#ooc ; another amazing edit

[halcyone-of-the-sea]

Hi!

I just wanted to say that I absolutely love all of your COD fics! Your Price fics made me fall in love with him (I saw a recommendation for See No Evil on TikTok and just went down the rabbit hole from there (it’s also my comfort fic)) and Laughing Poets made me buy Ghosts for Keegan. Your writing is so beautiful and poetic and has inspired me to start writing again after a really bad writing’s block!

I also did want to put in a request for Ghost (because I love him so much) but given his hype, I understand if you don’t want to write for him or if it may be hard. But I was hoping that this hasn’t been done before (much) and that I could read it in your words since you are so amazing!

I was thinking of the reader being a CIA agent that was working undercover to get classified information and 141 was sent in to extract her after she was compromised. And her and Ghost don’t really get along at first, like they don’t hate each other but they could just care less about one another. But then they get separated and one of them is injured and the other fights tooth and nail to get to them, realizing how much they care. I was thinking that her callsign could be ‘Reaper’ but it can be anything else if it fits better. It can be angsty (because that’s the absolute best genre), fluffy, nsfw, whatever you want to do with it.

I know this is asking a bit much and I’m sorry for that. Feel free to change it as you see fit and do whatever you want with it, if you want to do it. I really appreciate and love your work!! Thank you!!

'Til it Hurts

Pairing: Simon 'Ghost' Riley x F!Reader

Synopsis: You thought that it would be easy - moving on and blazing your own trail, but at every step, memories seem to come back and haunt you. And the biggest memory takes the shape of a man with a skull mask. Can you still deny what you had always felt when he stands at your side once more?

Word Count: 12.5k

Warnings: This duology will be 18+ and contain the following: intense gore, blood, violence, vulgar language, angst, fluff, suggestive content, (smut, p in v sex, virgin!reader (relevant to plot) all in part 2), abuse of power in the past, toxic working environment in the past, copious flashbacks, soft!simon because I love him like that (I guess considered ooc), banter, etc...

A/N: Part 2 will be posted tomorrow after I edit it and the link will be added to this part as well for ease of access. But, anna, that's wild that people post about my work on tiktok, lmfao. I'm so glad I helped you out of that writer's block, though! Enjoy part 1, Love (I did change it around a bit)!

*I do not give others permission to translate and/or re-publish my works on this or any other platform*

You often think of the friends you had when you were six. The neighborhood you grew up in was full of other kids your age, and there was practically a horde of young boys and girls outside at any given moment. Early mornings were ripe for adventures – ears perking up from your pillows at the sound of bird songs and lawnmowers like an instinctual call to cause mischief. Days would run long and nights would end late with games of tag. 

It was inevitable, at this point in your life, to not think about where your friends would be now. Were they happy? Starting families and getting married on island resorts; white sand underfoot and a gentle lapping of ocean water? You’d lost contact a long, long, time ago – never bothered to get back in touch, though you know things might be better if you had. 

God, you’d never have friends like that again. 

Selfless. Genuine. Without competition or a need to stab each other in the back. Friendships built on a childlike innocence that was never meant to stay or grow with the brutal stretch of years. People mature. They harden, sharpen. 

They break themselves to fit a mold of what they want to be without even realizing…Or maybe that was just how you grew up. 

Your feet pound against the cobblestone streets of Bergamo, Italy, as you make your way through the packed road of the Upper Old District. Under your chin, your fingers go up to grasp the scarf around your neck and pull the thick navy fabric up farther. Fast eyes flicker over faces as a fake plastered smile splays over your lips, and your jaw holds a tension that seeps into your shoulders.

Keep the act up, you have to remind yourself, fingers heavy at your hips, don’t let the facade slip, or else it’s over before it begins.

At your sides, past the unending sea of loudly speaking humans and loyal animals alike, the broad expanse of ancient architecture calls to the history of this city; red-terracotta roofing, extravagant greenery, and pillars as tall as the buildings themselves. A picturesque land filled with mysteries lost to time, stories never told beyond the scratch of a pen and moth-eaten parchment. 

A city now filled with killers. 

“Sitrep,” you grunt into the open channel, the earpiece fizzling as it sits in the clutch of your canal. No one answers and, slipping past a family of tourists, you glare at the ground; heart going so fast you feel like it could jump-start a car. “Damnit!”

The seconds draw on and as you pick up the pace, now shoving your way through the crowd, you feel eyes on you. Slithering over your skin like oil. 

Not good. 

Shit. Karver, where did you go!? 

Karver ‘Rigs’ Massarini was an informant – someone who’d been giving you everything that you needed to know about the cell in this area; along with a grouping of eyewitnesses to a stash of ICBMs. A stash that could do some serious damage if they stayed here with the wrong people. Intel suggests that those very missiles were going to be shipped off to Mexico in only a few days, smuggled across the border into United States territory with the intent of doing some pretty awful stuff and framing the US. 

If you and Rigs weren’t quick with this, so many innocents would suffer.

You’d already gotten into contact with Mexican Special Forces yourself, warning Alejandro Vargas and Rodolfo Parra of a possible breach and to watch for any unregistered shipments on the docks or coming in from the air. 

But now Rigs was missing, and you had a funny feeling you were being trailed. 

Back alley. You take a quick right, boots slamming to the ground and heart hammering. Get away from the civvies in case someone decides to go trigger-happy. 

This cell was known for being deadly, Mr. Massarini had sent the file over to CIA headquarters before you were shipped out; Laswell had set you on it right away without even taking the time to read it entirely.

“Extremely high Kinetic; I’m giving you full Execute Authority on this, Reaper. We’re running out of time. Find those missiles.” 

Torture, kidnappings, mutilations, the list went on for this group and how far they would go to keep secrets. No one had gotten any clear insight as to what their motives were – just that they needed to be put down in exactly the ways they had been doing to others. Ruthlessly, before they grew bigger or spread their influence beyond borders, and created a group that could rival what Al-Qatala had been. 

So that was where you came in. 

God, you wished Farah and Alex were here with you – at the very least you could rely on them to help, even if you sectioned yourself off from others more than a dying cat. There was a reason you preferred being sent in alone with only your wits.  

Mostly because of situations like this.

“Rigs, sitrep. Where are you,” you try again, the close walls shrouding in your shadows. Throwing looks over your shoulders, you take down deep breaths, a growl gradually digging itself a hole in your esophagus. Desperately, you say, “I’m heading back to the safe house ASAP. Wait for me there.” 

Your right hand gravitates to your pocket, slipping through the fabric and pushing aside the ripped seam at the bottom. The sheath at your thigh pinches you with every step, but you’ve endured it for years, calluses breeding where the leather had chaffed the flesh to toughness. To an ingrained perfection. Flinching when your fingers bump against the handle, the metal adornments feel cool to the touch despite the sweat dripping down your spine; temperature and nerves leaving your palms sweaty. 

None of this was going to plan.

You caress the small Dirk blade strapped to you, and when the first footsteps enter the alleyway behind you, your hand clenched into a loose fist around it. Your eyebrows pull tight with annoyance.

Taking a slow breath as the trailing stranger begins to move faster, you take a corner, halting the second you were out of sight. You nonchalantly turn on your heel and lean into the wall, feeling your body conform to the building and the stone dig into your back. 

The material is cold, and as you raise your Dirk up, you flip the blade parallel to your forearm, wrist lax, and fingers still. A slow breath flows from your barely-parted lips. 

3 seconds. You don’t blink, only gazing out across the space and noticing the dark shadow gaining ground. 2…1…

Your body jerks forward, free hand snapping out and grasping the fabric of a shirt. Twisting your hips, you plant your feet and wrench the stranger around the corner, breath coming out in a loud snarl. Without a shout, you have the person’s back shoved to the building in an instant, blade held above an Adam’s Apple. 

A man, then.

“I’m going to give you one full minute.” Your Italian was only surface level – far better at understanding others than speaking full sentences. But you think whoever this man is comes to a conclusion well enough. “Before I cut you open and watch the life spill from your eyes.”

You don’t recognize this person, his sharp face or dark, sly, eyes, and with a quick assessment of his large stature you figure out he’s the basic definition of a man sent to complete a job. One that would have left you dead if you were anything less than a contracted CIA Agent on a job. You had been trained among the best from your time in the Marines – years on Special Ops forces; taking point. Even if they were the worst times of your life, you still learned a great deal from them, particularly, how to know when to cut your losses. 

With one look into his smug face, you know that this stranger would tell you nothing. 

Your lips formed a grimace, teeth flashing under flesh at the rod-straight form of the man under you. He was smirking with eyes seeming to be laughing at you. Arrogant. Self-assured. 

“You’ll get nothing out of me, Reaper. We are already on your trail.” Your head tilts, a numb huff escaping your throat and pushing the individual's hair back as a breeze would. There was a small pause; tiny shiftings of your feet as your blade digs ever deeper. 

A thin trail of blood falls from the placement, and your muscles writhe under the epidermis. There’s no thought behind the laugh that enters the air, that cold, dark, thing that’s more of a bark from a hellhound. It was just a realization that no matter where you went, there could never be anything unique anymore. Everyone was always the same. 

“You’ll never get it out of me-”

“Break my bones; rip my flesh, you will never make me talk-”

“If you want to see me beg, you’ll be disappointed-”

There were countless memories you could bring to the precipice of your mind and re-live; moments ingrained into your psyche like a tattoo is to skin. So you can only smile and nod, scarf swishing around your neck. The man looks confused now, if not slightly nervous. That self-assured attitude leaking to the ground. Eyes as dark as obsidian beginning to snap back and forth – looking for a saving grace in the make-up of ancient stone that wasn’t going to come. 

You wondered how many people had died in this city throughout history. The stories lost to time. Have these alleys seen war? Famine?

Have they seen murder? 

But you are a woman of your word. A minute passes in tense silence, your eyes never leaving his own and ears carefully in tune, twitching like an antenna, to the joyous shouts and laughter just a street over. Here you wait like a rat in a trap, though you like to believe yourself more of the metal Hammer than the unknowing participant in a dance of death and wits.

You tighten your grip on your Dirk, shrugging up at the man. Your face is nonchalant as an understanding smile grows. As simple as a server at a restaurant.

“I believe you.” And you run the knife’s edge across his flesh like a match to a striker before he can scream.

Stepping back, you’re suddenly thankful for the scarf over your sweat-slick neck because as the spray of blood splatters over your nose bridge and forehead, you swipe it away with one of the ends of the thick fabric. You let the body drop, watching large hands snap to the gushing wound like that alone would stop the cold grip of death. 

Your mark has been met. 

The External Carotid Artery was easy enough to cut, though you had to dig deep for it, and it seemed the man had moved mid-slice. Frowning while the man gasps and gurgles; flails as a fish would, you study your work as you flick the blade clear of blood. Your brows furrow. 

“Nicked the Thyroid Cartilage, hm.” Sighing and shaking your head, you sheathe the Dirk and twist on your feet, still intent on making your way back to the hotel safe house and trying to find a lead on Rigs. The slumping of a body reverberates a moment later, a grandiose death rattle, and still, only a street over you hear animated conversations – the bustle of traveling feet, and the sound of the breeze. 

You often think about the friends you had when you were six. But, now, instead of being the one who fought off the monsters at the ends of the beds, you had become it. The monster. The boogeyman. 

The Reaper. 

Oh, what would they think of you now? 

You swipe at the blood along your fingertips, seeing the red bleed under your nails with such a numb feeling that it scares you more than anything. Taking down a gathering of saliva that feels more like a slug in your throat, you wonder when you lost the ability to value human life. Of course, the answer was slated in those early years in Special Ops, but you don’t dwell on those times. 

In fact, it was better if you never thought of them at all. 

Taking a left, you hum a tune under your breath and listen to the birds sing as the blood dries. 

—

The meeting room wasn’t even a room, just a vacant air-craft hangar that had been fitted out with two rows of metal fold-out chairs and a projector. Shadows danced over the floor, long streaks of darkness over concrete. 

“...I’ll be giving you full Execute Authority – but this mission is completely Black. Host weapons only. No Evac team.” Laswell’s voice echoes off the ceiling, and Ghost’s eyes flow over the projected intel, memorizing the faces and locations with nothing more than a blink of his blue eyes. Fluttering eyelashes caress the hard material of his mask before settling. 

Task Force 141 was being sent off on another deployment again, deep into Belarus and near the Russian border.

“Time frame?” The Captain asks, standing a small distance away and leaning against a crate of ammunition. His arms are crossed; jaw is loosely set. 

Kate looks at him, above the heads of Gaz and Soap, and nods her head before she comments, “one week.”

Gaz huffs from ahead of the hulking form of Ghost, and the silent man shifts his attention back to the group. 

“One week, Kate? No offense, but we don’t even know if the bastard’s in Belarus.”

“‘fraid to get dirty there, Garrick? Ah, we’re good enough for it.” Soap elbows the male at his side, and the masked man releases a puff of breath one row back. The Scot twists in his seat, mohawk tendrils falling over his forehead, and smirks. “C’mon Lt. back me up here. We’ve got this in the bag already.”

“Bit confident, Johnny?” Ghost grunts out, accented voice low and muffled from under the black fabric over his lips. His hips shift over the chair, legs splayed and arms crossed as he reclines back; letting the bulk of his gear weigh heavy. “Just wait until you’ve got us sitting on a pile of dry leads and rotting corpses.”

“Eh, nothin’ we haven’t dealt with before.”

“Focus, you three.” Kate interrupts as Gaz rolls his eyes to himself, fixing his ball cap over his head with a fast flick of his wrist at the antics of the other two. “You’re going to be shipped out at 2000–”

An easily recognizable ringtone starts to play. 

Blinking in surprise, Laswell takes a glance at the table that had been long forgotten and spies her phone buzzing over the metal. Her light brown hair, kept securely tied back, swished at the nape of her neck. She wastes no time.

Briskly walking over, the rest of the men in the room watched intently, heads perked up. Ghost couldn’t stop the pique of interest at the strange behavior, though his form remains still, only making a noise under his breath in contemplation. In the hold of his crossed arms, his fingers tighten.

“Not the person I’d imagine keeps her phone on for just anyone…” Gaz makes a slow comment, and John slides up beside him, hands hooking onto the sides of his combat vest. Watching. 

“Hm,” their command affirms.  

 Kate picks up her phone and immediately answers, brows furrowed. She shifts her weight as an inhalation reverberates. The conversation on the other side was too muffled, a small droaning the only signal that someone was on the opposite.

Unconsciously, Ghost straightens in his chair as the rolled-back sleeves of his undershirt leave his black ink tattoos on display. A deep intrigue spilled in his chest but otherwise, he was still focused on the previous instructions for the next Op. This was just another cog in the wheel, perhaps a location change for their safe house, or an accelerated timeline. No matter, they would get it done regardless–

“Reaper?” Laswell speaks, and blue eyes slide to stare at the Captain, whose legs had tensed. “What’s happened–” 

The Lieutenant knows something was wrong just by the simple fact that he’d never seen their Station Chief talk on her personal phone with that look on her face before – he’d seen it mirrored on the Captain and he’d clocked it from her just as simply. The wrinkled skin at the side of her eyes, and stiff-set lips peeled back in a frown. She’d always been serious, but the air was different. 

Reaper? He runs through the database of his mind and ignores Gaz’s and Johnny’s muttered words and glances. 

“Now who do you think that is, then?” Soap grunts out. Ghost doesn’t answer.

Brows furrow. 

Sounds familiar, the man can’t help but admit. 

“Patch me through. Now.” Kate slips to the computer a few steps away and opens a fresh tab, sorting through files and months of intel as if it mattered just as much as a bug under her heel.

“Kate?” Price prompts. The woman only holds up a finger and keeps the phone in between her shoulder and cheek, hands fast across the keys. 

Soon enough, a feed pops up on the projector, and the three previously sitting all rise to their feet in an instant. 

An open wound is in the process of being stitched and displays itself over the entire available space, violent red internal flesh puckering over the edges of…Ghost narrows his eyes, unphased.

Was that a fabric needle and thread being used for sutures? Resourceful, he admits.

“Bloody fuckin’ hell.” The manchester man levels thought the blandness of the tone contradicts itself. “Where’s this feed from, Laswell?”

“What the fuck…?” Soap growls out, and the Scot blinks at the screen in shock as the Brit beside him lets off a sound of disgust akin to a sick cat. 

“Reaper, sitrep.” Kate doesn’t flinch, rushing off into procedure as steady hands delve back into flesh, blood falling from their fingers like water to splatter to a rundown wooden table. The world-away computer was most likely getting a rain of crimson all over the keys at this rate. 

Price grunts under his breath. 

“Shit,” a distinctly feminine voice wafts out, a harsh sigh held back, though the annoyed tone was noticed immediately, “can’t a girl stitch herself up in peace? Besides, Watcher-1 answer me this, huh?” The computer is jerked, its screen going staticky as Ghost watches with roving eyes to take in the background when the visibility returns. A bed, nightstand, and sitting by the floor of the front door, copious amounts of weapons. The man takes stock – an M13 assault rifle, X12 handgun, and Arctic .50 sniper rifle. Ammunition lines the floor in a way that leaves Ghost’s lips thinning under the mask. 

Someone’s in a hurry. But from what?

“…what goddamn hotel doesn’t have mirrors in it?” Kate’s sigh can be heard a mile away. “No, I’m being serious here, Watcher – how the hell does that happen?” 

Watching you take a step back, Ghost as well as the other three all blink in surprise when you come into view. Your top was off, only a sports bra covering your flesh, as your focus stays on the digging needle you send into yourself over and over. 

Yet again a feeling of intense familiarity strikes the Brit in the chest. Your soft face, your hair, your voice. It was infuriating.

Who are you? The inability to call forth a memory leaves the fists at his sides gradually clenching under his gloves. 

“Reaper.” Seriousness grows in the Agent’s voice, and Price lets out a slow chuckle that leaves Gaz turning to him in confusion. 

“Sir?” But the inquiry is ignored.

“Still as stubborn as ever, then, Reap?” Everyone sees your hurried stitches stop, head snapping up as they clock a veiled panic behind the iris’. 

Your eyes tell all the story they need, and Ghost’s body freezes as the color evokes a physical twitching of his hand. 

“Holy hell,” he utters under his breath so silently no one even realizes he spoke; eyelids pulling back before settling like nothing had even happened.

“You know, you're the first person who’s been nice to me out here.”

“...Then I’d tell you to get better friends, Sergeant. I’m not sticking around.”

“I never said they were my friends, Ghost, and I never expected you to stay, anyways. That’s not how this works.”

“You’re right. It’s not.”

“Bravo-06?” You ask, voice sometimes cutting out over the line. A laugh breaks out, and a small smirk twitches the corners of your lips, “Hey, Old Man, how’s it going over there? Been a while.”

“What have you got yourself into now?” Price asks, chuckling under his breath with a groaned continuation, “and how do you need me to get you out of it?”

The spectral man now watches with a newfound fervency, blue eyes boiling so violently that if anyone had seen, they would have thought he was about to attack. Like a split second of eye contact with a wolf before it rushes. The build of his shoulders was still loose, however, and the only indication of shock was his optics; the mask shrouded all. 

But there was a subtle movement of his hips, feet transferring over the floor to stand shoulder-length apart.

“Oh, this,” you point to your injury with a free finger, tying off a knot on the last line of sutures. “Nah, it’s nothing. A couple of assholes tried to get the jump on me a block back, one had a knife on ‘em.” Your hand tosses the needle and thread to the table, a muttered, thunk, sounding off. Looking down at your work with a raised brow, everyone watches. “Took care of it – they gave me a name, too, but with the trail of bodies I left today, I wouldn’t be surprised if it didn’t pan out.” 

A pause before you turn your head back up, face now completely serious as you focus on Laswell. 

“But we have a bigger problem, Watcher. Rigs is gone; I think my position’s compromised. I’m going black.” Your form leans to the side, and a wrinkled t-shirt is thrown over your head. From your mouth, a stifled groan releases. Ghost blinks in surprise.

The Captain’s lips thin, and he looks at a tight-wound Kate. 

“I have a contact in the lower levels, Reaper, meet up with her and she can have you out of the city by tonight. I’ll send over her info.”

“No can do, Watcher.” You sigh, and Ghost simply stares, following your figure as you back up, heading to the X12 and shimmying it into the back of your pants before looking over your shoulder. Kate hums under her breath. “If they’ve got Rigs,” Walking quickly back over to the computer, one of your hands grasps the top of the frame, thumb poking out from the corner. You tilt your head. “I ain't leaving without him right behind me. I’ll be in contact in a month – if I’m not, then I’m dead already.” 

Your chuckle strikes a cord through the room and Soap snorts in answer. 

“Glass-half-empty kind of person, then?” 

“I’d say,” Gaz mutters.

Continuing, you’re about to say something else – lips already partially parted and breath sucked in  – before your eyes lock onto Ghost. The atmosphere of the room flips like the page of a book. 

You stare at him with what seems to be a million emotions flying past the glossiness of your optics; lids already peeled back and whites showing in a display that showed more than told. The man could only begin to imagine what you were thinking – how long had it been since he’d seen you last? You’d obviously gotten out of your Marines Special Ops unit. 

Not quite how I remember you. It wasn’t hard to recall that small branch of the MRR – Marine Raider Regiment – and how they treated you. But that wasn’t any of his business. He’d been there to do a job, and he’d accomplished it. Quite thoroughly, if anyone would have checked the file after it was all over. 

Ghost’s life was counted in the sands of an hourglass, small, molecular, bits hitting the bottom one after the other; rarely was that time wasted on pointless squabbles and words but at that moment, he was conflicted. 

The Brit had never expected to see you again, and the sand briefly halted when you spoke. Hm. 

Yes, he remembered that voice… he’d just never heard you this confident before. 

“Ghost.” He watches the emotions on your face settle, and he was thankful for the mask covering his visage because he knows he would have left at least a small twitch of his lips slip. “Long time no see.”

“Mutt.” The Lieutenant nods in a monotone greeting but notices a slight jerk of your shoulders at the name. His eyebrows furrow, but mentions nothing as his pulse slows. 

Your neck moves as you swallow, looking to the side as a dark curiosity fills the space in Ghost’s lungs; head nanoscopically tilting to the side like a vulture. 

“Nice seeing you, Bravo-06,” You tilt your head toward the Captain before clearing your throat and addressing Laswell. “I’ll be around.” 

It wasn’t hard to tell that the title had made you freak, a kind of bad cloud suddenly springing to life above your head. 

Seems to bother her more than being in a Hot Zone, Ghost tells himself, the deep well of dark water in his gut still. That didn’t make any sense. He watches your hand slaps over the computer and the feed goes dark in an instant. 

The room is more silent than Ghost is. 

“Kate, she’ll need our help.” Price shakes his head from side to side; body moving to the front of the room. “I’m not asking.” 

The two talk it over as Ghost’s mind trails, head tilting down more towards his chest as his eyelids narrow. 

“Hm,” He grunts, arms tensing as his grip shifts. Soap turns around as Gaz goes to join the conversation between the Captain and the agent.

“What? Know ‘er or something, Lt?” The Scot asks, slapping a hand on the taller man’s arm. Ghost eyes lock on the grip before he blinks, looking back up and leveling the Sergeant with a dead stare. Johnny laughs awkwardly and moves his limb back to his side. “Just…didn’t peg you for the type to start relationships.”

The Lieutenant turns down the aisle of chairs and lets out a bland, “negative. Leave it, Sergeant.” 

Why did you react badly to the namesake you’d gone by for the entire time you’d been in Special Ops? Mutt was when everyone had called you when he had been around for that short time. 

He felt no great concern for you – no hatred or care – you were just another Agent that would probably end up dead like everyone else. Another time, maybe, he’d have gone in a heartbeat, and if the team decided to go after you, he’d follow. A mission was a mission, it wasn’t like it largely mattered. 

But there was something in the back of his mind. Intrigue? Yes, perhaps. The blue-eyed Lieutenant wasn’t one to dwell on these types of things, but a colleague was still a colleague. 

Whatever the outcome, he’d do his job with all the ruthlessness and tact he always did.

Ghost’s hand goes up to fix the position of his mask and glances at the blank projector stream, eyes boring into it as they darken. A moment later, he was leaning against the ammunition crate that Price had previously been on, arms crossed and ears twitching at the ongoing battle of wills; isolated to himself as his intimidating form towers ever upwards. Spine straight. Bones stiff. Eyes grim. 

You’d been nice to him – a person that, for the limited time he’d interacted with, had left an impression that was only just starting to come back full force. Smart and resourceful; not too bad on the eyes. 

He takes down a sigh. Stubborn…but undoubtedly loyal. 

His thumb brushes your cheek, and you look up at him as if he wasn’t the one in a mask – as if his entire being was laid bare before you. He swipes away the trail of blood with one firm press. The gentleness of your skin is known even through his glove.

“You’ll live, Sergeant.” He utters, teasing in his monotone voice, “now, where the hell are we goin’? Gun’s itchin’ to lay a few out.” 

Ghost would have smirked at the way your eyes dilated if he had the ability, but in the end, he brushes past. Because if he hadn’t, you would have seen his own do the same.

‘Reaper,’ he frowns, feeling the ammunition crate dig further into his hip, they never called you that one.

Perhaps the real battle of wills was happening inside of him – not five feet away between his Captain and his Station Chief.

—

You remember every interaction like it was yesterday, and although he might not, you can’t help the memories from flooding as you gather your gear. Stuffing guns into duffel bags and intel into crossbody sacks that weigh you down like boulders. 

Fuck, you open the back window and shimmy out into the back streets, knowing that your position is compromised and not waiting any longer to test your luck. Your side burns something awful; horrible stitches peeling back skin as you groan in pain. What the fuck was Ghost doing with Price? I didn’t know they knew each other. And the two other men in the room…eh. Not the problem right now! 

“I shouldn’t be surprised,” you pant, swinging your legs out of the window frame and sharply inhaling when a suture tears. “I’m never in the loop.” 

In all honesty, you don’t want to be – too complicated. It’s better to just stick around and be told what to do. 

Glaring down at the ground with glazed eyes, you only take a breath of hesitation and let off a curse before dropping. 

Your knees take the brunt of the force, and the ricochets of landing on cobblestones travel up your ankles and leave your legs shaking. If you weren’t running on adrenaline, you would have come up with a dirty joke to mutter to yourself. 

The discomfort can only last so long, you tell yourself, and ignore the spreading liquid on your side, only thinking of Rigs and the mission. 

And Ghost. 

Gritting your teeth, eyes vulnerable, you turn down the backroad and stay away from others, drowning in memories more deadly than blood. It had been a while since you had thought of it – the lockbox in the back of your mind keeping all under tight watch; guard dogs with metal teeth and chained necks. 

But that title; that namesake you’d scrubbed your skin raw over. Mutt and all the others said in cruel breaths. Oh…but Mutt. 

Mutt was the worst of them.

Your hands were vibrating, the tremors traveling up your wrists and arms – past elbows and bruised flesh under skin; bloodied nose and quivering lips. Why did they always yell at you? But worse, why did they always make you do the dirty work? 

The Captain, everyone just called him Alke, was standing in front of you, berating your accuracy on the last round of target practice. Fortunately, this deep into the Unit itself, you’d found a way to let it go in one ear and out the next, eyes as blank as a starless sky. 

You could see the spittle flying from the man’s lips and some even splashes across your cheeks like acid, but there was something artful to the way you didn't react. A culmination of crafted numbness that bleeds like trauma. It was a constant, everlasting, void.  

What they were making you into was not what you wanted, but what possible other option was there? Resign? No, this was nearly an unimaginable position to be in at such an age. You deserve to be here. Should you report the blatant unprofessionalism and favoritism in the ranks? And be blacklisted by these people's friends so that you never ascend the line?

Your ears twitch. 

“...You’re not sleeping until your marks are perfect – else we’re overthinking your position in this Unit. Can’t have a Mutt in our ranks, can we?” The last sentence is punctuated with a ruffling of your hair almost like a brother would; teasing, but you know that isn’t what it symbolizes. Harsh laughs and mocking remarks from the bystanders. “Least of all one that’s gonna get us killed. Tch.” When you don’t answer, staring off in a daze at his nose in a perfect image of formation, the Captain raises an eyebrow. “Affirmative,” he smirks, “Mutt?”

“Sir!” Your mouth shouts, though the action is more instinctual as your back straightens.  He frowns at that, perhaps wanting to torment you more, but huffs and files out, ordering the rest to follow with one last call.

“I expect you to be up for morning drills an hour early. I’ll be checking your shots myself.” 

“Sir!” 

After everyone’s gone, you blink back to reality. There’s a second of confusion, creases forming in your forehead at the sound of birds and blowing glass. Head turning side to side, your lips thin at the absence of others as if only realizing how spaced out you’d actually been. 

Flashing teeth and heated eyes flash through your mind before you blink them away. Signing away the tense nature of your chest, you clear your throat and relax your legs. Your vision slides to the corners of the concrete dugout, snapping past sectioned-off areas for privacy to search if there was someone who might have stayed back. 

Not finding anyone, your hands, clenched behind your back, loosen and fall limp to your sides like bags of rock. One weakly goes to swipe at the trail of blood from your nose, wrecking your already wrinkled sleeve with crimson; but soon an identical trail drips off your chin regardless. Licking your lips and tasting copper, you take a shaky breath and nod to yourself. 

You knew what shooting all night would bring on – lesions under the firing pad covering your shoulder; deep-rooted pain leading to nerve damage later on. Blisters that leak puss and blood onto your bedsheets. Not to mention the mental strain, the bags under your eyes burn from lack of rest. 

Gritting your teeth, you walk over the tossed rifle on the floor and pick it up with shaky fingers, the tips flinching back from the cool metal before encompassing it tightly. 

Silently, you get on your stomach and set the weapon in the crook of your already pain-laced shoulder. Your blood splatters the stock.

—

It had been two weeks with no luck in finding Rigs, and you were starting to get paranoid.

Staring at the dead body tied to the wooden chair, you growl and tear your Dirk from the woman’s chest angrily. 

There had been increased police patrols from all the corpses you were leaving, so you’d compromised and limited the chance of being caught at the same time. 

Bergamo, Italy, was an ancient place, and the underground was what you were now both metaphorically, and physically, exploiting. Sewer systems. Catacombs. You’d lost track of the paths you’d taken a million times over, and had started to hate the constant darkness only kept back by the small hand lamp you’d stolen. 

But there were ups to this constant downward slope. 

It made interrogations increasingly easier to pull off with multiple feet of stone all around you. The screams don’t meet the surface.

“Catello Tullio,” you mutter, caressing your sensitive side with your free hand and placing your blade on a turned-over piece of rock. The area reeks of blood and gore, a stack of bodies chucked carelessly in the corner beginning to reek something awful; even as you have another to add to the count. It wouldn’t be long before the rats came in droves.

Another given name, another score. But this one was new. Apparently, the title of the one that took Rigs while he was out getting more rations in the market. 

You point a finger at the slumped body, “you better hope I don’t find you in hell if you gave me the wrong damn name.” 

Grabbing your light, you stalk off down one side of the tunnel back to your camp, dodging drag lines that strike your eyes with their crimson streaks. 

The raggedy blanket and gun-sack you’d been using for a pillow take form in the dark, and somewhere in the corridor a rat squeals; feet pitter-pattering until it disappears altogether. You didn’t even want to think of the spiders living down here. Files and notes are strewn along the floor, perfect hiding places for eight-legged monsters. 

You couldn’t do anything until nightfall. It was just too risky. 

Massaging your side as you bend down, you grimace at the partially healed wound and scoop up your pistol before plopping to the ground with a grunt. With the deadly object held in your lap, you take a moment to breathe and try to push away a growing headache in the back of your skull. 

“This has to be one of the worst Ops on record, huh?” your small voice speaks back to you in bouncing waves of echoes as you begin to fiddle over the gun's small grooves and dents. “How did you manage this, Reap?”

Smiling blandly, the overwhelming quiet and nothingness all around you is like a curse. And in those pockets of a void, your mind always trails to him – or at least it had been for your time on the run. Ghost. That dark and brooding mass of horribly bleak humor and…well…you couldn’t call him mean. 

Your eyebrows furrow.

He was never mean to me. 

There were soft instances where you would question yourself as to if the Brit had possibly had some affection for you. It wasn’t a long shared history of course, but you had sworn that there was something about the way he looked at you…something that you remember so vividly…

You shake your head and stand after a small while, stretching your feet. Placing your pistol in the back of your belt, the weight brings you dull comfort.

 Shining your light on the hand-held radio on the ground in passing, you rove back to it after you scan the perimeter. Its black metal mocks you.

No one’s coming to help ‘cept you. One voice says, and another grunts out, get it together, Mutt. 

You turn on your heel to go and take a breather to disperse your dark thoughts but only make it three steps before your eyes widen, lips parting in awe. Nearly falling flat over yourself, you whirl around in an instant. 

A static enters the air as if the gods above were laughing at you - toying with your fate like it was a rock tossed to the sky. The familiar British drawl causes your chest to tighten, though the sentence is broken and barely understandable.

Someone’s here for me! A smile slashes your face – fierce hope lighting your eyes. You hadn’t wanted anyone to explicitly come for you, but this was a welcome discovery. Someone to talk to!

“--eper…Copy?” Darting like a cat, you move so fast that you stumble over rocks on the way there. “Lead…cafe…red cloth…Out.”

By the time you snatch the small black object, the garbled and firm tone has already shut itself up. Your mouth parts.

“Shit!” You yell, shaking the thing in your hand with an iron grip, hissing like a snake. You look above you at the cracked ceiling of stone and a growled accusation.“I’m too deep…Fuck. Gotta get up there if I want to be able to respond.”

But it hadn’t all been fruitless. Lead. Cafe. Red cloth. You clip the radio to your belt and make sure your shirt covers your weapon; pat your thigh and tell yourself to stop forgetting your Dirk everywhere before setting off in a jog. The light flashes over dead eyes and stiff bodies.

You snatch the blade off of the stone as you pass it, slipping it into your cut pocket and hearing the satisfying clink of it sheathing.

“Let’s just hope I don’t smell too bad…” You say aloud, chuckling, and listening as the sound echoes off the stone. If no other company, you still had the sound of your own voice. 

You couldn’t decide if that was a good or a bad thing. But, you were getting side-tracked. 

A Cafe with red cloth, then. Not exactly the place you’d go for an intel swap, but if someone had been trying to contact you for more than a week, you’d imagine they were getting desperate at this point. 

If I had known…you frown. 

Thinking over the multiple blueprints and pictures of the city in your files, you go through your internal cabinet of knowledge for color schemes - not what you’d have thought you’d be using it for, but, oh well. A lead was a lead.

“Golositá!” You laugh, sudden glee on your face as you dodge a pile of large stones; lips peeling back as you take a fast corner. “Gluttony! Of course, that’s the place.” 

The bustling business on the upper side of Bergamo with red table cloths as well as red awnings extending into the street. Anyone would be a fool to miss it. 

Like blood lining the street. 

You force yourself to run faster.

—

You met him last, despite being a Sergeant. The Captain had you up late last night yet again – running the forest trail this time rather than shooting. In the back of your mind, you wondered if it surprised him when you were still up early with the others; from the looks that he was giving you, you just decided that, yes, he was. Or he was just pissed he didn’t have an excuse to get rid of you. 

Blinking away fatigue, you keep your stance relaxed as a gargantuan shadow comes to loom ahead of you. 

The man everyone had whispered about called himself ‘Ghost’ and, if nothing more, was certainly intimidating. Shoulders wider than a bench, arms as rounded and as strong as boulders; not to mention the tattoos that made him look like he took cross-country motorcycle rides in his spare time. Tan tactical gear and dark patches for the SAS, the red and white British flag. Gloves covered his large hands, straps carried knives on his biceps and thigh. Something akin to a tan cape that was loose around his hidden neck.

But the mask was what really caught your attention; your head tilting with an innocence that no longer lives in you.

Skeletal. Half a visage of a dead and gone intimidation of humanity. Sewn into a hood of black cloth from which only the eye sockets were open…But the eyes there were no different than if the holes had been empty in the first place; as if the person inside was as dead as sun-bleached bone. Was a corpse piloting this suit?

Ice blue. Freezing blue. Harsh. Colder than a grip of a phantom, you thought as you blinked up at him, colder than the nights you would stay awake working yourself to death. You watched this Ghost’s chest move in a steady inhalation and you stuck out a busted-knuckle hand. Foolish, maybe, but there were worse things to be afraid of than a mask. Then of those eyes that made your spine shiver. 

But you didn’t look away.

“Pleasure, Sir.” There was a moment of tense silence where your Captain, at Ghost’s side, was frowning at you silently. The man could say nothing as long as this SAS member was here to assist in your next Op overseas. At your sides, your colleagues on the tarmac shuffle on their feet like nervous penguins. 

Ghost glances at your hand, and you try not to show how fast your pulse is running when his eyes leave a cold trail as they grace your split knuckles and torn nails. He ends with a slow look at your name patch. 

“Sergeant.” He says and slips past without another word. His shoulder brushes against yours, and you inhale smoke and ash; gun-cleaning solvent paired with a canvas tent. Dirt and metallic blood. Snickers bounce off air particles, striking your ears as an embarrassed heat rises to your cheeks, but that scent stays in your nostrils for days. 

Your Captain scurries after. 

“Erm, forgive, Mutt. She’s a helluva strange woman, that one.” You keep your sneer hidden, a hiss lodged in your throat and a twitching finger. But your anger isn’t directed at the masked beast that stalks away. That yapping bully of a Captain would hold all of it as long as you were here.

At that point, you were sure you’d seen the last of Ghost until the Op – not really getting the feeling he’s a people person so much as a ‘give orders and follow them’ type. 

But that was fine by you, it didn’t change anything. You’d been told to go back to the firing range tonight for opening your mouth and ‘making an embarrassment of the Unit’....whatever that meant. All you did was welcome the guy with the barest hint of a good attitude. 

You supposed manners were a foreign concept around here.

The world ahead of you was blurring, red circles in your eyes that gloss over with water every minute you force yourself to stay awake. The stars were out, sky dark, and the area was only lit by large lights situated around the base. In some sort of strange way, you enjoyed the sound of crickets and the cold breeze over your bare arms as if the only sense of peace you got was when you were half-passed out, nailing shots from a rifle. 

The stock was where it always is, your cheek pressed to the side; staring down the scope at the multiple holes in the paper targets. Dots surrounded by multiple other dots like a slice of cheese. You suppose that made you the hungry mouse in that case. 

‘A mouse with a fucking day before she drops.’ You frown, blink, and pull the trigger as the trees rustle. The force lands directly on your shoulder – the kickback is usually not one to bother you, but seeing as your appendage was one bad day away from being dislocated and forever damaged – you took it with a grit of your teeth. 

And you took it because you knew you could. Just as you knew that you felt a pair of eyes on the back of your neck. Freezing, you remove your finger from the trigger and loosen your grip. Turning your head to the side, a free hand goes up and shifts the ear mufflers from your head to your neck in a single movement. 

You swear your heart jumps to your throat when you see a skeleton’s icy blues numbly watching you; arms crossed while a nice-looking SA-B 50 Marksman Rifle sits against the wall at his side. How…long had he been there? Watching?

“What’re you doing, Sergeant?” Ghost asks sternly, that Manchester accent making him sound harsh. Grating like a rock being run against concrete. “I’m sure your Captain wouldn’t be thrilled at a scene like this, eh?” 

Blinking, you remind yourself to breathe before answering – voice tough and hoarse.

“I have my orders, Sir. You’re free to join me.” 

You turn back as a grunted huff falls from behind muted cloth. Ghost walks up to your laying form, standing on your left side and picking up the binoculars from the hanging hook in your station. As you look back through your scope you don’t know why, but you hold your breath; waiting for something.

“...Not a bad shot. You’re prone to firing more to the right, judging from the grouping. I’d fix that, less you miss a moving target runnin’ the opposite.” He lowers the object - staring from the side of his eye. From your position, your neck cranes to see his fingers twitch. “Wouldn’t want that, would we?” For someone you’d expected to be quite harsh – though you had no doubt he still was – Ghost was more sarcastic in his mannerisms. 

Backhanded comments that wound sting if you got on the other end of them.

“I’ll keep that in mind, Sir.” Shifting your grip, you move the stock farther up your shoulder, feeling an immediate release of tension, though the expansive trauma still leaves needles in your tissue.

“Hm, pay attention and you just might learn something.” You feel yourself quirk a lip for the first time in months; your mouth doesn’t stop to think.

“You mentor a lot of people in the middle of the night, then?” 

“Only the ones stupid enough to be awake.” He takes a step back, going to grab his own rifle as his footsteps don’t even make a sound.

‘Quiet for a guy with thighs that could choke me out.’ 

Your brows furrow at the heated thought, taking a slow breath and flexing your hands as the shadow disappears from over you. Why were your hands sweaty?

Were you…afraid? That…that wasn’t it.

“You’re up too, you know, Sir. Bit hypocritical.” This was the first time you’d had a full conversation with someone since you’d gotten in with this Unit. A mildly pleasant one, at least…you wouldn't really call this bonding.

“I can always leave ya’ to it, Sergeant.” Deadpanning the words, you clear your throat and fall silent at the threat. 

‘No,’ you wanted to comment, ‘no, I want the company so badly it hurts.’ 

You swallow saliva and reposition your ear mufflers back over your head, heart bruising your ribs, as you bring down a calming breath of air to still your nerves. 

The two of you don’t speak again, and you don’t ask why he takes the shooting cubby right next to yours, the nose of his rifle peeking out from the concrete wall. You certainly don’t ask why he’s up, either.

And in return, he doesn’t ask you the same.

—

When you find Golositá you’ve managed to sneak through the city unseen, taking every backroad and alley you could as the heat of the day increases to near sweltering. Panting, you stick to the thin shadows of the path across the street, eyes dancing over red cloth and flicking to faces; studying visages as one would a medical report. 

Your chest hurts, and you run a hand over your side, feeling the raised skin under your shirt before digging into the aching ribs. All this running around and little food to help keep your normal strength was troublesome, and it would only get worse if this Op from hell continued. 

I need new intel. Badly.

About to retreat, not finding anyone you recognize off the bat, a black-shrouded figure kisses the side of your vision as if a phantom. 

On the outside table, the farthest removed, a man sits stiffly with an untouched teacup in front of him. Smirking, you can’t help but scoff at the thought of Ghost using the thing – you’d think his thumb and forefinger would break the delicate porcelain in an instant. Like a spine over his thigh.

Your cheeks heat. 

He looked almost identical to what you remember – minus the gear, obviously – and your stomach twisted at the thought. Was a simple look enough to bring you to the breaking point? Why were your lungs tight?

As if feeling your stuck eyes, those icy blues shift from people-watching to lock onto yours immediately. As hollow as they always were, it seemed. He blinks and the blonde eyebrows on his sliver of visible forehead move.

Shit. Your hips trade weight. Look at you.

Loose shoulders under a rugged buttoned-down and painted balaclava make your breath go thin, not able to resist sneaking a glance at those tattoos you remember so vividly. Yes, that was still Ghost.

Jesus, is this how it felt to see someone you barely even remembered suddenly appear? Was it elation or caution that was making your heart race? 

Ghost doesn’t look surprised. His eyes don’t widen; don’t soften or light up. They blankly watch you as you shake away the shock and raise a brow in return. A sarcastic finger goes to your head, and you mock salute. 

What are you doing? You seem to ask, a mischievous expression growing as you start forward when he dismissively narrows his eyes. You look ridiculous. Are you asking to be spotted? 

The man leans into the too-small chair he sits in, one hand going to hang off the back and the other resting on the tabletop. Gloved fingers tapping morse in slow measures.

Clear. Come here. He follows you with his gaze, head stationary, as you enter the flow of traffic, smiling at people at your sides and letting off polite greetings when you could. Steadily striding, you weave through groups and individuals like water, legs steady even as your ears pick up every little sound. 

A comfortable middle point of visible excitement and strict business. Why were you so…happy?

When you approach Ghost’s table, you slip up beside him with a sly chuckle, pulling out the chair to his right. You, softy, lower yourself down into it, not turning to him but instead simply making sure no one had followed you with a quick scan. His heat only adds to the warmth of the day like a walk through damnation.

“Well, well, well,” you smile, addressing the SAS member with his shadow hanging over you once more; such a heavy thing, though you don’t mind. Your expression mellows to have it above you again. There was a safety to it, you had to admit. The cold comfort of death. “Trip to Italy, Sir? Take a little vacation?”

“Came to bail out a bird from my past,” You smell that scent again – smoke and ash; gun-cleaning solvent paired with a canvas tent. Dirt and metallic blood. “And if I ever went on a vacation, I sure as hell wouldn’t pick this place. ‘Bout to burst into flames; traumatize a few kids and their mums.” 

Hadn’t he changed even a little bit? 

“Now that’s dark.” 

“Never said it wasn’t.”

Of course he hasn’t, you answer your own question, feet shifting and skin pliable, why would he? He isn’t like me – didn’t have to reinvent himself based on atoms and in the wake of silent nights. 

There was a piece of you that believed that Ghost had always been this way, though you knew it was false. Nobody in this profession was just born like this, they were led to it. Whoever it was under the mask or balaclava didn’t matter anymore. 

They had died a long time ago.

“Not a fan of the history, Brit?” You tease, bringing up a hand to itch at your undereye, finally taking a peak at the form that nearly swallows you. 

Your lids try not to peel back, but you didn’t realize how close you’d sat next to Ghost – any closer and you would be in the crook of his arm; the relaxed spread of his knee bumping into yours and arm over the back of your seat. Trying to act nonchalant, you ignore the strange swirling in your gut with a hum and a twitching of your leg.

Stop that.

“Don’t care a smidge, just not a fan of the damn heat.” The gruff man responds with his inked arm on the table flexing, as though he was tenser than he showed. Ghost clears his throat, “needs a good downpour, eh?” 

“Try living underground for two weeks. Literally. Sun’ll feel like a blessing.”

“Fuckin’ hell…That’s why the radio wasn’t working, then.” While this was all cute – re-learning each other like a shaken puzzle – there were dangers to being this open. The Brit would be fine, but if you got spotted, well, there would be worse things to worry about than an achy side and a pile of bodies in a tunnel.

“You got something for me, or are we here just to stand out like bullet holes in a forehead?” Feeling his head tilt to you, snaking down your form, your body leans forward, palms sweaty as they lock on the table. “Price with you? The other two I saw on the feed?”

“Negative. Op in Belarus. Sent me in alone.” Your knees brush, delicately; like a touch of down feathers. You refrain from taking in a shallow breath, knowing he’s analyzing every movement with a hidden mouth and gentle huffs of air that rises his sculpted chest. Through a grunted sigh, Ghost tells, “The Old Man insisted. Laswell thought you’d be alright by yourself, regardless,” and falls silent.

What was he doing? Why was he talking with that rasp in his tone? Your heart swells at the comment about Kate, but a confusing feeling settles in your lower body. Why did the air feel thick?

The warmth of the sun was making your skin perspire, leaving a sheen of sweat over your arms. But the thought of heat stroke fled as you became hyper-aware of the man beside you, keeping careful not to touch you, though his gaze still bore into the side of your face like prodding fingers anyways.

He can’t quite figure you out, he admits to himself. So much of you was different – and he couldn’t tell how. 

She’s lighter, he tightens his face, not the same as when I left. 

But there had been an utter satisfaction when he’d seen you in that alleyway, even if you were different in a million ways, that would never change. Ghost’s body had loosened, his clenched jaw let go, and snappy answers to servers stopped entirely. 

Because those were still the same colored eyes that he remembered. He takes a long breath. 

Through the haze under your creased skin, a red alarm starts to sound off. Not because of the confusing way you felt the chilled form of Ghost on a near internal level, but because of the hooded individual across the street.

When your eyes lock, they back up three paces and bolt down the adjacent street, vanishing into the crowd. Your expression darkens, and Ghost shifts his attention from your face to the streets. 

His eyes blankly follow where you were looking.

“Come on,” you get to your feet, hand snatching at the SAS member's sleeve, dragging him with you as a mother would a toddler. It was ironic – if he resisted, you wouldn’t be able to force him to move, not in a million years, but he slid off his chair with fluid muscles. 

He doesn’t question you when he’s brought into an offshoot of the road, vacant of tourists or locals besides a stray cat and a few scavenger birds. Flies jump off garbage cans, buzzing through the air above your heads as you level Ghost with a serious stare. 

You nearly stumble over your words when you get to look at those long blonde eyelashes that you remember heatedly, but push through as they move to half-lid his blank eyes. Your heart skips beats as you spare looks up and down the space.

What the fuck is going on with me? Focus. This is serious. 

But, Jesus, he should really stop looking at you like that.

“You said you had a lead over the radio – anything on someone called Catello Tullio by chance?” You ask, voice like stone.

“Tullio?” Ghost hums in the back of his throat, all business, hips moving under him as he goes to glance at the street. His balaclava moves as he speaks. “Someone made a mention of it. ‘Fore I put a knife in ‘em, ‘o course.” Nodding, he huffs out, “On me.” 

Turning on long legs, he starts to walk farther down the path, and you follow at his side, peering up and eager to gain more intel. “You’ve caused quite a panic around here, Sunshine. Cell’s terrified of the ‘Reaper.’ I’m nearly impressed.”

He briefly flashes an optic to you, heart betraying him as he remains locked on your lips. Rotating his jaw, he turns back forward.

“Oh, my,” smirking slowly, you roll your eyes, “whatever will I do without your approval, great Ghost.”

“Dunno – kick the bucket probably.” Shaking your head in false annoyance, the slow, mocking, stain in the man’s tone leaks into your very DNA; coating it with honey. Like a warm sunrise, you clock a small hitch in his chest and equate it to muted chuckles when you laugh. 

“Don’t go placing bets, now. I’m not so easily broken.”

“Oh, wouldn’t think of it, Sweetheart. Wouldn’t be my handiwork if it happened,” his tone goes light, “don’t wanna take credit away from you.”

“Brit.” You spit with fake venom.

“American.” He grumbles back, but you clock the small spark in his iris, cold blue bouncing silver light like snow. 

He sounded…entertained? Snide in a sarcastic way. 

Your mouth rises in a stupid, dopey, grin as you stare from the side of your vision, chest jumping in easy comedy. What a strange pair you two were, but you find you liked his company even more, this time around. 

Or maybe he had changed slightly. Or maybe it was just you.

At the end of the day, you were relieved that it was easy to talk to him. Conversations with corpses are a bit one sided, after all.

Ghost’s lips had to be at least quirked under that dark fabric to achieve mischief like what he was spitting out, you leveled with yourself. At the minimum, the man wasn’t annoyed he’d been forced out of his own primary mission because of you. 

You remember he wasn’t averse to cracking jokes – particularly dark ones – but it had…it had never felt like his before.

Strange, you admit with a raised brow and a cocked head, cheeks burning for no apparent reason. You’d gotten him to chuckle? Holy hell, you deserve a Nobel Peace Prize for that. I’d think he would be pretty pissed about being sent here. He’s never been one to fuck around. 

You both continue in easy silence until you decide to speak once more, intent on asking where you were being led. 

Ghost’s head had perked up in what you assumed to be soldier-like attention, but then his head had whipped behind the two of you. Oblivious to his shift in mood, like a dark cloud, you open your mouth.

“Well, where are we–” 

“--Get down!” Hands slap on the back of your arm and jerk you to the opposite wall as a loud echo rings out. Whizzing over your head so close that you feel the breeze of it. 

Gasping, the air is expelled from your lungs in one fell swoop; your spine grating over the rough stone as your legs scramble to keep upright. Wiping away the shock quicker than an eraser over a whiteboard, your neck snaps to the problem; brain already hardwired to get over being shot at and the adrenaline that floods your veins immediately after. 

Across the way, Ghost’s fast hand was reaching to the back of his outfit – without a doubt going to grab a concealed weapon. Eyes fiery and arms tight. And as though you were seeing it happen in slow motion, you lock onto the hostile in the middle of the alley back the way you both came. And then onto the hooded silhouette ahead of you. 

Boxed in. 

Hyperfocused, all of it happens in only three seconds, two trained professionals protecting each other without even realizing it. 

One, you realize how this will have to play out if you don’t act immediately. You don’t know how you can trust Ghost to take the other hostile while you focus on the one ahead, but you don’t question it. Two, your gun lays heavy in your hand as your legs pivot. Three, you fire double shots with a loose finger and hear mirrored gunfire from the man beside you. 

You don’t bother watching him drop.

Snapping your head backward with a rageful expression to see Ghost’s corpse hit the floor with a cracking of a skull, shouts start to ring over the city. When you lower your weapon, you turn to notice the Birt examining your own downed hostile with a satisfied stare. If you hadn’t had his back, he would have been shot in it. 

But what you didn’t know was that he was thinking the same thing about you. 

Turning to stare at each other, your widened eyes lock; fingers twitching along the cool X12’s metal as those stormy iris’ only seem to darken further when they dart to your lips. Like staring into a wild animal’s gaze and pretending you’re not in a trance because of it – stuck in that moment of infinity and nothingness with not a single muscle moving. Waiting for either a mouthful of fangs around your supple neck or for the beast to turn away with grace and practiced steps. 

You swore Ghost’s mouth parted under that damned balaclava, but whatever he was going to say was lost when the world came back in a violent storm of screams. Panicking, you gape at the entrance – seeing multiple shadows shoving through the crowd to get to you.

“On me!” Keeping your pistol in one hand, you bolt, hearing heavy footsteps pounding behind you as your mind begins to run.

Ghost trails without a single doubt in his mind as to why he’s following you, and it makes him cautious. 

Catacombs, you decide, get under the city and backtrack to the outskirts. Survey and have Ghost tell me his intel before making a move…yeah! 

“Where are we headin'?!” Ghost shouts, keeping right your heels as you turn corners. Gunshots ring over your heads as you jump up small groupings of tile steps, blood pounding in your ears. You try to remember the maps you had stored in your files underground. Left…no, two rights. Shit! I need to be higher – see the streets like a bird would! “Reaper?!”

“Do you trust me?!” You call over your shoulder, and though it seems deranged, a smile forms over your lips. “I’ll need an answer in the next few minutes, yeah? I’m on a time crunch!” 

“What are you on, Girl?” The adrenaline speaks to you, propelling your legs faster and faster. You vault over a fallen trash bin and take the shock to your ankles as it travels to your thighs. Snickering, you feel the brooding man’s presence like you always could – just beside you like a loyal hound. His focus excites you as you put your gun away in the small of your back. “Bloody hell! Not giving me a choice?”

“Not if you don’t want to get shot in the ass!” Taking one more right, you find yourself rapidly approaching a dead end, tall walls, a balcony, and a large dumpster – the flap already closed overtop. Not answering the man as he barks out a comment, you throw yourself atop it with a puff of breath and spasming lungs. 

Laughing, your hands don’t falter. Reaching up with eager fingers, you grab at the black metal front of the balcony a small distance above and suck down a hot breath. Your arms strain, sickly sweet sweat on the top of your lip, and eyes wide with glee despite the gaining footfalls rising like a battlefield cry. Jerking your body up with only your upper-body strength, you slide your abdomen over the railing with barely a second passing. Once your feet are firmly on someone's property, you twist around and slap your hands to the metal with a twinkle in your vision; face wrinkled with all the animated amusement. 

A wide grin is stuck on you.

Ghost stares up with slightly widened eyes from the ground, arms poised on the garbage bin.

Oh, hell, when she smiles like that…

“But I can’t judge, can I?” Teasing, you extend a helping grip with a smirk. “Everyone has their fetishes, hm, Ghost? Maybe yours is just having a gun pointed at you.” 

He blinks at that, but knowing the urgency in the back of your throat, he pushes himself up with a grunt. You try not to watch his muscles strain, but spy the way the veins in his forearms grow larger as his alluring hips flex. They situate themselves under him as he crunches before straightening in an instant. 

Fuck, don’t drool, you scold, lips lightly parted like seven devils were flying in the back of your mind. Jesus, imagine the weight those things can carry…shit. Wouldn’t mind losing my virginity to that. 

A leather-coated hand slaps into your awaiting one. You snap back to a screaming reality and stare down into hypnotic sheens of ice and…wait…did Ghost have fucking green flecks near his pupils?

“You sure it isn’t yours, Sunshine?” He harshly comments, and his balaclava moves with a rising of his eyebrow. 

Clearing your throat, you murmur a weak reply as your face begins to feel like a blazing fire, squeezing his limb before pulling. He chuffs. Grunting violently, you know he does most of the work in helping himself up, though the Brit still slaps your shoulder in comradery when he’s stable. Kneeling down, he forces himself into the wall behind the two of you, fingers weaving to create a cuff over his knee. 

Tossing his head up, he motions with urgency.  

“C’mon. Be quick ‘bout it.”

Catching one foot in the basin of his clutch, you force down your illicit thoughts about Ghost and jump, pushing off with your opposite leg on his shoulder and his added boost. Scaling the wall, you arch and scramble - with a growing bite in your side – to the terracotta-shingle roof.

Following after and checking your six, the beast of a man joins just in time. 

Shadows dart around the corner far on the ground, and the both of you are speeding animals over the rooftops in the meantime. Against better judgment, boots pounding the tiles, you release loud bouts of genuine laughter. 

How long had it been since you’d had such fun? Enjoyed someone else's company like this? Running across homes, you look at your side, only to find Ghost’s eyes already digging into you. Unrelenting. Unmovable. Panting, you smile brightly, giggles making your sides hurt something awful but your pace doesn't slow for an instant. 

All it took was a glance at the streets – you know where you are now. 

“Enjoying yourself, Reaper?” He asks, arms pumping and barely winded, and you wonder for a moment how he breathes under that covering of his – it had to smell horrible by the end of the day.

“For…the first time in ages, Ghost.” He chuckles at that, and it is a betrayal of his nature. How could someone so violent, so cloaked in oceans of blood, produce such a soft sound? A genuine sound that makes your stomach flip? 

His bewitched eyes rove back in front of him, and he can’t deny the simplicity of speaking to you. It wasn’t a chore, just a conversation with a person who he wouldn’t mind having on 141 at his side. 

There were few people worthy of that.

You swallow thickly and take point, leading the shadow of death to your home underground so you can re-evaluate. 

You can only wonder why you don’t feel nervous as he watches over you, skin marked with horrors but his hand had fit so well in your own. And you also wonder how you can come to care for someone you haven’t seen in ages so quickly, as if you’d both been around each other for years. 

Had you really ever forgotten him? Or just tried to push the affection, both emotional and physical, for him out? But that was the problem, you tell yourself with a clenched jaw, that physical attraction. All of that was just…tied into a million knots. Complicated. 

You’d never had sex before.

And, Ghost questioned himself as he watched your legs move, did he forget you out of necessity? Because those eyes of yours won’t leave him alone, and he so very much enjoyed looming over you.

He sighs heavily and follows in silence.

—

When you first joined them, they all created rumors. This was long before you were permitted solo Ops, long before half of your file was filled and bleeding with black ink that would shame a warlord. When everyone just thought you were signed up because you were some unhinged kid, brimming with unchecked problems and willing to throw everything away just for the chance to prove yourself. Who got into it for kicks. 

They would say you enjoyed it, killing. Reveled in it, really. That it got you off when you were covered in blood and crimson guts as they pooled at your feet. 

You suppose that was what turned you away from sex in general – those heavy comments said with no remorse that stuck with you. It was fear almost, a genuine twisting of your mind to make it your fault. It wasn’t your fault, you knew that; you could sleep with anyone you wanted and the comments weren’t a brand on your skin.

You could forget about it. You should. 

But the words were so mean. Just cruel for the sense of being cruel. And it stuck with you.

If that was all anyone would see, why try and force them to look away? You kept to yourself, never spoke unless spoken to, and shoved all of it down like a kill switch. No sex, no relationships. Nothing to make you think about the rumors. 

Getting off on death? You were horrified at the concept, horrified that people would play around like that with you – with your life!

You just ended up telling yourself you wouldn’t feel it until it hurt too bad. In a way, you were right…but you can only force emotions down for a while until they break forward like a fist to the mouth. 

Besides Mutt, they had many names for you – titles and backhanded monikers. Rabid. Demon. Devil. Monster. Sometimes, beast.

But they all had the same meaning. Inhuman. Wrong. 

It shouldn’t have bothered you that much. It…It shouldn’t have made you stay up at night still thinking about the way they would laugh and pinch your arms as you were left shaking; drowning in gore not your own because they sent you into the heart of the Hot Zone for a few jokes. Teasing you about how you probably touched yourself because of it.

But it was just an excuse to make you too scared to leave. Your reputation…

“There’s that Devil for ya’, always ready to slit some more throats for us. You think you could do the next few, Mutt? You’ll love it, I know you will. I’ll give you a good report if you do it without alerting the guards – see there… ‘Course you will. Fucking freak.”

Your eyes stare forward blankly, Dirk leaving a dotted fluid trail over the dusty ground.

Why did they do this to you? 

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[milktei]

hi! i really fell in love with your “again” fic with sakusa. it was so amazing & i really liked how you wrote it. i was wondering if you can write another fic with that same concept but with suna?

Fine

Suna Rintarou x Reader

Genre: Angst, hurt/comfort

Warnings: Suna is probably a bit ooc. not edited

Requests: Open

a/n: first of all i would like to let anon know HOW SORRY I AM FOR TAKING LITERALLY OVER A YEAR TO POST THIS. I LOVE YOU ANON AND IF YOU ARE STILL IN THE FANDOM I HOPE THIS IS OKAY. THIS WAS HALF FINISHED IN MY DRAFTS FOR SO LONG AND I FINALLY BIT THE BULLET

on another note requests are still open somehow but i can’t guarantee that they will be finished efficiently :’)

You weren’t sure when the rift started.

You two were happy, at least you thought you were.

He would bring you little gifts after practice, eat meals with you any chance he got, either plan or agree to go on dates with you.

Until he didn’t.

Maybe he got too comfortable after so long of together. Maybe he thought he didn’t need to do much to woo you anymore. To an extent he didn’t, but him completely failing to put any effort into the relationship hurt.

He was on his phone more, staying at practice late, practically ignoring you when you would hang out, all without any explanation.

One date. One night not spent in an apartment is all you asked for.

After weeks of trying he finally agreed. An awkward dinner were trying to keep a conversation going felt like pulling teeth.

Your displeasure with him was palpable from when you got in the car all they way to his apartment where you two now stood.

“What is it?” he asked with annoyance ringing through the air.

You sighed as you sat on the couch “I…” you swallowed, almost afraid to tell him “I’m not very happy with how today went.”

Suna scoffed, “You’re talking as if that’s fault or something.

You winced “Well it didn’t seem like you were enjoying yourself either.”

He raised an eyebrow at you tone and threw his arms in the air. “I did what you asked y/n! We went on that damn date didn’t we? I even invited you over! What more could you possibly want?”

Time seemed to slow down in that moment. What more could you possibly want? Surely he knew? How could you possibly answer that without making him even more mad?

Clenching your hands, staring angrily at the ground, you could only say what came to mind.

���How did we end up like this Rin? It’s like we’re strangers again.”

For a moment you could have sworn you saw a shift in his posture, a subtle recoil, but it disappeared in a moment and was replaced by a more rigid stance.

“I don’t know what’s going on with you y/n but I’ve been feeling just fine. if you don’t like it you can just leave.”

The venom in his words was unlike anything you have ever heard come from his mouth. This wasn’t the man who you fell in love with. The man who stuttered endlessly when he first asked you out. The same man who took pictures of you any chance he could because you always looked good in his eyes.

No. This man was aloof, uncaring, detached.

He was not your Suna Rintarou.

“Fine.”

A beat of silence.

“Fine?” Suna echoed back. You hated that you couldn’t read any emotions in the tone of voice he used.

“Fine,” you said feeling more confident with your decision.

No longer feeling cemented to where you sat, you grabbed your bag from the couch, storming to the front door where you ripped open the closet to grab your coat. as you jammed your feet into your shoes you took a couple deep breaths.

“So you’re leaving? Just like that?”

You inhaled sharply and turned to him, angry tears filling your eyes. “You don’t get to talk to me like that,” you pointed at him accusingly “not after everything you did, not after everything I did to try to make this work. This isn’t my fault and you don’t get to make it seem like it was.”

The only sound that filled the room was your angry breathing and in a moment you turned on your heel and left the apartment

——————

That memory from months ago rang clear in your mind as you stared at the man in front of you dumbfounded. There he was, standing at your door. He nervously scratched the back of his head as he held out a bouquet of flowers to you

The state he was in was nearly a mirror image of when he first asked you out.

“I’m sorry.”

You had half the mind to slam the door in his face.

But you didn’t

That lovesick part of your brain that you desperately tried to shove back wriggled its way free and you take back the man that had put you through so much pain.

That leads to where the two of you are right now. Months after he showed up with those flowers.

You had initially planned to go to the mall alone, just to buy a friend a gift for their upcoming birthday.

Suna had the day off and when you told him of your plans, he surprised you by asking to tag along.

While at first you were elated to be in his company. A cloud of dread sat in the back of your mind.

He was trying, you could give him that.

Flowers, home cooked meals, cafe dates, and daily calls. Everything you could’ve dreamed and asked for all those months ago.

That was the problem though. He was doing everything you begged for and now you couldn’t tell for the life of you if it was genuine or not.

It was irrational and unhealthy to be thinking this way. To think that Suna was only being a better boyfriend because you asked him to and not because he actually wanted to.

But how could you think any other way with how he had treated you before?

Still, you walked through the mall with him, hand in hand, just like before.

A particular shift caught you eye in a store, one that wasn’t your friends style, but definitely yours. Suna could tell from the look in your eyes that you liked it.

“You thinking of getting that shirt babe? I can get it for you.”

You looked at him like a kid caught with their hand in the cookie jar and forced out a giggle “No thank you Rin, I was just looking.”

His smile faltered the tiniest bit “Alright.”

The rest of your shopping trip was uneventful and you eventually found what you were looking for.

It was when you got in the car that he tried again, “Why don’t we grab some ice cream before we go home? There’s a new place on the way to your apartment.”

He rejoiced at the subtle excitement that showed on your face

“Only if you would like to. We don’t have to.”

He nearly groaned in despair at your response.

“y/n”

You stiffened in shock at the seriousness in his voice “Yes?”

“Somethings bothering you.”

it wasn’t a question, it was a statement that Suna was waiting for you to confirm.

“What are you talking about?”

He sighed “I’m not going to sit here in silence again when I know somethings wrong. Something has been wrong for a while now.”

“Nothings wrong!” you shout defensively. Shocking even yourself. You turn your gaze to your lap and nervously wrench your hands together.

Silence filled the car

“Well now I’m even less inclined to believe you.”

You let out a sad chuckle at his response and take a deep breath before telling him what’s been on your mind since you got back together.

“It just feels like nothing will ever be like how it used to be.”

He kept silent and you took it as a cue to keep talking. You weren’t sure you would be able to stop even if you tried

“How am I supposed to act like nothing happened! They way you spoke to me back then…and then expected me to stay, getting mad at me for “throwing away” what we had, even though you knew I was unhappy.”

Tears fill your eyes but Suna dared not invade your space in a moment so vulnerable

“Then all of a sudden you come back and I can’t find it in myself to day no because I wanted you to do better so badly- and you are!

You’re putting more effort into this, but I can’t help but feel bitter sweet because I can only think about how your only trying because I asked. I wonder everyday if any of this is genuine or if you’re just comfortable having me around and then one day you’ll realize that this isn’t for you and leave again.”

The amount of despair that filled Suna was immeasurable. His mind filled with doubt and screamed at him at all the ways he could’ve done better and how he never deserved you.

Still, he reached out a hand and waited for you to grab it.

“I should have never let you leave that day y/n. I knew that from the moment that door shut, but I was too stupid, too proud, too afraid of what would happen if I chased after you.”

His grip tightened, “and like a coward I waited, hoping that maybe you would come back instead of me having to take that step.”

Suns let out a self deprecating laugh “It took me way too long to realize that’s what got us into this mess in the first place. Me waiting for all you love on a silver platter when you got none in return.”

He turned as much as he could in his spot and grabbed your other hand. You looked up at his face and almost gasped at the amount of love and earnest that showed on a normally expressionless face.

“I understand that you think that I may only be putting this much effort because you asked. But you shouldn’t be afraid to ask y/n, not anymore. Trust me, while I am doing what you asked it’s also because I want to make you happy. Every time I think about that day I get so angry at the fact that I made you so desperate for the bare minimum.”

“Please y/n, anything you want just ask and I will do everything in my power to make sure that I don’t make you sad again.”

You couldn’t help yourself and leaned across the centre console of the car, hugging him as best as you could as tears finally began to flow.

“How do I know this isn’t just going to go back to the way it was? You could very easily fall back into that habit.” You said through sobs.

“I know” Suna sighed

You pulled back “You know?”

“I know” he confirmed, “but I promise to do whatever I can to make this right y/n, you tell me if your unhappy and I will do my best to fix whatever I’ve done and ensure that we’ll be fine.”

A beat of silence filled the car before you let out a small laugh through your sobs. Suna’s heart fluttered at the first sound of happiness you let escape for the first time in a while.

You lifted a hand and messily wiped away your tears, “This is an awful place to have a heart to heart moment”

He smiled at you with all the love under the sun and cupped your cheek. “There’s a lot that we still need to work through, it’ll take some time. But how about I take you to that ice cream place first?”

You beamed at him, “Okay”

Yeah, you two would be just fine.

#haikyuu!! #haikyuu imagines #haikyuu x reader #hq suna #suna rintaro angst #suna rintaro headcanons #suna rintaro x reader #haikyuu oneshot #haikyuu fanfiction #haikyuu angst #haikyuu reader insert

[pennyblossom-meta]

L Lawliet: a deep dive into the expanded universe pt.01

EDIT (07/04/2024): Added some imgs.

Apologies for being so late to give this a follow up to @maevearcher's meta which can be found here and here. As usual, she’s made excellent points and I'll try to answer the ones which caught my eye.

Since this post ended up gaining a life of its own and becoming a bit too long, I’m splitting it in 2 or 3 parts. The core of the content for part 01 starts after under the button to Read More.

Here we talk about L's humanity.

I'll start with a disclaimer of my own: while I consider the manga as the base for the story, I'm very much open to the expanded DN universe as a complementary study of the characters and their motivations — sometimes even filling in the blanks for some of the background mysteries, such as the dynamics of Wammy's House and how L's successors view him.

To further clarify: by canon I mean the manga and any works by Tsugumi Ohba as the base material. I think @maevearcher and I are more or less in agreement on that, from what she mentioned in her own posts. As she said, the written word is indeed the baseline truth.

The expansion of the DN universe also has its own very special set of problems; for example, in many ways, L:CtW (L: Change the WorLd) commits the sin of overindulgence by throwing in considerations that, arguably, go against canon. Besides the ending where L lives for a final 23 days and Watari dies, the portrayal of Near in the movie (though in the novel he's also walking a fine line between becoming partially and very much OOC) is also a point of contention. I confess that I really wasn't fond of the way they portrayed Misa as a potential crush of L given canon insights on his opinion about Light whether in the role of Kira or as a person (pg.64 of Vol 13: How to Read, henceforth referred to as V13:HTR), but aligning L to become more humane and forgiving was at least interesting.

The same happens with the live action movies, the 2015 series, and the musical. At least the game Spiraling Trap isn't clashing with canon elements — that I could tell. The main plot is separate from the events of DN and the dating sim is a little slice of heaven into L's thoughts and emotions which I dearly love.

However, while L:CtW does indeed overindulge, the novel AN:LABB (Another Note: LA BB Murder Cases) gives us a singular glimpse into L through the eyes of Mello while keeping the events mostly accurate to the main plot, even with its slight deviations. It's certainly an optional perspective to the core of DN, but one that I always found very insightful. In V13:HTR, Obha mentions how he would’ve liked that there were more novels about L and how he solved previous cases, in a similar fashion to how Nisio Isin approaches AN:LABB. Here’s what Ohba says in pg.61 of V13:HTR:

(...) I didn’t think up much for [L’s] past. For him to be in such an influential position, he must have solved an amazing amount of cases, but I have no idea what kind of cases they were or how he solved them. But I would love for NISIOISIN, who wrote the Death Note novel, to write more stories about that (...)

This means that, to some extent, even the original author, Ohba, accepts AN:LABB as close to canon — or rather, as canon as it can get given the creative liberties allowed to a third party writer. To that point, Nisio Isin took L’s capoeira demonstration during the Yotsuba arc and made it a whole thing in the novel, with L taking inspiration from Naomi Misora’s skills. However, given the importance of that event, in the main story, L takes a while to even remember Misora so we can infer that either the stress of the case is getting to him OR learning capoeira and subsequently Misora’s role in it didn’t leave that much of an imprint on him because true canon didn’t really put that much emphasis into it. Either way, it’s an extrapolation that works. The technicalities can be overlooked given how ambiguous the scene is, as there is more than room to deduce a different past.

At the same time, I am an apologist that there are shared characteristics to L throughout the different mediums. My own interpretation of L's character has the manga as a baseline, but the expanded universe has taught me that there are sides to him that might not be so easy to perceive in dialogue bubbles or illustrations alone. Little things like L's addictive personality or the way he represses feelings are visible in the manga but caught beautifully in the novels, for example.

Going from the written word into the screen also represents a loss of the purity achievable only within the narrative in-book, where you can extrapolate and reach your own conclusions without being subject to the bias of sound and movement — though manga aggregates the visual to words and with it an altogether different dimension of meaning. That's one of the many things I enjoy about elements of fiction introduced through books; the stillness of the images and the narrative are more complex. Every time the baseline gets adapted, it loses something or that something shifts to fit into the perception of others. It ceases being pure and its essence is fundamentally shattered. Like the concept of a musical score on paper that gets played by an orchestra, there will never be an adaptation as good as the source material because it breaks the illusion.

While I can certainly extrapolate and accept the loss, I find that the written word from the novels, the tone of a VA's voice and the body movements in a live action still complement the manga well, despite narrative clashes.

About L’s humanity

Recently I've been re-watching the anime and it's incredible how Alessandro Juliani's understanding of the character resulted in such a well-rounded voice for L. I actually prefer the EN version to the JP because of the voice acting. It's superbly brilliant, even if L becomes less listless. He's certainly still aloof, but his aggressiveness is portrayed more vividly; in contrast, L in the manga feels a bit more dangerous and scary to me due to the range of expressions that the anime didn't manage to add in due to time and budget constraints. If anything L tones down how dangerous he can be. He does this on purpose so that he can trick and trip his adversary, as can be seen during his earlier interactions with Light. At times, L makes a mockery of himself, apparently placing himself in the position of a more demure individual while sharply observing the world around him and forming conclusions.

As to @maevearcher ‘s first point:

(...) An image of this lonely autistic genius, locked inside the confines of his ways, waiting for the right person to come along and save him from the banes of his solitary existence…until he meets Light and realises there’s someone out there who he can relate to, for understanding and stuff. I personally don’t buy too much into that.

The depth to which L relates to Light can be overestimated, but not without reason. Theirs is mostly an adversarial relationship with varying deviations throughout the expanded universe, but if we solely consider the manga then we get this comment from Ohba regarding whether L has any friends on pg.64 of V13: HTR:

Nope. And when he says that Light is his first friend that’s a big lie. He never considers him a friend. He probably secretly thinks really negative things about him.

During the Yotsuba arc, L is at a disadvantage. Light has turned the tables, tricked him into what Beyond Birthday could not do and thus gained a solid position into rendering L almost powerless to charge him. To elaborate on the latter point: BB wanted to create the perfect, unsolvable crime to humiliate L, making him lose, and thus “spend the rest of his life trembling in fear of B’s shadow” (pg.163, AA:LABB); L would know who the guilty party was but wouldn’t be able to prove it or bring that person to justice. As such, L would not be able to solve the mystery. At the end of the novel BB fails due to Misora’s quick thinking and that’s that. However, Light has several advantages that BB lacked, starting with his own social position, charm and the impeccable reputation of a model student and the prized son of a police chief who helps solve cases every now and then.

We can argue that, what truly happens in manga canon, is L and Light showing how much they respect each other for their detective skills, forming a sort of strange kinship within the cat and mouse game, especially when Light loses his memories of the Death Note. The game thrills them and they enjoy pushing each other’s buttons. No one else has ever challenged them like this. That being said, the first time they meet up for coffee after the tennis match, L is observing Light like a hawk, keeps testing him for a reaction and seems somewhat irritated at how much Light talks. I would venture a guess that L doesn’t actually like Light that much, even when he loses his memories. He might even find Light a nuisance when he waves the flag of morality — though this is a common problem L is confronted with when dealing with the Task Force, in particular Chief Yagami and Aizawa. This also places him at another gruesome disadvantage, as he’s surrounded by people who openly dislike and criticise his methods. The Task Force is also extremely wary of the way L pursues Light and think he’s being stubborn without proof to substantiate his reasoning. Ironically, it’s Aizawa, one of L’s most critical subordinates, who initiates Light’s downfall years later once he starts to consider L’s suspicions in light of Near and Mello’s tactics. 

Both L and Light respect the game, no matter where it takes them. I would further make an educated guess that Light even preyed on L’s vulnerabilities during the Yotsuba arc, predicting how L might fall into depression for failing at the game. Light was more than capable of understanding that L’s competitive and childish side would make him a sore loser, especially given that he had already “lost” the first round of battles just by showing his face. Even if there is a sliver of friendship between both during Light’s months of amnesia, it’s dead and buried the moment he becomes Kira again. 

My conclusion here would be that, while what happened with Light was extreme, it was also somewhat similar to Beyond Birthday’s eternal enmity towards L: the challenge, the need to humiliate and take down the greatest detective, one of the most brilliant minds to ever walk the Earth. There are some notable quotes from AA:LABB that reference what it is to be L, surrounded by future challengers and individuals who both look up to L and want to prove they’re better than him:

Pg.69

By simple arithmetic, L's ability in 2002 was the equivalent of five ordinary investigative bureaus, and seven intelligence agencies (and by the time he faced off against Kira, those numbers had leapt upward several more notches). This is easy to think of as a reason to respect and admire someone, but let me say this as clearly as possible: that much ability in one human is extremely dangerous. Modern danger management techniques rely heavily on diffusing the risk, but his very existence was the exact opposite. In other words, if someone was planning to commit a crime, they could greatly increase their chances of getting away with it by simply killing L before they began. That was why L hid his identity Not because he was shy or because he never left the house. To ensure his own safety For a detective of L's ability, self-preservation and the preservation of world peace were one and the same, and it would not be correct to describe his actions as cowardly or self-centered.

Pg. 117

L was the goal of everyone in Wammy's House. Everyone of us wanted to surpass him. To step over him. To step on him. M did, N did, and B did. M as a challenger, N as a successor. B as a criminal.

Pg. 160:

B approached Naomi Misora, calling himself Rue Ryuzaki. Rue Ryuzaki - L.L.  For anyone from Wammy's House, there could be no higher goal than identifying yourself with that letter - and Beyond Birthday seized this case as his chance.

One of the biggest problems with these quotes is that they paint a very complicated — and, ultimately, suffocating — picture of what it is like to be L. Ohba himself mentions Watari’s predisposition towards collecting geniuses from all over the world and what Wammy’s House has turned into, under the snippet for Watari’s character (pg.60 V13:HTR):

He’s a guy who cultivates detectives for fun. That’s kind of terrible, isn’t it?

Everyone profits from L. Watari becomes richer than ever. Wammy's House becomes breeding ground for geniuses who end up dreaming of a life where they enjoy constant thrill and challenge. However, in order to do so, the dream cannot be complete until the successor crushes the original; until M, N, B and A defeat L. At least one of L’s successors couldn’t handle the pressure and committed suicide. B, known as Backup, runs away from the orphanage and goes on a murder rampage. Having never met L in person, he deduces several personality quirks that the “original” demonstrates, going as far as exacerbating them in order to be creepy and repulsive. Mello, who boasts of having met L in person and being privy to stories about how he defeated several other detectives (then taking their aliases as a trophy) both fervently admires L and wants to step on him. 

Step on him. That’s quite the turn of phrase. It does sound scary, doesn’t it? To be surrounded by people who would take the opportunity to pull you down, no matter how much they admire you. They want to be you, to prove that they’re better than you. It’s game and ego. Life and death. Winner and loser. 

And that’s perhaps the most blatant summary in approved canon of what it is like to be L that we’ll ever get. We can, of course, argue that Watari cares about L. He’s not only his handler, but also the one who brought him into Wammy’s House. It’s fairly clear that he nurtured (and even enabled) some of L’s most distressing character traits, though I wouldn’t necessarily say it was with a purely utilitarian agenda. It’s perfectly acceptable to extrapolate how Watari might’ve wanted to keep L, a child of great intellectual genius, happy by allowing him to be challenged and properly educated. In fact, AN:LABB (pg. 145-46) even gives us L’s perspective on the kindness that justice can achieve, which is confirmed within the expanded universe to be similar to Watari’s teachings as L confronts Kujo in L:CtW. 

"I have nothing to do with him," L said. "To be completely accurate, I do not even know B. He is simply someone I am aware of. But none of this affects my judgment. Certainly I was interested in this case, and began to investigate it because I knew who the killer was. But that did not alter the way I investigated it, or the manner in which my investigation proceeded. Naomi Misora, I cannot overlook evil. I cannot forgive it. It does not matter if I know the person who commits evil or not. I am only interested in justice." "Only... in justice... " Misora gasped. "Then ... nothing else matters?" "I wouldn't say that, but it is not a priority." “You won't forgive any evil, no matter what the evil is?" "I wouldn't say that, but it is not a priority." "'But..." Like a thirteen-year-old victim. "There are people who justice cannot save." Like a thirteen-year-old criminal. “And there are people who evil can save." "There are. But even so," L said, his tone not changing at all. As if gently admonishing Naomi Misora. “Justice has more power than anything else." "Power? By power ... you mean strength?" "No. I mean kindness." He said it so easily. Misora almost dropped the phone. L The century's greatest detective, L. The detective of justice, L. Who solved every case, no matter how difficult... " ...I misunderstood you, L." "Did you? Well, I'm glad we cleared that up."

I would, once again, venture another educated guess that, while Watari’s primary reasons for starting a program of successors to L was noble, it ultimately backfired on an individual level. Society wise, the letters, as L calls them in L:CtW, are a force for good. They solve crimes, help law forces around the world to keep peace. Some of them even become scientists like Dr Kujo — though she becomes the main antagonist in the spin-off novel. However, the pressure this kind of lifestyle fostered creates a group of individuals who are highly competitive and manipulative. Some, like A, can’t handle it. Even L has his own troubles, being called a reclusive sociopath, possibly by the police forces who treat him as a utility rather than a person. He’s someone they admire and resent, who is tolerated given how effective he is at cracking down cases. 

This passage from L:CtW paints a grim picture of the way L suppresses his own feelings as he breaks down for not being able to prevent Maki from being kidnapped (pg. 150-51):

"Light...it hurts. My heart--" It was a hurt that L Lawliet had suppressed, that he had to suppress in order to continue his existence as the peerless Detective L. How had the world's top detective been described in regard to facets of his personality rather than his ability as a detective? He had been called a kinky detective who relished bizarre murders, a human computer capable only of measuring mass murders in terms of cold numbers, a reclusive sociopath. What L thought of such estimations of his personality only L could know. But no one could truly understand L. How L did not and could not forget the faces of thousands of victims. Who could comprehend the man who had lived his life, and had to live confronting all the lives that ended prematurely, the tears of grief-stricken survivors, the devaluing of life as a daily reality. How was it possible to measure the pain of such a man? Was it a strain so heavy that L's back curved under all its weight? Was it an agony so terribly to leave the indelible dark circles around his eyes? Was it a feeling so bitter that every bite he took needed to be coated in sugar? The chronically rounded shoulders, the inevitable dark circles, the eccentric tastes--L suppressed the pain of being a champion of justice, but the evidence of the pain was moulded into his very body.”

Even within the clear disparity from the official canon, this passage slaps. It humanises L further, making the detective become a person and not just a machine who is content with his lifestyle. I know there’s a tendency for those who prefer the manga to see L as someone who is unabashedly himself and perfectly alright with the life he lives. I would argue that the Kira case was not only the most difficult challenge L ever faced, but also a series of moments where he had to be at his best — and at his worst. He had to do everything within his power to solve the case, not only because of his pride but because of what he considers to be his sense of justice. Saying with such confidence ‘I am justice’ is a rather cheesy and childish thing to say out loud, though I read it as both what started as a child’s stubbornness and what L became, as he positioned himself as a barrier to prevent crimes. 

L suppresses himself, represses his emotions; he tries to control them, as Fu Takashi says in an interview, he is “dependent on games or battles of the mind”. Perhaps this is a consequence of the foundations of his personality. Despite L’s innate stubbornness, it could be argued that this is as much his fault as it is Watari’s, who didn’t nurture L’s social skills as he should have when he was a child. By not having an outlet outside of his hobby, L is trapped in a prison of his own making. Superficially, L is a “smart guy who hates losing”, but what about the rest? What about the things that make him human, the connections with others? In the same interview, it is mentioned how L feels lonely and needs affection. But what affection can you get when you isolate yourself from the world and keep everyone at arm’s length? He’s not a machine. Even machines become obsolete with time, and need outside help to keep functioning.

As for the latter point, if everyone around L is trying to step on him, humiliate him and surpass him, then it’s only natural that his emotional defences would be up. Aside from Watari, whose loyalty he can count on, he’s alone. L has no one else. And everyone around him will have a dangerous, significant probability to betray him.

Next in part 02: About romance, having someone close and intimate, the meaning of the Monster speech.

Tagging @rinneroraito, @flametrashira and @sharkiethrts who might be interested in this meta.

#death note #l lawliet #death note meta #light yagami #spiraling trap #l lawliet headcanons #l lawliet x reader #watari #mello #mello death note #nate river #mihael keehl #near death note #beyond birthday #another note #l change the world #l death note #l lawliet death note

[thattiredanimator1t0mblr]

| soft!father figure!Miguel o'hara x teen!spidey?reader | Headcanons | (platonic)

(Miguel o'hara x reader platonic)

(Miguel o'hara x teen!reader platonic)

(Miguel o'hara x reader platonic)

A/n: reminder, miguel is gonna be OOC(out of character) as HELL because I legit forgot how to write, and I lost all my skills because of art block 2 years ago and stopped. So, just a heads up, Ooc!Miguel.

Trigger warning: cursing, mentions of loss of family members/and or friends, mentions of death, mentions of dead family members(?), potentially overprotective/slight platonic yandere!miguel(?), etc.

Miguel....looks at you, the same way he looks at his own pride and joy, which is also you, ofc. (Because you are the main character and are amazing.)

He'll try and brush your hair, no matter how short or how thin it is. if you have a buzz cut, he'll just lightly massage your head. If you have braids or an afro, etc, he'll try and learn hair styles like that for you, like how to do braids, or afro puffs for you (please correct me on terminology, I'm not black, so forgive me if I accidentally say something wrong or call a hair style the wrong name/gen)

He will help you with anything and everything. You are his new pride and joy, sit down, and don't worry about a thing. :)

He'll help you with missions, homework, hell, even on how to build nuclear weapons if you ask nicely enough.

You're his kid(metaphorically), why shouldn't he help you with everything and dote on you?

However if you are more independent or less likely to understand/and or like how much he tries to help you in everything, he'll back off, he trusts you, he just cares about you too much to let you do anything(as horrible as that sounds, it comes from a place of good)

He's like those overprotective dad's that tell you, your outfit is too revealing, or some horror story about some random kid getting kidnapped before you go out. (Is that just my parents? Maybe I'm projecting a little, sorry!)

He will judge your friends, especially if its other spiders, hobie? He won't say anything to you but he will lecture hobie for 2 hours on making sure not to be a bad influence on you, gwen is...alright, he may not really like her but he understands why your friends (whatever that reason may be.), miles? Oh fuck no. Miguel would rather set himself on fire and destroy the spider society instead of letting miles be friends with you, and (aromantics, don't read this part.) If you're dating miles, congrats, miguel is popping a blood vessel from how pissed he is.

Of course, he may lecture you, or even 'ground you'(he'll start to get very emotional after 2 hours of being away from you, he can not risk losing another kid, you are too important to him.), but a little bit of pestering/and or convincing, and he'll begrudgingly accept you and miles are friends/dating.

He may teach you Spanish, if you're up for it.

Calls you spanish nicknames. (Hispanics and people who speak spanish fluently, I am so sorry, I don't know spanish and I'm using Google Translate, please forgive me for this. Please correct me in the replies/comments so I can edit this and fix it./gen)

Princesa/Príncipe, Cariño, Mi sol, mi corazón, mi vida, etc.

He lets(makes) you stay with him on his platform office thingy(sorry, I don't know what to call it.), he'll pull up a YouTube video or movie on some hologram, or holographic screen and let you watch while he works.

Honestly, does not know now to use basic cooking appliances, if you're from a universe where the year is like, anything under 2060, congrats, miguel will not understand any terminology or technology you have(like a regular phone, ipad or a regular computer from 2020, his universe is so futuristic and such, those things are ANCIENT to him, God forbid you quote any vines infront him, he will not understand and there's like a 30% chance his grandparents/great grandparents used to quote vines.)

Will ask you to help him with a fucking microwave,, his universe is so futuristic.

Sometimes, he sends you with him on missions that aren't missions, like jsut going out to soem really nice universe he thinks you'll like, and being 'undercover'(you're both gonna wear whatever you want, hell probably wear casual, you can wear anything you're comfortable in.). To which you'll both jsut be hanging out at some cafe, library, amusement Park, cinema, whatever place you like or he thinks you'll like, and pretends that you're looking for some anomaly but in the end he'll jsut tell you to go back to HQ or your own universe and he'll take care of the anomaly(there was no anomaly, he lied so that he could hang out with you.)

If you lose or are going to lose any family members, friends, lover, etc, maybe from the Canon or something else, he'll do everything to cheer you up, highest quality therapy, stuffed animals(if you like those), the entire series of a book you like, he'll even pay for your favorite Netflix show to get a 2nd/'random number' season, he is a billionaire, he won't let you on any missions, he'll make you rest, help you mourn and even maybe help arrange the funeral if you trust him enough.

This man has severe abandonment issues(hc), he has lost his daughter and family, he cna not lose you too.

He is a bit clingy and overprotective, he doesn't, like, read your texts or anything, but he does silently judge your friends, aswell as sometimes glare at anyone.

He has a huge soft spot for you.

If he's in the middle of lecturing or arguing with someone, maybe because of a mission, and you walk in or he notices you walking by, he will stop and say good morning/good afternoon/whatever time it is.

Warning, 'cringe' below, because I do not know how to use spanish nicknames properly, please forgive me :(

"(Random spiderman) this mission was important! You made mistake that could've costed someone their life!- good morning, Cariño."

^ this is what I mean by that.

Sometimes, he makes lyla monitor you on missions 10 times more then any other spider because he gets worried about you.

He will help you with your spidey suit, and making a suit if it rips or you don't have one yet.

This man will watch soccer, and get pissed off at how badly they're playing, like, you could jsut be in another room or sitting next to him doing your own thing and all of a sudden you'll hear a roar of spanish curses and such, because someone made a stupid move while playing.

He'll make you pack lunches, burritos, Quesadillas, Empanadas, Enchiladas, etc, (now I'm hungry thinking about it😭). If you don't like any of those or are allergic to certain ingredients used in those, he'll make you something else, a sandwich, burger, maybe French fries, sliced fruit, strawberrys dipped in chocolate (if your not allergic), pasta, lasagna, etc. Or he'll just buy you some takeout and put it in a lunch box for you. Whatever you prefer :)

Supports you no matter what, no matter your identity, religion, sexuality, race, etc, he supports you :).

---

#random tired writings #x reader #hcs #headcanons #headcanon #atsv miguel #atsv x reader #atsv x y/n #atsv x you #across the spiderverse x reader #across the spiderverse #across the spider verse x reader #across the spider verse #atsv headcanons #atsv hcs #miguel ohara x reader #miguel o'hara x reader #miguel o'hara x you #miguel o'hara headcanons #miguel o’hara x you #miguel o'hara x y/n #miguel o’hara x reader #miguel o'hara hcs #miguel o'hara #platonic #dad miguelo'hara #miguel ohara x you #miguel ohara x y/n #child!reader #x child!reader

[itsgoghtime]

Here You Come Again

CW : angsty hurt/comfort (hurt part doesn’t last very long), Ray is a little ooc again, Ray being the sweet honey saccharine boy that he is (it’s his favorite time of year)

Words : 3842

"Do you ever wonder if the universe brings people together?"

"Do you ever wonder if the universe can pull them apart?"

"Nah, that's improbable."

1989 - New York City

There's always something about autumn that inspires magic in the soul.

Maybe it's the changing leaves.

Maybe it's the events.

Maybe it's because I was in love once during this season.

Definitely not that last one.

Granted, I had always loved autumn. The colors change into deep and rich tones that just draw the eyes in. The smells, the sights, the fact that my entire wardrobe that had only really ever consisted of sweaters finally came into play.

Autumn was just the best season.

It was. Now, I just connected it to someone who was no longer around. Didn't help his favorite holiday was Halloween.

After the success of Ghostbusters saving New York (and covering it in marshmallow), Ray and I had dated steadily for some time. A few years. Until, Ghostbusters went under.

"Ray, please. There has to be something we can do..."

"Hun, I'm sorry. There isn't... the business has gone under - I can't ask you to stay here, when I can't provide for you. You deserve someone who can."

"Ray, I don't want to leave - I'll find another job, work as many hours as it takes... please, don't end this between us."

Ray shook his head, letting go of my hand with tears in his eyes.

"I can't."

"Ray, I don't want to be with the business. I want to be with you."

He couldn't even face me when I walked out the door.

It had been two years since I had moved into a little apartment upstate. I found a job proofreading and editing books.

This fall - I was finally working up the desire to go out and do stuff again. Governors Island, the Jack O'Lantern blaze, maybe a haunted house, if I could convince myself I could do it alone. I couldn't let my hurt heart dictate what I was doing anymore.

Todays adventure, the Brooklyn Book festival.

My eyes were as big as dinner plates - I was absolutely amazed at how many books there were, as I had been every year. I took my time meandering, running my hands along the different covers and buying a few every now and then.

I came across a booth with all sorts of paranormal books. It made me smile, remembering how much Ray loved this sort of stuff. I looked through a few of the books before the person running the stand approached.

"How can I... oh my gosh, is that...there's no way..." The familiar voice said, calling my name and I froze.

I looked up and saw Peter Venkman. Just who I didn't want to run into.

"Hey, Peter. Long time no see."

"Yeah, that's about right. Good heavens woman, you've grown up so much!" He laughed. Peter, from the beginning, had taken it upon himself to be an annoying older brother, even though we were only a few years apart in age.

"Yeah, tends to happen to a person when you don't see them for a long time." I chuckled with him.

"How have you been? What have you been up to? Why haven't you come to visit?" Peter was asking interrogation questions at lighting speed, and I answered as short as I could, trying to keep up with him.

"Ray should be back soon, wanted to go find a hot chocolate stand he said you had gone to a few years back. Said they had..."

"...apple cider doughnuts..." I finished for Peter, my look becoming distant. He was still talking about me? "I think I'll just buy this book, if you don't mind." I handed Peter cash, which he took and let me take the book.

"I'll go find him - he'd want to see you." He was absolutely oblivious to my anxious expression - which was normal, for him anyways.

He turned around, and I bolted. I could hear Ray's voice approaching, and heaven knows I didn't want to see him yet. It was enough to see Peter. But Ray?

I immediately returned home, knowing that Peter would look for me throughout the festival to bring me back to the booth.

Arriving home was like retreating to a safe room. I leaned against the door, curling up at the bottom as I slid down.

There's no way.

I reflected back on conversations with Ray - about the universe and it's influence on people meeting.

We had gone over different theories - religions, philosophies, even just theories regular people talked about - soulmates, those sorts of things. Luck versus fate versus no sort of outside influence.

I didn't like thinking about the fact that we had concluded that conversation with the thought that maybe - just maybe - the universe had brought us together.

And then, consequently, that same universe seemed to tear him from me. Or was it just us, denying the pull to each other?

I didn't know anymore, as I sat with my back to my door.

———

Over the next week,  I tried to forget about my interaction with Peter. I dove into my books in the evenings, as usual. The paranormal book sounded oddly familiar as I went through it's pages - I discovered the author had consulted with Ray and Egon on their research.

I put the book down.

Why did it seem that even though I had gone two years, without any sort of contact or closure - and now, as the wound had finished healing over, it was opened right back up with one conversation?

I couldn't quite put it together.

In the morning, my coworker came into my office, giggling.

"What's up?" I asked, not looking up from the manuscript I was looking through.

"There's someone here to see you. Says it's important."

"Oh, yeah, I was going to have a meeting with th..."

"No, someone else. It's not your author conference." She laughed again, stepping aside.

Ray Stantz.

In my office.

My eyes slowly moved over him, trying to convince my mind that he was real. His hands shook slightly with the yellow flowers in his hands, and that same soft, nervous smile was on his face.

I was in shock for a moment, and stood to meet him.

"Hey." I whispered, a smile finding its way to my lips.

"Hey yourself." His voice was just as gentle as I remembered.

My coworker skipped out of the office, leaving Ray and I to stand there for a moment, just looking at each other. He finally came out of his trance, and chuckled a little.

"These - are for you." He handed me the flowers and I smiled.

"Thanks." It took me another moment, but I set the flowers down. "Stantz, why are you here? Moreover, how did you know to find me here?"

"Well, it's a pretty simple story, actually. Peter mentioned he saw you at the Brooklyn Book Festival that we used to go to every year. He said you didn't give him a lot of details about what you were doing, so in true Venkman fashion, he looked you up. Found out where you were working, the usual." He looked so guilty - even though he wasn't the one to blame.

I had to laugh at his expression, which seemed to ease him a bit.

"Venkman... that little gunner snipe."

"Funny you say that, those were my exact words when I found out he had invaded your privacy like that." He chuckled.

"Ray, it's alright. I knew by the look in his eyes when I ran into him - he wasn't going to let me off the hook that easy."

"Oh, good. I was afraid you'd be mad."

"I couldn't be, even if I tried."

Our laughter ceased, and then, it became a little awkward.

"Well, it was nice seeing you, Ray."

"Nice to see you too." His voice was quiet, like he had been before he had asked me out for the first time. He moved to leave my office, before turning around in the doorway.

I should have known.

"Hey, can we catch up sometime? Meet up for coffee somewhere?"

I smile, trying to hide the excitement that his question just brought me.

"Yeah, that would be good."

Before Ray could respond, Venkman was in the doorway with him.

"Hey you! Good to see you all set up in your office!" He called with a jovial tone that was laced with sarcasm.

"Hey Peter. So stalking people is your new hobby, eh?"

"No, just stalking you for one of my best friends in the whole wide world." He clapped Rays shoulder. "Even when he didn't ask for it. I'm an under appreciated talent, you know!"

I rolled my eyes and laughed. "Yeah, yeah. Now get out of my office, I have a conference soon."

Peter chuckled and blew me a sarcastic kiss that I pretended to catch and threw it back at him. Ray went to go with him, but I called to him, and he stopped to look at me.

"I'm pretty booked up until Thursday - but you could come and pick me up from my apartment at 6 and we can catch up then. If you're not busy, that is."

"Thursday works perfect. I'll see you then." His smile brightened and that familiar sparkle came back - I stood in a little shock as he walked out the door.

———

I found myself watching the clock on Thursday with impatience. Time wouldn't move any faster, and I was only halfway through the day.

Unable to focus on my manuscript, I sat back in my chair and let myself think.

I couldn't believe myself.

I ran into Peter Venkman once. Once, mind you.

And a week later, Ray Stantz showed up unannounced at my office, asking me to catch up.

I should have been mad. I should have been pushing them both away.

But... I couldn’t.

There's something about this whole situation that I just...

Yeah, Ray Stantz waltzed right in the door, just like he had done so many times before, and he wrapped my heart around his little finger.

I looked back up at the clock. It's 4:30.

I scowled. Of course, I just had to think about something other than work and now, work is almost over.

Should've done that earlier.

——

5:55. I'd been pacing my apartment for fifteen minutes.

I had arrived home from work at five, showered, dried and recurled my hair, spent fifteen minutes deciding what to wear before settling on my favorite sweater - the cream one with the little orange and red leaves on it - and sweatpants and sneakers.

5:57. The doorbell rings.

I rushed towards the door, and then took a minute to collect myself. He didn’t need to know how eager I was to see him. Yet.

Opening the door held the same emotion as opening presents on Christmas. I tried to push that feeling away, but seeing Ray in his button up and jeans wearing that leather jacket I had always been obsessed with...

It put me over the edge. I knew exactly what was happening.

I was falling for Ray Stantz all over again.

"Hey, sorry, I hope it's okay that I'm a little early." He nervously chuckled, and I had to pull myself out of my trance to respond, almost a little too late.

"No, no! That's totally fine." I chuckled, not able to hide my stupidly big smile. It seemed to ease Ray, who smiled back.

"Oh, good."

"Where did you want to go get coffee?" I asked, trying to calm my heart down.

"I was actually wondering if you wanted to go get cider at that stand we used to go to every year. If that's okay, of course." I took note of the blush that appeared on his cheek as he said this.

Little did he know, my stomach started boiling with butterflies.

I nodded softly in response. "I'd love that."

He offered me his arm, which I took, and we began to walk down the street towards the Ecto-1.

"I asked Winston if I could borrow his car, but he said he was going to a drive-in movie upstate and needed it. Sorry, I didn't mean to bring Clarisse on this excursion."

"Ray, it's alright. I've missed the old gal." I squeezed his arm, trying to let him know he was doing alright by me. It seemed to have worked, because he stopped apologizing for everything.

He opened the door for me, like the gentleman he had always been, and went around and climbed into the front seat before driving away.

All of our time together was the happiest I had felt in a long time. The most unadulterated, genuine happiness.

The cider was good, but it didn't compare at all in sweetness to Ray. I hadn't realized how much I had missed him until I spent a couple hours with him.

On the way back to my apartment, the two way radio in Ecto-1 buzzed. Ray answered it, still laughing at something I had said.

"Stantz here."

"Ray, there's a call that just came in. It's in your area, would you be able to answer?"

Ray looked at me, wearing his leather jacket that he had insisted putting on me when I got cold, and his heart fluttered. There was guilt in his eyes, and he shook his head.

"No, I can't tonight."

"Ray," Peter's voice chided. "I know you're on your date with your little friend, but it'll be just like old times if you go. Come on, I don't want to go on this one tomorrow cause it's out of the way from the rest of them on the schedule. Please?"

I looked at Ray, who just kept looking more guilty by the second.

"Hey," My voice caught his attention. "It's okay, we can go. I'd love to see the gear in action again." I didn't tell him that I also just didn't want him to leave yet.

Ray's eyes lit up, and he answered Peter.

"I'll be there."

Within just a few minutes, we arrived at the apartment complex of whoever had called. I watched Ray put the Proton pack on, and my breath hitched in my throat. I had seen him do this a hundred times before, but it was just so much more attractive every time he did it. This instance was no different.

Without warning, he held out the trap, which brushed my hand slightly, pulling me from my lovesick trance again.

"What?"

"Do you wanna come? It's easier with two people." His hand was still outstretched with the trap. I smiled, and took the trap from his hands, which seemed to make him happy.

We were buzzed up to the apartment, and the owner explained to us that their rug had taken a life of its own and was trying to wrap itself around anyone that entered the apartment. Ray assured them we would take care of it, and they thanked him, going to their neighbor's apartment to find refuge.

Ray turned to me before we went into the apartment. He pulled a pair of goggles that had been attached to his pack, and began to put them on my head.

"Helps so you can see the trap better than I'll be able to when it's open. Just switch the button when I give you the signal and we should be good to go. Easy as pie."

I smiled, feeling him adjust the goggles to fit my head.

"Alright."

Ray turned the proton pack on, and for a moment, just looked at me in the goggles. His eyes sparkled with affection before he slowly turned the doorknob.

At first, we didn't see the rug. But sure enough, it was hiding in a corner. Ray smiled at me, and I held the trap, ready to roll it across the floor on its little wheels when he was ready.

His proton stream wrestled with it a few times - slime covering us both at different moments. But surely, he caught the entity in the stream, and I rolled the trap over and opened it up. It swallowed the ghost, leaving the crumpled rug on top of it.

We stood there for a second in shock, staring at the limp rug, before beginning to laugh.

I stood up, and just like second nature, we hugged each other as we laughed. It felt like old times, like Peter had said it would.

After a minute or so, we pulled apart, both blushing profusely.

"You... uh... you did good with the trap." Ray said softly as he looked at his feet.

"You did good with the proton laser beam... thing..." I looked over at him, and we both laughed again.

The car ride home was just as fun as the rest of our evening. We talked about how the call went, how the evening in general went, and we laughed as we compared how much slime we both had.

"Oh, Ray... your jacket..." I gasped when I realized it too, was covered in slime. I looked at it where I had put it in the backseat of Clarisse.

"It's fine - it's been through a few calls before. Doesn't hurt it any, especially..." His voice went quiet. I tilted my head, furrowing my brow in curiosity.

"Especially what?"

Ray thanked his lucky stars it was dark, because his blush deepened. "Especially because it's being worn by someone beautiful like you."

I bit my lip, smiling widely. Realizing it was a little awkward again, I diverted the conversation to when he had worn this jacket on other calls. He excitedly told me about his recent adventures with the jacket, and even a few without.

He arrived at my apartment, and opened my door for me again. We walked arm in arm to my door, and my heart sunk a little. I had so much fun, I didn't want him to leave.

I turned to look up at him after I unlocked my front door. I picked a piece of slime out of his hair - his hair was still as soft as I had remembered.

"Thanks." He chuckled.

"No, thank you. For an extremely fun evening." I practically whispered. Despite my better judgement, I cupped his cheek in one hand and kissed the other, lingering for a moment. I noticed his hand came to meet my elbow before I pulled away.

I took a step back towards my door and smiled at both our blushes.

"Same time next week?" I asked, my brain screaming at me for being so forward.

"Yeah, I'd like that." Ray smiled widely at me. "You have a good night."

"You too." I watched him walk to Ecto-1, and watched him wave at me before driving away.

I was smitten. Head over heels in love. Again.

The next couple weeks, I found myself having Ray over more often than just once a week. We spent a significant amount of time together, when I wasn't working and he wasn't on a call. But sometimes, he would bring me lunch at work, or we'd go out together, and we'd get to see each other then too.

Things remained neutral - we weren't holding hands or anything. My heart ached for it, but I wasn't sure how he felt.

One evening - a Thursday, to be exact - Ray appeared at my doorstep after I was home from work. I had opened the door to see him in an orange flannel - one of his favorites back when we were dating, because I had told him I loved it.

"You'll want to wear a sweater. That cream one with the leaves that you love would work just fine." Ray stated, trying to act nonchalant, while his eyes sparkled with excitement.

"Where are we going?" I called from my room. I decided to wear outfit I had put on for our first... excursion. I couldn't bring myself to call it a date, because he hadn't mentioned that it was.

"It's a surprise..." His voice just rang with suspicious happiness. Stepping out of my room, his smile only widened when he saw my outfit. "We're practically matching!"

I chuckled. "Yeah, we are."

"You don't get motion sickness, right?"

"No...? Why...? Oh." I laughed a little harder when Ray blindfolded me. He picked me up into his arms under the premonition that 'I don't want you tripping'. I forgot how strong his arms felt as I was in them. It made me sad when he put me in the car and buckled me in, because I didn't get to be in his arms anymore. Heaven knows I wasn't going to voice that, though.

I heard Ray go back around the car and get into the drivers seat.

"Comfortable?"

"As much as one who feels like they're being kidnapped can be." I chuckle. "If I throw up later it is totally your fault."

He just laughed, and put us in motion.

I didn't get sick like I thought I might, and soon, he unbuckled me and picked me back up into his arms.

"How long do I have to wear the blindfold for?" I asked, laughing a little more.

"Not much longer." He held me a little tighter, walking a short distance before putting me back down on the ground. Still standing so close, he took my blindfold off and leaned down towards my ear.

"Welcome, to the Great Jack-O-Lantern Blaze."

My eyes adjusted to the light, but when I was able to focus, I gasped excitedly.

I was in the middle of it all. The lights and the pumpkins were fantastic. The smell of pumpkin flavored things surrounded us, and it brought such nostalgia. I turned to Ray.

"This... this is where..."

"Where we had our first date. I remember." Ray's expression was soft as he looked down at me.

I looked up at him, the nostalgia and the longing and the love written all over my expression.

"Letting you go was the worst mistake I've ever made. The last few weeks, I've been happier than I've been in a long time. I... I want to ask you if you'd consider dating me. Steady. Again."

I smiled bashfully, and I looked at my feet for a moment.

"Ray Stantz, you've had me since we got slimed on that call together."

Ray's smile widened, but his eyes still held some anxiety. He didn't say anything for a minute, but it didn't bother me. I stepped forward, cupping his sweet face in my hands as the distance between us lessened.

"Now, you just stay right there, because I am gonna love you to death."

Our lips finally met - after a month of fantasizing about it, he kissed me just like I had imagined, but better. His arms came around me, closing the remaining distance between us as my fingers combed through his soft hair.

The Great Jack-O-Lantern Blaze had been a success this year, at least according to Ray.

#ray #ray stantz x reader #ray stantz #ray x reader #ghostbusters #reader insert #ghostbusters two #dan aykroyd #halloween oneshot #spooky season

[countessqin]

Happy Birthday dear [Name]! (Family of three edition)

Characters: Jing Yuan x fem!reader (romantically; wife-husband relations), Yanqing x fem!reader (familiar; mother-son relations)

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[Author's Note]

- So, august is my birthday month, and I decided to write some birthday voicelines/wishes from our favorite characters! For some reason we don't have voicelines about our birthdays so here we are! - It may be kind of self oriented writting? but I tried my best, and I hope you all will like it! - I'm starting with my two favorite characters, Jing Yuan and Yanqing! If they are a bit OOC, my apologies. And, apologies for typos and mistakes. - I will do some of other characters if I will feel like it, and will have inspiration and time - You can find other stories that I wrote for hsr here (^*^)/♡ PS. I have another work connected to birthday celebration in my drafts so stay tuned! When I will publish it? Good question, it is still 2/3 written... I have a bit of writer's block, sooo yeah... but i will finish it this-next week, I think

Thank you for reading and have a wonderful day/evening!

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Small bio:

Name           - [Name] Age              - ??? Occupation - Ambassador/Negotiator of the Xianzhou Luofu Status         - Married

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Jing Yuan

[Happy birthday]

- Hm? Do I know what day is it today? Well why, of course I know dear. It's Thursday. What else? Hmm... I promised to Yanqing to have a lesson today at noon. Anything else? Not that I remember... *takes your hand in his* I'm joking. My dear sparrow, *takes small handmade wooden box out of his pocket* happy birthday! No matter how much time will pass, I will never forget such important day, the day love of my life came into this world. I wish you to always stay happy, healthy and positive. And always remember, you are wonderful person, my little sparrow. I love you, [Name] *light kiss on your lips*

{Obtained} : handmade wooden box with ormanent of [your favorite flower], with delicate, custom made pair of golden earings inside - one sun, other moon . As well as bouquet of your favorite flowers, box of custom made chocolate (your favorite type).

Yanqing

[Happy birthday]

- Mom! Happy birthday to you! You are the best mom a person could wish for, I really really love you, here *shyly handing you a stroll* it is the ink painting I did for you. It's a [your favorite animal], I-i'm sorry if it doesn't look very professional, but I- hm? It is amazing? The best drawing of [your favorite animal]? Thank you mom. Happy birthday *hugs you* I wish you happiness, less stress and-and so all your dreams will come true! I love you mom *hugs you*

{Obtained}: ink painting with [your favorite animal], as well as small birthday card with carefully written: "To the best Mom a person can have. Happy Birthday Mom! I wish you happiness, less stress at work, more free time for yourself and your hobbies. I love you very much!" and small doodles of you, Yanqing, Mimi and Jing Yuan.

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#honkai star rail #hsr #honkai star rail jing yuan #hsr jing yuan #honkai star rail yanqing #hsr yanqing #honkai star rail x reader #hsr x reader #qin's stories~

[cupcraft]

I was talking about this the other day but I think some.people are gensrs a tar pit in the sense that they expect and demand perfection from artists who share their work for free and this is especially true for writing and fic and oc work.

Like it's one thing if an author asks for constructive criticism or grammar checks from strangers and you politely tell them (emphasis on polite). And it's another to see something you don't like and leave a raging comment like they destroyed you're whole life on a work that is again FREE and not professionally edited and is just a hobby piece from a real person's fandom enjoyment.

Yalls audacity baffles me like you know what I do when I dislike a fic or the grammar is annoying me. I click off. I move on. What do I do when somethings ooc? I move on. I've never once felt compelled to ruin a fic writers whole day especially when they a didn't ask, b it's free art, and c I am by no means a professional (even as I try to publish my own writing. At heart it's always been a hobby) and being a professional wouldn't make shit behavior okay either FYI.

And also some of you don't know how to give constructive criticism and I can say that with my experience writing and beta reading both in school (albeit for technical/science writing) and work on fics/zines etc. Like constructive is meant to be just that, constructive. It is not meant to degrade someone and for you to go haha amazing I ruined this person's passion for writing good thing they sucked! Like idk hownto tell you this but you have to support artists even when they "suck" you have to be supportive of people who are sharing something they love for free. If you really don't like it move tf on. It's important though when you do engage you're kind. Fandom is meant to be a community and it should be enjoyable to you thst people grow and change and their art and passions evolve. If you're heart is set in destroying anyone who isn't Perfect like they had a whole literary/art agency team behind them for again, free art then you are in fact a tar pit and you are miserable and likely projecting. Get over yourself

#discourse #can rb

[kazumiwrites-fanfiction]

I'm Just a Recluse

REQUEST: Hi I saw that your requests were open so I decided to give this a go by the way I absolutely suck at doing requests but I seen almost nothing on this 'prompt' Yandere!idia shroud x reader who has a massive crush on him but thinks he doesn't feel the same way. This idea has been rotting in my mind for the longest time. (ps: I really hope that this was clear enough 😭😭😭 again I'm sorry I really suck at writing requests)

SUMMARY: Does he have feelings for you? WORD COUNT: 1.7k

WARNINGS: Maybe manipulative reader, yandere-ish Idia, Idia being possessive and jealous mostly, Azul just wants blackmail, most likely OOC, Idia getting flustered, written in less than 30 minutes so I can't guarantee the quality but this is how I write- A/N: Anon I love that you requested because I was unable to sleep, but at the same time it's nearing 3 AM as I write this authors note help 😭 (dw you're amazing and your request was perfect, I really suck at writing stuff that was requested so it's like we're two sides of a coin (if that doesn't make sense i'm sorry)) Anyways I'm like 90% sure I botched this because I don't think I know Idia that well (I am going off what I know of him so far, so there may be inconsistencies with canon and whatnot) and it ended up being less yandere?? Idk mostly because I was like "yes I'm writing a yandere but I got an idea that's not 100% yandere" (as one does) and then it went down a whole 'nother rabbit hole- so I'm so sorry if this is not what you were looking for (also the fact that I'm writing this late at night does not help either) Reading your request over I'm mostly sure that what you were looking for was something similar to "soft reader x yandere!Idia" and not whatever the thing I wrote is- but I wrote it so I might as well publish it- Also the fact that I added Azul and Floyd because I love them and my late night brain said "might as well" is uh- yeah- A/N: Also I'm really sorry Idia I suck at titles </3

© kazumiwrites - All rights reserved; please do not steal, edit, copy, repost (etc) my work without my express permission.

You always liked Idia. You weren’t really sure why, since you never really saw him much… He seemed to be always in his room, playing games. Mostly, you saw him while passing by the room that the board game club occupied. Other than the occasional passing by as you walked through the halls, that was the only thing.

Well, there was really nothing to go by, to explain your crush. You tried to dismiss it as just liking his aesthetics, or something like that - you didn’t know him well, after all. Or, rather, at all. And there was no way that he even knew about you.

Well, it was a good thought. Still, you joined the board game club, if only to up your chances of Idia noticing you.

The housewarden of Ignihyde had not registered you much at first. You were the person possibly isekai’d into this world (like a character from an anime), but other than that, you seemed like another regular person.

Or so he thought.

Once you had joined his club, things changed drastically.

You had been doing everything you could to try to spend some time with Idia, playing the same games as him and trying to talk to him.

The poor boy got flustered and he couldn’t do much. Here was a real person who seemed nice, talking to an otaku like him. It was unheard of.

Still, a game was enough to make him relax a bit, enough to have a semi-decent conversation.

He gradually found himself getting more and more interested in you. At first, he had asked Ortho for anything on you, but then he started to try more to connect with you. However, they were subtle.

Sometimes, a note placed in your desk, other times a flower in your room. Small, simple things, never signed, and without a trace of anyone.

Of course, he had Ortho do it - he didn’t want to get caught, that would make him want to die - but he still wished he could see your reactions.

Maybe you were happy, intrigued. But then again, perhaps you would be disgusted when you realized who had been the one sending those gifts. Perhaps you hated otakus. Weren’t they the people least likely to get into a relationship?

Still, he shook off those thoughts. He had to make sure you at least didn’t get grossed out and quit his club. That would make him so distressed that he wouldn’t come out of his room for at least ten years. He liked seeing your face, and didn’t want that light of happiness gone.

He should’ve known this was coming, though.

Unbeknownst to Idia, however, you had struck a deal with Azul. "Help me get Idia to fall in love with me by whatever means necessary," were your exact words. And Azul knew he could most likely blackmail both you and Idia later, however this turned out. So, being the benevolent person he was, he accepted. (And also? It would be interesting to see how this turned out in general, even without being able to get blackmail). As a show of trust, he didn't even force you to sign a contract with him. How truly benevolent he was.

So here you were, sitting a bit too close to Azul, leaning in slightly to him to discuss a game when you heard the door open. Your eyes flickered up slightly, meeting Idia's carefully composed gaze. "Hi, Idia-san."

Oh, how he longed to snatch you away from Azul… But no, he couldn't do that. Obviously Azul was better for you anyway… He was smart, and he could talk to people. And he had money. Obviously you'd like that more than a recluse.

But still… How he wanted you to drop the formal titles and call him just by name… Just like in all the romance anime he watched. "Oh, drop the -san and call me by name!" That's what he could've said, what he wanted to say - but he couldn't. What if you were grossed out?

He moved to the other side of the room, getting out one of the games and starting to set it up. His eyes flickered up as he met your gaze (and unwillingly, Azul's). He didn't miss how your hands were intertwined. Why were normal couples like this…

You tilted your head slightly to the side as you asked about playing the game with him. Idia was startled at first, but reluctantly agreed. He was irritated that Azul was here - didn't he hate luck-based games? Or was he so in love that he would do anything just to stay by your side? Oh, how it made him sick.

After a few rounds, he was done. He was tired of it all. The last straw was when he saw Azul wrap an arm around your shoulders.

Your eyes widened as Idia got up quickly, hitting the table in the process, the pieces scattering to the floor. He didn't seem to notice as he stepped toward you, pulling you from Azul's grasp.

Azul had been holding on lightly, barely even touching you, so there was no resistance. He just watched you and Idia quietly, thoughtfully, all the gears spinning in his head.

"You're not hanging out with a guy like him," Idia muttered quietly. "You're staying with me." He moved his grip to hold your wrist, tugging you out of the club room.

You followed without resisting. What else would you even do? Try to fight him? Of course not. Not when you were so close to getting what you wanted.

He cornered you in a deserted hallway, staring at you. You waited for a moment before tentatively speaking. "Idia…?"

Idia stayed quiet, the tips of his hair just gradually growing into a vibrant shade of pink. Finally, he got out, "…I shouldn't have done that…"

"Shouldn't have done what?" Your eyes were wide, so cute… But he shook the thought off.

"Shouldn't have dragged you away. Obviously you want a guy like him for a boyfriend and not me."

You paused. Your plan… Had it worked? Was he jealous? "Hey- I don't like Azul. Not in a romantic way anyway. The person I like is the person I'm talking to right now."

Idia froze. He had to be dreaming. This had to be some elaborate VR set that showed him what he wanted most in the world. Perhaps… It was so cheesy too. Like some scene from a romance anime. He met your gaze.

But still…

"Me? You have to be joking. I mean, who would like me? I'm just a recluse who stays in his room all day playing games-"

"But you're more than that," you cut him off, before smiling a little apologetically. "You're sweet, and kind, and I love the way your eyes light up when you're talking about your favorite anime or game."

Shit. No one had said that to him before. "W-well. I-" He cut himself off. He couldn't say it. He couldn't say something so embarrassing. Yeah, he had dragged you away from Azul in the heat of the moment, but that was because he wasn't thinking. He let the jealousy, the possessiveness, guide his actions.

And now he was paying for it.

"I-"

"C'mon, Idia-san, get it out." Your voice was so gentle, so soothing.

"I like you and I really wanted to get to know you better but I wasn't sure if you liked me so I sent all sorts of weird creepy stuff like notes and I bet you're disappointed because it was just me and not, y'know, some cool ikemen."

His words were so fast it was almost a blur. Before you could even process his words, he took a deep breath and continued.

"And I really want you to stop calling me -san and just by my name but I don't want to ask that of you because I'm just some random creep who is obsessed with you and wants to keep you to himself and-"

"Stop stop stop." You laughed a little. "Hey, I'm not disappointed that you were the one sending me the gifts - they were sweet. I was worried that Rook-san might have been the ones sending them, but I'm glad to get the confirmation that you were the one."

Why would you think it had been Rook? Perhaps you had a crush-

"And, you only needed to ask if you wanted me to drop the -san, Idia." You smiled sweetly at him.

Well, at least you hadn't caught the 'obsessed' and 'creep' part? That was embarrassing of him to say.

Idia looked more and more flustered before he just stepped closer to you, awkwardly wrapping his arms around you in an embrace. His face nuzzled in to the crook of your neck, heart beating too fast and his palms sweaty. Was this okay? Would you like it - perhaps he should've cleaned up a bit more-

Your arms wrapped around him, and he immediately relaxed. What he wouldn't do to have you hold him like that for the whole night - whole week, even.

Unfortunately, at that moment, Floyd had to come skipping through the halls. "Koebi-chan and Hotaruika-senpai? What're you doing here - Is Azul done with his boring club?"

Idia let out a soft huff, glaring at Floyd even as he held on to you. "One, the board game club is /not/ a boring club, and two, I'm hugging [Y/N]."

How bold of him to say.

"Ooh, can I hug Koebi-chan too? I bet I can squeeze them so tight~"

Idia somehow held you tighter, turning you away from Floyd. "No. Now go run off and find Azul or something." How he had managed to hold a full conversation with Floyd, he wasn't sure. At least he seemed bored enough to run off… He sighed softly. He'd have to spend more time with you in his dorm. He was still holding you tightly as he walked to his dorm.

~bonus~ Azul was just around the corner and listening in to your conversation, phone recording everything that had happened. He sighed as Floyd had come in - of course he had to ruin it. Still, he had gotten some good stuff. "Hmm? Azul, you're here… Spying on Koebi-chan and Hotaruika-senpai?" Floyd's head tilted slightly to the side. "Don't say something as crass as spying. I was merely gaining intelligence." "So, spying." "Gaining intelligence, Floyd." Azul let out a soft sigh. "That you got in the way of." "I did nothing." "Yes you did."

As always, reblogs and comments are always appreciated! ♡ Send your thoughts grr

Feel free to send requests! Check out this post for info ^^

#idia x reader #kazumiwrites #twisted wonderland #twst #twisted wonderland x reader #twisted wonderland x y/n #twisted wonderland x you #idia shroud x reader #idia #idia shroud #twst idia shroud x reader #twst idia x reader #idia x y/n #idia x you #idia x gender-neutral reader #idia shroud x y/n #idia shroud x you #idia shroud x gender-neutral reader #twst idia x you #twst idia x y/n #twst idia x gender-neutral reader #twst idia shroud x gender-neutral reader #twst idia shroud x you #twst idia shroud x y/n #twst idia shroud #twst x you #twst x reader #twst x gender-neutral reader

[paranoid-borderline-insane]

SO @tulipsbymybed and I have been going back and forth with head canons for one Capt John Price and we’ve created this one that’s maybe a little OOC, but its lovely nonetheless

One of our prevailing head canons is that you, as the reader, and John take in Simon (Ghost) after an injury because John doesn’t want Simon’s mental health to spiral, laying in a hospital bed, but the injury is severe enough he can’t be on his own. From then Simon starts becoming a mainstay in your home, becoming a bit of an adopted son to you two, staying with you guys more often than not when he’s not deployed because his ptsd is better in your home environment.

Also based on Tulip and I both having cats, John and you also have cats, I believe we’ve decided on them having 4.

But the newest head canon I started was making John a tiktok for him to teach people how to woodwork, particularly how to build furniture and fix stuff around the house, because another head canon we have is that he builds, like, everything he can in your home. Most famously the many bookcases you need to hold all of your books. He’s particularly well loved women wanting to get into woodworking but have no one to teach them, always open to answering comments to help people learn.

Another reason he’s well loved is because he makes it very clear that he’s head over heels for his wife (you!) and will do anything and everything for you, commenting as he builds that he’s making something because you need it, or adding decorative features that you like.

Since one person commented that they wished John was their dad, and he responded by saying that he’d officially just adopted them, he’s become his little community’s dad. You occasionally feature in videos, usually with John’s prompting or because you commented in the background, but you’re in charge of editing and posting.

Any thirsty comments he receives, and he receives a good handful of them every video, are either ignored, or the particularly bad ones get blocked. This is a place of family and teaching! He’s not doing it to be ogled, especially when he makes it very clear that he’s a very happily married man.

Knows a lot of his audience are queer people with different identities, and tries to always be considerate of that and will go out of his way to make it clear that they’re accepted and welcomed

LITERALLY ALL OF THIS IS TO SAY one day, after it being requested, to celebrate 100K followers or something, you edit together a ‘day in the life’ with John narrating over the finished footage and Tulip wrote an amazing 1k+ words of it 😩

#john price #john price x reader

[shamy]

I had such a cute dream last night about Sheldon and Amy and the cast lol it made me miss the fangirl life 😢 with all the problems in life I haven't been on tumblr in years and I've barely interacted with stuff from my favorite fandoms, I hadn't thought about my ships in a long time, but out of nowhere yesterday I dreamed that they were going to do a new series in the BBT universe and it was about their older lives and in my dream only Jim, Johnny and Simon agreed to come back to the show

in my dream I was watching the new episodes of this new series and Sheldon, in his 50's, was having lunch at the university with Howard and Leonard and they were talking about their wives and when Sheldon talked about Amy he always calls her "My Love" (ooc I know lol blame my brain! but It was so so cute tho😢)

I had the same feeling in the dream as I did years ago when I watched the episodes for the first time and fangirled about any little Shamy interaction/scenes, it was really crazy to feel that way after so many years without being in contact with anything from the ship (my life has really been complicated in the last few years lol)

Anyway, Mayim wouldn't return to play Amy and that made me angry in the dream another actress played Amy, there was a flashback scene after Sheldon calls Amy "My Love" and it was all their great moments on the OG series, it was as if my brain had made a fanvideo of them just for me😭

The things that our brains are capable of doing amazes me!!!

Even though Amy wasn't played by the same actress I still "had the feels" and the fact that they were happy in the future made me sooo happy, anyway it was great to feel all that again, it made me open tumblr after years, search their names and ship names in the tags (unfortunately there isn't much new stuff) made me want to do some edit of them, unfortunately I don't even remember how to gif and I don't even understand photo sizes on tumblr now. Tumblr has changed a lot since the last time I saw it, anyway, regardless of whether I'm going to post stuff about them or not, here are the scenes that my brain put together in my dream 🤧🥺️❤️️

#personal #i miss them <3 ;-; #shamy #sheldon x amy #tbbt #the big bang theory

[colorfullyminded]

PLSS TELL ME UR STILL DOING KISS THE COOKK!! its almost gunna b a year since ep 6 and i rlly need to know if the other 14 in the works. (take ur well deserved break u dont need to be making fics 24/7)

Oh wow, I wasn't sure if people still wanted that. To be honest, we actually have written up to chapter 8 (9 technically because there's an 8.5). All I really need to do is finish editing them before posting them. The reason I've been so hesitant is also my feelings towards the fic. I both love the fic and also feel incredibly self conscious with some of the decisions I chose in the fic (especially later chapters--some of which haven't been posted yet). I love writing smut, and I do think Wirt deserves to be written more unhinged than people allow him to be (he's a poet for godsake, if he can be so despondently dramatic laying on a couch-- you know his yearnings are just as fantastical, dramatic, and probably hella thirsty. And let's not mention Dipper's search history). I love writing these two because they're so multifaceted and I love trying different perspectives of their personality. Also writing with my friend Clubs has been amazing and I genuinely enjoyed his help with this fic! I want to continue this series when I'm more motivated to write. But again, for how much I love this fic, there are moments where I go back and read and blush and go "I'm sorry, I made Wirt say what? I made him do what?! IS THIS HOW HE WOULD ACT?! THIS DOESN'T SEEM RIGHT? WHATTHE FUCK WAS I ON TO THINK THIS WAS OKAY?!" (I'm in charge of Wirt's dialogue/actions in this story, Clubs does Dipper, and occasionally, though very rarely, we may also add something to the other's characterization). There are times I worry I've made him ooc. There's nothing necessarily wrong with that. I was having fun, I'm enjoying my extra smutty era (where all I wanna write is to be a problem) and honestly if I wanted to explain my reasonings I probably could make an accurate presentation on why Kiss the Cook is not that out of character. But I also do pride myself on my fics and a lot of comments I've received are about how well and real the characters feel. I feel so good that I'm able to articulate and present them in a way that feels genuine and makes the readers feel like it's just another adventure-- but with the two. I like bringing that feeling into my writing. And Kiss the cook, some elements do feel very much like the characters (Clubs does amazing with an older Dipper), but I do start to doubt some of Wirt's actions or my writing in this particular fic as being too "Horny on Main". So it's kind of a love/hate relationship I currently have with this piece of work. But if people do still love this fic and want to continue this adventure, maybe I should go back and get these chapters prepped for posting? Despite my fears, everyone who has commented on KTC have been very supportive and encouraging and sweet. So this whole anxiety and self doubt is probably just in my head. I shouldn't be so hard on myself. I do have other smut WIPS that tackle different layers and so I can always finish those up if I need to take a break from the wildness of KTC. So to answer your question, yes, we do have more in store, and maybe it's time I show you what we've cooked up (no matter how embarrassed I make the reader...or myself)

#Pinescone #Kiss the Cook #Asks #Ask Me #Ask about my writing #KTC #Thank you for the message #I appreciate these asks about my work #I really do love talking about the boys

[cataperat]

A Guide to Writing In-Character

I originally posted this on Reddit but figured it might belong better here. I edited a few parts here and there, but overall it's the same.

______________________________________________________

I've found that there are lots of questions on how to write in character on this subreddit, so I decided to make a guide on how to do... well, that. I will use Harry Potter characters as my examples since it's a popular series most people know. I will also sometimes write in bullet points because I've found that it's easier to read that way. Some Regulus and Sirius Black spoilers though. Read at your own risk.

A quick overview

OOC means "Out of character". OOC does not mean a different appearance, sexuality, etc. It refers to characters whose personalities are written very differently from the source material (breaking character). This means a character who does things that are against their beliefs, that contradict their very nature, that makes the reader think 'this is a writer insert'. And while OOC characters are generally frowned upon, maybe, just maybe, if you come up with a believable reason (maybe your fic is about them getting over a trauma, or they change in some way in your fic), it can work. Speech is also another important factor of writing OOC characters (will be covered later).

When I say OOC, I mean things like Ron Weasley, who is deathly afraid of spiders, suddenly adoring insects, or Draco Malfoy using casual slang. It can be Hermione Granger suddenly not giving a damn about her grades, or Sirius Black no longer being a troublemaker. Though these depend on the fics, most of the time you will want to stay in character.

ADVICE

Fill out a character questionnaire. There is an amazing character questionnaire here. While I don't know who made it (found it online), it's excellent and helps me understand my character so much more! Try filling it out to the best of your ability.

Figure out the character's likes and dislikes, along with their worst fear. This can tell you so much about the character, even if they're not fleshed out very well and/or are minor. If they're so obscure you know virtually nothing about them, then just skip to my character analysis of Regulus Black.

EDIT: Thank you to u/letdragonslie for pointing this out to me! Here's a section of their comment that explains things perfectly:

All of this is excellent advice, but I'd like to add that you also need to pinpoint a character's flaws and negative traits. To use your Hermione example, she's also bossy, rather close-minded, holds herself to too-high standards, and can get so focused on studying and doing well academically that it can negatively impact her social life and mental health. Even if you hit all of a character's likes and dislikes, and nail their motivations and positive character traits, if you neglect to include their flaws and negative traits, it still won't feel like them. For example, a Zuko who is not angry, impulsive, and obsessive just doesn't feel like Zuko.

It's also important to know what (or who) matters to your character, and why. With Hermione, it isn't 100% clear why she cares about academics so much. A large part of it is probably that she just enjoys reading and learning, but it also seems like she didn't have many friends before she came to Hogwarts--she certainly has difficulty making them while she's there. So perhaps she focused on academics to compensate. Additionally, Hermione's parents are both professionals, so it's likely that they raised her to value her education. Why does Hermione get almost fanatical about it? It seems as though she ties a lot of her self-worth to doing well academically.

And an additional dialogue tip: many fandom wikis will have transcripts available so that you can study the characters' speech pattern better.

Connect everything. This one's very important and I know it sounds kind of vague, but make sure everything follows a logic and keep on digging deeper. Ask questions like How, Why, and In what ways to help dive deeper. The character questionnaire will be super helpful, I promise.

Here's an example: if a character loves playing a sport and practices all day long, this tells you that they are determined and very passionate about things. What if they like this one sport, but hate all the others? That tells you they're very particular. Ask yourself why they chose this particular sport. Is it because of the need for communication? that they play with a team? or that they play without a team?

Continuing with the example above, let's say that this character is very arrogant and constantly demeans others/brags about themselves. This tells you that they like being in control and are confident in their abilities, so when things don't go their way they get upset easily and/or shocked. What if they're a social butterfly? That means they like soaking up others' attention, and are good at holding a conversation. This also tells us that they have lots of charm. We're drawing conclusions from facts. That's the best way I can describe this.

In case you're wondering, the character I'm talking about is Oikawa Tooru from the volleyball anime Haikyuu. He's a character with lots of layers, so I didn't do him justice with this mini-analysis, but I hope this is a good example.

Applying what was covered above

Character analysis: Hermione Granger

Likes: books, doing well academically, studying, reading from the Hogwarts library, standing up for minorities' rights (house elves)

Dislikes: people making stereotypes about her because she's a Muggleborn, discrimination

Worst fear(s): getting expelled from school, failing a test

Now we take each trait and draw conclusions from it.

doing well academically -> determined, ambitious

studying -> has self-control (can force herself to sit down and study) -> mature

reading from the Hogwarts library -> curious

standing up for minorities' rights (house elves) -> righteous

getting expelled from school, failing a test -> afraid of failure -> might not accept mistakes and just constantly bring herself down whenever she does badly. Probably gets hung up about it.

By drawing conclusions and interpreting Hermione Granger's likes, dislikes, worst fears, goals, and more, we can understand what type of person she is and get an inside view into how she thinks, what questions she asks, her sense of humor, how she reacts to some things, etc.

Analyzing minor characters

Now, Regulus Black was a very important character. He played a role in his brother Sirius' development, along with influencing Harry and teaching him and Dumbledore about the Horcruxes though indirectly. We don't know much about him though, so we try to make up conjectures that seem likely and piece it all together. Everyone interprets characters in different ways, and with the little knowledge we know about him it's likely everyone will be off by a bit.

His older brother Sirius was a delinquent + Gryffindor = disowned, so all the family pressure likely fell on Regulus, with his parents trying to convince him to join Voldemort and whatnot.

He was probably the 'good kid': Prefect of Slytherin, good grades, obedient. He was probably calm and rather shy, and while some people might argue he was meek because he turned to Voldemort, I disagree because 1) his own brother basically abandoned him during crucial developmental years, especially with a family like that and 2) he did defect from Voldemort in the end and sacrificed his life. That being said, many "perfect kids" have secrets to hide, so there's a good chance Regulus also had a more hidden and wilder side. And knowing Slytherin, he had to have a pretty good dose of ambition. Maybe he became less trusting of others, or maybe he got mental health issues from being with an abusive family.

See how we're taking what we know of this character and turning it into an outline we understand?

_________

Alright, time for tips now.

TIPS

TIP 1: Know how your character speaks.

Some characters talk with long sentences, others short. Others don't talk at all. Dialogue is a very important way to immerse your reader and write more in character. It's not only a way to advance the plot, but every line tells you something about the character. Go back and reread or rewatch clips of the character talking--note the vocabulary used (is it fancy? informal? how is its cadence?) and the sentence structure (are the sentences short, choppy, and to the point? or long and rambling?)

It helps to hear the characters' voices as you're writing. It's okay, though, if the book doesn't have a movie adaptation. Also write down common phrases they use, and nicknames are helpful too. See how differently these two characters would reply to the same question:

Q: Did you see my textbook anywhere?

Draco Malfoy: Are you as blind as Potter now? It's under the table there. If you have to get glasses, don't buy ones that look like an insect is sitting on your face.

Luna Lovegood: It might be under the table, the one with the ancient runes all over it. Oh, but watch out for the Screezling Bumbegnagle down there, my father says they bite.

It's a little late right now so I don't think I did Draco Malfoy justice but I hope this helps works things out. Oh, and Screezling Bumbegnagles aren't from the source material.

TIP 2: Make the characters do what they will naturally do. Don't try forcing them to do something that goes against their nature.

Pretty self explanatory, right? If a character is very perceptive with people in general, don't make them be oblivious for 20k words for the sake of a friends to lovers fic.

TIP 3: Rewatch/reread and pay attention to the characters' reactions. Also pay attention to their mannerisms.

Again, pretty self explanatory. Observe how they react to certain events; are there some that trigger them? how do they react to a joke? do they have friends or sidekick? As for their mannerisms, look at their nervous ticks and body language. Do they bite their nails, or hug themselves when they're nervous?

TIP 4: Find some quotes that you feel reflect the character you're writing and use them to construct similar dialogue.

My English teacher from a few years back actually told me this when I asked how to write in character (she wrote some fics herself) and it helped so much.

TIP 5: Practice, practice, practice.

_______________

And... that's the end! Took me a while to type this up so I'm sorry for any mistakes in advance (it's also incredibly late here), but hope this helps and thank you for reading :)

#fanfiction #fanfic #ao3 #writing #fanfic writing #ao3 fanfic #fanfics #writing resources #in character #character analysis #regulus black #hermione granger

[sanctum-of-ramshackle]

is it wrong for me to ask the twist guys visiting gravity falls yuu during summerween? and then getting chased by the summerween monster or maybe epel meeting the manotaurs?

OOC: Hello there! I’m terribly sorry for this late reply. There isn’t anything wrong to ask something like this, but I do need to address others that I’m not the type of writer on Tumblr who does requests or stuff like that. I only create what I thought it’s fun and express with many to see. No disrespect to other writers who do requests by fans, but I don’t want to be overwhelmed from high demands.

So about the present Gravity Falls and their love for Halloween…I can whip something up.

[Mystery Shack]

MC/Yuu Pines: *In their zombie costume* Uhh…Uncle Soos? Are you sure kids want these candies? *Holds the bowl of “rejected” candy*

Soos: Of course. In fact, I thought of using that story about your relatives and I escaping from “The Summerween Trickster.” This should help stop leaving these awesome pieces from falling behind.

MC/Yuu Pines: True…Not wasting food and I do enjoy these Gummy Chairs. *Pops one in their mouth* Mmm~! Cherrywood flavor!

[Then suddenly the mirror lights up, following with the First Year gang along with Grim arriving with their costumes on.]

Soos: Oh, hey! Your friends are here.

MC/Yuu Pines: Guys! You actually came, and you look amazing. *Picks up Grim in their arms*

Epel: We couldn’t miss your town’s holiday.

Deuce: So Summerween, what is special about this spooky holiday besides Halloween?

MC/Yuu Pines: People in Gravity Falls love Halloween so much that we celebrate it twice a year. *Holds up a calendar marked “Summerween”*

Grim: Do you always carry that calendar?

MC/Yuu Pines: My phone is charging.

Ace: That means double the candy?

MC/Yuu Pines: Of course! Double the teeth-rotting fun. So are the others coming?

Deuce: Dorm Leader Rosehearts can’t come since he’s busy with his duties and the Queen’s Rules for certain holidays.

Jack: Leona-senpai wasn’t thrilled when hearing about this holiday and decided he can’t be bothered.

Epel: Vil can’t come either as his schedule is tight and doesn’t want to ruin his vampire costume.

Ortho: Nii-san said he’ll come. He needs to readjust his Headless Horseman costume.

Sebek: Hmph! Waka-sama wasn’t invited to this Summerween.

MC/Yuu Pines: Did you invite him, or did you forget again?

Sebek: …

MC/Yuu Pines: You forgot. Well, the portal won’t open again until another hour so let’s celebrate!

[Down the street of Gravity Falls is crowded with many residents in costume. The First Years plus Grim and MC/Yuu were trying to not trample over anyone since there’s barely enough space for bigger costumes.]

[(A/N): Scene from Trick r’ Treat]

MC/Yuu Pines: Alright, important rule. Don’t get lost because I’m afraid you’ll attract the wrong attention.

Ace: How? We’re in costume.

MC/Yuu Pines: Yet most of you look like SSR Cards: Halloween edition of an Otome game. Except you’re not.

???: Oh? MC/Yuu? Is that you?

MC/Yuu Pines: F#@€. Gabriel.

Deuce: Who?

MC/Yuu Pines: No time to explain yet. *Shoves everyone in the crowd*

[Everyone split up and now they’re lost.]

MC/Yuu Pines: I think we lost him.

Deuce: MC/Yuu, who was that?

MC/Yuu Pines: *Sighs tiredly* Gabriel Gleeful. The son of my aunt’s obsessive stalker, Gideon Gleeful. Apparently, he became my stalker three years back when I was visiting my family and we ran into each other in the woods. We played for hours until Auntie May-May and Gleeful found us. She quickly took me away for my safety and explained that man isn’t a good guy.

Deuce: Was he that bad?

MC/Yuu Pines: Bad enough that police got involved.

Deuce: Great Seven…

MC/Yuu Pines: Don’t worry. You’re with me now so I feel protected. You’re like an awesome older brother to me.

Deuce: *Touched* MC/Yuu…

MC/Yuu Pines: Come on! Let’s find the others and have fun!

[After Deuce and MC/Yuu gathered everyone back, they were having fun enjoying Summerween and feasting on popular candies, playing games and sometimes scaring others for a laugh.]

MC/Yuu Pines: *Checks everyone’s buckets* Huh? Hey, why didn’t you guys eat the other candy?

Ace: You mean those rejects? They didn’t taste that good.

MC/Yuu Pines: Oh f$&%.

Epel: You cursed. What’s happening?

MC/Yuu Pines: *Looking for the melons* I hope all the Jack-o-Melons aren’t blown out…

Jack: MC/Yuu, what’s going on?

MC/Yuu Pines: Uncle Soos warned me about this.

Sebek: Warned about what?

MC/Yuu Pines: The Summerween Trickster!

[Silence fell upon them, but a certain red-head snorted.]

Ace: *Snickers* Seriously? The Summerween Trickster? Is it a folktale your town tells every year?

MC/Yuu Pines: This isn’t a laughing matter. We need to be sure the all the candy is enjoyed before-

Ortho: I detected an unfamiliar presence one meter away.

[With some misfortune from tonight’s spooky night, a gush of wind blows out all candle lights of the Jack-o-Melons.]

MC/Yuu Pines: We’re screwed.

[Then under the flicking illumination of an old lamppost, a tall figure wearing withered clothes and a pointed hat. The most distinguished part of this is the smiley mask.]

Ace: *Feeling weary* Uhh…Who’s that?

MC/Yuu Pines: Run.

[The whole gang ran away from the Summerween Trickster as the monster contorts its body on four limbs, then starts sprinting after the First Years. Fortunately the golf cart is parked by and everyone hopped in and sped off back to the shack.]

MC/Yuu Pines: *Driving behind the wheel* This happens every time brats don’t enjoy the good parts of “rejected candy.” This mother¥€£%#$ comes out to not play Trick-or-Treat!

[Finally they reached back to the shack, and ran inside.]

MC/Yuu Pines: It’s not safe here. We need to return back to Twisted Wonderland and destroy that diabetic monster.

Deuce: What’s the plan?

MC/Yuu: Ask my friend and tell him I need reinforcements.

[The Summer Trickster broke into the museum section of the Mystery Shack, searching for the MC/Yuu and the First Year gang.]

MC/Yuu Pines: *Reveals themselves by the mirror* Hey, pile of junk food! Over here!

[The embodiment of candy faces over to the young teen. Then it starts running after them.]

MC/Yuu Pines: 3…

[The Trickster is a meter away.]

MC/Yuu Pines: 2…

[It’s getting dangerously closer.]

MC/Yuu: 1…

[They grasps on the monster by one of its front limbs and leaps back into the mirror, dragging the Trickster along.]

[Twisted Wonderland]

[Mirror Chamber]

[The two spawned out of the Dark Mirror and MC/Yuu were quick on their feet to cue the signal.]

MC/Yuu Pines: Now!

[Balls of fire casted upon The Summerween Trickster and MC/Yuu was taken away safely by Lilia.]

Malleus: *Extremely furious* You dare harm my Child of Man? *Summons more fire balls* You are mistaken to do so.

[Malleus throw more enraging fire at it. The Trickster starts to melt and crisp from extreme temperature.]

Deuce: *Summons a cauldron and smashes the monster* I got it!

Ace: *Casts the wind spell* Now!

Grim: *Blows his signature flames into the wind and directs to the monster*

MC/Yuu Pines: *Pulls out their axe and sprints towards the candied abomination* Happy Summerween, bitch! *Hacks the monster’s head off*

[Finally, the beast is destroyed.]

MC/Yuu Pines: *Sighs* I’m sorry, guys. This is not what I planned for your first Summerween in Gravity Falls. I didn’t know the Summerween Trickster still roams around, hunting for rejecters. This is the worst.

Epel: Are you kiddin’? This is the best holiday to remember.

Deuce: Yeah! We had fun and learned so much from tonight.

Ace: Even sneaking in candy without Riddle knowing.

Ortho: I had an amazing time! Nii-san was also overjoyed for the goodies I collected.

MC/Yuu Pines: But-

Jack: You didn’t ruin our night. If anything, it’s probably the best night to unwind.

MC/Yuu Pines: So…You guys aren’t upset for almost endangering us?

Deuce: MC/Yuu, you didn’t know. It wasn’t your fault.

MC/Yuu Pines: *Wipes their tears away* Thanks for the reassurance.

Ortho: MC/Yuu, there’s a surprise outside!

[Campus]

[The whole area was decorated with Summerween decor and everyone is dressed up.]

MC/Yuu Pines: *Surprised* Oh, my god. Is this why no one else can’t come?

Ace: Yeah. Since you were so excited for this holiday…

Riddle: Everyone participated to join in the celebration. This is a way to thank you, for everything you did. Of course, there are no rules against this holiday.

MC/Yuu Pines: *Tears starts welling in their eyes* You guys…

Epel: Let’s celebrate Summerween!

#The Master of Sorcery answers #disney twisted wonderland #twisted wonderland #twst #twst au #twisted wonderland mc #twisted wonderland yuu #twst mc #twst yuu #Gravity Falls #MC Pines #Yuu Pines #twisted wonderland scenarios #twst scenarios #twisted wonderland x reader #twst x reader

[cicinicole-14]

20 questions: fic author edition

tagged by the lovely @jenniferiawrence

1. How many works do you have on ao3?

15 atm!

2. What's your total AO3 word count?

44,041

3. What fandoms do you write for?

svu!

4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos?

happy

captain benson

a decade without

road trip

fear fades

5. Do you respond to comments? Why or why not?

i always do! i make sure mostly just to say thank you for the read/comment

6. What's the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending?

definitely sunday olivia dies in that fic whoops!!

7. What's the fic you wrote with the happiest ending?

happy for sure!! they have a baby!!

8. Do you get hate on fics?

literally just got some from my troll yesterday 💀 but i moderate my comments quite well so…and i ignore all the hate

9. Do you write smut? If so what kind?

i don’t! i’ve written some soft core smut on occasion but it’s not my cup of tea.

10. Do you write crossovers? What's the craziest one you've written?

no but i would consider writing a jo wilson x olivia benson friends crossover bc i think they’d be friends.

11. Have you ever had a fic stolen?

not that i know of but god i hope not! i’ve had friends who’ve had this issue!! it’s no fun!!

12. Have you ever had a fic translated?

yes! i know someone on twitter who actively translates the fandoms fics so she can read them. i think it’s so cool!!

13. Have you ever cowritten a fic before?

yes!! @samwrites99 and i wrote a decade without together and i’ve co-written with @doc-pickles and @only-freakin-sunflowers ofc

14. What's your all-time favorite ship?

atm it’s EO (elliot stabler and olivia benson)

15. What's a WIP you want to finish, but doubt you ever will?

my roryverse, it’s not posted atm but it’s my fave i wanna write it it’s an inconceivable au for eo and i wanna finish it so bad.

16. What are your writing strengths?

i know i write kids really well bc i’m surrounded by them daily so i know their voice. and also i like to think i write dialogue very well! i try hard also!! this is so random but i think i wrote my texting fic really accurately?

17. What are your writing weaknesses?

LENGTH like omfg it takes me a lot to try and write more than just a thousand words idk how some of y’all can churn out 30k i am looking at you nimblewordplay my love

18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language for a fic?

i’ve done it but my thing is that it HAS to be in character. if it’s not something the character has already said they spoke another language it’s fine but if they don’t it’s ooc and i don’t like it.

19. First fandom you wrote for?

general hospital back in like 2011/2012 💀💀💀we don’t talk abt those fics

20. Favorite fic you've ever written?

i would stay forever (if you say don’t go) is my favorite atm she’s my most recent and i LOVED this fic sm it’s amazing.

tagging: (not tagging 20 peeps sorry but here do it don’t do it enjoy!!) @samwrites99 @doc-pickles @only-freakin-sunflowers @angry-slytherin @iamtrebleclefstories @rgrdsalxndra @rahleeyah @marilynwhitmore

#tag game #eo

[arsontisticallyinfernal]

🗯️YEs yeS ‼️🗯️ Hello ‼️ This is me again and I love how my previous ask came out as❗So I am here for another headcanon idea for Obey Me! ❗🕴️

So, there is this pin on Pinterest 📱I found that goes like this . . .

Hey man, what's up ?

Just converting oxygen to carbon dioxide. Yk the usual . 👨‍🔬

Wtf man school's over why still doing science ⁉️

Breathing, [name]. I've been breathing. 🕳️🕳️

The thing is‼️, I want to see Mammon, Leviathan, Simeon and Luke (separately ofc ) reacting to GN!Mc saying about the O2 and CO2 converting 👨‍🔬. This is the only idea I have currently in mind🧠 right now so I must see this before my soul leaves my body from no brain juice ⚰️

🗯️SO, we shall see how it will come out as 💃❗

- Orange Anon

I’m so glad you enjoyed it!! Feel free to stop by again after this lol

Now this ask, it’s amazing, ah this’ll be fun. Hope you enjoy, orange anon!

idk what to title this so- have it- Also I assume it’s through text? if not I can redo it! And sorry this came out late, was taking a nice lil mental break with my s/o

Also I didn’t do Simeon since I really wasn’t up to doing his gibberish texting, THOUGH I WILL DO HIM IF THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO BE IRL FJHFKJDHKJ

Mammon, Leviathan and Luke being stupid + MC/Yn/Reader though text

Pronouns: He/him mammon, He/him levi, He/him simeon, He/him luke

Genre: Being stupid and on crack [how the hell do I explain a hc like this dhdhdhdh] platonic

Characters: Mammon, Leviathan, Luke

Fandom: Obey me!

Warnings: Cursing

Edited/proofread: Hell nah-

Mammon<3

Mammon: Oi, human, wyd?

Y/n: Just converting oxygen to carbon dioxide. Yk the usual

Mammon: Wtf Y/n, why are ya doin science? aren’t you in your room?

Y/n: .

Y/n: I’ve been breathing, mams, breathing.

Mammon: .

and no response after that, he feels too embarrassed now. Never brings it up ever, but if you bring it up around him, he starts shouting “That never happened!!” and denying everything

Leviathan<3

Levi: Hey Y/n, what’s up?

Y/n: Oh, yk, the usual.

Levi: wut?-

Y/n: Converting oxygen into carbon dioxide, that’s what I’m doing

Levi: SCIENCE!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?

Levi: Y???? SCHOOLS OVER!

Y/n: I’m breathing.

Levi: Oh

Levi: OH

Levi: U want to come to my room since your not doing anything?

He doesn’t know the difference of your and you’re. I can barely understand his messages in game- He was so confused at first, but now that he knows you weren’t doing much, how about you visit his room and watch anime or TSL with him?

Luke<3

Son: Y/n! Y/n! Are you busy right now?

Y/n: Yeah, kind of

Son: What are you doing? Will you be done soon?

Y/n: I’m just turning oxygen into carbon dioxide, so no, I won’t be done anytime soon, hopefully

Son: Your’re still in science? Isn’t school over for the day?

Y/n: Luke I’m- I’m breathing

Son: oh

Son: Oh I’m so sorry for asking if you’ll be done soon!!

Y/n: Nah it’s okay!

Son: Well then, do you want to come to purgatory hall? I want to bake some celestial realm cupcakes!

Treat your son well, dear reader. He might be a bit ooc. Luke was hoping you’d come over to bake with him, please do.

#obey me #om!swd #obey me luke #om! luke #om! mammon #obey me mammon #om! leviathan #leviathan x reader #x reader #gn!reader #mammon x reader #luke x reader platonic

[inkmiracle]

you rang?

can you do platonic jax & reader scenario where caine throws a team cooking competition and reader was unfortunate enough to be paired with jax...

though uhh. with reader in the mix there would be an uneven number of contestants (7) so someone is either alone or has a team of 3

HI ANON YES I DID RING

AND YES YESY YESYSEYSYEYSEYSYE IM HOPPING TO IT!!! RN!!!

also i am SoSoSoSorry if this is a little (or a lot) ooc :((

im having a bit of trouble with character study rn so im suffering sosbs

things that i did that i can edit if you dont like:

quiet reader

nameless reader (no y/n)

gender neutral reader (no specification so i used theythem)

jax kinda warms up to reader slightly, they're friends who would drop kick each other off the empire state building if given the chance at the end

and also i had some baking thrown in i dont know why i had trouble with finding something they could cook !!

Jax and Reader (G/N, no y/n used just they and "newbie") in a cooking activity

Caine had cooped everyone up as quickly as possible.

"Hello, hello! I have prepared a brilliant activity for you all today, my amazing performers!"

With the entire circus crew either groaning or in silence (with the exception of Jax and his snide remarks), the talking pair(?) of teeth with eyes chirped suddenly.

"Great! Glad to see you're all super excited! Now, let's get to ...Cooking!"

Silence. Absolute silence. If crickets existed in the circus, they would be going wild right now.

"C-cooking? Did I hear that right?" Ragatha piped up, her voice quivering slightly. Her expression faltered.

"Very much so, Ragatha!" Caine shouted (unreasonably loudly).

Aaaand, there came the chatter again. Freaking out, everyone was talking to one another, except Jax and the newest member of the circus. As Caine paired the rest of the circus together in groups, herding in a desperate-to-escape Zooble, Jax stepped back. "Count me out," remarked the rabbit. "I'd rather have an anvil dropped on me than this." The newbie was still quiet, though.

"What, really? Nothing to say, even after this entire thing? I've seen a lot of newbies pipe up faster than you," Jax teased.

After tuning out the ringmaster's loud and cheery voice announcing who would be paired together (which consisted of Pomni and Gangle, Caine and Bubble [they were the judges], Kinger (alone), and Ragatha and Zooble),

Which left Jax and ...the new one.

And the rabbit was NOT happy.

"No, nope, nada, never in my life. Count me out, Caine."

Jax folded his sticklike arms, defiant about the whole situation. He would die on this hill, cooking was so much worse than whatever was going on the other days.

"Come on now, Jax, it can't be that bad!"

A few minutes passed. Everyone was set up at their respective kitchen stations.

"Because of my abilities as the ringmaster and Bubble here's culinary expertise, we will be judging as not to be unfair! You will be "

Caine clapped his hands together, leaving the gloved appendages clasped in approval.

"You may begin!!"

Everyone started rushing off, except Jax who didn't want to do this at all.

"Nope, I'm gonna say it again. Never."

And after a LOT of persuading from Caine and the newbie, he finally caved.

"Fine, fine! I'll do it if you leave me alone. Got it?"

And so when the new member set off to get the ingredients, Jax reluctantly looked through the options.

"Spanish rice - no. - Hashbrown casserole - nah - COOKED RABBIT??? -- Oh, here. Grilled cheese or something, I guess that's good?"

And the two of them set off, not without some complaining from Jax whenever he was asked to do something, even a simple task. He did help though, and was surprisingly good once he got used to it. Jax eventually got extremely focused, fixating himself on winning this contest.

"Hey, newbie. Grab the butter."

"Over here, dork."

"Ay! Hurry it up over there-"

And when prompted to help, he was - well a lot easier to work with. It seemed Jax had started to enjoy this. Even just bantering with the new circus member, or talking about whatever while they cooked a meal that originally passed as "just seems easy enough", Jax felt comfortable. He completely felt relaxed and chill, forgetting the competition.

When the time came, Caine beeped. Loudly.

"Attention master chefs! Time is up!!"

All the teams nervously presented the food they made. Zooble and Ragatha first, with a pot roast, Gangle and Pomni next with pancakes, Kinger with an unidentifiable ...something, and Jax with the newbie.

After trying everything, Caine and Bubble chatted for a moment, hushed. "Well, in a turn of events, Jax's team wins!"

Caine knew now - this was something they'd have to do again sometime if it worked this well.