#i have been dragging my feet to try some creative prints

[bioluminosity]

I removed all but 5 of my prints in INPRNT as I have enough funds to withdraw in a month. There is still some sort of sale going on, because of course there is. The last prints will be removed later, once I can actually jump up and get some proofs for my own prints and figure out the logistics of shipping.

That in of itself is easily the main reason I liked sites like INPRNT, so...it is not an easy decision to make, and so please be respectful of other creators who can't so easily abandon their INPRNT storefronts.

#bio.txt #it sucks but #i have been dragging my feet to try some creative prints

[pegakitty]

Here at the Risstastic Drag Race, we celebrate love, joy, and hope. Are your creations made with love? Do they spark joy? Will you have hope in your heart for the future of drag?

While we strive to be a wholesome drag race, some contestants mix like oil and water... wigs are ripped off, nails are broken, and things are said that cannot be taken back.

We have a slew of creative challenges ahead, but first we need contestants. Now let's look at a few audition tapes.

First up is Cocoa Kitty, from a small coastal town. She says she enjoys getting her feet wet!

Dressed like an 80's housewife with a large blonde wig, minimal mascara and bright pink lips, Cocoa Kitty waves to the camera.

"Hello cocoa beans! This is Cocoa Kitty and this is my audition tape to join the Risstastic Drag Race! I love trying new things, but my loves in life are chocolate and cats, hence my name."

She gets up, showing off her retro floral print dress to the camera, and that her fingers are adorned with some silver jewelry.

"I'd say my dream in life is to find true love; someone to love me for me and keep pushing me to do my best. I'm not desperate, nor do I think I'm running out of time, it's just a desire deep in my heart. I'd say I embody the 'love' portion of the Risstastic Drag Race, if I were to be chosen to compete."

Cocoa Kitty blows a kiss to the camera, thus ending her video.

Next up is a high class city gal, Aria Hymn. She waves to the camera, her bronze skin decked out in blue makeup, silver glitter and lips, and purple music notes on the side of her eyes. She's dressed like she's going to the Grammy awards, with a floor length pale blue number and a long sheer train behind her. Her hair is platinum blonde with curls upon curls, nearly identical to the late Marilin Monroe's do.

"Hello to those of you watching. I am Aria Hymn, and true to my name I'm a singer with multiple albums available for purchase anywhere that sells albums. I sing with my whole heart and soul, I HAVE drag in my heart and soul. Wherever I'm on stage, I have people clamoring for more of me. My fans can't get enough of me. If I were to be chosen to compete in the Risstastic Drag Race...I'd say I embody joy!"

She giggles, flipping her hair over her shoulder.

"I don't have a dream; I'm already living it. The world's had but a taste of Aria Hymn, and soon I believe there's going to be more of me."

The third auditioner is from a farm down south. Her gapped teeth are somewhat of a charm point to her.

"Howdy Y'all!" She says, tipping her cowboy hat. "I'm Sally Foxx and I just love gettin' creative with fabrics, wigs, and makeup. Even if looks don't turn out great, it always gives me an important lesson, and let's just say I have plenty to go around."

Her strawberry blonde hair is parted into two braids, she's dressed in faded orange plaid with light blue overalls, and her freckles are obviously fake.

"I may be southern, but I hope to bring some country charm to the Risstastic drag show! I'm not wearing makeup right now, but when I do it's certainly eye catching! Maybe this drag race I can find a neat feller to sweep me off my feet?"

She shows off some makeup products, but they're notably cheap...

"My dream is a simple dream; I'm a woman of simple tastes. I want to rescue as many animals as I can."

Unlucky number four, we have Elle Ganza. She's lived a relatively normal life until she got into drag and garnered a small number of fans. Elle Ganza is new to drag, having yet to be in any drag shows or contests or lip-synchs.

"I'm stepping out of my comfort zone, and into the chaos with just the clothes on my back... oh and my three other suitcases." Elle says, applying brown blush to her face and forehead. "This is brand new territory for me. My sole audience have been my supportive family members and friends. I'm anxious, I mean, who isn't? But I'm more than ready to show the world just what Elle Ganza truly is."

She gets out crimson eyeshadow, and begins applying a thin layer of it.

"I like the elegant aesthetic; hollywood, upper class parties, grand balls... I want to be a Queen that can wow everybody with just her presence alone. I have a lot of practice to do, lip-synch wise. But I'm ready to get started! My dream is to just...get out there!"

Number five starts with a flash of lightning and crash of thunder, cartoon bats fly off the screen. Drinking a suspicious red liquid in a wine glass, a gothic vampire queen grins seductively.

"My reign of terror has yet to begin on this humble planet. I laugh at the concepts of love, hope, and joy. But I'm not a villain...I just need entertainment. I'm here to bring the beauty of darkness everywhere I walk, and make the men of this world kiss my heels as I walk by. Drag races aren't a cake walk, they are cutthroat. It's you against the world. I'm not interested in making friends in this...what is it called..Risstastic Drag Race? I seek to do what I do when I see any man; dominate. And if that's too bitter for you to swallow, you can choke."

She extends her hand, showing off large black nails sharpened like claws.

"This world and the next world I fly to are just eager to be in the palm of my hands, no? I am Rose Bouquet, and those who dare to face me...seldom leave alive to talk about it."

Last but certainly not least, is a tech and meme obsessed girl who's had the world served to her on a silver spoon. A bit spoiled and bratty when things don't go her way, she loves to incorporate various elements from popular franchises into all of her drag looks.

"Beep beep!" She says, outlining the robotics of her makeup in black body paint. "I'm Glitter Blitz, and I just loooove anime! I'm not...one of those fans! I just find a lot of joy in watching my favorite shows! Anyway, I'd say I'm very creative. I've been a Drag Queen for about five years, and I looove lip-synching to my favorite anime openings. I should....probably practice lip-synching english songs if I want to compete in the Risstastic Drag race...but don't worry, I'll bring my Blitz!"

Who are you looking forward to win in the Risstastic Drag Race?

#drag #risstastic drag race

[lizzielikeborden]

Monroe (1)

Summary: Takes place after the third season (just because I need to work with completely uncharted territory and do not wanna deal with the Sparrow Academy or any of season 2′s craziness). So the Umbrella Academy comes back home again, this time dear old Reginald Hargreeves is dead and all seems well and normal. To make sure the timeline is correct the boys are going through Reginald’s office where he kept all of his important business. That is where Klaus finds something particular...

Authors Note: No one requested this, I just wanted to get creative and I have been thinking on this and really wanna do it PLEASE COMMENT IF YOU WANT ON THE TAGLIST!

Taglist: @little-boats-on-a-lake​

When they say it only takes one time they mean that. In no way shape or form were you a heavy drinker or drug user. But it was your birthday, and your friends wanted to take you out on a fun night. Of course they couldn’t pick a regular little bar, they decided on some crazy rave spot that was technically illegal. 

“Come on it’ll be a great time, you’ve barely even been to a bar. This is gonna be a once in a lifetime experience.” Y/F/N1 chased you around your little apartment as you refused to get ready. 

“Oh it’ll be once in a lifetime alright, she will never go back.” Y/F/N2 commented as she walked into the room putting bracelets up her arm.

“Yknow we are trying to convince her to go, not convince her to never hang out with us again.” Y/F/N1 smacked Y/F/N2 on the arm lightly. 

“Wait, I like her point. Lets make a deal. If I go tonight promise me I will never have to any crazy shit ever again.” You turned to face them both with a light smile and one eyebrow slightly raised. 

They turned to look at each other and then back at you. Clearly they would do anything to get you out of the house and out to their little rave because they both agreed to the deal. Not really knowing how to get ready the girls dragged you into your bedroom. The two of them dug through all your drawers that were full of random clothes that were not fit for the occasion. 

“You are not giving us much to work with.” Y/F/N1 stated as she began going through the closet. 

“Wait I’ve found something we can use.” She took a small black sparkly bra out of your underwear drawer. 

“Excuse me but that is not clothes that is a bra. I cannot just go outside with a bra on.” You told Y/F/N1 as she held it up to your chest. She was laughing at you for what you had said. 

“We can stop by my place and a mesh top to put over it.” Y/F/N2 spoke up as she held some little black shorts in her hand. 

Before you could ever protest what was going on you were being dragged out the door. You stumbled around quickly, neither girl was allowing you to slow down or think. They knew that you’d change your mind or simply get out of going. You got in the passenger side of the car and buckled your seatbelt. You could barely shut the door and get it together before Y/F/N2 hit the gas. You were driving so fast with a lead foot that you were almost positive the car was going to get pulled over. You wished it would’ve because the closer you got to having to wear a bra and shorts in crowded public the place the more anxiety bubbled in your stomach. The car parked in a made up parking place considering how outside the lines it was. 

“I’ll be right back.” Y/F/N2 ran out and locked the car. She was quickly in and out. When she stepped back in the car from getting the mesh top she threw it at you. 

“NO. No wat am I wearing this.” You looked at the mesh shirt, it wasn’t even really mesh. It was just see-through, you could clearly see the fact that your bra was going to be seen vibrantly. 

“Oh cmon, one night and never again. We have a deal.” Y/F/N1 patted you on the shoulder from the back seat of the car. She was topless and changing in the car. 

You took in a deep breath realizing that your options to change were in a dirty restroom or the front of a moving vehicle. So, you changed into the incredibly revealing outfit and your friends began to hype you up. When you pulled up to wherever this odd location was and saw some of the most creative looking people. Y/F/N2 changed outside the car without a care in the world. You knew your friends were wild but this wild. No way. Y/F/N1 grabbed your hand noticing the deer in the headlights look you had plastered on your face. She and Y/F/N2 led you to the door and you walked down the dirty stairs with walls covered in graffiti. 

“Here we are.” Y/F/N2 screamed as she opened the door. The music that blasted through the room was incredibly loud. Smoke, blinding lights, and more loud noises completely filled the room. You realized that you could barely even see anyone, so no one would notice you or what you were wearing. Your nerves let go a bit, but still not much. Your friends got drinks and brought them over, the three of you were drinking a lot. You did it for nerves, they did it for fun. Eventually all three of you were drunk, separated and drunk. You of course were stumbling around, not as used to being drunk as the other two girls. And you tripped around and fell into a complete stranger. A beautiful stranger that you would not remember, and you spent the remainder of the time with him until your friends were ready to go. You remember having lovely conversations and dancing together a bit. You also remember the way he was and how wild yet caring he was.  Anything other than that was a complete mystery...

“So you really think we did it this time?” Luther spoke up holding a box full of books in his hands. They were from his fathers office that he, Diego, and Klaus were searching through while the others ran around making sure everywhere else was normal.

“So far everything seems normal, but we haven’t seen enough or done much else. Then again we’re the morons apparently so we wouldn’t know even if we did look.” Diego threw an empty bag across the room, moving around some of the belongings that were from his fathers childhood.

“Oh dear old dad is still just as boring dead as he was alive.” Klaus sat with his legs and feet propped up on the desk as he looked through a box of fly papers that took him forever to get the small lock off of. 

“You can say that again.” Diego agreed with his brother as he too continued to go through small chests and boxes that had been left around the room.

The three boys continued to through papers, files, boxes, bags, and other weird little contraptions. All boring, mostly of friends he had, deals he had made, knick-knacks from being alive so long, projects he never got to finish, diaries of so many different genres, and receipts for literally everything. That was until Klaus came across a file with his name printed on it in bold. 

“Hey look dad was keeping tabs on you.” Luther stood behind him and read the date on the file, seeing it wasn’t from his childhood and was from his adulthood. 

“Probably just some rehab file he kept to hate me and call me a disappointment for.” Klaus opened it and saw his picture, it was a stapled multi piece of information. The longer he read on the more he noticed it had nothing to do with drugs. It was simply just his DNA and medical things along those lines. Then he turned the page, and his eyes popped out of his head. He read the word “Monroe” and right next to it were multiple pictures of a little girl. Not a very old one at that, all of these were baby pictures. Nervously he read on more and more, he flipped back and forth between the two pages seeing that their were multiple, hell more than multiple similarities. It took a few more minutes but he finally realized that was his kid...

#klaus hargreeves x reader #klaus hargreeves #klaus hargreeves imagine #The Umbrealla Academy #umbrella acedmy #the umbrella academy

[aclosetfan]

Lunch Break Blues

The wind whipped Blossom's hair as she tried wrestling it into a top knot. It had been raining on and off all day, and no doubt it would start up again soon, but while the rain had momentarily ceased, she and her sisters took advantage of the rare sunlight pouring through the broken clouds. It was the first lunch in a long week that they took perched atop one of the skyscrapers far from any prying eyes. Usually, a weather report full of rain made Townsville dull and would drive Buttercup crazy, but this week's unprecedented downpour had done little to stop Townsville's villains. Blossom suspected it was because they were feeling a little stir crazy too.

She didn't know what was worse, staying home and doing nothing or flying around soaked to the bone each day. Her hair was a frizzy mess, and she was pretty sure a nasty cold was on the horizon. The rain was such a nuisance that Bubbles had begun to forgo her tennis shoes or steel-toed boots for her daisy-print rain boots. Buttercup had busted out her rain repellant windbreaker. And Blossom had personally opted for her ugly yellow polka-dotted raincoat and matching hat, which yes, she knew looked ridiculous, but she dressed practicably not for fashion. She didn't care who laughed (her sisters and a choice selection of villains); at least she was staying reasonably dry!

The skyscraper they were at was far too windy for her hat to stay on, so she had shoved it in her pocket and went to task on taming her hair. An awful frizzy mess. She pouted and sighed, dropping her hands from her mangled top knot. Generally, the wind did very little to bug her, having the capability to fly and all, but it kept spraying rain droplets and puddles into her face and her hand itched towards her rain cap once more.

A dejected sigh from her left pulled her attention away from her own problems. Glancing over at Bubbles, whose pigtails had gone limp, stabbed absentmindedly at her salad. Her sister took a sad, miserable bite and chewed slowly as she watched the next round of clouds blow in with watery eyes. Bubbles had seemed to be feeling blue (har har) for the last few days, and it wasn't because of the rain. What for though, Blossom didn't know. Bubbles hadn't decided to pour her heart out just yet. However, that didn't deter her from trying to pry the problem out of her sister. Blossom was a problem-solver after all—it was one of her core defining traits.

"Bubs?" She asked with a tilt of her head, "You okay?"

"Oh, Bloss," Bubbles sighed, putting her salad down in favor of ringing out the water from her pigtails, "I'm just feeling a lil crummy. Don't worry."

Blossom snorted, "It'd be easier changing the tide."

That tugged a small smile out of Bubbles.

"Is it the rain?" She asked, already knowing it was the wrong answer.

Bubbles sighed, "No, it's not the rain—it's just, well, it's kind of silly actually."

"I could go for a good joke about now that isn't about my raincoat," Blossom shrugged.

"It's an affront to fashionable society, Blossom," Bubbles sniffed, "You look like a drowned clown!"

"On the outside!" She huffed, "But I'm perfectly dry, thank you, unlike some people."

"I look cute, rain or shine. Jealousy isn't a good color on you." Bubbles blew a raspberry at her before going back to stabbing her salad.

Blossom rolled her eyes and muffled an annoyed groan, "So you're not going to tell us what's up?"

"You'll just tell me it's silly."

The response stung a little, but Blossom shook it off, "Come on, I promise I won't—" she held out her pinky, "—I swear!"

Bubbles regarded her hand for a moment with a thoughtful look before linking their pinkies together. Simultaneously, they lifted their hands and sealed the deal with quick kisses to their fists.

"So," Blossom tried again, "what's up?"

Bubbles sigh was loud and dramatic as she brought one leg up to wrap her arms around, resting a cheek on her knee.

"It's my art," her sister complained, "I wanna make something big, you know, like real profound, but all I ever draw is cute stuff!"

Blossom felt her eyebrows furrow, "But you love cute stuff?"

"Van Gogh didn't get famous for drawing fluffy bunnies, Blossom!" Bubbles whined, "Real artists have really thoughtful ideas! They mean things, and anytime I try to do the same thing, it comes out stupid!"

"Van Gogh drank paint and killed himself. So I don't think he's someone you should be comparing yourself to."

"But he was a genius!"

"He was sick." Blossom counterpointed, "And couldn't find the help he needed. I prefer you sane and alive. Everyone does. The world doesn't need another tortured artist."

Bubbles pouted, "Yeah, but they don't need another goofy doodlist either. I want to make stuff that means something to people."

"They do mean something." She smiled, nudging Bubbles' shoulder with her own, "Your drawings always make me smile. They're happy and fun, and even if they're sometimes silly, that doesn't make them any less valuable to me. That counts for something, right?"

Bubbles smile brightened, and she giggled, "That's really sweet, Bloss, thanks. I think I needed to hear that, but—" there was another dejected sigh, "—I dunno, I just feel so uninspired and bored, and I really want to make a statement. I know there's something great inside me—"

"Because there is."

That earned her another smile, "—yeah, but I can't get it out! It's like all my hand can do is silly cartoons!"

Blossom nodded, "Well, I'm no artist myself, but I'm guessing there's nothing better than practice."

Bubbles flopped back onto the wet concrete, and Blossom cringed in sympathy as she imagined the water soaking its way through Bubbles' shirt.

"Bubs don't lay on—"

"I need to be more introspective!" Bubbles interrupted, "More in tune with myself and nature and the world! I need more life experiences, ya know, so I have stuff I can really pull from when I draw."

Outside of Bubbles probably being the most "self in-tuned" person Blossom knew, it was "life experiences" that threw her the most.

"Bubbles, life experiences? You're a superhero. You face the most depraved of society every day; you met people at their lowest moments. You've faced adversity larger than most will ever dare encounter!"

"But none of that has affected me! I need to get sad! I need to get in touch with my blue period!" Bubbles waved her hands around in exasperation, "I need to be relatable!"

"You've faced the worst and have come out better because of it," She scowled, "and you don't want that? Do you want to be emotionally scarred? To be relatable?"

Bubbles groaned and covered her face with her hands. "I knew you wouldn't get it!" Then came a muffled whine, "This is why I didn't wanna tell you!"

Blossom tsked, "I certainly don't see how being a beacon of hope as opposed to a cesspool of depression and self-pity is worse."

"It's not like that!" Bubbles shot up, "I don't want to be dark and depressed, but that's like what all the great art is!"

"Great art is the art that makes you feel, Bubbles; it doesn't matter what emotion that is, you know that. And if your art makes people feel happy, then what's the big issue?"

Bubbles deflated, "I dunno. I just want to make something that'll make people remember. Centuries from now, I want it to inspire people! Go, oh, I want that! Whatever that is." Bubbles looked up back at the clouds, "And that means I've really got to come up with something good. Something meaningful, but I've got zero ideas."

Blossom considered what she was saying for a moment before nodding, "Okay, I think I understand what you're saying. It's like you're in an art block."

"Yeah," Bubbles nodded, "I'm on creative hold. Everything I make, I don't like."

"Well, this weekend, why don't we go to the art museum, look at the stuff you want to emulate, and try to get into the head of the artist, you know?"

Bubbles perked up, "That's a good idea! You'd really wanna come with me?"

"Of course. We'll drag Buttercup along too. You know she needs some sophisticating." Blossom murmured, shooting their other sister a sideways look.

With the hood of her windbreaker still partially up and wet dripping hair curling in every direction, Buttercup sat perched on the ledge of the building a few feet away, hunched over her sandwich. She chewed mechanically in what looked like deep pensive thought. Her eyebrows were furrowed as she seemed to study the cars far below. She had been mostly quiet this afternoon, happy to be outside but pissy about the rain, and had spent much of their lunch hour shooing away a group of hungry pigeons that seemed to follow her everywhere she went. The pigeons, however, seemed to be appeased at the moment with the few chunks of bread and potato chips Buttercup had relinquished to them.

Blossom expected Buttercup to snap at her for the comment, but it seemed she was so lost in her own little world, watching the cars whiz by, that she hadn't heard them talking.

Bubbles giggled, "Actually, Bloss, I was thinking I needed to be a bit more like Buttercup."

She gave Bubbles a look, jabbing a thumb towards their sister, "Buttercup?"

"Mm-hmm," Bubbles nodded.

"Our sister?" Blossom asked again for clarification, "Buttercup?"

"Ah, come on! Look at her!" Bubbles grabbed her by the cheeks and swiveled her head back towards Buttercup, "She's got the look down."

"What look?" Blossom asked, but because her cheeks were being squished, it came out like, "Wa'ok?" Bubbles understood her regardless.

"That dark, introspective look." Bubbles explained, "Ya know, mused hair, dark under-eyes, stained fingers. The look of a moody artist!"

Generally, Buttercup's hair was mused because she refused to brush it since it was "short for a reason, Blossom." Today, it was also because of the rain. Furthermore, Buttercup had dark under-eyes partly because she insisted on wearing dark eyeliner that smudged halfway down her face every day without fail, and also because she had stayed up until 3 a.m. last night playing video games. And finally, Buttercup's fingers were stained not because of any artistic endeavor but because she had stuck her whole hand into a vat of black and mysterious sludge this morning. She had done so because Blossom had explicitly told her not to stick her hand in the vat of black and mysterious sludge they had been investigating, which had been a mistake on Blossom's part. She knew her sister couldn't resist doing something after it had been brought to her attention, so why she had decided to tell Buttercup not to mess with the vat of sludge was beyond her.

And while Buttercup was often quote-unquote moody, it wasn't because she was broody or introspective. It was because she was either hungry or bored or sometimes both. Bubbles was actually the moody and overly sensitive one, but Blossom knew better than to say that out loud.

"She looks like she needs a bath." Blossom huffed, pulling her face from Bubbles grasp.

"Don't focus on that." Bubbles waved her off, "Look how deep in thought she is! Buttercup isn't much for talking, is she? I bet she's got a lot going on in that head of hers."

"Buttercup?" She asked, her eyebrows furrowing in confusion once again.

Bubbles rolled her eyes and gave her shoulder a playful wack, "Don't be mean! I'm serious. She's been sitting like that for half an hour now, looking, thinking—"Bubbles tapped her chin in thought, "—I wonder what she's thinking about. From the looks of it, it must be important."

Blossom looked back over at Buttercup, tracing her eyes over her sister's face once more to look for something she may have missed. Her look was pensive. And it was admittedly artsy even if it was on accident. She supposed that even if Buttercup tended to evade artistic endeavors in favor of more physical hobbies, she could still be a poet at heart.

Buttercup was done with her sandwich now and handed off the crumbs to the birds. She still seemed lost in thought. However, she had moved her attention away from the hustle and bustle of the city to the clouds above. She didn't smile, but when a beam of light broke through the clouds and landed on her face, the stress lines on her forehead disappeared, and contentment passed over her features. Blossom couldn't help smiling at the sight of it. It was nice to see her like that. Maybe she was thinking about something profound and meaningful. Bubbles was right. Buttercup wasn't one to share her every single thought unless she was pissed, annoyed, or pressed for an answer. When Buttercup was in a good mood, she simply vibed, enjoying the quality time.

Blossom hardly thought she was mysterious, though. Buttercup's body language was more than enough to determine her mood. If she liked a song, she'd bob her head to its beat. If she liked a certain food, she'd inhale it without breathing. But now that Bubbles had said it, what was Buttercup actually thinking about?

Suddenly, Blossom felt guilty for never asking.

"Hey, Butters?" She called out to their sister, snapping a few times to get her attention.

Buttercup blinked back into reality and turned to face them, "Mhm?"

"What are you thinking about?" She asked.

"What am I thinking about?" Buttercup tilted her head, giving them both a look, "Why?"

"Don't worry about it." Bubbles spoke up, "Just tell us, right now, what you're thinking about."

Buttercup shrugged, looked away, smacked her lips a few times, and looked back, "Lizards."

"Lizards?" Blossom heard herself echoing as every kind, and warm thought she had regarding Buttercup came to a crashing halt.

Buttercup shrugged again, picking at her teeth, before looking back up at the clouds, "They're cool as shit, dude."

Blossom blinked once and then twice before turning back to Bubbles, who looked a little bit dumbstruck. 

"Well, you're right when you're right, Bubbles. She's a real Van Gogh in the making," She snorted dryly.

"Ah, shut it," Bubbles huffed, crossing her arms.

"Wait," Buttercup spoke up over the wind, "why you dumbasses talking about vans?"

"Face it, Bubs," Blossom smiled, ignoring Buttercup, "you don't give yourself enough credit. If there's someone here proficient in artistic musings, it's not the pigeon whisperer. It's most definitely you."

Bubbles uncrossed her arms and sent her a warm smile, leaning her damp head on her shoulder, "Maybe you're right, Bloss, but could we still go to the art museum?"

"Yeah, duh." Blossom smiled, leaning her head on Bubbles, "You know I love museums."

"Hey!" Buttercup shouted, hands on her hips, "Seriously, which van are two laughing about, and where is it going!"

#just a lil something for all the bubbles out there #bubbles and blossom's relationship deserves more love #in reference to Buttercup: #I like my jocks best when they’ve got nothing going on upstairs #also blossom’s a good sister but she���s still the older(ish) sister #obvi #so her younger(ish) siblings are always going to be a lil dumb to her 😂 #ppg blossom #ppg bubbles #ppg buttercup #ppg sister bonding #ppg Drabble #my writing #rainy day blues 😔 #h/c mentally Bubbles is doing the best out of the three sisters but I still think she’s probs a lil messed up #just hasn’t realized it yet #long post

[sidespromptblog]

The Night

Summary: Remus just wanted someone to share his ideas with, regardless if it was at midnight and everyone was supposed to be asleep. He most certainly didn’t expect this of all things to happen.

Humming a janky tune to himself Remus practically skipped away from his bedroom with a stack of suspiciously stained and bloodied papers in his hands, of course, it was also well past midnight. Something that was made abundantly clear as he sank down rising up in the space of the other sides, as all the lights were off in the living area aside from one little night light that was most likely for Virgil’s sake only. The kitchen was barren, no sign of the life that usually inhabited it during breakfast, lunch, and dinner. A half-hearted pout formed on Remus’ lips, as he haphazardly shuffled the papers around in his hands.

He wanted at least someone to talk to, to spout his horrific ideas off to.

And since Deceit usually kept his door locked, there was no way that the dishonest side would ever let him in at this time of night, and Roman… Remus wrinkled his nose as he made his way up the stairs towards the others’ rooms. He didn’t want someone with such dull creativity looking over his ideas, he already knew that Roman would cringe and shoot down his ideas for the wig that would melt the skin off the wearers head until it reached the brain leaving a puddle of slimy goo, down the drain. He wanted someone… someone who was…

Someone who was smart!

There wasn’t a single light on underneath any of the doors, and not a single sign that any of them were awake. Then again, that wasn’t really going to stop Remus either way, sleep had never stopped him before and it most certainly wasn’t going to come anywhere close to stopping him now.

Almost immediately he bypassed Virgil’s room, after all, there was no need for him to have a panic attack while imagining all the vividly horrific ways that Thomas could die in his sleep. And he was at least twenty percent certain that if he went to their resident emo, he’d scream and cause a great deal of a ruckus and wake everyone up and then he’d never been able to tell his ideas to anyone! And his nose wrinkled at the stupidly happy and cheerful stickers that were plastered all over Patton’s door, complete with puppies, kittens, and little paw prints speckled all over the baby blue colored door. It internally made Remus retch a little bit, the sight of such happy cutesy things on display right in front of him.

Rip off the stickers, burn the stickers, burn the door, piss on the door, leave carrots outside of his door so that he can’t escape and he’ll be forced to either starve or eat the carrots, eat the stickers? Remus’ knee bounced jerkily up and down at the thoughts that rattled around inside his head, and before he knew it he had already ripped off a bright bubbly blue paw print sticker before sticking it right back to his forehead. A near-silent snicker left his lips as he scraped his nail down that bright blue paint, leaving a thin line of chipping paint behind. It wasn’t nearly as much as he would have liked to do, but for now… it was enough. Maybe later, if he couldn’t find anyone to talk to, he could come back and paint the door a dark putrid green color. The dirtiest nastiest green, that would smell just awful and-

Remus’ hand froze midway down Patton’s door, as his eyes locked on the deep blue door to his left with a simple name printed on the front and nothing more. It was cracked open just the slightest, most likely just in case Virgil had a nightmare of something and he’d need to come to someone to calm those fears. It made Remus’ gut twist and writhe as if he had live eels for intestines instead of actual organs, and a smile lit up his demented face.

“Loooogan,” He purred pushing open the door with his foot before shutting it behind him with a resounding click, “Logan! Logan! Logan! Logan!” He chirped rushing over to the side of the bed where the faint rise and fall of the logical side’s breathing could be seen, leering over him like a dark shadow in the night Remus felt something inside of him freeze for a moment at the sight of Logan’s completely and utterly peaceful expression. Without his glasses, and without the serious expression he wore, he looked… entirely different. It was almost useless of him to notice it, but the worry that lines that creased Logan’s face in the subtle manner that they did were… gone. He looked almost happy as he was asleep, Remus almost regretted having to wake up. Almost. “Loooogan,” He drawled again, shuffling his papers to one hand as he reached down shaking the side before him.

A soft whine answered his insistent noises and actions, and something inside of Remus’ chest short-circuited.

“Rem..us…” If Remus could have… he would have screeched at the name that fell from the logical side’s lips, because he was already certain that his face was blazing right now as his breathing completely stuttered and stopped in its tracks. Logan was still fast asleep, still on his side and breathing as he had a few moments ago. There was no way that he had woken up, and there was no way that he had been able to see just who was in his room, especially without his glasses on and the room as dark as could be. He couldn’t have known, so that meant.. that meant…

“Logan!” He hissed the name out, his lungs working extra hard now as he leaned even more over the sleeping side, shaking him more and more. “I don’t know what you’re dreaming about, that would make you say my name, but wake up! I wanna know right now!” Did he? Did he really want to know? It wasn’t like Logic of all people was having some forbidden sexual dream about him, was he? No there was no way on earth, he only wanted Logan awake so that he could talk and ramble about his ideas. Nothing more. “Log- Ah!”

In one movement, one movement alone, Remus felt the logical side’s hand latching onto his shirt and dragging him down onto the bed. If his lungs had been having a hard time breathing now… well then it was just about doubled as he laid there, his limbs spread out, on his back, laying completely still. This.. this was… he was on Logan’s bed.. with Logan laying next to him.. completely at ease.. relaxed… around him of all people. Remus’ heart thudded in his chest ringing in his ears, like it was soon to become an alien that would tear out his internal organs and soon his ribs and chest exposing itself to the world. His tongue laid dry in his throat, like a limp lump of sandpaper that made it impossible to do so much as swallow too loudly near the side that was asleep.

“Lo..gan…” His cheeks were burning, he was certain that his face was as red as it could possibly be, just what was he supposed to do?! Clearly, the other side didn’t know what he was doing, or maybe he’d been infected with mind leech that was making him do odd things in the middle of the night. This… this was emotional warfare! This wasn’t fair, it should’ve been no problem at all to push Logan away and get back up. And yet… Turning his head, he could just barely make out the curve of Logan’s face in the darkness. He didn’t want to wake him up, but… he’d have to. “Logan, come on you dork. You sleep harder than the dead, wake up and let my arm go.” He huffed to himself, even he knew that had sounded half-assed even to someone with a full ass.

Logan squirmed, and for a second Remus was gripped with two very conflicting emotions, relief… and disappointment. Two emotions that went right out the window as Logan turned and moved, before finally setting his head right on Remus’ chest no doubt hearing his frantically beating heart in the process.

Emotional warfare! His mind screamed at him, while his body… his body melted at the warmth coming off of the logical side, it was the first time in.. well ever that someone had voluntarily touched him, let alone anything like cuddling especially like this. His arms moved mechanically, even as his mind screamed at him to do various things in order to get out of the situation. What would happen when Logan woke up in the morning? It didn’t matter, not as his papers laid forgotten and scattered on the floor, and not as he wrapped his arms around the logical side that had curled up against his side like some oversized cat breathing contently next to him sleeping without a single worry. Why did touching someone like this feel so… nice? He had been fine before he had done it, so why was his skin tingling like this? Why did.. why did Logan feel so nice in his arms?

Something akin to tears burned Remus’ eyes as his eyelids slowly started to droop, and before he knew it… he was asleep, his dreams going untroubled for the first time in years.

Remus woke to sunlight filtering through the window in a warm haze of sunbeams lighting up the room, and a very awake Logan staring back at him unblinking with those thickly framed glasses pushed up his nose.

The reaction was almost immediate.

“OhMyGodYou’reAwake!” Jerking back as if he had just had his nipples electrocuted by a hundred-volt battery, Remus tumbled back his feet kicking up in the air as his back slammed into Logan’s floor leaving him completely immobilized for a second as he laid there frantically trying to piece together what had happened. Logan was.. he was awake, he was awake and he hadn’t said or done anything until Remus had woken up. He hadn’t screamed or made any kind of sound in disgust, in fact… he had remained curled up next to Remus even while he was awake, not moving a single muscle from where the both of them had slept all throughout the night.

Hadn’t he?  

Fear and embarrassment weren’t usually emotions that Remus felt on a day to day basis, but looking up as Logan peered over the side of his bed. He felt those emotions coloring his face, especially if the look on the logical side’s face was anything to go by. He looked… half amused and half concerned for Remus, especially given the fact that he hadn’t gotten up yet, and had just laid where he had fallen like a limp noodle.

“Are you-”

“I don’t have a humiliation kink!” Remus blurted out before Logan could even finish his sentence, scrambling to sit up as the other side blinked in obvious confusion. The hairs on the back of his neck stood up on end, as Logan blinked owlishly at him, looking so much more confused than Remus had ever seen him before. It was kinda hot if he was being honest, the way that Logan’s lips pursed as he attempted to piece together just what Remus had meant, all while tilting his head to the side regarding him not with an eye roll like most did… but genuine concern. A rarity, that was if it had ever happened to him before.

Oh god, Remus wanted to throw up a bundle of blood confetti to distract from this awful experience. Or maybe he just wanted to lean in and kiss those pursed lips, yeah… he definitely wanted to do that.

“Are you alright? You don’t have a concussion do you?” Out of all the things that Logan could have asked, it wasn’t why Remus had been snuggled up to him that morning, and it wasn’t a request for Remus to leave his room. He didn’t know what it was, but with his messy bedhead, Logan seemed… more relaxed now than he ever had been in front of both him and the others. This was very much obvious as Logan sat up, scratching the back of his head. “I heard you last night, I’m sorry if I happened to cause you any kind of discomfort. It.. it won’t happen again.”

Finally, the useless lump that was Remus’ tongue managed to work.

“I… didn’t mind it,” He honestly said fiddling with some of the papers around him. “It was nice… to sleep next to someone wasn’t trying to suffocate me to shut me up.” He cheekily added, “You’re a pretty good person to sleep next to pillow princess, I’d let you choke me any day of the week.” Remus added a wink for good measure, expecting something like a blush, stuttering, or even an eye-roll that his usual flirtings got. “I’m into it.”

He wasn’t expecting a laugh to tumble so freely from Logan’s very kissable lips, and he wasn’t expecting to feel himself grow even warmer at the sight of Logan’s hand covering his mouth to hide such a thing.

“Pillow princess…” Logan snorted, and Remus fell even more for the sound. “That’s a new one,” He wanted to kiss him. He wanted to kiss him. He wanted to kiss him so damn much. How on earth was this fair?! Since when did the nerdy side make him feel like this?! Just a few months ago he had been perfectly fine with throwing a ninja star at his head and calling it a day, just what had changed?! “What are those?” Remus’ mind snapped out of the train of thought that it had been rushing down, as his line of sight followed Logan’s fingers to the scattered papers on Logan’s floor.

It was a mess, that much was for certain. He’d had a lot of papers that he had brought with him, he was pretty sure that this was all of them, all the ideas he’d had rolling around in his head at midnight when he’d made his journey here to bother the other sides.

The shame and embarrassment that cascaded over Remus was a feeling that he had never permitted himself to feel before, “I uh…” His entire body burned once again, “These were my ideas, I wanted to tell someone and your door was open, so I uh… I came in to bother you, even though you were asleep, looking like a greek god waiting to be painted and worshipped.” Oh lord, oh god… that had just slipped right out hadn’t it? He had just gone ahead and said that, with no warning whatsoever… he was such a mistake. But then again… he didn’t feel sorry for saying it, he had meant every word.

Logan’s cheeks burned a bright red, and almost immediately Remus wanted to imprint the color into his mind and never forget it. Ordinarily, he hated the color red, it was the opposite of his own green and to top it off it was Roman’s color. But… Logan made the color look beautiful, he made it looked like it had a place in Remus’ world after all. He made it look… real. He’d made Logan blush, not Patton.. not Virgil… and most certainly not Roman, but him. It made a strange feeling of pride well up in his chest, ready to pop like a balloon from the soonest word from the logical side.

“Well, I…” The red on his cheeks deepened as Logan glanced away, giving Remus a perfectly good view of that red touching the tips of the nerd’s ears the back of his neck. Bite it, his mind whispered. “I wouldn’t be opposed to looking over your ideas,” Logan mumbled, his hands fiddling with the sheets. Remus wanted nothing more than to take those hands, the fingers rough with callouses on ends and lick them.  To shower and pepper every inch of Logan’s body in love and pleasure, “Over dinner?”

Once again Remus felt himself short circuit at the shyly asked response, and for the first time in… ever, he found himself completely and utterly speechless. The only thing that left his lips was a faint wheeze as happy tears burned at his eyes like he was looking right into the sun, and… well, he supposed that he was, given that Logan was sitting right there in front of him.

“I’d like that,” He finally managed the words out, a dopey grin on his face.

So maybe he did have a chance after all.

#logan sanders #logic sanders #ts remus sanders #remus sanders #ts remus #ts logan #ts logic #ts sanders sides #ts sides #sanders sides #sanders sides fanfiction #intrulogical #lomus #ts logan sanders #gay disaster Remus #morally stupid remus

[rocket-remmy]

Captain Moose and The Vicious Vampire || Otto and Remmy

TIMING: Late September PARTIES: @gravityfissure and @whatsin-yourhead SUMMARY: Remmy tries on their new fair prize for size. Otto needs to stop taking walks at night.

Ever since Bea’s birthday party, Remmy had been feeling an uplift in their mood. There was still a lot to be worried or even upset about, but if there was one thing they had learned, it was that attitude was more important than the situation. If they could just keep their head up, then things wouldn’t seem so bad. Couldn’t be so bad. They would find a way to fix things, and they’d find a way to fit into their new life. Even if they still felt that little tremor of panic when they went outside. Going for walks daily had helped, but Remmy still had an aversion to going outside at night. Today, they’d donned their new craft fair socks and spent most of the day walking around the common. And the more they walked, the more confident they felt. In fact, they began wondering why they didn’t go out more. There were so many people who needed help. A kid whose ice cream had fallen needed a new cone. A woman who had lost her phone needed help finding it. (They found it one of the trash cans wrapped in her sandwich paper). A man was following a girl home and Remmy stepped in to stop him, giving a pleasant, innocent smile and badgering him till the girl was safe inside.

 But there was more to be done. They couldn’t let anyone see their face, though, right? They needed to be careful about this. They needed some sort of disguise. Perhaps a mask. Maybe even a cape, to cover themself with should the need arise. Morgan was out for the night, as was Deirdre, and Remmy took it upon themself to dig through the linen closet, grabbing the first things they could find that looked good enough. Snipped it to fit right, cut out holes or the eyes, and then donned their favorite shirt-- “Home is wherever my dog is”-- a pair of black pants and their only pair of boots. Gloves for extra measure, in case punching needed to happen. It was with this set up-- a cape with little cat’s with witch’s hats on, and a bandana for a mask that was a pink, sparkly galaxy, full of glitter-- that they found themself trouncing through the alleys of White Crest. And when they saw a shadowy figure following someone down an alley, they knew it was time to swoop in. 

It was late and recent events had left Otto feeling more drained than he cared to admit. Being dragged along on Deirdre’s shroom adventures had very real and damaging repercussions. One that had ended in the operating theatre and doctors claiming it was no small miracle by which he’d survived the impaling he’d suffered after his ‘fall’. The pain meds he’d been given took the edge off, but work rolled on and there was hardly any time that could be taken off even for a through and through laceration meaning the walk home at 3AM was inevitable. 

 The pain meds were also the reason Otto failed to notice the creature silently stalking him down the alleyway until it launched itself at his back colliding with enough force that he staggered, tipped over some bins and fell with an echoing clang while claws slashed and teeth gnashed; seeking purchase anywhere they might be capable of rending flesh from bone. “Fuck!” blind fingers scrabbled, seeking anything that might be able to help until they curled around a trash can lid dragging it across and shoving it in the way of the creature’s teeth. “”Help!” as if that would do anything. In a town like this he was almost certainly done for. Hells, what an underwhelming way to go out.

 The poor man in the alley was thrown from his spot by the larger, hulking figure. Remmy swooped down quickly. “Halt!” they shouted, the towel rustling behind them. The vampire, confused, turned to look at them. “Why don’t you pick on someone your own, erm--” Remmy looked the vampire up and down, realizing how much taller they were than them, but swallowed, standing confident again, “--strength!” Yeah, that made sense. That made a lot of sense. The vampire, still confused, dropped the other man and turned to face Remmy. “And who the fuck are you supposed to be, then, huh? This ain’t comic con, kid, go back to where you--” but before he could finish his sentence, Remmy had grabbed the front of his shirt and was tossing him up and over them. He landed hard on his back at the entrance of the alleyway, crashing into a few trash cans on his way. Remmy smirked. “Wanna try that again, villain?” they asked, before turning to look back at the guy. His arm was already in a sling, it was a good thing they’d shown up. “Are you alright?” they asked, holding a hand out to him. 

 Otto tasted asphalt and felt the sting of the ground against his face as he skidded to a stop. He also felt a wet stickiness against the lower right quadrant of his tee and a pain that made him suspect the stitches he’d gotten had popped, his hand immediately went to as voices continued behind him. Pushing himself over awkwardly, Otto propped himself up against one of the walls staring at the weird scenario playing out in front of him. A scenario whereby a masked and caped hero seemed to think it fitting to swoop in and save the day in- was that cape printed with cats wearing witches hats? The fuck? He blinked in apparent confusion, those pain meds must’ve been doing something seriously fucked up to his head. No way was his imagination usually this creative. But then the caped crusader was rag-dolling the vampire into the bins and Otto couldn’t bring himself to question the weirdness of this. “Uh.... sure?” his eyes flickered back to the pissed off looking vampire getting up out of the trash as he cautiously took the proffered hand and clambered to his feet still looking over the figure’s shoulder, “might uh-- wanna do something ‘bout that guy.”

 The poor, innocent civilian looked pretty banged up and scared, but that was okay. Remmy was here to rescue him now. Turning back as the villain rose from his heap on the ground, shaking garbage from his limbs and glaring them down. “Don’t worry-- I’ll take out the trash!” They spoke with a crooked smirk on their face, before running straight at the vampire, catching him off guard. Two punches to the face startled him enough to nearly topple him again, and Remmy spun to give him a good kick straight to chest. The vampire went flying from the alley, landing in the middle of the street and tumbling a few feet before skidding to a stop. “If I were you, I’d give up now,” they said, hands on their hips, as the vampire scraped himself up from the street, skin scored from the asphalt. Shaking his head, fangs bared, he leapt at them. Remmy shook their head, disappointed, before striking up another stance. They quickly moved out of the way, expecting him to turn and follow them but-- “Hey!” the beastly man kept going, charging at the victim in the alleyway. “Oh no!” they shouted, leaping for the vampire, trying to stop him before he got to the man. Fists dug into the vampire’s shirt, yanking, and the two went tumblring to the ground hard, rolling just past the wounded man. “Don’t even think about it,” they demanded, wrenching his arm up behind his back.

 Otto could only stare at the weird scene unfolding in front of him. The corny one-liners ripped straight out of some kind of comic strip that he’d normally roll his eyes at. Hells was this what his life had become? But the stranger seemed intent on fulfilling their caped crusader fantasy and hey? Who was he to stop them from punching his would-be assailant in the face. It was kind of entertaining to watch all things considered, at least, it was until he had a full grown vampire bearing down on him again. “Oh fuck!” he ducked out of the way just in time to see them both go toppling by and feeling the need to help grabbed the nearest thing he could find; a half broken baseball bat sticking out of a dumpster. It would have to do. Rushing up to the duo he slammed the wood with a sickening crack against the back of the vampire’s skull twice for good measure. If he could just get a decent angle it wouldn’t be hard to shove the splintered bat through this bastard’s heart. It was the least he deserved Otto just needed to find an opening.

Remmy ducked and rolled with the vampire, slamming him to the ground, just in time to be thrown onto their own back, slamming against the ground. It didn’t exactly hurt, but the surprise caught them off guard enough to not be able to right themselves in time to dodge the incoming fist to their face. The vampire’s hand curled around the eye patch on their face and yanked, pulling off. Remmy tried to push them off, only to hear wood crack against the back of his skull. The man flopped down, face first into the cement. Ow, that was gonna hurt in the morning. Wincing, Remmy shoved them off and scrambled to stand, stumbling only slightly. They looked down at him, then over to the man they’d been trying to save, watching him raise the splintered bat above the vampire’s heart. “No!” they said, running over and grabbing for the bat. “Don’t kill him! You can’t kill him!”

 The cry for mercy came right at the very moment the splintered wood of the bat plunged downward piercing the flesh of the dazed undead creature. Good riddance. Otto thought, grunting as he put his full bodyweight behind the act before the piercing scream echoed off the walls of the darkened alley. There was a bright flash of flame as though the figure had been doused in gasoline before vanishing into nothing but ash and leaving Otto to fall to his knees breathing hard. The clatter of wood on asphalt rang loud and clear. The tremors came a few moments later as the adrenaline began to subside. “He-- He was trying to kill me!” 

 “No, no, wait--” Remmy tried again, but they were too late. The wood splintered through the vampire’s back, and in an instant, he was dead. They stood still for a moment, unbelieving of their eyes, before dropping to their knees. “You killed him,” they stuttered, “why-- why would you do that? I had it handled!” They stood up again and began rooting around the alley, looking for a container-- something they could scoop the ashes up into. They needed to move them. Even if that vampire had been attacking someone, they needed to lay him to rest somewhere that wasn’t an alley filled with garbage. “You can’t-- you can’t justify killing with more killing! That’s not how it works! You have to-- someone has to break the cycle,” they said to the man, “someone has to be better.”

 “You had it handled? How do you call him almost ripping my throat out two times handled??” There was a minor note of panic in his voice as Otto waved at the pile of ash that was being blown away by an autumnal breeze drifting through the alleyway. He tossed the piece of wood aside, backing up one step and then two away from the strange caped crusader. “Break the cycle?” his expression mirrored his look of disbelief at the sheer faith this individual seemed to have in law, order and justice. He couldn’t help the slight huff under his breath “break the cycle of death? In this town? Good fuckin’ luck with that.” No way that was going to happen after all. But hey if they wanted to hop on that train bound for failure who was he to stop them? “Sorry Captain Washline, that sort of sunshine BS really isn’t gonna fly here.”

 “But he didn’t rip your throat out! I saved you!” Remmy insisted, feeling their chest heave again. This man was yelling at them when all they’d done was help. Sure, they made a little mistake, but everything had turned out alright. Except for the dead vampire. Remmy found a jar and started scooping the ash into it, looking over at the man with a furrowed brow. “Yeah, well, with that attitude, of course you wouldn’t think it was possible. But it’s gotta start with someone,” they muttered, standing up straight. “It’s Captain Moose to you, too,” they snapped, closing the lid on the jar. “And you’re welcome. For saving your ass.” They brushed their hands off and started heading out of the alley way. “You can believe whatever you want to, but I’m going to believe in the good of people. Even you, Mister Stakes-a-lot.” 

 “I don’t count near brushes with death as good things but thanks.” Otto answered shortly still wondering how of all the people in this town to come to his rescue it was someone dressed in a witch hat cat cape. The town certainly knew how to make a niche even its so-called heroes didn’t stick to the norm. His eyes narrowed a fraction, half tempted to ask if there were antlers to go with that name. “Aye, sure,” he tipped a salute from his temple, scoffed and backed into the alley. Hells he needed to stop going out after dark. 

 As the man said his last words-- more like spat-- Remmy stuck the jar in their pocket and sighed. He was backing away and taking off now, not even a thanks in tow. But then again, they hadn’t done it for the thanks, right? They’d done it to feel like they could still help someone, that they still could be worth something. They sighed again, gathering up their cape and brushing off their pants, then turned to head out of the alley as well. They patted the jar in their pocket. “So,” they asked, glancing left and right, “where should we spread your ashes?”

#chatzy #chatzy: otto #captain moose and the vicious vampire #otto

[the-blind-assassin-12]

Cross Cut

A/N: Another in the Play the Hand You’re Dealt event, this takes a look at the day Logan met his buzzkill from his point of view, and what you did that made him sure that you were the right person for this job. 

Warning: language. and William’s face, gross. 

Word Count: 3,432

Requested by:  @something-tofightfor See You in New York Logan, General, Secrets & Lies, Logan’s POV

Logan tugged at his left shirtsleeve, fixing the toggle of the silver rimmed onyx cufflink. He twisted it with his long fingers, pushing it back through the buttonhole to tighten the fit around his wrist. That’s better. His eyes flicked up to the numbers above the elevator door, lighting up as the vessel carried him swiftly to the 38th floor. Leaning back against the shiny railing,  he slid his hands into the pockets of his pants and crossed his ankles. Wonder how this is gonna go. He took a breath before letting it slowly out through his nose. Could go a few different ways, depending on… He uncrossed his feet and shifted his weight away from the railing, removing his left hand from his pocket to check the time. This could be good. Or it could be a disaster.  

He’d been preoccupied with the defamation case for the last few weeks, working long hours  with the legal team to prove his innocence, and between that and trying to get caught up on the work that he’d missed while dealing with that, he’d given little to no thought about what today’s introduction would be like or how it might change things. It would be the first time that he would be working with someone so closely that he hadn’t personally chosen or worked with previously, and while he knew the date Cynthia had mentioned as her associate’s start date, Logan hadn’t had time to consider anything else regarding the situation. He trusted Cynthia’s judgement and wanted to believe that the woman wouldn’t send him someone that wouldn’t be a good fit- that she wouldn’t send a goldfish into the shark tank. Annoyed enough already that his father and the rest of the Delos board were insistent upon this being a necessary step, he didn’t want to be locked into 6 months of interaction with someone that he himself would fire in 6 minutes if given the choice. Guess we’ll see. 

The bright white bulb behind the stencil cut 38 lit up and the elevator car came to a smooth stop as the doors opened silently. Logan tilted his head to the right and rolled that shoulder, a small pop coming from somewhere in his neck. He could see Charlie standing a few feet away, an espresso in one hand, his touchpad and a few files stacked and tucked into the crook of his bent elbow, ready to prep Logan for the day’s meetings and deadlines. New to the company, Charlie had just graduated the intern program and Logan had made sure to snatch him up, the young man showing more promise and attention to detail than any other prospective assistant Logan had considered. He was sharp, capable and dedicated without being cocky, pretentious or a kiss-ass. But why does he look like he’s ready to shit a brick? Logan watched the man’s throat undulate as he swallowed, his eyes blinking rapidly as he clenched and unclenched his jaw. Mildly concerned, Logan strode from the elevator. Only one way to find out. 

“Mornin’, Charlie,” Logan greeted him with the same relaxed demeanor that he did every morning no matter how stressed, frustrated, exhausted or busy he was. He smiled, taking the coffee that was offered to him in his left hand, right digging his phone from his pocket. “What does today look like?” Aside from meeting my new ball and chain. Quickly entering his passcode to unlock his phone, Logan took a sip of the bitter espresso and opened his calendar. 

Charlie switched the items in his arm as they started walking towards Logan’s office, tucking whatever files he carried under the touch screen tablet. With a few deft swipes that he could have done blindfolded, he opened the same calendar portal so that he could go over Logan’s schedule. “Good morning, Mr. Delos.” He cleared his throat, covering his mouth by making a fist with his free hand before bringing it up to press his pointer finger to his eyebrow, dragging it towards his temple. It was his tell, the dead giveaway that his nerves were bordering on nausea. Terrible poker face, Charlie. “There’s an R & D budgetary meeting at 11. They want to propose some new synthetic materials and software upgrades they’ve been working on.” 

Logan took another sip of espresso, nodding. He approved that meeting on his agenda by highlighting it with one finger, the entry vanishing from Charlie’s screen and showing up in bold font on his own. That could be interesting. Having a hand in the research and development of new technologies for the parks and for other branches of Delos Inc. was one of Logan’s favorite things about his position. Though he didn’t have a degree in engineering, he often contributed to brainstorming sessions combining his experience in the parks with his creative ingenuity to help spark new ideas or solve existing glitches or issues. “Should run about an hour, yeah?” He raised his eyebrows questioningly as he turned to Charlie,  just in time to catch another press and drag of his finger over his forehead. What the fuck is he freaking out about? 

Charlie nodded. “Yup, it should, usually does.” He dropped his hand back to his tablet to swipe at the next item on the list- a conference call with an investor in Paris at noon. Logan groaned internally at that one, but approved it anyway. Turning the corner, they passed Juliet’s office. Her door was closed, but Logan waved to her through the glass wall, raising two fingers on the hand he held his beverage in. Hey, Jul. She was on the phone, a frown creasing her face that only deepened as she pressed her lips together and half-heartedly waved back. Okay, who the fuck died around here? He used the same fingers that he used to wave to his sister to unlock the keypad on his office door, then pushed it open for Charlie to follow him inside. 

“After that you’ve got-” 

Logan closed the door with his elbow, the lock engaging automatically as soon as it clicked shut. Even though two of the four walls that made up the executive offices were glass, the soundproofing made them as private as they needed to be. “Cut the shit, Charlie.” He drained the rest of his espresso and crossed to his desk to toss the empty white cardboard cup into the recycling bin. I know something’s up, so tell me what it is. 

‘Um, well,” Charlie stammered. Logan watched him clench his hand in a fist in an effort not to bring it up to his brow. He shuffled the file he’d been holding beneath the tablet, opening it and pulling out two magazines with obnoxiously bright yellow lettering emblazoned across the top, and photos and headlines collaged all over their covers. “The legal team got them to pull it from their website but…” With a shaky hand, Charlie held out the glossy prints. “I figured you would have seen them already but…” He sighed. 

Is that? Logan’s eyes widened as he reached out and took what Charlie was handing him. But before he’d even turned it around, he knew exactly who he was looking at. That fucking piece of shit. The shiny, waxy paper crumpled beneath his fingers as he flexed them, a hot rush of anger flushing through him. That’s why Jules looked at me like that, he glanced up at his assistant, why he looks like he’s gonna blow. He looked back down at the photo staring up at him, his top lip curling in thick, vicious hatred.  

Ousted Delos Exec Breaks Silence on Sex Scandal Rumors: It Wouldn’t Surprise Me- drugs, debauchery, and other things you didn’t know about Logan Delos as told by his former brother-in-law. 

Fucking William. He flipped to the second cover, scanning a similarly damning headline featuring an equally pathetic looking photo of Juliet’s ex-husband, the man’s complexion looking off, his blond hair long and lanky in appearance. This is low, even for you, you fucking- Logan’s eyes slipped closed and he clenched his jaw. No. Not gonna let this asshole… Exhaling slowly, he dropped the tabloids to his desk and blinked his eyes open. Pulling out his chair, he sat down and set his phone on top of the prints, blocking William’s face. Following the suggestion of his addiction counselor, he’d taken all name notifications down from any publication that didn’t relate strictly to business so he wouldn’t be inundated with opinions on how long his sobriety would last and pictures of him at his worst. So when William’s “tell-all” went to print, Logan knew nothing about it. But I’m not gonna let him get under my skin and fuck around. He’d done enough damage, and now that he’d finally been dealt with, Logan wouldn’t let him gain an inch of real estate in his mind. Not again.  

“Well,” he looked up at the other man and cleared his throat. “Never a dull moment, is there?” Charlie’s mouth opened and closed, his shoulders rising with a breath as though he were going to say something, then deflating as nothing came out. It’s fine, not your fault. Movement behind Charlie caught Logan’s eye as he saw Juliet leaving her office and taking long steps towards his. Here we go. “Listen, Charlie, do me a favor and just accept all my meetings for the day. If anything changes and I need to reschedule anything, I’ll let you know.” Juliet raised her fist to rap her knuckles on his office door, three assertive knocks followed by the muffled call of his name. Charlie raised his eyebrows and gestured towards the door. “Yeah,” Logan sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Let her in. Wait!” Charlie froze with his hand on the door knob. “You’ll let me know when the rep from the New York firm gets here, right?” 

“Of course. She’s scheduled to be here within the hour.” Great. “Mr. Delos?” Logan tilted his head indicating that Charlie should go on. “I’m sorry about this bullshit. I hope this is the last of it.” 

Logan saw in the man’s eyes that he was being genuine, another trait he valued in his personal assistant. He nodded, the slightest smile of appreciation curving his lips to the side. “Thanks, Charlie.” He stuck his chin out at the door as Juliet knocked again, harder this time. “You better let her in before she breaks it down.” 

Charlie’s hand resumed motion, turning the knob to open the door. He barely sidestepped out of the way as Juliet spilled through, the young assistant skirting around the woman and scurrying out the door and out of the way. “Logan, I’m fucking livid. I’m...this is… how can he still be…” His sister paced around in front of his desk, arms and hands punctuating every words she was saying with their rigid movements. Good morning to you too, sunshine. She turned to him, finally seeing him through the haze of red. “I’m fucking pissed, I’m…” She swallowed then, tears springing to her eyes that Logan knew were caused equally by anger as they were by anything else. He got up and stepped around his desk as she wiped at her eyes. “I’m so sorry he’s still trying to hurt you, Logan, I’m...this is my-” 

That initial swell of hatred built up again as Juliet tried to take the blame for William’s latest stunt. “Hey. Don’t, Jules.” He warned. She sniffed, nodding as a tendril of soft brown hair fell over her eyes. Her slender fingers came up to tuck it back into place as tears still rolled slowly down her cheeks, leaking from dark eyes brimming with frustration and contempt for her ex-husband, sympathy and love for her brother.  “I mean it, don’t. This is not your fault, okay? There’s nothin’ you could have done or not done to stop him from being what he is.” Not after you married him, anyway.

He chased that thought away, wrapping her in a one-armed hug that she returned eagerly. Since Juliet and William’s divorce had gone through roughly one month ago, Logan had been working on repairing his relationship with Juliet, and was just starting to build one with his niece. He looked down at his desk, at a photo taken just a few weeks back of him and Juliet with Emily at the aquarium. Both siblings were pointing to the brightly colored fish and gently swaying coral that filled the enormous tank that they stood in front of, but the one and half year old’s wide tawny eyes were stuck on her uncle. He brought his second arm around his sister and squeezed quickly before letting go. Of course he would have preferred that she listened to him about William in the first place, not just because her disbelief had cut him deeply, but because she could have saved herself from having to have married him. But he’s out now, and I’m not letting him hurt you- either of you- anymore. 

Juliet took a steadying breath and stepped back with a shake of her head. “I’m sorry, I’m just…” she scoffed. “I can’t believe he is Emily’s…” she couldn’t even say the last word. Yeah, me either. “Anyway,” she resumed her pacing, but much more slowly and far less aggressively and Logan returned to his desk chair. “I was on the phone with legal when you got in before. I’m sure Charlie told you that we got the...articles…” she was careful not to use the word story when they both knew that there was no truth to the facts that William claimed to know. “Those were taken down from these two websites.” Logan nodded, leaning against the backrest as he tapped his thumb against the edge of his desk. “Well, we’re slamming them for running it at all after the trial, after you,” she rolled her wrist, looking for the right wording. “Running it after you proved she was lying, well… they’re in deep shit.” As they should be. 

“Good.” Logan sat forward, wetting his lips as he dragged one hand through his hair. It’s been a long day and it’s not even 10 am. He sighed, pushing the tabloids even further to the side of his desk so that he couldn’t see William’s face. 

“Logan?” Juliet looked down at the floor before bringing her eyes level with his. He tilted his head in response. “How are you...are you doing okay? I mean with all of this?” She chewed her bottom lip. It occurred to him that she wasn’t only asking how he was handling the accusation, but also if he showed any signs of falling back down the stairway to hell. 

Surprisingly, even the shock of being dragged through the mud for things he’d never even think of doing hadn’t been enough to push him back over that edge he’d fought three times to climb, this last bout with recovery feeling like it would be his last. I got my sister back, got my family and my company back and… He thought of Emily and how she was the only child in the world he gave two shits about.  He smiled, and though it wasn’t one of unbridled joy and happiness, it didn’t feel forced and that was something. “I’ll be okay, Jules, don’t worry. Besides,” in a display of timing so perfect that he couldn’t have choreographed it better, his phone screen lit up and he pointed at it. “My fairy godmother is here to fix all my bullshit.” He picked up the phone as Juliet actually let out a small laugh. “I’ll fill you in later, yeah?” She nodded and wished him luck before leaving to head back to her own spacious office. The phone in his hand lit up and buzzed again, and he swiped Cynthia’s name to answer. 

“Good Morning,” he answered the call, skipping the formal greeting.

“I’m assuming you saw the trash rags?” She, too, forwent any sort of official bullshit, which was one of the things Logan admired most about her. 

“Sure did. Guess you saw it before it was pulled from the internet?” I wonder what it says… He glanced sidelong at the magazines on his desk and tapped his pointer finger against his phone. 

“Who do you think called your legal team?” Of course you did. “That ex brother-in-law of yours looks like shit in those pictures.” Logan had to laugh at that. He heard the clacking of a keyboard as Cynthia fired off an email while she had him on the line. He does.  

“Thanks, Cyn, I owe you one.” He was vaguely aware of movement outside of his office, the elevator door opening and closing as Charlie escorted a woman- you- out of it. “Speaking of which, I think your rep just got here.” 

“She did. She texted me from your elevator.” Oh. So she’s just like you then. “I wanted to touch base with you one last time before you were introduced.” Interesting. 

Logan watched Charlie guide you towards his office, noting your confident posture, the practiced way that you made the elevator-to-office walk look as though you had done it countless times instead of this being your first time setting foot in the building. Your eyes stayed on Charlie even as she took a sip of the coffee in your hand, sharp and focused. “I’m listening.” 

“She’s the best I’ve got, so you have to trust her. She can be stubborn, like you.” Fantastic. “And in this case you’re going to have to be the one to concede, understand?” Yeah, Cyn, I get it.  “I’m telling you, she’s going to tie this off in such a nice little bow that no one will be able to say a word. And this new layer of garbage with your sister’s ex? Consider it gone, she’ll have a statement prepared by lunch.”

“Sounds great, Cynthia.” I hope you’re right. After three years of dealing with the aftermath of his trip to Westworld with William, depression, addiction, and all the havoc those things wreaked on his personal life and career, Logan was in dire need of a break. Cynthia assured him that she was in fact right, and ended the phone call the exact second that Charlie’s knock came on the door to introduce you to him. Damn. He had to admire Cynthia’s ability to run a well-oiled machine in her firm. And if she stands by this rep then I should, too. 

You’d given him your name, extending your hand to shake in a show of trust, briefly discussed your background and what you already knew about the case. She’s intense. He licked his lips as you rifled through the file that you carried, the deep burgundy polish on your nails standing in stark contrast to the manila folder as you pulled out page after page of preliminary drafting that you’d done for a blueprint back into the good graces of the dear old public. This is gonna work, she’s gonna- 

“Is that?” You pointed to the two tabloids still sitting on his desk, not waiting for his answer, simply striding over to pick them up. Oh, alright. “These are ridiculous, and the fact that he went to this level speaks volumes about the type of person he is.” You’re right. You shook your head muttering. “Garbage people in these damn garbage… does this thing do cross cut? And can it take staples?” What? Yeah, it- You were pointing at the industrial strength paper shredder located next to his desk, and again without waiting for him to answer, you pressed a button on the machine and sent both magazines through the slot, teeth catching the thick paper and slicing it to ribbons. 

“Guess I’m not reading those.” 

“You don’t need to,” you shrugged, a spark in your eye catching his attention. “They’re lies, right?” 

“They are.” He watched the remains of the magazine crumple and curl into confetti, William’s face and words obliterated before his eyes. 

“Then what they say doesn’t matter.” You smiled and pulled your phone from your pocket, tapping the screen to answer a message as you took a sip of your coffee, tossing your empty cup on top of his in the bin. Finished with the message you were sending, you put your phone away and reorganized the file you brought with you. “Now,” Logan watched the way your left eyebrow lifted as a determined tone entered your voice. “Should we get started?”

.

.

.

@something-tofightfor​ @its-my-little-dumpster-fire​ @suchatinyinfinity​ @gollyderek​ @thesumofmychoices​ @lexxierave​ @belladonnarey​ @ymariejp​ @obscurilicious​ @songtoyou​ @traeumerinwitzhelden​  @drinix​ @jigsawlover10​ @getlostinyourparadise​ @nananananananananananabatman​ @with1love1anu​ @malionnes​ @luminex3​

if you would like to be added or removed to the tag list for this event or any of the individual series, please feel free to let me know! 

#Play the Hand You're Dealt #card game prompts #Logan Delos #See You in New York #syiny part three #services no longer required #logan delos x you #Logan Delos x Reader #william is the worst piece of human filth #so it's fitting that he turns up where he does here

[bleach-your-panties]

My bad, for Armin Arlert letters are W, X, and Y. For Shoto Todoroki the letters are C, G, and L. 👻😈

Armin Arlert: W - Werewolf: Yellow eyes, fangs as long as your arm, and fur all over. Which side are they on and why? You and Armin were sitting in your living room doing your homework when he suddenly stopped, put down his pencil, and looked over at you. Feeling his gaze, you turned to meet pensive cerulean hues. Raising an eyebrow in concern, you asked, "Everything alright, Armin?" "Werewolves are superior for multiple reasons. Their strength and abilities are unmatched because they literally gain all of the abilities of a wolf. The gray wolf is one of nature's apex predators and-" You stopped him by putting a hand on his arm, a warm smile covering your face. "Okay, I get it; you win, werewolves are superior, my little human dictionary." You leaned in and gave him a peck on the cheek. "I, um. Sorry about that." His cheeks took on a rosy appearance. You giggled.

X - X-Ray: What's Halloween without a little naughty fun? It's a day where you can be anything or anyone that you want to be. So, what's under that costume? ;) "That was the most lit Halloween party that I've ever been to." You laughed as Armin closed the door to your house behind himself. "It was pretty fun. I'm glad you enjoyed yourself." He walked up behind you and wrapped his arms around your shoulders, then kissed your cheek. Giggling, you turned around and wrapped your arms around Armin's neck. "You were a star out on the dance floor." His cheeks turned a little pink and he let out a small laugh. "All thanks to you. You're a great teacher." It was your turn to blush now. You put down little broom that came with your witch costume down on the coffee table. "Um, my parents will be out until morning. Some Halloween gala at their job or something. Do you want to to...spend the night?" You asked cautiously, not knowing how the blond boy would respond. "Sure, I'd love to. I'll take the guest room. The library your parents have installed in there is-" You cut him off by grabbing him by the ruffled white shirt of his pirate costume and planting a deep, suggestive kiss on his lips. Immediately, he knew what your plans for the night included. Armin picked you up and you wrapped your legs around his waist. "Your room?" You shook your head. "I was thinking of something...more...spontaneous.” Your black and purple corset hit the hallway closet floor after Armin nimbly undid its multiple laces. Next, your black tutu hit the ground, followed by your purple lace panties. " Tell me why we're in the closet again, (y/n)-chan?" He asked between nibbling on your neck. "I felt like we needed to up our spontaneity." You reached into his skull-and-crossbones-covered boxers and massaged him, receiving a moan in return. "Right. Spontaneity." Y - Y. O. L. O - It's Halloween night, and you only live once. So release your inhibitions and do something wild! They won't judge, they promise. In fact, they'll probably be right there along for the ride. "I don't think this is a good idea, (y/n)-chan..." Armin said hesitantly as he followed after you, carrying an entire 6-pack of double-rolled toilet paper with him. "You're right, Armin. It's not a good idea, it's a great idea." You laughed maniacally as the two of you approached the first victim's house. Yes, you had concocted the diabolic plan to TP some of the houses in your neighborhood and you were dragging innocent, wide-eyed Armin along with you. "The first house on our list is Mrs. O'Reilly. She's always hated me and her stupid cats are always bothering Peanut." Peanut is your loving, adorable Chow Chow. He's very playful, loving, and gets along with most other animals. Except for those demon cats from hell. "So this is a revenge run?" Armin asked, stopping in front of the house with you. It was currently 7:00 pm in the evening, and he'd much rather be at home reading or something else productive since it was a school night. "Sure, whatever you want to call it. Now, we have to be quick so nobody sees us and so the old bag doesn't wake up." You took two rolls of the toilet paper and threw each one at the roof where they caught on the storm gutters and rolled down, giving the front porch a nice ghost, pumpkin, and bat-printed banner. "Haha, yes! Pass me some more toilet paper, Armin!" The hesitant blond looked around, trying to make sure that no one was watching him participate in criminal activity. As soon as you'd decorated the house with the other four rolls of toilet paper, a light in the house flicked on. "Oh shit! Run, Armin!" You dropped the empty toilet paper rolls and grabbed his hand, pulling him down the street towards your house. Nothing else could be heard except for the thumping of your Converse-covered feet down the pavement and your laughter. Oh, and Mrs. O'Reilly's threats of calling the police. Shoto Todoroki: C - Costume: What costume would they pick to wear? Are you guys going for a couples' theme? *Pics included* "Okay, so you're definitely going with this one, right?" You asked Shoto, referring to the costume you currently were holding up for him to look at. Shoto looked at you with a deadpan expression. "No." "Oh come on! This one is perfect for you!" He shook his head. "No, it's perfect for me to look like an idiot in and for you to laugh at me in." You thought about it. "True. Very true. Okay, so what about this one then?" Shoto groaned. "(y/n)..." Almost doubling over in laughter, you waved your hand in surrender. "Alright, alright. I'll be serious. Look, I have an idea." Halloween Night Your costumes:

Mina approached the two of you outside of your house as you and Shoto were preparing to head to Momo's house for a huge Halloween shindig. "Oh my God, I LOVE you guys' costumes. That's really creative!" She squealed. You beamed. "Thanks, they were my idea. Want some gum?" G - Graveyard: So you decide to spend the night in a graveyard because you think it'd be fun. Right.. How did your night turn out? Shoto usually had sense enough to not follow along with most of your silly ideas and antics, but for some reason he'd decided to go along with your idea to spend the night sleeping in the city cemetery. Also, Bakugo calling him a pussy and betting half the class $20 that he wouldn't do it was also a motivator. Nighttime: You'd come prepared with a tent, sleeping bags, snacks, your laptop and a portable charger so you guys could make the most of your little escapade. "Let's watch a scary movie!" You suggested, popping open a bag of nacho cheese Doritos while Shoto opened a bottle of juice and took a sip. "Fine, but don't even think about crawling into my sleeping bag when you get scared, (y/n)." A ghost of a smile covered his face briefly. "Psh, me, scared? You've got to be joking-" A rustling sound outside your tent made you pause. "D-did you hear that, Shoto?" "Hmm, hear what? Pass the chips, please." "T-there's something out there...what if it's a ghost or a...zombie..." You whispered the last part. "If it is, tell them that it was your idea to come and disturb them." He said, taking the bag of chips from you. Rolling your eyes, you sat down on top of your sleeping bag. "That's not funny Shoto, I-AHH!" You jumped and screamed when you saw two big shadows outside of your tent. "ZOMBIES!" You screamed, unzipping the tent as fast as you could and preparing to run for your life. "Oh my God! I'm gonna die, I'm gonna die, I'm gonna-" You stopped when you heard laughter behind you. Shoto had slumped to the tent floor on his back, an elbow covering his eyes as he struggled to breathe. "Good way to wimp out, (l/n)." Bakugo cackled, along with Eijiro, who were crawling into the tent. "You guys are assholes!" You steamed as they continued laughing at you. L - Lantern: Take a walk on a lantern-lit path late at night or maybe make homemade ones with a pumpkin and candle. However you decide to do it, do it together. Shoto sat with you at your kitchen table, the two of you carving the insides out of your pumpkins so you could make lanterns with them. "I've never seen anyone do this before." He commented, dumping some more pumpkin guts into the silver pan you two were using. "Yea, I know right. I saw this on Pinterest." You finished up with yours, so you went to the sink to wash your hands. Shoto finished soon after you. You had carved a heart with the two of your names in it on the front of yours and he had carved a flaming heart with your hero name inside of it on the front of his. You snuck a peak at his pumpkin, smirking. "So does that mean that I set your heart on fire?" Returning the smirk, he shrugged. "Something like that." That made you blush and giggle. "I'm going to go grab the candles from my room." He nodded as you headed for the stairs. When you returned, you placed a candle in each of your pumpkins. "Okay, I need the lighter." Rummaging around in the kitchen junk drawer, you came across some mini light bulbs, a bottle opener, and some stamps, but no lighter. "Dammit.." You mumbled to yourself, slamming the drawer shut. "What's wrong?" Shoto asked, noticing the distressed look on your face. "I don't know where the lighter is..." You looked at him, getting an idea. "No, (y/n). The dollar store is right around the corner, we could-" "But why go all the way to the dollar store when you're right here, Toki-kun~" "I thought I told you not to call me that..." His cheeks tinted the least little bit of red. "Pleaseeeeeeee..." Later: "Our lanterns look really nice, don't you think, Toki-kun?" "Mhm..." The two of you sat outside on the porch swing in your charred school uniforms while the firefighters put out the fire in your kitchen. "Yea, my parents do not need to know about this." Shoto nodded, agreeing.

#armin arlert #shoto todoroki #happy halloween #mhascenarios #aotscenarios

[wichols]

Rant Ahead

It does not happen very often but we have reached it folks. I need to rant or my brain will explode.

Let me be very clear I am an educated (almost 27 year old) people-pleasing person. 9/10 I will try to complete whatever project is given to me and go above what was asked. I work a typical day job as a receptionist. Not only am I the youngest full time working person but I am also the person who is paid the least. Meaning if there is any job someone does not want to do I get it.

I get the shitty jobs. 

Whatever I had planned to get accomplished gets tossed out the window if someone needs help. 

I work in an office with generally nice people. But as a people person I get lonely. I sit by myself most of the day or do jobs that leave me excluded from other things. So when someone does interact with me it is important that most of those interactions are important. This is not always the case.

Just in this past week, I have been pushed to my breaking point.

I have been cut off mid-conversation.

Talked over.

Gotten food for someone who totally had the time to get it themselves.

Pulled from projects.

And now the center of this rant. The box project.

Being the creative person I am it is very hard for me to accomplish tasks if I don’t understand the why behind something. You bark out orders without explanation I will fucking DRAG my feet to accomplish it. I work in a place that is not creativity inducing. But hey when your spouse is a full-time student and you got bills to pay its what you gotta do.

So I have had this box project under my desk for about 2 months. Not only is it a time-consuming project but it is tedious work reading someone else’s sloppy handwriting. I was given very little direction and instructions so I have really been struggling with accomplishing the task. I accomplished the first part of the box task and the person wasn’t 100% happy with it so I left it for another 2 weeks to come up with a better game plan. And 2 weeks turned into another 2 weeks. Because bad mental health is a bitch and I literally couldn’t bring myself to work on anything of substance at work for like a month.

But this week. This week I put my nose to the ground and started blazing through the project. I took disorganized folders and organized them. But the publication date and topic. I created a spreadsheet with the main subject of each folder. I took what I was given and improved it. IT LOOKS 100x better than when I got it. I even hand labeled each folder with the date and subject (which was not requested in the initial giving of the project- above what was asked). Satisfied with my work I go to deliver the box back to it’s owner sorted and labeled along with the printed spreadsheet tucked nicely in the box for their viewing pleasure. Upon glancing in the box this is the response that I get... “Oh you hand-labeled everything... would it be possible to make printed labels for each folder?” “Sure yep not a problem. I can do that. No worries.” Can’t say no to the person who’s name is on the door and is also my boss.

And I walk out of their office box still in tow. Upon returning to my desk, I slide said box back safely under my desk.  Spend 30 minutes trying to figure out why my mail merge from Excel to Word isn’t working. Contemplate what it would feel like to just burn the box inside the office for all to see and/or just walk out for the day and not tell anyone. 

I can’t stand to correct and correct and correct something because you change your mind. I want to put all my energy and effort into it the first time and be done. I had done and given my best and it is still not exactly what you wanted. But you don’t give me the decency to actually explain specifically what you wanted. In this example, I do not win. My spirit is beaten and my want to do things for you in the future is small.   I grew up in a house where I didn’t always feel supported. I get it. I am a big feeling person. I feel like I am constantly pouring myself out for other people and rarely get anything short of a few drops in return. I am literally like Tinkerbell if people stop believing and affirming me, my inner soul will wither away into nothing. I need positive affirmations in my life. When you demand and constantly take without giving anything but a half-hearted thanks in return, that hurts. You talk bad about me in earshot that sucks because I will remember that long after you say something positive about me. I will always question your motive behind any little thing you say or share. 

All I want is your approval. To feel needed and wanted. 

This week I have given all I can. 

I snapped. 

I sat at my desk and shed a few tears. I let myself acknowledge my shitty angry and hurt feelings. Inadaquiceys and all. Said fuck in the workplace a few too many times. This week I feel stuck and stifled in my job. I feel lonely. I feel used. I don’t get the decency that others do. Favoritism in the workplace is real. Judgmental people are not limited to high school. And I will never be flat enough for some people to walk all over me. I will never be enough for some people. Not everyone will like me. But thanks Tumblr for being a very accepting place where I feel wanted and affirmed. It makes the sucky feelings feel a bit less sucky. So I will continue to push forward in my outside of work creative projects because you deserve it. And I am so excited to share those with you!

#rant #rant post #irl feels

[justheretobreakthings]

Welcome to the Family - Chapter 6

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Word Count: 3,049 (Total Word Count: 15,010) Read on AO3

Story Summary: Lance had been excited about his family taking in a foster kid, eager to get to meet his brand new little brother or sister, who would surely adore and idolize their super cool Big Brother Lance. What he got instead was a sullen, quiet, temperamental teenage housemate with a criminal record and a disastrous haircut.

The days leading up to the beginning of the school year were both too long and not long enough. Too long because there wasn’t a whole lot for Keith to occupy his time with. That was, admittedly, at least a little his own fault, as he spent the vast majority of his time in his room rather than downstairs where things were actually happening.

But it was easier on him this way. The TV in the front room was usually taken, and he didn’t want to interfere with anyone else’s use. Even when it wasn’t, the room was right there adjacent to the stairs and the basement entrance and the front door, all which were constantly trafficked. No way would he be able to relax amidst all that. And there was a family computer in the basement, but it faced outward into the room at large, and Keith hated the feeling of people looking over his shoulder while he was online, no matter how innocuous his browsing may be. Besides, Rachel had brought her trumpet home from summer band on Friday to practice it over the weekend, and the basement was her prefered practice space, so that was.

Tania, after noticing just how much time Keith spent hibernating in his room, had ordered a small used television for it online - despite Keith’s insistence that it wasn’t necessary, and hadn’t she already blown enough money on him over the past few days anyway - but they still had to wait for the delivery.

So the meantime was whiled away by re-reading his books and cautiously trying out the art supplies Tania had bought him for school. He didn’t think much of his artistic abilities, but it was one of the only creative outlets suggested by past therapists and social workers that actually clicked with him. He wouldn’t normally have asked his foster family for supplies, but Altea High required every student to take at least one year of a fine arts elective, so registering for art class had actually been a reason to need them.

The days were not long enough, though, in that, in spite of the way time had dragged, Keith still hadn’t managed to properly make himself feel ready to return to school by the time Monday morning rolled around. He woke early in the morning to a knocking at his door and Manuel’s voice telling him it was time to get up, and went downstairs to an unusually elaborate first-day-of-school breakfast, which Lance and Rachel both ate rather robotically, still adjusting to the waking world after a summer of sleeping in.

He threw on his clothes for the day - some dark gray jeans and a short-sleeved flannel that had formerly been Marco’s and which, to Keith’s surprise, had actually fit him pretty much perfectly, and were in better shape than most of Keith’s own clothes anyhow - and managed to get to the bathroom to finish his morning routine before Lance got to it. He had already managed to learn just how elaborate Lance’s ablutions were, and true to form, he kept Keith and Rachel waiting impatiently downstairs for twenty minutes in order to get his hair and face ‘perfect’. Even though when he finally was satisfied and came to join them, Keith could swear Lance looked exactly the same as he always did.

Rachel led the way out the door, slipping into the driver’s seat of an old scratched-up LeSabre parked at the curb. “You can take shotgun if you want,” she said to Lance as he opened the door of the seat behind her.

“God, no thanks,” Lance said. “I’ve seen you drive. I’m sitting where I’m most likely to survive when you inevitably crash us headlong into the auditorium.”

Rachel rolled her eyes. “Oh, whatever. Keith will sit up front with me, right, Keith?”

“Uh, sure,” Keith said, opening the door and carefully sliding into the seat.

“Do what you want,” Lance said. “But don’t be surprised if you’re the first to go.”

“Shut up, Lance,” Rachel said as she turned the key in the ignition. She shifted the car into drive and started down the road.

“Tell Keith how many tries it took you to pass your driving test.”

“I passed it eventually, it doesn’t matter.”

“Five tries. And on the third try she ran over a - ”

Rachel cut him off by speeding up and then braking hard at the stop sign on the corner, sending Keith lurching forward and Lance’s face knocking into her headrest. “Oops,” she said flatly. “Sorry, Lance, guess I’m just a bad driver.”

“Vete a la mierda,” Lance muttered, rubbing his forehead with a scowl.

“I’m telling Mamá you’re teaching Keith bad words,” said Rachel.

“Don’t you fucking dare.”

Keith managed to tune them out not long into the drive. He pulled his feet onto the seat and his knees up to his chest, letting all his focus drift to the buildings and trees and street signs they passed as he stared out the car window, trying to familiarize himself with the new surroundings, look out for landmarks that would make the route easier to remember if he needed to walk to or from school any time soon. Occasionally certain foster families of the past would forget to take him to school or pick him up. Or maybe do so intentionally. He could never be certain.

Lance and Rachel managed to keep up their light bickering all the way up until they pulled into the student parking lot, where Rachel had to try twice to park between the lines of her selected parking space, to Lance’s amusement. Despite Lance’s elaborate morning routine, it seemed they had still managed to arrive at school earlier than most, since the majority of the parking spaces were still empty. That was good. Keith still needed to stop by the front office to pick up his finalized schedule, and the last thing he needed was for that to make him late on the first day of school.

He parted ways from the McClains at the entrance, where they set off to their lockers and Keith to the front office. It was fairly crowded when he entered, students and a few parents trying to get some last-minute arrangements made before classes began. Keith hovered near the doorway, not wanting to barge past anyone or draw undue attention to himself by going to the receptionist.

In the midst of debating how he was going to go about asking for his schedule, his thoughts were interrupted by his name being called. The door to the guidance counselor’s office, adjacent to the front office, had been flung open, and Mr. Smythe stood in the entryway, waving him over.

Keith let out a breath and hurried over. Mr. Smythe was a recognizable presence, if a rather overwhelming one. He was a difficult person to forget, between the shock of bright orange hair on his head to the elaborate matching mustache, from his shoulderpadded blazer to his distinct accent. He’d certainly left an impression when Keith and Tania had met with him a few days prior.

“Keith, my boy, good to see you again!” Mr. Smythe said, beckoning him toward the office. “Come in, come in, I was just about to get your schedule printed up for you.” Keith followed him into the little office silently. He wasn’t sure how long this would take, so he opted to keep standing rather than take a seat in one of the chairs along the wall by the door.

“Now,” Mr. Smythe said, plopping himself into his own chair and turning to his computer screen. “I fit you into the art elective you wanted and made room for you in one of the Spanish 1 classes that fit the rest of your schedule. We also managed to get a gym uniform in for you in your size in time for you to be able to participate in your Phys. Ed. class today, so you can let Señora McClain know she needn’t worry about that.”

“Okay,” Keith said.

The printer on Mr. Smythe’s desk whirred as the counselor swiveled his chair to face Keith directly. “Regarding your core classes,” he continued. “For most of them we’ve decided to go ahead and place you in the standard sophomore level courses. I understand that there may be a few concepts from freshman courses that may need to be reviewed for you, but I’ve given your teachers fair warning ahead of time, so they’re aware that you may need a little bit of one-on-one assistance. Don’t be afraid to ask for it. I’ve also gone ahead and gotten you signed up for peer tutoring during your study hall block, so that could be a means to help you catch up.”

“Oh.” Keith’s shoulders slumped and he lowered his gaze. The whole situation was embarrassing, him being as far behind in school as he was. He knew he wasn’t stupid - despite what certain foster family members or classmates had told him in the past - but between constantly switching schools, his discipline record, assignments and books gone missing, the absolute joke of ‘education’ that the juvenile center had stuck him with all through last school year, and a decade of intense stress as the icing on the cake, well… he was probably lucky that his grades weren’t even worse.

“The only class that we couldn’t put you in sophomore level for was your Mathematics requirement,” Mr. Smythe was continuing, and Keith shook himself back into the present. “Seeing as the syllabus is much more linear than your other core classes. We’ve placed you in Algebra 1. However, if you put some elbow grease into your studies, Ms. Ryner has said that she would be happy to work with you to map out an independent study curriculum to get you back on track. If you go that route, you can have Pre-Calculus finished by graduation, same as the majority of your classmates. Of course, only Algebra 2 is a required credit for graduation, but colleges will be looking for - ”

“The regular track is fine, Mr. Smythe,” Keith said, immediately wincing afterward when he realized he had just interrupted.

Mr. Smythe, fortunately, didn’t seem to take offense at the interruption, and instead simply gave him a brief nod before pulling the schedule out of the printer tray and handing it to him. “Well, the option is available all this semester in case you change your mind. We’ll be happy to make accommodations.”

“Thanks,” Keith grunted. He accepted the paper and scanned the schedule.

“And Keith?”

“Mm?”

“That doesn’t just apply to classes.” Keith looked back up from the schedule to find Mr. Smythe’s gaze fixed firmly on him, intense and sincere. “If you are having any difficulties adjusting here, any concerns, or if you just need someone to talk to. My job isn’t just schedule planning and test prep, you know.”

Keith narrowed his eyes. “Why… are you telling me that?”

Mr. Smythe shrugged. “Thought I’d make the offer. It’s never easy for a new student to transition, and I know you have a bit of a, ah, colorful history in school settings - ”

“Who told you that?” Keith snapped.

“Your transcripts,” Mr. Smythe replied simply.

“... Oh.”

“Of course, it’s entirely up to you if you want to meet with me or not,” Mr. Smythe continued. “Señora McClain did inquire about it, but doesn’t want to force anything. Just be aware, my door is always open.” He leaned back in his chair and swiveled his gaze to his computer. “Feel free to run along, now, Keith. Wouldn’t want to make you late for your first class.”

“Um, right,” Keith said, hesitating only a moment before backing out the door, pulling it closed behind him.

His next stop was his locker, and thankfully he remembered where that was from the school tour he’d been given last week, and it was close, only two halls down from the administrative wing. The hallway was crowded when he got there, and he clung to the straps of his backpack tightly as he wove his way through the mass of students and to his locker.

He hung his backpack onto the hook and grabbed some supplies for his morning classes. Biology was the first listed on the sheet that Mr. Smythe had given him, located in room 224, which was… he wasn’t sure where. It was a lot to remember after only a single tour.

Biting his lip, he looked around the crowd of students. Lockers were grouped by year, so this hallway should be full of sophomores, which hopefully meant that a familiar face was nearby. After a few moments of scanning, he spotted an orange headband poking up from the crowd, taller than most of the other students around, and he set off in that direction. He recognized that headband, he was pretty sure, and the odds of another student in the same school having that same particular taste in hair accessories seemed slim.

Sure enough, the boy with the headband was the same as the one who had been visiting the house the other day, and Lance was with him, chatting idly while leaning up against a nearby locker, the girl who’d been with them there as well, standing with her arms wrapped around a bright green trapper keeper.

The boy - Keith couldn’t quite recall his name; Hank, maybe? - noticed his approach, and greeted him with a smile and a wave, that got the others’ attention and had them turning to him as well. “Hey Keith!” he said brightly.

“Hey...” Keith said in return.

“Hunk,” the boy supplied. Oh, well, he had been close.

“Right.” He cleared his throat and held up his schedule to the others. “Do, um, do you guys know - could one of you show me - um, room 224?”

“Here, lemme see that,” Lance said, snatching the schedule out of Keith’s hand to examine. “Huh, same bio class as me, so you can just follow me there. Same lunch blocks too, looks like. And English, and computer science… and gym…” He raised a brow at Keith. “You stalking me, man? I mean, don’t get me wrong, I’m flattered, but - ”

“I’m not stalking you,” Keith said, glaring as he grabbed his schedule back from him. “I didn’t pick the schedule.”

“Relax, I’m joking. Just making sure you’re aware how blessed you are to have me in so many of your classes.”

“I see we’re playing fast and loose with the definition of the word ‘blessed’ this morning,” the girl remarked, and for the life of him Keith couldn’t remember what her name was.

“Pidge here is just jealous of you,” Lance said to Keith. Pidge, then. Keith repeated it in his head a few times to commit it to memory.

“I am jealous of no one,” Pidge said. “I’ve got most of my classes with Hunk, so if anyone should be jealous, it’s you.”

“Aww, Pidge,” Hunk said with a smile. “That’s sweet of you to - wait, what do you want?”

“Your cookie at lunch.”

“No.”

“Then I take back my compliment.”

“All right, well,” Lance straightened up from the row of lockers and stretched. “Come on Keith, I’ll show you where Biology. Let’s give these two some privacy to get their flirt on.”

He made a gesture to follow as he stepped away, as Hunk let out an indignant squawk and Pidge stuck her tongue out at him. Keith hurried to fall into place next to him. “Wait, those two are dating?” he asked.

Lance smirked. “Heh, nah, they just get annoyed when I say they are. So, of course, I say it all the time. Why, you looking to get together with one of them? Because I gotta tell you, I don’t think you’re either of their type - for a number of reasons.”

Keith grimaced and shook his head. “No, I don’t date.”

“Huh,” said Lance. “Guess I’ll have to tell Pidge she was right.”

“What?”

“Here we are,” Lance said, dropping the subject abruptly and gesturing grandly into the doorway of a classroom. “Welcome to the Joy of Biology.”

He moved toward the back to plop into an empty desk, and Keith followed along behind him, staring straight ahead and watching the other students in the corners of his vision. Cautiously he edged toward the desk beside Lance’s. “So, do we just sit anywhere, or - ?”

He paused when he realized that Lance was already striking up a conversation with the occupant of his other desk neighbor, a girl with wire-frame glasses and a thick black ponytail. Deciding not to disturb them, Keith slid silently into the open desk, setting his notebook and folder on the desk’s surface and opting to simply remain quiet until class began.

The teacher, Mrs. Montgomery, arrived right before the bell rang and the students who were still standing as they chatted amongst themselves, presumably catching up after the summer break, hastened into the empty desks that remained. She thankfully didn’t try any sort of first day of school look-what-a-cool-teacher-I-am opening stunt, and instead opened the class fairly dully, dropping a stack of syllabi onto one of the desks in the front row for the students to pass around and returning to the front podium to read out the roll call.

It wasn’t exactly a big social occasion or anything worse being nervous over, but he still rehearsed saying ‘here’ in his head a dozen times over so that he was prepared when she called his name. “Kogane, Keith.”

“Here,” he replied.

He may have messed it up somehow anyway, though, because a kid sitting two desks away jumped in his seat and whipped his head around at the sound of Keith’s voice to look him up and down. He had floppy brown bangs and a sharply angled face, and the moment his gaze met Keith’s, his eyes widened and he quickly turned away again.

Keith narrowed his eyes at the back of the kid’s head. Something about his face struck him as vaguely familiar, just a twinge of recognition in his gut. He wracked his mind, but he couldn’t place it, and he reluctantly let the matter drop from his thoughts when the teacher finished with roll call and started passing out the textbooks.

#vldgen #vld fic #voltron fic #keith #lance #my writing #fic: welcome to the family

[darkmindsthinktwistedthoughts]

Enter the Kitsune - Prologue pt1

Summary:

Being thrown back in time is hard enough without it being in a completely foreign country.

Aerion Foxx is a creative department employee at a fashion magazine. She was finally doing her dream job when this happened. Now trapped in the past she has no choice but to play along with whatever life throws at her next so she can get back to her own time alive.

The inner circle of warlords thought they were able to handle everything. from the daily running of their own fiefs to full-scale war. With the arrival of the new tomboy Princess, each one of them finds something new that they were not prepared for. For one warlord, in particular, his world is about to get a lot more entertaining and maybe even a bit brighter.

Warnings: Strong Language

Masterlist

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Prologue part 1

Modern-day Kyoto

One place I never thought I’d find myself was here. Thanks to a frantic phone call placed to my department about some messed up photos from an important fashion shoot we needed for next month’s spread, I found myself now wandering the busy streets of somewhere I only ever got to see pictures of. I should have been cursing my luck to have the work put on hold back home but I just couldn’t, finally, I had a bit of a break and got to travel on my job.

I was one of the lucky ones. At least that was what most of my friends from college said when I landed a job after graduation. I was so excited to be hired at a popular magazine publisher. I was an ordinary office worker back then. It was hardly my dream job but it takes time and experience to get to the level of being able to be put on a team to discuss trends, layouts and hot topics that go to print.

Last month I was over the moon when they said I could take part on the team dealing with the rise in the trend of Japanophilia. Naturally, other magazines were looking at different aspects of the land of the rising sun’s cultural history and beauty but we had gone with a “Trends across Time” theme. And if you wish to show off traditional kimono the first place everyone thought of was here in Kyoto. The fact there was still a large number of historical buildings also made this the best backdrops for the photos.

It had been a seriously long day. If it hadn’t been issues with the photographer who was a Pro at everything except communication without insulting people who were not in front of the lens then we might have finished earlier. Still, the shots were in the bag and emailed back to the main branch. One of the models had suggested a great local shop that seemed to cover everything from ramen to Teppanyaki. The idea of sizzling thinly sliced pieces of meat and vegetables cooked on a hot plate was too much of a temptation to ignore after standing around all day plastering a smile on my face and doing damage limitation in order to get the job done.

Now I had eaten my fill I was feeling a little sleepy. I stifled a yawn as I made my way in a direction, I thought my hotel was, it was darker and the lights of the city were on. The air pressure must have changed a little so I dragged my favourite hoodie out of my backpack and pulled it on over my head. It would be my only defence against the approaching chill in the air. The soft fabric made me smile and as I pulled the hood up, I caught a glimpse of my shadow on the ground now sporting animal ears. I rounded a corner of a building and realised I was actually more than a little lost now. Did I come this way? Dammit! Ok going to have to pull out my phone and check google maps here. I began patting down my pockets in search of my elusive smartphone. I pulled it out the back pocket of my jeans only to sigh at the low battery warning flashing on it. Great.

I noticed something that looked like a landmark ahead of me. If I can figure out what it is, I might find the route back with no problem. Moving forward I discovered that what I had found was, in fact, a small monument at a site for a temple. The words carved into it weren’t in any way readable to me so I looked at the curator sign near it. “Oda Nobunaga 1534 – 1582” Oh it’s a memorial then? Ok. As I worked out what I was looking at I heard the sound of someone approach me from behind. Turning my gaze, a little I saw a young man dressed in a green shirt, dark trousers, glasses and what looked to be a lab coat. There was an ID badge clipped to it but I couldn’t see what it was. Guess he is either from a lab around here or maybe that big University I saw the other day.

He must have noticed my staring and looked back at me silently for a moment before starting to speak in Japanese and after registering my confusion corrected himself attempting English instead.

“Sorry. Good evening.” He seemed to be friendly enough even if his face didn’t move much more than to open and close his mouth as he spoke.

“Oh! Yes, Good evening.” I gave s small nod and an awkwardly sociable smile in reply. I felt it before I really saw it. A big fat raindrop landed on the back of my hand that was holding onto the strap of my bag. “Great…”

“Are you alright? Do you have an umbrella Miss?” The young man looked a little concerned and shifted closer. Honestly dude its just a bit of rain.

“Somewhere just not with me right now. Might have left it back where I’m staying.” I shrug knowing I’d left it on my bed in the room. The wind whipped up and then there was an almighty crack as a blinding light touched down near us. “AH!” Looking at the point of impact I could clearly see the modest stone monument had snapped in two. Did that bolt of lightning do that? The hairs of the back of my neck stood up straight at the thought. If I had been closer it might have killed me.

“Please be careful Miss…”

I looked back at the young man who seemed to be holding a hand out to me but almost as soon as I’d seen that he had disappeared. No, it wasn’t just him everything had vanished, swallowed up in some sort of impenetrable fog. Along with the loss of visuals, I felt something like the worst ever drunken night out experience. That feeling you get if you have more than one too many and you are stuck in a limbo between having a wide-awake hangover and that curious detachment from your body shortly before passing out. God, I feel sick. I squeezed my eyes tight shut the hand on my bag tightened its grip while the other just balled into a fist. Anything in an attempt to try to keep control over myself while I just felt that floating, swirling sensation wash over me in the empty darkness.

– SMACK, THUD –

Burning… something’s burning. I opened my eyes and was hit with a lancing pain piercing through my brain.

“AH!” I cried out and groaned as I held my head in my hands. It was so sharp I ended up having to scrunch my eyes shut again a few times in an attempt to get used to it enough to focus on what was going on around me. Did I hit something? Remembering the smell of burning I looked around and saw the ribbons of smoke and flame licking at the building I was in. How the hell did I get here? The thick smoke was creeping around me clinging to the breathable air turning it against me. Pulling my collar up higher to cover my nose and mouth I tried to scan my surroundings to see if there was a way out.

Of all the unbelievable situations to find yourself in on a business trip, this was one that was going to make everyone in the office call me crazy. I couldn’t see the man from before anywhere. I edged closer to what I thought could be a stable exit and then found something that might as well have been a scene from a movie.

A Japanese soldier laying on the floor in full armour that looked like it was right out of a museum. There was a shadow moving that was darker than the others in the room, it was getting closer to the soldier. No that’s no a shadow… The light of the flames glinted off what the shadow had in their hand and my blood went cold. The cold unyielding gleam of metal reflected in the darkness cutting through the acrid smoke.

“Look out!” I called out before I even knew what I was doing. The shadow turned quickly and fled leaving the fallen soldier on the ground alone. I rushed to the soldier crouching down to look him over. Wait… was he asleep? Who the hell sleeps through a burning building? “Hey. Wake up!” I shook his shoulders urgently making his body rock on the hardwood flooring. With a small groan, the man opened his eyes. It’s ok no need to rush not like the building is about to collapse or something.

“Who are you?” The soldier's voice sounded deep and was almost rivalling the creaking timbers of the building that were struggling with the heat from the flames.

“Introductions will have to wait we have to get out of here.” I made sure my bag was secure on my shoulder before holding out my hand to the still-sluggish looking man on the ground. “Come on.” After hauling him to his feet we took off running through the building chasing the clean air to freedom.

Once making it outside I doubled over. That thick smoke had gotten into my lungs and as I gulped for air I glanced behind at where we had just been. A traditional looking building was in full flame now. Parts of the roof were already starting to creak and collapse in sections. Thank god we got out of that in one piece.

“Someone tried to do away with me while I slept? Audacious, but foolish. Killing my guards and getting that close to me are another matter. You there. Woman. Let go of me.” The soldier I ran from the building with addressed me and I then realised I still had hold of his hand.

“Ah. Sorry.” After giving a quick apology I dropped his hand and straightened up again. I hadn’t noticed in the smoky room but the guy was actually not a bad looking one. He was observing me clearly thinking of something. His black hair looked like it was absorbing the light, which probably had something to do with the soot in it making it appear even darker. His eyes were like a fine dark wine, the red of them was so deep and mesmerising you could easily be lost in them. If we had met in another way I might have been put under their spell easily.

“You saved my life. You may be some girl the monks snuck in for amusement, but I owe you my thanks.”

“Amusement? Seriously is burning down a building what passes for amusement these days? And what do you mean Monks? I have zero idea how the hell I even got in there.” With each confused, exasperated word that left my mouth, I felt a throbbing skull-splitting pain. I’d probably kill for some Advil right about now.

The breeze around us had managed to find something wet that was seeping down the back of my neck from where I had my hair tied back. The cold dampness on my skin was such a contrast to the heat of the burning building that it made me shiver. I really don’t want to look into what that is right now. Did I hit my head on something? The man in front of me looked every bit like a screen print of some historical samurai. The armour, the stance, hell even that cold calculating brutal look in his eyes all screamed of power you couldn’t ignore. That sword hanging from his side just added to the “do not ignore me” feeling.

“What are you staring at? Surely you know who I am.”

“Not a clue.” I sighed giving a slight shrug and small apologetic smile.

“You saved me without knowing who I am? Not expecting reward or favour? So be it. I shall tell you my name. I am the man who will rule all under the sun –” As he was speaking, he seemed to stand up straighter and taller than before. He was intimidating but it was the way he spoke and puffed out his chest that really set off a small beware alarm inside me.

“You really don’t have to tell me who you are.” I blurted out, cutting his introduction short.

“What?” His powerful gaze looked at me once more, full of interest and I’m guessing from the way his mouth was a little gaped he was also slightly surprised. Something about this whole thing makes me think I’m not going to enjoy solving the mystery of who you are.

“You’re a curious one, woman. No one’s ever spoken so impudently to me before.” He burst out into loud echoing laughter. I guess I missed the part of this where any of it is funny. “You intrigue me, which is almost as worthy of praise as saving my life. I am the Lord of Azuchi Castle and Daimyo of Owari, Nobunaga Oda.”

“That’s nice… Wait, what?” Part way through accepting who he was my sluggish brain caught up to speed with it and stalled. He just said Nobunaga Oda, as in that guy that got that monument at that old temple site. That Nobunaga Oda?  I began turning my head around looking for the guy with a camera that I was certain was about to jump out at any moment and tell me I had just been Punked. I saw the engraved sign on a gate. Honno-ji. So that building back there was a temple? “This is going to sound very strange but excuse me. Could you tell me what year it is?”

“It is 1582. Why?” Nobunaga asked inclining his head. This has to be a bad dream. No way this is real. I put my hand on my arm and pinched it as hard as I could. Ouch! Ok… bang goes that theory. “What are you pinching yourself for? I’ve given my name. It’s your turn.”

“Huh? Hey!” I cried out as I realised Nobunaga had stepped forward and abruptly used his hand to tilt my chin to force me to meet his gaze.

“Give me your name.” His voice was deep and commanding but it also made me bristle automatically. I am not something to be commanded. And clearly Please was not something this guy was taught as a child. Matching his gaze with a glare of my own I stubbornly refused to allow my body to react to him. Well, I guess there isn’t much harm in telling him my name.

“My name is Aerion Foxx.”

“Aerion then? A good name.” He had a smirk on his face that was like a child that just won a game. Ok, that is another annoying thing. I don’t mind games but there is something about this one that makes me think it's not one set on a foundation of mutual respect.

“Thank you I like it too. Now let go of me.” Brushing his hand away I was quick enough to put a gap between us again. Seriously ever hear of personal space? I need to work all this stuff out but I just can’t get my head to stop pounding. I don’t know if it was pain or shock but I felt my body start to tremble. I could feel a rumbling sensation under my feet. I had visions of that iconic scene in movies where you see a glass of water quake just before a huge monster arrived. Looking around I saw a wall of armoured figures approaching.

“Nobunaga, my lord, you’re safe!”

--- 

[rtilrtil]

A-kon Artist Alley: Art Theft & Staff Indifference

Last weekend i was at A-Kon, an anime convention in Ft. Worth, Texas. this was my 3rd year tabling at their artist alley and almost certainly my last. while i’m disappointed to say that, what took place over the weekend was unacceptable and disrespectful to every creator that bothered to show up there.

if you are a creator who has ever been to or have considered tabling at an artist alley, please consider reading. thank you.

before i continue, i’d like to say that i don’t blame any one single person for this, and i do believe that there were lots of people trying to do the right thing, but ultimately those who have the responsibility and the power to protect the artists failed to do so. i am making this post because i think it is important for as many artists as possible to know what happened at A-kon 2018 in the hopes that the staff is more aggressive about their own policies in the future - and if not, at least let people know to avoid a convention where important rules that keep thieves OUT of artist alley are ignored.

moving on to the events of the con:

on Thursday evening i set up my table next to an empty corner table. the tables are set up in an island format, so every island has 4 corners which get 2 tables instead of one to form a square shape. when i came in Friday morning - the first day of the con - the corner was still empty. 

about halfway through the day, a few people arrived to start setting up there. at first i thought they were late, but i later found out that they were waitlisted and were offered the table to replace whoever was originally supposed to be there. this will be important later.

a few hours later they ended up setting up this: 

now a setup like this is typically something you see in the vendor’s hall, where actual companies sell licensed products and other merchandise not made by the vendors.

this setup is highly uncommon for artist alley and most certainly violates both clauses of this A-kon artist alley display rule:

not to mention another rule stating you can only take up 4 feet of space behind you, where they had an entire table set up for their merchandise.

you can trust me when i say that at most artist alleys there is not only not enough space for this monstrosity to be set up to begin with, but would be asked by staff to be torn down almost immediately.

but that is really only the tip of the iceberg, because the red flags started going up way before they finished setting up.

although the pictures are a bit blurry, you may notice something strange about the products on display - they all look like they’re from different artists.

and indeed, many of them are - in fact, it seemed apparent as the weekend went on that none of the work for sale at this booth was made by the people running it.

now proxy selling at A-kon and many other cons is allowed, but this is what the rule says:

This is where my earlier point about this table being waitlisted comes in to play. I have to assume the people running it were local, because a staff member implied that they were basically notified during the weekend that a table had opened up and they could come in to take the their place.

When you sign up to most conventions, you are asked to post a portfolio link, and part of doing that is to vet the people coming in to make sure they have.. well, a portfolio. You want to make sure the artists coming in to artist alley will be selling their own work.

and while I have no idea what link they gave the staff, the only website they had on display was an Etsy page where you can order a custom made phone case.

No tumblr, no deviantart, no pixiv, no instagram, no website..nothing. So there’s only two possibilities here:

The vendors set up a fake portfolio site full of some or all of the art on display here claiming it to be their own, and A-kon staff believed it

A-kon didn’t look at their portfolio at all, and just took the $275 from them without bothering to vet them at all

Now some of you may be asking why I would assume they would lie about claiming some of the art to be their own. Here’s where things get a little weird.

On Saturday, I was able to find one of the artists who made the art on one of the pillows they were selling. They were an artist in a foreign country thousands of miles away not attending the convention. The artist told me that the vendors had permission to use their art, but the story the vendors told was a little..different.

When the staff confronted the vendors about concerns of stolen art, the vendors claimed that the artist was their sister, but that she was currently on vacation and couldn’t attend. In fact, they claimed that all the art they had for sale was made by their family.

now why would you tell a bizarre lie like this if you had permission from every single one of your proxy artists? the only answer is that they clearly didn’t, and needed a blanket excuse to cover all their bases.

to make matters worse, they also refused to give any contact information to the staff for all the artists in their “family” that were not attending the convention.

the staff didn’t really seem to care about this at all? i found that a little bizarre. this kind of behavior is beyond suspicious and i can’t imagine how naive you’d have to be to think nothing fishy was going on with sketchy “proxy” vendors who have no problem lying straight to your face. if your one job is to enforce the rules of Artist Alley and you can’t do it, why are you even there?

anyway, it gets worse.

take a look at some of these phone cases they had for sale.

what you’re seeing here is not just a mix of fanart from various artists, but also copyrighted photos of the K-pop group BTS and officially licensed art and stitches from anime like Himouto! Umaru-chan, Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood, Free!, Diabolik Lovers, Ouran High School Host Club and probably many others I don’t recognize.

Just to point out a few easy-to-find examples: here’s a stitch from the anime Himouto! Umaru-chan, ripped directly from the anime and printed out in a phone case.

How about that Halloween-themed FMA:Brotherhood phone case in the first image? Well, just type “fullmetal alchemist halloween” into Google Images and it’s the first result!

This is a scan of official promotional art for FMA that there are hundreds of results for.

How about that one of Free! Iwatobi Swim Club? Turns out it’s official art from the Free! Eternal Summer 2015 Calendar - sold, created, owned and licensed by none other than Kyoto Animation, the studio that made it.

I can’t speak for all the fanart on display here as it’s very difficult to find just through google searching, but even if I could, I wouldn’t want to drag them in to this - because at least one of them was aware this was going on, even though the vendors lied about who they were. all I can tell you is that many attendees and artists in my island recognized many art pieces on their products and knew the artists were not present and not aware their art was being sold.

so while these vendors may have had permission to proxy sell some of the stuff they had, it’s fairly obvious that this wasn’t the case for everything, and they lied to the staff to try and cover it up.

as I said earlier, on Saturday I expressed my concerns about the items on sale to the Artist Alley control booth. I even went through the trouble of showing them how to find the art through reverse image search to prove that it was stolen while trying to run my table solo. funnily enough - as i was talking to a staffer at the control booth, an attendee was also complaining about the same booth to another staffer with pictures of art on pillows from artists he recognized who were not present at the convention. I thought that was funny.

at the end of the day, a number of staff appeared on-site to question the vendors about their merchandise. statements were taken from me and a few other artists nearby, and it looked like maybe something would be done about this blatant theft on display.

but as i returned to sell on Sunday, the booth was still up and fully operational. when i asked why, the A-kon AA staff replied via twitter that it was “pending review”. another artist was told that they traced all this art (lol) and that tracing was allowed, however this contradicts another one of their rules:

by this point, the con was almost over - the vendors had gotten away with it, despite numerous voices of concern coming from artists and attendees alike - and indeed, this booth was allowed to sell stolen art all weekend uninhibited to unknowing attendees.

as for what other creative excuses the vendors may have had to tell the staff, if the staff even cared or they were actually duped by their obvious lies i don’t know.

here’s the point: artist alley is supposed to be a space for individual artists to sell their own creations. and while some labor was at least spared on the phone cases, the centerpiece is clearly the art, and the art did not belong to these vendors. none of the art belonged to these vendors.

so let’s break down the facts about what took place here:

a corner table was sold to waitlisted vendors in artist alley at a-kon (this means a-kon made double their money on this corner table..really makes you think 🤔 🤔 🤔 )

the vendors’ products were not vetted as the staff was obviously unaware of what was being sold

the vendors broke multiple display rules and nothing was done

the vendors lied to staffers and were caught lying and nothing was done

the vendors were selling stolen art and nothing was done

the vendors refused to give out contact information they were supposed to have for the artists they were proxying and nothing was done

the a-kon staff either does not take their own rules seriously, enforce them in any way, or are incompetent or otherwise incapable of doing so

at this point, the artist alley at A-Kon may as well be a vendor space where greasy conmen and thieves can just slap art on whatever and make a killing, because that is how i felt after watching what was essentially a dog and pony show of A-Kon staff pussyfooting around an issue that should’ve been dealt with swiftly and sternly.

this shit shouldn’t fly and while the vendors already got off scot-free, i can only hope that shedding light on this will help with stopping this issue from spreading, because you can bet that if other art thieves catch wind of the fact that A-Kon staff don’t give a shit about enforcing their own rules that they’ll tag along for the free ride.

If you’d like to read the A-Kon artist alley rules for yourself, i copied them from the email and put them in this pastebin.

if you’ve read this far, thank you for reading, and if you know anyone who participates in artist alleys in any fashion, please share it with them if you found this concerning.

#artist alley #akon2018 #akon29 #akon #art theft

[andaleduardo]

Rooftop N.7

Ao3  N.6  N.8

 Tuesday 18.05.1993

“I'm gonna fuckin get ya, four-eyes!”

That’s the third time Henry spats those same exact words behind their backs, Eddie thinks to himself as he hears Richie throwing some lost response in shallow breaths.

“How’s that working-  fuck!  How’s that working for you, dude?”

To feel their sweaty hands intertwined, tight enough to stop blood circulation, would have been great if they were not trying to stop Henry Bowers from catching them and start throwing punches. They had been running for a bit now, and false respiratory complications aside, Richie knew that Eddie could go for longer than him, so he really hoped their chaser would have given up by the time he fell in utter exhaustion.

Running with a backpack is the weirdest fucking thing to do, Richie notices. And if he wasn't about to puke out a lung at the moment, he would have joked around, telling Eddie how ridiculous they must look. Like the backpack was doing them from behind or something.

Nah, he scratches off that option. That's way too bad, even for me.

So, he settles on running, because that's all he can do at the moment. Not even breathing. No, he doesn't think he can breathe, automatic mode at its best.

His clammy hand grasps tighter onto Eddie's to pull him forward along. Since his legs are smaller, it leaves him behind some steps, long enough to keep their arms stretched between them. Just as Richie was about to allow his body to pass out, a frustrated grunt was heard from behind them. A small reminder that they were still being chased.

See, things were going pretty regular today, at least for Eddie. As for Richie… well, let’s just say he had a few plans.

This morning, when they woke up to the sound of Eddie’s alarm an hour earlier than normal so as to avoid Sonia discovering the bedroom’s door locked, Eddie expected everything to be worse. And by worse he means more awkward. More tense between them than what it had been the day after the quarry, more distant from each other in opposition from last night’s events. But Richie woke up and threw his body on top of Eddie’s, and he had to turn on his ‘totally annoyed mode’ in order to keep things on the regular track.

After pushing Richie out of bed and onto the floor, he waited until the (apparently energetic in the morning) boy got dressed and left through the window. Then, in the room all by himself, Eddie unlocked the door carefully, attempting to keep the noise down, and got dressed and ready for school.

His mother, unsuspicious as ever, sat with him in the kitchen table to watch him eat breakfast and complain about life in general. Luckily, she didn’t come in time to see Eddie shove two plastic-wrapped peanut butter sandwiches on the outer pocket of his school bag.

When asked why he was leaving earlier than usual, Eddie answered with a simple

“I want to talk to the teacher about my work project before class starts.”

And off he went, mocking her naivety.

Richie was sitting on the sidewalk some houses away, just enough to be hidden from the Kaspbrak’s living room window. When Eddie approached him, bike by his side, he tossed the two sandwiches to his face, startling him out of his existence when one collided with his ear.

“Ouch, Eds! You sure know how to woo a guy.” Eddie watched as thankfulness made its way on Richie’s eyes as he grabbed the two sandwiches, now on his lap, and stuffed one in the pocket of his jacket.

Their ride to school was comfortingly quiet, the town was still waking up. They could see stores opening up, adults leaving their houses and entering their cars. There were no kids around, yet. And there wouldn’t be many until half an hour later, when they’d start their path to school. The morning air was vaguely chill, the rain from last night gave the asphalt a glossy touch and the sidewalks were slippery, along with the small patches of dirt and front backyards that looked alive and muddy.

Derry. What else could they say about a town that is heavily rained upon in the beginning of summer. Just Derry.

It wasn’t until they were stuck going around the school building to pass the 30 minutes left until their friends would arrive, that the awkwardness seemed to settle.

Eddie could easily say he was feeling terrified of what he allowed his body to do some hours prior. Did it happen? He couldn’t wrap is head around the reality of it, couldn’t distinguish if it was a dream or not. He wished it was.  Did it really happen? He thinks again.

Did I make things harder for us? If he weren’t so preoccupied, he would have laughed out loud for the innuendo of his question.

Oh God. He thinks. Fuck, no. This is so wrong on so many levels. There’s definitely nothing funny about the double meanings of that.

Embarrassed was an understatement for how he felt. Eddie was ready to turn around right now and leave Richie walking alone. He would run in any other direction, as long as it didn’t have Richie standing at the end of those.

Wrong paths they would have been.

On the other hand, Richie was sure it had been a dream. Pffff, yeah sure. Eddie gets a boner rutting against me?

Yowza! That’s the funniest joke I’ve heard since diapers.

But that didn’t explain why his cheeks felt warm, or why Eddie’s looked pink. That didn’t explain why Richie could feel his skin prickle where he can faintly remake the images of being in touch with another body.

Funny!

 -

 By the time their whole group was present by the bike rack, Beverly got the pleasure to announce, as she opened the zipper of her bag and shoved a hand inside it, that their party was still on. And then, as if it was the world’s most natural gesture, she took out a thick stack of purple … paper sheets?

“What’s that?” Ben had asked while leaning over Bev’s figure to read the words on the top paper.

Overexcited, Richie removed the whole stack from Bev’s hands and shook his arms in the middle of the group while grasping the papers. “These? There are flyers, baby!”   Bev’s aunt works in a stationary store, it was easy for her to print a hundred of them while working one of her single shifts.

Stan rolled his eyes and turned around to start walking towards the building, everyone subconsciously started following along.

“Flyers? Are you serious right now?” Eddie asked no one in particular. Bill, who was by his side, agreed to his surprised tone.

“Isn’t that a buh-bit ex-exss-” He struggled with the word, frustrated momentarily while the group kept walking but waiting for him to succeed. “-Excessive...?” He spoke carefully.

“No sir, no sir!” Richie took one of the flyers from his arms and stuck it in Bill’s face. Eddie peered over to see it for himself, too.

It was a fairly small piece of purple paper, with big blocky yellow letters announcing “PARTY”. Creative. Above that was some information like the date, which Eddie noticed was next Friday, the address to Mike��s barn, and, surrounded by musical notes’ doodles standing in a stupidly flashy neon font:

“LIVE MUSIC!”

“Live music?” Bill must have been reading the same part along with Eddie, because they both asked the same thing together, stuttering tossed aside.

Eddie and Bill shared a glance, then looked straight to the party organizers. Eddie mocked them. “Who’d you get to play there? Some shitty group with low percussion skills?”

Richie flashes him a grin. “That’s up to you to find out ain’t it?”

With a scoff, Eddie tore his eyes away to instead look around the school halls as if they were any interesting. “Yeah, right.”

“You promised!” Richie shrieked, surprised.

“I promised my ass, Richie!” He retorted back.

“I’ll take that, too, then.”

Bev rolled her eyes and bumped Richie’s elbow, he smiled sheepishly at her.

Trying to ignore the burning sensation on most of his skin, Eddie tore the flyer from Bill’s grip to read it over better while the others started handing out the rest of them throughout students.

That’s when he read it.

 everyone invited except Mullet Bowers and Greta-st Face Disaster

Oh man.

 And here they are, unwillingly skipping last period because it took Henry that long to understand why he was being laughed at in class. Nonetheless, he found out. Eddie had been walking to his chemistry lab along with Ben and Richie when the bull came out of nowhere, fumbling with rage (was it even necessary?).  By the time Richie spotted Henry at the end of the hall, he had grabbed Eddie’s hand and started off in the opposite direction.

Ben stood there, confused, and Eddie stumbled to try to keep up. He fell as soon as Richie began running, which took him three seconds, but their hands had been clasped together which meant Richie was pushed towards the floor, too.

That’s when Henry screams reached them. (seriously is it really necessary?) But Eddie’s thoughts were pushed out of his head when both of them stumbled to their feet, fingers still intertwined, and resumed properly running this time, still with a long advantage over the older bully.

Here they are now, long left school ground. Bowers was still after them and Eddie was trying to overlook past his burning muscles to think ‘Why did you drag me along, Richie?’ But maybe Eddie should be asking himself why he had let Richie drag him in the first place.

“Holy fuck…” Richie’s lungs were on fire. “No way- ugh! I need to-”

Eddie kept throwing glances behind his back, snapping his neck in weird angles. He couldn’t find any trace of Henry. He was about to warn Richie about it when suddenly he collided into the latter’s backpack. With a surprised grunt and an aching nose, Eddie let go of Richie’s hand and clasped both of his on his face. You could have warned me, dickhead! Eddie thought, but he was too busy panting to find enough oxygen to speak at the moment. He turned around once again just to make sure they were free of danger and lowered one of his hands to grab his backpack straps, an old habit he has.

They stared at each other in the middle of the street. Panting and harsh breathing. Aching legs and nose. They laughed. They laughed so much it started to hurt. They were slowly becoming two bundles of pain. Maybe they could merge together and become a single one. That sounded nice.

There wasn’t a coherent conversation after they stood there like panting idiots. Something along the lines of:

“Should we…?” Richie heaved through his words while pointing a thumb in the direction of which they had come. Should we go back to school? That’s what he meant to ask.

“No.” Eddie said. “Should we…?” He panted heavily, pointing to the other end of the road. Should we go home?

Richie nodded and planted both hands on his knees, curving his body so that he could bend his back in different angles. Man, running with a backpack is harder than it should be.  He straightened himself out again. “Yours or-”

“Mine.” Eddie answered.

It was a silent agreement that they were meant to spend the rest of the day together.

They walked together, there wasn’t one moment that Eddie worried about his lungs. Running felt great, freeing, perhaps. So, when they were approaching the street where his house stood, he did something un-Eddie like. He shoved Richie with his elbow, he might have used more strength than needed. He blamed the adrenaline still running through him. Funny, the adrenaline runs too.  With Richie’s suspicious attention on him, Eddie grinned, but didn’t bother to look in his direction. “I’ll race you to the front door.” And then proceeded to take off, the burning in his legs returning, but that wasn’t going to stop him.

He heard Richie complain behind him, but Eddie knew he had started running too by the sounds of his sneakers hitting the ground.

Eddie rounded the fence of the house next to his and crossed the grass that his mother called “front yard”.  His mother. Eddie’s throat tightened and he stopped abruptly. For what felt like the twentieth time today, Richie and Eddie collapsed against each other. Richie tried to stop, he did, but he was almost catching up to Eddie, and the grass was still wet, still muddy. His feet slipped against Eddie’s and he fell on his butt into the cold surface, something inside the backpack pressed into his ribs.

“Fuck, Eddie!” He groaned on, hands digging into the dirt. “What the hell was that for?”

But Eddie didn’t turn around, he just gaped at the front door and whispered. “My mom, Richie. I can’t be home before school ends.” With that, he faced the boy on the ground, his worried frown deepened at the sight. “Can’t you even stay on your feet for one minute? You’re all dirty!” His whispers were staged, just in case Sonia was in ear-range.

Frustrated, and helplessly mad (although he didn’t want to be) Richie laughed ironically, way too loud for Eddie’s liking. “Excuse me, will you? You stopped out of fucking nowhere, Eds!” He scrambled to his feet, already feeling his pants glued to his legs where the wetness installed itself.

“Lower your voice-”

“Your mom’s not home.” He shrugged while adjusting his clothes into place. Eddie stared with furrowed eyebrows.

“And how do you know that?”

“Her car’s missing.”

Gaping slightly, Eddie snapped his neck to stare at the spot where his mother parks the car, it wasn’t, in fact, there.

Richie passed through Eddie while flicking his forehead. “Dummie. Lend me your shower.” Eddie followed him with his eyes, noticing pieces of grass stuck to Richie’s hair, and his soaked clothes, the backpack too.

“Don’t you dare step a foot in my house!”

-

After the bathroom door closed, Eddie allowed himself to sit on his bed and capture every sound that made its way to him. Richie's barefoot steps on the tiles, the ruffling of clothes against skin, the squeaks that his faucet does every time someone turns it on, the water hitting the bottom of the tub. His mind goes back in time, years ago when both of them had enough innocence (yes, even Richie) to take showers together.

11-year olds would be playing outside, usually with Stan and Bill, and they'd get dirty. Well, Eddie couldn't, or his mother would be upset. She always sounded angry and sad after Eddie came home with stains and messy hair. Eddie didn't want to make her feel that way so, most times, he came home sweaty.

One time, Richie and him went over to his place and played on the streets until his parents allowed. Back when they cared.  Then they had stumbled inside in a fit of giggles, knees and hands dirty, clothes slightly smudged in greys and browns. Eddie didn't care about it.  Richie had asked his mother if Eddie could bath in his house and stay for dinner. Maggie had smiled at the boys and ush them upstairs.

Maybe she didn't realize that Richie would be joining the said shower, Eddie thinks so, years later.

But the boys didn't think too much at the time, they just struggled out of their clothes in chuckles and pushes and got under the water. If memory doesn't fail him, Richie had joked about 'Eddie's pickle', saying it was smaller, but that it was okay because Eddie was small all over and Richie liked him like that.

Remembering this now, while Richie was in next room showering, made Eddie's cheeks crimson and his heart stammer.

He recalls, among those years of innocence, that both of them had asked the same to Sonia one time. Eddie doesn't know if he ever saw his mom freak out like that ever before. At the moment, neither of them could grasp her reasons, they just stood there, mouths gaping like fishes and ears red from being scowled, while she threatened to call Richie's parents.  Now things were different. He supposed that if he went to join Richie right now, something ought to go wrong, even if he recognised a subtle wish to do just so. But then there’s an image on his head of all those solo times Eddie has in his shower, the exact same place where Richie is now, and he groans. Rubbing his face to shake away those images, he feels embarrassed. What is it about Richie that everything involving him leaves Eddie embarrassing himself?

To use his time better, Eddie tidied up the room and searched for the clothes Richie sometimes forgets. He ended up finding some in the back of his closet. He placed them neatly on top of his bed, the footprint was still there.

The kitchen sink was a mess of pilled up dishes from breakfast and his mother’s lunch, so he settled on taking care of that and arranging something for both of them to eat.  Mid way from getting two glasses of orange juice on the table, Richie burst through the kitchen entry, already dressed, with a towel on his hand. Eddie didn’t hear him coming down the stairs, so when Richie asked: “Hey, where’d you want me to leave this?” - he almost spilled one glass on the floor, but managed to salvage it.

Before Eddie could say anything at all, he heard a voice that wasn’t Richie’s.

“I knew it.”

 He faintly recognized his mother’s way of spatting out words in disapproval. Not even settling the glasses down, he turned to lock eyes with Richie, who was torn between glaring at Eddie with huge eyes, and looking at Sonia, who was out of Eddie’s view but certainly not out of his. The way Richie’s throat moved while he dry swallowed didn’t went unnoticed.

“Mrs. Kaspbrak!” He exclaimed, faking amusement. “Long time no see!”

Eddie’s heartbeat was everywhere, in his hands holding the cups for dear life, in his ears, in the back of his head and the sides of his neck.

Almost like a barrier between Eddie and his own mother, stood Richie. The kitchen entry occupied by his body, Sonia by the front door. Richie watched as the woman’s eyes studied his face, maybe his damp hair, then lowered down to the towel in both his hands. In a slow-motion-like movement, Richie watched Mrs. Kaspbrak’s expression turn into one of recognition.

“Did you just shower in my house?!”

Eddie’s breathing stopped for a second, still haven’t laid an eye on her.  He could see Richie’s fists grasp the towel harder and his smile twitch. Suddenly, he feared what may happen in the next seconds.

There was anger in his movements as Richie moved one hand to his own hip and cocked an eyebrow at the woman in front of him. “Ridiculous idea, ma’am!” He pressed down the R’s. “Eddie licked my hair nice and wet-”

She didn’t give him time to finish, horror in her face as she grabbed Richie by the ear, obliging the boy to bent down so as to not get any body part ripped out of him.  Eddie’s eyes widened, finally seeing his mom there to make things real. Richie dropped the towel and grabbed her wrist, hissing in pain and squeezing his eyes.

“Mom, cut it out!” They made eye contact, then, but she didn’t let go.

“We have a lot to discuss, Eddie.” Before he could talk again, Richie was barking out a laugh, a very sarcastic and angry one.

“Listen, lady, I’m trying my best to not lose my shit right now. So, would you kindly let go of my fucking ear?”

“Mom, let him go.” Even Eddie himself was surprised at the bravery in his tone. Mrs. Kaspbrak lifted her head to look at her son in disbelief, nonetheless, she let Richie’s ear alone but pushed him to enter the kitchen properly, following him inside. Richie stumbled with the push but managed to get a grip on the towel before making his way to Eddie’s side.

“So, dryer?” He lifted an eyebrow while pointing, with the soft fabric, to the machine under the kitchen counter.

“Not right now, Richie.”  Richie’s intentions were certainly not comical, Eddie knew it was his coping mechanism but he couldn’t help and turn him down. He stared at his mom again, who was standing in front of him with an unreadable expression. “What do we have to talk about?”

He tried so hard to keep it together, hell, he did. But as soon as a paper bag was pushed to his hands, Eddie knew it was only a matter of seconds for him to lose it. Carefully, and finally, placing the full glasses on the table, Eddie grabbed the bag shakily. He peered inside.

A wave of shock ran his spine when he saw Richie’s lighter inside, along with a pharmaceutic box he too well recognised.

“Mom?” he whimpered. There were tears fogging up his vision. “Care to explain?” Behind him, he could hear Richie walking in circles and trying not to peer over and see for himself.

“Explain it, Eddie?” Aggressively, she tore the paper bag from her son’s hands and turned it upside down, letting its contents fall on the kitchen table. Richie was there in a minute. My lighter. He thought. And then he remembered the sound that took them both by surprise last night.

“You went looking through Eddie’s bedroom?” He spat those words to her, on the corner of his eye, he saw Eddie’s shoulders slump. Neither of them answered him, so he scoffed and started pacing again, not even noticing the other half of the bag’s contents.

Eddie stared at the box until he couldn’t restrain himself from blinking any longer. When he opened his eyes again, it was still there.

“If you give me reasons, Eddie, I will do what I have to. Think I haven’t noticed you coughing around and trying to cover it up? And then what do I find, Eddie?” He didn’t answer, eyes on the ground. “If you think it’s funny to go smoking behind my back, I hope you find this funny too-

“Smoking? Are you serious?” He finally looked up at her in disbelief, voice strained and cheeks stained. “Do you think I’d go around smoking?!”

“I don’t care, Eddie!” Her voice echoed. Eddie sniffled, feeling helpless and ashamed that Richie had to be here while this argument happened. “You’re going to carry your inhaler around again-”

Richie’s mouth fell opened at those words, watching Eddie shake his head frantically from side to side. He was choking up on his tears while trying to speak. “N-no! D-don’t make me!”

But she answered him by shoving the white and blue carton box in his chest, and Eddie took it sheepishly. That’s when Richie snapped.

“Mrs. Kaspbrak,” He approached her carefully. “I don’t think this is reasonable, Eddie doesn’t need it and besides, the lighter is mine not his-”

“Great, then he’ll stop being around you, too. You can start by leaving.”  Then she made her way to the fridge, like nothing had happened, and started taking out various things needed to prepare dinner.  Eddie stood there, listening as Richie’s politeness left his body in a second and started hitting her with words and curses. He stood there, getting angrier and angrier every time his mother had the audacity to attack Richie back, like she was some kind of superior being who had the right to do so.  She’s not, Eddie realises.

She doesn’t have the right to be doing this.

“You’re a worthless prick, woman. I bet you were waiting for your chance to get Eddie under your thumb again!”

“Congrats, boy!” She tossed the tub of butter she took out of the fridge onto the counter. “You’ve got me all figured, a shame you can’t seem to understand your own mother as well.”

With all the strength he could find, although Eddie doesn’t know where it came from, maybe from the adrenaline, he screamed for them to stop while tossing the box onto the wall in front of him. There was a snapping sound once it fell to the floor, and since Eddie wasn’t so sure if it broke, he walked over and stepped on it forcefully while his throat squeezed out grunts of frustration.

Sonia spoke carefully to him, nonetheless threateningly. “Edward-

“I am not asthmatic, and I do not smoke.” He wasn’t lying, but there was still a pang of guilt living in his chest. He sniffled once more, and locked eyes with Richie, who was looking at him like he’d found his hero. “And I won’t certainly stop seeing Richie.”

On his way out of the kitchen, Richie bumped shoulders with Sonia, a childish act, yeah, but damn it if he didn’t want to push her more.  For the next hour, Eddie expected his mom to burst through his bedroom door and make Richie leave, but strangely, she didn’t even make her presence noticeable while Eddie tried to stop crying and Richie apologized for what felt like the millionth time.

“It’s okay.” Eddie told him. “I think she needed a second reminder, you know?”

Richie knew, but that didn’t stop him from feeling guilty.

By dinner time, Richie had to leave and Eddie went downstairs with him to carry him to the door. Once it was closed, his mother walked closer to him.

“Dinner is ready.”

And when Eddie followed her to the kitchen, ice cold quietness, he took a glance at the spot where his inhaler stood moments ago, it wasn’t laying there anymore. The silence in which they ate felt different this time, as if, somehow, Eddie finally let his mother know who he truly was.

 He hoped that she could take it better this time.

rooftop taglist:   @richietoaster   @rainydayriots   @reddieloves    @thetrashmouthclub   @lemonboi03 @noodleboyshane    @pillsandglasses   @studpuffin      @dandelion-stan     @reddiesetrichie     @squishynonbinarytwink      @itschunky      @burymestanding     @duderrific    @its-rye @salty-kaspbrak  @youtubequeens   @reddieseggrolls   @addimagination   @pastelstozier @sleepysirenprincess @constantreaderfool   @mrs-vh @eds-trashmouth

perma taglist:  @constantreaderfool   @mrs-vh  @eds-trashmouth @girasol-eddie

#reddie #fanfic #writing #rooftop #ao3 #richie tozier #eddie kaspbrak #ben hanscom #beverly marsh #mike hanlon #stanley kubrick #bill denbrough #henry bowers #pennywise happened but certainly dead #ao3 isn't working #original

[bellatrixobsessed1]

Wan High Weeping (Part 32)

Her father always knew just when to strike. Azula was almost certain that he had go through various social media pages and came upon one of many pictures.  It had only been a day and both Usha and Kori’s accounts were flooded with images of her eating what was probably half of the concessions. Chan and Chu-Leng posted their own share of them. She didn’t know why she had looked, she knew what she would find. She knew that seeing herself like that would bring color to her cheeks all over again. She knew that reading the comments would be the death of what was left her self-esteem but she was so morbidly curious. Or perhaps, maybe she read them with the hopes that someone would say something in her defense.

She should have known better.

No one ever came to Katara’s defense when she had posted things like this about her.

 Her eyes burned with tears that she was fighting to hold back. Yes, Ozai had definitely seen the images or at least a few of them. Frankly, even one was enough to send him into a rage. He had seen them alright, and for it he was shaming her with more rancor than ever.

 Azula was in the middle of getting dressed, she only had a chance to pull on a pair of pants, when he threw the door open. She hadn’t even gotten to button them, not that she thought doing so would have been easy anyhow. He grabbed her at the bend of her arm and practically dragged her to the bathroom. He did it with a surprising speed that had her tripping over her own feet as her tired mind struggled to keep pace.

He threw her into the bathroom and pointed at the scale.

 Quietly, she shook her head. That was the last thing she wanted to do. She had done herself so much damage. In a fit, she ignored the alarm bells screaming at her to throw up her last meal. She had made a spectacle of herself at the party and she was going to punish herself for it. She had seen no better way to do so than letting the food settle for a change.  

It was a decision she already regretted without having her father demanding her to step on the scale.

 He shoved her closer and she shook her head again. She really, truly didn’t want to know this time. She looked at him with a pleading so uncharacteristically tearful that even he hesitated for a moment. But in a flicker, he regained his angry demeanor. He pointed to the scale again, “Now, Azula.”

 Again, she shook her head.

 He drew in a sharp breath and she knew that she had tested him.

 His hand found her cheek and left a stinging. “Don’t make me ask again.”

 Shaking and with tears falling freely down her cheeks, she stepped on the scale. She died her best to look everywhere but down. Agonizing seconds came and went.

 “Read the number to me.” Her father commanded, his voice slick and dangerous. Azula almost wanted to chance another slap. Reading that number would certainly have the power of one. “Read. It.”

 He was losing patience. So, with another muffled cry, she looked down and quietly relayed the number to him.

 “What was that?”

 “O-one hundred and…” She trialed off. “And thirty-eight.” That put her up a good three pounds. She whispered an apology. Whether it was to herself or to him, she wasn’t sure.

 “One hundred and thirty-eight.” He repeated. “Have you been trying at all?”

 She stepped away from the scale and leaned against the wall, it was all she could do to keep herself upright. “Yes.” She replied softly.

 “Have you really?”

 “Yes.” Azula repeated.

 “Then why is it that you weigh more than before.”

 She swallowed. “I don’t know…I.”

 He slapped her again and pinched the bridge of his nose. “This is embarrassing. Do you know what it looks like for my company to have pictures, like this, of my daughter plastered all over the internet?” He held out his phone.

 “I’m sorry.”

 “You should be. This is disgusting. Disgraceful. I don’t even want to look at you.”

Neither did she.  

 Azula expected him to throw the phone down on her. Instead he tossed her a shirt and grumbled, “put it on and figure out how you’re going to fix this.” Without another word nor glance in her direction, he walked out of the bathroom.

 She let herself sink to the floor and wrapped her arms around her middle. It felt much too soft. It looked equally so and she didn’t know how to fix it. Why couldn’t she fix it? She buried her face in her hands, maybe she should just get it over with and go under the knife after all.

 .oOo.

 Azula had never dreaded returning to school so terribly. She hadn’t even feared her first day this much. She stared dully at her keys, watching them sway from one side to the next. She set them down and rested her head on the dining room table. Ozai was already unbelievably pissed. She was already an embarrassment. Her grades were already taking a dive. She might as well just stay home. Her belly was as empty that morning as it had been full on the night of Chan’s party. Her father had put locks on the pantry door and on the fridge.

She would only be getting food when he gave it to her and maybe that was a good thing. If she couldn’t control herself, she’d let him do it for her.

 She found herself crying softly again. She had done a lot of awful things, said a lot of awful things. But she didn’t think that she deserved this. Or maybe she did; maybe this was the world’s way of showing her exactly the kind of position she had put others in. And she decided that, yes, she did deserve this.

                      “Am I going to have to drive you to school?” Ozai asked. “Or do you think you can handle that on your own?”

 She flinched. She stood up rubbing the tears out of her eyes. She hoped that she could get a handle on her emotions before she reached Wan High’s doors.

 Azula picked herself up and made her way to the door, it was bitingly cold for the first of second of November, but she didn’t have the will to go back in and fetch her coat. She didn’t want to risk ruining her father’s morning coffee.

 She was still feeling terribly faint. The drive to Wan High was hazy, in a sense it felt as though she hadn’t driven at all. One minute she was in her driveway and the next she was in her parking space simply sitting and staring. Sitting and staring until the bell rang and she knew she was late. Still she sat and stared as the grey of late autumn settled over the sky. She wasn’t sure how long she had sat there but she finally pulled herself out of the car and into the building. Whatever lecture principal Roku was giving her about the importance of being on time was going in through one ear and out the other.

Because she knew that she would repeat herself the next day and the day after that. The emptiness of the hallway was too much of a comfort to pass on.

 But that didn’t do anything to stop the degradation. They were persistent, creative. They always found a work around. She knew that they would.  She had when she was one of them. She opened her locker and a tumble of notes cascaded forward. Notes and print outs of the images posted on Usha’s page. She didn’t pick them up, she didn’t want to read the commentary. She didn’t want to look at them, at the scene they depicted.

 Her walk to class was numb. She took a seat, ignoring June’s, “glad you can join us.”

Katara’s seat was as empty as she wished she could make hers.

She could hear Chan and Chu-Leng whispering and chuckling behind her. Maybe one day she’d be thin again, like she was before. Maybe one day she’d be thin enough to disappear, to wither away and not be noticed at all…

 .oOo.

 She wandered the halls with no aim in particular, no aim save for avoidance. She spent her lunch hour dodging teachers and hall monitors until she was stopped by someone she hadn’t spoken to in ages. “Aren’t you supposed to be in class?” Coach Ming asked.

 Azula shrugged. “No.”

 “Lunch?”

 Her silence was answer enough.

 “If you get to the cafeteria right now, I’ll pretend like I didn’t see you and you won’t get a late strike.”

 “I’m not hungry.” Azula lied.  

 “You don’t have to be hungry to go to the cafeteria.”

 Azula gave another half-hearted shrug.

 Coach Ming’s smile dropped as she led Azula down the hall. “Ya know, I’ve missed having you on our team, Azula. Usha is a strong player but she doesn’t have…the spark that you did.” She came to a halt. “How are your ribs?”

 She couldn’t see them, couldn’t feel them beneath a very prominent layer of flesh. Other than that, she hadn’t put much thought into them since her accident. “Fine, I guess.”

 “Well then, why don’t you stop by my office after school and we can talk about getting you back on the team for next year?”

 She ought to have been thrilled. But she couldn’t dig up the enthusiasm. Coach Ming had probably only extended the offer out of pity and that alone. “Maybe.” Azula replied. Truth be told she wasn’t much into the prospect of making a fool of herself in front of her former coach. They reached the cafeteria doors.

 “It doesn’t have to be today, Azula.” Ming set a gentle hand on Azula’s back. “Whenever you get time.”

 She stole herself away in the corner of the lunchroom. From there she observed Mai—perhaps it was just the dismal lenses she was viewing the world through that day—but her former friend looked paler and grimmer than usual. Evidently she looked some thinner, and she envied Mai, wishing that her own mood would reap her appetite away instead of increasing it.

 She couldn’t pick Katara out, and decided that the girl must be absent. Suki was not present either. Mercifully, neither was Chan. She wondered when he had left, he was there that morning. Another small mercy was that she did not see Jet. But Chu-Leng, Usha, and the rest of her volleyball team were.

 Azula caught sight of Teo, wheeling himself to a lonely table. A good lot of her wanted to join him, but she decided that ultimately it wouldn’t be fair to the boy to burden him with her anymore. Save for that table there were no seats available so she sat herself down on the floor of that corner, drew her knees up to her chest, and rested her head against the wall.

She was terribly hungry and she had some money left. But she didn’t feel like dragging herself across the lunchroom to food line. Doing so would mean crossing paths with Usha. Anyhow, it was probably for the best that she skipped again. Her father would be happy with the decision.

 She didn’t notice Teo until he greeted her with a very quiet and meek, “you’re not doing too good, are you?”

 She stared at her palms, wishing that he would just do himself a favor and stop conversing with her. And he did. He stopped talking, but he didn’t leave her. He didn’t leave her after the bell rang either, he followed her in silence until he had to break off to go to a different classroom.

 The only mercy Azula had, was that the day was almost done. It was only a mercy until she remembered that she would be returning home to Ozai for her nightly reminder that she was deteriorating his good image.  And that between she and Zuko, he was looking like a fool and a failure.

Perhaps he was, somewhere very deep down, she decided that he must be a fool and a failure to have a missing son and a miserable daughter. She supposed that it took a disappointment to raise two more of them.  

 The waterfall of photos and notes were still scattered on the floor by her locker, she stepped over them and put her books away. After a few newer pieces of paper flooded out, she decided that she would just bypass going to her locker altogether from there on out. They could write her up from coming to class unprepared if they wanted to.

 She noticed a piece of paper still caught in the topmost slit of her locker door so she tore it out. Just one more mistake on her list of them. That one wasn’t a not but a drawing. An exaggerated caricature version of her. Chu-Leng so kindly signed his name on the bottom. A museum worthy piece like that needed a signature.

She let the image fall from her grasp and wandered down the hall.

 “Do you think that Jet really did it?” She overheard.

 “Well the slu—Katara wasn’t at lunch today and neither was Jet…”

 Azula hesitated for a moment.

 “TyLee wasn’t here either.” A different girl put in, if Azula remembered correctly, her name was Meng. The girl who still liked to play with dolls and, occasionally, follow Aang around. “I like TyLee, I hope she comes back soon.”

 “What does TyLee have to do with anything?” Asked the first girl.

 “I heard that she was the one who caught Jet doing…you know.” Answered the second.

“Doing what?” Meng asked.

 “Don’t worry about it.” Spoke the first girl. “You wouldn’t get it.”

 “Just because I’m a freshmen!”

 “No, because you’re you, Meng.” The first girl laughed.

 “Rumor has it that he raped TyLee too…”

 Azula didn’t stick around to hear the rest. But she did manage to catch, “yeah, at one of last year’s parties.” And that was enough. It was enough because she had taken TyLee to those parties. She would have known if something was amiss. She should have…

And so she rationalizes that it had to be more school gossip.

She hoped it was just more school gossip.

 It kept her awake, the possibility that it could be true.

 .oOo.

 Ozai was true to his word the next morning. Just like the night before, he made a point of turning his gaze away from her when they crossed paths. Perhaps that was more of a mercy than anything. At least he wasn’t forcing her to step on the scale again. He only paid her enough attention to toss a single pop-tart her way and a small water bottle.

 It was a parting gift as she left for school.

 Like the day before, Azula sat in her car, waiting for the flow of people to trickle into nothing before making her way into the building. A soft sprinkle of cold rain fell upon her, it caught in tangled locks. Locks that she couldn’t be bothered to comb these days. She wouldn’t have gotten dressed at all if the school didn’t require her to wear a uniform.

 She slumped in her chair. Katara sat next to her giving her ample competition in regards to who was in a bigger state of disarray. It chilled her through and through because the bedraggled appearance so heavily implied that the rumors weren’t just fiction this time.

And she had been calling the girl a whore.

Azula buried her head under her hands.

 When the bell rang, Katara rushed from the classroom with a considerable amount of haste.

 .oOo.

 She supposed that there was no harm in going to the lunch line anymore. Everyone knew who she really was, what she was really like. She was woozy and Ozai wasn’t there to stop her. She would just get rid of everything anyways. She acquired more than her share of  a meal, in seating herself she had lost her nerve. Because it did matter, she didn’t want more pictures to surface. So she finished her meal in the privacy of a bathroom stall. It was so easy to overindulge after being so deprived and easier still when the kind tastes took her mind away from TyLee and Katara.

It was only kind until she remembered what it felt like when her father had her on the scale. After that it was pain and shame all over again and she was glad to already be in a stall. It had been a while since she had to do it. She emptied her stomach and stood. But her knees buckled and she found herself hunching against the stall, waiting for the spell to pass.

She wanted to scream or to cry, or perhaps both. It would draw too much attention though. So she dabbed at her mouth with toilet paper and flushed again. Finally the fuzz in her head began to clear and she stumbled her way back towards Teo’s table.

 He opened his mouth and closed it again. He did so a few times before finally mumbling, “I’m worried about you.” And then he spoke in a near whisper, “Actually, I’m scared. You’re scaring me and I don’t know what to do.”

 Neither did she. So instead she forced a smile and replied. “You don’t have to do anything, I’ll be fine.” Even so, she ached all over and her thoughts were overfull with horrible notions and vile reminders. She couldn’t put it out of her mind that she had been so close to Jet. That there had to have been some point where she had hung out with him and had a good time the morning after he had victimized TyLee. It dizzied her just as well as her physical condition.

 .oOo.

 She waited by the doors, taking a slew of verbal abuse. But she had to catch her. Her focus lapsed in and out and she hoped that she hadn’t missed TyLee because of it. At last she picked out the girl’s flouncy braid. She reached a hand out.

 “Oh, hi Azula.” There was no enthusiasm in the greeting. Her eyes were as bleak as Azula’s own mood.

 And Azula found that she didn’t know what to say. So she said the wrong thing. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

 “Because, you’re you.” TyLee mumbled. “I saw how you treated Katara and you were close to Jet. Why would you believe me? You didn’t even answer your phone. You and Mai…you both left me.”

 “I thought that you were ignoring your texts.”

 “You didn’t think that something could be wrong!? You’ve known me since we were kids and I always replied to your texts right away—because I knew you would get mad if I didn’t, by the way. So, were you?”

 “What?” Azula asked. It began to settle in that this was a horrible idea after all. She must be some sort of masochist, constantly throwing herself into situations she knew wouldn’t end well for her. But in some sick way, she craved the torment. The least she could do, after everything, was allow TyLee to speak her mind.

 “Were you mad? That night. Were you mad that I didn’t text you back right away? Is that why you just left with Mai? Well sorry, I was a little busy.”

 “I don’t think that I was mad. I just knew that Mai needed a ride home and that her mother would have a meltdown if I didn’t get her home.” That much was true. Genuinely, she hadn’t meant TyLee any destruction. Truly, she had just been trying spare Mai trouble. She thought so anyways, but the longer TyLee stared at her the more she felt as though there had been a malicious undertone to it. “I wouldn’t have talked to him if you would have said something. I wish that you would have said something…”

 “I wish that you didn’t make me feel like I couldn’t.”

 “I also wish that I didn’t.” She replied quietly. It seemed so insufficient but it was the best that she could do. She didn’t know of anything else to say, especially when an apology seemed so hollow. She also wished that she could offer more, offer help and support. But she could support herself, much less try to lift another person. Like most other things, it was a useless effort so she muttered something of a goodbye and an apology and slinked off to her car.

 For a good long while, she only eyed the steering wheel, longing for the car to drive itself. She certainly didn’t feel like taking the wheel. She heard a tap on her window, she only rolled it down because it was TyLee who had done the tapping.

 Azula unlocked the door and let TyLee take the passenger’s seat. It brought a sense of familiarity to have the girl sitting there again. That was how things used to be when her phone blew up with messages and plans to go to the mall.

She would love to do that again one day.

 “I don’t want you to be mad at me.” Azula confessed.

 “I don’t want to be mad at you…” She trailed off. “I. It’s not your fault, you didn’t know. If it makes you feel better, I was mad at Mai too for a while.”

 But it was her fault.

She knew TyLee well enough to know that the girl was just being generous.

 “It’s Jet’s fault. All of this is Jet’s fault. I blamed Chan too, but he was just the host.”

 Somehow her words still didn’t alleviate any guilt. Because she had, had it right the first time. If Azula had been a more approachable person, then things would have gone differently. So many things…

 “I think that, that’s what Jet wanted. He wanted me to blame you guys because…” she swallowed. “Because that way, I had no one to talk to. The worst part is, it worked. I was so alone…”

 “And then…”

 TyLee smiled and dabbed at her eyes. “I found Katara.”

 “You saved her?” Azula asked.

 “I guess you can say that.”

 Azula smiled, this time it was genuine. As true as she could muster anyhow. “That counts for something, right? At least you didn’t let it happen to someone else.” She paused. “From the sound of it you were pretty fierce, glad I was able to teach you something.”

 TyLee laughed. “I guess so.”

 “Do you need a ride home?” Azula offered, she thought that it would do her well to have the company.

 “I would take your offer, but I kinda can’t just leave my car here over night.” She rejected, sheepishly. “But, uh, maybe you can come by tomorrow…if the police to pull me in for more questioning again.”

 Azula nodded. At least she had tried. She couldn’t blame TyLee for keeping her distance.  She watched the girl walk to her car before starting her own.

 .oOo.

 She forced herself to take a shower, she was in pretty dire need of one and she wanted to take one aspect of criticism away from her father. But all she could manage to do was sit on the floor of the tub and overthink.

Overthink until her brain finally went numb.

 She had washed her hair out well enough, but when it came to lathering the rest of her body, that was where she had given up. Sweeping her hands over the length of herself made it all too apparent how soft she had grown. So she chucked the soap at the wall and opted to simply sitting there instead.

 The water was beginning to run cold, and still she remained until her father hollered at her for taking too long.

 .oOo.

 She didn’t know if she was reaching out for help or if she was sticking to her masochism, whatever it was, she dropped by her father’s office on her way downstairs. “I talked to coach Ming the other day. She said that I could join the team again.” She elected not to tell him that she never actually dropped by the woman’s office.

 “Did she?”

 Azula nodded, itching for even a twinge of approval.

 “I suppose that they’re letting anyone join these days.”

 Her world crumbled a little further.

 She left the estate feeling empty. She entered Wan High feeling foreboding. Unable to afford a phone call home, she decided that she would try to get to class on time that morning. Her locker is a mess again, more photos and doodles. This time with a sprinkle of terrible photoshops, mostly of her face on the bodies of various sumo wrestlers. It was almost laughably petty. She knew they came courtesy of Usha, they bore such a striking resemblance to the style of those ridiculous images of Katara’s face on different sexy costumes.

This time the inside of her locker was a mess too. Someone took it upon themselves to spill what smelled like vanilla soda through the slits. It was a sticky mess that she hadn’t had time to deal with, and she recalled her plan to just avoid her locker.

 Before she had the chance, someone else slammed her locker shut. “Thought that you could use a drink.”

 “Very thoughtful, Chan.” She replied dryly and with little spunk. She headed in the direction of June’s class. If only he wasn’t going to the same place. It didn’t take much effort for him to fall in step with her.

 “So, are you going to pay me for eating half of the food at my party?”

 “I provided entertainment, you should pay me.” Her words still lacked any bite.

 “That’s true, it’s a gift that keeps on giving.” Chan replied. “Honestly, I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone eat like that! I don’t know how you can eat so much at once.” He was openly laughing as though he had just said the wittiest thing. As stupid as it was, it stung just as well. “There’s something wrong with you.”

 She could deliver a low blow, could remind him that he let his party guests assault other party guests. She could swoop lower still and tell him that he had a really strong hand in Ruon’s death. Instead she replied, “I am aware,” and dropped herself into her chair.

 “Careful, you’re going to break it!”

 Chu-Leng gave him a high five.

 “Probably.” She muttered. Chan stopped laughing.

 Katara found her own chair a minute or so after the bell rang. Her eyes were puffy and red. Even June skipped her usual remark about tardiness.

 .oOo.

 She decided to switch things up at lunch. She couldn’t say where the compulsion had come from, but it drove her to take a seat next to Katara. Katara who was sitting alone, Suki at the other end of the table. She could sense the tension from a mile away.

 “I heard about the party.”

 “Heard about it? You were there.”

 “I left early…”

 “Right.” She wondered if she sounded as deadpan to Katara as Katara did to her.

 “If it’s any solace, he tried feeling me up.” She didn’t exactly know what point she was trying to make. Perhaps, an acknowledgement that the attack it wasn’t anything Katara had provoked? “I was just laying there.” Maybe a sense of comradery?

 “I wish that, that was all he did to me.”

 “He didn’t actually…?”

 “No, TyLee stopped him.”

 Azula nodded. “TyLee can fight when it matters.”

 “Unlike some people.” It was spoken with a volume that carried to the other side of the table. Azula caught Suki’s head dip. “Why do you care?”

 “I don’t think that you’re a slut.”

 “Then why did you say it? Over and over again.”

 She couldn’t give an answer because she honestly didn’t know. ‘It seemed fun at the time’ didn’t sound like a great answer. But it was the truth. Katara repeated herself.  Perhaps she was just going along with everyone else. She liked to think of herself as a ringleader, and perhaps she was. But really, they fed off of each other. She and Usha and Chan all bouncing vile ideas off of each other. It felt safe, it felt untouchable. It gave them common ground. “I don’t know.” Azula muttered. “I guess I’m just a bad person.”

 Katara’s face scrunched and then softened. “You’re not a bad person…”

 She could say it all she wanted, that wouldn’t make it true. Azula didn’t want to talk about herself anymore so she diverted the subject. “I liked your costume, it suited you.”

 Katara smiled some, “thanks, my mom made if for me.” As soon as she said it, her cheeks flushed.

 Azula didn’t have anything witty to say that time. Truth be told she would have loved it if Ozai would have helped her make a costume. “Is she a seamstress or something?”

 Katara shook her head, “no, but Gram Gram was. Sewing is just a hobby.”

 Azula nodded. “That’s one hell of a hobby.”

 “Yeah! It’s fun too, sometimes we do some sewing together and mom teaches me about different traditional patterns!”

 There was something about her enthusiasm. That momentary glimmer of happiness—something of the old Katara, that cheered Azula. She clung to that. It settled in that she was rather happy herself, because she had found a solution. A way to fix things for herself and for Ozai, just as she had promised.

 “Have you ever done any sewing before?”

 Azula shook her head.

 “Maybe, if you want, I can show you how. I could use a distraction.”

 “Maybe…”

 “Uh…yeah…”

 “I am going to talk to Teo.”

 “Oh, yeah, okay.” Katara replied. It looked as though she wanted to say more, but instead she returned to her lunch. She wondered if she had instilled some sort of false sense of hope. She didn’t allow herself to dwell on it.

 “What did you and Katara talk about?” Teo asked upon seeing her sit.

 “I told her that I don’t think she’s a slut.”

 “Oh, uh, well. That’s progress.” He responded rather awkwardly.

 “She is mad at Suki.”

 Teo glanced over at the table. “That explains why they’re sitting miles apart.”

 “Maybe you should sit with her.” Azula suggested.

 “Sure,” he stood up only for her to tug him back down.

 “Tomorrow.”

 “Alright…” he knitted his brows. “Tomorrow.”

 She stooped down and picked ruffled through her backpack, she pulled out a decently battered volleyball. “I won my first game with this one.” She handed it to him.

 “I wish I could have seen that. It was probably a really great game.”

 Azula smiled. “It was, my father was…he was really proud.” She watched Teo rub his fingers over the greying white fabric.

 “Thank you, Teo.”

 “For what?”

 “For talking to me. It meant—it means a lot.”

#Avatar #Azula #katara #TyLee #Teo #Mai #Suki #Sokka #Toph #Aang #Jet #Ozai #Fanfiction

[sp-aceagecrystals]

Divine Oasis (part 1)

There is a certain sense of unreality that comes with walking through a room of thousands of quietly seated student, their matching uniforms blurring together near the edges. This feeling comes with knowing that against almost absurd odds, your name was picked from the ornate glass bowl sitting on a marble pedestal before the crowd of your peers. It comes with the sudden realization that you will die very, very soon.

Word count: 1785

Warnings: death (by drowning)

Author notes: this is my first finished long creative writing piece, and I’m really proud of having finished it! This is going to be the first part of probably a 6 part series, as it’s the origin for all my Reborn OCs! (Also, the character uses multiple sets of pronouns, so I shifted between them throughout the piece)

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

As Joan sat on a bench at the edge of the expansive room, her eyes focused on a small knick in the hard stone floor. Her caretakers flanked her on either side, two lovely old ladies who had treated her like the little daughter they never had. She had never been interested in these ceremonies; it was always the same speech, the same crushing silence as a name is drawn, and the same somber-yet-anticlimactic finish of some kid getting sent to their own special deathbed. Not to say they didn’t find the process itself interesting, this was just always the most boring part. She was almost entirely zoned out when they felt Ms. Heather lean towards her. She didn’t really process what the woman said, but she quickly noticed the silence that had fallen over the room. The administrator on the podium shifted on her feet slightly, the wait for some sort of response was now getting uncomfortable. One of the four Reborn lined up beside her - an older boy with curly gray hair - reaches over and plucks the name that had been drawn straight from her hand. He clears his throat before repeating it, his tone growing a bit impatient.

“Joseph Harper, please come to the stage.“

Maybe because of the name they called, or the fact that she had missed the name getting picked, but something doesn’t click for a moment. She feels stuck, like all her bones and joints were suddenly concrete, nailed to her seat. Eventually, though, she finds the will to stand. The loud clack-clacking of her formal shoes seems to echo through the entire room as she makes her way to the stage. To ignore the thousands of eyes trained on her, she focused in on the details of the Reborn. The aforementioned boy, a chubby black-haired girl with a warm smile, a red-haired kid who seemed to be shivering, and a younger skinny boy with borderline iridescent eyes. They all looked happy, bored, or some combination of the two. As she comes up the steps, the gray-haired boy helps them up, an indecipherable look of concern in his eyes.

She forces herself to sit still on the stage, simply turning to face the crowd and folding their hands behind their back. The administrator has started droning on again, and soon enough she’s being lead out of the room. Everything feels numb, like all the sound and movement is on another plane, physically close but mentally distant. Someone tells her to sit, and someone says the wait won’t be too long. She listens obediently, trying to drag her mind back to the present. They look towards the closest Reborn, the older boy. Joan notices the way hair seems peppered with a darker gray at the tips; this soot-covering followed throughout his outfit, most notably on the dense black coating on his leather boots. He must notice her assessment, as he glances over to her. With a readjustment of his position to face them, he offers out his hand. She smiles blankly and shakes it, only vaguely processing being informed that his name is Mirror. “A bit of an odd name?” She wills herself to say, though it comes out quiet and empty. He grins slightly and chuckles, “Well, my power is smoke control, so that might help it make a bit more sense? You know, like ‘smoke and mirrors’?”

“Ah, that... works.”

“Yeah.”

And like that, the conversation is just as dead as she will be. He opens his mouth to say something, but the loud slam of the old office doors cuts him off. The two turn towards the source, where three figures cloaked in pure white robes approach. On the top of each hood is dual sets of wings, silky blue embroidered in silver. Their steps are silent, making their very presence seem ethereal and unnatural. Of course, that is fitting for the Holy Hands.

One holds out a pale manila envelope in their hand. Joan takes it, easily prying open the weak adhesive. Unfolding the paper inside, a message is clearly printed inside:

THANK YOU FOR YOUR SACRIFICE FOR MADARIS

YOUR DESIGNATED METHOD IS DROWNING

She stares unthinkingly at the letter, unable to process it, until one of the cloaks’ lowered voices cuts through her thoughts.

“Whenever you are ready…?”

She nods, and the group parts to allow her out of the hall. Hesitantly, she makes her way through, until she turns the corner and freezes in awe. In the past, the main hall had always been surrounding a tall, circular wall, intermediately supported by ornate marble pillars. Now the pillars stand without walls, exposing a flourishing oasis of plants with a small lake (or a large pond, however you want to see it). The spaces once walled in now let soft daylight spill into the main hall, breathing a sort of life into the now empty space. Approaching the edge, even the smell of such untouched wildlife was almost suffocating. Taking a step in feels somehow invasive, as if this sanctuary will be corrupted by their presence. As Joan makes her way to the water’s edge, they spot a small pier nearby. Vines and moss fill the gaps between the sun-bleached boards, wood creaking so loudly she was honestly considering the chances of it snapping under her. The toes of her shoes poked out over the glittering blue-green ripples. They forced a few deep breaths in and out of their lungs, a pathological survival instinct screaming in her mind to reconsider.

Maybe a more dramatic end would have been more fitting; reeling back and taking a running jump, or diving in with the elegance of a natural-born swimmer. They were neither that brash nor that graceful, though, so instead she simply tilted on her toes further and further, until she could sense her weight shift. For a split moment, they processed the sensation of falling, a primal panic jolting through every nerve in her body. But just as quickly as they had started falling they had hit the surface, cold and oddly invigorating. Her clothes were immediately soaked, their too-tight shoes like leather bricks flailing blindly above them. The water stung their eyes and her lungs burned in her chest. Having never learned to swim, Joan was unusually relieved by their inability to save themself at this point. Finally, after battling against every instinct she had, she opened her mouth and took a desperate breath.

The pain was unimaginable. Her throat was being ripped open, shredded from the inside; or at least that’s how it felt. They couldn’t really comprehend whether they were breathing in or out now, not that it made much difference. The water seemed to fill her instantly, her stomach and lung convulsing in some last ditch effort to live. Vision doubling, the deep murky teal of the lake faded into a pure, divine white. Everything they ever knew flashed before them; names, places, colors, voices, sensations. Their final thought was a single statement. Not in a sense of hope or reflection, but a triumphant and bitter promise.

I’m going to live, dad.

•••

They didn’t know how long it’d been once they open their eyes. For a brief moment, she even wondered if she was dreaming. Silt from the spongy floor rises in plumes as they shifted, slightly at first, then attempting to sit up. The cerulean shade surrounding them seemed foggy, almost suffocating. It’s this thought that drew her into a startling awareness that she wasn’t breathing. Not that they were drowning either; no, she was long past that point. Her lungs expanded and deflated uselessly in her chest. They went through the motions to stand, balance practically nonexistent against the water’s pressure. The only interruption to the turquoise landscape was the dark silhouette of one of the pier’s support poles. Lost for a better way to reach the surface, she slowly made her way to it and began the climb up.

The journey was uneventful and seemingly endless. Beams of light cut through the liquid atmosphere, giving hope to a coming end. Finally, their hands gripped over the flat, splintered surface of the pier. Despite not necessarily needing oxygen by this point, the energy she exerted to bring herself atop the boards left her desperate to take a breather. Naturally, her first reflex was to cough up the water now entrenched in her body. This was about as painful as it had been earlier, a fiery hot pain cutting through their esophagus for what must have been forever, until they felt unnaturally empty. To her shock, there was no blood. She desperately wanted to lie down and sleep for the next hundred years. Somehow, though, they found the will to stand, legs so shaky she wasn’t sure she’d be able to walk. They only had to stumble for a moment before their body fell back into the rhythm of the living. Only at the edge of the oasis do they realize that the walls had resealed in the time they were underwater. Too drained (both literally and metaphorically) to try and find another way out, she simply pressed a hand to the ivory wall, leaning into the cold surface for support. In an instant, it began to shake and, with a loud groan, slide to the side. She jumped back in surprise, wrapping her arms around herself. Instead of the coarse fabric of the academy uniform, though, their hands met bare skin. A glance down showed them that they were now wearing some sort of dress, made of a smooth, water-resistant material. The front went down to right above their knees, while slits on the sides separated it from a longer back section that, while rounded, reached halfway down her shins. The dress was sleeveless, the top rounding off below her collarbone and connecting to a matching choker with a black fishnet. Besides the fishnet and matching black leggings, the whole outfit was a similar murky teal to the water they had died in. The cacophony of sound from the wall had stopped, bringing their attention back to what was in front of them.

All the other Reborn stood or sat idly in the main hall. Aside from the younger boy, who had fallen asleep, everyone’s attention had shifted to her. Mirror (was that what he said?) stepped up first, eyes silently taking them in. His gaze met theirs and, offering out a hand, a crooked grin came to his lips. “And who might be joining us?”

They hesitated briefly, mind racing to create a new identity. A single word repeated, again and again, in her head until she smiled back and shook his hand confidently.

“Maritime, at your service.”

#creative writing #original character #trans character #fic #sp aceocs #oc maritime #reborn canon #my fics

[averyonelovesjack]

i don’t (V) ~ daniel seavey

requested: @phcnekisses

summary: the story of y/n and daniel isn’t quite finished as y/n doesn’t want to give up just yet, appearing at his window.

warning(s): nada my dudes

word count: 2021

author’s note: alright, so this is the final part of this series. i’ve absolutely loved writing this series and am so glad that it has been so requested to continue. i hope that you all enjoy this ending and the way this story has gone. thank you all so much for 500 followers, i know i’ve said it a lot and i don’t in any way want to sound like i’m gloating or whatever about it, i just am so so so so thankful and grateful and shocked that this happened. i really want you all to enjoy because this is truly the kindest fandom i’ve been in.

SHOUTOUT TIME: ok so this is a MAJOR shoutout to @phcnekisses who is so beyond creative. she has directed every single part of this story, even making me excited to hear what idea she has next for this mini series. it is absolutely insane to hear all of the crazy and perfect ideas she has for this story. please go follow she deserves it:)))

read these first: 

part I, part II, part III, part IV

Daniel’s cold body stuck to the floor, his tears gluing him down as he let them fall from his cheeks to his hands to his wooden floor, staining it carefully. His back tensed against the end of his bed, his knees pushing into his chest. Everything beside him fell apart, crushing his body into the floor. 

His thoughts consisted entirely of every mistake he’d made in the past week. He’d so easily let the girl he loved dearly get away from him, and he couldn’t even let her hate him. Every pain she felt would be worse because each time he gave her hope, he broke her down further and she’d still loved him with everything in her. 

Was there anything Daniel could ever do to regain y/n? He’d done everything in his power to destroy her, and it wasn’t purposeful. He just dragged her into his mess of a life and caused harm by it.

Through his loud sobs, a soft knock came from the door. Daniel didn’t answer, remaining as quiet as possible but inevitably failing through his loud wails. The knock was harder this time, and Daniel closed his mouth, just chokes leaving when his older brother’s voice came through the wooden door.

“daniel, open the door,” 

No response.

“buddy, come on. it’s bam bam,” The older boy tried to make his broken little brother laugh, but nothing happened, “daniel, open the fucking door” 

There was nothing Daniel could say, nothing he could think of. He didn’t need the company, the pity. It was hard for him to show this sad side of himself, and to his older brother, he wouldn’t do it, “i just need to be alone, go away” 

“i was really rooting for you guys,” Tyler’s voice rang through the door, anger hidden among it, “could’ve redefined the meaning of love. just another thing mom and dad had to go and ruin” 

Daniel jumped from his little spot on the floor as a loud noise came, the door shaking in its place as a tiny yelp of pain came from outside. A frustrated Tyler left the door, his hand aching from the release of anger he’d just given the door of his brother. 

The heartbroken boy sat tiredly on his floor, only mute sobs escaping his lips as he tried his best to convince himself it wasn’t over, but couldn’t seem to. For him, the whole world seemed to be over. like his life couldn’t move on after losing y/n.

Daniel’s body gave up as he looked towards his phone, recognizing that it was Jack who was calling him now. He didn’t want to answer, he wanted them to leave him alone, to stop thinking about him but he knew they wouldn’t. His nimble and pruned fingers picked up the phone, opening it carefully to answer the messages when his heart shattered in its entirety at the image of the beautiful girl set as his lock screen.

His body struggled to function as his arm chucked the phone towards the wall, hearing it shatter and crack all over the floor, louder cries leaving his mouth now.

Beside him Daniel heard music. It wasn’t just music, it was music he knew. As much as he tried to ignore the music, assuming it was from a noisy neighbor, nothing in him could. He wanted to resume his thoughts, to drown the entire world out with the fact that he’d ruined the best thing he ever had. 

“well i found a girl, beautiful and sweet,” Daniel listened closer to the song now, everything inside of him breaking at the idea that he once too could relate to the song playing outside, Perfect by Ed Sheeran, “I never knew you were the someone waiting for me” 

His heart sank in sadness, but grew in anger as he stood up, his emotions getting the best of him. He wanted to scream. To shout, and yell, and curse, and fight. He wanted to hurt whoever had decided to be an asshole and stand outside his window with music, music that hurt every cell inside of him. Everything in him wanted to scream at the person standing all too close to his house.

As he reached the window, opening it harshly, the music grew louder and the boy looked down at the ground, his mouth open for fire. Daniel stopped, recognizing the beautiful girl in the new and short white dress that he hadn’t seen before. Upon her head sat a white veil, one he did recognize, and in her arms were a beautiful set of red roses that made his heart pump harder.

“i’m not quite done with you yet, seavey,” Y/n’s melodic voice said from below him, louder than usual to make sure he’d heard her clearly.

“what do you want?” his heart was heavy and his voice sad as he spoke.

“to talk. give me five minutes, please,” She explained, giving him every reason she could without giving it all away. 

Daniel sighed, trying his best not to cry as he trudged his way down the stairs. He found his shoes, pulling his feet into them and walking out towards the side of his house. 

In front of him, Daniel saw his family. His mother, his father, Tyler, Chris, and Anna, all standing to the left of y/n. A smile appeared on her teary eyed face as she handed her flowers to Anna, who took them gratefully.

**pov change**

I watched as Daniel walked towards me, confusion visible on his face when he saw the members of his family standing beside me. I looked at him through my glossy eyes, his body standing sadly in front of mine.

All of a sudden, my hand came up, striking the left side of his face roughly as he woke up a little bit. My voice was tough and growled, “that’s for leaving me,” He stood shocked, but i wasn’t finished. My flat palm struck his right cheek next, “and that one’s for telling me our love isn’t strong enough,” My arms came out straight, my hands reaching either side of his shoulder and pushing him backwards next, “that’s for thinking i’d ever leave you” 

Daniel looked towards his parents, his hands finding their way towards his cheeks as he tried to find some direction. In this moment, i took a leap of faith and bent down onto my one knee. My, whoever he was now, looked at me with fear in his eyes as i let out a deep breath.

“daniel james seavey, when i agreed to marry you, i wasn’t just agreeing to being yours forever. i was agreeing to everything. i was agreeing to be with you in sickness and in health. i was agreeing to be with you through thick and thin, through our highs and lows. i agreed to accept your flaws, imperfections, mistakes and failures. i agreed to supporting you through your career, until you grow old. Until we grow old together. I understand that you were hurt by what your parents have decided to do, and yes, people can and will fall out of love. But that doesn’t mean you need to be afraid. Your mom and dad may be parting, but after so, so many memories were made. After they had a lifetime of experiences and happy times together. And we aren’t them. We’re Daniel and y/n. We’ve argued, and we will argue. We may have fallen out through disagreements, but here we are today. And today, i am promising you to never do anything to tear us apart,” I paused, tears welling in my eyes as he stood in front of me with his own formation glossiness behind his eyes, “So, Daniel James Seavey, will you please do me the honor of putting your faith in our relationship, pushing aside your fears, and marrying me?” 

Behind my back I pulled out the small silver ring that had formerly been dropped in my hand, just hours prior. Between my fingers I showed him the ring that had formerly been mine to give him on our wedding day. Daniel’s eyes widened, staring deeply into mine with content and love. 

Daniel’s eyes shifted towards his family. His sister had tears in her eyes, a smile printed upon her face. Each Chris and Tyler were smiling widely at their younger brother, excited for his response. And his parents, well, they stared at each other in anticipation. His eyes stared at his parents a little longer, as if he had been thinking about everything with them.

His mother took special notice to this and spoke next, “daniel, sweetie, please don’t think about us. You deserve the world, and y/n is standing here and giving it to you. For heaven’s sake, stop worrying about the future. Look at your present and say yes”

Daniel stares down at me, his eyes pouring deeply into mine as my knee ached in pain. I looked up at him a little longer before stating, “the grass isn’t the comfiest thing to kneel on, so if we could speed this up a little bit, it would be much appreciated” 

A tiny laugh escaped Daniel’s lips as he looked deeply at me, his words spilling out of his mouth, “y/n y/m/n y/l/n, yes, i will marry you“

My body leaped up and into his warm arms. He was slightly taken aback, but more than happy to hold me in them again. I took in the scent of his shirt, smiling gratefully at him as i heard the cheers beside us. Daniel’s hands rubbed my back soothingly, calming my pounding heart as my body pulsed at the events of the day.

The cheering quieted and a little gasp escaped Anna’s mouth as my fiance and i turned to see what might have happened. My eyes gazed towards Jeffrey on one knee in front of Keri. I remained in Daniel’s arms as my fingers reached my mouth, excitement squirming through my veins. 

I looked at the beautiful two people in front of us, listening carefully to Jeffrey’s words, “keri, we haven’t been the best towards each other in this past few months,” He started and i looked up at Danny, smiling as he watched his two parents, “but seeing this, with everything inside of my heart, i regret it. if the love between daniel and y/n is this strong, our love is even stronger. will you do me the honor of rejecting this divorce and choosing to stay with me?” 

Tears welled in my eyes again as a wider smile appeared on my face. My head rested in Daniel’s chest, my heart swelling as I looked to see my future mother-in-law’s answer. The happiest look appeared on each of our faces as Keri let an excited tone reach her voice, “yes!” Jeffrey stood up and the married couple pecked each other’s lips, Keri quickly stating, “i love you” 

“i love you too,” Jeffrey gave her a smile and I looked up to see my fiance staring at me with an adorable look.

“i love you,” his voice was quiet, so that only i could hear him over the loud roars and cheers of the family celebrating the rejecting of their parents split.

“i love you more,” i kissed his soft lips next, the spark that i’d always loved being sent through my veins and giving me the electricity i craved.

“I love you most,” I gave him a smile with his adorable words and he pulled me closer to him before the child inside of him comes out, “i think this calls for a group hug” 

Giggles left my mouth as Tyler groans, “you are such a kid!” 

“i think it does,” Keri gives her son a smile and the whole family piles it in, my body engorged in Danny’s. 

Our laughs and cries settled down as the adorable little voice of Daniel echoed through my ear, “your family is going to murder me” 

I giggled a little bit, as did Daniel’s family, “yes, probably” 

#daniel seavey #jack avery #jonah marais #corbyn besson #zach herron #daniel seavey imagine #why don't we #wdw #imagines #imagine #fanfic #i don't #mini-series