#it’s one thing to do it for comedy purposes and it’s another to talk about your top surgery completely serious using nipnops the whole time

[i-want-it-on-fire]

If I have to read the word “nipnops” in reference to nipples one more fucking time today I’m going to blow up a dam

#it’s one thing to do it for comedy purposes and it’s another to talk about your top surgery completely serious using nipnops the whole time #please…speak…like an adult…I’m begging you… #op

[welcometothejianghu]

Welcome to another round of W2 Tells You What You Should See, where W2 (me) tries to sell you (you) on something you should be watching. Today's choice: 少年歌行/The Blood of Youth

The Blood of Youth is a 2022 live-action adaptation of the tale of a deposed, disabled, and incredibly cunty prince who's on his way back to settle the score with his asshole father, and the rag-tag band of weirdos he accumulates along the way, including Spear Girl, Bad Monk, and Fire Puppy (pictured above).

I hope you like shounen anime, because this is the most shounen anime something is allowed to be without actually being based on something running weekly in Shounen Jump. What if Nirvana in Fire were also Naruto? It would be the Blood of Youth.

This show is an underrated gem of action-packed fun that not nearly enough people in English-speaking fandom have seen. In an attempt to correct that -- and ahead of an announced second season and prequel in progress -- I'm here with five reasons you should try it out.

1. Zero thoughts head empty

You do not have to pay an enormous amount of attention to this show to understand what's going on. The show itself does not always know what's going on. It got distracted by a shiny object over there, and now we're all gearing up to go punch the shiny object. We'll get back to the main plot when we're done with the punching.

It has a million billion plot threads going on at any given moment. Bad guys roll in from sects you've never heard of before, using superpowers with stupid names, only to get kicked into next week. There's approximately eleventy thousand characters -- so many, in fact, that I ran into problems several times while making this rec post, because there aren't readily available photos of everyone I want to talk about. Just look at the DramaWiki cast list. See how it goes on for like fifty screens? That's a little what the show feels like.

Except I'm not saying that like it's a bad thing, because the show knows it's doing this, and it acts accordingly. It telegraphs pretty well who's important and who isn't (and then it goes out of its way to color-code the latter, which is handy). What you're left with is absolutely a manga-style plot, complete with training arcs and semi-relevant sidequests, all working up to the final boss match.

It is an extremely self-aware show. On multiple occasions, something would happen, I would crack a joke about it, and then a beat later the show itself would make the exact same joke. I wouldn't call it an outright comedy, but it's still very funny, and on purpose. It has no illusions about being some kind of profound, meaningful epic. Mostly it's just here for a good time.

Yet this lightheartedness is what makes the powerful emotional parts really powerful by contrast. The show is not stupid; it's just goofing around most of the time. When it knuckles down, it can be devastating. And you know what? It does wind up being profound and meaningful about some stuff. How about that.

So yeah, if you're up for something that bops merrily right along and only occasionally rips your heart out, here you go!

2. Putting the poly in polycule

Bisexuals, rejoice! It's representin' time!

Here you go, I made a relationship chart of about 40% of the show's potential and canonical ships. I could have included so many more, but I only had so much space on the image, so I had to leave out some amazing ones, like the sword hedgehog who's real into this one cougar who could easily wipe the floor with him, or the rich nerd who thinks he has a chance with the aforementioned hot butch, or the fancy MILF who cheated on the emperor with a dreamy jianghu man and is trying not to cheat on him again with a different, slightly less dreamy jianghu man. See? There's just so much.

I would also say these are not exclusive ships. They are extremely inclusive ships. I am a fan of most (though admittedly not all) of the pairings listed here, and in fact of many of the three-and-more-somes indicated by these lines. They're such a cuddle puddle of shared intense feelings that it's hard to imagine anyone getting more than mildly jealous. Moreover, the potential for romance does not get in the way of hetero friendships; a boy and a girl who are each dating other people can go do adventures together, and (mostly) nobody gets weird about it, which is nice. If anything, what makes the overall dynamic so polycule-like is how equally friends and love interests get treated, meaning that it's not difficult to see a lot of crossover potential between those two categories.

If you're like me, you're hesitant about canonical romance, especially when it's straight, mostly because so many straight love stories wind up being tiresome, gross, and/or skull-poundingly boring. You will then be pleasantly surprised by how the canon pairings with members of the main cast are not like this at all!

Xiao Se and Sikong Qianluo are the main textual romance, and golly gee, they're just cute as heck. As the chart above indicates, I like interpreting them as two Kinsey 6's who have found their single exceptions, Mulder-and-Scully-style. Maybe one of the best things about their relationship is that it gets sidelined all the time for the plot. They're not so busy being in love that they forget to get shit done. Then they get a bit of downtime and get to go on a date, and you're like, aww, those sweet gay disaster babies are gonna do a little bit of heterosexuality. Just precious.

Tang Lian and Fairy Rui are right up there with the cuteness. She's a sex-positive dancing beauty who wants to ride that pretty boy like she stole him, and he's a shy sword boy so tightly bottled up that he'll explode if he sees a bare ankle. Avoiding spoilers, I will simply say that this is a pairing of two relatively soft people, until a bad thing happens to one of them and the other hardens up about it. If that's your jam, they're here for you.

Lei Wujie and Ye Ruoye are probably the most magical and the most practical of the bunch. They have a beautiful, super-dreamy, really horny sword-dance meet-cute, complete with its own pop song ... and then that's it, they're basically just together. She likes him, he likes her, good for them. In-laws aside, it's a refreshingly low-drama situation. Besides, I always love it when the hypercompetent woman gets the sweet, devoted himbo who'd do anything for her. Ruoye's had a hard life, and she deserves someone who can dick her down good at night and make her a nourishing breakfast the next morning.

And then there is, of course, The Ship:

Xiao Se and Wuxin are canonical, textual soulmates. The show treats their dynamic as more important than any other. It's so important, in fact, that the show has to sideline Wuxin for huge parts of the drama, lest everything get too damn gay. They each get a boyfriend catch on the other. They both do fairly reckless things when the other is in trouble. They are the secret hidden happy ending to the series. They share the kind of ride-or-die relationship built on mutually being the hugest bitches in any given room. Whether or not you think this is romance, it is extremely romantic, and the series agrees as much as it can, all things considered.

And if none of those flavors of love float your boat? Well, have you considered ... eunuchs?

3. She likes e4e

So I'm on record as being real into eunuch characters, right? Well, if you're with me on that, you are in for a treat here, because these are some absolutely buck-wild eunuchs.

There's five main ones, and I can't even begin to scratch the surface of what's going there. Like, really, I don't even think I understood all of what was happening with them. They're kind of the bad guys, but then they're kind of the good guys, but then some of them are the bad guys, but then they're just working for the bad guys, but then they screw over the bad guys, and ... it's just a lot, okay? It's a lot, and it's all happening with this bunch of catty bitches.

Also, you would not believe the difficult time I had finding any images for this section. I guess for some reason, fandom isn't way into a bunch of canonically dickless color-coordinated middle-aged men in weird hats? Whatever, man, they are missing out. If, however, you have the good sense to be into the intense and complicated (semi-romantic??) relationships among colleagues who also professionally just happen to be missing their external genitalia, buddy, strap in (and maybe strap on, depending).

Don't let me oversell how much these guys are in the show. They're not. They're vaguely important at points throughout, and they become incredibly important near the end, but they're hardly main characters. They're mostly back at the palace, doing their various schemes and looking absolutely fantastic.

So if they're such a minor part of the story, why do they get their own selling point? Well, I think their presence is a good example of two specific things about the show:

Specific thing the first: It's so queer -- not gay, but queer. Thinking back to my last selling point, you will notice how many of those straight pairings may look normie on the outside, but once you get down to it are not playing by cishet rules. (For instance, I've seen a lot of people read Tang Lian's resistance to sexual advances as asexuality, which, sure!) Likewise, there are lots of incredibly important, intimate relationships that don't conform to standard romantic pair dynamics. Add to that a lot of bodies with unusual characteristics and conditions, and you've got the makings of plenty of delightful non-normative love stories.

Specific thing the second: There are so many things going on with so many side characters that there's a kink here for everyone. Don't care for eunuchs? How about slinky villains with mind-control powers? Devoted servants who would do anything for their masters? Former bad guys who owe life-debts to the good guys who saved them? Bonded pairs traipsing around the jianghu together? Sons nursing legitimate grudges against the men who killed their fathers? Alcoholic widowers with incredibly slutty necklines? Mysterious cross-dressers with unconvincing moustaches? Vengeful brides? Martial siblings? Murderous royals? Guilt-ridden half-siblings? Boring star-crossed lovers? All these and more! It's a smorgasbord of rarepair fuel!

Also, I just love these toxic drama queens. It's like if RuPaul's Drag Race had the authority to have you executed.

4. The most intriguing outfits I've ever seen in anything (and yes, I'm including Winter Begonia)

Time for a fashion show!

The asymmetrical fits, the detailed embroidery on everything, the brilliant colors -- everybody just looks so good. And yet everything still looks ... eh, I don't know if "practical" is the word I want, but at least wearable. Nobody's dragging ten-foot trains of fabric behind them or wrapped in eighty floofy layers of gauze (except Rui, but she's special). Their outfits are strange and elaborate, but they don't defy physics.

What's truly stunning is how often they get new outfits. Xiao Se alone changes clothes about once every other episode, and more if he's getting a flashback. He is the fashion plate of the whole series, and every look he serves is pitch-perfect.

They're not outright color-coded, but the main characters do have certain colors associated with them -- which is extra-fun when you watch those colors bleeding into their friends' clothes as their relationships get stronger. I also think -- and I'm willing to be proven wrong on this point, but I think I'm right -- that they recycle some characters' outfits into parts of other characters' outfits. On more than one occasion, I'd swear that Lei Wujie shows up wearing the left half of something Xiao Se was wearing a few episodes back (tailored to fit him, of course, because that dumb ponytail boy is tall).

Where I think the costume design gets massive points, though, is that the costumes are themselves adaptations.

Before the live-action series, there was a 2018 3D animated donghua. I have never watched the latter, but apparently the drama is intensely faithful to the animated visuals, to the point where some fights are shot-for-shot remakes.

Of course, you can do a lot more with unreal clothing and bodies in animation -- and you can show a lot more skin, at least according to Chinese content laws. The live-action costumers chose to preserve about as many of the appearance beats from the donghua as they could manage, while still accepting the limitations of real-life bodies and materials. You can see some side-by-side comparisons here. The live-action outfits manage to be instantly recognizable without being slavishly devoted recreating to their inspirations.

So if you're sick and tired of dreary, ill-lit shows with bland palettes, this vibrant, colorful drama may be just the thing for you. It's a rainbow from start to finish.

5. Actually a good central plot?

Despite all the wacky delightful shounen nonsense that this show has -- and it has a lot -- the core of the whole narrative, which is Xiao Se's story, is surprisingly great and cohesive.

The short version is this: Xiao Se used to be Xiao Chuhe, sixth prince and somewhat heir apparent. Then he and his jerk-ass dad had a falling-out that resulted in the prince's having his martial arts abilities all but taken from him. He's been living the life of a very well-dressed innkeeper for several years, trying to avoid all of that palace garbage. But now his jerk-ass dad is dying, which means that a lot of horrible decisions are finally having unfortunate consequences for everyone, and Xiao Se's got to get back in there to make sure everything does not go to shit and land someone terrible on the throne -- even if it has to mean taking it himself.

His central conflict is between what he used to be and what he's become. Does he miss being Xiao Chuhe, high-ranked martial artist and future emperor? Or is he happier being Xiao Se, long-suffering nobody who can barely run a business, much less hold his own in a fight? What would he be willing to do to get back what he's lost? What are his obligations to himself versus his obligations to everyone else? How much is he responsible for his father's bullshit? And why has he wound up having to babysit this stupid Fire Puppy?

It's okay, they're best friends now. Lei Wujie decided.

No spoilers, but I liked Xiao Se's ending a lot. I feel it's very true to the character and shows a real understanding of who he is and what he values. And really, at the end of the day, sometimes all you need for a happy ending is your girlfriend, your girlfriend's girlfriend, your girlfriend's girlfriend's boyfriend who's also your boyfriend, your other boyfriend, his girlfriend, and your long-distance for-real soulmate.

Feel like giving the youths a try?

You can find them on YouTube or on Viki. But be absolutely sure that no matter where you watch it, you make sure to go watch the epilogue as well. (And if you get real into the story, well, here's a link to information about all the other adaptations.)

You are also welcome for how I did not spend this post going off for five hundred years on how much I love Wuxin and his funky relationship to Buddhism. I figured that's way too niche of a selling point for most people, and might indeed have even been counterproductive. But know that I could have.

Also, I'm very happy about the announcement of a second season, because that's going to mean Liu Xueyi has to shave his head again, and he looks unbearably good with a shaved head.

Oh yeah, did I forget to mention the whole motorcycle photoshoot?

In case you hadn't noticed, the whole cast is stupidly hot. Hachi machi.

#the blood of youth #少年歌行 #bloody youths #i made this #rec post #the party is a polycule #LeiDHD

[thisapplepielife]

Written for the @steddiemas challenge.

King Steve

Prompt Day 12: Hallmark Movie Tropes | Word Count: 9963 | Rating: M | CW: Royal Inaccuracies | Tags: King Ralph AU, Unexpected Royalty, Platonic Stobin, Happy Ending, Steve POV

This one is also available right here on AO3.

Loosely based on the 1991 comedy King Ralph, starring John Goodman, but this time make it Steddie.

Steve shoves the key into the lock of the Wienerlicious front door, and jiggles it just so, trying to get the damned thing to open. Robin picked this place as their next place of employment, and he's pretty sure it was just to stick him in another goofy uniform so she could call him dingus more often.

Jokes on her. He looks damn good in lederhosen, way better than she does in the milkmaid getup. So, suck it, Robin. 

Even if he's too old for this shit. He's nearly thirty, and they're still bouncing from crappy job to crappy job, aimless.

He needs a purpose, but he just hasn't found it. Not yet.

He flips on the lights, and goes through all the opening procedures on his own. Robin won't be in until later, so he's gonna be on his own through the lunch rush. If there is a lunch rush. Sometimes, that's non-existent in this place. 

And it seems like today is gonna be one of those days. He hasn't had a customer in an hour, and he's bored out of his goddamn skull. Just watching the hot dogs turn on the roller grill behind him.

Finally, the door swings open, and in walks three stuffy-looking men in suits. Glancing around the place like they're walking in front of a firing squad instead of into a fast food joint.

"Welcome to Wienerlicious," Steve greets.

"We're looking for Mr. Steven Harrington," the first one says in a British accent, and Steve narrows his eyes. He doesn't think he owes money to anyone. Especially not to anyone British. Robin and him might be scraping by, but they've managed to do it all on their own.

"Who's asking?" Steve asks, putting his hands on his hips.

"I'm Gareth Jones and this is Inspector Goodwin and Inspector Williams," the first man says, like that means anything.

Steve doesn't think he's committed a crime, Pink Panther style, but maybe? He wishes he'd stolen some cash or jewels, but he hasn't, so he's not sure why they've sent two inspectors all the way to the Wienerlicious to talk to him.

"And you're here for…" Steve trails off, moving his hand in a hurry up and spit it out motion. He'd rather get this over with.

"Well, sir, that's a private matter for us to discuss with Mr. Harrington," Inspector Goodwin chimes in, and they are definitely British.

"Then, I guess you're shit outta luck," Steve says, moving back to wiping down the counter. "If you decide you want to order something, you let me know."

He watches them look between each other, clearly debating this offer. But they step up to the counter and study the menu, with a hint of disdain, before ordering three number seven combos. Steve makes them, and puts down the red baskets on a tray. Taking their money, and handing over their change.

They're staring at his name tag. Fuck. He forgot he was wearing it.

"Are you Steven Harrington?" Gareth asks, leaning closer, nearly across the counter.

"And if I am?" Steve asks, taking a step back.

"Then we have an exciting opportunity to share with you," Inspector Williams says, gleefully.

"Listen, I'm not gonna, like, sell Amway or knives or anything. So, just. No, thanks."

They look back and forth, like they don't understand what he's talking about.

Steve sighs, "I have a job. I don't want another, no matter how much money you think I'll be able to make, so thanks. But, no thanks."

Because, yeah, he's in lederhosen, but he's working with Robin and he gets a predictable paycheck. It's a fair trade-off.

"Sir, please, just give us a moment of your time," Gareth pleads, and Steve is annoyed.

"Just arrest me if that's what you're here for," Steve says, nodding towards the two inspectors. Robin will sort it out.

"Oh, no, sir. Not at all. They're here for your protection, for your safety," Gareth says, and Steve wrinkles his forehead at that idea. He's pretty sure he doesn't need protection. "Please, just hear me out, sir."

"Fine, one minute," Steve says, following them to a table, and sitting down, crossing his arms over his chest.

"Mr. Harrington-"

"Steve," Steve interrupts. 

"Steve," Gareth, the chatty one, says, but it seems physically painful for him to get out of his mouth, "it is my glorious duty to inform you that you're the new King of the United Kingdom, Your Majesty."

"The new King of what now?" Steve asks, because he's been King before. Sure, it was Hawkins High and not the United Kingdom, but he'll pass. He's grown and shit since then.

"Of the United Kingdom, and the entire Commonwealth, Your Majesty." 

Steve laughs, because why wouldn't he laugh. That's ridiculous. 

Then he remembers seeing the news headline that the entire Royal Family had been electrocuted and killed during a holiday photo session, and that they were searching their records for the next heir in line for the throne.

Steve bets they didn't expect to find him in lederhosen, slinging wieners with sauerkraut. 

"But I'm an American," Steve finally says, shaking his head.

"We are unfortunately aware, sir," Gareth answers.

"Then, how am I the next in line? That makes no sense." Steve questions, he's never even been to England. 

"On your mother's side. There's no delicate way to say this, but your grandmother had an affair with Prince Richard, and your mother was the product of that affair. So, you're in the line of succession for the throne through the House of Wyndam-Pryce bloodline."

"Okay, go talk to my mother then," Steve says, "she'd love to be a Queen."

"It doesn't work quite like that. See, there's what we call male-preference primogeniture-"

"Well, that's just sexist," Steve says, crossing his arms. He doesn't know what that last word means, but he definitely understands male-preference and can fill in the blanks.

"Yes, well, perhaps that's true," Gareth says, looking flustered, then looking excited, "but you could press to change that! As King. With the help of Parliament. You could work to change it."

"Now, Jones," Inspector Williams says, "you know the law prohibits Monarchs from solving problems."

"Yes, well," Gareth says, backing down a little, "that's a different issue altogether."

"This all seems suspect," Steve says. He wishes Robin were here. She'd know what to ask, what to say to all this. "If I'm not solving world problems, which to be honest, I'm not sure I'd be all that great at anyway, what exactly does this even entail? Is it not like being the President here?"

"No, that's more like the Prime Minister," Inspector Goodwin answers, "not exactly, but closer. You, as King, would be a ceremonial figurehead."

Steve is confused, but that's not exactly new. 

"I don't understand," Steve says, because he definitely doesn't.

"You are the new King. It's your birthright, sir."

Steve is pretty sure he's not interested in any birthrights. He's seen Buffy. Kristy Swanson was hot, but he doesn't want any of that shit for himself. No fucking way.

Unless.

"How much does it pay?" Steve asks.

"Well, it doesn't, exactly…" Gareth trails off.

"Then, again. No," Steve says, moving to stand.

"But as the sovereign, it all belongs to you. To the Crown," Gareth says, and Steve starts picturing that and now it doesn't sound so bad at all.

"All of it?"

"All of it, Your Majesty," Gareth confirms.

"So, are you willing to go with us, Your Majesty? To England?" 

And maybe he'd make a different decision if Robin were here to talk him out of it, but he nods.

"You can't go be the King," Robin says, pacing around the room, one of his shirts clutched in her hands. He jerks it out of her grasp, and stuffs it into his suitcase.

"Apparently, I can," he says, "and you can come with me."

She scoffs, "And do what? Be your lady-in-waiting?"

"Yes!" Steve says, he doesn't know what that is, but yes, if it gets her to come. Absolutely. 

"Steve, no," she says, shaking her head.

"We'll get married really quick and you can be my Queen," he says, nodding his head, "think how fun that'd be? You and me? Ruling a whole country?"

"And the Commonwealth," she says, but shakes her head, snapping out of that idea. "No way, they'd make me have your babies."

"Ew," he says.

"Ew, right back at ya, dingus," she says. 

"Then, I'll go first. Scope it out. And you can come later, once I'm settled in."

"This is a bad idea, Steve," Robin says, really talking with her hands.

"Careful, I'm the King," Steve teases.

"Not my King, dingus, you better keep that in mind," she says, and he smiles, pulling her to his chest.

"I wish you'd come," he says.

"I don't even have a passport," she says.

"Well, neither do I. But apparently, as the King, that doesn't really matter much."

"Oh, this isn't going to go well," she says, pacing again, worrying some more.

"Maybe not, but it'll be an adventure, right? C'mon. Come with me," he begs, trying to give her the eyes. But she's immune.

"Maybe later. If this sticks. I'll get a passport, legally, and come make fun of you in your stupid cape or whatever," she says, and he hugs her again.

A day later, Steve steps out of the black town car, and looks up. Jesus. This place is wild. Fucking crazy, it's a palace, like, for real. He still kind of assumed they'd been teasing when they showed up at his place of work, explaining that while he was once 46th in line for the throne, that he'd now been bumped up to number one. Just because the entire extended royal family died in a freak accident during a portrait session for their annual Christmas card.

That's a lot to swallow.

Do they not have a designated survivor? Robin has told him about that, in the US. They should have, it seems like. Most definitely.

Water, metal and electricity did not mix. And snap. They were all gone.

And now he's here.

King.

He's being led inside this freaking mansion, and it's way less funny. He's a freaking American. A bastard, apparently, and he shouldn't even be eligible for the throne. Robin looked it up. Made sure he knew that, as she railed on him for even considering doing this.

But they were desperate. And here he is. Steve Harrington, American. King of England. No, Great Britain? United Kingdom? The Commonwealth? He scratches his head and scrunches up his face. He doesn't remember. They went over this on the plane, but he's already forgotten. Shit.

He's just pretty sure it's not the King of England. Even if that sounds right to his American ear.

There's some old, stuffy British dudes waiting to lead him around, and he follows. But he's starting to think he can't be the King. Not again. He's pretty sure being the King of Hawkins High will be nothing in comparison to this. This is actual insanity. 

Actual royalty.

They leave him in his new royal bedroom, and you could fit his and Robin's whole apartment inside this one room. He stands and looks out of the window, and feels homesick. He'd rather be in that tiny apartment with her, than here surrounded by all this opulence. He shouldn't have even agreed to get on the plane, especially not without Robin. They couldn't make him accept this offer, he's pretty sure. Even if they were pretty adamant about it, at the time. It felt like he didn't have a choice, even if he's pretty sure he did. Still does, maybe. He hasn't been, like, crowned or anything. He thinks he can still say no, and probably will.

He'd just been hand stomping lemonade and slinging hot dogs, minding his own business. He was just a little delirious and desperate for something new, anything at all.

He was bored.

And then there these stuffy dudes were, telling him he was the new King. 

It all happened so fast.

He should call Robin soon, to let her know he landed. He really wants her to move here to be with him, if he decides to stay. Surely, that's something he could make happen, with all this money and all these resources.

Someone clears their throat behind him, and there's a guy, probably about his age, standing there, hands properly folded behind his back. When Steve looks at him, he bows his head at the neck.

"Hey," Steve says, turning to face him fully, "I'm Steve."

"I'm Edward, your private secretary, Your Majesty."

"What can I do for you, Eddie," Steve says, and he watches as the man cringes at the informality of it all. He just doesn't look like an Edward. He looks like an Eddie. But if he doesn't like that, Steve won't force it on him. At least not to his face. Not yet. He'll wear him down, first.

"Nothing for me, sir. What can I do for you?" Eddie asks, stepping a little further into the room.

"Edward, I think I'd just like to go to bed," Steve says, and Eddie moves towards the bed, drawing down the sheets and fluffing his pillows. 

It's overkill. But nice. 

"Thanks, you don't have to do that, but I appreciate it," Steve says.

"Your dressing room is over there. I'm sure there's some proper sleeping attire," Eddie suggests, pointing towards the right door. "And if you'd like a bath before bed, I can draw one for you, sir."

A bath doesn't sound half bad, but Steve is pretty sure he can run his own bathwater. He might be the King, and isn't that a stupid thought, but he hasn't forgotten how to do basic things for himself, not yet.

Eddie does it for him anyway, despite Steve's protests, and then shows him the little turtle bell on the marble ledge that he can ding if he needs assistance at any time.

"During my bath?" Steve asks, raising an eyebrow.

And Eddie nods, "Any time at all, sir."

That's weird, Steve thinks, but watches as Eddie closes the big double doors, leaving him alone with his bath. He rings the little turtle bell, and Eddie comes back through the doors.

"Your Majesty?" he asks, hands clasped in front of him.

"Are there bubbles?" Steve asks, and Eddie looks taken aback, but quickly nods and produces a bottle of fancy looking bubble bath from a cabinet.

"Thank you," Steve says, smiling, and Eddie nods at him curtly, before leaving. Again.

Steve wants to ring the turtle, just for shits and giggles, but refrains. He wants Eddie to like him. He's close to his age, and maybe they could be friends. Well, maybe not, he's stuffy like his colleagues, just not as stuffy. That's for sure. Gareth and Inspectors Goodwin and Williams aren't exactly old, but they were a little uptight. 

When he's good and pruney, he gets out, and wraps a towel around his waist. When he opens the doors, Eddie is standing there, at the ready.

"You can sit down, you know?" Steve says, walking around the edge of the bed.

"I really can't, Your Majesty," Eddie says.

"Says who?" Steve hollers from the walk-in closet, where he's pulling up a pair of silk pajama bottoms. They're nice, and feel good against his skin. He likes them. He's definitely not wearing the matching long-sleeve shirt though. No way. He can't imagine how uncomfortable that'd be to sleep in.

"Royal protocol, sir."

"Aren't I in charge now? So, if I say you can sit, you can sit," Steve says, coming out of the closet, towel drying his hair.

"That's really not how it works, sir," Eddie says, looking away from him. Clearly trying to get Steve to drop it. 

He will, for now. But that man is sitting before this is over with. There's no reason for him to stand around all the time. Steve's worked retail. He knows how much that sucks, and he didn't even have to do it in dress shoes.

"Did you need help finding your top, sir?" Eddie asks, and Steve realizes that's why he's being so weird. Oh.

"Do I have to wear it?" Steve asks, pulling his towel over his chest. Maybe he's being weird, or creepy, right now. Is he sexually harassing his secretary? At home this is fine, normal. It's like a locker room, right? They're in his bedroom. But maybe that's not cool here, he has no idea.

"Well, no, sir," Eddie says, "but it would be proper. But you don't have to, I suppose."

Steve tries to slide in bed without flashing his hairy chest at Eddie again, pulling the sheets up to his neck.

"There, I'm in bed," Steve says.

"Very well, sir," Eddie says, pulling the drapes closed, nodding at Steve, and hitting the lights on the way out, "Goodnight."

"'Night," Steve says back, as the door closes, and then he's gone. 

And Steve's all alone.

These sheets are super soft, and so is the bed. Steve closes his eyes, and thinks he'll be asleep in no time.

He wakes up to the sun in his eyes, as Eddie is pulling open the heavy curtains.

"Good morning, Your Majesty. Did you sleep alright?" Eddie asks, bowing his head at Steve, and Steve really needs him to stop doing that. It's unnecessary. Steve sits up in bed and scrubs his hand across his face. He did sleep well.

"Yeah, I think I did, thanks," Steve says, stretching, as Eddie goes into his closet and starts selecting clothes. 

"We'll have to get you fitted properly today, but these should do for now," he says, laying out a pair of slacks and a dress shirt. A belt. 

"Okay," Steve answers. He can wear that. That's not so bad. "What's on today's schedule?"

And he wishes he hadn't asked, because the list Eddie rattles off is never-ending.

"All that today, huh?" Steve asks, and Eddie nods. Then steps out into the hallway so Steve can get dressed.

He stands in front of the mirror, trying to tame his hair. He shouldn't have gone to bed with it wet, now it really won't behave. He might need to wash it again. He looks around, and realizes there is no shower in his bathroom. He's gonna need a bathroom with a shower, the bath was fine, but not for everyday use. 

"Edward?" Steve says, opening the door, and Eddie follows him back in.

"Yes, Your Majesty?" Eddie asks, standing at attention.

"Is there a bathroom with a shower around here that I'll be able to use? I don't need it this morning, because of the bath, but in the future?" Steve asks, looking at Eddie.

"Yes, of course, sir," Eddie says, "I'll show you where that's at this morning."

"Thanks, also? Can I request some specific hairspray?" Steve asks.

Eddie pulls a little notepad out of his pocket, ready to take notes, "Of course, sir."

"Faberge Organics, the Farrah Fawcett spray," Steve says, and watches as Eddie takes notes. He doesn't even laugh at him. Maybe Steve should tell him it was discontinued, like, a decade ago. But it'll be funny to see how much sway this position actually holds. Maybe he'll send some staff member to find a lone can of it, long forgotten on the dusty bottom shelf of a drugstore.

"Of course, sir," Eddie says, putting the notebook back in his jacket pocket.

Steve steps out inside the hall, and isn't sure what he's supposed to do. Eddie must pick up on that because he holds his arm out, motioning for Steve to walk ahead of him. 

"I thought I could give you a more in depth tour this morning, sir, if you're feeling up to that?" Eddie asks, trailing him. 

Steve pauses, waiting for him to catch up. They start walking again, and Eddie's behind him again. Steve slows his pace, and Eddie slows his own. He feels like he's having to crane his neck back to even see Eddie as he explains all the rooms, all the antiques. The paintings.

That goes on for the whole tour of this floor, and then Steve waits at the top of the long, winding staircase. Eddie waits behind him.

"You do realize I don't know where we're going, right?" Steve says, holding his arm out, inviting Eddie to lead the way.

"Sir, you are the sovereign, no one walks ahead of you. Especially not your staff," Eddie says, and Steve looks at him like he's crazy, because that's a crazy rule. Steve is only King on a huge technicality. He's just a person.

But when it's clear Eddie is not moving until he does, he walks down the stairs, wishing Eddie would just fall into step beside him, at least.

And Eddie gives him the rest of the tour, from two steps over his shoulder. It's kind of weird and uncomfortable.

After the tour, he's led directly into a room to be fitted for new clothes, and Eddie stands nearby.

"We've prepared a few questions to ascertain your knowledge of English history," Eddie says, as they're measuring Steve for a new suit. 

Having your inseam taken is a little distracting, even under regular circumstances. Having three different pairs of hands nudging under your balls, right after you've been declared King, is another level of distracting entirely.

"Okay," Steve says, uneasy. He knows he knows nothing about history, "but I can tell you it's almost zero, right up front."

Eddie looks at him and asks, "When Anne Boleyn failed to give him a son, Henry VIII had her…"

Steve thinks, tries to come up with a logical answer, and settles on, "Adopt?" 

Eddie looks exasperated, "No. Beheaded."

"Jesus, that's a bit much," Steve mutters, and he swears he sees Eddie tamp down the barest hint of a smile. 

"Please pick a fabric, sir," Goodwin says, draping some swatches over his arm and showing Steve.

They all look the same to Steve. Various shades of dark, most with pinstripes. 

"You pick, Edward. I trust your judgment," Steve says, because he does. Eddie is dressed nicely, so surely he can pick the right thing for Steve to not look like he's wearing the curtains.

Eddie nods, quick and sharp, and then hands the chosen swatches over to one of the tailors. Pointing at three of them.

After his fitting, Steve is in jeans and a polo, even if Eddie fought him on it. "Here's a few traditional English dishes, sir, some of which you'll be served tonight. The kitchen chose things they thought you might enjoy, and I thought it might be prudent to make sure you're familiar ahead of time."

Steve nods. Okay. He can do food. He likes food. 

"Roast beef with Yorkshire pudding, fish and chips, bangers and mash, and of course, spotted dick." 

Steve's eyebrows shoot up as he looks at the bowl full of dicks in front of him that he had assumed were sausages. 

He grabs the silver tongs, and picks one up, carefully inspecting it like it might be a bomb, before looking at Eddie. 

"Dick of what?" he asks, scared of the answer. 

Eddie chuckles, "You're holding a banger. A sausage," he clarifies, pointing to some other dish, "that's the spotted dick, sir. It's a dessert." 

Steve looks and can see the raisins. The spots of the spotted name, he assumes. That's more reassuring.

"Please, sir, try it," Eddie says, so Steve lets him serve him a plate, so he can try everything so there's not an embarrassing incident at tonight's dinner.

"Sit, eat with me," Steve says, and Eddie shakes his head.

"No, sir," Eddie says.

"Edward, live a little," Steve coaxes, kicking out a chair leg, an invitation, but Eddie doesn't budge. Just stands at attention, a few feet behind Steve while he eats. It's good. He likes it. Even the spotted dick, which he can't even think about without laughing. How is he going to be able to eat it, or say it, in a public setting? Impossible.

"This is all good, I was scared what you might bring me, to be real honest," Steve says.

Eddie smiles, "Well, we went easy on you. I didn't think you were ready for the black pudding or haggis."

"I don't know what that is," Steve admits.

"For the best," Eddie teases, and Steve smiles at him.

"Tell me about yourself, Edward," Steve says, using his fork and knife to cut into one of the bangers. 

"I'm here to serve you, sir," Eddie says, and Steve looks back over his shoulder at him and rolls his eyes.

"No, about you. Not about me in relation to you, just about you."

"Sir, I don't really…" Eddie trails off, like he doesn't know what to say.

Steve won't make him talk, but he sure wishes he would. He'd like to get to know him better.

"If you won't sit, would you at least come over here where I can see you?" Steve asks, and he's happy when Eddie concedes, and comes into his line of sight. 

"How long have you worked at the palace?" Steve asks.

"Nearly ten years, sir. I've been a secretary for about two years, though. After my uncle retired, I was chosen to fill his duties."

Steve nods, hoping Eddie will continue and elaborate further. He doesn't.

So, Steve eats while Eddie stands by, quietly.

And it's weeks of meetings, fittings, lessons. Eddie and the rest of the staff are working diligently to get him ready to face the press and public.

Steve's trying. He really is, but it's a lot to comprehend. He doesn't understand all the rules, all the protocols, and he is constantly on the wrong foot. Doing something stupid, saying something stupid. He's never gonna catch on to this.

He flops back on his bed. He's going to make a fool of himself, and the Crown. 

Eddie comes in later, and takes one look at him, and starts digging in Steve's walk-in closet. He comes out with an all-white outfit and instructs Steve to put it on. 

Steve does. He's stopped fighting. Stopped asking why, a long time ago. It doesn't matter why, none of them care. He's just a small cog, in a big wheel. He's in charge, but he isn't. Not at all. None of his choices are his own. He's not sitting on a throne barking orders. He's following, trying to please the people around him. Trying to please Eddie.

Once he's dressed, Eddie takes him out to the yard of the palace, and gets down and straps big pads to his shins. They look like oversized, shin guards for baseball catchers. But padded. He was a catcher for one season in high school and hated it. It's the hardest job on the field, he's pretty sure. Pitching was easier. He did that in little league for a while. 

He's standing there in his padded shin guards, looking at Eddie for guidance. Eddie hands him a paddle. Steve tries to hold it like a baseball bat, and Eddie laughs, while trying to help him correct his grip. 

"This is a cricket bat, not a baseball bat, sir," Eddie says with a smile. 

"Oh, so more like croquet?" Steve says, lowering the bat in front of him, and Eddie grins.

"You know how to play croquet?" Eddie asks, looking surprised.

"Sure," Steve says, "I might not be royalty, but I do come from a rich family. Back home. We definitely played croquet from time to time."

Eddie smiles, and nods, "It's not like croquet. You want to keep the ball away from your wicket, not aim it towards it," Eddie explains, helping him adjust his grip, again. His instinct is still to draw it up like a bat, twirl it around in his hand. Test its heft. But Eddie tells him to keep it down, in front of him, to protect his wicket, the three stumps and two bails balanced behind him.

Once Steve is in place, Eddie yells, "Bowler!"

And the guy downfield throws the ball at him in a goofy fashion, bouncing it in front of him, and Steve hits it. And it sails up and away. They do it over and over. This is something he's actually picked up on quickly for once, and it's fun. Steve hits the shit out of the next one, and declares it a home run.

Eddie laughs, "A maximum, sir, but yes, the same idea, I suppose. Six runs." 

If it bounces to the boundary, it's worth four Eddie declares, and eventually Eddie goes to the other side of the little dirt rectangle, and they teach Steve how to run back and forth to accumulate runs that way, if he doesn't hit it out of the park.

"You can lead with your bat, sir, get it over the crease ahead of you," Eddie says.

"The line? The baseline?" Steve asks, and Eddie smiles. 

"Yes, sir, that," Eddie grins. 

And he runs past Eddie once more, passing in the middle, and he reaches up as they go past each other, offering him his hand, a high five.

Eddie clearly isn't sure about this, but still puts his hand up, and they touch as they run by each other, each headed to the opposite end from where they started. 

When they've finished, Steve leans over, his hands on his knees, breathing hard. But he's happy right now.

Once he stands, he looks at Eddie, smiling, and asks, "Do you want to play croquet next?" 

And Eddie laughs, honest to god laughs, and it makes Steve smile, big and bright. It's a great sound, and he hopes to hear it more often.

"Sure, Your Majesty, we can play croquet," Eddie says, and sends the pages to go find the equipment.

Pads shucked to the side in the grass, Steve watches as Eddie lines up his shot.

"Don't do it, don't even think about it," Steve says, breathing down Eddie's neck, taunting him as he tries to line up his mallet with the croquet ball.

Eddie laughs, and nudges him backwards with his elbow, and then freezes, like he's realized what he's done. Steve just shoves him back a little, hopefully assuring him that it's fine, that he likes this. That this feels normal, at least almost, and that's fucking priceless. To his sanity, to his heart. 

He's homesick for Robin, for America, honestly.

He wants to watch baseball or basketball on TV. He wants to drive his car. He wants a pizza, a burger, or some fried chicken. Anything. He can ask for anything he'd like to eat, and they'll bring it, but it's always a fancy version. They seem to have an aversion to actually just going out and getting him the junk food he's missing.

This has been a huge responsibility to take on, one he doesn't fully understand, with a very steep learning curve. But right now, they are just two guys playing a sport together, for fun.

That he understands, fully.

"This is the most fun I've had since I've gotten here," Steve says, standing next to Eddie as he whacks the ball through the hoop.

"I'm glad to hear that, sir."

Once the game is over, Steve stands there in the grass, happy. He looks at Eddie, "What sport can you teach me next?"

Eddie just laughs, "Polo, I suppose. How do you feel about horses?"

And then it's back to the unfun parts. Steve showers, and throws on the clothes Eddie has laid out for him. And he attends meetings. He has his weekly Audience with the Prime Minister, one-on-one, without Eddie present. They always make him feel nervous that he's going to fuck up.

But it's only twenty minutes. He can do anything for twenty minutes.

Eddie works sports into his tight schedule, and Steve appreciates it. It's not everyday, but it's as often as they can fit it in, and they play and Steve pushes himself. To get better. To have fun. 

To impress Eddie, a little, with the one thing he's been good at here.

 

Steve's having a bad day, and he's had enough, so he pulls a baseball hat over his head, and walks out of the front door. Nobody stops him, but he's pretty sure that's just because they've never had to deal with a Monarch that was trying to escape the way he is. But he's had all of this he can take today.

He doesn't get far down the road, before he realizes he is being followed. He turns and looks, and there's Eddie. So, Steve slows down, stalls, waiting for him to catch up.

"You coming with me, or are you going back to tattle?" Steve asks, and Eddie smiles.

"Where are we going, Your Majesty?" Eddie asks, falling in step behind him.

"I'm hungry. I want some food, some American food. Something I'm familiar with. No spotted dick, or whatever the fuck that was. Is there something around here that I'll recognize?" Steve asks, and Eddie nods, and then he waits for Steve to start walking again, keeping two paces behind him.

Steve glances back at him, "How did you end up working for the royal family?"

"My family. It's just what we've always done," Eddie says. "My uncle had this position before I did. When he retired, the last King asked for me to step in, to keep with some sort of continuity, I suppose. He'd known me for a long time, since my childhood."

"I'm sorry you lost your friend," Steve says.

Eddie pauses, like nobody has ever said that to him before, "Thank you, sir."

Steve nods, "Well, what would you like to do instead?" Steve asks, and Eddie looks at him, like he hadn't expected the question.

"Working for the royal family is the highest honor," Eddie says, and Steve laughs.

"Okay, that's bullshit. You don't want to serve people. You don't want to serve me. That's not your dream. What do you want to do? What would make you happy?" Steve presses.

Eddie looks at him, like this might be a trap, even if it really isn't. Steve genuinely wants to know what Eddie likes to do. He wants to know anything Eddie will tell him. Which really, really hasn't been much. He's definitely not very forthcoming about anything personal.

"I like to play music," Eddie finally says. 

"That's cool," Steve says, meaning it, "are you any good?"

"Not bad, I don't think. I play with my friends in a little four piece, when I have the time. The palace requires a lot of my time," Eddie says, and then looks embarrassed. "Not that I'm complaining. I'm happy to be at your service, sir."

"Steve," Steve says, "please, just call me Steve."

"King Steve," Eddie says, and smiles at him, just a little. Steve realizes Eddie's teasing him, and it makes Steve happy. Like they might be friends. Or could be, in time. He definitely needs a friend here.

"Well, that's not the first time I've been called that, so it's an improvement. For sure. But try to work it down to just Steve, in the future. At least while we're alone."

Eddie nods, but he doesn't look like that's going to be something he'll ever do.

They walk a little further, and Eddie stops in front of a Kentucky Fried Chicken. Perfect. 

Eddie ushers him inside, and into a hidden corner booth, before going up to order. When he comes back, he gently puts down the tray, and acts like he's going to start setting everything up, like this is a state dinner. It's definitely not.

"Just sit. Eat with me," Steve says, and Eddie looks uncomfortable.

"That's really not…"

"Does it look like I care, Eddie? Please?" Steve asks, and he pushes a styrofoam plate in his direction, and starts loading it up.

"Are you a breast, leg or thigh man?" Steve asks, and Eddie blushes a pretty pink.

Steve's pretty sure he's not a breast man, and that's more than okay with him. Maybe he can use that in his favor, someday, hopefully.

"Anything is fine, si-"

"Steve," Steve corrects.

"Steve," Eddie whispers, like he might be caught and reprimanded. 

Steve smiles, and puts a couple different pieces on Eddie's plate, then some mashed potatoes. Gravy. A couple biscuits, and looks at Eddie as he pushes it his way.

Eddie is just looking down at it. 

Steve reaches down and picks up his thigh with his hands, and takes a bite.

"Finger lickin' good," he says, and Eddie giggles, as he picks up a piece himself, and takes a bite. It looks awkward, and a little dainty, but it thrills Steve that he's playing along. Getting a little more comfortable with him.

He wants to get to know him, Eddie, the man under the suit. Maybe the man, out of the suit.

On the walk back, Steve looks back at Eddie. 

"Eddie?" Steve asks, and Eddie looks at him.

"Yes?"

"Was there really nobody else? Is it me…or nothing?" Steve asks, because he's pretty sure he can't do this. Doesn't want to. At least not long-term. Not for his entire life. He's given it a good go, but he's not feeling it, at all.

"Well," Eddie says, drawing out the word, seemingly unsure if he should keep talking. 

"Well, what?" Steve asks, pausing, and pulling Eddie off the sidewalk and into a little hedgerow. They stand there looking at each other.

"There was one other option, but he didn't want to do it, so I kept my mouth shut," Eddie says, looking at the ground.

"So, that guy could say no, but I'm just the schmuck who had to accept this thing? This weight on my shoulders?" Steve asks.

"I didn't know you then. You were just a name, a profile, on paper," Eddie explains, still looking down.

"And you knew the other guy?"

Eddie nods.

"Who is it? Do I know him?"

Eddie looks up, quietly asking Steve if he'll keep this secret, and Steve reluctantly nods.

"My Uncle Wayne," Eddie says, "he's retired, and already he did his duty to the Crown, and didn't want that kind of spotlight trained on him. He just wanted to go on, living his normal life. He didn't ask for it any more than you did."

Steve nods, he understands, even if it doesn't make him feel much better.

"Oh," Steve says, "I understand. I just wish, well, that I'd have been given more of a choice, too. If I said no, they'd have found him, eventually, right?"

Eddie nods, "I'm sorry, sir."

Steve gets it. Unless he wants to make that old, retired man sit on the throne, he's stuck.

"It's okay, Eddie. But I feel alone here, most of the time, so I'd like Robin to move here. Can that happen?"

Eddie shakes his head, looking sad.

"Sir, they're never going to allow you to marry your American girlfriend. It's been a hard enough sell for you."

Steve laughs, pushing his bangs back off of his forehead, "Girlfriend? No way. She's my best friend. Platonic with a capital P, only."

"Oh, well, then, yes. I'm sure we could arrange for that to happen, assuming she'd like to come."

Steve grins, wide. That's the best news he's gotten in weeks.

They start walking again, "Do you live at the palace?" Steve asks.

Eddie chuckles, and shakes his head, "No, sir, I don't live at the palace. It just seems like it."

He's teasing, and it makes Steve smile.

"Where do you live, then?" Steve asks.

"Right around the corner, actually," Eddie says, and Steve stops walking.

"Can we go see it?" Steve asks.

"You want to go to my flat, sir?" Eddie questions.

Steve realizes that was probably rude to invite himself over, "Only if you want me to. You're not obligated, of course."

"I didn't think I was obligated, Steve," Eddie says, "but it might not exactly be tidy. I wasn't expecting a royal to want to visit me at home."

"Do I look like I'm gonna care about that?" Steve asks, and Eddie smiles, and redirects them, but still keeps just behind his shoulder. 

Eddie's apartment is nice, and not as messy as he'd sold it as. Steve looks around, at the pictures on the walls. At his guitar on a stand by the couch. Eddie is digging in the fridge and brings him a beer, which Steve takes with enthusiasm. He's been offered wine, and liquor, at the palace, but this is just a regular beer. That he'll be allowed to drink out of the bottle, no glass in sight.

It feels like home, and he twists off the cap, sliding it into his shirt pocket.

Eddie sits next to him on the couch, and they drink, and just make small talk. It feels normal. Cozy. Like he's in someone's home, instead of a museum, and he longs for a place like this to call his own again. He took it for granted back home, and now he misses those days. Misses Robin.

They don't stay long, and just walk back to the palace after they've finished their beers, but it's the best night Steve's had since he's gotten to this country.

"I can't move to London," Robin says across the ocean through the phone, and Steve slumps at his desk. 

"But, I miss you," Steve says, twisting the cord around his fingers.

"Well, you should have thought of that before you packed your shit and ran away to play King," Robin snarks.

She's teasing, but it's true.

"Will you at least come to visit?" he asks, hoping. Begging.

"Of course," she says, "if you're paying."

"I'm paying. I'm the King, you know. Just be aware you'll have to curtsy to me," he teases.

"Yeah, never gonna happen, dingus."

But she agrees, so he puts Eddie on the case to set it all up through his office.

"I want to go to the movies," Steve declares suddenly, and Eddie looks over at him. They're sitting across from each other at a desk, as Steve's going over paperwork from his red box. Signing what he needs to sign, asking Eddie about what he still doesn't understand.

"The movies?" Eddie questions. 

"Yeah, you know, a movie theater?"

"I'll see what I can do, sir," Eddie says, with a smile.

 

That night, Eddie guides him to a secluded room. And it's a private theater. Right in the palace.

"This has been here all along?" Steve asks.

"Well, yes, sir, but it's really for the staff. But I cleared it tonight, for you."

Steve doesn't even care what they watch, he just wants to have some fun.

"Thanks, Eddie," Steve says, settling into one of the chairs. Patting the one beside him for Eddie to sit, and after Eddie's collected a bucket of already prepared popcorn from a table, he does sit, and hands it over to Steve.

They sit side-by-side, watching a movie, sharing the bucket of popcorn, and it feels normal for a couple hours. He could have been on a date, a regular date back home, tonight. 

But it's Eddie, and he can't kiss him at the end of the night, even if he'd like to. This gift from him was more than enough.

Eddie follows him back to his bedroom, and turns down the bed, and Steve stands there, watching him.

"Thanks for tonight, Eddie. I had a lot of fun," Steve says.

"Me too, sir," Eddie answers, "goodnight."

Steve is standing out on the step, bouncing on his feet, nervous. Excited. Robin is on the way, and when they finally pull up with her, she leaps out of the car and runs straight into his arms. Not a curtsy in sight. He catches her and spins her, hugging her tight. He didn't realize it until this very moment, that one of the things he's been missing the most is human touch. None of these people touch him. No friendly hands on a shoulder, or arm.

No reassurance. No checking on his emotional needs. No comforting him. No checking in, at all. He's just supposed to function, as is, all on his own, he supposes.

He's been needing a hug, he realizes, and he buries his face in her neck, and if it's weird, she's going with it.

"I'm so glad you're here. Welcome to my new home," he says, and she grabs his hand, and he lets her pull him into the palace and up the staircase, at a near run. Dodging staffers, who bow to him as he is dragged past them. They clearly disapprove, but he doesn't give a shit. This is the most normal thing he's experienced in weeks.

She pauses at the top of the staircase, but only because she doesn't know where she's going.

He nods to the left, and he's being pulled along again, giving her directions to his bedroom, and once they're inside, she launches herself onto his bed, bouncing.

He smiles, and hops up next to her.

"Holy shit, Steve, look at this place!" she shouts, eyes wide as she looks around.

"I know, right?" he asks, but he's only looking at her. She's the only thing in this whole room that he cares about, that he loves.

That night he wraps his arm over her side, crowding up behind her, and she lets him hold her, "I'm so happy to see you."

"You better not be that kind of happy to see me," she says, contorting to get away from his crotch.

He laughs, laying his head on his pillow, "I'll try to keep it in check."

"You better, dingus."

And dingus sounds like a better, more fitting, title than King ever has, a thousand times over.

He wants to be her dingus, he doesn't want to be the King.

Steve is startled awake in the morning, by Eddie at the foot of his bed.

"Oh, Your Majesty, I do apologize," Eddie says, starting to back away from the bed, "I didn't realize you had company."

Robin looks at him, giving him the once over, "Well, not that kind of company, Jeeves. Let's get that straight."

Steve laughs, and nods, "Definitely not that kind of company, Eddie."

"We're best friends," Robin says.

"Platonic with a capital P," Eddie repeats, "as Your Majesty has said."

"Your Majesty," Robin says with a cackle, rolling towards him, and he slaps her on the arm, and it just makes her laugh harder. "King Dingus."

"He hasn't picked a regnal name yet, so perhaps that could be an option?" Eddie says, and Steve can't believe it. It's the funniest thing Eddie's ever said in Steve's presence, by far.

Steve laughs, throwing his head back, melting into the bed again.

Eddie just looks confused, and a little alarmed. But he still draws back the curtains, and brings Steve and Robin in a wheeled cart full of breakfast and coffee.

"Thanks, Eddie," Steve says.

"Sir, madam," Eddie says, and he bows his head at the neck, and then he's gone.

As soon as the door closes, Robin slugs Steve in the arm, "You have a crush on Jeeves!"

Steve doesn't even try to deny it, just smiles, "Yeah, that's Eddie."

Robin stays two weeks, and then she goes back home to their real life. And Steve's agitated. He misses her. He should have gone home with her. 

Eddie comes in carrying a large, heavy by the look of it, cardboard box. Great, now what?

"What's that?" Steve asks, standing to go take a look as Eddie places it down on the table.

"Your hairspray, Your Majesty," Eddie says, opening the flaps, "I'm sorry it took so long. I had to convince Unilever to engage in a short, private production run, just for you, sir."

"No fucking way," Steve says, reaching in to pick up a can, and it's really it. 

He grabs Eddie and hugs him, shaking him around, and Eddie is just a ragdoll in his arms, but Steve could kiss him, he's so happy.

"Thank you, Eddie, you're now my favorite person. Robin, who?" he teases, immediately taking a can to the bathroom.

Eddie follows, and watches him as he sprays it on his hair and tries to style it, even though it's not wet. 

"Just wait until tomorrow, I'll look so damn good," Steve says, and he meets Eddie's eyes in the mirror, and Eddie's blushing.

"I'm sure you will, sir," Eddie says, and Steve can feel it between them. The sexual tension. The attraction. He's not sure how to do anything about it, if he even can.

But he wants to, and it's nice to have that feeling again. About anyone. And he's happy it's Eddie that's making him feel like this, because he really likes him a lot.

"Can we go swimming today?" Steve asks, and Eddie looks at the schedule, and nods. 

"I think we can fit that in this evening, if you'd like, sir," Eddie answers.

"Yes, please," Steve says. 

That evening, they walk down to the private pool and Eddie stands there while Steve strips off his shirt.

"Aren't you coming in?" Steve asks. He's assumed Eddie would. It's a sport, and that's one of the few things they do together, as almost equals.

"Sir?" Eddie questions.

"C'mon, get in!" Steve shouts, laughing, splashing water towards Eddie, which Eddie dodges easily. But Eddie nods. Disappearing into one of the locker rooms.

Steve's taking bets with himself, if Eddie will be in one of those silly old-fashioned, striped swim costumes with shoulder straps when he comes back.

He's not.

He's just wearing a pair of basic black trunks, and Steve can't help it as his eyes rake over Eddie's pale, exposed skin.

Steve's not sure he's even seen Eddie's forearms, let alone is his bare chest. He has a tattoo. More than one, it looks like, and Steve grins. Fully enjoying the view. Maybe he's not as buttoned-up as he appears on the surface.

Eddie comes down the steps and pushes off, and swims towards Steve.

"What now, sir?" Eddie asks, treading water. 

"I was thinking about laps, but anything would be good with me," Steve says. As long as he's with Eddie, he's in.

And they fall into lane lines, and Steve breathes to his left so he can see Eddie, and for once, they are side-by-side, equals. They both do a flip-turn and push off, resurfacing together. Steve smiles, and keeps kicking.

He feels normal, here, now. Swimming. His teammate beside him. And Eddie is his teammate, maybe the only one he has in this place. He's surrounded by people, but he feels like Eddie is the only one that ever actually sees him.

And he's happy as they swim, together, until they are both struggling to breathe, clinging to the side of the pool. Steve rests his head on his arms, and feels good. Really, really good.

His happiness doesn't last long. 

The next morning, Gareth comes into his office, with four or five other staffers trailing behind him.

"Your Majesty, we'd like to discuss taking the first steps towards the wedding," Gareth says.

"Whose wedding?" Steve asks.

"Yours, sir," Gareth says, and Steve sees red. He knew they were scheming to set him up on dates with various available women, but this is too far. He'll be the King, but marrying a stranger isn't happening.

"I'm not getting married!" Steve snaps as he storms out, turning to hold his hand up, giving the universal motion to stop, demanding that they not follow.

Steve only wants to find Eddie.

Eddie is walking down the hallway, and Steve accosts him. 

"This is too far, you can't tell me who to marry, Eddie!" Steve yells, and Eddie quickly grabs him by the arm, and pulls him into Steve's bedroom, and shuts the door behind them. Locking them inside.

"Your Majesty, please, it's for the good of the country. To protect your bloodline, your birthright. You're the last. You need to marry, and produce heirs. That's just how it's done."

"I'm not the last and you know it!" Steve screams.

"Please," Eddie says softly, like he's trying to tame Steve, "please consider doing this. It's the right thing to do."

Steve crosses his arms across his chest, "Absolutely not."

"Sir, please," Eddie says.

"Stop calling me sir, if you're gonna fuck me over, at least use my name, for god's sake."

"Steve," Eddie says, "we aren't doing this to hurt you."

"Well, it sure feels like you are. What about love? What about who I love?" Steve asks, his voice softer.

"Love must be subordinated for the good of the monarchy, Steve," Eddie says, his voice softer now, too.

Eddie has called him Steve, here, and Steve can't even be happy about it.

"No. No way. No, no, no."

"Princess Caroline is a perfectly acceptable choice. You need to do this."

"You're serious?" Steve snaps.

"Yes!" Eddie snaps back.

"I won't, I'm not marrying someone I don't love!" Steve assures loudly, and he means that. They can't make him. "This place is terrible, this job, it's bullshit! It's all bullshit! I'd rather be selling hot dogs, or ice cream, than to be locked up here in this gilded cage! At least at home my choices were my own and I could fuck up my life any damn way I saw fit!" Steve screams. 

"Steve," Eddie says, scrubbing his hands over his face and Steve's never seen him this undone, "Why? Why are you fighting this? This is just how things are done."

"You know why," Steve says, crossing the room and closing the space between them.

"I don't…that's not…" Eddie mutters, looking anywhere but at Steve.

"Eddie," Steve says, taking him by the shoulders, "look at me."

Eddie does, reluctantly.

"I can't marry Princess Caroline, because I love you."

Eddie's face falls, like he's just been given terrible news, and Steve's stomach drops. He's miscalculated this, all of this, and immediately lets go of him. They haven't been flirting, they haven't been anything to each other. Steve has misinterpreted their whole thing.

He feels sick.

"I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," Steve says, taking a step back, "I shouldn't have said that to you. Please, don't-"

But his words are cut off, when Eddie is suddenly moving towards him, and finally, finally presses his lips to Steve's.

Steve reaches his hand up, and cups the back of Eddie's head. It's better than he'd even fantasized about. He kisses him, over and over, holding him. Finally touching him in all the ways he's longed to, for months.

"Eddie," Steve breathes out, once they've separated, and Eddie just smiles at him and takes him by the hand, leading him towards the truly outlandish bed. He hadn't dreamed this is where the day would end up, even if he'd dared to hope. 

Eddie pushes Steve onto his back on the bed, and the dynamic has shifted in a way that Steve loves. Yes, please. More of this. He watches as Eddie pulls off his jacket, his tie, and unbuttons his dress shirt.

It's the best strip tease Steve's witnessed in his whole life.

And when Eddie crawls on top of him, in just his underwear, Steve laughs and wraps his arms around Eddie, pulling him close. Pressing kisses to his shoulder, his chest, anywhere he can reach.

After, Steve brushes his hand through Eddie's hair, holding him, as they lay together. Eddie's legs are tangled with his, and they're comfortable here, together. 

"I need to quit," Steve says, softly.

"I know you do," Eddie answers, pressing his lips to Steve's chest.

"Will your uncle take over? If I do?" Steve asks.

"I'll talk to him," Eddie assures.

"Will you go with me when I leave? Or will you need to stay with him?" Steve asks.

"At first, I'll feel I'm obligated to stay," Eddie says, "he's my uncle. He raised me. But after he gets settled, perhaps."

Perhaps isn't a no, so Steve takes that as good news, and just pulls him closer while he has the chance.

"Maybe, you'd like to settle in with me here at my flat, for a stretch. Before you go home," Eddie suggests and Steve nods. Absolutely. Yes, to that. Please.

Eddie and his speechwriters help him perfect his abdication speech, and write his Instrument of Abdication letter. Wayne Munson, at his side. Stoic and quiet, but willing now, to accept this responsibility. 

Steve signs it, and Eddie, Gareth, Goodwin and Williams all sign as witnesses to his signature. 

And it's done, basically.

"You boys do realize I have no children, so this might come right back to you, after I'm gone," Wayne says softly.

And Steve and Eddie both nod. They know. But they appreciate this time Wayne's given them, to live and love. It's a gift, because he loves Eddie and wants him to be happy. Steve knows that, and he won't take it for granted. Not ever.

In a few days time, he's standing before Parliament, something he's never had to do, before now.

"My Lords and Members of the House of Commons, I know it is unusual for a King to address you in this manner, but I have some things I'd like to say, that I'd like for you to hear them in person, from me," he starts, before going on to apologize for being too set in his ways, too American for this duty. But he explains that there is another heir, an English one, also born into the House of Wyndam-Pryce. He tells them that it was discovered after Steve had assumed the throne, but now that he knows, he feels it only right to step down. He introduces Wayne, and turns over the Crown, happily.

As soon as he steps back from the podium, he feels like the weight of the world has left his shoulders. He walks out into the sunshine and smiles, closing his eyes, tilting his head towards the sky. 

He's a free man, once again. 

Eddie is waiting, and takes his hand, and finally, for once, Eddie steps out ahead of him, leading the way.

There are lots of people standing around watching him pack, and Steve looks around, "Are they scared I'm going to steal something?"

Eddie laughs, "Well, maybe. You can't take anything that belongs to the Crown."

"I only want to take one thing with me," Steve says, smiling.

Eddie grins, lowering his voice, "Me?"

"Okay, well, two things," Steve teases, and Eddie cocks his head, curious.

Steve walks down the staircase, carrying the giant cardboard box of hairspray. Eddie holds the door open for him, and then helps him put it in the trunk. Technically, it belongs to the Crown, but Steve is sure they'll never miss it. If Wayne wants him beheaded for taking it, bring it on. The man hardly has any hair at all left, so he definitely doesn't have a pressing need for hairspray.

"So, how was it to be King?" Eddie asks, settling into the back of the town car beside him.

"Well, I met you and I got a lifetime supply of my favorite hairspray, so pretty good, overall," Steve teases, and reaches over and takes Eddie's hand, looking at the window as the palace grows smaller in the distance behind them.

He's not the King, not anymore. 

But he's Eddie's boyfriend, his partner, and he's pretty sure that's a way more important role for him to try and fill.

Notes: This originally started for Steddie Holiday Drabbles, but the length got away from me. And then really got away from me. I couldn't condense this into 1000 words, it seems. So, I did something different for that Royalty AU and used this one here.

Royalty isn't really in my wheelhouse, but King Ralph popped into my head, and made me cackle. Sure, I'll make American Steve an unlikely King. No problem.

I'm sure Eddie had the job of about a dozen men, here. Go with it.

Also? John Goodman is a damn delight. Nobody could deliver the "dick of what?" line better than that, though I had Steve try.

Wienerlicious was from the show Chuck.

House of Wyndam-Pryce is a Buffy joke. That's Wesley's last name, and Wyndham was the fictional name in King Ralph. So it seemed fitting.

If you want to write your own, or see more entries for this challenge, pop on over to @steddiemas and follow along!

#steddiemas #hallmark movie tropes #royalty au #steddie #steddie ficlet #steve harrington #eddie munson #king steve #platonic stobin #stranger things fic #thisapplepielife: short fic #thisapplepielife: steddiemas

[firefirefruit]

Steel in Her Veins, Chapter: Twenty-Two

Read On: AO3 | Table of Contents | Next Chapter

Characters: Fem!Reader x Roronoa Zoro

Chapter Twenty-Two: The Doctor Just Pinched Me

“What did you just say?!” Sanji sputters, a cigarette spat airborne from his lips. You furrow your brow at the cook.

“What do you mean, what did I say? I said ‘let me play with your—‘” Realisation dawns on you and you swear even your blackened arm sizzles in humiliation. You reflexively bark out a nervous laugh. “Oh, for fuck’s sake, Sanji.”

Usopp, on the other hand, bursts into laughter, doubling over as he struggles to catch his breath; you shoot him a scowl and shove him hard, but his resounding cackles only intensify. Meanwhile, Sanji's stunned expression slowly morphs into a shit-eating smirk, and you can practically see the gears turning in his devilish head.

"You…dirty-minded fiend." The cook wriggles his eyebrows. "I didn’t know you had a thing for doctors."

Zoro whips his head around so hard you think for a second, he’s actually snapped it off. He glares at the cook, frustration colouring his face from his lack of understanding. “What you talking about?”

Sanji, undeterred by Zoro's glare, flashes a smug grin and leans back against the railing, crossing his arms over his chest. "Oh, nothing much, just that Raya wants to play with Law’s sword."

Yet again, Usopp breaks out in belly-aching laughter, his knees knocking onto the floor. “Oh, this is the highlight of my day!” he gasps.

“Sanji? Can you shut up now?” you scowl, feeling the familiar smell of your hair singeing in embarrassment.

Zoro furrows his eyebrows and blinks obliviously. “Yeah, it’s just a sword. What’s it to do with doctors?”

“Tch. Meathead,” Sanji grumbles under his breath, flicking his cigarette butt into the sea before strolling back into his kitchen.

“Zoro…” Brook gapes at the samurai. “Surely, you get it…you know…maybe try putting the words into a different context?”

His brows knit together in a knot of confusion, his gaze bouncing from one smirking face to another like a befuddled spectator at a carnival sideshow.

Then, like a slow-motion replay of a pratfall in a comedy of errors, realisation begins to dawn on Zoro. It starts as a flicker of recognition, a tiny flame of understanding struggling to ignite amidst the murky depths of his mind. He blinks once, twice, his expression morphing from bewilderment to incredulity in the span of a heartbeat.

Suddenly, it hits him like a ton of bricks, and his eye widens with the sudden revelation. And with all the subtlety of a charging bull, Zoro turns his gaze upon Law, his eye shooting daggers with the precision of a seasoned marksman.

"Already preying on our crew-mate, Law?" he roughly mutters out, his tone clipped short.

 “Oh my God, I didn’t mean it like that!” you exasperatedly exclaim, hands flailing in the air. You turn to Law, desperation in your eyes. “I didn’t mean it like that.’

Law, ever composed, merely shakes his head with a small smirk. "I know."

"Okay, okay, so, what about it?" you quickly press on.

He glances down at the sword in his hand, then back up at you, his lips twitching with the hint of a smirk.

"You want to play with Kikoku?" he asks, the corners of his mouth lifting into what was, you suppose, an attempt at smiling. Regardless, you nod eagerly, your eyes lighting up with joy; Law looks at you in curiosity before the next set of words part from his mouth.

"I want to know why first."

You shrug nonchalantly, trying to play it cool despite the sword-like butterflies that are totally geeking out in your stomach. “I like swords."

Zoro scoffs hugely hearing this, while Usopp snickers at yet another one of your sentences, earning him a humongous slap on the head before you swerve around to Law and hiss, “You did that on purpose!”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he smoothly replies, his eyes fixing on you with a twinkling gaze. He looks down to his sharp-bladed partner, twirling her body under the sunlight like a marionette. "If there's even a dent on her, I'll be teleporting you into different pieces."

You meet his gaze with determination, a smirk rising on your lips. "Fine with me."

With a nod to you, the doctor turns to your old furry friend, making your heart squeeze again at the fact that he’s really a few steps away from you. Soon, you'll be able to talk to him. To see how he's lived, t know where he's been, who Law really is to him. And, of course, to ask where Zepo is.

“Circle the rest up and bring them on board. I’ll explain the situation to them later.”

And with a firm, “Aye, Aye, Captain!”, Bepo turns to you, giving you a large, meaningful grin - in a way that wordlessly says, 'we need to talk!' and goes to climbing over the deck, only slowly descending from your sight.

Law looks at you expectantly, his sword extended in the air between the two of you. “Let’s go, then.”

✦

As you and Law make your way up to the crow's nest, you can’t help but analyse the weight of Kikoku in your hands, its presence so thrilling, yet so bashfully reclusive. You can’t wait to see if you’re able to talk to her, to see what she’s really like, whether she's happy with her owner or, rather, incredibly displeased.

You steal a glance at Law, who walks beside you with his usual deadpanned demeanour, but you can't help but notice a flicker of amusement in his eyes as he watches you.

Reaching the crow's nest, you open the door and step inside, the familiar scent of wood and metal greeting you as you enter your side of the workshop. You gesture for Law to take a seat on one of the refined stools, and he does so with a raised eyebrow, his gaze lingering on the array of gadgets and contraptions scattered around the room.

"A gym and a workshop?" He comments, his tone casual as he begins to push his sleeves to his elbows. “Interesting design choice.”

You laugh a little, lovingly spreading your hand across your desk. “We have a living skeleton as our bard, and our Cyborg lives off of cola in his stomach-fridge. Wouldn’t say this is the weirdest one out of them.”

Law exhales a breath from his nostrils, not quite wanting to commit to laughter, yet still not being able to control his reaction. “Fair enough. It’s a nice set-up you have here, regardless.”

You nod in agreement, a sense of pride swelling within you at the compliment. "Thanks. It’s my baby, in a way."

Law nods, his eyes flickering to you and your arm, and before you can pick up and begin to truly get a sense of Kikoku, he ‘rooms’ it to his lap with a flick of his inked finger.

“Hey!” you snap, glaring at him. “What about our deal?”

“I'll take a look at your arm first," Law simply says. “The deal’s still on.”

Rolling your eyes, you begrudgingly comply, pushing up your sleeve to reveal the blackened charcoal of what used to be your arm. And with a soft tug, Law examines it closely, his cold fingers deftly tracing the contours of the markings as he murmurs to himself in thought.

"Well, it is a transformation," he concludes after a moment, his expression grave. "But it's different from any I've seen before. I’m going to do a few tests to understand what we’re dealing with."

You shrug, stuffing a wrapped sweet you found in one of your desk drawers in your mouth. “Do as you like, but only if it doesn’t interfere with my work.”

He purses his lips, looking deeply into your skin. “Do you have any Devil Fruit powers?”

You nod. “I do. The burn-burn fruit, specifically.”

“And can you still use them?”

“Why don’t you have a look?” A shit-eating grin begins to grow across your face before fire from your hand explodes into Law’s face – albeit you used the harmless version of your power, Law glares up at you, his eyes blown into massive saucers.

“What the fuck were you thinking?” He snaps, staring furiously at you.

You wince and inhale sharply, your upper arm punishing your childish shenanigans by pulsing angrily through you. “You’re supposed to be laughing, Law. I was trying to mess around.”

Still unamused, he looks down to your skin. “So, in short, you can use them, but it hurts like hell.”

But just as Law’s getting into the groove of his expertise, you both hear heavy footsteps cramming themselves in the entrance of the door, and you turn to see Zoro loudly stumbling into the crow's nest, his expression unreadable. Your eyes widen as he looks at you, a flicker of suspicion crossing his face.

"What are you doing here?"

Zoro shrugs nonchalantly, though there's a hint of defensiveness in his stance. "Working out," he mutters, his gaze flickering between you and Law.

You raise an eyebrow, pushing the sweet in your mouth into the corner of your cheek. “You don’t normally work out around this time.”

“I don’t remember you asking me these types of questions, either.” And with a twitch to the samurai’s eyes, he stands from afar, facing you and Law, and peels his shirt off.

He flings it in the corner of his gym, his eyes never leaving Law’s, as he begins to stretch out and flex his arms. “Got a problem?”

Law’s mouth twitches upwards slightly. “Thanks for the entertainment, I’m sure my patient’ll need it.”

You slap a hand on the side of your cheek, definitely not entertained by any of this. “Is this another dick-swinging contest I’m gonna have to watch?”

Law chuckles softly, a hint of amusement dancing in his eyes as he looks at Zoro. "Looks like it," he remarks, his tone light yet tinged with a touch of irony.

You shoot him a sideways glance, a smirk playing at the corners of your lips.

"Well, let's hope it doesn't turn into a full-blown showdown," you quip, your gaze flickering between Zoro and Law. You dramatically sigh, earning an eye-roll from Zoro. "May I remind you that you're dealing with a wounded patient, here?"

"Please," Law and Zoro both mutter.

As Law begins to conduct his examination of your arm, Zoro's presence looms in the background like a silent sentinel, his watchful gaze never wavering. You can't help but feel a pang of annoyance at his intrusion, yet there's also a strange sense of comfort in having him nearby, like a lion you’ve so begrudgingly befriended. Always on your shoulder, always watching, always growling.

Law, unfazed by Zoro's presence, focuses intently on his task, his movements precise and calculated as he ‘rooms’ in a set of his medical equipment that you assume was salvaged at the last second from his sinking ship. Then, he prepares himself to conduct the tests on your skin.

As he lowers his head closer to your blackened arm, his hands rub together in sanitiser; the smell of distilled alcohol wafts into your senses and a tiny part of anxiety wedges into the depths of your stomach. What are you both going to find out? Or – will the tests come back inconclusive? You don’t know. Honestly? You're not sure if you want to.

“This might hurt, so breathe deeply for me,” Law’s voice intrudes into the babbling of your thoughts as a mild warning, as he gently places your hand over his palm, his other hand resting over the skin. With a silent nod, you inhale and grit your teeth, ready for the familiar pulse of pain to ring through you, to turn your world upside down yet again.

And he pinches the skin at your fingertips, hard. A pause. He pinches again, but in a different section, a lot harder this time, from the way his fingers are turning white from pressure. Pause.

And nothing.

You blink, looking down at a curious Law as he pinches at the skin yet again, his eyebrows furrowed as continues to observe your reactions.

He raises his eyebrows. “You’re not pretending to feel anything, right?”

“Not at all.” You huff out a laugh, looking as intrigued as him as you flex your affected hand out over his. You cock your head, deep in thought.

“The contusion appeared from my hand first, so compared to the rest of my arm, my hand should be just a bunch of…dead, old cells. Which would make sense - that I'm not feeling anything at your attempt of contusions. Weird that you tried to bruise me, Law," you mutter, giving him a side-eye at his odd idea of doctorly testing. You then begin to prattle off on more of the medical knowledge you once used to know from your heart. From way back in Wano. From both the books they gave you, and the books you would steal. You continue, your voice now softer, more thoughtful, as you talk more to yourself than to him.

"But how am I still in control of it? How are my muscles still convulsing, if they're supposed to be dead? Shouldn’t I be unable to even move my hand, let alone use my powers?”

Law looks at you, leaning back in his chair. He retracts his hand, folding them into a tight cross, and continues to stare at you with an emotion you can’t quite place.

You stare back at him, then awkwardly look around the room. Was it something that you accidentally said?  

“…What?” you mutter.

He smirks, carefully looking at Zoro and then to you. And with the lowest, quietest voice, he mutters the next few words in the stilled air between you two.

“Bepo was right. You really are her. Kozuki Raya.”

#one piece #one piece zoro #roronoa zoro #roronoa zoro x reader #nami #zoro #one piece luffy #luffy #monkey d luffy #one piece ace #straw hat pirates #usopp #sanji #tony tony chopper #nico robin #straw hat luffy #one piece fanfiction #one piece fic #one piece fanfic #op fanfic #op fandom #female reader x zoro #zoro x female reader #zoro x fem reader #three sword style #zoro roronoa #zoro rorono x you #zoro roronoa x y/n #straw hats #one piece nami

[meraki-yao]

RWRB Thoughts: The Deadline Contender Panel

Quick list of very direct, subjective, random and spontaneous thoughts I had while listening/watching the panel:

I absolutely understand that Taylor probably doesn't remember every detail of the movie off the top of his head, especially with nerves, but Sweetheart really didn't describe the played DNC scene correctly😅

That being said Taylor calling Henry Alex's boyfriend made me SO FUCKING HAPPY???? I was squealing and kicking my legs because of all the feels. On top of that, intentional or not, Taylor takes a breath so it goes "wanted to bring his... boyfriend!" and there's this subtle emphasis on the word, I am screaming

I do question why this scene though? I don't know much about this whole process, but just an educated guess, if we're trying to get an emmy nom via this panel, shouldn't we be showing a scene that's more representative of the movie's core? Like, say the New Year's scene, or Kensington Palace, or the Lake scene. If we have to include the comedy aspect, then show the freaking Red Room. I love this scene of course, but if the purpose is to nominate ourselves and show ourselves then I feel like another scene should have been picked

Why can't people freaking pronounce Nick's surname correctly? It's phonic! Ga - Lit- Zine

"Orange Guy was still president" I snorted

I heard there's stupid discourse over this minor, harmless thing, but because people are stupid, here to clarify "especially Taylor since he's here" is CLEARLY A JOKE BETWEEN FRIENDS and if you didn't pick that up then that's kind of sad :P

I'm wondering if there's still recordings of the zoom auditions/chem read. I can also imagine zoom chem read being much harder. Honestly I think zoom auditions only work with monologues.

He did the chem read in his sister's apartment lmao

THEIR CHEM READ WAS KENXINGTON????!!! WHAT THE FUCK???!!! THE MOMENT THAT MADE MATTHEW GO "there's the one" WAS THIS FREAKING SCENE??? This also implies they had to say "I love you" upon the first time meeting each other oh my god I wanna see that so bad

Also I cannot freaking imagine this intense of a scene via zoom, God I really want to see it (don't think we'll ever get it but still)

Someone ask Matthew or Nick what the other scene in the chem read is

The notebook, pride and prejudice and 10 things i hate about you mention made me happy :D

The speech thing... Kinda feel like should be a Matthew question? It's cool to hear that Taylor referenced President Obama but this is still ultimately him being Alex? Plus Taylor's a great public speaker to begin with

Did he dabble in political science? Did he ever mention that? I know he did Spanish and Community but political science?

I think the only really bad gay movie in recent years was Bros and that has a myriad of issues internally and externally, but I think it's just this one?

Why is TikTok the metric? Might write something longer in the future when I have time but the thing is with this

Speaking of Taylor and queer roles, I think I saw somewhere that Noah Torres was bi?

I talked to @pippin-katz about this but dear God, I have heard the question "What is your favourite scene" being asked to the boys at least three times now, and they always answer the cake scene. Why don't they ever expand on the question, especially since Taylor affed the Kensington scene this time, and why don't they ever ask other questions or ask about specifics? Between me and my friends, we came up with at least 40 questions that could be asked to the boys and haven't been asked yet.

Nick how the fuck did cream stay in/ behind your ear for two days and Taylor how did you spot it

I'm honestly getting really tired of the sequel question, it's always phrased the same way, and of course, the answer is gonna be the same. Even if they knew, they contractually can't tell us, the first announcement of a sequel will have to come from a bigger source like Amazon themselves.

I understand being nervous but this interviewer felt too timid and unsure of herself

Overall still very enjoyable, always more than happy to hear Taylor speak about his baby that we all love, but the question are so freaking repetitive. I said it clearer in my discussion with Pippin so here's a screenshot of that part

#rwrb #red white and royal blue #rwrb movie #taylor zakhar perez #nicholas galitzine #alex claremont diaz #henry fox mountchristen windsor #henry hanover stuart fox #firstprince #my rwrb list #rwrb rambles #deadline contenders

[slut4fangs]

Don't Threaten Me With A Good Time Part 2

Part 1

Pairing: Eddie Munson x Female reader

Summary: A steamy game of Truth or Dare escalates between you and your best friend Eddie Munson. It becomes increasingly clear he will stop at nothing to get your attention, including obsessing over you, stalking you at work, and wearing skin tight leather pants. Anything it takes to have you come over a play a naughty game of Truth or Dare

Warnings: 18+ Smut, Eddie is a perv, obsessive, irresistible, flirty, soft dom Eddie and mean Eddie but in a sexy way *wink wink.* Face sitting, creampie, unprotected sex, overstimulation. Eddie is a bit of a stalker because he's obsessed with reader, raunchy drinking game, a healthy amount of exhibitionism. And A bunch of other sexy things I want to be a surprise, etc.

Author's note: I really loved writing the first part so much that I couldn't help but write another one, Eddie and Reader's relationship is very personal to me lol I'm literally fangirling over my own writing right now. Enjoy, and remember to reblog and comment, it really helps and def encourages me to write more + means a lot to me! <3

It had been a week since you and Eddie confessed your feelings for each other, well more or less that's basically what happened. Most nights he would call just to talk about his day and ask you about your day, an excuse to hear your voice and to keep tabs on you. One thing Eddie Munson was sure of was that he didn't want anyone asking you out, or even innocently flirting with you, that was off the table. Eddie thought he was being casual, only coming into Family Video when you were scheduled, but you caught on quick.

"Need help finding anything, Munson," you're leaning up against the horror section shelf, arms crossed over your chest.

Eddie was squatting with his elbows on his knees, trying to find god knows what, he was particular with his horror movies. Eddie's hair was in a low bun, loose strands rested on his cheeks. You fought back a dreamy sigh that threatened to blow your cover, 'play it cool', you thought to yourself.

You squat down beside Eddie, and finally he turns to you, "I would, but the service here sucks," he slaps his knees and stands up, smiling down at you.

You fake pout, "that's offensive, Munson. I keep this place organized, and I do a pretty damn good job at that considering you like to put everything out of order on purpose, just to fuck with me. You're a menace." A very cute menace, honestly.

Eddie did that on purpose, mix up all of the tapes in the horror and comedy section and then watch as you huffed and puffed, organizing them all over again while he watched sitting on top of the counter, usually talking to Steve and Robin. That was most nights, but Sunday nights like tonight you were always on your own, mainly because Sunday was the least busy night and it was an option to work this night. But you were nothing but persistent in the pursuit of moving out of Hawkins, saving up for your way out was on your mind as much as Eddie Munson was. Which was saying something, because you thought about both a lot, both involved escapism and the irony of it all mocked you.

You hold out your hand to Eddie and he yanks you up by your hand so fast you have to steady yourself when you knock into his chest, you scoff while he's clearly amused that you're both chest to chest again.

"Woah, you ok," Eddie steadies you by your waist. You feel like a puddle of feelings looking up at him, all you wanted to do was kiss that goofy grin off his face.

"I would be ok if you stopped rearranging my masterpiece," you cross your arms over your chest, defiant but playful. Your cover was still holding strong, while you were screaming on the inside.

"I don't know what you're talking about," Eddie puts his hands up in defense and chuckles.

"Yes you do, you know exactly what I'm talking about," you poke his chest with your finger.

"But when you organize the bottom shelves I always get the best view of London and France...and your underpants. You know that saying, right?"

"It's a children's rhyme...so yeah, I'm familiar. Why are you interested in my underpants anyways, Munson?" You weren't wearing any panties today and there's no way you were about to organize those VHS tapes in front of Eddie, you would never hear the end of it.

"Stop calling me that."

"Fine, what do you want me to call you?"

"Daddy," Eddie smirks and pokes his tongue out at you.

Your face heats up, you'd be lying if you said you hadn't thought about calling him that outside of your fantasies. "You're such a perv, Eddie oh my god," you turn around and storm to the back of the store, the employee break room just behind the door. Eddie follows behind you, staring at your ass, and making sure to close the distance between you two when you hit the door his crotch is on your ass. Your hand rests on the door knob, frozen in place. It had been a week since you two were this close, it was driving you both insane being so close and keeping the game at play. But now since you both were aware, the rules of the game had changed drastically. Eddie was braver now, blatantly driving you crazy because he knew he could afford to be more obvious and in your face about it.

"Somethin' important in that break room, baby," Eddie whispers in your ear and you can feel the hairs on the back of your neck stand up in anticipation.

"I have to pee, Eddie." You fake annoyance, this was your only way to maintain your cool, otherwise you would've fucked him in the aisles already. You had half a mind to make the horror section look like a porno, which Family Video would never dare to carry, being a family friendly store and all.

"Can I watch," Eddie says, completely serious and intrigued. Part of him wonders if you would ever consider saying yes to that question.

"Gross, no" you swat him away with your clipboard, you had your checklist for closing the store in hand.

"You should add doing me on that checklist of yours, sweetheart. What do you say," Eddie smiles nudging you back with his elbow. You're both facing each other now and you can feel your breath grow shallow with each passing moment. You wanted to be all over him in that moment, but teasing him was all apart of the fun. He tortured you, so it was only right you got to torture him back.

"Shut up, Eddie," you roll your eyes at him, fighting back a smile. Because his smile was just so contagious, it was hard not to melt at. You turn around, barging into the break room, turned away from Eddie and immediately letting that smile escape you while he wasn't looking at you, butterflies in your stomach.

Careful to coax that smile away because you knew Eddie would follow close behind you, not letting you out of his sight. He was in a good mood today, but that was about to change. You knew the more you teased him the meaner he would get, and that was sort of your goal.

"I have a show this Tuesday," Eddie mentions, sitting down at the break room table, manspreading like some kind of Greek god.

"Yeah...so?" You stand above Eddie and the moment you're close enough for him to grab he pulls you into his lap.

"So you're going," Eddie's voice gets huskier, more demanding as he places a gentle hand on your chin, tilting your face to his. "I don't like your attitude, Princess. Do I have to be mean to get your attention, is that it?"

“M-Maybe,” you stammer, Eddie’s delighted at his new found discovery.

“Ah, I know what you are now, makes a lot of sense too. Hmm, I think I could use this to my advantage.”

“What I am, what do you mean by that?” You wiggle under Eddie’s gaze, his eyes were practically black whenever he was like this, it was mesmerizing as much as it was terrifying. 

“You’re. A. Brat. See, you can’t even stop yourself from grinding yourself on my dick. You’re so needy, Princess,” Eddie moves you so that you’re straddling his waist, both of your legs gripping his hips for dear life.

“I thought I was a cocktease,” your voice is hushed, small compared to Eddie’s loud mouth.

“Oh, you are. That’s what you’ve been doing the moment I walked in here, acting like what happened a week ago was nothing. If you wanted to get a fucking rise out of me it worked, you’re coming home with me tonight. When’s your shift end, Princess?”

“In thirty minutes…”

“See you in thirty,” Eddie hops out of his seat, pulling you up with him as he stands, striding out of the room without looking back. 

Eddie knew what you wanted now, which was reassuring, but there were still answers left blank whenever he thought about you and what your relationship meant. How far can you go with someone and still consider them a friend? One thing was clear, and that everything had changed between the two of you for good. Maybe you could still consider each other friends, but most friends didn’t spend all day fantasizing about the other. Eddie sat in his van, parked in front of your work, contemplating how insane this all was. He had never felt this crazy about someone. Never could he imagine being so consumed, and so obsessed with you. He had always seen you as beautiful, funny, smart, reliable, but it wasn’t until that game night where you two had first seen each other in a different light. Eddie thought about that night a lot, and wondered how intentional your advances were, or if it was just a pure accident. 

Everyone was drunk, laughing and playing cards, when you came back from a night out you found Robin, Nancy, Steve, and Eddie all at the dining room table. Nancy called to you first and managed to ask if you wanted to be dealt in. You said sure and she dealt you a hand of cards, but then you noticed there were no more seats left.

You looked over at Eddie, his lap looked so comfortable and inviting, so sit-able. And so you were still tipsy from the bar, so you thought to yourself ‘fuck it,’ and sat down in Eddie Munson’s lap. Eddie was shocked, you were always so polite and friendly…but never this damn friendly. The pressure of your ass on his thigh made it hard not to get a boner, but he fought for as long as he could, trying to play it cool. No one said a word about it, they hardly even noticed, all distracted with drunk chatter.

“Comfortable, honey,” Eddie squeezes your waist playfully.

“You’re the best seat in the house, Munson,” you say, definitely not thinking about sitting on his face. You had drunk two glasses of wine, and while it was having an effect on you, you were completely aware of your actions, just more inclined to do them is all.  

Eddie chuckles, “so I guess girl’s night was better than game night with us then…did you at least miss me,” Eddie fake pouts. He was always naturally flirty so there was nothing off about this, but now things suddenly felt different, dirtier. The way he squeezed your hips made you feel like you were doing something forbidden.

You rub your thighs together at his words, moving to straddle his thigh, your elbows on the table. Staring down at your cards you place one in the deck, everyone was too busy and caught up with conversation to see what was happening right in front of them. It was almost too easy, you thought about taking Eddie to your bedroom right then, no one would even suspect a thing if you said you were tired and wanted to turn in for the night. 

“Of course I missed you, don’t be silly,” you rubbed yourself on Eddie’s thigh, testing the waters. 

Eddie’s cock grows beneath you and you grind your ass on him, it goes on for about five minutes and Eddie’s doing everything in his power to keep social grace even though you were driving him crazy. Eddie stood suddenly and excused himself to the restroom. Little did you know at the time, he went to your bedroom to relieve himself instead, he left early holding his jacket over his pants to hide the dark patch on his jeans. 

“Is he…alright,” Robin questioned, raising an eyebrow in your direction. And for a moment you thought you were about to get caught before anything had actually started. But then thankfully Robin shrugged it off and went back into a rant about the newest book she read and how bogus the ending was. You sighed quietly in relief and went about the rest of your night like normal. 

Normal was a funny word, a concept really, a concept that didn’t exist between you and Eddie anymore. That’s why when you opened the passenger door to his van, you didn’t know what to expect.

“So, are you kidnapping me or something? Because I don’t have time for that, I have an air tight schedule, Munson.” You couldn’t help it, the word just slipped out of your mouth, it’s what you were used to calling him. That’s what Steve called him for a long time until eventually Eddie started calling Steve ‘Stevie,’ that’s when everyone followed suit on the first name and nickname basis. 

If looks could kill, you’d be dead, the way Eddie stared you down made your stomach do little flips. He looked really hot when he was angry, and maybe subconsciously you wanted to rile him up more than originally intended. 

“What did I tell you about calling me that? It’s Eddie, got it?”

“Yes, sir,” you salute him with your hand and he scoffs back at you, muttering something along the lines of ‘that’s more like it’ under his breath while backing out of the parking space. 

The ride to Eddie’s place was quiet, he moved into a one bedroom apartment a year ago, it wasn’t fancy but it was homey and modest. Eddie opens the front door for you, letting you go ahead of him, always looking for a chance to gawk at your ass. Eddie didn’t care about being subtle about it anymore, he pinches your ass the moment you step in front of him, cackling when you jump in surprise. 

“Eddie! What was that for?!”

“Your butt is really pinchable. I can't help myself, but hey I almost forgot I have a surprise for you,” Eddie smiles mischievously and runs to his cabinets to fish out some shot glasses and a bottle of whiskey. He was planning on you coming over, he had deep cleaned and reorganized his whole apartment in a nervous rush two hours beforehand. But he would never admit that outright.

You cross your arms over your chest, narrowing your eyes at him, “what’s that for?” Stupid question, you knew what. Eddie wanted to play a game.

“I have a drinking game I’ve been dyin’ to play with you, honey,” bingo, fucking jackpot, you were right.

Eddie looked downright stunning tonight, and you finally have a moment to admire him under good lighting. A Black Sabbath muscle t-shirt that left little to the imagination with leather pants, god how could you only notice now he was wearing leather fucking pants?! 

“Like what you see, doll,” Eddie winks and hands you a shot glass and brings you to his room, leading you by one hand, and holding his shot glass and the whiskey bottle in the other. 

Eddie’s room was…clean? Strange and unusual behavior from a man that would usually forget empty beer cans in his room. 

“Weird,” you mumble under your breath. Eddie’s making himself comfortable, head up against the headboard, pouring himself a shot and motioning for you to set your shot glass down and pours one for you as well. “So this game you’ve been dying to play with me…what exactly is it,” you ask, crawling on Eddie’s lap and making yourself comfortable straddling him for the second time today.

“Truth, Dare, or Drink sweetheart?” Eddie’s grinning from ear to ear, prepared Truth’s and Dare’s already in mind.

“Truth,” you say instinctively, already regretting your choice you wince, knowing what’s bound to come up. Maybe Eddie will go easy on you, or at least wait a few rounds to bring out the big guns so to speak.

“What have you and King Steve done,” oh so he wasn’t going easy on you at all, not even a little bit. 

Whatever, you had to answer this truthfully sometime, better late than never. You downed the shot before you spoke, Eddie’s eyes widened at this, his heart skipping several beats. “He taught me a few things, like how to kiss. But it’s not what you think, Eddie. It wasn’t that big of a deal, really. Are you satisfied now?”

“What do you mean taught you a few things, what does that even mean? Just kissing? Why did you need a fucking teacher, anyways. Did he con you into that so he could feel you up or something, I mean, fuck. That just sounds like a porno to me, sounds fucking ridiculous to me.” The thought of you and Steve sharing such an intimate moment, made Eddie’s heart ache a bit, but imagining the two of you kissing did give him a semi hard on.

“Ah ah ah, wait your turn. You only get one question at a time, sir. Play by the rules,” you say, Eddie rolls his eyes at you. “Truth, Dare, or Drink, babe?” 

Eddie’s heart flutters at the pet name but he keeps a straight face, “Well, since I’m drinking no matter what after listening to that…fuck it, dare me,” Eddie downs his shot and pours himself another, downing that one as well. 

“Jesus, you haven’t even heard the dare yet.”

“I needed the first one for sanity, and the second one for bravery, now dare me!” Eddie yanks your hair playfully and you swat his arm.

“Ok fine, I dare you to…”

Eddie chants, “please say eat your pussy,” three times with his hands clasped together in prayer and his eyes screwed shut while you think of a dare. 

“Take your shirt off,” it wasn’t much but it was the best you could think of under pressure.

“Oh, so you are horny, good to know. Lame dare, but good to know,” Eddie tosses his shirt on the floor and slaps your ass. “I could still eat your pussy though, I don’t need to be dared for that. That’s on the house!”

“Focus, Eddie! Keep your head in the game, this is serious!”

“I’ll have you know I am very serious, now Truth, Dare, or Drink?” Eddie’s eyebrows are raised, prompting you, a whole list of truths and dares already circulating his mind.

“Dare…and drink,” you hold out your glass and Eddie pours you another shot and you toss it down, wincing at the burn, but appreciating the warm feeling that grew in your stomach from the whiskey.

Eddie has something wicked in mind, you could tell by the look on his face,  “I dare you to sit on my face,” Eddie’s staring you down, laying down and making a ‘come here’ motion with his pointer finger.

You take a deep breath and crawl onto his chest and plant a small kiss on his cheek, the way Eddie had his tongue out and wiggled his eyebrows at you made you throb. Thinking about his tongue on your pussy was something you thought about constantly, and now it was finally happening, in the hottest way possible no less. You place yourself on his face, Eddie grips your thighs, pulling you down further so you weren’t hovering. 

“Oh fuck,” you moan, hands running through his curls, you pull on his hair when his tongue sucks at your clit. You start grinding on Eddie’s face and he does the unthinkable, HE starts moaning at how you tasted. Eddie squishes your thighs, massaging them, your face is flush and you try not to laugh. He sucked on your clit so hard that it tickled, you throw your hands over your mouth, but not before one giggle escapes. Maybe he won’t notice? Eddie stops and you smooth your skirt down so your can see his face better. Oh god, he fucking noticed. He also noticed you didn’t wear panties underneath your skirt today. He wasn’t about to let those two things go without chastising you about them.

“Hey, what’s so funny, punk,” Eddie questions you, his mouth wet from you.

“It just tickles, that was,” you sigh deeply, “amazing. But don’t get a big ego because I said that,” you point your finger at him and he tries to bite it but you pull it away quickly. “Now, Truth, Dare, or Drink, Eddie?” 

“But I wasn’t finished!” Eddie tugs at your skirt and tries to pull you up to his face again, you resist him and scoot into his lap. He sits up, hands propped up behind him and sighs, “you’re driving me crazy again.”

“Too bad, answer the question, pretty boy,” you say and squish his cheeks together. Eddie thinks he’ll die if you call him another pet name, you’re softening the mean Eddie that showed his face not too long ago. 

“Are you kidding? Dare me, and make it challenging this time, babe. Shock me,” Eddie tosses back another shot and winces, slamming the shot glass down on his bedside table.

“I dare you to call Steve Harrington and ask him on a date,” you giggle at the utter shock on Eddie’s face at your words.

“Well, you shocked me. But I’m drinking and not at liberty to discuss Stevie for the rest of the night, ok?” Eddie takes the whiskey bottle and takes one big gulp.

“Easy there, tiger,” you say, taking the whiskey bottle away from Eddie before he tries to chug anymore. “I think we’re good on this for tonight, I’m putting this away,” you roll off the bed and stride into the kitchen, placing the whiskey bottle back where Eddie got it, hoping he doesn’t try to argue with you on this one. 

“You’re such a killjoy, baby,” Eddie grumbles from behind you, following your every move once again. You turn around to see Eddie admiring you, amused by how responsible and cute you were, the little things showed you cared about him and it made his heart swell. “My sweet little killjoy, my little cocktease, my little brat,” Eddie rattles on, caging you to the counter, arms on either side of you . “Am I going to have to show you how to ease up, ya know, just let me in. I know you want me, baby. Afterall, that’s why you’re wearing this skirt, huh? That’s for me, isn’t it,” Eddie’s face is proud, “I love the lack of panties by the way, easy access. Only for me, right,” Eddie’s in your face now, staring down at your lips and licking his own. 

You’re speechless, for once you’re speechless. That was a lot to process, and Eddie was on a roll, you wanted to hear more from that dirty mouth of his. 

“Truth or Dare,” Eddie challenges you one last time. 

“Dare, definitely dare,” you say, knowing you would’ve done whatever he asked of you right then and there. You were under his spell, you thought, or maybe you just happened to have a soul crushing, heart pounding, crush on your best friend that changed the dynamics of your friendship forever. Probably the ladder, though.

Eddie grabs a handful of your ass and squeezes, “I dare you to hop up on my counter and open those pretty legs for me. Here, I’ll help,” Eddie lifts you up and sets you down on the counter, discarding your shirt you stare at him in awe. You never really thought raw sex appeal was a real thing until you saw Eddie Munson at work, and riled up. He was a sight for sore eyes, that was for sure. Shirtless, tatted, leather pants, the imprint of his hard cock through his pants were very distracting. Eddie opens your legs, insisting you keep your ‘pretty skirt on for him’ winking, unzipping his pants to reveal he also didn’t wear underwear today either. His dick hit his stomach, pre cum staining his newest tattoo of a dragon in red ink. Eddie peels the leather pants off and situates himself between your legs, “you’re being so good for me, doll. I’m really proud of you, nothing smart to say?” Eddie holds his dick in one hand, rubbing it up and down your pussy. 

“You look really yummy right now, so no,” you hold his face in your hands gently and crash your lips into his. Eddie slams himself into you with ferocity, no one’s called him yummy before and he thinks he could get used to that, get used to your body as well. You wrap your legs around his torso and moan into his mouth, a moan you didn’t know you had in you, it was so pretty it sounded fake. 

Eddie breaks the kiss to suck on your neck, mumbling sweet nothings into your ear, “you’re so pretty, baby. Did I ever tell you that? Oh god, you’re being so good for me tonight I’m going to fuck you so good. Can you touch yourself for me, please? Yeah, rub your clit just like that, you’re perfect.” Eddie’s praises and rough pace was enough to make you see stars alone, your fingers on your clit was sending you over the edge. Overstimulated and a moaning mess, you kiss him with tears falling down your cheeks, Eddie sucks on your tongue and bites your lip, he was overstimulating you on purpose. Knowing much more about women’s desires than any man in Hawkins, only because he was obsessed with women and sex, and learning about the two of them. The female sexual response was something that came naturally to him, he had enough practice to know what drove women crazy, and you were the cherry on top. The one he’d been waiting to spoil with his knowledge, but it was almost downright devilish from your perspective. You’d never fallen apart in front of someone like this, it was new…but a good new.

Pulling away from the kiss Eddie wipes a tear from your eye and cups your cheek, “aw, did I make you cry? I’m so sorry, baby. But I’m not finished yet, do you think you can be a good girl for a little bit longer for me?”

You shake your head yes, fucked out and resting your head on his shoulder, holding his torso while he pounded into you. Eddie gripped your hips and resumed his fast pace for a good ten minutes, kissing your chest, neck, and lips until you felt him come deep inside of you. You could feel his dick twitch as he pulled out of you, “I’m really proud of you, baby,” and sloppily kissed your lips. 

“Does my makeup still look good,” you sniffle and wipe under your eyes, laughing at how absurd this all felt. Fucking your best friend felt like a sin, it was something secret that was just for the two of you to share. The feelings you two shared only made it worse, made you feel more guilty, and scared the friendship would never be the same. That worry never leaving your mind most days, but right now you didn’t care, this wrong felt so right. 

“Don’t worry about it, you look yummy,” Eddie smirks and pulls you in for another kiss. 

Before you knew it, it was finally Tuesday, the day of Eddie’s show and you were sitting at the bar watching his set, he was wearing those fucking leather pants again. Eddie kept glancing over at you, not being able to help himself. You were wearing a flattering red dress adorned with red lipstick, he admired the bold choice, and you admired his. The Pants were definitely something you could consider your weakness now, something that would always make you think of how your best friend seduced you again, and how you were starting to care less any time you saw him mouth something to you from the stage between songs. Eddie mouthed the words ‘hey, killjoy’ and ‘yummy,’ and winked every time he caught you staring at him with your mouth open. Watching him play was fucking mesmerizing.

When the show ended Eddie sauntered over to you, resting his elbow on the counter and leaning into your personal space, “did you like it?” He was ecstatic you went to one of his shows, cheering him on silently from a pretty decent size bar crowd he had managed to gain over time. They were a town favorite, Corroded Coffin was one good show away from a state tour, and Eddie was proud of that.

“I loved it, the guitar player was pretty cute too, and the singer…,” you smile up at his face that was glistening with sweat. 

“Hey, I happen to be both of those guys. What are the odds, wanna have a private show in about an hour? VIP only!”

“Isn’t it inappropriate to take advantage of your fans,” you tease him.

“I think it would be inappropriate to not take advantage of how killer you look tonight, doll face. See you in an hour,” Eddie grins, stealing your beer, then smooching your cheek quickly and hugging you to him with affection. Sticking his tongue out at you, he jogged away to pack up his equipment with the rest of the guys. 

Your mouth dropped, not caring if anyone saw, because still it could’ve easily been seen as regular Eddie behavior from an outside view. But you knew better, you knew right then and there you were head over heels in love with your best friend Eddie Munson.

#eddie x female reader #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson #stranger things 4 #eddie munson fanfic #eddie munson fic #perv!eddie munson #eddie munson x you #eddie munson x yn #eddie munson x y/n #dom!eddie munson #dom!eddie #perv!eddie

[starspann]

do you write for poly!matt & trey with reader? what about some smoke sesh hc’s?

YES?? OMG TY FOR REQUESTING THIS

smoking w/ matt and trey hc’s

matt stone x reader x trey parker

fem!reader, she/her pronouns are used

★☆✵☆★

warnings: smoking, cursing, suggestive themes

dating matt and trey and smoking with them <3

★☆✵☆★

an activity that you 3 frequently participate in

did it a lot together, before and after dating

sometimes you use a pipe, being that it’s yours, you light up and get first hit

when it does come to rolling, you tend to let matt or trey do it for the sole purpose of watching their fingers at work

watching the smoke leave their lips might be one of the hottest things ever

now when it comes to the entertainment,

you literally have to put up a fight to pick the movie

you’ll always end up choosing anyway,

and it’s always something stupid

think of an annoying, slapstick 90’s comedy, like the cable guy or billy madison

(not saying these r bad bc i lowkey adore them)

“oh my god.” trey gasps loudly

“what??” you reply, worry in your voice,

“this movie fucking sucks.”

earns him a good smack on the arm

“you fucking scared me!!”

i can imagine that trey is a little more energetic and talkative while matt lays back, a bit more tired and relaxed

doesn’t mean that matt isn’t talking though

in fact, they CANNOT shut up

actually impossible to have a few minutes of silence

it’s honestly cute watching them interact in such a state

giggling to each other and pointing at the tv screen and their surroundings like children

they piss themselves laughing with their dumb little inside jokes

you just sit there and observe with a smile on your face, joint in hand

“y/nnnn,” matt whines, sinking into the couch

“pass it over already, fuckin’ fiend over here..”

“shhh, shutup, c’mere—” you’d gesture him to come closer

yes, you shotgun the smoke into his mouth

and yes, trey gets super jealous and demands you do it with him too

matt leans into you and let’s you play with his hair, his hands,,

trey would rather have your hands under his shirt, gently raking your nails across his back— he likes the sensation

matt babbles on and on about random shit. he can barely get through one sentence without starting another story halfway.

trey gets cuddly, suddenly he’s never felt the touch of a human being before and needs to be all over you and matt

he definitely ends up sprawled out on top of you guys

his head in your lap, legs on top of matt’s, probably has his foot in his face

“ew! gross, dude.”

cue giddy chuckles from you and trey

“pssstt… y/n..” he whispered, looking up at you

you look down to see his blue, glossy, low-lidded eyes..

oh my god

trey notices the way you stare at him

“hi.” he says with a stupid smile on his face

“hey, baby.” you giggle

from behind you, matt’s hands find their way to your waist,

or were they there before?

smoke sesh quickly turns to a make out sesh

#matt stone x reader #trey parker x reader #doug remer x reader #joe cooper x reader #baseketball #baseketball x reader #doug remer #joe cooper #matt stone #trey parker

[trutrustories]

STUDY IN LOKI ROMANCE

Part 3: 1893

Since we're only a few days away from the last episode, I decided to COUNT DOWN everything we´ve got so far ( that can be interpreted very easily as romantic ) and discuss what the actual fuck is going on with second season. Because even though I shipped lokius practically from S1E2, I absolutely did NOT expect this kind of development. (Not that I´m complaining)

Warning: This is gonna be LONG post, lots of screenshots, lots of SPOILERS, lot of "oh-my-god-they-so-cute" language, and little bit of meta.

I originally thought that this post would be everything at once, but since I have just too many screenshots this time around, I´ll have to split it. so every post will be one episode. Color coding means:

IIIIIIIIII = anything, that coud potentialy be just acting choice.

IIIIIIIIII = everything else (tzn.: whatever was written, and/or carefully prepared by filmmakers. )

side note: I already wrote, about how amazing it is, that Mobius is unable to fight but fights anyway and how beautifuly, and ridiculously brave he is HERE. But this is about Loki/Mobius interactions, so I´ll try my best not to talk about THAT. (Even when I´m really happy, that s2 continues with this formula and Mobius is still his completely defenseless while aggressively brave self. I love him, btw.)

EPISODE 1 HERE EPISODE 2 HERE

Episode 3, here we go:

22) matching suits part 2 anyone, who work on those costumes: I want to kiss you all!

23) Another exhibition of touches:

the challange name is: "how close we can get, before we sink into each other"

24) "And they lived happily ever after..." They had some lokius fan in the editing room, I´m telling ya! This retro movie style transition... THAT is my roman empire...

like seriously? what is the purpose of this? I can´t wrap my head around it. someone just thought that it is really crucial to end this scene with two of them in a circle. OK.

but WHY?

It was LITTERALY used only once! (I´m sorry, but as someone, who works as an editor, this just driving me crazy 🤒🫠)

25) Loki and Mobius enjoying popcorn:

I have several things to say here:

ever heard about when one person is "forced" to have fun for the first time, and to try new things by the other person, and he´s protesting and is all about work and serious matters, but secretly loves it and is visibly relaxed and happy? - Because I´m sure this is some bloody romantic comedy trope, that everyone have seen about hundred times!

"Oh look, you have a piece of food on the chin, let me just…"

I know I already said this somewhere, but, this is the moment, where in my language suddenly (completely randomly) switched from formal way of speaking to each other to intimate way of speaking to each other. (I´m Czech, btw, and I have no idea, what happened in that recording studio but it had to be interesting)

26) Also... Bickering like married couple (part 3)

27) "You know sometimes I forget, that you are one of them... Blows my mind!"

Mobius being Loki´s fan.

Also yeas. Loki is one of them. God. And Mobius is a small, normal dude. JUST A HUMAN. Analyst, even! And they´re eating popcorn together.... also Loki will do whatever Mobius wishes

28) another "let´s be as close as we physically can" challange

Loki can´t keep only eye on him. he needs hands, because reasons

29) Mobius supporting Loki in using magic...

... or I should say Loki using Magic, whenever Mobius wishes, because...

"Will you handle this please?" "Gently!"

And on top of that... not him, explaining, what just happened, to the public, by: "The amazing Loki, everyone! He´ll be here all week! 🥳🥳🥳"

who the heck asked, Mobius? stop showing off with your magical boyfriend

30) Victor/Ravonna - the most transparent mirror ever:

THIS scene? Are you kidding? Ravonna running towards Victor: "Mr Timley! are you okay? And Mobius running practicly at the same time towards Loki with: You allright?" and both helping their man up on their feet?! IN SYNC! this is too much.

WTF

31) THE BIKE THIS. this is the most GREENLY green point, I can think of. Someone had to have this vision. This idea. And put it in to screenplay. Someone had to find the bike. Someone was shooting this. Camera is moving around them. And they were all like GREAT idea, let´s have them riding tandem bike while chasing Ravonna and Timely, that makes complete sense! (even when we have Loki chasing Brad USING MAGIC one episode back) anyway... ever heard about "let´s do this crazy stupid thing - absolutely not - and then they do the thing" trope?

32) Loki going with Mobius, not even thinking about it anymore.

And to think, that I was expecting something like S01E03 (Lamentis episode)! Once again, I wasn´t prepared for amount of Lokius content I was actually served. What a surprise! 🤯

#loki #loki spoilers #loki and mobius #lokius #mobius m mobius #owen wilson #tom hiddleston #loki s2 spoilers #loki season 2

[starglow-xx]

— Oh Baby!

part 2! - a solution? sure, let’s call it that

heartslabyul & savanaclaw x f! reader

synopsis: when the boys of heartslabyul and savanaclaw get turned to kids, who else is supposed to take of them except their beloved prefect? go figure. damn you crowley. oh, and you too grim.

fandom: twisted wonderland

type of work: part of mini series! : “Oh Baby!” ; written segment, fluff / platonic themes, comedy? ; check out pt. 1 here!

warnings: a stressed prefect pt. 2, unedited

a/n: YALL it’s been a year since i posted the first part to this and obviously since then i’ve completed the books for octavinelle, scarabia, and pomefiore, so maybe they’ll have future appearances later hehe but no promises

“you’re telling me you don’t know how to fix this?!” you whisper yelled.

“that’s what i said was it not?”

you wanted to scream in frustration at the headmaster but refrained yourself from doing so as your newly turned baby friends were oh so peacefully playing in the common room as you and crowley talked in the kitchen, and didn’t want to draw attention.

“loosey duecey! loosey duecey! loosey duecey! loosey duecey!”

“shut up!”

maybe peacefully was too good of a word in this situation.

“WELL THEN! it seems that i am no longer needed so i will take my leave—”

“get the hell back here for seven’s sake! and didn’t i tell you to keep your voice down?!”

“but—”

“shut up! if you won’t help me solve my problem then don’t speak at all!” you continued to whisper yell.

“...”

“seriously?!”

with strength that you usually save for rounding up ace, deuce, and grim (on normal circumstances), you grab the stupid headmaster by the back of his cloak thing as he turns away from you to make his escape.

“oh no you don’t!”

the bird for brains had the audacity to sigh at you like he was the one inconvenienced with 8 children. 8 actual children.

“ms. prefect, you must understand, that despite how gracious i am, i simply do not have time for—”

“i’ll go on strike if you don’t help me!”

“...come again?”

you sweatdrop as you let go of his cloak. you didn’t really think the whole thing through, it kind of just came out of you mouth, but it seemed to get his attention so you’re going to have to role with it dammit.

“t-that’s right!”

you cursed in your head slightly as you stammer. there’s no turning back!

“i’ll for once since i’ve gotten here be an normal student! so that means no cleaning after your messes, doing chores that shouldn’t be my responsibility, fighting stupid overblots blah blah blah, you get the picture?”, you threaten.

crowley is silent as he contemplates your words.

“and no, holding housing or allowance over my head is not going to work, because i will literally get myself adopted by another dorm or so help me.”

at that, crowley sighs once again, but this time in defeat at the teenage girl in front of him.

“all right, i’ll go work with the staff to try and figure something out.”

phew.

“however!”

god dammit you can never win can you.

crowley with a stern voice as he wags one of his fingers shatters your hopes and dreams with a simple, “the children must stay here!”

you couldn’t believe your ears, and started to yell, forgetting about whisper yelling.

“what?! why?! i’m asking for help with them because i can’t handle it!”

he simply raises an eyebrow at you.

“do you think it’ll be beneficial and efficient to have the children running around potions and stacks of books while we try and find their cure?”

you sigh, disappointed but not surprised at his rebuttal.

“...no sir”

“great! i guess we’re on the same page after all! i wish you the best of luck prefect, for i am gracious.”

you deadpan.

“right of course. whatever would i do without your help headmaster”

“oh you’d probably perish!”

“that was sarcasm”

ignoring your retort, the man dramatically swished his coat cape thing nearly whacking you in the face (you’re 98% sure it was on purpose) as you feel a migraine start coming on, and the you 15 minutes ago wouldn’t believe it wasn’t because of the children.

after a deep sigh, you follow after crowley reentering what grim dubbed as the “danger zone” only to catch the evasive headmaster walk out the door and shut it behind them.

from where you’re standing, you hear grim, who’s awake now, but still lying on the floor, mumble something along the lines of “useless” and you couldn’t agree more.

you eye the handful of children running around and yelling at each other.

oh great seven, this is going to be one hell of a migraine.

i love their shenanigans <33

as always, reblogs and shares are appreciated! i hope you all stay safe! and just in case nobody told you they loved you today, i love you! you are enough! <3

writing belongs to me! please do not plagiarize, repost, or translate on here or any other sites!

#twisted wonderland x reader #twst x reader #twisted wonderland #heartslabyul #savanaclaw #heartslabyul x reader #savanaclaw x reader #reader insert #female reader #oh baby! #riddle rosehearts #ace trappola #deuce spade #trey clover #cater diamond #leona kingscholar #ruggie bucchi #jack howl #crowley #prefect

[tokyo-debunkers-headcanons]

Eyo I've been looking forward to seeing blogs pop up for this game since I started playing, now as we know the mc is a fairly short/average height female so I was wondering for either vagastrom and/or frostheim reacting to a reader who is taller then them. Which ironic considering how tall a couple of them are😂 can be platonic or romantic idrc -👾

I don't think I can do a drabble with this one, so sorry! but I can write the little blurbos! And I'll do both! And I'm just gonna go ahead and give the MC here a big height difference because I think its funny. For the sake of comedy, this MC is 6'9

JIN KAMURAI

Platonically: I think he wouldn't like it. He's not necessarily the tallest, but he's not used to that big of a height difference. To have a sudden 'honor student' be forced to come along on missions was already a pain in the ass, but with the added height, it made recon a lot hard. On the up side, longer limbs meant easier access to their stigma enhancement.

Romantically: he'd get used to it but he's not a fan of the Frostheim elite gossiping about how tall his partner is. More than once has there been a ball at Frostheim and he's used his eyes like daggers to shut someone up. He'd use his stigma but dealing with the consequences would be too much of a pain. He again, like the longer limbs though, but now its more for hand holding and kissing their palm to embarrass them.

TOHMA ISHIBASHI

Platonically: I think Tohma is one of the few that don't necessarily care all too much. As long as they get the job done and don't get themselves or the second years killed then its whatever to him. He will however keep their height in mind for any future purposes.

Romantically: He still doesn't care. He's more of a brains type of person. Of course everyone has their preferences, but Tohma's ideal partner doesn't have a specific height range to them. He would want someone more intelligent to play chess with and talk.

KAITO FUJI

Platonically: Platonically speaking i think he'd find their height an inconvenience, not that he'd ever tell them that. At the very least he wouldn't be able to lose them in a crowd. When he tries to impress them however, he finds their height taking some of the wind out of his sails. But in certain situations he is using that "big dog energy" that they give off.

Romantically: he's not even hiding the fact that he's using big dog privileges anymore. And now he loves that their height draws attention to them, like look at his amazing partner! They're a couple! They chose him! He pretty much brags about how great their tall partner is. He will fight anyone who makes fun of his partner though, no questions asked.....or he might tell Luca to do it, but its the thought that counts

LUCAS ERRANT "LUCA"

Platonically: Luca here is another one that I don't think would care. The biggest difference though is that he doesn't intend to use their height to his advantage. He might ask them to use their height to help with something but he would be straightforward and tell/ ask them about it.

Romantically: okay, if they manage to get his one track mind off of his brother to get all romantic with him, then they're absolutely in on the plan now too. He starts adding them and their height into his plan to subjugate a demon to help find his brother. If they actually go along and take it seriously it's some serious brownie points with him.

ALAN MIDO

Platonically: two words. Sparring! Partner! Because of their height, he will want to spar and get some practice with something bigger than him. He will want to spar in the pit each and every time they come to Vagastrom.

Romantically: he will actually not want to spar with them anymore, or at least he say he won't. He's more of a protective kind of guy. Height doesn't necessarily matter to him, just so long as his partner is safe.

SHOHEI HAIZONO "SHO"

Platonically: number three in guys where it doesn't really matter what height MC is. He might ask them to grab a few things from top shelves while he cooks, but other than that and asking with lifting some stuff. He hesitates to take them out for rides on Bonnie (his bike) however, because of their height.

Romantically: In a relationship, he once again doesn't care his partners height. He does however make them more food, to make sure his partner has enough energy to get through the day. He's more likely to take them out of a ride on Bonnie but he still hesitates and makes sure their long limbs won't accidently touch something that could get them hurt, all before he even CONSIDERS taking his partner out on a bike ride

LEO KUROSAGI

Platonically: he would 100% make jokes about their height. He would also constantly want help getting things from top shelves, even if he can reach it himself. If he's gonna keep them around, he's gonna make sure they're useful for something.

Romantically: okay, i hope his partner is ready to be a pair of hands in his posts. He would try his best to convince his partner to make a tiktok account with him. If not, then he would absolutely get them to take pictures for him. Congratulations! They're his new personal camera person. He's the type to not post it unless its PERFECT, so they might be there for a long time.

#tokyo debunker #frostheim #headcanons #Vagastrom #jin kamurai #tohma ishibashi #kaito fuji #lucas errant #luca #alan mido #leo kurosagi #shohei haizono #sho

[avelera]

On Fanfiction as Genre

Something something... in the world of original fiction, the genre comes first and the story comes second.

For example, "This satirical religious comedy, Good Omens..."

Whereas in fanfiction, the media itself is the genre, and fanfiction writers write within it. The genre becomes the story, the story becomes the genre.

For example, "This coffee shop AU, set in Good Omens..."

Now, here's the thing. In the world of published original fiction, you would never or at least very rarely roll up to your publisher and say, "Hey! You know that really popular coffee shop romance series I was writing? Well, what if I took the two popular main characters and dropped them into a zombie apocalypse for the next book in the series?"

Your publisher would probably look at you like you have two heads. Even if you're their superstar, they might gently and cautiously point out that the audience has a certain expectation that this series is a coffeeshop romance, and you might lose readers if it suddenly, unexpectedly, became a zombie horror story.

But fanfiction writers do this all the time. In fact, it's largely the basis of most fanfic, "I like the original, yes, but I'd like to do my unique spin where instead of Aziraphale and Crowley being in a satirical religious comedy, they're in a grimdark zombie apocalypse and also they're human now."

Fics can range from canon-adjacent all the way out to barely recognizable as based in the same original story, but readers are largely accepting of this because the genre isn't it "coffee shop romance" suddenly becoming "zombie apocalypse horror". The genre remains the same: Good Omens. Just as a fan of science fiction will be accepting of a story that is rigorously scientific and takes place on Mars (eg "The Martian") and enjoy wildly unscientific magical space opera with laser swords, (the original "Star Wars" trilogy). Some might not enjoy the full breadth of the genre and have their preferences, like more or less scientific, but that is much like fanfic readers preferring more or less canon-adjacent takes on the characters.

This gets interesting because as my writing teacher said, you break genre expectations at your own peril as a writer. Note: Most "genre breaking" works are nothing of the sort, they simply break a few unspoken expectations. You don't say something is a Western and then set it in a stock trader's office in New York City. People who pick up your book expecting a Western aren't going to think it's clever, they're going to think it's annoying, most likely.

This is because genres have certain pleasures associated with them, as my teacher said. In Western, Sci-Fi, and Fantasy, the expected pleasures are largely setting or plot-based. We expect a sci-fi story to take place in space, or to otherwise involve technology real or imagined. We expect fantasy to involve magic in some form. We expect a Western to be set in the Old West or have something to do with cowboys and horses, for the most part, though of course in all examples there are exceptions.

Horror and Romance are particularly interesting, because those pleasures are not based in setting but in the expected emotion the reader can expect. Horror readers expect to be scared by the end, no matter how you achieve it, and Romance readers expect to engage physically, mentally, or emotionally in a story about love and lust. Then you get into interesting mixtures like Sci-Fi Horror, which helps narrow things down.

My final point to all of this is that this is one reason why original fiction publishers and fanfiction readers are often speaking at cross-purposes to one another.

I see a lot of predictions for continuations of media that think with a fanfic writer brain. "I want these characters to talk about their feelings next time," except that the genre of "talking about feelings" they're imagining is more aligned with literary or psychological character study, or the romance genre. Whereas the core media is, for example, a satirical religious comedy. Or a workplace romantic comedy set on a pirate ship. Or it's a comic book action movie about a super soldier punching bad guys.

Yes, you will get elements of that in any good script that provides variety, but the story isn't going to switch genres as seen by original fiction publishers and studios, because they would think that's crazy. They see the story as living within a genre and the audience basing their choice to engage with that story as being based in the expectations of that genre. People want to see a pirate comedy. People want to watch a superhero punch bad guys. To have them suddenly pivot to a deep arthouse film style discussion of feelings and unearthing of trauma isn't just weird to them, it's a betrayal of what the audience is ostensibly there to see.

Where you see deviation of this is in stories that are so well-established that they begin to operate like fanfiction. "I want to see a Superman movie that's a deep exploration of trauma and what it's like to grow up feeling like an alien in the American Midwest." Superman, in this case, is the genre so we can range further afield with what about this story we explore and we can switch genre away from it just being about punching bad guys.

Which is why I sometimes praise a film as being really good fanfiction, but it usually requires a media property with broad household name familiarity to make the story itself into a genre that allows further explorations that dip into less expected genres, like arthouse film takes set in a popular scifi franchise universe. And that's why, very often, fanfiction readers aren't going to get what they hope for from a lot of franchises, especially those who don't have the popularity or confidence to treat their story as the genre itself, rather than as residing within the expectations of its genre.

#maggie rambles #writing #fanfiction

[ikemenomegas]

jjk actor au...

Going a little feral over an actor au where no one is dying XD.

You and Gojo and Shoko and Getou all pulling up in the van at award shows, taking turns helping one another out and casually squad posing until everyone's ready to walk together. People are always looking for whose hands touch whose first. There's also lots of shorts of the four of you strutting and arranging yourselves for the arrival shots.

Either Gojo or Getou always try to be near you during red carpets and other events. There's so many compilation videos trying to figure out which one you're with. There's a few very well done much viewed compilations of you just craning your neck to and finding Shoko when she gets stolen away to actually do some interviews.

The compilation videos of you all lounging around and joking during special interviews, which is a huge contrast to the serious roles you played in in the movie/drama you were all in together, get circulated around quite frequently. There's cute things like "every time y/n dropped something during the vanity fair interview" and in the comments is a counter for who picked up after you the most.

There's plenty of videos like "every time Gojo Satoru and Getou Suguru make Eyes at each other during press tour" and "getou suguru and y/n being couple goals for two minutes and 28 seconds". There's also less click bate-y titles that somehow have more content like "gojo satoru and y/n answer fan questions" but it's gojo looking at and talking to you until you forget about the interviewer just about every question when he turns the question onto you. The fans get no information but you can feel yourself sweating by the end.

There's compilations of get_twosg and gogosatory's instagram stories where people look for crumbs on you and shoko, who almost never post anything on your own feeds unless your managers force you. The only exception is when the two menaces aren't with you and then it's occasional food stories and shoko talking about wine or whiskey and you looking distracted until you realize shoko is taking video of you. There's also compilation videos of Gojo and Getou together in your and Shoko's infrequent reels.

After the movie/drama press tours are over, people look for crumbs when you do things in pairs or trios. There's a really famous drama where Shoko plays a super irritated investigator and you're a vigilante leaving her clues. You end up in a movie with Nanami once and there's a clip where interviewer asks you both if you're going to see Gojo's new film and Nanami gets relentlessly teased for his reaction.

Getou plays the second male lead turned victorious partner to you in a period drama and there are soooo many videos of you playing with his hair - which he grew out even longer than usual specifically for the shoot.

Gojo and Shoko end up in a super-hero type film together at some point, and there's tons of videos about them having the same wicked kind of humor, which people don't expect for some reason.

You and Gojo end up as the romantic leads in a very slice-of life type romantic drama about an athlete slowly losing his eyesight and having to change careers. This one is famous because there's those one of those non-explicit love making kdrama/cdrama scenes in it where gojo's line is something like "I need to see you, at least once. Show me?" and then you kiss him. There's a variety of interview question about that line and the two of you almost always botch it on purpose, because if he's serious about it, it inevitably ends up online at your expense.

After that the two of you got accidentally pigeon holed about two other romantic dramas/movies each and got sick of it lol. You refused to do another romantic type media and insisted on a horror film.

It ended up being a horror-comedy miniseries that did really well as a cult piece. You did that one alone but Haibara and Ijichi were in the film with you, so you did have friends around.

Getou and Shoko's first drama together is actually a romcom too, but this one is about them being a married couple who are together for the convenience trying to find a way out of their in-law's meddling. It's super cute and is praised as showing nontraditional family structures in a positive and realistic light. You have a cameo in this series as Getou's adopted sibling which leads to a brief period of very odd fanfiction...

#au of the au #jjk #gojo satoru #getou suguru #ieri shoko #io.myy oc #actor au #from the notebook

[tenpintsof-sundrop]

Dick went to prison in Titans?? -Rotten Anon

I'm getting ready for bed but this is SOOOOO FUNNY to me and I feel the need to tell you the context because it's just SOOO

Like Titans is a comedy. Strap in.

Also because you haven't seen the show, I could tell you anything about it and you would have to believe me, but please know that EVERYTHING I am about to tell you is 100% canon to HBO Titans and the fucking Wattpad style of storytelling is one of the reasons I love the show SO. FUCKING. MUCH.

TLDR: Dick got himself arrested on purpose because he wanted a big kid timeout. But like this post is SOOO long because once I get chatting about Titans I can't fucking stop 🤭😂

SO - partway through Season 2, the Titans have a Destiny's Child style breakup (but it's really more like a Fall Out Boy style hiatus because they all come back later) because Dick tells everyone that he liked about the circumstances of Jericho's death and they're all mad because he's a liar and because ?? he supposedly got Jericho killed. When Jericho's gay little ass admired Dick so much that he THREW HIMSELF in front of the sword (I can talk more about that in another post).

Anyway, everyone is mad at Dick so they leave Titans Tower and #quittheband (for now) and there is a 2 or 3 episode span where they are all doing very different things, and there is no explicit timeline for how long they are apart in these episodes. When it follows Gar, it explicit states that he is alone for 3 days before Conner wakes up and in those 3 days he gones insane from loneliness, BUT - the time also seems way longer than days (it seems way more like weeks or months) because it is enough time for:

Conner to get kidnapped by Cadmus and have his entire mind reprogrammed so that he is a Cadmus robot

Gar also gets kidnapped and has BRAIN SURGERY performed on him to become a Cadmus slave

Dawn and Hank move to somewhere in the countryside, start fixing up a house, break up, and then Hank relapses in his addiction and joins an underground fighting ring where he gets beaten up for money

Rachel gets adopted by a group of homeless teenagers

Jason and Rose go back to Gotham and break up SEVERAL drug rings as Robin and Ravager

And Dick goes to prison

And the circumstances of Dick's arrest are HILARIOUS to me

The Titans all go their separate ways, and Dick is in the airport, and Dick asks the person at the check in desk for a ticket to the most isolated place possible, which she says is Greenland - so you expect that he's going to do what he does best - emotionally (and in this case physically) isolate himself and cut himself off from everyone

But then he oh so randomly crumples up his ticket (clearly changing his mind about his plans) and he ATTACKS ONE OF THE AIRPORTS SECURITY GUARDS?? And he gets arrested on purpose. Because he basically - he went to prison on purpose because the way he thought of it, he "murdered" Jericho, so he needed to go to prison to pay for his crimes.

Aka - big baby put himself on a time out on purpose.

And the whole point of the storyline is that it helps him mature and become Nightwing. And there is this element of it that feels pretty White Savior - because when he goes into the prison, he vows that he is "done helping people", but then his bunk mates are all from Mexico and they are being deported - and in their hometown, because they refused to join a gang (or because they fought back against a gang? I wasn't 100% clear on that part) they will be killed if they return, so they are going to make a prison break in order to illegally stay in America to avoid deportation. And Dick helps them with their prison break

And one of them spoke of a spirit named Alezule (I am probably spelling that wrong) who is a protector/savior who will make sure they are safe, and it's like a blue bird (like NIGHTWING) - and the symbolism is insisting that when Dick helped them with their prison break, he was becoming Nightwing

There's also this parallel because one of his worst moments was using his costume and skills as Robin to disrupt a prison transport truck carrying the head of the Maroni (again, bad spelling) crime family - and he left him exposed to be killed by his enemies as revenge for his parents being killed. And this came back around and got his entire circus family killed

And this time he used his skills to disrupt a prison transport and saved a family when he had previously vowed not to help them. Idk

Anyway - another thing I find hilarious about it is that after a hallucination of Bruce Wayne that is projected by Rachel (again, I can expand in another post), gathers Dawn, Donna, Kory and Rachel at a diner together and "mansplains them into putting the Titans back together" (Kory's literal words) - there is a news story on TV about Dick helping the prison escape and Donna literally says "he's on his own, we're not helping him. Whatever cross he's on, he nailed himself to it" and like SHE KNOWS HIM SO WEEEELLL

And so Rachel convinces Kory to go 'save' Dick and so they BREAK INTO THE PRISON, beat up a bunch of prison guards, and when they find Dick, his cell is empty 🤭 because he is gone (and that is not even mentioning the Bruce hallucinations HE was having and the fucking weird ass epiphany he had)

Yeah. He just escaped prison and the show DOES NOT GIVE ANY DETAILS. The show completely glosses over how he did it. (Which is something I kind of love about Titans. They gloss over things that are kind of majorly important to focus on joke conversations and dramatic freak outs).

And so Dick has a federal warrant for his arrest on his head for the rest of the show that is NEVER mentioned again - unless Daddy Bruce somehow magically made it go away 🤷‍♀️

#anonymous #rotten anon #sundrop answers #dick grayson #dc titans #hbo titans #titans #I love this show so fucking much

[thejakeformerlyknownasprince]

Animorphs / Yellowjackets crossover?

• The night of the 25th Reunion of the Claremont High Class of 1998, Marco is waiting on the curb when Cassie’s car pulls up.  He looks the same as anyone else, tonight. Not like a movie star.

He pulls her into a firm hug.  Cassie holds on hard.

And then, shoulder-to-shoulder, the only two real survivors of the 1996 Air Penn disaster push open the doors and walk into their school’s gym.

• They’re not friends, not really.  But tonight they need this.  Marco because of the unsubtle glances of their former classmates, Cassie because of the whispered notes of concern as people watch her walk through.

“Where’s Ronnie tonight?” Marco asks, sotto voce, as they make their way to a table near the back.

“At home with Shelly.”  Cassie pulls out a chair for him, then for herself.  “I know kids are invited, but she didn’t need to be here.  T’Shondra?”

“Same story.”  Marco gives his public smile for a classmate’s husband who’s even now pointing and whispering their way.  “Out with friends.”

Before Cassie can say anything else, they both clock the woman approaching, a copy of Marco’s autobiography in hand.  Marco’s smile widens another inch, edging toward feral, even as he pulls out the pen.

• See, a while back, Marco was in a movie.  He got the role as a press gimmick, but he’d done pretty well with his minor part and there was talk of his getting a recurring role in an upcoming Netflix series.

• A while before that, Marco wrote a book.  The most-quoted review called it “a tell-all that tells none,” which isn’t even wrong.  There are plenty of anecdotes about his life before the plane crash, his life after being rescued 18 months later, and even a few isolated descriptions of their mock-prom and their pretzel-sharing system while out stranded in the mountains.  He cottons to having eaten an entire bottle of Rachel’s foundation when hungry enough, but that’s as scandalous as it gets.

• A while before that, Marco did a speaking tour.  It was half inspirational, half comedy show.  He perfected the art of answering questions without actually answering them.

When asked the worst thing he did to survive: “Breathing in Jake Berenson’s stank eighteen months out from his last shower, hoo boy.”

When asked how Rachel died: “Uh, hello?  There was a plane crash and we all spent a year and a half without real food?  You’re the one who bought tickets to this event, lady, you can’t tell me you didn’t already know that.”

When asked why Cassie claimed Rachel was alive until a few months before rescue: “Dude, I wouldn’t trust anything I said after all the isolation and hunger.  I went full-on Tom-Hanks-talking-to-a-volleyball out there, only my volleyball was a friggin’ rock, and let me tell you on the bad days my rock friend Mr. Balboa started talking back.”

When asked whether he’d left anything out of his book: “The shit bucket.  We do not speak of the shit bucket.”

When asked how David died: “Seriously, you did buy tickets for this event on purpose, right?  You are here to see guy-who-was-in-a-plane-crash voluntarily?  Because if this is, like, a hostage situation, then blink three times...”

• In retrospect, the crash itself would seem so clear.  Practically inevitable, as one Reddit commenter puts it.  It was a crappy charter plane that they’d booked last-minute because the commercial flight had been canceled for weather.  It was overloaded with luggage and equipment from the baseball team on board.  It had one pilot battling a long illness, and one who still held trainee status.  Rumors of a bribe to allow a too-fast inspection were never confirmed, but they were never denied.  Wing, meet downdraft.  Nose, meet mountain.

• For over a year, everyone assumed that was the end of the U.S.’s third-ever coed Little League team.  The news outlets ran beats of the same story: Rachel Berenson showed up to tryouts alongside her cousin, knowing perfectly well this was the boys’ team.  The unusually progressive coach let her at least give pitching a try.  She struck out five batters in a row.  She struck out a hell of a lot of other teams too, throwing a no-hitter that got her team into Playoffs and then giving them a shot at the Little League World Series.

Then the storm.  Then the crash.

The other girls on the team — Cassie, Collette, Kelly and Elena — got mentioned as well.  Sometimes the reporters even remembered there were boys, that Jake was their main slugger and team captain, that Aximili could clean up the bases on a hard hit and steal anything he didn’t bat in.

If you look long, you might even catch one of the broadcasts that remembers the pilots.  If you’re really lucky, you might catch the one segment — just one — that mentions Gafinilan and Mertil without immediately blaming them for their own deaths.

• Melissa was almost on that plane.  Nowadays she’s fond of telling people that: she missed being on that flight by a matter of sheer luck.  The Yellowjackets’ shortstop, she would’ve been traveling with them except she took a hard line-drive to the face less than a week before playoffs.  Concussed, barely able to see out of her left eye, she was forced to miss the rest of the season while Marco took her place.

“I was almost on that plane,” Melissa says, on the stage of their school gym, the night of the 25th Reunion.  She’s looking straight at Marco over the top of the mic stand.  “It was almost me.”

I was almost as famous as you get to be, it sounds a little like she’s saying.

“Never forget what we lost.”  Melissa clicks the remote in her hand and that stupid Goo Goo Dolls song starts playing.  Cassie feels Marco stiffen next to her as the first image of Rachel fills the projector’s 40-foot screen.

• Back then, Tobias shouldn’t have been on that plane at all.  He was just the coach’s son, just the pitcher’s nephew, just the batboy.  Not a Yellowjacket.  And yet.

• Back then, when Rachel swam awake in the first seconds after the crash, her whole body aching, Jake was crouched directly in front of her.  “Move!” he shouted in her face.  “Rachel, we have to move!”

She widened her eyes, trying to clear her vision.  Jake was filthy with ash and blood, blooming with red marks that would soon be bruises, and even over the ache of her whiplashed neck she couldn’t ignore the sharp pain of the seatbelt-jerk bruise across both hips.

“The plane” Jake shouted “is on fire—”

And that got her on her feet.

They moved so fast that the world would’ve blurred even without her battered brain: Cassie was the first person they ripped from a seat, then David.  Collette was bent up all wrong, body folded around the seatbelt in a way that made her scream breathless as Rachel dragged her loose.  They got Marco under both arms and heaved him out into the snow.  Jake got as far as grabbing Kelly, and then he jerked his hand back from cold bloodless flesh.  No time for discussion, with smoke thickening the air; they moved to Elena and shoved her out as well.

Tobias was the hardest of all, crouched over his father.  Coach Alan was upright in his seat, but he wasn’t breathing to disturb the smoke and didn’t react when Jake jabbed him hard in the eye.  Both arms around Tobias, Rachel dragged backward, holding him against her body until she was able to tip him onto the emergency slide.  She turned back to the nose of the plane.

Jake met her coming the other way.  He shook his head, pointing for the exit.

“Timmy!” she shouted, coughing.  “Craig and, and—”  Their basemen were all still up there, hidden in the opaque smoke.  She tried to shove past Jake, but he blocked the aisle.

“We have to go!”  He had to shout too, in order to be heard over the roar of the fire.

“Craig!” she screamed, fighting Jake, but he was shoving her backward.  “Liam!”

And then they were falling, down the slide, tumbling in a heap into the snow below.

Rachel punched Jake in the face.  The fuselage exploded.

• Then, the headcount over the next few hours contained more bad news than good.  Jake’s older brother, their third-base coach, was dead.  So was Tobias’s dad.  So was their chaperone Mr. Hamee.  Timmy, first base; Liam, second; Craig, third; Jesse, reserve.  All had been sitting together near the front.

No sign of the emergency beacon.  Collette, Pedro, and Elena all injured.  Enough bags of trail mix and pretzels to get them through maybe four more days out here.

It would’ve been five, but David was bouncing around the wreckage talking a mile a minute and pouring peanuts into his face.  "Do you guys see this shit?" he was shouting. "Like a movie! Like an action movie! It’s wild!"

“I think the bleeding has stopped,” James said quietly, where he and Cassie were bent over Elena.  There wasn’t blood anymore, but it’d been coming out of Elena’s ear.  There was no way that was good.

“We’re fucked.”  Marco said it first, staring at the burst-open fuselage.  “We’re totally fucking fucked.”

“They’ll find us.”  Jake spoke even louder than David.  “There’s a search party going as soon as any plane goes off radar, and...”  He pointed to the huge swath of downed trees the plane had destroyed in its last seconds of life.  “We’ll be easy enough to spot.”

Tobias had been sitting on the ground, staring into space, but at that he lifted his head.  “How far were we blown off course?” he asked.  “Do we have any guarantee they’re even looking in the right place?”

There was a long silence from everyone, even the injured and panicking kids.  Rachel broke it when she jerked the trail mix bag out of David’s hand, which was the second time in their first day that a conflict came to blows.

• Now, Marco drives through the night, after he leaves the reunion.  He didn’t have a drop of alcohol — paying for Tobias’s third and fourth trips through rehab turned him off the stuff — and his relationship with sleep has been somewhere between on the rocks and it’s complicated for the last two decades.  He keeps to the speed limit, making three left turns to be sure no paparazzi are following, and he keeps his eyes on the road.  Once he catches himself humming “Iris” under his breath, and in response cranks the car’s XM metal station to eardrum-damaging levels.

• Now, the sun’s coming up by the time Marco makes it to Seattle.  He checks his hair twice in the rearview mirror, smoothing it back and then ruffling it into an attempt at nonchalance.  The shop’s exactly where he remembers it being, the last six times he drove up here and lurked across the street without ever going in.

This time, he gets out of the car.

“Welcome to Wash World, how can I...”

The guy behind the counter trails off.  He’s a big man, full beard and long hair sprinkled with gray.  In the flannel shirt and fleece-lined jeans, he looks like a typical Seattle hipster.  Even the California accent fits.

“Hi Jake,” Marco says.  It feels like an understatement, all things considered.  It’s been fifteen years since he last spoke to his ex.

“You a customer?”  A small woman in a brightly-colored headscarf appears at Jake’s elbow before he can say anything.

“If you’re not a customer, you have no business here.”  A different woman, albeit with the same Eastern European accent, has emerged from behind Marco.  She crowds close to Marco, backing him away from Jake.

“Our Yakob has no business with anyone and you can have your shirts pressed or you can leave.”  The third of the Eumenides has gone so far as to pull the front door open and gesture.

Marco holds up both hands in surrender.  Cassie told him to call ahead, and apparently she wasn't kidding.

“Ms. Zivojinovic,” Jake says, to one of them.  Possibly to all three.  “There’s no harm.  He’s my brother.”

Marco’s eyebrows go up at that, but sure.  He won’t argue.  It’s simpler than the truth, and more likely to go down easy with this group.

The one closest to the door sniffs loudly.  “If he’s not a customer, I don’t care if he’s Jimmy Hoffa found at last.  He can —”

“I prefer to think of myself as Amelia Earhart.” Marco shrugs out of his 5000-dollar leather coat, dropping it on the counter.  “There, dry clean that.”

“It’ll take three to five business days,” the woman behind the counter says.  “You going to stick around for three to five business days? Or are you some fly-by-night, ne’er-do-well, love-and-leave...”

“He’s my brother,” Jake protests, louder.

“I have a brother,” the one by the door mutters.  “You have never met him, Yakob, and do you know why?”

Jake sighs.  “He is garbage?”

“He is garbage!  Would you like a receipt?”

Marco takes a second to recover from the abrupt turnaround.  “Yeah, I want a receipt.  How would I get my coat back without one?”

“If it comes to that,” one of the Misses Zivojinovic says ominously, “we will find you.”

• Jake extracts himself from the Eyrenies at last, promising to be back within the hour.  “Come on,” he says to Marco.  “There’s a café a few doors down.”

Marco follows until they’re just outside the plate-glass window, and then he stops.  “Good to see you, bro.”  He waggles his eyebrows at their reflections.

Turning, Jake follows the direction of Marco’s gaze.  He doesn’t laugh, but he does an almost-smile.  It’s obvious why Marco’s amused: Jake’s stopped growing at six-foot-three, two-fifty pounds.  Between that and the beard, they’ve never resembled each other less.  “I’m sorry,” Jake says.  “It was just...”

Marco flaps a hand in the air, dismissing this.  “Like I’ve never told someone you’re my cousin or team captain or very good friend.”  He doesn’t have a dead brother, so he’d never dare to pull out the line Jake just used, but he gets it.

It’s too cold to linger on the sidewalk without a coat.  Jake pulls open the door to the café, ushering them both inside.  Marco pays for their coffees and Jake lets him, because neither of them talked about it when it was Jake paying for Marco’s arcade passes and cheeseburgers.

“So the beard.”  Marco gestures, tilting the rim of his mocha latte.  “That’s different.  I had wondered how you’d managed to avoid notice all this time.”

Looking down, Jake fiddles with his paper cup of hot chocolate.  “I don’t own a phone or computer.  It’s as simple as that.”

“Oh, I’m sure and the Kindly Ones using the bodies of nosy journalists to compost their garden have nothing to do with it.”

Jake shrugs.  “They’re good people.  And they don’t watch the news.”

“Yeah,” Marco says.  “Speaking of which.”

All at once, Jake’s whole body goes still.  It’s the kind of tension, readiness for violence or flight, that Marco hasn’t seen since the last time he watched Jake drive a knife through the chest of a struggling rabbit.  “Something came out,” he says.

Marco shakes his head.  “Nothing like that.  Not yet, anyway.”  Lifting his butt halfway off the chair, he fishes out the scrap of paper Cassie gave him last night.

I know what you did.  I won’t keep silent unless you make me.  That’s all there is to the note, other than the rough symbol scrawled underneath.  It looks like an odd little insect: six limbs on an elongated torso, two extra eyes on stalks, a scorpion-like tail.

• Back then, Tobias was the first one to find the symbol carved into a tree trunk.  “Look,” he’d said, voice rising in excitement as he pointed up at it.  “Guys, look.”

“What is it?”  Rachel squinted at the symbol.  “Some kind of alien centaur-thing?”

“Who cares what it is?”  Tobias spun in a circle, looking for more marks.  “It wasn’t carved by a moose, I can tell you that much.  It’s a trail marking, or a property boundary.”

“People,” Rachel breathed.

“Exactly.”

They’d set off crashing through the woods before Jake could point out what a bad idea it was.  “Hello!” Tobias had been yelling, when they’d disappeared from sight.  “Hello, whoever you are!”

• Then, Cassie had watched them go, had watched Jake go chasing after.  It was probably safe enough, as long as they realized they could follow their own tracks back through the mud and slush.  Instead she went back to what she’d been doing: tearing their spare jerseys into strips to make bandages.  There were a lot of wounded, and not a lot of clean cloths.

Rachel and Jake and Tobias weren’t back when the sun started to go down, and she did her best not to worry.

“We should eat something, right?”  That was James, standing on a fallen tree to address them all.  “We should each have a small snack.”

That was one of the first moments when they looked around, hoping for an adult or at least someone with some kind of seniority.  One of the first moments they realized just how on their own they were.

“Yeah.”  Cassie spoke up then.  “We should.”

James became the one to divvy up the little bags, that first time, with Marco following as an informal enforcer.  (“Two hundred calories per bag of pretzels,” Marco said, “and we can get by on seven hundred a day.  We get a pretzel bag or half a trail mix apiece for three meals, and that’ll last us for five days’ worth of food.”)

“Hey,” Cassie said, sitting next to Ax.  She’d seen him peering close at the back of the bag of trail mix he’d been handed, frowning at the ingredient list for the chocolate candies. “You’re vegan, right?”  His family were religious, even if Tobias tended to eat meat.

He shrugged.  “It’s not worth insisting on right now.”

Gently, Cassie took the trail mix out of his hands and handed him her pretzels instead.  “It can still matter,” she said.  “For now.  We’re not giving ourselves up yet.”

Ax had smiled weakly at her, and selected a pretzel.  “I hope you’re right.”

“I’m not giving myself up.”  She leaned back against the log, chewing slow to make the M&Ms last.  “We’ll get through this.  Even if we have to walk back home.”

There was no answer.  Ax was looking at the plane, at the place where his brother’s body was unlikely now ever to be recovered.

“Ax...” Cassie said, feeling like a fool.

“Even if we have to walk.”  Ax bit down hard on a pretzel.  “We will survive.”

• Then, Tobias had come crashing back later that night, still glowing with good news, to announce the hunter’s cabin he’d found.  “There’s a dead guy in the attic,” Rachel had said, as if no big deal, “but I doubt he’s using the place anymore.”

That first night in the cabin, Jake had gone up to the attic alone.  It smelled rancid, it had that horrible desiccated corpse watching from the corner, but it was the only place that had privacy away from the cold.

Marco followed, because it was what Marco did; he couldn’t help it.

“I got you, man.”  Marco had wrapped firm arms around Jake, had held him too tight.  “I got you.”

Jake had crumpled then, but only as far as his knees.  Only as far as burying his face in the juncture between Marco’s shoulder and his neck, their skin wet everywhere it intersected.  Disgusting, beautiful, whatever.

• Now, Jake agrees to pack a bag and go with Marco for the next few days, even though the Weird Sisters are clearly displeased that he’s conceding to someone who knows about his past.  He mumbles a greeting as they pick up Tobias outside a motel that’s really more of a flophouse, and keeps his hands in his pockets as they walk up the front steps to Cassie’s beautifully decorated front parlor.

• Now... “Hi,” Ronnie says to the others, in the kind of voice people use when they’re trying hard to sound casual.  “I’m Cassie’s husband.”

It’s pretty clear Tobias has been sleeping rough; he mostly stands in the corner staring at Ronnie.  Between his dad dying in the crash, what later happened to Rachel, and Ax’s disappearance, they all tend to agree that he has every right to be even more messed up than the rest of them.

More messed up is saying something — Marco knows why Jake kept the long sleeves on in the San Diego heat, he had Cassie calling him at 4AM last week claiming there were wolves in her backyard — but Tobias can’t help it.  They know.  It’s why Marco keeps paying for his rehab stints, why Cassie keeps offering her couch for him to sleep on.

“Jake.”  Jake becomes the one to shake hands.  “Thank you for having us.”

“So this... note.”  Cassie gestures to the scrap on the table.  “It could be nothing.”

“It could be Ax.”  Tobias, of course.  He has a tendency to ascribe everything from robocalls to weather patterns to Ax.

“Your relief pitcher?” Ronnie asks.

“Our friend,” Jake says, but there’s no sting to it.  “We haven’t seen him since...”

• Then, it’d been six weeks since the plane crashed.  Six lonely, cold, hungry weeks.  Marco was walking on eggshells around David, Collette around Rachel.  They’d eaten the last rabbit Tobias had shot, down to the skin, down to the marrow.  Ax, of all people, had quietly suggested taking apart the taxidermied deer head on the wall to boil the skin off that as well.

Jake had floated the idea of doing their own take on Prom because... because the date would soon be right.  Because they all had their formal outfits for the banquet anyway.  Because it was something to do.  Because they all needed a pick-up, with winter coming on.  Because they were about to be out of food, again.

Rachel had seized the idea with both hands, of course.  She’d gone wild with her makeup kit and the tatters of everyone’s formalwear, tying Jake’s tie and then — laughing at them, much-needed laughter — Marco’s and Ax’s and Tobias’s as well.  Cassie was in jeans because she’d already sacrificed her gown to make bandages, but she looked more comfortable that way.  Collette’s dye job was grown out several inches (she continued to insist she was a natural blond) but Rachel braided it so that the brown and gold wove together into a pattern.

They’d been beautiful.

• Beautiful or not, once they reached the torchlit clearing they’d stood around in silence for so long that Rachel was about to call the whole thing off.

It was James of all people who’d cleared his throat and started singing: “And I’d give up forever to touch you, ‘cause I know that you feel me somehow...”

“You’re the closest to heaven that I’ll ever be,” Jake sang along with him, Rachel taking up the melody a second later, and by the time they were at the chorus, there were six or seven voices in the clearing.

“What?” James said, when he finished and everyone was staring at him.  “I’m only a badass thrash-punk six and a half days a week.”

That got another laugh, so very needed, from the clearing.  Pedro made a circling motion in the air, and James turned to look at him.

“Another?” James asked, flushing but looking pleased, and Pedro made a humming noise of agreement.

“Baby’s black balloon makes her fly,” James sang, game enough, “Almost fell into that hole in your life, and you’re not thinking ‘bout tomorrow ‘cause you were the same as me...”

Tobias held out his hand for Rachel, smooth as you please, and they became the first couple twirling across the clearing in each other’s arms, both still singing along.  But James had pulled Collette into his arms, he and Elena together holding her up.

And then Marco seized Jake’s hand.  Jake jerked back automatically, but Marco thrust up his chin and stared hard challenge into his eyes.  The kind of look Jake could never back down from, and Marco knew it.

Jake was a terrible dancer, but that was all right; Marco was a good lead.  And if anyone stared, if anyone whispered, then they were looking too hard at each other to know about it.

They’d all felt a little strange, floaty-headed and bobble-eyed.  James’s words slurred a little, and none of them were quite balanced.  But they were hungry.  That had to be it.

Time got vague.  Half of them could hear the music, even after James stopped singing.

• Then, there was a scream echoing through the clearing. Instantly Jake had a branch in hand, Ax producing the hunting knife. 

It was Rachel who emerged into the clearing, dragging David behind her by a fistful of his hair.  She threw him to the ground in the middle of their circle, driving a kick into his side.

“Tell them!” she shouted.  “Tell them what you just said to me!”

“Jake.”  David rolled to his knees, arms over his head.  “Jake, help me, she’s losing it!”

“Okay.”  Jake kept his voice level.  Anyone else, and he might’ve believed Rachel really had snapped from the stress.  But out here David had revealed a side of himself that scared Jake almost as much as the snow and the hunger.  He’d started talking about no rules ten minutes after the crash, and hadn’t stopped since.  “Why don’t you just tell me what happened.  Rachel first, then David.”

“He was talking big.”  Rachel spat.  “Trying to impress me.  And then he said...”  She leaned close to David, snarling.  “Tell them.  Go ahead.  Tell them.”

“David?”

“I didn’t, I didn’t, I was just, I was lying, okay?”  He hadn’t dropped his arms.  “I was just making it up, it was just a joke.”

“What did he say,” Jake said.

“He found the plane’s emergency beacon.”  Rachel’s fists shook, but her voice was steady.  “The first day.  He found it — and he smashed it with a rock.”

Jake felt his whole body go cold.  He’d been expecting something sexual, something pressuring and gross, but... but this...

A body slammed Jake on its way past.  Marco, screaming, wild with rage.  He’d taken off running at David, who’d dragged himself to his feet and sprinted into the woods.  Rachel was half a step behind Marco, and Tobias keeping up with Rachel.  No sign of James, or of Pedro, but there were more bodies out rushing through the trees after David.  David was crashing away, and then he was screaming, and then he wasn’t.

Wait, Jake considered saying.  Stop.  Only he didn’t.  He and Collette looked at each other, and they listened to what was happening in the clearing on the other side of the ridge.

• Now, Cassie pours them all coffees, examining each of their faces.  Marco’s unreadable under the makeup and big hair.  Jake looks healthier than she thought possible: full-faced, broad-bellied, laugh lines starting around his eyes.  Tobias is loose-skinned and skitter-eyed, but at least the track marks she can see all look old.  What do they think of her, she wonders, with broad hips and grey in her braids.

“Ronnie,” she says quietly.

He pushes to his feet.  “I’ll give you the room.  Nice to meet you all.”

This is a reason she loves him: that he understands there are things he’ll never understand.  That there are things she can only talk about with her boys, her fellow survivors.  Like how, her first hot shower after getting rescued, she orgasmed so hard it felt like a panic attack.  Like how she can’t stand the sight of supermarket meat, fragments of body parts sealed in plastic, but she’ll butcher and cook any livestock who die under her care.

But then, there are things the two white boys and the Latino movie star standing in her kitchen will never understand either.  Things only Ronnie can appreciate.

So Cassie’s been complete.  She’s been good, all things considered.

And now this.  One damn thing after another.

• Now, Tobias doesn’t care what they think about him when he says again, “It could be Ax.”

“Ax has been in a funny farm in Germany since I don’t know when,” Marco says.

“Switzerland,” Jake says, at the same time Cassie murmurs, “That’s rude.”

Marco rolls his eyes, smudged day-old eyeliner exaggerating the motion.  “Fine, Mom and Dad, he’s in a mental health facility in Switzerland.”

“Why would Ax blackmail us?” Jake asks, more pragmatically.

Tobias doesn’t have an answer for that one.  He looks away, out the window at Cassie’s sprawling backyard.  Seems like they only went two ways after rescue: soaring to success in politics (Cassie) and media (Marco), or going to ground.  Tobias self-medicates; Ax pays other people to medicate him.  Ax’s way probably works better, but Tobias’s is faster.

• Then, Jake had hiked back out to the site of the plane crash six months after it went down.  In case some remains of the signal beacon were there.  In case there was a bag of pretzels, a single solitary gummy bear, that they had missed.  In case...

Coach Alan’s body was the one he saw first.  Coach Alan’s skeleton, rather.  The flesh had been cut away in gouts and chunks, pulled loose from the limbs and torso to expose lengths of rib and femur.

Jake staggered back, hand coming to his mouth.  Craig’s body beyond looked intact, but.  He couldn’t— he couldn’t— Tom—

There was a crunch from outside, and Jake spun around, hot bile in his throat.

“Hi.”  James stepped into the fuselage through its torn-off front end, expression carefully neutral.  “I figured this conversation was coming sooner or later.”

“You.”  Jake looked from the stripped body — Ax’s brother, Tobias’s dad — to James.  “You...”

“I chose to keep my friends alive.”  James shoved his hands in his pockets.  “Just like Rachel did.”

“Don’t say that!” Jake snapped.  “David might’ve doomed us all, and Rachel didn’t have a choice.”

“We had a choice about eating him,” James said levelly.  “And we chose right, didn’t we.”

Jake shook his head, shook it again.  None of them had been in their right minds that night — something in the soup, something in the air.  That was a mistake, and it wouldn’t happen again.

“Jake.”  James took a step toward Jake.  “We have to talk about this.  I know you’re hoping for rescue, and so am I.  But we have to make it that far, first.”

“We?” Jake said coldly.  “Where’s all this...”  Again he pointed at Coach Alan.  “Been going, James?  Because if any of it has made the communal soup pot, most of us haven’t seen it.”

“You’re right.”  James shrugged.  “I’ve been coming here, harvesting, and giving it to my friends.  Your little clique seemed fine with getting first crack at every rabbit Tobias brings back.”

Jake was shaking his head harder, ears ringing.  “We have to live with ourselves.  We have to act like human beings.  Not— not sharks eating their own.  If nothing else, we have to all be together on this.”

“I’m keeping my friends alive,” James said.  He took another step toward Jake.  The hunting knife was on his belt.  “I’m doing what it takes.”

Jake didn’t move.  “Listen to me!” he shouted.  “Listen to me, we are not doing this.  Or at minimum, we’re putting it to a vote, and we’re discussing it as a team.”

“Thanks, captain,” James said.  “But no thanks.”

Jake shoved him hard in the chest.  James stumbled, taking a step back.  “We keep everyone alive,” Jake snapped.  “We act for the good of everyone.  You want to lead?  Fine, lead.  But just because you’re hungry, that doesn’t mean you get to be selfish.  Call for a vote about what we do while we wait.”

“Hungry?”  The contempt was stronger now, twisting the corner of James’s mouth.  “Of course I’m hungry, you fool.”  He planted both hands on Jake’s chest, not shoving back, just applying pressure.

“So are they.  A vote—”

“Let’s just acknowledge the elephant in the room here, Jake.”  James dropped his hands.  “The good of everyone is going to end with all my friends dead, well before yours kick it.”

Jake opened his mouth.  “That’s not—”

“Pedro’s my roommate.  Collette’s my best friend, and Elena’s with her.  I was...”  James pointed to the seat to his left.  “Sitting there.  Pedro next to me, Collette and Kelly across the way.  I’m supposed to be in the same boat as them.  And you know what they all have in common?”

Of course Jake knew.  Collette was paralyzed, Elena couldn’t see.  They weren’t sure how the hit on the head had affected Pedro, partially because he was having trouble talking enough to explain his symptoms to them.

“If it comes to a vote, to waiting for rescue, they lose,” James said.  “If we’re going to be all equal and civilized, then...”  He shrugged.  “My money’s on Cassie to be the last to starve.  That catcher’s bulk has served her well so far.  But maybe it’ll be Marco, since he’s smaller and needs less.  Heck, Tobias could probably provide for himself forever if he was only catching squirrels for one.”

Jake shook his head, shook it again.  “That’s not...”

“You’re trying to save your friends,” James said.  “I’m trying to save mine.”

• Now, Tobias leans against Cassie’s island.  “Guys,” he says, “there’s something you should know about Ax.”

He’s back stateside.  He reached out to Tobias a few weeks ago.  Something about a compound where a lot of people like them — damaged, not quite right — are gathering to support each other.  Ax has been talking to it, he said in that call, and wouldn’t say how.

“He said he can help us settle,” Tobias tells the group.  “He said he knows what it wants, and—”

“It.”  Marco’s whole face twists with the force of his sneer.  “It.  What, the fucking mountain?  Last I checked, we left that out in the Canadian Rockies where we found it.”

“Not the mountain,” Cassie says.  “You know that’s not what he meant.”

“Fine!”  Marco throws up both hands, drops them to his sides.  “Then it doesn’t exist.  The One is a fucknugget, just on the off chance it does.”

“Don’t think anyone said it wasn’t a fucknugget,” Jake says.  “But might still be worth to find out what it wants.”

• Then, Ax had known what Jake hadn’t said, what Jake had found — and not found — out at the airplane.

“The wilderness provides,” Ax said, because it was the only way to make sense of it all.  “The mountain has taken so much, and there’s nothing saying it won’t give something back occasionally.”

Jake stared in stunned silence, the small bundle of desiccated flesh limp in his arms.  Like a man who’d braced so hard for impact he had no choice but to fall when the impact didn’t come.

“Okay,” James said.  “Okay.  I’ll get some water boiling.”

• Then, it’d lasted another eight months.  What they’d taken from the airplane.  What they’d taken from David.  Tobias brought back a squirrel a week, sometimes two, sometimes even a pair of rabbits.  But two rabbits among ten people stretched to less soup than would fill an eight-ounce coffee cup, and squirrels stretched less than that.

• Then, at first thaw, Marco had been the one to suggest they hike for it.  A smaller team, a dash down the mountain and straight east as far as they could go.  East because it was easier to keep track of, with the sun rising nearly dead-on that way now that spring had come.  East, because they had to go some way.  East.  Until they found help, or until they couldn’t go further.

• Ax and Tobias made the first attempt.  Two weeks they’d been gone.  And they’d made it back to the cabin, eventually.  Barely.  They’d been limping, injured, so exhausted and hungry that their steps were a staggering line even as Tobias half-carried Ax to join the others.

“Fuck this,” Rachel had said, around the fire that night.  “Seriously, fuck this.  We’re not getting rescued, we don’t have the strength to walk out, and we don’t have anymore fresh meat.  We’re all slowly starving to death.”

“So what do you suggest?” Jake said, weary and hoarse.  “We sent Tobias because he can hunt, and Ax because...”

Because Ax knew more than anyone wanted to admit it was possible to know, about the whims of the thing keeping them here.

“You know.”  Rachel looked at Jake, fist clenched around the knife, teeth bared.  “You know.”

“We’re all still okay,” Jake said.  “We’re still—”

“We’re skin and bones,” she snapped.  “Our fucking teeth are falling out, Jake, and our nails are coming off.  James is dying.  Collette will probably go next.  We need to act, now, or—”

“No.”  Jake pushed to his feet, which took effort.  His knees hadn’t worked right in weeks.  “No.  We’re not discussing this.”

“Damn right we’re not.”  Rachel was on her feet as well, and she had Tobias’s gun in her hand.  Now everyone was standing, all shouting, Ax trying to pry the rifle away and Marco grabbing at Rachel’s arm.  She wrenched loose of them all, and raised the gun before anyone could react.

“We are not,” Jake shouted, “drawing lots!”

“Agreed.” And then Rachel swung the gun around, and she’d hooked the toe of her shoe through the trigger guard.

There was a gunshot.  So loud, that none of them heard her hit the ground.

• Cassie was the first to react.

Ax was crying, Collette too.  Marco was gagging like he’d throw up if he’d eaten anything at all this week.  But Cassie didn’t hesitate, grabbing the knife where Rachel had dropped it on the ground.

“We do not waste this sacrifice.”  She spoke loud, over everyone’s ringing ears.  She was crying too, but her teeth were bared.  “We do not.  Now, all of you, help me.”

• Then, they’d split up a second time.  James’s prediction was coming true: Cassie and Jake, Tobias and Marco and Ax, were the strongest ones left.  Cassie and Jake for their fat reserves before the crash, Marco for his small stature and slow metabolism, Ax and Tobias because they knew the most about survival.  They were the natural team to go down and east, down and east until they couldn’t anymore.

But Cassie stayed.  To cook, to be medic as much as she could.  To get the last of Rachel’s marrow where it could do some good.  Jake begged her to come, but Cassie had stayed with James and the wounded ones.

• Then, they’d walked, the four boys, for another month.  The tips of their toes had gone black, later to be amputated, as had the littlest fingers of both Jake’s hands.  Tobias had shot until he ran out of shot, had brought back a decaying fox that writhed with maggots and had boiled the maggots into a nasty stew because the fox itself wasn’t safe to eat.  Marco cried with hunger, and cried again with joy when Ax had come across the batch of fiddleheads.  He didn’t care who saw.

Ax cut himself, every night when they stopped.  He let blood he couldn’t afford to lose, and at some point Jake stopped trying to get him to stop.

Tobias settled for thanking the rabbits, the birds, the fox and even the maggots.  He thanked the fiddleheads and dandelions, when those were what they could find.

He thanked Rachel.

• It’d happened anticlimactically: the forest ended.  First on a clear-cut, then on a logging road, then on a suburban backyard.

“Who the fuck are you,” said the homeowner, when they stumbled and shuffled up to his back porch.  “And what the fuck do you want.”

He had a pistol on his belt, the kind that people who didn’t know shit about guns bought just to have.  He wasn’t shy about pushing his coat back to show it, but then there was the rifle slung back over Tobias’s shoulder.

“We don’t mean any harm, sir,” Jake rasped.  “We were in a plane cr—”

“Get the fuck off my lawn.”

Holding up their hands, they went.  Behind them, the guy made no secret about dialing 911 and loudly starting a conversation with the cops.

Good, Jake thought.  That was what they needed, anyway.

• Now, they drive, Cassie at the wheel this time because no one trusts Tobias and Jake claims not to have a license.  Tobias has the pair of coordinates from the text he received, and Cassie’s GPS app is wiling to take latitude and longitude as input.  Marco sleeps at last, but only because Jake is there.  (“Hold me,” he muttered, so soft the others can’t hear.  “I don’t know what’ll happen.”) Jake does as he’s told, and so nothing much does happen.

• Cassie finds the place easy enough, because although it doesn’t have an address as such, it does have a road.  Maybe Ax is up there, she thinks, looking at the gate.  Maybe it is.  Maybe just a bunch of hippies with soola root and too much spare time.  Maybe something a hell of a lot weirder.

“We doing this?”  It’s Jake, coming around the side of the car, hands stuffed in his coat pockets.

“I’m not right,” Cassie says bluntly.  “You’re not either.  But maybe we can figure it out, if we... I don’t know, if we listen carefully enough.”

“I’m sorry,” Jake says.

“About?”  But she knows, and that’s why her tone is sharp even though she doesn’t mean it to be.

“That week.”

Cassie looks away.  She knows what week; they’ve had this conversation before.  “Let’s go, okay?”

• Then, it took a week — seven full days and nights — for the search party to find the cabin.  Jake had described its location the best he could, and Tobias even drew a rough map, but it wasn’t enough to narrow down an entire mountain range all that quickly.  One entire week, to find the other half of their party.  This, after over a month of walking to get out.

Collette was dead, by the time they got there.  James was dead, Pedro, Elena.  Only Cassie left.  She’d kept them going as long as she could, had stretched the meat and had resorted to boiling bark, boiling grass.  Boiling Collette, when it came to that.

It wasn’t enough.  She wasn’t enough.

Cassie didn’t talk about those weeks that she’d waited, or about what happened to the others.  She didn’t talk much at all, those first months back.  But of the survivors, she was also the only one to finish a college degree.  To get into vet tech work full-time, animal welfare activism on the side.

• Now, Cassie puts both hands on the right gate, and Jake on the left.  Her boots slip in the mud as she struggles for purchase, but Tobias is there shoving next to her.  Marco gets a shoulder next to Jake’s end, and together they force the door.

The plan was to load back into her car and go up the hill, but there’s a figure standing on the other side, backlit by the sun.  Ax.  Or someone who looks like Ax.  Or something who looks like him.

“You have done well, to come this far.”

#animorphs #yellowjackets #animorphs fic #long post #crossover #animorphs au #yellowjackets au #very long post #cannibalism #gore #character death #self harm #body horror #it's animorphs AND yellowjackets y'all #it gets grody #seriously long post #even by my standards #i recommend switching on auto readmores if you follow me

[debb987]

Author Note for fic - 2012 TMNT interpretation

This was kind of long for the Author Note of Chapter 3, so I’m placing it here instead. So, I don’t mean to do any bashing on “The Eldest Brother” fic, this is just some analysis / my interpretation  on the TMNT 2012 circumstances. 

Leo is a fan of Space Heroes, a series which often shows the captain “calming down” the junior by slapping him (uses physical violence as comedy relief). For someone that didn’t leave the sewers in fifteen years, they only have Splinter and the media to learn and imitate. He’s not being purposely mean, he just doesn’t know better.

Splinter struggles to separate Sensei role and Parent role. He often ends up mixing them up, which makes it hard for his sons to confide in him on certain things, so he is shown often giving the first step to help with what he sees his sons need. Like talking with Donnie in the Metal Head episode, with Leo about fighting unfairly to win, and Raph about ignoring the insults instead of letting them make him angry. This, of course, means that if he doesn’t notice something, the issue is not addressed or resolved. 

Mikey is the family baby (and has ADHD, you can pry this from my cold, dead hands) and that comes with: Babying, doubting his capabilities regardless of how many times he proves them wrong (he probably can’t stay still/be silent/ concentrate. Better be the bait instead of ambushing the enemy) considering him too distracted/childish to be trusted with dangerous or difficult stuff. The brothers’ default response for his ideas/opinions is, often, to dismiss them. Probably they don’t even realize how mean this can be at times, and even Splinter seems to think Mikey is childish/an airhead, so… yeah. Not resolved, at least at this point of time (S1 2012 series).

Donnie is expected to know everything, create anything, repair everything, to the point where he gets scolded when he doesn’t know something. “Why didn’t you tell me they had shields??” “Because I wanted us to fail. OBVIOUSLY I DIDN’T KNOW!” And although he has accepted the role and does so for his family, I think he’d not be too keen on working for others not close to him, hence the reluctance to make a Tphone for Rise!Raph, this stranger that claims to be another version of his brother but acts nothing like him. He’d probably not have this issue if it had been Rise!Mikey landing on their world. Too similar to be anything but the baby bro~

And 2012 Raph, much like his Rise!counterpart, prefers to turn difficult emotions into anger, and loves and wants to protect his family the best he can. He’s a little hothead and can be quick to  jump to conclusions, but that’s expected for most teens in general, if you ask me. Again, not resolved, at least at this point of time (S1 2012 series) but he does get some character growth later on from what I’ve been told. I haven’t watched anything after S1 2012.

Anyway, I usually don’t rant this much in the AN of my fics, but the TMNT fandom scares me (the 2012 vs 2018 discussions can get real mean), so I’d rather “justify” things here than go individually in the comments. Circumstances for each TMNT version are different… please don’t insult ppl if they like one version more than the other, and, is ok to be able to criticize the ‘flaws’ of each show and still like them. 

Welp, hope you enjoyed the read!(Or will enjoy it, if you happened to see this note before I publish Ch 3 haha) 

This is the link for anyone curious. https://archiveofourown.org/works/42638430/chapters/107105004#workskin

 See ya’ around~ dEBB987

#tmnt crossover #rise of the tmnt #tmnt 2012 #rise raph #tmnt raph #tmnt analysis #AO3 fic #tmnt 2012 analysis #eldest brother #the eldest brother #rottmnt crossover #the eldest brother tmnt #Deb writes

[stayarmytinyzenmoa-l]

NCT Spooky Season [Day 3]

Dearly Departed

TW: Ghosts Genre: Romance, Comedy Pairing: Zhong Chenle x Reader YN Pronouns: Not specified Word Count: 1.3K Prompt: “If I die first, I will haunt you”

[NCT Masterlist] | [NCT Spooky Season Masterlist] | [Yesterday] | [Tomorrow] [Ao3 Link] | [Wattpad Link]

Notes: Day 3 babyyyyy Disclaimer: Please remember that this is an AU and a work of fiction, obviously the idols mentioned/written about in this story would never partake in these actions. The idols mentioned in this work are meant to be seen more as face claims rather than the actual idols themselves.

Feedback is greatly appreciated!! Thank you for reading!

"I am so sorry for your loss," your coworker rubs your back comfortingly. "If you need anything, just let me know, alright?" He says.

"Thank you, I really appreciate it," you hid your mouth behind your hand and opened your door with the other. Once it was closed and locked, you let out a sigh of relief.

"Who was that?" Chenle's head pokes out of a wall. You shrugged.

"Just a coworker," you hummed, walking past him.

"Just a coworker?!" Chenle walked out of the wall and poked his head out of the front door, and you could hear him laugh.

"What's so funny?" You pulled a box of ramen from your pantry and started to boil water. Chenle floats back in and settles on one of the counter stools.

"Babe, he's pumping his fist in the air right now, he really things he scored with you," Chenle laughs. "Little does he know."

"Who knows? Maybe I want a living boyfriend now," you joked.

"Huh?! Babe, that's racist," Chenle shoots you an exaggerated frown and you laughed.

"Wouldn't it actually be speciesist?" You thought about it while you mixed in the flavoring packet.

"Oh, yeah, huh?" Chenle chuckles. "You know it's a huge trend to date ghosts now," he shrugs.

"I do know, I'm dating one," you placed the finished bowl of ramen on the table and Chenle grabs at it, pulling up a ghost-version of it to eat with you.

"As cool as it is to possess inanimate objects for you... I do miss touching you," he blows on the noodles before eating them.

"Yeah... me too..." you rest your head on your hand. "Still, it's nice to still be able to talk to you like this, you sure you're not going to head toward the light soon?" You tossed another joke,

"Why? Do you want me to?" He jokes back.

"Hell no! You made me a promise!"

"Right, if I died first then I'd haunt you," he points at you with his chopsticks before slurping down more noodles. Then your doorbell rang.

"Huh, who could that be at this hour?" You looked at the clock and walked over.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa, let me look first," Chenle walks through you, sending a cold chill down your spine and freezing you in place for a moment with goosebumps, all the while Chenle stuck his head through the door again. Once you regained your senses, you shook your head and groaned.

"Seriously, Chenle?! You did that on purpose!" You wait for the warmth to move back to your fingers. Chenle walks back inside.

"It's no one, ding dong ditcher probably," he shrugs. Then the doorbell rings again.

"Sure."

"What if it's an axe murderer?!" Chenle worries behind you.

"Then we'd both be dead together, that would be fun, right?"

"And have some rando move into our apartment?!"

"We'd torment them together," you waved him off and looked through the peephole. You glared at Chenle before opening your door. "Mark, hey! What are you still doing here?"

"Turns out the cabs don't run at this hour," your coworker laughs nervously. "Is it... would it be okay if I spent the night?"

"Oh, babe, he's making a move on you, say no," Chenle says behind you.

"Sure, it's dangerous right now," you opened the door wider and let him in.

"Babe!" Chenle groaned.

"Wow, nice place you got here, (Y/N)," Mark whistles.

"Thank you! My boyfriend and I decorated it," you slipped it in so that he wouldn't get his hopes up.

"Damn, you both got good taste then, is he okay with me staying over?"

"No!" Chenle shouts.

"Yup," you answered for him.

"Cool," Mark sits on the couch.

"Let me grab a pillow and blanket for you," you disappeared into the hall and Chenle sat on the coffee table in front of him.

"Listen here, you little shit," Chenle glowers. "Don't you dare try anything with (Y/N), or I swear I will haunt you next!" Chenle grumbles.

"Here, Mark, you can use these," you placed the two things down at the side of the couch.

"Thanks, (Y/N)!"

"Say, do you believe in ghosts?" You ask him. Mark shakes his head. "Huh, no wonder," you laughed.

"What? What do you mean no wonder?" He tilts his head to the side and Chenle groans behind him.

"Look, he's horny and ignorant, kick him out of our apartment, (Y/N)," Chenle grumbles behind him.

"Well, Mark, why don't you look at your reflection on the TV?" You left to grab him a glass of water, and when you heard him scream behind you, you could only laugh.

"I got you some water," you walked back and Mark was on the floor, pointing at Chenle behind the couch.

"G-G-G-Ghost!" His voice cracks.

"Boo," Chenle responds and Mark screams again.

"Oh, come now, he's harmless," you crouched down next to Mark and handed him a glass of water. He looks between you and Chenle with shaky eyes.

"Y... You're okay with this?!"

"He is my boyfriend, I'd ought to be," you shrugged.

"You're dating a ghost?!" Mark half whispers.

"Hey! I used to be alive!" Chenle crosses his arms and reaches for the glass, pulling up a ghostly version of it. "Now get off of the floor, be lucky I can't kick you out right now," he huffs.

"I... I am so sorry, (Y/N), I was so ignorant," he shakes his head, "my, uh, my brother is also dating a ghost..."

"But you didn't believe him?"

"I didn't think it was possible," he shakes his head and sits back on the couch. "I... uh... thanks, (Y/N), I..." Mark shrinks under Chenle's gaze.

"It's fine, Mark, as long as he doesn't walk past you, you'll be fine."

"What happens if he walks past me?" Chenle rolls his eyes and does so and Mark freezes up, hand gripping onto the glass and pupils shaking.

"That," Chenle snarks.

"Babe!" You reprimand him. "He's a guest!"

"Yeah, and he has a gaga crush on you," Chenle floats next to him. "I don't blame him though," he laughs.

"Oi," you cracked a smile. "Is he alright?"

"First time is always the worst," Chenle shrugs. You wrap the blanket around Mark's shoulders and take the glass from his hands.

"Well, I'll check on him in the morning."

"Yup, let's go to bed."

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