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#god i sound shitty out of context
r1ghtwhereyouleftme · 3 months
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Me: I hate [insert thing here] discourse
Also me: *gets so annoyed when people are blatantly stupid and do things thay make zero sense therefore making me go along with discourse bc I can only handle so much stupidity*
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Okay this fic idea has been in my head for weeks...
Imagine reader being Percy's (full) sister and secretly dating Clarisse. And Percy's rambling about not liking "hating" Clarisse and reader is just doing whatever and doing that thing where someone's pretending to be interested just hums and agrees absentmindedly and then he just says "Fuck Clarisse" and reader is like "GIRL I'M TRYING, BUT SHE'S BUSY" (this is not an actual smut request for her tho), but reader accidentally said it out loud (ik it's cliche to 'accidentally say stuff out loud but I like it in this context). And Percy is like "Excuse me what da fok" and then he storms off to yell at Clarisse and reader hears him yell "REALLY?! MY SISTER?!" and everyone who's watching is just scared for Percy and the consequenses of yelling at Clarisse.
I imagine the "Look here comes the consequence of my actions chasing me right now" audio during this scene
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- I’ve been trying -
Pairings - Clarisse La Rue x Fem! Reader
Synopsis - your secret relationship with clarisse quickly becomes not so secret
An - I BURNT MY FUCKING FINGER
Palestine aid links
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It was a few hours before capture the flag. Most kids spent their time preparing for the game as it was the last one for summer; you however were pressed up against a tree with your favorite girl trailing sweet kisses down your neck.
“Fuck” you gasped as clarisse found your sweet spot. Bringing your hands to her hair you slightly tugged it, almost like an attempt to bring her closer of you could.
Clarisse flattened her tongue against the red mark she had began to leave. Her grip tightened on your hips and her leg pushing slightly between your thighs. The moment would of gone further only if clarisses brother hadn’t started yelling for hee.
Hitting her arm clarisse eventually came to, pulling away only slightly. “What-“ she panted heavily.
“Mm your brother he’s calling for you” you complained with a deep breath. Annoyed clarisse rolled her eyes. Taking a look around she returned her gaze back down at you, taking a notice of your pupil blown eyes. A giddy grin crossed her lips, finding her cocky attitude amusing you pushed off the tree to kiss her sweetly.
Shaking her head some clarisse squeezed your hip one last time. “You have no idea what you do to me… we’ll have to finish this later I’ll be busy for the rest of today and probably tomorrow” she sighed.
“Really” you complained making clarisse chuckle. “Yeah really, don’t get to bitchy it’s just two days”
Hitting her arm again you chuckled again. “Shut up I don’t get bitchy”
“Uh huh whatever you say babe” she teased drunkly walking backwards. Grabbing her spear she blew you a kiss before jogging towards the sound of her sibling calling.
——
“Then she has the AUDACITY! The fucking—“
“Language” you sighed giving Percy an authoritarian look. Shrugging you off he continued his ramble on about how he hated clarisse.
Shaking your head some you smiled finding it amusing your little brother hates your girlfriend. Though no body knew she was your girlfriend. You both agreeing on keeping it a secrete as it kept people off clarisses back and Percy off yours.
Your relationship with Percy had always been a little strained. Finding out you were a demigod let alone a daughter of Poseidon you had left home at an early age; causing you to never really know your brother. Growing up at camp it seemed like Percy was more like your friend than sibling. You still came home however, every holiday you were back in the same shitty apart with the same shitty step father.
When Percy finally came to camp it was easier to build a relationship with him. And for once… it felt like you really did have a brother.
“…also her blaming me for her spear breaking like it isn’t HER FAULT for attacking me! And I swear to the gods if I hear one more person say she isn’t that bad I’ll scream” Percy groaned holding his head in his hands while he paced in mad circles. Finally tuning back into the conversation the first thing you had heard — “UGH fuck clarisse!” He huffed.
“Girl I’m trying but she won’t be free until Sunday” you groaned holding your head back. It took only a moment for you to realize what you had said.
Looking at you then a door he quickly ran out, following his lead you chased after him. “Percy wait!” You yelled half laughing.
Instantly finding clarisse Percy stood before the cocky girl who was sitting with her siblings on the porch of their cabin; waiting for the final hour before the games.
Clarisse turned her attention from her brothers to Percy before scoffing. “What do You want beanstalk” her instult causing a small fit of laughter around her.
“MY SISTER OUT OF EVERYONE YOUR SLEEPING WITH MY SISTER!!” He shouted causing his face to go red.
The people around went quiet. For what seemed like minutes lasted only a few seconds before Percy began yelling again.
Clarisse who was stunned just sat there and let the boy yell at her. Standing right beside him was an embarrassed version of yourself.
At a certain point she had gotten tired of the small boy shouting at Her. His breaking voice annoying her. Standing up clarisse walked over to you, placing her hands on your waist and kissing you sweetly.
A slightly laugh leaving her lips as she knew your brother was watching in astonishment. Breaking the kiss she smiled at you before turning her shit eating grin to Percy. “Mind your business. What your sister does with me I’m sure you don’t wanna know” she chuckled, hitting your ass before walking away with her siblings following quickly.
Percy looked at you once again shocked. “Isn’t she dreamy” she smiled giddily. Your brother sighed, grabbing your shirt and dragging you away.
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baejax-the-great · 1 year
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Absolutely reeling.
So I knew that the origin of "Hector was a great man, moral, noble, better than all of the Greeks" began as Roman propaganda that somehow has made it to now, the year 2023, and is still taught to high school students.
What I did not know was why scholars shit on Achilles as vehemently as they did (and still do).
My copy of Fagles' translation of the Iliad has a preface by a different scholar who I'm not going to bother to name because he's an idiot (and idk probably dead at this point). I read the entire thing, absolutely baffled, because he would cite a part of the text (that I admittedly had not read yet! at all!), quote it, and then come to the most batshit interpretation based on that quote I had ever seen in my life. His general take was that Achilles was a sociopath who had no feelings for anyone other than himself and his own pride, and every action he took (until welcoming Priam into his hut) was done in service of that pride. To support this, he decided that Achilles did not see Patroclus as a person, but rather as an extension of himself, and thus someone injuring Patroclus was them injuring Achilles, and so he did not care about Patroclus, he only cared about his wounded pride.
Yeah.
That sounded wrong before reading the book, and while reading the book all i could think was, "Did we read the same fucking thing???" Put in context, those quotations still did not support his conclusions whatsoever.
But i cracked open Caroline Alexander's "The War That Killed Achilles" last night, and she solves this mystery of "Hector good, Achilles bad" for me right out the gate (which is good because so far I've only read the preface).
Western Europeans by and large learned about the Trojan war from Roman stories, which became fairly popular, and not the Iliad, which was not translated into French or English until centuries later. As mentioned, these were propaganda that cast the Trojans in a much better light than the Greeks because the Romans believed they were descended from Trojan refugees. This starts a trend that is still going on in scholarly circles as casting the Iliad as a war between "barbaric Greeks living in a shitty, lawless camp" vs "civilized, educated, weaving, real-wife-having Trojans," making the Iliad a tragedy in which Homer for some reason skewers his own people and their warlike culture as barbaric while propping up a dead, foreign city-state. This interpretation is still extant and was the postscript to another copy of the Iliad I have.
According to Alexander, scholars closer to Homer's time saw the entire war as a tragedy--both the destruction of Troy AND the destruction of the Greek army. While this is not covered in the Iliad, very few Greeks actually made it home after Troy. Some that did were then outcast (Teucer for example), some were murdered (bye, Agamemnon), some went on to create new kingdoms in other places (Diomedes), but by and large, there was no going home from that war. There was no great victory with all their loot. The entire thing was a disaster for both sides, spurred on by fickle gods.
Back to the more recent European interpretations of this story, one reason Hector ended up cast in such a "good" light, despite being a dumbass who wants to dishonor dead people just as badly as Achilles ever did, was in order to make Achilles look worse. Why was it important that Achilles becomes a villain in this story in which he is very much not a villain? Because Europeans were involved in so much war with each other and the rest of the world that a young, insubordinate man who criticizes his idiot of a commander, decides his life isn't worth throwing away for this war, and refuses to fight to sack a city was an affront to their values. Young men were to be obedient, follow their commanding officers, and colonize the world for queen and country. Achilles suggesting losing his life is not worth it to prop up Agamemnon's war is a dangerous precedent for all the good little soldiers needed to make their nations wealthy.
It's almost funny that these analyses propping up Troy as a beacon of civilization were made by people living in countries so bent on colonizing the world. They identified with the city being sacked and not the greedy sackers of said city, who they were much closer to. And Achilles, educated, morally rigid, emotional Achilles, is recast as a sociopathic asshole who doesn't care about anyone other than himself, unlike all of those other beacons of selflessness among the Greek leadership.
The tragedy of the Iliad is that Achilles is right, the war is pointless, Agamemnon did dishonor the shit out of him, and it doesn't matter because he's going to die in it anyway.
Frankly, given how badly his character has been interpreted for so long, I think the muses owe him an apology.
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inoreuct · 7 months
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I've been lurking in the Zosan tag and I'm super in love with the snippets you've been posting! For a prompt, I really enjoy them being soft and taking care of each other after fights? Also love outsider POV if that seems fun to you.
wahshdhdhhs THANK YOU 😭 i’m having so much fun writing them and i had fun writing THIS :)) made it short and sweet and mostly from nami’s pov; soft but also they bicker because. when do they not. enjoy!
Nami huffed as she made her way to the galley, peckish after the battle. Sanji was probably there, but loathe as she was to admit it she’d feel a little bad to ask him to make something; that fight had taken a lot out of all of them, and she’d gotten off easy— The last she’d seen him he’d been wrapping his forearms with his shirt and trying to staunch the bleeding from several wicked slashes.
The door was cracked open when she got there. Strange. Sanji was meticulous about keeping it shut to keep Luffy out, but she supposed if he was to be lax at any time, it would be when he was injured. 
That was, until she heard the voices.
“Stop moving, shithead!”
“I’m not moving! The fuck are you—”
She peeked through into the kitchen and almost stopped breathing, hunger forgotten, fatigue banished, grin growing by the second.
“If you don’t stop fucking fidgeting it’s gonna leave a scar,” Zoro warned, tugging Sanji’s hand forward again and rolling his eyes at the cook’s dramatic sigh.
Sanji was perched on the dining table, one arm outstretched as Zoro shoved a needle threaded with fishing line through his skin. He tried to hide his wince at a particularly tender spot, shoulders jumping before they settled at Zoro’s soft sound of apology. Nami took a note at the back of her mind to get Luffy to befriend more doctors.
Still, looking at the arm that Zoro had already finished, the stitches were neater than Zoro would have done on himself; she’d seen the scars that he’d gotten from sewing himself up. They didn’t look like they’d had half this much care put into them.
“You’re lucky they aren’t that deep. The hell’d you go and do this for, shitty cook? You need your hands,” the swordsman mumbled, brows furrowing and actually sounding a little confused, and Nami simultaneously felt sorry for him and like she wanted to clobber the big idiot upside the head. 
“Ah, you know me,” Sanji sighed, slouching to the side dramatically but keeping his arm still. “Always the martyr—” Zoro levelled him with an unimpressed stare, cutting a stitch with a dry snip, and he faltered. “Well, I— I don’t know, marimo.” He shrugged, swallowing. His eyes were staring at something on the table. “I saw you there and just moved.”
Nami gathered her context clues and had to stop herself from pumping her fists. It was finally happening. The two idiots had been dancing around each other for ages; She and Usopp had a running bet on who would get their shit together first, but hell, at this point she didn’t even care who won.
Zoro sighed heavily, short and sharp, pushing Sanji’s skin together to finish off the last stitch. “Just— Don’t do it again.”
“The hell do you mean don’t do it again, you ingrate?!” Sanji squawked, outraged and hissing through his teeth when the fishing line was tightened. “I saved your life!”
“I would’ve been fine!”
“You would’ve been hurt—”
Zoro tossed the scissors and needle aside, brandishing a roll of gauze in Sanji’s face. “And what if you couldn’t cook anymore?!” 
“Well maybe, just maybe—” The cook snatched the gauze, gripping it in his fist with his eyes ablaze, “Really think about this, now— I care more about you than that, you moss-brained oaf.” He took a measured inhale, jaw working as he looked away. Nami was about to do a victory lap around the deck. “Good God, how long is it gonna take to get it through your thick skull…” 
“Curly-brow.” 
Sanji remained resolute, face turned to the side even as Zoro stepped closer.
“Oi, cook.”
He wound the gauze between his fingers, looking down.
“Sanji,” Zoro murmured. “Baby. Come here.”
Nami clapped a hand over her mouth, eyes wide as coins. This was a thing. They were already a thing. Oh, Usopp was absolutely going to lose his shit. 
Sanji swallowed, unable to escape when Zoro had callused hands on his knees and was dipping down to nose at his cheek. “First you want me to stop moving, now you want me to—” He cut off when Zoro kissed him, simple and sweet, thumb rubbing circles over his kneecap. “…Mm. Right, yes, I suppose that’s… a valid reason.”
“Thank you.” Zoro set his jaw, looking up at Sanji earnestly. “I mean it, curls. I know how much cooking means to you. And you said...”
Nami watched as Sanji’s face softened, his hand coming up to cup the side of Zoro’s face. “Of course, mon chou.”
The swordsman chuckled low in his chest. “Did you just call me a cabbage?”
“Wh— No.”
“Yes, you did.”
“How the hell do you know?”
“Our navigator doesn’t just have maps. Found a French dictionary lying around.” 
Shit, she’d been wondering where that had gone. Green-haired bastard.
“Said navigator’s been here since five minutes ago.”
Double shit. 
Sanji whipped around with a scandalised noise as she gave up the act and stood in the doorway properly. “Nami!”
“I didn’t see anything!” she cackled, just barely sheepish, hands up in a gesture of peace as she turned and hightailed it out of there. The smart thing to do would be to blackmail the shit out of Zoro—
But she thought of how gently they’d treated each other, the looks in their eyes, and sighed. She’d let them have this.
(But getting her to admit that they were good for each other or that she was happy for them would be harder than pulling teeth, she’d make sure of that.) *
“Go get me a wet cloth, darling, there’s blood in your hair.”
“You think she’ll snitch?” Zoro asked, running the tap over a clean dishcloth and wringing it out before walking back.
Sanji hummed, non-committal and slightly amused. “Would you mind if she did?” he asked lightly, seemingly unbothered as he wiped at the red drying tacky in Zoro’s hairline from where he’d been whacked over the head.
The swordsman laughed under his breath. He could feel the tension in Sanji from the way he was sitting, spine too straight as he wrapped his arms around the cook’s waist, hipbones pressed into the table’s edge between his thighs. “…Not really, no.”
“Nothing to worry about, then,” Sanji said, cool and composed, but this time he didn’t bother hiding the relief in his smile. “Now.” He pursed his lips, scrubbing the rest of the blood out of Zoro’s eyebrow. “To the showers with you, and then bed.”
Zoro held up the gauze. “Still gotta wrap your stitches.”
Sanji rolled his eyes again, the corners crinkling as he smiled. “Fine. Wrap, shower, bed.”
“Mm,” Zoro hummed, pulling him close and leaning up for one last kiss. “Perfect.” 
fin.
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multifandombitxh · 1 year
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Midnight Massacre
Pairing: Ghost x Reader (tried to keep it gender neutral)
Genre: Fluff, hurt/comfort
Warnings: Depictions of violence/blood/death/k*lling, g*ns, knives, bullets, strong language, mentions of s*icide and PTSD
A/N: And I'd fuckin do it again. I'm playing MW2 and I swear to GOD this man has me in a whole chokehold. Lovin' it. I will not apologize. Enjoy lol
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It had taken a few minutes for your heart rate to return to normal, the nightmare leaving you in a cold sweat and pumped full of adrenaline. The dreams were never the same, so you never knew what to expect when they reared their ugly heads. One night it could be slow torture from a faceless enemy, the next it could be fire, horrifying screams, and death.
No matter the context, the scenes haunted your sleep on random occasions and left you feeling weak and helpless by the time you woke up. Tonight's dream, however, was especially traumatizing, and it did a number on your perception of reality.
Once you were fully aware of your surroundings again and realized you were awake, you shook the images away and covered your eyes with your palms. Sweat dropped down your spine, leaving a cold trail. You all but ripped your t-shirt off, searched for a replacement in the dark, and settled on a tank top.
With shaking hands you left your designated sleeping area for the night, slipping on your black cargo pants and boots. Leaving behind all thoughts of blood, gore, and the sounds of your friends perishing, you made your way down the dark, dusty hallway.
You'd only joined 141 recently, but it had been long enough now that you weren't exactly considered new blood anymore. One of the more interesting men in the unit had caught your eye from day one, despite the fact that he had little interest in getting to know you on a personal level. In group conversations he rarely engaged you, but one on one was a different story. There had been plenty of nights where the others had gone to bed while the two of you played a little game to see who would cave and take first watch.
It was usually you.
Ghost had a fucking novel of shitty jokes; some crude, some cheesy, some straight up cruel. Every now and then he'd crack one that would have you accepting defeat and taking the first watch of the night. Granted, he always took the second one if you took the first, and vice versa. None of the others dared to complain about this strange ritual, since it left them each with a later watch.
Tonight, Ghost had caved in first, finding your story about summer camp as a teenager unbelievably boring. It did offend you in a way, but at the same time, you knew it would get him to give in quickly. A man can only hear so much about how to make a friendship bracelet in vivid detail, or how to do a proper French braid.
Because of this, it allowed you to get some sleep first, but that obviously didn't work out. You'd all found shelter in a warehouse that wasn't far from your destination, and had to stay the night since the plan had to take place during the day to work. As you traveled down the hall, using the wall to guide you in the darkness, you finally stumbled upon the main area of the warehouse.
A circle of chairs sat in the middle of the room where you'd all gathered earlier that night, where you claimed your victory over Ghost. He was still there in the dim yellow lighting, arms crossed tightly over his chest and his eyes trained forward. Most of his own gear was absent, the only thing covering his torso a thick black shirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. You shuffled into the room, kicking the concrete floor to make your presence known.
"Your watch hasn't started yet," Ghost stated without turning to look at you.
"I'm aware," You replied, leaning against the hallway entrance.
He looked over his shoulder at you, black makeup smudged around his eyes as if he'd just been rubbing at them. "Come to relieve me early, then? Sweet of you."
"Sure," You said, throwing up your hands in defeat. "You caught me, boss."
"Don't get all soft on me now, Sledge," Ghost said, blowing air out of his nose.
The use of your call sign made you visibly cringe; you didn't even choose the damn thing. After running out of amo and breaking your only knife during a firefight, you made do with your surroundings and found a sledge hammer. Needless to say, the unit was shocked at the amount of damage you managed to inflict with the thing. Thus, your call sign was born, and from that moment forward, you were affectionately known as Sledge.
You hated it.
There was nothing worse than a daily reminder of the carnage you witnessed at your own hand.
Shaking off the memory, you made your way over to a table with weapons and amo scattered all about. Rolling your eyes, you carefully examined the guns to make sure they still had their safety on, and made sure every knife was sheathed. After organizing the mess a bit, you snagged a hunting knife and a pistol, tucking them away and looking for the proper ammunition.
"I know you're not actually here to take your watch," Ghost said, his voice dangerously close to your ear. "What's goin' on?"
"Nothing," You shrugged, "Concrete floors are hard on my shoulders. Makes it hard to sleep."
"Sure, sure," Ghost hummed, "Wanna tell me the real reason you're up, Sledge?"
"Quit calling me that, you know I hate it. And no, I'm not telling you."
"Shame. Was hoping you'd tell me Johnny's talkin' in his sleep again."
You threw him a half-hearted smile over your shoulder, now fully aware of just how close he truly was. "Maybe you should go check on him, then. He might be."
His eyes locked with yours and you felt your insides shrink. It was easy to feel small under his gaze, considering he was a brick house of a human being and looked like he ate bullets and nails for breakfast. The mask certainly didn't help, that was for sure. Feeling uneasy with the eye contact, you returned your attention to the table of weapons.
"Y/N, look at me," Ghost whispered.
Hearing him say your name was enough to make you shiver, his accent making it roll off of his tongue like silk. It was nice that he listened to your request to stop calling you by the nickname you despised, considering you'd normally be taunted for expressing your distain for it. Even still, you did your best to ignore him.
"Do you remember which amo we use for these?" You asked, hoping to change the subject and gesturing to your empty gun. "Can't remember to save my life."
"Don't try this with me. Won't work and you know it."
"I always get them mixed up."
"Y/N, look at me, that's an order."
With some reluctance, you turned on your heel, leaned back against the table, and looked up at your lieutenant. His arms were still crossed over his chest, and you couldn't help eyeing the tattoo you hadn't seen before on his forearm. How long had that been there? Realizing you still weren't looking at him, Ghost placed his index finger under your chin and raised your head to meet his gaze.
"If something's going on with you, I need to know," He explained, "If you're not okay, that's something we have to take into account."
"Oh, for Christ's sake," You muttered, shaking your head. "Is anyone in this unit actually okay? I mean, really. I'm pretty sure everyone gets nightmares every now and then, Ghost. I'm fine."
"So it's nightmares, then," He said with a nod, "Could'a just said that."
"Didn't feel relevant."
"Come sit down."
Groaning like a teenager about to be grounded, you followed him over to the circle of chairs, sitting down beside him and crossing your arms. He leaned forward on his knees, his hands clasped together in front of him. You waited patiently to get the scolding of the century about 'paying attention to your mental health' and 'you know what happens when a soldier starts displaying signs of PTSD'.
But it never came.
Instead, an uncomfortable silence fell over the room. The only sound you could make out was the faintest rain drops that began splattering the old windows of the warehouse.
"Go on, tell us about it," Ghost said after a few moments.
"The nightmare?" You asked, raising an eyebrow. "You're joking, right?"
He didn't respond.
With a deep breath, you turned your head to the side, focusing on the many different objects that dotted the floor before you began.
"It's always different," You sighed, "I'm used to them by now, I can shake them off just fine usually. But this one... I don't know. I woke up, but I was still dreaming. Everyone was here, just talking like normal. These soldiers came out of the shadows and stood behind everyone. One for each of you. They all had guns, and one by one, they just..."
Tears welled in your eyes at the images that flitted through your head, forcing you to shake them away. You rubbed the back of your neck anxiously, taking a small breath and willing away the pain. A large hand closed over your knee, startling you.
When you looked up at Ghost, he had turned fully in his seat to face you. His arm was outstretched as his gloved hand sat carefully on your knee. The gesture made you shift in your seat, and you unintentionally found yourself facing him as well. Something in your subconscious knew he was safe, despite your efforts to avoid this whole encounter.
"Tell me what they did," Ghost said, his tone soft like you'd never heard it before. "Go on."
"Do I really have to say it?" You asked in a weak voice.
"Trust me."
You drew in another shaky breath before continuing, "They executed everyone."
"Sounds pretty serious," Ghost said with a nod, "Then what?"
"I was trying to stop them, but I couldn't move," You recalled as you fought back tears again. "It was like I was stuck in quicksand. I was just... Frozen. All I could do was watch."
"What would you have done?" He asked, "If you could've moved, what would you do?"
Anger bubbled in the pit of your stomach, overtaking the sadness. You balled your fists and dug your nails in hard. "I would've killed them myself. I don't care how long it would take, I'd do it. I wanted to, I'd make them suffer."
"I know you would," Ghost said with a small laugh, "I've seen you take big groups out for less."
"But I didn't," You said, lowering your head.
Ghost stood from his chair to move in front of you, crouching down on the floor in the space between your legs. He had to crane his neck to look up at you, and when you avoided his gaze again, he gently took your chin in his hand and held you in place. With no other choice but to stare into his eyes, you gave in, your shoulders slumping.
"It wasn't real," He said slowly, "If it was, none of those soldiers would have made it out in one piece. But it wasn't real, and it didn't happen."
"That doesn't really make me feel any better," You said with a small, broken laugh.
"How can I make it better?" He asked, his voice just above a whisper. "Anything, just tell me."
"Why do you care so much?" You asked in return, puzzled by his question. It wasn't like him to act like this, and you wondered to yourself if this was some kind of prank. "It was just a dream."
Ghost released your chin and let his hand slide down to your arm, slowly trailing downward until he reached the palms of your hands. When his fingers began lacing between yours, heat flooded your body and you tensed. Sensing this, Ghost loosened his grip and used the pad of his thumb to stroke your knuckles.
"Like it or not, I do care about you," He explained, and you could swear he was smiling beneath his mask. "Nightmares are serious business. I've seen soldiers off themselves over nightmares more times than I can count. I don't want that to happen to you."
"I wouldn't do that," You scoffed, "I don't think I'm capable of that sort of thing, anyway."
"Keep it that way," Ghost said, his tone firm. "You even start thinkin' like that, you come straight to me. That's an order."
"You sure like dishing out orders," You joked, allowing yourself a small smile. "When are you gonna quit telling me what to do, huh?"
"When you start listening," He shot back, his eyes crinkling at the corners. Definitely a smile under there, you were sure of it now. "Head back to bed, yeah? I'll take your watch."
"You don't have to do that, seriously-"
"I'm not asking, I'm telling," He cut you off, standing from his spot in front of you and pulling you up with him. "You've had more than enough excitement for one night."
Before you could further protest, Ghost did the unthinkable, pulling you in close by your wrist so you were flush against his chest. Your breath caught in your throat as he looked you over, his eyes trailing over your face, down your nose, and landing on your lips. A different hand snaked around your middle and you froze, his palm pressed flat against the center of your back. When it began sliding downward, you thought you were going to pass out.
For the first time that night, you were just fine with maintaining eye contact, waiting for him to do something, anything. His hand traveled lower and lower until it reached the hem of your pants, one of his fingers lacing through a belt loop.
"Make me a promise, yeah?" He asked in a deep, gruff voice.
You swallowed hard. "Depends on what it is."
Ghost leaned in close until he reached the shell of your ear, his hot breath barely grazing your skin through his mask. Your head was running marathons as you tried to comprehend what was happening, but for whatever reason, you didn't want it to stop. Using what little bravery you had, you dared to reach up and lay your hand over the left side of his chest. Even with the thick fabric in the way, it was easy to make out every detail of the muscle there. He tensed under your touch and held his own breath for a moment.
Ghost released your hand and raised it to his own face. You were sure what he was doing until you felt warm, chapped lips ghosting over the skin of your ear.
He pulled his mask up.
"Promise me you'll keep this between us, love," He murmured, his tone close to that of a purr. When he spoke, his lips made contact with your ear, and goosebumps raised on your skin.
"What if I don't?" You dared to ask, feeling bold.
He fell silent, humming once as the hand on your lower back abandoned its position. For a moment you thought you'd gone too far, and when he removed your knife from it's place on your hip, you took in a sharp breath. It clattered to the floor beside you, the protective case around the blade muffling the sound slightly. Next he took your still empty gun, placing it in his own holster and making a point to shove it in roughly.
"Guess I'll have to make it an order, then."
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otomiyaa · 1 month
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I just remembered something and... oh god. Just to give you some context, I'm a girl, in my early twenties, and I live in latino america (sorry if my English is shitty, the language just spawned in my head when I was 3 years old)
When I was 15 years old a new girl got transfered to the same school I was in. The seats were assigned and we got to sit next to each other during the classes. We became close really quickly, so we were always excited to sit together. I would say we were friends, our parents knew each other so we used to hang out a lot outside of school as well. I don't now how it started, I don't remember who asked who about the topic, but the thing is I knew this girl liked to get tickled, or at least she didn't mind it, she used to say it made her feel happy and that it helped her get distracted during the boring classes. I remember how I used to grab a pen and start doodling on her forearms, how I used to grab her hand and start caressing it with my fingernails, how she used to ask me to tickle her sides while we were in class and she would just laugh silently and hide her face on the desk as I did it so she wouldn't distract the rest of the class. One of my first experiences with tickling, I guess a big part of how I discovered I felt some kind of way about tickling. I haven't seen that girl in person since high school, but we have mutual friends so we follow each other on instagram. God forbids she ever brings out the topic again or I'll get so embarrased I'm going to want to kill myself. Thank you very much
wooow imagine if we'd all be like that "tickle me please it makes me happy, it distracts me, etc." hehe, but really that sounds so sweet!!
Thank you for sharing it!!! I hope you can meet her again and see if she still likes it 🤭
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mycatsaidwhat · 1 year
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things i’ve heard college students say pt. 27
-if you hit it raw, why are you voting red? 
-if all he does is smoke and give you meat, you’re dating a barbeque grill sis 
-being horny is a feminine trait, you should be thinking about war
-lord, we thank thee for the food before us *grocery store sushi, sponge bob fruit punch, pokemon-themed fruity pebbles* 
-why does the aftertaste of coke zero taste like blood 
-suck it up, you’re an American, you can do anything with god and Nixon on your side
-i’m too drunk to pray for god 
-if I’m ever in a coma, just show me that meme of Georgia as a state backslapping the Republican elephant and I will bolt upright 
-“Academic weapon” and “alcoholic” both begin with A
That they do, Braden, that they do
-My Little Pony? More like My Big Pony
That did psychological damage
-turning right on red is the greatest civil liberty we have left in this country 
-well as of 1989, dueling does not prevent you from running for public office, so props to you 
-he walks like he got pegged
-if I’m ever throwing up on the side of the road and I text you that I’m drunk, you don’t have to come get me. I always find my way home. Like a pigeon. 
-being in a relationship will NOT solve your problems. Happiness comes from substance abuse 
-I wrote down all the reasons we should do shots tonight. For context I have an essay due tomorrow. 
-I want you to take a picture of Quintin Tarantino in person because he simply CANNOT look that weird in real life 
-you’ve got like 50 feet of intestines, right? You could definitely do a couple laps around a tree with them 
-*is making an alignment chart of writers that we’ve covered in class and whether we could take them in a fight and if we’d feel good about it* 
-i wanna kill everything or die, I don’t know, I’m sad 
-he seems like the kind of professor who would make us fill out the course evals in class 
-he has abs, what do you think we were doing? 
-Here in this house we stand for the flag. The flag being Bucky Barnes in the first Captain America movie, greasy and sweaty and freshly tortured
-I’m just trying to enjoy my shitty Busch light and you bring me Charles LeClerc with his legs spread 
-if I got cancer my private snap story would become an inspirational story and that sounds like a lot of pressure 
-college is just progressively caring less about people seeing what you’re doing on your computer in class. I’m texting, I’m on Doordash, I’m on Shein, I’m on Tinder, I do not give a fuck 
-got stacks on stacks on stacks, baby I clear the racks 
Nice, Dr. Suess, get it! 
I was referencing a rap over Gimme More by Britney Spears, but sure  
-if doing drugs and fucking raw in pools in front of everyone is what adult producers think eleventh graders are up to these days then someone needs to tell them 
-I’d fuck to the Gravity Falls theme 
-you missed the professor’s Coin Jar Day and his annual discussion of child marriage 
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drunkenbagel · 1 year
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Enchanted to meet you - Part 2
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Pairing: Pedro Pascal x Spanish f!reader Contents: slow burn, a bit of strong language/swearing, mentions of alcohol and drunk behaviour, implied sexual ambiance/tension but not actual smut. Word count: 3,1k A/N: I had some issues with my acc, which got deleted (and all of my posts/likes/etc🥲) but I'm back! anyways, here is the second part to the story! hope you like it :) Taglist: @canpillowscry @lxdyred (thank you so much for reading! <3) Part 1 - Part 2 - Part 3 - Part 4
You sighed while picking up your things from your work table and started heading to the elevator.
“Nora, it's not like that. I think you're taking it a little out of context.”
“What?! You're telling me that somehow befriending Pedro fucking Pascal isn't that big of a deal to you? Is that what it is? What the hell has New York done to you?”
“I'm not saying that! It's just- I don't think I am his public friend anyway.” You sighed again. “He's a celebrity, and I'm just a regular girl. Hell, I'm sure he sees me as his kid. He actually calls me kid, Nora. And I just happen to have the biggest crush on this man! Do you know how embarrassing that is?”
“Well, you got me there. But what if he's faking it and he likes you too? You may have a chance. You can still manifest your way into this man's ass anyway.”
You snorted loudly, and some people on the hall gave you a weird look.
“You always know how to cheer me up, that is a fact.”
“And I'm also the funniest, best sibling you ever had” she said laughing too.
“You are literally my only sibling, Nora. You're my rant dump. The best racoon, maybe. I could give you that title.”
“Are you kidding me? You know I love racoons. They're my favorite beings. And they are so funny too. I actually feel weirdly honored.”
It had been a little more than four months since you met Pedro, and the two of you had been getting closer. In the first month of knowing each other, much to your surprise, he gave you his personal number, and since then you started exchanging text messages almost constantly. Especially since you didn't saw each other again apart from a couple times at the beginning of your friendship, because he had a lot of work and had to travel back and forth. Schedules are real shitty sometimes, more since yours both didn't exactly coincide.
The elevator made a small sound and the doors opened.
“You know that I-”
Your face fell and you froze as you saw the secretary speaking with someone that looked an awful lot like Pedro. You instinctively hid behind a wall on a random hallway.
“y/n? You alright?”
“He's here.”
“What? Who are you-”
“He is here. At my work! What is he doing here?” you whisper-shouted while cautiously looking at him again. There was a brief silence on the other line.
“You mean to tell me that Pedro showed up at your work? Out of the blue?”
“Yes! He was supposed to be in Canada for some filming or some shit! Oh my god, what do I do?”
“Eres tonta?” Nora said. “Go talk to him like a normal person, estúpida! I bet you're hiding somewhere now.” (Are you dumb?)
You straightened and looked around as if you could see your sister looking at you.
“I fucking knew it” she said, and you heard her laughing on the other line.
“Shut up! You know this kind of things make me anxious. What do I do now? I look like shit, Nora.” You looked at your reflection on a nearby sign and started to fix your hair a little. “What is he even doing here? Why not tell me he was coming?”
“It's something called a surprise, y/n. You show up uninvited.”
“Ha-ha” you mockingly laughed. “What should I tell him? How do I react? I don't want him thinking I'm a big weirdo by making things awkward or something.”
“Just talk to him, for starters!” she scolded you.
“About what?! Hey, funny seeing you here, do you want to hang out? No! I don't think we can be seen in public without him being recognized, and less with me. Go somewhere closed? Same thing. And I can't take him to my shitty house, that place is a fucking dump and you know it.”
“Okay, okay. Breathe, y/n. Please.” You closed your eyes and took a deep breath, then exhaled it. “Good. Now, maybe he just wanted to say hello, and go about his day. You're getting a bit ahead of yourself.”
“I know, I know. Okay, I'll just... Casually go out. I guess?”
“Good. And keep me updated right away or I'll call the cops.”
You laughed while shaking your head. Oh how you loved her.
“Thank you. Talk later. Bye!”
“Bye, you dumbass” she said, and hung up before you could say anything else.
You looked into your reflection again, and went to the exit as if you didn't see him in the first place. Only when you got out, he wasn't there anymore. You frowned. Maybe I just imagined it? You shook your head, and went to the door, when the secretary called your name.
“y/n! Here, Ashley told me to give you these reports for Monday. Oh, and by the way, there is someone waiting for you over there” he said, pointing towards the small book aisle that was on the waiting room.
You then saw him standing there in between shelves, looking through some books. You couldn't help a small smile from appearing in your lips.
“Thanks, Carter. See you next week” you said, waving at him while you walked to Pedro. You stood behind him, and he was so concentrated on the books that he didn't hear you approaching.
“Hm, Cien años de soledad, good book.”
He instantly whipped his head to your direction, a little startled, but when he saw your face he smiled widely.
“Hey!” he said, and grabbed you by your shoulders to give you a brief side hug.
“Hello. What are you doing here? I though you worked.”
“Yeah well, we finished a bit earlier than expected and I don't have to go back until Tuesday, so I wanted to surprise you. I hope that's okay.”
“Yeah, yeah. Sure. I just- I don't know if you wanted to...” be seen with me? “Anyways, fancy a drink? I sure as hell could use one. Or two”
“Oh, hell yes” he groaned.
“Good, because I know a good Irish pub just in this street.”
“Después de tí, señorita. You lead the way” he said while bowing slightly. (After you, young lady.)
After a bit of small talk and a 5 minute walk, you two walked into McCarthy's, your favourite pub ever. You had gone a couple of times with Ana and some friends there. Had a whole lot of good alcohol too.
You sat on a table that was a bit hidden from the rest, and you thanked Marcus for that. The kind bartender had been your friend since you started being a regular here. You two even dated for a while back then, but in the end you both preferred to stay as friends. Also, the amount of times he had to drive you home drunk was a bit embarassing.
After what seemed to be the shortest time of laughing and drinking, Marcus approached your table.
“Hey lass, we're closing. You need a ride?” he asked while putting a cloth on his shoulder.
“Already? Thanks for telling me, Marcus” you said, words a bit slurred, clearly a bit drunk. “Don't worry, I can walk home”
“You sure? I don't mind driving you, you already know that.”
“Yeah I'll-”
“I'll go with her.”
You two turned to look at Pedro, who had been awfully quiet during your coversation. Marcus stared at him for a little while, and then at you.
“Wolf?”
“Rabbit. Soft, white rabbit” you answered laughing, remembering the code names you made back then. He wanted to know if he was bothering you or if you were okay with that. He was such a caring friend. Pedro just looked at you two back and forth, without understanding. He didn't know why that interaction bothered him, but it did.
“Alright, then I'll have to ask you to leave like the rest so I can close up for the night.”
You two picked up your things, and on the way out, Pedro got ahead of you to open the door. You stopped briefly to say goodbye to Marcus before leaving.
“Always nice seeing you ‘round here, lass. Take care, please” he said.
“Thanks, Marc” you said, bringing him closer to give him a hug. After that, you kissed his cheek, and left off to the door. You didn't notice, but Pedro was clenching his jaw for the whole time, for a reason unknown to him too.
After a small silent walk, you went to reach for your phone, and in the process you realized your keys where missing.
“Shit. Please, no, no, no...” you muttered while frantically searching your bag.
“What happened?” Pedro asked, a little worried. “You alright?”
You sighed, defeated.
“I left my keys at work. And they are obviously more than closed right now. And until Monday” you said, groaning loudly. “Joder! I will have to call a locksmith, and then make copies of keys... Shit, this month is going to suck so fucking bad.” (Fuck!)
“You could stay at my place.” The words left Pedro's mouth before he could stop them, and he panicked for a second. You froze too, feeling your already alcohol-warm cheeks heating up. Did he just say that? You raised your eyes to meet his.
“Are- Are you sure? I don't want to disturb you.”
“C’mon, kid. I have some free days and an empty home. Besides, we could continue the party there if you're up for it.”
“Oh, like you could handle it?” you said, challenging.
“I know damn well I can” he answered, now widely smiling.
“¿Me estás retando?” you asked. (Are you challenging me?)
“Oh, sí.” (Oh, yes.)
“Then it's on.”
When you arrived there, you started drinking basically a bit of everyhthing on Pedro's shelves, and it ended with the two of you being very drunk. You had drank quite a lot more, never backing up on the challenge, even when he told you that you had already won, while trying not to piss his pants because you had slipped and fell to the floor.
“I know I won! I always do” you said, laughing as you got up.
“Okay, kid, you win. Now let's get you to bed” he said while still laughing, also visibly drunk. He took your hand to lead you, and you felt sparks just from that touch. “It's one of my guest rooms, so you don't have to worry about anything. You have spare chargers on the drawer by the bed, and in the bathroom are also spare hygiene things if you need them.”
“Y’have any clothes?”
“Ah, yes. Wait a moment” he said, and stumbled a bit to his room next door. Meanwhile you tried to take your shoes and pants off on your own, but given that you were heavily drunk, it was quite a challenge. Pedro arrived short after with a shirt and some plaid pajama bottoms.
“Here” he said, leaving the clothes beside you in bed. You then tried to take off your sweater, but it got stuck on your head. You heard Pedro laughing, but he helped you get out of it. He folded it the best he could, and went to leave it on the chair beside the bed. “I'll leave this here for-”
He turned around, but you were right behind him. So close. Only in your underwear. His laugh faltered, and he shallowed hard, feeling his head spin.
“Pedro” you whimpered, while tugging at his shirt. He could feel his heart thundering in his ears. He knew he was attracted to you, but you never gave him any clue that it was reciprocal.
He saw you moving your lips, saying something, but the loud sound of his own beating heart didn't let him hear what you said. You tugged again at his shirt. He instinctively started to take his shirt off. Was this happening? Was this really going to happen?
Without breaking eye contact, you took the shirt, and reached for the clasp of your bra. He closed his eyes and shallowed again. Okay, Pedro, calm down. Blindly and not wanting to intrude you, he took off his jeans. He then felt you taking his hand and leading him to bed. When his leg touched the matress, he opened his eyes and found you looking back at him, but you were wearing his shirt on. Wait-
You threw your arms around his neck and pulled him towards you, collapsing on the bed. Pedro tried to avoid falling with his full weight on you, but you were hanging off of him for dear life.
“Warm” you whispered sleepily, clutching his head onto your chest. He radiated a lot of heat, and you found that very comforting. That's why you asked him for the shirt he was wearing. Now you were using him as your personal heater.
“Wait, y/n- I think I-”
You shushed him, and when he realized what was going on, he let out a small laugh. Without getting out of your grasp, he took the duvet and covered you two with it. Then, he accomodated himself on top of you, since you didn't seem to be letting him go anytime soon. You were also warm, and within a few minutes, he fell asleep too.
You woke up some hours later, with a dry mouth and a proper headache. You also felt your chest heavier than usual, so you opened your eyes briefly, and saw Pedro laying on your chest. Ah, it's just him.
Wait.
You opened your eyes abruptly this time, looking at him again. He had his arms around your waist, and you had yours in his hair. You the realized that you had only his yesterday's shirt on, and with one brief look below the covers, you saw that he was practically naked too. You frantically tried to remember last night's events, but you only remembered getting into his house. Then, all blank. Oh no, what the hell did I do?! Did you just ruin the brief but amazing friendship you had? Did you two had sex?
You then started making your way out of the bed, trying not to wake Pedro. You picked up your phone and made your way into the kitchen. Your body was sore as hell. While you poured a big water glass on the sink, you dialed Nora's number. She picked up at the fourth tone.
“Hello?”
“La he cagado. Monumentalmente.” (I fucked up. Tremedously.)
“¿Qué has hecho? ¿Estás bien?” she asked, sounding a bit worried. (What did you do? Are you okay?)
“I think I had sex with Pedro.”
There was a small silence. “What do you mean 'you think'? Did you or not?”
“I don't remember, Nora! I just- We drank a lot yesterday, and I woke up with only his shirt, on my underwear, and him practically naked too! I am freaking out!” you whisper-screamed while running your hand over your hair.
“Oh shit” she laughed. “You two had sex!”
“Don't laugh! I don't know what to do, he is-”
You felt two hands snake around your waist, and a raspy voice say good morning, beautiful into your neck. You froze, and ended the call.
“Hi” you said in a whisper.
“Did you have a good sleep?”
“Y-yeah... You?”
“Definitely. After last night's, I slept like a baby.”
You shallowed. Oh no. So you two really had sex. Sounded like very good sex. And you didn't remember! Fuck. The universe was taunting you.
What you didn't know was that Pedro woke up as soon as you left the room, following you to the kitched without you noticing. And, of course, heard the whole conversation. He then had the wickedest idea, and wanted to test you on how far you'd go without telling him what you really thought.
“What do you say? Do you wanna go again? Or are you too sore? I hope I wasn't too harsh on you.”
“No, I'm...” he kissed the back of your neck, and you felt a shiver run down your spine. “I'm fine”
“Good, then...”
He turned you around and lifted you by your thighs, forcing you to cling your arms around his shoulders and legs around his waist. You let out a small yelp, and buried your head in his neck as he carried you into the bedroom again. Your heart was beating very fast, and you thought it was going to pop out any moment now.
He laid you down on the bed, and trying to contain the laughter, he lowered his forehead to touch yours.
“Are you sure you're okay? You're a little tense.”
“Yes” you answered, a little too fast. It took everything in him not to burst laughing, and he tried to cover it by leaving small pecks on your neck. You sighed at the feeling, but tensed up again when he started lowering his mouth. One of his hands started to lift your shirt over your hips when you couldn't take it anymore.
“Stop! Stop please. I can't do it” you said, pushing him and getting off the bed.
“What? You can't do what?” he said, trying not to break character.
“I just- I cannot pretend anymore. I'm sorry if something happened, but I don't remember shit about yesterday and I'm proper freaking out right now. I don't want to ruin our friendship based on some drunk decision, and-”
You stopped talking when he suddenly burst out laughing. You looked at him in confusion.
“What? What's so funny?”
“y/n... Your- Your face-” he said, wheezing.
“Stop fucking laughing! I'm serious.”
“Nothing happened, love. I was just messing with you. I wanted to see how far you'd go.”
“Wha- But you were... I-I am... And you said...”
“I know what I said” he answered, wiping his tears. “I heard you on the phone”
You felt your cheeks burn.
“All of it?”
“All of it.”
“And you were going to let me do this, you fucking asshole?” you said, hitting him with a pillow.
“Ow! You think I'd let you? That hurts my feelings” he said, while fake pouting.
“Oh, I'm going to hurt you, Pedro. Te voy a matar!” (I'm going to kill you!)
You started hitting him repeatedly with said pillow, until both of you were laughing and panting on the bed.
After that, the bond between you two grew stronger, now going from friends who only texted to best friends who chatted, video called and saw each other at any chance they had. You had no idea how everything in your life was going to change.
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bookshelf-dust · 1 year
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you've ruined everything.
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billy hargrove x fem!reader
word count: 2,867
warnings: swearing, kissing, mentions of past/ongoing trauma, brief smoking, mentions of death, vecna (yes he counts), a pretty violent kill just not described in graphic detail, billy and reader are a mess
requested here
a/n: sylvia, this one's for you (really hope you read that in eddie's voice). so i kind of ended up with a recreation of some season two moments during the plot of season four, if that makes any sense. for context: everyone is still in hawkins, billy is upside-down-aware, everyone is chill with each other. this was my attempt at something riveting, but i don't know if that's what i accomplished. sidenote: for vecna's end, i want you to picture the endings of david in the lost boys or top dollar in the crow (sorry if those are spoilers). i hope you enjoy this!! <333
————
"Max..." Vecna's voice felt like a shiver. Max felt it skate down her scalp, tickle the base of her spine. As if someone had poured ice water over her head.
It was almost funny that he'd chosen her, really. She should've seen it coming.
This young, freshly traumatized girl. This girl who'd been dealt a shitty hand: uprooted from her father, from her hometown, disputed over by new friends. Best of all, she'd watched her brother get ripped apart—mentally and physically. Yeah, he'd lived, but Starcourt had still happened.
Maybe the Mindflayer was dead, but at what cost? Obviously their efforts had been in vain if Vecna was running amuck. But this time, it didn't seem like anything could be fixed. It felt like Vecna was the end.
"Your time...is almost at an end." His voice reverberated around the concrete walls of the school hallway. At least she’d thought it had.
“Max!” You were snapping your fingers in her face, an aggressive gesture, a tone in your voice you’d never used with her. It had been in her head. He’d been in her head.
Max’s headphones hadn’t left her ears since Nancy and Robin told you that music worked. That it’d saved Victor Creel (for the most part). And it would damn well save Max.
But He was getting angry. Vecna didn’t approve of your tactics. He didn’t like your plan.
Save Max. Save Max. Save Max.
So He flipped another page. Swept down another path. He looked into you. Listened.
That boy from the summer. Billy, was it? He’d hid something away. Tucked it nice and snug in the back of his mind. You.
You’d do just fine.
Vecna closed his eyes, let the vines do their job. Let them tether him to your world. He felt through that red blur, felt for you. Found himself sifting through your memories.
"Billy, would you please sit still? You fucking popped at stitch." You sounded aggravated with him, but you'd kissed the angry skin on his side anyhow.
He caught glimpses of you and that boy.
"Max, you have to tell Billy these things. He needs to know how you feel." Max hadn't known how to tell the boy how scared she'd been when she thought she'd lose him.
It seemed you played a great role in both of their lives. He wondered why he hadn't chosen you to begin with.
It seemed a different approach would be necessary this time. Messing with your mind clearly wasn't going to be the best move. Not like it had been for Chrissy. For Fred. For Patrick. Max.
So He started appearing for you. Showing himself off. Making himself known to you.
God, He was like a shadow.
The first time you'd been in the car with Steve. A glance in the rearview mirror and Vecna was in the backseat. You would've laughed at the odd manner of the situation, if it weren't for the way the monster was looking at you.
Like you were a hindrance.
You'd jumped, causing Steve to jump, but you'd gotten him to brush it off, keep his eyes on the road.
The more Vecna showed up, the more you understood what he was playing at.
He was outside the gym the night of the championship game when you'd gone out to get some air, the bleachers being way too crowded and sweaty for your liking. Billy had offered to go with you, but you knew he was much to invested in Lucas winning the Tigers the game.
You didn't even flinch when you heard that growl--familiar at this point. In fact, you patted your pockets, grabbing hold of the pack of Marlboros and the lighter Billy had shoved in your jacket earlier.
The spark caught, a little flame igniting, and you lit a cigarette. Watched as he made his way towards you. He really was ugly.
"You've ruined everything."
You felt it that time. How Max had described the way Vecna's voice carried.
To you, though, it felt like when someone lights a fuse, when you watch the flame snake up up up. And then it stops. There’s just no boom. It simply feels like the empty space after the firework goes off, the air dead quiet. You thought you could get used to the feeling if need be.
Of course, you didn’t tell anyone about this. About your experiences.
Not like Max had. Like Billy that night last summer when he’d dialed your number, hands sweating and shaking, in the telephone booth.
This wasn’t about you. This was about keeping Hawkins safe. Keeping Max and Eddie safe.
You didn’t tell anyone except Will. You thought he’d understand that instinct to not worry anyone else, and he did. Be able to tell you anything that might help. But then you realized you were burdening him with all of this, and you quit.
But your friends had started to notice when nothing was happening to Max—when she made it past the week mark, when the symptoms had stopped.
No way it was that easy. That, what, Vecna had just given up? No. It was never that simple.
————
“Yeah, yeah, I’m coming.” Steve stomped down the stairs, swung the door open.
He was met with you.
“Why are you sweaty?” Steve propped his arm up against the door frame.
“Don’t worry about it. Where’s the bat?”
“Huh?” Sometimes you thought he really did need to be told everything.
“Nancy’s bat. The one with the nails?” You waved your hands above your head for emphasis. I need to borrow it. Please.”
“That’s my bat.” Steve set his hands on his hips, his most common motherly gesture.
“No, Steve. It’s Nancy’s. You took it at Jonathan’s house, remember? Fuck, okay. That’s not important. Would you just get me the damn thing?”
Steve obliged, though slightly frightened by what you could need it for, but, frankly, he thought you were a badass and could handle whatever it was.
He marched back up the stairs to his room, leaving you in the doorway. You heard him mumble along the way. “Nancy’s bat my ass. ‘S totally my bat. I’ve used it way more.”
————
Will was panicking. He’d always been good at keeping secrets; he did it nearly every day of his life. But he cared about you. You were like a sister to him. And he understood why you’d come to him, and even why you’d stopped, but when Steve called the Byers residence in question of why you might need a bat, he entered full freak-out-mode.
He had this image in his head of you being all alone, trying to fight this thing, and it made him sick. He didn't need to feel for the goosebumps on the back of his neck to know that it wasn't just in his head.
His hands were sweating as he picked up the phone, dialed Max's number.
"Hello?"
"I need to talk to your brother."
"Will? Why do you need to talk to Billy?"
Will could hear muffled music around the sound of Max's voice, so obviously Billy was home.
"It's about Y/N. I think something bad is going to happen. I think she's going to die."
————
Steve lazily rose from the couch, pausing the television. He followed the obsessive knocking once again, raising his hands in surrender though no one could see him. "Alright! Jesus, I'm coming, I'm coming. Can't you people just leave me alone for a while?"
This time, when he swung the door open, he was met with none other than Billy Hargrove. The apparition of such a creature was so odd to him, that Steve laughed. Actually laughed. Billy did not like this.
"Shut the hell up, Harrington." Steve did, but only because he didn't like the look on the blonde's face--like something was wrong. He realized that there was no reason for Billy to be here other than if something was wrong.
"I need your help." Steve had to bite his tongue. This was insane.
"Byers said that Y/N was here tonight, that she's gone off a-and I would fucking rip you a new one for not telling me about this Vecna shit, but I don't have time for that one right now. It's just that you guys have done this before, and I'm not exactly cut out to go off looking for her on my own--"
Steve cut him off, having never seen Billy ramble, or look remotely mentally distressed. "Hey, man, it's totally fine. I'll get a hold of Nancy, and you could go pick up Robin or something--look, we will figure it out, okay? I know this is a lot."
Billy shook his hands out, zipped up his jacket. He didn't like this. Not even a little bit. He wondered if this what it had been like for you when he'd been flayed: the constant buzz of fear, like you were gonna slip and fall away from him.
But he was also angry with you. You told him everything. This meant you'd been keeping something serious from him, and the both of you had worked so hard to get to a solid point in your relationship where all of your cards were on the table, no matter how shitty the hand was.
Sometimes it was just hard to be open.
Billy sat on the steps inside Steve's place, half registering that he was on the phone with Nancy who was simultaneously arguing with Mike.
There'd been a day once, back when he was still recovering, where he was sat on the edge of the tub, you with your knees pressed into the rug below you. You'd rubbed your hands together, trying to warm up the salve before you touched him. Billy's sides had always been ticklish, but that on top of the sensitivity of healing wounds meant you had to be very gentle with him.
Billy had tried to argue that he could do it himself, but he'd lost that battle, and let you at it.
"C'mere," you'd mumbled. You'd distracted him with a kiss while you moved your hands over some of deeper scars just below his ribs. He'd registered your palms being there, but he couldn't find it in himself to give a shit when your kiss told him he'd be okay.
You dipped your fingers back in the tub of medicine, spread them over a scar on his hip. "You're my favorite person in the whole world, Billy Hargrove." He'd scoffed.
"When I said you could tell me anything, I didn't mean cheesy shit like that."
The sound of the receiver being slammed back down snapped Billy out of his reverie.
Steve looked at Billy, put his hands on his hips. "Okay, Hargrove. Let's do this."
————
You'd parked your car a ways off from the quarry, and rock crunched under your feet as you made towards the edge overlooking the water.
This was the best place for you be be alone that you could think of. The moon was full tonight, the light shining over the water. It was beautiful in the way that the lights in the mall had been beautiful that night last summer.
You paced, waiting for him. The bat was heavy in your hand as you swung it back and forth, what with the nails jammed into the wood, listening to the swooshing sound it made in the night air.
You weren't entirely sure why you'd brought it, but the idea of coming out here empty handed felt unbelievably stupid.
Fog was rolling in over the water. Fitting.
And there he was. Big and writhing and evil. An image of Billy screaming flashed through your mind. Vecna had done that. Hurt your pretty baby.
"What are you doing out here, Y/N?"
"Thought we could have a little chat, you and me."
"Is that so? What makes you think you're so special as to get that kind of treatment?"
"Nothing, really. Thought we could make a deal. You seem to like me a whole lot, what with the trauma and all. I was thinking you take me. Leave Max and everyone else alone. I think you've had plenty of fun already."
"Oh, but there's always so much more fun to be had, Y/N."
But you'd caught that shift in his demeanor. Vecna hadn't expected you to give yourself up. Chrissy had run for her daddy. Fred for the hills. Patrick thought his friends could pick up the slack. But you. You were so different. So enticing.
You'd caught Lord Vecna off guard. Eddie would think it astronomically badass.
Your thumb shifted Billy's ring around your middle finger, the other hand still swishing Nancy's bat.
"I think it's pretty solid. Take me and do whatever it is that you think you need to do to feed that ego of yours. But stay the fuck away from my family. They've had enough."
"Yeah they have." Steve's voice. Steve's voice. You turned your head in time to see Billy hand the brunette a lighter before Vecna was alight, struggling for you, for anything.
But he looked shocked at the arrow that pierced his chest, and knocked him backwards. A fucking arrow. It had been Robin. The group of you gathered to watch Vecna fall. It was almost poetic, considering the way Henry had ended up in his alternate dimension.
Not so much when you mumbled, "Where the fuck did you get a bow, Buckley?"
"I tried to take up archery in middle school," she shrugged.
You watched Vecna burn from above, his body having impaled a stalagmite at the edge of the quarry floor. It felt almost ethereal.
You spun around, suddenly remembering that Billy was there. He was looking at you, but he was practically fuming. You hadn't seen him that angry in a long time. The rest of the group noticed, but Steve spoke first. "I think we oughta go make sure he's like, for sure, cooked."
Nancy eased the bat from your hands and smiled before pattering away.
"Billy, I--"
"Don't, Y/N. What the fuck were you thinking coming out here, huh?" He was an animated arguer, a hand gesture accompanying every frustrated word. But you didn't miss the glaze over his eyes. He'd obviously been worried sick.
"Oh, I don't know Billy, maybe that if he took me, that it wouldn't be Max. That it wouldn't be Dustin, or Eddie, or Steve's funeral that I'd be going to. That it wouldn't be fucking you lying dead somewhere!"
You'd moved closer to him in your haste.
"One sacrifice is better than a handful, Billy."
"No, Y/N, it's not!" Billy shouted, his words echoing around you. "If you die and I live, I'd have nothing. You have people that depend on you."
Billy's words knocked the wind out of you. You couldn't breathe.
"Billy."
"It's different for you. Your family needs you. Nobody needs me."
You stepped in front of him, taking his hand in yours. "I do. I need you."
A tear slipped down Billy's cheek, and you reached out to hold his face. He leaned into the weight of your palm, trying to control his breathing.
"Were you ever gonna tell me that you felt this way?" You asked him.
"Were you gonna tell me about Max or this Vecna creep or that you obviously thought it was okay for you to go off getting yourself killed?"
"Billy."
"Tell me. I need to know."
"Billy, I think you've got it all wrong. If I die, the rest of the group will go on. Steve and Robin and all of the kids. It doesn't make a difference if I'm here or not. I thought that by doing this, I could somehow fix it for them. For you. Make sure that your lives would be somehow different. Safer. That I'd be worth something."
"But you are. To me. You think I keep you around for no reason, Y/N? It's not like I love you or I need you or anything?"
"Yeah but I'm sure you c--"
"No, I fucking couldn't. There's no one else out there for me. Not one as good as you. As badass. You were shit talking him, weren't you?"
Billy laughed, but that didn't stop the tears laving over his freckles.
"Yeah. But, Billy, you gotta know that Max needs you. That Lucas needs you. Who's gonna teach him to be better than Steve, huh? Robin needs you. She wants to grow out a mullet, you know. I need you, Billy."
Billy wrapped his arms around your back, firm and warm.
"We're such fucking losers."
"Welcome to the club!" Robin's voice made you jump, and Billy's hand absentmindedly rubbed your back to soothe you.
"Shit, Rob! How long have you guys been back up here?"
"Long enough to hear all about your shared trauma." Nancy said, clapping her hands together happily.
Billy rolled his eyes and kissed you, his lips chapped and a little salty, but comforting nonetheless. He couldn't give a shit if Robin was making gagging noises behind him.
God, the two of you were so fucked up. But you were more than happy to be fucked up together.
————
please let me know if you liked this! feedback is always appreciated!! comments and reblogs mean more than you know. <33
tagging just to be safe: @zaypay
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forgottenfourr · 10 months
Text
i saw you in a dream - university smau
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chapter fourteen - impossible
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w/c: 1349
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a/n: i am still very sick (yes again) but the people must be updated!! while bedridden i have been rewatching kingdom: legendary war and i always forget how insane it is but i love it sm. i always act like i'm watching it for the first time when i rewatch it. but watching 3 groups that i absolutely love (skz, tbz, & ateez) compete against each other is so </3
chapter is not proofread because i am too exhausted too tbh
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yn's pov:
as you predicted, the cafe was agonizingly slow today. plus the anxiety of meeting with chan during your shift today was not helping the hours go by any faster.
it's about 2:30 when he walks into the cafe, his normal bright and full smile plastered on his face like always. maybe this chat won't be as shitty as you thought.
"hey!" he greets, voice as joyful as it always is.
your anxiety subsides slightly, "hi! do you want anything to drink? on the house." you try to match his attitude but fail.
"nah i don't really drink coffee. i'll just go sit and you can meet me there whenever you're free, yeah?" he says while gesturing to the booths that are just a few hundred feet away from you two.
"i can go on break now! min is here so he knows about you coming here to talk." like on cue, minho appears behind you, placing his hand on your shoulder to make you aware of his presence.
"oh my god minho! hey!" chan says somehow more cheerful than his previous words.
"hey, chris, how are you?" minho quickly starts a conversation with chan like they are lifelong friends.
"i'm good! busy with senior year stuff but overall everything is alright. how are you?" you can hear the genuine response and question in chan's voice. it makes you wonder if he is always an open book like this for everyone.
"meh, senior year. pretty exhausting shit. plus being friends with this dumb ass," he says while pinching your side making you shriek away at his touch.
"DICK HEAD" you retort back to minho whilst shoving him. causing both of the boys to laugh.
you groan at the two and how immature they are. "min i'm going on break," you state. not giving him the option to say no or ask you to wait a few more minutes.
"okay, don't miss me too much!" minho calls out sarcastically as you and chan make your way to a nearby table. his comment making you turn around and flip him off which resorts to him laughing at you again in hysterics.
you and chan take a seat across each other. if anyone were to not know the context of what is going on right now you're sure they would think you guys were on a date.
"it's nice to see minho so comfortable with you," chan begins, ultimately dragging out the conversation you so desperately just wanted to be over.
you nod your head at his words, a slight smile on your face.
"i don't mean to sound rude but, can we just get to the point? what did you want to talk to me about?" you feel awful for skipping the small talk and going right to business but you felt as if you couldn't wait another minute. your anxiety growing in you more and more as each second passed on.
chan's face seems to falter slightly and he repositions himself in his chair. it is very evident that he is now uncomfortable.
"yeah uhm," chan pauses for a moment, trying to find the right words that wouldn't automatically accuse you. "don't take this the wrong way but," he takes a deep breath, "did you actually write the guitar part for your song?"
a haste breath falls past your lips at his question.
"what?" of course you did. you came up with it yourself. you weren't a piece of shit. you would never steal another's work.
"of course i did, why are you asking?" the genuine annoyance and hurt so audible in your tone.
"i am not accusing you of anything!" his statement coming out very quick and apologetically. "it's just. i have a friend who i worked with a few months ago. and he has a guitar part in his song that sounds identical to yours. and it could be a coincidence! but it seems very unlikely?" all his words have a ping of uncertainty to them.
"no, i swear i wrote it myself i-" a sudden thought making you cut off your own words.
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you remember exactly where you first heard the guitar melody. you had finally fallen asleep after nearly 3 days of being awake. you remember returning to your dream world, immediately greeted by the mystery boy. it felt like it always did, serene and peaceful. but it was different that day. the boy spoke to you.
"hey, do you know how to play the guitar?" he said with a warm smile on his face. the one you grew so fond of.
you laugh slightly, "i can but i am awful at it."
"would you like to be a little less awful at it? i can teach you some stuff," he said as he pulled out a guitar from seemingly nowhere
you didn't know what you expected his voice to sound like but it was certainly 10x better than anything your mind could've made up.
your cheeks blushed at his offer, "i'd love to." you replied, your acceptance making the tip of his ears red.
you guys spent the rest of your time together sitting together and playing songs for each other. though, most of the time it was him playing for you and you watching him with awe. he taught you different chords and melodies, helping you with each note as you struggled through.
there was one melody though. one that stuck with you. that bounced through your head at any given moment. one you found yourself humming at any given moment. it was like it was planted in your brain and you had completely fallen in love with the simplicity of it. the melody being so beautiful and perfect no matter the key or pace.
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your face grew pale at the sudden realization. you had only heard it once in your life. and that being from your dream boy. who is fake. who your subconscious came up with. right?
because it wouldn't make sense if the boy from your dreams actually existed. it isn't possible. and if it was, the only thing about the boy that would be the same is his appearance. everything else about him your mind created.
so there is absolutely no way he also just so happens to know the guitar melody that he taught you in your dream which you then thought was just something you came up with yourself because AGAIN it happened IN YOUR DREAMS.
there was no way that is possible. even if a teeny tiny bit of you wanted it to be possible, there is no way. it's like scientifically impossible. sharing your dreams with someone? let alone someone you don't even know?
it's too much to process. let alone in front of chan who probably thinks you're having a mental breakdown or going absolutely fucking insane right in front of him. which you kind of are!
"uh, yn?" chan tries to get your attention back to him quietly but him calling your name just makes you all too aware of what is happening right now.
you quickly stand up and you continue to revert your gaze from him. "i uh, i have to go." you quickly say, words barely audible through your mumble.
you don't give him a second to think before you're racing out the cafe's front door and run home. leaving chan there unsure of what just happened.
it's too much to think about. you just need to be away from everyone right now. minho will be fine at the cafe by himself. he'll be pissed but he'll forgive you. you'll make it up to him later. right now you just need to be alone to process everything. the possibility that somehow the boy you have been spending time with in your dreams for the past 7 months might be real and also might have been having the same dreams you have.
it's too much. but a part of you is hoping that he does exist and remembers everything you two did together. it's nearly impossible but one can hope, right?
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br1ghtestlight · 4 months
Text
getting war flashbacks to the bobs burgers fanfic where louise is doing math homework in the restaurant when nobody else is around and then bob has a heart attack </3 that shit was TRAUMATIZING
love linda shouting four whenever there's a math problem or anything related to numbers. best recurring joke. FOUR!!!!
you can do it gene :D also im so bad at math I 100% would not be able to help either. dumbass rep family
bob trying to help gene with his homework is cute. even if he is Not very good at it. he wants to be an involved dad :(
gene im not gonna lie that math question has gotta be fucking with you. rhat is not a real question. i could NEVER do that not if i was given 100 hours that shit is fake
see this is where when I was in math class i would just write a random number and move on bcuz im never gonna figure it out anyway im not gonna waste time. so that's my advice gene. just Give Up
he says "maybe your mom or tina could get you started" because they're older but I genuinely think louise has a better chance of helping bcuz she is so smart. if she'd WANT to help is another question entirely
because I'm stuck in a safe 😐
AND THEN HE BLINDFOLDED ME ON THE WAY HERE??? HE BLINDFOLDED YOU??????
teddy I think his guy is gonna murder you im gonna be so real right now
unfortunately im kinda following teddy's logic now like. it isnt like fischoeder isn't doing this type of shit everyday just for fun. rich guys are just like that BUT getting their money is nice
"gene was doing homework?? that's new"
WE'RE NOT ALL ECONOMICALLY COMFORTABLE LIKE YOU ARE
"Why did you tell me the whole long story about the sandwich in the drawer if you're running out of battery LOCKED IN A SAFE??" "Context!!!!"
also bob and teddy have such great comedic chemistry lmao they bounce off each other so naturally
louise isn't lying she Does have a certain set of skills 😭 if anyone could find him it WOULD be her the lockpicking genius nine year old supervillain
miss you. see you soon. gotta go!!
has he gotten a new cellphone since that MIDDLE OF THE DAY AND YOUR PHONE IS AT 23% argument or is it that same shitty 2008 blackberry phone that dies almost immediately lmfao
bob is a real one for doing this bullshit for teddy he did NOT have to. they're ride or die fr
I'm not entirely unconvinced that gerald isnt a serial killer but thats okay <3 men can have hobbies
also I'm choosing to believe this gerald is the same one from the taxes/weed cookie episode even though it ABSOLUTELY is not bcuz i think that would be funny. by day he's a regular tax agent by night he is a creepy rich kidnapper who pulls mind games on all his handymen
OH I FORGOT THE SUBPLOT FOR THIS EPISODE IS ABOUT SPORTS PEOPLE why did they do the whole thing with gene's homework then.... are they connected. what is the gameplan
WE PICK A NEW LOVER FOR MOM
i love how bob is apparently the only thing keeping his family from going completely off the fucking rails like. he's the only thing standing between his family and their restaurant burning down with everyone inside fr
your dad never loved that dream :/ because he's a hater :/ AND SO JEALOUS :/
you're not gonna break the world record. another hater. STOP THAT
I might be having a panic attack 💔 I CANT TELL BECAUSE IVE NEVER HAD ONE BEFORE OR IM ALWAYS HAVING ONE soo real teddy
WE LOST HIM 😭😭💔
aww I love them all wearing their lil aprons <3 (crappy photo of my tablet bcuz the app im using to watch this episode doesn't allow screenshots)
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SAY SOMETHING SMART LIKE UHH HOW WOULD YOU FLIP A GIANT BURGER. OH GOD THEY DIDNT MAKE THE GIANT BURGER DID THEY. WHO WOULD EVEN AGREE TO EAT THAT. AN OVER FOURTY CO-ED BASKETBALL TEAM. REALLY 😯
sorry this episode has so many good ooc quotes FJDMDJSKSKKM
gene STOP calling him father
bob is being like a whole ass detective meanwhile linda and the kids are currently making The Worst Decisions Ever
h jon benjiman is doing such a good job voicing bob in this episode idk it has so much personality and sounds natural. or it's always like this and im just now appreciating it but either way A+ work
cute bob and teddy moment ❤️❤️
(ignore the awful camera quality. nothing I can do there) also love the fact that teddy can easily lift up and manhandle bob. Good to know
there's so much going on w/ this gerald guy I dont even know WHERE to begin. what a guy. wow
this is so cute and sweet im so happy!!! YOU DOUBLE FAKE WALLED HIM :D YOU SMART SMARTIE. YOURE A GENIUS BOB
"I knew I asked the right person to come help me. Yeah. Mort wouldn't answer."
"What? You called Mort first?"
"No..."
HE ASKED MORT???? LMFAO big win for tedmort shippers. I fucking guess
MORT NEVER DOUBLE FAKE WALLED ANYONE why is bob like genuinely jealous of mort and teddy right now 😭 chill out man you've got a wife at home
"let's just say it's twelve" FINALLY bob follows my very smart advice when it comes to math homework smh
ALSO THIS IS TECHNICALLY THE FIRST TIME WE'VE SEEN THEM EATING BOBS BURGERS FOR DINNER OR IN GENERAL!!! I mean it's a giant hamburger loaf but it technically was served at bob's burgers so it counts
GIANT FRENCH FRIES
aww this episode was so fun and cute!! I love the more adventure-y type episodes where they explore a new location so this episode was great and very stressful lmao. also very funny. I love bob and teddy's dynamic/back and forth throughout the episode and the weird mort mention at the end felt like they were soft launching his and teddy's relationship even though I KNOW they aren't actually. mort could replace kathleen if we believe. very solid 8/10 episode :)
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melishade · 3 months
Note
#22. Hanji and Optimus. Caught in the moment hanji hug Optimus/ dark timeline
This ask game
For more context: Part 21: Hanji’s Perspective
"So what do we do now?" Hanji asked the Prime. Optimus stared at them for a brief moment before sitting up from the berth. He noticed a cube of energon left untouched before reaching out to grab it.
"The Survey Corps, Arcee, Wheeljack, even Megatron are all out of our depth," Hanji continued as Optimus drank some energon, "And I...I couldn't handle the situation at all. When you got captured, I started acting shitty. To my comrades, to Levi. So much so he actually snitched on me to Megatron. I'm sure that I made him cry...I'm not proud of that. And Megatron ends up taking control of the Survey Corps and does a significant better job than me-!"
"Megatron was a leader himself," Optimus reminded Hanji.
"Optimus that's not the point," Hanji proclaimed, "When the fighting got tough, I couldn't meet the expectations of being a Commander and everyone else had to pick up after me."
Hanji rubbed their eyes. "I've been so shitty to everyone ever since you got captured, and I shouldn't have done that. But, fuck, you're so important to me and I've lost so many others that I didn't want to lose you. God, I'm so selfish aren't I?"
Hanji lied down on the table they were on. "I'm so sorry Optimus."
"Hanji, there is no need for you to apologize," Optimus reasoned as he set the cube down, "This situation was something none of us accounted for, so sacrifices had to be made to keep you safe."
"You make it sound like you would have done it again," Hanji remarked.
"I would have," Optimus confessed.
"I would prefer that you don't make it a habit," Hanji warned him, although that got a rather uneasy hum from Optimus. The Prime still was able to recollect himself and continue.
"But I do not regret my actions," Optimus declared, "It helped save more lives. And I am glad that not all of you perished. You made an irrational decision. So have I, but we are all flawed. And you and the others are still trying to fight and live. That is more than enough for me."
Hanji started getting teary eyed, causing Optimus to backpedal a little. "I apologize. I did not mean to make you emotional. And I-!"
Hanji used their 3D gear to fly over and slam into Optimus' faceplate, startling the Prime. The pain didn't seem to bother them as they just hugged his face and snuggled him.
"Stop talking, you self-sacrificial dumbass," Hanji told him. Optimus still felt a little awkward at the sign of physical affection, but he used his digits to gently pat Hanji's back.
(Free game: 44-46,14, 7, 19,23,26, 32,34-37,39. 10 has been asked.)
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talesofthedm · 8 months
Text
Confessions
The bastard Astarion confessed his feelings on this playthrough sooner than I thought he would so I had to do research and take notes (i was already taking notes, lets be honest).
Anyway, this is my sleep deprived attempt at writing out the Act 2 romance confession. It combines dialogue from both the standard romance confession, the variant if you defend him from Araj, and also a really bad pun (I like puns. Astarion does not.)
Im definitely going to rewrite/edit this at some point when I start like actually writing out the full fic of my playthrough, but that's pretty much to remove some added context/change it out/not be sleep deprived when i edit.
There is a reference to a previous fic i wrote (here), but you don't need to read it for context (but I am here for the shameless plug).
Tav is Freya (she/her), Gloomstalker Ranger/Assassin Rogue. Brief description of a scar she has.
Excerpt:
Astarion buried his nose into her hair and breathed in, trying to memorize it all. The sound of her heart, the tickle of her breath, the smell of sweat and dirt and too-cold river water and whatever perfumed soap she used that was rapidly fading with the passing days. He laced his fingers at the small of her back, feeling the warmth of her skin from where it peaked under her shirt. He just wanted to hold her there, for a while… for an eternity if he could.
TW: brief mentions of just Astarion's past with... all that, and mentions of blood. No actual descriptions, just dialogue.
Gods, when did life become so complicated? They were no closer to finding a way to kill an immortal than before (which was to say, not at all). Instead, they found the entrance to some disgusting, fleshy pit that they all collectively looked and went ‘no.’ The only thing of note the entire day was that damned drow woman with her sultry voice that kept pushing and pushing and insisting… She had half a mind to help her spill some, seeing as how much she seemed to love blood.
She must have been pacing—stomping—back and forth and lost in thought when he called to her.
“Freya?” Astarion asked, tinged with worry. Perhaps he thought she’d have another breakdown, spend the next half day sleeping while they huddled in a corner trying to protect her unconscious body. “Do you have a moment? I think we need to talk.”
She was suspicious, to say the least. He was never one to “talk,” as much as it seemed that’s all he did. When she turned to face him it suddenly became a possibility. Dread. Horrible, gnawing dread at the base of her stomach. It was quiet and deafening at the same time.
He bounced on his feet, as if preparing to run and never look back. True true fear in his eyes.
She all but ran over. “Are you all right?”
“I, uh, wanted to thank you…”
And then she was confused. “For what?”
“For what you said while I was in front of that vile drow,” as if it was so obvious to say, so plain to see. She at least understood his disgust. “I spent two hundred years using my body to lure pretty things back for my Master—" She supposed, on a certain level, she knew. She’d seen the missing persons cases. She’d see the patterns.
But the tension in her body relaxed. There was no threat, no worry that she could soothe beyond watching him squirm at the very idea of a thank you. The corner of her mouth turned upward, enjoying his mild discomfort at having to deal with people.
“What I wanted, how I felt about what I was doing, it never mattered.”
And then it all came tumbling down again, further and deeper than before. Freya felt sick, felt guilty, felt wrong. Her mind shot towards the memory of her first night with him. The tieflings, the party, the shitty wine, and her stringing him along as he so blatantly tried to flirt with her. Let’s take a rain check, she said, once she had her fill of the vampire’s failure to get in her pants.
And then she did her rounds.
And then she talked to Halsin.
And then he told her there was no cure and the only hope was a perilous mission into the shadowcursed lands for a maybe and a hope.
And then the previous weeks’ worth of shit landed on her at once. She was angry and stressed and she needed to direct that somewhere. She wanted to get blackout drunk and hunt; to stalk and maim and rip out some unsuspecting animal’s throat with her bare teeth if it came to that.
And then she remembered Astarion standing there, bottle of wine in hand. What are you doing? He half demanded, half asked. It’s raining, she replied. She all but dragged him by the collar to the outskirts of camp and had him fuck her against the tree until she forgot anything but his name.
Her breathes came fast and shallow with each thought. Freya wrapped her arms around her torso, hoping to keep her meal down and hoping he would think she was simply crossing her arms as she was pulled back to the present situation. “I know,” she whispered.
“You… you knew?”
“I’m not dumb, Astarion.” Her eyes narrowed, believing him to be insulting her. She’d deserve it.
But he was simply dumbstruck. “And you still tolerated me? Still let me seduce you?”
“It was fun,” she shrugged—as if the simple motion could throw away the silence of camp and the churning feeling in her gut… She normally loved the silence. Why was now any different? “I slept with you because it was fun… the risk of death—the constant threat that if I blinked the wrong way or smacked my head in just the right spot that it would somehow—somehow dislodge the magic. That I’d be gone in an instant…
“It was fun. And it was mindless.” Freya blinked away tears before they fell.
Astarion stilled, a beautiful statue. The words he himself knew but had refused to think or say aloud…
He swallowed the lump in his throat. “I know…”
”Were…” She hesitated, scared of his response. She couldn’t look at him or even stand near him… but she also couldn’t run from him. “Were you even attracted to me?” Her fingers reached up of their own accord, tracing the edges of the burn across her cheek and nose. “Or was it all a lie?”
He laughed. He laughed. At her… at her disgusting face… Tears pricked at the corners of her eyes. Of course she was a game. A pawn to be sacrificed and used the moment the opportunity arose. Her mind wandered to the game of Lanceboard Raphael and Mol had been playing. What was he guarding in exchange, she wondered. The worst of it was the timing. He had waited for now—when she was too tired to fight and scream and simply be angry—to do this.
Astarion watched, the slightest of smiles on his lips at the mere thought of that question. Was Freya, someone so deadly and terrifyingly aware of everything and everyone around her, truly this stupid? “Of course I was attracted to you. Look at you, for goodness’ sake!”
He reached out, gingerly taking her callused and scarred hand in his own. Freya was frozen in place, unable to meet his eyes until he lifted her chin to look at him. “You’re a vision,” he whispered. “And youre so much more than that…”
The whispered words. The softness in his eyes. The implication that she would forever and always be her own person where he was nothing more than a body to be picked over and used like carrion for harpies. She blinked away tears as rapidly as she could, refusing to let him see her like this. Losing.
Freya was suddenly very aware of the silence in camp. The passive noise—the rustling of sheets, of Gale’s quiet snores harmonizing with Karlach’s significantly less quiet buzzsaw, of Wyll’s tossing and turning as he failed to find a comfortable position that account for his new horns—it had all turned to bated breath.
The bastards.
Astarion averted his gaze from hers, it suddenly burning. He dropped the hand from her chin and instead used the energy to hold on to her even tighter. “I don’t know what to think. I don’t know what I want.
 “I care about you. Deeply. And—and I—I don’t know if I want a friend or—or a lover or—” he stopped himself, knowing full well that he started to ramble but was stuck vomiting the words that had been eating away at his brain more than the tadpole. “I just know I want you in it. In my life… Whatever that means.”
He was searching, pleading, begging for a response of any kind from Freya. Even if its rejection. Because anything is better than silence. Than waiting. That was the worst part; waiting for the mark, waiting for the starving pit in his stomach to dull enough to function, waiting for Cazador to drive the blade in and carve out his flesh.
Waiting for Freya to break the silence he knew she loved so much.
Freya took a tentative step toward him. He felt her arms snake around his waist and press herself into his chest. She was careful, a movement he would maybe mistake for hesitation and nervousness if he didn’t know her so long. It was like she thought him fragile, made of glass. That he would shatter the moment they moved—and perhaps he would.
That’s what he was really scared of, he realized. Her pitying him.
Even still, even for just a fleeting moment, he was willing to indulge. He was willing to accept the lie and just hold her there and pretend; like everything else in their relationship is. Was.
Astarion buried his nose into her hair and breathed in, trying to memorize it all. The sound of her heart, the tickle of her breath, the smell of sweat and dirt and too-cold river water and whatever perfumed soap she used that was rapidly fading with the passing days. He laced his fingers at the small of her back, feeling the warmth of her skin from where it peaked under her shirt. He just wanted to hold her there, for a while… for an eternity if he could.
He continued. “You could have asked me to do the same—to throw myself at her, what I wanted be damned. But… you didn’t. And I’m grateful.”
“I don’t want you to think you have to do anything you don’t want to…” she whispered into his shoulder, barely audible. “You make your own choices now—for better or worse”
He held her closer, speaking into the top of her hair. “It would have been so easy to bite her… To just go along with what I was being told to do. A moment of disgust to force myself through and then I could have just carried on, just like before!” He waved his hand in that flippant wave, a dead laugh bubbling up from his throat as if it was a humorous anecdote.
And then more silence. More waiting. More torture.
Freya tightened her hold around his waist, as if signaling her willingness to stay for a moment longer. “How often were you disgusted by your targets?”
“I tried to pick beautiful people where I could, but there were so many over the years. After a while you stop caring…
“My entire reason for existing was to seduce anything with a pulse. And every instinct I have tells me that nothing’s changed. That I’m still just a means to an end—!” His grip tightened more, bordering on painful but not quite. It wasn’t possessive. It wasn’t protective. He was desperate. Astarion shifted his weight, burying his head into the crook of her neck.
A few tears finally left Freya’s eyes. Guilt and sadness that she had made him feel this way—that she was no better than all the people in his life before her. A means to an end. A confirmation that he was nothing but a tool to be used and tossed aside at a moments notice.
“You made me see I never stopped thinking like I was still his slave, even in freedom. But I’m more than that… More than a thing to be used.”
Freya spoke as if compelled, not in control of her own voice or thoughts. She hated the silence now, and she would not let it exist. “I care about you.”
Astarion pulled away suddenly, his entire body tensed like a pressed coil. It left her afraid that she had said the wrong thing, that he would run into the shadows and never come back. “Really?”
What she didn’t expect were his eyes. Searching, pleading, begging once more. What made matters worse was the spark of hope in them. She didn’t want to lose it, squash it. She wanted to save it, keep it, make it shine as brightly as the sun he lost so long ago and only recently rediscovered… she wanted him.
He was already smoothing away the tears, just as he had done in the House of Healing. It was refreshing, the coolness of his skin against hers.
“You’re worth a great deal to me, no matter what you’re going through…” she spoke between sobs. “For as long as you need, no sex, no midnight romps. Nothing.”
Astarion couldn’t help but break into a smile, the tips of his fangs peeking out. “Ha! Well that almost sounds like a challenge…” It was absent minded, another flippant response to distract away from something.
But he was giddy. He felt… happy. The excitement overtook him, like he was suddenly privy to the greatest secret in Faerun. His chest felt lighter, fluttering. He could take her, spin her, sweep her away to the farthest corners imaginable and just be. No expectations. No script. No plans or threats or empty promises…
“Honestly, I have no idea what we’re doing.” He took one of her hands in both of his. “But I know this: this is nice…”
Freya wiped away the last few stray tears. “We could be an absolute disaster together…”
“I supposed it cannot be much worse than when you dropped a building on my head,” he chuckled, pulling her to him once more and resting his chin atop her head. “But you’re serious about this? About… us?”
“Dead serious.”
“Five seconds into this relationship and I already want to break up with you.”
Freya hummed into his shirt, pleased with herself.
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decepti-thots · 1 year
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i would be super interesting in hearing your thoughts on the first trans tf character actually! transgender, textual and subtextual, in transformers is something i've been thinking about a lot recently
Personally, I do count it as Classics/Recordicons Howlback- for those not aware, the strip I'm referring to is this one.
...oh god this got longgggg, i will cut this to save all your dashes.
Willis actually talks about it here on Tumblr, basically saying he had been avoiding female characters in writing those strips for a while because while there are a couple of lasses in that continuity, the general rule of thumb was that everyone was supposed to be 'genderless' (which unfortunately in Classics continuity was actually just 'man as a default', because of course it was). And then he decided this was pretty daft of him because why couldn't a 'genderless society' just. Like. Decide 'hey, being a girl sounds neat' or whatever and then Be A Girl if they wanted. Which is pretty much what IDW would eventually retcon in as an explanation for how a robot species conceives of gender.
But since this is basically just a word of god situation, some folks argue this doesn't 'count'. Personally, despite not usually paying much attention to 'word of god', I count it because I think you have to give a certain amount of leeway when looking at the context it was being done in; if a creative wants a queer character or concept in there for a franchise where asking permission for that is required and yields uncertain results, insisting 'word of god doesn't ever count' strikes me as ungenerous. But true, Howlback is never canonized on panel as trans, so I see what people mean.
And then one elephant in the room in this whole discussion is... IDW Arcee. Spotlight Arcee is not a 'trans narrative' just because it leans on some very, very nasty transphobic tropes, and for many years IDW Arcee was not really treated as trans even by writers trying to do better by her than that shitty-ass comic. But as of the last ever issue of IDW1, and yes I really mean it was made 100% confirmed in the last ever comic for folks who didn't read exRiD btw, Barber managed to retcon it so Arcee was definitively, in-universe trans the whole time. And the Jhiaxus stuff didn't even have to be thrown out to do it. So is Arcee the 'first canon trans character'? Do we go from the date of OP #25, or from her Spotlight appearance? I personally go somewhere in the middle- Barber functionally treats her as trans throughout exRiD, he just never quite finds room to fit in an unambiguous mention- but that muddies stuff a lot. Some people argue IDW Arcee is the first canon trans character because she is both on-page trans and was introduced earlier, even if the confirmation of her as trans came way later, and very much in spite of what happened at the beginning.
And of course in between Barber taking over Arcee and him canonizing her as For Real Trans, we have Lug and Anode in Lost Light. This is on the page, it is explicitly unambiguously trans, and for some folks both of those things are needed for First Trans Character credentials. Meaning that they feel Lug and Anode, in 2016, were the actual honest-to-god first trans characters in TF, since they may not count Arcee's earlier appearances since at the time they were written, she wasn't yet trans. (Edit: amendment regarding a precursor to them is here.)
But then, what about the AVP stuff? Well after Howlback was word of god-ed as trans and before the above from Barber on the page in IDW, back in 2015 AVP, which is considered canon material, got asked about if any characters were trans. And answered in the affirmative! Notably, these are all little nods to characters who for various reasons have Stuff going on with their canon genders, e.g. G1 Overlord being nodded to as genderfluid because that character in the anime he originates from is basically 'created from' a man and a woman who are a married couple. (G1 Overlord is weird.) Also, Archadis was originally designed to be a female character and then swapped to male, which gets a nod as a trans man character, that sort of thing. These are technically not 'word of god', as AVP, despite functionally being a way to canonize word of god stuff, is in-universe fiction of its own and considered as such. I have seen at least one argument, therefore, that the 2015 AVP stuff constitutes the first unambiguous in-fiction depiction of explicitly trans characters in TF, as it predates all the above bar Howlback, who they don't count. But I've also seen some people say AVP is actually just a word of god machine and not canon as a result! So some people say none of the trans stuff in there is Real Canon!
...and you could really take it further and therefore look at which of those characters would be the earliest to debut in-fiction and I think that means you could make the claim the first ever canon trans character in TF is indeed G1 Overlord, which would be mostly very silly to do, but funny, so I think someone oughta.
Anyway. All this is to say, there's a lot of contenders for who is first, and probably more characters you can definitively call 'trans' in SOME context than many folks realize!
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mdhwrites · 11 days
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This is a weirdly...personal thing to ask so feel free to ignore it. But when it comes to scenes involving reconciliation between characters, do you think the word 'sorry' is always neccessary?
I've seen such scenes play out with viewers saying 'X didn't even say sorry!' even if 'X' was demonstrably remorseful for what they did. Personally, if someone who wronged me was trying to make amends, and they couldn't muster a simple, singular word, 'sorry,' I'd come to the conclusion that they're not sorry at all, and that they don't really give a shit. But...do you think I'm being too harsh, thinking that way?
Sometimes, remorse for one's actions can come about in ways besides simply saying sorry. I mean, characters' expressions alone can convey apologies in ways words can't. So again, is the word 'sorry' always necessary for a reconciliation scene in stories to actually work?
Absolutely not. I have criticized characters before for barely remembering to apologize but that's because apologies are complicated. One of the first lessons a child learns after learning the word "Sorry" is not to say it if they don't mean it. This is why going "Sorry, but-" will immediately kill your apology. If you lead off with a huge excuse for why you were a colossal asshole, GUESS WHAT! You're still a colossal asshole because you only care about not feeling guilty, not being at fault, and NOT the other person's feelings. Just because you EVENTUALLY remember to say sorry doesn't fix that first you wanted to make it clear you hadn't done anything wrong.
An exceptional classic example of an apology that doesn't even need an "I'm sorry" is when someone breaks something they don't know the meaning of. The wronged person gets upset, the wrongdoer gets defensive, they both storm out, furious and hurt. Then the wrongdoer is told why the thing was important, understands the deeper meaning of what was done and goes out to replace it. Then when the victim sees it, they don't have to say sorry. In fact, "Sorry, I didn't know what it meant to you," is actually the weaker option here because it still includes an explanation. Now admittedly, that option allows the victim to also apologize for not explaining why they were so upset.
The better option is that when the object is seen, the wrongdoer asks about what made it important. "Someone told me your grandma was a hell of a woman. They made her sound preeeetty boring though."
"Oh yeah, then they didn't know her, just like you don't."
"Well, I'm all ears then. What was she like?"
That shows such a deeper understanding of the wrong done, and is genuinely better for showing that the character has understood why the other was hurt, than a simple, "I'm sorry." Using the default can work but if it just sounds like someone reciting what you're supposed to say when you're in trouble... It doesn't sound genuine, does it? Even if it's technically the right thing to say.
Hell, you want a GREAT breakdown on shitty apologies and how saying sorry can just make you sound like more of a douchebag? Pop music is FILLED with this problem and Todd in the Shadows has a great example of it. Check out the video if you have the time.
youtube
(Oh god, this is from EIGHT YEARS AGO)
To the general complaint though, it's a lot like how people view redemption arcs. "Did the person get forgiven?" "Are their crimes able to be redeemed from?" etc. like that. Claiming that reconciliation and apologies can only work if a character says sorry is trying to quantify these elements. To be able to check a list that then says whether or not an element empirically fails or not. To make it so someone cannot refute your argument.
That's not how writing works though. What works for one book won't work for all of them. It depends on context and skill. You could copy the greatest apology scene in media and if it doesn't work in your setting or with your characters, it will feel as hollow as a character being forced to say sorry because their parents told them to. Writing rules are fluid like this and we shouldn't try to say something has to, or can't, be included in a scene for it to work.
Sorry if you don't agree. evil grin
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I got WAY too much enjoyment out of that last line. XD
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centraldaddyfigure · 1 year
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Get Back Day 2, January 3rd, 1969 
John’s late, George flips through a copy of Beatles Monthly and they all make fun of it, Ringo shares a Starkey original “Taking a Trip to Carolina” and George strums along, “Give Me Some Truth” is almost a Beatles song, “All Things Must Pass” is almost a Beatles song, “One After 909″ is once again a contender for being a Beatles song and Paul is for some reason giddy about it, drinking ensues, and they’re already very, very tired. 
What do the Nagra tapes have to add for context? First of all, it’s past 10 PM when Paul shows up early to practice “Oh! Darling” and a version of “Maxwell’s Silver Hammer” in which it really sounds like he’s singing “John” instead of “Joan” in some of the lines. We hear George sing a lot more, contributing the noodling JP are shown doing, playing songs by other artists (god, his voice sounds so good on “Hitch Hike”) and their own “oldies” (I love hearing “You Can’t Do That”).  John and Paul do some gibberish singing, “Two of Us” rehearsals begin. Based on how much George’s jamming & giggling with the others is edited out in Get Back, it kind of seems like Peter Jackson is privileging the JP narrative over a more holistic view of band dynamics. We’ll see if I still feel that way in days ahead. 
Daily Get Back photoset inspired by @zilabee. And pardon my shitty screenshots, y’all, I’m just havin’ fun.
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