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stoobfoobnoob · 1 year

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The winner takes it all

(The abba song has nothing to do with the story I was just listening to it while I wrote it lol)

reader x Scoups (he’s all over my fyp)

angst, breakup au, there is no happy ending

mentions: Woozi, Hoshi and Mingyu in one scene, and Seungkwan

Synopsis: You should be angry that your boyfriend of almost 10 years breaks up with you, instead you spend your time redecorating your apartment and ignore all the pain that should be consuming your heart.

----

No one tells you about what it’s like after breaking up with someone you’ve been with for a really long time. They don’t tell you how hard it is to come home to an empty apartment with half the decorations gone and the picture frames turned over until you found boxes to put them in. No one ever mentioned how cold the bed would be at the end of a long day at work or the fact that there are three-day-old leftovers in the fridge because you no longer need to make portions for two.

People failed to mention that breaking up with your high school sweetheart leaves you in tiny little pieces and makes you feel like you lost all the bets.

Seungcheol always kept the apartment at 65 degrees. He got hot quickly and for the first time since moving in you’ve bumped up the ac to 75, he hated the linen curtains and said the light seeped into the apartment too much, and he never liked the smell of burning candles. So, since he left and packed his things you found yourself looking through all the old curtains and candles that collected dust in the storage closet. It was a good way to cope at first. Changing things that you both decided on to make it your own, leaving no traces of him to begin with.

You didn’t touch any of his things in the bathroom. You left his shaving cream and cologne tucked away in the medicine cabinet and left his shampoo in the shower.

You’ve been meaning to throw them all away.

incoming call from Jihoon

Jihoon was your friend from high school, he was the one who set you up with Seungcheol all those years ago.

y/n: hey.

Jihoon: do you still want me to come over?

y/n: oh uh, yeah come when you’re ready.

Since the breakup, you no longer had someone to do the heavy lifting and you recently bought a new bed that needed assembling.

Jihoon walked in to see that your apartment was no longer the way it used to be. The grey curtains were replaced with soft egg-yolk yellow ones, the furniture was rearranged, and there were new photos on the wall of you and your friends and paintings of generic scenery.

“Thank you again for coming,” he sees the half-eaten sandwich on the kitchen island and the unopened mail with Seungcheol’s name on it.

“Of course, I wouldn’t let you ask Soonyoung to help you.” His comment made you chuckle for the first time in a while. If he was gonna be honest he was expecting you to be a mess.

It wasn’t every day that you break up with someone you’ve been with for almost a decade, he was expecting you to have swollen eyes and a stuffy nose with a cluttered apartment. But it wasn’t. You managed to do your hair and makeup like it was a normal regular day.

While the two of you were gathering the materials for your new bed Jihoon asked,

“How are you holding up?” There was hesitation in his voice, not completely sure of the answer.

“It’s been hard, but I can do nothing about it.” Your voice was soft and you didn’t look up at him once.

“I know you probably don’t wanna talk about him, but he’s not doing as well as you.” Your head snaps and your face shrivels up in confusion.

“What do you mean?” You said.

“Well, first off he moved in with Mingyu.” Mingyu was Seungcheol’s old roommate in college who was now a chef at a really famous restaurant in the city. “He hasn’t been showing up to work either and he just looks terrible.” Jihoon felt bad about gossiping about his friends.

“He’ll be alright.” There was a bit of sadness in your tone like you pitied him.

----

Seungcheol fell out of love with you. He didn’t really notice that he did until he came home one night and rolled his eyes before unlocking your shared apartment. He noticed that he hated the flight of stairs he had to take every day, he hated the 30-minute drive from the apartment to his job, and he hated coming home and talking about the same 5 things with you.

1. How was your day?

Seungcheol always said the same things- nothing really changed at work that is interesting enough to mention.

2. Can you replace the lightbulbs?

It had been bugging him for a while that you had been asking him to replace the bulbs when they were perfectly fine. You said that they were too yellow for the apartment and “didn’t fit the vibe” which made him clench his jaw each time.

3. Can you please turn on the heat?

There were always 10 minutes of his day when you would beg him to adjust the AC. Tell him that you were freezing and refused to grab a sweater instead of complaining; he thought it was cute at first you know. Earlier in the relationship, it was an excuse to pull you close and hug you until you both ended up on the couch. Now it was just annoying.

4. Do you want take out or no?

If there was something Seungcheol would much rather have for dinner was a nice home-cooked meal. He didn’t like contributing to the housewife stereotype that his girlfriend should cook for him all the time, but he did tell you when the two of you moved in for the first time that it would be nice to have a hot meal that you cooked for him every once and a while. Since you started working late hours, you didn’t find the time to cook dinner.

5. Should we have lunch with my parents?

He liked your parents. They treated him like they were their own, but since the two of you passed your 5th anniversary your parents would ask him if he was going to propose every time you left for the bathroom. Seungcheol started to work on days your parents were in the city.

When he broke up with you, you didn’t overreact like he thought. You leaned back into the dining chair while he paced back and forth in front of you. The half-empty bottle of wine and the dinner plates sat in front of you like props in a movie as he told you that he wanted to end things.

“do you love me?” he stopped in his tracks when you spoke so sternly.

Perhaps you saw this coming or maybe you just matured so well that you didn’t pick a fight with him.

“Of course, I love you.” He starts getting flashbacks to when he first said I love you to you, it was winter and he had to stay back after school to make up a quiz when he saw you waiting for him at the end of the hallway. You were wrapped in a thick scarf and his overcoat when he saw you, you pulled out a little bag of pastries from your bag. It was from a bakery only in the area you worked in and he had been craving them forever. He didn’t mean to say it right then and there but he did.

Seungcheol’s ears were red and his hands wouldn’t stop brushing his hair back, “I do love you. I can’t just erase everything we’ve had and not love you... I’m just not in love with you.”

He couldn’t tell from where he stood, but your heart sank into your stomach.

“I’m just going to ask you one thing.” Your fingers were picking at the dry skin on your lips ( a habit he hated of yours)

A small ‘okay’ left his mouth,

“Did you fall out of love with me because there’s someone else?” He hated how you didn’t sound mad, you sounded more genuinely conflicted than angry.

“I didn’t cheat on you.”

“I didn’t ask if you cheated, I asked if there was someone else.”

From the way, he sat down and the awkward tension that filled the apartment you got your answer.

-----

When Seungcheol told Jeonghan and Joshua that the two of you broke up they practically told him he was an idiot. Cursed him out and refused to believe that you guys were done for good.

“This is just a break, right? Not an actual break-up?” Jeonghan judged him for letting you go. Letting you slip through his fingers like that.

You weren’t expecting him to come to his senses or come back to you a couple days after. What you did expect was the countless amount of texts and phone calls claiming that you could always count on them in times of need.

You definitely did not expect Seungcheol to move on so quickly with a girl from your work. He started showing up at your office with flowers and a new cologne you didn’t recognize. Seungcheol started picking up your coworker, walked right past your desk, and pretended like you and him didn’t spend most of your early adulthood together.

Seungkwan, your right-hand man at work was angry for you. Practically shooting daggers when Seungcheol’s new girlfriend walked around the office,

“He has the nerve! I mean really?? He just had to date one of your coworkers, and why aren’t you angry??” He complained while he sipped from his coffee,

It was starting to infuriate you that you weren’t as mad as you should be.

“Is it messed up?” you asked hypothetically while you looked through your paperwork.

“Yes,” you answered. “But he’s not my boyfriend anymore and I can’t tell him when he can move on or with who for that matter. I wish I could be mad, but I just don’t have the energy for it.”

A few months had passed since the breakup and Seungcheol started dating your coworker when he showed up to the office late at night.

-----

You had stayed overtime to work on your next presentation when a figure appeared in the reflection of your office windows. His hair was longer now and it was black. He was wearing colors you had never ever seen him wear before and he was working out now.

“What are you doing here?” Slumping into your chair before turning around to face him.

“You got the bigger office!” Seungcheol felt the need to have small talk. It’s true you got the nicer office when you got promoted, it was something you had seen coming and waited to celebrate with him.

“She didn’t tell you? ____ isn’t in today.” You said as you rubbed your temple.

He just stood there scoping your new office out,

“Oh, I’m not here for ____.” He got quiet again, feeling around in his pocket. Seungcheol didn’t look at you once when he put the box on your desk,

“I bought this months ago for our anniversary, and it just came in today. I would’ve given in to my mother but she doesn’t like that kind of stuff. And ____ would see right through me if I gave it to her.”

It was a little velvet black box, and inside was a ring. A yellow-gold band with a simple oval diamond in the middle.

“What do you want me to do with this?” You questioned, looking at him through your furrowed eyebrows.

“You can keep it or throw it away. I just thought I should give it to you.” He smiles one of those half-assed smiles while he rubbed the back of his neck.

“Seungcheol, what are you doing here?” you whispered, your face riddled with an expression he couldn’t make out.

If he was gonna be honest he didn’t know why he was there, he didn’t know why he couldn’t have just canceled the package or given it to someone else. Seungcheol didn’t know why he was standing in front of you, after months of pretending like he didn’t care.

His lack of response was annoying you,

“I miss you. My place doesn’t feel the same without you, it’s always so quiet and cold. I miss waking up to you, you were always so warm. ____ is perpetually always cold.” Seungcheol started to sound desperate.

“Don’t do that. Do not compare me to her, it’s not fair.” The tone of your voice made him feel small like a little kid being scolded.

“Did you come here thinking you’d get a second chance? You broke up with me remember? Started dating my coworker, and you pretended like you and I were never a thing, and now you give me something for an anniversary we’re never gonna have,” You started to laugh out of frustration.

“We were good together, Y/N.” He said trying to convince you.

You shook your head in disbelief at the conversation you were having,

“If the universe gave me the opportunity to get back with you- I wouldn’t. Do you think I deserve this? To be in a relationship I have to second guess all the time, to be with someone who is so willing to throw all that we had away, to constantly have to convince myself that you love me?” You stood up facing the view from your window.

“I do love you, I will always love you!” Seungcheol didn’t even hear the irony of what he just said.

No one ever told him what happens when you realize you fucked up, people fail to mention the consequences of letting something great slip right out of your hands. People did not tell him how guilty he would feel or how stupid he must’ve looked to go back to someone whose heart he broke. They didn’t tell him what to do when he fucked up so bad.

Seungcheol had little hope that you would jump into his arms and tell him that you missed him. He didn’t expect you to forgive him or accept the ring.

“I think you should leave.” You told him, grabbing his hand to give him the ring back.

You didn’t hear from him again after this. You never asked your coworker how things were going between the two of them and your friends avoided the topic all together.

“I was in your arms thinking I belonged there, I figured it made sense. Building me a fence, building me a home- thinking I'd be strong there. But I was a fool, playing by the rules”

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I don’t know why I wrote scoups to be the bad guy it just turned out that way 🤷‍♀️

#seungcheol angst #seungcheol x reader #seungcheol imagines #seventeen angst #seventeen scenarios #seventeen imagine #choi seungcheol #angst #breakup au

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weaselandfriends · 1 year

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Three completely unrelated questions: ever heard of interactive fiction (parser games like Zork etc), and if you have, what's your opinion on it? Also, you mentioned a Pokemon fanfic ages ago and do you have plans to write that because Pokemon is my obsession and I would read the hell out of a Pokemon story if you wrote one. Also, is Sister from CxC and that Chateau de whatever vampire anime she keeps talking about inspired in any way by the Marquis de Sade?

Question 1: This blog, believe it or not, used to post exclusively about Homestuck, so yes, I have some familiarity with interactive fiction and parser games. I actually knew about Zork long before Homestuck, mainly because when I was 12 I was a huge Nintendo fan who would read books about the history of video games and Zork would always show up sooner or later. Now have I actually played a parser game? No.

In college I took a senior seminar on interactive fiction. This was a very funny course that included the David Cage classic Heavy Rain. I remember the professor bringing in a PlayStation and having us actually play the game; all the students made fun of the terrible voice acting and inhuman characters, and by the end the professor, looking genuinely hurt, said "I thought it was a good story..."

In this class, I wrote a paper that was actually about the original Super Mario Bros, arguing mainly that even in the complete absence of traditional narrative (text, video, etc.) any video game is actually interactive fiction, in which the player's phenomenological experience of the game shapes their understanding of the game's narrative. Consider the way a first time player would play Super Mario Bros, moving tepidly and carefully, stopping to hit every block, and dying frequently, and then compare that to an experience player or a speedrunner who will blaze through stages at full speed, ignoring most obstacles and reaching the end in a few moments. The understanding of who Mario is as a character is significantly different for these two players, and in fact the absence of traditional narrative elements makes this interactivity even more pronounced compared to a game like, say, The Last of Us, where character is much more strongly enforced by the authorial entity via traditional narrative elements.

Some time after I wrote this essay, Dark Souls would get popular and give everyone else the same idea I had, with its "environmental storytelling" that stripped out traditional narrative elements without sacrificing narrative itself. But I think you can see the precursor to Dark Souls' style in a lot of older games.

Question 2: Very odd coincidence, I actually started thinking about that Pokemon fanfic idea again recently, prompted by the ask I got in which I talked about my idea for a professional League of Legends sports story. Since Players stole my thunder in that regard, I started thinking of ways I could put my rather extensive esports knowledge to use for a story, and remembered my old Pokemon fanfic idea.

I always liked the near-future near-utopian world of Pokemon, where there seems to be little or no scarcity and 75% of the populace does nothing except pursue hobbies of interest. I'd like to do a serious exploration of what a world is like that encourages 10 year olds to drop out of school and attempt to become professional sports stars, without verging into edge. This is a world where it's *fine* for 10 year olds to do that, mainly because widespread, versatile, and even skilled Pokemon labor means there's less need for a large and robust human workforce. So what are these pros like, having left home at 10, spending their youths tromping through wilderness, their only significant social interaction being with what are essentially animals? All while training to excel in a competitive sport that requires an encyclopedic breadth of knowledge about all the diverse Pokemon species, movepools, statistical spreads, strategies, etc.? Obviously they're going to be total social weirdos. I think it'd be a great premise for a sports story to focus on a big, international tournament where these utter nerds come down from their mountaintops and are suddenly hoisted up as the exemplars of human society, imbued with instant celebrity despite their inability to function in any social setting.

So, to answer your question, it's back on the table. I'm pretty sure after CQ my next story will be a relatively short horror story set at a prestigious all-girls prep school in New England, but after that anything's possible.

Question 3: Sister's favorite anime, Le Chateau de Diodati, is primarily modeled on Le Portrait de Petit Cossette, a 2004 gothloli OVA directed by Madoka director Akiyuki Shinbo. Petit Cossette isn't hentai itself, but Shinbo was also directing several visually bizarre hentai OVAs around the same time, which I rolled into the Diodati fictional narrative. The name "Diodati" comes from the Villa Diodati, a Swiss manor once used by Lord Byron and the Shelleys, famous for being the location where Mary Shelley first created the story of Frankenstein. Diodati is also an Italian name; the Comtesse's full name, Marie von Diodati, is a nod to the tripartite cultural heritage of Switzerland (French, German, and Italian), and meant to contrast Marc Elmarghichi, who is of Moroccan descent. Sister/the Comtesse's appearance is modeled off Lambdadelta from Umineko and Shinobu Oshino from Monogatari (another Shinbo anime!).

The only work by de Sade I've read is Justine, and while the unabashed degeneracy of that work was in the back of my mind while writing CxC, it never manifested into any explicit or implicit reference. I have something of an aversion to de Sade, not because of anything he wrote, but because one of my least favorite novels, Thomas Pynchon's Vineland, has a horrible pun where a gardening business is called Marquis de Sod.

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magnetarmadda · 1 year

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Hi there! Like probably a lot of people, I'm quite jealous and in awe of the amount of reading you seem to get done. If you don't mind my asking, did you read this many books when you were in grad school? I'm in the last few months of my PhD (in paleontology!) and I've found that working on my thesis has absolutely killed my ability to get through books. Did this happen to you? Did your brain recover afterward? Or did you never deal with the reading slump?

Thanks! (And I hope you're having a good day, because you seem like a cool and nice person!)

Hey, hi! First, best of luck with your final months of grad school!!! Honestly, for me, they were so hard because of the lack of structure. Just, “finish your dissertation” and that was all the instruction really. If you ever wanna chat/vent about that, lemme know!! (Also paleontology!!! That’s so cool!!)

I always like to preface my reading habits with this: I have a very fast reading comprehension speed, and so for me, it averages out to about 100 pages of a novel in an hour and about 75 pages of nonfiction in an hour. In that way, I got lucky with the combination of early reading education, at-home book discussions, and genetics. So I can sit down and read a 300-page book in one evening, which meant that, even though I was only reading only one or two days a week, I was still getting through 50+ a year that way in grad school

I also listen to a lot of audiobooks and love trade paperbacks of graphic novels. The graphic novels can be quite fast reads for me, and this again is partly luck and genetics—my mom’s an artist, so I learned to look at images critically quite young, and can frequently find important info in them quickly. Then, for audiobooks, I do struggle with some chronic illnesses and chronic pain, and I frequently have to check out of life—but I cannot be left alone in my own head, or I rapidly catastrophize lol. I also can’t shut my own brain off when it’s time to sleep, so I listen to audiobooks then as well. I’d say this means I average about 4 audiobooks a month, where they’re usually between 8 and 14 hours (I do listen at 1.25 or 1.5 speed, because otherwise my brain stops paying attention)

I was also lucky with my advisor in grad school. She had a firm self-care policy, in that she cares more about her students’ well-being and health than timely progress. So I never felt like I was stealing moments or neglecting my work—I was trying to cultivate the healthiest version of myself, given all the other factors outside of my control. In the six years I worked with her, we actually spent more than one meeting talking about fantasy novels instead of research, which was lovely

But, yeah, there were a lot of reading struggles in grad school for me. I would go long stretches of time where the idea of opening a book and reading more words was unbearable, because god, didn’t I just spend all day reading and writing?? I also started to not care as much for the types of books I read before grad school, so now I’ve got a few stacks of books on hand I feel guilty that I haven’t read (but I’m trying to recognize that I’ll probably never read them, because tastes can change). So I might've had motivation to read, but nothing I had on hand sounded particularly good

Submitting that dissertation and knowing the hard part was over was actually the biggest relief, I think maybe of my life. I defended in mid-October and then submitted the finished manuscript about two weeks later, and then I spent a solid month just…reading whatever the fuck I wanted to lol. I have a postdoc now (and am applying for faculty jobs 🤞), and the responsibilities are waaaaaay less than as a grad student. In fact, my PI is adamant that I should not do more than 40 hrs a week, and so I’ve been able to plow through books like wild in the last few months

I also want to say: grad school is hard. It’s so absolutely difficult. Master’s programs are rough, and PhD programs are their own rodeo, and it sucks to say (because it sounds awful to most people, I know), but unless someone goes through grad school themselves, it’s hard to fathom what makes it so hard and exhausting. It’s totally okay to cut yourself some slack for finding you don’t have as much energy for other things, even the things you really enjoy. The books will be there waiting, and I'll admit it took me a solid 4 years to accept that myself lol

Thanks for the lovely ask, and I really do wish you well as you finish up 💜 again, I'm here--ask box or dm--if you'd like to take more about any part of the process 💜

#about me #reading #mad answers asks

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biggestsimp12 · 1 year

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☁️Fluff prompts☁️

____________________

1."You're so adorable."

2. "Come cuddle."

3. "Can't you stay a little longer?"

4. "When I'm with you, I'm happy."

5. "Going somewhere?

6. "I'm better, now that you're here."

7. "I could never forget you."

8. "You make me happy."

9. "You're more than that."

10. "You're the only one I wanna wake up next to."

11. "you're hugging me too tight!"

12. "stop looking at me like that!"

13. "has anyone told you that your eyes sparkle in the moonlight?"

14. "how mad would you be if i kissed you?"

15. "LOL, my lipgloss is all over your lips."

16. "that's the first time I've ever seen you smile."

17. "you're lucky you're hot."

18. "I didn't know you could sing."

19. "you weren't supposed to hear that!"

20. "shut up before i kiss you."

21. "you give me butterflies."

22. "I can't focus around you."

23. "kiss me better."

24. "why'd you stop?"

25. "you wrote me a song?"

26. "I'm not scared but if you are, you can hold my hand."

27. "you ramble and it's adorable."

28. "are you blushing?"

29. "I'll drive you home."

30. "you're shit at math."

31. "take my jacket."

32. "could you hold my hand?"

33. "you're so cute when you're mad."

34. "you have no idea how long I've wanted to do this."

35. "I would do this everyday if I could."

36. "I love you so much that it terrifies me."

37. "you have soft hands."

38. "are you tired?"

39. "you have everything to me, can't you see that?"

40. "can i keep it, the photo of us?"

41. "you're a terrible driver."

42. "You are the person I want to spend the rest of my life with"

43. "did i say that out loud?"

44. "hey, only i can call them that!"

45. "have you ever thought about how much worse our lives would be without each other?"

46. "I meant it when I said for better or for worse."

47. "that's the sixth time you've complimented me today."

48. "nothing else matters except for you."

49. "we could run away."

50. "the world could be on fire and I'd still be happy as long as I'm with you."

51. "they're such an idiot. my idiot but still."

52. "this isn't adrenaline, I want to spend my life with you."

53. "Would you still love me if I was a worm?"

54. "You're honestly the cutest when you're all flustered and red."

55. "We need more people in the world like you."

56. "Okay, well if you're leaving me for the day then the least you can do is give me a hug before you go."

57."I'll do you one better and give you a hugs and a few kisses."

58. "Why have I never noticed how gorgeous your eyes are?"

59. "Your arms are my safe space, so that's it

where I'll be sleeping tonight."

60. "Your nose is just so.. boop-able." *Boop*

61. "I need you to plant a kiss right on my forehead. Please."

62. "I can't move because you're sitting on top of me."

- "Have you ever thought that maybe

the problem isn't me sitting on you, but

maybe you're sitting under me?"

63. "Your hair is really soft after you wash it."

64. "Ssh. Stop fussing. I'm just braiding your hair."

65. "You smell really nice."

66. "Would it be all right if I borrowed your sweater?

It smells like you."

67. "I might have slept with your robe when you were gone."

68. "If you steal the blankets, I am going to put my cold feet on you."

69. "Here, let's share the blanket."

70. "You're comfortable."

71. "You are my new pillow."

72. "You are very endearing when you are half-asleep."

73. "But I want to hear you sing."

74. "We can talk over dinner."

75."Don't be stubborn. Try it!"

76. "Don't get up - I'll do it."

77. "Will you let me rub your back?"

78. "How to give me a back scratch?"

79. "Star-gazing was a good idea."

80. "You look beautiful/handsome in the moonlight."

81. "I'll always be here for you."

82. "I'll be here to protect you."

83. "I think I love you." "You are my love."

84. "How about something warm? It will help you sleep." "It's okay. I couldn't sleep anyway."

85. "Don't be silly. I want to stay up with you."

"It's not morning yet."

86. "Shush and go back to bed."

87. "I heard you talking in your sleep."

88. "Your bed head is really cute.

89. "We'll do dishes together."

90. "You have something in your hair.. um-do you want me to get it out?"

91. "Just 5 more minutes."

92. "I remember practicing how to ask you out in the mirror.."

93. "I would've had breakfast ready, but you were sleeping on my arm and I didn't want to wake you."

94. "I know I've kissed you like, ten times, but just like another ten, please."

95. "Are you wearing my shirt?"

96. "Wanna, like-I mean, if you're not busy.. We could you have lunch? Or even just coffee if you don't

have a lot of time?"

97. "So I was driving past a pet store and

couldn't help but wonder how cute an animal would be like in our home.."

98. "Shooting star. Make a wish."

99. "It's beautiful, isn't it?"

100. "I want to marry you."

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Feel Free to use them!

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coralinehecc · 1 year

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Corals Monthly Update #1

Well due to Tumblrs lack of a word limit, this idea has been on my mind ever since I started using this website properly. Basically, I wanna do these somewhat frequently and basically talk about what I got up to over the past month and possibly spill into the last month if need be. Starting from today imma try do these every day on the 20th or 21st because why not! So lets start off with this month, November! This month started off pretty nicely, as I had Halloween break spill over into November because mid term exams were early this year apparently. I however had plans! Instead of sitting around myself, Sully, had arranged to meet up with Wolf and spend a few days at his house in the back ass of nowhere. Despite Wolfs internet being almost as bad as his siblings tempers, it was super fun! He has a lot of stray cats that come around and hang about the farm which they look after and they’re so adorable!! My favourite was Oreo since she was so goofy >:]

(Wolf also had 2 dogs, one tiny one and a MASSIVE fluffy guy who was super excited to see us! Sometimes a bit too excited lmao) However, because of that I actually didn’t get much pictures while I was up there because cats distract me. Poor Sully was slightly allergic to cats sadly and was taking no chances so we couldn’t let them in for long and if we did it had to be far away from him. Cats aside, we also visited a small town near where Wolf lives and it was like an expanded version of where I grew up. Even had a huge ass forest which made me super jealous cuz I would’ve KILLED to grow up with smth like that!! We met up with Wolfs super chill friend Pierce (hope i spelt that right) and had a good time walking around and seeing what this little place had to offer. I also tried something called Vodka black which is like mostly blackcurrant mi waddi mixed with vodka and I loved it lol. Eventually we went back to Wolfs house and relaxed for the rest of the evening. OH ALSO! While at his house, Wolf let me borrow his 3DS so I could finally play Tomodatchi Life again, though I quickly reset the island as it had so many islanders that were either out of date, unfunny memes or people I REALLLY do not like anymore. So I started a new island! Here’s mostly everyone on it as of right now! >:]

(Wolf, Sully and Saul Goodman are also here but I didn’t snap any photos lol) I hope to get a New 3DS soon because my first one died and the 2DS Sully let me have has a broken cart reader :[ Anyhow! On the last day we went into a bigger town that was an hour drive away. There was also a CeX there which had fucking SA2 stocked and nearly made me jump with the shock lmfao. I of course instantly bought that but also picked up Splatoon 2 since I wanted to give it a try (and i still need to play it oops.) There was also a discount store we passed that Wolf commented on, apparently saying it was shit. However after going inside it literally had everything I needed for a Red Guy cosplay I want to work on at some point! After our quick and simple trip around the town, we piled back into the car and were driven back to Dublin to catch the train home. Despite us only being there for a few days it was great fun! I always have a blast meeting up with Wolf and this time was no exception :D Other than that extravaganza, I haven’t actually been up to much IRL stuff. School is just school so nothing ever interesting happens, and I don’t do much at home either. Only thing I can say is that Carey in the House: Take 2 is almost done! I wanna say it’s currently 60 or maybe 75% done? I’ve been trying to push out the last chunk of animation but due to winter making silly caveman brain think it hibernation time, my productivity has slammed through the floor. My plan is to get it out before Christmas however! This is so I can spend all my time on hanging out with family and friends, since both Vi and Softy are coming over for New Years!! My current weakness though is backgrounds, rendering the base in blender saves a LOT of work but I’ll need to look into shaders to speed things like colour and line art up because it takes FOREVER. Here’s a comparison between backgrounds for example! Left is base render, right is the finished piece done in Clip Studio.

(the bottom one is a better example as it has a lot more smaller details) If need be I’ll probably ask a few friends to help out with smaller things but until then I’m (mostly) working solo. So WISH ME LUCK!! EDIT: HOW COULD I FORGET!! I ALSO DYED MY HAIR PURPLE!! However before that I had to bleach it and due to missing a certain product that was vital and SOLD SEPERATELY I had to go into school on Monday looking like I just stole all 7 chaos emeralds.

Thankfully I got it all sorted and now I look AWESOME!! (sorry for bad camera quality! New phone has a shit camera)

For now however, that’s basically all I got up to this month. There’s probably something I forgot or didn’t mention because it was short (like twf reddit stuff) but that’s basically everything for the most part! I’m going to be doing a trivia stream with Waltenews on the 26th tho so I’ll talk about it more next time! Go check it out at “twitch.tv/Waltenews” or I will find you!! Thank you all so much for reading and I hope to do more of these :D

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learningnewways · 2 years

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Day One

Well, one day down, 75 more to go, but who’s counting?!

After an okay first nights sleep, other than the crying, the lady who runs the organisation, M, took me to the local market to buy some food. The thing with coming to places like The Gambia, is that you can’t really take photos of the realities of life, because it’s super awkward and not really appropriate to take photos. Also, the wifi is shocking, so it’s very hard to upload any photos to the blog... So just picture people everywhere, flies everywhere, rubbish everywhere, fish everywhere... It was pretty hectic. There is so much rubbish everywhere here, it’s hard to imagine that people live like this.

I got some basic food from the market and finally got some toilet paper from a small supermarket type place, which was good. I have some local money now but still no local SIM card. I forgot to say... I woke up the first morning and there was no power. So no fan, no wifi, no running water, nothing. Who needs a shower or to flush the toilet anyway, right? This power outage lasted most of the day. Apparently it’s normal here... So I’ll have to figure out what to eat since the fridge goes off so often and has mould everywhere inside it... Not ideal for a gal who loves to cook in large portions and eat leftovers!

I spent part of the day with M’s family who were lovely enough to let me into their home to eat with them and talk about life in The Gambia. They all said it’s very hot, so if it’s hot for them, you can only imagine how hot I’m feeling! I managed to get the wifi working for a minute and discovered lots of encouraging messages from friends and family back home. It’s so nice to know people care and are praying for me. So to everyone back home and to those reading this blog, thank you! I don’t know who you all are, but I so appreciate your support and prayers. I need them!

Unfortunately, I also got news that one of my best friends back home had been in a serious life or death kind of situation, where a search and rescue team had to come get them and their friend after hours of waiting anxiously. Praise God they are safe and doing well, but the thought of them being trapped and the possibility of either of them losing their lives really freaked me out. So then came another hour or so of deep sobbing, as you can imagine!

After I recomposed myself, M and I went for a walk around the neighbourhood. which I could absolutely get lost in! So many little shacks and shops and people. We went to the local beach where they go fishing, and of course, there was piles and piles of rubbish. Hard to imagine Tahunanui or New Brighton with piles of rubbish like that. M and I sat on the rocks and watched the waves, and for the first time since arriving, I felt okay. I love the beach and when I knew God was asking me to go to The Gambia, I was so pleased to know there was a beach nearby!

M shared a bit of her life story with me and man she is one strong woman. She talked a lot and of course I won’t write about it here, but there were a few things that stuck out. She said, “money is not important, time is most important”. Of course money is needed for life and ministry, but time is more important. Spending time with people, connecting, building relationships, listening to their stories... That’s what life is about. I think that’s why I miss home so much and didn't want to leave, because I already know and have known for years that relationships and spending time with people is what’s most important. That’s why it’s so hard to leave those I love, even if it’s only for a short amount of time in the long run.

She also talked about her life and how she felt like she kept getting dealt a bad hand and that while she learns through it and it always teaches her and makes her stronger, she can also get angry at God. That it often feels like everything goes bad all at once and that it’s too much to handle. I couldn’t agree more! Sometimes life seems so great, that I’m looking around waiting for something to go wrong. Other times I feel like I’m drowning and being attacked from every angle. I feel like that right now, like that’s what this next few months is going to be. Great...

Before bed I had a bit of wifi, so I tried to call my friend who’d been in the accident, but the call kept dropping out every 10 seconds, so that wasn’t going to work! It’s hard to be so far away when things like that happen to people you love. And it’s not the first time something really scary has happened to my friends and family since I’ve been away. It’s awful, I hate it. I just want to snap my fingers and be home, giving them all the biggest hugs.

As I lay in bed trying to sleep, the thunder and lightning came, another one of my biggest fears, whoop-de-freaking-do! And this isn’t New Zealand style, this is tropical thunder and lightning, where it is louder than you could ever imagine. I put my headphones on and cranked the music so loud, but somehow I could still hear it. So yeah, last night I did not get a good sleep, but instead had the first of many anxious nights ahead I’m sure...

Today I start the hands on work here for Samaritana, so here’s hoping I can find my feet a little and remember the real reason I’m here, which is to serve. This trip is not about me, it’s about helping and giving to those around me. I’m not quite sure how to balance the realities of my fear and terror and heartache at being here, while also being humbled knowing I’ve been called here by the God of the universe for a purpose beyond myself. Hard to get your head around that!

I was listening to Into Faith I Go by Pat Barrett last night as I tried to drown out the thunder, very relevant lyrics for me right now I feel. One lyric in particular says, "I'm facing all my fears" and yuuuuuuuuup, I sure am!

youtube

“I've never been good at change

If I'm honest, it's always scared me

But I can't deny this stirring deep inside me

Now I know it's time to stop resisting

'Cause I'm not getting any younger

Fear is a such a sad way to live a life

So face to the wind, I'm jumping out, I'm walking in

Every single thing You want to show me

To the ups and downs, the highs and lows

The taking in, the letting go

To tears and laughter, the great unknown

To the open journey, into faith, I go

Nobody said this would be easy

Anyone who did never went through anything painful

But faith is not some fragile thing that shatters when we walk through something hard

So, we walk on whatever may come

Running like a child in an open field

Stepping off the edge, I'm facing all my fears

If this is what it feels like to be born again

I'll be born again

So when I feel like giving up

When I feel like throwing it all away

I look back over my shoulder

And I can see Your goodness every single step that I have taken

And it beats like a drum

And it rings like a bell

And it sings like a choir

And it's leading me on my way

Oh, You lead me on my way”

#Youtube

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harmonymurphy · 1 month

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I've decided this is the year I stop spinning my wheels. I was going to try to do it last year, but between Mom's failing health and my deteriorating vision, it just wasn't happening. But I'm going to have my normal vision back next month, and that's the last thing holding me back.

Well... that and how nervous I get at the thought of finally sharing my webcomic idea. So I thought I could start saying some pretty vague things about it, slowly getting less vague, working my way up to posting some concept art possibly in May or June. And then maybe this fall I'll actually start it.

So... um... here goes nothing. I'll just vaguely explain some stuff relating to the premise, then sort of talk to myself about/explain how I have this very bad idea for how my story needs to be told but I don't see a way out of it.

One thing I like to do is imagine mythological creatures are real in the modern world, just hiding somehow, then try to figure out how different species might interact with each other. Then I'll look through myths and see if there's anything I can use to extrapolate into conflicts between various species. Similarities between different species that could indicate a single origin. Stuff like that.

For my webcomic, I had chosen a few species said to have shape-shifting powers and imagined what it would be like if they were secretly passing as human. Since us rednecks are seen as weird by our own neighbors, I thought it would be fun to tell a story about foreign mythical creatures coming to live in the redneck south and trying to figure out what's going on with all the guns and grits.

So I had the idea that the first few chapters will be some of the teenage non-humans botching their attempt to pass as human while meeting their new redneck neighbors, then slowly explaining their society to their new human friends. Every couple chapters something would happen to make the humans uneasy as they realized their new neighbors are hiding things from them, being evasive when asked questions about their history or about why one species seems to be treated as an enemy of the others.

I have this one character I'll refer to as H who is very special to me for reasons I'll explain someday. As I figured out his backstory, I came up with more and more scenes I wanted to show, way too many to show in flashbacks. I realized I wanted to do a prequel about H's life before the main series began.

The problem is, I'll need to do them at the same time. There are multiple things H did in the past that will have repercussions for the main story. I have spent years debating it, and I always come to the conclusion that I want my hypothetical readers to be introduced to a certain... thing in H's backstory before they see it in the main story. The scene will be so much more emotional that way, and my muse is fueled by raw emotion.

I've been doing a chapter-by-chapter outline of H's story this week (one of the few things I can still do while I wait for the laser treatment to fix my extra-crappy vision) and I've determined I'll need to share around 40 chapters of H's backstory to pull it off properly.

One solution would be to start out with H's story, finish it (it's going to be around 75 chapters in total), then do the main story. I suppose that could work. I intend to write them so you could enjoy either one independently. And I know what I'm going to call H's story, while I'm still undecided on the official name of the main story. But I really liked the idea of slowly introducing readers to how everything works in the story, while H isn't human and most of his story takes place in the nonhuman world. One example is my main antagonist group, where I wanted a sort of slow reveal of how this one society is causing conflict for the others. H has to outright explain this group to someone in chapter 16 of my current outline, and circumstances require him to spend a winter with them, which takes about 10 chapters to cover. It would reveal a lot of things early, but I don't see a way around it.

So I guess that's going to be my really bad idea. Start my main comic, do 20-30 chapters, then start H's story and alternate chapters as the story requires. I am seriously risking artistic burnout with that setup, but I think it'll be worth the risk to tell the story properly.

#Feel free to ignore #Mostly talking to myself #Planning for the future #I always feel like I'm being annoying when I post stuff like this #But I like reading stuff like this from other artists #Maybe somebody will want to read it someday #Okay I'll stop now

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deadcactuswalking · 2 years

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REVIEWING THE CHARTS: 07/05/2022 (Future’s ‘I NEVER LIKED YOU’ feat. Drake, Benson Boone)

“As it Was” by Harry Styles spends its fifth week at #1 on the UK Singles Chart, and it’s a weird week – not as much busy as it is just plain strange – so welcome back to REVIEWING THE CHARTS!

Rundown

Before we talk about all of the strangeness in the new arrivals, of course, we start with what was on the chart and has dropped off this week, which includes some notable tracks first exiting the UK Top 75 – which is what I cover – after five weeks in the region or a peak in the top 40. Our notable dropouts this week include “Hold it Down” by Digga D, “Everything but You” by Clean Bandit featuring A7S (a shame as it’s a great song), “Hallucination” by Regard and Years & Years, “Gold Forever” by The Wanted off of the return last week, “Boyfriend” by Dove Cameron, “Numb Little Bug” by Em Beihold, “Overseas” by D-Block Europe featuring Central Cee, “Ghost” by Justin Bieber and finally, “Do It to It” by ACRAZE featuring Cherish. This is the first noticeably big week of our noticeably big month of May, so to see all these songs, some of which were really long-term Spring or Winter hits, dissolve the first week is pretty fascinating.

What are always infinitely more interesting are our notable gains, yet with a week containing three songs from Future and a happy gathering of new arrivals and returns, there weren’t really many songs already on the charts sliding up. Firstly, for whatever reason, we saw returns for “Levitating” by Dua Lipa and “To the Moon!” by JNR Choi and Sam Tompkins at #75 and #68 for whatever bizarre reason, but we did see notable gains – up five spots or more from last week’s position – for “low down” by venbee and Dan Fable from last week’s debut at #66, as well as “Je M’appelle” by Benzz at #48 thanks to a Navos remix, with pretty much nothing else gaining, other than – of course – “Big Energy” by Latto featuring Mariah Carey and DJ Khaled at #28 because the country wants to see me cry, and in better news, “About Damn Time” by Lizzo, which surged up to #15 thanks to TikTok traction. The song’s pretty good so I’m not complaining, though I really did not expect Lizzo to get another hit this soon.

Our top five this week, bottom to top, consists of “Baby” by Aitch and Ashanti, “Starlight” by Dave, “Go” by Cat Burns, “First Class” by Jack Harlow and of course, “As it Was”. Now to talk about some music that won’t ever touch the Singles Chart but did release last week...

Off the Charts

AMERICAN WASTELAND – nascar aloe

Okay, I’m going to ACTUALLY keep this brief this time: it’s way too busy of an album release and chart schedule for me to start writing paragraphs this week. Thankfully, nascar aloe didn’t give me too much to say: it’s a distorted trap-metal album which is at its best when it’s placing righteously owned rage in fake British accents and on The Prodigy type beats. Sadly, most of these tracks feel like bog-standard edgelord rap under two minutes. My favourite track is “FENCE HOPPER”.

Psychokinetic Love Songs – Hey, ily!

This terminally online emo-pop band finally release their debut album and I’m not going to lie: it’s kind of disappointing, and somehow expands on the messiness of the EP that came before, as the band has yet to come to grips on how to use that broad theatricality that they unravel when they clash the quirky chiptune tones with grittier post-hardcore drums. It’s in unique sonic territory, for sure, and it’s not awful but it meets the ceiling of its boundaries way too quickly for me to not think this isn’t just flimsy. My favourite track is “Shutting Down”.

HISTORY – The Knocks

You know, it should be telling that what is practically a singles compilation is a lot better than what are supposed to be fully-formed albums, but I just can’t not grin through the entirety of this album. Even when the grooves aren’t as tight, or the mixing is a bit off, the songwriting is always damn near infectious, with a smooth and funky selection of nu-disco joints that is a sleek listen, even if not all of them reach the wonderful pop perfection of my favourite track, “All About You” with Foster The People which is probably my candidate for the best song released in 2020. Yeah, the singles go that far back.

Crystal Shards – blackwinterwells

Hyperpop pioneer blackwinterwells released an album blending newer minimalist synthpop that really does sound crystallised with cloudier ambient trap singles, some of which reach as far back as 2019 – nascar aloe did this too, it’s kind of a theme this week. The differences really aren’t as starkly obvious as they should be, and this cohesive hopelessness really impressed me in comparison to some of wells’ other album that in my opinion had never compared to her loose single track. A full-blown compilation of those would be near perfect. For this effort, however, it’s still pretty decent and my favourite track is “vivisect” with 8485, because anything she touches is gold.

Two Ribbons – Let’s Eat Grandma

Sometimes the most frustrating albums aren’t those that are boring or even bad, but good albums you can’t find much to latch onto and talk about. This Norwich indie pop duo released a really cute and ethereal record that organically splits into two halves, one electronic and one folksier, although really the two blend so much that it becomes almost meaningless. The songwriting is really consistently wonderful throughout, and the atmosphere is there... but much like, say, Beach House, the quality really does not match how distinct it is. My favourite track is the prog-electronic interlude “In the Cemetery”.

blue water road – Kehlani

Now I did not expect to like a Kehlani album this much, but wow, they really knocked it out of the park with this one, considering how mature and soulful the more downtempo cuts, which make up much of the album, really are, tackling different types of grieving in unique lyrical detail. Kehlani focuses less on grand harmonisations unlike other R&B singers, rather on the more intimate vocal layering details, which made me want to relive those moments of introspection even more. It’s a grower, and it’s far from perfect – hell, I really DON’T like the song with Syd – but it’s worth a listen, especially my favourite track, and one of the best songs of the year thus far, “melt”.

BELIEVER – Ivy Hollivana

This EP of artsy electropop actually kind of threw me in how vibrantly off the wall it was, but it’s not in a way that’s clumsy or animated, as Ivy Hollivana and their production are reeled in by the more subtle delivery and a mix that doesn’t sound that muddy, but feels like it’s kind of crushing in on itself. It’s a short listen but definitely a unique one that I didn’t really expect. My favourite track is “LOCKJAW MYTHOS”.

MAHAL – Toro y Moi

The man wrote “So Many Details” so he really didn’t need to prove itself... but Goddamn, this might be his best album yet. He can strip the electronic layers from his sound and yet so effortlessly create a psychedelic soul record that sounds content with being bloody exhausted. Every track feels like it was a precious child that Chaz immaculately crafted, yet comes off as so jazzy and improvised that all of the detail breezes by, especially on the breezy “The Loop”, with one of the best guitar solos I’ve heard outside or really including rock music, and a resonance throughout the album that I really can’t pinpoint but moves me more than even some of Mr. Bundick’s earlier work has. “Last Year” is an anthem of self-love and improvement but ends up digging in its own sides with the ending mantra of just stopping while you’re ahead. If anything, the album is about simply acceptance – not in ignorance but in acknowledgement... “Hustle’s got you losing touch”, I suppose... not that you could tell by the seismic and downright gorgeous closer “Days in Love”, which is up there with “The Place Where He Inserted the Blade” by Black Country, New Road for the best song released this year. This record feels like both Summer and Christmas, absolutely give it a listen. If you’re wondering where my Future album review is, he charted this week so, speaking of... back to your regularly scheduled programming!

NEW ARRIVALS

#65 – “21 Reasons” – Nathan Dawe featuring Ella Henderson

Produced by Punctual and Nathan Dawe

Is this an answer to 50 Cent’s “21 Questions”? Jokes aside, this does reference a 2000s hit that is not 50 Cent’s #6 collaboration with 50 Cent – in fact, it’s a song we saw sampled last week. I guess Benzz was just one of many to think the horn riff to Danish DJ Rune’s “Calabria” was catchy, as here we see it repurposed into house-pop instead of drill. The best version of that song stays the reggae-infused remix by Enur and Natasja known as “Calabria 2007”, which actually reached #46 in the States and made no noise over here. Alas, we’re not here to discuss that bounciful nostalgic tune, but instead, this stiffer piece of future house that just lays a pitched-down “Calabria” riff under your typical house percussion, sounding particularly metallic and the flat bass that barely actually drops or has any impact. Ella Henderson sounds fine, I suppose, but her semi-rasp does not translate well to this artificial vocal production, which makes her sound really unfitting for a cheesy bop like this, which I’m convinced should only ever have a reggae deejay on, as that’s by far the best attempt tried at making this song click. I will admit that the counting gimmick and build-up in the bridge replicates the cheese of “Destination Calabria”, but it still leads to a chorus where Henderson is trying to harmonise with a 20-year-old horn riff. This isn’t awful, but honestly insanely generic, with only that sample trying to lift it up to any sense of notability. Knowing my luck, this’ll be a top 10 hit. It may face some competition, though.

#61 – “That That” – PSY featuring SUGA

Produced by SUGA

The aforementioned competition is specifically coming from the “Gangnam Style” guy because it’s 2022 and anything can happen on the pop charts. I did say it was a bit of a strange week, and I should point out that this is the first time PSY has charted since 2013’s “Gentleman” hit #10 in the UK. I like that song, and hell, I like “Gangnam Style” and to be honest, even “Hangover” with Snoop Dogg so I was kind of looking to enjoy this... and yeah, I do. It’s based on a horn riff that is similar enough sonically to remind me of “Calabria” – kill me – but the blasts act much more as stabs than a hook, and it’s put against a uniquely K-pop groove with the tropical percussion and really high tempo that’s fitting for the content, even if PSY and his at times hilariously limited vocals – he isn’t really saying much. It’s mostly about being starved of partying due to the pandemic – which is NOT over, Mr. Gangnam – and finally letting loose, which fits the bombast and familiar build-up that I’m kind of disappointed doesn’t lead into a blast of fuzzy synths but instead an explosive horn riff backing up the hook pretty decently. I wish there was more interplay with PSY and SUGA, who said they felt like “besties” and “childhood friends” when writing the songs, but the call-and-response on the outro is infectious and SUGA’s fast-paced flow on his honestly kind of killer verse goes harder than it has any right to. I do really like this, memes aside, but I don’t expect it to stick around given it’s primarily in Korean and boosted mostly by sales thanks to the BTS involvement. I can dream.

#54 – “Honest” – Justin Bieber featuring Don Toliver

Produced by sonni, BEAM and Azul

#54, huh, Bieber? For a new lead-off single? Well, regardless of how his new music charts, he’ll be fine, but it does alarm me that Bieber’s new song, with a video to boot, is getting less traction than all three Future songs that debuted this week – and we’ll get back to him in a bit. Something must have gone horribly wrong, right? Well, other than potential oversaturation, this song is kind of a mess. There’s a stiff, robotic groove layered on top of melodies that sound like ASMR nature sounds, with a really awkward hardcore kick drum way too high in the mix before we get into the liquidised trap beat which really does not let Bieber do anything, let alone create a catchy hook, as he spends most of his time on the mic awkwardly rapping or murmuring. For a song that’s supposed to be a love song, it’s got a really creepy, menacing Houston vibe, which could have worked with Travis Scott and Don Toliver, but not with Justin Bieber, who says that because his girl is “spicy” that “he likes that Cajun on” her. For what it’s worth, I like Don on here, who acts as a BTEC Travis Scott when Travis Scott himself is barely working at GCSE level, though there really is a disparity in the content considering the Biebs is on about his wife and Don wants this girl to throw her booty on the couch, and Don does not do nearly enough to save this from being possibly one of the worst singles Bieber has ever put out. It’s a complete failure in all regards, and honestly comes off as more terrifyingly condescending than loving and honest. It’s like a serial killer wrote this, which makes me really realise why it didn’t do well. Let’s hope it stays that way.

#53 – “PUFFIN ON ZOOTIEZ” – Future

Produced by Nils, TooDope and TM88

Atlanta rapper Future released his ninth studio album I NEVER LIKED YOU last week, debuting at #2 on the UK Albums Chart and... it’s fine. It’s projected to do insane numbers in the US because of course it is, but in my opinion, it’s nothing more than a slightly overlong slice of decadence and misogyny, which is pretty much Future’s discography summarised in a sentence. Of all the murky trap that Future delivers, “PUFFIN ON ZOOTIEZ” is absolutely the best choice for me and it seems many others, as this debuted instead of the collaborations with Young Thug, Gunna and Kodak Black, or even “KEEP IT BURNIN” featuring Kanye West which is a gnarly, toxic tread banger that I thought would chart thanks to the video. Instead, we have this and the two tracks with Drake, so starting with “PUFFIN ON ZOOTIEZ”, which never gets less silly regardless of how many times you say it, this is Future in a mode I really quite like. TM88 and his co-producers provide a pretty slick and chill acoustic guitar, and Future understands that whilst he doesn’t need to provide much elevated energy, he needs to be focused, and his flows here are so tight over the trap knock. Sure, he’s just flexing, taking drugs and having sex with women, but the beeping synths and Future’s increasing desperate “on the verge of tears” delivery makes sure the verses don’t blend into the almost reassuring chorus, which by the end of the track feels perfectly exhausted and even overwhelmed. It’s a lazy song, but not because it was lazily made, rather because it feels like it’s a pretty damn great way of conveying laziness. I do have to ask, what does “her hair touch her ass, she gon’ think she Korean” even mean? Genius has this obscure reference that I really do not think Future would pull off, so I’m assuming it’s freestyled gibberish, which is honestly completely fine with me.

#52 – “Love Me More” – Sam Smith

Produced by Jimmy Napes and StarGate

It really does feel like a while since we’ve last seen Sam Smith, and I haven’t really missed their presence. Sure, “How Do You Sleep?” was decent but I’ve never been able to enjoy their wide array of generic ballads and soul-tinged dance-pop. This really isn’t any different, but I do enjoy it a considerable amount more, probably due to how minimalist it is in pretty much everywhere other than the vocal production, as with the amount of layers developing into a choir surrounding the chorus, and their riffing acting as sound effects, it might as well be an a cappella song with digital drum and bass programming that does sound stiff, but considering that the song is about self-love and improvement, it kind of fits. Sam sounds they’re just out of a phase where they were really stuck in terms of hating their own self-image and the chorus really sets that in stone, even if it ends on an optimistic note that they’re learning to love themselves more. I like this, even if it’s just for kind of the novelty of it in this climate, and I hope it sticks around – good job, Sam Smith, first time I’ve liked a track of theirs this much since probably “Latch” with Disclosure.

#50 – “I’M ON ONE” – Future featuring Drake

Produced by Torey Montana

Now back to Future, and again, this is a song I quite liked from that album. Sure, Drake already has a track called “I’m on One”, specifically his feature on DJ Khaled’s 2011 track with Rick Ross and Lil Wayne which hit the top 10 in the US but just #78 over here, but that song is also boring as sin, so a song with the same title that’s a minute shorter is a welcome addition to the increasingly unwelcoming Drake discography. With that said, this is a bit long and I really do think if it was just Future, it’d be a lot better, considering what I like most about this track is the distorted horror synth that kind of clips in the mix amidst the bizarrely-mastered 808s and skittering trap percussion which sounds like a murky dirge that Future would both rip apart and blend into, and well, he does, as he says he’s too rich for a murder case which I wish he’d have more of those gripping details about, before taking Adderall and asking you to call him “Michael Phelps for swimming in your bitch’s face”. His awkward, stunted flow adds to the psychotic nature of this song, only furthered by its fluidity, with a barely-existent chorus and... an honestly really embarrassing Drake verse. He repeats his lzy Blueface reference and insists that all of his women wear expensive watches, in what sounds like a badly-mixed leftover from Certified Lover Boy. He gives instructions on how to make a girl’s ass “jet-ski” before exclaiming that he doesn’t know why people test him – boy, I wonder – and stumbles into the outro where he makes a “grrt” sound because he thinks he can pull that off. Oh, and I wouldn’t put your sex references anywhere near Cristiano Ronaldo given his past, but really, that’s just one of the mishaps in this verse that’s almost so bad it’s good, and I still like the song despite it since his flow is pretty okay and honestly, the comedy, whether intended or otherwise, is more convincing than Drake going fully into an inauthentic gangster mode as we all know he can do. Speaking of inauthentic...

#42 – “Just Coz” – Aitch and Giggs

Produced by WhYJay and LiTek

Okay, I don’t mean to do Aitch like that, and really, nowadays, he sticks to his lane of boring flexes and sex-raps more than anything, but I’ve still yet to hear a verse from this guy since “Strike a Pose” that was actually any good. He’s got his typical producers for an admittedly eerie vocal being flattened by cheap-sounding guitars and a hip-hop groove that feels really stagnant. Aitch himself feels like he is placed way too forward in the mix, and by the time that he’s convincing lesbians that men might be okay actually because of his massive schlong, I zone out. Giggs is here, and I do like his creepy delivery but it doesn’t really work when he’s saying he’s “hosting vagina” and “splurting” on his Valentino jeans. This is just awkward and kind of gross, without a chorus to wrap any of it together. Giggs has a much longer verse than Aitch, and neither are really all that good, so I’m not sure what it proves in all honesty. I do like the line about how Giggs “came in the club with a Monica” and “trying to cut with a Brandy”, because it’s a cute little piece of wordplay, although if he said he was in a bar with Monica and was trying to leave with a Brandy, it’d be much more clever. Just saying.

#21 – “In the Stars” – Benson Boone

Produced by Jason Evigan

We’re keeping the “GHOST TOWN” guy around? God, of course we are, aren’t we? Well, Mr. Boone has a second hit on his hands with “In the Stars”. It’s more melodramatic piano-based singer-songwriter schlock that doesn’t have as much detail as it does longing self-deprecation and wow, it really does feel like a self-flagellation over the most generic instrumental ever. With that said, I did think he was onto something when this massive-sounding vocal performance was connected to a tragic death, wherein Boone looks at the old birthday letters and reminisces on his relationship with this person, who is kind of kept up in the air in terms of what dynamic they had, presumably to make it more accessible. Then he guilt-trips a dead guy in the last line of his chorus because of course he does, as he can’t self-flagellate for long enough before deflecting blame. Who’s to blame here anyway? They died, for God’s sake, how can you pin the blame on your heartache to the person who died for, well, dying?! Maybe I’m misinterpreting this but it does come off really roughly, even if it is marginally better than “GHOST TOWN”.

#8 – “WAIT FOR U” – Future featuring Drake and Tems

Produced by FNZ and ATL Jacob

Now, we get back to Future for our final new entry, right in the top 10, “WAIT FOR U”, which now actually outlasts “Essence” as Tems’ highest charting song so good on her, especially because she really is why this song is any good. She doesn’t even provide original vocals, as her contribution is taken from the 2020 track “Higher”, repeating that she will wait for... Future, in this context, with that longing desperacy in her vocals really shining, even on an acoustic-based trap beat that I actually might have underrated when I first heard the album, as it’s a pretty well-written song too. Future plays off of the Tems sample asking him to be clearer and be more honest with her as a partner, revealing that he gets more vulnerable and tells his partner when he’s on pills or codeine. When he’s loaded, he keeps it real, and whilst Future has spent much of his career talking about toxicity, that’s probably the most convincing toxic relationship he’s described thus far. I really wish Drake wasn’t here, as his negging for a girl apparently cheating on him is badly-mixed and sours an otherwise pretty sombre song with his nasal misogynist garbage. When I’m saying that nasal misogyny ruins a FUTURE song, you might be doing something wrong, Drake! It’s just gross, even if I like how he takes over the chorus with Future for the second time, and lets Future say that really kind of profound line, “When I’m loaded, I keep it real”. I know Future has been sober for a while but it doesn’t make it not harrowing. This is a brilliant song hidden in some awkward drum programming, a terrible Drake verse and sadly fading out as a bit of a cop-out instead of having a true climax or bridge. I don’t think they’ll ever take Drake off for a more final remix (that would preferably see more original vocals from Tems to play off of Future) so sadly this exists in a state which I think is on the brink of greatness but honestly sounds unfinished. Much like “I’M ON ONE”, it’s kind of a mess but this is still good, it just should be better.

Conclusion

That concludes our strange but kind of decent week, as Best of the Week goes to Future for “PUFFIN ON ZOOTIEZ” and the Honourable Mention goes to “That That” by PSY and SUGA – yeah, I really hope that one sticks around, though Sam Smith was close. For the worst, there really is no competition other than two songs that stick out: Benson Boone gets the Dishonourable Mention for “In the Stars”, whilst Worst of the Week goes to the travesty that is Justin Bieber’s “Honest” featuring Don Toliver.

It’s Jack Harlow’s week next week. Let’s see how big of a splash he makes. Thank you for reading and I’ll see you next week!

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reidsaurora · 2 years

Text

"Letting You Go" ~ S. Reid

Summary: Spencer Reid spends his afternoon showing off magic tricks to his wife, Y/N. Unbeknownst to him, it may very well be the last afternoon they spend together.

Pairing: Husband!Spencer Reid x Wife!Reader

Word Count: 1,319

Content Warning: character death, very mild swearing

Genre: Angst. Very depressing Angst.

Extra Notes: N/A, i think

Features the One-Liner: "Pick a card, any card. No, not that card!"

Originally Written: 01/18/2022

Criminal Minds masterlist can be found here!

════ ⋆★⋆ ════

"Alright, pick a card, any card you want," Spencer asked me during his 75th card trick that night. OK, maybe it wasn't 75, but you get the idea.

"Wally," I laughingly said. Wally was my special nickname for Spencer. At some point earlier on in our relationship, I'd started calling him by his middle name and at some point, "Walter" got shortened to "Wally" and it always stuck.

"OK, OK, I promise this'll be the last one. Now, pick a card."

I reached for the ten of diamonds, but was met with the sight of him pulling the deck away.

"No, you don't wanna pick that card. Pick a different one," he chuckled.

I attempted to roll my eyes, but his actions made me laugh so I was unsuccessful.

"OK, it's fine, that card's OK."

I giggled at his antics as he continued on with his card trick. He flicked through his cards a couple times, acting as though I'd never seen this trick before.

"OK, is this your card?" he asked, holding up the ace of clubs.

I shook my head.

"Oh," he replied, acting disappointed. "What about this one?" This time he held up the five of hearts.

"Still wrong," I giggled, followed by a small cough. I grabbed my glass of water and took a sip.

Suddenly, he had an astonished look across his face. "Wait a minute. How'd that get there?" he asked, pulling the ten of diamonds off the bottom of my cup.

I choked a little on my water, struggling to get air back into my throat for a moment.

"Hey, shhh, be careful," he told me, rubbing my back as he spoke.

Once I finally caught my breath, I said, "I know. I'm sorry."

"Nothing to be sorry about," he attempted to smile, kissing my cheek.

"Seriously though, how do you do it?"

"A magician never-"

"Reveals his secrets. I know, I know."

He leaned over, kissing me on the temple. "You wanna see another magic trick?"

"Spencer-"

"Please!" he practically begged to show me another.

"Alright, fine, go ahead."

He pulled a quarter from his pocket, placing it into his left hand. "And now, the great Spencer Reid will perform the infamous 'disappearing coin' trick."

I giggled as I said, "Ooh, I'm so intrigued."

He held his right hand above the coin, snapping three times. On the third snap, the coin suddenly disappeared.

My mouth flew open, still somehow surprised by his trick, even though he'd probably shown me this trick before. He did love flexing his magic tricks.

"OK, seriously, you gotta show me how to do that."

"Maybe I will someday," he replied, a small smile appearing afterward. He took my hand in his, rubbing his thumb over the back of my hand.

"Well, you should probably start teaching me sooner rather than later," I told him. "I'd like to at least learn one magic trick before I die."

"Hey, don't talk like that," he quietly reprimanded me, petting my hair with the hand I wasn't holding.

"We have to talk about it at some point or another, Spencer. I'm not sure how much longer I can hold on."

"No. No, don't talk like that. We're gonna get you into that clinic and get you on that new drug trial and you're gonna be as good as new."

"Spencer, I'm dying. I've come to terms with it. I need you to do the same."

"You're my wife. I'm not just gonna let you die without trying everything I can to save you first," he argued, though he was whispering.

"Wally, I need you to let me go, so that I can let go," I stated.

"I'm not letting you go. Not if I know there's a possibility of you joining the drug trial."

"First of all, that waitlist is a hundred miles long. There's no guarantee I'm gonna live long enough to get into the trial, much less the guarantee that it'll work. Second of all, what would you do if I were in your position? Would you want me to suffer and watch you hold on when you knew it was time to let go?"

Just then, the sound of the doorbell went off. I wasn't sure who it was, we weren't expecting company.

"Saved by the bell," he whispered, kissing my temple. "I'm gonna go see who that is."

As I waited for him to get back, I stared at my "safe square" on the wall. It was something I'd learned to do early on after my diagnosis, seeing as most of the medicines I took made it seem like the whole room was swaying.

It couldn't have been twenty seconds later before I heard footsteps running down the hall to my room, and I knew exactly who it was.

Our youngest child, Anna, then appeared in the doorway. I could've sworn JJ wasn't supposed to bring the kids back for two more days, but then again, my mind was drawing a blank on what day of the week it was anyway.

"Hi, Mommy," Anna smiled. She climbed up onto the bed with me, hugging me carefully so as to not hit my port.

"Hey, honey," I said with a small smile, feeling a tear slip down my cheek. I quickly wiped it away so she didn't see me crying. "Did you enjoy your time at Aunt JJ's house?"

Just then, our oldest child, Gideon, walked in. He gave me a silent hug before sitting down beside his sister.

"I did. Aunt JJ took me to the salon and got my nails done. See?" she asked, finishing her statement by showing me the bright pink nail polish she was dawning.

JJ and Spencer then walked into the room, JJ sporting a sympathetic smile.

"Well, wasn't that nice of Aunt JJ?" I said, smiling back at her.

"Oh, it was no trouble. The boys went fishing so I offered Anna a manicure instead," JJ explained.

Anna then stated, "Who wants to sit in the sun all day and not talk anyway?"

I laughed at her sassiness, savoring every moment of it. I then turned to my son and asked, "What about you? Did you have a fun time with Henry?"

He nodded in response.

I knew why Gideon was hardly speaking. He knew something was wrong with me. Not in the same way Anna knew, like I was going to get better soon. Gideon knew I was having trouble holding on.

My eyes were becoming heavy, but not in a normal, tired way. Like they were shutting themselves and I had no control.

"Y/N?" I heard JJ call, though she sounded muffled.

I attempted to reply, but couldn't form words.

This was it.

"Jennifer, get the kids outta here!"

"Mommy!"

"Mom?!"

"JJ, please!" Spencer shouted as climbed on top of me.

Out of the corner of my eyes, I could see JJ leading Gideon and Anna out of the room as fast as she could. Though, she seemed almost as panicked as they did.

Spencer began chest compressions as my vision went dark. With every push into my chest, I got closer to my last breath. I knew it was coming, just not like this.

"No!" he shouted before pressing down some more. "No, I'm not gonna lose you, dammit! I can't!"

I never believed in the whole "your life flashes before your eyes" thing. Until that moment.

Every kiss I'd shared with Spencer, every hug I'd shared with the kids, every press conference JJ and I held during every case we were assigned together. I even recalled seeing memories from when I was a little girl that I hadn't thought about in decades.

Spencer gave me a long kiss that I could barely feel. Even in my last moments, I was still able to recognize his lips.

And just like that, I took my final breath.

════ ⋆★⋆ ════

Surprise!! You can find part two here!

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fandomwriterstuff · 3 years

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“We’re a well-oiled team of military-grade kindergarteners,” his best friend, and the only other human on the ship who would understand what kindergarten was, continued chastising him and his companions. “The level of education and training among the three of you eclipses that of the entire rest of the members of this operation,” Annabeth continued, pointing her finger individually at himself, his pilot Jason, and his Chief Science Officer Nico. “You know, I’m not that surprised with you, Percy, but you are our XO so you should really be more responsible,” he winced at that, still feeling a bit of imposter syndrome at being the Commander of the USS Olympus. “Jason, shouldn’t you be piloting a ship or something?” At that, he saluted her and did an about face before scampering off to get into more trouble. “And you, you’re definitely way too responsible to have gotten mixed up with this Seaweed Brain and Sparky, so what’s in this tomfoolery for you?”

Nico, the only Neptunian on the ship, shifted his large black wings self consciously under the scrutiny of their Chief of Operations. Percy, as the Commander of the vessel, felt obligated to protect his usually stoic and well-behaved… acquaintance? Di Angelo was reserved, almost standoffish, and resented anyone who tried to stick up for him for some reason, but that didn’t stop Percy’s stupid seaweed brain from doing so. Hence the acquaintance. Percy was 99% sure Di Angelo didn’t consider him a friend. But he was nice to Percy and a great officer, so Percy considered him his friend.

“It was my fault, Annie,” he used her childhood nickname carefully, not knowing whether it would soften her up or piss her off more. He was hoping for softening. “It was just another one of Jason and my dumb ideas that we thought we would need a scientist to help with, and we didn’t want to piss off Leo by involving him in it. You know how he is about his engineer and warp cores and whatnot,” Percy held his hands up placatingly. “Leave Di Angelo out of this, he has sciencey things to do, isn’t that right?” Percy side-eyed his companion who (not surprisingly) rolled his eyes.

“I try not to get involved with human pranks or even Jovian mischief, but Officer Grace and First Officer Jackson were about to be meddling with my linguistics team. It isn’t my duty to tell my superiors what to do, so I sought out the next best option, supervising and ensuring no lasting damage was done to the physical or emotional state of the linguistics team. Now,” Here Percy held in a smirk as Di Angelo shrugged. “If they caused interference with the machinery of the ship, that wouldn’t be my expertise, so I allowed it to happen and-” Percy held back a laugh as the other male started speaking even faster to get everything out as Annabeth turned redder and redder. “I’m very sorry about that, truly, but I had no control over the situation.”

“No control over the situation? You three broke our LIT machine and now we have to go back to Earth as soon as we pass close enough to fix it. Soon enough nobody on this ship will understand each other,” the woman across from them crossed her arms and Percy shrunk back a bit.

“I want to make a joke about a machine being called “LIT,” but I feel like it isn’t the right time,” he muttered. “I know the Linguistic Inhibition Technology is important, but most of us have a working understanding of at least one other language, so it shouldn’t be a huge issue, right?”

“You know it works by connecting to the implant technology in our brains, so as it shuts down one by one, members of this ship from spaces stations and planets far and wide will have no clue why they suddenly can’t understand their XO, or their Chief Officer, or their best friend. So you better explain this. And you have to tell them that we’re going straight back to Earth to fix it because no nearby planets have the same brain implant tech as us. Damn Terrans and their brand name technology copyrights,” Annabeth grumbled and finally turned around to walk off.

“Hey, you’re Terran, too!” Percy shouted after her, but she just flipped him the bird.

“She can do that?” Di Angelo asked, side-eyeing Percy.

“Yeah, she’s been my best friend since we were twelve. As long as she doesn’t undermine my authority in front of everyone else, I don’t really care. I’ve done way worse to her,” Percy laughed at the other man’s frown. “Nothing bad, just pranks and things of that sort. Maybe when we get back to Earth we can show you where we’re from. You never set foot off of the training grounds while you were in school.”

“I would… like that,” Di Angelo paused and gave Percy a soft smile.

“Great,” Percy patted the younger male on the shoulder and made his way to the Command Center.

Percy sat himself down in the rotating chair and pressed on the comms device.

“Gooooood evening crew of the USS Olympus, this is your Commanding Officer, Percy Jackson, speaking,” he smiled at the engineering crew that was scuttling by, only for one of them to pause and look at him like he was speaking a different language… Whoops.

“There was a malfunction with the Linguistic Inhibition Technology and we will be returning to Earth henceforth to repair it before the damage becomes problematic. You may experience glitches with your implant technology and may revert to only understanding your first language and those you have studied extensively. If somebody looks like they’re not understanding what I’m saying right now, please escort them to the linguistics team in Science Bay 3. Carry on. Jackson, out.” He clicked again and the mic turned off.

He sighed, this would be one of his bigger mistakes. They were supposed to be exploring, but they couldn’t do that if nobody could speak to one another. One trip home couldn’t hurt him, and he was sure Annabeth would be happy to see her father.

It wasn’t until later after the Chief Officer meeting when someone finally asked Percy about Earth. For many of the non-humans on the ship, Earth was a place to get education and training to go out in the star fleet, and they never set foot outside the campus grounds, just like Di Angelo. But people had stopped asking him questions because Earth was basically “Space Australia,” as Annabeth had explained to him. The adaptability of humans and their need to pack bond astounded many and horrified many others. So, he stopped talking about home.

It was a new member of their ship, Novax (a Vulcan who was a part of Leo’s engineering team), who asked him about it first.

“I hear Earth is 75% made of pure salt water, and is filled with animals of all kinds. Do you have a favorite water animal?” he asked Percy excitedly.

“Definitely dolphins, though they aren’t underwater creatures. Like humans they need oxygen to breathe, and come up for air very often. My favorite actual underwater species would have to be a hippocampus from Neptune. I’ve always wanted to go and see one, but my human anatomy prevents me from going on-planet,” Percy explained and sipped on his hot tea.

“There are a million creatures in the ocean and you pick one that doesn’t breathe underwater?” Clarisse grunted. His Chief Tactical Officer was a brutish Martian, but very specialized in weapons. “And your second favorite isn’t even Terran.”

“What else do you know about the ‘ocean’?” Novax breathed, leaning forward.

“Eh, not much,” Percy shrugged.

“I’m not sure I heard that correctly, maybe my LIT unit isn’t functioning well,” another member of engineering asked, Nyssa. “Your planet is 75% water and you don’t even know what is inside it?”

“I could tell you about the people who spend their life learning about what survives in the deep depths,” Percy looked up, knowing he had all of the non-Terrans hooked on every word. Even Di Angelo had paused in his note taking and was staring wide-eyed at Percy. “But I don’t know if you’d want to know.”

“No we do!” Nyssa exclaimed. “There are people who dedicate their lives to a place that’s literally not navigable by humans, the main inhabitants of the planet?”

“Well as you said, most of the planet is water. Which means that coastal communities are filled with fisherman, whalers, swimmers, and more. I could tell you about some of those. I could also tell you about the scientists that spend years of their lives building bots that can’t even come close to withstanding the pressure at the deepest depths without imploding, or I could tell you about those that do come close,” he shrugged.

“What happened to those?”

“The video feed cut out after only seeing multiple rows of sharp, jagged teeth,” Annabeth answered, her sharp grin frightening those who hadn’t noticed her. Some forgot that she was Terran, because she was also half Minervan.

“I could tell you about whales. Beautiful, they come in black and white or grey or blue. But they can be as big as almost 100 feet long. That’s as long as most pirate ships. And they could fit about 400 average sized humans in their mouths. You don’t want to cross one of them. And they only live on the surface. The things that live in the deep,” Percy shuddered for effect. There were no Neptunians on the ship, so there were no natural water dwellers there, so all of his rapt listeners were shocked by this information. “There’s the anglerfish. They light up the dark with an antenna on top of their heads, and the light lures in prey. But it’s so dim elsewhere that you don’t see their big sharp teeth until you’re right up against them,” he murmured. “Giant squids are almost as big as whales but not nearly as peaceful and beautiful. They have eight arms and two tentacles that could wrap around any boat and crush it.”

“Ten limbs?” Nyssa whispered, clearly disturbed.

“Plus, the Portuguese Man o’ War,” Percy shrugged nonchalantly. “Also known as the floating terror. It’s like a big blue jellyfish that sits innocently on top of the water with huge blue tentacles that sit just underneath with a sting strong enough to kill a full grown human.”

“Don’t worry,” Annabeth grinned that shark grin again. “Percy won’t tell you about the stories of the old days. He doesn’t want to scare you.”

“That was the not scary part?” Novax gulped.

“Anyway, I just got notified that we’ll be back on Earth in a few days, so brace yourselves,” and with that, she stood and left them all staring after her. When the door clicked shut, Percy had all eyes back on him. He shrugged.

“Don’t look at me. I wasn’t going to tell you about the kr- nevermind,” he stood. “Di Angelo, with me,” the younger officer stood, back to business and was at Percy’s side again in a moment. “Clear your schedule, you’re spending shore leave with me, pal.”

“Great,” came the deadpan reply.

“Don’t sound so somber,” Percy rolled his eyes. “I’m just going to show you the beach and maybe a good gay bar. You need to let off some steam my dude.”

The other male reddened.

“That is so… That is…” he huffed. “Highly inappropriate.” he glared down at the ground and Percy felt a little bad, maybe the guy wasn’t out? But it was clear he had a preference for males. Oh well, that foot was already in Percy’s mouth.

“Fine. But I will be attending and I am a great dancer so you’re missing out,” he winked at the flustered officer and made his way back to his cabin. It would be an interesting few days.

He made a plan with Annabeth. Day one before shore leave, Percy would spread a rumor to Novax about the kraken. Bigger than a giant squid and meaner. Known to crush entire pirate ships in the olden days.

Day two, Annabeth would mention sirens to Nyssa. Hideous creatures that could lure you in with their voices and lead you to believe you were bringing your ship in to everything you ever wanted, when in reality you would crash your ships and then drown.

Day three, Percy would tell Leo about the Megalodon. A definitely very real shark so big you couldn’t even imagine it. Percy shuddered at that one.

“But, there are some good things,” Percy was speaking to Nico Di Angelo from his Commander chair, in ear shot of some of the participants of the conversation a few nights prior. “Mermaids, the siren’s nicer cousin species. And the lost city of Atlantis. Known to be a great and bountiful city, lost to the sea and cursed by the gods to be stuck down there forever. Some believe it still exists, but it’s within the Bermuda Triangle.”

“What, pray tell, is the Bermuda Triangle,” Clarisse sighed.

“Hard to explain. Ships just… go in… and they never come out,” Annabeth shrugged. “Planes go down. Ships wreck. People who go in don’t come back out, so we don’t know if Atlantis is really there or not.”

“That’s… terrifying,” Novax whispered as he walked by.

Percy was sure he had created a healthy fear of Earth’s oceans in his crew. And he meant to, because while he loved the beach and swimming, he did want to make them shy away from the depths. They wouldn’t do well to explore it.

#percy jackson #humans are weird #humans are space orcs #star trek #fusion #nicercy #percico #if you squint

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angelsndragons · 3 years

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fjord’s feelings for caduceus changed in episodes 98-99

by which i mean, fjord finally realized how special and important he is to caduceus, which in turn set the tone of their relationship for the rest of the campaign. buckle up, this is a long one.

not when fjord threw away his sword and went to caduceus instead of jester. or when caduceus presented him with the star razor. or after the citadel fight when caduceus gave him his holy symbol. i think things changed for fjord in episode 98-99, when caduceus saved his life and removed the orb.

this is going to require some context.

because here’s the thing: fjord’s always looking for the price, waiting for the catch or other shoe to drop. people caring for him because of him with no strings attached is unprecedented. vandren and the world taught fjord that love is conditional, that only if you hide what others would find ugly and make yourself useful to them will they deign to give you a scrap of affection. i don’t think vandren did this maliciously, mind you, it was just part of his worldview and fjord’s life up to and beyond that point supported it. we can see that right up to the end of the show, where fjord is terrified that vandren didn’t remember him or that he didn’t mean nearly as much to the man as vandren did to him.

so we have fjord, who learned to don masks and hide his truest self, including his best and worst aspects. while fjord made the nein into a coherent group, into a force, a crew, a family, even, he still waited for that other shoe to drop. waited for the day that they would reject him because he was no longer useful or because he pushed them too far. you can see this waiting all over the early campaign; he’s not looking for an excuse like caleb to cut and run but he anticipates nearly all the moments that almost fractured the nein, in spite of that low wisdom score. while jester carried the guilt of not being able to save molly, fjord carried the guilt of not protecting the group in that crucial moment. travis confirmed on talks that fjord’s biggest fear when he lost his powers the first time was that he would no longer be useful and be kicked out of the group.

that’s why fjord damn near broke down at the end of 72. the nein, no questions asked, with their standard level of snark, accepted that he was going to be a liability and kept him around anyway. armed him anyway. declared that he was no liability and that they would help him along until he could help himself and them again. this unconditional acceptance caught fjord completely off guard. it always does, really. because caduceus had said for months, an out of game half a year, that he was looking to reforge the sword as a gift for fjord. he said this to fjord’s face. he did not change course when he learned that the sword was a legendary blade forged by acolytes of the wildmother and moonweaver. the blade was still meant for fjord, even if fjord was still chained to uk’otoa. fjord extends his love and protection to the nein but is still not convinced the reverse is true. he was starting to believe it but he wasn’t quite there yet.

caduceus has a high enough wisdom to understand that’s fjord’s hang up even if he doesn’t quite understand the reasoning behind it. that’s why he pulls fjord aside in ep 75 and tells him that he doesn’t have to choose the wildmother, that there are other gods and other ideas out there looking for a champion. fjord, who at this point considers wildmom his only option (travis says she’s the only one who’s shown the slightest interest in fjord and that’s why he’s gunning for her), is befuddled by caduceus and this whole talk, so much so the pair end up talking past each other for the next several episodes.

after fjord officially becomes a paladin, things between him and caduceus become fairly...unsettled compared to their previous interactions. they talk past each other more, they aren’t in sync enough to double team those social interactions they were just starting to get good at. things are just weird for a while. to me, that’s fjord waiting for the catch, waiting for caduceus to call in some favor or something like it. and he keeps getting confused when caduceus doesn’t. so he tries once or twice to follow in caduceus’ footsteps and do as he would instead. and it just makes things weirder. these two don’t have a moment together that doesn’t leave one of them confused or unsatisfied until ep 87, when caduceus gives fjord the holy symbol and inadvertently kicks off the next phase of their relationship. because here, caduceus tries to put them back on equal footing and fjord recognizes it. caduceus rejects framing their relationship as mentor/student and tells fjord he doesn’t need caduceus to give him answers. fjord is “well on his way.”

by defining what they aren’t, mentor/student, our two boys inadvertently ask the question, “so what are we?” honestly, it’s a question that the entire group grapples with in the 90s as they reintegrate yasha, as veth struggles with the question of changing back and whether she can stay with the nein, as beau tries to sacrifice herself for veth, as jester learns some uncomfortable truths about the traveler, as caduceus finds his family again. fjord and caduceus can easily define what they aren’t - not mentor/student, not brothers or cousins- but what they actually are stumps both of them.

their relationship doesn't look like any of their relationships with the others: beau is fjord's bro and first mate, caleb is fjord's complicated mirror and admiree, jester his crush and first person he learned to be vulnerable with, veth his antagonistic sibling. on caduceus' side, caleb is the one he looks to for a fellow project nerd and clear, unvarnished goals, beau and jester are the sisters caduceus misses, yasha the quiet beloved barbarian he understands better than the rest, and veth a mess he wants to help but can't. but fjord and caduceus' relationship is highly undefined at this point. notably undefined, beyond their newly shared connection to melora. at the dinner with essek, we get the stone bomb. and travis and fjord panic. like no, seriously, they spend the next four episodes low key panicking over this revelation. this ties back to fjord waiting for those other shoes to drop but it’s also more than that.

when it comes to destiny, fjord has always been the answer, the self made man, to both caduceus and caleb’s questions about destiny. he makes choices about who he is, who he wants to be, and takes actions towards those goals. he is one of those rare people who can wear many different masks, take on many different roles, while still maintaining his sense of self and becoming a fuller version of who he is. when I say fjord is the answer to destiny, what i mean is that he is what ioun said way back in c1 about Fate: mortals make choices and through those choices, destiny is fulfilled. he is the answer to caduceus' own growth from passive instrument waiting for someone to play him to active communicator in this conversation between gods and mortals. in this sense, fjord is what caduceus learns to be (this is exactly why caduceus rejects a mentor role; he has as much to learn from fjord as vice versa).

so for this coincidence to pop up, this idea that maybe fjord only had the illusion of choice to extend his service to the wildmother, that maybe somehow he was manipulated again, that there was some grand destiny pushing things and fjord had no say in it, yeah, i can see why fjord was low-key terrified. so is this what fjord and caduceus are: just some predestined grand fairy tale partnership neither of them have that much say in? episode 96 resoundingly rejects that label too. for one thing, none of the stones or clays treat fjord's last name as anything amazing or spectacular. for another, this string of episodes gives us caduceus at his most human. the terror of not knowing what happened to his family, the uncertainty of his homecoming, the relief of saving his family and home, the irritation at the way the chaos crew treats the temple, the playful attitude caduceus cultivates after, it's all on display. caduceus drops much of his placid exterior and willingly allows the nein to see sheer depth of emotion he has.

which leads me back to episode 98-99. uk’otoa’s agents come for fjord. and caduceus is pissed. travis and ashley both said on talks that they hadn’t really seen taliesin that pissed, that it was like someone had threatened an actual loved one of his. fjord dies. and comes back to an exhausted, still pissed off firbolg who is five seconds away from snapping archmage vess derogna’s head off for interrupting his prayer of healing. taliesin doesn’t even begin to relax until they start interrogating the dead fish people the next day. once caduceus confirms the ball is still in fjord, notably caduceus and caleb were the two who remembered, fjord starts asking for a way to remove it. he asks caduceus to start a commune with wildmom in tandem with jester’s commune with the traveler. caleb tells fjord that caduceus fought “very hard for you while you were down, i don’t know if he’s up to it.” having heard that, caduceus still tries, with his first divine intervention attempt of the campaign. and when jester figures out that greater restoration will work, caduceus pushes through his exhaustion, takes charge, and goes through a truly terrifying greater restoration with fjord to remove the ball. convulsing, seizing, shuddering, collapsing, etc.

in those moments, and in the quiet after when fjord confirms that he still has his powers, it finally hits him that yes, people can protect, fight, and love him for who he is alone. there is no chain or other shoe waiting to be dropped here. the wildmother is no uk’otoa, to punish or take power at a whim. caduceus will fight with everything he has and then some for fjord because he loves him (not for nothing does fjord only realizes the depths of jester’s feelings when she uses heal on him). who are caduceus and fjord to each other? they are people who will fight for one another and the others as far as they can. fjord says over and over again that he wants to protect the nein and look out for them because he cares for them. he demonstrates it over and over again as well. caduceus says basically the same thing; he wants everyone safe and happily on their way and will stay until they are. he demonstrates this all the time as well. this is, i think, the first time that he demonstrates his dedication so unequivocally, free of the artifice of duty, fully committed through love. fjord recognizes this in caduceus and caduceus does in fjord.

i say this is a turning point because, while they don’t really have another super in depth conversation alone together, these two start clocking each other and openly help and look out for each other. there’s an ease and intimacy to the relationship after this. fjord watching caduceus swim near vokodo’s lair, fjord being ready to hand over his armor to caduceus when it looks like his won’t be ready, fjord, caduceus, and beau plotting behind jester’s back to keep her safe from the traveler, the absolute offense fjord takes to eadwulf after he spoke to caduceus like that, fjord levels up in paladin after caduceus tells him he’s proud to know him, all the way to the end of the show when fjord shelters the clerics and tells them to finish lucien, we get little moments like these from both of them. hell, caduceus is the first person in the campaign to tell fjord directly that he loves him.

#cr #critical role #cr meta #fjorclay #wildbros #fjord #caduceus clay #prim did theirs so i'm doing mine #in b4 the wrap-up #just barely #and ran out of steam at the end #i'll expand on that later #gotta finish my vm v m9 meta #and the cockroach party analysis

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fridayfirefly · 3 years

Text

The Power of Luck [Chapter One]

Read The Power of Luck on AO3

Masterlist [All Works]

Masterlist [The Power of Luck Series]

Written for Maribat March Day 6 - Miraculous Side Effects

The Ladybug Miraculous had quite a few side effects. Marinette was able to think quick on her feet, she was a skilled tactician in battle, and her reaction time was half that of a normal human. Most notably, the Ladybug Miraculous granted its user the force known as Miraculous Luck, which, depending on the situation, was sometimes more of a curse than a blessing. Marinette didn't get to choose how that good luck manifested. For instance, when she needed an extra day to finish a history project, her school closed down due to a gas leak. Or when she wished for a fresh start after the defeat of Hawkmoth, her parents were offered a deal to grow their bakery business in America.

Marinette assured her parents that she didn't mind moving. After all, most of her class had already moved on. Lila had been deported to Italy, narrowly avoiding jail time. Chloé (much to her dismay) was sent by her father to an all-girls boarding school in England. Adrien was taken in by his Aunt Amelie (as Gabriel was in jail and Emilie was declared brain-dead) and moved to England as well.

No one else from Marinette's class left the country, but many of them moved out of Paris. Nathanial was accepted to an elite art school in Marseille. Max was accepted to a gifted program at an elite school in Bordeaux. Officer Raincomprix was transferred to Toulouse and took Sabrina with him. Juleka and Luka both started homeschooling after their mother sailed the houseboat down the Seine to the city of Rouen.

Worst of all was the loss of Alya. Her parents were horrified that the son of Hawkmoth was in the same class as their daughter, and promptly pulled Alya out of class and decided to move out of the city. Alya begged them for weeks but nothing came of her protests. In the end, Alya left too.

The Miraculous Luck could do a lot of things, but it couldn't keep her friends together. Those who remained at François Dupont filled holes in other classes. Marinette tried to make the best of her new class, but she felt no real connection to them. When her parents proposed the move, Marinette jumped on the opportunity. In Gotham, she wouldn't be haunted by the ghost of her old life.

Marinette cut her hair, leaving it choppy and just above the shoulders. She donated all of her brightly colored clothes to the thrift store down the street and created a new wardrobe for herself. It was toned down and mature, much more fitting for Gotham.

Marinette left Paris a much different girl than the naive fourteen-year-old who thought she could save the world. She was ready for a city like Gotham, a city that didn't make any promises, a city where Marinette could set down some new roots.

-----

At first, it was easy to fly under the radar at Gotham Academy. It was a school filled with the self-absorbed children of millionaires and billionaires, after all. Marinette was there on scholarship - her good grades, leadership experience, and working-class parents combined to cut her tuition down by 75%. Marinette quickly learned that scholarship students were at best ignored, and at worst mercilessly bullied. So Marinette kept her head down and vowed that she would get through the year unscathed.

There was one variable, however, that the Miraculous Luck wasn't able to account for. Marinette's entire plan fell apart thanks to one boy: Damian Wayne.

Marinette became acquainted with Damian Wayne through the school's rumor mill. She learned that he was one of the most wealthy and most attractive people in the school, but he was thought himself too good to spend time with any of his fellow classmates (Marinette couldn't fault him on the last bit; she also found the students at Gotham Academy to be difficult, to say the least). Marinette also learned through the school's rumor mill that Damian spent quite a lot of time staring at her. Given that Damian had never paid the slightest amount of attention to a Gotham Academy girl before, this was a big deal. Suddenly Marinette was the farthest thing from under the radar. Everyone who used to look down on her wanted to be her friend. It was exhausting.

Marinette resolved to ignore Damian Wayne - an easy task, given that she still didn't even know what he looked like. Now that everyone was staring at her, it was hard to

"Why?" grumbled Marinette. "Why couldn't my so-called Miraculous Luck help me get through one normal year of school?"

Tikki shrugged from her spot inside of Marinette's backpack. "Maybe all of this attention will turn out to be a good thing?"

"I doubt that." Marinette glanced around, checking that no one had spotted her talking to her backpack. There was one spot in the cafeteria that was hidden from view, a window-sill nestled behind a pillar, bordered by a wall on one side and an out of order vending machine on the other. Marinette sat on the window-sill every day to eat lunch, with Tikki as her companion for the meal.

"I think your problem is that you're overthinking this. Miraculous Luck always works out in the end, even if there are some obstacles in the middle."

"I just want this horrible school year to be over," sighed Marinette, setting her head down in her arms.

"Don't give up yet, Marinette. I have high hopes for this school year," said Tikki.

Marinette had some serious doubts but picked her head up anyway. Maybe this year wouldn't turn out the way she expected. Marinette defeated Hawkmoth, the greatest villain Paris ever faced. She could survive a year of high school.

-----

Marinette was going to survive her senior year of high school. Damian Wayne on the other hand... Marinette still wasn't sure if she was going to let him survive the year, after everything he put her through.

"Excuse me?" a sickeningly sweet voice piped up from behind Marinette.

Marinette put on her best disinterested-face, took out one headphone, and turned around. "Yes?"

There were three girls standing behind her: a blonde, flanked on both sides by a brunette and a red-head. The blonde girl had a smile on her face but a devious look in her eyes. Marinette had long ago learned to spot manipulators, and this girl had it written all over her. "Are you Marinette Dupain-Cheng?"

"Yes."

"My name is Julie Cooper. I was just wondering... Are you dating Damian Wayne?"

Marinette huffed in exasperation. "What do you think?"

Julie's eyes narrowed. "I just wanted to warn you. I mean, did you really think that Damian Wayne would seriously date a girl here on scholarship? You should break up with him before you get hurt."

"It was a rhetorical question. I'm not dating Damian Wayne. It's just a rumor."

Julie instantly perked up. "Oh, good! I was beginning to think that Damian had lost his mind. I mean, I'm sure you would be a nine or a ten at a public school, but at Gotham Academy, you're like a seven, maybe an eight on a good day. Most of the girls who go here are actually hot, not just," the girl waved her hand towards Marinette. "Above average."

Marinette wasn't sure if Julie meant for her to feel flattered or offended, but her words had the strange effect of making Marinette feel both all at once. "Um, thanks? I'm going to go now."

Julie's brunette friend suddenly paled as the girl started to tug on Julie's sleeve. "Um, Julie?" she whispered.

"What, Nora?" Julie's eyes widened as they fixed on something behind Marinette.

Marinette turned around to see what the cause of their concern was. Or rather, to see who the cause of their concern was. It was a boy, tall and scowling. "Are you done here, Cooper?"

Julia nodded, a nervous edge to her voice, "Bye, Marinette." She and her two friends hurried off, exchanging frantic whispers.

"What do you want?" asked Marinette with a sigh. She was tired of dealing with boys who were only interested in her because Damian Wayne was interested in her.

"I wished to apologize."

"For Julie? Did you put her up to this?"

The boy looked confused. "No, of course not. I meant that I wanted to apologize for everything, not just Julie Cooper."

"For everything?" The truth suddenly dawned on Marinette. "You're Damian Wayne! I didn't think that you would be so tall."

"You didn't know what I looked like?" There was real shock in his voice.

"Well, by the time I learned that you had been staring at me everyone was staring at me, so that wasn't much help in figuring out who you were."

"You could have googled me."

Marinette shrugged. "I could have, but it felt weird to google one of my classmates. I pretty much just resigned myself to never figuring out who you were."

"I should have approached you sooner. I've wanted to apologize for a while, but every time I've caught you alone you've looked like you wanted to be left that way."

"I'm not a fan of most of the students here."

"The students here can be..." Damian searched for the appropriate word. "Tiresome. I resigned myself to a dull four years of high school in their company. That is, until I saw you."

Marinette cocked her head. "Why me, though? I'm nothing special."

"You're different than everyone else here."

Marinette stiffened. "I know. I've been told. I'm here on a scholarship which means I don't belong," she snapped

Damian shook his head. "No, that's not what I meant. You move through life differently than all of the other students here. You don't care about the gossip or drama - at least, not until you were right at the center of it all. You've seen the real world, so you float above the high school drama. You're just so... so..."

"So what?" Marinette's tone softened.

Damian ran his hand through his hair, ruffling it. The addition of the messy hair added a certain charm to his otherwise polished exterior. "I've been brainstorming for the right word for weeks. The best I can come up with is pure. You don't let yourself become affected by anything in this school."

It was a very flattering description of her. It was also very on the nose. "I'll forgive you, Damian Wayne, but only on one condition."

"What?"

"I want to get to know you, and I have a feeling that you feel the same way."

Damian nodded. "It's a deal."

Maybe her Miraculous Luck wasn't so useless after all. Marinette had expected to go the whole year without making a single friend. Now, it seemed that she might make one after all.

@maribatmarch-2k21

#maribat #daminette #Marinette Dupain-Cheng #Damian Wayne #MaribatMarch2021 #maridami #marinette x damian #miraculous ladybug fic #my work

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astronomoney · 3 years

Note

IDK if you're still taking requests or not, but the latest fix on D. Wayne was 😍🥰. For part 2 can you add the prompts 11 from fluff, 6 from angst and 20 from neutral pretty please?🥺🥺

Pairing: Damian Wayne x fem!reader (age 16ish)

Prompts: Prompt list ☁︎11- “Hey hey hey, it’s ok i’m here. It’s just me ok, you’re safe.” ᜊ6- “I don’t care about you anymore.” “i’m starting to think you never did.” ⚛︎20-“Please be quite, i can’t even hear myself losing my will to live.”

Summary: After the fight you had with Damian things have been tense but sometimes bottling up your emotions only make things worse (i can’t do summary’s to save my life) enemies-to-lovers because i’m a sucker for that shit

Warnings: Blood, swearing, kinda character death i guess, Damian being a dick as always, angsty teens being angsty teens

A/n: this is a part 2 but you can find part 1 here once again this took waaaay to long to write literally i could not figure out what to do but whatever because i did it and i’m proud of myself for it (Masterlist)

Word count: 3k jeez these are getting longer

Tag list: @battlenix @pleasestophoney wow look at that multiple tags

Part 1

Love and War pt2

Spending spring break in Wayne manor had its ups and downs. Ups included a huge library in the south wing, delicious homemade meals every day, and the best water pressure you’d ever experienced. The downs included 8 hours of training daily, getting lost while trying to find a bathroom, and having to spend way too much time with your arch enemy.

Technically he's not your enemy. At least he’s not supposed to be. After the fight you had last week you couldn’t be sure. You’d had fights with Damian before but this felt different. Usually after a fight he'd sulk for a few hours but then it would go back to normal, but this time it didn’t go back to normal. Damian had been avoiding you for almost 8 days.

You knew the fight ended too soon and you both had more to say but if he was going to act like a child and ignore you then you weren't going to stop him. You still had to patrol with him but it was considerably quieter. The manor was big enough for the both of you and after a few days you'd figured out his schedule and how to get around him. Tim let you train with him, so as long as you stayed on your side of the gym and Damian stayed on his you didn't have to interact with him at all.

It wasn't until the 4th day of break that you had to talk to him. Bruce had to go meet with the league for the day so training ended early. You had a couple hours before dinner and decided reading would be the best use of that time. You walked down one of the many hallways lazily dragging your hand along the wall until you reached a door. You couldn't remember exactly where you were but you were about 75% sure there was a couch in this room, so you pushed the door open.

Inside you found tall ceilings paired with dark wallpaper, a tall window with the thin white curtains pushed out of the way, and a couch. Actually it was three couches but after 4 days staying here you'd gotten used to the large number of furniture that was there for no reason.

The couches formed a square with the open side facing the window lined wall. The first two couches were empty but when you stepped farther inside the room you saw someone sitting on the third one. Of course the one room you picked to go into also happened to be the one room Damian was sitting in. He looked up from his sketchbook and immediately frowned.

There were two options in front of you. You could back out of the room and leave him be but then you'd be backing down from something that might not even turn into a fight which made you seem weak so really you were left with only one choice. You straighten your back and closed the door behind you, officially leaving you in a room alone with Damian for the first time since the fight. You walked over to the couch facing the windows head on and sat down on the side farthest from him. He watched you the whole time but you paid him no attention, instead you simply opened your book and began reading.

You felt his eyes leave your form and you let out a quiet breath. You heard a page turn and a pencil being dragged lightly across paper. It had been over a week but nothing seemed to be getting better between you and him. Patrols were a nightmare beforehand but now that he'd switched from constant criticism to almost no comments you found that you preferred the former.

Damian's pencil against the paper was the only sound in the room and yet the silence seemed so loud. You hated it. You hated having to avoid him all the time. You hated not being able to talk to him anymore. You hated how far away he felt even when he was right next to you. Above all you hated that you didn't hate him as much as you used to.

You never realized how much you talked to him until you didn't. It was a weird feeling to miss someone when you hadn't even known you cared about them. You honestly just wanted to apologize and let things get back to normal but as you sat there staring at your book you couldn't bring yourself to say anything.

After three to many nightmares where Damian got hurt, you finally realized how badly you needed him back. So you took a deep breath, swallowed your pride, opened your mouth, and prayed to god that something would come out.

"Look-"

"Damian-" you both spoke at the same time. "Sorry, you go first." You apologized.

"No you can go first." He replied almost nervously. That couldn't be right, he never got nervous.

"Uh I was just going to say, well i've been thinking lately,"

"You?" He asked sarcastically.

"Oh haha really funny. Will you just listen for a goddamn second." He was not making this easy. "I know we haven't been talking much ever since, well you know and uhh." You couldn't find the right way to word it. You were still too stubborn to outright apologize but you knew he would never say sorry unprompted. "You've just seemed... off, lately and if it has something to do with me-"

"It doesn't." He cut you off. "I'm not 'off' and even if I was you definitely wouldn't be the cause." His expression was blank but calculated.

"Well jeez you don't have to be so rude about it." You sneered back at him. "What were you trying to say anyway." So much for your apology.

"I've convinced father to change our partners." His voice was flat and he seemed bored with the conversation.

"You what?" You stood up. You couldn't believe he actually did that without talking to you first.

He stood up as well and was a few inches higher than you. "We don't work well together, you can't tell me you don't agree."

"I don't! We've been a great team! Remember the Penguin pen raid or Mr Freeze's death ray thingy." you exaggerated your point by waving our hands through the air. "We stopped those. Together. You can't just go around changing things without asking me first!" You were fuming.

"Sure I can! We only stopped those villains because of what I did, you just got in the way." he pointed at you.

Here we go again, the blame game. The endless cycle of 'he did this she did that'. You were so sick of it. "That's bullshit and you know it. I can hold my own on the field just as well as you can. And you know what! I don't even want to be your partner anymore."

"Neither do I! You can go play hero with someone else while I do all the real work. I never wanted you on the team in the first place!" He stared you down and if you weren't so fired up you'd probably be intimidated.

"God you're so annoying!” You threw your hands up in frustration. “You think you're so great and no one can even come close to you but in reality you're exactly like the rest of us!"

What were you doing? This wasn't what you wanted. You wanted to apologize and make things right but now here you were screaming at him again. You almost couldn't help it. Fighting him gave you a sort of rush that you craved. It was like a drug and you were addicted to the pain. You didn't want to fight him but it was the closest thing to a conversation you'd had in over a week and at this point it was enough to satisfy your need.

"I'm going to prove that i'm better than you. I'll do it on my own too!" You told him.

"Go ahead and try! You can do whatever you want because I don't care about you anymore."

You stepped back, stood as tall as you could without going on your tiptoes and took a breath. "I'm starting to think you never did." You said calmly, it seemed to catch him off guard and he didn't retaliate. You grabbed your book and turned towards the door. Dick was standing there, completely still and staring at you and Damian.

"Woah." He said awkwardly. He clearly didn't know how to handle the situation he'd just stumbled on.

You pushed past him and into the hallway. Tears were building up in the corners of your eyes so you had to move fast, the last thing you needed right now was for them to see you cry.

Damian watched you walk out before turning around and groaning. "I can't believe her," he muttered to himself. "I'm starting to think you never did. That doesn't even make sense."

"Because... you do care about her?" Dick asked. It probably wasn't the best choice of words.

Damian looked back at him with an almost offended expression. "That's ridiculous! I don't care about her, that was basically the whole point of our conversation."

"Was that a conversation? The part of that 'conversation' I saw seemed more like her yelling at you and then you... yelling back." He stated the obvious.

"That was completely her fault," Damian defended. He seemed angry but it wasn't his usual kind. Usually it was directed at someone or something and usually that thing would get acquainted with his katana but this time he was mad at himself and he couldn't understand why. "I don't care about her." He repeated quietly almost trying to remind himself more than anything.

You spent the rest of the day hiding in the guest room. You planned on staying there forever and letting yourself fade out of existence but the universe had other plans. 3 hours, 5 episodes of your favorite show, and a nest made of blankets later you got a call from Tim asking you to come to the cave.

He didn't tell you why he needed you, he just said to meet him in the lower level of the cave so when you got there you were very surprised to find him and Damian standing in the hallway. You groaned internally and considered turning around and just walking away but Tim spotted you before you could. Damian's back was to you so he didn't know who it was until he turned around and you saw his face fall.

'Nice to see you too asshole' You thought to yourself, walking over to stand near him but still keeping your distance. "What did you need?" You asked, wanting to get out of there as soon as humanly possible. You kept your eyes ahead trying not to look at Damian and you had the feeling he was doing the same.

The entire mood of the dimly lit hallway had shifted from the moment you locked eyes with him and the tension was noticeable. Tim looked between the two of you before clearing his throat and bringing the attention back to him. "I actually don't need anything."

"So then why did you call telling me to come down here?" Damian asked, clearly annoyed that Tim was wasting his time.

Tim smirked in response and opened the door before Jason, who was behind you apparently, pushed you both into the room before either of you could react. You landed on top of Damian with a grunt. Once you realized you were on top of him you felt your cheeks turn red and you stood up quickly. You could have sworn you saw the slightest bit of a blush on him but you were too preoccupied with the now locked door to think about too much.

"Ok love birds here's the deal, you're petty hormone fueled fighting is driving us crazy and now we're doing something about it." Jason told you from the other side of the small glass window. "We said you were gonna lock you in a room until you figured out how to get along and now we're following through." he smirked.

"I swear to god if you lock me in this room with him," you motioned towards Damian, "I will drop kick you into the sun."

"If you let us out now maybe I won't kill you," Damian threatened alongside you.

"Maybe if you’d learned to talk to each other like normal people you wouldn’t be here in the first place," Tim said. "We'll be back after patrol so you've got about," he looked at his watchless wrist "4ish hours. Have fun." And with that they both walked away.

"DON'T YOU DARE WALK AWA- and they're gone. Dammit." You cursed and hit the steel door which hurt a lot more than you thought it would. "Shit," You shook your hand.

"Well that was just stupid," Damian scoffed at you, taking your hand to examine it. He always did that sort of thing on patrol so you didn't pull away or even really register what he was doing.

"Oh i'm sorry, is my frustration not smart enough for you?" you sneered back. "What even is this place anyway," You looked around the small dark room, determined to not look him in the eyes.

"A containment cell for metas, we haven't used it for a while so the power blockers are probably turned off." he told you before releasing your hand. "You definitely bruised it but you'll be fine."

You reluctantly thanked him and turned back to the door to see if you could get it open somehow. "Ok so how do we get out?"

"We don't."

You flipped around, surprised to hear him give up without even trying. "You're kidding right? There's gotta be some way out of here. We're superheros, a few walls can't hold us,” you exclaimed. “Can't you use those ninja skills you're so proud of and like... kick it down, or something?" You watched him walk to the back of the small cell and sit down on the floor.

"No," he replied simply. "This room was built to hold the most dangerous people in Gotham and I don't know if you've noticed but we don't have any of our gear." He glared at you and you rolled your eyes.

"So we're just supposed to wait here until they get back? We can't just sit here all night," You tried to convince him to do... anything really.

"Well if you're so keen on getting out then let's hear your genius plan," He leaned forward with all the smugness of billionaires son, daring you to say something. "That's what I thought. Now will you please be quiet, I can't even hear myself losing my will to live."

"Fine whatever we'll just stay here in complete silence," You muttered sarcastically under your breath. Damian remained quiet as you started pacing back and forth but you could tell he was watching you.

After pacing for about 30 minutes you realized how tired you were from training so hard the past couple of days and sat down in the corner. You spent so much time over the last week worrying about Damian that you hadn't let yourself relax long enough to get any real rest. The little sleep you did manage to get mostly turned to nightmares.

At first you didn't even realize you were asleep. It all looked real enough except for the fact that you'd somehow been transported to a rooftop. You scanned your surroundings but everything was just slightly out of focus so you couldn't tell exactly where you were. When you turned around you saw him. Damian was there, and behind him was a shadowy sort of silhouette.

The shadow raised a knife and you realized what was happening. You tried to warn him, you tried to scream or yell or move but it was no use. The knife plunged into Damians back and you were helpless to stop it. You felt the pain he felt, you felt the blade slice through you. Finally you could move again but it was too late. The shadow disappeared but you didn't care about it, all you wanted to do was get to Damian. You ran forward but it was like running through water, your body moved in slow motion and you watched the blood start to pool underneath him.

Suddenly you were falling. Damian was gone, the roof was gone, everything was gone, it was just you and a black abyss trying to swallow you up. You screamed again but no noise came out, it was like all the air was being sucked from your lungs. It was silent and dark and empty nothingness until you saw a faint light. Then you heard something, your name being repeated, someone calling you and then you were pulled out of the void.

You shot up and gasped for air and frantically looked around but your eyes hadn't adjusted to the light yet. You heard a familiar soothing voice pulled you farther out of your trance.

"Hey hey hey, it's ok i'm here." The voice was calm and concerned at the same time. "It's just me ok, you're safe," Rough hands gently turned your head and the first thing you saw clearly was a pair of worried green eyes. You're breathing slowed and you're heart nearly skipped a beat.

Wrapping your arms around his chest you pulled him closer. He hesitated for a moment before folding you into his embrace. It was soft and delicate and it seemed like he was scared of holding you too tightly. Neither of you said anything else, you just sat there on the floor of a meta containment cell in each other's arms.

Time stood still and you finally admitted the truth to yourself. The real reason you hated Damian was because you loved him.

A/n: might fuck around and make a part 3 with the classic “because i love you!” confession scene

#love and war #batboys x reader #dc x reader #robin x reader #writing fanfic #damian wayne x reader #dick grayson x y/n #writing fanfiction #damian wayne #dc characters #dc writers #enemies to lovers #enemies-to-lovers #damian my poor trauma boi #damian wayne supremacy #part 2 #love and war pt2 #pt2

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capitainelevi · 3 years

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38, 69, or 75 lol but pls do it post Rumbling if you can of course! i just can’t get enough of what their life would be like 😪

Thank you for your ask!! ❤️❤️

Drabble challenge: Followers send a number to your ask and you write a drabble using that sentence/prompt in your piece. "You leave whenever you feel like it.", “Mind if I join you?”, and “I’ve had enough! I want to be alone!”.

Home Once the war ended, there was no need for Petra to ask: Levi would always choose to spend his remaining days by her side. Petra helps Levi heal while they look forward to brighter days. Canon universe. Word count: 2577

She had always been by his side.

Over time, Levi assumed that it would always be that way. He got comfortable as the years went by, despite the danger surrounding their lives. Petra had been his shadow for years, his right hand, to the point where she became an extension of him. The threats they faced together, the sadness, and the loss they shared, consolidated an unbreakable bond between them. Levi trusted Petra with his life, as did she.

Petra was the only one left. The last one to stay by his side. And he was about to lose her.

Sensing death surrounding her, Petra gave her captain a heavyhearted smile. The last thing she would have wanted was for his last memory of her to be of her shedding tears. There was no chance for them after all, no happiness to be found. Not after all they had done. Petra whispered- "Heichou... goodbye." as her vision went black.

Petra opened her eyes abruptly, terrified of the images still floating in her memory. Had she been a titan? No, it must have been a nightmare. Was it even a nightmare? Petra ran her fingers through the pebbles, trying to grasp herself onto reality. The last memory she could recall was of the heartbreak written all over Levi`s face as he silently bid his farewell.

As the mist surrounding her started to fade, Petra caught a glimpse of her captain, standing against a rock, with tears running down his cheek. A feeling of relief washed over her as she crawled her way to him, her legs too weak for her to stand on. Petra threw herself in his arms, squeezing him in a tight embrace, trying to convince herself that it was all real. That they had made it. Feeling Levi`s arms wrap around her trembling form let her tears run freely down her cheeks, and Levi let her cry against his neck.

"Is this over?"

Levi ran his hand up and down her back in an attempt to soothe her, not being able to grasp what Petra must have felt just mere minutes ago. He was still wary about it all being over. They had known nothing but fighting for survival for all those years, and he could not grasp the idea of peace.

"I don`t know."

Levi could not recall the events leading up to him laying on a hospital bed with Petra asleep in a chair next to him. Embraces, more tears, people yelling, Petra clinging to his neck, the way to the hospital, they all felt like a dream. Was Eren truly gone?

"Heichou, you`re awake."

The first thing Levi observed was the tiredness written on her face, the dark circles surrounding the hopeful look in her eyes, and he wondered just how long he had been asleep. He just nodded at her, his throat too dry for him to form any words. As if reading his thoughts, Petra put the water cup against his dry lips, and he nodded again in thanks.

"Everyone came to visit, but you`ve been out for three days."

Without giving it a second thought, Levi worded the first thing sitting on the tip of his tongue- "Is Eren gone?"

Petra just nodded, feeling grief wash over her at the image of the hopeful boy that looked up to her for guidance all those years ago. The boy that she involuntary helped massacre most of the world population.

"Did he come to you, Heichou?"

That was no surprise to Petra. Eren must have known there was nothing he could have said to the both of them that would convince them that his actions were the right ones. Nothing that would make the two of them feel like their squad`s sacrifice to protect him had not all been in vain.

"I think there is no need for formalities anymore, Petra. I`m retiring.”

Petra felt a wave of nostalgia hit her at his words, but she supposed she should have expected that. She tried not to let anxiety overcome her as the thoughts of his imminent departure took hold of her. Petra gathered all her courage to ask him about his future. Their future, she hoped.

"I suppose you`re right, Levi. What will you do now?"

Levi took his time to answer, but at the end of it, he was sure of his decision. There was no turning back for him. No regrets.

"Paradise`s not home for me anymore."

Petra was aware of the lump forming in her throat at hearing his words, troubled by the idea that the home they sacrificed so much to protect could not be called home anymore by the person she admired the most. But at a careful reflection, Petra was unsure if she had that same devotion towards Paradise as the first day she pledged her life to protect it. She tried to keep the tears at bay, at the thought of a life without Levi in it.

"Petra, you don`t need to ask. You already know this."

She had trouble containing the smile forming on her lips as a sense of relief washed over her. Her captain knew her so well. Not my superior anymore, she had to remind herself. Now that their mission was over, Petra hoped that something beautiful could blossom between the two of them, but she was content just by being by his side until the end of their time. Her love for Levi had always been strong, and while she knew feelings were not his forte, Petra saw that at the very least, Levi cared deeply for her.

"Where will we go?"

Levi just shrugged, the idea of a future still strange for him. He never expected to make it out of the war alive, and now, he had something to look forward to and someone to accompany him along the road. He was pleased Petra was going to be by his side, even if for a little while. But at the same time, his heart was conflicted. She deserved better than anything he ever had to offer her. But he would not take the choice away from her.

"Marley`s not a shithole, at least. It can be a start."

Petra listened to Levi debate what choices they had by himself while her thoughts were occupied with the words she needed to put together in her letter to her father. Her father had always been supportive of her choice of joining the military, and Petra prayed she would also be supportive of her following her heart this time.

Their conversation was cut short as the doctor entered the room, and when Petra tried to leave to give them privacy, Levi stopped her. He felt like she needed to know what his future struggles would be. Petra was relieved when the doctor emphasized how lucky Levi had been not to have a spinal injury, but the damage to his leg was still severe. She made a silent promise to him that she would be there by his side through his rehabilitation, no matter how much that took.

Petra let him rest as she went to get everything ready for their departure, leaving an agitated Levi behind her. "You can`t do all this shit by yourself."- he had argued with her, but she declined his offer to help her. As soon as the door closed behind her, Petra grinned, overjoyed at the idea of a future with him, even if that meant putting up with his foul mouth for many years to come.

As soon as Levi was well enough to leave the hospital, they both presented their resignation to their queen, anxious to put that life behind them. It made Levi`s stomach churn at being called a hero, but for Petra`s sake, he just kept quiet while the military praised their actions. Levi squeezed his fists so hard he could feel his skin bleeding thinking of all the countless lives that were lost in vain. That he indirectly played a part in. One look at Petra, and he knew she felt the same as him.

They both preferred the quietness of countryside life and using their savings, along with the money they accepted from Historia after many arguments they were able to afford a small house, comfortable enough for the two of them. But the surprise came when they started working on redecorating the house, and Levi popped a question which made her drop the paintbrush from her hand.

"How do you feel about kids?"

Petra`s mouth fell open, unsure of what to make of his question and the indifference plastered on his face as he asked her something she dared not think about. She had always loved children, but the military life she chose and motherhood were two dreams that she felt she could not achieve together. Petra tried not to get ahead of herself and picture holding a baby with her amber eyes and his raven hair in her arms before she knew what he meant.

"I haven`t given much thought about it, but I`ve always loved children."

Levi shook his head, frustrated at his lousy wording. He had hoped Petra would have picked up on his request. "Not kids. Teenagers."

"Teenagers?"

As Levi talked about Gabi and Falco losing their families and how, while they were still brats, they were still good enough kids who could come live with them, Petra could not help but smile. She had made a good choice. Levi Ackerman was a good man through and through. They welcomed the children into their new home as soon as the house was ready for them. Having the kids there, it gave them purpose.

But the next weeks had been hard on all of them, as Levi`s rehabilitation process was going to be long and hard on him. The wounds he suffered took a toll on him, as he went from being Humanity`s Strongest Soldier to someone with not enough strength to use a crutch yet, all in a matter of days. But Petra was determined to help him through it as best as she could.

Their days were filled with frustration, yelling, and cusses, and their nights were silent, with only the ghost of their former comrades and friends keeping them company. When the children asked if Levi was alright, Petra tried her best to put on a smile and explain to them that it was hard for him, but they would overcome it together. She had to believe that.

It was a particularly rough day when Levi finally snapped at her. His leg hurt like a bitch, his arms were sore, and he was tired of Petra`s optimism. He wished he could take the crutch and put all his frustrations and anger in it and use it to smash everything in the room to bits.

"I’ve had enough! I want to be alone!"

He regretted the words coming out of his mouth instantly as he saw Petra`s face twist in hurt. She left the room without taking a second glimpse at him, and when he tried to yell for her to come back, he had no words for her. Sometimes, Levi thought he must have been doing it on purpose, pushing her away in the hope she could chase the life that she deserves. Petra was the best woman he had ever met, and he had nothing to offer her. Nothing but anger and frustrations. He pictured her alongside a handsome, tall husband and a child in her arms, and he regretted keeping her by his side even more.

But Petra had never complained to him. No matter how many words he threw at her, how angry he was at life and himself, she never answered back, and she never blamed him for his roughness. He truly felt like he never deserved her.

Gathering all the courage he had left, Levi went to look for her and attempt to apologize to her, but he knew there were high chances he would mess that up as well. Levi once again wondered how Petra put up with him. He found her working on her candles, a hobby Petra had gotten into since they moved into the cabin. The villagers were ecstatic when Petra opened up a stand for Sunday market, and Levi had to admit he enjoyed the fresh smell her candles brought to the house.

"Mind if I join you?"

Petra just nodded, but she chose to work in silence while he watched her. Her eyes widened in surprise when he asked if he could help her, and while she was unsure of his crafting skills, they needed to put their fight behind them. She understood how hard it was on him, but she was at a loss in how to handle him. But she was confident in her decision to stay by his side, no matter what.

As expected, Levi had managed to make a mess of their kitchen in an instant, and Petra burst into laughter when his eye twitched at the sight. She knew an unexperimented Levi and candle making in his kitchen would be a recipe for disaster, but it was well worth it. Even with the chaos they now had to clean up. Hearing her laughter for the first time in months made him realize how much he had missed it.

"I`m sorry, Levi, I don`t think my clients would appreciate the products."- Petra giggled as she examined the attempted candle.

"Then they have shit taste."

They cleaned in silence until Levi cleared his throat to get her attention. Petra waited for Levi to gather his thoughts, and when no words came out of his mouth, she took hold of the conversation. She never wanted him to feel bad about what had happened.

"We don`t need to talk about this, Levi. It`s okay"

But his next words took Petra by surprise- "You leave whenever you feel like it."

Petra didn`t raise her sight from the floor as she barely whispered- "What would you have me do?"

Levi felt his blood boil with anger at seeing the woman he cared for more than he would ever admit put up with him. He both wished for Petra to leave him and stay by his side until he drew his last breath.- "Anything, Petra. I deserve it. Fucking yell at me, get angry, fuck, even leave me. Go be happy."

Petra tried to contain her sorrow, but she could feel the tears running down her cheeks. She wished Levi would see she would never find happiness without him by her side.

"But I am happy, Levi. I just want to stay with you."

"Stupid girl."

But it was her choice, and he was not going to push her away. Seeing Levi smile at her for the first time in months only made her cry harder, and she threw herself in his arms when he called for her. Levi let her cry for as long as she needed, the mess in the kitchen soon forgotten.

They spent the rest of the evening in front of the fireplace, with a cup of tea in hand. Levi thought it was about time he asked the question, and he put his cup down and straightened his back.

"Maybe we should open up a teashop."

Petra was adding more wood to the fire, but Levi could feel her smile as she answered- "I think I`d like that."

ao3

#ahh sorry for the delay I`ve been a bit busy #rivetra #petra ral #rivetra fanfiction #rivetra fanfic #my writing #I hope you like it!!

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