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#its probably dehydration right?
wowitsverycool · 1 year
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sometimes i really vibe with disco elysiums brief moments of quiet apathetic misery that are distinctly intimate in the way they cradle you with melancholy’s ice cold hands. you almost want to savor the despair, pull it over you and be consumed by that awful, beautiful feeling of hopelessness. regret can taste so good. it’s a place other than the future, past, or present -- a realm of its own. time moves on, always ticking, travelling down one road forever, but here there is only sinking. to the depths of water you fall, the sound of rushing water so hypnotic and suffocating. a sensation in the back of your neck, the relaxing weight of resignation. as you’re anchored to the bottom, your mind detaches and floats to the surface. fine. you don’t need that here anyway. you don’t think, you only suffer. all that awaits you here is suffering. isnt it wonderful that you can predict everything here perfectly? there are no variables, just a buzzing in your chest aided by your concrete-filled lungs. it’s like they’re glowing. you once swam through your thoughts, but now you sink like a rock. she floats above it all, of course she does. she peers into the water and her reflection fragments in the waves. she can’t even see you. she would look away anyway. oh, beautiful, beautiful suffering, never leave me. all i have left is what you take from me.
that’s what it feels like to me anyway lol haha!!
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tsukidrama · 11 months
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okay so like as im typing this out i feel lowkey pathetic as fuck but i just easily had the worst day of my entire life and i lowkey need somebody anybody who wasn't with me to tell me "im glad you're okay and u didn't deserve all of that"
i frew up....... for 16 hours nonstop 🤪 literally nonstop!!!! i am not exaggerating even a little bit!!!! it was constant and i have never been so scared that i was gonna die. can you even fucking die from throwing up? probably not but once you hit a certain point it really really really feels like it.
it was so bad that we had to call my mom. and still with both her and mars tending to me like i was a baby, literally doing everything for me from getting me water to changing the tempature or fixing my blankets, it didn't help even a little bit.
it started at 6pm. at 6am i was about to start slamming my head against the wall until i passed out so mama took me to urgent care. we got there as soon as they opened.
walked in there and broke down like i haven't broken down ever before in my life just begging for the pain to stop
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this story actually has one of the happiest endings as far as my medical fiascos typically go. the doctor who came into see me was an actual literal angel on earth. i wanna buy him a card or flowers or some shit. a lot of the time i don't get a lot of sympathy with this condition (on account of me being "too young" for my IBS to be as severe as it is) but this fuckin man not only prescribed me some really good medicine but he actually stayed in the exam room with me for probably 45 minutes, specifically just calming me down and comforting me. and it worked. the meds were a big part of course but it was honestly the best therapy i've gotten in years. i have been in an out of hospitals/urgent cares/emergency clinics more than i can count. the medical bills i rack up are horrifying. and i swear to god that ive never ever encountered a medical professional anywhere near this level of compassionate. especially while sick and throwing up like that. probably 2/3rds of the time i get written off as "just having a panic attack"
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nexus-nebulae · 1 year
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ugh i got a throat infection and i can feel my throat constricting from it and while i did get some antibiotics for it i only just started it today so i haven't felt any effects yet so i'm just sitting here with an uncomfortably half-closed throat that's really sore all the time
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mainfaggot · 1 year
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Had the most exhausting day ever
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tasmanianstripes · 2 years
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Man, the backrooms became kinda shitty
It started as a genuinely creepy, original concept to SCP-like thing
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deadsetobsessions · 2 months
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As the girl who came up with the Triplet! Tim AU PLEASSEEEEE continue it!!!!! I NEED to see Bruce who thought he had one robin finding out he actually has three separate completely different ones
I gotchu lmfao I think I’ll get to Bruce later? I’m really happy you liked it omg like that idea is so good
——
Their plan was perfect! It would have been perfect, had it not been for Dick Grayson and his nosy face!
Batman might not have known his identity, but Dick Grayson did. He promised to keep it from Batman, but Tim hadn’t exactly thought about his secret identity when he showed up to harass the man into being Robin again.
And now, they’re paying for it.
Tim leaned back and crossed his arms as he watched Dick cradle his head in his hands, looking half a short breath away from a mental breakdown.
“Are you telling me… there’s three of you?”
“Yes, Dick.” Tim sighed, having answered this exact question ten times in the past two minutes.
Dick lifted his head, wide eyes looking a little feverish… no, looking a little manic.
“Tim. Your name is Tim, right? I’m not-”
“Yes, my name is Tim. Technically, so are the others. But the one here with us is Lionel.”
“No, wait, Tim, you understand how this is- insane, right? It’s not even remotely in the realm of mentally healthy.” Dick paused. “Wait, are you skipping school right now?!?”
“Has anyone ever told you your priorities are screwed up, Dick?” Lionel-Tim walked back into the room, hands full of snacks and, most importantly, Dick’s emergency marshmallow bag. Dick turned to Lionel, eyes full of guilt, and grabbed the bag of marshmallows like a dehydrated man in the middle of a desert who’s only couple of feet away from an oasis that he’s been looking for for days.
“Oh my god. I’ve had three younger brothers and I thought they were all the same kid!” Dick wailed, grabbing a handful of marshmallows and stress cramming it into his mouth. Tim threw him a disgusted look.
“To be fair, we made sure to train to act like each other from a really early age,” Tim said, snatching the bag of chips that Lionel chucked at his head. His snack laden triplet plonked himself on the plush spinning chair, shoving a hand inside the bag of gummy worms and cramming it down his throat as he spun around.
“I can’t believe I’ve never even checked up on you at your place!! If I did, I would have noticed it way earlier!”
“Probably not,” Lionel mumbled through his mouthful of colorful gummy worms. “You only caught us because Tim got beat half to death by an edgy crime lord teenager.”
Dick hunched into himself, a myriad of complicated emotions- largely, guilt and fury and heartbreak- wormed its way past his face. Tim glared and threw a chip at his triplet.
“It’s fine, Dick. Lionel’s just being an asshole. We’re taking care of it. Revenge prank.” Tim explained.
“He wouldn’t have caught us and you know it.” Lionel grumbled.
“I’ll help.” Dick mumbled dejectedly.
“You’ll have to get in line, Wing,” Tim went back to his laptop. “My thirds got first dibs, and I’m not planning on staying still either. I’m gonna mess with Jason’s slush funds.”
“He’s got a stash of cash locked up in the fourth safe house, but that’s not interesting. Look!” Lionel proudly displayed a duffle bag- from where he got it from, Dick had no clue- and unzipped it to show batteries, lightbulbs, and random bits and bobs.
“What is that?” Dick asked.
“That’s the second lightbulb in his bathroom light! This is the left battery in his TV remote! And this is half of his back up boot laces. I took all of his 10 mm sockets! And the specialized socket he got for his bike! And this,” Lionel grinned, lifting up a piece of fabric. “Is his pillow case!”
“Niceee.” Tim whistled. He tossed a piece of tech at Lionel. “Sneak back into his house and put that in between his pillows. It’ll keep both sides uncomfortably warm.”
“Fuck yeah!”
“Is… this revenge for almost killing you?” Dick asked.
“It’s either this or complete and total financial ruin, social death, and then actual death.” Tim tapped away at his laptop.
“You’re kind of scary, you know that?”
“We know!” Lionel chirped.
“Base, come in.”
“Base,” Tim quickly replied, laser focused on Archy’s call. Lionel and Dick quieted.
“Hood’s lurking outside the school like a creep,” Archy muttered into the comm, papers rustling behind him.
Dick tensed, upset making itself visible once more.
“You still have the container I gave you this morning in your pocket?”
“Yes.”
Tim smirked in a way that made Dick suddenly have a horrible need to shake and lecture him on the moralities of not becoming a villain. “It’s glitter. Purple and pinks.”
“…Ah.”
“Godspeed, Archy!” Lionel chirped again, sounding slightly more demented.
A moment of silence before-
“Oof!” A puff. “Oh, no! I’m so sorry, mister!”
On the other end of the comm, the gruff voice of a beefy teenager spluttered, “What- why do you- egh- my mouth! The glitter went into- pleh, pleh! What the fuck, kid?!”
“I’m so sorry! It was supposed to be for a project! I worked so hard to mix the colors right! Wait, stay still, mister! I’ll help!”
Archy, eyes wide and innocent, patted some more glitter onto the vigilante.
“No, stop! Stop! You’re getting it on my bike!”
“It’s a pretty color- oh hey, this is open-”
“No! That’s the fuel tank!”
“Oh! Whoops! Sorry!”
As chaos spread on the other side of the comms, Tim and Lionel burst into cackles. Dick choked on the marshmallows, helplessly shaking with laughter.
Lionel whacked at Dick’s back, hysterically giggling.
“That’s- that’s Archy?”
“Archy pretending to be Lionel pretending to be me yeah. I hope he got glitter in the fuel tank.” Tim grinned.
“Want me to patrol tonight to see if he got the glitter out of his bike?”
Lionel jabbed his pointy elbows onto Dick’s shoulders. “Absolutely. Distract him, too! I gotta mess with his safe houses. He’ll never feel comfortable in a safe house ever again.”
“Don’t go overboard, Lionel.” Tim looked up. “But also, I changed his WiFi passwords to 123456, so do with that what you will.”
Lionel grinned. Dick mustered up a smile in response, pushing the guilt away. He had a lot to make up to his little brothers, and if terrorizing Jason was how he was going to accomplish that… well, Dick’s not feeling too nice about Jason right now.
——
Batman squinted suspiciously at a humming Nightwing.
“Something happen?” He managed to ask.
“Hm? Oh, no, I got some nice pictures.”
“…I see.”
Batman, regardless of what his history might suggest, knew how to pick his battles. This? This thing that brought Nightwing’s murder smile? This was one battle he was willing to walk away from.
“Hey, B, you ever think about adopting more kids?”
Batman choked and promptly grappled away. Nightwing cackled.
“You can’t escape the question!”
Batman ran faster.
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this is for the girlies (or anyone) that sometimes forget to eat or drink for a while until they feel really sick, and need a personal stevie to force feed them sandwiches.
robin and eds had just left steve’s house, leaving you both there alone. and once you told them goodbye you were hit with a wave of nausea, along with a crippling headache. you staggered into steves kitchen whilst he was cleaning up the board game in the living room and leaned over the sink. trying to breathe deeply in the hopes it would make you feel less like you were going to pass out. steve came in, and was going to pick you up and spin you in his arms when he saw your position.
“baby, whats wrong? you okay? what happened?” he asked, worry lacing his voice.
you turn around to answer him, but you don’t feel like you are able to form words. thankfully, steve can tell enough by how pale you look, like all the color has drained from your body.
“jesus christ baby, woah, sit-sit down” he said, picking you up and placing you onto the kitchen island.
your head felt heavier now, and you slumped over onto his shoulder. he attempted to ask you more questions, to which he only received a whimper from you. he needed to get you water but he couldn’t leave you unsupported, so he carried you into the living room and lowered you onto the couch.
“ill be right back, babydoll.” he said, mostly to himself before he performed the quickest water-run known to man. coming back and propping you up slightly and putting the straw you your lips, “drink.”
you did as you were told, and after sucking on the straw and lazily staring at him until the entire glass was empty, you took a deep breath.
“what the hell was that, baby? what happened?” he asked softly.
“i dunno, jus’ don’ feel good” you replied.
“yeah? what have you eaten today?” he asked.
you stared at him as you recalled your day. and slowly he watched your eyes turn from contemplation to guilt.
“baby,” he warned, “what have you eaten today.”
you sunk into the sofa behind you.
“i forgot, stevie.” you frowned at him, and he sighed.
“have you had any water?”
“you just gave me some!”
“i mean before that, doofus.”
you shook your head no, pouting moodily at him and lying back onto the couch. you felt tears well up in your eyes, everything seemed to be much bigger than it was. you were very embarrassed; and in your hungry, dehydrated brain, steve was very disappointed in you, and could not believe his girlfriend was so stupid as to forget to eat or drink. this was obviously very much not the case, and steve did not think that about you. as the flood came, you attempted to hide it, but he tool your hands and began soothing you instantly.
“hey, hey, look, its okay. you’re okay. shh.” he brushed the sweaty hair out of your face, “need you to lie down while I get you somethin’ to eat, okay? youre probably tired too, honey.”
you nodded tearily, and let him lie you back down. he went into the kitchen and made you a nice toasted sandwich just the way you like it, with a glass of water and a coke. he came back and sat next to you, giving you the food and setting the drinks onto the coffee table. you ate quickly, and were more than halfway through your sandwich when you looked up at him and realized how much better you felt. he raised his eyebrows at you, and you giggled.
“you feel better?” he asked. which only reduced you into a fit of more giggles. he shook his head and pulled you into his lap, whispering into your ear, “you drive me crazy, lady.” he laughed. “your hangry-ness needs to be psychologically evaluated.”
you stuck your tongue out at him and finished your meal before turning back around to him and wrapping your arms around his neck and pressing your noses together.
“i’m sorry, thank you stevie.” you said, and kissed him softly.
“it’s okay lovey,” he took your hand into his, “no big deal, just gotta remember to eat, goofball.” he replied.
“why’d i do that when i have a perfectly good personal chef and doctor here?” you said, receiving an eye roll.
“alright sleeping beauty, lets get you a nap. and then all your needs will be full.” he said, taking your hand and guiding you into hie bedroom.
“well… not all of them.”
you received yet another eye roll, but this time it was accompanied by a deep scarlet blush.
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chai-berries · 8 months
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i’m a little crybaby bitch & i just sobbed over a movie but all i could think about is being abby’s little crybaby gf & having her comfort me </3
sooo unfortunately/fortunately i am not a big crier when it comes to anything but one of my best friends is a happy/sad/bored crier and i’ve helped her calm down post cry a few times. she’s a true cancer <3 i’ll channel her into my thoughts.
im thinking of two scenarios, watching something sad without abby & watching it with her ⤵️
watching without abby:
she’d probably be working on something in another room when you decide to start a sad fucking movie. abby’s ears perk at the first sniffle, but she brushes it off cause it’s always allergy season. but when she hears you shakily breathe out “oh,,, my gOD” with your voice all broken and wet, she’s immediately sliding to a stop right outside the living room. you’re curled up with a huge blanket swallowing you, surrounded by snacks and your emotional support water bottle. she notes your wide, glossy eyes and coos “baby what’s wrong?” and you gesture at the tv, “she - she just loves her family so so much! and she couldn’t tell them before they died!” your voice is cracking around your words.
abby has absolutely no idea who “she” is but that doesn’t keep her from sitting down and pulling you into her side, rubbing her hand up and down your arm. “they’re just a - a great family” you stutter though tears. abby looks up at the tv and sighs. “baby, why did you chose the saddest movie on netflix?” you hesitate. “uh, i was up to the challenge?” “yeah? how’s it going?” she quirks a brow at you. you laugh wetly and abby mentally fist pumps. she presses a kiss to your temple. “okay, how about we watch something happy. ill refill your water.” abby gets up to go into the kitchen when she’s stopped by a tug on her back belt loop. you’re looking up at her, eyes less glossy but still not dry enough. “what?” she asks. “thanks for putting up with a crybaby for a girlfriend.” she picks up your hand from its place at her waist and brings it up to her lips. “anything for you sweet cheeks”
watching with abby:
“no, no, no, nah, not happening! abby, please tell me they’re not gonna do what i think they’re gonna do!” you pause the movie and shake abby’s shoulder, your face so serious in the light of the television. abby giggles and shrugs like a fucking twerp and nudges you to keep watching the movie. she tells you that “you’ll find out soon - keep watching” like she’s never, in all the time you’ve been together, been witness to the millions of times you deep dived imdb and wikipedia five minutes into a movie whenever it starts out with a sad scene.
you don’t do sad movies. and it’s for a good reason! you get all dehydrated and you look sick for hours afterwards!! it’s embarrassing and gross!! abby has witnessed it once and, like her father’s daughter, handed you a glass of water and pulled you gently into her arms, holding you until you got your breathing under control. and that was a week before you asked her out!! on your first date she told you that the crying thing made her want to “take care of you forever”… is it too obvious to point out that she soooooo got lucky that night?
however, in present time she might be sleeping on the couch for trying to get a depressing movie past you. she apologizes to you, tucking you under her arm. “i promise it’s gonna be worth your tears, okay?” she kisses your head. “and i always take care of my crybaby girlfriend, don’t i?” she kisses the same spot again. you relax into her side.
… sooo it’s safe to say you sobbed a whole lot at the end and completely soaked the front of abby’s shirt. you guys had shifted horizontal mid-movie, you laying on top of her. “i hate you” sounds a lot more honest when you’re not desperately clutching at the waist of the person you’re talking to. “but it was a good story, right?? aww i’m sooo sorry, baby,” abby rubs your back. she hands you your water bottle and chocolate before you even think to ask, like she always does. then, you begin the embarrassingly to you cute to abby process that involves sips of water, bites of chocolate, and your head following the rhythm of abby’s chest up and down as you match her breaths.
<\3
no but really we all know abby will always comfort you even if she has no context to what you’re crying about! ride or die babyyyy
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prosciuttoon · 6 days
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Toshiro/Shuro is overhated
(mirror of my thread on twitter)
ever wanted to talk abt something so bad but u have so many thoughts so u cant even begin to organize a sentence. thats me abt shuro and its why i cant give my thoughts on him. i NEED to get this out of my system bc its takign up so much memory in my brain i need that space for thinking.
so i was really surprised to find so much hate for him even tho he seems pretty normal and rational out of the whole cast. ive deducted that its mostly abt his laios fight and that the ppl who hate him probably had bad experiences w social cues and relationships w neurotypicals bc of that. theres no way to avoid it bc its pretty much Right In Your Face that laios is ND. but thats not the only factor in why their relationship is rocky. its also the culture barrier. u have to understand toshiro was raised as JAPANESE NOBILITY ofc he would be a little conservative
also culture shock. idk if u know this but jp culture is very Mind Your Own Business like a lot of other asian cultures . ofc hes gonna be weirded out by a stranger invading his space. also his names not even Shuro. its just yt ppl not pronouncing his name right and settling for whats easiest.
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img src: fan translation by savaralyn2 , i think its from the adventurers bible Complete Edition bc i dont remember it in the old one
ok you get the gist of the culture aspect of it. lets go into the ND/NT clash aspect of it. yes i understand its pretty hurtful to never be told when youre acting inappropriately. i am autistic too lmao. but you have to understand that shiro is one guy and he even does realize that repressing things is one of his fatal flaws. again. asian culture. non confrontational. that sorta thing. but these are genuine frustrations. if i were him id be annoyed too but id speak out about it. set boundaries. bc im blunt. shiros not. he was taught crazy strict manners (hierarchies, respect, politeness, etc).
his problem isnt ableism its a culmination of culture barriers, how he was raised to behave, and terrible lack of communication as thing caused by "all of the above" plus he just generally keeps to himself a lot which means repressing frustrations that will explode leading to a pathetic fistfight while hes starved, exhausted, and dehydrated. also. if he was ableist he would hate laios. he doesnt hate laios. at the end of the day, they are friends. NT and ND ppl can be friends u know. there will be rifts (like their fight) but you just have to communicate misunderstandings. theyre gonna be fine lol
anyways that was my whole spiel abt it. i think i got everything out that i wanted to? my head still feels a little full so i may add more later when i remember something
also i think its a little unfair to rule out the possibility of laios and him just being 2 very different kinds of ND bc its very common for misunderstandings to occur even then. EVERYONE IS DIFFERENT BUT WE NEED TO COMMUNICATE TO UNDERSTAND EACH OTHER! but for the sake of interpreting the Fight as a commentary on NT social rules and ND frustration, ill say toshiros NT. will we ever know? hes so far in the sidelines... youd really have to dig in the extra content to see the intricacies of his character.... please give him a chance
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suddenlybambi · 1 year
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use me ♥ kenny mccormick
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pairing : kenny mccormick x vampire!reader
nsfw (smut) - minors DNI!!! - aged up characters (18+)
tags : mentions of blood, biting, blood drinking (all that usual vampire stuff iykyk) , mild praise kink, afab reader, mild sub/dom dynamics
word count : 3.1k
summary : mysterion just wants to keep the streets safe and y/n just needs to feed - he has an idea, but she refuses it until she has no other choice
masterlist
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a/n - bambi stop turning men into subs challenge 💀
this isn't proof read because its 1am and i wrote this in a haze, so lemme know if you catch any mistakes please and thank you xoxo
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The body crumpled to the floor of the alleyway as Y/N let go, doing her best to wipe her mouth clean of the blood. They weren’t dead, she was always able to stop herself before it went that far, but they would probably be a little woozy once they were conscious enough to get up again.
In her usual act of what she considered to be kindness, she slipped an iron supplement into their mouth, making sure they swallowed it in their half-conscious state. 
Leaning down and lifting her mask up slightly, she held their eyes open to look into them to work her literal charm. 
“You are going to forget you ever saw me; you just passed out on your way home,” She instructed. She could tell by the expression on the man’s face that it was working. They would always get this weird dopey look to them. “You are also going to drink more water because you are a bit dehydrated. Probably best to get some iron supplements for yourself while you’re at it, just for good measure.”
The person nodded, and Y/N knew her tracks were covered. Slipping her mask back down to cover her eyes, she let the man go and watched as he brushed himself off and stumbled away, wobbling a little as though he were drunk. Turning around, she began walking the opposite way down the street to return home. She would be satisfied for another week if she was lucky and didn’t over-exert herself.
“I assume the red on your lips isn’t lipstick?” Mysterion stepped out from the shadows as Y/N passed him. She knew he was there; she could smell him and hear his breathing from down the street, watching her feed. “You just couldn’t help yourself?”
“You know I don’t have a choice,” Y/N sighed, having had this conversation before on several occasions. She walked past Mysterion, but he followed her, never one to give up easily.
“I gave you a choice,” He corrected, trailing slightly behind her. “You just didn’t choose it.” 
“That was a one-time thing out of necessity,” The words were routine to her by that point. She used to bribe Chaos to distract him on the other side of town while she fed, but he had caught on to the trick. “It’s not safe.”
“What’s not safe is for you to be roaming the streets and picking people at random,” He interjected. “For the public or for you.”
“And your suggestion is any better?” Y/N stopped and turned around. Even past the mask that covered her eyes, he could see the anger brewing from the slight red tint her eyes had started to assume. “We don’t know the long-term effects it would have on either of us.”
Mysterion had been right about it not being safe for her to pick people at random. There was a time when she fed from a man on some sort of drug that she had a horrible side effect from. She thought she was finally dying, but that was when the masked hero appeared. She couldn’t explain what was happening to her, but he seemed to understand well enough to know that she needed clean blood to heal, so he offered his own. His blood was like nothing she had ever had before, it was blissfully intoxicating, and she couldn’t stop.
The next night, when she saw him again, she thanked him but said it could never happen again. While Mysterion couldn’t die, at least not for more than a day, the guilt for killing again after she had sworn not to ate at her more than the new craving for his blood.
“I thought you enjoyed experimenting?” His tone was teasing, but that just angered her more.
“Just…” She sighed, trying to calm herself down as best as possible before she really flipped out on him. She knew that was what he wanted. If she did, she’d attack him. If she attacked him, she’d end up feeding from him. It had almost happened a few weeks after the initial incident, and he’d been provoking her ever since. “Just leave me alone. I’ve been doing this for longer than you could ever imagine.” She turned around again and started to walk, but his next words stopped her after only two steps.
“376 years, right?” He phrased it as a question but said it as more of a statement. How did he know that? “That’s just if I’m going based on your death certificate. Took a lot of digging, but it was easier when I found that you were born in England.”
“Congrats, dude,” She waved her arms up a little in a mixture of disbelief and frustration. She didn’t want him to see the genuine shock. She felt that he had taken time to research her. Modern technology was amazing, but that was still a difficult thing to do. “What do you want? A prize for being a top-notch stalker?”
“If you want me gone, why don’t you just charm me away?” Mysterion had inched closer to Y/N as he spoke. She could see his eyes through his mask, his pupils blown out in the dark of the night. “Unless you can’t?”
He was right. She couldn’t. She had tried before, tried to make him forget her. She didn’t think he was aware that it had been an attempt to charm him instead of just another plea to leave her alone, but she was suspecting he knew more about her than she wanted him to.
“Stay out of my business, and I’ll stay out of yours, Kenny,” She hoped the use of his real name would throw him off his tracks enough to make an escape. She had known the moment she saw Mysterion that it was Kenny. His blood had a distinct smell that she had always picked up in class. She assumed it must have been something to do with his immortality.
Immortality did strange things to the body, she would know.
“Your business is my business when you roam these streets looking for victims,” He slowly pulled away from her, giving her some space as he looked around to make sure they hadn’t been spotted. “Let me walk you home?”
“Get fucked,” With that, Y/N jumped up and transformed into a bat, flying off over the empty streets. It was a terrible idea, but she needed to get away. It drained her energy and, subsequently, her thirst at ten times the rate as just going about her normal day, which would inevitably lead to her having to feed again within the following few days, where the entire conversation with Mysterion would repeat itself, just as it always did.
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It had been too long since she last fed. 
Going to school for the first time had caught up with her unexpectedly. She lost track of time studying in the evenings. She had managed to obtain a necklace that allowed her to walk in the sun 17 years ago and that had opened up the world to her again after 350 years of living in the shadows. There was so much to learn that she had never gotten the chance to before when education wasn’t readily available, least of all for women. She relished the opportunity to learn and lost track of the days.
She hadn’t even thought about feeding until the first drop of blood from the fight between two students in the halls hit her like a tonne of bricks. She could smell it from the opposite end of the hallway.
Instinctively, she closed her eyes, knowing they would have already turned red from the thirst. The thirst was overwhelming. She needed to get out of there before she lost herself, but she couldn’t will her legs to move. The need to hunt was driving her mad.
A hand grabbed her arm while her eyes were closed. She knew from her already heightened sense of smell that got even stronger while hunting, that it was Kenny. He didn’t say anything to her, just started to drag her away. Y/N kept her eyes closed as she let him pull her through the halls, trusting him to do what was best for everyone by getting her far away from the people she could hurt. 
She didn’t know where they were going until the fresh air hit her, and she heard a car unlock. She finally felt safe enough to open her eyes, climbing into the back of Kenny’s car. The backseat had tinted windows. She had seen him get into the car on enough occasions to know that. No one would be able to see her blood-red eyes and her protruding fangs if she stayed in there.
The panic was short-lived as it resumed in full force when Kenny climbed in next to her. He needed to get away from her, and he needed to do it fast. His scent was intoxicating, and she would very quickly lose herself. She could hear his racing heart pumping blood through his veins.
“You need to leave. I haven’t-” She started to explain as fast as she could, but he interrupted her.
“You haven’t fed in 2 weeks. I know,” He finished for her. Y/N’s anger started to slowly simmer within her. He knew that, but he was still taunting her? Whatever game he was playing was a stupid and dangerous one, and he needed to stop. “I’ve kept an eye on you.”
“Stalker,” She mumbled, somewhat half-heartedly. She thought she had caught the scent of him in her yard, but she had brushed it off as her imagination. “I’ll go tonight. Just let me calm down alone for a bit, and I’ll be fine to go back in.” She emphasised the alone as much as possible.
“We’re not taking that risk,” Kenny refused, reaching over the front seat to lock the doors. She felt trapped, like a mouse in a trap, but the cheese was Kenny fucking McCormick. He may as well have been trying to serve himself up on a platter. “Just feed on me.”
“Is this fucking funny to you?” Y/N could feel how sharp her teeth had become, almost slicing open her own lip as she spoke. The thirst was unbearable. She needed Kenny to leave. “Do you get off on this or something? What is wrong with-”
He cut her off again; however, this time, it wasn’t by talking. Kenny had pulled Y/N onto him, holding her on his lap with a secure grip on her waist and stopping her from talking by planting his lips on hers with a frantic kiss. She should have pulled away. She should have lept over the driver's seat, unlocked the doors, and used what little energy she could muster to run at her super speed until she found someone she could safely feed off of.
She should have done all of that, but she didn’t.
Instead, Y/N kissed Kenny back. Her body shifted into autopilot, her hands running through his hair. It was bliss until the unthinkable happened.
Her sharpened fangs cut Kenny’s lip, and a single drop of blood hit Y/N’s tongue. Panicked, she pulled away and tried to climb off of his lap, but his hands on her waist wouldn’t allow it.
Two words were all it took to break her final thread of resolve.
“Use me,” Kenny instructed in a breathless whisper. Before either of them could truly register what was happening, Y/N’s fangs were in his neck.
Kenny let out a shaky moan as the sharp pain suddenly turned into pleasure. It was one he had sought out ever since Y/N had fed from him all those months ago. She had explained it to him once when she was telling him that she wasn’t really hurting the people she fed from because her fangs would automatically release endorphins into them. She described it as a numbing feeling, but it made Kenny feel anything but numb.
The pleasure, coupled with the soft sounds of Y/N mewling as she drank from him, let alone the added fact that she was on his lap, was enough to leave Kenny rock-hard. He couldn’t control himself as his hips bucked up against her.
His heart almost stopped when she very suddenly pulled away, the feeling of her fangs no longer in his neck and the blood draining from him left him feeling empty. Her eyes were half-lidded as she looked down at him, lips stained red from blood, and her mouth hung slightly open.
Kenny thought he had died once again and gone to heaven when she, without warning, rolled her hips against his. His cock twitched desperately in his pants, and his grip on her hips would have been bruising to anyone but a vampire.
“When I asked you if you got off on this, I didn’t realise I had hit the nail on the head,” Y/N’s voice was low and seductive. Kenny had never heard anything so sexy in his life. He wanted to hear her talk all day, every day. He tried to roll his hips up to meet hers again, but her hands snapped down to his thighs, holding him in place. “Use your words, and I’ll consider giving you what you want.”
“Touch me, fuck me, use me, please,” He begged without hesitation, knowing it was the fastest way to get what he desperately needed at that moment. “Please?”
Y/N captured him in a breathtaking kiss, he could taste his blood on her tongue as it swirled with his, but he couldn’t care less. Her hands slid up his thighs until they reached his beltline, moving at superhuman speeds to impatient get her hands on what she wanted. The zipper popped open and flung across the car as she broke it, neither of them caring for a single second.
The muscles of Kenny’s thighs twitched and spasmed as Y/N’s hand slipped down his boxers, pulling his swollen cock out. The tip was red and leaking precum. Y/N ran her thumb over it without hesitation, bringing it up to her mouth, her tongue darting out to lick it up. He caught sight of her fangs, still protruding from the rest of her teeth. She was still hungry.
“Remind me to go down on you when my mouth can be trusted,” She whispered in his ear, pressing her chest against him as she leaned in. “For now, I’m impatient. We’ll have to skip to the main event.”
“Please,” He nodded eagerly, cock twitching in anticipation. Y/N took it in her hand, pumping it a few times as more precum leaked from the tip.
“You sound so pretty when you beg,” She smirked down at him. He didn’t have time to register what had happened before she sunk down onto him in one swift move. He hadn’t seen her remove her underwear. He didn’t know if she had done it at super speed without him seeing (though the panties were nowhere in his car to support that theory) or if she just hadn’t been wearing them in the first place. The latter drove him crazier than he already felt.
Just as she sunk down onto him, her teeth sunk back into his neck. Kenny was the most delicious meal Y/N had ever had, and she couldn’t help herself from going in for seconds.
Painfully slowly for Kenny, she lifted herself up and down on him. She kept a tortuous speed, her strength stopping his desperate attempts at thrusting up into her.
Reaching for his hands, she pried them off of her hips, slipping one up her shirt and under her bra to fondle her breasts and manoeuvring the other so his fingertips brushed up against her clit. He took the hint instantly, switching between each breast with his left hand to make sure they both received adequate attention and rolling her nipples in between his fingers, revelling in the louder moans that his neck was barely muffling as she fed from him.
His right hand slowly circled her clit, starting slow at first but speeding up as soon as she picked up the pace, sliding herself up and down on him. He felt whenever he hit her g-spot as her walls would clench around him, causing him to repeatedly hit it as the pleasure became unbearable.
“So close,” He managed to choke out, his movements becoming slightly sloppy as he started to lose himself. Y/N pulled her fangs from his neck, lifting her head just slightly so she could whisper in his ear.
“Cum for me,” He did so instantly, a loud moan escaping his throat, his head tilting back as he filled her up. He felt her walls clamp around his dick as she reached her own peak, her eyes rolling back slightly.
When she looked back at him, her eyes had returned to their natural colour, and her teeth had once again dulled down. He was completely struck by her beauty but struggled to keep his eyes open to admire her as he felt woozy from the blood loss. He heard her curse as his eyes drooped closed, his head lulling to the side.
Kenny wasn’t sure how much time had passed, but he woke up to Y/N curled up against his side in the backseat of his car. She appeared to have done her best to clean him and herself up while he was passed out, but since she had broken his zipper in the heat of the moment, his jeans were still open.
He stretched a little as he woke up, Y/N lifted her head to look at him, and he could see relief flooding her face.
“I was worried I had taken too much,” She sighed a breath of relief, a hand reaching up to cradle his face. She intently examined his eyes, looking for confirmation that he was okay. “I’m so sorry; I lost control.” Kenny pulled her in for a kiss, far sweeter than the passion-filled ones they had shared earlier.
“I’m immortal, remember?” He reminded her softly as they pulled away. “You can’t kill me for long.”
“But we don’t-” She was about to protest again about how they didn’t know what would happen to either of them if she continued to drink his blood since he wasn’t a normal human, but one look at the pure adoration in his eyes stopped her in her tracks. “You should have just told me that was what you had in mind when you said you wanted to experiment. We could have been doing that for months.”
“Well…” Kenny grinned as the words processed in his mind, the implications clear as day. “We have an eternity left to catch up on missed time.”
721 notes · View notes
kawareo · 3 months
Note
ur right, the only person who has an excuse to have abs is Karlach (the whole avernus thing, I believe she was probably malnourished during that time and slowly gets her healthy chub back the longer she travels with everyone)
Ok just gonna do a quick ramble about how i see them here, from no abs to yes abs
Gale: nerd who stays solely in his tower. His abs might be there but if they are its all illusion magic babey, there is SOFTNESS and thats a hill i will die on
Shadowheart: no visible abs and shes not particularly strong, shes just basically fit in a way where running up a small hill wouldn't kill her and her knees wouldn't creak when she crouches (sorry Gale), no abs, stomach soft to touch
Wyll: he's fit enough but not that strong, id say there is no ab definition but he can do some situps without feeling agony in the morning. They exist but theyre covered completely, you could feel them if he flexed!
Astarion: now. NOW. hear me out. He has abs at the start of the game and itd make sense because even though hes not that strong his DEX is high and it could make sense. BUT. as the game progresses he loses the abs because he is for the first time on 200 years not constantly dehydrated/starved and his body gets into a more normal state. His initial ab definition makes sense if we remember how movie stars look like when they dehydrate before shoots to make muscles more visible, id say same thing.
Karlach: abs of steel BUT theyre not that visible, she's strong as hell but id also give her some meat on the bone to make her stronger especially in the waist area. Similar to Astarion she also softens as the game progresses but worry not, the abs are still there, like bricks covered with a layer of fluff (youre so right for this anon)
Lae'zel: skinny and strong, you could cut yourself on how defined her abs are. She looks like shed have metabolism of a horse or maybe its just how githyanki are built but yeah she should be the only one whos stomach muscles present a risk of poking out your eye. Ab queen.
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pigeonpeach · 3 months
Text
How they would handle a drunk spouse
Warning! ALCOHOL!
Characters: Jean, Diluc, Dehya, Eula, Arlecchino, Navia, Shenhe
A/n: this is a draft that i just fixed up to post. I promise jean x reader will not be forgotten
Cw: fluff, alcoholism. No warnings aside from alcohol!
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Jean
She knew Kaeya was a bad influence! Its not entirely his fault but she doesn’t have time to care about your mistake here. You can try to sweet talk her or be all cuddly but shes not holding back on you! You should’ve known better than to get this drunk if you didn’t want to make her worried sick! She goes into overdrive caring for you though. A bucket and water telling you to drink every drop. You aren’t going to bed until she’s sure you feel better because she doesn’t want to wake up to vomit everywhere. Also because you could choke on your own vomit. Its also to help lessen the hangover. Mondstadt is the drinking capital in Teyvat though so there’s definitely more tips she knows just by living there. Despite her being s but mean it does help when you are hungover and less dehydrated than you would’ve been. She made sure to leave you some painkillers and medication for you on the nightstand.
Diluc
“I told you so” kind guy. He’s probably a bit annoyed but that doesn’t mean he isn’t going to help. Although he can’t help but find it a little bit amusing the state you’re in. Just giggling and mumbling words. Its kind of cute. Unlike Jean his anger and annoyance lessens the more cuddly you get. His heart melting at the fact that you still seek him out in this inebriated state of yours. He’ll fix you something to sober you up real quick and hold your hair if you vomit. If you have to take a bath he will be there to make sure you don’t drown. Since he is a bartender he has the best knowledge of how to handle hangovers. Next time however you should be careful
Eula
She probably was drinking with you to be honest. But her liver is far stronger than you thought! Seeing you drunk out of your mind she will stop drinking for the night and take you home instead. A gentle bridal style while she takes caution to not upset your tummy. She gets you plenty of water to help sober you up for bed time. You will just have to go along with her word, she isnt entertaining any arguments or resistance from you now! She changes you out of your clothes, ties up your hair, etc. She makes sure you’re nice and cozy for the night before she takes care of herself.
Dehya
She can’t help but find it amusing watching you stumble about. She asks Lambad for some water but she holds it to you so you won’t drop it. She teases you about being a lightweight. But she isn’t finished drinking yet so just hold on! Once you fall over and pass out though she ditches that plan and instead carries you home. A bit difficult considering she too is tipsy but it helps that she’s strong and not nearly as drunk. Nonetheless she tucks you in and sleeps right next to you, making sure you’re pressed up against her so you can be nice and warm.
Arlecchino
She knew you would be a light weight. Just one shot of firewater and you’re out like a light, your head on her thigh as she was reading something. You seem too peaceful to move so she simply lets you stay there. Her hand rummaging through your hair every so often. Occasionally she glances to see your face and smiles. You’re cute like this. Next time she’ll make sure to dilute the firewater properly so she an enjoy your drunken state a little more.
Shenhe
She’s not sure what to do with you actually. Worried that you’ve hit your head she brings you to Bubu pharmacy, to which Baizhu has to explain the difference between a head injury and alcohol. But he sends her off with a few pain meds for you in the morning. She heeds his instructions well. Helping you settle in for a nice rest to sleep it off. She might have gone overboard though because she overdoes it with the blankets and water. But its still appreciated when you wake up with the worst hangover.
Beidou
You crash together. You fall asleep first, in her arms as she eventually falls asleep too , holding you close to her. Both drunk out of your minds you two end up asleep using a tarp as a blanket on the deck of the crux. The crew still mulling and celebrating their most recent success. The crew ends up having to lift you two back to your beds together because even unconscious would Beidou not let go of you. When you wake up she’s far better off than you as she teases you endlessly. Needless to say you two will be chugging water from here on out. At least until the next celebration. Lucky for you she keeps a stash of painkillers for her crew for this specific occasion.
Navia
A relentless teaser! How horrible! She ends up giggling watching you stumble and stutter. She can’t help it! You’re such a silly bean! Once you get sleepy is when she brings you home to rest. With her guards doing the heavy lifting of course. But she’ll do the bathing or changing herself with them casted out of the room. Afterwards she prepares herself for bed, snuggling against you.
In the morning she’ll make her guards get you painkillers and water.
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If you're currently taking requests, can you please do yandere dorm leaders + Jamil with a demigod reader like from Percy Jackson the readers godly parent can be your choice. If you're not currently taking requests feel free to ignore this
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Percy Jackson Reader | Yandere Twisted Wonderland
Child of one of the big three, water bends to your will. And in the oddest moments, your father gives his two senses. Nonetheless, your power earns you a lot of respect and a lot of scorn from the average student. Of course, those interested don’t mind all that much until your powers seem to be an obstacle to your love for them: 
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Malleus Draconia
“I see. Your mastery of the sea is impressive. I wonder if we spar who would fare best?”
He wants to engage with your power because it gets him an excuse to take your time 
This also helps him gauge your power against his own
He doesn’t cease his repeated sniping of people that hang around you 
Even if you actually challenge him seriously
He thinks you’re just the cutest
“Fine, my love. If you wish to challenge me let's have a wager. If you win I’ll stop my…warnings. But if I win you will forfeit all rights to speak to others. This is more than fair.”
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Idia Shroud
“I feel we’re connected in some odd way…”
“Yeah….”
“Do you want to play COD?”
There’s a weird synergy that has you both respecting one another
He thinks its cool how you can heal up with magic
But his excuse for prying creepily into your privacy+ is justified by his constant experimentation to measure your powers
“W-what this camera? Ha, it’s only to track what you’d do in such a harrowing situation! I-it w-wasn’t b-because your wearing j-just a white shirt.”
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Jamil Viper
“You’re a lot like Kalim, I’m sure your just as susceptible.”
“...I uh…get the feeling you’re capable of something…manipulative.”
“Wow, how insightful.”
Your dear old dad is probably the only help your getting with him
He’s often finding himself befriending you 
Despite being caught trying to hypnotize you
He makes a point to use his usual tactic to leave you alone
With plenty of time to come and hang out with him
“Scarabia’s the perfect setting, not a whole lot of water for their father to stay anything.”
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Kalim Al Asim
“Yay! Twinsies!”
He’s so happy that you have an affinity for water just like him
He can’t make weapons like you do or heal yourself with it
But he thinks it's pretty cool
It's even cooler that you get really cuddly weak if you stay in Scarabia long enough
“Awww why don’t you stay! I promise I’ll bring the water as soon as we finish our carpet ride!”
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Vil Schoenheit
“I doubt that. If you really were the child of Poseidon I doubt he’d let you walk around with skin as dehydrated as yours.”
“Gee thanks, Vil.”
“Yup that’s what I’m here for.”
He knows he’d never be able to overpower you
But he’s not all that hurt
Where you can pride yourself on your strength it doesn’t do anything against his finesse and intellect
Which he prefers
because what power couple doesn’t complement one another with their flaws and strengths
And while you may be willing to entertain these invasive welps bold suitors
He’s not so lenient
“Where you wish to merely scare them off, I wish to punish them. It’s only a given that we mirror one another, in the method.” 
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Leona Kingscholar
“Join Savvannaclaw, you herbivore. You still have some evolving you can do.”
Strong mates are always fought for in life
And to make his mark he has to sand fight off the competition
The next part will be winning your heart or successfully taming you
Just give him time, he’ll make it happen
One way or another
“Ha let’s exercise I want to see how far you’re willing to go.”
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Azul Ashengrotto
“With your kind of power…you could overthrow the entire empire within the coral sea!”
“Uh, I guess.”
“You guess? (Y/n), we could bring all of those who laughed at me to their knees. Metaphorically speaking.”
“They…bullied you?”
“...”
“Aww Azul…”
“S-shut up! Let’s just put them all in their place beneath you”
He loves you immensely 
And while he may seem that he’s always aiming to slip you into a contract for ‘sea conquering’ 
He’s after something more
He’s after you
His pearl, his angelfish, he wants to be your plus one as you right the world
“Ho ho what a predicament. Why don’t we negotiate the subject of payment, after the broken china incident with Grim, we wouldn’t want you to fall into debt.”
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Riddle Rosehearts
“I hardly believe your dyslexia is attributed to such a trait.”
“Bet. Write something in Greek I can do it.”
“...I stand corrected.”
“Ha see?!”
“Nonetheless you’re in desperate need of my studying prowess. Come to Heartslabyul.”
He is enamored by you 
The powers and heritage just add another layer
But he finds you are lacking for someone so kind
Or rather that you don’t have conviction
In your studies or in your boundaries
You don’t need to worry he’ll do that for you
Collaring anyone who gives threatening looks  and any look in general
“Off with your head! I decree that you will be punished for the breaking of the Queen’s law: that no one touches the Ramshackle prefect but you’re queen!”
664 notes · View notes
usedpidemo · 2 years
Text
Awards after-party affair (Itzy Yuna)
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Like a ringing bell at the top of the hour, the signal is loud, instant, and right on time. One eager attendee catches the first van roll onto the red carpet entrance. He makes the call like it’s routine, alerting everyone else for an invasion—a visual attack is about to happen. 
“They’re here!” 
You’re no different from the rest of this eager crowd. You stop whatever you’re doing—in this case, fiddling with your handheld camera—to redirect your gaze in the same direction as everyone else. Despite how little in common you share with these people, you’re all in perfect sync, like this has all been practiced and choreographed a thousand times. From the front seats come out two imposing men: one serving as driver and the other as manager/bodyguard. The driver slides open the door. Though they’re only silhouettes, shadows that are unassuming, it’s enough to make the masses scream their lungs out.
See, you’re not a fan. To you, you’re only doing a job. It pays remarkably well and creates jealousy to anyone whenever you bring it up in conversation. At this point though, you’re completely callous to the experience and share the same amount of displeasure as an average joe working a 9-to-5. The ordeal of covering numerous award shows, red carpets, and press junkets from week to week—sometimes two events in a single day—serve as more of an endless assault on your senses and test of patience with everyone, and this is no different. Sure, it’s a rare privilege to meet all kinds of larger than life stars, but dealing with their bitchy PR managers is a whole other affair.
It’s late in the afternoon, the sun at its apex right before descent, without a single cloud in sight, and you’re fucking dying of dehydration. It doesn’t help that there's cafes perched on nearly every corner you look, and an iced drink never looked so mouthwatering. Even if you wanted a teeny-tiny sip, you can’t. You have no power to, because as trivial as it is compared to other events you’ve attended, everything’s on the line. Your editors need the scoop to regurgitate the same old content produced by almost every other media outlet patiently waiting in line, too. 
The truth is: it’s always been the same old same old since day one. Really, there’s little that crosses the line from both the interviewer and interviewee. It’s always the safest option, the cleanest question. Nothing goes beyond that; no one’s willing to step beyond that arbitrary boundary, even if it’s to spice up the headlines once in a while. No wonder your publication, along with many others, resorts to shady gossip and misleading articles with poor, if not any supporting evidence.
Still, you’re already there, and there’s nothing to lose in the long term—except a few hours of your time. 
One by one, both actors and idols alike hop off their black vans, wave to the crowd, speak to a few junkets in line, then head inside. Extra time willing, they take a couple of pictures with the screaming audience or some lucky fan. The entire process moves by in a robotic and formulaic way, it reinforces the negative stereotypes critics have about the industry—and you’re quietly one of those detractors. Nevertheless, you put aside your personal judgment, and follow along, the several dozens of photos you’ve taken of every star on the carpet as proof of your professionalism. 
The endless stream of appearances from both small and big names continue for at least another hour. Celebrity vans line up bumper-to-bumper to continue dropping more off; it might as well be a delivery store of people’s dreams. Out comes the next anticipated set of stars, another indistinguishable five-member girl group, all dressed in black. Your trigger fingers take as much as they can, as fast they can. The end result is several individual and group shots added to your camera roll, probably some of your best so far, as they are conveniently positioned right in front of you—at the center of your lens—compared to almost everyone else. Take another look at a few of the pictures you took, and you notice they’re staring right at you. 
Even as the red carpet wraps up, you don’t really think much of it. Inside, you’re called backstage, along with your fellow media representatives, where it’s basically a rinse and repeat of what happened outside, with longer, more forgiving intervals. At least you can finally rest your tired legs, and unlike the red carpet, where it’s a nonstop barrage of action, commercials actually give you, and the other journalists by extension, more room to breathe—the only positive ads will ever have for humanity.
Similarly, winners line up backstage after claiming their trophy and giving their typical, routine speech. Arriving at a room filled with nothing but media, they answer a different but familiar set of sanitary questions, then go back to their seats. The pacing difference between awards proper and red carpet is night and day, like hitting traffic at rush hour. Most of the time, everyone’s eyes are glued to the widescreen television while the show plays out, and it’s no different from a viewer watching at home. The energy inside the cramped room is laid back and relaxed; at times you forget you’re at an awards ceremony and not your local bar.
Really, it’s only the celebrities themselves who are in a hurry, speaking to the press like they’re rapping, tapping their feet like they haven’t stopped dancing, clear in their intention to leave in a hurry, which is the most relatable they can be with their audience. Most winners appear only once, with a few exceptions. The seven boys you see almost everywhere in Korea, even more so globally—make the most frequent returns, even closing out as the recipient of the grand prize, and their exit means everyone in the media is done for the night, too.
You should be going home by now. It’s getting late, and you’re practically done, except not really. As is tradition, there’s always a few afterparties being thrown around in celebration, and to your annoyance, you have to attend one. To make things worse, you’re not there to have fun and get wasted—not in the slightest. You’re there to take some more photos and get additional quotes, according to your superiors’ orders. There’s no added incentive or bonus in return for a few more hours of your time that could have been spent in more productive activities or resting for the next day, but you still power on because your job is never truly stable. One missed opportunity, one stolen scoop, and next thing you know, you’re being shown the door.
The lounge you end up going to might as well be a goddamn rave. Flashing lights, bodies crowding up the dance floor, deafening bass-boosted music blasting through the many speakers—it’s the most torturous parts of the job crammed into one colorful, insufferable hellhole. It’s less of a place where celebrities hang out and more of a grimy hangout where needy, desperate mad men and women look to get fucked. Before entering, you check the address and location on your phone. Perhaps there’s been a mistake, and you were given incorrect information. Nope. The text you receive from your supervisor reconfirms the location. Inside, you also find a few other journalists suffocating under the same toxic air like you. 
Squeezing between drunk bodies, mindlessly dancing like there’s no tomorrow, you sneak to the spacious bar, a temporary reprieve from the ear-splitting, soul-crushing madness. Whipping out several paper bills from your pocket, you slide them forward on the counter, mumbling to the barista your desired drink. At this point, you’d take anything, as long as it makes the rest of the night bearable.
“I’ll take two of what he’s having.” A feminine voice interjects, more bills than yours twirled between her fingertips, and the barista accepts her payment instead, overturning yours and sliding your money back.
From the blurred reflection on the counter, you swing your gaze to the right. A cute, young woman in a black, slinky dress takes the unoccupied seat beside you, flashes you an eye smile and cheeky grin back. 
“Sup,” she says, casually, like you’re two friends hanging out together. “Didn’t expect you to show up here as well.”
“Wait.” With furrowed brows, you point a finger at her. She looks awfully familiar, but you can’t really tell her apart from the countless well dressed people you’ve been seeing for hours on end. “Aren’t you from—”
“Oh? You interviewed me earlier!” 
Her answer doesn’t provide a single hint or narrows down who. You’ve taken countless pictures of different girl groups, and your lack of investment towards any of them means they’re basically indistinguishable in your eyes. Still, she looks young enough to be a member from one of the more junior groups. 
“Yeah, none of this is adding up.”
“Yuna? Shin Yuna? Does that name ring a bell to you?”
“Oh, of course it does!” Her name rings a few bells, but still, you’re not confident enough to confirm, and it shows in your tone. “Itzy, right?”
She nods positively, brimming with joy at the mention of her group’s name. “Yep yep!”
“Well, congrats on the award again,” you reply, reaching out your hand as a friendly gesture. You don’t really remember what award her group won or how many trophies they won, nor do you have the willpower to care, but a little kindness goes a long way. “You had a great performance as well.”
“Thanks!” Smiling toothily, Yuna bows while reciprocating your motion, meeting halfway for a respectful handshake. Her grip tightens for a brief moment before quickly pulling back. “I appreciate your comment.”
Timely. The barista returns to you with two drinks you forgot you ordered. She takes them both, hands you one, and you both raise your glasses to the sky before clinking them together. 
“Cheers.”
With hearty spirits, you take a little sip from your drink, while Yuna downs a quarter of her beverage.  The sweet taste elicits a cheery, wide smile on her lips, compels her to down more. After only the second swig, half of her drink is gone. Both of you can’t be more different when it comes to enjoying alcohol; you’re one to ease into it slowly, while she rushes into the feeling. Then you take note of the fact that she looks quite young—she’s the youngest of her group, in fact—having just come of age, and drinking appears to be a fresh concept to her. No wonder she looks so enthusiastic and pumped about indulging liquor.
“So,” Yuna places her glass on the counter with an audible thud and peeps you with comically wide, childlike eyes. “What brings you here?”
“Not much,” you say, casually, as you stare at the stainless glass and the yellow liquid contained within. Its bubbliness fascinates you, captures your scrutiny like it’s the most interesting thing around, like a work of art in an exhibit. “I should be the one interviewing you, and to get some more information.”
“Information about what?” 
“I don’t know. Something to fill up the paper, I guess.” You inch the drink closer to you, inspecting it from top to bottom like some type of rare artifact—something to occupy your idle, bored mind. 
“You make it sound like you’re spying on us,” retorts Yuna, playfully resting her chin against her clenched fist leaning on the table. Her eyes take a cursory look, examining you from head-to-toe, finding something around your chest that intrigues her. “I mean, good try though.”
“It’s not that kind of information,” you reply, aware that it’s spoken with hyperbole, but still, there’s a difference between safe, journalistic reporting and straight-up criminal stalking. 
“You’re really terrible at this tabloid job, you know?” mocks Yuna, poking her finger at the camera partially hidden behind your coat. On her lips is a cocky, teasing smirk, with the clear intent to toy with you. She’s leaning closer, eager to watch your expressions crumble little by little. “It’s like you’re begging for information.”
If only she weren’t so cute and innocent in how she goes about it, you’d probably wave the white flag, give up halfway, and profess—or straight up leave.
“And is that supposed to dissuade me?” says you, flatly, completely unbothered. Your eyes make contact with hers, staring at her with a piercing leer. Instead of being intimidated, her smile widens, and her shiny teeth are blinding; she knows she’s caught you under her trap, slowly pulling on your most sensitive strings, and her words have a subtle effect on you. 
“If it could, yes,” replies Yuna, peering through your gaze with widening eyes, looking at you with heightened intrigue, unfazed by your shallow threat. “But since you’re so determined and stubborn to get some information for that shitty paper of yours, I’ll let you in on a little secret.”
“Do tell.” 
Suddenly, she tears her gape away from you, turns her head left and right for any crossing sign, then back at you with a wider, suspicious smirk. “Not here.”
—————
You expected her to take you to a peaceful location, like the back rooms or one of the many uninhabited private booths. For someone like her, a K-pop idol, surely there’s a van waiting for her outside, ready to depart on call. 
A bathroom stall was far from it.
The moment she stood up, walked away, then looked back with a different, expressive glance, that was an open invitation for you. Forget about the fact that she’s an idol and a celebrity first; in those caramel eyes was a glance that was forbidding and scandalous, but alluring enough to draw you in without a moment of hesitation. Not once you questioned where she was leading you. You trailed closely behind, drinking in the young starlet’s hourglass figure, perfectly shaped for a skintight dress that made her stand out from everyone in the crowd. With such dreamlike beauty walking in a sea of commoners, you thought all eyes would be on her, as usual, but the opposite happened—it was you who became hypnotized by her.
Eventually, you both sneak past everyone, which proves to be relatively trivial, locking yourselves together inside an empty bathroom secluded on the club’s second floor. Yuna looks around the spacious restroom for possible occupants, only to find every one of the five available stalls completely unoccupied. Despite how hidden you are from the rest of the party, the music echoes loud enough to pass through the walls.
“Perfect,” she says, taking another scope then to the widescreen mirror, possibly referring to the setting, and to herself. She looks at her reflection with a confident, proud grin, and your suspicion is proven correct. “I’m pretty sure you know where this is going, right?”
“Mhmm,” you reply, nodding. Two people, alone in a bathroom. You know damn well what’s about to happen.
This isn’t the first time a star has offered themselves to you behind closed doors. It’s an industry secret, but open news shared among most publications and certain names that get around. It’s these private affairs where most of the money comes from. Each incident generates revenue in exchange for keeping such filthy secrets classified and hidden. Can’t say you’re clean or innocent in the issue; you’ve had a few experiences with some of Korea’s biggest film stars in exchange for money too, but this is your first time with a K-pop idol, and they say they’re the ones who are deepest in the circle.
“Good, I guess I don’t have to tell you how fucking horny I am,” says Yuna, casual in her delivery of such shocking filth. “And the rumors are true,” she continues, flashing you a flirtatious wink. Her fingers play with the straps holding her dress together, dragging them along her shoulders.
“That you’re a slut?” 
“We’re all sluts, baby,” she replies, approaching you with a seductive gaze that can render anyone paralyzed, and you’re no exception. With a cute, fresh face like hers, It’s unbelievable and quite frankly dumbfounding how leisurely she says it, like it’s the norm for everyone in her profession—and it’s sufficient evidence to prove that case. Then again, she’s still a teen, and you’re on the edge of a really dangerous line. Sure, having sexual favors with anyone in the entertaiment industry is already a line crossed, but this is a whole layer below with far more grave implications, and here she comes, forcefully dragging you far beyond the point of no return. Really, with your line of work, this was bound to happen eventually, but you never expected it to come from such an unexpected person—a Korean idol, your least favorite kind of celebrity.
But this is the moment where all of that changes.
“Still have some battery left in that camera, right?” Yuna points at the handheld camera dangling freely on your chest again. “Go and take some.”
You incorrectly predicted her to jump right into the action, but you’re not bothered in the slightest. You were already taking a gallery’s worth of mental pictures of her sexy body, made hotter by her deliberate, seductive teasing, but having a physical reference for future personal use is helpful too. 
So you pull the camera from its strap to take photos of the frisky maknae while she does many poses for you. Even behind a lens, her beauty is so ethereal, it doesn’t compare in the slightest to looking at her with the naked eye. She exudes a perfect balance of cute and sultry, a trait you’ve rarely seen among the many actors and actresses you’ve met before. Perhaps this is the greatest strength of an idol, and you’re left wanting more. 
Yuna then approaches you, occupied taking as many pictures you can of the idol, running your remaining memory dry. She drops to her knees, looks at you with those wide, inviting eyes, and her fingers wrap around the edges of your pants.
“Don’t stop,” she says, pouting her lips upward, in the direction of your camera to emphasize her command, and you know you can’t do otherwise. Photography isn’t in your skill set, yet she trusts you with her life—her career—and there’s pressure beginning to amount in your head. Surely she’s not that desperate to the point where she’s asking a random journalist to get her quick fill of excitement.
The spark in her eyes, the determination on her brows, and the carefree smile on her lips—this isn’t her first rodeo, and it certainly won’t be her last. 
Yuna turns her attention away from your curious, troubled gaze to your pants, unzipping the hindering garment down while you continue capturing every still, every frame of the young woman in such a vulnerable, lewd position. These photos would spell disaster should they ever leak out of this room, and it’s even more dangerous when it’s a young group, a rising name who has a stake on the global stage. Even so, you continue snapping photos at her request, fingers pretty much playing a single repeating key on the trigger, you might as well have glued your index to the button.
“I knew it,” she murmurs, the erect tent on your groin area poking into view. Seconds later, your boxers join your pants on the floor, springs your cock free from its clothed prison. “I’m gonna have a lot of fun tonight. I don’t know what the other girls are doing, but they’ll regret not being here. It’s fine, I don’t feel like sharing this.”
With your hard cock next to the pretty, demure idol, your involvement can’t be any more obvious. Yuna immediately notices the sudden quietness of the camera, so she looks up at you again, notes your flushed cheeks, the little beads of sweat forming on your head, and giggles. 
“Really now?” she says, lifting a puzzled eyebrow, fingers slowly gripping around your shaft. You try to resist, show a little opposition, but it’s superficial; before long, you can’t hold in the jolt of pleasure coursing through your nerves and utter a low, muffled moan. “You’re perfectly fine with taking sensitive pictures of me, but you’ll say no to this? You’ve said it yourself. I’m a slut—a slut for good cock.”
Her soft, dainty tongue latches onto your tip, rendering you more speechless. Can’t say she’s wrong, and telling her otherwise would make you look worse. Bodily ecstasy makes your senses go haywire; your hands struggle to hold the camera, but you manage to save all that important material with one hand and let the other wander down to caress and stroke her long, auburn hair. Your eyes flutter shut, unable to take in the sight of Yuna kissing and pumping your cock, and the knot in your tongue loosens, releasing delicate, breathy moan after moan.
It’s clear that Yuna’s done this before, experienced with the art of sexual pleasure, like it’s her primary line of profession, and she knows all the tricks and weaknesses to get to the core of any man or woman. At this point, you’ve practically neglected her demand, but the soft, intimate kissing sounds she makes as she revels in your cock give you a solid reference point to take more mental pictures of her. The camera in your grasp has been set aside on the sink. Both of your hands grip on the young woman’s brown locks, straddling a line between gentle and assertive as she gradually takes your length into her mouth.
“F-fuck, Yuna—” you mutter, having difficulty to formulate words, forcing your brain to resort to moans and grunts like a baby.
She doesn’t react or budge in the slightest; she only works harder and harder. The idol remains steadfast, filling her mouth up to your base, generously coating your shaft with her saliva. Her fingers dig into your thighs, pressing you harshly against the sink as your moan turns into an echoed groan. The quick burst of pain you feel is overtaken by the continuous pleasure flowing throughout your veins, like sexual indulgence is the only thing your body understands. 
You try to fight your overwhelmed senses, hoping to catch even a tiny glimpse of the beautiful woman giving you the best blowjob in the world, and it proves to be an intense struggle. Not once are you cognizant about tossing the idol’s head back and forth, even with the audible, echoey plop plop sounds raising several warning flags saying you’re too aggressive. Eventually, you manage to lift one eye open to see Yuna, completely immersed in her own pleasure, diligently sucking your cock while mixes of drool and precum splatter on her chin, her collarbones, and down to her black dress, leaving even more apparent hints for everyone to see.
In the end, it’s only you who gets to look at the different, ruined side of Yuna. Here’s a popular star, larger than life in the eyes of many, down on her knees, subservient to the most human and primal urges, just like anyone else. A wave of cum gushes into her mouth right as she releases your cock like spilled milk. Your burst of seed waterfalls, filling her chin and her dress with a dirty, sticky coat of white. Her eyes pop open, surprised at how filthy she looks, and how early she made you cum.
“Oh God,” says Yuna, pressing a hand on her glistening chin, then to her dress top. Gooey strings connect her fingers and the expensive, messed up fabric. “I made you cum early didn’t I?”
You’re catching heavy breaths, looking up at the ceiling, staring at the blinding lights like you’re seeing heaven. You might as well be; she ripped your soul out of your body with only her tongue.
“Shit, Yuna, I—”
Returning to her mischievous ways, her laughter echoes throughout the bathroom, poking fun at your overwhelmed state, like it’s the first time you’ve had sex. She’s proud of herself for making you cum with a mere blowjob, and she flicks her digits to coat them with more of your seed as her reward. Lapping them up into a sizable sample, she takes her fingers into her mouth for a taste.
“Yeah.” She rises to your level, licks her fingers clean, decorates her pink lips with your seed with a wide, charming, cheeky grin. Your marks are prominent on the grooves of her lips. “You’re so yummy.”
Lowering your gaze back down to earth, you finally see the ravaged mess you’ve done to Yuna. Spurts of white on her face, neck, and many puddles that have stained her dress. Seeing the utter disbelief in your expressions, she plays into the naughtiness by pressing her cum stained fingers on her inviting, visible cleavage.
With a free hand snaking down to your crotch, she pumps you back to hardness, holding a steady gaze of lust with you, the fire in her loins freshly renewed. “I know you want more. I want more.” Her other hand reaches to one strap, pulls it further down her arm, then does the same with the remaining cord, freely exposing her sizable breasts, drawing your eyes toward her chest. It’s difficult to look away, especially when someone like her knows how to captivate with a face like hers, natural with how expressive she is, only because she allowed you to stare elsewhere.
You gasp and sigh under the tight duress Yuna puts on your groin, giving her more confidence and a stronger hold on you. Grasp her bare shoulder with one hand, wander around her waist with the other, carefully crossing the lines of fabric and skin until you reach her surprisingly round ass. Her features slowly melt and eyes widen as she leans her face close, breath tensing up in anticipation, lips repressing her groan, practically whispering to you, “Fuck me. Fuck me.”
Yuna’s eyes pop out, caught unawares as you take her body and flip your positions around. She's now pressed against the bathroom sink with you assuming control. Her hands hold onto your shoulders, still fixated to your eyes like she sees stars within them. With the strength of your hand gripped to her ass, you lift her up partially so that her feet no longer touch the ground, and her legs slowly part, giving you an opening. Your other hand ruffles through her short skirt, digs into her tunnel, and she winces.
“Oh, fuck—” Her nails dig into the fabric of your shirt as you feel a slick, wet sensation on your fingers. Her features are so expressive, they’re best actress worthy. She shudders, teeth gritting intensely as you withdraw your digits. In an instant, her calm, confident attitude fades at your slightest touch, and she grows impatient and desperate. “Give me your cock now! I need you to fill me—”
You capture her lips in a passionate, fervid kiss, shutting her up as a distraction while you line your erect cock between her sopping cunt. She whines into the smooch, tries to break away, but you pull her in, let your tip run up and down around her wet entrance, and she hums musically. In turn, she pushes you as close to her as humanly possible; you might as well be practically inside her. Her lips curl into a frown as she pushes her dress further down, bunching it with the bottom of her skirt, her now naked, sweaty midriff pressed against your shirt.
Drawing your face away from hers, you take a second to admire the spry starlet, once dolled up to near perfection, now as filthy and human as the typical clubgoer. She doesn’t reciprocate your adoring gaze, annoyed at the small amount of time wasted, when that time could have been spent already impaling yourself deep inside her. It’s not like you’ve spent the whole day salivating and taking pictures of her.
“Wait.” Avert your eyes from the idol to the camera you’ve forgotten for a moment. She kisses you madly, showering your cheeks with wet, soppy marks filled with lipstick and sticky cum, but it doesn’t faze you in the slightest. You know simple distractions don't bother you by now. 
Camera pointed at you both, you return your attention to her, finally giving her what she wants without any further delay. With a single smooth stroke, you plunge your cock into her wet pussy, and it flexes right back in a brief move of resistance, but you push deeper into her heat and it takes the breath right out of your lungs. 
“F-f-fuck, Yuna, you’re—tight.”
The spry woman lifts her head back, exposes her smooth, flawless neck, uttering a long, breathy sigh before it turns into a pitched whine. Her nails poke into your nape, clutches deep into your skin, body sliding up and down along with your cock as you acclimate to the suffocating tightness of her cunt. There’s no sense of rhythm or pace in the manner you pound her, only focused on chasing that sensual high, using her model figure as canvas for your pleasure.
“Oh fuck, oh fuck, that’s—” Yuna whines with each slam of your hips, slack jawed and drooling, eyes completely shut, enveloped under the gripping force of your cock spearing her tight, sensitive hole. “Your cock feels so—”
Her sentence fades into another series of whimpers and cries of bliss. Seeing her tits bounce and ripple with each rock of her body arouses you, and they draw you in, more than any other part of her. Yuna’s body was an open invitation for you to take, which you gladly do. 
Bury your face between her chest, cupping her soft, creamy flesh within your grasp, then take her taut nipples into your mouth, going back and forth between both breasts, giving them the equal amount of attention they rightfully deserve.
You continue to fuck the maknae into submission, giving the camera a good show, already more entertaining and exciting after only a few minutes than a four-hour-long awards ceremony. The artist is treated way better, and so is the cameraman by being an active participant in the action, dictating the pace the way he sees fit. As it goes, you push yourself quicker and quicker, trying to wrap up the show, plunging deep into her constricting walls, drenching your cock with more of her wet juices. 
The many expressions she makes as you touch her and ruin her are award worthy; they can belong in a fancam reel and it wouldn’t be any more different. Hell, she’s more provocative and intense than her typical routine music performance. Her features curl into almost every emotion a human can experience, from pain and pleasure, evoking a strong, unforgettable image, another mental picture to save in your memories, more detailed than any photograph. 
Then there’s the sound—the music is as loud as ever, blocking out the endless stream of cries she makes. Yuna’s tone is high-pitched, moaning out a blissful song as you stretch her pussy out, with the little flap of wet skin against skin backing her up, and it tickles your ears in all the right spots. 
You slide a finger from her breast to her crotch, feel the surging wetness coat your digit, then lower her to the floor—but only for a moment. While Yuna remains staggered in ecstasy, you turn the woman around, facing the mirror, before you reacquaint your cock inside her drenched cunt, and it’s like you never stopped fucking her. She moans, and moans—and moans.
“You’re so fucking hot, Yuna,” you whisper in her ear. Her back arches as you wreck her from behind. Staring at your reflection, you note your smug expression. For once, you look really good in the mirror, especially with the woman in front of you. 
Her expressions say it all: she likes being fucked. The way her smile briefly flashes before melting between thrusts, she knows her body is built for sex—perfect for a slut like her. Even she can’t help but look proud at how drop dead gorgeous she is, especially in that lewd, erotic position. 
Using her expressive, satisfied face as motivation, you piston quicker and quicker, glancing at the young idol flaunting her many charms off like she’s in front of the cameras, like the bright lights are on her, like an audience is watching her. Your mind is centered on her too; in fact, she’s the only one in your thoughts, with each thrust intended to make her sing, make her perform, make her act. 
“Gonna—gonna—” she cries, hoarsely, barely able to muster up the strength to formulate coherent speech. 
“Cum on my cock Yuna,” you say, whispering in her ear again, pulling on her triggers. “Cum on my cock.”
The words are more than enough to set her off. Yuna’s mouth goes wide, forming an ‘O’ shape, her body going rigid and quaking as she loses control of herself to her bliss. She orgasms; it’s powerful and lengthy, dragging you further into her inescapable whirlpool, and really, it only accelerates your own forthcoming climax, and you fuck her as she rides out her peak, savoring the remaining time you have left before you drown in your own high as well.
“I can feel you throbbing hard for me,” she says, completely washed over by her own dwindling orgasm. “Cum in me. Cum for this slut. Don’t ever think about pulling out of this wet pussy meant for you!”
Gripping your hands between her dirty chestnut locks, you try to resist a little more, show that you can last longer than she initially thought, but ultimately give in for a second time. On a deep, violent stroke, you make a lengthy, incomprehensible sound that might as well be the relief you feel after holding in that burning sensation in your loins. You release hot spurt after spurt into her pussy, her name dripping from your lips like you’re thanking God for release, and you feel a sticky, gooey tingling on your thighs.
Eventually, your hips wind down along with your orgasm, until they come to a full stop. You rest your head forward, laying on the sink beside her, still embedded inside her. The moans that filled the room fade in the background of the club’s thunderous music, but both of you are oblivious and tired to hear anything except for deep, heavy breaths.
After an uncertain period of time—could have been a few minutes or a few hours, you have a timely day off tomorrow, so it’s the least of importance—you come to your senses first and check on the camera you’ve set on the side. Yuna follows shortly after, washing her hands clean, but it doesn’t cleanse her of her filth.
“So?” she says, trying in vain to look neat. She looks at the camera in your hand while you scan through the reel. “How do I look?”
You present the gallery to her, showing her every single ilicit and raunchy photo you’ve taken of her, until you get to the part where you reveal that you’ve recorded yourselves having sex. It’s crude, it’s pornographic, it’s perfect.
She pouts her lips, gives an approving nod. “We look so good together. I need you to send me these via email.”
“Of course,” you say, nonchalantly—like this is a completely regular exchange—like she’s not an idol and you’re a journalist with an integrity to uphold, but all that’s thrown out the window now. “When I get on my computer tomorrow.”
After you both clean up to the best of your abilities, Yuna gestures at you to wait as she unlocks the bathroom door, then slowly turns the knob. Not once has it knocked and distracted you. Maybe you’ve missed a few, but still, it was probably drowned out by the music and the moaning. As a result, you were left unbothered the entire time, so perhaps Yuna’s plan was foolproof right from the start—
“Hey!” 
Yuna’s eyes grow wide in shock, followed by yours. On the other side of the door are four women waiting, well dressed as she is, who look just as surprised as both of you. 
“Who’s that guy you’re with?” asks the woman with dragon-like eyes, tone expressing disappointment at her member. Her gaze is similar to Yuna’s, studying you from head to toe like she did.
Then they all say in unison, “And why weren’t you sharing him with us?”
(A/N: Yuna looked incredible in that dress she wore for The Fact Music Awards, and the fact she's sharing so many pics makes it even better. Surprised there's nothing based on this material, but I understand why. Boys Like You is really good, go stream it! Thank you for reading!)
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cordeliawhohung · 5 months
Text
Everything You Touch - Part 4
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Simon "Ghost" Riley x fem!Reader - part nine of "soft spot"
"You deserve better."
warnings: canon typical violence, ptsd, description of panic attack/anxiety, brief accidental/unintentional self harm, a lot of hurt, a crumb of comfort.
wc: 5.3k
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Hospitals always had a way of smelling like bleach and death.
No matter how much cleaning and scrubbing was done, it always lingered in the halls and in the pores of every single brick of the building. Simon hated the scent, and he wanted nothing more than to leave that place far behind him, but he couldn’t. Not with you stuck in that stale bed with a brace around your neck. 
After stabilizing your condition at a local hospital, they flew you off to St Mary’s Hospital in London as its trauma center was one of the few hospitals in the city that could handle a case like yours. Severe strangulation, a gunshot wound that had torn through your axillary artery as easy as shredding tissue paper. You should have died, and Simon was well aware of that fact, but by some miracle you were alive. 
No thanks to him. 
Over the last two days, Simon had heard so much medical jargon he was certain he could quit his job in the military and become a doctor. He had every single ailment of yours memorized, and he couldn’t stop repeating them in his mind. A high energy wound from a deformed round had torn through the soft tissue in your chest just under your arm, severing your axillary artery. If it wasn’t for Kyle’s quick thinking, and John’s call for an air ambulance, you would have bled out. On top of that you also had a grade two concussion, two fractured ribs on the right side of your body, and three on your left, a hairline fracture in your hyoid bone, and grade one laryngeal edema. You weren’t malnourished or dehydrated at least, and that fact alone changed everything about your survival. Had you been treated any worse, he would have been sitting next to a grave instead of a bed. 
Two days. Two days of sitting there watching you slip in and out of consciousness. Whatever medicine they had hooked you up to was strong, and probably for good reason. It was selfish of him to wish you’d wake up, to wish you’d open your eyes and greet him with a smile as if everything was okay. As if he hadn’t held you through what he thought were your final moments. As if he hadn’t gotten a wink of sleep because of the pure anxiety and rage that flooded his system. 
He should have made their deaths slower. He wanted to, anyway. For the time you had spent sleeping in the hospital, he kept replaying the way Bukin had called you darling. He hated the way the bile rose to his throat whenever he thought of it, and he knew he should have caused more pain, should have drawn his death out. When he was younger, before he joined the force, he was an apprentice to a butcher. People weren’t all too different from pigs, and he was still just as good with a knife. But he couldn’t take that luxury when you stood there to watch it all. 
A soft sigh brought him out of his thoughts, and Simon’s eyes landed on you again. It was impossible to tell if you were just visiting for a short while, or waking up for real, but just as he did the other times, he reached forward and took your hand in his. Your hospital wristband rustled against the fabric of your blankets, and he found his fingers absentmindedly playing with it. Because you had arrived at the hospital with a gunshot wound, and there was slight concern about someone coming after you, they had given you the fictitious name of Jane Doe in an attempt to protect you from further harm that could come your way. Your date of birth was also wrong, as they made you three years older than you really were. 
“Si-...?” you attempted, but your voice failed halfway through. It was like that time you were a kid sick with laryngitis. Your voice was much deeper than it was supposed to be, and the words refused to vibrate properly in your throat. 
“Hey,” he said softly, rubbing his thumb over your knuckles, “try not to talk too much. Your throat is still pretty swollen.” 
Everything felt light, like you were floating, but not in a way that was comforting. It reminded you of how everything felt when you first woke up in that basement. How sick you felt and how Leon wrapped his arm around you to keep you upright. Or that rot in your chest as you sat crumbled in the sand on the beach. The overwhelming scent of his cologne on the jacket he made you wear, his hand on your wrist, hands around your throat, choking, crushing, breaking-
“Sweetheart, hey, hey,” Simon said softly. As he reached out and wiped the tears that you hadn’t even been aware was streaming down your face, you tried to remember the last time you had heard him speak so softly to you. Like he thought his voice would shatter you. “You’re alright, you’re safe. I’m here now, yeah?” 
The heart monitor showed proof of your anxiety, but as Simon kept talking he filled the noise in your head with him instead. It was just him and his thumb wiping gently at your cheeks. He was so warm, and you found yourself taking breath after deep breath in an attempt to calm yourself down. His mask was on, that same odd skull patterned one he wore when he saved you, but his eyes were just as expressive. 
You reached your other hand up and gently pawed at the plastic brace around your neck. After wiping away another stray tear, Simon grabbed that hand and gently pulled it away from your throat. Holding both of your hands in his, he continued to rub his thumbs across your knuckles. 
“You’re still pretty swollen, so you’ll have to keep that on. Try not to move your neck,” he instructed as if he was a doting parent. 
Was this real? Were you out of that basement, out of Leon’s reach? It had to be real. Simon’s touch was as soft as it always was, and the scent of the hospital was just as stale and vile as you remembered it being as a child. You attempted another deep breath, but you became suddenly aware of the pain that coursed through your body and winced. Everything hurt, but it felt far away at the same time, like you felt the aches through a veil. 
Sniffling a little, you snaked one of your hands out of Simon’s and reached for his left arm. Everything was fuzzy, but you remembered that he had been shot in his arm. Johnny had cracked some sort of joke about it, so you knew it wasn’t bad, yet you still worried. Even as you laid in a hospital bed hooked up to machines and tubes, you still worried about him. 
“Just a flesh wound sweetheart, nothin’ to worry about,” he assured you. His eyes studied you for a short moment before dropping down. You thought he looked at your throat, until you remembered the new pain that blossomed in an odd area along the side of your chest. “Should be more concerned with the wound you got.” 
You made a pitiful attempt to look down at yourself, but the brace on your neck made it impossible to do so. Which was certainly for the best, because you didn’t want to know how badly it would have hurt if you bent your throat in such a way. Instead, you pulled your hand away from Simon’s arm and gestured to your chest with a quizzical look on your face. Or, at least what you hoped was a quizzical look. 
“Yeah,” he confirmed as he grabbed your hand again. It was like he couldn’t stop touching you. “Got a few fragments left in you, but nothin’ the doctors couldn’t handle. Guess we got you in the best goddamn trauma center in the country.” 
Even with everything that happened, he tried to make light of the situation; probably in an attempt to not worry you. Maybe you shouldn’t have been worried. It didn’t hurt to breathe anymore than it had previously, so the bullet hadn’t gone through your chest or punctured a lung. You were lucky that it wasn’t worse. 
God, what a sour thought that was. Thinking you were lucky; thinking you should be grateful to have survived such atrocities. 
Your vision grew a little fuzzy, and you found yourself staring off into space as your mind wandered again. Everything felt too real and so fake at the same time; like the pain was faux. You should have been able to hop out of that bed and head to work, and your co-workers wouldn’t even spare you a second glance because there was no way you were gone for as long as you thought you had been. Yet at that same time, you should have been dead. Should have been laying splayed out on your back with dry eyes that stared up at the seagulls finding solace and food in the flesh of your body. Perhaps a part of you did die; some part of you was left to rot in that orchard. 
“Wh-t h…ppened?” you asked. Voice still failing you, you made sure to choose simple words. Tingling pain mingled in your throat, and your mouth felt itchy. 
“The boys and I brought you home,” Simon answered softly. But that answer was too short - too blunt - and even he knew that, so he swallowed and tried again: “You were in pretty rough shape. You’ve got a few fractured bones and your throat is messed up bad. But you’re safe now, they can’t hurt you. I promise.” 
Such a funny way to say that he killed them. Not that you blamed him at all; how could you when you had attempted to slaughter Leon with a steak knife? You remembered exactly what it was like standing there as you watched Simon dig the heel of his boot into Leon’s shattered arm. Remembered what color dead grass turned when blood pooled under it. 
Fertilizer. That’s what he had called you. A task that ended up being bequeathed to him instead. 
“I need you to get some rest, yeah?” he continued. “Doc says he won’t send you home until you’ve healed up some. 
It wasn’t much, but you squeezed his hand in response. You weren’t sure if it was because the state your body was in or because of the various medicines they pumped through you intravenously, but you were tired. The type of tired where you didn’t care if you woke up or not. Simon carefully raised your hands up and pressed delicate kisses to your knuckles through the fabric of his mask. When you were in that basement, all you wanted was for Simon to hold you, to feel his touch again, to be bathed in his warmth. Now that you were finally out, everything felt muted. Everything was spoiled. 
No, you were just tired. That was all. So you closed your eyes again and listened to the steady hum of the machines around you. They sounded similar to the machines your mother had been hooked up to when receiving treatment when you were a kid. You used to take naps listening to those beeps. Things always had an odd way of coming back to you. Comforted by the auditory proof of your own existence, you faded away into sleep once more under Simon’s careful gaze. 
But what Simon didn’t know was that the very moment you finally woke up, the nightmares began. They chased after you in sleep, in consciousness; it didn’t matter. Even in death Leon’s hands still wrapped around your throat; even after you were well enough that they removed your brace; even after the swelling went down; even while holding Simon’s hand. Always small. Always weak. 
Things only got worse when you were well enough to be sent home. There was something dehumanizing walking into your home and not being able to recognize the smell. It was cold, bitterly so, as the drafty window was something your landlord still refused to fix. Boo, who had grown much too big much too fast and was without his cast trotted towards the entrance as a cooing mess. In what was surely an attempt to trip you, he rubbed against your legs in greeting, and Simon assisted you in settling in. 
And though everything was the same as how you had left it, something was wrong. A crawling feeling overtook your skin every time you looked at the floor in the living room. The air smelled stale like you were in a coffin rather than a home. Dinner tasted more like blood than it did soup. Did it all change in such a short amount of time? Did you just not recognize it? Or was it just you that had changed? A stranger in your own home? 
“I want to shower,” you said suddenly. 
It was the first thing you had said throughout the entirety of dinner. You stared down at the half eaten bowl of soup in your hands. Your voice sounded better, and your throat didn’t spasm every time you swallowed, but you were still restricted to a liquid food diet more or less. 
“A bath would be easier,” Simon countered. His spoon had been clinking against the side of his bowl for some time, but you knew him better than that. He had probably finished eating quite some time ago. “Can’t get your wound wet. I could run one for you.” 
You swallowed another spoonful of soup. It wasn’t until your stomach began to churn that you realized it had gone cold. “Okay.” 
Neither of you moved for what felt like forever. Weights kept you held down by your ankles, and all you did was move your spoon around the thick liquid in the bowl. You almost hadn’t realized that Simon stood from his seat until his hand brushed against the side of your face. You didn’t jump, but your heart lurched so hard it almost hurt, and still you gazed up at him with dull eyes. His hand smoothed over your hair, eyes studying your face carefully, before he slowly leaned down and pressed a firm kiss against the crown of your head. 
“C’mon,” he said, pulling away. “Let’s get you cleaned up.” 
You followed behind Simon as he led you to the bathroom. Boo trotted along still hellbent on tripping you and purring the whole time while doing so. He didn’t seem scared even when Simon turned the water on, and he perched himself on top of the counter behind you as you began to undress. Healing was agonizing, and taking longer than you wanted it to, and tasks such as dressing and undressing were no longer as simple as they used to be. 
That deep ache in your chest had dulled over time, but hadn’t quite gone away, and was still aggravated whenever you bent over, but you were still able to get your pants and socks off with relative ease. The real trouble came when you tried to take your shirt off. Raising your left arm was impossible with your wound, but you tried your best to wiggle out of the clothing anyway. A particularly painful pinch shot through your chest when you attempted to raise your arm, drawing a wince out of your sore throat. 
“Here,” Simon spoke up softly. 
He was very well versed in taking your clothes off, but he had never been so gentle about it before. You let your arms go limp as he slid the fabric of your shirt across your body, freeing your right arm and exposing your torso. He moved the collar over your head, and gently straightened your left arm so he could slide the rest off of you. Due to your injury, you weren’t able to wear a bra, so you were fully exposed to the chilly air. 
A fuzzy paw tapped your back and you turned around to give Boo some much needed and deserved attention, but the moment you caught sight of yourself in the mirror, you froze. Maybe you just hadn’t paid attention, but you couldn’t remember the last time you looked at yourself. Really looked at yourself. Stale bruises littered the delicate skin of your throat. Pale red burst capillaries stained the whites of your eyes, though there were very few left over after your time healing. 
Then, of course, there was the obvious. Thick gauze covered the wound itself in order to keep it clean and avoid infection, and it was then that you realized you hadn’t actually seen the damage that had been caused. You had seen the blood that poured from it, and felt how terribly the bullet burned as it tore through you, but hadn’t seen how bad it mangled your flesh. You were sure it was for the best, in some way, but you didn’t need to see it in order to tell the extent of the damage. 
The gauze stuck to the side of your breast and extended up over your chest and under your armpit in order to stay secure. Without an exit wound there was no need to patch up anywhere else on your body, but you could see the bruising peek out from underneath the pristine white dressings. 
Simon’s fingers ghosted along your right shoulder as he stood behind you. His eyes found you in the mirror, and it took you a moment before you were able to do the same. You wanted to tell him how silly you thought it all was. How you felt so terrible despite the evidence of your pain being so minimal. You thought that after everything you went through, you would be nothing left but a pile of flesh and blood. There should have been more scars, some sort of disfiguration, and yet you were the same woman just painted a different color. 
Your body healed faster than you did. 
When you were ready, Simon helped lower you into the tub where the steamy water enveloped your body. As much as you wanted to lay back, close your eyes, and let go, you needed to stay sitting up in order to keep your dressings dry. Boo hopped off the counter with a chirp before jumping up to sit on the edge of the tub. Curious, he pawed at the water before leaning down to drink from it. 
“Why’d you have to snatch up the weird one?” Simon asked teasingly, though his voice fell flatter than he would have liked. 
You tried to laugh, or smile even, but nothing came. There was something strange about talking about such domestic things. After everything that had happened, you had expected all the good to be sapped from your life. It felt like the only thing you should have been allowed to talk about was pain and death and yet there you were, sitting in a tub with your cat drinking up the water like an idiot. 
As Simon settled on the floor next to the tub, you noticed Boo’s right paw was deformed. For the most part it was intact, but it seemed flatter than his other paw. You remembered his pained squeak when Leon had attacked you, how he had gotten in the way and fell victim to another one of that monster's merciless acts. 
“His paw,” you pointed out softly, hand sloshing in the water to point. Boo took your pointing as an invitation to sniff your finger, and then lick the water that dripped from it. 
“Yeah, got messed up pretty good,” Simon concurred as he leaned across the tub to grab your body wash. “Had him in a cast for a bit. Strong little bugger. Shoulda seen him hobbling around with it on.”
He presented you with your body wash and a fresh rag and you contemplated the items for a moment before carefully reaching out for them. It had been a long time since you washed yourself with items that belonged to you. You breathed in the familiar scent of the soap as you rubbed it into the rag and then along your skin. It didn’t smell how you remembered it, but it was better than plain water. 
You thought back to the time you and Simon had gone on holiday when that terrible nightmare of your father plagued you. You remembered how Simon’s arms wrapped around you and held you close to his chest as you let the water wash over you. He had asked you if you wanted to talk about it; he always had a habit of knowing your feelings better than you did. Though talking about it would have done some good, you said no. Why had you even done so? What was the reason? Were you afraid? Whatever it was, you regretted it, because you feared then that you’d never be able to talk to him about anything ever again. 
Would never be able to tell him what happened; what Leon said, what he did. How he tried saying he and Simon were the same - that your lover was a violent man. That he liked to watch you squirm. How could you tell him all of that? About how you fell to the sand hoping and praying to feel his touch again? How you had to wear Leon’s coat? And the scent that clung to it - clung to you - no matter how much you scrubbed, and scrubbed, and scrubbed, and-
“Hey, easy,” Simon warned softly. 
His hands carefully wrapped around your wrists and pulled them away from your body. Fresh abrasions prickled across the now raw skin on your wrist from the intensity of your cleansing, and the rag was promptly removed from your hand. Simon attempted to get you to look at him, but your vision was too blurry to see anything correctly. 
“I can’t,” you spoke, and it was only then that you realized you were crying, “can’t get clean, can’t do it, Simon I- it’s-” 
Water sloshed around you, and Boo ran off as it spilled over the side of the tub. Strong arms wrapped securely around your center as you felt your back collide with something firm. Simon had climbed into the tub behind you, fully clothed, with legs on either side of your body. His chin rested on top of your head and you found your arms wrapping around yourself as he embraced you. 
“Breathe, sweetheart,” he coaxed as he swayed as much as the confines of the tub would allow him to. “I’m right here. Need ya to slow down and breathe, yeah? Just focus on me, nothing else. It’s just me and you.” 
If it wasn’t for Simon holding you together, you were certain you would have crumbled. It wasn’t a pretty sight or feeling; being broken. That knowing even in death Leon still had a hold of you. But you focused on Simon, how his legs had to be bent in order to fit in the tub with you, how you could feel intermittent kisses to the top of your head. The tattoo on his arm glistened as the water clung to his skin, and you found your head falling back to lean against his chest. You listened to his breathing and tried to match his pace; felt his heart thud against your back and willed your body to steady itself.  Boo licked himself furiously in some corner, paws having gotten wet from the displaced bath water.
Nothing had changed. 
“Your arm,” you said between stuttering breaths. 
“It’s fine,” he assured you. 
You knew that it probably wasn’t. Warm water had a particular way of making fresh wounds sting, but worrying about it wouldn’t change anything. Even though you wanted to, you needed to focus on staying with Simon and not slipping away somewhere else again. 
“I thought of you. When I was in Urzikstan,” he said when your breathing finally slowed. He placed another quick kiss to the top of your head and loosened his grip as he ran his hands gently up and down your arm. “Couldn’t get you off my mind. Kept thinking ‘bout every moment I ever spent with you. That god awful movie we saw together at the cinema. The first time we kissed. You’re the only thing on this earth I care about and I fucked up. This shoulda never happened and that’s on me.” 
You shook your head, skull rolling along his clavicle. A pulsing pain bounced along the soft tissue of your brain as it protested the movement, but you did your best to ignore it. “Stop,” you said, but you weren’t mad. You were too tired to be mad. “I already know what you’re going to say. I don’t care.” You paused to swallow, your voice still not used to speaking so much at once. “Doesn’t matter whose fist comes at me, I’ve been doing this my whole life. But I’ve never had someone to pick me up until you. So don’t-” Your voice failed you, and you weren’t sure if it was because of your throat, or because of the cry you tried to suppress. “Don’t you fucking dare say it.” 
So he didn’t. All of those words on his tongue dissipated and dissolved into his blood where it festered and boiled. He didn’t agree with you a single bit. Had he torn that picture of you to shreds the moment he found it in his pocket, Bukin would have had nothing to use against him. Would have never found you. It wasn’t supposed to be like that at all. You were the one who was supposed to take care of him because you were supposed to be unharmed. Instead, he suffered from a broken nose and malnourishment, and you had taken the bullet meant for him. 
Instead he relished in the fact that he had you in his arms, that he could breathe in your scent, feel your warmth. It shouldn’t have happened at all, but he was going to take what he could get. 
“This can’t be comfortable,” you pointed out after a while as you tugged on his sopping wet jeans. You said it as if Simon hadn’t tried to confess something, as if you hadn’t just experienced a panic attack; like things were okay. 
“Been through worse,” Simon said dryly. 
“Really?” you asked as if sincere. “I think wet jeans are what nightmares are made of.” 
It wasn’t funny, but Simon laughed anyway and tilted his head to the side to press his lips against your temple. He was always touching you, always kissing you, as if he could wash everything away with his hands alone better than any body wash could. Maybe he could. His hands were certainly kinder than your own. 
Once the water grew cold, Simon helped you out of the tub. He stripped his own soaked clothes off, and it was then that you noticed just how… skinny he looked. Between the hoodies he always wore and bundling up in the cold winter weather, you didn't realize just how much weight he had lost. The scar on his ribs stretched tight with his skin, and his veins protruded more than you remembered. Even with his state he came back for you. 
A fresh and thick towel was used to dry you off, and Simon made sure to do all of the work. From what little of your torso that had gotten wet, all the way down to your feet. He didn’t take nearly as much time drying himself off before quickly ushering you into the bedroom and assisting you in getting dressed. After taking the myriad of antibiotics, probiotics, and painkillers you had been prescribed, you found yourself laying in bed, staring up at the ceiling while Simon shuffled about. 
Eventually several layers of blankets had been tossed on top of you, and Boo purred at your feet, content to finally have his family back in one place. Simon settled under the covers next to you, and you instinctively curled into the warmth of him. Everything was soft and fuzzy due to the oxycodone flooding your system but you were still very much aware of the way Simon’s fingers traced up and down your left arm. 
“Ischemia,” he said slowly. 
“What?” you hummed, half awake. 
“Ischemia. Bad blood flow,” he repeated. “Doc told me to keep an eye on the blood flow in your arm.” 
“Because of the wound?” you asked, to which he hummed in response. 
Things grew quiet as he ran his hand up and down your arm. Boo continued to purr up a mad storm while your fingertips were poked and prodded at. Simon watched carefully at how the color would push in and out of your nail bed, providing proof that your circulation was fine. Once he was satisfied, he studied your face, taking in how your eyes darted underneath the lids, the soft rise and fall of your shoulders. Everything in him was telling him to pull you tight and don’t let go, but he was terrified he’d crush you. 
“I wasn’t afraid of dying,” you admitted suddenly, causing Simon to pause. You said it like you had answered a question nobody asked. Your eyes slowly fluttered open, and he took notice of how unfocused they looked. “I was just afraid of… not… being able to see you again.” 
What was he supposed to say to that? How was he expected to form words when the love of his life looked at him like she’d die without his presence? A tight line formed along his lips as he lifted his hand to rub against your cheek. 
“You should get some rest,” he diverted. 
You knew exactly what he meant by that, but your eyes closed anyway as you reached your hand up to rest on his. Even moving it that far sent a pang of pain shooting down your arm and through your chest, but it was worth it to be able to hold him. 
“Can we talk about it later?” you asked quietly. 
“‘Course,” he promised. 
After laying there for a moment, Simon reached over and turned the side table lamp off, plunging the room into darkness. It was strange laying in bed. He couldn’t quite recall the last time he had fallen asleep in such a comfortable position, as he spent his entire time captive falling asleep in a chair, which proved to be a difficult habit to break. 
He wondered what it must have been like for you, down in that basement; a civilian mixed in military matters. Blood soaking into the bed sheets stained his vision almost worse than the Polaroids that had been taken of you. Sometimes he’d wipe his hands off on his pants because he still felt your blood staining his hands through his gloves. Every waking moment he heard Bukin calling you darling like it was played on repeat on his own personal broken record. 
But there was no time for regret, grief, or anything else that tempted to poke at his heart and mind. There was limited space in his life, and in that moment, and forever more, it was reserved for you. Only you, and your laughter and your soft touches and the way you looked at him. He loved you. He loved you so fucking much it hurt. But there wasn’t space for that either; that terrible realization of just what he would do for you. No, for the moment it was only you, him, and that stupid cat purring at his feet, and that was enough for him.
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machinesonix · 25 days
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Somehow I have made it this long without realizing that none of the screen adoptions of Dune so much as mention the Butlerian Jihad. Like I guess it's burned into my brain so hard I sort of assumed it was part and parcel of the universe. Don't get me wrong, I think that's probably the first thing you learn if you want to dive deeper into the setting, but it still hits me like if the LotR movies showed us the big flaming eyeball tower and was like ‘Oh, that's why there are bad things, but don't worry, that's just background stuff.’ Yeah, you can understand the movie, but if the story is just like Frodo vs. The Witch King you are losing out on any of the conversation about the corruptive allure of power or theological undertones. So without further ado let's pretend this is for the benefit of interested new fans roped in by the movies and not part of my desperate attempt to silence the howling specters of literary analysis that live in my blood.
The Butlerian Jihad is an event set ~10k years prior to the events of Dune in which humanity won their freedom from the machines that they had enslaved themselves to. As a result, it is a religious taboo to create a machine that thinks like a human. That's frankly the bulk of the information presented by Frank Herbert in the text without dipping into books 7+, but whether or not those are canon is frankly an enormous can of worms, which really makes sense when you consider the size of the worms. But boy howdy, Frank loved his subtext and parallelism. Everyone has a foil character, every theme is hit from multiple angles, and Villinueve has been doing an excellent job of capturing a lot of that in repeated imagery and dialogue. The Butlerian Jihad happens off camera, but it's themes are absolutely critical to the big picture.
The Butlerian Jihad was a holy war. It was not merely a rebellion against the machines, it was a crusade against them. The prohibition against thinking machines isn't just a law, it's in the pan-universal Bible. Absolute psychopath Pieter DeVries himself claps back at the Baron for insinuating he might have a use for a computer, and this is a guy who has been hired specifically for his preternatural absence of morals. Let's hold onto that idea for a minute. 
Probably my favorite scene in the first book is the one where planetologist Liet-Kynes is dying out in the desert. As the last of his strength fades to dehydration he hallucinates conversations he had with his father concerning terraforming Arakkis for human habitability. He's told that the means are not complicated. There is already enough water on the planet, the Little Makers just have it all trapped deep underground as part of the sandworm reproductive cycle. You just need to isolate enough water to start irrigating plant life, and once it's established that'll keep the water on the surface on its own. The hard part is making sure everyone on the planet is environmentally conscious enough to foster a developing ecosystem. Nobody can drink any of that water while it's being collected, because they'll just introduce it back into the water cycle where the Little Makers are. It's going to take generations, so that sort of water discipline is going to have to go above and beyond a social convention. People need to be willing to die before they'll take a sip and compromise the plan. Ghost Dad Kynes concludes that the only mechanism in the human experience to enforce this consensus is religion. 
In the context of this whole parallelism thing, you have probably noticed that the Butlerian Jihad is not the only holy war in the narrative. Paul sees a new jihad as the only way of creating a future where humans can flourish. Now you might be saying ‘Wait now, Machines. I thought the point of Paul’s holy war was to avenge Leto and disempower established power structures by taking away the control of the spice!’ And you’d be right. The thing is, without getting into spoiler territory, Dune Messiah is not going to be about how everything just gets so much better now that Paul has destroyed the economy, government, and untold billions of human lives. This isn’t the endgame. Dude can see the future and the way he does it involves looking into the past. Paul lives in a society defined by a holy war and his goal is to redefine society. 
Putting it all together you can see what I mean about the Butlerian Jihad being essential to the themes even though the story never shows us a thinking machine or a narrative beat where the absence of computers changes the outcome. It helps us see the big picture. I’ve seen a lot of dialogue lately on whether Paul is a tragic hero or a consummate villain and I’m not here to answer that, but I am here to underline the critical detail. Paul intends to be seen as a tyrant. Just like Kynes’ hallucination says, religion is the lever to make a value stick around forever. He wants to traumatize humanity to hate chosen ones and emperors the same way the machines traumatized humanity to change them forever. The Water of Life ritual doesn’t invert his values, it lets him realize these visions of war are the means, not the ends. He is absolutely not happy about it, but this is Paul’s terrible purpose. 
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