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moralesmilesanhour · 10 months

Text

teamwork (makes the dream work...?) pt. 4

Summary:

wc: 1k+

A/N: um hii sorry for updating a lil late 😅 but I got really into writing this esp at the end. We're almost done! As always feel free to comment your thoughts and reactions, or send them to my inbox! Thanks for reading :)

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Song: It's Only a Paper Moon - Ella Fitzgerald (totally optional to listen while you read, if you like that sort of thing)

The small plastic bag carrying your lunch swung from your wrist as you pushed the door to the counselor’s office open.

"Thanks again for helping me organize around here," said the woman standing beside you.

"No problem, Ms. Keene!"

By the time you stepped inside, Miles was already sitting at the round table in the middle of the room.

The boy spoke first as soon as your eyes met.

"Hey," he greeted you flatly. His stare wasn't too far off from the look of curiosity you get from a stray cat that isn't certain whether you're trying to give it food or not; neither malicious nor particularly excited.

You tilted your head in surprise.

"Hey, you in trouble or something?"

Miles shook his head.

"Ms. Keene lets me have lunch in here."

"You two know each other?" The tall, dark-skinned woman asked. Though she had asked you both, she beamed at Miles as she spoke. He glanced back and forth between you and the woman.

"Kinda."

She clasped her manicured hands together.

"I'm glad you're starting to make friends again. That's progress. Enjoy your lunch," Ms. Keene said as she spun on her heel to leave, her short bob cut bouncing along with her.

"And put on those glasses!"

Miles rolled his eyes as the door shut with a click.

"Everybody's on your case about these glasses, dude. Just put 'em on," you said as you sat down next to him.

"Don't need 'em."

"Okay," you pointed to the analog clock hanging directly across from him, "tell me what time it is without using your phone."

He scoffed.

"Easy, it's…"

The boy stood, and squinted so hard that his nose scrunched. He heard you laughing through your nose behind him after a minute and soon dropped back down to his seat, hands raised in resignation.

"Alright, you got me. But who's looking at the damn clock all day?"

"Sitting in the back of the classroom with no glasses on is nuts, Miles. What's so bad about them?”

Miles pouted in indignation, "They make me look like Steve Urkel.”

“They can’t be that bad,” you said, grabbing the case from next to him and prying it open. “Lemme see.”

“Nope.”

“Just this once!”

“Nuh-uh.”

“Please?”

The boy sighed, then took the glasses from you with a wary expression. He looked at them like they were a moldy piece of bread before finally putting them on.

“Happy?”

Neon green color aside, the glasses were truly not that bad. The thick lenses framed his face and made him look younger. The boy blinked, awaiting your verdict.

“Awww, you look like a little nerd!”

“Don't start with that,” Miles shook his head, a grin spreading across his face in spite of himself. He swiped them off of his face and took the case from you.

“It’s not a bad thing,” you said over a bite of your sandwich, “you look cute in them.”

He froze, a hand instinctively flying up to scratch the nape of his neck before turning his gaze in the other direction. You could still see the impression of his dimples peeking out from the side.

“Don’t get a big head over it, now,” you elbowed him gently. He quickly changed the subject.

“I’m finna tell Ms. Keene that you’re distracting me.”

Miles was now hunched over his notebook again. He had his homework sheet covering one page, but you could tell he was sketching. When you tried to look over his shoulder, he frantically shut it closed.

“Can you not be nosy for five minutes?”

“My fault, bro, damn.”

Miles continued to draw quietly for almost the entirety of calculus, never once allowing you to peek at it. He didn’t pause until you lightly tapped his arm.

The boy flinched at the sudden contact, but you had his attention.

“I’m stuck on this problem you wrote, just this one. Help me out?”

He tapped his pen lightly on the desk in consideration. Finally, he shrugged, closing the notebook and sliding it to the side.

“Sure.”

You placed the worksheet between you and Miles, where your desks met.

“It’s this one. I’m not getting the solution you got,” you explained, placing a finger on the offending equation.

Miles peered closely at it. His braids nearly brushed the desk as his head moved.

“You gettin’ it wrong because you forgot to distribute here,” he pointed. “Everything has to distribute.”

You nodded as the gears in your head got to turning again. “Thanks.”

“Ma!” Miles whined as he took his plate of yellow rice and peas from the table.

“I’m just saying! La chica es muy linda, sigues mirándola. Don’t do anything crazy up there, understand?”

You were far from fluent, but the first bit of the brown woman’s sentence made a shy smile grace your features.

“This looks so good, thanks Mrs. Morales.” you said as you grabbed your own plate, carefully carrying it with both hands.

“No problem, baby,” the woman replied, gently smacking the back of her son’s head before sending you both upstairs. “Same time as usual.”

“Your mom’s nice,” you remarked once you entered Miles’ room.

“You just sayin’ that ‘cuz she gassed your head up,” Miles laughed.

“Whatever. I’m ‘bout to fuck this plate up!”

“Not on my bed, I hope.”

The boy gave you a warning glance.

“Relax, you see me sitting?”

You blew on a spoonful of rice before trying it, and the flavor nearly made your eyes pop out of your skull.

“Your momma went crazy in that kitchen.”

“M-hm,” was all Miles could reply as he shoveled the rice into his mouth, already halfway through the plate.

Soon both of your plates had been scraped clean, and you started working after taking the dirty dishes downstairs to wash. All three calculus problems had been completed, but a small squabble broke out over the appearance of the slideshow that Miles had put together.

“It looks so boring,” you complained. “At least make the background a different color–”

“Uh-unh, you gon’ make it hard as fuck to read. I say we keep it simple,” the boy swatted your hand away from the keyboard.

“Make the title dark magenta, and you got a deal.”

He sighed, “Fine. It’s legible, I guess.”

It was still only 7:30 by the time the project was finished, and you didn’t feel like leaving behind the warmth of Miles’ home just yet.

“Can you play some music?”

Miles spun around in his swivel chair.

“What kind?”

“I dunno, whatever you listen to,” you tilted your head at him quizzically. “What do you listen to?”

“Um,” He reached into a drawer and pulled out a small Bluetooth speaker, setting it on his desk. “Just…whatever I feel like. Lots of stuff.”

He carefully laid down on his bed next to you, making sure to maintain at least a few inches of distance.

Old jazz music began to float through the air.

“You like Ella?”

“Yeah,” he said at a near-whisper. “...I do now. Forgot what this song was called.”

“‘It’s Only A Paper Moon,’” you answered. “From ‘The War Years’. Beautiful record.”

Miles snuck a glance at the side of your face while you stared up at the ceiling. He liked the dreamy, far-off way you’d said the title.

“You sound old as fuck right now,” he commented. “Record…”

This made you burst into laughter, and Miles decided that he didn’t mind that sound, either.

“My momma always calls ‘em ‘records’, so I picked up the habit.”

“I like how you talk.”

You finally turned your head and met the boy’s eyes. The small grin playing on his face wasn’t a teasing one.

“‘How I talk?’”

“When you’re not grilling me with questions like a cop? Yeah, it’s nice.”

Not sure what to do with this new information, you turn your gaze back up to the ceiling.

“You’re a strange one, Miles,” was all you could say.

There was a brief pause before you asked,“What did you mean by ‘now’?”

Miles raised an eyebrow. “What’d I say about complete sentences?”

“Sorry,” you rolled your eyes. “You said you liked this song now, you didn’t like it before?”

He was silent for a good, long, ten seconds before answering.

“I used to not be super into jazz. Dad used to play that shit on the radio, driving me to school. I hated having to hear it the entire ride,” he laughed. “I know he’s somewhere making fun of my ass now.”

You hummed in acknowledgement, wondering if you should offer comforting words, or your condolences. Knowing Miles – at least a little – you decided against it.

“I used to listen to Ella songs when the house got too loud, or while I was eating lunch.”

“They let you listen to music down there?”

“Nah, I was eating upstairs with the English teacher after she saw me sitting by myself.”

“You still sit by yourself?”

Shaking your head, you answered, “I usually sit with Tianna, she’s usually my calc partner. This week’s kind of an exception.”

“So if it wasn’t for her, I woulda finished this shit three days ago,” he joked.

You placed your hand over your heart and gasped dramatically. “You mean you don’t enjoy being graced by my presence?”

“Hm,” Miles conceded, “I enjoy it a little.”

“Is this your way of saying we besties now?”

“Whoah, never mind. You killed the moment.”

“That was a moment?”

“Nope, forget everything I just said.”

Fun trivia since we're almost at the end: what book do you think Miles and the MC are reading in English class? There's no prize for answering but i'll be really excited about it. Thanks again for reading!

Taglist:

@thisaccountisrandomsstuff

@sizeablysized

@itsnotino

@asteria33

@kissmxcheek

@urmotherswhor3

@mrs-morales

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@missusmorales

@mystic60

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#earth 42 miles morales #miles morales #earth 42 miles morales x reader #earth 42 miles morales x black!reader #miles morales x reader #moralesanhour

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katieraven · 2 years

Text

insomnia

idol!chan x producer!reader, afab!reader

word count: 4.9k

genre: tiiiiny bit of angst, fluff, smut - minors dni please!

warnings: sleep issues, (work-)friends to lovers, a teensy bit of anxiety I guess, dom!chan, brat!(?)reader - idk how to describe it tbh there's no reeeal dynamic of that kind, oral sex (f. receiving), choking, piv, he calls her babygirl once, darling and baby used very sparingly, basically they've both been into each other and didn't quite realise that until now -- did I miss smth?

summary: chan helps you with a work issue and it turns into something different

a/n: hii so it has finally happened, my first skz fanfic has arrived! I already have wayy too many ideas for future ones and I'm like not a hundred percent satisfied with this one but it's the first thing I've written in a year (?) so go easy on me please. I just needed to get my chan feelings out in some way or form and this happened ANYWAYS enjoy byyye - katie

also hi @chvnnie this is the fic I was talking about - you've been a huge inspiration btw I would almost go so far as to call you the main reason I wrote this at all whoops

this is a work of fiction and does not represent stray kids.

You’re in your head. It’s not an unusual thing, in fact it’s how you spend most late-night hours in your tiny studio. You almost live here, it’s basically your second home. If not your first, your actual flat being your second. While a lot of people stay late to work on their various projects, only very few stay quite as late as you do.

It’s one of the few moments you are not troubled by the weight on your shoulders. Three a.m. in the morning, absentmindedly reaching for a cup of now cold coffee, drinking it without noticing its staleness, too deeply immersed in whatever you’re working on to care. Your fingers are flying over the keyboard, eyes flitting over the different tracks in the audio program before you, feverishly changing, moving, improving.

Only today something goes wrong. You don’t know what you did, but within seconds, everything is gone. You blink. The audio program is empty. Not a single track lies before you. The progress you’ve amassed over the last hours, days rather, vanishes right before your eyes. You try a couple of short-keys and combinations but not one single track returns.

“Ugh, fuck me”, you sigh, wiping your face.

“Well, if you insist …”

It startles you, but once you recognise the voice, you relax. Chan is standing in the doorway of your studio – you had left the door open to let some air in, after a particularly hot afternoon. The building was empty enough for there not to be anyone walking past. Well, almost.

Chan smirks at you, one dimple appearing in the corner of his mouth. While usually his comment would have made you laugh, chuckle at least, you can only huff out a lightly amused breath, before turning your head back to your monitor. Still empty lines where tracks used to be half a minute ago. Chan’s smirk turns into a frown.

“Hey, what’s wrong?”

His concerned voice touches something inside you and you feel tears well up in the corner of your eyes. No. You’re not going to cry.

“I, uh, it’s nothing, really.”

“Sure”, he scoffs. “Cause I’m gonna believe that.”

He appears to the left of you and looks over your shoulder. After a couple more short-keys and opening three folders, you give up and lean back in your chair with a sigh. You’re not going to cry. It’s okay. It’s fine.

“Will you tell me what is going on or do I have to magically divine it from the fact that you are sitting in front of an empty audio program?” Of course, he got it immediately.

“I was working on something, and it vanished.”

He hums and his eyes focus on the monitor in front of you.

“It’s not important, really, I can do it again.”

His left eyebrow raises, then he leans over your keyboard and starts working on getting your tracks back. You feel guiltier the longer he takes, it’s just your own, self-indulgent stuff after all.

“Really, you don’t have to … it’s nothing important.”

“Tell that to the artists you’re working with. Or the hours you probably spent on this.”

You shake your head. “No, it’s-“

The tracks reappear. All of them. Like magic. You can only stare at the screen, dumbfounded. He stands back up, a proud smile on his face. Then he hits the spacebar, and the beat starts filling the tiny studio. You startle and jump forwards to stop him, but he grabs your shoulder and presses the spacebar himself.

“Why don’t you want me to listen to it?” He asks, a slight frown on his face.

You wipe your face. “It’s … personal.”

Chan crouches down next to you so that he’s roughly on eyelevel with you. “Hey. It’s just me.”

You turn the chair towards him, and he grabs the armrests. You look at him for a beat, then it hits you that you just almost lost everything you’ve been working on for a while. This is different than your usual work. This is personal. It’s a song that you’ve been producing only for yourself, not JYPE, not any other artist. This is your baby. You just almost lost it, and he brought it back. The tears come back, and this time they’re stronger. You just let it roll over you.

As soon as the first tear falls, Chan’s expression drops. “Oh no, no, what’s wrong?”

His hands fly from the armrests to your knees, then your thighs, rubbing soothing patterns up and down. Your sobs turn into hick-ups, and you hate it, hate that he sees you this vulnerable. No one ever does, you wear armour at work. It’s what you remind yourself of now. You reach for the shield you put up around your heart with both hands and pull, until it’s up again and your sobs die down. That’s the reason, yes. Not the fact that Chan is still kneeling in front of you and hasn’t stopped rubbing your thighs.

You breathe out shakily. In again, and out. Then you finally dare to look at him. “Thank you, for saving it.” You gesture towards the screen.

His look is still probing, searching for what you just broke down for, but a smile curls up the corners of his mouth. “Of course. It wasn’t that far gone, honestly. I barely did anything.”

You roll your eyes and weakly slap his arm. “Stop always understating everything you do.”

He chuckles. “I apologise profusely.” The formal tone makes you smile a bit.

“Now. Will you let me listen to this absolutely not important personal stuff you made?”

You hesitate and look at the open door.

“Let me rephrase. If I close the door, will you let me listen?”

This, and the adorable face he’s pulling, finally makes you laugh and cave. “I guess, yeah.”

Your eyes follow him as he gets up and walks to the door, closes it, and locks it.

“For good measure”, he winks.

It’s one of those moments that make you realise that in all the time you’ve been at JYPE, you’ve made a lot of acquaintances and a couple friends, but none as wonderful as him. You often think he’s too good for this world – the rest of his friends do, too. Although the rest of his friends probably don’t get all warm and fuzzy inside when he smiles at them. Or find it hard to concentrate when he wears muscle shirts. Or watches his performances, more than necessary, and then blames it on just wanting to be a good friend. Supporting him, and such. God you’re down bad.

He walks back to his spot next to your chair. His finger hovers over the space bar and he looks at you, the unspoken question in his eyes. You steel yourself and nod.

Then the beat fills the studio again. It’s the first time you have heard this aloud yourself, so far, you’d only ever listened to it on your headphones. You’re almost scared to look over to see his expression, terrified of his opinion. This is like a tiny piece of your soul, and you just handed it to him, hoping he would not drop it. Of course, he doesn’t. When you finally do, he stands there, eyes wide, looking over at you. His intense stare makes you squirm.

“It’s nothing special, and it’s not done yet, you know how it is with these things, they take ages to be finished and this is just very rough, I-“

“This is amazing”, he interrupts you. Now it’s your turn to be absolutely dumbfounded. “What?”, you blurt out.

He turns the music down a tad, then he turns back to you.

“I really like it. And it’s different from the stuff you make for other artists.”

Somehow, you’re still anxious.

“What I mean by that is that I always hear pieces of you in other people’s music and I’ve always been a bit sad that you don’t get to make stuff that’s entirely your own. This – “, he gestures over to the screen, “is really you. All of this. Like, I can hear some of your inspiration in this, but the entire thing just screams you.”

Which is the exact moment your singing starts, and you want to vanish into the ground. Because his mouth falls open, and he turns the music up again. Moments go by of him just standing there, completely taken by the music. His expression has softened and there is a slight smile dancing around his features. You lean over to turn the music off again, there’s only so much time that you can take listening to your own voice right now.

When Chan turns back to look at you, head slightly angled down, you’ve never seen a warmer smile from him than right now. It overwhelms you, the sheer affection for this wonderful man in front of you, and you shoot to your feet and throw your arms around him. He is startled for just a second, before he hugs you back so tightly that you feel like he put something inside you back together. It makes you cry again.

“Shh. It’s okay, darling. It’s okay.” He rubs circles along your back, and you breathe in slowly, engulfed by his scent that is so distinctly him.

“Thank you”, you mumble into his shoulder, and he chuckles, before pulling away. “What did you say?”

You huff, and lightly punch his arm. “I said thank you.”

“No, thank you for trusting me enough to show this to me.”

You try to hide in the crook of his neck, but he keeps you half an arm’s length from him. Somehow, you end up staring right into his eyes. The honesty and affection you find there send goosebumps up your arms, up until where his hands are still wrapped around them. Suddenly you realise how terribly close you are to each other, and how he’s just a friend and this shouldn’t make you as tingly as it does. You shake off his hands and clear your throat. He just sees you as a friend. Right?

Because the way his eyes burn with something you’ve never noticed before makes you question your own sanity. You try and look anywhere but into them.

“Hey, we should probably unlock the door again, you know, unless people start to wonder.”

He blinks. “Yeah.”

None of you moves.

“But it’s also 3 a.m. and we’re the only people in the building.”

There’s nervous laughter bubbling in your throat and you rub your arm only to keep your hands occupied. Then you make the mistake of looking at him again. It’s involuntary, really, your eyes get caught on his black sweatpants and travel up his body almost automatically. There’s not much you can do about it. And when your eyes hit his, you’re done for. He looks at you with such intensity that you simply cannot turn away. A shaky breath leaves your lungs when he blinks slowly, only to look at you again, the same fire in his eyes, pupils blown wide.

You open your mouth, “Chan, I – “

He moves closer, as if you saying his name had shaken him out of a stupor. He reaches for the hand that you wrapped around your arm and gently pries it away. When it falls to your side, he intertwines his fingers with yours.

“What are you doing?”, you whisper, unable to speak any louder, scared that it would make this real. Make this have consequences.

Chan’s thumb is drawing patterns on your hand, and it covers you in goosebumps again.

“I kinda really wanna kiss you.”

Your breath hitches in your throat, eyes still locked onto his. They’re burning into you, but you can’t bring yourself to look away. He lifts his other hand up to your face and lightly touches your cheekbone. You have to actively keep your eyes from fluttering shut, body still covered in goosebumps. Your cheeks heat up under his gaze.

“Would that be okay?”

You breathe out a shaky “yes”, and he’s on you in seconds. He lets go of your hand and instead grabs both sides of your face, tilting it so that you’re looking up at him, before sealing your lips with his.

Everything is happening too fast. For a second, your arms hang limply at your sides, but then he starts moving against you and you can’t help but grasp the hem of his shirt and pull him closer. He hums against you, and you open your mouth almost on instinct. A tiny noise escapes you and he catches it, drinking it in hungrily. You push and he walks backwards until the back of his knees hit your chair. He clumsily sits down, and you move until you’re straddling him.

Only then do you break the kiss, both heavily panting as you stare at each other. You lift your hand from his shirt and start tracing his lips, his cheekbone, until your palm lies flat against his cheek. He nuzzles into it and closes his eyes, hands falling to your waist. God, you think, he’s so pretty. You watch his chest rise and fall rapidly and feel his thighs move under yours, and that’s when you realise what exactly is happening right now.

“Channie”, you whisper, and his eyes fly open, fingers playing with the hem of your t-shirt.

“Hm?”

“What are we doing?”

His fingers start pulling your shirt up just enough to be touching the delicate skin of your waist and you shiver, biting your lip to stop a sound that would have been decidedly too desperate.

“Well, I don’t know about you, but I’m doing something I’ve been wanting to do for way too long.”

Your hand slips to his neck and his eyelids flutter, but there is a concerned look in his eyes. He sees your hesitation.

“Should we be doing this? Are you even allowed to?”, you ask.

His fingers stop and he lifts his hands to your face, searching for something in your eyes. “I could not care less about what we should or shouldn’t do. The only thing I care about right now, is if you want this. But if you don’t, then that’s okay.”

You melt at the honesty in his expression, shiver at the way his fingertips are toying with the hair on the nape of your neck.

“What exactly does this mean?”, you whisper. It feels impossible to move right now. Like you’re being held in place by his intense eyes.

“Well.” His thumb brushes over your cheekbone and you sigh.

“First of all, I want to kiss those pretty lips of yours. And then”, his fingers travel from your neck down your arms, “I’d like to make you come so hard the only thing you remember is my name.”

A moan tumbles from your lips, and almost on instinct you roll your hips against his crotch. He hisses and grabs your waist. “But I need to know you want that, too.”

You nod, a bit too quick for your liking, but you don’t find it in yourself to care anymore. His hands gently rock you against him and your eyelids flutter, gaze locked onto his. “Use your words, babygirl. I need to hear you.” The condescension shakes you out of your haze.

“Don’t be so fucking patronising.”

A smirk curls around the corners of his lips. “Still need to hear ya, though.”

You lean down as if to kiss him and sink your teeth into his lip, just enough for it to sting, pull, and let go again. He watches you with the intensity of a predator watching his prey and something inside you relishes in it.

“Yes, I want that”, you finally give in, “I want you.”

He pounces with a low sound that comes from deep inside his throat, a growl, almost, and latches onto your lips. You wrap your arms around his neck and pull him in, kisses open mouthed and messy. His hands keep holding you against him. You roll your hips, both of you moaning in unison, your hands are in his hair, and you pull on his curls until he moans into your mouth, making you smile into the kiss.

He feels it against his lips and pulls away. “Oh, you’re a mean one, hm?”

The smile you give him in return would be angelic, if not for the vicious glint in your eyes. It makes him chuckle lowly, before suddenly standing, pulling you up with him and picking you up. Your legs instinctively wrap around him, and he walks over to the sofa in the corner of the room, lowering you down until your back touches the cushions.

He's kneeling between your legs, propped up with one hand next to you, the other on your cheek again. You tip your head back, baring your throat, and you can see understanding flash in his eyes. His hand slowly moves down until his fingers wrap around you and you feel the slight pressure on your pulse point. Your breath quickens.

It makes you want to rub your thighs against each other, but his legs are in the way, leaving you to squirm under him as he just watches you intently. His other hand travels up your body and pushes your shirt up with it, until he finds your sports bra. His thumb glides over your hard nipple poking through the fabric and it sends a spark of electricity right to your core.

“You wanna play mean? I can do that.”

His fingers close further around your throat and the increasing pressure ever so slowly clouds your mind, until your mouth falls open and you whisper his name.

“Hm?”

You try and move your core against his thighs but you’re too far away, his hand keeping you in place.

“Do something”, you hiss as he just keeps watching you, an amused smile on his face.

“Did you forget your manners, baby?”

You roll your eyes but decide to play along. “Please, do something.”

“But you look so pretty like this.”

Your hands fly up to his arms and you groan, but he just chuckles. “I told you, I can be mean. But I’m starting to get impatient too, don’t worry.”

His hand leaves your throat. All the blood comes shooting back, an intense clarity that leaves you gasping. You only notice that he has taken his shirt off when he leans back down towards you, reaching for the hem of your own t-shirt. He looks up at you, a question in his eyes, that you answer with a quick nod. Then he finally pulls your shirt up, making sure that his fingertips travel over your skin along with it, showering you in goosebumps.

He pulls the fabric off of you and you reach for him, fingers connecting to the smooth skin of his chest. You let your hands run down his stomach when he leans down to kiss you, trailing along the waistband of his sweatpants. His breath hitches when your fingers dip into his boxers, but he reaches down to stop you.

“Nu-uh. You first.”

He sits back on his heels and pulls on your leggings, throwing the piece of clothing behind him absentmindedly. You’re in front of him only in your underwear now, nipples clearly visible through the thin fabric of your sports bra.

“You’re fucking hot, you know that?”, he mumbles, and you feel your cheeks heat up before he grabs the hem of your panties and pulls. Cool air hits your core, and only then do you realise how embarrassingly wet you are already. He looks down at you and curses under his breath.

“Fuck, look at you. Already soaked, and just for me?”

You nod, “only you”, breath hitching as he lazily moves two fingers all the way up your entrance until they are pressing into your clit. You start moving against him on instinct, eyes rolling back as you finally get some relief. He lets you, for a few seconds, before pinning your hips down to the sofa. Your eyes snap open, a desperate whine leaving your lips.

“Hush, baby. I’m gonna take care of you”, he mumbles, before leaning down and licking a broad stripe along the way his fingers just did.

It makes you absolutely lose your mind. Your hips buck up and you moan loudly, hands flying into his hair, just to grab onto something, anything, to keep you grounded. The tip of his tongue dips into your entrance and your head tips back with a groan. His left hand holds you steady, before he dives in again, nose brushing past your clit with every movement. Your thighs tremble, you’re already way too close even though he barely started yet. You feel yourself clench around nothing.

“Channie, please …”, you sigh, and he looks up at you, tongue not leaving your body.

“Hm?”

The sound reverberates against your sensitive skin, and you shudder, looking down at him. Fuck, he looks good. Lower part of his face covered in your slick, curls sticking to his forehead, he laps at you like a starved man.

“Can you – fuck, Channie, fingers, please – “, is all you manage to choke out, but he has mercy on you.

You feel the tip of his finger tease your entrance and you clench in anticipation, before he pushes in and you close your eyes again, a desperate moan leaving your lips. He curls his finger upwards, and you know he’s close, so, so close to where you need him, but he isn’t quite there yet. You can feel the high approaching, can almost reach for it.

“More, please”, you press out, brows furrowed, and he adds a second fingers, curls up, and hits the spot. You swear you see stars for a second. Your mouth falls open, a string of incoherent words tumbling over your lips, and you feel him smile against you. It almost sends you over the edge on its own.

“Found it, hm?”, he mumbles, and you hum, every muscle in your body tensed.

“Look at me”, he whispers.

You somehow manage to lift your head, moaning at the sight before you. He dives down again, holding eye contact and your fingers pull on his hair, coaxing the sweetest moans from him. He curls his fingers up once, twice, and you snap. Your high washes over you with an intensity you’ve never felt before and he flattens his tongue against you, helping you ride out your orgasm with long strokes. Once you finally stop clenching around his fingers, he slowly removes them, making sure not to hurt you. You still wince at the sudden emptiness. Finally, you untangle your fingers from his hair.

He climbs up until he is face to face with you and you blink until he’s in focus again. He smirks at your blissful expression. “D’you have fun?”

You decide to tease him. “Eh.” You shrug. “Was fine, I guess.”

“Fine?” He stares at you in disbelief. “Clenched around me like you were holding on for dear life, but you say it was fine?” You chuckle, but the determination in his face sends shivers down your spine.

“Okay. You know what, I’ve had enough of your attitude.”

He sits up on his heels, before getting up and taking off his sweatpants, pulling his boxers off right with them. He reaches down for his pocket and pulls out a condom, ripping it open with his teeth, and rolling it over his cock, before he kneels back down, slowly pumping himself.

“Let’s see what you say after I’m done with you.”

His lips crash into yours and at the same time, you feel his fingers on your clit. You hiss at the slight overstimulation, but pull him closer by the neck, moaning into his mouth. You can still taste yourself on his tongue and it makes your stomach flutter. Then you feel his tip push against your entrance. He pulls away to check in with you, but you pull him back in.

“Please, Chan, need you”, you pant against his lips, and he groans, before pushing into you.

It's an entirely different sensation from his fingers and both of you moan at the same time, before he bottoms out and stills, fighting for his composure. He begins moving ever so slowly and you appreciate that he wants to be careful, but something inside you wants him to lose control. You lean up and drag your teeth across the shell of his ear, drag your fingernails across his back. He shivers, his arms buckling and his forehead falling onto your shoulder. His pace picks up and you kiss him on his pulse point, before whispering into his ear, “fuck me like you mean it.”

He stills. You let yourself fall back down grab one of his hands, leading him towards your throat. “Please.”

A smirk curls up the corners of his mouth. “I knew you could use your words.”

He pulls out almost completely before he bottoms out again and closes his fingers around your throat. Everything around him becomes hazy, he’s the only thing in your mind, the only thing you see. His hips snap against yours at a relentless pace and you feel the knot in your stomach tighten, instinctively lifting one of your legs. He grabs it and pushes it up against your chest, changing the angle, and finally hits that spot again. Your eyes roll back, moans tumbling from your open mouth as he keeps slamming into you, before slightly adjusting his position. His hand leaves your throat, and your mind refocuses, his thumb pressing against your lips which you open oh so willingly, sucking his thumb into your mouth.

“Fuckin hell”, he groans, rhythm turning sloppy as he watches your lips wrap around his finger. “Such a good fucking girl, hm?”

He pulls his thumb out with a pop and you whine, but he hushes you. “Impatient”, he tsks, before rolling the pad of his thumb over your clit. Fuck, you’re still so goddamn sensitive. His hips snap against yours again and then he hits the spot inside you.

“’M close”, you moan, and he nods.

“Come on, let go for me, baby”, he answers, breathless, and it pushes you over the edge. When you thought your first orgasm was intense, it was nothing against this one. You feel so fucking full of him, he feels so right against you, and then his finger leaves your clit, and he falls towards you, hands on each side of your body, riding out his own high. His arms are shaking from the strain, and you push up to press your lips against his. He moves inside you and you shiver before he gives you one last peck and carefully pulls out.

You fall back against the cushion. He removes the condom, before crawling back up and snuggling against you, propped up on his elbows on each side of your face. “You’re fucking amazing, you know that?”

It makes you blush, and you turn your head to the side, suddenly confronted with what just happened. With whom it just happened. He sees the change in your expression immediately.

“Hey, look at me.”

You obey him and see the softest smile on his face, before he leans down and gently presses a kiss to your lips.

“What’s going on in that pretty head of yours, hm?”

His fingers are playing with your hair, eyes intently fixed on you. You sigh.

“I – don’t know what this means. To you.”

He raises one of his eyebrows, “but you know what it means to you?”

Your heart lurches in your chest and resumes beating at a much quicker pace because yes, you do, and you hate having to admit it. You don’t know if you should admit it.

He kisses you again, longer this time. When your lips separate, there’s this softness in his eyes again. “Tell me what it means to you. Please.”

This is the truly dangerous part. Anyone can have meaningless sex, but it wasn’t meaningless, at least not to you. This is where the consequences come in. This is where you have to admit that you just ruined a perfectly fine friendship. You take a deep breath. You trust him. If anyone would be able to uphold a friendship after this, it would be Chan. So you steel yourself, and look into his eyes again.

“I like you a bit more than I originally planned to”, you whisper, not daring to speak up.

You’re close enough that you can feel his heartbeat. It quickens after he processed what you said, but where you expect him to tense up and leave, he leans down to kiss you again. You’re completely dumbfounded.

He holds your face and you close your eyes, simply enjoying the gentle pressure of his lips against yours. When he breaks the kiss, you steel yourself again. Your breath hitches when you open your eyes, his own swimming with emotion.

“I’m so glad you said that”, he whispers, thumb brushing against your cheek. “Because I do, too. And I was so scared this would be a one-time thing for you. I don’t think I could have lived with that.”

There are tears pricking in the corner of your eyes for the third time tonight, only this time you allow them. He leans his forehead against yours and you wrap your arms around his neck and then you stay like this, just breathing each other in. And you feel like your sleepless nights might have just become a bit easier to bear.

#stray kids fanfic #stray kids smut #bang chan fanfic #bang chan smut #bang chan #stray kids #skz smut #chan smut #bang chan fluff #chan fluff

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thesewordsareallihavetogive · 1 year

Text

broke down: A Safe Place to Land one-shot - Bradley "Rooster" Bradshaw x nurse!reader

Summary: 2.5k words. One-shot in the A Safe Place to Land universe. y/n's car breaks down and Bradley is determined to make sure she's okay. (time line stuff: ch. 1 takes place in september 2019, ch. 5 is set in december of 2019, and this one-shot occurs in april of 2022.)

Warnings: car issues, bradley being a Stress Protective Fiancé, uH angst i guess? lots & lots of fluff. also sexism

a/n: hi y'all! it's been a moment lol. this story has been floating around in my noggin since november-ish & i'm so glad i finally wrote it out. enjoy! <3

series master list | master list

Shit. y/n muttered under her breath as she pulled her car off to the side of the road. Two warning lights lit up on the dashboard and a disconcerting noise started echoing from underneath the hood before she brought the vehicle to a stop. Based on the thin smoke rising from the crevice between the body of the car and its hood, y/n had a feeling she wasn’t going to make it the final stretch of her drive.

It had already been such a long day and y/n was really, really looking forward to seeing her fiancé and downing a cold beer or two. Or three. With a heavy sigh, she stepped out of her usually trustworthy car and popped the hot-to-the-touch hood. Smoke clouded her vision and she coughed–this was definitely an issue she couldn’t resolve by herself.

After dialing roadside assistance, y/n called Bradley. The phone hadn’t even rung twice before he picked up, his warm hello being slightly muffled by the lively crowd in The Hard Deck.

“Hey Roos,” y/n sighed. She tried to hide the exhaustion in her tone, but Rooster picked up on it immediately.

“What’s wrong, baby?” Dammit. This man could read her like a damn book. The aviator furrowed his brow and sat up straight in the chair he’d been occupying. The rest of the squad was bordering on boisterous after the several drinks they’d downed and were more focused on an intense game of nine-ball. y/n rubbed her temple and thought about how to best tell him and avoid him freaking out. She loved him to the ends of the earth, but he was a worrier.

“I’m fine! It’s nothing, really…” she trailed off. Her frustration and emotions got the best of her, so it all spilled out at once. “Actually, my car broke down so I called for a tow truck and I’m gonna be late meeting up with you guys at the Hard Deck so I’ll probably just head home after this because I’m so tired and-” Rooster’s eyes widened at the jumble of words y/n rushed out.

“Where are you?” Bradley cut her off before she could work herself up anymore. y/n could hear movement in the background and she instantly felt guilty. The last thing she wanted to do was interrupt him while he was having a well-deserved night out with his friends.

“It doesn’t matter. I just wanted to let you know that I probably won’t make it to the bar tonight. This might take a while,” y/n huffed. Her nerves were shot and above all, she just wanted to go home. Sure, a night out with her fiancé and their friends would be nice, but a warm bath and a pint of Ben & Jerry’s would be much nicer.

“y/n. Where. are. you?” Bradley asked slowly, punctuating each word. His voice was low and left no room for argument. y/n had only heard him speak that way a handful of times since she’d known him–all of which were times he thought she might be in trouble.

So she told him her location. She had pulled off on the edge of some backroad she was taking in hopes of it being a shortcut. Instead, she was now thanking her lucky stars that she had barely enough cell reception to call the tow service and Bradley.

Rooster cursed–y/n was alone in the middle of nowhere and it would be dark soon. A dozen scenarios went through his mind at once and none of them were good.

In a few long strides, the aviator crossed the room towards the bar without so much as a goodbye to his friends. He fished enough cash out of his wallet to cover his tab and then some as he flagged down Penny. The worried expression and his rushed movements, while his phone was pinched between his shoulder and ear, had Penny moving cautiously to tend to him, foregoing some of the other customers before him. She’d hardly accepted the cash from his hand before he offered her a tight smile and jogged out of the bar.

“I’m coming to pick you up,” he said with finality. y/n’s brow furrowed and she started pacing alongside her car.

“What? No, Bradley. Stay out with your friends. Have a good time, you deserve to let loose. I’ll see you at home, okay?” If he weren’t so focused on getting to y/n, he might’ve noticed the warmth that spread through his chest anytime his fiancée mentioned their shared home.

Rooster was typically far more gentle with the Bronco than he was right then, but that was hardly a thought in his mind when he pulled his keys out and shoved them into the door lock. y/n inwardly groaned as she heard the tell-tale sign of his old car’s door slamming and the engine turning over.

“Nope. No. I’m not going to be able to relax or think about anything else until I know you’re okay. I’ll be there in 15 minutes, tops.” He peeled out of the parking lot, pulling onto the main road before he’d even finished his sentence.

y/n blew out a heavy breath and dragged her palm down her face before stopping short. She pulled her phone away from her ear and checked the GPS route she recently had open.

Your location to The Hard Deck Bar – 24 minutes via State Road…

“I am okay. And it’s over a 20 minute drive to where you are,” y/n sighed. She had no doubt that Bradley would be able to beat the estimated time of 24 minutes, but shaving almost 10 minutes off seemed a little outlandish, even for the fighter pilot.

Rather than reminding his fiancée that he routinely flew planes at over 1,000 mph, he simply grunted out “I said what I said” and pressed his foot harder against the gas pedal.

Bradley stayed on the phone with y/n while he drove. Based on the unmistakable sound of the Bronco’s engine revving and cars honking because Rooster had cut them off, it was easy to assume he was breaking a handful of traffic laws.

Otherwise, the call was relatively quiet. Bradley broke the silence every few minutes to ask if y/n was okay–she hummed yes, Roos each time. He asked her if there was anyone lingering around or coming up to her–No, there’s literally no one out here. Her fiancé couldn’t decide if that was a good or bad thing.

y/n huffed in frustration when she tried to unsuccessfully start her car for the umpteenth time. Just as she rested her head on the steering wheel with crestfallen resignation, she caught a set of all too familiar headlights in her rearview mirror. The nurse felt a bittersweet smile creep onto her face. She was happy to see Bradley, she always was, but she couldn’t help the sinking guilty feeling that he cut his night out short because of her. y/n slowly climbed out of the car and really felt the exhaustion hit her this time around. Now that Bradley was here, she didn’t have to keep looking over her shoulder and was able to let her guard down a bit.

By the time she closed the door behind her, he’d already crossed the distance from the Bronco to her car. Bradley wore a sympathetic smile when eyes met y/n’s. Something about the loving look in his eyes had y/n holding back tears. The aviator wordlessly pulled y/n into his chest and she gladly went along with it, wrapping her arms loosely around his waist.

“I’m sorry, Brad. I didn’t mean to ruin your night,” y/n’s words were muffled by the fabric of his t-shirt. Bradley tutted and brought a hand up to massage her shoulders where he knew she got tense often.

“You don’t need to be sorry, baby. I’m glad you called me,” he pressed a kiss against y/n’s hair before resting his chin atop her head. They stood wrapped in each other's arms for a moment, silently swaying side to side. y/n was still nuzzled against Bradley’s chest when he patted her back before pulling away and moved toward the hood of her car.

Bradley “Rooster” Bradshaw knows his plane inside and out. This extended to cars as well. He’s been under the hood of his vintage Ford Bronco more times than he cares to count, so he’s familiar with working on cars, to say the least. Maybe if this whole flying thing didn’t work out, he could be a mechanic.

Rooster waved the remaining smoke away from his face when he popped the hood of the car. He’d hardly been glancing around the various parts before a particular problem caught his eye. He stood back and rested his hands on either hip. There wasn’t much that puzzled him, but it was certainly an interesting sight, he thought as he tilted his head to the side.

“This drive belt is damn near shredded. When was the last time you got your car serviced?” Rooster asked innocently. When y/n blushed and wouldn’t meet his eyes, his face dropped. The aviator rubbed his temple. He had a feeling he wasn’t going to like her answer.

He produced a rag out of seemingly thin air and pulled the engine’s dipstick and wiped it off before checking the oil. He held the dipstick up to catch the remainder of the setting sun’s light and frowned–the oil was definitely below where it should be.

y/n was scratching the back of her neck now, looking increasingly sheepish.

“y/n?” Bradley asked expectantly. He wasn’t being condescending, but y/n felt like she was in trouble.

“Umm… I took her to get serviced not long after Lover came out. I sat in the waiting area and listened to the album like 3 times in a row.” Rooster did some math before his eyes practically bugged out of his head.

“When Lover came ou- baby, that was over two years ago?!” Bradley said incredulously, mouth agape. Before dating y/n, Rooster didn’t know much of anything about Taylor Swift. Eventually, his then-girlfriend started purchasing her own vinyl records and Taylor Swift’s music became regular in the rotation. Whether Bradley liked it or not, he learned some Swiftie lore. And, being the history nerd that he was, he remembered almost all of it. The album release dates had eventually wormed their way into his mind as well.

“I know! I know, but I literally only ever drive to work because we take the Bronco everywhere else so it didn’t matter that much…” y/n raised her hands defensively. Her voice trailed off towards the end; even she knew it was a bad excuse. Rooster slid a hand down his face in exasperation and smoothed out his mustache above his tight-lipped frown.

“Honey, what if you broke down or worse while I was deployed? I-” Rooster sighed. He stopped himself before he went on a tangent that might upset y/n. Nothing was worth arguing over right then so he let the topic rest. Bradley made a mental note to schedule a servicing for her car the following day.

The tow truck y/n called for pulled up just in time to avoid what was heading toward a tense conversation. When the driver approached the pair, he hardly spared Rooster a second glance initially; he was too focused on dragging his eyes across y/n’s body in a way that made her skin crawl. Bradley puffed out his chest and took a step forward, redirecting the man’s attention. The aviator’s movement allowed the remainder of the sun’s dwindling light to sparkle against y/n’s sizable engagement ring. She doubted that was Rooster’s intention, but she smirked nonetheless.

The tow truck driver posed his questions to Bradley. The much taller and tanned man was about to respond when y/n cleared her throat and stepped forward. It was her car, after all.

The driver was surprised. The hint of a grimy grin spread across his face.

“Alright, little lady,” he snickered. Strike one.

y/n took the man’s questions in stride. She knew the answers to most of them; she wasn’t dumb. Just because she procrastinated on her car’s maintenance didn’t mean she was clueless about her vehicle. Rooster was confident that she could handle herself in the conversation, so he hung back with his hand resting on her lower back protectively.

Some of the more unnecessarily specific questions were aimed to trip y/n up–Rooster knew it, and y/n pieced it together pretty quickly. Strike two. Good for y/n, and disappointingly for the sexist tow truck operator, y/n was very good at bullshitting her way to the right answer every time and had an unrivaled poker face.

Rooster smirked, impressed. His little spitfire was doing what she did best–putting men in their place.

The driver eventually huffed in annoyance. He clearly lost their verbal sparring match, so he set out to do his actual job and leave with his tail tucked between his legs. He tuned out the couple as he worked on hooking up the car and lifting it onto the truck bed.

y/n linked her arms behind her fiancé’s neck and grinned up at him. Rooster matched her smile. She was trouble, a force to be reckoned with–and he loved her for it.

“Thank you for saving me,” y/n murmured while her lips ghosted over Bradley’s. She pressed a sweet kiss to his lips, but before he could deepen it, she pulled away and examined him at arm’s length.

"My knight in shining… tacky tourist shirt,” y/n grinned deviously, amused by her own joke. Rooster rolled his eyes, pressing his tongue to his cheek before he retaliated by tickling her side–the exact same spot he’s been targeting since their very first beach date. y/n laughed before pulling him back toward her by his flowered collar for the deep kiss Bradley longed for.

At some point, the tow truck driver had finished up and y/n’s car was secured on the bed. He cleared his throat and shuffled uncomfortably as the couple shamelessly pulled away from their PDA stunt. y/n signed the necessary paperwork before thanking the man–she might be petty and a smart-ass, but she wasn’t an asshole.

Bradley and y/n walked hand-in-hand back towards the Bronco, where he opened the passenger door for her and offered his hand to support her as she stepped up into the lifted vehicle. Once Bradley was sitting in the driver’s seat, he wordlessly handed y/n his phone so she could play music. Somehow, the nurse had talked him into setting up bluetooth of all things in his vintage Bronco. He was well aware that she had him whipped, but he wouldn’t have it any other way.

With one hand on the steering wheel and one hand resting on y/n’s thigh, Bradley pulled back onto the road and drove toward their shared house, the Hard Deck long forgotten. The windows were rolled down and soft tunes filled the night air.

“Hey Roos?” y/n spoke, intertwining her fingers with his.

“Yeah, baby?” Rooster hummed, briefly taking his eyes off the road to look at his fiancée.

“What’s a drive belt?”

a/n: fun fact: i learned how to check a car’s oil level when my friends and i were in bum fuck nowhere on a camping trip. pretty sure my dad was v stressed out when i called him and asked me to walk me through it but it definitely fed my ego.

#rooster x reader #bradley bradshaw x reader #top gun: maverick #bradley bradhsaw #nurse!reader #rooster x y/n #bradley bradshaw x y/n #a safe place to land

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smolwritingchick · 2 months

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The Bangtan Gal Chapter 89- Blood, Sweat & Tears

Chapter Summary: Jennie and Jimin fight over his extreme diet. BTS film BST with Jennie and Taehyung filming a sexy scene together. Jennie spends time with GOT7.

Words: 7,000+

Author's Note: A reader had messaged me years ago and sent me fanart of Jennie for Blood, Sweat & Tears back in 2018! This is by mimikoe_ on Instagram! If you see this, thank you again for your art! I appreciate you! This was so sweet of you. I hope they keep drawing! They are so talented!

This chapter gave me a bit of anxiety. I'm so sorry for the angst. At the time of editing this, I felt like I should have just deleted this argument between Jimin and Jennie but I decided to keep it and have my character mess up. Show more character development of her learning from her mistakes. Angst for this but it will end fluffy. This topic is such a serious matter so I felt a bit wary now that I'm older and looking back at what I wrote years ago. Again, I'm sorry if I made anyone uncomfortable with this. :( This one for the angst is regarding Jimin's diet for the BST era. After that, I did not write any more about the diet. This will be it.

------

The following day, at Big Hit’s building, the members got ready for their dance practice in the studio. Jennie went to the bathroom and once she was done she found Jimin finishing up getting a drink from the water fountain.

Once he turned around, he grinned. “Ready to go back?”

“Uh huh!” she smiled back.

She stared at his face longer than usual and couldn’t help but feel something off about him. His face looked even smaller which began to worry her.

“Yo, your face,” she placed a palm against his cheek to examine how small it had gotten.

His cheeks were gone and his jawline had gotten sharper. Something was not right.

“Did you eat at all today?” she exclaimed with concern. “Or even yesterday?”

Jimin’s stomach dropped at her questioning. He then pulled away from her and started to walk away. He could not face her. He could not bring himself to look at the hurt in her eyes. The concern in her eyes. He wished she would stop chasing after him like this to get a solid answer. All he wanted to do was be left alone to diet in peace. Jin already gave him an earful, asking him why is he going to this extent to lose weight but Jimin felt like this was the best thing to do. To look perfect for their next comeback.

“Jimin, you’re stressing me out!” her words took him away from his thoughts as she walked after him around Big Hit’s building. “What is the issue?”

“Can you please stop talking about this? I said I’m all right,” he snapped.

She chose to ignore the irritation in his voice and persisted in questioning him. Grabbing his hand to stop him, he turned around, displeased.

“Your face is so much smaller than usual! Are you not eating?!” she exclaimed.

Pulling her to him as she bumped into his chest, Jimin looked down at her. He was bothered by her interrogation.

“Can you stop being so loud?” he hissed in a hushed voice, glaring at her.

“Stop being so loud? This is the perfect volume to get what I’m saying through your head! Let’s be late to practice and go out to eat real quick. Okay? I’ll take the blame. I don’t mind being lectured for being late for both of us. It’s okay. Just come with me to eat, please! Noodles. Let’s get noodles! And pork, too! Lots of it! Or even chicken! My treat! I’ll pay!” she insisted, despairingly trying to get him to eat with her.

Jimin was conflicted. She was willing to get in trouble just so he could eat instead of dancing with an empty stomach. She did not mind going to practice late as long as he would get a meal in him.

He wanted to. He wanted to say yes. But he couldn’t. He felt like he needed to diet.

“I’m not hungry,” he responded with a frown and released her.

“Yes, you are! I’ve seen the way you’d clutch your stomach and heard your stomach growl a lot this morning! What you’re doing is making yourself sick! You cannot do this to your body! Your body is going to break down! You gotta listen to it! You gotta feed it! Not let it go so long without food! We’re performers. We need all the energy we can get. And then our comeback is so soon, come on, Jimin!”

Running his hands through his silver hair, he shouted sternly with a growl, “Enough, Jennie! Enough! Just shut up already! Stop bothering me about it and leave me the hell alone!”

The harsh sound of his voice made her flinch as her stomach dropped from his anger. It began to scare her. He never yelled at her like this. He never actually yelled at her at all. And soon she felt tears of frustration and anger beginning to form in her eyes. The 95 Liner clenched his jaw as his anger amplified. He felt angrier at himself for shouting as it started to get the attention of staff members. And soon after Namjoon was walking over to them, worried after hearing them from the practice room.

‘Ennie...I’m so sorry...’ he thought sadly.

Jimin didn’t mean to shout. He didn’t mean to get this riled up, especially towards his precious Ennie of all people. But he wanted her to back off and let him be. Why couldn’t she just let him do this in peace?

As his words registered in her brain, she started to feel vexation overcome her, “Don’t you ever tell me to shut up! I’m trying to help you!”

“Hey!” Namjoon butted in, getting in between them.

“I didn’t ask for it! Learn to stay out of everyone’s business!” Jimin shouted.

“What you’re doing is not necessary and it’s absurd!” she shouted back.

“You wouldn’t understand-“

“Understand what!?” her voice went higher. “Why are you doing this? Huh!? Is it because of what others think?! You don’t need to lose any weight whatsoever, so end this crap, right now!”

Jimin felt his body shake as he listened to her voice her opinion on the matter.

Grabbing him by his shoulders, she shouted as tears began to slowly go down her cheeks, “You are more than just abs! You are fine just the way you are, why can’t you see that!? People aren’t your real fans if they only see you for your body, Chim Chim! Please don’t do this to yourself, I don’t want to see you like this. It’s breaking my heart, Jimin, just stop it!”

Shrugging her off of him, Jimin found himself walking away before he ended up yelling more harshly. It was like talking to a wall. She just would not stop talking about it.

“Sometimes I wish you would just shut up and stop getting involved! Just let things happen, no one needs to hear your piece or what you think someone should do. If I want to do this, then let me do this. You are so annoying!” he angrily replied.

“Stop! We’re not doing this! Come on. Let’s get into the practice room. We do not need to be fighting, right now. This is not the time or place,” Namjoon warned them.

Jimin angrily stormed into the practice room and slammed the door shut. Jen let out a frustrated sigh. This was not supposed to be like this. Why did it have to be this way?

“Jennie...” Namjoon frowned and walked over to her to try to calm her down.

More tears flowed down her face as she paced around. Blowing air out of her mouth, she looked up, trying to calm herself down. She wiped her tears and took a moment to regroup before turning her attention to her leader.

“So, you’re just going to let him continue doing this? Let him go? Do you not see what’s going on? How serious this is!? How wrong this is!?”

“I do,” he responded calmly. “We tried to invite him to eat but he just wouldn’t eat with us and wanted to continue to diet...”

"I just want this to end," she shook her head and walked past him to go back to the dance studio.

As soon as Jimin stormed into the practice room, the rest of the members immediately wanted to know what happened. Everybody heard their shouting match and from the look of Jimin’s scowl, things were not getting resolved, anytime soon.

No matter how many times the boys asked him what was wrong and what happened between him and Jennie, Jimin remained silent and shook his head. After a while, Jennie strolled in with Namjoon. Her scowl matched Jimin’s and she too remained silent when she was asked about what happened.

“Is everything all right?” Mr. Son asked, noticing a dramatic shift in the atmosphere of the room.

Neither Jen nor Jimin answered, feeling quite defeated and bummed from their huge blowout. Namjoon had to answer for them by saying that things would be fine. Dance practice was awkward and it seemed like the group couldn’t get synchronized because Jimin and Jennie were thinking about their fight. Namjoon also couldn’t quite stay focused as he thought about their mentalities. And the curiosity of the rest of the group led to everything noticeably off about their movements.

Seeing problems in their dancing, Mr. Son told them to stop and questioned everybody. “What is going on? We film the music video in a week and the choreography is looking sloppy. Whatever happened between you two,” he glanced at Jimin and Jennie, “You must put that behind you and stay focused on this comeback,”

Easier said than done.

After practice, Jennie chose not to go straight back to the dorm and decided to drown herself in work. She began writing things she was feeling. Writing out her feelings made her feel somewhat better, but just being away from Jimin for as long as she could also helped. Everything about that argument bothered her. She wanted to stop thinking about it but it was nothing that she could do to get it out of her head.

Same with Jimin as he continued to tell the members to leave the situation alone and let him cope in peace at the dorm.

The following day, Jimin and Jennie completely ignored each other. No acknowledgment whatsoever. Not even a good morning. Jungkook and Taehyung noticed the tension and were saddened that half of the Maknae Line weren’t on good terms. The two tried to get them to at least speak to each other but to no avail. This lasted for a few days.

Having enough of the tension, Namjoon went to her studio to speak with Jen privately.

“I want to talk to you about what happened between you and Jimin,” he said, taking a seat on her couch.

Jennie rolled her eyes at his name. She didn’t want to think about him. The sight of him and the sound of his voice and name made her cringe as she thought back to their intense confrontation. She didn’t want to think about it and wished Namjoon would drop it. The situation made her uncomfortable and she wanted to avoid it.

Running a hand through his hair, Namjoon let out a sigh. “I get what you tried to do but I don’t think the way you went about it was the best action,” he softly criticized.

Before she could protest, he shook his head and she closed her mouth.

“Jennie, you were in the wrong this time. You can’t just blow up like that when someone is dealing with issues as serious as this. That wasn’t right and you should consider Jimin’s feelings and his mentality. I think it hurt him more the way you raised your voice at him. He’s struggling and we’re all trying to help but we cannot force him to eat. I think if you two spoke privately instead of where all the staff was, things would have gone better. It’s not that easy to try to get him to eat just because you want to see him eat. I understand your intentions but again, you can’t make him eat, Jennie. You can’t force him to do what you think he should do. He has to make that choice,”

Jennie looked down at her lap and frowned as she thought about his words. Her mind went back to her dispute with Jimin and she cringed at how she acted.

Wow...

She did not see that point of view and now she felt like shit. She felt like a shitty friend and she felt selfish.

Yes, he was right. She should have gone a different route instead of blowing up like that. How she acted was judgmental and she seemed to have been more critical of Jimin instead of showing compassion. It just hurt to see him like that and she wanted to try to do something. But it seemed like she most likely made the situation worse along with her poor choice of words.

Jimin was right. She should just stop butting into people’s business all the time. It seems like everything she does just gets worse. She wanted to help but what she had done was not the best route to go. She needed to apologize to him.

“You two need some space,” Namjoon advised. “But once you two cooled down a bit, it’s best you apologize. I don’t want to see you two fight,”

After a deep conversation with Namjoon, Jennie spent the rest of the day catching up with GOT7, who they were thrilled to see. Spending time with them, made her briefly forget about the struggles with Jimin and boosted her mood with their goofiness and positivity.

The group decided to go paintballing, which she thought was one of the best ways to let off some steam. They chose to split into teams of two.

“I choose Jennie!” Jackson announced.

“Too late, I called dibs already,” JB replied.

“Since when!?”

“Since this morning,”

“She likes me the best, so that makes me her partner,” Bam Bam announced.

Jen laughed at their banter as the group began bickering.

“Actually, she’s my partner. I asked her the day before,” Mark grinned victoriously.

“Yep. He did. Mark is my partner,” she admitted with a sheepish grin.

“What!? That is not fair!” Jackson complained.

“If I had known I would have asked her as soon as she yes to paintballing!” Jinyoung exclaimed.

The teams consisted of Youngjae & JB, Jackson & Jinyoung, and BamBam & Yugyeom.

As they prepared to get ready, Yugyeom and Jennie chatted.

“Ah, I wish Jungkook joined us. He would’ve loved this,” he said, thinking about his best friend.

“I know~. Today, he’s busy working on some choreography. I believe it’s for Begin. But don’t worry we’ll have plenty of more opportunities to hang out. Comeback season is always so busy. I’m happy I was able to get away from work for a little while to see you guys.”

“Yeah, me too. I can’t wait. I miss him. You two are doing well, right?”

“Yeah huh. Still going strong,”

“Good. He talks about you so much when he’s with me and the guys. Don’t tell him, I said that,” he teased, making her face heat up.

She giggled. “Even when he’s not here, he always makes me feel special,”

“He better be treating you, well. If not, I’ll fight him,” Bam Bam added in a teasing manner, making them laugh.

“Haha, thanks. Hey guys, how’s your upcoming comeback coming along?” she asked. “I’m anticipating Hard Carry,”

“Oh, you are going to love it! I hope we get some wins for it,” JB responded.

“Ooh, my excitement for it is building~,”

“How are the preparations for your comeback?” Youngjae asked her. “I still cannot believe you dyed your hair red. It’s a great color for you. You look beautiful,”

“Aw, you think so?” Jen beamed and touched her red hair. “Thank you. I was so nervous about getting it dyed. But I’m happy with the results,”

“Oh, heck yeah! I was like is that Jennie!? Wow~! So pretty!” Bam Bam added.

“Red suits you well, Jen,” Yugyeom stated.

“You guys are so sweet. As for our comeback, it’s going well. But uh, Jimin and I had a little falling out. So, I’m a little off my game and happy I’m here to get rid of some of that tension,”

“A falling out?” Jinyoung asked, surprised.

“What?! You and Jimin? I thought I would never see this. You two are always so close,” Jackson said in disbelief.

His words made Jen feel even shitter as she felt even more bad about what she had done.

“What happened?” Mark asked.

She then explained the whole situation to them. Every detail and how she had a talk with Namjoon and that she realized how wrong she was.

“Although it’s none of my business with what he does with his body, I couldn’t help but want to talk him out of whatever he’s doing because his face looked so skinny. Skinnier than usual. But all I did was make it worse. I’m hoping maybe after today I could get him alone and apologize,” she said with a sigh.

“Ah, I see. I still think you are a good person. We all make mistakes and sometimes go a little too far with our words and how we say them. Jimin cares a lot about you. I’m sure this falling out will not be the end of your friendship. It’ll take some time but you and Jimin will rekindle soon enough,” JB encouraged her.

The gang played five rounds of paintballing. The games were filled with chaos and laughter as Jennie and Mark kept getting hit since the other teams wanted them out quickly. Although Jen and Mark didn’t win, it was just nice to get away from the stress of comeback preparations and unwind with everyone.

After paintballing, Bam Bam insisted on taking photos as he stood close by Jennie and lifted his phone in the air for a group selfie with him, Mark, and YoungJae.

‘She’s here with us!! I’m happy to see you, Jennie! #GOT8 #JenBam’ he posted to a widely positive reception that she was still in touch with GOT7.

---------

Later in the evening, Jen checked her Instagram to see more new photos that GOT7 posted with her.

To the selfie of her and Bam Bam alone, Jackson commented, 'I see u forgot to include me!’

Laughing, she typed out, 'Bro, you knew we were taking photos lolll :P’

After some more commenting, she went to find Jimin in Big Hit’s building. Hearing music from the practice room, she made her way over to it and watched him dance to Lie. It appeared that he had to be practicing for hours. Exhaustion was clear on his face but he showed no sign of stopping.

When Jimin saw the door open, he did not look too pleased to see who had walked in.

“What do you want?” he asked in a flat tone.

“I’m probably the last person you want to see, right now. But I just wanted to apologize for yelling at you. I shouldn’t have done that. I shouldn’t have tried to pressure you to eat. That was wrong of me. I’m sorry,” she said with a frown.

Jimin looked down and remained silent, taking her words in.

“I hurt you a lot,” she went on softly, voice sounding brittle. “Perhaps it was the way I yelled at you. Or how I sounded judgmental instead of showing you compassion and support. I shouldn’t have yelled or tried to pressure you to do anything. And you probably don’t want to speak to me or whatever so okay. I’ll give you space and stay out of your way. I just wanted to apologize. And whenever you are ready to talk, I’ll be here,”

She took his silence as where he stood in the situation. As expected, she knew he wasn’t going to easily forgive her. He needed time and space.

“O-okay, I’ll be going, now. See you,” she made her way to the door.

Part of her hoped that he’d stop her and say that he forgave her but it didn’t work that way in this serious situation. He let her go. And it’ll take him some time to forgive her.

---------

As the week went by, it was finally the day BTS filmed Blood, Sweat & Tears. Each member of BTS was dressed and ready for filming as they were excited about the upcoming comeback.

“Eeeek! Today is the day~! I am so stoked! We are here for the first day of shooting Blood, Sweat & Tears! Look at me! I look so bomb!” she turned around, showing off her outfit.

“Ah, watch the shirt. It’s not buttoned all the way,” Jin popped in the shot and fixed her shirt for her. “There, much better. Jin to the rescue!”

She laughed. “Thank you,”

“Wings, the album for us,” Rapmon declared when the camera was filming him.

“It’s very elegant and luxurious,” J-Hope addressed as he showed off the background. “Look at the set,”

For the first day, the group did their first shots of dancing. Even just performing it once, made the members hot and out of breath. The staff provided fans and blowdryers blowing cool air to cool them down, which helped tremendously.

“This concept is more sexy than usual. So, I am going to try to be sexy for this music video. Keyword, try,” Jen added.

'That won’t be hard, Jennie!’

After the first takes of dancing, the camera showed shots of the members watching the film, to monitor anything they needed to work on.

Hobi and Jennie glanced at each other after they watched how she messed up.

"You saw too, right?" Hobi asked as she nodded.

“Yeah. I did that, too early,” she replied as she watched herself jump a few seconds before the rest of the group.

Once they filmed again, a sudden sound of shattered glass was heard and the director stopped the filming.

“The glass is broken!” was announced and it was none other than Rap Monster who was the reason behind it.

'God of destruction, Rap Monster’

“Jeez...” Jen exclaimed, looking at the broken glass.

“Rap Monster!” J-Hope told the camera.

When the camera was pointed at Rapmon who laughed about the ordeal, he exclaimed, “Bam!” as he thought about how he broke the glass. “I don’t know why always...I don’t know why I break things,”

'We want to know the reason, too’

After the shooting resumed, the next scene was set in a room where the members sat on the couch. For this scene, Jennie was not in the same room as them. Instead, for the beginning of the music video, she had an individual shot.

“Action!”

She ran lightly down the hallway until she found a door. On the other side of the door was another camera waiting. She pulled the doors open and looked surprised to see the seven boys sitting.

“Cut! Good job!”

“Ayeeee. First try!” she bounced around in excitement.

Although Jimin still wasn’t speaking to her, he couldn’t help but smile softly at her excitement. She was doing a good job of filming.

“Jennie makes the best facial expressions when she is filming. Good acting,” Jin grinned as he got his makeup retouched.

After her shot was done, she stood in the background as the boys sat on the couch and floor. Suga stood behind Jimin and covered his eyes.

“We are moving to the table. We have to change our hairstyle. Let’s go!” Jimin said.

The group changed into white clothes. Jennie wore white pants and a white blazer with her red hair styled in a high ponytail. The scene was set up like a dinner. Decorations of white, including the tablecloths and chairs.

“Are you ready to enjoy the dinner?” J-Hope asked Suga.

‘The eight noble members’

“Rap Monster, I can see your belly button. This concept matches you so well,” Suga said, making him chuckle.

Jennie sat across from Jin on the other side of the table. Jungkook, Rap Monster, and V sat on one side while J-Hope, Suga, and Jimin sat on the other side. J-Hope and Jungkook sat the closest to Jennie while V and Jimin sat the closest to Jin. Jin sat up from the table and lifted his cup in the air, while the rest of the boys followed his movements with blank stares. All they had to do was raise up their drinks but for the first shot, V couldn’t contain himself and laughed, which made the rest of the group laugh, too.

‘One more try due to V’s laughter’

On the second time, the members cheered successfully. With Jennie, instead of a blank expression, she looked hesitant as she raised her glass and then stared at it. Locking eyes with Jin, she shook her head and he began to stop himself from drinking the drink.

Little did they know V watched everything. He looked intrigued by her as he raised an eyebrow and smirked.

Suddenly, she slowly turned her glass to the side and watched it spill on the table, refusing to drink it. With the camera focusing on V, while the rest were occupied with their drinks, he watched Jennie with a sly smirk on his face. Sensing that something wasn’t right, she narrowed her eyes at him.

‘Finished the shooting without laughing this time’

With the rest leaving, only Jin, V, and Jennie were left. The director wanted Taennie to improvise the scene of having a staredown at the table. As the two were filmed with tension advancing between them, Jin was stuck in the middle, looking on while he was also back in his seat.

Jennie loved filming with Taehyung. It was just something about how at ease she felt when she was with him. He always found ways to enhance their scenes and he pushed her to be a better actress for Bangtan’s music videos.

As they stared at one another, she did not look too pleased to see how confident V looked regarding Jin. After they got their shots, V was good to leave while Jen and Jin were left.

"V and Jen have good chemistry. I felt like I was interrupting something when I was watching them. I wanted to say, should I leave?” Jin laughed.

When the song came on, Jennie lip-synced her verse as she sat in a chair, leaning back. She had her feet on the table and then did more shots looking sexy for the camera.

Being very close to EXO's Sehun since meeting the group, the two recently chatted about their comebacks. Sehun informed her he filmed shots of his feet on the table for Monster, so she wanted to do some sort of cool parallel with him and reenact his movements, hoping it would make it in the music video.

Once they got what they needed, Jennie and Jin were the last to leave as they bowed and thanked the staff.

“Day one complete! Time to go to sleep~!” she beamed.

‘Day 2’

Day two consisted of more individual shots for the group. Jen looked amazed at the set as the first set consisted of Suga and Jimin in the top room while Jungkook and Rapmon were in the bottom room. V even had to jump off a balcony as each member had different concepts. Jimin and Suga were the first ones to leave early as she waited for when it was her time to shoot.

After getting her hair and makeup done, she went to watch Jungkook film his shots on a swing that was hanging from the ceiling.

“I wish I was on the swing. That looks so fun,” she commented.

Jungkook had to do a tough wire scene, getting lifted in the air. His hair was covered in feathers which made her giggle. Once he was safely set down, he sat up, scrunching his face because of the feathers covering his face.

“Have a nice time up there?” she teased and removed the feathers from his head.

“It was alright. My back hurts but the scene was alright. I hated the feathers, though. Jennie, can you give me a massage when you get home from filming?”

When she responded, “Yeah, absolutely,” his eyes lit up.

Jennie's scene consisted of her in a garden and wearing a flower crown and tiara for the occasion.

“I’m in a garden~! Look at all these flowers,” she spun around. “Simple take. Explore around the garden, and look like the baddest chick in the game. I can do that,”

The camera followed her exploring the garden and looking beautiful in the environment. Jin was called in to join her and she filmed a few takes of being a good influence on him by taking walks together. She also placed a hand on his cheek and looked at him in concern, making sure he was all right with V lurking around them. After the rest of the members went home, Jennie and V were left with their scene together.

“For this, I’m the good girl. Or so I think. Let’s say I’m more of an angel while V is more like the bad guy. A fallen angel or a devil. I’m trying to be like the good side of Jin while he’s the bad side of Jin. Soooo, this is not going to end well. But I will prevail! I will win this battle and get Jin to the good side. So, in your face V! You are not winning today!” she punched the camera lightly.

When the camera transitioned to V, he chuckled, getting into character. “Ennie, Ennie, Ennie...she’s going to lose this battle. I’ll give her an A for effort but the dark side will win,”

“Lies!” Jen’s voice was heard across the room, making him laugh along with her.

“Action!” the director announced.

Jennie proceeded to walk down the hallway with V lurking from a distance. Feeling someone following her, she turned around but didn’t see anyone. But once she turned back around, V was in front of her, catching her by surprise. After they filmed the scene a few times, the director wanted their next scene to be sexy. The whole comeback had sensual vibes to it, especially with the choreography.

Lately, as Big Hit had been planning the comeback, they predicted that fans were going to give Taennie a lot of attention due to the fact of their scenes together for the music video. So, the company was highly considering making the pair act on that for promotions. Taehyung and Jennie didn’t mind it. They thought it was funny to troll fans into thinking they were dating or something for the comeback. Although there was a slight fear in the back of her mind of a hate train for her, in the end, she went with it and felt comfortable with her best friend.

Taehyung had been nothing but sweet to her about the idea. He even asked her about boundaries and what she was comfortable with so they could make this as believable as possible without making each other feel awkward. They thought that subtly was the way to go, with lingering gazes during music shows, and so on. They make a bold statement for the music video but then keep fans speculating with subtle displays of affection when on camera.

When they told Jungkook about it, he kept wishing it was him in the situation but for the music video and comeback in general, the director felt best for it to be Taehyung instead due to the role he was playing. He understood it and knew it was just acting between them.

Getting in position for their next scene, Jennie gave him a warning, “I ate smarties before this so my breath smells like smarties. I hope you like the smell of smarties when you lean in close,”

Taehyung giggled. “It’s okay!”

He began to get himself into character, looking at the ground while Jennie continued to look up at him, ready to begin acting.

“And...ACTION!” the director announced.

As soon as he heard the director say action, it was like a switch went off of V as he looked up and appeared lustful towards her and a little crazed.

With her back connecting to the wall with a harsh thud, Jen did not flinch when V lunged and slammed his hands on the wall, trapping her while staring sharply into her eyes. The sound of his hands slamming on the wall made a loud sound as they maintained eye contact. The song played in the background while they proceeded to act out their scene.

‘Taehyung and Jennie filming part of their sexy scene together. Strong eye contact!’

She stared at him, unamused, making sure not to give in to anything he was trying to offer. She then turned her head away, facing the camera when he inched closer with a wicked grin on his face. She felt his warm breath against her cheek before he began to move down to her neck as she appeared to have an ongoing battle with giving him her attention. Lust was clear in his eyes as he tried his best to tempt her.

While still staring at the camera with a sexy gaze, she began to lip sync.

How much longer before you consume me?

No matter how much I resist, I can’t fight what you’re doing

My mind is telling me to break free but my body screaming out

No, I can’t want you, get out of my head

As you kiss every inch of me you see that I want it too

Breath on my neck, I bit off more than I can chew

V placed his forearm over her head and she looked up at him. She shook her head and was about to look away again but this time he grabbed her chin with his other hand and made her look at him.

Their faces were extremely close as their lips were centimeters away from each other. As they both glanced at each other's lips, it was like he was luring her to kiss him, wondering when she’d crack as he slowly felt her losing resistance.

Reflecting on my choices, I’m wonderin’ if there’s any way out of this.

I’m losing this battle, I just can’t resist this

Only a matter of time before you screw me up and I’ll be stuck reminiscing

With that sinister smile on his lips, he stuck his tongue out and bit his bottom lip lightly. Pulling herself together and realizing how close she was to giving in, she shoved him back. Quickly, she walked away while he watched her go, satisfied.

“Great!” the director announced.

As soon as they heard him say that, Jennie and Taehyung burst out in laughter, unable to hold it in anymore. After she walked back to him, they bantered to each other at how funny this was for them to do this. This was War of Hormone but on a whole different level of mature sexiness.

Although they weren’t sure how much of this footage would be in the MV, the staff wanted them to improvise. For another take, Jennie stood on his shoes to make herself higher and placed a hand on the back of his shoulder while looking over his shoulder at the camera in front of her. With her free hand, she ran a hand through his blond hair. Then for another shot, she stood in front of him with him behind, holding her close while she lip synced.

When they went to see the footage with the director, they analyzed their movements and made sure everything was top notch. Taehyung laughed nervously when watching himself be so forceful with her.

“Ennie, I am so sorry,” he grinned nervously. “Did I hurt you?”

“No, no, I’m fine.” she smiled in reassurance and turned back to the video.

Her face felt flushed when watching herself act sensuous. It was still so weird to see herself like that. But she was proud of her efforts.

"This is...intense," she looked on. "Is this going to be appropriate for the music video rating? Oh gosh. And maybe it was a good idea to wait until the members left to film. Because oh my gosh, their reaction to this? We’re never going to hear the end of it. Maybe this can be a Bangtan Bomb if all of this doesn’t make it in the music video,”

“Ennie looks radiant in this. Wow, so beautiful,” Taehyung praised.

“Oh stop~. Look at you! ARMY is going to blush when they see you in this music video. A born visual he is,”

“Thanks, Ennie. We make a great team,” he pulled her in for a kiss on her temple.

“This was perfect!” the director praised after watching all of their footage. Their chemistry was impeccable, to say the least. “We don’t need to take another shot of this scene. We’re finished,”

“YAY~! We did it!” Taehyung cheered and joined Jennie in jumping around while holding hands in excitement.

‘Day 3’

The final day of filming started with Jin who was supposed to kiss the statue and Jen was in the background.

“Action!”

The camera followed Jennie quickly as she was dashing down the hallway. But she was suddenly grabbed from behind by V as she yelled, “Don’t! Snap out of it!“

That seemed to have made Jin pause as he looked back to see the two. But in the end, she helplessly watched Jin fall into temptation.

After the scene, all the members are together, acting like good friends. The scene was supposed to show them being free and mischievous. Jen strolled a little behind the boys, smiling at them while looking around. Her attention caught Jin staring at the painting called The Fall Of The Rebel Angels. There were two entrances on each side of him as he stood in the middle. A black entrance and a white entrance. One good and one bad. To resist or sin.

Jennie went up to him, standing in front of the white entrance. Gently grabbing onto one of his hands, he turned and looked down at her while she smiled, gesturing for him to follow her to the white entrance. But then V came over and stood on Jin’s other side, in front of the black entrance, which made Jin turn his attention to him. V smirked at the both of them while Jennie slowly dropped her smile, fearing for the worst.

After the members ran through the door and Jin was left behind, Suga was supposed to cover Jin’s eyes and after a few takes it looked funny due to his height, so Jin suggested switching partners. V replaced him to cover Jin’s eyes instead and it worked perfectly. Then for their final filming session, they were filmed performing the choreography.

When the director said cut, Jen turned around to see Jimin looking exhausted as he leaned forward, putting his hands on his knees. Jin went over to him and placed a hand on his back, looking concerned.

'Gosh, I hope he’s all right,’ she thought as she chose to keep her word by leaving him alone.

After the group performed the dance one last time, the director announced they were done and BTS celebrated with cheers and ran around, proud of their hard work.

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

A few days later, Bangtan was filmed doing a dance practice for BST so it could be posted as a Bangtan Bomb. Jen found herself getting more and more frustrated and concerned for Jimin’s well being but chose to stay out of it to avoid another argument. She wanted to respect his space and wishes but it was eating her inside to see him look light headed every time he moved.

She wasn’t sure if it was people on social media who made fun of his weight or something but whatever it was, it made her upset to see her friend like this.

She was distracted. Her conversation with Namjoon went through her head and she found herself glancing over at Jimin from time to time. He wasn’t himself. She noticed how he would stumble sometimes and hold his head. She feared something bad was about to happen.

With Jimin, he was feeling dizzy due to the lack of energy and food. His lightheadedness was getting stronger as the song progressed. After jumping around during the dance, Jimin felt himself falling back, and losing consciousness.

By instinct, Jennie ran up behind him to catch him. She fell hard on her butt, wincing at the impact. But all that mattered was that Jimin was OK in her arms. She could deal with some pain.

“Jimin!” she shouted with fear in her voice as the members rushed to him.

"What happened!? Is he all right?! Jimin!” loud commotion surrounded them as they tried to help him.

Everyone freaked out when he passed out and staff tended to him until he regained consciousness. Jen stood out of the way after the staff took over. Jimin kept reassuring everyone that he was fine and could keep going but dance practice was canceled for the rest of the day and he was told to rest.

At the dorm, Jimin went to rest like he was told and ate a little. Jen was happy to see him trying to put something in his stomach after passing out as well as continuing to drink water.

“That was scary, Jimin. You sure you’re all right?” Taehyung asked with concern as he sat on his bed with Jungkook. “I’m glad Jennie caught you before you hit your head on the floor. That would have been even scarier,”

The new information he was told sparked Jimin’s interest as he looked astonished that it was her. He did feel something soft before he lost consciousness.

“She caught me?”

“Yeah, it was like she zoomed right behind you before you connected to the floor,” Jungkook added. “Like she knew something was wrong. I know you have your reasons for doing this but please be careful with the diet. We’re all here for you, you know that,”

Jimin nodded. He was grateful for Jennie catching him. He seriously could have given himself a concussion since he fell so abruptly. He found himself wanting to see her. But then he remembered that she wanted to give him space and was going to wait until he was ready to forgive her. To tell the truth, he had forgiven her as soon as she apologized. But he chose to let her go and see how long she was going to give him space. She did a great job letting him be, and respecting his wishes. He asked himself how long he was going to continue to ignore her.

But in the end, he missed his friend.

He missed his Ennie.

He knew she was trying her best to be a better friend and not lash out like she did. To show more compassion in his struggles instead.

Later that evening, Jen went to peep into Jimin’s room to find him sleeping while Taehyung and Jungkook were still with him. The way she stuck her head in the room hesitantly was noticed by the two boys as they waved and smiled.

She sighed, worrying about Jimin’s well being as she walked in the room. In a hushed voice, not wanting to wake him, she asked, “How is he?”

“Doing good,” Taehyung responded while Jimin listened in, with his eyes still closed.

The sound of her voice made it hard to resist smiling but Jimin kept a neutral face. It was good to hear her ask about him although she still wanted to give him space.

“He ate quite a bit too,” Jungkook added.

“Great. As long as he’s ok. He scared the shit out of me, man...” she said, thinking about how he passed out.

“He gave us all quite a scare. I’m glad you were there to catch him, Jagi,”

“Yeah, you were so fast,” Tae pointed out.

“I dunno what came over me but something told me to keep an eye on him during practice. Well, I just wanted to know how he was doing. I’ll see you guys in the morning. Good night,” she turned to leave.

“You’re leaving already?” she heard Jimin say as he opened his eyes.

Turning back around, she answered in surprise, “Oh, I thought you were asleep. I just wanted to check on you and give you your space,”

“Can I have a moment alone with her?” he requested as he sat up.

“Sure. We’ll be gaming,” Jungkook answered and left the room with Taehyung.

Once they were left alone, Jimin spoke softly. “Thank you,”

“For what?” she looked at him in confusion.

“For catching me when I passed out. Thank you,”

“Always,” she nodded a few times.

“You can come closer, Ennie. I don’t bite,” he chuckled softly and gestured for her to come over to the bed.

The sound of her nickname made her stomach flip as a small smile came across her face. She did what she was told and sat on his bed.

“...how are you feeling?” she asked softly.

“I’m feeling better,” he responded truthfully. “I felt good after eating something,”

“I'm glad to hear you say that,”

Jen was surprised when he reached out to hold one of her hands.

“I’ve been thinking about our friendship since you apologized,”

“Me too,”

“What you did that day really hurt me,”

She nodded. “I know...and I’m truly sorry,”

“I know you are. I see that you are. Over the days, I’ve been missing you and our friendship. Things aren’t how they are anymore and it makes me feel weird. I want things to go back to how they used to be with us,”

“Me too. You’re important to me,”

“You’re important to me,” he squeezed her hand lightly. “And I want us to treasure each other, move forward, and understand each other’s boundaries. I want us to be there for each other and support each other. When things get tough, I want us to talk it out privately without yelling or screaming. I know all friendships aren’t perfect and we’ll argue once in a while but let’s try to work on not yelling at one another like we did,”

“Yeah. I’ll do better and be a better friend to you. Again, I’m so sorry, Jimin,” she said as tears began to fall from her eyes.

"I'm sorry, too,"

He leaned in to kiss her on the forehead and then pressed his forehead against hers, closing his eyes. He felt a huge weight lifted off his shoulders. Less stressed about everything as he expressed himself to her. His eyes had gotten glossy as he pulled away to look at her.

With a smile, he reached out to wipe her tears with his thumb and then pulled her in for a close hug. A hug that was long overdue as they both felt relieved to hug each other again.

“It’s okay...” he murmured and placed a hand on the back of her head. “I’ll be okay...and we’ll be okay...”

They stayed like that for a while, enjoying each other’s company. It felt good to be forgiven and to move forward. Jimin was right, things were going to be okay.

After pulling away, he asked, “Can you stay?”

“Yeah, of course, I can,”

He let her in under the covers with him and they cuddled, before slowly drifting to sleep.

#bts 8th member #jungkook x oc #bangtan boys #bts #bts additional member #the bangtan gal #bts fanfic #bts fluff #bts scenarios #bts imagines #bts eighth member #bts female oc #bts female addition #bts female member #bts black oc #jungkook fanfic

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mcflymemes · 1 year

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MURDER, SHE WROTE PROMPTS * assorted dialogue from the television show

suppose you tell me what happened here last night.

i'm looking for motive.

back home, we have a saying. flowers that bloom too quickly are fair game for a late frost.

i don't want to alarm you, but something very sinister is going on here.

all right. we come to an understanding, or one of us doesn't leave here alive.

there are three things you can never have enough of in life: chocolate, friends, and the theatre.

a good guest is like halley's comet. seen and enjoyed seldom and briefly.

you can never nudge the moral compass far from its true north without losing something vital.

i've gotta talk to you.

half the country had reason to kill him.

they do say a new experience broadens the mind.

it's a job requirement.

lie down, dear. lie down. it's a dream, that's all.

that is a marvelously interesting recipe.

send me a copy of the book when it's finished?

you always do, don't you?

you must do quite well.

it's hard to know yourself.

were we ever that innocent?

uh, there's just one slight problem.

there will be two house seats waiting for you the next time you're in town.

in our business... you never know.

i was bored out of my mind.

you are trouble.

now you wait right here.

would you do me the honor of dining with me this evening?

time for you to get back to work.

out for some early morning air?

it's hard to know yourself, let alone another person.

not funny, friend.

funny thing about having your name in lights. when the power fails, you learn a lot about yourself and your "friends."

three more paragraphs and i can go to bed.

the party tonight? we're coming as our favorite fictional character.

i doubt that any of us despised him enough to kill him.

that's what you're all thinking, isn't it?

what's wrong with this phone?

who ever heard of framing someone with the wrong gun?

at least... i don't think i did.

well, how about a toast for later?

how soon can you get down here?

i don't know. i haven't made up my mind yet.

is that you?

look, it's an interesting puzzle. i'll give it a try.

i've got the name of a very good lawyer.

they've told me absolutely nothing about you.

i'm so sorry. i should have told you.

you haven't got a thing to wear.

you have my word on it.

i do believe you're offering me a job.

don't you go to the movies?

you've been seeing too many stephen king movies.

rudeness does not become you.

people do seem to enjoy it.

just as i suspected. when under stress, the english always head for the teapot.

i'm not used to being refused.

i haven't read any of them.

permit me the pleasure of educating you.

television is your business, not mine.

i don't usually give advice, but in this case, i say... go for it.

you must be a real book lover!

how good of you to come.

is there anything else you need?

they asked if maybe you wouldn't mind bending the truth just a little.

yeah, that's nice... but no thanks.

hey, isn't that something.

that isn't what i meant at all.

there's not much to tell.

now i may be wrong... but frankly, i doubt it.

we didn't have much in common.

i'm sorry honey, but we're just dying in here.

help is on the way!

i can be very persuasive.

how about a pair of pants?

i sure know how to pick 'em, don't i?

how could i refuse?

why don't you take some advice?

i haven't eaten a thing since breakfast.

slander can be an expensive indulgence.

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cordidy · 1 month

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Just a little OS i wrote based on the "Lucky Charms" theme for a discord server i'm on :) I don't like to use "MC" or "YN" so the character is named Deirdre and she is not the HL Mc, just a normal Hogwarts student.

TW : none, it's just cuteness

"What are you doing?" Deirdre jumped, surprised. She had been so focused on her search she had not heard Sebastian join her. The sun was setting, she did not have a lot of time left. "Searching for something," she answered, still focused on her task. It was like looking for a needle in a haystack but she had to find it. Sebastian came closer and started looking. He had no idea what he was looking for, but still. "And what are we searching for exactly?" He curiously asked. "A clover," Deirdre simply answered, getting on her knees to take a better look at the grass. Sebastian raised a suspicious eyebrow. "You are looking for a clover?" "Yep." "And you're having trouble finding one?" "Uh-huh" "In a...clover field?" Sebastian was known for being quite bright and quick but he had to admit, he was kind of lost right now. Deirdre got up, dusting her skirt before going to another patch of grass. "It's not just any clover, I need a 4-leaf one," she explained, and she had spent her last afternoon in Hogwarts looking for one, to no avail. "What do you need a 4-leaf clover for?" The young man asked, now intrigued. "Because it brings luck !" She answered him, almost annoyed he would ask such an obvious question.

The Slytherin looked at her, surprised. "Wait, are you trying to tell me that...grass can bring you luck?" In all the books he had read over the years, he had never heard something like that, even in the dustiest volumes of the Restricted Section. "Oh wait, is this one of your "Mugglery" again?" He added. It would make sense that Muggles and Wizards would have some differences in folklore, after all. Deirdre looked at him, confused. "Wait, you wizards don't believe in lucky charms?" She was back on her knees, searching. "Of course we do," the Slytherin answered, trying to not look at his friend's skirt moving with the wind, showing her calves. Over the 7 years they had known each other, he had seen how pretty she had become, coming from a small girl to a pretty young woman with long red hairs and freckles almost matching his. Of course he did not imagine himself courting his best friend, ever, especially now that they had graduated yet, he… remained a man...with eyes…and she was really pretty after all… "Unicorn hair for safe travel, golden foot mushrooms to bring wealth, these kinds of things” he recited to try and focus his mind on something else that wasn’t Deirdre crawling on all four. “But I did not know Muggles were into weed," he said with a little chuckle to tease her. "What do you even need luck for? The exams are over and you graduated with flying colors!" "I....I have a very important appointment tomorrow and I...I'll feel better with it that's all" she tried to brush it off in a casual tone. An important appointment? She had not told him anything about that and they shared...everything... "Wait, does it have something to do with you asking to stay at my place tonight ?" After the passing of his uncle and his sister a year later, Sebastian had inherited both Solomon's small home and his late parent's house in Hogsmeade.While he had started renting his uncle's house for some extra cash, he had planned to live in the family home although the thought of going back there on his own was painful. So, of course, when Deirdre asked if she could spend a couple of days with him, he had accepted right away, not even wondering about the reasons. In his mind, she just...did not have anywhere to go now that her parents had made it clear she was not welcome anymore since she was an adult and a witch. On the other hand, while the house was just a 2 bedroom place, Sebastian had plenty of room to share. "What big appointment?" He asked, looking at her a bit worriedly. It must have been quite something for her to keep it secret. "No....nothing important," she lied. He stopped searching for a clover and looked at her seriously. "Come on Deirdre, it's either an important appointment or nothing, can't be both" The young woman sighed before facing him, clearly uncomfortable. "I....I have a job...well, rather an apprenticeship interview" she said, looking away. "Really? Where?" The young man asked, now curious and rather excited. It was in Hogsmeade for sure, or at least in the region, which would explain the need for accommodation but there were several possibilities. "...der..." she muttered. "What?" "Ollivander!" She said louder, turning red as a tomato. Sebastian looked at her for a moment, clearly flabbergasted. "You're...Merlin, you're serious?!" "Yes..." Deirdre answered shyly before being smashed into a bear hug.

For the past 2 years Sebastian had played as a Beater in the Slytherin Quidditch team and had some issues realizing how strong he had become thanks to the hours of training. "Deirdre this....this is fucking awesome! Mr Ollivander never takes an apprentice and he chose you?! When?! How?!" "Not...not yet!" The young woman said, trying to wiggle her way out of her friend's embrace in vain. He was strong, but also quite heavy. “Re…remember when we had to bring your wand there to fix it?” “After Ominis sliced it in half…yeah…” it was still a hot topic, even two years after. “Well Mr Ollivander said…the wands in the shop…liked me?” Sebastian looked at her, puzzled. It was well known most wands had a mind of their own but…preferences? Feelings? That was new. “Like they wanted to see me around more often so…he offered a potential position to start as a baby wand maker” "So this is why you want your lucky grass? To pass the interview? You don't need that, you're a brilliant witch! The old Ollivander would be crazy not to train you!" Deirdre sighed. She knew she was a good student but this...this was a once in a lifetime chance. "I....I can't fail that interview, Seb. It's...it's my best opportunity so far...'' She looked desperate and ready to burst into tears from the pressure she was putting on her own shoulders. Sebastian took her hand, patting it gently."Sweetheart, you don't need a magic dandelion..." "Clover." "Clover to get that position." He got up, still holding her hand to help her up. "Look, how about we go to my home and you settle down and get your things ready for the interview while I prepare us a good dinner?" He suggested "Seb, no. You have quite the big day tomorrow, you need rest!" “Come on, it's just orientation day at St Mungos. They'll have us visit the place, give us some generic books to read before the classes start in September, nothing fancy” he said, pushing her gently back towards Hogsmeade by her shoulder "You, on the other hand, need calm, rest, and a good evening with an even better company to relax for your ‘not so big appointment’," he added with a smile. "Spending your night out looking for grass won't help, let me just take care of you tonight" Reluctantly, she followed him. As promised, the evening was exquisite, just like the food. She felt really relaxed after spending the evening talking about how she was planning on researching muggle's folklore to see if she might come up with new applications for wand crafting. “No wonder…how did you say it again? The wands like you? They’re probably into weed too,” he teased her as they were doing the dishes, earning a pinch in the stomach before Deirdre kissed Sebastian's cheek on her way to Anne's old room for a good night of sleep. When she woke up the next morning, Sebastian was already gone to Saint Mungo's but he had left her breakfast and a note on the kitchen table. You got this! Don't forget your lucky weed. See you tonight - S Deirdre let out a small chuckle when she saw, right next to his signature, a small 4-leaf clover

#harry potter #hogwarts #hogwarts legacy #hogwarts legacy game #sebastian sallow #slytherin boys #hogwarts legacy sebastian #hogwarts legacy fanfic #hogwarts legacy mc

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coolgreatwebsite · 5 months

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Happy 1 Million Views to the Video That Broke Me

This is a repost of something I wrote over on my Cohost, but I figured a year later it should also probably live on the domain I pay money to have. Better late than never!

This is the most successful piece of content I have ever created. At one million views it is the thing I've made that people have seen the most. It is the thing that the most people have seen my name attached to. And it's total trash.

It's 2017 and we're a week or so out from the release of Sonic Mania, a game that I'm, at that point, pretty damn excited for. A kindly poster from the Something Awful forums (that I have known from many forums previous) poses a challenge: be the first to beat his short kaizo Sonic the Hedgehog 2 ROM hack and he'll gift you a copy of Sonic Mania on Steam when it comes out.

I was already getting the game on PS4 but I figured whatever, everyone else seems to be having trouble with it, I'm bored, I got nothing better to do, I'll give it a shot. I load up KEGA Fusion, start a low bitrate and resolution OBS recording because it'll probably take a few hours and who cares it's a forum contest verification video, and get to work. A hour and half-ish goes by and I'm finished with the hack. I upload the video to YouTube, post it in the thread, win my free copy of Sonic Mania, and that's the end of the story. Thanks for reading.

youtube

Except of course it's not the end of the story. A few months after I got done thoroughly enjoying Sonic Mania, I realized that I'd been getting a weird amount of new subscriber emails from YouTube. I decided to actually look at my metrics and noticed a uh, highly localized spike of activity. Give you one guess on which video (hint: it's the one this post is about). "The Algorithm" had suddenly taken it and was running away with it at lightning speed.

In the timespan between posting the video and this spike, YouTube had announced they were drastically raising the bar on the metrics you needed to hit to have your channel monetized. I was by no means a large YouTuber at the time, but I was meeting the old requirements for monetization just fine. I wasn't anywhere near meeting the new requirements until now and this video was blowing the hell up for whatever reason, so I decided to do what any good opportunist would do and made it an unwatchable experience.

I set the ad frequency on that thing to the maximum that it'd let me. I forget exactly how frequent that was but it was something absurd like an ad every 5 minutes. Maybe even more than that. I figured I'd either get rich or maybe it would make people stop watching and leaving the worst comments in the world. Seriously the comments on this thing are their own nightmare, a bizarre soup of people ascribing meaning to nothing, trying to suss out emotions where there are none, saying complete gibberish, I'd need an entire second post to unpack whatever the hell is going on there.

Well, I wouldn't quite say I got rich. The money you get off what most people would conventionally call a popular YouTube video is just not much in the grand scheme of things. But holy shit they didn't stop watching. If anything they were watching more. Why didn't they stop watching? This video was less than nothing. It was an ordeal to watch all the way through. Why were they doing this? Why was the algorithm showing this to everyone? Why this and not one of the things I put effort into or something that was at least meant to be entertaining at all? I didn't have the answers and I still don't.

Before this I personally wasn't lamenting the possibility of losing monetization on my channel as up until this point I had made around $40 total on YouTube in the decade or so I'd had a channel. But I had been spending a lot that time watching friends with channels around the size of mine who were actively hustling to, and unfortunately failing to, meet the new hurdle. They were putting out some really good shit. Way better than my stuff, frankly. And here I was getting launched to the finish line by... a throwaway, blurry, hour and a half long, commentary-free, save state abusing playthrough of a crummy Sonic ROM hack? That I had made as a means to a completely separate end?? That got promoted by a computer program for seemingly no reason???

It felt shitty. One of the friends I mentioned in that last paragraph was my longtime friend Fotts who was in the middle of getting their (sadly now dormant) series TAS Force off the ground. They were constantly tweeting about the ordeal of trying to meet the new monetization requirements and it was a damn shame because they were putting in a ton of effort and it was great. The kind of thing I'd watch even if I wasn't friends with anyone on it. It was a million times funnier than anything I was doing, and the complete opposite of my shitty contest video. If there was any justice in this world the views I was getting on this dumpster fire would be going to them. But as it turns out, there is no justice online.

I recalled a conversation I had with them a few years back while they, I, and a group of about 7 or so other friends were all wandering around an Orlando Wal-Mart wearing identical black t-shirts that read "MARVEL CAN SUCK MY COCK" in big block letters (long story). They had actually kind of gone through this sort of thing before. See, they're the uploader and one of the voices of this video you may or may not have seen with 6.5+ million views on it.

youtube

They lamented to me many of the laments I was currently lamenting. "This was just a stupid throwaway thing", "why is this so much more popular than the stuff I put effort into", "it's just me making PaRappa the Rapper say the word 'Chinese' over and over". Ok maybe that last one was a bit more specific to them. Anyway, I responded with (and I admit a lot of the reason I felt this way was because I thought and still think the video is funny) something along the lines of "you can't pick what hits for people, it might have been throwaway but at the end of the day you posted it because you thought it was at least a little bit funny, try and focus on the fact that you have a popular video at all rather than the fact it's not one of the videos you're particularly proud of".

But yeah damn turns out that advice is easier said than done when it happens to you, and it's even harder done when it happens to a factually not entertaining video. One you could have uploaded as unlisted and achieved your intended result with. The runaway success of this thing genuinely broke me on this whole "Internet" deal.

I should stress I mean this in a good way. I realized that it's not so much that you can't pick what hits for people, it's that you physically cannot pick what gets put in front of people. The people cannot pick what hits for them. A computer does. You can try and promote and affect what gets seen in your own small sphere of influence, but ultimately we are, on YouTube and on all of our social platforms, at the mercy of a black box of computer programs that I'm not even sure the people who created them understand anymore. I'd obviously known this on some level prior to this video existing, but bearing witness to it all happening firsthand to this video in particular was another thing entirely. Anything prior that I had achieved marginally similar success with (there were a couple that had broken 100k) was meant to be entertaining. It was meant for people to watch and go "I liked that", not for one guy on a forum to see and go "good work solving my maze Superman". I could classify the success as "neat, people liked that one" in my brain. This defied classification.

The only logical conclusion was that it truly didn't matter what I uploaded. It's all decided by a random machine picking things at random to serve random amounts of people, and the people click on it and watch it simply because it is there. You can poke at the machine, prod at the machine, try to guess what the machine likes, try to iterate on something the machine has previously demonstrated that it likes. It's all an effort to get the machine to put it in front of the people who will click it because it is there. That's what all the bigger capital-C Content Creators do. From the high level stuff of "what kind of things do I upload" to the low level minutia of "how many curse words can I say in the first minute", making it Big On Line in any capacity is about trying to appease an unknowable mechanical entity and nothing else. It's either that or you're "old money" in a sense, established before this all became the case.

And again, the bigger names do this. Entire companies do this. If I were "smart" I would have pivoted my entire YouTube channel to nothing but hour and a half long commentary-free bullshit hard ROM hack playthroughs. Maybe another one would hit like this did. But for the life of me I could not and cannot think of anything more soul crushing.

I wouldn't say I had aspirations to be a Big Time YouTube Man, but at that time I would have maybe liked to be a Moderate Size YouTube Man. Or a moderate size Twitch man. Someone who had people watching but was still able to have fun with it and do his own thing. This newfound realization that it was truly a random lottery, even beyond the random lottery that most of human life is, that becoming any size bigger than Small Time was literally decided by an actual factual random number generator, freed me from the desire to do anything that I didn't want to do. If actively chasing success on these modern, algorithmically-driven platforms, actively going after "Kaizo Sonic 2 Full Run" numbers, meant putting aside the things I like and reinventing myself and the things I do down to the minute details in order to appease a literal ghost beyond anyone's understanding or control that changes what it's looking for on a whim, then I did not want to do that. I did not want to keep a timer for when I could talk normal, I did not want to announce my streams on Twitter with the link in a separate reply one day, in an embedded image the next, and in my display name the next. If there is absolutely one thing I do not want to do in my life, it's dance for a robot.

But the most freeing thing about realizing this is that it also meant if I just kept doing stuff I liked, maybe, someday, I could get lucky enough to where the unknowable internet robot would push that in front of a million or so people. In the grand scheme of things it's about an equal chance of that happening on something I like and am proud of versus something I made in a desperate cloying attempt to placate an algorithm.

Anyway damn this got long and rambly sorry about that lol. This was initially meant to just be a little toast to the 5 year-ish anniversary of me fully becoming an Internet nihilist. Remember folks, it's meaningless to chase success in an algorithm dominated landscape. In the words of a certain extremely Normal-type man, "real life isn't all just being true to yourself", but I reject the notion that the Internet is not or should not be, in spite of the legion of ghouls and freaks at the top of the chain actively trying to make that the case every day.

Be true to yourself. Do what you love, make what you love, post what you love, and maybe if you're lucky a computer somewhere will decide it's your turn, because that's the single deciding factor in all of this. In the mean time, you'll end up slowly and naturally surrounding yourself with cool people who get you, if only a little bit. At least that's what's happened for me so far. I've been pretty alright with it.

#article

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mieux-de-se-taire · 3 months

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To the End - MCR Interviews

89.5 WSOU Radio Interview - 6/7/04

6:12-6:41

youtube

Gerard: Let's do track 3 "To the End." Interviewer: Track 3 "To the End" Gerard: Yeah, I'm psyched, this one's like very cinematic, kinda tells a story 'bout marriage and a lot of weird stuff that I had never lyrically written about before, so I'm kinda psyched on that one. Interviewer: So where was the inspiration for this from? Gerard: (Either forgetting or unwilling to admit that it's based on the short story "A Rose for Emily" by William Faulkner) Um, no idea. It just-- yeah, LA. It just kinda came out. When we wrote the music, it was just like-- it had this really great like dance feel, which we had never tried ever, and I was just like, "This is so funny, let's put some really messed up lyrics to it."

Trouble Bunch Music Interview - Aug 2004

Paragraph 12

Interviewer: In 'To The End', why does the elevator only go up to ten and would you feel okay getting off on the thirteen floor? Gerard: Well, I felt that picking a lower number would be like 'I can't get high enough' so I had to pick somewhere around ten. I felt like I just needed to get higher; like the top just isn't good enough. I think that's kind of a metaphor in how we feel and how we operate as a band, that the top isn't good enough since that's not what we're after. It's not good enough for us because we want to make a difference and actually change things. We don't just want things thrown at us. But I've gotten off on thirteenth floors. They make them right?

Kerrang Interview - Aug 2005

Page 3

Gerard: Without Blur we never would have had songs like 'You Know What They Do To Guys Like Us In Prison'. I saw 300 people start crying when they played 'To The End', which is a song title I ripped off of them.

MCR Forum Interview - 10/30/10

Paragraph 4

Ray: Planetary (GO), which has a different energy, but it's something that we've always tried to write, but we never did one hundred percent. If you look at a song like "Vampires Will Never Hurt You," it has a little bit of that. It doesn't have the electronics in it, but it easily could. And "To The End" on Revenge has that kind of like disco *drums on leg* 16th note hi-hat thing in the verses.

Grammy Museum Interview - 1/26/11

7:19-7:34

youtube

Mikey: On each of our albums we'd always come like a centimeter closer to writing a full on dance song. And even back to like "Vampires Will Never Hurt You," it's kind of-- Ray: Yeah, it has that vibe for sure. Mikey: --good dance to it. And then, um, "Sharpest Lives," uh, (quietly, not into the mic, holding up 3 fingers) what was the other one? Ray: "To the End" Mikey: "To the End," yeah.

Two Minutes to Late Night Interview - 8/15/22

8:05-8:54, 46:42-46:54

youtube

Gwarsenio Hall (Interviewer): Like "To the End" Frank: Oh yeah Gwarsenio: "To the End" are, like-- "To the End" and-- Frank: I'm pulling up the track listing by the way Gwarsenio: "To the End" and, uh-- I'm so sorry-- song number 2 on the record, start-- they both have these like-- Frank: Oh, "Give 'Em Hell Kid" ... Gwarsenio: Like, I listened to it, and I was like-- there's like The Stooges and Queens of the Stone Age shit on this. Even in "To the End," the little (vocalizing) "do do do do." I'm like, "This is a Josh Homme riff right here." Frank: (laughs) Which is funny because I don't feel like anybody was listening to Queens at that point. I don't know, was-- when did Songs for the Deaf come out? Gwarsenio: '03, probably, so you guys might have been-- Frank: Oh really? Alright, so maybe right around there then.

Gwarsenio: What song do you think would make like a fun, like, drag queen lipsync? Frank: I'm thinking-- I think the danciest song is "To the End," right? It has the most vibe to it, so maybe "To the End."

#mcr #my chemical romance #three cheers for sweet revenge #revenge #to the end #interviews #song interviews

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salaapaoo · 6 months

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it's been a while since i've been on here!! I've been p busy w school >< but i got tagged !! by @fanfiction-artist-prototype for 20 questions!! 1. how many works do you have on ao3? I have 16! but a bunch of wips hidden in my docs hehe 2. what's your total ao3 word count?

144,014!! I feel proud bc it's been,,, almost a year since i started?? I haven't really had time to write lately though :<

3. what fandoms do you write for? hmm... only lcf so far, but i wanted to write for sss class revival hunter !! but i need to catch up and brain rot harder!!!

4. what are your top 5 fics by kudos?

young master, you dumb bitch

puppy teeth

in the comfort of death

death's little reaper

teeny tiny trouble

5. do you respond to comments? why/why not?

I usually do!! I feel kind of bad tho bc I see comments and then tell myself that i'd just respond later, but then forget.... hhh i will respond to them eventually ;;

6. what's the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

hm.. there's only a few that are done... so i guess i'll say what i think will have the angstiest once i'm done?? I think it might be between mr forgettable, witcher's calamity, or comfort of death???

7. what's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

uhm.... i feel like a lot of mine don't really have happy endings??? hhh

8. do you get hate on fics?

no ! i'm really happy with that! i feel like the fandom is really nice tho heh

9. do you write smut? if so, what kind? :] yes,,, uh theres.. some out there

10. do you write crossovers? what's the craziest one?

i don't write crossovers hhh mostly because i would worry about trying to keep even more charas in character ;; brain too rotten w lcf

11. have you ever had a fic stolen?

not that i know of ??

12. have you ever had a fic translated?

yeah! i had one translated into russian!! that reminds me,, i should probably add a link to that to the summary or smth ghksjhg

13. have you ever co-written a fic?

hmmm officially on ao3, no, but i would consider a lot of my fics cowritten w my friends because would end up brainrotting together so hard that it would end up mostly written!! so if i end up writing it, i usually end up dedicating it to them or smth

14. what's your all time fave ship?

hmmm,,, im not too picky??? i usually like eating them all

15. whats a wip you want to finish but doubt you will?

hmm... im a bit worried about finishing comfort of death ?? i want to finish them all!! but for comfort of death i'm a bit worried because i know how i want it to end but the in between hhhh uughgggh having to connect it ughghghg we're still far out!!

16. what are your writing strengths?

my friend said that my writing felt nostalgic and like heheh that makes me feel proud!! smth abt how i desc scenes, so i think that's a thing i'm really proud of !!

17. writing weaknesses?

i think the fact that i don't like rereading is a big weakness because i'll read it again after a long ass time and then see so many errors!! I think i have a lot of run on sentences, too!!

18. thoughts on writing dialogue in another language? i don't think i'm too confident on writing dialogue in another language!! I would probably just put it in italics and say its being done hhh or if i do, then i'd want it checked by someone who speaks it

19. first fandom you wrote for?

lcf!

20. fav fic you've ever written?

mmmm that's hard... but i think i'm really attached to like, teeny tiny trouble or maybe witcher's calamity? theres a few hidden ones that i'm actually really attached to !! i hope to have more time to write soon!!

tagging

@vveirdnobdy uuh,,, idk who to tag??? whoever wants to join?

#ask game #20 questions

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dapper-nahrwhale · 2 years

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so wheres dareth in crime au 👀

He is in the same place as he should be, former dojo owner turned karaoke bar owner.

So I accidentally wrote over 2k abt that last night trying to answer that. Somehow the ninja snuck their way into this lol making it twice as long. Uhhhh enjoy?

(I'm doing prompts for the ninjago crime au now, to get some more inspiration and all, so if you've got any ideas send them over and I'll write them!)

[Read it here or under the cut]

"So why a karaoke bar?" Ronin asked the barkeep, genuinely curious to know. Not for any ulterior motives, just to know.

Lately, Ronin had not been frequenting his usual haunts of shady dive bars and cesspools of criminals. Instead he's been trying something new. A karaoke bar filled to the brim with Garmadon enforcers wasn't his go to, not unless he wanted to make trouble. But this one was special. It had a particularly cute bartender. Sure, any bar can have one, but none of them had this one.

It was also good for getting inside info on what moves Garmadon was planning on making. Not to stop him, just to keep out of his way. For now. But most of his time has been spent there chatting up the barkeep, not getting any practical useful information. Might as well grill the owner to have something to show for it.

"Well, I had a dojo a long time ago but never had enough business to keep it going and had to shut it down, it was good for a while but… things happened." The cute bartender distractedly glanced at the Garmadon enforcers with a tight frown, nearly dropping the glass he was cleaning.

Ronin decidedly didn't look at the brutes sprawled around the bar. They seemed good for the bar's business, and Ronin couldn't afford to get himself in any more trouble. Better safe than sorry. Better to keep his head down for now and try not to cause any more trouble.

"And a karaoke bar seemed a good idea as any." The man laughed, and Ronin would give anything in the world to hear that sound again. All his money, his secrets, his life, anything just to make him laugh again.

"I'm sure there's gotta be more profitable businesses out there you could have picked. Y'know, like uh pony racing." Ronin knew quite a lot about profitable businesses, having been involved in more money making schemes than he can count. There was definitely a reason to own an underperforming bar, and that wasn't to make bank.

And there was that laugh again. Ronin could die happy now.

"Eh, I happen to enjoy hearing shitty covers of pop songs and making way too sugary drinks." He gestured to the drunk group wailing at the mic, singing so loud and annoying they might as well be screaming. It made Ronin want to toss them over a bridge, just to get some peace and quiet. But the barkeep didn't seem to mind, humming along with the song that played.

The man's tie hung undone around his neck and a white shirt was unbuttoned just enough to catch a peek of a gold chain holding a medallion with a star in it. Shiny. Ronin willed his hands to stay onto his drink. He didn't want to get kicked out of a bar for having sticky fingers

Again.

"Why the name Laughys though?" He took another gulp of the drink to distract himself. It was too sweet and tangy, too much juice, not enough liquor, but at least it tasted good. He squinted his eye at the barkeeps smudged nametag. Dareth. Odd name, but who's Ronin to judge.

"Who doesn't need a good laugh every now and then, especially with how things are now. We just do what we can to make it easier."

"Ah, I get that." Ronin did whatever he could to stay afloat himself. Pushing down others to get what he wanted had never been a problem before. But now, now he can't justify it to himself as easily, can't excuse it. It's all those damn kids' fault. Making his bleeding heart pour out everywheres.

"Guess I just want to let people have a good have time and forget about how fucked everything is, ya know."

"Yeah, yeah. I know." He sighed, taking the last swig of the sugary tangy juice.

"So I've seen you around here a lot lately, but you never go up to sing?" Dareth's astute observation did not go unnoticed.

"Ah, so you've noticed me around here have you?" His coy sharp grin tried to change the conversation, with no such luck.The flat look Dareth leveled him with would have stung if he'd had any shame or dignity left.

"Hard not to notice you, what with my other regulars being Garmadons guys or whatever other gang has taken over this street for the week."

"At least the last gang could sing, this one eh."

"I'm sure you could do better, then."

"Oh, uh, I'm really not that good at singing. Sounds like a croaking cat, I swear." He laughed at that. His singing really did sound much worse than that.

"C'mon, karaoke's not about being good at it, it's about having a good time."

"I haven't had one of those in a while either." Hands clutched the empty glass like a lifeline, like if he let go he'd drown and that would be it for him.

"Here I'll show you." The rag he was using to clean glasses was carelessly tossed over his shoulder onto the counter.

"Shouldn't you be, I don't know bartending?" He panicked.

Dareth looked around at the empty bar. The enforcers were scattered in groups, hushed whispers reached Ronin's ears making him more than a little paranoid, but none were approaching the bar. Ronin was the sole occupant.

"I think they can hold out for a few minutes." He held out a hand with a smile.

The wide smile made around his eyes crinkle and shine. The kindness of it was so bright Ronin knew it would blind him if he looked at it directly. So he looked at his outstretched hand instead. It was soft and bejeweled with several fake gold rings and a little bit sticky from making drinks all night.

He didn't look at his own, he knew they were calloused and crooked and more than a little bloody from things long ago that he wishes he could regret. He didn't want to get any on the man's white shirt, nevermind it was already stained from spilled drinks. He didn't want to ruin him like he had everything else in his life. He was too good for Ronin to ruin him as well.

He didn't want to be selfish this time.

He couldn't.

"Uh, I'd love to but, I uh, gotta go. Left the laundry in the oven." He glanced at the time just to divert his gaze from the hand. 10:30 isn't that unreasonable a time to call it quits right? He's not a young man anymore, he really can't be out drinking all night. He's got things to heist, people to steal from. A very busy life without this rather endearing bartender in it.

The laugh Dareth gave almost made it all worth it.

"Well, you're welcome back any time then. I'll put the karaoke duet on hold. Until after you've taken care of that, what was it, oven laundry? Heh, sounds like fun."

Oh Garmadon, is that what he just said. Had Ronin really just used 'oven laundry' as his excuse. He had to leave right now before he embarrassed himself any further.

"Here, for the tab. Keep the change." He slapped a few too many coins into the man's hand and fled the karaoke bar like a bat out of hell.

He was too sweet for Ronin, too kind, too good. Too good for him, anyways. He didn't want to ruin him too. Every beautiful thing Ronin had ever touched he had ruined in the end, and by god if that man wasn't the most beautiful and charming person he'd met in a long while. Ronin was just too good at breaking the things that he shouldn't. Too good at ruining the things he wanted to keep good. And he didn't want to drag anyone down with him. Not again.

For once in his life he couldn't be selfish. Not this time.

Not again.

He didn't notice Dareth looking back at him as he left, a disappointed frown now etched on his face and his hand still outstretched holding the coins. Still waiting. And then he sighed and got back to work.

He also didn't notice the empty glass still clutched in his hand until he got to the street and by that point, it was too late to turn back then. Might as well keep it. Guess sticky fingers don't go away too easily.

Some things just stay with you.

"Mr. Ronin's in loooooove!" Jays mocking reached his ears as soon as Ronin's unlocked apartment door opened up. It made him pause. Jay's unruly curls popped over the couch, shit eating grin in tow.

When had Jay of all people gotten to the point he could look at Ronin and just tell what was going on in his head. He was getting too close to these kids. He needed to cut ties from everyone and run far away before he fucked them all up too.

The kids were lounging in his tiny living room, Jay taking up most of the worn couch with his tiny body, Kai and Nya perched on the armrests like gargoyles, Zane sitting cross legged on the floor with Cole practically planking next to him on the ground, some program played on the small tv in front of them.

Zanes' polite chime of, "Mr. Ronins business is his own, we shouldn't pry." broke him out of his thoughts.

Instead he shook his head and headed in the room. No he couldn't do that to them, leave them, not when they were all counting on him. He couldn't. Not yet anyways. They had a job to complete and Ronin was, if nothing else, a professional. He wouldn't leave them hanging like that.

"Look, the love guru just knows these things ok-"

"Shut it brat." Ronin stormed by, intent on shutting himself in his apartment and wallowing for a good bit, but fate had other ideas. Namely fate had all the kids in his apartment eating his stale chips and watching his crappy tv.

Jay pouted at being referred to as a brat. Even though it was undeniably true.

He reinforced his brat status by throwing a chip in Kai's overgeled hair, laughing when it stuck there. Kai immediately retaliated.

Ronin reached the kitchen, rinsing the glass he accidentally stole out in the sink.

"What are all you doing here? Don't you have your own places to be at?" He tossed his red straw hat like a frisbee at the group as an attempt to break up the oncoming chip battle. It did not work. Zane plucked it from the air and placed it atop his own head, looking more than a little smug.

"We ran out of chips, so we broke into your apartment." Nya held up Ronins half empty chip bags.

"And your cables better than any of ours, seeing as how Jay's generous 'upgrades' only fried all of our TVs." Cole glared up at Jay, who sprinkled crumbs on him.

"Ah. Fair enough." He shrugged. Honestly he couldn't blame them, he'd have done the same thing too. He was damn proud of them for getting past all the various traps and alarms he'd set, which takes some pretty diligent teamwork. Good for them. They're getting better.

And now Kai, Jay, Cole and Nya were all throwing chips at each other. Great. Maybe he wasn't all that proud of them after all. And Ronin refused to clean their mess up. At least with all them here, once they left he would have to. He really didn't want rats in here again.

He was fully intent on going to his room and planning out the next heist or trying to sleep, whichever came first, when Cole stopped him.

"Uh, you wanna watch with us, Mr. Ronin?" Cole asked while smothering Jay with the mostly empty chip bag.

All of them laughing and throwing chips at one another, having fun, it seemed too good to interrupt. But they did come over to his place, for more than just the chips and semi reliable cable he suspects. Might as well give the kids what they want or they'll be pestering him all night.

"Hell, why not. Scoot over runt."

"I am not a runt!" Screeched Jay from the couch.

"So what's on." He kicked Jay's legs away from one end of the couch and plopped down, accidentally crushing a bag of chips. Great. Just great.

"It's a reality show, but like with brutal fighting and shit. They toss a bunch of kids in a pit and they gotta fight it out gladiator style." Kai explained.

"And what's the winner get? Something good I hope." If it was a rare trophy or a boatload of money Ronin might have to see about another heist.

"They get to live." Zane stated, glowing eyes locked on the screen like trying to solve an insolent puzzle.

"Ah, that's it?"

"That's it." His tone was solemn as he'd ever heard a robots voice. He'd never known a machine could sound so melancholy.

"You ever known anyone who's been on there?" Ronin really hoped they didn't.

Kai shrugged, "Yeah, a few. But it's their own fault for wanting to get on that show in the first place. Fame and glory only lasts so long when you've nothing to back it up." He crossed his arms and slouched back onto the armrest.

"But to spice it up, we're taking bets to see who's gonna win. Want in?" Cole cheekily held up an old Chen's noodle house notepad, with their names and bets marked down. It seemed like Jay, Kai, and Nya kept losing, while Cole and Zane seem to have teamed up on winning. Good for them.

"Nah, I know well enough never to bet against a super smart super bot and former crimelords bodyguard."

"Then you know more than them." Zane looked to the trio grumbling on the couch as someone on the screen won their battle. They handed Zane a few coins each, which he split among Cole. Not the outcome they had predicted it would seem. But the outcome the other two had.

Interesting development.

"I'm feeling like having a grilled cheese, any takers?" Might as well feed them something better than old chips if they're here. Ronin got up and stretched his arms above his head till he heard a satisfying pop.

"Oh yes!"

"Yeah I'll have one."

Affirmations rang out through the kids.

"I wouldn't mind helping you, the competition here has gotten stale." Zane cooly brushed off.

"Hey, we are not stale!" Nya outraged shout followed them a few feet away to the kitchen.

"Yeah, if anything these chips are more stale than us!" Kai threw the last if the chips at Zane.

"You guys are cleaning all this up, you do know that right?" Ronin gestured to the scattering of crumbs littering just about every surface of the apartment.

Stony silence met him until all the kids chimed in at once.

"Maybe that grilled cheese doesn't sound so great-" Jay leaped up.

"Yeah, I've got to go, uh-" Kai beat him to the door, pulling it open.

"There's a definitely real thing we totally forgot about-" Nya was right behind them pushing them out, the traitor.

"Oh, are we leaving now? What about helping clean-" Zane switched tracks and followed them as Cole pulled him away.

"Yep buddy. Ok bye Mr. Ronin, thanks for letting us hang out, uh, we'll see you later I guess? Yeah, bye!" Cole waved and shut the door behind them, leaving Ronin standing there dumbfounded.

Well, that's one way to clear a room.

And still the place was a mess. He sighed and got to work.

The things he does for these kids.

He didn't even notice the stupid smile on his face stayed the rest of the night.

#b.text #b.writings #ninjago crime au #scruffshipping #apparently.#ninjago #ninjago fanfiction #i want intending this to get so long really. it was jsut supposed to be a short interaction then it grew from there....#b.asks #cant believe the 1st real writing thing im posting abt this au is this but eh im fine with that actually.#ninjago dareth #ninjago ronin

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