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purplerose244 · 11 months

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Watched the fifth episode of LEGO DreamZzz: LOVED IT!

HALFWAY THERE BABY!!!!

I don't know how this season ends so I don't know if it's open to future seasons, but I'm having a blast honestly! It's such a cute adventure and I love the characters a lot! 😍

I wonder if we'll get some sort of reveal at some point, between Ninjago, Nexo Knights and even Chima that was always kinda present

Well we'll see! ONTO THE EPISODE!!!

PEAK PERFORMANCE

Heeeeeyyy some real world shenanigans! I was wondering how their interactions in the Dream World were gonna be while still in school, without all the mayhem 😂

Coop really is a cool guy, but after seeing his fears I worry about how stressed he is by everything

Logan just gives me huge Kai vibes and that's besides Vincent, just look at him 🤣

Owww, I feel like Mat is not good at this

LOOK AT Z-BLOB WITH THE LITTLE FLAG CHEERING FOR HIS BUDDY IF ANYTHING HAPPENS TO Z I WILL KILL EVERYONE IN THIS ROOM AND THEN MYSELF!!! 💚💚💚

Yep, poor Mateo is good at lots of stuff but sports isn't one of them

I feel that pain, failing PE 😅

DANG IT LOGAN PLEASE DO SOMETHING NICE FOR ONCE I REALLY WANNA LIKE YOU BUT I CAN'T IF YOU KEEP BEING A JERK LIKE THAT AAAAAA-

Omg Mat got a grumpy pillow, have I mention that he's my son and I love everything about him?

SQUISHED Z BLOB 😂😂

Heeeeyyyyyyy I was waiting for the dream avatars! Finally 😍

IZZIE LOOKS AMAZING!!!! 💗💖💓💖💗💓 Between her design and Zoey's I'm having a hard time deciding my favourite

Pffff blue Logan 😂

Obviously Mateo's also really cool, gives me Lord of the Rings vibes (which is fair since he mentioned the book before), and I love the green eye and the green streak of hair where is was blondish before 💚

I'd love to see Mateo fanarts as human and not LEGO, but I will not risk looking up for it and accidentally seeing spoilers!!... like I usually do 😅😅

I don't remember Cooper's avatar being that different, maybe I'm wrong

Also interesting how he seems to be into following instructions, I think he's the most tame of the team so far. Mat got the strategies down, but Coop seems very rational as well

Izzie is short for Isabel?... I feel like I could've realized that... LOVE NICKS 😍😍

Towards the Sandman then? I'm very curious to see how they look like, so far the designs in this show are always really good. Even the forge master, being a simple kid, had something interesting about it

Why do I feel like Logan will do something very stupid

WHY DO I FEEL LIKE EVERYONE WILL DO SOMETHING VERY STUPID

Of course Izzie would make a giant rabbit and I have nothing but respect for her for doing it 😂💙🩷

Cooper seems to be very tame with his creations, just like it was said before. Not enough creativity. I feel like he will have to learn how to think outside the box

*Mateo casually flying with a modified Z-Blob mecha copter* YEP THAT'S HOW YOU THINK OUTSIDE THE BOX 💚💚💚

To be honest everyone is very young so I can't even blame them too much for making mistakes. Like, if there's an age to fail, it gotta be middle school

Does Logan have problem with authority or listening to people? With Mateo, with prof Oz, I feel like he really struggles with that. And I don't wanna trace this back to Vincent's other roles, but given how Kai didn't have his parents for a long time and Jestro was a straight up orphan, I wonder if his household situation is okay...

Look at me hyperanalysing something that is not explicit lol

So it is confirmed that Lunia was defeated while she sealed the Nightmare King? I wonder if we might see flashbacks or images of her at some point

YETIIIIIIII

OH WOW HE'S FABULOUS NOW!!! I know this came out before pride month but, like, this is pretty neat 😂🏳️‍🌈 Or maybe Jim is just really comfortable with makeup, fabulous either way!

Cooper got his magical girl transformation sequence as well! ❤️

Too bad we didn't see Izzie's 😢

Yeah he doesn't look super different, but considering he is passionate about cars the pilot look suits him a lot! I'm getting more and more intrigued by Coop, I think I understimated his character before

Aaaaaand Logan did a whoopsie again. He really needs to adjust himself some, and yes the others followed him suit so everyone got their fault but MAYBE DON'T USE THE THING THEY SPECIFICALLY TOLD YOU NOT TO USE?? 😵‍💫

I swear I wanna like you Logan but you gotta give me something to work with 😅 And you gotta learn the sorry, mah man

MAH BOY MATEO IS THE PLAN GUY LOOK AT HIM THAT'S MY SON HE'S SO SMART HE'S THE LEADER AND DOESN'T REALIZE HOW GOOD HE IS I LOVE HIM 💚💚💚

Izzie did not just say yeeted 😂😂

NUUUUUU NOT JIM 😱😱😱😱😱 DUDE STOP GIVING IZZIE MORE GRIEF SHE'S ALREADY NOT OVER SHARKYJAW 😭

Awww Mateo taking the blame 💕 To be fair they're all kind of at fault but yeah, the main issue was definitely Lunia's hourglass so good job sweetie!

Omg

OMG

FINALLY LOGAN FINALLY YOU'RE DOING SOMETHING NICE 🥳🥳🥳 I BELIEVED IN YOU FROM WHEN YOU VISITED COOPER AND THEN YOU BROUGHT SOUP FOR MATEO, I KNEW YOU COULD PULL SOMETHING OFF AGAIN!!!! 🤩

... it's, like, and EXTREMELY small step but one step forward regardless 😂

Cooper checking on Izzie was so sweet!... is this ship material? I focused on Mateo only so far so I don't know... I'll keep this as a maybe, we'll see what happens! 💕

I KEEP LOVING THESE EPISODES I DON'T KNOW WHY THEY HIT ALL THE RIGHT SPOTS FOR ME 💜💜💜

#keep em coming lego #lego #lego dreamzzz #dreamzzz #spoilers #dreamzzz spoilers #dreamzzz cooper #dreamzzz izzie #dreamzzz mateo #dreamzzz z blob #dreamzzz logan #mateo #izzie #logan #zooper #z blob

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ikingsley · 3 years

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Ina x MC: Another Woman

Summary: Ina has a secret admirer.

Warnings: Fluff!

Tag: @samanthadalton @domakir @kulaykape @hellyeah90sbaby @dopeyouth @kwaj05 @thedaft1 @swimmingshoebakerydreamer

Author’s Notes: A little fic for Valentine’s Day! Thank you to my friend @kwaj05, the “Prompt-Giver” and my personal editor LOL.

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Belvoire’s campus buzzed with anticipation. It was only a few days before Valentine’s Day, but students already made plans to woo their classmates or planned grand gestures for the people they were with. Even the quietest of students absorbed the campus’s lively energy, acting more extroverted than ever. Maybe it was just being overtly friendly or being flirtatious, but everyone felt the effects of the holiday spirit.

Luna was no exception. As an intelligent, witty, attractive young woman, she was often hit on by both male and female classmates. But the stunner only had eyes on one particular woman, a certain stuffy professor. So when people flirted with her, she often nodded politely, or smiled and turned away. The lack of interest she expressed was received by her admirers, who disappointedly backed off.

It was the day before Valentine’s Day, and students piled into Professor Kingsley’s ample classroom. They came in pairs, chatting lively with their lovers.

The class started quite uneventfully. Ina watched as Luna took her seat, flashing a knowing smile as Luna nodded back at her. Then Ina began her lecture, which very suitably was about the power dynamics between couples. Ina knew that some of her students had tuned her out, but every time she looked on at Luna, she was met with a piercing pair of eyes. And this was satisfactory enough to her. Each time, she would smile to herself, motivated to continue lecturing.

And right before she was going to let the class work on their own, a soft knock at the door was heard.

“Professor Kingsley? I have a package for you,” a voice rang out.

“Hmm,” Ina hummed. She hadn’t been expecting a delivery. Maybe it was a romantic gesture from Luna.

Ina got up and opened the door. Nosey students stretched their necks out to see what was the mysterious package, Luna included. Luna had absolutely no idea what Ina could have gotten. She was more lowkey, a person who wanted to keep her private life, private. She’d celebrate with Ina on their own terms, and found no need to plan huge public gestures.

It was much to Luna’s surprise when the delivery man presented her with a teddy bear, chocolates and a bouquet of red roses. The gift was left anonymous and Ina thought she knew who had given it to her.

What... Luna thought. Red roses? That was her and Ina’s flower to each other. It carried a heavy weight, especially after the sabbatical ordeal.

Luna was uncharacteristically not having it. But a wolf-whistle from several of the frat boys in her class brought her out of her stupor. Is this was jealousy feels like? she thought. But I’m not a jealous person!

“Damn Prof! I see you,” Ford commented.

Luna did a quick glance around the room. Everyone around her was smiling, and to not look like an outlier, Luna put on her best fake smile. Meanwhile, Ina smiled sheepishly at the boys’ wolf-whistle and Ford’s comment. She gave Luna a quick glance, one that lasted merely a quarter of a second. Had she really given Luna a good look, she would have been able to tell something was wrong. But Ina’s quick glimpse at Luna’s faux demeanor made her assume that the sender was in fact her girlfriend.

Ina smiled to herself and subsequently wrapped up class. Today she was teaching back-to-back classes, and Ina made sure that Luna was well-aware she wouldn’t be able to lag behind to avoid them being caught. Quickly, Ina was left with an empty classroom. Everyone had places to go and people to see. Though she found it odd that Luna hadn’t even acknowledged her on her way out, Ina didn’t think much of it.

“Baby, I’m home!” Ina called out.

Night had fallen quickly. Ina had a faculty meeting that seemed to last hours. Dean Steinhelm had droned on again, and many of the professors fought to stay awake. Despite a relatively boring meeting, Ina had noticed that Professor Alvarez was looking at her every so often. As the newest addition to the sociology department, Professor Alvarez had worked closely with Ina. Ina once was the new teacher in Belvoire’s human science school, and she knew how isolating the experience could be. Ina took Alvarez under her wing, like a sort of mentor, despite their age difference of only a few years.

Ina walked into the office, and put down her work bags. She then strolled into the bedroom, where she found Luna sprawled on the bed doing homework. Ina stood leaning in the doorway, drinking Luna up.

“Are you gonna greet me or just stand in the doorway like a brooding loner?” Luna said, without looking up from her laptop.

“I do not brood,” Ina said, finally shuffling towards the bed.

“You so do,” Luna replied coldly.

Brr! Ina thought. Luna’s tone was slightly reprimanding, leaving Ina concerned. She seemed fine during class...“Lu, are you okay?”

“Hmm. Yeah, I’m fine. I’m just tired,” Luna sighed.

The hours that passed between the class and now had calmed Luna down. Sometimes it would cross her mind and she’d feel a sense of jealousy wash over her. Luna hadn’t considered herself a jealous person, but with Ina it was different. There was just something about her. But then Luna realized that she was being unreasonably jealous. Ina was by far the most popular professor, and one of those stupid frat boys probably sent her that gift. And then she’d laugh because she knew the frat boys would never have a chance with Ina. This vigorous cycle repeated itself, but eventually she’d felt relieved. Ina was hers.

Ina crawled into bed, wrapping Luna in her arms. “Hey, thanks for the gift today in class,” Ina whispered into Luna’s ear.

And again, Luna felt jealousy course through her, “Ina, that wasn’t-”

“The mysterious aspect of it was quite hot. But it was also swee-” Ina said letting out a hot breath.

“Ina! That wasn’t me!” Luna exclaimed.

“Oh. So...who was that then?” Ina asked quizzically.

“I have absolutely no idea.”

“Does my secret admirer bother you?”

“Not really. I know you’re mine and I’m yours.” Luna’s jealousy fluctuated often, but she didn’t want Ina to feel bad about the present. Ina had no control over who found her attractive. I mean, come on. Ina was just drop dead gorgeous.

“I’m glad. A couple of my relationships...have deteriorated because of jealousy. I don’t need that extra drama in my life,” Ina said.

Now Luna really didn’t want to bring up her varying jealousy. She turned away from Ina, and Ina fell asleep holding Luna.

Hours passed by. It was almost four in the morning, and Luna was still wide-awake. She tried so hard to not feel jealous - that was so unlike her - but something wasn’t sitting right with this whole secret admirer thing. Ina shifted in her sleep, pulling away from Luna.

“Ina?” Luna asked.

“Sorry, did I wake you?” Ina turned to Luna.

“No, I’ve been up.”

“Why?” Ina shifted to check the time “Jesus Lu, it’s almost four!”

“I...” Luna began.

“What is it?”

“I know you didn’t want me to be jealous and normally I’m not but I don’t know, something feels off. I know it’s not your fault, but the red roses are our thing and I-”

Luna’s rambling was cut off by a forehead kiss.

“It’s okay. I know I’d feel jealous,” Ina admitted. “It’s cute that you’re a little jealous. But I’m yours. And yours only.”

Luna sighed in relief.

“Is this why you’ve been acting weird?” Ina asked.

“I guess. Sometimes I feel jealous, but other times I know that it’s always been us. Not anyone else. My feelings have changed every couple moments.”

Ina gave her another forehead kiss.

“It’s only you,” Ina smiled while Luna leaned in for a kiss. The jealousy she felt dissipated. Their relationship had only been strengthened by the secret admirer. The two broke out into raucous laughter. It was a weird situation, but they had gotten through another hurdle together.

“Who do you think sent it? ‘Cause I think we need to have a little chat,” Luna said, cracking her knuckles in a fake overprotective nature.

Ina laughed, but racked her brain.

“Do you think it was a frat boy?” Luna hummed.

Ina shook her head. “Gifts from those students tend to be more...flamboyant and never anonymous.” Ina recalled getting serenaded by the football team on various occasions.

Finally, Ina gasped. “Oh my god...it’s Professor Alvarez!”

“The new professor of sociology?!” Luna laughed.

“Yes! Just because I was being nice to her doesn’t mean I was hitting on her!” Ina followed. “Wait...she’s married...to a man. Hold on! She mentioned she was going to send me a gift for helping her adjust to Belvoire. That’s why she was looking at me in the faculty meeting. She wanted to see if I figured out it was her! The cheap ass! I guess that’s what was on sale because of Valentine’s Day.”

“What’s your definition of nice to her? Because being nice to a friend is different than being nice to your girlfriend.” Luna whispered in Ina’s ear, her hot breath hitching Ina’s own breath.

“Come here so I can show you what nice is,” Ina said, straddling Luna’s hips.

Luna woke up to the smell of something pleasant. That can’t be Ina, she thought. She threw on a satin robe and walked to the kitchen. Her jaw dropped.

“Ina! You didn’t burn your apartment down?” Luna snickered.

Ina rolled her eyes, but didn’t turn around. “I have to focus!” she said, pointing at the iPad next to her. It was playing a very detailed video about cooking eggs and bacon. “Go back to bed.”

“Aww, breakfast in bed?” Luna smiled.

“Mhm,” Ina hummed back. “Now go before I actually burn my place down.”

“Simp,” Luna said under her breath, turning to return to the bedroom.

“I heard that!” Ina laughed.

Ina came with two plates of bacon and eggs in her hands.

“I know you felt off after yesterday, but Happy Valentine’s Day, my love,” Ina said. “I’m yours, and yours only. Also, I didn’t want to buy anything because Valentine’s Day is the epitome of a capitalism-”

She was cut off by Luna reaching up and kissing her forehead.

“Babe, I’ve heard this rant before. You’re such a nerd, but I love you,” she said pointing at her lips. “Happy Valentine’s Day.”

Ina put the plates down, kissing Luna with everything in her.

#ina kingsley #queen b #ina x mc #choices #luna garcia

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mintchanniemint · 4 years

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pairing: [still friends] bassist!chan x (fem)reader wordcount: ~3.3k taglist: @100797-bc - @chansrms

[08:45 a.m]

"...So, since everyone seems ready and excited for this new project that involves more departments of our university, I think it's time to start! Be careful, everyone! And make sure to share all your thoughts with each other!"

A wave of "yes, Prof." slowly lit up in the huge auditorium as every student sounded both tired and bored. You had to admit you strangely didn't really hate this project, you probably had to do worse things, like that time you ended up doing a cooking project and nearly poisoned that girl from the History Department. Whenever you reminded yourself of that little incident, you always made sure not to see her, not even accidentally in the college restrooms. But this time, the project not only sounded a bit safer, but you even ended up in a group with a certain someone. And that was the only reason why that morning you didn't fall asleep while the professor was giving you the guidelines and instructions for your tasks. The project was related to the school systems around the world, and how they differed from each other, analysed under specific views. You were assigned a not-really-exciting topic, which was School Uniforms. Now, you had to admit you felt quite lucky the university you were attending didn't force its students to have a uniform to wear, but just the thought of having to learn how to tie a tie made you fall asleep on the spot.

"Hey."

Your train of thoughts got brutally interrupted by a way too familiar voice as you finally looked around, a bit confused, noticing that the hall was nearly empty. You looked in the direction of the voice that got your attention, to see a way too sleep deprived Bang Chan in front of you. You couldn't help but giggle a bit, he sat down on the seat right in front of yours, crossing his arms on the chair and plopping his chin on them. He looked at you for a couple of seconds, in silence, before slowly closing his eyes.

"You really look like a cat, sometimes." You whispered with a smile, your hand automatically reaching his soft curls, playing with a brown strand of hair with two fingers.

Wait… brown?

"Chan, when did you dye your hair?" The alarm in your voice nearly made you sound a bit too concerned and he quickly looked at you, his eyes half open.

"A couple of kids told me that I had to have a nice hair color for the project-" He then closed his eyes again, his head pushing a bit against your hand, as if asking you to keep playing with his hair.

"They were so serious about it, but my red hair dye is not so cheap to be covered by some brown color so I just used some hair color spray."

You looked at him, biting your lip trying your best not to burst out laughing.

"Yes, that's such a Chan thing for you to do…" You mumbled to yourself, your voice clearly highlighting a smile on your lips. He hummed in response, probably asking you what you meant by that. You shook your head and stood up, getting your bag from the seat next to yours.

"C'mon, bass boy, we need to go and try the uniforms!" You said, trying to sound as exciting as possible, hoping to somehow give some life to that sleepyhead in front of you.

"There's a reason why I always skip morning lectures." He mumbled, yawning and keeping his back on his shoulder. He followed you as you walked through the hallways of your department, not too familiar to him.

"They said this is the class, right?"

"Were you listening while that professor was assigning the classrooms to each group?"

"Nah… not really."

"Me neither."

The both of you just looked at each other for a couple of seconds, as if mentally screaming and asking what to do if you got the wrong class. Luckily enough, though, the door before you suddenly opened, revealing a black haired guy wearing round glasses, and a taller girl right behind him. They both looked at you, then the girl checked a pile of papers in her hands, nodding, and suddenly they smiled at you.

"Welcome! We were waiting for you!" The guy exclaimed, taking a couple of steps back and letting you and Chan enter the classroom. It was empty, some desks were occupied by big boxes with black, confusing scribblings scribblings on them.

"Those are the uniforms we are going to try, hopefully the sizes are gonna be fine! We thank you for submitting your essays and researching about school uniforms from various countries. Even though yours…" The guy mumbled, checking some of the papers the girl gave him, as he looked at Chan. "... was submitted two minutes before the deadline. But we appreciate the effort! You also followed our little advice about your hair! " The girl interrupted her friend, trying not to make him say anything way too harsh. She smiled at Chan, getting his usual cold stare in response, which left her a bit confused.

"Uh… yeah he really cares about this stuff, guys! Chan is just… not really good at expressing himself with words, yeah!" You swiftly entered the little conversation too, probably making it worse since as a consequence you only got an embarrassing silence and four pairs of eyes looking at you.

"Can we please see the uniforms now?" You quickly whispered, nearly tripping over your own words as you felt your own mind screaming for five whole seconds.

"Sure! Some students have already tried the uniforms they mentioned in their own essays and they're getting ready to take photos! We're really ambitious for this project!"

"And we're sure that the magazine of this project will turn out amazing with our photos! Seungmin is gonna make you shine like models."

They looked like those cartoon characters that completed each other's sentences, you couldn't help but find them a bit funny, though. Seeing them being so enthusiastic about this project made you feel a bit guilty too, since ten minutes earlier you were literally planning an escape with your fake-brown haired friend in case you didn’t get the right classroom.

You smiled at the two students in front of you and grabbed Chan by his arm, guiding him to a box on which you recognized your names were scribbled on with a black marker. Other students, definitely more responsible than you and Chan fused together, told you about the stuff you had to do. It was quite simple: go to the improvised changing rooms, wear the uniform, take pictures. Write about your general thoughts and impressions of the project at the end of the day. You just hoped Chan grasped all that, as he looked like he probably would have fallen asleep in the changing room. It didn't matter that much, you would have definitely helped him anyway.

You two were given three uniforms, and since there would have been lunch break in a couple of hours, the students of your group were asked to wear one of those uniforms. You didn't really understand why, but thinking about how other students had probably ended up in groups where they were supposed to cook, you felt quite lucky and didn't want to complain at all.

Chan was given his first uniform to try, and he walked to the changing rooms to try it on quickly. The photographer was taking quite some time taking those photos, and you didn't have to try the uniforms yet, since many other students were already waiting in line for the shoot. You just stood there, leaning on the wall, waiting for the moment Chan would have finally left that improvised changing room. Suddenly, the black curtain moved and a not so amused Chan made his amazing appearance: he was wearing black trousers and a white shirt, a tie on his right hand. He looked at you as he walked closer to you, and left the green and red tie on your hand.

"I don't know how to do this." He mumbled, as he finished buttoning his shirt up. You looked at the piece of cloth in your hands and took a deep breath.

"I don't know either but… Let's try, I guess?" You mumbled in response as you brought the tie around his neck, trying your best to seem like you knew what you were doing. Because of the little task you were asked to do, you had to get closer to Chan. You could feel his calm, relaxed breath gently hitting your face as your eyes were completely focused on that tie. Suddenly you felt his hand resting on your waist when you finally figured out how to make that tie look presentable for the shoot. You felt quite proud of the result and, not minding too much about Chan's hand on your waist, you dragged him to the photoshoot corner.

A cherry-red haired guy was there, a black bag right next to him, by his feet, as he was giving instructions about posing to a girl right in front of him. He then got his camera and, making sure everything was perfect, a loud "click" was heard.

"Let's take a couple more. So we can, eventually, choose the best one!" He smiled, getting a thumbs up by the girl who was temporarily his model. Seungmin, hoping you got his name right, seemed quite professional, and it took you literally seconds to guess he was from the Arts Department. You felt quite out of place for a good minute, everyone around you seemed like they were genuinely interested in that project and then there was you, who didn't stay home just because that grumpy, quiet cat-owner sent that essay last minute and automatically made you want to go just to spend the day with him.

Wow, that's embarrassing… And quite lame.

You shook your head, trying to let that thought drift off, when you suddenly heard someone call your name, announcing that you were able to try some of the uniforms you were assigned. You had to leave Chan's side, and you had to admit it felt way warmer when you had his arm around your waist.

"It's my turn! Gotta go."

"Make sure to button up the shirt properly."

"Oh shut up." You stuck your tongue out at him and you walked away, not before getting a gentle, quick squeeze on your waist by Chan, though.

Okay, let's be honest. Both of us are embarrassing and lame…

You mentally rolled your eyes at your own thoughts and quickly walked across the room to get your uniform, and headed towards the changing room. You didn't have any problems trying the clothes on, the trousers felt quite comfortable and you also liked how pretty the colors were. You looked at your reflection on the mirror, which was probably lent by the drama club, and quietly wondered which country's school that was supposed to be. You didn't really remember, even though you were literally the one who wrote about it in that essay, but you just shrugged it off and left the changing room, your eyes quickly landing on the little photoshoot corner.

It was Chan's turn, and that girl wasn't lying at all when she said that Seungmin was going to make everyone feel like a model. You nearly got caught staring at him and quickly walked closer to the queue of people standing, waiting for their turn to take photos. Seungmin seemed not to let your friend go, he probably found a good subject to photograph. He took photos of him in at least four different poses when he usually asks for two poses per student.

Chan left the spot with a small nod and walked away, leaving a satisfied Seungmin checking all the photos taken with his camera. Your friend quickly found you and walked closer to you, his eyes scanning the uniform you were wearing.

"Looks nice." He mumbled, one hand in the pocket of his trousers, the other one reaching a strand of hair that escaped from your ponytail.

"Oh well, thank you school president." You teased him with a smirk, before distractedly playing with his tie.

As it was finally your turn to take the photos, you couldn't help but feel Chan's gaze constantly on you. Seungmin made you feel at ease in a matter of seconds and you had to admit the shots were really pretty. He clearly was working so hard to make everyone shine in those uniforms. You thanked him with a smile and, followed by Chan, walked closer to those boxes containing other school uniforms. You had to try three other pieces before the big clock on the wall finally signed that it was lunch break. You were relieved half of the day had finally passed, but then you remembered you had to stay in that uniform you had just put on for the following two hours.

"The last time I wore a uniform for school was ages ago!"

"Wouldn't it be ten minutes ago?"

"Chan, c’mon." You sighed, exasperated, as you got your lunchbox from your bag and walked to the cafeteria with your friend. You noticed the uniform he was wearing only when the two of you sat down at a table and looked at each other for a fraction of seconds.

He was wearing a black turtleneck and a white shirt on it, his trousers were dark and looked more comfortable than the ones he had to wear for the second shoot.

"What."

Uh oh… caught staring…

"Oh, nothing! It's just… well, at least you don't have to wear a tie, hm?" You cleared your throat and looked around, your mind in complete alarm mode.

What an idiot.

Chan, in response, nodded and opened his lunchbox. Meaning that his whole interest was now on the food in front of him. You sighed in relief, you both loved and hated how naive that guy was. Definitely a double-edged sword. You shook your head at those thoughts and quickly opened your lunchbox, enjoying your meal and Chan's company for lunch.

"You know…" You said, between some bites. "Don't we look like high school students?" Your lips quickly curved into a silly smirk.

Chan looked at you, his eyebrows furrowed. "Isn't that part of the project-"

"No, Chan, I mean! Doesn't… this! Make you wonder what high school life would have been like if we were, you know, classmates-”

"Not really."

"Absolutely no fun." You pouted, your little rainbow-colored dream was completely destroyed before it could have even reached its completion because of Chan's straightforwardness.

The two of you chatted a bit after finishing your lunch and, since you had quite some time before returning to your team's classroom, you decided to go for a walk in the huge hallways of the university. You didn't feel as uncomfortable as you thought you would a few hours earlier; the uniform you were wearing was quite nice and warm too, and you were glad Chan had brought a scarf that morning, since you forgot yours at home because you were in a hurry. Even though he probably didn't even agree on that, you were wearing his scarf as you were walking down the hallways. Many students greeted you and way too many people were literally staring at Chan. You raised your eyebrows at the guy next to you, wondering exactly what they were so fascinated about.

Just wait till he opens your mouth, everyone.

You lightly giggled at your own thought, finding your mind funnier than usual when suddenly you walked past a group of students that stopped you. Specifically, that stopped Chan. You were a few steps back, looking at them quietly as some of them, definitely freshmen, gave Chan a few little pieces of paper. As the group of younger students walked away, Chan looked at you, his eyes literally filled with question marks.

"Wow Chan, you show up for morning lectures once and the whole Literature department falls for you." You commented with a dry laugh as you walked closer to him, checking the little notes in his hand. He shrugged and put them in the pocket of his trousers, leaving you speechless for a second.

" Wait, you're not throwing them away?"

"No, what if they actually need some tutoring."

"Chan are you serious-"

He looked at you for a second, his fake brown hair slightly touching his eyes. You sighed and shook your head, looking away for a second, when suddenly a huge thought hit you like a train.

What was that? You really couldn't tell, but something was burning. You felt annoyed. By what? You really didn't know how to explain it. What was that for? You had to calm down, those were just random phone numbers on a piece of paper, it wasn’t like that guy was going to contact them anyway. … right?

Breathe. Take a deep breath, you really need it before you do something dumb. Don't be dumb, don't be dumb, he's just a friend after all, he can do whatever he wants. Do not do anything dumb.

"Are you okay?" His usual, dull voice interrupted your thoughts for a second, making you notice you were actually holding quite tight on the scarf that was gently keeping you warm.

Your eyes finally met him, and you stayed silent. Complete silence. For at least five seconds. Your mind was running, gosh it was sprinting. From one thought to the other. And that weird burning was growing, and growing, and growing inside you. Your eyes were analyzing every single detail of his face. His brown eyes, that weird dye that was covering his usual beautiful dark red hair, his plump, full lips, that black turtleneck. And again, his eyes, his lips, his hair, his turtleneck, the ears that were usually adorned with beautiful earrings that were now completely bare.

And again, his eyes, lips, the turtleneck, his hair…

When suddenly, your hands moved before your mind could even realize that. You grabbed him by his arm. That was completely normal, you literally had always done that. But that time, that time you were dragging him to a small, quiet corner, far from those annoying and busy hallways. You were now in a small hallway, near two broken vending machines and an emergency exit.

"What is wrong with you?" He mumbled, his voice clearly expressing his confusion. You said nothing, you just pinned him against the wall, his hands quickly finding their way on your waist, and you looked at him straight in the eyes.

Your hand reached the collar of his black turtleneck, pulling it down with not much delicacy and your lips softly met his warm, sweet skin. He squeezed your waist as you angrily, but lightly, bit his neck, making sure to leave at least a small mark. You took a step back and looked at it for a second before fixing quickly both his turtleneck and shirt. Your eyes slowly met his, and moved to look at his cheeks, who were tinted in a light, pastel red color.

"Please don't contact any of them." You whispered, unexpectedly out of breath due to the adrenaline rush. You didn't let him say nor do anything, you just took a few more steps back before walking away in a rush, headed to the classroom.

Now.

…

What the hell did I just do?!

#inkidz #bang chan #chan fluff #bang chan imagine #bang chan soft hours #skz au #skz imagine #skz blurb #skz soft #stray kids blurbs #stray kids imagine #stray kids au #stray kids chan #bassist!chan #skz fluff #chan imagine

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korra-the-red-lion · 3 years

Text

Unnatural Affairs. Chapter 23: And So It Went

Hey everyone, this is the last chapter of the first series! I do have plans for a sequel in the works, however! Thank you for anyone who has read it this far!

(Ally)

Surprisingly, I didn’t fail all my exams.

Actually, I did pretty well on most of them. I somehow passed Drama with a good mark. The sub who took over was pretty chill during the exam and let us bring all of our notes. My other exams weren’t too bad either. All and all, a pretty successful end to term.

I was just about finished with my packing when I got a text from Lyn. Sarah had already gone home, since her last exam had been two days ago. I took one last look around the room before heading out. I could finish packing later.

The weather outside actually wasn’t terrible today. It was a pleasant sunny day with barely any wind chill. I tucked my chin into the top of my coat as I walked across the campus to meet up with my girlfriend. A happy tingle went through my body as thought about that. It was a little silly to still get excited about the thought, but hey, why not be happy?

Lyn stood in the archway that connected Harper and the library together. She was leaning against the wall when I got there, scrolling through her phone. The bandage was off her face now, only faint lines to show where she had been cut. Her eyes lit up when she saw me and she gave me a quick kiss.

“Hey.”

“Hey to you,” I said back.

“Ready to go?”

I nodded. She held her arm out and I looped mine through it. Together we walked over to the big tree in the middle of campus, where Michael was waiting for us. His plane left tonight but he wanted to be here for it. He waved when he saw us, and he laughed when Lyn held her other arm out with a smirk. He wasted no time on grabbing a hold of it, Lyn laughing along with him as he did.

I knew Dahlia was intrigued by what we were doing as we walked together down the path to where the Swan Pond was. I waved to her with my free hand, and she ended up trailing after us, curiosity bright in her eyes.

When we got there, we all untangled from one another and got to work. Dahlia sat on the bridge nearby and watched as we cleaned away snow and ice from a spot under one of the trees that hung over the pond. After all the snow was gone, Lyn put down a bundle of flowers. Michael tucked a stone with a beautiful design cut into it in front of the roots, making sure it was secured. I hung one of our old amulets over the stone and gently nailed a wooden plaque onto the tree. We stepped away and admired our work.

Here Lies The Forgotten Students

We remember who you are, and what you did for us. We know that society failed you when they stopped asking questions. No one should have given up on any of you. To David, we know your story. To Amelia, we know your truth. To Jamieson, we know your tale. To Fiona, we know your reality. To Fredrik, we know your narrative. We’re sorry that it took this long before someone finally learned what happened to you all, but at least you can rest easy now, knowing that the person who did this to you has met his justice. All we can hope for you now is that your next chance at life is better than this one was.

With all our love,

Spook Searchers.

“We really need a better name,” muttered Lyn.

“Hey, we’ve been through too much for us to change it now,” said Michael with a waggle of his fingers. “That would be like, sacrilegious.”

“Besides, it’s a fun name. It hides away all the horrible truths and traumas that were inflicted on us,” I pointed out.

Lyn shrugged indifferently. “I just hope we never have to do something like this ever again. I need it scrubbed from my mind.” We both nodded in agreement.

Dahlia drifted over and knelt in front of our makeshift grave. I could see her mouthing the words as she read along. Her fingers ran over the names of the departed, her eyes sad. She dropped her hands and sat there quietly for several minutes without saying a word. When she looked back at me, she was smiling through her tears.

“This is quite lovely. I’m glad you all did something nice for them, they deserved it.”

I nodded at her. “Of course. And we intend to figure out who caused your death as well. We haven’t forgotten about you either.”

Dahlia’s eyes went wide before she looked away. I saw her brush away the tears from her face and nod slowly. “Thank you. It truly means a lot to me.”

We left her alone after that. I spared a look back as we left and saw her kneeling in front of the grave, her head down and hands clasped in prayer. We walked back to the library together and decided to get one last warm drink together. Lyn paid for all of us, even though we both argued against it. The lady behind the counter laughed as we both tried our best to push Lyn out of the way, which ended in absolutely failure.

“You can’t beat these gains,” Lyn said with a wink.

We sat down at the table in the back and looked out the window. I thought about what a crazy 3 months this has been. I couldn’t believe how so much had happened in such a short time. Not only solving all those murders but dealing with all the school crap on top of it all. I felt like I was the same person I was at the start, but more mature now. Someone who liked who she was, someone who liked that she wasn’t ordinary.

“You’re gonna have some crazy jetlag, you know,” Lyn said to Michael as she sipped her hot chocolate.

Michael sighed. “Yeah, probably for a day or so. It’s not like, a terrible flight but it’s bad enough. What are you doing for the holidays?”

I saw the twitch of Lyn’s eyes before she looked down at her drink. “I’m gonna stay with Olivia for the first bit of the break, but after Christmas I’m heading to Florida for training camp. I’ll be back like, 2 days before the new term. So, not the most relaxing break but it’ll be fun.”

Michael nodded as he looked at me. “What about you, Al?”

“Going home,” I said with a smile. “I’m going to sleep for the entire break. Maybe watch some movies and TV. But me and this brain deserve a big break.” I poked at my temple.

“Yes, it does!” Michael slapped his hand against the tabletop.

We chatted for a little while longer before Michael had to head back to grab his things. His buddy offered to drive him to the airport, but it was a bit before his flight. Still, better to wait in the airport than spend money on a taxi. Lyn gave him a hug and slap on the back. I gave him a big hug and kissed him on the cheek.

“Have a good flight, I’m going to miss you,” I said.

“It’s only for a few weeks,” he said with a smile. “Plus, you can always call me. You know where I am.”

I nodded as we embraced one last time. Michael waved to us as he walked backwards. I gasped when he tripped over his own feet and nearly landed on the casted arm. Luckily, he caught himself and shouted, “I’M OKAY!” before racing back to his room.

I chuckled to myself with a shake of my head. Michael was so chaotic at times. But that was something that I loved about him. He was authentic. I wasn’t lying when I said I would miss him. There was something calming about his presence. He was a good friend, and I was glad to have met him.

Lyn and I walked back to Lukas hand in hand. I noticed she was getting a bit of a far away look in her eyes again, so I squeezed her hand to bring her back. She blinked and looked down at me with a smile.

“Sorry,” she said with a shrug. “I was just thinking.”

“Thinking about what?”

Lyn worked her jaw as she chewed on her thoughts before answering. “Lots of stuff, I guess. Training camp, Christmas with Liv, shit in general. It’s gonna be nice to have a break from it all. Then we’ve got the big championship meet to worry about when I get back. Just tryna make sure I’m organized because there’s a lot to remember.”

“It’s going to be fine,” I said soothingly.

“I know, I just like to be on top of things, you know?”

I laughed. “Nope! I’m pretty sure I only passed some of my classes by sheer luck. I handed in something for Anthro a week late, but I think my prof forgot I was even in the class, so she didn’t take points off.”

“Jesus,” Lyn shook her head with a playful smirk. “I can’t imagine being that disorganized. How’d you get through this term, let alone solve a crazy case? You’re something else, honestly. Like Wonder Woman or Supergirl.”

I blushed deeply. Lyn was always saying these really nice things about me and well…I wasn’t really used to them. I pressed up against her and buried my face in her arm, causing my glasses to go askew. Oh well, it’s not like I could see all that well anyway. Cold weather plus warm breath equals foggy glasses. Also, being compared to one of my favourite superheroes? I’m slightly dying of happiness on the inside.

When we got back to Lukas, Lyn helped me pack the rest of my things. It probably took the same amount of time that it normally would have because we kept stopping to kiss, cuddle, and I even got Lyn to watch an episode of Stargirl with me. It was really peaceful. A much better date than nearly getting killed by an out-of-control spirit. Hours passed by like seconds, and the next thing I knew, we were in bed sleeping.

The room was nearly pitch black as I stared up at the ceiling. Lyn was sleeping beside me, her arm tossed over my waist, snoring softly. I had been sleeping, but it came in fits right now. After everything we’ve been through, especially with that horrible horror realm or whatever the hell that had been, I’ve been having more difficulty sleeping through the night. I mean, I was sort of used to it, but not to this extent. My therapist and I were going to have a field day when I saw her next.

I turned my head slightly to look into the face of my girlfriend. I just wondered how it was all going to turn out. By some strange twist of fate, we got together because of my moral compass and curiosity. Lyn stuck around because she wanted to figure out what happened to her friend. I sometimes wondered what would have happened if she didn’t believe me that day in the café. Would I have gone through with it anyway? Would Michael and I have done it alone? I lightly traced my fingers across the scars of her arm, the ones she got because she protected me. It probably would be a different story then, huh?

All I know is this is how it turned out, and I don’t think I would have done anything differently. We got hurt, we got physical and mental scars. But I really think it was worth it to help those people. They were crying out for so long, waiting for someone, anyone, to hear them. I feel lucky in a way that I was the one who answered.

Finally, I felt my drifting off again. I closed my eyes and let sleep take me away, hopefully to a dreamless land.

XXX

Lyn helped me shove my last bag into the trunk of my dad’s car. I told her she didn’t need to stick around and help, but she told me it was no big deal. My dad nodded his thanks at her, and she nodded back. I stood by the car, fidgeting with the bottom of my coat. Lyn glanced at my dad one last time before she gave me a massive bear hug.

“Have a great break, Ally. I’ll see you in a few weeks.”

I squeezed back as tightly as I could. “You too. I hope everything goes well with your sister.”

Lyn nodded, her cheek brushing against the side of my face. “Me too.” And even though my dad was still there, she cupped my face between her hands and kissed me. I blushed from the intensity of the kiss, feeling all the unsaid words. When she pulled away, I could see the emotion shining brightly in her eyes, her cheeks and ears bright red.

I kissed her cheek one last time before we untangled ourselves. I got into the passenger seat and waved to Lyn as we pulled away. She waved widely back the whole time, never stopping until I was out of view.

My dad instantly started to tease me the minute we were on the highway. I moaned and made a big show of telling him off, but I was really happy. It felt good, talking to my dad like this. As long as the topic of ghosts wasn’t brought up, we were good.

I didn’t know what next term had in store for us, but I was looking forward to it. We had to solve Dahlia’s murder, but at least we could take our time with it. There was no time limit, and hopefully no creepy murderer. There was a lot about this university, heck, even this town that was hidden beneath the surface. I wanted to learn so much more about it all. Sure, it was bad this time, but usually the ghosts are just lonely people who want to share their stories. I had this special gift, and it was about time I used it, instead of being ashamed of it.

After this winter break, I wanted to see what the future had planned for us.

#unnatural affairs #ua #ally holland #lyn hart #michael yamamoto #dahlia cressman #paranormal #murder mysteries #romance #wlw romance #ghosts #sapphic lead #original story #orginal writing #writing #final chapter

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achlysmiseria · 3 years

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Chapter 1: =My First Day at a New School=

Being in a relationship with a serial killer kinda sucks. But before that, maybe I should start by introducing myself or something. I don’t know. There’s nothing special about me. My name is Perseus Alexander Moore. I’m an eighteen-year-old guy in his twelfth year and I’m distinctive in most groups but I’m not famous or rich or smart. I’m just those guys you normally see in school except I don’t exactly go as ‘normal’ since my hair is styled in an afro which makes it easy to distinguish in a group of people. This is the start of how I made the greatest mistake of my life.

Today I will be going to a new school. It had to be arranged since I moved into my older brother's place. If you’re wondering why, a big incident took place, which I have to live with my whole life but we’ll talk about that later. After changing into clothes for the day, I crept out of my room and went downstairs and the first thing I came upon was the sweet smell of pancakes and bacon filling my nose. My nose scrunched up which made me stop but not because of the smell, but because of the person right in front of me.

Eric Ulysses Moore, my big brother. He’s a successful hematologist oncologist here in this small city of Asheville, North Carolina. He’s got the same curly brown locks as mine except it’s not long or styled informally. We both look somewhat alike but since he’s blessed with our dad’s genes, who is a tall man, he has much darker skin than me and I was told he was taller than me when he was my age.

While my brother cooked breakfast and I’m standing at the kitchen door, I felt like I should just tiptoe out of there but he turned and saw me. “Good morning, Perseus,” he greeted with a smile. “Had a good night’s sleep?”

“Yeah,” I blandly replied. “I also have to go. I might be running late.”

“School doesn’t start at seven-thirty. Eat something first.”

“I’m not hungry,” I said but of course, he wouldn’t take ‘no’ for an answer. He served a plate and pointed his eyes to the vacant chair, gesturing I should sit down.

“Look,” my voice was leveled. “I don’t want to deal with you right now. I have to get going.”

“Perseus,” he called back. I ignored him and ran out the door. I brought out my earphones and plugged them in my ears, momentarily escaping from this hell called reality. I grabbed my skateboard and I skated through the busy streets.

Normally, my mom would kill me if I did this. My mind being preoccupied with the music playing, words popping up in my head for lyrics, guitar chords I could possibly use for a song I’m writing while I pass busy streets, small comments in my head about the places I pass will definitely make her want my head.

The trip would have been really quick if I hadn't had to go through so many huge groups of people hurrying to their destinations and most of them are too oblivious to notice what’s around them.

Once I reached the gates of the school, I was somehow —what’s the appropriate word— disappointed.

Right in front of me could have been a grand building but the gate alone is covered in graffiti and the paint is tearing off. The building itself looks like it’s about to collapse, given a few years or even less. You might even think it’s haunted. Students filed into the entrance and it gave me second thoughts. What if I just skipped school today? I thought it would be nice. I could just go home and go back to sleep but then, I have to deal with Eric. And to think of the possible scenarios when I enter these gates: probably new friends, or more jerks who are looking for trouble. I swallowed the anxiousness and the excitement growing in me and I walked in.

Entering the building, I felt like I was a kitten that trespassed a lions’ den. In the hallway, everybody turned their head towards me and I tried my best to stay passive.

Luckily, when I got enrolled here, they gave me my schedule and the room numbers so I didn’t have to ask around. I reached the room for my first class, which is Conservatory of Music. Then I noticed there was this note taped on the glass window of the door. It said: Class will be in the Music Room. I raised an eyebrow. Music Room, I thought. I looked down at the paper I had in my hand and scanned it. It didn’t have any directions for the room. I buried the annoyance that’s building up in me and looked around just in case no one could see how stupid I look and with my luck, I found three guys walking in my direction. The guy on the right had copper-red hair, freckles across his cheeks and nose, and a mischievous grin on his face and is probably one of the people I will never trust my life with when handling matches or sharp objects. The one on the middle had emo/scene slick black hair and it was long on one side so it hid his face. He looked reserved at first glance since he had his head lowered and even if his friend on the right had his arm locked on his neck, he didn’t complain. The one on the left took me aback. I was looking at a much younger clone of Brandon Routh when he played Clark Kent or Superman. He’s this tall guy with glasses, shiny black hair swept to the side, and a jacket. His facial features are almost perfect and I don’t think his face is familiar to acne or a single pimple. The guy on the right saw me. His hazel-green eyes shone and his grin widened. “Hey,” he waved. “You must be new.”

“I am,” I had to keep a straight face. The redhead kept smiling but when he faced the note on the door, he frowned. “Damn,” he snapped his fingers. He faced his friend and yelled to them, “Upstairs, guys. Prof switched rooms.”

“I told you he would,” said the guy with the glasses. The ginger raised his hands in defeat but still cracked a smirk. “At least we found this guy,” he gestured his hands to me. “If we didn’t think to check this room, he would be late than we already were.”

“Yeah, yeah shut up, Michael.” The other two faced me and studied me from head to toe. Superman said, “You were lucky. This campus is huge.”

“That’s what she said,” the guy named Michael snorted, which earned him a smack on the back of the head, “You’re so mean, Xavier.”

“And you’re being an idiot,” replied Xavier, who had a more Asian look than everybody else I've seen.

I felt inept. I’m standing in the middle of a playful conversation of strangers I just met and they didn’t really mind me there. Or how late we were.

“Hey,” I spoke up. “Aren’t we supposed to get to class?” The three of them stared at each other then realized it with a start. Some of them cursed and then we ran to the Music Room.

Fortunately, we reached class before the professor arrived. The place was huge and I think we were more than fifty students here. We were going to be seated on the floor and our bags were piled onto each other at the back. But what’s enticing are the instruments in front of us. I was tempted to grab a guitar and run but the professor finally entered the room. Before I could look around for a place to sit, someone already grabbed my hand and pulled me down.

“Sorry,” said Clark Kent. “I didn’t get to introduce myself. I’m Nicholas Taylor but call me Nick.”

“I’m Perseus Moore,” we held out each other’s hand and shook it. Behind Nick, Michael’s head popped out and he beamed. “I’m Michael Johnathan Carter. Most people call me Michael or Mike. You pick. I don’t care.” We shook hands and I faced their other friend.

“I’m Xavier Hernandez,” he said politely. “It’s nice to meet you, Perseus.”

“Yeah,” I tried to smile. They seem nice, I thought to myself. We started talking in our small circle and then Nick asked, “Do you play any instruments?”

“I play guitar,” I replied. Michael’s grin got even wider if that was possible and then he scooted near me. “What songs can you play?”

“Erm,” I moved a bit farther from him but I was saved when the professor got our attention. He’s a guy that looked like he was supposed to go to a Rock concert but got lost and ended up in a classroom full of teenagers. Instead of the usual teachers’ uniform, he wore this black band shirt of Korn, had a few piercings on his lips and eyebrow, plus tattoos all over his arms. “Good morning class,” he greeted. I thought we would respond with the habitual bland greeting but the place roared with excitement. Everyone was just yelling at the top of their lungs so the teacher had to silence us. “After a summer break, you all are still very loud.”

“We love you, Sir Ramirez!” Michael yelled and it just ignited another round of cheers. Again, we were silenced but I’m surprised one finger from the teacher made everyone quiet.

“I am also glad to see you all again. Most of you have moved up which is great,” Sir Ramirez congratulated us. “I was also informed that we have a new student joining us. Where is he?”

I just sat there, not planning to do anything for anyone to catch my attention but Michael grabbed my arm and raised it for me. Quickly, I yanked it away and glared at him. “Thank you, Michael. Now, please come up front.” The first thing I thought was, What is this? Grade school? But I obeyed and walked over to his side. “Introduce yourself.”

“Hi,” I started, I could feel my palms starting to sweat. “I’m Perseus Moore.”

“Do you play any instruments, Perseus, or are you just here to learn a thing or two?”

“I can play.”

“Awesome,” Sir Ramirez clapped his hands. Everyone started muttering to themselves and I didn’t like it at first until the prof asked, “What instrument do you play?”

“Guitar, sir.”

He smiled and walked over to the corner where the pile of goodies are and picked up a maroon Gibson SG then handed it over. My eyes widened at the guitar and I looked up at him for confirmation. “Give us a show, Perseus.” He signaled me to start and with barely any practice for the past month, I played Thunderstruck by AC/DC. The students went wild and I think everyone on this floor, and possibly the one under and the one above us, could hear them singing the song.

Sir Ramirez raised his hand to stop me in the middle of the song and I did. Everyone had this look on their faces which I can’t comprehend and my heart was pounding against my ribs. “So,” the professor starts. There wasn’t that much emotion shown on his face and I wasn’t comfortable with that. “I can’t tell you how much I’m impressed.”

“You are?” I blinked. “I mean, thank you, sir.”

“Of course I am. It’s been a while since I’ve seen someone with this much grit and how much the whole class enjoyed it.” Then everyone started screaming like their favorite basketball team won. Makes me wonder how their voices haven’t cracked yet. I would never last that long. When they settled, Sir Ramirez clapped his hands and everyone joined him. With an awkward smile and my pulse beating in my throat, I bowed. Nick and the others cheered and they were joined by everyone else. When I got back to my seat, class started and at that point, I happily thought that this was going so well so far. Boy, was I wrong.

After three classes, it was finally our Lunch Break. I hated the other classes since the teachers after Conservatory were snobby, nosy, and irritating as hell. They lose their cool easily. I’m only grateful that Nick, Michael, and Xavier will be in the same classes as me since they’re the only people I know.

While we were walking to the cafeteria, Nick said, “You were great back there.”

“Thanks,” I tried to sound more confident than I am.

“Wanna join our band?” Michael smiled. “We’re missing a lead guitarist. And you don’t seem to be part of anything yet.”

“You’re recruiting me?”

“Of course,” he placed his hand on my shoulder. “We’ve been talking about it. You in? Please say you are.”

“Stop that, Michael,” Xavier spoke up. “You know we have to talk to Morpheus first about this.”

“Who?” I turned to him.

“He’s our band leader and frontman,” Nick replied. “The guy’s awesome and super chill. He would love to meet you. But we need to know if you want to join us as well or otherwise, he’d think that we forced you to.” Then I heard Michael comment, “What is this? A cult?” Xavier flicked his fingers in the middle of his friend’s forehead and it made a sound, probably shaking his skull. Watching them alone, being whoever they are, saying whatever they want and their closeness to each other makes me think about their offer. I faced Nick who had an expectant look on his face. “I’m in.”

We reached the school’s outdoor covered court. It’s after passing the cafeteria. I’m telling you now that this is the only place that’s pleasant in the whole school. Instead of seeing trash littered everywhere, the court was clean and there were trees aligned on the side of it. Under one of the trees, there was this Blond holding an acoustic guitar. Michael ran to him and gave him a tackle-hug.

“What the hell, Michael?” He exclaimed as the others just laughed out loud. They sat up again and the redhead tugged on the guy’s sleeve. “We found a lead guitarist, Morph.”

“Hi?” I waved. The Morpheus guy studied me with his sky blue eyes and frowned a bit. He stood up and I realized he’s way taller than Nick which only made me anxious about my height. Gee, thanks. He circled me, like a lion studying its helpless prey. Morpheus turned to his bandmates and asked why I should be in the band. They explained it to him with enthusiasm while I just stood there not even getting why he’s asking them instead of me.

“So,” the tall blond turned to me. “I see that you got yourself some fans now.” Looking over his shoulder, Nick and Michael had huge grins on their faces, excitedly waving their hands while Xavier is also smiling but not like the other two. My eyes went back to Morpheus and I shrugged. “I never meant to. They just asked me to play.”

“Can you perform in front of something bigger than a bunch of students in one room?”

I could’ve answered him with an eager ‘Yes’ but in the pit of my stomach, my anxiety starts poking me. Morpheus patiently waited for my answer while I thought, A bigger crowd? That would be awesome but if I’m not good enough… Then what? I mentally slapped myself in the face. I looked up to him and said, “Even if it doesn’t take me anywhere, I can.”

Morpheus gave that a thought which lasted longer than I wanted to. My friends had their fingers crossed and I quietly hoped I would get accepted. Morpheus’ lips slowly curled into a smile and happily said, “You’re in.” Then they started clapping their hands. Michael locked his arm around my neck and yelled, “Finally! Someone decent enough to play for our band.” That comment got him a smack on the head and he just laughed it off. Xavier ruffled my curly hair and spread his arms out. “Welcome aboard Erebos.”

“Erebos?” I raised an eyebrow.

“Oh, yeah,” Nick said. “A friend named the band. She said that it’s the name of the primordial darkness in Greek mythology or something like that.”

Just then, their faces lightened up. I followed wherever they were looking at and found something I wasn’t expecting. Walking towards us was a girl with straight hair as dark as midnight, autumn tanned skin and she had a gray jacket wrapped around her waist since the school uniform for girls had short skirts. Michael ran over to her and held his hand out for a high-five. “Hey, Babycakes!”

Babycakes?

She scowled and pointed a finger at him. “How many times do I have to tell you to never call me that.”

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Michael tries to imitate her British accent. “Did I touch a nerve?”

“You always do.” She crossed her arms and her eyes found me. I flinched, probably because I’ve been staring at her for too long, looking stupid, and got caught. Nick saved me though. He placed a hand on my shoulder and told the girl, “I’d like to introduce you to our new lead guitarist, Perseus Moore!”

“Perseus?” She raised an eyebrow. She studied me from head to toe and as I watched her, I noticed her eyes were gray. They remind me of fierce storm clouds or bones when reduced to ash. My heart started thundering against my chest when her eyes met my golden brown ones. She then looked up at my hair and asked, “Is that natural or are you just looking for attention?”

“What?”

“Your hair. And your eyes? You’re not wearing contacts, are you?”

“I could say the same to you,” I commented. A shadow of irritation passed over her face and then I realized my mistake. Morpheus cleared his throat and got her attention. “You’re not going to tear his face off, are you, Kass?” Xavier spoke up. She faced him and cracked a smirk, leaving me wanting to melt into a puddle for some reason. “I don’t have a reason to,” she faced me and held out her hand. “I’m Kassandra Cyrillus. It’s a pleasure to meet you.”

I shook her hand. “I could say the same thing.”

“Not when you really know what you’re talking to,” I heard her mutter. That took me aback. What is she talking about? I faced Nick who looked somewhat nervous when she said that and when I looked back at Kassandra, she still had the same expression except I recognized the look on her face. Like, she had the face of someone who got away with murder which is stupid because that’s impossible. Or was it?

“Now, now, Kassandra,” Michael interrupted my train of thought. “Stop scaring away the new guy.” She gave him a look which made him raise his hands in defeat and then she faced me. “You all have the same subjects later on, right?”

“Yeah,” we replied in unison. She didn’t give any reaction but handed Morph a bag. “I’ll see you all later then,” she looks over her shoulder a bit and walks away. When she was finally out of our sight, I turned to my bandmates who were looking at the bag. When they opened it, it was filled with snacks and a big pack of potato chips. They all had an evil grin on their faces and they closed the bag again. “It’s cool how she could smuggle some junk food here in school.”

“She must’ve paid the school guard to let her in,” Nick joked. My eyebrows arched. The image of Kassandra burned in the back of my mind and I can’t help notice how she looked so innocently malevolent. Two words I never thought would fit together. Morpheus saw how confused I was and placed his hand on my shoulder. “You look lost.”

“I don’t understand how things go around here,” I said with genuine honesty. “Is it just me or is Kassandra plotting something evil?” They looked at each other which is concerning for me like it’s a tough subject they don’t want to tackle. “Did I say something wrong?”

Nick snaked his arm around my shoulder. “Nah, dude. It’s just that, Kassandra had this reputation here at school, so it tends to make her judge and mistrust people she meets at first glance. Be a little patient with her. She’s actually a great person to be with,” he smiled. With that, the school bell rings for our upcoming classes. We walked to our classroom and went on with our day.

Finally, school was about to end. I just had to end this last class: Literature. My bandmates were left behind since they said they needed to talk to our Math teacher. When I reached the door of the classroom, I expected a bunch of students sticking their noses in books but instead, I found most of my classmates were off their seats, just being chaotic as usual.

“You’ll get used to it,” said a familiar voice behind me. When I turned around, I found Kassandra. She had a black backpack slung on one shoulder and the strap had a metal pin of a badly drawn smiley face with X’s for eyes and it had its tongue stuck out, the logo of the Grunge band Nirvana. “Nice pin,” I complimented. “Somehow matches your personality.”

“Don’t flatter me, Perseus,” her voice laced with bitter sarcasm. “And if you want small talk, I suggest we go inside and sit down. Unless you want to block the door, I’m not joining you.”

I stepped aside and let her in first and muttered, “Sorry.” Following her to the back of the classroom, I sat on the vacant chair beside her. There were more vacant seats other than this but I just felt like I needed to sit next to somebody I at least know if I get called. Now and then, I would steal glances of her just to see her doodling on her notebook. Well, I just think she’s doodling. The first thing that caught my attention was that she’s writing in Greek? Second thing I noticed were the symbols Aδης. What do they mean? Like I know. I wanted to ask her but everyone started to make a commotion when Michael entered the room.

Kassandra let out a soft laugh when she saw her friend being flirty with the girls who were head over heels for him. “Always a tosser,” she muttered and closed her notebook. “Then these girls would fall for every banter. Can you believe that?”

I realized she was talking to me so I answered, “Er, yeah. They’re being a little too extra.”

“Michael’s always extra,” she shrugs. I then noticed her lips were curled up into a small smile and I kind of felt good about that. She looked at me and raised an eyebrow. “What?”

“Nothing,” I looked in the other direction. When they were seated, the professor entered the room. He’s a pudgy man with a scowl on his face and has more hair on his chin than on his head. I could hear a lot of the students around us snickering and then they all burst out laughing when the teacher sat on his seat. Confused, he tries standing up and then realizes the problem. “You insufferable brats!” He yelled at us. When he tried to walk out of his desk, everyone was laughing except for me and Kassandra since the chair was stuck to the man’s rear-end. I mean, it’s literally glued to his butt. Honestly, it’s an old trick in the book but I think getting someone to do it right in front of you makes it funny. He started yelling things I don’t think would get him a promotion, or probably let him keep his job. Nonetheless, we continued class while the professor was seated, and ever so often, you will hear giggles when he tries standing up.

“Now,” he pats a stack of papers on his desk. “This will be your homework for two weeks. Read it carefully and I don’t want anyone submitting anything stupid, understood?”

Everyone jeered and groaned. Kassandra and I stayed silent then I glanced at her just to find her reading a book under her desk. As the papers were being distributed, the professor said, “You all will be partnered” —everyone cheered— “by the person beside you.” The excitement died and it just made him smile smugly. The school bell rang for dismissal and everyone quickly raced to the door.

“Wait,” I looked at my seatmate. “Who am I partnered with?” We stared at each other. It seemed like time suddenly stopped for some reason. Our eyes locked and I don’t know how, but I could see this shadow behind her gray orbs. What could it be? A weird gut feeling tells me that this person in front of me was someone… someone who you shouldn’t get on their bad side or you’re screwed. Kassandra smiled and answered, “I suppose you’re stuck with me, Phrixus.”

#=PLMR=#original story #chapter 1 #novel series #novel #romance #music #greek mythology #angst #teen author #rock music #book 1 #band mentions #author #2000s feels

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jimlingss · 4 years

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The President’s Son [16]

Chapter 15 - Chapter 16 - Chapter 16.5 OR Chapter 17

➜ Words: 4.6k

➜ Genres: 100% Fluff, Slice of Life, Bodyguard!AU

➜ Summary: Kim Taehyung is the President’s son, mischievous and playful, and infamous for being a troublemaker. When everyone’s given up, they call for you to be his personal guard. There’s no other choice when your dad’s assigned you to it and surprisingly Taehyung doesn’t mind either. Maybe because you happened to grow up with that brat.

She stops when you pass, calling for your name. The polished woman sends a reserved smile when you turn around to meet her eye, and she finishes her conversation with the girl following her before she’s dismissed, off to run an errand or maybe send a message. Taehyung’s stepmother asks how you are, catching up when she’s been so preoccupied lately with duties of The First Lady. “Good, good. I’m glad you’re doing well. How about Taehyung? How is he?” “He’s doing well,” you say, despite knowing full well it’s already in the report that she’s read. “Keeping up with classes, completing his art portfolio. He’s been thinking of joining a club which would help him network and make connections to others too.” The woman nods, the corner of her lipstick stained mouth curling. “He’s a troublemaker, but a sensitive soul — though I have a feeling you already know that.” Her irises twinkle, perceptive in a way that is almost intrusive. “I’m thankful he has someone close to him that he trusts. You don’t have to worry, by the way, if you’d like to get...closer to him.” You don’t understand what she’s trying to imply, and she merely smiles at your confused expression before glancing down at her dainty watch adorning her wrist. “Well, I must get going. I have a meeting to attend, but if there’s ever any time you need my help, I’m a phone call away.” “Thank you.” Your head bows and she makes a noise of acknowledgment, another farewell, and the First Lady saunters down the corridor. You muse how difficult it is to figure her out — for a long time you already knew that she’s more than Taehyung makes her out to be. His personal and petty vendetta against the woman who remarried his father is childish at best and blinding at its worst, robbing him of an opportunity to have a close relationship with her. But even after so long and interacting with the woman, you, yourself, can’t seem to understand her actions, intentions, personality traits. But you’re not too hung up about it, having an inkling that she’s far from being any sort of bad person. She seems to make Taehyung’s dad happy and that’s all that really matters. You continue through the house, trying to make it towards the front entrance, but it’s not long before you’re stopped again. “Well, well, well, look what the cat dragged in.” A rush of air leaves your nose and you eye him. “Looks like you’re free.” Jungkook grins boyishly. “I managed to grab myself a break. Even the best need rest.” “Huh, really? I guess I need to go rest then.” His smile only expands, hands burying in his suit pants pockets and he stops right in front of you with all the time in the world. “Seriously though, how have you been?” “Fine. Same old. Nothing really changes. You?” “Same,” he hums, doe eyes twinkling with judgment. “We should grab a drink though. Looks like you need it.” You scoff, a smile tugging up your face. “I do not.” “Trust me, anyone and everyone who watches Mr. Kim Taehyung needs a drink. Even you, lion tamer.” Jungkook grins and the cute mole dotting near his bottom lip becomes more prominent. “And don’t go rubbing it in our faces that he’s not that bad. You know Hoseok’s pissed, right? He face-planted and almost broke his nose once when he was trying to chase after him. Doesn’t sit well when the noobie does better than those who have been around here for years.” You shrug. “I can’t help being good at my job.” “Nah, he’s just freaking biased as all hell….” The bodyguard’s eyes narrow and he nods, smile becoming more sly. “Though I gotta admit I’m surprised that you’ve grown to actually like him.” “Why? I’m apathetic towards things, you know that.” “No, I mean you actually like him.” There’s a pause. “What?” Jungkook sighs. “Never mind, dense girl. Now I’m beginning to understand why he always calls you ‘dumbo’ all the time. Cute nickname though.” Your brow lifts and you scoff. “Don’t call me that.” Your peer gives you a wolfish grin. “Offended? You’re not when he says it.” “Hey!” Suddenly the pair of you are interrupted by a figure standing at the end of the hallway. It’s a dapper, dark and handsome man who’s striding towards you. Your eyes widen, but his are pinpointed on the man beside you. “Are you slacking, Jeon?” All traces of the playful man disappear and Jungkook answers timidly, “No.” Seokjin smiles at you. “Hey, chickpea. Haven’t seen you around in a while.” He turns and like a switch, his expression becomes grim. “This guy, on the other hand, I thought I told you to go to your post ten minutes ago.” You hitch a thumb over. “He just told me he’s resting.” The boy is appalled at how quickly you betrayed him, his jaw dropping, but standing in front of his senior, he tries to play it off. “Psh, resting? No. I meant I was arresting. I got a report that there’s a suspicious man on the grounds. Was looking for him.” “Really?” Seokjin crosses his arms, staring him down. It’s too amusing to watch and you’re sure your old classmate doesn’t enjoy the smile on your face at the moment. “Because I didn’t hear anything about that.” There’s an awkward laugh. Jungkook tries to slip away, but Jin shakes his head, not letting him when his hand comes down onto the younger’s shoulder, gripping and squeezing tightly to keep him in place. “C’mon, we’re needed in the East hall.” Before dragging him off, Jin bids you farewell and promises to catch up later. Jungkook, on the other hand, moves his thumb slowly across his throat with eyes narrowed into slits, threatening you for throwing him under the bus. You wave goodbye to him, enjoying his despair too much. You make your way towards the entrance again, crossing through the maze of hallways and rooms, ducking your head when there’s people of prestige making small talk and brushing past, evading when tour groups weave through the corridors. But before you can make it to your destination, you’re stopped by a familiar voice. “Hey, dumbo! Over here!” Turning in your spot, Kim Taehyung’s running up to you at full speed, throwing his arms open to engulf you in a suffocating hug. You’re shoved into his chest, voice muffled through his cotton shirt. It’s unprofessional — not that it matters anymore — but you’re still in the Blue House with hundreds of eyes probably looking at you. Though rather than getting in trouble, you have a feeling it’s solidifying your position as Taehyung’s bodyguard. No one can handle this position better than you can. No one is liked more by Taehyung himself. “What are you doing here?” You finally pry him off, looking over to acknowledge Jimin who joins with an apologetic smile. “I was about to go to you.” “Yeah, I know. I wanted to get rid of him early,” Taehyung says and motions his chin towards the shorter male. “His shift is over. So I decided to come to you first.” “I still have ten minutes left before the hour’s over,” his bodyguard chirps with a good-natured smile, but it falls when the college student cranes his neck, tight-lipped and eye twitching. “N-never mind.” Much to Taehyung’s dismay, you invite him, “You should join us, Jimin.” The boy smiles, eyes crinkling, and worries soothed by your reassurance. “Okay.” “How was class?” you ask as he leads the way. You don’t know where Taehyung’s going, but it’s certain that he’s not staying at the Blue House longer than he needs to. “It was boring. I almost bashed my head on the desk when the prof started talking about government systems in the eighteen hundreds. I couldn’t care less.” He groans in exhaustion, hand dragging over his face, bored just talking about it. You hum, syncing your footsteps with his and failing to notice how Jimin naturally falls behind. “Your stepmother asked about you.” “About what?” His brow lifts in skepticism, less curious and more alarmed. You shrug. “Just how you were doing.” “What did you say?” “What she already knows. A little about your schooling, that you’re doing pretty okay.” “Pretty okay? I’m doing fantastic!” Taehyung exclaims in feigned exasperation, mischief leaking into his tone. “I have no idea why she’s trying to pry though. Woman can’t keep her nose out of people’s business.” “She’s nice—” “Yeah, yeah. Whatever.” Taehyung waves his hand lifelessly, ending the subject. “Anyways, I was thinking about something recently and I have a plan.” “A plan?” You eye him. It was never good when he made a plan. Taehyung doesn’t make plans. The man grins, mouth drawing into a rectangular shape, enthusiasm and eagerness suddenly summoned to make his brown irises twinkle. “Yep. Let’s go on a date.” “No.” You answered instinctively, like a withdrawal reflex. And he pretends he doesn’t hear the outright rejection. “I want to make the hypothetical a reality. You said yourself that you’d have to be in the moment to see if you’d date me, right? So let’s make the moment happen.” “Absolutely not.” “Umm...you guys?” Jimin raises a finger in the air, trying to remind the two of you of his presence. “Why not?” Taehyung inquires genuinely, gaze seeking the same amount of sincerity. He’s not joking like you wish he was. “I’m on duty.” “Then we can wait when you’re off.” “Um...my shift’s over, guys,” Jimin pipes up, squeaking like a mouse. “It’s still unprofessional, Taehyung.” You stop dead in your tracks and he halts on his own feet. The both of you come face to face with one another. “I can’t date the people I work for.” “You don’t work for me.” “Didn’t you say that I did?” you calmly reason, reminding him of his own words. “You said I worked for you and no one else.” Taehyung’s mouth fills with cotton, rendered speechless. In the meanwhile, Jimin steps forward. “C-Can I go now?” No one hears him. Not when the air is this emotionally charged and you’re holding your bated breath while Taehyung never strays from his intense eye-contact. “It’s unethical.” “Is that it? Is that the only reason you have for me?” “Taehyung.” Your voice is full of warning, but you don’t know what you’re threatening him with. Maybe it’s simply to stop him from talking before he keeps going and makes you question yourself. You’re afraid of how you might waver. “If you don’t like me like that, if you’re truly not curious about what it would be like and you don’t even want to give it a try, then tell me, right now. Tell me so I don’t have to keep putting my hope into us.” Taehyung is serious, expression solemn. You don’t know where it’s coming from. “There is no us.” “Really? I highly doubt that,” he says it with so much confidence. You’re baffled, not knowing what he means, and staring straight at him. Taehyung shrugs and walks off. “I won’t force you into anything though.” You watch how he strolls nonchalantly, hands digging into his pockets. A sigh spills from your throat and you turn around. “Jimin, you can go now. I’ll take it from here.” “O-oh, okay.” He’s a deer in headlights, flushing from Taehyung’s declaration of affections even though you should be the one with heated cheeks and widened eyes. “Will you be okay?” “I’ll be fine.” You smile to reassure him, and you’re not wrong. When aren’t you fine? You catch up with Taehyung who’s speed walking down the street. He doesn’t seem to be angry or upset in the least bit, merely sulking as usual. “Where are you going?” “Does it matter?” He scoffs. “You have to follow me anywhere I go anyways.” It stays quiet for an extended moment. It’s difficult to wrap your mind around it. You’ve only been asked out once before, back in the academy, to which you politely turned down, not wanting to lose focus on why you had come there. Your entire life has been spent in concentration, disciplined, never straying off from goals or indulging in frivolous things, like dates or social events. But maybe you should’ve seen it coming. When you consider it, it’s not out of nowhere. You and Taehyung have shared at least two meals a day together for the past two months. You’ve shared a bed with him, let him hug you close, let him draw you in such an intimate manner. Taehyung’s stopped being just a friend a long time ago — and deep down you know it too. “The movie theater?” you question when he finally stops. “Problem?” He looks up at the screen with the titles flashing by. “I’ve been wanting to watch something for a while now.” With a deep inhale, he smiles and approaches the booth. “Two tickets to When Spring Meets Autumn, please.” The lady behind the glass takes his cash and slides two tickets over. “The auditorium is to your left, number twenty one.” “Thanks.” Taehyung stops at the concession. You step beside him, puzzled to no end. “A romcom?” “Why?” He smiles, and it’s small and coy. “I like romance movies too, y’know. They’re sweet.” The vendor interrupts the conversation. “Next, please.” “Yes, can I get an extra large popcorn, please?” “Is that all?” “Should we get drinks?” Taehyung looks over at you and you’re speechless, unable to respond when you don’t know what he’s doing. After a beat, he smiles at your silence and looks back at the vendor. “We’ll probably just take a medium-sized drink. Coke with no ice.” “What are you doing, Taehyung?” you ask while he leads you into the dark theater. “I’m enjoying a movie...with you.” Taehyung tells you to hold the drink and you feel his hand press on your shoulder, guiding you to the center row. “Wait. It’s dangerous,” you whisper and before he can protest no one’s going to attack him, you insist, “Let’s sit on the edge.” For the first time, Taehyung obliges your will. While you still can’t see well in this amount of darkness and your hearing is distorted with the surrounding speakers, everyone who wants to get to Taehyung has to go through you first. It puts your mind at a little more ease. But you still turn around to look at other people, swiveling in all directions, assessing the premise and every entrance, exit. Suddenly, there’s warmth on your arm. Taehyung's leaned the bag of freshly popped popcorn over to you. “Want some?” “Sure.” You dip your hands in, grabbing only two. It’s buttery on your tongue, the taste addicting. You realize just how long it’s been since you’ve watched a movie in an actual theater — free time is better spent brushing your skills at the dojo, practicing on the shooting-range, working out, or resting for the next day. The commercials play, loud, and he reclines his seat back. Taehyung glances at you before he’s moving over, whispering in your ear. His hot breath skims against your skin, oddly causing your chest to stutter. “Relax. We’ll be fine. I promise you no one’s going to try to get me in the middle of the movie theater, okay?” “You can’t promise something like that.” “No,” he whispers back with a smile. “But I can promise you’ll have a better time if you’re not constantly worried. I know it’s your job, but it’s also called pacing, dumbo. You’ll wear yourself down if you’re always on high alert.” He has a point. One that you never really considered before. So you release a shaky breath held in your throat and look towards the screen. Taehyung smiles at you, glad that you can relax even if it’ll only last for a short while. The two of you lean back and when the movie begins, the lights dim even more, sound increasing in volume, screen expanding. Your hand reaches over, accidentally knocking into Taehyung’s as he’s also reaching in the bag for popcorn. And he lingers there, never once withdrawing, allowing the back of your hands to press against each other. You look over and the blonde pretends he doesn’t know what’s going on until three seconds pass and he finally grabs a handful, moving away. You scoff lightly, mouth pulling with a smile he doesn’t see. The movie is absolutely terrible. The prettiest actress gets killed off within the first ten minutes by a car accident and the rest of it is terribly dull and predictable. It doesn’t help that once your hand meets the bottom of the popcorn bag, there’s nothing else to preoccupy your time with. But halfway through the film, goosebumps suddenly raise all over the back of your neck. You’re made hyperaware, feeling Taehyung draping his arm over the back of your chair. From the close proximity, you hear him clear his throat. Every movement he makes, your eyes and ears pick up on it, overly conscious of his presence in a way that almost makes you feel…..nervous. And you don’t feel nervous often. You end up leaning in towards the man, shuffling closer. When you turn your head to stare, he notices your gaze and shifts himself. Both of your eyes set on each other, connected. The profile of his visage is illuminated by the luminescence of the film, his features softened and glowing in the white lights. You come closer, lips parting. Taehyung stares and swallows hard, Adam’s apple bobbing in his throat. You can see his lashes, the tiny freckles and moles dotting his face in spontaneous areas, details that you never noticed from afar. You see him clearly. “Taehyung.” “Hmm?” “Did you wear deodorant?” His expression falls. He moves away. His arm drops off your chair. “Course I did!” “Shush!” The person in front of him turns around with a glare and he’s left muttering a halfhearted apology. Your facade cracks with a smile while Taehyung sips on his drink, sulking. For the rest of the time, he keeps his hands to himself and voluntary, you lean closer to him — just because warmth seems to radiate off of him. “What did you think?” “Movie was mediocre.” you say and Taehyung agrees. “Where are we going now?” His pace quickens as if it’ll be enough for you to just follow along and be unable to put up a fight. “I’m hungry, aren’t you?” “Well, I’m oka—” “I got a reservation at a pretty nice place. It’s at eight, so we’re right on time.” It’s a walk down the street, a mere block away, obviously planned so that it was easy without escape. Taehyung even opens the door for you, ushering you in like a gentleman. And once you enter, you’re put at a standstill. He doesn’t eat at a place like this. Kim Taehyung craves fast food and greasy snacks, burgers and fries, ice-cream and carbonated drinks. But here are candlelit dinners, meager portions of steak, orders of not just simple meals, but appetizers and desserts. You’re frozen until Taehyung guides you forward after he says his name and the waitress shows him to the table. A personal waiter introduces himself, showing the menus and pouring iced water by a whole fucking fancy pitcher and an arm behind his back, practiced after months of work. You’ve been to places like this before, just standing at the back with your eyes pinned forward, on alert without moving like a statue while the important people chatted and ate together. Never did you consider that you’d one day sit at the table as well. “This is a date, Taehyung.” “What? “ He doesn’t even look at you, browsing the menu. “Who says?” “A movie? A dinner?” “We watch TV and eat together all the time.” He languidly shrugs. “Yeah, but not like this. Not at a place like this.” The man puts the menu down and folds his hands in his lap, eyes flickering up to you with a smile less than innocent. “I said I would treat you to something, remember? So take it as that.” “Taehyung….” “Do you want this to be a date?” he questions, becoming increasingly upset with the distant way you look up at him. This is not how he envisioned it to be. “You already said no. I get it. So stop insisting this is a date then. Just eat and we’ll go home. Think of it as me paying back the favour.” It’s silent, awkward even. There’s chatter all around you, warm conversations surrounding the space between the decorative walls. But between you and Taehyung, it’s gone cold, and you can’t understand. You cannot fathom how you’ve gotten here in the first place. It’s too difficult to comprehend alone. “Why did you even ask me that earlier? Why did you ask me on a date?” “Because if it wasn’t obvious enough, I like you, dumbo. A lot,” Taehyung emphasizes and ducks his head across the table where no one can eavesdrop. “I have since you appeared in front of me and saved me during the whole hostage shit.” “You’re confused,” you tell him. “You’re confusing gratitude with other feelings—” “I’m not.” His pitch raises into frustration and his hand crumples into a fist. “Stop taking my feelings so lightly, Y/N. I’m not a child. I’m not kidding either. I’m being serious. I like you.” No one around knows what’s happening. You’re in your own bubble shared with Taehyung, an intimate confession spilled while surrounded by strangers. “I get that you might not feel the same,” he says, “But stop treating my feelings as a joke.” The waiter steps up, unknowingly interrupting, but allowing you a moment to break away and think. “Hi, are you ready to order?” “S-sure.” Taehyung makes his order and you say you’ll have the exact same. It’s awkward as he takes the menus, suffocating silence that maybe the waiter feigns ignorance to. He flashes a charming smile, promising it’ll be out in about ten minutes and he fills your glasses of water again, excruciatingly slow. You and Taehyung watch the water flow, the ice clinking against the glass…. Finally after five full minutes, the waiter leaves. Taehyung’s left staring at the flower centerpiece and you’re turning the fork over the table, fiddling with the hem of the white cloth napkin. “I’ve….never dated anyone before.” “I know.” “I don’t know what it means to be in a romantic relationship.” “To be honest, me neither.” “You told me I was emotionally stunted. I can’t offer what you’re looking for.” “The only thing I’m looking for is you.” You swallow hard. “What if it doesn’t work?” Your gaze meets his and he holds it, unyielding. The two of you are no longer children or just childhood friends, a bodyguard and college boy. You’re adults, two human beings with statuses that don’t matter. “Then you’d still be my best friend.” Taehyung takes a deep breath. “I meant it. That night, when I told you no one could take your place ever. That I wanted you. Badly. I meant every word that I said.” Someday, he’ll no longer be the President’s son. Someday, you’ll no longer have a professional obligation to hold up to anymore. Someday, Taehyung’s greatest wish would come true and he’ll return to a life of normalcy or something that at least resembles it. That same someday, you’ll just be two adults who grew up together — just like now, but it’ll stay that way even after leaving this place. “Would you ever date me?” — “You kind of have to be in the moment to know.” You remember what you told him. It still holds true now. “Someday,” you answer him earnestly. “Someday, when it’s all over, I’ll go on a date with you and then we’ll see what becomes of it.” “Someday,” Taehyung murmurs after you, mimicking you as it sinks in. “What does that mean?” A week from now? A month? A year? Ten years? “When I’m not your bodyguard anymore.” You turn to him again. “When I’m not working under my dad. When you’ve graduated and you’re doing what you want and I’m not holding you back. When I’m more confident in being able to express myself and communicate properly….” “Someday….” Taehyung repeats it to himself. It takes three seconds — three seconds and a smile comes across his face. “I hope you can keep that promise, dumbo. I can wait a lifetime if I have to.” // The pair of you eat dinner together, bantering and chattering. It’s not awkward or difficult like earlier with the weight of his declaration lingering above your heads and an answer caught in your throat, jumbling the rest of your words. Time moves quickly, and he pays like he said he would, opening the door when you leave together — careful and kind in his actions like his hopes still depend on it. Outside, he holds your hand and you let him without protest. The promise has been ingrained between the both of you. “Where are we going now?” “Back to my place,” he says. “Date’s over, dumbo. You’re just dropping me off my doorstep now.” “So it was a date, huh? Finally admitting it?” “Oops.” Taehyung grins. “How’d I do?” You shrug. “Not bad, I guess. I think I’d have to go on dates with other guys to be able to compare though.” A laugh squeezes out from him. “Hey! You better keep that someday free. I’m gonna hold you accountable. Even if you’re married with a kid in this ‘someday’, I’m still gonna show up at your door. Just letting you know that. I won’t give up — took you nine years to come back. I can wait another nine if I have to.” “If you don’t want to, you don’t—” “I want to,” he interrupts with a sweet smile, and you wonder how he can be so bold, so sure of himself. It goes quiet and both your steps slow. His hand squeezes yours. The mosaic of lights coming from shops and street lamps casts on his softened features, making him glow. And you don’t think about it. Instincts charge the air. You allow emotions to choose the course of your actions — not logic, not muscle memory, or obligated duty. You lift yourself and his hand lets go of yours, lifting to cup your cheek. Taehyung’s half-lidded eyes watch your expression and your own lids shut tight. You lean in for a kiss, a gentle press of your mouths against one another. It’s terrible — noses knocking against each other, you missing his mouth and getting the corner instead, holding your breath for too long and running out of air. You end up pulling away, gasping with your face hot, murmuring apologies. “S-sorry.” “Don’t be, dumbo.” Taehyung smiles and this time, he’s the one who leans in. He inhales and kisses you with his mouth slightly parted. It’s plush, timid, but still full of eagerness, and your senses are filled with the scent of lavender, baby lotion, something you didn’t notice in the wake of nervousness. It lasts ten seconds before it breaks apart. “There. That’s how you do it.” Kim Taehyung reaches down to hold your hand, grinning to himself. He swings his arm back and forth, excited with a bounce in his step. You’re the one following him now. “Man, this someday’s gonna be great.” You laugh and he savours the sound.

#bts fanfic #bts scenario #taehyung fanfic #taehyung sccenario #taehyung fluff #OOF THINGS ARE FINALLY HAPPENING Y'ALL #FINALLY #AFTER 16 CHAPTERS

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softestsaddestbitch · 3 years

Text

December TC Challenge

stole this from @elder-edda (sorry for creeping! just, given the usual demographic of the tc community I was excited to find another 20-smthg)

1) what color is your tc’s hair?

He has just, simple brown hair but he’s starting to go grey which, no lie, is 100% doing it for me.

2) is your tc married?

Yes? He doesn’t wear a ring and I believe she kept her last name which makes me think it’s more of a civil partnership since they’ve been together since the early 2000s at least. But he also will refer to her as “my wife” and was telling me once that they waited until “after they got married” before moving in together.

3) if yes, do you care? would you do something with them regardless of their marriage?

I know these questions are general but I do take offense at the idea of being a homewrecker/other woman. I’ve met his wife, she’s really nice.

4) what’s your worst memory with your tc?

I put my foot in my mouth SO OFTEN. Good lord. Especially my last semester at that school? He was acting weird and I had just realized after fucking ... four years?? that I romantically liked him. So I kept bringing up my weird age fixation and other bs bc I have adhd and am possibly autistic?? and can’t read a room to save my life.

5) what’s your best memory with your tc?

One year we had a really bad snowstorm, so bad in fact that I had my first-ever snow day. The college that I used to go to has four campuses across as many cities, and C has to drive in twice a week to my (old) town from his. Now, morning classes had been canceled but afternoon classes had been given the go-ahead. C, who does not check his emails until he arrives at campus, evidently did not get this message until he was already in town and therefore didn’t have a morning class, but did have an afternoon class. On this day I had a late morning class that had been reinstated, but my prof didn’t get that memo so I also was on campus but didn’t have a class. So I went to visit his office, which I had been doing throughout the semester (I didn’t have a class with him at the time) and we just ... hung out for like 2 hours. It was so nice and one of the anecdotes he told me still haunts me lol.

sidenote: at the time, I hadn’t yet realized that I liked him, but I still went out of my way to visit him. Damn I was a dumbass.

6) does anyone in your school know how you feel?

ish? I told a classmate but in a “haha joking” kinda way. And a friend who went to that school knows. No one at my current school knows.

7) does your tc know how you feel?

I think he might? might have a lil inkling which would explain why he started acting so weird my last semester. Or at the very least was told/realized how bad it could look that he was getting so chummy w/ a student.

8) do you think there’s any chance your tc reciprocates your feelings?

He and his wife have been together for around 20 years now. No. No, I don’t think so. Maybe in an alternate universe.

9) are you getting your tc a christmas present? if so, what is it?

I have in the past! Specifically like, a tin of cookies lol. I’ve also given him an actual present when I left. I do intend to send him a Christmas card every year but not this year because ... you know ... the apocalypse.

10) have you ever flirted with your tc?

Flirtation inherently has intent. So, no. How he interpreted our interactions I don’t know.

11) how long have you had a crush on them? what began it all?

SO! TIMELINE!

I was at my old school from September 2014-April 2019, I had C for the first time in September 2015. Like I mentioned above, I did not realize I had a crush on him until literally the middle of my final exam of my class with him December 2018, so I’ve only consciously had a crush for about two years now. However, as I also mentioned, I went out of my way to stop by his office, even when I didn’t have a class with him. And my relationship with/feelings towards him are complicated so I’m not going to say I did so solely because I like him, but I would put it maybe closer to somewhere in 2017. You don’t plan your schedule around someone you don’t feel strong feelings for.

12) do you believe you’ll get over them shortly after you stop taking their class/have the chance to spend time with them?

As of today, it has been been exactly a year and a half since I last him in person. In the time since, I have cried over missing him, routinely gone back to keep up with his current research projects, and made his picture a part of my home screen. I almost exclusively listen to the playlist I made for him - so much so my Spotify Wrapped is pretty much that playlist with a few extras.

13) what kind of grades do you get in their class?

Haaaaaa pre-supension I was failing his classes. My first semester back I got .... a mid/high 70? and I finished my last class with him with an A+ and the essay I had written for his class had the highest grade between the two classes so..

14) does your tc ever do any tiny, little things that you adore?

When he puts a hand in his pocket and leans against the wall. When he tucks his hair behind his ear because he keeps falling in his face (he has long hair, a little past his shoulders). When he can’t stop himself from googling something even if its in the middle of class. How you can ask him anything at any time. The way he would chuckle at my jokes. How his handwriting hasn’t improved in decades. How easily he brushes off toxic masculinity. His candidness and willingness to share little anecdotes. The way he used to always smile whenever he saw me. That he goes home everyday to have lunch with his wife.

15) are you their favorite student?

I was! And it was obvious to other students that we had a friendly, casual relationship too. For a time, if his other students had questions about him they would ask me, and I usually had the answer. I didn’t matter in the long run, but I was.

16) do you two share any tastes? movies, books, music, etc.

He’s a legal historian, I’m a baby legal/political historian. We also like the same historical cooking youtube channel.

17) is your teacher religious?

I doubt he would say he’s religious, but I feel like we have a similar relationship to religion which is to say no formal association, but had profound effects on our childhoods and subsequently, presumably, how we view things as adults.

18) do you masturbate to them?

Yes.

19) do you communicate with them outside of school?

I sent him a meme once. And asked about the socialist uprising scandal he was apart of. I also almost emailed him while at a museum exhibition with my history friend. These are all through email.

20) do you have any tc songs or songs you relate to your tc? what are they?

SO my number one song this year was “You are the Reason” by Calum Scott because, you guessed it, of him. But also:

I Lost a Friend - Finneas When You’re Ready - Shawn Mendes You Are in Love - Taylor Swift Break My Heart Right - James

& given the season, especially w/ what transpired last year, Last Christmas by Wham!

21) what’s your favorite thing your tc has said/memory you have with them?

One time he kinda trailed off in the middle of lecture after stating that he thought of xyz a particular way which contrasted one of the popular schools of thought, and the way he plainly said, “well, yeah, which I guess ... is I’m arguing it” almost like he was semi-surprised with himself has always stuck with me.

But also, in addition the memory I shared earlier, we spent an hour and a half talking about grad school and what to expect and how to get there.

22) do you plan to continue a relationship with them after you leave school?

I trid, I really did. But he doesn’t “socialize with students part or present” so I can’t exactly see him. But I did get some academic-related from him at the beginning of the year.

23) how will you deal during the summer? will you see him/her?

He’s a hermit who used my last vacation before I moved to go on all the vacations he had to postpone because he was working on his last book. And this past summer ... Covid. This question is obviously directed at high school students, but in general, he lives in the back of head always, and when I’m in my hometown for the summer my heart aches because theres a none-zero chance I’ll see him, but I know I won’t.

24) does your tc support gay rights?

Yes. He’s never been put in a position that I know of where he had to outright condemn homophobia, but in one of his classes, he actively made the choice to make the very first reading of the semester about how women in ancient times had more agency than assumed, and also how the woman in the case study was a lesbian.

25) what class do you have with them? And what period? Do you have them every day?

History classes. I won’t get into specifics because it’s kind of an eclectic mix and I’m paranoid someone from the area could come across this. But I had him twice a week every semester that I had him. Again this kind of question is more so applicable to high school students, not so much university students.

26) have you ever drifted out during a lecture thinking about them and missed information?

No. In his classes he is too enthralling, and I’m a good student otherwise.

27) have you stalked them online? what did you find out?

In theory. He’s a fifty-year-old history professor whose reaction to a description of the big lipped/tiny face filter on snapchat was “that sounds disgusting.” The man doesn’t have social media, and if he does those privacy settings are on so students can’t find him he thinks he’s very professional. I do visit his mini-bio section on the college website fairly often tho.

28) have you ever run into them outside of schools? what happened?

I did once. He introduced me to his wife, who said “oh you’re E! C has talked about you” and it apparently he had done so positively, and blew my mind because this was back when I was failing classes and also, as a person, I don’t believe that people think about me when I’m not there. They gave me a restaurant recommendation and afterwards his wife surprised me a they were leaving the restaurant because ... we had listened to them, and they also went there for lunch that day.

29) has your tc ever spoken of teacher-student relationships? what did they say?

It had recently come out that it had been found out that another professor had been in a relationship with a student and he’s the one that brought it up before class one day (with all of us not just me). He didn’t say anything for or against it, just that it was generally discouraged, but that most schools did have policies in place to handle the situation.

30) do you regret telling anyone about your tc? if you’ve kept it a secret, why have you done so?

Absolutely not. I can’t tell my best friends because they’d do nothing but give me shit for it and it would call every time I mention him into question. But the friends that I have told ... its been so freeing, and like a weight has been lifted from my heart. One friend in particular I unloaded on her all my emotional shit pertaining to him this past summer and she was so understanding it legit since then I’ve been less distraught when thinking about him. It still hurts, but it feels less like I’m suffocating now.

#personal #professor crush #professor crush community #teacher crush #monthly challenge #december

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initiumseries · 4 years

Note

Which parts of BTVS did you not like and how would you have changed them?

Yes! Great question.

So, if I’m being honest, most, if not all, of my issues with BTVS start after she graduates high school. I feel like the show lost the magic of the Scoobies bond and the older they got, the more distance we had from them as characters, the more OOC it felt like everyone started behaving, So, I’ll start with s4, buckle in this is gonna be long lol.

Season 4

So as usual, I like the idea of season 4. The gang has graduated, they’re growing up, and trying to find their place in such a big pond. On top of that, the Initiative is on campus (which makes sense, you can’t just blow up a high school and there are no repercussions for that, and it’s kinda cool the idea of instead of a govn’t lockdown, they infiltrate Sunnydale and are running experiments to weaponize demons. Clever, fun. I like it.), and ofc Buffy’s given up having a normal life, but now she just wants a normal relationship, and doesn’t even get that. I’m on board. Especially the idea that the gang inadvertently drifts away from each other because that’s real. That happens when you go away to college, even if you go away together. So my issues, are rooted in the details.

Maggie Walsh turned into this weird obsessive surrogate mother, who wanted to get Buffy out of the way, except the execution was so sloppy. I LIKED commanding, no nonsense, bitch monster from hell Maggie Walsh, and I would have liked to see that follow through in how she attempts to dispose of Buffy, and how she handles Riley. She becomes this soft, weirdly maternal unhinged force after trying to kill Buffy, and I don’t really understand why. I would have liked to see more of that motherly role, while still rooted in that commander in chief sort of aura she exudes when we first meet her, when it comes to Riley. I also thought her death came too soon, like they just didn’t know what to do with her after she executed her function *coughs in the Anointed One* of creating tension between Buffy and Riley (which, honestly, his being in the Initiative at all would have been enough conflict if they had leaned into that without stuffing so much stuff in there). I definitely would have had Maggie maintain that strength and authority, while softening where necessary to emotionally manipulate Riley. I’d make it really clear that Riley is deeply confused because we believe the hold she has on him, and withdrawal on the drugs would have been a nice touch, but I think it came too soon. Which leads me directly into:

Super cool. I remember when I first watched this on TV and the gang finally rebonded (after a HILARIOUS episode of them finally addressing their conflicts), they’d reached the climax with the Initiative and Adam and Buffy does a very Sailor Moon thing of all the different emotional strengths of her friends bond together to give her enough power to defeat Adam. LOVE IT.

Except what’s the point? Prof. Walsh created Adam...for what exactly? We never really get a clear, salient reason for that, bc they kill her, and Adam’s exposition is...not sufficient to explain why she had an off the books project to stitch together a...demon son. It’s weird and especially because Adam doesn’t really do all that much, it really leaves me wondering like, what was the point? For me, I feel like, instead of making Adam a spectator for a lot of the drama that takes place in s4, I would have preferred him be the driving force. behind most things.

Also: Riley’s Black friend would not have been such an angry misogynistic raging asshole because I’m tired of Black people being The Worst to make the white characters look better, more reasonable.

I would have needed a stronger explanation for Adam trying to turn Riley into...whatever that was.

Willow would have been bi and I absolutely would have, if I went in that direction, had a much more fleshed out discovery of that fact (Because in this world Seth wouldn’t have left lol). I also would have made sure Willow and the actress who played Tara would have had the chemistry they deserved.

Anya would not have stayed in Sunnydale. She would have left. She was a poor man’s Cordelia and had 0 character growth or interest.

Season 5

Again, love the ideas. Suddenly Buffy has a sister we ALL knew wasn’t there before? A God shows up? What I love(d) about Buffy is that the escalations felt so natural? Like it didn’t feel like the show was like HoW dO wE oUtDo oURsElVes aGaIN?! It felt more organic like, well, yeah, the govnt. Oh shit, a GOD? D A M N! And Glory had personality! She was crazy! And it also matches alongside Buffy’s coming to grips with her own abilities. She’s one of the oldest slayers on record at this point, watching her in s1 and in s5 you SEE, her skill level is above and beyond, and now she meets a foe that still provides such a challenge, Buffy is scared. LOVE IT.

So Spike, getting neutered, was interesting at first, but it really starts to wear out its welcome for me, about this time. My problem being, he poses so little of a threat, that all his scenes start to feel like filler and not like they’re driving the plot forward in any useful way. His obsession with Buffy becoming sexual, was INLINE for Spike, but I liked Spike because he was a DICK, he was also dangerous, and after a lot of hilarious moments in S4, watching his basically creep around Buffy’s house and try to manipulate her into spending time together (which felt soooo pathetic to me in a way I didn’t like) and like, the Buffy bot (fucking ew) all season was just, not a fun time. I think, for me, I would have had Spike maintain his dignity as a character and I absolutely would not have had him threaten Dru’s life to drive home his obsession for Buffy. Ew. Yuck. Cringe. I just think there had to be more that Spike could do this season than run around chasing Buffy’s coattails.

One again, Tara/Willow. Tara had no character development (even in an episode that was created to provide her with development? I definitely would have made use of that episode to create more ACTUAL depth for her character) so then to turn around and have her become mindless for basically the REST of the season, is just, rude lol. And because they have no chemistry and their relationship feels so...baseless, when this moment happens, I don’t feel anything. I don’t believe WIllow would be this angry, this heartbroken, this devastated that she’d take in such dark magicks and blindly go after Glory. I’d believe it if it were Oz, but Tara/Willow do not get the same level of build up and relationship establishing for me to buy this. I would have changed that.

Unpopular opinion, but I also would have made Dawn less of an UTTERLY irritating, shrill, whiny, screaming white tween. I get it, she was supposed to be the baby. But I get nothing from watching a white girl who is mostly just bored and irritated with her life, start shoplifting from her sister’s friends and in general, because she’s kinda sad sometimes. Get a grip. The only time I feel bad for her is when she finds out she’s not real. Actual problems. Wicked, I’m on board. But I think I would have just made her less fucking annoying and whiny and a lot more sympathetic. She still could have been frustrating and bratty, but in a way that was a bit more likeable, so that in those moments where she’s *genuinely* struggling, you feel for her on a broader scope. I would not have made her do all of those incredibly infuriating, incredibly stupid things, like running away in the middle of a dangerous situation. Because it ends up reading to me, like Buffy’s anger, frustration and criticisms of Dawn aren’t her being too hard on her as the eldest, as the Slayer, but accurate because Dawn is a horrendous nightmare of a new human being with no real redeeming qualities. Definitely a better ways to execute that.

Also, I feel like this season is where the Scoobies drift again, but this time we aren’t really addressing it? Buffy’s dealing with Joyce getting sick, Riley being a POS, Spike stalking her, and she never leans on Willow for any of it. They never even really talk about any of the things going on. It’s such a missed opportunity to lean back into the core gang navigating growing up together. Willow is now basically the guardian of her new partner, and again, we don’t really see WIllow lean on Buffy at all. And Giles is preparing to leave, which, to me, felt organic. He felt like Buffy had outgrown him, but I think he was also trying to rediscover himself, but is pulled back into being a Watcher and he seems both grateful and disappointed. I would have liked to, I donno, make that a little clearer. Also what is Xander doing at this point? He’s outgrown his usefulness as well, so he kinda just becomes a hanger’s on. If Xander doesn’t just leave Sunnydale after s3 or 4. He needs to do *something*, he should have been reintegrated into the group in a new way if it wasn’t through school.

Season 6

This is so hard. I feel like this season is just, SO dark, SO heavy, and absent the levity that had been established up til s4. But it’s also really earned. Buffy is going through it. The layers are wonderful. I LOVE IT. But I also needed like...emotional breaks? And this is also kinda where I needed the scoobies to feel like scoobies, and trying to figure out how to help their friend. Xander and Willow have been friends their entire lives, and season 3 really fleshes out that emotional shorthand they have, but it’s so quickly abandoned in s4 and onward. Suddenly Willow/Xander feel like strangers with Anya and Tara between them. I feel like there should have been more moments of Xander and Willow just..being, and struggling with Buffy’s loss together in a way that only the two of them really understand because like Buffy said Xander has a piece of her that Oz, and so then Tara, can’t reach. That should be a constant thoroughline. Xander should have been the first person to see something wasn’t quite right with Willow and the magic.

Giles should have left earlier to give more time between him leaving and Buffy coming back. I like the idea of Giles beginning to build a life for himself in England and literally dropping everything once he found out Buffy was back. I emotionally hate the conflict of Willow threatening Giles, but I like it as a character development issue, and Giles definitely should have side eyed Willow, maybe even brought up his concerns later with Xander.

I think I also would have had Spike leave Sunnydale and come back when Buffy does. I didn’t need a reformed Spike, and it would have been interesting to see him ingratiate himself with the group now that Buffy is back, and he’s the only one who sees how much pain she’s in.

I HATED Warren and the group. The disgustingly overwhelming and unchecked misogyny and Warren was INSANELY unlikeable. I don’t need to like him, but I needed some catharsis way before we got it. He was HORRENDOUS.

Even in death, Tara is bland.

Willow’s magic addiction legit comes out of nowhere. I needed more organic build up than Amy, who has been a rat for like 3 years, suddenly being like “hey I know this guys who can give us magic drugs!”

The chasm between Willow and Buffy this season would have hit if they hadn’t been distant since s3.

I think we needed the seeds for Dark!Willow planted a lot earlier like I described.

Also a lot more evidence that Willow was running away from her nerdy past because when it comes up here, it’s completely left field.

This would have hit harder if they still felt close.

Season 7

Fuck man, the whole thing was awful. But I ESPECIALLY would have thrown out that left field retcon of Buffy having been in an asylum. I lost sleep over that shit lol.

But I would have totally rewritten season 7. If Spike’s involvement was necessary (it wasn’t), then I absolutely would not have had her defend him against Wood and Giles. I would have had her treat him extremely coolly. Like a tool they require. There would have been *some* level of redemption for him that was believable within the confines of his character, but not so much that we forget he’s an assaulter.

The Potentials would have been WAY fucking less horrendously annoying and I really would have leaned into conflict avoidance with the scoobies that reaches a peak when Xander loses his eye. Giles and Buffy would have renegotiated their adult parent/child relationship in a far healthier way and we would have had a lot more interiority with Buffy like we’ve had, pretty much since the show’s inception.

Angel would have been there when Buffy was isolated and alone, not Spike. Because #bangel4lyfe lmao. They still woulda kissed as a “greeting” lol. Buffy would not have told Spike she loved him, or that she ever loved him. She woulda told that dude thank you and dipped out of the cave lol.

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slothgiirl · 4 years

Text

shadowplay part 14

You’re going to miss LA. You think to yourself as you hoist your bag out the uber, considerably heavier than when you arrived a little under a week ago.

“I’ve got it love,” Alex grins, not waiting for your response, before taking the bag right out of your hands, clad in a jacket like the sun wasn’t shining high in the sky.

“I had it.”

“Yeah well,” he smiles, taking a moment to plant a kiss against your lips, “I’ve got it.”

You roll your eyes, leading the way into the airport, but can’t help the smile that grows on your lips. The warmth in your chest has nothing todo with the california sun, leaving you bubbly as fuck, the same way you’ve felt this whole week with Alex.

Even rock stars have to wait their turn to grab their tickets before having to go through the very unsexy security.

Standing in line, the airports ac cranked up like crazy, you’re glad to be wearing one of Alex’s jackets. “ feel like a glorified coat hanger,” you tell him, “just here to keep your jacket from being ruined during the flight.”

Alex chuckles, “but you're much better company.”

“True,” you giggle, “can’t say the same for you though. It’s no fun getting tipsy while you're holding your own like a proper james bond.” Thinking back on the many drinking games you'd taken part of during the last week. Zack had been a surprising lightweight.

“Well-,”

Whatever he was about to say is lost. The sound of cameras clicking, a flash temporarily blinding your eyes. As a man urgently says, “Alex is this your new girlfriend!”

A camera clicks again.

“Alex! Look over here,” the man cries out.

You wish you had Alex's sunglass wearing habit, as you blink rapidly, trying to recover from the blinding flashes suddenly assaulting you.

One man becomes two becomes three. All jockeying for his attention. “Alex are you working on the new album!”

“Sweetheart, look over here!”

“Is she your new girlfriend!”

“When's the new album out!”

The people around you, who moments ago hadn't cared, look over, whispering under their breath. You don't know how celebrities like Kim Kardashian can deal with the media circus that surrounds their lives constantly you think as you try and ignore the flashes continuing to go off. Ignoring them like you would the pointed looks of your profs as you struggled to stay awake during seven in the morning lectures.

Alex, sensing your unease, slips his hand into yours, squeezing your hand in his tightly as he pulls you along up to the self check-ins.

It's easier to block them out when you're busy concentrating on printing your tickets.

“I swear my passport was just here,” you mutter. Your purse wasn't even that big. How could it have gotten lost.

Alex smirks, unable to help himself as he teases you, “should've given your passport to me love.”

You snort. “My passport picture should be kept between me and this unfortunate machine.” You had tried to bleach your hair blonde, but had only achieved a horrid orange color that you'd dyed back to black the next day.

You pull out the elusive passport, but Alex nabs it from your hands before you can scan it into the machine.

He looks down with a ridiculously sappy smile, “you look beautiful as ever.”

“Oh you're so full of shit,” you snipe back.

Alex chuckles, the machine finally printing your tickets, before leaning in and kissing you again, taking you bottom lip between his lips, for just a moment too long for such a public place.

You flush crimson, but can't make yourself look away from Alex; the man you've grown so fond of.

He'd never been this open and at ease of PDA back when you had been faking a relationship for his benefit. It makes you really wonder how his friends had bought it.

A crease forms between his brows, “don't mind the paps love. ‘s better if you just ignore ‘em.” There's a certain stiffness to his shoulders that hadn't been there moments ago too.

The paps bother him too. You're surprised he isn't used to it. Then again, he hadn't even spared them so much as a glance.

Understanding dawns on you, he was worried about how you'd react now that you'd both just decided to start dating. Alex doesn't want them to put you off.

You shake your head as you both make your way to TSA, Alex still holding your hand, keeping you close to him. “I was just thinking how I'd be a terrible paparazzi. They'd send me out to chase Britney Spears and I'd be like but what if she doesn't want to be bothered right now.”

He laughs as you step on the escalator up and leave the paps behind.

You're in the cab back from the airport as your phone buzzes, finally off from airplane mode. Ten different texts from your mum asking if you landed okay. All the work emails you put off in the states. And Sam sent you a million screenshots of you and Alex in the airport earlier with the text: i'm now celebrity adjacent and i WILL name drop.

You laugh, having expected nothing less from her.

“What,” Alex asks lazily, cigarette in hand, both the cabs windows down.

“Just Sam being Sam.” You reply.

He nods, becoming incredibly serious, too serious to be sincere, “she's your Matthew.”

“Well you're not wrong.” Sam was that close to you. “We're going house hunting tomorrow...later today. I hate jet lag.”

Alex grins. “Why don't you just move in with me,” he says simply, as though it's not a loaded question. As though it's really that easy.

Sending you through eighty five degrees of: you haven't told your parents, they're going to freak, you just started dating, too fast, you're parents were going to absolutely murder him because everyone in your family had been convinced you were going to die an old spinster by now.

“We just started dating,” you say instead.

Alex shoots you a puzzled look. “Technically it's been six months.”

“Stick to being clever in writing Alex,” you reply. “this has been on my to do list for a year now.” You have been saving up money and building credit for ages now.

“Okay so maybe it's been a week,” he shrugs, flicking the cigarette ash into the street, “but it feels like forever.”

You snort, your cheeks heating up all over again. You hadn't felt this happy with a man in ages. “Nice try but the answer’s still no.”

“Can I at least come with,” he pouts.

“No,” you laugh, “Sams going to want all the gossip as soon as I see her. Who else is going to tell her that Breanna really thinks rice crackers and peanut butter are a snack!”

“Don't be so hard on her.”

“You didn't have any either,” you counter. “I can understand someone eating healthy, I dunno if I've ever made a dress larger than a size 6, but I draw the line at trying to pretend kale chips taste good.”

“I hate peanut butter,” he answers, the laugh clear in his voice. “sticks to the roof of my mouth.”

“She also told me about this app that fakes plastic surgery for editing,” you add, “made me feel like an old woman. Only just discovered filters.” You really didn't use instagram for much more than following some writers and designers you admire.

“She hogged you all week,” Alex groans at the memory. Breanna telling you where to squat so her legs would look longer, her camera in your hands.

“It was fun. She's a hell of a hiker,” you admit. She'd been able to walk and talk easily, lugging around her camera with her, while the boys jammed out back at the cabin.

“Miles won't walk more than a block before whining. Ya sure I can’t go with you and Sam? I've gotten very used to having you around all the time”

“You can help me move in,” you tease.

“Oi!”

You lean in close to his ear, “promise I'll make it worth your time,” you practically purr, barely managing to keep from laughing.

Alex's cigarette falls out of his hand.

He turns to you fully, his hand cupping your cheek, a glint in his eye as the sun sets over London, “I'll hold you too it.”

You beat Alex to the bags, having learned by now that he wasn't about to let you pay. Which was for the best. But you could at the very least carry your own bag up the stairs to your flat.

“I've got it,” you shut him down, keeping a hand outstretched, so he doesn't just take the bag from your hand.

“Alright alright,” Alex laughs, following you up to your flat.

You were glad that he was staying. You had also gotten used to waking up to him every morning. To making out in bed first thing. Or lounging around on your phone as Alex tuned his guitar.

It had been that way for a while if you were being honest with yourself.

Alex had carved out a place in your life long before he'd kissed you and told you he loved you.

Saying you had only been dating for a week meant nothing when you were already sure of the depth of your feelings for him.

“ ‘s it alright if I stay over,” Alex asks softly, leaning against the door while you search for your keys, looking just as hopeful and earnest as he had so long ago when drunk, when he'd tried to kiss you then.

You stick the key in the door, before turning to meet the warmth of his brown eyes, and kissing him for all the times you'd wanted to before: kissing him just because you can. You can't imagine ever being sick of the feel of his lips against yours. “Stay as long as you like.”

The door clicks open.

“All that's good,” Alex smiles, “I already ordered breakfast… ‘fink it's closer to lunch by now.”

“Oh thank god,” you reply, abandoning your bag next to the door and sinking into your sofa, stretching out all the kinks in your neck from having sat on a plane for the last nine hours. “I was just thinking how I was going to have to run to the grocery store.”

“We can go after.” Alex says, kicking off his shoes, and laying down next to you.

You giggle, scooting over as much as you can do there's room. Both of you are slight, so it's not hard to curl up on the sofa without feeling squished together. You relax against Alex, happy to waste your last hours of vacation with him.

#Alex Turner #alex turner fanfic #alex turner imagine #alex turner x reader #Shadowplay #we in the last few rounds now

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purplesurveys · 4 years

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725

Your name? Robyn. Age? Just turned 22. Ugh, I’ve finally reached the point where future ages – other than 30/40/50 etc – won’t be much of a milestone anymore. I can hear Monica Geller tell me, “welcome to the real world, it sucks.” Gender? Identify as female. Ethnic background? I usually just say Filipino to make it easier but technically I’m mostly Tagalog with a bit of Mangyan and Ilokano and I think Bulakeño? in me. What do you like the most about your ethnic background? It’s hard to find anything to be proud of from being Filipino sksksk I like our cuisine I guess? Especially the seafood?

The least? It’s not something I dislike directly about our own background, because what I like the least is the hundreds of years of colonization by four different nations that led to the near-complete wipeout of our native culture and the severe colonial effects that followed. The reason I find it so hard to rack my brain for stuff about our ‘ethnic background’ is because everything about it has already been penetrated by Spanish, English, Japanese, or American influence, even down to how well I can speak English right now. It’s almost impossible to look for something that’s ours. Who is your favorite golf player? I’ve never liked watching golf. Whats your favorite kind of gold? (White, Yellow, Rose, Traditional) Rose gold looks pretty. Would you rather wear turquoise pants or purple? Highkey would not wear either of these but if it came down to it, purple. Would you ever go on a jungle safari? I kind of already did. It was a lot of fun and I would rather keep going to safaris if I wanted to see wild animals as it’s a much lesser evil than zoos. If you saw a UFO what would you do? Hope my fingers are quick enough and immediately take a video. What color is your mailbox? We don’t have one. Mailmen just place it by the handle of our screen door. Are you taller than your Mom? No, I’m the smallest one in the family. Who is your meanest friend? I never really counted Patrice as a friend but she’s been the least nice acquaintance I remember having. Her attitude is actually the reason I hadn’t seen her as a friend, so that said I wouldn’t really be befriending anyone who I thought isn’t very nice. Have you ever thought about suicide? Yeah, well I’m not exactly the most mentally well person durrrr. I don’t think of it as often as I used to, but it’ll cross my mind more or less once a month. Have you ever broken a pinata? I’ve never had that experience before actually. I’ve only seen it in cartoons. Who loves Orange Soda? I don’t like soda, period. Where did you go the last time you used public transportation? I dunno if it counts because the jeep just goes around the campus hahaha but I took a jeep coming from CAL going to CMC, my home college. My dad accidentally drove the car I was gonna use that day so I had to book a Grab (our local Uber; also I can’t do public transpo for long distances hence the private car, heh) going to school, and then the campus jeeps to go from one class to another. If you were to start a band what would you name it? Never hire me to name stuff. Would you rather spend a year in the abyss or outer space? Outer space. It’s where I’ve always wanted to go anyway. I fear for my sanity if I wind up in the abyss. Do you know someone who has shot off a part of their own body? No but I know someone who had been shot (or stabbed? I can’t remember but he was attacked); it was my Kuya’s close friend. What TV shows stick out from your childhood? Mr. Bean, Pokemon, SpongeBob, Jimmy Neutron, Drake and Josh, The Suite Life of Zack and Cody, That’s so Raven, to name a few. What is/was for dinner tonight? No idea yet. My dad usually whips something up at the last minute but it always turns out so so good. What’s really the best cure for a hangover? FRIED CHICKEN and I will die on this hill. Do you eat the stems of broccoli? Oooh I don’t think that’s been served to me before actually. I’m not opposed to trying them though cause broccoli’s my favorite vegetable. How many cavities do you have? I had a couple before but they’ve since been fixed at the dentist. Have you ever given money to a bum? Yes I always give them money ranging from ₱10 to ₱20, and biscuits if I have some in my bag, if they knock on my window. If you found 100 dollars on the floor of a church what would ya do with it? If I found it in a church I’d absolutely run the fuck away with the money lmao. Is your head a fun place to be in? I’m a bit of a workaholic and am always thinking about the next thing to accomplish, so tbh I imagine it looking like Spongebob’s brain HAHAHAHA as in exactly this shot

What is your favorite word? Poignant to me sounds and looks the way it means, which is so satisfying. Why is going to poop such a social taboo? We covered a bit of this in my anthropology class last semester and our prof shared a theory that says our body is in and of itself clean but once substances exit the body they’re seen as impure and already dirty - which is why we’ll have no problem talking about the circulatory system but many tend to faint if they cut their finger too much and see blood leaking out of them. Same explanation goes with poop, saliva, sweat, etc. I’m too lazy to check my notes if every bit of this is accurate, but the impure/dirty is the one I remember to be correct. Who is your worst enemy? Don’t really like the idea of enemies per se but after Marielle betrayed my trust twice I vowed to never speak with her again, and I never have. When was the last time you passed gas? I don’t like farting. If I feel one coming I suppress it on purpose. Do you eat raw hot dogs? No, that sounds so nasty. Do you ever speak out loud what you should be typing? Eh, sometimes and only if I’m by myself. It’s not a habit though. Do you own a squirt gun? We call them a water gun here but it used to be one of my favorite toys from childhood. I don’t own one anymore as I largely don’t need them. Do you like the Subway $5 footlong? I don’t really eat Subway. What is the last thing you ate with Marshmallow in it? Hate marshmallows. I always remove it if it had been added to the food I’m eating. Would you rather live in a shack on the beach or a mansion in Ohio? I love you beach, but I’m taking the damn mansion lol. Do you believe that zombies could really invade the Earth? I don’t think zombies could ever surface naturally but at some point in the distant future, when technology and human knowledge advance enough and if someone was ambitious enough to use such knowledge for the worse, I feel like some chemical or substance causing someone to become a zombie could be made. Idk, people have come up with crazy shit from science that were initially thought to be impossible so for me I’m not ruling out zombies or at least a milder version of them haha. If you were to buy a boat what would you name it? Margo, as an homage to Margo Martindale’s role from BoJack Horseman. Who is your internet provider? PLDT. What has the tv show two and a half men taught you? Nothing, because I’ve never watched an episode. What’s something you’re not supposed to be doing right now? Not thinking about my unfinished thesis. I should definitely be thinking about it right now lol. What’s hotter topless or pantless? A bit TMI considering the time ksksks but topless for me. What would you do if you found a four leaf clover? I don’t know what that’s supposed to mean (but I wanna say it means good luck?) so maybe I’ll just take a photo of it heh. Miami Dolphins or NY Jets? I don’t even know what sport these teams belong to. What is your favorite kind of instant popcorn? I don’t like popcorn, so it’s a pass for me. Do you pay attention to the expiration dates on food? Yeah I check on them quite often since I once had a terrible experience drinking spoiled milk; but I’ve also been told by my dad that the expiration dates don’t necessarily mean spoilage and molds and all that nasty crap, and that the date just means by when the product’s quality will slowly start to decrease, like if chips start to get tougher to chew or if a chocolate bar becomes less sweet. It’s a source of relief, but I’m still paranoid about expiration dates overall. What ringtone is on your phone? Just the ones Apple provides. What odd thing do you wish you were doing right now? Driving in circles around the village just to enjoy the outside world :( Are you a smoker? Socially. How do you feel about not being able to smoke in a lot of bars? I don’t mind it. I’m not desperate to smoke ever.

#survey #surveys

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vmstudies · 5 years

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30+ things i learned in my first semester of college

Okay, so as a college freshman in her second semester, I wanted to write all this down before I forget it all or it becomes irrelevant. College is a trippy af time, especially for freshmen, and I know high schoolers are all freaking out trying to find what’s true and what’s not. So here’s what I learned my first semester of college, and some stuff I’m still learning.

Warning: this post is long af.

disclaimer: I’m a nursing ROTC student so I’ve got like a million and one things on my plate at any given time, and I have a wake up call at 5:00am almost every day of the week, so if you have to/already do wake up early, this will be great for you.

1. Be patient. You’re going to have people around you doing all different things. You may not be going out, but your hall mates will. Learn to let go and let them be. Unless they’re screaming excessively in the hall at 3am. Then maybe say something.

2. Do all the extra credit you are offered. Most professors only have 3-4 exams and a final. At least 99% of mine so far have done that. Take what you can get and do everything to keep your grades up.

3. Time management is key. I personally suck at it, but I find ways. Unfortunately sometimes, for me, it means cutting sleep, which I would not recommend, especially if you’re waking up so early. But learn to manage your time the way that works for you.

4. Find a good pair of headphones. Some noise cancelling ones preferably. Those will become your best friends.

5. Coffee will be other your best friend. Even if you don’t drink it. I never had a single cup of coffee till first week of second semester. I drink a cup a day now.

6. Eat well. It doesn’t have to be a salad every meal, but find the healthiest options you can that you like. The Freshman 15 is real, and I gained it, but I’ve lost 10 pounds just by eating a portioned amount of each food group per day.

7. Exercise. This goes along with eating in preventing the Freshman 15, but it also helps with stress relief and focus among a million and one other health benefits.

8. Take chances. Nothing illegal and nothing that could jeopardize your health, grades, or future, but just remember that when a moment passes, you can never get it back.

9. You don’t have to be best friends, or even friends at all with your roommate. But make an effort to get along. My roommate and I learned very quickly that we were not going to be best friends like we thought, but we get along well enough, and that’s all that matters.

10. You’re probably not going to remain friends with all of your high school pals. Even the ones who go to school with you. I thought the group from my high school at my uni would be my best friends and now I only see them when my roommate brings them by.

11. Take a chance on everyone. You’d be surprised who could become the best friend you’ve ever had very quickly.

12. Colleges will want your living situations for next year very quickly. Don’t panic. Just get it done before rents go up.

13. Look for ways to contribute to your city. Volunteer at churches or food banks or homeless shelters or hospitals - wherever works best for you. You start to feel a part of a community when you give back to it.

14. Skipping class isn’t bad, but only when it’s done a few times. If you only show up for exams, you’re screwed, because there are things on the exam that won’t always be on the PowerPoints. TL;DR: show up to class.

15. Don’t drink after people. Mono runs rampant on college campuses, and it’s now airborne. Hand sanitizer is your third new best friend.

16. Exam season isn’t that scary. As long as you’re maintaining your grades in a class, the finals should be okay. Should be.

17. Assuming you aren’t a commuter, if you have the ability to go home every weekend, don’t. The weekends are a time for you to hang out with friends and have fun at college. If you’re spending it at home, it’s not even worth it.

18. That being said, if you have the ability to go home “often” and you’re happy and comfortable at home, visit every once in a while. It’s good for the soul.

19. Many professors are there to complete research requirements. That being said, it doesn’t matter to them whether they’re good professors or not so long as they get their work done. That being said, you will have some shitty professors. Just work hard and beat them by beating their class.

20. You will have some professors who are, to put it nicely, absolute dicks. Again: beat them by beating their class. Ace that shit then never sign up for a class with them again.

21. Find the study style that suits you best. Rewriting notes is absolutely useless for me. This semester, my study style has become taking notes in notebooks in my dorm, and just having the PowerPoint up to add notes to the slides as my profs speak. It works.

22. Have someone in every class you can text and ask questions or study with. Cooperate to graduate, kids.

23. This one is huge. You will get homesick. It’s almost a total guarantee. It may not be immediate, but it will hit and it will hit hard. Don’t worry. Nobody’s freshman year is what they say it is. Yeah, you’ll find your group, but chances are you’ll spend the first semester drifting and asking if you’re the one person in the entire world who isn’t enjoying things. You’re not. We’re all in the same boat. Just keep drifting. You’ll find your group eventually. Who knows - they may be closer than you think.

24. Sororities and frats may seem like all that, but - at my university at least - while they’re huge here, they’re also a major pain in the ass. Rush for sororities was literal hell, and one girl I was talking to the other day said she lost 12 pounds in just that one week. Know what you’re getting into.

25. If you’re single and remain that way, don’t worry. There’s nothing wrong with you there either. People move at their own pace. My best friend has, like, 5 guys wanting to date her right now, and I have absolutely no one (that I know of). Don’t worry. Just keep doing what you’re doing. The right one will come eventually.

26. Know what you’re worth.

27. Get to class at least 5 minutes early. I’m always running to my 8:30 and it sucks.

28. 8:30 classes aren’t that bad. As someone who is most definitely not a morning person, I have yet to complain. It’s nice to get up and get going for the day.

29. 6:00pm classes suck. Mine ends at 7:15 and then I still have to go get dinner, which is in the opposite direction from my dorm, get back to my hall, shower, eat aforementioned dinner, do schoolwork and study, etc. It’s a pain.

30. Find something small you can do that makes you happy. For me, it’s Korean. I started teaching myself Korean halfway through last semester and I like to think I’m doing pretty well for someone self-taught. I also have a stack of notecards that hits the 26oz mark on my Nalgene. It’s kind of insane.

31. BUDGETING IS SO FREAKING IMPORTANT. I cannot stress this enough. And so is saving. If you get a paycheck or an allowance of any kind, put some of it away in savings every time you get paid, and try not to touch that savings money.

32. Be open to everyone else’s likes/dislikes/thoughts/feelings/opinions. You don’t have to agree or like it, but respect it. You’ll meet people who have all different hobbies, opinions, religious/political views. As long as they’re not out there preaching that we should all just kill each other or whatever, idk, respect it. Respect Dems if you’re a Republican; respect Republicans if you’re a Democrat. Respect Muslims and Jews and Christians/Catholics and Hindus and Buddhists and anything else you can think of. Respect.

33. Keep your dorm neat. Make your bed every day. Clean room=clean mind. Clean mind=better studying.

34. Do your laundry every week, y’all. Shit gets nasty.

35. Only bring what you need. If you find after 2-3 weeks you haven’t used it, send it home. Dorms are tiny. You need all the space you can get.

36. If you’re religious, find your religious community. It will be a great reprieve a few times a week. I was never overtly Catholic, and I’m still not, but it’s nice to get away for an hour a week. Plus after 5pm mass Sundays they feed us home-cooked food, and it’s freaking good. Take advantage of that.

37. Find a place on campus that reminds you of why you’re there when you have doubts or you’re feeling homesick. For me, it’s the first place I ever saw when I stepped on campus: the main lawn. It’s super relaxing and it’s a great reminder that I’m there to kick ass, get a degree, get a commission, and become the person I’m supposed to be in the process. It can also mean the difference between contemplation and a total breakdown. TL;DR: find a place that eases your mind.

That’s all I can think of right now, but if you have more that I missed, feel free to add on! Again, this is all from my own personal experience, and if you find that you don’t agree with one, okay. One size does not fit all. But this is just what I recommend. Have fun in college and good luck! Remember: YOU GOT THIS THING!

#studyblr #studyspo #college #college prep #things i learned #tips for college #college tips #self care

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omgviolette12 · 5 years

Text

After hours- Chapter 4 A professor Loki Fanfic

Previous Chapter

Summary: Evelyn Monroe has been a TA for professor Laufeyson’s Calculus course for four months now. He was known to be quite strict, but that never deterred her from applying for the position in order to be close to the man she had been secretly pining for. One evening, she returns to his office after opening hours… and with her bountiful luck, she walks in on something not meant to be seen.

Chapters: 4/?

Words: 2105

Tags: @milkymaidme @dangertoozmanykids101@alexakeyloveloki @little-moonbeam-666 @marvel-ous-fics@clovermariear @lynnesm@bitchyikes@moon-child-of-a-poet, @allthecraftandthings@bubblegumspitt

If you’d like to be added, let me know. I’ve also posted this on AO3

________

If Evelyn thought she would get a wink of sleep that night, she was sadly mistaken.

Her thoughts were insistent on replaying certain scenes inside her head, which led her to overthink many things regarding Professor Laufeyson.

She would get flustered when she thought about how nice it felt to sit in his lap, then she’d remember how good he’d smelt. Then the next moment, she’d want a dark hole to swallow her up when she thought about how she ended up there, and why he even bothered to hold her.

In addition to that, she also spent the majority of the time thinking about the woman he was with. While there were many striking similarities between them, there were also differences. The first being that she was much more…voluptuous.

Before the woman could hide the entirety of her lady bits behind her professor’s desk, she saw that her breasts were larger by a considerable margin; While Evelyn wasn’t small-chested, her boobs weren’t nearly as large. The lady’s backside was also quite round and plump, taking the blows of her professor’s…paddle… like jelly.

In simpler terms, the woman was thick. With not one, but three C’s.

Evelyn refused to be a hater and assume she had some work done on her assets, but she wouldn’t deny the possibility.

She continued to compare herself endlessly to the woman - and what she thought her professor’s type might be.

The woman seemed much more mature, experienced, and desirable. And unfortunately, the more she focused on those differences, the more she found the similarities to be mere coincidences.

Evelyn even began to think that she probably did mishear her name. After all, why would he say her name, of all things? Although they had grown comfortable with talking to each other over the past year, he still treated her like all his other students.

He was more attentive for sure, but she attributed that to the fact that she was just slower than the rest of her peers.

And just like that, her insecurities continued to eat at her throughout the night, and well into the morning.

Crushing on a professor really sucks ass…

Evelyn was practically dead on her feet as she went about her day - she opted to stay home and laze about, neglecting to work on her art assignments. She’d curse herself tomorrow when she has to play catch-up, but she didn’t care at the moment as she curled up on the couch to watch her favorite cooking channel.

“Eve! Come do my hair!” Candice came bouncing into the living room, hair wet and comb in tow, “Cmon, get your lazy ass up and help me.”

Evelyn did not bother to raise her head as she replied, “Leave my lazy ass alone and do it yourself.”

“Pleaasee! You know I can’t do hair…”

Candice continued to pester her until she finally gave in, “Okay! Fine! But just know you’re cooking today.”

“Yeah yeah…” Candice plopped her butt unto the couch, handing her the comb, “Bantu knots, I want my curls like yours.”

As Evelyn began to part through her hair, Candice snapped her fingers as if remembering something, “Oh..! You still a TA for professor kinkster or nah?”

Candice yelped as Evelyn combed her hair a bit too roughly, “Prof…Professor what now?”

“You know…whack whack, paddle-waddle. Professor Laufeyson, duh. Did you give him the letter?”

Evelyn gave her elder sister an exasperated look, “Can - can you not call him that? Where did that come from…”

“Eve, you said he was tenderizing some booty with a paddle. He’s kinky as shit!”

“Is.. is that a bad thing, or..?” Evelyn never questioned the oddity of what she witnessed until now, as she thought that everyone did that sort of thing during sex.

“Nah.. it depends on what you like. Some people are into it, but not me.” Candice began to casually munch on some chips that had been left on the coffee table, “You should Google it - Bondage, whips, crazy sex toys, etcetera. Like I said though, not my thing.”

“What.. what in the world are you talkin’ about?” Evelyn was flabbergasted, and it showed clearly on her face.

“Look, all I’m saying is that he’s a freak in the sheets. End of story. Now did you give him the dang letter or not?”

Her head was still reeling from what she was just informed of, but was focused enough to answer her question, “Yeah… I gave it to him.. But…” Her dark skin began to flush red as she once again recalled the events, “I kinda like…passed out? Then woke up in his lap…”

Candice began to choke on her chips, “You.. you what now..? Like…how?!”

“I mean, I didn’t really eat much that day, and then he got too close -“

” - So because he got close…you fainted? Then you woke up…in his lap? His lap sis? Don’t you think that’s a bit…intimate for a teacher to do?“

Evelyn paused, resting the comb in her hair, "Yeah, but… it didn’t really mean anything right? He was probably just worried…”

“Evelyn. Come on.” Candice turned around to give her a pointed look, “Now I know you’re not this stupid…”

“Well, apparently I am! What am I not getting here?”

Her sister looked at her oddly, “Man…mama sheltered your ass to the max. Are you actually this naive?”

Evelyn crossed her arms, a frown coming upon her brows, “Instead of patronizing me, tell me what the hell’s so wrong?”

“Eh… you’ll just get mad. Forget I said anything.”

“Tell me Candice…or you can just finish your damn hair yourself.”

Candice kissed her teeth, “Tsk, don’t get mad, okay? He just seems like…hmm… how do I say this…”

She paused, considering her words carefully, “Like he’s the type to…you know, fuck his students on the regular…have hoes on call, you know the works. Just warning you, I don’t want your feelings hurt.”

“What - No! I mean I get why you think that, but he’s… he’s not like that at all… he apologized to me, and when I asked about the girl, he said she wasn’t a student -”

“ - So she’s his girlfriend then?”

Evelyn was stumped, “No…? I mean… he didn’t really clarify…”

Candice sighed, her expression bordering on pity as she looked at her, “Look, I’m saying this for your own good…but don’t get your hopes up with this man. First of all, he’s your professor who’s like, 13 years your senior? And then -”

“ - It’s just a damn crush, it was never that serious. Drop it.” Evelyn’s voice was cracked with emotion, almost yelling.

“Okay…okay… I’m sorry. You do you.”

Candice grew silent as Evelyn rushed to finish her hair. After that conversation, she just wanted to be alone.

_______________________

It had been a few hours since Evelyn hid away inside her room, sitting at her work desk. She was upset with Candice not only because of the condescending manner in which she spoke to her… but for what she assumed about the professor that she’d come to know.

From what she’d learned about him, Professor Laufeyson was anything but a womanizer. He had good looks, but she has never seen him interact with or entertain any female on campus unprofessionally - and they threw themselves at him in literal droves.

Well, until that night that is…

Evelyn wiped her eyes in frustration, as she tried to push Candice’s words to the back of her head. Sometimes she was helpful in her bits of advice, but today it felt extremely unneeded.

She opened up her laptop, intent on sucking herself into a black hole of memes and mindless entertainment to get her mind off things.

That was until a loud ping! notification flashed at the side of her screen.

It was from her outlook account, where she had set up her school email address. She had neglected to check it in the week she was absent due to a certain someone, and she regretted being so childish now. She probably missed out on a ton of important emails from her other professors, and Evelyn hoped there wasn’t anything urgent.

But when she logged in, she did not expect to see three unread emails from professor Laufeyson, the third sent to her inbox just yesterday.

Laufeyson, Loki Fri 4/12 TA position Evelyn, it was a very pleasant surp…

Laufeyson, Loki Thur 4/11 Office visitation: Please stop by at your earliest convenience

Good morning, I understand that due to certain circums…

Laufeyson, Loki Wed 4/10 Important: Regarding yesterday’s incident

It is imperative that we discuss…

Seeing three emails in a row from professor Laufeyson really knocked her for six. Whenever she had questions and decided to email him, he would never reply- only answering them when he saw her in person. She found it to be counter-productive, but never really dared to complain about it.

But considering the circumstances, she guessed it was understandable - he probably thought she would go around blabbing his business, so he took to damage control. Regardless, her heart started to race as she opened the email from earlier on in the week- opting to read them in order.

Laufeyson, Loki Wed 4/10 Important: Regarding yesterday’s incident

It is imperative that we discuss what transpired. Please visit my office at the earliest opportunity, around 11 am. I hope to see you tomorrow, and promptly.

Sincerely,

Loki Laufeyson

It was short and sweet, as Evelyn expected it to be. She suspected that even if she saw that email at the given time, she wouldn’t have budged from her bed in the slightest. Clicking out, she moved on to the next one.

Laufeyson, Loki Thur 4/11 Office visitation: Please stop by at your earliest convenience

Good morning,

I understand that due to certain circumstances, you are hesitant in discussing matters with me. I have much to make clear with you, in addition to making several apologies. I would like to discuss this in person, Evelyn. It is very… unbecoming, and I do not want this situation to compromise any academic priorities you may have. If you would feel more comfortable speaking over the phone rather than in person, I will attach my number. Please, I implore you to make good use of it.

Best,

Loki

Evelyn found this one to be much more sincere, to the point that she wanted to hop down to his office right away - even though it was the weekend. She once again mentally slapped herself for acting immaturely, instead of facing the situation like an adult. She could only sigh as she opened up the latest email, which she assumed was sent after he dropped her home.

Laufeyson, Loki Fri 4/12 TA position

Evelyn, it was a very pleasant surprise, although in a rather odd position, to see you at my office door. I shall once again apologize for startling you, as I was unaware that you were faint of heart. Despite that, I hope that I have managed to clear the air so that we can re-establish our relationship to its previous state. Although, I am aware that you may still be uncomfortable working together with me. We will discuss things once more if that is the case, so that we may come to a resolution regarding your grade.

If you would still like to retain this position, please attend my lecture this coming Monday - I am in need of assistance, and I would love for you to take this responsibility. I will also reiterate what I said yesterday evening. I value your presence, as you are one of my most favored students.

Have a lovely weekend,

Loki

At some point in reading that email, Evelyn’s heart had turned into a beating, mushy mess. He called her his favorite student, and Evelyn was practically mind-blown with this newfound information. She knew that he found her tolerable, more so than the other students in his class - but not to this extent.

Evelyn came to a decision. Although things might still be pretty awkward with this professor of hers, she’ll make an effort to get over it, and get back to how things were. He had even attached his private number to his email, something that she never thought he would share.

They were both adults, so she’ll try to treat the situation as a minor embarrassment. She would attend the lecture on Monday and pretend like the entire thing never happened.

But little did Evelyn know… that things were forever changed between her and professor Laufeyson, and that they would never be the same again.

_________

A/N: Hey guys, please let me know what you thought, what you think will happen, etc! Things will be picking up next chappie, if you know what I mean. ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°)

I’ll try to get another chapter out before I leave for sleep-away camp for work on June 20th(No longer 15th, thank goodness), as I’m not sure about the internet reception there. I sincerely hope there is, since my contract ends on August 11th. I need to update! grrr! Thank you guys for reading, and I sincerely appreciate very comment. Like seriously, they make my day!

#loki fanfiction #loki fanfic #loki fic #tom hiddleston fanfiction #tom hiddleston fic #tom hiddleston #loki laufeyson #loki odinson #loki (marvel)#loki smut

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eirianerisdar · 5 years

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Med School happenings

Or: Since I’m graduating med school, here’s a long and rambling list of Things that were faintly amusing, relatable, and/or weird that happened in medical school. By the way to avoid confusion I’m not from the US so med school for me is six years total from university entry, no split pre-med/med.

1. The junior doctor who was assigned to teach us young’uns something interesting but just came off a 24-hour shift and has 12 more hours to go until he can go home so he just starts deliriously spouting information while rounding the ward like a cryptid in blue scrubs

2. There was a dude I saw in general surgery clinic two years ago whose guts had all fallen out of his abdomen and down into his...um...yeah and the two female doctors, me, and this one guy student I was paired with just stared at him. Apparently the patient could poop okay and it had been like that for 20 years. He was scheduled for a CT and a very complicated repair.

3. Have you tried going to the bathroom wearing a white coat if you’re a girl? It’s impossible. You start plotting out bathroom breaks to match up with places you can safely put your white coat.

4. If you’re a girl, no matter how obvious your white coat is, people will still call you nurse. Ok this one isn’t as funny, but sometimes when doctors call you “young doctors” and people still think you’re nurses, you tell them you aren’t a nurse and they suddenly think you’re an experienced doctor there is no in between. You’re a nurse. Or you’re an experienced doctor. Female medical students don’t exist, apparently.

5. “No ma’am, I can’t stand by your friend’s bed in the A&E for 4 hours while you go home and nap. She’s well-taken after. Go home and sleep.”

6. “Ma’am - Don’t go that way, that’s the back of the nurse station, if you want to speak to me tell me here. (listens) ...Ma’am, I can’t force your grown-up son to check himself into the hospital if he doesn’t want to.”

7. “Sir, I can’t undo your physical restraints if your doctor says no.”

8. Taking a psychiatric history in a room with a small window in the male psychiatric ward and looking up to find a patient with a bandaged head staring at you through the window, unblinkingly.

9. ...Ignore him and continue speaking to the patient you’re supposed to.

10. Actually psychiatry rotation last year was wild we went to an older psychiatric hospital and in the male ward me and another girl were given a hand alarm that you activated by pulling out a pin like a hand grenade, personally walked to an interview room by an experienced male nurse, a younger and fitter male nurse was stationed right outside to intervene if anything happened with the patient (and nothing did) and afterwards we were escorted back out of the ward with those two nurses as personal guards but when we asked the guy med students in our group what happened when they went to interview patients they said they were dumped in a room with the patient, left alone, and told to yell when they were done.

11. A day of lectures is scheduled from 8:30 in the morning to 6:30 at night, with an hour at 12 for lunch. The lecturers overrun to 12:45. Run to the hospital canteen and order one of the only two items on the menu (that you’ve memorized by heart now) you know you can collect immediately. Inhale in five minutes. Go back to the lecture hall.

12. The lecturer who turned a 45-minute lecture into a 4-hour one (literally)

13. Senior cardiologist: “You hear that murmur? It’s a very obvious murmur.” Whole group: “Yeah...?” (No...)

15. Professor: “Y’all see these diplomas? These diplomas are greeeat. Get a couple of ‘em and you could open a clinic and everybody somehow thinks they’re all specialist licenses.”

16. Final year opening lecture, professor: “You’re final year now, you should know basically everything by now, so don’t worry.” Us: *crazed laughter* (You suuuure, prof?)

17. So desensitised to blood that you can watch Saw as a dissection group while barbecuing raw beef for dinner (ah, the old preclinical days)

18. A marathon afternoon specialised clinic session with sixty cases in 150 minutes, including scrambling to organise an emergency operation for an outpatient. “I want to die,” the junior doctor says without any tone in her voice as she finishes up the last case before going to OCT. “Don’t die,” the room nurse says. “Dr __ was so nice to take some of the cases off our hands.” If it wasn’t for that other doctor, we would have had seventy cases in this single room.

19. There was a grouchy patient in one of the final exam circuits who was extremely sensitive (with no reason, being an outpatient called back without any cause for pain) and he yelled in “agony” if anyone so much as touched the skin of his abdomen and so all the students who got him as an exam station started guessing physical signs because they couldn’t feel anything without him screaming, which is an insta-fail for hurting the patient

20. But when most of us passed anyway our entire dorm at the hospital started screaming and slamming doors all across the four floors

21. It rained today at our graduation photos, but then the professors all got up from their seats at the front of the steps we were standing on, grabbed 30-40 or so carbonated “wine” bottles, uncorked them, and sprayed us all, caps and gowns and all. We were going to run but then we were flanked by a couple of guys who had grabbed extra bottles

22. Our entire cohort’s last collective act together was to make a run for it, chased by streams of white and red grape juice and the gleeful faces of our professors and a few of our male classmates

#med school #medicine #medical school #med student #medical student #there's more but I'll add on to these if I think of anything #there were a few very strange happenings during my six years here #my post #personal

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bbs-backlog-challenge · 4 years

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BB’s Games Of 2019

2019 as a year felt like it lasted two years, and a lot happened in my personal life. Got a new job, learned to drive, got my first car, moved out of the in-laws’ basement into our first real apartment, started my first long-term game of DnD (which in itself has involved a new relationship and an emotional breakdown)- and between it all I somehow managed to play 77 games. Backlog’s down to 35 titles, lads- at this rate, I’ll be down to zero by July 2020. (Not gonna happen.) In 2020, I’d like to explore the SNES catalogue a little more, but before that happens we have to review everything 2019 brought me, in a somewhat chronological order.

- Near A Tomato Carry-over from last year’s post since I was in the middle of playing it at the time. I definitely never quite got a handle on the combat and I think some of the themes went over my head, but I still had fun here, and the 9S hacking minigame never got old. It was a gift from an old friend who I miss. Was nice to reconnect. - SSBU With my new main Zelda, I cleared all of WoL and got every spirit on the Spirit Board. I never really used her before but she’s cute now! Really liked the attention to detail in the spirit encounters. Unfortunately, Cloud is still in the game. - Mega Mans 1 2 and 3 I actually spoke about my experiences with the Mega Men in my BBLC post for Mega Man Eggs, so you should read that right now. - Metroid Samus Returns It’s Good. Like, a solid Good. Never Great, never Bad, just Good. It’s nice to see one of the least accessible games in the series get a remaster, but it feels very disposable, if that makes sense. Like they just needed a Metroid to keep people busy while they reboot Prime 4 development. AM2R is vastly superior, go play that. One point of amusement- the game tells its story without narration, and also seems to pre-suppose you know Metroid lore. I was entertained by the thought of a newcomer to the series being completely mystified by the sudden space-dragon that comes out of nowhere to wreck you at the end of the game. - Khimera: Destroy All Monster Girls You can click here to download it, ‘cos it’s free, which is almost criminal. This is one of the higher tier games I’ve played this year. A little bit Mega Man, a bit Metroid, with hints of Touhou and Undertale, it’s pretty tough at times but never to ‘precision platformer’ levels. It’s a lot of fun and the dev deserves your support. - Steve And Ollie RPG Oh, I made this one. Making something else next year? Question mark? - Prof Layton 3 Feels like these are getting weaker as they go along. The story has always been absolute boohockey, but the puzzles feel like they’re degrading in quality too. With over 200 in each game, that’s not super surprising, and I’m glad they didn’t bulk it out with a load of the awful block-slider puzzles. Still, it’s Layton, if you liked any of the other games you’ll like this cos it’s the exact same thing. - Fault Milestone Two Yo, there ain’t a damned thing I can say about Fault, so go play the first one and then play this and you’ll understand. - Full Throttle I never bothered to finish it. The obtuse old Sierra puzzlers were hard enough to deal with back in the day, and just feel kind of inexcusable now. I don’t have the patience for it. - eXceed 3rd Slick and fun bullet hell with a nigh-incomprehensible story and great music. Touhou fans will like it. Music by SSH who is relatively well known in doujin circles. - ASAMU Finished it before writing my BBLC post! - Eternal Senia Everything I said in my post rings true- do your best to look past the wonky translation, because there’s a heartfelt story underneath it. Very accessible gameplay, by design. - Inivisble Inc You have never before been, nor will you ever again be, so aware of having left a door open. I fully expected to hate Invisible, but I got hooked pretty hard. Quite tempted to do another run of it once the backlog is clear. - Pyre GOTY. Supergiant’s best game so far, and that’s not an easy thing to say for this Bastion veteran. I sobbed by the end. I’m not being dramatic- literally sobbed. Please play it. Music and writing and, just, heart, are all top tier. All the Nightwings are the best, but Hedwyn is the best best. - Ellipsis Finished it before writing my BBLC post! - Just Cause 2 I found myself getting bored very quickly. The main missions are all identical (really, they are) and the side missions are very uninspired. Blitzing around in a jet or grappling around a mission target is a lot of fun but it feels very shallow. There’s a lot to do but not really any reason to do any of it. I dunno, it’s a kind of hollow experience, that I nonetheless had fun with. - LiEat It went over my head a little, but that’s more on me I think. These horror-esque, eccentric japanese RPG Maker games usually do. But, it’s neat, and short. If this sort of thing usually sticks on you, I think this is a good title. - Shantae Pirates Curse These games always felt non-essential to me; I’m not sure why they never stuck. They never really go below or above Good. Entirely enjoyable but I don’t feel like I’d have really missed anything if I hadn’t played them. It is, however, absolutely worth investing in for the utterly superb sprite work. That doesn’t sell a game by itself, I know, but Shantae is a pixel art masterclass. - FF5 I’d more or less finished it by the time I wrote my BBLC post, so I don’t have much to add. It’s a refreshingly goofy entry in a series known for taking itself too seriously, even compared to its predecessor. Look forward to my entry for this game in my Games Of 2020 post, having played the Four Job Fiesta! - Touhou 17 It’s mid-tier in the touhou hierarchy, IMO. Didn’t set my soul alight but I did enjoy it. Playing as Wolf Marisa makes the final boss too chaotic to really enjoy, but playing through again with Reimu made it more fun. I beat Extra on my third run through, which gave me false confidence that after 10 years I might actually be good at these games- to then be quickly humbled by attempting Th11’s Extra. Final Boss’ theme song has one of the greatest lead-ins of all time, especially given you start the fight by running away from her! Also really loved the Stage 4 theme as you barrel head-first into Hell (the real one this time), and the haunting, calm-before-the-storm serenity of Stage 5, overlooking the City Of Beasts. - HackNet + Labyrinths GOTY. (Yes, I know I already said Pyre was GOTY; it’s my post, I can have two GOTYs. Make your own damned post!) It’s hard to say what I loved about these games without spoiling too much- just know that they play very much like investigation games, and figuring out the puzzles feels great. Labyrinths technically takes place during the events of Hacknet, with a somewhat more Black Hat approach to things- despite this, play all of Hacknet first, and then play Labyrinths. The expansion introduces a lot of new stuff and much trickier challenges, such that going back to the base game afterwards to finish that would leave it a little hollow- a disservice to how great the ending is. - Mega Man X I said everything I wanted to say in my BBLC post, and anything I didn’t cover was better said by Egoraptor. - Octodad Finished it before my BBLC post! - Chroma Squad The final mission is disappointingly poor, but everything up to that point was pretty good. Huge variance and creativity in the bosses. However, the most fun I got from it was when I realised the game allowed me to customise my team name, transformation name, and other such terminology. Dave, Dayve, Davy, Davina, and Dehve shouting “It’s time to Chromatise, Chroma Squad!” very quickly became “It’s time to shit, you bunch of fucks!” and it was funny every single time. (Personal favourite bit of dialogue- “I tried to shit! It worked!”) - Pyrite Heart Finished it before my BBLC post! - Starfox 2 Finished it before my BBLC post! - Burly Men At Sea Finished it before my BBLC post! - Disc Room Finished it before my BBLC post! - Kokurase Finished it before my BBLC post! Should have broken these ones up a bit! - Metroid Rogue Dawn Very, very impressive romhack let down by a distinctly un-fun final section. They managed to fix so many of OG Metroid’s problems, I’m surprised the gauntlet of terribleness that is Tourian escaped with only a cosmetic change. Nonetheless, it’s free, and the other 95% of the game is superb, even from a purely technical standpoint. - Wuppo I dunno what happened here! I was full of praise for Wuppo when I played it, but somehow I just couldn’t stick with it and just never felt like playing it. It’s a very aimless game, and I wonder if that might be why? It’s a shame, I feel disappointed in myself for not seeing it through, but ultimately I play games to have fun and I just wasn’t quite there with Wuppo. - Super Mario Odyssey I loved it, obviously. I wrote my BBLC post towards the end of my time with Odyssey so most of that stands- I do want to add that the controls always felt a little loose, like I wasn’t quite as in-control as I was in Galaxy. Also Mario prioritises walljumping over ledge-grabbing and it’s super-hard to unlearn that instinct after 20 years. Finally- Long Journey’s End is just bullshit. - Secret Of Mana Dropped it pretty soon after Finning it. There’s some logic to the way the game works, some kind of hidden turn-order system, that I could not at all figure out. My AI companions (useless, btw) would hit an enemy which meant I couldn’t, except sometimes the hit would still register but only actually go through 3 seconds later, without any way to tell which way it was going to go. It takes like 7 months for your character to get back up after taking a hit. It’s just, wonky, and I couldn’t solve the puzzle of how to make the game do what I wanted to do. - Pokemon Shield Still working my way through it. It’s- yeah, it’s pokemon. Get a similar vibe to Sun/Moon with it that it’s kind of unfinished- lots of small (and some not so small) parts of the game just feel like there were bigger plans that couldn’t be realised in time. I’m still enjoying it! They did a great job of making the gym battles, and the whole process of 8-badges-then-champion, feel like a spectacle. I think only the anime has managed it to this degree before. - Earthbound Man, I really, really want to like this game, but the battle system is terrible. I need to play through the game again buffing my party up with cheats or something, because it’s so unbalanced and cheap. Everything else about the game is wonderful, but I got so frustrated with the fights! - Mario Kart 8 Didn’t play any of the single player this time, it was midgi’s christmas present so I just joined a couple of multiplayer games. Absolutely baffled that the game features F-Zero style anti-gravity courses, has Mute City and Big Blue, and even has the Blue Falcon as a selectable vehicle, but they haven’t put Captain Falcon in it. Like he’s ever going to get another game of his own? Let him have this! - Carmageddon 2 It’s pretty clunky by now, being 20 years old, but still plays well enough. The physics are super loose so you slide around like your tires have been buttered. It was more fun when they were zombies instead of just normal people. Missions are brutally hard and should be skipped with cheats. - Neopets After 15 years of playing, I finally got a Ghostkersword. The site as a whole has gone through a lot, and certainly its heyday is long gone, but there’s no other game quite like it. I’m playing the Food Club every day, still. - SIF New phone can’t run the actual gameplay section well enough, so I just log in occasionally to grab free scouts. Here’s another one whose golden years are behind it, sadly, but I certainly still have a lot of affection for SIF. - FF1 Mobile version, which fixes a lot of the bugs with the NES original. This year I completed a solo run with 1 Red Mage, a 4-black belts run, a low-level run, and a 4 White Mages run (which ended up being a lower-level run than the low-level run). I’m fairly comfortable in calling myself an expert in FF1, now. There’s still not really any other games like it- build a party as balanced or imbalanced as you like, and see how they fare. I’d like to build my own game in a similar style, one day. - Re: Live Gacha games and RPG just don’t mix! Both gacha and events do not gel with core RPG mechanics of your character(s) developing in strength as the game goes. It seems impossible to balance the game well- do you cater to the whales who spend and spend until they have the strongest teams possible, meaning the free players or the terminally unlucky can’t stand a chance, or do you cater to those players and give them no reason to spend for the more powerful characters? It’s a shame, because the anime was baffling but in that enjoyable way where you just kind of go with whatever it throws at you, and exploring that in a non-freemium game with a solid beginning middle and end would be really interesting. - Tiny Thief Mobile game that’s not available any more, I think my BBLC post covered it well enough. - F-Zero One of the criticisms most commonly levied against F-Zero is that it wont hold your attention for long. While that’s true, it’s not like you have to make a purchasing decision about it any more- it comes bundled in with the other games you’re buying, so the only investment is time. Ignoring that, it’s still fun to burn around the tracks, and the sense of speed hasn’t ever diminished. The music, too, is underappreciated, with Port Town being my personal fave. - F-Zero GX I can’t believe Nintendo hasn’t done anything with this ridiculous universe for 15 years now. The cutscenes are so hilariously overwrought, and the cast of characters is huge! It could so seamlessly intersect with the Starfox universe, too. There were rumours of a Starfox Racing title some time ago, and I really hope that’s the case. It’d work so well (by which I mean, a particularly enjoyable kind of awful). Anyway, the game still plays great, Story Mode is WAY too hard, Dr Stewart’s theme is a Tune. - Stratosphere This game is from 1998! Build a flying fortress, deck it out with fortifications and weapons and power supplies, then use it to destroy other fortresses. I only ever played the demo as a kid, never got the full game. Took some cajoling to get it to work on modern hardware, but eventually I got in and it wasn’t worth it at all. Wow, that performance, apparently it was designed to run at a terrible frame rate and it wasn’t just a result of my 1998 PC not being up to the task! A shame, but I guess it put one of my ghosts to rest. - DKC 2 The best of the three SNES games, despite the inclusion (and protagonism) of Diddy Kong. Lots to love here, but the OST is top notch. - DKC 3 Not as good as 2, but IMO better than 1. There was a much heavier emphasis on gimmick levels in 3, not all of which hit their target, but does provide a great deal of variety. Consensus is that 2 is better, but if someone claimed 3 was the best DKC, I’d let them get away with it. - King Arthur’s World (SNES) Speaking of putting ghosts to rest… We somehow always managed to get this game whenever we got a SNES, and kid!Beebs most certainly didn’t have the patience for it. Adult!Beebs barely does, either. It’s a very ambitious attempt at some sort of RTS/Puzzle hybrid, somewhat comparable to Lemmings? King Arthur must make his way from his starting position to the throne elsewhere in the map to claim it as his own, using the myriad abilities of his soldiers to get him there in one piece. I decided this year that I was finally going to play through the whole damn thing, start to finish, for the first time ever. With copious use of save states and rewinds, I was finally able to slay this demon. For as fiddly and frustrating as it is, I would still say people should check it out if they have the tools to do so- there’s not really anything else like it, on SNES or otherwise; you’re guaranteed a unique experience, if nothing else. - Oscar (SNES) Terrible. - Spanky’s Quest (SNES) With a name like that, how could I refuse? It’s a weird little puzzler, aping (wahey!) Bubble Bobble and Parasol Stars a little. You’re a monkey who can blow bubbles that stun enemies, but if you bounce the bubble on your head it gets progressively larger and can be burst to send a barrage of similarly-sized sports balls at your opponents to knock them out. You know, just like real life. - Addam’s Family (SNES) This easily-dismissible movie tie-in is actually a very competent platformer with some very, very light metroidvania exploration involved. Gomez has to go through Addams Mansion and rescue the members of his family who have been kidnapped by… something. There’s hidden secrets everywhere and the family can be rescued in any order you like. Genuine recommendation. - Panel DePon/Tetris Attack The only vs puzzler I enjoy (yep. Not even puyo puyo. I know.) I played the HECK out of this in my teenage years, and got crazy good at it. Tendonitis says I’m not allowed to do that any more, but once I shook the rust off I was still pretty strong! It was released as Panel DePon in Japan and was fairy themed, but for the western release they replaced all the fairies with Yoshi characters and renamed it Tetris Attack despite having nothing to do with Tetris at all. Up to you which you prefer- language isn't too much of a barrier here. Soundtrack is killer. - Subsurface Circular Finished it before my BBLC post. Still not decided if I liked the way it ended. - Master Of Orion 2 C’mon. After playing three other pretenders to MoO2’s throne, I had to give the real deal a couple of spins too. It’s Civ 5 in space. Customisable race builds. A whole galaxy to bring peace to, by whichever means you prefer. Would love for someone else to get into it. - Touhou 8 Last minute entry I just played yesterday ‘cos I wanted some Touhou and I haven’t played this entry in a long while. A Solo Marisa Normal Final B run, if you’re interested. Kaguya beast-mode tearing apart the Spell Of Imperishable Night at the end of the game is still an awesome moment, but it’s a shame you can miss the last couple of spells if you take some unlucky hits. - And here’s the list of Bins, which are all covered in their BBLC post: No Time To Explain MoO Skyborn Jumpjet Rex StH 4 Ballistick Munch’s Oddysee Outland Project CARS RiME Magicka Waking Mars Urban Chaos Divinity: Dragon Commander Strike Suit Zero Hell Yeah! Lambda Wars Beta Stranger’s Wrath MoO 3 XCOM Lots more Fins than Bins this year! Good to see!

#gaming #video games

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manifestoonmoralmanlove · 5 years

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Soulless Riffing: Brainless Epilogue

I got a supernatural action/romance book series as a gift that’s just riddled with stuff that I hate….and as a steampunk Victorian London action romance story filled with werewolves and vampires…it’s yeah gonna be easy to poke fun at.

I just want to say, it’s totally cool if you like this story or ones like it! It’s certainly a better caliber than a lot of what I make fun of…however…I can’t help but want to make fun of it.

Over here for the 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7+8, 9, 10+11, 12, 13, and 14.

HERE’S THE FINAL CHAPTER, STRAP IN MY HEARTIES!

Epilogue

So, dang, this epilogue’s pace is the worst. It’s so bad, if I recounted the events in the order they appeared I feel as if this riff would have a bad pace itself.

So there’s this detached, braggadocios tone that describes two separate portions of the wedding in two totally separate parts of chapter. I can boil it down to this actual quote, “The wedding was hailed as a masterpiece of social engineering and physical beauty.”

It starts off with almost an entire page of describing the dress. I mean sure, but fashion isn’t my thing so my eyes glaze over. Also that they had to redesign the dress at the last minute cause Maccon gave her a hickey that needed to be hid. And I mean, isn’t that what we need to educate our young women about?

Man’s every careless sexual impulse needs to be catered to even if it greatly inconveniences everyone else. Why can’t you just cover it up with make-up? Why is this adult novel treating a marriage of adults like a middle-school dance? WHO KNOoooOoOoooOooOOOWS?????

BUT THIS WAS ALL FOR THE BETTER cause the neckline of her dress inspired London’s fashion for a whole 3 weeks.

Here’s an accurate attempt at me trying to understand this, “I guess it’s nice to have rich idiots incinerate and rebuild their wardrobe because of a thing you wore once. But why stop there? I’d create an army of genderqueer flannel-babies out to hate read harmless fiction.” Yes Faps, your interests are clearly superior to those who like to dress feminine. Way to go!

We have a full page on the food which was more interesting but in a limited way because I have not had guinea fowl, aspic jelly, pigeons, sole, woodcock pie, pheasant, or grouse. But like, I’m not uncultured or anything! I’ve had alligator meat before! ….oh damn my American is showing real bad right now. DON’T MIND ME I’M JUST GOING TO HIDE BEHIND A WALL OF IMPERIALISTIC WAR CRIMES! But that’s okay cause the British can relate to that.

Personally I’d much rather the story brag about delicious food it’s likely the audience has had before, than just throwing out stuff that sounds period appropriate. Cause honestly? My imagination does not think any of that would be tasty. My dream wedding is definitely forcing near a thousand people (most of whom I’ve met only once) to pick at gamey meat and envy my dedication to an inconsiderate buffoon.

But before the wedding officially goes down we have the one and only nice scene. Alexia wakes up Akeldama early so he can see the sunset before her wedding. There was no reason for her to do it that day, since it made her late to her own wedding, but dangit it was nice.

However the actual wedding? Phew boy, there is no talk of the actual ceremony. In fact there’s no cute speeches, dancing, bonding moments between friends or family, or even funny drama of the werewolves clashing with the humans. I mean it would have been super annoying to have a scene where Alexia’s sister shrieks at one of the werewolves for drinking punch out of a bowl like a dog, and when she tries to rip it from him it spills all over herself. Cause there’s no reason to cathartically enjoy seeing her sister humiliated but dang…it would have at least been SOMETHING ALMOST FUN!

Three things happened during the reception.

1.) Alexia and Prof. Lyall hook Ivy up with some BARELY named servant to Maccon and Lyall. Like, you realize the trope of shacking up the side characters is supposed to be this cute little tying together of established characters, usually very different ones? Like it’s supposed to kinda help wrap things up by having separate parts of the story literally cum errr I mean come together. Like, the obvious and decent choice, would have been Lyall and Ivy. Hell if you needed Lyall for other nonsense, why not that Haverblink hunk guy Ivy was I THINK drooling over? Took a fun trope and wasted it.

2.) Alexia is ~gifted~ the Vampire hive servant Angelique. Gosh I’m super looking forward to the part where Angelique realizes vampires are chumps and betrays them for the super cool Alexia. I thought since she was named and pleading with Alexia for help earlier, she’d be damsel’d, or comes back later with more secret info, or was the villain mastermind AFTERALL! NOPE! This human person with a name, hopes, fears, goals, thoughts, and emotions of her own is given like a decorative silverware basket as a GOD DAMN WEDDING GIFT! AND ALEXIA THINKS THAT’S FINE CAUSE TO HER HUMAN BEINGS ARE PROPERTY AND SHE’S OUR RACISM FIGHTING HERO! HOORAY!

3.) Sorry to save the most tepid for last but the last thing of note is that Maccon’s werewolf pack, as part of werewolf tradition turn into wolves and just circle around them barking and howling….okay cool cool…but have you considered the more wolf thing to do would totally be for all of them to pee on her. ONE AT A TIME, THEY’RE CIVILIZED! Her new husband gets all offended that she’s upset at this wholesome tradition. Alexia secretly plots to bring supernatural genocide back into vogue again.

So on the carriage ride home they fuck but we have an entire book worth of build up for this scene to last 1 page. Like, I wasn’t even looking forward to it but was still disappointed. And, of course, this is one of those books that can’t directly mention SEX PARTS which SPOILER ALERT usually makes it confusing if you can’t be fucking straightforward. Despite being all coy about it there’s the iffy phrase, “had Alexia squirming in such a way as to force the very tip of him inside her whether she willed it or no.”

Yeesh! As hot as you folks may find ravishment, it feels really out of place with a woman who’s supposed to be super horny and into her husband for it to still be written noncommittally like ravishment.

But with a lurch of the carriage he’s blamo balls deep and she says out loud that it hurts. He DOES look worried and ask her if it still does. So kudos! However there’s this infuriating line

“Something extremely odd and tingly was beginning to occur in her nether regions.”

Okay you weren’t aroused until he was balls deep, and we’re going to describe this as if a 26 year old woman (whom by the way has described being aroused by this man before, and describes being fascinated with her dad’s dirty books) is bamboozled that a dick in her made her horny.

(Man looking confused and a bit suspect as he says okay.)

Also “It culminated in the most intriguing second heartbeat emerging around the area where he had impaled himself.”

WHAT!? YOU CAN’T SAY PUSSY BUT WE’RE GOING TO THROW THE WORD IMPALED IN THERE?

(Brittney Spears looking cringed out.)

That gives me the yikes.

She flops over after what sounds like 2 minutes of porking to remark, “Ooo,” said Alexia, fascinated, “it shrinks back down again. The books didn’t detail that occurrence.”

OKAY 1ST OF ALL YOU LEGIT SAW THIS HAPPEN BEFORE WHEN YOU WERE DRY-HUMPING IN THE DUNGEON, BUT EVEN IF YOU HADN’T, WAS SHE UNDER SOME DELUSION THAT WHEN A DUDE GETS HIS 1ST BONER THAT’S JUST WHAT HIS DICK IS NOW?

YOU’D THINK CODPIECES WOULD STILL BE IN FASHION IF EVERY MAN IS SLINGING AROUND HIS ERECTION 100% OF THE TIME!

WHY ARE YOU SO FUCKING STUPID ALEXIA!?

If you wanted a cute little sexy thing to mention…why not, “Oh my dad’s books never mentioned that it throbbed! Or that it could twitch! Or that it got SO red! Or that it got THAT hard, it’s only full of blood afterall!”

LE SIGH!

So the story ends with the prospect of them gonna fuck sum more.

Say something Nice Faps:

I legit really liked that brief scene where she holds Lord Akeldama’s hand as they watch the sunrise, and he’s crying, and she’s got her head on his shoulder and just PRECIOUS!

Out of the things to brag about at a wedding, food is the top of my list, I can appreciate that she dedicated some time to it.

The sex had a bit of that ravishment flavor but Maccon does check in, and she admits she enjoys it.

IT’S OVER!

#soulless #brainless #riffing

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