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fernpost · 3 years

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Cycle 0 - Interviews

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Taako Taaco. 114. Elf. Wizard; Specialization in transmutation and inventive magical applications.

Previous experience: Top of class at Tredore, Academy of Magics and Technology; recently graduated.

Criminal Record: Multiple counts of petty theft.

Davenport likes to think of himself as calm and composed. It’s hard to throw him off. He has to be in order to have gotten this far in his mission as fast as he has.

But when he turns around from shutting the door to see his interviewee with his feet kicked up on the table, twirling a wand through his fingers, he’s a little shocked. He’s been doing these interviews for two days now, and even the more relaxed and confident people have held a bit more sense for decorum.

It’s a bit rude.

It’s also a little interesting.

He sits at his desk, pulling the elf’s papers away from his boots (shiny, and though they look expensive he can see they’re worn down and well taken care of) and glances down. “Tell me, Taako Taaco, what makes you want to explore the planerverse?”

“Bored.”

If the feet on the desk threw him off for a second, that floors him entirely. “Bored?”

“I’ve got nothing else to do on this plane, why not, you know?”

“No burning desire to go further than any being has gone before?” That’s one of the normal responses, the well-planned out speeches he keeps getting in response to his opening question.

The elf crosses his feet, leaning back somehow further into the provided chair. Davenport worries for a second that he may fall as he continues on, “that’s cool too, I guess. But I figure, why wouldn’t you want the great Taaco name aboard your ship.”

Davenport picks up a pen from his table and makes a small note on the paperwork, “no offense, Mr. Taaco, but you’re rather cavalier about this interview that determines whether or not you’re accepted into a program that may redefine our understanding of the world.”

The elf shrugs and takes his feet off of Davenport’s desk, flashing him a smirk, “you’ve seen my sister’s paperwork, yeah? No way you’re not going to accept her, and we’re a package deal. Says it right there in bold at the top of my application, my man.” It does, in fact, say that at the top. Cursive words noting how he refuses to accept any position on the ship if his sister isn't there too. When reviewing who he was interviewing today, he saw similar words on Lup Taaco’s paperwork.

“You’re very confident in your sister’s abilities.” Davenport begins, pausing for a second as he notes the way the elf begins to tense up before continuing, “however, I wouldn’t sell yourself so short. You also graduated top of your class, and excelled in the art of transmutation multiple times. One of your letters of recommendation even noted how you made many spells easier to cast, somatically speaking.”

“What can I say, I’ll find any short cut I can.”

Davenport makes another note on his paper. “Now, I do need to ask about your record of petty theft.”

“Oh, natch.”

Lup Taaco. 114. Elf. Wizard; Specialization in evocation and applied magic regarding planar research.

Previous experience: Top of class at Tredore, Academy of Magics and Technology; recently graduated.

Criminal Record: Multiple counts of petty theft.

“Lup Taaco, it is nice to meet you.”

“The pleasure is all mine, Captain.” The woman in front of him smiles. The resemblance to her brother couldn’t be more clear, and though her demeanor is quite similar, she at least doesn’t have her feet on his desk.

Not that his desk is anything fancy, but the point stands. “I’m not technically the captain yet, you know.”

“Potato, potato.”

Davenport is fairly certain that’s not how that phrase is used. “You did research into the planes at Tredore, correct?”

“Quite a bit, yeah. I’m sure my brother told you?”

The slight tilt of her head and lit of her voice tells Davenport this is some sort of test, which is confusing and a bit disconcerting, considering he is the one conducting the interview. He checks a quick box on his papers. “He talked you up a bit, yes. But this is your own interview, and I wanted to discuss your own knowledge with you, personally.”

She smiles, a touch more warmth to it than her previous attitude. “Oh, of course. Did quite a bit of studying at Tredore. First real school we attended. Kinda boring at times, you know?”

“If you’re accepted into this program, it’s going to be four intense months of studying and teaching you the more complex workings of the ship. Plus the two months of actually being on the ship.”

“That’s the fun stuff. Not a third semester in a row of another language I already figured out most of years ago.”

“How many languages do you speak, Ms. Taaco?”

“Including common, five languages.”

“Impressive.” Davenport himself only speaks three. “Now, I would like to ask you about your criminal record, if you don’t mind?”

Her smile grew sharp as she laughs.

Honestly, he isn’t surprised. Her explanation is the same as her brothers. Grew up on the road, needed food and other items on occasion. Didn’t always run fast enough. Davenport can’t fault them, and certainly won’t hold it against them.

He glances down at her paperwork, about to ask another question about her education, when she speaks up. “I’ve got a question for you, Captain.”

“Oh?”

“The ship- we’re really going with the name ‘The Starblaster’?”

Davenport sighs. He knew this question was coming, but he was expecting it to come during a press conference from a reporter, not a potential shipmate. “Yes. To be fair, it was a communal name we put to a vote from everyone who worked on building the engine.”

Ms. Taaco smiles. “Dope.”

Barry J. Bluejeans. 37 years old. Human. Wizard; specialization in applied magic regarding bonds and planar research.

Previous experience: Current assistant professor at Duffman University of the Arcane, part-time employee at the Institute of Planer Research and Exploration.

Criminal Record: Previous altercations regarding necromancy; no crimes against the nature of life and death ever committed.

Mr. Bluejeans is an interesting man. By the look of him, you’d expect to see him fumbling his way through a PTA meeting for his two kids. Instead, Davenport is staring down the word ‘necromancy’ on his paperwork on an application regarding literal planar travel on a ship called 'the Starblaster.'

So far, the interview has been going well. He’d listened to the man explain his research into the arcane, and he’d understood planar travel as well as any of the current scientists and engineers at the Institute. He was called in often for conferences and meetings about the bond engine. He’d seen the man walking around on occasion. They’d never been in a meeting together before, but he’d seemed nice.

But he also had a history of necromancy.

Now, Davenport doesn’t like to judge people. However, being in an enclosed space with someone who needed to specify he had never technically committed “crimes against the nature of humanity” isn’t the most comforting.

But, he was a smart man. Easy to get along with, too. So far. Necromancy notwithstanding.

Best to get it over with, “so, Mr. Bluejeans. I do need to ask about your criminal record-”

“Oh! Yeah, I never killed anyone. Or un- killed anyone. Uh, resurrected, I mean. Just did lots of studying into the application of necromancy and necromantic spells. Got in trouble because I toed the line of ‘research’ and ‘bringing my cat back to life,’ but got a stern talking to. Didn’t try it again, and don’t plan on needing to deal with those types of authorities again.”

Okay, normal enough answer, far as the situation applies-

“My current research into it has stayed purely theoretical, and it won’t interfere with the mission at all.”

So the man is still into necromancy.

Davenport glances down at the man’s file, thick with it’s attached papers Bluejeans has done on planar research. He’s not even stuck up about his level of education, and that’s extremely rare for the field.

Holding back a sigh, Davenport asks, “Can you explain the paper you wrote on the outer planes interactions with the inner planes for me?”

It was a really good paper.

But the man is still into necromancy.

Lucretia. 20. Human. Chronicler; Specialization in journalism.

Previous experience: Due to multiple NDA, she is unable to give us the exact number and titles of books she has written, but she sent letters of recommendation from Duke Rensburg, Lady Norabelle, and Warren of the Seatree Clan.

Criminal Record: Acquisition and attempted use of a false ID.

“So, Ms. Lucretia, I understand you cannot provide us with most examples of your works, but from what you have provided, you seem to be very, very good.”

“I like to think so, yes.” The young woman in front of him seems polite. She’s quiet; he saw her waiting outside with a few others before her interview, and while most of them were engaged in some awkward small talk, she sat away from them. Likely partially due to her age- she is much younger than the people outside- but she also simply seems quiet.

Which wouldn’t be the worst quality in someone you would be sharing a small, enclosed space with for an extended period of time. But, if she couldn’t bond with the others sufficiently, the bond engine won’t work.

(Hell, the bond engine was already finicky, they figured out the tech only a month ago, and they only have four months to bond an entire crew to pilot it and-)

“Can you explain to me why you acquired a fake ID and tried to use it at a, uh,” Davenport glances down at the records in front of him, holding back a chuckle, “at the forbidden section of the Library of Runar?”

Lucretia looks uncomfortable for a second, and he’s sure if the lighting in the room were better he would be able to see her flush with embarrassment. She gives him a hesitant smile, “I can’t get into the explicit details, but I was working on a book for an older client whose memory was becoming patchy, and I wanted to confirm some details before I put their name to it. They wouldn’t allow me into the section without the proper documents, but my client refused to agree that I should double check his work, even though I was almost certain he was wrong, so I simply… found a way to get past their guard. I wasn’t going to steal anything and I was going to use the proper equipment to read through the documents.”

Davenport smiles, “pursuit of knowledge and truth is important to you, then?”

“I don’t think spreading lies, especially in that context, is very honorable, no.” Her hands are folded in her lap now, and she seems a bit more relaxed.

Considering the others he is planning on accepting, he may be wrong about her getting along with them. Anyone willing to break the law just to prove an old man wrong would at least get along with him. Davenport refuses to have any pushovers aboard his ship.

Magnus Burnsides. 19. Fighter; Specialization in protection fighting and mechanical engineering.

Previous experience: Current bouncer at Apex Club. Currently enrolled in Gallier’s Fighter Academy and College.

Criminal Record: One count of assault and battery, appealed for defense of another person present. One count of indecent exposure and public intoxication.

Davenport will be the first to admit it can be tricky to follow human aging patterns, but he knows he’s not mistaken in thinking the man in front of him is barely out of “child” territory. Nineteen is a very, very small amount of time to be alive. Also, a very, very small amount of time to learn important things, like how to run what is basically a ship right out of a science fiction novel- complete with breakthrough technology.

Despite this, it’s hard to not find the young man in front of him to be endearing, and mostly knowledgeable in the things they need him to be.

“Magnus. You’re very young, one of the youngest applicants we have. What makes you think you’re qualified as the head of security of the ship?”

The young man in front of him- Gods, he really is young- grins and lifts his arms to flex, a show of pride and ego almost unbefitting of an interview setting, “Have you seen my muscles? I’m very strong, and a very good fighter.”

Many of today’s interviews have been quite different than he was expecting.

“I was referring more to job experience.”

“Oh!” Magnus shifts in his seat, fingers drumming against the table as he thinks. “I worked as a bouncer for a club while I was in college and did, if I must toot my own horn, a very good job. You should have a letter of recommendation from the owner-” He leans forwards, reaching a hand out as if to look through his own files to show him the letter.

“Yes, I did read through it. She was very thorough in stating how eager you were to help.” Davenport glances down at the papers in front of him, holding back a sigh. It truly was a glowing review of this young man. While his grades from the aforementioned college weren’t the highest, especially in classes one might consider important for an institute of planar research, the two letter of recommendations he submitted from teachers of his explained how Burnsides was very persistent when he wanted to learn something he didn’t know. He also had taken quite a few classes regarding vehicles- not enough to claim the young man was an expert but enough to provide a solid basis to show him how things worked and could be repaired on the ship.

The kid’s attitude was something of a breath of fresh air in this place. However, there was one glaring concern.

“I was also a bit concerned about the criminal record we have on file for you. Assault and battery as well as the indecent exposure and public-”

“In my defense for the second one, I was drunk with some friends and maybe thought it’d be funny to streak in the lake. Who hasn’t been to a party that gets a little out of hand.” He holds his hands out as if to say “am I right?”

Off the record, Davenport is inclined to agree that he was right. On the record, he is choosing to ignore it. “And the assault and battery? The file says it was in defense of a young person.”

Burnsides grins, “that’s how I got hired as the bouncer!”

He waits a moment, expecting Magnus to continue. When it seems the young man is assuming that is enough explanation, he prompts, “by beating up a man outside the club?”

“Yeah! He was harassing someone outside, and I was walking home and passed by. I told him to step off, and he didn’t. So I decked him, and he was out right away.”

It lined up with the records he had, and honestly, seeing someone so ready to step up to the defense of a stranger was a good quality. Better than some of the older applicants who were much more… formal in their training. He wonders briefly how Burnsides would react to an altercation against someone with magic.

Glancing down at his records, he guesses he would run headfirst without thinking.

Stifling a small grin, Davenport continues, “Now, tell me. Assume we’re up in space, and something goes wrong with the bond engine. What would your course of action be, Mr. Burnsides?”

Merle Hitower Highchurch. 214. Cleric; Specialization in botany, religion, and medical treatment.

Previous experience: Current botanist at the Institute of Planar Research and Exploration. Professor of botany at Narvick’s University for four years.

Criminal Record: Multiple counts of loitering.

The door is pushed all the way open before Davenport can even call out the next person.

A short dwarf slides into the room with a wide grin, “hey Dav!” A mug of tea is pressed into his hands.

“Hello, Merle. You do know this needs to be at least a little formal, yes?”

“Formal schmormal. Ask me your silly questions already, bud.” Merle Highchurch, resident botanist at the Institute of Planar Research and Exploration, plops right down in the seat he’d taken to commandeering once a week, for the past three weeks.

Davenport had seen him around before, but a botanist in an institute designed for exploring other planes that had little capabilities to actually go to those places yet was rarely busy, and even more rarely called upon. He still barely knew the guy, but after the day they’d gotten stuck in the elevator for ten minutes when it broke down, the dwarf had come to his office for tea each Wednesday.

It was a bit strange, but the tea was good.

“Tell me about your work experience.”

Merle laughs heartily, “they barely have me do anything around here, ‘cept tend to the couple of plants they’ve grabbed from the ground plane.”

“It’s the Elemental Plane of Earth, and don’t sell yourself short, Merle. This is basically a job interview, you know.”

Merle slurps loudly at his own mug, “aren’t you planning on nepotism hiring me, because we’re buds?”

“That isn’t even what that word means, Merle.”

“Isn’t it?”

Davenport stares into the tea, “is this made from the Earth plant?”

“Maybe?”

Davenport. 276. Captain and navigator; Specialization in mechanical engineering and arcane components combined with contemporary technology.

Previous Experience: Crewmate on the Lady Blue for twenty years. Graduated from Grensville University. Current staff at the Institute of Planar Research and Exploration.

Criminal Record: Unlawful resistance of orders from captain, raising of commotion on board ship while employed.

Davenport handed the six files over to Selune, “These are them.”

The halfling woman flips through them, eyebrows raising higher with each one she sees. “You’re sure you grabbed the right ones? A few of these I understand, but you do know we had the Issaiah Broler apply.”

He folds his hand in front of him, nodding. “I also know that during the interview he made me want to pour my tea on his lap. There’s no chance of getting the bond engine going with him. These are the six I picked. They’re all qualified- and the ones that are less educated in the specifics in the field I’m sure will pick up on the important information quickly. The Taaco twins already will give the bond engine a huge boost. Ms. Lucretia will ensure we have everything chronicled, something I’m sure you can appreciate, Selune. Mr. Bluejeans previous work shows he will thrive given the opportunities awaiting us. Mr. Highchurch is an educated man, and I trust him to keep the crew healthy and provide ample information on anything botany related we encounter, and I’m certain Mr. Burnsides will provide ample help in any task we show him how to do.” He sighs, glancing out the window of her office. There were a few people lingering outside in the courtyard of the Institute. “We have been given a tremendous opportunity to explore beyond what we can imagine, Selune. The last thing I want is to be bogged down by people stuck in their ways, who have been working in this field long enough to have their preconceived notions about what to expect and who will react badly when they’re proven wrong. I trust my own judgement in picking a crew, and I hope you trust my abilities to get these people ready to set sail in four months.”

What he doesn’t say is that he doesn’t want a bunch of stuffy jackasses on his ship. He’s not even sure picking all the over-qualified people would pass through the higher-ups' inspection of the crew. The people he picked were qualified enough to get a quick sign-off, but not too much. Anyone “overqualified” would probably get rejected. The ship had been built in basically six months. It’d get them off the ground, sure. It wasn’t going to explode on them once they got up there, but it wasn’t safe. There was a reason Davenport was the captain at all.

The six candidates in those files didn’t have a name for themselves as “important” to any stuffy scientific group or noble family. These people he picked were just that- people. A group of people who he believed deserved this opportunity. If anyone was getting the chance to make a name for themselves- to have the chance to redefine everything they know about the planar systems, he wanted to make sure they deserved the chance. A dangerous chance, sure. But what was science if not a little risky.

She sighs, opening the file on top. Her hand reaches for her pen, “Davenport, I got the final say on the name of the ship, I suppose the least I can do is give you final say on the crew.” She begins to write ‘approved’ at the top of the file, flipping through each one before giving him a pointed look. “But when I get angry calls about how you approved a bunch of nobodies and two people not even old enough to drink, I’m transferring them straight to your crystal.”

“And I will not be answering a single one.”

“I wouldn’t expect you to, Captain.”

#davenport #taako #lup #magnus burnsides #lucretia #barry bluejeans #merle highchurch #taz balance #the stolen century #my works

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elia-de-silentio · 3 years

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The overarching themes of Vanitas no Carte: Identity

The Case Study of Vanitas is a very good, too little known manga (I hope the anime changes something), with some central themes than are exposed in different ways through different characters. In this meta, I want to explore one that was brought to my attention pretty recently: here a little examination on the various ways to face one's own identity in The Case Study of Vanitas.

The Stable Identity( Noè)

Let's start off with the positives, shall we? Noè has probably the most secure personal identity of all the bunch.

And this is pretty amazing, considering everything he went through. He has no memory of his birth family, but gets adopted by some nice people - who die shortly afterwards. Right at their graves, he is kidnapped by slaves, in an accident that left him injured. Then he is bought by someone who actually treats him nicely and is a good mentor for him, he finds many friends his age - and then one of them, the one he was closest to, turns out to be a cursebearer, kills all of the others and then tries to kill him; he is saved by the mentor, who beheads the friend right in front of him. The most immediate emotion is relief for being alive, and he will always feel terrible for that. Then, he has to witness his surviving friend try to cope very badly with her mourning by repressing her identity and try to substitute it with that of her dead twin. That's a lot.

And Noé reacted to all of this by becoming a confident person, kind and attentive to others, but not to the point of being a pushover. I'm not saying he walked away unscathed from the events of his childhood: he regrets the way he handled things with Louis, the way he didn't understand him, and has developed quite the savior complex as a result.

What I'm saying is that he is probably one of the very few well-adjusted people in the psychiatric ward that is Vanitas no Carte. He is still questioning himself, but in a normal way for a nineteen-years-old that has just left a sheltered environment for the big wide world. He is aware of some of his strenghts (his naivete) and is realizing others (putting unfair expectations on other people, underestimating other people due to racial biases); but most importantly, when he realizes these mistakes, he doesn't run away from them or obsess over them believing they make him a horrible person: he recognizes them, apologizes to the wronged person if necessary, and works on improving them.

This isn't to say he's completely happy-go-lucky with no regrets; he feels guilty about being relieved that he lived while Louis died, and he has a lot of uncertainties regarding his identity as an Archiviste and the impact his powers can have on other people. But he managed not to tie his entire identity to that guilt; and as for the second point, Teacher helped him rationalise that and figure out a conduit that didn't undermine him and at the same time showed respect for others. Noè went through several traumas, but received one thing most of the cast didn't: guidance and support from his environment. Whatever Teacher's actual motives are, he shaped a well-balanced person.

The Group Identity (The dhamps, appearently 99% of vampirekind)

"Us dhams are only loyal to each other!" This is what Dante says in one of the first chapters, giving us the first clues to their status as outcasts.

The war between humans and vampires ended up with each deciding to keep to themselves, but dhampires are the living exception to that silent agreement. So, both societies decide to reject them, and they can't find a place in the world unless they stick to others of their own kind. This common history of traumatic experiences of abandonment and subsequent resentment of both human and vampire society for it goes on to create a very strong group identity: the only ones they give a damn about are those like them, everyone else is a potential enemy and is only good to be exploited.

Then, we have the vampire culture. I mean ... it might be because insofar we have met almost exclusively aristocrats obsessed with their respectability ... but they have a lot of prejudices.

You're born under a uncommon moon? You're a pariah. You're mixed race? You're a pariah. Your parents committed a crime? You're a pariah, and are used as a tool. You're born as part of a set of twins? Either you or your sibling are killed at birth, because of something that is SAID, not even a certified element of vampire biology. You're stuck with a curse? You're executed, no attempts to heal you.

Their society seems to run on an ideal model of person which depends on factors outside the individual's control, and whoever doesn't fit this description and deviates from the group in any shape or form gets ridiculously fierce punishment. They make the freaking Church look good by comparison, at least their repressive and racist side is composed of extremists instead of everymen.

The Clan Identity (Chloé, and partially Noé again)

Chloé identifies with a group of people too; but it's not a race, it's a family. The D'Apchier family, the nobles who are responsible for Gevaudan. Her father made sure she had this idea in her right from the start, and she interiorized it.

And this had mixed results: while on the one hand she was chained to self-loathing by the guilt of having accidentally caused the massacre of the family and was only saved by Jeanne and Jean-Jacques reclaiming her as part of theirs, on the other she was able to resist to Naenia because of the love and responsibility she felt towards the people of Gevaudan. Chloé is, at this point, the only curse-bearer who managed to trick and attempted to fight directly against Charlatan.

Then there is Noé in relation to his Archiviste identity. He seems to think of it mainly in negative terms, very conscious of the living invasion of privacy it turns him into ... and nothing else. We have never seen him wonder about who his birth parents were, ask himself why he doesn't remember anything, why was the clan exterminated, or how he feels about being a survivor, one of the only ones if not outright the only. He sees his heritage as a burden,and hasn't thought of it in any different term. I wonder how a change in perspective could impact the above 'stable identity'.

The Someone Else's Identity (Vanitas, Dominique)

I already dedicated a whole post to this trait they share, so I'll be short: both Vanitas and Dominique hate themselves and try to become something worthy by taking elements of people they admire: Louis for Dominique, a combination of his birth father and Luna for Vanitas.

The Object Identity (Jeanne)

The very first thing Jeanne was said in her whole life was that she was an object. A vessel for something (or someone?) else, who mustn't have feelings or desires of her own. Encouraging, isn't it?

Luckily, this wasn't all she got in life. Soon afterwards, she was adopted by Eric and Louise, who loved her a lot, received kindness by Ruthven, met Chloé who became an older sister to her. Unluckily, all of this was taken away from her in the most cruel way possible.

She couldn't make any sense of her parents's betrayal and death, and the way her life suddenly changed; she rationalised it by telling herself that it was her fault, if she had been just the good object everyone told her to be nothing would have happened. So she accepts the Object Identity: she is a tool, so she doesn't feel, she exists only to obey orders, and as long as she is nobody else will ever suffer. It gets even worse after she fails to kill Chloè: she couldn't fulfill her duties, and both her and her big sis suffered for it. This mindset traps her in a world of pain, but also prevents her from facing the fact that she is subject to a senseless injustice, one she has no control over.

Vanitas managed to help her with that. He validated her feelings, and showed her that nobody had to die if she had them, solving the situation with Chloé and Jean-Jacques. This gave her a nice confidence boost, returning her to the cheerful attitude she had as a young girl; the consequences of this change remain to be seen.

The Unknown Identity (Luna)

This one is interesting because Luna themselves is pretty explicit about it. They see themselves as something 'other', who is outside commonly used categorization; starting with 'male or female' (and here I am left wondering if they had specific sexual characteristics but didn't feel like they 'fit', or were intersex and nonbinary, or had an entirely different biology from both vampires and humans).

Luna doesn't like this condition: they said they tried to figure out what they were, to understand themselves, and they regret doing so now. Why? Maybe they didn't find any answer and were left perpetually unsatisfied, or they found an answer, and they found it to be awful?

Still, this indicates Luna has never been particularly happy with themselves, and this found no resolution. And then they died. Nice, uh?

Well, I think this was all. There are other characters I would like to know more about in regard to this, like Ruthven, Marquis Machina, and Mikhail, but there is still time.

All in all, I'd say Vanitas no Carte explores the theme of identity pretty throughly; many character arcs are still in progress, and I'm interested about how things will develope especially for Vanitas, Dominique and Jeanne.

Thanks to anyone who bothered to read my ramblings!

#vnc #vanitas no carte #the case study of vanitas #vnc meta #vnc analysis #vnc noe #vnc chloé #vnc vanitas #vnc dominique #vnc jeanne #vnc luna #elia's recaps

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stellocchia · 3 years

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I really liked Wilbur's lore stream from yesterday, so you guys are getting a short stream analysis from me

As always dialogue is color-coded: Wilbur, Tubbo, Ranboo

And since I'm the least concise person ever everything is under the cut

The stream is (DSMP LORE) A Year Later

The stream starts with Wilbur singing the L'Manburg anthem to Ranboo. It is interesting to notice that, just like all the streams since he's been back he doesn't start off the stream by addressing chat in any way but already taking with someone in-universe.

"I'm a big big fan of the song (...) (Wilbur notices that Ranboo was muted) so sorry, let's try again: have you heard that song before?" "Yeah I have, I have. I have- I've had a friend that sings it quite a lot" “Good, good, and I was gonna say, it’s obviously based on Hallelujah right? But the thing is, the thing is Ranboo, right? But the thing is- the thing is Ranboo, right? Is that the reason we did it is because Tommy used to sing Hallelujah to the plants" "Oh, to the plants?" "Yeah! In- in the- around the- around the uhm... around the thing! You know the- the caravan? (...) so, my man, Tommy used to sing to the plants to make them grow better and that was the song he used to sing and so I thought what a way to honour Tommy, you know, one of the most- one of the most loyal members or of our fair nation than by naming the song after him, you know? And singing it based on his little- his little Muse. Tommy is a- Tommy is all of our Muse really I'd say"

I cut as much of this quote as I could while still leaving it well understandable and leaving in everything I wanted to talk about, but man is it long... So let's break it down a bit at a time:

1) The friend that Ranboo referenced that sings the anthem a lot is most likely Tubbo considering that they met him later on in this stream while he was singing that very song

2) The memory of the song seems to still be a particularly pleasant one for Wilbur, which probably explains why Ghostbur as well was so fond of it. He speaks about it positively throughout and it generally seems like an overall positive moment of reminiscence, probably because it's a callback to a simpler time when Wilbur too was, you know, happier overall. It's a reminder of a time before the worsening of his spiral.

3) Also interesting that they kept it in canon that Tommy singing to the plants was what inspired the anthem. Especially because I'm not entirely sure if that's the case considering that the actual anthem wasn't written by cc!Wilbur but by a fan upon his request (obviously this is outside the story).

4) Last thing I wanted to mention was Wilbur describing Tommy as a Muse. Muses in mythology are the inspirational goddesses of the arts, music, and science, Tommy aside from the anthem obviously isn't that. But it is interesting that Tommy does take a central role when it comes to motivating people. We could say that Techno's speech on the 16th was inspired by him since it was directed at him. Similarly, Niki and Jack had their arcs revolving around him. Tommy was able to rally the troops with ease multiple times. And Dream's obsession with him itself is the main motivator for, like, 90% of his actions. So, while he may not cover the role of a muse literally it's not a comparison that is too far off...

They headed to the museum afterward and took notice of the Ranboo poster being missing. And then they headed off to L'Manburg (which, by the way, looks amazing, thank you cc!Phil for that one).

"It goes by L'Manhole now apparently" "I- yeah it's kinda- ugh- I'm not a fan. It's kinda rude to L'Manburg's history, you know? It- it's called L'Manburg. It's called L'Manburg. NOT Manberg, not L'Crater or whatever. L'Manhole, I don't care, it's now L'Manburg, it's always L'Manburg, okay?"

It's interesting that not too long ago he was saying that even L'Manburg itself (with an emphasis on the name) wasn't what was actually important, the purpose of it was. He admits later on that he lied in that conversation, but it's impressive how quickly he trusted Ranboo enough to let him see how much he still cared about L'Manburg when he was so intent on lying about it not too long ago.

Wilbur's enthusiasm about seeing the flag is another nice confirmation about him still caring deeply for his old nation.

"Damn, I really went down to bedrock, didn't I? Holy shit I did- I did a number on this place" (I wonder why Ranboo didn't correct him on this, because Ranboo knows that Techno, Phil, and Dream are the ones who actually exploded the country down to bedrock...)

They end up seeing Tubbo on the other side of the crater and head over to him. While they're heading there Tubbo is singing the anthem himself in a very mournful tone.

One interesting thing that I noticed it's that it's Wilbur that heads towards Tubbo's location instead of having Tubbo go to him like he mostly did with Tommy for example. I suppose it could be because Tubbo having been a president himself is in less of a subordinate position to Wilbur than Tommy who's always been a simple soldier.

"It's like looking in a little mirror, look you're wearing my suit still? How long have you been wearing that?" "Oh I just put it on, just for today" (in a similar fashion to Jack bringing out the L'Manburg uniform to reminisce, Tubbo also brought out clothes he strongly attaches the memory of L'Manburg to)

"Ranboo have you met Tubbo?" "Yeah, yeah. I've- I've met him, I mean we've, uhm... we've been around" (Ranboo still minimizing his relationship with Tubbo to Wilbur. Of course, this is because he doesn't trust him but it's interesting that he isn't even honest about that)

After a bit of back and forth, Wilbur starts apologizing to Tubbo. At first, like most other times he's having a serious discussion he puts himself in an elevated position to tower over Tubbo. It's a neat way to show how his own desire for control affects him, having Wilbur literally elevate himself over others when speaking to them. Literally putting Tubbo down in this situation. Which does make the beginning of his apology very obviously feel insincere.

"I'm sorry for making you president specifically before blowing it up and I'm sorry for when I did this *pointing at the crater* and blew all this up and making this whole. I'm sorry that I uh- that I said that you were the president of a crater"

This is that first part of the apology I mentioned. Just to clarify, I don't actually think that it was entirely insincere. It just feels less impactful due to Wilbur putting himself in a position of superiority over Tubbo, especially because it's something we've seen him do before. It's also to be noted that this time, like others before, he seems to be apologizing less out of actual guilt and more out of a desire to earn forgiveness. Which is not a critique by the way. I just feel like that's a misconception Wilbur has, that apologies serve the purpose of confirming to him that he's doing a good job at changing more than to actually make amends for what he's done. The reason why I think that's the case for the beginning part of this apology as well it's because of how fast he went to ask tubbo if he forgave him, which did put a certain level of pressure on Tubbo in this situation.

"I mean it wasn't- this wasn't all you Wilbur" (thank you tubbo for finally dispelling some of those misunderstandings)

"Yeah so me and mainly Ghostbur honestly, like-" "Ghostbur" (some more of Wilbur not being too fond of Ghostbur)

"Right is he [Ghostbur] this obsidian crap then I take it and these- these fucking dumb lanterns up here" (a bit more)

To correct Wilbur's misconceptions Tubbo starts off asking if the other knew Dream, to which Wilbur responds with how much he appreciates Dream and how he's his hero, which makes Tubbo backtrack and blames most of Doomsday on Techno and Phil. Which, as we know, isn't actually accurate and I have a feeling that this misinformation will be harmful later on once Dream is out of prison (though I don't blame Tubbo for backtracking with how enthusiastic Wilbur is, that was the basic conflict-avoidant approach that Tubbo seems to prefer).

"They rained tnt for days" (if this is actually canon then Doomsday was even more of a tragedy than we previously saw it as. It was days filled with fighting and destruction. Then again, Tubbo has misremembered traumatizing events before)

"Techno and Phil, they hated the government. I mean it was partially my fault as well" "But you didn't blow it up" "No I didn't. I would never have wished or anything like this to happen" "So it was just Techno and Phil?" *long pause* "Y-yeees"

Two things to say here:

1) I appreciate someone in canon recognizing that it's not Tubbo's fault for what happened to L'Manburg and blaming the people who actually blew it up, similarly to how I appreciate Wilbur bringing up with Tommy that it was clearly Dream pulling the strings with his exile with Tubbo. It's nice having it stated plainly for people to hear

2) This is the misconception I mentioned. This is most certainly gonna backfire at some point.

After that Wilbur commends Tubbo quite a lot for rebuilding New L'Manburg (once again being dismissive towards Ghostbur) and is clearly enthusiastic about it, even going as far as to say that that mattered more to him than them building him a grave.

"I just, I feel lost without L'Manburg. All my core beliefs, everything died with it" "You feel lost without a nation..." "I have no purpose anymore" "I guess that's where anarchy fails" (I think this may be the first time someone admits it to someone else, even though that lack of purpose and feeling disoriented is very obviously a shared sentiment amongst the ex-citizens)

After that, it's when Wilbur invites Tubbo to join Paradise, the, supposedly burger van with a small house attached to it that wasn't supposed to become a nation. I have a feeling that the proposition coming right after that exchange may imply that Wilbur changed his mind on it. He does purposefully put himself again in an elevated position when making the proposition.

"Would you like to come join me in Paradise? Literally" "Hmmm, I'm not sure Wilbur. I'm not sure I trust you man, I need to- in order to follow someone I need to trust them" "Wait, wait but you- I thought you forgave me! I thought it was, you know it-" "Wilbur I forgive you because I like to hang on to the hope that people can change, but-"

This is what I mean when I say that Wilbur's apologies come with expectations for the person he's apologizing to. By asking Tubbo first if he forgave him when he originally apologized, he already made it harder for Tubbo to refute that. And now we learn that he expected trust to come along with forgiveness. He's not doing this maliciously of course, but he does seem to have some misconceptions on this.

"I know you had that- that at the festival? With Technoblade? I never spoke to you properly about this. I- I could have saved you" "But you didn't" (other people brought this up, but this is a neat little parallel to the one scene in exile where Ranboo was lamenting about how he should have gone with Tommy and Tommy shut him down pointing out that anyone could have gone but no one actually did)

There is a second round of apologies and Wilbur is still standing higher than Tubbo, BUT he does put himself on his same level after he did a bit more pushing and found that Tubbo was standing his ground. He finally puts himself on the same level as Tubbo and openly acknowledges his boundaries which is the first actual real effort to change that we've seen from Wilbur. Which I'd say is a pretty important step for him.

"Wilbur in order for you to gain my trust back you have to prove it, I can't just give it out anymore. I used to be able to but I just- I just can't" (acknowledgement of how Tubbo's trauma also affected him deeply)

"You know I still have dreams, right? Of the explosion. And- and of the fireworks. And- and all of it. I- I still- I vividly see all of it. Every day. It hurts. It hurts a lot Wilbur"

I want to commend Tubbo here for being able to open up like this, especially considering how much he generally leans into denial and how much he usually suppress. And on top of that this is Tubbo acknowledging that both Wilbur's actions (the explosion) and Techno's actions (the fireworks) have hurt him and STILL hurt him and affect him deeply. It's quite a big admission especially for him.

"Sorry feels like such a weak word. I feel like there's nothing stronger that I can say" (first time that he's standing on the same level of Tubbo while apologizing)

"You're so strong man. Genuinely. You just- just the fact that you proved to me just there that you have this memories, that you have this nightmares and you still find it in your heart to forgive me. That's... you're a fucking champion man. You- you're a hero"

It's interesting that the reason why he claims Tubbo to be strong here is because he forgave him. It's not something that's inherently about Tubbo, like the fact that he still found the strength to go on and rebuild after the events he mentioned, for example, no. What Wilbur brought up is the one thing that Tubbo did for him. Which tells me that he still clearly has a bit of way to go to learn how to make amends and how redemption actually works, but, you know, that's to be expected honestly.

Wilbur moves on by inviting Tubbo to at least come and see Paradise, just to see what they'd made and Tubbo refuses because he wanted to spend more time reminiscing. Wilbur this time respect Tubbo's boundaries with no pushing which is yet another step forward for him honestly. Wilbur also gives Tubbo a "lucky rabbit's foot" that Tommy gave him to cheer him up and assure him that he had no problems with him not going.

With this their conversation comes to a close and Wilbur and Ranboo head over to Paradise (though not before Ranboo has confirmed with Tubbo that he actually does want to be left alone).

"You know I was gonna say 'this is hard' but obviously it's hard. I mean, you know, I've..." (a bit of reflection on his actions for Wilbur, you love to see it!)

"It's gonna get better! It's gonna get better! And it's gonna be worth it when I see them smiling. All of them. Tubbo, Jack, Niki, Tommy, anyone!" (I'm pretty sure that this is a genuine sentiment right here. It really does seem that wilbur's Big Plan right now is just to make amends and change)

"Do you know who the original L'Manburg group were? Do you know who we were?" "I- I think most of them yeah... I think it was like: you, Jack, Niki, Fundy I believe as well" "Fundy was a bit after. Fundy was after we'd gotten independence"

I wonder if that's an actual misrememberance on Wilbur's part (c!Wilbur, not cc!Wilbur, I'm sure cc!Wilbur remembers this) or just him wanting to put some distance between his good memories of L'Manburg and Fundy. Because Jack and Niki weren't there for the independence war either and yet he singled out Fundy who was. And I doubt that he'd forget about his son being one of the people who lost their first life in the final control room. In addition to that Wilbur didn't mention Fundy before among those he wanted to make smile.

I really think that this was intentional and that it was because, well, Wilbur felt deeply betrayed by Fundy. And we as the audience know that Fundy only ever publicly stopped acknowledging him as his father to be able to stay undercover as a spy, but he doesn't. It wouldn't be so weird that he wanted to erase Fundy from his memories of the time when he was supposed to be happy.

"I try and keep this on the low because I don't want uh- I don't want people to use it against me is the main problem. I do wa- I didn't even tell Tommy, I lied to Tommy" "Yeah?" "I'll be honest I'm gonna tell him soon that I lied to him because if it- it kinda eats away at me. But I told- I told tommy that I didn't actually care about L'Manburg and that it was just like a tool for me to use to gain, you know, power and stuff, but it's not- it's not true. L'Manburg is- was really important to me. And it is still to this day"

Once again I'm surprised how little it took Wilbur to trust Ranboo with stuff he hasn't really told anyone else. Makes you really understand how low of an opinion of himself he has that when the first person that calls him "alright" out loud just gets his undying trust. Especially considering that Ranboo doesn't trust him back and hasn't been the most honset with him so far. It's also a nice spelled out admission for anyone who didn't get how much Wilbur cares about L'Manburg from the longing look he gave to the camaravan's replica in the stream where he said he never cared.

"I wanted history to live on, not as a stain caused by me, you know. I basically took a big shit on the history books it feels like" (just another interesting little insight on Wilbur's view of the situation)

"I've heard about what's Tommy's, you know, moved on... and how jack's moved on, and how Niki's moved on and everyone's moved on from L'Manburg at least partially, but Tubbo man, he's still..." (he only thinks the rest of them moved on because he hasn't spoken almost at all with two of them and he never really listened to Tommy. Also, again, Fundy is not mentioned)

"I don't know where I'd be without you [Ranboo] here right now man, I mean T-Tommy's great and all and he's here but I- I feel like, you know, I don't wanna- I don't wanna string him along too much because he's- I- when I look at him. When I look at him when he's helping me out building things with me I see the same eyes that looked at me when... when... There were some- there weren't some fun times in the ravine of Pogtopia. I wasn't a very well man and I can just see Tommy from that day"

This one was one heck of a confession!

I don't know if this is me misremembering, but I'm fairly sure that this is the first time he's admitted to not being great to Tommy specifically. Again, Tommy is the one person he met with so far that he hasn't apologized to. Heck! He told Tommy to his face that him being sorry for his actions didn't mean he wouldn't do them again. It's a pretty damn big admission to acknowledge that that behaviour (which is the same now, if not worse when only related to Tommy) wasn't good. It also shows that he's at least a bit aware of Tommy's emotions which is rarely shown honestly. Though whether he cares because of Tommy or because being around Tommy makes him feel guilty (which is what you'd expect him to feel) and he doesn't like that is to be determined still, mostly just because the phrasing was a bit uncertain at the moment.

"I know what it's like to have no one- or at least feel like no one trusts you. Uhm, and I- I've realized that if- if no one's with you then how can anyone really know when you've redeemed yourself? So that's why I'm here I guess" (Ranboo's answer to why he trusts Wilbur. Which he doesn't, but still)

And the stream ends with Wilbur saying he hopes Tubbo comes around to try out one of the burgers (though he does repeat that he doesn't want Ranboo to pressure him to join) and complimenting Ranboo a bit more.

#dream smp #wilbur soot #ranboo #tubbo #c!wilbur #c!ranboo #c!tubbo #character analysis #dream smp analysis #long post #I said it would be short and I most definitely lied #but you guys should know that I'm not capable of brevity by now #so honestly it's on you if you believed the title

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silverloreley · 3 years

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This is for @lucianalight, but I suppose since I’m putting it out there I’m going to get more attention that I wish for (I largely wish for this post to not get popularity because popular posts always bring controversy and hatred to the makers those days and I have enough on my mind to deal with that too).

For everyone that may feel stung by what I write, keep in mind: 1) english is not my first language, 2) I tend to block easily (and unapologetically, at this point), 3) that this is in no way meant to elicit discourse of any kind or worsen anyone’s day, mine or lucianalight’s or anyone’s who happens to read it. It’s an idea that was buzzing into my mind and I wanted to get it out and explore a bit, if possible, nothing more.

To the post:

Reading your various analysis about hero coding (I’d tag them but you know them better than me ;P) and so on in Marvel movies I had a thought: if the story of Thor1 had been told from the Jotnar’s pov, the two dead at the start of the movie would have been a pair of trusted soldiers who had been sent on a desperate mission to retrieve an ancient heirloom of the royal family which was also a source of energy for the whole realm, an artifact lost in a violent war that may or may not had been born because of greed (but whose greed? because both parties felt in the right...).

This last act happened because the king had an interesting lead on how to break in the enemies’ vault to retrieve what was rightfully theirs and they needed it so bad he had to make an attempt.

Attempt ends badly, the emissaries are killed. It could have ended there, just a failed adventure and another hope lost, but a few hours after the fact the crown prince of the enemy kingdom comes, to accuse and wager war with an attitude that people who had been reduced in misery and scorned for longer that the prince had lived couldn’t accept and someone made a small scorn to the prince, a mockery of no real value and little bite, but which leads the arrogant and violent prince to react with deadly intents.

Many people die at the hand of the tyrant king’s golden son, who is not only as arrogant as his father but not even half as smart. He is, although, powerful and hard to kill.

They could have done it, though, even adding to it the prince isn’t alone, because in his arrogance he had led his companions along to the heart of Jotun territory and jotnar have the natural advantage there.

But no, deus ex machina! A reminder they are still less powerful: the tyrant king appears and tries to wash off the blood on his son’s hands as a childlish act. Sure, nothing like some old-fashioned death to show how harmless the boy is, uh?

King Laufey promises war. A war, everyone knows, they can’t even fight, let alone win, because the only effective means of transportation are in the enemy’s hands. The war could hardly happen, but pride forces them to declare it, and try as they may to fight it, should any chance happen. After all, they are dying anyway, they are desperate like that, what else do they have to lose?

In a part of the public opinion there is the belief that with the death of the enemy king and the retrieval of their artifact everything would go back as it once was, with high buildings and better defences against enemies of every kind, may it be armies or starvation, beasts or illnesses (after all, we don’t really know what the Casket does, no?)... and a king who is supposed to care for his people needs to listen to those voices and maybe he made them his own too.

Now, if the story had been told from the pov of the jotnar, there could have been preparations for war, or plans to avoid it, maybe the hope for another chance to steal back the Casket, which was later offered by the supposedly traitorous second prince? But let’s not look in the gifted horse’s mouth, it’s a plan.

Which failed. Or rather, it was a trap. The new attempt at revenge for their people’s lost pride and status (by killing the tyrant king in his own bed, without additional bloodshed, plus recovering the Casket) went down the drain and Laufey died, on top of the (probably) thousands of victims from the Bifrost’s continous activation that left the jotnar in even worse state that before. All because they were angry and desperate.

One could even add the kidnapping and brainwashing of their lost prince (not that unlike the way barbarian noble children were raised in the court of Byzathium, educated in the ways the empire deemed best to use them better later on...), the humiliation of having one of them turned against them that way. That must have stung, uh? Tragedy upon tragedy, and the prince was even discarded by the tyrant king at the end of it, leaving the situation even more hopeless than before.

Maybe what we saw as a hero’s journey to improvement (Thor’s, although one with a bit of salt could argue that any improvement was lacking, conditional and even temporary), parallel to a villain’s origin story (Loki’s, although I argue he’s way less villainous than others in the MCU and, anyway, he redeemed himself quite a few times afterwards, but that’s another discussion), was in truth the tragedy of a whole population. Maybe, a bit like the tragedies about the trojan war, it could have been the lamentation of a populace brought to its knees, conquered for a fault that was partially theirs but that was paid for far worse than due, and punished for attempting to get back on its feet. All while little changed for their oppressors.

Perhaps, it’s a matter of perspectives.

#not tagging because of reasons #just my personal thoughts #and I won't engage in discourse of any kind #I only want to explore this different point of view

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demonslayedher · 3 years

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Your content on Kny is interesting, being a Kny fan I would like to share a cusiority. During the final battle did you notice that the Hashira were passive about the death of some? When Shinobu died only Tanjiro had a reaction because of how busy he was; Mitsuri didn't seem sad and when Iguro remembered who died in the middle of the final battle he didn't even mention her. What did you think? It would have been nice if Gotouge had shown us what the Hashira's thought when the others died

[cont.] I'm the anonymous person who asked you the question about the Hashira who fell in the fight, Tumblr makes people write very little. Apart from Tanjiro they seemed cold to me, even for Tokito; the only one affected was Himejima; when always Iguro mentioned him during the clash with Muzan it was like he was thinking normally. There wasn't time to mourn for the dead but I was expecting a slightly deeper reaction. Anyway for Shinobu yes there was Inosuke and Kanao but the pillars are important too

Thank you for the Ask, time to get into it! This served as a good excuse to flip back through of a lot of the later volumes... or rather, a huge chunk of the series. Short Answer: I don’t think Mitsuri knew about Shinobu’s death. Longer Answer: A walk-through of the Pillars’ situations in the final showdown and a partial analysis of Kimetsu-style story pacing.

Disclaimer: I finished this around 2am. I chose to leave it rambling and unedited and typo-ridden. HAVE MY FEELS, I’M DISHING THEM.

(Disclaimer: This isn’t meant to be a plug for my own fics, but since they are born out of my emotional experience of canon, mentions will make their way in. U fu fu.) First, absolutely yes on there being no time to mourn. From the moment the Ubuyashiki Mansion blows up in volume 16 to the actual end of the fighting in volume 23, that is one hell of a night; this final arc(s) had NO CHILL. Like, wow. It’s been a long time since I followed another battle-driven manga, but that seems like a lot, especially for a relatively short series. And I was initially happy to dismiss all the lack of satisfying sadness as being due to the fact that they are in *PANIC MODE* and entirely focused on fighting, but that is also not necessarily the case; they do come off slightly cold. I want to touch a bit on what we want to see the characters mourn each other, but also why I think it works out a bit better that we didn’t; from a purely narrative standpoint. LET THEM BE SAD: Parasocial Needs Science says we form bonds with fictional characters that affect our brains in very similar and impactful ways, so our feelings are legit when they get killed off. It affects us like a breakup or other goodbye and makes us crave closure. As for my own assumptions, we look for proxy characters in-universe to give those characters we love the attention we wish to; their sadness validates our sadness, watching them get emotional can be super cathartic, and a good mourning arc can provide satisfying closure. This is something we got with Rengoku, canonically loved by like, everyone. Hell, even the guy who killed him was sad. Just to rub salt into it, the most recent fanbook that includes a section about how the Pillars see each other, and it drives home that even if we never saw much or any canon interaction between him and any other given character, they’re all like, “Oh yeah, Rengoku, he’s a great guy.” And, he’s the only character we really get space to mourn, pacing-wise. First, because of when it happens in the plot, this gives the story time to show us each and everyone one of the Pillars hearing the news; it gives them times to process it (which Tokitou clearly needed), and most of us, it takes us in depth through how it affects Tanjirou, our main character whose emotions that we, the readers, are most in touch with. Rengoku got star treatment in the way he was mourned, and we readers get to lap that up. So then when we don’t get that in-universe star mourning treatment, it does feel a bit jarring by comparison. Gotouge did say she was sorry to hurt everyone, but these are the conditions the little humans were up against all along and a point driven home again and again; even with power on par with demons through the attainment of a mark; even Pillars are just breakable humans who will never be able to regenerate like demons can, hence why their stakes are so much higher in every battle they go into. Furthermore, the Pillars are more ready for this than anyone else, they of all the characters would be the best at keeping their emotions in check in the heat of a battle. Which means they had to keep them in check for seven volumes of near constant battle, love it or hate it. KIMETSU LOGIC: The Writing Sins That Make This Manga What It Is I could go on and on and on and on about the writing sins this manga commits and how it shows that it’s Gotouge’s first time writing something of this length. In manga not all of it can be blamed on the author alone because the editors have a very significant influence, but yeah, this is not the most amazingly crafted story out there, by a long shot. Would I change any of it, though? Well, a few things, yes, of course, out of personal preference. But on the whole, no. It’s the collective errors that stamp KnY with its style and make it what it is, and I find it as endearing as all the randomly super goofy art. Now, when it comes to the lack of Pillars reacting to new of each others’ deaths, I wouldn’t necessarily classify that itself as a fault, and if I were Gotouge’s editor, I probably would have encouraged her to keep it to a minimum too. After all, I would be considered with selling a new shot of tension with every week’s installment to keep any readers from getting bored with the constant battle. And dang it, THAT TENSION WAS HIGH, those battles were remarkably emotional and tense through and through. The breaks in tension that we got were necessarily and not distracting, with the notable exception of Iguro’s past. That was clumsy placement. I’ll be honest, I didn’t bond with Iguro as much as a character because he lost his earlier chances to be appealing to me, and by the time the chapter with his flashback came out, I DIDN’T CARE, I waited anxiously all week to see what was happening to Tanjiro and was invested enough to have an appetite for the additional Sumiyoshi and Yoriichi bits, but dang it, Snake Pillar was getting in the way of what my emotions were primed for at that point. But, such is the way of fickle weekly readers; with THAT MUCH tension going on, readers crave a little breather here and there with a look at who else might taking in a breather in a flashback. We got bits and pieces of that mostly through flashback, like Tamayo’s memories of conversation with Shinobu experienced in real time through Muzan, as well as in-real-time moments with the characters having very slight chances to catch their breath (no pun intended). But, how well those breaths worked depending on each character, and how the readers’ emotions were getting slammed week to week. Just like how I as a weekly reader (by that point) had no appetite for an Iguro flashback while eager to move forward, there likewise would have been limited appetite for mourning, and we’re stuck with who we got as proxy characters to react through. ACTION, REACTION: The Rhythm of Basic Writing Advice It has often been said that in writing, something should happen in a scene, and the next scene should be a reaction to it. In the next scene something new happens, and likewise, there is a reaction. We could also thing of this as stages within the same scene, like the part when the music changes or the moment the battle has ended but we’re still on the battlefield. In Rengoku’s case, we got one big happening, and then a whole lot of reaction drizzled through the story after that. In the Infinity Fortress case, we get a big happening with the Ubuyashiki Mansion blowing up and then--a big happening!--a big happening!--a big happening--! A--uh oh, there’s a reactio---NEVERMIND, THINGS ARE STILL HAPPENING, GOTOUGE, PLEASE, THIS HURTS, OW, OW, HOW ARE YOU SO CRUEL, WE GET IT, THIS SITUATION IS AWFUL, PLEASE STOP HURTING THEM---

The reactions are there, scattered throughout. They��re short, but they sure make themselves count. While Tanjirou is our Empathy Personified hero, it’s natural that we get more of his reactions, but the lack of them in other characters is, I would say, a natural fault of having a huge cast to work with it. Once you start dragging too many other characters into the reactions, the actions have trouble moving forward, and with the level of seven volumes worth of tension it’s the actions that keep readers hooked and buying magazines. THEY’RE ONLY CORVIDS, OK: Now We’re Actually Looking At Canon Details Now that all being said, although it’s easy to dismiss a lot of Kimetsu Logic as amateurish at first, on further reflection, the little worldbuilding logic does excuse itself for not plunging each of the characters into a period of reaction to actions happening elsewhere. Not all the birds had Yushiro’s papers. Not all birds were created equal. It’s really hard to navigate that place. Ergo, communication was probably highly imperfect; not all the crows knew everything going on. We don’t feel that as readers because we’re seeing Kiriya and his sisters get all the available communications. In Iguro and Mitsuri’s case in particular, I suspect that might not even had been Mitsuri’s crow (as that one has a distinct personality and accessory) giving her orders to gather where Muzan is. It was probably any old down-to-business crow working with the information it had as clearly as it could in the battle that was most difficult to physically navigate. If Mitsuri’s crow (named Urara in the most recent fanbook) had been there, I imagine she’d have been having difficulty that whole time to even stay within a close range of that battle. Furthermore, a crow like that with a strong bond with Mitsuri might had also judged that telling her about Shinobu’s death was a dangerous distraction, and chosen to withhold information. The fanbook specifies that Iguro’s crow Yuuan was the one who told him about how Tokitou got a red blade (in fact, this is basically the only thing said of this crow besides its name and gender). To able to report in such detail that Iguro could analyze that Tokitou attained the red blade by the strength of his grip, that probably quite an accomplishment to have either witnessed that much, or to pass on crucial information that detailed and quickly. At that time, Iguro and Mitsuri were physically separated and she was distracted by the crow giving her orders to gather where Muzan was, so she might not even have overheard that Tokitou had died. As for Iguro, the second fanbook tells us that because Tokitou was young he had hoped he wouldn’t die. There was no opportunity to mourn him, and they weren’t close enough for that to throw him off much from battle, but on a Pillar to Pillar level, I think the amount of thought Iguro did dedicated to Tokitou showed a certain level of esteem for him and regret at this passing. What would have been nice? Maybe a little look over his shoulder to Mitsuri like “I hope she didn’t hear that.” That would have revealed a tender side of Iguro in a very short use of panels. I want to come back to analyzing Mitsuri’s reaction later, so let’s keep focusing on the loss of Tokitou. Once he attained more of his sense of self back, it seems he preferred the company of Corp Members closed to him in age (if we go by his little flashbacks, which in true Kimetsu Logic, are things we didn’t know about until they come up in flashbacks). Most of the Pillars weren’t especially close with him, even if they did care about his wellbeing, as they seemed particular aware of how young he was. Sanemi probably had never interacted much with Tokitou until that battle, and *OKAY, HERE IT IS, THE UPCOMING FANFIC SELF-PLUG* one of the things I really liked working with in my post-canon fic is that there’s a point at which thinking about Tokitou forces Sanemi to deal with all the trauma he’s buried from that battle. I figure it would hit him later; he had a good excuse of a distraction. Ugh. Man. My heart hurts again thinking of that chapter. Let’s also not forget, after Himejima showed his respects for Tokitou both quickly and sincerely, he couldn’t allow Sanemi to deal with Genya’s death until after everything was over. All the Pillars had to think like this. What would had been nice? I liked this reaction scene to two simultaneous and horrific deaths exactly as it was. Ow. Ahhhh. Owwwwww, it’s hurting again. This is catharsis exactly the way I like it. Let’s keep going with Himejima, the only one to have known to expect all this, and who stayed ready and likely hoped to bring down Muzan all by himself without any other sacrifices (welp, so much for that). There’s a scene in the novels that implies he had some idea that Shinobu wasn’t intending to make it out of the upcoming battle(s) alive, and I imagine he felt the same regret and bitter acceptance in advance that he also felt with Ubuyashiki. If we heard the news about Shinobu like Tanjirou and Giyuu did, I imagine he was hurt but it wouldn’t have been noticeable, and he probably would not be surprised even at how quickly it happened. What would had been nice? Anything. Just a “How pitiful” and some tears as he runs through the halls woulda’ been great. So since Giyuu did hear it loud and clear with Tanjirou, I first want to point out that whether that was Tanjirou’s crow or not (might not had been, because his crow was busy with a letter delivery from Senjurou at the time too), that crow must had loved to shared details; maybe even details that were not necessary. Like, would telling the lower level Corp members everything really help? Wouldn’t the loss of each Pillar make them lose their nerve? Was it because that crow was wearing one of Yushiro’s papers that it had to report extra detail for Ubuyashiki HQ? Whatever the case, Giyuu is initially shocked about Shinobu and then is like, “what is that paper the crow has? It sure is reporting things fast.” What would have been nice? ANYTHING MORE THAN ONE PANEL OF SHOCK. Come on, Giyuu, give the GiyuuShino shippers S O M E T H I N G. Granted, if Tanjirou had been killed in battle with Akaza, I believe Giyuu would have had an initial outburst of emotion, but then gotten himself under control real quick and stayed that way until it was safe to break down (which he did immediately later on, since the threat was gone--but he was just as soon picking up a sword and stabbing him, so again, Pillar-mode must come before experiencing emotions). I interpret canon as that even though Giyuu might had found it easily to address Shinobu in conversation due to frequency in how much they had conversed and the fact that she would usually talk to him first, he would never had considered himself especially close with her (since he never saw himself close with any of the Pillars). I feel their relationship had potential to grow closer if Giyuu had actually gone out of his way to communicate more with her, and he probably would had if they both survived, but at the time she died he probably still felt a distance, which is why it did him harder when Tanjirou--someone who Giyuu did actually get to a point of enjoying conversation with--was dead right in front of him. (Side not, oh man, OH MAN, being a weekly reader was so tough then. I still have so many emotions from that week. Oh man. Oof. Ouch.)

Of note, Giyuu had the best opportunity for reflection on a comrade’s death since he had enough recovery time once he woke up to build a fire and treat wounds, and Tanjirou took that chance to read a letter.

What would have been nice? AGAIN, GIYUU, ANYTHING, but after that battle I think he deserved to disassociate a bit. Also of note, I don’t know that they had complete information either, because NO ONE (by “no one” I mean Tanjirou and Inosuke) seemed to hear anything about Zenitsu single-handedly killing Upper Moon Six and surviving it. What would had been nice: “Good for you, Zenitsu, I hope you’re okay” or “Six? Again? Didn’t we already do that? There was a third??” or “well I got Upper Moon Two SO THERE” or “..........are you sure?” or even way, way after all is said and done, off in epilogue times, “you fought WHO by YOURSELF???” but I digress. Now back to Shinobu, losing her so early on in this marathon of high-stakes battles made her death seem forever ago by the time we got to another Pillar death. It would had been nice for more of them to react both with “no, not Shinobu!” and “we are in deep trouble” sort of ways. That made the glimpses we got of her in flashback feel way, way more nostalgic, since for our experiences as readers, she had already been gone a very long time. I like that the battle with Douma got stretched over so long a span of the manga, they really showed the stakes in how difficult of a foe he was, even if that battle was itself was relatively shorter than others. And as stand-ins for the readers to mourn Shinobu, I love how we got that both through Kanao and through Inosuke. But yes, it sure would had been nice to get something from... Mitsuri. Now, if I had only read the events of canon, manga chapter to manga chapter, and even the Taisho Secrets, I still never would have guessed that Shinobu and Mitsuri had such a warm friendship. I know this purely from the fanbooks and novels, and that is something I find a writing error that detracts a lot from the work. Some of the most apt criticism I’ve heard of the Kimetsu pacing is that it could have stood to give us one of more arc to bond with the characters at least a little more, so we could really, really be emotional over loosing them. We get all our spare Pillar interactions in works outside of canon and after Tanjirou initially gets to know Shinobu, he has no more on-screen interactions with her; she mostly appears in Taisho Secrets. Pillar Training was fun and all, but maybe another arc with stakes in it that occurs closer to home and brings out some different sides of the Pillars in Tanjirou’s presence, instead of each of them getting one dance each with our protagonist. That would had been a chance to show Shinobu and Mitsuri’s friendship, in which case, we would had really, really wanted to see Mitsuri’s reaction. But, Mitsuri had a job to do in the very, very, very heavy tension and battles that ran in weekly magazines for months on end. She carried the very heavy weight of needing to provide brevity. Her silliness contrasted against all that tension was fresh air for readers who had been holding their breath (no pun intended! kinda) through so much. And man, our reliance on her for that made it hurt all the more when things suddenly got very serious for her. But, that means she was also unable to play a heavy emotional role too early on. There wasn’t room to give her a satisfyingly emotional reaction to Shinobu or Tokitou; when after all, this is the girl who was fretting about dearly beloved Oyakata-sama, was horrified to see the explosion, angirly attacked Muzan, but was saved from certain doom almost immediately after she was taken by surprise in the Infinity Fortress, and then she’s BACK TO 100% FANGIRL MODE. Like, giiiiiiiiiirl, Oyakata-sama just diiiiiiied, tone it down a notch. I feel like I had more to say. OH YEAH. WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?: To fanfic, duh. Going back to reaction and action and producing something with sellable pacing, again, I wouldn’t risk bogging down the tension-heavy final arc with too much open sadness (less is more definitely applies when the reaction scenes were often SO GOOD), but it clearly set up the desire for it. And, the length and intensity with which a work of fiction can live rent-free in audiences’ minds is a measure of its success. If we MUST turn to fanfiction to get that emotional closure (or force the Pillars to get theirs), then this is proof of a job well done in making us care. Herein lies the freedom with fanfiction: It doesn’t have to be good. It doesn’t have to sell. It doesn’t have to fit a regular serialized format. Fanfic is whatever it wants, all it has to do is indulgently scratch an itch. I have way more stomach for sappiness in fanfic than in original canon, because I have higher expectations of canon to honor writing conventions, and to make decisions that will serve the overall story, not necessarily cater to my tastes. But fanfic? Fanfic, you are here to serve me. Dive into those characters’ dry eyes with a jackhammer and gives me their tears. I don’t care how much you have to fry their brains to do it, give it to me. I mean, I don’t write fanfic like that, noooo. At least, not that I post publicly. Ssh. No one needs to know aaaaaall my particular canon itches I wish to have picked raw. But all the more power to people who DO post that publicly and provide a great service to all the other people with that same need. But, in the spirit of writing fic that tries to honor the spirit of canon, I try to sprinkle the juicy emotional potential canon could have had around as needed, to draw out what I feel canon just didn’t have the opportunity to give us. It’s ultimately self-servicing for what I wish canon would had done, but my style of published fic does try to stay widely appealing as a gen fic. Everybody’s got their own balances and tastes, and that’s cool. And that is freedom canon authors don’t have. I’ll conclude by saying that, although we as readers collectively earned it, the ending of Kimetsu no Yaiba was too bright and happy and specifically chose bittersweet moments that would be easy to swallow (pretty smart for a quick ending), but entirely skipped all the really heavy stuff in the immediate aftermath.

And yes, as difficult (and even dull) as it would be to slog through, there’s a part of me that wants to see all that, for the sake of closure.

And now I sleep byyyyezzzzzzzzz

#KnY fandom theories and meta #KnY Spoilers #tw death #KnY nerdery #kimetsu no yaiba #demon slayer

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klixxy · 3 years

Text

weekly fic recs

(ft. my bookmark comments - mostly mha and voltron)

boku no hero academia:

what is right and what is easy - theroyalsavage

(bnha; tododeku; fluff + angst; 2k words; oneshot)

Midoriya Izuku is not chosen to represent Hogwarts in the Triwizard Tournament. He does not slay a dragon, or rescue innocents, or brave a maze of dark magic. He does not win accolades, or fame, or glory.

Instead, Izuku meets the son of the greatest dark wizard of the age, a Durmstrang student with hair like a sunrise and eyes like a war. And maybe, he just might win something else.

If I'm Being Honest.... by I_dont_know_man

(bnha; tododeku; fluff + crack/humor; 26k words; oneshot; truth quirk)

Midoriya scrunched up his nose in confusion. “Uh, Shouto, why are you glaring at me like that?”

“I-” Todoroki began to lie, until nausea slammed him like a door to any room that Bakugou entered. “I--” Todoroki grit his teeth, and glared daggers into the wall behind Midoriya. Goodbye, friendship. It had been absolutely divine while it lasted. “Because you’re very attractive.”

They say honesty is the best policy, but it sure as hell had a knack for Todoroki making a complete and utter fool of himself.

Or: In which Todoroki is placed under a mysterious truth-telling quirk and suffers, Uraraka laughs at him, Midoriya is confused but smitten nonetheless, and Twitter is the thirstiest site on the planet.

paint on our lips (paint on those fingertips) by spicanao

(bnha; tododeku; angst + magical realism; 11k words; oneshot; gallery au)

Galleries are wonderful places. The works seem so vibrant, so beautiful, so alive.

Until they're actually alive.

(Ib AU)

[my bookmarks: holy shit this is beautiful in an odd, poignant, dream-like way]

Todoroki Shouto’s Amateur Guide to Not Fucking Up The Timeline by Anubis_2701

(bnha; tododeku; crack/humor; 13k words; oneshot; time travel; future fic)

All that Todoroki had wanted was milk. Nothing drastic, nothing dramatic, just milk.

Unfortunately, in his quest to get milk, he ended up running into one of the saltiest, most impulsive people this side of the globe. Who also just so happened to have a volatile time-travel quirk.

So yeah, he was fucked. Just slightly. Being punted randomly through time wasn't exactly how he'd wanted to spend his Saturday morning. At least the younger versions of his friends are cute.

awake and (un)afraid, asleep or- by driedupwishes

(bnha; tododeku; fluff + angst + The Feels; 54k words; oneshot; social media/future fic)

“You,” Shoto says, picking his head up from where his screen is filled with The Worst Photograph Ever, curtesy of Shinsou, Jiro, Kaminari, his brother, and nearly everyone they know. “You are so dead to me.”

Kirishima blinks, mouth half open while Izuku mutters oh god, it’s too late, isn’t it on the other end of the phone, before Kirishima is leaning into his space to see his screen.

“Oh,” he says, in response to the photo someone in the crowd of civilians watching the fight had taken of them. “Oh, that’s-” he cuts himself off for a minute, leaning back to eye Shoto’s face while on the other side of the phone Izuku smothers what is probably a laugh, and then changes tracks.

“It’s super manly to love and support your friends,” Kirishima tells Shoto haughtily, as if this whole thing isn't his fault in the first place.

or: Kirishima and Shoto accidentally start trending on Twitter and in retaliation Shoto decides to make an Instagram to showcase all his Hero Deku merchandise, so that everyone knows how much he loves his boyfriend Izuku, and no one expects how quickly it will all spiral out from there

[my bookmarks: broke my heart. i teared up multiple times and even now I'm barely holding back tears.

pure beauty. pulls an incredible amount of emotion from the descriptive language and conveys the love and loneliness and that pulsing ache so well that i thought that my chest would cave in from the force of all the fucking feelings in it. this entire fic was a perfect, awe-inspiring package of fluff, beautiful shoto and class 1a interaction, heartfelt long distance tododeku feels, and almost every single paragraph had my heart fucking squeezing so hard in my chest that i could barely breathe.

i am in awe.]

Hooliganisms by aphrodaisyacs

(bnha; gen/todofam; crack/humor; 17k words; series; social media)

In which an anonymous artist’s street art of Bald Endeavor goes viral, causing a chain of coincidental events and ironic situations to ripple through the lives of everyone- heroes, villains and civilians alike.

[my bookmarks: i'm crying so much from laughter]

Part 1: Where it all begins- the origins of the street artist known as the "Bald Hooligan" and their rise to infamy

Part 2: The spin-off focusing on the unlikely trio whose friendship was borne from the events of Part 1

Daydreaming by AnonymousTwit

(bnha; gen/todobakudeku; angst; 7k words; oneshot; todoroki-centric)

If he'd been more careful, then they'd be fine. If he'd been paying attention, then he wouldn't be alone right now.

But he wasn't and he hadn't, so it's just him, now. It's him, his thoughts, and the unconscious bodies of two of his closest friends as he waits for someone to reach them.

Whether they be friendly or not.

Author has writer's block and coughed up some Todoroki angst in retaliation.

A Study in Firsts by Oceanbreeze7

(bnha; gen; angst + fluff + humor; 76k words; ongoing; class 1a-centric)

There’s a first time for everything.

The first time everyone crammed in Momo’s room to study, a mess of limbs and books on her bed.

The first time Mina burned crepes so badly the smoke alarm went off.

The first time a jumpscare got Sero so badly, he flipped off the back of the couch.

The first time Uraraka fell asleep at the table and accidentally sent it floating.

The first time someone realized Todoroki walked far too quietly, and far too cautiously around the dorms to be normal.

The first time Midoriya broke his toe on a door frame and kept walking through it.

The first time Kirishima woke up screaming through the walls.

The first time Tsuyu blanched at the sight of a needle.

The first time Bakugo dropped, clutching the back of his neck with eyes scarily vacant and detonating everything around him until Aizawa had to intervene.

It wasn’t always pretty, but the dorms were filled with firsts.

Responsibility by deafmic

(bnha; gen; angst + hurt/comfort; 94k words; series (complete); todoroki-centric; dadzawa + papamic)

“I told you outside,” Aizawa chooses his words carefully, reiterating the same point he’s made before. “My responsibility for you doesn’t end at the classroom. Every part of your life is partially my responsibility. Your father doesn’t scare or intimidate me. If you need help, I can get it for you, but you and I both know that you need to ask for it first.”

Aizawa organizes a way for the students to go home for the holidays. Todoroki Shouto, however, gets left behind by his father. Aizawa, annoyed at Endeavor, takes Shouto under his care for the night, and is joined by a certain Yamada Hizashi.

[my bookmarks: *unholy screaming sobbing noises*

an incredible and emotional journey from start to finish.]

the drip of melting ice by walking_through_autumn

(bnha; gen/platonic shintodo; angst + fluff; 19k words; oneshot; todoroki/shinsou-centric ft. dadzawa)

Aizawa found out within a day. It was quite likely due to the dish Todoroki had washed and left to dry in the shared kitchen after the kitten had been fed off it. Hitoshi was forced to reflect that it wasn’t any good hiding the litter and cat food in their wardrobes if Todoroki was going to make a fundamental mistake like that.

Aizawa stood in his door frame and raised an eyebrow. “Well? Where is the cat?”

Hitoshi gave his most disarming smile. “What cat?”

Todoroki chose that moment to exit his room, eyes on his phone, other hand holding a cat toy. He bumped into Aizawa and looked up slowly, like in a horror movie.

“...oh,” Todoroki said. Aizawa raised the other eyebrow. Hitoshi rubbed a hand down his face.

Herbal tea, weekly floor gatherings, spoiled surprises, movie marathons, shared custody over a cat, rain and ice and blankets and plushies, and the journey of falling into a friendship.

(Or: Hitoshi moves into the 2A dormitory at the beginning of his second year, learns who his neighbour is, and makes the friends he had declared he isn't there to have within the space of a semester.)

Hand in Hand in Hand by kngsbrg (Citlalcoatl)

(bnha; todobakudeku; fluff + strangers to lovers; 10k words; oneshot; tea au)

Boiling the water, choosing the right temperature for the right kind of tea, using quality leaves, scooping the precise amount, and letting it steep for just the perfect time...

All that and more is needed to make a delicious cup of tea.

A business that Shouto was quite knowledgeable about.

Spring begins and brings with it the hint of new fresh air, buds waiting to blossom, and just a bit of change.

[my bookmarks: featuring: oblivious teamaker shoto and pining firemen baku and izu]

even if i die (it's you) by monomoon

(bnha; todobaku; fluff + angst + strangers to lovers; 75k words; complete; paramedic au)

Or; where Todoroki never went to UA and, in rejection of his father's ambitions, became a paramedic; and where pro hero Bakugou Katsuki is just a little bit too intrigued with the heterochromatic man who always glares daggers at him whenever he sees him.

When Bakugou was suddenly and abruptly met with two cold, heterochromatic eyes glaring daggers right back at him, he had two immediate thoughts:

"Why does he look like he's plotting my assassination?"

and

"Why the fuck are his eyes so pretty?"

[my bookmarks: UGH THIS IS JUST FUCKING PHENOMENAL- GORGEOUS LOVELY INCREDIBLE HEARTSTOPPING HEARTBREAKING BEAUTIFUL RIDICULOUSLY GOOD POIGNANT I AM RUNNING OUT OF ADJECTIVES BUT IT'S GREAT TRUST ME AKDHJSFNW]

This Is Now by colormesherlocked

(bnha; gen; angst + hurt/comfort + fluff; 193k words; series (ongoing); todoroki-centric)

Todoroki Shoto will be a hero.

...But not just yet. Right now, Todoroki Shoto is a bitter, pessimistic, hurt teenager who doesn't want help, friends or hinderances of any kind getting in the way of his misguided goals.

Thankfully, there will soon be people in his life who will be more than happy to drag him into a place of happiness, safety, and acceptance - kicking and screaming the whole way, if they have to. All he has to do is survive his first meeting with them and all the incredible changes that will come after.

This is Todoroki Shoto's Hero Academia.

(Semi-canon compliant up to a point and told from Todoroki Shoto's POV.)

the league of anti-villains by aizawa_wears_crocs (avenris), avenris

(bnha; gen; angst + fluff + humor; 35k words; ongoing; todobakushinmono-centric)

When he's secretly tasked to find the UA traitor, Todoroki isn't expecting help. He's especially not expecting it from the three other first year students perceived as villainous in their own ways. Unfortunately for him, Shinsou, Monoma and Bakugou have all got something to prove, and his solo mission turns into a team effort that rapidly spirals far beyond what they were expecting to find - but hey, they're in too deep now.

Or: in which the gang solves the mystery of the traitor feat. todoroki family shenanigans, copious amounts of dadzawa, backstory for my favorite 1-B gremlin, and good old-fashioned illegal vigilantism.

such eloquent graffiti by firelilyblooms

(bnha; todobaku; angst + hurt/comfort; 9k words; oneshot; todoroki-centric; future fic)

Todoroki Shouto is sitting cross-legged at his coffee table, hunched over a bowl of instant ramen, when he finds out along with the rest of the world that the Flame Hero, Endeavor, is dead.

Or, Shouto's guide to dealing with death.

[my bookmarks: i am in ✨pain✨:)]

Tell-All by HopeNight

(bnha; todofam; angst; 4k words; oneshot; todofam/natsuo-centric)

When Natsuo is twenty-years-old, he publishes a tell-all book on his father and growing up in his house. This starts a domino effect, of course. With the book comes an investigation and sets the groundwork for the Hawks scandal in several years’ time that will see the disbandment of the Heroic Public Safety Commission and the ascension of pro hero Deku to the Number One slot. This will also lead to a decades long chain of change and progress with Deku wielding his influence and charisma like a sword and shield to make society and the world a little better than when he found it.

In essence, you can say, that Todoroki Natsuo is the true hero of this story with his fake quirk and an anger burning in his gut. Just one small book and suddenly…everything changes. The future is brighter for its existence. The curtains are thrown back and the light begins its work to disinfect and cleanse.

When Todoroki Shouto is in his second year of UA, his brother, Natsuo, publishes a tell-all book of essays about growing up in Endeavor's house.

This is Natsuo's story about how he really changed the path of things.

like an open wound by filzmonster

(bnha; gen; angst + hurt/comfort; 5k words; oneshot; todoroki-centric; manga spoilers)

It's a Sunday and Shouto is making gyoza in the dorm kitchen - or: It's a Sunday and Todoroki has an existential crisis over food.

[my bookmarks: oh my GODDDDDDDDD

*screeches while crying**is a blubbering mess*]

Shouto Todoroki and His Stuffed Eeyore (And Also Childhood Trauma) by ThatSpicySeaFlapFlap

(bnha; gen; angst + MORE ANGST; 42k words; complete; todoroki-centric)

Aizawa looked him in the eye, placed a gentle hand around his bicep (not like Endeavor, his father had only ever touched him with the intention to burn) and asked, “Are you okay?”

People don’t usually ask him things. They like to tell him things, like where to sit or what to wear or how to talk or how to be a hero or how to be himself.

‘Am I okay?’ He thought. He realized he doesn’t ask himself things, either.

Shouto didn’t have an answer to Aizawa’s question, so instead he said:

“A very long time ago, my mother did something....highly upsetting.” The boy was tracing the outline of his scar, his calloused finger stopping and jumping around the bumps and ridges of the burnt skin. “Something today reminded me of that.”

“Do you want to talk about it?” His teacher asked.

“No.”

“Okay. I’m here when you do. I’m always here, kid.” Shouto only responded with a sob. He felt as if he’d earned that right after all the emotional labor he had been put through tonight.

days by chibistarlyte

(bnha; todobaku; angst + hurt/comfort; 19k words; series (complete); todoroki-centric)

Most days, Shouto is fine.

But some days...

Some days, Shouto falls apart.

Location Sent by sunflowerstorm

(bnha; gen; angst + hurt/comfort; 15k words; oneshot; todoroki-centric; third year 1a)

In their first year at UA Midoriya sent his location to the class 1-A group chat during the Hosu incident because he didn't have time to do anything else before rushing to Iida's aid.

Now in their second year, Todoroki sends his location to the group chat at 6:30am on a Saturday morning after going home for the weekend. Midoriya knows immediately that something is very wrong and takes off, Bakugo hot on his heels.

-----

"They’d known each other long enough to be able to communicate practically wordlessly. The quiet rage on Midoriya's face was extremely telling, this was bad. Bakugo braced himself as Midoriya shuffled to the side to show where his hands were hovering over what was most certainly a burn and a serious one at that. Todoroki’s own fire didn’t burn him but they all knew that didn’t make him fire proof. Bakugo could do the math."

Faith by phinnium

(bnha; gen; angst + hurt/comfort; 7k words; oneshot; todoroki-centric; manga spoilers)

"You wanted to open a case?"

Aizawa frowned, "uh, yeah. Someone showed you Dabi's video, didn't they? And I don't doubt Todoroki himself has told you bits and pieces."

Izuku did not expect this to be how the conversation went.

"Yeah. But Todoroki isn't being hurt now. He's fine. Endeavour's changed."

Or: Midoriya trusts the Hero Commission far more than he should, especially given the situation at hand. Todoroki isn't available to explain what's what, so Aizawa and Bakugou do it instead.

(Written after the release of issue 293 of the manga, and in the aftermath of the current arc. Spoilers ahead.)

Incendiary by macrauchenia

(bnha; gen; angst + hurt/comfort; 17k words; ongoing (hiatus?); todoroki-centric)

"You're going to die, little Todoroki. And if you don't, your classmates will instead."

A training exercise backfires when Izuku and Todoroki become tangled in an escaped villain's vendetta against Endeavor. Alone in a perilous situation due to the villain's barrier quirk, Todoroki must take desperate and creative measures to save his classmates.

[Class 1-A Teamwork/Bonding]

Parallax by petrichor (findingkairos)

(bnha; gen; angst + hurt/comfort + fluff; 64k words; ongoing; todoroki-centric)

Todoroki Shouto has memories that he didn't make on his own, motor skills that his brain doesn't know how to parse, and a love of science and mathematics and physics that means he broke down his Quirk into its most intricate, universe-bending components at the age of seven.

In one universe, he wants to become a hero. In this one, even though he doesn't want to, he might have to.

(Featuring: a rapidly developing Shoutosquad, Quirk science, headcanons of all flavors, healthy and supportive sibling and sibling-like relationships, and Dadzawa.)

[notes: one of my current favorite fics that i’m eagerly following for the next update. :D]

Caturdays by staqua (aka my fav todobaku author)

(bnha; todobaku; fluff + angst + enemies to lovers; 10k words; oneshot)

"Hmm... It's lunchtime now isn't it? You should have lunch with him."

"With Bakugou?" He blanched. "I think he would refuse and then murder me."

Rei chuckled softly as if death was a joke and held his hand tenderly. "If he's in the hospital, someone he cares about must not be well. I think anyone going through that should have a nice meal with good company."

"You overestimate me," Shouto pointed out and she gave another laugh.

OR: Shouto's usual Saturdays included visits to his mother and the cat cafe; he wasn't expecting Bakugou to get thrown in the mix.

voltron: legendary defender:

*hacks twitter in space* by Zakyuu

(vld x marvel; gen/klance; crack/humor + fluff; 17k words; social media au; ongoing)

the voltron paladins arent as popular as the avengers, obviously — in fact, no one even knows they exist. but they still radiate the same kind of dumb gay energy like the rest of the world.

or: pidge somehow manages to connect voltron's communicators onto earth and virtually nothing is the same. voltron also collectively makes everyone lose their marbles while they play hot potato with the fact that theyre in a ten thousand year war with the galra.

the fear of falling by amillionsmiles

(vld; gen; angst + fluff; character study; 3k words; oneshot; keith-centric)

Keith can pull off a downward spiral. It's the kind of maneuver he does in his sleep.

[my bookmarks: stunning. beautiful. breathtaking. poignant.]

Recoil/Release by Cheshyr

(vld; gen; angst + hurt/comfort; 22k words; oneshot; keith-centric)

When Keith is bitten by an alien creature with venom that causes your dominant emotions to be amplified, the team is ready for a day of dealing with an incredibly angry paladin.

Which means they're not ready at all for what actually happens.

hound by story_monger

(vld; gen; angst + hurt/comfort; 47k words; oneshot; keith-centric)

Keith has a lot of practice being alone; you might almost say he's good at it. When he finds himself seriously injured and stranded on an unknown planet, he knows he's not alone there. And here's the worst part: even after rescue and after things return to normal, Keith gets the distinct sense that whatever was on that planet has followed him. He doesn't have proof. But he knows it's there. He knows it's not going to stop until it gets what it wants.

Keith's 'Physical Contact' Initiation Program by alisayamin (sh_04e)

(vld; gen; fluff+ angst + hurt/comfort; 26k words; oneshot; keith-centric)

Keith didn’t move and neither did Pidge. It was a little awkward until Keith finally said, “Maybe we could officially officiate this..?”

“What do you mean?”

“Fist me.”

Pidge recoiled and sputtered, “Keith, what the f-” She was cut off by Shiro’s bellowing laughter from the observatory deck.

With his straight face unchanged, Keith lowered his left hand with the stopwatch and lifted his right hand, fisted.

Pidge actually sighed with so much relief, “OH. You mean fistbump! Right.” She slapped her forehead to remove the very very wrong image her imagination drew for her, “Holy shit, Keith, we need to work on that but yeah sure, I’d be honoured to officiate your physical contact program whatever.”

That one time Coran realized Keith was too distant and decided to make him undergo the 'Physical Contact' Initiation Program which then led to --> 5 times the paladins realized Keith was an actual cat.

The Red String by Le_Tournesol

(vld; gen/klance; angst + fluff; 19k words; series (ongoing); keith-centric; pre-voltron au)

Lance and Keith keep coming across one another at different points in their lives.

[my bookmarks: this is so sad and sweet and lovely]

All that is gold does not glitter by Rangergirl3

(vld; gen; angst + fluff + hurt/comfort; 28k words; complete; keith-centric)

Keith isn't what most would call a 'people' person, but that doesn't stop him from caring about his team.

aka

Five Times the other Paladins learned something about Keith, and the One Time he learned something about them.

[my bookmarks: fuck. just- fuck.]

Miscommunication Celebration by SleepySsnail

(vld; gen; fluff + hurt/comfort; 4k words; oneshot; keith-centric; birthday fic)

Keith was never too focused on his birthday, but when it rolls around he hopes his team remembers it. When Keith's birthday is full of quality time and fun, he doesn't even question why his friends haven't said "happy birthday" to him.

Or: Where Keith thinks everyone is celebrating his birthday when they really forgot about it.

Keithtober 2019 Day 23: Birthday

avatar: the last airbender:

Change of Address by hearmerory

(atla; gen/zukka; ANGST + fluff + hurt/comfort; 89k words; series (ongoing); zuko-centric; modern au)

A collection of instances in a modern AU of Zuko's shitty childhood, featuring Ozai's dislike of his son's autism and sexuality.

[my bookmarks: FUCK F U C K WHAT THE ACTUAL F U C K.

I CAN'T WITH THIS ANYMORE.]

92 notes · View notes

internalsealpanic · 4 years

Text

Lover, Tell Me, if You’re Able

Summary: You trek down to the underworld to save a certain Robin using your admittedly limited knowledge of Greek Mythology. Nothing a little moxie can’t fix right?

a/n: I’ve been wanting to do an Orpheus Eurydice thing with Jason for a while now. I’m pretty sure this has been done but I really wanted to take a stab at it.

listen to this song while reading: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zP47npl3rHo

warnings: angst, slight body horror, unhealthy grieving, bad decisions, and kind of an eating disorder caused by unhealthy grieving. There is some tooth rotting fluff though.

word count: 5,049

You snorted in your usual short, breathy laugh—which according to certain asshats sounded less like a laugh and more like the death rattle of a hyena —as you nearly tripped over what felt like the fiftieth rock in the past half hour. You cursed quietly wrapping your shaking arms around yourself letting your unkempt fingernails dig into your thoroughly abused coat which probably had a few unwanted holes by now. It wasn’t even that cold nor was it even remotely scary. You know, aside form the ghostly moaning bouncing off the walls but that was par for the course in Gotham subways. No big deal.

After what felt like the seventieth rock, you swore. You swore loud and vicious and cutting. You swore to capital ‘G’ god that when you found Jason Peter Todd you were gonna curb stomp his ass into next week. This is his fault for being stupid enough to- to-

Just like that, your anger and frustration plummeted into grief.

Your mind fell back to the funeral,

For the first since you entered the dark tunnel a few hours ago—a few days ago?—, you could feel the cavernous walls threatening to close in on you as you took another shaky step.

To all the ‘I’m sorrys’ and condolences,

You could feel your rib cage fall open. Each gentle pat on, gentle look, and hushed whispers scooping out your insides leaving a vast empty cavity save for a heart that ached too much to beat properly and a pair of lungs clogged with too tar to breathe. The expanse of your chest feeling too full and too hollow at once.

To all the ‘he died too young’ crap,

No shit!

No friggin shit!

He was 16. He was six-fucking-teen. He just got his fucking driver’s license.

You wanted to scream but the words lingered in your bones. Instead, the nestled and furled into a mantra and worked their way up to your throat, burning. As if folding and creasing them into a perfect, proper eulogy of hand-picked words would bring him back.

You knew it wouldn’t. You weren’t foolish. You weren’t that hopeful. You weren’t even disgustingly hopeful. You were Alley born. You were practical and brutally realistic. You were also not dumb. As much as people in Gotham Academy seem to believe, you weren’t stupid. You knew there was no ending to his story that involved a long peaceful life. He was also a child of the Alley, born of Gotham’s gutter, there was no way he would not die young.

Your tongue felt heavy like a tombstone being set into place.

And to all the ‘he’s in a better place now’

HA!

The words set your grief a flame burning it into the kind of white anger that consumes even those around you.

Fucking hilarious.

Just fanfuckingtastic.

You’d see about that.

You took a long sobering breath holding it in afraid that if you breathed out the anger would seep out leaving you with nothing but grief.

After what felt like an eternity, you breathed out sure that all the anger, all the irritation, and all the sputtering hope had settled in your bones.

You were going to get him back.

You will.

——————————————————————————————————————————

Jason tapped the edge of your science textbook with his pencil morse coding something and clearly demanding your attention. You rolled your eyes, moved your textbook an inch closer to you, and continued reading through the passage electing to ignore your likely scowling best friend.

He tapped again. You didn’t look up sure that he’d go away if you pretended his existence was an elaborate hoax. This ingenious strategy is probably why you two have been glued together for the last 10 years.

Losing patience, he snatched up your textbook earning a petulant, half-hearted glare from you. “What the fuck do you want, Jay?”

“Do you remember the Myth of Orpheus and Eurydice?”

You blinked at him, honestly confused.

He gave you a questioning look. He could probably see the gears turning in your head.

You’d heard the names before but you were struggling to associate them with anything. Until it clicked.

“Oh yeah, Hadestown the dude with the guitar-”

“Lyre,”

You made an affronted noise which made him roll his eyes at you but you could see the slight twitch in his lips at your antics. You would count that as a win.

“He plays the lyre, you uncultured swine. Did you even read the packet?” He asked lightly tapping your head with your textbook.

“Your posh bitch is showing,” you snorted. he tapped your head just a tinsy bit harder with the textbook. You scowled at him. He gave you a gentle reassuring smile which roughly translated to ‘it was an accident I swear’. “Uh sure. Yeah. Course, I read the packet” you lied reaching over for your textbook which he sets down on the table behind him.

“Are you even literate?” He joked.

“Last time I checked I needed that to forge doctor’s notes for rich snots,” Jason wrinkled his nose trying his level best to scowl at you but from the crow's feet forming at the corners of his eyes the laughter bubbling in his chest was clearly winning out. You knew he was just worried about the unnecessary risk you were taking but it was a bad habit from the Alley days you couldn’t shake. It wasn’t like you were likely to get caught.

“The In Class Essay is next period, dip shit” he sneered as harshly as he could. He was so bad at being a hard ass that you just smiled. “Yet here you are talking to me and depriving me of my education,” you snarked, gesturing vaguely to your book.

You could technically get up and get it yourself but you were too lazy and you were pretty sure Jason wasn’t gonna let you get the book that easily. “Sides, it’s English who cares?” At that, Jason wrinkled his nose in disgust. “How am I friends with you again?”

You hummed, leaning back in your chair, tilting your head back dramatically before flinging yourself over the table to snatch up the textbook from the table behind him. You were a good amount taller than Jason which really wasn’t something to be too proud of. The bar wasn’t too fucking high.

You plopped back down to your chair grinning ear to ear victoriously immensely enjoying his shocked look. Then he looked like he was about to deck you.

“Well for starters, I’ve saved your ass from getting shanked about 15 times now. That’s just counting instances out of uniform,” He looked at you affronted. You simply rolled your shoulders. “Plus,” You reached into your blazer pocket and produced a beat-up looking tootsie pop ring.”You’re the one who proposed,”

Jason turned a luminescent shade of red as if you had just pulled out his entire cash of porn which you’ve done. “Why do you still have that?! How?”

“Because you still haven’t given me a proper one,” you said smugly tilting your head to the side inviting him for a rebuttal. He sighed exasperated. Resting his chin on his hand, palm covering half of his face, he glared at the opposite wall making damned sure that he didn’t look your way. The flush in his ears peaked through his cropped curls. It was hard to catch but your nosy ass definitely heard him mumble “I’m saving up,”.

Your face broke into a stupidly wide smile, a warm feeling bubbling up in you. “I’ll hold you to that, lover,” you cooed cheerfully, giving him a quick peck on the nose as the bell rang. You could see the mortification attack his entire being in waves.

——————————————————————————————————————————-

Stumbling out of the tunnel, you find yourself in a fray of souls all crowding towards the shore. You keep your head down and shuffle in step with the dead.

‘The dead hate the living’ Constantine warned as he handed you the drachma and a beat-up old map. You handed him a wad of cash. He didn’t seem to care that money was dirty.

You keep your expression carefully blank and focus on your feet but the sheer anxiety crawling up your spine rattling every vertebra was making that very difficult. You swallowed thickly trying to think of anything else but the depressing moans and absolutely haunted expressions were also making your life difficult. Instead, you focus on your award-winning bullshit speech that was surely going to win over the lord and lady of the underworld. Ok, sure, you weren’t half the thief Jason was nor were you even half as smart. But you were definitely the better conman. You might have had absolutely no interest in English class but words have always been your friend. You could definitely spin it with the best of them. It helped that all the rough edges that came with being an Alley kid tucked themselves neatly away behind trustworthy eyes and easy smiles. Even gods could be taken for a ride, right?

Somehow you made it to the shore without incident and even got yourself on the boat without even as much as a glance from the ferryman. That was a little unnerving but you weren’t about to complain. Not when it brought you a step closer to your goal. It might have been partially due to your unkempt appearance. Long nails, dead fish eyes, ratty coat, sallow cheeks, and dimming complexion all thanks to this wonderful diet called ‘grieving over your dumbass boyfriend/best friend because he decided to be a dramatic bitch and die an untimely death’. Part of you wonders if you simply want to bring him back so you could murder him. Maybe. Looking around at the haunted looks on your fellow passengers move that to a probably.

Uncomfortable, you jam your hands into your coat pockets. One hand dug deep into the recesses of the pocket where the little ring was safely squirreled away. You fidgeted with it passing it from finger to finger like the coin trick you’d learned a while back.

——————————————————————————————————————————

“Marry me,” Jason demanded unsurely, kneeling on one knee clasping your hand with both of his tiny ones. His little face ironed into something serious but cheeks flushed making them, what the girls called, pinchable but even at age 6, you were able to resist if simply for the fact that you were dumbstruck by the fact that your best friend and crush was suddenly at your doorstep in the middle of the day and clasping your hand.

“What?” You asked tugging your hand away but he didn’t let go. He absolutely refused to.

“Marry me,” he insisted. “I’m proposing,” he added shyly seeing how the confused furrow in your brow did not disappear. “Lena said it was a good idea,” he added quietly.

A round of hoots and hollers exploded behind you including Lena who was laughing her ass off. Even Carol and Lassie who were busy doing their makeup were snickering and giving you a thumbs up respectively. Your face burned hot and you scowled at all of them which just made them laugh louder. You snapped your attention back to Jason who looked at you with bright earnest blue eyes. Fuck. You crossed your arms trying to look intimidating and failing miserably because of just how goddamned cute he looked. Manipulative bastard.

“Don’t you need a ring for that, bud?” you challenged.

“Oh yeah,” He scrambled digging through his various pockets before producing a tootsie pop ring. Your hackles rose. What the hell Lena?

“Look at the size of that rock!” Josaline hollered from behind you. You could see the teasing smile on her face. You wanted to shrink. You wanted to maul them. You also wanted to burst because your crush likes you. You had a tiny, itsy bitsy crush on Jason for a while now. You’ve always declared that it was small but that didn’t stop the girls from teasing you relentlessly and this was just a nail in the coffin. You wanted to scream at Jason but the way he looked at you made your little heart flutter.

“Fine,”

He grinned wide. “Great! We can share rent,” he said his earnest smile turning cheeky. You swore some of the girls were choking from laughter. That was the moment you decided to make Jason Todd’s life miserable.

——————————————————————————————————————————-

As it turns out, traversing the underworld wasn’t that hard.

Nope. It wasn’t any harder than going around crime alley. At least here, you weren’t too worried about getting shot.

Nope.

It was just incredibly. Fucking. Depressing.

The atmosphere was suffocating and the only thing you’ve heard for hours were people listing their regrets when they weren’t too busy sobbing. Given they have every right to be this way. They did die after all. But Christ! You being able to understand it didn’t mean you could stand it.

Jason owed you big time.

Jason owed you the largest bowl of ice cream complete with 20 different flavors of your choosing, a mountain of whipped cream, a shovel full of sprinkles, and an ungodly amount of chocolate syrup.

And a hug. A long ass, bone crushing hug.

Yeah, you’re definitely demanding a hug. You don’t care if his pansy ass tries to break for it. You were getting the hug.

Once this was done-

You turned the thought over in your head pointedly ignoring the fat droplets of tears now streaking your face. You weren’t entirely sure whether they were from relief or unrelenting anxiety. If you succeed, your 8 months of hell would have been worth it.

But what if I fail?

What happens when I fail?

The thought seized your breath, your lungs constricting as if their cage of bones was threatening to collapse in on itself in your effort to shrink away from the possibility. You stopped breathing completely. A bad habit you picked up from your first foster home after social services took you from your home. Apparently, they didn’t think a group of hookers could provide a safe loving environment for a kid. Assholes. Breathing meant relaxing. Relaxing meant letting your guard down. Letting your guard down led to bad things. Jason never commented on your new habit after you two reunited. After you both found yourselves at the mercy of Gotham’s streets.

“Lover tell me if you can~” You paused but not quite long enough for a response. Not like a few months ago when you’d wait catatonically for Jason to respond with the verse you’d forgotten in his oddly melodious voice. Singing was the one way you’d learned to breathe out after locking up without triggering a panic attack. Sure, it annoyed the hell out of a lot of people but who cares. You liked it. Your voice was decent. Plus, Jason loved it when you sang. Your breaths flowed easier accompanied by a melody and the smile on Jason’s face every time you sang always took your breath away.

——————————————————————————————————————————-

“ Lover, tell me if you can Who’s gonna buy the wedding bands?~” You hummed the rest of the forgotten stanza under your breath as you wrap the ‘acquired’ blanket around the both of you. Gotham winters were a bitch but you tried your best to keep your spirits up which basically meant teasing Jason to hell and back. Who knew calling him lover would annoy him so much?

Instead of the intended reaction, Jason simply continued to the next stanza sounding a lot more in tone than you. You huffed partially from amusement partially from frustration.

“Figures you would know this song,” you teased.

Jason scowled tugging more of the blanket around himself as a lame form of retaliation. You leaned in closer to him and wrapped your arms around him. He huffed not really able to stay mad at you for too long.“It’s from Hadestown. The old woman at the pawnshop always plays it when she’s working,”

“Horse shit, all she ever plays when I’m there is Madame Guillotine,” You wrinkled your nose.”She probably hates me,”

“Gee, I wonder what that’s about,” Jason smirked.

“You know, she probably has a crush on you,”

“EW! Shut up!”

“Come on we gotta milk it-”

He elbowed you.

“Fine,” you relented, rubbing your chest and letting your head lean on his. You watched the snowfall basking in what little warmth you shared.

“Promise me you’ll sing that when-”

“IF”

“When we get married,”

“Fine but ya gotta sing the entire GI Joe theme song plus the Baby Shark Song,”

“BET”

——————————————————————————————————————————-

You stood before large obsidian doors bouncing on the balls of your feet. The doors were carved elegantly with swirling patterns and sprawling carvings of flowers and bones. Dramatic but very pretty. Your stomach churned as the doors lurched open.

You were going to be sick.

Before you were a long table piled high with every kind of food you could think of. Likely you would have had to pick up your jaw and mop up a cascade of drool from the floor if not for the last few months. Your stomach threatened to implode if you kept looking. Months of not eating properly did that to you. The first few months were the worst. You were barely able to keep a bite down without your body convulsing and rejecting it. Sadness had hollowed you out and filled you with something else during those months.

Now, you shifted your gaze to focus on the tall man sitting imperiously at the other end of the table on a throne carved out of precious metal. How someone looked imperious while eating was a mystery to you. It might be the fact that he was abnormally large looking to be around 10 ft tall. His frame was broad which contrasted greatly with the regal features of his face which were set in a rather loving configuration as he stared deep into the eyes of the dark-skinned woman as she recounted what sounded like a hilarious encounter with a dryad. The woman was unnaturally pretty with sculpted features and wild curls. She looked right at home underneath the sun which made her presence here ease your fraying nerves. They smiled at each other smitten with each other’s presence which almost made you feel guilty for interrupting their moment of marital bliss.

You clear your throat as politely as you could drawing their attention and possibly their ire towards you. You took a deep breath, the kind that inflated your entire body, and forced it out through your nostrils as your mouth was busy reconfiguring itself into an easy smile.

“My Lord Hades. My Lady Persephone,” You greeted bowing your head courteously. Your gestures were less grandiose and theatrical as the ones you used on the rich punks in Gotham which they happily lapped up. No, you made sure every movement, every posture, and every word was quieter, trying your damnedest to radiate sincerity and reverence from every pore in your body. Sure, you didn’t have Jason’s easy charisma and sure, you didn’t have the power Dick had for making everyone fall in love with you instantly but you were damned if you were going to make a fool of yourself in front of two literal gods and squander your only chance at getting your boy back. Not when you’ve come so far. Not when you’ve done so much. Not when you’ve dirtied your hands this much.

Hades looked neither pleased nor displeased by your presence. Good enough. The fact that you were still intact might have something to do with the mischief in Persephone’s eyes. She looked extremely amused despite your interruption. You hoped, which you didn’t normally do, that that boded well for you.

“I am her-”

“We know,” Hades interrupts.

Your body twitched. Rude. But you schooled your features into something resembling pleasantry.

“You’re here for the boy,” He adds, waving his hand. Without time for your brain to process. Jason is there battered, bloodied, and bruised. The dazed look in his eyes made him look haunted which made your breath seize. A cocktail of anger and sadness and relief swelled in you as your body twitched forward. All you wanted to do was hold him, to stroke his hair, to sing to him, to take him to Dr.Thompkins to get his injuries sorted out, and possibly watch the old woman thwack him on the head half a dozen times. Hell, you would offer to count. Your stomach churned and you felt dizzy. This is the most alive you’ve felt in months. This is also the most fearful you’ve felt in months. You felt like you were going to fall apart and recongeal into an entirely new person.

Focus.

It was hard to do when you saw how tattered his Robin uniform looked but you managed to straighten yourself out enough in time to catch Hades as he watched you appraisingly, searching for raw desperation in your features. You tucked it away in your bones and in the deepest recesses of your chest. He seemed amused and even mildly impressed by your restraint so he dined to push further.

“What are you willing to trade for him?”

Everything.

Your mind screamed automatically. The word dangled thickly at the edge of your tongue.

You would have plucked each and every star out of the sky and fashioned them into a necklace that would adorn Lady Persephone’s neck.

You would have used Poseidon’s ocean to douse the sun.

You would have used the fires of Tartarus to set the world ablaze. It deserved it for the hand it dealt Jason.

You would do anything if it meant having Jason back in your arms.

You bit your cheek hard forcing yourself to refocus. You shifted your posture making a show of thinking if only to gather yourself. You knew the answer. It might not have been the right one and if you’re being honest, it wasn’t even a good one. You rolled your shoulders trying to mold yourself into a more sure version of yourself.

“My future,”

The room plunged into silence.

Jason who had looked like he was not all there widened his eyes and shook his head at you. You simply leveled him a smile full of cocksure and hot air. Sure, your future wasn’t worth much. People have told you as much. But it was a novel offer. It wasn’t every day that a mortal offered their fate to you and gods love nothing more than novelty.

Both gods remained silent. Hades narrowing his eyes at you and Persephone stared at you with an unreadable expression. The longer the silence wore on the more your confidence waned. The treacherous chorus in your head began to sing of the failure that has yet to happen.

Persephone let out a trill of delighted laughter and Hades shook his head in amusement, his solemn lips twitching into the beginnings of a smile. Both you and Jason stiffened.

“My love, just let them go,” Persephone pleaded sweetly cupping Hades’s face gently. It was an intimate gesture that made even you soft.

“My dear…”

“It was not the boy’s time, my love,”

Damn straight, it wasn’t!

Hades let out an exasperated sigh before looking at you again. “I will grant you both freedom if you pass my trials,”

“Anything!” The word spilled out of you too quickly, too raw. A satisfied smile wrinkled at the corners of Hades’s eyes. Fucker.

“I will have you do three trials-” He flicked his hand and Jason materialized beside you. “-with the boy’s aid,” Without an ounce of hesitation, you gathered him into your arms with all the bravado and restraint giving way too stupidly unfiltered happiness. Without meaning to, you let fat droplets of tears streak your face. Jason copped your face giving you a wry smile and wiping away the tears with his thumb.

“You look like shit,”

“So do you,”

You both laughed. You kissed his palm and took his hand from your face and kissed his knuckle. A flush crept on to Jason’s face but he couldn’t hide that any better than he could hide the loving look in his eyes when he looked into yours.

The trials were almost insultingly easy especially when you had the world’s best Robin with you. Sure, you were battered and bruised but it was nothing you could not handle. You suspected that Persephone was rooting for you. That or Hades just wanted you out of his hair. Either way, you didn’t care. There was no way you were failing.

You returned to Hades’ hall, arms full of spoils, and Jason’s hand interlaced with yours. You both try to fight off the hopeful feeling bubbling in your chest but there was no helping it when his hand was warm in yours. You smiled gratefully at Persephone who returned it in kind, looking sincerely happy for the both of you. You made a note to send her an appropriate sacrifice once you were back on the surface.

Hades inspected your spoils and hummed. Your stomach lurched. Jason squeezed your hand and kissed your nose. Persephone practically squealed at the adorable gesture while Hades just smiled at his wife’s antics.

“You have succeeded,”

“Thank you-”

“But I have one last trial for you,”

Hades holds up his hand before you could protest.

“Do you recall the deal I made with Orpheus?”

You nodded almost numbly. Jason gave you a surprised look which you returned with a scowl.

“Good. I will make the same deal with you. Does that sound fair to you?”

You both nodded frantically. You knew this would be hard especially with your frayed nerves but it was nothing you could not handle.

On the way to the tunnel, you held each other close, soaking up contact while you could. When you reached the tunnel, you hesitantly let go of his hand making sure to remember the feeling of your fingers intertwined together. He pressed kisses to every inch of your face likely feeling guilty over your haggard state. You whispered jokes and half baked promises to appease him in return as you squeezed him harder. You walked tensely up the tunnel trailed by his ever quieting footsteps. You began to hum every song you could think of including the very annoying ones which earned you a lot of annoyed grunts and critiques from your ghostly companion. You also chattered about everything you could think of. All the latest gossip. All the things you learned during your global crime spree. You may have left out the crime spree but you could deal with the fall out later. Instead, you focused on the happy things. The things you wanted to do with him once you two got out. Once, you brought him back to Gotham. Sure, Bruce was probably going to maul you for all the trouble you’ve caused the JLA but fuck them. Seriously fuck them.

After what felt like an eternity, you saw it. You saw light. Bright, crisp, and blinding. You were going to cry. You were almost there. You were almost out. Your body launched into a sprint. Your chest felt like something in it shook loose and your body was lighter than it had ever been. You were almost there. You could almost feel the sun on your skin.

You ran into the light and -

——————————————————————————————————————————-

You woke up on the damp earth.

Everything ached.

Your veins felt rusty and sluggish.

Your mind even more so.

Snow flitted down to the earth in gentle feathery flakes.

Your senses returned to you one by one.

The sound of shouting and car horns littered the periphery of your consciousness.

Your fingers felt cold and numb.

The familiar smell and taste of Gotham smog overwhelmed your senses.

That wasn’t right.

That wasn’t right at all. You were in Mani in southern Peloponnese. You were face to face with one of the Gates of Hades just a few hours ago.

You shuffled through your coat. You did not have your drachma. You did not have your map.

You snapped your head in every direction looking desperately for any sign of Jason. Not even a single footprint.

Your stomach dropped as despair took hold of you and clung to every bone in your body. Pulling yourself up unsteadily, you stood taking baby steps towards a thoroughly battered brick wall. Fishing your phone out of your pocket, your phone began dialing a number automatically.

“You have reached Wayne Manor,” Alfred’s posh voice carries over the phone.

Your breath stutters. The words claw their way out of your chest.

“Jason- Jason, he-”

Alfred remained silent. Alfred was likely shaking his head in pity. You couldn’t stand that. You could barely stand the feeling of your skin right now. Your resounding failure rippled underneath your skin making you tremble on to your knees. You could do nothing but crumple to the ground in pathetic sobs as the weight of agony and despair weighed over you.

“Jason. Jason. Jason.”

You whispered apologetically, reverently. The words would not call him back. Those words could never call him back.

—————————————————————————————————————————–

Piece by piece Jason returned to himself.

Jason woke up swallowed in darkness. It was deep and unyielding. Even his training with Batman could not alleviate the anxiety that brought.

The second thing to return was his hearing. It was deathly silent save for the pounding of his own heart and his frantic breathing.

Where was he?

The air around him tasted stale and the resolute smell of formaldehyde was inescapable.

Then the pain lanced through and all his memories came back in a splotchy kaleidoscope of fear, fire, and pain.

He was dead.

He died.

He was in Ethiopia.

He was trying to save his mom.

Oh god.

Where is Bruce?

Where is he?

Why is it so dark?

Jason tried to move his limbs but it was no use. He was boxed in.

That’s when the smell of earth hit him.

Jason pressed his hands every which way.

He was literally boxed in.

Was he in a coffin?

He tried to scream.

His mouth was wired shut.

Oh god.

He was going to die.

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The ending was a bit rushed. I might edit it later. Thank you so much for reading. Feel free to roast me in the comments.

(Note: I tried editing the ending to make it more panicky and claustrophobic. I don’t know if t worked.)

This was inspired by the fact that Jason Todd: Not-So-Outlaw by goawayolivia never answers how Jason came back.

Here is my answer. It is pure dumbassery.

taglist:

@birdy-bat-writes (enabler)

@idkmanicantenglish (sweet heart)

@batarella (Because I honestly blame you for this)

@multifandomgirl-us

@foenixphire

#jason todd x reader #jason todd imagine #Jason Todd #angst #My writing #attempts at humor #dc fanfiction #reader insert #imagine #hurt/comfort #kind of #more on hurt #have fun #batboys #batkids

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simp-for-spencer-reid · 3 years

Text

Flavor shot: Holiday Blend- Blue Christmas: Part 1

Series Masterlist

“See you in like a week?” Cate wasn’t sure if she was comforting Spencer or herself with her words. Despite only being a week and a half ago, it had felt like months since they had admitted their love for one another. The two had spent every night leading up to this morning with each other. Alternating between Spencer’s apartment and Cate’s to make sure Shrimp didn’t get too lonely on his own, though he did prefer the quietness of an empty apartment.

“Yeah, I’ll uh…” Spencer gestured to his gate at the airport. He had begun to walk towards it but turned on his heel back towards Cate. “Are you sure you don’t want me to go back to New Hampshire with you?”

“Go see your mom for the holidays!” Cate gently pushed his shoulders. “We’ll be fine! I think we can stand to spend a few days apart.” she laughed as Spencer drew her in for one last hug. At least, that’s what they had said the last few hugs. With a final quick peck on the lips, Cate stepped backward, extending a hand, barely gripping Spencer’s fingers. “Tell her I said hi and that I wish her a Merry Christmas.” Cate smiled as she finally dropped Spencer’s hand.

Their plans for the holidays were to celebrate with their respective families: Spencer was flying home to Vegas and Cate was going home to New Hampshire to see her family and she would drive back to Quantico with her car so she could have it back in DC.

Cate’s own flight was booked for the next day. She was all packed for her 3 day trip back to her roots. Marta would be checking on Shrimp, feeding him and making sure he was all set while Cate was gone. Marta was also going to be Cate’s ride to the airport.

Her flight was scheduled for noon, which would put her in New Hampshire around 2:30. And that’s where she stood right now. Standing with her carry-on and her tote bag, she looked for her dad’s pick-up truck in the terminal. Instead of a truck, she was surprised to see her older sister’s silver SUV.

“Beth!” Cate’s face broke into a huge grin as she ran to give her sister a hug. The girls embraced each other tightly.

“It has been too long!” Beth pulled back and gave a stern look to her younger sister. “You need to call more.” Cate shrugged, her face flushing.

“I know..” Beth helped Cate put her bags into the trunk of the vehicle and they scuffled into the warmth of the car. Traffic from the airport to their home was brutal. Of course, that’s only typical due to the holidays. But, it gave the girls plenty of time to catch up.

“So, how’s the big city treating you? Still working with Marta?” Beth asked, giving a quick glance to Cate from the driver’s seat.

“Yeah, it’s great there. It’s busy and it seems like everyday there’s something new.” Cate laughed. “I got a cat, too. A little orange one, his name’s Shrimp.” At the stop light, Cate showed Beth a picture of Shrimp on the couch, nestled in between two pairs of legs. Beth grabbed the phone, and zoomed into the hand that was mid-pet on Shrimp’s back.

“And who is that? Are you holding out on me, sis? You have a man and you didn’t think to say anything?” the light turned green. Beth shoved the phone back at Cate and continued driving. Cate blushed, turning to look out the window at familiar scenery.

“I did meet someone. His name’s Spencer.” Cate thought of Spencer, playing fond memories in her head.

“Am I gonna have to twist your arm to get more information?” Beth laughed, lightly punching Cate’s arm. “How long has this been going on?”

“Officially?” Cate thought back. “A few months.”

“So there’s some unofficial business in there? Let me guess, a one night stand and then friends with benefits but you caught feelings for each other?”

“No!” Cate laughed. “Not like that at all… We were just friends for a while.” Beth gave Cate a pointed look to dish more details. “We’ve known each other for a year! You do the math!” Cate swatted Beth.

“Watch it! I’m the driver! Don’t you want to live long enough to see *Spencer* again?” Beth teased. The girls opted to sing along to the radio for the remainder of the ride. Beth asked a few more questions about Marta and Cate’s apartment back in DC, which passed the time quickly.

Beth’s SUV pulled down the long driveway up to their parents’ house. Snow covered the ground and glistened in the afternoon sun. Cate grabbed her bags from the trunk, and followed Beth up the walkway to their backdoor. When the door swung open, Cate was met with the smell of vanilla and the warmth of the inside. Kicking the snow off her boots, she entered the house- filled with the sounds of laughter. Immediately, she saw her younger brother playing with their niece and nephew, Stella and Finn, but she was really looking forward to seeing her mom. Cate’s mom was found in the kitchen, baking sheets filled with cookies and dough waiting to go in. Once spotted by her mother, Cate opened her arms, which were still carrying her bags.

“Hi, Mom.” Cate’s mother bounded over, slinging a dish towel over her shoulder. Cate wrapped her arms around her mom, tucking her head over her mom’s other shoulder. “I’ve missed you.” Cate closed her eyes and she felt like she was a kid again, back in her hometown and living with her parents. Her house still smelled the same.

“Catherine.” Her mom said gently. She still looked the same to Cate: same pale skin, just a bit more wrinkled at the corners of her eyes, same dark brown hair, but with some grays starting to peek through. Her mother held her out at an arm’s length. “You look too thin, have a cookie.” Cate took a cookie from her mom with a smile. As she bit into it, Beth waltzed into the kitchen too. With an announcement.

“Cate has a boyfriend!” Beth looked smugly to Cate, while their mom looked between the two of them, before settling her gaze on Cate- who was coughing after almost choking on her cookie.

“Beth!” Cate coughed out.

“Wha-? Since when? See, this is why you need to call more!” Cate’s mother was now in interrogation mode. And make no mistake, she would get all the answers she wanted. She sternly held a finger pointed to Cate. “Who is he? And where is he?”

“I haven’t even put my bags down yet and you’re already on my case!” Cate tried to diffuse the attention on her. Leaving her mother sputtering about Cate’s love life and confronting Beth for all she knew, Cate escaped upstairs to her childhood bedroom.

It was still painted the same color green. A sheet set of stars and constellations were on her mattress, with a black comforter dressing the bed. All of her old posters still littered the walls and some frameless photographs were taped about the walls in the empty spaces. A smile was brought to Cate’s face, thinking of all the memories this room held. Cate set her bags down on the bed, and slowly walked downstairs. The ambush was partially her own fault. She should’ve kept her mother updated in her life. Cate had no good explanation for not calling her mom.

“Okay now what is this about a boyfriend?” Cate’s mother was back by the oven, her cream colored apron lightly stained from the years of use. Cate settled into a stool at the island. Beth had disappeared into the living room to watch Stella and Finn wrestle with her and Cate’s younger brother, Robby.

“You’d love him. His name is Spencer and he’s smart, kind, and he-” Cate cut herself off, “He has a good job.” She wasn’t sure if she was allowed to disclose that sort of information. Cate’s mom raised her eyebrows, interested.

“He sounds wonderful. Is he spending time with his family this Christmas Eve?”

“Yes, he’s in Vegas visiting his mom for a few days.” Cate informed her mom. She played with some flour that dusted the countertop.

“Well, you’ll have to come home sometime so we can all meet him.” Her mother smiled, placing a hand on Cate’s. Cate smiled at her mother. “Now, round up your brother and father to go get our chinese food. Wouldn’t be a Bennett Family Christmas without it.” Chinese food had been a staple for their Christmas Eve since Cate was a little girl. One year, Cate’s mother decided to try and cook a Christmas ham paired with mashed potatoes, candied yams, and homemade cranberry sauce. Well, Cate cooked just about as well as her mother, so it’s safe to say that that year, the house was full of smoke on Christmas Eve. The only thing salvageable was the cranberry sauce. Since that year, They’d always stuck to just baking cookies for Santa and ordering chinese food.

Cate slowly walked to the living room, taking her time to relish in her home. She noticed new pictures framed on the walls of her niece and nephew. There were a few new knick knacks on shelves and hallway tables. The couches in the living room had been rearranged and the old wooden television stand was gone and now the tv was mounted on the wall.

Beth was perched in the middle of the love seat, a blanket with a christmas pattern draped over her legs. Robby was kneeling on the ground- one arm outstretched and holding Finn at bay from a tickle attack and Stella was on his back, his other hand tickling her feet while she giggled uncontrollably. Cate’s father was sitting on the corner of their large couch, trying to read on his tablet, but getting distracted watching his grandchildren and his son play.

“Robby, Mom wants you and Dad to go get the food now.” Cate couldn’t keep in a chuckle.

“Nice to see you too, Catherine.” Robby said as he rose from the carpeted living room floor. Their dad looked up over his glasses at Cate.

“Hi, Dad.” Cate met him in the middle as he brought her in for a hug.

“My Catie Girl, how is the big city life?” He asked, parting from her.

“Oh, you know, busy and nothing like home.” she shrugged. Cate smiled at him. He placed a hand on her shoulder before going to retrieve his coat and some boots to get their order of food. Her brother Robby followed.

Cate knelt on the ground, opening her arms as her sister’s children each ran into an arm. Embracing them both, Cate expressed how much she missed them and how big they’ve gotten.

“Auntie Cate, I lost a tooth!” Stella bared her teeth at Cate, displaying a gap where there should have been a bottom tooth.

“I grew one!” Finn smiled largely, showing a new tooth growing bigger than the rest.

“Oh my goodness! You guys are getting too big!” Cate smiled at them. She pulled her phone from her back pocket, swiping to find a specific picture. “I got a cat! Maybe one weekend you can come visit with your mom and you can meet him in person.” Stella and Finn’s eyes lit looking at Shrimp.

“He looks so soft!” Stella cooed.

“I bet he catches all the mice!” Finn yelled.

“If there were any mice in my apartment, I bet he would.” Cate laughed.

It became tradition for the family to sit on the living room floor, gathered around the spread of takeout boxes on the coffee table as a classic christmas movie played on their television. This year, they had voted and Cate, Stella and Finn won with their pick of The Polar Express.

It was dark outside and everyone had piled their plates with fried rice, crab rangoons, teriyaki chicken and beef filled egg rolls. They shared laughs and stories of the year’s happenings with each other, catching up and making jokes like old times.

Once filled plates were now over halfway done, Stella and Finn were both slowly falling asleep on the loveseat with Beth sitting in between them. The Polar Express was still playing, Cate’s parents were nestled together on the couch. Robby was laying on his side, leaning against the loveseat. Cate had her back against the couch, a christmas blanket wrapped around her. The house was peaceful and cozy with the glow of the christmas tree and the flicker of the movie.

A knock on the door disrupted the lull in the living room. Cate’s parents looked quizzically at each other, not expecting anyone. Beth placed a protective hand on each of her children. Cate was the first to stand up, walking to answer the door. She presumed it was a neighbor, coming to wish them a happy holiday, despite how odd that would be.

Cate opened the door to a shivering Spencer, holding a large leather suitcase. A scarf wrapped multiple times around his neck and face muffled his voice.

“What are you doing here?” Cate couldn’t believe her eyes, but was happy to see the tall, long haired man. She let him into the house, closing the door behind him. “How did you figure out where I lived?” He set down his suitcase and unwrapped his scarf.

“I might have asked Garcia to track your phone for me.” his voice seemed off, but Cate would ask him about it later when her parents and siblings weren’t peering into the foyer from the archway into the living room. Cate and Spencer acknowledged them after staring at each other for a moment.

“Spencer, these are my parents.” Cate gestured to her mother and father, who were walking into the foyer.

“Bill.” Cate’s dad reached out a hand to Spencer. Spencer hesitated, but figured shaking hands would make a better first impression than a spiel about germs. Cate’s mother on the other hand, brought Spencer into a hug.

“I’m Jacqueline, but please, call me Jackie!” Cate’s mother was as short as Cate was compared to Spencer. He had to bend his back far forward in her embrace as she wrapped her arms around his shoulders. He felt comforted by her motherly mannerisms.

“Please, come in and help yourself to some takeout! Cate, take his things to the guest room and Spencer, I hope you like chinese food!” Her parents shuffled back into the living room as quick as they had nosed their way to the front door. Cate softly took Spencer’s hand and gave him a smile before starting up the stairs.

The guest room was two doors down from Cate’s room on the same side of the hallway. The only thing in between them was a bathroom. Spencer felt like he walked into a cabin; the walls were a tan color and the bedspread was a quilt. Cate sat on the bed and patted the bed beside her. Spencer placed his things down on the chair in the corner before joining her on the bed.

“I’m sorry I just showed up. I know you were spending time with your family and I was supposed to be in Vegas but I just couldn’t be alone tonight.” Spencer spilled out.

“It’s okay, you’re more than welcome to stay. I want you to stay.” She rubbed her thumb over his knuckles. “Is everything okay?” His eyes began to water, but no tears spilled out.

“I, um. My mom was having one of her bad days when I got down there. She didn’t-” his voice cracked. He closed his eyes so that he wouldn’t cry. Cate brought him in for a hug. She tried to say the right thing with her limited knowledge of the situation.

“You’re not alone, Spence. It’s hard, I’m sorry.” Cate moved her hand along his back. She fought back her own tears. Now wasn’t the time for her to cry. They held each other for a few moments and when Spencer felt confident that he wasn’t going to cry, Cate led him back down to the living room where he introduced himself to Cate’s brother and sister. He picked a bit at some of the chinese food, but he wasn’t in the mood to eat. Cate’s parents could tell something was up, but didn’t pry.

After the movie finished, Robby and Beth carried Stella and Finn up the stairs to bed. Jackie and Bill had gone upstairs to bed as well. This left Cate and Spencer downstairs in the living room. Cate was cleaning up the coffee table and Spencer helped a bit. He was the first to break the silence.

“My mom has Schizophrenia and Alzheimer’s.” Spencer said as he placed some paper plates and empty takeout boxes in the trash. Cate tried not to look at him sympathetically, but she could only imagine how hard that must be.

“Spence, I’m sorry.” Cate paused in her cleaning of the kitchen counter. She made her way over to him, taking his hand in hers. “I’m here for you.”

“She’s been fine for a while, when I write to her it’s easier because she knows it’s me, but when I was there earlier, she didn’t recognize me at first. Usually, the fog goes away after an hour, but even after I went back in the morning she didn’t know it was me. I just. I’m not ready for her to forget me yet.” His voice trailed off to only a whisper. Cate squeezed his hand.

“You’ll never be ready for that, Spencer. You’re doing the best you can for her and that’s what matters.” Cate tried to comfort him, but knew that there was nothing she could say that would make things better.

Once the rest of the cleaning was finished, Cate led Spencer up the stairs to his room again. She gave him a mini tour quietly as she whispered who was behind each closed door and where the bathrooms were if the one in between their room was occupied. She left Spencer in the guestroom to get changed and acclimated while she went back to her room to change into some sleep shorts and a bigger shirt.

When she got back, Spencer was sitting in the bed with the side table lamp on. He had his glasses on while he read his comfort book- the same one his mother used to read to him growing up. Cate smiled and walked in, closing the door behind her. As she slipped under the covers, she knew her mother would kill her if she found out that Cate was in bed with her boyfriend under her roof, but that didn’t stop Cate from burrowing into Spencer’s side. He raised an arm to rest over her and he began to read aloud quietly. Before she knew it, Cate was sound asleep.

#spencer reid #spencer reid x oc #spencer reid fanfiction #spencer reid fluff #spencer reid angst #criminal minds #criminal minds fanfiction #sugar with a side of coffee fanfic

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banashee · 3 years

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i"I have way too many stories already planned" I said. “I can’t write in multiple fandoms at once, it will throw me off” I said. “OK so I’ll just get this out of my system real quick” I said. “Well shit, I’ve gotten more ideas now that I’ve started…” I said, determinded to face it - I have a problem. Just a small one… Who am I kidding. Send help.

Also, this is the first time I’ve written for this fandom. I’ve loved and enjoyed TMA for a while now, not just the pod but also fanworks. And now I’m joining in on the fun and you folks will have to deal with it :D ♥

This story got inspired by a conversation on Reddit with Swiftysmoon. Thank you very much for the inspo! This one is for you :)

edit. sorry about the missing ReadMore cut, Tumblr is programmed like a pile of garbage and removed it after I edited a typo...I’ve added it back in now.

please mind the tags and warnings

Into the Void

Truth be told, Jon never planned on this to happen. Of course not - it is ridiculous and more than a little embarrassing, but he can’t help himself.

See, the thing is, Jon is a restless, anxious person in general. He’ll hide away in his office for hours, typing away or recording statements in solitude, only interrupted when someone actually wants something from him. That, or when Martin brings him yet another cup of tea, checking if he’s still alive or starved to death on his desk.

No kidding - Martin had told him this, once, and although he’d been half-joking at the time, the underlying message had been very clear.

‘Please take care of yourself, you worry me.’ - it had been oddly sweet, and Jon still has no idea how to even react to this kindness.

But the thing is - Jon has nervous habits. While his mind is wandering and he is buried neck-deep in his work, he tends to fiddle. Mostly with pens, or anything else he can reach on his desk. That would be fine - no one notices it, unless they stand right next to him. But Jon had almost choked on the pen he’d been chewing on, lost in thoughts while reading his notes, omn more than one occasion. Mostly thanks to Tim bursting into the room like the whirlwind he is.

For one, Tim Stoker just doesn’t knock. Ever. He enters a room as loud and cheerful as he does anything else, and it can be a bit unnerving. Still, he somehow manages to be a professional and be really good at his job. That and the fact that there is ‘Chaos’ written all over him makes for an odd combination sometimes, but they’re all somewhat used to this.

So, when Tim suddenly sticks his head into the room with a cheerfully casual

“Hey, Boss!”

Jon startles and nearly stabs himself in the throat with a pen while he scrambles to make it look like he didn’t chew on it the entire time. He needs to preserve some sort of professionalism around here, even though he feels a little bit lost sometimes.

He glares halfheartedly, trying to keep whatever is left of his composure in place. Tim shoots him a bright smile with finger guns, then he rattles off the information that Jon had asked him for not long ago.

Thankful that he doesn’t have to explain himself, Jon launches onto it.

As time goes on, things around the institute get more and more weird. One thing adds to the other, and suddenly, they’re at war against worms all over the place. They spend their days at the institute armed with fire extinguishers and in Martin’s case, a corkscrew. Martin even lives there now, which adds a whole different level to it all.

Really, it is not surprising that they rarely ever get any outside visitors down in the archives. They have a bit of a reputation for being weird, and truth be told, Jon can’t find any fault in the people who assume that. If he wasn’t involved - if he didn’t know what lurks out there, in the shadows, he’d have thought the same.

Pushing his own dismissive, sceptic act is getting harder and harder these days, but it doesn’t stop Jon from trying.

Even after Jane Prentiss’ attack, Jon tries to keep up that act. It’s clearly faltering now, though, which may or may not be partially due to the fact that he confessed to Martin that yes, he does believe and he is terrified. It’s been an awkward conversation, to say the least, and not just because Jon pretty much asked if Martin was a ghost and despite Martin stabbing him with the corkscrew. To be fair, he’d apologized profusely for that, and while Jon is not happy about it, he is thankful for his attempt to get the damn worms out of him. Just thinking about it still makes him shudder, makes him lay awake at night.

On the plus side, their team in the archives has grown much closer to one another - it eases the anxiety and paranoia, just a bit.

Jon finds himself busy, not to say, utterly distracted. Time flies, and he takes even less care of himself than he did before. He practically lives off tea, and whatever food is offered where Martin, Tim and Sasha drag him along to.

Jon acts prickly and annoyed as always, but in reality, he appreciates their efforts. Lord knows, he isn’t sure he deserves this kindness, but he still makes an effort. These three people are all he’s got, after all. They’re the only group of allies who have any sort of idea what is really going on in the archives, and that alone is enough to have him lower his walls just a bit.

One day, Jon keeps blowing an annoying, grey-streaked strand of his otherwise dark hair out of his face. He didn’t have the time or energy to get a haircut lately - there are much more pressing matters to take care of. But his hair is currently at the awkward in-between length that he hated years ago, when he decided to grow it out. He’d kept it long, up until shortly before his promotion to head archivist. Only then he parted with the shoulder length ponytail in an attempt to be perceived as more professional.

It doesn’t feel right - never did. And as much as he hates the annoying strands falling in his face, it makes him feel like he is back on the way to himself. Or at least as much as he can these days.

Especially in the face of, well, everything else, it is a small comfort. Right now though, Jon is annoyed - he takes a pen from his desk, and sticks it behind his ear to hold back the constantly falling piece of hair - it works.

Jon only notices the pen again when he is about to go to bed that night - he huffs, places it onto the small desk in his bedroom and then crawls under the covers. Once he is in bed, Jon is waiting for the insomnia and the nightmares to keep him awake, despite his best attempts to fall asleep.

He is long used to both, but the last few months have been significantly more stressful.

The next day, Jon is exhausted. He barely makes it into the kitchen for some coffee, then he drives to the institute, the pen forgotten back home. Oh well - he’ll bring it back in another day - no big deal.

Except, it becomes a Thing, with a capital T.

Jon is chewing on and fumbling with his pens as usual, recording statement after statement and doesn’t exactly realize what he is doing. He hides away, until one of the others drags him away from the desk for inconvenient human needs like food and company, but really, he goes willingly now. All he needs is a small reminder.

The bit of human warmth and company means a lot to Jon, and he soaks it up as much as he allows himself to. Trusting people is a struggle for him. His relationship with each and every coworker is definitely a work in progress, but he is willing to try, anyway.

One night, Martin points to the side of Jon’s neck in quiet amusement.

“Oh, you’ve got ink on you - yes, right there.” he touches the spot behind his own ear. Jon blinks, and when he tries to wipe it away, his hand comes away with yet another goddamn pen.

It joins a small pile of accidentally stolen pens on Jon’s desk back home - he’s been meaning to bring them back ages ago, but he keeps forgetting. At this point, he refuses to drop them all off at once, because that would definitely catch someone’s attention - and attention is the last thing he wants right now. Add in the fact that this is, well, ridiculous and embarrassing… No. Just no.

Jon looks around the room, heat creeping up his face even though there is no one around to look at and judge him - then he opens an empty drawer in his desk. The pens disappear with one swift movement of his arm before Jon slams the drawer shut. There - done.

And this is how, what Jon secretly calls his “Desk Drawer of Shame”, comes into existence.

Occasionally, a small handful of pens will make its way back into the archives. But at this point, they’re way, way too many to bring back at once, at least not without pissing off Elias. That is, if he isn’t chuckling at the ridiculous and mysteriously high cost of office supplies in the last few months.

At the very least, Jon would be at the receiving end of some good natured ribbing from his coworkers in the foreseeable future.

Jon is reading the last few lines of a statement, when the door to his office opens up after a quick knock. He looks up with a frown, which is more habit than anything at this point, and quickly drops his feet back on the ground. At least, he isn’t chewing on a pen this time.

Standing in the doorway, shooting him a small smile, is Martin and he is waiting for Jon to finish recording the last few lines. Only when the familiar

“Statement ends.” marks the end of the recording session, he starts talking.

“Hi! Uh, did you have lunch yet?”

Jon didn’t, and Martin knows it, but he is trying to go the polite route before his motherhen-mode is activated and he physically drags the man away from the desk in an attempt to make him take a break.

So, Jon smiles back, which still feels a bit foreign in a work context, but he secretly enjoys the spark of happiness on Martin’s face when he does. Not like he focuses on that or anything…

“No, I- I didn’t. Did you have something in mind?” he asks as he gets up and pulls his jacket from the back of his chair. It’s a welcome distraction from his work.

Jon didn’t sleep, again, and he can tell that he is getting sloppy and way more irritable than usual. Chances are, getting a bite to eat and spending some time out of the institute with a friend will do him some good.

On the way out, Jon falls comfortably into step with Martin. Plenty of thoughts cross his mind, and he chooses to ignore all of them. In fact, he’d been so busy staring up at a cluster of freckles on Martin’s cheek that he doesn’t even notice what he tells him about the little café that he was planning to visit. Only when he stops talking, obviously waiting for an answer, Jon nods, hoping that Martin actually asked him a yes-or-no question.

For now, it seems to be enough, and they enjoy their lunch break. Jon is still lost in thoughts though.

That night, he is unable to sleep once again, as his mind keeps him wide awake and Jon is shaking apart under the blanket. There are two new pens on his desk, and it feels like they’re glaring at him. It’s ridiculous - they really are the least of his worries. Jon is just distracted, that’s all.

There is ink on his neck. Again. Jon swipes at it in mild annoyance, inwardly cursing himself for being so careless. His movement catches Tim’s attention, and then his eyes wander to the pen that is stuck halfway to Jon’s ponytail - it’s for convenience, really - but it’s clearly the cause for the ink scribbles on his skin.

Tim puts the pieces together and grins. He is way too easily amused about this, but to be fair, they get their laughs whenever they can these days. And this is still much better than the silent, angry version of Tim that tends to come out more and more and the last few months. At least, when he’s laughing, he isn’t that.

Small favors.

The more distracted Jon grows, and the longer his hair gets, the more pens he keeps losing - or more like, forgetting - in it.

He doesn’t realize that he is doing it, really, until someone - mostly Martin or Tim these days, because Sasha is (gone) (different ) absent - walks up and plucks one of the pens right out of his hair in order to use it. Jon should be annoyed, but he can’t bring himself to be. It’s oddly comforting that the two of them are still willing to seek him out. Because that’s what this is - there are plenty of pens around, of course.

There is no need to come into his office, to come close to him just to get office supplies. They’re here because they want to, and that honestly means the world to Jon.

As much as he’d tried to keep them at arm’s length, he’s failed miserably. Thankfully so - things would be much, much worse if they had to deal with everything on their own.

“Hang on - how many bloody pens are in there?” Martin asks one day, calling over from the other room. He looks up in utter confusion while already cracking up with laughter.

“Wait, are those-?”

Oh goddammit.

Apparently, that’s what happens when Jon answers absentmindedly when asked for the location of a pen in his apartment.

He needs to renovate his kitchen, because the landlord just won’t do it in any reasonable amount of time, so Jon is in old jeans and an even older T-shirt, packing dishes and kitchenware into boxes with Martin and Tim. The two of them had been kind enough to offer help, so that’s why they’re all piled in Jon’s small apartment on a Saturday morning.

Partway through, they realize that they should probably label the boxes, and soon after, Martin stands in the bedroom, opening not the stationary drawer, but The Secret Drawer of Shame With Accidentally Stolen Pens From The Institute.

“Oh, good lord.” With an audible ‘thump’, Jons forehead collides with the kitchen table. His glasses sit crooked now, and he doesn’t lift his head up while he tries to explain, and despite being flustered, he manages to keep that certain tone of voice that’s usually reserved for work hours.

“I, yes. I may have accidentally taken a pen or two with me and only realized it here. Coming back into work with all of them at once seemed… well. Not ideal at the time.”

“No wonder when you keep storing them in your hair.” Martin comes back, with a handful of pens and a bright smile.

While walking past, he pulls another pen out of Jon’s bun, just to prove his point. A long strand of hair slips forward and falls back into Jon’s face. Meanwhile, Tim has snuck off to peek into the other room out of pure curiosity, then he proceeds to laugh his arse off for the next few minutes.

“You know, we should make it a sport at this point. How much stationary supplies can we steal until Elias catches wind of it?” Tim offers, because of course he does.

It is ridiculous and childish, so naturally, it quickly becomes A Thing.

Anything to get a tiny bit of satisfaction is a valid option at this point, and besides, it’s not like Jon is trying to be sneaky or anything. It just happens , like so many things these days.

As it turns out, Elias doesn’t care. None of them is stupid enough to assume he doesn’t know - the bastard knows everything, that’s part of their problem. He just never calls any of them out on it - if it is because it’s too unimportant or if he is getting a chuckle out of it as well, they never find out.

At some point, late at night when all three of them had a few drinks, they’re brave enough to joke about what fear entity would be responsible for a never ending void filled with pens (“A.K.A you desk drawer of shame, Jon. Have another drink, you’re annoyingly sober for this conversation.”)

It’s a half-serious debate, and one which they continue every once in a while. Most notably so at the institute’s christmas party, huddled in a corner where they’re mostly being left alone. And if that is mostly due to Jon glaring holes through anyone daring to come close, just a hair away from actually hissing and snarling, well. He didn’t get his reputation of being rude and prickly for nothing.

All of this turns into fond memories, once everything has gone to hell.

Jon is freshly awake from six months of coma, and the world around him has changed. Martin is barely around and Tim is dead . So is Sasha, even though they never knew, for the longest time.

All of this hurts badly enough to stop him from breathing every once in a while, and after a series of even more tangled and unfortunate events, Jon finds himself huddled close to Martin on a train.

They’re on their way to Scotland and neither of them talks much, but they’re unwilling to let go of the other’s hand. The air is chilly, even inside the wagon, and Martin is still shivering under layers of jumpers and jackets.

The Lonely has settled deep into his bones, and sometimes, it’s like he is fading away again. Every time this happens, the steady warmth of Jon keeps pulling him back.

Jons hand is smaller and bonier in Martin’s own large, soft hand, but it’s grip is steady and warm. His thumb keeps stroking gently over the back of his hand while he is holding it, and it is the most loved Martin has felt in a long time.

Eventually, he manages to relax enough to doze off for a bit. While his head find’s it’s way down and onto Jon’s shoulder, he can feel the slight poke of a plastic pen that is sticking out of his hair.

Martin almost smiles, and squeezes back when Jon tightens the grip around his hand and settles against him.

They keep finding the damn things around the safehouse, because frankly, they’re everywhere. And that’s just whatever Jon had on his person out of sheer habit. Lord knows, his hair has grown way past his shoulders by now, and more often than not, he keeps it up and out of the way with whatever is around him at the time.

Mostly, it’s pens.

At first, they’re just there , and both Jon and Martin have about a million other things to think of and to deal with than a few too many office supplies laying around.

The exhaustion, both physically and emotionally, leaves them absolutely drained and dead to the world.

It is bad enough so that they crawl into bed almost as soon as they have arrived and inspected the small cabin. The question of whether or not they’re going to share the bed isn’t even raised - neither of them is willing to let go of the other. All the way from London to up here, they’d held hands to reassure themselves that they wouldn’t lose each other, and they’re not about to stop now.

It is a lot easier to remind each other that they’re not alone when all they need to do is focus on the breath and heartbeat of one another. Focusing on the heat radiating under the blankets, where they are embracing throughout the night to keep the nightmares and the ever growing anxiety at bay.

They have plenty of bad days when everything just creeps up at them and even talking is too much. Those days, they spend curled up in front of the fire or in bed, holding on tight for as long as they need to in order to feel more alive again.

After a while, they’re able to relax more. Martin is much warmer and solid now, doesn’t fade away into the fog without noticing. It’s happening less and less now - whether or not he will be able to shake off The Lonely entirely, neither of them knows, but he is happy about every step in the other direction.

Jon is just as happy to see him doing better, and he tells him as much over breakfast, smiling as he tangles their legs under the table.

There are two pens already stuck in his hair, holding it up in two buns. It’s probably from when he read a statement from the stack of files and tapes that Basira sent over the other day.

The statement has definitely taken the edge off of things for Jon. Now he can sit at the kitchen table with his boyfriend and enjoy a cup of tea instead of growing weaker and weaker with hunger for statements. As ironic as it is, it makes him feel more human, even though he is no longer fully human. He’s pretty sure of it.

“I love you.” Martin tells him, because it is true and he likes saying it as often as possible, now that he can. It sends a spark of warm happiness through his chest, and it is bright enough to chase away the cold fog that’s still lingering sometimes - just for a bit.

“I love you, too.”

He’ll never get tired of hearing this.

“I love you” they say, as they drink tea in the morning and eat freshly baked bread, still warm from the oven.

“I love you” they say, as they walk hand in hand through the cobblestone streets down in the village, on their way to buy groceries and look at the little local shops.

“I love you” they say, as they step around each other in the tiny kitchen while cooking dinner, distracting one another with kisses until one of them remembers the food or notices the charred smell of something burning. It’s only then that they break apart, cursing and laughing all at once.

“I love you” they say, as they spend nights wide awake, holding on tightly through their grief and fear. They say it out loud or whisper it into the darkness, comforting one another as best as they can.

“I love you”, they whisper through silence and tears, but they say it just as much through smiles and laughter.

“I love you” they say, after every single argument. Their love for each other is strong, so much so that they’re certain they will be able to figure out the rest. Whether that’s the end of the world as they know it or anything else doesn’t matter.

“I love you” Martin says, after he walks up behind Jon and plucks one of the pens out of his hair. There are at least two more, and besides, Martin woke up this morning with a few lines of poetry in the back of his mind. He wants to write them down before he forgets - maybe, just maybe, he can turn them into something beautiful.

“I love you.” Jon says, and he pulls Martin closer by the front of his pyjama shirt, turning around just enough to be able to press a quick kiss to his lips. The movement leaves them both in an awkward position, hanging over the back of the sofa with their glasses askew.

Martin has one of his arms wrapped around Jon, who is holding on tight, happily leaning into him with a quiet, happy satisfaction on his face. Clearly, he is enjoying this an awful lot.

No doubt, if it wasn’t for the hold onto the sofa Martin has with his other, he’d have toppled over and fallen right into the smaller man’s lap. And maybe that’s exactly what Jon is trying to do - who knows. He is way more affectionate than either of them would have thought possible, really.

They remain wrapped up in the tight hug, and neither of them wants to let go yet.

Notes:

Warnings: - Off-screen canon character death mentioned - insecurity - Loneliness - Trust issues - if you want me to add anything please let me know

#banashee writes #tma fanfic #the magnus archives #the magnus archives fanfic #JonMartin #mentioned character death

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guildedlily6 · 4 years

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You Plus Me Equals Soulmates Part 4 (Peter Parker x Reader Soulmate!AU)

Summary: Things continue to grow tense between Liz and Y/N after the results of the house party. Meanwhile, things heat up between Y/N and Peter Parker. Is Y/N Peter’s soulmate? Or will Liz interfere?

Author’s Note: Hey, you may have noticed I’ve been posting parts for this imagine every day for the past three days, but I’m sorry to say don’t get too used to it. I am writing mainly at night due to me having online school during the day (yay quarantine) which usually ends in me up until 4 or 5am. There is a Part 5 in the makings because of the unresolved things in this part with Liz and more that I’m not going to spoil for you right now. Click on the links below to read Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3.

Part 1 || Part 2 || Part 3

Word Count: 2,824

Warnings: swearing, fluff (if that counts as a warning)

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

So it’s official. My former best friend, Liz Allen, and Peter Parker are no longer going to homecoming together. Partially because of me. But maybe Liz and Peter were never meant to go to homecoming together in the first place.

It’s been about two weeks since the mortifying incident at Liz’s house party that ended up all over social media. I was a school-wide meme for about two weeks before the Principle got involved and started handing out detentions and even suspensions to anyone who even mentioned the party or posted about it on some social platform. Out of anyone in the school, though, Liz chats about it the most. She won’t talk to me directly, but word travels fast when you’re 16 and the gossip of the school, so I hear every little thing she has to say about me. So far, I’ve ignored it. I have other things on my mind.

Peter Parker is sitting across the room from me in 7th period, writing something in his chemistry journal. I do have to admit, things were extraordinarily awkward once he found out about the drama, pictures, and videos of me yelling “I don’t care about Peter Parker!” in front of everyone to see, but unlike Liz, I talked things out with him and we’re actually friends now.

Friends. Do people really think about their friends the same way I think about Peter?

The answer is no. Ever since the party, I couldn’t stop thinking about brown curls, eyes that hold such softness, and the familiar smile.

I’ve accepted the part of me that wishes to see a matching equal sign tattoo on Peter’s wrist, by now. What I haven’t accepted is that confronting Peter about my newfound feelings is necessary in order to discover if he feels the same way and with the same intensity as me.

“That wraps up today’s lesson. Homework is due tomorrow and if it is not turned in, it will be entered as an automatic zero,” rings the usual monotonous voice of my chemistry teacher. I tuck papers and folders into my backpack, packing up just before the bell rings.

Slinging the backpack around my shoulders, I stand up only to notice someone is waiting for me.

Peter smiles gently. “We have a Decathlon meeting today,” he reminds me. Right. Liz is also in our Decathlon club, which is a small problem, but “everyone is a necessary member of our team” as Mr.Harrington would say.

“So are you and Liz going to fight or something? I mean, you didn’t last week or the week before that in Decathlon club or in the hallways… or in any of your classes together, but if you do plan to fight, tell me,” Ned says eagerly, rushing to catch up with Peter and I.

“Liz and I are not going to fight, Ned.” For the past week, Ned has been trying to convince me that the only way to settle things once and all for Liz and I is to throw down in the middle of the hallway, or something along the lines of that. Two weeks ago, I totally would’ve been up to forcefully shove my fist into Liz’s face, but now I’m not in the mood to get expelled. Honestly, the whole mess shouldn’t be as big of a deal as it is. I feel like I’m back in preschool, fighting over a toy. Not only is Peter not a toy, but he’s also made it perfectly clear that he wants nothing to do with Liz.

However, Peter hasn’t exactly made a move to ask another person to homecoming yet.

Peter, Ned, and I walk into the gymnasium, other members of the Decathlon club already sitting in chairs.

“Just get seated please! Today we’re going to figure who’s going to Washington with everyone for the National Decathlon,” Mr.Harrington announces while unfolding chairs.

MJ sees us and greets us with a nod that says ‘sup’, Flash looks at Peter and laughs, whispering something to his friend, and Liz regards the three of us with a yawn.

I sit down in between Peter and Ned.

“Alright, so all of you have paid the club dues which means you’re all technically allowed to go to Washington with us. Who thinks they may have a conflict with the trip from April 30th-May4th?” Mr.Harrington takes a seat, spreading out some papers before him on a fold-able table.

Peter’s the only one to slowly raise his hand in the silence. I glance over at him with a questionable look.

Mr.Harrington raises his eyebrows. “What is your conflict, Mr.Parker?”

“Well, you know I have the Stark Internship, and well, uh… Mr.Stark said that I should always be prepared for someone to call me so-”

“Hold on, lemme get this right. Parker gets to miss out on the trip because of his ‘Stark Internship’?” Flash raises a single eyebrow, crossing his arms and leaning back in his chair.

“Peter, you understand this trip is mandatory. The conflicts are only for… well, only for serious things,” explains Mr.Harrington, peering over his glasses at Peter.

Peter blushes slightly, embarrassed. “Well I- I don’t want you to… Uh, make Mr.Stark angry…”

He’s still pretending to have a Stark Internship? Seriously, Peter, drop the act. You can’t quit the team.

Our Decathlon leader sighs. “Peter I’m afraid you have to go on this trip. You’re extremely valuable to this team. Unless you wish to leave the team…”

“I- I understand Mr.Harrington.”

“So he’s off the team?” Flash speaks up again, obviously excited by the possibility of Peter getting kicked out of the club.

“What’s your decision, Peter?” Mr.Harrington asks.

“I… I guess I can’t do it,” Peter admits quietly.

I turn my head to look at him.

Really? What are you doing?

“Well, okay. If you change your mind, just email me, Mr.Parker.” Mr.Harrington crosses something out on his paper before pushing his glasses back up on his nose and looking at Peter.

The rest of the meeting goes on as it does normally; reciting facts and sitting around listening to Flash and Mr.Harrington argue over whether ‘fergalicious' is a word or not.

__________Liz’s POV__________ I plan to get Peter back. It sounds dumb and childish, but if I want to prove that I wasn’t humiliating myself in front of the school for nothing, this is how to do it.

Unfortunately, there’s some minor obstacles. The first problem is that somehow Peter found it in him to forgive Y/N for saying she doesn’t care about him and now they’ve grown to be close friends within the past two weeks. The second problem would be that Peter most definitely hates me. Part of that may be my fault, though, since I haven’t bothered to try and communicate with him in any way in the last couple weeks. The third problem is that I wish Y/N wasn’t mad at me. Yeah, I’ve done some pretty mean things in the past, but none this bad.

My chin resting on the palm of my hand, I gaze at Peter from a few seats away. Either he doesn’t notice or he’s ignoring me on purpose. To be fair, I did say that I didn’t want to talk to Y/N or Peter ever again.

I shift my eyes to focus on Y/N.

I want my best friend back.

Was it really worth it? No, it wasn’t. But I guess it’s too late now. I’ve already formed my plan, so no going back.

“Liz? Hello? Do you have an answer?” Mr.Harrington waves a hand in front of my face.

I snap back into reality.

Was everyone watching me gaze longingly at Peter and glaring at Y/N? “Can you repeat the question?”

Mr.Harrington hits the table a few times with his baby toy hammer, signaling I answered wrong. “I’ve already repeated the questions 3 times, and if you were paying attention, Miss Allen, maybe you would know that.”

In the corner of my eye I see Y/N smirk and shake her head with a look that reads ‘dumb ass’.

Whatever.

Anyway, my plan is to slowly release every single secret Y/N has ever told me out into the school until almost everyone knows everything about her. At that point, Peter might be so embarrassed to be seen with her that he completely abandons her. Next, I’ll make my move on Peter.

Obviously, I have some details to fix, but it’s coming together. However, Peter not going to Washington affects a lot of my plan. If he does end up going, every part of my plan will fall into place.

_________Y/N’s POV_________ After the Decathlon meeting ends and everyone is dismissed, I pull Peter out into the hallway.

“What’s the real reason for not going to the National Decathlon?”

“What? I told everyone it was because of the Stark Internship-” but Peter doesn’t get to finish his sentence before I cut in.

“Yeah that’s what you told people. But, like, a 16 year old kid doesn’t have a Stark Internship.”

Peter’s expression displays a bit of hurt from my words. “You don’t believe me.” “No. I don’t. Sorry, I don’t believe you have an internship with one of the richest people in the world.”

“Well, I- I can’t tell you.”

Now it’s my turn to be hurt.

He can’t tell me? Why not?

This slight pause gives me enough time to realize how close we’re standing. There’s plenty of hallway outside of the gym for the both of us, but we choose to stand so close that if I leaned in eight more inches we would-

I dart my eyes back up to meet his eyes.

“Fine. Okay,” I say.

“Did you want me to come or something?” He questions.

“I- yeah. I mean you’re my friend, right? Why wouldn’t I?”

Friend.

He looks down, slightly disappointed. Is he disappointed? Why?

“Yeah, I guess,” he responds, shifting his backpack straps and taking a few steps back. “I don’t know why there would be another reason,” he mutters under his breath.

“Hey guys what are you- did I interrupt something?” Ned busts through the gym doors and pauses after seeing our faces.

“No, you didn’t, Ned.”

“Oh, okay. So Peter, are we still going to your place after school for our Star Wars movie marathon? My mom bought popcorn for me to take,” Ned continues, oblivious to the uncomfortable tension.

“Yeah,” answers Peter.

“Oh, I’m so sorry, Y/N. Do you want to come?” Ned smiles warmly.

I say “Yeah sure, Ned,” the same time Peter cuts in with “I don’t really think-”

“Great! You remember where Peter's apartment is, right? If you don’t just, text one of us.” Ned starts walking away, leaving Peter to glance apologetically at me.

“I’ll see you soon,” I say to Peter before walking away.

_______(Time skip)_______ I click send on a text telling Peter I’m at his apartment.

Was Peter actually disappointed when I said we were friends? Aren’t we friends? I think back to earlier. How close we were standing. Peter’s lips had looked soft and his eyes were inviting, but I hadn’t done anything. Anything about what? What even is my goal?

Soon enough, the door to the apartment opens and I’m greeted by Peter’s aunt May.

“Oh, hey Y/N. Come on in,” May says while stepping aside. “Peter and Ned are in Peter’s bedroom.”

“Thanks, Miss…” I stop myself, unsure of what to call her.

“May. You can call me May,” she says, beaming.

“Thanks, May,” I say. I walk past May and up to Peter’s bedroom, slowly opening the door.

“Hey Y/N,” Peter and Ned greet at the same time. I take a seat on the floor, leaning against Peter’s bed.

“Hey guys. When are you going to start the movies?”

“Oh we were waiting for you. Do you want some popcorn?” Ned holds out a bag of popcorn and I grab some, eating a few.

I get up and we all make our way to the living room. May announces she’s going out and then leaves. I take my seat on the couch. Peter sits down a small distance away from me and Ned sits on a different couch.

All throughout the night, Ned munches on popcorn while the movies play and I slowly get drowsy. I find myself leaning more and more to one side before I completely fall asleep, and so does Peter.

_________(Time skip)_________ I wake up to something moving beside me.

Why is the couch moving? My mind is a big groggy. I open my eyes.

I’m lying nestled into Peter, our limbs tangled in mess. My eyes drift up and meet Peter’s, which are very much awake and very much flustered.

“I- I’m sorry… I just woke up and-”

“It’s okay,” I say, chuckling softly and quickly moving away. At the loss of contact, I feel my heart sink sadly.

“Soulmates are usually naturally attracted to each other if seated or lying near one another.” Where do I remember that from? Right. History Of Soulmates textbook I had to read in my psychology class.

I sit up straight and look at Ned, who’s still asleep on the couch. Star Wars: Return Of The Jedi is playing on the TV. I grab my phone from the table beside me. It reads 8:35am.

I turn to look at Peter and realize I’m still practically draped over his lap. I blush a bright red and once Peter notices, his blush matches mine. Hastily, I scoot away from him and then stand up.

“Uh… where's your bathroom?” I ask timidly.

“It’s down that hall and to the right,” Peter says, his voice still slightly raspy from sleep.

My feet carry me away, padding down the hall and then into the bathroom. I close the door and look in the mirror, fixing my hair and straightening up my shirt. After I finish touching up, I open the bathroom door, only to be surprised by Peter standing right outside.

I bump directly into his chest and he laughs gently. I smile faintly and step to go past him, only for us to bump into each other again. He tenderly grabs my shoulders and leads me to go past him.

I look up at him and admire his messy bed head and the adorable blush still on his cheeks. He looks down at me with an expression similar to mine and then lets go of my shoulders, still smiling. “Sorry,” he apologizes, turning to go into the bathroom and then closing the door.

Since when did you get so mushy, I think to myself.

I walk back out to the living room where Ned has now woken up.

“What were you two doing?” Ned asks the question suspiciously, looking me up and down.

“Peter and I? Nothing I- we… I just went to the bathroom and-”

“Together?”

“No! I- I mean no.” I look at my phone to see a text from my mom: when are you coming home?

“If you did, I mean I don’t judge, I personally was waiting for it to happen, it was just a matter of time before-”

“What are you two talking about?” Peter walks in, running a hand through his curls. My heart flutters at the sight.

Stop it.

“Congratulations on you and Y/N finally getting together,” Ned says and I think I’m ready to crawl into a hole and die.

Peter looks at me with an unreadable look on his face. “What?”

“Peter and I aren’t together, Ned, we just- I just went to the bathroom and he happened to be outside. Nothing happened-” I quickly try to explain it all. But Peter had a different idea.

“We could be together…” interrupts Peter. I look at him, shocked. “I mean, I was just saying- we’re not together- I was just suggesting…”

“Yeah. Um…” I try to find a response in myself.

Together? Really? Does this mean he feels the same way?

“Right. This is a bit awkward… So I’m going to go. Thanks for the marathon, Peter.” Ned gets up, grabs the popcorn bag, and leaves through the front door. I pretend to be interested in the lamp sitting on a table.

“So…” Peter starts off. “I guess I should tell you this now. That day when I asked Liz out, I had actually meant to ask you to homecoming. I really like you, Y/N. Extremely. It’s like nothing I’ve felt before. Like-”

“I’m naturally attracted to you,” I finish for him.

He grins with so much happiness it’s almost contagious. “Yeah. Exactly like that.”

“Can I- your tattoo. What is it?”

He rolls up his right sleeve, showing his bare wrist with one simple tattoo. An equals sign.

We’re soulmates.

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

Hey so here’s some fluff, but the first kiss is yet to come. Things will escalate from here, so make sure to keep reading. Or don’t. I can’t really control what you do. Thanks for reading!

@disfunctionalcellmembrane @marvel4geeks

Part 5

#imagine #peter parker imagine #peter parker x reader #peter parker x reader soulmate!au #part 4 #fluff #smut is yet to come #fanfiction #marvel #marvel universe #spiderman #tom holland #liz the crazy best friend

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the-ice-sculpture · 3 years

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March 2021 Books I Read

*assume all the book are aimed at an adult audience unless specified otherwise in the description

Thanks a Lot, Mr. Kibblewhite: My Story by Roger Daltrey ★★★☆☆ 🎧 Non-fiction autobiography of the frontman of The Who. 368 pages. A more down-to-earth rock autobiography than the usual, with reflections on the era, his life, and some of the more controversial things that happened. The audiobook was narrated by the author really well, but coming at it from the angle of someone just interested in the era as a whole, it didn’t give me what I wanted from it (though, admittedly, that’s not really a fault of the book) and I didn’t find it as gripping as others I’ve read. Still done well though and it sparked some ideas, which was the main point.

The Flower Girls by Alice Clark-Platts ★★★★☆ (3.5*) 🎧 Thriller. 339 pages. The main character, along with her older sister, was involved in the murder of a toddler when they were young children. It has interesting themes that question the justice system (particularly regarding underaged offenders), morality, whether ‘evil’ exists, and the lack of integrity in tabloid journalism. Another where the audiobook was narrated really well. It’s dark, obviously, but it doesn’t go into too much explicit detail about what happened. Has good use of multi-POV. It gets fairly tense though a little predictable, but I liked that this one had more going on with what it discusses than your standard thriller. Ending could’ve been more satisfying but it still wasn’t a bad ending.

On Power: My Journey Through the Corridors of Power and How You Can Get More Power by Gene Simmons ★★☆☆☆ 🎧 Non-fiction autobiography/business management/self-help. 163 pages. I wanted to get an insight into the marketing strategies of KISS (since they’ve always been way more of a brand than a band) for music history research purposes, but that’s not what this book is. It’s exactly what the title says it is (I’m not sure why that surprised me either). Mostly common sense rather than anything concrete. It can be very, uh, boomer-ish, though it does raise a valid point with how if people want to make a good difference in the world then they’ll need money and power to do it on a large scale. Did it give an insight into certain philosophies? Yes. The world of music? Not so much. Not directly anyway.

The Gutter Prayer by Gareth Ryder-Hanrahan (The Black Iron Legacy #1) ★★★★☆ (3.5*s) 📖 Fantasy. 512 pages. This deserves more attention (it only has a couple of thousand ratings on GR). It’s a bit dark, but I wouldn’t call it grimdark. There’s a small cast of characters: a man turning to stone, a thief occasionally involuntarily slammed by visions, a ghoul who eats people, an investigator, and a scholar who are all linked together due to a heist gone wrong. There's really just two main POVs and a few other minor ones so keeping track of characters isn’t too much work. It’s all set in the same city so the worldbuilding isn’t too daunting. The writing style is great – it reads very vividly and smoothly, and it has a unique vibe compared to other fantasy stories. The world isn’t that technologically far behind ours, and there are a lot of humanoid monsters very much present. It can be a bit gory and has definite horror influences (think men made of wax, eldritch worm creatures, body parts in jars etc), but it’s not to the extent that it'd bother the average reader. The balancing of action and character was well done and it’s the most original new fantasies I’ve read in a while.

Pretty Girls by Karin Slaughter ★★★★★ (4.5*s) 📖 Thriller/horror. 548 pages. I don’t want to say too much because it’s better going into it partially blind, but I will say this: it’s very graphic and a fair amount of reviewers say it gave them nightmares. A lot of the content is dark and massively fucked up, and that’s either going to entice people or put them off. Plot: involves the family of a missing young woman and a theme of ‘is it better to know what happened or remain ignorant?’. I was fairly meh for around the first 25% of this book. Then there was an ‘oh shit’ moment. Followed by several more ‘oh shit!‘ moments at increasing volume. Then the last 75% was ridiculously gripping. Amazingly tense, very fast to read writing style (might’ve helped with not inspecting potential plot holes too closely though), great character development, and it makes you fear for the characters and feel for them.

The Last Family in England by Matt Haig ★★★☆☆ (2.5*s) 🎧 Contemporary fiction. 352 pages. A suburban domestic drama from the perspective of a dog. Labradors have a pact that they should protect their human families at all costs. They believe whenever a family falls apart it’s either because the dog didn’t do its job or because the family didn’t have a dog. But other dog breeds world over have abandoned the pact in favour of hedonism. It’s quirky and charming, even funny in places with how seriously the main character (well, dog) takes himself, but I found all the family drama slightly tedious and most of the characters not very likable. It also wasn’t the light-hearted read I was wanting/expecting it to be.

#book review #book reviews #books #reading #reading wrap up #my posts

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loveafterthefact · 4 years

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Love After the Fact Chapter 57: Wasting Time with a New Friend

Lotor makes some new friends. Together, they discover that word of Lance and Keith's union has reached video game developers in the worst, best way.

Featuring Leakira in the role of comic relief (Not to offend Leakira fans, this is meant to be a fun, happy place. I just thought it might be funny little detail) XD

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Lotor finds them sleeping in a hallway. A much-needed distraction.

More specifically, it’s an adolescent Olkari with orange feelers, dressed in green and white garb stained with red dust. They’re incredibly small, even for a smaller species. Pretty adorable, like a wolf cub.

So obviously he nudges them with his foot.

“Can I help you?” the kit growls, amber eyes glaring up at him.

“You’re sleeping in a hallway.”

“And? What’s your point?”

“... You know what? I’m not really sure.”

With a groan, the kit sits up, tugging on their feelers. “So what are you up to, Mr. Prince?”

“Oh not much. Wandering around, looking for trouble.” He’s actually looking for a distraction, but that’s almost the same thing as trouble.

“Trouble, huh?” The Olkari smirks. “I’m Pidge. Lance’s resident tech genius and vent crawler- I mean spy.”

“Ah-haha, I see. You’re one of his ‘associates’.” Lotor grins, helps Pidge to their feet.

“Yes. Working for Lance usually involves some level of trouble. What are the princes up to today, anyway?”

“Lance is with Allura. She’s having a hard morning. Keith is with Thace, our emergency medic and reproductive specialist.”

“Oh, really? Making sure his junk works?”

“That’s the idea. Why?”

“It’d be awesome to have some dirt on Keith. He’s just so perfect.” Pidge skips down the hallway, a curious prince following behind them. “The worst thing he’s done is drink a bit too much, find his happy place at a party, and get really snuggly with Lance.”

Following Pidge into what should have been an old, empty storeroom, Lotor’s eyes widen in surprise. The typically ignored room is set up with monitors and a work table covered with Balmeran crystals and a few other tools.

“Where did you get some of these tools?” he asks, eyeing a choice laser of Galra design.

“I crawled through the tunnels underneath the actual labs and stole them. I’m welcome in the labs, of course. I just don’t want to share my work with them. The field of science is rife with thieves.”

“You found the tunnels already?” Lotor stares. There are tunnels all under the mountain, his ancestors making the massive peak into an insect hive. There are escape tunnels and hidden caches and underground pools and even a forge made of volcanic glass that he discovered as a small boy.

He still likes to go down there on the rare occasion he can find the time. Someday, he’ll take his children down there, and tell them all about the stories carved into the ancient walls.

“Yep! Anyway, let’s see if I can hack into Thace’s equipment. And by that I mean give me like, thirty ticks because I can definitely do it.” While Pidge types away on their computer, Lotor sits himself on the floor, eyeing a faint square cut into the stone. Most people don’t notice, don’t know to look for the fine edges carved into the floor. “Ooh… Interesting.”

“What’s interesting?” Lotor asks. “Is Keith okay?”

“You really care for him, don’t you?” Amber eyes smile at him, intuitive.

“Of course I do! He’s my cousin! And my friend!” And he has more than his fair share of health problems. Lotor himself was not a healthy kit, so he understands the worries that his cousin might have.

“Aw-w. You’re just a big ol’ sweetheart, aren’t ya?” Pidge turns back to their computer. “What’s interesting is that Keith is… surprisingly healthy. His weight and body mass index are good… Thace is optimistic about a successful pregnancy.”

“Why is that interesting?” Lotor scratches his head, frowning a little.

“Because our boys requested contraceptives, probably due to health concerns.”

“Miscarriage risks are higher for him. That’s partially due to his sex, and partially due to his condition. Do you think they’ll use contraceptives?”

“Pfft. No. They’re young, they’re stupid, and they both want pups. I doubt Lance can keep it in his pants.”

“What about Keith?”

“He’s shy.” Pidge shrugs like that explains everything. It kind of does. Keith’s priorities are probably more of the cuddling variety than the ‘aggressive hugging’ variety. “Can I have some of your blood?”

“Hm? Uh… How much blood?”

“I dunno. A few vials? Maybe I’ll swab your cheek too? It might help with my experiments.”

“And what might those be?”

“I’m trying to invent Altean-friendly prosthetics. It’s not going well. Alteans are stupid inside and out.” Pidge gathers their tools to stick him, and Lotor stares. This tiny little Olkari is far more than they appear. “Who do you think will kill Lance for getting Keith pregnant? Krolia or Shiro?”

But they're young, still playful and carefree.

“Hm… My money’s on Krolia. Or the creepy friend.”

“Adam? Oh, he’s softer than he looks. More likely he’ll live vicariously through their children and terrorize anyone who tries to mess with them.” Pidge sticks a swab in his cheek as they fill a second vial with his blood. “Your fangs are adorable.”

“Thanks?” Lotor regards them. “So you do science, you do people… What don’t you do?”

“Relationships.” Pidge cleans the crook of his arm, bandaging the spot where they bled him. “And genders. Those are for more primitive individuals.”

Lotor laughs. “More highly evolved, are you?”

“Exactly. Unlike Alteans. Stupid, scaley assholes with stupid, cranky cells.”

“I don’t get it. What exactly is the problem?” Lotor peers over Pidge’s shoulder as they examine his cells under their microscope.

“Not sure, but Alteans have some odd properties that make their biology incompatible with metal, coral, bone, wood, and other prosthetic materials. When used, the Altean’s cells refuse to accept the forgein material, even if it’s biocompatible. Hence, their cells are stupid.”

“So it would seem. How are my cells?”

“Hm… I'll have to run some of my own, secret tests. I may try to culture your skin cells to figure out how it all works.”

“Have at it. Can I interest you in a secret?”

“Always!” The young Olkari’s eyes shine, eager to learn. To know. A person after his own heart.

“Most of Altea’s technology is rediscovered. Thousands of decaphoebs ago, there was what’s known as The Forgetting. The Altean’s powers were quite suddenly drastically altered, and their society descended into chaos. Much of their technology was lost, then rediscovered within the last few milophoebs.”

“No fucking way!”

“Way. This includes their lauded Teludav technology.”

“Those fakers! How have I not heard of this?”

“I know! It’s their best kept secret. Also, beneath Mount Sil’brana is a petrified forest.”

“Oh, that’s so cool!” Pidge makes a note on their datapad. “I wonder… I don’t know if I could interface with that or not. Probably not, since it’s no longer organic, but then again perhaps I could reach the echo?”

“Echo?”

“All organic life leaves behind an echo. Sometimes, I can reach that echo. I’d be great at solving murders!”

“Well, if ever I am murdered, do find my killer. I’m sure my wife would appreciate it.”

“Unless she did the murdering,” Pidge snickers.

“Some days, it wouldn’t surprise me at all. She’d say it’s my fault, but…”

“Pregnancy.”

“Yeah. How do you think Keith will be when he gets pregnant?”

“He’s relatively mild-mannered as long as Lance keeps him happy, so either unbelievably psychotic or unbearably sweet.”

“He is really sweet. I honestly didn’t expect it when he first arrived. Lance is a little… He’s reserved, but also high-strung at the same time?”

“He definitely can be. But he can also be very playful. Those two are either quiet and reserved together, or cutting up and goofing off together. But Lance is the high-strung one, for sure. Keith just wants to know whose head to crack open. Lance wants to know every single little detail about everything.”

“So he’s a control freak.”

“Little bit, yeah. We’ve all got our thing.” Pidge smiles. “But Lance gave me a home when mine was lost. He had no reason to do that. He didn’t know what I was capable of.”

“I had assumed you were on Altea for research?” Lotor's curious, but won't push.

“No. Though I do enjoy research. For example, I have the new Phantasm Killbot game. I just got to the first visual novel part where they introduce the characters and their little side plots and all. Wanna help me out? For research?” The Olkari holds up a controller.

“Yeah alright. Anything for research.” Lotor takes the controller, waits for the character introduction screen. He’s played this game before. “Player one… Leandro.”

“Player Two… Akira.”

The screen loads.

“Uh… That’s… Interesting. Is that- Does that look like Lance to you?” It really does, at least to Lotor. The only difference is that ‘Leandro’ has brown hair and his scales are a very pale blue.

“Wow, that’s weird. Okay. Let’s see where this goes- Oh my fuck, this is going to be good.”

Lotor can’t help but agree, staring at a screen of a smirking ‘Leandro’ lounging with a wide-eyed Galra presumably named ‘Akira’. The Galra has purple hair and golden irises, dressed in what might loosely be referred to as clothing.

It’s exceptionally weird, even weirder given that Akira is the name of Keith’s father, Lotor’s uncle.

“I cannot wait to tell my cousin about this,” Lotor breathes, coming to the realization of exactly what’s before him.

“Yes! We have to! Right now!” Pidge stands, tugs on his arm.

“Well, let’s not be too hasty.” Lotor stares at the screen, that mischievous part of his brain clicking and whirring. “I mean, we have to do our research, right?”

“You know…” Pidge taps their chin. “You might be onto something.”

“I mean it’s just courtesy, right? Making sure we can give them all the information we possibly can?”

“You’re absolutely right. Okay, so you get first choice for dialogue and it looks like Not-Keith has a prompt for us.”

“Oh, gods. Okay, I am so sorry, Keith… Let’s see, here.”

…

Akira: We can’t keep meeting like this. What if people find out?

Leandro: I’m a prince, my sweet. I do what I want.

Akira: But you could be killed!

Leandro: You’re worth dying for.

Leandro: It’s my fault, anyway. I just couldn’t resist you.

Akira: It’s not your fault. I let you have me.

Leandro: You should let me have you again.

Akira: Please… I need it…

*Kiss Passionately*

Leandro: Oh, my sweet. You’re in season!

Akira: Make love to me, and I will give you a son.

…

“I feel dirty,” Lotor mutters. “This is what’s passing for entertainment right now?”

“It’s so bad! I love it!” Pidge snickers.

“Lance is going to be mortified.”

“No, he won’t.” The two new friends turn to see Adam leaning in the doorway, smirking.

“And why, pray tell, is that?” Lotor asks, one eyebrow almost reaching his hairline.

“Lance is bigger than that. He’ll be filled with a sense of… well-being.”

“Oh, gross! Adam!” Pidge chucks a wrench at the Altean’s head, the trio laughing as he dodges, then retrieves it for them. “I don’t want to hear about my friend’s dick!”

“Am I wrong?”

“No, and I hate it.” Pidge drags Adam to the floor, sits in his lap. “Okay, you can help us. What should Leandro say next? ‘A daughter would be fine’ or ‘Honor me with the gift of your flesh’?”

“Who the quiznak wrote this?” Adam mutters. “And we want ‘Honor me with the gift of your flesh.’”

“I don’t know, but I will find out. And kill them,” Lotor mutters.

“Easy on the instincts, Mr. Prince.” Pidge continues to the next cut scene.

“It’s nothing to do with instincts! I just hate that I had to read that!” Lotor sighs. “At least that cut scene is over. Now we have… Brothers, Sven and Kuron? Lots of new characters for this one.”

Adam blinks, gaping at the screen. “What. The fuck-”

...

Allura sighs, running a hand through her loose curls. It's been a rough morning, one that doesn't promise to get easier. A howling chorus of laughter cuts through her stressed thoughts. Cracking open a storeroom, she spies her husband, Adam, and Pidge laughing away at a video game.

"I wOuLd DiE fOr AkIrA," Pidge mocks, cackling.

"Leandro, please!" Lotor laughs, cutting through a false simper as he pretends to swoon. "I couldn't live without you!"

"That's such a toxic sentiment, honestly." Adam shakes his head, but his eyes are glittering bright.

Shaking her head, Allura leans in the doorway, settling a hand on her slightly protruding stomach. Life is never perfect, not for anyone. But seeing her husband playing around and having fun with their friends -his new friends- suggests that everything might still turn out alright. Or at least, not as awful as it sometimes seems.

#LoveAftertheFact #LAtF #klance #galtean au #altean lance #galra keith #adashi #altean adam #galra shiro #voltron legendary defender #vld

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rosaline-kei · 4 years

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Bare; AruMika Fanfic (One-Shot)

Disclaimer:I do not own Shingeki no Kyojin / Attack on Titan nor its characters.

Synopsis: It was the first time Armin ever saw a woman’s bare back, bare chest. Exposed.And he had not expected to see it in this sort of situation.It was the first time Mikasa found herself this much exposed in front of him.And the last thing she felt was any form of uncomfortableness, but still, she wished that he didn’t have to witness something so unsightly.

Rated: T

Pairings: Mikasa Ackerman / Armin Arlert

Read it also on / Please Leave a Review at my Ao3 / FF net (as stated in bio)

Author’s Note : A drabble that i decided to (semi)complete. I don’t think it’s that good but meh. You can interpret it as platonic or romantic but frankly, i think its leaning more towards (unresolved) tomantic tension lol.

He watches her fall.

Again. For the second time. For the second time, Armin hears her air-tank choke, and watches it come to an abrupt halt a second after. The next thing he sees is how she almost crashes to what could’ve been a close death if he hadn’t swoop in, scoop her in his arms before landing on the ground.

Unfortunately for him, he hadn’t been in time to save her from the spiky branches that tore through her blouse, staining them crimson red all over, bestowing her yet another series of scars on her back and chest that would take a while to recover, heal from. And if she was lucky, they’d disappear for good.

But he had been in time to catch her before her head could’ve knocked onto something rock-hard, which could’ve led to a concussion. A coma. He is momentarily relieved when he sees that she is still conscious. He lays her down gently against a tree, with such caution as if he was handling a watchmaker’s intricate task, as if she is the most fragile thing he has seen or touched. He doesn’t want her anymore hurt than she already is.

But that relief soon washes itself away when he sees her wince in pain, and he can tell that its taking every ounce of her remaining strength to not let out a loud yelp that could possibly scare the creatures resting in the forest at this time of the day, or more specifically night.

After developing and improving on the 3-D manoeuvre gear, Commander Hanji had given an Okay for Levi and his squad to test it out while she busies herself with another pile of paperwork, with her responsibilities as Commander. They had split themselves up, in the forest at night, continuing their training as per normal while familiarising with the new gear that they’d possibly be wearing when they’d confront the man who had abandoned them.

He isn’t sure how far they are now, and figures that screaming for help would be pointless because he knows he needs to take action now as opposed to waiting for his calls to be answered.

Because Armin had been in front of the raven, he is unable to tell if it was her momentary carelessness and loss of her cool that had led her to her downfall or if it was due to a fault in the gear that had caused the gas to halt so abruptly. It doesn’t matter either way, for now. He has other things to worry about, like how her blouse was soaking up more and more blood.

“Mikasa.” He calls her name as calmly as he could, but he is sure the woman in front of him can see through this false front he puts for her, and that he is worried to death even though he is aware that this isn’t the sort of tragic moment where this would be the last breath she takes. He knows she is stronger than that and that it’d take more than a fall to kill her. But he still worries. He can’t help but worry for her, for the future, her future. And he hopes when the time comes when they meet him—their ex-comrade who abandoned them—she won’t be so careless, reckless.

Before he knows it, he finds his hands gripping both of hers tightly, reassuringly. “Is your breathing fine? Is—”

He hates how she forces herself to sit up a little straighter, swallowing every painful shriek that she doesn’t want to let out because she knows it’ll do no good, and would only worry her blonde friend even more. What she doesn’t know is that Armin doesn’t care. He wants her to scream and let out all of her pain, because he knows it’s better than bottling everything up.

However, he doesn’t bring it up. Because arguing now would be a foolish thing to do.

“The wounds are not that deep.” Armin can’t tell if she’s lying to reassure him. He knows that the woman in front of him, who was worth a hundred soldiers, would not die so easily from a few scratches from the branches. But he also knows that this woman was still human. And humans are fragile beings, the surface of their skin is thin, easy to tear from something as trivial as a paper cut. And while he was sure Mikasa is aware of this, she doesn’t seem to apply that knowledge to herself. “Just… There was just a lot of branches.” She pauses briefly. “And it just happened to open up old wounds… but I’m fine. Give me a while.”

Armin is instantly reminded of the recent wounds that she received not too long ago from both a spar and from work; labour that she had been assigned to do (and from what he had heard, pushed herself a little too far. Something that he has already nagged and chided her for.).

His eyes narrow, and he doesn’t trust her ‘I’m fine’ completely. But there is still colour in her face, her breathing isn’t concerningly shallow and it doesn’t look like she is forcing her eyes to stay wide open to avoid the pitch black a person would see when they faint. And he reminds himself that she isn’t dying.

He hopes that something like this won’t happen again, on the battlefield, where her life would truly be more at risk. He doesn’t want to lose her.

He glances around the forest. Albeit dark, he recognises it. They have been training in these parts for quite some time now after all. “There’s a river nearby.” He quickly says, suddenly in a rush. “We’ll wash your wounds there.” He doesn’t give her a choice. He isn’t asking.

“I’m fine.” Yet she insists on the fact that she doesn’t need help. “On the battlefield, I don’t get the luxury of washing my wounds at a lake.” She is stubborn. “I have to put up with it.”

“But we aren’t at war now.” He sounds sterner now, fiercer. He isn’t usually like this; he is admittedly more of a passive person who probably had given into her more often than he should recently. However, he doesn’t know how else to respond to her stubbornness.

He slowly carries her up, and it seems like Mikasa’s body is a little too worn out to fight back.

Again, it is foolish to argue now. That’s the last thing Armin wants with her. He tries to reason. “And by the time you’re on the battlefield, all your wounds would already be healed. You’ll be stronger. At your fullest. But right now, you’ve been overworking yourself, getting new bruises. You aren’t at full capacity.”

Mikasa doesn’t argue back, because he is right. And she knows he wouldn’t yield to her stubbornness because he cares for her too deeply.

…

When they reached the river, Armin once again gently sets her down and removes both their gears, setting them aside. He notices that her wounds are no longer oozing out as much blood as before, and it soothes him… just slightly. It confirms the fact that they aren’t that deep, but it doesn’t mean Armin would care any less about it. About her.

His hands scramble about in his pockets, and finds a clean handkerchief that he isn’t sure how it ended up there, but regardless is thankful for its presence. He approaches the lake, soaks it with water before squeezing some of it out and turns back to Mikasa.

It was only then did he realise what he has to do and what he has just gotten himself into.

Mikasa already knows, has her back already turned and facing him as her hands move to unbutton her blouse.

It is probably an extremely inappropriate moment to flush, but Armin can’t help it. Instinctively, he turns away, sparing her some privacy even though that isn’t exactly a choice later on. “I- uh… ah…” There is no longer a sternness in his tone. It is lost, and nervousness overwhelms him. Mikasa notices it in the instant she unbuttons the last button, letting the blouse fall down her shoulders, down to the ground.

Armin is unable to believe how she removes the clothes from her body without that much hesitance. Does she not realise what she is doing? Or does she trust him that much? Or is it because she doesn’t see him as man?

The last thought irks him somehow, but that is far from the truth behind Mikasa’s lowered guard around him.

Mikasa knows the back of her sports bra is partially torn, too. And she knows it’ll get in the way. So, her hands move towards it, unhesitatingly, to take it off.

“W-Wait!” Despite his well-known intellect, clearly Armin didn’t think ahead for this scenario. He is red all over. “I- ah… y-you can keep that on. I don’t want to...—”

“I trust you, Armin.” She says this so confidently, even though admittedly, she’s a little embarrassed too. Because she is still a woman who has undeniably grown in certain areas, and this is the first time she exposes herself this much to a man. But there weren’t nurses around to tend to her, so she isn’t in a position to complain. And she knows that if she puts back on her blouse and tells Armin to forget it, he’ll go on a lecture and the cycle repeats.

And above all, she trusts Armin. He is her childhood friend, too. He would never harm her. He could never harm her. She knows this, and she never takes advantage of it, of his kindness because she cares for him deeply too. She cares for him, in her own unspoken way. “It’s okay.” She doesn’t look back to him to give a reassuring look that provides as much assurance as her tone, mostly because her cheeks are tinged slightly pink, and she doesn’t want that to distract him or make him any more uneasy.

I trust him. She thinks. But even so…this situation is…

Her cheeks, tinged with pink, says enough.

Armin gulps and nods and walks towards her silently before kneeling down behind her after she has removed her bra. Perhaps if Mikasa could’ve reached all the wounded areas on her back easily, the two childhood friends probably wouldn’t have found themselves in this sort of… predicament.

“I’ll… be fast.” He says, but it doesn’t mean he won’t be gentle. He dabs the cloth on her wounds lightly, wiping away the blood.

She winces, making Armin even softer in his movements. “It’s okay.” She says again, her arms crossed and covering the front of her chest. “We’re alone…anyway. We aren’t supposed to meet the others yet… they probably wouldn’t have noticed our absence.”

“Yeah…” Armin murmurs, “Does it hurt?” He checks on her, as he approaches the slightly deeper cuts that appears to be her re-opened wounds. He makes a mental note to inform Commander Hanji that they should have a wardrobe upgrade, have better material for their uniforms. A blouse and a jacket over it weren’t going to do it for them at this point in time.

“No.” Mikasa responds. “Sorry.” She responds, and Armin raises a brow, before he finds them furrowing in slight frustration.

“Does that mean… your fall was due to carelessness?” He asks, and he tries his best to ensure that his question doesn’t sound something close like a reprimand.

“I don’t think so.” What an uncertain answer, Armin cannot help but think. Neither a lie nor the truth. “I’m just… tired.”

He decides not to pry any further, and lets it go for now because pushing, and maybe even arguing won’t do either of them any good. And perhaps, its because he can empathise with her too. Deep down, he knows it isn’t just the training and labour that is wearing her down. There was him, too. In that way, they are alike. However, their connection extends further than that.

They aren’t just connected because of him.

Either way, He doesn’t want to think of his name, much less say it out loud now. So, he changes the topic.

Somewhat.

“Please…be more careful next time.” He finds himself saying this before he could rethink his words. In Mikasa’s eyes, Armin never had his guard up so high around her. Because just as she trusts him, he trusts her. However, hearing him so vulnerable now seemed to have surprised her a little, and it softens her heart. It makes her feel a little more vulnerable than she already is, too. “I can’t lose you.” It sounds like a plea, and he is referring to the next time they are out on the actual battlefield; a place where lives are truly at risk, at stake. More prone to death. “That is… all I ask from you, Mikasa.” He whispers that last part in a hushed tone, and she could only wonder why.

“…I don’t have any bandages now.” Armin continues before Mikasa could reply. “Otherwise… your wounds are a little cleaner now. Ah… we better get you back to headquarters quick…” He grumbles the last part, and walks over to the river once more, rinsing the blood absorbed from the handkerchief before walking back.

When he returns back, his anxiousness does too. “Uh… your front.” He is vague. “I’ll… clean it now… so… uh… I… d-do you—”

His words are cut halfway, and his cheeks become redder when the woman in front of him unexpectedly turns towards him, facing straight at him. And even if her arms are still covering her breasts, there is still the sight of her cleavage that he tries to avoid looking at but it is difficult not to when he’d start cleaning the wound in front because...

Either way, he is astounded once again that the raven doesn’t mind being so exposed in front of him.

“M-Mikasa! W-What are you—”

He looks away so fast when she turns anyway, so he doesn’t notice the light, faint pinkness on the raven’s cheeks. “I trust you.” She says again, “There aren’t that many scars as compared to my back… the blood is still oozing out a little, but nothing serious…” She remarks as calmly as she could, forcing every stutter to die and her words to be more articulate. It is hard to maintain her usual levelled tone in her voice, but she tries to because she doesn’t want Armin to think she is uncomfortable or hates it.

Armin gulps again, and with his eyes still fixated on a random leaf on the ground, he marches to her in an awfully stiff way, kneels down, and Mikasa swears it took him more than a minute to finally be able to face her.

Despite their shyness and silence, there seems to be an unspoken understanding between them that prompts Mikasa to slowly loosen her arms, exposing her chest completely but Armin’s eyes aren’t focused—he makes sure they aren’t focus on her… womanly parts. He doesn’t want her to feel uncomfortable, and he isn’t sure if he can contain his blush if he even dares peek at them.

Besides, the long scar that stretched from the top of her chest, down to her upper stomach catches his attention the most. And his worry sinks back in, numbing his flustered self temporarily. Even if the wound isn’t that deep, he worries. His eyes soften as he cleans the blood dripping. For the first time, he never knew he could hate the colour red so much. And he can only hope that she wouldn’t drenched in it the next time he encounters her on the battlefield.

He doesn’t say anything for now, in fear of making her uncomfortable. He doesn’t even know what sort of conversation to even make, in this sort of situation. And as he is finishing cleaning up, Mikasa speaks.

“Sorry…” Mikasa suddenly apologises again, although she sounds sullener. “For you to see something so unsightly.” She is referring to her scars. And although she knows she—that both of them had seen worse, more gory things in their life, she can’t help but feel bad. It’s not like anyone wants to see a friend’s bleeding wounds. “And I’m sorry for troubling you.” He wonders if she is referring to her earlier obstinance.

“…Gee… what are you saying? You’d have done the same thing for me right?” Armin murmurs, and when he finishes cleaning the last bit of leaking blood, he garners some courage as his ocean hues meet her greyish ones that seemed a little brighter, perhaps due to the moonlight. Unsightly? He scoffs to himself. What is she talking about?

She is beautiful. He thinks immediately, and blushes at the sudden thought. And then finds himself mesmerised by her, by the trusting, loving look in her eyes that she doesn’t bother to hide, that she lets him see. Because Mikasa Ackerman cares for Armin Arlert deeply and what is there in that fact to hide? He shifts closer to her sub-consciously, as if his eyes want a closer peak of the ‘colourfulness’ hidden behind her orbs. Unknown to him, he is hypnotized. “You aren’t unsightly…” Words like that spill from the tip of his tongue, “Your eyes… they sparkle in the moonlight. Like last time.”

Last time…?

Mikasa finally sees his face, a little clearer now, and unknown to Armin, he is moving closer to her, and she is unsure why he suddenly complimented her eyes. Or why her heart begins to palpitate, or why there is warmth accumulating at her cheeks.

“Armin…?”

“Mika—”

But alas, the moment is ruined. Armin’s arm grazes her breasts lightly and most definitely accidentally, when he moves closer—but the fact that it was an accident doesn’t make the situation any better as Mikasa’s cheeks officially burnt red while Armin, upon realising what he had just done, instantly turns around and becomes a stuttering mess.

“I-I-I d-didn’t m—”

Mikasa finds herself covering her chest again. And even though she knows it’s an accident, it is still flustering.

Then suddenly, she recalls something, a moment back before their lives had taken a terrible direction. A moment before they realised and saw what life outside the walls was truly like. A moment, which had revealed to Mikasa back then that Armin wasn’t as innocent as she thought he was.

“…Armin, weren’t you the one who… had those indecent books that you later circulated around the boys for a while… before they got confiscated?”

Her statement doesn’t make this… his predicament any better, nor does it cure his stutters. If anything, it worsens them, and to make things worse, he feels his heart beating rapidly as he struggles to find words to explain.

“I-I…! I-It isn’t w-what you t-think! I—”

“…Perv.” She says it flatly, in such a cold way that almost drives Armin into tears of embarrassment. That was, until he heard a chuckle that followed after a minute of him internally suffering from being labelled as a perv by her.

A beautiful, angelic sort of sound he hadn’t heard from her for a while.

“W-Why—”

“You can turn around now.” She says, and he does so, hesitantly. She already has her bra back on, and her smile still stays plastered on her face after her chuckle.

What a sweet smile, he thinks.

“I still trust you.” She says softly, and that relieves him a little. But he is concerned that she didn’t withdraw her remark about him being a perv. Then again, to be fair… that indecent book incident…

He cut his thoughts off halfway when he sees her about to wear back that bloodied blouse. He immediately stops her, and Mikasa frowns, confused.

“Arm—”

Before she knows it, Armin is the one unbuttoning his blouse and before she is the one who turns to a stuttering, confused mess the blonde speaks, “It’s dirty… don’t wear it back”

He goes behind her, removes the dirtied blouse after handing her his own.

“Ah…” was all Mikasa could say, and she feels embarrassed at the fact that she thought he was undressing for… other reasons. And she is too stubborn to admit it, or say it out loud.

“Thank you.” She ends up saying, and she is genuinely grateful. Slowly, she puts on his blouse as Armin takes a seat behind her, his eyes looking over at her wounds. He notices some of them bleeding a little again, and it aches his heart but there is nothing much he can do with just a handkerchief.

“Sorry… for you to see something so unsightly.” Her remarks echo in his head, and he doesn’t like it.

Granted, Armin agrees that scars are anything but pretty. Because behind each scar, is pain. You can rarely find any beauty in them.

But when Armin sees Mikasa, he still finds her beautiful. Not just the outer appearance, but her heart. She may be regarded as cold by strangers, cruel by enemies… but he cannot help but find her heart beautiful, because he is one of the very few people she has ever made room for in there.

He leans in closer to her back, and before the blouse covers all her back as she buttons them, he presses his lips against the area near the nape of her neck. It all happened too fast, too instinctive; at least on his part. Armin was barely aware of the affection he just gave her.

Mikasa is caught off guard, and she flushes at his sudden ‘attack’. But she doesn’t hate it. She is just confused why he did it and… is puzzled about the sudden fluttering in her heart.

“A-Armin…?” She stutters out.

When his lips finally depart from her back, it seems like he hasn’t snapped out of the trance he is in, and isn’t completely aware of what he just did. And all he manages to say is, “You aren’t unsightly.”

Mikasa goes silent, and for some reason, she feels her entire body and nerves relax, as if such simple words provided her some sort of solace.

“…You really are a Perv.” She cannot help but reply, because she finds it unfair how he could do something like that… how he can surprise her just like that.

It is only when she calls him a Perv again, does he become fully aware of what his instincts drove him to do. He is now panicking and blushing madly. And then, he is struggling again, to find words to explain, to justify.

“…I could’ve cleaned my chest myself you know.” Mikasa says these words as if she had been aware of this fact all along. But really, that thought has only now occurred to her; and it probably flusters her more than the blonde whose cheeks grew redder (if it can already be redder than it already was) as the word Perv automatically and continuously reverberates in his head. He hopes Mikasa doesn’t really think of him as Perv.

It seems both of them had been too caught up in the moment.

Well, what’s done is done and Mikasa doesn’t seem to be bothered about Armin’s actions as much as he thinks she does. Not even the kiss on her back, which is something she chooses not to question now. Because she is sure they are both tired and given the current predicament—the one where they are in the middle of the forest, unable to head back using their gear since hers is faulty— and that it isn’t the best time to bring it up.

For now, the raven merely watches the blonde’s shyness grow increasingly as he mumbles out inarticulate words that she assumes are meant to explain and justify himself, and prove himself unguilty of his Perv nickname.

This is the same man who is able to use words as weapons against enemies, to push forward his beliefs. That same man was stammering, unable to find the right words and a part of Mikasa finds this side of his amusing. And maybe cute.

She doesn’t say anything after, as her heart chooses to treasure this little moment they have.

#AruMika #AruMika Fanfic #arumika fanfiction #attack on titan #snk #Mikasa Ackerman #aot #Armin Arlert #snk fanfic #aot fanfic #aot fanfiction #snk fanfiction #shingeki no kyojin fanfiction #attack on titan fanfiction #attack on titan fanfic #shingeki no kyojin #shingeki no kyojin fanfic #my fanfic

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the-awkward-outlaw · 4 years

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If you're doing requests can you do a kind of complicated one for me? Is there anyway you can do a transgender reader (m to f) x Arthur where Arthur realizes they're trans but still loves and accepts them? I'm doing this for my friend and I think she'd really appriciate it :)

Hello, Anon! I hope your friend reads this and that she likes it. Also, if I wrote something that is potentially offensive, please let me know so I can fix it! This is my first trans piece and while I know a couple of trans people, I don’t know them well enough to really get the deep details.

Also, I’m gonna say it since it’s pride month and this is a trans peice. Trans people are people and deserve to be treated as such! I may not know you, if you are a trans who is reading this, but I will support you until the end! YOU are the only person who has the responsibility and the privilege of being who you are.

Masterlist

Read on AO3

Arthur closes the door of the bathroom, listening to you whistle while you make yourself some lunch. He loves hearing you whistle, knowing it means you’re happy. As he relieves himself, he thinks about how happy he is with you.

As he begins washing his hands, you walk past the door. He hears you ask him to grab your hairband in one of your drawers, but you must not have heard him when he asked which one. Instead of demanding which one, he just begins ruffling through them. In the third one down on the wall, he finds a prescription bottle. Strange, he had no idea you had prescriptions. Curiosity gets the better of him and he reads the label. It says ampicillin. Looking again in the drawer, he finds a few more prescription bottles with other names he can’t pronounce.

Not knowing what it means, he pulls out his phone and types the name into it, but decides he’ll look up the result in a minute so you don’t get suspicious. He quickly finds your hairband and comes out, giving it to you.

While you’re busy finishing up lunch, he plops onto the couch and googles your meds. Instantly, his phone comes up with stating that it’s a drug to increase estrogen levels. Why would you need estrogen boosts? He looks up the other names and quickly comes to the conclusion that you’re taking boosts in female hormones, but there’s another pill you have that lowers male hormones. What in the world?

Instantly his heart starts pumping. Is there something you’re hiding from him? You walk out of the kitchen with your food in hand, beaming at him. He returns it briefly but then his face falls again.

As you sit beside him and flip on the TV to find something to watch on Netflix, you glance over and see the concerned expression on his face.

“You okay, Arthur?” you ask.

He puts his phone down. “Yeah. Except… I think we need to talk.”

“Okay,” you say in a neutral tone. He’s never done this before.

He sits up a little straighter and sighs. “I uh saw somethin’ in the bathroom drawers that I think we need to talk about. Darlin’, are you sick?”

“Sick? Why would you think that?” Your heart’s pumping though. You thought your medicines would be safe in that drawer, that Arthur would feel no need to look in that one since you told him your monthly lady things were in there, although it was a lie.

“Because I saw a bunch of medicines in there. Prescriptions,” he said.

You swallow hard, feeling your face pale. “Uh… no, no I’m not sick. They’re… they’re…”

Fuck, you haven’t told Arthur the truth. You were planning to eventually of course, but you just didn’t know how to do it from the start. You tried that tactic before with previous boyfriends and they’d all freaked out and run off. Arthur was special though, and you didn’t want him to do the same. Your eyes tear up. This is it.

He grabs your hand and gently squeezes it. “You know you can tell me anything, right darlin’?”

“I… I know. But… Arthur, you’re going to hate me for it.”

“Why would I do that?”

“Because everyone does. Everyone acts like it’s my fault, that I chose to be this way. I didn’t! All I chose to do was to right a wrong.”

He waits for you to answer as the tears slide down your cheek, but when you don’t, he goes on. “Darlin’, I don’t understand what you’re sayin’. Please tell me. Maybe I can help you.”

“Or you can run away,” you say dejectedly. Before he has the chance to respond, you decide to just tell him quick, like ripping off a bandaid. “Arthur, I’m…. I’m transgender. I… was born a… born with male parts, but I never felt like a male. So I made the decision to have things done and to be put on medicines that would make me female.”

You wait for him to start screaming, to call you horrible names, to be sick. Anything like the past men you’ve dated have done. His eyes are wide and his mouth is partially open. His hand is stiff around yours. You wait for him to say something. Instead he stands up, grabs his things, and heads out the door. After he closes it, you lose all your control and sob.

A few hours go by and you’ve heard nothing. You decided not to text him, figuring he’s either blocked your number or you’re the last person he’d want to speak to. It still hurts though to know he won’t be coming back.

That night, you go to bed and cry yourself to sleep. Why did you have to be cursed with a body that didn’t match who you are? Why do other people have the luck of having the right things to match themselves?

************************************

In the morning, you feel eyes on you as you start waking up. It’s not a comfortable feeling so you bolt up in bed to find Arthur sitting next to your bed. He smiles when you see him.

“A-Arthur?” you say in a pained voice.

“Hey, sweetheart,” he says and his hand slides onto the bed, looking for yours.

“What are you doing here? I thought… I thought after what I told you I’d never see you again.”

“Nah, I couldn’t do that to you. I’m sorry for leaving like that. It was wrong of me. But it was a bomb I wasn’t expecting to be honest, and I know it don’t make things right.”

You blink away the tears, feeling yourself closing up. You can’t afford to let yourself get hurt again.

“Darlin’, when I left yesterday, I went and looked up the steps I imagine you had to take, and not just the physical ones like surgeries and hormones and stuff. I went onto a lot of websites where transgenders and allies can talk and ask each other questions. I realized this must have been a long journey for you, that it probably started a long time ago when you figured out you didn’t feel what your body said you were.”

You smile a little and openly let yourself cry. “Yes, Arthur. I figured out a long time ago that I never felt like a boy, but I was in denial for a long time.”

“Well, come on. I’ll make ya some coffee. Why don’t you tell me your story? I wanna hear it.”

“You’re not mad? I… I lied to you, Arthur, and there’s a lot of people who will say that I’m… still a man because that’s what my chromosomes say or because I can’t have babies like a woman.”

“Yeah well those assholes can go fuck themselves,” Arthur growls. “It ain’t their job or their privilege to say what you are. Only you can decide that. ‘Sides, I ain’t mad. How long you and I been together now?”

“A… a little over a year.”

“Yes, and I haven’t had to worry once about whether or not you was gonna be faithful. Y’know, a few of my past girlfriends were datin’ other men within months of me datin’ them. Face it, darlin’, you’re the best girl I’ve ever had. I don’t wanna lose you. And it ain’t like it’s your fault about you bein’ trans. Can I tell you a secret?”

You nod and he helps you stand up, smiling at you. “I think you’re incredibly brave. I can’t imagine the fear you held and still have, and how you chose to defy the people who say you couldn’t do this and instead said ‘I can and I will’. But you don’t have to be alone anymore. I’ll always be here by your side. I love you too much to do anythin’ else.”

The kiss you share after this, albeit a wet one due to your tears, is one that the both of you will remember for years to come.

#rdr2 fanfic #red dead fanfic #arthur morgan #arthur morgan x female reader #awkward asks

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