#maybe I'll write a post at some point all about the authors I once Loved that I am now deeply critical of

[tleeaves]

The art is lovely and now I'm gonna ramble because that's what I do when I care about something.

For the love of women, please PLEASE can fan artists remember to add muscle to their Shadowhunter ladies? I'll commend Bowater for cleverly giving James that sculpted and lean look without making him a beefcake (nothing against beefcakes, I'd love to hug them), but Cordelia is once again suffering from Arms And Shoulders Too Slender It's Hard To Even Imagine Her Picking Up A Sword. There is some there, yes, but artists shouldn't be afraid of giving particularly Female Main Characters weight and toned muscle. Cordelia is supposed to be nearly the same height as James as far as I can remember, and she's curvy, and full, and she wields a sword like it's second nature to her. Please explain why she looks so tiny in James' lap.

Also I'm pretty sure marriage runes are supposed to go over the heart whenever possible (thinking about Will's parabatai rune being over his heart instead -- he didn't get Tessa to draw over the scar, did he??) and... either I'm looking at the picture wrong or James' rune is not over where his heart should be.

For the matter, where are their other runes and scars?? James' Voyance rune isn't even on his hand. And I'm pretty sure he's right handed. I could have that wrong though.

Another thing: no one can ever decide what Cordelia's hair looks like and it's the funniest thing to me. This is what happens when all you do is vaguely say the colour is like fire but also like rose petals but also a flowing river of those things but also is Red (probably for redhead, but then from there I never understand where the rose petal analogy comes from considering the typical rose is a deep bloody colour -- I do acknowledge the existence of those light orange varieties though which might more closely resemble red hair). In the end, I'm glad readers can infer what they want and imagine the characters how they like.

Anyone else think James looks like he's built like a tennis player? Oddly specific, maybe, but it was a thought I had. Mostly the arms and somewhat narrow body.

James' hair is nice, his eyes are an interesting take on gold in the shadows. Bowater managed to also make him look closely related to his father, so bravo for that.

In the end, the focus is obviously on the marriage runes and not other physical aspects outside of it being clear that this is James and Cordelia. Bowater's style is very beautiful and elegant. Love the way fabric and lighting is done too. I'll add also that it is possible to be a smaller person who is slender but still strong so I mean Cordelia's not necessarily done wrong, I just interpret her appearance differently. Obviously, they're both hot and they're both attractive and I have my qualms with the series, chronicles, and author -- the fandom I am so-so on, though I'm still here, aren't I? And I'm taking the time to ramble about my thoughts on a piece of fanart -- but this is good. Gorgeous, even. Both James and Cordelia are beautiful.

#side note: am I the only one who thought cc made a mistake trying to describe james as handsome in cordelia's eyes #as opposed to matthew being the beautiful one #when there has always been a deep and aching strange beauty to james?? #james herondale #cordelia carstairs #vaguely crediting charlie bowater though it isn't like you can't find a dozen more copies of this with the credit #also yes I mercilessly picked this apart because I am still trying to find avenues to express my dissatisfaction with tlh #I search for flaws what else can I say #I am aware of it but it's hard to turn those thoughts processes off #maybe I'll write a post at some point all about the authors I once Loved that I am now deeply critical of #a lot of people would hate me for it but eh #also we all know about the marvelisation of cinema #but is it time to talk about the marvelisation of book series/worlds? #or perhaps it has a better and more book-focused name? the jkr approach? rick riordan's marvel-esque flaw? the sjm plague? the clare affair? #we'll workshop it #maybe it's the curse of middleschool-YA series and the issue of aginh readers in fandoms #and I don't mean this as discriminatory against anyone older in fandom because there is not really a limit nor should there be #for most media #but the issue of when the readers grow up amd authors try to accomodate for that -- not necessarily by making their work more adult -- #but by making MORE because there is also an influx of new fans and they want to stay relevant while retaining the old #it's a whole thing though I'd need to sit down to properly organise my thoughts to talk about it

[everlastlady]

Mammon + Servant Reader (Female)

✘Posted: 11/4/2023

✘Story Contains: Fem reader, Reader is a maid, Bubble baths, Gentle Mammon, Slight Nudity, Favoritism, & Feel good times.

✘Word Count: None, writing this on mobile y'all

✘Author's Note: Decided to do Mammon with female reader, I'll do a male reader soon. Just decided to cater to my female readers but I promise I will cater to my male readers. Remember to eat a meal or a snack, drink some water, get some fresh air, take your medicine, and remember that you are loved. If you loved this story remember to comment, click or tap that heart button, reblog with tags, and blaze if you can. Always remember to support your local writers. ♡♡♡

✘Summary: {Name} is a simple maid for the greed lord Mammon. {Name} isn't sure why Mammon always calls on her and always wants him by his side when he wanders his home. But she doesn't mind because she finds her master funny and enjoys how gentle he is with her. But what happens when {Name} gets sick? And it's time for Mammon to take care of them.

" It's okay sir, I'm sure that you will fine someone better than Fizzarolli. " She spoke softly to her boss Mammon who sat in the large green chair. As the imp news woman spoke about what happened at the show. The maid named (name), picked up the remote and pointed it at the large screen and turned it off. Once it flickered to black. She looked over at Mammon who was still fumming over what happened at the clown pageant. " I don't understand, I gave him everything! " Mammon's voice deep and demonic as he slammed his fist onto the table, sending a large crack through it. (Name) smacked her lips. She would have to get that fixed. " sometimes, you can give someone everything and they will still leave, I understand that you are frustrated sir but don't let this stop you from making money; I'm sure someone new will come along, what about the Glam Sisters? " (Name) walked over to Mammon's liquor cabinet. " Comas, after a piece of the set fell on them, they both ended up in the hospital in comas, besides they don't really fit the image of what I'm looking for. " Mammon muttered. (Name) noodded her head and set down the glass of liquor for Mammon. The greed demon looked up at (Name) and smiled. " Thanks, I know I always say this but you are my favorite maid, far better than the rest! You always do your job right and know how to keep a smile on my mug. " Mammon chuckled and took a drink. " Come drink with me, (Name) " Mammon grinned looking up at the maid. Her soft (E/C) looked at Mammon before shaking her head. " No, thank you, sir, I still have work to do; it's not good for one to be drunk on the job. You can cause a lot of mishaps that way putting others in harm and yourself. " (Name) said with a darling smile.

" See that is why you're my favorite (Name)! So smart and responsible with your duties. Maybe next time on one of your vacation days, you and me can drink together. " Mammon said. He would actually love to have a drink with (Name). And you wouldn't have to wear that plain maid outfit. Mammon wondered what (Name) would look like in different outfits. What dresses would (Name) wear or outfits that weren't dress related. Mammon never really seen (Name) outside work. He knew that she lived in the Pride ring and had an apartment. That's all he really knew about (Name's) life since she barely sooke about herself, she listened more than she speaks. " So (Name) how the payments on your apartment? Going because I've been thinking about giving you more payment, maybe you could buy yourself a nice house. " Mammon smirked. " It's going well, besides my loud and annoying neighbor. It's been good but I don't think I need a bigger payment. " (Name) said while tucking a piece of her hair behind her pointed ears. " Aww, come on; yes you do because you are responsible and work hard so tonight expect me to send you a shit ton of money. Now run around and tell the cook to prepare dinner. " Mammon waved his hand to dismiss (Name).

She smiled and bowed, walking out of Mammon's office. Mammon stood up and stared at the spot that (Name) stood in. " Lord of greed giving out money, I must be crazy... " Mammon looked away. " She better get a nice house with that money, a beautiful one at best. " Mammon sat back down. But there was no time to think about (Name) because Mammon had to find a replacement for Mammon so he would probably have to hold another clown off. His little fucked up beauty pageant, but hey if it helps him find Fizzarolli's replacement. Then he would be glad to hold one again. Especially have Fizzarolli and Asmodeus banned from it even that little imp with the gun that had showed up. When night time had finally coated the sky. Mammon sat in the dining room. The table decorated with food. (Name) stood next to Mammon holding a bottle of the greed demon's favorite wine. " (Name) how about you sit down and eat with me. " Mammon took the bottle wine and set it on the table. " And that's an order, just in case you try to come up with some excuse. " Mammon gestures towards the chair at the end of table. " Hey cook! Bring out plate for (Name)! " Mammon yelled. (Name) walked over and sat down - with a smile, the chef brought out a plate that had lemon pepper chicken, mashed potatoes covered in gravy, pasta,and vegetables that were just steamed. The night went well, Mammon made (Name) laugh with his jokes and stories. She listened to her master's rants and ideas.

Mammon enjoyed seeing (Name) laughed. The way her giggles slipped off her lips and coated his ears like honey. How her shoulders moved when she laugh, even that snort was adorable. Mammon felt hot in the face. He couldn't believe that she had made him feel this way for such a long time. But he never acted on these feelings because he was busy making money. But he always made sure that no one tried to get at (Name) which is why so many servants were fired for trying to hit on her. After dinner was done, (Name) stood up and bowed. " I'm grateful that you invited me to join you for dinner, sir, everything was delicious and I appreciated our conversation and the jokes you told. " (Name) spoke through a fit of giggles on the last part still remembering Mammon's joke about clown fish. " No problem, I also enjoyed eating with you. Way better than those dinners I have to attend with Lucifer and the other sins. " Mammon stood up smiling but he stopped noticing how (Name) wobble a bit when standing straight up. Did she drink to much wine? No that couldn't be because she had to drive home. " (Name)? " Mammon walked over to (Name) . " You okay mate? " Mammon reached out. Before she could respond she threw up on yourself and the carpet, (Name) would have fallen and hit the floor but Mammon caught her before she could pass out.

" (Name)! " He called her name and held you close not caring if he got her vomit on him. (Name's) eyes flickered opened as she coughed. " I don't feel good... " Her voice sounded dry and low. " Y-You are going home, let's go get you cleaned up. " Mammon picked up (Name), poor girl could barely speak it hurt to speak so she wouldn't fight back with Mammon who brought her into a guest bedroom. (Name) always took care of him, he will now take care of her. Mammon managed to grab a large shirt that had his logo on it. (Name) could sleep in that and get out of that disgusting maid outfit that was covered in vomit. Mammon ran (Name) a bath. He made sure the water wasn't too hot or cold. He added in some bath salts and oils. Mammon turned towards (Name) trying to figure out how to not make this sound creepy. " (Name) take off that outfit and get into the tub, we gotta get you washed up mate, this bath will help a little. " Mammon offered his hand. (Name) nodded weakly and took his hand, stepping into the bathroom. Mammon turned around as (Name) peeled away her clothing and stepped into the tub - it smelled like mint and honey. She let out a relaxing sigh. Mammon turned around and got on his knees as he began to wash her up. " You don't have to do that sir. " (Name) said in a tires voice. " Shh, yes I do, you always take care of me, so for the night just let me take care of you please. " Mammon said while washing up (Name).

She nodded her head as her boss Mammon washes her up. Avoiding her chest area and crotch area. She held onto the tub when Mammon lifted her leg to wash it. This felt nice, so she enjoyed herself. Mammon took a cup of water and poured it over (Name's) head as he washed her hair and face. He would let her handle the rest while he went to go get her towels and medicine. He could have gotten servant to do this but no, he wanted to take care of (Name), Mammon returned and helped (Name) out of the tub. She dried off and slipped into the large dark green shirt that Mammon gave her. It had his logo on it. " Sorry that I couldn't get you any undergarments. " Mammon said with a crimson blush. " It's fine, I usually sleep without them more comfortable that way. You feel less trapped. " (Name) said while taking the medicine that Mammon brought her. She crawled into the bed as Mammon placed his hand on her head. " Your fever is going down a little. " Mammon said with his hand placed on (Name's) head. " I'm going to stay by your side so scooch over. " Mammon moved over before getting into the bed with you. He laid next to you and stared at you. " You look cute in my merch. " He said. (Name's) voice was still a little dry but still did her voice to talk. " Thanks, the material feels soft. " She said while playing with the blanket.

Mammon turned his side to look at (Name) who did the same to look at Mammon. " Sir... " (Name) began to speak again. " Call me, Mammon. " Mammon said running his fingers through her hair. " Mammon thank you for taking care of me, I'm also sorry that I ruined the carpet. " She looked down. " It's fine, I can get it clean; besides I've been wanting to replace that carpet with a new one. Taking care of you is something you deserve, you always take care of me, so I decided to take care of you... I don't know your my favorite and I like you. " Mammon he hoped that saying that didn't make things awkward between (Name) and him. " I like you too. " (Name) smiled tiredness filled with their eyes. She rested her head on Mammon's chest, while he continued to play with her hair, but soon he leaned down and kissed her. (Name) pulled away quickly. " Mammon, you'll get sick! " She had worry in her voice. " I don't care, I will be fine. " Mammon went back to kissing (Name) who soon melted into the kiss. She enjoyed this moment between her and Mammon. This was no longer just a maid and her master. But just two people who love each other and care for each other. Who take care of each, who soon will have a future together.

Mammon's Clowns aka Mammon Tag List:

If you want to be added to the Mammon Tag List Let Me Know.

#helluva boss #helluva striker #helluva mammon #helluva mammon x female reader #helluva x reader #helluva x female reader #character x reader #character x you #helluva fanfiction #helluva fandom #helluva stories #helluva everlasting #everlasting writes🪻

[elvisabutler]

who's my princess?

fandom: austin butler rating: m pairing: austin butler x older female reader word count: 2169 warnings: jokes about being a sugar baby. heavy use of the nickname princess and baby boy. praise kink. faint d/s elements but not quite, you'll see in the fic. oral ( female receiving, attempted male receiving. ). public sex acts. no use of y/n. author’s note: welcome to day 4 of ally’s wet hot smut summer, praise kink with austin butler x older female reader. so here's the thing with this fic, i have been struggling to write it— and austin in general for the past week/two weeksa. to the point where i actually skipped ahead to rooster x reader titty fucking that i already posted on another account. i'll post it here once i finish my austin degradation kink day, promise. anyway what i ended up finally settling on with this fic was doing austin with an older female reader. you can read how much older however you like or if you want could ignore my reference to it being an older female reader. it also erred more toward plus size but can still be read a little more explicitly as not plus size. anyway, i hope y'all enjoy this fic even if it's a lil more niche for the fandom. as always, i do enjoy your comments and reblogs and tags and they are my writing life blood to be quite honest. there was also three different versions of this moodboard and i am still not sure i'm in love with this one. also i'm not completely back from my impromptu vacation but i wanted to post this before i tossed it in a fire or something.

"They think you're my sugar baby, you know," you murmur against the shell of Austin's ear, watching as his jaw muscle tenses just so at the implication.

His eyes slide across the room, taking in the looks people are giving the two of you. It's not that he isn't used to the looks, the slight judgment that people pass when they think he's merely just a kept boytoy but this time it hits different. For Vanessa, as much as he loved her and as much as he supposes she loved him there was always quite a kernel of truth there. It rubbed him the wrong way some days but at the same time it allowed him to slowly prove his acting chops without necessarily worrying about if he'd have a place to stay if things went horrendously wrong. But for you? For his gorgeous girlfriend? Oh, he wasn't a boytoy in the slightest. Sure, you could have made it so he was a kept man again. You could have allowed him to live in the lap of luxury and only come up for projects that were artsy and true cinema that he could sink his teeth into. No, instead he told himself he'd treat you, he'd make sure you were taken care of by him. You were older, you didn't need a partner to spoil you and cater to your every want and need. You didn't need these things but he was determined to give them to you. After all what sort of romantic partner would he be if he didn't spoil the love of his life.

"Hm," he hums softly, turning his head just enough to look you in the eyes. "Of course. They know I'm younger than you. They think I found another sugar mama to support me. If only they knew. Think they'd believe us if we told them?"

There's something so inviting and enrapturing about Austin's gaze that has you shivering just ever so slightly in delight and arousal. "About what?"

It's a dangerous game you're playing, teasing him like this but you can't help it. You want to rile Austin up in the same way he has with you on so many occasions. His tongue darts out to wet his lips before he bites his lower one. "Is my Princess playing dumb? Is she trying to be coy? Tease me?"

You smile softly and shrug, attempting to look as innocent as can be, "maybe. What are you going to do about it, baby?"

"Baby?" Austin moves to pull turn you around and pulls you closer to him, his hands settling on your plush hips and squeezing. "I think there's only one baby here, and it's not me, Princess. You don't have to tease to get what you want, you know that. My good girl knows that."

A shaky inhale is your only response for a moment as Austin smirks, his eyes dancing with a certain mixture of arousal and amusement that he only gets when he looks at you. Things between you are always a little playful, the joys of being old enough to not care about what other people think of you but it's still a delight to see after failed relationships before him. Maybe that's why you hadn't had a relationship that lasted this long before him. Maybe the universe was just having you wait for him. It takes you a moment to collect your thoughts even as you feel your arousal slowly dripping from your vagina, slowly dampening the underwear you're wearing.

"Your good girl does, but maybe I want to be bad today. Maybe I want you to show me and everyone else how desperate you always are for me," you practically purr out the last words and Austin's grip tightens just that little bit more as he moves one hand down to your behind and squeezes partially as a warning and partially as a promise.

"How desperate I am for you? How drenched are your panties? Would they stick to that pretty little pussy of yours? That pussy that was made for my cock? The one that could never be satisfied by any other cocks before mine?" His words are quiet but so deadly that you can't help the whine that leaves you even as your hand moves to cup the front of his slacks. You're in public but between the two of you, you're making your way to an empty corner with no one the wiser about what's happening. It should be mortifying the way Austin has you acting like a teenager and yet you remember that you're doing the same for him. You're both acting as if you don't have a care in the world, as if Austin and you both aren't at least partially in the public eye.

The thing is in this moment it doesn't matter. It doesn't matter because all anyone is going to see is you and him having your hands all over each other because you're so in love and practically obsessed with one another that you're both needy. Even if the way you're needy is subtly different between the two of you.

"Somewhere private." The words tumble out of your mouth when you finally make it to that corner and realize that your hand is trying to undo his slacks and his hand is trying to lift of your dress as if no one would be watching. Austin looks at you with blown pupils and huffs out a breath of air from his nose before he nods, grabbing your hand and pulling you out of the room and into regrettably the nearest closet he can find.

You start to drop to your knees, thinking this has to be something quick between the two of you, a quick blowjob that'll ruin your panties that he'll steal and put in his pocket for the rest of the night until you can get home. Except Austin's grip on your arm stops you, pulls you back up into a standing position even as your eyebrow arches upward in a simple unspoken question.

"I didn't ask for you to suck my dick, Princess," he murmurs, leaning over you just enough that he practically pins you to the door. "You want to be good for me, don't you? Make up for how bad you just were?"

In another time and place you'd maybe be embarrassed about how quickly you nod. In another time before Austin you'd have scoffed and shook your head. As it is all you want is to hear Austin tell you how good you are with those plush lips of his. All you want to feel his lips upon your skin, sucking hickies on it, his teeth biting your skin and leaving small indentations. You merely want all of Austin in this moment. "What—what do you want then?"

A simple question and a request for direction. You can't be his good girl, his bestest girl, his flawless girl without direction. You might be accidentally bad.

His hand moves to cup your chin and pulls you in for a featherlight kiss before moving down to your neck kissing there. You don't realize what's happening until you feel his hands cup your breasts as he places kisses along the tops of them exposed by your dress. You see his body starting to inch closer and closer down to the floor as he trails kisses down your body, setting every inch of your skin they touch ablaze with a fire that burns starting from your aching vagina. It clenches around nothing, wanting something— anything— near it and being deprived even as his lips are so close to it that he could tongue you through the fabric of your dress.

"Aus—" you start to whisper his name only to be cut off with a shaky exhale as you feel his fingertips against your calves and against your knees. You feel his fingers press into your plush thighs and bite your lip to stop yourself from whining only to have Austin remove his hands from them. "What—"

"Good girls are loud for their boyfriends. For their baby boys," he smirks and you can tell even in the low light of the closet. Any other time and you might lightly tap his face to smack it off of him but right now it has your thighs clenching together and him laughing. "You're my good girl, aren't you, Princess? My goddess of a woman. The cougar who sunk her teeth into me? I just want to hear you. I want everyone to know that I'm bringing you such immense pleasure with my tongue that you can't help but scream."

You are about to say something before Austin's head is under your dress faster than the words can come out. They're quickly forgotten in the haze and loud groan that leaves your lipstick covered lips as his fingers— those long fingers you've sucked and nipped at before— find themselves buried in your pussy. Austin plays you like a musical instrument, earning sighs and whimpers and every noise in between to form a symphony that bounces off the walls of the closet. You feel your orgasm starting to inch closer and closer before he pulls out his fingers and you keen loud enough that you hear people on the other side of the door wondering what's going on.

Austin chuckles and if you could see his eyes you're certain you would see them blown with arousal but still somehow sparkling with pure mirth. His laughter is a warm gust of air against your thigh but somehow a cool balm against your dripping cunt. Your thighs are sticky with arousal but not release and you almost want to cry before you feel Austin's breath focusing closer and closer to where you want it. "It's like a fountain down here."

The words are said with a bit of awe before he continues, "this all for me pretty girl? All for me, ma'am? If breathe just right can I get another drop?" He teases even as he lets out the smallest puff of air against your clit. "Oh. I can. So responsive. Such a good responsive woman. Couldn't ask for anyone better to be on my arm and in my bed. Maybe I should marry you. Keep you all to myself."

"Austin, please." You plea as your hands move to his hair, ruining whatever hairstyle his stylist had crafted in one fell swoop of your hands clenching at the strands.

"What my Princess wants, my princess gets," he jokes before his tongue finds its way to your throbbing clit.

The noises between your legs sound obscene with his tongue and chin and everything sliding against the arousal between your legs. He eats you out like a starving man, one of his hands moving to curl inside you as his mouth sucks your clt. It's too much and too little all at once. Your thighs tighten around his head as your hands tighten in his hair and you hear Austin moan as he shifts just enough to have his cock press against your calf. He's in control but at the same time so are you. You're making him so desperate he needs to hump your leg to get relief and he has your cunt spasming even though you haven't come just yet. You're sure you're saying words or perhaps it's just gibberish as Austin's fingers curl just so, pressing against that spot that has the coil in your lower abdomen wounding tighter and tighter. His thrusts against your legs are becoming more stuttered and your hands yank at his hair to try and pull him away so you don't come all over his face only to have him use his one free hand to grab your ass and force you grind down on his face. Somehow the brush of his nose against your clit and the way his tongue moves just so in tandem with his fingers against that spot of yours has you shouting his name even as you try and muffle it just a little. Your body shakes with aftershocks, thighs twitching against his head and lower stomach feeling like it's pulsating from the intensity. It takes both of you far longer than you'd like to admit to catch your breath and even as you do, Austin looks every bit as wrecked as you do before he opens his mouth.

"Think they still think I'm just your sugar baby?" The joke comes easily and with a soft smile. "Because that was some loud screaming, Princess. I was proud of you for it."

You can't help but look off to the side in embarrassment before you feel Austin's hand on your chin, forcing you to look at him. You swear you smell your own scent on his hand and you can't help but lick your lips. "Maybe, but I don't— Let them. Because it doesn't change that I'm your good girl, does it?"

"Never."

taglist: @ab4eva, @blurredcolour, @butlersxbirdy, @precious-little-scoundrel, @eliseinmemphis, @prompted-wordsmith, @lookingforrainbows, @araxw, @thatbanditqueen, @ellie-24, @austinbutlersgirl67, @heartbrake-hotel, @ccab, @18lkpeters, @slutforsomegoodlettuce, @dkayfixates, @kendralavon7, @chasingwildflowers, @slowsweetlove, @kxnnxy, @meetmeatyourworst, @purejasmine, @stylespresleyhearted, @powerofelvis, @amydarcimarie, @thegettingbyp2, @austinswhitewolf, @richardslady121 and @mrs-butler

#austin butler #austin butler x reader #austin butler x y/n #austin butler x you #austin butler fanfic #austin butler smut #austin butler fanfiction #austin butler fic #ally's wet hot smut summer #ally writes

[ponyosfrogg]

INBETWEEN (PT 3)

Summary: You wake up, completely under the effect of your dream about comic characters, just to find out a new character has been added to DCU? Or has she always been there?

Pairing: Tim Drake x Reader

Author's Note: Gosh, sorry for taking some time. This chapter was a pain in the ass, all i wanted was to write about sweet moments but god 😶‍🌫️ sorry about the typos, I'll fix them as soon as i can i promise, hope you like it my loves! thank you so much for the support! 💗

Warning: Some of the themes and contents written in this fic might be upsetting for some of the readers, read at your own risk. Some parts have strong language.

As you woke up with a throbbing pain in your head, you couldn't help but wonder if this would be a issue every time you tried to wake up normally. Frustrated, you cautiously opened your eyes, preparing for the brightness. The light made everything appear blurry, so you tried shading your eyes with your hands, but it didn't help much. Suddenly, a silhouette rushed towards you.

"You got me so worried! I can't believe you didn't took your medicine's today! I'm so angry at you" A slap out of worry hit your arm and made you more awake and more aware of your surroundings. You were in your house, with your best friend beside your bed. She must've taken you to your bed since the last thing you can recall was washing some dishes. The slippery and weird feeling in your hand was just proof. "And so glad that you're okay." Amber hugged your laying body with compassionate behavior.

You reposition yourself on the bed and lay your back on the bedstand now facing your best friend who was sitting next to you on your bed. You were in your room. Your real room.

"Are you okay? You're very quiet." With her voice you tried to collect your thoughts in one place. So you had a dream about comic characters? God, you must've been going through some shit because you rarely even dream. Maybe you were in need to feel some family support? Or you just read a lot of them last night.

"Yeah, I'm okay no worries. I just had the weirdest dream ever. I'm sorry about worrying you I'll be more careful about my medicine." but you were so sure that you took all of them today. Why would your heart react in such a way. You found yourself questioning yourself once again, falling into a familiar pattern of self-doubt and second-guessing.

"Oh I can't wait to hear about it but first i have to tell you something." She must've done something she thought was necessary but not necessarily the best idea. "I called Nate." Yes, just as you guessed. Amber must've seen the shift in your reaction and started to get panicky. "Don't blame me! I got so worried and waited for one hour but you didn't wake up so i had to call him, i didn't know what to do. he said he's on his way to come here now. Could be here any moment now." She got up from the bed and started to walk around the room in a panicking way.

But you weren't focusing on her anymore, just hearing Nate's name made your heart flutter a little bit. He was your ex. You had been inseparable from your childhood and at some point it turned into a beautiful relationship. Nate was an ambitious student who wanted to have nothing more than a wife and a job. You on the other hand, you like the possibilities life could offer you. You never had something on your mind you were just going around wherever life takes you. Spontaneous trips to places you'd like to visit, working freelance and getting paid whenever you're in need of some money, reading books and comics whenever you're free. You were a kind of woman who would post something dumb on an afternoon during weekdays which would make all of your working friends question your sanity. So it's safe to say that you guys were completely opposites.

And whoever said opposites attract, they were wrong as fuck. You needed someone to think like you. It was hard to maintain the relationship when both of your needs were completely opposite, beside your characters. You guys broke up two months ago or something like that. you weren't keeping the count.

Although it was hard to not to think about him, you always thought you made the right decision about him. You wouldn't want to keep him from living his life, and you wouldn't want him to keep you from living your life either. It was the right decision. But why were you feeling nauseous right now?

"It's okay, we were going to see each other at some point anyway." You tried to smile in a relaxing way and you must have been successful since she gave you another big hug. She was one of the kindest soul you had a chance to meet on this earth. She had beautiful ginger curly hair with a lot of freckles on her face. She had this beautiful smile that made your day better whenever you saw her. She was just the most adorable person you could ever hope for and you were glad she was your friend, your best friend to be exact.

"Okay, I'll leave you alone and give you some privacy for you to change your clothes." You rolled your eyes at her words. Yeah, you took back whatever you said about her, she was devious. "I'm not going to all doll-up for Nate, Amber." She giggled at the annoyance at your voice while she was leaving the room.

You looked around your room. How could something feel so familiar yet so strange. You felt an unexplainable feeling on your chest. It wasn't about your heart, something was different. Maybe the dream affected you more than you could admit.

As you gazed around, your attention was suddenly drawn to the batfamily poster hanging on the wall behind your desk. It was an old favorite, something you had put up about three years ago. It included all of the batfamily members. Yet, this time, there was something different about it, or rather, someone.

You rushed to get a closer look, your eyes widening in surprise. Among the familiar faces of Bruce, Jason, Dick, and Damian, there was a new addition—a girl standing beside Damian. Who was she? And why the fuck she looked like you.

"Amber?" You yelled from your room, hoping her to hear. Her voice echoed back a response, and you called out again, "What did you do to my poster?"

You heard her quick footsteps and then Amber entered your room, her expression showing annoyance at being summoned. She glanced at the poster you were holding in your hand. "It looks perfectly normal to me. I didn't touch it."

You rolled your eyes, feeling annoyed more and a bit frustrated. "I mean, who's the new character next to Damian?"

Amber looked at you as if you had said the most absurd thing you could ever say. "Are you serious right now? Is this supposed to be some kind of joke? Listen, i need to go out. I know that you're kind of excited and anxious to meet Nate and you don't want to be alone but i have to go." You turned around and saw she already dressed up. You were speechless.

"Wait, what? Are you going out? Are you going to leave me alone with Nate and excuse me but what the fuck is happening right now! Who is this girl."

She didn't say anything and left the room, leaving you without any further explanation.

You reached over your laptop and opened it. Yes, something weird was going on and you were determined to find it and what would be a better way than google. You pull your soft, white chair and sit on it while you are waiting for your laptop to be open. When it got open, you typed the batfamily and searched for it.

After like three minutes, you saw the name Viperia, even though you read a lot of comics and familiar with almost every character at that point you've never heard of her so you typed 'Viperia' on a different tab. To your surprise, there were numerous posts and messages about this character. She appeared at the same time as Damian in comics. She was snarky, cocky and definitely a pain in the ass but somehow she literally had her own fan-base. You saw a lot of websites made in the honor of her, a lot of fanarts and literally thousands of fan fiction. But how come you've never heard about her and why did she literally look like you.

"Yeah, this must be a fucking dream."

When you heard a knock from the door, you remembered you were expecting Nate. Fuck, you already have forgotten about him coming. You pulled yourself together and promised to check this after you're done with Nate. Right now you have to focus on him.

You must have been so lost on your research, you didn't realize Amber already left the house. You opened the door and you saw Nate's bright face.

Seeing him make a lot of emotions rushing to you. There was longing in your heart, you were longing for his presence. There was some kind of disappointment. You were disappointed in him, he could've made this thing go further but he didn't. He chose to give up on you and you chose to give up on your relationship.

When you break up with someone, seeing them changing does have an effect on you. You expect them to be the same but you don't realize people tend to change every now and then, especially after going through a painful break-up. You felt sad but you felt you didn't have any right to be sad, after you were the who cut the cords of that relationship. You chose your path to leave him. It was painful for you but you knew that if you didn't, it would be more painful in the future. But somehow right that moment you were looking at a completely different guy. He had a bright smile on his face just like he always does but somehow it was different, it was full of confidence. His eyes were shining like two little stars. He was radiating some kind of sunshine energy that you became addicted once. And seeing him make all of these things rush through your mind.

He had a white shirt on him, which made him look very... professional? But in a pretty way. His partly long hair was slicked back nicely. You can see his newly grow beard that he probably is going to shave tomorrow morning. Even though he looked almost the same as two months ago you realized he changed, he's much better now. He's better off without you or maybe you were just that lonely who was considering going back to her ex just because you hated being alone or a narcissist who thinks everyone is in love with her.

"Hello." His stern voice made you startled since you were, once again, wandering on your mind. "Hello, how rude I am. Come in." you stepped backwards for him to enter the house. He was looking around when you closed the wooden door and turned at him.

"You guys made some changes on this apartment huh? It looks prettier." You smile at the compliment. Always too nice.

"Yes, it was time to get rid of some old stuff." Then you realized this was not an appropriate sentence to say since it's only been two months after the break up.

You cleaned your throat and talked again: "Take a seat I'll prepare us some coffee." When you were rushing to the kitchen, you heard his footsteps right behind you. "You never really learn do you? I'm literally here for your heart and you are offering me coffee? Way to go." You laughed at his point.

It was nice to be around him. He had such a charm that could make you feel comfortable all the time. There wasn't any awkward silence around him. It was always joyful, happy and full of smiles. He was like a home for you once. Now he was just a stranger you perfectly know.

"Well, old habits die hard." At that point you literally wanted to punch yourself on your face. There were millions of words in English and somehow you always chose the one that made you sound like a heartless person.

When you were preparing the coffee he sat on a chair beside the window. It was raining again. There was no lightning or storm but just plain rain. It was the fourth day today and the weird thing is, it was middle of the fucking summer, July to be exact.

"So, your heart?" When you put on his mug, (which was adorable by the way. It was dark red with little white hearts on it.) on the little coffee table in front of him. You sat right in front of him. "Yes, I think Amber is overreacting. I'm perfectly fine." He looked at you with his brown eyes, completely scanning your body. It's like, he was trying to find evidence of you being okay. But in reality he was actually thinking about how much he missed you. He missed being around you, your presence, your voice, your scent and everything about you. He missed hearing your stupid theories about comics, he missed talking about ordinary stuff under the stars on a hill that he would take you every saturday, he missed you making him laugh so hard that he would cry, he missed you. Simply you, being you.

"Still, i think you should come to the hospital and let me examine you over there since I didn't bring a lot of stuff." You nod, perfectly aware of the fact that you simply wouldn't do something like that. You knew something was different. You experienced a lot of seizures like that and it was different and since you already took your medicine, you wouldn't bother to go again. If there's something, that would mean more medicine. But you were sure that was not the case.

Your mind went to Damian's sister again. How could this be possible. She looked exactly like you and you were wondering how she can appear on your poster. It was there for three years now and you would've noticed at some point right? Viperia... Even the name sounds so made up, you still were trying to convince yourself that you actually imagined that person. But then again, Amber said she's been there for some time. Maybe she also hallucinated.

You tried to pull your attention back on the guy sitting in front of you. Viperia was the future you problem, right now you had Nate in front of you.

"You look tired." When he stated the obvious fact you simply smiled. "Yes, it's been a long day." More like two days in one. "And I'm kind of anxious maybe that's why."

He directly looked into your eyes with such a compassionate look. If he could make your pain go away, he would in a heartbeat. It was so weird to part your ways even though you love that person. But growing up meant realizing it's important have someone who has the same mindset as you and about that, you guys were not the best. 'Love can start something but it wouldn't make something keep going.' Your mother used to say this sentence a lot whenever she and your dad argued.

He reached over your hand that was on uour your lap. When he touched you, you could feel the vibrations going around your body. It was dumb to think that you were over him but when it's you, you can never be sure and you knew that all to well.

"You know that I'm here right? It doesn't matter what time is it, if you call, I'll come." He said almost whispering. His hand traces its way through your face. Cupping one of your cheeks. No, that wasn't good. You could feel that every cell of yours longing for him but that wasn't a good idea.

"I think you should go."

He looked at you for five seconds with a disappointed look on his face. He could tell that you were uncomfortable and he didn't want to keep doing whatever he was doing. Then he take his hand off your face and stood up. "Yes, I think I should go. Thank you for the coffee. I think tomorrow morning you should visit the hospital just in case." You nodded and said 'thank you' while he was taking his stuff and going to door.

"Goodnight." He was the one who smiled as an answer this time.

As soon as you closed the door, you released the breath you didn't even you were holding until that point.

You went into your room after sitting back of the door for some time, collecting your thoughts about Nate. You needed something to take your mind off from Nate and you decided to keep researching about Viperia.

Two hours later, your mind was almost going to explode from all the information you found about her.

She was the sixth child of Batman, not a sister but twin of Damian. Raised by Bruce but also Talia too. Her name was the same as yours but she was using Viperia as an alias, which was a venomous snake. She was skilled at martial arts and she was a great assassin, maybe even better than Damian. She was quite popular with her rage and snarky comments just like Damian. She was getting along with almost every family member except Tim and you didn't find anything relating to that topic. On some fandom base sites, there were a lot of theories about them dating secretly 'why else they wouldn't even once mention about her relationship with Tim' they wrote. 'Tim never even refers to her as his sister.' You searched so deep that you even had came across a smut writing between her and Alfred which made you a little bit of uncomfortable and also scared.

You started to think how could you miss this character or did she literally appear out to nowhere in three hours?

The creator was releasing new chapters on that comic series in every two weeks. 'Batman's Daughter' was the title. It was covering the whole background starting from the birth which was crazy but useful also, since you learned that Talia literally put her in Lazarus Pit whenever she had some kind of blade cuts on the age of fucking three. No wonder that girl was total nuts but of course fun to read.

When you were doing your research your laptop's notification sound made you startled. Maybe you didn't have any resemblance with her since she could literally murder without even flinching and you were, well, getting startled from a notification sound.

It was an e-mail.

You took your laptop and stood up from the chair you've been sitting for some time now. Since you also started to get sleepy it was a good idea to going to your bed and read your mail over there.

You sat on your soft green colored sheets and opened your mail, you didn't know the person who sent you the mail. There was literally no name or anything. Just an attachment and a word on the subject part which was 'read :)'

You clicked on the attachment, even though you knew you shouldn't since it was a mail from someone unknown and you might even download a fucking virus on your laptop but however something inside of you was couraging you to open it.

It was a comic on a pdf format but it was more like a work in progress. Some parts were still empty.

The Doom of Batfamily?

That was enough for your curiosity to take over, so you started reading.

It was starting with Bruce talking with his family about some unusual murders on the city. He was suspecting someone from the League of Assassins since the murder weapon was a sword. But turns out it was Viperia who is getting more and more insane everyday because of the Lazarus pit. But it didn't even stop there, she was getting involved with some villains to trap her family one by one and killing them all, she was thinking they were on her way.

You were horrified. It was very graphical and the sketches literally showed everything explicitly. In the end, she was literally standing on all of their dead bodies, laughing histerically.

You close the laptop immediately and closed your eyes, trying once again to collect your thoughts. Everything seemed so messy right now and you didn't know what to do. Why Viperia appeared out of nowhere, Who was the sender of the mail, why is she killing all of her family, what the fuck is going on.

"Fuck, no."

Without resisting more, you give yourself in the sweet arms of sleep. You could try to solve that problem tomorrow, you needed some sleep now.

After like two minutes of sleeping you opened your eyes involuntarily since, well, you only closed them for two minutes.

"It took you long enough."

With this voice, you got scared again.

"I didn't know you like sleeping this much it's literally noon time now, wake up so we can go to my favorite cafe to have some breakfast and then feed the ducks."

You watched him in horror.

"Hey, haven't you missed your beloved brother?"

"Damian?"

#batfamily #batfamily fic #batman #bruce wayne #damian wayne #damian wayne x reader #dick grayson x reader #dick grayson #fan fiction #dick grayson x y/n #inbetween #jason todd x reader #jason todd #bart allen #barry allen #wonder woman #aquaman #alfred pennyworth #the flash

[master-sass-blast]

Let's Call it a Draw Between Us -Chapter One: Defeat.

Author's Note (uploading multiple works tonight, so I'm slapping this on all the fics I'm posting):

Uh... hi.

It's been a very long time. Longer than I'd hoped for, but suffice to say, this year hasn't gone according to plan.

In sum, I had a mental breakdown in Spring, got diagnosed with hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos syndrome in July, my husband totaled his car in September, I was sick for the whole month of October, my husband found a new (used) car... and then hit a deer at the end of November, and the insurance company ruled that it was totaled because the repair costs would be worth more than the value of the car.

Yeah.

There's been other shit, too, but part of what I've learned with the new diagnosis is that my body does not regulate or cope with stress well -which I sort of already knew, but it's to a vaster extent than I'd known. Essentially, this past year has just taken me out at the knees, and it will probably take my body a while to regulate and function well again.

I still want to write and post fics, but I now have a lot of anxiety around not being able to write and post fics (along with other things that my befuckened body interferes with), which is just... a lot. And frustrating.

I'm not throwing in the towel. But I also can't promise any sort of posting schedule moving forward. Right now, my body and brain are just too unpredictable, and I have to make sure I'm taking care of my basic needs (like eat and hygiene and sleeping, it's literally that difficult to deal with) so that I'm physically okay.

Thank you all for being so patient. I hope to see you more regularly in the coming New Year, but if not, know that I'm okay and still kicking, but that my body's just kicking back for the time being.

Much love and best of wishes to you all for the New Year!

Summary: Sevika pines. She drinks. Then she competes in some arm wrestling and makes some very sapphic eye contact.

She loses, loses again, and then she wins.

Or maybe she wins all three times. It depends on your point of view.

(Basically just a very self-indulgent fic that spawned from an idea about Sevika and a big, buff Reader that I'll probably never get around to writing in full, so I wrote this as a way of honoring that idea.)

Pairing(s): Sevika/Reader.

Rating: M for some sensual themes and making out.

Word Count: 10.1k. Whoops.

You drive her to drink.

Speaking of… Sevika leans against the bar and snaps her fingers at Thieram. “Whisky, neat. Half a glass.” She narrows her eyes when he raises his eyebrows at her, then scoffs and goes back to staring across the room once he jumps to. Idiot.

She hadn’t expected much out of you after she first met you. Properly met you, that is. Technically, her first introduction to you had been in an underground fighting ring stocked by Stillwater’s hardier, more opportunistic patrons. You’d made quick work of the other prisoners, but Silco had wanted a proper evaluation before deciding whether or not to scoop you up, so in she’d gone. She’d socked you in the jaw, you’d suplexed her through a shitty wooden table. Good times.

She hasn’t had any complaints about you. You’re quiet, compliant. You don’t get drunk on the job, and you don’t start fights with the rest of the crew.

But that seems to be about it. You don’t really hang out with anyone else. You’ll talk to her every now and then, but otherwise you keep to yourself. You don’t play cards with the others, shoot pool, or share drinks. No swapping of stories, or exchanging inside jokes. From what she can tell, you keep to yourself like a hermit in an invisible cave.

Like a shadow, she reflects as you hang back in your usual spot (towards the back of the bar, tucked into darkness, where no one bothers you). If you’re not watching it, you forget it’s there.

She’d thought that was it. She’s seen plenty of people leave Stillwater and fall into violence, or inebriation, or withdrawn sullenness. She figured you were a tragic statistic –yet another to add to Zaun’s tally.

And then…

Her upper lips curls when Jinx comes bounding down the stairs. She tracks the blue-haired sprite across the bar, over to where you’re sitting, then scoffs when you greet Jinx with a small smile before glaring down at her glass.

It’s like watching a flower unfurl after weeks of frost. You smile and open up towards the sun of Jinx’s exuberance like you’ve been doing it your whole life, like there’s nothing more natural to you than beaming at Silco’s brat. And, sure, Jinx is a kid and she’s kind of cute, for a demented gremlin. But she’s still Jinx.

Sevika scowls down into her whiskey. Fucking psycho kid.

You’d called it kismet when she’d asked why you tolerate Silco’s batty brat. You’d lost your baby sister when you’d gone into prison, Jinx had lost Vi after the factory explosion, and then, years later, the universe had brought you two together and balanced everything back out, or fucking whatever.

She supposes it’s a decent arrangement. Jinx isn’t nearly as vicious and off kilter with you around, and you get all soft, and mushy, and happy, and pretty–

Sevika motions to Thieram to top her glass up again. Fuck me.

You’re protective of Jinx, too. Not that the brat can’t handle herself (Sevika has her new arm to prove that). But, she can still remember the night Finn’s gang had crowded into the Last Drop. They’d been obnoxious, and overbearing, and more than a little sloshed. Jacen, one of Finn’s “good buddies,” had slapped Jinx across the ass as a joke.

He’d done it in front of Silco. He was a dead man regardless.

Before anyone –even Jinx–could react, though, you’d lurched out of your chair, grabbed the sledgehammer you keep with you in lieu of a knife or a gun, and taken two long strides across the bar. “Jacen!”

Sevika’s core clenches at the memory. She lets out a harsh breath, then gulps down half her drink.

The crimson, glittering spray of blood through the air had been beautiful. Like gems cascading through the air. Jacen’s face had caved in on one side from where you drove the head of the hammer all but through it. He’d dropped to the floor in a heap, unmoving.

“Anyone else want to have a go?”

She’d gotten herself off to the thought of it that very night. The fury in your eyes, the decisive, powerful movements of your body, the splatter of blood. She’d climaxed harder than she had in a long time.

The whiskey burns her throat –expected and grounding.

She takes it without coughing or gasping. She’s been an expert for decades. Her jaw works as she finishes swallowing, and then she turns her head so she can watch you again.

You’re listening and nodding while Jinx rambles. There’s a certain attentiveness to your expression. Maybe it’s the angle of your eyebrows, or the soft, lax look of your jaw, or the brightness in your eyes. Whatever it is, it’s a total abandonment from both the harsh, dominating fury she’s seen from you, and the skittish, withdrawn apathy.

Something soft and needy aches beneath her ribs as she watches you with Jinx. Sevika grits her teeth and exhales with practiced languor. I’ve gone fucking soft.

Sevika doesn’t consider herself possessive. She visits the brothel far too regularly, and has more than a handful of casual “situationships” with different ladies around Zaun to be possessive. She’s not monogamous, at least. She doesn’t think of other people as property. The children of Zaun don’t have the luxury of such affluent detachment.

But she wants you. It’s like this thing that sits beneath her ribs and crawls around inside her. It’s restless, and writhing, and it gnaws on her bones like a feral dog in the dark corner of an alley. It keeps her up at night with racing thoughts, vivid hopes, and half-formed “what ifs.”

It also keeps her up at night because, more often than not, she winds up masturbating to the thought of you –like some starstruck, gods-damned teenager.

She’s not used to wanting –not for companionship, at least. She wants her freedom, wants her equality, wants Zaun to stand strong against those fucking Piltie pigs… but that’s about Zaun. There’s a certain degree of detachment there. It’s not about Sevika personally, the woman who is renowned at the Gardens, beats everyone’s ass in cards, and can drink any citizen of Zaun under the table. The woman who got blown up and survived, lost an arm and came back stronger, and practically rules the Undercity with a steel spine and a –literal–iron fist.

She doesn’t want for company. Any attention she wants, she can easily get. She doesn’t stay up half the night yearning for anyone, much less a… lover? Companion? Affection?

Sevika knocks back the rest of her drink, but the burning in her throat pales in comparison to the ache in her chest. Janna, kill me. Put me out of my fucking misery.

She wants you. She wants to get her hands on you, get you underneath her (or on top of her, she’s not picky), and crack you open. She wants to drink you down, watch all that rage and goodness and steeliness and softness pour out. She wants to find its source and let it all wash over her. She wants it –needs it–for herself.

She wants it to be hers, even in part. She wants to bask in everything you keep held back by your silent, stoic mask.

There’s a headache forming behind her left eye. Probably from clenching her teeth; ever since the scars on her face crystalized, the muscles on the left side of her jaw have been more sensitive to strain.

She’s not used to this –this, this insipid, endless pining. It’s been going on for months now, and she’s just about ready to put a fork in her eye just to make it fucking end.

She barks at Thieram to get her another glass. Drink until you feel nothing. Zaun’s oldest remedy. She leans heavily against the bartop, then groans beneath her breath. Might as well buy the whole bottle. Against good sense, she resumes watching you. Warmth spreads through her chest when you grin at Jinx, and she bites the inside of her cheek to keep from smiling.

“Y’know, somehow, I don’t think she’s going to figure out you like her just from you staring at her like a creep through a window.”

Sevika tenses, then glares at Ran as they sit down on the barstool next to hers. She picks up her refilled glass with her left hand and lifts it to her lips. “Fuck off. Nobody asked you.”

Ran stays where they are –a credit to their courage, at least. They smirk, then glance across the bar, to where you’re sitting, before returning their knowing, smug gaze to Sevika. “It’d be easier if you talked to her.”

“Shut. Up.”

“I’m just trying to save you the eyestrain.” They grin, thin and sharp, when Sevika flips them off, then lean against the wooden countertop. “Seriously, though. Why not ask her out?”

Sevika scowls and focuses on her whiskey glass, which is suddenly very interesting. “S’not that simple.”

“Why not?”

Sevika nearly kicks them off the stool and onto the floor (just for starters), but when she catches a look at Ran’s face and realizes they’re not teasing, she sighs and scrubs her face with her right hand. “I… I don’t know what she’d say.”

“Since when is that a problem for you?” Ran asks, face twisting with equal parts mirth and disbelief. When Sevika rolls her eyes, they shove her shoulder lightly. “It’s not like you ever have to work for it.” They pause, then smirk devilishly. “Maybe it’s weakened your game. Is that it?”

Sevika glares at them, then kicks Ran in the shin when they start snickering. “I’m gonna smother you in your sleep. And for your information, you giggling bastard, that’s not the problem.” When Ran swallows their smile and motions for her to continue (while rubbing at their shin), she huffs. “I –I don’t know if she likes women.”

Ran’s visible eyebrow arches. “You’ve seen her.”

“...Duh.”

“She likes women.” When Sevika grimaces, Ran narrows their eyes. “You think otherwise?”

“I don’t think she likes anybody,” Sevika admits; doing so is somehow both a relief and condemning all in one. “You’ve seen her around people. She’s not exactly interested.”

“Not everyone likes a girl in their lap the way you do.”

“That’s not the point,” Sevika snarls under her breath as she rolls her eyes.

“Then what is?”

It’s not easy to articulate. Sure, it’s an unspoken, universally acknowledged truth in Zaun, but that doesn’t mean anyone ever says it.

People go into Stillwater, and they come out –if they come out at all–different. Broken. You spent most of your life in that shithole –spent most of your teenage years there–at the anti-mercy of the wardens and other prisoners. It only stands to reason that any part of you inclined towards a relationship –or sex, or human contact–got snuffed out by the need to survive.

She feels bad for you, sometimes. Only when it’s too quiet, and she doesn’t have anything to do, and she’s not drunk and-or high enough to keep her thoughts from wandering to the dark, traitorously soft corners of her mind. She can almost see the child you started as –fiery, but so soft and good and kind–and it all got stomped out by the assholes ruling above them.

Sevika forces herself to loosen her death grip on the glass. Breaking it wouldn’t be the end of the world, but she hates picking shards out of the grooves of her mechanical fingers. “You haven’t seen her around Silver. She touched her shoulder–” she nods at you subtly “–without warning. I thought she was gonna break Silver’s fingers.”

“That’s Silver,” Ran says with a derisive curl of their upper lip. “She wouldn’t know the meaning of ‘boundaries’ if it rammed itself up her ass.”

They’re not wrong; the young woman’s brazen attitude is one of the things Sevika likes about Silver –albeit in small doses.

“She doesn’t talk to anyone,” Sevika murmurs, pathetic by her own standards. She’s worn down enough, though, to speak plainly. “She doesn’t go to any of the brothels, or take anyone home –and, yes, I’ve asked. She hates being touched, or being near anyone.” She presses her lips together to keep a pitiful smile back –she’d never forgive herself–then downs more whiskey. The burn of the liquor grounds her, brings her back to normalcy. “I don’t think she’s interested.”

Ran nods minutely, mulling the evidence over. They watch you for a minute, hawkish in their scrutiny. “She sits with Jinx.”

“Jinx,” Sevika grits out (both because it’s Jinx, and because of the implication of Ran’s observation), “is a kid.”

“She is,” they agree, unfazed. “But, clearly, she’s not entirely opposed to all human contact.”

Like I don’t fucking know that. Sevika clenches her teeth together to keep from snapping. She’s observed the same damn thing, and it’s what keeps that whining, consuming, itching ember of hope burning in her chest.

Ran watches Sevika for a moment, then continues when she doesn’t say anything. “She sits with you.”

“That’s different,” Sevika says on reflex.

“I don’t think it is,” they press. “She never sits with anyone else. It’s either on her own, with Jinx, if she’s here, or with you.”

“I–”

“It’s not like she’s in it for playing cards,” Ran continues, staring Sevika down when she tries to argue. “And she doesn’t drink much, either.” They prop one elbow against the bartop. “Frankly, if you’re not here, then she isn’t. She only bothers hanging around if you’re here.”

“That’s–”

“She talks to you a lot, too,” Ran drawls, tone both teasing and reflective. “The rest of us are lucky to get a word or two from her, but she’ll talk the whole night with you.”

“I’m–”

“She lets you touch her, too. I’ve even seen her touch your shoulder in return.”

“If you interrupt me again–”

“Quit moping,” Ran says, voice flat and final. “Ask her out, or get over it.”

There’s a lot she could say to that. First of all, no one accuses her of moping. But she tucks it away for later; she doesn’t want to start kicking Ran’s ass in front of everyone, because that means the trigger point for said ass kicking will inevitably become common knowledge. Her feelings are nobody’s business but hers. Second of all, no one but Silco tells her what to do, and that’s only for work. She is the only damn master of her personal life, thank you very fucking much. Third, she knows for a fact that Ran spent nearly two years pining for one of Silco’s assassins, so they’ve got zero room to talk shit.

Sevika downs the rest of her drink, then motions for a third refill. “She’s not interested.”

Ran stares at her for a moment. Then, they scoff and shake their head. “You’re an idiot.”

Sevika glares harshly at them–

The door to Silco’s office creaks open, then thumps shut, followed by the man himself quietly descending the staircase to the bar floor. “Jinx.” He finishes buttoning his trench coat shut. “Pack up your things. We’re going home.”

“What?” Jinx’s face screws into the picture of teenage consternation. The baby fat on her cheeks makes her look younger still. “But–”

“It’s alright.” You quickly and neatly arrange her blueprints and drawings into a single stack, then hand them to the blue-haired youngster. “We can talk later, okay?”

Envy curls in Sevika’s gut when Jinx hugs you and you reciprocate with one arm. She turns away and hides her scowl behind her glass. Fucking brat.

Silco addresses the rest of his crew, “I trust that you’re all competent enough to avoid burning the place to the ground?” He arches his good eyebrow, then smirks when a mix of serious answers and half-drunk jokes rise up from the crowd. “Good enough.” He turns to face Sevika and tosses her a key. “You decide when the bar closes.”

She catches the key with her right hand, then flips Petrichor off with her left when they start grumbling under their breath about Sevika being in charge. She raises her glass to Silco in lieu of a spoken fair well, then knocks the rest of it back when he leaves out the rear with Jinx in tow. “Fucking finally. Theo! Put something good on for a change.”

“Are you having another?”

Sevika looks down as Silver –one of Silco’s personal spies–materializes at her side. She eyes the younger woman –her tight dress, high ponytail, and alluring make up–then looks away. Not with you. “Probably not. Best to take it easy.”

“Since when?” Ran mutters under their breath.

Sevika subtly kicks their stool, then looks down when Silver situates herself between her legs.

“You sure?” Silver pouts –which does stir something in Sevika, given Silver’s plush lips and deep-colored lipstick, but it’s not the something that she wants tonight. Silver bats her eyelashes a little, then smiles coyly. “Could be fun.”

Sevika bites back a scowl; she doesn’t want to put Silver off permanently –not yet, anyway. She wracks her brain for some sort of believable excuse that even Silver would accept–

As fortune would have it, one falls into her lap.

“–pretty sure I hit three-fifty yesterday–”

A collective chorus of groans alerts Sevika to the newest problem –chiefly, that Arik is bragging about his “gym gains.” Again.

Nevermind that she could break him over her knee like a fucking twig.

“It’s taken a lot of dedication and hard work.” Arik stretches and flexes, preening while everyone else rolls their eyes. “I don’t want to brag, but I’m probably the strongest member in the crew.”

Sevika arches one eyebrow in judgment; it’s ludicrous, considering that he’s ignoring her, the bouncers, Leon and Boris, and Lock, Silco’s mountainous, tattooed henchman that works security at the Shimmer plants. Why do we even put up with you?

Theo barks out a laugh. “Fat fucking chance, dickwad. No way in hell you’re the strongest person here. Pretty sure Miss Silver could knock you on your ass.”

“I’d take that bet,” Silver chimes in, twirling a lock of her straight, powder purple hair around her finger.

Arik pouts, looking like a spoiled teenager. “Oh, yeah? Who’s strongest, then? You?”

“No.” Theo shakes his head. “I don’t have delusions of grandeur like you. Nah, it’s probably…” He looks around the bar, eyeing the bouncers, then Sevika, before twisting in his seat so he can see the back of the bar. “Actually, it’s probably Mouse, here.”

It takes you a moment to register the nickname foisted upon you by the rest of the crew. You lift your head, blink a few times, then straighten up. “What?”

“Cuntface here–” Theo jerks his thumb over his shoulder at Arik, who sputters and wheezes like a dying engine “–thinks he’s the strongest person in the crew. I wagered that title would probably go to you.”

“Oh.” You look around at everyone, then nod. “Okay.”

Arik huffs and crosses his arms over his chest. “There’s –there’s no way to prove that! Size isn’t everything!”

Sevika bites back a smirk as every single woman in the bar glances at each other and rolls their eyes.

“You’re shitting me, right?” Theo sneers at Arik. “Look at her, and look at you. It’s not going to be much of a competition.”

“You can’t prove that!” Arik insists, expression petulant.

Theo swivels in his seat to face you again. “Can you knock him out to shut him the fuck up?”

“No one’s doing that,” Sevika pipes up when everyone starts chattering and laughing excitedly. When people start grousing, she levels the room with a hard, final glare. “We’re not paying to get blood out of the floorboards. Again. If you all want to be idiots and knock the shit out of each other, you do it on your own time and floors, where I don’t have to clean up after your fucking mess.”

There’s a lull, and for a moment it seems like that’ll be it–

Silver perks up. “What about arm wrestling?”

“Hey,” Ran drawls, eyes lighting up. “That could work.”

“Anything to get this moron to shut the fuck up,” Theo grumbles.

Arik pouts, but says nothing.

When she realizes everyone is looking for her –presumably for permission, not that anyone’s ever bothered asking before–Sevika waves one hand dismissively. “Knock yourselves out.”

You watch as a table is cleared and Theo all but shoves Arik into a chair. When everyone looks expectantly at you, you shoot a wide-eyed, somewhat panicked glance her way.

Sevika offers you a half smile, then shrugs as if to say ‘it’s your choice.’

You shrug back, then sigh before standing. You stride over to the awaiting table and sit opposite a very grumpy, red-faced Arik.

Sevika shifts on her stool so she has a better view. Heat unfurls in her core as you prop one elbow against the table. She watches the way the thick muscles in your arm and forearm ripple with each movement. Damn.

Arik shifts in his seat. His eyelid twitches as he eyes your arm and hand. “I– I don’t know–”

“Take her fucking hand,” Theo growls.

Arik swallows hard, then props his elbow on the table and takes hold of your hand.

“On go,” Ran declares –they’ve left the bar and now stand beside the table. “Three… two… one… go!”

It’s not even a competition. If anything, it’s almost pathetic.

Arik tenses his arm –then squeaks when you push his hand down so fast he nearly falls out of his chair. The back of his hand hits the wooden surface of the table with a dull thonk. He lets out an angry snarl, yanks his hand away, then lurches to his feet and storms off with such force that his chair topples to the floor.

Everyone else cheers and claps as the front door of The Last Drop slams shut behind Arik.

“Fucking finally,” Theo mutters before running one hand through his curly hair. He looks at you and smiles appreciatively. “Thanks for shutting him up. Want a drink?”

You lean back and away. “I –I’m good, thanks.”

“That wasn’t even a challenge, though!” Silver pipes up, pouting.

“We already knew it wouldn’t be,” Theo fires back drily.

“But,” Ran interjects with a wry edge to their voice, “if we’re really trying to figure out who’s strongest…” 

Sevika presses her lips into a thin line when they turn and look directly at her. Don’t you fucking dare.

“Do you think you could beat Sev?”

Traitor.

You look at her, then lean back in your seat and grin. “Oh, yeah. Easy.”

Sevika feels her brows rise up, and she grins back despite being annoyed with Ran literal seconds ago. “Really? That’s the stance you want to take?”

“I mean…” You shrug and smirk. “It’s the truth.” You raise one eyebrow as buzzed laughter and inebriated runs through the gang. “What, you're too scared to test it?”

Them’s fighting words. Sevika cocks her head to the side, smirks right back, then shoves off her barstool and stalks over to the table.

Your eyes light up as she sits down across from you. You lean forward, prop one elbow on the tabletop, and grin. “It’s nothing personal, Sev.”

The crooked angle of your grin makes her heart flutter in a delightful, squirmy manner. She swallows hard, forces down the childish feelings of elation, and props one elbow on the table without dropping your gaze. She smirks, and revels in the way your eyes dance in the bar lighting. “Nothing personal, sweetheart,” she fires back, making sure her voice comes out lower and huskier.

Your grin broadens. You clasp her hand and squeeze tight while Theo counts down…

“Three, two, one–”

Oh shit.

It’s like shoving against a wall. Granted, Sevika’s shoved, kicked, and punched a number of walls in her day. She’s left her mark –even broken a few–on nearly all of them. She likes to think that she’s a reasonably strong, generally indestructible motherfucker.

You watch her for a few moments, expression placid –save for the smug, wicked, coy, sexy smirk on your lips. You let her try for a little longer, then inhale sharply and blink rapidly. “Wait, did we start already?”

“Fuck you,” Sevika grits out without any real malice.

You grin, showing a brilliant, alluring flash of teeth –and then you push.

“Shit.” Sevika strains against your arm.

To her credit, she feels your own arm waver slightly; to your credit, you brace your muscles, and it’s like pushing against a wall again.

She grits her teeth and tries to up the ante again. She curses when it doesn’t work, then grunts when you push her arm down another fraction of an inch.

“You okay, baby?” You grin when everyone else laughs (it’s a mix of delight and shock). “It’s okay if you need to tap.”

She grins back. Right now, she doesn’t care if she loses. Frankly, if you keep flirting with her like this, she’s the real winner in this scenario. “Keep it up, baby. We’ll see who taps.”

It’s a lost cause. You take your sweet time, push her hand down smooth and slow, and talk a lot of smack all the while.

She’s got less than an inch between the table top and the back of her right hand, now. You’re not even actively pushing, more just keeping her pinned at that point. She grunts, then laughs when your arm doesn’t budge. “Come on, you cunt. Just fucking finish it!”

You laugh in return and wink. “You’re getting tired in your old age, Sev.”

She grins. “Say that again and we’ll take this out back, bitch.”

You wink –then shove the back of her hand down against the table.

The crowd clustered around the table breaks into cheers.

Sevika can’t find it in herself to give a shit. Yeah, she lost, people are teasing her for it, whatever. She’ll kick their asses later, if she feels like it. Right now, you’re laughing, and smiling at her, and she technically got to hold your hand. That’s all she really cares about.

“What about the other one?”

Sevika blinks a few times, then frowns, confused. She looks up at Theo. “Huh?”

“Her other arm.” He’s talking to you, but he turns and gestures to her mech arm. “What about that one?”

“Uh…” Trepidation flashes across your face as you eye her prosthetic. You cringe and lean back in your chair. “I doubt it.”

It’s fair; her mech arm is reinforced, has motors that work the joints the way her muscles used to, and it’s heavy as shit. She’s crushed bones with her mechanical hand, just by clenching her hand into a fist.

But, still. In for a penny, stupid ways of flirting –all that shit.

She props her metal elbow on the table, resulting in a muted thud.

The table quakes beneath the weight of her arm.

She grins in a way that she hopes is taunting and enticing. She holds up her left hand and waggles her fingers. “You scared, sweetheart?”

Your eyes flash. You run your tongue along the inside of your lower lip. You brace your forearms against the table as you eye her metal hand. You hesitate, pressing your lips together, then say, “Just don’t crush my hand.”

“Nah.” She shakes her head. She’s not out for revenge.

Your shoulders relax. You cock your head from side to side, stretching your neck, then put your left elbow on the table and clasp her mechanical hand. “Bring it on. Sweetheart.”

It’s a more even match; she’d certainly hope so, given the fucking mechanical arm.

There’s a vein popping out on the side of your neck. Your face is pinched, expression one of intense focus and strain. The muscles in your arm and forearm stand out in full, glorious relief, defined and rippling as you fight against the force of her arm.

Her arm isn’t shaking this time, at least; such are the merits of steel reinforcement bars. But she’s not moving your hand, either. Sevika growls. The motors in her arm whir as she pushes harder.

You grunt and shove back. You bare your teeth. Your gaze is locked on where your two hands are joined. Your hands trembles from the sheer force of your exertion–

And then her hand lowers an inch.

Everyone else gasps. Exclamations and expletives roll through the bar.

“Fifty gold pieces says Mouse does it,” Theo says. 

“Bullshit,” Ran fires back. “She’ll get tired, first.”

Kharim pulls out a pad of paper and a pencil. “That’s fifty on Mouse, so far. Do I hear one hundred?”

“I’ll put twenty on Sev,” Silver says with a sweet smile.

“Really?” Sevika grunts as she pushes harder against your hand. “Only twenty?”

You let out a breathless, strained laugh –then push her hand down further.

“Who’s got another fifty on Mouse?” Kharim asks.

Too late, she realizes her prosthetic arm is actually working against her, in this situation. She has to work against the weight of the mech arm –which you can use to your advantage, naturally. The built in mechanical safeties are hosing her, too. Her arm is designed such that, at certain angles or certain levels of exertion, the gears and motors will give to whatever she’s working against. It prevents damage to the internal mechanisms and bending the internal support structures. It’s invaluable for the longevity of her prosthetic, but it also means she can’t mindlessly strain against your hand like she could with her right arm. Her only hope is that her left arm can outmatch yours in raw strength.

Normally, she’d go all in on that bet. Normally –unless her opponent was doped to the gills on Shimmer–there wouldn’t even be enough force in the picture for the failsafes to override the locking mechanisms.

You growl, teeth bared in a glorious snarl, and shove her metal hand lower.

She can’t even find it in herself to be mad. One, she’s not some mealy-mouthed bitch who needs to be the strongest person in the room at all times; she, unlike some people (Arik), is confident in herself and her abilities. Two, it’s frankly impressive. It’s an unrepentant display of raw strength, and she’s not above respecting it. Three…

It’s hot.

She’s torn between focusing on resisting you and watching the muscles in your arm flex. Her mild buzz isn’t helping, either. In hindsight, should’ve stopped with the second glass. It’s taking far too much focus not to just gawk, to grin and simper like an idiot, and she likes to think she still has her pride –which is also why she’s not just giving up. After all, she has her pride. Sevika growls when you force her hand lower, then doubles down and pushes back. Maybe not for much longer, with how this is going. Fuck.

You grit your teeth. There’s sweat glistening along your hairline (which might be her only other saving grace, since her mech arm can’t get tired). You snarl, then grip her hand tighter.

Sevika swears when her arm suddenly jerks downward. She nearly topples out of her chair, saved only by managing to plant her feet beneath the table. She catches herself, blinks–

It’s over.

You shove her metal knuckles against the table with a thud –hard enough that the wood dents inward where her steel knuckle guard hits the surface.

The crowd goes nuts, loses their minds, whatever. If she’s being honest, she’s really not paying attention to it. A distant fragment of her brain registers the squaring of bets, exchanging of coin, but–

You’re still holding her hand.

A larger, deeply buried part of her is furious that she doesn’t have better sensory input on her left hand. She can detect pressure and temperature, rudimentary shit, but she can’t feel the calluses on your palm, or the precise texture of your skin. She can’t really gauge how thick your hand is in hers.

You’re still panting, somewhat dazed as you stare down at your joined hands. Slowly, your eyes trace up the line of her mech arm, up to her face, where you take in her stunned expression. You swallow, quick, then grin.

You’re breathing hard. Your skin glistens faintly with warmth. Your hair looks tousled, slightly sweat trapped. And your grin practically glows.

It’s the closest she’s ever been to seeing what you look like after sex. Sevika can feel her mind filing every single detail of how you look away for future masturbatory reference. She grins back, slow and a bit dazzled. “Shit.”

You let out a soft, quiet laugh. You drop her gaze for a moment, but when you look back up your eyes shine unabated joy.

You’re not looking away. You’re not pulling away. You’re not letting go of her hand.

Do it, a voice that sounds irritatingly like Ran’s whispers in her mind. Do it, you fucking coward. Sevika licks her lips, then leans forward, hoping that she comes across as conspiratorial and collected. “I–”

“Aw, don’t feel too bad, Sev.”

The sudden intrusion feels more like an assault. Fake, sweet perfume cloys at her nose. There’s arms around her neck, and unwanted weight in her lap.

Silver’s face looms into view. She peers down through her lashes, lips posed in a perfect, alluring pout. “It’s not–”

Whatever else Silver says goes in one ear and out the other. She’s looking over the smaller woman’s shoulder, instead.

You pull your hand back across the table. Your smile slips away, and your shoulders bunch up ever so slightly. Back to the usual mask of the careful, quiet mouse.

Godsdammit. Sevika shoves Silver out of her lap and stands with a snarl. “Fuck off.” She stomps away and up the stairs, to where Silco’s office and a few private rooms are. “Everyone, out! Tonight’s done!” She ignores the groans and jeers following her, storms into Silco’s office, and slams the door shut behind her so hard that it rattles in its setting.

Silco’s office is mercifully dark. Quiet.

Sevika collapses onto the quilted velvet couch tucked into the corner of the office. She drops her head into her hands and scrubs at her face. Janna’s left fucking tit, that was a disaster. She sits up, only to slump against the couch like a dejected teenager. This is never going to work out.

If she was anyone else, she might cry –out of sheer frustration, if nothing else. Since she’s not anyone else, she helps herself to a cigar from Silco’s stash.

She only gets as far as rummaging through his desk for the cutter. (Jinx must have absconded with it. Again.) Something in her hindbrain makes her go still; an old, well-tested instinct that says ‘something isn’t right.’

Sevika freezes. Her eyes scan the darkness for any signs of intruders, or one of Jinx’s traps. She strains her ears; aside from the faint, scuttling noises of stray pests, it’s silent.

Too silent.

There should be more talk coming from downstairs; she hadn’t really expected everyone to listen to her when she ordered them all to clear out. There should be music playing, people arguing, clacks from the balls on the pool table. At the very least, there should be complaining and the noises of a final clear down.

She’d half-expected Silver to follow her upstairs. Or maybe Ran, at least. But there’s no sounds of someone climbing upstairs, or Silver’s high-pitched voices, or even creaking floorboards in the hall outside.

Sevika pulls out a knife she keeps tucked in a sheath hidden behind the waistband of her pants. She creeps forward, deadly silent, until she reaches the door of Silco’s office. She gingerly places her right hand on the doorknob, until it’s completely encapsulated by her grip, then slowly turns the handle. Once the latch is fully retracted, she tucks herself behind the door and inches it open. She waits for a beat, then another, then peers around the corner.

The bar is empty.

Now that the door’s open, she can hear the sounds of someone rummaging around the main bar floor. There’s no conversation, though; it’s too quiet to be the usual crew, for another matter.

Sevika stalks down the hall. She quietly, efficiently clears each room before she passes it, until she reaches the end of the outer wall, where the balcony begins. She tucks herself into the shadows, then peers around the corner.

You’re down on the bar floor, putting the remaining chairs up on the tables.

Sevika watches you for a moment, somewhat dumbfounded. Where the fuck is everyone else? She blinks, until her brain finally processes that The Last Drop has not been broken into by assassins or other hooligans, then steps around the corner and into the full light of the bar. She taps the railing of the balcony with her metal hand to alert you to her presence. When you look up, she gestures around aimlessly. “Where’d they go?”

You look around, then back up at her and shrug with one shoulder. “You said to get out.”

“Doesn’t mean they’d actually listen.”

Your gaze cuts away from hers. You duck your head, then go back to putting up the chairs. “Might’ve pushed ‘em. Enforced the order.” You give a one shouldered shrug. “Thought you wanted ‘em gone.”

Sevika grunts and nods. Fair enough. At least, now, she doesn’t have to deal with Silver lingering around. For lack of knowing what else to do, she watches you as you continue tidying things up for the night. “We don’t pay you to do that.”

You shrug; your back’s to her, now, as you work your way around a circular table. “Doesn’t really matter. Thieram deserves a night off, every now and then.”

There’s not much point in loitering on the balcony and staring at you like a mooning idiot. She strides across the length of the balcony, tromps down the stairs, then crosses the distance to the table you’re working in three strong steps. She grabs one of the remaining chairs, flips it upside down with ease, then hooks the seat of the chair on the table top.

You go still for a moment. You watch her, gaze following her every movement, until you relax again and resume working. “‘M sorry ‘bout earlier.”

She nearly trips over the chair she’s picking up. Sevika stalls, blinks, then sets the chair back on the floor and levels you with an incredulous, confused stare. “What?”

“For kicking your ass.” The corner of your mouth briefly ticks up in a self-satisfied smirk, but it washes away to true contrition. “Wasn’t trying to humiliate you ‘n front of everyone.”

“I–” She pinches the bridge of her nose. Can’t imagine where that narrative came from. “I’m not. You didn’t.” She hangs the chair from the table, then scoffs, indignant. “Fuck’s sake, I’m not Arik.”

You smirk, but stay still as you watch her for a few moments. “You were mad about something.”

“I was mad at Silver,” Sevika grouses, careful to avoid making eye contact. And her lousy sense of timing.

You let her get the last few chairs, opting instead to grab a tray and collect stray glasses and empty beer bottles. “You two okay?”

She snorts. “We’re not involved enough to be ‘okay’ or otherwise. We’ve fucked before. End of story.”

“...Did she do something to you?”

The tight, lethal quietness in your voice gets her attention. She straightens up, meets your gaze, and shakes her head. “No. She just gets on my nerves now and then, s’all.”

You grunt, understanding, then add a couple more glasses to your tray before carrying the lot over to the bar.

Sevika grabs a couple stray, half-empty bottles of whiskey, tequila, and vodka, then follows partially in your wake. She stops at the bar counter, watching as you round the end so you can dispose of the beer bottles and set the used glasses in the sink. She sets the half-consumed bottles on the counter, then leans against the neon light-edged lip while she watches you. “Gotta say, it was pretty impressive.” She smirks when you half-turn, brows lightly drawn together, then waggles her metal fingers. “Figured I’d have you licked.”

You snort, then shake your head. “Might’ve.” You set the last of the glasses in the sink, then drop the beer bottles in the recycling can. “Probably would’ve if we’d gone longer. You’d have me beat on stamina.”

She can’t stop her automatic, teasing, too sultry for its own good reply. “Oh, I doubt that.”

You do a quick double take.You stare at her over your shoulders, eyes the size of dinner plates. Then, your lips press together before quirking upwards in a shy smile. You laugh softly. “Yeah, well, your mechanics would’ve won, in the end.” You toss the last of the bottles into the recycling can, then turn and step to the bar. “Figured it was just best to–” you draw your fingers across your neck in a quick slash and click your tongue “–cut things quick, override the locking mechanisms.”

“Smart,” Sevika purrs.

You lick your lips, then grin. You eye her for a moment, shifting from foot to foot –then, you grab the remaining bottles and crouch so you can stow them beneath the bar counter. “Course, helps that you’re shit at arm wrestling, too.”

“Excuse me?” she laughs, caught off guard and bemused. “Run that by me again?”

“You’re shit at arm wrestling.” You chuckle as you stand. “Your form’s terrible. Makes you easy to beat, even if I wasn’t stronger than you.”

She grins wide, exhilarated. Fighting words. “Oh, is that how it is?”

You plant your palms against the bartop. “‘S how it seems to me.” You smirk –which grows into a smile as she looks you over–then prop your right arm against the counter. “I could show you a couple tricks. Improve your odds a bit.”

She takes the bait like the happiest, dumbest fish that ever lived and sets her right elbow atop the counter. “Teach me your ways, oh wise one.”

“Right off the bat–” You reach forward and adjust the angle of her arm. “‘S really not about raw power. I mean, it helps, but angles are a lot more important.” Your hands slide along the length of her arm, adjusting things until you’re satisfied with how she’s positioned. You nod to yourself, then move to her wrist. You hold her right hand with both of yours. “Gotta think about how you’re holding your hand, too. Too many people wind up pushing with their forearms. Means that they got their hands at the wrong angle, most of the time. You want to be pushing with your upper arm and shoulder.”

“Whatever you say, coach,” she drawls, layering on the sarcasm to –hopefully–hide how breathless she is.

You snort, then lower your left hand and grip her right hand with yours –assume the position. “Alright. Try now.”

She does –not with as much vigor as she used in the initial match, but she still puts decent effort into it. Her eyebrows spike high when she feels less strain than earlier. “Shit.”

You flash her a lopsided grin. “See? Knowing what you’re doing helps.”

“Bite me.”

You fake a grimace. “Not until you shower first. I don’t know where you’ve been.”

“You implying something?”

“I’ve seen how many people you can beat up in a week, Sev.”

She chuckles, then shrugs in concession. “Fair enough.” She grips your hand tighter and smirks wickedly before shoving against your hand, hard. “Hope you’re ready to join the list–”

You grunt –then brace against her onslaught and force her hand the other way.

“Shit!” Sevika strains against your hand, but it’s veritably useless as you slowly push her hand downward (at least you have to work harder for it, this time). “Son of a bitch –motherfucker!”

“Still stronger than you,” you fire back as you finally pin the back of her hand against the bartop. You smile, impish and sweet. “But that was a good try.” You grin when she glowers at you, then toss your head back and laugh when she flips you off with her left hand.

She can’t think of a retort; the wrestling tugged your shirt off kilter, and your laugh exposed something new –fresh, smooth ink along the side of your neck, previously hidden by your collar. She stares, tracing the way the tendrils of the flowers curve around your neck and down your clavicle before disappearing under your shirt. “That’s new.”

You look down at her, blinking rapidly, then crane your neck to look down when she gestures loosely at your chest. “Oh. Yeah.” You shrug with the opposite shoulder. “Wanted to do something for myself. Cover up some of the shit I got inside.” You hesitate, then swallow hard and ask. “Do –do you wanna see the rest of it?”

“Sure.” The meaning of your offer doesn’t really hit until you let go of her hand so you can start unbuttoning your top. Sevika locks her knees to keep from toppling over as all the blood rushes Southward from her head. Janna, help me.

Mercifully, you only undo the top three buttons on your shirt. Unmercifully, that gives you enough leeway to push the right side of your shirt down over your shoulder, revealing more of your chest and your neck.

Oh, and the tattoo.

It’s pretty. It’s a good piece, too, done by someone who knew what they were doing. The design is a dense cluster of flowers that fans up the side of your neck and down over your collarbone.

“That’s real pretty,” Sevika ekes out, voice gone to gravel. She reaches up to touch it, but catches herself before her hand leaves the bar. Don’t startle her. “Do you mind?”

It takes you a moment, but you look down when she gestures with her flesh hand. “Oh.” You let out a soft, trembling breath. Your throat flexes as you swallow. “Yeah –go for it.”

Everything that follows feels like a dream. The world seems to take on a warm, golden hue that overpowers the glaring neon lights and the dark shadow of night outside. It feels like she’s moving through molasses, achingly slow as she lifts her hand towards your neck.

Your skin is unbelievably soft beneath her fingertips. The lines of ink stretch slightly as she traces down your neck and over your shoulder.

“This okay?” Sevika murmurs.

“Yeah.”

Something about your heavy, trembling exhale makes her look up.

You’re staring down at her with wide, dark eyes. Your lips are parted, and you’re practically panting despite standing still.

But you’re not pulling away. You’re not shaking. If anything, you’re practically melting beneath her hand. And your gaze is locked on her face –practically zeroed in on her mouth…

Oh.

She owes Ran a drink. Or another kick in the shin. Maybe both.

This, however, is at least more familiar territory –so long as she plays her cards right.

Various options flit through her mind, but they all desiccate before they reach her tongue. She quickly finds herself locking up instead as she tries to figure out what the fuck to say. Shitshitshitshitshit–

(She’s never been more grateful that you kicked everyone out. Ran would never let her live this down.)

“Ask her out, or get over it.”

Sevika swallows hard. Go big or go home. Not like the world’s gonna end if she says ‘no.’ She clears her throat. “Anyone ever tell you that you’re really fucking attractive?”

“I–” Your eyes go wide as you sputter. Your gaze flicks between her eyes and her mouth. “Not –no. Not really.”

“Shame,” Sevika drawls. She traces her thumb down the stem of one of the flowers inked into your neck, then looks back up at you. “You’d think they’d have eyes. I’ve noticed since the first time we met.”

You snort, equanimity somewhat restored. “What, in an illegal prison fight club soaked in the blood of others?”

She smirks and winks at you. “You made it work.”

You draw your lower lip between your teeth as you smile. You duck your head bashfully, then brace your forearms against the countertop –which puts you closer to her height. “I hope you won’t be offended if I say that I didn’t notice you ‘like that’ from the start.”

Her gut drops. “Oh?”

You shake your head, gaze still glued on the countertop. “I was, uh, a little concerned with surviving –making sure you didn’t knock my teeth out with your metal fist, that sort of thing.” You let out a little laugh, then look at her. “But I noticed later.”

Warmth blooms in her chest and abdomen. She grins, soft and slow. “Really?” Her grin grows when you smile shyly and nod. “Well, shit. Lucky me.” She strokes her thumb along your tattoo again; satisfaction curls in her stomach when you shiver.

“I–” You lick your lips and look at her eyes, then her lips, then back up, then back down again, then back up again. “I don’t…” Your gaze locks onto her lips when she smirks; your pupils blow wide, and you let out a ragged, heavy breath. “I’d really like to kiss you right now.”

Heady elation blooms in her chest and quickly spreads through her body. “That,” she murmurs as she slides her fingers beneath your chin and leans in, “sounds great to me.”

Your lips are soft against hers. Hesitant. You freeze, scarcely even breathing.

But you’re not pulling away –or panicking–so she decides to stay the course. She presses her lips a bit more firmly against yours, then smirks when you let out a quiet moan and angle your head towards hers. There we go. After a few moments, she breaks the kiss and pulls back incrementally to assess your interest level.

You’re trembling. There’s a faint glow of sweat on your forehead. Your breaths come ragged and fast, chest rising and falling heavily. Your eyelids are half-lidded, pupils blown so wide that your eyes nearly look black.

Before she can do anything, you lean in and kiss her again; this time, it’s her turn to moan against your mouth.

It’s clumsy. It’s easy to tell that you don’t have much –if any–experience in this department. But your unabashed eagerness more than makes up for lacking finesse.

Sevika gently grasps your jaw with her right hand, guiding you through the series of kisses that follow. She carefully angles your head as she pleases, and pulls back intermittently to both catch her breath and see what you’ll do. When you keep following her lead, she decides to nip at your lower lip –just to see if it’ll draw you out of your shell more.

You let out a throaty growl when her teeth graze your lower lip –and then you pull away.

A mix of disappointment and fear flash through her stomach –but it all drains away when you vault over the counter and land next to her. She smirks as you crowd into her space, but frown when genuine trepidation settles over your face. “What?”

Your brows pinch together. “I–” You clear your throat when your voice cracks. “I don’t… I don’t know what to do with my hands.”

Oh. That’s all. She smiles, lax and confident, then places her hands on your broad shoulders. “Touch me, sweetheart.”

“Where?”

She slides her hands down your chiseled arms, then takes your hands and places them on her hips. “Anywhere.”

You’re too still at first –nerves driven by inexperience. But you loosen up when she nips at your lower lip again. You draw in a guttural breath, then squeeze her hips tighter when she curls her fingers into your waist. You press closer to her when she slides her tongue against yours. When she slides her right hand up the back of your neck and tugs at the soft hair at your nape, you growl, then slide your hands around her ass and squeeze.

Finally. Sevika moans softly and arches against you. She wraps her right arm around the back of your neck, so she can keep you close, and rests her left hand on your hip. She plunders your mouth with her tongue, then moans again when you grope her ass more firmly. She hooks one metal finger through one of the belt loops on your pants and tugs you closer –then gasps when you shove against the bar.

You crowd against her, kissing her fiercely, eagerly. Your hands cup her ass and lift, forcing her onto the balls of her feet so you have better access to her.

Surprise flits up her spine. She’s not used to being in this position; most women come to her to be manhandled, not the other way around. But she can see the appeal of it; there’s a certain giddiness in the gut that accompanies it, like the hang time from jumping across rooftops.

The kiss devolves into something artless and hungry. The two of you meet each other in the middle, pressed against each other like teenagers in a closet.

She’s starting to get into that state where she feels like she’s melting into you, and vice versa. The bar, the faint drone of passersby always present in the Lanes, the buzz of the neon lights that wrap around the bartop, the arm wrestling match less than an hour ago –all of it’s gone, blurred into background coloration like splotches on one of those fancy, impression-type paintings, for which Pilties drop the equivalent of a Trencher’s life earnings (and then some). There’s that familiar, ravenous ache in her cunt. She ought to ask you back to her place; The Last Drop hardly seems poignant enough for your first time. But the notion of stopping your eager exploration of her body is downright offensive –especially when your open mouth catches her jaw and sends arousal curling through her gut.

You pause when she tips her head back. A few ragged pants fan across the sensitized, blood-hot skin of her neck. You swallow, then clear your throat. “I –is this–”

“Yes.” She curls her right hand around the back of your neck, then gently presses your forward until you lean the rest of the way in and press your lips against her throat. Her eyelids flutter as you trail soft, closed mouth kisses over the hollow of her throat. She moans softly, and her fingers curl into your short hair. Fuck. She waits for a bit, letting you explore, but pipes up again when she feels you growing more hesitant –nerves winning out over exploration. “Use your tongue.” She shudders when you lick beneath her jaw. “Attagirl.”

The praise does something for you. You moan into her skin, then repeat the motion again. You swirl your tongue against her throat, mimicking the way the two of you had kissed seconds before.

“That’s it,” Sevika encourages you, eyes rolling back in her head. She rolls her hips against you, then groans when you press closer, neatly pinning her against the bar. “Good girl.”

You whine, loud and broken, then lift. You half lay her out on the bar, then support the rest of her by locking your arms just beneath her ass. You bend over her and bury your face in her neck, devouring her like a starved stray.

Sevika locks her ankles behind your back. She clutches at the back of your shirt with her right hand, and braces herself against the bartop with her left arm. She’s in the perfect position to grind against you, so that’s just what she does.

A small, idle fragment of her mind notes just how great this is. Yes, she enjoys having her way with women –and she’ll get to you soon enough–but there’s something to be said for receiving. It’s a new spin on “being eaten alive,” and she’s never been happier to be dinner.

She slides her fingers into your hair when your mouth trails lower, towards her clavicle. “Good girl.” She gasps, then tightens her grip on your hair when you drag your teeth over her collarbone. “That’s it –good girl, good girl–”

You moan and grind your hips against hers–

Something crashes in the alleyway outside. There’s a loud slam, followed by the crystalline crack of shattering glasses. An enraged, muffled shout ensues, followed by more heavy thudding.

You both freeze.

She recovers first. A few minutes of hearing proves it’s just a couple of angry drunks going at it –she can hear slurred, if muffled, arguing and grunting that accompanies being punched. Idiots. She turns back to you–

You’re completely stiff. Your eyes are wide, gaze flicking around the bar. You’ve gone from holding her to gripping the edge of the bar top.

Sevika winces faintly when she hears your knuckles crack. She opens her mouth to reassure you–

Another thud makes you flinch –and then you press down against her.

Sevika grunts. She tries to sit up, only for you to push her back down. She stops struggling when you use your arm to cover the top of her head. What the–

There’s something so deeply protective about the gesture that it makes her brain short circuit. You’re literally covering her with your body, as though the ceiling’s about to collapse on top of the both of you.

It’s sweet. It’s also bewildering because nothing bad is fucking happening. It’s just drunks in the alley; they’ll probably pass out long before they could ever beat each other to death.

Sevika gingerly splays her fingers against your back, between your shoulder blades. She murmurs your name, but gets no response –not even a glance of recognition. Her stomach drops when another round of shouting makes you flinch. She feels your chest push against hers as your breathing speeds up –and okay, that’s enough, time to divert things. She says your name, louder this time, then carefully cups the side of your face with her right hand. “Hey, baby. It’s okay. Just look at me, alright?”

You jolt when her thumb sweeps across your cheek. You do look down at her, though, and let out a shaky breath when you meet her gaze.

She revels, just for a moment, in how quickly you melt again under her attention. You’re still tense –you haven’t let up your death grip on the bar top–but your shoulders loosen up and your breathing slows a bit. You swallow hard, then lean every so slightly into her touch.

Focus. She can already feel herself getting sucked back into dreamy, brainless bliss. Focus, focus, focus. She blinks hard, then clears her throat. “Hey. Let’s get out of here, yeah? My place is quieter.” She pushes up on her left arm so the counter isn’t digging into her back. “More comfortable.”

“Oh.” Your eyes go wide. “Uh–”

Sevika swallows a grimace. Shit. Maybe Ran was right; she’s rusty, too eager, and now she’s pushing too fast. “It’s okay if you don’t–”

“No, no,” you cut her off. “We can –I just–” You set her down, then lick your lips as you rock from foot to foot. “My bed’s probably bigger.” You shrug and shove your hands in your pants pockets. “That’s all.”

Only several years of playing cards keeps her from sagging in relief. She nods, trying to process as panic flashes and ebbs, then takes a moment to study you. She notes the tightness in your shoulders, the way you’ve got your head ducked, and presses her lips together faintly. “I don’t want to make you do anything you don’t want to do.”

Your eyes flash, and you step closer to her. “It’s not,” you growl, “an issue of want.” You swallow, then let out a self-deprecating laugh –which, fortunately, prompts you to relax a little. “I just won’t know what I’m doing, s’all.”

“I can work with that.” Sevika closes the distance between the two of you, gripping your hips when you bend down and kiss her again. She savors the feeling of your lips for a moment, then pulls away and grins up at you. “Lead the way, sweetheart.”

#sass writes #sevika x reader #fueled by the author's desire to be built like a mountain #but alas i am a twig #also i know jackshit about arm wrestling #don't use this as a guide on how to win at arm wrestling #smut will be coming in part two

[fategoflatass]

So, I posted not to long ago my honest surprise to this whole endeavor that delevoped right before my own two eyes. Wanted to post my thoughts (?) on it earlier, but today's the day my Internet company decided to be crappy once again, so yeah.

Just as a heads up: I ramble a lot, and I love writing. Beware of that.

As he said those first lines, let me tell you: I was screaming. Albeit not too much, since I'm used to these kind of scenes to be interrupted rather sooner than later, so I kept my expectations where I could see them. Even then, I was enjoying myself quite a lot.

It's just, them, you know? Like, there this trope (?) that I love where a character whose true self is restrained due to reasons gets to be themselves around this one person or these group of people. Trope that, clearly, applies with these two losers. No wonder I'm so attached to them, huh? I also love losers, but that's beyond the point.

The moments where Jinshi gets to be himself whenever Maomao's around always give me such fuzzy feelings in my chest. Is like reading snippets of a high school romcom's script, you know? And I love high school romcoms! They have that tad of awkwardness proper of their age that always makes me go aw. Or at least the good ones do.

Something that happens to me with this LN is that, and I don't know what the author does but, I always feel like I'm part of these scenes? Like, I'm present. And it can be endearing, but turn awkward as soon as things go wild like here. Nothing wrong with that though: he's a twenty-year-old dude whose teenage hormones have never been satisfied, being the closest he's ever been to his first love, you know what I mean? He's wilding, and I'm not here to judge him on that.

But yeah, my man's head over heels and here he either falls on the most comfortable mattress or crashes against the concrete floor.

At this moment, I had already banished from existence. Her finally realizing (or allowing herself to realizing) his true feelings is something I've been waiting for for so long it's insane! Now, that doesn't mean that what awaits us from now on are butterflies and rainbows—they're angsty, so it could get worse. Call me pessimistic, I don't care. I won't believe in the progress I so long for until I see it.

Now, I talked before (and I'll do it again later on) about her denial on their situation, the possibility of them being a thing and all that, so let's focus on loserboy instead.

I get it that he's just so damn tired of this bullshit, yet I highly doubt this is the proper way to deal with things? Either way, he seems to have enjoyed it way too much. Could this be considered a kink awekening? Because if so, he and his European toad should be sent to horny jail ASAP. He's too much of a menace for anyone to handle, I'm telling you.

I've nothing to say here, unless you wanna hear me scream for the tenth time?

I mean, can you blame him? Even when he's such a popular guy among the ladies (as she mentioned earlier in the epilogue), none of them can satisfy that rooted need that he has—to have a person by his side who seems him for who he truly is and doesn't judge him for that. Someone who's able to see beyond his looks, even if they're so blindingly attractive is humanly impossible.

And once he believed to have found that someone, of course he never let go. He couldn't care less about their difference in status, because what's so wrong to want to be genuinely happy for once in your life? Is it so wrong if they don't share something so insignificant when it comes to love with you?

Maybe not for him, even thought that'd bring him the discredit of his peers (not like he cares that much about that, though)—but for someone who's constantly avoiding trouble and thus would like to pass as unnoticed as possible? Yes. A lot, may I add.

Not like he cares much, though. His intentions are clear: he's gonna jump on a pool that at first seems dry as hell, hoping for some water to make its presence and muffle his fall.

I'm sorry, but that last line sent me.

But even then,

‼‼‼

BRUH IT HAPPENED

LOVED THIS VOLUME 10/10 WOULD RECOMMEND

#the apothecary diaries #kusuriya no hitorigoto #knh spoilers #to you who told me about volume five #you were right #i so needed to read this omg #i'm sad though because this means i'm halfway through the ln #hope they confirm three consecutive 24 ep seasons whenever s1 ends

[trashcanwithsprinkles]

Now that CN is over I need more fics to read (I say as if I'm not in the middle of rereading CN and plan to reread ITYSG(AINLY) again because I'm literally obsessed with your fics). Do you have an recs? Also what's your favorite fics/comfort fics (you can include your own)? I always find it interesting to know what the authors of my favorite fics like to read when they aren't writing.

other than my other fics (babysitting in the apocalypse is my other zhongchi fic), i do have a some zhongchi recomendations! sadly i cannot actually go to my bookmarks atm nor provide direct links. i also don't really remember the authors' names of most of them? and you'd have to like.... save them for later, what with ao3 being down and all;; but here are some off the top of my head if you want to get planning:

(once ao3 gets back up i'll update this list with proper links and the authors' names and maybe more recomendations since i do have many more i just can't remember,,)

○ entirely out of spite by Bgtea - i generally assume everyone's already reading this one given how big it is (and how it was kind of my inspiration for cyanide even tho i never said it), but if you're not, holy shit are you in for a good one. literally anything bgtea makes is wonderful. this one is an au based on the premise of a different story, but you don't need any knowledge whatsoever of it to enjoy and understand eoos (tho consider it if you like the premise, bc it's also really good). the rundown is- a mondern ajax dies and wakes up in the body of tartaglia, the antagonist of genshin impact, a game he'd been playing before kicking the bucket. he is tasked by a weird isekai-anime looking menu to fill in the shoes of the antagonist or else, but he's not technically stopped from altering the story just a tiny bit or being ooc, so he goes about trying to play the tartaglia role without meeting the same end as tartaglia (who dies ingame). it's such a good fic i cannot recommend it enough - it's not complete yet, but the wait for each chapter is more than worth it, and bgtea always does an insane amount of research for everything they post.

○ literally any other zhongchi fic by Bgtea. there's this short one about pulcinella or capitano (i can't remember, it might've been pantalone) selling pictures of childe to increase morale in the fatui (something something pr strategies), that one is hilarious. there's another one about zhongli getting stuck as a dragon and childe taking care of him as the world slowly goes to shit from rex lapis being missing (a comment pointed out it might be called "ajax' adventure with dog-lizard" and it sounds about right for me). another one they have is the autumn winds are sighing i think. that one was posted WAY back, some of the info is a bit outdated, but it's still so, so good. i can't remember what it was all about, but i do remember it involves zhongli going to snezhnaya to meet childe's siblings. the pining and tension on that one is off the roof. i should read it again,,,

○ after everything by Amanveth (i think that's how their username is written,,) - literally palate cleansing fluff. there's really good angst as well but it's overall just very sweet and soft, very much a feel-good fic. it's about zhongli and childe going back to being friends after the events of the archon quest and slowly realizing they're in love. it's still ongoing but it updates shockingly fast, and it's a nice little thing to read before going to sleep.

○ the white cicada society by clementinesgulag. still ongoing i think, but i have paused reading it for reasons unrelated to the fic itself, so i can only really atest to the frist arc of it? but holy fuck is the first arc good. the angst is godly in this one, and i'm always a sucker for a good horror mystery. this one is about the gritty and slow reconciliation of post-archon quest zhongli and childe as they investigate a series of awful murders and terrifying paranormal shit (i'm pretty sure) going on in the city. (it might be revealed to not be paranromal later in the fic as that partiuclar plotpoint hadn't yet resolved when i paused it at the end of the first arc, but i wouldn't know. wouldn't make it any less good if it wasn't tho)

○ death became him by Merianon. also still ongoing i think, but part of the many fics i have paused reading for reasons unrelated to them (i have... way too many saved,,,). this one is about childe going back in time after dying and waking up as a god, and the fic starts there, so it's about how the events of the game go with childe as a god and not in the fatui. i can't remember all that much about it tbh, but i remember i really liked it, the concept was so interesting. i'm waiting for it to end.

○ a sight for sore eyes by ToumeiKyoudai. still ongoing afaik, but i paused reading it as of very recently (again for reasons outside of the fic). this one is the events of the game except childe is legally blind. you have no idea how interesting and hilarious this fic is, the premise is so simple but it's so nicely executed. i can't really say all that much more about it since it's basically just that- it's a retelling but childe's blind. and he's so fucking funny. it's all so fucking funny, and the worldbuilding is stellar, and i just really really like it i can't explain why exactly. it's not a comedy! but fuck it's so entertaining.

i have so many more that i wish i could put here but i'm not 100% confident in their titles nor which fic was which (happens when you have a ton bookmarked but have paused reading a lot of them), so i don't want to risk saying this fic is one thing when in reality it's something else completely different,,,

these last two i put below for reasons i'll explain in each of their blurbs, but they're still as recomended as those above!

○ lungs full of roses, by SecretlyACatLady. if this is the title (and i'm 99% certain it is, but i can't check), then this is hands down the BEST hanahaki angst i've ever read. i'm not kidding. this one is very specific in its angst tho, and i gather likely not what everyone is looking for in a hanahaki fic, but holy fuck. basically childe gets hanahaki here but knows he cannot afford to have anyone find out he has it (bc fatui) and also not that he died from it, i think? might be mistaking that particular plotpoint for another fic. anyway- he leaves liyue but zhongli goes to look for him bc he's confused and just wants to apologize for the whole tsaritsa's contract and all. it gets out of hand real quick when the ppl of mondstadt try to help by acting as pushy wingmen and it's so GOOD holy fuck. i've never liked when other characters try to push the main pair together and act all 'just kiss already we all know!' around them, and seeing it backfire as horribly as it could if it were a realistic scenario (tho enhanced bc childe) is so incredibly satisfying. the reason why i put it down here is 1) i'm not 100% sure that's the title and 2) if it hasn't been abandoned, it's been in hiatus for a while now. which is hearbreaking, but it's also such a good fic that i'd honestly recommend it regardless if only for the angst at the start. but i understand not everyone is in for something like that if it doesn't resolve/likely won't resolve (idk if it's abandoned tho but i understand that if a fic takes too long to update, people will fear the worst). so yeah,,

○ non-playable character, by Jouicifer. this one is here exclusively because i'm a sucker for horror mystery - it doesn't mean the zhongchi isn't good, but it's not as prevalent in the plot as in white cicada (another horror mystery), so i can't exactly put it with the other more zhongchi-centric fics? not that the zhongchi isn't here, but. hard to explain. this one is also hard to explain in general, i'm not sure if it's based on the premise of another story or if this is a highly-secific trope/sub-genre in china (i think?), but the author refers to it as 'unlimited flow', so look it up if you want to be sure. either way, much like with eoos, it doesn't matter if you know anything about whatever that might be to enjoy and understand the story. the rundown is childe and a bunch of other people are players in this sort of virtual-reality scenario hopper, where they get put in 'games' with other players where they can die (tho idk if die die irl as well). basically, in the newest scenario they get thrown into, it's a horror murder mystery about a haunted mansion, and their guiding npc is zhongli, whom childe has met in another scenario and whom he is an absolute simp for. god idk how to explain it, it's just so good; but you need to be there for the plot first and the ship second. the ship is there! it's just the plot takes presedence. but holy fuck is the plot good. the reason why it's down here, like lungs full of roses, isn't bc of the plot or the ship being secondary, but... well, it's also been in hiatus for a long while now. to this fic's credit in particular, it was in a long hiatus before, but updated! out of nowhere! and then it went into its current hiatus, so. again, i understand people don't like that, but i'm a patient person so i'm willing to keep it in my bookmarks for as long as it takes (and forever if it gets abandoned). it's just THAT good. and since there's not much horror murder mystery in this fandom (or in fics in general), i'll take whatever i can get. the mystery is good in this one, so it helps.

(edit: added some authors and a fic title, thank you archon-of-chaos and redwormonastring!)

#as soon as ao3 is up i'll look thru my bookmarks and correct anything i got wrong #and also add some more fics #i have a ton more that i really really like #i just can't remember their names with as much clarity as these ones #idk why it's not like i like these particularly more than some of those #i enjoy all equally #except non-playable character that one's probably my favorite #and eoos #anyway #thank you! #always happy to recomend fics

[if-confessions]

Author here: my confession is i'm lying. My demoless intro blew up and i kinda can't be asked to write it anymore. I keep posting screenshots of snippets but i'm never gonna release anything. I feel bad cause there are so many asks but i seriously don't have an ounce of care. I love my cast and my story but it’s so hard to write. I've seen a lot of accounts with a lot of hype and asks but no demos so i don't feel terrible and we authors don't owe anyone content anyway. I know it's bad but i love getting sent questions and notes cause people are so interested and it's so fun to post new ideas. Once my hype dies i'll probably just create a new one cause i'm already writing a synopsis for this new story and it's so good.

Hi Anon,

I'm going to get real with you, buddy. I had to write this message multiple times because I ended up being a bit too... angry. And as much as I absolutely don't vibe with this whole position, it would still not be fair to you to get the end of my frustration with it.

So I am trying again, (more) calmly.

I honestly have been wondering if you are maybe lying to yourself when you said you can't be asked to continue your project. You seem to be very enthusiastic about the story and the characters (or you wouldn't be sharing snippets or answer asks about it. What jumped at me was: my demoless intro blew up.

I've answered a lot of asks in the past about creators worried about not being enough because their project didn't get enough attention, but very little when it came to the ones blowing up overnight. But just because your intro blows up, doesn't mean you don't struggle with all of this.

So I have a few questions for you:

Are you having this blasé attitude about your project and giving up because of the heightened expectations of having blown up?

Then you might find getting a break from interaction/the social aspect to help. Or maybe interacting with other creators outside of Tumblr and discuss experiences and what to do when the motivation is gone or it becomes to overwhelming (hint: it's often a break).

Another option is to set expectations about the project. And I mean yours. Creating a grandiose story spanning books and dozens of chapters each and a cast as long as your arm can be incredibly fun, but it might not feasible, and often becomes overwhelming. Maybe take a look at your story and chop it down to manageable bites or remove parts that don't fit.

Do you worry if you actually post it, people will not vibe with it?

In this case, consider alpha/beta testing, where you share more about the story to a select few and request feedback. Joining a writer's group or a smaller IF server to discuss or brainstorm or get feedback on ideas is also a nice way of getting confidence about what you are doing. Some community have even some sort of writer's circle, where multiple people get together and write for an hour or two.

Are you afraid you will be found out as not being a good creator (a.k.a. the imposter syndrome)?

We all start somewhere, and that somewhere is very often bad. Don't sweat it. The good news tho, is that it can't get worse. The more you write, the better you get. (but you have to write first)

Do you want a point of reference? Try reading the first version of my first game. It is cringy as hell, there are a lot of grammar and syntax mistakes... I hate it so much, so I made it public to everyone. Go roast me about it, then go read the much better version (or the other way around.

Do you feel like you are lacking confidence in your ability to finish the project because your experience with the medium is minimal, making it overwhelming?

Pause the project for a bit, and write a tiny game (not more then 1k). Join game jams to test some stuff out. Mess around with the program and see what can be done.

Did your struggle with writing come from realising the amount of work required to make it happen?

Time to break it down in smaller pieces, until it feels doable. Then take one piece at a time. And there is no timeline you need to keep...

Do you feel like you can't do this by yourself and would feel more confident continuing the project if you had more direct support?

Try to reach out to other people and see if someone would be interested in helping you make this project a reality. I've seen many projects being done in duo or trio (Harcourt, Lady Thalia...). It will be a different dynamic, but can be very fulfilling.

Are the characteristics of the IF medium something you can't see working? Does the story not work when variation is added? Is there only one path that works for you?

Maybe, IF is not the medium for this project (or for you). That is also fine!

Not everything will work with IF (hell, even inside the IF sphere, some stories fits better the parser-type or the choice-based one, or the hyperlinks one). Maybe the project should become a novel, or a poem collection, or be turned into a comic/webtoon.

~~~

Before you go on to make another intro post with your new idea on the hope that it will blow up so you can just talk about it and bounce when it becomes too difficult, maybe ask yourself:

why you entered this community in the first place,

why you wanted to try your hand at making IF too,

why this story stuck to you so much you wanted to share it with everyone,

what made the story fun in the first place,

what was the point where the fun in writing actually stopped,

whether you want to abandon a story you seem so passionate about...

Interactive Fiction is an awesome medium, and it's a shame to take it for granted...

Or you can go ahead and post that new idea of yours, continuing to blatantly lie to people to get attention rather than enjoying the medium and the craft for what they are, and toy with people essentially...

I might have been reaching there about the lying to yourself, or the fact that blowing up affected your love for creation more than what you message conveyed...

... and you might actually not give a shit at all about doing anything but throwing ideas at the wall, ignoring the rich and incredible history of Interactive Fiction and its captivating evolution (still happening today), neglecting the vibrant community just to con people for notes and attention that are insignificant in real life, lying to everyone just for the lolz...

You do you boo...

~~~~~~~~

Little reminder for people reading this: Don't send hate to people posting an intro post without a demo assuming they are like this anon. It would really suck if we end up gatekeeping a fun hobby because of one bad apple.

[old comments in tags: I'm sorry but I really don't like liars that do it for the lolz it's not cute gosh i tried to tone done the judgement on this really hard I honestly hope anon is just overwhelmed because they got more attention than they thought they would in the first place /]

#confession time #if-confessions #demo or no demo #dark side of if

[mizukagami-takamagahara]

Favorite and least favorite Blazblue characters?

Yay~ finally getting to this ask. I’ve got a lot of really cool asks (thank you everyone so much) that I’ve been wanting to get to, but my health is Rather Poor, and when I do answer these things, I want to be able to put a lot of energy and attention into them.

Now, getting to the ask! I had a lot to say, and it all came out messy... and somehow, I only ended up talking about one character, Nu 13. Who fits as both one of my favorite and one of my least favorite characters, for reasons detailed below. To not make this an entire fucking novel, I'll cut the post off here and consider it an early birthday post for her.

That said, here's a quick run down of some other stuff I didn't get to talk about, relevant to your question.

My other Hated Fave is Nine/Konoe. One of those “I love the character but if we were stuck in a room together I’d maul her” situations. I consider her to be a misandrist, and I have a very charged history of like, generational reactive sexism in my family, so her generational reactive sexism (relationship with her father coloring her relationship with men overall) enrages me. On the other hand, it’s so well written, SHE’S so well written, she’s an incredible character and I adore her as an art piece. She is like a cathedral to me. The most beautiful symphony in a key you hate.

Touched on briefly in the post below, my all time absolute favorite is Terumi/Susano'o. That's a story for another day. I like him in a very particular way where he's like, the best character ever, but also he's constantly on probation. Or reverse probation? I need to see him try to kill/maim/ruin someone once a month or he's at risk of being evicted. Being the champion is a title you have to defend, y'know?

I think the character I study the most and talk about the most is Noel, although to my tastes, she's very middle of the road. I feel neutral about her. I just use her as a guinea pig for all my BB related project. You know Dangan Ronpa? How they used Sayaka and Leon as a starting point/beta test for everything? It's kind of like that, except I haven't gotten so sick of her yet that I'm killing her off or anything.

With all of that covered, allow me to get into the actual post! Thank you for your patience!

Off the top of my head at least, I can’t honestly think of BlazBlue characters I dislike. Every character that comes to mind shares something that makes me hesitant to actually claim I dislike them. That is, the characters I like the least are the characters I understand the least. Spinner Superior and the entire Bloodedge Experience cast make the list… but I haven’t read BE. Valkenhayn makes the cut- another character I really don’t pay attention to. Bullet, Hibiki, maybe Amane- all characters I really just… haven’t paid much attention to yet.

I don’t really want to claim I dislike them at this point, because when I really think about it, I’m like 99% sure that I lack interest in them BECAUSE I haven’t taken the time to look at them.

One of my hobby/goal/things in my free time is working on these BB character documents, analyzing everything I can about each character in the series for my own personal work. I have a feeling that when I get to really analyzing and writing about these characters, I’ll find things I like about them.

Here's a quick look at my files, to see what I'm talking about. Have mercy, it's very WIP.

There are two characters that stand out to me in an… almost “love to hate” way, but not quite. I have a lot to say about these characters, but I’m still tired, and this post is going to be LONG as is, so I’ll try to keep it brief.

Author's Note: I fail to keep it brief.

Before BBDW, my least favorite character was DEFINITELY Nu13. Ironic, because she almost got me into BB back in the Continuum Shift days. I saw her and some of her crazy behavior and thought... well, not much, just kind of an error message in my head going “hot woman spotted.” So I looked into her, and her story!

And got bored immediately. At first I was intrigued- I love violent characters that could arguably be described as “rabid” or “feral,” but upon further inspection, she had one of the few character flaws I just can’t look past. She was absolutely static. Immutable. The only character she was willing to interact with was Ragna, and even when interacting with him, she couldn’t hear a thing he said. In my interpretation, at the time, this made her a character that couldn’t connect with the outside world in any way. To me, she was an island. Absolutely remote. And completely useless to my interests.

A fear years later, a few months before the launch of Chronophantasma Extend, I ended up getting into BlazBlue anyway powered by sheer Terumi thirst. Are you guys starting to get a picture of my type yet? From then on, BB has remained my all time favorite series, and Terumi/Susano’o continues to be in my top three favorite characters, usually comfortably wearing the “#1 all time fave” crown. I suppose that answers the other half of your question.

Throughout this time, Nu still didn’t appeal to me at all. Locked in as my least favorite, definitely. Eventually, I got my college roommates into BB. One of the girls fell in absolute love with Nu. I couldn’t understand it at all. In hindsight, she’s right on every point about Nu that she likes, and I really appreciate those traits now too- but I couldn’t see it at the time. She was able to see Nu as an incredibly tragic character for the same reasons I saw her as inert. In the C-Series, Nu is alone, horribly alone, locked in her pain and her delusion. I saw that and ultimately felt she was beyond saving, but my associate felt that made her into a beautiful tragedy, a princess more worth saving than any other. Maybe I’m getting a little abstract out of nowhere here, but I now feel that’s the best way to look at Nu’s story- she’s locked away in this fairy tale delusion. Ugh, I have more to say on it, but look at how long this has gotten already!

Anyways, then BBDW came out, and Mori gave us a glimpse of what he intended to be the next step in Nu’s story. Juusan, XIII, Thirteen. And hooooooooooooly shit my guys, I absolutely love Nu, XIII, and her arc now. It’s her fucking healing arc! It’s her fucking growing arc! She’s finally able to start becoming a person, fleshing out, interacting with the world!

I’m not the type who really needs or even WANTS redemption arcs for characters, but Nu DESPERATELY needed this chapter. My biggest gripe with her, as mentioned, was that it seemed impossible for her to have any kind of relationship with ANYONE. I guess I was a little close minded- I needed to see evidence that Nu could be reached, that she could wake up from her fairy tale slumber and start really living. And we have that now, in XIII.

Looking back on the writing from the earlier games, when I hated Nu so much, I see those scenes in an entirely different light. Her first fucking scene in every route is waking up, our sleeping beauty. But she wakes up to the same dream every time. She’s put right back into her coffin, death, to dream and dream and wake and be killed again. Isn’t that kind of beautiful??? Her CT story mode IS a dream, it’s a desperate dream, the one she holds most dearly but doesn’t even understand- Nu is a character who THINKS what she wants more than anything is a romantic love with her prince charming, but we see in her story mode there, and in the relationships that finally save her, that what she really wanted was a full relationship as a real person. Platonic relationships, with no expectations, just someone seeing her and maybe offering her a smile. She craved, needed, the ability to connect with others, but that was a dream so far out of reach she couldn’t understand it. I KNOW I’M RAVING AT THIS POINT, I DIDN’T MEAN TO, BUT C’MON IT’S BEAUTIFUL.

And, and!!! As I mentioned, the relationships that finally save her, finally wake her up from the dream the same way the BB world is being woken up from ITS looping dream (WHICH IS ANOTHER AWESOME CONNECTION AND GREAT WRITING, THE WAY NU AS A CHARACTER CAN BE SEEN TO EMBODY THE LOOPING WORLD, NEW AND BROKEN AND UNABLE TO CHANGE WITH NO HOPE OF TOMORROW)

Ahem, ahem-- It’s familial connections. She so badly wants that romance with Ragna, but it isn’t the love of a prince that saves her- it’s when he accepts her as his sister. It’s when he accepts her as a victim and her own person and not a bastardization of Saya, and comes to save this lonely girl. An echo of his little sister he couldn’t save. HIS ENTIRE JOURNEY WAS TO SAVE HIS SISTER AND HE FINALLY DOES. IN SO MANY WAYS, INCLUDING IN THAT MOMENT OF REACHING OUT TO NU.

And then it’s Noel. And Lamba. Her sisters. Again, people who once saw her as a disgusting representation of what they feared the most, a replacement or a copy- when they let that go, see past it, and really face her, they take Nu in as their little sister. And its their patient love that heals her. Just like Ragna, when they first met Nu, her connection to Saya and themselves terrified them, infuriated them, but now they look directly at that connection and don’t see it as a threat. It fills them with compassion. It can be a lovely thing, to share something so fundamental as your creation with someone else. There’s love in that. They see it now and are able to offer it to her.

This answer has been very messy and very long, but hey, let’s pretend it isn’t that bad. Give me some mercy, I’m on so much cough syrup.

#ao no kokagami #nu 13 #juusan #konoe a mercury #yuuki terumi #noel vermillion #ragna the bloodedge #lambda 11 #bb meta #prime field device #boundary interface prime field device #murakumo unit

[kay-elle-cee]

Hi wow hello omg!! Thank you so much for agreeing to do this Ask the Author with me (': I just have a few questions about your first ever smutty fic, Things That Haven't Happened Yet...

What is your personal favorite (real) sex scene in the fic?

Which smut scene do you think is the most well written?

Which smut scene did you write first?

Do you plan to write more smut?

What's your favorite overall scene in the fic?

Whose POV was harder to write?

Knowing the other dreams James and Lily had but you perhaps didn't get to write about, who do you think has a naughtier mind between the two of them?

[SPOILER ALERT] Did they actually eat lunch? James surely needed some carbs by that point but there were other things to finish when the story ended. 👀

my article will be published in vanity fair next week, thx again for interviewing w me <3

Omg Charles 🙈 Thank you so much for all these questions, I'm so so so happy you loved TTHHY and am HAPPY to answer these questions!

Under the cut for spoilers and NSFW discussion!

1. What is your personal favorite (real) sex scene in the fic?

Ah this is so hard, because honestly I think it’s a tied between the first two. Because the first one is just the raw kind of heat and frustrated passion, but the second one is a little of that with the introduction of “oh wait actually maybe that’s not all it is”. If I HAD to choose, I guess I’ll say the second. Would love to hear other people’s opinions!

2. Which smut scene do you think is the most well written?

Okay I had to go back and reread them all and maybe it’s a bit of a cop out but I love the shower scene. It’s less detailed than the others but it’s very clear in my head and I liked the transition between the sex and the more intimate moments.

3. Which smut scene did you write first?

I mostly went in order for this fic! So that first time in the Order library was the first! (The only scene I remember writing out of order was that final scene outside of cottage—I've had that written since before chapter 3 was posted!)

4. Do you plan to write more smut?

I do! It won't be in everything I write, but I do have some other concepts/fics in my drafts. I unexpectedly had a ball with this and it's kind of hard to stop lol.

5. What's your favorite overall scene in the fic?

Shower scene. Hands down now and forever the shower scene. The idea that that's kind of like the shift in everything, and them finishing but just....staying there, connected, kissing (and through those kisses, at least on James' part, communicating things he's too scared to say). And then the follow up and the intimacy of just like, being together and showering together and those kind of gentle, not necessarily sexual touches. UGH. I'm sorry this is the scene I'm most insane over.

6. Whose POV was harder to write?

Weirdly, Lily's? I feel like I've been SO in her head lately for some other projects, it was just nice to be in James' head. And James is very straightforward, I think, with what he feels in this fic, whereas Lily has to come to terms with it. (Not that I don't LOVE writing that, but I think just wanting to make sure I wrote that believably contributed to a little more friction while writing Lily).

7. Knowing the other dreams James and Lily had but you perhaps didn't get to write about, who do you think has a naughtier mind between the two of them?

Okay so. I think for Lily for so long this has just (in her conscious mind) been about physical attraction. Her garden dream is the most...I'll say out there of the fantasies—all of James' were private moments (even the drunken alleyway snog), but Lily's garden moment was I think the riskiest we saw (OUT in the OPEN). So WITH all that preamble, I think Lily's dreams were a little more out there and riskier (against a window, chances of being caught, etc) BUT I think she's a bit better at controlling herself once they're together, and it's James that can't keep his hands off her and possibly instigates more of those scenarios.

8. [SPOILER ALERT] Did they actually eat lunch? James surely needed some carbs by that point but there were other things to finish when the story ended. 👀

Listen, maybe it's because I'm old (compared to them) but I do think they ate lunch. I think it was a very quick lunch and Lily was adorably a little nervous having him in her little flat, but James was just kind of in awe of this place he'd only seen like once irl and then reoccurring in her dreams of them. When they were done with lunch (or ate what they both deemed was 'enough for now'), she showed him her appreciation for the garden. They did not make it to her bedroom.

Thank you SO much for these questions, Charles! They were so fun to answer and I'm always happy to scream about my fics into the void. 🥰

#TTHHY spoilers #kelsey writes #jily #asked and answered #itsjamespotter #tthhy

[intothegenshinworld]

Hi, so about the paralysed reader thing.

Could you maybe do the same thing with Yae, Raiden, Shenhe and Ganyu ?

I might not be paralysed but I have a condition that often doesn’t allow me to put any weight on my right foot and sometimes I feel weak and shameful about it so it’s kind of comforting to read that.

Gn or male reader if u want.

Thanks so much and have a great day!

Note: Second part of this post

I usually tend to write gn!reader so more people can read it, hope it's okay! :) I also decided to add some more characters as well (since I was feeling like it.) Didn't really proof read this so lets hope its alright!!

While Yae Miko might tease you at times, she'd make sure to never hurt you with her comments. The Grand Narukami shrine is located on top of a huge mountain, truly unfortunate since you couldn't climb all those stairs, but she'd make a point to visit the Yae publishing house more often, if not only to visit you right after. Yae would bring you snacks from the vendors she passes and share them with you during her visits. Often rambles about the work at the shrine and her authors, tends to have the latest gossip as well. ''Oh, come on, don't be so nervous. You tell me all about you, and I'll tell you all about me. Deal?''

Ganyu is a hard-working woman in need of a break. She'd offer to take you on a stroll in your wheelchair/to carry you when your legs would give up on you, but please tell her to lie in the grass with you! She'll have interesting stories to tell and would love to hear about your stories as well! ''This puts my mind at ease. I hope you enjoyed today as much as I did.''

Raiden Ei had been meditating in her plane of Euthymia for a good while!! You shouldn't be surprised when she invites you for a visit there! If you do happen to go outside with her, Ei will follow you around to help you when needed. With the two of you going around the city streets you're bound to get many goodies for free! ''Shall I let someone fetch some desserts for us? Hmm? You usually don't eat desserts in the morning?''

Shenhe loves that you accept her the way she is and can't help but enjoy every minute you spend with her, (even if she rarely mentions it out loud). She's very strong and would opt to carry you to each corner of Liyue if you need it. Shenhe might not be the most talkative person but you surely will feel safe and protected while she's around you. ''I wouldn't mind carrying you for a while longer. If you happen to feel fatigued we can take a break as well.''

As the 11th harbinger it's no surprise that Childe is stronger than most people. He wouldn't be seen pushing your wheelchair across the streets of Liyue harbor because he keeps insisting on carrying you. He always finds a way to bump into hillicurls to fights them with you in his arms. Childe might not be the best option if you want a quiet afternoon-- but you'd always be safe when he's around you. ''Morning, comrade! Ready to go on another adventure? Don't be surprised if we happen to come across another hillicurl camp. They have been everywhere nowadays.''

Albedo would be the one to invent all kinds of inventions to make your life easier. Upgrades to your wheelchair or crutches if you have the ability to walk with support, he can make it all. He comes down to make these inventions in the Knights of Favonious HQ. Tends to steal you away by asking you to test something new he made. You can assume that he will carry you up and down (at least once) from Dragonspine. ''Oh, this? It's a sketch I made a few days ago. You want to see more? Perhaps I should sketch you sometime.''

#genshin impact #genshin x reader #genshin x you #genshin imagines #genshin impact x reader #genshin impact x gender neutral reader #genshin fluff #yae miko #yae x reader #yae x y/n #ganyu #ganyu x reader #ganyu x y/n #raiden shogun #raiden ei #raiden ei x reader #raiden x reader #raiden ei x y/n #raiden x y/n #shenhe #shenhe x reader #shenhe x y/n #childe #childe x reader #tartaglia #childe x y/n #tartaglia x reader #albedo #albedo genshin #albedo x reader

[elvisabutler]

rode hard and put away wet

summary: relationships are about give and take. as much as elvis gives, he has to take nearly as much. you let him. fandom: austin butler | elvis ( 2022 ) rating: m pairing: austin elvis x reader word count: 1420 warnings: degradation kink. actions that can be seen in a s.a. tint. oral ( m ). use of the derogatory names ( slut and whore ). use of the phrase "poor white trash" to describe elvis. hair pulling, holy shit hair pulling. face fucking-ish. i think that's it? i might have missed something. author's note: i am not good at writing degradation kink by itself. i like reading it especially for certain characters/people/fics, but i have learned with this that i am not the best at it. in addition to that knowledge, i do not condone kinks like this getting sprung on people even if they're together and in love and care for one another. so this is version four, maybe five of this, if i didn't post this version y'all were not going to get a degradation kink blurb out of me. if any of y'all want to know the versions i cycled through i'll tell you but they went from something that had military kink attached to it to something that veered way too close to sa for liking, so you understand how hard this was for me to actually write. sorry if it's not my best. also feel free to read this as actual elvis.

It starts in the 50s, you're both young and you both fancy yourself in love with one another. The Colonel had tried to get you out of the picture the second he had met you filling Elvis's head with whispers of people not paying for his records if they knew he had a girl. Your counter is simply pointing out multiple artists who seem to make a perfectly respectable living despite being married. You point to actors who have significant others who are doing perfectly well. You win that argument. It starts in the 50s and you two are in love with each other, you two learn each other's bodies like the back of your hand and Elvis whispers promises to get you a ring and having you as his wife soon. Once you're all settled in Graceland he'll buy you that ring and you'll get married and he'll give you a baby because that's what you're supposed to do when you love someone. It starts in the 50s and Elvis gets himself in trouble with his dancing that you've loved from the second you laid eyes on him. He's in trouble and the Colonel being the idiot that he is books him on the Steve Allen show and there's a real life hound dog and Elvis is angrier than you've ever seen him and Scotty and Bill have already left leaving just you and Elvis and that stupid suit.

"Baby it's not-" You start before Elvis grabs your face, forcing you to look at him.

"It's an embarrassment is what it was. Got me dressed like a butler singin' to a dog. I-I- you don't you probably think I'm some poor white-" He cuts you off with such force you almost jump, you know he won't hurt you but you also know that all the Presleys have tempers.

"Elvis!" You shout, grabbing ahold of his wrists before you look at him dead in the eyes. "What- I don't think that, you know I don't you know I think you're the sweetest-"

"I don't want you to think I'm sweet-like you can walk all over me like they just did." He pauses his chest heaving. "Get on your knees."

Your eyebrows raise up and you shake your head. "Where- we're in public, E."

"I'm not asking you twice, mama. On your goddamn knees." His hand moves to your hair and you feel his fingers curl around the strands before he pulls just slightly. You fall to your knees pretty quickly.

Elvis doesn't waste a moment before undoing his pants, pulling them and his underwear down as best as he could exposing his surprisingly hard cock. You eye it and then look up at Elvis, questioning what exactly your boyfriend is trying to do before you actually voice his name. "Elvis?"

"Gonna take my cock like the slut you are, like the whore you are when we're at home, aren't you? Gonna let all of them know I've had this mouth when we're not even married. That I've already used you and if I wanted I could leave you a ruined woman."

Never in your life have you let anyone talk to you like that, let alone the man you're in love with. The man you plan on spending your life with but there's something in his eyes, there's a glint in his eyes that sends the words straight into your brain where they do something to you. They send a jolt of arousal through you so fast and sudden you shudder with the force of it. Elvis's eyes widen just a bit before he smirks.

"You like me talking to you like that. You fucking city girls, should have known. Take my cock, shove it between those pretty lips before I do it for you."

You tilt your head just slightly. "I don't think your poor white trash self could get it in on the first try anyway."

Before Elvis has a chance to respond or pull your hair to force your mouth on his cock you're taking him in your mouth, relaxing your throat to attempt to deep throat him. His hand tightens in your hair as he tries to control the movement of your mouth. He wants to use you as hole, something to be around his cock and bring him off. You find that it's not something you mind, though you'd prefer to be more of an active participant in this. So your hand moves to cover his and every time he tries to pull you off of him, you push yourself back on. Your eyes are watering as you try to breathe while focusing on everything else including the filth you hear coming out of Elvis's mouth.

"Think you're all that like everyone else. Think you can control me, thinkin' ya know what's best for me. Ain't none of you making money like I am. Got ya a pretty house, gonna get you a pretty ring, gonna give ya everything you want and ya still want more." His grip tightens once again and the sting on your scalp has tears actually coming from your eyes and Elvis laughs.

"Aw, the pretty girl can't take my cock? Can't take me pulling her hair? Ain't so high and mighty now. Just a slut for my cock."

You nod even with his cock still in your mouth and your hand moves to touch yourself before his foot nudges your knee.

"No. You're such a slut- such a whore you're gonna come when I say without touchin' yourself. Ya take orders so well."

He's not wrong, you do take orders well and you feel like you might come without touching yourself but you had wanted to feel your fingers inside your cunt while he practically face fucked you. You wanted him to be forced to watch you take pleasure in an act you think he's doing just to blow off steam because he's never been like this even when he loses his temper. His voice above you is starting to slur, and his words that he's mumbling are starting to turn to straight nonsense. You know he enjoys the slight bite of your teeth sometimes and so you shift your lips just enough so that when he moves your head off there's a bite of your teeth sliding against his cock. It works from the way his hips stutter and you feel the warmth of his come flooding your mouth, practically choking you before you're slapping Elvis's thigh in an attempt to get him to let you spit out his come before he shakes his head.

"Be a good little whore and swallow my come, baby. Then you can come."

That does it for you, you're swallowing, traces coming out of your mouth anyway just from how you had started to cough around his cock but you feel your eyes roll in the back of your head and your toes curl and your cunt clench around nothing as you come. Elvis's grip on your hair loosens and he finally allows you to pull completely off his cock as you cough and practically fall to the floor, breathing heavily as you do. You glare at him through your eyelashes.

"Elvis Aaron Presley-"

"I'm- Sorry darlin'- I just- I-I everyone's just been pullin' me everywhere and ya heard Scotty and I needed-" He tries explaining his actions before you wave him off.

"If you- If you ever need me to do that again, I- I'm not going to say I'll enjoy it every day or more often than once in a blue moon, but- tell me next time. Warn me?"

"You mean it, baby? I didn't hurt you did I? You really liked it?" He sounds hopeful, like he's going to file this away for those times when he's wound tighter than fully coiled spring.

"I liked it. A little." A pause and you're moving to sit up properly. "Now help me up like a gentleman. Or did you forget how to be like that?"

His bashful grin as he holds out his hand tells you your answer before he actually says anything. "No, ma'am. Not at all, mama."

If he remembers what you said this day every time things don't go his way- every time he decides throwing a tantrum is a good idea. Well, it did all start in the 50s, you just realized letting it happen in the 60s and the 70s wasn't the worst thing that could happen.

#austin butler #austin butler elvis #austin butler elvis x reader #austin butler elvis fanfic #elvis presley fanfic #elvis presley x reader #elvis x reader #austin butler elvis smut #elvis presley smut #elvis presley #i think that's all the tags? #kinktober 2022 #ally's kinktober 2022

[ravenishishtrash]

Okay so ✨Hamilton fanficion✨

Back in 2018 I was a big Hamilton (and other musicals like BMC, DEH, Heathers) fan, and I'm talking like a having amino (and a semi decent following on it), drawing silly fanart of the characters in maid suits, reading fanfiction fan

And sometimes I just go by my day and I randomly remember something from a Hamilton fanfiction that makes me stop in my tracks

And so, I decided to come onto here and provide a list of things I remember, that I want to forget, and am afraid that I'll forget at the same time, about Hamilton fanficion

(this being said, if you're still a hamilton fanfiction writer, you do you, this post does not mean to offend you)

I think like 80% of the fics if not more were college AU fics, and 15% were just different AUs but I don't think I've actually read a fic that wasn't a random one-shot taking place in canon timeline (I do believe it was because all of the hamilton ff writers just like me were 16 back then, and just simply did not know how to write historical fiction)

Most of the fics were LAMS (which is Alexander Hamilton x John Laurens) and it was practically canon in fandom eyes, and before anyone says anything, I've seen the letters, of course I've seen them but guyz, I think we were just a little bit delulu with how firmly we believed this (and I'm including myself in this!)

Still on shipping, the second most popular one was Jamilton (Thomas Jefferson x Alexander Hamilton) and I'm gonna be honest, this was my shit, I enjoyed this dynamic a lot more (I always found friends to lovers a bit boring), but man, were the ship wars brutal, I remember when amino mods tried to actually do some sort of a debate lams vs jamilton in which there were actual teams that wrote whole essays about which ship is more valid, but they ended up insulting each other after maybe two rounds

The last ship with its own point is Hamburr (Alexander Hamilton x Aaron Burr), I've always perceived this one as a cool kids ship, I think people who shipped this were the most chill about it

Background ships included Mulette (Muligan x Lafayette), which was one of those ships that were always in the background some sort of "if you don't ship this as your side ship i don't trust you" kind of ship, the same goes to Jeffmads (Jefferson x Madison) in lams fics, and in a lesser degree, and i don't remember its name, Eliza Schuler x Maria Lewis Reynolds (if you don't remember her from her name, is the woman Hamilton cheats on Eliza with), which is always fun, we love seeing some wlw

And now, the random facts that were just headcanons that people very often included, Jefferson and Lafayette were almost always in some sort related (especially in Jamilton fics) and that's because of the double cast, but I don't really think the same was true for any other character it was just them

Hamilton was always a caffeine addict with a bad sleep schedule who was way too engaged in whatever topic the fic made him and I remember one fic (it was a college au, of course) where the whole point was that it was actively ruining his relationships around him (it was a hamburr fic)

John Laurens loved turtles bc of some historical letters in which he mentioned he liked turtles and fandom did its thing and you couldn't read a lams fic where turtles weren't mentioned at least once

Charles Lee and Samuel Seabury were always minor villains/mean college students and the latter was sometimes in a weird unhealthy relationship with (king) George

There was no Eliza slander! I know it's a weird point, but now seeing how fandoms like spn or 911 reacted to female love interest I’m actually suprised there wasn't any, she was always just a good friend (or, in one Soulmate AU I think it was Jamilton, Eliza had Hamilton's name on her wrist but he didn't have hers and that was just brutal)

There was this fic that I won't mention by its whole name (it's off the internet anyway, I don't think the author wants to be reminded of it nor associated with it), that was a hanahaki AU Jamilton that nearing the end of its run had 300k+ words; it was about Alex having a mean spirited rivalry with Jefferson at their corpo lawyer job but hearing he has hanahaki so deciding he wants to be nice to him now, but little does he know that the hanahaki in question is *for* him and later he himself develops hanahaki for Jefferson and they even live together at one point so they have this situation where both of them are willing to die in order to keep the other one happy and cure them by being their rebounds but they actively making each other worse, it's probably not as good as I remember it to be but godDAMN was it a cult classic it really was one of the kind, ALSO a girl on a plane asked me what fic I was reading bc she was peeking over my shoulder because it looked good and it's just one of the interactions I will *never* forget

This fandom was also my first impression of A/B/O dynamic and it wasn't a good one, one of the fics with it that I remember was Jamilton, in which Hamilton was some sort of Omega activist (there was a scene where he was annoyed that romantic comedies in universe pushed the agenda of omega leaving their omegaxomega relationship for an alpha when oxo can be fully normally sufficient) and Jefferson was an alpha and there was a scene at a diner where Jefferson was spreading his pheromones so the other alphas would stop looking at Hamilton? yeah thanks, no thanks

Washington was 95% of the time Hamilton's father in one way or another but what did you expect, in one fic he was even Hamilton's mother soulmate but she died before he met her which I didn't know was possible in soulmates aus

I read one Jamilton fic on wattpad (even then I rarely used wattpad) that I think was (a college au) about how madison and jefferson were in abusive relationship and hamilton "rescued" jefferson out of it? (it feaured a truly iconic quote in a scene that i still remember where jefferson was having a panic attack in the dorm's bathroom and madison didn't want hamilton to think he was an abuser so he said something along the lines of "Don't listen to this whore" and Hamilton responded "I won't listen to a whore" and Jefferson was like no he also hates me no one loves me and then Hamilton added "But Thomas isn't a whore." and I kid you not, I think about this scene every time I see that stupid "do you think im pretty?" "no." ":(" "you're beautiful" meme) and my art was featured in one of the chapters! it wasn't a good art, but it was one of my biggest achievements back then (I drew the most art during my hamilton phase, I wish I kept that passion for drawing in the years to come)

And... I think that's all that I can think of off top of my head

Despite many peoples' opinion now, I don't think the fandom was wrong in how they perceived the source material, any who was in the fandom at that time can tell you that sometimes it felt like it's own entity, those were our characters and what they did in the musical and the historical context didn't really matter in the long run, besides some limited posts about lams or just funfacts about the real lives of the characters (i have so many funfacts about inaccuracies in hamilton stored in my head), just what the dynamic between them was

But, as have many, I grew out of hamilton fanfiction, it shaped how I moved around fanfiction and fandom spaces for years and no matter how much "cringe" that fandom was (and it was cringe in every way possible) I probably won't forget the fun parts (for example how I joined judges guild on amino that was supposed to host contests regularly and then we did one contest and 90% of the members stopped responding so I pretty much single-handedly picked the winners when we had like I think about 20-30 entries? contests were a big deal on amino) and I won't regret it, I think it was one of the if not best then funniest places to be on the Internet in 2018

I have recently rewatched Hamilton now that it is available on streaming and one) I found out that I didn't really know all the lyrics and certainly not what some parts mean (english as you probably already have noticed is not my first language) and two) I actually found myself thinking, man, i would like to read some good fanfiction about this, but not a single one Hamilton fanfiction on ao3 can be separated from how the fandom perceived the characters and that's okay, it's just the way it is

If you truly want to know the grasp of what was normal or not in this fandom, let me tell you this: I saw Jefferson Miku Binder before it was a meme, and it really wasn't that weird, I was seeing art and headcanons like these on the regular, that just how the fandom looked like

and with that, I'm signing off

#fanfiction #alexander hamilton #nostalgia #my post

[wingsfreedom]

The Gladiator 300th Chapter Celebration Event

I went off the model in order to write a post that can better express my feelings. (So sorry in advance to @kigozula)

What make you stick to the story so far? I'll start with shorter lines then longer ones.

It's based on the original but it doesn't try imitate it: instead the work has it's own identity. And yet it remains one of, if not the most faithful, attentive and respectful adaption of canon I've seen. Two birds with one stone.

It's so satisfyingly coherent, consistent and connected.

It follows reason and isn't too much over the top.

It's very creative with the concepts and has unexpected plot twists that keep me invested.

The events that spread through the story make for an engaging world-buliding and make the universe feels alive.

The author doesn't hate-write the characters they dislike in canon which was a pleasant surprise to see these characters being handled with care.

Since this deserves it's own point again: for once, Zuko is a likable character.

The love between the romantic couples is real and not something left for interpretation.

I never expected to find great battle scenes so that was another pleasant surprise and left me overwhelmed with excitement.

Sokka/Azula, how their bond affects them and how they affect the world around them is the heart that leads the story. In other words, the world doesn't revolve around them, instead they lead the world.

I don't know how to explain it and I may not have payed enough attention to everything but I like the story's take on morality. Bad deeds aren't overlooked, there are consequences, someone can be human is 100% a terrible person, a good person can be human and yet have darkness in their souls. I like the complexity.

I'm not an expert on this topic to say the story's take on slavery was handled with the care necessary but I can see it's being handled seriously and I really appreciated it wasn't swapped under the rug as an edgy setup for romance.

The story takes friendships seriously! It doesn't look down on friendship or consider it a bond not worth developing which is really wholesome.

I like Azula's side of the story in Part 3, maybe I have word it better in the review but I like how it's about not giving up against the extremely difficult odds and finding light and warmth in the darkest times -- I was naturally driven towards the source of that light and warmth which was in Azula's room and Sokka's small group.

It treats women's issues pretty well imo; love, pregnancy, marriage, domestic problems, controlling fathers who care about their image more than their own daughters -- they're not downplayed and the abusers face consequences.

The character writing make me emotionally invested in the characters even in the ones I'm not actively interested in but I still enjoy reading about them all the same (even in small scenes like that of Longshot, the way he spoke give him personality, and Ursa's parents were funny too).

I appreciate how the dark topics were handled tastefully (unlike GoT or Overlord) -- while some scenes make me feel greatly disturbed, the narrative doesn't spend great lengths to make you feel sick and this precisely what make them more effective or impactful (the public executions, the pregnancy and abortion discussions, the examination and the one night stand...ect, I felt disturbed even while listing these).

ATLA has my favorite power system in all of fiction because of the realistic martial arts combined with the chakras/wheels system of yoga... and so I enjoyed the expansion here by the introduction of the gold fire, fire resonance, special fire forging metal give it special properties, adding mysterious lightbending and the corruption system (or casting a shadow over the elements)

And, of course, I can't neglect the reason I started this story for: Azula. This is my favorite take on her character so far that I won't even bother with anything else at this point (and because I'm pretty much done with this franchise/fandom as well)

Original characters

Rei: I like how her character is about creating a meaningful life out seemingly meaningless existence or rather start

Shaofeng: I just appreciate the fact that this is the first time I read about a villain who managed to be more irredeemable than Ozai himself yet an effective element in the story. We haven't seen what is his true deal yet but I'm looking forward to uncover his mystery.

Seezu: I like the gloomy aesthetics and the power set (it's very unique, though morbid). It was also funny how his cleaning skills were better than his assassination skills (in FLS arc at least). And he's surprisingly, weirdly endearing in a sense too, not gonna lie. I hope that doesn't change.

The Quiz:

• Name of the first Gladiator Sokka fought against? Spawn of Volcano (I still remember the funny exchange: Chan "oh no my Spawn's in trouble" Azula "why do you call him your spawn? Is he your child or something" still makes me laugh

• How many years are Azula and Sokka a couple now? 5 or 6 years (since Azula picked Sokka as her gladiator)

• Which character found out about Azula and Sokka’s secret relationship first? Toph (edit: and Rui Shi!! But since he didn't have a name yet back then it was so easy for him to slip lol)

• Which character felt something might be going on/will be going on between Sokka and Azula from the beginning? Piandao and Lo & Li

• What’s the name of Ozai’s first love? Ozai's first, Ursa's second

• What was the first Gladiator event Azula and Sokka took part in? The Fire Fountain City event when Sokka knocked Ozai's statue over.

• How often did the Blue Wolf fight in the Slate? Two times. Against the second-ranked gladiator and against Yang's wife.

• Who would have almost been the potential future prince? 🤔 there have been 4 princes already plus Zhao currently which make them 5. So do you mean a person unrelated to the fire royals? Any potential suitor for Azula. Kuan the Obnoxious (affectionate), Hahn the Obnoxious (derogatory), Aonu sponsor of the second-ranked gladiator and Chan.

• How old was Aang when he was forced to freeze himself and Appa? This is a good question. I think it must have been stated somewhere in the South Pole chapters which I wasn't as interested in them as I was in Sokkla's side of the story but after some pondering my guess would be 18 years old.

Anyway, there isn't always much I can say about a fanfiction but I think Seyary is a great story teller and I wish a future with more accomplishments for her.

#gladiator #sokkla #atla fic #I could've wrote more thoughts based on Kigozula's questions but this post got long and is already enough i guess

[isabellehemlock]

🔥 ask game: 4, 8, 16

Hi Sindi! Thanks for sending me an ask 😎

Since you're all things TOG I hope it's alright to assume these questions for that fandom, so that's through the lens I'll be answering with 🤗

4. What was the last straw that made you finally block that annoying person?

I have "I block liberally" in my bio for a reason lol.

I mean, I strive not to label anyone by adjectives as if that's all they are - and lol, plenty of people find me annoying, too! - but looking at my blocked list, the majority overall theme (keeping in mind there's individual circumstances too, so not a general commentary on every single person blocked) but yeah, the majority? People who stalk and harass people across platforms - over nothing more than what they ship, kinks, etc.

Like I'm not talking about someone who sends their friend a post and wants to discuss to process or something - but like coordinated campaigns, spite events, efforts of several people across platforms, not only against one person but anyone associates with them, and/or telling people what public spaces they're allowed to be in, what ship positions they should or should not write, events they engage in, who to talk to, etc etc.

It's one thing to write on your own personal blog what you're into, and would love to see more of (I do that, too!) - but once it slides into one on one hounding, name calling, harassment, yeah, bye.

8. Common fandom opinion that everyone is wrong about

Okrrr I'm hesitant to call it "wrong" because well, in life there's always exceptions, so maybe uh, let's reframe as ill-informed? And really, this isn't fandom's fault when the one effin piece of marketing Netflix did was string together a few random bullet points of "facts" for our Immortal Family and then a chunk of people have been dissecting the conflicting comic, movie, and now blink-and-you'll-miss-it marketing of said movie ever since (including, but certainly not limited to: where is Joe from, and why was he in Jerusalem?)

But as someone who's background and studies involve Church history, I'll admit I've been a bit 🫠 at some of the things stated as "facts" in regard to Nicky’s background. I'm not suggesting that someone should have to study up on any given subject in order to write fic (like, it's free fic, not a thesis), but I'm surprised how prevalent it is?

Just this narrative that Nicky *had* to be of noble birth, *and* automatically be more learned than Joe, *and* was a virgin *and* essentially wore his cassock right under the armor onto the battlefield (I'm having a little fun with that last one to lighten the mood lol).

Since I know I like to be informed when someone presents historical facts - I'll link a few articles and links below:

@qqueenofhades wrote an excellent post about the why a priest would not be wielding a weapon - and here's a book about how the Church forbade it, though (ironically, out of the Crusades) thoughts shifted about the Church being actively involved in the sense of authorizing and even directing military campaigns - but again, the average priest maybe had a weapon in the 1200s, and solely for the sake of self protection while traveling. But no, your average parish priest wasn't swinging a long sword onto the battlefield in his cassock.

Here's some information about how non nobles could become priests, or heck, even illegitimate children of priests could become priests.

And yes, 100% there was a social hierarchy within the Church and often to climb it you were likely educated and noble etc etc etc - and yet our Church history does include having illiterate popes, too (and really, just because someone is illiterate doesn't mean they are unlearned or stupid or incapable of learning it at any time. It doesn't have to be an either/or).

And though of course celibacy was encouraged from the beginning, the Church did not make an official decree about it until the 1100s. Priests had families and children - though not often - and yes, there were definitely clergy and religious who were not interested in making, much less, upholding vows of chastity around Nicky’s mortal timeline.

All that to say, that though it's not impossible that a random priest (perhaps a military chaplain ministering to soldiers?) found himself needing to grab a sword on the battlefield in the chaos around him (because perhaps he had a few years of training with a sword as a kid before being sent to a monastary?) - I don't think it was the given I've seen some people declare it as?

But here's the sad truth: Nicky is just a fictional character with conflicting canon sources. So, there will always be discourse. Sigh.

However, for anyone reading along and looking for more resources for their Crusades fic, I've written one up here, and linked not only other sources, but from @actualmermaid resource post as well as the old guard hub resource doc.

16. You can't understand why so many people like this thing (characterization, trope, headcanon, etc)

Hmmmm I'm not sure if I'm like deeply offended by any particular tropes/canon as much as I filter out certain tags due to personal reasons, etc - I mean even the whole Nicky priest discourse is (for some) potentially rooted in priest kink love lol, so I mean, to each his own?

I definitely filter out the noncon that has happened between Joe and Nicky, but again, that has more to do with personal reasons vs say, a judgment on content (though please pleaseeeee tag it properly).

If you've made it down to here, bless ~ I know this was potentially a heavier reply than what the game was looking for 👀

#answered ask #choose violence ask #discourse #fandom stuff #this isn't commentary about anyome enjoying priestNicky #i blame Netflix really #I'm just answering the ask in regards to historical context #kats catholic commentary

[marypsue]

for the ask game: 10, 11

+ 76 with the hawkins indiana psychic baby boom series. i know it's not done yet, but anything that didn't make into the first two parts and won't fit into/make sense in the 3rd one either?

love the way you write xx

[from this meme]

I've done 10, but I'll gladly do the other two! (And thank you very much!)

11. Link your three favorite fics right now

Ooh, that's a hard one. Like I said, I have a list that I need to get caught up on. I'm liking the 'right now' on this very much, though. It's doing some heavy lifting.

I've already mentioned @maddie-grove's Tonight, Tonight, The Highway's Bright, so for three other ongoing fics, I'm going to plug Wavelength, by @bixxelated (Stranger Things season 1 AU where Mike also has psychic abilities) because it's so much fun, and there is a bigger mystery unfolding than I've been able to see the full shape of yet, i bet you think about me by @rocketnebulas (Stranger Things, Steve/Jonathan, they broke up but still share a Spotify account AU) because I just love the way this author writes romantic relationships, and A Stumble by @definitely-not-a-bug (Stranger Things, post-season 1 - season 2 AU where El got caught when she went back to Mike's house after the events of season 1, and it changes everything and nothing) because the character work in that one is just killing me and it's frankly criminal how little attention it's gotten.

76. Did you have any ideas that didn’t make the final cut of the Hawkins, Indiana psychic baby boom?

There's actually a scene I've been sitting on that I cut from part 2 because trying to make it fit was making the story drag! I was hoping to shoehorn it in somewhere in part 3, but the more I write, the less it seems to fit what's going on between the characters at this point in time, so it very well might just end up on the cutting room floor.

...

“So, tell me. When the Brain says ‘if you need anything at all’, does that include help digging up a pumpkin patch by hand?”

Joyce sighs, jabbing the point of her shovel into the dirt and leaning heavily against the handle. “Why do you have such a problem with him? And don’t try to tell me it’s just that he’s too good to be true, again.”

Whatever answer she’s hoping for – and even she’s not sure – she doesn’t get it. Hopper just goes back to throwing shovelsful of dirt out of the steadily-growing hole at their feet and doesn’t meet her eyes.

“I worry about you,” he says, finally, to the dirt.

“Worry about - ! Hop, he’s the biggest sweetheart I’ve ever met. Nothing at all like -” Joyce bites off her own sentence. “Honestly, sometimes I wonder what it would even take to make him get really angry.” Honestly, sometimes, some perverse part of her wants to push. Wants to be cruel enough to find out.

Even thinking it, trying to put it into words, just makes it sound crazy even to Joyce. God, what is wrong with her. Bob’s seemingly endless reserves of calm patience should be reassuring, not anxiety-inducing.

Joyce just – she doesn’t know where his limits are. Doesn’t know if maybe she’s already found them. She’s fallen for one lying, manipulative sonuvabitch already. The more helpful and understanding Bob tries to be with each new thing Joyce has to put him through, the worse the nagging worry gets. That maybe he’s putting on a friendly face to get something out of her. Or quietly stewing over the best way to hurt her back for something Joyce didn’t even realise she’d done. That maybe it’s all about to blow up in her face –

That sounds paranoid. It sounds paranoid, and Joyce knows that’s not what Bob’s like. She trusts him, he’s never given any sign that he’s anything other than exactly what he seems to be, anything other than genuinely kind. It’s just –

Sometimes, she just doesn’t know what he’s thinking.

If only he’d blow his top every once in a while, draw a hard line of how much more he’ll put up with, maybe then Joyce would be able to tell where she stands.

“That wasn’t what -” Hopper huffs out a sigh, resting a foot on the head of the shovel and leaning against the handle as he looks Joyce in the face. “You got him right in the middle of everything. Keeping him in the dark’s gotta be a full-time job. Especially right now.”

“That’s why I don’t want to, anymore,” Joyce says. That’s part of the truth, anyway. “He’s part of my life, now. I – I want him to be a part of my life.”

#chatter #this is mary's fic tag #the hawkins indiana psychic baby boom #stranger things