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helliontherapscallion · 3 years

Text

(Y/n) and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Week: Tuesday

Monday Wednesday Thursday (Part 1) Thursday (Part 2) Friday Saturday Sunday

Spotify Playlist (collaborative)

Warnings: anxiety, doctor’s offices, taking pain pills (not sure if I need to tag that, but just in case), stalkers, blackmail, swearing, non-consensual taking pics of nudes, slight body dysmorphia, self-loathing, toxic friends

Word count: 5,326

(A/N): another long chapter, my little wlw heart loved writing this chapter! Also holy shit I was not expecting the first part to blow up, thank you to everyone that read it! Gosh, it’s enough to make a grown woman cry :’)

You cracked open your crusty eyes to Wilbur poking his head into your room. “(Y/n), Dad wants you.”

You groaned rubbing at your eyes in an attempt to get the sleep out of them. “I’ll be down in a sec.” Your voice was scratchy and thick with sleep.

He closed the door silently and you heard his socked feet thumping down the hallway. Your pain faded slightly into soreness, but your shoulders and upper back were slightly stiff. After you drug yourself out of bed, you shambled down the stairs to see your family at the table eating breakfast. Your stomach growled loudly, making you blush slightly in embarrassment.

Your eldest brother snorted. “Hungry (y/n)?”

You slumped into your seat next to him slowly shoveling food into your mouth. “You have no idea.”

“You wouldn’t be that hungry if you ate dinner when you got home like I told you to do last night, young lady. You better eat every single thing on that plate.”

There was no arguing with a stern Dadza, so you reluctantly complied. Meanwhile, Tommy and Tubbo were telling Wilbur about your match animatedly.

“And the ball was like fwoosh and she- the ball and-and-”

“And she hit it and Haley hit it to the other side! It was so cool!”

Wilbur merely smiled listening to them ramble about how badass you were last night. They made you feel genuinely happy that they admired your volleyball abilities; they were probably your biggest fans and that made your day most of the time. You remembered the first match they came to during your freshman year, they had run up to you right after the end-of-match whistle blew to spew about how good you were on the court. They met the team that day. Your team adored having them at your games, over the years they slowly replaced your school’s mascot. They played a huge part in morale boosts before and during matches.

He looked over to you, “I didn’t know my little sister could be so badass.”

You felt your cheeks flare up. “It’s nothing I haven’t done before. It really wasn’t anything special.”

“(Y/n),” Philza pursed his lips, “you did all that with a bruised back, I’d consider that something special.”

“Wait (y/n), you’re hurt?” Tommy and Tubbo looked at you with wide concerned eyes.

“Yeah, but it’s not that bad. I can still move and stuff.”

Techno rolled his eyes, “it’s bad if you’re going to the doctor for it.”

“Eh, it doesn’t hurt as bad as it did yesterday, so I’m not worried.”

“You’re deadass wincing everytime you move your arm,” WIlbur deadpanned, “it clearly still hurts.”

“Well yeah, I didn’t say the pain went away completely. Fuckin’ dumbass.”

“Language,” Philza glared at you two, gesturing to the two fifth graders watching the exchange with interest.

You and Wilbur resumed eating and murmured out a defeated “sorry Dad.” You both glared at Techno when he huffed in amusement.

“If you three keep bickering, you’re going to be late to school. Remember, you two have to drop off Tommy and Tubbo today cuz I’m taking your sister to her appointment. Now go get ready, I’ll take care of your dishes.”

Your brothers took off up the stairs, each competing to get to the bathroom first. Occasionally, you would hear shouts and slapping noises. You felt glad you didn’t have to deal with that today. Judging by Techno’s gruff voice laughing and an explosion of loud complaints from the rest, you assumed that he won today. “I swear, they’re gonna put me in an early grave.”

“You and me both Dad, you and me both.”

You went into the kitchen and pulled out a bottle of pain pills from the junk drawer. Various bottles of Motrin and Advil were scattered around the house because when you live with a rambunctious family like this one, people are bound to get hurt and headaches are common. Popping three into your mouth, you washed it down with a glass of water. The sound of the running water faucet and the slight splashing of water filled the silence of the room.

“How’s your back? Does it feel any better?”

“Kinda, today it just feels more sore than throbbing, my headache went away mostly, and my shoulder doesn’t feel any worse, so that’s better I guess.”

He shut off the water and reached for a towel to dry off his wet hands. He moved over to the freezer and grabbed a frozen package of peas that your family never ate. You all used it whenever one of you would get a bruise. He moved behind you and held it against your back without warning. Flinching forward from the unexpected temperature change, you winced with the wave of pain moving brought you.

“Shit, sorry.”

“You’re good. Just give me a little warning next time,” you chuckled. He gently placed it back on your back and you sighed from the slight relief that it brought you. You leaned into the peas and closed your eyes. “That feels amazing.”

“I bet. That bruise was pretty bad yesterday, can I look at it again?”

You reluctantly left the sanctuary that was the medical grade frozen peas and leaned forward, moving your hair out of the way for him. “Knock yourself out.”

He made a hissing noise as soon as he moved your shirt out of the way. “Dad, it probably looks worse than it feels.”

“...Have you seriously not looked at this yet? It looks pretty bad, hun.”

“Well, sorry I can’t move to look at my back without being in pain. I’ll try harder next time.” You snarked him.

“Hey, watch the attitude. Here, I’ll take a picture so you can see how bad it is.”

You heard the rustling of fabric as he fished his phone out of his pocket and the obnoxiously loud click of his camera app. You turned around to look at the damage. You squinted at his bright phone screen. Your entire back was swollen in some areas and was covered in ugly reds, blues, blacks, and purples. You made a disgusted noise in the back of your throat and cringed away from the screen. You always got nauseous seeing injuries.

“Yikes.”

“Yikes isn’t the only word I would use, it’s bad (y/n).”

“It looks worse than it feels, I promise. I’m gonna go get ready so we’re not late to my appointment. It sounds like the boys are finally done with the bathroom.”

You hobbled up the stairs slowly and made your way to the bathroom. The door was wide open ready for you to use. Turning on the light, you closed the door in a hurry so that your brothers wouldn’t try to get in again to hog the bathroom like they usually did. You frowned at your appearance. Your hair was sticking up in every direction and you had dark eye bags around your dull looking eyes. A few pimples dotted your skin like constellations in the night sky, but much uglier and more out of place. Turning your body, you scanned your figure. Your eyes watered as you realized that you had gained some weight. Adrian, Sammy, and Annie were right, you looked like garbage all the time.

You ripped your eyes away from yourself in the mirror with disgust etched deep into your features. You were disgusting through and through. Ripping your brush through your hair, you winced at the pain emanating from the back of your head. You deserve the pain for letting yourself go. Once you were slightly more satisfied with your appearance, you stepped out of the bathroom and quickly changed into the clothes you would wear today. You decided on a hoodie and a pair of tights. You didn’t feel like dressing yourself up.

You once again walked down the stairs and slipped on your shoes to meet your dad in his car. You idly scrolled through your phone while you waited for him, looking at your notifications for the first time that day. You had ten texts from the group chat that you were in with Adrian, Annie, and Sammy.

Sammy <3

(Y/n) where the hell are you?

Adrian <3

Do you guys think she ditched us?

I knew she was ignoring us

Sammy <3

Who ignores their friends?

Annie <3

(Y/n) apparently.

She has more important things to do ig

Oh my god

Do you guys think she skipped school?

Adrian <3

I wouldn’t put it past her

Maybe she finally gave up

(Y/n)

I’m sorry guys, I just have a doctor’s appointment today

I would never ignore you

Sammy <3

Yk, it’s hard to keep defending you when you keep ditching us..

(Y/n)

I’m not ditching you!

I’m sorry I didn’t tell you guys about my appointment

I’ll make it up to you guys

Adrian <3

How?

You’ve already skipped out on us enough already

Annie <3

Oh ik!

She can write our final research paper for us Dri!

I haven’t started it yet lmao

Adrian <3

Saaaame lmaoooo

Sammy <3

Guys, what about me???

Adrian <3

Idk, figure it out yourself

Sammy <3

Rude!

Uhhh

Ur gonna put together my final presentation for us history

(Y/n)

Alright, I can do that for you guys

Sam can you pls send me the rubric?

Annie <3

Thanks love ;)

(Y/n)

No problem, I like doing things for friends

My dad’s coming, I gotta go

Talk to you guys later

Adrian <3

Byeeee (y/n), ur the best!

(Y/n)

: ) <3

You put your phone down as your dad started up the car and pulled out of the driveway. The drive was quiet as you stared out the window and thought about how much work you now had to do. On top of your own classes, you had two more to write and a presentation to make in a class you hadn’t taken since the first semester in your sophomore year. The research papers had to be at least four full pages long with a minimum of ten sources each due on Friday and you had no idea how big Sammy’s US history presentation has to be or what it’s even about. But that was fine, you’d do anything for your friends.

“So, who were you texting? Your boyfriend?” He asked jokingly.

“Oh, just Adrian, Sammy, and Annie. I don’t have a boyfriend Dad,” because you were a closeted lesbian, but you wouldn’t tell him that anytime soon. “You know that.”

“I know,” he chuckled, “it’s been a while since I’ve seen them. How have they been?”

“They’re good. Adrian got a job at the diner, he’s a host. Sammy and Annie have been focusing more on raising their grades.”

“Good for them! You should invite them over for dinner sometime.”

“I was actually thinking that I could maybe go hang out with them on Halloween...?”

“(Y/n), the family was going to take Tommy and Tubbo trick-or-treating.”

“I know, but there’s always next year. Plus, we haven’t been able to hang out in so long! We’re always free at different times.”

“I don’t know (y/n), what if they don’t want to trick-or-treat next year? What were you planning on doing with them?”

“We were just gonna hang out at Annie’s house and watch some horror movies,” you lied. He would never let you go if he knew you were going to a party. Especially one where alcohol would be involved and hormonal teenage boys ran rampant actively scouting for an easy lay.

“...I’ll think about it.” The car pulled into the doctor office’s parking lot.

“Thank you Dad! It’s been a while since we’ve all hung out together.”

He chuckled as you both walked into the lobby, checked in, and waited for your name to be called. About ten minutes later, you were summoned by a nurse so you went into the back leaving your dad to wait in the lobby. The nurse recorded your height and weight (much to your dismay, you gained four pounds) and asked you the standard questions about your injury and uncomfortable questions about your overall health. The clacking of her acrylic nails on the plastic keyboard filled the awkward silence.

Once that was done, she left and you had to wait a little bit for the doctor. After slipping into the backless gown the nurse left, you mindlessly scrolled on your phone. Jumping when someone knocked on the door, you looked up to see your family’s doctor smiling at you.

“Hello (y/n), how are we feeling today?”

“I’m alright.”

“I hear that you had quite the fall onto some concrete, is that true?”

“Yes, I landed on my back and the back of my head.”

She reached over and squirted hand sanitizer onto her hands, rubbing it in and looking back at you. “Can you please lay on your stomach so I can take a look at your back?”

You nodded, shifting on the uncomfortable paper covered cushioned table onto your stomach. You felt her cold hands gently graze your bruises before she pulled out her stethoscope. “Can you take a good deep breath in for me?”

You complied and she instructed you to let it out. Doing this multiple times along your back, she put her stethoscope away and continued prodding at your exposed back.

“There’s definitely some swelling in multiple areas… It doesn’t feel or sound like you cracked or broke any ribs, which is excellent… Do you have any pain deep in your shoulder when you move it?”

“Yes, I landed on it wrong last night at my volleyball match.”

“How would you describe your pain? Stabbing, sore, throbbing…”

“More sore, but a little stabbing pain when I move my arm.”

She moved her fingers to examine your shoulder. “It doesn’t sound like a sprain or fracture, can you move it up and down for me?”

You moved your arm up and down, front and back, and side to side. “You still have a full range of movement, that’s good. Can I have you sit back up again?”

You sat back up and she started testing you for a concussion. After passing her tests, you were cleared of having a concussion. “Alright (y/n), it appears that you only strained your deltoid and teres muscles and you have severe bruising along your back. Make sure you ice your back and, if you have one, wear a shoulder compression sleeve. Anti-inflammatory medications such as Ibuprofen will help with the swelling. Other than that, you have a clean bill of health! You can still participate in volleyball practices, but you need to take it easy. Don’t do anything that will strain the muscles any further.”

“Thank you Dr. Samson,” you smiled at her.

“You’re welcome. I’ll leave you to change back into your clothes and you’re free to go! You may leave the gown on the table.”

She left the room and you redressed yourself. Walking out to the lobby, Philza’s head perked up when he heard the door opening. He stood up and walked over to you with a slightly worried face. You both walked back out to the car.

“So?”

“Dr. Samson said that I don’t have a concussion, sprains or broken bones. She told me that I just strained my shoulder muscles and I need to keep ice on my back.”

He visibly slumped in relief. “Thank god. What’d she say about volleyball?”

“She said that I could keep playing, but I have to take it easy.”

“Good, wouldn’t want you missing finals on Thursday. Do you know if the team you’re playing is any good?”

“Dad, of course they’re good, we’re the top two teams in the area.”

“I bet their setter is nowhere near as good as you are and I bet the setter and spiker aren’t as synced as you and Haley are. You two make a good pair.”

“Yeah we do, don’t we?” You looked out the window and smiled a little and felt your ears turn red. The very mention of Haley’s name was enough to make you feel like you were on cloud nine. The car fell silent again as you neared your high school.

In your AP world history class, the class was looking at the test you had taken yesterday. Surprisingly, you got a 74% on the multiple choice part and a 50% on your essay portion, so that landed you with a just below passing grade. You thought you completely flunked that test yesterday, so that was a pleasant surprise. It took a good portion out of your overall grade in the class, lowering it from a comfortable A- to a slightly alarming B. You supposed it could’ve been a lot worse. Besides reviewing your tests, the class didn’t do much except starting the reading for the next chapter.

Your psychology online class went like it usually did, however your phone blew up with texts about midway through the block. Glancing down, you saw that it was Haley. Shouldn’t she be in class?

Hales : )

(Y/n) meet me in the locker room right after school

I need to talk to you before practice starts

It’s an emergency

(Y/n)

What’s going on?

Hales : )

I’ll explain after school.

Can’t talk about it over text

(Y/n)

Alright, see ya then ig

You felt your gut twinge. Something’s wrong, but you didn’t know what. You were worried about Haley, usually she was really bubbly. You’ve never seen the senior act so strange before. You could only wait the block out until the bell would release you from the confines of the library and into the locker room. After sending a quick text to your brothers that you were going to stay after school for your practice, you stared blankly at your laptop’s clock as you counted down the minutes left in the class period. Ten minutes. Eight minutes. Four minutes. Two minutes. Thirty seconds-

You shot up from your seat as the bell rang. Pushing past some groups of freshmen that congregated in the hallways, you made a beeline for the locker room. In the locker room, you found Haley sitting on the metal bench on the opposite end of the locker room with her back facing the last row of lockers and facing the brick wall. She was clenching her phone in her hand with an iron grip. You hurried to sit next to her.

“Hales, what’s going on? Talk to me.”

“It’s bad (y/n). Like, really bad.”

“What’s bad? You’re worrying me.”

Wordlessly, she unlocked her phone and handed it to you. On the screen was something that you weren’t expecting to see. You scrolled through the contents and felt your stomach drop with each scroll; someone took pictures of you and Haley throughout the match last night. Every picture was a violation to yours and Haley’s dignities, they had gotten zoomed in pictures of your boobs and asses. Deeper, there were even pictures taken of you changing into your volleyball uniform through your open window. You were only in your underwear. Haley had a similar picture that you scrolled past as fast as you could. Scrolling to the bottom of the text message thread, the person that sent Haley the pictures added a caption to the last picture. It was a picture of you and Haley together celebrating your match, her arm slung around your shoulder with your mouth open mid-laugh.

Unknown

I’m sending these out to the entire school unless you stop hanging around her.

If you tell anyone, the pics will be printed off and put in every single locker and bathroom the school has.

You’ll be the sluts of Klinkver High.

Cut all ties now. You have two days.

Do not try me.

“Jesus christ Haley. Who the fuck would do this? This is sick.”

She took her phone back and locked it without looking at the screen. “I don’t know (y/n). I wanted to tell you not to openly talk to me for a few days. We don’t know who took these, we don’t know what they’re capable of. I don’t wanna risk angering them.”

“We can find them! If we look close enough, we might find a few clues where they were sitting. Do you remember seeing anything suspicious last night?”

“(Y/n), our best option is to leave it. We just can’t talk in person anymore; we can still text each other.”

“Hales, how are we gonna not talk? I’m your setter.”

She ran a hand through her thick black hair. “I don’t know (y/n). Just-just don’t talk to me anymore, I don’t want your pictures leaked.”

“I don’t care about my pictures. My name’s been drug through so much shit this past year that it won’t affect me. I don’t want your stuff leaked.”

She gave a watery laugh, “you care too much, I love that about you…” Glistening eyes turned to look deep into your own. “I’m so scared (y/n), I don’t know what to do.”

You pulled her into a hug, wincing slightly when she squeezed her arms around your upper back. She buried her face into your shoulder and started shaking with muffled sobs. “Haley, I promise I’ll catch whatever sick bastard is doing this to you. You don’t deserve this.”

She said nothing as you rested your chin on the top of her head and started to rock her back and forth slowly. You two stayed like that even after her sobbing resided, finding comfort in each other’s presence. Glancing at the clock, you realized that you two have been in the locker room for an hour. Practice was set to start in fifteen minutes, people were going to start coming into the locker room soon.

You reluctantly pulled away from the hug and looked Haley in her bloodshot eyes, “I’m not going to let those pictures of you get leaked. I swear on my-”

The door to the locker room swung open and loud laughter echoed throughout the room. Haley pushed you away and speed walked off to a bathroom stall, slamming the door shut behind her.

“Damn (y/n), what’d you do? She’s pissed.”

“It’s none of your business, Zara.”

“Oh, so it’s a lover’s quarrel then~” She cackled, her hair bouncing slightly with each heave of her shoulders.

“For the love of… Haley and I aren’t dating, we’re both straight.” She’s straight.

“Mmhm.” She brushed past you to go to her locker. You followed her, your locker was in the grouping next to hers. You shared the area with Haley. You changed as fast as you could so that Haley would have time to change before practice starts. Speed walking into the gym, Zara was hot on your trail wearing a shit eating grin.

“Why are you in such a rush? Giving your girlfriend the silent treatment?”

“Zara. We aren’t dating. For the last time, we’re both heterosexual, not homosexual!” You wildly gestured with your hands to emphasize your point, your voice being amplified by the vast gym. Coach Williams gave you a confused look from across the gym.

“You just keep telling yourself that.”

“I’m serious.”

“Hi serious,” a soft voice replied from behind you, “I’m Jazzy.”

You groaned at the pun at the same time Zara started cackling, giving the short libero a high five. “Nice!”

“That was so bad, Jaz.” You couldn’t help the smile that found its way onto your face.

Zara poked your cheek with a wide grin. “C’mon, you’re smiling!”

“I am and I hate it.”

Your bickering continued with Jazzy watching you two with a content smile. The remaining members of the team (Haley, Marlene, and Zuri) filed into the gym right as Coach Williams blew her whistle.

Practice went by slowly without Haley talking to you. Sure, you had the rest of the team, but it didn’t feel the same with you guys ignoring each other. If the team or Coach Williams noticed you two not talking to each other, they didn’t say anything. By time practice was over, you all went to the locker room to change. After slipping into your fuzzy pajama pants, you sat on the bench and texted Wilbur to come pick you up. He was supposed to pick you up after practice today because he and Techno took the car home after school. Five minutes passed and he still didn’t reply. He probably won’t see the text until you got home from walking.

You sighed, resting your chin in your palm as you leaned forward. One by one, the girls left the locker room until it was only you and Haley left.

“Do you need a ride (y/n)?” She asked gently.

“But what if the person sees us together? I can just walk home, it’s not really a big deal.”

She rolled her eyes at you. “It is a big deal. It’s cold and dark out. You could get kidnapped or something. You don’t even have a coat with you. I’m giving you a ride whether you like it or not.”

You playfully rolled your eyes at her and stood up to walk next to her, “okay, mom.”

“Don’t give me that attitude young lady.”

“You can’t tell me what to do, you’re not my real mom!”

She gasped and lightly smacked the back of your shoulder, “I married your- are you alright? Shit, I didn’t hurt you did I?”

“No, you’re good. It’s just this damned bruise.”

She moved her hands and frantically turned you around to pull the neck of your shirt down. You two stood in front of the school’s main entrance with the nauseatingly bright fluorescent light bouncing off the reflective surface of the tiles. The orange tinted street lights lit up the sidewalk outside.

“(Y/n)-”

“I know what you’re gonna say.”

She scoffed, “oh really? What am I gonna say then, o wise one?”

You turned around to face her, “‘oh, this is bad, yadda yadda yadda.’ Everyone’s been saying that about it. Honestly it looks worse than it feels. Tis but a scratch, m’lady.”

She snorted and covered her mouth, “never call me ‘m’lady’ ever again.”

You started to walk to her car in the empty parking lot. “Or what? What’re ya gonna do?”

“I swear to god, (y/n), I’m gonna leave you here.”

“Do it, pussy. Bet you won’t.”

“You really wanna bet?”

You grinned at her, “hell yeah.”

She broke off into a mad dash to her car, laughing freely into the night sky. You chased after her trying not to move your arms much, your laugh mixing with hers like a perfect symphony composed of the world’s best musicians. The sound of your rubber soles slapping the pavement resonated throughout the parking lot as you quickly gained on her. Reaching out to grab her shirt, she smirked at you and sharply turned to the right into the grass.

You grinned as her pace slowed down slightly. You’d be able to catch her at this pace. You pushed your legs to move faster as she looked at you from over her shoulder and shrieked in surprise at how close you were to her. You cackled at her reaction, reaching out once again, you grabbed her hand. She was stopped dead in her tracks as your shoulder was yanked with the sudden momentum, making you hiss in slight pain. Despite that, you didn’t let go of her soft hand.

You both stood there under the moonlight and the soft orange street lamps trying to catch your breath. The slightly damp blades of grass tickled your ankle as you shifted to face her better. Through gasping breaths and a dopey grin, you said “you… lost, pussy.”

She let out a breathy laugh as she pulled you to her car. “Shuddup.”

“Make me~”

She opened the passenger side door for you and got into the driver's seat. Her car smelled like vanilla and citrus. “Oh, you will later when I make you do more sets in weight lifting tomorrow, hurt shoulder be damned.”

She turned on the ignition and the car revved to life, soft indie pop wafted from the speakers. She backed out of the parking space and sped off to the main road. “You wouldn’t…”

“I’m your captain, (y/n). I can make you do whatever I want.” You felt your cheeks heat up a tad. You were happy that she couldn’t see you.

“Naw, you’re too much of a softie for that. Admit it, I’ve got you wrapped around my little finger.”

She chuckled as she pulled into your driveway and put the car in park. “...Alright, maybe you do. Just a bit.”

She turned to look at you. She looked stunning with the shadows accentuating the contours of her face perfectly. You found yourself glancing at her lips and leaning slightly towards you. To your surprise, she started leaning into you as well. Before your lips could finally mesh together, she pulled back with a sigh and ran her hand through her hair. You felt a rush of disappointment and fear course through your veins. She didn’t like you like that, you should’ve known better. You were so stupid. So, so stu-

“I can’t (y/n). I want to kiss you so bad, but we can’t. Not yet at least. Not until we find the pervert that took those pictures of us.”

You sighed, “right.”

The car was filled with awkward silence. Not even the soft music streaming from the speakers could alleviate the awkwardness. God, you really screwed up your friendship, didn’t you? Sammy, Adrian, and Annie were right; you messed up everything you touched.

You coughed, “I think I’m gonna…”

“Yeah…”

You grabbed your bag and walked into your house, the smell of chicken slapping you in the face instantly. Without checking in with your dad, you hurried up the stairs, desperate for the warm comfort of your bed. That, and if you wanted to get Sammy’s presentation and Adrian’s, Annie’s, and your research papers done by Friday, you had to start as soon as you could. You were going to skip dinner for tonight, you’d just grab more breakfast tomorrow morning.

You plopped on your bed and got started on your research paper. Luckily, you already had all of the sources you were planning on using and the rough outline of each body paragraph, so writing the actual paper wasn’t going to take long. You worked until you heard a knock at your door.

“(Y/n),” Techno’s monotone voice called out, “dinner’s ready.”

“Tell Dad I’m not hungry. Practice’s got me beat, I’m going to bed soon.”

He grunted, “you know he’s not gonna like that right?”

You felt frustration start to swim circles around your chest, “Techno, just tell him that I’m not hungry right now. Please.”

“Damn, you don’t need to be like that. I’ll tell him.”

You heard his stomping footsteps thumping down the hall. Shit, you pissed him off. You were a terrible person, he was just trying to get you to eat something, Pushing back the tears that threatened to spill from your eyes, you forced the panic that was starting to swirl around your body in laps deep into your being. You didn’t have time to deal with your failures and stupid emotions, you had to get this done. You didn’t have time to think about Haley’s warm breath ghosting across your lips. You didn’t have time to think about how she probably regretted almost kissing you. You didn’t have time to fall into an anxiety spiral, you needed to focus if you wanted Adrian, Annie, and Sammy to forgive you. You ruined yours and Haley’s friendship and did the same to yours and Techno’s. They were the only ones you had left. You needed to be a better friend.

Taglist (comment if you want to be added or if I missed you, it won’t let me tag some tumblrs :((( ):

@immadatmostthings @thaticecreambish @hee-hee-haw @dearnataliealoveletter @wasteofspacze @dcml04 @bbigbbrainn @dirtydiavolo @vanhakirja @rinzyx05 @misselsbells06 @ialexabsuniverse @im-a-depressed-gay @energy-drinkk @mothra-main @i-need-hugs @dragons-lurk-here @katj733 @m4r-s @vievi @dykeragee @waterstrawberry @aplaintart @kakamiissad @myunfinishedsymphony @nagitokinnieissad @autumnpleaves @justanothergirlwithdemons @zachariethememerie @moon-asia @m0on-blue @strawberrysodababy @akikko-yataro @haikkeiji @shiningsunrises @cinnamonmochi @queen-turtle-boiii @imanewsoul @sparkling-gayyyy @angelicaschuyler-church @vixenfoxpup @ella-ivanov @shio-yuki @mosstea-png @ijustshatbricks

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blondehairstripe · 3 years

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So I think that as of S3, Varian is crushing hard on Rapunzel. And in this case, it goes deeper than mere infatuation, given the nature of their relationship and everything that’s transpired between them within the series.

Read on for in-series analysis with screencaps and some bonus post-series fanon speculation!

IN-SERIES ANALYSIS

Before he went villain, I’d say that Varian’s feelings toward Rapunzel were more hero-worship, so he likely thought she was pretty, but undoubtedly out of his league and already taken to boot. No signs of crushing yet—he instead becomes infatuated with the only unattached person who came to visit him: Cassandra.

In my humble opinion, Varian didn’t have a romantic attraction to Rapunzel until it hit him like a bolt of lightning when she told him “It’s your mess, but it’s my kingdom” in Rapunzel’s Return.

Though he was oddly flirty with her while she was in that dungeon cell...

There is also the distinct possibility that the cell was where the first stirrings of a crush began to form during their reconnection. The basis for this theory comes from the absolutely adoring look he gave her when she said “we need him” and how he looked pretty well smitten as she pulled him along.

By the end of the episode Rapunzel frees Quirin, and hoo boy, is that the final nail in Varian’s coffin of feelings. She’d forgiven him his atrocities, kept her word, freed his father—honestly, it’d be weirder if he didn’t fall for her if you ask me.

Then Be Very Afraid rolls along, and we learn that Varian considers Rapunzel “wondrous and magical,” something Rapunzel notes rather slyly and Pascal seems to think is sweet. The look on Varian’s face when she takes his hand and pulls him along again says it all. Boi is smitten.

Additionally...just look at this dork when Rapunzel catches him being a nerd about metals and drinking hot cocoa in Cassandra’s Revenge. This is the reaction of a teenager who just got caught doing something embarrassing by his crush. He zeroes in on Rapunzel specifically and doesn’t seem to care that any of the others caught him.

But through all of these new feelings for Rapunzel, Varian loves Eugene too (90% platonically in this case), so my take is that he’s resolved to not interfere in their relationship. And after everything that’s happened, he likely feels that Eugene is a better match for her and that they truly deserve each other. Though after his stint as a villain where Varian completely lost his respect for the ruling class, the whole “she’s a princess I’m a peasant” thing would likely not be a factor for him anymore. Also, he’s clearly never given a crap about age gaps, and the 4 year gap between him and Rapunzel is even smaller than his canonical S1 crush on Cassandra with an 8 year gap.

Now that we’ve covered the analysis of canonical events, we can delve into pure fanon speculation territory.

POST SERIES SPECULATION

While Varian has indeed resolved to not do a single stupid thing to mess up Rapunzel and Eugene’s relationship, he can’t keep himself from wanting to be close to Rapunzel and craving her affection. Luckily (or unluckily, depending on how you look at it) Rapunzel is a very affectionate person, so she’ll hug Varian, hold his hand, even cuddle him because he’s her precious friend. Also, she’s a pro at giving him the verbal validation that seems to fuel him (aka his love language: words of affirmation).

This results in Varian coming up with excuses and ways to stay close to Rapunzel, and at times when he ends up being sandwich-snuggled between Eugene and Rapunzel (because let’s face it, we’ve seen that Eugene is huggy) he sometimes catches himself trying to pretend Eugene isn’t there, which he instantly feels super guilty about.

Side note: Ruddiger is completely aware of how he feels because Varian is an open book when he’s alone with his little raccoon buddy, and the devious little critter sometimes manipulates situations to try to get Varian alone with Rapunzel or to set them up for what he believes is a romantic encounter (what do you mean being trapped inside a dumpster together isn’t romantic? Intimate dark setting, and all the garbage you can eat!). These setups only work about half the time, and so while Varian appreciates the sentiment, he’d prefer Ruddiger to stay out of it because the failures tend to end with Varian being horribly embarrassed.

And if Rapunzel ever gives him what she views as chaste kisses on the cheek or forehead, Varian’s over the freaking moon and always blushes so hard he almost passes out. Rapunzel finds it cute while Eugene thinks it’s the funniest thing ever and teases Varian he’s gonna have to get over that habit if he ever wants a girlfriend/boyfriend of his own. Whether he’s aware of Varian’s crush or not is up for debate, but he for sure has no idea how deep it runs and thus considers it harmless if he’s aware of it.

Varian probably also frequently gives Rapunzel gifts in order to get her attention and favor in the form of inventions/discoveries he thinks she’ll like. He might even bake her things since we’ve seen he has a knack for it. His favorite thing is if he can get Rapunzel to come work on a project with him, giving him the one-on-one time he craves while doing something he loves.

Also, I think that if anyone were to insult Rapunzel in Varian’s presence, they might find their shoes sticky bombed to the floor. Looking at you, Uncle Monty. Varian might become the second person in Corona to not like him.

Of course, he’s not so obsessed with Rapunzel that he has no life outside of her, since he very much enjoys one-on-one time with both his dad and Eugene (Lance is kind of a 50/50 shot for him, and the girls are like little sisters to him). And of course he spends most of his time in his lab doing alchemy. But he lights up every time Rapunzel enters the room and gravitates towards her, and would do pretty much anything for her.

And for a while, Varian convinces himself that this is fine, and that he doesn’t need Rapunzel to love him back the same way he loves her. Though he feels small flares of jealousy whenever she and Eugene kiss or indulge in other romantic gestures that Varian would never hope or dare to try, but he stomps the jealousy down for the greater good of everyone involved.

The wedding would be super bittersweet for him, since he’d be so happy that his friends have found happiness together, even while knowing that Rapunzel is unquestionably out of his reach now. But that doesn't stop him from continuing to love her. His dad says he’ll get over her one day (his only human confidant, the dude is legendary at keeping secrets), but Varian isn’t so sure.

And from this point, the fanon possibilities are pretty much endless, some of them running the gambit from Varian continuing to respectfully pine for Rapunzel in secret, to him getting over her and finding his own happiness with someone else, to him gradually descending into madness and going just a touch yandere. Depends on what flavor of Varian you’re in the mood for: pining Varian, happy Varian, or villainous Varian. And of course, you can get real fancy and combine different Varian flavors to make something unique!

@varipunzel

#Varipunzel Appreciation Week #varipunzel #varian #rapunzel #tangled the series #rapunzel's tangled adventure #tts #rta #tangled #analysis

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animegarbage-iam · 3 years

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Okay, so I'm gonna put this out there. Personally I hate the ending of Naruto and the creation of Boruto. And no its not because "sasuke and naruto didn't end up together." I'm more upset because it was lazy.

Okay, so to get this part out of the way. The whole sasunaru thing Kishimoto brought on himself in the very beginning when they had their FIRST accidental kiss. And lowkey making them a focus because they're 'rivals' or whatever. Who remembers the relay race? I'd say that counts a bit as queerbaiting but I digress.

From team 7 times Sakura was obsessed with Sasuke because so was everyone and he was dreadfully uninterested (in everyone). Naruto, crushing on Sakura, and undoubtedly jealous that someone (sasuke) was getting noticed and didn't even care while all he wanted was for someone to not treat him like garbage. However, Sasuke never warms up to Sakura past being forced to work with her, then continues to tell her how much he despises her and tries to kill her multiple occasions. Once she gets older she kinda gets over him, quite honestly, and seems to follow Naruto because the poor boy is destroying himself trying to essentially save Sasuke from himself. *Don't forget about his panic attack in the snow. Or the fact that he officially rebuffs Hinata telling her he sees her as a friend and she has been pining equally as long as Sakura.

****Regardless of the boys' feelings, those girls should have gotten better. Both girls had to fight years for the other person to notice them, and it wasn't like they got beautiful confessions that had been building for years. It honestly seems like those pairings went together simply because one side had/has feelings and the other person was like, "fuck it, I guess?" That's fucking tragic. Those girls are warriors and deserve to be loved by someone that has and will treat them like a treasure.

-admittedly I didn't like either of them when they were introduced. I didn't like that their main contribution seemed to be to gushing. I liked them better when they weren't seeking the constant approval from their unrequited crushes. Sakura turned into a baddy when she stopped pining and focused on herself. And lowkey so does Hinata once Naru's like, "friend?" It stops being, 'ooo ima do this and maybe he'll notice me' and she grows into focusing on becoming her own baddy.

Alright, the children. I'm not even gonna touch the obvious bullshit of their half-assed names. But like really serious fucking question here guys. What the fuck kind of sense does it makes that Naru's kids have fucking 9-tails whiskers? Like, maybe, passably, if Hinata was the one that had Kurama trapped inside her body. But honestly, even then it wouldn't make sense. Like, did Kurama clone himself and then inject his clones into the the fetuses? No? Then why they got whiskers? Can they use the power of the 9-tails? Cause they shouldn't.

-After all Kurama is a demon fox trapped inside of a shinobi, he is his own physical person, as opposed to some ideal. He is not so much a part of Naruto as Naruto is his unwilling prisoner. As we all know, its over time the two become okay with eachother, and I do mean okay because Kurama has pretty much resigned to being kept prisoner inside of Naruto. *At least Naruto utilizes his power so Kurama probably doesn't feel completely restricted. Though its not on his terms he does get to essentially "stretch his legs" which is better than being completely used, killed, or 1000% restricted.

If you read interviews with Kishimoto, it confirms what you could guess if you're reading his series close enough; He was winging it. Not necessarily a bad thing, but it does answer why a lot of things get muddled or blown over. Honestly, that's why I hate Boruto, it was slapped together to keep the Naruto hype going, but dammit I wish it was done better. The creation feels thoughtless and rushed, if I wanted to watch Naruto again, I would watch Naruto again. They didn't have to rush a B-movie spinoff just to try and keep the hype going.

Like, do y'all remember when we got to know more about the clones? And how they're not just expendable but living parts of Naruto? Like, he went to some deep Star Wars Storm Trooper level type shit. There was thought, it fit, it gives us more. It was done with heart, but thats not the same type of heart or attention he gave to the end.

All in all, I guess I'm just sad because I was left disappointed. After the world he created and all the characters and backstories he brought to life, it felt like a cop-out. It was easy, simple, but it doesn't fit.

So that's my opinion, feel free to express your own.

#naruto #naruto shippuden #kishimoto #boruto #naruto ending #sasuke #hinata #sakura #the girls deserve better #everyone deserves better #many questions #sasunaru #sasusaku #naruhina #kurama #nine tailed fox

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grayintogreen · 3 years

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In all my Lucien chatter, I feel like I have to answer a certain question:

Do I Find Lucien A Sympathetic Character?

Short Answer: No.

Mid-Length Answer: No, but he’s a compelling, tragic one, and those two things are VERY different. You can be a tragic character and a compelling one without being sympathetic.

Long answer: Hoo boy.

Here’s the thing. Everyone has a choice to not be a dick. If the world is a dick to you, you don’t have to be a dick back to it. If you get broken and pushed around and treated like shit and every attempt to reclaim agency just leads you into YET ANOTHER THING that makes people kick and spit at you, you can continue to yeet yourself at the world and overcome it. You do not have to suck the first eldritch monstrosity that offers you powers’ dick and become a massive toolbox to do it. Doing that makes you a bad person. It does not make you sympathetic. It makes you a person who makes bad choices when they could have definitely made other ones. It makes your circumstances deeply tragic.

That being said, I have made this joke once before and I will make it again- Molly is kind of like Lucien’s Tyler Durden. He is free in all of the ways that Lucien is not. Free of the Somnovem, free of his past, free of the anger that’s colored his attitude for years, free of literally EVERYTHING but the thrill of just doing what you please. Molly once said “joy can fill an awful lot of a person’s life.” Well, so can hate. That’s what makes Lucien genuinely tragic (and viscerally human)- he doesn’t have to be sympathetic. I do not feel the least bit bad for his schmuck ass, but I do feel like he’s a tragic villain, who clearly can only be truly happy and at peace with himself and the world when he has nothing else in his head. Molly and Lucien are the same person and I stand by this, but Molly is a fresh start and a clean slate that Lucien is too much of a hopped up arrogant pissy bitch with a god complex to ever consider on his own. He doesn’t think he should give the world a pass on what it did to him by taking a different path, and he won’t. Not unless he has some kind of epiphany about what it was like to be Molly and how liberating and freeing that is, but since the Nonagon is more present within Lucien than Molly, that won’t happen.

That’s the thing. Lucien is the middle ground between “Molly” and “Nonagon.” Molly is the potential to make better choices and the Nonagon is the guy going BURN THE ENTIRE HOUSE DOWN WHOO LET’S GET WEIRD (like a shoulder angel/devil combo except the angel is doing heroin and planning bacchanals), and guess who is making all the calls right now? Hint: it’s the crazy one. Part of me is still holding out for the parts of him that are Molly to wrest back control, but I’m also pretty sure Lucien is gonna eat the Star Razer before that becomes even remotely likely, and you know what? That’s fair. I respect that.

But on the off chance that Lucien is allowed the opportunity to dial it back and we get to see what he’s like without the Nonagon bullshit (probably still a dick, but so was Molly more than half the time, if not a mostly harmless one), he’s still not going to be a sympathetic character to me. I don’t find Essek to be a sympathetic character either (an adorable, affection-starved idiot, yes, but he’s got his poor little rich boy schtick going on and that’s a whole other thing), but I love him!! You don’t have to be sympathetic to be a good, compelling character and worth a redemption arc. You just have to have the capacity to change and the desire to do it.

But as of right now, Lucien/Nonagon just wants to see the world get rekt, so he’s a bastard man and I am only sad that he’s too much of an idiot to realize that he definitely had options and that’s one of the myriad reasons I love him. He’s garbage. It’s delightful. Compelling characters that are just awful and have reasons to be awful (even if it doesn’t justify being awful, because NOTHING justifies being awful) are fun to me, because even if you think they’re actual children, you can still see how they got there. In many ways, that makes the monsters scarier- you can see how easily you can become them.

And on the converse, it makes the monsters less scary because you can see how easy it is to turn them to your side with the right attitude (see: Essek). The Mighty Nein (or at least Jester) kinda tried to do that for Lucien? But he rejected it and doubled down on his bullshit, which... I mean fair. I don’t think they gave him the fair shake they gave Essek, but Lucien sure as FUCK didn’t deserve it, and I don’t feel bad for him about that either.

Anyway. Tl;dr I love Lucien to itty bitty pieces. He’s my favorite NPC (followed closely by Essek and Artagan, who are also flash bastards). But he is a shitheel bastard and deserves whatever is coming to him, and if he does get a redemption arc, it’ll only be because the Molly side of him got admin control, which, again, PROBABLY NOT GONNA HAPPEN. I’ve made my peace with that.

#critical role #look i just love rat bastards a lot #lucien #lucien the nonagon

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asexual-juliet · 3 years

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Hello, sorry to bother you, but I was reading your older posts and now im so hyperfocusing on Dick Casablancas. He’s potentially the worst person ever, and I think I still really like him??? It doesn’t make sense, but he had so much room for character development!!! He had been through so much trauma and had a objectively pretty bad childhood/parents, and I think he could have been a really decent person if he was allowed to be anything other than the comic relief. Also I love your work.

this is literally the opposite of bothering me. you’ve given me the go ahead to talk about this piece of trash garbage boy as much as i want and for that you have my eternal gratitude!!

honestly, when i say i love dick casablancas, i’m talking about the version of his character that i have created in my head where s3 explored his trauma and he actually worked through his shit and became a better person. but alas.

the big thing to remember with dick is that he was supposed to be a minor character, but the writers liked ryan hansen so much that they started writing him in more until he became a series regular. so by the time they decided they wanted to write him as this funny, likable character, they had already set him up as a guy who treats women like shit and does creepy things with rapey undertones.

and honestly, this is understandable! they didn’t realize how fun dick’s character could be until they had already made him into a shitty person. the problem is that instead of addressing it, they chose to ignore it and hope the viewers would forget.

obviously the biggest problem with dick’s character is him encouraging cassidy to rape veronica as established in 1x21. the writers wrote it thinking that dick would remain an unimportant minor character and that the rape plotline would end with duncan, but they chose later to write dick a bigger role and retcon the rape, giving his actions real, dire consequences, and there was a conscious effort to make the viewers forget about the worst thing the character ever did. it’s a really shitty part of his character, and there’s no divorcing dick from his actions, but the writers could have acknowledged it and had him grow past it, especially after s2 when cassidy’s abuse came to light.

cassidy’s plotline gave them a perfect opportunity to explore dick’s shitty past actions and have him reflect!! sexual abuse thoroughly fucked cassidy up, and s3 could have been a great opportunity for dick to take a step back and see the effect that his gross non-consensual actions could eventually have on the girls he harassed, but the writers ignored it in favor of writing him as the two-dimensional comic relief.

dick had an incredible amount of potential after everything went down with cassidy, and we saw the writers tap into that a little bit with the scene in 3.01 where he shows up at logan’s suite and cries, the scene in 3.18 where he asks logan about what happened on the rooftop, and the scene in 3.18 where he calls his dad out on his bullshit (as well as the more subtle way they had him spend basically all of s3 drunk), but they could have done so much more with it and just didn’t!! dick is genuinely one of, if not the most traumatized characters on the show and we deserved to see that side of him much more than we did.

also like you pointed out, dick is the product of two shitty parents, and i think it would also be super interesting to explore his relationship with his dad a little more! because dick was his dad’s golden boy, but his dad also treated cassidy like shit, and to have dick deal with that and kind of start to realize the negative lasting effects his dad’s toxic masculine ideals continue to have on him would’ve been so interesting. so many of his shittier traits are learned behaviors, and that would have been so interesting to highlight

also. this is irrelevant but how fucked up is it that the only place dick had to go after he was kicked out of his dorm was to the building his brother threw himself off of??? how lonely is he that that is the only place he has to go??? and how hard is it for him to live there for at least a year??? the fact that he came to logan’s suite saying “i have nowhere else to go” ...the thing is he could’ve easily gone home because his dad skipped town and kendall’s dead but like??? he chooses the place his brother died over the place where he lived which is absolutely heartbreaking. like, the neptune grand is where cassidy left mac, tried to kill veronica, where he killed woody, and where he killed himself and dick still chooses to live there. and i’m definitely reading too much into it but part of me is gonna put his decision on the fact that he lived in his house with cassidy and didn’t notice anything when he was being abused/killing people/raping veronica and if he lived there alone guilt would definitely overpower him. but at the grand logan is there and dick’s not alone and yeah, it’s where cassidy died, but dick wasn’t there to witness everything that happened that night, and he really couldn’t specifically have stopped the actions of that night, but he blames himself for not noticing something was off with cassidy and bullying him and being home might remind him of that.

in conclusion: girls don’t want boys girls want a solid narrative arc that focuses on dick casablancas and his unresolved trauma. thank you so much for the valid asf ask.

#ask #dick casablancas #cassidy casablancas #veronica mars #vmars #vm #veronica mars spoilers #yes dick is a piece of shit yes i love that dumbass dearly #im so sorry i wrote so much i just have a lot of feelings

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just-call-me-the-intrusive-thot · 4 years

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Soulmate September - Day 15

Day 15 - It is impossible to lie to your soulmate.

Pairing(s): Romantic Loceit, Romantic Prinxiety, Romantic Intruality

TWs: swearing [like, twice at most]

Logan found himself in a bit of a conundrum.

He watched the other sides bicker and argue among themselves - what else was new? - while Thomas tried to calm things down. In truth, Logan had no idea why Thomas had bought the damn trinket, it was likely a scam anyway.

The item in queston was a small, relatively unobtrusive enamel pin that, according to the informative leaflet that came with it, emitted a ‘subtle aura’ that would prevent the wearer from lying to their soulmate. Logan was skeptical to say the least, but Roman, ever the romantic, had insisted Thomas buy it in order to weed out the lucky prince of his dreams. Of course, the pin had no effect in reality, but because Thomas believed it so, the effect on his sides was interesting.

“I can’t believe you wasted ten dollars on that garbage.”, Virgil scoffed, perched on the stairs as always.

“Oh, come on Virge!”, Thomas tapped the pin fondly, “Even if it doesn’t work, it’s a cute design, right?”

“Wow. A red heart. Yes. Totally original. I can feel the no doubt months of work that went into designing it.”

“....Sarcasm really isn’t a great look on you, y’know.“ Thomas muttered, feeling dejected.

Roman piped up to his defense, “It’s a classic design, Bring Me The Depression! Sure, it may be a little plain, but classics are classics for a reason!”

Virgil rolled his eyes, “Whatever, you just like it because you’re a sentimental dork.”

“And what if I am?! Better than being such a Robert Downer Jr!!”, Roman huffed, “You are one killjoy who should make far less noise.”

Before Patton or Thomas could butt in, Virgil murmured, “God, I love it when you make those references just for me-”

The anxious side slapped a hand over his mouth instantly. His eyes widened in horror at what he’d just said as the others all turned to stare at him. Roman especially.

“.... You do?”, the Prince bashfully inquired.

Virgil uncovered his mouth, clearly about to try and cover his tracks when, “Of course I do, I love that you put so much thought into it for my sake!”

Once again, he clapped a hand back over his mouth.

Logan wasn’t sure how to take the topic away from this whole soulmates mess to spare his fellow left brain boy further embarrassment; they were aspects of Thomas’ mind, they didn’t even HAVE souls, not that Logan believed they existed. Power of suggestion is an uncanny force it seems. The logical conclusion was that they were merely acting upon feelings already harboured.

The logical side had to admit, he really hadn’t seen this coming.

“.... Virgil,”, Roman began nervously, Logan realising he must’ve come to the same conclusion somehow, “What colour is my sash?”

The emo squinted at him curiously, “Red? Duh.”

“What color is the sky?”

“Depends on the time of day.”

“Best soda flavour?”

“Grape-”

“How much do you like me?”

“With all my heart-”

Virgil hauled his hood over his head and eyes, “Thomas turn that goddamn thing off RIGHT now-!!”

“No, no, this is way too much fun-!”, Roman began.

Virgil glared at him, his tempest tongue echoing with the weight of his anxiety, “Do you have a death wish, Princey!?”

“Yes if it means you’ll keep yelling at me in that tone of voice-”

Now it was Roman’s turn to look mortified. His eyes nervously darted from Thomas and Patton’s looks of excited adoration, and Logan’s look of sheer and utter “I am so done with this”. The prince swallowed anxiously, looking to Virgil who seemed to be just as nervous as he finally took the chance to sink out.

“Wait, Virgil! Don’t- Aw shoot! Just as you two were finally telling each other how you feel!!”, Patton lamented.

“Padre, you traitor!”, Roman huffed, crossing his arms as he sunk out. Logan theorised it was just an excuse to go after Virgil. Just then, a cackling voice erupted from behind the TV,

“Who knew Emo In Grouchland was so sweet on Roman? Shit taste!”, Remus snickered, vaulting over the TV and taking his spot with glee. Thomas sighed, “How long have you been listening in, Remus?”.

The duke grinned, “Oh, I’ve been here the whole time! I was waiting for a good moment to skewer Roman with this little gift I got him, but the conversation got soooooo juicy I couldn’t resist listening in!”. He brandished a serrated edged sword that looked positively lethal and extremely painful. Patton and Thomas both winced while Logan readied himself to step in should he be needed.

“On that note, Pattycakes, how come you keep losing the gifts I send you?!”, Remus piped up disappointedly, “I put so much work into them, but all you ever tell me when I ask you is that you ever get them!”

Thomas and Logan met Patton with immediate looks of intrigue while the father figure figment looked figuratively flushed. He avoided answering Remus directly, lying to Thomas, “I-! I dunno what he’s talking about, kiddo-”

“What is it our dear brainiac says?”, came a familiar smooth voice, “Ah yes. Deception!”

Logan shuffled to the side to let Janus have some room, “Actually, it’s Falsehood.”

“Whatever, sure.”, Janus waved a hand dismissively. He was more focused on the source that summoned him, tsk-ing at Patton, “All this truth being spouted and yet the one lying hard enough to summon me is our dear Morality. Colour me surprised.”

Patton avoided meeting Janus’ gaze, “I don’t know what you’re talking about-”

“Patton, did you just try to lie to my face?”, Janus chided, raising an unimpressed eyebrow.

The moral side bit his lip nervously, pointedly avoiding Remus. Unfortunately, Remus wasn’t about to let that slide,

“Yeah, Pat, what the fuck!”

“I’m nervous, obviously-!”, Pat cupped his hands in front of his mouth, inadvertently letting Remus know he wasn’t able to lie to him.

“So where DO my gifts go off to, Pattycakes?”, he asked expecting the garbage or a wood chipper.

“I keep them, obviously!”, Patton blurted, his embarrassment growing.

Remus clearly hadn’t expected that, asking before he even had the chance to reconsider; “Why?”

The moral side figured he might as well come clean considering their current situation,

“Because I love them! They’re gross and a little scary sometimes, but they make me feel wanted around here whenever I’m sad!”, he admitted, tugging on his cardigan sleeves, “They make me feel….loved...”

Remus looked just as stunned as the others, but that expression melted into a toothy grin quickly enough as Remus scooped Patton into his arms in a bridal style hold, “See you nerds later, I have the cutest bitch in the mindscape to sloppily make out with!”

Before anyone could stop him, not that they probably wanted to, Remus sunk out with Patton clinging to him tightly.

“..... On that interesting note, I think I’m gonna go grab a snack.”, Thomas mused, already headed to the kitchen when Janus sighed, “I do hope this insufferable truth telling ends. I enjoy illuminating the lies you all spout but if there’s none to highlight, then I’ll be out of a job.”

Logan shook his head, “That’s incorrect, you also embody Thomas’ self preservation meaning you handle far more than lies, but more importantly, if you were ‘out of a job’ then you would simply cease to exist, which would not be beneficial to Thomas’ safety and wellbeing.”

Janus rolled his eyes and leant against the arm of the L sofa. “Are you always this sweet when you’re correcting someone’s use of hyperbole?”

“I was not being sweet, I fail to see how-”

“I was just teasing you, Logan.”, Janus smirked, getting comfy, “But if I’m being honest, which I very much am, it’s nice to be appreciated around here.”

Logan furrowed his brow, “Do you generally feel unappreciated Janus?”

Even Janus wasn’t immune to the effects of the psyche either, “Yes-”

He caught himself and cast a worried look toward Logan. Thankfully, the logical side may be intelligent, but he sure wasn’t smart enough to read Janus’ gesture properly.

“Are you alright, Janus?”

“No.”, Janus uttered, unable to suppress the truth.

A flash of concern that etched itself into Logan’s face gave Janus some hope that perhaps his feelings might be returned; it was always harder to read Logan, about all Janus knew was that he did in fact have feelings despite his protests. But those exact feelings? He’d be damned if he could figure any of them out.

“May I be of some assistance then?”, Logan offered, sitting on the sofa seat that placed him next to Janus while the latter remained on the arm of the sofa.

“... I’m not sure.”, the lying side hated how uncertain the truth tasted, “But I would like to try something, if I may, Logan?”

Logan frowned in uncertainty, “...As long as it will bring no bodily harm, I am willing to try anything.”

Oh god, is he really doing this? Yes, apparently. Janus brought his left hand to gently ghost over Logan’s cheek,

“May I kiss you, Logan?”

Ugh, Deceit loathed the crack in his voice, but before he could apologise and let Logan off the hook, the logical side replied,

“Please do.”, Logan’s eyes remained locked on Janus’.

The serpentine side didn’t need to be told twice. Janus softly tilted Logan’s face towards him, capturing his lips in a gentle kiss. It was soft, fleeting but with an obvious taste of longing. They both let out a content sigh n unison as Janus pulled back,

“I’ve already asked too much but-”

Logan cut him off, already giving a fond smirk, “It’s alright. I will have Thomas ‘lose’ the pin in the garbage. Your work will be unimpeded, Janus.”

“Perfect. I believe you deserve a reward.”, Janus chuckled as the two went in to kiss once more..

----

Short ‘n’ sweet this time!

Just some gay disaster sides who can’t lie, ehe.

@tsshipmonth2020

Taglist: @somehow-i-got-an-account @cateye-glasses @fandomsofrandom

#loceit #intruality #prinxiety #logan sanders #janus sanders #patton sanders #remus sanders #roman sanders #virgil sanders #my fics #soulmate september #roman #virgil #logan #patton #janus #remus #thomas

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luci-in-trenchcoats · 4 years

Text

Won’t You Stay (Part 9)

Summary: The reader and Ethan talk about their pasts where they learn they have more than a few things in common...

Masterlist

Pairing: Jensen x Director!reader

Word Count: 3,600ish

Warnings: language, depression, self-doubt, past domestic abuse, mention of death

A/N: Please enjoy!

_____

“Hey,” said your dad half an hour later, handing you some tissues as you sniffled and sucked down your milkshake at a park nearby.

“Thanks,” you hiccuped, getting an arm around your shoulders on the bench.

“How bad was it?” he asked.

“What?” you said, wiping off your face.

“Y/N. There are things you don’t know about your mom, your birth mom, things I never wanted to tell you but you deserve the truth, not the story I made up,” he said. “I used to make up stories and lies too.”

“What are you saying?” you asked. He leaned back and stared out at the dim park, a few lights turning on.

“I didn’t love your mother. I feared her,” he said. You stared at him and he shifted around, pulling up his shirt and showing you his side. “You know that scar I got from skateboarding as a kid? She threw a glass at me.”

“She hurt you?” you asked.

“I moved to LA to run away from her,” he said, staring at the ground. “She was...awful. We were only teenagers and she was awful. I couldn’t imagine what it would have been like as adults.”

“Dad. Did she hurt you?” you asked. He sighed and closed his eyes. “You said she threw a glass. What else did she do?”

“What did Logan do?” he asked.

You sighed and sipped on your milkshake, your dad rubbing your back.

“Alright, I’ll go first. Your birth mother was controlling. She was mean. She got physical at times. And I was a kid that didn’t know what the hell to do,” he said. “Then she did something without me knowing and after I left, I found out what that was and then I heard nothing and then I got a call she was in an accident. That’s when I found out about you. Sweetie, I was never depressed because I loved her and lost her. It’s something that’s been a part of me since I was thirteen years old. I’ve always been a bit like this. The thought of you growing up with her though, alone, mortified me. I am happy that she is gone and that’s the honest truth.”

“What did she do to you?”

“...You were planned, by her,” he said. “She poked a hole in a condom.”

“Dad,” you said. “Dad...she-“

“I didn’t know. Not until it was too late,” he said. “I thought it tore. A few weeks later I was told by her that it was on purpose, right after I left. She said she got her period though and I believed her. I believed her. I never should have. Who knows what I was leaving you with? She knew exactly what she was doing though because by the time she would have had you and she came back to me, she knew I would do it, for you, and then she’d have the both of us.”

“Did you ever tell anyone?”

“Mom knows. No one else,” he said. “I’m not proud of that time in my life.”

“You were eighteen and you left. You should be proud,” you said. He smiled and gave you a hug, releasing a shaky breath.

“You left whatever was going on too. We must have done something right,” he said. You nodded and blew your nose, tossing your garbage in the nearby trash can. “Whatever happened with Logan, kiddo?”

“At home he got controlling,” you said with a swallow. “I didn’t even notice it at first. Then he started to pick out my clothes and what I could eat and he put me down and then he got rough in bed one night and I knew I had to leave before it got worse. So I broke up with him and two days later he was dating someone new already.”

“How rough?” he asked softly.

“It hurt. I kicked him and then punched him and then left,” you said. “I got a hotel room that night.”

“How do you feel now? You ever tell anyone?”

“No. The book and movie made me happy for a while,” you said. “It didn’t work all the way but I am feeling a little better lately.”

“You really like Jensen, huh,” he said, giving you a smile.

“I had a mini freak session this morning and he was so nice about it. Logan would have put me down and belittled me. Jensen made me feel safe though.”

“He’s a good kid. He didn’t have to drive me home the other night and hang out and help keep mom and you calm. But he did. Be with a boy that does stuff like that, sweetie,” he said.

“He’s kinda like a big fan of the book,” you said. “Like big fan.”

“Does that bother you?” he asked.

“No. I just...I hope he likes me because of me, not because I wrote his favorite book,” you said.

“Didn’t he ask you out before he knew who you were though?” he chuckled. “I think you got him on the hook all on your own.”

“You’re not gonna like, go murder Logan, are you?” you asked.

“Do you want me to?” he asked.

“No. I just want to forget about him,” you said.

“Then forget about him. Stop giving him control and move on with your life,” he said. “You were really good for me in that regard. Really good.”

“I’m sorry about what I said back at the house,” you said. “It wasn’t true. I wanted to be mean because I knew it’d get you to back off.”

“You were scared and trying to push. I knew that,” he said, fixing a piece of hair behind your ear.

“You didn’t see your face.”

“You didn’t see yours,” he said. You nodded and took a deep breath. “Can we talk again? Be thick as thieves like the old days?”

“Yeah. Yeah,” you said with a small smile, wiping off your face with the back of your hand.

“You want to come stay back home?”

“No,” you said with a smile. “I’m a big girl. I do like having my own space. But can we do a family dinner every week or something?”

“I think that’s a good idea for all of us,” he said. “Offer is always open though.”

“I know,” you said. “I’m still sorry about earlier.”

“Apology accepted. You want to get some sundaes to bring home?” he asked.

“Yeah. I feel like the other guys are gonna be pissed at me,” you said.

“You’re a good secret keeper. They should let you slide without an explanation,” he said. “I mean, no offense but does Anthony think we’re idiots? I knew years ago he liked guys.”

“Really? I was a little surprised when he told me,” you said.

“Well, you can catch your son checking out men’s asses only so many times before you start to wonder,” he teased. You felt yourself giggle and got a boop on the nose. “That’s the sound I like to hear out of her.”

“What’d you think about Ella?”

“I think her big sister did a good job of making sure she gets treated right,” he said.

“Jensen kinda helped out during that talk,” you said.

“He’s just racking up all the brownie points, isn’t he?” he said.

“You think he’s a good actor?” you asked.

“Yeah. He’s got the potential to go big. This movie will change his life,” he said. “He certainly knows Lyle inside and out.”

“What’s a good date idea?” you asked. “I kinda ditched on one with him tonight.”

“Oh, boy talk? I missed that for sure,” he teased. “I am sure you’ll come up with something good. Why don’t we head on home and maybe mom can help us come up with something.”

“Okay. Dad...I won’t tell anyone about what you said. Ever,” you said.

“I know. I will give you the same courtesy. Come on, sweetie. I’m starving.”

“Hello, Y/N,” said Jensen with a big grin when you let him into your apartment Sunday afternoon. “Your apartment building is very fancy.”

“A doorman and security were a requirement from my parents to living alone. I had to appease them somehow,” you said.

“It smells pretty in here,” he said as you locked up behind him. He pulled out a bundle of flowers from behind his back and handed them over.

“Thank you,” you said. You set them in a glass of water, Jensen following you into your kitchen.

“Nice. It’s very cute,” he said, leaning against your counter. “So. I heard someone was going to make me the best grilled cheese and tomato soup I’ve ever had before we watched some football.”

“Not to brag or anything but I am pretty spectacular at grilled cheese,” you said.

“So humble you are,” he teased, taking a seat at the counter as you pulled out some ingredients. “How’s your dad doing?”

“Better. Everyone kind of aired their crap last night. It was good,” you said.

“Good. You seem a little more relaxed than normal,” he said.

“Wait until I’m filming again in the morning,” you said as you whipped up a light dressing to put on the bread. “Your ribs feeling better?”

“Oh, I’m fine. They were only bruised. I should be ready to do scene 12 on Friday,” he said. “I hope. I’m kinda nervous about it actually.”

“Afraid of heights?” you asked.

“No. It’s just the big stunt for the first act,” he said. “I know it’s like an ‘oh fuck’ moment in the book. It’s important to get it right.”

“Don’t worry about it, Jensen. No one knows Lyle better beside me,” you said.

“Not to go full nerd on you again-”

“Ask away, fanboy,” you teased, Jensen giving you a smirk back.

“Cute,” he said.

“Does it bother you?”

“No. I like my little nickname,” he chuckled. “I’ll have to come up with something good for you.”

“In the meantime, ask away. I like talking about this stuff with you,” you said. He hummed and watched you work on the sandwiches for a moment before you switched over to the soup.

“So how did you come up with the story? It’s a bit dark sometimes. I like that but I was always curious. Scene 12 for example. Lyle’s going to get caught, interrogated by Hale, he’ll escape and then nearly get killed by Hale when he catches up to him.”

“I think there’s two ways of focusing on that chapter. One is Hale is hellbent on revenge for his son and lets that rage take over and he nearly kills an innocent man for it after terrorizing him. The other is the way I think you see it, the way I think I lot of people see it. A man who lost his son and another young man whose family hurt him. Hale hurts, Lyle hurts. Hale shows Lyle eventual kindness after he realizes his mistake and Lyle finds a father figure, he finds someone that will protect him, not hurt him. Two lost souls and all that,” you said.

“I totally get it. I just wonder how a Hollywood girl who grew up with Ethan Y/L/N as a father comes up with a story like that,” he said.

“I had a single dad for the first ten years of my life, Jensen. I love my mom, I do, but our whole family knows that me and dad, that’s something special. He was my father and my mother back then. He didn’t know what he was doing. We figured it out together,” you said. “Plus I like the flawed hero story. Everyone does.”

“True,” he said. “Those are always more interesting.”

“Is that the kind of role you like to play? If you had your choice I mean,” you said.

“Yeah. I’d play a good or bad guy. I don’t have a preference,” he said. “Happy to have a steady job right now mostly.”

“I know you guys get a pretty good paycheck,” you said, stirring the pot a few times.

“I heard a rumor that I wasn’t supposed to get as good a paycheck as I got. Apparently our director pushed for me,” he said. “I suppose I have you to thank for that.”

“I feel like you should be compensated for your work,” you said, shrugging as you covered the pot. “It’s a lot of pressure and this is going to be a multi movie thing someday.”

“My agent told me this movie will change my career. I’ll get to pick my next project instead of scraping for it,” he said.

“Isn’t that a good thing?” you asked.

“It is. It’s going to be hard to top working on The Dark Woods is all,” he said.

“Oh yeah because this working experience is so awesome I bet,” you laughed.

“Actually, yeah, it is. I have never met a director like you. Even when shit goes wrong, I’ve never once seen you yell at someone, even when they probably deserve it. You’re kind and prioritize cast and crew over a schedule and money. People notice that, Y/N,” he said.

“It’s how people should act,” you said, shaking your head. “Alright. How do you like your grilled cheese? Barely crispy or extra crunchy?”

“Somewhere in the middle,” he said. “Need help with anything?”

“Nope. Just grab yourself something to drink from the fridge and this will be done in a jiffy,” you said. Jensen hummed and took a bottle of water out for you and himself, carrying them over to where you had set your table.

Ten minutes later Jensen was moaning around the grilled cheese, giving you a thumbs up.

“Okay. You are allowed to brag about your grilled cheese skills anytime,” he said. “I haven’t had a home cooked meal in forever.”

“You don’t cook?” you asked. “I’m not great but slowly trying to learn. Instant pot is a girl’s best friend.”

“Well I mean, no one’s cooked for me besides my parents or your parents in like a year,” he said. “It’s kinda nice. I will be sure to return the favor soon.”

“Might have to wait until the weekend. It’s going to be crazy busy this week,” you said.

“Eh, it’ll be fine,” he said, dipping his sandwich in his soup. “Mmm, so good.”

When you were finished eating, Jensen helped you clean up before you sent him into your family room to settle in for the game. He wandered over to your bookcases on either side, scanning the rows while you turned the TV on.

“I didn’t know you had other books,” he said, looking back with a smile. You quickly hopped up and saw him pull out one. “This is not a Lyle Sullivan book.”

“No, it isn’t. I’ve written a lot, since I was a teenager. I uh, only the one is published right now, the other two on the way,” you said. “This other stuff is crap. Only my parents and siblings have read it really. Also Logan but he said they were bad.”

“Logan is an idiot, full offense intended,” he said with a smirk, flipping through one. “I finished The Dark Night yesterday which holy crap by the way. It was amazing and I have so many questions.”

“You liked it?” you said, tucking your hair behind your ear.

“It was so good. Lyle’s like a full on badass but he still fucks shit up and he and Molly are like living together and they’re so cute and she’s actually like learning from Hale how to be a badass too so she’s safe and Hale’s like his actual dad and Lyle called him dad and I was like fucking finally but-”

“Okay,” you laughed. “I see you liked it.”

“Yeah,” he chuckled. “I did. Since I’ve read the Lyle prequel before too would you mind if I read one of these? I get bored in my trailer sometimes.”

“Sure,” you said.

“Any you recommend?” he asked.

“Oh they’re all horrible,” you said, rubbing the back of your neck.

“I see. I guess I’ll just have to read all of them,” he said with a smile. “I’ll start with this one. Oak Street. I wonder what it’s about.”

“Jensen,” you said as he pulled out the first one. “I’m really not a good writer.”

“We have very different opinions on that,” he said. He hummed and he sat down on the couch and set the book on the end table to take home later. You rolled your eyes and sat down next to him, Jensen putting an arm around your shoulders. “This okay?”

“Mhm,” you said, leaning against his shoulder as you turned your attention to the TV. You shut your eyes, the game drowning out in the background.

“Y/N, wake up,” said Jensen. Your eyes flashed open and you shot up, both his hands on your arms. You looked around, still on the couch with the football game going on. “Hey. It’s alright. You were having a nightmare. You were taking a nap on me.”

“Sorry,” you said, rubbing your eyes.

“S’okay. I’m pretty tired on the weekends. I can’t imagine how exhausted you must be,” he said, sliding a hand up to your cheek. “Bad dream?”

You nodded and looked away, Jensen turning your cheek back towards him.

“I get bad dreams too,” he said. He smiled and returned it, dropping his hand away.

“People aren’t sweet like you, you know.”

“They are. You just haven’t been around too many quality people lately it seems,” he said.

“I can’t really disagree with that,” you said.

“Your friends aren’t sweet?” he asked.

“Are yours?”

“I ditched the bad ones. The ones I got left, some are guy guys, they don’t talk about the serious stuff but they’re good. The other guys...yeah, we talk about feelings and shit. One of my best friends we talk everyday about that stuff,” he said. “We have a tag up. We just check in, make sure the other is okay.”

“Like I said. You’re sweet,” you said.

“Like I said. You should hang around with some better people,” he said. You nodded and sat back, tucking into his side. “Not a lot of friends?”

“Never had a lot. But then when I broke up with my ex, all my friends stopped talking to me and kept hanging out with him,” you said. “Always was kind of hard, growing up the way I did, knowing if people liked me.”

“Well I know someone that likes you very much,” he said, smirking at you.

“I wonder who that is,” you said.

“He’s quite adorable,” he said. “Very handsome.”

“Lucky me,” you laughed. “Sounds very humble.”

“For sure,” he said. You glanced up at him, Jensen rubbing your arm. “If you’re up for it, want to go do something fun?”

“What do you have in mind?”

“Your hair is a hot mess,” teased Jensen three hours later. He tried to fix it back in place but you quickly felt his baseball cap on your head, ponytail pulled through the opening. “All better.”

“I cannot believe you took us to Disneyland,” you said, looking back at the rollercoaster you’d just gotten off of. “I haven’t been here in years!”

“Best part is we can totally drink now,” he said. “Want to hit a few more rides first before we get a snack?”

“Yeah, that’d be great,” you said. You got bumped as you walked, Jensen grabbing your hand and pulling you around to his other side. He didn’t let go once you’d made it past a crowd of people and you gave it a squeeze. “Hey, Ackles.”

“Y/L/N,” he said as you headed for another coaster.

“Thanks for saving my ass that night we met,” you said.

“I’m sure you would have handled it on your own,” he said. “I got your back from now on though if that’s cool.”

“I’m okay with that, Ackles,” you said.

“Good. You watch mine and maybe it’ll all work out,” he said.

“Maybe it will,” you said. He hummed and leaned over to kiss you, smiling when you blushed. “Don’t say a word, fanboy.”

“Mhm,” he said, a smug little look on his face. “Alright, let’s try another one of these coasters out.”

_____

A/N: Read Part 10 here!

#supernatural #spn #jensen x reader #jensen ackles #supernatural series #supernatural reader insert #jensen ackles x reader #spn reader insert #jensen reader insert #jensen x #jensen ackles x you

203 notes · View notes

feverinfeveroutfic · 3 years

Text

chapter twenty-one: misery loves company

"another fan's appreciation, a do-be, don't-be situation. drag me down into your hatred." -"misery loves company", anthrax

“Thank you again, Marla.”

Sam, Zelda, Alex, and Chuck had landed in Syracuse at around nine thirty at night. And, once they had landed and after a swift phone call to the apartment in Hell's Kitchen, Marla drove up for a ride over to Joey's place. For all Sam knew, he had barricaded himself into his place and thus she asked Marla to bring some more things along with her all the while: her old journal stayed put in that red courier bag over her shoulder. If Joey would at the very least let them in, she knew that the work of her pens and her pencils would perhaps help him.

Once Marla bounded into the airport parking lot, and she pulled up to the curb of which the four of them congregated at in anticipation of her, Sam was quick to catch her there at the driver's seat first: she kept her hair that bright neon green except this time around she ridded of the black stripe so she had a solid helmet of rich ferocious green hair that they saw from clear across the parking lot.

“You got those books?” Sam asked her once the three of them had piled into the back of her car.

“Right in the back seat!” Marla announced with a quick gesture behind her.

“Yeah, there's a li'l stack of books here—right here on the floor,” Chuck told her; once she put her courier bag in the trunk, Sam rounded the front of the car back to the passenger seat.

“Those are the books I got from the house in Elsinore,” she told him. “Next to my art, they were the only things that kept me sane. I have no doubt those books will help him recover and keep him company in this hard time for him.”

She strapped in and Marla lifted the parking brake, and they proceeded away from the curb and into the rest of the lot. Despite the glow from North Syracuse, the darkness met them there at the driveway and all the way into the woods outside there. The memory of her and Joey having driven up to North Syracuse felt so fresh in mind: it wasn't that long ago he took her to the edge of the lake and then he showed her some hockey moves, complete with a round on the ice.

She kept her hand up on the “oh, shit” handle over her head all the way out from that city's edge.

“I'm also glad you two guys and Zelda came with her,” Marla said at one point, and with a glimpse into the rear view mirror.

“Well, as Alex said—Joey's going to need all the support he can get,” Chuck told her.

“I was coming back East anyway,” Zelda added, “back to Providence once all is said and done here.”

“Tour's cancelled, I assume?” Marla asked her with another glimpse into the mirror.

“Yeah, pretty much. My hope is that we can pick up where we left off again soon enough. The four of us are fine and good to go—like we'll tour with David Bowie or with Springsteen, as long as it gets us going again.” Zelda paused for a moment. “We were doing great, too!”

“New album,” Sam said in a soft voice.

“Marla can't know the full truth about it as of yet,” Zelda pointed out; she had leaned forward to the back of the seat to better say that to her.

“Oh, right, right, right.”

“I didn't even hear you anyways,” Marla said with a shrug of her shoulders.

“Anyways, but yeah! We were just killing it lately. More so than when we toured with them and these two birds on either side of me here. I have no clue what's gonna happen to Anthrax now.”

“They're gonna need a new singer, for one thing,” Chuck told her. “Who that's gonna be is another question all together.”

“Somebody who isn't Joey,” Sam declared.

“Yeah, it's not gonna be the same without him,” Alex agreed with her. “He gave them that dissonance that makes them stand out. His high voice held in junction to their hard and fast music.”

“He also gives them their heart, too,” she continued, “like when they were just a quartet and he was playing guitar, they had a lot more heart than when Scott was with them the first time around.”

“Yeah, they did,” Marla said with a glimpse over to her. “They really genuinely did. Like they had a certain warmth to them. Like a kindness of sorts.”

They fell back into silence and Marla took the next exit off to that familiar neighborhood, the street with the right turn across from the art shop, buttoned up for the night. The apartment complex stood dark and lifeless against the inky black sky overhead.

Sam reached his front door first and knocked on the panel.

“Joey?” she called through the wood as Chuck stood behind her.

Silence on the other side. The kitchen light was on, as well as the living room light. But it felt as though nobody was home.

“Try the knob,” Chuck advised her, and she turned it to the side. The door swung open.

There on the living floor, stretched out flat on his back, was Joey. His jet black curls had spread over part of his face while his arms were stretched out on either side of him. He looked as though he had fainted: through his curls, Sam made out the sight of his eyes pinched shut. His otherwise brown skin had washed out to the point it was more pale than the four walls that surrounded them.

To think that she held him in her arms only a month before. To think that she had come so close to him before that point. To think that he confessed his love to her and kicked that other woman away from him.

Sam lunged for him.

Everything seemed to move in slow motion from that point onward. She was about to clasp her hands to the sides of his face when something stopped her.

Or someone.

“Sam, look!” Chuck pointed out.

She glanced down at Joey's outstretched right arm. The syringe on the floor, filled with something gray and liquid, and for all she knew fatal.

“Joey!” Zelda shouted from behind them.

“JOEY!” Sam never yelled so loud in her life as she crouched down on the other side of him.

“Oh, god,” Zelda groaned. “Oh, god. Oh, god, oh god oh god oh god oh shit—oh hell no.”

“Oh, fucking hell,” Chuck said as she ran his fingers through his hair. “Sweet Jesus don't let it be true.”

Marla and Alex skidded into the apartment.

Joey groaned in his throat and Sam and Chuck gasped.

“Joey?” she whispered to him. Chuck crouched down next to her. Marla and Alex loomed right behind them.

“What's—what's all the yelling?” Joey grunted out through gritted teeth.

“Oh, thank god,” Alex declared in a broken voice.

“What's going on?” Joey rolled his head over so his hair streamed off of his face. Sam looked over to the couch to find an empty beer right bottle next to the base.

Using a tissue, Zelda picked up the syringe from the carpet and she tossed it into the garbage can in the kitchen; Sam and Marla took another look at his arm to find that he had not made a single puncture.

The point of the needle had missed the vein by about a hair's breadth. Had he not been drunk, he would've made the lethal injection. Being drunk literally saved him.

Marla and Zelda lifted him off of the floor and propped him into an upright position, with his back right up against the front of the couch. He bowed his head and his jet black curls tousled around his shoulders and his chest. Tearful, Sam lunged forward and lifted his head for a better look into his eyes: those soft brown irises had given way to bloodshot terror. The beautiful sun kissed Indian boy she had fallen in love with had the angel of darkness looming over him right at that very moment.

“Joey,” she pled into his face, “Joey, can you hear me?”

“I do,” he said as he closed his eyes. His dark lips, once smooth like chocolate, never looked so dry and chapped from the lack of liquids.

“Dude, why do you have to do this to yourself?” Alex demanded, mortified.

“I just feel like I have to,” Joey confessed in a broken voice: all the while, he barely moved his lips.

“We enjoy a couple of beers once in a while, but it's once in a while, though,” Chuck pointed out.

“Joey, I could've lost you!” Sam declared as she could feel the tears coming on.

“I've only had one drink,” he told them; indeed, he didn't smell alcohol at all, but rather like he had been asleep for hours on end. “I just—don't want to be awake anymore. I want to sleep. I can't sleep. I want to sleep.”

A single tear fell down Sam's cheek at the sound of that.

“Joey, listen to me,” she begged him. “You and I were getting so close to each other in my bed—in my bed! Back at my mom's house! Make no mistake, I was about to go all the way with you. I'll go with you all the way right now if you want.”

“Sam, please,” he said as his eyes drooped shut, “I'm not in the mood right now.”

“Joey—please—listen to me. You don't need to pollute your body like this—you have to heal—you have a beautiful body and you mustn't do this sort of thing to it.”

“I deserved it, though,” he breathed out; she could hear tears in his voice.

“No! No you didn't! You didn't deserve any part of it, Joey!”

She began crying right there, right in front of him. She pushed the hair out of his bloodshot eyes once again.

“I want to heal you—I want to make art of your beautiful body and show the world of what I see in you. All the love I feel, away from the horrors of which you do to yourself.”

She brought her lips to his, to that dry and cracked skin and she could feel the pains in his heart all the while. She held her hands on either side of his face to better feel his skin.

“I love you, Joey,” she begged right into his gaping mouth. “I love you—I love you, Cliff—”

“What?” he asked her.

“I love you, Joey,” she repeated in a near whisper.

“I thought that's what you said,” he breathed back to her.

“What else would it be?” she asked him and she could feel her eyes burning with tears. She ran her fingers through his inky black hair for a better look into his face, so sick and pale; and she took a glance down at his body, so thin and emeciated.

“When's the last time you ate?” Chuck asked him in a gentle voice, to which Joey shrugged and he closed his eyes again. Chuck turned back to Zelda, Marla, and Alex right behind them.

“One of you go into the kitchen and get him something—he's probably famished to high heaven right now.”

“No,” Joey begged them.

“No?” Sam demanded as she brushed a tear from her eye.

“You look like you're about ready to pass out,” Alex chimed in.

“Why the hell is he here,” Joey sputtered, and his speech slurred a bit.

“Alex came along because he wanted to help you!” Sam exclaimed. “Chuck and Zelda did, too!”

“I don't need help,” he croaked. “I don't need an Eskimo again.”

“Yes, you do! Yes, you do, Joey! You got fired and now look at you! You're in dire straits! I let one boyfriend die, I'm not going through that again.”

“I can get it myself...” His voice was to a near whisper at that point, further accentuated by the lack of liquids within him.

“I need to help you, Joey—I need to get you away from that. I need to protect you.”

“Sam—don't—with him,” Marla advised her as she set a hand on her shoulder. “He'll figure it out himself.”

“But I need to help him! He needs help—” Her voice broke as the words left her lips. Marla tugged her up from the floor and she turned her around to better face her.

“Literally the best and sexiest thing you can do for him is to let him figure it out for himself,” Marla continued in a gentle tone. Sam could see in her eyes that she too was crying. But she had to let him go, even if it meant another series of deep breaks within her heart. She bowed her head and wept right in front of Marla; she lowered her head and all but collapsed right into her chest. Marla cradled her in her arms and held her within her chest.

Chuck joined in right next to them.

Sam couldn't think about anything any further than that. All she recalled from that point onward was her climbing back into Marla's car and then nothing else after the fact. Everything was a blur, such that the mysterious man finally returned to her, even while she was wide awake. She pictured him right next to her, with his eyes deeper than the bottom of the ocean and his face right up close to her own. She wished to ask him on what to do next, but he never said anything to her.

Instead, he shook his head to her and then he looked back towards the trunk. She couldn't hardly think of anything else, but she knew that he meant business, and he always did when she reached a dead end. Behind every dead end was the road less travelled and his presence within her showed it to her. Marla saw him, too, and thus she knew that they were all in it together. It was all she could think about on the way away from Joey's apartment.

One of them led her into some place there in Camillus and the next thing she knew, she sat right next to Alex in a booth somewhere around there. She brushed away more tears and she peered over at Alex and the thoughtful look on his face. He had already ordered himself a cup of coffee despite it being almost eleven o'clock at night.

“Where's Marla, Chuck, and Zelda?” she asked him in a broken voice; she picked up a napkin so as to dry her eyes.

“Chuck and Zelda went next door for something,” he replied in a gentle tone, “Marla's right there.” He pointed to the right of her, where Marla finally picked up the receiver after she had apparently been waiting in line for a time. She put in the coins and slowly dialed the number.

Alex picked up his mug and took a sip of coffee.

“Hello, Charlie,” she started in a loud enough voice for the both of them to hear. “This is Marla. I know it's late, but meet up with me, Sam, Zelda, Chuck, and Alex as soon as you get this. We're at the coffee shop up in Camillus, like it's the coffee shop right at the center of town. It's highly important that you do. Like, this is dire. This is a potentially life or death situation here.”

Sam turned her attention to Alex right next to her in the booth, and his hand rested upon the table top before him, right next to his cup of coffee.

“So you said your parents hail from New York, right?” she asked him in a broken voice.

“Yeah, Sheep's Head. A neighborhood down in Brooklyn—my dad's from there, especially.”

She looked down at his cup of coffee right before him. Having coffee so late at night felt so strange to her, but at the same time, there was something so precious about it. She thought back to when she and Joey first met Alex, and he sat on the front porch of the coffee house with Cliff. The only thing they missed was a bit of rain on their backs otherwise the mood would surround them and fit like a glove. She had bought him some ginger snaps all the while.

“You know what, Alex?” she started. “You're always giving me stuff. I wanna give you something, too.”

“Nonsense, you always give me stuff,” he pointed out with a straight face. “You feed me and you cuddled up next to me—both in my car and in my bed. You took me to your old home, too, the place you go to when no one's looking. That's far more than what it's worth, Samantha.”

“And you took me home...” Her voice trailed off as she glanced up at Marla who had dialed another number on the pay phone right next to them.

“So we're always giving each other stuff,” she told him. “How 'bout—we give each other our silence?”

“Our silence,” he echoed that.

“Yeah, if we don't stifle one another with gifts to each other, surely we'd have to give each other our silence.”

Alex lowered his gaze to the floor before them and then he nodded his head in realization of what she meant by that.

“I don't know if I've told you this,” she started again, “but one thing I've always wanted to do with Joey was make a glass piece based off of him.”

“Glass—like stained glass?” He was stunned by that.

“Yeah. When I was in school, Belinda taught both me and Marla some tricks on how to work with the glass tools—you know the cutter and how to make things go with the grain of the glass. It was something I've always wanted to do when I was in school.”

“And you never did?” He knitted his eyebrows together, to which she shook her head.

“Never could get into it,” she confessed. “And I have no clue where to start with where Bel works over in Albany, either.”

“Do you think—” He raised his gaze to the ceiling overhead: the light over them shone down on his prominent brow and it in turn made his eyes appear deeper than they actually were. “Do you think maybe they can get you something there?” He returned his gaze to her.

“Maybe,” she said with a shrug and a sniffle: all the crying had loosened her up. “But then again, that would mean that I would have to come back here to New York. I'm already just barely settled into my mom's house. And I'm still just getting to know you guys, too.”

“Traveling can be hard, too. I mean, look no further than when we were in Germany last summer.”

“Oh, yeah, on the flight home, you were out like a light,” she recalled.

“And I was out like a light after I got back to the hotel from the border, too!” he added with a chuckle. And then he turned serious once more. “Well—Samantha—”

She turned her attention to him, right into those bright steely deep eyes with a quick glimpse to the little tuft of gray over his brow, which had returned to full bright fruition. He nibbled on his bottom lip.

“Whatever you want to do—” he began, but he stopped from something right next to them, and Sam turned her attention to Zelda who had just walked in through the front doors right then. Marla hung up the phone but then Zelda lunged for it herself.

“Sam?” Marla said once she turned back around towards them.

“What's up?” she asked her.

“You guys aren't gonna believe this.”

Alex raised those dark eyebrows at her.

“Apparently Bill hasn't nulled the marriage,” she told her. “You're still legally his wife.”

Alex closed his eyes and bowed his head.

“Oh, for crying out loud,” Sam groaned as she leaned her back against the vinyl seat right behind her. “But wait, I kissed Joey, though! That's a breach of contract, isn't it?”

“For it to be as such, you have to be caught,” Marla pointed out. “You have to actually show proof of it in the state of California.”

“Caught,” she echoed. Alex raised his head right then.

“Caught,” he muttered, and then Sam raised her eyebrows at him.

“Marla, do you have your camera on hand?” he asked her.

“No, it's back home in Hell's Kitchen.”

“Damn.”

“Why?” Marla frowned at him. Sam lowered her gaze to those spidery guitar player fingers right next to his coffee cup, and right next to her own hand. Thin and sparse, perfect for running along the neck of that little red guitar back at his parents' house.

“Well,” he started again with a bit of caution, “'cause if you did, I'd ask Sam here to hold my hand with me and you to take a picture for us. If he needs proof that his legal wife's sneaking around behind his back, then let's give it to him right now.”

“I think you're gonna need to do way more than to hold hands with her, Alex,” Marla pointed out. “Even when she said that she and Louie screwed around, he didn't buy into it once. At least as far as I could tell anyway.”

She sat back down next to Sam while Zelda called up someone, probably one of the girls back in Rhode Island. The three of them sat there in silence, when Marla turned her attention back to them.

“I have an idea,” she said in a low voice, “but it doesn't involve him, though.” She nodded at Alex.

“What're you thinking?” Sam asked her as she drummed her fingers on the top of the table.

“We go back to Hell's Kitchen—you know, it's four hour drive, so it's going to be real late by the time we get there but it'll be more than worth it, though. Like we get in the car and—and—” Marla closed her eyes.

“Yeah?”

“We go back there and—seeing as Chuck is with us, another Native American man—I do a little—” She ran her tongue over the edge of her top row of teeth.

“A little what?”

Marla nibbled on her bottom lip and then she made the shape of a woman's body with her index fingers and then she made a camera gesture thereafter.

“Marla,” Sam scoffed, albeit in a hushed voice.

“Well, what the hell else are we supposed to do, though, Sam? Especially since we're here right now, within range of Hell's Kitchen and my camera—” She flashed Alex a dirty look.

“Hey, sometimes the way is through, you know,” he pointed out as he took a sip of coffee.

“And be the other woman with Chuck and Tiffany?” Sam was horrified. “I don't think so.”

“Well, unless Joey wakes up any time soon, there's no way to do something straight up without crossing some lines and then showing it off to Bill to verify it. As far as he knows, you're a citizen of California now and therefore his official wife. He won, Sam. Unless you go to bed with Chuck and I catch you on camera all the while, that Bible thumping mother fucker won and you go back to Elsinore and undo everything Bel and I did to get you out of there.”

She sighed through her nose and she pulled in her fingers so she had her fist upon the table top.

“Time to put on your acting skills, Sam,” Marla told her with a wink. “C'mon—it's a four hour drive. The longer we stick around here, the later it'll be by the time we get home.”

Alex polished off the rest of his coffee and then, as Marla left a tip for the waitress, the three of them headed out of there right as Zelda hung up the phone.

“Rose is coming to get me,” she told them.

“Okay!” Marla replied. “So—good night for now.”

They exchanged embraces and then Marla led Sam and Alex back outside, where Chuck met up with them, out of breath and with a sheen of sweat on one side of his face.

“Where've you been?” Sam asked him.

“Looking for another phone,” he told her as he ran his fingers through his dark hair. “Not another one for at least a couple of blocks and the damned thing wasn't working.”

“Well, we're going back to Hell's Kitchen,” Marla announced to him, “I have an idea because Sam's still caught up in a little pickle with her insane counselor.”

“Oh, really?”

Sam herself then turned to Alex.

“By the way,” she started, “what were you going to tell me a little bit ago?”

“On what?” he asked her.

“You know when we were talking about glass and coming back here to New York, and how traveling is hard and whatnot,” she recalled. “You were going to say something to me. Whatever I wanted to do and then you got cut off. Ring any bells?”

He paused and then his face lit up.

“Oh, yeah! I was gonna tell you that whatever you wanna do—I'm behind you on it.”

“Really?”

“Yeah.” Even in the afterglow from the cafe behind them and the streetlights before them, she could see the thoughtful look on his face. She sniffled again and she flashed back to when he rescued her from the side of the road.

“Aw.”

“Besides,” he continued with a shrug of his shoulders and a shift of his weight, “after what happened with Joey earlier, you're going to kinda need that, too. That type of support. I'm sure Marla and Belinda would give it to you, too. But—you know. The more, the merrier.”

“Thank you, Alex, that—that means a lot to me.” She showed him a little smile and she could feel the tears coming on once more.

“Hey, it's just like when I picked you up from the side of the road a couple of months ago. I'm just doing what I can.”

“Hey, kids!” Chuck called out to them. “Think the snow's coming, I feel it!”

“Oh, shit! Yeah, let's get a move on...” Alex and Sam ran to the car together, and he stayed right behind her in the back seat on the four hour ride back to New York City. Even if the snows came in right then, Sam knew that she could rely on friends now.

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capricornsicle · 4 years

Note

I have a feeling your ask box and I are going to be familiar. You might be hot-taked out after that killer Satomi discourse. But whenever you’ve got it in you, I’d sure love to hear what you think about Kira and her Jeff-deemed-absolutely-necessary departure.

Oh, definitely. And I do love content, so...

Kira Yukimura was done so dirty by the writers and Jeffrey “I’m not racist I’ll prove it by arguing to poc calling me out for it on twitter” Davis. Her treatment was racist, tokenizing, and it wasn’t even high-brow racism. It was sloppy and lazy. If you’re gonna write all your characters of color off the show, commit to it. She went to the desert like 5 times before she stayed. Cowards.

Kira was only meant to be on the show for the Nogitsune storyline in 3b. However, fans liked her so much that, as with Theo in season 6, she was brought back for more episodes. The difference is that Cody Christian is white-passing and male and Arden Cho is not. Female characters don’t exist on Teen Wolf without a relationship to a male character. Hayden existed for Liam. Tracy existed for Theo. Melissa existed for Scott and Argent. Allison existed for Scott. Lydia, the female character with the most screentime of all of them, spent a lot of her time existing in relationship to Jackson, Stiles, Parrish (shudder), and other male main characters. Women on the show were reduced to love interests and mothers more often than not, and Kira was the same.

I loved her character. I loved her arc. I loved Arden Cho, who in real life is as sweet and kind as her character. I enjoyed her parents, both Noshiko, who’s surprisingly funny and a total badass, and Ken, who’s the most wholesome man in the universe. The only straight man we stan. I love him.

Anyways, Kira was getting a fun arc outside of being Scott’s girlfriend, with her parents and her powers and all, and then wham, white-passing boy shows up and no more main character status for Kira. Guess there wasn’t enough room to keep the only interesting plot line of all the ones happening in s5. Personally, I would have chosen Kira over the Marrish garbage fire of underage relationships, but that’s just me.

Then. The Skinwalkers. I could write a whole essay about them, but this is a Kira post, so I’ll limit it to her. At least Luther got sent to the moon for a reason. Kira got sent to the desert for “rEaSoNs”. There was no indication that her power was out of control, but every indication it wasn’t. She was growing and learning. Then, suddenly, she was “too powerful” so she had to go to the desert and disappear for a few episodes and then go back and forth for a while before they wrapped up sending Theo to the upside down or wherever he went and she could finally go... hang out with the people who we were told could help her control her power but who only threw spears at her and gave her a season finale ex machina. Then back to the desert with you!

You can tell something was going on backstage in her treatment. Arden Cho wasn’t informed she was being cut, she had to be told by fans. Her departure was carried out as swiftly as possible, and not for any real reason. Kira would have been tremendously helpful against the hunters and in a lot of later scenes, against the Ghost Riders (and let me remind everyone that KIRA WAS THE ONE WHO TOLD LYDIA ABOUT THE WILD HUNT), against pretty much anything. Immune to electrocution? Don’t help with the hunters who love electrocuting people. Sloppy writing through and through.

And what’s more is that Kira was cut just in time for the Scalia thing, which was so fucking rushed oh my GOD nothing has ever been less natural- this is a Kira post, calm down capsicle. Anyways, Kira got replaced as Scott’s love interest and not much else by a white girl, no hate on Malia or Shelley but much on the writers. I loved Malia and Kira’s friendship, and if anyone should have gotten with Malia, it should have been Kira. (The first time I saw Malia I wondered if we were getting another ambiguously brown character, actually, but no, just Georgian and well-tanned. But I bet not all my followers knew Tracy was played by a Chinese and Cherokee actor. Or that Nolan was played by a Mexican and Caxcan actor. Or that Theo was played by a Penobscot Native actor. The list goes on of white-passing POC who got to stay marginally longer than Black or brown characters.) The “Scott ends up with a white girl he has no chemistry with” threw me for many loops, especially after I was surprised to find myself liking Scira, even though I’m usually bored by straight relationships because of their one-sided focus and nonexistent chemistry. Kira got to be a character outside of Scott, and I liked their romance better for it, and then desert for a thousand years!

TLDR on the canon end of things is that Kira and Arden were done dirty by a group of powerful white men who wanted to tell a cishet white story.

Now, on the fandom end of things, I’m stepping into the real hot water. It’s safe to say that Kira’s story was sloppy and Arden didn’t deserve that ending, but it’s less safe to say that this fandom doesn’t treat her that well either. Here’s the most popular x Scott ships on Ao3, under the Teen Wolf tag with no other filters.

Scott and Allison. Scott and Stiles. Scott and Isaac. Then Scott and Kira, in dead last. Scott and Malia don’t even make the top ships list, probably because of how rushed and sloppy it was, but I digress.

People love Scott and Allison a lot, and I get that. I liked her too. I was also sad when she died. But, unlike a lot of sentiment I see in this fandom, I don’t think she should have been brought back to fight the beast in season 5 and get back with Scott. Not only do I think bringing characters back to life without very good reason and explanation (which they wouldn’t have, come on) cheapens their death, and that bringing characters back to life is weak storytelling in general, but let’s recall that Scira is still a thing in season 5. They’re still madly in love when Kira leaves. Allison should not have come back and love-triangled so Kira could be written off for a different white girl or so the massive amount of young white girls in the fandom who love Allison would be angry at Kira for breaking up their OTP. That would have been the one thing that could have made season 5 worse. (Well, they could have made Marrish a thing or killed Mason, but Jeff Davis thought about it and a shiver went down his spine because the ghost of Christmas future hears my name in its nightmares.)

Even if people aren’t “bring Allison back” campers, they largely ignore Kira’s entire existence. People who post gifsets and posts about Allison or Lydia don’t give anywhere near the same amount of attention to Kira. I see more Malia posts, actually. And while all of them had more runtime than Kira, none of them paired with Scott quite as perfectly, or had such strong independent storylines. Lydia almost did, but it kept petering out and she kept going back to main plot only. I see lots of appreciation posts for Allison and Lydia and Malia and the men, obviously, but NOTHING for Kira or Arden Cho. We all know what happened backstage because we read the same post in 2016 or whenever and then we all stopped talking about it.

Even the racism in this fandom skips Kira. Scott antis, I’m looking (controversially) at you. I’m glad Kira isn’t the subject of a bunch of obvious racism (as much as “bring Allison back!” makes it subtle), but not because she’s a forgotten side character. Kira made the main credit sequence! She has a sword! What else could you all POSSIBLY want?

And here’s where I burn at the stake: Kira was written off her own damn “look Fun Japanese mythology” storyline half the time so it could center around Stiles. A white boy. There were numerous issues with the mythology before that — “Oni” means demon, not “firefly samurai ninja”, and it refers to a similar mythology as the western “fae”, a large collection of creatures benevolent, malevolent, and in between, with different traits and origins. Kitsunes are meant to be red or white, not gold, and they’re foxes, not cats, animation team. “Nogitsune” refers to the malevolent class of “low” Kitsune, or “wild” Kitsune, who didn’t align themselves with the goddess Inari and do divine and pious work. There are many of them and the most they really do is harass people at shrines, not murder indiscriminately for funsies. They’re only malevolent in that they like doing bad deeds, not that they’re serial killers. And they’re not one of the usual 13 low Kitsune, two of which are bad of their own accord! (Spirit and Air. Google it!) They are meant to be dealt with by Inari-aligned high Kitsune, not your average tricky fox. Among other things.

So Stiles. Outside of the Kira storyline, he’s used in a lot of fandom discourse about racism and sexism. And queerbaiting. Y’all love a scrawny white boy. Anyways, Stiles gets possessed by the Nogitsune (that’s NOT how that works but okay Jeffrey) and suddenly s3 is about him. Kira’s not evil, now let’s look at Stiles being tired and messy and killing people. Dylan #1 did a great job playing that part, no hate on him, but the fact that a white boy became the main character in a Japanese (or Korean, if you’re Jeff, same thing) girl’s storyline is. Hmm. How do you call it? Blatant racism. And erasure. Which is racism. YIKES, Jeff. There is so much wrong with Stiles being the Nogitsune and controlling the Oni and his whole story (and oh my god the other guy who got possessed was also a white boy instead of a Japanese character played by the same actress Jesus fucking Christ). I’m not going into that, because that’s its own essay.

Anyways, because of how much this fandom loves Stiles, it’s easy to ignore how Kira and Japanese characters were treated. People project onto Stiles with glee. He’s white. He’s awkward. He’s (supposedly) not super attractive. (Yikes.) He’s ditzy and bouncy and all that fun stuff, but he also always saves the day. He got written off for most of 6b and he still saved the stupid day. And hey, dark!Stiles (let’s not get into calling him dark instead of Nogitsune that’s just too much wine we’d have to crack open to say it) is a fun trope and people like posting and creating about him. Except that he’s the white boy who took Kira’s storyline. Her independent story about Kitsune and the like was all given over to him, not just by the show, but by the fandom. So now every post about Kitsune is a Stiles post, even if it started with Kira. And because it’s Stiles, and this fandom loves him, and is easily offended by people leaning too hard on the glass house around them and him, Kira gets forgotten and swept aside. Everyone would rather talk about Stiles. Who is incapable of bad. Or cultural appropriation. But if you attack him you’re being ableist because he has ADHD. This is why I relate to Nolan for anxiety feels instead.

TLDR on the fandom end, y’all don’t treat Kira better than the show did. I see a few posts here and there from some dedicated users — typically the same people posting about Boyd, Deaton, Morrell, yeah that’s it I’m the only one posting about Kali. (Un-fun fact: Kali was not played by an Indian actor, but by a half-Black actor. Jeff Davis, when called out on twitter, said “wow ok idiots we tried to find an Indian actress but it was hard actually SUPER hard so shut up and stop telling me how to write MY show”, which is paraphrasing with intent to make fun, but exactly what he said.) Y’all who know about Arden and Kira should diversify your blogs to include more POC, especially ones where the actor AND character were rudely sidelined for vague white people reasons. Post gifs of Kira along with Allison, Lydia, and Malia. Post ship stuff of Scira too. Post about kitsunes, the origin story of the Nogitsune, when you post about the white boy who became the main character of that arc. Call the show out. Call the fandom out. Stop making every bit and piece of her story about Czechoslovakia White Boy. Demand Kira in any future runs of the show, if season 7 or whatever does happen. Include her in your fanfictions, in your headcanons, in your art. You don’t have to love her, but you have to remember that she’s as there as any of the white characters are.

This take is very hot. If I receive racist asks and/or messages about this, I’m going to make fun of each and every sender.

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mysterioh · 4 years

Text

The Ignorant Beauty & The Beast of New York - Ch. 18

PAIRING: MOB!STEVE ROGERS X READER

SYNOPSIS: You love biology. The study of life excites you. But you hate people. Especially the ones that like to stick their nose in your business. Too bad the King of Brooklyn didn’t get the memo.

WARNINGS: Light Depictions of Gore. Mentions of Child Abuse.

MASTERLIST

An Eye for an Eye

You hiss at first contact with the alcohol wipe against your chin.

“It’s deeper than it looks,” Steve stated, gently dabbing at the dried blood.

“Can you not press on it so hard?”

“I gotta clean it, babe, or it’ll get worse,” he replies, his motions growing faster.

“But it hurts,” you whine.

Steve rolls his eyes affectionately. “What are you two or twenty-two?”

“Don’t sass me, Rogers,” you warn him with a lovely pout.

He chuckles in reply. “I wouldn’t even dare.”

He throws the stained wipe into the trash bin and begins searching through the box of bandaids for a size suitable to cover the wound.

Your eyes fall onto the newspaper, left on his desk in a hurry, and frowned.

“They’ve painted me as if I’m some whore,” you said. “Like I’m your mistress or something.”

Steve stops his searching and frowns. “You know that’s not true,” he shakes his head.

“I know,” you mumbled, “but the rest of the world doesn’t know that.”

He lifts your chin with his hand. “Hey, don’t worry, alright? I’ll fix this,” he assures. “Everything’s gonna be fine and as time passes it’ll pass as well.”

You smile with a nod, believing in him.

“Quentin called,” you told him.

Steve groans audibly, ripping the band-aid open.

“He says, he’s going to break your pretty nose if he ever sees you again,” you informed him with a smug grin.

He shakes his head in amusement. “Is my nose really that pretty?”

“I don’t know,” you shrugged, “I think it’s kinda cute.”

“I’ll make sure to never run into him again,” he pledges, aligning the bandage with the cut on your jaw. “Still don’t get why he hates me so much.”

“I think it has something to do with stealing away his best friend.”

He shrugs his arms smugly. “Not my fault, he should’ve done a better job at keeping watch. Did he really think I was gonna let a girl as pretty as her slip out of my fingers?”

You punch him lightly on the chest. “You flatter me, really.”

His chuckles fill the air as he presses his palms to either side of your seat on his desk and leans in close. “It’s not flattery if it’s true,” he crooned.

You fall shy by his words, but not shy enough to not return his affection with a sweet kiss on the lips. You part from him and it leaves him hungry for more. He cups the side of your face in his hand and pulls you closer for another kiss. He stops when he hears his phone ring.

He pulls it out of his pocket to find a message from Natasha.

Found something. You know where to find me.

Steve’s jaw tightens as he slips the phone back into his pocket. He gives you an easy smile then a kiss.

“I’ve gotta go,” he grabs his jacket off the chair by the fire.

“Where are you going?” you asked, getting off his desk.

“Nowhere, just some unfinished business,” he puts his jacket on while making his way to the front door. “I’ll be back soon.”

Before he leaves he turns to you and takes your hands in his.

“I want you to stay here until I figure things out. Do me a favor and try to relax?” he suggests, “It’s been a long day. Watch a movie and empty my fridge if you’d like.”

You laugh at his words. “You act like I won’t do that already.”

He opens the door behind him. “I’ll see you later.”

Just before he leaves, you reach up and give him a kiss on the cheek.

“Be safe.”

It was dusk by the time Steve reached the warehouse in the Bronx. Parking his car, he walks out to find Natasha waiting for him at the door.

She gives him her signature smirk and a wave as he walks up to her.

"How is Y/N?" she asks, entering the desolate building.

"She's fine,” Steve informs. "Just a bit tired."

Nat shoots a devilish grin in his direction. "I see you two have been getting along rather nicely,” she teases, "compared to before that is."

"I don't know, maybe it has something to do with her being my girlfriend now?" he retorts with a playful lilt to his voice.

Nat shrugs indifferently and shakes her head. "Still don't know how you managed to do it,” she cackled. "Personally, I find you unappealing,” she deadpans, opening the door to a room. "but hey? There's someone for everyone. Am I right?"

Steve sighs deeply as he enters. "Some days you can be such a jerk."

The room is sparse with nothing more than a single light hanging from the ceiling and a man tied to a chair in the center. He twists and turns in his chair, shouting incoherent words that were muffled by the duct tape plastered along his lips.

She chortles at his remark. "I feel like you wanted to use a much stronger word."

Steve smirks at the sight before him then turns to Natasha with a dashing smile.

"I'm a gentleman, Natasha, and I treat women with respect."

She rolls her eyes. "As charming as ever, Rogers,” she replies, yanking the tape of the man’s mouth mercilessly. His face stretches in pain from the sudden burn on his skin.

"YOU ASSHOLES HAD ME TIED UP IN A WAREHOUSE FOR FIVE HOURS,” Pietro shouts at the two.

Steve laughs heartily before taking his jacket off.

Natasha brings her hands together. “Now that we’re all here. I suggest we get started,” she proposes, her skin glowing with excitement. This was her favorite part of being in the mob.

"Ladies first,” Steve motions towards her and then to Pietro.

"Hi, nice to meet you. My name is Natasha,” she introduces herself to Pietro.

"I know who you are,” he snarls at her. He looks up at Steve fearlessly. "You're the kingpin."

"My friend and I would like to talk to you about your crimes against the Brooklyn Mob,” Natasha states.

Pietro looks at them as if they’re crazy. He whips his head back and forth between the two like a mad man.

"Crimes? Against the Brooklyn Mob? You've gotta be fucking joking me!” he shouts "Let me go! I did nothing wrong!" He shakes violently in his chair.

The two ignore his cries and continue.

"Number One: Defamation of Character,” Natasha states.

"I hope you've realized this but my "mistress" isn't a mistress,” Steve informs Pietro, rolling up his sleeves so he doesn’t get them dirty. He looks down at Pietro and his jaw tightens at the sight of him. He feels like ripping the boy’s head off.

Pietro gulps involuntarily at his words. He knows he’s not going to get out of this one. His eyes boldly meet Steve’s but fall quickly. “She's my girlfriend and a top student at Columbia. So your garbage publication can be rather damaging for her future,” he jeers.

"I didn't write the article!" Pietro explains. "I just gave the information!"

"To who?" Steve takes a step closer to him.

"I don't know who he was,” he shakes his head. "I met him at some bar. I swear. I didn’t do anything,” he rambles frantically.

"I want a name, now,” Steve grits.

"I don't remember his name,” Pietro repeats harshly.

Steve’s fist connects with Pietro's jaw. He groans from the pain. Without a warning, Steve punches him again, this time in the center of his face, then another at his left.

Blood pools inside of Pietro’s mouth as he sees stars in his vision.

"Stop!” he groans, “I think–I think it was Strucker,” he wails. "He's this bald guy with a scar on his face. I didn't know he would blow it up like this."

Steve turns to Natasha and asks her a question with his eyes.

You know who he’s talking about?

She shakes her head then continues.

"Two: Obstruction of Privacy."

"You had the gall to take pictures of us and spread them all over the city,” Steve barked, slamming his fist straight into his nose.

The sharp sound of cracking bone bounces off the walls of the room. The only one that winces is Pietro himself. His head drops forward and he takes painfully heavy breaths, his mind spinning from all the blows.

“Three: Exploitation."

Steve holds his chin and yanks him forward harshly. Pietro whimpers in his grasp. Blood drips from the corner of his busted lip. Splotches of purple and blue cover his once clear pale skin.

"You used my girl for a bit of extra cash,” Steve growls at him. “You put her on the map for everyone to see. How does it feel knowing you’ve put an innocent woman in danger?”

Pietro looks at the kingpin through half-lidded eyes. His lips form a weak smile and it only pisses Steve off more. “Did you really think you could keep her hidden forever?” he drawls, “If I didn’t do it, someone else would.”

Steve pushes him back. “And now that you have, I think you deserve retribution for your services.”

Nat takes a step forward. She takes his bruised face into her hand and turns it left to right, examining Steve’s work. She stands straight and makes her edict. "After being found guilty by the representative of the mob, I allow Mr. Rogers to do with you as he pleases."

Steve smiles wickedly. He kicks Pietro’s chair and it hits the wall, keeping him at a slant.

"Wait! Stop!” He fights against his restraints as Steve hovers over him. “I'm sorry!"

"You know what they say,” Steve said, tongue dripping with venom, eyes red like a demon’s.

“An eye for an eye."

Steve shuffles quietly in the garage, toeing off his shoes, he enters the house and heads straight for the laundry room.

He takes off his bloodied shirt, throws it in the hamper, and grabs a fresh one from the closet of the room. Pulling it on, he exits the room and glides along the marble tiles of the manor.

He follows the sounds of low murmurs and flashing lights of the television coming from the living room. The image he finds is more than endearing. You’re snuggled deep into the couch with Lucky digging into your side and a blanket over the both of you.

Steve walks over, mindful to keep his movements quiet. He turns off the television then lifts the blanket gently. Lucky jolts quickly, growling lowly at the dark figured man.

Steve chuckled quietly, calming the dog down. “Shh, Lucky, it’s just me,” he scratches the fur around his chin. The puppy yips quietly and jumps off the couch. “Good boy.”

Steve slid his arms underneath you and took you into his arms. Lucky follows closely behind him as he walks out of the room and up the stairs. Moonlight streams through the grand windows that run along the curve of the grand staircase, casting a nightly shade onto your sleeping form.

He walks into one of the many spare rooms and tries to lift the blankets to put you in. “Sorry for manhandling you,” he whispers while gently placing you on the bed. Lucky hops onto the bed from the other side and takes his spot next to you.

“What about me?” Steve whined.

Lucky simply shimmies closer to you, making Steve grunt indignantly.

“Some “man’s best friend” you are.”

Your footsteps grow heavy with every step up the stairs towards the house. Reciting a silent prayer, you open the squeaking front door and walk inside.

Your lips curl into a grin when you find the living room empty. You tiptoe your way up the stairs to your room.

“Where have you been?”

A gruff, mean voice comes from behind you, making you stop in your tracks. You turn around slowly, heartbeat steadily increasing.

Your father stands at the end of the stairs. A can of beer in one hand with the other holding onto the banister. His hair was messy, his flannel shirt unbuttoned to show his white undershirt underneath. Paint stained his washed-out blue jeans along with his boots. He lifts a brow at you, expecting an answer.

“I-I missed the bus today,” you explained. “So I had to walk.”

“Bullshit,” he growls.“You’re lying to me, aren’t you? You think you can fool me?” he barks, throwing the can away.

Your eyes shut tight at the sound of the metal rattling against the floor.

“I’m telling the truth,” you insisted, body shaking under his icy gaze. He pulls you down the steps roughly by the arm. You almost slip by the way he tugs on your arm.

“You were with that boy again, weren’t you?” he asked, slamming you against the wall.

“I wasn’t,” you shake your head, eyes plagued with fear.

“Didn’t I tell you to stay away from him?” he scolded.

“But he’s my friend,” you whimper under him.

“You don’t need friends,” he hurls. The thick smell of cheap beer lingers in his mouth. “You don’t need anyone.” His grip on your wrist grows tighter.

You tug at his hand over yours, tears brimming at the edge of your eyes. “Please stop,” you choke out, “It hurts.”

He takes your face into his hand and brings it close to his. “Listen here, you little bitch, when I tell you to come home on time. I mean on time,” he spat, “If I ever find you late again or with that boy, I will not be nice.”

Your jaw tightens to keep yourself from screaming as tears start to stream down your cheeks. Your eyes part from his and catch the opened front door, tempting you to make a risky decision. You weren’t bold enough to retaliate against him. But with freedom only a few feet away, you had to take a chance.

You bite the hand holding your face making him curse in pain and dash towards the door. Only to be pulled back by your backpack.

“Where the fuck do you think you’re going?” he barks, veins popping out of his skin. “You think you can get away?” he turns you around and shakes you violently. His face was red and all up in yours. “You can try running away all you want, but in the end, you’re coming right back to me,” he grits, emphasizing each word. “No matter where you go, I will find you!”

You jolt quickly in bed, heaving deep breaths. You rub your face with your hands and sit still, trying to take even breaths to calm the rapid beat of your heart.

It was just a dream.

He’s gone.

He’s not coming back.

A soft whimper rises from your left and you turn to find Lucky by your side You smile at him and cup his face into your hands. “I’m fine, buddy.” You slip out of the bed and motion him to follow you.

“Let’s go find, Stevie,” you whisper, opening the door and walking into the hall. Your footsteps are soft, careful to not make the floorboards creak. They don’t do that in this house and even if they did no one would yell at you for it, but habits are hard to forget.

You open the door to Steve’s room slowly, hoping it wouldn’t wake him. Tiptoeing your way over to his sleeping form, you gently tap his arm.

"Steve," you whisper, shaking his arm. "Steve?"

His eyes flutter open. "Huh?” he whispers groggily, propping himself up with his elbow. “Y/N, is everything all right?"

You tug and twist the end of your shirt, completely red. "Is it okay, if I sleep with you?" you asked, "I-I don't want to be alone right now. It’s just this house is too big and—”

"I don’t mind." he smiles with sleepy eyes.

You smile before running over to the other side of the bed and getting under the covers. You scoot over to him, closer than he was expecting, and snuggle deep into his side. A light blush forms on his cheeks and he’s thankful that the room is dark. You take his free arm and wrap it around yourself.

"Good night," you mumble against his shoulder.

He chuckles, getting himself comfortable, lips brushing against your forehead. "Sweet dreams,” he wishes before pressing a soft kiss to your head.

The rest of your dreams that night were far sweeter than most others.

TAGLIST (CLOSED): @ashwarren32 @rootcrop @siriusement @savedbystark @little-dark-empress @great-goddess-of-sin @boxofteenageideas @imsonick @scuzmunkie @achishisha @calwitch @chuckennuggets1213 @captainchrisstan @thirstybunz @littlebees-things @voltage-my2dlove @booktease21 @rinkashirikitateku @harleyscheekheart @allegra-writes @iced-capsicle @eliza5616 @bookgirlunicorn @murdermornings @fckdeusername @illbethethundertoyourlightning @kaetastic @windshieldlaughjin @mccrps @undiadeestos

#steve rogers x reader #mob!steve rogers x reader #mobster steve rogers x reader #steve rogers x you #steve rogers x y/n #steve rogers imagine #mob!steve rogers x you #mob au #mafia steve rogers x reader #mafia!steve

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quietest-rebellion · 4 years

Note

Do the chaos household for that character meme you coward

Me upon realizing I have to explain what that is

Basically it's the idea of my fav murder boys having to live together. This being Stefano, Eddie, and Higgs. @christmasace and I came up with this one night and it has been our main source of serotonin since.

I'm going to do the character break downs for them in the context of their original games though. So anyway, buckle in, lads, this'll be a long one. (Eddie and Higgs will be below the cut)

Stefano Valentini

How I feel about this character

Fav. Favest of favs. I would willingly die for this man in a heartbeat. His voice? Beautiful. His personality? Snarky. His art? Breath taking. The way that he has to fix his hair after getting shot with a smoke bolt? Hilarious. Me? I'm in love. Also the fact he put jokes outside of the theater is iconic. Anyway, Stefano was an appealing character from the moment I first saw him in Markiplier's playthrough. I didn't realize I'd fallen until I started crying at his death and Mark was like "I don't even feel a little bad!" Because then I was like "oh shit why am I crying" Also I believe Stefano is an undiagnosed autistic man with horrible PTSD and brain damage(obviously) and I will die on this hill. I could talk about how I feel about Stefano for pages but I won't right now.

All the people I ship romantically with this character

Me. Honestly I feel like Stefano is either an asexual aromantic, who only cares about his art, or he is a raging bisexual who is extremely picky with men since he himself is such a perfect man. As for actual ships though, I feel like Stefano is attracted to Sebastian and flirts with him throughout the game. I just don't really see the idea of Sebastian flirting back. 🤷🏻‍♀️ Emily Lewis. I love the idea of them being in a relationship, official or unofficial, and then things went south and he killed her. Stefano killed a lot of people before being put into STEM, why was this one so special he had to make a series of displays representing her? I don't know, just my thoughts.

My non-romantic OTP for this character

This is gonna sound weird, but I guess Theodore? Look, I just love the idea of Stefano driving Theodore insane and making him regret ever hiring him. And like, all the memes everyone makes about it? Amazing. (A personal favorite, also the one that I made) Plus, "You are special. You've always been special." Yeah, anyway I really need to know what the other half of that conversation was. Does Obscura count? I think she does. I see Stefano and Obscura's relationship being like that of a father and daughter or of a pet and an owner. He just loves her so much and he's so snippy when Sebastian gets to the theater the first time. "You did not appreciate my beautiful Obscura's performance." I imagine if you actually chose to fight and kill her in Ch. 7 he was really upset about it. Guardian is along the same lines as Obscura but I think Obscura has a higher place in his mind. 1. Because she is a camera and takes more photos for him. 2. There is confirmed to be more than one Guardian so he probably doesn't grow overly attached to any particular one, where there is only one Obscura. 3. Stefano seems to love whatever he did most recently the most, which is fair. As an artist, it really just Be Like That.

My unpopular opinion of this character

Unpopular only in the world of the game, but his art is good. Actual unpopular opinion? Not sure I have one, tbh.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon

I say it literally all the time but I really want a prequel comic or SOMETHING to tell us more about him as character. What happened to his family? Why did he come to America? What war was he injured in? Also the idea of him getting some dlc for the second game is still always on my mind, like, it could take place before and during the main game and it’s just us fucking around and making art and then catching Lily and fighting Sebastian. I am not gonna say that he didn’t deserve to die in canon, so really I wouldn’t change that.

Eddie Gluskin

How I feel about this character

Look... uh... I honestly am not sure how to describe my feelings for him. Because on one hand, is a misogynistic asshole who deserves literally everything that happened to him as an adult. But on the other hand, he was an abused child that grew into a hurt and sick adult. Also, when he’s not trying to kill you he is quite the gentleman. Basically, I love this character, but I have no idea why and am slightly ashamed about it.

All the people I ship romantically with this character

Literally no one. This man should not be in a relationship with any of the canon characters. I’d like to imagine an AU where he is sane and settled down with a wife and had 2.5 kids and lived together in their house with a white picket fence but that isn’t going to happen obviously.

My non-romantic OTP for this character

Look, I know they never interact with each other, but Eddie and Trager. And like, not as friends really but more as weird acquaintances. They talk about surgeries and such, share a drink every now and then, complain about women, etc.

My unpopular opinion of this character

He’s straight.

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon

I just wish he would’ve been sent to a place that could actually help him instead of Mt. Massive. But then he wouldn’t be in the game, lmao. ALSO, there is a lot of unused Eddie dialogue in the files for the game. I really wish that all of them would have actually been included in the game. Some gems include: “Did I...? Oh lord. I forgot to give you an anesthetic, didn’t I? Eddie, you doofus! Would forget my own head if it was screwed on!” (Timestamp 16:32) “There you go. No, no, don’t cry. You’re not dying. I’m going to make you better.” (Timestamp 10:13)

Higgs Monaghan

How I feel about this character

Garbage boy stink man. Just a rowdy, dirty boy. Pizza rat. Like, I sometimes have a difficult time imagining that he ran a company before he was a terrorist, because he doesn’t seem like a very organized person. Higgs is so multifaceted it’s impressive. In the game we only really get to see him a this asshole who wants to end the world. In his journals we see his hunt for power and want to be important. In his bunker we see the organized chaos of how his brain worked and how he operated his life. Not to mention the Peter Englert emails that are so well written. Anyway, I love him. Plus I’m gonna mention something my sister(Thrushheart) pointed out when I was having her watch me play. He is the exact opposite of Sam. Examples: Sam hates being touched or touching people. Higgs is touching people as often as he can, including but not limited to even licking them. Sam is reconnecting the world, at first for Amelie, then for everyone he’s met along the way. Higgs is ending the world, at first for Amelie, then for himself(or possibly still for Amelie). Higgs is loud and bombastic while Sam is more quiet and reserved. Sam is smol and Higgs is tol.

All the people I ship romantically with this character

Look, I’m not gonna say that I do or do not ship Goldenbridges. I’m not sure how I feel about it because, as I said, Higgs and Sam are such contrasting personalities I don’t think it would work. Fragile. Okay, okay, I know what you’re thinking, but I imagine they were together before he met Amelie. His betrayal would mean even more if this was true. And in his journals he only ever refers to Fragile as “his partner.” Now I know this was done to hide that they were his journals and because they were work partners, but it could also mean more. And of course we can’t forget the somber and clear writing, directly over his bed in his bunker. “Fragile forget you ever met me.” And how surprised he was to see her on the beach after the fight. The sad look he gave her as she caressed his face. Aaahhhh.

My non-romantic OTP for this character

I wasn’t sure whether to include Higgs relationship with Amelie here or in the last section. But he quite literally worshiped her and the ground she walked on so 🤷🏻‍♀️ I don’t feel like she ever really gave a fuck about him though. Amelie is extremely manipulative and proves that every time she opens her mouth so I have no doubt she told him whatever he wanted to hear so that he would help her.

The Veteran Porter. If you worked hard enough to get more than one star with this guy, you learn that he used to work for Higgs and that’s why he is reluctant to trust the UCA. I like to think that he and Higgs were good buddies before Amelie.

My unpopular opinion of this character

With likable villains it’s hard to figure what is a popular opinion and what is not. So I’m really not sure. Maybe just that he didn’t get enough screen time?

One thing I wish would happen / had happened with this character in canon

Redemption ark! Redemption ark! Higgs is the one guy on this list where I’m like, “Okay, he saw the error in his ways. Maybe he gets a second chance.”

______________________________________________________________

Anyway, that’s all of them! If you actually read this whole thing, first of all... wow. Second of all, thanks! Here is a screenshot of these chaos boys from The Sims 4 as your reward.

#christmasace #asks #anon #stefano valentini #martina talks about tew #martina talks #eddie gluskin #higgs monaghan #this reminds me that I need to make the post about the sims ones that I made #yes we actually have a house where they're all living together on the sims #long post

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douxie-casperan · 3 years

Note

[✂, ↕?]

The prompt below was specifically requested to be the Heart of Glass AU and features the Bad End! The second prompt will be done at a future date.

↕ - A memory that may or may not have happened

Looking back on it the signs were there of something being wrong that couldn’t be seen being blind as they had been. Things like how Nari slowly began to close herself off haunted with sadness that they couldn’t remember seeing there before but it was evident in her eyes. She must have been hurting so much but kept putting on a brace face anyway to not make them worry and always brushing off any attempts to ask until the questions simply stopped coming. Everyone deserved privacy right? They just figured it was something that would sort it’s self out but within days of the last time they ever spoke to her she simply vanished into the night almost as though she was simply holding on that little bit longer for one of the erratic visits to come. It didn’t make the sting any less painful when word came months later when even Skrael and Bellroc began to worry over her absence. There have been more than a few sleepless nights spent wondering where she is, what she was doing, if she was simply okay that were left unanswered.

They have three reminders of the trio of beings who took him in that they always carried with them, one is etched in ink, there is the staff they love dearly even when keeping the existence of it a secret and finally the left hand which had been the first gift from Nari herself which had been carried for so many centuries of their life. This one let them be something more than useless that they would have been condemned to be otherwise making it was worth all the stares, the snide remarks and any problems it caused hundreds of times over. Now down to two, these almost felt haunted.

The other thing should have been a red flag right from the start but when you’re so traumatised and barely able to hold a thought together for more than a few seconds everything is taken at face value because beyond that is simply too much to bear. Archie confirmed she had been there to see them before Killahead while at the time they had been passed out with barely more than a handful of waking hours since it happened. She said that the Order had promised to keep the two of them safe and that she would return after ensuring that all of them would live without being in fear ever again. She wouldn’t of course, thanks to him they wouldn’t see one another again until they were living in the far-flung future of Arcadia not knowing that she was being held right beneath their feet plotting her own freedom with or without help.

Nothing comes for free; they knew that better than anyone yet never once thought to question what the price that had to be paid for such a promise to be had. It was spun to them as a means to prevent the extinction of magical beings at the behest of a mad king but it was far more than that wasn’t it? It was the ability to live without persecution being bought on the back of conquering the other to ensure it, never about restoring a balance already upset by the actions of one old man. It was so obvious and yet, and yet.

The blindfold was ripped away with a few simple words of clarifying truth and the anger it causes is barely contained any more than the magic desperate to lash out in retaliation against their own sister who stands there with helmet held in hands and a pleading expression in emerald eyes that he would somehow see her reasoning. A familiar dragon is perched on their shoulders glaring just as much bristled with a twitching tail and both can hear the echoes rattling about their brains repeating again and again of what led them here.

All of this was for you, all of it to make a world where nobody would have to suffer like you did! Gunmar is merely a means to an end for that paradise to finally come forth into reality.

At the cost of everyone else you mean, did you think for a second I'd ever want that?! Just because I suffered never meant I wanted anybody else to as well!

That was our deal, Douxie. If they would keep you both safe I would accept their power and become the Champion of Magic and right what my brother wrought against us, it was only a matter of time before we were all put to the sword and this was my one chance to finally make things right.

He's long gone! Bellroc felled him at the battle didn’t you know? His era is dead and the legacy he left drove everything underground but having a bunch of trolls running around eating people isn’t exactly going to fix everything. That’s not balance that’s genocide!

“… I’m gonna ask them myself, I want to hear the answer from them directly and if you really do care about what I think you’ll help clean up this mess you gave an open invite to instead of yanno going after the actual problem who is probably waiting for his grand moment,” is hissed whilst summoning their own staff to hand ready to use for a very specific spell reserved only for emergencies. What could be a bigger one than knowing?

“You’re older than me and I kinda liked to hope you would know better, Morgana. In case you missed the memo there’s only one person I have it out for and it sure as heck is not an entire planet full of people.”

The base is tapped and with a few whispered words a shimmering crack appears beside them that is barely visible except where the light catches the edges.

“Be better, please? Not exactly asking the world here but if I can avoid becoming jaded despite literally everything that has happened to me then I can’t see why you’re so determined to swan dive into it. I wanted you back so much, I’ve been trying so damn hard for so long to have that but right now I can’t really stand to even look at you if you can think this is remotely okay.”

“Douxie, please we can still fix this.”

They say nothing, merely giving her a soft smile before the two of them disappear beyond her reach with all the consequences she has wrought.

It was all true, Skrael said so himself. Oh it was attempted to be played as somehow being a mercy that they’d been kept in the dark this entire time, of how despite so much time there had been to tell the truth that went by wasted, the same amount that could have been used to change their minds and work towards a better solution they had instead sought out something even worse than what she’d unleashed on the world fancying a bit of annihilation on a far larger scale instead. It made their heart hurt so much, why did everyone think for even one second they’d be okay with it? Any of it? That somehow being allowed to pick favourites would somehow make it magically acceptable despite knowing people that mattered to them personally could be spared while the rest would be damned?

They said culls about us too remember? All for the greater good, just a few sacrifices and spare the lot, send them forth and you’ll go free. You sound like he did.

He was… cruel, and he used you, Hisirdoux. We kept you safe; we protected you. We didn’t force the weight of the world on your shoulders- you were a boy! A young boy! You never should have had so much pressed upon you! I was only ensuring that you wouldn’t have to feel that again! You do not deserve what happened to you. Not again. I will not take part in doing that to you, not like he did.

Why were they the only one who wasn’t completely blind to what they were all heralding?

And yet didn’t stop you lying to me did it? You can’t pull a greater good on me I’ve heard it all before. Different century and it’s the same garbage. I’m tired.

Just… Let us make this right, Hisirdoux. Please. You can rest, here, Hisirdoux. You can rest, now. And in the morning, we can make it right. I can make it right.

Just tell us what we need to do and we will do it! We can’t lose you too.

It was almost ironic that this was the one time it wasn’t his fault; really it was their own if anything for believing anybody could be better than that instead of being a simple flip of the same coin. If people ended up suffering for the greater good well now that was worth it for the result because they didn’t matter, not really being little more than unnamed masses. Even Nari, one of their own, was somehow seen as an acceptable bit of fallout in the name of a false balance despite knowing she would feel each and every one of those lives being wiped out… It must have hurt to look at them, an example of both why it had to be done and why it should never be, she might have even hoped their being there might convince her siblings to change, to realise the same thing too.

They would not it seem and continuing was slowly taking everyone else down with it. Douxie did tell them both that they hoped they might yet see reason, the why, and realise why they never should have been contemplating it in the first place, of not wanting to leave and how unless they change, well they might never see one another again so please don’t try to follow. Nari was not the only one who could disappear after all as was the downside of having a very good teacher in how to do it properly and took the lessons to heart. It was probably only Archie’s presence that gave them the strength to walk away without looking back instead of breaking down crying right there over the bitter losses that were totting up one after the other though admittedly the final hug very nearly pushed them over the edge. It felt like the picture-perfect description of bittersweet.

After that things are barely held together by the thinnest of threads while the apartment is cleaned out. Nothing of importance was ever kept there but there were some things that needed to be held onto and were added to their most precious belongings taken from their room at the fortress before the argument began as an unfortunately correct precaution. Afterwards there was a key to be handed in with the words of it was simply time to move in, one place would have a notice and an apology for the suddenness while the other gained a sign saying closed until further notice knowing that the coven would likely pick over the best bits like vultures the second permission is given but they won’t mind particularly because at least anything dangerous will be removed. Right now all they care about is getting out of Arcadia and as far away as possible from the life they’d carved out there and all the traces he had tainted it with. He who had swept in taking them from their first home offering a new beginning with a home and family just to back a tyrant a few years down the line leading them to their second one just for history to repeat it’s self again and leave them in complete free fall. No lost limbs this time though, a small upside if forced to find one.

After removing the card and destroying their phone to lessen any chance of being tracked the two of them took the motorbike that was as battered and bruised as they are and rode silently through the night not caring where they would end up because anywhere else would be more than they could hope for. It’d been a while since they were last forced to rough it but they’d manage because if Douxie and Archie were anything it was survivors in a world that hated them for it and there was a lot of practice between times able to settle for any length of time. It would take three days before they felt there was enough distance to feel safe enough for risk a temporary break. The place was cheap but private having no problem with a cat companion and they were surprisingly fine about the request for a few more pillows in their room. That might have been the charm offensive and sheer exhaustion helping sell the need for it mind, was hard to tell.

Piling them up in a circle on the floor with a few blankets that had been pilfered including a few special ones that were very old, they simply flop onto them and then finally, finally allow the tears come that are without any sign of being able to stop. Within a few choked breaths a purring shape manoeuvres himself into their arms only to become louder from how tightly he’s being squeezed while a face is buried into his fur. They miss how the brand-new phone bursts into life until a voice that they felt they hadn’t heard in forever comes from it.

“Doux? Hey is that you? The hell are you I’ve be- There’s a pause upon catching the sound of someone trying to cry their heart out and her tone instantly becomes an awful lot more worried.

“Hey, hey are you okay did something happen?”

At first there is little more than the sound of snivelling and a mumbled nonsensical apology repeated over and over. She waits patiently, trying to soothe as little as she can while trapped on the other side of the speaker not even able to see what’s going on. There’s a few hiccups and stuttered starts before she finally gets the answer and of all the things in the world she could have expected this was not one of them.

“I- It happened a-again… Zoe, I, I’ve lost everything. You, you are Archie a-are all I’ve got left.”

#flamekeeperbellroc #No facts truer than a good meme #Heart of Glass

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dontasktheradiodemon · 3 years

Text

Gardens #2 (1/6/2021)

Click here if you’re like “What the heck is this about?”

Two chats today because I forgot to post one yesterday!

Angel @sluttyspiderpolkacock catches up with Madame @usedhearts after his abrupt arrival from Hell. He talks to her about his hopes to get away from Valentino and she offers support.

Madame

The gardens had drawn her away from the beach-- as much as she loved the sea, she missed this. She missed life, growing and sprawling, curated into beauty.

Madame sat at the fountain, her tentacles trailing in the water as she admired the plants. It was different from how she remembered Earth's flora, but it was flora all the same, and she loved it.

She adjusted her top, still in her bikini but with an added sarong around her hips, and leaned to smell a flower. "It's so lovely here," She muttered to herself.

Angel

" Big Mama, ya up here, too? " It was easy to see her, towering over the bushes and gracing the flowering vines from the trees, despite being seated. Angel's own willowy form almost could've passed for a foxtail.

He wove through her tentacles to come see her. " Valera's e'ry bit the butterfly, ain't they? " Arms in a welcoming spread, he flashed her a bright smile. " It's good t' see ya ~ "

Madame

Her head turned when she heard him and her face brightened into a beaming smile.

"Oh, Angel, darlin'! I'm so glad t' see ya, c'mere 'n give Mama a hug." A tentacle caught him around the waist to pull him into her arms, too excited to let him walk the rest of the way to her. She wrapped her arms around him and smooched the side of his face.

"Thought you'd be at that shindig with Big V. How'd you sneak away, sweetheart?" She held his face gently in one hand, gently stroking his cheek with her thumb.

Angel

Angel smiled sweetly, giddy and the smallest bit shy with her affections but welcoming them with a tight hug in all his arms.

" I just got m'self a lil break, no biggie! They'll survive wit'out me just fine! They got Babygirl Paps an' the fluff girls takin' care a e'ryone. It's time the newbies got a chance t' shine, don't'cha think? "

His smile grew wide with an affectionate lean of his cheek. She was hitting JUST the spot and he was becoming PUTTY in her hands.

Madame

"Yeah, suppose yer right about that-- them new girls gotta learn sometime!" She laughed, taking one of Angel's hands and gently guiding him to sit next to her.

"Well, c'mon then, take a seat, get off ya gams, and tell me everythin'. How're ya, shug? How ya been likin' this whole palace we got to explore? Pretty schnazzy if ya ask me." She winked and very, very gently poked him with her elbow-- didn't want to hurt him, after all.

Angel

He almost fell off balance as her hand left his cheek and led him to his seat.

" I ain't seen e'rythin', but it's pretty fuckin' nice, " he said simply with a dip of his fingers into the fountain ( for no particular reason whatsoever ) , " I been workin' my ass into the ground all season. Everyday a huge fuckin' clusterfuck a shoots an' appointments... " Angel gave a roll of all his eyes as he mocked the tone of Valentino's voice.

" _Gotta churn out that fresh content, Angel Cakes ~ Camera ain't gonna eye - fuck itself, Angie Baby ~ If I don't see a chicken supreme in my office in five I'm gonna throw a BITCH FIT... SUMMER._ 'Cause y'know, he don't like me doin' the food runs. "

Madame

Her eyes roll at the Valentino impression. Yeah, that sounded like him. Madame shook her head, her large hand wrapping around Angel, rubbing his back.

"Course he don't want ya doin' the food runs-- fuckin' idiot thinks if he starves his workers, they'll look better when all it really does is make 'em give subpar work. How ya gonna entertain a John if ya really wanna just eat his burger insteada his dick?" She laughed, her head shaking again.

"Angel, darlin', he ever send ya out ta run an errand, come to me 'n I'll get a meal in ya. My babes ain't gonna starve on my watch-- can't rightly let 'em, breaks my poor Southern heart." She looked off into the distance and closed her eyes, wiping away a pretend tear.

Angel

Angel giggled and covered his mouth with a sly aversion of his eyes. " Y'know... sometimes dick be temptin'... " A snort, and his arms wildly fanned.

" I didn' even GAIN THAT MUCH! " he continued, " I ain't e'en said nothin' about livin' up the hotel and downin' everythin' Alastor whips like a fuckin, GARBAGE DISPOSAL, NO! I just go to Cherri's, post ONE picture, ONE TIME, of the CUTEST FUCKIN' DONUT...! "

Oh he was full on venting, now. He held up a finger and dug through his fluff a hot second. " An' he sends me THIS! " There he had it, The Book. " What kin'a palooka e'en uses these anymore?? Ya THINK he'd fuckin', hire a nutritionist or some shit who moonlights as a hitman, or some shit. He HAS the FUCKIN' MONEY! I KNOW! 'CAUSE I'M OUT THERE MAKIN' IT FA 'IM! "

He then collapsed into Madame's chest, still muttering but full tuckered out, arms limp. " _I'ma fuckin' kill 'im..._ " **Did he say that out loud?**

Madame

Madame listened to everything, watched every flail of arms, intently. Poor boy. It was a tough gig, being Valentino's prized pet. She honestly thought she'd taught him better, but he was always on about how he already knew the business, knew how to handle people. Obvsiously not, with how Angel was going on.

Her arms wrap around him when he falls forward-- a chest this big had many uses, pillows being one of the best in her opinion. Madame gathered him close, going so far as to pick him up and cradle him against her chest.

"Aww, honeybunch. I know just how ya feelin'. Valentino....well, he's an asshole. Head so far up his ass he eatin' his own shit fer breakfast." She shook her head, rocking Angel a bit, like one would a child who'd had a nightmare. She hums softly, an old lullaby her mother used to sing, way back when. She kept that up for a few moments before falling silent. The silence hung between them before she spoke, voice low.

"If'in you did kill him, I wouldn't blame ya, honey. There'd be no love lost between me'n him. I'd support ya claim to that throne, if'n you wanted it. In Hell, ya learn ta balance the cruelty with the kindness, and if ya can't find that balance, well, then, ya deserve to reap what ya sow. And Valentino's sewn a whole lotta hate down there. Karma's a bitch, even for the dead, and all I'd say would be 'good riddance'. You deserve so much more'n him, 'n so much more'n he gives ya. Yer the star and you deserve to be treated like one."

A tentacle scooted under his chin, tilting his head up so she could look at his face.

"You remember Mama's in ya corner, alright, Angel? I'm rootin' for ya. And my arms and doors're always open for ya."

Angel

His eyes blew wide and cornerless, staring not at Madame but at a far off, intangible point behind her. It never really occured to him just how impactful erasing Valentino's existence from Hell would _be._ All he found himself stuck on was getting it _done,_ losing himself in the possession of madness and the mindsets of cornered prey whenever he acted.

Angel didn't want to inherit the empire. Having the responsibility of so many souls under his care wasn't something he ever thought suited him. Protecting his peers on the streets was one thing, so was taking demons of all walks of life temporarily under his wing until they could fly on their own. _Management_ was another. Keeping souls in _line_ was another. He always thought himself the soldier, the weapon, the right hand, the poster boy of the wall supporting his image. An _Overlord_ of his own right...? The closest he'd come to it was before he partnered with him, fresh into demonhood, throwing his power and whims wherever he wished...

_But claiming Valentino's head would **do** that to him, wouldn't it?_ He'd inherit his power, his enemies, new enemies out of his allies... Angel's head began to spin. This was the nature of Hell. _Endless tiers of suffering._ All he wanted was his freedom... _How much was too high a price to pay...?_ He'd be fighting Valentino's battles _long_ after he was gone...

" That was, uh... " he said in an uncharacteristically small voice, " ... a fig're a speech... He's good t' me... really... " Angel bit his lip, eyes meeting her now that he'd processed all she had to say to him. Madame and Valentino sure had _history..._ and if Angel learned anything from his partnership with him... _it must've ROTTED to the very CORE._ They had this in common and he could feel it in her voice.

He trusted her. He knew he could. But maybe he didn't have to use it... not QUITE yet...

A warm, genuine smile bloomed over his face and he took her hands. " I will, " he promised with a binding kiss between her aligned pointer fingers, " Ya have my word, I love ya club an' what'cha doin' wit' it... I'll... " _Meet you in the middle._ " I'll... come aroun' some more. Maybe a performance or two would make 'im nervous enough t' give me next holiday off, ah? "

Angel laughed, knowing that chance was slimmer than his waistline after routine removals of his floating ribs. It _would_ be _nice_ not to have to work Valentine's Day...

" Thanks... fa hearin' me out... " he said sweetly, subtly off the edge of a choke, " The grind don't stop, an' it gets pretty fuckin'... MUCH... "

Madame

"That's right, baby, the grind don't stop, but Mama's here for you." Her tentacles moved around, and she used them to cradle Angel instead of her arms, freeing them up to hold one of his set of hands.

"Now, you listen to Mama, alright? I know Big V better'n anyone around. Raised him in Hell myself, and he shames me every day, the way he acts. I know his temper, his vices, I know it all, Angel. And darlin'? He ain't never treated no one right since the moment he landed ass over tea kettle in Hell. Probably long 'fore that too, considerin' he landed in Hell in the first place. I know the sorts a things he tries to pull..."

She took a deep breath, and leaned down, her tentacles lifting Angel higher. She pressed her forehead to his, and took his face in her hands, her voice lowering as her throat tightened.

"Next time he tries anythin'-- _anythin' at all_-- you come to me, Angel. I know yer a big boy, I know you can handle yerself, but it breaks my heart to know you're there with him, every day. It honestly truly does. Bein' Val's favorite is a hard life, or unlife, I suppose, but just know Mama's got ya back. I'd sooner slap that grin off his face and grind that stupid hat a his inta the dust than see ya hurtin' cause a him. I know it can be hard to accept help, but I do want ya ta know that it's there, if'n ya need to accept it, alright?"

She sniffled as she straightened up, using both her hands and tentacles to hold him close. "You're my boy, Angel, I love ya like my own. We ain't blood, but what's blood ever done for anyone? We better'n blood, we're family, got it?"

Angel

_Oh the tears._ They were coming. She already knew what he was keeping safely lodged in his throat. It saved him from having to admit ANYTHING while making it crystal clear to him that she had just what he needed, and was willing to give it to him.

But for NOTHING in return...? Angel closed his eyes and nuzzled into her forehead as the tears beaded off the long length of his lashes. Behind his eyes were the memories branded into his skull, words insisting that there was no such THING as the sentiments he found himself faced with. _With every sanction, there was a CATCH. With every favor, a FEE to be repaid twice over._

He fought them with the help of her every word.

" G... got it, " he choked, " I got it. I won't let'cha down... " A small sniffle. Angel's emotions flowed, but they were soothed and much more contained than they were when he was alone. It was becoming clearer and clearer now that he was in the company of trust.

He found traction in her tentacles and allowed her to support him, the tight pressure of the coils feeling more like safety than constriction. Perhaps, he really could survive post extermination Hell...

" I, uh... " Angel swallowed thickly. " ... Blew the top floor window... b'fore I took off... I dunno if any angels got in, but... he 'ad t' deal wit' 'em... "

Madame

She lifted a hand to wipe away a couple tears before they could fall-- she was wearing waterproof make up, as she always did, thank fuck. Madame pressed a kiss to his forehead, and held him.

Until he said that. She blinked and looked down at him, shock clear on her face for the moment or two it took her to process what he said. And then she burst out laughing. Her entire body shook with it, loud cackles that rose into the air.

"Oh fuck, oh god, Angel! Baby, you're a fuckin' riot! Did ya really? Just broke through the damn window? Damn, shug, ya know how ta make an exit!" She laughed again, Angel pressed against her chest.

"Oh, honey, ya ain't hurt, are ya? No scratches, gashes? I mean, ya looked tip top when ya walked up, but that fur a yours hides a lot. Anything ya need Mama ta look at?"

Angel

He chuckled sheepishly with a comical bump along the waves of her laughter. Despite how afraid he initially was to return, it must've been HILARIOUS from Madame's point of view. It eased him some.

" Nah, nah! I'm fine! I think...? Uh... " Angel did a quick survey of himself. Valera might've brushed out the last of the glass from his fluff already. Enough of the alcohol wore off for him to have felt any stinging by now ( he was PRETTY sure. )

" Yeah! I think I'm good, thanks ~ " he assured, " I take color real easy so if I'm bleedin' , it SHOWS. BRIGHT an' hot pink ~ " He took a little too much pride in that.

Madame

"Oh, fancy Mister Pink Blood over here," She said, still giggling a bit. "Mine's blue, if'n you were wonderin'."

Madame took a deep breath, rocking him in her arms again, just on instinct.

"God, I'd pay a million bucks ta have seen the look on Valentino's face when ya did that. Serves him right. An Angel lead the angels to him!" She started laughing again, devolving into softer giggles after a few moments.

"How's everthin' else, though? Ya feelin' alright? Ya body's fine, but wanna make sure my boy's doin' good."

Angel

" It shows up pretty in pictures, is all ~ " he said casually, " Bloodplay photosets always turn out real good. " He then casually reclined along a tentacle and drew idle circles in the fountain to watch the calming ripples.

" Think... e'rythin's ok... " he mused, " Just really needed not t' work the Extermination pa'ty an' just... chill out some. " He scrutinized his own reflection in the water for clues. Not much else came to his mind from the massive shadow his immediate issues casted over them.

Madame

"Alright, if that's it...." She trailed off, two of her tentacles peeling off to plop into the fountain as she leaned back.

"Y'know I hadn't even seen the ocean since I was a young'n? Hadn't swam in it fer longer'n that, too. I'm....so thankful to Valera fer invitin' me. Not only do I get to not worry about the Extermination-- at least as much, but I get to enjoy somethin' I missed fer so, so long."

She gave Angel a squeeze. "And now my boy's here'n safe 'n sound. Nothin' better to relax an ol' ladies' heart."

Madame smiled down at him. "Everythin' will be fine, Angel. We may be in Hell mosta the time, but this right here?" She gestured to the plants around them. "This all is proof that we ain't always there. Even in our hearts'n minds, when we there physically, we aren't always in Hell. There's a sayin': Hell is other people. But I think Heaven can be, too. If ya got the right people around..."

Angel

Angel wrinkled his nose. " Heaven's a load a bullshit. All of it, " he said cynically, " Ya condemned, ya condemned. Ain't no POINT in tryn'a make nice wit' the fuckin' feathery DOUCHEBAG brigade lookin' t' ERASE US e'ery fuckin' YEAR. " The words came from his gut. He wasn't hiding any hidden hopes or dreams. " Ya really think a place that commits annual fuckin' genocide a sinner's where it's at? A thing to LOOK FOR IN PEOPLE? It's a fuckin' fairytail, the fuckin' shit they tell us t' be believin' about Heaven, _**Mamina...**_ "

The last endearment rolled off his tongue like a plea. _ Don't try t' sell me anythin' I'm never gonna have..._ " Ya know I fuckin' - RAN, from the party. I ran from the fuckin' studio too. Hotel ain't gonna save me wit' their redemption prayers. Just... gonna put a lil' pause on the sufferin' awhile. Like 'ere. It's just a break. After this, it's Hellhole Sweet Hellhole all over again 'til the next time we're at our wit's en'. That's all there is, that's I got. " Angel sat up from his recline so he could look Madame in the face. " ... E'en if I got you. I don't mean it like anythin' ya do don't matter, but... y'know... " He sprawled his hands defeatedly as his words failed him, and his face fell into a bittersweet anguish. It seemed some things were completely beyond even his imagination.

Madame

Her face only softened as he spoke, and her heart ached for him. Oh, this poor thing, tossed about by life and then by Hell, it was no wonder to her that he was so cynical.

"Angel, darlin'," She said, after he finished his rant, her hands moving to ever so gently hold his face between them. Madame let out a long, slow sigh, staring into his eyes with the sweetest, most motherly expression she could.

"Call me an optimist, but I'd like to think that livin' over a century in Hell has taught me one thing: even Hell can have some sweetness. Sure, we all sinners'n demons down here-- or there, but that don't mean there ain't still decent folk who'd treat ya right down there. That Princess for one, she's a good egg, startin' up that Hotel may not get the results she's lookin' for, but it can help. She wants to change things, and I don't blame her.

"Hell is Hell, it's true. Heaven ain't no picnic either, but I think ya missed my point, shug-- When I say that Heaven can be other people, I ain't meanin' the feathery bastards that come down ta kill us every year, or even the fuckin' cunts that live up in them clouds and send 'em down. I'm meanin' the _concept_ what ya learned in Sunday school. What Heaven is _supposed_ to be. It's supposed to be a place where ya surrounded by people that love you and that ya love too. And if we can find those kinds of people, even in Hell? Well, that's a bit of a miracle in my books.

"So no, Hell ain't never gonna be Heaven and thank fuck fer that, cause I think Heaven's prolly borin' as shit compared to the fun we can have in Hell. I'd rather run a cabaret in Hell than lay around bored as sin in Heaven any day. But what I'm tryin' to say is that, if ya got good people around ya, then things'll get better. Hell, honestly, ain't been no different from life up above, fer me. Ya gotta make the most of what ya got, honeybunch."

She pressed a kiss to his face, her lips covering half of it when she did. "That make sense, darlin'?"

Angel

" Yeah. Total sense. " Angel deadpanned into the rosebush behind her. " First rule t' makin' it in Hell's bein' an Overlord or the fuckin' Princess, " he replied caustically. It didn't seem like she was going to understand or stop lecturing until he relented one way or another. But if Madame was Hell bent on teaching him something, he had to let her know he wasn't a CHILD that could be sold far off dreams when he was preoccupied with spending his every waking moment surviving the present.

" I _know_ there's sweetness in Hell. Dealin' sugar's my JOB. Makin' the most outta the scrap I got doesn't give me time ta KID. " He got up and started pacing the pavement, cigarette in his teeth and a light in his claws. " First thin's first, get outta Big V's horseshit. If it don't kill me, THEN I can see what I can do about gettin' a fuckin' life preached to me by a sister who fuckin' rapped my ass every Sunday. " A puff of red hearts whisked into the sky. He couldn't bring himself to buy a thing she said past offering to help him if he needed a place to be. The crystal clear promise of security was the only thing that made sense to him and as he was, he had no place for faith.

Madame

Her expression didn't change, even when Angel got up and started pacing. It was alright-- he wasn't ready, in his heart, to hear what she said, and that was okay.

"It's good to have priorities, shug. Glad ya got that shit figured out. I don't mean to preach, just speakin' my own truth, Angel. If ya don't wanna hear it, well, then, I'll shut my yapper 'n we can just enjoy the respite we get here, yeah?" She took a deep breath and swirled a hand through the water.

"Just want ya t'be happy, sweetheart. Like any Mama would. Just cause we in Hell doesn't change my heart."

Angel

" I appreciate what ya sayin', Big Mama, " he sighed through curls of crimson escaping from the valleys of pointed teeth, " It just ain' it fa me. I 'ad to lie, scrap, and _fuck_ m'way to where I am now. I don't... _got_ the means t' be thinkin' a what it'd be like to not have to. I don't 'ave the POWER - I mean, maybe, I _USED TO,_ but... "

Angel looked around. He couldn't imagine littering the pristine garden with his ash, so he kept the butt on hand. " ... I gave it away. Fa this. Fa... " _He could say this to her, right?_ " ... Fa HIM. Before... it all got to 'is head an' before I knew it, I wasn' it anymore. He was chasin' more an' more power, the kind I gave up. So it's gonna... _TAKE..._ s'more lyin', fuckin', an' scrappin' before I get anywhere else. Until he could look me in the fuckin' eye an' SEE... how BAD. He fucked. Up. "

Madame

She nodded along with him, knowing those words well, knowing that feeling. "I getcha, baby, I getcha. Don't need to explain none to me about shit like that. I understand, babydoll, I do."

Madame reached over, gently taking his hand in hers, drawing him back to sit next to her again. "Ya got a smoke ta spare, Angel? Mama's got a cravin'."

She let out a sigh, and glanced out over the garden. "If'n ya need to talk about it though, I'll listen, Angel. No one'd understand better'n me, yeah? I know Vee better'n anyone cept maybe you 'n possibly the other two Vees. So ya need to vent? Just rant ya head off? I can listen. I know how much that can help sometimes."

Angel

" That - ... That's it, " he said calmly, starting to feel more comfortable in the stimulants soothing his system, " Ye... yeah, I... " Angel procured his case and flipped it open for her to browse, allowing his head to lean against her shoulder. The light off the pink crystal seqins sparkled in the water.

" He's... gonna pay. An' I'm gonna collect. That's all I got an' all that matters. Until I do that, ain't nothin' in the shithole that's gonna be up fa my takin'. " He put out his cigarette on the empty side of the case and fixed himself another. That could do for now. " _C'est la CAZZO vie._ "

Madame

Madame looked over his selection and took one. She waited until he lit his next and leaned in to light hers off it. She took a long drag, blowing the smoke out-- no shapes like Valentino's, just a cloud, the way she preferred it.

"Sure is, Angel, sure is. I'll be there ta have ya back, though." She ruffled his hair affectionately. "Mama's in ya corner, and don't forget it."

Angel

_That_ was the reassurance he needed, something concrete he could trust in. " Never, " he affirmed sternly as if his voice wrote a contract in the smoke, " I got that, ain't much I couldn't do. " Snapping the case closed, he lounged against her and looked up into the sky, redless save for the dissipating shapes they blew. For the moment, he really felt like he'd be ok.

Madame

Her hand moved to the back of his head, giving him some gentle scritches as she held him close.

"Got any ideas fer an act ya'd wanna do at the cabaret? Anythin' ya wanna do that ya hadn't got to before?"

Angel

" Zorita 'ad some shit goin' on, " he said immediately through brightened eyes, " Dunno if I could really pull it OFF, but the SHOWS were real fuckin'... _choice ~_ "

His arms then got animated, slicing and molding the air around his thoughts as he brainstormed.

" I got chances to try a lotta thin's, but only the one time it'd take fa Big V t' decide it wasn't worth gettin' me into when the pole was just as good an easier t' maintain. If I got back to anythin'... I think I'd wanna do the ring... "

Madame

"The ring, eh?" She smirked, giving a nod. "That's a fun one, fer sure. What about the ribbons? He ever let ya do those? The things soma the girls can do...."

Angel

" Ribbons? The ones on the sticks? " He racked his head through the years. " Huh... no... I don't think so... Unless the prop's somethin' I'm wearin' an' can throw, he thought it a waste a time. I tried t' pitch 'im the idea a dancin' wit' 'em in nude if I could keep a trailin' ribbon over my junk the whole time, but he didn' believe me, " he explained, snickering, " I could TOTALLY pull it off if he gave me the time! _His loss ~_ "

Madame

"No, no, the ones hangin' from the ceilin'! It's like the ring but, y'know, big ol' ribbons a cloth. Some circus level shit, but damn, if it ain't pretty." She laughed, shrugging.

"Think ya'd look real pretty danglin' up high from all a them."

Angel

He blew a raspberry, a storm of popping hearts spraying over the fountain. _Can't take that image back NOW -_

" Oh, silks, yeah, I TOTALLY knew what ya were talkin' about, " he said between giggles, " Yeah, I done those once or twice. It came pretty easy, I dunno, an' it was lotta fun, but y'know Big V... "

Angel then put a pair of free hands to his head to mimic feelers. " _They wanna see ya ASS, Angel Cakes,_ " he mocked.

Madame

Madame laughed, shaking her head. "Fuck, ya got that down, don'tcha?" She shrugged.

"Valentino's always been shortsighted about these things. If ya _always_ give em what they want, then there ain't no reason fer them to be tantalized! Can't give 'em all a it up front, ya gotta _tease~_" She gave her chest a little shake and winked at Angel.

"But acourse you know what I'm talkin' 'bout, don'tcha, Angel?"

Angel

" Probably more than HE DOES, " he joked with a mirroring preen of his own chest, " He's all about that fast money, but he ain't got NO. IDEA. How far ya can stretch the bucks. LEMME TELL YA! "

Angel excitedly straddled the edge of the fountain to face her. " The LONGER ya can edge a John, the more he's gonna give ya. Physically, emotionally, all of it. Big V deadass for - fuckin' - GOT that there's more t' hustlin' than _wham, bam, thank you ma'am_ - 'in it out. Time he trade in those goofy fuckin 'eart shades fa dollar signs, ya'd THINK! "

Madame

"Oh, I know, honeybunch, I _know_. It's all about the tease! All about the tantalizin'. Give 'em just enough to keep 'em comin' back fer more 'n more!" She laughed, winking at him.

"Big V's lost sight a that, he's too preoccupied with shittin' out content fer Vox that he fergot the biggest money maker in th' game." Her smile turned sly as she looked at Angel.

"But I never fergot that. That's why I lasted this long, and why I'll keep lastin'."

Angel

" Time's up, ah? He sells fuckin' Voot Floops fa $666 an they taste like FUCKIN' ASS! I WOULD KNOW! " he joked as he toyed with his case, " Ain't nothin' in 'em either, just THE emptiest shit there is t' be eatin'. Fa like a week? Month? Fuck I know, but it was all we 'ad in the studio breakroom an' I swear ta FUCK I always en'ed up HUNGRIER than before I ATE 'EM. "

He then opened up his case and started rolling some more cigarettes. " Wonder when someone's gonna tell 'im his new boyfrien's fuckin' _STUPID..._ " A sly smile. " He ain't got nothin' on ya, yeah? Could _you_ get away with it? " Angel chuckled, " Not too 'arshly, though! I ain't about t' be feelin' bad fa his new squeeze... unless... _he's got a cravin' fa spider..._ "

Madame

She snorted. "I _could_ but don't mean I _would_. I ain't about ta stir that pot like that-- besides, ya _know_ I'm a good ol' Southern Lady, and we have better ways a sayin' shit like that ta the point were people ain't even know we talkin' shit."

She placed a hand on her chest and batted her lashes. Madame deepened her accent as she spoke again. "Well bless yer heart! I ain't ever seen a bug quite as cute! Yer as adorable as a bee's wing!" She started laughing.

Angel

Angel echoed her laughter with intermittent snorts. " Ain't no gay bitches got time fa that. Our petty, impatient asses WANT ya knowin' when we're takin' ya fa a DRAG, " he joked with a wink. _Pun intended._

" That's the master plan, though ~ " he sang with a quick drag of his tongue over the end of a fresh cigarette before slipping it into the case, " Fuck 'im. Fuck 'is boyfriend. THEN fuck over 'is whole ass life. Shit ~ "

Madame

"Sounds like a plan, shug. Sounds like a plan, indeed." She chuckled. "Just know I can't take _direct_ action in ruinin' Big V's shit. I'll support ya, but I can't get involved with my own tentacles-- plus, I mean, Val'd smell that a mile off, so's best I keep to the background, fer all our sakes. It he breaks our deal first, then I'd have free reign to help ya more directly, though."

Angel

" Yeah yeah, ya don't gotta, " he assured, " I ain't plannin' on involvin' or takin' no one down wit' me. Promise. No one better take this from me, either, but... What, kin'a deal ya got goin' wit' 'im? "

Madame

"Ain't nothin' fancy, basic sorta non-interference thing. I don't mess with his business directly, he don't mess with mine. Mostly keeps us outta each other's hair-- but poachin' talent is fair game, which is why I can offer ya protection 'n such." She smirked and winked again.

Angel

" _Nice_ loopholin' ~ " he sang, " No wonder ya been sittin' pretty all this time, Big Mama. Save a spot fa me an' I'll be the prettiest throne candy anyone's e'er seen ~ "

Madame

"Deal Makers gotta get those loops on lock, baby boy, and I wouldn'ta lasted this long if I weren't a damn good Deal Maker." She giggled again.

"Ever since ya started up with Big V, I had a spot primed 'n ready for ya. Knew ya were a star, baby."

Angel

" HA! " Angel gave a short, small burst of slightly embarassed laughter. " Spotlight's where I belong, Mama ~ Chargin' me rent in m'own house oughta be a _crime ~_ "

Madame

"Ain't that true, babe, ain't it true!" She laughed again. "Ya belong in it."

#extermination party palace #sluttyspiderpolkacock #usedhearts #chat log

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pandastern · 3 years

Text

Gravity (Bakugou x OC)

Part 13: Same Chains - Different Colours

If youd like to be tagged to the taglist for upcoming parts please dm me :)

Masterlist II AO3

Bakugou x Vigilante!OC

Warnings: angst, explicit language, violence

Word count: 1715

Genre: enemies to lovers ; angst ; romance, slow burn

When a new student makes an entrance, Bakugou has a real bad feeling. There is something about this girl that just doesnt feel right. From the flaming hair to the calculating glint in her green eyes, everything about her just pisses him off.

Little does he know that his fate is intertwined with the person he despises so much, defining his future path in a way he would have never expected

By the time Artemis arrived at the tribunes where her class were seated, she still hadn’t quite shaken off her most recent discovery. Her classmates greeted her, Iida and Ochako making some space for her to sit down.

“Hey, Artemis! They announced you're dropping out of the competition. Are you doing okay?” Ochako asked.

“You missed the Cavalry Battle! Most of our classmates made it into the final round,” Iida explained in full class rep mode, gesturing with his signature hand chop motion.

Despite their enthusiasm, Artemis could sense the concern beneath her friends’ expressions.

“Yes, I’m okay. I guess I wasn’t as healed as I thought I was, so they took me out of the competition.” Artemis sighed inwardly and tried her best to crack a smile, despite the discomfort she felt. “I’m… sorry I worried you.”

“We’re your friends! You’re allowed to make us worry once in a while,” said Ochako.

Artemis frowned slightly, but decided not to respond. Was it really that natural to worry for someone? These people barely knew her, and yet all of them acted like they’d been friends for years.

Taking a deep breath, she put on her best friendly face and listened as Kaminari and Sero behind her updated her on the latest events. She was a little surprised to find out that Ojiro had dropped out voluntarily, though she could understand his reasoning. For some people, pride was very important. More so than results.

“It’s as if that Shinsou guy brainwashed me or something. I don't exactly know what he did or what his quirk is, but Midoriya had better be careful,” Ojiro grumbled once he’d finished his story.

“Shinsou?” Artemis asked. “Wait… wasn't he the guy who tried to start shit with us? The fuzzy purple head?”

“Yep, that’s the one. Midoriya is up against him in the next fight. I just wish I could give him enough pointers to win.”

“Brainwashing, huh?”

That was an interesting quirk, Artemis thought. How was a person like that not in the Hero course? When you considered the possibilities a quirk like that could give you during fights, it seemed stupid and an incredible waste not to utilise powers like that for the Hero course. Then again, it explained his antagonistic attitude.

Before she could dive deeper into her thoughts, a lady with a snack cart pushed into their seating area, offering food and drinks. To Artemis’s absolute delight, she spotted a selection of much-needed energy drinks.

“Oh God, yes!” she groaned.

Finally, something was going her way today.

She jumped up, pushed forward and grabbed two cans of her very own survival liquid and a bag of chips. The thought of the treats was already lifting her mood. She’d paid and had just pushed past Denki to get to her seat, when suddenly a hand shot forward and grabbed the drinks in her hand.

“Oi, what-”

“Should you really be drinking that garbage, dumbass?” Bakugou growled into her ear.

Artemis hadn't even noticed the bane of her existence entering their seating compartment. When had he gotten up here? The sound of his voice sent a shiver down her spine and her stomach lurched again.

“Are you gonna police what I drink now?” she hissed, though she didn’t look up at him.

The scent of burnt sugar wafted around her, making her heart race. Fucking hell.

Instead of arguing further, Bakugou pulled the cans out of her grasp and put them back in the cart before handing her an iced tea.

Words couldn't explain how badly Artemis wanted to throw his ass over the fence and watch his body plummet several stories down into the arena. She let out a frustrated growl and finally met his eyes, ready to snap at him, an action she regretted instantly.

Her breath caught in her throat as she realised just how close Bakugou was standing next to her. It also didn't help that her brain instantly replayed the scene in the infirmary. Heat spread across her cheeks.

Thankfully, Bakugou seemed to have the same problem, and Artemis decided that even though she was in desperate need of caffeine, it wasn’t worth causing a scene right here in the open. Especially since she now realised that everyone was staring at them.

She pulled away with a huff, took the tea and sat back down, very determined not to look at Bakugou again so as to calm down her rapid heartbeat. What the hell was wrong with her, anyway?

“Dickwad,” she muttered to herself.

The curious whispers of the classmates who had witnessed the whole spectacle didn’t go unnoticed by her. However, she opted that ignoring it was the better strategy for now. Stubbornly sipping at the drink in her hand, she tried to focus her attention on the competition in the arena.

Artemis watched as her friend Midorya scored the first victory against Shinsou. And while she was happy for her friend, she couldn’t help but be more interested in watching Shoto Todoroki fight next. The words of his father echoed in her mind, making the hairs on the back of her neck stand. She’d never paid much attention to the quiet boy, mostly because he usually prefered to be alone.

As Midoriya and Todoroki’s flames clashed in the arena, Artemis realized that she’d never seen him use the fire side of his quirk before today. And seeing Endeavor’s reaction to his son activating his left side told her why.

With a loud roar, the number two hero’s voice echoed through the entire arena: “Shoto, have you finally accepted yourself? Good! It all begins from here. With my blood, you’ll be able to surpass me. You will fulfill my desire!”

Artemis’s body stiffened as the memories of her father started to flood her brain.

Your power is my gift! You shall pave the way for New Olympus!

Why was it that men like Endeavor and her father always glorified their own blood, thinking it justified to turn the people around them into tools, not caring about the price other people had to pay for their hunger for power?

Ice spread through Artemis’s veins. She understood. And for the first time, she saw Todoroki. He was like her, in a way, rejecting the chains that bound him to that monster he had to call father. Todoroki was a tool, a weapon in the eyes of his maker, existing purely for the selfish gains of a Hero who didn’t deserve his title.

The revelation hit her like a gunshot, flinging her back into the dark, cold room she’d once called her home. A cage built only for her, robbing her of any humanity she possessed, until she couldn't feel anymore. The rage she saw in his eyes was the same that burned inside her.

A warm hand wrapped around her wrist, pulling her out of the endless stream of memories that threatened to drag her into the dark.

“Artemis?”

Instinctively, she swatted away the hand that had touched her without consent, then flinched. Her head whipped around to the person who’d said her name.

Ochako gave her a concerned look. “Are you all right? You’re as white as a sheet. Do you feel unwell?”

Artemis took a deep breath and forced herself to smile at her friend. “No, I’m… I’m okay. Sorry.”

She could tell Ochako didn’t quite believe her, but she didn’t pry, which made Artemis very grateful. After all, her story wasn’t something she wanted to tell anyone. It was bad enough that she had to carry the memories inside her heart, having them haunt her dreams the moment she closed her eyes.

These flashbacks were getting annoying. It frustrated her that she had no control over what could trigger another episode, and the lack of caffeine that usually kept her brain buzzing and distracted didn’t help either. She’d have to come up with more effective ways to keep her brain busy from now on.

The Festival progressed without any further surprises. Artemis tried to pay attention to what was happening inside the arena as best as she could, but her thoughts kept drifting off. To her annoyance, the time her attention peaked was when Bakugou was standing in the ring. Watching him fight was fascinating, not that she would ever admit that to anyone.

It seemed to her that Bakugou was made of pure determination and strength. Every attack, every explosion, was well-planted. The man was a ferocious fighter and strategist, brimming with talent. So, it didn't come as a shock to her that Bakugou easily moved forward in the competition into the finale. And yet something felt off. Artemis couldn’t quite put her finger on it, but something in Bakugou’s demeanor told her he was growing more and more frustrated by the second.

Unlike the fight with Midoriya, Todoroki seemed to refuse to use his fire again, which seemed to rile Bakugou up even more.

Artemis leaned over to Midoriya, who’d joined them on the tribunes after his fight with Todoroki, and whispered into his ear. “Say, is it just me, or does Bakugou seem more aggressive than usual?”

“Hm, so you’ve noticed too,” Midoriya replied with a serious look on his face. “I can't be sure, but it seems to me he’s taking Todoroki’s behaviour as a personal insult.”

“Insult? Why? Because he’s not using flames?”

Midoriya nodded. “Kacchan has this mindset that if you don’t give a hundred percent, it’s because you think he’s not worth it.”

What was it Bakugou had said to her in the infirmary? If you can't give your best, why are you even here?

No wonder he was screaming at Todoroki to use his flames. In his head, he probably thought since Todoroki had used both sides of his quirk in the fight against his childhood rival Midoriya, he was looking down at Bakugou by not doing the same thing.

He didn't understand what using the fire side meant for Todoroki, what was connected to that part of him. Artemis wasn't sure he could even if he was told.

She couldn't explain why, but watching that fight was painful. Maybe it was because no matter whether Bakugou or Todoroki ended up standing last, neither of them would be able to enjoy their victory.

Tagg list:

@sammyluvzz @chicledechoclo

#bakugou #bakugou katsuki #katsuki bakugou #gravity #fanfiction #mha fic #bnha fic #mha x oc #mha x reader #bnha x oc #bnha x reader #bakugou x oc #bakugou x reader

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