#the story is really fucking funny actually

[megumi-fm]

.

#okay random story time i don't know why im narrating this or how i even stumbled upon this memory rn #but i generally do sad vents in the tags and for a change this is a funny one #so back in highschool (i say highschool but i mean junior college) i used to visit this park near my house a lot #i was an sg kid back then and the thing about parks there is that they're kinda beach-parks and they have the best cycling/running tracks #they're also really massive parks so i used to go often. sometimes bicycling. other times walking. yeah. the park was like my sanctuary #anyway. there are quite a few bike rental areas in the park and there was a cute lil shop next to this one particular rental place #and they sold like biscuits and water and icecreams and stuff and i went there a lot #and on one particular day i went there and there was this guy around my age part timing at that shop #now again this might be culture specific bc i dont see it in india but part timing in uni/pre-uni is pretty common is sg #a lot of shops and restaurants employ teenagers to twenty something ppl for part time jobs... anyway im just adding context #point is that i had walked to the park with my mum that day and she told me to go buy a couple icecreams so i went to the shop #and i saw this guy around my age and like. not to be a simp but this dude was so pretty? #like he saw someone had come to the counter so he looked up and shot a smile and i thought i got slapped by sunlight #i could spend the next several lines going on about his pretty tan skin and his glowing raven eyes but this is pathetic enough so ill stop #anyway he saw me and smiled really wide (customer service smile- i thought to myself) and i smiled back and asked for icecreams or whatever #and then this guy started getting chatty right. so he was all 'you come here (to the park) often right? ive seen you with your bike a lot' #see now. the problem with me is that i always think im bothering people. this poor dude was attempting to make conversation #and i was replying with one word answers #and i wasn't even realizing that he didnt want that. bc he kept asking more questions and i. kept. shutting them down. #then when he gave me the icecream he was all 'are you here alone? icecream alone is no fun... i could keep you company if you want..?' #which. he was being really cute about right. but because im so fucking dense i was all 'oh no i came with my mom actually' #and he went 'aw man' in this really cute but faux sad way which i didnt understand at the time and i left and then #after three full fucking days. i realized this man was tryna hit on me? #and then i went to the park like a week later and he was gone. poof. i even thought of asking the uncle in charge of that place #then i got too embarrassed and chickened out #yeah so turns out my neurodivergence neutralizes any sort of rizz that comes my way #i could've been chilling with a cute boyf rn but no😩 this is my destiny #megumi in the tags

[bisexualnerd]

Hii i wanted to tell you i loved that last chapter you dropped, I saw the tag major character death and immediately went ah. so it’s one of those fics. where jay dies and it’s just hurt hurt hurt as the last note. Ahhh just—they haven’t acknowledged each other as brothers yet your honor 💔 and Tim knows now (great pretending your found family aren’t also vigilantes acting from him) and Jason never knew, like peak potential. I can imagine he’s gonna go ??? who the fuck pulled my baby bird into the vigilante business and uh why?? without knowing (if this goes like we all know) that Tim was the one who wanted to honor him and keep Robin’s legacy alive. Also I can imagine the whole imaginary friend think goes back to a box at the back at his head?? Timmy was just getting warmer to the truth and Jay goes out to pull this stuff. classic. (me being annoyed) — Aww but really poor Jay I can imagine he’s never felt more spiteful of the fact that his powers don’t extend to phasing through things and not just walls. jay in my head: cursing under his breath how he just gets partial danny phantom adjacent abilities, i mean if he’s gonna have a power why not have it full pump I-can-walk-through-walls-disappear-and-fly package.

really just really excited where u take the fic, hope u don’t mind my rambling, just wanted to drop my thoughts 💜💜 also like take your time, i hope im not adding pressure or anything

Ohmygosh it's been so long since I've got an inbox on Tumblr!! And of course I don't mind because I'm ecstatic!!! I love hearing you guys' thoughts about my writing!!!

And Jay's death is like, such a constant in the fandom (and when he doesn't die, he still gets injured and traumatised so severely). And there was no way Tim would have let the Waynes know because if he had done that, they would have never, under any circumstances, let him go out to photograph anymore 😂😂

I actually did initially draft up his power to be able to phase through everything, but then I remembered all my evil plans for the series and I was like, skrttt~ STOP! And I had to nerf him 😅 Now I can picture a side story, or a small part of a fic of him cursing his power in Ethiopia 😈 (and why is partial danny phantom adjacent abilities so freaking funny 🤣)

Thank you so so much for the really fun and lovely inbox!!! I hope the direction of the series in the future will keep you interested 🥰🥰

#batfamily #batfam #batkids #tim drake #jason todd #dick grayson #bruce wayne #ao3 #fanfiction #ao3 fanfic #batfam fic #alex answers #inbox

[docwritesshit]

hihi!!! can I request a traffic light trio x fem!goddess reader please!! (all separate head cannons!!)

Oooo this’ll be fun!

Traffic light trio x Fem!Goddess!Reader

Redson

With this one, yall met a celestial event

One look across the room and this one became so curious

You were someone newer, under the wing of Quanyin and still learning the ropes but getting the hang of it quite easily

So you two met, begrudgingly under Quanyins guidance

But Reds was very… nice and polite. Very different from the stories you heard

Then things evolved and here you were dating!

She visits you more often than you visit her, mostly because his father likes to joke they took after him

PIF and DBK both approve of this btw. They would be hypocrites not to.

Gifts and trinkets they made decorate your walls, however they are more mystical in nature

Loves loves loves when you send gifts back. Likes the the little swans you make to actually fly down to him the most

Dates consist of you guys walking the celestial heavens all day any day

Letters travel back and forth between you two a lot because yall are both pretty busy

What you don’t know is that they save all of the letters in order to craft you a swan of your own made up of the love he has for you

Cuddle up to him and watch them combust

MK

Ok he may have flown a bit too high while in his bird form and smacked you in the face-

Instantly transforming back and apologizing profusely

Then he gets stars in his eyes once he really looks at you

“Wow… you might be the goddess of my dreams- SORRY THAT SLIPPED OUT!”

Poor boy, he’s too cute for his own good

Once you start dating, he sends you so many doodles he’s made of you

So. Many. Doodles.

Even makes you a whole ass portrait for your anniversary

Yall both go to Flower Fruit Mountain for dates

Wukong keeps to himself, but gives MK proud smirks so damn often

Loves cuddling you. Snug as a bug in a rug when you hold him with all your robes flowing around

Makes you food. Is very particular on how he makes it cause you’re a goddess-

Loves star gazing with you and hearing all the stories you tell about different constellations

Oh my god he’s so fucking cute I can’t express how endearing it is

Would try and replicate a clay pot he saw and it would come out a muddled mess and you still cherish that thing

You are so protective of him if any other celestial tries to criticize you for dating the pupil of that “menace of a primate”

He has and will faint if you coo over him being cute. Do it, it’ll be funny

Mei

Honestly, pure fucking coincidence you two met

You were talking with the her uncle and she decided to crash in for a visit

Took one look at you and went “oh, cute. Imma keep her!”

And so you two are dating now-

Dates take place in Megalopolis mostly, she doesn’t really like the celestial realm and you haven’t seen a lot of the modern world

Likes to take you on motorcycle rides the most. The gleam in your eyes pales to the sun in her mind

Gives you her jacket if you get cold, even if you pint out you can just summon one of your own.

Loves doing your hair. Trying out different hairstyles is so fun.

Gets you a phone. Then sends you songs that remind her of you. You have so many playlists from her

Teaches you hand to hand combat with weapons because you never know when you need it

Loves hanging you off her arm and bragging how she bagged a “goddess”

You wanna know what’ll get her weak as well? Do her own hair. Face will be beat red. Do it.

That’s all :3

#lego monkie kid #lmk #lmk x reader #lmk mei x reader #mei lmk #lmk mk x reader #lmk mk #lmk red son x reader #lmk redson #lmk reader #traffic light trio x reader #lmk traffic light trio

[camping-with-monsters]

🌻“Promise?”🌻

#to be honest I’ve not been feeling great lately #up and down a lot #I’m content for now though #this originally was a vent drawing but like #turned into something warmer and nicer to look at #paused on working on it in favor of doing my recent animatic #I actually finished this yesterday but uh. didn’t post for some reason?? #I’m managing y’all ✌️😁 #luckily I’m going back into treatment for some mental issues I’ve been having lately #my mom made me an appointment to see a specialist #I might also be going back into therapy!! #I was in it for a couple months last year but had to quit due to a conflict of interest #/not neg #the story is really fucking funny actually #my old therapist was alright #nothing too special to be honest #nothing bad with him but eh. I’m sure there’s better ones out there lol #but yeah. I’ll be okay. I promise. #my sona #sona #ocs #original characters #The Kiwi Draws

[firethekitty]

last semester i wasn’t doing well in a very important class i needed to pass in order to graduate so i was working my ass off writing essays and shit and every time i started slacking i would bring up this image and i’d say “ah fuck you’re right vash i really need to keep working” and then i’d write for another two hours and i actually managed to pass and graduate and i honestly don’t know if i would’ve been able to without this picture. thank you vash

#i wanted to share this story i think it’s really funny #like ‘yeah i owe about 70% of my college graduation to an image of vash telling me to stop fucking around’ #talking #trigun #this is actually 100% true btw /srs #after 14k notes i feel the need to clarify that i did not intentionally bring this image up when i started fucking around #but he always seemed to find me. like when i looked at pics he was there. watching me. saying this. idk if that makes this funnier

[ghost-proofbaby]

IT WILL COME BACK (E.M.)

"honey, don't feed me - i will come back."

summary: when eddie came back from the upside down, he was different. and you finally come to realize just how different the man you saved truly is one night, when push comes to shove.

pairings: kas!eddie munson x reader

warnings: mentions of BLOOD (in sexual manner), mentions of BITING (in sexual manner), allusions to possible coercion (consent is still explicitly stated - trust me), mentions of death and trauma, mentions of eddie's canon death, taking a lot of creative liberty with expansive vampire lore across all media, mentions of murderous dreams? (eddie dreamt about killing reader idk), oral (f receiving), smut. MINORS DO NOT INTERACT - 18+ ONLY.

wc: 7.7k+

a/n: i told y'all i'd write a serious biting/blood kink fic one day - today is the day. very lazily edited so beware.

When Eddie came back from the Upside Down, he was different.

There were subtle changes at first. Small, minute details that were easy to ignore. Everyone could turn a blind eye to them — everyone figured they would fade once the boy healed. His healing was first priority, and whatever lingered after could be dealt with.

Get Eddie better. Then question all that lingers.

A simple plan. A genius plan. A torturous plan.

The two of you had been friends, if you could even call it that, prior to it all. Teasing in the hallways, working on school projects here and there when in shared classes, he was your favorite (and only) dealer when you craved something to make sleep come just a little bit easier. He had been familiar — an old ghost you'd grown comfortable with, long before you’d seen those large and wet eyes looking back up at you in the boathouse. 

Long before he’d pieced together the puzzle pieces as to why you’d needed the weed to cancel out the nightmares. Long before he’d processed exactly what those nightmares entailed.

But then, you’d fought for him. You’d fought with him. And most importantly, you’d bled with him.

God, you had bled for him. 

Something admirable had blossomed in that short time. Eddie’s entire life had fallen apart, thread by frayed thread, and that new planted emotion had been the only solid thing to emerge for him to absolutely cling to. You were more than a fellow classmate to pass by in the hallways. You were more than his favorite customer, always weaponizing fluttering lashes and puckered lips for a discount he’d have given you regardless. 

You were a force to be reckoned with, and had ignited a hunger in him like no other.

That’s all he had thought it was when he’d awoken in his living room — not the distorted version but the real one — to you screaming for the others to help you as you’d sealed his wounds. That’s all he had thought it was when you’d come to visit him as wounds turned to scars, and stabbing pains turned to hungering pangs. So he had tried to bury it, listen to Harrington and Wheeler and Buckley when they told him to take time to readjust. He’d locked away that hunger and focused on his healing, just as everyone else had, and told himself it was just residual feelings. 

Residual feelings had been bound to happen after seeing someone bloody their hands, with your own blood, for your survival. 

And in his burial, he’d never considered a similar hunger igniting somewhere deep within you.

You visited far more often than you should have. Returning time and time again to change his bandages, taking on one too many shifts at the hospital during his unconscious spells and baring your teeth for anyone who got too close. The sweet blood on your hands hadn’t washed away in that first shower; you swore, if you looked closer, you could still see the stain of nearly losing him across your knuckles. 

Physical wounds were easier to heal than the internal ones. It was easier to lather on antibiotic lotion than it was to sleep soundly at night. Both of you came to realize that quickly in the weeks that followed Eddie’s return from the dead.

His nights were plagued with bad dreams, with thirst and cravings he couldn’t quite name. He’d wake up, burning up from the inside out with a fever that never existed. Tearing skin. Puncture wounds. Blood spilling across floors and his lips alike. He could never tell if the shivers that traced his spine had been from the cruel visions that had become his nightly visitors or if it was due to his perpetual drop in temperature that had worried Nancy since the very first night home from the hospital, that had concerned the nurses who piled blankets atop him during his week long sleep of recovery. 

Your nights were even less kind. Horrific memories were the demons that haunted you — remembering the way you had watched Eddie cut that sheet rope, remembering finding him bloodied on the ground, remembering the warmth of his blood seeping across your palms and how when your ear had turned just as heated with it as you pressed it to his chest. Only to hear nothing. Emptiness.

His heart had stopped for minutes. Plural.

It had been your steady rhythm, your desperate hands and your gasping breaths breathing into his lungs. You’d sunk your claws into him, caught them right between his ribs and had decided he couldn’t leave you.

Some nights, when you wake up screaming, you can still taste his blood on your lips. You sometimes still swore that when you’d checked for a pulse after that, you hadn’t heard anything. Still worried that Eddie Munson’s heart never really restarted and resumed beating. 

The worst was when you’d stare through the faded grey of  mornings plastering across your room’s walls, and could still remember that initial look in his blown out pupils, once honey brown swallowed in pure black as he’d taken his first breath on his own. 

Hunger.

You’d felt it, too. Shame riddled you on the nights you’d come down from the nightmares and remember it; it was as though the Universe had snapped back into place the moment you’d watched his chest first rise. A need so ardent to remain at his side. A chain clicking into place, binding both yourself and Eddie to one another, unaware of just what price had been paid to keep the boy that had laid under you in this world. Unaware of the hunger you had struck the match too that would become both your downfalls.

And so it had been buried. Something alive, even with your doubts of Eddie’s liveliness, and choking on dirt while six feet under. You and Eddie, two sides of the same coin, had decided to not speak of it. He never told you how he had come to be able to pinpoint your heartbeat in every shared room he entered, throat burning as his gaze always settled on you, and you never told him of the matching aches that had shamefully sparked within your chest and between your hips for him. 

A hunger to be near one another. A hunger to devour. Neither of you really understood the heaviness.

“How are you feeling today, Eddie?” Steve asks as he sits on the edge of the new bed in the new apartment in the new part of town the Munson men now occupy. 

Government money could go a Hell of a long way. Especially after your home had been devastated by the aftermath of alternate dimensions and unheard of evil being defeated.

“Fine,” is the only response Eddie can muster.

In reality, every time anyone came near him now, he burned. His throat tightened till it was surely raw, he swore his teeth sharpened until a mere slip of his tongue against his canines could bring the taste of metallic blood to his mouth. His entire body would tense with every person that walked through his door.

Control. Whatever was happening to him, Eddie needed to exercise control.

“Just fine?” Steve continues on, not catching the drift as he puts down the bag of things he’d bought at Eddie’s request. Basic things — painkillers, packs of cigarettes, a 6-pack. Some habits die harder and can’t be controlled, “You look like shit, Munson.” 

“Gee, thanks, Stevie.” 

Everyone had assumed the dark shadows beneath Eddie’s eyes would fade. They assumed his cheeks would eventually fill back out. They assumed he could wash away the ashen shade his hair now flatly flowed in. It was as if the life had been drained from Eddie since that day, and they had all assumed it would eventually flow back into him. 

It never did. Just as his new hunger lingered, so did the look of Death.

“Sorry, man,” Steve throws his hands up, shrugging a bit before he stands, “Just being honest. It’s the best policy.”

“Is it? Is it really?” 

If honesty was the best policy, Eddie could have filled the room with it. He could admit about the nightmarish wants, needs, he’d been keeping at bay. He could admit the way his irritation had been growing this last week every time another body, another friend, walked through his doorway and it wasn’t you. You, who had begun to plague the night terrors. You, who Eddie was beginning to crave far more than he had before he’d stared the afterlife down the barrel of the gun. 

Steve just looks at Hawkins’ newest zombie boy, sighing, “Look, I don’t know what’s got you pissed off-“

“The whole dying thing, for starters.”

“-or why you’ve insisted on being an asshole to all of us these last few weeks-“

“Again, I died.” 

“-but you’ve got everyone but me scared to visit you. We’re all scared of you biting our heads off, dude,” Steve finally finishes with a scowl. 

Everyone. It’s unspoken that you’re included in the generalization. 

It occurs to Eddie that maybe, just maybe, he should be kinder if he ever wants the ache of yearning to see you again to fade. If that’s what he could call this ache.

By the time Steve has left, Eddie’s still thinking about his warning. About the way he had been unusually cruel since coming back to life, since waking up handcuffed to a hospital bed. It made sense initially. But he wasn’t handcuffed to a hospital bed anymore — he was home, or as close to home as he could get, and he was technically safe.

The issue was that he’d accepted his safety. Everyone who had wanted Eddie Munson dead was now six feet under themselves. No, the bigger issue at hand was everyone else’s safety.

Your safety.

Once he’d realized you were the staring lead in his violent fantasies, he had stopped calling. Half of your absence last week had been his fault. 

No one really bothered to look deeper into it. Steve didn’t press as to why Eddie’s fridge had remained empty, Nancy didn’t take second glances at the odd books on vampire tales that were now littering all the free real estate of Eddie’s room, and you hadn’t questioned the coldness of his tone whenever he spoke to you. The chill of his words had grown icier than his own palms, desperate to keep you at arm’s length until he figured out what had changed in him that day he came back to life. 

He wanted you near. He wanted to rip your throat out. He wanted your blood to stain his mouth and neck just as his had stained your hands. That was an issue. That wasn’t normal. 

Something had changed in Eddie Munson, and it had terrified him to his twisted core, and no one had cared enough to notice. Not yet.

–

It took you two weeks to be fed up with the radio silence. 

Eddie stopped calling even Jonathan (the only one of the group he found he didn’t want to devour whole, as it turns out). When everyone had mentioned it in passing, it had only reminded you of the sleepless nights you’d be enduring. That small voice in the back of your head that had called out to you in the dead of night, the whisper of come to me that echoed all the way across a broken town. 

Come to me. 

Sometimes you swore it was Eddie’s voice calling to you. Sometimes, you nearly left your own new apartment in the dead of night, and let your legs guide you to the undead boy you had single-handedly revived.

Tonight was one of those nights. Your stomach was twisting, your head was pounding, your bones were aching. Every single inch of you hurt as it listened to that soft calling, and at some point, you gave in.

Hunger. You were insatiable with the need and drive to be at Eddie’s side. Warnings from the others be damned.

One thing leads to another. You find your coat, you find your car keys. You find yourself driving the deserted streets of Hawkins in the middle of the night. You find yourself on the Munson doorstep, knuckles shaking and aching with the knowledge that just beyond the wood of the door, he was there. You don’t have to see him to feel him; his thrumming presence, his anchoring existence. 

Come to me. 

The door swings open before you get the chance to knock. This string tying your two souls together is not a one-way channel, it seems. 

“Why are you here?” 

You watch him wince as the harsh words leave him. Immediately, you know that the abrasiveness is on instinct. Just as something claws inside of you to be near him, there is something within him howling to keep you far from him. 

The polarity of two magnets. Some nights, surely, his twists in a way that would draw him to you, just as yours will twirl with the sensibility that whatever has changed within him should give you cause to run as far away from him as possible. 

But tonight, your magnetism only yanks you closer to him. He doesn’t even invite you in, and yet, you find yourself stepping over the threshold of the new apartment. 

“You’ve gone quiet,” you whisper as an answer. It’s not what he wants to hear, grimace deepening, nearly a scowl now, “I just… It’s been weeks. I…” 

I missed you. I needed you. I heard you in my dreams and I’ve never had much self-control when it comes to you. 

Magnets are a useless metaphor for whatever is happening here between you. A better comparison would be the cliche image of a moth to a flame; he’s dangerous, threatening to burn you alive, and you still find your heart fluttering after him hopelessly. You’re going to get scorned, and you’ll still never learn. You’ve fallen victim to a tired narrative that you’d rolled your eyes at in a plethora of books. How many times had you sworn that wouldn’t be you? Just how many eye rolls had you exhausted at the mere idea?

And now, here you were, on his doorstep. Grasping for something you’re not sure either of you can give. 

“I’ve been dealing with a few things,” he mutters as he shuts the door behind you, shielding you both from the chill of the night. The room is still cold, especially in his radius, “Didn’t think it would make much of a difference.” 

“You didn’t think I’d care if you just stopped calling?” you turn slowly, taking in the state of the living room. Wayne was clearly gone for the night, work most probably, and several books littered the coffee table. Eddie had been the one reading them, lounging on the couch. 

The last time you had seen him, he couldn’t even sit up in bed on his own. 

He’s keeping an unusual distance, nearly leaning back out of your vicinity, “Figured you were busy.”

He’s never been this short with you. His words are choked up, his body tense with pain. You assume it’s just his injuries bothering him.

You couldn’t be more wrong, but you’re completely unaware.

“I brought you back from the dead, and you think I’d still be too busy for you,” you laugh humorlessly, fully in disbelief at his pitiful excuse, “Eddie, we could find out Vecna didn’t really die, those damn cracks in the Earth could open right back up, and the first person I’d care about finding is you.”

The animal inside that had been yearning for his presence is satiated for now, but you can still feel it lurking in the darkest depths of your mind, ready to call out a new request at any moment. It’s the distraction that has you spilling pathetic truths. 

The only response he offers you is a dead stare. With eyes wide, pupils nearly swallowed up by darkness. 

“You could have called,” your voice cracks, body shaking with the effort not to take a step closer to him, “You could have just let me know you were still alive.”

“I-” 

He cuts himself off when he’s the one taking a step closer. His entire face twists with pain, and you give up keeping your distance. In an instant, you’re at his side as your hand reaches out for his bicep. 

He flinches away. Something inside of you burns. 

Your hand is hovering in the air between the two of you, and in this lighting, you swear the skin is still stained with the blood that won’t wash away. 

“Please don’t,” he begs, “I’m fine, but… please.”

You don’t know what he’s begging for. Distance, for you to pull your hand away, time – you don’t know what he needs. 

“We should sit down,” you insist, finally pulling your hand as far from him as possible but making no move to put the space back between you two, “Has anyone helped you with your bandages? If your wounds got infected-”

“They didn’t.”

“If you didn’t change the bandages, they definitely could have-”

“They’re not infected,” he grits out, but he’s still walking over to the couch regardless, “They’re healed.” 

Healed.

Mere weeks ago, those wounds were still deep enough to keep you from ever achieving a full night's rest. Deep enough to worry you to the core that you would wake up to them finally having consumed him. Deep enough that you all assumed it would take him months, not weeks, to recover.

“What do you mean they healed, Eddie?” you whisper, almost reaching out for him as he sits down. 

Your hand twitches, but the echoes of his begging and his flinching keep it at bay as you stand before him. 

“I mean, they healed,” he huffs, nostrils flaring as he takes deep breaths. He’s looking anywhere in the room but at you, his gaze subverting you with purpose. As though the mere sight of you, the mere proximity, is painful to him, “Don’t know how, don’t know why – they just did.” 

“So why are you still in pain?” 

A sharper intake of breath. A hush of silence falling over the apartment. Even the buzz of the building’s AC unit has faded from all your senses. It’s just you and him, and a heavy quietude like no other. 

Until he finally breaks the surface tension, breathing out, “You.” 

Your heart drops. That tug inside your chest, the one taut as you look at him right within your reach yet still so far away, almost snaps. 

“Me?”

He nods with a harsh swallow, “I- Look, I can’t explain it, but when I came back, I came back…” 

“Different?” 

He doesn’t have to explain it. You’d felt it.

The moment his eyes had opened, just moments after what should have been blissful victory. The taste of his blood heavy on your tongue, a terrible sweetness that had choked you rather than its initial metallic twang. The whispers of his voice in your mind. 

He wasn’t the only one changed from whatever had occurred that night. 

“Different is a good way of putting it,” he nods, looking up with apologetic eyes, “It’s not you. It’s cliche as fuck, but it really isn’t – it’s me. I died, and you brought me back, but I don’t think either of us knew the cost.” 

The yearning. The nightmares. The unmanageable needs. The hunger. 

“What was the cost?” 

He almost doesn’t hear you. Your voice is a whisper, tone weighed down with the curse of knowing. 

You might not have known the cost when you were pressing your palms into his chest through your wretched sobs, functioning as his heart and lungs for nearly a minute, but you think you might have a clue now. 

All that had been tethering you to him since he’d come back to you, all those webs and strings that had formed their knots around both of your necks. He’d changed, and you had plummeted right into the chasm of the unknown with him.

His blood on your tongue, sweet as honey. 

Blood shouldn’t be sweet. 

He grabs one of the books off the coffee table, motioning for you to join him on the couch. Under the weight of your realization, you’re nearly under a trance. All he has to do is wave a hand, and you follow. 

You’re at his beck and call. Just like you had been when he’d been calling out for you, yearning for you. 

“Don’t make me say it,” he mutters under his breath, tossing the book into your lap the moment you’ve sat down. This time, you’re mindful to keep your distance. 

This time, you’re painfully aware of the compromising situation the two of you have found yourselves in. 

The book is older, leather-bound and worn from years of readers’ careless hands breaking the spine. The corners of every page are weather, close to disintegration. The entire thing could easily pass for a Halloween decoration. 

It’s not. You flip open to the title page, and if Eddie didn’t appear so deathly serious at your side, you would have scoffed. 

“Dracula?” you question carefully, running a finger over the delicate script of the title, “Eddie, I don’t-”

“I’m not insane,” he interrupts you, “I’m not fucking- I swear to you. I’ve gathered up every goddamn book about it that I can. Fictional, nonfictional. Just- there’s obviously a Hell of a lot more fictional material to work with, okay?” 

A vampire. He’s convinced he’s a vampire.

And even worse – you’re convinced right along with him. 

You turn your head to look at him, trying to find the right words, but all you find is Eddie burying his face in his hands, head nearly hung between his knees. 

“I can’t eat normal food anymore,” his voice is muffled, “That was the first sign. Couldn’t stomach it, made me throw up for hours when I tried. And then all those nurses kept talking about how I was healing faster than they expected. Most of my smaller cuts – those healed in under a day,” he finally lifts his face just enough to turn and peer at you through all the stray curls that fall into his vision, “My vision and hearing were the next things I noticed. Remember how I had a nonstop migraine those first few days?” 

He doesn’t need to convince you, but the argument is compelling, “It… wasn’t a migraine.” 

He shakes his head. “Not even close. Just turns out that it’s a killer to get used to fucking superhuman night vision and impeccable hearing. I still can’t handle being out in the sun very long. I don’t… burn up or any of that shit, but… it just…” he trails off, shoulders falling in defeat before he throws himself back against the couch. When he continues, his tone is flat, devoid of all emotion, “I keep having these dreams about you, too. Bad dreams. Terrible dreams.” 

You shut the book, toss it back onto the coffee table, and decide to Hell with keeping your distance. 

You need it. Even if he’ll only allow you to get an inch closer to him, you need it. 

“What do you mean by terrible dreams?” you ask, breath catching at the end of your question as you scoot yourself closer on the couch. Even with such a small movement, Eddie is quick to notice, eyes flicking to you quickly with a sense of urgency flashing behind them. 

“Don’t,” he lowly warns. 

“What’s happening in your dreams, Eddie?” 

Another inch closer. His jaw clenches. 

“Sweetheart, do not-”

He doesn’t finish his sentence. Your knee bumps into his thigh, and you watch him go rigid. Hands turning to fists, eyes pinching shut and face twisting with the same pain he’d worn the ghost of when you first arrived at the apartment. 

The moment you touch him, you see it. The flashes of his nightmares, all those terrible actions haunting him every time he closed his eyes. You. Your blood. That hunger. 

Like a blackhole in the center of your stomach, it burns viciously as it sucks the air out of your lungs. It threatens to cave your entire being into itself until there’s nothing left. Not even a crumb of who you once were. 

But it's not yours. It’s Eddie’s. 

That pain on his face is only exhibiting a fraction of what he was feeling. That dizzying craving that he’d miraculously been keeping at bay since you’d simply entered the building, not even yet knocking on his door. You hadn’t even been in the same room as him yet, and he had still known. Had smelt you, had felt you. 

He could almost taste you. 

“You…” you have to shift your knee away from him, break the touch, break the connection, “You haven’t fed since you woke up.”

“I haven’t fed, period.” 

With the connection severed, he somehow finds it in himself to open his eyes once more. You don’t know how – if he’s feeling what you’d just been privy to, you’d be an incoherent mess on the floor. Something feral and unrecognizable. 

Although, maybe he was nearly there. You couldn’t see his pupils. That same look when he’d first woken up – a man swallowed whole by hunger. 

“You’ve been dreaming about ripping my throat out,” you say it as a matter of fact, not a lick of judgment in your tone. 

It wasn’t you scrutinizing him. It was what you had seen, with one simple touch. 

His voice is hoarse as he echoes in confirmation, “I’ve been dreaming about ripping your throat out.” 

You should probably be afraid. All your survival instincts should be kicking in, your feet should be carrying you towards the door, you shouldn’t be leaning in closer. 

“You know what really sealed the whole vampire ordeal though, sweetheart?” he breathes out, your eyes fluttering shut at the lull in his hushed tone. 

Just as you’ve been leaning in, he’s been slowly turning his body to face yours, hands twitching at his sides. He’s no longer retreating from your presence, sucking down breaths in harsh gulps the closer you grow to him. 

He’s losing control. You’re losing control. 

That thread, vibrant red as it draws you near him, is clear as day now. A noose around your neck. A road to your damnation. 

A road to your hunger. 

You hardly hum in response, completely entranced now. Had he ever been capable of this before? Of holding you beneath such an inescapable spell with such ease? 

Probably. 

He doesn’t use his words to answer. Instead, he finally takes the plunge. 

His head ducks down towards your neck just as his hands lose the war, grabbing onto your hips, dragging you dangerously close to him until his lips hovered just over your pulse point. And by some strength that you certainly don’t possess, he stops there. Letting his lips barely brush against your soft skin, breath coming out in pants for you to feel, to relish, to get lost in. And just as soon as those pants, those waves, become a comfortable pattern to succumb to, you feel them.

His fangs. 

Grazing over your sensitive skin. Sharp tips nipping at a surface they could so easily break, pierce with one wrong move. Your pulse is thrumming beneath the surface, heart racing painfully as Eddie’s grip turns bruising. 

Come to me. 

“Please.” 

You’re the one begging now. It goes against every rule you’ve ever seen applied in fiction. If a vampire is baring their fangs against your neck, you should be reaching for a stake. The only noise escaping you should be a scream for help, not the pathetic whimpers beginning to slip out. 

“I can’t,” you feel his gasp more than you can hear it. Your blood is too loud, roaring in your ears as you feel the fangs slip with his words, “I can’t.” 

That hunger you felt, the one that had called out to you through the night and led you right to his doorstep, is unavoidable now. You need him closer, you need him to do this. For the first time since you had saved his life and tasted his blood after the Upside Down, everything seems to click into place. All he needs to do is let them sink into you, take that final leap of faith and reprieve that ache you’ve battled for weeks now. 

You’re so close. So close. 

“Eddie, please,” you’re nearly sobbing, hands gripping onto his shoulders, trying to pull him in closer. 

But you’re no match for his strength. You don’t know if it’s a new addition with his vampire business or if there was always more to him than met the eye, but he easily stays stoic against your attempts, not moving a centimeter. Still hovering, still just barely making contact with your heartbeat. 

“I-” his head drops slightly, tip of his nose beginning to trail down the side of your neck, mouth no longer dangerously close, “You saw my dreams-”

“I trust you.” 

You do. You trust him even more now than you had when you first stumbled upon him in the boathouse. More than when he had pleaded his case, promised he hadn’t been the one to kill Chrissy Cunningham. The trust comes easier than breathing as his nose nuzzles into the junction of your neck and shoulder. 

“You shouldn’t,” he mutters, fangs now brushing your collar bone, “You really, really shouldn’t.” 

He doesn’t stop you when you move to straddle his hips. Your weight settles onto his lap, and he only fights to keep his face burrowed there in your shoulder, arms now moving around your waist to hold you tightly to him. 

His self-control is impeccable. You’d admire him and all this impressiveness another time, when something inside of you wasn’t lamenting his resistance. 

All at once, it occurs to you how to give him the final push. 

“Did I ever tell you how sweet your blood was on my tongue after I brought you back?” you start, sighing, rolling your shoulders to expose more of your neck, grip on his shoulders tightening, “All that blood, all those tears, and I still can’t forget how welcome that warmth of you was in my mouth. How I needed more. How I pictured it every night, after every nightmare-” 

He breaks. 

One moment, his nose is buried in your skin. And the next, his fangs are. 

You weren’t sure what to expect, but relief would have been low on your list. You gasp out in initial shock, but as you feel his teeth dig in, it’s as though something has snapped. The ache has been satiated, preening as you feel the warmth of your blood contrast the chill of his chin pressing into you. 

If there’s any pain, you don’t feel it through the haze of pleasure. 

Ice shards spread through your bloodstream, but the point in which Eddie’s mouth is connected to you radiates heat. He’s pulling you into him, letting go completely and relinquishing all that control as he nearly purrs against your skin in satisfaction. That connection is back, two minds linking with a heavy click, and you can feel all his pleasure mingling with your own. Satiation, desperation, adoration – the plethora of emotions all swarm your head and block out any better judgment. 

You’d let him drain you dry, if that’s what he needed. If nothing more than to hear those soft moans as his fangs sink even deeper. 

He pulls back too soon, though, suddenly and unexpectedly. Just as quickly as he had given in to both your desires, he’s putting an end to them. He hadn’t taken much blood, but your head is swimming from the loss all the same. Your grip has gone slack on him, hands slipping down to just barely cradle his biceps while his own touch stays unyielding around you. 

You can hear his thoughts. Or rather, maybe more aptly put, you can feel them. 

He wants to devour you. Wholly, ruthlessly. 

He looks up at you with pupils still blown wide, chest heaving and a small scarlet drip trailing from the corner of his mouth. For the first time since he’d come back to you, he looks alive. Hair fluffed in a halo around his head, skin tinted with a healthy glow and unmistakable blush, bags beneath his eyes faded for the time being. 

You were never quite sure if Eddie Munson’s heart had ever restarted, knew for certain that it hadn’t now, but you swear you can feel its pulse finally thrumming for you. 

I need more. 

It’s his voice in your head, echoing in the empty space as you look down with wild eyes to match his. 

But it’s your voice in his head when you respond instantaneously. 

Then take it. 

Something unspoken lies there in the need. He doesn’t move back to your neck, doesn’t bite down and drink his fill of your blood. He only stares for a few seconds, watching the welt of blood that pools from each puncture wound of his making. His eyes follow when it runs down your skin, as though he might lose it should he so much as blink. Down, down, down. Following the trail that his nose had followed minutes before, across your collarbone until it stains the neck of your loose shirt. 

My pleasure. 

His hold proves helpful when he quickly changes positions, roughly throwing you down onto the couch before he’s settled between your thighs, crawling his way up your body. He pays close attention to the maroon trail on your throat, his tongue cleaning up after his mess, savoring the taste of you on his tongue. 

Sweet as honey. 

His tongue only pauses for a moment over the bite wound, pressing into it, making your back arch as you press yourself fully into him. Your head digs painfully into the cushion behind you as you expose your neck, wanting and begging and pleading all without words. 

“I think we should take this off,” he plucks at the hem of your shirt, tugging hard before he begins to carefully lift. His freezing knuckles brush against your burning skin, eliciting a whimper from you, “Before we make an ever bigger mess. Don’t you agree, sweetheart?” 

A sultry tone you’ve never heard from him before. Honeyed words, familiar to how he once spoke, but entirely new in the way they curl around you. There’s a confidence there, a baiting that he’s luring you with. 

“Yes, please.” 

He could ask anything of you in this moment, and you’d be eager to comply. Fueled by your desire for him before the events of spring break, worsened by his new condition. A bright, red, vibrating thread. You couldn’t severe the tie if you wanted to. 

And you most certainly did not want to. 

Your shirt is removed, his hands careful despite the way they shake. His words may be smooth, but each move is jagged, the only sign you had that he’s still exercising control. 

“And these?” he whispers, lowering his lips to your sternum as he toys with the band of your pants. His fangs scratch down the center of your stomach as it quivers with each breath, careful to not break skin as they make their presence known. You nearly lose all capability to speak until he says, “Use your words, baby. Tell me I can take them off.” 

Yes. 

His eyes flare, looking up to you, “Use your words. Not your mind. I want to hear how badly you need me – I want everyone to hear you beg.” 

The words strike straight to your core. Lashing out in your lower stomach, burning deliciously. 

It’s more than putting on a show. He needs to know you want this. 

“Take them off,” you gasp out, hands wandering to tangle in his hair, “Take- Take it all off. I’m yours, Eddie.” 

Shaking hands perform a dance you had long since fantasized about. In easier days, when Eddie had been uninvolved in the episode down, heart still beating along as he would bounce his knees in front of you and his fingers would idly fiddle with his pencils and pens. A yearning, a wanting, you’d always held for the boy. 

He used to be an escape from it all. A pretty thing to daydream about when you weren’t worried about monsters. And now – he was one of the monsters. 

Your monster. Tied to you inexplicably, brought back by your hands and your stubborn efforts. 

His lips and fangs are one in the same, trailing along your body as he finds a home at the apex between your thighs. Even in undeath, he’s the most beautiful thing your mind could conjure. 

You’d forgotten how he was privy to your every thought until he reacts.

“You’re too sweet,” he murmurs, smirking salaciously as he mouths innocently at that sensitive skin of your inner thigh, tongue darting out to lick a cool stride before he breathes out against it. It has you writhing beneath his hold, “You’ve wanted this all this time, sweetheart? Wanted to see me, between these pretty thighs, making you scream my name?” His mouth falls open a bit wider, the sharp canines pressing but not sinking against where he had just licked. He holds there, eyes locking with yours, until he pulls back to cockily say, “Could’ve just said something, y’know. Didn’t have to bring me back from the dead to have me devoted to you.” 

Finally, finally, he lets his fangs sink back into you. The soft meat of your thigh is more pliant in his mouth, and he doesn’t linger as long as he had on your neck. One nick, just enough to start the blood flow, before he’s pulling back and licking hungrily at the scarlet liquid. Less for feeding, more for marking.

Marking you as his, just as you have with him. His methods just appeared a bit more physical. 

He’s quick to avert his focus on your cunt, no warning before the tongue still covered in your blood is taking long strides over your entrance and clit. Devotion. That was the only word to describe the way he was unraveling you, alternating between indulging in your sweet cunt and returning back to that bite, going as far to even sink his teeth in a second time to take a proper drink of you. His chin and lips grow slick with it all – with the blood, with your wetness, with his own saliva. A starved man with a feast before him. 

The way he’s rutting his hips into the couch as he slings your legs over his shoulders doesn’t go unnoticed. 

It’s a mess. A wonderful, satisfying, enchanting mess.

Beautiful. So beautiful, all mine. 

His voice has you teetering on an edge of new carnal pleasure. Completely consumed by him, your hands tugging viciously at his curls. His face is round once more, eyes and cheeks no longer sunken in, vitality being breathed into him with each taste of your blood. 

Let me touch you. Please.

You beg over that connection, trying your best to not buck your hips mercilessly against his tongue. You feel his wicked grin. 

“You’re already touching me, sweetheart,” he reaches up, untangling your fingers from his hair for emphasis before he’s pinning them to your sides, “And what did I say about using our words? Hm?” 

“Need more,” your voice is wrecked as you tilt your head back, wrists straining against his hold, “I need more.” 

You’re fully light-headed now, the blood loss finally catching up. Maybe you were about to let him drain you dry. 

And what a beautiful way to die. At the hand, at the fangs, of the one you had fought so urgently to bring back to you. 

One last timid lick to the wound on your thigh, and he’s crawling his way back up to you. The mess doesn't phase you as he kisses you hungrily – the blood remains sweet rather than metallic, the remnants of your juices still on his tongue – and you meet him with an unbridled fervent. Nipping at his lips with your own dull canines as if you were the one looking for a bite of vivacity. 

You don’t know when he lets go of your wrists, or when your hands find their way up beneath his shirt. The specifics don’t matter once he’s naked before you, clothes discarded messily to the ground with your own. The only thing that matters is the weight of him, the reminder that he was still here as his hips roll into yours and the head of him catches on your entrance. 

He had been dead. For minutes. And you had brought him back to you. 

The process had taken longer than the mere CPR administered, had taken weeks of whatever waiting game you two had tortured yourselves with, but you had him now. He was yours. You were his. There wasn’t a deity, a monster, an omniscient being in this world that could take that away from you. Not even Death herself. 

“Last chance, baby,” he whispers against your lips, holding himself up so that not a single inch of his skin pressed to yours. You nearly cried out, missing that connection, missing him. Your hunger, the hunger for him entirely, rattles your bones once more, “Say the word, and I’ll-”

“No,” your hands pause their exploration of skin jagged with scars. Reminders of those few dreadful moments in which the world existed without Eddie Munson in it, that would fade in time but never fully disappear. Always there, just like the stain of his blood on your palms. Always there, just like your desperation to have him at your side. “I meant it when I said I’m yours. I’m not changing my mind. I want this.” 

His skin is back on yours, body laid fully along your own road map, and it all comes flooding back. The pain of seeing his lifeless body, the nights spent in an eerie hospital room, baring your own teeth at any one who came too close to the man you had pulled back from the ledge of Death. The anxiety, the fear, the relief, the yearning – it all accumulates as he’s pressing into you, brimming you so full that there’s no room for memories of nightmares. 

He’s here. He’s yours. You’re his. 

His heart didn’t need to beat for you to accept that truth. 

You can’t decipher which chants of your name fall from his lips for others to hear, and which ones whisper in the depths of your mind for only you to bear witness to. Each curse, each grunt, each moan – there for you and only you anyways. You’re entirely unsure if your lips even separate once as he thrusts, cock brushing somewhere deep in you that has you clenching around him. 

And if his fangs wander, it only adds to the pleasure. 

Blood, sweat, and tears all mingle between your bodies. He’s holding you tighter than water, as though you’re at risk of disappearing from him at any given moment. But that link between your two minds, your two souls, is unwavering. It’s the only thing grounding you to the moment as your half curls around his waist and your heel digs into his lower back. Urging him, pressing him, taking him. 

“Fuck, sweetheart,” he says it out loud, this time. You feel his lips brushing against your ear as he does, “Gripping me so tightly. This pussy was fucking made for me.” 

Every movement only unlocks something more feral inside the two of you. Your nails rake down his back, leaving angry red lines to trace over once it’s all said and done. There’s enough shallow bite marks across your neck that you’ll be wearing scarves for weeks, months. The others might question it, strangers might stare, but the pride you feel as he marks you is unmatched for any anxiety about it. 

That black hole of hunger is no longer swallowing either of you whole. That debilitating pain, that animal inside, has been tamed. 

When his hips begin to stutter, mouth no longer capable of the strength to properly bite you as his lips only smear the soft spattering of blood pooling at the base of your throat, you’re already there. Squeezing him tightly, sucking him in, voice raw as you let everyone know who’s ravishing you. 

Eddie. 

Hawkins’ newest zombie boy – Hawkins’ newest vampire. 

The climax is just as pleasurable as the lead up. The haze lingers long after his spent has dripped out of you, long after he’s collapsed into your body with exhaustion and contentment. The blood dries, the wounds clot – but that haze doesn’t falter. 

As long as his skin presses to yours, you feel that caress of his mind against yours. 

“Did…” you’re breathless as his face nuzzles into your nude chest, a few mindless hums of gratification still slipping from him as you bring a hand to toy with the curls at the crown of his head, “Did any of your vampire books say anything about… that?”

The connection. The bloodlust. The spell you swear he still has you under, even as it’s all said and done. 

He snorts against your skin, “Not that I, uh, recall.” 

“What? You mean to tell me in all your research, you never dived into any vampire smut?” you tsk jokingly, a calm smile tugging at the corners of your mouth. He lifts his head, and you swear, those honey-brown irises have threads of a deep maroon now, “You’re slacking, Munson.” 

“Why read about it when I can just experience it?” he coos, letting his nose and lips drag across your still hot skin before he rests his chin on your sternum, “Besides, I mean – we’ll need to do this again, won’t we, baby? For research.” 

Your head still spins. Your body aches in a welcome manner. There will be a need for explanations to others, for actually researching his condition, later on. But for now, it’s enough. 

The pounding behind your ribcage, the one you know Eddie feels for the both of you when his ear presses to your chest, is enough. 

Of course, lover. 

That thought stays between the two of you. The world doesn’t need to know what can’t hurt them. 

eddie's taglist: @capricornrisingsstuff @thisisktrying @hideoutside @vol2eddie @corrcdedcoffin @ches-86 @alovesongtheywrote @its-not-rain @feralchaospixie @cheesypuffkins87 @thebook-hobbit @babez-a-licious @eddies-acousticguitar @aysheashea @kellsck @cosmorant @billyhvrgrove-main @micheledawn1975 @eddiesxangel @siriuslysmoking @witchwolflea @tlclick73 @magicalchocolatecheesecake @mizzfizz @nanaminswhore @mikiepeach @ali-r3n @hawkebuckley @alwaysbeenfamous @darkyuffie-blog @vintagehellfire @lilmisssiren @elvendria @loveryanax @stylexrepp @princessstolas @fangirling-4-ever @eddiesguitarskills @babez-a-licious @josephquinnsfreckles

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#ghost's stories #eddie munson #eddie munson x reader #kas!eddie munson #kas!eddie munson x reader #eddie munson x you #eddie munson smut #eddie munson angst #reader essentially became soul bound to him womp womp #don't drink a vampire's blood kids #i really didn't edit that intensely i spent two hours fucking with photoshop #if it's bad it's bad #finally dipping my toes into kas!eddie tho wahoo #vampire!eddie munson #someone requested eddie with this song forever ago but i lost the ask #eddie reading dracula to figure out if he's become a vampire is actually so fucking funny to me

[jackklinemybeloved]

zac’s “less is more” approach to comedy is always golden but it is working PERFECTLY for colin provolone from both a comedic and dramatic standpoint. everyone else I kinda get the vibe of but colin is Just Some Guy which is driving both me and raphaniel up the fucking WALL.

#it’s VERY funny but Colin what the FUCK is your deal what HAPPENED TO YOU #he’s just some guy we know nothing about his past but we KNOW he has Some Kind Of Past #what kind of past? what happened? we don’t knowwwww #and the whole story treats him as Just Some Guy which is so funny but also like. what the fuck! #but my actual point is like #I love that zac can just stay on the sidelines without anyone really thinking about it #like he doesn’t take up scenes very much #which is cool but sometimes works to his character’s detriment #but here? perfect. #much easier to keep Colin as Just Some Fucking Guy when he barely talks #anyway. zac oyama is very talented that is all. #dimension 20 #the ravening war #colin provolone #d20 spoilers #zac oyama #bishop raphaniel charlock

[zellk]

Forgot to share here.... old doodles of when I finally came around to finding a design I like for Qalaari's mom !!

#it's so fucking funny to me that i inadvertently gave her a variant of the “mom about to die” haircut because... well... #surprise... she did die when Qalaa was young (12) :'^) #Qalaa (now between 20 and 22) still hasn't gotten over it #her mom had really weak health and really shouldn't have had a child but she made her choice #it turned out to be not the best one for her health LMAO #who wouldve thunk #but hey she wanted it and i'm pretty sure she doesn't regret it #but well... Qalaa does feel like she was a participant in her mom's death #(the other participant being her biological father who ran away before she was born and shattered aamira's heart) #ANYWAYS #i love qalaa's messed up familly #it's like a regular messed up story where actually no one (and everyone) is to blame (except Qalaa lmao she asked for NOTHING) #Aaamira gave so so much love to her child ;;;;;; this built the unbreakable core of Qalaa's kindness #aamira #aamira croquelune #aamira molandine #croquelune #still thinking about making that potentiel small DnD 'lore addon' of Qalaa's village that you can take and plug in your very own campaign #as long as you have 'far from civilization' woods or mountains you can put them in there #a village that welcomes the 'monsters' and the cast out #(like aamira) #look at me rambling in the tags lmao i just love qalaari (& her background) so much #last thing tho : you have to understand that Aamira is small and very slight and Qalaari was a HUGE baby and is a really big girl overall

[yellowocaballero]

Reading 'Solo Leveling' (a webtoon/webnovel about a guy who uses a game-like interface to level up and fight monsters and become ridiculously OP and the coolest and hottest guy in the whole wide world) really proves something to me that I've thought about.

The goal of a story is to achieve what it wants to achieve. Different genres have different certain marks the story should achieve. If it doesn't hit those marks, it's not a good example of the genre. In a lot of was it's not even a good story - it doesn't entertain the audience in the way that they want to be entertained. A romance novel isn't a bad story because it doesn't feature great action scenes, but neither is it a bad story because it doesn't delve deep into the sociopolitical implications of neocolonialism. Does it make the reader feel happy? Is it cathartic? Is there a happy ending? Then it's a good romance story - even if you think stories shouldn't need happy endings.

The 'satisfaction' of stories like Solo Leveling is the fact that is very entertaining to watch a guy be super powerful and mow down bad guys and have everybody around him go "WHOAH that's a cool guy". Maybe it's cool because you're projecting, or maybe you like great action scenes, or because you like 'underdog gets powerful' stories. It's a power fantasy. That is the goal of Solo Leveling, and so long as I'm going "WHOAH COOL", then it's a good story. And Solo Leveling is the example of the power fantasy video game dungeon OP protag. It does those elements, it executes them competently, it's a good story.

This is the third of these types of stories I've read more than 5 chapters of. The first was Omniscent Reader's Viewpoint. And baby. This is no ORV.

ORV a big reaction to Solo Levelling in a lot of ways, since Solo Levelling was very genre defining and influential, and it's hard to write these OP stories without having a relationship to Solo Leveling. It's like the most popular webtoon out there. The OP hero, the gaming interface and rules, the gods fucking you up, power fantasy - they're all checked off by ORV. It doesn't subvert them much. You watch kdj pull one over on a shmuck and you're like HEY YA BABY and you watch him utterly decimate some schmuck and you're like WHOAH COOL. You like ORV, basically, for the same reasons you like Solo Leveling. They're the same genre and in a lot of ways the same story.

But ORV has driven me nuts and after a while Solo Leveling has gotten boring. Because ORV has a fantastic supporting cast that puts the MC's OPness in relative perspective. Because there's cool action scenes with different teams, of different dynamics, giving freshness to each chapter. Because you get to see kdj slowly implement some nuts gambit of the course of the entire arc and when we finally hit the end point where it all comes together it's FUCK YEAH. I'm leaving out the actual depth here. But ORV and Solo Leveling do the same thing, except ORV has a great deal of other story elements that build into the main 'point' and escalate the satisfaction, joy, and intensity of those points. You don't read these OP hero novels for the supporting cast. You read it to watch a dude be cool. But ORV's supporting cast - and, like, the fact that they're actual characters, even the women - gives us a lot of other smaller 'hey yeah!' moments, gives it buildup, makes the OP moments meaningful, and gives a grand climax and huge satisfaction when kdj does what the SL guy did by himself. And the supporting cast is only one example of this. A story is a good story if it accomplishes its point, but a story like SL will never really deliver its promises nearly as well as ORV could. Not because ORV is deep and has """themes""" or fucked up shit like that. The 'WHOAH COOL's are just better. Because ORV knows why stories are good and what makes a good story.

Anyway I'm fucking begging you I have tears in my eyes this is why your fic needs more than the hot ship of the day I promise it won't detract from the ship it will make the ship BETTER but you have to get WHY you like these homosexuals so much and it's NOT just because they're CUTE sometimes there's OTHER REASONS THAT ARE IMPORTANT LIKE THE WOMAN YOU'VE BOOTED AND -

#you're killing me smalls #my writing #orv #omniscient reader's viewpoint #solo leveling #solo leveling is good at what it does bc i've read 120 chapters of it #but it's not great because i don't actually care #man really early on the MC had PTSD and I felt like we were doing something with that #and why he was so desperate to grow stronger and i felt like that was a good character motivation for the #hashtag grindset #we like characters for other reasons than projection. i prommy. prommy i swear #the funny thing is that literlaly everybody who reads all 1 million words of orv #are a kim dokja kinnie and you do have to project insanely #because the story self-selects for kdj kinnies #if you weren't insane in the exact same way kdj was insane #you wouldn't have fucking finished orv now would you

[konigceo]

modern booktok romance books SUCK and i'll leave it at that

#lala ⊹˚. ♡.𖥔 ݁ ˖ #if romance is like a subplot it's usually not that bad #but like if the entire story's just about these 2 characters going at it. #ew no gross #specifically the books that are ONLY smut #idk it's a specific thing that i hate #which is really funny since i write smut #but idk. #it's corny to see it in actual books #also wtf is it with modern romance tropes #(looks at colleen hoover) #no but seriously #i fucking hate modern romance books #just go read fanfiction #some fics i see deserve to be published #and i STAND by that

[drbtinglecannon]

The plot of Scott Pilgrim Takes Off is actually better than original plot, by a large margin

#not only did we get so much more ramona screentime & growth but I actually really liked that everyone lived & changed & grew #also the handling of scott & ramona's relationship feels way more healthy. also the show was SO QUEER omg it was great #I love roxie lmao shame she & kim didn't work out. wallace was kind of a bigger scumbag but I loved him finding his own sparkle at the end #also julie? me. I look similar & constantly swear constantly. she was hilarious & her x gordon was really funny #ramona's green hair look is what I wish my hair always looked like. OH ALSO RAMONA CHOOSING HERSELF? I LOVED IT #but yeah like. this rewrite helped the story age better imo. appreciate all the constant criticism of scott dating a high schooler in his #20s like finally it's addressed as fucked. lucas lee tho lmao “she's actually 31!” #anyway excellent show 10/10 animation was so fluid. the art style matched the comic perfectly. the story was a fun & refreshing spin #scott pilgram takes off #scott pilgram vs the world #scott pilgrim #ramona flowers #tc posts

[zaritarazi]

hanne (trying to recall a fun childhood story): did you tell them about the zipline

matthias: i did tell them about the zipline

jesper: he told us about the zipline

hanne: then why do you all look so upset

wylan: sorry, to clarify, are you referencing the zipline designed to kill children?

hanne and matthias at the same time, still not sure why people don't think that the zipline story is funny: yes

nina, walking back into the room after getting a glass of water: why does everyone suddenly look so concerned did matthias bring up his childhood summer camp's illegal fucking zipline again

#this is how i feel hanne and matthias are in any modern au #matthias is like remember when we got left after school for 3 hours and had to walk home and hanne is like haha yeah #and everyone is like i'm sorry fucking WHAT #and matthias is like yeah! we saw some rare birds on the walk home #hanne i think is more aware how deeply fucked this all is but is also like. well what can i do about it now #i'm not gonna call my parents that's for damn sure #kaz like also matthias and hanne stop telling fucked up stories about your childhood. they actually do make me laugh #but only because it's funny to imagine child matthias suffering #if only child me while suffering had known child matthias was suffering at the same time. that would've been my sole joy in life #matthias: that's... really beautiful #kaz: i will kill us both #soc headcanon #grishaverse headcanon #matthias helvar #hanne brum #something about the machine designed to kill children to me was like. matthias has done this and didn't realize he shouldn't have

[weedle-testaburger]

there's this kind of youtuber i lowkey really hate who aren't overt bigots or anything but just do this thing where they seem to try stupidly hard to look for reasons to hate media that just so happens to have a lot of marginalised rep in it. especially if it has a thematic point that would involve acknowledging politics

#my favourite example of that (as in i actually find it funny not it annoys me) #is cinemasins complaining the train in snowpiercer and the guy who wants the protagonist's eyes in get out don't make sense #like. they don't have to be explained in the story the point is they're a commentary on socio economic injustices and racism #stories aren't logic puzzles they're parables and if you read them as being logic puzzles you're doing it wrong #and spoiling a lot of really profound media for yourself #having said that the youtubers i hate most are reactionary cunts like nerdrotic critical drinker or turkey tom #they should be punched every time they upload until they fuck off #and the most annoying kind of youtubers (not hatable but annoying) are the ones who try to argue that mainstream media #which is trying to be diverse and progressive is Bad Actually (verilybitchie is awful for that and she doesn't like pan people #so that put me off her pretty quickly which is a shame bc some of her videos and topics are interesting)

[p4nishers]

can we actually take a moment and remember swan upon leda? can we actually shut the fuck up and sit the fuck down and think about our lord and savior swan upon leda because i'm tired of doing it alone every single day guys

#the title itself!!! THE FUCKING TITLE #swan UPON leda #god he's an actual genius THANK U HOZIER SO FUCKING MUCH #i hate how that myth is portrayed and received and objectified bc they make it out to be such a funny little chuckle story like 'hahaha led #is SO easy that she fell for a swan isn't that actually the funniest thing you've ever heard omg like women are literally so easy to please #whatever whatever blahblahblah yes that's fucking hilarious matthew thank u SO much for that absolutely fascinating commentary on a women #getting raped by a god really truly an amazing insight into ur pea fucking brain #like fuck sorry but i just absolutely despises how this myth is made out to be and i remember learning abt it in class and being literally #nauseated bc guess fucking what it's literally not hard to understand wtf is happening and while u r laughing away about i repeat a WOMEN #getting RAPED some fucking of us have brain enough to be mortified #jesus ANYWAY #hozier dropped that song after roe v wade was over turned and i just i love him so fucking much he cares SO MUCH and before anything else #he's an activist and he actually gives a shit about women's rights and he dropped this song as a comfort as something to hold onto but also #as a social commentary and he linked charities and resources to help women and keep them safe and this song just means everything to me #bc greek mythology often gets reduced to children stories bc most ppl know myths from children books and obviously a book for kids not gonn #outloud say the word rape or even imply that that's what's happening and that's fine ig but bc so many ppl know it from there it gets #reduces to a joke and a raped women gets ridiculed but hozier actually took one of the few poems about leda being raped and it being a rape #at all and made it into a song during a time that was so traumatizing for ever afab person in the world basically and it just says 'i see #you i see what you're going through and i'm listening and i actually care and i want to help you' and he's helping by writing a song yes bc #he's spreading the word that way bc that's how movements are spread and people listen to him when he's singing and that's how he helps and #i did i mention that i love him? bc i'd actually do anything for him and to meet him and tell him how much he fucking means to me #the line that always gets me is 'a crying CHILD pushes a CHILD into the night' bc yes she was a fucking child who had to deliver 4 KIDS BC #AN ASSHOLE DECIDED SHE WAS PRETTY ENOUGH TO FUCK and nobody ever cares that she was just a child and her child helen was just a child when #she was abducted and raped and impregnated (JUST LIKE HER MOTHER) by theseus a supposed great hero and im genuinely sick she was just a #child like so many women or girls in greek mythology and ik it was a different time back then or wtv but they were just GIRLS and nobody #cared about that or cares now. but this song does. #bc of course it does it's hozier. #hozier #swan upon leda

[astranauticus]

not sure if this counts as an AU but.. thinking about the Per Aspera crew as horror game bosses like.. you are wandering through a forested mountain range and you know somethings wrong because the forest shouldn't be this eerily silent, this devoid of life, and then you hear the crash of falling trees and there is a hand that is half your size glowing golden in the night and it is grabbing you and its claws are digging into your flesh and you see the spines running down the golden arm that is far too long as it lifts you over a crater in mountain, over a coiled, serpentine thing with a visage that is not of this world, and if you look closely you can see the shape of a child curled at the centre of the thing, golden hair reflecting the glow of the creature and if you listen closely you can hear her sobbing, 'Don't hurt me, I don't want to do this'. you are sailing through the astral sea when you see an ephemeral, resplendent spelljammer cutting through the starry waters and you rejoice because you have been lost on the seas for so so long, so you board the ship looking for help, supplies, anything, and you are greeted by a blue fire genasi (you wonder, do those even exist? but you can't get off the ship now because where else will you go?) and she tells you she is the captain of this ship but as far as you can tell there is no crew on board, and if she is not appearing right behind you from a trapdoor you've never noticed she is always in the engine room 'fixing the ship' even though the ship seems to be sailing perfectly fine ('Where are we going?' you ask her once and she doesn't even turn to look at you, 'Don't worry about it') and if you are ever so unlucky as to damage the ship in any way, you begin to catch flashes of red and orange out of the corner of your eye, a fire genasi wearing the woman's face who whispers at you with hollow, angry eyes 'Don't you fucking dare hurt my ship'. you are sailing through the astral sea when you see a rotting, decaying spelljammer, so badly damaged it's barely moving although you have to wonder how it's even staying afloat at all, and out of some morbid curiosity you climb on board and the deck of the ship is in no better shape than the hull, the marks of hard-fought battle - scars in the wood from sharp blades and arcane energies, stains of blood and oil splattered about - still fresh but you know time doesn't pass on the astral sea so who knows how long ago this all took place, and as you climb below decks you start to notice the writings on the walls, pieces of parchment nailed to every surface and connected with fraying, rotting threads, or words etched directly into the wood, the deep gouges barely readable, and you start to hear the creaking and clanking of rusted machinery slowly moving about and you turn a corner to see a figure standing in a room facing the wall, slowly scratching yet more of that unintelligible writing into the bones of the ship, and it turns as the rusted dented mechanite stares at you with eyes ablaze and he asks 'Who are you? Where is my crew?' as sparks of arcane lightning begins to arc through the room. you are running through a feywild forest and you know, even without the figure chasing you, that you have made a horrible mistake, you should have known better, should have been more careful, should have kept your impulses in check, and now you are being chased through an unfamiliar forest and the figure, the Hunter pursuing you knows this realm like the back of his hand, knows every tree and shrub and vine that is slithering up to grasp at your ankles, and you glance back desperately to catch any glimpse of your pursuer but there is no pursuer, he has hidden himself with some arcane trick or some innate power or just the knowledge that this realm is his home, and you hear his voice even though you cannot see him as he cries out 'You should not have hurt my family. Prepare to face the Hunter of Hundkiln'

sorry no Vhas yet maybe I'll update with one for him once we get more of his whole deal

#rolling with difficulty #asto speaks #well i lied only kyana's and finbar's really work as video game bossfights #dani's is more... horror short story? vr-la's is horror comic #bc dani's much more psychological and the environmental storytelling of vr-la's one would be pretty interesting.. probably #in hindsight vr-la's reads like it could be a magnus archive entry LMAO #contrary to whatever you may think (especially if youre in the discord) i dont actually like most horror #like i've only listened to abt ~10 episodes of tma bc it started fucking up my sleep thats how much of a wuss i am #like i dont actually *enjoy* horror but idk i had so much fun writing this. for some reason #hell i dont even enjoy *writing* most of the time #all the others are kinda based on a specific scenario like kyana's is if she never left the cenobium and suvi snapped before she did #(if you've watched/read jjk0 video game bossfight suvi is very much just orimoto rika) #vr-la's and finbar's are pretty self evident #dani's is kinda.. inspired by alfonso of the stultifera navis making this my second rwd brainworm that's just an arknights reference #captains that are cursed to haunt their empty ships plagued with has beens and could have beens #(her one is the only one absolutely not meant to be read as literal btw its a very 'that house has been empty for 40 years' kinda vibe) #found it kinda funny that dani's and vrla's start in very similar ways bc they both kinda have that i am the ship and the ship is me thing #dani's vibe in this is just more illusions and delusions and vrla's is more decaying forgotten grief #a ghost of a mechanite haunting a corpse of a ship

[rawliverandgoronspice]

trying to assign instruments to gerudo characters for thralls' soundtrack. Nabooru is getting the sitar so far, as I think she's good at representing the gerudo side that's closer to the Wild Era in terms of long-term vision for gerudo prosperity, not to mention that it works great for a more laid-back character; though Iftaah could also get that aspect, even though her perspective is a little bit more desperate and a little less actually strategizing about diplomacy and commerce in the way that Nabooru's is... not sure I have nailed down the perfect instrument for her yet though? Maybe a duduk, for its plaintive quality and capacity for softness? But I don't know, I feel like there could be something better out there. Saeruk and flamenco guitar seem pretty great fit for the versatility of the instrument, both harsh and defiant, playful at times, but also extremely sad if needs be, and the fact that she represents more the "older" kind of gerudo works well with more hispanic/romany inspirations. And then there's Aveil, who I feel represent the best the connection of the gerudos to their land, and I'd love an instrument that really represents that. Still looking for that one.

There's a bunch of fun things for Ganondorf that can be done, but I think he'll get... bigger instruments, in general. And church organs are quite versatile too it turns out. :) I like the marimba from his first phase boss battle, but it's a little too... I don't know, I feel like it lacks the roundness and depth and imposing quality that we could get with other picks. But Ganondorf so far has about *eight billion* leitmotifs going on with what I have selected for him (him and Ganon's, as they are... not exactly separate entities in the story, but sort of, it's kind of weird), so it might be more a case of actual melody rather than instruments, or maybe on top of instruments that swap in and out depending on what we want to invoke...

Sorry, rambling, but I would really love to compensate for my lack of voice actors with a pretty meaningful stab at the soundtrack. I feel like I kind of have to honestly. ;;

#thoughts #thralls of power #animatic project #gerudos #nabooru #ganondorf #I need to upgrade my music software and stop using Logic 5.5 that came out in 2002 ;; #and gives me between 30mn to 2h before subjecting me to a coinflip about whether or not it corrups my savefile #never really had the material for a proper upgrade but I really want to make one and that seems the perfect opportunity for that #also yeah nabooru has kind of a big role in thralls! #she wasn't there at all in descant or just in passing #but she becomes kind of an important player in this version of the events #her antagonism with ganondorf is. definitively there let's say. #it's funny I actually kind of used descant as a brainstorming ground for thralls in many ways #as every single character arc is just whatever I began to sketch out in unhallowed vespers #but like More and More Deliberate and more focused too #there's a bunch of threads I completely cut out #so it won't be a perfect 1:1 #which is for the best I think I just hadn't spent enough time with some characters to truly get them #I'm much more confident now #Iftaah is perhaps the one that needs the most work at the moment? she has a Bad Fucking Time so I need to make sure #it goes to places that not only serve other people's arcs but also her own --and that she ends the story in a meaningful place narratively #Serielle also needs work but more in the sense that's there's so much happening in her brain. and it's pretty difficult to convey. #but I fully know what's going on in there at least even if it's wildly convoluted #anyway!! rambling rambling sorry sorry #I am frustrated that I can't actually work on it so here I am rambling #ok back to work now