#can you tell i’m projecting onto both of them lmao

[halcyone-of-the-sea]

Hi Hal!

Congratulations on finishing all the requests (there were so many good ones!!) and thank you for opening them up again!! I’m excited to see what you have in store for us with all your other projects, bestie!!! 😊😊

I was unsure of who to request at first because there are so many good ones but then I saw Hesh’s name and an idea hit me.

If you’re ok with it, could you possibly write one for Hesh where the reader is part of the Ghosts has been taken/captured by the Federation and after some time, they get intel on where she is so they go out to rescue her and she and Hesh are reunited? I don’t know if you want it to be a pre-established relationship or one where they both admit their feelings after they get her back, so I’m leaving it up to you. But I need a little rescue/reunion fic to fill the void in my heart that the ending of Ghosts made.

As always, feel free to change it up as you see fit and do whatever you want. I just think that Hesh deserves more love and I wouldn’t be opposed to seeing Riley again (aka: the best dog in the world)!!

Thank you and remember to take care of yourself and I appreciate you and your work!! 💕💕 Love you, bestie!!!!

Lengths Of Love

PAIRING: David 'Hesh' Walker x F!Reader

SYNOPSIS: You'd loved Hesh for as long as you can remember, and you'd pulled him out of trouble for even longer, but you'd never had the courage to tell him how you feel. Until you do. Until you're being dragged away from his broken body.

WORDCOUNT: 10.7k

WARNINGS: Major spoilers for CoD: Ghosts, heavy angst, blood, guts, descriptions of wounds, canon-typical violence, weapons and firearms, death, torture involving: drugs/hallucinogens, physical violence, mental stress, talks of PTSD, anxiety, paranoia, rescue fic, best friends to lovers plot, wounds that would 100% kill you that you live from (plot armor fr), etc.

A/N: Bestie, I don't know what you put into your prompts, lmao, but I always end up writing so much for you!! Thanks so much for sending something in <3<3

*I do not give others permission to translate and/or re-publish my works on this or any other platform*

The beginning of the end started with good intentions and one statement. 

“You hear this? It’s Rorke. He’s here. They’re evacuating on the train system below.” Hesh’s green eyes darted to you and Logan, his painted face a collection of rage and surety. The three of you were, in an instant, in agreement of revenge—there was no question as to what had to be done. Merrick couldn’t stop you, not on this. 

Rorke had made one of the most dangerous decisions of his life, and that was underestimating the Walker boys and their partner in sinful crime. 

“Harp,” you look away from the body of the warhead as it enters the atmosphere, locking onto Hesh’s hard eyes; the ones that had grown steadily colder since the death of his father, Elias. But it wasn’t just him—the patriarch had been close to you as well. The knowledge of his passing, witnessing it as the rope restraints seared into your flesh, had lit an all-consuming fire in your gut.

Like hounds, the scent of blood had hit the air. 

“Let’s get the bastard. Now or never,” you ease out, and Logan darts his gaze down to you from behind his balaclava. 

“Damn right,” Hesh barks, nodding firmly to you.

Anyone would have missed the way your gaze lingered on him as he darted off and began rushing down the stairs from the control room, Logan ever quick at his heels. But they wouldn’t have missed the way your breath pushed out a soft sigh as your eyes kept locked on the back of Hesh’s head as you followed after. 

You’d been childhood friends since practically infancy, a neighbor to the Walkers. It was natural that Hesh would grow to be the object of your daydreams ever since grade school; a constant and digging knife into your heart when he’d repeatedly pick other girls over you.

But such was life. 

All that mattered now was bringing down Rorke, silly love could wait.

“Merrick,” Hesh yelled down his line, the world outside this building rampant with open war. “The missile’s away and we’ve got a lead on Rorke, we’re going after him!” 

The white double doors meet the three of you as you all rush to them, and the panicked man’s voice flashes down the line immediately. 

“Negative Hesh! You three get back here and return to the rally point. We’ll track him down together.”

You call, “Isn’t an option, Merrick. We can’t let this one go.” 

You and Hesh ram your shoulders into the doors, Logan darting through first with his weapon drawn down the hallway. The brunette’s and your shoulders brush in a jostling of gear—pulling the back as your eyes lock. Cold light seeps from overhead, metal under your feet clanking in-key.

You look away before Hesh agrees and levels with the Ghost over the line to push your point. “Sorry, Merrick. Your mission is complete…ours isn’t.”

Federation heads pop up from behind makeshift barriers of barrels and other stacked items and as you all enter and clear rooms, alarms blare with the ferocity of fighting lions. Hesh keeps by your side, offering you openings that you greedily take as another soldier falls with a stiff twitch of your finger on the trigger. 

Darting behind cover, the man slams to the space beside you, calling over above the noise and the whizz of bullets.

“How long till impact?!” You shove a new clip into your FAD, brushing sweat and blood from your cheeks, smearing patches of your own paint. 

Glancing at the watch on your wrist, you hear Logan pushing the line. You dart out of cover to help—locking onto hostiles and backing up the younger brother with quick feet.

“Eight minutes, Hesh! You got a plan that doesn’t leave me with scorched hair?” He finds it in himself to laugh, clocking a soldier to your left and riddling him with bullets. 

“We need to get to that train, Harp. Don’t worry—I’ll kiss the burns away for you.” He rushes past and sends a smirk over his shoulder. You’re left stunned for a second, wishing that the teasing tilt to the older brother’s words was more than that. You blink, and the feeling is forced away.

Later.

“Keep pushing, Logan,” Hesh moves on. You all sprint down descending ramps, farther and farther underground with every step; adrenaline building to a breakneck level like weight slowly being added over and over to a chest. “We need to get to Rorke!” 

You didn’t want to tell him, but, while revenge was on your plate as well, this was a very reckless idea.

As you grab for a grenade from your belt and jerk on the pin, you chuck it down the way and call out a warning to the boys, who, like a well-oiled machine, dart and wait for it to detonate. Bodies fly, bloody splashes of torn limbs, and three Ghosts materialize from the smoke with masked and painted faces; eyes like fire and veins boiling. 

“Fire team suppressed in 3-1,” Hesh shouts through the line as you slide your knife into a man’s eye, his goggles breaking in a shattering of glass. “Advancing to loading bay!” 

There’s a large elevator ahead for transporting crates, and all of you jog inside as the gate creaks shut.

Merrick’s stiff voice replies, “Roger that.”

Silently, you click into the channel and mutter out as a moment of relative peace coats your body like a blanket, even if for a few small seconds. 

“I’ll keep ‘em safe,” a small twitch of your lips, “Commander.”

A deep and unimpressed voice wafts into your ear with a large sigh. “Know you will—just remember to keep yourself safe in the process, Kid…Don’t do anything stupid.”

You shift your gaze to Hash and find green already staring at you. Blinking, the man quickly darts his vision away and after a moment you turn your face back down to the connection and huff through a burning epidermis.

“Haven't you heard?” The elevator shows the train as it descends down, and you call to the boys, ‘six minutes’, with a firm voice. 

“Stupid seems to follow us three everywhere.”

Hesh points as the figures of more soldiers walk around below. “There’s Rorke’s train, straight ahead!” Sure enough, the worm of black and gray metal extends to your eyes across the large room

“He’ll be on there soon. Logan, take left.” You order and the brown-eyed man nods from beside you, shouldering his rifle and checking the clip. “Hesh?” 

“Taking right—you got Point, Doll.” He stares at you, licking his lips. “Clear the way?” You tilt your head at him as the elevator jumps to a stop, the barrier sliding away. It pains you to look away.

There were so many things you had to tell him. Too many things. 

“Always.” Shiting your face forward, you take a breath and take notice of points of cover, scoping the room in three seconds flat. Screeching wheels and alarms ingrain your eardrums. “On me.” 

As you head out first, fire the first bullet, the two peel off in opposite directions, Hesh only sliding up beside you and uttering into your ear.

“Be safe.” 

That comment makes you want to be anything but, if only he’d whisper into your ear like that again. 

Clearing the room, you can’t get your mind off the fact that this crush was overtaking nearly every part of your life—years of quiet agony and staying your tongue in fear of losing what great friendship you had. 

The stock set into your shoulder recoils with another burst of fire, Federation soldiers scream in pain, but you barely register over the shadows in the sides of your vision. 

“Damnit, Hesh,” you growl, bullet grazing your shoulder as you grunt and slip behind a concrete divider. 

“What’s that?” Your eyes widen comedically. Shit…had you forgotten to close the line? 

“Eh,” you clear your throat, grimacing at the small sparks of pain in your shoulder. “N-nothing.” 

There’s a bout of silence and then a panting voice, rough and growing more serious. “You alright over there, Harp?” You can’t even respond before Hesh quickly continues. “I’m comin’ to you. Stay there.”

You violently shake your head, although he can’t see it.

“Hesh, I’m fine! Keep right and clear that hallway.” 

There’s a deep grunt. “Fine, but if I see one scratch I’m makin’ Riley chase you down the Base when we get back.”

If we get back.

You roll your eyes with a growing smile, steeling yourself and slamming your weapon to the top of the divider before locking onto your targets. “Please, we both know he loves me too much for that.”

“Most I’ll have to do is put a treat in your pocket, Sweetheart.” His sly smirk is heard easily, and you swallow tense-like and breathe shakily. That low drawl in his tone left you more distracted than you could ever get used to. “Hell,” There’s a struggle over the line before the shink of a knife meeting flesh. A breathless chuckle that leaves your gut swirling. “Maybe I’ll just chase you down myself.”

Logan coughs over the line and you have to click off before you scream. Your face flares up until your ears ring and you have to duck behind your cover again before you get metal right to the forehead. 

Behind the barrier, you glare at the floor.

When did general teasing get so hard for you? Jokes and jabs carrying weight—since when? Sure you’d liked—more liked loved—Hesh since before all of this, but you’d carried on well enough. 

“Fucking hell,” you grumble, shaking your head to clear it and rushing. 

The brothers pop through the side hallways to flank the enemy, taking out the one or two hostiles that were still breathing after you level your barrel with the last standing head; firing with a burst of gunpowder.

“Train’s leaving, let's go!” Hesh screams, waving an arm quickly at you, walking backwards on quick feet. “Harp, C’mon!” 

You chuff, hopping the divider and sprinting as the metal object speeds up—there’s a moment where you fear you might miss it, Hesh and Logan both forced to hop on even in your absence.

“Harp!” Green eyes flash, one hand on the railing and the other extended out. 

“On it!” Snapping, you slam your palm into his and feel his strong fingers curl to clutch you. Logan grabs your collar and helps; the both of them easily yanking you over just as the wall of the tunnel engulfs you all in illuminated shadow.

Back meeting the train’s body, you pant and chuckle as Logan shakes his head, amused, and pats your shoulder. You wink at him jokingly. 

“Good save there, Walker Number Two.”

Hesh grabs the side of your neck, looking you over as he leans back with a breathless chuckle at the title for his brother. He blinks quickly at your shoulder, eye narrowing before he reaches out and looks at the blood on your gear.

“You mind telling me what this is, Doll?” You make a nose in the back of your throat as the smell of his musk hits your nostrils; the deadly concoction of his scent and his digging gaze.

Stuttering, you huff. “Eh…bullet graze?”

You’re leveled with thin lips, but Logan grabs his brother by the upper arm and peels him off you, motioning to his radio as the train gains even more speed. Wind whips past your face as Hesh clears his throat, quickly avoiding your eyes. 

The man’s splotchy paint shows his red skin under the darker pigment. 

“Merrick, we’re on the train,” he speaks, shifting past you without another look. “We’re going after Rorke.”

“Solid Copy.” You watch the brunette walk away and hold your breath, though you don’t know why—heart beating not just because of adrenaline. 

Embarrassment breeding in your stomach, you ignore Logan’s knowing stare and push off the wall, rubbing at your bleeding shoulder with a stiff hand. 

—

You break a man’s neck against the wall, hand on the back of his head before you slam it into the hard metal. There’s a crunch of bone and a broken rattle before the broadcasted feed from the screen on the train’s panel spits out a message in panicked Spanish to the already deceased men.

“Evacuation protocol C is in effect. All personnel secure cargo and supplies—”

Hesh interrupts ahead of you as you let the body drop, scowling at the heavy sound of its dead weight. At his angry voice, you perk and tune in.

“Tell Rorke we’re comin’ for him.” There’s a quick shove from the other end of the feed, the previous man disappearing as the individual that takes his place makes your eyes go to slits. A great growl like a wolf echoes from your heart and seeps from between your clenched teeth. 

Rorke’s scarred face appears with a smirk and a cocky voice.

“Why don’t you just tell me yourself?” You look at your boys, more concerned for them as you watch firsthand the trauma the death of their father brought them. 

Logan holds his weapon tighter, fixing his grip. Hesh is a bit more direct. He leans closer to the screen, bearing his teeth like a dog and snarling with rage and hatred.

“You’re done, Rorke.” All of a sudden he peels back a fast fist and sends it careening into the screen—making a shattering of glass and a hard thud emanate deep into your bones. 

Blinking quickly, you tense as it happens, not expecting that. But as soon as you try to make sense of it, the brunette is already banking off to the side door, calling a sharp, “Let’s finish this!”

He grabs the side of the train car and wrenches on the handle, grunting and pushing with all of his might.

“Hesh,” you try to reason, stepping in now before things get too hot. “We need to think of a plan before you rush into things. This could get us in a heap of shit that we might not be able to get out of.”

It’s like he doesn’t hear you, and you spare a glance with Logan for help. But he, too, has already joined his brother with a swish of gear on the handle. With one great push, the door opens to the outside brightness, making your face turn away for a moment. 

Along the far expanse of open sand dunes outside; mountains flanking the bridge this train flies across, you get the perfect view of a warhead meeting the ground in an explosion of fire and death. It bursts far across the valley, and you cover your eyes as the sharp ball of light burns your retinas. 

The shockwave hits moments later, and Hesh says easily as the train shakes and squeals like a metal pig, “Looks like Icarus got control of the rods!” The boys step out onto the platform along the train, and you have no option but to follow. “All that’s left is Rorke, let's go!”

“Hesh,” you try again, hissing out his name, and you’re graced with a quick glance.

“Harp,” he comments, “what is it? We can’t wait any longer—”

“What we can’t do is go in blind!” You shout above the wind, legs stanced to help you stay up. Green eyes twitch with confusion, perhaps even a little hurt. 

“Blind? What are you talking about, we push forward and take what’s owed.” You know how much this means to him—to Logan—but there was a point where pride and stubbornness outweighed sense. This was dangerous, especially for Hesh. 

You were always the one to keep him level; keep him from becoming too much like his dad. 

You’d promised that old bastard you’d look after his boys, albeit in a teasing sense, but to you, it had been a stark vow on your soul. Logan was a brother to you, and Hesh…Hesh would always be more, but that only made your love for them both grow. 

“You keep those two from getting in their heads, you hear? They mean well, but there’s no one I trust more than you to level them out, Harp. I’m proud of you. And I’m sure your folks would be too.” Elias had said that, and when he died you bottled it up and used so much force that coal had turned to diamond. 

You would keep Logan and Hesh safe. Safe, and level, and not hard-headed. 

For as much as you secretly loved your brunette, he sure was stubborn as all hell.

“If you want out, Harp,” Hesh calls to you, gritting his teeth. “Just wait back in the train car. This is something we can’t put off like everything else—this ends now; today. I’m not letting Dad’s killer survive.”

“Son of a bitch, that’s not what I’m saying!” You’re quickly losing your standing. Logan jogs ahead to scout, time ticking. “Hesh, you know that I loved Elias as much as you two did—not one is denying that this needs to happen. I'm with you. But this is too damn dangerous! We can’t rush into this without a plan of attack; of exfil! Do you even know how we’re going to get off of this thing?!” 

Hesh had been isolating the few days he had on the U.S.S Liberator, keeping to his room. The man idolized his father and put him on a pedestal of gold even when he was a teenager. He’d even pushed away from you, which all together was unheard of. Logan had nearly had an aneurism when you’d come back to the cafeteria and shook your head in disappointment after trying to get him to open his door. 

The two of you told each other everything. Always. That was just…how it was.

But the man that Hesh had donned the skin of was not the man you loved.

Hesh glares at you, eyes going alight with anger. 

“If you were with me, you wouldn’t be holding me back.” He turns and runs after Logan, leaving you behind in the open air as the train banks left and right with the sway of the bridge. 

Staring. Barely breathing. Mouth parted and eyes wide. 

When the man is at the end of the current train car, having to jump a small distance to the next, he pauses. His back is tight, and under him, his feet shuffle. 

There’s a moment you hope he’ll turn around and come back, take you into one of his hugs, and squeeze the life out of you. It wouldn’t be such a cruel way to die, you think, to be held in his arms. 

But the next moment you see the back of his head shake, and he jumps over to the next section, not even giving you a second glance.

You don’t want to admit how long you waited there, your mind jumbled and confused. 

Don’t take it personally, you try to tell yourself, sucking down a breath before slowly walking forward. He’s hurt. Grieving. He didn’t mean it.

Rationality was a tool of the level-headed, and you were anything but that nowadays.

Over the line Hesh’s voice makes you flinch as you slowly follow after, train car after train car.

“Rorke must be at the front of the train!” You step over dead bodies and lend merciful bullets to the ones still writhing, boots coated in crimson. Following a trail of wreckage with stiff lungs. 

Stay out of his way? Fine, you could do that.

You stayed back from the head-to-head fighting, laying covering fire and keeping off the comms—whenever Hesh managed to look back at you, you simply moved on to the next hostile. 

Eventually, you all ended up on the rooftops, the boys far ahead and yourself blank-faced at the rear. Logan was acting more concerned than Hesh was, glancing at you constantly in confused worry. But it was very much short-lived.

“Incoming!” The right side of the railcar bursts with fire, and you gasp before grappling for the opposite side of the train, keeping you there before the swaying beast leveled out. “Helos. Take cover and take out the gunners!”

You scoff, quickly making your way behind a connector joint to lean your back against it and catch your breath. Two helicopters fly alongside the train, Logan already firing at one, and Hesh…your eyes narrow with annoyance. Hesh was already running ahead of the pack, his low grunts and growls over the line giving way to his impatience. 

You click your jaw and try to remind yourself that this is the same man who held you close during movie nights and carried you to bed when you fell asleep. Made you waffles when your boyfriend in eighth grade broke up with you on Valentine’s Day.

Stitched your wounds before he gave them a teasing ‘kiss better’ and looked up at you through dark lashes. 

You wildly shake your head to force yourself back to the present.

The gunners are harder to hit not only based on wind and distance alone, but on the erratic movements of the pilots. It’s several clips before you down the second Helo, and Logan’s follows immediately after as they both collide and ram into the mountainside.

You both share a glance and rush after the misguided brunette. 

At the end of the train, only the engine remains. 

“Clear!” Hesh relays, jumping down from the roof of the railcar and hurriedly walking to the white door, leaning against the wall. “We’re at the last car, Logan. Rorke’s pinned, he knows we’re comin’.”

You gaze down from the top as Logan follows, silent and brooding. Your hands along your FAD tighten under your gloves. You don’t even look at the man. 

“Merrick, do you copy?”

“Copy, Hesh.”

“We’re moving in on Rorke.” You slide him a look, seeing him glaring those pretty greens into the ground. “If you hear the word “Checkmate”, you will fire on our position! Confirm?” Your eyes snap with horror, heart lurching.

Surely, you hadn’t heard that right.

Merrick’s voice echoes your frozen confusion. “Say again, repeat your last.”

You jump down and stagger for a moment, barking out a harsh, “What the fuck are you doing?” Inside of your chest, your heart rampages like it never had before. “That’s suicide!”

He was going to kill everyone to bring down Rorke, and you get no answer beyond a clenched jaw and a quick side-eye.

“You heard me, Merrick, on “Checkmate”, hit this train!” The connection is cut and Logan gets into position to shoulder the door open, you watch, stuttering. 

Hesh levels with his brother, “We can’t take any chances, Logan. Even if we fail, Rorke dies.” Panic builds, and you’re taking quick steps forward.

You keep those two from getting in their heads, you hear?

You have to stop them, you have to drag them away—but even you know that deep down the only thing that will stop these two is a bullet. 

Eyes snapping back and forth, you only get close enough to try and snatch at Hesh’s arm right as he finishes a countdown of three; at the end, Logan kicks down the engine room door with a violent connection of his boot.

Even with the drop on the three guards inside, it doesn't stop the bullet from ripping through your lower side, preoccupied and distracted yet again. You yell loudly, balking back into the door frame and hunching over as blood spurts out of you. Hesh’s head whips your way immediately, jaw going slack and a soul-deep hysteria takes over.

So now he pays attention.

“Shit, Harp!” So little time. 

Logan can’t take care of the last remaining Fed soldier by himself, and in a large act of self-sabotage, that very soldier just happened to have a missile launcher. 

The entire left engine explodes—the train jerks; everyone is sent in a back-and-forth motion, first hitting off the last train car before being sent right back through the engine room entirely. A transference of force gives you whiplash as your head bounces off the door frame. 

The world goes blurry, body hitting and slamming through layers of glass and pain before the control room is suddenly where you end up, using the body of a stunned guard as a cushion. 

There’s a second of muffled gunfire, struggling and yelling—and then it all comes back into focus like a sniper’s scope being correctly sighted. You gargle an expletive and shove the guard under you back down despite the searing heat in your side and head; struggling to unsheathe your combat knife as the world tilts. 

Hands push at your cheeks, grip at your neck futilely, but when you get the blade out and struggle the hands down once more, you hammer the point into his throat with a thump of your boot pressing for purchase on the floor. 

The man spasming, you push off of him and slam to the ground, coughing in great lung-shattering segments.

“You can’t win, Rorke!” Hesh’s voice brings you back from the swirling, and you hear your blood patter to the metal floor like rain.

“Shit,” you mutter, gasping for air. 

Gazing up you see Rorke holding Logan in a chokehold, free hand pointing a gun at Hesh. Your eyes bulged, trying to push onto your knees and reach for your weapon as you saw Hesh continually looking away from the target and worriedly watching you. His hands at his sides are loose, but when you lock eyes with him, they clench and shake. 

“It’s over—” He tries, but the loud gunshot bounces off the train’s enclosed space. You’re yelling before you can think, darting forward and leveling your gun right to Rorke’s head as Hesh’s form collapses to the ground.

Standing on unsteady feet, you pant and stumble, but the devil’s brown eyes hold you captive. Rorke smirks as you guard Hesh behind you. 

“Well, well, well, seems the girl’s just as promising as you, eh, Logan? She’s the other one who slipped her binds in Las Vegas.” He laughs. “Look at me, I’m surrounded by young talent.” 

“I don’t exactly care if you are or aren’t,” you growl, shuffling to keep Hesh even farther behind you as you instrumentally cough again. Your legs are wobbling. “Just that you put my fucking friend down.”

“You willing to die for him?” Rorke looks demented, with his scar and his intimidating build. Whatever torture he had been through to make him like this—a Ghost killer—it had worked perfectly. There was no coming back from this. He whistles lowly. “That’s some loyalty you have there.”

His mind was dead to all else.

You don’t hesitate in an answer, even as the man behind you grabs your leg, trying to move you with a wheezing breath.

“H-Harp,” his spine moves in a cough. “Don’t…please.”

“Always.” Interest alights in those dark, tiny eyes. Logan tries to give you messages with his gaze, but you ignore him. Ironic. “That’s not something I’ll break on. Unlike you.”

“Shit, Kid,” there’s a grand laugh, “now that’s heartless…but good,” Rorke glances at Hesh, raising a brow and chuckling. “I’ll love to see the look in his eyes when I—”

“Checkmate!”

“Checkmate confirmed.” You look down at Hesh and see him watching you, his gaze open and bare. 

“I’m sorry,” he gasps, but all you can do is watch. 

There’s no time to think.

“I love you,” you confess in a fleeting moment of bare nothingness, blurting it out. “I’ve loved you.”

Hesh’s body entirely halts, jaw slowly slackening in horror; something shifts behind his eyes but before he can open his mouth, a rageful bark bullies the smooth tone of his throat back.

“What did you do?!” Your form is bodied into the controls behind you, colliding as you snarl and are forced to recover. With a snap of your finger, you fire a shot into Rorke’s foot. 

He yells and whips his wrist back, slamming the butt of his gun into your temple. 

As the bridge ahead of the train explodes, Hesh drags himself to cover your body, muttering into your flesh words you cannot name as the darkness sets in.

“It’s over,” Hesh speaks grimly to Rorke, turning to look at him silently as he presses your head into his chest, sharing a nod and thin-lipped look with Logan still stuck in his arm. “It’s over.”

“Shit, Son…” The train gets thrown and broken in a wave of utter destruction and rebirth; and through it all, Hesh never lets go—not even when the water below comes up to meet you.

—

The beach’s sand is coarse, and it sticks to your gear with a fervent hold. To your skin, the paint, and blood, for the moment washed away as hands dragged you from the water, small puffs of breath and whimpers greeting you. 

“C’mon, Sweetheart.” Hesh. And he sounded frantic. “C’mon, open…open your eyes, dammit. Please, you just told me the best thing you possibly could. Please.” 

Water slips off your neck, and as you’re weakly lying back, propped against a rock, hands slip to your cheeks, moving the skin as a barely conscious body tries to make you wake up. 

A forehead hits against your shoulder, a deep groan of pain emanating from the man who grips at your gear.

“No, no, c’mon,” Hesh can barely keep himself sitting up, bloody and broken. Logan had to drag him from the water not seconds prior, and in turn, Hesh had grabbed what little strength was left and helped him get you. “Logan!” Green darts to brown, and the older brother pleads in a broken voice, “Help me!”

You bend your head forward and cough up blood and water, shoving Hesh away from you so you can collapse on your side and expel your stomach.

“Harp,” the man quickly mutters, dragging himself over and grabbing your shoulder to keep your face out of the sand. “Fuck, okay—it’s okay I’ve got you.”

“You,” your voice cuts out, and you shake as you gasp and sputter, “A-are a fucking idiot!” 

Hesh chuckles, and you feel his head hit off your arm, his struggling breath. “God, I know. I know, Sweetheart.” 

Logan crawls over to you, pushing you back against the rock and grappling for his medical pouch as Hesh patches into the comms. You grunt and look down at the younger brother, head swirling in colors and ears pounding with your pulse. 

“Merrick, do you copy? Merrick, come in.”

“Hesh! Hesh, is that you?” You weakly smirk at the shock and relief from the tone, letting your head tilt back as Logan hurriedly packs your gunshot wound with gauze. You wince and stare at the sky—blood infectiously tinging the sand below you. 

Hesh tries to help too, but you and the man are in far worse shape than Logan. The older brother’s shoulder leans into yours heavily, and you shift your eyes to the side as they flutter.

You haven't forgotten what you told him, what you confessed, but right now pushing back the black in the sides of your vision was more important.

And Rorke. What had happened to Rorke?

“Yeah,” Hesh watches you, face screwed with concern. “Yeah, I’m with Harp and Logan. We’re…we’re alive. Rough shape, but alive.”

“And Rorke?” You hold your breath.

“Dead.” Logan ties off a quick tourniquet and your spine tightens in agony, hissing out as your nerves spike with electricity. The brown-eyed man spares you a sorry glance but you shake your head in dismissal. “He’s dead.” 

Out in the water, the enemy warships are firing off missiles inland, some smoking and others already sinking. Merrick gives you the news as Hesh brings a hand up to your chin, tilting your head his way. You go willingly, skin on fire from the scrape of his gloves. 

Logan moves back, having done what he can, before he collapses back into the sand, panting with an arm over his stomach. His older brother’s forehead bumps into yours, eyes stuck. 

“Copy that. The Federation is in full retreat—the rest of the payload is inbound to finish the…”

Whatever else Merrick relays is lost and Hesh’s lips splay over yours, his nose letting out a long breath and body sagging, dead-weight. Cheeks hot and mind running, you let instinct take over and reciprocate, quick fingers pulling at his vest straps.

“Since when?” He asks, breathless when he moves back an inch. 

“After you introduced me to your first girlfriend, Cassie Albrook,” you smile, eyes crinkling. “Seventh grade. The one with the black hair? God, I was so jealous.” 

Hesh chuckles deeply, body jerking as he kisses you again, pulling back and holding your cheek in his hand. His eyes are wide and open.

“You mean to tell me, I could have been kissin’ you all the way back since seventh grade?” Your face moves with pure love, flesh going soft—even the pain diminishes somewhat. 

Merrick’s voice still gruffly moves down the line, and the last bits of his sentence are heard. 

“...Sit tight, Recon’s comin’ for ya.” Everything was looking up. 

Missiles slam into the Federation ships out in the water, the sudden burst of liquid and fire making Hesh briefly cover you with his side to protect you from the shockwave. When you turn to look, nothing but sinking metal remains. 

“I’m sorry,” Hesh tells you, and you don’t have the energy to pull away from his neck as you let your head rest—the thumping of your brain and the calming shadow of his form giving way to believe you had a concussion. 

“Hm,” you hum, letting him continue. His voice echoed in his breast.

“I…I’ve been an ass these past few days, weeks, I shouldn’t have said what I did—wanted to take it back as soon as I turned away from you.” You close your eyes and sigh long, sarcastic even now. 

“You owe me dinner and a movie, then I’ll see if I can forgive you.” Hesh chuckles, nose pressing down into your scalp. He kisses you there as water falls from his chin.

“Sounds like a plan, Doll.” The man lets himself rest, curled around you and waiting for the recon team as the sand and the water move. “I love you too…just so you know. Long time.”

Your failing mind lets off a scoff. But a happy one.

When you wake again, not remembering when you’d fallen asleep, it is to the sound of screaming. 

“Logan!” You jolt up and have to place a hand on your head to stop the pounding. Hesh is struggling to move, fighting to get to his younger brother who you turn as quickly as you’re able to face. “Logan!”

Your face voids of blood. 

Rorke is dragging the other man away, pushing him to the ground as Logan tries to fight like a dog on his back, with only one arm working properly. Growling, you try to stand—body falling and sliding right back down as Rorke kicks Logan’s combat blade from his hand, walking over to you and Hesh. 

He stands and pants, limping from your shot to his foot and a hand across his abdomen in obvious pain.

“Look what you did,” Rorke motions behind him to the still-falling missiles being disposed of from space into the ocean; atop the wreckage of what Rorke had been a part of. Falling to your side, you leave behind a raging Hesh who attempts to move and get to Rorke while you go to Logan. The devil wheezes and points from you to the boys, forcing a grunt of approval. “You’re good.”

Hesh is shoved back by a ruthless boot into the rock, and you snarl, coming over to Logan and his very broken arm as he weakly writhes on the ground. You place your body over his and bare your teeth as if a beast. 

“Rorke!” You bark. “It’s over! It’s done. Everything you’ve built is dead and recon is on its way for us…you’re finished.”

“Nothin’s finished, no,” Hesh tries to lunge again as Rorke’s body stumbles closer to you but falls into ragged coughs and stays on his side in utter agony. 

“Stay away from them!” The man you’d just confessed to hisses, hand grasping futilely at the sand. Green eyes run back and forth from you to Logan, desperate and breaking by the second. “Rorke! You son of a bitch!”

“Nothin’s ever finished.” Grabbing you by the scruff of your neck, you’re being tossed off Logan and thrown to the side in a cloud of sand, body screaming at you as you yell out loudly. 

Rorke bends a knee to look Logan in the eyes, shaking his head.

“You’d of been a hell of a Ghost.” Yelling, you wrench at the combat knife in your vest, set your feet, and tackle Rorke off of the Walker boy with a feral curse on your breath. 

“Get the fuck off of—” Your leg twists with a defining crack as you’re grappled and thrown off, only able to slice a nice long cut down his jaw and at the beginning of the man’s throat. 

Screaming you hear briefly Hesh’s rageful bellow, his calling of your name in high keens of helplessness. Promises of revenge and justice. 

Breath breaking as tears line the back of your eyes, Rorke comes over you and pins your dominant hand to the ground—you look up and grimace, trying to make your body function. 

Move!

Rorke laughs, great shoulders shaking with glee. He’s fucking demented as he continues his sentence from before your fruitless attack. 

“...But that’s not gonna happen, is it?” The man smiles and you struggle as Logan and Hesh rapidly try to assist. 

“Harp!”

“There ain’t gonna be any Ghosts.” Rorke’s eyes shift to Hesh, and you follow with a sense of dread and horror. The man’s mind had been made up when he turned back around, disregarding Logan entirely in favor of you and your ‘unbreakable’ loyalty. 

The joy it would bring him to destroy you and set you loose after such. Set you loose on Hesh. 

He leans in close to you, so you can feel his breath and his conviction. 

“We’re gonna destroy ‘em together.” 

“Harp!” You’re shoved back, knife grasped and ripped from your hand as your broken leg is grabbed and pressure is applied. 

You scream again, arms carding across the dunes as Rorke begins dragging you backward like a child holding onto a stuffed toy. Blown green eyes meet yours, Hesh reaching out and screaming at the top of his lungs for you. 

But he can’t move.

“Harp!” 

And you can’t feel your fingers. 

“I love you,” you whisper, perhaps for the last time and he sees your lips move. Hesh screams and slams his hand into the ground, Logan stumbling to his knees but immediately dropping back with a small cry. 

And Rorke chuckles.

—

You don’t know where he took you, but you do know the jungle floor is cold and wet, and the mud under your fingernails makes you feel gross. 

What you do know is that the earthen walls of the pit you are in are pointless to try to climb—the top is slatted with a covering of long sticks with wide square openings. You know it’s going to rain by the smell in your bloodied nostrils. 

You know that your leg is broken, your bullet wound is festering through the tourniquet, and your concussion is making you sleepy. 

In your head, you count these ‘knowns’ and sprinkle them like seeds as you stare blankly at the sky far above. Everything aches; hurts. When you breathe, it comes in and out with a wheeze. 

You know that Hesh loves you, and perhaps that’s the only fact you care about. Wherever he is, you’re glad he can’t see you like this. 

Rain patters against your head, the storm clouds finally rolling through. Leaves can be heard shuffling on their branches. You breathe in and out, rising and settling your lungs slowly. 

You can’t break—not like Rorke. 

No matter what he did to you, you can’t betray the Ghosts. Logan. Hesh.

Elias’s words echo as you curl into a tiny ball, shivering and whimpering as your wounds move and pull. 

...I’m proud of you. And I’m sure your folks would be too.

You know this game. Torture. They’ll pump you full of hallucinogens, starve you, beat you within an inch of your life; and through that you cannot give in.

But it’s easier said than done.

In the middle of the night, the top of the pit is pushed away and there are the voices of multiple people that dance above the rain storm. They jump down and in the state you are, there’s nothing you can do to stop them from hooking their arms under yours and hauling you up, limp and motionless. 

The words are in Spanish, and you still can make out some over the commotion and the way your hearing dips in and out. 

“Where do we inject….”

“...neck, I believe…arm could work too…”

“...nasty…was it? I heard…mix of drugs…Who knows?”

Your head is harshly yanked back, and the sharp pinch of a needle digs into your neck, the action making your good leg kick out in panic but there’s little you can do. 

A flood of thick fluid enters your veins and like sap seeping out of a tree some drops exit the wound and mix with the rain weighing down your clothes. They’d taken your gear, only your undershirt and cargo pants still clothing you. 

When they’re done, they let you drop back to the floor, where you flop and smash your face into the mud with a weak drag of your cheek along the sludge. With calls from above, a rope is tossed down and they all ascend. The top is clattered back over moments later. 

Laying still and groaning, teeth clenched, already you feel ten times more strange than before. 

“Ah,” you grasp at your head, which was bursting to begin with, as it gains a looseness to it—the mud below you shimmered with puddles, the chill got colder, and your clothes felt grating against your skin. “Not good. N-not good.” 

You pull at your shirt collar, coughing as your eyes bulge; your heart breaks itself as it immediately can be felt hammering into your ribcage far more sensitive than you’d ever experienced. It felt like your chest was going to rip open. 

Panicked sounds emanate from the back of your throat, fingers digging into your scalp as the drugs carry their venom through your blood. 

Your wounds blazed.

You start screaming, babbling for nothing, and pulling at your flesh, but the overhead striking of lightning leaves the desperation mute to all but the trees.

—

Hesh stares at you from the corner of the pit, but his eyes are not green. You watch, silent, barely moving, from where you curl into a tiny heap of bloodied flesh. You’d torn at your skin for days; time looped together with more injections and no food. Water you got from the sky.

They had offered soup, but you knew better even as you dug harsh lines into your neck. There were just more drugs in the broth. 

But Hesh. Hesh.

He wasn’t right—didn’t stand like him, or breathe like him; there was something off about his smirk as he watched you gaze at him in an addled stupor.

“Feelin’ good over there, Kid?” Not Hesh. Not. Hesh.

You’re panting, your body sweating profusely in the humidity and so, so hungry.

Not Hesh takes a step forward and his image tilts like the turning of a page with Rorke taking his place, but as soon as it happens it flips back on itself to your Love.

“N-not right,” you hurriedly whisper.

Not Hesh puts a hand to his ear, kneeling down in front of you. “What was that, now?” A long chuckle. His voice is…is…deeper. Your eyebrows flinch up and down. “Who do you see, Sweetheart?”

“Hesh,” you whimper out. “Hesh, what are you talking about? What’s going on? I…I feel like I’m…I’m twisted inside out.”

“Hesh, huh?” The man looks to the side, smiling. “Well, that’s better than I expected. This’ll be fun.”

“W-what—” A fist connects with your face and you get catapulted into the wall. Before anything else, your stomach is kicked, making your call of alarm get forced out as a gasp as your clotted bullet wound reopens in a great tear. A large hand grips you hard by the chin, snapping it forward to stare into those wrong eyes but the familiar face of Hesh. 

What was he doing to you?

“H…Hesh,” you can’t even stutter out his name before you break down into coughs and gagging; tears rolling down your cheeks, and blood and mud everywhere.

“Yeah, that’s right. You just keep lookin’ at me.” You dry heave and push at his hands, fingernails digging into his skin to create crescent moons. “Keep lookin’ at Hesh.”

—

It’s three months of the same, and you can’t go on anymore.

You lay in a near comatose state on the ground, flesh completely covered in mud and open wounds—maggots eat at your dead skin, wriggling deeper. Not having the heart to pick them out, or even move the few non-broken fingers you have, you lay in blank agony. Pain so deep you can’t scream or make a single noise. It would make it worse; it is making it worse. 

Breathing is becoming a chore.

“Is today going to be the day?! God, I sure hope so.” Hesh looks down from over the edge, fiddling with another syringe of drugs. “Enough blood down there to make a fuckin’ painting out of. Shit…You lasted longer than I thought, Kid.” You don’t look at him. At his dark, wrong, eyes. 

“I’m nearly impressed.” There’s a low chuckle and the crackling of branches. 

You close your eyes and try to think of a single kiss and green eyes, but the rest of the image is tainted to you. Your mind can’t call it forward without the corruption of the puppet ahead of you, this shifting specter of mist and smoke.

Memories that used to bring you comfort call to fear and spine-curling hurt. 

This couldn’t be Hesh, you told yourself for the millionth time, but…who else could it be? Your body was too broken to try and work through the hallucinations, to think or rationalize.

There’s a thump of boots and a grunt. Someone coming closer as birds speak far above. Singing. It's the first you can recall another living creature being this close to the smell of infected decay.

 “Now, now, let’s see that neck of yours.” You’re seized and pushed onto your back, head lulling and eyes fluttering. Hesh’s image shifts and bends into another, one you should be able to name but can’t quite recall. It’s hard to focus. “Just one more, and we can fix this. Together. No more Ghosts, huh? We’ll make it right.”

Birds songs. Birds and flying shadows. Rapid wing beats like an eagle or the pound of paws on the ground. 

There is an un-godly snarl and a call of rage. 

“Rorke!” The dark-eyed Hesh snaps his head away, his needle stilling in his grip only inches from your flesh. He’s grappled and ripped away, thrown up and slammed down into a full-body jerk of pure strength not a second later with a cry of shock. “Get the fuck off of her!” 

Shadows roll and wrestle, feral yowls like that of beasts bounce off your impaired hearing, mud stuck in your ears. You think your vision cuts out for a moment because the next there’s a different man gripping your shoulders, slightly shaking you back awake.

Blue eyes like the ocean. Your brow barely twitches in confusion. 

Keegan? 

“C’mon, that’s it. Right here.” A light is taken and directed right into your eye in the fading light. “You’re doin’ great, Harp. Just keep lookin’ at me.” 

The light passes over your blood-coated eyes and barely diolates. Keegan’s lips under his balaclava thin to an alarming degree. 

“Fuck,” he grunts, looking down at you before he darts his vision over to Hesh, the actual Hesh, who’s locked limbs with the former Ghost; fists to guts and primal anger. 

In his haste to get to you, Hesh had damned himself—he’d left no opening for any of the others to get a clean shot at Rorke. But no one could blame him, even if it was reckless; incredibly stupid. 

The man had been on your trail nearly every day since you’d been taken. Barely sleeping, eating little. A man possessed. 

The Ghosts had been half convinced something had taken over his image and scooped out his personality.

“Merrick,” Keegan patches into the secure line, looking back down at you. “Positive ID on HVT, three klicks West. Hesh has engaged—we found Harp.” 

There’s an instantaneous response, worried breath. “Solid copy…how’s she doing?”

“We need MedEvac immediately. She won’t last another night.” There’s a curse on the other end, a loud and quick call to the rest of his squad. 

“Copy! I’ll call it in!” Keegan tries to stabilize you as Hesh and Rorke rip each other to shreds, and Hesh, who had the upper hand in the beginning, is quickly losing it.

“Awe, look who tracked ‘er down!” Rorke snatches at Hesh’s collar and lays two jabs to his ribs—there’s a definitive crack as the younger man shouts in pain. “Young love! So fucking pointless.” 

“I’m going to rip you into pieces,” Hesh bares his teeth, eyes wild and unrestrained. For a moment Rorke looks taken aback by the utter conviction in his green gaze. “And make you choke on your own damn teeth! You hear me?!” 

Ripping away with a tear of fabric, Hesh bends low and tackles the former Ghost to the ground, splaying him out on his back before his fist is snapped back and brought down; again and again and again. 

“Hesh!” Keegan shouts, pressing deeply into your wounds and trying to give you fluids with one hand. “This fucking kid.” The Sergeant gives up, shaking his head. 

Trust had to be given, and Keegan knew that at this moment he had to trust Hesh to hold his own. He needed to keep you conscious. 

“Easy, Harp.” You can feel the cracks in your dry throat as the water seeps past them, and you cough up droplets before the blue-eyed Sergeant tilts your head and helps you. “Easy, Sweetheart.” 

Keegan doesn’t even want to look at your body as the brutal sounds of a fist on bone continue, clothes scuffling and gargled breaths—the savagery and barbarous remnants of mental and physical torture too much even for him. 

“Christ,” he hisses. 

You gulp down water slowly and let it fill your stomach like a brick. 

Hesh reduces Rorke’s face to a mess of flesh and busted bone, sweating and not even stopping as his knuckles split under his gloves or his fingers dislocated from their sockets. His eyes burn, his face goes red—he looks insane. 

He looks like a spirit of utter revenge. 

Only when Logan and Merrick drag him off the spasming body does he stop, but not after he tries like hell to fight out of that hold as well. Whipping around, he attempts to land a punch on Merrick before Logan is forced to put him in a restraint hold. 

Hesh’s cheek meets the mud, face being sunk into it as his right arm is twisted so far behind his back it nearly breaks. The older brother growls, free arm and legs moving—back sliding. 

“David!” Merrick barks at him, face pulled in a sneer, enraged at the man’s lack of sense. “Shut this shit down. Look at her, dammit!” Logan gets bucked off, but the youngest Walker boy has enough sense to wrestle him back down and grab onto his chin; forcing those green eyes to lock on you and Keegan. 

The second he sees you, he entirely freezes.

Merrick sighs out harshly, jogging over to you and already checking in with the MedEvac that Kick’s flying in. There would be no resistance—all the other hostiles were dead. 

“Jesus Christ,” the Commander breathes, kneeling by you instantly and studying your body. 

Hesh’s reaction is slower, but the spread of vile tears burns the back of his eyes. Logan lets him go at seeing this, standing and holding out a hand, but the brunette stays on the ground a moment longer; utterly still. 

Hesh’s mouth opens and closes. 

All at once he’s rushing over and limping up at your side as Merrick grabs more medical supplies from his packs to help you. 

“Oh my God,” Hesh breathes, and Keegan sends him a glance. You’d drank all of the water. “Harp, hey, you’re going to be okay—it’s gonna be alright, you hear? I’m right here, Logan and I are gonna get you home. Back to California, okay? Riley’s waitin’ for you, Doll.”

You flinch at that voice, and Merrick looks sharply at the blue-eyed Sergeant. Their eyes lock, holding for a long moment. Logan’s brows tighten in confusion. 

The brunette seems not to notice it at all, hands finding your cheek before Merrick can give him a warning. Your eyes slowly shift to him before they peel back with fear.

Hesh’s vision goes glossy, clenching his jaw. “Shit, what did he do to you—”

“Hesh!” 

You yell and yerk back, shoving the man off of you with a fear-filled sob. 

“No!” Keegan and Merrick grapple to keep you down, not wanting to aggravate your wounds as Hesh falls to his ass, hands slapping behind him before he hisses and brings them back up. He blinks quickly in confusion and panic.

Logan rushes over and hides him from your view, beginning to understand what was going on. 

“No!” You call again, Keegan having to hold your head into his chest to hide you away. Merrick yells down his comms to hurry the Helo up, and that he doesn’t care about anything else. “No,” your voice gargles off as you sob into Keegan. “Please, no more.”

“Shh,” the Sergeant mutters, looking over his shoulder at a pale and shaking Hesh. “Nothin’s going to happen to you. Not anymore.” 

“Harp,” Hesh whispers, jaw slackened. “I…I don’t…”

“Hallucinogens,” Merrick says grimly, watching you shake and wail. Logan has to look away, his fists clenching. “Who knows what she’s seen. Reckon it wasn’t anything good.”

It’s like he doesn’t hear anything besides your cries. Whenever you gasp Hesh tenses as if he wants to run to you—comfort you the best way he knows how. 

Hallucinogens? He thinks and feels tears dribble down his cheeks as he blinks, rubbing at his jaw and shakily placing a hand over the back of his neck. Logan puts a heavy grip on his shoulder, weighing them down even more.

—

Rorke’s death should have been a time of celebration—of honoring the fallen. Elias Walker, Ajax, and countless others. The Federation was nothing more than broken factions now. Dust to the wind. 

But no one can celebrate when they’re trying to fix one of their own.

You were being kept in the secure medical ward under twenty-four-hour surveillance and around-the-clock care; only Keegan was allowed in, seeing as you were the closest to him outside of Logan and Hesh and had no adverse effects to his presence. 

Merrick had said he didn’t want to risk Logan going in, as it might worsen things. Hesh was taking it hard. 

He just got you back, how was this right? How was it fair that you’d had to go through that right when it was supposed to be over and done with? The man got sick over it, thinking about what Rorke had done to…break your mind like he had. 

Two months. 

Two months of nightmares plaguing him, of your eyes when you looked at him. If Hesh had just been stronger, then that bastard would never have dragged you away on that beach. He resulted in working out more, running laps around Fort Santa Monica with Riley at three in the morning—he grew bags under his eyes. He grew quiet. 

When all of his broken ribs and fingers healed, the artificial wounds, he was offered awards for taking down Rorke; even a summon by the President. 

He’d denied all of them. 

If a medal was going to get you better faster, he’d have taken them in an instant. But he wasn’t that stupid. Hesh was withering, and everyone saw it. He loved you more than anything—more than fame or recognition. The man lay awake at night fearing that you were too cold or uncomfortable in the far-off ward, he was paranoid about your safety. 

More often than not, the nurses found him and Riley fitfully sleeping outside of your door on the hard ground, arm used as a pillow. They didn’t have the heart to move him.

In the last two weeks before the third month of your isolation and evaluations, in his nighttime routine, Hesh finds your door open. 

He stares at it now with a blank expression, fatigue once burning his eyes all gone for a deep and pounding panic. With a hand gesture, Riley halts and sits, and, sensing his handler’s mood, lets his ears go straight up in attention. 

Hesh reaches for the gun in the back of his pants, peeling it out slowly and taking a nearly silent step forward. Ready, his ears strain for a sound…but there is none. 

His free hand reaches for the door, the short sleeves of his gray sleep-shirt bunching. A moment later, he lightly taps the barrier farther out before entering the room with the gun drawn.

He said he wouldn’t get distracted, but it would be a lie to say his eyes didn’t immediately go to you. 

You were there, asleep, curled up on the far recliner chair instead of the bed. Head lulled to the side and knees kept close to your chest. But it was the scars that broke Hesh.

They were large and long—on your face and arms; legs. All moving and stretching like a child’s drawing up your sleep shorts and shirt, disappearing only to reappear somewhere else. Healed over but still fresh.

Hesh drops the gun and turns his body slightly away, staring at the side wall before he takes an unsteady breath. He re-hides his weapon and turns to leave, not seeing anyone else.

Maybe Keegan had forgotten to close the door…he’d have to chew him out for that. Already a dull point of anger was making his jaw clench at the sly older man.

“Bastard,” Hesh mutters.

Before he can exit and close the door softly behind him, he hears a broken squeak of alarm. He halts as you stare heavily into his back—awoken by the sound of nearly silent feet. In a steady motion, the man’s hands are by his sides, open and visibly holding nothing. 

“I was just leaving,” Hesh whispers, not looking at you. His heart hammers. “I’m sorry, I thought someone else was in here—the door was open, okay?” 

Your hands twitch, body still and breath held tight.

“Hesh?” He flinches, eyes closed tight. 

Don’t look at her. Don’t turn around. Leave.

“Are you really…him?” You ask silently, eyes darting nervously around the room and quickly waking up fully. 

It’s a moment before he answers you. 

“Yeah,” he forces out, voice tiny and sad. “Yeah, it’s me, Doll. Just David Walker.” 

Your throat bobs with a thin swallow. Treatment was still ongoing, but it’s not every day you wake up to find the man who you had nightmares about standing in your room. 

Breathe, you have to remind yourself. It was the drugs. Not Hesh. Never Hesh. Rorke.

But you were still scared. 

“I…I need to see your eyes,” you say. 

Hesh turns carefully, staring hard at the floor. His heart lurches, hands going clammy. 

What if she has a setback? He asks himself. What if I mess this up…Shit, Hesh, you couldn’t have minded your own business?

Oh, but he never could when it came to you. 

“Then look at me, Sweetheart.” The man breathes slowly, darting his eyes up to your face. “They only belong to you.”

But your gaze can’t slip to his sockets, only able to glare fearfully into his neck. But this Hesh felt different, more like the one you grew up with—those memories still coming back but tainted; you need to see green, but it was hurting you to think that you might not.

“I’m scared,” you admit, shakily. The man’s thighs tense, but he stops himself before he can go and take you into his arms. That wouldn’t help. “I’m…I don’t know what’s real anymore.”

“I’m real. I swear to you, Harp, I’m real. I’m right here and I’ll wait for you as long as it takes. Even if it’s years, I will always be right here.” He pleads, hands still at his sides and going nowhere if you don’t tell him to. It’s like a floodgate opens, months of internal pain and heartbreak spilling out. You needed to know this, even if he never got to see you again. 

“I have loved you since I saw you get jealous over Cassie Albrook in seventh grade and tried to hide it because you thought she made me happy—she could never make me happy, Harp. That was you. That was always and will always be you. I…I can’t breathe when you’re not near me, I don’t know how to act right when you’re hurt. Seeing you hurting is…is…” Hesh’s voice breaks and he falls silent. 

“Please, if you need to look into my eyes, I’m beggin’ you, Sweetheart, please, do it. Even if it’s only one glance.” Your breath is stuck in your throat, tears welling and sliding down your cheeks. 

In your skull your brain pounds, bordering on hysteria and an urge to flee. There was so little that you trusted anymore. Keegan, yes—the nurses and doctors? You had no choice there. 

You knew that the Hesh you’d seen in the pit was Rorke, Keegan had explained it all to you after the drugs had been pumped from your system; you understood that part. But it didn’t make the sickening confusion any better.

Symptoms of severe PTSD, paranoia, anxiety—you’d seen the charts when the nurses thought you weren’t looking at them. 

You still wouldn’t let anyone with a needle anywhere close to you, had to be put under for it. 

But you’d been so lonely here. A simple kiss seared into your mind before the horror set in, a stain of a smile on your lips. A chest vibrating with a content purr. 

Hesh. You want your Hesh back. 

Taking a stuttering breath, your eyes dart upwards. You push through your misty gaze and lock on a color that can only be described as a grassy field of verdant growth. Great open plains of viridescent being—showing you a world bathed in tender belonging. 

Home. 

You sob and rush from the chair on legs that still hurt even now, meeting Hesh in the middle as he takes a step forward and wraps his arms around you. You’re covered and kept in a hold so tight it’s like he’ll never let you go, heart pounding and his face loose with shock.

But he says nothing beyond a loud shuttered exhale of relief, pressing you to his chest and burying his face into your scalp, breathing you in; taking you down like a sinner in church until all that remains is you. Your fingers digging into his shirt, your face in his neck, how you call his name as if calling a ghost back from the dead.

“Oh, my Girl.” Hesh chuckles through the tears in his eyes. “My Girl. I missed you so much, you won’t even believe it.” 

You push yourself into him tighter. 

Riley, at some point, had come to stand in the doorway, his dark beady eyes seeing only the colors in gray, brown, yellow, and blue, though that never truly mattered. Color was only half of the picture. 

And the rest of the image in front of him was seeped with the pigment of love. 

The dog’s tongue lulls from the side of his mouth, and in the air behind him, his tail moves back and forth into a soft arch.

TAGS:

@luuvbuzz, @emerald-valkyrie, @anna-banana27, @blueoorchid, @cryingnotcrying, @writeforfandoms, @homicidal-slvt, @jade-jax, @frazie99, @elmoees, @littlemisstrouble, @alpineswinter, @phoenixhalliwell, @idocarealot, @lavalleon, @facelessmemories, @h-leigh, @20forty9, @glitter-anon-asks, @emily-who-killed-a-man, @neelehksttr, @aeneanc, @escapefromrealitysm, @i-d-1-0-t, @pparcxysm, @hawkscanendme, @caramlizedtomatos, @waves-against-a-cliff, @sanfransolomitatm, @maelstrom007, @jemandderkeinenusernamenfindet, @pheobees, @glitterypirateduck, @uselsshuman, @fan-of-encouragement, @halfmoth-halfman, @ghostlythunderbird, @I-inkage, @pukbadger, @kopatych11, @0nceinabluem00n, @cocrorapop, @knightofsexyness, @abnormalgeil, @smallseastone, @jacegons, @330bpm-whiplash, @simon-rileys-housewife, @4-atsu, @tiredmetalenthusiast

#cod #cod x reader #call of duty #cod x you #x female reader #call of duty x you #call of duty x reader #hesh walker x female reader #hesh walker x reader #david hesh walker #hesh walker #cod ghosts #cod ghosts x reader #call of duty ghosts #cod x female reader #x fem!reader #call of duty: ghosts

[midknightwritings]

Anddd another request..I’m not sure if you’ve already done it but here you go..!

Again, if I broke any rules please ignore or delete this

How will these characters(Mika,Leo, and Izumi)react to you/reader crying for the first time?

Reader is a very “strong” levelheaded/serious person and no one has seen them cry before. Not even their own family(except the mom) or close friends

But of course, everyone has their limits and Reader has been so stressed out that they cried for the first time in years

What they didn’t know though was that their s/o was planning a surprise visit that very same day

I’m Here For You

Synopsis : After dealing with constant stress for the past few months, today you finally reached a breaking point. Letting out your emotions in the comfort of your home, the last thing you would've expected was a surprise visit from your lovely partner.

Era : N / A

Warning/s : Stress / Overworking / Breakdown / Hurt & Comfort

Mentioned Character/s : G/N!Reader / Leo / Izumi / Mika

Word Count : 1,579

A/N : Shimeji anon this actually hits so close to home for me cuz I’m literally like that too LMAO I keep it in for ages until I flat out explode AHAHAHA Anyways~ Once again I'm really sorry this took forever but I hope you enjoy regardless 🥺 💕

•❅───✧❅✦❅✧───❅•

Today was just awful, you could even argue that it was the worst day you've ever experienced in literal years. Various tasks and projects alike seemed to pile up due to the busy season that's currently happening but the problem was that none of your peers were pulling their weights… At all… Originally, you were tasked with handling a do-able job, which would’ve been simple to complete in itself. Yet, the problem was the fact that your part was heavily reliant on your peers' parts but, since your peers were doing absolutely nothing, you ended up having to do their work in order to meet the actual deadlines… So it’s safe to say that you were overwhelmed, stressed and overall just not having a great time.

You thanked every star in the sky and whatever higher being up there that you were able to hold yourself together throughout the day but, as you were packing away your things once you got back home, the emotional bottle within you finally bursted. Soft, quiet sobs escaped your lips as you tried to stop yourself by wiping the tears away but they kept on coming with no end in sight. So… after years of staying cool and keeping yourself together, you finally allowed yourself to shatter under the pressure and let everything out.

•❅───✧❅✦❅✧───❅•

Leo Tsukinaga :

Leo wanted to surprise you with a new song that he composed so he climbed up the tree beside your bedroom window and was about to swing it open, [ usually he would throw rocks to get your attention but at some point you gave him a small key so he can unlock it from the outside before he ends up actually breaking the glass ], when he suddenly stopped as he felt his heart shatter at the sight that laid before him. You were curled up in your bed as your shoulders shook from how hard you were crying, your sobs emanated throughout the room as Leo looked at you worryingly. So he opened the window carefully before he hopped onto your bedroom floor.

This caused you to perk up but you didn’t even have the emotional capacity to hide your emotions as you desperately tried to wipe away your tears instead. Leo could tell that you were trying to calm yourself down and he had his own idea to help you with that! With a big smile and his signature laugh, he tackled you into a bear hug and smoldered you with kisses, no part of your face was spared. He even kissed the tears away before he snuggled into the crook of your neck.

Leo isn’t good with words and he knows that so, instead of fumbling to say the right thing, he started to hum a gentle melody instead.

At this point, he has you in an embrace where you’re both cuddling each other, your head's resting against his chest as you could hear the rhythmic beating of his heart while he hummed his ballad dedicated to you. His hums caused small rumbles in his chest that could be felt through the embrace. You both stayed like this for a while as you let everything out before finally calming down. Through it all, Leo was even playing with your hair as he comforted you.

Once you were ok, he would pepper you with kisses once again as he proudly proclaims how much “I love you!” His kisses are light, causing you to giggle from how ticklish they were.

“Wahaha~☆ You’re laughing again! Ah~ Your laugh is a wonderful melody, my muse! I can feel inspiration gushing forth once more!”

For the rest of the night, Leo would distract you from your thoughts by playing games, singing songs or just generally doing anything to make sure that your project doesn’t even cross your mind. After all, to Leo…

Your smile is the most beautiful thing in the entire galaxy.

•❅───✧❅✦❅✧───❅•

Izumi Sena :

Izumi came to visit you because he was worried. Your last text seemed a bit off. There was no logical reason behind this feeling. To anyone else, it seemed like a regular message from you but Izumi’s gut feeling told him otherwise… And he was right. Izumi had a spare key since he would often come over to cook for you and just take care of you in general, and he would even proclaim how much he hated waiting outside, so when he entered your house to see you curled into yourself on the couch, his eyes widened with worry as he walked up towards you.

This was the first time Izumi has ever seen you cry, so it was a bit jarring for him as he didn’t know how to comfort you. He knew he shouldn’t say anything sarcastic or harsh, since that would most likely make you cry even more, so he just sat beside you and wrapped his arm around your shoulders before pulling you close.

The two of you stayed like that as you gripped onto his shirt and cried into it, your tears made his outfit wet but that’s not important right now… What’s more important is the fact that you’re releasing all the pent up emotions within you, and Izumi will be that shoulder you can cry on in order to achieve that. No words were exchanged as a comforting silence surrounded the two of you, the sensation of him gently rubbing your back helped you greatly.

Izumi’s quick to figure out what must’ve happened. After all, the timing of everything lined up perfectly; One moment you were venting to him about your peers and your project, the next you’re crying by yourself at home. It doesn’t take a detective to figure out that the problem stemmed from your project and peers alike.

Once you finally calmed down and your sobs turned into small sniffles, Izumi would take some tissues and wipe away your tears, all the while mumbling about how you look “absolutely awful” but his tone clearly implies that he just hated seeing you in such a state of anguish.

“Come here... Go wash your face and freshen up. I better not see any more tears or snot when you get back, am I clear?!” [ Translation : Go and wash your face, it’ll help make you feel better. I’ll still be here waiting for you when you’re done. ]

This is when Mama Sena kicks in as he immediately starts to take care of you in order to make you feel better. Just relax as he cooks a hearty dinner that will surely take your breath away! What’s that? You still need to work on your project even when you’re at home? There’s no way in hell Izumi would let you do that all alone! So c’mon, don’t be annoying and explain the details already! Let him help while he’s here because…

He’ll do everything in his power to make sure you’re not carrying this type of burden alone ever again.

•❅───✧❅✦❅✧───❅•

Mika Kagehira :

Mika stood outside your door anxiously as he fidgeted on the spot. Usually you would answer the moment he rang the doorbell or, at least, yell through the door that you were coming to open it. So the fact that he didn’t hear anything for a while caused him to immediately assume the worst, and seeing your puffy eyes when you did open the door freaked him out.

You thought you hid your breakdown well but the moment Mika asked you what was wrong, as his heterochromatic eyes were filled to the brim with worry, you couldn’t help but fall apart once again. Small confused noises and squeaks left his lips as he guided you back inside your house, closing your front door with his foot, before pulling you into a comforting hug.

You both just stood there as he slightly swayed you from side to side, all the while he would rub your back, caress your hair, and pretty much do everything he could to try and get you to calm down as you continued to cry into his chest.

He didn’t know what happened, and the fact that you were seriously so distraught that even you of all people started to cry, caused millions of thoughts to run through his head. You’re known to be so calm and level-headed, even through the most challenging moments Mika could ever imagine, so he knew that whatever happened seriously affected you to the core.

The moment your tears dried up and you slowly stopped crying, Mika would pull you into a more tighter, but still gentle, embrace. Small hushes would leave his lips as he would comfort you to the best of his abilities and, once you were ok, you would both pull away from the hug. Mika would wipe any remaining tears off your cheeks as he would give you a soft smile. It had a hint of worry within it, but that’s just because he wanted to make sure that you’re genuinely ok again.

“No buts! I ain’t hearin’ them from ya! Imma stay here till yer feelin’ better n’ that’s final!”

Mika would be there by your side for the rest of the night, listening intently to your vents and rambles about the entire situation as he would even make some comments here and there about your whole ordeal. Overall, he would be there for you to let it all out because, at the end of the day…

He doesn’t want to see you crumble again in the future…

#leo tsukinaga x reader #izumi sena x reader #mika kagehira x reader #ensemble stars #enstars #enstars x reader #ensemble stars x reader #enstars x y/n #ensemble stars x y/n #enstars x you #ensemble stars x you #gender neutral reader #esworks #🍬 hansel's writing

[theflagscene]

Wait! How!? When!? Where!? How is White suddenly there!? How did Tee meet White!? You can’t just play upbeat music and have the boys running around to show the passage of time and not explain how the fucking villain of the story got the most adorably innocent lil princess boyfriend on the planet!

Phee, bringing Jin on a date to the same place you and Non liked to go is just weird. I hate people who use the same ‘date’ spots for their new partners that they used with their past partners and no, this isn’t me projecting, why do you ask!? Lmao 😂 shut up it’s still tacky af

‘Friend’ the dreaded word.

What is with the ass slapping and window sex!? I mean, I get that they’re supposed to 18 year old boys, who are by definition perverted, but that was some porn level shit. Also, again, no prep. Phee wasn’t even the one blown so it’s not like they were even using spit for lube, or an already lubed condom. What is this, another ABO show? Just having the dudes slick and sliding all over one another apparently.

Ta’s got a decent ass at least, good for him.

“Did you cheat on my brother?” Nah, pretty sure they broke up when Phee saw him being raw dogged by the teacher and then told him to go die, but whatever helps you sleep at night Tan.

“Don’t fall in love with him.” Yeah, I think it’s too late for that.

Oh, mom is not looking so great. Hmm, something tells me that video isn’t real. Mom knows what’s up, it’s finally hit her, her baby’s dead. The actress did a fantastic job of a mother realizing the truth of the death of her child, it’s a startling realization that does take your legs out from under you. Your mind blanks, you can’t think about anything but the last time you saw them, the last terrible thing you said, all you can do is try not to scream. - That got a little too dark and real, sorry.

news.boc.com Cute BoC, very cute.

How long were Phee and Jin supposed to have been fucking by now? Weeks? Months? Because Jin has gotten very emotionally invested very quickly, which is appropriate for teenagers I suppose.

Two years, so they’d be in their what, second year of uni? Tan has gone full mad scientist I see.

Wait, he called to tell Tan that his mom was dead and it was her funeral that day and he just showed tf up! When his dad thought he was still in England!? Lmao, that’s fricking hilarious. I know, I know, wrong reaction to this scene but I’m weird, what can I say.

Oops, bye bye daddy. No wonder Tan is so fucking nuts! That would drive anyone insane. He literally needs Non to be alive otherwise he’s lost everything for nothing.

Is Tan his own guinea pig for his drugs!? Jesus dude, get some help.

Question, were Phee and Jin fucking during their time at university too? Or are you telling me all this ‘I love him’ crap was from one night of decent dick and a few ‘best friend dates’? Like the math ain’t mathing, establish a better timeline here for me when it comes to their relationship because in the first episode it made it seem like they were screwing around for a really long time, months at the very least. But now it seems like they fucked around a couple times in one 12 hour period, Jin decided that was enough to wanna date, caught Phee in a mood because of the fake news report and then they just… what? Kept fucking? Stopped? Jin carried a torch for him for over two years after one night together? Acted like a scorned lover for years because of a single teenaged tryst? Not to be that guy, but girl, you’re coming off a little desperate. I need a more accurate timeline!!!

“This won’t kill them.” Tan, could you try and be a tad more convincing when saying that?

That was a fantastic look from Tan to end on, ngl. Although someone needs to save baby White!

Next episode, we’re back in the present for the most part it seems. Jin somehow still trusts Phee, Fluke somehow gets the gun back and oh look, he holds White hostage, poor bb did nothing, leave him alone! And Tee clearly does know what happened to both Non and Keng as he runs up onto the roof where his uncle is to see the pair… unconscious? Dead? One of each?

I want some backstory about how White fits into all of this next time as well, that would be great. Although considering how little the timeline of events during grade 12 are fully explained, I doubt knowing more about White would make very much sense at this point.

#Lynn watches DFF #dff the series #dff spoilers #dead friend forever #pheejin #teewhite

[kate-bot]

OKAY SO I've gotten two asks about my Noisette cosplay AND THANK YOU SM FOR THE KIND WORDS !!!!!!!! It was sm fun to make this cos, so I will gladly explain everything I did in hopes that it might help someone else!! also both anons please share your cosplays with me when theyre done i would love to see them....

I've tried to link everything where I can, where I got stuff etc... I only rarely cosplay (although I am thinking of going as the noise in May Comiccon) and this was my biggest ever project so!! It's very trial-and-error! But without further ado

KATES EXTENSIVE(ish) GUIDE TO COSPLAYING NOISETTE FROM THE HIT GAME PIZZA TOWER!!!!!!! (warning its kinda long)

THE HAT

Okay i’m gonna be real my mum helped me so much she basically did all the sewing for me. Sewing is the fucking bane of my existence I hate doing it so much so we planned it out together and she basically executed it. Props to her for that she’s so real… She also wrote down what she did!! So i’ll just paste and colour that in for you to read!!

“The black material (seen in the above image) was originally a beanie hat that was picked apart to use as a template…

This was game changing basically. We had experimented with making the hat from scratch but it was far too difficult and we were both too stupid so we just unstitched a pre-existing hat and stole the template. The hat we cut up was one we had lying around for years so i cannot tell you where to get one from, but any beanie that is stitched together will work i guess! So I would recommend finding a hat that fits you snugly and doing the same thing!

…and the wool fabric that was utilised gave the finished product was stiff enough to be structurally sound.

I just got this from my local fabric shop, I would recommend wool over something like felt because it’s super sturdy and I was pulling on my mask a LOT.

Once sewn together, I attached a stiff card facemask to the front to help provide some structure, and to locate where the eye holes should be cut.

I think this picture shows it pretty well, my mum was able to curve the shape of the fabric to fit a pre-existing mask- we got ours from Hobbycraft, just one of those stringed white template masks yknow. We cut off the string, made the eyeholes a little bigger and just stuck it straight on!! I should mention this was pretty much all done with a sewing machine as well!

After that, we made two ears from a paper pattern, stuffed them and put some wire inside to allow them to be positioned, before sewing them onto this headband, which was then sewn into the hat. The bottom of each ear was also stitched to the crown to give it some additional stability and to secure the headband correctly in position (having fitted it on the wearer).

Yeah it was actually less of a mask and more of a headband!! That was what gave it most of the support and meant the ears would stay up, I’m not sure how it would work without it!! The ears were the only part that I could actually help with LMAO i just freehanded a little template, stuffed it, and then put in some modelling wire to make them able to be posed :)

Then it was a lot of hand sewing, and glueing the eyeholes to the mask to create a cohesive look.

AND YEAH that’s pretty much all it was! I also attached some little felt eyelashes to add to it as well. Honestly I could never come up with a step-by-step guide for the process because it was such a trial and error thing (i’d made two test-hats before we even came up with the method) but it was so fun!!

I would 100% recommend if you want the ears to stay UP to stuff them AS MUCH AS U CAN and/or put wire in them!! :) I also made some cute little bows to clip into my wig in the same fabric to make it more cohesive!! I also put a bow (and a bunny tail heheh) on the back of the dress too!!

THE DRESS

Super simple! I just found one online (okay for some reason the link has been taken off of the website, but just look up "overall dress" on google shopping and you will 100% find something super cute)- I made sure to buy the dress first, and then take it to the fabric shop to try and colourmatch the mask fabric as best as I could. Then it was just buying some big ol buttons off eBay and sewing them on!! (I could actually do that bit by myself, I'm bad at sewing but im not THAT bad)

EVERYTHING ELSE

Cute patterned knee-high socks cuz shes cute like that. Leg warmers, I think I got them both off of Amazon... Converse I got from Depop and I had wanted to buy a pair anyway so I was super stoked to get them cheap!! I chose converse over a pair of high-heels or Mary Janes just for comfort reasons, I was walking around loads at the con so... Everything else apart from the shirt was from Amazon or just. Somewhere online(I have no idea where to get fancy white gloves LOL) and the shirt was from Depop as well! I liked how frilly it was, re: Noisette is cute like that!!

oh yeah and the wig. I hate wigs it was awful. I have no idea how to style them. underneath the hat was the most awful bowl cut ever I just. It wasn't my best moment. Dont ask me about wigs please .

Also I should mention I got this bag for the cosplay (which I now use all the time cuz its so cute) because i needed space to store shit and I wanted something on-brand with her cafe... this isnt the exact link I used but I just got it off of ebay :P

PROPS

Unfortunately I don't have a lot of WIP pictures of my props but they were pretty simple to make!! The coffee cup was literally just spraypainting over a reusable coffee cup and using POSCA pen to draw on the front! Fun fact the cup says "To Peppino" because originally my boyfriend was gonna go with me as Peppino before the Cruetly Squad brainrot got to him so. YEA

And the tip jar was also pretty simple, I just painted on the lid a plastic jar (can't be glass, not allowed at ComicCon) and cut out a bit of vinyl to work as the sign. The cobweb was just hot-glued 3D printer filament, and the spider was made with foam modelling clay (literally the best thing ever if you're making small models like that) and i stuck him to the lid of the jar with Kandi string so he'd bounce around :]

AND I THINK THATS IT!! i may as well post a pic of the full cosplay since I dont think many people would have made it this far.... But I think it turned out pretty cool!! I got recognised a few times as well which was amazing!! (cropped out my bf cuz idk if he wants his face on tumblr gfhhfg)

SO YEAH!!!! if anyone has any questions please let me know.. but GOOD LUCK IN UR COSPLAY MAKING FRIENDS!!!! :D

#ask #pizza tower #noisette pizza tower #noisette cosplay #pizza tower cosplay #Yes this is very longwinded! But I really wanted to include all the details!!! #also second anon im so sorry it took me so long to reply i completely blanked on its existence #I HOPE THIS IS HELPFUL TO SOMEONE... ANYONE #re:noise cosplay in may? i'd love to try out making a mask (like out of paper-mache of his whole face) rather than a fabric one #might be fun? not sure #also face reveal ig i hate How i look in the cos cuz i rely so much on my hair to look half decent but. #IN THE NAME OF HELPING SOMEONE... ough #anyway ill stop rambling #thank u for the asks!!!!!

[madzapan]

so how long does the skip button skip?

I have a master’s degree in engineering and figured I’d put that to use to (roughly) determine how long each skip of the cursed Button really was. 

VERDICT: hoo boy. the skips get really, really long. Skip (lmao) to the bottom for results, or read on for how I did it.

I had to use context clues from dialogue to make some sort of data set to graph. Here’s that:

You can see the Skip # (first skip, second, etc.), the time in hours that elapsed after that skip, and the dialogue that gave a clue about how long it had been. 

The red values are uncertain, but I made an assumption. Skip 1 = a few minutes = 5 minutes. After the second skip, the Narrator didn’t have much to say about them getting longer, so he must not have noticed a big difference from the last = 10 minutes. Anytime two values were mentioned, I averaged them. After Skip 6, I just went with a year, though it very well could have been longer. 

The TOTAL TIME column is how much time has elapsed from the first skip, while the HOURS column is just the time between skips. This got important later.

As you know, O Fellow TSPUD Fan, there are more than 6 skips. There are 18. I needed a way to forecast how much time might have elapsed between each skip, or at least, when the heat death of everything on Earth happened. 

So I decided to run two separate regressions - one, projecting the time between the unknown skips, and one, projecting the total time after each unknown skip. After quickly realizing I’d need a logarithmic (read: for really huge values) scale on the time axis, I landed on an iffy but fine-for-this-project exponential regression line for both datasets.

YIKES!

Both of those get real big, real fast. Let’s look at some actual values.

These blue ones (below) come from the equation of the second chart, which is meant to predict the time between each skip. Not super usable numbers, but we’ll get there. Hold onto your pants.

Next up, I added all of these so that we could tell the total elapsed time using the individual skip equation. I also used the other equation, based on the total time values, to project the increases in total time elapsed, rather than just the increases of the skips. You can see they’re pretty different, but the next Thing will give you a better idea.

RESULTS!!! (for those of you skipping)

Using these two methods, we get some wild answers for how long stuff took. 

For example, when we come back and the Narrator is talking to himself for the first time (...but the game was never meant to be funny!) it’s been somewhere between 380 - 440 years. Centuries, stuck on a bad review. Poor guy.

But it gets worse!

His “the end is never the end is...” rambling starts after 40,000 - 50,000 years. You know. Ten times longer than human civilization as we know it has existed.

After that? I’m no scientist, Jim, I’m an engineer. If someone wants to tell me about when stuff will start to decay and cave in, be my guest, but I will say that this room seems extremely durable. I do know that in about 7 - 8 billion years, Earth will probs get eaten by the sun, and we get close to that in the first skip after the plants die (5 - 7 billion years).

The screaming (of aliens? the Narrator? no thanks) takes place after 50 billion years. 

The final desert happens after 500 - 800 billion years. At that point, who’s counting a few billion, right?

Please feel free to correct stuff as you see it. It’s been a while since I just did some quick & dirty number crunching.

Anyway, the end is never and all that. Math rocks. 

#the stanley parable #the stanley parable ultra deluxe #tspud #tspud spoilers #spoilers #the stanley parable spoilers #the stanley parable ultra deluxe spoilers #skip button #tspud skip button #skip button ending #tspud narrator #tspud stanley #narrator #stanley

[nyxfaei]

Yo wait ur a system? Is it ok to ask? Mind introducing us to everyone?

I am!!!

I’m always kinda confronting so I’m always here but at least one of these guys are usually in the drivers seat with me!

They’re like if facets of me became their own people- or if imaginary friends became their own people. they both are and aren’t me? Hard to explain. ANYWAY

Doxa- protector. You’ve seen me post him a lot. Very chatty and loves being perceived. Silly. Flirty. But is dead serious about looking after the rest of the system that he views to be his coven. Somewhat omnipotent about the other members of the system. He’s in a relationship with dragana and is a total wife guy. He uses pet names a lot in conversation. He doesn’t mean anything by it and will normally ask you if you’re okay with it first. He’s currently very interested in Arthur Lester as a person and concept. I’ve already made a post about him as a character.

Dragana- a mediator. A lot more quiet than Doxa but good natured. A lot more introverted though and has a low social battery. She has a much better impulse control and will jump in when doxas being stupid and I can’t stop him. She may or may not be as omnipresent as Doxa but she won’t tell me. She at least has the ability to kick whoever is confronting aside if they’re getting to be too much. She enjoys wearing elegant yet comfortable clothes and listening to 90s indie women artists lmao. I should just make a post about her in general

Ren- chaotic goth punk. They’re Doxa and dragana’s son. He has a weird rocky relationship with Doxa due to happenings in their story. He has a good relationship with dragana though. Although I’ve done a lot of projecting onto them, they don’t front very often because they hate the idea of being in control of so much. He’d mostly enjoys to pop in, listen to loud music and tease people and be a menace- although he’s a well meaning menace. He enjoys going to places with lots of people and just exploring- such as boardwalks and downtown areas. He loves DIY and taking things apart and making new things out of them. Horror movie fan. He’s in a polycule with Lewis and Felix.

Lewis- very introverted and usually keeps to himself when fronting. Horror fanatic. Very into monsters and mysteries. He’s probably the facet that first got interested in malevolent. Bad abandonment issues so when he’s fronting ren and Felix are pretty close by. He enjoys wearing comfy clothing rather than making any sort of statement as opposed to his partners. Enjoys writing, reading (usually graphic novels because I am dyslexic as fuck), and listening to gothic metal. Can come off as rude by accident.

Felix: definitely Lewis’s foil and yet they get along very well seeing as they’re in a relationship together lmao. Loves his friends and is very enthusiastic about everything all the time. Has a killer gut instinct. He does have an originality complex and Will Die if someone shows up wearing the same thing as him. He’s a scaredy cat that prefers spooky movies over scary movies but will put up with them for ren and Lewis. Huge fan of slushies, junk food, and early 2000s emo music. He’s far too easy to tease but we love him with our whole heart.

Callum- constantly wants to be out exploring and adventuring and traveling. Pretty damn social and did a lot of fronting two years ago but he’s been taking a bit of a break- although I still see him show up quite a few times. For the most part he seems to be very well put together but in reality he’s very competitive and has poor impulse control and definitely has his chaotic moments and will just do things on a whim. Big fan of 80s new wave. Has cried over Duran Duran. He’s very good friends with the polycule. Australian?????

Moyra- oldest in the system and has been with me since about 5th grade. Very cynical and has middle manager energy. Used to be the protector but now she just does her own thing. She’s kinda rude and finicky but means well for the most part. Perfectionist and very easily stressed. Just turn on some New Age music for her and she’ll be fine.

Then there’s my fictives-

Arthur Lester- you know him. You know Arthur. He’s a mess. He’s very bad at concealing his thoughts and feelings and Doxa is constantly aware of them and is driving him crazy with his repressed homosexual issues. Is in like. A constant state of internal screaming but he talks and types like a polite young man save for all the fucking swearing he does LMAO- surprisingly gets along with Doxa since Doxa keeps Kayne away from him. Still trying to solve his podcast counterpart’s issues and is very invested in the mysteries of it. Good for him. Somehow always manages to get me hurt while fronting.

Kayne- yes that’s right there’s a Kayne in here. You also know Kayne. All of my chaos goes into that guy for better or for worse. Used to front a lot but since I’m going through a rough time he’s been taking a back seat since he isn’t very good with delicate situations OBVIOUSLY. When he fronts he’s always up to some fuck shit. Really likes playing among us LMAO

Melkor- from the silmarillion. Tbh this guy has been dormant for a few years which is a relief because he’s like if Kayne and the king in yellow were one person. If you don’t know what that means, just imagine if a goth metal head with anger issues created the concept of chaos itself and has the powers of a god. Anyhow, he’s been locked in his mind palace room listening to metal for the past few years and I prefer to keep it that way

#system stuff #nyx shut up #I recently discovered that I’m a system and my little imaginary friend thing I have going on has a name lmao #actually did #if you don’t understand or ‘get’ system things feel free to ask. just be respectful about it #I know I’m mentally ill lmao bitch gotta cope

[penn-dragon]

Do you mind if I ask your top 10 favorite characters (can be male or female) from all of the media that you loved (can be anime/manga, books, movies or tv series)? And why do you love them? Sorry if you've answered this question before.....Thanks...

This is such a sweet question I would love to!

These are in no particular order because my level of passion for them changes depending on my current hyperfixation, and I’m limiting myself to one character per media but giving honorable mentions because I tend to love two or three characters almost equally

1. Monkey D. Luffy!!! (Honorable mention: Zoro and Sanji)

One Piece holds a special place in my heart. I watched it on 4kids when I was growing up and it was the first anime I watched as a teenager. Luffy is so so so important to me as a character. I got myself through the worst parts of teendom by imagining that if he was real Luffy would love me. He’s such a warm, loving, and joyous character. He’s Joyboy!!! He came into the world without a family and so he made his own and that’s so special, the message that no one in this world is born to be alone and somewhere out there someone or ones will love you and fight for you. And on top of all this he’s an aroace king!!!

2. Mogami Kyoko -Skip Beat!

Kyoko was my Girl Crush™️ in high school. I remember telling my best friend “yeah if I was gay I’d date Kyoko” LMAO. Beyond that there’s just something so special to me about reading this manga over and over, watching this girl—who only knew how to live to make her existence as palatable to other people as possible—grow into herself and find her own passions and loves as she heals from the abuses she’s dealt with her whole life. (Just looking up images of her made me want to reread the whole manga)

3. Peter Parker (Honorable mention: Harry Osborn)

Spider-Man is an OG, a forever love. No matter how many years go by I’ll always circle back around to Spider-Man. I love him and his pain and his Anger Issues™️ and his iron-clad morality. The people’s hero, the friendly neighborhood Spider-Man. He’s also responsible for coding my brain to always gravitate towards the comic relief characters. I love a jokester who quips through dangerous situations.

4. Yosuke Hanamura - Persona 4

So I always joke that a majority of my favorite characters fall into one of two categories. 1. Hides their insecurities behind jokes/false bravado, and 2. Internalized homophobia/in love with best friend. And the characters I go FERAL for have both. Yosuke Hanamura is one of the both. I love a comic relief character!!! I love a man that’s hopelessly in love with his best friend but won’t admit it because he’s terrified of the implications!!! When I played this game for the first time, like most people, I was SO MAD THAT I COULDN’T DATE YOSUKE. 90% of the time when I play I don’t end up dating anyone because I refuse to deny the protag his one true love lmao. Yosuke and Yu also have the bonus of being my first ever gay ship. Their love is so powerful it pierced through my own internalized homophobia lol!!

5. Din Djarin -The Mandalorian (Honorable mention: Luke Skywalker)

I’m out here projecting so much onto this man!!!! He’s autistic, he’s asexual, he’s Traumatized. My other category of favorite characters is “Stoic Dad who learns to love again through a pseudo child figure” so he’s right up that alley. The man responsible for finally getting me into Star Wars after 27 years of having absolutely no interest.

6. Virgil Hawkins!! - Static Shock (Honorable mention: Richie Foley)

The way I waited with baited breath for every Static Shock episode as a child. It’s still one of my favorite shows, I own all 4 seasons on DvD and cherish them. I love Virgil so much!! He taught me about diversity! He’s such a lovable character and it makes the show an absolute delight to watch no matter how dated some parts of it get. The show does such a wonderful job balancing Virgil’s super heroics as Static with the heroics of every day life and it’s so endearing.

7. Oliver -Space Boy (Honorable mention: Amy)

Oliver is definitely the most niche character on this list (which is a crying shame please PLEASE read Space Boy on Webtoon it will chemically change your brain.) I’m just so attached to him. I feel so much for him and his story. If I could give him the biggest hug I would in an instant. “Take away his humanity and you can ignore his pain. Define him as a tool and you can justify using him.”

9. Rex Salazar - Generator Rex

Oh maaaaaan I love this asshole teenager!! I’m soooo obsessed with characters who get dehumanized for the sake of using their abilities like a tool and not a person. Re: the above Space Boy quote. The aesthetic of this show is so cool! (Also hello character who hides their insecurity behind false bravado.)

8. Aang - Avatar the Last Airbender (Honorable mention: Zuko)

Oh Aang… My sweet boy… my beloved… He imparted so much wisdom to me growing up… and also taught me it’s okay to have fun. I’ll always love him so much. There’s so much to rant about Avatar but it would take three hours.

10. Yugi Mutou - Yu-Gi-Oh! (Honorable mention: Atem)

I related to Yugi SO MUCH as a kid. He’s just a little weirdo who loves games and craves friendship more than anything. Honestly Yugi might have been the character I most strongly related to when I was young. I remember feeling swells of happiness when people would say nice things about Yugi as a character because it felt like they were saying nice things about me too.

#sorry this got long #you activated my trap card (autism) #long post #Penn answers things #dnana-2809-blog #thank you for asking I love getting asks!!!!!

[stancy-simp]

An underrated aspect of the Stancy dynamic is how it deals with Nancy’s desire to rebel against whatever is expected of her.

At face value within the story this is mostly shown by her outright refusal to end up as a stereotypical housewife in a loveless marriage with no personal ambitions to drive her, like her mother did.

But from a more meta perspective, this could also mean something to us. Because we, the audience, have our own expectations which we project onto Nancy. And these expectations were mostly born of tropes and cliches from certain media properties made popular during the 80’s.

The typical coming of age high school romantic comedy—you know how it goes. The plucky young female protagonist dumps her meathead boyfriend and ends up with the sweet, soft-spoken social reject.

A Stancy endgame would be a middle finger to both of these traps that female protagonists often find themselves in.

Steve would never make Nancy fill the role of a meek little subservient housewife, no matter how many psychos online try to force that narrative. Like many others have said, he would probably fill the role of the stay at home mom lol

And it would artfully subvert the expectation that just because a male character is from a lower middle-class family and is shy, sweet and creative that it’s a forgone conclusion that he will end up ‘getting the girl’ in the end

Nancy Wheeler shouldn’t give a shit what anybody wants her to do, in her world or in ours.

People in the Stranger Things universe want her to watch the kids all day and have a hot meal ready for her husband when he comes home from the office? Because that’s what the girl is supposed to do? She’d tell them to fuck off.

Real life people on social media don’t want her to hook back up with her lunkhead jock first love? Because they think it’s sweeter of her to stay with her broody, artistic wallflower boyfriend? Because that’s what the girl is supposed to do? She’d tell them to fuck off too because it’s none of their business. Hell, she’d probably tell me to fuck off too lmao

Regardless of what you or I think, the only person who can decide who Nancy Wheeler loves is the character of Nancy Wheeler. But claiming that Stancy in particular ‘doesn’t make sense’ is stupid. Romantic feelings often operate outside of ‘what makes sense.’ Relationships aren’t coldly calculated programs that are optimized for convenience. We’re people with feelings, not computers.

I don’t think they even realize it but I’ve seen a lot of post-season 4 hardcore Jancy defenders on other sites keep saying that Jonathan is more relatable than Steve, and that is their primary reasoning for preferring a Jancy endgame.

No disrespect, but I think a lot of people have some heavy attachment to Jancy because they see themselves in Jonathan, and maybe they’ve had a Steve in their own life that threw a wrench in their plans…And they just wish everything could be like in the movies where the dweeb ‘wins.’

And I’m not saying that all Jancy fans are like that — it’s not even most of them — but there is a sizeable group of people who do appear to feel that way. And I don’t think the story should be compromised to appease them.

Sometimes a more realistic approach is the best one, and do you know what’s realistic at this point in the show’s canon? Nancy and Jonathan are shown to he growing apart, and Nancy and Steve are shown to be growing closer — possibly closer than they ever have been, even back when they were dating. They’ve evolved to the point where they’re practically different people, and those people are very much into each other.

People are all “Stancy doesn’t make sense! Nancy would never leave Jonathan for Steve, that doesn’t make sense!”

Why not? Because you say so? Because you have an English major and know the way stories are supposed to go? If she ends up loving Steve more than she loves Jonathan and Steve loves her back, then that is literally all that is required for them to want to try to make it work, and all signs are pointing towards that being the case.

“They’ve been building Jancy up since season 1! It’d be stupid to change course now!”

Why? Because that’s the way stories are supposed to work? Because she’s been dating Jonathan for a couple years and now it’s unthinkable that two teenagers could split up at the ripe old age of fucking seventeen? Talk about sunk cost fallacy. Remember that thing I said about Nancy not wanting to end up stuck in a relationship with someone she doesn’t love?

Folks act as if writers subverting expectations comes across as cheap or disappointing. I think in this particular instance it would be refreshing and satisfying. In a show that is essentially a love letter to the eighties I think Nancy going her own way to oppose popular tropes from that era could be very meaningful.

I hate to break it to some of you, but sometimes the dumb jock turns out to actually be a really great guy. Sometimes people fall out of love. Sometimes the girl of your dreams catches feelings for someone else.

Sometimes love is more complicated than a straight-to-DVD romcom

#stancy #ramblings #my posts #stranger things spoilers #stranger things 4 #stranger things volume 2

[firecrackerhh]

You do nothing but get into constant fucking drama with other people in this fandom for no other reason than goddamn clout, that or you’re legit too fucking unaware to understand why people think your behavior is rightfully fucking irritating to everyone around you, and I’m not sure which potential option makes me disrespect you less.

You irritating fucks constantly get under this fandom’s skin for legit retarded fucking reasons and then you act surprised when people tell you that you’re fucking wrong?

You’re so fucking media illiterate you can’t even tell the difference between slapstick and actual abuse in a cartoon and you wanna fucking lecture people about topics you clearly have no business fucking talking about!?

Read the room! Assuming you’re fucking capable of it you goddamn retard. Jesus fuck!

What the fuck is it with the most brain dead people in this fandom thinking they have the right to speak on fucking anything dude, what the fuck!?

If you can’t tell the difference between a character kicking another in the balls Vs a gay man being physically abused by his bitch ex wife, if you legit believe that both require deadly seriousness, then you’re just retarded dude, I’m sorry to tell you.

Not that you care probably, I’ve seen you like one of my posts where I use the word retard, guess ableism only bothers you if it’s directed at you. Kinda hypocritical ngl.

Like yeah you would still be annoying af but at least it would be morally consistent if you hated every instance of the word instead of cherry picking.

Christ never watch the 3 stooges, you might get an aneurism lmao.

Didn’t you fucking say you were gonna leave the fandom? Or is the attention you get by being a lolcow too fucking sweet to ignore?

Maybe more people would be willing to have good faith discussions with you if you weren’t acting so fucking morally superior about everything you goddamn mental midget. The fucking gall.

You ain’t superior to anyone, you’re nothing but an irritating parasite getting high off the attention like a fucking heroin addict looking for a hit of dope, fucking tragic. At least if you were honest about being a fucking attention whore I would respect you a little bit, but nah you wanna bullshit others (and probably yourself) into thinking that any of the shit you say actually has any value. Tragic.

If you’re gonna leave, leave. It’s beyond obvious you don’t fucking belong here if all you wanna do is start shit and make other people miserable.

People recognizing slapstick isn’t actually abuse, isn’t fucking abuse apologia you retarded sack of shit, holy shit, how the fuck can people like you even exist?

I stg if you just love harassing fans cuz of a fucking character they like or because they clearly have better media literacy than you do, then you seriously need to touch grass, leave people the fuck alone you goddamn dumbfuck.

“Don’t harass this person guys!!!” You don’t even fucking bother to use the marker tool in your photo app to hide people’s usernames you fucking sack of shit! If you really cared about people not being fucking harassed you would fucking do the bare minimum!

Tho considering you’re the same person who said “it’s no wonder antis and criticals don’t like you guys!” I expect nothing less, if anyone sounds like an abuse apologist here it’s you.

The entire fandom shouldn’t have to suffer cuz a few people here are assholes, you’re one of them.

Stop fucking projecting onto people so fucking obviously, it’s pathetic af.

At least I’m honest I’m a fucking bitch and I have no qualms in admitting it. I know who I am.

Christ at least Squidiot was fucking funny to laugh at in hindsight, you’re just pathetic and irritating.

Grow tf up or get the fuck out, take your fucking dogshit takes with you.

🧨🔥~Firecracker out~🧨🔥

#tis i the werebitch

[lexi-the-demon-69]

Nah what in tarnations goin on with the anti-LicoPom shippers these days

Personally I don’t ship those two, but I wouldn’t call myself an anti-LicoPom person. my personal hcs of the two just wouldn’t make the ship work, but ya don’t see me lunging at somebody full speed right at the jugular because they ship the two

Who in their right mind comes after someone bc they ship two adult characters? (that aren’t related to each other, mind you) (Side note: Going by the idea that Licorice is in his 20s and Pomegranate is in her 30s, why would an age gap be wrong, if they are both adults? My parents are literally 11 years apart💀)

I dont think either characters are absolute saints. They’re cookies of darkness, for crying out loud! Of course they’re not gonna be amazing people,,, or cookies?

Like if that one anon wanted to discuss why they disagreed with a ship, sure whatever, but when it turns to name-calling and pointing fingies? That immediately ruins the argument.

Anyway point of what im yapping on about is that people who ship stuff gotta be less passive-aggressive towards others when they disagree with other people’s ships/opinions. Like we’re all apart of the same fandom, can’t we all just get along and set different opinions aside? Or is there something I’m just not getting?

One thing I will never understand is ship discourse. My brain has too many debuffs lmao

Hope you have a nice day, your blog and art look very nice! 😄💕

I honestly have to agree! Coming after and attacking me for liking a ship, instead of having a nice conversation with me, is stupid. Hell, I've had a better conversation with a ChocoMilk shipper and I hate that ship. (You know who you are and thanks for explaining your side of the story!) I am more than willing to have someone explain why they don't ship the things I do, as long as they're nice and civil about it. But, if you're gonna call me names and attack me as a person, then I'm going to pull your pants down and spank you with my opinions on why you're wrong.

One thing I forgot to mention is this: Pomegranate showing interest in Dark Enchantress doesn't mean LicoPom can't work. Besides, Pome x Dark Enchantress is more disgusting than LicoPom because that genuinely seems toxic and illegal.

Pome x Dark Enchantress is a toxic ship because there's obviously a power imbalance and you cannot tell me that Dark Enchantress wouldn't manipulate or ab*se Pome in that relationship if she did something wrong. Pome is a devoted follower of Dark Enchantress and, just like all of the other members (except Dark Choco) holds her in such high regard that they will do ANYTHING for her. Just goes to show how fucking hypocritical that anon is and how dumb Antis can be sometimes.

I have unfortunately dealt with antis before (if you've known me since my Henry Stickmin days, then you'll know.) and the best way to deal with them is to spank them with their own argument and block them.

I honestly don't get ship discourse either bro. None of this is real. It's a fictional relationship where I can project myself onto a character who will more than likely think I'm a weirdo.

Also, glad you like my art! I hope you enjoy your stay!

[triciaofsteel]

South Park romance hcs, except I’m Aroace and don’t know the first thing about romance

(this whole thing is a slash jay, also aged up cuz like???? Duh???) edit: bro I started working on this at around 2 am and then I blinked and now it’s 3 am what the scallop

Edit 2: ok cool I just figured out how to put the read more thing that’s pretty nifty

Also sorry if any of these feel ooc it is WAYYY too late for my mind to process anything rn it’s mush these are just the bits and pieces that I’ve picked up from the slop

I only have Kyle, Leslie, Stan, Clyde, Kenny, and Bebe for now but I’ll like.. edit it later I guess, later when I get more brainworms (also totally not self projecting onto them. Yes I know I’m a total loser)

Kyle: ASEXUAL KYLE CANON ASEXUAL KYLE CANON!!! /srs HES LITERALLY ME 

-Has realllyyy big problems with expressing emotions aka feelings in general it’s an autism thing (like Craig) 

-Which also makes him all weird with like physical contact n stuff?? “Get ur dirty paws offa me” typa shit

-ESPECIALLY WHEN IT COMES TO STUFF LIKE POKING/PRODDING!! He will probably sucker punch just about anyone who gets close and honestly, not feel sorry about it (I wouldn’t either)

-love language is…. Nothing. Lmao

-jkjk it’s probably some shit like gift giving??? But like, in a different way than you think. Just think about that one “can I just do your laundry someday” scene, but instead of laundry it’s homework. what is that love language called someone please tell me I actually have no idea what I’m talking about.

-he thinks about stuff logically a lot of the time, which is why he’ll like NEVER pick up on any hints whatsoever. 

-the more I write the more I realize I’m making him sound too much like Craig. Uh

-what is love (baby don’t hurt me..)

-if he EVER does confess, (he won’t.) he’ll probably do it in your like, insta/facebook dms, there is NO way this mf is actually gonna ask someone out face to face

-absolutely despises the idea of uhhh. Yknow. Jacking it in San Diego. WHY???? BECAUSE TRANSMASC KYLE!!!!!!! This is actually canon I’m Matt and Trey.

-he will not make exceptions because he’s in love or whatever (he’s not) you still gotta keep up ur side bc he’s not entirely head over heels!!! He’s not!!!(I think he’s learned his lesson from Leslie)

-single kyle: “bro I hate relationships so bad bro couples need to shut up fr”

-double Kyle: “bro I hate relationships so bad bro I need to shut up fr”

-I feel like he’d be the type to not be able to distinguish platonic feelings from romantic feelings. Why? Because me

-you HAVE to be direct with him because he’ll never be able to figure out anything otherwise. Ur sad? Tell him ur sad. Wait actually don’t he has no idea how to comfort ppl

-best he can do is an awkward pat on the back and a mumble “it gets better…?” 💀 or, if he’s pissed, “wtf am I supposed to do abt that”

-if someone confessed to him first, it would probably go something like this

“I love you”

“???? Are you being /srs or /j???”

or

“I love you”

“Wow haha that’s so silly never say that again”

or maybe even just a straight up “ew” 💀

-Cupid (Twin Ver)

Leslie!!!

-Leslie is actually Lesbian + aroace oriented . I don’t make the rules sorry, tho the aroace part is more dominant, it’s more like aroace + lesbian oriented

-similar thing with Kyle, but instead of being rude/straightforward about it, she’ll either gaslight you or do this:

“oh, you love me? That’s so funny!! I do too :3”

“Really?”

“yeah!!!”

“Does that mean we can date???”

“What? No!!! I meant that I also love me.”

“…”

“stupid bitch”

-I love her

-was torn between making her lesbian and making her aroace so fuck it we both

-I think she hates men (I do too /j)

-typa girl to run around breaking people’s hearts for the pure fun of it (Michael Jackson reference???)

-she thinks love is a joke. Like genuinely.

Stan:

-…

-I genuinely don’t know how I’m supposed to characterize this guy

-he canonically jacks it in San Diego so that’s something I guess

-his dog was gay you guys

-bi

-rly hope ur ok with being vomited on (I am not)

-just think of the PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE thing

-gets rly defensive whenever anyone asks him about Wendy

-responds with 👍 or “k” to confessions

-would probably be a discord kitten for nitro /j

-Cupid (jack stauber)

Clyde:

-This man is ALSO bi

-hey 😏 what’s going on 😏

-love language is giving discord nitro /j

“I love you”

“I’m so sorry bro”

-I saw someone say that being bi and single is like playing on both sides of a sports team and still losing. Yeah that’s him, L rizz 😂😂🤣🤣🤣

-this bitch has both Tinder AND Grinder and still remains lonely

-probably because he starts off EVERY conversation with a terrible ass pick up line

“hey bbg sorry I gave you lice but relationships are all about sharing everything with each other😍😍😍”

-PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE thing, but it’s with EVERYONE

Kenny

-there are two types of people, people who say that Kenny is “the straightest kid in South Park” and people who know the TRUTH

-this man is the biggest slut ever

-wasn’t he a prostitute once

-Relationship red flag: he once ate an entire banana with the peel on during a date. Partner horrified, broke up like a day later

-honestly, there’s not much to say, it’s literally kenny

“what’s your love language”

“money”

“MONEY???? BRO AINT NOBODY SPEAK 💴💴💸💶💶💸💎💎💸💵💷💎💰🪪💰💰💶💳🪪”

(it’s actually physical contact but we don’t talk about that)

Bebe

-I love lesbians!

-omni maybe? (Girl leaning)

-Unfortunately scared of relationship commitment

-I’m pretty sure she’s been hit up on multiple times, every time she ghosts/friend zones them

-Has a long distance relationship with Clyde despite living in the same town??

-would probably leave a guy in a restaurant and make him pay the bill

“damn, look at that ass!! 😍😍”

-I feel like she listens to pinkpantheress and maybe coco and Clair Clair

-love language is shoes

#south park hcs #kyle broflovski #sp kyle #leslie meyers #sp leslie #stan marsh #sp stan #clyde donovan #sp clyde #kenny mccormick #sp kenny #bebe stevens #sp bebe

[mischiefpaw]

hiya!

hey i dont know how many people still follow me but i figured i should give an update on what i’ve been up to through all this radio silence.

TL;DR i was artblocked and still am but i’m making a webcomic! more details below.

as you can probably tell, i fell into a pretty bad art slump over the past couple years. i haven’t been happy with or felt able to finish pieces for a while, which was made worse by losing interest in most fandoms i’ve made art for in the past. it’s not that i don’t like them anymore or will never ever draw from them again (sorry to the people who followed me for warrior cats though i think i’m through with that), my interests have just changed LMAO. While things have improved on the slump front, I’m still kind of artblocked and relearning how to work through it. That’s not gonna go away immediately, but i’m determined to get through it and get back to posting art of things i love!

As for what my interests have shifted to... for the past year i’ve been writing a webcomic called Ad Terra! Ad Terra follows a struggling professional gamer stranded in an apocalyptic world by supernatural forces, and his bitter rival. While both seek to find their former teammates, old grudges and clashing personalities make things much, much harder than they have to be in this tragicomedy about grief, the glory days, and zombies. 

If that sounds like something you want to know more about, shoot me an ask! I have so so so much to talk about when it comes to these characters and while I won’t spoil too much, i’d love to let you guys get to know the setting and characters.

As for progress on the comic itself, I’m currently in the scripting phase. I’m expecting that the first chapter will be posted in late 2023/early 2024-- which seems like a long time, but I’ve got some secret comic-related projects up my sleeve that’ll be worth the wait ;) For right now, you can follow @adterra​ on tumblr for updates when they come. I’m super excited to share the story with you guys when it’s ready!

(quick sketches of our protagonists!)

Onto actually talking about art! I have been drawing, but most of it is unfinished doodles I haven’t felt like posting. As I said before, finished pieces probably aren't gonna turn up for a bit, but I’m going to try and get into the habit of posting more sketches and studies (more as a form of accountability to show myself that i actually have been doing stuff than anything else, but also bc i love seeing other people’s sketchy studies myself!)

thanks for reading love you all mwah happy holidays

#mischiefpaw talks

[quynhorlose]

if you wouldn’t mind, can u tell us more about the mute regulus aspect of the fic?

yes gladly!! (i assume this is about what i teased a whiiiile ago lmao)

so, i do this thing that a lot of fic writers do where i tend to project onto characters. with sirius, the plant thing and with mary, my struggles with religion (you’ll see this one soon). with regulus, well.

i see myself in him a lot more than i think either of us would like 😭 i’m a younger sibling (and adopted to boot) and i struggled with a lot of the things he has. so when it came to trying to piece him together in this upcoming fic… i’ve had selective mutism since i was a very small child. it’s part of the second half of fight/flight that we don’t talk about enough. fight, fight, fawn and freeze.

i think all four of them get a bad rap; fight is misunderstood as recklessness, flight is misunderstood as cowardice, fawn as compliance and freeze as incompetence.

but really, it’s just. it’s the body’s way of protecting itself. clamming up. disassociation, in a way.

for a long time, it was just me floating through my own life like a ghost. and i think with regulus, being that younger child with such a loud sibling in such a quiet house and witnessing the things he witnessed—it’s not impossible for me to see where he may have slipped into the instinct in the same way i did.

we talk about survival instinct a lot when we talk about sirius and regulus. it’s really easy to pin sirius down as flight and fight. regulus, i think, embodies both fawn and freeze for a large part of his journey. i think it’s really important that as we recognize the path that he took, we recognize other damage it might have done. other ways to cope.

i also see regulus as an observer! i think he’s got a way of reading people that sirius/others may not. and that’s something that grows from just. watching. i’ve got hints at this throughout the growth fic:

but beyond the fact that regulus doesn’t waste words, isn’t chatty, etc., i think the idea of him living without them at all for a time is worth exploring. especially if it means getting to process my own growing up through the magic of fic.

though this one won’t be out for a while! i’ve still got the band fic, bike fic and breakdown fic to get through.

#this got far too rambly anon #look what you’ve done #but yes i want to explore it further #i think i’m very guilty of projecting my own struggles and quirks and the like on these characters #helps when we know nothing about them in canon! #asks #quynh spiels

[goblinselfshippr]

I am awake and ready to continue annoying you all with Vergil

I’ve literally made him a sad little divorcee(even though we never formally married), and I think the little things he does in the background are really telling about who he is as a person. There’s also something that really messes with my delusional little brain that I kinda wanna mention: like 90% of the things I’ve headcannoned in the past for him has become cannon in either the comic or the latest game. I know it’s just good characterization, and if it’s done right fans should be able to draw logical conclusions from what little info you’ve given them (cinemasins propaganda be damned). Unfortunately I am rabid and have projected onto him for over 50% of my life, and sometimes my brain says shit like “its bc he’s real and is trying to show you.” Which is why I really get into concepts of dimension travel and differences in time frames (*cough cough* Sam *cough cough*), and actually I’ve always felt like I’m from some other place entirely- which might just be because I’m autistic lmao. Anyway.

I like that he’s flawed and has faults, and you can kind of see how he’s emotionally immature because he’s been in hell since roughly 18. He tries though. He gives his favorite book to Nero as a sort of promise to come back, I think. He really doesn’t seem like the odds have been stacked in his favor with the few years he did have with his full family. There’s an after credits scene of him and Dante talking about their parents, and it really sounds like unfortunately they pitted their kids against each other. Like yeah siblings fight a lot, and they’ve both been exposed to a lot of violence, but it really seems like a lot of unhealthy competition was encouraged maybe by their dad (because we see their mother yelling at them for fighting until they bleed). I also could just be reading too far into stuff because that’s my husband fr

#❤️[a thousand years]

[hanjsquokka]

hey! i may or may not have found out my crush had a gf while i’ve liked him (😔😔) so i’m pretty deep in my feels- if you could do a like scenario similar to mine but when seungmin finds out and comforts the reader about it? you can play with it however you like, but it’d mean a lot to write it.

thanks so much!!

<3333

Ahhh I totally feel you there! I still remember when I found out that the guy I had a crush on for four years (I'm such a loser lmao 😭) had a girlfriend. This was short since I'm a bit slow on motivation rn but I hope you like it anonnie <3 (Also projected a few of my own feelings into this ajkdjs)

I feel like Seungmin is the kind of person who's like actions speak louder than words. He'd notice every single detail and not say anything but rather show his affection through small actions. Idk why but this just makes me feel so soft :(

kim seungmin × gn!reader , fluff , comfort , 0.5K words

Honestly, you should've known. You should've known he was taken. No guy as perfect as him could've been single. Perhaps it was fate's way of telling you to move on when you saw him in the coffee shop, his arm slung over a girl's shoulder, laughing at something the two of them found so funny their faces were pink. Maybe you would've dropped your piping hot coffee in your hands if you didn't turn away quick enough, trying to erase the image from your brain but it played over and over again, taunting you, mocking you for getting your hopes up so high you thought you had a chance.

In the midst of your solo pity party (watching your favorite TV show), your doorbell rang. The incident happened a few days ago, but you felt so… defeated. There was no one to blame. No one was at fault. And you couldn't even dislike that girl because you knew her. She was such a kind person, you could never hate her no matter how much the jealous side of you wanted to.

“Oh, Seungmin, what are you doing here?” You asked when you padded over to the front door in your fluffy socks, decked in your comfort hoodie and sweatpants.

Seungmin didn't say anything for a few moments before he lifted up a bag he was holding. “I got something…” He said quietly, stepping into your home and slipping his shoes off.

The two of you settled onto your couch, you curiously waiting to see what your friend bought. Your mind was temporarily distracted from the gloomy mood you were previously in.

“You said you wanted to try these right?” He revealed a box of small cupcakes. You easily identified them as the products of a new bakery that opened, one that you had been dying to go to. You often told him the same, pointing to it from across the street as you walked side by side.

“Min… you didn't have to…” You swallowed back whatever emotions were building up inside you — either from the pure kindness of Kim Seungmin that he refused to admit openly or from your earlier breakdown caused by your failure of a love life.

“I wanted to.” Was all he said, placing a cupcake generously topped with frosting and sprinkles. You watched him take one for himself before you bit into the pastry, the sugary cake bringing a small smile onto your face. “Knew you'd smile.” He cracked a grin which only made you smile widder, letting out a small laugh. You fell into a comfortable silence with him, both of you relishing the baked delicacies he bought until he spoke up again. “There's… going to better guys than him.”

Your mouth hung open. “How do you…”

“You're wearing that hoodie with those socks and watching that show. You think I didn't notice?” He asked, as if it was the simplest thing ever — spoiler alert, it wasn't, at least not for you. You were shocked. Since when did he pay so much attention? Since when did you not notice? Just how much of an open book were you and how good was Kim Seungmin good at reading? “Close your mouth or you're going to attract flies.” That snapped you other of your little daze, hitting his shoulder while he laughed. He calmed down after a moment and cleared his throat. “I'm serious about that though — you'll find someone better.”

You looked straight into his eyes. Maybe you already have.

©hanjsquokka | copying, translating or republishing my work is strictly prohibited

#skz #stray kids #kim seungmin x reader #seungmin x reader #kim seungmin #seungmin fluff #seungmin #kim seungmin fluff #stray kids fluff #skz fluff #( mana's inbox 💌 ) #( asks : minnie 🐶 ) #( anon ♡ )

[z-h-i-e]

New Year Fanfic Asks - Part 2/5

6. Which yet-to-be-started fic is first on your list?

Technically, the next thing I’d like to get done is something written under my secret pseudonym (secret in that few know it’s my, not so secret in that I’ve not been secret over the fact I do write under multiple names), so I can’t really say what that project is.  But, I can talk about the second on the list item – in 2011, I wrote a fic titled Beautiful Oblivion, and I have had different manifestations of things that could be sequels or prequels, and I think I have something specific enough to run with. 

7. Will you change anything about the way you interact with other writers?

I tend to be very open and available. I can’t always read whole stories; I try to look at snippets when something comes up.  The reality of the situation is that for the most part, I write the content I want to read and I don’t go actively looking for things.  I do a fair number of presentations each year, not just for fandom creators, some of these are live groups in the county I live in or other online events. I suspect I’m probably going to be increasing the amount of that type of content that I create and share. I’d actually like to try to get some how-to videos out there, I just have to take the time to look at options and see what would work the best. 

8. Is there a story idea in your mental vault that you’ve never been brave enough to try writing? Is this the year? Can you tell us about it?

I don’t think I have a lot of fear – and I think Werewelves was evidence of that. What I am in the process of doing is weaving the additional content into Werewelves that was only written on the side and not originally included in the paths of the story, and that is I suppose what would be called the wolf-on-wolf action of Finrod and Edrahil both in wolf form, aka, my furry indulgence pathways. I have a lot of tucked away stories in my head about Finrod in wolf form, but since, again, I’m writing for myself, and sharing when I think there are others who are interested, I have found that one of the biggest not allowed categories in the Tolkien fandom is no longer coming to the door and seeing ‘no slash allowed’ but coming to the door and seeing ‘no furries no exceptions’ (and strangely enough, more of that comes from places that are super welcoming to LGBTQIA+ stories, but I don’t have the time/energy/desire to bring up the irony of disallowing fur culture when once upon a time, other groups were biased against what said group now encourages–but, I was made aware in the 90s by fellows furs that we’d probably be the last outlier, so I am 0% surprised). All that to say, if I thought I’d find other people who were interested in Finwoofs escapades in Valinor, I’d potentially write them out, but until then, I’ll just think about the adventures he has when he has a tail and floof. A lot.  

9. Short term goals… what do you hope to complete this week or in January?

I am trying really hard to get at least one story onto AO3 each day that is not currently there.  I have said I would do this many years running, New Year’s Resolution and all that – and then, I 0% follow through.  I’m doing okay this year, but goodness, am I procrastinating my ass off (case in point - I’m already on question 9 here). I don’t know what it is about posting older content – maybe it’s just that I want this to be the forever home, and I’m still not entirely convinced that there won’t be something to come after AO3, or perhaps that I’m worried that a time will come when AO3 decides it will police content, and I still remember all the time I spent on fanfiction.net, and galadrhim.net, and faerie, and all the other fandom websites, only to have them poof.

10. Will you keep a record of all the fics you write and/or post this year?

LMAO. I can’t even keep track of what I have for WIPs, or the titles of things I’ve written. I come across stories on a regular basis in my email or on some random site somewhere I forgot about that I entirely forgot I wrote. Short answer: It’s not looking likely. I hit 1K stories somewhere between 2006 and 2007; it’s anyone’s guess what’s out there these days, where it is, what it’s named, and if I’ll even find it again. What I really need is a fanfiction secretary to round up my stories and get them into one place together and since that’s not looking likely, if I can at least get them shuffled onto AO3, that will be a win.

#fanfic asks