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justatalkingface · 1 year

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What are your thoughts about One For All?

By that, I mean the power itself, the story surrounding it, the connections to All For One, the person, all of it. You spoke extensively about Izuku and now I'd like to hear your thoughts about his quirk. Yoichi Shigaraki seemed very suspicious, and his quirk being a death curse at first seemed like it was setting up for a really morally ambiguous OFA. But it turns out the guy's a saint and he's trying to take down the devil. As far as I can tell, One For All kills people just to justify Izuku being the current holder and to make him special. We also got the typical shōnen power escalation of Izuku ending up with a bunch of new powers out of nowhere. Many of which seemed to exist just to have him surpass All Might quickly enough so he could handle fights against super powerful foes, because this series takes places within a year. The story rushed this dude's development, so his powers had to rush him to where he could handle things. And he also became a genius who could master a bunch of new quirks in a very short amount of time. Many of the abilities felt very redundant with his power set or go mostly unused, such as smokescreen. Float and Black Whip were cool and added a lot to Izuku's kit. The OFA vs AFO plot line eventually took over the series. I prefer the battles against AFO's forces in comparison to the earlier parts of the series, where the kids fought each other in battles with no stakes. The academia part of MHA was always the weakest part, but some people preferred it. What do you think?

One For All... well, let me get this almost mandatory part out of the way: he suffers for being introducing during The War Arc, and by dint of it means we'll probably never have a satisfying amount of information on him.

Quirk wise... it actually tracks? If family Quirks are similar, both AFO and OFA both, then, have a Quirk that is based around 'transfering Quirks', the same way that Asu's family all have Quirks based around frogs, yet they are all expressed in different ways.

I've seen people argue that the mysterious door he's helping hide is AFO, since the stockpiling Quirk passed through AFO himself first.

I just, let me.... alright. Honestly? I could see it. I really wouldn't be that surprised at this point if they did that. Logically? That makes no sense. The power stockpiling Quirk was just that, stockpiling power. It was only special when it got fused with OFA's nameless Quirk, and they fused into something more, a Quirk that is apparently specialized to act as a mental arc, in his body. Moreover, it should mean that AFO would have a Vestige there, and I just... really hope they don't do that, because I can't see a way it ends well, you know?

More recently, I'm wondering if that BIg Mystery they're clearly hiding has to do with why AFO was crying when he was killing(?) the Second; did The Second kill OFA? Was that a revenge kill? Did OFA plan that? Did he go, 'My brother is too powerful to stop, so we must sacrifice ourselves until someone is strong enough to do so, and act as fertilizer for their eventual rise' and that's why the first couple of generations are edgy and the later ones, who didn't get that memo, or who were thought to be that theoretic final product, are more open?

I... could see that. It's not something I think would be done well, with MHA as it is now, but I could see that.

Really though, when you think about it the fact that each of them have suicidally went up against AFO in his prime means that there's no way that OFA should have been able to be transferred throughout the generations, because AFO has so much stacked in his favor that he should have easily been able to hunt them down and kill them (and when does he even realize they have that Quirk? Early on, especially, it couldn't have been easy, with how weak it was; it'd probably be easier to identify it based off behavior more than power).

The thing I've realized about OFA is that the early lore for it is really kind of questionable, just because they explicitly went up against AFO with barely any power ups, which is basiclly suicide. Even if AFO wanted them alive to keep the Quirk alive (and why? Before his 'development' you could argue it's because he wanted his brother back, and thus his Vestige in it, and later it's a strong Quirk, but there's a good period where it was a Quirk with potential, not power, and AFO has been developed into a two dimensional caricature who would kill for the lulz, who has no depth or moral attachment to anything. Before his 'development' you could argue that he wanted even a small part of his brother back, and it would explain things, but now? Was he just... letting it live to refine it so he could steal it when it was strong? It'd fit with how everything is AFO's fault these days), it would be dead ass easy for him to capture the current Holder and then keep them imprisoned, maybe after crippling them, until he can get what he wants from them.

The fact it's kind of incompatible with a person with a Quirk... kind of tracks, since, you know, Nomu, but if this was always a thing, under that logic everyone who wasn't Quirkless with this thing should have rendered brain damaged like, you know, the Nomu. The fact that they kind of... fall apart? That feels like bullshit. It has the energy of trying to make Izuku a True Destined Hero in a True Shonen by making him the only one who could use it safely, instead of, you know, just being chosen on his heroic merits, and goes blatantly against the themes the manga was talking about from the start, that everyone can be a hero. Because 'men aren't born equal' is wrong, and even a Quirkless kid can be heroic, can save someone. But, you know... Everything Changed When The War Arc Attacked. I'm not surprised it got fucked up.

May be a little off topic, but I'll point out since AFO has vestiges now (suddenly), that that's going to be important for whatever end game there is, and, you know, that's going to be bullshit, since OFA only has those from a Quirk that was specialized in making them, and even then they only started communicating with him at the War Arc, after generations of that one Quirk being powered up to allow it to happen. Meanwhile, AFO just takes the Quirks, and even if Quirks keep, well, a vestige of their former owner, why did it take so long to happen if it was just a thing that happened when you moved Quirks? Why didn't any OFA user before Izuku have this happen? Why aren't the Nomu filled with the traumatic impulses of their parts; not the main body, but the minds of however many extra Quirks are stuffed inside them? There's no reason for that logic to apply to AFO, since he just takes them, but... yeah. ECWTWAA.

....So, is the reason he's such a two-dimensional character is that he can't get a good night's sleep because god knows how many people are just constantly screaming at him, in a ironic own goal on their part that is making him more and more evil as he slowly loses his mind over the years, doing more and more terrible things they don't want him to? Or is that just me putting more work in AFO's characterization that Hori has actually done?

You want to know my prediction? That was introduced as the way to beat him, in the end: Izuku and OFA are going to lead a revolution in AFO's body/mind and purge him, or... something stupid to beat his mind once and for all, since AFO is apparently studying Orochimaru style immortality and we're reaching a point where killing any one body, and maybe even both, won't be enough to kill him, so they have to go deeper to finish him!

Which totally makes sense.

SIgh.

On the Vestiges, and the powers? In theory, I'm fine with it, Hori clearly was hinting about them way back when, but in practice the way that's been handled is ass. Either A, these guys all have buttons to unlock their Quirks, in which case there should have been a Team Meeting with Izuku rather than him randomly shooting out combat tentacles out of nowhere, when he could have killed someone with them, just like... you're in a fight; surprise super powers! What could go wrong, or B, it just happens, in which case them making noises about proving himself or whatever sounds... dumb when what they think about the situation has nothing to do with it.

More than that, though, the way they're being used to power up Izuku? The way that they're just his Stands now, more than actual characters? Only showing up behind him to show how serious Izuku is? The sheer fucking disrespect of it irks me; Hori, if you're going to introduce actual characters who are people, then treat them like people. If you just want to give Izuku powers, don't give him a mindscape full of people with opinions, just give him powers. One or the other Hori; you can just give Izuku a weird Animus style flashback without a personality you actually need to manage being attached.

On the powers themselves, it's clearly something that got dropped on the wayside. Black Whip, obviously, is Hori's favored child, lovingly used at every possible chance and drawn out in great detail (I hear he really likes Spiderman?) but after that? The first couple were utility skills, chosen to give Izuku some soft support while he wandered on his own without readily available support tech, beyond those.... Hori just used them as crutches to skip over all the development Izuku never had the time to do to master AFO itself. No matter how they phrase it, no matter how complicated they make the explanation, they're just there so he can punch harder.

As a person, it's hard to tell much about OFA. He has morals, he opposes his brother, he's keeping secrets from Izuku.... let's be honest here, he's more of a plot device than a human being at this point, and I have zero faith in his future development. It's kind of frustrating since there's a lot of interesting potential there (is he a Good Guy(TM)? Did AFO just go too far, and before that he was fine with his brother the warlord? Was he cowardly like Izuku, but also went through character development once he gained the ability to stand up for himself? There's a lot of ways his characterization could be spun, but that has more to do with his lack of characterization than anything) that I'm sure he'll never live up to than anything.

Beyond that... there's this symbolism with hands that keeps coming up. Shigaraki has it, of course, that's mostly his trauma being expressed with his hand based Quirk (and strengthened by AFO using hands to condition him, actually...), to the point where it became his theme. Later on, though, when they started expanding on AFO and OFA mentally, there's thing where both of them are reaching out to people, with this focus on their hands. Both of them do it, and it's always drawn in this ominous sort of way, even for OFA, the apparent good guy. Sometimes, usually (or only?) for AFO (who also has a Quirk focused around his hands; it's not surprising his mind would orient around that to some extent) it's even the only thing we see of their mental silhouettes. It's... very interesting to me, and makes me think there was probably going to be more to him at some point, that there was going to be some, any, depth to his character.

On the academia part, here's the thing: compared to later on, the early stuff was better, not on the merits of school vs fighting, but because early on, even with its flaws, it's clearly something Hori put a lot thought into, had a plan. The later stuff? Well, there's some sort of plan, but the later we get in the timeline, the more it feels like Hori is backpedaling from some original concept, and changing it to something else as we go along. And in itself, his ideas changing isn't a bad thing, but those changes are still built off the foundation of his older plans, and it leaves more and more plot points hanging out in the wind, without proper support. If this manga was a house, the higher Hori built it, the more floors he added, the more he started shifting the house to one side, while everything he had already built stayed where it was. That's not how you get a solid house, and no matter how much fancier those higher floor may look, it doesn't make up for the fact that it's only barely staying in place.

At the same time though, it's clear that, for all that this series is called My Hero Academia, the actual school part of it is something Hori doesn't seem to be all that interested in, or have put thought into. UA, narratively, isn't a school, it's an excuse, and the times when Hori puts in things like class presidents, or normal, actually academic tests and the like, it's because he has to put them in, and so it's understandable when you look at the actual school parts of this 'school', it feels awkward and out of place.

When people talk about liking it, it was probably less, 'Man, Izuku and friends in school, doing school things, was great' (though, there are are probably plenty of those as well, to be fair; again, My Hero Academia; it's not surprising to see interest in that school setting promised in the actual title) and more that, 'Wow, it was nice to focus on Izuku and the main cast we were introduced to from the beginning, and watch them actually talk to each other and interact!', since the farther we got into the actual hero stuff, the less we had of all that, and of all the characters we got attached to originally, when we first started the story.

#mha critical #bnha critical #ask #One For All #All For One #My complete lack of faith in this series developing anything anymore #OFA's transformation into The Mandate of The True Hero #The Vestiges are people not Stands #Black Whip is Hori's favored child #Remember when 1A was important?

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zecretsanta · 1 year

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To: @kayzero

From: @wherestarsarestillasleep

Hi! The prompt I went with was “Aoi and Hongou during 999 while Junpei is solving the incinerator puzzle. (Akane optional.)” I hope you can enjoy it!

As you push the cold metal barrel harder into the back of his skull, you have the weirdest thought. You’re keeping him on such a short leash, there’s a disgusting kind of intimacy to the moment. You can track the tired old rhythm of his breathing, smell sweat drowning out expensive cologne.

Things you don’t want to know, too average human, too mundane. It’s bizarre. Almost disorienting. You’ve dreamed about having a gun to his head or a knife to his throat for so many years. You’ve thought of this so many times while he’s been far out of reach.There’s a grounded level of reality in the irrelevant minute detail that only makes it all the harder to connect in your mind, semi-hazy with disbelief of the moment you’re in.

Hard as you worked for this, some part of you saw it as a fantasy storytale, that you’d make it to this point someday, that this future would become your present. All the times you swore it over to each other. Same promise you’d always made. You’d be her Santa. Whatever she needed to believe in.

All that time selling the story to Akane, did you ever really buy it yourself? It’s surreal.

But here you are. All three of you standing outside this door, Junpei and the others locked in that incinerator, loaded gun in your hand pressed to Gentarou Hongou’s head.

God, you want to pull the trigger so fucking bad. Every unfiltered instinct you have’s telling you to do it, take the chance, take the shot. And you could do it. Right here, right now. You could do it. You picture it now, in that weird fuzzy headspace. All you have to do is squeeze your finger and he’d be dead. Fall heavy to the floor by your hand, the blood’d leak red and wet and metallic out of his head and you’d leave him to rot. Your body stays steady, but your mind’s having trouble computing the reality.

Felt the same way when you kidnapped him. Sometimes you’d take on the mask and grab ‘em, sometimes Akane. You did the whole Nonary Board, much as Akane wanted to herself, just to completely ensure it. That however this would all end, there could be no rewriting the reality of those bastards being put in a death game with four very real bombs in their stomachs. You broke into where he lives, past all that CEO security, gassed him so anticlimatically, and took a moment to just look down at his body crumpled defenseless below you. To take in tossing a grenade was all it took, and you had him physical and mortal and meat you could cut through right then and there.

But it’s not up to you. Some other world, you’d have set yourself on a bloody nauseous revenge quest to murder him yourself. But you’re not doing this for you.

You’re not the man that passes judgement, you just help carry it out. You’re a servant, or an assistant, an extension of her will. You’re a guard dog, and that’s how you feel right now. The need to keep him away from her is visceral, hair on edge electricity fight or flight, having the bastard near her you hardly blink. But your sight falls on her past him now.

It’s an experience to watch on her face as Akane slowly loosens the mask, June stepping off the stage. The way it drops carefully in stages from innocence to hatred, shining in her eyes like the moon reflects on blood or the chapal’s candlelight off your gun. Her skin’s clammy and her breathing uneven, she holds herself up with one arm on the wall, looking up through loose hair. There’s a curl of triumph in her mouth, some kind of exhausted exhilaration in her eyes where they fall on Hongou. Most of all, you see hate.

She wants him to suffer even more than you do. That’s why she chose for him to get out of here alive. You want him dead and gone and his name meaningless but Akane wants it tarnished, she wants him humiliated and wretched and aging in a cell. The idea of leaving him alive in the world crawls on your skin, of having him right here right now and walking away, letting him live on.

But if anyone should get to decide, it’s her.

So you cattle-stick prod him onward, and you don’t take your eyes off him until he’s bound in the trunk, and you slam it down together with your sister, leaving him in darkness.

And you leave him behind.

#submission #zero escape #9 Hours 9 Persons 9 Doors #999 spoilers #Zecret Santa 2022 #kayzero #wherethestarsarestillasleep

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cazimagines · 2 years

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Born to be wild - Chapter 16

Synopsis: Joining F1 as one of the first female drivers you knew was going to be a challenge but you weren’t prepared to deal with one particular asshole on the tracks. With the urge to win so strong within each racer, will romance pave the way? Or will it destroy everything?

Word count: 818

Previous chapter: It's the new f1 season of 1976 and as you and Niki arrive for the first race, news breaks out of your relationship and how it will impact your performance.

A/N: Hey ya'll, I won't lie this is a small chapter but I have more time on my hand's atm as I am not needed at work as much yet (future me will cry when the back-to-school season hits) so hopefully soon I'll be able to get some juicy chapters out for you guys.

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Born to be wild masterlist

Previous chapter

It had been two months since the news of your relationship had hit the press. Unspringsinly, it hadn't died down. You and Niki hadn't changed the way the two of you raced. Both of you fought for victory. Both of you worked on your cars separately. Both of you would overtake each other during the races. Yet, the news would spin story after story of how the two of you were helping each other. That you were secretly working to ensure Niki would win the following season. It was never about you winning. No. It was about Niki winning.

Anything they could use to slander the two of you. They used.

You and Niki attempted to turn a blind eye to all printed in the newspapers. You preferred your ignorance to what they were saying about you rather than knowing and having their opinions way you down. Of course, they would try and corner you and Niki with questions at every race. At times it was challenging to avoid them. Instead, you would have to vaguely answer them and then disappear. It had also meant public appearances together were rare, for each time you wanted to go out to a restaurant, you felt the public eye on you and people walking over to the two of you to ask questions. There were only so many times Niki could tell people to fuck off.

It meant the two of you had started staying in more when together, at each other's houses. It was frequently Niki's place rather than yours, for his mansion in Salzburg was grander than your little apartment. You enjoyed seeing inside the private space of Niki Lauda and already felt comfortable in it. Spending time together between the races made you feel a more extensive connection between you.

Now though, you were both at your separate garages working on your cars for the qualifying tomorrow. Though the team had their own engineers, you still preferred to work on the car yourself. You knew the car like the back of your hand, and you didn't want to worry about something going wrong if someone changed a part in it without your knowledge.

The sound of clanging metal and a muttered swear word in an Austrian accent pulled you out of your thoughts. Glancing up from where you were working on the car, your face glowed when you saw Niki scowling at the ground while holding two cups of coffee.

"Whose job is it to clean this place up. I spilt some coffee on my wrist after almost stepping on a nail."

"Sorry, Niki, that was me. I chuck anything I don't need over my shoulder and, frankly, forget all about it."

"And that's wise?" Niki asks, tilting his head and raising an eyebrow up at you.

"Likely not, but I haven't stepped on a nail yet."

Niki frowned.

"Is that for me?" you ask, gesturing to the cup.

"Yes, I thought you might need it. I'm on break while the mechanics work on the car, then I'm going to test run it." Niki replies, walking over to you and handing over one cup.

"Thank you," you say, wrapping your hands around the hot cup to warm them up and inhaling the sharp smell of the coffee.

"You're welcome," Niki replies, but a soft smile pulls on his lips as you look at him.

"I'm just working on the car at the moment," you say, walking back over to it to create conversation as Niki follows you, studying the car.

"What have you been doing to it?"

"Of just tightening up some ‌bolts, designing the outer layer to be more slipstream and such."

"I see," Niki replies, his eyes fixated on the car. "And all this is helping the pacing of your car?"

"Some of it, there are other things, of course. Like what I do with the gear."

Niki finally glances at you, surprise written over his face.

"The gear?"

"Yeah, you know, one of my tricks."

"And how do you achieve that?" Niki asks, glancing back at the car as he begins pacing around it.

"You want me to reveal my trick at last?" you joke as you raise an eyebrow at Niki.

Niki glances at you again, smiling.

"I doubt I ever will hear what they are."

You think for a moment, glancing at Niki and then at the car before walking to it.

"The trick James taught me was to tug it in quick succession twice to get a quick boost, especially going around corners."

Niki moved closer to the car.

"Fascinating. Is there anything else the gearbox can do?"

"Oh yes!" you exclaim, feeling excitement bubble up in your chest as you see Niki's eyes almost sparkle.

He places his coffee down on the side as you explain some of what you know in more depth, and slowly the untouched coffee grows cold.

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#niki lauda rush #daniel brühl #daniel bruhl #niki lauda #niki lauda fic #niki lauda x reader #niki lauda imagines #niki lauda fanfiction #niki lauda imagine #niki lauda x you #niki lauda rush 2013 #rush 2013 #zemo #rush #born to be wild

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sideblogformindtrash · 1 year

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GRANDMA'S HOUSE

Short chapter, I decided to divide it.

Not much to tag, they are mostly talking about previous themes of death and captivity remain.

The breakfast is silent and awkward. The three of them ruminate ideas to fix the story, but there is no possible solution, so the silence prevails.

Prisoner has his eyes red from crying all night, and pokes the food uninterested, while the Wolf chews on a bone, unable to face the Prisoner in this new context. The weight of having hurt him so much is unbearable without the shield of the story, and having him as a Guest is far too weird now. The Fox just taps her claws onto the table, as much as it bothers her, she knew it was a matter of time. This world is decaying and the old tales her father latches onto are unsustainable over rotten foundations.

The breakfast is silent. The three of them ruminate on ideas to solve their problem and fix the story, but the truth is there is none so the silence prevails.

Finally, Prisoner brings up the question that’s been lingering heavily over them.

“You won’t take me back to the basement, right?”

There’s fear in his voice, but also yearning. Sure, it was a painful part of his story, but it was never complete without it. The Wolf does not reply.

“We could maybe… just keep the story going as is” He tries again, begging.

“I don’t want to tell a story that ends in that basement” The Wolf growls, and the Prisoner flinches, still carrying the trauma of being tortured over and over “I… Actually liked seeing you go free. As much as it pains me to admit, for I despise those knights. It was my favorite part of that story”

It takes effort for the Wolf to say that. His eyes are gleaming, and part of him is a bloodthirsty beast that just lost its toy.

“We should give it another try. Please. Maybe today they’ll come!”

The Wolf seems to consider it, tempted by his own need for a story to tell. He snaps out of it when the Fox growls, showing him bare teeth. They have a small battle of wits, growling at each other, bristling fur, like the wild beasts they are.

“...We better not” he says, defeated under her piercing gaze. So for now, he just falls back on his seat.

“Maybe I should look for them. I know the way home…" he mumbles “At least I think I do”

Both Fox and Wolf's fur bristle, a bad feeling about this whole thing. He was always unconscious when being carried out, or nearly so, and Fox always thought the Prisoner's friends were kinda off, when they came knocking on her door.

He gives a half smile seeing that reaction, as if he was kind of expecting it.

"What. Will you say I can't?" He dares "I thought I wasn't your Prisoner anymore-"

"Do what you want. That doesn't mean things will turn out how you expect them too" Wolf replies, growling.

"They are always the same," he complains “What does it even matter”

"And that's the issue with breaking a story" the Fox intervenes "It was always the same but now it… no longer is. You can try and change it if you want but… doesn't mean you'll like the results"

He lowers his head, poking the food in front of him. It's not like he has a choice right now. Either he finds a way to change his story, or he fades away completely, and that was the most definitive way to die.

The Wolf could recover from being shot or beheaded or diseased, the Fox recovered from the train tracks, from the traps and hounds and hunters, and the Prisoner recovered every time from extensive painful torture.

But none of them, and likely no one in Fantasy, could recover from being erased and forgotten without a tale worth telling. So much so that some speculated that the rot was caused because… nothing was worth saying anymore although most decided believing that was too dire.

So the Prisoner gets up, taking his dish to the sink in the corner of the wooden kitchen and scrubbing it clean with painfully cut and bristled fingers, under the watchful eyes of both his dog-like companions. They wanted to stop him but they dared not, as he politely thanked them for the meal and walked out of the little house, for the first time, with his own legs.

It's the first time he can fully take on the scenery from the Cabin exterior. He was always dragged inside, and carried out limp, so all those trees and the path were a blur that was now starting to clear in his mind, taking a formal shape.

The house was small and charming, surrounded by flower beds and a neatly kept garden. But the forest ahead, beyond the fence, was dark and twisted.

He could see by the stubs that many trees had been cut from that area, but the rot wasted no time taking over their place with ticker vegetation.

He could faintly make out paths that lead deeper into the woods and had been taken over, and a single main path that was still well kept and in use.

He knew it led to the town, and somewhere in there was the Knight's training halls, where his friends lived.

So he takes a deep breath and takes a shaky step towards it, then another, and finds himself alone in the woods.

#fantasy whump #My writing

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super-kristuff · 1 year

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I started playing Kingdom Hearts III recently, and I wanted to throw down a bunch of my thoughts so far. For some context, I replayed kh1 not too long ago, but I haven't played kh2 since middle school. I've played 358/2 and a bit of chain of memories and birth by sleep, but I haven't touched re-coded. Tbh, I thought re-coded was just a way from them to retcon the old games to make the plot more consistent.

Anyway, I've just finished the second world based on Toy Story, and like, the homoerotic tension between Buzz and Woody is crazy. Like, it is clearly an unintentional consequence of placing characters with a leitmotif of "You've got a friend in me" in a world built around the power of friendship. There are so many scenes where Buzz and Woody talk about their feelings and how much they trust each other to have their back. Its a major plot point that Xehanort steals Buzz, and Woody rescues him. Woody tells Xehanort off, and I quote, "Whatever you're talking about, I don't care. -- My guess is no one has ever loved you before."

Like, I can also go on about how Buzz, from the beginning, is like, we should just go home and wait it out. So in many of the feeling sessions, Buzz begs Woody to just go home with him. And how home is clearly a symbol of safety, normalcy, and comfort. And how Buzz wants Woody to be there. And in the rescue scene, Woody is the one talking about bringing Buzz home.

It's the second world in the game, but honestly it felt like a complete game in and of itself. God, the game has so much whimsy. There was a fight in a ball pit. There were toy mechs that you could pilot. One of the treasures was in a thumb-war mini-game. At one point, you're teleported into the video-game that the mechs are from, but they're real mechs instead of toy mechs with different abilities to match. One of the bosses is a creepy possessed anime girl figurine.

It's such a good game. And like, I could write pages on how the gameplay feels. Obviously, I've seen the kh4 trailer, and I had my doubts about how the parkcore floaty gameplay would feel. But playing kh3, it honestly seems like a natural extension to the current gameplay? LIke, the gameplay does have its weaknesses. I feel there are just too many options in combat. They game absolutely should have split the combat mechanics into unlocks that are worlds apart. Like, the game starts with form-changes, team-attacks, AND attraction attacks? And each of these will completely change how your controls interface with the environment. Most absurdly, is the shift from classic third-person kh controls to first-person microsoft flight simulator controls.

Which, like, isn't to say any of these are bad additions per-say. I just feel it gives the game a completely avoidable steep learning curve. Which in that vein, I also wish some of the combat mechanics could be turned off. It's just too much to keep track of.

But also, the game is amazing. Like, as long as you never press triangle, none of the above things happen, and you can enjoy a classic kh experience. Which, the game nails. I'm definitely thinking about trying to 100% it. Or at least playing through it a second time at higher difficulty.

Replaying kh1 made me realize how absurdly deep the game was. I found 4 secret bosses? And in preparing for them, I learned how the mushroom guys worked and how to properly farm for synthesis items. And I think it would be sick if kh3 had those mechanics as well. Obviously, I'll have to see, but here's hoping.

I'll try to post any more absurd details, but the Woody/Xehanort confrontation was too good to not write about.

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yurtletheturtlehenderson · 2 years

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not sure if these types of questions get on your nerves or anything, but i was wondering what you do to organize and plan your writing. (cosmic specifically). ive been trying to start writing again, life’s just been so much but i wanna start getting back into writing. i was just wondering how you do it? love you 🤍

I don't mind at all, I'm happy to answer in fact!

Short answer: bullet points. This is especially important if you're someone like me who is doing a rewrite where it's following along with the show and working an reader/oc into the series everyone already knows, big convoluted background origin story or not. I bullet point scene by scene, episode by episode with each season. Tedious, I know, but it helps keep my adhd thought on track and organized

💡 The idea:

When I first decided to write my first ever story, cosmic, i wanted to jump right in but I knew it was better for me personally to just sit myself down with this little crumb of an idea and get to know it and the world i wanted to bring it into. This little wisp of an influence I would have loved to have seen in the show and all I did was sit and watch the show while keeping this in mind. I got myself used to the world and the history of the lab and what boundaries our heroes faces when it came to investigating it so I knew what gray areas were free to play in as my little sandbox. And as I watched, the more that watered my idea and allowed me to develop it cause I saw ahead of time what I needed to make it happen (I also just happen to be someone who loves details and fitting them in wherever I can), and it definitely helped to jot down any thoughts that came to mind during the first watch.

📝 The Bullet Points:

The second watch is where I really get into the physical planning of it all. I wouldn't necessarily consider it any more important than the first cause if I didn't have the first (again, maybe this is just how my brain works) I wouldn't have had the opportunity to fully develop my ideas and let myself get inspired as I enjoy the show (that's how I came up with the story in the first place, after all!) But it is where all the "writing" gets done.

All it is is just a bullet point list, episode by episode, scene by scene, of what is going to happen. Probably not super conventional or how "the pros" do it, but again, my brain just might be weird and likes to be thorough. I don't make myself go in detail for stuff I don't need to. Literally, half the bullet points are stuff like

-gov does tests on pumpkin patch. Powell tells hopper about the reported sighting of el.

^that's an actual copy and pasted line from my season 2 bullet points. The stuff where I actually integrate reader (yes, I try and do this wherever I can which is another reason why I am reluctant to update s1 on tumblr cause there's a lot of missing experiment nuggets in non reader scenes) The point is, it can obv be as extensive as you want if you even find that bullet points work for you.

A quick example from my tua fic plans. Sorry I couldn't get anything from cosmic, the app I used for that one didn't allow screenshots, but it is the exact same process.

As you can see, i don't always keep my notes super serious and/or wordy and just have fun with it to keep myself from working myself into a corner 😅 believe me I have a lot of great little nuggets, including literal memes just thrown in there. But overall, that's about it!

🔁 Repeat:

That's pretty much it, and is still the method I use more or less today. Like when season 3 of ST came out, I just sat down to watch it as a fan. But it was also the first time I was watching stranger things while having my series out so it was really fun to watch with a new lense with y/n just riding in the back seat of my mind and popping in here and there. (Again, notes have gotta be ready!) And I plan to do it again with season 4, and it will be the first time I do it with my tua fic being written as s3 releases!

Again, I just want to give a disclaimer that this is just how I go about things cause my unmedicated brain gets tangled and distracted easily so doing this helps me. I've definitely gone through trial and error, as anyone likely has and will but my best advice is not being afraid to try things. When I had the idea to sit down and be thus thorough, I really wasn't super jazzed about it and I certainly didn't dive in all at once because I was afraid of getting bored. But it weirdly helped and felt kinda satisfying?? Cause I went the extra mile ahead of time instead of facing that later if that makes sense? I knew it was something that was gonna bother me later, knowing the lore and getting it 👌just right👌

If you just stick to your gut and get what you feel like you're gonna need, I think things will work out just fine. Sorry if this was super long but I feel like people should know by now that's just me 😂 also, thats the kinda the point I was trying to make! Lol shutting up now. Love you too darling, feel free to stop by anytime <3

💕💕💕 - Yurtle

#yurtle answers #lovely anon #cosmic #tsu ☂️#yurtle plans #edit: omg truly how does one shut up 🥲 i dont know how

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leclerc-s · 7 months

Text

track 001. london boy

─── ❝ so i guess all the rumors are true❞ ───

masterlist // next

bailey knew it was never a good idea to enter a pr relationship, but she was all out of ideas. if a fake ‘relationship’ could get her out of her slump she would take it. as a songwriter there was nothing worse than being stuck in a writing slump. she had done extensive research on her fake boyfriend and all she had come up with was that he was a scorpio and sassy, there was also something about him being an avid twitch streamer. so, clearly, her methods of research needed some work, but not by much, in her opinion.

it's also was a perk because it meant jeremiah would finally stop bothering her. she had made a few mistakes in the past and one of them was agreeing to go out on a date with him when they were 15. they had dated for 3 years until bailey had called it quits on them. her excuse had been that she was too busy with her growing career but she just wasn't in love with him anymore. the two had been best friends before they began dating and now their friendship was ruined, which is why bailey regretted ever dating him.

she had been single since then which naturally meant jeremiah thought she was still in love with him. she wasn't but he didn't understand that, so like every other guy who didn't understand what the word 'no' meant, he kept asking her out. this in turn meant she had to lie and tell him that she was talking to someone so he would stop annoying her. it was then that the opportunity to be an f1 driver's pr girlfriend fell into her lap. she hadn't even known who the driver was until she was signing the nda's with his managment.

bailey had been annoyed with him not showing up to the initial meeting but one quick google search for the f1 schedule had told her he was currently in austria racing. the two wouldn't be officially meeting until Silverstone, his home grand prix, or at least that had been the plan until his manager was texting her to let her know he would be showing up at her small concert in london. now she was effectively freaking out over how the two would make any of this believable if they didn’t even know each other.

liked by zoyatorres, landonorris, jeremiahbuchanan and others

baileywinters london, i am in you

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user82 ariana (lando) what are you doing here?

↳ user90 who is this lando you speak of?

↳ user82 lando norris is a formula one driver, british, attractive

↳ user15 she is for the girls, gays, and theys only. mr.norris can leave.

jerimiahhuchanan sorry i couldn’t make it to your london show

↳ baileywinters its okay! there will be more!

zoyatorres have fun in london

↳ baileywinters will do! 🫡

baileywinters posted a new story

met this weirdo at my show, apparently he's famous or something? he was signing shirts

landonorris seriously? that’s the best you can come up with? baileywinters alright asshole see if you can do better

zoyatorres hello? you go to london and you meet a guy? i expect details winters! baileywinters you got it zoya!

landonorris posted a new story

saw a pretty cool girl perform tonight. 10/10 would recommend. great show baileywinters!

baileywinters you think i’m cool? landonorris alright don’t let it get to your head baileywinters mine was still better landonorris as if

isabellaperez LANDO NORRIS HOW DARE YOU NOT INVITE ME?! landonorris next time, i'm sorry!

liked landonorris, danielricciardo, isabellaperez and others

baileywinters so the cars go vroom vroom in weird circles? thanks for the invite mclaren! i hang out with the weird guy from my show and suddenly i’m at an f1 race, life is weird.

tagged: mclaren, landonorris, danielricciardo

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mclaren it was a pleasure having you here! please come to more races, lando’s more tolerable

↳ landonorris my own team against me? this is betrayal.

↳ danielricciardo you’re more quite when she’s around.

isabellaperez why did no one tell me you were here? mclaren i have a bone to pick with you and your drivers!

↳ mclaren redbullracing your admin is out of control

↳ redbullracing 🤷🏻‍♀️ what can they do about it?💋 isabella

jeremiahbuchanan since when are you into f1?

↳ baileywinters always have been but i’m more of a sebastian vettel fan than i am of the sport

↳ user13 she gets it

↳ mclaren she’s a aston martin fan? is this the betrayal lando was speaking of?

↳ baileywinters i will be a fan of whatever team sebastian vettel is on

↳ user63 these two just met and she’s already been invited to a grand prix? seems like a pr relationship

↳ user72 they seemed to hit it off. i don’t see what the big deal is? let them be friends. not every man and woman who spend time together are dating

↳ user91 not to mention it takes weeks to plan stuff like this out. they had probably already planned this when she met lando. she probably planned her london show around her appearance with mclaren

who’s jeremiah?

why are you asking?

he just dm’d me asking if we were dating. do i lie to to him or do i tell him the truth?

LIE! I NEED YOU TO LIE TO HIM!

also do think it's wise to tell someone you don't know that it's all fake?

okay, that’s a good point but why do i need to lie to him? you know him, don’t you trust him?

do you trust everyone you meet norris?

no, but if i scroll back far enough on your instagram he’s everywhere

we dated, he's an ex

why are you stalking my instagram?

i don't know if you're aware but i know nothing about you. i'm gathering intel on you

also you’re friends with your exes?

okay, that worries me a little but yes. why do you make it sound like i'm a fucking mission or some shit?

is it a problem that i'm friends with jeremiah? and it's one ex. i've only dated one guy.

how did one guy get you to write so many songs about him?

first you stalk my instagram now you're listening to my songs?

i went to you concert...i had to make it look like i was fan. what's the point of this if it doesn't look believable at least?

does this mean i have to go back and watch your old season? or can i just watch dts? please tell me i can just watch dts, it's so much faster

if you want a dramatization of f1, sure watch dts

wait, i just realized, you were stalking my instagram and your reason was pretty shit. lando norris, do you have a crush on me?

i'm not even going to entertain your thoughts.

that's not a no

alex albon WHO’S THE GIRL NORRIS?!

george russell what girl? lando brought a girl? huh?

isabella perez i can’t believe you didn’t tell me you knew bailey winters. friendship over.

carlos sainz qué? why did i not know lando had a girlfriend?

lando norris WOAH! who said anything about girlfriend? she a girl who’s a friend. there's a space between girl and friend. girl friend.

daniel ricciardo he has a crush on her!

lando norris i do not!

daniel ricciardo you were a blushing mess the entire time she was near you. and you were quite. penelope trevino lando's never quite. who is this girl?

natalia ruiz she was pretty, from what i saw.

isabella perez she’s gorgeous! besides the women here present she’s my wcw

charles leclerc we seriously need to find isabella a boyfriend

isabella perez get me your brother’s number charles leclerc what? you have his number? are you asking for lorenzo’s? isabella perez it’s a joke, but do you think he’d been willing to get me the number of some of those cute prema boys? isabella perez also arthur’s literally my best friend, i can get him a girlfriend though? i have friends. max verstappen sorry? i thought you said you had more friends besides us. isabella perez i do pierre gasly your sister doesn’t count isabella perez fuck you baguette and i do have more friends, you french fuck rowan todd i know you don’t want to get arthur a girlfriend when that boy is still hung up on your sister isabella perez if we don’t talk about it, it’s like they never dated. meaning i don’t have to be awkward around my best friend and sister.

daphne jones added one person

daphne jones no one question it.

(626)-584-6812 what the fuck is this?

lando norris oh god

isabella perez oh thank god i thought you added arthur or my sister and i was panicking because we were talking shit.

lando norris DAPHNE!

(626)-584-6812 daphne jones? oh my god! excuse me while i go scream in a pillow

lance stroll she’s so real for that mae jones daniel’s live reaction to meeting daph for the first time

daphne jones changed (626)-584-6812 to bailey winters

bailey winters i should’ve become friends with an f1 driver sooner if it meant knowing daphne jones

penelope trevino what are your intentions with my son? carlos sainz *our son bailey winters excuse me? lando norris PENELOPE REBECCA TREVINO! CARLOS SAINZ VÁZQUEZ DE CASTRO! isabella perez full government names, he’s pissed.

lewis hamilton i worry for you people, i seriously do.

lewis hamilton i apologize in advance bailey, they’re nuts.

bailey winters sir lewis hamilton knows my name. oh my god. i've peaked. this is what my life has been building up too

esteban ocon oh this comedy gold right here

lance stroll you cried after you met daphne the first time esteban. shut up. mick schumacher in his defense it's daphne freaking jones. freya vettel that's a valid excuse

sebastian vettel i have you children muted for a reason. this is insane. you’re all insane.

pierre gasly lando is currently chasing carlos with a golf club.

bailey winters where did he get the golf club from?

rowan todd i’ve learned it’s best not to question things around here. bailey winters noted.

penelope trevino he’s still my son, i regret nothing.

bailey winters i’m so confused

esteban ocon to clear it up for bailey, carlos and penny are lando’s parents after he drunkenly referred to them as mom and dad. mae jones penny and carlos claim to hate each other but we’re all waiting for that enemies to lovers trope to hit isabella perez just like we’re all waiting for mae and max to get their heads out of their asses and get back together. alex albon or for natalia and charles to stop pretending like we don’t all know they’ve been sleeping together and just announce they’ve been basically dating since 2019 natalia ruiz excuse me? carlos sainz the walls are thin. i’ve heard things. i bet sebastian did too. sebastian vettel i heard too much.

daniel ricciardo the only healthy relationships here are daphne and i + pierre and yuki

pierre gasly yuki and i are not dating yuki tsunoda that’s not what you said yesterday. i guess i’m not the love of your life. pierre gasly yuki, no, you are. i promise. fernando alonso you two desperately need to get girlfriends george russell fernando's never present but when he is he roasts the absolute shit out of someone.

bailey winters i seriously love you people. this is the best thing to happen to me in a month.

lando norris wow, and yesterday she said meeting me was the best thing to happen to her alex albon clearly she lied to make you feel better sebastian vettel you won’t think that for long bailey, i promise bailey winters i died, dead, deceased. digging my grave. here lies bailey winters, she died after meeting her favorite driver (sebastian vettel) and celebrity crush (daphne jones) daniel ricciardo she’s just like me. daughter? bailey winters father? wait, who's my mother? max verstappen daphne charles leclerc it may take a while for you to connect the dots

3:13 am

bailey winters DANIEL AND DAPHNE ARE DATING? I JUST FIGURED THAT SHIT OUT. WHAT THE FUCK? THAT FLEW COMPLETELY OVER MY HEAD! CHARLES AND MAX PRACTICALLY GAVE IT TO ME!!

¡leclerc-s speaks! love giving my ocs shitty exes. happy sprint day! manifesting a mclaren or ferrari sprint win today!

¡disclaimer! this is in no way making assumptions about the people involved in this story, this is all fake. it is a fanfiction please don't take any of what is said seriously. this is all for entertainment purposes and as a creative outlet for me. enjoy!

#leclerc-s #the honest series #lando norris #lando norris x female oc #formula 1 #formula 1 fic #fanfic #fanfiction #f1 #f1 smau #f1 social media au #f1 instagram au #f1 fic

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regarding-stories · 1 year

Text

Why I loved "Dark" and never got into "1899"

There once was a great, mysterious show that hit all the right buttons. From the draw of its setting, the chosen time periods it was set in, its characters and the people depicting them on screen, the way it told its story, it was compelling and I could never could get enough.

This is, of course, Dark. And after only a few episodes of 1899, damn, even after the first episode, I knew it wouldn't be that show. Of course you can't just repeat a past success. You have to make new things, but the things I mentioned above - they're independent of a particular story.

And 1899 botched most of it.

Only so much you can take

There's only so much you can take in one go. Be it violence, drama, or mystery. Dark respected that. When Dark was violent, it was disturbingly, shockingly violent, showing us the deep, dark dimension of violence. Violence was an extension of its core theme: human obsession. Violence wasn't cheap, it came at great mental cost to the people on screen and to the viewer, it came at an apex of an emotional buildup boiling over, it was motivated, it was inescapable, and you could feel that something went click and it erupted. It was painful to watch. You actually didn't want it to happen. It never left you cold. And as such, it was sparse. It stood out.

(No real spoilers for Dark, don't worry.)

The same for mystery. Dark starts as a drama of people, as a story of their suffering, their obsession with each other, but also it roots itself in the mundane. You get to know the characters first. Like a disaster movie it takes its time to first make us care, aided by its excellent, deep casting. You understood very well, at the beginning, how most characters related to each other. Or maybe you thought you did. As the show unfolded you eventually learned several times that your understanding was wrong, supplanted by another, also incomplete view. By the end of the series, I was tracking along on the excellent companion website what the relationships between characters were. It was an intellectual challenge and intriguing.

The same goes for the setting. This show made an excellent depiction of Germany as its setting without ever looking cheap or too mundane, but also never fake. The show is set in multiple time periods and makes it work, but the lure of the initial shots is strong already, the first episode is basically in the now, in the Black Forest, and every shot sells the setting. As a German, I felt at home, but I also felt like it was a home ready to be supplanted by an otherworld, the mystery to come. For Dark being set in Germany was neither just a gimmick nor a mindless choice ("had to set it somewhere"), it brought all the character of that choice, all the flavors. By the end of Dark, could you have imagined it to be set anywhere else?

Same for its chosen time periods. When Dark did mystery in the 1980s, it plays on the themes of the 1980s and West Germany, this odd, incomplete country in a time period full of fear, Cold War, nuclear scare. If American shows depict the 1980s you always feel like in a Steven Spielberg bubblegum childhood (looking at you, Stranger Things). The American 1980s are immature to their core, even when set in the adult world. Look at all the cocaine-crazed psychos and stock brokers. The American depiction of the 1980s is often infantilized. In comparison, the 1980s in Germany had a whiff of the provincial - and you can tell from the old cars, the attitudes, the phones, how people thought about metal music, careers, anything! But the themes of the time are played on, themes people would remember that lived or grew up in the time. The fear of nuclear war and nuclear contamination (Chernobyl happened 1986). Dark replays the fears of the first Ozone Hole to the knowledgeable but in service of its own story, never mentioning what it was referencing. Dark hits the themes of that time exactly, and deepens the provincialism even better in the 1950s. It narrows the outlooks of its characters as it goes further back in time, making our present time and the future seem like evolutions of the imaginable. And yet all in the service of its other theme - the inescapable, the compulsions that bind us, but also the ultimate inescability of the true reason behind why things always act out the same. The brilliant reason that pays it all off.

But here's the thing - when Dark displays violence, sex, emotion, death, or mystery, it displays them all in manageable chunks. It lets them color the mood, lets them lurk in the background, give everything a certain ambiance. But it never overdoes it. It manages to have a narrator who both calms and also mystifies you, luring you in with the familiar feel of old audio plays and a strong voice, guiding you, but you can't trust it.

I really won't spoil Dark for you because it's one of the best shows ever made. Every season I hoped the show would get the chance to run to finish, and when it actually did, it did so to perfection. It didn't do a Lost or Twin Peaks on us - it didn't leave us hanging, it didn't go for a half-baked resolution just because it didn't have an endgame. In fact, the endgame of Dark is brilliant, consistent with the themes of the show, surprising, sad, beautiful, satisfying, but also a goodbye that can't be called a happy end. At that point, you're satisfied with a resolution. The characters on the screen want an end. You want it. But you're not tired of it, you need that resolution. And you get it. The ending leaves us with a sense that both the show and the ending are perfect and it was all coming to this. It was what was needed. Can an ending ever be stronger than that?

And now do that all wrong

1899 manages to botch all of this in episode 1 and never recover. I stopped in the middle of the episode and picked up again later. I restarted the show two times at least just to make it to the end of episode 3. It really dropped the ball on almost everything, trying too hard on all fronts, accomplishing very little.

Take the setting. It all happens on a ship in the late fin de siècle, a time period known for its own fears about the end of century, gripped by similar apprehensions like when we approached the year 2000. We're on a big steam ship, similar to the Titanic. And already this choice makes it unappealing. Almost all of 1899 plays out without natural light, and it's a visual drag. At no point do you feel comforted by its lighting choices, its gaslight makes me feel constrained, boxed in, claustrophobic.

Look at the characters on screen. None of them ever looks like they are having fun. Most of them are introduced as couples with at least one asshole in them. Or as a lone wolf. They're brought together like the unconnected particles they are. A sea journey at that time meant no entertainment but each other, a book, the onboard entertainments - for weeks. So for the luxury class passengers this meant you socialized to have fun. Watch an adaptation of Agatha Christie's "Death on the Nile" or "Murder on the Orient Express" and you get a sense of many people relating to other people (often unsuccessfully, but the try). All the characters in 1899 seem like particles without connection, even after weeks on the sea. They don't know anyone else, they share no stories, and they alienate even the people they know. Who are we to like here? The Chinese ladies pretending to be Japanese? They always argue. The Belgian couple? He's an utter prick. The redhead lady who's supposed to be the protagonist? The gay "couple?" One of them is a complete narcissist and horndog. The strong point of Dark was the web of connections in space and time that a small town generates. All of 1899's characters are unconnected in a way that might work if this was soon turning into an action slash-fest that forces them into relations with each other, but as you keep watching them, you only get ever more tired.

This is of course also rooted in the horrible dialogue. First of all, to reinforce the theme of isolation, practically everyone speaks a different language. Be it the Polish guy shoveling coal into the furnace, the African stowaway, the Belgian couple, the Spanish couple, the Danish second class immigrants, the German captain, the English protagonist, the Chinese pretending to be Japanese... It's hard to get any satisfying dialogue out of this setup. And it doesn't make sense! If a ship set out in a German port at that time, a good deal of its passengers are bound to be German. But instead we get this reference to the Tower of Babel. So, a lot of the dialogue is either establishing a base for communication, or trying to communicate in spite of not sharing a language, and most of the time it doesn't work. And that isn't the worst of it. When people can actually talk to each other, like the German captain and the English loner woman who is almost a doctor, they constantly ask each other questions and never give answers. Who talks like that? It's incredibly frustrating, meant to harbor a sense of mystery, I guess, but also very, very tiresome.

Once you have met all of them, they have barely done anything but argue. There's nobody among them who enjoys anything. If they have sex, they're all obsession without even any joy left. Thrills to paper over emptiness. We even have a couple on their honeymoon but they hate each other. Relatable?? And if they dislike each other, they have good reason to. But speaking about relatable... notice how I don't use names? Because I don't remember any. None of the characters stand out as a person, is addressed by others by their name even that often, nor do you usually speak the language they talk to each other in. So you switch from English to German (if you speak it) to any other language and back.

Lack of light. Unhappiness. A feeling of an oppressive misery, social isolation. Feel like watching?

But wait, it gets worse

Then comes the mystery, and it hits you over the head. This shipping line lost the sister ship months ago. People keep getting mysterious letters inviting them to come. (But nobody ever talks about them. Duh.) Everybody has a horrible backstory and it starts to manifest around them. Pyramids. Scarabs. Mystery hatches and switches.

Err - say what? Yes, you read right. Soon after they find their lost mystery ship - which they are told not to approach - they board it and find the passengers missing - save one child - and then there's a mysterious stranger on board - which nobody notices they've never seen aboard before even after weeks on the ship - who stays in an unused cabin - which the people from neighboring cabins don't notice after weeks of being there - and suddenly we get people showing each other a small pyramid and something something with the mysterious stranger and scarab beetles coming out of his coat sleeve.

Yes, it's very mysterious. It's on the nose mysterious. It's as mysterious as a third rate cult inventing its own mysteries after the cult leader read a book about Egypt once. But that's not the main problem. Atlantis. Bermuda Triangle. Whatever.

The show piles unanswered questions both in dialogue and in what happens on screen. People do mysterious things. Nothing is explained or ties together. The ship is revealed to have mystery rooms (but they make no sense), switches and switchboxes hidden in hidden compartments. People know about them for unknown reasons, like the first mate - but the captain doesn't. So the first mate is obviously a conspirator of sorts. The shipping line knows things it won't reveal and sends telegrams to prevent people from doing what they will obviously do anyway. There are mystery communications coming out of a telegraph ticker in coded symbol language.

All of this by end of episode 3, 150 minutes into the show. Season 1 (which is to be the only season as it didn't get renewed) is 8 episodes long. The show doesn't give you anything, really, in this time. No answers, nothing to satisfy. No joy. For 150 minutes. I hope nobody is mystified why it didn't get renewed.

I mean, come on. It botches the setting. It has mostly unappealing characters. The two main protagonists are okay, I was overjoyed about the casting choice of the captain. But they are then engaged in obscure dialogue and depressing flashbacks. Nobody has anything going for them. The male protagonist is even an alcoholic. The problem is that we are as alienated from these people as they are from themselves by the time they start to connect. And only in few cases even that is pleasant.

Dark was the small town, its connections, but also the secrets, the private spaces, the mystery behind the curtains, the compulsions, the thrills, what you believe in to be right, the struggle, and it was all convincing, compelling, and even parts that initially seemed unconvincing later on came into their own right and explained in their own way.

1899 is alienation that goes on and on. Why should I care what happens to these people? Yes, the protagonist lady has modern morals. She ignores class barriers and tries to do the right thing. The captain also doesn't care if you are a Polish coal shoveler (who is the only charming, nice character) or a black stowaway, as long as you are willing and capable. It's an interesting trait, but way too convenient for the story, and how did he come into a position of authority over hundreds of people to begin with, an authority over life and death, ultimately? How does anything make sense?

The most annoying parts are those where 1899 quotes (or seems to quote) Dark. The obvious one are the credits (which worked for Dark but not so much for 1899) and the song at the end of each episode. The selection of songs is on the nose ("White Rabbit" by Jefferson Airplane - very surreal, 5 out of 5) and at odds with a 19th century show. And the first death is of course a child. But whereas the missing and dead children of Dark lead into the dark heart of the mystery (and are disturbing), this child is, well, dead, and that's bad because she's a child and a girl, alright? Given how little screen time any of the cast gets, we saw her a few times and maybe she was more relatable than others, but you can't call her a fleshed out character. Hell, if it had been done right and for mere mystery, she didn't have to be! But nothing works.

Ein Ende mit Schrecken...

Maybe I'll pick it up again. But 1899 is mostly one thing. Frustration. I just looked up an article why it wasn't renewed. And it spoiled a bit about how things evolve. They don't. And some outright stupid revelations. Yeah, okay, not going back.

Here's the thing. The people that wrote, casted, and directed Dark obviously knew what they were doing. And somehow the people that made 1899 didn't. But will they learn from it?

I noticed that in this day and age creators in the movie industry do not exactly seem to be encouraged to learn from their mistakes. Rings of Power season 1 sucked and was hated by lots of fans? We double down on it because we only consider the feedback from the critics (which is largely bought these days, one feels). The Last Jedi was an atrocious movie? (I watched it on a flight and thought every five minutes "This cannot get worse or more stupid." - and it did.) No, we make an even worse movie! To show you! We tell you it's good!

While it's hard to say what is true of these particular creators or studio execs as a group and unfair to generalize, I get this hunch that nobody goes in and does an honest review of what went wrong and learns from it. Because millions ride on success or failure and egos are on display. I've already resigned myself to the fact that it is by now the fate of almost every franchise to be ruined by incompetent writers and hack directors, maybe things just need to end and the prevalent sequelitis needs to be cured.

But I would hope that whoever made 1899 learns the right lessons from their failure and creates another work as tight and original as Dark in the future. I don't need another Dark, but I would welcome another story of its caliber.

In case of 1899 however an old German adage holds true: Besser ein Ende mit Schrecken als Schrecken ohne Ende. Better a terrible/terrifying ending than terror without end. 1899 dragged on without redeeming itself. It deserved the axe it got. Let's hope the team gets a chance at doing better.

#1899 #mystery #symbolism #dark #cancellation

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sanguine-vitae · 1 year

Text

It was in equal parts terrifying and thrilling to know that there was something in that cave that knew we were just beyond its walls. Not that I’m willing to die just yet, but to know that there was intelligence just an arm’s length away, possible answers, just beyond sight… It asked us to join it in its cave, and there was for a brief moment my thoughts manifest in the voice of another. Demolt. Saying it was a bad idea and that we should run instead.

But where would we be if risks weren’t taken? So as a group we made our way into the creature’s lair. The cave was massive. Large enough to hold the whole clan comfortably if it came down to it. But the occupant. The owner. Was far more marvelous a thing.

A dragon! Never have I been so close to one, let alone talk with one. He invited us into his home as long as we were honest in our mission of peace and protection of the Lord Mayor.

Demolt wasn’t sure still of this creature’s intentions with us, even when he transformed himself into the humble form of a human man, and hid behind me.

The dragon, Soulbraxis his name, told us that the letter we had, the assailants we were searching for, was he himself. It was his letter. His handwriting. His note. Though he told us that he hadn’t meant it like how we, or the assassins interpreted it.

A terrible misunderstanding due to the hands of money and prejudice. Something I am fully aware and empathetic with. It was then that Demolt came out of his shell and began to unruffle his feathers. Im sure it had to do something with Soulbraxis’ words and not eating us, but I think it had mostly to do with his extensive library. Demolt explained that Soulbraxis was a copper dragon, and thus, had a love of stories, and in a show of good will towards him, shared with him a story from his homeland. Something about ducks for children.

It seemed to please Soulbraxis and he shared with us a story of his. About how he and Fenric met. And lo another revelation befell us. That it wasn’t Fenric that had slayed the hydra, but Soulbraxis himself had. But kind dragon he is, he allowed Fenric to take the story and build a town with it, under the promise that he return with more stories at a later date.

He seemed so world traveled and knowledgeable that Ambrose and I - we tried asking a few questions for ourselves. They asked about curses, and I asked about - well. How to extend one’s life. To Ambrose he had no information, saying those were the stuff of fairytale and legend. And to me he -. He shut himself off right quick and told me that there were ways, but they were dark and fiendish, and I would be better off not pursuing them.

But I must. I must keep trying.

For her.

We departed then, with a note to give to the Forgotten Vanguard, the people Soulbraxis hired to deliver a present that turned sour. We were told that it would take a day and a half to get to their keep, and we hoped everything would turn in our favour, and they wouldn’t kill us on sight.

That night we sat around a campfire and shared with each other the worst days of our lives. I don’t know what sparked it. I don’t know why Demolt decided then to recant the tale of how he lost his arm, but he did, and it was a solemn affair.

Patrick went next, telling us how he had tracked a bear to its den, only for the den to collapse and keep him stuck in a cave for a week with no food.

Then Ambrose told of her family breaking apart… It. It was so similar to my own. To my own grief. I felt a kinship with them. Losing their mother, then soon after their father… We are both orphans in a way. I hadn’t the heart to correct them that both my parents are still alive. At least that I know of. I hope they’re both still alive.

I hope my mother is still alive…

Please be alive.

The next morning found us at the Forgotten Vanguard’s keep. We tried to formulate a plan as to how to approach them, when Patrick, strange man that he is, said he saw bright green flashes and began racing off towards the building. When we got there, there were no shouts. No sounds of battle.

Though battle had already been had and what lay before us were bodies. Bodies upon bodies. Patrick had been first into the room and up the stairs with Jericho and myself shortly behind him. When suddenly. Terribly. One of them got back up. Then another. Then another. Groaning and bodies held in unnatural positions and ways.

We flew into battle. Patrick on my right, Jericho on my left, and Ambrose and Demolt piling in as soon as the first spell left my hand.

Despite all of them being capable fighters, the small hoard took a lot out of us. I could feel my teeth itching at the sight of zombies tearing into Patrick’s skin.

And before I, or Ambrose could cast any healing, they were already up another flight, chasing the high of battle, and off I went with them.

There had been noises. The sound of metal on wood. The sounds of an altercation we could prevent. But we couldn’t. By the time we reached the next landing the fight was already over.

A person dressed in robes held another by the neck and out an open window. Their voice was terrible like the grating of nails against bone and spoke of their desires for a perfect world. One without suffering. One without pain. A perfect world… We just needed to lay down and submit. Submit like the Forgotten Vanguard hadn’t, and it cost them their lives. They dropped him then, and we heard the sickening snap of bones, of blood, of meat trapped in crumpled metal. And they turned to us. All locked in some mesmerizing spell. They called us lambs. They said we had potential. That this would not be the last time we saw them.

And like that they were gone.

#the journey

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tittaalbum · 2 years

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Colorful wave sophia mp3

Colorful wave sophia mp3 how to#

It’s about time you knew more about this London-based fourpiece, so let me tell you about them. Soccer Mommy, “Yellow Is the Color of Her Eyes”īased off singles alone, The Big Moon’s forthcoming second album Walking Like We Do is currently my frontrunner for 2020. In this case, “Hallelujah” processes death with a level of vulnerability (and Stevie Nicks energy) I don’t think we’ve yet heard from the sisters HAIM. (Their streak continues, but at least now the music and visuals enhance each other.) It’s so cruel and kind how tragedy and pain will bust open the creative juices. For awhile there, I thought HAIM might’ve run out of steam once they started to coast on PTA-directed music videos. No, but on a serious note, HAIM have been candid about all the shit they’ve worked through on their forthcoming album ( here’s Alana sharing the awful story of the loss of her best friend that inspired her verse on “Hallelujah”). Well, I don’t know who hurt HAIM, but it is inspiring some of their best work since the initial buzz that made them a household name (and worthy of Taylor Swift’s inner squad). Even a track like “Link Up,” a made-for-Instagram pussy-stunting anthem, shoots above algorithm basics to experiment with a beat and even cockier attitude change halfway through. But truthfully, she’s always had the mind of an independent, DIY by-any-means-necessary creator Songs for You is an extension of this ethos. The distinction here is that, now, Tinashe answers to herself. Now here she stands a year later, one label down and one project up - this time, under “Tinashe Music Inc.” This week’s Songs For You is her first independent release, 15 songs reminiscent of her early mixtapes released between bickering with her former label home, RCA, over her albums. In April 2018, I told you Tinashe wasn’t a music-industry prisoner. But this Porridge Radio refuse to give up the fight as they screech through a final crescendo toward the light. “I don’t want to get bitter, I want us to get better” is a very relatable plea for the things we face as we strive to be better to each other and often find it’s much harder than we’d like to admit.

Colorful wave sophia mp3 how to#

“I’m stuck, I’m stuck, I’m stuck, I’m stuck,” she frets, trying to work out how to be a well-intentioned person. It begins with emergency guitars, strings, and a rhythmic patter that’s then interrupted by vocalist Dana Margolin’s assertions of hitting a brick wall. “Lilac” is the band’s first release after having just announced a deal with Secretly Canadian. seaside town of Brighton some years ago, actually sound like their name: Their musical landscape has a viscous, gummy heaviness that is incredibly satisfying to prod around in. There is no way I would ever have predicted the existence of a band called Porridge Radio but now that one exists I cannot understand a world without one. Parker’s greatest trick, though, is you’ll get exactly as much as you put into this song: At a minimum, it’s gorgeous sonic wallpaper, but spend a bit of time with it and it’s a fascinating artistic leap from an artist in the process of cementing a brilliant legacy. “Posthumous Forgiveness” is ultimately the most lyrically direct Tame Impala song that exists, which also makes it the most heartbreaking. Here, he burrows further and further into his own life and memories, exploring his complicated relationship with his father, and how he wishes he could tell him about what his life is like now (hence the song’s title). Parker excels at creating music that exists out of time, using sonic signifiers of the moment (you’d be forgiven if you thought the Weeknd in some way contributed to the vocals here), but as he moves further and further away from the relatively straightforward psych rock of 2010’s Innerspeaker, he continues to find a home in zonked out, hypnotic self-reflection. “Posthumous Forgiveness” is easily the highlight of the latest crop of singles from Tame Impala’s upcoming The Slow Rush, because it doubles down on what front man Kevin Parker does so well.

#Colorful wave sophia mp3

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witch-hazels-musings · 3 years

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Okay okay, I’m super excited and nervous bc i’ve never requested anything but: can I request some headcanons of Dainsleif, Scaramouche and Tartaglia falling in love with a god? I’m the anon from that ask 😅

archons of my heart

this might have been the most different set of short little stories i’ve ever written - each character responds so differently to this scenario! (note: based on what we know about these characters, I stuck true to their values* - it might not be what you were intending, and I keep things true to their character) <3

Warning -> angst (Dain), fluff (Childe), genera/fluff?(Scara - mention of long hair)

Character X GN Reader | Anthology

Includes: Dainsleif, Scaramouche, Childe

Dain

Devastated, conflicted - these words have never resonated more in his mind than the day he found out about who you were, what you were

What does he do … he dislikes, no hates the archons and yet … you were one of them - you’d always been one of them and the whole time you hid this fact from him knowing full well the feelings he had for them

He couldn’t really hear as you desperately tried to explain to him why, he only heard the shattering of his heart as your face turned into something he no longer recognized

He stood there, his hands balled into tight fists at his sides, eyes tracking your movement as you paced back and forth in front of him, your feet wearing down the grass with each passover.

“I know you’ll never forgive them for what happened …” You begin, your voice somehow distorted now that he saw you for what you really were. He didn’t have words to respond, he felt out of his body. An observer rather than a participant, how he wished that were the case.

You stepped closer to him, hands reaching for his arm - the arm that had been tainted for so long - and without noticing he recoiled from your outreach. It was the first time he had ever deliberately refused your touch and, although he understood the pain it caused you, it was clear from the reaction of your face, he couldn’t bear your hands on him. Not now, not when the whole world was crumbling down around him.

You stood there, just the way you always did, incredible, perfect, beautiful and reverent in a way no-one ever looked before - he loved you, he thought he loved you

You were so different than those gods that destroyed everything he ever knew, everything he ever cared for, fought for

If only you hadn’t tried to save him then maybe he could have gone on living in the delusion of this relationship .. though, it was only a matter of time before he found out anyway - one day he’d notice how you never aged ... it was inevitable

To love you, to love you so deeply and intensely; to love you after keeping his heart sealed up for so long, to love you with the passion that burns like the stars in the sky only to know this truth - he felt that light burn out in a painful flash

An eye for an eye - he will maintain his beliefs

“Dainsl…”

“Do not …” His voice caught in his throat, it was the first time you’d heard him be taken over by his emotions, “ … do not speak my name.”

“Please, I love you.” Your hands pressed against your chest, body bent forward as if to beg him, plead with him to reconsider.

“I owe you nothing but the repayment of the life that you saved. I shall spare yours to conclude my debt.” For one final time he gazed upon your face, burning into memory the cheeks that he once touched, the eyes that held his breath, the lips that lingered against his skin and were capable of transforming into the most incredible smile. He looked, he lingered, he tried so hard to will the power in him that would whisk him as far from you as he could go but each time he tried he stalled, like a stubborn fool he hesitated.

Your wet cheeks moved as you studied at him with a hopeful, supplicating smile, your head shook and your lips parted as if to call out to him and the power he lacked to leave you filled him suddenly. Like a flash of lightning in a storm he disappeared from your eyes.

Citizens will often recall the days when it rained with an intensity of a woeful god, and can’t help but notice the mysterious man who would leave the room every time your name was mentioned.

Scara

Cool -- cool, cool, cool - you’re a divine being - bet

It’s very likely that Scara will be excited about this revelation - he already thinks so highly of himself that knowing that he has captured the affection of a god only swells his pride more than it already did

He’s so smug when you tell him, when you spill to him what you are - he doesn't believe it either and will make you demonstrate that power to him and if you look back at him after your display, you’ll see him with a devious grin

Be careful, he may manipulate you to act as an extension of his wishes -- and if he has any vengeance to enact on the people who harmed him, you’ll have to be very strong in your convictions (though, you can do whatever you’d like honestly, you a god)

“Again.” Scara commands, his arms crossed over his chest, head tilted up so he can look at you from his perch on the rock and a smile stretched so far across his face you wonder how his lips don’t steam in pain.

“I’ve already shown you multiple times. Do you still not believe me?” You huff, resting your hands on your hips, adamant that you won’t comply with his request.

“Okay okay, I’m convinced.” He shrugs, hoping off of his stoop and walking toward you. “So how long have you been a god?”

“I don’t know, it’s hard to keep track of the years … though I’d say around 500.”

“Interesting. Can you make me a god?”

“No, I don’t have that authority.”

“Disappointing, but oh well.” He stopped just before you, he was shorter than you so you looked down at him, thankful that he removed his hat otherwise you’d have a hard time seeing his face. He reached for a strand of your long hair, his fingers twirling around it before sliding down the silky strands and repeating the process. “So, why did you decide to tell me this secret of yours?”

“I …” Why did you tell him? You knew what kind of person he was, you knew the actions that would follow - his greed and selfishness would motivate him to use this information for his own advantage. “Against my better judgement, I told you because I love you.” You cover your face with your hand, embarrassed by the confession. It’s the first time you’ve ever fallen in love with a human before, Scara was your first and that notion electrified your skin.

“You love me?” You didn’t need to see him to catch the cocky attitude spilling from him.

“I do …” You replied with a sigh.

“Who would have thought that?” “Listen, if you’re going to make fun of me then I’ll just …” Your voice was cut off by Scara pulling you toward him and pressing his lips against your own. Your knees nearly gave way at the contact and you reached to his arms to stabilize yourself. His lips are thin and the power he uses, the pressure of the kiss tells you what kind of man he is.

“This is excellent news, don’t think I’ll let you get away from me now.” He hummed, his lips dancing over your own as he spoke, his breath warming your skin. Was this really the best human that could have stolen your heart? Well, you were sure it wouldn’t be borning.

Childe

He’s likely indifferent to your real status - to find out that you’re an archon or a god - he’s almost unsurprised by the news

You wonder if he didn’t already know that you weren’t human, you wouldn’t put it past him to have done some digging on you and after being alive for so long it was bound to be suspicious that you knew things that many people didn’t anymore -- it was also suspicious that Zhongli seemed to recognize you pretty quickly, his eyes shining as if he saw an old friend

“You could have just told me.” Childe emphasized, crossing his arms and leaning against the large pole behind him.

“I know … but, well I wasn’t really planning on sticking around.”

“Oh, so you’re one of those.”

“Ah, no! That’s not what I meant.” For being of reverence, you always found yourself stumbling over your words when talking to Childe. “Ugh, I meant that I didn’t think that … well that I’d fall in love with a human.” You picked at your clothes and shook your head.

“If there was ever a human for you to fall head over heels for, I am the best candidate for that.” You looked at him, laughing at the way he pointed his thumbs at his chest and grinned from his own joke.

“I don’t know … maybe I made a mistake?” You express, rubbing your chin with your hands.

“Hey now!”

“I’m joking of course … so, you really aren’t … upset?”

“Why would I be upset?” He asked, eyes furrowing and head tilting to the side.

“I don’t know … my timeline is different from yours for one.”

“So. That doesn’t matter to me.”

“There will be a day when you’ll be old and I won’t have aged a day.”

“Don’t care.” You huff and take a few steps away from him. He didn’t seem to grasp what it meant to be in love with a god. This was the reason you rarely took human companions, the guilt in your heart at watching them age and the pain of losing them was all a strain on your heart.

“Childe …” You begin again but as you turn to face him you notice he’s moved from his place and is now standing in front of you.

“I don’t care who you are, what you are, or what you’ve done.” He takes your hand and brings it to his lips, his breath of humanity filling your very soul. “I love you, and I don’t take that feeling lightly.”

“I don’t want you to regret choosing a partner who cannot live a normal human life.”

“If I wanted a normal life, I wouldn’t be where I am to begin with. What I want is you, and I’m pretty good at getting what I want.” He smirked and kissed each knuckle on your hand. How was it that a man could bring down a god so easily?

“Now, the real question …” Childe’s tone shifted, his body extended to his full height which made you tilt your head to look at him. “Do you still have your divine powers or whatever?”

“Like …?”

“Like, can you summon lightning or manipulate the earth with a snap of your fingers?”

“Haha, oh, I still have my abilities, yes. There were times I had to fight, so I’ve adapted them for those purposes.”

“Excellent.” He grabbed your wrist and pulled you along after him. “Let’s fight, don't hold back.”

“Childe! That’s dangerous.”

“Even better.” He gave you a quick wink before dragging you to a place where the two of you could engage in the battle of his dreams.

#genshin impact #genshin impact X reader #genshin impact headcanons #genshin impact musings #genshin impact fiction #dainsleif #genshin impact dainsleif #genshin scaramouche #genshin impact scaramouche #scaramouche x reader #dainsleif x reader #childe X reader #childe #genshin childe #scaramouche

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onyxoverride · 3 years

Text

Camellias at Sundown

Miche Zacharius x Reader

◙warnings: forbbiden love, mutual pining, happy ending, some angst (familial death + longing,) soft smut minors dni (18+), cunnilingus + stockings, fingering + mirror, then finally sensual sex, Erwin x Levi mentioned.

◙word count: 8k

◙summary: Miche Zacharius has a duty as the only son to the rich Zacharius family to play out his role as the future lord of the estate. But he’s been in love with the you, the gardener of the estate ever since he was young and with inhibitions lessened, he pursues you.

◙note: thank you so much @lady-lunaaa for beta-ing this I appreciate you endlessly to the moon and back. This is for Rias 3k Richboy Collab!! @bakugohoex thank you for letting me participate! I am also doing Yuji which is here: Sweet Secrets. Please support everybody else's fic as well thank you for reading I hope you enjoy!!! I think this may be my favorite thing I've written so far :0

Miche Zacharius has seen the inner workings of his own gilded cage since he was young. Each bar engraved with different obligations — to his family, to his standing in society, to everyone around him except the person he wants most.

When he saw you, it was when you were not old enough to work properly. Playing with the trimming of hedges your mother snipped while he was studying Latin and Italian with a ruler smacked against his wrists every time you caught his eye. To say the least, he had a lot of bruises.

When he and his friends, that he had to make through his position as a rich man’s son, sat outside his eyes would always go to you. Snipping away at the extensions of blushing flowers, some crimson, others an innocent white but all smelling just as sweet. A mixture of jasmine and citrus, subtle but still sweet. This is when his friend Hanji would nudge him, push him towards you in a childlike fashion. The only time where they could truly represent their age. Erwin would chuckle behind a teacup while throwing a glance at his young raven-haired butler, sharing an amused subdued smile. And while his mentors and his nanny weren’t looking he would sneak to you, as quiet as he could almost as if he’d scare you but he is simply too large, even as a child. Making sure his eyebrows aren’t drawn because apparently he looks intimidating like that before getting your attention with a cough (he can hear Hanji laughing behind him at his behavior.)

“Uhm…” his foot is tapping the grass behind his heel while he rubs the back of his neck. Too focused on how he presented himself to you to think of what he should say until he catches the sight of the flowers in your hands, calloused and overworked from the daily work.

“The flowers- uh- what are they?” grimacing at his own words, scolding himself because seriously? They’re obviously fucking flowers you just said it Miche-

Your laugh cuts his thoughts off. Gentle and subdued after years of learning how to be quiet around the people you serve, “they’re camellia’s,” you grasp the blossom of one of the pink flowers and offer it to him.

“Oh,” flower set into the plain of his hand makes it seem smaller than it truly is, blushing against his hand and his face just as pink, “well, they’re very pretty…”

“I’m glad you think so, young lord,” and it all comes reeling back, tethering him to reality once again as you try to continue your duty. You spare one last glance, hoping your mother doesn’t see how wanting it looks.

His tailored suit feeling all too tight as he walks back to his friends, they’re teasing him. Tugging at his shirt while he gives a faux laugh to appease them. He keeps watching, attention torn between the small flower he delicately holds, sweet smell seeping into the lines of his hands, and you. You, who keeps working as quietly as you can, trimming out the weaker flowers so the strong will shine through.

That night he presses a flower into his favorite book and hopes the smell never fades, nor this memory.

■

Instead of asking Nanny for stories or a snack before bed, he’d ask about you. Words travel as quick as fire amongst gossips and as good-natured as the woman who raised him is, she still finds entertainment in running her mouth and knowing too much. So, she’d tell him everything, and often. About how your father passed when you were young like his mother did, how your mother raised you in the small gardener’s house with a small bedroom shared between the two of you. About how your father and mother were the best gardeners they’ve ever had and you were developing your skills even quicker than them, like all of you had a sixth sense for nature. About how you don’t even know how to make or pour proper tea like most of the servants but survive through your skill, hands tracing vines, and keeping track of the tastiest fruit to share with the estate when the grapefruit and lemons bloom and ripen. About how on your eighteenth summer, only a few years ago, your mother passed and you now live alone in the gardener’s house. Even if he has heard it over and over again, he’d tug Nanny’s dress and wait for her to tell her more. Including the mundane about how you trip over yourself too often to count when you enter the house. As quick as fire — you’d hear about it from some other servant that joined you for dinner. Trying to hide heated cheeks and covering your face with the bread you eat. You’d say nothing for the time being, not wanting to drag him further down into a possible affair that would ruin you and him if he continued to pursue this childish crush. But each and every servant, especially the older ones, found it so endearing and just a bit as worrying. They still orchestrated to have you around even just a bit more so he would have more stories to listen to, and you’d slip out little facts about yourself knowing Miche would in the end hear those words. If not from your mouth, at least from someones.

■

Often Miche wonders why he was born at his stature. Not height, though it does become worrying when everybody shies away from him because of how tall he looms. His class stature. Money rolling off of everything he owns simply because of his blood and how he comes from a line of skilled detectives with a superior sense of smell that makes their job seem like child play. It’s not like he wants to spend his life sending you longing looks. The few times you’ve interacted carved into his mind, waiting for the time he doesn’t need to engrave and savor. They are few and far between with barely anything shared besides conversation and gentle innocent touches, loving looks with no words to address them.

Even when his father became ill, he sought you out before anybody else. You know how he longs for you, pulling at your heartstrings every time you catch his gaze. The first time he’s become vulnerable for anybody is when he caught your arm, late at night in the kitchens after arranging some citrus arrangements for his sick father. He’s silent at first, only a small huff through his nose while his hair covers his eyes. He doesn’t like his father, they never cared for each other particularly. It’s as if he barely knows the man, which may be the part that hurts his heart the most.

“Young lord-”

“No-” he sighs, fingers trailing around your wrists, “just Miche. For you, please, just Miche.”

Not once has he ever broken his tough demeanor, carefully crafted from a young age due to his upbringing, but now it’s crumbling even just a bit.

“M-Miche,” it feels unfamiliar but not unwelcome on your tongue, you can see how his muscles unravel at the sound of your voice. You have craved his touch and attention and now that it is night, inhibitions are lessened and comforted by the blanket of stars and quiet household, maybe accepting it isn’t too bad now. Hands gentle around his, realizing just how big they are in comparison to yours makes him huff in amusement. You can tell he doesn’t wish to talk about what plagues his mind, it’s not quite your business to ask either but you bring his hand up to your lips. Not kissing, just grazing over the writing callouses he’s developed and over the flushed joints. He leans forward, pressing you gently against the counter as he pulls his hand away from you. For a moment you’re worried you have overstepped your boundaries, misinterpreted something, but he presses your hands into his face. He looks so much more mature now than from when he stuttered to talk to you as a child. Eyebrows finally relaxed even just a bit from the forever intimidating scowl he wears, eyes closed and savoring your eternally calloused and injured hands running over his scruff. The sweetness from the flowers permeates your skin and the citrus you handled earlier slightly sours the scent. Nonetheless, it comforts him. Your warmth, your scent, and your gaze settled on him. He won’t lie and say he doesn’t like being the only one you’re looking at even if just for a moment. The curse of selfishness love brings upon an individual is unusual to him, you would think by now he would have gotten used to the sting that courses through his gut whenever he realizes over and over again that you are not his, and he is not yours.

Silence extending to the two of you before he presses a kiss into your knuckles, “you should come into the estate more often.”

“Inside would be strange for someone who takes care of plants,” you say, amused with how childlike he sounds despite his deep voice.

“There are plants inside.”

“The maids take care of them,” you caress a thumb over his lips as he sighs, “but I suppose arranging more vases wouldn’t be so bad.”

You cave all too easily for his puppy-dog eyes and the adoration hidden behind his words. But this is all you two can afford. Stolen touches and soft beginnings, hand pressed into his chest with a small kiss into his knuckles and both of you are ripped away from each other once again.

His gilded cage feels too tight.

■

At first, Erwin thought it was just a young man’s infatuation with another person his age. A young and childish crush on a pretty girl that smelled like flowers but gradually as they got older, the others of his social group realized it was much more.

Miche contemplates the scenes outside too sorrowfully for a man who is not mourning. It’s easy to see he’s trying to look for something or perhaps someone. Erwin caught on early why he gazes so strangely outside the window and how Miche twirls flowers between his fingers whenever there’s a vase of them around, fingers trailing along petals and putting them back trying to make the arrangement look undefiled.

For a skilled consultant detective, he leaves a horribly obvious trail.

“From what I know, you’re not supposed to be pursuing a servant,” a chess table sits between them, untouched for a moment for the sake of tea.

“You have no room to talk, Erwin,” he cuts a glance to Levi standing quietly until he scoffs at the insinuation. The red that invades his cheeks cannot be tsked away. They have all been together since they were children — there is no way Erwin and Levi’s secrecy could slip past him, Hanji, and Nile. Miche’s superior senses and being groomed into a detective, he was the first to figure it out. Nile did take much longer to catch on. Too busy chasing after his now soon-to-be wife.

“I’m aware,” he pauses to take a sip of his tea, “I simply said you’re not supposed to. I never said not to.”

Miche hides his face behind the teacup, cursing Erwin for saying anything because now he is putting agency behind his pining. But he is not like Erwin, someone who can be satisfied with secrecy, and he is not like Hanji, someone with a harem under the spell of their charms. He wants you to be his, shamelessly his, loudly and proudly his, and he wants to be shamelessly yours, to tell everybody that his love resides in a beautiful woman with calloused hands and a sweet voice.

He was never strong in the first place when it came to you but now it seems his strength is withering away completely.

■

Ever since Miche mentioned wanting you in the estate more, you have been learning some new skills. Who knew making potpourris could be so useful? The maids inside the estate seem to love them, making the closets smell sweet instead of stale, they even requested some for the bathrooms. You agreed as long as they could spare some cinnamon for you to use in it.

Late in the evening with a sheer bag of your homemade potpourri, you sneak into the household. Catching a glimpse of Miche is not exactly rare but definitely not as common as you both hope. Better than before but still not enough for either of you. There’s a place in your heart that craves to be completed and you know only Miche can satiate it.

What’s frustrating is that the dress code inside the estate is different, so you had to trade some fresh lavender for a pair of white stockings instead of your usual gardening attire. Your clumsiness rears its head once more, tripping on your way to the bathroom on the second story not even realizing Miche is there before he’s holding your arm so you don’t fall flat onto the floor.

It’s highly embarrassing. Tripping so messily in front of him. There’s an art in the way the rich ladies swoon and faint prettily so the one they want to court can catch them but that was nothing of the sort. You see this as an inconvenience not an art form, completely frazzled and stuttering but Miche sees a chance. Erwin’s innuendo bounces around in his head and before he even thinks, he’s pulling you into the bathroom with him, looking into the hallway before closing the door.

He finally takes a moment to process the situation. You and him are alone, in a secluded bathroom away from anybody at the moment. This may be the only chance he has at the moment to pursue you. But instead of being the suave bachelor he should be, he catches a whiff of the strong potpourri and stutters out, “what’s-what’s this?”

Watching a dignified man fall over himself is endearing, seeing his cheeks glow like when he was a kid and his green eyes look more lively when they catch yours, “Oh! I made it. To make places smell good...”

He nods, barely listening as he leans closer into you, pressing you against the sink counter. You are sure you sound foolish but neither of you are really paying attention to that, “you know we shouldn’t be alone together. If anybody sees us-”

“No one will, I promise.”

There’s a firm confidence in his voice you cannot deny, letting his hand trail up your arm and to your jaw.

“Can I?”

The possible consequences of your actions melt into puddles at his desperate look, begging and pleading even just for a kiss. You give in, nodding into his hand.

He’s unexpectedly... soft. Holding you like fine china with barely brave kisses, finally indulging in an almost life-long craving is euphoric. There is a small moan pressed into your connected lips and as soft as this moment is, knowing you make the only son of the renowned family of the Zacharius’ sound so pitiful is revitalizing, filling you with confidence that you never had the courage to grasp onto.

Grasping onto the lapels of his coat, you pull away just for a moment, feeling his hand trail down to the peaks of your ass. Just being touched by him sends heat coursing through your veins and puddling into your nethers. The tops of his cheeks to the tips of his ears are red as roses as he pushes out another request, “can I... touch you more, please?”

His age deceives him, now he looks so young and bashful that you cannot help but laugh, “have you never...?”

“No, it’s not that. It’s just-” he curls down into your neck, “you’re different.” You’re special, is what he truly wants to say.

It is risky. Both of you in a stray bathroom in the estate, both of you of completely different class standings, both of you completely head over heels in love with each other. The warmth of his hands linger on every part of you they have touched, your jaw, your hips, your ass. Maybe the risk is worth it.

“Then touch me all you wish, I have no objections.”

Immediately his hands descend to your thighs, pushing up the uniform dress until he is able to feel your skin under a thin layer of stocking. Trailing his fingers to the warmest part between your legs and it isn’t until you are keening and gasping that he finally pulls you to sit in the chair present in the bathroom for visiting ladies purses. Miche is quick to be on his knees between your legs, working off your shoes to set a stocking-covered foot on the juncture of his thigh as he flips the skirt over his head. Now you cannot see him but you can feel him. Hot breath huffed against your thighs sending a shiver through you.

“You’ve served my family so well,” large hands around your ankle and thigh to keep you in place for him while he is kissing at your cunt through your stockings and panties, “let me serve you now.”

The kiss is a muted feeling because of the fabric but nonetheless, it makes you suck in a breath, watching his head move underneath the dress.

Part of him does not wish to cause you inconvenience but the impatience moves his hands before his mind catches up, blunt nails pinching at the fabric covering the place he can smell that is so purely you. Pinching until a little hole is created so he can wiggle a finger in and tear the fabric a big enough hole to reach your cunt. The rip startles you but the fact that he is desperate enough to act so beastly sends a shiver down your spine. God, this is the scent he could only catch a few rare times, the scent he fucks his fist to at night wishing it was you. But now is not the time to dream. His fantasy is brought to life before him, finally able to push your panties aside and stare at your cunt despite the darkness of your skirt covering him. He lets his hand ghost over your clit, savoring how your hips jump a bit, gathering your slick on his fingers and watching how it pulls thin only to finally put his mouth upon your mound. Not minding the curls accenting it or the lingering smell of soil permanently stuck to your skin. In fact, he prefers it because all of these traits are so distinctly you and he cannot get enough of the fact that he is between your legs and under your skirt.

A hot tongue presses firmly against your lower lips, licking in between until he is pushing his face nose deep into your cunt, nose knocking against your clit as his tongue works around your hole. Your head falls slack against the wall, you fold the leg he is not holding against the chair next to his head as your other foot knocks against his growing bulge. Even just feeling his member beneath your covered foot makes your eyes widen because of the size and how desperately his hips chase the pressure. He’s fumbling to hold your leg firmly against his tightened pants, pushing your ankle against his cock as he devours your cunt with dedication. You wish you could at least see him in his full glory but for now, you are satisfied with this.

If anything, you would compare him to a desperate dog humping your leg and lapping at your nethers like it is his last meal on this earthly plane. You find your hands wanting to dig into his hair but the best they can do is clench the fabric over his head. Your hips are following the flow of his tongue, his other hand placed on them to guide your juicy cunt into his mouth while he moans into it. You can just barely feel the edges of his scruff scratch at the sensitive skin around your inner thighs and cunt. The depth of his voice reverberates through your clit and you can feel an orgasm march steadily along your belly while Miche continuously rolls his hips into your ankle. He could cum just from the smell of your cunt sticking to his lips and nose, just imagine how he feels right now.

But he keeps his pace steady despite some of your squirming, licking until he feels his scruff is soaked by your cum and immediately sets to work on cleaning up your juices with his tongue. You keep a hand over your mouth to muffle your sounds. One last thrust into your leg and he is falling apart quickly, cum sticking to his underwear as his hand roughly grips your thigh so he does not moan loud enough to attract any unwanted onlookers. If only you could see how his eyes roll back and his jaw clench.

Again, you feel a hot breath against your thighs as he shifts your panties over your soaked cunt. He pulls back as you gather your skirt to your hips so you can see him and what a sight it is. Heady green eyes and breathless pants paired with disheveled hair and a wet face and beard, licking his lips and huffing through his nose until most of your juices are gone with his tongue and fingers assistance.

Your hand is still present over your mouth, almost frozen in shock about how both you and Miche crossed a line that cannot be uncrossed. Not that you exactly care anymore, your hands pull his face to yours and into another long-winded kiss where you can taste your own juices and his soft tongue once more.

Reluctantly, he pulls back, adjusting your shoes back onto your feet and leaving a wet kiss to your inner thigh before helping you up.

“I should... wash up. You leave before me,” he presses soft kisses onto your scarred knuckles, turning you toward the door with a tap on your ass that leaves you giggling out a farewell.

Next time he wants to see your face when you cum. He would forfeit heaven and earth just experience you once again.

■

The local police came to him with a theft case not long after you two’s... endeavor. Since he has been busy with that, he has not been able to see you besides the occasional glances into the garden. The case was relatively easy too, despite having to pick up for his father’s lack of presence due to his illness that is slowly chipping away at his life. The theft is either the victim’s brother or his brother’s wife and now it is up to the cops to figure it out and knowing them, it will be a slow process with too much paperwork. Miche can already feel the forming headache swelling on his temporal lobe and has already asked one of the maids present to whip up some soothing tea. Chamomile cannot fix his problems but it can make the stress knot in his shoulders untangle just a bit.

What you did not expect is the said maid shoving the tray of tea into your hands, trading them for the rose potpourri you were delivering to Nanny and pushing you in the directions of Miche’s office. Obviously, she took the chance for you and Miche to interact some more, spurring on the continuation of forbidden love even if it was partially for their entertainment. First of all, you do not even know how to pour tea. You are not a maid, you were never trained in that area but put some garden shears in your hands and you could make the garden look pretty as a painting. It shouldn’t be too hard, right?

Wrong. Your hands are already shaking when you meet Miche’s eyes, his eyebrows shooting to his eyebrows and cheeks flushing, memories rushing back into your minds. The heat of his eyes travels up your neck as you silently set the teacup down beside him. For a second, he observes quietly, letting his eyes venture over you and huffing in amusement with how untrained you seem in pouring tea but enjoying it nonetheless.

But he wants his hands to adventure you, letting his fingers rest on the back of your knee that just barely peeks out of the skirt while you pour as if asking for permission. You throw a glance at him and a nod, setting the teapot onto the desk, bracing yourself on the wood as his hand quickly travels to your inner thighs. Pulling you closer to him with a firm grip on your thigh only for him to pause when he feels the torn edges of the previous wound he inflicted upon the stockings you are currently wearing.

“You’re wearing the same stockings?” he whispers fervently, dropping the paperwork in his other hand in shock.

“Well-” you wish you could explain that these are the only stockings you have and how a hole in the crotch does not necessarily make them unwearable and you do not feel like trading more things for a pair of tights you never wear except inside the estate. If only you knew what that does to him, cock already hardening in his pants at the memories and feeling of your soft skin underneath his fingers. Instead, he pulls his chair back, pulling you to sit in his lap as you catch a glance of someone from across the room. Your heart almost bursts out of your chest before you realize that someone is just you, a reflection in a mirror set against a display case. He adjusts to let your legs be opened wide by his. It does not matter if you crush him or not. You could crush his lungs, and he would still try to let his last breaths be of you.

He can see how the overfilled cup of tea sloshes over the rim but more importantly, he can see your embarrassed face in the reflection of the mirror. A mirror he has been meaning to move somewhere else but is glad he has let it stay at least this long in his office. Fingers trail over your exposed panties, pushing into your clit. The way you moan his name sounds like melted honey over his heart but your expressions are more sinful than anything he has ever seen. Contorting with a bitten lip while his fingers soak themselves with your juices. The only thing of his that has been inside you is his tongue but now he feels the plush hotness wrap around his digits, crooking up into the softest parts you are unable to reach yourself.

Both of you know someone could come in or be listening so you try to keep yourself quiet but with how he is pulling the most unholy sounds out of your body. Letting his fingers dip deep inside you to curl and watching with a chin on your shoulder how your mouth opens in a panting moan. You can feel his cock sitting heavy against your ass, rocking back to please him even if a fraction of the pleasure he is giving you. He takes a firm hand to your breasts to make you lean back into him, holding you firm almost wishing you two could melt into each other as your cunt swallows at least three of his twisting fingers. He wishes he could see how your wet pussy takes his fingers in the mirror but his desk cuts off the image. Your face is plenty enough for him to enjoy, as well as the smell of your cunt permeating the air around him, causing his hips to rock into your ass steadily. He watches you intently until your eyes meet his in the mirror, feeling your insides clench sporadically and having to bring his thumb into your mouth to muffle your loudness.

Maybe one day your voice can be set fully free for him to enjoy. But for now, he savors how your cunt soaks his fingers and how your tongue wraps readily around his finger. Panting in his lap, you grind backward, meeting his desperate grinds until he is finishing in his underwear once again.

Miche holds no shame in finishing in his pants as long as you are pleased before it. Though the temptation to feel your cunt wrapped around his cock instead of his fingers settles in quickly. You catch your breath while leaning back onto him, letting him press kisses into your neck and up behind your ear, letting your hand comb through his hair. There are wishes floating between the both of you of how you wish you two could stay in each other's arms a little longer. But before duty can call both of you away, there is a hesitant knock upon the door causing both of you to fly away from each other, his hands coming to flip your skirt down over your ass and you giving him a handkerchief to clean his fingers off on before the maid that attends to his father peaks in.

“Young lord, your father...”

And with a sorrowful squeeze on your hips, he leaves to follow her, unable to meet your eyes.

■

If Miche could see the inner workings of his gilded cage, he can also see the lock that keeps him in it — His father, currently teetering on the edges of consciousness and the call of death. A sickness that struck him in his old age and kept him bedridden for at least two years.

It is not that he wants his father to die. He would not wish death upon anybody, he just wishes his father was able to understand his passions or him at all before he leaves this world. But instead, he keeps his infatuations secret otherwise running the risk of being disowned despite being the only son. He wishes he could show his father how beautiful the garden you tend is, how beautiful you are. How he would risk everything to be with you, how if you could just hold your hand in front of his father even he’d be able to see...

How if his father could just wake up. But instead, he sleeps. Peacefully, almost suspiciously so. The maid was right to get him. The doctors say his time is approaching and Miche has to make the decision to keep him alive but unconscious or pass away peacefully.

It takes five days for Miche to decide.

It takes five days to plan the funeral as well.

This is one request you wish you never had to fulfill. Preparing arrangements of lilies for the funeral of the father of the man you love. It is not strange to not speak to each other for days but this is different. This time sorrow pulls him away from the one thing that could ease this pain. But for a moment as you prepare the flowers in the church for the service, he is able to be alone with you once more.

You wish you could see him wearing a black tux in a different context. Instead, his eyes are darkened, looking as if he hasn’t slept in days. Cautiously, you let your eyes wander around the church making sure no one besides you and him are present before running into his arms. Leaning into his warmth as he takes a deep breath, curling into you.

The church is completely silent before you speak, “I’m sorry-”

“Don’t.”

How many times has he heard “I’m sorry for your loss” in the past few days? He is tired of it. Tired of being reminded how he probably is not as sad as he should be for his father’s death. The only person that did not say the usual line was Erwin, who clapped his back and said “some doors close for others to open.”

“I wish I could help,” you let your hands rub across his back as he rocks the both of you.

“You are.”

“The flowers don’t count-”

“Not with the flowers.”

You go silent once again, letting him hold you just to find some respite before pulling away. He needs to be the official lord of the estate now, composed and elegant to greet people and thank them for coming. Calloused thumbs smelling of lilies brush over his cheeks before he is pulled back with the sounds of expensive shoes hitting the wooden floor of the church.

Miche hates the smell of lilies.

■

Five more days until Miche is able to reach out again. A note with fancy script you can barely read delivered to you by a giggling maid saying, “Bring camellia’s to my chambers tonight.”

Camellias are still in season luckily. Heart beating fast as you cut some flora at his request, finally you get to see him once more.

The blanch whites and biting red of the camellias do not exactly make the most beautiful arrangement, but they look sweet, almost childish with each other. As you work on different parts of the garden your foot taps the grass flat out of nervousness and you keep glancing towards the sun as if the evening could come any sooner.

Miche himself is pacing back and forth in his room, glancing at a dusty book that has not been touched in years before adjusting a blanket over a chair.

Just as the sun sets your impatience gets the best of you, gathering your bundle of flowers before trying to sneak into the estate without anybody seeing you on your way to Miche. It would just be more of a hassle to be interrogated by other maids or worse, Nanny. But before you manage to knock on his door it is swung open and you are pulled into a kiss that steals your breath. You are trying to mumble against his lips that someone will see the two of you but he only pulls back for a moment.

“And? I am the lord of the house now. It doesn’t matter.” You suppose it doesn’t.

“I could take you against every wall of this house, they can’t do anything.”

You smack his chest with the flowers as he gives you a playful smile, kissing you loudly in the hallway before pulling you into his room. He sits you on the edge of his bed as he walks to his bookshelf, leaving your eyes to wander. Old fencing swords on display, his family crest messily embroidered into a piece of fabric, some stray chess pieces scattering the countless amount of bookshelves present. There is even a vase filled with a variety of dried flowers that you recognize from the garden you have tended since you were young.

There is a quiver in his step as he retrieves a dusty book from the shelf, nerves making his leg shake as he sits next to you. He’s acting too formal, it makes you stiffen and shift your full attention as he clears his throat.

“Do you remember when we were young, in the garden?” Tilting your head you almost say there were plenty of times when you two were young and in the garden, but the most memorable one was when he was staggering and lanky, walking up to you red as a sunburn and leaving with a flower pressed into his palm.

“That time you asked me what flowers were?”

Miche’s face turns just as red as when he walked up to you as a young boy, still the memory haunts him but more than anything he remembers how hopeless he felt after he held a small flower in his hands, knowing he could never truly pursue you. Until now.

There is a flattened pink disc that still lingers with the sweet scent of camellia. Something close to jasmine that has long seeped into the pages of the book. It contrasts the fresh red and white flowers in your hands so readily, freshly bloomed in the spring sun and picked just for him.

“Yes,” he clears his throat once more, hoping his nerves will clear with it, and sets the dried flower into the palm of yours. Of course, you remember this. A bloom you snipped too short that your mother would have scolded you for if she saw. A bloom you gave to him hoping it would satisfy the want in his eyes.

It was when he realized his gilded cage was too tight. A gilded cage that now has no lock, door swinging open for Miche to finally stretch his wings.

“I am the lord of the house now,” you nod, wondering at what he is getting at, “and I am the last Zacharius,” uhhuh, “and the police won’t stop working with me even if I run the chance of losing my social status...”

The blood in your body rushes to your face so quickly it almost makes you dizzy. He holds your hands, thumbing over the fresh flower petals before kissing your knuckles of the hand that holds the dried flower.

“Are you saying what I think you’re saying?”

“Unless you don’t want me to say it.”

Tears are gathering in your eyes and you can’t help but smack his broad chest with flowers over and over until he is giggling and fallen flat into the bed beside you. Letting the petals fly across the sheets until you are fully satisfied with the hits you have served. The singular dried pink flower is amongst the carnage of petals, discarded and forgotten in the sheets.

“Can I take that as a yes?”

You swing a leg over his hips, “yes. Always yes.”

He gives you a boyish smile of true excitement before he leans up to trap you in his arms, pulling you into a kiss filled with smiles and giggles.

“Since you are on top of me...” he sets your hips closer to his, letting his slowly growing bulge be known.

“You’ve become less gentlemanly with me, it seems.”

“I will always be a gentleman to you, my love, let’s say I am now more honest, shall we?”

You hum into his lips, letting his hands venture underneath your more casual dress to feel bare skin, ghosting over your ass only to feel no presence of panties.

“If innuendos make me ungentlemanly, what does no panties make you?” he breathes against your lips.

A whisper of “who knows” is the response he receives before you are rolling your hips into him, capturing him in another messy kiss as his hands meld into the fat of your behind, guiding you in your grinds. Intoxicating, every kiss you allow him only pulls him further into the mix of you and flower petals.

It only takes a moment to flip the two of you, letting him push your dress up until you are pulling it off yourself. Miche sits back to watch for a moment, letting his eyes adventure across the body he has never fully seen but craves more than anything before he unbuttons his own shirt. Slowly, almost temptingly so until he reveals himself fully to you. The hunger to see him in his full glory finally satisfied and glory is the most accurate word to describe him. Strength set in his broad shoulders and chest with a bit of pudge settling on his belly decorated with a brunette happy trail leading to the biggest cock you have ever had the pleasure of seeing. Intimidatingly big, accented by heavy balls with cute curls. He lets you stare as he does the same, the last of the setting sun shining through the window to shine on your skin along with some of the petal carnage sticking to your body. It is only when you close your legs after shifting your gaze that he settles on the bed once more, kissing the tops of your knees

“Must you really hide from me?” He has been knuckle and tongue deep inside you, it is long past the time for such shy, albeit adorable, actions.

You bloom into his embrace, letting your legs fall open to frame his own and his eyes settle straight onto your cunt. He gives a sly boyish smile, licks his lips, and before you can close your legs with a squeal of “don’t stare!” he dives down. Once again letting you feel the softness of his tongue on your lower lips and clit, gathering spit onto your clit to let slide between your folds to your hole to help with the next step.

It is a quick kiss to your cunt before he pulls himself up and over your body, rubbing his scruff along your neck before letting the tip of his cock tease your clit. A soft exhale of his name breathed against his hair, and he kisses your jaw, mumbling into your ear, “can I?”

Your nails make residence on his back as you echo your previous words, “always yes.”

Once more he captures your lips, swallowing your gasps as his tip stretches you out slowly. Part of him wishes to see how your pussy blossoms open at the coaxing of his cock but he would much rather experience your first official time together up close. Hearing every moan and hiss he pulls from you and feeling your nails scratch against his back. Resisting the temptation to cum immediately when he feels the softness of your cunt wrapping around him.

But he pauses when you whisper a small ow, not pushing any further until you say and peppering kisses onto your eyelids as you sigh in pleasure. Now you know for sure he is definitely big enough to hurt, “damnit.”

“Sorry love, almost halfway I promise.”

Half? Halfway? “Almost halfway?”

His chuckle reverberates through you, embarrassed with how you are implying how even half of his cock is hard to take. He pushes another kiss onto your lips, rolling his hips in and outwards only a tad to soak more of your juices on his cock. Inch by inch he sinks into you, pulling back whenever he feels your face grimace to coat his cock with more of your self-produced lube, thankful you are aroused enough to even produce any. Until he is fully seated within you, even him not moving makes you breathless.

Hands press into your cheeks making your eyes open to look into his. A beautiful green no plant could ever wish to achieve. He whispers against your lips once more, asking for a sign to make sure you are ready and quickly you answer back yes. Locking your legs behind his thighs to roll back into his, the stretch is stinging at first but the more thrusts he sends into you the less of a problem it becomes. Eyes rolling back into your head and mouth open to let moans fly free, the pleasure is nothing compared to his fingers or his tongue. His member hits the softest parts inside of your walls, pulling an orgasm out of you before you even realize it. He holds you as you spasm around him, letting your nails dig into his back and resisting the urge to cum with you.

Patiently, he waits until you are trying to catch your breath to pull out, tugging his cock covered in your juices to spill his cum onto your belly. Later, he will think about the possibility of having children. For now, he wants to enjoy every moment with you, just you.

More kisses are pressed into your face that you gladly return, letting him rest above you in a comfortable cage. However, the night is just beginning — why waste the dark embrace of the stars with sleep?

■

Late in the morning, there is a knock on Miche’s door which tears his warmth away from you. Throwing a robe on before peeking the door open to see Nanny standing there with a smile on her age-worn face. His heart drops to his toes, knowing that your endeavors will now be shared with every single servant in the house if they did not happen to hear them last night.

“Should we bring you two breakfast — no, lunch — in bed?”

There is a blush settled in his cheeks because essentially he is being teased by the woman who raised him but he only mutters out a yes please, before making his way back to the bed to curl around you once more. A warm hand placed over your puffy and abused mound to ease at least some of the sourness settling in. But at least finally you two get to bask in the heat of each other in the comfort of his own bed, even if there are still flower petals sticking to both of your bodies.

■

“You didn’t have to do this.”

“But I did,” Erwin adjusts his tie in the mirror, one set against a display case in Miches office. As much as Miche objected at first, it was easy for Erwin to become an Officiant and Miche will forever be grateful for why.

A pretty silver band set with precious stones is twisted around between Miches fingers. Erwin speaks up once again, “Nervous?”

“No,” he huffs out of his nose, “excited.”

■

Never once in your life have you imagined maids fretting over you like a highborn lady. Adjusting your dress and hair until you have to shoo them away otherwise you would go mad. You aren’t exactly sure how fancy ladies stand so many hands on them. It is not a huge voluptuous dress either, you did not want one. The maid dresses were even too fancy for your taste, becoming all too accustomed to overalls caked with soil or casual dresses with branch-tugged tears. It hurts knowing nobody but his friends will be here, neither of your parents being alive to see how happy the two of you are but you know your mother would scold you with tears in her eyes and kiss your forehead to know how proud she is of you. You are not sure what your father would have done but if he loved you as much as your mother claimed, you hope he loves the happiness you are experiencing as well.

Levi is waiting at the door for your arm. After becoming close to him throughout a year of officially being Miche’s partner, you two have grown close, bonding over being born in lower status’ than your lovers and teasing the both of them when they show particularly pompous attitudes. And whenever Hanji would flirt, instead of being met with heat down your neck like it was at first, you throw playful quips back until they are keeling over, laughing their heart out.

Levi is silent, but he tucks a red camellia behind your ear with a hand lingering on your cheek. You are lucky he even decided to show affection but you know everything he does comes from a pure place in his heart.

The ceremony is informal, only you and his friends beside another maid and Nanny that has been keen on getting you and Miche together present. Erwin is there to officiate and Levi steps on his foot to cut a soon-to-be long speech short so you two can shut up and kiss already, in Levi’s words.

If only Erwin, Levi, Hanji, Nile and his wife knew what that garden has seen in the early hours of the morning when both you and Miche were struck with the idea of fulfilling a fantasy. Then surely they would not be stepping around the base of the grapefruit tree so casually. The maids already know — quick as fire, remember?

Miche Zacharius has seen the inner workings of his own gilded cage since he was young. But now, finally after all these years, he can experience the life he has always wished for, filled with freedom and passion blowing under his stretched wings.

𝔱𝔞𝔤𝔰: @kenmachishi @novvabeam @armins-bowl-cut @yourtamaki @jeonmahito @peachysimp @thethyri @bakugos-cumsock @peachy-momos @tetsunormous @ixwrites @bakugohoex @iwaizoomies @ectacy @bunnelliee @snkfade @iiraven @babieweeb @dancingazaleas @jellyfiishing @flamingblinglove @whats-her-quirk @venenat3d @erenpapi @ive-always-hated-you @michezacharias-wiki

𝔱𝔥𝔞𝔫𝔨 𝔶𝔬𝔲 𝔣𝔬𝔯 𝔯𝔢𝔞𝔡𝔦𝔫𝔤, 𝔩𝔦𝔨𝔦𝔫𝔤, 𝔞𝔫𝔡 𝔯𝔢𝔟𝔩𝔬𝔤𝔤𝔦𝔫𝔤 !! ʕ◔ᴥ◔ʔっ♥

Did you enjoy? remember any and all feedback and thoughts are appreciated and enjoyed. I’m sending you love and well wishes.

//: 𝖒𝖆𝖘𝖙𝖊𝖗𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖙

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lovenona · 3 years

Text

ON THE SACRED BONDS OF BROTHERHOOD.

synopsis; choso may be their beloved frat brother, but he’ll always be your brother first. (for the frat au collab.)

pairing; frat boy! choso x f! reader

contains; stepcest, dubcon (reader is under the influence but having a good time), extensive descriptions of knife play and blood play, marking (choso carves his name into you), oral (f! receiving), borderline yandere/possessive choso (he loves you A Lot), choso goes from mean to Soft, consumption and romanticization of drugs and alcohol, (1) use of ‘angel’, reader is afab and uses she/her pronouns, this is essentially all foreplay and ends before the fucking because i got tired, minors do not interact or perish

word count; 6.5k

the yard outside is clean, well-kept. there’s talk that the house’s landlord is a retired gardener who receives great joy from keeping up the hydrangeas and peonies along the sidewalk. it’s certainly award-winning, that front yard, with its colorful blossoms and plush bees circling the mailbox.

they’re so lucky, students bemoan on their way to and from class. i can’t believe the frat boys get to live there. i bet they don’t even know how lucky they are.

it’s a seemingly kind house from the outside – recently renovated with navy blue paint and white trimming, a large front porch and a few inviting windows. the place that omega lambda now calls home is, simply put, a dream. it sits just a few minutes from campus and it tells the street proudly, fondly, that there is no better place to be than here.

it’s true, in some respects, that omega lambda likes to see themselves as above the sweat and grime of their fellow frat brothers. they don’t spend their weekends “fucking and drinking” and tracking dirt across the carpet like animals. their fun is calm, refined: to be invited to a night with omega lambda means a night of smoke curling into the air, of gossip over olive-colored couches, of pills under tongues, of ease and relaxation.

it’s slower than the others, they say in the back of monday morning lectures, but no less extreme, no matter what those boys try and tell you.

i think i was tripping for days, the girl from psychology 101 boasted. whatever the fuck yuuji gets is strong.

such stories amaze you: and even as you stand on the sidewalk outside the perfect blue house, petunias curling inward with the evening breeze, you cannot believe they are real. it’s hard to imagine the face of your beloved stepbrother tied to these antics. it’s hard to imagine that the boy who used to come home every winter and summer with bloodshot eyes and a beat-up skateboard also swore a loyal, unbreakable oath of brotherhood to a band of boys you’ve never met.

it’s hard to imagine that your own stepbrother, choso, the one who taught you how to ride a bike and how to apply eyeliner and how to kiss without teeth, quite literally runs what has been dubbed the chillest fraternity on campus.

but yet, here you are, new to university, fresh-faced and eager, cowering outside the door of the omega lambda residence. your favorite skirt hovers around your thighs and you tug at the collar of your shirt, fiddle with the charm of the necklace choso gave you for your birthday a few years ago.

he’d invited you here almost immediately after learning that you and your roommate had tried your hand at partying with beta pi epsilon. naoya is trash, choso’s fervent texts read the next morning. absolute dick – don’t trust him. come hang out with us instead. he’d attached the address of the blue house along with a reminder to have a snack and take some medicine for your godforsaken hangover.

the message had taken you a little by surprise. choso’s always been sweet to you – doting, even, if you wanted a better word for it – but you hadn’t been sure how he’d handle attending the same university. your other friends all complain that they’d rather die than see their families; twins separate after orientation, brothers and sisters look the other way if they pass each other in the quad. you feared choso would be the same, that the omnipotent attention he gave you at home would completely dissipate the moment you moved into your dorm.

but his text reaffirms you, if anything. and although your roommate had opted to be wined and dined by the boy from calculus this evening, you don’t mind attending alone. her absence from your side only means you will be able to see your stepbrother without a distraction.

the music buzzes through the door as you knock and wring your fingers on the doorstep. should you just walk in? should you text choso and wait for him to fetch you? the ins-and-outs of frat etiquette cloud your mind until the door swings open and you’re met, face-to-face, with a young pink-haired man dangling a blunt from one hand and his phone, opened to his spotify playlist, from the other.

“hi,” you say, words foreign in your throat. “choso invited me?”

“oh, cool,” itadori yuuji says, shrugging his shoulders like he never would have questioned it. “come on in. you can put your shoes over there.”

while omega lambda is not packed from wall to wall as your night at beta pi epsilon had been, the various couches propped against the walls and surrounding the living room coffee table are nearly packed to the brim with the frat brothers and their guests. the air, hazy with smoke and desire and drinking, shifts and swirls as it curls around purple LED lights before fogging up the windows and disappearing up the stairs. it is warm here, easy, like dropping into the depths of a pleasurable dream.

“there’s drinks in the kitchen,” yuuji is saying, voice thick with his high, “and we’ve got some other stuff on the table, although you’ll have to pay yuuta for those–”

yuuji’s narration is cut off as a familiar figure crashes into yours, sweeping you into a hug so tight you fear your bones will snap from the pressure. choso smells like the cologne you bought him for his birthday, like fresh laundry and comfort; you breathe him in, deeply, and let yourself relax into the soft cotton of his black t-shirt.

“glad you could make it,” choso mumbles into your skin. he draws back slightly, drinks you in, your little skirt and your dainty socks that he’s always been partial to. he looks from you to yuuji, still vibing to the side with his playlist, and his eyes crinkle in what must be mirth.

“it’s good to see you,” you say.

“you saw me at lunch with mom last week.” choso smiles, the black line across his nose crinkling when his eyes light up.

“you get what i mean.” you tap his shoulder, lightly, as emphasis. the anxiety dissolves; it’s you, and him, like it’s always been. it’s your stepbrother choso who watches your shadow and wraps you up to keep the rest of the world at bay.

but the tender moment is broken when someone, a tall blonde girl with the aura of a lioness, calls out to choso to ask him for assistance. he looks at you, a bit forlorn, before telling yuuji to help you get settled in and making his way to the other end of the living room.

“yes, this way!” yuuji grabs your arm and drags you across the floor like you’ve known each other forever. “i make some fucking good drinks if i do say so myself.”

which, consequently enough, is how you find yourself losing your mind within the walls of omega lambda.

it’s not that you’re a virgin to the world of cocktails and lime and pills: it’s that you’re too sweet to know when to stop. it’s hard to tell yuuji no more, thanks when his face is so bright, when he and the strange, blue-haired frat brother mahito are asking you to try this and try that and to let us know what you think.

so you let yourself sway through the house, from couch to couch, listening to this mahito boy tell you about his latest philosophy courses as he dances cold fingers across your shoulders, listening to yuuji explain the very serious business of pulling an all-nighter without coffee, watching the LED lights shift from purple to blue and back again.

(you’re not sure where choso is. perhaps, in your altered state, he’s sitting just across from you and you don’t even know it. but you don’t mind, because his brothers get along with you just as well. you don’t mind, because you’re too drunk or too high to know any better.)

“and how are you doing?” a dark-haired man slides into the empty couch space next to you. arms littered with various tattoos and dark hair pulled back into a casual half-bun, he could have been your beloved choso had he not exuded such finesse, such arrogance, which choso could never be capable of doing.

“i’m alright,” you say, but you’re more than alright. the room is so warm and your brain is so fuzzy that you might melt into the couch if someone looked away for even a minute. “i don’t think we’ve met before? i’m choso’s stepsister.”

he simpers, a humid thing, one that coils around your eyelids and sets your insides alight. “ah! i’ve heard a lot about you. it’s nice to meet you.” he holds out a manicured hand; black nail polish glimmers in the dim light. “geto. i’m one of choso’s frat brothers.”

his handshake might take your soul with it. his hands are smooth, refined. you swear he can feel your quickening pulse as you introduce yourself. he watches you like you might be the only person in the room, like you might be the sweetest thing to have ever crossed the threshold. and filled with rum and liqueur and confidence you take it, gladly, because you’re young and the thought of university still puts stars in your eyes.

“so what are you studying?” geto is saying, prying you apart, picking through your history. he’s in his final year and you’re in your first and he knows all there is to know while you still have nothing. you latch onto him because he gets it, because he’s handsome, because you’re silly and desperate and drunk. somewhere along the way your thighs touch and his hand greets your shoulder and you think that you finally made it into his lap because mahito complained that the couch was too full.

geto smells like expensive cologne. you smell vaguely of lemons and shampoo. yuuji jokes with you from across the table and you like it, the way these brothers’ eyes fall on you.

so you spiral, further and further, into a daze you cannot escape from. you barely react to geto’s firm hand snaking up your bare thigh because you are too busy trying yuuji’s latest creation and asking mahito for more of whatever he gave you. it’s fun, it’s weightless; you feel beautiful, supreme, like the kind of college girl you’re supposed to be. you’re desirable, cute. you’re the girl to be in love with, the one who sets the scene.

those rumors were right. the party is certainly slower than the other frats you’ve visited, with more emphasis on sitting and vibing than on dancing and drinking games, but no less extreme. you’re so far out of your brain that you wonder briefly if it will ever be possible to come back down. maybe you’ll be her, on monday morning, the girl who’s still tripping.

“you know,” geto is saying, his breath eerily close to your pulse, a moment away from pressing a kiss to your cheek, your neck, “you should stop by more often.”

“yeah?” you hope you sound sexier than you are. “i’d love to–”

“excuse me,” choso’s voice cuts through your lazy fantasy like the sharp fall of a guillotine. “i’d prefer if you didn’t hit on my sister, geto.”

geto’s laugh reverberates against your back, your ears. his grip on you lightens immediately, and whatever words he’d saved for you die away. “i’m not,” he says, but his voice is too easy to be honest. “just keeping her company. right, sweetheart?”

you’re finding it hard to see straight. caught in this game of cat and mouse you find you can do nothing but sit lamely in geto’s lap and watch choso’s favorite necklace reflect the purple light. it’s only after a revolution around the sun you realize you haven’t spoken, that you’ve done nothing but hover, a lot of drunk and a little high and a little nervous, between one man and the other. you mumble a yes in affirmation but it’s clear from the tension that choso doesn’t believe it.

“oh, for fuck’s sake,” choso sighs. “come on, then. you’ve had enough for one night.” familiar arms lift you off the couch and you stumble, much like a baby gazelle, into the safety of choso’s chest. the room spins with the sudden change; you cling to him like a lifeline as you abandon the party to head upstairs.

of course, bedazzled out of your mind, you do not question when choso leads you to the end of the hallway and over the threshold of his bedroom. it feels expected in a way, safe, as if the party had always been meaning to end here. as if there was no other place you should be.

“so?” choso asks, casually, shutting the door behind him with a damning click. “did you enjoy being a little whore with my brothers?”

his words take a long moment to settle in your ears. you’re caught in the swirl of euphoria in your brain, the black t-shirts scattered across the floor, the small houseplant you once bought him seated on the windowsill. it warms your heart to see it there, after all this time.

“well?” choso demands your attention. he takes your jaw in his hand and lifts your eyes to meet his gaze. his silver rings, imposing and cool on slender fingers, burn into your heated flesh like embers. his eyes swim with distaste and you know it’s your fault, somehow, but when the walls tilt and your rationality fogs over, you can’t quite pinpoint why.

“i–” your words catch in your throat. it’s clear, from the darkness in his eyes, from the way his nails dig into the soft flesh of your jawline, that anything you say to defend yourself will be futile. it’s choso’s world, you’ve always known, and even now, you’re merely living in it.

“i invite my sister to see me, because i miss her,” choso’s words nestle themselves deep into your bloodstream, settling amongst the brandy and wine, “and she chooses to spend the night bending over for my brothers. how do you think that makes me feel?”

it’s a look you know: a look that has haunted you for hours and days, a look that you know better than any other. it’s the look that guides the hand between your legs at night and the look you recreate in your mind’s eye when your vibrator just isn’t enough. you’re crumbling already, like sand beneath his touch.

“i’m sorry,” you say to him, but the words are soft and whispered things, shy beneath the weight of your own guilt and disappointment. “i didn’t mean to–”

“no,” choso admonishes. he steps closer, guiding you backwards until his bedsheets brush the backs of your knees. “of course you didn’t. you’re still too dumb to know what you’re doing.” his voice, evenly condescending, hardly matches the gentle brush of his fingers as he moves to cup your cheeks. you close your eyes against it, savoring the shivers he sends across you body with every heartbeat, every movement. “still need your big brother to keep you in check.”

you do not respond: he does not intend for you too. instead choso presses you back until you fall onto his bed, crawling over you to cage your body beneath him like a predator and its prey. your brain falters with the sudden movement, with the lateness of the hour and the depravity of your position, but you can do nothing but look at him with your helpless doe-eyes while something saccharine pools in your belly.

“look at you,” choso says. “high out of your damn mind. good thing i caught you when i did. who knows what would have happened.”

you believe him, you do, especially when choso dips his head to kiss you and demands your subservience. his tongue licks the aftermath of your cocktails from your lips and claims the expanse of your mouth, your teeth, your sanity. you let him take you, body and soul, even when you’re clamoring for air and freedom. there is no safety but choso’s lips, flavored with his cinnamon chapstick, no sacred home but the warmth of his mouth.

“there’s my girl,” choso breathes, nose brushing against yours as he pulls back for air. “going to be good for me now? going to make it up to your big brother?”

he doesn’t wait for a response; fingers dance along the silk of your blouse as he undoes each button, one by one, letting his fingers dip slyly against the newly exposed expanse of your collarbone and your chest and your stomach. you make no move to stop him, caught somewhere between choso’s aura and reality and time.

(and maybe in another life you would have stopped him. maybe in another life you would have been ashamed. but it’s choso, your sworn protector and god among men, and you would be a fool to try and stop the one who knows best. he is safety, protection. who knows what would have happened if he hadn’t taken you away when he did.)

“is this new?” choso asks, studying the curve of your bra as he rests against your hips. “who are you trying to impress?”

it’s thin lavender lace, choso’s favorite. your face warms at the observation and you turn your head away, nestling among the sheets, as if you could escape choso’s eyes: but his fingers still trace the material and you can still hear him breathing and you know he will never look away.

“i just got it,” you answer, humbled and mildly humiliated and certainly a little fucked up. the words are slow and imprecise as you stumble over your own tongue. “i wanted to…treat myself.”

choso’s exploratory hands move from your bra to the waistband of your skirt. “could’ve just asked me,” he says earnestly, intently. “i would’ve gotten it for you.”

your affirmative hum is lost when choso mindfully pulls your skirt down your legs and discards it somewhere in the shadows of the room. he says nothing of it, of the thin fabric or the way it flattered you just right. perhaps he is jealous of it. perhaps he does not want to remember the way his brothers looked at you when you wore it, the way geto’s hands caressed the places no other man should go.

“they match, i see,” choso gestures towards your underwear. terrified and knowing and aware that you’re growing damper with each passing minute, you press your thighs together. “they’re cute.”

“t-thank you,” you whisper. “i… i got them for you. your favorite color.”

he smiles, a precious and glorious thing, a smile that causes flowers to grow and birds to sing. you electrify at the sight of it, blissful only when he is.

“i’d hope so,” choso says, “because i don’t think i could take it if this was meant for someone else.”

he reaches over to the nightstand while his words claw through you. choso smells like cinnamon and safety and pleasure; your heartbeat quickens as his t-shirt brushes against you, as your world collapses into nothing but choso’s profile, his butterfly hair-clips and his glowing skin and his power.

when choso settles back over you, resting against your thighs until you think you might die of it, something silver and shiny rests in his palm. you’d recognize it even if your eyes were closed, if the room were so dark that you couldn’t see if you tried. a searing and insatiable sensation lodges itself in your veins; it is fear personified, it is anticipation of a behavior you cannot even name.

choso twirls his beloved switchblade deftly between his well-manicured fingertips. it reflects the low-light of the room. it calls out to you, the beautiful and dangerous thing, a siren’s song that promises both your misery and your fortune. choso’s face is relaxed, serene, as the envy and the fury seemingly melts away from him and leaves only a disinterested vessel behind.

he lets you study it, lets you study him, and you know he’s pleased when he can feel your thighs tense, when you try so damn hard not to let choso know just how affected you really are. he shifts, grinding gently against your pelvis as he moves, causing you to bite your lip in a desperate attempt to surpress the gentlest of moans.

“well,” choso says, disregarding the state he’s slowly working you into. he shifts down your body and runs a lackluster hand across the lacy expanse of your underwear. shivers pierce your navel, silver rings poison your skin. it’s all you can do to watch him, his heartless eyes and his casual form, as his thumb prods at the place where you underwear crosses your hip. “let’s get these off. i’d hate to have anyone else see you in them.”

you feel the blade before you see it. cold, unfriendly, it rests against the gentle skin of your hip, a killer ready to take a life. a humiliatingly choked whine is out of your mouth before you can swallow it; your gasp reverberates throughout the room, the sound of one who knows they’ve lost a fight.

“choso–” you breathe, but you don’t know quite what it is you’re asking him for.

he doesn’t answer immediately, opting instead to tease you further with the blade as he presses it against you until goosebumps rise in chorus. your fingers curl in on themselves, desperate for purchase, while fear and longing hum everywhere in your being.

“don’t worry,” choso says. “i’ll buy you more. now be good and stay still.”

you want to writhe, to lash out and squirm beneath the intensity of the moment, but you fear choso’s disappointment more than you crave such release. your big brother choso has never been afraid to hurt you: to pierce the skin where it hurts, to draw blood where he means it. if you move, the blade will move with you. you know this as you know every scar choso has left behind.

it’s agonizing, this pace. choso’s tongue peeks out from between his teeth as he works with the ease of a great master. it’s like watching paint dry, like waiting for grass to grow or continents to shift. he cuts away at the expensive lingerie you bought just last weekend like he has all the time in the world, like he does not care if the sun rises and you are still crying beneath him.

(and he does it, you know, because you’ve never been one to be patient.)

“choso,” you whine, drawing his name out, long and frustrated, as if in song. “go faster.” your legs twitch in protest and the blade comes ever closer.

“no.” choso does not even spare the kindness to look at you, his beloved little sister. “stop whining.”

the rest of your complaints lodge in your throat. you fear disobeying him, so you grip the comforter like a lifeline, exasperated tears pooling in the corners of your eyes as the blade cuts through your clothes and ghosts across the bare skin beneath. it’s embarrassing, really, the way you can feel yourself becoming more and more desperate the further choso drifts away from you, the more he refuses to indulge.

you wonder if he can sense the arousal on you, feel it, smell it, even, like you’re nothing but his own little plaything in heat.

after an eternity, the blade finally cuts through your panties with a satisfying rip. the torn fabric sits pitifully against your hips, a reminder of your own subservience, until choso peels it away from you with enough condescension to move you to tears. the cool air of the room hits your thighs, your cunt, like a ghost who’s taken up residence beside you.

blissfully unaware of your feelings, choso studies the remains of your ruined underwear, the thin fabric and the obvious stain of your arousal. locking eyes with you, he bring it to his nose for a brief and pleasurable inhale before he discards it somewhere on the other side of the room.

“there we are,” he says, as if he hadn’t just smelled yourself in front of you. “now no one will ever know about it but me.”

“choso,” you whimper, hot. it’s a gift and a humiliation to be beneath him like this, to shake with need and yet to be denied it, to ask for something, for anything, in a voice so unabashedly loud that anyone who passes by the door might hear it.

he ignores you, again, and turns his attention to your bra as it flutters against your fervent chest. you watch with wide eyes as the blade comes closer, closer, dancing against your ribcage and sending ice into your lungs until it slices through the front of your bra, down the center of your chest, like the thin fabric was made of nothing but water.

“get rid of this,” he says; you listen. with quick and quivering fingertips you shimmy your way out of the delicate material and toss it over the side of the bed faster than the speed of sound. choso, pleased with your obedience, intently traces the curve of your breasts, thumbing your nipples until you find yourself arching into his touch.

(choso, you mumble, eyes falling shut at the feeling. still, as always, he does not listen. he draws his hands away.)

it kills you, the way choso’s eyes possess you, own you, dictate the movement in your bloodstream. it’s akin to being pulled along on marionette strings, a puppet of choso’s own design, made to dance for him and him alone.

it’s the prize he deserves, your big brother, to own you and protect you, body and soul.

it’s that very intensity which moves you to misty tears, which causes your hands to fly out to meet him against your better judgement. choso lets you pleasure yourself for a moment with the texture of his t-shirt and the outline of his shoulders before brushing your hands away like unnecessary flies.

“did you whore yourself out like this when you went to naoya’s?” choso prods. the patronization lies beneath feigned and genuine curiosity. there are no inflections, no signs of anger. this is how your big brother gets you, every time: it’s the neglect, the disinterest, that breeds your guilt. “are you really so easy for every boy that comes your way?”

you shake your head and wish you could bury yourself further into the bedsheets. no, never. try as you might the first-year college boys here just haven’t been enough, the older ones too preoccupied with better cunts to look your way.

“just because those guys are my brothers,” choso continues, shifting further and further down your body, spreading your legs until he can fit himself comfortably between them, “doesn’t mean i have to share everything with them.”

“i’m sorry, choso,” you try again, “i’m sorry. i don’t want anyone else–”

“that’s right,” choso interrupts. “you don’t need anyone else. no one is ever going to love you the way i do.”

the way your big brother does, his eyes say, but he doesn’t have to voice it. you already know. it’s true that no one knows you better than choso does. no one understands your limits and your desires the way your brother has for as long as you’ve known him. no one knows how to caress you when you cry, how to run their tongue across your lips to silence you when you’re too eager. it’s always choso. it’s always been choso; but sometimes you’re just too much of a fool to see it.

the blade, cool and demanding, presses against the soft flesh of your thigh, just below the hip. you twitch in surprise at the sensation and curl your toes to quell the ache in your cunt. it’s slick, weeping; you can feel it, the arousal, as it pools and pools and drips quietly onto the comforter.

“choso, what are you–” you ask, breathily, pitifully, but choso’s quick glare reduces you into obedient silence.

he licks the cinnamon chapstick on his lips. a stray hair falls across his eyes and kisses the dark line across his nose. he is love and danger, a cocktail of possession and surrender. “i think,” choso says, the words slow and thoughtful, “you need a reminder of who loves you the most.”

a strangled cry escapes your lips when the blade pierces your skin just enough to draw blood. the sting travels up through your spine and fogs up your senses, causes your cunt to weep in horrible anticipation. it hurts, it does, the first cut, but still you find yourself waiting for more of it, more, in terror and lust and love.

“choso–” you cry, a misty tear escaping out of the corner of your eye, but the call is met by another stroke, longer this time, drawn out, until your knuckles clutch the bedsheets so tensely they might as well turn to stone.

“stay still,” choso admonishes amidst the burn of it. “you’ll hurt yourself.”

as if you were the one in control. but you listen, obediently as always, and the alcohol from earlier combined with the need in your chest mixes together until your body is as taut as a desperate wire, until you no longer have control of yourself or your limbs. the knife cuts easily, choso’s hands as steady and precise as ever. you can feel the blood dripping onto his sheets like a series of hot tears.

it’s too much, all at once. it is a fire which destroys you, which renders every coherent thought into ash and causes you to sob nothing but drawn-out cries and pleads of choso’s name into the dark bedroom. he has you just where he wants you: pliant, dumb, obedient. if he asked you to fetch him a star, you would have asked him which one he needed.

choso’s tongue darts between his teeth as a steady hand continues its masterpiece. you sob unabashedly in reply with every stroke, with every flex of his fingers as he works his blade against your tender skin. and yet, as the pain grows, so does your need for something, for anything, for release; with every aching minute your cunt grows hotter and lonelier and emptier between your thighs.

you crave something, anything, choso, perhaps even more than you wish for air.

“there you go,” choso says, just as you release another cry so piercing there’s no way even yuuji wouldn’t have heard it. “all done.”

you sit up on your elbows to peer down at the masterpiece below your hip. smeared with blood, aching and raw from the blade, the word CHOSO spreads across your upper thigh in an uneven but heartfelt script. it makes you dizzy, this marking, this sign that no one owns you better than your sacred brother does. you wonder if it will leave a scar, if it will heal; and even more so, you wonder if choso will merely rewrite it, again and again, until every cell in your body knows that you are nothing without him.

you say nothing; a whine escapes your lips as your eyes flit from the mark to choso’s eyes, dark and possessive, as he looks back at you.

“you like it?” he asks, once again the sweet thing, the doting one.

“yes,” you whisper back, never one to lie to your perfect big brother.

but you cannot hide the insatiability. choso notices the way your thighs twitch from the intensity, the way your cunt drools and your eyebrows furrow because you cannot relieve this ache on your own. you’re helpless, entirely at his mercy. choso tilts his head with a soft and unreadable simper at the sight.

“you’re really worked up, huh?” he pretends your distress is not blatantly obvious. he twirls the bloodstained knife between his fingertips for a moment before bringing the flat edge of the blade against his lips in a somber kiss. “this little thing’s got you down bad, i see.” he flashes the switchblade at you like a diamond. you watch, entranced, as choso slides his tongue across the metal until any traces of your blood disappear into his mouth.

your belly’s on fire. the switchblade shines with choso’s spit and he smiles, your blood on his tongue, while he prods your legs apart, further, until you’re entirely open for him with nothing to hide. you whine lowly as choso’s eyes flicker between your eyes, dazed and helpless, and the slick on the bedsheets.

“choso,” you repeat. “please, help me.” your eyes are wide and your voice is small and you crumble beneath the weight of your own needing, of your own body working of its own volition, of the high that collapses all over you.

perhaps it’s the way you call for him, your big brother, in your time of need. perhaps it’s the way choso can never really deny you, even when he feigns disappointment or rage or neglect. he’s bound to you, your protector, and you can see in the way his eyes soften ever so slightly that choso will not deny you this request.

“sure thing, angel. let me clean this up for you.” choso’s voice is generous as he bows his face towards your hips with the reverence of one before the altar. he leaves no room for your answer. an eager tongue swipes across your thigh and laps at the blood which pools there. his movements are indulgent, refined, as he holds your legs open with intimidating palms and drinks you in like medicine.

“choso–” you gasp, unable to look away. his eyes flit back to meet yours in reply but he continues his ministrations, slow, teasing, as he ignores your cunt entirely and licks at the fresh wound until it’s finally, sacredly, clean. your newly beloved CHOSO glimmers with his spit when he pulls away. he smiles at you then, praying over your hips, lips stained red with your blood, with your being.

“i may be their brother,” choso gestures towards the door, to the party which must still rage below, “but i’m your brother first, and now you’ll never forget it.”

the words are followed by his tongue on your inner thigh, fervent this time, as he travels downwards, downwards from his name on your leg until his nose is a breath away from your clit. you thrust your hips towards him impatiently and he accepts it, gratefully, burying his face deep into your cunt like he’s searching for gold. choso lavishes your clit with plump lips and an eager tongue, drawing the bud into his mouth and kissing it until you cry, until your legs tremble as they ensnare him in your garden.

“choso–” you’re crying, voice transcendent throughout the frat house, his favorite song. there’s a tongue prodding against your hole and a silver ring on your clit and you lose yourself within it, within choso’s breath on your folds and the fire which erupts into chaos.

when it comes to pleasing you, choso does not require air. he refuses to resurface as his tongue explores every inch, as he laps away at you with the passionate abandon only an older brother can provide. what you need, he needs, and what you desire most, choso is always willing to provide. he holds you steady as he works so you cannot escape him. he forces you into stillness as he abuses every sacred inch of your cunt, as he works you into a frenzy with his fingers and his tongue until you can think of nothing but wanting to cum.

and then, then, at the precipice of pleasure, choso pulls away. you pause as you catch your breath, heartbeat like an earthquake, and recollect your shock. why has he stopped? where has he gone? you’re about to sit up, to feign sobriety, to demand what the matter is, when something cool and smooth presses against your clit.

choso’s cheek rests against your inner thigh as he presses the flat edge of the switchblade against your cunt. it’s cold and dangerous and sublime and you cannot help but think of the way it could ruin you, that if you shifted or choso wanted it everything could end here, now, forever. and it is this fear, coupled with the coolness of the blade suffocating your clit, with the alcohol in your bloodstream, that sends you into a place from which you may never return.

the orgasm is as violent as a hurricane. the moment you tense and begin to quake with a strangled sob choso replaces the blade with his tongue and rides you through it, coating his lips with your cum and swallowing the vibrations and heightening the sensation until you are tortured by it, by the sting of pleasure and overstimulation and want.

(“that’s it,” you think he says into your skin, but your ears ring too loudly to know. “cum for me, just like that.”)

it takes some time for the waves to recede and for your body to become still again. with a head comprised of of jelly and limbs made of water you lie still, panting, as choso nonchalantly licks your slick from the switchblade with a hum and gingerly sets it back down on his dresser. you watch as he slides the belt out of his jeans and tosses it into the dark room, as he hovers above you like an angel and its lover.

“better now?” he asks against your parted lips. you nod. he kisses you, deeply, a kiss made of iron and cum and blood, tongue swiping across your teeth before he draws the air from your lungs. your vision swims when he plants a kiss on the tip of your nose, your cheeks, your forehead, between your eyebrows. he plants his love until there is nowhere left untouched, until you are buzzing with the security only your brother choso can give you.

“yeah,” you mumble back to him, content, satisfied. even the sting of his name on your body is a pleasantry now.

“good.” choso wipes the perspiration from your brow. his jeans scratch against your pelvis, and it is only then that you finally register his cock, hard and eager, waiting patiently for its turn. it is only then that you realize choso’s lesson is not yet over, that your brother’s desperate need has only begun.

“now,” he purrs, gently, lovingly, “can you show me how much you love me?”

(as always, forever, you do. you show him your love, endlessly, even when the party ends and the house falls eerily silent. you show choso everything, all of it, loyally, just as he asks, with an only you, choso, and a no one else loves me like you.

because although choso offers his love to the brothers downstairs, he will always, forever, be your brother first, til death do you part.)

#tw incest #tw dubcon #tw knife play #tw blood play #tw marking #tw yandere #choso smut #choso.#it's dark in here #it's hot in here

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