#not really something that gets brought up because it's unflattering it's an ugly part of his character but it's there mingling with the goo

[stop-breaking-my-heart-dragonage]

Are there any companions you can't stand?

I wouldn't say I have any that I can't stand. Something that's so engaging to me about DA is that the companions have good, bad, and a lot in between. Honestly, I don't hate any of them. There are companions that I have more issues with than others, but I like them all; even, and sometimes especially, the ones that tend to be heavily hated on by the fandom.

The only companion that might fall into this category for me is Sebastian, but I totally acknowledge that I've yet to make an effort to use him when I play DA2. I legit just forget about him. How am I supposed to have a good grasp of his character when I don't engage with him outside of his companion quests? Plus I usually romance Anders so Sebastian always leaves my party in the end with threats of bringing an army down on Kirkwall for not killing Anders, soooo... yeah. Not the greatest impression he's left me with.

I would like to have a more well-rounded opinion of Sebastian because the concept of him is interesting; he's this chantry brother who is also a prince, but his family was murdered so he puts up a bounty on the chantry board [which admittedly is SO funny] and his companion quests are about avenging his family and helping him decide if he should take back his lands or remain a chantry brother. But then I talk to him, I listen to him talk to the other companions, and it's like... oh, the chantry has become his entire personality because the dude was brainwashed and now he's saying shit like the maker was actually the one who freed Fenris from slavery, and when Fenris tells him a story about how Denarius killed a child in a ritual for more power, Sebastian just doubles down that the maker has his reasons, like....babe, c'mon now.

I feel like I've read pieces about him written by fans who love him that are more compellingly written than he is, if that makes sense. Really, I would love to be educated by those who love him, especially Sebastian romancers because of all the love interests in all of DA, he's the one I look at and go, "....okay but why?" I have a lot of fun with character discussions and other perspectives so I mean that sincerely.

Also I think it's worth noting that when I play, I tend to get super into the roleplay of my warden/hawke/inquisitor, but while they have party members they can't stand, I have opinions that are separate from them, y'know?

For example, since I've talked about it a lot recently, my mage Hawke and Aveline butt heads constantly. By the end of Act 3, they're rivalry is heated and Ed's surprised Aveline even sided with him in the end because THAT is how much their relationship deteriorated over the course of the game... but then there's my warrior Hawke who adored Aveline. The two of them were best friends and Aris always gave her the benefit of the doubt, like she had Aveline's back through and through.

I've complained about Aveline a lot in my posts so it probably does sound like I can't stand her, but that's not true. Aveline's actually a companion that fascinates me, like she makes me go, "God, you're such an asshole, tell me more right now." and it drives me crazy how she and Carver are foils, like I love it so much, I could go on and on about how foiled they are, it makes me want to bite something.

It's very easy to look at Aveline and think she's just a bitch, she's a cop, she's a bad character, #Aveline-critical, bad companion, etc. I see it all the time, and not just with her, but with every companion in dragon age, y'know? I'm not saying that's wrong or anything; some characters just don't vibe with you or you have legit reasons for hating them and that's fine. I'm just saying some of it's very surface level unless you make the effort to elaborate.

If you don't like a character, you're less likely to make an effort to understand or see anything positive about them. You're more likely to have confirmation bias, so whenever they do or say anything, you go looking for the worst interpretation. I try not to do this just because for me, that's the "boring" approach to games like this but as we've seen, I'm not immune either... y'know, Sebastian.

But Carver gets this a lot, too, and I think I've made myself clear that Carver is my favorite, I love him, the Hawke twins are S-tier companions and I would throw everyone in Kirkwall into the ocean if it meant Bethany and Carver's happiness.

Now that I'm thinking about it, the characters a lot of fans can't stand are some of my favorites?

Like a lot of people shit on Sera, and I'm like "Nah, that's my girl! Listen, she's got a LOT of internalized issues, but we're working through them okay! She's getting better!"

And Vivienne? Oh, don't get me started on Vivienne, I have a whole deal about her. She's also an asshole and I love her.

My canon inquisitor is Surana who escaped the circle and joined the dalish, becoming Lavellan. Vivienne is a reflection of what Ash could've been if she hadn't run away with Jowan. She played the game of the circle, she stepped wherever she needed to step because Ash knew she was at a disadvantage by being an elf, for one, and for two, not coming from a family with wealth that would give her special privileges. Her downfall was buying into her own hype and believing she couldn't be wrong about Jowan, believing that she could either prevent them from making him tranquil or help him and Lily run away, and believing she was above punishment because she worked her way into being Irving's favorite. Yet it all bit her in the ass and she had to run… so then years later after living outside of the circle and realizing just what the chantry is, how it conditions and abuses mages and shit, she meets Vivienne who also played the game well and came out on top, who now spouts the same shit Ash used to spout and it's makes their dynamic sooo chewable.

Then there's Cullen who's not a companion but I lump him and Josephine in with the companions anyway. They're advisors, they're in the inner circle, they count.

He's such a spineless ass in DA2 like believe me, I get all the criticisms he gets... but he's also fairly polite to Hawke even if they're openly anti-templar, he's softer spoken, and he's unwell after what happened to him in DAO and Meredith's clearly taking advantage of his state... but then he becomes an advisor in DAI who is so done with people's bullshit and blatantly honest about it, like he looks at Chancellor Roderick like "this fucking guy again" and he's so ready to just go for it, y'know? Well... unless you're a pretty lady who bats her eyes at him, then suddenly he doesn't know how words work. Like sometimes I feel crazy because I find him to be so funny in DAI, and overall a compelling character that I enjoy interacting with even when he's being a total asshole. Yeah, there's issues in his writing but I appreciate the vision the writers were going for, even if they stumbled... except for Sheryl Chee, I don't appreciate her contribution of those few posts on the DA forums that everyone uses as a smoking gun to "prove" awful things about him. Nothing gets under my skin more in character discussions than bad faith arguments and there's so much of that when it comes to Cullen.

Actually, while we're on that, can I just add a note that when I first got into this fandom, I saw someone's post about Chee doing an interview where she said all those bad things about Cullen wanting to assault the mage warden and I was like, "What? An interview? What interview?? Where??" and I couldn't find shit until much later when I read another anti-Cullen post that cited a DA forum as the source for her saying those things... so not an interview. I went digging for the forum, went into the way back machine to find it.... only to discover that this smoking gun comes from a fanfiction forum where Mary Kirby was also talking about Sten and catgirls and y'all expect me to take that seriously?

We can have discussions about whether or not Cullen's a bad person or a bad character, but the moment you bring Sheryl Chee into it, I know you're here in bad faith and your argument is void.

Sorry for the tangent and the long answer but this is the stuff I enjoy. I could talk about the characters of DA for ages unprompted that when someone does throw me a bone, I will discuss and gush about them all.

#asks #dragon age #dao #da2 #dai #sebastian vael #aveline vallen #carver hawke #dai sera #cullen rutherford #vivienne de fer #i have to stop myself before i go on tangents about morrigan and wynne and anders and isabela and merrill and dorian and varric and- #literally everyone sksksks i can't help it #also on the flip side of this type of discussion i also love looking at characters that most people adore and discussing their flaws #like i love alistair he's my favorite companion in dao BUT it's easy to forgot that he can be just as petty and selfish too y'know? #if you don't execute loghain he can straight up just abandon you and leave and you'll find him in da2 as a drunk like... babe really left #and let you deal with the blight because he was so blinded by revenge and thirst for loghain's death and that's not great?? #not really something that gets brought up because it's unflattering it's an ugly part of his character but it's there mingling with the goo #and if you have a good relationship with him but don't know how he'll react when you spare loghain that can be devastating too #but it's also super understandable WHY he reacts like that WHY he leaves even if it's a selfish move on his part and hurts you #i dunno i think sometimes we're scared to talk about the ugly parts of our favorite characters because we love them #and don't want them to be wrong especially in fandom with a lot of pissing matches and bad faith arguments y'know? #i dunno this is my spiel of the night: i love all my companions except sebastian who is just a character that exists to me #i wasn't joking when i said i'd like to be enlighted about sebby and his romance like....... explain elaborate educate

[sirfrogsworth]

Photo Restoration Project - Part 1

A long time ago, Katrina sent me some old photos of her family I could restore. Her parents have been helping me from afar for years and I really wanted to do something nice for them. Unfortunately my dad got much worse and I pretty much forgot about this project for quite some time.

But then I decided to visit Katrina in Orlando and we discussed having dinner with her parents and I remembered these photos. So I thought I would fix them up so I could present them as a gift in person.

The first and most important photo was from her parents wedding.

Old photo prints can fade over time due to UV light exposure. From what I understand, different colors fade at different rates and red/orange tones tend to be the least susceptible to this fading. Thankfully all of the color information is still there, it's just that the darks are not as dark and the lights are not as light. The dynamic range got squeezed like an accordion. However, if you do a levels adjustment on the red, blue, and green channels individually, you can unsqueeze the accordion and balance everything back to the way it was.

But you can't always save everything and there may be other damage that needs fixing. If something becomes pure white, there is no way to restore that detail. Thankfully I was able to use the new generative fill feature to bring back detail in the dress, the flowers, and the tuxedo shirt.

And because I hate front facing flash and how it makes colors look ugly and sterile, I may have also added a marble floor and pillars.

Next up was a photo of Anastasia, Katrina's mom, protesting Henry Kissinger on behalf of her home country of Greece. This suffered from the same color fading issues.

What made this one a little more tricky was an uneven fading. The left side had to be adjusted independently and the top was even more faded. I had to isolate the trees to bring back their color. And the protest signs were difficult to read, so I enhanced those as well.

Next we have this lovely photo of Anastasia tending to some house plants.

This photo was actually in decent shape. It lost a little contrast, had a little bit of fading, and her top retained almost no detail I could recover. Recovering accurate skin tones is probably one of the most important skills I learned when restoring these photos. I wanted to keep that filmic look of the era while avoiding making people look jaundiced or pale. Lightroom's new masking feature that let's you isolate every aspect of the people it detects in a photo. This made fixing skin tones much easier. I could isolate just her face or her lips or her hair or her eyes and make precise individual adjustments. This process could have taken a great deal longer without this feature. But, I brought back proper contrast and color, added a little bit of detail to her top with gen fill, and hopefully got fairly accurate skin tones as well.

Next up, forward facing flash strikes again in a photo of Mike and Anastasia during Christmas.

Film did not do well in low light. If it was indoors and nighttime, you pretty much had no choice but to use flash. But a flash is a very small, bright light source and this causes a very unflattering result on humans. Today we have much more powerful flashes with rotating heads. We can bounce the light into the ceiling or off a wall and increase the size of the light source to get a more flattering result.

In this photo I wasn't able to do much, so I just balanced the skin tones and brought out some hidden detail and called it a day. It's still a lovely memory and thankfully film has such character that it negates a lot of the unflattering aspects of direct flash.

Next up is some cuteness...

A big priority when editing photos is to make sure the subjects are the star of the photo. And in this one their faces were a bit obscured in shadow. There was also a lot of haze in the background hiding the beautiful vista. Not to mention when I cleared that haze, there was this super faint hint of something in the sky. I can't tell if it was a rainbow, but I decided to believe it was a rainbow. The only thing that I am still struggling with, and this seems to be common with a lot of old photos, is green. Getting a good, saturated, natural green to look right has been very difficult. Everything I try ends up looking toxic or fake. The only thing that ends up looking right with the rest of the photo is more of a yellow-y brown. It's something I'll have to work on as I learn, but as long as the overall photo looks balanced and natural, I'm okay with not perfectly nailing the greens.

Up next we have a lovely scene on a Greek dock...

As far as editing goes, this was pretty basic. I just undid the fading, adjusted the skin tones, replaced the blown-out sky, and made the colors pop. But I think this is actually one of my favorite before and after shots. I just love how such a simple fix brought this scene to life.

A new car is a big deal and Anastasia looks so proud here...

This image has another common issue in addition to the typical fading of colors. It has a yellowish orange color cast. This could have been an issue with the film used or the development process or a chemical reaction on the print. A color cast is a lot like looking through colored glasses. It's like a translucent color material was put on top of the image. This can be a little trickier to deal with, but if you know your color theory, you might already know the solution. Blue is the opposite of yellow/orange on the color wheel, so if you introduce blue to the image it should balance out. Also, add a sky if it was missing.

Next up we have a landscaping project...

This one wasn't too tricky, but there was one interesting issue I had to address. All light has a color temperature. Daylight has a temperature of around 5500K. But the inside of the garage was being lit by reflected light and so that light took on the color temperature of the things it was bouncing off of. So I had to mask out the people and the car and address the color temperature inside the garage to make everything look balanced. Also, the green fought me hard on this one. And with the theme of this picture being plants, I felt I really needed to find a tone that worked. I think I finally got there, but I spent way too much time in the color picker doing trial and error of green tones. Also, new sky.

With this next one I actually did a pretty thorough explanation of how I edited it. But this was probably my favorite puzzle to solve from this collection of photos.

I'll do the abridged explanation...

The physical photograph was printed on a paper with a very heavy texture. And when it was scanned, the light from the scanner bounced off that texture and created a pattern of unwanted highlights.

I was worried this was impossible to fix and I almost gave up on this photo. But after one final Google search I discovered something called "Fast Fourier Transform." It's a mathematical formula that can be used to detect patterns. And the image editing software Affinity Photo, just so happens to have a filter called FFT denoise that helps you remove unwanted patterns from scanned photos.

And thanks to that filter, I was able to remove a substantial amount of that pattern...

Then I did my standard clean up techniques...

Oh, and I decided to try learning how to colorize.

Photoshop has a new set of experimental filters and a colorization tool is one of them. It is not great yet, but it is a great starting place. Instead of having to hand paint every single thing in the photo, Photoshop gave me a base to work with and I could take it from there with traditional techniques.

That's all I have the energy for today, but there are a bunch of cool restorations to talk about. Hopefully you all find this interesting. It was such a great gift to give to Katrina's parents. And spending that time with them and making them happy felt like I was with my own parents again. So we all got a gift in that wonderful evening.

Part 2 coming as soon as I have the energy!

#photography #photo restoration

[ofallthingsnasty]

tags: toxic dom/sub dynamics, fat (and insecure about it) reader, face-fucking, a little bit disgusting because it's a punishment mini disclaimer: i'm still not up to date with one piece but this is is pre-canon. this started out fluffier in my head but it's crocodile so hey, haha. just a little pwp. pairing: sir crocodile/f!reader word count: 1.9k

“Darling.” His voice floats to you through the half-closed door of your walk-in closet, where you’re currently hiding - eyes on your reflection, fingers pinching and prodding at seemingly too-snug fabric.

You know that tone, the barely concealed sigh. Shit.

“It’s your size, is it not?” Is it? You aren’t quite sure, yourself. You got into it just fine, the tight fabric easing over your thighs, your ass and then your stomach way better than expected (there have been garments that surrendered before they even got over your hips, that wouldn’t zip over your soft back)  - but when you gave yourself a once-over, your face fell at the sight of your stomach in velvet, very clearly there, very clearly on display. It fits in theory, you think, but it looks beyond unflattering, makes you feel uneasy, as though you’re already being judged by strangers who are bound to stare should you wear this outside of your home. The soft clink of metal on wood pulls you out of your thoughts.

The door moves behind you and through the mirror, you can see Crocodile slowly ducking into the room, cigar smoke lazily following him.

He looks tired, eyes half-lidded and hair just a smidge out of place - he's had a long day but the sticky, heavy weight of your insecurity doesn't care, keeps your thoughts hot and oh- you cross your hands in front of your body, suddenly anxious to be seen by him. (It’s silly, so silly, and you know it, because he has seen way more than this.) “So it does fit.”

His face is hard to read - some part of you half-expected him to pull a grimace at the way the garment seems to exaggerate your belly, although he’s never done that to you. 

“Don’t you think that there is too much on display like that?”, you ask and your brows furrow in ugly self-doubt, turning around to look at him. Expensive or not, the fabric seems to cling to your hip dips in such a way it makes you want to crawl into one of his fur coats and never emerge again, to be hidden away forever. His steely eyes flick down for a split second, one puff of smoke the only indication that he has registered your words. His shoulders sink with a long exhale.

“You know, I’m starting to think that you’re just being an ungrateful little brat.” Out of everything that could have left his mouth, this is not what you expected. Your head snaps back to your stunned eyes in the floor-length mirror. Something akin to panic makes your heart thrum, not wanting to appear like you’re trampling his expensive gifts with your bare feet. “No, I-” Another heavy sigh interrupts you. And like a thoroughly trained dog, it makes you shut your mouth. 

“You get nothing but the best this town, this country, has to offer and yet you complain about every single piece of clothing I pick out for you.” You shrink into yourself, suddenly overwhelmed with guilt. He’s right and you know it. You have rejected, tossed aside any dress, any blouse, any pair of pants he had brought to you in the last few weeks. Not out of malice, never out of malice - but out of frustration with yourself. “It’s not like that, really-”

“Then what is it? Your silly little insecurities again?”, he says, so nonchalantly that it almost makes you groan. “How tiresome.”

He closes his eyes and his forehead twitches as his frontalis muscle strains. You're in trouble now. “Strip.”

His tone doesn’t allow any backtalk - even your wide eyes don’t soften his face, although he can clearly see them through the glass of the mirror. “I’m sorry”, you wobble over your lower lip. “It’s just-” A wave of his hand is enough to stop you, a lone strand of hair that has fallen loose moving in sync with the shake of his head. 

“Where are your manners?”

Oh. So that's how he wants to play. You’re both mortified and glad, because it means that he isn’t going to storm out of your bedroom and hide away in his office. This is an open, an opportunity to make things better. Just do as he says, just be good for him.

“I’m sorry, Sir”, you eke out while you reach for the closest zipper of the dress. “I don’t care.”

He stares and stares as you peel off the layers of clothing, right until you're naked, a pile of neatly folded fabric right by your feet, still with your back to him. Weird as it sounds, you feel better - freer, without any area of your body highlighted by tight fabric or harsh shadows. 

Still, you have a hard time holding his gaze - too afraid to catch his ire, for this to be nothing but a ploy to humiliate you. He steps closer until you can feel the heat of his body on the skin of your back, until the smell of tobacco grows so thick you feel it settle itself into sinuses. Strong fingers dig into the fat of your cheeks, press so harshly into it that they must be able to feel the curve of your teeth as they push your mouth forward. It’s not a loving touch. You stare at your reflection, looking as stupid as you feel right now.

“I work all day, all night to provide for you, to keep you fed and happy. And then, when I try to indulge you, you pick apart any gift I bring to you.”

He lets the words settle in for a moment and holds your eyes through the glass.

 “Do you know how that makes me feel?”

You can guess. You probably know. But you don't want to say it out loud, guilt still heavy in your stomach.

“No, Sir”, you slur against his grip.

He raises a thin brow at your audacity. That little bit of disobedience is going to cost you later, no doubt.

“Like shit”, he spits out and lets his hand fall away, dragging your head to the side with it.

“Do you know what I'm going to do now?”

“Yes, Sir.”

You don’t. But you don’t expect him to be gentle, not with the way his brows are still tightly knit together.

He clicks his tongue. “Turn around. On your knees.”

You do as he says, hands wringing around each other just over your lap, a nervous gesture. His gaze weighs heavy as he just takes his time to appraise you - soft form, rolls and stretchmarks, dimples and all - and it makes you even more uneasy. “Are you having fun playing stupid today? Do I have to spell it out for you? ”, he says around his cigar. You shake your head, almost furiously so. Even though you feel like a broken record with the way you’re responding, it’s simply part of this, part of your role, your place beneath him. “No, Sir.” You reach up to undo his pants, nervous fingers busying themselves with freeing him just enough for you to take him into your mouth. He’s still soft as you take him into your hands. You can smell the long day at work on him - he isn’t usually like this, he usually joins you once he’s clean, but this isn’t necessarily about pleasure - not yours, anyway. You sit and wait for his permission to start. He grants it with nothing more than a lazy nod and soft exhale.

It’s easy to work him until he gets hard, you’ve done it many times before - but when you finally wrap your tongue around his cock you can’t help but wrinkle your nose. He tastes sharp and salty, and your base instinct tells you to spit him out again. So you hesitate. A mistake.

Your tiny act of defiance is quelled by him simply pushing himself down your throat and it makes you gag, both out of reflex and disgust. The sound is wet and blubbery, more animal than human. The tips of your ears grow hot in humiliation. He doesn’t need to warn you a second time. You start to move on your own again as soon as his hand lets you, trying to counteract the taste of him with extra saliva - you’re just glad he allows you to grab him to stabilize yourself, which saves you at least a little bit of a tired neck. He lords above you, chewing on his cigar, icy eyes unreadable as he simply stares at you as you work your face hot for him, gag and drool and still hold his gaze like he expects you to. Not a single noise leaves him and with every second your brow creases more and more, feeling more guilty and small and insignificant every time you taste him on the tip of your tongue. Minutes pass like this, the room silent except for the loud effort of your tongue.

“Not enough, not enough”, he mumbles from up above, slightly out of breath. “Hold still-”

His hand suddenly clutches the back of your head  and he pushes himself down your throat again, until your nose is pressed against his pubes and your face framed by his open fly. The only thing you can do is let a spit-bubble -  equal parts mucus and saliva - pop in your face. Your mouth makes an ungodly sound, the soft muscles of your oropharynx jumping at the intrusion, unwillingly massaging his cock. Tears shoot into your waterline and you look up, eyes big and forehead grooved with strain. You feel like you’re about to puke on him, that’s how deep he is. Valiantly fighting the urge, your epiglottis flutters when he pulls out and starts fucking your face in earnest, holding you in place. He’s rough - you’ve earned it, you figure, for being so cold, so uncaring - and you try to relax as best as you can, just holding your mouth open.

Concentrate. From one breath to the next. Don’t get distracted by the miserable, wet noises you’re making right now. It sure would be easier if he didn’t suddenly start talking.

“I should have you walk around in the nude for a little while, see how you'll like your clothes then.” Oh god, you think and gurgle in protest. Knowing him, he’d make good on this promise. “Don’t like that, do you?”, he asks, entirely rhetorical. If you were to nod now, with his cock down your throat, you know you’d spew on his expensive leather shoes. His eyes flash with something and he ruts your mouth so hard you get dizzy. “That’s right.”

“You take what I give you. At the very least, you'll take this”, he grunts out and crushes you against his stomach, suddenly emptying himself into you. It’s hot - and burns the tender flesh of your throat that he irritated with brutal friction. You can feel that familiar itch at the back of your nose, the sharp feeling of his load working its way up. You can vaguely taste him - salty and terribly unappetizing, smoker that he is - but he stays right where he is, his grip iron and his eyes closed as he enjoys the last traces of his quick orgasm. You can feel him twitch in you, you think. He plucks you off his dick himself - you’re pushed away by his fingers on your forehead, and you lose all of your tension, torso lulling forward. Your ears are ringing and you can’t stop the wad of cum and spit and something that seeps out of the corner of your mouth, landing on the ground with a disgusting splat. He doesn’t care. Neither do you.

A deep inhale from above signals that he’s satisfied with your performance - you look up to find him pushing that little strand of hair back that has cut itself loose, eyes considerably warmer than before.

 “Now let’s get something that is more to your taste, darling.”

#one piece x reader #sir crocodile x reader #crocodile x reader #/one piece #/crocodile

[nosafeharbour]

Pandæmonium: Abyssos thoughts/reactions

I haven’t typed up my thoughts on something like this since Werlyt, which goes to show the kind of way I’m feelin’ about it

Going into Abyssos I was really worried I wouldn’t like it... Asphodelos brought up some of my “oh, I really like Elidibus” feelings but in general I don’t have a massive attachment to any of the Ascians or Ancients asides from Lahabrea. So when Asphodelos threw some wrenches in with Erichthonios, being a “bad” father, Athena, I wasn’t sure if I would vibe with him..? I was really nervous they’d overly rely on twists and that it would dilute what should be Lahabrea’s The Dying Gasp/Seat of Sacrifice moment, y’know? I just wanted him to get the emotional closure that Emet and Elidibus did

And when I didn’t get attached to Elpis in the same way others did, this sort of felt like Endwalker’s last chance to really sell me on the Ancients past my initial story experience. It had a lot of pressure on it’s shoulders :(

BUT I REALLY LOVED ABYSSOS, I AM SO RELIEVED

- I’m glad Lahabrea is Hephaestus (Hephaistos? I need to get used to that) but we still got a twist..? I guess we don’t know how it will impact the future but it’s very interesting that he basically Sundered himself before Sundering was really a thing. I get the impression that his little lobotomy incident is going to have an impact on how he went off-kilter after the actual Sundering..?

- I call it a lobotomy as a joke but it’s actually so upsetting to think that if it does have a longlasting effect/come back to bite him in the ass... that he really did go through with that, admitting he was terrified to do so, in the hopes it would be for the best

- man

- The “...Say my name.” moment was so badass and I am so glad that not only did the Elidibus enjoyers get their moment, that it was as slick as it was. I really do love Themis a lot, and I was really glad that him and Lahabrea were proper colleagues

- The mention of Emet and Igeyorhm noticing the change in him was nice in both a “worried about him” way but also it kind of reminds me of Thancred in ARR

- I’m glad we could mention Thancred in a dialogue choice

- And speaking of me seeing all of this through my bias-tinted glasses, he really did end up with the Gaius vibe? Viewing this person who we suffered at the hands of through a different lens, seeing their attempts at having a good heart get ruined by their terrible actions. The WoL barrelling through the door ready to fight them, only to skid to a halt when confronted with a terribly sad and pathetic old man living with his regrets. WoL is understandably so bitter and on edge at the start, but like Werlyt, by the end is smiling and making little jokes

- man

- So Hephaestus of mythology is typically depicted as being lame/physically “deformed” or “ugly” and I feel like they kind of leaned into that with how Hephaistos looked compared to the older Lahabrea? To the degree I was kind of uncomfortable at first because he was obviously being painted as the crazy/evil/ugly version of an otherwise very classically attractive/sane guy, the way Lahabrea calls him all the parts of himself he is ashamed of... with the context of Hephaestus essentially being physically disabled in a way that is meant to be seen as grotesque, I was fearful it was gonna be lowkey ableist, but I think with the way things went, it wasn’t too bad. I think the first few shots of him were super unflattering on purpose, but when you saw him in the context of younger Lahabrea later on, he looked more like him and less like something that was meant to be jarring and negative. I dunno, it’s something I’m thinking about

- Like why does Hephaistos not have eyebrows, but Lahabrea does...

- Anyway,

- I CAN’T BELIEVE HE IS MAX HEIGHT... I even went to check the heights of the Elpis cast and he is the only one who is max height. I’m feeling so normal about it

- HEUGH

- I was pleasantly surprised at how much they mentioned Azem? It confirmed that Azem does know about us, which is absolutely fascinating and a lot of room for thought. I liked Lahabrea acknowledging them too, because that still fits in nicely with what I had in mind for mine :)

- I’m in bits, I’m sorry, just look at him

- I love this moment SO MUCH, the hostility is there briefly on both sides but Lahabrea immediately backs down like “no, you’re right”

- I got kind of emotional seeing him and Themis help us with the platforms in P7!! The chain motif and him being midway between sincere and rolling his eyes about it is very charming

- I really loved Hegemone and Agdistis... their music was incredible and they had the two most fun fights. I’m gonna have a lot more thoughts on them once I’ve worked through the immediate Lahabrea on the brain

- The first thing in the post-ShB world that really gripped me about Lahabrea was how the NPCs in Amaurot and Anyder talked about how loved and highly respected he was. So this got me in the same way, as did the mention of the rest of the Convocation being worried... people really did love him

- The way he can’t even look her in the eye as she passes on, but gives a simple thank you. I don’t know, I found it very fitting and poignant. I think this is where my heart started to break a bit

- NOT SURE WHAT I’M FEELING, BUT I SURE AM FEELING IT

- The Hephaistos fight... it was basically everything I wanted from a Lahabrea fight in this raid series LAUGHS... The fire imagery cranked up to 11, and I was dying for a remix of Thunderer because that’s the OG Ascian theme in my eyes. The other Ascian motifs were cool too

- My only concern was that it was too perfect but was ultimately not the big P12 Dying Gasp/Seat of Sacrifice finale... I wonder what P12 will be. I want to assume some kind of Athena/issue arising from re-combining Laha and Hephaistos, but my dream is something to do with “our” Lahabrea from the present

- You can see the resemblance best here, and I think in this scene they dial back on the shadows on Hephaistos’s face that had me worried they were going for “ugly on purpose”... he is in fact handsome too

- I don’t have much to say here I just think he’s very handsome

- AUGHHH this scene was good. I mentioned it before but I like the angle of “overworking and over-analysing relationships” they’re taking with him because it does feel like a nice parallel to Thancred

- I’m so curious about Athena... I do like her if she simply is as she’s presented at face value. I guess you could see it as kind of [wiggly hand motion] how they tried to make her out as pure evil bitch who wronged poor poor innocent Lahabrea, but I’m here to support women’s rights and women’s wrongs, y’know? I am fascinated to see if there’s more to it though, so I’m happy either way. I did want her to have possibly just girlbossed too close to the sun, so I’m happy she was twisted in the end

- The nods to the Ascian Prime stuff was really neat. The “I am become you, and we are become one” dialogue that Laha and Igeyorhm have in Azys Lla

- Not sure why Athena was white tho. The melanin went missing along with the eyebrows

- This was sweet because it really was the “smiling at Gaius at the end of Werlyt” energy. I can’t believe Albi would ever make such a sweet face over Lahabrea. Not forgiving, not forgetting, but finding a nice small moment of cheer at the end of the day

- This is the line that got me really misty eyed. It was nice recognition that Hephaistos is Lahabrea, and a nice moment for Erich

- I really, really love Erichthonios now. I wasn’t sure where I stood on him in Asphodelos? I had such a shaky experience with Endwalker, and spoilers, and my expectations, but the father & son dynamic panned out really well :) He is now in the same soft spot in my heart as Ryne and Allie

- I got his minion on my second run so I’m happy about that too

- I just really like this

- This is cute, too

- I AM ABSOLUTELY THRILLED TO BITS ABOUT THIS. My biggest wish for Pandæmonium was that it would tie back to present day; for me, delving into Lahabrea wouldn’t have the same emotional impact for me if it didn’t. To bring it back to Emet and Elidbus’s last moments, it’s their histories with us as Unsundered that give those characters their impact? So seeing Pandæmonium itself now tied in with the aetherial sea, mentions of the crystal wanting to be made whole again, and then mentions of the Sharlayan professor going missing in Azys Lla has me really excited... I don’t really mind what MacGuffins they use to bring back “our” Lahabrea, but I want it to wrap up with us making peace with all the different iterations of him. I think that would do him the most justice, narratively for the player, and for the WoL.

- So overall, I am very pleasantly surprised. I like what they’re doing with Lahabrea, and I feel so engaged with this story now, in the way I had been missing since Werlyt/Bozja/Omega felt like they were for me, you know?

- I’m feeling so heartbroken over the whole “a calm heart stays the course” thing and seeing all these facets and fears to Lahabrea... what feels like reconciliation between him and his own identity, with Erich, but knowing there’s another tier to go, plus the Sundering. It has a good impact

- I was also gunning on this to help me get the vibe right for my Azem. I’ve struggled with their design for so long, and while this didn’t really include them + my Azem has a foundation away from Lahabrea, it did still help inspire me!

- I can’t believe I have to wait 8 months for the finale

- I also can’t believe a part of Lahabrea canonically said “Hehe.”

#6.2 spoilers #pandæmonium #abyssos #reactions

[retro-scorpio]

Sexual Tension

I don’t know what else to call this little one shot, so you’re unfortunately stuck with this.

I wrote this short story a little while ago, and it’s basically a college AU featuring Julian Devorak from The Arcana with special appearances from Julian’s sister Portia, Nadia Satrinava, Count Lucio, and Asra Alnazar. I may end up adding to this later, but as of right now this is the finished product.

So, if you’re into fanfiction about characters from The Arcana, then enjoy this story.

Julian has the rather stereotypical reputation of being a loner, so much so that it’s impossible to track him down outside of classes. Even then, he’s an elusive presence in the room, always choosing to sit in the back and keep to himself, his notes, and his cup of black coffee. Rumors spread about him as a result of his mysterious nature, but he doesn’t seem to know about them or care. At least, that’s what I’ve been told. I don’t know how true any of it is, because ever since I stepped foot in this university, I’m seeing him just about everywhere I go.

I first got a glimpse of Julian when I bumped into his shoulder as I was trying to find one of my classes. We both apologized, and he directed me to where I needed to go. Later on that same day, I discovered that we were both in the same English class about texts from the Victorian era, and so I opted to sit next to him. He’s always in the campus library the same time I am, hunched over books and scribbling things down in his notebook, and there was even one time where I caught him prancing around outside in the early morning light as if he was part of an imaginary sword fight.

So, I shouldn’t be that surprised to see him at auditions for our school’s fall production of Sweeny Todd, but at the same time it has me wondering just how many more times our paths are going to cross. Perhaps he likes the story as much as I do and wanted to see how our school would adopt it.

“Hello!” a skinny, petite, pale, brunette lady exclaims excitedly at me, startling me and making me flinch slightly. “I haven’t seen your face before. I’m Lizzy.” She extends her hand out to me, and I shake it. Before I can even tell her my name, though, she asks bluntly,

“You don’t know what role you want, do you?”

“Pardon?” Lizzy sheepishly smiles.

“Sorry; I should have warned you in advance that I’m really good at reading people. Being involved in theatre does that to you over time.”

“It’s okay,” I respond. “Especially because you’re right; I’m not even sure if I’ll get a part at all. I just really enjoy the story and thought I’d give this a shot.”

“Have you ever acted before?”

“A couple times, yeah. When I was younger. I’ve always liked the idea of acting, but I’ve not had much time to devote to it.

“Well, here’s your chance to tip your toes back in the water! I think I have the perfect role for you.”

“You do?” I ask. Lizzy enthusiastically nods her head.

“You see that giant group of people over there?” She points out a crowd huddled on the other side of the auditorium, appearing to be watching Julian’s every move and swooning over him.

“They’re all wanting to play the role of Sweeny Todd’s assistant.”

“Let me guess: Julian’s playing Sweeny Todd.”

“Unofficially, yes,” Lizzy answers in a hushed tone. “He certainly has all of the traits of the character. The assistant is the most sought after role because in this iteration, they’re Sweeny Todd’s love interest and eventual partner in crime.”

“I thought Mrs. Lovett fulfilled that role.”

“In the classic, yes. This version is a sequel of sorts that answers the question, ‘what if Sweeny Todd didn’t die and instead managed to escape?’ So, he ends up traveling to and settling down in New York, where he picks up an assistant who helps him around his shop. He leads a normal life for five years until his daughter Johanna finds him and confronts him about what he did in London. The assistant happens to overhear their conversation and talks to Sweeny about it later that evening, and he or she—depends on who ends up getting the role—convinces Sweeny to pick up where he left off because there are a lot of corruption and starvation in New York.” Interesting. So, some artistic license has been taken with the story, which could either go really well or quite terribly.

“So, why do you think I would make a good assistant?”

“Because you’re the only person Julian’s noticed walk in here.” Before I can ask for Lizzy to clarify, a booming voice cuts through the chatter, and I’m forced to rush to the large group of people vying to play the assistant.

“Ladies and gentleman,” the voice rings out. It belongs to a tall, blonde man on the stage. “My name is Lucio, and I’m co-directing this play with the help of my dear friend Lizzy. Now, I’ve been told that there’s a long list of people wanting the role of Sweeny Todd’s assistant, so we’ll get that out of the way first. Will everyone fitting that description please step to the front of the auditorium and line up horizontally so that I can take a good look at each of you?” It becomes clear quickly that Lucio is pulling out the weeds before anyone even says a line, for he goes down the line and says no to the people he deems unfit for the role. A lot of it seems based on physical looks as he utter phrases like ‘too short’, ‘too fat’, and even ‘too ugly’ to a couple of individuals. By the time he gets to me, I’m finding it hard to swallow, but I try my best to not let Lucio know that I’m nervous. Instead, I look straight at him as he glances over every inch of me.

“Spunky,” he murmurs. I’m not wearing anything grand, so I wonder what brought on that comment. “I like it.” He moves on to the next person, and I hesitantly remain where I’m standing. Even though he gave me a compliment, Lucio didn’t explicitly tell me to stay like he did with the others still in line.

“Alright,” he states once he’s assessed everyone, clasping his hands in front of his chest. “So, for those no longer standing up here, you can either talk to Lizzy and audition for a different role or you can leave for the evening. The choice is yours. As for the rest of you, you’ll be ad-libbing your way through a pivotal scene in the play shortly. Julian, if you would hop on stage please.” Looking back at the seats, I see Julian sprawled out, as if he was right at home. He leisurely untangles himself and makes his way on stage.

“Bring out one of the folding chairs from backstage,” Lucio nearly barks at Julian. As Julian fulfills the request, Lucio tells us that we’ll be acting out the scene in which Sweeny Todd admits his crimes to his assistant.

“Julian will deliver the first line, thus setting the scene, but the direction it goes is entirely up to you. When I have seen enough, or if things are stalling, I will call scene. Remember, only one of you will get the role, so make a good impression. Julian!”

“Ready when you are!” Julian calls back. His voice is surprisingly smooth. The few times we’ve talked, he’s sounded a bit groggy, as though he needed more sleep. Combined with his tall stature, bright eyes, and muscular physique, it makes him quite the dream boat. I can see why so many people want to play his love interest.

“Excellent! You there. Pinky.” Lucio points at a girl with hot pink hair. “You’re up first.” Thank goodness. I did not want to go first. Lucio directs us to sit down in the second and third rows as he plants himself closer to the middle of the auditorium.

I must say, Julian is very good at improving. Not only does he know his character, but he’s also giving his partner opportunities to showcase their talents. Whether they take him up on his offer is another story. Some of them want to steal the scene, and others are using it as a means to flirt with Julian. Meanwhile, Lucio’s patience is slowly growing shorter as no one seems to be exactly who he’s looking for. He’s given everyone nicknames, some of them unflattering as time wears on. Fortunately for me, he calls me Spunky.

When I sit down on the chair on stage, I close my eyes and take a deep breath, envisioning the scene I’m about to play in my head. If this is a pivotal part in the play, then it needs to be full of suspense and drama. Just like that, a plan’s in place.

“Ready?” Julian whispers as I open my eyes back up. I nod my head, and he utters the opening lines.

“Elise, what you heard my daughter say is true. I am—well, was—the Demon Barber of Fleet Street. I murdered countless people. Judges, doctors, lawyers, even my own wife. I ran away from London because I didn’t want to get caught, but the truth is all of those people either deserved to die or were wishing for death to be bestowed upon them. I was simply doing the world a favor.”

“I don’t believe you,” I reply. There’s a fleeting moment where Julian’s caught off guard, but he quickly recovers.

“Oh, really? And why’s that, dear?”

“How am I supposed to believe that the same man who constantly stubs his toe on furniture and smiles at everyone that he meets is capable of ruthless, calculated, cold-hearted murder? For God’s sake, you can’t even walk into a room without making some sort of mess! You’re always relying on me to keep the shop tidy, and I feel like someone who was into killing people would be able to neaten things up themselves.” Julian sticks his hand in his pocket and pulls out a pencil.

“So, you don’t believe I have it in me to be a murderer.”

“No, I don’t.” The next thing I know, Julian’s leaning over me, his face inches away from mine and his pencil hovering over my nose.

“Let me tell you something, darling; this tool has helped me make my way up the social chain. No matter how rich a man is, there comes a day where he needs a shave, and I’m the best there is.” He moves the pencil down and presses it against my throat while maintaining eye contact.

“There’s a certain amount of pressure that you need to apply in order to get a smooth, clean shave. If you don’t put enough pressure, you end up missing a few spots. Put too much, and well, you end up cutting him. Draw the knife across the neck fast enough, and you have a dead man suffering from major blood loss.” He presses the pencil harder against my throat to emphasize his point, making it slightly difficult for me to breathe.

“Shall I show you what I mean, Elise, or have I made myself clear?”

“I believe you,” I gasp. He immediately releases pressure and takes a couple steps back, smirking at me.

“Good. Now, if that’s all you wanted to discuss, then I suggest you head up to bed for the evening. We have a long day tomorrow.” He starts walking away from me, but Lucio hasn’t yelled for the scene to end, so I assume that I have to keep going.

“Why America?” Julian stops in his tracks and turns to face me.

“Pardon?”

“Why did you flee to America of all places? You could have easily traveled to France or Italy, but instead you chose New York.” Julian sighs.

“Like I said, I didn’t want to get caught. I wanted to start a new life, and word travels quicker from England to other countries in Europe than it does from England to America. The two countries are separated by an ocean, after all.”

“Have you ever thought about doing it again?”

“Doing what again?”

“Using your profession as a means of…extermination.”

“Elise, I was in a really dark place when I executed that plan in London. I’m not the same person I was five years ago, and if I were to do it again, I’d be signing my own death sentence.” I get up from the chair and slowly walk up to Julian, worried that my next actions are going to make Lucio end the scene.

“My father was killed by a drunk police officer who mistook him for another man, and my mom was raped and beaten by the judge overlooking the case.” I gently place my fingers around his chin and stand on the tips of my toes, bringing my face closer to his.

“The rich and powerful are just as evil and corrupt in New York as they are in London, Mr. Todd. They get to do whatever they want with impunity, even if it costs the lives of innocent, hardworking people. Someone has to make them pay for their crimes, or their offspring will continue being monsters among the human race. Is that something you’re willing to live with?” Julian looks like he’s beginning to run a fever at this point with his flushed cheeks and glassy eyes. I plant my feet back on the ground and walk around him, heading towards an imaginary door.

“Good night, Mr. Todd.”

“Scene.” Even though Lucio’s voice is the softest it’s been during this entire process, the auditorium is silent enough for it to carry.

“Well, Spunky, I knew there was a reason I liked you. Congratulations, you have the role. Asra, you’ll be Spunky’s understudy, because you’re the only one that has as much chemistry with Julian. Everyone else who was auditioning for the assistant, you can either stick around and try for another role or leave; it doesn’t matter that much to me.”

 I end up staying through until the end of auditions, mainly because I wasn’t sure if I was allowed to leave or not. Turns out, once all the roles were filled to Lucio’s satisfaction, he gave everyone a copy of the rehearsal times, so it’s a good thing that I stuck around after all. Plus, I got to watch Julian perform on stage. I must say, the way he carries himself when he’s acting is quite entertaining, to say the least.

Speaking of Julian, he practically runs up to me as I’m leaving the auditorium.

“Well, hi, Julian,” I greet him, surprised that he sought me out. “Is everything alright?”

“Yeah, yeah, everything’s fine,” he replies quickly, his words rushing together into a jumbled mess. “I was just wondering if you would maybe like to walk with me? Since we’ll be working closely together, I would like to get to know you a little, but it’s totally fine if you just want to be alone.”

“I wouldn’t mind a little bit of company.” Julian smiles enthusiatically, and it makes my heart race.

“Great!” The two of us walk outside and start meandering around.

“You know, I don’t think I’ve ever gotten your name,” Julian tells me. “Isn’t that weird? We keep seeing each other around campus, and we even share a class together, but I don’t know what to call you.” Is Julian normally this nervous? He’s certainly a fast talker, and he’s rambling a bit.

“My name’s Carina.” He stops in his tracks and gawks at me.

“Are you serious?”

“Yeah…” What about my name is making Julian awestruck? He doesn’t hate the name, does he?

“Carina was the name of a pet rabbit I had when I was younger. I’ve always liked how sophisticated and beautiful it sounded, and I thought that if I was to have a little girl, she would be called Carina.” He takes a momentary pause and shakes his head before adding,

“Then again, naming a child after a childhood pet isn’t exactly normal.” He continues walking, and I kind of have to jog to catch up to him.

“So, Julian, how long have you been acting? You looked like a professional on stage.” The compliment makes him flush.

“I’ve been acting since I was about five,” he answers softly, avoiding my gaze. “It started with children’s theater and stuff like that, but when I was ten, I attended my first summer drama camp, and my love for acting has grown ever since. Lucio ran the camp, you know. Has for many years.” I had no idea Lucio and Julian had that much history together.

“Do you like working with Lucio?”

“He’s very passionate about his work, which makes him a very intense person to be around. If things don’t go his way, he’s prone to throwing fits and screaming at people. Despite of that, he does manage to put together spectacular shows and treats everyone to a nice party in the end, so I would say working with Lucio is similar to a roller coaster. It’s both scary and exciting at times.”

“I see.” Julian finds a bench and beckons for me to sit down with him. Once we’re seated, he asks,

“What made you decide to try out for this play? Was it in order to get closer to me?” Before I can answer, he quickly backtracks.

“I don’t mean that in an arrogant way. God knows I’m way too insecure to think that way. It’s just that ever since Lucio accidentally let it slip that I would be the male lead in this play, I’ve heard people whispering about me all over campus, revealing to their friends what they would do to me if they got to play the assistant. To be honest, all of the attention makes me sick. I mean, I enjoy being in the spotlight when it comes to acting, but when I’m not on stage, I…”

“You just want to be left alone, don’t you?” Julian clasps my hand and nods his head.

“Well, Julian, if it makes you feel any better, I auditioned because I really enjoy the story of Sweeny Todd and wanted to see if I had what it took to get a role. That’s it. No nefarious intentions involved.” He visibly relaxes.

“Thank you, Carina,” he sighs contently. “You have no idea how much that means to me.” He brings my hand up to his lips and kisses it softly, making me look away and blush. This play is going to be interesting, to say the least.

 I wish there was a way to describe how today’s rehearsals went without being vulgar, but when you’re forced to repeatedly act out a scene where you’re passionately arguing with someone that you feel unresolved sexual tension towards and from, the most mild way to go about it would be to state that it was like two animals in heat. I’m honestly surprised that Julian and I managed to get through rehearsal without tearing each other’s clothes off on stage in front of everyone in the auditorium to see.

You see, this scene involves Elise, the assistant, yelling her grievances at Sweeny Todd, which revolve around money and sex, and Sweeny shouting that those problems wouldn’t exist if she didn’t essentially tell him to become a criminal again. This of course makes Elise more angry at Sweeny, and the scene ends with her storming out of his room and slamming the door behind her. Lucio calls this scene “the beginning of the end”, because after this point in the play, their relationship quickly becomes toxic to the point where they want to kill each other.

Speaking of Lucio, he’s been a key player in creating the tension between Julian and me, because he continuously forces us to approach the edge of no return, but he never allows us to go over it, not even outside rehearsal. Julian’s trying his best to be a gentleman and abide by Lucio’s rules, but I can tell that he’s getting worn out by constantly pushing down anything he may feel towards me and only allowing those emotions to come out when we’re on stage.

I suppose that’s why Asra pulls me aside as soon as Lucio dismisses us for the evening.

“Carina, there’s something you need to know about Julian,” he tells me softly but firmly.

“Go on…” Asra sighs.

“He’s a bit of a pressure cooker. He shoves any feelings he deems undesirable down until he can’t contain them anymore, and then they explode out of him with no way for him to control them until they’re completely out of his system. And it’s not just feelings like anger or sadness; he can get quite horny as well.” Before I can even reply to anything Asra has said, he quickly adds,

“I’ve seen the way you two have interacted during practice, and I don’t want to see you hurt. Sure, he’ll light up your world, but only for as long as he has to act with you. The moment the curtain drops on the final performance, he’ll throw you away like the burnt match you’ve become while spending time with him.” So many questions zoom through my brain, but right as I pick one to ask Asra, Julian walks to us and practically drags me away from him with a fake smile plastered on his face.

“Did something happen between you and Asra?” I ask Julian as we walk outside the auditorium.

“It’s a long story,” Julian mutters scornfully.

“I don’t have anywhere I have to be, so spill.” Julian stops and turns to face me, grabbing my hand as he does so.

“Carina, there are just some things that are best left in the past. Let’s just say that Asra and I aren’t the best of friends.”

“Why?”

“Why do you care so much?” Julian’s voice gets a bit nastier and louder, making me feel defensive.

“Oh, I don’t know,” I nearly shout sarcastically. “It’s not like anyone would get curious if someone told them that a friend of theirs treats people like they were pieces of trash to be disposed of at the first opportunity.” Julian’s eyes briefly widen in shock before decisively narrowing in anger.

“Maybe some people are trash. You try your best to hold on to them because they mean a lot to you, but in the end you have to cut ties before they hurt you.”

“What in the hell are you talking about, Julian?”

“I’m talking about Asra!” We’re both yelling at this point. “He’s always painting himself as the victim, and he never acknowledges any of his wrongdoings!”

“What?!” Julian lets go of my hand to pinch the bridge of his nose in order to calm himself down.

“Look, if you want to know the truth, you’re not going to get it from either Asra or me, because we both were self-centered at the time.”

“Then who does know the truth?”

“Why don’t I have you meet her?”

 As it turns out, the girl in question happens to be in an apartment Julian lives in. Initially, I thought she was the short, plump, red-headed individual who greeted us when we stepped inside, but then she quickly dragged Julian away, talking excitedly about finally having a subject for the painting she was working on. Before I know it, a door slams, and I’m left alone.

“Why don’t you make yourself comfortable?” a smooth, female Indian voice tells me, making me jump out of my skin. When I recover from my shock, I find myself face-to-face with a regal-looking woman. She’s just wearing a t-shirt and jeans, but her face looks very queenly. I follow her request and sit down in one of the chairs in the kitchen, which is the first room you’re in when you walk inside the apartment.

“You must be Carina,” the woman states, pouring hot water into two mugs and putting in tea bags. “Julian’s told me a lot about you, so I figured it was only a matter of time before he brought you over. I’m Nadia.” She walks over to the table and sits in the chair next to me, handing me a mug as she does so.

“How do you know Julian?” I nervously ask. There’s something about her that tells me that I’d do well to not piss her off.

“In simple terms, I’m a friend of his who’s mentoring his sister. She was the one that you saw first.” I take a sip of tea.

“What about in complex terms?” Nadia smirks at me.

“You’re clever. Julian could stand to be around someone like you.”

“Thank you,” I reply shyly.

“I’m Julian’s…unofficial therapist, you might say. Then again, I’m kind of everyone’s unofficial therapist, except for Portia. Julian’s sister,” she quickly adds upon seeing the confused look in my eyes. “Anyway, I deal with secrets. Secrets that can either bring people together or make them despise each other.”

“How do you do that?”

“Why, I talk to people. I listen to them, note anything interesting, and pass it along to whoever’s interested in it, for a small fee. Speaking of which, I’m sure there’s something you’d like to ask me. I have a feeling Julian didn’t bring you over here just to meet his sister and her teacher.” I take a deep breath to calm my nerves.

“I don’t know if you would be able to answer this, but something happened earlier this evening that raised some questions for me.” I quickly recount what Asra and Julian had told me after practice, and Nadia nods her head as I talk.

“To be honest, I’m not surprised,” Nadia responds. “Asra’s quite petty, and Julian can be melodramatic sometimes. They’ve both come to me complaining about the other, and I’ve seen their interactions with each other over the years, so I have a lot of information about the nature of their relationship. I just need one thing from you.”

“I understand.” Nadia smiles, making her look that much more like royalty.

“Good. So, tell me: how do you feel about Julian?” I nearly choke on my tea, and I feel my face start to burn up in embarrassment and something else, something more animalistic.

“I see,” Nadia replies to my nonverbal response. “You’re both pulled so taut that you’re about to snap.”

“That obvious, huh?”

“Only because you both blush at the mere mention of the other. How hard has Lucio been pushing you?”

“We’re not allowed to be intimate off stage. We can be friendly, but that’s it.” Nadia sighs.

“Classic Lucio. Gets completely blindsided by Asra and then takes it out on you.”

“What do you mean?” Nadia proceeds to launch into the story of Julian and Asra. Apparently, they started off as rivals because Asra was jealous of Julian becoming Lucio’s favorite without even trying when he had to work tirelessly for two years prior just to get Lucio’s approval. The rivalry was one-sided, though, because Julian was blissfully unaware that Asra felt any ill will towards him.

When Julian was a sophomore in high school and Asra a senior, they ended up being the lead characters of one of Lucio’s original plays. Julian had shot up over the summer and was eight inches taller than Asra, which led to Asra developing feelings for Julian. This, of course, presented some internal conflict for Asra up until Julian had expressed interest back. From there, their relationship burned bright and fast.

Things between them started going downhill quickly when Asra would manipulate Julian into doing sexual things that Julian most likely wouldn’t have done on his own and Julian would either get super clingy or super distant. Nadia had tried to get them to work things out, but as soon as the final show ended, Julian broke up with Asra and ghosted him as much as he possibly could.

“So, why exactly would Asra care about my wellbeing if he really doesn’t care for Julian?” I ask Nadia once she’s done with her tale.

“Well, once Asra and Julian broke things off, Julian developed the habit of getting romantically close to his costar only to drop them once the production was over. Since you’re pretty new to the acting world, Asra wouldn’t want your experience to be soured by anything Julian does. At least, that’s what he’s told me.”

“But?” Nadia smirks knowingly.

“You’re the first person since Asra that’s made Julian…I don’t want to say lovestruck, because that sounds overdramatic, but maybe pleasantly nervous.”

“Really?” She nods her head.

“If you stay over here long enough this evening, Julian’s bound to show you what I’m talking about.”

 Julian’s managed to contain himself, all things considered. His sister Portia kept teasing him about me, Nadia awarded her with smirks, smiles, and some extra dessert, and it seemed like every other commercial on TV was based on a cheesy romantic comedy.

But then Nadia leaves for the evening and Portia goes off to bed and Julian starts channel surfing only to stumble upon a show that featured a girl moaning loudly as a guy’s using his dick like a jackhammer to drill an additional hole into her.

That’s when I can tell that some frayed strings in Julian are snapping. His face becomes flushed, his eyes dilate with a mixture of shock, horror, and arousal, and his mouth’s agape at the scene unfolding in front of him. I myself am having a difficult time keeping my composure, but I’m able to remain sane long enough to gently take the remote from Julian’s hand and shut the TV off. In a blink of an eye, my hand replaces the remote as Julian turns his body so that he’s facing me.

“C-Carina,” he stammers. “I…I’ve been trying so hard, and I—” As quickly as he grabbed my hand, I place my index finger on his lips and lean close to him. Somehow, his face becomes even redder.

“Julian, what do you want to do to me?”

“I don’t know if I should—” I cut his sentence abruptly by clamping my hand over his mouth.

“Just nod or shake your head, okay?” Julian nods his head, his gray eyes sparkling in the living room light.

“Do you want to kiss me?” Nod.

“Do you want to make out with me?” Nod.

“Do you want to run your hands all over my body?” Nod.

“Do you want to leave bites all over me?” A more hesitant nod.

“Do you want to do to me what the man on the screen did to that girl?” A very slow, almost ashamed nod, but a nod nevertheless.

“I want you to listen to me, Julian, because I’m only saying this once. When I remove my hand from your mouth, I want you to do me on this couch. You can go as rough or soft as you want, but I don’t want you to stop until you’ve orgasmed. I don’t care what Lucio’s going to say when he sees us at our next rehearsal; his decisions have pulled you so taut that you’re snapping right in front of me as we speak. Do you understand?” After a moment of serious contemplation, a quite shy nod.

“I’m going to count to three, and then I’m leaving you to do whatever you want.” Nod.

“One.” Julian swallows.

“Two.” Something inside me quivers in anticipation.

“Three.” Time gets jumbled for about five seconds, and when it straightens itself back out, Julian and I are at the other end of the couch; he’s moved on top of me and is frantically kissing every part of me that he can touch. I can’t really keep up with him, not that I’m complaining.

#thearcana #juliandevorak #portiadevorak #asraalnazar #nadiastratinava #countlucio #collegeau

[lovesickjily]

Cuffed

Summary: Lily wonders, as she stares at the messy-haired man currently handcuffed to her bedpost, if this bizarre situation could be considered as kidnapping.

FFN or AO3

inspired by a dream that i literally forget the events to lol

If she were to be asked how the heck she got into this situation, Lily supposed that it all started with an email. One, simple little mistake of an email.

Who even used emails nowadays? Texting was a completely acceptable alternative, and unless one wanted to send a lengthy message, or, in some cases a virus to those that they hated, emails were extremely unnecessary. Of course, Lily was completely biased, because she’d had literally no problem with sending them until today, when she’d gotten an email from James Potter.

Tall, dark, and handsome, with hair so wild that it just exudes sex vibes, and god, not to mention those lovely honey-colored eyes of his framed behind dark glasses that brought more attention towards his pretty face, it was no surprise that Lily didn’t at all have a problem with the man, not when he looked like that. She’d open up anything from him, an email being just one of such, and  it seemed friendly enough, saying:

Hello, Lily!

I’m James Potter, if you don’t know me, and I’m attaching a rough draft from what I’ve got so far concerning this month’s issue. Sorry that it’s not our usual friend Frank that’s doing it, but I hope I can meet your expectations as his fellow graphic designer. Have a good day!

Best regards, James.

P.S. Please be as critical as you can. I strive for perfection, which I think I can only achieve if you point out everything that you hate about it.

He was quite endearing, really, being one to skip the professionalism and getting straight to the point. She’d never met the man before, but she had quite a good idea of his personality through the email, and she quite liked those people whose personalities shone through their writing.

She decided to leave the attachment to look at later, having far more enough on her plate and trying to balance her other tasks, and, because she quite liked to take a break, she opened out her other email from Mary, switching to her personal email quickly. Though on opposite ends of the city for work— but across the hall when it came to flats—, they still found time in their lives to send each other strange things that only they would find funny as far as best friends went.

Today, apparently, was ugly picture day.

Mary had at first attached a photo of herself from their high school days, captioning it with ‘at least I got prettier. goddamn,’ to which Lily responded with her own high school photo, and Mary responded by telling her to ‘sit the fuck down. you’ve always been pretty.’ Lily didn’t entertain to her thought, knowing that her best friend would only accuse her of being a narcissist, even if for good reason.

The email chains were quite hilarious, and sometimes, she’d find herself scrolling all the way to the beginning of it all to read again on slow days. She looked around the room, and upon seeing that Dumbledore was strolling merrily along with her computer in his line of vision, she quickly clicked back to her personal email, pulling up James’s email to show that she was ‘working.’

When he’d walked away, seeming to have taken his good old time like the view of the boring gray office was enough to admire, she pulled open the camera on the computer, and, because it was an unspoken rule for all computer webcams, the quality was quite terrible, but that was fine, she supposed, as it would only enhance the unflattering aspect that she hoped this photo of her would achieve. She contorted her face together, quite unattractively, she’d say, and pulled her chin towards her neck to achieve that desired double-chin look, snapping four pictures of her in different poses before nodding in content. It was Mary that was going to receive the photos, and what kind of best friend would she be if she didn’t receive terrible pictures of her on the daily? They’d created a photo album solely for each other’s faces, Mary having named Lily’s ‘Wank Bank,’ which she supposed fully explained their friendship.

She was quick to send the email, and the computer made a small chime to indicate that it had been sent, before returning back to work, for real this time. She’d only begun typing away at the computer when she heard a sound from her emails, and usually, she’d ignore it, but there was this sinking feeling of some sort that had growing within her since she’d sent those faces of hers, that she’d—

Oh my god.

No.

No, no, no.

She’d sent the email to the wrong person.

There, instead of Mary’s usually peppered responses, was a new email from James Potter, who she would have coined as a bloke who was not afraid to double email in times of clarification, had it not been for the fact that the email was part of a thread, meaning that she’d sent something back to him.

Her mortification at the mere fact that she sent it to him of all people grew at least a million times.

She was reminded of one of those scenes in the movies, the ones where the idiotic main character, who had a passion for seeking out the supernatural rather than running away, found herself walking towards a room with a stick in her hand as she knew full well that she was about to be sliced apart by an unknown force. Yes, that was her, only the impending doom that she felt bubbling inside of herself was due to the fact that she already knew what she’d done, that she was fully aware of the fact that she was about to be face a gruesome murder by the hands of embarrassment.

And there it was, like a colorful banner spread across the drab walls of the room, was an email from James saying:

Thank you for the acknowledgement? I don’t know what the appropriate response is, because saying anything else would mark me as unprofessional. Nice pictures, by the way. I’m fairly certain that’s the most I could say.

Best regards, James.

She didn’t know whether to slam her head against the keyboard or against the screen, but she supposed that the screen was the better option, seeing as she might accidentally send another wrong email again. Computer shortcuts were both a blessing and a curse, after all. She sighed, composing another email to explain herself, but no, that wouldn’t do at all. She needed to properly apologize, and a simple little email would not do it.

Dear James,

I’m so sorry regarding the last email I sent you. I swear it wasn’t at all intended towards you, and as much as I’d like to write about a million paragraphs to properly convey my remorse, I’m sure we’ve loads to do in our 9-5 jobs. Please, let me make it up to you. I’ll prepare a special dinner for both of us, and we can discuss the original email concerning the graphics, among other things, of course. Does Friday at 7 work for you?

Sincerely, Lily.

He responded nearly immediately, and she wondered if he was slacking off like she was or he was just quick to reply to everything.

Dear Lily,

That will do very well.

Best regards, James.

P.S. I sincerely wish I could be more informal in my emails.

The knock at the door came just when she’d deemed the meal finished in the oven.

She agreed that she might have done it a bit too much, having changed out of her blouse into a low-cut top that made her tits look really nice, and she’d applied three layers of mascara and a nice, cherry-red lipstick, because even if it wasn’t a date, James Potter was still gorgeous. She’d like to at least look presentable after he’d seen terrible photos of her face.

She answered the door and was greeted by him, his eyes raking over her body, which was just the effect she wished for, because maybe that was enough to make up for the fact that he’d seen her at an angle she wished no one but Mary could ever see her in. She was fairly certain that she looked the same, unsubtly admiring his body, his strong arms being displayed with the black tee that he was wearing, and his hazel eyes looked so much prettier with him being a mere foot away from her.

“Hey,” he breathed, and she gave him a small smile.

“Hi. Come inside,” she gestured, and he responded with an easy smile, his eyes taking in the view of her apartment. “The food’s still in the oven. You should seat yourself, and I’ll prepare everything.”

“Is this a restaurant, Lily? Only I think it’s only fair if I help you.”

His voice was quite lovely, and she internally beat herself up for wondering how it’d sound with him atop of her, but she quickly shook the thought out of her head, smiling sweetly up at him. “No, I insist. You’re my guest, aren’t you?”

“As a guest, I consider it quite rude of me to let you do all the work.”

“As the host, I consider it quite rude of me to make you do some work.”

“If I’m eating here, I think I should at least assist you.”

“Yes. You can help me by sitting your pretty bum down and wait. Besides, I’ve already set the table, so unless you’d like both of us to carry out the Shepherd’s Pie together, please make yourself acquainted with a dinner seat.”

He stared at her incredulously, and she wondered if he was contemplating whether or not he should actually carry it out with her, but then he smirked in defeat, making a great deal of emphasis of sitting down. “You’re more clever than I thought.”

“Did you have low expectations, then?” she responded, grabbing a pair of oven mitts, but she didn’t pull open the oven just yet, turning to gauge his reaction.

“Nah. My expectations of you were already up here.” He made a gesture of raising his hand above his head to demonstrate where she would be on his invisible scale. “But now, they’re right about here.” He reached up as high as he possibly could while sitting to the point that the bottom of his shirt lifted, revealing the abs that had unfortunately been obscured behind the tee, and if she followed that trail of hairs, god.

Not now, Lily. There was a time and place for everything, but now was most definitely not the time for dirty, perverse thoughts.

She focused her eyes on the oven instead, carefully taking out the Shepherds Pie and placing it down on the table gently. He made a sound of content, saying, “Smells delish.”

“I’d rather hope it did,” she replied easily, and she picked up her utensils, baring them in her hands as they did in the movies to demonstrate just how excited she was to eat. The Shepherds Pie, of course, not the man sitting across from her, though he looked just as delicious, maybe even more.

They dove right in, Lily allowing James to cut the first piece for himself, and they talked about the graphics for the magazine that they worked for, the information not being all that important for right now, though she did tuck away everything they exchanged with one another for later. It was really easy to talk to him, and she quite liked talking to him, because it wasn’t just the sound of his voice, but the way he could make conversation out of anything.

The little Tardis-themed salt and pepper shakers that she had lying atop of the table? He was quick to make a remark about that, and it was well worth the 20 quid that she paid for them if just for him to compliment them. It spurred into a well-heated debate. Could you believe? An argument concerning salt and pepper shakers?

Time seemed to fly by fast when she was talking to him too, and she wondered where had he been all this time she had been bored out of her mind in her office, knowing that if she knew just have amazing of a time she’d have with him, she’d bloody talk to him all day. The office hours would definitely pass by much more quickly. She voiced that thought to him, and he looked so bloody pleased with himself that she’d say it again if it meant that he would give her that same quirky smile of his.

And with time, she was quite concerned with how quick it had taken for her to develop feelings for him, and it was quite discombobulating how fast her heart speed up when he did smile, which appeared after just about every one of her little comments and retorts. And god, when his eyes raked over her, even if it might have been just because of how daring she had been with her fashion choices, it made the butterflies in her stomach fly at full force, like they were speeding up her heart rate solely by flapping.

The next thing she knew, the tray was empty, a signal that he was going to leave soon, and the fact of the matter was that she didn’t want him to go yet. She wanted him to stay, and she didn’t mean for the entire night, though she wasn’t at all partial to that idea, but long enough for her to get to know him more.

They’d sipped a bit of wine as they ate, and though she was far from drunk, she had just about enough of that liquid courage, standing up just as he stood up, presumably to leave for the night. “It was really nice to formally meet you, Lil—”

“Do you want to have a look around?”

His eyebrows drew up in surprise, and she honestly didn’t even blame him, as she literally just strung that question out at him, but then he gave her a small smile, nodding. “Sure. I’d love to have a look around Casa de la Evans.”

Her own lips drew upwards. “Well, don’t let me stop you. I’ll be behind you, in case you accidentally— or purposely— break something.”

“Is that so?” he asked teasingly, “Or do you want me to be your tour guide?”

“I lied. It’s your explanation that’s correct. I actually don’t know my way around the flat at all.”

“After this tour, you’ll know every inch of it by heart,” he replied, and he made a wide sweeping motion with his arms, “This is the dining room.”

“Evidently,” she smiled.

He whirled around to the living room and pointed, simply stating ‘living room.’ He was being the absolute cutest, but she wanted him in her bedroom, having concocted quite the plan, and she followed him down the small hallway, opening the first door. Upon the sight of the toilet and shower, he turned to her, a small cock of his eyebrow, saying, “This is the bathroom, where you get rid of your waste and then clean evidence of said waste.”

“That’s the strangest way to put it.”

“It was either that, or something concerning shit.”

She quirked her lips up at him, wondering how he could make talk about the bathroom sound endearing, and they walked out, closing the door behind them as they made their way to the adjacent bedroom. “Here is thy fair maiden’s bedroom, where she slumbers and retreats for the night.”

“Have a look around,” she replied, dropping their faux tourist act, and she watched as he eyes skimmed over the room, stopping prompt at—

Oh god. She’d left her bra out in the open, lying right near her bedpost, and there was nothing wrong about a bloke seeing her bra, seeing as she’d been the one who’d invited him in the first place, not to mention the fact that she had tits, meaning that it was a dead giveaway that she’d wear said products. Of course she’d have bras, but still, it was a bit embarrassing for it to be out in the open like that, because if she wanted him to see her bra, it’d be on her very chest, ready for him to remove.

“I’m sorry about that,” she told him, plucking it from the ground and stuffing it into her drawer.

“Don’t be. Was just surprised is all.”

He was looking at the pictures she’d framed on her bedside table now, and it contained a drawer, filled with miscellaneous things, like some candles, a few documents, and a pair of—

Could she?

Yes, she could, there was no doubt about it.

Should she?

Well.

No, but one only had just the one life to live.

She did the next action out of a whim.

She opened up the drawer, pulling out the pair of handcuffs that she’d bought out of pure boredom one day and looped them around his hand, not even trying with both of them because that would have been a hassle, and he’d undoubtedly catch on quickly and resist. She secured it around him and put the other cuff around her bedpost, glad that it locked in place once she’d shut it.

His reaction was priceless. His eyes were widened, only just taking in the event when she’d finished her work, and his eyes shifted from his hand and then towards her, looking to be in sheer disbelief. “Lily, what the fuck are you doing?”

That was a good question.

What was she doing?

She was more rational than this, she thought, and she scoured her brain for an excuse, as telling him that she wanted him to stay made her sound creepy. He waited for an answer, not at all looking mad, when she remembered what had caused this apology dinner in the first place. “We need to talk.”

He cocked an eyebrow at her. “We’ve been talking for the past hour.”

“Yes, but I mean…” she trailed off, biting her lip softly as she desperately hoped that he caught what she was referring to, even though she didn’t at all want to bring it up.

His eyes widened at her, and he reached out with his other hand, placing it on her shoulder. “Listen, Lily. You don’t have to worry about it. I’m not going to report you to HR, if that’s what you’re scared of.”

“I— thank you,” she replied, her cheeks flushing red, and she felt the color on her throat, “I don’t know why I did that, to be honest. I suppose it’s my idea of a joke.”

“The handcuffs or the email?”

“The handcuffs,” she answered, “The emails was directed to a friend, so that was completely intentionally. I— I’ll unlock you right now.”

She avoided his eye, the embarrassment of the situation fully creeping up on her now, and she dug around in her drawer in an attempt to look for it, but it was nowhere to be found. She checked under the candles, atop the documents, even going as far as reaching all the way back and pressing her fingers against the very edge of the drawer, hoping that it was there. No luck.

Oh, great. She’d done it now.

She had completely, unintentionally handcuffed someone to her bed, wondering if she’d broken any laws because of her own foolishness, because of something that was meant to be funny. “Lily?”

“I’m so sorry,” she nearly whispered, not sure whether to laugh or cry at this predicament that they were in, “I can’t seem to find the key anywhere.”

His lips curled up, evidently amused by her despite the fact that he was literally locked up in her room at his own mercy. “Lily, it’s honestly fine.”

“It’s not,” she insisted, “I— Here, I’ll make it up to you. What’s your favourite song? I’ll play it for you, and I— I’ll massage you! I’m sure working in an office all day has put some sort of strain on your back. Please, sit down.”

He made a half-arsed attempt at sitting on the bed, looking quite awkward with one hand held up in the air, and she started thinking of other circumstances where he’d look that way, circumstances that would ultimately end up with both his arms handcuffed with her atop of him— sans any clothing of course. She burst that bubble, because again, now was not the time.

“Lily, you don’t have to do anything. I—”

“No, you’re going to shut your pretty mouth up and let me give you a massage.”

He quirked an eyebrow up at her but raised his other hand up in defeat, to which he promptly made a motion of zipping his mouth shut. She climbed up on the bed behind him, and as she tentatively placed her hands on his shoulders, she was reminded of how akin this was to the intro of an adult film, with mediocre acting at best and the scene escalating quickly.

The only difference being, however, was that there would be no shagging, as far as Lily was concerned.

She kneaded his shoulder, just once, when he turned his head back to look at her, winding his free arm around her neck and pulling her beside him. She stared at him in shock, her heart beating at the speed of a race horse, but she didn’t budge, knowing that his grip on her would keep her in place. “You didn’t really think that I’d let you give me a massage, did you?”

“Well, you’ve no other choice, considering the fact that you’ve nowhere else to go. At least let me massage your wrist when you break free.”

“Break free? Am I your prisoner now?” he joked.

“Please don’t say that, because it makes me feel like I kidnapped you.”

“And you haven’t?”

“No, actually, believe it or not, my plan to seduce you did not involve a case of Stockholm Syndrome.”

“Seduce me, did you say?”

“Yes,” she affirmed, because there was no point in beating around the bushes. He had eyes, and he had to know that she dolled herself up to impress him, if she could judge by the way his eyes had lingered on her person the entire time they’d had dinner together.

“Can I be honest with you, then?”

“Are you implying that you’ve been lying to me this entire time?” she teased, and he smiled at her.

“Sort of, yeah,” he replied, and he turned his gaze away from her, though his hand, which had been looped around her back, wound its way towards her own hand, intertwining them together. “This might be a little embarrassing, but the reason why I reached out to you instead of Frank like he usually did was because I asked him for the switch. I, er, I sort of, really wanted to get to know you better? I really do like you, Lily.”

His confession was like music to her ears, a symphony that she wanted to hear for practically the rest of her life, but he wasn’t going to get her that easily. She was going to take advantage of this situation, because maybe, maybe she’d attempted to assert her dominance like the powerful woman that she hoped that she was, and she was not going to let him make her feel like putty when he was the one who was handcuffed to her bed.

Maybe, she begrudgingly admitted, she was a bit drunk from the wine, but she was still very much in control of her thoughts, or at least for the most part she was.

She shot up from the bed, pulling James’s arm off of her, and she stood in front of him, leaning down so that they were face-to-face, or face-to-chest. “And what are you going to do about it, James Potter?”

“I dunno, really,” he breathed, and she noticed that his eyes were trained on her lips rather than her chest, most likely because he wanted to be a bit more of a gentleman, “The current course of action is to accidentally email you some pictures of myself.”

Her cheeks flared up. “They were meant for my best friend.”

He cocked his head to the side like the smarmy idiot that he was. He was supposed to be defenceless in this situation, not getting the upper hand from it. “Really? That’s quite tragic. Could you make that face in the email for me right now, then? It’s quite cute.”

“It was not.”

“It was the cutest thing I’ve ever seen.” He pulled out his phone from his pocket, unlocking it and flipping to his camera roll, revealing that he’d gone as far as saving the pictures. “See? Bloody adorable, you are.”

She didn’t at all think she looked adorable in those photos, the camera catching her worst angles, and they brought shame to her nice pictures, the ones she’d taken in pretty lighting with a proper smile, not an overly-exaggerated pout. Out of all the emails that she could have sent to him, why that one? She’d sent Mary loads of nice photos of her, so why couldn’t James be the recipient of those photos instead of what she’d actually sent to him? “Why aren’t you mad?”

“Why would I be mad? Because you handcuffed me to a bed because you accidentally emailed me something?”

It sounded even worse coming out of his mouth, and she visibly flinched. “That’s precisely why.”

“I figure if it meant that I get to talk to you more, there’s virtually nothing wrong with it.”

James Potter. Charming. Gorgeous. Smooth.

She was undeserving.

“I’m going to look for the key again,” she said instead, and she turned around, pulling up her other drawers in case the key had somehow wounded its way in another part of her room, but she just didn’t quite get it. She’d never even touched the key, never even used the handcuffs, so just how did the key go missing? Perhaps she’d dropped it one time when she took out a candle, not knowing that it was attached to it. Yes, that had to be it.

“Need a little help over there?”

“Yes, actually, but seeing as the only person who could assist me is unable to move from his fixed spot near my bed, I’m afraid this is a one-woman expedition.”

“I’ll support your expedition. I’ll be a one-man cheerleader.”

She smiled in spite of herself. “Is that an excuse to throw compliments at me?”

“How else am I supposed to stress how gorgeous you are?”

“Then what am I supposed to do about you? I can’t very well cheer you on for sitting there and being pretty.”

“I disagree. There’s something called multitasking, you see.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, that’s rather unfortunate. Give me some time to look for the key, and I’ll cheer you on in other ways.”

She heard him take in a shuddering breath, and she felt her lips curving upwards. She beat him at his own little game, despite having absolutely no idea what she meant by ‘other ways.’

She expected that she’d turned her entire bedroom upside down looking for the bloody key, and James, having stayed true to his word, cheered her on the entire 21 minutes that she’d spent searching, his words including, but not being limited to, a compliment of some sort, each one getting more and creative than the last, or was it less creative? She didn’t know. She surely wasn’t going to be picky about the compliments if he was so willing to give them to her in the first place.

But 21 minutes were put to waste, and the only difference between that time span and now was that her room was significantly messier than before. Even worse, she still hadn’t found the bloody key.

Would she have handcuffed the gorgeous bespectacled man to her bed had she known that she’d be unable to find that key?

Probably, probably not.

Who knew?

The fact of the matter was that she didn’t have the key, and there was no use in dwelling the possible outcomes that she could possibly be experiencing had she not locked him up. He’d probably be at home right now, and she’d definitely be lying on her bed contemplating how much she should have handcuffed him.

She just couldn’t win.

He was standing up again, probably due to the strain that the cuffs might have made to his wrists when he was sitting down, and he was nearly beginning to throw another compliment at her, she could tell. His compliments weren’t even simple ones that anyone could throw at her if they saw her walking down the street. No, James Potter seemed to be studying her— had to be— because no one could give her one glance and say something like— Oh.

Speaking of a compliment. “You know that feeling when you study your arse off for a test and you end up failing it anyway?”

“Yes?” She really hoped that he wasn’t going to tell her that looking at her gave him that same feeling, because what a blow that would have been, especially after this night that they had.

“Well, I reckon the sight of you is enough to forget that I fucking failed because then I’ll feel like I’m winning.” Ah. There he goes.

“But then—”

“Nope,” he cut her off, “I fucking won.”

“Have you?” she asked, moving towards him, his words giving her further courage as her fingers skimmed across his chest, “Have you really?”

“Yeah,” he let out, and she noticed the way he’d swallowed when he looked at her, his eyes growing slightly darker at the sight of her. Her fingers traced the outline of his jaw, admiring the curve of it, and she was completely aware of how frantic her heart was at the small distance between them, but she wouldn’t let that deter her. She drew her lips up close to him, and he watched carefully, and she allowed a small kiss to the corner of his lip, just barely tasting it, before easing her way towards his ear as she slightly slid her lips over his skin.

She stopped at his ear, whispering, “No, I don’t think you have.”

And with that, she pulled away, grinning victoriously when her actions had the desired effect on him.

Lily Jane Evans. Smart. Pretty. Confident.

“Fuck, Lily.”

“Maybe later,” she replied coyishly, adding, “I’m not going to do anything to you when you’re helpless.”

“I’m not bloody helpless,” he insisted, and he waved his free hand in the air, “If I wanted to, I’d have pushed you off of me.”

“The Stockholm Syndrome has gotten to you, apparently,” she joked, and he rolled his eyes at her halfheartedly.

“What will it take? More compliments? I don’t think I’ve ever had to pay someone with compliments.”

“Credit card transactions work just as fine,” she replied easily, “Only I’d feel awful if you actually paid me money.”

He smiled. “You know, if it wasn’t unprofessional, I would have gone on for hours about how bloody gorgeous you are after you sent me photos of your face. It took about fifty tries, I’d wager, before I finally came up with an email that didn’t imply that I thought you were pretty.”

She blinked, staring at him. “You’re kidding.”

“Nah.”

“Why would you—”

“I think we both know the answer to that.”

She scoured his eyes, his pretty, golden eyes that seemed to glitter as he stared back, for any signs that he might have been deceiving her in any sort of way, but all she saw was solemnity and, if she was correct, some adoration, like she hung the stars. And if she did hang the stars if his eyes bore the truth, then they were dangling in his eyes, shining brightly.

His hand flew up to cup her face gently, and he parted her lips open before leaning in as much as he possibly could, stopping a few centimeters short from her face. “Could I kiss you?”

A man who acted from consent. Lovely. “And ruin my lipstick?”

“Funny, I thought you wore it for me.”

“Funny, because then you’d be correct,” she replied, and the next thing she knew, her lips were on his, savouring the sensation as the feeling in her heart skyrocketed, and who knew James Potter could be so good at kissing with only one hand? His hand flew from her chin and down towards her waist, playing with the bottom of her shirt but not advancing any further.

She hoped that when she pulled away, there would be red staining his lips, because that meant that they’d done a great job of smearing it off. On the flip side, she didn’t want to know, because that meant that they’d stopped kissing, and oh god could she please stay like this forever?

It was almost as if her lips were made to fit against his, like their molds completely complemented one another in the sense that if one were to be made, the other had to be as well. He tugged slightly at her bottom lip before pressing one last light kiss on her, pulling away sweetly as he reached his forehead against hers.

“That was— wow,” she said, and she couldn’t at all help the smile that grew on her lips as he mirrored her actions, a light chuckle falling from his lips.

“Wow?”

“More than wow, actually.”

“I’d hope so,” he responded, “There’s hardly any lipstick left on your lips.”

She gently poked his mouth, a nice cherry colour now from their ministrations. “And there’s loads on yours.”

“Does it make me look pretty?”

“Very,” she nodded, and his smile grew more.

He brought her arms around his neck, saying in a quieter undertone, “I have something to tell you. Don’t be mad?”

“I’m the one who handcuffed you to the bed. I don’t think I’ll get mad.”

“All right,” he said, “Come here.”

“I’m right here.”

“Closer,” he elaborated, and he used his hand to bring her towards him so that she was flush against his chest, “Promise you won’t be mad?”

“I promise.”

“Pinky swear on it.”

She quirked an eyebrow at him but intertwined their pinkies together, smiling. “Will you tell me now? I’m getting quite antsy over what you’ve got to say.”

He paused, quite possibly for dramatic effect more than anything else, and—

“I’ve had the key in my pocket this entire time.”

She pulled away from him quickly, his eyes widened. “You what?”

“Oi,” he said, bringing her back towards him, “You promised you wouldn’t be mad.”

“I’m not,” she insisted, “Only that I didn’t expect— oh my god. You— When?”

“It doesn’t take that long for a bloke to notice that he’s about to get handcuffed to a bed, so I swiped the key from the drawer when you weren’t looking.”

“Oh my god,” she repeated, her voice filled with exasperation and amusement, “All this time I thought I lost the key.”

“Nah, it’s been right here all along,” he replied, patting the pocket in his trousers.

“Why’d you do it?” she asked him.

“Isn’t it obvious? I reckon it would have been the funnier approach by playing along with you. Was quite cute of you, I’d say.”

“That’s why you weren’t mad.”

“Wouldn’t have been mad if I didn’t steal it. Do you want to do the honours of releasing me?”

“Will you report me to the authorities for kidnapping?”

“Nah. I’ll report you for stealing instead.”

“Stealing?”

“My heart,” he quipped, and her lips curved upwards, watching as he took the key out of his pocket as he’d said and placing it into the lock on the handcuff, turning it and watching in satisfaction as it opened with a click. He threw it to the side, cupping her face gingerly with both his hands this time. “But, I’ll let it slide just this once.”

“Just this time?”

“And every time after.”

With that, he pressed his lips against hers, and she responded eagerly.

An email and a handcuff were quite possibly the strangest combination in getting two people together, but if she were to contemplate it later, she’d agree that it was all very well worth it.

#jily #jily fanfiction #jily fanfic #jily au #james potter #lily evans #james and lily #lsj writes #oneshot

[imaginetonyandbucky]

Good Intentions: Season 3 Finale Part 1 (Ep 5 of 6)

Bucky may have gone to hell, but no one has any intention of leaving him there. Also on AO3. ~Dracusfyre

Azazel took gleeful possession of Bucky’s soul as the Reaper brought it down, smiling unpleasantly as Bucky writhed and tried to escape the painful touch of Azazel in his true form.  “Now now,” he said as he tightened his grip.  “You’re here fair and square.  What else did you expect would come from thinking that a demon was your friend?”

Tony didn’t flinch at the reminder of his betrayal. He watched as Azazel pinned Bucky to the floor with one clawed foot; the soul was still in shock from his sudden death, but Bucky was still struggling nonetheless. Tony wondered distantly if he’d been the same when he came to hell, or if he’d been more resigned to his fate.

He must have made some sort of noise because Azazel glanced up at him, as if surprised to see him still there. “What do you want?”

Tony’s eyes flew to the floor.  He honestly didn’t know why he was still there; he just felt a strong reluctance to leave Bucky’s soul. “Sir, I-”

“Oh, I suppose you think you deserve some sort of reward for this.  I wasn’t sure a crossroads demon could deliver, but you did, so I’ll instruct Crowley to grant you something appropriate.” Azazel flapped a ruined remnant of a wing in Tony’s direction dismissively, so Tony backed away with a bow, fists clenched behind his back.

***

Tony waited until Azazel was safely gone before he slipped past the door into Bucky’s cell. “Bucky?” he whispered, and was answered with a low groan. “Hey,” he said softly, putting a hand on Bucky’s shoulder.    

“Tony?” Bucky turned his face towards Tony’s voice, and Tony winced at the damage Azazel had done today.   Turning a soul like Bucky’s into a demon was an ugly, evil process, and Bucky had been fighting Azazel the whole way.  This was his fourteenth furtive visit to Bucky's cell since Bucky died, and each time he seemed a little weaker than the visit before. Souls were resilient, and they stubbornly healed damage until the day they were broken completely, but even with Bucky’s strength it would take a while for him to recover this time.

“Yeah, I’m here.” He put one hand on Bucky’s shoulder and started carding through Bucky’s tangled hair with the other.  “So you would not believe what happened today…”  He started, pitching his voice low and soothing.  It took a few minutes but eventually Bucky relaxed under his hands.  He was halfway through his story when he felt a tremor shiver through the stones of Bucky’s cell. After a moment it did it again, this time strong enough to rattle the tray of Azazel’s tools next to the wall.  The sensation was terrifying; Tony didn’t know what it would take to shake the foundations of Hell itself, but he wasn’t interested in learning, especially if it meant he was caught being somewhere he really shouldn’t be.

“I’m sorry, Bucky,” he murmured, and brushed his lips across Bucky’s forehead. “I’ll be back as soon as I can, I promise.”

“Be careful, Tony.” Bucky's voice followed him to the door.  The floor shook again, throwing Tony against the wall.  In the distance was the furious roar of an archdemon, and Tony thought he could hear the ringing sound of clashing blades.  He hesitated, trying to figure out what to do.  If Hell was under attack, he didn’t want to leave Bucky, but if the angels made it this far Bucky would probably be safer without him.  On the other hand, now might be the best time to try to free Bucky –

Someone came barreling around the far corner of the hall, from the direction of the fighting, and slammed right into Tony, knocking them both to the floor.  “Steve?” Tony said in disbelief.  The last time he’d seen him, even before he’d grown ill, Steve had been pale and thin, held together mostly by determination and attitude.  Tony had no idea how much time had passed on Earth since Bucky died, but Steve had grown at least six inches, shoulders broadening with muscle. He had a knife in each hand, one etched in runes that looked vaguely familiar and the other the unmistakable flat silver of an angel blade.  “What are you-” Steve looked back over his shoulder towards the sound of fighting and Tony finally put it all together. “Is this a jailbreak?” Tony said incredulously.

“Did you think we were just going to leave Bucky in Hell?” Steve said, gesturing for Tony to get up and start moving. “Show me where he is.”

“But-” Tony started to protest that Azazel was probably going to be back any second before he remembered that no, Azazel had been drawn away from Hell for some emergency on Earth. “Oh, you clever bastards,” he breathed in awe. He turned and started sprinting back towards Bucky’s cell. “Is it just you and Sam?”

Steve kept pace with him, something that he wouldn’t have been able to do before.  “Sam found a few friends upstairs who weren’t interested in helping Michael and Lucifer start the apocalypse.  They’re guarding our escape.”

Tony skidded to a stop in front of Bucky’s cell. “It’s not pretty,” he warned.

Steve set his jaw.  “I know. Sam told me what to expect.”

Tony nodded and opened the door.  “Bucky, it’s me again,” he said, moving into Bucky’s line of sight, hands working quickly on the restraints pinning him to the table.  “Steve’s here,” he added unnecessarily as Steve rushed to Bucky’s side.

“Bucky!” Steve held his hands kind of awkwardly, trying to find a place to touch Bucky where he wouldn’t hurt him. “I thought you were dead.”

“Steve?” Bucky stared at him, dazed, struggling to sit up as Tony freed him.  “I thought you were…smaller.”

Steve put an arm under his and held him up as Bucky half fell, half slid off the table he’d been strapped to. “I think you had something to do with that, jerk.” They helped him out the door just as Sam was coming around the corner, pressed backwards by the demon he was fighting. Tony threw out a hand and tripped the demon just long enough for Sam to stab him through the heart with the angle blade, destroying the demon with a shower of sparks and heat.

“Good, you found him. We need to go.” Sam’s mouth was a thin line as he gestured for Steve to hurry.

“I’ll guard the rear,” Tony said, taking his arm from around Bucky, who muttered a weak protest. “Get him out of here.”

“No, we’re here for you, too,” Steve said over his shoulder. “Come on.”

“What?” Tony said stupidly.  He actually looked around to see if Steve was talking to someone else, and Sam muttered something unflattering before grabbing Tony’s wrist, then hell slipped sideways with a rush of wings.

#tony x bucky #tony stark #Bucky Barnes #prompt fill #dracusfyre #SUPERNATURAL AU

[aliceslantern]

Nocturnal Memory, a Kingdom Hearts fanfic, chapter 16

[Summary:  Dying takes a lot out of you, it's true, but when Demyx wakes up for the first time since his fight with Sora nothing's right. His memories are fragmented and he's missing his true name. And he's not the only one. An incomprehensible mystery and an inevitable war make him question what, exactly, he would do to become whole, and reclaim the music lost to him.

on FF.net/on AO3]

Lea only had a few hardened pieces of bread. Demyx settled for instant coffee. As it boiled he sat listlessly at the card table. While Demyx had slept off the alcohol, Lea had spread the paperwork out messily in any direction. Some of the pages were coffee stained, though legible. He wasn't sure whether to read them or not; after all, this was Lea's, and none of his business. Demyx cleared a small spot for himself, and text caught his eye.

It was Demyx's handwriting. His own handwriting. Reservations aside, he snatched it. He recognized the header on the paper right away—Organization paperwork.

How did Lea have this?

It was just a reconnaissance report, from several weeks spent on a world he'd remembered as particularly lovely; it had been targeted for its strategic placement in the galaxy. The few clipped, stunted sentences on the report didn't do the place real justice.

There were more. Not just his reports, but others' reports—some of Dilan's, Aeleus's, work orders completed within the castle. Papers about all their second-strand Nobodies. Each had been given a number, but Demyx remembered naming all of his. David. Iggy. Janis. Grace.

316 woke up today. I worked with them for a little while. They really like reggae for some reason. Maybe that has something to do with where they're from? Look into this.

At the bottom of the report was a big "yes" in Saïx's handwriting, followed by, "Get it combat ready ASAP."

He had always hated that, though, and how eventually he would feel the little ping of their loss in his consciousness. It hadn't caused much pain then, but it wasn't pleasant, either. Even with his powers back he still didn't feel that same connection to the hivemind of the Dancers, probably because he himself was no longer technically a Nobody. They must all be human now, he tried to reassure himself. Then again, if they were as fucked up as he was, maybe it was better if they were gone.

At the bottom pile was older stuff, darker stuff. Reports by Xigbar. Planet X fell. Swarmed by Heartless. Barely had to lift a finger. Demyx saw a dozen at least like these. His stomach felt still sicker.

Mixed in were gray file folders of their personnel reports. Demyx saw his and felt his heart stutter. Maybe his true name was in there, or something useful. He snagged the folder and tried to quell his breathing.

The first page was an intake form. It was more or less the same as any of the second strand Nobodies, with sparer information. His number was listed first, in Roman numerals, not Arabic like the rest. His given name was listed, but the small box was blacked out, with "redacted" handwritten in white. He held the paper up to the light, trying to see the printed letters through the marker, but the ink was completely opaque. Like a lot of things.

His chest began to ache. His homeworld info had received similar treatment. His power, weapon, and skillset was listed, and there was an unflattering picture of him at the beginning, zombie-eyed and shorn-haired, face still childish. There was only one small piece of information that was new to him. His birthday, October 19, and the birth year, telling him for the first time that he was nineteen years old. Nearly twenty.

"Nineteen." He felt so much older than that, a million years old really.

At the bottom were yearly reviews, written in pencil by Saïx.

The first year—Nine has proven to be a capable worker—when he sets his mind to it. He has an incredible potential for laziness. His power still grows, as does he. With proper discipline he'd be a perfect member yet. The second and third years listed a clear decline in his work ethic, and Saïx's aggression became less and less veiled. Absolutely USELESS. Lazy. Incompetent. Complete and utter waste of resources.

Then the fourth year, right as Sora had destroyed them all—Terminated. DOD 6 March. Three months ago. He'd only been conscious since April. How much time had actually passed? He'd known he'd lost some time in recovery; he hadn't realized just how long. It was true that time flowed differently on all worlds, but he didn't buy it. Something wasn't adding up.

Demyx's hands were shaking. He set the reports down and tried to fix them the way he had found them. He realized that the kettle was whistling loudly and had been for some time, worsening the stabbing pain in his head.

He drank the coffee down too quickly and nearly scalded his tongue. He left Lea's house, walking fast even though his legs complained, and headed back to the castle.

The hangover mostly abated after he ate something and bathed. He was so sore he could barely raise his arms high enough to get a shirt on. He couldn't figure out what to do now and loitered for far longer than he should in the kitchen, trying hard not to think about the reports, and the lies.

"Good afternoon, Nine. I thought you had spent the night at Lea's. How did it go?" Ienzo asked. He started to make himself some tea.

"Oh. Good, I guess. I'm pretty sore."

"I would imagine. Might I join you?"

"Uh, sure." He paused. He tried to find the steely sense of resolve he had felt that morning. "I have something to tell you."

"What would that be?" He stirred his tea calmly.

Demyx's throat was dry. He forced a laugh. "I, um. I want to fight."

Ienzo went still for a moment. "I'm not sure I follow."

"I want to fight. This. I want to help."

"You… you do?" He spoke slowly.

"Yes." He laughed again, as hysteria twined into him. "Oh, fuck. I got pretty drunk last night and I guess I had some sort of epiphany."

"You're sure," Ienzo said. "I know in vino veritas, but perhaps… perhaps it was just a passing impulse."

"That's the thing." His eyes were tearing up again and he blinked it away. "It's been a while since I felt this sure."

"…What if this is what he wants?" Ienzo asked.

"I don't care what he wants! I…" He took a deep breath. "I can't just sit on this guilt and do nothing."

Ienzo looked down. Demyx couldn't read his expression.

"I found my birthday," he said more softly. "October. I'm nineteen."

"I know." Ienzo smiled weakly. "I forget that little more than a year separates us."

He wondered if he should tell him the rest. "Lea has… Lea has paperwork. From the Organization."

"I'm aware."

"That means he's gone back. How has he gone back without getting killed?"

"We didn't want him to go back. This was during Sora's Mark of Mastery. He's brought back useful information. I was hoping… that he could find some sort of clue, about our conditions. But it all seemed paltry to me. Accounts. Reports. Pittances of things that we already knew." Ienzo hesitated. "We had almost wanted him to surrender to them; to be a double agent. But that was before he started screaming his alignment from the rooftops."

"Are you fighting too?" Demyx asked. "Have we… have we all…?"

"Yes and no. I'm trying to gather as much as I can, as fast as I can. I don't think we'll be much use until we're all healed. If we're not, he could use that against us." He set down his mug and looked Demyx in the eye. "There was a thought, at the beginning, to make you the double agent."

"Ten already thinks that's what they're trying to do, by fucking me up," he added. His voice was steady but he was faint.

"You have to admit there's some appeal," Ienzo said. "Your powers are returning rapidly. You're skilled at gathering intelligence. Besides, there's little the other side doesn't know. If we sent you… let you drop some few spare things… maybe we could get a return."

"I don't think I could get them to trust me. I never could find out what was going on in the Organization."

"Perhaps not. But you have the will to, apparently, when before you didn't."

Demyx stared at the table and traced the woodgrain. "…You mean go to them. Beg for mercy, to be healed… and then be among them."

"…Yes. That was the basic plan."

His heart clanged in his ears.

"Obviously this would be after you became considerably stronger. And they need you to mend the town. If our other plans proceed at the predicted rate… Perhaps… in the fall, sometime."

Demyx laughed. "Happy birthday to me!"

"You should tell the committee of your… change of thought. Just so they're aware."

"…I feel dizzy, Ienzo." His hands trembled. "Is this a stupid thing to do?"

"I do not know, Nine. I really don't."

He hunted in the storage room for useful things. His heart still hammered against his ribs. He needed to fix the guitar, to get his mind off of all this. Otherwise he thought he'd throw up.

He needed wood, for the fingerboard. The leg of a chair or dresser would do. It would need to be cut, sanded down, and finished. There had to be sandpaper and finish somewhere… even if it was ugly, it would do. And something for frets. Even if he found tape he could cut it. Pegs… maybe there was something among the lab equipment that could work?

The hardest would be strings. He'd probably have to buy or trade for them. He only had the measly amount of money that had been on his person when Sora had killed him. But Heartless had some money… When he could fight better he could go after them.

He found a songbook on the floor, waterlogged and half chewed by mice. He held it gently in his hands. This must have originally accompanied the guitar; it wasn't far from it. The pages were brittle and swollen. The first few pages detailed the parts of the guitar. The tide of his excitement caused him to flip through page after careful page. Even though the tablature might as well have been runes for all he understood, he could learn, right? There was still time. At least, for now—

But he didn't find much of anything else. If there was anything good, he didn't come across it in his search, and he searched for some time. Was there anywhere else he could look? Would the sitar ever get back to him? Or would he just be like this—so weird and so fucking numb all the time—until this war inevitably killed him? If Sora had been able to cut him down so easily when he was at his strongest, what about the other vessels? What if this meant more than espionage? And if he got caught by them? Would any of this actually be worth it, in the end?

He gave up after sundown, and found it hard to get much sleep, a sick stinging anxiety keeping him up most of the night.

The next day a note for him arrived from the committee, calling him back to work. He'd only been away a few days but it felt like so much longer. He followed the path deeper into town, with the weight of the knife steadying him.

Demyx arrived where they'd told him, near the castle. A massive crane had been set up, and new stone connected the old aqueducts with the rest of the town. He saw Cid sitting inside the cab, yelling indiscriminately, but it was too hard to hear because of the noise.

"Oh good! You're here!" he yelled at Demyx when he saw them. "Do you like this new setup we've got?!"

"What are you doing?"

"What was that?!"

"I said, what are you doing?"

"Hang on, I'm coming down!" The engine stopped rumbling. Cid climbed down and checked his ears. "Post-industrial piece of shit," he explained. "But it's what we've got. We always had plans to build out the aqueduct. With this place mostly in ruins, we've got to get this going before you can step in fully. Those repairs we did earlier were to try and connect the old system to the new. I'm afraid to say that today, you're more an extra pair of hands than anything."

He was still so sore he wasn't sure he'd be much use. "Uh… okay."

"Yuffie and Leon are up top, patching everything up. I'm guessing you don't know much about masonry."

Reconnaissance had supplied him with a weird amount of knowledge for all sorts of things. He'd studied far too many industrial parks. "…More than you'd think."

"Then up you go. Careful on that scaffolding." He gestured to wooden supports built up some few stories in the air.

He exhaled and climbed diligently. His arms were jelly by the time he got up top.

"Thanks for showing up," Yuffie said, voice bitter. They were both kneeling down on the highest part of the scaffolding, spackling on a thick gray mortar over cracks in the stone with trowels. They were getting nowhere fast. "Pick up a trowel and get to work."

"There are some tools over there." Leon gestured to a toolbox sitting just behind them, near a few bags of dried mortar. "You might want to grab a pair of work gloves."

He did so and returned. He could already tell this would be painful, tedious work, but he was already here, and if he was going to work with them, there would be a lot more painful, tedious work coming. It would have to be worth it, he told himself. Maybe there really was a way for them to heal him. Maybe they hadn't found it yet. If Aerith and Ienzo worked together…

For a while they built in near perfect silence, laying and cementing stone in the hollows between reclaimed pieces. Very quickly a burn set in his arms and he had a feeling time was passing a too slowly.

"Why not just use pipes?" Demyx asked. He rolled his shoulder to try and ease the pain.

"We don't have any," Leon said. "We've got to work with what was left from all the other destroyed districts. This will all hold up better, eventually."

More silence. The pain had him near tears, heaving bricks to and fro, but he forced himself not to complain because Yuffie was right there.

"Lea told me he was teaching you to fight," Leon said.

Yuffie peeked through her bangs.

"…I guess that's true," Demyx said.

"It's reasonable. You shouldn't wander unprotected. Nobody should." Leon wiped the sweat from his brow. "He told me you were interested in standing with us."

Yuffie looked up fully. Her gaze was bemused, but uncomfortable.

"We'd be happy to have you," Leon continued.

"How would you trust him?" Yuffie asked. She scoffed. "How would you know he wouldn't…"

Leon gave her a look. "Wouldn't what, Yuffie?"

"I don't know. They hurt people. You hurt people. What about the Thousand Heartless?" Her tone was sharp and she spackled a bit more harshly than necessary.

"They sent me there to die," Demyx said. He tried to make it sound matter-of-fact, but he was starting to get pissed. "They wanted Sora to kill me and he did and that's that."

"But say you had stopped him—"

This again. "But I didn't." The sun was beating harshly on his face. "I never had a fucking chance."

"Yuffie. Stop. Please." Leon's tone was sharp.

"I've gotta get out of here. I'm gonna go help Cid." She slipped down the scaffolding and was gone.

Demyx's stomach hurt. He took a deep breath.

"Yuffie holds a grudge," Leon said. "I'm guessing you already figured that out."

He didn't know what to say. He was so mad he could practically see red. "I'm trying to do the right thing. Does she think I don't know? Does she think I don't feel that way all the time?" The mortar was cool against his hands.

Leon nodded. "I understand it was… complicated."

More silence. The pain in his arms was grounding. When they broke for lunch he sat off by himself, dangling his legs on the scaffolding and trying to find some flavor in his pathetic sandwich. He felt footsteps and weight next to him and saw Yuffie with her plastic container. "Going to yell at me some more?" he asked. He would get up and move, but his exhaustion rooted him to the spot.

"No." Her voice sounded forced. "I came to—ugh—apologize."

"What, did Leon make you?"

She shrugged. "Did they really want to kill you?"

He had no more appetite. "I was terrified," he said. "We were all dying. Half of us were gone. I never cared for their cause, I just did enough work to save my life. I don't think anyone thought the fake Kingdom Hearts would work but we were desperate. Xemnas, he… he said the whole time that this was the answer. We didn't know how to be whole again. You don't know what it's like, Yuffie, the emptiness, it's just this huge… void, inside, gnawing like, these little weird half pops of feeling coming in now and again." He touched his chest and prayed he wouldn't start crying.

She didn't say anything. She looked vaguely pained.

"When they gave me that order to face him… I think they saw me as a burden. Like if they put me there I could buy them some time to make a better plan. I don't know why I didn't just run." A pause. A hot wind had kicked up. "How can you think I'm so bad when you have no idea how you'd act in the same situation?"

"Fuck that." Her tone wasn't as heated as usual, though. "Have you seen a world fall? All the chaos… the bloodshed… knowing that most of them won't get out? Knowing that they'll die, or they'll become Heartless? Or worse?"

Planet X fell. Xigbar hadn't even given the planet a name. How many stories and songs had been lost? He'd seen the reports, heard the whispers of the lesser Nobodies in his consciousness as they reported to him, the fire, the fear, the screaming, waves and waves of boiling darkness. A sharp pain stabbed behind his eyes. "Yes. I have."

"It's how my dad died. I'm sorry. I can't see the shades of gray in this situation." She looked away from him, out onto the rest of the town.

He could hardly believe it. A human conversation. "I never wanted to hurt anyone. I know that I probably did."

She slumped forward. "Me too. Shit. I always wondered if I could have done more when this place fell. All I could think about was… running."

"You were in danger. It was the instinctual thing to do."

"Maybe someone else should have gone in that ship instead of me. Maybe I should have stayed with my dad." She closed her eyes. "We're going to be working together for a while. Let's at least put up with each other."

This day was too fucking weird. "I can do that."

#nocturnal memory #demyx #kingdom hearts #kingdom hearts 3d #fanfiction

[hgfstreamchats]

Avengers: Infinity War

How's every little thing, night human? Alright, alright Have you seen this already, or should I avoid spoilers for it? (I haven't seen the one that just came out) I haven't. Aha, gotcha. I'm seeped deeply enough in your pop culture that I know how it plays out, however. *nodnods* Loki looking all awkward there. "we KIND OF just had an apocalypse there" As one does. Hello! Took a minute for my keyboard to key in there, but wow Excellent! I know this guy probably came first, but he's SO much like a bad ripoff of that guy from Ben 10 ikr? GO LOKI! I mean, it was a good try.

A knife, though? A knife of all things? Thanos is INCREDIBLY dumb. It could have worked. It wouldn't have been much of a movie if he did, but I was rooting for Thor to kick his ass Yeah. there was a crowd-wide scream in the theater I was in when Loki died There was a lot of yelling that night actually I admit I'll be mad if he really is dead this time. Well whether he is or not, there is that tv show coming And there's always reboots. true, true And other universes I mean, there is no reason why they can't bring in Lady Death at some point And Deadpool. Even though they won't have her be Thanos' flame But she usually isn't against trading souls Then they can have Deadpool cockblock Thanos. I mean. I would watch a whole movie on that premise A wacky romantic comedy! just... cockblocking Thanos, who is definitely that ugly fratboy that Lady Death has no interest in everyone wants to cockblock Thanos. It'd be the feel-good hit of the summer. I mean. I would watch a whole movie on that premise A wacky romantic comedy! just... cockblocking Thanos, who is definitely that ugly fratboy that Lady Death has no interest in everyone wants to cockblock Thanos. It'd be the feel-good hit of the summer. "Why do you think I would want to deal with more dead people, it's like... a logistical nightmare" Besides, she can take the long view. Everyone dies eventually. "This person wasn't supposed to die for another 80 years, you've destroyed the balance" ...Multiple times, in some cases. *cough*Optimus*cough* OP would cockblock Thanos Ha! lol Side note, I just think it says some unflattering things about a villain when all their minions are THAT toadying and talk about 'em in that weirdly... worshipful? way. All culty and all. Agreed Greetings. Hello! Good evening, both of you! My mistake, one of you! I am pleased to not miss seeing the poor decisions of good meaning individuals. More realistic :< all Marvel characters do is make poor decisions. constantly Good people don't always make smart decisions just because they are kind 'Good' people notoriously make bad decisions, because it makes them feel better. Cough cough, Autobots. dangerous faces > Yeah, and 'bad' people notoriously make bad decisions because they have some stupid personal grudge they want to satisfy. Cough Megatron cough. And I make both kinds of bad decision, so does that make me a neutral person? I just think it means "emotionally satisfying" is completely orthogonal to "achieves your goals" True ... boy this was hard enough to watch the first time Of course Rocket knows about it AND NOW: shenanigans why an omnicidal madman gets ready to kill untold infinities Is it truly omnicidal, if he only wishes to kill 'half'? Semi-omnicidal? Oh he has "reasons", they're just too stupid for words I wonder what he did with species that were on the last of their kind? Actually I kind of want to know why he's in charge of an army in the first place. Does seem like a cause that shouldn't have so much of a following But, he only JUST started collecting the infinity stones. Before that it seems like his power WAS his army. He did have one a while ago, but Loki lost it Without all that he's just... some guy? Relatively big and tough, I guess, but who cares? I think he is supposed to be strong without the stones There isn't that much proof of it though If it's just physically strong, then--again, who cares? boring We do not have enough history to say for certain what resources he started out with. Maybe he adopted all of them We know he adopted at least two children, maybe he just... collects them or something And we do not know how long he has been collecting followers. One can amass an army from nothing, if they have enough time and drive. I guess; it just seems kind of bizarre. I'm rolling my eyes so hard right now. She has forgotten about her mother very quickly. It's not *that* nice of a knife. Trauma can make you forget things to survive That was kind of how I interpreted it, yeah. Repress and deny. I would not trust this man to pick up a parcel on time, let alone kill in a vital situation. Even easier for such a young child Oh, I like him. Out of curiosity, how many of us have seen Endgame? Not me. I have not. I've heard it's three hours long and I'm going to wait for, ahem, something I can watch at home and pause in the middle. It's not because I want to talk spoilers or anything, just curious It is very long I feel like they need to bring back intermissions if they're going to do that. Get the biggest popcorn/drink/whatever available . . . That is not stealth. Drax doesn't really "do" stealth "why" GEE I DUNNO subterfuge: a literally alien concept He's so full of shit. People cry out of relief, too. Or any strong emotion. He's such an aft That is a fun toy, though. So sad He can bend reality. There is no tension. Still sad because you know what is going to happen It's obnoxious to watch him pretending there is so he can play out his little ~dramas~ You have no idea what he might do to her now, and that is the truly sad part At least in the comics he deluded himself into putting on limits so he could be sexier for death. This is just dull. *high five* I feel like they were trying to make him more relatable, but... somehow the power of sexy is more understandable They were trying to make him more relatable? Sorry, who wants to relate to THAT? I think so, I mean, they tried to make a lot of the characters more relatable Would not destroying a stone that is one of the pillars of the universe have consequences? You'd think, right? But I don't remember that being brought up at any point Well, the soul stone is inactive so... maybe, maybe not It keeps just being "oh no we can't DESTROY it, we could use it!" But inactive might not be the same as destroyed, right? I think they are more a force for changing the laws of the universe than actually controlling it At least, in the comics it seems more that way At least, in the comics it seems more that way whoops okay I'm ducking out for the torture scene Good choice That is one way to solve the problem. That was it, right All done? Done. good, good "oh we're using made up names" Did Strange lose his teleportation ring? He could just leave, if he chooses. Heh. Maybe it only works short range? Maybe it only works on earth That sounds like a lie. And yet GOTG says that she is the last survivor of her race That's not how planets or anything works. Does he not have several stones that bypass these finite laws of the universe? He could create. He could just double all the resources Or teleport things to the places they are needed, his justification is a lie, he's just an asshole euuuurgh, the other torture scene brb Sloppy. what a loving father It's fine to sacrifice her own life to save all, but she cannot sacrifice her sister to the same end. Back So he killed much more than half of them? And crippled this one, just be be even more of a prick. This is the guy who thinks mass murder is the solution to every problem. Mass murder is the solution to several problems, but certainly not all of them. They almost accidentally murdered their allies I'd argue that at this point Thanos has "when all you have is a hammer"-ed himself into mass murder as a solution Exactly. "Oh, there's a famine? TIME TO KILL EVERYONE!" No one can be hungry if they are dead. Again though, there are at least two planets where it lead to one survivor Ha. better than none This seems like something he could have done earlier. Then they are bad at their jobs. Only one win scenario... Before their options narrowed so badly. Maybe the "one" is to make them feel desperate Give me the Ring, Frodo~ He may also be lying about the fourteen million. Maybe desperation is part of what leads to the success of multiple lines Convenient that he brought a sacrifice. I am so angry about this This seems like a great moment to shove him into the abyss. He may be too heavy for her to push. And, right? Is this supposed to make us feel sorry for him? Because it's failing. It makes me feel even more sorry for her Why does anyone like this character? Because he is entitled, and thinks he is a genius, when he is only selfish, and stupid. PRO TIP: Don't try to make us feel sorry for someone for whom genocide is a first step No idea, then again, I don't know anyone who does I don't think I've seen one positive word about him. Even, like, as a character Oh it's the sad music Poor Gamora. The comic book version is fun... being a large ham who literally wants to woo death and got cockblocked by Deadpool The nicest thing I can think to say is... well... at least he isn't trying to bone death in this a literal skeleton I prefer that idea but... at least it isn't into nec-romance Ha, nice. . . . I call shenanigans on this physics. maybe physics work differently here I think physics definitely works differently here. All this to protect one guy. Tactics also seems to work differently. One guy who was willing to sacrifice himself. Where is the air support? Surely they can muster more than two men? Humans can't fly naturally They can pilot machines. Nice. Wakanda should be full of flying machines. But, also, was that the bifrost? Can he... use that now? true I thought that was Heimdall's thing I'm sorry to be nitpicking, it just occurred to me And you'd think so, right? The axe allows him to use the bifrost. They said the hammer could use the power of the bifrost Ohhhh Oh, shut up! Unfortunately he is insane, regardless of what happened. I wish the filmmakers could get their hands off Thanos's dick for like two seconds. nobody's gonna be fuckin' grateful you murdered half of everyone you know His tiny, tiny one. I do like Starlord. ...Mostly. He is very resilliant, even without the magic. I feel like cutting his hand off would have been more expedient than trying to pull the gauntlet off, too. But then the movie would be over. Who cares! Cutting his head off would solve even more problems. Very true. Indeed. Hand first, then head. My god he's an idiot This was NOT the time Oh, you stupid, stupid fragger. Argh, I know, right? If he could have waited TWO MINUTES Bad decisions all around. He could have had ACTUAL revenge They could have started with those. Maybe they, uh....... take time to warm up? She had one job. And yes, saving her friends is important and all, but still. Okay, not that I don't like pithy comments, but it seems like they could have made better use of their surprise round Like that! Hopefully he is not storing any important organs there. I HOPE this is part of his plan. After his big talk earlier about how he wouldn't give up the stone to save them. It would have to be. Stark's presence must be part of the final win condition. Endgame: final phase of chess when you sacrifice important pieces for victory That alone says it is part of the plan Okay, fair. I hadn't considered this before, but maybe part of their attraction for each other is because they are connected by the stones Unicron's sake, why is he still talking? nobody caaaaaaaaaaaaares nobody likes you shut up forever He likes fellating his own ego. *GRUMBLE* I do wonder if this means it wouldn't have helped to have just. Started with that instead of trying to protect Vision Because he's the last person in the universe who he respects to have a say *enough to have a say This is why it is important to kill first, gloat after. Yep. No matter how tempting it is to do otherwise... Prioritize. awwww, he's SAD. Nobody cares! Cry more tears, you big disgusting grape. It shouldn't be allowed for characters to mourn over people they intentionally and willingly murdered Also, his 'instant' snap takes forever. It takes long enough for people to know they're dying. Like for Scarlet Witch it makes sense, because she actually did have to kill the willing Vision, Gamora fought for her life and he didn't have to do it Notice how none of his "equally likely to die" soldiers are shown dying? Very fair and impartial. He deserved that. He deserved to live, and lose them all for his failures. aw, noooo. :< I bawled at this part in the movies Good point. Good thing Stark handles his trauma well. And Thanos gets his sunrise that he does not deserve. With music that says we're supposed to get all sappy over it. While the rest of the galaxy fights over half the animals and resources left. Keep in mind he halved all living resources, so unless you can eat rocks... yeah, there isn't actually more resources now What a crock of drainage. Alright, light note to end on, because we need one. It's going to be more than half of everyone dying too. Wait The post credit scene There's aftercredits stuff And because I have zero interest in listening to Thanos's sad man music. Oh, yes! Small spoiler, don't wait for the post credit scene in endgame, there isn't one Oh, huh. Breaking the tradition, huh? Now the biggest question, is does the gauntlet count mechanical life forms as 'alive' enough to erase? I don't want people disappointed like I was His comment about ~sparing half of humanity~ made it sound like he was deliberately choosing who would live and die, at least on a species level. Hm, we don't see any erased by the click, but that doesn't mean that they aren't So I guess it would depend on whatever terrible opinions Thanos himself has. She called him Nick I had to explain that symbol to so many people after the movie ...okay, I'd shop here I need this shop same Okay, maybe not. A feel good way to end the evening. This is a movie that needed to end with mercy gas. Yes. Good night, everyone! Thank you for coming! I do not want to be carried home by a big strong man who will watch my movies for me. It makes it sound like you want Thanos to fart at the end Speak for yourself. And thank you for streaming! Night all Goodnight! Goodnight And as far as I'm concerned, he did. One long, continous one, from his first scene to his last. On that note, good night. They edited it out in post. But we know.