#it was very fun though. i enjoyed it sorta felt like an exercise.

[murplemuddle]

jupiter

#going for something more painterly here #this was very quick to do #not very complicated #pretty messy #it was very fun though. i enjoyed it sorta felt like an exercise. #if i do something like this again i have to work on my clouds #digital art #my art #definitely going to redo this someday once ive improved more

[svankmajerbaby]

✨️🎀🎈💞💝🕯🎙🤲💌

!! thank u so much for the ask. i love talking about writing......

✨ What's a fic you've posted you wish you could breathe life into again and have people talking about it? (or simply a fic you wish got more credit)

-hmm theres a point in which i have to tell myself not to worry about likes or comments bc what really matters is me getting the practise and exercising my writing muscles and having fun with it... But. i do wish i could get more ppl into my toy story fic. its got a whole bunch of wonderful comments and kudos and stuff, i just feel so proud of it and writing it came so easy and i poured so much of my love into it, i really really wish anyone who loves these characters would read it too.

🎀 give yourself a compliment about your own writing

-english is not my first language so grammar isnt often The Best, but i take a lot of care with using words and expressions as correctly as possible, and I try to always spell words right (i dont think ive ever confused loose and lose, for example, which ive seen confused a few times). some descriptions of spaces are particularly well done, at least to my own criteria, and the song choices are fun (or at least fun to write and picture in my head).

🎈 describe your style as a writer; is it fixed? does it change?

- honestly, ive no idea. i think i get verbose, and i write long dialogue scenes. i overuse the — to lead into another thought, because thats kind of like how my mind works. i try to be "cinematic" in my writing and always start a scene with a description of a place, its lighting and its sounds, like im used to when writing scripts. and i got the sense that usually the characters often ramble and go on long discussions about stuff that maybe normal people wouldnt just start out discussing so strongly. but honestly id much rather someone else outside my own perspective told me what my writing is like, i would trust them more than my own opinion.

💞 what's the most important part of a story for you? the plot, the characters, the worldbuilding, the technical stuff (grammar etc), the figurative language

-the characters!! everything is important, and stuff like grammar often jumps out first for me... but i need to enjoy how the characters are written, and feel like theyre real people with genuine motivations and interactions. i dont mind too much if theyre not super alike to canon, as long as they feel true to the core of their personality and values.

💝 what is a fic that got a different response than you were expecting?

-i was surprised to even get comments on my barbie frankenstein one. i loved writing it and it came through so easily and comfortably, but even though i had used that moderately popular meme of reimagining barbie as a gothic protagonist as inspiration i didnt really think it would be anything but something i liked to picture existing. i was so happy to see people enjoyed it too.

🕯️(there are two questions with this candle emoji symbol? i chose the first one, idk why theres two) was there a fic that was really hard on you to write, or took you to a place you didn't think it would take you?

-the tiff fic :'^) ive always liked writing sorta dark stuff, ever since i was little, but this was on another level. sometimes i felt (and still do) feel a bit awkward bc i really do push myself to write stuff i feel a bit embarrassed or shocked by, but i do think that if i want to be a better writer it does me good to make an effort to depict stuff that makes me uncomfortable and seek to write it in a sense of finding a way to both make if effective and relatively tasteful (or at the very least in-character).

🎙️which one of your fics would you like someone to make a pod-fic of?

- i have never heard about pod-fic before, but i guess i can imagine what it is (wonder if its like an audiobook, or if it has sound effects and the like??). i would love to listen to an audiobook of the barbie frankenstein fic mostly bc i would love so so much to hear the dramatic literary dialogue ive written in kelly sheridans barbie voice. also now that i think about it i have no idea what the creature would even sound like... that would be an interesting challenge.

🤲 what do YOU get out of writing?

-practise writing in english, a sense of accomplishment (when i get to finish something!!) and every once in a while some strong validation in the form of ppl liking what i write... all of it is super valuable to me, especially practise and the push and drive to finish stuff to upload, but the validation in particular just really hits that dopamine in my brain i guess

💌 share something with us about an up-and-coming work (WIP) that has you excited!

-its from the glen and glenda fic im halfway planning! i got a few dialogues written and some scenes sketched out, but its still a long way to go. im very excited about it tho! ive grown to really love the versions of the twins ive made in my head. hopefully theyre faithful to their screen depictions while also adding a bit more depth and character building ive wanted to take them through.

#. 🦴 #i just noticed a writing mistake in that screencap of my glen n glenda fic fbfnnfjfhdhd #i didnt mention it but im also super proud of my mothers day fic. its the only one i made thats short and to the point #while still being effective like. emotionally. and i like the dialogue i did for it #idk man i love writing so much and even with how much im struggling with writing now #i still get such a rush of being able to make such things by stringing words together

[moonchildsaurora]

Running in Circles

✤ guard captain!Mingi x thief!reader  ✤ genre: Guard AU // smidge of fluff, (semi)enemies-to-friends. (feat. Yunho) ✤ t/w: sfw, none - except very brief mentions of some fighting, rated PG ✤ count: 3k ✤ [ part 3 ] of Lacuna miniseries

a/n - huge apologies for keeping Captain Song in for a so long but alas, he’s finally freeeeee. I really need to pick up the pace with continuing on with this mini series 😅 this idea sorta played out better in my head than out in words - I’m not 100% happy with this, it’s defs not my best but I shall practise writing more Mingi fics in the future! This is also probably the tamest of the lot in terms of cry-level. Just preparing you guys with an easy read before the shitstorm that awaits in the next member on the list one shot hahahahahahaha. @hereisleo​ & @barsformars​ hope you both enjoy this for ya man 😉 I couldn’t bring myself to hurt this giant teddybear too much in writing. Also everyone, let’s welcome back a familiar face within this one shot :P

In all of his years of being a royal palace guard of Aethevintis, nothing would cause his body to seize up with tension instantly and hasten the greys that threaten to come through his still youthful auburn tresses than when he was requested at the interrogation chamber.

Heavy steps echoed off the dark granite stone floors, the sharp clinking from an array of medals that hung proudly to signify his prestige were in sync with his tense pace. Song Mingi had no problem exercising command and authority when it was needed, in fact, he prided himself in doing so.

He was good at his job, and he knew that.

Otherwise the title of Captain wouldn’t had been bestowed upon him that four winters ago. The real struggle was when his confidence in being assertive was mistaken for the ability to intimidate, broad body physique to further fuel that common misconception. And so Mingi often found himself sat in that bleak chamber with some poor unfortunate soul, who had been frightened into admitting nothing more than petty crimes.

He’d argue such tactics were unnecessary. Running his hand frustratingly through his hair for the umpteenth time, Mingi mentally braced himself for whatever...or rather whoever awaited for his arrival.

Rounding the corner, his brows arched up with surprise upon seeing the King standing in front of the chamber doors. The troubled look that replaced the King’s usual ebullient features prompted Mingi to straighten his posture immediately; this was sure to be a serious matter.  “Good afternoon Sire…”

Yunho turned towards the rich baritone voice of the Guard Captain and rigid shoulders relaxed ever so slightly at the sight of one of his most trusted.    

“Captain Song,” Yunho nodded in acknowledgement, “Although I’m not sure if it’s entirely good at all.”

Mingi’s forehead creased but remained silent to allow the King to further elaborate about his plight.

“The Queen’s aquamarine diamond parure has been stolen, and I suspect a selection of other jewels too. Those I care not for as much as the diamond parure…it’s got high sentimental value as it was passed down within the family from my great-great-grandmother.”

“That certainly isn’t good at all. Has the perpetrator been caught yet, Sire?”

“As luck would have it, yes actually. And I’ve been told that you would be the perfect person to know how to handle this….situation,” at saying this Yunho fully turned to face Mingi. The falchion in his belt’s scabbard felt heavy and a million and one thoughts were running through his mind at once.

“Mingi…”  

Mingi could see the sincerity in Yunho’s eyes and the hesitation in spilling out the words that needed to be said.

“I hope you know that in any other circumstances, I would not be requesting you to deal with such matters that you have immense dislike for. I apologise for putting you in such a position. This…certain individual has crossed paths with you before and I’m hoping with that familiarity you may be able to coax them to reveal where the diamond parrure is. How you do so, I’ll leave that up to your discretion.”

Oh.

Well that wasn’t what Mingi was expecting to hear. A certain individual he’s familiar with?

He straightened his back and gave a determined nod of his head, “I shall do my best Sire. That room may be the bane of my existence but this matter is clearly of importance to you, let us hope the thief can be convinced to comply.”

“You have my utmost gratitude Mingi,” Yunho said, reaching his hand up to give Mingi’s shoulder a comforting squeeze before making his way out of the grim dungeon hallway.

Mingi waited till the King was out of sight before turning to face the chamber. Taking a deep breath, he steeled his heart and pushed open the doors with slight force.  

“Well, well if it isn’t my favourite Captain of the guards. Come to keep me company for the evening?”

If he wasn’t already sweating before, he sure was now. That oh-so coquettish voice he’s grown to recognise almost immediately, fell on his ears.

You sent a cheshire grin to the tall figure, legs propped up on the worn-out wooden table and hands idly fiddling with the heavy brass shackles around your wrists. This certainly wasn’t the first time your paths had crossed but it was the first for you both to meet in a more dire setting.

Mingi feared for the implications of your capture.

Not just a mere thief of the streets but being the leader of Dusk Talons, the Royal Crown surely won’t pass up a chance to make an example of a core individual from the renowned thief guild.    

“You ought to close your mouth, otherwise the flies will get in.”

One of the guards closer to you brought his fist down on the table, a mere tactic meant to frighten you. However, all it got out of you was the bored glance you sent to the guard who started berating you for talking back to Captain Song.

Mingi let out a sigh, “That’s enough. I can take it from here, you all are dismissed.” The command was given to the other guards in the room as he settled into the chair across from you. They left without a fuss and silence encompassed the room, though not for long.

“Would you please be a dear and help with this?” you asked, chains jangling as you held out your cuffed wrists towards Mingi.

“It would seem that’s not needed at all,” a ghost of a smile gracing his lips, “your handy work got the job done for you.”

“You’re no fun.”

Not admitting out loud, you were slightly impressed that the guard captain didn’t let your lock-picking slip by him. The shackles dropped on to the table and you made a show of stretching your arms out, body arching lithely off the chair. Your loose tunic rode up just shy of showing skin, causing Mingi to avert his eyes out of respect.

That widened your grin.

Mingi let out an awkward cough, any pre-planned script he had for questioning was abandoned. You weren’t entirely a stranger to him nor were you an acquaintance – if the laws even allowed for that. But Mingi didn’t feel right about making you go through the same interrogation protocol as previous criminals had to. You weren’t like them.  

“I can’t tell if you thrive off the riskiest raids or that you don’t fear anything nor anyone. Going after Her Majesty’s diamond parure? Of all things!”

An airy chuckle left you, “If I didn’t know better…you sound awfully worried for me, Captain.”

“Shouldn’t you be at least more careful? What would become of your family if something were to really happen to you?”

The grin on your face disappeared immediately.

Mingi continued when he didn’t hear a response, “I’ve seen you…giving food and gold back to those in the Lower Wrean. I know some of the funds for the city’s orphanages are provided by your guild. And that one time…the only reason why you led the attack on our eastern outpost was to rescue a few of your own and relocate some of the nomad camps away from potential crossfire. You don’t abandon family, right?”

These were the things that convinced Mingi, you weren’t really all bad. Questionable choices? Sure. Morals? A little grey. Although underneath the layers, your intentions have always stemmed from a compassionate heart.  

“What’s to the rich if they lose a few here and there? They have far more than enough, so to us, they’re top of the list of contributors.”

Mingi remembered you telling him that when he had first caught you escaping from one of the noble’s house. Your guild only ever stole from the rich and it was a bonus if the corrupted was targeted too. Mingi, who then was still under the command of the previous captain, hesitated to pursue. For his moral compass went spiralling. Being bound to carry out his royal duty or close a blind eye because he empathised with what you stood for.  

Empathy.

Nothing more than a weak link, according to his captain. There was little room for that, just as grey had no place among Aethevintis’ black-or-white justice system.

Hence, a thief was still a thief at the end of the day. Even for a good cause, by definition you were on the opposing side.

You continued to observe Mingi in silence, with a neutral expression, as you let his words sink in. Captain Song was much different than his predecessors. An unspoken level of mutual respect had developed between you both somewhere along the way of your encounters. The way he led with his heart rather than blind authority was admirable.

“We do what we must to get by. My family…as you so kindly put it…are capable of adapting to whatever circumstances are thrown their way. Risk is an inevitable norm for us.”

At least, you could appreciate Mingi looking at you without that faux sympathy.

“And I’ve lived doing what I do best…that is to survive. Being careful only gets you so far but being smart, well, you could go just about anywhere with that.”  

With a rather loud yawn you broke the tension in the dim room. The grin reappeared back on your face and you slinked backwards on the chair. Mingi was contemplating on whether switching back to the original subject of this…talk…would be a good idea or not. He needed a starting basis, a hint of sorts from you in order to give direction where he’d be searching for the missing parure.  

Betting on the fact that you don’t wholly despise him, Mingi tried his luck. “Now I do have a job to complete, and I’m sure we both would rather spend our time elsewhere other than down here…”  

“Aww, I thought we were having a good time getting to know each other better. Don’t get to do that as much on the streets now, do we?”

“What have you done with Her Majesty’s parure?” asked Mingi, keeping his tone levelled.

“You sure are set on that huh? What’s in it for you if you successfully retrieve the jewels?”

Tilting your head, eyes sparking a challenge. Only to be met with determination glinting off Mingi’s own pair of dark chocolate brown orbs.

“Nothing more than the satisfaction of returning a precious family heirloom back to my King. It’s of great importance and sentiment to him.”

You wished you could find fault in his resolution. Yet again, Mingi was nothing but honest in answering you.  

Surely, you could play a little nicer this time, right?

“Hmm, I’ll think about it. I’m feeling rather parched as well…any chance I could get some fresh water?”

Sensing you weren’t going to give in anytime soon, Mingi drew in a deep breath and exhaled. Standing up he offered, “And I’m guessing you haven’t had anything to eat?”

“You’re offering?”

“This is an interrogation chamber, not a torture one.”

Mingi left to gather the necessities. Head filled with too many conflicting thoughts, that he missed the growing grin on your lips and the space where the dungeon keys previously sat on his belt.  

“THE PRISONER HAS ESCAPED!”

“FIRE IN THE COURTYARD!”

It was havoc.  

The thunderous sound of fireworks broke through the tranquil evening. Catching everyone by surprise and confusion arose as to why bursts of colourful sparks were going off within the palace grounds. When some of the flag banners and trees caught fire from the stray sparks, it caused a flurry of panic.

And to make matters worse – the guards had lost you.

Mingi finished over-seeing the last batch of palace staff into the safe area. “All palace guards are to stay by the doors to the throne room and west wing! No one is to leave or enter until my unit and I have done a final sweep of the grounds, “ he ordered.

Part of the team was put in charge of getting the fires under control. He deduced the fireworks were set off as an intended distraction and, a successful one at that too. Mingi’s priority was now to prevent you from escaping.

He heard the commotion and shouting before, “CAPTAIN! THE SOUTHWEST WALLS!”

You held your own and by the time Mingi had reached your location, the guards who were stationed there were knocked out cold on the ground. A minor cut bled slightly from your left cheek and you looked a little more roughed up than when Mingi had last seen you.

“Here I was thinking this would be a clean goodbye…” you said, securing the rope around your waist that Mingi noticed was tied to the stone merlons. He also saw a couple of dark-coloured pouches with you that weren’t present on your attire during the interrogation.

Three guesses as to what filled those pouches.

You followed his eyes to where they were fixated on, “Ah yes, amongst thieves it’s the number one rule to not hide our spoils on ourselves…lest we get caught.”

A series of sharp whistles was heard. The signal that your guild had completed their tasks and was awaiting to reunite with their leader down below at the meeting point. You blew three consecutive similar whistles back in response.

“Wait!”

You paused with one foot up on the stone edge. Turning back to look, you saw Mingi’s hand hover slightly over his falchion.

“Are you going to try and stop me?”

‘No. But I will ask once more, where is the diamond parure? I know the cold season approaches and you’ll need all the resources you can get. Those gold and other jewels you’ve got there should be sufficient enough. So please….”

Having already made your decision the moment you slammed the doors to the chamber out, simultaneously breaking the noses of the unsuspecting guards, you knew what you had to do. But that didn’t prevent you from adding a little dramatic flair.

After all, you want to stay memorable in Captain Song’s books.

“You just don’t know when to give up, do you?”

Your voice dripping with light sweetness, eyes locked on his as you made your way right up to him. Your hand darted out to grab his falchion and on reflex, Mingi intercepted – large calloused warm hand latching around your wrist.

“But maybe that’s what makes so different from the others…” You flipped his hand so it faced palm up, and placed a familiar cobalt blue pouch on it. “You’re a good man, Captain Song. Thinking with your heart doesn’t make you weak…this world needs more of that, more of people like you.”

You watched his shoulders fall with relief and the look he had in his eyes change into something you couldn’t quite discern. Mingi nestled the pouch carefully towards his body, the delicate clinking confirmed its fragile contents within. And he didn’t feel the need to look inside for confirmation; he trusted you.

“If we were to meet in another lifetime, I hope we’d be on better terms then. Preferably one leaning closer to friends.”

A genuine smile crept up from the corners of your lips upon hearing Mingi’s words.

“That sounds rather nice, actually.”

You could definitely use a friend like Mingi in your second lifetime, should fate ever be so kind to give you another shot.

“CAPTAIN!”  

The clamouring of guards and blades being drawn drew closer and you could hear the running of feet up the stairs.

“Well, that’s my cue to leave. And I am so sorry for doing this but…”

And you physically winced when you sent a knee to his gut, causing Mingi to collapse and gasp for air.

“…Captain Song wouldn’t go down without a fight and this makes it look less like you just let a scummy thief off the hook.”

Mingi waved his other gloved hand, “I…understand – you ought to hurry…” he managed to cough out the words.

“Don’t be a stranger.”

With that, Mingi watched you leap over the wall’s edge just as back-up from his unit arrived. Not only did you leave him with the Queen’s jewels and potentially a bruise or two, you also left him with a new sense of comfort.

Two worlds apart. Two unlikely individuals who were both willing to cross the bridge that’s been built to fill the gap, to meet in the middle.

Yeah, this was a change he could get used to.

“Thank you Captain Song!” cheered the orphans, watching with admiration at how effortlessly Mingi climbed the tree to recover their kite that got stuck in the tall branches.

He soon found his legs to be attacked with hugs from several pairs of petite arms.  

Mingi returned the affections with gentle head pats and a, “Be careful not to run too fast and watch where you’re going!”  

The townspeople greeted him as he patrolled his rounds. Even scoring a ruby red freshly-picked apple from one of the vendors. Today would be a breeze. Golden rays of the sun shone down warmly and the morning air was still crisp. Mingi was already planning to finish his shift early and go see if he could convince Yunho to sneak away from royal duties for a round of archery out by the fields.

“STOP! THIEF!”

Just like that, his trail of thoughts were cut short. Mingi snapped his attention towards the direction where the yelling came from. Jogging over to where the crowd had gathered, he was nearly bowled over by a fleeting figure.  

Upon making eye contact for that split second, he could recognise your mirthful eyes from anywhere.

Your eyes crinkled with delight and being bold as to send a wink his way. But your feet never stopped sprinting and within seconds, Mingi had lost you among the sea of townspeople who still went about their business on the street.    

“THEY WENT THAT WAY!”

Mingi looked back to see some of his unit tailing after a few hooded figures who disappeared into the maze of alleyways. Your guild sure knew the layout of the town inside out.

A sigh escaped him. So much for finishing up early for the day.

But if it was a chase you wanted, then it would be a chase you’ll get. Being the respectful gentleman that he was, he’d let you have a head start of course.

Maybe one day, when he’s old and cranky, worn out to his bones – he’d stop running in circles after you.

Luckily for you both, today wasn’t that day.

#kwritersworldnet #atzinc #kpopuniversenet #kdiarynet #8makes1teamnet #ateez au #ateez mingi #ateez x reader #mingi x reader #mingi oneshot #mingi blurb #mingi au #ateez oneshot #guard au #ateez blurbs #ateez writing #song mingi #ateez drabbles #ateez scenarios #ateez fic #ateez fanfic #ateez fluff #kpop writing #pyx writes #mingi fluff #platonic friendship

[psychosistr]

Talk to Me- Chapter 3

Summary: They’ve reached the restaurant and everything’s going great so far!...So why is Steelbeak so nervous about messing everything up? Maybe Domino can help him loosen up a little.

Notes: This scene was so much fun to write- I love writing date stories far too much x3

-First Chapter-

As far as Steelbeak was concerned, the ride to the restaurant had been a complete success. Flirting with Domino had been easy, natural, and fun- and that stroke of luck with the song on the radio had resulted in a surprisingly romantic moment that he honestly couldn’t have topped even if he’d planned it himself. They’d been seated quickly without having to wait, and had even gotten a great table by one of the windows with a stunning view of the moonlit bay in a corner of the restaurant with no one else around. All things considered, it was a great start to the night.

Which, unfortunately only made him more anxious about doing something to mess it all up.

He kept trying to tell himself that things were different this time- that things between him and Domino were better now- but, in the back of his mind, he kept thinking about how all of his attempts at conversation last time they went out to eat had ultimately messed everything up and left him with nothing but a bill to pay and quiet, lonely car ride home. It was a stupid thing to worry about, and he knew it, but he was so completely out of his element that it left him feeling more than a little unnerved.

It wasn’t the going out part he wasn’t used to, mind you. He’d gone out on plenty of “dates” before and those had gone well enough to earn him several “girlfriends” that were so charmed by him that they’d wait literally MONTHS just for a chance to see him again.

No, it was the idea of going out on an actual date with someone he was actually interested in seeing again that had his nerves frazzled.

Every other date he’d been on before had been the same routine: Dinner and drinks. Some sweet talk that he didn’t really mean. Drive back to his place. Have a little fun. And then he’d send them on their way with the usual “Don’t call me, I’ll call you”. Lather, rinse, repeat- the same thing every time.

With Domino, though, things were different. The other man was too sharp to fall for his usual sweet talk (though flirting was definitely still on the table). Steelbeak also wanted more than just a one night fling- he wanted to go out with him again in the very near future, or maybe even just hang out more outside of work. He wanted-

“-something wrong?” The loon’s voice cut through his thoughts instantly.

“Huh?” Steelbeak blinked and looked up from his half-touched plate of seafood paella, unaware that he’d spaced out. “Sorry, ya say somethin’?”

“……” There was that stare he’d become all too familiar with over the past few months- the look that told him the shorter bird was mentally picking him apart and analyzing him with unsettling accuracy. “Something’s on your mind and it’s stressing you out.” And he’d hit the nail right on the head, as always. “What is it?”

Darn, he really couldn’t hide anything from this guy, could he?

With a frustrated sigh, Steelbeak frowned and ran a hand over his comb. “Is it really that obvious?” A nod from his partner accompanied by his deadpan stare told him that, yes, it WAS that obvious. “You’re gonna think it’s stupid..”

“Probably.” Wow, he didn’t miss a beat with that, did he? “But I still want to hear it.”

Well, he thought, might as well spit it out. Otherwise the darker bird would just keep giving him that look until he did. “Can ya ‘least promise NOT t’ laugh?”

The edges of the other’s beak curled slightly in a smirk as he shrugged. “Maybe.” That was probably the best he was going to get.

Figuring that he wouldn’t be able to get it all out if he was looking into those seemingly all-seeing red eyes, Steelbeak chose instead to keep his gaze on the bay. “…..I..ain’t exactly used t’ datin’ like this.” His eyes followed the rolling motion of a wave as it crashed on the beach before receding. “Don’t get me wrong, I like goin’ out with a cute dame much as the next guy, but I don’t even bother rememberin’ their names half the time. We go out, I tell ‘em what they wanna hear, and it works good enough t’ get ‘em home with me.” He blindly waved his hand in Domino’s general direction. “But, with YOU, I don’t even know how t’ start a freakin’ conversation. If I try talkin’ to ya like the rest, it’d probably be charmin’, but it’s not gonna be real- my brain ain’t exactly wired for honesty, y’know? So I’m tryin’ real hard t’ think of somethin’ t’ talk about ‘sides small talk ‘cause I wanna say somethin’, but I don’t wanna look like an idiot for tryin’ too hard.” He gave a short, self-deprecating laugh and shook his head. “Aaaaaannd I just heard myself out loud: I’m tryin’ too hard t’ NOT try too hard..guess that don’t make a whole lotta sense, huh?”

When he finally turned his attention back to his date, he saw that the other bird had reached across the table with an extremely small, unmarked vial of something and currently had his hand angled over the rooster’s glass of water- clearly preparing to drip whatever was inside of the glass vial into his drink. “……” Realizing he’d been spotted, Domino slowly leaned back into his seat properly and set his hands back down in his lap, maintaining eye contact the whole time as if that would hide what he’d been about to do.

“…Dom..what’s that?” Steelbeak asked his partner incredulously.

“…Nothing…” He was clearly lying through his teeth and trying to maintain his poker face, despite being caught red-handed.

“We both know I ain’t buyin’ that.” Steelbeak looked down at the table obscuring the loon’s hands from his view. “I know you ain’t tryin’ t’ slip me a mickey, so spill it.”

“Fine..” The poker face finally fell away and Domino’s hand came back up to rest on the table with the vial still between his fingers, surprising the rooster with the dejected, guilty frown on his face. “It’s a truth serum.”

Steelbeak’s eyes widened in surprise at the admission. “Why the heck do ya have truth serum on ya??”

The darker bird shrugged a little. “I like to be prepared for anything- it comes in handy for emergency interrogations.” He set the vial on the table between them so that Steelbeak could see it better. “I thought that, if you’re uncomfortable because it’s hard for you to speak honestly with me, then a drop or two might help.”

The tiny glass container sat on the table, looking so small and insignificant, but Steelbeak knew better than to assume things when it came to drugs and chemicals in their line of work. “..That stuff really works..?”

“I’ve found it to be effective more than 98% of the time.” Domino replied. “It’s fast acting, too- most people notice the effects almost instantly.”

“……Eh, what the heck?” Steelbeak grabbed the vial and, instead of putting a few drops into his glass as Domino had been about to, he popped the drip-cap off and brought it directly to his beak to chug half of the colorless liquid in one go. “!!” He immediately regretted his decision- the liquid was oily and tasted like someone had boiled down a bottle of mouthwash into a loose syrup. After grabbing his napkin and coughing into it for a solid minute, as well as chugging his entire glass of water to weaken the nearly medicinal taste still coating his tongue, he set the half-empty vial back down in the middle of the table. “Ugh, this stuff better be worth it..”

Domino picked the vial up and put it away after screwing the cap back on. “You know, two drops would have been more than enough. Don’t blame me if you start spilling F.O.W.L.’s most highly guarded secrets.”

“Figured I’d need all the help I could get.” With the horribly minty taste finally cleared from his pallet, Steelbeak took a moment to think about how he felt. “Y’know..I do feel calmer. Wow, you weren’t kiddin’ ‘bout that stuff- it works REAL fast.”

The darker bird smiled a bit, but there was something sly about that look in his eyes that Steelbeak couldn’t quite place. “Let’s test it out: What would you like to talk about?”

“I wanna know more about YOU.” The words fell from Steelbeak’s mouth with surprising ease. “We don’t talk ‘bout much on the clock, so, I wanna know, what sorta stuff do ya do for fun?”

“Hm, that’s pretty tame, but a good place to start, I suppose.” Domino picked up his fork, idly spinning it between his thumb and index finger as he thought the question over. “Well..I read, mostly. I also enjoy going to the shooting range- it’s a fun way to exercise and keep my skills sharp. During the winter I like to go for walks in the snow or even ice skating, if it’s cold enough. Oh, and sometimes I just like to go driving along the coast at night since it’s so quiet.”

“Sounds like a good time.” Steelbeak smiled a little, a general feeling of satisfaction coming over him. He couldn’t believe how easy that had been! He felt more relaxed now, like he had when they talked in the break room the other day, or after their mission to raid and blow up a S.H.U.S.H. base. “Never woulda pegged ya for a skater, though. Found any good places ‘round here for that?”

“The lake in the park was nice, I went there last time it snowed.” The loon had a soft smile on his face as he glanced out the window, clearly remembering the day fondly. “It was in the middle of the night, so there was no one else crowding the ice or crashing into me.”

Ah, there it was- that rare but genuine and gentle smile that made Steelbeak’s heart melt a little. “Maybe I’ll tag along next time. Haven’t gone skatin’ in ages.”

Red eyes looked back up at him, that smile growing a little more. “I’d like that.”

For a moment, they stayed like that, just smiling contently at one another.

Then, Steelbeak noticed, Domino’s shoulders began to shake the way they did when he was trying not to laugh out loud about something. “What’s so funny?”

“Well, it’s just..” Domino’s smile was turning into a grin as he continued resisting the ever-growing urge to laugh. “You know that truth serum you drank?”

“Yeah, what’s in that junk, anyway?” Steelbeak asked, his curiosity piqued now. “I mean, I’m glad it worked, but it tasted like melted toothpaste.”

Domino’s body was practically trembling, as was his voice, but he managed to get out a simple reply. “It’s peppermint oil.”

“…What?” Steelbeak blinked, unsure if he’d heard the other bird properly.

“You just drank a bottle of peppermint oil.” And the last of the loon’s resolve crumbled, allowing him to openly laugh at the baffled rooster.

“What?!” Steelbeak sputtered for a moment. He’d seriously just chugged freaking PEPPERMINT OIL?! After a few seconds of his partner laughing at him, the rooster finally groaned and let his head fall forward to hit a clear spot on the table. “Can’t believe I fell for that…why the heck would ya even HAVE that..?” Somehow it seemed more believable that the other bird would carry truth serum on him then peppermint oil.

Wiping a few laughter-induced tears from the corners of his eyes, Domino’s smile didn’t go down one bit. “Like I said, I like to be prepared for anything. Peppermint is very versatile- it can relieve nausea, help with indigestion, or just be used to freshen breath after a less than fragrant meal. I’ve also used it as a fire accelerant before.” He took notice of the way the lighter bird's shoulders were starting to tremble and his grin lessened slightly. “Hey, are you ok-?”

Before he could finish his question, Steelbeak sat up with a huge grin of his own spread across his face and started belting out his distinctively nasal laugh. “Friggin’ peppermint oil! Oh, that was good!” He had to wipe away tears of his own so he could look his partner in the eyes again. “This is why I like ya, Deedee: You keep me guessin’. I never know what t’ expect with ya. You’re exciting.”

Domino’s own smile returned. “You’re certainly not having any trouble being honest now, are you?”

Steelbeak shrugged, the huge grin still practically splitting his face. “Yeah, but it’s gonna be easier on my ego if I just keep pretendin’ it’s ‘cause of a truth serum. So, let’s keep talkin’ before I lose my nerve again- sound good?” He raised his almost empty glass towards his partner expectantly.

Domino picked up his own half-full glass and tapped it to the other’s. “That sounds good to me. Let’s talk.”

<-Previous Chapter Next Chapter->

End Notes: Just to clear up any possible confusion: Domino WAS trying to get caught spiking Steelbeak’s drink so he could bluff and get him to try it willingly- the guy knew what he was doing x3 Also, by “peppermint oil”, I’m referring to edible peppermint extract that’s used in cooking- he didn’t make Steelbeak drink an essential oil because that is dangerous xP

#darkwing duck #dwd #steelbeak #Dominic Domino #steeldomino #100 follower giveaway! #talk to me

[rax-writes]

Title: Hobbies Fandom: X-Men Characters: Warren Worthington III x Reader Word Count: 1,398 Warnings: None Notes: Request from anon for, “Could we get a shy reader getting herself opened up (not in the dirty way) of her maybe gaming/animal loving personality by Warren? It's sorta who I am as a person and I don't have many friends.” // I hope you enjoyed this, dear anon! I know damn nearly nothing about video games, so I hope none of this sounds dumb. ♥ // Also, anybody who recognizes the That 70’s Show quote I used gets cool person points.

Group projects were always an absolute nightmare. You always ended up paired with people who couldn’t ever decide on a path to take for the project, and once some form of order was established, nobody wanted to do even the bare minimum amount of work. It was even worse when it was just you and one other person paired together. If they were gung-ho about it, you usually disagreed with their ideas, or if they were passive, you ended up doing all of the work, and they got a good grade for absolutely nothing. The fact that you were shy, and more than a bit socially awkward, didn’t help either.

When Professor Xavier announced that you were to be paired with none other than Warren Worthington III, you weren’t sure whether to jump for joy, or head for the hills.

“A new school year brings a myriad of possibilities, students! One prominent possibility is the prospect of new friendships. That is why I have paired you all with someone you don’t know all that well, with the goal of bringing everyone closer together,” Professor Xavier explained. “The project entails the formation of an essay, one from each and every one of you, after you have gotten to know your partner a bit better. In the essay, you will assess the similarities and differences between you and your partner, and address how this exercise helped you to gain a new friend. Get to it!”

The class’ previously quiet and studious atmosphere dissolved into one of quiet, tentative chatter amongst the partners. It seemed that everyone was approaching this a bit begrudgingly, but ultimately, open to the project. Well… everyone except Warren, who remained in his seat across the room from you, looking as surly as ever, with his arms crossed across his chest and a scowl on his face.

Point blank, he was hot. You’d have to be absolutely off your rocker to not think so. You were thankful that you had not yet had any reason to interact with him, because having to interact with attractive people made you five times as awkward as you already were… which is really saying something. And that was why you felt your stomach drop to your toes when he abruptly stood from his seat to make his way over to you, loudly dragging a chair from somewhere nearby to sit in front of you.

He sat backwards in the chair, his arms draped over the back of it and his legs situated on either side of the seat. There were a few stray strands of blond curls that fell across his forehead, although he had seemingly attempted to keep it all pushed back. His green eyes showed immense boredom, and the realization that he’d rather be anywhere than sitting there with you admittedly pained you a bit. Truthfully, however, you couldn’t exactly blame him. He was a god in the flesh, gracing you with his presence for the sake of some silly class project.

“Hello? Anybody home?”

Warren snapping his fingers in front of your face effectively threw you out of your daydreaming. To your absolute horror, you realized he must have been talking to you, and you were too busy fawning over him to notice.

“Yes, sorry, I…. What did you say?” you managed to sputter, nervously fidgeting with your pen to avoid meeting his gaze.

“I said, what’s your name?”

You introduced yourself, and – with a pleasantly shocking amount of politeness – he shook your hand.

“I’m Warren. Let’s get this over with ASAP. It’s a dumb project, I don’t want to have to waste any more time on it than I have to,” he grumbled, adjusting his leather jacket and taking a deep breath. “You got a piece of paper and a pen I could use?”

You nodded, before ripping a page from your notebook to hand to him, and giving him a pen from your book bag.

“Thanks,” he muttered, then messily scribbled your name at the top of the page. He turned to squint at the chalkboard, checking to see what questions Professor Xavier had suggested the students ask one another. “Alright, what’s your favorite book?”

“I like a lot of books, so it’s hard for me to pick one. There’s aspects of every book I read that become my favorite, so I guess I don’t really have an answer for that one…. What about you?”

“I don’t like reading,” Warren said simply, and you watched as he scribbled down ‘Likes all books’ beneath your name. You quickly wrote down his answer, then looked to the chalkboard, as he’d done.

“What are your hobbies, Warren?”

“I like rock and roll, sex, and pizza, in that order,” Warren answered without hesitation. You had to physically force yourself to keep your mind on the project, rather than let your thoughts wander to what sex with him would be like. Thankfully, he spoke again, jarring your daydream once more. “What about you?”

“Um…. I like video games, but I’m not very good at them. And I like animals, so I always enjoy any opportunity to spend time with animals.”

“Nobody’s good at video games right off the bat. You get good at it with practice,” Warren stated, shrugging. “What games do you play?”

“Right now, I’m playing God of War. Keep getting caught on the same level, though….”

“Well, keep at it, you’ll get past the level sooner or later,” he said coolly, then looked at you for a moment before adding, “I don’t know that game, but I could try my hand at it if you can’t get past the level, if you wanted. You could introduce me to the game and we could play together sometime.”

“I’d like that,” you replied instantaneously, smiling. Warren just nodded and looked back to the chalkboard.

“Favorite animal?”

A knock on your dorm door that night was unexpected, to say the least. Even more unexpected was Warren Worthington III being the surprise visitor, looking uncharacteristically sheepish with a bag of chips and a two liter of soda in hand.

“Figured we could hang out and do some gaming, if you’re free…. For the project.”

Despite your internal panic, you smiled and let him in. Whether it was for the project, or because both of you could use a friend, you didn’t care.

It was nearly two o’clock in the morning before either of you showed signs of slowing down. You played God of War, and he helped you get past the level you were on, while also getting a bit invested in the game himself. You then played Call of Duty: Black Ops, Warren’s favorite, and he gave you the run-down on nearly every aspect of the game. It was great to see how invested he got in the game, and in telling you about the game, considering how stoic he usually was. You could tell he was genuinely having fun. Aside from the video games, the two of you also talked about school, music, movies – anything that came to mind. It was astonishing how well the two of you got along – and how easily you managed to break free from your shy shell.

“Jesus fuck, it’s almost 2 AM. We’ve got classes tomorrow,” Warren noted, rubbing his hands over his face with a groan.

¬“Shit, you’re right,” you agreed, although you didn’t want the night to end. Would he still be standoffish to you tomorrow, as per usual? Was this a one-time occurrence? Or was this the beginning of a friendship? Or even more – but you figured you should pump the brakes on your daydreaming right there.

“I should head back to my room,” Warren said, a hint of sadness to his voice, which you hoped you hadn’t made up in your own head. “I’ll see you in class tomorrow. We should hang out again Friday night.”

“Sounds good,” you said, smiling brightly.

Warren stared at you again for a few more seconds, then a small smile spread across his face.

“See you around,” he said, before exiting the room, closing the door softly behind him.

“Yeah…. See you around,” you responded, a positively giddy smile on your lips.

You fell asleep with that smile on your lips, and a hint of excitement in your heart, eager to see where this unexpected – but very welcomed – new friendship would go.

@ririwilliams @whoabrekker @v-writings @alexsunmners @dreamingforthegodlike @fuckthatfeeling @myfriendmagislit @yesmaddyyyposts @proserpinepluto 

#this is cheesy as fuck and i hate it but oh well #when do i ever actually like any of my writing? lmao #warren worthington iii #warren worthington #warren worthington x reader #warren worthington iii x reader #warren worthington iii fluff #warren worthington iii fan fiction #warren worthington iii fan fic #warren worthington iii fanfiction #warren worthington iii fanfic #warren worthington fluff #warren worthington fanfiction #warren worthington fan fic #warren worthington fanfic #warren worthington fic #warren worthington the third #angel #archangel #x-men #xmen #x-men fanfiction #x-men fan fiction #my writing #x-men fandom #xmen fanfiction #xmen fan fiction #x men fanfiction #x men fan fiction

[legaciesmade]

maxence danet-fauvel. he/him. cismale. ╱ i thought i saw mathieu beaumont getting questioned by the police. the twenty-three year old is in their fourth year at west bridge studying business. they were at manon’s party because he’s her older brother and it was at their house. do you think they had something to do with her death? + a beguiling smile, a collection of luxury watches, the sound of running shoes on the track field.

hey you demon fucks .. i’m bailey !! i’m twenty-two, i go by she/her pronouns and i live in the b(est) timezone ;) if you wanna know more ab me, i’m a video game heaux and a pisces sun/aquarius moon/cancer rising ( for any fellow astro-hoes. ) also i’m not gonna lie, you’ll find me more readily on d.scord compared to t.mblr ims bcos... it’s easier, so hmu for tht if interested. anyw, mat is....certainly a new muse to me so i’m kinda just going with the flow. but what i do know is he’s fuckin trash. go figure.

his pinterest

the eldest child of the beaumont family; mathieu was basically groomed to one day take over the family business. it didn’t matter if he didn’t want it, he was the eldest and that was that.

so here he is, majoring in business ( with a bunch of math/finance courses on the side ) like a Good Son

literally he’s been taking classes to prepare him for college ever since the start of high school, maybe even earlier than that. because it’s a Very Serious Responsibility

to say he was envious that manon got to choose her own major/path in life is an understatement, but he’s learned well to hide his anger behind a smile,,,, thts so sad alexa play despacito

i’m leaving a lot of family stuff sorta open-ended bc i don’t want to assume too much ab manon aside from what we know thus far sjdhsjdh BUT JUST KNOW THAT, YEAH, MAT LOVES HIS FAMILY BUT....sometimes love isn’t enough. especially when you have like, basically NO say in a lot of aspects of your life...

his sport is literally the only thing that’s 100% his. his father would’ve probably preferred him to go out for football but... nah fam, boy wanted to do track and he’s crazy good. been doing it since middle school and each time he’s made captain position. dad still isn’t that impressed though.

that all being said. he’s also in student council; he enjoys it enough, but this was definitely more of a “you have to join it” scenario lol oops

his birthday is january 18th ( it must’ve been suuuuuuch a fun birthday this year, huh ;))))) i’m not sorry )

sun - capricorn ( restrictions, order, and control. you exercise these characteristics firstly on your own self. you like to control your reality by setting daily patterns to follow, and will frequently choose to wake up earlier than needed. you usually are stubborn and determined, and will frequently enter power games. however, you can be very patient. when this is combined with your determination and self-discipline, you can each any goal you set your mind to. )

moon - capricorn ( you show a lot of initiative. you are in it to win it. in fact, you might have a hard time kicking back and taking it easy. you do not want to feed into another’s beliefs about victimhood. you might experience issues of emotional detachment from other individuals, but this can prove very helpful; you can excel in things that require cold blood and seriousness. )

ascendant - aries ( you are athletic and active, highly energetic and capable of physical work. you are always ready to take initiative. self-reliance is learnt early in childhood. though you often have difficulties with your parents, especially the parent of the same sex. )

basically... his double capricorn aka his sense of maturity and seriousness, point to a very dutiful and hardworking nature... but, it also means that he had a lot of circumstances that forced him to grow up FAST. which, um, he did,,, in a sense. *points to his parents/his dad* we can blame them/him. HOWEVER, his aries rising/ascendant makes all that seriousness/logic tense af bc aries is like action/action/action... automatic response without thinking it through. so. that’s fun!!

alright so. the party and the pact. hm. mat’s in a very sticky situation with this whole thing and he still isn’t exactly sure how he feels ab it....but what’s done is done and there’s no going back now. of course he’s grieving in his own way, manon was still his little sister, but whew! seeing her like that really made him think of all the times they clashed/fought? like... yeah siblings fight okay but their different personalities/the clear difference in how their parents treated them, there was always a boiling point. no matter how quiet his negative emotions were, they were still there. sweet, naive manon... probably had no idea mathieu felt like this, because he just never fuckin talked ab it. and honestly, why would he?

in terms of what’s happening plot wise with the texts, etc, mat isn’t... okay he’s BOTHERED by them, but is he gonna let it show.... no. the fuck kinda question is tht...... he has enough to worry ab as is, keeping up with his courses and track and student council, not to mention his family and being the grieving brother,,, now someone’s sayin they KNOW what he helped do???? bye it’s not funny and he’s already exhausted. he’s v skeptical ab a lot of ppl in this so-called pact....but he knows most of them wouldn’t be out here tattling surely, when it’ll impact them just as much. *thinking emoji*

alright so idk what else to write atm like this is....Bad but. i tried okskjsk bye

#ps.intro #I WILL REPLY TO MESSAGES AND STARTERS LATER #aka it's 12 something AM.....i'm tired ;/// #super late to the party i k n ow whsoospsjhndjs

[prblynvr]

hey hey hey hey so like..... “great. perfect. nice. Fuck this” for the 5 word prompts??? eldonado preferably???? I loved ur last fic and like.......... angst please 💛💛

dretfgyui okay so i totally failed at angst, but have a kind of broken down version of this prompt! i wanted to try an exercise in recognizing jealousy in different ways and i sorta maybe did it? idk, but i hope you enjoy! read it here on ao3

feel free to send me more 5 word prompts!

It wasn’t very often- and there was usually a catalyst- but Sam realized that sometimes Peter was incredibly selfish.

It was never in an obvious ‘hoards wealth and resources from the less fortunate’ way, but rather in a utterly human and teenage way. And Sam knows he’s shouldn’t be one to scorn others- lest he become a complete hypocrite- but Peter has always been an oddball. So naturally, the ways his selfishness showed up wouldn’t be that of a Typical Teenager.

The first thing Sam noticed was that Peter was selfish with his time. He would turn down Sam for an after school hang out because he had a test the next day he needed to study for and No, Sam. You’ll just distract me so you can’t help me study. Even if he knew Sam had actually understood Macbeth, he still wouldn’t let him help.

He would spend time on what he wanted, feeding his drive to be successful at video making by losing countless hours of sleep over edits that don’t need to be done for days. He knew that he had to manage himself, and a lot of the time Sam felt like Peter was isolating himself because of it.

Next Sam noticed how selfish Peter was with his belongings- especially with others. He was selfish with his electronics- rarely letting people touch his laptop, phone, or camera. Sam was one of the few who had an all access pass to Peter’s stuff. Maybe it was part of the Gen Z/Millenial need for privacy in an extremely public era, but Peter seemed to take it up a notch. Sometimes, he would get huffy if Sam so much as turned the volume up when they were editing together, reaching around Peter to touch the keyboard himself.

Most important of all, Sam realized Peter was selfish with his feelings. His resting bitch face was widely known and those that interacted with him on a daily basis knew that Peter was not one to emote in blatant ways. Sure, he was defensive of his insecurities and could be provoked by outside sources, but his robot-esque exterior was hard to crack if the response wasn’t anger or rage. Peter hoarded his emotions and bottled them up tight, waiting for a day he could explode and blame it on something that happened, rather than deep seated repression and the hormonal imbalances of a 16 year old body.

It was one particular afternoon that Sam realized jealousy in Peter could be monstrous. In that moment, Sam thought Peter was being extremely unfair. He knew better than most what mood Peter was in at every given moment- it comes with the best friend territory- but he had rarely seen Peter like this, and never directed at Sam. There were targets of this sort of passive-aggression in the past, but Sam has never been on the receiving end. It seemed insane to Sam once he finally figured out what new emotion he was picking up  from Peter.

What would drive someone into an almost manic state, enough so that he would make an exposé on his best friend? Of course Sam understood the principle of the situation- evaluating your own bias- but why did he have to bring Gabi into this? Why did he have to act so smug when presenting the video, like he had placed the final piece of the puzzle that was Sam? Why did he have to smirk at Sam while he presented it, driving Sam up a wall in absolute frustration?

He’s jealous, Sam thought later that night. Not ‘he’s just jealous’- writing the interaction off as a petty emotion, but rather a full statement of truth. Sam had come to realize that something in Peter was deeply bothered by his friendship with Gabi. And now it was in the doc- for all to see and assume from.

And the kicker of it all was that Sam wasn’t in love with Gabi, not at all. He was in love with Peter.

Great.

—-

Eventually- meaning several days later after Peter reached the end of his rope and made a breakthrough on the video from Nana’s party- Sam and Peter were talking again. They were talking to each other about the case. About the dicks. And that was it. There was only one aborted apology between the two which helped ease them back into casual conversation, but the thrill of the mystery was a good jumping off point.

Then the mystery was over. The case had been finished, albeit not completely solved. Dylan had still proven to be an idiot, even though his friendly and sweet nature had grown on Sam, just not as much as it had grown on Peter. Netflix had swooped in and suddenly Peter and Sam were expected to be actual professionals who do things for their productions, rather than pass out after finally finishing edits at 3 A.M. and just posting the damn thing.

The Netflix party was swanky, if Sam’s standards were anything to go by. Sam had always assumed his first suit would have been for prom, yet here he was, summer between Sophomore and Junior year, decked out in formal wear. Peter was fidgeting next to him looking unfairly good. His suit wasn’t as fashionable as Sam’s, but it didn’t matter. Sam was attracted to Peter when he was awake in the middle of the night, decked in sweatpants and a whole day’s worth of face grease. So when Peter put in the effort, Sam’s heart beat just a little bit faster.

Peter kept biting his lip and it was driving Sam kind of crazy. His hair wasn’t flopping in his face like usual, courtesy of a small bit of product, his eyebrows were actually contained and his stupid long-

“…eyelashes.”

“Sorry, what?” Peter asked leaning into Sam’s space and asking loudly in his ear.

“What?” Sam replied.

Did I really say that outloud?

“You just said something but I missed it.”

“Oh, yeah I- just uhhh said…. uh…. there’s a lot of flashes.”

Good save.

“Yeah, there’s a lot of cameras here tonight.” Peter commented, leaning further into Sam. He slipped his arm over Sam’s shoulder as they continued their circuit around the room. “Are you okay? Not too nervous?”

“Oh, my dude,” Sam said jostling back into Peter, “I am living it up! Look at what we’ve created!”

“It’s crazy to think that 27 dicks could have done this.”

Sam laughed, leaning into Peter further.

Even if I can’t tell him, at least I still have this.

Although Sam was an extrovert who enjoyed meeting new people and being around many at once, tonight felt different. This wasn’t just a party, it was a professional party- one that seemed to drain him with every passing minute instead of fill him with excitement.

“I’m going to go get a drink,” Sam said slipping out of Peter’s arm. “Want anything?”

“No, I’m good. I’ll find you in a bit.”

Sam walked away, shooting Peter a set of finger guns accompanied by a grin before scooting towards the bar. The line wasn’t too long, but all he wanted at that moment was some water and a place to sit down. Sam was taking stock of the three people in front of him in line, patiently waiting to get refreshments as well, when he felt a tap on his shoulder.

“Excuse me? Are you Sam Ecklund?” A voice from behind him asked.

He turned his head and shoulders just enough to see a blonde, vaguely familiar girl. She was dressed as if she had a reason to be at the party and maybe she did. Sam only really knew Peter and a handful of the Netflix representatives there. Besides that, he had no idea what the guest list was.

“Oh, uh- yeah that’s me.” He said, finding her eyes. In a split second he schooled himself into standing up straighter and faking a little enthusiasm. The night had been incredibly long so far, but he and Peter had stayed up later.

Just half an hour, he promised himself, half an hour then you can probably convince Peter to leave.

“Oh, awesome! I just wanted to tell you how much I loved your work on the doc. Like Peter was always so serious but you really stole the show with the comedy aspect!”

“Yeah he seems that way, but Peter’s really just a big jokester too.” Sam said, feeling a little hurt that she would think insulting Peter would gain her favor with him.

“Hah okay, I mean sure, but you really did a great job. Like, without you I don’t think Peter would have ever solved the case.”

Some part of Sam agreed with her- he and Peter were a partnership. But there was something about the way she just kept dismissing Peter that almost pushed Sam over the edge. If he were in a cartoon, you would see his eye twitching in annoyance as this girl continued to talk.

“Nah, Pete’s brilliant. He could have gotten it himself- eventually.”

The girl laughed loudly and brightly, like Sam had said some hysterical joke rather than just a plain comment. Her hand came to rest on his elbow as she continued to giggle. His insides were suddenly knotting up as his eyes flit around the room. Finally, they landed on Peter, who was milling about on his own.

“You’re too funny Sam. Guys with humor are so attractive. Like, there’s just something about you that’s drawing me in. Y’know?”

Peter still wasn’t looking at him so Sam looked back at the girl. The line moved and Sam was able to politely shrug off her hand as he stepped forward. Instead of taking the hint, she simply stepped closer.

“Uh…,” he said, eyes moving and finally connecting with Peter. He widened his eyes and put on a nervous smile. He hoped Peter would come over and interrupt the conversation with some emergency so he could make a quick get away, or at least text him a meme to cheer him up. The line moved again, causing him to have to look away from Peter for a moment

“So, what are your plans for the rest of the night,” she pressed. He stepped further away. “Any cool after party or fun events a girl looking for a good time should know about?”

Saying ‘falling asleep in the same room as my best friend/crush’ probably wasn’t the best way to respond to her question and Sam was a bit stuck.

“Well-”

“Hey Sammy! Thanks for holding our spot.” Suddenly Peter was right next to him, sliding into the space between this girl and Sam.

“Perfect timing.” Sam hoped Peter could feel the waves of gratitude he was trying to beam straight into his psyche.

“Yeah, I forgot to ask for a water before you left. I don’t think I should be having anymore caffeine tonight.” He joked. Sam took a moment to study Peter’s face as a smile carefully graced his lips. It was a publicity smile, one Sam knew he practiced in the mirror as to not look like a murderer when he was in the press. It was one Peter used when trying to be polite without offending anyone.

But, his eyes were crinkled just slightly- something Peter’s public smile never had. That was a private smile, one reserved for his mother or for when he discovered a clue he had been trying to track for days. It was a movement that happened only in the close vicinity to those he trusted. It was just another thing Sam loved about Peter.

“Hi.” A voice cut in- and just like that, Sam’s internal monologue that was about to categorize everything about Peter that drove him crazy was cut short.

“Oh sorry,” Peter said, extending his hand to the girl, “Peter Maldonado.”

“Pleasure,” she said, quickly shaking his hand before stepping back. Sam slung his arm around Peter’s shoulder as he dropped her hand.

“My friend here was just asking about if I knew of any good after parties.” Sam said. “I didn’t quite know how to tell her our boring plans for the night.”

“Well, you are the stars of the show tonight,” she laughed, “And my name is Allison. Allison Keller. But you can call me Alli.” She scooted away from Peter and seemed to gravitate back towards Sam.

“Well Allison, we’d love to help you,” Peter said. Sam watched Allison’s face flit through a range of emotions before landing on a passive smile. “But Sam and I have to get ready for an early flight tomorrow so we’re going to head out soon anyway.”

Suddenly it was their turn at the bar. Peter turned them around enough to ask for two waters before slipping his arm around Sam’s waist and whispering in Sam’s ear, “You okay to leave now?”

Please don’t be blushing right now. Please don’t be blushing right now. Please don’t be blushing right now.

Sam grabbed the two water bottles before turning back to Allison to say, “It was great talking to you but we’re going to head out. Enjoy the rest of your night!”

They walked away without waiting for a response. Sam dropped his arm from Peter’s shoulder, but Peter’s stayed put around his waist until they were near the door. Once they were clear of the room, Peter finally dropped his arm. They chatted a bit about the party as they left and made their way back to their hotel for the night, but not about Allison. Sam wasn’t sure if Peter wanted to avoid the topic all together and didn’t want to be the one to bring it up.

Peter’s mom was in the adjoining room to theirs as they made their way in.

“Hi boys, how was the rest of the event?”

“It was great, Mom,” Peter said, poking his head through the door to her room.

“Yeah, it was crazy how many people were there,” Sam added, shucking off his tie and jacket as he moved into the room.

“Any crazy things happen after I left?”

“No-”

“Sammy got hit on by some girl.”

“Hey! Why is that so crazy?” Sam responded as he heard Ms. Maldonado’s laughter coming from the other room.

“Not crazy that it happened, Sam,” she said, “Peter, be nice.”

“Yeah Pete, be nice,” Sam joked knocking Peter through the doorway. “I’m a catch, dontcha know?”

Peter laughed small but bright. His polite public smile was shed for a real one, lips slightly turned up as he giggled. His eyes were locked with Sam’s as they stood in the doorway, each leaning against the opposite jam. Peter’s nose crinkled for a second as he used it to move his glasses up his face. Sam’s traitorous heart began beating way too fast.

“Well, I think I’m going to turn in. I am beat! Night, Ms. Maldonado.” He finally turned away from Peter to look at his mother. He waved at her as she said “Good night!”

Sam bumped Peter again on his way back into their room, the contact sending a spark through his shoulder. Peter walked all the way into his mom’s room as Sam went about changing into his pajamas. By the time Sam was ready for bed and back out into the room, Peter had changed and was lounging on his bed. The door between the two rooms was shut, leaving Peter and Sam alone again. Sam turned off the lights flopped down on his own bed. The TV softly hummed in the background, casting Peter in soft light as he turned and faced Peter.

“Thanks for doing that, by the way,” Sam said, “That girl was driving me up the wall.”

“Yeah, of course dude.”

Sam laughed. “Like usually I’m okay with talking to girls, but she was just terrible! I didn’t expect you to get so… possessive though. She probably thinks we’re like dating now.” Sam’s brain to mouth filter had apparently taken an eternal holiday, since it would have never let him actually turn his honest to god feelings into the butt of his own joke. An intense sense of dread sent a rock to the bottom of his stomach as he clenched his jaw.

Luckily, Peter just laughed. “Yeah, well, she was getting a little too friendly with you.” The end of his sentence was more of a mumble than anything.

Sam hadn’t missed it, but being one never to let Peter off the hook he said, “What did you say? I couldn’t hear you.”

Peter huffed before he spoke, “I mean, she was touching your arm and being all… I don’t know. It’s dumb.” He rolled back over facing away from Sam.

“Dude, it’s not dumb. She wasn’t even being very nice about you so I don’t know why you’d be nice about her.”

“What do you mean?”

“She was all, ‘Oh Sam, you’re so funny. You’re way better than Peter!’” He could feel Peter rolling his eyes from across the room.

“Yeah, okay whatever, I get it. You didn’t need me.” Peter pulled the blanket more over himself and turned onto his back.

“Hey,” Sam called out, “I’m serious. She tried to compliment me by insulting you. Like, what kind of plan is that? You’re my best friend. Bros before hoes, dude.”

“Aww, dude.”

“And I thanked you for your help. I was too tired to come up with an excuse. So like, if you were jealous of her you have no reason to be.”

Just the thought of Peter being jealous over some girl drove Sam a bit wild. But Peter just hummed in response and the conversation was over. It hadn’t gone perfectly, but things rarely did with Peter. Sam had said his piece, and maybe Peter believed him, maybe he didn’t. But Sam knew that Peter had been jealous. He knew that even if Peter didn’t reciprocate his exact feelings, he was still feeling strongly enough to react so fiercely. He even pulled out his press smile just to help Sam out of a sticky situation.

So it wasn’t perfect, but Sam thought it was nice.

Perfect. Nice. What’s the difference?

—

Sam had been content to let it sit. He had been fine with Peter and him living out their lives as film partners/best friends until they retired rich and powerful. All throughout their second season, living with Peter was driving him wild. They weren’t just some weird sort of hometown heroes anymore, they were certifiable documentarians, and with that came a very different sense of self.

They had been out of practice for almost 2 years. The schedule and filming and equipment were different, but when they lights went out, it was just Peter, Sam, and their subject. Watching Peter light up the room and run down an interview like it was a sneaky interrogation drove a spike in Sam’s resolve. It had been a long time since he realized his feelings for Peter. It had been a long time since he realized that maybe- just maybe- there was a chance Peter liked him back. So why was he so scared?

It all came to a head one night when planning for the next day’s shoot. They were going to return to St. Bernardine’s the next day to do some more interviews of the students there and finish out the afternoon by returning to Kevin’s. It was going to be a typical shooting day, nothing out of the ordinary - if you think documenting poop crimes wasn’t out of the ordinary.

They had mapped out their route, let the crew know of the plan, then gotten ready to eat. So far, they had mostly made it on pre-cooked meals or take out, but tonight was different. Tonight, Peter Maldonado decided he was going to cook dinner. For Sam. (Well, for them both, but it was only them.)

Oh fuck.

Sam caught a glimpse of him in the kitchen, stirring something on the stove as he listened to a podcast playing from his phone. He had told Sam he was going to cook, which recently meant either Ramen, Kraft Mac & Cheese, or frozen chicken nuggets, but tonight meant some pasta dish that wasn’t recognizable. Peter was cooking chicken in one pan while boiling pasta in a pot.

“What’s this?” Sam asked from where he was lurking in the doorway.

Peter jumped a bit before turning to meet Sam’s eye, “I was tired of the packaged stuff and asked my mom for some suggestions.”

Sam smiled at him before asking, “Need any help?” He was quickly swept up in Peter’s instructions to cut up some vegetables to be cooked after the chicken. They carefully moved around each other as they prepared the meal, commenting on the podcast playing as they went, and in what felt like no time at all, they were done. Sam moved to plate the pasta and set it on the counter by Peter who then added the sauce, chicken, and vegetables. It was all extremely domestic, and far too much for Sam’s traitorous brain to handle.

‘What if-’s began flooding his mind with unplanned scenarios of a life he didn’t feel like could ever truly be his. Lives unattainable, yet so powerful to him, he was jealous over his fictional self for living them.

What if we were already dating and I could grab his hand right now as we ate? What if we lived together and cooked dinner together every night? What if the documentary never happened? What if I never talked to him that first day in middle school?

With every question he would imagine a scenario with the same ending. He and Peter would still be together, still a dynamic duo that could accomplish anything. They would spend as much time together and were dedicated to each other. The journey would be different, but the ending the same.

What if I told him?

The last one stuck with Sam the most. In all seriousness, he wasn’t sure the answer to the question, and he couldn’t exactly predict what Peter’s response would be, but he was falling deeper down the rabbit hole trying to be realistic. All through dinner, Sam’s mind kept wandering to how that night could go. How maybe he could just grab Peter’s hand and tell him. Maybe he could. Maybe.

They finished up and began cleaning- back to domestic chores. Peter collected the dishes as Sam rolled up his sleeves to get to work scrubbing the pots and pans used. As he finished, Peter moved to taking them from Sam and drying them off. Sam had two more pots to go and his heart was beating- hungry for some sort of emotional resolution.

Fuck this.

“Hey Pete?”

He hummed a response.

“I…” Sam lost his resolve. He had been so ready to finally come clean, but this wasn’t a fantasy. This was real life and once he said his piece, there was no going back.

Then Peter’s eyes met his and he asked, “What’s up, Sammy?”

“I like you, Peter. Like, in a more than friends way- and not a ‘bro, I like you, no homo’ like- I mean- a full homo- a full homo way.” The words tumbled out of his mouth and he watched as Peter’s expression turned from something soft and open, to something charged.

His eyes squinted just a bit as his mouth opened ever so slightly. Sam waited for Peter to respond, to say something- anything - but he didn’t. All Peter did was set down the pot he was drying off, wipe his hands on his jeans, push his glasses up his face, and kiss Sam in one swift movement.

Wait - what?

He had missed slightly, lips landing closer to the corner of Sam’s mouth rather than square on, but with his mouth came his hands. They cradled Sam’s face, adjusting the angle so that they met perfectly this time. Sam’s brain finally caught up to the situation, causing him to drop the pan into the sink and splash them both with soapy water.

His hands clutched at Peter’s waist as he responded in full. They pulled back a second later, wet and soapy. Peter’s shirt has wet splotches and wrinkles where Sam’s hands had been, as well as an assortment of other spots resulting from Sam’s poor reflexes.

“So… like…do you-”

“I full homo you too, Sammy.” Peter said, laughing his way through the end.

Sam just smiled back and pulled him in again - wet shirt and dished be damned.

#eldonado #american vandal #my writing #sam ecklund #peter maldonado #grasslandgirl #AV fic

[angeltriestoblog]

Second sem (and freshman year) recap

It’s pretty hard to believe, but another chapter of my college journey is finally over and done with. Since I had ended the first half of the school year in such high spirits, I didn’t really believe upperclassmen when they warned that things were only going to get harder from there. In fact, I even thought I’d be the one to prove them wrong! I mean, with a class schedule that looked like this, how would I run out of time for all the things I both needed and wanted to do? My Tuesdays and Thursdays were practically free, save for that one Math class I had to attend in the morning that I surprisingly never cut.

For the most part of the semester, I was in a chill state compared to everyone else. I claimed that I had successfully adjusted to the demands of higher education to the point where I found what once was an unreasonable workload to be manageable. I was able to make time for my home org’s activities and devote enough attention to the only project I was deployed to, which I touched on a bit in my first recap blog post (linked here in case you want to jog your memory). As previously mentioned, I was assigned as one of the Documentations Heads under the Information Management department of the Career Building Program, a three-phase event that gives its participants a glimpse into the corporate world. We kicked things off with a resume writing workshop that I was lucky enough to join. The facilitator assigned to me gave useful insights that I was able to apply in the creation of my own curriculum vitae, which I am keen on using when it’s my turn to apply for internships and jobs in the future. I obviously don’t have much on it yet, seeing as I’m just a freshman, but the idea of filling it up with more experiences over the years is exciting me in ways I cannot explain.

Our group was even given the opportunity to explore the studio of the country’s biggest network, where we were briefed by executives in communications and IT and toured around the sets of our favorite shows. We even ran into Luis Manzano while he was filming Minute to Win It! Unfortunately, I wasn’t scouted by any representative from Star Magic and spontaneously put in a love team with Donny Pangilinan, but I guess that’s alright.

I also went to Talent Night with some friends (not in pictures: Gela's boyfriend and ICA barkada), which is shocking since I’m honestly not the type to attend parties like this. I’ve always been the girl who stayed home and binge watched YouTube videos on a Friday night. But, I guess the drunk confidence of those I was with rubbed off on me and I managed to pull through! It was also a plus that Timmy Albert was one of the performers: I do pass him by along the corridors quite frequently, but it’s just different seeing him sing and play an instrument in front of a crowd, especially since I’ve loved Roses and Sunflowers even before I got into Ateneo.

One surprise that I definitely did not see coming was participating in Daloy, our annual program that revolves around corporate social responsibility. This year, we decided to shed a light on how this could be seen in the Philippine clothing industry, so it seemed fitting to hold some talks featuring prominent figures in this field, as well as a fashion show to exhibit the collections of local brands that advocated sustainability. I was really interested in the concept when I first heard of it, and initially wanted to go as a mere audience member - little did I know that I would be tapped by the committee to model! To this day, I don’t know how or why I was chosen: from what I know, there were even screenings held a week prior to the event to determine who would get to walk the runway. But, I was messaged three days before and in that short span of time, I had to fit clothes, find pieces in my closet to match them and perfect my walk (which took several tries on my part, given the fact that when shy, I’m stiff as a board).

Agreeing to join was a huge step out of my comfort zone - the closest I’ve ever come to strutting on a catwalk was back when family members would ask me to “walk like a fashion model” as a kid during reunions. So, the fact that it had all paid off in the end, and that I was even complimented for the way I looked and performed beyond what was probably expected, was definitely a huge confidence boost for me. I couldn’t have done it without Nelly, Daloy’s project head who patiently guided me through the entire process before the show.

Shoutout as well to the other ACTM upperclassmen who were so friendly to me this school year. We may not have any pictures together, but you deserve a spot on this post nevertheless: Gella, my "boss" (hehe) who was always so patient when I asked questions and even went out of her way to say such kind words about my writing; Sam Que who made me feel like we had already known each other for so long even if we had just talked for the first time, and Ysagab who constantly reassured me that I was doing a good job even if I was looking like such a rookie.

My presence in events wasn’t limited to those of ACTM, though. I also went to the Loyola Film Circle’s Under the Stars, where I was able to see the live performances of OPM acts and watch one of my favorite chick flicks beneath the beautiful night sky. Since it took place the day after Valentine’s, I was surrounded by Ateneans and their significant others (who didn’t hold back at all when it came to publicly displaying their affection), but I didn’t even mind since I was content in the company of both my college constants and high school friends.

I dropped by Sulyap as well, which was the culminating activity of the Ateneo Heights Writers Workshop and the launch of the chapbook of their fellows. It was one of the busiest Fridays of the school year, but I still made it a point to go, because I wasn’t about to pass up the opportunity to be a part of something organized by my dream org, Ateneo’s premier literary publication. As much as I love my course and the people in it, I have to admit that I haven’t been able to exercise much of my creative side. So being in a room full of like-minded individuals and hearing them speak lengthily about their works and the process that brought them to life was a refreshing experience, a much-needed break from the usual routine. My personal favorite was Unica Hijas by Mikaela Regis, which revolved around a lesbian couple trying to make their relationship work despite the fact that they study in a conservative, all-girls high school - a setting which is all too familliar to me.

It’s also worth noting that I was sorta able to tick a particular item off my freshman year bucket list. And I say sorta, because… well, you’ll see. It’s been a dream of mine ever since to watch a UAAP basketball game live, show up to the arena in a bright blue shirt, cheer as loud as I can when a player makes a point and raise my fist in the air while Song for Mary plays in the background. But, even if I’m consistently in school by 6am, I was never able to get tickets - I couldn’t match the efforts of some fans, who would camp overnight just to get their hands on them. But, just when I thought there was no more chance for me to show my school pride at a match, my friend Mika offered me a free ticket to the Ateneo Lady Eagles’ volleyball match against FEU at the Filoil Arena one Wednesday. We weren’t really on speaking terms before because we were from different cliques, but after bonding over K-Pop, I saw how nice and chill of a person she actually is. So, I didn’t want to turn her down even if I was hesitant to go at first. You see, I was never a fan - in fact, I didn’t know how the game went despite the PE lessons I had back in Grade 5. (Ms. Abella, if you see this, I’m sorry.) But, it didn’t take a lot of convincing for me to agree and I ended up enjoying way more than I thought I would. Fortunately, I was able to catch on when it came to the rules of the sport: the energy of the crowd was contagious as well, and the performance of the players was way too good it was impossible not to shout either out of triumph or frustration. Once we made it to the finals against UST, I even found myself waiting for announcements on where to buy tickets. I didn’t get any though, because they were either sold out due to the ever-increasing demand (ALE fans don’t play around) or there was a conflict in schedule (hi, Enlit play).

Despite this, I streamed the last game and screamed like I was actually in the venue myself. Apologies to all our neighbors, who probably thought someone was getting killed in the house beside theirs. I was so proud when they brought home the championship after three years, I even bought a Team Ateneo shirt (it’s not that hard to guess whose name is on the back) and went to the bonfire with my friends Gwen, Julia and Lou. I had hoped to meet and take a picture with the players, but they were already far too wasted when I arrived. Like, seriously. I saw Maddie Madayag chug a whole bottle of Mule right before my eyes.

So, you could say that it was all fun and games (quite literally) for me until hell weeks eventually rolled in. Plural form intended. I found out that all my professors were just holding back every major requirement until the very last stretch of the semester. Suddenly, my schedule was chock full of presentations and final papers, comprehensive exams and extra classes that put my time management and endurance to the test. I spent many days in Matteo Down just like before, but also started going to the floor above it in case I wanted to suffer in the company of more people. The studying would only continue once I got home: I’d pull all-nighters despite my brain’s and skin’s desperate cries for help, as manifested in my worsening acne. I don’t think I’ve ever felt that stressed in my life, and it’s scary to think that that’s only the tip of the iceberg in the Ateneo.

Coping mechanisms I’ve picked up to help me deal with these unavoidable circumstances would be trying every restaurant along the Katipunan area whenever I had free time (which I will elaborate on more extensively in another blog post, so do watch out for that!) and eventually discovering Pancake House’s corned beef hash, which I love so much I once had it thrice in the span of a week. Another one would be the addition of yet another emotional support K-Pop boy to my collection. After watching My ID is Gangnam Beauty over Holy Week break, I fell in love with Cha Eunwoo and his god-tier visuals, mild demeanor, impressive English skills and heartfelt determination. This led me to binge watching reality show episodes and furiously putting the entire discography of Astro on loop. If you look at my Last.fm, you could see how Crazy Sexy Cool easily climbed to the top of my most played songs, sitting prettily at the #1 spot with over 300 plays in just a little over two months.

Although I constantly had to bear the pressure and stress on my shoulders over the past academic year, I am eternally grateful to Ateneo for equipping me with lessons both within and beyond the realm of academics that have helped me grow into someone I never imagined, but am happy to have turned into anyway. When my naive and starry-eyed self first entered college, I had such high hopes for what my experience would be and proceeded to map out the next four years of my life in accordance with the vision I had in my head. Having just broken free from the metaphorical chains of my previous school, I found it to be the perfect time to transform into a student who excelled academically, had a long and winding list of extracurricular activities and easily built a vast network of connections thanks to her pleasing and magnetic personality. If I got lucky, maybe I’d have one of those so-called “college blooms” and even get myself an actual boyfriend!

This isn’t something unique to me, I bet a lot of people entered this new stage of their lives with the same mindset so I wasn’t the only one in shock upon realizing that it doesn’t always play out that way in real life. Because of these ridiculous expectations we have implanted in our heads, that basically state that we have to be successful in everything we do and fast, we subconsciously keep ourselves from enjoying the process. In our desire to aim high and aspire for perfection in all that we do, we could end up failing to acknowledge the small yet equally important wins we gain along the way: the friend we make outside of our block despite the sheer discomfort we experience in meeting new people, or the answer we gave in class that impressed our most intimidating professor could appear minuscule when placed beside our goal of being straight-A student who’s active in seven orgs. In addition, we deprive ourselves of the allowance to make mistakes, stray from taking the detours and breaks we need to remain functional human beings and often drive ourselves to the point of fatigue and burnout. And when we are still not flourishing and thriving as planned, we fall prey to toxic comparison: we pit ourselves against others who don’t have the same background or circumstances as we do and question why our progress doesn’t match with theirs.

This is obviously such a toxic way to go about things. Talk about sucking the fun out of what’s supposed to be the four most enjoyable years of our lives. Thankfully, over time, I did some growing up, if you will, and channeled the power of acceptance - both of what I am and what I am not, and the will of God (or whichever supreme being you've placed your faith in) who meticulously planned out what’s ahead of me before I was even old enough to know what school was. I now work to the best of my ability, confident that all I have to do is put in my share of the hard work and see where it takes me, and am also more gentle with myself when I make mistakes.

On a somewhat lighter note, I’ve also been able to form my own opinions about very controversial issues on campus: an example of which would be what I think is the best CR - the answer is definitely Arete. You can’t go wrong with its triple killer combo of aircon, bidet and strong WiFi connection. The only possible downside could be the fact that there are usually a lot of people, so it’s not the best option if you’re planning on being loud and… um, smelly. The secluded and fragrant Leong Hall and ever-reliable New Lib restrooms come in second and third place respectively, while honorable mentions include the 2F Kostka CR (but only from 6:00-7:00am, when no one else is around) and this one specific stall in the Socsci building that's spacious enough that I can bring all my belongings inside with me.

Another point for discussion would be the superior place to eat on school grounds: this might cause an uproar, I’m aware, but I still believe it’s JSEC, despite the stark price difference compared to other cafeterias on campus. I was set on trying something from every stall before the school year ended, but I was too fixated on my top picks: I don’t have any regrets though. In fact, I wish I had more of the beef salpicao with calamares on the side from Casa Paella, the Superbowl from Blendabowls and The Coop fries with garlic aioli served on the side. Besides the fact that the food served is satisfying beyond measure, I enjoy the chit-chats I have with the ates and kuyas manning the stalls, who never fail to ask me how I am and tell me about the cute chinito boys they see on campus that they think I might like.

Although I can’t completely rule out Gonzaga, because of this particular stall with quality liempo and a kuya who always gives me a five peso discount. (I’ve been told he does this with girls he finds cute, but I have yet to confirm that). Also, it’s the only place on campus that I know of that sells fresh fruits by the kilo - perfect for those days when I try to convince myself to go on a diet before I relapse and binge eat at Pancake House.

A lot of people do say that ISO sisig is worth the cross-campus walk it’ll take to get there (e-jeep rides are more recommended! An experience in itself! Especially if you’re seated in the back, where there’s a constant feeling of being sucked in a vacuum! But, I digress) - it might just be a matter of preference, but I think it’s overrated. A destination that deserves more attention is the Cervini Hall cafeteria just by the university dormitories. I’ve only been there a grand total of two times so I don’t exactly have any specific favorites on the menu that I recommend, but I’d definitely still go for the homey ambience.

As for superior study places, Matteo Down has been tried and tested several times: I do prefer getting a place opposite to the entrance though, because it does get distracting having to see people enter and go out the door so often. What was supposed to be a study session often ends up becoming a game to see how many people are wearing a striped shirt today. I usually spend time on the fourth floor of the Rizal Library, and get the couch as often as I can because of the comfort (and charger) it provides.

Of course, I wouldn’t have been able to power through this year without the help of my closest friends: Sevi, Gwen, Raya and Christine. I always had this nagging fear in the back of my head that I wouldn’t be able to find a tight-knit group once I got to college, but thank you for proving me wrong. Thank you for letting me be my true self, for entertaining even my most random thoughts and for accepting all the kalat that comes with being my friend. I sincerely hope that we stay together and have more Gino’s dates in the future along with Chloe!

To Gela, Jill, Shar (and Dom, but we don’t have any pictures together except for the last one HAHAHA) - I didn’t expect at all that I’d be writing about you guys. I was so intimidated by all of you at first, because I felt like we were so different in terms of our upbringing and environment. But after getting to know you, I came to realize that you are seriously some of the most down-to-earth, chill people ever. Thank you for always providing quality chismis, volunteering to find me chinito boys to date and giving me apps to make my IG stories look cuter.

To the rest of X1, we weren’t exactly the most united and we knew that - it’s just that we were probably the most diverse out of all the groups in our batch, and with that comes clashing personalities and differing opinions and interests. But, nevertheless, I am content with the time we managed to spend together, where I was able to get to know all of you!

To the friends that I made outside of my block (and even my course), thank you for laughing at my jokes and telling me that I'm fun to talk to. Hopefully, we get to hang out more and maybe even have common classes in the future hehe

To my Enlit section, we barely spoke to one another during the first semester so I fell under the impression that you were all stoic and no fun to be with. But, I was proven wrong eventually. I wish I was able to talk to more people in LL, but to the classmates I was closest to (Dootie, Cyrah, Czarina, She and Jessa), I will never forget our side comments and mini-rant sessions. I heard we’re having another English subject come sophomore year, and I really hope I end up with you guys again.

All in all, there is no other word that could sum up the experience that was my freshman year in college better than “adventure”. It was every single emotion on the spectrum All At Once, but I wouldn’t trade it for the world - in fact, during the first half of the semester, I admit that I’d entertain thoughts of alternate universes where I’d be an Iska/Lasallista/Tomasino out of sheer curiosity, but now I just can’t imagine myself anywhere else. Anyway, enough with all that drama. I’m going back to school in three weeks to start my summer term, which we fondly (lmao) refer to as intersession. So, there’s technically nothing to miss.

Hope the rest of you enjoy the summer break that I unfortunately will not be able to experience until I graduate from college! Wishing you nothing but love and light, always.

Angel

#life update #angeltriestoblog #life dump #angel crawled her way thru freshman year!!!! #COULD U BELIEVE #angel is now a sophomore #that's disgusting

[messrsmemoirs]

What do you think Remus was doing before going to teach at Hogwarts? Or if you answered that already, what do you think his feelings were on teaching? Do you think he ever had a dream job?

Before teaching at Hogwarts, I think Remus spent a lot of years sort of lost, and drifting.  Both physically, being sort of out of work more often than not, but also emotionally. Remus had to really figure out who he was now that his entire world had sort of dissolved beneath him. Not only had he lost his friends, who were more than likely his entire social circle and formed part of his identity, but without Voldemort there was no need for the Order, either. There was no need to band together, no need to stay together after the war. So Remus had war brothers and sisters, but they weren’t close like the real thing or like his friends. And without the Order, Remus didn’t even have a purpose, or in the most basic sense, a job to do. Remus woke up the morning of November 1 1981 and he had basically become redundant and suddenly very, very alone.

What happens to people when they come home from war? From what I understand, there is this very strange feeling of familiarity that is somehow not familiar whatsoever. Once the celebrations had died down, Remus would have been left in what probably felt like a strange parallel universe: everything is the same, like Diagon Alley, Hogwarts, wizarding society... People say hello, the food still tastes like it used to, and familiar comforts like cups of tea are always there. Hell, the cup he left by the sink is still there, in the same spot. Only now, it’s like Remus can’t ever imagine living that life even though he has all the memories testifying to it’s existence. And there’s this gaping, aching whole of wrongness right about where the other cups in the sink are, with ghosts in the residue of tea at the bottom that were drunk by people who don’t exist. Not anymore. I think the first year Remus spent by himself he didn’t actually do much at all except survive.

Now I do of course like to imagine that he had some help. I really don’t think someone like Mother Hen McGonagall would have let Remus just wander off into the shadows. She knew what his bond with his friends was like. She knew that he’d effectively lost it all, etc. And I think she would have done what she could to check in from time to time, but there’s also a certain professional boundary between her and a former student that I don’t think is really let go until Remus himself becomes her colleague, so I think it was largely letters and maybe some surprise appearances of a Tabby cat with spectacles over for tea when she didn’t hear back from him. Someone like Moody would have... well, not checked in, I suppose, because Moody is an Auror and he’s, you know, Moody. But I think Moody would have invited him to do some odd jobs with him, or recommended him to others needing some work done. Moody isn’t going to hug Remus and tell him it’s okay, but Moody will certainly let Remus pick up his wand and fight the depression away with some exercise--and hey, if bad guys go down, that’s just a plus, right? Wink, wink. Maybe Hagrid kept in touch from time to time, running errands for Dumbledore, who would also have been keeping tabs on Remus I think because he’s not a heartless bastard like fanon tells him to be, and I think he did care for Remus on some level.

But we have to remember that Remus is also this very proud sort of fellow, and after he had gotten over the worst of his depression and stood up on his own two feet once again, he wanted people to think he had it under control. So those contacts would have died down, and then Remus would of course have had to move out of wherever he had been living once the last of his money from James had been used up and he didn’t have work enough to keep his place. Now, depending on whether you think of Lyall as having been alive, Remus could have moved back in with him for a time before deciding that he didn’t want to be a burden on his family. Again, this is the pride talking, but there are also still Death Eaters out there in the world. Death Eaters who may still do terrible things like what happened with the Longbottoms, even though the war is over. If they know who Remus is, and they probably do, Remus is always at risk. He may also not want to stay with family for that reason.

Now as far as things he could actually have done over the years, I think we’re looking at a selection of odd jobs and actual, open homelessness.

What are the sorts of jobs available to a werewolf? Remus has not been publicly outed yet, and so he can maintain some work for a time if his absences don’t become noticeable as a pattern. I do think Remus would have shown up for work the morning after spending the night eating himself alive, though, if he felt he had to. Look at PoA: obviously the timing was poor, and of course there’s the whole “dementors are going to search the train and it’s practical to have Remus there for chocolate remedy slash plot reasons”, but he still would have been pretty much dead to the world at Hogwarts. And there’s no way of knowing whether his absences from teaching were his own choice (given that he’s actually doing much better since he’s in control under the effects of Wolfsbane) or maybe Madam Pomfrey drop-kicking his stubborn ass into bed where it belongs, but either way, Hogwarts was our only window into his career life, and Remus is shown taking breaks after full moon and it’s something that was subsequently noticed by Hermione, a 13-year-old girl. Now suppose there’s a 50-year-old witch or wizard with a business and a family who has a prejudice against werewolves, and how far do you think Remus could make it disappearing at the worst possible time? And even if he didn’t, he does sorta look like he gets hit by a truck every month or so, like suspicious clockwork.

Suffice it to say that legitimate, over-the-table work is not going to be very reliable for Remus. Unfortunately, he’s much more likely to get a job where people don’t ask questions, and those jobs are the less reputable sort. Smuggling illegal dragons eggs, or cursed artifacts--things that someone like an expert in the dark arts could handle. Maybe grunt work like the shipping industry where trolls do the heavy lifting but there’s paperwork to be filed and boxes to be packed, and how else are we supposed to get things like the Monster Book of Monsters to the book store? Wear some gloves. This also leaves Remus open to possible blackmail: “I’ll keep you on, but if you cross me I’ll send the Capture Unit after you.” (Of course, Remus isn’t stupid, and he’d reply, “And I’ll be sure to tell them the names of all your associates and your business partners,” etc. So it’s a careful dance.) And it makes him unintentionally part of the stereotype of werewolves as criminals, because even if all he wants to do is live his life and eat supper once a week or so, he’s doing work that society considers bad and if he’s caught all the responsibility is on him.

There’s also the potential that he worked outside of the wizarding world, too. Muggles don’t have the same knowledge of werewolves; they don’t openly fear them so much as they have this ghost of a fear that’s now a fun Halloween costume. Nobody’s going to actually believe that Remus J Lupin is a very real werewolf in modern day England, ha! So why not get a job as a cashier, or as a bookstore clerk, or a stock worker? It pays. Though I realize as I type it that there’s of course the problems with exchange: is one pound worth half as much in sickles or knuts? Could Remus work full time at Aldi and still barely make enough to eat? Surely there was an economic boom for wizards following the decline of Voldemort, but what about England as a whole? Did the exchange rate sort of stay comfortable close, etc? We just don’t know if it was really feasible for Remus to live as a wizard and work as a Muggle, so maybe he worked and lived as a Muggle.

Between those periods, though, I think Remus was not fortunate enough to avoid homelessness. I think he would have lived in a colony at least once, even if he hated it, simply because they had resources he needed at the time. He would have left ASAP, of course, but still. I expect he would have learned to keep himself clean and trim in the sink of a public bathroom, washing himself in the cold with some rough spells meant for tougher work that actually sting a bit but at least he’s clean afterwords. I think he probably learned to sleep on the Tube, maybe riding it back and forth a few ways until he woke up and was kicked off or felt people staring. And I think he did his best to appear in control at all times, even if he never felt like he was and would actually refuse help if it was offered.

I do have some thoughts on what his dream job could have been as well, and I’ll add that onto this ask since it’s relevant.

I do think Remus wanted to teach. In a perfect world, I think he could have gotten the job early and even earned himself a nice pension. But I think Remus realized from his time as a Prefect (or even tutoring other students) that he had a knack for it, and that he really enjoyed helping others learn. I headcanon that the briefcase he had with the peeling letters was a gift from the Marauders, so that he could have it for his first day on the job. And, he did have it, didn’t he? (*sad little sigh*)

Anyway, I have these other headanons that Remus grew up knowing how to speak Welsh since Hope was Welsh and Lyall met her in Cardiff. I imagine that Remus lived in Wales for his early life, and that they moved around a lot but tended to be in Wales for a while before eventually settling in rural England (i.e. a certain cottage in Yorkshire we may all be familiar with). And about this time in the eighties, Wales was getting it’s language back, so to speak. It was historically beaten out of the speakers, literally. And around this time, the government of Wales was actually beginning to put up bilingual street signs, and Welsh schools were popping up. I play with the idea sometimes of him having an apprenticeship or something at one of the newer schools who would have needed a fluent speaker. You never know, right? Honestly, the things that happen in life...

Anyway, I can always think up some specifics if that’s what you’re looking for but I hope this sort of covers most of your questions!

#remus lupin #the dark years #text #Anonymous

[jmsebastian]

Dragon's Dogma, Open World Gaming, and a Fool’s Errand

Open world games just really aren’t for me. This is something I started to finally realize during my playthrough of Breath of the Wild. Tying the do-what-you-feel approach to a series I’ve enjoyed as much as Zelda seems like it would be the magic formula to allow me to finally understand the major appeal of these types of games. Sadly, that did not happen. It was an enjoyable enough experience thanks to its leanings on classic Zelda mechanics and some more modern action game tropes, but I just did not care very much about exploring the world at large. Unlike games such as Skyrim, which have huge worlds filled mostly with empty landscapes, at least Breath of the Wild had stuff in it. There were tons of people, lots of collecty things to pick up for obligatory crafting, horses that still can’t compare to Shadow of the Colossus’ Agro more than a decade later. I cared about none of it. Everything I did in that game was with the singular purpose of beating it so I could say I did. I should have learned my lesson.

Fast forward several months and I’d begun to itch for a new fantasy adventure. There are more types of these games than I could ever play, so there was some care taken to ensure that I chose wisely. Reviews, game play samples, wiki entries all helped lead me to choose that next game. That’s why Dragon’s Dogma: Dark Arisen now takes up a substantial amount of space on my hard drive. On the surface, it was exactly what I was looking for. You can customize your character to a large degree. It has fantastic animations that feel responsive without being finicky or making the combat too easy. There’s still weight to your actions, so you can’t Bayonetta your way out of trouble or anything, but it is much faster than the From Software games of the world. So, perfect then. Fantasy hole filled.

Dragon’s Dogma is an open world done very poorly. The point of the game, at its most basic, is that you have to kill the dragon that stole your heart (which sounds suspiciously similar to the 1996 film Dragon Heart, but sorta kinda reversed). Having your heart stolen somehow makes you an Arisen rather than spelling your instant and everlasting death. Being Arisen means it is your destiny to kill the dragon to reclaim your heart. There’s no way around saying it, it’s a stupid premise. First, as an Arisen, life seems exactly the same save for everyone now calling you Arisen and the huge scar on your chest. With no practical difference in life pre Arisen and post, there’s simply no inherent reason to pursue getting your heart back. The game makes that your goal, so it’s your goal. Unfortunately, there are a lot of less clear cut goals in between.

For all its problems, at least the game’s framework is concrete. It’s easy to understand, and that’s a lot more important for games than is often acknowledged. Maybe some players don’t need the game to provide motivation through narrative, but if I’m going to spend a lot of time leveling up and fighting the same battles over and over again, it would be nice if it felt as though what I was working toward was going to pay off. Dragon’s Dogma made almost no effort in this regard.

At more than 30 hours in, I didn’t feel as if I’d learned anything that brought me more understanding of what was going on. In those 30 hours I fetched some herbs to heal local sick people, went to an outpost so that a Hydra could be triggered and I could lop one of its heads off, learned about the slave class called Pawns (whose lack of free will and incessant need to repeat themselves was profoundly disturbing to me), chased a boy around a village with no endgame, and murdered a fort full of goblins that were maybe somehow in cahoots with the dragon that stole my heart? At no point did I feel like I was doing anything of my own volition, but instead was just carrying out tasks handed to me by middle managers who didn’t want to bother putting in any effort for anything. If my character’s life was this unfulfilling, that makes the lives of the Pawns that served and died under me even more tragic.

The focal point of the numerous problems that arise comes from task management. Games like Dragon’s Dogma don’t know when you’re going to do any particular task, and it’s crammed with so many tasks and subtasks that there’s a need by the developer to bring how the game manages task out into the player’s face. That means I see little bubbles above the heads of people I need to talk to (as towns are filled with people who have no value to me as the player and simply exist to make the town feel like a town). It also means when I talk to them, a graphic appears and a sound effect plays alerting me that a task has begun. When I complete the task, my screen is splashed with experience points, money earned and more sound effects disrupt the natural ambiance of the scene to tell me I did a good thing. It’s a Pavlovian trick and robs me of any genuine sense of accomplishment.

This is not motivating, it’s demoralizing. The sheer number of things to do feels insurmountable. Since their relevance is impossible to know when undertaking a request, you sorta just go through them in order. They take you back and forth across miles of terrain, so even accomplishing something small takes a significant amount of time. Typically you’ll do something like seek out a witch in a forest. Part one of that quest is to find the witch. That means running around a shrouded wood until you uncover the witch’s house. The second part of that quest is telling the person who told you to do it that you did it. There’s a certain realism to this that, I can’t deny, has a certain charm. That charm quickly fades when you realize that you’re running back and forth along the same path, listening to the same information be mindlessly told to you, with the same enemies popping out to attack you “unexpectedly”.

This world is huge, yet the space between major points is bogged down with filler.

There is fast travel in the world of Dragon’s Dogma, thankfully. Unfortunately, you can’t really access it until you make it a good way into the game and can purchase the items that let you warp to certain places you’ve already been. It’s on you to investigate the items you can buy from vendors in order to discover that you can fast travel at all (there is an even worse fast traveling mechanism built into the original version of the game that’s not worth explaining for its lack of usefulness). Fast travel helps make things more bearable, but the fact that it needed to be included (and then improved for the PC release) highlights just how much of a wasteland the game takes place in.

The expansiveness of the world makes for another problem, which is that it’s very difficult to tell if you’re within a reasonable level to kill the enemies and beasts you stumble across. Even the weakest enemies are hard to kill alone. This is done to keep players from steamrolling their way through the game and to account for the possibility of three Pawns accompanying the player at any given time. For any enemy of reasonable strength, you’ll have to chip away at their health bar, focus on areas of weakness to gain an advantage, and manage the battlefield for extended periods of time. Isolated, this makes for interesting scenarios and is the most enjoyable part of the game, by far. It is taken to the extremes much of the time. The amount of damage you deal to enemies that are in your league and those way out of your league is difficult to determine even several minutes in sometimes. This means you can get yourself in unwinnable scenarios pretty quickly if you aren’t careful. God forbid you chip away at a Manticore for thirty minutes before realizing you’re not where you’re supposed to be.

Running into obstacles too difficult to tackle at the player’s current level can be a great way to guide them through the game’s intended route, but it’s at odds with a game that is supposed to allow you to do what you want when you want to do it. Most of the time, fights are really only difficult because you’re simply outnumbered or the mythical creature has a seemingly limitless supply of HP, and not because the enemies themselves are tricky to figure out or have complicated move sets. The flexibility of the combat allowed for through the Vocation system, the target points that exist for the larger enemies, and the adventuring party nature of combat all feel like elements meant for a game more like the original idea for Shadow of the Colossus than an Elder Scrolls style open world RPG and makes it feel as though progress is never really being made.

The dots represent the number of health bars this guy has.

There’s no easy cure for this sort of design. Dark Arisen has an additional component, Bitterblack Isle, that feels like the counterpoint to the main game. It offers a nice respite from the mind numbing openness by being more focused and self contained. You are taken there and you just have to dungeon crawl and kill everything. You are free to explore, but progression is more carefully planned and feels both genuine and rewarding. Sadly, Bitterblack Isle’s difficulty as a whole makes taking it on in the early game a pretty extreme exercise. I spent roughly half my time playing on Bitterblack and it was ruthlessly punishing for my characters. By level 30 I managed to find a bit more success, but getting to that level on Bitterblack alone would have meant cheesing the easiest of the island’s enemies hundreds of times. Given the choice of doing that or doing the main quest, I felt forced back into the main quest where I could get experience for far easier, if crushingly boring tasks. This pretty much killed any motivation I had to keep playing.

I probably had the most fun decking my character out in equipment more than anything else.

Maybe that’s my problem with open worlds. For all there is to do, games like Dragon’s Dogma seem to rely purely on the will of the player to push them forward, even when their designs seem to actively discourage moment to moment enjoyment. There’s something exploitative about the genre that just rubs me the wrong way. It’s not fair to make me be a messenger boy for an hour just so you can reveal some more details about a plot that barely holds together when it’s finally all presented. No reward in these games will make filler worth it. Games being big for the sake of being big live on the idea that value lies in the sheer amount of time that can be spent playing it, and take it to their most fallacious logical conclusions. I can only hope that in the future I’ll see the warning signs earlier.

#dragon's dogma #capcom #dark arisen #rpg

[jkl-fff]

Ha! Well, thank you for acknowledging my basic human agency—my freedom—to answer or not answer as I see fit. Heh … Seriously, though, it’s no problem; please continue to send in any and all the questions you like. The attention and interest are, frankly, flattering. And the distraction is more than welcome—it’s fun!—so no worries.

First Time as a Teacher, How Did I Feel? This one is sorta tough, because I’ve kinda always been a teacher in one capacity or another ever since I was … gosh, 14? 15? That was when I started working as a camp counselor during the summer for the Boy Scouts (did so until I was 19). While I was there … Ho boy, I taught a ton of different merit badges—basket weaving, astronomy, emergency preparedness, first aid, wilderness survival, orienteering, small boat sailing, rock-climbing …

After that, I was on a religious mission for two years (because I was raised mormon and that’s just what mormons do) in France. Pretty much spent *all* of that time teaching people about the religion, or teaching other missionaries how to be more effective at teaching people about the religion (by Cthulhu’s carpals, I was so young and naif and desperately closeted back then … feels like it was four life-times ago …), and teaching a weekly free English class as a service to people. Though, naturally, the end goal of that was finding more people to teach about the religion, so … When that ended, I was asked to keep teaching in my home congregation, and did so until I was about … 23, and just sorta collapsed inside. Couldn’t keep pretending I wasn’t attracted to other men, couldn’t keep pretending the god I had believed in was helping me be happy, couldn’t keep pretending the whole thing wasn’t thrice-damned absurd … So I stopped.

Spent another year living in France after that, this time in the employ of their Ministry of Education as an English teaching assistant in a French high school. Then two years teaching French for one university while I got a Masters’ Degree (standard trade off: graduate students teach lower-level courses, usually getting their tuition waived, health benefits, and a modest stipend), an intense month teaching an accelerated French course for the National Guard, and finally (after a brief hiatus working for FedEx) here I am in my second year of teaching French for a different university.

To say nothing of all the Taekwon-Do teaching I’ve been regularly entrusted with since I was, like, 16 …

Like I said, it’s tough to answer this one. So constant, so regular, and for so long … I just don’t really remember how the first times at each respective task felt anymore. But I do know that it *now* feels exhilarating and energizing every time my class starts one of its French lessons. Those are kinda the times that I feel most alive during the week …

First Time Writing a ParaPines Fic, What Made Me Write It? “Adorable Like a Werekitten” (shameless plug time, read it and all my fics here: https://jkl-fff.deviantart.com/) was both my first ParaPines fic and also my first foray into fanfic altogether. According to the posting timestamp … jeez, that was on October 2nd, 2012—a little over 5 years ago … And as to what made me write it, well … ParaPines came into my life during what was a rather tumultuous time, emotionally speaking.

Back then, it was like I was adrift at sea (maybe I still am … but at least the sea is more-or-less calm now, whereas back then it felt like a maelstrom within a hurricane, and I would foundering). Happiness and companionship and love—even just as meaningful friendship outside of my family—were all things I had pretty much abandoned forever all hope of finding (gods above, I sound like an emo album from 2006!) when two things happened: I discovered some … er, ahem, um … erotic fanart of Dipper Pines (which led to discovering more fanart in general, which led to discovering Gravity Falls and ParaPines and ParaNorman, all of which I found to be some of the most fantastic and adorable things to ever exist), and I fell in love with a guy in real life.

Actually, the falling in love part might have been what made everything so tumultuous emotionally … Certainly, I was not happy before him, but I was content in my unhappiness. It was a stable, dependably gray life I led before him. And then, suddenly, in my life … him. Just as suddenly, I started questioning somethings … then everythings … then ALL OF THE THINGS! Why should I linger in misery? Why cling to celibacy? What purpose was there in remaining faithful to vows I had made for a god I no longer believed in? What exactly was wrong with being gay? Why was I so convinced being gay was wrong? Why did I loathe myself so? If I had committed no fault, why shouldn’t I deserve to be as happy as anyone who was straight? Why not *all* the gay people? Why not everyone everywhere? Why not me right here and right now? Why not me … and him, with him, for him and to him and through him and by him forever and ever? Of course, it was a slow process, what with being internal and psychological. Seldom so explicit and obvious as my gloss above suggests. No, it took months and years for most of these questions to work through themselves, and honestly some of that working is still taking place even now. I hope it never stops.

But I digress. All of this gradual falling in love with him and becoming friends with him and spending time with him and pining over him and despairing because of him—all of this, and more, which had me adrift in that maelstrom in that hurricane—was taking place during and after my discoveries, as I said above, of Gravity Falls and ParaNorman and the joyous amalgam of both that is ParaPines. I was in dire straits and desperate need of something—of anything at all—that could anchor me a little, and this fit the bill. Y’see, both shows are great (great writing, great characterization, great plot development, great messages), so I could enjoy them each unironically without a sense of embarrassment. And … and and and … the ParaPines fanart was all so … so pure, so innocent, so bright and free and easy. The boys always looked so cute and happy together, y’know? As if being gay with another boy was as simple as that. No big identity struggle, no big community turmoil, no angst, no pain, no fear. Just … two gay boys being cute and happy together, with everything being as simple as that for them … Basically, everything I was craving, everything I was fantasizing about, everything I wanted for myself and him … Everything I wanted “being gay” to mean …

So I latched onto this fandom like a life preserver (it may actually have been something that preserved my life), and soon found that I just needed to contribute to it. I *needed* to write, y’know? Needed to put all of the thoughts and feeling swirling and sloshing and storming around in my head down onto paper. So I started writing for the fandom, using that writing as a means to work through some of my insecurities and anxieties about being gay, about being in love with someone who I always dreaded would leave my feelings unrequited … Heh. Poor little Norman. Though they’re all foils for parts of me, he got the brunt of all my angst, falling head-over-heels for DipDopDoblivious.

All of which to explain why I’m so invested in these two, even today, and probably will be for the rest of my life. Simultaneously, they’re now imbued with parts of my very psyche and identity, and have basically kept me from ripping myself to pieces.

Oh, and more specifically for ALaW, I saw some freakin’ adorable art by @skeletonizer featuring werecat Dipper, and sorta had to write something in which Dipper became a werecat. Like, it was too cute to be resisted. Heh. I remember being shocked at myself as I wrote it (“Really? You’re writing a story about a crossover of two characters from completely different franchises? You sunk this low?”), and trying to justify it to myself as a literary exercise (“I’m seeing if I can write in a completely different tone and style than I normally do! That’s all that’s going on here, I swear!”) so I wouldn’t feel like such a nerd/dork/geek. Ha! Although it turned out to be a slippery slope, that ParaPines fanfic, since now I’m sliding down it all “WHEEEEEEEEEE!” with no hope of every getting back up and out of it. And embrace the persona of being a nerd/dork/gook wholeheartedly (life is too short not to let yourself love what you love because of what anyone else—including yourself—might think). 

Best “mistake” I ever made, deciding to write that fanfic!

(WARNING: A LITTLE NSFW AFTER THIS)

First Kiss and First Sex *sigh* These can both be conjoined, as they happened at the same event. The memories aren’t exactly pleasant for me (or rather, memories connected with him aren’t exactly pleasant for me now … they’ve all become rather melancholy), so I’m not going to dwell on or develop the answers overmuch. It was at a New Year’s Party, one that was jampacked with people and flooded with alcohol that people had brought with them to contribute to the festivities.

Now, I loved (love?) him, but I’ve never been under any illusions: he’s self-destructive, he’s damaged inside (more so than average people), and he’s an alcoholic as a result. That night, he imbibed freely and flitted about like a boisterous social butterfly. And I, true to my demeanor, drank only water or orange juice mixed with fresca. For the most part, I stuck to corners or quieter spaces or would linger out on the deck and watch the city in the distance (perhaps I would’ve spent the whole night out there, save that it was December-becoming-January and bitterly cold). Y’see, I’ve never much cared for parties; loud music, jumbled conversations in a raucous din, tight spaces filled with people, strangers everywhere I went … I’ve never cared for any of these. They overwhelm me and tire out my brain. But I would periodically go in search of him and check that everything was still okay, then force myself to try and socialize a little before seeking out a quieter spot again. As midnight approached, he came in search of me. He said he wanted me to be his New Year’s first kiss, and … and I had been pining for him for months at that point, dreaming of it—of my first kiss—being him, being the first person I had ever been *in love* with, saving my first kiss for him … Such a silly, romantic fool I was … so of course I acquiesced at once. Perhaps I shouldn’t have, but … Gods above, he was clumsy and uncoordinated from being drunk and there was that sickly-sweet aftertaste of booze on his lips. Yet it was the best kiss of my life—a kiss that sorta ruined kissing for me, because no other kiss has ever made me feel like that one did …

Next thing I knew, he had led me down into the basement, which was a roiling cauldron of fog (from a machine) and colored dance lights and silhouettes of other guys moving slowly to the music. The room wasn’t big and there were plenty of other guys in it, yet it felt strangely private. The fog made it impossible to recognize anyone unless you were standing right next to him, plus there seemed to be an unspoken understanding on the part of all present (all except me, who felt lost and at a loss in an alien world, since I wasn’t completely out yet and all of this was new and confusing to me) that this space was one free from the gaze and the judgment of others. Every man was anonymous down there, in a way, even to those he knew. Even to himself, perhaps. Maybe that was why he had brought me down there. Like a spatial manifestation of drunkenness, that room was a haze of socially accepted deniability to those went in. Anything that happened down there was considered to stay down there and dissolve from memory and the real world when the fog did. Inhibitions didn’t have to exist, and neither did consequences or responsibilities. [Which is all utter bullshit, by the way. You are you; you are what you do and what you say, and neither alcohol nor anonymity absolve you of responsibility for what you do and what you say, for who you are. People like to tell themselves the fairytale that these things can change you, or that it’s not really you when under their influence … but, like all fairytales, that’s bullshit people tell themselves to feel better so they can try and skip out on owning up to their own mistakes. Gods, I *hate* alcohol sometimes.] Anyway, he made out with me for a while against one of the walls. I should’ve said “no”, I should’ve told him that he was drunk and this wasn’t what he really wanted, but … When I made some feeble attempts at protest, he just said, “Shhh …” and kept going. And I was too weak to insist after that, too desperate for something more than just hanging out with him to refuse … Some other guys joined us for a bit, and he initiated a circle jerk with them. But I was only interested in him, and I guess the others picked up on that because they soon left me and him as alone as one could be in that room. He stroked me for a while, then sucked me for a while, but wouldn’t let me return the favor for long because he was “too drunk to get it up” …

The next day and every day after that, we pretended that nothing had happened—never spoke of it—though when I hinted at it … it was clear that he did remember. Crystal clear. But he wanted it to be something that dissolved with the haze of the room and the alcohol, something that wasn’t and wouldn’t then or ever be remembered, something that would never exist in the real world.

Sadly, that wouldn’t be the last time I got my heart broken by him. People think I’m smart, but I sure do make some dumb mistakes sometimes … and I make them over and over again …

Thanks again for the asks! Hopefully that downer ending on that last one won’t deter anyone from sending in more asks, though. Don’t be shy, people! Send in anything and everything you want to know! I’d be more than happy to answer them (and especially now that I just finished making myself depressed), and find them quite the fun distraction!

#ask #ask me anything #ask me about my ocs #ask me questions #ask me stuff #question #my life #fuck my life #emotions #depression #unrequited love #love sucks #love story #Love Is #alcoholic #alcoholism #alcohol #angst #fanfiction #writing #parapines #teacher #submission

[elliotgoodtiger]

Chapter 6 “Royal Typewriter”

Giles came back today. Oh wait, you don’t know who Giles is, do you? Giles is the man we hired to take photo and video content during our recording session here at Middle Farm Studios. He stands 6ft 7in and runs a 6min mile with ease. I’ve only ran the 3 mile farm course twice, and both times with him. It’s the hardest course I’ve ever ran in my life. Before I get into that though, let me tell you how I became a runner, and why it’s important to me.

My dad was always in fairly good shape, but when I got to around 13 years old, he told himself “If I have any chance of still being able compete against him in basketball when he’s a teenager, I better start training now”. Right there and then he started running. Buying running books, subscribing to running magazines, buying running watches, all of it. He was obsessed. 5k races soon turned to 10k, which soon turned to half marathons, which soon turned to marathons. Hell he even did a triathlon and nearly drowned in the Chesapeake bay. When I turned 15, my dad forced me to run cross country at my High School. I wasn’t exactly thrilled. Actually, I was pretty fucking annoyed. At 15, my hobbies were basketball (poorly), playing guitar (poorly), playing video games (successfully), and, er, doing other things a young teenager does when his parents are at work (successfully). The thought of having to interact with classmates, and spend my Saturdays traveling to races that I would always finish in last, was not appealing. And thats exactly what happened. I finished last every. single. race. ‘Cause I didn’t try. Had no interest. My dad would take off from work early to watch me not try. He wasn’t too happy about that. I don’t blame him. Anyways, that would be the first and only school activity I would ever be eligible for as I continued to fail my classes. Sorry pop. I worked a near full time job all though my senior year of high school, so while he wasn’t exactly thrilled that I was on course to NOT graduating, he saw I wasn’t just sitting around doing nothing.

Anyways, years go by, I’m living on my own, blah blah blah blah blah. He’s still running, and still trying to get me into it. I still have no real interest of doing anything but going to work, coming home, drinking beer, and playing guitar. But he still tells me how great it is. I mean, he REALLY loves the sport. By the time I’m 25, I join my first band, ‘Sky Eats Airplane’. Going from working at Guitar Center, having never played in a serious band before, to suddenly touring the country and playing shows every single night, was pretty nuts. I appreciated the opportunity and experience, but I always kept the mindset of “this could literally end tomorrow”. I was sorta right. Sky Eats eventually fell apart, but as soon as it did, Of Legends was right there behind it, keeping the dream alive. After that, TesseracT was there. The TesseracT situation was a bit different though. I knew that wasn’t going to last long right after my first tour with them. When we agreed to an amicable split, I figured, “hey, I’m sure there’s probably another band right around the corner”. At this point I was 28 and felt too old to just start something new. Plus, I didn’t know the first thing about starting a new band. My buddy Zack and I had ‘Zelliack’, but him and I had no real idea how to bring our bedroom project onto an actual stage. A month after TesseracT and I split, I took a job tour managing a band over in Europe. By the time I got back to the states, I felt lost. I took a job working overnights in a warehouse because I figured I could work on music during the day while working all though the night. I never really minded the hours. 9PM to 6AM. Full time. I could dig it. It’ was supposed to be temporary, but soon the days turned to weeks, turned to months, till I was there for an entire year. Slowly withdrawing from my normal social groups.

When you work the night shift, even on your days off you still keep that schedule. So on days off during the weekday I’d be awake at 3am with nothing to do. Now THATS boring. At first I thought it was kinda nice that I could watch ’The Larry Sanders Show’ uninterrupted, but by the time winter came around I decided I needed to do something other than drink myself to sleep at 11am (Side note, when you’re buying beer at 9am, the person selling you beer has no idea that you just worked a nine hour shift. When you do this three/four times a week, they look at you like you have a serious problem. Hey man, I just want to get a little buzz while Jake and I play Grand Theft Auto, buzz off). There was a gym downstairs in my building, that had a treadmill. “Sure, why not, I’m out of beer, so I need something to do till the store opens up”. I got into full Rocky mode and put on sweats (I’m a dumb-ass) and went downstairs. My first run in close to a decade was by myself, at 3am. I ran a slow mile. It wasn’t as bad as I thought it’d be. Actually, I kind of enjoyed it. “Alright, I’ll try it again tomorrow.”. I did it the next day and went a little further. Honestly, I was hooked by my third run. I decided to run every Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday. Each time going a little further till I was doing 4 miles regularly. It was still very wintery outside, and I had NO interest in freezing my balls off, but I figured if I could get to 4 miles at a decent pace on the treadmill I’d be good to go by spring. Once spring came around and I started going outside I realized this was something I wanted to do forever. There was a park/trail right next to my house that I had basically been ignoring the previous 7 years. I realized that at 5am, I would be the only person out there. Imagine having your very own park to run in. Thats what it felt like. As the running days turned to weeks, turned to months, I would ask myself, “Why do I run? For my sanity?”. Yes, that was a big part of it. But, always in the back of my mind, I kept telling myself, “If at any chance I’m going to someday get back onstage, I need to be ready. I need to be in shape”. I was turning into my dad. I was running with purpose, with a goal. Once I felt ready enough, I told him I wanted to run together. He was floored. Excited that there was a new father-son activity in his life. He’s passed on all his running knowledge to me. Thank’s pop. Last winter when Periphery were recording their new album, Jake came and stayed with me for two months. He’d been out of exercise for awhile, and told me he wanted to give running a try. I took him to a track right down the road and watched the man take 15 minutes to run 1 mile. There was a look of intense pain on his face. I figured there was no way in hell he was gonna want to do that again. Later on, over a couple of beers, he told me how he couldn’t wait to get back out there to do it again. So I put him through the ringer. We’d be out in the park and I’d say “don’t worry, the next hill is just a little one”, when really we were going over something that even I would struggle with. By the end of his two months, he was able to do 2 ½ miles without stopping. I figured he’d lose interest in it once he went back home, but he didn’t. He kept up with it, and when he came back to visit that summer we would do four and five milers side by side. Proud of you, bud. When Dez contacted me about wanting to start a new band and asked how would I feel about playing shows again, I didn’t hesitate. I felt ready to get back out there, mentally and physically.

Well, I’ve probably bored you enough. But quickly, let me tell you about this fucking farm course I’ve been running at the recording studio. It sucks. Shit, a goddamn marine would complain about this. The first thing that happens is you run straight up a hill for about half a mile. And it’s steep. Remember when Rocky ran up the mountain in Rocky VI? Well…. it’s not that bad. But to me it feels like I’m preparing to fight Ivan Drago. Around mile 2 you start having to suck in air that is 90% cow manure. So now you’re gagging when you’re already out of breath. Mile 2 ½ is down hill. You’d think that’d be easier. NOPE. It’s just at irritating as running UP hill, just not as tiring. Also, the road is AS wide as a single car. If a car needs to pass by, you have to stop running, and sink yourself into the stalk. Nice, just what I wanted. An itchy ass back. Mile 3 is the real “fuck you”. You’re completely exhausted at this point, all you want is a little straight road to run. Not gonna happen. Have fun running your ass up one more hill. Finally once you reach the end, you’re so cold and caked in mud that all you want to do is take a hot shower. Gotta be honest, I don’t think I’m gonna be missing this run too much once I get back to New York City. The first time we went out, it was me, Giles, and Joa. I came in dead last. I didn’t even know Joa fucking ran. Bah, whatever, now I’m droning. Thanks for listening!

I’ll finish this book later

#goodtiger #elliot coleman

[yamithediaperdork]

Silly little god (A Malcore Story)

It was a bright and wonderful Saturday morning when at the edge of a park, a light flashed. appearing out of nowhere and dressed in blue jeans and a red top was one of the most feared god's in the multiverse (At least to those who valued their pride and dignity) Yami: God of Diaper humiliation and scented pine cones. the last part was just a temp job though, as rick was on vacation and someone had to fill the role if a god ditched their job for longer then 5 hours. that five hour limit was what was on Yami's mind as he prepped himself for today's fun. As a god of diaper humiliation Yami's own powers grew and weakened depending on how many mortals were suffering from well, red faced diaper humiliation. the worst it was for the victim, the more power he got in return. However lately it's been getting harder and harder to actually get enough juice off of it, as idiots were trying to make diapers a normal thing and cut down on the social stigma that came from being a dorky little diaper butt. Well, yami wasn't the kinda of god to just let himself get slowly de powered and returned permanently to his Mortal form of malcore! (Yami himself was actually the 4th one to use the title..apparently there was some sorta curse that made everyone one of the diaper gods get trapped in their own lust for unending diaper humiliation. something that Yami was going to make sure didn't happen to him.) For the past few weeks Yami had been coming down to earth, setting himself up to be a little baseball star for the local boys team. enhance himself with his powers had made that easy and he'd spread the belief that anyone who wet or crapped themselves was a little diaper baby and deserved humiliation. he'd even made a few boys from visiting teams wet themselves but apparently once Yami had left the effects had weakened, none of them suffered lasting enough humiliation for his needs. Well, there was a old saying: if you want something done right, you gotta do it yourself! His plan had risks, and downsides to it, for starters he just KNEW the other gods were never going to let him forget or live this down but sometimes a man had to do what he had to do. Normally any diaper humiliation Yami himself experienced (and it was more common then he'd like to admit) didn't do anything for Yami himself as he only got power ups from mortals. (this was a law added to keep a diaper humiliation god from thinking about padding some of his fellow god-lings) So with that in mind.. Yami would ping the area, suspending disbelief once again that he was never seen with his parents..and increasing a over all lack of empathy in the humans around, so they would be less understanding and more prone to teasing. it was a exhausting thing to do, and Yami couldn't do it all the time but it WOULD pay off..he hoped. taking out a crystal orb from his bag, Yami focused one last time, making sure to poof his baseball uniform into the bag..and some super thick babyish pink diapers..then focused on the orb itself and slowly drained his powers into the thing, keeping in mind his time limit as Yami once more became malcore. dropped off by his parents who were too busy to stay and watch the game, Zex went into the locker room to get changed and hoped for half a second that malcore wouldn't show up today. ever since Malcore had started playing on the team Zex had gone from their top player to only second best and -somehow- not being the parents of the star player meant his folks never had time for his games anymore. "Dicks." he muttered to himself. Trey and Dylan were in the locker room and were just finishing getting changed and nodded to Zex who nodded back. "Any signs of Mr.superstar?" Zex asked, using the pet name more of the team had for malcore. of course no one called him that to his face, or used it around the coach. and malcore was the reason they were in a championship game today (Anther reason why Zex was so irked his folks weren't going to watch) "You know him, likes to make a entrance." Trey said and finished getting his shoes on. "Better hurry up, coach wants us warming up before the game. " he added. "well all of us expect for Mr. superstar." Dylan added and rolled his eyes. "Ugh..Hate that guy.." trey whined and then they were out and onto the field leaving it just Zex in the locker room. Stripping down to his briefs and grabbing the pants of his uniform Zex jumped as a loud whistle was heard. "Wow, nice crap stained baby undies." Malcore said, leaning on a locker, arms crossed. "Oh shut up, I know you wear briefs too." "Not today! going commando..looooose and freeee" Malcore said and stood up strait then wiggled his hips. Despite himself Zex smirked at that. "your such a dork, you know that?" "Bitch please, I'm made of win and awesome." Malcore said and flexed before going to walk over, his tote bag open and he was heading for a bench. that's when he tripped and cried out, hands going out and catching himself, but his tote bag had flung off and sent everything inside all over the floor. "Wow, ever so..grace...ful..Pffft.." Zex trailed off as he looked at Malcore's uniform, and then at the two thick pink diapers. "well well well, what DO we have here?" he asked, going over and picking one of them up. "T-T-Those are just..uh..they're for someone else!" Malcore stammered, blushing red instantly and scrambled to his feet to snag the diaper back from zex. Zex in return just put a hand on malcore's forehead and found it surprisingly easy to hold him back as he looked it over. "wooow.. for someone who totally hates diaper boys and thinks all pants wetter need diapers..these are some..VERY pwetty diapies for widdle malcore." Zex teased. "I..I told you, they're not mine!" "who's are they then? Hmmm sissy boy? and if this isn't yours..then you know..it won't fit on your butt." Mentally Malcore groaned, this was all good and stuff, but he hadn't actually meant to trip like that and he was a bit weaker then expected. 'this is what i get for going on that all ice cream diet' he thought and huffed. still, he couldn't just start the game diapered, could he? his ideal situation was for the crowd to call for him to be pampered like a little baby, then the diapers found. "well come on then 'little maclore' .. or would you..heh.." Zex paused and looked at the pink diaper again. "Prefer princess?" "How about if you don't stop right now I'm fucking leaving and your shot at winning the title drops to nothing, and I'll tell the coach it';s your fault!" Malcore shot back angrily and thankfully this seemed to stop Zex in his tracks. "..fine. whatever. just know if you even LOOK ready to wet yourself..I'm telling.everyone about your triple P's." Malcore blinked and tilted his head, having stepped back from Zex and was honestly confused. "Triple P's?" "Pretty pink pampers." Zex said and laughed. 'guh, when did he become such a jerk...oh..right..' Malcore huffed then relised he was a victim of his own magic. Zex finished getting dressed and got ready to go warm up, but not before one last shot. "Don't be scared to ask for help if you change your mind and want one of your diappppers on." he called then took off for the field, smirking and smiling to himself. "...If I ever have to do this again I'm planing it out wayyy better." malcore groaned, facepalming. Zex was a little confused himself. normally he was one of the guys trying to get malcore to be nicer, but just bullying him had felt damn good. plus, who'd of guessed Mr 'wet pants means your a baby' was a big sissy baby butt? He just chalked it up to knowing malcore deserved the humiliation and since malcore was responsible for his parents being dicks, it felt nice to take it out on him. still, who'd of thought that the guy who could hit home run after home run was THAT weak? Spotting Dylan and trey doing some of the warm up exercises Zex jogged over. there was one thing for sure. no WAY he could keep this to himself. Malcore took awhile to calm himself down, toying with just ditching the plan and sneaking out. surely he'd get a good jolt from just the humiliation he'd just experienced right? maybe this was a stupid plan all along. Then he thought about Dustin, the Yami before him and how he was just a happy diaper filling baby in a crib, his parents thinking he had always been mentally a baby and not even able to enjoy any of his baby life the way he had thought about it. "No. Nope. thats NOT going to be me..come on Malcore, you're a freaking god. you can do this. it's a hour or so of humiliation and enough humiliation energy to make you large and in charge for at least a year!" he said and having amped himself up got his uniform on and walked out. as he came onto the field, he scanned it for a second, and locked eyes with a smirking Zex..and fuck. there was trey and Dylan, and all three of them had big grins on their faces, and were laughing. 'i guess it's no shocker he went and told them.. man.. when i get back i need to ask Net to help me dial back that spell..' malcore thought and waved to them then went over to the dug out. The game started and while the stands were full something was off with the crowd it seemed. at least to anyone casually walking by. they were more quick to jeer a mistake, and at one point even started a 'you fucked up!' chant that left a outfielder from the other team in tears and had chants of crybaby start up. This while being expected, was bad because it was dragging the game out longer and longer and worse, making malcore's nerves get to him. all he had been planing on was a wetting accident, but if his tummy kept up like this.. worse, he really was just ROTTEN at playing without his powers to cheat and so the crowd had turned on him, and taken to yelling 'choke' whenever he was up to bat. the coach even pulled him aside and asked if he was feeling alright, and Malcore lied saying he just felt a little icky in the tummy but begged to keep playing. the more malcore seemed to falter and suck though, the more Zex apparently stepped up to the plate. Zex himself figured Malcore just was all nerves with now over half the team knowing about the triple p's (Turns out Dylan and Trey couldn't keep it to themselves anymore then Zex had been able to) Still, it was tough going and it came down to one last chance. the game was tied and they had one batter left to go, and it was Malcore. Malcore was struggling, shaking a little though most assumed it was from nerves (and well, ok, to be fair a lot of it WAS just that!) but he was also fighting not to soak himself too soon. as he went to head for the plate, Zex himself stopped him. "Look, i know you can do this. forget about all the teasing, al of that, and show us what you can really do. or i swear, I'll diaper your ass on the field." he said, in a low voice but with a smile on his face, so it looked like he was giving Malcore words of encouragement. "I-I'll try." Malcore squeaked and a little spurt of pee tinkled out. "You better do more then try unless you want the crowd to see your Triple P's." with that threat in mind Malcore made his way up to bat and gulped. 'This was a stupid plan. this was a stupid plan. i'm just gonna get stuck out and leave.' Malcore thought, shaking and practically doing the potty dance in place, so focused on keeping his pants dry and clean that he was blocking out the umpires offer to go use the bathroom, and the crowd's chanting for him to choke/wet himself. the first pitch came down and Malcore swung, releasing anther steam into his pants and they were visibly getting damp now. "STRIKE ONE!" the second ball came flying in and malcore swung, and..that was it. his bladder couldn't take it anyone and even as "STRIKE TWO!" was called he was hunching down, soaking himself and making a puddle in the dirt. Joey, the catcher for the team cried out and jumped back, letting anyone who couldn't see,/figure out what was going on know without a doubt. "EW! MALCORE'S WETTING HIMSELF!" A loud brassy poot was heard as as malcore hunched there, his bladder drained and face crimson, he knew it wasn't just gonna be wet pants. Someone was yelling about the game being over, and the other team winning but Malcore wasn't exactly following, as with more farts the back of his formally white pants were expanding out and turning a nasty shade of brown. Not helping him was the fact the act had apparently fried part of his brain, as he was yelling out "I-I'm Pooping my pantssss! I want my mommy! i want my daddy! I want my diapers!" the crowd was laughing and videos were being taken and Zex came over, shaking his head. "Really you stupid big sissy? you couldn't hold it in for anther five minutes!?" he asked. Malcore whined and looked at him, and then the red turned to pale white as in Zex's hands were the diapers. "W-wait wait wait wait!" Malcore whined and held up a hand, but there was NO mercy in Ze's eyes and off came the poopie pants and malcore's uniform shirt was used to clean him up..then mr. superstar was on the field..in nothing but two massive pink diapers..and a smile. Naturally malcore did the only thing he could, and sobbed and ran out into the park. "HEY YOU DUMB BABY! Get back here!" Zex called and then shrugged, going to go and get changed and likely trash malcore's big boy clothes. it's what the little sissy deserved after all. Getting into the woods, and laughed at by everyone who saw him (Malcore was certain he was at least Facebook famous, if not YouTube and god knows how many other sites!) he scrambled for the spot where he had touched down and looked for the orb with his powers in it. at the very least once he was yami again, he'd have so much power after all of this. looking around frantically he didn't see it..and then froze. it was in his bag! in a special compartment that was on;y going to open near the near of the time limit!! if he had been warned once he'd been warned 1000 times to to use pocket dimensions like that if he was going to take a break from godhood! "Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck!" Malcore groaned and stomped in place. A look over at a clock tower visible from where he was told Malcore that even if he ran as hard as he could.. there was NO way he was going to make it back in time, and that was even factoring in no one stopping him or trying to manhandle him. "..Net? server? Anyone of you who are listening, and likly watching this?" Malcore said, looking up. "Look, I know you've all been enjoying the show but I could reallly use a soild right now and some help would be nice." he called up to the heavens. there was a flash of light and Malcore started to smirk..till it faded and he was dressed in a light pink top with a heart on the front and a attached mini skirt, purple, frilly and mostly see though. "...Oh fuck you guys too!" In the locker room, Zex was about to toss out malcore's bag when a pocket opened on it. he was the only one in the locker room, at least for the moment and raised a eyebrow as a orb rolled out of it. "oook..the hell is-" Zex started to ask and grabbed the orb. instantly there was a flash of light and his mind filled with the knowledge of what had happened, who malcore was, and giving Zex a choice. He could go and return these powers to little Malcore.. or he could keep them for himself... One year later and Malcore still couldn't belive he was stuck as a forever diaper sissy. Zex had been kind enough to fold him into his spot in everyone minds, so no one missed Zex while Malcore wasn't left a homeless orphan. the downside was Zex made sure his parents now super believed malcore was a tusande diaper sissy, and just loved to 'humor' their little sissy. which mean lots and lots of diapers and dresses for malcore and meant that Zex had a steady power supply as the new yami. Zex himself refined the Yami powers and became one of the big four gods, and earned loads of respect among his fellow gods who had only ever seen malcore with contempt. it was the perfect ending for a silly little god who had doomed himself the end

[vampyninjacow-blog]

Dating in a time of Technology

I recently started to date again. Now I have never been one to have a consistent stream of partners, that has always been my sister. In some ways I was very naive to the dating world when I started and to this day I still have my moments. I have the desire to allow people the opportunity to show me their best. More often than not it is theirs and my worst that comes out. But I have skipped ahead a bit. Let's go back to the beginning of this misadventure that I call dating in a time of not only technology, but global Panamanian. 

I’m going to take you back to the end of the first decade in a new century. Here is where a lot of my learning curve began. It all started with AML( no names just initials). Now he was a quite bit older than me and well had a issue with my virgin status, yes I was 19 and still a virgin, but if you grew were I did you could see why sex was not that appealing. AML was nervous about me being a virgin, at the time I didn’t see why, now I understand. I wanted to prove myself to him so I devised a plan to make this “issue” disappear. I was slightly attracted to another man, a friend I guess, and I knew he was into me. So one night I just got high and ripped the band-aid off, so to speak. AJT was cool about it and well I thought that was that. Sadly my relationship with AML was doomed by then. So being me I tried to move forward. I enjoy sex so I tried to find a no complications relationship that could just be fun. I ended up dating a long time friend RIG. We were best friends in elementary school and reconnected in our senior year. This was a disaster and somehow taught me nothing, because I went right on and tried a “friend with benefits” thing with a guy from class. He broke the rules and in my semi irritated and just all around emotional state I was left in a position to be prey for someone I thought I trusted. You see my aunt was dying from cancer and well my whole family was all over the place. I went back to AJT. This was how I began my first abusive relationship. This was not how it started. We began to hang out as friends. I have just been diagnosed with General anxiety disorder. I was on a lot of new medication and had not stopped my self medicating. One night when we were supposed to meet up with other friends we got drunk and high and I was having issues with my meds not always working so I was still taking Lorazepam to combat the sudden attacks. Well unfortunately I was gone and before I knew it we were having sex most of that night is still a blur. I definitely can't remember things to this day. It was after this that I finally learned to just stop...so I did. I stopped drinking, smoking, getting high...I even found coping methods for my anxiety so I was off the meds. The best thing I did was I stopped trying to date. I was able to focus and get my degree in 4 years. That was in 2017, so what changed well let me tell the story.

Now I’m not saying that I was completely celibate from 2015 to 2017. I had two partners and in fact one of them is now engaged and I couldn’t be happier for them. What happened was, on the night of my cousin's 25th birthday party I met a guy. He was nice and we clicked. It had been a while since I had met someone like that so I sorta got lost. Before I knew it my cousin was gone I was drunk and it was last call. I was completely prepared to say goodnight and go home til I realized I left my house keys on my cousins counter. I had locked myself out of my own house and I was kicking myself. That’s how I ended up in a one nightstand with a guy who actually tried to not have sex with me. Weird I know, but it's the “me too” era and I guess he was just being cautious or maybe he really did respect the fact that I was drunk, and unable to make sound decisions. Whatever the reason, this guy broke the shield that had been protecting me for 7 years. Things came flooding back, and I remembered that night so many years ago. By the way if I saw that guy today I would thank him. He opened my eyes again. I wish I could thank him, but that’s not how one night stands work. I took the initiative to better myself. It started with exercise. I started to walk at least 15 miles a week. I felt great, and it showed. That's how EEA found me. We had known each other for years and when he asked me out I was shocked. Unfortunately despite my relative beauty, guys don’t really ask me out. So he caught me when I was vulnerable. This is where my second abusive relationship began and after two months of hell I ended it, sadly the damage was done and my life fell right off track. My anxiety was at an all time high and I was losing control so I decided to get counselling and talk to my doctor about it. Now you're probably wondering what this has to do with online dating, well I’m getting there. After a night of drinking I ended up on Bumble. I went on a few dates, met some real crazies, thought I made some friends even. In the end though I started to notice a pattern. I was going all over the place with the guys. I was even trying to go out with guys that weren’t my physical type. Yet, every time the same thing would happen. I would do my best and be honest with them, right from the start, and they always just started the mind games. I started to think it was me. Like I was doing something and that was why. So I decided that I would try a different approach in Hinge. This time I was more distant and I would only tell them some things. I would keep some stuff, not hidden, but only available to them if they ask. I seemed to work somewhat. This is when I noticed something. The men I met on Hinge were hot and cold consistently when it came to communication, while the guys I met on Bumble were either ghosters or weirdly bad at communication. It was like they were too excited to know everything they would push and then it was like they didn’t want anything else. I thought I had found the exception to this rule until COVID-19 came into play. My life was already rocky and I was getting tired of it all. He seemed to generally care, but just like the rest, he began to ghost. So I had enough, I confronted him and texted him “I don’t know what is going on and I don’t really like this communication roller-coaster you’re doing. If you don’t want to see me anymore just say it.” I’m not going to lie, I was really sure he was going to ghost me. He didn’t though, while his reply was the classic, “it’s not you it’ me” B.S. and of course he added on the “You deserve to be happy” He actually ended it with me. This was the first time that I have stood up for myself and I actually got someone to break up with me. I still feel the hurt of rejection, but I know in my heart it was the right move. If someone fits into your life then they won’t run, they won't blame you. I guess the point I’m trying to make is that, maybe there really is a chance out there for happiness. It isn’t me, it's just the power of technology allowing people to feel safe, behind the screen, it allows them to feel like they can do what they want without consequence. 

Here is what I took away from it all. If it doesn’t feel right, then it isn’t right plain and simple. If they aren’t maintaining the vibe they gave you in the beginning then it is alright to call them out, maybe it just isn’t working. If you take anything away from this it should be this. It’s okay to be alone, don’t get burned by the same person again and again and in the words of Kash Doll “Don’t introduce me to a vibe you can’t maintain”. In other words, if you aren’t interested don’t be invested and if you can’t be the person they want then don’t. Be the person you are.  

#beyourself #preach #datingonline #speakup

[calorieworkouts]

How I Found My Voice in the Weight Room

Much to my parents' annoyance I'm known for informing people I do not have great genes. Intellectual genetics, certain. I'm the product of a super-smart women and also a quite brainy man. I originate from a family members that values minds over muscle. Books over BOSUs. Songs over muscles.

I cruised happily on my intelligence as well as thought not much about bodily look or exercise-until college. More especially, my senior year of college when I realized the freshwoman 40 I would certainly acquired stopped me from fitting right into any one of my interview fits. Certain, I would certainly discovered my denims no more fit, as well as my 'diet' consisted more of late night pizza than very early morning oatmeal-but I was enjoying. I could possibly use my jeans unbuttoned, as well as select oat meal for morning meal if cholesterol was ever before a concern. Till then, I was content to consume, drink, and be beautiful damn collegiate-merry.

And then elderly year work interviews showed up. I owned suits however quickly understood none fit. I 'd had the ability to stay in a place of rejection with my jeans and also stretch jeans, yet that time was finishing. It was time to do something regarding my additional pizza weight.

Finding My Way... To the Gym

I look back now and am still frustrated the 'something' I picked lead me to our school's tiny, Division-3 weight space. It was dark, filthy, and also seldom utilized by non-athletes, yet somehow I really felt phoned call to venture in and also see just what it resembled. I really did not drop immediately in love. I stumbled right into sorta-like. I had no idea what I was doing, but considering that I was an amateur I still saw sufficient results to transform my physique. Many thanks to my capability to simulate what I would certainly seen on tv or skimmed in journals I produced a patchwork of a resistance training routine.

I used only equipments I acknowledged (hey there leg expansions!), as well as count on bodyweight workouts (many, lots of push-ups). I fit dumbbells in where I could (bicep curls galore). After about 6 weeks (fortunately never wounded myself with my lack of knowledge), I was making visible progress-and might at least suit my coats and skirts again.

After college graduation I found myself returning to my parents house in addition to my newly minted English Literature degree. Unable to locate a task, I joined a women-only fitness facility to have something to do while I browsed. It was the very early 90s and also, while some women were lifting weights (a lot of us motivated by Linda Hamilton's 'guns' in Terminator 2), there were really few of us in the weights area.

I still had thirty-ish pounds to lose, however my women-only choice was much less about vanity or friend-finding, as well as much more regarding intending to raise weights with other women. I had no suggestion at the time I made this choice that it would change the remainder of my life. Weight training in a female-only atmosphere promptly moved my relationship with the iron from prefer to like. I really felt entirely comfy to attempt new points without the fear of people making fun of the reality I was an amateur or a beginner. I brought workout magazines to the gym and also mimicked their routines. I got Arnold Schwarzenegger's Encyclopedia of Bodybuilding, and lugged it everywhere I went.

Finding My Stride: A Balancing Act

I raised every single day. I grew larger as well as more powerful as well as I felt impressive. Until I really did not. After around six months, my love for the weights started to wind down. I really did not look onward to my exercises as I utilized to. My protruding arms and also graceful shoulders started to shrink. I began to expand skinny-soft. I raised seven days a week and also yet looked like though I would certainly not ever lifted a barbell before.

It took me a while (my individual blog site isn't really an use the word MISFIT for absolutely nothing!), however I ultimately deduced I would certainly been overtraining. I informed myself. I learnt how to hear my body and observe the fact it required remainder in order to expand. I started to eat without effort and feed my muscle mass what they requested for. My plate tackled a broad range of shades. Fruits, vegetables, and lean healthy proteins became just what my body required. I took in food as close to its initial kind as possible. I decreased and also grew even more still-in all features of my life-and it was then I realized most plainly I 'd found my voice among the dumbbells and cables.

I had actually shed the extra pounds I 'd been carrying around for a while, but, to my shock, that was the least of the changes. I strolled taller. I spoke out in all circumstances with a self-confidence I never understood I had. I sought brand-new and unpleasant circumstances I had actually formerly avoided. I felt qualified, empowered, heard, and also strong. And also I have actually never recalled. I've preserved my weight-loss for 19 years and I securely believe it's because weights, for me, have to do with much more than fat burning and body sculpting.

They're the core of who I am.

They're the reason I speak out and out.

They're the reason I'm completely comfortable in my own skin and with that I am.

I'm still amazed how 20 minutes a day (Note: I'm consistent - not hardcore), year in and year out, has developed the foundation for my life.

I also fulfilled my now-husband as a happy spin-off of the muscles acquired in the gym. He still tells me exactly how he noticed the way I walked prior to anything else and also chose he needed to meet me. He informed me after that how he could possibly see I was certain and fearless incidentally I carried myself. I credit all of that to the weight room.

Today, I'm still raising weights regularly at age 43. I work full time as a writer as well as have a six-year-old, so my weightlifting looks rather various now than it did back after that. My exercises are typically done at 4am when I can grab some 'me' time before 'everyone else' time starts. My weights currently much more take the type of resistance bands, bodyweight, or energetic play.

At 23, I never ever pictured I would certainly be able both to maintain my effective weight loss and also be more fit two decades later on. Looking in advance, I intend to be the old woman in the dumbbells area at 83. If you take place by and see me in there, please come by, snag a resistance band or pinhead, bang out a few reps, and also share your story.

Greatist Journeys check out fantastic tales from phenomenal people. This guest article was written by Carla Birnberg, independent author as well as owner of the fitness blog MizFitOnline.com. The viewpoints expressed here are hers and hers alone. To find out more concerning Carla, visit mizfitonline.com as well as follow her on Twitter at @mizfitonline.

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