#i will mold their life story into something of my own fucked up creation

[yermes]

PAC: 🃏

This is a reading for all the gay little people who live in my phone.

Disclaimer: please take what I say with a grain of salt and not as the gospel. I just want to share some ideas of practicing and giving advice using the medium as often as I can with school, work, and my own personal studies and practice. God I am so fucking tired will try and do something IG! Liking and sharing does a lot 🥰

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The cards

Magus 🪄 

Sun / Mercury in Aries, Mercury, From Kether to Binah, Air

ACTION IN CREATION. Aka the world is your oyster and it’s truly what you make of it. You will start to self realize and start to gain more skill in your own will and magic.

Fortune 🎱 

Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, Pluto, Jupiter, The axis Chesed - Netzach, fire

Well girl thats life. Sometimes you crank that Soulja boy other times that soulja boy cranks you. But honestly you are about to face the consequences of your own actions whether that be good or bad.

Strife 🐍 

Five of wands, Saturn in the 1. of Leo, Geburah through Fire

The worst and best part of being human is that things are constantly in motion ATM thats a struggle for you. You want to break the mold that confines you. The crisis will eventually lead you to a breakout.

Extras: 🔖

Story/vent:

Literally losing my mind with having to open literally every single day I am so fucking tired. But I do sign up for classes monday so slay 🥹

#suitlifeofgerm #askgerm #pick a card #daily card #pick a picture #germ reads #tarotoftheday #shadow work #pac #tarot #thoth tarot #tarot community #tarot blog #tarot witch #free tarot #tarot spread #daily tarot #tarot reading #tarot cards #tarot spreads #tarot reader #tarotblr #tarotcommunity #pick a image #divination #pick a reading #pick a pile reading #pick a deck #tarot deck #oracle

[phoenix-before-the-flame]

Iam looking at your phoenixverse laxus design with both eyes OPEN 👁👁 but now im so curiojz as to what else the phoenixverse has to offer. PLEASE tell me youve got any headcanons about how zeref refived natsu. Like any thoughts at all on that?

Ohohohohohohohohohoho anon my guy my dude, my man (genderless) I am about to speak. Pull up a fuckin chair bro. Also puttin this under read more because uh, long lol

This is actually one of my favourite things to think about regarding Natsu (apart from yknow, END lol) and Zeref because it is such an interesting little story point.

For Natsu, the interest comes from the fact that he's not who he thought he was. Natsu's always confident about his identity, he's quick to announce who and what he is in a situation and he's proud of who he is. The knowledge that yeah sure, you are Natsu Dragneel, but uh Natsu's not who you think he is buddy- that Natsu, in some way died so many centuries ago but was pulled back and reshaped, reborn- repackaged even- into you in a body that you thought was human but is some almagamation of that and more? All tied to a book? Can he still say with confidence that he is Natsu Dragneel when he hardly knew the truths about himself? And if sayin that is even true when he could easily just be something molded to look like what Zeref lost? (Ofc we the readers know otherwise but imagine the dilemna man) The reality of it would've- should've- been earth shattering. It would've been an identity crisis and then some.

For Zeref, oh man. Zeref's whole thing stems from the fact that he loves Natsu. He loves Natsu so much (and his parents too i guess) that when the tragedy struck and he lost everything, it fucked him up. He just couldn't deal with the incredibly unfair hand that life dealt him that he was willing to turn the world on its head and essentially change the course of fioran history to try and undo what happened to him. To save something from his old life that he loved.

But heres the thing about Zeref's love. It's twisted. It's fucked up. It's dark.

Working years, decades- possibly even centuries- on the single minded task of reviving his brother (and why just Natsu? Why not the parents well? Why only the younger sibling? Did he intend to bring them all back but became single minded on just his brother?) could lead to obsession. Obsession with making him perfect, no longer just as a human but more than that. Stronger so he won't be killed as easily. Obsession with keeping him close, tying him to his soul in such a way that if Zeref goes, Natsu goes as well. Making sure that he's pulling the strings that when it comes to, when he finally closes his eyes at the hands of his brother, he has a comfort in knowing that his brother is going with him and he won't be left alone, like what his very first tragedy did to him. (Plus also making Natsu, his creation that he brought to life, kill him would be a back stab at Ankhserham. Because the god cursed him for fucking around with life and death, so having his demon kill him would be Zeref controlling the life he chose to create and determining his own death. It'd be a last gotcha).

Zeref may have loved Natsu enough to bring him back, and he still loves him in a way, but it's messed up. Because the whole ordeal of everything messed him up.

But I digress, this is just side stuff, your question really. How did Zeref really bring Natsu back?

Now since you asked specifically for phoenixverse, i can get a lil bit loose with canon details and not feel as restricted.

So we have our hard facts- Natsu and Parents die in Zeref's youth, Zeref fucks around tryna undo their deaths and finds out by getting cursed for doing this, then proceeds to use the curse to his advantage and over an undisclosed amount of time to create his demons and what not.

'Undisclosed amount of time' being the key thing here.

Canon implies that the time between Natsu's death, Zeref getting cursed and Zeref reviving Natsu happened within a relatively close period of time. And if it's anything I love, it's spacing out events.

I'd like to think that between the loss of his family and when he gets cursed is a decent gap of time, like a decade or so to really push the fact that he's so fixated on the loss. Then after getting the curse he sets to work of reviving Natsu over the course of decades to almost a century and a half.

(Am i implying Zeref to be a bit older than the 400 years? Yes, yes i am. The way I saw it the events of 400yrs past were inciting incidents i.e Zeref giving Natsu to Igneel, slayers gettin sent to the future, and not the actually set date where everything happened. And again, I like the idea of Zeref fixating on this for a very long time. Him being older drives home the single-mindedness and determination to get it done)

As prodigious as Zeref is, creating life and being the first wizard to do so, i don't think he could do it so easily within a few short years which is why i personally love the idea of Zeref taking so long to be able to revive Natsu. A touch of realism to something magical kinda grounds it in a way, gives it some weight at the very least.

Specifically Natsu being Zeref's final project ever and all the other demons he created over the years prior being experiments and steps taken to perfect the process so Natsu would be the culmination of all that he learnt (demons like deliora and lullaby being demons of inorganic matter given humanoid form-> tartarus- esque demons being humanoid demons with animalistic features (organic matter) -> Natsu, human demon and hybrid traits all working together in cohesion).

And speaking of a touch of realism, or sorta realism anyways, riddle me this.

Zeref needs something to make Natsu well, Natsu. Sure he could probs make a demon that looks like him, but thats not what he wants. He wants his actual brother so, what could he get to add into the mixture to really do that? Why a few samples of course :].

But Phoenix! I hear you cry, how could he have gotten samples if you said in your version that it took him forever to finally revive Natsu?

And so leads into the actual true definitive answer to your question anon.

Zeref, in needing the most important ingredient in the Natsu stew took things from the OG body to help build the new one. But! The kicker here is the samples I imagine him using aren't blood but instead, bone.

Maybe he realizes a decade or 2 down the line in his demon experiments that he missed a step in what he needs to see this through. Maybe he thinks he's too late because what can he do now at that point. Maybe he realizes that he can use not flesh and blood, but what remains for his plan. Maybe he commits another sin in the hopes of it bringing for another and digs up his young brother's bones. Maybe he whittles them down piece by precious piece over the long period of time after failing so many times (am i also implying failed Natsus? Failed ENDs? Hell yeah i am) and coming dangerously close to it all ending for naught, with the last shard of bone. And maybe after so long and so many atrocities, he finally succeeded?

TL:DR Zeref snagged OG Natsu's bones and used those to help in the process of quite literally rebuilding him from scratch to give us our Natsu.

I dunno man, it just adds a layer of fucked up-ness to the whole situation of how far Zeref was willing to go- even defiling his brother's bones to get him back.

And on Natsu's side learning about all this would just twist the knife of his identity crisis even deeper (especially on that implication of failed END attempts before him).

Also like, by stretching out the time of events and making Natsu being the very last demon Zeref ever made bring so much for layers of meaning to the name END in itself.

END, being the literal meaning 'Etherious Natsu Dragneel'

END, signalling the last demon Zeref's made. An end to his experimentations.

END, as in the last and perfected version of his brother, with the last remains of OG Natsu's bones going towards his creation.

And END, as in Zeref's end, where he intends for Natsu to kill him thus ending his life.

#fairy tail #fairy tail headcanon #natsu dragneel #zeref dragneel #fairy tail natsu #fairy tail zeref #i fuckin LOVE characters who were basically lab made #characters who for all intents and purposes comes off as your average living creature but its the circumstances of how they came to be #being fucked up and made from scratch and the hands of another #is a special sweet spot of characters i adore #shadow the hedgehog mewtwo hunter owl house #especially when its implied that there were multiples of them made before hand to add another layer of sweet sweet intrigue #which is why when natsu was revealed as END i was like yippee!!!○_○ #but as we all know by now that didnt really pan out to anything substantial #i dunno #maybe im thinkin too hard on this but its still an idea that i love and hold onto #also anon sorry this got long u uh #u activated my trap card lol #*grips your shoulder tightly* but do you understajd my vision bro #do u get it #the implications #the layers #makin the situation all gray and muddled instead of set black n white

[incarnateirony]

Mm, one thing I am not looking forward to with the other GM, as much as I love him as a typist, is the inevitable backhanded BTS measure of trying to override 900 pages of story by wandering in and declaring something, and I fully expect that to happen. He is Very Proud Of Playing God, and when he realized that the way he set up Becoming God off of another character's work was being undone by the very campaign he asked me to run, because that's why he used the character's work to do it, it became WELL ACTUALLY--HE DID IT HIMSELF BEFORE THAT. AND SOMETHING ETERNAL ANNOYING LA MULANA DUNGEON.

And like, bro. You are literally not going to be able to bitch the players into hailing Lord Rando As The Supreme when they witnessed the beginning of existence and FUCK ALL, YOU WEREN'T THERE, you were just some dude in the way to get there a few times. Yeah, the moral is, as Kion said, they are all their own lords, and we together, all for one, and one as the All, creation is what we make of it. That was always the goddamn point of the device he implied made his dude god. And like. Nobody cares about your guy, guy.

It's a delivery thing he still hasn't understood, you can't just wander in and throw things and demand people care, as per the whole idea of his past "hints" that he wants people to break down to extremes as if they are by default expected to know how god "should" act and care deeply about his state, and like, fuck all no he was being an annoying douche the whole time the like. 3 times he showed up being the opposite of helpful.

Randomly declaring things once a month to assert power is not even GM attitude, it's just obnoxious player attitude. They just spent 3 months rearranging creation itself in SPITE of your dude to make the world in the image of their own dreams and learn how to build better things when they get back to ~reality, they have climbed the world trees, stood at the edge of the void, they have faced life, and death, and cosmic soup, and whatever the fuck. Why the fuck will they want to find him for any other reason than to beat his ass?

Like right now everyone's saying their tearful goodbyes to a character they helped mold over these months, and teach each other together, and hope they might meet again, or at least be allowed to not forget what happened and who they knew and what they did together. Nobody cares if your dude comes in squawking IM GOD. No the fuck you aren't, you're a pain in the ass with no establishment that keeps cropping up at bad times doing stupid shit that hampers them. They're god, or at worst, their dead friend is god, because on him the world will turn, forever, self born by his own design for everything. You're. A guy who pushed a button then tried to change the backstory three times.

Neither plots nor people work like that dude.

And he gets real proud like, LOOK HOW MUCH JALIM LEARNED FROM ZENTO while even making the bad guy blink at, how the fuck did you take it like that. ok whatever easier for me I guess. And like. Character growth is great and all, but at best that's still a player path sticking on a GM badge and calling itself god. I don't know if I'd agree with the growth since the last act he did could have severely fucked the heroes in another arrangement. Luckily they moved too fast for god's fuckup to backfire on them. But the whole "I say a speech I think sounds good, pound my chest and fuck off to the wind after making everyone's lives around me hell but swearing up and down I helped" is a player brain, not a GM.

There was even a time like, he shook a defeated enemy awake not realizing what he was doing because he hadn't paid attention to the plot for real for shit (which I understand now he didn't the first time either), and like, no your dead friend is this monster they just put down. I kept trying to deflect you doing it but you insisted and it woke up so all the heroes responded and heard your argument and realized you fucking woke Death back up. Like. Six hours after they had defeated him, no less. "Well he destroyed the pillar that had to be done" bro it was already destroyed, River destroyed it in the fight, it reconstituted as the reflection of his presence when you forced it back up. You're patting yourself on the back for making a problem then fixing it. I'm not letting you take that from the heroes or the one that actually destroyed it. That's just spinning your wheels to try to reinforce your godness.

The irony is, he swears he gets this, plays his weird version of the collective, vaguely cites the theology, but then insists on trying to come in, alone, and change everything. When literally the ending is no, you are all your own lords, the soul is supreme and in this moment, we are One. Facing the call to destruction or search for emptiness, the conflict of how everything came from the nothing. It literally required EXTENSIVE planning IC and OOC both, players coordinating deeply against seemingly impossible odds. You have said many times your character refuses to enter the city because of XYZ excuse. You insisted on trying to do this alone, against the plot morals, which is why it went bad every time, because you weren't listening or paying attention. So there's just. Twenty levels of irony.

"Well my job keeps me busy and I can't read all-" Shhh. sh sh sh stop right there. No. Almost every player has a job. One has three jobs. They manage to connect, coordinate, read along, or ask questions when they get lost, they work with everybody. So if you got the time to build the world's most retarded La Mulana knockoff to send people through, you had the time to read. The matter is, you didn't care and you thought you knew better. Now this would make an excellent narrative about demiurges/pankrators like Chuck if it was on purpose but instead you're making it a commentary on humanity because the point is sailing over your head and you keep trying to retroact him into things he literally Does Not Fit.

The whole. Oh my character was just a griffin that died and got found by a god to become powerful but a slave and met Kion and became friends and Hit The Button To Save Him In Error And Became God except SURPRISE now I"m saying it was something different vs

Developed campaign that existed before this one and before the dude hit the button on a multiplanar journey across the cosmos and ancient memory showing that the person who created The Button and the city built on his pure willpower was, in fact, always created and trained for this role (and its opposite), he fits every bill on the mythology you try to use, you don't. You played some dude that kept falling in holes to become a bigger god and are trying to claim yourself the All and Void both. And yeah the moral is the soul is always an oxymoron like that but so is everyone's. You didn't come from the void, you weren't self born, you are not The Great Dragon or The Great Teacher, you are not the Workman, or the Master Builder, you are none of the things, but saying I Am All sounds hella neat and powerful, but you're not grokking what you're even trying to fucking present while kicking in the door with a funny song to melt down five planes because YOU WEREN'T LISTENING.

Like, this be mine, and the campaign is a success because everyone, the players, AS the collective shaped it correctly. He pays lipservice to the ideas but throws out randos doing nonsense actions and calls it the collective, or insists he is The One or The All while simultaneously refusing to join the others, and so on and it's like. bro. give it up. you said you wanted the campaign, you were clearly aware of at least the base potential implied in Xorv, you don't just cling to a godtitle. And no don't say it's for GM purposes if you're only NOW thinking up a knockoff dungeon with no real form, history or purpose that will at best be highly obnoxious. Just admit you had no plan. You had 3 months while I ran this to come up with more than "my current favorite game to clone is--"

[seritaka]

sometimes i wish mp100 gave more character backstory but other times i’m glad that their past is like putty in my hands

#i will mold their life story into something of my own fucked up creation #kat chats #mp100 #mob psycho 100

[nancydfan]

So I have been a fan of resident evil for a while now and I have to say without a shadow of a doubt Ethan is my favorite protagonist. I feel like the rest of the protagonists in the series are kinda the same, you’ve got the police/army guys (Leon and Chris) who are determined to save the world, and then with the rest of them they’re kinda the same, badass people willing to give their all to get rid of evil and return the world back to normal. And that’s fine, except it’s a kind of story that’s been told over and over again and not just in resident evil.

That’s why I love Ethan so much. He is a breath of fresh air that the series needed. And while yes, you can argue that his type of storyline has also been used a lot, it’s something that has never been explored in resident evil.

With the rest of the protagonists, they choose to fight. They volunteer to put themselves in horrifying scenarios for the greater good.

Ethan isn’t like that.

He’s literally just your typical average dude. He has a normal job, and has a relatively normal life which he was happy to spend with Mia until she went missing.

In RE7 Ethan doesn’t volunteer to deal with the horrors that he faces. He just wanted his wife back, and even after 3 years he still loves her enough to drop everything and rush out to find her.

When I finished RE7, I liked Ethan as a main character, but it was RE8 that made me fall in love with him. In RE7 there were a lot of times when he just didn’t respond or kind of reacts underwhelmingly, but I think this is less of his character and more of Capcom trying to make you feel more like Ethan and having him react too much might take you out of feeling like the main character is you.

Of course his actions are still very reflective of him, like when he first enters the house and has to “kill” Mia the first time, when she reaches out to him he reaches right back, implying that he regrets what just happened and that he still wants her to be okay, no matter what is wrong with her.

I know Jacksepticeye said one of the reasons why he doesn’t like Ethan is because he doesn’t have a character arc, but I disagree. Like I said, Ethan goes from not being very vocal at times/ underwhelming reactions in RE7 to I feel the exact opposite in 8; he talks a lot more with lines that make sense, and you can feel his emotions at times even with just seeing his hands. Now one can argue that Capcom just wrote Ethan differently, which I can see.

But I feel as though Ethan has changed- in the first game, he’s scared and confused, and finally ends on frustration as the game nears its end. In RE8 he is angry, angry that his life keeps getting turned on it’s head because of some stupid mold. He is angry, and fueled by his grief and determination to save the only family (he thinks) he has left. He is 100% done with everything and has honestly given his last fuck a long time ago.

And again, this is what makes him special- he doesn’t necessarily care about the mold, about Miranda or any of the “bigger issue” things- he just wants his family. In 7 he just wants to get his wife and get out of there, and In 8 he just wants to save his daughter. He didn’t sign up to be a hero, to save the world from it’s own creations. He just wants his family.

And honestly that’s what makes him more human and alive to me than the rest of the protagonists- the rest of them kind of just feel like characters with their (almost cheesy) need to take on insurmountable problems to save the world. But Ethan is different, he’s just a man who probably just wants to do his taxes in peace and have a normal, quiet life. The rest of the protagonists, though I’m sure would love to quit, wouldn’t change their jobs or their situations because they know someone has to do it and it might as well be them. But not Ethan. If he had the choice than he’d make it so none of this ever happened, and that he and his family never have to be involved in something like this again.

Which is why I think this is what makes his sacrifice so much more tragic. With any of the other protagonists yes we would be sad but we’d find comfort in knowing that they died doing what they loved (saving people), and wouldn’t have it any other way.

But Ethan is different.

He didn’t want to sacrifice himself- we can see that in the way he struggles with Chris to get out, to stay in one piece for his daughter because he wants to be there for her. He went through hell and he just wants to see his little girl grow up. And when he hears Mia’s alive that want only grows more because he has a chance to have his family back, but I think he knows he can’t. He’s falling apart, his body has dealt with so much and kept him alive but not for much longer. And so even though he desperately wants to go back with Chris, after hearing Mia’s alive he knows he can let go. I think another part of why he was fighting so hard to escape with Chris is because he didn’t want Rose to live without both of her parents, but when he hears Mia’s alive he realizes that Rose will be okay, she will at least have one parent. He is so tired, so tired of fighting that even though he hates the fact that he can’t go back with her (you can physically hear the pain in his voice when he says “Goodbye Rosemary”), he knows that it’s something he has to do.

And he isn’t happy or content with sacrificing himself. In fact this is the last thing he wanted, which again is what makes it so heart wrenching. After all the pain he’s been through he doesn’t even get to see his daughter grow up, doesn’t get to grow old with his wife, his painful adventure to get his family back ends just as painfully as he pulls the trigger to destroy the mold.

This is why Ethan is special to me. Ethan is just a man who wanted to be happy with his family, not some stereotypical stone cold hero who would gladly give up his life for the greater good. He is truly unique and in a way I saw myself in him and his personality, which is what crushed me so much when he died. I wanted him to have a good ending and he got handed a shitty end. I really hope Capcom gives him a good resolution, one where he doesn’t have to be a main character at all but at least give us something where we know he’s okay and reunited with his family.

Sorry for getting weepy and deep lol, it’s just I really love Ethan and have no one to talk about how upset I am at his ending lol. Thanks for listening to my rant!

Oh my dear nonnie you’re always welcome to rant in my inbox. Long or not, thoughts, etc. that’s why my box is always open :)

And just so you know, I’m currently crying in an airport lobby over Ethan Winters 😆

I’m on mobile so I won’t be able to properly respond probably except to say you are absolutely right on all of these things. He really is such a stark contrast to the rest of the RE heroes and that’s what makes him so special to me too. He is just a man. A man who does everything he can for his family. All he wants to do is be left alone to love his wife and raise his daughter. I keep thinking of that scene in re8 where he’s talking to the doc. That is the Ethan Winters Capcom refuses to let us see all that much. Easy, happy, carefree moment. There’s a lightness to his voice. He doesn’t care about the problems of the world. That isn’t his job too. And it’s unbelievably tragic that not only does he get pulled into this twice (with three years of suffering for Mia before Dulvey and then the heartache of her “murder” and Rose’s kidnapping), he then dies in the end???? He doesn’t even get the reward to live with his wife and daughter? WHAT DID ETHAN WINTERS DO TO YOU, CAPCOM!!?

also overcome? Miss me w that bullshit. Y’all blew him to smithereens.

I swear if Capcom doesn’t bring him back in some way I don’t know how I’ll proceed w this series. I love Leon and Claire and Jill a lot too but nothing like Ethan. And I’m super not interested in getting my heart ripped out every few years. Especially w a new protagonist.

Ethan is just the perfect representation of deserved better. He pays his taxes on time, probably helps that old lady down the street whose husband just died. Tells the same joke we’ve all heard a thousand times to the point only Mia and him are laughing at it. He would be there for every parent teacher conference and up at 130 with a flashlight chasing away the monsters from Rose’s closet. The world may be crazy somewhere but he’s content to just be here with his family.

And Capcom took all of that away. I don’t think I’ll ever not be angry about it.

#thanks for the ask nonnie 💜💜💜 #resident evil #resident evil 8 #resident evil spoilers #Ethan winters #Ethan Winters Defense Club #mrs joe speaks #long post

[ddaenggtan]

Half-Baked Holiday | ksj | M

Granny Park’s Gossip:

That Seokjin, don’t get me started on him. He’s worked hard to open and run that bakery of his, you know, and I’m so proud that it’s so successful now. Wish he would find a nice person to settle down with, though, he deserves it, as long as he’s been on his own. Well, I guess you can’t really call it alone when he’s got that grump of a best friend always hanging around him. He really should be paying her, what with all the time she spends at the bakery with him. She’s always waking up on the wrong side of the bed, but she’s not so bad when she brings me some of those cookies of his, or just around Seokjin in general, if I’m honest. Too distracted by staring at that pretty face of his, I suppose, though who can blame her?

pairing } seokjin x reader

word count } 12.6K { also on ao3

genre } friends to lovers, idiots to lovers, bakery au, fluff, smut, literally the slightest bit of angst

warnings } fluff, fluff, fluff; jin is an idiot and so is the MC, like they’re genuinely both dumbasses but in different ways; pining; misunderstandings; masturbation, spanking, unprotected sex, oral sex - male receiving, exhibitionism a little, rolling pins are used in ways they are not intended to be used; several mentions of jins squeaky laugh and also his red ears bc they’re my favorite things in the world

{ The Snowball Effect Series Masterlist } 

a/n } whaddup i finally finished this thing barely on time so yEET i yet again maintain my status as queen of last minute deadlines!!!! HBH is my Baby, I love it, it’s my perfect shiny garbage baby, and if you like it, you should DEF check out the others!! They can be read as standalones, but it’s really really really really really really highly recommended that you read them all in order, as they all end up in the same place and there are a ton of little easter eggs and references and shoutouts woven into the entire series!!! Extra special shoutout to the authors of all the other stories, @fortunexkookie (ryn), @taehyungforreal (ashley), @stutterfly​ (kristi, who also made the incredible banners!!!) 

You're a good person. You pride yourself on being kind and giving. Every year you make donations to several charities. You help organize summer fundraisers so kids can eat. You buy the most ethically-sourced groceries possible. You leave your change in case someone else can use it. You always tip at least 20% when you go out to eat. Out of everything, though, of all the good deeds you try to do in your life, there's one thing that makes you a truly outstanding human being. 

You don't lose your fucking mind every time the urge hits you. 

"But how many calories are in the Holiday Donut?" The lady in front of you asks. You can feel your eye twitching and even the young guy behind the register is starting to falter in his bright grin. 

"Um, I'm not-"

"Look lady," You cut in. "You have heard about nearly every thing on the fucking menu. It's a donut, stuffed with strawberry creme and coated in colored frosting and sprinkles. How many calories do you think are in it? Just order the banana nut muffin like you always do, get your coffee, and leave, so the rest of us aren't stuck in a line for another hour." 

The lady looks scandalized as she turns to glare at you, but all it takes is a single cocked eyebrow to send her huffing out the door. She mutters a few choice words under her breath as she goes, but you pay them no mind. 

"Your usual is almost ready, Pumpkin." You level Jin with an unamused glare as he pushes his way through the kitchen doors with a steaming tray of scones in hand. 

"You know I hate that name, Spice," You remind him dryly. 

"You know I hate it when you run my customers off with that dark cloud you call a personality, and yet here we both are," he responds. He just smiles at your eyeroll and you do your best to ignore the fluttering in your stomach. Instead you make yourself comfortable on one of the barstools at the counter. 

Seokjin's bakery is as busy as it ever is; several of the tables are taken, either by students on their nth espresso or families doing holiday shopping or people just looking for a place to relax amidst the bustle of the streets. There's someone perched on the stool at the opposite end, close to the register, but you pay them no mind. You're too focused on the mug Jin slides in front of you - green and chipped on the handle, it's your favorite - and the steam wafting up from the cocoa inside. There's a thick layer of marshmallow on the top and a candy cane sticking out, just like you like it, and a Holiday Bagel on a small plate next to it. 

"Thanks. You're still an ass, though." He has the decency to look offended at your words, and you grit your teeth against the smile that threatens to split your face. He always looks so cute when he's huffy. 

"One of these days I'm going to make you start paying for your food like everyone else, and then you'll start treating me right."

"Sure," You agree in a monotone as you pull your phone out and start tapping away on it. "That'll be the same day that you stop asking me to do your books for you because you can't be bothered."

The sigh that expels itself from his lungs is almost as dramatic as the play he dragged you to the week before. 

"I am perfectly capable of doing my books myself, thank you. I let you do it to keep you busy."

"Mhm, sure, I believe that," You tell him. He scoffs again and you barely register the hand he shoots forward to steal your bagel before you're slapping it away. "You don't even like strawberries and kiwi, Seokjin, and you will lose a hand."

You don't look up from the emails you're sorting through on your phone, but you don't have to in order to know that he's got both elbows braced on either side of you. You've known him long enough to know that this is his Pout Stance, and you dare not look up because there's no denying him when he looks like that. 

"You're so mean to me, Pumpkin. All I do is spoil you with good food and perfect company," he whines, "And what do I get for it? Insults and mockery. You could at least give me a kiss every now and then."

You choke on your cocoa. It burns your nose as it starts to come up that way, and the dark liquid dances across your phone screen as it molds to every crack and crevice. 

"Goddamn it, Seokjin," You sputter. He's already holding a cloth out to you, apology written on his face even as you glare at him. You pat your phone dry as best you can before resigning yourself to the fact that it's just going to smell like warm chocolate and peppermint until the next time your best friend flusters you. 

"To be fair, I didn't expect you to be so opposed to the idea," Seokjin mutters. He continues under his breath as you wave off his attempt to help again, something about him being handsome enough, but you aren't listening. Because that's the only real problem between the two of you. 

You aren't opposed to the idea. It's all you can think about most days; in work meetings, while you're doing paperwork, in team briefings, while you watch TV, when you're asleep. What his pillow lips would feel like against your own occupies nearly every waking thought you have. The others are torn between fantasies of what being his would be like and memories of him in general, neither of which you're lacking in.

You've known Seokjin for years. You don't even know how long since you insist you met when you were twelve and Jin is just as insistent that you met when you were nine. All you remember is being alone on the side of a playground playing hopscotch by yourself and then giggling at something the nice boy had said and then the two of you were inseparable. You aren't even sure how long you've felt like this towards him. It could've been high school, when he was one of the most sought after boys in school and yet still made time to comfort you every time a boy rejected you. Maybe it was college, though, when he was further away than he'd ever been and yet always answered your calls and responded to your texts and you'd cancel dates because he had randomly driven up to see you. Maybe it was after, watching him run his own bakery and do what he loves every day with the brightest grin you've ever seen on his face. 

You can't be sure. All you know is one day you were washing dishes in the back after being his guinea pig for some new creation, and he told some dumb joke, and when you turned around to mock his squeaky laugh like usual, you couldn't. Because he had flour on his cheek and chocolate on his lip and you'd never wanted to kiss someone so bad in your life. 

And then it just devolved from there and now the butterflies in your stomach have just set up camp. It's been too long, but you can't risk your friendship with him over some stupid crush. He means too much to you. 

Your eyes don't leave his back as he disappears back into the kitchen, still complaining about something under his breath, and you suppress a sigh. 

Shopping is the worst. You aren't really sure why you're here, because you hate shopping and you hate crowds and you especially hate holiday shopping because it's like Satan himself smashed the two together. You get all your gifts online or early in the year, you don't go anywhere near a mall from October to March, and it works for you. You don't have to deal with holiday crowds. Ever. So why are you on hour five at the largest mall in driving distance with no breakfast, sore feet, and full bags hanging from every possible place they can?

"Does that really seem like something Taehyung would like, though? I got that jacket for him already, I know, but this seems so much more fitting. What do you think, Pumpkin?"

Oh. Right. Seokjin had showed up at Too Damn Early For A Saturday O'Clock and demanded you accompany him for his holiday shopping. 

"I think that if I don't eat something in the next ten minutes, I'm ripping your head off and eating that instead. And for dessert I'll demolish those fancy chocolates you got for Jimin." A passing mother gives you a horrified glance as she ushers her toddler along and you almost wish you gave a shit. It's the mall, she can't control what other people say in this hellhole. You probably could’ve done without the emphasis on Jimin, though; Jin knows how much you worship those chocolates, you’ve said countless times that they’re better than orgasms, and still, he got some for Jimin and not you. 

You aren’t bitter. Or petty. No. You’re an adult, and you’re not going to pout just because your crush got your mutual friends some sweets instead of you.

"If you touch those chocolates, you're going to march your ass right back to that store and replace them while I return all your gifts," Seokjin quips back. You glance over at him and wrinkle your nose at the two berets he has in each hand. 

"What the fuck are you doing, Spice?"

“Wondering when you’re going to listen when I talk to you,” He responds. He holds both of the berets up for you to view more clearly. “Now, which of these is more ‘Tae’ to you?” He doesn’t react to the blank glare you give him, long since immune to your powers of pessimism, and instead just wiggles the berets in each hand so you actually look at them. 

Neither are to your personal taste; one is diamond-encrusted in some kind of quilted pattern, with some kind of alternating animal print as well. The other is more understated, if you can call it that, with a faux-fur trim, a feathered poof in the center, and a truly obscene pink houndstooth pattern to it. You can’t help the wrinkled nose that the two options cause in you, and you ignore Seokjin’s huff of irritation in favor of looking past him to the rest of the options. You only have to look for a minute to find something better suited, which mostly means Jin wanted to give Tae something truly gaudy on purpose. 

“Here,” You say, stuffing the hat into his hands. He stops mid-rant - something about how you should be helping him more, though you aren’t sure why because he’s the one that dragged you here and is lucky you haven’t bailed yet - and focuses on what you’ve just given him. It’s not a pretty beret, by any means, and is by far the cheapest one there, but it’s got some kind of artful splatter across it in greyscale tones, with a pop of red around the rim to accent it. Seokjin just stares at it for a second before turning his gaze on you, and you shift uncomfortably. 

“What?” You eventually ask. 

“Nothing,” He says airily. “Just surprised.” 

“At what?”

“You paying attention to people and being able to buy good gifts.” He puts the other two back into place and heads towards the registers, ignoring your indignant squawk. 

“I get you perfect gifts every year!” You don’t miss his eyeroll, and it makes you want to strangle him a little. 

“I don’t count,” He tells you as he settles in behind some grandmother buying entirely too many things that have to be for her grandkid. “You know me better than anyone, and you have access to my Amazon wishlist.”

“Yeah, except none of that is on your fucking wishlist,” You mutter. He turns, eyebrow arched and ready to get more backtalk, but you just make a face at him. 

He drags you to five more stores after that and abandons you in the middle of Williams Sonoma. You’re on your third lap of the store, ready to disassemble the fancy grill they’ve got on display to see if he’s somehow in there, when he appears, probably from the ether or some shit. You’re still trying to figure out how he managed to phase through time and space and the massive shelf of Martha Stewart Collection Cookware without you noticing, and in the meantime he takes the massive amount of bags from your hands and deposits something in your palms instead. 

It takes you a minute to register the warmth, but the smell hits instantly and makes your stomach grumble loudly. You’d be embarrassed if you weren’t so fucking hungry. 

“Eat,” Seokjin commands. “We’ve got more shopping to do for the bakery.”

You can’t even argue because your mouth is stuffed full of pizza pretzel bites - the only real reason to come to the mall, in your opinion. You’ve inhaled one serving in record time, and Jin doesn’t even react when you bust into the second one in the middle of some tech store. Instead, he just holds out a hand and waits for you to plop a pretzel bite in his palm. 

It’s hours later, long after you’ve helped Seokjin drop off all the bakery supplies at the shop and carted the presents up to his apartment, that you realize you’re still holding on to the bag from the pretzel place. You’re about to toss it into your garbage when it registers that there’s too much weight for just garbage; curious, you open the bag up and dump the content onto your kitchen counter. 

Inside is a small box of chocolates, the same kind you’d threatened to eat earlier in the day, your favorite flavor and everything, with a small note atop it. 

These were supposed to be part of your gift, but you looked put out when you thought I wasn’t getting you any. Thanks for today. xxSpice

You resist the urge to smile; it’s only right that he give you sweets after the frankly absurd amount of time he’d made you spend at the mall. Still, you can’t deny your lip twitches along with your heart at the knowledge that he’d been planning on including them in your gift. 

And you might tuck the note away behind a postcard on your fridge, but you’re never going to admit to that. 

The next day when you get to the bakery, Seokjin doesn't hesitate to shove you into his small office and push you into his desk chair before he disappears back into the kitchen. The usually cluttered space is empty, devoid of the usual invoices and order forms and whatever the fuck else your best friend keeps on his desk. Even the picture frames have been moved, placed haphazardly atop a filing cabinet. Something flutters in your chest when you notice the one directly facing his chair is one of the two of you.

Taken years and years ago, back when you were first moving into your college dorm, when you were both tired from carrying boxes up the seven flights of stairs to your room. You still remember how irritated you had been when Jin's parents insisted they get a picture of the two of you in your matching university hoodies. You don't remember what it was, but you remember Seokjin cracked some dumb joke or said something ridiculous. He must have, because in the picture, you're looking at him with a softness in your face that isn't present any other time.

Seokjin reappears with a steaming mug and a hand behind his back. The familiar scent of warm chocolate and peppermint hits you, followed closely by the warm-butter sharp-mint honey-glaze smell that you remember taste-testing for him so many times that you're almost positive it’s going to linger on your gravestone.

"That's mistledough." You narrow your eyes, and he rolls his own. His hand pulls out from behind his back to reveal the treat he'd concocted in college and perfected not long after. Shaped like a sprig of mistletoe and a warm honey brown color, the mistledough is easily the best selling product that Seokjin has.

And it's only on sale from Black Friday to the first day of January.

You don't even know what's in it. He's never told you, hasn't let you watch him make it; he'd just show up randomly and shove a weird-shaped treat under your nose and tell you to eat it. And of course you did, because you've been whipped for him since the first day he made you smile on that playground.

It's not important, really. What's important is that he's brought you cocoa and mistledough, which means he's bribing you for something important.

"No," You tell him.

"Please," He pouts. "You don't even know what it is yet." You huff and look anywhere else. His pout is dangerous for you and you know it, and you refuse to be bought for some cocoa and bread.

In an attempt to avoid the puppy dog eyes he no doubt is wearing, your eyes flit around the room. They eventually settle on the mass of shopping bags to your right. You turn, seeing the collection of various wrapping papers on the left and the collection of tape beside them.

"No," You repeat, turning your glare on him. "Wrap your own damn presents, Spice, I'm not doing it for you this year."

"But you do it so much better than I do!" He steps forward, setting his bribes in front of you so the scent wafts towards you that much more. "Your corners are always perfect, Pumpkin, and the edges are so well matched, and you get the pattern to line up perfectly, and-"

"No, Jin," You tell him, already standing. "I told you last year that it was the last time I'd be doing it for you, and that was only because you left it to the day before - again - and had to be in the bakery. I already wrapped all my presents, I'm not doing yours too."

He doesn't even say anything. He just widens his eyes a little and looks down at the scuffed tile floor, kicking his shoe dejectedly against the foot of the desk. There's utter silence in the room, only broken by the muffled chatter of customers and the beep of one of the ovens every few minutes.

You last for a solid ten minutes. You know because the smell of more mistledough fills the air, and you know Seokjin wouldn't try to bribe you with anything that wasn't the freshest batch.

"Why can't you do it?" You grumble, already sitting back down and picking through the wrapping paper.

"I've got like a hundred orders to fill today. That's not even really an exaggeration, either. Soobin's been on cake duty all day so that I can get to work on the mistledough orders and still have time to finish Tae's cake before we leave." You sigh and turn to look at him.

He looks stressed; that's not unusual for this time of year, but it still makes your chest clench. You want to pull him close, run your hands along the furrow between his brows until it's smooth again. Smother him with kisses until he's giggling and happy and remembers that he's a badass culinary god and that he can handle this and that you love him.

"I wish you would tell people no sometimes," You say instead. You slide one of the biodegradable rolls onto the desk and start looking through the drawers for the massive ruler you know is tucked away somewhere. "You can't fill every order. Let people pine for their fancy bread, they don't deserve it anyway."

"You know I can't do that, Pumpkin," He says, breaking off a piece of your bribe and leaning against the tattered desk. "We only just got to where we're steadily in the black, and the seasonal stuff brings in a lot of money. I've got to milk that for as much as I can."

"Yes, because you being overworked and stressed like this is a much better alternative. I'm pretty sure your eyebags have eyebags." You wait for the dramatic gasp, but it doesn't come.

Instead when you look up at him from where you're digging through presents, he's staring at the picture of the two of you. Whatever he's seeing is beyond that, though, invisible to anyone but himself. It's not rare that he gets introspective and quiet; it's actually fairly common when it's just the two of you. You don't know why. You don't want to know why. You just take the moments when they come and wait for him to say whatever he's going to say.

"You're my best friend," is what he eventually says. Your hand stutters where it's slicing paper, mimicking the pang of heartbreak that shoots through your veins. You love being his best friend.

You just wish you were more than that.

"Yeah," You say offhandedly, "No one else wanted the gig, so I guess I'm stuck here." You can feel his eyeroll, but he pats your shoulder as he heads back into the kitchen. When he reappears a while later with fresh cocoa and a bagel, you pretend to be mad that he steals a bite of it until he laughs at your grumbling.

When you leave his smile feels lighter, and you tell yourself you're imagining his eyes lingering on your back as you go.

You’re gonna kill him. You really are. You’re going to absolutely skin him alive, you don’t give a fuck how cute his face is or how hard he makes your heart beat. There’s not a single fucking thing he could say or do that would make up for this. 

Maybe if you hadn’t been out here waiting for nearly twenty minutes. Maybe if your phone showed that he had even opened the last six texts you had sent him. Maybe if it wasn’t Seokjin who insisted on leaving at like ten in the morning to being with, even though you had plenty of time to get there because you didn’t even need to run by the bakery because he’d already put Soobin and Yeonjun through what probably counted as actual military training in order to prepare them for today. Frankly, it’s a miracle Seokjin is even leaving them on their own today, considering how hectic it gets. You’re entirely sure that it’s only because Soobin has worked there since the bakery opened and Yeonjun joined not long after so they both know the ropes as well as they possibly can. And because Seokjin was likely up until an ungodly hour preparing and baking an enormous amount of mistledough for today.

In fact, he’s probably still passed out up there, you decide as you climb out of your truck and head into your best friend’s apartment building. You’re cursing under your breath the entire way, paying no mind to the scandalized elderly gentleman that shoots you a Look. You really are gonna kill him, you decide as you shove the key he made you into the lock and jiggle the handle slightly so it’ll actually turn. You’re going to drag him out of his stupidly comfortable bed and probably try to shove him down the garbage disposal or something. His shoulders may present a challenge, but you are up for it. 

Your mind is so made up that you don’t even register the bags he’s got ready by the door, or the coolers full of groceries that are packed and ready beside them. You just sidestep it all entirely and head down the hall. You don’t even register the faint sounds, muffled by the door to his room, and by the time it all finally reaches your brain, it’s too late. You’ve already thrown the door open as wide as it will go, which means you get a perfect, unobstructed view, even as Seokjin startles and yelps. 

Because of course - of course - he isn’t sleeping or showering or packing. No, instead he’s got his fist wrapped around his cock and is thrusting shallowly into the warmth of his palm. The universe loves to torment you entirely too much, clearly. Why else would it offer you such an unhindered look at the love of your life’s dick?

It’s a nice dick, too. Long and the perfect thickness, a pretty dusky pink head. You can’t lie and say you’ve never imagined what Seokjin’s dick looks like - you basically grew up with him and the others, and young boys talk about their dicks. A lot. Plus, you’ve had a crush on him for several years now. 

You just never could have imagined that it’s so absolutely gorgeous that you can feel your mouth water. It’s impossible to tear your eyes away from it, in fact, until Seokjin gets over his initial shock and shoves his blanket over his lap. 

“What, uh,” He starts, throat rough. “What are you doing here?”

“Uh...you asked me to pick you up, remember? Because your car doesn’t have four wheel drive like the truck.” You learned a long time ago how to avoid being embarrassed around Seokjin, but even that can’t stop the burn in your cheeks as you force yourself to make eye contact with your best friend. It’s a struggle to focus on anything that isn’t the planes of his naked chest, broad and tanned despite the winter weather, but you manage. 

Barely. 

“Right, yeah, but...uh, weren’t you supposed to call? And aren’t you early?” The tips of his ears are as red as your face feels. The contrast between the current situation and his obvious shyness is so endearingly distracting, it takes you a full minute to focus back in on what he’s saying. “--at this point, I mean, I know that we apparently aren’t there yet, but really, I don’t mind-”

“Wait,” You interrupt, “I’m still stuck on how I called you four times, both before I left and en route and once I got here, waited another ten minutes since I got here early because I know you like to be early, and yet somehow this is my fault.”

“Well...you should have knocked! Why wouldn’t you knock when coming into someone else’s apartment or bedroom?”

“Why didn’t you hear me coming? The floor in your hallway is a million years old, it squeaks constantly, how did you miss that?”

“Well, I was a little preoccupied.”

“Clearly.”

“You still should have knocked.”

“Why did you give me a key if you wanted me to knock? And when have you ever knocked on my door when you show up randomly? Besides, I figured you were asleep and didn’t want to wake you up while I took all your shit out to the truck.” His face softens a little, and a shy smile teases at his lips. 

“Thanks, Pumpkin,” he says quietly. Your stomach flips violently at the look on his face and you roll your eyes at it. 

“Yeah, whatever.” You pick up the clothes he already has laid out and throw them at his chest. “Get dressed, you’re buying me breakfast on the way to the cabin.”

He doesn’t protest as you leave him and gather his bags up, balancing them atop the coolers of groceries and snacks he’s no doubt made for everyone. It only takes a little finagling, but you manage to get it all downstairs and into the backseat of your truck. Fat white flakes are falling from the grey sky by the time you’re finished, and Seokjin’s nose and ears are still pink when he eventually gets in as well. You turn the heat up, just in case it’s not residual embarrassment heating his face. 

He doesn’t even say anything except a muffled thanks. After a few minutes, you’ve almost resigned yourself to an awkwardly silent car ride. 

“So…” Seokjin eventually says in a too-casual tone. “About earlier-”

“No,” You hiss before he can continue. “No we are absolutely not talking about what happened.”

“Oh, come on,” He implores as you turn into the first drive-through you can find. “It was bound to happen eventually, considering-”

“We really don’t need to talk about it,” you insist. 

“I’m just saying that I know you aren’t really one for...y’know, sexual activity,” He ignores your open-mouthed gape and continues, “But I have my own needs, and self-satisfaction is the best balance between the two that I’ve found. That said, I’m sorry you had to see it, I know it probably made you uncomfortable. Because. Y’know. Dicks.”

You’re still gawking as he finishes his spiel, and you feel a little like a fish. You surely must look like one, with your mouth hanging open in shock, your eyes as wide as saucers, and the general air of befuddlement that surrounds you. There are so many things you want to say, questions you have, all of them colliding in your brain.

“I like sexual activity just fine!” is what makes it out, just as the speaker beside your window crackles to life. There’s a long, pregnant pause in which you and Seokjin just stare at each other. 

“So...what can I get for you today?” The worker says through the speaker. You want to die, just a little, as you rattle off your order and Seokjin’s to him; the universe hates you, obviously, that’s the only real explanation here. 

“We are not talking about this,” You tell Seokjin firmly as you pull away from the speaker. Your face is still burning, but you refuse to acknowledge it. “You are paying and then we are heading to the cabin and we are not ever speaking of this again.”

He holds his hands up in defeat. You almost believe that he’s dropped the subject, but unfortunately you know him too well for that. Which is why you shoot him a warning look as you pull up to the window and he starts to say something. 

“All I was going to say is that my parents asked about you the other day. They’re mad that you haven’t been by lately.”

“I’ve been busy,” You say as you hand Seokjin’s card to the kid in the window. “I haven’t had time to visit.”

“You visit Jimin’s grandma like twice a week.”

“Yeah, well, Granny Park and I are friends. Not to mention I still have to unseat her as the reigning go champion.” You don’t mention that you’re sneaking her mistledough and cookies so that she won’t blab about the fact that you’re in love with Seokjin. Or that every time you go to his parents’ house, they end up talking about weddings and asking when you’re getting married. You can’t deal with that, not when you factor in your feelings for their son. 

“I’m just saying. You’re like a daughter to them. They miss you. I’m going by there after we get back from the cabin, and I think they’d like it if you tagged along.”

All you give him is a noncommittal grunt and several bags of fast food. You love his parents, you really do. You just wish they didn’t come with the constant reminder that Jin only sees you as a sister.

He lets you eat in silence, though, content to munch on your fries and pretend most of the morning never happened. He sings along to every song that plays on the radio, and it isn’t until you’re about thirty minutes away from the city and doing your best to navigate the roads in the worsening snow that you get suspicious. 

“When you say you like sexual activity just fine-"

“I thought we dropped this!” He sends you a look that just says ‘really?’ and continues. 

“I just want to know what you mean. Because obviously we’re on two different pages.”

“I mean that I like it just fine. I enjoy it, it’s fun, I would like to continue having it in the future. What of that is strange to you?”

“No, I just...I was under the impression that you weren’t interested in that. You never really talk about it, and you’ve never mentioned any...partners, or anything so…”

“I didn’t realize I was supposed to inform you of every person I’ve ever slept with.” You glance over at him, astounded, and are shocked to see that his lips are pursed in a frown and his brows are drawn together. You resist the urge to reach out and smooth the lines on his face. “Wait, are you actually upset about this?”

“It’s just...I’ve told you about every person I’ve slept with.” You wince a little because he’s right. You’ve heard about every single one of his sexual encounters, some of them in great detail, and you do your best not to think about them. “If I had known that you were interested, then-”

“What? You would’ve set me up with one of your friends?”

“Who was the last person?”

“What?”

“Who was the last person you had sex with?”

You look at him again, a quick glance to try to figure out if he’s being serious or not. His face is hard, an emotion you can’t place clear in the set of his jaw and the steel in his eyes. 

“I’m pretty sure there’s an actual blizzard starting around us, and you want to know who I fucked recently?”

“Yeah, I do. Fair’s fair, Pumpkin.” Something in his voice raises alarms in your head. You could insist that you don’t want to talk about it; he’d respect it if you were really serious, you know he would. There’s an edge to him right now, though, one you haven’t seen in a very long time, and you don’t like it. You want to smooth it out, sand it back into the gentle lilt you love.

“Fuck, Spice, I don’t know. That guy from the bar that one night?”

“What night? What bar?”

“I don’t fucking remember, okay? It was like...fuck, years ago, I don’t even remember what he looked like, let alone his name or what bar it was. Are you happy now? For fuck’s sake, I didn’t think I had to report to you every time I wanted to get laid. You’re my best friend, not my keeper. I didn’t think it was any of your business.”

He mumbles something under his breath that you don’t catch; between the sound of the heater going full blast and the Christmas carols he’s got blaring through your truck’s sound system, it’s hard to hear anything. Still, when you glance over at him again, something dark sits in his expression, and you’ve got a gut feeling it’s your fault. 

Things remain tense even after you arrive at the cabin. Seokjin doesn’t wait for you to help him, just loads all of his stuff into his arms and wobbles his way inside while you’re still slinging your overnight bag over your shoulder. The door slams behind you as you enter, caught by the wind of the growing storm outside, and you send what you hope is an apologetic wave to where Taehyung and Star - his girlfriend of forever and one of your closest friends - sit in the den. 

You immediately make your way to the kitchen, swiping a tin of cookies and making hot chocolate, all while ignoring the overly aggressive chopping your best friend is doing behind you. You’re sure Star and Tae aren’t surprised when you flee to the room that you’ve unofficially claimed over the years. 

You stay there for most of the day. The door stays open, just in case someone actually wants to come talk to you; you have no doubt that everyone can hear you cursing at the dog show you’re watching, and at one point you’re pretty sure you hear Namjoon’s voice steer someone away, but you can’t be sure. You don’t even want to be sure. All you really want is to know what the fuck you did to piss your best friend off and get him back to normal. 

You can’t just ask him, though, because he’ll no doubt get even angrier that you don’t already know, despite the fact that you have no way of knowing unless he actually tells you. 

Frustrated, you pick up your phone and flip uselessly through the chat you have with him, trying to find literally any explanation for how he’s acting. The group chat with all the boys plus Star and Cat has been quiet most of the day, only the offhanded comment about someone leaving now or going to be a little late. 

Your chat with just Cat and Star is almost as quiet. There’s a featured video of Seokjin blowing up at Jeongguk a bit too harshly considering the younger had just nabbed some kimchi before dinner, but that’s essentially it. You’re tempted to ask Star to get Seokjin to tell her what’s going on, but not only do you not want to drag her into whatever this is, you also know better. He wouldn’t tell her anything. She isn’t his best friend. 

As much as you’re looking forward to the rest of the night, there’s a sense of dread deep in your bones when you eventually emerge from your room. You only do so because you’re out of hot chocolate and you know that you’ll be dinner if you’re late to eat. 

You wave off Star’s curious look when she sees you; you don’t need her worrying about you, not when she’s got so much else to focus on, if the crutches leaned nearby are any indication. Hobi and Cat haven’t arrived yet, which only adds to the sinking feeling in your gut, but you brush it off. They would call if they had trouble. You know they would. Besides, Cat said they’d probably be leaving late. 

Seokjin doesn’t even look at you as you pass him to get to the dining table, and that hurts more than you’d like to admit. The real sucker punch comes once you sit down, however, when you see a mug of hot cocoa with your signature candy cane placed just to the right of your plate, only to realize that Seokjin’s mug of special coffee he loves so much is placed at the other end of the table. 

Away from you. 

Air catches in your lungs, and it sounds silly that you’re tearing up over your best friend not sitting beside you, but he always sits beside you. Always. No matter what the two of you have been fighting about, he’s always sat beside you because he likes to laugh at the faces you make about the conversations going on, and he feeds you the best bits of meat while you act annoyed about it but secretly love it. 

You knew Seokjin was upset, but you hadn’t realized he was this upset. 

Jimin sits beside you and introduces you to his neighbor, but you don’t even catch her name, just that he keeps calling her Snow and she looks at him like he’s the meal and that there’s a massive purple bruise along Jimin’s neck that you have a sneaking suspicion is her handiwork. She looks vaguely familiar, but you can’t be bothered to place her, not when Seokjin is laughing about something Star is saying and looks entirely too at home down there. 

On your other side, Namjoon and his roommate are talking about a science something or other that they’ve been working on. They’re both so invested in the conversation that neither notice Namjoon dumping the extra spicy sauce over his rice instead of the mild that he prefers. You can’t even bear to listen as he starts complaining to Seokjin that he made the food too spicy and the resulting tirade from the eldest. 

If anyone notices your sour mood, they don’t say anything. It’s not surprising, when you think about it; you’ve long been established as the grump of the group, and you don’t expect that to change, even with the girl Jeongguk brought along that seems torn between whether she actually likes him or not. 

Yoongi catches your eye at one point and you just cock a brow at him. 

“Where’s Jisoo?” You mouth at him across the table. He looks to Peaches, the girlfriend of his that you’ve only ever met once in passing, and looks back at you. You way your eyebrows at him halfheartedly and Yoongi rolls his eyes. It’s disappointing that Jisoo isn’t here. She always provides some sort of entertainment.

If nothing else, she usually provides some semblance of distraction. 

By the time dinner ends, you’re fairly positive no one knows about your spat with Seokjin, or the strange tension between the two of you. You’re sure no one noticed how you didn’t eat much of anything; everyone was too wrapped up in their own conversations and relationships to pay much attention to little old you. 

You really should know better by now.

Jimin doesn’t move from his spot beside you, even as the others begin gathering dishes and your best friend disappears into the kitchen with the promise of cookies and chocolate-covered treats in an hour or two. Snow disappears, no doubt after a silent conversation between her and Jimin, and you roll your eyes at how he watches her disappear into the room they’ve claimed. 

The two of you sit in silence; it’s a game of wits, almost. You know he knows something is up, but you also know that he knows you aren’t one to just offer up your thoughts. But he knows that you know that, and he knows you know he isn’t going to let it go because he can tell something is actually bothering you this time. 

“So are we going to talk about why Seokjin has been so pissy all day and how there’s been a notable lack of Pumpkin by his side, or are we going to continue to pretend that everything’s fine like we did through dinner?”

You wish you were better able to resist him. Maybe your time with his grandmother has weakened you to him, and maybe you should work on being less transparent with him, but either way, you slump in your chair and set your empty mug of hot chocolate down with a thump. You still send him a glare that he smiles through and make a mental note to tell Granny Park that there’s a reason for his sudden need for scarves that she should ask him about. 

“We had a fight.” You eventually grumble, eyes darting to where Seokjin stands over in the kitchen, dipping marshmallows, pretzels, and other treats into melted chocolate. “I think.”

“You think?”

It doesn’t take very long for you to recount the day’s events to him. You even tell him about The Incident from that morning that you walked in on, because once you start talking you can’t seem to stop until he knows it all. 

“And now he’s pissed, I think at me, but I can’t figure out why. I mean, it wasn’t any of his business, but you know how I am with him, so it’s not like I could just not tell him, but I don’t understand why it pissed him off.” You huff a little. The frustration with everything that rolls in your stomach collides with the hurt you feel over Seokjin snubbing you, and it’s so distracting that you almost miss Jimin’s careful whisper of your name. 

“Have you ever considered just asking him?” Jimin says softly. “I’m pretty sure having an actual conversation with him would fix this whole thing.”

“But…” You hesitate, twisting a stray thread from your sweater between your fingers. “Jimin, what if he hates me?” 

There’s a vulnerability to your voice that you hate, one that only Seokjin, Jimin, and Granny Park have ever seen. It’s rare, mostly because you hate feeling vulnerable, but it makes Jimin’s eyes soften ever so slightly even as he bursts into a fit of giggles so powerful that he almost falls out of his chair. 

“This is not helping!” You hiss, shooting a look at where Seokjin is rolling out chocolate chip cookie dough. He doesn’t look up at Jimin’s outburst, but his lips twitch ever so slightly into a frown and the crease between his brows deepens. 

You know that look, too well. It’s his ‘I Do Not Care Even Though I Actually Do But I Don’t Want You To Know I Care” look. You saw it frequently when he first went off to college, when he was constantly worrying about all the boys he left behind in that little cul-de-sac. You really hoped it wouldn’t ever come back. 

“I’m sorry,” Jimin says eventually, wiping a tear away from one eye. “I really am, I promise, I’m just. Oh, I think I might lose a bet.”

“What? How is that helpful, Jimin? Y’know what, where’s that dumb dog thing Yoongi made you, I need to smush its face until I feel better--”

“What you need,” Jimin says as he places a gentle hand on your shoulder to sit you back down in your chair, “Is to stop abusing my lovingly crafted plushies and actually talk to Seokjin.”

“I can’t tell him how I feel, you know this Chim-”

“Did I say confess?” Jimin asks as he stands, eyes flickering to where his neighbor-slash-girlfriend(?) is in their room. “Just talk to him. I mean really talk to him, okay, about why he’s upset. I think you’ll be surprised.”

Jimin doesn’t give you a chance to protest; he’s gone and disappeared down the hallway before you can blink, and you don’t want to know what’s happening in that room. 

Eventually you meander over to where Seokjin is sliding cookies out of the oven, each perfectly placed to allow for the perfect bake. You putter around for a minute or two, opening and closing cabinet doors at random. You aren’t finding anything interesting, certainly not the strength to have this conversation, which is why you’re startled when someone says, “It’s all the way to the left.”

You turn, and Seokjin is absently stirring leftover melted chocolate. When you fail to move, too busy staring at him in confusion, he turns and points to a cabinet beside you. “The cocoa,” He says, “It’s all the way to the left.”

“Thanks,” You mumble as you move toward it. Inside is a box of candy canes and a weathered tin that you recognize from Seokjin’s apartment. Its twin sits in the bakery, right beside the register so that it’s close at hand for when you inevitably come thundering in with a storm cloud above your head. Each holds the special cocoa recipe that Seokjin learned from his grandfather, who learned it from his grandfather. 

You chance a glance at your best friend; he knows how much you love that cocoa. The people in this cabin right now are the only people he’ll make it for - save for Hoseok and Cat, who still haven’t arrived. Seokjin’s ears are burning red, and a weaker person - or at least one less accustomed to him - may have cooed at the sight. But you’ve spent too long building up the walls so that he’ll never find out just what you keep tucked away in your heart. 

“I’m-”

“Sorry.” He finishes for you. “I know you are. And...I forgive you.” You nod at his words; you couldn’t even hazard a guess as to what had actually upset him, but you’re glad he’s forgiven you for it. Still, it nags at you, because what if it happens again? Unlikely, considering you haven’t been able to get laid in actual years because you’re too smitten with the man standing across from you, but still. 

“Are you going to tell me why you were upset, or are you just going to play with chocolate all night?” You eventually ask. He sighs, heavy and long, and turn to lean back on the counter beside you. He’s wearing his ridiculous alpaca apron that you got him for his birthday, and that only makes him more beautiful as he considers what he wants to say. 

Your heart lurches painfully in your chest. He’s everything you’ve ever wanted, and it almost feels like he’s close enough to touch, but you just can’t seem to let your hand reach out to do so. You think if you could, you might be able to grab him and hold on forever, but something deep in your gut stills you. 

The fear of losing him, of losing everything that you have with him right now - late nights at the bakery, shopping for birthday presents, the quiet moments in a chaotic world where you find peace in each other. As much as it hurts to love him, as hard as it is to speak around the words that strangle in your throat that speak truth to every feeling you’ve ever locked in the recesses of your heart, you can’t risk telling him. Because this pining and loving and eventually watching him grow old with someone he loves?

That’s enough for you. 

“I just got jealous, I suppose,” Seokjin eventually says. “I always thought that you weren’t interested in sex, y’know? You mentioned it once in college that you’d tried it, but your little half-frown was there, so I knew you didn’t like it, because you get the same one every time you eat gingerbread because you hate it but you don’t want me to get disappointed that you aren’t eating the houses I make. I just thought it wasn’t something you wanted in life.”

“Um.”

“Which is obviously fine, sex isn’t for everyone, asexual people exist and are valid, as are those that are sex-repulsed, y’know? And I decided a long time ago when I first looked into it all that I didn’t care about sex in a relationship. That’s not the important thing to being partners with someone. But apparently sex is a thing for you, and I just wish I had known that because all this time I could’ve-”

“What, set me up with your friends?” 

“No, definitely not. It’s just that we...I could have...it just hurts to know that you’ll have sex with other people but not with me, even though I respect that it’s your decision to make.”

“What.”

“But I just...I know I’m not entitled to an explanation, but I can’t lie, I would really appreciate one if you can give it. I mean...I dunno, I know that I had sex with other people, but we had that whole conversation in college about it, and you seemed alright with it, so I did. And I always told you about them, because communication and openness is important, and I wanted you to know that I was respecting your boundaries with that while also satisfying my own needs. But it really did feel weird, because...y’know, so I stopped. And I guess I assumed that if you weren’t fucking me, you weren’t fucking anyone.”

“What.”

“I just really care about you, Pumpkin, and I know I know don’t really say it a lot because I’m more of a ‘showing it’ kind of guy, but...I just would have appreciated knowing that. Especially since I’ve always been more than willing to love you like that.”

“Spice,” You say slowly, being careful to keep your face blank. “What the actual fuck are you talking about?”

Seokjin blinks at you owlishly. “What do you mean ‘what am I talking about,’ I thought I was pretty clear. I mean...yeah, I’d love it if you would have sex with me, but that’s your decision, and I’m curious as to your reasoning and logic. Ultimately, it doesn’t matter, which is why I forgave you, because as much as it stings, it’s your choice. And I love you, as you know, so-”

“How would I possibly know that?” Your voice catches a little on the words, probably because you’re having a little trouble actually breathing. Everything is fuzzy and the words ‘I’d love it if you would have sex with me’ and ‘I love you’ are playing on a loop in your brain. Your entire world has just shifted on its axis, and yet Seokjin looks completely unbothered. 

“Maybe because I’ve put up with you so long?” He teases with a fond smile. “I mean, I know we aren’t the type to say the words very often, but c’mon Pumpkin. We’ve been dating since you were twelve, not many would last that long without even a kiss.”

“We haven’t been together since I was twelve, though.” He raises a brow at your confused tone. 

“Okay, thirteen, then.” He says. The confusion on your face must be apparent, because it begins to bleed into his, the beautiful features morphing to mirror your own. 

“Seokjin, I don’t know what you’re talking about. We aren’t dating.”

His expression only gets more confused. 

“Uh, yes we are?”

“Uh, no we aren’t? When the fuck did that happen?”

“When you were twelve, as I said. I asked you to be my girlfriend.”

“I feel like I would have remembered that happening.”

“Then you should go to a doctor, because it definitely did. It was the best day of my life. We were sitting on the playground, it was recess, you were upset.”

“I remember none of that.”

“You cannot possibly have forgotten this!” Seokjin exclaims. “I cheered you up and offered you my cookie, which you ate in like two bites even though I had made it with salt instead of sugar and it had to be disgusting, because some girl had knocked your cupcake into the dirt-”

“Park Sooyoung, that bitch, I remember that-”

“And then,” Seokjin continues, ignoring your outburst, “I was so deeply honored that you ate that disgusting thing that I offered you the equal honor of being my girlfriend. And you nodded and I kissed your cheek and then you punched me in the arm - which hurt, I might add, for days - and then I watched you play Pokemon Sapphire on your Gameboy Advance.”

The memory rushes in, though not exactly how he remembers it. Park Sooyoung had knocked your cupcake out of your hands and into the dirt, and you had been so mad about it that you’d started to cry. Seokjin found you, curled under a tree away from everyone else, and when he eventually learned what upset you, he’d told Sooyoung off like no one had ever seen. And then he’d handed you the best cookie you’ve ever eaten.

You think maybe that was when you first started falling for Seokjin. With the salty cookie that masked the taste of your own tears, and the angry tirade he had gone on despite the two of you not having known each other for very long, with the wide smile and squeaky laugh and ears so red and cute that you couldn’t focus on whatever he was saying and just nodded along to it. 

“Well...why didn’t you say anything since then?” A thought crosses your mind, and it so horror-filled that you have to ask. “Do the guys know?”

“If they do, it’s not because I told them,” Seokjin answers easily. “When you introduced yourself as my friend, I figured you were just a very private person and didn’t want to rub it in their faces or something.”

“Is that why you always drag me along when you, Hobi, Tae, Cat, and Star go out for karaoke?”

“Obviously,” He scoffs. “What could be better than a triple date with your two best friends?”

“Literally anything! Hobi and Cat sing each other the most raunchy things I’ve ever heard, and Tae does all those weepy ballads or indie songs nobody recognizes, and Star’s got those dopey love eyes all night, it’s revolting.”

“You mean like those faces you make at me when you think I won’t notice?”

“I-” You huff, at a loss. “Well what about the other day, with that girl at Mistledough you were flirting with, who was flirting back and-” Realization hits you. “And she’s Jimin’s neighbor girlfriend lady!”

“Pumpkin. Are you serious right now?” He gives you a dry look, but there’s amusement written all over it. “You’ve heard my sales pitch a hundred times. You’ve given my sales pitch a hundred times, albeit with a little more of a monotone and general ‘I’ll kill you’ vibe to it. It was just so she’d buy all the treats I could possibly sell her.”

You make a small ‘hmph’ noise that you aren’t exactly proud of, but makes Seokjin laugh. He pulls you into a warm hug, wrapping his arms around your waist to keep you there. It’s a little awkward, because your arms are still crossed over your chest, but he doesn’t seem to mind and despite all the muttered complaints you give him, there’s nowhere else you’d rather be. 

“So…” Jin says in a too-casual tone after a few minutes. You muffle a groan into his chest, already preparing for the worst. “What kind of sex are you into?”

“Oh my god,” You mumble.

“Wait, you’re right, I’m getting ahead of myself.” He clears his throat and stands to his full height. When he looks at you again, his eyes are full of something you can’t place exactly, but it makes your heart skip nonetheless when he says your full name. “Will you do me the honor of officially becoming my girlfriend? Again?”

You resist the urge to roll your eyes and nod. The grin takes over his face is blinding, worth all the trouble from the day, as is the soft kiss he presses to your cheek. You can’t help but huff when he pulls away from it, even, and he raises an amused brow at it. 

“Does this mean I can finally kiss you the way I’ve been dreaming of forever?” 

You do roll your eyes this time, but you let your fingers dance over his jaw and pull him into a gentle kiss. His lips are softer than they look, which you truly didn’t think was possible, and the way they mold and move with yours is warm and tender. You don’t even know how long you spend kissing Seokjin. Time isn’t real, not now, not with him pulling you closer and pressing warm against you like every single daydream you’ve let yourself have. 

Years of repressed urges and desire come out before you can stop them, though. Your hands move down to rest on Seokjin’s impossibly tiny waist, slipping behind his apron to tease at the waistband of his slacks. Why he insists everyone wear nice clothes to dinner, you couldn’t possibly say, but they make his ass look phenomenal so you never complain. 

The kisses become more heated, his tongue dipping out to taste your lips for a moment. Hands find their way to your ass and palm it greedily, and he tugs you flush against him. A hard length is pressing into you, and you don’t have to guess to know it's not the rolling pin. 

Images - memories - flash through your mind of that morning. Your mouth waters and you pull back from Seokjin. Panting, lips swollen from kisses, and half-lidded eyes, he's never looked better. 

"Can I suck your dick?"

He groans low in his throat and his eyes fall closed. "Fuck, Pumpkin, right here? Anyone could walk by." You drop to your knees as your hands undo the clasp on the pants. 

"Doubtful, they're probably having that post-dinner nap, or playing some game." Anxiety pools in your gut; you know quite a bit about what Seokjin likes in bed, but you've never been sure if exhibitionism is on that list. "Does it make you uncomfortable? I don't have to. I've just been thinking about it all day." 

Seokjin barks out a quick laugh and shakes his head. "No," He says, "I definitely would love for you to suck my dick in this kitchen if you want to."

"Good." You flip his apron to the side and tug his cock out of its confines. You don't bother dropping his pants all the way; there's no time, you're too impatient. "Let me know if anyone shows up." 

Whatever he's about to say gets cut off by a sharp intake of breath as you warp your lips around the head of him. One of his hands moves to grip the counter behind him and the other rests lightly on your crown; he doesn't pull or tug, just keeps his hand as a gentle pressure as you sink him deeper into your mouth.

As much as you've never been one for sucking dick, you're in heaven. There's no other explanation for why it feels this good to have him sitting heavy against your tongue as he hits the back of your throat. There are still two inches left so you wrap your hand around it and hollow your cheeks as you pull back. 

A strangled moan escapes him, and his fingers tighten ever so slightly in your hair. Heat floods to your core and you kick yourself internally because you could have been doing this for years. Your tongue darts out to slide teasingly along the underside of his cock and he reflexively thrusts into your mouth. 

You cough a little and pull back, wiping spit from your lips as you catch your breath, and Seokjin is already spewing apologies. 

“I’m fine,” You say as you sit back against the cabinet, tugging him to stand in front of you. His back is to most of the kitchen and your head rests against the hard wood behind you while you eye the hard wood in front of you. “I can take a little bit of roughness, Spice, don’t worry.”

He looks hesitant so you ghost your fingers along his length to tease him. His jaw clenches at the same time his eyes close and you resist the urge to smile. Tension bleeds out of his shoulders and when he opens his eyes again, he quirks a brow in a silent question and you nod. 

In seconds, he’s in your throat once more, thrusting himself in and out at a slow pace that makes you clench with the desire to feel it elsewhere. You hollow your cheeks and suck properly as he fucks your throat, and he muffles another moan.

“Fuck, Pumpkin, please don’t stop,” Seokjin whines quietly. You smile, just a little, and take him back into your throat for a few seconds before pulling back and repeating the process. Each time he hits the back of your throat, he lets out a muffled groan that only makes you wetter. His cock is thick and your jaw aches and you’re struggling to breathe just a little bit, but the fucked out expression on his face is more than worth it. 

Something clatters in the hallway and you freeze, Seokjin’s cock sheathed to the hilt in your throat. His ears turn red and he starts to pull back, but you stop him with a hand on his thigh. He looks down at you, surprised, and you chance a wink that makes him chuckle. 

Footsteps make their way past, giggles following close behind, and you hear the door leading to the hot tub open and close. After a few seconds of silence, Seokjin relaxes, pulling out of your throat. You take a few deep breaths and glance over to the door, curious. 

“Jimin and Snow,” He tells you, one hand absently stroking along your cheek. “We probably shouldn’t use the hot tub tonight.” 

You wrinkle your nose. “Why would I want to anyway? Have you heard Namjoon’s lecture on what could potentially grow in a hot tub if it isn’t sanitized regularly? It’s not a fun lecture.” Seokjin laughs, squeaky and adorable, and helps you to your feet. He doesn’t hesitate to pepper kisses along your cheeks, and you wrinkle your nose even as tilt your head so he can get the places he missed. 

“Now when you said that you can handle a little roughness…” Seokjin says, voice a soft murmur in your ear. You make a small hum of affirmation, encouraging him to continue. “Does that mean I can spank you for not finishing blowing me, or is that something you’d rather not do?”

“Fuck, Seokjin,” You hiss, rubbing your thighs together. “Now you have to do it.”

He’s got you turned around in an instant, your fancy dress pants on the ground a few seconds later. His hands mold to your ass, cupping the flesh briefly through your underwear before letting his hands fall away. 

It’s methodical and slow and torturous, how he peels away that last layer keeping him from your wetness. You know that the fabric is soaked through, it has been since you first got his dick in your mouth, and Seokjin groans at the sight. 

“Even better than I imagined,” He mutters. Your cheeks heat in a rare blush, and you drop your head down between where your forearms are braced against the countertop. His hand smacks against your ass, lightly, and you choke back a laugh. Is that really what he thinks a spank is?

Another slap hits you, no real force behind it, and you scoff under your breath. 

“What?” Seokjin asks. When you look back at him, he’s expectant, like he knows what you’re about to say. 

“Is that what you call a slap?” You ask. He rolls his eyes and pulls his hand back for another. It already looks unsatisfying, and you can’t help but push him a little further. “I always wondered why your dough doesn’t rise high enough. Guess I know now.”

His eyes darken and a chill comes over you. 

“Oh, is that how this is gonna be?” He asks. He gestures for you to face forward again and you do, curious as to the dark look in his eyes. 

Something hard and cold smacks into your ass, and you yelp in surprise. There’s a little more force behind it, enough to sting pleasantly but not enough to hurt. 

“Is that better, Pumpkin?” He asks. There’s a mocking tone to his voice, but when you look back, you can see the slant of his lips and tension in his jaw that shows he’s concerned. The rolling pin from earlier rests in his hands, and it flares something in your gut. 

“Much,” You tell him as you turn back around. He spanks you with it again, and again, and again, and it isn’t until you feel something wet drip down the back of your leg that you remember the chocolate he was fucking around with earlier. 

“If you get that on my nice clothes, I will destroy you,” You warn him. He laughs a little and there’s a thump as the rolling pin hits the countertop. 

“Is that code for get me naked?” He asks, a laugh in his voice. 

“No, that’s code for lick it up and then fuck my brains out.” 

The laugh in his throat quickly becomes a growl and he sets to work doing just that. His tongue runs over your skin, gently lapping at the chocolate there, and several times he gets distracted leaving purple marks in his wake. He even slides tongue along your slit, long and thorough and quick, and you almost come just from the obscene moan he lets out. 

"Fuck, please, I need you," You gasp out. Seokjin slides a hand under your shirt, massaging the muscles in your back as he does, and stands to his full height.

"Let me know if it hurts," He says softly. His voice is a whisper against your ear and it's never sounded quite so wrecked or beautiful. "I'll stop, okay?"

"If you don't get inside me in the next five seconds, I will go ask Jimin and Snow if I can join them in their kinky hot tub," you growl. 

He curses quietly and thrusts his length inside you. Neither of you are quite prepared for what it feels like, and the moment he gets buried to the hilt, he stills. 

"Shit, Pumpkin, I'm not gonna last long," He mutters. You can't even manage words. The stretch is absolutely blissful, just on the right side of painful when paired with the sting of your still-tender ass. He's the perfect height for this, too; perfectly lined up without either of you having to try very hard. 

He pulls almost entirely out, leaving just the dusty pink head you remember inside. There's not even a chance to whine at the loss, because before you know it, he's slamming back in. 

Seokjin's pace is erratic and harried; there's no smooth strokes here. You're both in too much of a rush, too drunk on the pleasure to want anything but release. 

Hands move along your skin, one lifting your shirt so he can pepper kisses along your spine while the other reaches down to gently tweak your clit. 

It takes three swipes of his finger to have your knees shaking with the power of your orgasm. You clench around him and he stills. You can't think, your brain is absolutely fried at this point; all you know is the feeling of him inside you and the disappointing emptiness when he pulls out. 

Warmth hits your back and Seokjin's moans echo in your ears. You're almost afraid to turn around, afraid this is some hyper-realistic dream.

"Shit, hold on, let me clean this up," he says, panting. You can hear him moving through the kitchen and when he comes back, something cold and wet slides along your back. 

You wait patiently as he cleans you up. He wipes away every instance of cum and chocolate from your skin - though he looks a little disappointed to be doing so, which you file away for later. 

"God, that's so much fucking cum," You say, wrinkling your nose at the mass of wet wipes he tosses in the trash while you fasten your pants once more. 

It's just in time, too, as Jimin and Snow come in from the hot tub, smiling and giggly with each other. 

"Ah," Jimin says, looking between you and Seokjin. "I did lose a bet. Damn, she's gonna be so pleased with herself."

You glare at him, but there's no real heat behind it. The two of them disappear to get dressed in actual clothes, and you and Seokjin set to work plating the cookies and treats he'd made. 

You can't stop the fond look at the rolling pin every few minutes. 

Later, after you discover Cat and Hobi have arrived safely and you make sure they actually eat the plates set aside for them, you're on the hunt for Seokjin. He's disappeared somewhere and it's almost time for the countdown. 

You finally find him - where else - in the kitchen, making a horrified face at Namjoon. 

"What? It was good," Namjoon says with a frown. Seokjin just waves him off and Namjoon shrugs, grabbing a couple glasses of champagne and heading back to Slick. 

You sidle up to him as close as you can get and he wraps an arm around your waist like it's second nature. It's surreal, that the man you love is pressing a kiss to your temple and handing you a mug of cocoa. 

"I'm glad we talked," He says eventually. You hum your agreement; you aren't looking at him, just staring down into your cocoa as you absently stir it with a candy cane, but you do lean into him ever so slightly. "Remind me to bake Jimin a cake."

"Why? What's he done to deserve a cake?"

"He helped me out earlier, while I was cooking dinner. Helped me figure out how to say what I needed to, that sort of thing."

Your face shoots up as your heart clenches in your chest. "Jimin," You echo. "Jimin is why you decided to talk about your feelings." Seokjin just nods, eyes wide and not understanding why you have murder in your eyes. 

"I'm gonna kill him so hard-" You say, already setting your mug down and turning to go find that short gremlin and skin him alive. You don't get two steps before a hand comes to rest on your shoulder, heavy but gentle. 

Seokjin pulls you closer to him, a smile playing on his lips as he does. "Why would you want to kill Jimin for that, Pumpkin?"

"Because!" You exclaim. "Jimin's the only one that knows that I-"

The words tangle in your throat, cloying together into a ball you can't seem to unwind. You're too used to choking it down. You don't know how to say it. 

"That you love me?" Seokjin finishes. You can't bear to look at him, huffing slightly as you turn to stare out the kitchen window at the snow-covered trees beyond. 

Seokjin's hand glides down your arm to wrap around your own, tangling his fingers with yours. With a grace you tend to forget he has, he brings them both upwards until he can press a soft kiss in the center of your palm. 

"Jimin isn't the only one that knows that, Pumpkin," He says quietly. You can feel your ears burning, a pleasant contrast from how it's usually him embarrassed and red. 

"Whatever," you grumble, giving up on your mission to brutally murder one of your best friends. Seokjin laughs, loud and squeaky and wonderful, and pulls you into another hug. 

"I love you too," He whispers. "Now, let's go join the others. I believe you owe me several years of kisses."

"You wish," You mutter half-heartedly. He hands you your cocoa and pats your still-sore ass with a wink.

"That's a great move."

"Really?"

"Yes." There's a pause as she waits for you to remove your fingers from the piece. "If you want to lose."

You offer her a weak glare that she ignores as she studies the board. 

"I'm glad that you and Seokjinnie finally got things figured out. It was very cute to watch, but it was getting a little ridiculous, you know." 

She moves a piece, and you squint to try to help you figure out her strategy. 

"Right, it had nothing to do with your bet with Jimin," You say sarcastically as you move another piece. You eye her, one finger still remaining on it, to try to figure out if it's what she expected. 

"Of course not," She says as you remove your hand. "That was merely a bonus." She immediately lays a piece, gaining even more of an advantage than she already had. 

"Well then," You start as you lay another piece, "I'm sure you know all about Jimin and his neighbor, and Star and Tae I don't need to tell you anything about Yoongi or Cat or Jeongguk, either, probably." 

Her fingers hesitate over the piece she's picking up, and her eyes narrow at you. 

"Ah, don't be so cruel. You're supposed to respect your elders, you know."

"Alright, Granny Park," You say with a rare grin as you glance to where Seokjin is baking a ‘sorry we fucked in your kitchen’ cake and decoration some sugar-free cookies for her. "What exactly do you want to know?

#moonchildnet #ficswithluv #smutcentralnet #btswriterscollective #ksmutclub #magicshopnet #seokjin fanfic #jin fanfic #seokjin smut #jin smut #seokjin fluff #jin fluff #bts fanfic #bts fluff #bts smut #reader insert #jin x reader #seokjin x reader #the snowball effect collab #ddaenggtan

[cruddyborderlandstheories]

let me explain to you the plot of borderlands 4 (kidding. mostly)

tl;dr: the eridians are evil, or, worse, completely uncaring about the things going on in their little sandcastle. the guardians are salty bitches about it and need our help and/or are going to start slaughtering people and im gonna fuckING TAlk ABOUT IT mostly because i need to write this down bc its been bouncing around my head since the game (bl3, not 4. that’d be wild) came out. minor spoilers for Guns Love and Tentacles. mostly that side quest.

tl;dr: tl;dr: eridians bad, guardians mad, and we are caught in the middle of a war that’s about to go down between them. spoilers for GLaT

tl;dr: tl;dr: tl;dr: Fl4k was a warning. Spoilers.

i dont even know where to begin because FUCK THERE’S SO GODDAMN MUCH TO THIS STORY

so im just going to start listing facts or points (+) of this theory that i remember at this very moment and probably forget a lot of them alright i’ll elaborate on all of this i promise. okay? lets go

+the eridians made a bunch of vaults that hold monsters in them

+some of these monsters are clearly constructs. some of them are not

+those that are clearly constructs:

the warrior

the traveler

the sentinel

+those that are not clearly constructs:

the destroyer

the rampager

the serpent

(possibly) gythian

(possibly) graveward (more on this in a bit)

+those that are not accounted for:

the timekeeper (but do keep this bad boy in mind)

+the eridians made the guardians: biomechanical constructs that are somewhat sentient, gaining sentience, and are supposed to guard the Vaults

+we also know now that there are these things called proving grounds with a salty, sentient guardian named the Overseer:

“vault hunter, I thought you might show up sooner or later. so naughty your species, so curious. the vault of vaults has been opened and IT has been released. prove your worth and I will reveal why the masters made me wait for you”

“naughty humans have opened the vault of vaults but the masters will determine who is a fault. until next time, warrior”

“long ago there was a brief spark, the first vault was opened, a light in the dark. a riddle, yes? perhaps it will unravel next time, hunter”

“so, you’ve returned. persistent, yes. or stubborn? or both. are you so desperate to prove yourself?”

“we were created for one purpose by our masters- and we couldn’t even do that right (laughs). but don’t blame us! when a cog breaks, point your finger at the artificer, not the cog! are you a cog, Vault hunter, or an artificer? Or both? prove yourself worthy.”

“pity us not, though the world has been broken. those who sleep will soon be awoken. not long now, seeker.”

“the eridians were our masters, but we failed them. they gave the order then silence. they VANISHED. such is our fate, Vault Hunter. server to a master who has left the house so long ago. prove to me that you deserve an introduction.”

“we were supposed to guard the Great Jail. but no quarter for servants who fail. but servant, that is not quite right. ‘Prisoner’. that is what i am. Until next time, adventurer.”

“a final chance to prove yourself. but will your reward be what you desire? a prisoner in a cell staring out at the fathoms of a sleeping universe. after a time, how would you know if you were prisoner or master? consider this while you prove yourself one last time.”

“it has come to this. one last trial. but will your efforts be worthwhile? that is what we will determine next time, hero”

“I am a prisoner, but you, vault hunter? what are you? hunter, warrior, hero? no matter what name i use, you return to prove yourself time and time again. but prove it to whom, i wonder? perhaps you seek a greater audition”

“it is done and my masters have taken note. would you like to know what they told me right before they vanished? ‘beware the vault hunters, they will take your kind’s place’. now i am free, and you are chained. until next time, guardian”

“well done, but have they taken note? that is what I wonder.”

+ the entire thing about there being a Fallen Guardian we have to kill

+ how the entire thing of the trails are copies of the worlds we visited to open the Great Vault. either the eridians can see through time (TPS) or they built these recently

+how dark Maliwan is probably working together with the Guardians on Nekrotefeyo given the fact they’re working together in one of the trials

+oh and remember how i suggested Maruice’s ghostie goo (ectoplasm) is actually related to eridians and such? YEAH. turns out that was right.

+Nyriad, the unreliable narrator

+the fucking Forgetting

+how the eridians are NOT ACTUALLY GONE FOR GOOD

+the seraphs!!!

+how the guardians are all named after angels, sirens are tied to humanity’s religious imagery

+how tyreen literally only loosened the chains on the Destroyer and the destroyer is going to break free from pandora

+how animals and people like bloodwing, slag psychos, etc mutate due to the eridium on pandora

+the destroyer’s reaction to slag being injected into its eye is straight panic

+the vault monsters that are fleshy were probably science experiments by the Eridians to test eridium and/or the results of being locked in the vaults for ages

+humanity was probably created by the eridians as well (more on that later)

+the Watcher actually WANTS us to have more Vault Hunters, she warns us that war is coming. all we can assume right now is either the Watcher fucked up big time, or she WANTED all this to happen. More on that later.

+the guardians are preparing for war. the overseer seems especially salty about the cause of it.

+ graveward was killed at some point, so the guardians brought it back using the ships, so that they could use their souls to posses it (further proved by the loot: Grave, relic, and Ward, shield)

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

 alright holy fuck

that’s a lotta stuff to go over!!! Let’s do this thing.

Let’s start with the Eridians themselves

so. these bad boys. We never really knew much about them, but it was always kinda assumed they’ve been long gone bc of the destroyer, or just out of reach.

now that bl3 dropped we’re supposed to assume that they’re all officially dead bc of Nyriad/the Destroyer

and i am here to say that Nyriad is an unreliable fuckin narrator because she doesn’t know the whole story. in fact, she admits to not knowing everything!!

here’s what I actually think is going on, and yes, I believe 100% the eridians are shady motherfuckers who decided to play god:

the eridians are from a dimension that isn’t ours. we can assume this is a higher dimension, bc of all their weird space/time fuckery, especially the Vaults.

the eridians decided to do some science experiments. they make the vaults and use our dimension to store them and put all their experiments inside. they make guardians to guard their vaults, and they realize they can do better in the ‘making a fully conscious being’ department. they make humanity. they make sirens after experimenting with eridium. they decided to go big or go home, and they make giant monsters. after all that, they realize they fucked up, because there is one monster they cannot contain anymore, after all the shit they put it through

so the eridians realize they done fucked up and escape fully to our dimension, where they placed us and the guardians and all the science experiments they didn’t want to deal with at the moment. The Destroyer follows them

they land on nekrotefeyo, their ‘first landing’ in our dimension (hence the quote above). This, or the eridians had been in our dimension for a while now. Nyriad never says where the Eridians came from, just that they and humanity lived side-by-side, so it’s likely they’d been here for a bit, sending scientists back and forth, just doing their experiments all willy-nilly. And I would bet they created the Destroyer in that time frame.

“for their curiosity, they were rewarded with doom” i believe is a correct statement, but not in the way Nyriad thinks. I think the eridians created the destroyer to see if they could, to test the bounds of what was possible. and it backfired on them in the worst way.

Nyriad also says this, but I have a hard time believing her here

the most this is is speculation, because if none of the civilizations who met the Destroyer had nothing else to pass on, then humanity would not know of their existence. (I mean, she even says ‘SURELY it had different names’) Humanity has no record of other (intelligent) alien life in the universe, or their own civilizations being destroyed by the Destroyer*. It’s just the Eridians. 

*There is a reason for this, but let’s hold on for now.

So why tf do I think humanity was created by the Eridians? well, for one, I like the parallel to them having a god-complex. If they haven’t created humanity, then they definitely fucked with us to create Sirens. Sirens have a strong connection to Eridium and the Vaults (and other Sirens).

second, the murals in (most of) the vaults in bl3

show human-like figures hanging out with kids, and one touching something that seems oddly similar to a relic

like so

(on the left there)

there are also these really tall cloaked figures standing (t-posing) near the end of the mural

and most statues are depicted with robes on

a lot of the human figures in the mural are shown helping each other stand up, coming up from the ground like they’re being created, looking around (up at the sky at rays of light), and standing with a lot of eridian junk (there’s a vault symbol next to one). they’re also not shown to be wearing any sort of clothing, even tho extra steps were gone in to show the robed figures

it reminds me a lot of how a lot of religious texts describe humans as being molded from the earth or dirt or whathaveyou

long story short, it very much reminds of something like a creation myth, so i imagine humanity was, in fact, created by the eridians.

ESPECIALLY this smaller one reaching up to touch the relic

there’s no concrete proof for this, but its a hunch i have after studying this mural for a while. especially after Nyriad constantly questions why the Guardians were made to be on the brink of consciousness. humanity is Guardians 2, electric boogaloo. guardians were a mix of machine and bio goop, we are full bio goop. and that means we are curious, and have emotions, and are very naughty.

that or vice versa, eridians made humanity, realized we weren’t as subservient as they wanted and made the Guardians to fill that niche. Also, most importantly, the Guardians were literally made to be disposable. That’s their entire purpose. Their bodies will degrade, but then their souls will just eventually find another vessel. They’re trapped forever.

EITHER WAY

the Eridians created humanity and the guardians around the same time. enough that the guardians are likely vvvv salty about it.

humanity was made. Sirens came after that, through eridium experiments by the Eridians, explaining their connections to Eridium, as well as the other dimension (the one we are assuming Eridians are from) (think about the Lab Rats and Sirens and such)

so were the eridians preparing for something? war, maybe? possibly. they need firepower and obviously they wouldn’t sacrifice their own people when they have perfectly good constructs, so they’ll use their naughty meat slaves.

but the eridians need more than the sirens. they keep dying, and given the failsafe measures, its hard to keep track of them if one decides to let their powers go, despite the fact they added in, like, a siren gps for sirens to find other sirens and be drawn to them and shit

their big boy guardians, their constructs, aren’t doing enough to defeat their enemy

they start experimenting more with eridium. They learn it has the power to mutate things (mostly elementally, but also causes an increase in size, especially the longer/more they’re exposed to).

they create seraph crystals, condensed eridium, which mutate things at an increased rate. These become discarded eventually for reasons below

they begin finding other kinds of life and mutating the hell out of it using eridium/seraph crystals, in order to create their giant buttfuck squish monsters. These monsters are probably pissed the hell off bc they’re mutated and also probably being attacked by people. so they rampage, killing everything in their path.

the eridians need a way to store the big boys and also take them to the battlefields where they’ll annihilate the enemy, so they create the Traveler and the traveling Vault (which is why there was really nothing of substance in that Vault OKAY TAKE IT). Perhapeth the big flesh monsters mutate more due to being locked inside the Vaults and constantly exposed to eridium/whatever energy is in the other dimension.

Things are going well, and the big flesh monsters help turn the tide of war in favor of the Eridians, until the other party is completely wiped out by what they dubbed the Destroyer. So the eridians decide ‘well, we had our fun, time to put the monsters in their cages and forget about the seraph crystals’.

and most of the big boys, creation and mutation alike, are shoved in their Vaults, guarded by the Guardians so they can’t be released bc of naughty humans. except for one, notably the uncontrollable Destroyer. because it wiped out their enemies, now it wants more, with its insatiable hunger, so it turns its eyes on the Eridians and Nekrotafeyo

sort of explaining why the planet looks like it fucking exploded

the destroyer began to give it the SUCC

but there’s more about that planet

cuz the inside is all glowy and green and you totally know where this is going because i told you im pretty sure the eridians created humanity along with the guardians

i think this is the giant storage unit for all the souls, including the Guardian souls. humanity is depicted being pulled up from the ground in the Vault murals.

lemme explain here

I think nekrotafeyo is where the Guardian souls are stored, like one bigass computer. That’s also, we can assume, where the Eridians got the spark for humanity as well. 

around the game, when u ‘kill’ guardians, you can watch their sparks leave (they’re the red glowy things), they fly upwards and disappear. You can also see blue/green versions of these floating around and not doing anything, notably outside the Rampager’s Vault. 

I am curious if these color differences indicate a difference in wisp type (guardian v human) or if the red means they found another vessel and blue means they chillin. It is interesting to note that the Rampager has the ability to succ the wisps, so its possible its also related to the Destroyer. I mean, its way smaller, but it does IMMEDIATELY start wrecking shit as soon as it leaves the Vault.

anyway there’s more to this, because now we get to talk about ~ghosts~

if u didn’t heed my warning earlier, there are spoilers for guns love and tentacles past this point!! 

DOES THIS LOOK FAMILIAR TO YOU?????

THIS IS JUST HANGIN GOUT IN THE CORNER OF THE ROOM BTW

LITERALLY NEKROTAFEYO

and let’s not forget the Halloween event that showed ghosts are a v real thing in the borderlands and not just on carpenter planet

like super real. and the ‘hecktoplasm’ we get fuels a portal to heck. literally another dimension. that BY THE WAY is powered by a Maliwan device. that BY THE WAY is filled with Maliwan troops.

cuz remember on Nekrotafeyo where there are a bunch of Maliwan soldiers, but they’ve all got the DARK prefix to their name? you know how in the proving ground the dark maliwan troops are fighting side by side with a bunch of Guardians?

something fucky is afoot.

reminds me a lot of the terror effect

ANYWAY

i believe nekrotafeyo is where the eridian stored the sparks for both humans and guardians, that’s where they are coming from, and when nyriad questions how tf the guardians got that spark (stolen like fire of the gods), its because they’re slowly gaining sentience over time, probably relating to how many times they’ve been killed (returned to the core and then back again). because i 100% believe the eridians created the guardians just as an endless, permanent workforce, and the guardians that have been disposed of time and time again are starting to realize that and get SALTY. the reason i do not say that the guardians are gaining sentience with regards to how long they’ve been around is bc there’s such a huge difference between the intelligence of The Watcher and just a normal-ass Guardian that I have to assume their developing sentience has a different trigger.

anyway back to the eridians getting the succ from the destroyer. the eridians realize they can’t just run away from it back to their home dimension, maybe bc its tied to that dimension due to the vault mutations (i vaguely remember typhon mentioning that the destroyer is a dimensional horror) so they have to imprison it somehow. How do they do that? well it is fucking terrified of eridium (when you inject the eye of the Destroyer in TPS, it panics and freaks out), probably due to all the fucked up experiments they did on it, so let’s imprison it using that. 

And once we do that, we should probably get the FUCK outta dodge, bc these science experiments are getting c r a z y, let’s remove ourselves from the experiment and observe from beyond

so what do they do?

they get one of their sirens to operate a Machine they built that will send them back home. all of them, at once. we’re going home, fuckers. seeya. and obviously they will not tell humanity, because humanity will want to come with, like a lost puppy. and they will constantly question the other dimension and pester the eridians about it. humanity is annoying and the eridians have 1 big regret, im sure. 

they’re also leaving the Guardians to do their dirty work for them, keep the vaults closed so that humanity won’t open them and send the Eridian’s pissed off creations after them. Also explains why there are no Guardians for the Vault of the Warrior (is an Eridian construct) and why the Traveler had Guardians inside it but not on the outside (to keep it running). The only Vault that made me do a big think is the Vault of Elpis. But more on that later.

so they tell this siren that the machine is going to kill them all, and use their energy to power to machine (lol) to close the Destroyer in Pandora, giving a perfectly good super powered monkey severe anxiety. 

they also (apparently) do this ‘Forgetting’ thing, which Nyriad mentions, which makes humanity forget that we lived side-by-side with the Eridians and also everything about the Destroyer. which is so DUMB of the Eridians. 

because SERIOUSLY people, if you don’t want your idiot children opening something, the one thing you don’t do is make them FORGET WHAT IS INSIDE OF IT SO THEIR CURIOSITY GETS THE BETTER OF THEM WHEN WHAT’S INSIDE OF IT IS LITERALLY ‘HEY, YOU’RE ALL GONNA DIE’. literally pandora’s box. LITERALLY- that’s half the reason I think this is all just one big experiment to them. They don’t give a FUCK about us, actually. they just want to see what will happen. they named the fucking planet Pandora ffs.

like YEAH some people would probably try to open it, to try to kill the Destroyer. but guess WHAT FUCKLENUTS we could have had humans working to keep pandora sealed instead just your cryptic ass guardians. CURIOSITY IS A DANGEROUS THING

and listen. there’s a lot of reasons i believe the machine actually sent the eridians home. even if they actually are just morons and thought the Forgetting was the best thing to do for humanity (scoff)

fdgdsffssfgfsg

all-home

there’s more to this

what are we up to? i stopped writing this like 3 days ago and just came back to it

you guys know the whole story now. im not saying my whole entire backstory is fully correct (like, a lot of it is major speculation) but i do firmly believe these few points:

the eridians are from a higher dimension than our own, and came here for science, or to escape the destroyer

nekrotafeyo is named “first landing”

they have an obvious connection to another dimension thru vaults, eridium, and sirens

the eridians either created or experimented with humanity, eventually leading to Sirens

sirens have this connection to both eridium, vaults, and the other dimension

they have similar powers to some Guardians

on Elpis there are ‘pseudo-Sirens’ created upon exposure to chemical sludge near the Vault

Sirens probably are the result of very exact experimentation, meanwhile these fake Sirens are not

The Leech is able to create ‘Anointed’ who have Siren-like powers and turn to eridium when killed

In bl2, the Lab Rats can see the other dimension when phaselocked by Maya after they were experimented on with eridium by Hyperion

unlike other enemies who only see ‘blue’

every vault monster is the way it is because of the eridians doing shit, including the destroyer

the reason the rampager is so angry and begins destroying everything right away? it was mutated by the eridians/being locked in the Vault. It was stuck in there with a bunch of Guardians, probably either conducting more experiments or there as ‘prison guards’

the destroyer appears frightened of slag in TPS when you inject it, but it also gains power from it- pretty similar to Sirens, and if eridium caused these mutations it could explain the fear

eridium causes LOTS of mutations as we can see throughout the history of the borderlands games. i’ve written 2-3 long-ass posts about this now, i think y’all get the idea lol

terry, badass wildlife, slag/burning psychos, etc

we don’t know how long the destroyer/rampager/etc was exposed to eridium. We’ve only seen (relatively) small doses/exposure times

the eridians lied to Nyriad and are in their home dimension right now, probably laughing at us. or at least like ‘holy shit quick write this down’. this is probably all an experiment to them

I just have this FEELING

so sudden, and new

but really tho

The Overseer basically TELLS us that the Eridians are still out there somewhere

she calls them her masters, talks about how they left the ‘house’, then talks as though they can still see us in the present

Actually you know what, let’s talk all about the Overseer’s lines now because they’re dummy important

copy and pasting this because i forgot...

“vault hunter, I thought you might show up sooner or later. so naughty your species, so curious. the vault of vaults has been opened and IT has been released. prove your worth and I will reveal why the masters made me wait for you”

so IT is most likely the Destroyer. i have the firm belief that Tyreen just ‘slipped its chains’, as Nyriad puts it in her log right before the fight

like r u seriously telling me the eater of worlds is the size of a single story house lmao

NO

bigg

‘why the masters made me wait for you’ “MADE ME” I get the feeling she is here against her will, until her mission is completed

and that mission is to see which humans can pass the trials/the execute the trials

why? we’ll get to that. but she even hints that the reward may not be what we want.

“naughty humans have opened the vault of vaults but the masters will determine who is at fault. until next time, warrior”

so the second time she references her ‘masters’

Vault of Vaults is the vault of the destroyer. which is interesting to me. I guess it makes sense, is a big vault with other, tinier vaults on the surface.

I really wish we got an explanation as to what the Vault of the Architects was. might even explain the pyramid key ;-; fuckin pyramid key

so when i first heard this i thought there was some sorta ‘the masters will determine who is at fault’ rift between humans (the calypso twins or the vault hunters)

but now after learning more i realize this is probably between humans and guardians

are humans at fault for being naughty, or are the guardians for failing their only purpose?

i get the feeling the eridians will blame the guardians. the less favorite child :(

“long ago there was a brief spark, the first vault was opened, a light in the dark. a riddle, yes? perhaps it will unravel next time, hunter”

sooo im pretty bad with riddles

either this takes place long before our recollection of events, or this takes place around when typhon opened the first vault on promethea

what i think this means is possibly the beginning of Guardians gaining sentience

nyriad describes the smarter guardians as ones having a ‘spark’. i believe this is what the Overseer is referencing here- their gaining consciousness

THAT, orrrrr the guardians saw themselves fail at their only task and began to realize they could do more with their lives

failure breeds success, after all

“so, you’ve returned. persistent, yes. or stubborn? or both? are you so desperate to prove yourself?”

the differences between humanity and the guardians. humanity has strong desires/emotions, the guardians don’t

or, at least, they didn’t.

“we were created for one purpose by our masters- and we couldn’t even do that right (laughs). but don’t blame us! when a cog breaks, point your finger at the artificer, not the cog! are you a cog, Vault hunter, or an artificer? Or both? prove yourself worthy.”

lots to digest here

one purpose - to keep the Vaults closed

the guardians recognize they are only cogs in a machine, that they’re only tools, and it seems that they’re becoming bitter

‘point your finger at the artificer’ obviously blame the Eridians, not the guardians

‘are you a cog... or an artificer. or both?” i think is very important. i think this is another hint that humanity was created by the eridians

‘or an artificer, or both’ showing that humanity can step out from the shadow of whatever the eridians planned for them and make their own choices/destinies. the guardians can’t. ... yet.

“pity us not, though the world has been broken. those who sleep will soon be awoken. not long now, seeker.”

‘though the world has been broken’ - either bc the Eridians left them/the Vaults have been opened

more importantly “those who sleep will soon be awoken”

what i think this means, personally:

Graveward is a vault monster that appeared deceased (already killed or just died of natural causes) when we got there

but it was combined with a bunch of ship parts

this is confirmed both by the art book and by just LOOKING AT HIM lmao

these ship parts are likely a way to resurrect him by allowing the guardians to posses him

guardians are biomechanical constructs, so it makes sense that they would begin scavenging ship parts from eden-6 to fit to graveward

so they can have a stronger body to pilot

something had to be pulling those ships in to crash

also, this means BALEX didn’t do anything wrong lol

when you get to the vault, tannis is confused, because there should be a vault monster, but there’s only guardians

that is, until you kill Grave and Ward

they (and a bunch of other Guardian souls) then possess Graveward, bringing him to life- or, awakening him

what i think this means: the guardians are going to start possessing more and more stuff

why this means ‘those who sleep will soon be awoken’ possibly vault monsters who are killed aren’t actually killed, they’re just put in a sleeping state and the guardians will be using their tech to control them with guardian souls

the guardians stuck in that big ol computy machine somewhere (god pls let it be nekrotefeyo) are ‘sleeping’ and by taking control of those vault monsties, they will be able to wake up and pilot their own bodies

that is, there are too many souls, too little bodies, so they need more vessels

tl;dr: MORE GUARDIANS

also can we talk about how Sirens can absorb guardian souls pls?? bc what the FUCK tannis

ugh how fuckin’ creepy would it be if the eridians made the fleshy Vault Monsters and used the guardian souls to puppeteer them

seriously though, Tannis absorbed a bunch of Guardian souls why are we not talking about this

how was that not an important plot point

is tannis going to be okay?? i love tannis. please don’t hurt her. are guardian souls just pure energy?? what does it mean??? GEARBOX-

“the eridians were our masters, but we failed them. they gave the order then silence. they VANISHED. such is our fate, Vault Hunter, server to a master who has left the house so long ago. prove to me that you deserve an introduction.”

i think its really important that the Overseer doesn’t say the Eridians are DEAD. instead, she says they just ‘vanished’ or ‘left the house’

i think this further proves they’re still out there somewhere. probably watching over us like creeps

literally from the new DLC... come on. COME ONNNN

also confirmation the eridians are the ‘masters’ the Overseer is referring to all the time

side note i have the game sitting open on my other screen and wainwright just asked someone to drink him under the table what the f-

it does sound like they’ve been forgotten as even servants to the Eridians because she specifically says “were” and “but we failed them” probably meaning the Eridians were their masters UNTIL the guardians failed to keep the Great Vault from being opened

though i do think “prove to me that you deserve an introduction” is interesting

like do we not deserve one yet? well, not until we complete the trials she’s supposed to test us with

“we were supposed to guard the Great Jail. but no quarter for servants who fail. but servant, that is not quite right. ‘Prisoner’. that is what i am. Until next time, adventurer.”

kinda repeating what we learned from the above quote

‘Great Jail’ they put the Destroyer in evil baby jail for his crimes

no quarter for servants who fail - yeah the eridians are like ‘wow you guys suck, fuck you guys’

‘prisoner, that is what i am’. the guardians are all stuck in their roles. they’re trapped here

“a final chance to prove yourself. but will your reward be what you desire? a prisoner in a cell staring out at the fathoms of a sleeping universe. after a time, how would you know if you were prisoner or master? consider this while you prove yourself one last time.”

‘will your reward be what you desire’? we learn that the reward is actually being a guardian, so... it’s not great, if our deductions hold any water

‘a prisoner in a cell staring out at the fathoms of a sleeping universe’ - what the Overseer probably sees her position as guardian of the trials as a prisoner- same with all the other guardians stuck watching over the Vaults

i do also think this may be in reference to the fact she’s stuck in this dimension with us while the eridians ran away

“I am a prisoner, but you, vault hunter? what are you? hunter, warrior, hero? no matter what name i use, you return to prove yourself time and time again. but prove it to whom, i wonder? perhaps you seek a greater audition”

‘hunter, warrior, hero’ note she calls us by a bunch of titles throughout her greetings/goodbyes. but we are not satisfied by any of them

clearly we’re not proving ourselves to HER, since she questions who we are trying to prove it to

‘greater audition’ is likely in front of the ‘masters’ who are the eridians. remember, we have to prove to her first that we are worthy of an audience

“it is done and my masters have taken note. would you like to know what they told me right before they vanished? ‘beware the vault hunters, they will take your kind’s place’. now i am free, and you are chained. until next time, guardian

the eridians know what we’ve done- now humanity takes the place of the guardians

“beware the Vault Hunters, they will take your kind’s place” seems like a pretty fucked up thing to say

but also, more proof the Eridians knew what the FUCK was up, kyle

humanity is just guardians 2: electric boogaloo

the trails were ultimately a test to see if we were up to the task

and now that humanity (or, at least, the Vault Hunters) has taken the place of the normal Guardians, the others are free to do... something

what... i wonder.

i do think it is interesting that the Overseer is pretty morally gray here. like, she’s trapped here to oversee the trials for however long the Eridians have been gone, to see if humans are truly the successors to the Guardians

she obviously doesn’t want to be here, calling herself a prisoner

she even warns us that the reward won’t be something we want- i imagine she might not exactly be able to tell us WHY we will not like it, she is being watched by her masters (the Eridians)

like, i get WHY she doesn’t tell us what’s going to happen. if i were trapped there, I’d do the same thing

but here’s the thing

since we are (we assume) fully squishy and not mechanical in any way, we still have our free will (unlike, we can assume, the guardians)

so we’re not literally trapped in one job forever- we can choose whatever we want to do

so WHAT exactly do i think the guardians are going to do? well, they’ve got an entire army’s worth of souls, they’re resurrecting dead Vault Monsters, and they can modify their bodies now to become more weapon-like

what do I think is happening? The Guardians are preparing for war with the Eridians- they want to destroy their creators, and with us becoming the new guardians, there’s this loophole that allows the old Guardians to finally, FINALLY do whatever they want

(Is Fl4k supposed to be foreshadowing for this? Yeah, I believe they are!!)

+ also before i forget: the entire thing about there being a literal Fallen Guardian we have to kill

i believe this has to do with the fact when you kill it, it drops money. since we can assume the trials are crafted/designed by the Eridians, we can assume the Fallen Guardians are apart of that design as well. It drops money, which probably shows how it’s become corrupted compared to the other guardians. it has desires (collecting wealth). Since the Guardians are inspired by angels (especially in TPS), it’s probably supposed to be a direct callback to that

alright so I think you all are probably like CRUDDY THE PRE-SEQUEL

and like, yeah, that’s what i’ve been building up to the whole time

The Watcher!!!

“War is coming, and you’re going to need all the Vault Hunters you can get”

Let’s just look at the Watcher’s actions throughout TPS and Tales (well, her inactions in Tales, as well as 3)

In tps, the Watcher brings Zarpedon to the Vault, allows her to see the future, and creates the Lost Legion

so we all assume that yes, she’s trying to stop the Elpis Vault (and, by extension, Pandora) from being opened

but here is the thing. the lil thing. the BIG thing actually.

she stops us from killing zarps in the BEGINNING of the game

in the middle-ish when we kill zarp for realsies, she is NOWHERE TO BE FOUND. Zarp lets Jack know where the Vault actually is and little miss alien face IS NOWHERE AROUND

when you are inside eleseer, lilith mentions that the Guardians there actually let her through, like they WANTED her to be there

now let’s remember Lilith’s actions in tps (and remember that she is IN NO WAY at fault here. jack is a dickbag. you try to tell me this is lily’s fault and i’ll kick your shins into your asshole)

while jack is seeing the future about the Vault of the Warrior, she punches the treasure of Eleseer into his face. this cuts off the vision, so unlike Zarps all Jack sees is that he opens the Vault of the Warrior. Nothing about the Destroyer destroying everything.

and still, the Watcher is nowhere to be found.

So Jack opens the Vault of the Warrior, Lilith learns she can activate the Vault Map, the events of Tales happens, and Lilith has Athena tied up and is about to shoot her

WHEN FINALLY

FUCKING. FINALLY.

THE WATCHER SHOWS UP

and tells us that ‘we’re going to need all the vault hunters we can get’

now let’s TAKE A STEP BACK HERE

obviously. OBVIOUSLY.

this is pretty backwards from what the Guardians are actually meant to do: keep the Vaults closed. If she wanted us to NOT open the Vault of the Destroyer, she probably should’ve just come right out and told us what’s up. 

no, I think she 100% wanted the events to happen in the way they did.

Because remember, after this, SHE NEVER SHOWS UP AGAIN!!!

not in tales, where she could have stopped the Vault of the Traveler from opening (in fact she could have let Athena die and lowered the team’s chances of defeating the Vault Monster with whatever canon choices there are), not in 3 when she could have prevented the twins from doing any number of things they did, not to give advice to lily on sanc-iii, not during Commander Lily (even though she’s mentioned briefly) she did FUCK ALL

she did J A C K S H I T

it’s because she wanted this to happen. she WANTS the vaults open.

why? well, see above. The Guardians want the Vault Monsters all killed so they can resurrect them as big boy guardians

and that war she’s talking about? it wasn’t the war in bl3. That’s why she never shows her face. she’s talking about war with the Eridians. 

Which is probably bl4.

alright im tired. eridians bad. guardians okay-ish. they might try to kill us all and use our bodies as vessels, who knows.

anywaY this was all an elaborate plan for me to explain the backstory of h2o au and why magic is real in the borderlands universe and why they decide to FIGHT- [gets dragged off computer by a cane]

wow this is a 36 page document, why can’t i be this enthusiastic about school??

#borderlands #bl3 #lmao

[mipplenoop]

Chapter One: Refractory

I swiped left, I swiped right. My lips echoed those satisfying plinks and plonks as points racked up and candies dropped. There was a strange sort of comfort that came from controlling supersaturated treats on an iPhone screen, as their bright light danced on the mute concrete around me.

Though I was a prisoner, the phone made me feel free. It brought me back to all those hours at home, playing the 8-bit games that were all the rage back then - especially Sweets Smash. With Aaron, with Ruby, I remembered sitting under the dining table gathered around my brother’s old console, hiding from the discipline of our parents. Even though it was called Candy Crush now, and on a screen smaller than my palm, the feeling was the same. Just like back then, staring at those lacquered sweets made my mouth water.

Oh, how I longed for a good meal. I couldn’t recall the last time I had digested something other than salty, rubbery chicken and reheated green beans. I was so starved for something different that I could’ve eaten, say, an entire spotted hyena. Yes. I imagined myself grabbing the beast by the belly while its brethren howled and laughed, sinking my teeth into its fur and biting down through its thick, black hide. Tasting that sweet, fibrous flesh of a being inferior to me. In fact, I’d have eaten the whole pack - my stomach bubbled and churned as I immersed myself in the game, trying in vain to stave off that ever present sensation. But not a moment passed that I didn’t force myself to gulp down a torrent of saliva, lest I drown in my own starvation. At this point, the mold growing out of the cracks in the wall looked tempting. What made me, of all people, deserving of such punishment? Of such pain?

Nothing, I reminded myself. I was an honest person. I worked hard at making it in this life. I was caring, curious, and funny. Loyal. There were people who loved me. And I loved them, even to the point that I would’ve given my life for them. Sure, maybe I hadn’t always been the best I could be, but I tried. I tried so hard.

Yet in the eyes of the law, I was nothing but a killer. They - the police, the prisons, the surveillance companies, “They” with a big “T” - knew my sins, and were never going to forget. A cold, computational system never forgets. Charged on two counts of first degree murder. One count of aggravated assault.

Nobody understood that I was a victim, too. In the last moments of Duy’s life, it was me or him. Letting him live would’ve been a dark, endless pit that pulled me down forever, sinking me deeper and deeper into a suffocating void of toxicity until I died. Of abuse, or stress, or insanity, I didn’t know. But I felt it in my loins. That feeling was frustrating, and it was the only thing that hurt more than the hunger. They didn’t understand that I was more than ones and zeros. That Aaron, or even Duy was more than a statistic, more than... Fuck. The gnarled remains of my cock hurt just thinking about it. A phantom pain. Tears streamed down my pudgy cheeks, falling onto those precious candies.

I swept the tears away, but no matter how hard I tried, each move felt like a setback - a step towards loss. With each combo, blocks of chocolate grew in area, threatening to envelop my remaining freedom - eating away at the space which would allow the creation of striped candies and color bombs. Those big brown balls dotted with sprinkles of rainbow, that was what I needed to win. Just six of them, in about three times as many moves. I hoped that when I saw that victory screen, with all of the points I had won, it would be almost rewarding as a real meal - maybe I would be able to forget where I was, even just for a second. Yet those brown squares were eating away at my freedom to win, or to even try to win. It was a never ending battle for territory, where each attack that did not seek to eliminate the chocolate only facilitated in growing it.

“Your phone time is over, Gambia.”

The sound echoed through my head, disrupting the swirling thoughts that I had grown so accustomed to housing. When had he entered? I hadn’t even noticed.

Loop Liu eyed me through the bars of my cell, pelvis thrust forward in a display of attempted dominance. His hands rested over a pair of bony hips, lined by a belt weighed down with all variety of police gadgets. Handcuffs, pepper spray, knives, and whistles. Two empty gun holsters. Blue fabric of his much-too-big uniform sagged over them, weighted down by a sparkling, star-shaped metal buckle that identified the man as chief - pinned over his heart like a sticker for good behavior. It made him look even more so like a child in a man’s outfit. His lanky arm reached through the bars, beckoning me to hand over the phone.

“You made your one phone call, right? Who did you contact?” he questioned in a somewhat accusatory tone.

I looked down at the phone, at my game. I hadn't made the call, but only because I was too busy crushing candies. I tried to concentrate on winning, since that was the only thing I could control now.

Still, it was interesting that he used that phrase. “One phone call.” That was just a myth from Hollywood movies, wasn’t it? Aaron had made me aware of such factoids during our time in the hospital. People treated that line as if it was written in the Constitution. But in reality, I had no rights the second they found me - a beautiful brown big boy - beaten, bloody, in a room with two bodies. This phone didn’t even belong to me, but to the lieutenant currently at the front desk. It was an aesthetic. Worse than that, it was probably monitored, tapped, just so they could incriminate me further.

The chief sighed. “Gambia. This ain’t a hotel. Say something. You gonna make me come in there?”

Only fifteen moves left, and I still needed four more color bomb swipes. It was tough, trying to get a row of candies to align in the right configuration. With the limited space imposed by the chocolates squares, it would take all of my skill to get a win.

“Don’t make this harder than it needs to be,” he taunted.

Fourteen moves now. I couldn’t stop.

“I know people like you, you don’t have anyone to call. You don’t have any family or friends, because either they got scared and ran away, or because you killed them. Am I wrong? I know I'm not. Frankly, it disgusts me that we have to do anything for murderers like you,” Loop Liu tucked his thumbs under his belt and stretched backward. “But it’s the law.”

I continued swiping. Two more moves but no closer to my goal.

He was wrong, wasn’t he? I didn’t call because I didn’t want to hurt anyone else. I had people to contact. The nurses at the hospital, family friends, my parents’ old lawyer. Right? I just didn’t want to involve them in it. And as for the people I had supposedly murdered… Duy… well, that wasn’t my choice.

“Now if you didn’t call anyone, that’s perfectly understandable. You can give me the phone and I’ll leave you be. But if you did talk to someone, and we don’t know about it, if you’re lying to me, well, that’s not good. In fact, some may say that your actions are grounds for additional obstruction of justice charges.”

Why was I still thinking those thoughts? About what happened with Duy. Why was I being stupid again? There was no way out for me. The chocolate was closing in, leaving me with only a five by five grid to build the bomb. Maybe I could use a lollipop booster? No. That would be cheap. Aaron would never have resorted to using microtransactions or cheating in Sweets Smash.

Then again, Aaron wouldn’t have killed anyone, either. Maybe I should just give Loop the phone. It wasn’t even mine, and, like I had said, it was probably compromised. It was evidence that the whole world was against me, that they would try their best to make sure I lived in a dark, cramped jail cell for the rest of my life. It was an impostor. It was a fake friend. My real phone was broken, along with Duy’s spine, when I had crushed him.

My arm began to move, raising the phone toward the chief’s hand.

But I stopped myself.

“No. I want to see Big Wang Chang’s body. Then I’ll give you your phone,” my voice cracked, after having not spoken for days.

It was a pathetic declaration. Irrational. Yet, there was something in me that wanted to grasp onto just an infinitesimal chance at hope. Even though I would never talk with Ruby or Aaron on our old farmhouse, my heart still jumped every time I swiped a candy and was reminded of their warmth. Despite the fact that I would probably never again see the light of day, I pictured myself taking Aaron’s body from the morgue, dressing it in fancy clothes, giving it a modest send off and burying it in the field out back with Ruby.

Loop laughed, as he unhooked a ring of keys from his belt. “You think you can make demands? You’ve already asked us for breakfast, lunch, dinner, and a goddamn late night snack every single day you’ve been here. You’re out of requests.”

My stomach growled. Candies beckoned me, and they tasted like my lover. If I didn’t try now, I probably would never be able to again.

“I just want to see him one last time. I won’t do anything crazy,” I spoke, now with a more confident voice.

The chief rolled his eyes. “You want to see Aaron, you mean? Your ‘brother’?”

My twin.

“Not a chance,” asserted Loop. “Quit whining and give me the phone.”

I crossed my arms stubbornly in protest. The chief stood in contemplation for a moment.

Loop Liu lifted his cap and scratched his balding head. “Look, we don’t even have the body anymore. I don’t know what the feds did with it, but it got separated from Duy’s at the hospital. Good thing, too, if you ask me. You wouldn’t want to see your own handiwork. From what I already saw in the photos, that kid's chest was messed up.”

Duy had stabbed him, yet I was being blamed. This was the brilliant system at it again. Aaron was covered in my blood when they found us, and that was all there was the story. No need to investigate further, or to learn about how he saved me from an infection that would’ve taken my life, not to mention my whole cock. My blood began to boil at the sheer thought of it, and the only thing keeping me in check was that I had just gotten another color bomb. Its electricity reached out like tendrils of Aaron’s hair all those summers ago, long before he had cut it. I only had three more to go.

“That’s a lie. If you don’t have a body, how do you even know he’s dead?” I demanded.

I knew he was dead. There was no way around it. I was just stalling, taking up time, in a big middle finger to the chief. How dare he try and tease me, to give me the hope of seeing my twin once again. Fuck the chief. I remembered what Duy had done to Aaron. All I wanted was for them to give me the truth.

“Look, Gambia, we can go over all the fun details during your official interrogation. But let’s take things one at a time. First, I need you to hand me the goddamn phone.”

But I could already recall all the details. How the paramedics first took Duy’s body and threw it on a stretcher. How it landed with a squelch, and how blood spurted from his open mouth as his head fell back. His crushed, limp body jiggled as they tried to take his pulse. No response. Then they just carted him away, into another room full of body bags.

And I was left there gasping on the ground, as Chief Liu’s underlings took photos of me and Aaron.

The chief huffed. “Remember when we talked before? You gave me your solemn oath that we could get started after you settled in. With a real interview, and a phone call to your family, and all that good stuff.”

That wasn’t a promise. It was coercion, as I was being thrown into a hospital bed still bleeding, and still drenched in Duy’s blood. I was being smothered in questions and flashing lights, swarmed by the police, while they left Aaron in that terrible room all alone. Then when all of the doctors had gone, Chief Liu bent himself over me, and pushed his knee deep into the pulp that was the remains of my penis.

“Promises to bastards like you don’t count,” I sneered.

That last statement came out overflowing with anger. I guess I needed to practice holding in my emotions after experiencing so much trauma and isolation. Whatever. That didn’t matter now. I went with it. I held the phone out in front of my face and continued playing, as if to tell the chief “Come get it.” And my game was on an upswing, too. Only two more bombs needed, with eight moves left.

Liu swung his head to the side, with an amused expression.

“Don’t talk to me like that, boy. You won’t like me when I’m angry,” he laughed.

His air of nonchalance infuriated me. It wasn’t just about what he had done to me, either. I knew Loop Liu was corrupt. A liar and a rapist. Duy had told me as much the last time we met, as we hugged with his mouth pressed to my ear. In the end, perhaps he had become so disillusioned with the world because of what Loop had done. That’s right. I had to remember that we were all victims.

“And how are you when you’re angry? What’s that like?” I asked. My voice quivered with rage.

“You just might find out. I’m specially trained to take down punks like you,” the chief snorted.

“No, Loop. I’m going to take you down. There will be a day that comes when everything you’ve done comes back to bite you in the ass.”

“Really? That’s hard to believe, because I haven’t done anything,” the chief snorted.

“Of course you have. You know it, and I know it.”

“Is that a threat?” he asked, half jokingly.

No. It was a prophecy. One that was going to come to pass very soon.

“Duy told me,” I said flat-out. “I know what you did to him. What are you going to do when I let every police officer and lawyer in the city know that?”

There was a barely perceptible change in his expression. His brows crossed just a little deeper, and his forehead became just a little more wrinkly. This was the expression of a man who was not quite angry - afraid, and just enough to lose his cool. It made me feel a little bit better.

I was going to win. I could see the path forward - four blue candies split in half by a yellow. I just had to make the right move. Clink. Plop. Candies dropped. I looked at Loop as he started to tap his feet and pace the ground outside my cell. Clearly my statement had some effect on him. He was off balance now, so maybe there was a way through. Not just in the game, either. I was talking about getting out of this cell.

“You know, Julius,” he spoke quietly.

“What?”

“Some of the boys and I made bets. Bets on how many beatings you would have to take before confessing to the two murders. What do you think I wagered?”

“I don't know. Sixty nine?”

Loop chuckled to himself. “I said only one, because despite how fat you are, you have a feeble soul. And I reckon I’m right - don’t try to prove me wrong.”

Oh. Those were fighting words.

“Are we passing on the interview, then?” I asked, barely able to contain myself.

Loop Liu stared me down. “We sure as hell are. And I’m going to substitute it for a beating right now.”

It was fitting. As kids, Aaron always got out of doing chores on the farm by sweet talking our parents. He would joke with them, talk about how little work I was doing, or fake being sick by warming his forehead with our old heated toilet. I was never as smart. I would always end up doing his work, or take his beatings, while he got to go off on adventures with Ruby, or play Sweets Smash without me.

But as a result, I was used to doing backbreaking labor every day up until I fell off the roof of that barn. And even though it had been three years, I was nearly just as strong as I was then. Under my layers of folds and flaps was a man with the strength to bend steel bars. To crush the entire police force.

To kill.

Fuck! I messed up. It was the chocolate again. I wasn’t watching it. Now I had just two moves left, with no clear path to getting that color bomb.

I clutched the phone tighter as traumatic memories caused my hands to glisten. I couldn't handle another loss. I heard crackling, but I couldn’t tell if it was Candy Crush or the device itself. Or Duy’s ribs. The way I squeezed them with such ease, until his lungs popped and his chest caved in. Those round, blue candies reminded me of Duy’s glistening, pleading eyes as I smothered the life out of them-

“Just give me the damn phone!” screeched chief of police Loop Liu.

He had unlocked the door while I was deep in thought. Of course he had, that slippery bastard. Just like he had barged into mine and Duy’s relationship, he began to enter my cell. This space that they had designated for people like me without giving it a second thought. But now I knew it intimately, like Aaron’s smooth, slender body. And I could beat him with that.

Adrenaline, anger, and power pumped through my bloated body, and in that moment I saw every detail of my surroundings: the sixty nine rusted cell bars before me, the cold, mossy concrete slabs behind me, and the faint breeze that pulsed through each of their cracks. The high hum of the security system that blocked me from the outside world. Yellow heat lamps, swinging on their tethers. There was Loop’s pale hand against the door, ready to push. The hinges to squeak and squeal at his behest. And I knew the exact trajectory of its opening. I could think of one thousand ways to stop Loop from grabbing me, but I only needed one.

“You don’t want to do that,” I warned. “You are nothing to me but just another target. I will wipe you the fuck out with precision the likes of which has never been seen before on this Earth, mark my fucking words.”

I strutted forward in a confident rage, knowing that I could take him. I no longer cared about my freedom, or Duy, or Candy Crush. I wanted revenge. If I played my cards right here, I may be able to escape and wreak even more destruction. The chief was thin and unathletic, hardly able to stand up to my thickness. The distance between his elbows was less than half that of my body. Even though I was sorely lacking nutrition, I had no doubt that I could take him.

I smacked the man across his face, knuckles digging deep into the bony recesses of his cheeks. His head snapped back and the chief fell to the floor.

I stood dominant over my prey. This spotted hyena of a man, a pathetic excuse for chief, pleaded upward at me in terror. But despite my blinding anger, I still knew in the back of my mind that he was cunning. Duy had told me that much. His pack could arrive at any moment. And so I kept an eye on bony fingers as they slid across his belt, making sure he didn’t radio for backup. Once they came to a rest, I was going to pounce. Aim for the legs, then the face. Then the groin - for Duy.

But no. Wait. the chief was reaching for something else, not on his belt. That was it. A bright red whistle tied around his neck. How had I not noticed that before?

In a single motion, Loop Liu grabbed it, put it to his mouth, and blew as hard as he could.

The shrill banshee cry made me shrink back, stumbling ass first into my cell, shielding my sensitive ears with my palms. My strength negated. Could I still salvage the situation? Nobody would have heard that whistle except for me, right? No. Before I had time to regain my surroundings, with just one glance, I knew it was over. I had no more hope of escape, save for some divine miracle. The physical barrier was just too great.

They lined Loop like a street gang: three dark, African men to each side of the chief, each outfitted in tactical gear, batons in hand, ready to wage full on war. They wore full face shields, the tinted plexiglass as dark as the skin peeking out beneath it. In contrast to the chief, they were brimming with vigor and muscle.

The men seemed to have appeared from nowhere, in a highly coordinated effort, and the beck and call of Loop. They stood with feet perfectly aligned, immaculately distanced from each other in a regular fashion, not a millimeter off. They were not only strong, but obedient. Clearly, the best of the police force.

“Come get some!” I shouted.

They charged, and my fists pounded against their vests.

They seized me. Twelve arms wrapped around my torso, beastial limbs ripping into my form as I struggled against them. With every twist, with each shove, they pressed into me harder than ever before. They were the chocolate, and I was that last color bomb, never meant to be.

As I was suffocated under their layers of Kevlar and sweat, I thought to myself that I could’ve overpowered these half dozen thugs. If only I had a little more food, if only I had won in Candy Crush, it would be a fair battle. The embarrassment brought on by my weakness, and my impotence, only galvanized my struggle even more. My muscles rippled under my corpulent body as I cried out in frustration and shame. This brought only further embarrassment, perpetuating a vicious cycle that soon brought me to tears. The phone fell from my hands, screen shattering against the unforgiving floor. I would never be able to play Candy Crush again.

“You’re not going to win, Loop Liu,” I resolved. “I’ll kill you one day, I swear!”

Loop Liu giggled like a hyena. His head rolled back and he clutched his belly, though I could barely tell through the prison of meat that surrounded me.

“Oh, Julius Gambia. You think you’re ever going to get out of here? Out of the most secure containment system humanity has seen since slavery? No. For that commotion you caused, you’re going somewhere not even your lawyers will be able to find you.���

“And where’s that?” I asked, gasping for air.

“To the depths of hell.”

[snowdice]

The Horror of Stereotypes (Part 1)[Dice Roll 6]

Fandom: Sanders Sides

Relationships: Remus/Logan/Patton with Remus/Logan focus (more pre-romantic considering the situation), Remus & Roman, Logan/Patton (established, but not at the forefront for most of it)

Characters:

Main: Remus, Logan

Appear: Roman, Patton, Deceit (but blink and you’ll miss it)

Summary: There had always been a certain stereotype about people like him for as long as anyone could remember. After the Heart War of 1963, those stereotypes had been legalized and places like this had been created to enforce the universal truth: everyone had a soulmate. One soulmate. No more and no less.

At least they were supposed to.

When Remus’s brother gets arrested because of his two soulmarks, Remus risks everything by infiltrating the facility he legally should be in as well due to his own two soulmates to save him. There he meets Logan and it turns out they have a lot in common: they both got hired this week, they both have two soulmates, and they’re both here for the same reason.

Oh. And as it turns out, they’re each other’s soulmates too.

Universe: Soulmate AU

Genre: Horror (Yeah, it’s a fun combo. The horror vibe is mostly contained to chapter 3 though. It’s all still horrifying, but that specific tone is pretty much only there.)

Notes: Torture, Torture of a main character, Dystopian, Blood, Guns, Gunshot wounds, Leg wounds, Mentions of Desecrating an Animal Corpse by a Main Character, Imprisonment, Mentions of Cannibalism, Genocide Suggested, Sexual Innuendo, Fear, A tasteless but not serious incest joke, Medical procedures.

...

Goodness my tags were already horrifying enough because of the darkness of this universe and concept of this AU and then Remus started talking...

This is part of my Roll the Dice Event which is where I do random ships, universe, and genres for the Sanders Sides fandom. For more details see this post. I posted a few days ago my results from this dice roll here.

In which I once again do a dice roll that ends up not being a one-shot like it’s supposed to be... This is going to be 6 parts...

Getting into the building had been easy for Remus. Remus had a special set of skills that he’d never really thought of as skills until he was sitting in a little office right outside the main gate of this facility spouting off every one of his worst possible thoughts in extensive detail during a job interview. They listened to him for less than half an hour before deciding he was perfect for the job and two days later, here he was.

His tour guide chatted and chatted happily to him seeming not to question his contentment with his surroundings. She’d probably gotten a peak at his file after all.

Remus had always been… a weird child at best and the “bonkers evil twin” at worst. Almost everyone in his life tended to give him a wide berth since he was younger. Honestly, you hang one dead cat you found on the road on the middle school flag and suddenly you’re a pariah. It’s not like he’d killed the cat. In fact, he’d loved Senior Bitey when he’d been alive and knew for a fact that it was the type of funeral the feral little thing would have wanted. It was one more chance to put terror into the hearts of all the children in the school. He’d attempted to explain his reasoning to the school counselor. He didn’t think he’d done a good job at that.

Later in life he’d been “guided” toward more “productive” outlets for the dark thoughts that sometimes rattled in his head. He was given a pen and told to write down stories. Remus had taken to this suggestion with gusto and quickly learned not to let anybody read them. His high school biology teacher had been a bit weirded out by how enthused he was about dissection days, but he scored well on the AP test and got the highest marks, so she was willing to write him a letter of recommendation that helped him get into college with a biology major. He’d thought about becoming a coroner or forensic scientist, but when he’d turned 18 and his soulmark… well, soulmarks he guessed… had shown up, he’d decided that he really shouldn’t be doing anything that would put him in such close contact with law enforcement.

So much for that, he thought and glanced at his tour guide. “And last I’ll show you the upstairs housing!” she was telling him. “It’s for the multis who have already gone through processing and interrogation and are now on work detail.” When they walked into the next building, Remus did his best to pretend to look without actually making himself look. For all his notebooks full of bloody stories and horrifying abstract musings and his memories of dissected frogs, cats, and pigs, actual human suffering was not something Remus relished. Yet, he still smiled at the woman who was gaily guiding him through the prison that legally Remus himself belonged in.

See, there had always been a certain stereotype about people like him for as long as anyone could remember. After the Heart War of 1963, those stereotypes had been legalized and places like this had been created to enforce the universal truth: everyone had a soulmate. One soulmate. No more and no less.

At least they were supposed to.

But for a universal truth, different things happened at a surprisingly high frequency. There were people who didn’t fit the mold. They were broken. Like Remus.

There were people who grew up to not have any soulmarks. Since soulmarks appearing were the cut off for adulthood, legally these people never became adults. Once they turned 18 and no soulmark presented, they had no legal right to basically anything. They couldn’t own property or make decisions for themselves. They weren’t allowed to attend school anymore, and they couldn’t get jobs. Their parents could decide they didn’t want to deal with them anymore, and if they did so, the soulmarkless people were either put into a shelter or left to die on the streets. Remus wasn’t sure which option was better honestly.

Then there were people with multiple soulmates. They were monsters. They were selfish, immoral, and deranged. For most of his life, Remus had accepted this as fact. He probably would have gone on believing it even after he got two soulmarks himself on his eighteenth birthday. After all, people had been telling him all his life he was a monster.

Then his brother had gotten two as well.

If Remus was the evil twin, Roman was the good one. He was kind and enthusiastic in his love for other people and the world around him. He’d become an EMT during the day and was an actor on the side. His creations brought people joy and happiness. He was everything good in the world. Everything Remus could never quite be.

And he had two soulmates. Just like Remus.

So, fuck the world, honestly. In particular, fuck tour guides cheerily guiding him through the first level of hell who would have definitely run away from him if she’d met him on the street. Would she have jeered at him that he was crazy and disgusting all through middle school? She may have been right, but at least he knew it. He could draw the line between the evil in his head and what he put into the world. Her though? Her head was probably clear as white snow. She probably just followed orders and didn’t think about it. Her brain probably skipped right over the sights and sounds before her and never lingered. Remus thought dark thoughts, but he also didn’t ignore them when they came to life.

“This of course isn’t where you’ll be working,” his guide went on with a grin. “The people up here don’t know anything or already gave up what they do know. So, you’ll really not have much to do with it. You could use it as a reward offer though if you ever want to play good cop.”

This was the reward, Remus wondered with disgust. It wasn’t even a prison. It was a pig pen at best and a slaughterhouse at worst. Human suffering was pouring off these cement walls and, though Remus talked a good game and kept a smile on his face, it turned his stomach.

His brother was probably in one of these pens somewhere and that was the best-case scenario. You’d think, Remus though grimly, that the brother who was an actor would have been the one able to pull off the lie the longest. But no.

“Anyway, that’s the end of the tour. Well, except the two floors downstairs. You’ll need to wait for your pass to get there. It’ll take about two to three days.”

“Can’t wait,” Remus said.

She smiled at him and swiped her keycard to open a door into a much cleaner area before leading him down a hallway. “So, now, I’m going to introduce you to your team. It’s actually a very fun thing!” Fun. “You should be excited to be a part of it. We’re expanding the facility and we’re thinking of separating them all out by class. You’re going to be tasked with helping design a whole new wing for the 4 and ups.”

“Fantastic!” Remus gushed. “I’m surprised you’re letting the new guy in on it.”

“Well, the higher ups wanted fresh ideas for this, so we went out and got people in the tops of their fields specifically for this project,” she explained. “Most of your teammates have been working for us less than a month except for your boss Gavin. He’s been working with us for almost five years and was transferred to this office specifically for this project. Speaking of,” she said swiping her keycard at a door so it opened into a fancy looking office space. “Gavin!” she called. “I have your new interrogator here!”

A man turned and his eyes flickered to Remus. There was something off about him even more so than the sickly-sweet guide who ignored the horrors happening around her every day. He paused for just a moment too long before he gave Remus a wide, predatory smile. “Hello,” he said, his voice smooth and low. He walked over to them. “Gavin,” he introduced himself, his eyes studying Remus intently.

Remus plastered on a smile. “Nice to meet you,” he said with a wink.

Gavin chuckled a bit. “Thank you, Beatrice. I’ll take him from here.”

‘Beatrice’ apparently (Remus hadn’t bothered to learn or remember her name before.), nodded and quickly left the office back the way she’d came.

After that, Gavin showed him around the office, introducing him to normal looking people doing normal looking things. That more than anything he’d seen today make a shiver go up Remus’s spine. They all acted like normal people, but any one of them would happily annihilate Remus on the spot if they learned about the soulmark he hid on his back in addition to the one on his forearm. They’d likely helped harm his brother in some way in the last two weeks over the coffee and donuts in the corner of this very pretty office.

Once Remus had seen most of the office and been introduced to most of the people in it, Gavin led him into a different room off to the side. This room was something out of a science fiction movie. It had a giant screen across an entire wall with a 3-D blueprint pulled up of a building and a bunch of text scrolling down the side. At the console in the center of the room stood a man in a dress shirt and tie.

He turned emotionless eyes on Remus and Gavin as they came into the room. Remus barely kept himself from tensing to run. This man looked dead inside, like someone had stolen his soul and left him an empty husk.

“And this is Logan Berry,” Gavin introduced. “He’s the head architect for this project. You two will likely be working closely for a lot of this venture. Logan, this is Remus Prince. He is an interrogator who will be consulting with us.”

Something flickered across the stoic man’s face, but it was gone in an instant. “Salutations,” Logan said, sticking out his arm.

“Sup,” Remus replied, reaching forward to shake his hand. The moment that they touched, Remus felt warmth bloom across his lower back where he knew his hidden soulmark was. He met Logan’s eyes which were suddenly wide and not nearly as emotionless as they had been just moments before. Terror had immediately broken through whatever mask he’d been wearing. Oh, Remus thought. Remus had just met one of his soulmates, and clearly, he also had more than just one soulmate as well judging by the fear in his eyes. Remus swallowed and pulled away his hand. “Nice to meet you Nerd,” he said with a careless shrug, “or whatever.” He saw Logan take a small breath and then the mask slipped back into place.

“Likewise,” he said, voice impressively monotone.

Gavin clapped his hands once, not seeming to notice anything off. “Well, we have a lot of work to do today gentlemen. Let’s get to it!”

Want to read more? Click below!

AO3 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6

#sanders sides #remus sanders #logan sanders #intrulogicality #intrulogical #is the focus though #creativitwins #logicality #(established but background) #intruality #(sorta?) #roman sanders #patton sanders #deciet sanders #(if you're paying attention) #roll the dice #roll the dice 6 #adriana writes #soulmate au #horror #and now for the warnings... #torture #torture of a main character #dystopian #blood #guns #gunshot wounds #leg wounds #imprisonment #desecration of an animal corpse

[justasparkwritings]

May: TinyDoubt

Previous: April’s The Wild Lillies 

Pairing: None

Genre: Creative Angst

Rating: PG13 

Word Count: 1.5K

Warnings: Swearing! 

Summary: Creative block is alive and well as you stare at the figurines in  front of you, your only comfort? The voice in your head challenging you to soldier on. 

Notes: I tried to channel my deep deep writers block for this. Do I hate it? Maybe. Do I feel all those things about my writing? Oh absolute. Is that inner voice how I talk to myself? You bet it is. Is the title so good? Yes, yes it is. 

Paintbrush

Sculpting clay

Carving tools

Dry hands

Paint under fingernails

Hair swept back

Slick drying on cheeks

Shoulder’s tense

         Should’ve sprung for the expensive chair, the one that holds my legs back and supports my core.

       It isn’t too late, I could still spring for it after this batch sells… if I sell it.

       I sigh, glancing at the clock, 5 minutes to midnight. How long have I been sitting here? When was the last time I ate or drank anything? Too long. I’ll feel it tomorrow, the ache in my joints, the exhaustion in my body, limbs sore, eyes worn out, all craving nourishment and rest.

       Gently, I place the figurine on the clean expanse of my drying rack. Thin and leucite, it supports the variety of creations I’ve been making, each in a different state of disarray. None have ended up being perfect, none are worthy of completing, except maybe, just maybe, this one.

       Standing perfectly still at 3inches, somehow, in the bright light of my desk lamp, magnifying lens on its second highest setting, I had perfectly sculpted the manicured swoop of hair. Each strand carved delicately, the part off center, the lingering hair nearly over the left eye, all made from modeling clay. It had taken days to perfect the lift, the arching bow from one side. In its naked form, it looks immaculate. But I know I can only succeed if the coloring is perfect, if the glasses I made, labored over, filling with resin in raspberry pink, fit properly over the new ears I carved days ago.

       Ears were always the easy part, a simple structure on the head, never taking more than a pin-head size of clay. Noses too, tiny and dainty drops, always done in the middle of creation.

        Staring at this latest iteration, I can’t help but wonder if this is worth it. Meticulously drawing every line, breaking my back mixing yellows to get the golden shade and all the highlights, not to mention the truly painstaking part of it all, hands. Is it worth it, the weeks spent making this tiny, tiny creation, only to deem it unworthy, and left incomplete?

        Yes.

        Yes, it is.

       It’s always worth it, despite what the odds tell me. There’s always that voice in my head, telling me that not only is my skill appreciated, but worth something. The last set sold for five times the asking price. This set could double, triple that… Maybe if it did well enough, I could transition to this, full time. Though the thought of working on perfecting miniatures for 12 hours a day sounds quite possibly like hell.  

        This isn’t hell, or horrible, you’re too hard on yourself.

        The voice in my head tells me. Laughing, I counter that statement. “I am not, they’re all shit,”

        They are not.

        “I should’ve stuck with wood carving,” I grumble.

        You cut yourself pretty badly the last time-

        “I know I did!” 

       I can’t tell if I’ve fully lost it, or if this conversation is going to lead to a creative breakthrough. Though based on my running internal monologue, which yes is voiced by Nicole Byer, I am due for a serious heart-to-mind pep talk. It’s not that I haven’t scolded myself recently, or lamented about how completely incompetent I am, how horrific my work is, or how I am wasting my youth sitting at a cramped desk with coffee I’ve reheated four times. I haven’t had the full ‘this is meaningless, stop wasting your time perfecting the shades of blonde on this plastic and clay figurine and go figure out the next steps in your career’ in at least three weeks. I suppose, staring at these in complete monstrosities, that a conversation with myself regarding what I’m doing is far more enjoyable than listening to my father droll on about how I am in command of my destiny.

        Because I’m not in control.  If I was, I wouldn’t be sitting here making TinyTan figurines, crying when the paint dries a different color than my swatches or weeping when a miniature dot of adhesive gets stuck on the outside of the clay and chars the entire piece in the oven.

        So I’m not in charge of my fate.

        You make your own luck.

        “Alright, I didnn’t ask you.”

        Who did you ask then? Jimin? Yoongi? Oh wait, they don’t have mouths and they’re made of plastic!

        “See, they don’t have mouths because they fucking suck and I should give up.”

        They’re probably better than you think, you’re just too close to it.  

        “I think that’s actually incorrect and there is nothing wrong with how close I am to these figures,”

        You are though

        “What do you suppose I do? Capture their souls? Summon them with a knock off The Power of Seven Will Set Me Free, while I hold their tiny little plastic hands?” I throw the ball of clay I’ve been rolling onto the table, the small glob sticking to the side of a larger block I had been carving from.  

        Do you always have to be so difficult?

        “You’re inside my brain! You know how creatively frustrated I am! And you know how absolutely fucking bitchy I get when I’m upset!”  

        Why are you frustrated?

        I groan, standing up from my chair and walking to the kitchen sink. The hot water scalds my dry hands, melting the clay and paint off, the extra judicial scrubbing peeling back layers of grime I’d let build in the last 10 hours.

        Why are you so frustrated? Is it because you aren’t good enough? Are you scared it’s going to be your senior year showcase again, where that girls sister didn’t understand you collage and made snarky comments?

        I dry my hands, unwilling to answer the questions my mind was asking.

        If you don’t talk about it you’ll blow up like a volcano…

        “Because! Fuck, because I can’t get any of this right. I just got the hair done, and that’s taken me two weeks. All I’m doing is chipping away, carving away, fucking up and starting again. When I’m not working on it, all I’m doing is thinking about it. They haunt me in my sleep, their little round bellies body rolling to Mic Drop, trying to get me to eat the mini quiches they’ve carved their initials in. My life is consumed by these tiny fucking figures and it’s making me absolutely hate them.”

        Hate them?

        “Whoever decided TinyTan needed to be a thing,”

        Shouldn’t you be mad at whoever told you to create your own versions of them?

        “Oh, so you want me to be mad at myself? Aren’t I already?”

        Okay, point made.

        “I just stare at them, their little body parts, heads on a platter like the Addams Family.. Everything I make is ugly, everything I make isn’t good enough. Every curve, every cut… garbage.”

        Do you want to quit?

        “Give up on my project?”

        Yeah, say fuck it, toss them out, never come back to them.

        “I, should’ve gotten into doll houses,”

       Why?

       “They’re easier, the rules aren’t as rigid, it’s an interpretation and you can do that 1000 different ways,”

       So quit, move to doll houses, sell all your tools. But, answer this, what happens when you get upset or frustrated making doll houses?

       I sigh. “I don’t quit craft projects.”

       … didn’t you just say you wanted to?

       “I don’t quit crafts. Relationships and friendships, that’s another story. But art?”

        Then why are you bitching?

        “I just,” I sigh, slumping into my couch. “If I finish them, and they don’t turn out, what kind of artist will I be? What does that say about my craft? My ‘talent’?”

        What kind of artist do you want to be?

        “This Socratic method is really fucking annoying.”

        I’m your mind, stop doing it if it bugs you so much

        “I just, what does it say about me if they aren’t any good?”

       I’m not sure it says anything about you as a person.

       “Me as an artist?”

       I don’t know if we can answer that.

       “Maybe you’re right,”

        About?

        “Maybe I just, I’m too hard on myself. A set of figurines isn’t going to break my hobby… even if it’s broken my spirit,”

        If it’s broken your spirit, why keep doing it?

        “I love the finished product, but I love the process more,”

        Then keep going.

        The thing about the voice inside my head is that no matter how hard I try to lie to it, it always knows. It always comes back with wisdom and truth, shining a light on exactly what I’ve been trying to avoid.

        “Tonight?”

        No bitch, you need sleep. TinyTan will be there tomorrow.

        “Is this when we sing Zero O’Clock while we brush our teeth?”

        Only if you want to.

        I rise from my couch, slipping my apron off, putting it on my crafting chair and clear my throat.

       “Oo- and you’re gonna be happy,” I sing as I move through my apartment, miniatures drying, waiting for another day of scraping, molding and painting, my broken spirit stitching itself back together as the clock resets. 

Next: June Pride

#thebtswritersclub #monthlychallenge #BTS fanfic #Tinytan #Tinytanfic #bangtanuniversity #bangtanarmynet #btsgoldnet #ficswithluv

[honeylikewords]

This is working! Yay! So the ask I wanted to send you was, what do you think about the writer of the punisher trying to claim it for blm, since so many of the Nazis try to use him as a hero? I know that you've unfortunately have had some trouble with people using your fanfics for things like that, which sucks, as I like your castle fics and wish they weren't used by ugly people. Thank you for changing your theme!

I’m so glad it’s working, too! It’s good to know my theme is functional and accessible, now!

As for the ask, whoof, there’s a lot to unpack. And a lot to say. 

I want to answer this as delicately, thoughtfully, and honestly as I can, so I’ll speak from the heart and from my own personal, political perspective; obviously, I’m not a Black person myself and don’t want to speak over Black voices with regards to BLM and the global experience of systemic racialized violence, so my opinion is only my own, based off my own experiences, and what I’ve discussed with Black people and other people of color. 

I also ask that no one reblog this; I don’t really feel like getting into internet arguments about this topic or having this post spread around; it’s just my personal opinion, and people should be critical and form their own in their own ways vis-a-vis their own experiences and understanding.

That being said...

It’s complicated.

I think that there’s an inherent problem with The Punisher as an extant story. As a character. Regardless of creative intent nowadays, he is very much a product of male violence fetishization; he has been from his very inception. He has lasted as long as he has as such a major comic figure because people are drawn to his brand of lawlessness, his violence, his darkness, and that’s... really, really bad.

That isn’t to say we can’t have antiheroes, or violent stories-- we can and should explore many different kinds of stories, even dark ones-- but that the way we hold them up in culture, especially here, in America, can become toxic very, very quickly.

The Punisher has been a symbol of white, male violence for a very long time. The Punisher skull being coopted by actual US troops and police officers has been going on long before the Netflix show, long before The Punisher was ever on my radar. It’s been going on since he first stepped into comics, because he represents the ultimate power fantasy for these kinds of people.

He represents a distinctly male, distinctly American fantasy; if someone pisses me, off, I get to kill them. Cop or not, legal or not, fair or not, I get to make the rules about how the world works, and if I don’t like something, I get to kill it. That’s the ultimate power fantasy for so many of these people, and especially for white supremacists, violent cops and soldiers, who get into these jobs not to serve, protect, or allow peace to prosper, but to assert themselves as the dominant force and make others submit to their will by threat of force, or, worse yet, to fulfill their desire to hurt and harm, to kill, and to oppress.

No amount of reclaiming can ever really take what The Punisher stands for out of the hands of N*zis, cops, or the military, because he represents what many of these people aspire to be: a violent force above and outside the law, irreproachable. 

His skull being a dogwhistle between cops that they accept and encourage a level of targeted violence towards “the enemy” isn’t an accident. It’s a product of what The Punisher narrative always has been.

So, to that extent, I think it’s, frankly, kind of impossible to really “reclaim” The Punisher when he, himself, is the idealized form of these hate groups. He is the unimpeachable killer. He is his own lawmaker. And these cops, these N*zis, they use him for a reason. 

The closest I saw a narrative ever come to being able to reclaim Frank was Season Two of Daredevil. It really recalibrated the concept of the Punisher and put him in a finite cage, a space of operation; his war wouldn’t be endless or indiscriminate. It was targeted at a specific group of criminals, who were not chosen by race or creed or anything else, only by their specific actions in correlation to Frank. It framed him as a failure of society to protect the vulnerable, and as the frightening extreme of vigilantism; he was not a hero or a villain, but a man in the middle, as equally inclined to protection as he was to savagery. 

But they threw all that shit away the moment they allowed him to befriend an actual fucking N*zi in Season Two of Punisher. Any growth he had, any constraints, any hope for change, any understanding that nowadays, in an America ripped apart by white supremacy, gun violence, and extralegal violence, the Punisher was no longer a welcome narrative, was all flushed down the toilet.

Season Two ends with him shooting up a locked room of brown teenage-looking criminals.

It speaks for itself.

He has such a long-standing history of violence that trying to coopt him to represent peace, to represent protection? I dunno.

I believe it’s done in good faith, I do; I believe the artist has the best intentions and can, and should, try to wrest his creation from the hands of monsters. He can and should say “my creation is not for you, my art is not for you, and my character despises you”. That’s a right move. That’s good.

Donating to BLM charities is absolutely good, as well! And seeing that he wants his character to represent equal justice and a protection for the oppressed is good.

But this shit is coded into the very DNA of Punisher, at this point. It’s in the genetic makeup of his stories, his canon, his past. While it may not have been intended by the creator, this character has been in the hands of so many writers and artists who have molded Frank into the ultimate symbol of violent supremacy, of lone wolf shoot-’em-up vigilantism, that original intent seems... moot.

I don’t know if you can take the evil out of The Punisher when it was intentionally written in there in the first place.

We don’t need any more “antiheroes”, in my opinion, at this cultural moment. We are suffering enough. We do not need any more white men with guns taking the law into their own hands. We do not need any more “questionably moral” men. We do not need any more shooters. We do not need any more violence. 

We need to glorify and uplift the voices of the marginalized. We need to romanticize protection, kindness, empathy, strength, and courage. And I don’t think The Punisher can be a frontline voice of that.

At the very least, the utter bottom line, I’ll say this; it is very good to see them saying “Frank is not for you, you monsters”. That’s good. Take away everything N*zis like. Rip it away from them. Remind them they aren’t wanted, aren’t accepted, and don’t get to pretend their participation is normalized. They are to be cast out, called out, and rejected from every single thing they like. Shove it down their throats that they aren’t liked by anyone. 

It is very good to see this artist using his position to support an important movement and to donate to it using an incredibly recognizable symbol and one of the most popular media characters of all time. 

I wholeheartedly support that.

But there will always be a stain in Punisher. There will always be a cloud hanging over it. His story is a story that brings with it the baggage of male violence, white violence, gun violence, vigilante violence. The violence of people who believe they get to decide who lives and who dies. The people who believe they get to decide whose life matters.

And I don’t think that’s going to change.

There’s obviously a lot to say about, like, fanon interpretation, personal reclamation, personal enjoyment, etc., but this is where I stand on the issue of The Punisher as a large media presence, and with regards to my personal politics. 

I also want to add that this is not a personal indictment of anyone who enjoys the Punisher shows or comics or Frank as a character. I totally am aware that people can be politically active, thoughtful, and aware of the media they ingest and its political implications and still like characters like Frank for a variety of personal reasons. 

Still, I think it’s important to discuss these topics and to ask people to be mindful of what they engage with, how they engage with it, and what they support; everything has meaning. Every work of media, every character. And it’s our jobs to look at those works and characters and assess what’s going on with them, what our support of those things mean, and to what degree we engage with them. It means something.

Whew! That was a long one. But I hope it answered your question! 

[cartoon-children]

My Experience of Maladaptive Daydreaming

(This is from a paper I was writing for my class. I wanted to post it online because it might help others understand maly-d better, and let you know you are not alone in dealing with this.)

I’ve never really written about this. I’m a little scared. It's called Maladaptive Daydreaming. And I’m 95% percent sure I’ve got it. It has affected my life, for a very, very long time. Before I go on, let me explain briefly what it is. “ Common symptoms include: extremely vivid daydreams with their own characters, settings, plots, and other detailed, story-like features, an overwhelming desire to continue daydreaming, making facial expressions while daydreaming, whispering and talking while daydreaming, daydreaming for lengthy periods (many minutes to hours).” 

 They started in fifth grade. (I’m going through my three most important daydreams) The first was Zenobia, a story about a hero (Me) going to a magical land called Zenobia, to defeat an evil witch, also called Zenobia. Daydreaming about yourself becoming a hero is common in maladaptive daydreaming. In that world you are important, probably because in real life you don’t feel that way.  I was a hero (so was Grace and Daniel) and we defeated the Evil witch. The twist in the end is that I was actually the one who created everything, even Zenobia, and that I landed there without remembering that. And that I created Zenobia because I was lonely.

  The second was somewhere around seventh or eighth grade. World of Color. This world didn’t include me as the hero. I based my character off Colors. Orange, Blue, Yellow, Cyan, Green, and Pink. (In order of creation.) The story goes something like this: Orange is a shy girl who meets the other girls, the other girls become her friends and teach her how to ice skate. I think I based my story more in Anime than real life. Maybe I was subconsciously trying to remove myself from that world. But anyway, I fantasized about that all the time, seeing the different friendships play out, each two characters would have their own dynamics. But I think the meaning is simply that I wanted friends to encourage me, be there for me. To pick me up when I fell down.

 My current fantasy started somewhere around my junior year. I listened to Wombats (my favorite band.) religiously. One of the biggest triggers for maladaptive daydreaming is music. So, Quartet was born.  The characters are distinct, all very different from one another. The story goes something like this: A rag-tag group of young adults decide to form a garage band and live in the same house together for a year. (Their names are Neptune, Lavender, Magenta and Gray.) The meaning of this one is that people are everything. People define and shape your life. And to find and create your own family.

 I create because I am lonely. Because I want to be accepted and loved. Because I want someone to talk to, to be there for me and understand my every gesture. I want the freedom to express myself, to be heard. I want to yell and scream. I want to run and sing. I want to not give a fuck and say whatever I want, dump out all my dirty secrets, be as stupid weird and wild as I want to. (Did I just cuss in paper??? Oh god, I probably shouldn’t do that.)

 “Behind every daydream, there is a feeling. It drives your plot, it molds your characters. It’s the mastermind behind it all. Every character, every single story is an embodiment of it. The entire narrative content of your specific daydream is driven by an emotion that you failed and continuously fail to express in real life- and as long as this particular emotion remains unexpressed in your real life, by your real self, the respective daydream which is driven by it will not stop.”

 I create because I am lonely. I dream because I don’t want to bottle up my emotions, which in turn, bottles up my emotions. It’s very dissociative, this disorder. You lose sight of who you really are, you forget which pieces you hid in what characters, and you struggle to get them out. But the goal is not to get rid of these characters. You are them. They are you. You vent your emotions into them. But you need to vent those emotions through you. To let yourself feel the pain, the hurt, the love and the happiness.

#maladaptive daydreaming #maly-d #madd #actually madd #mental health #parascom #paras #madd help #personal

[sasorikigai]

@paindealt asked.... (aka the MK Kommunity Rambler)

Honestly YESSSS. That's what I love about Sub-Zero and Scorpion, and just Mortal Kombat characters. Is that they're IRONIC, and they have things about them that intentionally contradicts what character they're supposed to be. And that? Makes them feel more realistic imo. With a lot of characters in medias, they tend to fit one role/mold (like the stoic one, or the angry one, the funny one etc etc) which makes them feel one dimensional. But not the MK kast. Not only what we just talked about. 

Raiden is another fine example. Like, he's this wise mentor character -- yet he FUCKS UP so badly. In fact, lots of people blame Raiden for the key problems in the series. Like Earthrealm's defender, yet he led characters' to their deaths, technically tried to sell their souls, became a "bad" (or "dark") for a little bit. Like Raiden is that wise old guy, but he's far from perfect, and even his wisdom is of no help. And I just find that very interesting about the kast & why I love them so. 

The Mortal Kombat characters just SURPRISE you. And not in an ooc/bad writing sort of way. They're like REAL PEOPLE, and not only do they have a lot of history -- but you find out things about them you wouldn't expect. And it's why the MK games are my FAVORITE fighting series, just because the series really aced their characters and they're so good.

Like Kuai for example... when we see him older, it feels like he's actually aged. His younger self seemed more emotional, more liable to do something impulsive without thinking. (Example; going to straight on kill Scorpion for his brother without considering the circumstances). And then we see older Kuai and how much he's matured, how much wiser he became, and overall a man of peace. Yet... he STILL feels like the Kuai Liang we know. They did an amazing job with realistically aging Kuai up. 

Same with Johnny and his younger self. And I know I'm rambling now. But MK just does an AMAZING job with its characters and I am impressed by it. Yes, there are still some ooc stuff, or they didn't do a character justice... (such as the death of Hanzo). But for the most part, they're good at writing realistic & interesting characters and except for a select few (mostly from the ps2/3d games era) I honestly adore all the characters. 

I love that they’re both ICONIC and IRONIC, and despite their supernatural abilities and exceedingly and excruciatingly tragic lives, I believe they are two of the most relatable and characters who one can sympathize with the most. I called it their duality, but also, it’s their complexity and humanness that initially intrigued me to nab Hanzo Hasashi/Scorpion and Kuai Liang/Sub-Zero as my dual-muses (obviously)!

To begin, the premise of my blog’s creation (based on the word cathexis, which means THE CONCENTRATION OF MENTAL ENERGY ON one particular person, idea, or object (ESPECIALLY TO AN UNHEALTHY DEGREE - which I headcanoned here). Basically, it has to do with Hanzo’s most woeful tragedy that only has brought him a vicissitude od descension; with the loss of his life, his family and his clan, he has lost self-control, governance, freedom and humanity. By accepting the hubbed hell and excruciating suffering by letting himself be forged in hellfire, Scorpion not only lengthened his life (if he were to simply accept his fate without vengeance, then Hanzo Hasashi obviously would have not existed ever), he found the sole, one-track mind to seek out the one who annihilated his life to charcoal dust and exact revenge, to cause equally excruciating suffering against anyone who had been complicit in his clan’s demise (most notably Bi-Han, Quan Chi, Shinnok and Sektor, amongst the others who are subordinates under them). 

Despite Scorpion’s motive being immoral and wrong, I cannot help but to let it justified, because he too, is inwardly and outwardly suffering through his own hubbed hell and chaos and insanity. Through anger, there’s an associated sorrow and suffering and through vengeance, there’s self-destruction and emptiness that’s so humanly relatable and connect to. It’s also the universal idea that the concept of self-sustenance and familial love is what serves as the foundation of anyone’s fueled desire, responsibilities and duties. 

Through his suffering, depression and PTSD that continue to haunt him, despite taking more than two decades to free himself from the shackle of the past and let Harumi and Satoshi’s death become the fuel for his fiery passion to protect the Earthrealm at all the cost and regain his humanity and redeem himself, Hanzo’s redemption arc is essentially what drove me towards Mortal Kombat and especially MK11. It is a poignant, emotionally-changing makeover of an individual who literally has gone through hell and back, to be killed multiple times only to be resurrected and come back even more stronger, and gradually purified towards the good side with his solemn vow becoming evermore stronger. I especially like the fact that the franchise’s quintessential antihero got a huge transformation, to serve the side of good for seemingly the first time, without wrath and revenge, only to meet the most noblest death one can suffer through the all (through the allegory of retelling of The Scorpion and The Frog). 

Kuai Liang is one of those people who you immediately feel sympathetic for; he’s your quintessential good guy who has also suffered so many hardships, yet the stacked experiences of the past has only made him kinder and wiser; he IS perhaps the most miserable character (next to Hanzo) in my opinion. 

His clan (or most of it anyway) gets forcefully converted under Cyber Initiative. And that's after Kuai Liang rebuild it piece by piece, to add insult to injury.

His protégé Frost absolutely hates his guts, betrays him, cyberizes herself and even leads the new Cyber Initiative that perverts everything his Lin Kuei vision stands for. He's obviously hurt by it too, as seen in one of his intros ("Was I such a bad mentor?").

His friend Cyrax has to be put down literally right after he's freed from the cyber mainframe.

His other friend Smoke is trapped in Netherrealm according to Noob Saibot (Bi-Han) who taunts him with his.

According to his Story Ending, his biggest wish is to redeem his brother which is quite obviously not happening anytime soon without the Hourglass and in the main story line.

From many of his intros it seems that as a Grandmaster, he lives a lonely life. He straight up tells Cetrion that "love gets in the way" and both Jax and Johnny note that he doesn't socialize much outside of his Lin Kuei duties.

He makes peace with Hanzo and both become respected equals and brothers in arms. Hanzo then gets promptly killed by D'Vorah and Kuai Liang is understandably upset about it ("This is for Hanzo" intro with D'vorah).

In a lot of his intros with Jade, he constantly badgers her to join the Lin Kuei and she always refuses (funnily enough, in her intro with Scorpion she's more than eager to prove she can join the Shirai Ryu, despite not being from Earthrealm).

He keeps getting his ass whooped in almost all trailers or promotional videos.

Add on top all he had to endure throughout MK9 and the MKX comics (forcefully cyberized, killed by Sindel, then painfully "remade" again into a Revenant, gets tainted by the Kamidogu dagger, Scorpion almost kills him etc.).

Sub-Zero deserves major respect. He’s been through all this, and wasn’t seduced by Kronika’s promise of a new era and still remains resilient and headstrong and a beacon of hope in Raiden’s army against the Keeper of time. 

I obviously concentrated on Hanzo and Kuai, because I love them much more than the other MK rosters (obviously), but I definitely agree that Netherrealm Studios has done such an amazing job not only fleshing out their characters and giving them relatable growth and development, but different facets of their characters that become so intriguing and contradicting in a sense. Hanzo could be stern, hot-headed and intimidating outward, yet he’s perceptive, astute and compassionate to those who deserve his trust, loyalty and love. Kuai is your ever-stoic, phlegmatic individual who hides all of his pain and suffering inward, yet he’s so open about his philosophies and is able to crack ice puns or partaking in pranks, etc. They’re so multifaceted and the possibilities are endless, which makes them two of the most amazing characters.

 TL:DR; I FUCKING LOVE THEM SM.

#✗ the ineffable testimony of spawned hellfire (scorpion) #✗ bone-deep chill of despair (sub-zero) #✗ breathing iron and rust (outofkombat) #(take this morning ramble) #paindealt

[ranier-layarte]

LONG Character Survey: Ranier Leveilleur

BASICS.

FULL NAME: Ranier Kyran Layarte Leveilleur

NICKNAME: Ran, Raven

AGE: 21-25 (depending on expac)

BIRTHDAY: 1st Sun of the 2nd astral moon

ETHNIC GROUP: Au ra (Xaela)

NATIONALITY: Eorzean – From Ul'dah

LANGUAGE(S): Eorzean,

SEXUAL ORIENTATION: No

ROMANTIC ORIENTATION: Isn't this the same as the above?

RELATIONSHIP STATUS: Married

CLASS: Weapon Master

• Proficient in almost all martial weapons.

• Tends to carry multiple weapons at all times.

• Prefers Axes out of all the bladed weaponry

HOMETOWN / AREA: Ul'dah

CURRENT HOMETOWN/ AREA: Shirogane Mansion

PROFESSION(S): WoL, Scion, Machinist, Businessman, Crafter

PHYSICAL: Extremely fit, exercises daily. Muscular build

HAIR: Black/Dark Blue

EYES: Crimson

NOSE: Average, straight, roman-esque

FACE: Straight essentially a greek nose. (At least if I had to try and describe it)

LIPS: A bit on the thinner side, very lightly pink.

COMPLEXION: A mix of Fair and Medium?

BLEMISHES: None

SCARS: Scar on left thigh from stab wound, Scar on left midsection, and upper right thigh.

TATTOOS: WoL tattoo on the palm of his right hand. (Working on giving him another)

HEIGHT: 7'4

WEIGHT: 330 LBS/ 150kg

BUILD: Tall, Muscular, Fit,

FEATURES: None

ALLERGIES: None, at least not yet.

USUAL HAIRSTYLE: Long hair parted in the middle framing the face. Pulled into a ponytail and held with a silver bead big enough for the tail.

USUAL FACE LOOK: Around 40% expressionless, 30% Scowling, 20% Reflective, 10% happy.

USUAL CLOTHING: Higher end clothing generally a mix of casual with formal preferring long pants and a short sleeved shirt. Boots of some kind and armor of some kind at all times. Either under or over the clothes having a preference for the bulkier armors.

PSYCHOLOGY.

FEAR(S): Dying and thereby becoming unable to prevent future deaths and incidents. A fear of the unknown. (Which is part of why he tries to prepare for so many things)

ASPIRATION(S): Being able to amass enough wealth to live comfortably and to continue making the lives of the less fortunate easier. Helping create a better society for all.

POSITIVE TRAITS: Empathetic, Compassionate, Humanitarian, Perseverance, Fairness, Courageous, Loving, Self discipline, Reliable, Thoughtful, Patient

NEGATIVE TRAITS: Bossy, Jealous, Secretive, Grumpy, Harsh, Aloof, Stubborn, Cruel (Only to enemies but that doesn't really matter to people does it?) Arrogant (In some things though less now)

ZODIAC: Pisces

TEMPERAMENT: Mix of choleric and melancholic.

SOUL TYPE(S):  King, Warrior, Server (In that order)

ANIMALS: Raven, Bear

VICE HABIT(S): Training, Fixing machines, Drinking, Rubbing Chin, 

FAITH: The Twelve (Loosely)

GHOSTS?: I mean if you've seen them you can't deny them.

AFTERLIFE?: With everything we see there has to be right?

REINCARNATION?: Yes, it's clear there is.

ALIENS?: Yes.

POLITICAL ALIGNMENT: Leftist

ECONOMIC PREFERENCE: Prosperous, everyone has what they need. Along with the means to go beyond that if they are willing and able.

SOCIO POLITICAL POSITION: I think there’s enough to go on.

EDUCATION LEVEL: Higher end of the spectrum, attended sharlayan schooling for a few years of his life. (Around three) Was home taught and by other teachers. Extensive knowledge in numerous subjects such as Machinery, Technology, Gunsmithing, Gemology, Business. Holding the equivalent of a mixture of Graduate or Masters in the subjects.

FAMILY.

FATHER: Kyran Layarte

MOTHER: Sahar Layarte

SIBLINGS: Kyari Layarte

EXTENDED FAMILY:

NAME MEANING(S): Ranier (Rainier with out the first I Meaning Wise army apparently)Kyran (Beam of Light) Sahar (Early morning or Dawn) Kyari (???)

HISTORICAL CONNECTION?: My families connection to history? My connection? My father was one of the survivors of the hotgo tribe also. Does fighting in the Calamity among all the other events count?

FAVORITES.

BOOK: Whatever has his current interest, it can very.

MOVIE PLAY: Does this mean Movie or Play?

5 SONGS:

• “Shock me” Baroness

• “Up In The Air” Thirty Seconds To Mars

• “Rise” League of Legends, Glitch Mob, The Word Alive

• “Unbreakable” Of Mice and Men

• “Drown” Bring Me The Horizon

DEITY: Halone

HOLIDAY: Valentione's day

MONTH: March

SEASON: Fall

PLACE: Beside his wife or workshop.

WEATHER: Light rain

SOUND: The turning of pages, the sound of rain, metal moving against each other.

SCENT(S): Smoke, Metal, Old books, and sweat

TASTE(S):  Dulcet, Spicy,

FEEL(S): Rocks, Silk, Smooth metals,

ANIMAL(S): This was listed before.

NUMBER: 1? I don't know.

COLORS: Black, Blue, Red, Gold, Silver

EXTRA.

TALENTS: Metalworking, Singing, Sewing, Gem Cutting, Technology, Smithing, Machinery, Dexterous.

BAD AT: Getting rest even now, Not over exerting himself, Not overthinking potential scenarios that may never happen. Dealing with almost all animals, Even now sometimes talking about what bothers him too well, but he’s gotten much better over the years/expansions.

TURN ONS: Caring, Helpful, Courageous, Educated, Aggressive. Listening, Reliable, 

TURN OFFS: Selfishness, Boastful, Belligerent, Cruelty, Intolerant, Racism, Weak willed, Careless,

HOBBIES: Creating new things be it machines, armor, clothes, weapons, tools, etc. Working on the same as before. Reading, Exercising, Cooking. Shopping.

TROPES: Pragmatic Hero, Bad ass boast, Big Fancy House, Chekhov's Gun, Determinator, Don't You Dare Pity Me, Genius Bruiser, Heroic Build, It's All My Fault, No Challenge Equals No Satisfaction, Super toughness, Friend to All Children, The Chosen One, The Ace, Ain't Too Proud To Beg, Always Save The Girl, Berserk Button, Death glare, Excuse me while I multi task, Game face, Hypocrite, Lady and Knight, Not So Stoic, Not So Invincible After all, Red Eyes, Take Warning, Stern Teacher, Undying Loyalty, The Power of Love

AESTHETIC TAGS: Workshops, Tools, Kitchens, Weaponry, Guns, Armor, Fine Clothes, Rain, Feathers, Azure Skies, Romance.

VOICE CLAIM(S): Keith Silverstein, (Speaking voice) John Rzeznik (Singing) John Baizley (Singing)

FC INFO.

MAIN  FC(S): Free company? Azure Talons.

ALT FC(S): What?

OLDER FC(S): What?

YOUNGER  FC(S): What?

GENDERBENT FC(S): What the fuck?

MUN QUESTIONS.

Q1: IF YOU COULD WRITE YOUR CHARACTER YOUR WAY IN THEIR OWN MOVIE, WHAT WOULD IT BE CALLED, WHAT STYLE WOULD IT BE FILMED IN, AND WHAT WOULD IT BE ABOUT?:

• I genuinely don’t know. Something with the grandeur of lord of the rings maybe? But with the ability to add comedy and romance in the proper way. I'm all for serious movies but I enjoy the ability to add a well executed joke or sweet moment. It also would probably not just be a single film. Taking the general events and using my fics as material would probably be fine.

I’d have to think about it a lot more than I will right now

As for the name, well, I don't really have many options. But, probably something with Final Fantasy XIV as the main title. Give it a JRPG title I suppose as a sub title. Sort of like Warriors Dissonance or Uncovered Stories.

Q2: WHAT WOULD THEIR SOUNDTRACK / SCORE SOUND LIKE?:

• Ambient, switching to full of energy, able to convey emotion. Again mentioning LOTR, the score by Howard shore is really great and able to accompany many scenes in such a fantastic manner. As for the other bits perhaps the addition of artist tracks such as from favorite bands and those songs that have meaning to him. Like the ones listed above. 

Q3: WHY DID YOU START WRITING THIS CHARACTER?:

• As a way to work on and show that, a character doesn't just have to be overly reliant on tropes and cliches. That those are good as part of them but not as defining traits of them. Along with breaking some of those. Like how all protagonists always have dead parents, what's up with that? I enjoy seeing characters that try to break their molds and be more than that.

Q4: WHAT FIRST ATTRACTED YOU TO THIS CHARACTER?:

• My general thing in any game where you can create your own character has always been. To make who you'd want to be in this universe. I did that and then worked on it and reworked things until I got what I have now. So also, yes, he was a self insert.

Q5: DESCRIBE THE BIGGEST THING YOU DISLIKE ABOUT YOUR MUSE:

• Hard one I suppose but. I'd say how he is capable of doing so much. Even though I work with it as it is a key part of him, it's still hard to make him feel right, feel human when he's got these clear incredible strengths. He's very proficient at so many things some would maybe say he's a mary sue type of character. I make an effort to work on how he became that way to offset it. So it's a lot of extra work than if I had him being a more archetypal hero of his type. I may dislike this the most but I also like it. Love hate relationship you know?

Q6: WHAT DO YOU HAVE IN COMMON WITH YOUR MUSE?:

• A good part of our attitudes and personality though on his end they are greater generally. Along with our want to be as best as we can at certain things. 

Q7: HOW DOES YOUR MUSE FEEL ABOUT YOU?:

• Honestly, and in my current state. He would probably be very upset with me and to just know me or the hand I have in his creation and self.

Q8: WHAT CHARACTERS DOES YOUR MUSE HAVE INTERESTING INTERACTIONS WITH?

• Alisaie Leveilleur – She is the main one being his main love interest, girlfriend, and wife later. Though overall he sees her as an equal and a partner, which is part of the reason their relationship grows as much as it does. Along with giving someone who he can trust in and rely on, and vice versa.

• Finn Hogveart - Who harasses Ranier often enough especially with his pet and regarding moogles.

• Alphinaud Leveilleur - and him sometimes get along strangely due to Ranier's relationship with his sister. For a long time he tried to spy on Ranier and make sure he was good for his sister even though he knew he was a good person.

•  Cid Garlond - Ranier sees him as a mentor of sorts, along with someone that he can bounce ideas off of and work with on projects leading to a solid relationship between the two. The two sometimes bicker regarding their work but it's always just them being passionate for the projects.

• Gerolt Blackthorn – Similar to cid in some ways. Ranier looks up to Gerolt and his ability to continue making such amazing creations. Wanting to learn more regarding the processes means Ranier visits him when possible, bringing some drinks for him when he does. Almost having a relationship like bros. Ranier also sometimes has gone to try and sway Rowena on his behalf to lower his debt.

There are more but I don’t want to make this too much longer.

Q9: WHAT GIVES YOU INSPIRATION TO WRITE YOUR MUSE?

• I do not control the write, also Alisaie.

Q10: HOW LONG DID THIS TAKE YOU TO COMPLETE?:

Uhhhh maybe an hour all together. Over the course of three hours.

==========

Tagged by: @amandafullmetal​ @lyllyan-weiss

Tagging: @heyafinney​ @anikisbox​ and anyone who wants to do it that sees this.

#Ranier Leveilleur #Ranier Layarte #I did the best I could with it with the time i put into it. #I'm not the best at these either Hopefully someone finds new things or interesting #things from it

[lost-kinn]

so since we’re all talking about the pale king, i’d like to talk about the moment you see the pale king and realize Hey @ Team Cherry Why’s He So God Damn Short?

i’d like to pose the idea that it is crucial in any coming-of-age story to realize that your parents are people too, because this is what enables you to grow past them and cease to be defined by them.

and if there was ever a coming-of-age story, it’d be hollow knight. it’s the story about the knight growing up, finding out who they are, and becoming their most realized self--which might be returning to the greater void, or becoming the shade lord, depending on your opinion on which ending is the “True” ending. 

but growing up is, as hollow knight recognizes, not only reconciling yourself with your parents. it’s an act of reconciling who you are in relation to your society, to your peers, to your place and history, and religions if they’re involved in any of the aforementioned things.

so just to put that out there: i do think that one of the big narrative arcs of hollow knight is for the knight to grow up, and the rest of this argument follows that one of the big goals of the game is charting the knight’s journey in growing up.

for a child to grow up, they have to realize that their parents are not infallible.

and in order for a person to self-actualize themselves outside of the totalizing influence of a state or god, they also have to realize that their societies and their gods are not infallible.

it’s a very good thing, then, that the pale king is a triple-whammy of three of the most prevalent patriarchal figures of all time: Patriarch, God, and State.  

firstly, i want to highlight that when it comes to fathers, there’s a pretty common narrative that because a child is so young, all they know is their father and their father’s influence (or their parent’s influence, alternatively). their parent’s influence is totalizing.

in the process of having such an all-encompassing influence on their child and their child’s world, the parent creates their child, both biologically and in the act of raising their child.

it’s the issue of “raising” that hollow knight does a really good job of expanding.

think about your own childhood. was it necessarily your parents who had complete influence over you? considering that most of us spend seven hours in school every day, can we say that our parents are most influential, even if our parents were very involved in our lives (to say nothing of people with less involved parents)?

think about the way the government structured your schooling. even if you went to private school, the government still had standardized tests. if you went to public school, the state had a say in everything you learned, the people you were in contact with, even what you wore and what you ate.

if you spent any time in church, religion had a direct impact on your life. but even if you didn’t, religion shaped the history of the country you’re in, shapes the way that you probably think about the world, shapes the values you hold, just by osmosis.

when it comes to creating (“raising”) a young person, hollow knight rightfully pings three sources: parentage/family, state, and god:

1) their influence is usually complete and all-encompassing. particularly in a monarchy, government rule and influence is complete and supreme. in conceptualizations of god, gods are omnipotent and omniscient. for a young child, their parent’s influence is similarly complete.

2) gods are the creation myth of how everything came to be, and the way that the world should be. states will usually also tell you something similar; the american government spoonfeeds a particular history about the american revolution, for example, and posits a set of values such as freedom, individuality, and meritocracy, and all of these values can be difficult to see alternatives to if you’ve never known anything different. similarly, a parent will also provide for you a genesis story—quite literally, your parent fucked your other parent and then you happened—and also impose a set of values.

3) because of these previous two points, family, god, and state are the processes by which people are created, as a direct consequence of the all-encompassing influence they wield.

in hallownest, these influences are easy to see. gods are so prevalent for the sheer extent of their influence, their ability to shape their followers and their subjects to their will (e.g. unn and the mosskin, grimm and the grimm troupe). the extent of hallownest’s government was so strong that its monarch was revered as a god. the actual subjects of the city of tears are physically molded to the king’s will, and the followers of unn, the grimm troupe, and the radiance are all physically altered by the god’s influence. vespa commands a similar control over her hive even in death, even though she’s only a queen and not a god.

the expansiveness of god’s influence is also what aligns god so well with the state, of course; they’re hugely influential, they tell you why the world is the way it is, and they also tell you the way the world should be, brooking (usually) no argument.

we can see this easily paralleled with the child’s point of view of their parent when they’re very young; unable to see past their parent’s influence, their parent’s influence is totalizing.

    of course, the reason why it’s important to see that influence and to name the sources of these influences is because this pattern of influencing the world had some pretty disastrous effects for literally everyone.

a lot of hollow knight is realizing that the kingdom-state of hallownest gave you, the knight, a VERY short end of a societal bargain.

like. that society killed you (the knight), and your siblings, so that it could maintain itself.

hallownest is a Fucked Up Place, one that structured its entire society to give you, the knight, a REALLY short end of a bargain. your society--the kingdom of hallownest--did you, the knight, a huge fucking dirty.

here’s the thing about tying father, god, and state together: it provides the player with personal, ideological, and political reasons to say, “fuck this system.”

it collapses the knight’s coming of age story as a young child into an adult with other storylines, such as the knight’s ascension to godhood and the killing of god herself, and knight’s ascension to kinghood and overthrowing the last vestiges of hallownest (also known as being a revolutionary).

it’s not just that your personal father fucked up—it’s the realization that the entire society has done you wrong, and needs to be either fixed or surpassed. at the very least, it needs to be recognized for its shortcomings. (again, remember that it’s not just a parent who raises a child; it’s an entire society that has a hand in it.)

the pale king becomes the focus of that, even though we know that there were multiple other people who were involved in the plan--the white lady, for one, but it seems like even ogrim was aware of the plan to sacrifice thk, and deemed it an acceptable sacrifice so that hallownest could maintain its power. 

in short, the pale king becomes the embodiment of all of these plotlines in one person.

he gives give the state’s power a face and a name, and that’s not incorrect, per se, since hallownest is a monarchy. he gives godhood a face and a name.

the pale king is a character that says there is no divide between political and personal. it is all personal. the state if our father, god is the state, and if we want to settle the score for the wrongs that have been done to us (and i mean us as both the knight and us as players), then we need to start looking at family, god, and state.

and in hollow knight, the narrative has neatly combined all of these into one character.

    ultimately, the reason why it’s so important to embody father, state, and god all in the same body is because then the issue becomes manageable.

and by manageable, i mean SHORT.

(firstly, i should add that it’s not like the coalescing of father, state, and god is uncommon. if you wanna know how common it is, take a look at that old joke about how the final boss of any JRPG is either god, your father, or both. for a really prominent cultural example, take a look at none other than gendo ikari, who’s shinji’s father, the director of the instution that runs shinji’s life (“state”), and aspires to either kill god or become god or both, depending on your interpretation of evangelion.

and hollow knight brings up this conflation of father, state, and god in a lot of other ways, which i think is important to note. it’s not like the pale king has a monopoly on it. see: the hunter’s remark where he says that the sum of his being goes to the knight because he has “no children, no subjects, no followers.” see also: grimm, who’s an excellent foil to the pale king in this way; he is the master/monarch of his troupe (state), he is a god and The Singular God of his domain, and he’s also a literal father. like, that last bit is almost the entire point of the grimm troupe DLC.)

but returning to my point, the pale king embodies all three at once partly because he then because easily targetable.

it’s like that old adage they say about the monster in a horror film—the monster is only scary up until the point that you see it, and realize that it has a corporeal body that you can kill. (monster theory operates on this, anyway—monsters put a vague, incorporeal anxiety into physical body, which you can then confront.)

but also think about it in terms of government. locating the state in a single person makes it easier to oppose, easier for you to locate its “source.” think about a lot of governments today: their “rulers” are more dispersed, but therefore are more dispersed, and therefore society is more difficult to revolutionize. locating everything within the pale king cuts down the entire idea of The State to a human size.

and think about it terms of god, too. god’s been discussed to death--possibly literally--for centuries. nietzsche declared god dead in 1882. hegel posited that god was only a reflection of ourselves, in that we have created the world around us with the power innate to human beings, and then created god to house that power and use that power against us. god’s been dying for a long-ass time, and it’s been a huge source of both liberation and anxiety, because if there’s no god to keep the world together, what the fuck are we supposed to do? at least when there was a god that ran everything, we had someone to be fucking pissed at when shit went wrong.

and then you put all three of these into a physical body—

—and he’s SHORT.

ITTY BITTY.

TEENY TINY.

and then to add on to the fact that he’s short—poke around the white palace and the extra lore, and you realize that the pale king would have lost in a fight to the radiance because he wasn’t invincible, and that he was desperate for a solution, and that he made some good decisions and some fucking awful decisions, and his influence on the world was insane in its reach but he was still a person who walked on two legs and had a child and a wife and probably actually felt some kind of positive emotion for both of them. this is the part where we realize that the pale king is not infallible, and isn’t some cartoon villain who controlled everything everywhere.

the moment you see the pale king with your own eyes is seeing that the Very Society You Live In, the same society that fucked you over so horrendously, was made by a person who was fallible and even weak like you. this is the culmination of the storyline of the knight as someone who, literally, overthrows the last vestiges of hallownest, and surpasses the society that victimized them.

god was made--or maybe is--a person like you. this is the culmiation of the storyline of the knight who kills god and becomes their own god in the godmaster ending.

your parents are people like you. this is the culmination of the storyline in which the knight grows up.

you were made by people like you. the processes by which you were made are not beyond your power.

the process of growing up, as described by hollow knight, is empowerment. it’s realizing that you have more control than you thought.

like a child realizing that their parent is human for the first time, they realize that their parent’s influence, the world created by their parent, is not infallible or invincible. they realize that their parent’s influence on them is vast, but has a limit. and that this isn’t terrifying or awful, but is a freeing experience. they realize that their parent’s influence can be escaped, destroyed, or surpassed.

in the act of recognizing the humanity of the people who created you, you can recognize firstly the limitations of their power, and the extent of your own.

if they could do those sorts of great feats while also being a fallible person, then so can you.

the playing field becomes equal. they were a person. you’re a person. 

if the pale king is a person, then the pale king is no longer a cataclysmic event that happened to you (the knight). and the instant the pale king is no longer a chaotic, incomprehensible event that Happened To You, you can remove yourself from the position of a passive receptor of someone else’s actions.

you (the knight) are not simply void to be molded by a god, or a knight to be molded by a king, or a child to be molded by your father. you, the knight, are a person.

you, the knight, the victim of this situation, don’t just have to lie back then and let yourself be defined by your own persecutor, or the society that threw you away, and no longer have to be defined purely by your own tragedy.

you have to become more than your tragedy to become a person, but before you can do that, you have to realize that your persecutor had his limits too. you have to define yourself, and your own abilities and your own power, beyond the scope of your persecution.

the pale king needs to be more than the cause of a tragedy to let you do that. he needs to have limits, and in order to grow past him, his limits have to be seen for what they are.

now, let me say for the record: you need never forgive a persecutor, and personally speaking, i don’t recommend it. but i’d propose that it is required to their strengths, their failings, their mistakes, and their limitations, that you can really start to grow past them. and that hollow knight makes this requirement pretty literal, in that you have to see the pale king (and the white lady) to get voidheart.

you can only realize yourself and your potential when you’ve seen, for your own eyes, the remaining husk of your god, your state, and your father, sitting small and shriveled and dead on his throne. 

#hollow knight #lore #i'd also like to talk a bit about how the act of recognition is one of the most powerful tools hk uses #in that the knight recognizes themselves in thk #and the hunter #and hornet #and the broken vessel/lost kin #and in the greenpath vessel #and in all the faces at the bottom of the abyss #and i'm very sorry to say probably zote too #but that's a very connected train of thought that i'm just not going to tackle rn #fun fact: this also fits very well with the deconstruction era of being a subject that is produced by external societal power #not just a subject as a discursive entity that is produced by a subject that is ruled in the process of being produced as discursive #and i think one of the excellent strengths of hollow knight is that it explicitly acknowledges subjectivity in the deconstruction sense #and then rebuilds after the deconstruction #quite literally: the apocalypse has already happened to hallownest and we are in the process of picking up the pieces #the literary apocalypse has already happened and now we are rebuilding our own personal agency #which brings me to thk and their agency but i am going to cut that thought off at the pass #not today folks #anyway sry if this is not a post that is easy to read #i definitely did my best but i can only pare this line of thought down so far

[just-call-me-johnny-archive]

Johnny found himself at an all too familiar cliff; that was where he'd spent one too many nights peering over the edge. Years prior he had wondered if what awaited him after the plunge was better than he'd dreamt about that one night. He had learned since then that it wasn't a dream, and he supposed that's what kept him from taking his life as often back then. What was the point when he'd return?

After a few moments of staring out his windshield, Nny exited the car and ballooned an ice umbrella from his fingertips. The magic in his powers had worn off. Much like the magic in being immortal had worn off as well. Not the literal, supernatural magic that made these things possible. He was referring to the feeling of childlike wonder at being able to live forever and sprout snowflake from his hands.

He didn't have anyone in particular who was out to kill him. His only threat was the one he posed to himself. Even then, there wasn't any drive to harm himself- when he had urges he had to remember the people he'd leave behind if he went through with it.

Just three days were hell for survivors.

Really, his life was perfect now. He had family and friends. He had a job and a house that felt like home. He had someone who finally, truly loved him- who would never hurt him or leave him.

So why did he feel so empty?

He continued walking towards the edge of the cliff, untouched by the rain falling from the sky.

Was it because none of the money he made was actually hard-earned? He hacked for a living. This was... stolen. It was basically like using monopoly money to purchase everything and it- it felt fraudulent.

He felt fraudulent. He was a complete fraud.

What did he have? Who was he?

His husband was an artist- one of the best if not the best. He could create things and put them right onto the paper or tablet. His stories were comprehensive and could take someone away from reality. He was a fucking demigod- he had fire powers- he was beautiful. He was a creator- a god- in every sense of the word.

His brother was on his way to becoming a rock star. He got himself a record deal and was probably hard at work on his first album right this moment. He had a great singing voice that Nny could easily listen to for hours and never grow tired of. He had a future full of prosperity and excitement. He'd go on tours with his family and play to crowds of varying sizes.

His sister was a queen- an actual queen- royalty. She was a mother to many. When she wasn't showering everyone else around her with love and affection, she was kicking ass and being a leader of an entire planet. She had ice powers that were graceful and beautiful. Her motions were fluid; she was made to have the gift of ice and snow within her. On top of all that, she was a fucking doctor- and an incredible one at that. He couldn't imagine how many people she had helped in all her years of medical practice.

His son was the chancellor to a galactic alliance. He spent his days hard at work with relations, research, and recovery. He was the reason that so much good had come about since being put in a place of power. He was attempting to correct years of shitty leadership due to his false father.

His niece was the admiral of that same alliance. She was a natural engineer and skilled with a multitude of things. Much like her uncle, she was a jack of trades and could do about anything. Her combat skills were impressive. She was fiercely independent and capable of defending herself and her mates whenever they needed her. She was headstrong and in all ways a Phoenix.

He could go on about any number of his acquaintances and family.  

He was surrounded by greatness.

Yet, he was nothing.

He could feel the tickle in the back of his throat. The familiar near-sting in his nose. Nny had exhausted his tears. He was tired of crying all the time- of feeling sorry for himself- of being pathetic.

He glared into the ground until he felt the ice forming under him evaporate. He hadn't even realized his umbrella had already faded away and the rain was pelting his head.

"Lost in my head and I can't leave."

He continued his steady trek over to the edge of the cliff and stared down at the city below. "Watching the rain falling away, away from me."

He wrapped his coat closer to his body slowly and solemnly started to approach the guardrail. "Days grow cold as I grow old. Watching my life through a window."

The man climbed over the protective barrier and sat down on the cold, wet metal. "So I sit, watching the rain. And I can't leave."

Nny lifted a hand to weakly make a flurry shoot from his fingertips, but there wasn't any feeling in it and the black dust faded with the rain. "I want to feel something."

"I want to feel air that I can breathe." Nny looked skyward as he created two more, slightly more powerful gusts of black snow and ice.

He threw his hands down frustrated at being unable to think of something that was his. Something that didn't already exist- something unique. Not stupid wind wisps. "I'm tired of being nothing."

"I'm tired because I don't want to be make believe." He frowned, thinking over his own incompetence. His own failures and shortcomings. His absolute worthlessness.

Did people look up to him? What was it they saw his as? Brave? And strong? He wasn't any of those things. What on Earth did anyone see in him?

He arose from his perch on the guardrail and steps back over it to safety. His thoughts were too blurry at the moment to trust himself on a literal ledge.

"It happened again; I freed myself from words never said."

Those words being that he was special. Or valuable. Or needed. Even if those very things were true and shown to him through other means. He was too deep in his own head at the moment.

"This road with no end and there's no help, ooh."

He stared out at the road behind his car- the one back to people who could easily make him realize his worth and show him how loved he was.

But really love was something different from true worth. He could be told he was adored and loved and cherished, but why?

God, those words echoed through his head since he was subjected to them. The condescending tone. The obvious entitlement in his voice. The confidence in knowing he was right and no one could tell him otherwise.

People are tools, Johnny...

We all use each other in one way or another. Comfort, sex, money, affluence... I just don't see the need to disguise it in words of "love."

He clapped his hands over his ears as if that would have stopped the noises and the thoughts and the chaos inside.

"Lost and lonely...Strangers know me better than I know myself." He caught a glimpse of himself in a puddle. He resented the person looking back at him. So anxious and cowardice. All talk and no action. A hypocrite.

"So I sit, watching the rain and here I'll stay."

"I want to feel something!"

He stomped into the puddle and a patchwork of blue-black ice spread out from under his boot. However, it was frail and shattered. He glared again.

Johnny whipped himself around and continued screaming out. More ice spread out and around him, jagged, uneven red ice sprouting in angry pieces.

"I want to feel air that I can breathe!"

He glared at the pathetic ice spikes, making more form because his emotions were so conflicted and confusing. The entire thing cracked and fell apart underneath him.

He breathed out realizing that he needed to calm just a little bit if he wanted to do this one DAMN THING RIGHT.

But of course, it didn't work.

"I'm tired of being nothing!"

With this, the ice gave a little more and from the spikes form something solid and recognizable and from that, something steadily arose from the broken ice.

"I'm tired because I don't want to be make believe!!!"

Nny lifted his hand skyward- he made this new structure as high as he could handle. Around him the ice formed a solid ground, a patterned base is enough to make him feel just a tiny bit of satisfaction. But it wasn't enough. The thing falls again.

He continued to dance around, his hands worked hard to create something out of all his nothing. If he was his husband or his sister or hell even his daughter, then he would have done a better job creativity wise. He didn't have a single artistic cell in his body. That had been stolen from him.

"All we are is guilty hearts in a sea of memories," he paced and rubbed his shoulders in a mockery of self-comforting.

"Time goes by and people cry, but I don't feel anything."

He was powerless in everything. He wanted to be helpful. To somehow use his powers- his immortality for good. To contribute rather than stay at the sidelines- oblivious to the plight that so many others were subjected to. In a way, he felt almost responsible for any catastrophe. He always felt there was something he could have done different- to help. But no, he was a waste.

He repeated this again and grew more angry and emotional- contrary to his words. Slowly around him, the base started to rise with new structures that were waiting to be built up.

Nny ran to them with his palms up, fingers clenched as if he was physically lifting the ice up and molding it.

"I want to feel something!!!"

He jumped around, shooting magic here and there as he started to make something that seemed meaningful. Not just an imitation of a rose or some other functional device.

He spun in a slow circle as a covering of glass spread around him. Walls of decorative ice melded together as he smiled hopefully.

Maybe he finally had a breakthrough.

"I want to feel air that I can breathe!!!"

The things around him continued to grow and mount. How exciting! His own creations! His own little place! His work!

"I'm tired of being nothing!!!"

He jumped onto a growing tree-like structure holding onto a branch with one fist, blinded by the influx of power and confidence. The entire thing glowed brightly with purple- his happy color.

"I'm tired cause I don't wanna be-"

He lept off the branch as it grew and onto the bottom of a slope that was steadily being created from under him.

His smile was fit to burst as he raised his arms to shoulder level, his heart practically singing from the feeling of making and doing and being!

"I wanna feel something!!"

He saw a blue moon slowly come to light ahead and he was so amazed! He made that?!

He laughed and continued his climb upwards, practically running with joy.

"I wanna feel air that I can breathe!!!"

And for those moments he does! He felt his own air graze his cheeks as he continued to ascend to the highest peaks. He forgot this feeling ever existed. Of seeing something you worked so hard finally being revealed.

"I'm tired of being nothing!!!!"

And he was finally done with it! He wasn't 'nothing' anymore! His existence wasn't a stray mark on a masterpiece! He was the author of his own story! He was in control! His arm physically reaches out in front of him- a gust of ice and snow blowing in front of him.

"I'm tired cause I don't wanna be-"

His stomach dropped when he realized he had reached the top and- it was just a roof. It was... a roof like any of the other houses down there. Nothing spectacular. And his outstretched hand touched nothing but glass. What?

He looked around. Down at the three different sized trees. A snowman sat somewhere between that and the... house. All of the snow was settled at the bottom. Above and around him was nothing but glass.

A snowglobe. He made a fucking snowglobe.

"... Make believe."

His smile dropped steadily and his hand curled into his chest as he wrapped his coat tighter around him and dropped onto the roof, looking up at the moon with a pained expression.

He would have cried, but he was too exhausted. He just tucked his knees to his chest and buried his face in the sleeves of his jacket.

He tried to calm himself before he would return to the nameless city.

Where in a world of aliens, inventors, and creators he was nothing but make believe.