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elodieunderglass · 1 month

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Hi! I was wondering if you could help me out with a word I've forgotten? I'm trying to remember the name for a concept that (I think) talks about how people better understand or process Things once they have vocabulary to describe it - I've heard it talked about in regards to the colour orange, or coercive control, etc.

long story short i've just read a paper saying ancient Greeks and Romans weren't racist bc they had no word for racism and am trying to form an argument against!

(no worries if this is unanswerable, i'm aware its a bit of a long shot but you struck me as a person who Knows Things)

That’s extremely kind and funny of you. i don’t know much but i am ok at synthesis.

I think you might be thinking of the concepts loosely called the “Sapir-Whorf hypothesis”, which describes something called “linguistic determinism.” This idea has been “disproven”, as it is just too reductionist as a concept - people are clearly perfectly capable of having experiences that are tough to describe with words. There will be plenty of papers showing how this reasoning is applied.

but it is still commonly thrown around and still considered a useful teaching framework. That’s why you’ll see it referenced online as if it is fresh, new, and applicable - people learn about it every year in college. Also, elements of the framework are probably perfectly sound. It definitely seems to be the case that language shapes brains; it just doesn’t seem to be the case that humans who don’t have specific words for them can’t experience orange, or the future.

(Many things in college are taught using teaching frameworks that may not be, technically, true; the framework is intended to give a critical structure for interpreting information. Then, when we later find evidence that disproves the hypothesis, that single piece of information doesn’t destroy our expensive college education; what we paid for is the framework. This is mostly frustrating in the sciences, when fresh crops of undergraduate students crash around on social media, grappling with their first exposure to (complex concept) and how it’s DIFFERENT to what they learned BEFORE and their teachers LIED TO EVERYBODY and they’re going to save the world from POP SCIENCE by telling the TRUTH. You’ll notice that these TOTALLY NEW INFORMATION reveals map along the semester schedule. The thing here is that getting new information, or information being different from what you were previously told, does not cancel out the fact that you are getting what you pay for - an education. Learning new facts that change our relationships to hypotheses isn’t a ✨huge betrayal ✨ , but the expected process of academia. Anyway.)

You have an interesting response here, and can start by looking at the ways that Sapir-Whorf has been disproved. There will be loads of literature on that.

However, it would be interesting to look at the argument as an unpicking of the other side’s rather weird, ritualistic superstitious belief that a behavior doesn’t exist if the creatures doing it can’t describe it. It is not on the ancient Greeks and Romans to categorise and interpret their behavior for a modern educated audience. They do not have the wherewithal to do so. They are also fucking dead. We can name the behaviors we see, and describe their impacts, however the hell we like.

Sure, the ancient Greeks used “cancer” to refer to lumpy veiny tumors. We can infer that they still had blood cancer, because their medical texts describe leukaemia and their corpses have evidence of it - they just didn’t know it was cancer. But we do, so we can call it cancer. Just because Homer said “the wine-dark sea” in a flight of girlish whimsy doesn’t mean he was unable to distinguish grape juice from saltwater, which we know, because we can observe that he was an intelligent wordsmith perfectly capable of talking about wine and oceans in other contexts. We are the people who get to stand at our point of history with our words, and name things like “this person probably died of leukaemia” and “poets say things that aren’t necessarily literal” and “this behaviour was racist” and “that’s gay” and “togas kinda slay tho” despite Ancient Greeks having different concepts of cancer, wittiness, prejudice, homosexuality, and slaying than we do today.

Now just to caveat that people do get muddled about the concept of racism. Our understanding of racism from here - this point of history, with these words, probably from the West - is heavily influenced by how we see racism around us today: white supremacy and the construct of “whiteness,” European colonial expansion, transatlantic chattel slavery, orientalism, evangelism, 20th century racial science, and so on. This is the picture of racism that really dominates our current discourse, so people often mistake it for the definition of racism. (Perhaps in a linguistic-deterministic sort of way after all.) As a result, muddled-up people often say things like “I can’t be racist because I’m not a white American who throws slurs at black American people,” while being an Indian person in the UK who votes for vile anti-immigration practices, or a Polish person with a horrible attitude about the Roma. Many people genuinely hold this very kindergarten idea of racism; if your opponent does as well, they’re probably thinking something like “Ancient Greek and Roman people didn’t have a concept of white supremacy, because whiteness hadn’t been invented yet, so how could they be racist?” And that’s unsound reasoning in a separate sense.

Racism as the practice of prejudice against an ethnicity, particularly one that is a minority, is a power differential that is perfectly observable in ancient cultures. The beliefs and behaviors will be preserved in written plays, recorded slurs, beauty standards, reactions to foreign marriages, and travel writing. The impacts will be documented in political records, trade agreements, the layouts of historical districts of ancient towns.

You don’t need permission to point out behaviours and impacts. You can point them out in any words you like. You can make up entirely new words to bully the ancient romans with. You are the one at this point of history and your words are the ones that get used.

Pretending that “words” are some kind of an intellect-obscuring magical cloud in the face of actual evidence is just a piece of sophistry (derogatory) on the part of your opponent here. It’s meant to be a distraction. You can dismiss this very flimsy shield pretty quickly and get them in the soft meat of them never reading anything about the actual material topic, while they’re still looking up dictionary definitions or whatever.

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pucksandpower · 1 month

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Sink or Swim

Charles Leclerc x lifeguard!Reader

Summary: in which Charles learns there are some sports he’s just not cut out for … but at least he got a date with a cute lifeguard out of the whole ordeal

Warnings: near drowning

The salty sea breeze whips through Charles’ hair as he paddles out into the turquoise waters off St Kilda beach in Melbourne. It’s a few days before the Australian Grand Prix, and he’s determined to catch some waves and soak up the laid-back lifestyle before the high-pressure weekend begins.

“You’ve got this, mate!” His surf instructor Brent calls out with an encouraging grin. The tan, stocky Aussie has been giving Charles private lessons, showing him the proper technique for popping up on the board.

Charles gives Brent a tentative smile back, gripping the sides of the board tightly as he bobs up and down on the rolling swell. He’s a world-class driver, but he’s way out of his element here in the ocean. Still, he loves a new challenge.

A decent wave starts to form up ahead. “Here comes one! Remember to pop up when I say!” Brent yells.

Charles takes a deep breath and begins paddling hard as the wave builds momentum. “Pop up! Pop up!”

With all his strength, Charles pulls himself up into a crouched stance on the board — and immediately loses his balance, tumbling head-over-heels into the cool saltwater.

He breaks through the surface, sputtering and laughing at his graceless wipeout. “I’m afraid surfing may not be for me!”

“Don’t give up yet, we’re just getting started!” Brent hollers back with a grin.

For the next couple hours, Charles repeatedly attempts to ride the waves, only to lose his footing or get pitched off every time. He’s soaked and exhausted, but utterly thrilled to be out on the ocean instead of cooped up preparing for the race.

You’re stationed on the beach in your red and yellow lifeguard uniform, watching Charles’ futile surfing attempts through your binoculars. He certainly gets an ’A’ for effort if nothing else.

A solid set of waves starts rolling in, larger than the previous ones. You can see the raw power behind them.

“Big ones coming through!” Brent shouts over the crashing surf.

Charles nods and makes his way into position, paddling furiously as a massive wave rears up ahead of him. He pops up on the board at the optimal moment — and immediately gets launched into the air, flipping upside down violently as the full force of the wave pummels him underwater.

You gasp, realizing Charles hasn’t resurfaced after the extended pounding. In a flash you’re sprinting across the sand and diving into the choppy water, your steely eyes scanning for any sign of him.

There — a limp figure drifting beneath the surface, sinking slowly.

You kick hard, swimming as fast as you can while the current batters against you. Finally you reach him, wrapping your arms tightly around Charles’ motionless body and kicking back up towards the air. You break through, desperately gasping for air.

“Help! Surfer down!” You rasp, hauling Charles’ dead weight towards the shore as Brent and another lifeguard race out to assist.

You lay Charles on his back in the sand, quickly checking for a pulse. Faint and thready … but there. You tilt his head back and seal your lips over his, exhaling two rescue breaths into his lungs to fill them with air.

Nothing.

You interlock your fingers and start performing hard, rapid chest compressions. “Come on, breathe!” You growl through gritted teeth, your powerful arms pounding against Charles’ chest.

Finally — he coughs and sputters, vomiting up saltwater as his eyes flutter open in a daze. You roll him on his side, patting his back firmly as he continues coughing and wheezing.

“Wh-where … am I?” Charles murmurs hoarsely, blinking slowly as he takes in your face hovering over him.

You give him a relieved smile. “Don’t worry, you’re safe on the beach now. I’m the lifeguard who pulled you out, you nearly drowned out there.”

He squints at you, still looking dazed and confused. “Am … am I in heaven? You must be an angel ...”

You can’t help but let out a little laugh at his muddled words, your cheeks flushing slightly. “No, definitely not heaven. Just good old St Kilda beach. How are you feeling?”

“Like I got hit by a truck,” Charles groans, gingerly touching his heaving chest. “Everything hurts.”

“That’s what happens when you take on a 12 foot wave,” Brent chuckles, toweling off Charles’ soaked hair with a caring hand. “Let’s get you warmed up and looked over, eh?”

With your help, Charles is able to stand unsteadily. You wrap a thick towel around his shoulders, rubbing his arms briskly to get the blood flowing.

“I don’t think surfing is my calling,” he chuckles weakly, leaning into you a little.

“Probably not,” you agree with a smirk. “Best to leave it to the pros from now on. You saved yourself from becoming the first ever Formula 1 driver shark snack.”

Charles laughs, grimacing and holding his ribs. “Ouch … don’t make me laugh, everything hurts when I laugh.”

“Well then let’s get you looked over and make sure nothing’s broken or bruised too badly,” you reply gently. Keeping an arm around Charles, you begin walking him slowly back across the beach towards the lifeguard hut.

As you’re tending to Charles, cleaning the sand off his cuts and wrapping his chest snugly, he gazes at you with wonder. “I don’t even know your name, angel.”

You shake your head with an amused smirk. “It’s Y/N. And I’ll accept being called an angel just this once after saving your life out there.”

“Y/N,” Charles repeats, committing it to memory with a warm smile. “I’ll never forget it. You’re my guardian angel today.”

You can’t help but blush a little at his sincerity and charisma, even soaking wet and battered on the bench. There’s just something magnetic about Charles.

Once he’s patched up, Charles stretches out his legs with a wince. “Thank you for rescuing me. I very clearly should not have tried to take on that monster wave.” His eyes twinkle roguishly. “Though I have to admit, the thought of you giving me mouth-to-mouth was quite nice.”

“Oh stop it,” you laugh, playfully swatting at his shoulder. “I was just doing my job. But you’re welcome, even if it means no more surfing lessons for you.”

“Ah yes, my pro surfing career is tragically cut short,” Charles jokes wistfully. His expression turns more serious. “But in all honesty … you saved my life today, Y/N. I can’t thank you enough for that. I would be lying at the bottom of the ocean if not for you.”

You meet his warm green eyes, his face still holding the fading marks of his near drowning. “I’m just glad I was in the right place at the right time to help.”

A charged moment passes between you before Charles clears his throat, looking almost sheepish. “So, uh … I know this might seem a little forward of me. But would you want to maybe come watch me race this weekend? As my personal guest?”

You blink in surprise at the unexpected invitation. “Oh, I-I don’t know, that seems like a lot of-”

“Please, I insist!” Charles cuts you off eagerly. “It’s the absolute least I can do to try and repay my own personal angel for saving me.” He gives you a playful grin. “Unless you make a habit of turning down devilishly handsome race car drivers?”

You roll your eyes at his playful cockiness, but you’re already smiling and shaking your head. “You know what, why not? It could be fun to see you in your natural habitat.”

“Fantastic!” Charles beams happily. “Then it’s a date — well, not a date exactly, more like ...” He stumbles over his words sheepishly.

“It’s a date,” you confirm with an amused smirk, putting him out of his flustered misery.

Charles lights up, reaching out to take your hand warmly in his. “A date it is then. Thank you again, Y/N. I’ll show you a much better time at the race than I did trying to surf today.”

You give his hand a squeeze with a fond smile. “I’ll hold you to that, Charles Leclerc.”

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inkskinned · 1 year

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"it's so embarrassing you like that popular thing" "oh ew that geeky/strange thing is so cringe lol" "oh it's kind of weird you get excited about that harmless shit"

dude i love how ironic and jaded you are and that's so cool and sexy of you. and i am so so glad to tell you - you won!! we all had a meeting and we decided that you won, and we are writing your name on the inside of a burger king crown. the marker smeared, sorry, but we knew any form of real effort is ugly to you. but anyway. congrats! you are officially the coolest, most ironic, most jaded person in-the-world-right-now. we would throw you a party but you would think it was totally boring - and besides, we're weird so we wouldn't have been coming. we would have brought our love of beetles and of baking and of little canapes. we would have brought our artsy videogames and pages of writing. we would have written a poem with you, our hands covered in ink, and spread out a canvas to dance on, the night so lurid and pink.

but do not worry. we will not throw the party. we will just get you a ringlight and that crown i mentioned. it is a nice crown, except for where one of us dropped it.

the vote was a really hard one because we had so many cool ironic people to pick off the shelves. all of you have hands that rot fruit, how strange is that - you can't look at something without destroying it for other people. you like it when you can squeeze a person into a pinpoint - all us small ones scampering our little feet around our ugly joys. the vote was also a hard one because we kept our voices down because you don't like it when we talk too loud. you were on your phone at the time, talking to people other than us. you are a ghoul of every moment - half in, half out, you resent us for being here without shame or embarrassment.

so good news! we have invented an island for people like you. you get to go there and speak into the air things like if you still like watching harmless twitch streamers in 2023 you're fucking boring. you will say things like liveplay podcasts are fucking ugly and it's kind of awkward they try to make everything gay. on the island we made you, all of your words will have weight. they will form in the air like icicles, large white behemoth letters that will crumple in anvils around your feet. maybe we will send someone there once in a while to sweep, but honestly you might be there for a while, alone, waiting. we are busy being outside looking for mushrooms and flapping our hands and humming. we are busy kicking our little heels while we watch cringey tv. we are busy - sorry! as an apology, we have pre-filled the island with every bland, mediocre, unscented thing we could find. the island has the texture of american cheese. the island has an ocean that never gets angry. the island is perfect for you, trust me. you will be so happy there - as happy as you can be, ironically.

we want to say we are sorry for doing harmless things that you find annoying, childish, or unappealing - but we are not sorry. we thought we could help you, because we don't mind laughing at ourselves, but it turns out you are allergic to color and noise and atmosphere, so this is the best that we can do for now. we are all making a big shirt that says i voted in the ironic monarchy. we got you one that is just a fast fashion buttondown. i am so excited for you and this island and the big life you have won. you have a cool jaded grey life and miles of irony to roam. i love you! be well.

now leave us alone.

#spilled ink #writeblr #slam poetry #i started this as a joke and ended up taking after #the poem about all the women in the world meeting in the bathroom #i can't find it to link it directly i've been googling for like 15 minutes if someone can remember #turns out frantically googling the only lines like ''women meeting in the bathroom''#''secret womens meeting you always believed happened" is not useful for . to search??? help :(#also the reason this says harmless so many times is bc like #this is 100% about like #yeah man when ppl are mean about ppl enjoying things like. fuckin lady gaga #like this is so obviously about ppl who steal ur joy for no reason (i WILL steal ur joy if ur a bigot btw)#also yes it's bc someone was like ''liking the mcelroys in 2023 is cringe''#and im like. dude what the fuck literally just let people like things it's LITERALLY not that deep.#like i dont like centipedes theyre one of like the 2 bugs im squicked out by ... but like.#if u really like centipedes. im like so happy for you. i hope you can put socks on ur centipedes #so they can speedclean ur floors. that would be fun and cool!!!#i love u i hope all of you have a weird passion i love you i hope that passion fills your life like soap bubbles

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zot3-flopped · 10 days

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Sylvia Plath did not stick her head in an oven for this! When Taylor Swift took the Grammys stage last month to claim her award for Best Pop Vocal Album for Midnights, she saw that spotlight as an opportunity to announce her 11th studio album: The Tortured Poets Department. The follow-up cut to audience members—Swift’s music industry peers, mind you—told us all that we would ever need to know, and the collective disinterest across the crowd echoed through our TVs.

Folks from all walks of life took to social media to express a multitude of reactions. Swifties clamored to their beloved monarch’s forthcoming era, while others lambasted the terminally cringe title and artwork and ridiculed Swift for making a night recognizing musical achievements across an entire industry about herself—knowing perfectly well that it would send her fanbase into a surge that would, no doubt, overpower the excitement around the ceremony itself.

Quite a few people questioned whether or not that moment suggested that a critical—definitely not commercial—tide would turn against the world’s most-famous pop star. And, perhaps it has—but, to most, it will look like nothing more than a single ripple in Swift’s ocean of successes.

Swift remained relatively hush-hush about The Tortured Poets Department up until its release, leaving her fans, admirers and haters alike with nothing but an album title to ponder about. And it’s a bad title.

If you have never been in Swift’s corner, her taking the route of labeling her next “era” as “tortured” was likely catnip for your disinterest. If you are a fan—not necessarily a Swiftie, but even just a casual lover of her best and brightest work—you might be beside yourself about the first Swift album title longer than one word in 14 years.

In terms of popularity—certainly not always in terms of quality—no musician has been bigger this century than Swift, which makes it impossible to really buy into the “torture” of it all.

This is not to say that Swift being the most famous person in the world makes her immune to having multi-dimensional feelings of heartbreak, mental illness or what-have-you.

But, she has made the choice—as a 34-year-old adult—to take those complex, universal familiars and monetize them into a wardrobe she can wear for whatever portion of her Eras Tour setlist she opts to dedicate to the material.

Torture is fashion to Taylor Swift, and she wears her milieu dully. This album will surely get comparisons to Rupi Kaur’s poetry, either for its simplicity, empty language, commodification or all of the above.

And, sure, there are parallels there, especially in how The Tortured Poets Department, too, is going to set the art of poetry back another decade—as Swift’s naive call-to-arms of her own milky-white sorrow rings in like some quintessential “I am going to take pictures of a typewriter on my desk and have a Pinterest mood-board of Courier New font” iPhone fodder. 2013 called and it wants it capricious, suburban girl-who-is-taking-a-gap-year wig back!

Soaking our book reports in coffee or having our moms burn the edges with a kitchen lighter cannot come back into fashion; the cyclical notions of culture cannot make the space for such retreads.

There is nothing poetic about a billionaire—who, mind you, threatens legal action against a Twitter account for tracking her destructive private jet paths—telling stadiums of thousands of people every night that she sees and adores them.

Tavi Gevinson says it well in her Fan Fiction zine: “When 80,000 people are also crying, you become less special, too.” If Swift can return to one of her dozen beach houses across the world, kick up her feet and say “I’m a poet of struggle,” then who is to say that millions—maybe billions—of people with access to a notes app and a social media account won’t dream that dream, too?

Maybe that looks like a net-positive, but it’s inherently damning and destructive to take an art form that has long stood on the shoulders of resistance, of love and of opposition to power, systematic injustice and climate warfare and boil it down to the new defining era of your own 10-digit revenue empire. “My culture is not your costume,” yada, etc.

The Tortured Poets Department does begin with a shred of hope that, just maybe, Swift knows what she’s talking about—as she sneaks in a cheeky “all of this to say,” textbook transitional phrasing for poets, on opening track “Fortnight.”

But “Fortnight” unmasks itself quickly as a heady vat of pop nothingness, though it isn’t all Swift’s fault. “I was a functioning alcoholic, ‘til nobody noticed my new aesthetic,” she muses, attempting to bridge the gap between a behind-the-scenes life and on-stage performance—only for it to occur while propped up against the most dog-water, uninspired synth arrangement you could possibly imagine.

Between producer Jack Antonoff’s atrocious backing instrumental and the Y2K-era, teen dramedy echo chamber of a vocal harmony provided by out-of-place guest performer Post Malone, “Fortnight” chokes on the vomit of its own opaqueness.

“I took the miracle move-on drug, the effects were temporary,” Swift muses, and it sounds like satire. This is your songwriter of the century? Open the schools.

The Tortured Poets Department title-track features some of Swift’s worst lyricism to-date, including the irredeemable, relentlessly cringe “You smoked then ate seven bars of chocolate, we declared Charlie Puth should be a bigger artist / I scratch your head, you fall asleep like a tattooed golden retriever” lines glazed atop some synthesizers and drums that just ring in as hollow, unfascinating costuming.

Aside from the Puth nod, which I can only discern as a joke (given the fact that he is one of the 150-most streamed artists in the world and is one of the blandest pop practitioners alive—I don’t care if he can figure out the pitch of any sound you throw at him), I think Antonoff should stick to guitar-playing. Get that man away from a keyboard, I’m begging you.

Synths can be, if you use them correctly, one of the most emotional and provocative instruments in any musician’s tool-box. There’s a reason why keyboards defined the 1980s; they rebelled against the very oppressive nature existing outside of the cultural company they kept. There’s resistance in electronic music that, while they brandish an aesthetic that, to a layman’s ears, seems like technicolor hues for any infectious pop track, it’s a genre that aches to tell its own story. That is simply not the case here, and that electronica hangs Swift out to dry when she drags us through the lukewarm “I laughed in your face and said, ‘You’re not Dylan Thomas, I’m not Patti Smith’ / This ain’t the Chelsea Hotel, we’re modern idiots” lines, only to hit us with a softly sung F-bomb that sounds like a billionaire’s rendition of that one Miranda Cosgrove podcast clip.

I used to rag pretty heavily on Reputation—mostly because I thought (and still do, mostly) that it sounded like Swift had given up on making interesting, progressive pop music; that, in the wake of her (arguably) best album, 1989, it seemed like she’d lost the plot on where to go next. But as she’s put out Midnights and The Tortured Poets Department back-to-back, I find myself clamoring for the Reputation-era more than ever—at least seven years ago, Swift wrote songs like she had something to prove and even more to lose.

That was the always-obvious charm of Reputation, even despite the downsides—that she took a big swing from the echelons of her own musical immortality, that the comforts of winning every award and selling out the biggest venues in the world were no longer pillowing her aspirations. Even though that swing didn’t land, she still made it in the first place—and Swift is at her best either when she is clawing upwards (Reputation) or faced with nowhere to go but into the studio and noodle with the bare-bones of her own sensibilities (folklore).

You get something like The Tortured Poets Department when the artist making it no longer feels challenged, where she strikes out looking.

The mid-ness of The Tortured Poets Department will not be a net-loss for Swift. She will sell out arenas and get her streams until she elects to quit this business (a phrase decidedly not in her vocabulary, surely).

She will sell more merch bundles than vinyl plants have the capacity to make, and rows of variant LP copies will haunt the record aisles of Target stores just as long as Midnights has—if not longer.

Perhaps, in five or six years’ time, we will speak of this record just as we now do of Reputation. But right now, it is obvious that Swift no longer feels challenged to be good. The Tortured Poets Department is the mark of an artist now interested in seeing how much their empire can atone for the sins of mediocrity.

Can Swift win another Album of the Year Grammy simply because she released a record during the eligibility period? The Tortured Poets Department reeks of “because I can,” not “because I should.”

On “I Can Fix Him (No Really I Can),” Swift tries stepping into the shoes of the country renegades who came before her—the Tammy Wynettes and Loretta Lynns of the world. But her self-aggrandizing inflation of importance, glinting through via a seismically-bland bridge, is backed by a minimal set dressing of guitar, drum machine and keys.

“Good boy, that’s right, come close,” she sings. “I’ll show you Heaven if you’ll be an angel—all mine. Trust me, I can handle me a dangerous man. No, really, I can.” On “Florida!!!,” Swift calls upon Florence + the Machine to help her sing the worst chorus of 2024: “Florida is one hell of a drug / Florida, can I use you up?”

Even Welch, who is a fantastic pop singer-songwriter in her own right, delivers a grossly watery verse: “The hurricane with my name, when it came I got drunk and I dared it to wash me away.”

Not even the typos on the Spotify promotional materials for this album could have foretold such offenses. I won’t even get into the sonics, because Antonoff just rewrites the same soulless patterns every time.

What separates The Tortured Poets Department from something like Reputation is that, on the latter, Swift made it known what was at stake and who she was making that album for—herself, in the aftermath of her greatest long-standing criticisms (“Look What You Made Me Do” triumphs exactly because of this).

On The Tortured Poets Department, there is a striking level of moral nothingness. The stakes are practically non-existent, and the album sounds like it was made by someone who believes that they had no other choice but to finish it, as if Swift fundamentally believes that her creative measures are firmly embedded in the massive monopoly her name and brand currently hold on popular music. That’s how you get meandering pop songs about hookups, wine moms, Stevie Nicks comparisons, Jehovah’s Witness suit mentions, hollowed-out, tone-deaf nods to white-collar crime in lieu of empowerment and, topically, Barbie dolls.

(Don’t even get me started on the Anthology lyrics, which feature these absolute barn-burners: “Touch me while your bros play Grand Theft Auto” and “My friends used to play a game where / We would pick a decade / We wished we could live in instead of this / I’d say the 1830s, but without all the racists / And getting married off for the highest bid.”) This album and its hackneyed grasps at relevance exist as “Did I just hear that?” personified, but in the most derogatory sense of the notion.

My Boy Only Breaks His Favorite Toys” features another low-point in Swift’s lyrical oeuvre, as she sings “I felt more when we played pretend than with all the Kens, ‘cause he took me out of my box”—perhaps a measure of her capitalizing on the Barbenheimer mania that none of us could escape, not even the musician who spent most of 2023 flying across the world from one country to another.

But you, us, the listener—we want to believe that Swift makes these records because she has the artistic will, drive and interest to continue giving us parts of her story in such ways that they exist as an archival of her life.

But the problem is that, on The Tortured Poets Department, Swift is packaging her life into a form that is easily consumable for the 17 or 18 years olds who pour over her music. Just because her Eras Tour film is on Disney+ doesn’t mean she has to strip her songwriting (which we know can be, and has been, phenomenal) down for the sake of it being digestible by a wide spectrum of ages.

And, sure, maybe that makes the work accessible. But on The Tortured Poets Department, Swift makes Zoomer jargon her bag—titling a song after one of the most popular video games in the world and conjuring flickers of “down bad” and “I can fix him”—and it feels like she’s cosplaying because the Fountain of Youth was out of order.

Now that Swift is in her 30s, it sounds like she is infantilizing her own audience more than ever before—that singing to them at a level that could force them to reckon with something more akin with adulthood would be some kind of kink in the coil or her consumeristic threshold, that writing lyrics that sound like they were penned by a 30-year-old would, somehow, deter the interests of the billions of people who adore her.

If making one, continuous coming-of-age album is what Swift has been doing for 15 years, folklore and evermore were hiccups in the timeline—existing as the most fully-formed renderings of Swift’s own insecurities and concerns. They mirrored our platitudes towards an uncertain future with sweet, stirring remarks about isolation and heartbreak and the unavoidable, hard-worn truth about getting older. On those records, her larger-than-life living seemed, for once, to truly feel as close to the ground as ours.

Now, though, Taylor Swift is at the top of the mountain. Far better artists have made far worse records than The Tortured Poets Department, but you can’t read between the lines of this project. There is nothing to decipher from a place of quality.

Sure, Swift’s fan base will pour over these lyrics for the rest of their lives—insisting they know, for certain, which song is about who. But you cannot place a bad album on the shoulders of lore and expect it to be rectified.

We are now left at a crossroads. Women can’t critique Swift because they’ll run the risk of being labeled a “gender traitor” for doing so. Men can’t critique her because they’ll be touted as “sexist.”

And, sure, Swift is probably too easy a punching bag in this case—and most of the time, I would argue she is undeserving of being a victim of such barbs. But, you cannot write about someone being a “tattooed golden retriever” and get away with it and still retain your title as the best songwriter of your generation. You just cannot.

Sisyphus should be glad he never got the boulder to the top of the mountain—because Taylor Swift is showing us that such immortality and success ain’t all it’s cracked up to be. And, when you’re standing on the peak alone, who else is there left to hit?

In a recent interview with The Standard, Courtney Love said that Swift is “not interesting as an artist,” and I think The Tortured Poets Department proves as much. She has nothing to fight for, no doubters left to drown.

So where does she turn? Well, to boredoms of celebrity thinly veiled as sorrow everyone and their mother can latch onto—because we’ve all had to “ditch the clowns, get the crown” at some point in our lives, right?

The billionaire is having an identity crisis, but there are no social media apps for her to buy up. So she sings like Lana Del Rey and writes meta-self-referential songs about looking like Stevie Nicks.

What’s hollow about The Tortured Poets Department is that the real torture is just how unlivable these songs really are. No one can resonate with “So I leap from the gallows and I levitate down your street, crash the party like a record, scratch as I scream ‘Who’s afraid of little old me?’ You should be.” And normally, that wouldn’t be an end-all-be-all for a pop record—but when your brand is built on copious levels of “I’m just like you!” as the demigod saying it to their fans does so from a multi-million-dollar production set, it’s hard to not feel nauseated by the overlording, overbearing sense of heavy-handed detritus we’re tasked with sifting through on The Tortured Poets Department.

Love’s words to Lana, her advice to “take seven years off,” should be applied to Swift. Now, that doesn’t mean that, to make a good album, you must sit on material for years and labor extensively through the sketching, shaping and recording in order for it to be transcendentally landmark. But it’s obvious now that not even Taylor Swift wants to be the head of an empire—that she, too, can’t outrun the damning fate of being plum out of ideas by hopping in her jet and skirting off to God knows where.

See you at the Grammys.

****

#this review is everything #anti taylor swift #taylor swift #travis kelce #3.6 !!!#hope Pitchfork comes for her too #jack antonoff #taylor swift reviews #the department of tortured poets

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bobacupcake · 7 months

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Can you do one about the Sea of Thieves water?

so . there was a biiig long talk about this at siggraph one year!! you can watch that here if you'd like . in the time between me getting this ask and me fully recreating the water, acerola also released a great video about it . the biiig underlying thing they do and the reason why it looks so good is they are making a Really Detailed Ocean Mesh in realtime using something called an FFT (fast fourier transform) to simulate hundreds of thousands of waves, based on a paper by TESSENDORF

WHAT IS AN FFT - we'll get to that. first we have to talk about the DFT - the discreet fourier transform. let's say you have a SOUND. it is a c chord - a C, an E, and a G, being played at the same time. all sounds are waves!!! so when you play multiple sounds at the same time, those waves combine!!! like here: the top is all 3 notes playing together, so they form the waveform at the bottom!!

now if someone handed you the bottom wave, could you figure out each individual note that was being played? how about if someone handed you a wave of One Hundred Notes. you would think it would be very hard. and well, it would be, if not for the Discreet Fourier Transform.

essentially, there is a way to take a bunch of points on a waveform comprised of a bunch of different waves, add them all together, do some messed up stuff with imaginary numbers, that will spit back out at you what individual waves are present. i made a little test program at the start of all this: the left are the waves i am putting into my Big Waveform, the top right is what that ends up looking like, and all the little rainbow points on it are being sampled to spit out the graph at the bottom right: it shows which frequency bands the DFT is finding (here it is animated)

this has enormous use cases in anything that deals with audio and image processing, and also,

THE OCEAN

tessendorf is basically like, hey, People Who Are Good At The Ocean say that a buuuunch of sine waves do a pretty good job of approximating what it looks like. and by a bunch they mean like, hundreds of thousands to millions. oh no.... if only there was a way we could easily deal with millions of sine waves..........

well GREAT news. not only can you do the DFT in one direction, but you can also do it in REVERSE. if you were to be given the frequency graph of a noise for example, you could use an INVERSE DFT to calculate what the combined wave graph looks like at any given time. so if you were to have say, the frequency graph of an oceaaaan, for example, you could calculate what the Ocean wave looks like at any given time. and lucky for us, it works in two dimensions. and thats the foundation of the simulation !!!!!

BUT WAIT

as incredible as the DFT is, it doesn't scale very well. the more times you have to do it, the slower it gets, exponentially, and we are working with potentially millions of sine waves here

THE FAST FOURIER TRANSFORM here we are . the fast fourier transform is a way of doing the discreet fourier transform, except, well, fast. i am Not going to explain the intricacies of it because its very complex, but if you want to learn more there are a ton of good 30 minute long videos on youtube about it . but essentially, due to the nature of sine waves repeating, you can borrow values as you go, and make the calculation Much faster (from exponential growth to logarithmic growth which is much much slower, and scales very well at higher numbers). it's, complicated, but the important part is it's so much faster and the diagram kind of looks like the shadow the hedgehog story plot

so if we use the inverse FFT on a graph of a rough estimate of what frequency of waves in the ocean (called a spectrum, basically tells us things like how many small waves, how many big waves, how different waves follow the wind direction. sea of thieves uses one called the phillips spectrum but there are better ones out there!!) now we have our waves !!!!!!! we can also use another inverse FFT to get the normals of the waves, and horizontal displacement of the waves (sharpening peaks and broadening valleys) through some derivatives . yayy calculus

OK MATH IS OVER. WE HAVE OUR WAVES!!! they are solid pink and look like pepto bismol. WHAT NOW

i cheated a bit here they look better than not being shaded because i am using the normals to reflect a CUBEMAP to make it look shiny. i think sea of thieves does this too but they didnt mention it in their talk. they did mention a FEW THINGS THEY DID THOUGH

FIRST OFF - SUBSURFACE SCATTERING. this is where the sun pokes through since water is translucent. SSS IS REALLY EXPENSIVE !!!!!! so they just faked it. do you remember the wave sharpening displacement i mentioned earlier? they just take the value where the waves are being sharpened and this will pretty naturally show off the areas that should have subsurface scattering (the sides of waves). they make it shine through any time you are looking towards the sun. they also add a bit of specular ! sss here is that nice blue color, and specular is the shiny bits coming off the sun. the rest of the lighting is the cubemap i mentioned earlier, i dont know if thats what they use but it looks nice !!!!!

then the other big thing that they do is the FOAM !! sorry i lied. there's more math. last one. you remember the wave sharpening displacement i Just mentioned. well they used that to find something called the JACOBIAN and well im not even going to begin to try and explain what it means but functionally what it does, is when the jacobian is NEGATIVE it means waves are clipping into eachother. and that means we should draw some foam!!! we can also blur and fade out the foam texture over time and continuously write to it to give it some movement, and bias this value a bit to make more or less foam. they do both of these!!!

YAYYYYY !! OK !! THAT'S SEA OF THIEVES WATER!!!!! THANKS FOR WAITING ALL THIS TIME. you can see my journey here if you would like to i have tagged it all oceanquest2023

thank you everyone for joining me :) i had fun

#ask #potion of answers your question #randomentalist #gamedev stuff #long post #oceanquest2023

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wh0rezs · 1 year

Text

“PIRANHA”

PAIRING: DAD!JAKE SULLY X DAUGHTER! READER, MOM!NEYTIRI SULLY X DAUGHTER! READER

SUMMARY: An ordinary day is interrupted by the wailing of children and someone screaming “she bit me, she bit me” and years in the future the Sullys relive the past.

WARNINGS: non, fluff, mentions of blood and biting, fighting

Neytiri and Jake relaxed in the newfound silence that filled the hut, Mo’at had graciously agreed to take her four grandchildren to the play grounds/ training of “young warriors” for the new parents.

Soon their peace was interrupted by the rustling of the flaps, and emerged was one Jake’s trainee, greeting the Olo’eyktan and tsakarem in the customary way .

“Olo’eyktan and tsakarem, you must come to play grounds. There has been a situation involving your eldest child, [name].” the young warrior huffed as the mated pair stood up at lightning speed.

As they ran towards the play ground, their minds swirling of the most terrible outcomes- [name] having an arrow sticking out of her arm or eye, or [name]’s tiny body broken in several places. But the sounds of Omaticaya child- boy and definitely not one of theirs-yelling words at someone reached their ears.

Quickly the scene came clear to them- a young boy, roughly a year older than you, was clutching his right arm while his parents comforted him and Mo’at was putting a salve on his arm. Neytiri and Jake’s eyes switched to other side where their own children and Tarsem (young boy who hung out with [name]) stood. On both of [name]’s hips rested Lo’ak and Kiri, who were both four. Neteyam, who was five, stood behind his sister.

The boy’s wails finally reached Jake’s ears again once he realized his own children were safe, and now it was clear he was screaming “she bit me, she bit me.”

“Mo’at, what happen here? Who bit the boy?” Jake demanded, pulling everyone’s attention. Mo’at glanced at Jake before her eyes flicked towards you, his eldest child at the age 6.

“Seems like your daughter bit the boy, and wouldn’t let go until she was dragged off of him” she told him and showed him the boy’s arm where sure enough there was your teeth marks tattooed into his skin. As Jake glanced at you, you smiled showing off red at the end of your canines.

“[name] tell me why you did this and then apologize to the poor boy.” Neytiri commanded you, and you quickly explained that the boy Taronyu was bullying Lo’ak and Kiri for their tawtute looks. Lo’ak happily clapped and laughed at the story, as if it was the funniest thing to hear when you said bit him.

Jake couldn’t help but feel proud of you for defending your siblings as you apologized to Taronyu. Afterwards, Neytiri took Kiri and Lo’ak from you, and the Sullies headed home for the day.

On the way, Jake ruffled your braided hair and whispered “I am proud of you, my little piranha.” You glanced up at him, clearly confused as what a piranha was.

[10 YEARS LATER]

The scuffle on the beach reached Tonowari and Jake’s ears, as ear piercing scream broke the silence. When the two dads reached the scene, they were surprised to see the Metkayinas trying to pull a deep blue body off an ocean blue body.

Jake quickly assessed the scene, finding three out of the four eldest also huddled around the two. His eyes darted to familiar body, whose tails and arms were being pulled at by Ao’nung, was when he pieced together the puzzle. Your incredible sharp teeth were sunken in to the Metkayina’s arm, and you weren’t going to let go as easily as 10 years ago.

“[name] let go.” he commanded and you quickly did with red staining your canines. The whole group started off to mauris, all the children getting hell from both respected adults.

“And [name], what the hell was that? Biting someone like a that?” Jake turned his attention to the smiling form of his daughter. You explained that Ao’nung and his goons had harassed Kiri, calling her a freak and once the fighting started you did what you knew best.

Jake hid his smile at your explanation, and later that night he explained to Neytiri that it felt deja vu. The sight of you smiling, teeth stained red, at the thought of protecting your young siblings. You were always gonna be his little piranha.

A/N: this sucks but i love comforting fanfics

#dad jake sully #dad!jake x daughter!reader #mom!neytiri x reader #avatar 2009 #avatar 2009 x reader #sully family x reader #atwotw x reader

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writingstoraes · 10 months

Text

sparks 🎇

pairing: charles leclerc/fem!reader

type: written imagine (fluff)

word count: 1.7k, no warnings hehe

notes: once again this is a new idea even though i have a ton of drafts like my mind is a mess so i am not surprised ANYWAY . trying to get out of a writing slump so lmk what u guys think! ALSO apologies for any typos or grammatical errors this is not proofread at all 😆

about: The few of the many times Charles’ heart skipped a beat because of you.

Movies have always portrayed “real” sparks so well. Sometimes it’s a scene where a guy sees the girl for the very first time during a first date and he freezes for a moment, the apparent electricity between two people when their hands almost touch and they panic for a little while, or the moment of suspense before a first kiss and the exhilaration after.

But Charles taught that was exactly what they were - movie scenes. He lingered on the thought that the moments where sparks flew and one’s heart skips a beat, those moments cannot be manufactured in real life. They stay in movies, books, in the arts; where they belong, somewhere where they were fiction.

Not until he experiences it first-hand, not until he meets you, the woman who held his heart in the palm of her hand.

He felt it the first time your hands ever touched.

At first, he thought he was going crazy. There was no way he felt a current run through his skin the moment it came in contact with yours, but to this day, it’s a testament he swears on very seriously.

You had been going out for a few weeks, several dates here and there. It was the exact point where you felt comfortable with each other, but only starting to be, hence why there were still evident boundaries present. The two of you were careful to not cross any, especially Charles. He’s cautious on establishing any physical touch, sure, he’s held your waist to guide you through bustling crowds and had slung his arm over your shoulder, but he hasn’t held your hand. At least, not yet.

He had invited you to have dinner on his yacht, set at the perfect time where you can be of witness to the beautiful sunset over the sea. He says the food was nearly done, so he set up two comfortable chairs that gave you just the perfect view of the Monaco skies. The sun was setting and the golden sky formed a beautiful gradient with the blue hue that painted it beforehand.

He turns his head to you, your arm resting on the chair’s handles, a tad bit preoccupied with the view in front of you. He keeps a smile to himself, enjoying the personalized view he had. For some reason, he feels the urge to hold your hand, or at least rest his on top of yours. He was hesitating and second-guessing, lifting his finger once in a while and then putting it back down when he decides not to push through. It didn’t help that there were minimal distance between your chair and his, and so he was fighting the urge to initiate contact and have you flee off.

But his hesitant hand that kept on moving was something you grew to notice, and thanks to your knowledge of many, many romance movies, you assumed it meant he wanted to hold your hand but was too afraid to do it. You shove the thought of doing it first in the back of your head, overthinking that you might be wrong and he in fact did not want to hold your hand.

Maybe it was something in the air, the quiet waves of the ocean, or just the fact that he really really liked you.

He finally lifts his hand so he can reach yours, resting it softly on top of your hand. He lets out a relieved and contented sigh when he feels you ease into his touch. His heart raced faster, like it was screaming for help and begging to be let out of his chest.

As if that was not enough, he feels a current run through his arm and out of his fingertips the moment you grasp his hand and decide to interlock your fingers with his then setting it on top of the chair’s handle. He swears he saw fireworks when he closed his eyes and his heart finally exploded out of his chest. He vows he can stand up and jump around out of joy, but he chooses to indulge in the moment and gives your hand a reassuring squeeze instead.

He had met you earlier in the season and he would be lying if he said he didn’t want you to see him in his element, doing what truly made him happy. That is, if his team does not proceed to ruin the entire weekend for him and his dedicated fans.

He invited you to watch a grand prix, in a track that he felt most comfortable. He was the perfect gentleman whe he extended the invite, letting you know you could always decline if you didn’t feel like going. You were together, in all terms to be considered, but he didn’t want to pressure you into finally making your appearance only because he knew how harsh it could get. He assures you that he will take care of everything and all you needed to do was come.

You were committed to attend the entire weekend, from free practice until the race itself. Even if Charles was quick to reassure you that you didn’t have to be there for everything, you only return a smile and tell him you wanted to be, which not surprisingly calmed his nerves.

You knew people were going to stare, fans will take pictures, even the possibility of you making headlines. This was your first paddock appearance as his girlfriend, after all. It was inevitable, so you try to take your mind off of the pressure. Much to your nerves bothering you before you even got on the plane, you had been racking your brain on what to wear. You didn’t want to seem like you were trying too hard or too little.

You finally settle on an outfit and your lips form a small smile as you looked in the mirror. It was nothing extravagant, only a black one-shoulder top and a black high-waisted pants that you paired with a red leather jacket. It’s not like you wanted what you wore to scream Ferrari, but you wanted to add a little touch, at least for Charles.

“What do you think? I chose the red jacket for you,” you turn around to see Charles, seeing as you heard his footsteps earlier and knew he entered the room.

If he was being honest, he had seen you put on the outfit. He witnessed how you cocked your head to the side trying to see if it looks good. He sees the outfits laid on the bed, all with a touch of red, and he could feel butterflies swarm his stomach at the thought of you carefully planning out your outfits to include his team’s colors.

There it was again, the stupid sparks that he’s been getting ever since he met you. He curses himself for being a little non-functional when feels them, but he figures he has to get used to being blown away by everything you did. It feels magnetic, like he’s feeling actual static. You make him feel so much by just doing so little.

He sees you twirling around in front of the mirror, smiling when you finally put on the red leather jacket, looking satisfied.

He stops at his tracks, at least internally, and fails to respond for at least 10 seconds.

“Do you not like it? I can always go change-”

“No,” he says, almost out of voice. “You look absolutely beautiful.”

Where he was standing, he swears he sees fireworks erupt behind you.

Charles stands on the podium, feeling victorious and ecstatic he had clinched another win for his Formula 1 career. He looks fondly at the sea of crowd cheering for him, waving flags of his own country, Ferrari, and Italy. From where he stood he could see Fred’s big smile and the engineers celebrating, jumping up and down.

The trophies had been awarded and the Monaco national anthem had finally played. He was wearing his Pirelli cap and completely drenched in champagne. He scans the crowd down the podium, hoping to get a glance of you. Earlier, he did tell you you didn’t have to witness the awarding personally should he win, because he didn’t want you to get in between many people and possibly get shoved or pushed. He assumes that you were in the garage, waiting for him, probably with a kiss and a hug.

He leans over the makeshift railing of the stage, eyes still set on possibly sighting you. When he fails to find you, he finally comes down and there he sees you, just near the stairs going up to the podium with teary eyes and a wide smile. There you stood with hands clasped together, in awe of Charles who was standing in front of you.

He feels his heart race yet again, having experienced the first time you ever greeted him after he claims P1 in a race. Even just by looking at you he feels his world shift, like its only goal was to pull him towards you, like the fireworks that took the skies earlier weren’t enough and he was having his own show.

He jogs towards you, exhilirated and filled with adrenaline and pulls you into a tight embrace. His entire body twitches when you plant a soft kiss on his cheek, as if every fiber of his being had turned into putty at your touch. Everytime you engulf him in an embrace, kiss his cheek, or run your hands through his hair, he feels as if he’s inside his car going at least 320 kilometers per hour. He has no clue how you do it, how you possibly make him feel like he’s won a race every time he was with you; as if you and his heart had a binding agreement.

“Congratulations, mon champion du monde,” you say slowly and close to Charles so only he could hear, hoping you didn’t mess up the pronunciation, after having practiced it several times on the plane.

Something tugs at his heartstrings, having been greeted by the knowledge that you sent out his well wishes in French, even though you didn’t speak the language and mentioned you were always scared you were going to say something wrong. But mostly because you called him your world champion, and that just sends him down a spiral.

“Thanks for being here, amour.” he replies, pulling you in again for another hug.

------------

tagging: @slytherheign, @honethatty12, @siovhanroy

notes: thanks for reading everyone <3 will try to post a 1.4k special soon but firstly thank u so much for all the love hehehe hope u guys r having the nicest day!

#writtenbyrae #charles leclerc #charles leclerc x reader #charles leclerc x female reader #charles leclerc imagine #charles leclerc fluff #charles leclerc fanfic #formula 1 #f1 #formula 1 imagine #formula 1 fanfic #f1 fanfic #f1 imagine #charles leclerc drabble #charles leclerc one shot

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komorezuki · 4 months

Text

An expert on costumes and naval uniform wanted: what does Dagon's new outfit demonstrate?

Well, my hyperfixation on Dagon is still at its peak and now i feel there are some interesting things can be seen on her new pretentious outfit. I am trying to collect all my finds here and asking you to help me explain it. Hope this meta will be replenished with your additions.

So, let's look at it closer:

Disclaimer: i am not so good at color correction so if you know better please teach me to improve images.

Obviously she has some pirate (or rather lovecraftian, which her name directly refers to) vibes, hasn't she? Lite Davy Jones. Probably that her demonic form has tentacles who knows.

First: the coat as a whole. Blue color, embrodiered lapels and cuffs, collar (i dont know how this form is called), golden epaulettes. The coat is looking like a part of British navy uniform in Regency Era (hmmm what is it about Jane Austin??) We can see similar uniform in illustrations from the book Nelson's Officers and Midshipmen. I also dont know why her epaulettes are blank.

Next: the sash. I dont know if the red color makes any sense, anyway i would like someone to expand the information.

The sash looks shabby too:

What i want to focus to is pins:

Two saber pins. I dont think they make any sense, just a reference to navy/pirates

A blurry silver pin. Thistle? If so, it looks like Royal Scottish Reserve Regiment Cap Badge. Why does Dagon wear this?

A strange blue pendant with a horseman and circular inscription. It's very unreadable, and i have no idea what this pendant (medal?) means.

Two medal ribbon bars. This is most interesting thing. I have identified the only medal from this bars: Military Medal that is awarded to other ranks of the Army and Royal Air Force for acts of bravery in the field.

Upper bar seems also very intriguing but i couldnt find any info about blue+white+red strips in the middle of ribbon.

Next: random pretty stuff. Necklace and fragment of the embrodiery on lapel. Looks like it was once a luxury golden embrodiery, but now it has severely dimmed and soaked. As if Dagon took this coat from the sea floor. She is capable of it, I believe, I can expect this of potentially oceanic archidemon.

And most likely she is wearing black dress under the coat and nails that are as blue as her makeup. Probably there is something to say about her hairstyle, but...i ran out of ideas. Hope you my brothers help me to disassemble this visual disaster.

P.S. especially thanks to @ninnikukawaii for checking my english texts. I just want to say, you're an angel (♡°▽°♡)

Part 2 is here

#good omens 2 #good omens #good omens demons #lord dagon #dagon #dagon good omens #good omens meta #good omens hell #navy uniform #good omens analysis #go2 meta #go2

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sadesluvr · 4 days

Text

The Hills (Part Two)

JJ hates his menial job, but there’s a certain customer he lusts and loathes in particular.

(JJ Maybank x Reader)

Part One

You didn’t know what had come over you.

One minute you’d been poolside; pissed over something so fickle you couldn’t remember, and the next you were pressed against the cold walls of the storage room whilst JJ Maybank - known Pogue and borderline vagrant - had fucked you from behind.

He was all over you now; his love bites still etched on your body whilst his ocean and marijuana dripped scent was embedded into the material of your swimsuit. None of it compared to the fact that he’d made his mark directly inside you - his cum still seeping out of you when you’d showered before dinner that day. Your dear father had been concerned, so worried that his princess was walking with a slight limp whilst she kept her thighs pressed together…and all you could say was that you needed to pee.

What had happened was a one time thing, a lapse of judgement in the spur of the moment. He could run off and tell all his friends, but who was truly going to believe him? You had everyone wrapped around your finger, so as far as it went, your word was sacred.

Would you really be that embarrassed if word got out? It wasn’t as if JJ was a complete social pariah. Still, you knew enough about him (and his felonious father) to know that some things were best kept a secret.

And you vowed to keep it that way.

“I’m bored,” Bree said, dragging her vowels as she ran a hand through her hair. “Let’s get drunk. Or high. Better yet, both,”

You and Halle scoffed as you turned around, balancing an ungodly amount of clothes on your arms. They were over at your house, going through your closet as you sifted for something fresh - or forgotten - to wear. Midsummers was around the corner, and nothing but perfection was expected from you. Not that you were ever worried about that, of course.

“Can’t you see we’re in the middle of something?” you said, rolling your eyes.

“We can just go to the store and get a new one,” Bree huffed before perking up again. “Come on, let’s go to Rafe’s! They’ve always got something going on,”

Halle snickered. “Please, anywhere but his!”

“Agreed,” you nodded. “Rafe does the hard stuff. I am not a crack whore,”

“Speaking of, what’s going on with you and him, huh?” Bree pressed. “You know he’s into you…I bet he’s going to ask you to Midsummers,”

You smirked. The fact was rather amusing - Rafe could, and has, hooked up with many girls on the island, and yet you were the one he chased the most. It was the classic Madonna/Whore complex, and if you were to say yes - even once - you knew you were in for a life of nothing but rigid conformity, from the rich white of your wedding dress to the grand names of your babies once you carried the Cameron lineage. To some, that life was appealing, but you already had it all.

You just wanted a bit of fun. Perhaps in the form of another blonde.

“I’ll hook up with him but that’s it,” you shrugged, holding a dress to your body as you stared in the mirror. “It all depends on how drunk I can get…”

“Are you serious? How could you not like Rafe Cameron? Every girl on this island would kill to be you!” Bree exclaimed with a distant, yet covetous look in her eye.

“Tell me something I don’t know,”

Bree huffed again before pursing her lips.

“…If you don’t want him, can I have him?”

You cocked a brow.

“Does he want you?”

Halle bit her lip, holding back a laugh as she flopped onto your bed and grinned.

“I’m all for you getting laid anyway,” she said, breaking the somewhat obvious tension. “Whoever you got it from last time gave it to you good… I haven’t seen you glow like that since our twelfth grade spring break!”

You paused, suddenly being hit with the faint smell of chlorine and weed. JJ was behind you again, stamping impassioned kisses and bites onto your skin as he tutted into you, skilfully working his big cock into you as he sought his release. It was all too warm, too fast.

“Oooh, who’s the guy?” Bree perked up, with Halle nodding eagerly in agreement.

“It’s nothing serious…” you shrugged, turning your back to the both of them as you tried to hide your smirk. You and JJ weren’t dating - and you certainly weren’t close to being friends - and yet you couldn’t deny the feeling in your stomach. Whether it was nerves, lust, or somewhere in between, you couldn’t wait to run into the Pogue boy again.

“…You know what?” you said, clearing your throat as you stared off into the distance. “Maybe I can get us that weed for next time…”

That Saturday, you wore your prettiest (and tightest) sundress.

It seemed your covered body made you borderline invisible (it was either that or JJ was deliberately ignoring you) as you watched him stroll around the pool, smiling in people’s faces and flipping them off behind their backs. Knowing that he hated his job - where he served to service people like you - was rather amusing. You couldn’t wait to make his day worse.

You stood up as he came your way, grabbing him by the shoulder as if you were scolding him.

The boy turned to you and gave you a once over.

“Whaddup princess, back for round two?”

“Shut up,” you hissed. “Listen, I need a favour —“

JJ grinned.

“I’m all ears but I’m charging this time, alright? I’ve seen what kind of car your dad drives,” he finished with a knowing smirk, and you rolled your eyes at the implication.

“Ugh,” you huffed. “Anyway. You have something I want —“

“—Oh, really? ‘Cus it just so happens you’ve got something I want too…” he mused, staring down at your glossy lips before checking you out. “Three things, in fact. Four if you’re a freak —“

You cut him off, aware of the way your cunt throbbed at the mention of letting any man - let alone someone like JJ - take your anal virginity.

“I need weed, and I know you Pogues have got good stuff,” you said, voice shaking. “I want a bag… or something —“

JJ scoffed and rolled his eyes, running his fingers over his lips as he looked you up and down. There was something alluring about the fact that you, in all your bitchiness, were rather innocent under it all. Someone like you, coming to him for a favour? How could he possibly turn the opportunity down?

“You don’t know how this works, huh?” he laughed, staring at your wide eyes.

“Tip me and I’ll have it hand delivered on Sunday. You won’t even have to go to The Cut.”

Raising a brow, you rummaged in your tiny purse before handing him some cash.

“Here’s a dollar. Fix yourself up.” you instructed, nodding to his messy hair and the small scars on his lip and hands.

“Don’t let me down.” You said sternly, holding your hands on top of his own momentarily as you stared into his blue eyes. He was clearly distracted; fixating more on your lush lips and the sheer material of your sundress stretching over your breasts.

At least the two of you were on the same page.

The sun had set on Figure Eight, and, of course, JJ hadn’t shown up. If it wasn’t for the fact that he was bringing weed (you could’ve at least smoked your problems away), you would’ve felt like a girl stood up on her first date. Instead, you’d flung on your nighties and turned up the volume in your AirPods, staring out of the window and glancing at the moon.

As much as your mind wanted to focus on Midsummers, you could only think about JJ, and what it would feel like to have him fuck you again, this time in your pink satin sheets from the crack of dawn until the sunset. Sliding your hands into your silk shorts, you pushed past the wet lips of your pussy with your fingers and delved them into your core, imagining they were JJ’s and not yours.

“That’s it, Mama, get those fingers nice and wet for Daddy…”

You longed to feel his cool rings press against your hot cunt as he fingerfucked you; his trademark smug smile painted across his face as he soothed you, relishing in your desperation.

“Fuck, if you can’t take my fingers, you’re gonna fall apart on my cock, huh?”

You delved your fingers deeper into your pussy as you worked your way into the crux of your fantasy; only to be rudely awakened by the sound of tapping on a window.

“What the fuck —-“

Blinking, you struggled to get your eyes to adjust to the sudden light, your vision blurry as they locked onto a certain blonde figure. Huffing, you wiped your hands on your thigh before striding over and siding it open.

“You asshole, are you dumb?”

“Well, it would’ve been easier if you had left the gate open,” JJ said casually, climbing through your window. He was dressed in a ripped vest, and was carrying a small ziplock in one hand, with a gun in the other. “This shits like a fucking maze…Were those lasers…?”

Hurriedly, you closed the window, making sure that no one had seen before ushering him away from the view.

“The gate was open…five hours ago!” you exclaimed, careful to keep your voice to a hush. “Where the fuck were you?”

“I got caught up, okay?” he shrugged, unable to keep his eyes off of your body, fixated on the way your breasts jiggled with every animated reaction. “I’m here now, do you want the stuff or not?”

Frowning, you stuck your hand out for JJ to hand you the goods, inspecting the contents as he looked around your room. It was unbearably girly, yet JJ couldn’t help but feel a sick sense of pride to it all. He was the messy Pogue boy, slutting out a Kook princess - Rafe’s most wanted property - and it felt fucking good.

He glanced over at you, taking in the way your vest hung dangerously low on your chest, exposing the tops of your boobs and the outline of your nipples, hardened in the cool summer air. Your shorts weren’t any less tempting; the fabric riding so high up your legs that he could swear he could see a bit of your pussy through the opening.

If he was correct, you weren’t even wearing panties.

“Nice clothes by the way,” he grinned. “Is that lace? You goin’ somewhere?”

“To bed, yeah.” you scoffed, hiding the weed in your top drawer before lying on your bed. The hem of your vest rode up so that you gave JJ an eyeful of your stomach, teasing him with the rounded mounds of your breasts.

“Mind if I join you?”

He didn’t wait for an answer, instead flopping next to you and propping himself up on his elbow, trapping you between the wall and his body.

“I'm not in the mood, JJ.” You huffed, staring up at his damned smile as you tried to ignore the burning in your core. Just five minutes ago you were dreaming of this, and if it weren’t for your pride you would’ve been begging him to fuck you like a bitch in heat.

The blonde clicked his tongue, his lustful eyes drinking in your body as he began to run his fingers up your thigh, moving skilfully past your core and up onto your hips, daring to cop a feel of your breasts.

“You owe me for that…by the way,” he said knowingly. You raised your brows in shock, and he laughed.

“What, you thought it was free? That I’d give it to you out of ‘the goodness of my heart’? Nah, princess, this is good shit right here, and I’m not letting my journey go to waste —“

His hands stalked up your chest, causing you to let out a soft moan as he brushed your sensitive nipples before they decided to rest on your neck, gripping it with a considerable force as he held you in place to look at him.

“— You’re not really over our first time, anyway.”

He kissed you, and you instinctively pulled his body on top of you, gasping as he grinded his hard cock against against your thigh, signalling what he wanted. You were all too happy to give it to him, rolling yourself on top of him so that you could rub your cunt against his crotch, desperate for any kind of friction. JJ snickered, pulling up your vest to roughly grope your tits before placing his hand on your neck again, gently choking you.

“As much as I want you to ride me Princess, I didn’t come here for that kind of payment. I wanna fuck that pretty mouth of yours.”

His gaze on your was unwavering as he lowered you to the foot of the bed on your knees, hand still firm around your throat. Your core throbbed as you glanced up at him through your lashes, palming his bulge through the fabric before taking it out. This was your first time seeing it up close; a decent six inches with a slight curve and pink fleshy tip that spouted precum.

Instinctively, you placed it to your lips, coating your lips in his seed before you took him in your mouth. JJ let out a loud moan at the contact, gripping the back of your neck as he held your head in place as you bobbed up and down his lengthy cock.

You took a deep breath as you pressed your tongue flat against the underside, angling your neck further as you became determined to deepthroat his cock. Your ego was far too big to let JJ think he was winning; even though you tears were beginning to prick at the corner of your eyes.

“JayJ…” you choked. “I need to — Let me —“

“What?” He teased, cupping your cheeks. “Use your words, Mama…”

“Y-You’re too big…” you whimpered, dribbling bits of saliva down his cock as you gagged around his middle. “I need air —“

The blonde tutted.

“I always knew you were all talk. It’s a shame you can’t handle me, princess… I thought you and I were pretty good together the other day…” he rambled, and for some reason the clear manipulation in his voice made your cunt throb uncontrollably.

You bobbed your head again, this time managing to bury your nose in his messy pubes, squirming and clawing on his large thighs as he held you in place.

“That’s it, Mama,” he cooed, throwing his head back in ecstasy. “Be a good girl and choke on this fucking dick. Shit, I always knew that mouth was good for something…”

It wasn’t until you let out a desperate gurgle and that he let go. Though your cheeks were burning and eyes were filled with tears, you couldn’t help but admire your work - JJ’s raw cock was shiny, coated in your spit; twitching as he ached for more.

Grinning, you wiped the mixture of saliva and cum off of your lips before getting back to work, this time using your hands to massage his base.

“Don’t forget the balls, baby —“ he groaned, and you took his cock out of your mouth with a ‘pop’, taking a long lick down his underside before sucking gently on his balls. He groaned again, this time finishing with an impassioned gasp that threatened to wake your parents down the hall.

You slapped his thigh.

“You’re going to get me busted!”

“Fuck that…” he drawled through breathy chuckles. “…Daddy’s little princess has got a mouth for days — You give these to all the pool boys?”

“Consider yourself lucky,” you hummed, giving him a few languid strokes as you continued to attend to his balls. “Rafe’s been on me like a hawk…”

JJ sneered, wrinkling his nose as he slapped his heavy cock on your face, producing a wet smacking sound.

“I don’t wanna hear about that asshole right now,” was all he said, guiding your head back onto his cock, feeling his thighs tremble as he began to reach his edge.

He glanced over at your phone, wishing that he could snap a few pics, hell, even a quick video of the dirty deed; and send it off to the Cameron son himself in a quick Snapchat. To some it might’ve been trivial; but to a guy like Rafe having the right girl on his arm meant a lot - and, if JJ was to have even the slightest of leverage over him, how could he not take the opportunity to rub it in his face?

“Fuck…” he puffed, lips parted in ecstasy. “Choke on it one more time, baby…”

“JayJ—“ you begged, and he shook his head, solely focused on his release.

“C’mon princess, I know you can do it…Take a deep breath, ‘atta girl —“

It wasn’t long before he spilled down your throat, making you gag and pull your head back in shock. He hastily grabbed his dick and angled it at your face, painting white rivulets across your cheeks and lips as he writhed in pleasure, spewing words and phrases you weren’t sure if he even meant.

As he rode off his high, he scooped some of his cum up in his finger, and you needed no instruction as to what to do next. You stared into his cloudy blue eyes as you sucked his finger, and for a moment you could’ve sworn that there was something - even a flash - of affection.

Once he pulled the digit out of your mouth, a moment passed before he kissed you; sloppily yet passionate, so much so that you didn’t notice the screen of your phone light up, even in the dimly lit light of your room.

rafe.cameron liked your story

rafe.cameron: Bree said you’re coming to Midsummers. Meet me at the country club tomorrow we need to talk

@juniebugg @lunarzuku (ty for reblogging and tagging part one!<3)

#florence writes!!#jj maybank smut #jj maybank x reader #jj maybank x reader smut #jj maybank imagine #obx smut #obx x reader #obx x reader smut #obx imagine

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insomniacirl · 4 months

Text

Chip was pulled from the hole in the sea, where the ocean turned black and rotten- he climbed out and stayed alive, and the only thing on his mind for the next decade of his life was based around going back into it.

NOW. CHIP JRWI. *Poking him with a ten foot pole* What has made you so special?

This man basically bases this one, sole aspiration that has plagued him his entire life around himself wanting some form of closure and to save Arlin I guess- but when you compare that desire to the voices whispering "Welcome home." to Chip, over 100 episodes in, as they finally get to the hole in the sea, as Chip re-enters that impossible, vapid whirlpool that threw his life so off kilter to begin with? THIS MAN IS AN ORPHAN. THIS MAN IS A BASTARD. BY NATURE YES- FUNNY HAHA- BUT AS A FACT, TOO: HE IS A BASTARD. HE HAS NO PARENTS. And by assumption, maybe his mother/father left him for someone to find.

I'VE CONNECTED THE DOTS. I'VE CONNECTED THEM.

Anyway though, I have no idea- some theories but it's mostly just very interesting to me to think about.

Yall know that post that talks about pirates slaying a sea beast for a treasure chest, but inside is actually the baby it's been protecting??? *Cough* Chip JRWI. *Cough* It wants him back. *Cough cough*

Hmmmmmm, but who is the voice? Not sure if it was mentioned in the episode, but I'm guessing it's multiple- which is giving other undead (like him rn ohhhh lord, I am sad tbh) but also they can breathe under there??? Which means it wouldn't have been totally impossible to survive down there for a while- but I think the main question is how he got there.

Moving on because I have many thoughts not enough attention span to write them all down- my original point was actually gonna be more about the fact that he left this black hole, escaped death alive, the cold grabbed for him and he ran away to be so warm and so alive, lighting matches and leading riots.

And he swept away a soldier from the overseas, threw her life for a loop- earnt himself a sister, a best-friend, a co-captain, descendant of the sun, godliness flowing through her veins, golden light spilling from her eye, wings of a bird, a show of her freedom, of her vow to fight for what's right- not that he knew any of that when he first met her, he took her in because he knew together they could become something more.

And he held his hand out to an exiled hero from the undersea, another ex-soldier, lost on the path his destiny always promised was straight- Chip earnt himself the best kiss of his life, a best-friend, a co-captain, child of the moon goddess, wielding destiny's blade, trained to be the saviour of his people, cast out for doing what he knew was right, the chosen one, learning to live, holding a new vow, to protect, save those in need- and now Gillion's favourite colour is brown and Chip can speak to the sword only linked to the triton.

They're the sun and the moon, and the sky and the sea. And chip is the eclipse as they're brought together. Chip is the earth warmed by the rising sun and coloured by the water as he soaks them both in.

Yet Chip is welcomed home where the sun cannot reach. Chip is welcomed home where the sea is punctured and left dry.

#Chip Bastard #Jay Ferin #Gillion Tidestrider #Albatrio #Chip JRWI #Jay JRWI #Gillion JRWI #JRWI #Just Roll With It #JRWI Riptide #The Riptide Pirates #Fnc #I am a Fnc truther I won't lie to you rn guys

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dustofthedailylife · 2 years

Text

Rejecting you was my first mistake

→ Masterlist

Summary: They harshly reject you before realizing later on that they had feelings for you all along... only that you have already turned over a new leaf.

Pairings: Ayato, Kaeya, Xiao, Alhaitham x (gn!) Reader - [separate]

Tags: Angst, Hurt/no comfort

A/N: Hi peeps! I'm back with a new fic. Perfect for the gloomy fall season I deliver you some angst that a nonnie requested. I also added Alhaitham despite not being in the request. This is my first time writing for him (and it's angst, haha! He'll also get some fluff soon, I promise!)

AYATO

You looked below yourself and started drawing circles in the sand on the beach you were sitting on with Ayato. Your heart painfully clenched in your chest as you were unsure whether or not now was the right time to pour your heart out to the man by your side. Would he feel the same or would it end up ruining the friendship you’ve had since your childhood days?

“What is troubling you?” There really was nothing you could hide from him, was there?

“Nothing.”, you attempted to reassure him but he didn't seem convinced and raised an eyebrow with worry flaring up in his lavender eyes. You sighed deeply, your mind and heart starting to race one hundred miles per hour, while trying to gather all your courage.

“Ayato, I… I think I have feelings for you.”

“Oh.”

A small frown played around his lips that looked more like he was pitying you and you could feel how your heart shattered into a million pieces. A mind numbing silence followed your confession that almost drove you insane.

“Oh? That is all you have to say?”

“I’m sorry... I won’t be able to give you the reply you’re hoping for... I do not reciprocate your feelings, I see you more as a part of my family. I've actually been meaning to tell you today, that I’m going to be wed soon”

“... a wedding?”, you asked in disbelief with a quivering voice.

“It has not been officially announced yet, but she is from an allied clan and it was my father’s dying wish that I’d marry her.”

You turned your face away from him, not wanting him to see how his words had crushed even the last bit of hope you've ever had. You could feel tears stinging at the corners of your eyes and a painful lump forming in your throat. You got up from where you were sitting, kicking off the sand that stuck to your clothes and sighed silently in defeat.

“Do you love her?”, you asked with a shaky voice, waiting for his answer.

“I will.”, he replied after a short moment of hesitation, as if he was looking for the right words in order to not wound you more than he already had, oblivious to the fact that your heart was already broken beyond repair.

You nodded in acceptance before you started to walk away without looking back, feeling his pitying stare burn into the back of your head.

Weeks turned into months and months soon turned into years but he never saw you again since that day on the beach. You didn’t attend his wedding, that he had attempted to invite you to again via numerous letters, either. But every letter he sent to you or spontaneous visits to your home, stayed unanswered, until he ultimately decided to leave you alone to allow your broken heart to heal at its own pace.

It wasn’t until he found a letter addressed to him on his desk one day, that made reality suddenly crash down on him.

Dear Lord Kamisato,

I am truly sorry that I did neither reach out for a long time nor that I could deliver this message to you in person. Shortly after our talk at the beach back then I realized that I needed to change something about my life and decided to leave Inazuma for good. By the time you will receive this letter I am already long gone.

I had realized that I needed to stop chasing impossible dreams and start focusing on my own goals in life and I knew that wouldn’t have been possible, if my feelings for you kept being an obstacle. It felt like I was drowning in a deep ocean, trying to reach the surface in order to be able to breathe again, but no matter how hard I struggled, it felt like it kept moving further and further away from me. Thus I took the next ship to Liyue and started to build a new life there. You’ll be happy to hear that I even met a lovely man that I married not too long ago.

I’m sorry I could not attend your wedding and I often miss the days where we hung out to talk or played chess together. I hope that things have gone well on your end and that you’re happy and doing well where you’re at now.

With Love,

Your old friend

He gingerly put the letter back on the table in front of him, tracing your penmanship with his finger as if he intended to feel your presence through it under his fingertips for one last time. He harshly bit his lip and felt a single tear rolling down his cheek. He wondered why your words caused him such intense grief all of a sudden.

It wasn’t until his eyes landed on the photo of him and his wife on his wedding day that he began to realize and a tidal wave of regret surged over him.

Back on that day on the beach he told you he would get married, he told you he would love her and he told you he doesn’t love you the same way you loved him. So why was it that only now he realized that it was you, that it had always been you, who he had been in love with all along? He had been a coward and pushed you away. Now you are gone, building a family of your own, far away from him, while he is trapped in a loveless marriage with a woman he has nothing in common with.

He had lied to himself all these years, convincing himself that he was happy with the way things were now - but the cold hard truth was, that he could not be happy if it wasn’t with you.

KAEYA

“And I won, again!”, Kaeya snickered, throwing his playing cards on the table triumphantly before downing the rest of his wine in one sip. It had been a cheerful evening that you and him spent together at the Tavern after work and you’d feel great, if only it wasn’t for your crush on the Cavalry Captain, which increasingly pushed itself in the foreground on your mind.

“I give up, you beat me! Drinks are on me tonight”, you chuckled and lifted your hands up in defeat before going to order another round of drinks for you.

Kaeya watched as you walked over to the bar, conversing with the familiar bard who seemed to be quite fond of the wine as well and often kept hanging around the Tavern. He watched as the young bard threw a quick glance over his way before leaning in closer to you and whispering something in your ear that seemed to fluster you quite a bit, making you shake your head quickly.

“Got a love confession from the little bard over there, sweetheart?”, Kaeya teased as you arrived back at the table with the drinks.

“No, no, nothing like that. Nothing important.”, you reassured him, but deep down you hoped that what Kaeya had just asked was a small sign that he was interested in you as well.

As the evening drew to a close, Kaeya and you walked home together until you stood in front of your door. The moment you took the doorknob in your hand you suddenly turned around again with newfound courage, determined to spill your hearts content out to Kaeya.

“Alright, here we are. See you tomorrow! We can–”

“Kaeya, wait…”, you interrupted him and grabbed his hand before he could leave. “Remember when the bard told me something earlier?”

“Yeah, I do. Need any love advice from yours truly?”, Kaeya teased.

“Kaeya, please. This is not about him… but about something he told me, or rather about something he told me to do.”

“Are you in trouble?”

“Tch, that’s one way to put it… Kaeya, listen, I think – no, I’ve realized you’re more to me than just a friend. I–I I have feelings for you.”

A long silence followed your confession. His expression remained unreadable until he eventually pulled his hand out of yours again, placing it over his stomach and starting to laugh. Your heart painfully clenched at the sound of his bellowing laughter echoing in your ears.

“Hahaha, sweetheart. I think you had a bit too much to drink tonight, hm?” He remarked and patted your cheek with an amused expression, wiping a tear out of the corner of his eye.

“I only drank grape juice, Kaeya!”, you exclaimed, slapping his hand away in frustration. “I meant what I said.”

“Oh.”, he paused, his amused expression replaced with one that essentially told you everything you needed to know. He did not feel the same way about you.

“You actually like me?”

“I do… quite ironic, huh? The first time I ever fall in love, it’s with the only person who doesn’t love me back.”, you directed your gaze at the ground, feeling tears prick at the corners of your eyes as you desperately tried to swallow them down.

“I-I guess I’ll leave you be… goodnight. See you tomorrow, maybe…” He turned around, quickly waving you goodbye and leaving you heartbroken.

In the following weeks he noticed that you were purposefully avoiding him but he couldn’t blame you for it. He tried to act as he normally would when he ran into you, in the hopes that things would go back to how they were before that night, but they never did. In fact the more he tried to act normal, the more he felt like you were pushing him away, until you ultimately came to his office, handing him your letter of resignation telling him that you couldn’t keep going as if nothing happened.

It wasn’t until he saw you walking around the Dawn Winery’s vineyard hand in hand with Diluc, when he was there for some official business on the Knights' behalf, that he felt something inside of him die. At first he shrugged it off as jealousy, until he wondered why he was jealous in the first place. He had told you he had no feelings for you, so why did he feel the way he did when he saw you so happy and in love with Diluc? Why was it only now that he realized that he was in love with you?

To shield himself, he had always been so used to lying and keeping his heart locked, even to the ones he loved, that he had become numb to its desires - running away from his own feelings, until it was too late.

In the end all he could do was ruin things and push people away. It’s what he was best at, it seems.

XIAO

Xiao and you had hung out at Wangshu Inn but as soon as you had gone home he found your backpack sitting on one of the chairs on the balcony. Surely you must’ve forgotten it.

He picked your backpack up before it slipped out of his grasp, spilling its contents on the floor. Among it was your diary, which flipped open and landed face down on the ground.

Xiao let out an annoyed sigh as he picked up the things scattered across the floor, until he picked up your diary and caught a glimpse of a page where you had stuck a picture of you and him together with some doodled hearts and a small note reading "One day I will tell him..." below it.

What did that have to mean?

As if prompted, out of the corner of his eyes he spotted how your familiar figure appeared at the entrance to the balcony again. You halted the minute you saw him stand there, backpack on the floor with all your things scattered around it and your diary in his hand - opened. You could feel panic well up inside of your chest and your heart dropped heavily.

“What are you doing there, Xiao?”, you asked with unease in your voice. Had he seen the picture with your notes?

“I wanted to bring you your backpack, you’ve forgotten it. I accidentally dropped it… what does this have to mean? What will you tell me one day?”

He turned around, stretching his arm out, showing you the opened book in his hand and your worst fears had become reality the moment you saw which page he had been looking at.

“Xiao, I–, archons why did you have to see this… I like you Xiao – a lot actually.”

He eyed you cautiously with an indecipherable expression in his eyes. Was it confusion, was it anger or maybe even lack of understanding? You couldn’t tell and the silence that followed your confession made your heart painfully contract in your chest.

“Why?”

“What do you mean, why?”

“Why would you want to tell me this? What made you think I’d ever feel the same way? I’m not capable of feeling this way towards you, or anyone.”

“It’s not like I chose to.” Your voice was nothing but a mere whisper at this point and the lump in your throat became more painful by the minute. You took your last bit of strength to rip your diary out of his hands and quickly gathered your things together, that were still lying on the ground and stuffed them into your backpack. You flung it over your shoulder and left the adeptus without looking back once.

This was the last time Xiao talked to you. He convinced himself that he didn’t need anyone around anyway, he’d been alone for centuries already, he could do a couple more. That was until the Lantern Rite came around a year later.

He never had been the person to hang around big crowds and this year would be no different. He sat atop one of the buildings in the city, overlooking the harbor and watching the lanterns float into the night sky.

Suddenly his gaze found you in the large crowd at the pier and he watched you as you let your own lantern rise into the sky, but you weren’t alone. There was a man with you who kissed you tenderly as you stood there hand in hand, looking after your lantern with a big smile on your face.

Something inside of him stirred at the sight of you looking at another man with the same adoration you’ve had in your eyes for him back then. How often had you asked him if he had wanted to visit the Lantern Rite together with you as well and how often did you skip going because he refused to go?

The scene where you had left him on the balcony of Wangshu Inn, when he had found your diary, played in front of his inner eye again, evident hurt in your eyes, inflicted by his vicious words, when all you had ever shown and given to him was your time and love. He had yet again been too stubborn to realize what his heart wanted and fell back into old patterns of pushing anyone away who got too close to him. Maybe he had been scared of what it would mean if he had admitted he had felt the same for you – in fact, he still felt the same. But you no longer did.

He had pushed you away and you found happiness with someone else. Someone more deserving of your love and he had no one to blame but himself for that.

ALHAITHAM

The day you found out you and Alhaitham had been assigned to the same research trip for the Akademiya, you had felt your heart do a little jump for joy in your chest. Both of you had started studying together at the Haravatat and occasionally had been working on group projects.

The trip itself started well, you had been sent to research and gather information on some carvings found in one of the ruins of King Deshret in the desert. You had set up camp at the oasis nearby and working with him was going smoothly so far, as it always did.

On the second day you decided to venture deeper into the ruins together, to see if you'd find more inscriptions. As you took the lead, you suddenly felt one of the tiles below your feet sink down and before you could react you felt a strong arm snatch around your waist, pulling you to the side. Once you came to again you found yourself lying atop of Alhaitham, your back pressed against his chest and his arm still around your waist, in front of you a pile of rubble that had fallen down from the ceiling.

"Careful, there are traps here.", he rationally explained. Maybe a bit too rational considering you could have died. But you didn't give it too much thought, also because you were way too distracted by the pounding of your heart in your chest, and you knew it wasn't because of the triggered trap that it was beating so loudly.

"Right…", you huffed breathlessly, before slowly trying to wiggle out of his grasp again. Had the placement of his arm been intentional or did you interpret too much into it? As your thoughts spiraled off, you felt your cheeks heat up, looking down to the ground in an attempt to hide your flustered face from him.

"Are you hurt?"

"No. No, I'm fine. Thank you… for pulling me out of the way."

He looked at you with a stern expression, nodding in acknowledgement before brushing some sand off his clothes and returning to his studies wordlessly. He sat down on a huge stone in front of a mural, continuing to scribble notes in his notebook.

"Alhaitham?", you rasped with evident nervousness in your voice, gathering all your courage for what you were planning to say.

“Hm?”, he hummed, just briefly flicking his gaze up to you. You deeply inhaled beginning to feel your heartbeat pulsate in your temples.

"I think you're really great and–"

"Do you intend to ask me for help with your paper?"

"N-no, no that's not what I was going to say… uhm, I've been meaning to say that I really really like you.", you stammered, gesturing about wildly with your hands.

"I like you too, you're a great research partner and have great academic potential."

Ouch. Either he was completely oblivious or playing dumb, no matter the case, the lump in your throat became so big it started to hurt and at that moment you wanted nothing more than to cry and run away. Your confession had backfired even worse than anything you had imagined.

"I-I don't mean academically… or even as a friend. I like you… romantically, Alhaitham.", you coaxed out, using up all your strength in order to not start crying.

He looked up from his notes and put his pencil down, eyes now fully trained on you while furrowing his eyebrows.

"What made you think I have feelings for you?", he asked with an annoyed undertone in his voice. He slightly shook his head and devoted himself to his notes again.

He did not speak to you for the entire rest of trip afterwards, outside of the strictly necessary communication. Practically acting as if you didn't exist. Leaving you even more embarassed and heartbroken than you had already been from his original rejection.

Back at the Akademiya you immediately enrolled to change subjects and joined the Amurta for a short while, before deciding to quit your academic career entirely to become a Forest Ranger in Avidya Forest.

Alhaitham would lie if he had said he immediately noticed that you had quit, it had only occurred to him several weeks after you had been gone. It had gotten rather quiet recently and while he usually didn't mind being on his own and studying alone, he did miss your input on certain matters.

It wasn't until one day where he was tasked to bring an important document to Tighnari in Avidya Forest on the Akademiya's behalf, that he realized his grave mistake. It was then he saw you again for the first time. You stood on the gravel path in front of Tighnari's hut, both your hands interlocked with his, pressing a fleeting kiss on his lips. A smile brighter than the sun gracing your beautiful features before waving Tighnari goodbye and heading for the forest, together with a girl with green hair and purple eyes.

At that moment Alhaitham felt a wave of emotions wash over him, ones he, at first, couldn't quite place. You had never smiled at him like this. Was what he witnessed, what he could have had with you? He tried to ignore the painful knot in his stomach but no matter how often he told himself that he didn’t care what you were doing with your life now and who you were with, he had to admit that in reality he wanted nothing more than to turn back time to tell you he felt the same for you. It finally dawned on him that he had been blind about his feelings for you the entire time.

Why did he only realize it now? Only Archons knew.

He had learned the hard way that academic success wasn’t everything that was desirable in life. A realization that unfortunately came too late - you had already found happiness in someone else.

Do not repost, copy, translate or edit - © dustofthedailylife || reblogs, comments and asks about Genshin or my fics are always appreciated <3

Maple dividers are mine - do not copy.

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autisticlancemcclain · 4 months

Text

part one

“Guys,” a soft voice interrupted, and Keith could’ve collapsed with relief. The castle has been flipped sideways during the fall, floor suddenly now 90 degrees, and standing at the side of the control board, now the very high top, was Lance. For whatever reason he had climbed it while they bickered, and now stood very still, gloved hand pressed to the glass of the windshield. Blood trickled from his temple, tracing a line down the side of his face, disappearing in the neckline of his armour. “We got company.”

Shifting gears – Keith was about to tear him a new one, when Shiro says sound off you sound off – but froze when he looked out the window, following Lance’s gaze.

Marching towards them, in numbers Keith couldn’t pretend to count, was an army.

— — —

“Well,” said Hunk, holding Allura in both arms, “that looks bad.”

Shiro snorted. “Thank you, Hunk.”

“Anytime.”

Keith wanted to snap at them both. What time was it to laugh? They were injured, mostly defenseless, castle crashed. The Lions still sat, unusable, in their hangers. Hopefully they were okay, but it wasn’t like anyone could go check. Keith could barely even feel Red’s presence in the back of his mind – that stupid new Empire toy had drained them. It was frightening. And Hunk and Shiro were making jokes?

But Keith couldn’t find the words to chew them out. Instead, his voice was caught in his throat as he looked on the slowly advancing army with wide eyes and tense shoulders.

The advancing army was…trees.

That’s what it looked like, anyways. Rows and rows of rough bark and quietly swaying leaves, advancing in formation. A large black bird flew, cawing, above them. Keith tried not to think about omens.

“Did a forest come to life?” Pidge muttered, squinting. Keith was relieved she was seeing the same thing. Keith has been in space a long time, at this point, but this was like nothing he had ever seen before. This didn’t look like a people in any way he understood. They were alive, surely, their movements organic in fluid in a way non-living things couldn’t quite manage, but his eyes were not deceiving him, and in front of him was a bunch of moving trees. As he watched, they advanced slightly further, stopped, and froze.

And then, slowly, they morphed.

Out of the bark, people seemed to…melt? Was that the right word? The trees planted themselves on the beach as if they’d always been there, as if the giant ocean was simply a lake beside a forest, and the bark of each plant seemed to shimmer, to shift. Humanoid figures took form, with skin like wood and hair like moss and leaves, eyes dark and old and knowing. Little saplings hid behind the sweeping dirt skirts of giant, older trees, giggling amongst themselves. Tiny droplets of water shined in dots on dozens of brown faces, glittering on brows and lips and noses like diamond piercings. Vines wreathed around torsos like tailored clothing.

Above them, Lance gasped. It was a quick, near-silent sound, one Keith only noticed because he was watching Lance from his peripherals anyway.

“Dryads,” he whispered, unmistakably excited, and before anyone could get so much as a word in he scrambled down the control board, careened down the bridge, and sprinted his way out the exit.

“No, what are you – Lance!” Hunk shouted, the first to react. He handed a still-unconscious Allura off to Coran, who took her with a wide-eyed, confused expression.

“Number Two, what is –”

“I am going to burn your Percy Jackson books,” Hunk seethed, already stomping out after Lance. He scooped up his blue helmet on his way and shook it at the door. “You hear me, Leandro? Burn them! Head outta the clouds, that’s an army!”

Keith was quick to follow. The rest of the team fell in step behind him, jogging after Lance.

Outside was…well, it startled him.

He’d seen it on the way down, of course. But he hadn’t been focused, really, hadn’t taken the time to map it past what the air currents felt like, past a safe (ish) place to land. The beauty of it now knocked the breath out of him. The ocean was almost crystalline, it was so clear and blue. Keith could smell it even through his helmet, the salt, the sea, and something Keith couldn’t recognise. Every rock on the seashore shone in the bright golden sun, glittering like encrusted jewellery. Down the beach, where the rocks gave way to beach, the sand was bright brilliant white; hard, actually, to look at. On Keith’s other side was a rolling, sage green meadow, peppered with wildflowers so familiar Keith almost felt he could name them. He saw dozens of fruit trees, all different kinds, so ripe and rich his mouth watered. He was nowhere near enough to smell them, but the fruits were so plump and colourful that every instinct curled up in every corner in his head begged him to gorge himself to coma. Even the army in front of him, the rows and rows of stern tree warriors – dryads, Lance had called them – couldn’t stir wariness in Keith’s heart. His shoulders relaxed without his say-so.

One of the warriors stepped forth. She was wide-set, tall, and the ground trembled with every step. Her eyes were dark as murky green pond depths. Deep gauges lined her face, most from the pattern of the bark that made up her skin, but many that disrupted the pattern; rough, torn scars, one right through her right eye.

“State your business,” she said, voice rough as sandpaper.

No one said anything. The awe Keith felt was reflected in his friends, wonder rendering them mute.

“You’re dryads,” said Lance softly. He stepped forward, Hunk’s hand falling from his shoulder. “Tree spirits.”

The tree-woman nodded. “If that’s what your people call us, child. Here, we’re Aegians, Last Guardians of Marmaro. And we ask again – name yourselves.”

Her army raised their weapons as she spoke. Sharp, pointed weapons, some of hardened stone, some of crystal and marble, some of the same wood that made up their flesh. One even had shards of metal attached to a complicated string of vine.

“We are Paladins of Voltron,” Shiro said, finally, hands held up in peace. He moved slowly up from next to Pidge, eyes never leaving the Aegian leader, until he finally stood in front of her, arm loosely circling Lance’s elbow, tugging him gently back. “We come in peace. Our ship was attacked by the Galran Empire, and we barely made it out intact. We apologise for any damage.”

“I’m not sure ‘intact’ is the right word,” murmured the Aegian leader, glancing quickly at their smoking ship, “but regardless. You are here now. I am Dryope, and I grant you asylum, as is my birthright.” She said the name like dry-oh-pay, but with a lilt to her vowels Keith couldn’t replicate even in his own head.

Dryope stood to her full height – which, ho-lee – and struck her staff twice on the rock on which she stood. Immediately, the army fell back, weapons sheathed, postures loosened.

“Aegians!” she called, and every single tree-warrior stood to attention. “The Paladins of Voltron have come to us. We shall extend our hospitality to them, as dictated in the Ancient Laws.” She turned to them for a moment, contemplating. “Seven households come forward. Our guests are to be fed, clothed, and cared for. Who shall claim the honour?”

Keith exchanged a look with Hunk, shifting uncomfortably. Seven households? They were in no position to complain, but on all the planets they’ve visited before, they’ve never been housed separately. To speak up would surely insult their hosts – but was it safe to split up? They were injured and exhausted – if their hosts proved malevolent, they would be almost powerless individually. Allura was still out, Lance for sure had a head injury, Keith was, now that he noticed, breathing laboriously. A quick glance beside him revealed an odd angle to Pidge’s wrist, probably sprained, and Hunk shifted every couple of seconds like he could not stand comfortably. Shiro favoured his left leg. Only Coran stood tall and strong, Allura held protectively in his arms – but Keith knew better. (He will never, as long as he lives, forget the way the man collapsed, ashen and unresponsive, right at his spot at the castle’s controls. The rest of them had just been deemed healthy enough to fight again after falling ill to Deadman’s Spots, fevered and covered in sores and wasting away. Only Coran had been spared – or so they thought. They had almost lost him.) Coran could have a shard of bone sticking out of his leg and none of them would know.

They could not afford to refuse the help.

The gathered army rippled and shifted as people answered Dryope’s call. One by one more Aegians pushed their way to the front, until seven stood just behind their leader, shoulder to shoulder, chins raised proudly.

“We have space for the injured girl,” spoke the first Aegian. She stepped forward, and she didn’t look like a warrior at all – the smile on her face was soft and welcoming. She was much stouter than Dryope, and and her eyes held the same maternal kindness that Shiro’s often did, deep and black and understanding. The lined pattern that made up her bark was softer, lining her face like smile lines. Thousands of branches twisted and grew out of her waist, resembling the tangled roots of the biggest tree in the forest. Clinging to her branch-skirt were at least four little saplings, young and reedy, peeking their wide eyes out behind their mama’s hips. She smiled wider, hands outstretched, and Keith had to stop himself from walking into them himself.

“Yes,” said Dryope, nodding at her. Her face went oddly soft, smiling at the maternal woman. When she turned back to face the team, her face morphed back into its impassive expression. “Paladins, Rhea and her family will house your injured girl. She will be well cared for – Rhea has nursed and watched many in her time.”

“Come,” beckoned Rhea, almost interrupting Dryope. The leader didn’t seem to mind. “Bring her to me, she must be laid comfortably.”

Coran walked forward, handing Allura to her gently. It spoke volumes to her character that Coran approached her at all, let alone that he pressed a quiet kiss to his charge’s forehead and stepped away.

“She is only tired,” he said softly. “Not injured. She needs rest, and perhaps food.”

“I will see to it. Come, children.” With a sweep of her skirts echoing like a bamboo broom, she walked back through the ranks, saplings clinging to her back like baby monkeys.

Next, an elderly man stepped forward. He was hunched, gnarled fingers curled around the haft of a sharp wooden trident that resembled Dryope’s staff. Despite his limp, he walked with dignity, and when he lifted his chin to face Coran, his eyes were bright.

“Have you space, Father?” murmured Dryope.

He nodded. “Always.”

Using his trident as a walking stick, he strode toward Coran, standing beside him. Coran, ever the diplomat, smiled slightly, and began speaking with him too quietly for Keith to hear. Both men, he noticed, seemed to stand the same way, although he couldn’t explain what that meant. It was just – vibes, he supposed. An energy.

“By the Sky, Mother, how long is this going to take?”

Startled by the abrupt change in tone, Keith jumped, turning towards the man who spoke. He was taller than anyone on the team, although shorter than most of the other Aegians, and covered himself with leaves that looked deliberately sewn rather than grown. His smile was wide and white and what Keith could only describe as shark-like.

But what was most striking was his skin. The dark lines of patterns that covered it had Keith thinking he was as Aegian as the rest of them, made of tree bark, but then he blinked and realised – they were merely marks, or tattoos. Unlike the rest of the Aegians, this man had skin, this man was –

Lance gasped. “You’re — human!”

“Half,” the man corrected, chuckling. He swept forward and delicately grabbed Lance’s hand in one of his, pressing a kiss just above his wrist. Lance blushed up to his hairline. “My name is Peitho. I was born here, on Aegis. My father was a lost human explorer. I have never been to earth. But human genes…” He looked Lance up and down, grinning charmingly. “I’ve always felt they’re very dominant.”

Lance, obviously pleased with the attention, warmed up quick. He walked over, reaching up to brush the hair out of Peitho’s eyes, touch lingering. Like they were friends or something. Keith ground his teeth so hard you could hear it from the ship’s smoking engine room.

“I thought…I‘ve never seen a human in space. I thought we were alone, up here.”

Peitho laughed, full-bodied and bright, like the sound of a smoothly rumbling engine. His handsome face creased lightly as he laughed, emphasizing newly-formed smile lines, which only made him more beautiful, not less. Lance smiled widely along with him. “Oh, my dear,” he said, turning that charming grin full blast on Lance, “you are never alone.”

Keith thought his jaw might crack. What a sleazeball. No wonder Lance liked him so much.

“The introductions need not drag on,” Peitho said grandly, sweeping his arm out like he was in charge or something. His other arm was around Lance’s shoulders. “Akeso, Dysnomia, Elatreus, meet with your paladins. They are hungry, and likely tired from travel. The sooner we have them rested, the sooner they can partake in our welcoming festivities. Right, Mother?”

Dryope nodded, looking a mix of annoyed and amused. “Yes, you embodiment of impertinence.”

As ordered by the embodiment of impertinence, three Aegians stepped forward. The first – who must be Akeso, a tall, reedy person with willowy locs falling to their shoulders, who held no weapon – approached Shiro, nodding tersely. Keith felt his brother match the terseness, stiffening.

(Internally, Keith winced – could his brother not get someone who smiled, maybe? Akeso was probably fine, but, yeesh. There was once a time when Shiro laughed more than anyone else Keith knew. Sometimes maniacally, on two hours of sleep. But he heard it so rarely now.)

The second Aegian, Dysnomia, approached Pidge. Like the Green Paladin, she was short as shit. Keith met his friends eyes and snickered at her. The murderous look he got would make him more nervous if he, as Lance so often liked to gripe, had a bone of impulse control in his body. (Rich coming from him, but. Whatever. It wasn’t like Keith could argue.) The third, Elatreus, was absolutely, one hundred percent, the coolest Aegian Keith had seen so far. Holding an intricately crafted crossbow and with a shoulder width approximately the size of a small mountain, he lumbered over to Hunk. He held out his fist. Hunk wasted no time bumping with his own. Keith would be jealous if Hunk didn’t deserve it so bad.

“Oh,” said Peitho, after a moment. “Of course, there is one more. Ares!” He gestured with half as much enthusiasm at Keith. “Your guest.”

Keith stilled. From behind Dryope, the last Aegian host stepped forward. His pale, papery bark was gnarled and scared, bulky, and – stained, it looked like, all the way up the arms. His face was more impassive that Dryope’s, expressionless, except for the slightest of sneers. Resting on one shoulder was a massive club, three times the size of Keith’s head at its tip. Like his host’s arms, it was stained.

Keith forced himself to meet his stare. His host had eyes red as pomegranates – well. Eye. The right side of his face, like the rest of the Aegians, was humanoid. The left side looked like it had – looked like someone had clawed out his eye, leaving a gaping, half-healed knot of a scar.

Ares.

Keith wasn’t familiar with a lot of myths. But he knew what namesake his Aegian host bore – Ares, god of war, god of pain, god of hardened warriors and battlefield and bloodshed.

Fitting, hissed a voice in his mind. Keith curled his fists and ignored it.

“Paladin,” nodded Ares, taking his place next to him.

Keith swallowed. “Ares.”

“That, I believe, is everyone,” said Dryope. “Paladins, please follow your hosts. They will bring you to their homes and ensure you have somewhere to rest. At sundown, we shall reconvene at the hearth, eat, and make merry. Please –” she spread her hands, “enjoy our island. I will see you all shortly.”

She cracked her staff once on the ground. Immediately, her army parted for her, following her in formation once she marched through. Many of them returned to their tree form. It was still strange to watch.

Keith jumped as a hand reached out and squeezed his shoulder. Shiro smiled slightly at him, squeezing again before letting go.

“See you soon, kiddo.”

He followed his host, leaving Keith to realise he was the last still gathered in the shadow of their crashed castle. The eyeless Aegian stood next to him, hands resting on his club, watching him curiously.

Keith cleared his throat. “Um, we can go.”

The Aegian continued to stare. Keith shifted uncomfortably, fighting the urge to draw his bayard. That would certainly not help. Things were precarious enough.

“You do not trust us,” his host observed. His one remaining eye was unblinking, holding Keith’s stare until his own eyes burned and he had to blink.

“No,” Keith admitted. It wasn’t that he was scared of the Aegians, per se, but he was wary of them in the same way he was wary of the Blades of Marmora. He recognised their strength, their power, and knew from the way Dryope stood that she was keeping a lot of information to herself. Any group that kept secrets was impossible to trust, at least by Keith’s standards. He suddenly wished he had been paying attention enough to watch Pidge, Lance, and Hunk leave with their hosts, to make sure they were armed.

His host shrugged. “Wise, probably. I would have no trust in your position.”

He started to walk over the rocks, and Keith followed. It was no accident that the Aegian kept Keith on a diagonal to him, visible from his right side. Keith did his best to keep himself in his line of sight.

“You wouldn’t?”

“Do I look like I would?”

“I don’t know how to answer that diplomatically.”

To Keith’s great surprise, his host huffed a laugh. A slight smile upturned Keith’s own lips.

“Fair.”

They walked the rest of the way in silence. Off the beach and across the meadow, in a deep, round valley, there was a sprawling village. Small, large-bricked buildings dotted hills and lay nestled at the edge of small farms. Dead centre of the valley was a giant fire pit, gently lit, and surrounding it in a perfect circle were several larger buildings in the same style. Keith recognised many of the buildings as temples.

“This way,” Keith’s host said, beckoning him forward. He turned off the main path and walked along the edge of the hill. Keith teetered after him, trying desperately to keep his balance. He was reminded how hard it was to breathe with bruising around his ribcage, how tired he was. But he kept his mouth clenched tightly closed, unwilling to look weak.

They walked far past the centre circle, past outer circles, past even the farthest of farmhouses. In crossing one of them, the man stopped, Keith nearly walking right into him, and waited for several moments. He bent over as a tiny little boar came galloping to the edge of the fence on runty little legs, smiling as he scratched the thing between its tusks. Keith couldn’t help but notice the blood covering the sharp, portraying bones, as if the animal had just recently hunted.

“Hey, Kyknos. Good to see you.”

He pet the boar for a few more minutes, then wordlessly started walking again. Keith had to jog to keep up, tired from the hike so far.

“That, uh, your pet?”

“No.”

Keith waited. No more information came forth.

“Oo-kay, then.”

There was a Lance in his head that was laughing at him, bringing up every one-word answer of Keith’s that had frustrated the Blue Paladin to twitching eyes. Keith scowled.

Finally, the host stopped at a house. Keith felt he would nearly faint with relief, beyond ready to lay down his head, wariness or not.

“This your place?” Keith asked, panting.

His host raised his eyebrow, pushing open the door.

“No,” he deadpanned, “this is my annoying neighbour’s house. He’s on holidays. I’m staying here and using all his things to take revenge for hours of small talk.”

“Oh,” Keith replied, impressed. “Cool.” He’ll have to do that next time Lance is on a solo mission.

“No, I’m – I’m kidding, Paladin.”

“Oh,” Keith repeated, disappointed. “Less cool.”

“Just – get in the house.”

Keith didn’t argue. He followed his host into the small building, nodded as he was pointed to a guest room, and passed out the second his head hit the straw-stuffed pillow.

— — —

part three

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