#and a good amount in classic and modern english lit too!

[hongjoongscafe]

Someone out there...

Part: 3 {Serieslist}

Iln the connection|

Pairing: bunny!hybrid!jungkookhuman!readerxbunny!hybrid!wooyoung

Boy groups involved: BTS & ATEEZ

Genre: angst, fluff, smut, neighbour au, hybrid au.

Summary: the two bunny hybrids were terrified of the cruel world. Will they be able to live their life?

Warnings: mentions of starvation, weak hybrids.

Word count: 2.6k+

BTS and ATEEZ masterlist

Masterpost

Do not repost, plz

“Hello, I am the neighbour next door!”

“Oh God,” Kim Bina huffed, “is she gonna be like those neighbours?!” she rolled her eyes.

Wooyoung stood there with a blank expression. You felt like you interrupted their morning on a weekend. But this was beyond your concern after you noticed how malnourished he looked. His cheekbones were sticking out and it looked like he had no muscles in his face. The dark circles under his eyes were so prominent.

It was a big red flag but you rather ignore it. It was the first time you were actually going to meet them; without being late and in the rush.

When he didn't say something, you hesitantly continued, “I- I thought that I might bring some treats as a welcome gift…” you chuckled awkwardly.

Wooyoung eyed you and the big Tupperware container that had a considerable amount of baked goods in the other two smaller containers. A few seconds later, he cleared his throat and slightly bowed to you and let you in the house and gently closed the door behind you both.

You stood at the entryway. Wooyoung kindly placed the extra pairs of soft slippers. He hunched down and tried to help you out of your shoe but you yelped and scooted back.

“Oh, no no! I can do it myself!” you smiled at him and removed your shoes and wore the slippers.

Wooyoung cleared his throat again and showed you the way to the living room where Kim Dal and Kim Bina were sitting.

“Oh! Hello dear!” Kim Bina stood up and her face lit up as if you were his whole world and the love of her life. “I'm glad that you visited!” she faked the smiles. “Bring her something to drink,” she asked someone else whose presence was not yet known.

You saw another bunny man. But this one was taller. His bunny ears were patchy greyish-dirty brown and white. There was the pink hue of his ear skin. He had big doe eyes but something about them wasn't right– just like the other bunny man. His cheeks were hollow but not as hot hollow that people get after hustling hard at the gym. The veins on his arms were thick and poking out– again, not in a hot way.

The bunny man quietly nodded and waddled towards the kitchen.

“Come on, take a seat!” Bina offered. You smiled and sat down. “This is my husband, Dal.”

“Ah, hello, sir,” you greeted. “It's good to meet you.”

“Good to meet you too, young lady!” he smiled and offered his hand for a handshake which you gladly shook.

The house was screaming old school yet money. It had the vibe of a castle with those golden walls and classic paintings of some English people with the deepest of details that you could only see if you looked closely with a magnifying glass.

The huge gramophone in the corner was dramatic. The expensive furniture and decoration were too flimsy. It almost felt suffocating.

You have grown up in a much more modern house with a lot of space and minimal stuff around. Instead of people painting, you preferred modern-day art. Instead of having a gigantic gramophone, you preferred a nice simple plant or maybe a these-days record player.

Simple and elegant.

You didn't complain about this house, it was just suffocatingly decorated and lacking a personal touch. But it was not your place to judge.

The bunny man returned with water and juice in a tray. You smiled and took the juice. Now both the bunny men stood together with their hands in front of them and their heads down. You saw them properly now.

Something about them was saddening. Something about them wasn't sitting right with you. They didn't look like other hybrids that you have ever met before. You have seen many burnt hybrids before this and they were too active and playful and excited but these two were not.

Their clothes looked too old and worn out. They both were gaunt. You could tell that much. The shorter hybrid looked way too terrible and in need of proper care and attention. But you didn't voice your worries whatsoever. This was not your place, you thought.

“What brings you here, Ms Park?” Bina asked with a toothy smile.

“Ah,” you pushed the container in her direction, “I just made some baked goods for you all. I thought it might be a good idea and maybe get to know each other?”

‘Good idea? Huh,’ Bina sarcastically thought.

You continued, “so yeah, a tiny gift from me.”

“That is so sweet of you,” Dal said with a sickly sweet smile. “It must have taken a whole day,” he stated while opening the container and eyeing all the delicious sweet, and slightly sweet-savoury food. “I might just try some!” he said while opening the container that had cookies. He took a bite and genuinely loved them. His eyes grew double the size. “Bina, you need to try these! They are so delicious… Lady, you can bake!”

Bina took it and had a similar reaction. “Oh, yeah. Make sure you send some our way whenever you make some next time! This is delicious!” she said while chomping them. “Do you bake for work?”

You looked at the couple practically gulping the cookies but the bunnies didn't even take a step in the table’s direction. They were standing still. “I work temporarily at an IT company,” you replied while looking at the cookies and the bunnies.

“Temporarily?” Bina wasn't interested but there was nothing to talk about and she couldn't kick you out either so she kept forming questions from your replies.

“Y-yeah… If I fulfill the necessary training and requirements, I might start working permanently,” you observed that the couple wasn't paying attention to the bunnies at all.

The aroma of the baked goods was overwhelming for the bunnies. Their sensitive noses wiggled and their ears twitched here and there. But they knew better than that. Even if they sniffed in that direction, Dal and Bina might end up beating the shit out of them and they have already had a beating for the day, another one sounded like hell on earth.

Wooyoung felt weak and internally cussed at you for bringing them treats and making the two of them suffer. His hands itched to pick one and taste it.

Jungkook had no internal battle. He had come to a conclusion long ago that in his life, he was meant to suffer and humans were the ones who were going to make him suffer the misery of rapaciousness. The rapaciousness of food, proper shelter, sleep, health, clothes… but most importantly, love.

“Hey, you two should have some too!” you gently said to the bunnies.

The bunnies jerked their heads your way as if you just confessed to a murder that they committed. Two pairs of big round eyes were looking at you along with two pairs of trying-not-to-squint eyes.

You picked the container and offered them. They both looked at each other and then at their owners who looked at them with unimpressed looks and flared noses. “Please take some, I made these for all of you,” you pleaded.

“Pick up,” the almost harsh tone of Bina made you flinch. Immediately, the bigger bunny stepped up and picked one cookie and stood back at his place.

“You take one too,” you said to the shorter one.

Jungkook looked up at you for a second and looked down again and said, “we- we will sh-share.”

“Aw, why? There are so many! Please take one,” you slightly whined.

The shorter one looked up with shaky pupils and quickly picked one before standing beside the taller one. The moment you looked back at Bina, you caught them boring daggers into their head through their hard stare.

It scared you.

“I-I’m glad you liked these,” you mumbled and awkwardly chuckled. “Anyway, what are your names?” you asked the bunny hybrids.

“J-Jung- Jungkook,” the taller replied shakily.

“Wooyoung,” the shorter man almost whispered.

“Ah, you both have pretty names! How–”

“You both, go to your room!” Bina sternly commanded while rudely cutting your sentence.

The hybrids moved in a beat with horrified expressions on their innocent faces. It made you worried about them. You didn't like being there.

“It's their time to take a rest,” Bina smiled at you and bit another bite of cookie.

“Oh,” you looked at her for a second. “You know what? I should head back. I'll let you all rest,” awkwardly, you got up and walked towards the front door.

“Do stop by some other time, by the way!” Bina said as she showed you out.

You smiled at her and quickly walked back to your house and locked it with a sigh.

…

Jungkook and Wooyoung we're sitting in their bed. Both had one cookie each. They looked at it as if it was a piece of art, as if it was their first love. They don't remember when was the last time they had something like this. Something other than a tiny bottle of water and one scoop of rice twice a day.

They had forgotten the taste of other things. They adored the cookie. It smelled so good that they couldn't wait to devour it. They cherished it. The beauty of its uneven edges and melted chocolate chips was all too beautiful.

Wooyoung looked at Jungkook with giddiness. His smile reached his ears, “Hyung, I feel so happy!”

Jungkook smiled widely and nodded, “me too,” he whispered.

“I don't want to ruin it,” the Younger hybrid whined.

“It's gonna go bad if we don't,” Jungkook reasoned.

They nodded and slowly took one bite. The cookie melted on their tongues. The sweetness of the soft cookie and the chocolate with the hint of flakey salt that you sprinkled on top. It was overwhelming for them.

A sob pulled out of them. That soon turned into silent cries. The one single bite made them lose their minds. Looking into each other's blurry eyes, they understood one another. It felt like they won against the abuse and the wrath of humankind. It was so stupid that this made them cry but it made them feel so much at the same time.

To someone, it might seem dramatic, irrelevant even. But to only eat bland, tasteless food for an entire life and then suddenly something so different; something that has some flavour, some sweetness.

After making so many delicious foods for their owners, they never even dared to taste-test them. They never thought that they would ever taste something in their life.

“It's so good,” Wooyoung cried.

“I love the way it melts in my mouth,” Jungkook closed his eyes tightly and let the tears of joy run down.

Wooyoung cried more and more. As he took more bites, his heart swelled with happiness. The tears were falling without any shame. He loved every single second of this delicious sweet treat that you left behind.

But they had to stop enjoying it too much. The reality is that this happiness wasn't long-lasting. The moment this cookie was going to get finished and the taste fades away, they won't ever get to taste it again. This was the only and the last time they were having something like this.

Thinking about this, the will to even enjoy this tiny cookie fell out. This was just a hell they were living in. Crying just because they got a stupid cookie?! This is what their life was like. Even the smallest and the most basic thing made them feel like they were on the clouds that you brought to them today because it never happened otherwise.

Wooyoung didn't think much other than the fact that the cookie was yummy and that this was not going to last even for an hour. But Jungkook had other beliefs.

The older hybrid was getting angry as time passed. He was blaming you for putting him and his little baby in this position. If you have never brought those treats and offered him and Wooyoung some of the sweets, they wouldn't have ended up in their attic crying and loving this stupidly delicious thing. This was only going to make them more miserable. You were the one who caused it but you are now back in your home living your casual life just like any other human. You were full of yourself and over-smart in Jungkook's eyes. He thought that you were a mean, heartless human being who enjoyed seeing them like this.

You were at fault.

You were the cause of the sudden sadness.

You, you, you…

…

You sighed the nth time after visiting the Kims.

The enthusiasm before going there and after was gone.

Something about that house was suffocating. Something about the air in that house was poisonous. Something about the owners was creepy… Something about the harshness of Bina's voice that she carried for the bunnies. Something about the bunnies was heartbreaking. Something about the trembling pupils in the furry eyes was begging for help. Something about the weak hybrids was screaming a heart-rending story. Something about the feeling that screamed that you made a mistake. Something about the feeling that was making you want to go back and see the hybrids and ask them about this unfairness. Something about the unsettling feeling that won't go away the whole day.

It was too much for you to take in. The whole situation was making you distracted again and again. You kept looking at the house next door; just wanting to see the hybrids once more. But there was no one. Perhaps, you were looking into it too much and over-observing them.

The night was dark. Your room was dimly lit upstairs. The cool wind was blowing through the open window. Your skin got goosebumps when you stepped out of your shower and into your room. Your favourite RnB playlist was playing in the background. You hummed along to the music as you sat down on your chair and pulled out your journal.

The moment your pen landed on it, It made you think about the whole day. It made you question your choices. It made you feel weird things about the day and made you not ever return to their house ever again. For some reason, you felt guilty. This was strange. For the first time, you felt like this. You felt sympathy for the two you never met before… For the two you don't know the story about.

Was it possible? To feel this way?

To feel like you fucked up?

You sighed heavily before dropping your pen on the table and closing your journal. Getting up, you waddled towards the open French Window and looked straight where Kim's house was. To your surprise, someone was already in the attic– that house was a single story, and the attic was levelled just by your room.

You saw the long ears at the side of the head of the silhouette. By the looks of the body frame, it looked like it was Jungkook. The light between the houses was fused so the light from the background was making him look like a shadow.

One thing was for sure, he looked tense. It made you feel something again.

Something that you weren't aware of.

And that something was that just because of your one tiny single cookie, the bunnies were robbed of their food– they were robbed of that pathetic one scoop of rice.

But something that was bothering you the most was why were you feeling that way. Why were you feeling this connection of feelings with them? Why was all this so messy?

Maybe you needed to go back.

Maybe you needed to gain Kim’s trust around their bunnies.

Maybe you needed to play the game.

Maybe you needed to feel the true self of the bunnies.

Maybe you needed to feel the raw pain that they both shared.

Maybe just maybe… you needed to be someone for them…

.....

Sanaa's note:

😊💓

The behaviour of all the characters is visualized.

Taglist:

@veneziamadness @cheline @sansmilkbread @jayb17 @constantlydelulusional @8tinytings @tea4sykes ; @jhmylove

*lemme know if you wanna be added to the permanent or specific taglist*

*original picture is not mine, I just edited it*

#ateez #bts #ateez angst #bts angst #ateez fluff #bts fluff #ateez smut #bts smut #ateez fanfic #bts fanfic #ateez wooyoung #bts jungkook #bts jungguk #ateez jung wooyoung #bts jeon jungguk #bunny hybrid jungkook #bunny hybrid wooyoung #bts imagines #ateez imagines #bts jeongkook #jungkook smut #bts jeon jungkook #wooyoung x reader #jungkook angst #wooyoung smut #wooyoung angst #jungkook fluff #wooyoung fluff #bts fic #ateez x reader

[singular-yike]

A long time ago, a book about Shinto I read mentioned something about "warrior priests". I sorta gave up researching them after the shrine they were associated with in the book pulled up no results on English google (forgot it's name, but apparently there's an American branch of it that has way more documentation than the Japanese branch I was trying to look into, but this ain't about that shrine).

The concept of a warrior priest intrigues me, as a fan of media where Shinto priests fight, so could you tell me what you know of them?

I'll be completely honest, I've never heard of Shinto priests that also acted as warriors before this. So I was a bit lost as to what to do here.

However, I do know of the much, much more famous Buddhist warrior monks, called sōhei (僧兵 lit. "monk soldiers"), which I originally planned to use as my answer.

Fortunately, it is in the middle of researching them that I believe I came across a good answer to your question, but first, let's go over some history (which I've tried my best to keep brief and relevant to our topic today).

History of Shinto and Buddhism

Shinto and Buddhism have been closely intertwined for most of Japan's history. In fact, for a good part of it, most people would've understood them as a single system of faith, one and the same.

From our modern point of view, we call this shinbutsu-shūgō (神仏習合), the "syncretism of kami and buddhas" (syncretism being the combation different beliefs; Kami being what I usually refer to as the Shinto "gods").

It was not until the Meiji Restoration in 1868, when the "Kami and Buddhas Separation Order" (神仏判然令) was decreed, that the two religions for forcefully split in twain.

Yet even still, the two were never truly and completely separated, many Buddhist temples still house small Shinto shrines, and some Shinto shrines are dedicated to Buddhist deities like any other kami.

Indeed the policy never succeeded in its goals to separate the two religions, many Japanese people still practice both and visit both shrines and temples, but what it did do was create the modern view that they are separate, independent religions.

Practices/Beliefs Under the Syncretism

Right, now we can take a look at the practices under the syncretism that lead to these "warrior priests/monks" that I mentioned prior.

To keep things brief, basically, the Shinto gods and the various Buddhist deities (Buddhas, bodhisattvas, etc.) were fused together. The "how" was never agreed upon, but the mainstream idea was the honji-suijaku theory (本地垂迹).

It suggested that Shinto gods were but local manifestations of the buddhas and bodhisattvas, and that they too were not exempt from the cycle of death and rebirth, samsara.

Thus, Shinto gods needed to achieve enlightenment, nirvana, as well, just like us humans. Buddhist temples were built close to Shinto shrines so that the gods can listen to Buddhist sutras, cultivate good karma, all that good stuff.

There's a lot more too, like how Shinto gods later come to be considered the protectors of Buddhism, but the important takeaway here is that Buddhist temples and Shinto shrines slowly get fused with one another, to the point where they're basically the same thing.

Warrior Monks and Priests

It is under these syncretistic beliefs and practices that we move onto classical and feudal Japan, specifically the period from the late Heian period (794 to 1185) until the Muromachi period (1336 to 1573).

During this period, power in Japan was split between three: The imperial court, independent warrior governments, and what is called the "temple-shrine powers" (寺社勢力) (the "why" is a lot of history I really can't).

(Also do note that these are categories, not three unified powers, so all the temple-shrines didn't come together to form their own government or anything like that.)

Temple-shrines then held vast amounts of land and power, enough to compete with the other two powers for authority. A part of this competition and exertion of power is, of course, military fighting.

This fighting, on the part of the Shinto shrines, were often done by what are called jinin/jinnin (神人), low-ranking priests who did chores and odd-jobs for the shrine. Some of them where charged with guard duty, so they owned weapons and knew how to fight.

It was these people who we see join the sōhei (mentioned in the beginning) in their fighting, and we even have many records of people complaining about their violent rampages (yeah not all of these warriors were great people, in fact many weren't, but that's neither here nor there).

And there's what I believe you read about! Warrior Shinto priests, albeit low-ranking ones that were basically the odd-jobs guys. (Also worth noting is that not all jinin were warriors, some were farmers, merchants, artisans, etc.)

Ending

What I couldn't find

I should definitely add that I couldn't find anything about a specific group of jinin tied to a specific shrine.

The only two American shrines that I could find with specific ties to Japanese shrines are the Tsubaki Grand Shrine of America and the Izumo Grand Shrine of Hawaii, tied to the Tsubaki Grand Shrine and Izumo Grand Shrine respectively.

However, I couldn't find anything specifically tying them to any temple-shrine powers back them, nor any specific anecdotes about their priests being warriors either.

So yeah I got nothing on that front, sorry 'bout that.

Why all the history?

In retrospect all that history really seems rather unnecessary, doesn't it? But I've already typed all that up, and it'd just be an absolute waste to delete them now.

I originally mentioned all that because I wanted to give an idea on how this could've been obscured, both to me and to anyone else, and hence the topic's obscurity these days.

Shinto was Buddhism at the time (and vice versa, in a sense), so these people who fought with Buddhist monks were simply lumped in with them, they were of one temple-shrine organisation.

There's a lot of stuff in there that you can easily pour literal lifetimes into learning about, so we can always visit some other stuff there if you're interested~.

Final Words

Good gods I crammed a lot in here.

The tricky thing is that any talk about Shinto history also kinda necessitates a basic understanding of Buddhism, so it's tough to pick out what's really needed and what can be saved for some other day.

Also I'm not nearly as good at these top-down perspective stuff, as you may have noticed, narrow topics are a lot easier to work with (though I suppose that's true for most things).

And this intersected with history quite a lot too, which is not really my thing and I'm not nearly as well versed in.

Finally please do note that I'm no expert in Japanese religion and mythology or anything. I just find it all real neat~. So please don't be surprised if any of this turns out inaccurate or straight up wrong, and do tell me I'd love to learn too~.

And that's all I believe! As usual, I hope you enjoyed~! :)

#oh also sorry for no pictures!! #I like to have them to break things up but abstract stuff like this is kinda hard to find pics for #no idea what else to tag this honestly #no matter tho I'll add it to the Len'en masterpost for now #inappropriate as it may be #rather that than have it lost to the flow of posts #I'll make one for these once I have a few more maybe

[devilsskettle]

i’m just trying to think of other comparable pieces of media that get the same treatment as the iliad and the song of achilles. imagine reading wide sargasso sea and refusing to ever pick up jane eyre and having all of your opinions on jane eyre and charlotte brontë based on what jean rhys decided to write over a century later. despite it being free to read online or to borrow at the library. and basing all your opinions on the characters of the original novel on how you feel about them in the adaptation. or what if you tried to do that with pride and prejudice and death comes to pemberley. or pride and prejudice and zombies. first of all, you’d be missing a lot of the interesting part of reading adaptations which is the intertextuality! to be fair i’m kind of obsessed with intertextuality so i get it if that’s not what you’re here for but still! wouldn’t you be confused, or at least a little disappointed that you’re missing out on the full experience of the book? the author of a retelling or spin off kind of book like that expects you to be somewhat familiar with the source material, maybe that’s not true of song of achilles since it’s aimed at younger readers and there’s no good quick movie version that will get you up to date if you don’t want to or have time to read the original first, but would you really prefer to read it entirely stripped of its context? genuinely not mad or “gatekeeping” or whatever, that just sounds less enjoyable and more anti-intellectual than being excited enough about what you’re reading to want to know as much about it as possible. you sound boring. again, to be fair, maybe i just get overzealous about intertextuality, i did read/watch red dragon through hannibal in the hannibal book/film series just because i wanted to compare them to the tv series and actually get the original context of a lot of the content and i really loved doing that even though it was kind of a waste of time lol but it made watching the show really refreshing and interesting from a new angle. why would you not want that for yourself

#to be fair i think i’m like that BECAUSE i’m a classics major and that’s so much of what studying ancient mediterranean literature is #and i put off reading the iliad for a long long time considering my major but it made reading the aeneid that much better for me #and all the literature that was heavily influenced by homeric epic which is most of it in the greco-roman world! #and a good amount in classic and modern english lit too! #i think by now i’ve read every major greek or roman epic except civil war most after reading the iliad #and that was essential reading for all of them #including milton actually. yeah it’s in english but the guy just won’t shut up about homer #he might as well have written the damn thing in latin with the kind of grammatical constructions he’s trying to use to emulate classic epics #but that’s a story for another time #anyway i know it’s not that deep and i genuinely don’t care that much but. i am perplexed by that attitude #also i get how pretentious this sounds lol i promise i’m not angling for a good sticker here but i do study this shit you know? #*gold sticker #i’m not gonna dumb it down to try to sound less pretentious okay i’m dumb enough already

[skzsauce01]

A Bunch of (Oxy)morons

Anniversary Request Special

Synopsis: The dumb nerd develops a crush on the cynical cheerleader after he sits next to her in advanced literature, and learns just how smart her brain and mouth are. High school AU.

Warning: none

Word Count: 5.5k

Pairing: fem cheerleader!reader x nerd!Jeongin

Mr. Kim makes the entire class switch seats in the middle of the first semester for “feng shui” reasons, but Jeongin is pretty sure it’s because Changbin and Wooyoung have finally gotten on his last nerve with their incessant chatter. Participating enthusiastically in class discussions could protect their seating arrangements for so long.

Jeongin winds up with a seat in the back corner, next to the bulletin board covered with quotes, some of them literary, most of them not. The one closest to his head reads Carpe Diem! in bright gold. While the rest of the class shuffles around to their new desks, he stares blankly at the words, trying to figure out why the name of a fish species is so inspirational.

“He sure loves his quotes, huh?” comes a voice from his left. “Ugh, they’re all so cheesy.”

“Yeah, they’re really…”

He trails off when he realizes who exactly he’s talking to — JYP High’s notoriously joyless cheer captain. People always say it with humor and from a place of love, but the wry smile you have on makes the statement seem serious. It’s a particular kind of smile, one that makes you look like you’re perpetually rolling your eyes. One that doesn’t really match with your jaunty red and white cheerleading uniform.

“Really what?” you ask as you sit into your seat. There’s no mockery in your voice, which surprises him for some reason; people only tease you about your overly cynical demeanor, so why does it feel strange? Right, it’s because you seem like — and look like, if he’s being honest — the mean head cheerleader from every teen movie made.

“Lame. Some of them don’t even make sense. Like, what’s so great about carp?”

You let out a sharp laugh, and Jeongin is unreasonably proud about it. “I hate that one so much. I swear, every English and lit teacher has it hanging up somewhere. ‘Seize the day.’ If I see that one more time, there will be no more days for them to seize.”

He shakily laughs and redirects his attention to the scratched surface of his desk. Someone has carved a frowny face with x-ed out eyes, which perfectly exemplifies how he feels.

“Jeongin, right?” you continue. Thank goodness you took his remark as a joke. “You’re a junior?”

“Sophomore,” he shyly replies, rubbing his still-burning ears.

“Seriously? I thought they only let juniors and seniors take advanced lit.”

“Miss Wang talked to the counselors about it last year since she knew I liked reading the classics, and I guess she thought I was doing well enough in her class, so the school made me take a placement test to see if I could be put in. I had to analyze some passages and write some essays…” He’s talking too much, so he stops there and goes back to looking at his desk.

“You nerd. And a literary one at that,” you say, though it sounds more like a compliment than an insult. “Please tell me you’re not one of those pretentious critics that scoffs at any piece of modern writing ‘cause those guys suck.”

Unfortunately, Jeongin doesn’t get the chance to reassure that he’s not a pretentious critic because class resumes. You rest your head on a propped up arm, and your glittery bow tilts in the same direction. Pretty.

The bow, that is.

Several days later, Jeongin is sitting frozen in his seat, waiting for someone to say something.

There are a few things worse than the entire room going quiet after one has presented their argument. Jeongin would know as he’s currently living in that moment. Is it an impenetrable argument — can you even call it an argument if it’s that indisputable? — or is it so outrageously awful that everyone needs a moment to fully take in the amount of stupidity he put forth? Even Changbin and Wooyoung are oddly silent.

“I disagree,” you say, bursting the bubble of anxiety welling inside him and creating a new one altogether. He should have just stuck with the easiest interpretation rather than try to impress the class. “I think you make an interesting case, but weather is traditionally used to reflect the characters’ emotions and not the other way around.”

“Yeah, but imagine being stuck inside a creepy mansion while it’s constantly storming outside,” Wooyoung counters. “Wouldn’t you go insane too?”

“I’m pretty sure the cheer-less-leader would like the gloom,” Changbin teases. To almost no one’s surprise, you smirk and nod. “I swear, rainy days are the only times you’re actually peppy outside of a rally.”

Mr. Kim, however, still hasn’t gotten used to the gentle ribbing you get from your classmates. “There’s no need for personal attacks,” he says, to which you assure him that it was not a personal attack but a fact. “Does anyone else have anything to add? Chaeyoung? We haven’t heard from you yet.”

Chaeyoung agrees with your stance. In fact, most of the class does, Changbin and Wooyoung being the only exceptions because they enjoy playing devil’s advocate. Jeongin is thoroughly embarrassed, and even more so when someone points out that correlation does not mean causation, rendering Jeongin’s argument useless in the face of statistics. He sinks a little lower into his seat.

After an excruciating amount of time — there is no way thirty minutes is that long — the bell rings. Mr. Kim reminds everyone that the first draft of the analysis essay is due in two weeks. The class lets out a collective groan.

“Time will go by quickly, so don’t procrastinate.”

Jeongin shuts his book, leaving a folded sheet of notebook paper as a bookmark. That essay’s the last thing on his mind as of now. He’s halfway out the door when he hears you mumble to yourself, “Well, that was fun.”

“Not really,” he mutters, mostly to himself. However, since you’re standing right behind him, you hear his reply.

“I think Mr. Kim was impressed,” you say as you fall into step beside him. You’re holding two thick textbooks along with your fancy metal water bottle, and Jeongin debates whether or not  to help you with your books. That would be the polite thing to do, but he’s not feeling too polite towards you after what happened. “I mean, you did argue the opposite of every single literary weather analysis, and you made it sound kind of reasonable. That essay’s gonna be easy for you.”

He parses those compliments in his head, looking for the slightest tinge of sarcasm. He doesn’t find any. “Thanks.”

“You’re welcome, but say it like you mean it next time.” You give him a half-smile, a cross between your peculiar one and a genuine one. He blushes. “Anyway, have fun in math. It gets even harder next year.”

Jeongin glances at the trigonometry textbook in his hand, deciding not to tell you that he’s not that bad at math. You would just call him a nerd again, and a math nerd seemed worse than a literature one for some reason.

Probably because you seem to prefer reading over solving equations and proofs.

He does too.

The fall rally means two things: one, he doesn’t have to be in class for an hour and two, he has a chance to see what you’re like when you’re in Cheerleader Mode. He overheard Changbin joking that you saved all your energy for performances during class, and he’s seemingly correct.

Your sunny demeanor is so stark compared to your usual cynicism, it’s hard to believe that they’re not from two different people. There’s no lazy cat languor in the way you cheer; all the stunts you perform are sharp and polished, and wow, if he isn’t impressed by the series of flips you pull off near the end. You land into a split in front of the finished human pyramid, grinning from ear to ear. It’s only when the crowd applauds and when the music stops does your grin melt into the particular smile Jeongin identifies you with.

When he sees in advanced lit, you’re still in your uniform, a frown on your face as you jot down the homework assignments from the classes you missed earlier.

“You did great today,” he greets.

You momentarily look up at him, startling him with your sour expression. “Then you must have closed your eyes during the ending.”

“What? I thought it was amazing.”

You shake your head. “I was supposed to finish at the same time the girl on the top made it to the top. I miscounted my flips and did one extra, ugh. Everyone worked so hard, and I screwed it all up at the end. Anyway, thanks. I’m glad you had fun at least.”

“No problem, but” — he’s already blushing, and he hasn’t even said the lines yet — “say it like you mean it next time.”

“Don’t you use my own words against me.” That wry smile returns. You sigh and shut your planner, shoving it to the corner of your desk. The passing period bell still hasn’t rung yet, so you turn to him again. “So Jeongin, literary nerd, how’s that essay going?”

“I’m done. Which prompt did you pick? I did mine on the narrative structure.” He initially planned to write about the landscape and weather, but after that discussion, he decided it was best that he stay away from that topic for a while.

“Yeah, me too. Wanna swap papers during peer review?”

“Yes!” he says too quickly.

“Great. You better not hold back with your comments. Be brutally honest. I want my essay to look like it's been drenched in blood when you’re done with it.”

Two days later, Jeongin is finding that to be rather difficult because you are underselling yourself as a writer. He has heard your points in class discussions before, and they’re always well-thought-out. On paper though, he imagines that this is what you’re like when you’re in Cheer Captain Mode: assertive and matter-of-fact.

Most of his suggestions are about your paragraph transitions and better phrasing, nothing about the actual quotes or their respective pieces of analysis. When Jeongin gets his essay back, his is the one that looks like it has been drenched in blood. He scans through the comments. In the empty space on the last page, in giant red letters reads, “Tighten up your arguments and HAVE SOME CONFIDENCE!”

He’s unsure if this is a personal attack or a motivational speech.

“What does this mean?” he asks.

You lean over, your shoulder only a few centimeters away from his. He could kiss your temple right now if he wanted, and the sudden thought of that makes him flinch.

“Oh, sorry. That was probably my hair,” you say as you draw back. “Anyway, this means exactly what it says. Even though you have good points, you write like you’re unsure about it, which makes you seem less credible. You’re a sophomore in a junior-senior class; you’re smarter than you think you are. So have some confidence.”

He doesn’t really have that much left after reading your paper. Nonetheless, he says, “Okay. And thanks for editing.”

“Thank you to you too.”

You shuffle your papers back together and ask Changbin if he could look over it. Jeongin then trades essays with Felix, who sits catty corner to him. Felix is a junior, a fact Jeongin only knows because that was his interesting fact about himself during ice breakers before Mr. Kim made him choose an actual interesting fact. Jeongin sighs in relief when he sees that Felix’s essay is not nearly as good as yours. At least he knows that not everyone else’s writing skills aren’t as intimidating.

It takes nearly a fortnight for him to realize it, but Jeongin is pretty sure he has a crush on you. It’s either that or he’s holding himself to very high standards of analysis. Your message to “have some confidence” rang in his ears as he made edits to his paper, and he kept checking your facial expressions during class discussions to see if you approve of his argument or not. Then he started noticing the little things, like that little eyebrow raise you do before doling out a snarky remark. Your jackets are always too large, so one side always ends up halfway down your arm before you hastily pull it back up.

“Hey,” you say as you turn to him after finishing your conversation with Changbin. “Are you busy after school on Friday?”

This can’t be what he thinks it is. There’s no way you like him. “I don’t think so,” he squeaks out, ears burning.

“Great. Or maybe not. Anyway.” You open the cover of your topmost textbook and hold out a purple flyer to him. “The cheer team has a fundraiser at FroYoZen. If you show them this, we’ll get twenty percent, so come if you can and bring your friends.”

He takes the flyer and carefully folds into halves. “I might be able to go.”

“Well, I’ll be there, so I’ll know if you actually show up or not.”

Oh, he’s definitely going to go, and he’s going to drag as many people as he can with him. That should make you happy.

Unfortunately, he only manages to convince Beomgyu and Chaeryeong, though Chaeryeong is there more for “cheer-dance solidarity” rather for Jeongin’s sake. He stands in line with his flyer, scanning the tables to see if you are there. Despite half the cheer team being there, he sees you seated by a window with a stack of purple flyers and a cup of yogurt in a perfectly matching color. You’re dutifully doing homework.

“That’s the cheer captain,” Chaeryeong informs when she sees him staring at you. Luckily, you’re too busy with homework to notice that he had been staring.

“She sits next to me in lit. She told me about this.”

Beomgyu and Chaeryeong are stunned by this news, but Jeongin is pretty sure he’s mentioned you before. Well, maybe not by name, now that he thinks about it.

“Is she actually like what people say she is?” Beomgyu asks.

The memory of Changbin calling you a “cheer-less-leader” plays in his head. “Kind of, but she’s nice and really smart.”

“Can you ask her if she’s eating taro or ube, and if it’s good, for me?” Chaeryeong interjects. “Since you know her and all.”

As much as Jeongin would like to talk to you, he’s not sure if he wants to do it in a crowded frozen yogurt shop with dozens of his classmates around. You’re popular, he’s not, and while the social hierarchy at JYP High doesn’t really exist, it still feels awkward to him.

“I just sit next to her…” he weakly protests as Chaeryeong pushes him along, using him as a human shield as they approach you. Beomgyu calls for them to hurry before the line moves up too far. “Why don’t you do it?”

“Because I don’t know her and you do.”

“She’s not as scary as people make her out to be.”

“I know, but I still feel weird about it.”

“It’s one question.”

“Don’t you want to talk to her?”

He stutters out an incoherent response. Jeongin stops at your table, Chaeryeong peeking from behind his back. “Hi,” he says to you, his pitch much higher than normal.

“Hey…” You finally glance up from your notebook. “Oh, you did come. And you brought a friend too. You’re on the dance team, right? With your sister?”

Chaeryeong shyly nods.

“Your routine during fall rally was sick. Anyway, thanks for coming and supporting the cheer team,” you say. “Make sure you show them the flyer during checkout. There’s a bunch here if you need one.”

Chaeryeong takes one even though she has one in her pocket and nudges Jeongin. With more embarrassment than normal, he asks about the flavor you chose. “It’s the same color as the flyers.”

“Yeah, I did that on purpose. Ube’s my favorite flavor here.” You flash Jeongin and Chaeryeong that particular smile. “It’s cheesy, I know, but red and white is really boring for a fundraiser. Might as well pick a good color, am I right? Also, you guys might wanna get in line before it gets too long.”

Chaeryeong nods and waits for Jeongin, but he doesn’t want frozen yogurt anymore. “You can go ahead. Get me mango if I’m not back in time.” he tells her, and she bounds off to Beomgyu who is anxiously glancing at them. To you: “I wanted to ask you if you got your grade for the essay yet.”

“No, I’ve been checking. He said ‘by the end of the day,’ but who knows if he means by the end of the workday or the actual day.” You sigh and readjust your falling jacket sleeve. “Did you get yours yet?”

He shakes his head. “I’m sure you did good.”

“It’s Mr. Kim. He’s known to be a harsh grader.” You sigh again and pick up your pencil. “We’ll see what happens. Thanks for coming.”

You say it like you mean it, and something inside Jeongin bursts with confetti. “Thanks for letting me know about this.”

He also means it.

Grades are inputted in at midnight, and Jeongin’s first instinct is to tell you about the amazing 91% he received, only to realize that he has no way to contact you. He finds your social media and spends far too much time contemplating whether he should follow you or not. He wants to, he really wants to. He loves your profile picture: a candid of you leaning against a lit street light in the dark, your deadpan expression juxtaposed with the rose gold balloons you hold. It perfectly captures you.

But is it weird to do so? Would you suspect something if he did add you?

@cheerlessleader stares back at him, daring him to do so. He almost brings himself to press the button. Almost.

When he finally sees you Monday afternoon, he feels like he’s about to combust with all of the good news inside him. You finally finish your conversation with Changbin after what feels like an eternity.

“Grades went in,” he blurts out.

“You got a good grade, didn’t you? Look at this fountain of joy over here,” you call out to no one in particular. You smile. He loves your smile so much, especially when it’s directed at him. “So what did you get?”

He tells you with all of the confidence that he has, and you nod approvingly. “That’s great. Nice job, lit nerd.”

It sounds so pretty when you say it; it rolls off your tongue so easily, more like you’re singing than speaking. “It was because of your comments.”

“As much as I appreciate your flattery, you’re forgetting about your own writing skill. Stop doubting yourself. You’re too young for that.” Your jacket sleeve falls down, and Jeongin wants to pull it back up for you, to cover your exposed shoulder. Mr. Kim’s classroom is always freezing.

“What did you get?” he asks to distract himself.

You tug at your jacket collar. “96. Apparently, I’ve got ‘a little bit of confirmation bias.’ I can’t wait to see his actual comments on the essay, not just that little blurb he writes in the gradebook.”

Jeongin’s blurb is about his “extraneous and unnecessary details” and “looser-than-ideal structure.” “96 is amazing.”

“Thanks. 91’s amazing too.”

“Amazing” is too bright of a word for you to use, especially since your usual speaking tone borders on impassive. But he can tell the difference between your normal drawls and gibes now. Changbin is usually on the receiving end of your playful derision. Your words drip with sarcasm like honey from a spoon, deceiving the recipient momentarily with its sweetness, slowly covering them in its heaviness. It’s a very dramatic affair from Jeongin’s point of view.

He would love to get a taste, a true taste, none of that watered down stuff you serve him.

Beomgyu is one of his closest friends, and therefore knows something is off about Jeongin. “Hello? Are you even listening?”

“Yeah.” To all of his friends, Jeongin has been staring off into the distance for the past five minutes, but the truth is, he’s been observing you at your lunch table for the past five minutes. There’s a football game tonight, so you’re in your uniform, your iridescent bow shining in the sun. Jeongin has this stupid notion in his head that you’ll notice him and wave hello when you catch his eye.

“What’s the color of my homecoming dress?” Ryujin asks.

He snaps to attention after noticing everyone’s eyes on him. Ryujin’s question echoes in his ears, and he tries to play back the snippets of conversation he might have overheard. He swears they were chatting about peach drinks, not homecoming. It’s all white noise though. “Blue?” he guesses.

“Light or dark?”

“Dark?”

“Trick question,” she says, satisfied. She spoons a colorful blob out from her fruit cup. “I’m not going to homecoming.”

While Chaeryeong protests and while Beomgyu gets dragged into their bickering, signaling to an oblivious Jeongin for help, Jeongin is back to watching you make disgusted faces as your friends try hot sauce on apples. When Jeongin has finally given up on getting your attention, Ryujin is still adamant on not going to the dance.

“I’ll go if the boys go,” she says, clearly assuming that neither of them are interested.

“Well, I’m going now just to piss you off,” Beomgyu says. Chaeryeong cheers.

Ryujin is sending Jeongin warning glares, but he simply shrugs them off. “Yeah, I’ll go.”

The lunch table devolves into chaos: Ryujin aggressively flicks water at the Beomgyu and Jeongin, Jeongin tries to shield his books from water damage, and Chaeryeong pleads with her to go dress shopping together. On the surface, it appears that Jeongin has agreed to go to the dance just to spite his friend. That’s only partially why he’s going though.

Before advanced literature can begin, he turns to you to ask you what homecoming’s like — he wants to know if you’re going, but this seems like a more innocuous way of finding out — but you speak first.

“Did you hear about our final?”

He hasn’t.

“An ‘in-depth character analysis, complete with comparisons to other characters from any media.’ Ugh, I thought we were done with this book already. This has to be Mr. Kim’s favorite book or something.”

“It could be worse,” he volunteers. He’s itching to ask you, so he says it without any pretense. “Have you been to homecoming before?”

“Okay, look, I know my whole thing is ‘the cynical cheerleader,’ but I do cheerleader-y things too.” Dry wit, but none of it is about him. Your signature smile doesn’t accompany it, and your tone morphs into something more neutral. “What do you wanna know? It’s definitely not as fancy as prom, if that’s what you’re wondering.”

“What’s it like?”

“Kind of boring, if I’m being honest. You just hang out with your friends and talk, maybe dance if you’re feeling extra alive that night. Take pictures in front of the balloon arch and pretend that you’re not actually inside the gym.”

His heart drops. He hopes his voice doesn’t betray him when he asks, “So you’re not going this year then?”

You laugh a little, and the smile shows up, instantly soothing his worries. “No, I am. It’s my senior year. I might as well.”

That’s all he needed to know.

Like you told him, homecoming is a little boring. JYP High’s football team did win their game yesterday, so everyone at the dance is in high spirits, but the event itself isn’t as exciting as teen movies made it out to be. Pictures are taken in front of the arch, in front of the painted ocean scene, in front of the extremely out-of-place red padding on the gymnasium walls.

Jeongin scans the sea of people for you, getting hopeful every time he sees something green. He overheard you talking to Chaeyoung about rewearing last year’s dress, and Changbin complimented the color, saying it reminded him of the wooden grass cutouts they had for the Alice in Wonderland theme but “in a good way.” However, the dimness of the building doesn’t help.

While taking (another) picture in front of (another) painted whale, he hears Changbin’s and Wooyoung’s distinct voices above the hum of the dance. You’re standing near them by the octopus cutout, posing for pictures with a few of your cheer members. Even in the low light, you’re stunning in your short flared dress. You mockingly twirl for the camera, your skirt still spinning with motion when you stop. You smirk and push your shoulder forward, batting your eyelashes in the most coy manner he has ever seen. Then you dissolve into laughter as your members look on with horror when they realize how un-you you’re being. He can’t stop the growing smile on his face.

The sound of a shutter goes off, and Beomgyu lowers his arm and hands the phone back to Chaeryeong. Your cheer members have dispersed, and you melt your way into Changbin and Wooyoung’s circle.

“There’s an octopus!” Ryujin points out. Jeongin never knew about her enthusiasm for them, but he’s grateful for it as she drags them all to where you just were. She plants herself firmly in the center of the cutout.

“Jeongin, ask her to take it for us,” Chaeryeong says, shoving her phone into his hand and using him again as a human shield to get to you. “You know her.”

The same nervous feelings from before arise, and he’s sufficiently red when he finally reaches you. He stiffly holds out Chaeryeong’s phone, being careful to look at your face and not anywhere else. Seeing you up close now is like the opposite of looking at a Monet.

“H-hi. Could you take a picture for us?” he manages to get out. “You look nice, by the way,” he adds in a hurried breath.

“Flattery always works. And thanks.” You say it like you mean it. “Nice tie. I think Changbin’s wearing the exact same one.”

Jeongin’s not wearing a tie.

He fiddles with his shirt collar, wondering if he should have worn one after all. At the octopus, you snap a few pictures of him and his friends, an amused grin appearing as Beomgyu gives Jeongin and Ryujin bunny ears with his fingers. Chaeryeong bounds forward to see how the photos turned out, and Jeongin follows closely behind, mostly so he can be near you again.

“I like your dress,” he shyly tells you as Chaeryeong scrolls through her camera roll.

“What other favors do you need? If it’s stealing the octopus, you should probably ask them,” you say, gesturing toward Changbin and Wooyoung.

“I was just complimenting you.”

“Sure you were.” You turn to Chaeryeong. “Did the pictures turn out okay?”

She beams and nods. “Yes! Thank you so much.”

You wave them off and head back to your friends, returning Wooyoung’s challenge to a dance battle with a snarky retort. Your remark about dancing echoes in his head. Does he dare to do it? And during an event where no one is actually dancing? He takes a step in your direction, eyes trained on your back—

“Shark!” interrupts Beomgyu, disbelief and excitement coloring his cries when he spots the poster. “Let’s go.”

Jeongin follows his friends and situates himself right under the shark’s gaping maw. When he smiles for the camera, it’s because he’s watching you. Your lips are curled into a smirk as you listen to Changbin’s taunts, but even from this distance, he can see the genuine happiness shining through. You catch his eye and wave at him, sending his heart racing.

Carpe Diem!

Today is the day Jeongin seizes the day.

The golden quote by his head has been a reminder of your first interaction with him, and though he can still hear your sharp laugh over it’s cheesiness, it’s a perfect description of what Jeongin’s going to do after school.

Last weekend, he finally worked up the nerve to follow you. He nearly squealed with delight when he saw that you followed me back. Plus, you liked his photos from the homecoming dance and his latest one of his poke bowl. That had to mean something.

So that is why Jeongin is standing in line at FroYoZen, ordering ube yogurt instead of his usual mango. Cheer practice is still going on, but he needs to be back on campus before it’s over. He needs to catch you at the perfect moment and present your favorite dessert to you and ask if you would like to go out with him and wait anxiously for your reply. Just thinking about it makes him dizzy.

When he makes it back to school — thank goodness the store isn’t two far away — practice is still ongoing, judging by the lack of people hanging around the parking lot. Jeongin makes himself comfortable on the steps leading to the main building and watches the building doors. Your carefully packaged yogurt is sitting in the shade of his backpack. He would rather you eat it when it hasn’t been completely turned into a puddle, but practice is going longer than he expected.

“Hey,” he hears Changbin say.

Jeongin meekly says hello back. He doesn’t know Changbin that well since he sits on the other side of the room; you’re his only connection to him.

“You waiting for someone too?” Changbin asks. He sits down beside him, stretching his legs and his arms.

“Yeah.”

“How’s your final essay going?”

“I haven't started yet. What about you?” Why is practice so long?

“Same. I don’t know why he told us a month early. It’s not like anyone’s actually going to work on it.”

Jeongin nods and is frantically trying to come up with another response when the main doors swing open. Two girls he recognizes come out, holding their sparkly pom poms and water bottles. Another girl, this time with a duffel bag. Then you and another senior girl, chatting about another fundraiser, pausing under the veranda to finish the conversation. After you’re done discussing the finer points of Friday nights versus Saturday nights, you start making your way towards the parking lot. When you see him, you raise your eyebrows and your mouth quirks up.

“You seriously waited for me?”

Jeongin smiles and nods. “Y—”

“I told you I would,” Changbin says, standing up to greet you. “I can’t believe you didn’t trust me.”

“Yeah, ‘cause last time I trusted you, I ended up eating fruit with hot sauce!” You shake your head, more with amusement than annoyance, and notice the yogurt cup. “Ube or taro? If it’s ube, you make good choices.”  

“It’s ube,” he replies. His fingers wrap around the container, but he hesitates about giving it to you right now. Changbin being here wasn’t part of his plan.

You nod approvingly. “Nice. Are you waiting for someone?”

“Yeah.”

“I think the dance team is almost done.”

Jeongin just smiles stiffly and wonders if he should just go for it now. He sets the yogurt onto his lap and finds that no words are coming to his head. The speech he had prepared two days ago has been erased from his mind. His heart is beating too fast, the sun is too low in the sky and directly in his eyes, and your gift is slowly melting in his hold.

“See you on Monday,” you tell him as you begin to walk down the steps with Changbin.

All he needs to do is get up and follow you. He’s halfway up when he sees Changbin throw an arm around your shoulder. You make a noise but don’t pull away. Jeongin sits back down.

“You seriously waited two hours for me?” you say. “I was just going to ask Tzuyu for a ride.”

“You know I’m not actually a lousy boyfriend, right? Whatever bad things Yeri has said about me is a lie.”

“Oh, so they’re definitely true then.”

You gasp when he shoves you away and chase after Changbin when he sails down the rest of the stairs. Your red and white pom poms swing back and forth in your hand as you shout in your loud Cheerleader Voice for him to “get back here!”

He’s such an idiot. Why didn’t he see it before? Changbin is always around you, playing devil’s advocate to all your arguments, teasing you. Your social media handle is his nickname for you! All this time, he just thought Changbin was a friend — a really, really good friend.

The main doors swing open again, and the dance team comes out, just like you promised, but he doesn’t even notice. He doesn’t even realize going to school the following Monday; all he knows is that it was torture. Tuesday is torture. Wednseday is torture and basically every day sitting beside you is torture now that he knows he can’t ever go out with you. You still act the same towards him, sharing complaints about homework and teasing him for being a nerd, but he can’t joke or make you laugh like he used to. His feelings for you melt like yogurt in his hands: an ungraspable liquid that seeps through his fingers, falling helplessly to the ground, yet ever still so present, sticky and uncomfortable.

~ ad.gray

Extra: Changbin’s oxymoron is supposed to be salty sweetheart.

Thank you so much for the compliments! Hope you enjoyed this! <3

#stray kids #skz #in #yang jeongin #jeongin #stray kids imagines #stray kids scenarios #skz imagines #skz scenarios #in imagines #in scenarios #in x reader #jeongin scenarios #jeongin imagines #jeongin x reader #high school au #fem reader #20210819

[julemmaes]

We Have To

Nesta Archeron x Cassian modern au

A/N: I’M SO SORRY THIS IS SOME WEEKS LATE, BUT I MADE IT, I DID IT!!!!

@darkshadowqueensrule ELLA THIS IS FOR YOU. I HOPE YOU ENJOY THIS FLUFFY;) THING AS MUCH I DID PLANNING AND WRITING IT AND I HOPE IT BRINGS YOU JOY

Word count: 3,098

Cassian had so much to do that day that he cursed himself for not thinking of everything sooner. He had already bought the flowers for Nesta, who lay in the seat next to him, and the smell of the food and spices their neighbor had given him was already intoxicating him. He just hoped it wouldn't get too cold by the time they got to Azriel and Emerie's house. They were all going to be there, as they did every year, to celebrate Nesta's birthday in company, but before joining their family, Cassian had to pick up each of his four children from school.

He arrived almost immediately at the school of the youngest, Alesia and Becan, and smiled when he saw them on the edge of the sidewalk, waiting for the line of cars to flow by until theirs would appear in the parking lot.

They were only a year apart, but Alesia was the oldest, and in the last year she had grown so much that Cassian's heart ached every time he looked at her. She was starting to look like Nesta and he couldn't have been happier, even though she was losing the light blonde hair that was being replaced by the classic light brown color of the Archeron sisters.

Becan, on the other hand, looked exactly like Leka, his oldest son, and both were the exact copy of Cassian, it was as if they weren't even Nesta's children. Both of his little men looked older than they were, and they never failed to have that silly, cocky grin on their faces - as Nesta used to point out.

When the two children saw the familiar car they lit up, pointing him out to the teacher and starting to run towards him. Alesia was the first to catch up and got in right away, pulling up Becan's backpack, which at times seemed to tower over him as big as it was.

"Hello gorgeous." said Cassian turning to his children.

"Hi daddy!" they both yelled.

He reached out a hand to his daughter's head, fixing her hair behind her ear and then turned to his son, "What did you guys do today?"

Becan was arranging his backpack next to him with a frown on his face, "I had English and we got to plurals and the teacher said we're great, but I didn't understand why I can't say foots." concluded the youngest looking directly at him. Alesia beside him giggled, turning to face her father as well.

Cassian's eyes went wide with amusement, restraining himself from laughing, "What do you mean?"

"Why do I have to say feet?" the boy asked, arching an eyebrow, "Why can't I just say foots, or mouses?" then he shrugged, curling the corner of his mouth, "We'll never know."

"It's the irregulars," Alesia beat him to the punch, still looking at him for approval. Cassian smiled at her and nodded slightly, "There are no real rules, you just have to read a lot of texts."

A car in line behind them honked and Cassian huffed, turning back to the steering wheel, "Seatbelts please." he waited to hear the click of both children before driving off towards Xhuli's school, his first daughter. He turned on the radio, keeping the volume low enough to hear what his children were telling him.

He was more relaxed than in years past, oddly enough. He was always so fidgety during this time of year, and when Nesta's birthday came around, he couldn't help but remember all the times they had been young and celebrated for days on the beaches of Adriata, waiting for the sun to go down and rise the next day from over the mountains. He couldn't help but think of all the little gifts he gave her - the shells, the stones, the flowers - that Nesta had kept throughout the years to come and that still sat on the middle shelf of the bookcase in their room.

He thought about how the light from the coastal region was a gift from the gods, the way it had lit up Nesta's clear eyes every holy time, making them shine just for him.

He sighed, running a hand through his hair, focusing on his daughter's words.

"Then during the break Ella gave me a piece of her snack and I gave her a piece of mine," Alesia yawned, then nodded thoughtfully, "She's nice."

"And did you manage to do the geography test or was it too hard?" he asked her, turning into the street of Xhuli's school.

"It went well, I think," she murmured, "although I couldn't remember the name of the mountains in Illyria, what are they called?" she asked curiously, leaning forward. Cassian restrained himself from telling her to sit down in the seat, as an unnatural fear welled up inside him.

He cast a glance at Becan as well, to make sure he was buckled in properly as well.

"Myrmidons." sighed Cassian, returning his eyes to the road as his heart sped up in his chest.

"Yeah!" shouted Alesia, grunting, "The Myrmidons." then slammed a hand on her forehead dramatically.

"Are we going to Uncle Az's?" asked Becan suddenly.

Cassian parked the car under the big oak tree where he always waited for Xhuli to get out of school and unbuckled his belt, turning to face his kids, "We have to pick up Leka first, then we'll stop by mom's and then we'll all go to Az's together, yeah." he replied, reminding them that they wouldn't be eating at home today and they wouldn't have to wait for the oldest to come back with the bus. Becan nodded, yawning as well, and Alesia laughed, reaching over to stick a finger in his mouth until he had it wide open.

Cassian laughed when Becan closed his teeth on her finger and Alesia wailed, retracting her hand instantly afterwards.

The little boy unbuckled his belt, "Can I show you what I made for mommy?" he asked his dad. Cassian nodded excitedly, smiling at him, but feeling his heart tighten in his chest, "It's not beautiful, but the teacher said it's the thought that counts."

At that he snorted, because it sounded like something Teacher Aelin might have said, but the laugh was short-lived, because Becan showed him a drawing of them. It wasn't a masterpiece, as the child had already anticipated, but you could see how much effort he had put into coloring inside the lines, going over the edges with markers. He and Nesta were in the middle of the paper and holding hands, lying on what Cassian imagined were beach towels on the sand, while their four children were all in the water and playing catch.

"It's Adriata." he whispered, swallowing noisily and handing the drawing back to his son, "It's really beautiful, you've improved so much since last year."

Becan beamed all over, thanking him and settling back in his seat, bringing the drawing to his lap. Cassian turned around when he heard his new teenager's voice ring out not far from them and smiled, seeing that she was running to the car, waving her hand at him. He raised his own, waving back.

"And I made this card," the little girl said, pushing something shiny between the two front seats. Cassian wanted to laugh at the amount of pink and gold glitters on that thing. "But I don't know if mom will like this cause it's very sparkly."

"I'm sure she'll love it." he said, smiling reassuringly at his daughter through the rearview mirror. "What did you write inside?"

"That I love her and that I-" she couldn't finish the sentence, because Xhuli had flung the door wide open.

"Hello everyone!" she squealed, picking up the flowers and putting them on her legs, getting into the car. She turned to Cassian, leaving a quick kiss on his cheek and turning to her siblings right after, "Are you ready to play ride or die all afternoon?" she cheered them on with a bright smile on her face.

Alesia and Becan shrieked in delight, jerking their hands in the air and Cassian shook his head, his eyes wide, "Why do you always have to instigate them to play that awful game?" he asked her as he settled into his seat, "Someone always ends up getting hurt and crying."

Xhuli chuckled, shrugging, "It's always Tedian or Daorsa anyway."

Cassian looked at her open-mouthed, "Xhuli."

"What?" she asked equally dumbfounded, then huffed, looking ahead, "Even Uncle Rhys always says they're whiners and should learn to take jokes," she told him with a pointed look, "And he's their father."

He shook his head, running his hand over his face, "If your mother were here-"

"She'd tell me to make them cry harder probably," Xhuli chuckled again, "Come on you go, I can't wait to eat Aunt Emerie's meat pie."

"Belts." laughed Cassian, not leaving until he was sure everyone was buckled in.

The drive to Leka's high school was longer, considering he was studying downtown, but Cassian relaxed a bit as Xhuli distracted the little ones, focusing on the road.

"I got a nine in literature today," the oldest daughter said, catching his attention. Shifting his gaze to her for a moment he noticed that she was torturing her hands, playing with one of the rings Nesta left her.

He gave her a warm smile, "It's a really good grade, I'm proud of you."

"And I finished the correction before the others, so I did something for mom," she said in a more uncertain voice, starting to rummage through her backpack. He couldn't see her face, but he knew her cheeks were red. "It's crap."

Cassian really didn't understand where all the low self-esteem that seemed to be in each of his children that day was coming from. He guessed that the idea of doing something that Nesta might not like scared them as much as it had scared him in the early days of dating.

They stopped at a red light and Xhuli held out the small blue piece of paper toward him.

He opened his eyes wide again, admiring the way she'd folded each corner, where she'd decorated the still visible parts of the paper, until it was a beautiful heron in flight.

"Baby," he breathed, "I know I'm supposed to scold you for doing this at school, but-" he chuckled, shaking his head, "it's beautiful." and a relieved, very short laugh escaped her lips.

"Thanks, dad."

They arrived shortly thereafter at Leka's school, who was standing on the sidewalk and looking annoyed. When the car stopped just ahead of where he was, Becan unbuckled his seatbelt, shifting into the middle seat, but his older brother opened the passenger door, nodding to Xhuli, "Get in the back."

"Excuse me?" his sister asked, genuinely shocked.

Leka clenched his jaw and looked at her with dark eyes. Cassian knew immediately that something was wrong.

The son huffed, "I said go to the back."

"No," Xhuli shook her head, "I got here first and you're always in the front."

"Stop that right now," his father scolded them both. Then he crossed Leka's gaze and his son looked over the car, across the road.

Xhuli had a deep frown on her face, "He started it."

Cassian sighed, looking at the girl, "Could you please get in the back?" when she gaped, he clasped his hands around the steering wheel, "I know, you're already sitting in the front and it would be so much easier and faster if he just got in the back, but it's a hard day for him and-"

"It's not hard just for him," she retorted, in a tone of voice Cassian had never heard her use. She sounded like Nesta at that moment, authoritative rather than condescending.

"Please," he whispered, looking into her eyes.

Xhuli must have seen something in his gaze, because she huffed and gathered up her stuff, before walking out and giving her brother a shove. Leka didn't even seem to mind and dropped into the seat next to Cassian, quickly buckling himself in and resting his hood-covered head against the window.

"Leka-"

"Just drive, please," he murmured, not even looking at his father.

The relatively cheerful air that had been there up until that point had disappeared completely, and even when Becan had tried to get his older brother's attention, he hadn't paid any attention to him at all. Xhuli had tried to point out to him that he was being an asshole, but Cassian had snapped at her, and told her to apologize straight away.

They'd started talking about who would give their mom the gift first, and Cassian had more felt than seen, Leka tense up at his siblings' words. He had taken deep, shuddering breaths and it had taken all his strength for the man not to stop and hug his son in the middle of the road.

The second they pulled up in front of the particularly green and overgrown lawn, the three little ones hopped out of the car without even waiting for their father's permission and started running towards what they knew was their mother's gravestone.

Leka looked away from his siblings, shifting his gaze to his father and then his eyes filled with tears, but nothing fell down his cheeks, "I want to leave."

Cassian felt his heart in his throat, his hands trembling around the steering wheel.

"I want to go home, I don't want to go to the uncles," Leka continued, shaking his head, "I want to get out of here."

"Leka..." he tried again, reaching out a hand toward him. His son smacked his arm, pushing him away. Cassian closed his eyes.

"No!" he shrieked into the silence of the cockpit. His eyes were wide and he was struggling to breathe, "Why do we have to do this every year? It's sick." he spat at him.

Cassian shifted his gaze to his children, the ones who were now kneeling in front of his wife's grave. In front of the grave he took such good care of as he had taken care of Nesta while she was alive. Alesia was opening the card she had drawn at school and he saw a pool of glitter fall on the grass in front of them.

He turned to Leka, feeling his eyes water, "We need-"

"We don't need anything." he interjected again, more angrily, "You, you need this thing, because you can't seem to get away from mom."

Cassian jerked back at those words, opening his eyes even wider.

Leka seemed satisfied with that reaction because he continued, "She died five fucking years ago," he spoke through his teeth, "and you still bring me here and make me stand in front of her grave for an hour like it's going to do me any good, like talking to a fucking stone is going to help me." his son's voice cracked at the end of the sentence and tears slid down his skin. Cassian let go of a breath as his heart tightened in his chest more with every word Leka said.

"Stop it, you don't mean that," Cassian murmured, turning toward the gravestone-covered lawns, catching sight of some other relative who had come to visit a lost loved one.

"Yes, dad, I do," Leka shouted, "and being here so long, it hurts me! Just being here makes me so sick I can't breathe, and it makes me miss mom so much I can't think." a sob broke Cassian's breath, and he forced himself to look at his son. Leka was in no better condition than he was. "We come here and I can't think," he sobbed.

His face flushed, his breathing short, tears now falling without concern. He was opening and closing the fingers of his hands, looking for something to distract him from the pain so deep and inescapable that was grief.

Nesta Archeron, mother of four beautiful children and wife of the luckiest man in the world, had died in a car accident just a week after turning thirty-five. It didn't take long to realize that the news had shattered not only the family, but the entire neighborhood.

Cassian didn't remember much about the first few months after Nesta's death, always in a delirious state between anger and despair, but when it had taken shape in his head, when his body and mind had finally been ready to accept that this was now his new reality, another kind of grief, completely different from what he had experienced up until that moment, had taken over.

His children had needed him. And he hadn't been there for them.

Nesta would have been ashamed of him.

That had made him wake up somehow.

The idea of Nesta watching him, from wherever she was at that moment, and judging him for the way he had abandoned everything - for the way he had abandoned their children - had revived him and made him find his place in the lives of his daughters and sons.

And now, as he looked into his son's pitch-brown eyes, he couldn't speak, just as he had years before.

"Dad." Leka begged him in a broken voice, "Please let's go home."

Cassian shook his head, closing his eyes, "I can't."

Leka burst into tears, bringing both hands to his face to cover the grimace of pain and suffering as his body was shaken by loud sobs. Cassian placed a hand on his back, crying silently in turn, and Leka didn't take half a second before he pushed himself to him and let his father cradle him in his arms.

"I miss her so much." whispered Cassian as he wrapped his son up, "Every day."

Leka made a sound much like an animal that had just been shot before he resumed crying more loudly, "I miss mom."

His heart clenched so tightly in his chest that Cassian thought he was going to die, "I know."

"I miss mom." repeated Leka, pressing his face against his chest.

"We'll make it through, for her." murmured Cassian, clasping his hands around his jacket and bringing him as close to him as he could. He could feel Leka shaking, and he just wanted Nesta to be there with them, to help him fix the mess that was their lives. Watching Becan as he picked up the paper bird and flew it high above them, he thought he could never make it without the love of his life, but he still said, "We have to."

A/N: There’s one thing I always tell my readers, be aware of the winky faces;) I leave them anywhere I plan on destroying people’s hearts, so yeah, you’ve kinda been warned about the fact that this was NOT going to be fluff, I hope you liked it anyway, goodnight guys:)

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#nesta archeron #nesta #cassian #nessian #nessian fic #acosf #nessian baby #nessian children #acotar #acomaf #acowar #acofas #acotar ff #a court of silver flames #nesta x cassian #cassian x nesta

[curls-cat]

night by lonesome night

read it on ao3 here!

Sabrina and Red are both chronic insomniacs. It makes sense that they'd fall into step with each other. And from there, fall into feelings.

Conversations between two oft-overlooked girls, late at night. Shared cocoas and shared secrets.

(It’s Sabrina/Red, guys. The audience for this fic is two people. Me and @lesbianedelric That’s literally it.)

//

“I miss color the most,” Red confesses.

It’s after midnight, and she and Sabrina are the only two awake. It happens like this, most of the time. They’re a pair of insomniacs, the two of them. Nightmares. When they can get to sleep, that is. Sometimes they just… can’t.

One or the other of them will go padding down the stairs after either giving up on sleep or after starting awake, sweating and with their hearts pounding. She’ll make her way down the stairs in the dark, put the kettle on, and wait. Before it starts whistling, most nights, the other girl will join.

Some nights they talk. Not every night. Talking can be hard. So can listening. Often, it’s enough to sit in silence, and to know someone else is suffering, too. Tonight, apparently, is not one of those nights.

“You can’t see color anymore?” Sabrina asks.

“Some colors,” Red says. “Everything’s yellows and blues.” She gives a sardonic little laugh. “I can’t even see my own name.”

“Shit,” Sabrina says. She’d like to be more eloquent, but she’s never been particularly good at saying the right thing.

“Yeah,” Red agrees. “And Papa doesn’t— he understands, most of the time, what I’m feeling, but he doesn’t remember colors, not really.”

Sabrina doesn’t have a good answer for that, so she doesn’t say anything, just takes a long drag of her cocoa.

“He still can’t see them,” Red says. “Colors. So even if I got rid of the wolf—”

“Do you want to?” Sabrina asks. “Get rid of it?”

“Sometimes,” Red says.

“I’d’ve thought you’d want it gone all the time,” Sabrina says.

“Why?” Red says. “It can’t be killed. As long as I have it, I can keep it from hurting anyone else.”

Sabrina thinks about her own history of doing the hard thing, of being the monster, so someone else didn’t have to. “Yeah,” she agrees.

Again, they drink their cocoa in silence. It’s heavy, but comfortable.

*

Another night. Today Sabrina is drinking coffee. She won’t be going back to sleep, not after that nightmare. Red hasn’t joined her yet, so Sabrina is alone in the kitchen, no company but the house and its small noises. Wind juddering the windows, rain splatting against the walls and the roof. The creaks of settling floorboards. Her own thoughts, loud and racing.

“Do you want to talk about it?” 

Ah, there’s Red. Sabrina looks up from her cup of coffee to give Red a wan smile. “Not really,” she says. “The kettle’s still hot.”

Red goes to pour herself a cup of water, gives a suspicious look at the jar of instant coffee on the counter, and squints at Sabrina. She shuffles back to the table. 

Sabrina tosses her a teabag. “Chamomile,” she says when Red sniffs it. “One of us should get some sleep tonight.”

Red looks at the little mesh lump for a bit, then takes a long glance at the dark circles under Sabrina’s eyes. She gets up again and goes for the instant coffee herself.

“You don’t even like coffee,” Sabrina protests weakly.

“Neither do you,” Red says.

Fair enough.

Sabrina settles a little to the sound of Red’s slippers moving along the kitchen floor. Red puts an ungodly amount of sugar and milk into her coffee, microwaves it for a little while to offset the milk’s temperature, and makes her way back to the table. It’s a familiar sound. Nothing like the ripping flesh sounds that haunted tonight’s dreams.

“We could watch a movie,” Red suggests. “Or play spit.”

Sabrina shakes her head to both.

“Mario Kart?” Red suggests.

Sabrina shakes her head again. “Let’s just sit here, okay?”

“Sure,” Red says. She takes a sip of her coffee and makes a face.

Sabrina chuckles a little, fondly. She feels more settled into her skin now. More like a human, less like a collection of lit nerve endings. “Here,” she says, standing. She reaches a hand out for Red’s mug, holding her own in the other. “I’ll make us some cocoa.”

Red hands over the mug with more relief than she probably meant to let show on her face.

Now it’s Sabrina’s turn to bustle around the kitchen, turning the kettle back on and rinsing mugs and pulling cocoa out of the cabinets and pouring milk into the mugs to offset the wateryness of the brand of cocoa Granny buys and the whole time feeling the floor under her bare feet, a little too cold but textured and firm and steady and grounding.

“Did Puck get hurt again?” Red asks, once Sabrina’s finally settled down again. “You’ve been better about the bad nights, recently.

“You’ll never see the scars,” Sabrina says. “I’m the only one who’s upset.”

“Yeah,” Red says.

“It’d be easier if I heard from him literally any other time,” Sabrina says, because she said she didn’t want to talk about it, but now that she’s started she doesn’t want anything but to vent to someone, because whatever she and Puck had, it seems like she’s the only one who wants it anymore, and even still sometimes she’s not sure if she wants it at all or if she just wants someone. “But no it’s all ‘I’m off to see the world, you’ll wait at home for me, right? You never wanted adventures anyway!’ Of course I didn’t want adventures! I was twelve! I wanted to feel safe, for once in my life!”

“Do you still want that?” Red asks. “Safety?” There’s something heavy in her tone, something Sabrina doesn’t quite understand.

“I dunno,” Sabrina says, thinking about it. “I mean, yes, of course, but maybe not just safety? And I don’t want safety if it means getting left behind while everyone else is in danger. Does that make sense?”

Red nods. She sips her tea.

“I wish I could just get over him,” Sabrina groans, burying her head in her hands, fingers digging into her hair. “We were never even friends. But my stupid heart wants what it wants.”

“Yeah,” Red says, and it’s heavy, again. Sabrina wishes she understood.

*

Red and Daphne have had a fight, so Sabrina doesn’t even bother going to bed. She has no idea what the fight was about. She wasn’t home for it, because she and Puck went off by themselves to have a long-overdue talk about feelings and what they both want out of life. It turns out, at the moment, what they want is Not Each Other. And she’s not as upset about that as she’d thought. They’re going to try being friends. See if that works. And if it doesn’t, well then? You can’t build a relationship with someone you don’t enjoy spending time with. They’ll see.

She’s not really upset. She thought she would be, but she’s already spent years mourning the death of something they never had. It’s nice to know it’s actually gone.

When they came back, it was obvious that the girls had gotten into it. Daphne was being pointedly chatterboxy, talking to everyone but Red, including Pinocchio. Since Daphne and Pinocchio get along about as well as, well, Sabrina and Puck, that’s always a bad sign. And Red’s eyes were blue. She wasn’t being noisy about it, and she actually looked kind of sad, but her eyes were furious, furious blue.

So Sabrina doesn’t go to bed. She settles in the living room with a book and a pitcher of iced tea, lets the box fan in the window lull her into complacency as the room grows dark around her.

Red appears promptly at eleven, which is when you can be sure everyone else is asleep. Sabrina knows from experience, from her own nights waiting for a little space to mope in peace.

“In here,” Sabrina says without looking up from her book. She waggles the second cup she’d brought into the living room.

Bare feet scuff across the wood, then shff through the plush rug. The couch squeals and shakes as Red sits down on the other side, the kind of heavy plonk that someone as slight as Red can only achieve with intent. There’s some sniffling sounds, and Red’s breath is coming out in hiccup-y heaves.

Sabrina finishes her chapter to give Red time to compose herself.

“What are you reading?” Red asks when Sabrina’s almost done.

“Carmilla,” Sabrina says. “Do you think she’s real?”

“I’ve never read it,” Red says. “What’s it about?”

“Lesbian vampires,” Sabrina says. “It got a youtube series that’s like a modernization or something? My English teacher last year was really into ‘translations of classic works for modern audiences.” She makes her voice mocking, even though she’d been interested, too. Obviously. Otherwise she wouldn’t be reading one of the books listed in the packet.

“Cool,” Red says. “I don’t think vampires are real? But I’d have to check.” She sounds apologetic. “I wasn’t really paying attention ‘til a few years ago.”

“Yeah,” Sabrina says easily. “It’s not that important. I think I’m aware enough that if I start dreaming about a lady coming to chew on my boobs I’ll be able to sound the alarm.”

Red lets out a snort of a laugh, and Sabrina grins to herself. Point, Sabrina.

“Can I vent to you about Daphne?” Red asks after a moment. “Or would you rather I didn’t?”

“There is nothing bad about her that you could say that would surprise me,” Sabrina says drily.

“Are you sure?” Red asks, and there’s a darkness in there that Sabrina recognizes, because she’s felt it, too, when she looks at the way Snow treats Charming. Because she loves Snow, she does. Snow’s wonderful. But she’s not wonderful to Charming, and Charming just lets her hurt him, like he thinks he deserves it.

Ah.

Okay, so Sabrina has some self esteem issues, particularly where it comes to her perfect little sister. Daphne who’s good at magic and good at people and not traumatized and is everything Granny ever wanted in a grandchild and Veronica wanted in a daughter and even when she butts heads with Henry she’s still always so certain she’s got the moral high ground, and Sabrina knows, she knows that Daphne isn’t better than she is. She knows that if it hadn’t been for her, Daphne would be just as messed up as Sabrina is. But still.

“Tell me you weren’t fighting about me,” Sabrina says, tired and a little miserable.

“She’s so mean to you,” Red says, sounding twice as miserable as Sabrina feels, wobbly like she’s gonna start crying again.

Sabrina sighs and raises an arm. “C’mere,” she says.

Red burrows against Sabrina’s side like she was waiting for the invitation. Her arms wrap tight around Sabrina’s middle. They feel right, there. Comfortable. Sabrina settles her own arms around Red’s shoulders, and that feels comfortable too.

“Why do you let her get away with it?” Red asks. “I get it with the grown-ups. They’re adults, and they mean well. But Daphne… she’s my best friend, and I love her a lot, but she isn’t trying to—she doesn’t just want you to grow up to be a different shape of person. She just— she’s just mean. And only to you.”

There’s a lot Sabrina could say to try to explain this to Red. A lot about wanting Daphne to be safe, about needing to be loved by someone, even if that love is broken. About the person Sabrina was before her parents disappeared, and how hard it must have been for Daphne to watch that little girl die, and to see someone furious and always scared walking around wearing her face. About how many times Sabrina took the blame for Daphne because someone had to stay happy. Something had to stay good. And it wouldn’t be Sabrina, would never be Sabrina, was too late for that.

What she says, instead, though, is, “It’s easier, I guess. To let her feel her feelings at me without trying to get her to understand that sometimes people think differently to each other.”

“I hate it,” Red says. “I hate that Granny’s harder on you than everyone, and that your dad treats you like you’re fragile, and your mom is always disappointed in you for doing your best, and that Daphne can’t understand that she’s not helping, she’s making it worse!”

And now Sabrina wants to cry. Because, for once, she feels seen. And loved anyway. And that’s way too rare, that people look at her, really look at her, and like what they see. Want to stand up for it.

“You—” Sabrina swallows, clears her throat. “You don’t have to be my champion.”

“Someone should,” Red grumbles.

“Yeah, well,” Sabrina says. She had something else she wanted to say after, but she can’t fit it out around the lump in her throat.

They hold each other for a long time.

*

Daphne and Red don’t talk for over a week. Sabrina watches with interest. She’s never held out this long against the silent treatment, and it’s fascinating to see someone who’s not only as stubborn and Daphne, but as self-righteous about it. Red’s such a strong person, it’s kind of amazing. She isn’t loud about it, but she’s so, so good. Sabrina’s a little in awe.

The two girls might never have spoken again except that Sabrina manages to wake Daphne with one of her nightmares. Daphne’s usually a pretty damn heavy sleeper, so Sabrina isn’t careful about being quiet anymore. So she screams herself awake without much thought to anything but her own racing heartbeat, and makes her shaky way to the kitchen.

Red joins her there a minute later.

“Was I that loud?” Sabrina asks. She tries to make it a joke, but it doesn’t come off with any kind of levity.

“Yeah,” Red says. She starts making tea.

Sabrina is grateful. She feels too shaky to handle mugs or hot water or anything, really. Too scared. Too certain she’s going to drop something, and get locked away again in the dark by herself.

But she won’t, because that was years ago, now. She never has to go back there, never has to be that tiny scared girl again. She’s older. She knows how to protect herself, and she knows people that she can turn to. She is not alone. See? Red’s here right now, handing her a cup of something hot.

“It was about the orphanage,” she tells Red. “I was alone in the dark, and it was just—I haven’t dreamed about that in forever. I don’t know why it’s coming up now.”

“Cindy would say it’s that you feel safe,” Red answers. “Trauma comes back when you’re finally able to deal with it.”

Sabrina snorts. “Tell that to all the nightmares I’ve been having for the past seven years.”

Red shrugs. “I dunno. I’m not the counselor.”

“How’s that going?” Sabrina asks. “Counseling, I mean.”

“Good,” Red says, “You should try it.”

“Someday,” Sabrina says, and means it. “But I have to be able to talk about it first.”

“Yeah,” Red agrees. “I still haven’t talked about the whole ‘feeling like I deserve to be miserable’ thing.”

Sabrina grimaces. She raises her mug towards Red, her hand only a little shaky. “To thinking we deserve everything we’re getting,” she says.

“Hooray,” Red says, voice dry.

They drink in comfortable silence for a while, and Sabrina begins to find her center. Red always helps her find herself.

“You don’t deserve it,” Red says suddenly. Fiercely, too. “You don’t deserve any of this and screw everyone who thinks you do and made you think so, too.”

“Right back at you,” Sabrina says, though she’s going warm and mushy inside.

“Yeah, well, at least mine aren’t still around to make it worse,” Red mutters.

Sabrina laughs a little, bitterly. “Most of mine are out of my life, Red. There are so many people who screwed me up so much worse than my family.”

“So that make it okay?” Red demands. “Just because they’re not locking you in a basement or starving you or hitting you, it’s fine that they’re hurting you?”

Sabrina shrugs. “I mean. It kinda has to be.”

“No it doesn’t.”

Sabrina lets out a blustery sigh. “What do you want me to do, Red? If Daphne won’t listen to you, she won’t listen to anybody. Except Granny, maybe, but I’ve never been good enough for her, either. No matter how hard I try.”

“I don’t know,” Red mutters. “I just—I can’t sit back and watch it anymore. It feels like I’m condoning it or something. You deserve better.”

“Do I?” Sabrina says. “I’m not a great person, Red.”

“Neither am I!” Red says. “I’ve killed people, Sabrina. Actually killed them. Literally caused them to get eaten. And before you say that that was when I was sick—so what? You’ve been trying to be better every single day I’ve known you. And it’s never good enough for them! Someone needs to cut you some slack and understand that you’re trying! And I know Puck got it, sort of—’

Sabrina’s breath catches in her throat.

“But he didn’t cut you any slack, either! He just figured out how to help you be the kind of better you were trying to be! And that’s not what you need! I know it’s not! I’ve been watching!”

“I don’t want you to lose your best friend over me,” Sabrina says. She’s not worth it.

“Tough,” Red mutters.

Neither of them notice Daphne standing in the doorway. Not until she runs away, sobbing.

*

Red and Daphne sort it out. Daphne starts trying to be nicer to Sabrina. It’s slow going, but progress is made. It’s nice, to feel cared about.

Sabrina tries to pay attention to Red back, because she knows Red has always been good at watching people, looking for what they need, finding quiet ways to give it to them. And sure, they’ve got their cocoa nights (iced tea nights coffee nights chamomile nights), but knowing how someone likes their hot chocolate is different from seeing the ways you can meet their needs in the light of day.

Red’s sweet. And kind. And she tries so hard to make up for her past. She’s got a core of iron in her. She’s wise, in a weird way. She makes brilliant art, even in black and white, or when she can’t see the colors right. Sabrina can help with the colors, at least, can label them clearly. But even when Red gets the colors wrong, it looks cool. Like it was done on purpose.

She also gets overwhelmed when there are too many people around, and has to fight to keep a lid on her temper, always fight the wolf that’s living inside her. She looks at Basil like she’s longing for something she knows she can never have, like she has to hold herself back from being his sister. If she sees bone china something inside her freezes and it takes her a few seconds to come back to herself.

Sabrina notices these things, and keeps noticing. It stops becoming something she does on purpose and becomes something she just does. But it isn’t until she has a nightmare about Red, dead and bleeding, that she puts two and two together.

She’s had nightmares about Red before. But they’ve been the wrong kind of about, the kind that leaves her feeling guilty that she can’t shake her terrible first memories of someone she cares about so much. Not the kind where losing Red is what she’s so afraid of.

And today she doesn’t go to the kitchen, because even though she knows it was just a nightmare, knows Red will be fine, she can’t wait for the other girl to come downstairs, she needs proof right now, needs to know that Red is alive and whole, because she—

She loves her.

And not the way she loves Daphne, or Basil, or her parents or Granny or even Puck. This is not familial love. Nor is it the kind of reluctant passion she and Puck shared, once. No, this is a soft love. A creep-up-on-you kind of love. A love that you can overlook for a long, long time.

Red meets her at the door. “Hi,” she says, surprised. And why shouldn’t she be? This is a break from their tradition of meeting each other downstairs.

Sabrina looks at her, whole and healthy and beautiful, and breaks down crying. Right there on the floor outside Red’s room, she collapses to her knees. Red crouches with her, making shh-ing noises and rubbing Sabrina’s back.

“I’ve gotta tell you something,” Sabrina says, once she’s in control of herself again. Why not? She’s already changed things. What’s a little more? A little bravery, just this once? “And if you don’t want—it’s fine. I just—”

“Sabrina,” Red says, and she’s smiling, a little, tentatively. Glad to see she’s all right, or getting there. “What?”

“I just—my nightmare,” Sabrina starts again. “It was—you were—and I just—” She stops, breathes. “Red. I. I need you to be alive. For, like, ever. Because I—”

“Sabrina,” Red says again, and her tone is different, this time. Cautious, hopeful, shocked. “Sabrina. Do you—”

“I think I went and fell in love with you,” Sabrina says with a little unhinged laugh.

“Sabrina,” Red says, and this time her voice is transcendent. 

Red kisses her on the forehead. On the nose. Sabrina meets her lips with her own for the next kiss. And so what if they’re moving fast? Tonight barely feels real anyway. Maybe Sabrina will wake up and this will have been a dream too.

They stop kissing, eventually, because the floor is cold and hard and uncomfortable. And they go downstairs, as they always do, for cocoa.

“I’d have loved you from the sidelines forever,” Red tells her, eventually. “Loved you harder for all the people who don’t love you the way you deserve.”

Sabrina knows. Knows that’s how Red loves. Quietly, without expecting anything in return. 

She reaches out, twines their fingers together. “You don’t have to,” she says. “And now I’ll try to love you as much as you deserve.”

And maybe, someday, they’ll believe they do deserve it. Until then, they can believe for each other. It’s worked so far.

#sisters grimm #the sisters grimm #sabrina grimm #sabrina grimm defense squad #sabrina/red

[natsunoomoi]

Holy crap. So like with the previous post I was thinking about Fushigi Yuugi again and kind of checking up on what was up with Byakko Senki cuz I haven’t checked on it in awhile and it looks like it’s on hiatus right now and she’s working more on Arata Kangatari, which is cool cuz I thought she finished that, but I guess not and she just took a break to like finish Genbu and do Byakko or something.

But also I was scrolling through her Twitter to find that she is really into this Chinese movie “Legend of Luo Xiaohei” and so I was checking that out cuz so ironic that Japanese mangaka that got her big break writing manga about an ancient China setting is interested in a Chinese movie. So just looking through her Twitter thread and apparently she found out about Luo Xiaohei from watching a CM while watching Modao Zushi. LMAO It’s amazing, but this situation just feels like an ouroboros eating itself because I have a high suspicion that her work on Fushigi Yuugi imported into China back in the 90s was probably a huge influence on Chinese creators and artists to write their own stories about their culture and helped to popularize the xianxia and wuxia novel movements in more modern times. On top of that MXTX said she was inspired by a D. Gray-man fanfic and while she mentioned that title specifically, I think in the periphery Fushigi Yuugi itself and more recently Arata were probably an influence too. Growing up a number of my Chinese friends also said they got into anime overall because of Fushigi Yuugi because it was an anime and work from Japan about their culture and arguably done pretty damn well. 

In terms of the danmei movement as well, I’m pretty sure Fushigi Yuugi was included in what started the movement as the movement was influenced by Japanese BL that came in via Taiwan, and the beginning of Fushigi Yuugi had the whole thing between Nuriko and Hotohori even though that kind of went nowhere, Nuriko dies to everyone’s depression (I have several friends who refuse to watch the rest of the series after Nuriko dies because it’s not the same), and that whole ship goes off a weird deep end with Hotohori marrying a woman that looks like Nuriko. Also, the exact reasons for Nuriko being in the harem and all that. There was a whole lot of shipping in the 90s from Fushigi Yuugi and it was one of the first series that had a male cast that was almost entirely ikemen and I think the actual first reverse harem. A number of shows probably simultaneously popularized the female gaze in mainstream anime, but Fushigi Yuugi was definitely one of them. Like literally one or two years before there was a lot of manly men and guy’s guys kind of anime characters, but beautiful ikemen, no, not really. In 2021, there are some things about the series that are a bit problematic, but it’s influence on the world is pretty significant. It was one of the first shows I’d seen that had any kind of reference to homosexuality or transgender in it and although it’s not necessarily portrayed well, the fact that it was there and that Nuriko was such a beloved character it started a conversation and helped us to get to a time where the topics she represents can be more discussed. I’m actually not even sure what pronouns would be appropriate for Nuriko because of her reasons for what she did and in Japanese the pronoun problem is actually really easy to get around because you just don’t have a subject or speaking in 3rd person is totally normal. But still, without her the minds of thousands or even millions of fans around the world would not have been opened as early to LGBT topics. Her existence, even problematic as it might be, allowed people to consider and love a character of a different sexual orientation or gender identity than their own and just open their minds to just not being a homophobic, biphobic (cuz relationship with Miaka?), or transphobic piece of shit.

Then also Genbu Kaiden and Uruki’s powers. Yeah.... I mean, also kind of with the earlier discussion, the idea of dual cultivation I don’t recall even being brought up much before in most media, but such ideas were also banned and repressed in China at a certain point. Documentation shows it was more of an ancient practice that suddenly became known about again. The book I was talking about that has it more explicitly written is banned in China has its only original surviving copy in the Japanese National Library as it was one of the books brought to Japan by scholars escaping persecution in China and bringing with them books to escape one of the many episodes of mass book burning. According to my Chinese lit professor who had us read an English translation of that book as a part of our curriculum anyway. Supposedly the translator of said book had to go to Japan to read the original in order to write the translation. There’s apparently a number of ancient Chinese texts like that because book burnings were a thing at different points in Chinese history, so if you are a scholar of Chinese lit if you want a complete picture of your field for some texts you do actually have to come to Japan to do your research. But yeah, that power mentioned in that very book Watase-sensei gave to Soi, and also the story of Fushigi Yuugi takes place in that very library that contains that ancient copy of a banned and would have been lost to the world book. If you’re asking why a “dirty” book would be something a scholar would grab to save, ancient lit scholars do regard it as a rather well-written piece of literature even though the content of it is basically taboo.

But also the Fushigi Yuugi Suzaku Ibun game is a hot mess when it comes to this same issue because if you romance Nuriko you can save her from death and my friend Hikari said she wasn’t sure if she was happy about fucking with the universe like that. (I’m not either.) Nuriko’s death was such a huge impact on the story and everything. Also, notably, most of the Suzaku Shichiseishi died, but Nuriko had the LONGEST tribute. Like Chiriko and Mitsukake’s was like a tag on of a few minutes. Hotohori’s was too even, but it was addressed more in the later manga chapters the publisher pressured her to write and in the OVA series afterward.

Also, like Fushigi Yuugi other than the Neverending Story was one of the original sucked into a book holy shit how do I survive stories. Idk if SVSSS is influenced by it in that way, but it’s fair to draw the parallels because of the similar theme. It’s just canonically Taiitsu Shinjin is not behind the the system in the book and in a number of ways Shen Yuan is more competent than Miaka. Miaka gets a lot of shit though and when I re-watched FY a second time I actually found the gripes people generally have about it make up only a small part of the series. People just talk it up so much that it seems like a huge thing when it’s not. Plus the technical canon is only the original TV series because that’s where Watase wanted to end the story and that is an emotional rollercoaster that makes you cry so good. But like there’s some other kinds of parallels as well like how toward the end and like the last two episodes you hate Nakago up until the exact moment you find out why he’s an absolute asshole, and characters straight up criticizing him about how he’s an asshole the whole damn series just gives the same kind of feels that SY gave criticizing the original throughout SVSSS. Can’t say for sure, but Fushigi Yuugi has a lot of clout in a general sense.

But yeah, Watase-sensei said that she was really surprised by the animation quality of Chinese animation these days and she thought Japanese anime was going down in comparison. Same, yo. Same. But still, her work was probably a huge contributor to the movement that allowed MDZS to exist because her art is damn beautiful, Chinese influenced, and she had one of the first works in Asia to like bring the subject of LGBT issues into the mainstream after years of oppression from mostly Western influence because in pre-modern Asia no one gave a shit before and there’s a significant amount of classical novels that address some form of LGBT issues at least in Japanese lit and like even academic documentation that notes Confucius saying that doing it with a guy was better than with a woman. And the author of the work that probably was very influential to BL back in the 90s watches MDZS. She noted that there wasn’t any in the actual anime, which is true, but I think she helped that series to exist and she watches the anime so it’s kind of exciting.

I hope it influences her to go finish Byakko, but OMG I want her to finish Arata too because I like Arata. I should try to find time to read more of it because the anime is too short and the wiki descriptions of what’s happening are so damn confusing and incomplete.

[inevitablyuncertain]

1, 4, 16 & 18 for bookworm asks?

:0

1. What are you reading right now, and what do you think of it? i’m currently making my way through les mis (take 2 electric boogaloo). and i think the each book being started with like a 50 page history lesson isn’t really necessary, but i read them anyway because sometimes there’s lines that i just Vibe with. i like how dramatically allegorical every named character is; it take’s people’s character traits and goes ‘yea but what if they were the Absolute Symbol for this’ which is probably at least part of the reason adapting it to modern au is so popular in the les mis fandom (in addition to historical accuracy being a pain + modern au is easier to fluff for such a depressing book). and every so often i’ll be reading and think oh, the trait of this character could foil that trait of this other character from 300 pages ago and i just think that’s neat. it’s so funny to me how Dramatic(TM) and petty javert can be. i think think this kind of “i’ve chosen my hill and i’ll die on it” mentality of more classical lit characters has perhaps influenced how i play characters in dnd

4. Most overrated classic book? does contemporary classic count? to kill a mockingbird. i have no idea why everyone and their mother says that’s their favorite book. it was a good book, i read it in 10th grade english class too. but like? idk. it sounds like an easy answer

16. Favorite genre(s) and author(s)? sort of adjacent to my last answer but a lot of my reading tastes were influenced by my various lit classes so i do like classics especially the mid-century works like catch-22 and 1984. something about the writing style of the time is straightforward? which lends itself and gives some kind of tone to the exaggerated or absurdist themes they have.  i like bradbury and the stories he tells. my brother complained once that ‘for a scifi author he seems rather anti-technology’ but that’s not the point! >:V it’s about the people who use that technology and what they do with it. (also what’s the point of glorifying technology when those stories show like. the same amount of problems and suffering in the world ?) i also really enjoy baldwin. giovanni’s room? picture me pacing around me room re-reading the lines because they feel like they need to be heard aloud but i’m reading this for a class and i can’t keep getting distracted 

18. Favorite and least favorite books read for high school classes? hhhhh remember when i said my tastes were influenced by lit classes lmao favorites: - the little prince. i read this one in my french class and it! is very sweet! and i love it! one of my friends got it for me for my birthday one year - the awakening. i remember being just absolutely fascinated by the ambivalence that enda felt about her life as a mother and wife - their eyes were watching god. just. overall a very good book. i haven’t read it in years and i remember about half the plot AND YET it still holds a place as a favorite because i remember how well it was written and how much i enjoyed it least favorites: - tess of the d’urbervilles. i don’t actually know if i’d consider this a ‘least favorite’ but this is another one i haven’t read in years but unlike their eyes were watching god, i remember nearly ALL of what happened and i still sometimes just think about it and get frustrated. i’m not gonna get into that now though, just know i have strong feelings about this book - the old man and the sea. just kind of dull for a 9th grade english class and the teacher didn’t take and measures to make it more interesting

book asks :V

#long answers RIP #asks #fizzygig

[the-colony-roleplay]

Josephine Parker | Twenty Six;  Survivor

House: Calyset Status: Uninfected Elite Specification: Teacher Teachers: History and Literature, ages 10-13 Alignment: New Age Rebels

History

Some people weren’t ever quite suited to the fast paced, high-tech modern life. Jo Parker was one of them. Her parents were both scholars; her mother was a librarian, her father a history professor at the University of Washington. They lived in an old campus neighbourhood up in the woods, away from the city. The beliefs of Jo’s parents matched their surroundings: traditional, old school. Jo grew up surrounded by books, taking walks in the forest, indulging her father’s taste in ‘classic’ rock. She used modern technology as much as she had to, but her parents taught her an invaluable lesson, that nothing could replace the lessons to be learned from her surroundings, particularly in books.

For all her traditional settings, Jo had a fairly unusual education. Her father had always rejected the tradition of desks in a row, teacher at the front, for eight hours a day. He encouraged exploration, creativity. No question was too small. Jo took advantage of that to its fullest extent, sometimes waking her parents up in the middle of the night to ask why the moon changed shape. Both to temper her questions and encourage them, Jo’s mother homeschooled her. Or rather, she brought Jo to the library every day, worked with Jo on her breaks, and set her to reading while she worked. Jo absorbed every book like a sponge. As she got older, and the books in the public library no longer satisfied her, her father began bringing her along to the university. Sometimes she would sit in on a class, other times she’d curl up in a chair in the ancient library with its high-vaulted ceilings and equally ancient books.

To her parents’ relief, the university turned into more than just a place to study. Jo had always been on the quiet side, but even quiet people had friends. She found hers in the classic literature club, exchanging ideas on humanity and the stories that made them human. When she was sixteen, a new girl joined the lit club. Rosalind was clever, funny, outgoing; everything Jo wasn’t. A few weeks after she joined, Jo began dating her first girlfriend.

Attending the University of Washington officially didn’t change much from being an un-official homeschooled kid. She still spent too much time in the library, according to Rosalind. The only thing that really changed was the scenery. Jo never quite adjusted to living in a dorm full of girls and booze and parties. Halfway through the year, she moved in with her now girlfriend of two years. Rosalind worked at a bookstore, and part of her pay was an apartment above the shop. It only had one bedroom and the kitchen barely deserved the name, but the way the golden sun lit on Rosalind’s face as she curled on the couch in the morning, frowning at a sketch, made it totally worth it.

Life was never perfect, but for those nearly three years, it came awfully close. With permission from the University, Jo began working on a master’s thesis. The bookstore never crowded with shoppers, but it made enough to support Rosalind’s art classes. Some days she would bribe Jo into posing, other days they would head out into the market. Jo listened to people's’ stories, and Rosalind sketched them. Each thought the other’s work turned out much better than their own. Jo and Rosalind began to think about the future. Graduating, adopting a dog, maybe, and teasingly, where they might honeymoon. The day before D-Day, Rosalind had tried to be subtle in asking what kind of ring Jo liked. The next day, their knuckles turned white as they held onto each other, watching the news while a storm tore the world apart outside.

Their once quiet haven quickly turned to chaos. As high above the harbor as they were, the ocean came steadily lapping at their door. Jo managed to get a hold of her parents once, to learn they were travelling inland. That was the last time she heard from them. Rosalind wanted to inland as well, but getting there would be next to impossible with the amount of traffic and crowds streaming that way. Instead, they travelled the opposite direction—out to sea. Jo and Rosalind managed to catch one of the last boats out of Seattle, with suitcases half-crammed with books and Rosalind’s sketches.

No one really knew where they were going. Every port they radioed for contact either reported severe flooding or just didn’t reply at all. And then other news came in, about what was happening to the inland countries, about the meteors that had apparently decimated the population. The more they heard, the more it seemed like mankind stood facing the end. Everyone dealt with it in different ways; some sailors drank, Rosalind sketched her parents over and over, and Jo reread the books they’d brought, trying to memorize every last trace of rapidly disappearing humanity.

They had to land eventually. With almost no ports still open—or even still there—they’d drifted aimlessly. After nearly a month, they made land in northern Mexico. The few survivors they found were wary, but allowed the ship to stay long enough to resupply. Jo had never actively spoken Spanish, but she’d learned enough to read Don Quixote and that was enough to get by with the survivors. She started chatting with them, in the broken, mixed Spanish she could muster up. And then she started writing. It was just little things at first; who ran the crumbling bakery, whose son had died in the flood. The small things gradually grew into stories. By the time the ship had resupplied, Jo had filled the margins of an entire book with the history of the town. More importantly, she and Rosalind had made a decision. The two of them gathered as much food, water, and survival gear as they could manage. The locals promised to take good care of the majority of Jo’s books, which she replaced with empty journals. Rosalind scrounged for any blank paper she could get her hands on. Hand in hand, they waved goodbye to the survivors and set out into the broken world.

The next four years were a blur. Jo and Rosalind trekked north, staying with survivors when they could, and sleeping alone under the stars the rest of the time. Jo collected stories from every community they found, and many more lone travellers in between. Rosalind filled one sketchbook, then another with eyes, hands, broken cities, and faces. Somewhere along the way, Rosalind found, then traded an old polaroid for passage on a ship across the Atlantic. They were married, as officially as possible, on the voyage. In Africa it fell to Rosalind to translate, combining French and English. The couple travelled across Africa all the way up to Arabia. The intense destruction from the Asian meteor stopped them dead in their tracks. Even if the continent hadn’t been completely destroyed, there was no point. There was no way anyone would’ve survived. Jo and Rosalind turned back west, where they might find more hope. Europe was still a mess, but at least they wouldn’t be walking across a graveyard.

News was hard to come by in the new world. Most things travelled by mouth; Echo chips were useful only for passing information from one person to the next. Still, the uprising was hard to miss. Jo and Rosalind had their first encounter in the French countryside. A young girl and her father, terrified and starving. They’d been running for days, from what Rosalind could translate. Some people had taken over their camp. It hadn’t been so bad, until they caught one of the boys lifting rocks with his mind. They’d beaten him badly, and they warned the rest of the camp that any other unnatural acts would be punished similarly. They’d called themselves the New Wave. Rosalind had started getting headaches about a month before, and they’d been getting worse. Both of them had heard the stories, even seen some of the effects of Infected. They knew what came next. And now they knew to be afraid.

After that, they travelled more cautiously. Jo scouted ahead, making first contact with any clans to make sure they were safe before Rosalind joined her. As they travelled down the Iberian peninsula, they started hearing other stories about hunting groups. Clans disappearing. Bigger colonies being taken over by the Reformists. More than once Jo tried convincing Rosalind to turn back, to find a clan with other Infected. But there ships on the coast, probably their only way back to the United States. Those were some of their only fights, and the only ones that ever stuck in Jo’s mind, but eventually Rosalind always convinced her to keep going.

The crusaders caught them by surprise, just after breakfast. They’d been camping with a small clan; a dozen people, maybe two or three Infected. One minute they were laughing over weak coffee and taking down the tents, the next minute everyone was screaming, running. Jo’s hand reached for her wife. Their fingers found each other for the briefest moment, and then Rosalind was screaming. Jo tried to hold tighter. Someone was pulling Rosalind away. Rosalind was screaming to run. Her ring slipped off in Jo’s hand. Jo ran.

Jo Today

Jo ran north, as hard and as fast as she could. She didn’t see a single soul for weeks, not until she reached the English channel. Every time she stopped, she heard Rosalind’s voice ringing in her ears. Run. Someone gave her passage across the channel in exchange for her necklace. Rosalind had given it to her on their first anniversary in college. To replace it, Jo strung her ring and Rosalind’s on a chain around her neck. In the quiet moments, resting in the old English forests, Jo slipped her finger through Rosalind’s ring and wrote down every detail she could remember about her.

There were still small clans hiding in England, but Jo only contacted them when she had to. When she ran low on food or water or memories of what another person sounded like. She managed to evade hunters from the colonies twice, but the third time she was stupid. She’d stayed too long in one spot, and they caught her as easy as that. They told her she was being rescued by the New Wave and it was best not to resist. They gave her good food, a warm bed, even a nice job teaching due to her background with history and literature. But all that time, all she could hear was Rosalind screaming, feel her cold ring on her chest.

Five weeks after her capture, Jo tried to organize an escape. Some of her children were Infected; she knew what would happen to them once they got older. She couldn’t let that happen on her watch. She’d planned well; supplies, list of guard movements and rotations, a map of the grounds. But she’d never attempted anything close to this before, and one small slip up was all it took to raise the alarm. Even then, she tried to get the children over the wall. The first one was halfway over when a soldier grabbed her. She remembered hitting him back, grabbing for his gun, and then nothing.

After her recapture, Jo was confined to the correctional ward for a month and given a spare. Her little stunt had earned her much worse, but the Head of her House vouched for her, and teachers were already in short supply. Her punishment she could deal with, but the threat that cut her to the core was the possibility of her job being revoked. As much as she couldn’t stand the colony, teaching was a bright spot in her life. The idea of being stuck there without that welcome challenge, being unable to show the next generation a better way, was almost unbearable. Maybe if she were Rosalind, she would have defied the order. Maybe she would’ve rebelled again, tried to run as soon as she was released. But Rosalind was gone, so Jo kept her head down and performed as expected, all the while compiling her stories.

Jo is constantly battling between her shy, non-confrontational attitude and her desire to do what’s right. She’s not a fighter by any means, but when the people she cares about are threatened she can summon up enough courage to defend them. Most of the time, however, she’s just tired. Tired of trying to survive, trying to fight the NWRF, trying to rebuild the world. She wants to do what’s right but it’s hard, and sometimes she doesn’t know if she has the strength to do it.

RELATED BIOS: ROSALIND STEIN

CLOSED FC

#mature rp #oc rp #apocalypse rp #elite #calyset #rebels #Josephine Parker #jenna coleman #jenna coleman fc #closed fc

[penpalkingdom]

Name - Florence

Age - UK

Country - UK

Abt me - in my second term of my first year of uni, love my course and the mates i’ve made here, although i have very recently come to tragic conclusion that the amount of work i’m going to have to do for the next three years is not exactly small. i enjoy music especially, love a good music festival (if any of you reading this are from the UK i highly reccommend reading festival), and i also enjoy reading. as an english and philosophy student sort of have to enjoy reading, but i do regardless. tend to read classic/modern classics, my favourite book would probably be on the road by kerouac. enjoy sports too, hockey is my favourite, though am toying with taking up football next year.

Looking for - mates to chat with really. never hurts to expand your social circle, though anyone with any insight as to how one balances their social life, extracurriculars and work at uni would be lit. seems that i’m at a fairly significant bit of my life, and the more the merrier really. someone also at uni/college would be good.

Contact me, email -  fr702 @ york.ac.uk (without the spaces)

#penpal #online friends #internet friends #18-20 #submission

[principessacapulet-blog]

godhood is just like girlhood: a begging to be believed. -- kristin hang

Basic Information;

Full name | Juliana Rosetta Capulet Pronunciation | jOO-lee-AH-nuh roh-zET-uh kap-yuh-lit Meaning | Juliana; [Latin] Youthful. Rosetta; [Italian] Rose, [Persian] Splendid. Capulet; Caplewood, which is the place-name for the wooded area that stood beside the chapel. Nickname(s) | Jules every so often. Her father calls her Tink when he is feeling affectionate or in a good mood, a habit that started at Juliana’s own request during her childhood and has stuck through her young adulthood. Alice. Birthdate | July 30th Age | 22 Zodiac | Leo Gender | Female Pronouns | She/her Romantic orientation | Panromantic Sexual orientation | Pansexual Nationality | Italian Ethnicity | Anglo-Indian. Maternal side of the family is from Goa, with a little bit of Chinese descent. Fathers side is white. Current location | Verona, Italy Living conditions | She currently lives in the same bedroom she has lived in her entire life and has few intentions of leaving–not that she’d be allowed to if she did. She still lives in her rather large bedroom in her father’s home and lives a quite comfortable lifestyle.

Background;

Birthplace | Verona, Italy Hometown | Verona, Italy Social Class | Upper class Education level | Completed scuola secondaria di secondo grado (Upper Secondary School).  She currently studies part-time at the University of Verona–she originally wished to go to the university in Naples, but was not permitted to go. Father | Cosimo Capulet Mother | Chiara Capulet (neé Conti) – deceased. Sibling(s) | Siena Capulet – deceased. Other Important Relatives | Tiberius Capulet (cousin), Rafaella Capulet (cousin). Birth order | Eldest Pets | They have a gray Pitbull that Juliana named Tino when she was 15, and two black cats–one she named Nero and another named Luna, who has a small patch of white just between her eyes. Previous relationships | She has had very few formal relationships. There were a few here and there during scuola secondaria, both the lower and upper levels, but since she wasn’t allowed out of the house much to hang out with her sophomoric loves, they rarely developed the way her peers might have. There was a single boy that she still thinks about sometimes, one who she thought was worth sneaking into her bedroom, one that she thought about crawling out her window to go and see, but that too did not last. Arrests | None. Prison time | None.

Occupation & Income;

Primary source of income | She lives off of family money first and foremost. Secondary source of income | Being beautiful and having the sort of personality that she does, every so often a brand reaches out to her and asks her to make an instagram post. Most of the time she turns these down, but when she is bored, or particularly enjoys a product or location she’ll take the money. It’s more difficult though since many brands ask her to travel, and her leash is still limited. Content With Their Job (or lack thereof)? | Every so often, she wishes that she had a more standard job, perhaps one working in the Library or teaching or something that did not involve… what her current one does. But then she thinks of the men and women willing to die for her, the ones willing to survive for her, and she thinks maybe she’s in the right place. Past Job(s) | None. Spending habits | She tends to shop frequently, but favors brands like Anthropologie or other boutique brands that feed her favoritism of linens over other more expensive fabrics. She has no qualms about buying clothing that she finds appealing, and even fewer qualms about spending money on food or wine or anything of that nature. If she had more friends, she would constantly take them for nights out and foot the bill without much of a second thought. She loves to treat others, and her bank account usually reflects it.   Most valuable possession | It’s not the most valuable in euro amount, but she has a golden locket that used to belong to her mother and it’s certainly what Juliana would consider her most valuable possession.

Skills & Abilities;

Physical strength | Moderate to weak, she could easily be overpowered. Offense | When she is trailing her father she tends to keep her balisong on her person, which she’s spent a fair number of hours practicing–she likes it for the beauty of the weapon, but that does not make the blades any less sharp. Defense | She possesses basic self-defense, but is in training to improve this. Speed | Above average–she has always enjoyed running, and so while she is not combat oriented she choose to up her running ability soon after she starting standing at her father’s side. Intelligence | She is fairly book-smart, having spent a great deal of time focusing on school and reading, but she’s not overly street smart quite yet. She has a natural inclination to cleverness, but hasn’t learned to apply it yet. Accuracy | Still learning, moderate to poor hand-eye coordination.   Agility | Average. Stamina | Above average. Teamwork | She works very well with others and is a skilled communicator. Enjoyed being in charge during group projects for school, and finds herself enjoying being in charge of the Capulets, much to her frequent dismay. Talents | She has an exceptional memory and a tenacity for learning. Very good balisong skills from hours spent watching videos and practicing the dance in her palms. She is a fast reader and a fairly skilled artist when it comes to painting and drawing. Shortcomings | Cannot cook to save her life. Not skilled in combat of any variety. Possesses a naive and unshakeable desire for peace above all else. Languages spoken | She is fluent in Italian, English, Hindi, though the latter she does not tend to speak very often as it reminds her of her mother, memories of whom make her quite sad. She has also taught herself Spanish, Russian, and French, the latter two of which she is not fluent but can converse in comfortably enough to do business if the need should arise. She knows some Latin, most of which she learned in church. Drive? | No Jump-start a car? | No Change a flat tyre? | No Ride a bicycle? | Yes Swim? | Yes Play an instrument? | Piano Play chess? | Yes, though she doesn’t enjoy it much. Braid hair? | Yes Tie a tie? | Yes Pick a lock? | No, though she desperately wants to learn, thinking it’d be a fun skill.

Physical Appearance & Characteristics

Faceclaim | Zoë Barnard. Eye colour | Hazel--mostly light brown, but with big flecks of green and gold. Hair colour | Very dark brown to black. Hair type/style | Definitely on the longer side, reaching somewhere mid-back. Naturally quite wavy, she often styles it into much looser waves. Glasses/contacts | No. Dominant hand | Right. Height | 5'9’’ (175cm). Build | Slim. Exercise habits |  She runs every morning after she’s had her first cup of espresso. She has combat training with anyone and everyone who will teach her quite often, though she enjoys working with and tends to schedule sessions with Regina most often. Skin tone | Type 4, light brown/olive. Tans quite easily but occasionally burns. Tattoos | She has roman numerals on each of her triceps, one of which is her mother’s birthday and the other being Siena’s. She got them both on her 16th birthday. (ex.) Piercings | Double lobe piercing on both sides. Left nipple piercing. Marks/scars | She has a small collection of small white lines on her palms and the backs of her hands, left over marks from her dancing knife when she hadn’t quite mastered it yet. A scar on her right knee when she’d fallen off her bike while riding to the lake just outside the city and scraped herself on the rocky road. A line on her left elbow when she fell off her horse at age 10 and nearly broke her arm. Notable Features | Very full lips and a large smattering of freckles across her cheeks. Clothing style | She lives her life in linens and denim and cotton, favoring very simple, loose, classic clothing to some of the more intricate and high fashion ensembles of others in her social strata. She loves to wear ribbons and kerchiefs in her hair, tying them around the base of her ponytail or pulling back the front pieces into scarves. If she is going to wear a pattern in her day to day life, it’s often either plaid, polka dots, or florals. When she is dressing up, she favors bold colors and sharp prints. Jewellery | She loves to wear delicate chain necklaces, but hates wearing bracelets and often chooses not to wear rings. She has a very large collection of earrings, though favors a pair of gold hoops her father gave her for her 18th birthday. Her favorite piece is her mother’s locket, which sits on a very long gold chain that she often layers other necklaces over and then tucks into her shirt. Allergies | None. Diet | Vegetarian. She is quite fond of fruits and eats them constantly, though has a sweet tooth and if any are in the vicinity they soon won’t be with her greedy fingers nearby. Physical ailments | None.

Psychology;

Jung Type | ENFP, The Campaigner. Enneagram type | I’m torn between Type 7 wing 6 vs Type 6 wing 7. So.  Moral Alignment | Chaotic Good trying to be a Lawful Good. Temperament | Sanguine. Element | Water. Emotional stability | Juliana can tend towards emotional volatility, her mood highly changeable and easily influenced by her surroundings.  Obsession(s) | Overly concerned about the opinions of others and how other perceive her. Compulsion(s) | Touching others to feel connected, pressing her thumb nail into her pointer finger to divert her attention from something else uncomfortable.  Phobia(s) | Trypophobia (fear of irregular patterns or clusters of small holes), mild fear of horses after falling from one at age 10.  Addiction(s) | None. Drug use | Very, very rarely. Alcohol use | Often drinks wine with her meals.  Prone to violence? | No.

Mannerisms;

Speech style | She has a somewhat formal way of speaking that was coached into her during childhood and has lasted through to young adulthood. She uses clear diction and grace and proper sentence structure without even thinking about it.  Accent | Italian.  Quirks | In her head will often relate modern events to fairy tales or books that she’s read as a way to process and understand. Constantly runs her hands through her hair. Can fall asleep just about anywhere.  Hobbies | Reading and writing, painting and drawing, playing piano.  Nervous ticks | Biting the side of her tongue, fidgeting, running hands through hair.  Drives/motivations | Affection, approval of others.  Fears | Not living up to her family name, disappointing her family, never finding true love.  Positive traits | Compassionate, Warm, Curious, Determined.  Negative traits | Prideful but prone to insecurities based on other’s opinions, Reactive, Dependent, Naive, Innocent.  Sense of humour | Juliana finds herself highly amusing and enjoys all manners of humor.  Do they curse often? | Not frequently. 

Favourites;

Activity | Walking through Twelfth Night with Rafaella while she tells her things about the paintings and other works of art they stroll by.  Animal | Deer. Beverage | Amaretto or Limoncello.  Book | Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen. Colour | Peach. Designer | Dolce and Gabbana. Food | Tomato with Basil and Mozzarella or Tiramisu.  Flower | Peach Tree Fowers. Gem | Moonstone. Holiday | Summer Solstice, which she has made into a holiday even if it’s not one.  Mode of transportation | Bike, though her father prefers she use a chauffeured car.  Quote/saying | “What are men to rocks and mountains?” Scent | She wears Black Opium by Yves Saint Laurent, which has notes of Black Coffee, White Flowers, and Vanilla. She uses a rose-scented body wash and shampoo.  Weather | She adores dry heat and a blazing sun, but will take any degree of warmth the universe will give her. Vacation destination | Amalfi coast is her current favorite place she’s vacationed, but she’d love to go to South Africa and travel there while doing business with her family’s connections.

Attitudes;

Greatest dream | If anyone asked her she would say that it’s for there to be peace and prosperity, and for the Capulets to have the command they deserve over Verona--to be living without tension. I think in reality her greatest dream would be for the mobs to somehow come together under one ruling so that she might have more souls to commit the highest of crimes in her honor.  Greatest fear | That she will stumble and fall and fail her people, though there’s a number of different ways she fears this will happen; that she will be too fragile, incapable of doing what her soldiers need of her, or too fragile to withstand the darkness and fall prey to it’s addictive nature.  Most at ease when | She is standing near the helm but not in charge.  Least as ease when | She is left alone in the Cathedral to make decisions, not that this happens often quite yet.  Worst possible thing that could happen | Her father being killed and her not being ready to take the helm. 

#this took me 12 years #and i skipped some of the questions #but here we are #i think its finished #diveronatask #inspo. #about. #mirror.

[theraistlinmajere]

THE “”GOTHIC”” REC LIST

Edited for my own use.

LET’S START WITH THE GATEWAY DRUG BOOK

1. Flowers in the Attic (VC Andrews): Published in 1979 and technically considered contemporary Gothic. The style closely resembles a lot of “original” Gothic fiction I’ve read, but the themes, story arc and style are distinctly contemporary and very psychological. Gets a bad rap because it’s over the top insane and averagely written (which most Gothic is, tbh). Flowers is light reading, and I think it’s a good gateway drug into heavier Gothic. Has several sequels but stands alone as well. I wish I could call this Victorian-inspired Gothic but honestly it’s just knockoff Victorian in a contemporary setting. If you don’t enjoy this book, it probably means you don’t like the over the top insanity and average writing. Skip it if you like!

1.5. But if you do like it, I hear My Sweet Audrina is pretty good. All of VC Andrews and her ghostwriters are like a hellhole people sometimes don’t escape tbh it’s a raging aesthetic disaster down there.

Note: I have a strong suspicion that “contemporary” Gothic published between 1965 and 1989 will eventually have its own movement name; you will see a decent amount of it on this list.

THE VICTORIAN GOTHIC PART OF THE LIST Most of these are available for free online due to copyright law being born late or whatever. 2. Carmilla (Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu): Considered the first English vampire story (Germans invented the European vampire allegedly), and published in 187…9? 1871? Something like that. A novella. Arguably a same-sex romance (VERY arguably), but can also be read as a close friendship. The writing is good, but not the absolute greatest I’ve ever read. The real strong point here is the imagery and the dawn of the English vampire. Great Halloween read; I read it almost every autumn. 3. “The Trifecta,” according to Gothic fans: Dracula (Bram Stoker), Frankenstein (Shelley), and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (Swift & Stevenson): First mainstream vampire, original English monster movie fuel, and the dawn of psychological fiction. Shelley’s the best writer out of all of them but she’s a Romantic and I’m sort of biased against Romantics. She’s a precursor to true Victorian Gothic. Dracula is still one of the creepiest books I’ve ever read and it’s the only one in the trifecta I really really love (and finished).

Note: If, by any chance, you find yourself seriously obsessed with vampires at any point in time, please consult me for an extended list of vampire fiction because I have a shit-ton of it in my reading history and left most of it out so vampires wouldn’t clutter this list lmao.

4. Edgar Allan Poe, Completed Works. The Cask of Amontillado, The Masque of the Red Death, The Pit and the Pendulum, and The Tell-Tale Heart are all notable. His poetry is lovely–Annabelle Lee and The Raven are most culturally significant. Just solid and wonderful work that I like a lot but haven’t explored in a lot of detail. Will appeal to your interest in darkness imagery.

5. The Legend of Sleepy Hollow and Other Stories (Washington Irving): QUINTESSENTIAL HALLOWEEN READING. SPOOPY. WONDERFUL. I truly love this anthology. Will also appeal to your interest in darkness as a concept and a physical thing. 6. Nightmare Abbey (Thomas Love Peacock): an 1818 novel that makes fun of the Victorian Gothic movement. Hilarious, contains all the typical Victorian Gothic tropes and has the added benefit of actually falling into the Victorian Gothic movement ironically. Usually comes packaged with another novel called Crotchet Castle which is similar. 7. If, somehow, you haven’t had it with Victorian Gothic yet (and I got to this point, it happens, Victorian Gothic is a slippery slope)… Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell (Susanna Clarke): A really bizarre story behind how this was published, at least it is to me. Published in 2004, Over 10 years in the making and is written in the Victorian Gothic style but with a quirky and modern twist. The writer takes a page out of contemporary social commentary and includes pages-long footnotes, heads up (they’re funny and entertaining though). HUGE. You could kill a man with this volume. Excellent writing; I’m halfway through. I hear there’s time travel (?) and there are about ten thousand characters. Neil Gaiman is a fan. 8. The Phantom of the Opera (Gaston Leroux) is not technically Victorian (Technically Edwardian? Also French; I’m not familiar with French literary eras) but of course it has a huge following. I’ve read a little so far; I like the style and I think it’s culturally significant. You might want to read this because it’s heavily inspired by a French opera house, the Palais Garnier in Paris. Amber tells me she read literature in French to help sharpen her skills in the language; you may consider picking up an un-translated version of this? A BRIEF INTERLUDE FOR MORE CONTEMPORARY 9. Interview with the Vampire (Anne Rice): One of my favorite books of all time! Possibly the dawn of the romanticized vampire. Falls into that 70s contemporary Gothic bracket and is pretty amazingly written, but markedly more angst-ridden than anything else on the list (save for maybe Flowers). Lots of “what is evil?” and “what does immortality imply?” type speculation. Also gets a bad rap because Anne Rice made it big and haters are rife tbh it’s a very solidly built book in my opinion (BUT SUPER EMOTIONAL VAMPIRES). If you like this, continue with The Vampire Chronicles (The Vampire Lestat, Queen of the Damned, Prince Lestat, and about 8 others in between that concern minor characters). Lestat is one of my favorite fictional characters of all time. 10. Coraline (Neil Gaiman): Quick, cute, I found myself actually afraid for a little while despite the audience being middle grade readers?? I enjoyed it. The only Neil Gaiman on the list because his other work doesn’t impress me very much. 11. The Spiderwick Chronicles (Holly Black and Tony Diterlizzi): More middle-grade creepy aesthetic stuff. Cute modern fantasy stories, five volumes. I can read these books at twenty years old and still enjoy them (like Coraline)! The only good thing Holly Black has ever produced, in my opinion, though many people like her and her ~aesthetic.

11.5. Should you find yourself in the mood for more quick middle-grade aesthetic-y stuff, Pure Dead Magic (Debi Gliori) is really an adorable book with two sequels. Victorian Gothic tropes such as the creepy mansion, creatures in the dungeon, family drama, and Weird Newcomers are all present, but it’s set in modern times. One of the main characters is a hacker. Addams family-esque.

THE SURREAL-ISH FICTION PART OF THE LIST

Not true surreal fiction; these are contemporary surreal-inspired works. 12. The Bloody Chamber (Angela Carter): An anthology of short stories which retell fairy tales. Falls into the contemporary surrealism movement and is not traditionally considered Gothic, but this is definitely your aesthetic. Very quick read, very vivid imagery, lots of second-wave feminism and some brief eating disorder symbolism. Carter was a phenomenal writer! My favorite story is “The Lady of the House of Love"

12.5 (Just as a reminder since I’ve mentioned these) See also: Nights at the Circus (Carter) and Mechanique: A tale of the Circus Tresaulti (Valentine) for your interest in circus books!

13. The Palace of Curiosities (Rosie Garland), which I also rec’d before. Similar style to Chamber, similar themes. Both beautiful books. 14. Deathless (Catherynne Valente): Oh, Deathless. Technically contemporary lit, but hails to Russian Gothic (one of the earlier Gothic movements which I haven’t read much of). Retelling of about a million Russian folk tales. I could go on about this book for a thousand years. Stylistically similar to The Bloody Chamber as well, but far more poetic. (Very) structurally inferior to every other book on this list, but so heart-wrenchingly romantic you won’t notice or care on the first read. Visually breathtaking, absolutely the closest thing to death and the maiden imagery I’ve found in fiction. I’m fairly confident you’ll appreciate this one! Might as well read it to test my theory!! There’s controversy surrounding the fact that the writer is not Russian–something to be aware of. 15. The Enchanted (Rene Denfeld): TREAD WITH CAUTION. This is contemporary literary fiction (not Gothic) written from the pov of a death row inmate. Nominated for approximately a billion awards in 2014 (and won a few); high caliber of writing. Incredibly visceral, horrific, psychological imagery that was too much for me, though I still liked it. Short but dense–I had to take a two-day break to ward off the anxiety it caused. But you are darker~ than I so you might like it more!

THE SOUTHERN GOTHIC PART OF THE LIST 16. Beloved (Toni Morrison): Contemporary Southern Gothic. Incredibly creepy imagery, explores the connection between women’s issues and racial issues. Uses abortion and slavery as metaphors for each other. Gracefully written, but Southern Gothic (even contemporary) tends to be textually dense so it’s something to really think about as you read. 17. As I Lay Dying (Faulkner): “True” Southern Gothic. DENSE AS HELL but I think Beloved is a good precursor to Faulkner. A lot of almost comedic family drama, similar to Flowers in that sense, but very srs bsns nonetheless.

17.5. Basically all of Faulkner is considered Southern Gothic. He’s the father of Southern Gothic. If you enjoy this, you might also like Absalom! Absalom! and other such works. I loved As I Lay Dying but it’s possibly his easiest read, and while I love a good challenge I haven’t stepped up to this one yet.

Note: I use reading guides for all my classical works and Shakespeare, and I think there are good ones for Faulkner too, so that might be something to look into if you wanna vanish into this hell lol.

AN ADDENDUM: OTHER WRITERS

HP Lovecraft: Father of horror or whatever. Awful writer–anyone will agree. The guy had no command of language, but he’s known for over-the-top horror imagery that people really enjoy. Honestly I hate his writing so I haven’t bothered with much of it.

Oscar Wilde: If, by this point, you still want more Victorian-era writing, Wilde is here for you. Lots of social commentary, wrote basically one piece in the Gothic style (Chapter 16 of The Picture of Dorian Gray, my favorite novel), snarky as hell, incredibly gifted writer.

Neil Gaiman: Modern surreal in my opinion, sometimes called modern Gothic, well-loved and writes creepy things. I think he’s average because I’ve read too much Murakami (who does “modern surreal” way, way better) but many people really love him.

THE BLACKLIST Knockoff Gothic/Gothic themed things to avoid. I apologize if you like any of these okay ._.

The Grisha Trilogy (Leigh Bardugo): Contemporary YA, tries to be Russian Gothic and fails. Stick to Deathless. This book makes a mockery of Russian culture whereas at least Valente exhaustively researched her novel. Also doesn’t do romance very well.

The Night Circus (Morgenstern): What the hell is this book, tbh. 400 pages of obtuse and cliched imagery which you don’t have time for in your life. No plot. Two-dimensional characters, bad writing.

Those Across The River (Christopher Buehlman): Terrible. Just terrible.

[egooksconnolly]

Who will be the next James Bond after Daniel Craig?

Michael Rodio

Getty Images

The mystery over who might play the next James Bond after Daniel Craig has evolved into something of a real-life spy thriller.

Now that Craig is (basically) confirmed for the next Bond film, there has been plenty of speculation about who will take over once he finally retires from playing 007.

[RELATED1]

Many thought that Craig was done after Spectre—his own words did the job on that one when he said he was exhausted from donning the famous tuxedo—but with the date set and the 25th installment of the franchise coming on Nov. 8, 2019, it’s clear that Craig is (very likely) returning.

But what happens after that installment? With the film being the 25th Bond movie and Craig’s fifth turn as the iconic character (Casino Royale, Quantum of Solace, Skyfall, Spectre), it would be the perfect sendoff. So who takes over 007 afterwards? 

[RELATED2]

The rumors have gone wild with names like Tom Hiddleston, Superman himself Henry Cavill, and all-around ass-kicker Idris Elba as options to step into the role.

Early rumors had Sony reportedly offering Craig an astonishing $150 million to not only reprise 007 for the fifth movie in Craig’s contract, but also add a sixth movie to the slate, a Sony source told RadarOnline. To put that number in context: Even if Craig signed a deal for half the money and only one movie, he’d make $75 million—more than Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, the highest-paid actor in the world, made in an entire year. (Cash: the ultimate workout recovery tool!)

[RELATED3]

Of course, no amount of cash can stop the speculation. “The greatest thing about this entertainment industry is that whether there’s a movie out or not, people can find some entertainment from it,” Cavill remarked about the ongoing Bond rumor mill in his September Men’s Fitness feature.

Here's a not-too-scientific look at who the bookies are favoring—and who Hollywood might have in the wings just in case Craig finally decides he’s hanging up the bowtie for good.

Who will be the next James Bond after Daniel Craig?

1 of 12

Ben Watts

Henry Cavill

Cavill may not be the bookies’ favorite at the moment, but Hollywood producers wouldn’t have to think too hard about casting our September 2016 cover guy as the next 007—especially not after he got epically ripped for Justice League. As for his spy bona fides, Cavill already distinguished himself in the art of espionage with 2015’s The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (he wasn’t drinking a Vesper, but still).

Plus, he’s up for the challenge: “It’d be awesome to play Bond, a classic Bond, really,” the Man of Steel star said in his September cover feature with Men’s Fitness. “I don’t think I’d be the person to outdo Daniel Craig at doing Daniel Craig’s Bond. I would love to do a different version and just have enormous amounts of fun with it.”

Tom Hiddleston

Though he burst into Hollywood (and hearts of fangirls) with his turn as the scene-stealing Loki in Marvel’s Thor and Avengers movies, Hiddleston has a remarkable pedigree in both quintessential Englishness (Eton, Cambridge) and leading-man action roles involving firearms expertise (The Night Manager, Kong: Skull Island). And while Hiddleston's Bond odds may be a little longer since his split with Taylor Swift—shake it off, Tom!—he's still got the chops and the cheekbones to pull off a turn as 007.

Idris Elba

The London-born son of working-class immigrants from Sierra Leone, Elba could deftly craft a blue-collar Briton’s Bond that is equally smoldering and no-holds-barred action brawler. He has serious acting chops—he’s scooped up awards for his starring roles in BBC One’s Luther and Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom, not to mention his classic role as Stacker Pentecost in the modern cult classic Pacific Rim—and could easily bring his formidable martial arts ability to the role, since he’s already making a TV show about literally kickboxing his way around the world.

Also of note: Elba was reluctantly drawn into a firestorm over the Bond role after writer Anthony Horowitz, who has been tasked with writing new Bond books, said Elba was “too street” for the role. (Horowitz later apologized, saying he meant no offense.) 

Aidan Turner

Turner isn’t as familiar to American audiences as Cavill or Elba, but he may be soon: The 33-year-old Irish actor (and Glamour’s Sexiest Man of 2016) is one of the bookies’ favorites to suit up for 007, with the kind of smoldering looks and Briton-centric acting experience (a leading role as the gold-hearted seaman Ross Poldark in the BBC’s 2015 adaptation of The Poldark Novels) that make for perfect MI6 training.

And if there’s a hint at just how gloomy his Bond could go, tune in to the BBC’s adaptation of Agatha Christie’s And then There Were None, in which Turner plays a cynical soldier of fortune with a “complete disregard for humanity.” Beat that, Daniel Craig.

Margot Robbie

The first female Bond is a possibility, at least if the betting markets have anything to say about it: Ladbrokes has given “any female” 1/14 odds to get behind the wheel of the Aston Martin, which puts the listing squarely in fifth among the current Oddschecker.com rankings. (That’s better than even Cavill, for the record).

And since a female 007 would mark a major step in cinematic history, who better to flip the script than Margot Robbie, the Australian stunner who's showcased remarkable talent for stealing every scene from every movie she’s been in? Just ask Leo DiCaprio (who appeared with Robbie in Wolf of Wall Street) and Will Smith (ditto for Suicide Squad and Focus): It doesn't matter who audiences hope to see when they walk into the movie—when they walk out, they're talking about Margot Robbie.

Jack Huston

Huston may not yet have the onscreen presence of other potential Bond actors, but he has the pedigree: The scion of the legendary Hollywood directing dynasty (his grandfather is John Huston) and an actual British dynasty (his maternal grandfather was the 6th Marquess of Colmondeley), Huston is the odds-on favorite to play the next bond, according to bookie aggregator Oddschecker.com.

He’s also had experience holding down both high-concept movies (David O. Russell’s American Hustle) and big-budget leading roles (the 2016 Ben-Hur remake) that demand range and action versatility, plus a smattering of quintessentially English film and TV parts.

James Norton

As British as tea and red double-decker buses—he attended Cambridge and the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art—the 31-year-old Norton is a veteran of quintessentially British TV series like War & Peace and the crime procedural Grantchester. But it was his role in Happy Valley, as the vile killer Tommy Lee Royce, that seemed to cement his place as a dynamic, multifaceted actor in the popular imagination.

The only knock against Norton is that he’s blonde—but that didn’t stop Daniel Craig, did it?

Tom Hardy

Hardy is one of the UK’s most enigmatic actors, if only because he can seem so damn difficult to pin down. One minute he’s punching the snot out of Batman (The Dark Knight Rises) or whipsawing his way through the desert (Mad Max), and the next he’s singlehandedly holding down an entire screenplay while doing nothing but talking on the phone and driving (Locke). Or, you know, he's punching the snot out of someone else, as in Warrior. Point is, Hardy could easily carry the Bond torch lit by Daniel Craig—that of a physical, enigmatic 007 who is just as comfortable taking care of bad guys with his Walther PPK as he is with his bare damn hands.

Charlize Theron

If there's one requirement to play James Bond, it's that an actor needs to convincingly handle a supercar at dangerous speeds, preferably while dispatching bad guys with an array of firearms. So who better for the role than Charlize Theron? The South African actress shot, swore, and drove with the best of ’em in Mad Max: Fury Road (just ask Tom Hardy), and she'll likely be doing much of the same as the villain in Fast 8 (just ask Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson). Like Robbie, Theron has a talent for upstaging Will Smith—see The Legend of Bagger Vance and Hancock—but more importantly has remarkable acting range, whether it's in sci-fi thrillers like Prometheus or the dark serial killer drama Monster.

  Kit Harington

If there were an Olympic competition for perpetual poutiness, Kit Harington—aka Jon Snow—would have easily conquered it out of an already competitive British field. With Game of Thrones nearly wrapped and his face firmly fixed as one of Hollywood’s most bankable up-and-comers (a mere Harington haircut makes for major news), Harington could be a dark-horse casting decision for a Hollywood producer who decides that Jon Snow might know something after all—particularly how to order a certain secret agent’s preferred martini.

Alicia Vikander

Vikander has a talent for making any movie absurdly fascinating, whether the plot is straightforward (Jason Bourne) or high-concept (Ex Machina). Vikander is so eminently watchable, in fact, that she singlehandedly transformed The Man From U.N.C.L.E. from a Henry-Cavill-vs-Armie-Hammer glowerfest into a remarkably fun spy romp. (Yes: The best feature of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. was a woman.) Plus, with her action-adventure credentials burnished even further by the newly announced Tomb Raider reboot arriving in 2018, Hollywood has every reason to cast the Swedish actress as Britain's foremost secret agent.

Michael Fassbender

Fassbender is already Hollywood royalty—the Irish-German actor is equally adept in straight-up blockbusters (X-Men, Prometheus, the upcoming Assassin’s Creed), TV series (Band of Brothers) and critically beloved movies that ended up becoming blockbusters anyway (12 Years a Slave, Steve Jobs). If he were any type of Bond, he’d be the critically beloved (and German-speaking!) variety.

12 photos

Movies and TV

Article source here:Men’s Fitness

[rodrigohyde]

Who will be the next James Bond after Daniel Craig?

Michael Rodio

Getty Images

The mystery over who might play the next James Bond after Daniel Craig has evolved into something of a real-life spy thriller.

Now that Craig is (basically) confirmed for the next Bond film, there has been plenty of speculation about who will take over once he finally retires from playing 007.

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Many thought that Craig was done after Spectre—his own words did the job on that one when he said he was exhausted from donning the famous tuxedo—but with the date set and the 25th installment of the franchise coming on Nov. 8, 2019, it’s clear that Craig is (very likely) returning.

But what happens after that installment? With the film being the 25th Bond movie and Craig’s fifth turn as the iconic character (Casino Royale, Quantum of Solace, Skyfall, Spectre), it would be the perfect sendoff. So who takes over 007 afterwards? 

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The rumors have gone wild with names like Tom Hiddleston, Superman himself Henry Cavill, and all-around ass-kicker Idris Elba as options to step into the role.

Early rumors had Sony reportedly offering Craig an astonishing $150 million to not only reprise 007 for the fifth movie in Craig’s contract, but also add a sixth movie to the slate, a Sony source told RadarOnline. To put that number in context: Even if Craig signed a deal for half the money and only one movie, he’d make $75 million—more than Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson, the highest-paid actor in the world, made in an entire year. (Cash: the ultimate workout recovery tool!)

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Of course, no amount of cash can stop the speculation. “The greatest thing about this entertainment industry is that whether there’s a movie out or not, people can find some entertainment from it,” Cavill remarked about the ongoing Bond rumor mill in his September Men’s Fitness feature.

Here's a not-too-scientific look at who the bookies are favoring—and who Hollywood might have in the wings just in case Craig finally decides he’s hanging up the bowtie for good.

Who will be the next James Bond after Daniel Craig?

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Ben Watts

Henry Cavill

Cavill may not be the bookies’ favorite at the moment, but Hollywood producers wouldn’t have to think too hard about casting our September 2016 cover guy as the next 007—especially not after he got epically ripped for Justice League. As for his spy bona fides, Cavill already distinguished himself in the art of espionage with 2015’s The Man from U.N.C.L.E. (he wasn’t drinking a Vesper, but still).

Plus, he’s up for the challenge: “It’d be awesome to play Bond, a classic Bond, really,” the Man of Steel star said in his September cover feature with Men’s Fitness. “I don’t think I’d be the person to outdo Daniel Craig at doing Daniel Craig’s Bond. I would love to do a different version and just have enormous amounts of fun with it.”

Tom Hiddleston

Though he burst into Hollywood (and hearts of fangirls) with his turn as the scene-stealing Loki in Marvel’s Thor and Avengers movies, Hiddleston has a remarkable pedigree in both quintessential Englishness (Eton, Cambridge) and leading-man action roles involving firearms expertise (The Night Manager, Kong: Skull Island). And while Hiddleston's Bond odds may be a little longer since his split with Taylor Swift—shake it off, Tom!—he's still got the chops and the cheekbones to pull off a turn as 007.

Idris Elba

The London-born son of working-class immigrants from Sierra Leone, Elba could deftly craft a blue-collar Briton’s Bond that is equally smoldering and no-holds-barred action brawler. He has serious acting chops—he’s scooped up awards for his starring roles in BBC One’s Luther and Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom, not to mention his classic role as Stacker Pentecost in the modern cult classic Pacific Rim—and could easily bring his formidable martial arts ability to the role, since he’s already making a TV show about literally kickboxing his way around the world.

Also of note: Elba was reluctantly drawn into a firestorm over the Bond role after writer Anthony Horowitz, who has been tasked with writing new Bond books, said Elba was “too street” for the role. (Horowitz later apologized, saying he meant no offense.) 

Aidan Turner

Turner isn’t as familiar to American audiences as Cavill or Elba, but he may be soon: The 33-year-old Irish actor (and Glamour’s Sexiest Man of 2016) is one of the bookies’ favorites to suit up for 007, with the kind of smoldering looks and Briton-centric acting experience (a leading role as the gold-hearted seaman Ross Poldark in the BBC’s 2015 adaptation of The Poldark Novels) that make for perfect MI6 training.

And if there’s a hint at just how gloomy his Bond could go, tune in to the BBC’s adaptation of Agatha Christie’s And then There Were None, in which Turner plays a cynical soldier of fortune with a “complete disregard for humanity.” Beat that, Daniel Craig.

Margot Robbie

The first female Bond is a possibility, at least if the betting markets have anything to say about it: Ladbrokes has given “any female” 1/14 odds to get behind the wheel of the Aston Martin, which puts the listing squarely in fifth among the current Oddschecker.com rankings. (That’s better than even Cavill, for the record).

And since a female 007 would mark a major step in cinematic history, who better to flip the script than Margot Robbie, the Australian stunner who's showcased remarkable talent for stealing every scene from every movie she’s been in? Just ask Leo DiCaprio (who appeared with Robbie in Wolf of Wall Street) and Will Smith (ditto for Suicide Squad and Focus): It doesn't matter who audiences hope to see when they walk into the movie—when they walk out, they're talking about Margot Robbie.

Jack Huston

Huston may not yet have the onscreen presence of other potential Bond actors, but he has the pedigree: The scion of the legendary Hollywood directing dynasty (his grandfather is John Huston) and an actual British dynasty (his maternal grandfather was the 6th Marquess of Colmondeley), Huston is the odds-on favorite to play the next bond, according to bookie aggregator Oddschecker.com.

He’s also had experience holding down both high-concept movies (David O. Russell’s American Hustle) and big-budget leading roles (the 2016 Ben-Hur remake) that demand range and action versatility, plus a smattering of quintessentially English film and TV parts.

James Norton

As British as tea and red double-decker buses—he attended Cambridge and the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art—the 31-year-old Norton is a veteran of quintessentially British TV series like War & Peace and the crime procedural Grantchester. But it was his role in Happy Valley, as the vile killer Tommy Lee Royce, that seemed to cement his place as a dynamic, multifaceted actor in the popular imagination.

The only knock against Norton is that he’s blonde—but that didn’t stop Daniel Craig, did it?

Tom Hardy

Hardy is one of the UK’s most enigmatic actors, if only because he can seem so damn difficult to pin down. One minute he’s punching the snot out of Batman (The Dark Knight Rises) or whipsawing his way through the desert (Mad Max), and the next he’s singlehandedly holding down an entire screenplay while doing nothing but talking on the phone and driving (Locke). Or, you know, he's punching the snot out of someone else, as in Warrior. Point is, Hardy could easily carry the Bond torch lit by Daniel Craig—that of a physical, enigmatic 007 who is just as comfortable taking care of bad guys with his Walther PPK as he is with his bare damn hands.

Charlize Theron

If there's one requirement to play James Bond, it's that an actor needs to convincingly handle a supercar at dangerous speeds, preferably while dispatching bad guys with an array of firearms. So who better for the role than Charlize Theron? The South African actress shot, swore, and drove with the best of ’em in Mad Max: Fury Road (just ask Tom Hardy), and she'll likely be doing much of the same as the villain in Fast 8 (just ask Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson). Like Robbie, Theron has a talent for upstaging Will Smith—see The Legend of Bagger Vance and Hancock—but more importantly has remarkable acting range, whether it's in sci-fi thrillers like Prometheus or the dark serial killer drama Monster.

  Kit Harington

If there were an Olympic competition for perpetual poutiness, Kit Harington—aka Jon Snow—would have easily conquered it out of an already competitive British field. With Game of Thrones nearly wrapped and his face firmly fixed as one of Hollywood’s most bankable up-and-comers (a mere Harington haircut makes for major news), Harington could be a dark-horse casting decision for a Hollywood producer who decides that Jon Snow might know something after all—particularly how to order a certain secret agent’s preferred martini.

Alicia Vikander

Vikander has a talent for making any movie absurdly fascinating, whether the plot is straightforward (Jason Bourne) or high-concept (Ex Machina). Vikander is so eminently watchable, in fact, that she singlehandedly transformed The Man From U.N.C.L.E. from a Henry-Cavill-vs-Armie-Hammer glowerfest into a remarkably fun spy romp. (Yes: The best feature of The Man From U.N.C.L.E. was a woman.) Plus, with her action-adventure credentials burnished even further by the newly announced Tomb Raider reboot arriving in 2018, Hollywood has every reason to cast the Swedish actress as Britain's foremost secret agent.

Michael Fassbender

Fassbender is already Hollywood royalty—the Irish-German actor is equally adept in straight-up blockbusters (X-Men, Prometheus, the upcoming Assassin’s Creed), TV series (Band of Brothers) and critically beloved movies that ended up becoming blockbusters anyway (12 Years a Slave, Steve Jobs). If he were any type of Bond, he’d be the critically beloved (and German-speaking!) variety.

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from Men's Fitness http://www.mensfitness.com/life/entertainment/who-will-be-next-james-bond-after-daniel-craig

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