sense#95% chance i'm talking about sagiverse#occasionally i check in with canon and go do some meta on that but mostly i stick to our au#but yeah if you let us do it we WILL rewrite your brain and you'll have to live with it#and YES i am trying to get a wiki up because it's big and complicated! i'm just dealing with finals and so much work ;~;
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yes, i remember hearing that about disney having the rights for tarzan until around 2005 as well! i wonder if kingdom hearts being a collaboration between disney and a completely different company may have complicated things further for them. the second game "chain of memories" was released in 2004 and has a plot where sora revisits every single disney world he visited in the first game, in the form of essentially replicas of those worlds created out of his own memories... except the tarzan world (deep jungle) is inexplicably missing. there is, however, an early development image from that game that indicates it was planned to appear at one point and was removed. it's a shame, i would've loved a chance to see more parts of the world and interact more with tarzan and jane.
this reminds me, there's been quite a few other disney crossover projects over the years that tarzan characters have never appeared in and i'm sure it must be because of the copyright issues. the mobile game "disney magic kingdoms", for example, features nearly any disney movie and any character from said movies that you could think of except of course for tarzan! and i wish something could be done to allow them to appear. i don't know if you've heard of the disney lorcana trading card game, but the cards from it have some gorgeous art and even though it's still pretty new, it's done a good job so far of representing some of disney's more neglected properties. but obviously there's no tarzan cards and i fear that eventually it'll be the only movie in the disney animated canon to not have any. i am glad that the characters were allowed to show up in the recent once upon a studio short, at least.
ooh, yeah, i've never been to the festival of the arts either but i've seen videos and pictures from it online! i would love to be able to go and see all of the beautiful art and the disney on broadway concerts in person. i'm actually not very familiar with the tarzan musical, but i love several of the other musicals disney has done. also, i'll definitely have to check out those artists you mentioned!
i highly agree with you about howard ashman. i don't know if you've seen the documentary about him, simply titled "howard", but i definitely recommend it. another one of my favorite things about beauty and the beast is the way that belle and the beast are both people who have been ostracized from society in different ways but who are able to connect and find happiness with each other. and when i think about how howard was a gay man with HIV who poured so much of himself into the lyrics he wrote and all of the ideas he contributed to the movie, it just breaks my heart that he never got to see it completed. he and alan were such a perfect team.
-🌟
That's a good point, that probably did make things more difficult. The more companies involved, the more legal stuff to work out. I'm so glad Tarzan was included in the first one, but so sad they never brought him back, especially when it looks like they wanted to.
Disney Magic Kingdoms is the only game I actually do play! I've never had any hope we'd get Tarzan in that, even with how good they are with rarer movies… they even just added the Black Cauldron!!! But I've often dreamed of what could be. The thought of what the tokens might look like, and the attractions they could do?! Obviously the Treehouse, but maybe one based on Trashin' the Camp, or a "tree surfing" roller coaster?
I haven't really looked into Lorcana, but I have seen some of the artwork, everything I've seeing looks so incredible!! Would be so amazing to see Tarzan characters included. Darn that copyright!
Once Upon a Studio was so amazing. I watched "knowing" there would be no Tarzan, but they took so much pity on us. Still incredibly short, but there was so many Tarzan characters in it!!
I've seen Howard a couple of times, it was so well done and so worth the wait for it. I agree with you about Belle and the Beast. Howard really brought that out in a way no one else could. It's so unfair he never got to see the masterpiece he helped create, but what a gift he gave to the world.
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I’m going to speedrun my way through my work and then sit down and re-watch bad buddy again and im inexplicably excited for that and for the Our Skyy 2 episodes we will be blessed with starting this week and the My Word mv has truly scrambled my brain in the best of ways and i just. I love the show. I love the characters. I love, adore, worship the staff who worked on this show because the level of perfection it is is inspiring but also: you need to truly want to tell a story and believe in it for it to translate this well. It’s a rare feat in the arts. It’s even rarer in the 21st century; we’re very quick to dismiss the simple and we’re unwillingly to contemplate the complex. Bad Buddy, I don’t know how it does it, but it makes you WANT to think and analyse and explore and find out and learn, learn, learn about the world around you, about love, about grief, about choices. It makes you THINK and you don’t hate it for that. I will always think this is one of the best shows in the world. There’s very, very few that may ever hold comparison.
#i love bad buddy okay#i know i don't yell about it much#but i promise you i'm constantly thinking about it when i can#it brings me comfort#it brings me joy#it allows me to process some heavy emotions with ease and safety#it challenges me every time i watch it#it encourages me#honestly it keeps me going#bad buddy the series#our skyy 2 x bad buddy#pat x pran
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I'm sorry things are going terrible right now! :(
Thoughts on ep 3 summed up: too short, not enough, more questions.
My question, before I saw your update to your covid post: What is your favorite fanfic that you've read?
Hello Anon!
Thank you, things really are miserable for me, but I'm trying to take it a day at a time. <3
Honestly, from the few bits I have heard about Ep 3, I probably need to skip it bc of triggers. So that sucks, I think I'll just skip through it and watch the inter-team relationship scenes.
What is my favourite fic that I've read?!?!
That's a HUGE question, friend. I certainly don't have just ONE, so I'll break these up into my main ships. Also, I will be listing a lot of my own works, because I'm not ashamed of being proud of my work! It's sometimes hard for me to read 'new' (to me) fics, because I have trouble concentrating, so I re-read fics a lot (Including my own). Also, some of these (rarer) pairings don't have a lot of fics, outside of mine.
Top 3 JJ/Emily Fics:
[Take My Hand and Show Me the Way] by mjduncan
[Dreams, Schemes and In-Between] by Phoenix_Falls
[a color story] by sunshineandguns
Top 3 Tara/Emily Fics:
[Caution to the Wind] by thelarkascending
[Why Am I Like This?] by w00t4ewan (me)
[Night Changes] by drivingmishcrazy
Top 3 JJ/Tara Fics:
[Between You & Me] by w00t4ewan
[Just One Night] (Criminal Minds Bingo 2022) by thelarkascending
[Here is Home] by w00t4ewan
Top Je T'Emily Fics:
[Unwinding] by PepperSpicedLattee
[Fooled Around (and Fell in Love)] by w00t4ewan
[False Flags and the Art of Misdirection] by w00t4ewan
Top Tara/Rebecca Fics: (so far!)
[Easy] by w00t4ewan
[Kiss and Not Tell] by w00t4ewan
[Height Difference] by bow_is_best_boi
#criminal minds#cm evolution#cm fic rec#cm fanfic#cm fanfiction#tara lewis#emily prentiss#jennifer jareau#rebecca wilson#jemily#temily#jara#tebecca#je t'emily#cm spoilers#my writing#anon#reply post#cm commentary
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Your favorite jc's ship?
Honestly, I am not attached to any particular ship for him! I'm open to pretty much anything - I've joked that I'm an 'allcheng, anycheng, nocheng, whatevercheng' shipper before. I'm open to anything that makes our purple boy happy! (Or sad, but in a hot way.)
My answer also depends on the setting and how "serious" it's meant to be, if that makes sense? Also whether it's aiming to be fluffy/optimistic/sweet or dark, no thoughts only horny or a well-rounded romance, etc.
If we're talking "what do I think is the most realistic person for him to end up in a relationship with in a 'serious' post novel canon setting that is not a hot dumpster fire?" If anyone, I think it would be some unrelated OC/minor background person not actually named in the novel with minimal baggage/drama/involvement in past events, set long enough after the end of the novel that he's had some time to marinate and tenderize.
But I'm not particularly bothered by a ship needing to feel "canon-rooted"/"canon-plausible" (or for it to not be a dumpster fire) to enjoy fics or art or whatever! So I'm down for almost any pairing, I don't really have any notable NoTPs or limits, and if the setting is canon divergence or AU that obviously opens up a lot of possibilities.
And the fun thing about a fandom centered on a necromancer is that even being dead is not a major roadblock to post-canon shipping!
If I were more into the CQL/Untamed side of the fandom I would definitely be super into ChengQing, there's a lot about it that I think works well, but unfortunately as a mostly novel fan there's a lot less there to work with so a lot of times they're referencing CQL-only plot changes! (I haven't actually seen CQL just enjoyed gifsets and such and have some basic ideas of what the big plot changes are/that there is a comb involved somewhere, no hate to CQL though I think there were some very valid adaptational changes going on there!) But I do still enjoy ChengQing when I come across it anyway, especially the few darker novel-based versions of it floating around out there (though that's overall a rarer take on it).
Of the bigger/popular ships, the one with the most obvious dramatic energy/intensity straight out the box is ChengXian. So much room for angsty activities in that one whooooo boy!
Some ships do take a lot more to get me invested than others though. For example Xicheng is really popular and I can see the appeal, but for me to enjoy it there's just a lot of heavy lifting that has to go on to overcome their canon "Just Some Guy I Politely Chitchat With For No More Than Five Minutes at the Yearly Cultivation Conference" energy, if that makes sense? I can be convinced, it's just a long road from point A to point B for me to be hooked.
I also appreciate the potential of a lot of smaller or rarepairs with characters like Wen Ning, Qin Su, etc.
Crossovers are fun too. That Jar Jar Binks/Jiang Cheng smutfic is genuinely a masterpiece that brings me endless delight every time I remember it exists and I am not being sarcastic about that, it's so deranged and wonderful and makes me giggle just thinking about it.
Sorry this was probably the longest non-answer ever since I really don't have any very strong opinions!
(Also if the anon who sent me that ask an embarrassingly long time ago about fic recs that I still haven't answered is reading I am so sorry I am still trying to organize my bookmarks because I am The Worst and Least Organized I promise I haven't forgotten)
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A FATHER’S LOVE - talk about your muse’s relationship with their father? // ALONE - did they ever lose a loved one? how did they cope with their loss?
Her relationship with her father was strained. I’ve written flashbacks and the like for Vahalia before regarding her father and she doesn’t talk about him often. Those who know her well enough (which is like 2 people) know how she views her father and its never been a positive one with fond memories.
Vahalia isn’t the type of woman to be bothered by much but the very presence of her father is grotesque to her. In short, the man slowly poisoned and killed her and Valeria’s mother (Odessa Cress) for money when his business was going under. At one point the demand for weapons for Ishgard was at a high – as I like to view it. The weaponry and armor industry – it’s a lucrative prospect. So I’ve always written that while a large portion of Vahalia’s family came from Dalmasca they prided themselves in the ore industry and from there essentially being arms dealers and manufacturers. But of course, over time it caught on and the business wasn’t so lucrative with so many hands in the pot. Supply vs demand started to shit and Adrian Cress lost out on a lot of money.
Their mother was taken from them for money, Valeria had found out about her father doing so and how he did it and when Adrian found out one of his daughters had caught on to what he had done, he had it arranged that Valeria was to be killed, make it look like an accident. This resulted in Valeria disappearing for a few years which she eventually came back after feeling it was safe to do so after her father’s mysterious passing.
I had written this too, but after the ‘death’ of her twin, Vahalia took matters into her own hands and after finding out that her father, Adrian, was behind it all she dealt with him personally over the stretch of several years. She killed him, had him cremated and then she tossed him into the cold mists of Ishgard below the city.
Everyone in the Cress family is either buried or kept in the family crypts but she thought that Adrian Cress, after bringing their family to ruin, he deserved nothing less than to be forgotten. It’s upon Valeria’s return that Vahalia decides to take hold of the House that was left to her, and as Matriarch of House Cress to pluck it up out of ruin and obscurity to set it back on the tracks again.
That has been the character’s goal for quite a few years now. She puts her Household above all else, even herself and her own wanton desires so she’s quite protective over the trajectory of the Cress name itself. Vahalia has gone through some very questionable stuff to keep the past of the Family under wraps and to avoid being seen in society as problematic or to unknowingly place a target on their back.
She’s been working behind the scenes in silence, more or less, and has been building a lot on the broken foundation their father had left to her.
But to get back on point now that some history has been shared – she absolutely loathes her father and has always had a very strained relationship with him. It’s been known that after the death of her mother and the sudden ‘death’ of Valeria that Adrian and Vahalia – while in the same estate – would never talk with one another and even rarer still, see one another. They’d pass each other in a hall and not even look at each other or utter words in each other's directions.
Sadly the ironic part of all of this is that Vahalia is a lot like her father in so many ways. I think she knows this and she tries to bury it deep down so she forgets about it, but she is certainly Adrian Cress’s daughter. Adrian had dabbled in the art of poisons which is why it was so easy for him to kill his wife, his connections to those who work from the shadows is what made it easy for him to target Valeria using connections. Vahalia is very much in the same boat since she is the type to use whatever methods are necessary and consider it a ‘means to an end’. She’s ruthless and calculating and she has no qualms with taking people out that are in the way or are actively working against her.
The difference between the two is that Adrian did all that he did out of pure greed whereas Vahalia does so out of love and to protect what she deems is ‘hers’ or under her protection. Her love comes with limits and is a poison in and of itself.
So all in all I hope this answers both questions because I feel like they’re very intertwined. Vahalia felt alone after her mother and sister were no longer in the pictures and her coping overall brought her down into a rabbit hole which eventually, put her on the other end with her father and a choice to make.
@amorthonblackwood / @osric-slater-ffxiv
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