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#probably the last for a while but definitely the most polished
bumblerhizal-art · 2 years
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Tony Hawk Syndrome #3
rogues are conspiring from all angles against cassandra finding potential inquisitors
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breadbrobin · 4 months
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campfire games
luke castellan x reader - percy jackson and the olympians
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[established relationship, fem!daughter of ares reader]
summary: bets are fun, until they aren’t. you’re fine though. luke knows you’re an absolute badass.
warning: pushy male behaviour, suggestive comments, swearing, bets, threats, assault (physical), sexual harassment.
word count: 1.6k
(help i’m writing too many of these but this is the only other good one also feel free to leave requests yall i’m on summer break i have so much time and need something to do 🤩🤩)
(also i am still in love with luke castellan thank you very much I CAN FIX HIM PLSSSS)
(also very sorry to anyone named andrew it was the first name i thought of)
——————————————————
there wasn’t much that your siblings in the ares cabin liked more than winning capture the flag, but watching you tear down another boys’ ego was definitely one of those few things.
campfires were great for many reasons. singing, marshmallows, games—and bets. when chiron and mr d. turned in for the night early, something that rarely happened, the bets would come out. guys would try and talk to you, your siblings would intercept them, find out what they wanted, then place bets among themselves and with other campers as to how long it would take you to tear them down a few notches, or, on occasion, tear them a new one.
clarisse patted your shoulder as two of your brothers talked to another camper. “incoming.”
“details?” you picked at the chipped red polish of your fingernails.
“son of apollo. been here for about two months. andrew. something about wanting to go on a date with you and thinking you’re prettier than the aphrodite girls.” she rolled her eyes. “he tried it on with me before and doesn’t like taking no for an answer, so break his spirit completely. or, you know, his bones.”
you saluted her teasingly. “yes, ma’am. you can count on me, sergeant.”
she patted your shoulder again with a joking grin. “good on you, private. godspeed.”
with that, she left you sitting alone.
well, not really alone.
luke castellan had somehow ended up as your bodyguard in all of these cases. probably something to do with the fact that you’d been dating in secret for the last three months. you weren’t a huge fan of keeping your relationship a secret, but when you’d told clarisse, she told you that her and your other siblings wanted to keep making easy money, and betting on me was the best way to do that. since everyone thought you and luke hated each other anyway, it was easy enough to keep it up, but as your mocking remarks turned to teasing, then to flirting, it was getting more and more difficult. and as he was getting more attractive each day, it was getting harder not to kiss him in front of everyone at camp.
you swivelled in your seat to look up at him. he was sitting three rows back, almost hidden in the darkness, a distinctly put out look on his face.
“you hear that?” you asked with raised eyebrows and a grin on your face. “he thinks i’m prettier than the aphrodite girls. when have you ever said that?”
“i told you you’re prettier than a model one time and you punched me,” he said dryly. “and then i said you look like a goddess while fighting and you punched me again.”
“in my defence, i did hate you at the time.” you shrugged. “got my back?”
“always.” he said seriously.
you grinned and winked at him as you turned around, waiting for the newest idiot to come annoy you.
luke had, once upon a time, been one of those idiots in your mind. he irritated you to no end. he was better than you at sword fighting, so you bested him at everything else. he was more popular than you, so you became one of the most well-liked people at camp. all of your attempts to break him down, however, only made him fall in love with you. now, there you were, wishing you could be sitting beside him instead of waiting for some loser to come annoy you to death.
“y/n, hey.” andrew said, sitting next to you, probably a little too close.
you looked over at him. “andrew, right?”
he nodded, his smile widening as you knew his name.
you sat up straighter and scrutinised him, looking him up and down. “yeah, you look like an andrew.”
you heard luke hide a laugh in his cup behind you.
andrew’s face fell a little, but he regained it quickly. “heard you were one of the best fighters in camp.”
“i am.”
“that’s pretty cool. i mean, i can help you become the best if you want.”
“no, i think i’m okay.”
“come on, i mean, everyone needs to improve. even the self-proclaimed best. bet i’m better at archery than you at least.”
you looked over at his smirk and had to stop yourself from smirking too. this would be too easy. “no. thanks, though. i’m good on my own. one of the best, remember.”
“you could be better. we should have a little challenge. a game.”
“i only play games with people i like.”
“you could like me.” he leaned a little closer. you leaned away slightly. “i bet i could make you like me.”
you had to stop yourself from laughing. “yeah, i don’t think so, buddy.”
‘buddy’ was usually all it took to break a man’s ego. you’d used it on luke many times during unusually flirtatious sparring, back when you still pretended to hate his guts. it didn’t work on him anymore, but it usually worked perfectly on everyone else.
andrew didn’t falter. “i bet i could. give me a chance. let me take on a date. show you a good time.”
“no, thanks,” you said calmly. your siblings were watching intently. clarisse looked ready to step in if you needed it. you wondered what he’d said or done to her to put her on edge. then you realised it wasn’t what he’d done to her. it was what he was about to do to you.
his hand was on your thigh, gripping onto the bare skin by the hem of your shorts.
his hand was on your thigh.
gross.
you looked up at him, eyes sharp. you could hear luke shifting slightly behind you. “what are you doing?” you voice was deathly calm.
“showing you that i can show you a good time, princess.” his voice oozed honey—sickly sweet and sticky, like a fly trap. good thing you hated honey.
“how about i show you how many bones there are in the hand? by breaking every single one.” your voice was equally as saccharine sweet, but your eyes were glaring daggers into his and your jaw was set tight.
he just shifted his hand higher. you tried to push him off but he was strong. annoyingly strong.
he tutted. “come on, sweetheart. you’re gonna make a scene.”
you finally managed to peel his hand off your skin. “i’ll make a scene, alright. get off me and leave me alone. and while you’re at it, leave my sister alone too.”
he raised his hands, a sickening, sleazy smirk on his face. “i was just being nice, princess. you and your sister need to relax. you especially. i can help you relax.”
“oh, i’d love that. you know how i relax?” you tilted your head mockingly, eyes hard. “i punch my enemies in the face.”
he laughed. “you’re cute. now, come on. it’s not like you’ve got anything going for yourself. i mean, you’re hot, sure, but no guys ever gonna look at you when they realise how much of a bitch you are. not like i will.”
you rolled your eyes and stood up. it was time to go and sit by luke. it grated at you, but if he wouldn’t listen to you, maybe he’d listen to another guy.
he didn’t let you leave. his hand gripped your wrist and pulled you back to him as he stood up too. you were chest to chest with him. he towered over you, at least six inches taller. you stepped back, but he pulled you in by your waist and laughed.
“look at how good we look together,” he smirked. “i could show you—“
you punched him in the stomach. he doubled over, finally letting you go, so you kneed his diaphragm. he gasped for air as you stepped back. your friend chris rodriguez whistled appreciatively.
“touch me, or anyone here, ever again and i won’t just hurt you.” you hissed at him. “i’ll beat your ass, then i’ll drag you past the boundary and leave you for the monsters. got it?”
he nodded, still hunched over.
“good boy,” you grit out.
“fucking bitch,” he grunted.
your eyes darkened, but you didn’t do anything. your siblings were right behind him, all ready to drag him away. “good luck walking tomorrow, andrew.”
“good luck finding a guy stupid enough to fuck you,” he scorned.
you laughed. “hey, luke?”
“yeah, babe?” he stepped down beside you, his hand settling on your hip and pulling you gently into his side. andrew faltered at the sight. he probably hadn’t even realised luke was up there.
“are you stupid enough to fuck me?” you asked with raised eyebrows.
he looked like he was trying not to laugh. “oh, i’m way past stupid.”
you didn’t care about any of your sibling’s bets anymore. you didn’t care that people thought you hated each other. you especially didn’t care that everyone was watching. you kissed him. and in front of the whole camp, he kissed you back.
your siblings groaned in disappointment, knowing their betting days were over, but you didn’t care. you smiled the stupidest smile ever as you pulled away, feeling like you’d just had your first kiss all over again.
“what?” he asked quietly.
“nothing.” you shook your head. “just glad we don’t have to hide anymore.”
after months of kissing behind buildings, pretending to fight in public and avoiding each other so people wouldn’t find out, it felt honestly freeing to kiss him in the open.
he kissed you again as your siblings dragged andrew away. “and all it took was an asshole.”
“thanks for not stepping in,” you said. “i had it handled.”
“oh, i know you did. i was more than happy to watch you destroy his ego.”
“good, because if you had stepped in—“
“i’d be going home in an ambulance?” he smiled.
“no, you’d be going home in a hearse.”
“ah, my bad.”
as the campfire kept burning, you sat down with luke. your legs were pressed against his and his arm was around your waist. there wasn’t much that you liked more than tearing boy’s egos down, but being with luke castellan was definitely one of those few things.
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jo-harrington · 3 months
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Standard Operating Procedures 1.05 (Eddie Munson x Store Manager!Reader)
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Pairing: Eddie Munson x Fem!Reader
Summary: It's a normal Sunday night. You're just going over to have dinner, smoke, and listen to music. It's not a date. What could possibly go wrong?
Previous Part: Standard Operating Procedures 1.04
Warnings/Themes: AU where the Upside Down doesn't terrorize Hawkins. Reader works at the Claire's at StarCourt. Eddie works at TapeWorld. Mutual pining, alcohol and drug use (wine, beer, and weed), R has a minor panic attack while high, fluff, lighthearted smut (petting/groping/dry humping), minor angst, misunderstandings and miscommunication, driving probably a little under the influence, slight anachronism (slapping the bag)
Note: Big note for this one if you've read the most recent installations of SMVerse that I've posted...this is NOT in chronological order. SM and Eddie are not together in this one, we are rewinding back before Closing Time. This chapter and the next one are both a little longer and have been lingering in my head for quite a long time. Almost a year. So without further ado, please enjoy SOP 1.05.
You can find my masterlist here for more featuring our resident Store Manager and all of my other writing.
Please do not interact if you are not 18+.
Enjoy!
---
Sundays were your favorite days, hands down.
They sort of always had been, even before moving to Hawkins. Now, though, you had an extra special reason why they were your favorite.
Sundays meant that you could be yourself after you clocked out. They meant standing in the mirror and wiping away the layers of glitter eyeshadow and scented nail polish off. They meant shedding the overly sparkly jewelry from work and the trendy clothes from the JCPenney or Madigan's Juniors department that were definitely cut for a teenage body.
No matter how young you still were, you just weren't sixteen anymore.
You could finally breathe a little easier.
No more Dress to Impress, no more preppy popular girl, no more customer service voice.
Sundays meant freedom.
Lately, part of that freedom meant walking out of the store, taking the most freeing breath you could, and walking right up to your crush best friend so you could spend those last few dying hours of the weekend together.
Shooting the breeze, laughing, and getting to know one another. Getting to really see one another.
Tonight, though, there was just this cloud hanging over you as you stood in the store's bathroom after hours and shucked off the plaid vest and fashionably unmatched skirt you'd chosen for the day in favor of a t-shirt and comfy stirrup pants.
Summer was over, school was back in session, and you hadn't gotten to see Eddie as much as you normally did.
Which, in the grander scheme of things, a lot of things changed with the new school year starting: a bunch of your associate's schedules changed, a few of them even left town for college, and business started to slow a little during the week for the first time since the store opened.
Still, you missed him.
It felt weird from practically seeing him every day to only seeing him in passing or on the weekends.
What if he didn't want to be friends anymore?
Well, that was just silly. Some remnant of fear about the fickleness of your friends memories in childhood. Besides, the first shift after school started back up, he immediately came running to your store and talked your ear off about the new kids that he forced to join Hellfire.
"God, they're such losers," he reminisced with a sparkle in his eye and a smile on his lips. "They have so much potential. I can't wait for you to meet them."
Tonight though...
Tonight was like any normal night; you were getting together after the mall closed and picking up pizza.
However, instead of any of your usual haunts or shenanigans in and around Hawkins, Eddie insisted you come over to his place. Totally normal.
"And we can smoke," he added as an afterthought.
"You know I don't smoke Eddie," you reminded him. "My grandpa and his crackly lungs? I've taken him to enough doctor's appointments."
"Doesn't stop you from sucking up the air around me when I'm having a cigarette on break. No. I mean smoke. Reefer. Weed. Jesus, don't act ignorant Miss Goody Two Shoes."
"Excuse me," you choked. "How am I Miss Goody Two Shoes?"
"Because," he began with dramatic emphasis. "For all of your stories about garage beers and parties that your work friends dragged you to, you've never mentioned partaking in any sort of illicit substances. You're being obtuse on purpose or you're afraid."
You were caught like a deer in the headlights.
"I...I'm not."
And you weren't; it wasn't fear. It was just...inexperience.
Back home you were always careful, even when you hung around friends from school or work; with your overprotective father and uptight mother and two brothers who wouldn't hesitate to rat you out if they found out you broke some kind of rule? It would be over.
So you never got too wild at parties. Disheveled clothes could be straightened, and you could pretend that swollen lips were just a side effect of getting a little sick. You never drank more beer than whatever made you feel a little floaty if you weren't sleeping over at a friends. And you never smoked weed.
Ok so it was fear, in a way; residual fear. Just not the way Eddie thought.
"Hey, don't worry," Eddie said in the most understanding way he could. "You just tell me and I'll drop it, if you're afraid."
You wanted to tell him, wanted to explain it, but in a moment of reflection and wanting to assuage his worries, defiance got the better of you and you told him that you weren't afraid and it would all be fine.
You were going to be with him; you never needed to be afraid when you were with him.
Now though, staring at yourself in the mirror as you got ready to go and meet Eddie you realized you might have made a mistake.
Hanging out with your crush friend alone at his place? Fine. Sitting close on the couch as you ate pizza and listened to music? Cool. Drinking and smoking together, knowing that you got a little bit chatty when you loosened up a little bit under the influence? Uhm.
What could possibly go wrong?
---
The spread that you and Eddie had created was impressive.
Pizza and a six pack and red vines and...and...and...
Eddie was usually very thorough when it came to providing snacks or planning outings where you could get a nice little treat together. Tonight it was partially your fault.
You'd originally planned just to drive to his place after work and the pizza would be delivered, but he said that when he'd called to place the order at Lou's--large pepperoni and a box of cannoli--they told him that the delivery driver was out. Takeout only.
But then he also forgot to stop at Bradley's for soda.
So you offered to go to Bradley's while he picked up the pizza, and you might have gone overboard.
Soda and a box of wine and peanut m&m's and...and...and...
"And you say that I'm bad," Eddie scoffed as you walked in, arms laden with shopping bags.
"Excuse me, this is the once in a blue moon you let me pay for anything, I'm gonna take advantage of it."
Wayne was still home getting ready for his shift when you got there and he simply shook his head at your bickering with a fond smile, then pilfered a little of everything for his own dinner before leaving you both to it.
Once he was gone, the festivities began.
You were both overzealous, talking a mile a minute over each other about your days as you set up for the night. Eddie divvied out food--creating a plate that reminded you of the Peanuts' Thanksgiving feast, overflowing with multicolored candies and popcorn and pizza slices--as you took care of the drinks.
You were a little smug that you got to teach Eddie something during these little Sunday night not-dates for once.
"Where did you learn this?" he asked skeptically as you ripped into the cardboard box. "What even is Franzia? Sounds fancy."
"It is the least fancy thing you can get," you grinned maniacally and freed the floppy plastic bag full of pink liquid from its confines. "Honestly I should have thrown it in the fridge but it's fine. You can put it with some coke; it'd probably taste better anyway."
He made a face.
"I'll just have a beer."
"Oh my--Eddie! Live a little." You settled the bag on the coffee table and gestured to it. "You don't have to drink it...chug a beer, I don't care...but you need to slap it."
He huffed and shuffled across the carpet on his knees to settle beside you.
"Is this a Claire's thing?" he asked, he looked up at you through his bangs.
"No it's not a--well...no. It doesn't matter! My old store manager, Jen, made us do it whenever we went to parties and hung out at her place. It's fun."
"Why does this feel like a lie?"
You reached out and smacked your hand against the plastic, listened to the liquid slosh inside. He let out a long suffering sigh but gestured for you to go ahead and he settled on the floor as you squealed with glee.
Eddie popped the little tab on the spout and the cheap wine poured freely into his mouth; he maintained eye contact with you the whole time, even as he choked on the unfamiliar taste of the pink zinfandel.
When you'd hung out with Jen and your coworkers and friends, it was just...a silly thing. Now, though, it was just you and Eddie; you stood over him with the bag gently held in your hands over his mouth and his hand rested on your calf as he drank. It was tense and intimate and as you started feeling a little hot under the collar, you wondered if this was a mistake.
Regardless, when he'd had his fill, he shut the spout and raised his hand and slapped the bag so hard it soared out of your grasp and across the living room.
You both burst out laughing as it swished and sloshed with a pronounced glorp on impact with the floor, and Eddie collapsed against your legs as the giddiness got the better of him.
"Ok, that's better than a keg stand." He looked up at you and wiped a hand over his mouth. "Blagh...probably gonna need that coke if I have any more though. Your turn, sweetheart."
Then the tables were turned, but unlike Eddie, you stood toe to toe with him as he held the bag for you.
To avoid the tense eye contact, you kept yours closed as you pulled mouthful after mouthful from the bag. You almost felt a little smug; you'd always been good at this, despite how awful the wine burps were gonna get after. You knew Eddie's competitive nature--always seeing who could finish a blizzard from DQ first and giving himself a brain freeze in the process--so you were hoping to last a little longer, hit the bag a little harder, and get him to concede.
You counted down in your head and finally when you couldn't take the heartburn the wine caused any longer, you shut the spout and released it, ready for victory.
Of course, opening your eyes provided nothing of the sort.
Eddie stood there, inches away from you; his pupils were blown and he was breathing a little heavily and for a split second you thought to ask if he was ok.
Until he leaned a little closer.
Close enough where you could smell the laundry detergent and the general amalgamation of mall scents coming off of him.
Then you noticed that his eyes were locked onto…your lips?
Was he gonna kiss you?
You already thought…well…and in the van the other week? When he licked frosting off your hand? You'd thought...
Except that was the thing, you always thought, you never acted. Too stuck in your head weighing and judging the options and if you could just do something about it. If you could just lean forward a little, you could stop worrying and have your answer right?
And if it wasn't meant to be and things were weird? If he didn't actually mean to try and kiss you? You worked retail; you could bullshit with the best of them if worse came to worse.
Then you'd just pretend that your heart didn't ache from rejection for the duration of your friendship. You were already familiar with disappointment; this would be no different.
Alright, that's it, you weren't gonna chance it anymore. All the worrying you did back at the store was enough. You were just gonna kiss him. Just lean forward; just go. Just go. One, two...two and a half...
Eddie's eyelids fluttered a little bit, and your heart clenched in hope, until he leaned away and cleared his throat.
The wine bag was tossed onto the coffee table and Eddie gestured to the plates he'd prepared.
"So, pizza?"
---
Music was the next event of the night.
And the weed.
Funny how all of your anxiety over smoking flew out the window when you were anxious about something else.
Because you just couldn't get your feelings out of your head after Eddie walked away from a kiss like that.
Was it even going to be a kiss? Or was it just the awkwardness of your positions in that situation? Were you overthinking the overthinking?
On and on those thoughts spiraled.
Until Eddie said he was going to get his stereo to start your comprehensive education of metal.
"We really don't have all night Eddie," you said and threw a balled up napkin at him as he fiddled with his tapes.
"Ok, maybe not fully comprehensive," he held his hands up in surrender. "Nothing sounds better than vinyl and I have all of that at Rick's. And my mom's records. You wanna talk about classics? We've gotta spend a whole weekend there."
He put a tape into the slot and hit play and the room was immediately filled with guitar riffs and singing and shouting; he turned the volume down immediately.
"I've gotta give you the whole history sweetheart," he explained. "So you've gotta hear me too. This song's not so important...I'll turn it up when we get to the good part."
Of course, Eddie's music history lesson...started with him.
"Picture this," he said, arms waving as he walked over to his school things that had been haphazardly thrown in a corner of the room: a wilted canvas backpack, a black binder, and a dented metal lunchbox. "11-year old me, fresh after my mom's funeral and everyone she knew was coming up to us but I refused to talk. Wayne kept making excuse after excuse. But Rick, bless him, said 'gotta make him cry.'"
And on he went as he spilled the contents of the dented lunchbox on the coffee table and began the fine work of rolling a joint.
"Took me to the record store, let me pick out whatever I wanted. Of course I chose Sad Wings of Destiny because the art was cool. Little did I know that would change the course of my life forever."
You didn’t know what to focus on and that made you spiral a little bit further. The words, the music, his lips and his fingers as he followed steps that he seemed to know but didn't feel the need to elaborate on were all very appealing targets; the music and his story was what was important here though and you made the attempt.
He told his story in a way that only Eddie Munson knew how to—arms flailing, minute details, expressions and voices and everything you loved admired about him. He took a moment to swap cassettes and crank up the volume before he fell onto the couch beside you in a mess of cushions and limbs and hair.
"I would say ladies first," he began as he presented the joint to you. He then stuck it between his lips and continued talking around it. "But I'm nothing if not a gentleman and I need to teach you how to do this. It's a little different than cigarettes."
It was a comprehensive lesson and you'd gotten the hang of it quickly, but the proximity did nothing to help calm your nerves; Eddie's knee touching yours, his face and hands so close to yours as he held the joint to your lips, then one hand your shoulder as he soothed the cough that escaped you after your first hit, and finally the way he inhaled along with you as you took another.
Want burned in your lungs along with the smoke, but it didn't leave you when you finally exhaled.
You were very much looking forward to the light and mellow feeling that Eddie promised once the weed hit your system.
"Until then," he grinned and took another hit himself before dropping the smoldering stick into a nearby ashtray. "We just dive into the mind of the great Ronnie James Dio."
You rested back against the cushions and turned your head to really watch him; it was strange just...observing him. You had never done it like this before, close and quiet at this distance. Your time together was always spent with conversation and laughter, your observations and mental notes about him done in little snapshots as he moved through life like a blur.
Now you got to experience the simplicity of his presence in private and the addictive frequency that he emitted.
It was nice.
You watched the way his lashes brushed against his skin as he melted into the sofa beside you and closed his eyes. The way his plush lips pursed and then stretched as he hummed along to the music. You closed your own eyes for a second as he matched the sharpness of the lyrics with his voice, hushed and then shrill, and then hushed again.
And when you opened them back up to watch him some more, he was watching you and practically vibrating.
Your heart skipped a beat...
"Sweetheart," he reached out and touched your wrist. "You ok?"
Wait...he wasn't vibrating.
You were.
Then you noticed that your heart skipped many beats, then the beats suddenly tripled, and then it all slowed again, pounding harder and faster in your chest than you believed to be possible.
Did your chest hurt? Or were you imagining it?
It felt like the few times you ran the mile back in high school, but you hadn't run.
Had you?
Your legs felt like jelly. Your arms too.
So you must have run...but when?
No wait, you were forgetting something. Your chest, your heart, your lungs. You had to focus on them first, you needed them to live.
You tried to fix it all by taking a great gulp of air in--if you felt like you'd just run the mile, surely catching your breath would fix it--but you found that it didn't fix anything. In fact, you seemed to lose even more control of your body. You floundered, breathing heavily over and over, quicker and quicker to try and get a hold of yourself.
And the panic set in, unlike anything you'd ever experienced before in your life.
Your consciousness became untethered from your body and you sank deep within yourself. Like Alice falling down the rabbit hole. Only instead of a rabbit hole, the you that existed in your mind fell away from your eyes and deeper into your skull then out the back of it and into the so-soft cushions of the couch.
But this wasn't sinking, this wasn't melting. This was being buried alive.
You remembered Eddie’s taunting before, about being afraid of smoking. Why hadn’t you told him that you didn’t want to do this? Why hadn’t you told him you were afraid? You were a stubborn idiot and now you’d die here, buried amongst pilling fabric and lost change and lint and a few cheerios that were stuck between the cushions.
You would die here on Eddie's couch...
"Eddie!" you practically sobbed and reached out for him, remembering suddenly that he was there with you. Why wasn't he doing anything to keep you from sinking? "Help!"
"It's ok hey!" He grabbed your hands now and pulled you back from the void, hooked the tether back onto you and saved you from the depths. "It's ok, breathe. No, not like that. Slowly, deep breaths with me. In and hold it and out. Whoooooo."
You focused on the whooshing sound of the air that escaped his lips and you tried to make the same sound yourself. Over and over, slowly as he guided you.
"That's it," he smiled. "Good girl."
You slowly grounded yourself through Eddie, escaping whatever horrible clutches had just grasped at you. You began to feel better, lighter; more centered within yourself but…nicer?
Had that awful feeling been the high? Or was this?
Maybe everyone got caught by a demon when they smoked and then if they escaped they felt a nice light flutter and instead of a heavy beating heart that threatened to burst out of their chests, they felt...silly. Happy. Bubbly.
Like you did whenever you were around Eddie.
Only now it was better, and it was all getting better as he spoke to you and smiled and wiped at the few tears that had escaped your eyes.
Breathe in, breathe out. Good girl.
You kept breathing and staring at his lips.
Breathe in.
Lips.
Breathe out.
Eddie's lips.
Good girl.
You thought about earlier...minutes or hours you couldn't tell for sure...about the way Eddie leaned close to you and almost kissed you. All the worry you'd had about not being able to make a move because you were thinking so much you couldn't act. Here you were now, thinking again. When his lips were right there and you could do something about it.
With one last shaky breath, bubbly infatuation flooded your body; you smiled and said one final farewell to your nervous thoughts, and you surged forward. Your hands shook his away and grabbed at his face, as your lips slid clumsily against his.
Your noses bumped and teeth clacked painfully but it didn't quite matter because the sparks that emanated from your joined lips shot through your limbs and made you both feel tingly and pleasant. At least, you assumed they did for Eddie because he let out a sound that was somewhere in between a giggle and a moan.
But he didn't push you away; in fact, his hands clapped over yours and smushed them further into his cheeks.
He wanted you to kiss him. He wanted to kiss you. He...liked you.
It was a euphoric moment of joy and realization, but your need to put your lips on him outweighed that. So you tried again. Gentler this time.
Eddie followed your lead for a little while as you pulled him towards you; one of his hands found your waist as the other arm rounded your shoulders, and he became your anchor to prevent you from being buried by the sofa again. As thanks for his chivalry, you gifted him with soft caresses, quick pecks, and sharp little nips.
Your fingers developed a mind of their own, and seemed to love his cheekbones and getting tangled in his hair, although they couldn't quite decide which they loved more so back and forth they went.
The rest of you, though--mind and body--just basked in the kissing.
You were good at kissing; you liked kissing. And you liked kissing Eddie, more than you ever thought you would. Kissing under the light, buzzy influence of a beer or two was nice, and it might have been the weed or it could have just been Eddie himself, but this was nicer. Floaty and tingly and transcendent.
The music itself had stopped, but Eddie himself continued to provide the soundtrack to the night. Instead of guitars and vocals and pounding drums, it was a symphony of soft hums and sweet sighs.
Eddie, who often pilfered bites and nibbles off your plate and cited that he was a "growing boy," seemed to prove that his hunger was greater than yours the way he bit and nibbled at you too, appetite growing the longer you kissed. The pace you set no longer fed him the way he wanted and he started to feast a little more; that was a side-effect of being high, right? Hunger. Insatiable hunger?
His mouth pulled away from yours and started to explore your jaw, the column of your neck, the junction between your neck and shoulder. You let yourself get lost in the feeling of his attention, of his lips and hands as he gave and took, of the floaty feeling that settled comfortably in your limbs now, all the nerves of the day forgotten.
Before you knew it, your own hunger grew as well. You wanted him closer, needed more of him now that you had him.
You let yourself drift back along the pillows until you were laying comfortably and pulled Eddie along with you; one hand still lingered in his hair as the other fisted the collar of his shirt and got him right where you needed him to be.
Of course, you couldn't just take without giving as well, and as he settled onto you, your hips bucked up into him. You both moaned--savoring the proximity and delicious friction that his jeans and your leggings provided--and then giggled together as he collapsed on top of you, unprepared for the sudden surge of delight.
His breath fanned across your neck and jaw as he laughed breathlessly, and your hands caressed his head and shoulders fondly as you mirrored him.
He strained his neck a little to look you in the eye; his grin accentuated all the lines in his face, and for a second he struggled to form words. His mouth opened and closed silently and then he licked his lips to compose himself. The next thing you knew, his hand was coming up and squeezing one of your breasts with an exaggerated "honk" as he fell back against the other one and pressed his mouth to the swell over your shirt.
Back into the throes of unadulterated giggles you both went as he continued to honk and kiss and suck at exposed skin.
One of the highlights of the whole night was when he blew a raspberry against your neck; the feeling of goosebumps that erupted along your body and the spittle that sprayed across your skin would be a sensation you would remember and cherish forever.
"No fair," you whined and shifted against him again, both to protest the fact that you currently couldn't return the favor of all the attention he was giving you. Nevertheless, you treated him to the attention that you could, and you bucked your hips up again, only to be met with the feeling of him grinding down onto you.
Giggles began to mingle with desperate pants as he began to shift against you and settled into the cradle of your thighs; he grew harder and ground and rutted against the covered softness of you, faster and sharper, and your body eagerly responded, wanting to be as close to him as you could. As close as either of you could honestly fathom at this point, feeling too good like this to consider that there was more pleasure to be had if time went on and clothes came off.
Sunday nights together were truly gleeful and hedonistic, and tonight was no different. However, instead of snacks and arguments accentuated by the sounds of light-hearted talk and laughter, it was your writhing bodies and mingled breaths that took center stage; the two of you never stopped, only paused for your lips to smack wetly against one another, for your nails to rake through his hair and scratch against his scalp, and for him to grasp at your hips to pull you closer and closer as he drove you higher and higher.
"Eddie, I'm--" you broke away from him and keened, and he responded with a husky "uh-huh" and pressed his forehead against yours. Both of your eyes closed as you felt the pleasure building between the two of you, as he moaned and your toes curled...
As keys jingled in the lock of the front door of the trailer.
...and suddenly it was like a bucket of cold water had been dumped over the both of you and you froze, all thought of completion forgotten.
Your eyes shot open and you stared into Eddie's panic-filled, pleasure-blown pupils. He shifted sharply and then paused, almost like a glitch, and then he was off you, across to the other side of the couch in the blink of an eye. You watched, dumbstruck, as he panted heavily to control his breathing, and he held his head in shaking hands.
"No, no," he muttered. "Shit. Shit."
You reacted quickly as the door started to squeak open--throwing your legs over the edge of the sofa to sit upright as your hands clumsily fixed your disheveled clothes--and Wayne walked in. You took the extra second as he grumbled at the threshold and fiddled with his keys to look at Eddie, hoping for some kind of...secret conspiratorial smile or...or heated gaze...just something but he refused to look at you.
Suddenly, all of the good feelings that had flooded you since the moment that Eddie had chased your panic away...they vanished. The sweet giggles and shared pleasure were gone; even the love bites you were sure Eddie had left behind stung instead of blissfully buzzed.
And in their place, an acute clarity of what the two of you had just done.
"You wouldn't believe the mess I walked into tonight," Wayne chuckled with disbelief as he finally shut the door.
No kidding Wayne, you thought bitterly.
"Some of the machines were down when I got there and it took a few hours to figure out the problem. Some rusted old part..." On and on he chattered as you spiraled, stuck in your thoughts once again.
You and Eddie, Eddie and you. You and your secret crush...had just...on his couch. You and your best friend, your only friend in town...got high and kissed and canoodled and now he refused to even look at you.
You didn't know if it was the weed again or if it was just you, but you could see stars in the corners of your eyes and you felt lightheaded as the panic settled back in. And it only got worse the longer you sat there and tried to get some kind of sign from Eddie, only to be left with nothing. Such a stark contrast from just moments ago where you were giving and taking and responding to one another so freely.
Giving and taking...was that really what it was? Or did you just...do this to him? Do this to the both of you? Effectively tank your friendship the way you'd worried about since the first time you'd hung out and Eddie had specifically said it wasn't a date?
You abruptly got to your feet and Wayne stopped his chatter and looked at you questioningly.
"I..." you felt your throat closing up with emotion. "I just forgot I have a really important call first thing tomorrow. I...need to go!"
Eddie finally looked at you with wide, shocked eyes.
Were those tears? Oh god...
"I...it was nice to see you Wayne, sorry..." you scrambled to grab your bag from where you'd tossed it by the door and then looked back at both Munsons. Back and forth at Wayne's curious expression...and Eddie's devastated one. "I'm...sorry."
And you bolted out the door, into your car, and back across town to the lonely confines of your apartment, where you would wish for a second chance at Sunday all over again.
Because until tonight, Sundays had always been your favorite days.
Next Part: Leave of Absence
253 notes · View notes
jtl-fics · 1 year
Text
Fluent Freshman - Part 10
PREVIOUS
He calls his grandma to thank her for everything. She promises him that if anything keeps him from her on Christmas she’ll just make her way over to South Carolina to see him. “Maybe I can give that boy who is bullying you a piece of my mind!” She says and he loves her for it even if the thought of Andrew vs. his 70 year old grandma gives him heart palpitations that have nothing to do with the five hour energy he just slammed when no one was looking.
(He had eaten turkey because Abby had asked if he didn’t like it when he had forgone the white meat being passed around. She looked SAD so he just piled the dark meat onto his plate (at least it has less tryptophan) trip and now he needs to counteract the turkey. He could not afford to be sleepy on the impending car ride.)
He lets her know that everyone likes her pie and Abby had been overjoyed when he informed her that his gran always attaches a recipe card to the bottom for any pie in transit / for public consumption. (This is a woman who has been asked enough that she has the confidence to assume).
He gets off the line and feels the 5 hour energy kick in when Captain Neil appears out of nowhere next to him and he thinks he strains something when he resists the flinch his rapidly beating heart almost forces him into. “What language was that?” He asks.
“Polish.”
“You really do know a lot of languages. Just like your friend said.”
DANGER. DANGER. DANGER.
“Not that many.” DEFLECT DEFLECT DEFLECT “When are we heading out to Columbia?” DAMMIT
Captain Neil blinks but smiles, “We’ll be heading out in a little bit. Abby’s packing us leftovers. Too bad there’s no pie left. Do you think we could make it at the house? Andrew really liked it.” Neil says.
Pie is a safe topic. Pie will not betray him. Also if Andrew wants pie then he can’t kill FF until FF makes it and, perhaps, the pie will buy him a few extra days of mercy from his executioner.
“We can try. The secret ingredient is a grandma’s love though.” He says because it’s on the recipe card. It’s the most important ingredient in the whole pie. It’s what can keep a pie warm across a country. “Gran always says whipped cream can be used as a substitute though.” he says.
Captain Neil blushes.
DAMMIT WHY? WHY BRING UP THE WHIPPED CREAM?
“Well, we’ll have to pick some up from the store.” Captain Neil manages.
FF blanks his face as best he can and nods but gets up his heart beating too fast to remain seated. “I’ll be outside.” He says because he needs to walk around in some circles while he can. The car ride to Columbia is going to be a nightmare in general but especially since he slammed the five hour energy.
Kevin is the reason for the hold-up and the reason that FF gets 80 more laps around the house. He’s reminding them that they can’t stop exercising just because it’s a break gesturing to himself and the 20 minutes of squats that he just did to burn off the pie and then to FF who passes a window for the 10th time since this conversation started “See FF is keeping up with his fitness. Be more like him.”
Wymack eventually drags Kevin out of the house and into his car since they’re spending the break together. He flashes FF a thumbs up as FF passes and FF (unaware as always but great at mimicking social cues) gives him a thumbs up back.
It’s then that they get into the car. FF (as is the way of the world) is sitting bitch with Aaron and Nicky on either side of him.
Captain Neil is up front and starts to play some music. Both Nicky and Aaron are conked out before they even reach the entrance to the interstate. They have also slumped onto FF with Aaron asleep on his shoulder and Nicky drooling into his hair.
“You can just shove them off.” Andrew says.
“It’s fine.” FF says reminiscing about the last time he’d had something like this.
20 minutes later it’s not fine because the five hour energy is definitely kicking in but it would be so rude to move and wake Nicky and Aaron up. Nicky is probably tired because he came to check on FF five different times the night before and kept dragging him away from whatever Saw movie he was taking notes on and Aaron ate a LOT of white meat so he’s filled to the brim with tryptophan.
But he thinks he’s about to vibrate out of his skin.
He closes his eyes to try and breathe through this when.
“Smith said that we can try and recreate his grandma’s pie. We’ll just have to do a grocery run tomorrow.” Captain Neil says in Russian.
“It was good pie.” Andrew returns in the same language.
“He said that the secret ingredient is grandmotherly love.”
“It was on the recipe card. It said for best results be sure to add throughout the baking process.”
“His grandma said whipped cream was a good replacement. That it goes great with the pie.”
Uh-oh
FF knows that tone.
FF has fled across campus, the bus, the dorm room, and (one one notable occasion) the locker room when he has heard that tone coming from Captain Neil.
“Pie isn’t the only thing it will enhance the flavor of.” Andrew says back and FF feels as the car speeds up.
FF wishes that Andrew would just hurry up and crazy murder him already. He’d take the reverse bear trap over this psychological torture. He wants to pull up his phone and read if the Geneva Conventions list this as a war crime.
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511 notes · View notes
strawberrystepmom · 6 months
Text
izuku x f!reader. enemies to lovers au, workshopped with @izvmimi <33333 her follow up part can be found here. wc 3.6k.
With an exasperated sigh, Izuku points the remote that looks comically small in his hand toward the flat screen TV screwed into his office wall to turn the volume up the moment you come on screen. 
“This week, yet another family was displaced by the inaction of heroes. When the focus shifted from merely catching villains rather than protecting the public…”
Your voice drifts into a blur, the man choosing to focus on your mouth and how it’s moving rather than what you’re saying. Plush and soft, topped with camera ready shimmering gloss. Your eyes are wide and doe like, your cheeks round and trustworthy. You’re the picture of empathy, pretty and polished, immaculate in every way.
It certainly isn’t hard to imagine why VOHSV, Victims of Hero Supported Violence, picked you as their spokesperson. Who else could manage this busy talk show circuit with expert precision? Watching you play the crowd and hosts’ emotions like a violin makes him roll his eyes but he can’t deny you are damn good. 
Your message is infuriating to him and his colleagues but at least you look like heaven sent while spreading it. It’s probably why everything you say spreads like wildfire across the social media apps he has open on his unlocked phone that rests on his desk. 
He’s listened to your spiel enough times that he can already fill in the blanks of what you’re saying but he picks up the remote and turns the volume up an additional click to be certain you haven’t deviated from your usual points. Costly property damage, displacement, lack of available care to those affected by the trauma of villain attacks, blah, blah, blah.
The interviewer appears on screen as the camera pans, nodding at the last comment you made that Izuku didn’t care to actually listen to.  
“And how does your organization suggest the Commission begin combating these issues?”
The camera is quick to pan back to you with your perfect smile, teeth striking and bright and dazzling. The man watching from his oversized office and overstuffed chair clenches his fist watching you, uncertain if it’s annoyance or desire that fills his chest, but he doesn’t look away despite the flashing red light on his desk phone telling him he’s being paged by his assistant. 
“I am personally calling upon the top heroes to do better.” Your smile doesn’t waver and the camera zooms in on your head and shoulders, allowing your next impassioned plea to land directly where you intend it to. “Deku, you claim you care, yet you are responsible for the most costly property damage caused by a hero in Japanese history. How do you explain that with that big smile plastered on your face?”
Bold of you to be taunting the man chuckling humorlessly from his desk about plastered on smiles with a high definition flat screen sized Cheshire grin of your own on your face but he appreciates the audacity. 
“Be a hero instead of just talking about being one.”
Perhaps if your life’s path were different you’d be a hero just like him or maybe he’d even be you, full of righteous anger toward those who only wish to help no matter the means. Or collateral. 
Without thinking, Izuku pulls his phone off of the top of his desk and his jaw slackens when he presses the little pen in the corner of the current most popular app in the app store. The speed of his thumbs is almost impressive, big hands on a little phone screen won’t stop the number one hero, and he smirks when his phone pings letting him know his post has gone live. 
Deku (@fight4smiles)
Name the time and place, VOHSV. I’ll gladly drop a check by to cover some of the damage you allege I’ve been doing. 
He gets to see your reaction in real time, the camera panning from you to the interviewer who grins excitedly, pressing on their in ear microphone and back. The man chuckles to himself, swinging back and forth in his chair, lips curved into a smirk. 
“It appears the current number one hero has responded to your challenge. He’s willing to meet.”
Your smile droops but you’re quick to put it back in place, brows raised and head nodding wildly. The adversarial relationship between the two of you is nothing new, Deku having spent the better part of this entire year ducking and dodging your direct invitations to speak with the VOHSV. 
He watches you smack your lips together and purse them, primly placing your hands in your lap and laughter comes easily. It’s no big deal to him to cut a check to help put some buildings back together, the many zeros on the end of his bank balance just one of the many perks of being at the top but it has never been about that for him.
Deep down, he knows he’ll never change your mind about your crusade but he would love to shut you up at least for a little while. 
“How brave of him to finally step up. I will be reaching out to him soon with details.”
The red light on Izuku’s desk phone continues to blink wildly and just as he leans forward to answer it, his office door opens and his assistant stares at him with disbelief with the current number two Dynamight hot on their heels, pulling his mask off of his head and gently shoving them out of the way.
The assistant scurries back to their position outside of Deku’s office as quickly as possible, allowing the men privacy.
“Why did you do that?” 
Izuku looks down at his cell phone and tosses it on his desk with a relaxed shrug. He catches a glance at your pretty face one last time before shutting the TV off, tossing the remote aside and turning his attention toward Katsuki with his arms folded over his chest. 
“You know that you’re giving them what they want, right? Giving these shitheads attention is just going to create more of ‘em.”
More of them - outspoken victims’ rights activists. VOHSV is simply one of many groups that have cropped up over the last several years as hero academies have continued to churn out bigger and better heroes with every graduating class. It has been a decade since Izuku and Katsuki graduated and the classes after them have only become stronger, a source of pride for both of the men, given their hefty donations to their alma mater. 
Sure the battles have become bigger, spectacles to be adapted into films and documentaries later, but isn’t that what being a hero is all about? What’s left behind after you save the day, no matter who may be affected?
The heroes of today are simply doing what they’ve been taught to do and that’s save the day no matter the cost. It’s hard to hold it against them when it’s systemic and historically that has been the main reason why most advocacy groups have fallen apart but not the VOHSV. They are succeeding because they have you, coiffed to perfection and ready to take anyone you can to task, including the devilishly handsome and arrogant man topping the hero charts.
Izuku sighs, his phone buzzing persistently on the desk in front of him. It’s certainly his agent or his PR team or someone eager to scold him for what he’s done so he ignores it, sliding the little piece of metal aside.
“I’d care more if their points were valid but we both know they aren’t. I’ll cut a check, flash a smile, and hopefully make their mouthpiece look silly enough she’ll stop doing press circuits. It seems like a winning situation to me.”
Bakugou snorts, unimpressed with the answer.
“What if this backfires and you look stupid?”
Izuku’s phone continues to buzz and he opens his desk drawer, sliding the device inside rather than deal with the issue at hand. He’ll comfort everyone later, what matters the most to him right now is when you’ll be brave enough to reach out to show him your hand. Right now, he has you backed into a corner and he simply wants to watch you make your way out of it, smug that he’s the one who has you pinned there.
“Impossible. People don’t take these organizations seriously enough for me to look stupid.”
Katsuki snorts, leaning against the door frame rather than fully entering the office. He was asked to stop by earlier this week, the two of them supposed to be ironing out details to appear at a hospital opening in another part of the city, but the task has clearly been put aside for a petty online feud headed by the Beacon of Hope himself.
“I think you’re already stupid.”
Izuku offers a curt smile and nods at his friend.
“I’ll take that into consideration along with all of your other opinions, don’t worry.” 
Any further argument between the two is cut short when Deku’s assistant bursts back onto the scene, peeking around the door frame. 
“Uh…the VOHSV spokesperson is on the phone for you, Mr. Midoriya.”
Izuku laughs and raises his brows, shifting forward in his chair and pressing the flashing line one button indicating a call is waiting. He presses his thick finger to his lips to encourage Bakugou and his assistant to be quiet and he hits the speaker button immediately.
“I’ll admit, I wasn’t expecting to hear from you so soon.”
It takes all of you not to toss your phone across the room at the sound of his voice through your speaker. You’re in the back of a chauffeured vehicle, phone pressed to your ear so hard you swear that your cheek and head are going to hurt later, nursing a bottle of water in your free hand. 
You weren’t expecting to hear from him so soon, either.
“I figured since you are so eager and have so much to say we may as well get this over with. We have an event on Friday night and you will be forwarded the details on location and attire and we are anticipating your donation of over five million yen. It will help many who have been harmed due to your recklessness.”
The blood pulsing in his ears makes the room seem smaller, the walls caving in on him with your words. You’re so adversarial toward him, so eager to bite and nip and bat with your claws out, and he wants to know why. What happened to make you distrust people like him so much? 
Remembering he’s the one who has you backed into a corner, he shifts in his chair and tents his fingers on the desk in front of him.
“I’ll have your check, don’t worry. I won’t let you look silly in front of the fourteen VOHSV supporters you have to impress.”
You scoff incredulously. There is something seriously wrong with this man, his arrogance blinding his common sense. Your fingers ache where they grip into the metal sides of your phone and the driver keeps shifting his gaze from the road to the mirror to see your face twist into varying degrees of frustration and anger. Taking a deep breath, you let your lips curve into a smile and narrow your eyes. 
Focus. You have him where you want him.
“I didn’t realize this conversation was meant for stooping to petty insults but I can’t say I’m shocked. It’s hardly a surprise you refuse to take anyone else’s safety given your own personal record of injured civilians while you’re handling villain attacks.”
Bakugou’s jaw drops and Izuku leans forward to lift the phone from its cradle, pressing the button to turn it off speaker at near record speed. It takes all of his self control to keep from snapping the cord in two knowing it would effectively end the call and thus his opportunity to antagonize you further.
“Well, you aren’t the only one who has done their homework. We pulled a profile on you months ago and know your entire background. You have no relevant experience that would allow you to criticize heroes the way that you do. Put yourself in our shoes.”
You snort from the other end of the phone, impressed by how bad he is at lying. Arrogance has truly won out over any logic this man may have in his entire body and you suck your teeth, jaw slackening because you have truly won this round.
“See, Deku, here’s the thing. If you were telling the truth about anything you just said then you would already know that I am a graduate of an international hero academy. I have been where you are, or at least wanted to be, but then I came to my senses. I used to hope you’d be able to do the same but it appears my faith was misplaced.”
Now Izuku’s jaw drops, his emerald eyes darting across the room as though the words he needs will magically spring forth from the walls. Sadly, nothing happens and he sits there with his mouth agape dumbly. 
“I look forward to seeing you on Friday. Don’t forget that check.”
You pull the phone from your ear and end the call, laughing to yourself knowing that you left this cocky asshole speechless. He mimics your motion in his own office, pulling his desk phone from his ear and placing it back where it belongs. As badly as he wants to be frustrated by the loss to you, he’s impressed by how easily you hit back without an ounce of fear or worry of what you’re getting yourself into.
A woman as beautiful as she is brave and irritating.
He feels his cock stiffen slightly in his sweatpants the longer he thinks about it and frowns, immediately thinking of exploding buildings and grandmas to distance himself from the fact he’s into how eagerly you spar with him.
His assistant and Bakugou both stare at him, his friend laughing and turning on his heel to leave, waving dismissively.
“Like I said Deku, you’re already stupid. Have fun on Friday.”
Izuku’s assistant follows suit and closes the door behind them, giving him time to lick his wounds.
The rest of the week continues like his weeks usually do. He’s called four times to handle villain attacks, each one ending a little less destructive than the last, and Thursday is when he sees you on TV again, smiling brightly on a different talk show in the same time slot you were in on Monday.
He keeps the TV muted, uninterested in what you have to say about the people he saved this week, but he watches your mouth move silently. His eyes narrow every time your tongue darts out, the tip of it wetting your bottom lip and his freckled cheeks heat when your lips twist into that winning smile. 
That damned smile.
This man has made bringing smiles to faces his entire personality since the day he zipped up his prototype suit years ago, vowing on that day to work as hard as he could no matter how bleak things seemed. It worked and it’s what he’s known for, joy and hope and safety the things he strives for the most. 
Watching you smile while calling his character into question makes him simultaneously furious and hard again and he has to cross his legs and imagine those same exploding buildings when you press your lips together on the screen in front of him. 
A knock on the office door captures his attention and his assistant opens the door, clipboard in hand.
“You have a tux fitting for tomorrow.”
Reaching for the remote he turns his TV off and rises with a nod. Everyone knows you have to look your very best for your biggest battles and he has no intention of showing up to meet you face to face looking like anything less than a magazine cover.
He just never imagined you’d do the same yet here you stand, 8 pm on Friday night, draped in dazzling gold silk that hugs every inch of your body. You’re taller than he expected, one long leg jutting from the slit in your dress and elegant neck draped in simple jewelry.
You’re beautiful in a way that TV did little to capture and the arrogant man finds himself speechless when you hold out your hand in his direction, grinning at him. He searches for hidden fangs and finds none, just perfect pretty teeth.
“I wanted to apologize for earlier this week, this organization is my passion and it gets the best of me sometimes.”
Your words catch him off guard so he just nods and shakes your hand. If you notice his sweaty palm you keep it to yourself and he internally chides himself for his nerves. He is the fucking number one hero, his face is plastered on every single corner of Japan, and he needs to remember that. 
“Hey, we all have bad days. I’m just glad to be here to shed some light on a small cause.”
Your smile dims and his widens, your palm quickly leaving his. Heat simmers in your core and you feel disgusted by your own desire. Sure, he’s one of the most attractive men you’ve ever seen - all big muscles that his tuxedo does little to hide and pretty green waves falling over his face but he’s also the biggest asshole you’ve had the unfortunate luck of meeting.
Drawing your hands close to your body, you fight the urge to petulantly fold your arms over your chest, and he digs in his pocket to produce the check he promised. He holds it out in your direction and you pluck it from his hand, eyes widening when you notice that the amount written on the check is far larger than the five million yen previously discussed. 
“Doubled your donation. Very kind of you, Deku.”
He smirks and you feel warm again, cheeks heating in perfect time with your core. Perhaps it’s the glass of champagne you downed an hour ago to calm your nerves or the low lighting of the event space but he is undeniably attractive and you are undeniably attracted to him.
A terrible realization to come to while face to face with a man you called a liar and a fraud four short days ago.
Izuku enters your space and crowds around you, dipping his head low enough that his mouth is just above your ear. He’s bigger than you expected, an entire head taller than you, and you feel overwhelmed by the scent of his cologne and the way he carries himself. He has the demeanor of a man who knows he’s the shit and as much as it aggravates you, it thrills you too, the same heat lashing through your stomach with every flutter of his long lashes.
“Call me an optimist but I think we can still salvage a friendship out of this situation.”
You laugh, shaking your head and clutching the check he provided to your chest.
“There’s an after party starting soon if you don’t have more buildings to go destroy. I’m sure the rest of the VOHSV team would love to thank you personally for your generous donation.”
The hero presses his lips together and raises his brow, blazing green eyes meeting yours. The tension between the two of you is so thick that even the most unaware onlooker would feel it but the room is relatively empty and you’re grateful for it.
“Maybe I only want one person to thank me for my donation.”
Raising a brow to match his, you purse your lips and quickly consider your options. You could give in to the undeniable attraction, a sordid affair with a man you seek to change as part of your life’s work couldn’t possibly be good for optics if you were to be exposed. You could walk away and publicly embarrass him but that doesn’t sound like fun either so you do what you do best - think on your feet and hide your true intentions behind big doe eyes and a winning smile.
“There’s a powder room down that hall, last door on the right,” you motion to a corridor to your left and his eyes follow your movements. “Be there in ten minutes.” 
Izuku nods, moving enough to allow you to slip past him and he watches the way your dress shifts across your ass with each step you take away from him. He isn’t going to bother to be polite anymore knowing what is coming next, his mouth watering at the mere thought of watching that pretty little dress drop to the ground below both of your feet while he uncovers the treasure beneath it. 
His half hard cock presses against the zipper of his tuxedo pants and he doesn’t bother to adjust himself, taking a shortcut that keeps him against the wall and away from prying eyes to the hallway you instructed him to follow. Each step makes his cock throb and he groans when he reaches for the door handle, wondering what he’ll find when he opens it.
Twisting the handle, he chuckles humorlessly when his eyes fall upon an empty powder room. A large mirror framed by lights with a small sink and counter in front of it are all he finds and he shakes his head, eyes falling upon a folded piece of paper sitting on the counter.
Flicking the paper open with his thumb and index finger, he frowns at the words he reads first.
Better luck next time.
Followed by your name signed in delicate penmanship he traces the tip of his thumb over. The ink is still wet and it smears, his thumb marked with black. His eyes trail further down the note and spot your number below your name, the ink the digits were written in still shining.
At least you leaving your number tells him there will certainly be a next time.
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braisedhoney · 1 year
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since this line won the Vague Narry Line vote, it gets posted now! first of a couple unrelated lines i'm working on for a youtube video while I learn how tf animation works lol. more rambles under the cut.
anyway this. uh. this took a really long time. worked on it (and other projects) sporadically before and after my break, and this is the result. could definitely use more polish, but it’s a real improvement from my last attempt w/ a different program! having something that lets you use audio and normal layers makes a big difference. this is probably the most labor intensive one too, so i'm glad i got to share it.
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genericpuff · 2 months
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Genuinely I would give anything to hear your thoughts or read more critical analysis of yours on other webcomics writing (*slides you Marionetta* I like the webtoon but there are some things in the writing that I'd like to see be discussed critically more often but the fandom focuses way too much on shipping. sighs..)
Anyway, you probably have been asked this before but are there any webtoons in particular you would recommend? :D
Oh lord, you don't know how many times a week I get asks in my inbox asking for my opinions on webtoons they're reading. It's really sweet that people wanna hear me talk about other works outside of LO, but unfortunately I just don't have the time to read as much as I used to, even keeping up on LO lately is getting really difficult 😅 I'm definitely keeping a list though of works to check out!
That said, I try not to read series on the basis of criticizing them because frankly I just... don't want to spend time reading something if people are only looking for me to rag on it? 😆 Of course I know that's not the only reason, I know there's also just the element of seeing me talk extensively about other works the way that I do with LO, but it's not really something I can turn on and off like that, I have to get really into a series to want to talk about it to that extent. So it often comes down to just luck of the draw :'0
Right now the series I'm keeping up the most on (or have completed and would absolutely 100% re-read):
Alfie (18+, it's porn with plot but the plot is REALLY GOOD , I SWEAR LMAO the art is gorgeous, the characterization is IMMACULATE, and it ironically tackles the subject of purity culture way better than LO ever has lol)
Theia Mania (the creator is often in my comment section / neck of the woods, she's been working on an Abduction of Persephone retelling for a long while now and has also tackled other myth retellings in her style! I always love seeing new pages of her work in my feed :' ) <3)
Tales from Alderwood (if you like fantasy and comedy, this one's great, the plot's really starting to get interesting and it's just got this really great sense of humor about it)
The Black Parade (this one's REALLY interesting, it's a comic-stylized version of My Chemical Romance's The Black Parade, using the songs as narration and sometimes even dialogue to tell a visual story, it's really cool and the art matches beautifully with the lyrics and style of MCR!)
A Tale of Two Rulers (this is a Legend of Zelda fancomic that poses the question, "What if Zelda and Ganondorf got married to solve their political crisis?" It updates a lot slower than most of the other comics I follow but the art and writing is so worth it <3)
Dogs of Future Past (and p much all of Lynx's Undertale comics which can be found in the link, seriously, THESE are the comics you wanna read if you wanna get into Undertale fanworks, they are PEAK)
Tamberlane (this one's an anthro comic, I normally don't read anthro but this one actually gripped me by the throat, the art is gorgeous and the character arcs so far have been great!)
The Mafia Nanny (okay it's legit so funny that I'm including this one here but I've been reading it the last couple days after seeing it basically beat out LO at the top of the trending tab for a couple days, so I figured I'd give it a shot, at first I was like "great more tropey shit" but the more I read it the more it's actually started to get pretty good, I'm holding out and hoping to god it stays that way LOL it's not especially deep or anything like that, but it's really fun and cute to read and the shipping of the main character within the narrative isn't too self-absorbed which I can always appreciate, I'd honestly be 100% fine with it if it didn't turn into a romance)
City of Blank (I talk about this one a lot here, but it's one of my favorite Originals right now, the art is super polished and the writing has gotten INTENSE, go check it out if you want some fun action / sci-fi storytelling!)
Time and Time Again (a time-travelling vampire and his werewolf boyfriend get into all kinds of misadventures, what more could you ask for?)
Touch of Divinity (like the Mafia Nanny, this is one I just started reading, it's got a very interesting premise so far and I'm looking forward to seeing where it goes!)
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lets-try-some-writing · 8 months
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since i know you like your alien worldbuilding and i’m not really sure if you’ve answered an ask related to this yet, at least for tfp, i’d just be really interested in hearing some of your ideas (if you have any) on what cybertronian beauty standards are, and how most of the main cast would be seen in regards to those standards. do they even have an understandable concept of beauty? i mean obviously shiny paint and buffed finishes would probably be the norm, and different branches of the transformers race would definitely value certain traits over others (velocitron comes to mind) but what other features do you think would be cybertronian society’s general ideals?
Heck yeah, worldbuilding time. Lets gooooooo-
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Cybertronian Beauty Standards
There are a few universals when it comes to beauty standards across Cybertron. Namely well done paint, buffed plating, and unbroken armor. However across regions and castes, there are a few preferences that are rather prevalent.
Amidst high castes, the favored form is flamboyancy and keeping up the latest trends. If one wishes to keep up to standard, they will be required to constantly change their frame, usually in irreversible ways in order to ensure they are up to snuff. The trends always change, so it is near impossible to pinpoint what is seen as beautiful at any given moment amongst the high caste, but a few constants are brighter colors, accessories in abundance, and expressive optics. Its all a way to show off authority and wealth.
Middle caste mecha tend to be more reserved, and as a general rule, a more composed and sophisticated look is the most attractive. A firm frame without any serious kibble, hardy and built to last but still with enough unique accessories to stand out. Duller versions of their high caste counterparts paint selections are often the preferred choice, but often brighter colors are still appreciated most. For the middle caste its all about showing off one's ability to take care of themselves while still standing out in a way that is not obnoxious.
Low caste mecha look for survivability in those around them to determine beauty. A sturdy frame with no serious signs of deterioration, an appealing collection of scars to tell of battles won, and bright but often cold colors are preferred. Shining silver and multiple layers of armor are seen as most beautiful due to the story such things tell. A mech who can withstand everything and still manage to buff out their plating is one who is well regarded amongst the low castes.
Across different city states, these standards largely remained the same but were adapted to the preferences of each area. In the case of Iacon and its similarly wealthy sister cities, all mecha regardless of caste were expected to maintain their frame. Bright colors, slim waists with bulky shoulders and chevrons were seen as the most appealing. Thick pedes were also seen as an expression of grace when combined with thin legs and the overall bulk of the upper body. Additional kibble was not seen as particularly appealing and often a more minimalist appearance was most well regarded since it showed a mech could go without any notable modifications. If one had modifications, they were to be hidden if the mech in question wanted to keep up appearances. Any sort of markings to the frame were looked down upon, especially scarring. Clean plating without blemish was always seen as far superior to any sort of marking in wealthy cities. With that in mind, face preference tended to lean more toward those with polished and flat faces with their most interesting feature being their optics.
Less wealthy but more productive cities like Polyhex and Vos had a whole different set of preferences. Extra kibble was seen as appealing with a particular preference toward doorwings and wings in general. To have such a sensitive piece of additional kibble was put on a pedestal as it spoke of increadible self control to not be hitting everything and everyone or responding to stimuli poorly. Visors were held in high regard partially for the protective factor they offered, but largely due to how they obscured the face, a trait that was in high demand due to the various careers seen in the more bustling cities. Identity was everything, so having a frame with a slim midsection but with kibble almost everywhere else was seen as quite beautiful. Markings were tolerated and even seen as appealing to a degree so long as they were either artistically placed, or in the case of scarring, very minimal. The preference for facial structure was not really present as most instead preferred to focus on their visors as their most notable frame addition.
In poorer cities with a higher concentration of low caste mecha, such as Kaon and Helex, preferences differed yet again. Thick armor, heavily armed, and larger frames were seen as superior in every regard. The larger and sturdier a mech was, the better. A degree of curvage was seen as appealing, but largely the beauty was found in armor structure and useful kibble. Mecha in poorer cities resented any sort of ridiculous flamboyancy and much preferred quieter methods of showing off their grace. Polished but scarred armor was a mark of wisdom and prowess. Cooler colors showed an ability to go into battle without regard for faction or affiliation. Open weaponry showed bravery and honor since they quite clearly knew when and when not to fight. Usefulness was the most appealing, along with more aggressive plating structure. Unlike other cities, smooth and simple plating was not the most beautiful and instead most mecha agreed that spikes or at least extra boxy armor was better. With that in mind, sharper faces were also in higher demand.
Excluding cities, beauty standards fell into an interesting gray area that depended entirely on region. In small settlements, everything depending on environment. Those that lived near the sea were fond of the bulkier mecha since they could withstand the storms. They cared for them even more if their colors were various shades or orange and rust. Mecha from the spire forests were far fonder of tall and spindly frames, those with dark colors of the earth capable of rushing between obstacles without regard for the difficulties of a larger body. Those from the open plains and wastes fancied those more capable of speed so that they could get from point A to B without need for days of travel. Everything depended on region when not in the cities.
While there were outliers and small subcultures with different preferences, this is the overview.
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Based on my ask last round, can we get more of the satyr demon s/o thing? Slender, Hobo, and Jane separately if you will :3
Have an amazing day our beloved scary noodle writer!!!!!
I hope you enjoy and also have an amazing day :)
Jane:
Thinks you're the cutest thing in existence. Honestly, I can see goats as being one of Jane's favorite animals in general, so the fact that you have goat-like characteristics absolutely helps win her over. Something that popped into my mind, while the fur on your lower legs and your hooves are able to withstand the cold to a decent extent, I totally see her trying to stitch you a pair of leg warmers specifically for you so you don't get too cold, and if you ever wear them she gets so giddy and excited about it. Speaking of hooves, she totally asks if she can paint your hooves with her nail polish. You might be hesitant about how much nail polish she'd need, even though you've only got one set of them, but she comes prepared and gets extra nail polish just so she can paint them. I would say to accept it, as it makes her so fucking happy and content to just relax with you late at night, both of you laying in bed while she paints away at the top of your hooves. She'll always try and do your favorite colors, or designs she thinks you'll like. She likes feeling like she can help and spoil her partner, so being able to do things like that for you makes her very happy, and she loves you so much she'd try and do just about anything for you. Also, she definitely knits you both multiple pairs of matching leg warmers so that the two of you can match when you go out together in the winter.
Hobo:
Like with Jane, thinks you are the most adorable thing in the entire world. Hobo absolutely adores animals, and so he's naturally prone to thinking you're the cutest. Your horns, your soft fur, your cute fluffy tail, and your fluffy satyr ears, what's not to love? Hobo has also probably cried at least a few times over how cute you are. He has a tendency to get really tired and emotional, and if he sees you curled up somewhere in contentment the tears are just gonna start coming out from how much he loves you and how adorable you are. I've said before a few times that a very enjoyable/pleasurable experience for Hobo is having his partner stroke and pet his wings, and I think his tradeoff with you would be allowing him to stroke and pet your fur. He just finds it so soft and fluffy and comforting, and after a long day of work just curling up with his head in your lap so he can stroke your legs in peace would be one of the most relaxing and enjoyable things he can do. I think he finds it nice to date a fellow demon as he feels a bit nervous about scaring humans with his more demonic qualities, so he feels much more at ease around you, knowing he doesn't have to be worried about scaring you off or making you nervous in any way. He feels so much more relaxed and content around you, and it makes him so happy to have a partner like you.
Slender:
Something about you just makes this man go weak in the knees and want to scoop you up and hug you. He isn't sure if it's for your goat characteristics, the fact that he just loves you so much, or a combination of both. He isn't used to finding people adorable or cute and yet he can't stop wanting to coddle you 24/7 because you're so cute. Slender is a very strong Eldritch being, and so with you being a little goat demon, he feels the need to be protective over you and watch over you. He knows you can take care of yourself (you've made it this far after all), but he just wants to protect you from any other demons that might have their eyes out for you. Also??? Totally gets you cute satyr slippers for you to wear inside. You had once confessed that you were nervous about scratching up his nice floors in the mansion, so he did a combination of getting more rugs and custom commissioning Trender for a pair of satyr slippers for you to wear around the house so you don't have to fret, and they're the softest fucking things you've ever walked on and he feels so proud to be able to get you a gift like that that you enjoy so much. If you ever want or need custom satyr-approved clothing, you can just feel free to ask him and he will get it for you, no matter what, as he loves spoiling you and getting you useful gifts.
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polarisjisung · 8 months
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ASKING NCT DREAM TO PAINT YOUR NAILS
MARK: he would be scared to mess it up, probably would mess up a lot, but he'd be so concentrated, like he'd watch tutorials on how to properly paint nails and he'd start practising on himself until he got better and then he'd paint your nails all the time
RENJUN: would be shocked that you asked in the first place but totally down to do it, literally a whole nail tech, would be doing up the most intricate designs, maybe hiding his name in there a couple times and then when you start to notice he'd give up and just openly add an element of his name, like a cute R in a heart on your index finger, or something small like that into the designs— doesn't do them often but would enjoy it a lot
JENO: after you got sick of him asking to paint his nails for you, you decide to teach him how and he'd just start painting yours with fun colours, because the bright colours/ pastels wouldn't "fit his vibe" also would show your nails off to the dreamies and staff so proudly until they told him how bad he was that he started painting them every chance he'd get, taking off old layers of polish to try and do an even better job than his last try (just know he does in fact, still ask you to paint his nails)
HAECHAN: would come to you one day with all the nail supplies in the world, and would end up using like 5 max, definitely uses it as an excuse to hold your hand, would purposely make a mistake so you can get all pouty (because you would never actually say anything to him after he tried so hard to make them look pretty) and he can fix it up later, would match with you, like half a heart on your nail and the other half on his, brags about it to all the guys, maybe even staff, possibly some strangers
JAEMIN: he notices you struggling to paint your dominant hand one day so offers to do them, takes a good hour to do 5 nails (you would too so you're not complaining) but does them pretty well, even does a little cuticle care afterwards and definitely likes sending you nail inspo, would sulk a little (lot) if you were going to get your nails done since he can't paint them with you and feed you snacks while you do your nails together, but would totally pay for your new set— a big advocate of super fun nails, like new styles and bright colours ++ LOVES seasonal nails
CHENLE: wouldn't be opposed to the idea, just doesn't love it a lot, until he finds out about all the meanings of the colours, safe to say he throws out all your white polish, loves seeing how happy it gets you, even if he does a trashy job, so he starts doing it more often and even comes to you excitedly sometimes with the bottle to do them himself, might even paint them in your sleep
JISUNG: he's hesitant and he's practically certain he'd be all shaky and give you a horrible paint job, but he'd be surprisingly pretty good, you've never seen him so still in your life, posts him painting your nails on his story so everyone can see how good a boyfriend he is, likes filing your nails into shape, with puffed concentrated cheeks, because he likes watching the nail dust fall off, definitely shapes your nails into stilletos so you can "use them for self defence" unfortunately he ends up getting scratched by them a lot more than either of you would like
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NOTES: this was initially a jaemin thought and then I ended up with this
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soulcandi · 6 months
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𝑶𝑵𝑳𝒀 𝑻𝑯𝑰𝑵𝑲 𝑶𝑭 𝑴𝑬 | 𝐝𝐚𝐥𝐭𝐨𝐧 𝐥𝐚𝐦𝐛𝐞𝐫𝐭
synopsis: dalton doesn't have the guts to make a move on the cute sorority girl that he's been stalking since orientation, but the demonic entity constantly peering over his shoulder does.
warnings: probs 17+ (just to be careful), stalking, obsessive behavior, paranormal type-shit, reader is stupid and also hot (think jennifer from that scene in jennifer's body where she's flirting with the band), the smallest hint of somnophilia, demonic possession, identity theft (lol), extremely dubious consent, dalton is definitely a little ooc, written with afab!reader in mind, y/n gets referred to as a girl.
a/n: title ripped from the ghost song. i love me some goth masked men. forgot the name of the frat so i just made one up. also, i just imagined a random dark spirit possessing his body, not the one explicitly shown in the film. but you guys do whatever you want. also, this is probably really cringy. I wrote most of it on 🍃 and didn't bother to proofread.
word count: 2078
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Dalton’s favorite hobby was a tricky thing. How could he bring himself to tell Chris or anyone else in his life that the first thing he wanted to do after a long day of classes was shut off all of the lights in his dorm and count back from ten until his spirit was standing over your bed, watching you sleep?
How could he ever come up with an answer for how he somehow knew every last intimate detail about you despite never having spoken to you a single day in his life?
The easiest solution was to keep his hobby a dirty little secret right up until he graduated and moved a million miles away from campus. It’s not like he could ever look you in the eye anyway—the cute little sorority girl who approached him shyly during orientation and asked him to help carry a mini-fridge up the staircase of the Kappa Delta house. You were all glitter and smiles and infectious laughter and ignoring you was like trying to ignore sunlight. It just wasn’t done. 
Dalton hadn’t smiled since long before the funeral, but you coaxed one from his lips like it was the easiest thing in the world. It was impossible for him to up and forget something like that, especially when, as he went to wipe the sweat from his clammy palms, there was pink glitter plastered across the lap of his jeans. You effortlessly infiltrated every aspect of his life, pumping through his veins like some drug he couldn’t name. His entire world revolved around you and the best part about it was that you didn’t have the faintest clue.
Watching you was more of an addiction than a hobby to Dalton. Not in person, god. Never. The last thing he ever wanted to do was freak you out—to scare you. But what was the harm in flinging his backpack across the floor, shutting off all the lights, and letting his spirit travel to your room on the second floor of the Kappa Delta sorority house? He wasn’t hurting anyone by sitting on the corner of your bed while you flipped through your homework booklets and nibbled on the tips of your perfectly polished fingernails. 
Dalton’s favorite moments were when he caught you in deep sleep, tossing and turning in one of those silky little numbers that he instantly grew to love. You had them in every color, alternating throughout the week. They hugged you in such a dangerously perfect way, riding up over your plush thighs as you mumbled under a thick blanket of dreams. He made a home for himself in the furry pink armchair across from your bed (when it wasn’t stacked high with laundry, that is), treating himself by watching you breathe. It was mesmerizing how the fabric would ripple across your body while your chest rose and fell with each shallow breath.
It only took a few days for that guilty pleasure to bleed into his weekly routine. Dalton only realized things were starting to get out of hand when he found himself drawing you. 
Doodles on the corners of his syllabi turned into sketches in his notebook, which eventually turned into 24x30 charcoal portraits that took up most of the wall space in his dorm room. Art was his second nature and as soon as he returned from one of his nightly haunts, he was powerless to control the charcoal nub that somehow found its way into his hand. Dalton had to immortalize you on paper. Otherwise, he would have no choice but you seek you out in the dead of night over and over again until your image was burned into the back of his eyelids. 
A full week after he first saw you during freshman orientation—informative sorority flyers stacked tall in your arms, barely hiding the Greek letters stamped across the front of your cropped shirt—he turned in his very first sketch of you for an art critique. Professor Amagan was pleasantly surprised by his change in subject matter. Goodbye bloody red door, hello sleeping beauty. 
She had wanted to pin it up in the showcase at the front of the arts building but the thought of you ever stumbling upon it made a fiery hot wave of mortification spill over Dalton’s entire body. What would you even say to a lifesize portrait of your own sleeping body drawn by someone you’ve never spoken to before? He would count himself lucky if he wasn’t expelled on the spot.
Dalton hastily accepted his passing grade and shoved the charcoal drawing to the very bottom of his portfolio, never to see the light of day again. Unless, of course, he was cram-studying for midterms and couldn’t afford the time to go and visit you. In this instance, he would lock his door and prop you up beside his desk to steal quick glances at while he worked. But it never sated that itch inside of him—the one that reared its head when he caught the faintest ribbons of your perfume in the air as he marched through the courtyard with his head down. 
Dalton wasn’t proud of himself. Not for this, anyway. White hot shame burned at his heart whenever he caught your eye from across the dining hall or the library by accident. You were forbidden fruit on campus—the sweetheart of the most powerful fraternity and the stuff of everyone’s dreams besides. He should have felt forever guilty for stealing your private moments for his own pleasure. But fuck if you didn’t make it so hard for him to quit. 
Tonight, like every other night this week, Dalton flicked off his bedside lamp and yanked the nightlight out of the wall, plunging the room into thick and heavy blackness. He counted back from ten until he no longer felt the weight of his physical body holding him down, then blinked his eyes open to see a world illuminated with an otherworldly faint blue light. 
The walk to sorority row only ever felt like seconds. The spirit realm was like a highway in that sense. He slipped through the front door of the Kappa Delta house like a ghost. He was a ghost. And you were his all-time favorite haunt. 
You were already asleep when he crept to the door at the end of the hallway with your name plastered across the frame in glittery bubble letters. You always went to sleep with your desktop lava lamp flipped on. It painted your face in a warm glow as you slept and Dalton couldn’t help but wonder if maybe you were just as afraid of the dark as he was. The thought coaxed a pleasant shiver down his spine. Maybe you were just waiting for someone like him to come around and tear that fear to shreds. 
Your face was buried in your arms, one leg hiked up to your waist over the sheets. A massive sleepshirt clung to your frame, slipping off of one shoulder just enough to highlight the fact that you weren’t wearing anything underneath. 
Dalton bristled at the sound of something soft and light floating through the air and reached down to pull the pair of boxy headphones off of your ears, cupping one side close to his face.
♫ “In the silence of your room, In the darkness of your dreams, you must only think of me, there can be no in-between.” ♫
You rolled over, limbs twitching with a sleepy moan as you subconsciously turned your back to the light. Dalton shook his head with a quiet chuckle, folding the headphones and setting them down on your bedside table. You shouldn’t go to sleep with your music so loud, he silently chastised you. It wasn’t good for you. But he honestly would have said anything to make this feel right—to relieve himself of even just an ounce of the guilt he felt for standing there above you in your most vulnerable state. 
He liked to think that you felt him there watching over you like some sick and twisted guardian angel. Maybe you actually took notice of all of the little things that he did for you when you weren’t even aware that he was in the room. Killing spiders, plugging in your phone when you were too sleepy to do it yourself, hiding contraband before the Kappa chapter president barged for a room sweep. 
Dalton didn’t want to believe that someone could be so effortlessly and unknowingly perfect every single moment of their life. But here you were, leaning into his touch when he failed to fight the urge to stroke your jaw with the edge of his knuckle. A shaky breath shivered past his lips in response to your sleepy exhale. 
You were so pliant. So defenseless. Swallowing thickly, Dalton took his opposite hand and brushed a flat palm over your exposed thigh, watching with sick fascination as goosebumps rose across your flesh in the wake of his gentle touches. He simply couldn’t help himself, only flinching when your face screwed up in that adorable way that it always did when someone dared to deny you of something you wanted. 
Dalton paused with his hand outstretched toward your body, a sudden tidal wave of realization washing over him. God, I am such a creep.
 “Jesus Christ,” he whispered before realizing he’d spoken out loud and slapping a hand over his own mouth. He never knew if you could hear him when he passed between the realms like this, but just to be sure he always made a point of never saying anything until he was back in his own body. 
You shifted again, pulling the blanket up over your chin to ward off the sudden chill that crept into your room. 
What am I doing? 
I need to get the hell out of here.
Dalton never considered quitting his little addiction cold turkey. But whatever spell you had put on him for the last few months had finally run its course and he was going to take back whatever semblance of dignity he could before it was too late. 
The walk back to his dorm felt decades-long and he took the time to mull over everything in his head, searching for any way to make himself feel right about this. But it was hard to do anything other than mourn the loss of what had quickly become his saving grace while he navigated this new phase of his life. Portals and demons meant nothing to him as long as he could watch you sleep, knowing that he would be there to ward off anything that tried to hurt you. 
Dalton stopped dead in his tracks outside his door. It had slid open with ease but the tension in the air was so thick that the thought of crossing the threshold made his blood run cold. His body was there, right in the corner where he left it earlier that night. 
Only…hadn’t he been lying down in bed when he left to visit you? Why was his body now halfway across the room? And why was it moving?
“What the fuck?” he breathed, drawing out each syllable as he watched it blink. The eyes of his physical body shifted to an inky black for just a split second—he saw it—before they melted right back to blue. Dalton watched frozen in the doorway as the entity inhabiting his body glanced down to inspect the hands of its new vessel, turning them over to study his palms before squeezing them into tight fists. 
Satisfied, its gaze fell to the doorway where he stood in spirit. It couldn’t see him, not truly. But it could still smell the horror oozing from him through the hole he had torn between the realms. 
“Hey!” Dalton barked, but his voice was an echo that barely reached his own ears. It bounced off of the empty space all around him. The demon compelled his body forward, walking to the mirror on the other side of the dorm and leaning all of its weight against the glass. “That’s—hey!”
It combed a hand through its hair—his hair—and ran a slack hand over the bottom half of its face. An inhuman smirk grew over its lips and Dalton shivered as it made direct eye contact with him through the mirror, testing his voice like it had gone eons without a set of lungs to force its words through. 
“You’re pathetic.”
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First off, I wanna say that I mean no disrespect to the artists who worked on Hazbin Hotel. It’s just that I’ve been seeing people make redesigns of Hazbin characters, and though I don’t usually participate in stuff like this (it seems fun, and you are all incredibly talented. I just feel kinda bad tinkering with someone else’s work like this), the show made me frustrated, and frustrated induced brain-vomit started sloshing around in my skull so noisily that it’s been keeping me up. And, well, I had to get it out somehow.
So…here ya go, I guess. It’s nothing crazy or new. It’s just a few disgustingly rough ideas for this very specific version of Charlie that I kept seeing in my head. They’re far from polished or anything, and they’re definitely missing some key details because I’ve been hyper-fixating on trying to get the face right lol. I might make a full body illustration later, but I have commitment issues so who knows how far this’ll go. That is to say, don’t expect any more of this or the other characters unless 1) my brain decides to torment me with more literal demons or 2) I, by some miracle, become a more productive person. Plus, Tumblr’s a new thing for me, and I don’t know what I’m doing with this yet other than posting art and then disappearing for years. Seriously, you have no idea. It’s a wonder that I posted for a second time.
Anyway, the direction of this design is pretty obvious. I went with the lamb/goat motif because I liked the idea of inverted/parallel symbolism. I was toying with a “wolf in sheep’s clothing” concept where they appear to be a lamb in this form but actually shift into a more wolf-like dragon sorta thing when prompted. Their wardrobe is supposed to be an extension of the innocent lamb deception as the ruffles and looseness are meant to be kinda reminiscent of fluff while communicating a sense of privilege (a white untainted by the grit of Hell… something that probably wouldn’t last long). I was also inspired by white goth and catholic goth aesthetics (I blame Ethel Cain) as well as those insanely beautiful ball-jointed dolls. I don’t know if I captured that well (to be honest, the more I look at those digital renditions, the more I hate them). I considered adding a pair of spectacles coz I thought it was cute lol, and because I thought it could be a way for them to try and seem more human.
If I were doing a rewrite (which I have ideas for, but I should probably focus on my actual original characters instead) then:
1. They would be agender and androgynous (I’d go the Good Omens route and make most angels/non-human entities largely genderless as gender is a human construction, one that most angels wouldn’t really concern themselves with)
2. They would be kinda elitist and naive but still sweet
3. Their intentions would not be entirely insincere, but they would not be acting without selfish goals
4. They would be an eldritch abomination
5. There would be possible exploration of their role as an antichrist as well as basically being a tool of war for their papa’s self-gratification
6. Their pops would suck
7. More horror
8. Like, it wouldn’t not be funny…but horror’s my genre so….
9. They would not suck at fighting, but death is traumatizing and so is being the cause of it (squeamish)
10. That being said, could make friends with Death??
And that’s all I feel like writing. Hopefully I update this lol
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epiclamer · 1 year
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hey, could you do a hero caretaker x villain whumpee where the villain comes to the hero and needs help. So the hero helps them through the usual whumpee trauma reovery steps, sorry if this is confusing, I haven't done many requests before. Thank you in advance, I love your works so much, you are so talented and cretive.
Eyyyy thanks for the compliment and request! You did great!! (With help from my pretty princess @save-the-villainous-cat )
cw: trauma (could be interpreted as mental, physical or sexual violence just be careful!)
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Used
Both their hands were up in surrender. “D-Don’t shoot.”
Hero didn’t laugh. They were too busy trying to wrap their head around how the villain had managed to make it to their front steps in their condition.
It looked bad. Really bad.
Physically and mentally, Villain was a wreck. Hero hadn’t wasted anymore time in letting them in, guiding them to the couch and turning on the stove.
On the sofa, Villain worked their own wounds, cleaning and bandaging while Hero worked in the kitchen, cooking with the few ingredients in their cupboards. They didn’t prompt the criminal and they definitely didn’t touch them, the last thing they wanted to betray was the villain’s touch now.
Idly, Hero stirred a pot of pasta as it boiled. “Do you want to talk about it?”
Villain was close enough to hear—their flinch proved that—but they kept up their healing, otherwise unbothered by the hero’s last request. If they weren’t ready, Hero wouldn’t press them, but they had a terrible itch in their brain that pestered them about their lack of knowledge.
They didn’t ask again, not until the pasta reached a perfect cook, then sauce and cheese melted together to create a perfect balance and it was all stirred equally and dished into two separate bowls. Hero walked it over to the couch, placing both bowls down as they silently reexamined the villain’s work on their wounds. Trying their best not to judge the sloppy stitches and loose gauze pads.
“Mind if I?”
Villain nodded, trading out their medical supplies for a steamy bowl of noodles that smelled heavenly. With so little on hand, Hero sure knew how to cook a meal.
As gently as possible, the crime-stopper began to tidy the prior work. Their perfectionism kicking in as they righted every bandaid and flushed out every scrape. It was unnecessary and hard work, but it took their mind off the millions of questions tumbling around in their head.
The villain’s bowl was polished clean after only a few minutes. They gobbled down every last bit like they hadn’t eaten in weeks—which was probable since they looked thinner than ever before, in the most unhealthy way possible. Every time the hero glanced at them, they slowed down, pretending like they had more self control than they presented.
It wasn’t believable, but it gave them a false sense of control, which must’ve been consoling in the moment.
“I let my guard down once.” Villain chuckled, tears glazing their eyes as they stared off into space. “And they use me.” They shook their head, feeling the tears fall freely down their cheeks. “Like I’m a fucking animal.”
Hero let them talk, burying things was only going to harm them more. If they needed an outlet, Hero would always be available.
“I thought it was only going to be a few hours, Hero, I thought they were going to leave.” Villain leaned back against the sofa arm, throwing their head back as they laughed even harder, slipping into their horrible memories. “They. Never. Fucking. Did.”
The hero checked a particularly lazy stitch that would reopen soon. It was heartbreaking to hear the villain’s story and see the actual results of their mistreatment.
With the uttermost care they could come up with, the took the medical supplies and gently cut the strings and restitched the whole thing. The villain didn’t seem to mind.
“People say pain makes you stronger,” the villain said. “But it doesn’t. It makes you feel miserable. Being used like that…”
Hero tried to sympathize, they really did, but they had no concept of what the villain had gone through. Sure, they had had their fair share of gruelling interrogations and knifepoint fights, but nothing like this. Not anything like this.
“I understand.” They didn’t, and the villain knew that. But it felt wrong to say nothing in the silence that hung thick in the air.
Villain didn’t answer, eyes clouded as they relived the past, suffering from merely their mind now, but that was the hardest to escape.
“You’re going to be okay.” Hero squeezed their arm gently, egging their attention to return to the present. It worked, a little, and Villain glanced at them with sunken eyes. Through the exhaustion Hero could’ve sworn they had seen a flash of hope if only for a second.
“Thank you.”
Both of them slept in the hero’s bed that night, apart but still together, a feeling they had both missed dearly.
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linkemon · 8 months
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Boysband AU headcanons (4ggravate) 2
Friendly reminder that English is not my first language. You can check my Masterlists both in English and Polish here.
For those unfamiliar with the concept, 4ggravate is the Sumeru guys who started a boyband. It comes from the same series as the widely known in the fandom 4nemo.
Working with idol groups involves trends changing like in a kaleidoscope. When 4ggravate entered the scene, it quickly became clear that they would conquer the world. Your label, after the huge success of 4nemo, decided to take another boys under their wing. You didn't know then how much work you would have to put into promoting them on the market...
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Kaveh
✧ The most expressive member of the group. You'd even say it makes up for everyone else in this regard.
✧ Always there if you need to record additional video or behind-the-scenes content. This is what his fans see most often and he is the most into social media.
✧ It also has its downsides. Kaveh can be dramatic to the point where it's annoying. If he feels like it, he will walk out of the meeting with the film crew, complaining and slamming the door. Unfortunately, it will often be up to you to bring him back to finish the ad.
✧ He and Alhaitham are constantly arguing, which was a shock to you because they've known each other the longest out of the team. You usually try not to take sides or take turns so that neither of the two will take offense at you.
✧ Kaveh will dance, play, sing... He will fill any role if need be and he will be good at it. However, he feels the best while playing instruments.
✧ He studied architecture and constantly reminds that he knows art. However, this is not idle talk. He happens to come up with brilliant ideas about clothes or scenery while shooting music videos.
✧ Drinks secretly outside the studio. He almost got busted once when someone from the management decided to come to the apartment to hand over the documents but you just arrived before them and managed to put the can in your purse at the last minute.
✧ He wanted to thank you somehow and gave you the keychain. He once bought some handmade ones. He gives them only to exceptional people in his opinion.
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Cyno
✧ He as an innate sense of justice. You can be sure that if anyone sees someone hurt, it will definitely be Cyno. He never stands aside. He immediately confronts who he needs to, which often put his career on the line. He would probably be willing to sacrifice it for the greater good. For example, he points it out to the older employees if they use younger ones on the set. He does it even at the cost of unpleasantness towards him. He has earned a reputation as unapproachable and stickler among industry associates.
✧ He loves to play cards. He collects entire collections of them. His favorite card game is TCG Genius Invocation. It got you interested enough to get into it. He's very happy about that because being in 4ggravate has made it a bit difficult for him to find someone he can physically play with without spreading rumors. He loves to explain the new rules to you and show you what he has hunted for his collection.
✧ There was a time when, like Kaveh, he argued with Alhaitham. Whatever happened, one day he came back changed. Since then, they've at least respected each other and making your life a little easier.
✧ He is often given rap parts to sing. Mainly because of his low voice.
✧ Fans marvel at how different he can be. The media tried to create his image as quite dark. This is how new fans often see him. Meanwhile, when they spend a little time with him, they understand that this is not the case at all.
✧ A dedicated Cyno fan site was created to collect his jokes. They are very dry. Some people even send him their suggestions for him to tell on streams.
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Alhaitham
✧ Alhaitham believes in peace and quiet. You asked him once why he stayed at 4ggravate then. He replied that in this way he would earn enough to have money for his dream life for a long time. He calculated it all. He even showed you the entire spreadsheet on the computer.
✧ You don't know how he does it but he's learning all the time. Be it from books or from various types of courses. Ask him anything, about everything. He will always have an answer.
✧ He writes the lyrics of the songs. With no exception. He has a gift for words. He always knows how to put them together to use rhymes or puns. Composing is not his strong point, so the worst moment is when he has to collaborate with Kaveh, who is better in this field. Not that he would ever admit it.
✧ If he could, he would avoid interviews and meetings with fans. He doesn't like any of these activities. He goes mostly because he has to. For this reason, he does not have as many fans as Kaveh, but he is not very interested in it. The people who choose him as their favorite are usually those who are deeply interested in his words and where he draws inspiration from. And they always get accurate and in-depth answers that make him their number one forever.
✧ He does not part with the headphones. So much so that it became his sign. One time Kaveh took it for fun when he wasn't looking and broke them. You didn't want them to fight again, so you took the blame and returned it to him after it was fixed. He immediately knew it wasn't you and made you promise not to take the blame on yourself again. Despite this, the next day, there were notes on your desk regarding the marketing strategy for the next quarter. Interestingly, better than you'd ever do yourself...
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Tighnari
✧ Tighnari has a very sensitive musical ear. Thanks to this, he remembers songs extremely quickly, especially new ones and perfectly matches the rhythm by dancing. He is usually praised above all for his flawless choreography.
✧ The boy is vegan. He deeply believes in unity with nature. In his opinion, there is no need to use animals in this way. Half of his social media consists of this.
✧ Helped launch an eco-friendly line of stuffed animals called Aranara. He gave you one of his first pieces as a thank you for helping with their publicity campaign.
✧ He lives in the belief that being an idol will allow him to convey certain values to his fans. He attaches great importance to the educational aspect. He often comes up with themes for new albums and is able to cleverly combine them with previous or subsequent ones.
✧ Tighnari is known for his sarcastic statements, which is why interviewers love him. He skillfully sweeps them away and hits remarks back, making them borderline controversial. Their viewership is really high.
✧ Hates the heat. You used to shoot scenes for a music video in the desert. You remember that he was perfectly prepared then. That's not to say he didn't complain about the heat but he was one of the few members on set who didn't get sunstroke. He reminded you regularly to drink plenty of water and lent you his hat.
✧ At the beginning of his career, he received a headband with rabbit ears from his younger friend Collei. When they were younger, they attended several survival camps organized by their school together. To this day, she is his biggest fan. Tighnari only pulls out these ears on special occasions.
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avelera · 2 months
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So I was re-reading my Amnesiac!Nicky/Joe from the Old Guard fic, Lights Out, as I try to polish off the last chapter while the inspiration is still with me (like...4 years late, I am so sorry orz) and for the record I listened to so many historical lectures to write this fic like, dear lord, basically took online lecture courses on Middle Eastern history, which is was almost entirely new to me, on Islam, on the Crusades, just... so many lectures on the Crusades. It basically sparked an actual interest in me in the Medieval Era ( was an ancients-only girly before that and really didn't see the appeal), because actually if Nicky was from Genoa in 100 CE it would have been easier to write him than 1100 CE because the mindsets are just so foreign in that time.
So anyway, since then I've continued listening to lectures, definitely picked up a bunch while writing Dreamling stuff because hey, I'm a slut for immortals and I always use the hyperfixation to delve into new historical eras. And sure, in the years since with all the new lectures I've listened to, going back to re-read Lights Out has revealed some things I would have done a bit differently, some ways I might have better portrayed a Medieval mindset in Nicky than what I did, but for the most part, they were gratifyingly minor!
Until I listened to a lecture on Catholic history and realized the single biggest historical error in the entire fucking fic.
See, I was raised Catholic, got out literally as soon as possible, but I have an enduring interest in the Catholic Church and its history as an institution. So while writing Lights Out, brushing up on Catholic Church history besides the Crusades didn't really feel like a priority. I already knew a fair amount and from personal experience felt I could at least fake the perspective of a devout Catholic.
But there was one thing, one fucking thing I got entirely wrong and only learned it in the last week, after spending literal decades of my life studying European history.
I said that Nicky went to seminary school, that he fully became a priest and then was defrocked in order to go back to Genoa to be his father's heir after his elder brothers died of a fever. I was trying to reconcile the historically impossible idea floated in some Old Guard behind the scenes stuff that Nicky could be both a priest and a Crusader, because priests were actually forbidden from fighting in the Crusades.
But here's the thing: there were no seminary schools for priests until the 1500s.
Like, it was actually kind of a big deal and credited with one of the reasons that Protestants broke away was that there were so many shitty priests because no one was actually forced to even learn all that much about the Bible or the faith at all!
This blew my mind. I thought that priests got some sort of training and had some sort of school system going all the way back to early church but apparently I was completely wrong.
Probably the more accurate thing would be to say Nicky was in a monastery and got training there and was forced to leave.
But the whole idea I had around him having actually completed some sort of training before being yanked back to secular life? Completely anachronistic for another 500 years argghhh....
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raythekiller · 11 months
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what are your personal headcanons for the pretty ladies? i don't see enough people requesting them 😭
🗒 ❛ General Headcanons ༉‧₊˚✧
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Featuring: Kate The Chaser, Clockwork, Jane The Killer, Nina The Killer
#Notes: on god I love women
˗ˏˋ back to navigation ´ˎ˗
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꒰⸝⸝₊⛓┊Kate The Chaser
She used to be in the track team while in highschool, which is why she's so fast now. Not mute, but basically non-verbal, so like Hoodie she communicates mostly through notes or ASL. When she does talk, her voice is very low and raspy, never above a whisper. Almost never spends any time in the manor, opting instead on sleeping in a tent in the woods around it, even though she has a perfectly good room waiting for her. Speaking of her room, it has basically no decoration or personality in it since she stepped inside of it like, 2 times since joining Slenderman.
Genuinely loves kids. Sally calls her "Aunt Kate" and it's just the cutest damn thing ever. Kinda wishes she could have some of her own, but given her environment that's pretty out of the question. Actually quite good friends with Hoodie and Toby, having a sibling relationship with both of them. Hoodie because she likes the fact he can't speak and they communicate in a similar way, plus he's just pleasant to be around, and Toby because she genuinely finds his shenanigans funny (even if she never laughs). However, doesn't like Masky one bit, and he's one of the main reasons why she works alone instead of with the other proxies. Also, super random, but she listens to Billie Eilish.
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꒰⸝⸝₊⛓┊Clockwork
She has a buzzcut and I WILL fight anyone on this. Long hair gets in the way of her killing, also the hoes love bitches with short hair. She's a total womanizer, even though she's technically bisexual, women just hit different for her in general. Toby actually had a thing for her for the longest time and was pretty obvious about it, but in all honesty she finds him... Well, weird, so it was a hard no from her and now they kind of have this bad blood between them and avoid being in the same room together cause it just gets awkward. She loves drawing, mostly tradicional art with no colors, and hands it on her bedroom walls. They're covered head to toe in various different sketches.
Again, speaking of her room, it's the definition of those indie rooms you find on Pinterest. She loves plants as has like, 20 of them just laying around on shelves, windowsills and the floor. Also, she's not super into videogames, but she loves The Last Of Us and got Ellie's tattoo on her arm (y'know, the one with some plants and a moth). She has a guitar, but honestly spent more time decorating it with stickers and such than learning how to play.
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꒰⸝⸝₊⛓┊Jane The Killer
My version of Jane is Jane Richardson, the one who was a government experiment, so she's one of the only creeps (if not the only one) who doesn't live in the manor or talks with any of the others. In fact, she hates almost all of them. Not as much as Jeff, but still. The only person she's okay with is Clockwork because they met before she even knew Natalie was a serial killer and found her flirting funny, so they're kind of friends now despite the probabilities. When she does bump into some of the other creeps, Masky avoids her like the plague (she scares him). She's a trad goth AND listens to the music, mostly Evanescence and Within Temptation.
Definitely knows how to play the piano. Personality speaking, she didn't change much after the tragedies happened - she's still the loving, caring person she was before, even if a bit more cynical. She believes in kindness and how it persists even in the worst of situations, and she's not about to let some emo bitch boy turn her bitter.
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꒰⸝⸝₊⛓┊Nina The Killer
Has every nail polish color in existence and is the reason why most of the creeps nails are painted (yes, even Jeff. She did it while he was sleeping). Speaking of Jeff, they actually don't get along in a mutual sense. Sure, she was obsessed with him, but that was before meeting the sleazy fuck that he actually is and not the prince she fantasized about. She does, however, get along great with Toby, who's one of the only people who can match her energy and so they hang out all the time. She was also obsessed with true crime and generally any morbid media, like Death Note (Misa was her bisexual awakening). Also, definitely collects Monster High dolls.
As any alt kid, she loves fashion and customizing her own clothes. Has patch skirts and tie-dye shirts and everything in between. Absolutely a scene girl, her favorite bands are Mindless Self Indulgence and Get Scared. May or may not write weird fanfic in the notes app about the singers, who knows. She loves playing Stardew Valley and will go days on end without sleeping, trying to save up enough money to upgrade her barn.
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