#this is where i think oblivion genuinely hits its mark really well is just like...the tone when its done knowingly

[foulserpent]

i think theres like at least a couple posts with thousands of notes of this scene but i just need to emphasize that this isnt a bug and this is intended to happen exactly how its seen here. like this is scripted. if you manage to save him it bugs the game

#this is where i think oblivion genuinely hits its mark really well is just like...the tone when its done knowingly #which is also part of why the main quest is so annoying bc everything else its pretty clear that everyones fucking crazy and #everything sucks under the facade but main quest just plays the whole awesome god empire thing straight

[goldencherryhazz]

Work from home

A/N: first smut piece, let me know your thoughts, pls don’t copy my work, feedback and notes would be much appreciated!probably some mistakes 🤍

daddy!harry x sub!reader

Warnings: smut, daddy kink, oral, spanking, fluff. Pure filth basically.

WC: 3k

Harry hated leaving y/n, just so that he could endure countless meetings on zoom with his team, producers and whatnot when he could be spending time with his girl, after having to spending so long away from each other whilst he was on tour, but he knew it had to be done due to the ongoing pandemic, and the world basically coming to a halt. He loved his job and his fans, so he was going to do anything he could remotely, to try and bring some normalcy to this whirlwind.

Now Harry was a hard working man, and once he was in the zone, he didn’t liked to be interrupted until he was finished. He had left a kiss to her head when he left to go to his office a mere 2 hours ago which made her stir from her slumber. She wanted more, and had fallen back to sleep with the thought of being stuffed with his cock, leaving her to wake up again with the feeling of emptiness and need.

She tried to snap out of it, but doing that didn’t stop her from falling into subspace, she genuinely tried to get herself off, to satisfy herself, she started by lifting he shirt up, hissing as the chilly air came into contact with her nipples, hardening them, she pinched each one, twiddling them between her forefinger and thumb, before venturing lower down her stomach, tracing her hands over it until she touched the band of her sleep shorts, she wasted no time it taking them off and flinging them over the side of the bed, she then touched over her damp pussy, starting to rub light circles onto her clit, getting even wetter at the thought of Harry teasing her little cunt then fucking her into oblivion, she then teased two fingers over her entrance before pushing them in and curving them so that they hit her sweet spot, pushing them in and out, but getting no closer to cumming, she eventually gave up after about 5 minutes, and then made a decision, which led her to where she is now...

Stood outside Harry’s office, clad in one of her best sets of lingerie, that she knew Harry loved, as a lure to try and convince him, she took in a nervous breath, she hoped that he wouldn’t decline her, she couldn’t wait any longer. Y/n was willing to do anything in order to be able to have Harry make her cum, she just wanted the tingling sensation in he clit to be dealt with.

She knocked twice, opening the door as soon as she heard a gruff ‘come in` , she took two steps into the room, shutting the door behind her, before waiting patiently for Harry to stop typing and look up at her.

‘What the fuck are you wearing darling` he uttered already knowing the already obvious answer.

She took in the way he looked her up and down, almost hungrily, he was trying not to just give in to her which was quite impossible most of the time, he could feel his cock stirring in the loose fabric of his sweats, but he knew that she knew that he didn’t like to be disturbed whilst he was working, if she wanted him that badly, he was going to make her work for it.

‘Really need you daddy' she said without hesitation.

‘Aww baby, you feeling subby today` he cooed.

‘Yeah, tried to make myself cum, but I knew it wouldn’t be the same as you, my clits tingling daddy’

‘Well unfortunately for you daddy’s working, how bad do you need me baby, tell me’ he questioned, resting his head on the palm of his hand.

‘Need you to fuck me daddy, need to feel you inside me, I want you to choke me, be a little rough with me, I’m just feeling really empty` she choked out, her eyes glazing over in frustration.

The sudden sound of an incoming zoom call made its way through the room, he looked at her dead in the eyes ‘I’ve got an idea baby, how about you get yourself off on the corner of my desk, you’ve got to be quiet though, don’t want anyone to knowing what my naughty girls doing, and no cumming, you understand baby?’

‘Yes daddy` she said, walking over to his desk, her knees slightly weak.

He answered the call, greeted his team, trying not to get distracted by y/n as she hovered over the corner of his desk, before bending her knees slightly, her clothed clit coming into contact with the cold surface of the wood, making her hiss quietly, she braced both of her hands on the desk, before starting to slide her pussy back and forth, creating a delicious friction that she couldn’t get enough of.

Harry managed to focus on the meeting for the majority of it, flicking his eyes back to her every so often, watching as she traced he dainty fingers over her bare tummy, toying with her breast, he could feel himself getting harder and harder under his desk, to the point where he could feel his cock throbbing, y/n had managed to get through the call without making too much noise, only received a few warning glares when she moaned a little to loudly when she could feel herself on the brink of a release, knowing that she couldn’t cum, it was torture basically, the mixture of friction, Harry’s voice and knowing that he would probably he rock hard by now, but she knew that it would be worth it if she kept it up for a bit longer.

A little while later Harry was uttering goodbye’s to his team, sighing in relief as he practically slammed his computer shut, y/n was lost in pleasure , soo much that she hadn’t taken any notice that Harry had finished his call. He palmed himself to try and releave some of the building pressure in his cock, he knew that he would give into her eventually, but he was going to mess with her a little more before that.

‘Baby, come over here` she obeying like a little puppy, instantly walking towards him, becoming giddy at the thought that she might finally be getting what she wanted, more like needed.

Harry patted his thighs, signaling for her to straddle him, he could see that her panties were practically soaked through as she sat directly on his cock, making him hiss, she placed her hands on his shoulders, before Harry placed his hand on the back of her head, bringing her in for a hungry kiss, teeth clashing, thier tongues dancing with each other, the desperation making them both impossibly hornier.

Harry broke away from this kiss first, both of them gasping for air, she ran her thumb over the smooth skin of his jawline, his ringless fingers grasping at her hips.

‘Are you going to fuck me now daddy` she says out of the blue, really wanting the ache in her pussy to be dealt with.

Oh darling, didn’t think I forgot that you interrupted me whilst I was working did you, moaning whilst I was talking to my team, my friends, they could have heard you, ya know, you know daddy doesn’t like to share, dont you baby, think I need to teach you a lesson first.’

‘But I was a good girl daddy` she whimpered

‘Yes you were, still doesn’t excuse you from interrupting me though.’

She huffed ‘no baby, don’t get all huffy and puffy with me, you decided to walk into my office in your bra and panties whilst I was working, could’ve waited you know, and if you did I would be fucking you right now, but we’re here, so baby, how about you get my rings out and put them on for me, think someone deserves a spanking.

She slowly turned in his lap, reaching into the second draw in his desk to retrieve his rings, shakily placing them on thier own designated finger.

‘How many spanks do you think you should get today doll’

‘4’ she said hopefully.

‘Only four baby, best make it five then, an extra one for good look, ey.’

She rolled her eyes which Harry caught, ‘I can make it 6 if you want baby` he said gripping her chin lightly.

‘No, I’m sorry daddy’ she whimpered

‘You better be, you’re lucky that I’m even considering letting you have my cock today’

Y/n knew she had to tred carefully now, so she stood up and faced away from him, before bending over his desk, bracing herself, and willing to take whatever Harry had to offer. She secretly loved when Harry spanked her, the feeling of his hand crashing down onto her ass, his cold rings making little indents on her skin, the dominance he had over her as he marked her, she loved it and Harry did too.

Harry had stood up at this point ‘are you ready doll, want you to count each one for me.

‘Okay dad-fuck, daddy’ she squealed in surprise as his hand came crashing down, the sound of the slap reverberating through the room, his hand running over the supple flesh.

‘One’ she whimpered

*slap*

‘Two’

*slap*

‘Three’

‘Doing so good baby, only a couple more’ he smirked loving the control he had over her.

*slap*

‘Four’

*slap*

‘Five’ she cried, small tears in her eyes from the intensity, Harry marvelled over his work, as he could see what looked like two red handprints over both her ass cheeks, he smoothed over the skin lightly not wanting to cause her any more pain.

‘You okay baby’ he asked, wanting to make sure he hadn’t actually hurt her, they had already made a safe word, but he would never forgive himself if he hurt his girl.

‘Yeah, I’m okay daddy’ she sniffled slightly.

‘Think you deserve my cock now baby, took that soo well, such a good little slut for daddy aren’t you, went through all of that, just so you could get my cock.’

‘Oh I’d do anything for your cock daddy’ she says making him go wild, he instantly gripped her shoulder, making her stand up straight, before turning he around to bring her in for another heated kiss. ‘Jump’ he muttered between kisses, to which she obliged, wrapping her legs round his waist and her arms rounds his neck, practically like a koala bear.

He slowly back up to the desk again carefully laying her down not breaking the kiss, y/n being quiet relieved as the cool wood soothed her sore ass, Harry pressed himself into her, wanting to feel every inch of her body, she could also feel his hard cock dig into the side of her thigh.

She starts tugging at the end of his t-shirt, hinting for him to take his clothes off in which he happily obeyed, he had opted for no boxers today making the process even quicker, she saw the way his thick length sprang into his bare belly once he had taken his t-shirt and sweats off, throwing them not caring where they landed, the sight made her mouth water, she could see the large head of his cock was a shade of angry red leaking pre-cum, and the large protruding purple vein on the underside of his cock, which she couldn’t wait to feel against her walls.

Harry then wastes no time in ripping her underwear off of her, her juices now coating the inside of her thighs, she looked delicious and Harry could resist having a taste, so he dipped his head down, holding her legs apart, licking a large stripe through her folds which made her buck her hips up into his mouth.

‘Holy fuck’ she moaned, her clit being a little sensitive, but she honestly didn’t care right now.

He continued swirling his tounge around her pussy, dipping into he weepy hole occasionally, making her squirm in his grip, he couldn’t get enough of her sweet taste, he could stay between her legs all day if he could.

‘Feels so good daddy, but I really want your cock’ she whimpered.

‘Yeah, you want my cock baby, you can have my cock’ he finishes with a kiss to her clit, before trailing sloppy kisses up her belly towards the valley of her breasts, reaching one hand beneath her to unhook her bra, in which she arched he back slightly, helping him remove the lacy fabric, once she was completely bare beneath him, he takes one of her nipples into his mouth, swirling his tounge around the pebbled nub, doing the same to the other. He eventually made his way back to her lips, after leaving multiple hickeys on her collar bones and neck, marking her as his ‘you’re so beautiful darling’

He put his hand on either side of her head, her hands roaming over his beautifully inked arms, tracing over certain tattoos, making a shiver run up his spine, loving the gentleness of her fingers, ‘m’gonna fuck you now baby’ he says lining his cock up with her entrance ‘please, daddy’ she begs, he finally slips into her in one long thrust, making her arch her back and her eyes roll into the back of her head ‘Daddy Fuck..holy shit, you’re so big’ she cried feeling her walls stretch around his cock.

Harry also a groaning mess ‘so tight for me, s’like you were made for me’

He regains his composure before pulling almost all the way out and thrusting sharply into her cunt, starting to set a steady rhythm ‘not gonna last long doll’, her legs wrap around his waist, wanted him to be as close as possible, her hands find home on his back, her grip starting to make tiny red scratches, which he would later be reminded of when he took a shower.

Harry was now fucking her hard and deep, hitting her sweet spot with every thrust, the only sound in the room was skin hitting skin, the squelching sound of he pussy as he fucked her, breathy moans, and the occasional ‘daddy fuck yes’. He felt like he could burst with how good he felt, her warm, wet walls completely engulfing him, ‘who does this cunt belong to pet.’

‘You daddy, it’s all yours’ she breathes out, making him moan into her mouth as he kissed her plushy lips, her stomach flipping at the admittance.

‘Fuck baby gonna make me cum, you close, want you to cum with me’ she threw her head back at a particularly deep thrust, the pleasure becoming overwhelming ‘no baby’ he said gripping her chin, making her look at him again ‘want you to look at me when you fall apart, can you don’t that for me’

‘Yes daddy, m’so close, I’m gonna cum round your cock, so hard’ she whimpered

‘Oh baby, fuck’ her words making hit topple over the edge, his thrusts turning sloppy, ‘I’m cumming, cum with me pet. At this command her limbs turned limp, her head spinning, toes curling, screaming ‘daddy’ like it was the only word she knew, she didn’t think she had cum that hard in her life, Harry painting her walls, his release starting to leak out of her weepy hole, he eventually collapsed on top of her, still maintaining eye contact with her, trying to hold his weight up with his hand, so that he wouldn’t squash her. Harry hadn’t stopped thrusting into her to merely ride out thier highs, basking in both of thier releases, her cunt fluttering round his cock, milking it dry, he rested his head on hers, kissing her softly.

She tried pushing him away after a while when here muscles started spasming, in which he instantly stilled inside her, not wanting her to black out or anything. ‘You good baby, did soo well for me’

‘Don’t think I’ve cum that hard in my life’ she whispered hoarsely, her voice sore from screaming.

‘came hard too baby, can’t get enough of your cunt, m’gonna pull out now, hold my hand might sting a little’

She gripped into his hand, he slowly slipped out of her making her whimper at the loss of contact, starting on feel his cum drip down her thighs, Harry groaning at the sight, ‘looks so pretty with my cum dripping out of you’ he said leaving a soft kiss to her clit ‘can you stand baby’

‘cant feel my legs H’ she smirked knowing that this was fuelling his ego, a lazy smile spreading over her face, slowly starting to slip out of her subspace

He chuckled with her, ‘well I was thinkin’, how about we get cleaned up and take a nice hot bath, and then we can put a film on and cuddle.’

‘Mhmmm’ she hummed ‘that’s sounds perfect’

‘Wait, do you still have meetings’

‘No baby, that was the last one’ he smiled

‘Yayyyy’ she cheered her head still slightly fuzzy

He reached his hands out for her to grab so that she could sit up, hissing as all of her weight went onto her still very sore bum, that she would be reminded about for days to come.

‘We’ll get you an ice- pack as well darling’ he smirked

She managed to stand up on very shaky legs, falling into his bare chest, his arms wrapping round her so that she wouldn’t fall, kissing the top of her head ‘are you going to interrupt me whilst I’m working again baby’

‘Oh definitely daddy’ she whispered into his warm chest!

#harry styles #harry styles imagine #harry styles x reader #harry styles smut #harry styles smut imagine #harry styles hot #but daddy i love him #hs fic #harry styles fluff #harry styles is an angel #hazza styles #harold #hs1 #fine line #daddy!harry #work from home #dom!harry #harry smut

[deadcactuswalking]

REVIEWING THE CHARTS: 08/05/2021 (Billie Eilish, DJ Khaled)

Whilst this is slightly busier than last week, I am genuinely surprised with how little is actually going on here on this week’s chart, a lot less than I expected or predicted. With that said, the top of the chart is where our biggest story comes from and that is “Body” by Russ Millions and Tion Wayne taking advantage of a weak chart with its star-studded remix and peaking at #1 for its first week, replacing Lil Nas X’s “MONTERO (Call Me by Your Name)”. Not only is it the biggest hit for both of these guys and their first #1s, but it’s the first #1 for the entire UK drill genre, which kind of came out of nowhere for me since I think the song’s pretty worthless but with a TikTok challenge and streaming numbers that have even placed it in the American Spotify chart, it’s gearing up to be one of the biggest British rap songs ever. Let’s hope maybe this one doesn’t stall out as badly as “Don’t Rush” outside of the UK. With all that out of the way, let’s start REVIEWING THE CHARTS.

Rundown

Our only new arrival from last week’s UK Top 75 (which is what I cover), “Come Through” by H.E.R. featuring Chris Brown, is gone on the next off of the debut. Well, at least we have more than one new song this week, as well as some interesting chart nonsense lower down, but also some notable drop-outs for “Mr. Perfectly Fine” by Taylor Swift, “Mercury” by Dave and Kamal., “Lemon Pepper Freestyle” by Drake featuring Rick Ross, “All You Ever Wanted” by Rag’n’Bone Man (which will rebound next week as that album makes its impact) as well as “Watermelon Sugar” by Harry Styles finally making what seems to be its last exit. Our only return is in the form of “Confetti” by Little Mix getting a massive surge back at #15 after its Saweetie remix and the attached music video, though Saweetie doesn’t happen to be credited here.

We do have an interesting selection of gains and losses, as with the notable fallers – dropping five spots or more down the chart – we have “Titanium” by Dave at #23, “Wellerman” by Nathan Evans and remixed by 220 KID and Billen Ted getting ACR’d down to #29 (it had a surprisingly great run), “The Business” by Tiesto having the same happen to it at #32, “We’re Good” by Dua Lipa at #40, “drivers license” by Olivia Rodrigo at #43, “Blinding Lights” by the Weeknd at #45, “Don’t Play” by Anne-Marie, KSI and Digital Farm Animals at #51, “Calling My Phone” by Lil Tjay and 6LACK hit hard to #54, the same with “Up” by Cardi B at #59, “You” by Regard, Troye Sivan and Tate McRae shaking off the gains #63, “Get Out My Head” by Shane Codd at #60, “Heat” by Paul Woolford and Amber Mark at #66, “Solid” by Young Stoner Life, Young Thug and Gunna featuring Drake at #69, “Paradise” by MERDUZA and Dermot Kennedy at #71 and, sadly, “How Does it Feel” by London Grammar at #75.

Where it gets a bit more telling about how the charts are going to adapt into the Summer is in our climbers as we have solid gains for “Another Love” by Tom Odell making another run at #60, “Sunshine (The Light)” by Fat Joe, DJ Khaled and Amorphous inexplicably at #57 and now we get into the top 40 where we have more potential future hits. “Way Too Long” by Nathan Dawe, Anne-Marie and MoStack is at #38, “Don’t You Worry About Me” brings the Bad Boy Chiller Crew their first hit at #37 (although the song is only ever worth hearing for that chorus) and “WITHOUT YOU” by the Kid LAROI returns to the top 40 at #30 thanks to a remix with Miley Cyrus who is again not credited by the Official Charts Company. Boney M. are granted their first new top 20 hit since the 1990s, even if it is just a remix of a song that went #2 in 1978, as Majestic’s remix of “Rasputin” is at #18. Our final gain is for a song first entering the top 10 thanks to the remix with Ariana Grande finally making an impact – yet once again not given the official credit by the OCC – as “Save Your Tears” by the Weeknd makes its way up to #8, becoming his tenth top 10 hit here in Britain. That’s not the only song to first enter the top 10 this week but we’ll get to that in due time with our... odd selection of new arrivals this week.

NEW ARRIVALS

#73 – “EVERY CHANCE I GET” – DJ Khaled featuring Lil Baby and Lil Durk

Produced by DJ Khaled and Tay Keith

Two of our new entries are from DJ Khaled’s most recent album Khaled Khaled, an album much like any Khaled album I found cheap and just dull. This record especially is just mixed horribly, with a budget spent exceedingly on getting big-name features instead of any worthwhile engineers to actually mix and master this 50-minute trainwreck. The album doesn’t have many highlights at all but if I had to choose some they would be the two debuting this week, the first of which is basically a Lil Baby cut, “EVERY CHANCE I GET”, with a verse from Lil Durk. Okay, so, yes, first of all, much like the rest of the record, this mix is compressed and just weak, with bizarre bass mastering and drums that sound like garbage, before we get to Lil Baby himself sounding even froggier than ever. I do think that gives the song part of its charm, though, as with a Tay Keith beat, it’s definitely going for a hardcore, old-school Memphis rap atmosphere, and with Lil Baby’s flow switches disguising paranoid lyrics about the typical gunplay and flexing, it does effectively make a pretty intimidating listen... okay, well, it would, if DJ Khaled didn’t have to pop in to convince Lil Baby to “keep going”. We also get a single verse from Lil Durk here, mixed like he recorded his vocals in his bath to the point where it’s clipping against the bass, but delivering a King Von-esque flow that sounds pretty great, and admittedly more detail than you’d expect. I also love that silly “mmm-mmm” flow he uses at the end. I do wish a song like this, clearly supposed to be menacing, did not have the ludicrous personality void that is DJ Khaled on it, and it’s not like they need Khaled to collaborate together – or with Tay Keith for that matter – so I don’t really see why the dude doesn’t just shut up and promote his albums as compilations instead. I understand it comes from his mixtape days, but if this is going to be a studio album, treat it like one and just be quiet for once.

#72 – “Oblivion” – Royal Blood

Produced by Royal Blood

Royal Blood got the #1 album this week for Typhoons and admittedly, whilst I am interested in this band, I haven’t gotten around to listening to it, so I’ll take this album cut as a preview of what to come. If I am doing that, I hope to be surprised by whatever else that album has in store as I’m not really a fan of this. That eerie choppy guitar loop being immediately crushed by this heavily distorted riff and stiff percussion just does not sound unique or interesting, especially if Mike Kerr is going to sound this soulless. The build towards the chorus feels pretty pathetic and unwarranted, and said chorus is just not catchy, before we get to content about how he knows his fate through how arrogant he’s been and he deserves what’s coming to him. I mean, sure, but there’s nothing that makes it obvious that these guys don’t care about what’s coming to them given the pained vocal delivery and monotonous instrumental. It doesn’t feel exciting, rebellious or whatever emotion this tries and fails to capture, just stiff and staggered in its execution. This does make sense for Royal Blood but seems to me like they’re resting way too heavily on ideas ran through the soil at this point. With all that said, this isn’t bad at all, just not as great as those other singles have been from the record. I think I’d be more forgiving if it didn’t come off as a Queens of the Stone Age tribute act writing “originals” that bomb at their shows.

#56 – “love race” – Machine Gun Kelly featuring Kellin Quinn

Produced by Jeff Peters, Jared Gudstadt and Travis Barker

I guess this might actually be a rock-heavy week – not that I’m complaining about more of a rock presence on the chart but God, I wish it wasn’t coming from MGK. I’ll have some choice words to say about this guy’s last attempt at a pop-rock hit by the end of the year, probably, but at least for this song he brought on someone with some kind of legitimacy. Kellin Quinn is the frontman of post-hardcore band Sleeping with Sirens, one of the most successful bands in their genre but not one unlike others that grew out of the metalcore-infused pop rock to anything more unique or experimental. With that said, Quinn is barely here and other than Travis Barker’s typical explosive drums, MGK is the biggest presence here in his raspy but borderline unlistenable vocal tone that I just can’t stand, especially if it’s going to stretch out “run” as long and as far as he did in that longing, desperate chorus. MGK barely even lets Kellin Quinn have his own verse, registering him as backing vocals throughout the entire song, dampening his vocals that sound a lot more unique and enthused, especially when he starts screaming. That bridge did give me trancecore flashbacks – not that I’m complaining if I’m fully honest – so I’ll admit the part of me that eats up emo-pop garbage did let this grow on me a bit, but, man, without a guitar solo to distract from pretty awful lyrics (not that I’d expect much more from this artist or genre) and without really letting Quinn loose on the vocals, it’s lacking a certain grit and punch I expect from post-hardcore. The song did, however, indirectly remind me of New Found Glory, for which I am thankful for.

#53 – “I DID IT” – DJ Khaled featuring Post Malone, Megan Thee Stallion, Lil Baby and DaBaby

Produced by Ben Billions, Joe Zarrillo, DJ 360, Tay Keith and DJ Khaled

You wouldn’t expect an artist line-up like this to continue this trend of rock in this week’s new arrivals, but you’d be surprised, and personally I’m pretty happy with how much rock seems to be creeping up back into the public consciousness as if there’s one thing I got back in touch with the most over lockdown, it was the rock music I was raised on and it led to me even further appreciating a genre I had kind of lost touch with over the years out of just a lack of interest. With that said, this isn’t a rock song per se, but it does heavily and lazily sample a classic like much of this Khaled album, going for “Layla” by Derek and the Dominos. I’m not going to lie, either, it sets up a pretty effective back-bone for a trap banger about being awesome, especially with those squealing riffs in the chorus. Oh, yeah, and the mixing is horrible as expected, but to be honest to me it does not dampen the boasting, anthemic nature of this track, especially with Post Malone being a perfect choice to croon that infectious chorus. Megan Thee Stallion has a pretty embarrassingly by-the-numbers verse over a switch in the beat that makes it sound oddly stunted, but she does have that swinging rock charisma that people like Lil Baby do not have. With that said, I think I’m at the point where I eat anything Lil Baby says or does, because the flow switches combined with his frog-throat delivery is just impeccable. Content-wise, I think everyone here realises they’re being squashed by the clipping beat as they just go off about complete nonsense that goes in one ear and out the other apart from Lil Baby’s misguided but still pretty funny line about how he contemplated going vegan but sees no point in it because he’s got ten karats in both of his ears. Sure. At least DJ Khaled as something to do as he... harmonises, I guess, with Posty on the chorus. DaBaby is as distant as possible from the microphone to the point where I can barely hear him, not that it matters when his verse is that basic and short. This is kind of a trainwreck in all honesty, but with four choruses and a beat this heavy, it’s hard to be annoyed by it. Overwhelming maybe but these performers are all characters by themselves and throwing them in this three-minute chaos of squealing guitars and trap skitters just fascinates me if anything. Does it count as a posse cut? I don’t know. Either way, this is hilarious.

#5 – “Your Power” – Billie Eilish

Produced by FINNEAS

Decidedly not hilarious is this new single from Billie Eilish looking to be a smash from that upcoming album which now has a track listing and release date, with this functioning as I suppose the true lead single and her seventh top 10 here in the UK. It’s a brave choice too considering the lyrical content which is a pretty scathing attack on her ex-boyfriend and their abusive relationship, making several references to the gap in age and power dynamic that played into something really distressing for the both of them but especially a young, vulnerable Billie Eilish who found herself helpless in this relationship because of that “hero” quickly revealing himself as little more than his projected insecurities. The song’s detailed enough not to detach itself from Billie’s personal struggles but also works as what I suppose is a warning, as it’s retelling a story all too familiar with many girls of her age at the time who end up in these really scary situations. It does help that the song itself is great, relying on these layered acoustic guitars to form some kind of dejected groove behind Eilish’s vocals, whispery and cooing as always but in this case way too loud in the mix for my taste to the point where it kind of takes me out of the song as a whole. With a better master that blends her vocal take a lot better into the guitars, maybe going for a fuzzier, dream-pop angle, could work a lot better but with that said, I do understand the purpose of making it feel this intimate and minimal because Billie’s honest songwriting calls for a delivery like this, even if she ends up sounding shakier or even mumbling at times as a result. This is a big debut for Billie for a song not prepared to do as well as it did given its content and sound that is not exactly radio-friendly and oftentimes requires more heavy of a listen than a pop song would otherwise. I do love that final outro as her humming careens off the gentle guitars with just enough scratch but I do question how abrupt the ending is. Hopefully when the album’s out, we’ll have a bigger picture to as where this single in particular fits in.

Conclusion

With only five new arrivals and not much in the way of anything bad, I guess Worst of the Week goes to “Oblivion” by Royal Blood but giving a Dishonourable Mention would just end up as dishonest. Therefore, Best of the Week goes to Billie Eilish for “Your Power” but – and I cannot believe I am saying this for a 3/10 album with only fluke hits – but DJ Khaled – and Lil Baby for that matter – get a tied Honourable Mention for both of their songs, “EVERY CHANCE THAT I GET” with Lil Durk and “I DID IT” with Post Malone, Megan Thee Stallion and DaBaby. Now to distract from the fact I just did that, here’s this week’s top 10:

I can’t really make any healthy predictions for next week. Maybe we’ll get some songs from Lil Tecca, Rag’n’Bone Man or Bebe Rexha? Maybe we’ll end up with some fluke Weezer smash hit, who knows? Regardless, thank you for reading and I’ll see you next week.

[lia-nikiforov]

Spring 2018 Anime Final Review

So, uh, this is six months late. I’ve had half of this post in my drafts forever. To make it short, as I’ve mentioned previously, mom lost her job, which has not only been a heavy hit to my sense of stability for the last six months, but also means my time to watch anime was seriously reduced and even now a slight change of plans fucks up my whole schedule and sets me back for a full week. Anyway, nobody cares about any of these shows anymore so let’s get straight to it? I’m gonna ommit the two-cours that continued into the Summer - hopefully I’ll be able to make that post soonish? idk. Worst to best, same as usual

The crappy gender politics pit of shame

Darling in the FRANXX: I think everyone has ripped this show to threads at this point and there isn’t much I could add to that. It is quite funny to me to see how many people flipped out when the show went completely bananas in its last few episodes. Feels a bit like KADO, I’ve been telling y’all this was a ton of empty crap since episode 2, it just took the writing to completely self-destruct for everyone else to notice. A part of me feels tempted to do a long post breaking down just how badly the show collapsed in its final shebang, specifically how every single twist and turn completely nulled any remote kind of message or central thesis the show may have had, but at the same time it doesn’t seem worth the time. In the end, I may have given What is Internal Consistency, The anime way too much credit. It’s not hateful antigay propaganda, it’s just dumb as shits, with a writer and creators who didn’t think for half a second of the implications of what they were doing, and who were so incompetent they couldn’t even conserve the minimal plot and character coherency within a single episode, let alone 24. In other words, Darling isn’t saying “gays shouldn’t exist” but “I have no idea of anything regarding gay people”. What makes it egregious is that the show spent so much time acting like it was “meaningful” and “important” and yet it ended saying absolutely fucking nothing. Except mayb “have babies”. Down to oblivion you go, along with the likes of KADO, to the void of shows that couldn’t even be offensively bad and no one will remember a year from now. Bonus garbage points for the half-assed “bury your gays”.

Nil of Libra Admirari or whatever this show was called: I’m not trying to diss on the show, I just genuinely never remember the title because I have the JP and EN all mixed up. Not that it matters much, as far as I could tell, the show could call Shalabalabatuna and it would have the same significance in regard to the content. But the title isn’t important. In fact, it may be a bit unfair to have this show in this section. For the most part, Main Girl is very self-determined and has an active role in the story.... but then the last two episodes heavily featured a lot of rape threats or rape themes and forced pregnancy (real and threat) and I don’t really understand why they’d go there all of a sudden. One of them was treated relatively well, even empowering the victim in the process, but when the ikemen bad guy was rambling endlessly about how he wanted to impregnate the protagonist it really turned me off :/ I’m also not a fan of “main boy was her secret fiancé all along”, but at least they also handled that somewhat decently. It’s a very disposable series, but since I watched all of Amnesia, I think I owe every otoge adaptation at least the smallest chance to clear that very low bar, and Libra of Nil does it, more competently than most other stuff in the same genre.

Hisone to Masotan: I really, really wanted to love this show. Even now, as I put it in the pit of shame category, I’m pained. There was a good show in this, and a lot of it made it to the screen: an adorable, charming little story about a woman finding her place in the world, making new friends, finding her calling and bonding with an adorable dragon. Unfortunately, it got buried down under this opressing, horrendous gender politics that tried to do something with bringing attention to sexism in the military only to cancel it out making the one dude that embodied that sexism getting rewarded with the affections of a girl he explicitly tried to crush. It also called back on the virgin or whore fallacy and even managed to shove in a “bury your gays” trope. Even though Hisone challenges the ritual bullshit, it’s too little, too late, and she does end up carrying it out anyway, so the defiance to the status quo is of little importance in terms of problematizing the ritual itself. Sorry BONES, it wasn’t meant to be this time. 

The ni fu ni fa section

Ni fu ni fa is a Mexican colloquialism for “It was okay but it didn’t change my life.”

Binan Koukou Chikyuu Boueibu HAPPY KISS: This soft reboot of the franchise had some really great episodes and did an actually good job of developping its characters. For the most part, it achieved what its predecessor did in terms of satirical comedy and I enjoyed it quite a bit. However, what bunked it down so low in the list was the final episode. At some point, the writers forgot they were doing a parody and made the show somewhat self-serious, way closer in tone to the magical girl anime it was supposed to be making fun of, rather than the satire its predecessor was. Whereas S1 ended with the whole Magical boy stuff being revealed as a crappy space reality TV show, this one ended with a real cheesy conflict about happiness and family and blablabla. Which is not bad by itself if this were a Precure show, but that kind of self-serious plot development just didn’t work for this series. I still enjoyed it, and the fanservice episode is one of the best of the whole franchise, but I’m a bit sad the finale missed the mark so badly.

Hinamatsuri: Hinamatsuri was very hit-or-miss for me. There were some truly brilliant episodes, a lot of funny vignettes and heart-warming stories, and then there was some stuff that made me uncomfortable -like every single Hitomi story- or felt unnecessary and dry. It also threw me off that the superpower dynamic completely disappeared in the second half of the show, especially in Anzu’s part of the story. It was okay but I feel like I needed something that felt like a closing, and choosing to end it with Mao who featured very minimally in the show overall didn’t cut it. It’s a fun show, I’d reccommend people check it out, but it felt a bit too disjointed for me

Persona 5: The Animation: This is a hard show to place because I love the looks of it and I think the concept is interesting and pretty cool, but there is something that’s keeping me from connecting emotionally to the story. The part where changing the villains’ heart makes them repent from their sins and become “good” feels very artificial and very tasteless when you’re dealing with rapists and abusers. I ended dropping it at episode 16, I just couldn’t find the motivation to catch up with the 6 episodes i’d fallen behind on because my schedule is a tragedy

Tokyo Ghoul: Re: I guess it’s fair to say I’ve kind of outgrown Tokyo Ghoul. There’s something messy and confusing about how this season panned out, and there comes a point in which misery porn just doesn’t cut it anymore. I still watch because Ishida has a way to make every single goddamn character extremely sympathetic, which makes for an emotionally engaging viewing even when you’re not sure of what the plot is supposed to be or who you should be rooting for. I tried picking up the new season that just started airing and immediately found I had no idea of what was going on, who was on who’s side and in general, who the fuck were 90% of the characters, so I dropped it.

Nanatsu no Taizai: Imashime no Fukkatsu: I’ve mentioned it before, this second season had the opposite problem than the first one: the pace was too slow. It took more than half of it to get to Escanor, and then the season ends at a kind of random spot. I really thought we’d get further along on the story, since Gowther’s backstory was hinted at in the openings, but no such thing happened. They did manage to give us a variety of cool moments and fights, and I love Ban so his scenes with Zhivago and Elaine made me quite happy, though I really wish the romance between Elizabeth and Meliodas wasn’t su dubious and cringy. In light of some revelations that take place further along the manga, going out of their way to emphasize that Meliodas was a sort of mentor figure for Elizabeth when she was a toddler seems unncessary and just very squeamish. I do hope we get a third season though, and an OVA of the Vampires of whatever side story would be great too.

Rokuhoudou Yotsuiro Biyori: I was pleasantly surprised by this show, and it’s closer to being one of my top of the season than it is to “meh”. It had some weaker, cheesier segments, but it also managed great whacky moments and a genuine soothing atmosphere. What surprised me most is that the vanilla looking cast of moderately handsome dudes managed to develop into interesting, funny individuals with a dynamic that made every episode enjoyable. A solid reccommendation for anyone wanting to see delicious looking food and moderately handsome dudes being ridiculous. Also, the cat episode is the best episode of anime ever produced.

The I’m probably the only person alive who enjoys these shows

Mahou Shoujo Ore: This is a difficult show to place because it wasn’t quite as great as I wanted it to be and its parodic nature took me by surprise, but somehow I was still seriously entertained more often than not. The twists in the final quarter and the absolutely bonkers finale was a total riot, but I definitely advise caution before going in, given that some of the jokes may seem insensitive or in poor taste in regards to gender presentation, sexuality and there are even some mild harrassment jokes that certainly made me roll my eyes.

Yowamushi Pedal: Glory Line: I don’t know if anyone’s noticed, but I think through half of the show’s 25 episode run, I was convinced the title was actually Glory Road. It’s kind of anticlimactic that it’s called Glory Line if they don’t actually reach the final Goal btw. Anyway, I feel I say this a lot, but really, if you didn’t like the previous Yowapeda seasons, there’s nothing here for you, and if you did, you’re probably not gonna hop off this late in the game. This season does suffer from the same dragging than its predecessors, with the added issue of being quite pessimistic for no reason in about half the episodes, and a diminished presence for Onoda. I really wish they hadn’t dragged the Day 2 goal so long, I really hoped we’d see the end of the race, but no such luck I guess. Still love most of it and hope we get one more season or a movie to complete the story.

The favorites of the season

Golden Kamuy: In spite of its pacing issues, terrible animation and general clunkiness, I can’t help but love this show. When season 1 ended my feelings for it had mellowed quite a bit, but as soon as I picked up season 2 this Fall I just fell in love all over again. It’s fun, unique, over-the-top in some ways, incredibly grounded in others, and the dynamics between the characters are incredibly charming. 

Hozuki no Reitetsu: It’s hard to talk about this one because it feels repetitive, given how tonally the show remains just the same across its three seasons. It could’ve very well been a one-season, 36 episode show, for how little it changes in spite of the time that transpired between the first season and the second. But in short, the comedy continues to be as spot on as always, the Zashikiwarashi twins are the best addition to the cast. It’s definitely a show I could watch endless episodes off, and the rare case of an episodic series with no overarching plot that I can enjoy wholeheartedly. 

Card Captor Sakura: Clear Card arc: Over the course of the series, I’ve expressed a few concerns and misgivings about how the story of this 20th anniversary sequel was playing out. The final episode was particularly troublesome in that it left the story unfinished in spite of deviating from the manga. In spite of this, more than anything I’m very happy that this continuation still retains what made the original so special, that they captured the magic behind Sakura’s “everything will be alright” spell and gave us the chance to spend more time with these beloved characters and see their stories continue. The slow but sweet development of Sakura and Syaoran’s puppy love is a definite highlight. Needs more Touya/Yukito and Yue in general.

Piano no Mori: This show got heavily overlooked because it was kidnapped by Netflix (pls stop immediately), and then when it was finally unceremoniously dumped a month or two ago, it came under fire for the wonky CGI during the piano scenes -and it is indeed very wonky-. But beyond that, I found the story very engaging, especially because Kai is such a fascinating protagonist, his intense rivalry-friendship with Megane-kun (sorry, it’s been six months, i can’t remember names) is exactly the type I can’t help but root for. Kai’s participation in the final episode gave me goosebumps. I’m very happy we’re getting a continuation,  can’t wait to see how the Chopin competition develops.

Wotaku ni Koi wa Muzukashii: Sweet, funny and absolutely delightful from start to finish, Wotakoi was easily one of the highlights of the season. Although there were some aspects about Cosplayer-senpai and Yuri Otaku-senpai’s (I’m really trying to remember the names, I’m sorry!! ;---;) that didn’t work for me -namely the izakaya segment- Narumi and Hirotaka more than made up for it with their clumsy yet adorable romance. I spent the entirety of the amusement park episode screeching. I really hope we get a continuation -and get a chance to see more of Hirotaka’s brother and his gamer friend too- and that in general we can get more anime about adult stories

Megalobox: Who would’ve thought that a show that wasn’t even in my radar before the season started would’ve end as one of my favorites, possibly of the year? Even as someone who’s only marginally acquainted with Ashita no Joe and has no interst in the sport of boxing, I was completely enthralled by the style and passion of this production. As I said a bit above, intense rivalries are very appealing to me, and the build up in the tension between Joe and Yuri was almost palpable, their mutual respect gave me chills. Definitely the surprise of the season, made even better by its optimistic happy ending to contrast with its predecessor’s tragedy. Megalobox is a unique anniversary project that is closer to an homage and it works perfectly. Definitely check it out.

That’s it for the Spring season! I hope i can do the summer season this weekend and maaaybe even my watchlist for the Fall season. Fingers crossed i won’t get swallowed up in other stuff :’D 

#anime final impressions #spring anime #god i've forgotten 95% of my tags #darling in the franxx #megalobox #wotaku ni koi wa muzukashii #piano no mori #card captor sakura clear card arc #hozuki no reitetsu #golden kamuy #yowapeda #mahou shoujo ore #rokuhoudou yotsuiro biyori #nanatsu no taizai #persona 5 #tokyo ghoul: re #hinamatsuri #hisone to masotan #binan koukou chikyuu boueibu

[davidmann95]

The Kingdom Hearts III Reaction

First thing’s first: yes, I got the responses to my initial reaction letting me know I could use L2 to cycle through triangle commands, and oh my god that made things so much more manageable, so thank you.

Gameplay wise, I said what I had to say right off the bat earlier: lot of fun, best version of the traditional playstyle. Gorgeous except for when it’s the most gorgeous. Way more game than I could handle on the margins, but it felt like fun available options I could choose whether to pursue or not rather than overwhelming.

Under the cut I’m gonna talk some broad structural stuff; I’ll avoid anything overtly spoilery, but it would certainly be understandable if you’d rather stay away. Under another bolded sign though I’m going to get into MAXIMUM spoiler territory, so those who just want my basic impressions but would prefer to hold off on more than that until they have their own go at it can know where to get off.

So this game does like 90% of everything I ever wanted it to do, plus so much MORE than I ever would have expected, resulting in a finale even more grand and resonant and satisfying than I might have imagined after nearly 13 years of waiting. The problem is that all that stuff is in the last 8 hours, and it is very, very clear that’s the part of the game Nomura and company actually cared about. This wasn’t interested in being Kingdom Hearts III, it wanted to be Kingdom Hearts III Part 3/3: The Finale after Dream Drop Distance and A Fragmentary Passage covered the other biggies, to the point of as mentioned before critically compromising the beginning of the game. It reached the point where Dream Drop Distance went from just baaaaarely pulling ahead of 358/2 Days to dead damn last in my ranking of these, because it not only set the tone for what went wrong here - even if this succeeded in the end in a way that couldn’t - but sponged off vital reveals and the conclusion to Riku’s character arc, both of which 1,000,000% needed to be in here so this could be a complete sequel rather than in an intermediary story where they were weakened by context.

Long story short, Nomura and Square are going to have to think very, very hard about what kind of a role the Disney worlds are going to play in these going forward, because the enthusiasm for them on the part of the writers is visibly dead. Not across the board, passion clearly went into the likes of the Toy Story and Big Hero 6 worlds, but it could not have been plainer that Monsters Inc. and Frozen were checkmarks being crossed off, perfunctory in a way I genuinely don’t feel the Disney worlds were in the past (though that may be in large part because this time around Sora is literally just there for level grinding, rather than an immediate search for friends, stripping away the central underlying emotional urgency of I and II). It would’ve been alright if there had been a major act break of the sort II had to provide a sense of forward momentum, but as is it really is just marking time while characters other than Sora drive the plot in the background, mostly in the form of catching up with what the audience already knows. They’ll always be a part of the franchise, and obviously the iconic Disney figures in Mickey and the rest will always be central, but unless the powers that be find a fresh new angle I think it’s getting to be time to scale the movie settings back in favor of the main story and original worlds, if not to the extent the Final Fantasy elements have received.

So I spent most of the game disappointed, figuring it would pull it all together for the finale and more than satisfy me, but not enough to retroactively redeem the game as a whole. And then it retroactively went and redeemed the game, because when I say it kicks off in the last 8 hours I don’t mean that that’s where things start getting parsed out in time for the finale. I mean it’s 8 solid hours of climax, physical and plot and character, the most intense and overwhelming of the franchise, answers to real-life-decade spanning mysteries and character resolutions and endgame-scale setpieces and catharsis being delivered just one after the other after the other. It’s the entire emotional underpinning of the game in a single titanic endrun, in an experience and at a pitch I’ve never seen before. Even the parts that should have been set up earlier in the game still have the entire rest of the series and years of anticipation leading into them, and while it’s a shame it had to bank on that advantage, it worked, because when I look back on the game in years to come it’s going to be this that I’ll remember, and when I someday a long time from now play through the franchise as a whole, I’ll go through the parts that previously irritated me with a smile on my face because it’ll just be a charming interlude rather than a dead stop. I can’t put this over II’s more well-rounded experience because of those structural issues, but while 0.2 is maybe the purest expression of intent thus far in the series, its brevity, and the fact that as good as it gets its best isn’t as good as this gets, puts III neck-and-neck with it as the franchise runner-up for me.

Okay, BIGGEST SPOILERS IN THE FUCKING WORLD UNDER THE IMAGE

So being a person who exists online in the 21st century, I had some key images of the ending spoiled for me well in advance, which sucked but was also maybe a blessing in disguise, because if I hadn’t been braced when those last three seconds came...that would have been rough. It was startlingly rough as is, which is odd because as much as I’ve always liked Sora as a character and appreciated the odd way his nature as a Disney hero in a Final Fantasy dark epic makes him a perfect lead and counterpoint, I never realized the depths of emotional investment I’d attached to his specific fate until the rug got pulled out. It would be as blatant a “but there’s no body!” moment as any there’s ever been even without the secret ending and the confirmation on Nomura’s part that Sora will remain the main character, it’s an emotional blow and a setback and a mystery for the others to solve rather than a full tragic ending (and one would have to imagine the characters themselves would believe that and will act accordingly given this entire story was itself about bringing back a bunch of Very Definitely Dead Folks), but it’s harsh as hell even if it’s very clearly the next step in a Master Plan rather than purely blueballing players for the cruel joy of it. Still, even if it’s reminiscent of stuff we’ve seen before, a melancholy-at-best ending is fully within the franchise wheelhouse; if I’m right and there’s one full trilogy of main games remaining in the series (I’m guessing without many if any spinoffs, Nomura’s bosses are definitely going to have his nose to the grindstone to get through the remainder of this thing on a sane timescale so as not to have another...well, this), maybe it’ll fully establish a sad-odd-numbered-ending, happy-even-numbered ending pattern, with IV having a gleeful reunion, V ending with all seeming lost, and the grand finale letting the heroes have their happily ever after.*

Before getting into the gushing praise for the rest of it, the reason this is at 90% of everything I wanted rather than complete: Kairi is bizarrely shortchanged here compared to every other central character, especially given her relationship with Sora is the foundation of the very end and she’s the logical main protagonist for IV. Even her ‘death’ isn’t my issue so much - by the end of the game Sora has rescued literally every other main character from beyond the veil of the afterlife or a living hell in fairly rapid succession, she’s just the last and biggest deal to him personally - as that even a few more scenes with her would have shored up so much. Not that her material isn’t good when she is there, I absolutely do think it was, and the emotional buildup from the series up to this point was more than enough in my opinion to carry her stuff through, but it’s the equivalent of, say, Lois Lane appearing out of nowhere at the end of a Justice League story to provide the impetus for Superman: obviously this works and makes sense because we know how much they mean to one another, but in the context of this as a lone narrative it’s a little out of nowhere. Riku gets it pretty bad too, if not as much so, but he has the ‘excuse’ of having his character arc resolved in Dream Drop Distance. Still though, it means the central trio is scarcely a thing in here the way it was in the past, though it looks like the next game is going to be entirely about getting them back together and hopefully they’ll stay as a complete unit from there on out.

Also prior to gushing praise: if Dream Drop Distance hadn’t happened, it would be so easy to restructure this in a way that would make the whole thing satisfying instead of just a perfect chunk of it. Open the game with Sora and Riku going into the Realm of Darkness to save Aqua, have Sora succeed but in the process of THAT lose his powers (making it a noble sacrifice on his part foreshadowing the end rather than a non-fuckup that the player pays for); Aqua has to recuperate, preferably with Kairi and Lea so they can get more screentime, Sora’s off regaining his powers and tracking down clues to the location of Castle Oblivion since it was under Organization control and therefore hidden, and Riku’s off with Mickey having his DDD arc. Stick the reveal of the real Organization XIII midgame, and keep the finale almost exactly as is. That way, plot and character’s doled out throughout, character screentime is rebalanced, and everything that worked stays working and comes to the exact same conclusion.

Gushing praise time: holy fuckin’ cow, this hit me in ways I did not see coming. The reunion of the other two trios was something I looked forward to well enough but not anything I fully expected to outright bowl me over, but by god they pushed those buttons as hard as they could and made them everything anyone could need them to be. But that was expected, to one extent or another; what I don’t think anyone could have seen coming was, in the final gasp of this saga of hilariously, broadly Arch villains, every single one of them turning out to be a real goddamn human being with understandable emotions and motivations and implied history and arcs. Monsters see the light (with the contextually hilarious exception of the one character fandom MOST wanted to see get a face turn with Vanitas, and even he finds understanding and peace) after a whole series of believing there’s one in the darkness when only one or two major characters had made a turnaround, and it doesn’t just make this game richer, it retroactively improves the entire series thematically and emotionally, as well as setting the stage for more of that approach based on what we know of what’s to come. And action-wise, it really does go for trying to beat II’s last Xemnas fight, and while I don’t know that it manages it in sheer cool thanks to that final laser blocking/dual wielding finale, it I think really does come out on top in the fights leading up to it and the spectacle and the emotional power and the beautiful interface screw (after the shit with the tornado earlier!), nevermind the absolute end where Our Nerd Dad Luke Skywalker** shows up to give his blessing to the franchise and usher out the story as it was.

As for the pair of post-credits scenes: in each instance I had something spoiled for me, but also in each instance not the BIG thing. I knew Xigbar would live and summon the Foretellers, which honestly is not that shocking for me. That he IS one of them, that he’s been putting on an act (one clearly in the shape of his teacher) and been a bigger villain than Xehanort THE ENTIRE TIME? I believe that got a literal gasp out of me, and THAT’S before it turned out that after bullheadedly clinging to the idea that she’s still a main villain for all these years, Maleficent might actually end up a main villain again. And the secret movie? I had the title spoiled - and god what a perfect twist, the most gleefully apeshit moment in the game and already probable best moment in gaming of the year coming back around in a completely serious way to define the future of the franchise - but assumed wrongly that it meant Sora would be in some way ‘reincarnated’ amnesiac as Yozora and needing to be returned to himself. But nope, Sora’s for real out there alive as himself in...something like the real world? Or The World Ends With You, which I understand is at least a lot closer? And Riku’s gonna wind up stuck out there too? And because Yozora’s there it means they’re in some kind of fuckin’ Flash of Two Worlds! situation?! Or if it’s in the same physical realm (which I have to doubt or Sora would rush home as soon as he got a ship) it’s the equivalent of that dope two-part Terra Obscura arc in Tom Strong?! Sora and Riku, trapped in a world where Kingdom Hearts is a Dark, Realistic Modern Urban Fantasy (which, if Sora got here by dying, does...does that mean Gritty Realworld! AU Kingdom Hearts fanfic is that universe’s version of hell? Because that would be beautiful) (did “This is a fantasy based on reality” end up carried over as the logline to Final Fantasy XV from Versus XIII? Because if not, absolutely use it here to keep that gag going) and having to fight their way back to their world and friends, hopefully with Kairi going on her own playable adventure on the other end of the cosmos to find them since there’s no way she wouldn’t be leading the search? And with the Master of Masters waiting in the wings, the perfect villain in general because if Sora is the MOST Disney character in this universe he appears to be the LEAST, and especially perfect here now that Sora’s symbolically if not possibly literally on his turf? Waiting I’m guessing another 3-5 years is gonna be hell (I’m guessing IV’ll be announced next year or maaaaaaaybe late this year because thus far Kingdom Hearts has never gone with no announced games on the horizon longer than the end of the next calendar year, and we’ll see how development goes after that; like I said, I imagine the pressure is on for Nomura), but this could not look more like my shit.

So that’s, after all these years, Kingdom Hearts III: an understandable, maybe unavoidable, but still crushing disappointment that undermined itself narratively before it even began production and ran on a burned-out crew that could never meet the impossible expectations surrounding it. Until it suddenly winks, brushes itself off, and lives up to damn near EVERYTHING on its shoulders in the most incredible ways possible while also transcending its previous limitations as a story right in front of you, and then breaking your heart before planting the seed to repair it and charting a path towards an even more exciting future. All said and done, I liked it a whole lot, and it’ll always be special to me.

* At this point, I really could go for the ending of the whole thing literally being Sora and Kairi walking into the sunset together, with the camera panning up into the sky and text (not mysterious narration like in the past, but old-school Disney-cartoon-style outside-the-world of the story cursive text) appearing to declare 𝒜𝓃𝒹 𝓉𝒽𝑒𝓎 𝓁𝒾𝓋𝑒𝒹 𝒽𝒶𝓅𝓅𝒾𝓁𝓎 𝑒𝓋𝑒𝓇 𝒶𝒻𝓉𝑒𝓇. That is the level of closure and myth and satisfaction it’s gotta be building towards after everything thus far and everything to come.

** If you are reading this without having played or watched the game: given I know that’s now in the realm of possibility, no, I don’t literally mean Luke Skywalker showed up.

Yet.

#Kingdom Hearts III #Kingdom Hearts #Analysis #Opinion

[lady-hammerlock]

<3 <3 (Watchdogs 2 - Marcus x Wrench)

Otherwise known as: ‘Five-ish times other people caught Wrench’s mask displaying love hearts when he looked at Marcus, and one time Marcus saw it himself.’

This one is pretty tame and sweet. You’ll find the full story under the cut. :)

The first time Sitara noticed it the four of them had been working on the Cyber Driver car for almost eighteen hours straight. They had started to snap at one another, but frankly, after eighteen hours of hard work all in close proximity to one another Sitara was surprised that they hadn’t done anything worse.

She was pretty sure that it was Marcus who was managing to keep them all in a good mood, which was sort of ridiculous. Marcus was the new guy. He shouldn’t have been as good at fixing all of their bullshit as he was, but so far Sitara was pretty sure he had stopped at least two fights from breaking out, and he had pulled each of them aside and insisted they take naps when it was clear the work was becoming too much. 

“You know what we need?” Marcus said, pulling back from the car after their latest attempt to rewire the car’s controls had gone disastrously wrong. “Caffeine and sugar and maybe some actual food as well. I’m gonna do a snack run. You guys have any requests?”

Wrench let out a groan that sounded far more sexual than Sitara thought justifiable in response to the simple suggestion of food, but she really couldn’t blame him. The thought of food seemed heavenly at that moment.

“Hell yes,” she said, pulling back from the car and stretching. She hadn’t realized quite how hungry she was until Marcus had spoken.

“Oh, oh, oh!” Wrench exclaimed, flailing at Marcus. “Can you get some of those new corn chips? You know… the ones with the stuff? In the special packaging?”

Amazingly Marcus seemed to know exactly what Wrench was talking about. Sitara shook her head and sighed at the two of them. They had barely known each other for a week and the two of them were already managing to communicate using very few actual words.

Sitara and Josh rattled off their own requests and then Marcus was moving towards the garage door.

“Hey M,” Wrench said, chasing after the other hacker. “You want me to come with?”

“Nah man,” Marcus replied. “I should be right.”

Sitara wasn’t surprised that Marcus had declined Wrench’s assistance. As much as the two of them got along, Marcus was probably using the food run as a chance to get some peace and quiet away from the rest of the team, if only for a few minutes.

“Okay,” Wrench said. His mask smiled, but his voice was quieter than usual.

Sitara got back to work, figuring that she’d use the time Marcus was gone to do some more work on the car’s new paint job. The garage door closed behind Marcus with a shudder, and then Sitara heard Wrench let out a long, loud sigh; another sound that was distinctly un-Wrench.

Sitara glanced over, stencil in hand to spot Wrench staring at the door Marcus had just left through, the eyes of his mask displaying two very obvious love hearts.

“Oh. You like him,” she said. She hadn’t meant to say the words out loud. They had just spilled out as soon as she had realised what exactly she had just witnessed.

“What?” Wrench asked, snapping out of his reverie, the hearts in his mask replaced with two question marks.

“You like Marcus,” Sitara said.

“What? Of course I like him,” Wrench replied. “Marcus is an amazing guy. Wait a second Sitara! Are you telling me you don’t like him?”

Sitara rolled her eyes as Wrench let out the most over-exaggerated and falsely offended sounded gasp she had ever heard.

“And here I thought you were a woman of taste,” Wrench continued in the same scandalized tone.

“Don’t you fucking make this about me,” Sitara said, hitting Wrench gently with the paint-stained card in her hand. “Of course we all like Marcus, but you like like Marcus.”

That at least seemed to be enough to make Wrench fall silent, if only for a moment. His silence made Sitara more sure of her hypothesis. If there was nothing to the accusation then Wrench would have responded right away with some sort of smart-ass comment. Instead she found herself dealing with a silent Wrench and a pair of bright LED exclamation marks.

“Did you…” Sitara paused. Wrench seemed genuinely confused. “You don’t even realize you did it, do you?”

“Did what?” Wrench asked, the exclamation marks changing to the mask’s approximation of narrowed eyes.

“Just after Marcus left your mask’s eyes lit up in a pair of little less than three style love hearts,” Sitara explained as she knelt by one of the car’s doors. “You know, that might be the first time I’ve actually seen your mask do that.”

Wrench scoffed at that.

“Bullshit,” he said. “My mask makes little heart eyes all the fucking time. You’re just not paying attention.”

“Sure thing Wrench,” Sitara said. He was far too defensive and far too serious for Sitara to think there was really nothing behind the unusual emojis.

“He’s in denial,” Josh added from the other side of the car. He had been so quiet, so absorbed in his work that for a moment Sitara had actually forgotten he was in the garage with them.

“Oh come on Josh,” Wrench whined. “Not you too.”

“If you like him then you should probably tell him,” Josh added.

Ah, if only it was that simple. Sitara knew Wrench just about well enough to be able to say with some certainty that no matter how much Wrench liked Marcus, there was little to no chance of him actually pursuing the other hacker.

“I don’t…” Wrench floundered for a moment. There was a loud ‘clang’ as an innocent tire-iron that had just happened to be lying on the floor near Wrench at the time took the full brunt of his frustration. “I don’t have a fucking crush on Marcus or whatever it is that you two are trying to say.”

“Uh huh,” Sitara replied, nodding slowly and not looking up from the stencil she was currently taping onto the car. “You just keep telling yourself that.”

“I don’t,” Wrench argued.

Sitara couldn’t help but notice that after that day in the garage, the frequency with which a pair of little sideways love hearts appeared on Wrench’s mask skyrocketed, as though he was trying desperately to prove her accusation wrong.

She was sure that Wrench would claim there was nothing behind the amount of time the two of them spent together either, or the number of times that Wrench touched Marcus. They were all pretty innocent touches, but Wrench had definitely never been that touchy with the rest of them.

She began to witness more and more instances where the two of them actually flirted with one another, although she was pretty sure that they would both claim they were just messing around. She was equally sure that Wrench still hadn’t actually told Marcus how he felt. She just hoped that one day soon he actually would.

“We’ve only got ten seconds left until that gateway resets.”

“I can stall it!”

“Come on guys. We’re so close!”

“Just a few more connections and…”

“Come on Marcus! You can do it!”

There was nothing the rest of them could do now but stand back and cheer Marcus on as he completed the last few stages of the hack. They had all helped out where they could, and it had definitely been a team effort, but Marcus had been the star of the competition. There was little doubt now that they were going to win, and there was no doubt in Horatio’s mind that it was all because of Marcus.

Lately Horatio hadn’t been able to spend as much time with the rest of Dedsec as he would have liked. As the only member of the team with full time employment he had just been too busy. He’d made sure to roster a few days off for Swelter Skelter though. This was important. It was exactly what he had needed; what they had all needed for that matter.

Horatio really began to wonder how much he had missed though when the eyes of Wrench’s mask switched to display a pair of love hearts as he watched Marcus. It was just for a few seconds, and they were all pretty excited, emotions running high thanks to the competition. He was pretty sure it didn’t mean anything, but he couldn’t resist teasing Wrench a little.

“Hey man,” he said, nudging Wrench in the side. “Your mask’s giving away your boner for Marcus.”

“What, is it showing love hearts again?” Wrench asked, sounding a little more flustered than Horatio had expected. He wondered how much control Wrench actually had over what the mask displayed, whether it was programmed to respond to his facial expressions or read his brain waves or what. 

“I mean, damn straight its showing fucking love hearts!” Wrench said, and Horatio couldn’t quite tell whether he was getting defensive or whether this was just Wrench being his usual over-the-top self. “Do you not see how fucking amazing Marcus is being right now? I don’t fucking care that none of you have masks like mine; every single one of you should be giving my man M heart eyes.”

And then the challenge was over and the machine in front of them went off and they were all screaming and congratulating Marcus and Horatio’s conversation with Wrench was quickly forgotten. 

In fact Horatio might have forgotten it entirely if it wasn’t for what happened later that night. They had all met up with this older hacker named Ray who had offered them a little something, and before long they were all completely high off their faces. 

They had drifted apart when the cocktail of drugs had really kicked in, but as the night progressed they met up again and then drifted apart again, each of them going wherever their own personal version of blissful oblivion guided them. 

Horatio vaguely remembered a cute girl who smelled like strawberries and who had delighted in messing with Horatio’s face-paint, getting black and white smudges all over her hands and face in the process.

Somewhere along the line he met up with the others again, or at least with Wrench and Marcus. Marcus had lain down and fallen asleep on a seemingly random patch of ground. Wrench sat nearby, just staring right at Marcus as he slept. The love hearts that Horatio had spotted earlier were right there on his face for all to see this time, and this time they didn’t look as though they were going to be going away any time soon.

“You just sitting there and watching Marcus sleep?” Horatio asked Wrench. “That’s pretty creepy man.”

Wrench didn’t look away from the sleeping hacker, but his mask did change back to its default crosses.

“It’s not creepy,” the masked man argued. “Marcus is vulnerable right now and who knows what sort of weirdos are out here and might try to take advantage of him. I’m guarding him.”

Horatio rolled his eyes at Wrench.

“Of course you are,” he said.

He might have said something more if he wasn’t so sure that not only would Marcus not mind that Wrench had been watching over him, he would probably think that the gesture was just as sweet as Wrench was trying to insist it was.

Instead he spotted the girl who smelled like strawberries again, standing a short way away and waving to him. He drifted back towards her. After all, it wasn’t so late in the evening that he couldn’t still have a little bit of fun.

Just before he left he saw the love hearts appear on Wrench’s mask once more, and of course they appeared right when he started to ‘guard’ Marcus again.

In Raymond ‘T-Bone’ Kenney’s admittedly limited experience it was rare for Wrench to be quiet, but since he had come back from his run-in with the FBI he had been the quietest out of all of them. Hell, even Josh had been more talkative. The others were tiptoeing around the masked man as though he was made of glass, none of them seeming to know what they might be able to do to comfort him.

Ray grew sick of it pretty fast. So they had all seen his face? So he put up this stupid fucking front that made him seem way more unapproachable than he actually was? So fucking what?

He stomped over to the younger man and slammed a hand down on one of Wrench’s shoulders, immediately regretting it because of the metal spikes that seemed to cover every single inch of Wrench’s clothing.

Ray wasn’t exactly an expert when it came to emojis and all that sort of text speak; it had never really been his thing; but he was pretty sure that the symbols Wrench was flashing at him then were not exactly happy.

“Hey buddy,” he said. “How are you holding up after that whole mess?”

“Oh, just fucking fine,” Wrench said, shrugging off Ray’s hand. “I was only grabbed by the FBI and had fucking Dusan being all obnoxious in my face and they… you know… they took…”

He sighed and shrugged, all of the fire that had been in his voice a moment ago swiftly fleeing without a trace.

“Don’t worry about me,” he said. “I’ll get over it.”

Ray frowned at the younger man. He was clearly bottling up a lot of shit, but it was also just as clear to Ray that he wasn’t really going to be able to help their resident anarchist.

Luckily it was right at that moment that they both heard the sound of the entrance to the headquarters opening.

“Hey guys!” Marcus called out in greeting.

Wrench’s head immediately turned towards the stairs, his eyes lighting up in a pair of sideways love-hearts as they did.

None of the others had witnessed anything past Marcus retrieving the mask from the FBI, but it was clear that something had gone down between Marcus and Wrench after that. Ray didn’t know what it was, and it certainly wasn’t his place to pry, especially not where young love was concerned. He just hoped that whatever was going on, Marcus stood a better chance of comforting Wrench than Ray did.

Marcus stayed in the hackerspace for an hour or so. Most of that time was spent with Wrench, who seemed intent on sticking so close to Marcus anyone might have thought they were handcuffed together.

Ray didn’t know how Marcus did it, but within minutes Wrench was back to his loud, obnoxious self, flirting and oversharing and generally doing his damnedest to make everyone in the vicinity at least a little uncomfortable.

Eventually however Marcus’s business in the hackerspace was done, and he was heading out once again.

Wrench turned to face the stairs as Marcus climbed them, and then and only then did Ray spot them again; those damned heart eyes. 

When the door beeped shut and they could all be sure that Marcus had left the hackerspace, Wrench let out the loudest, longest sigh Ray thought he had ever heard; certainly the worst that had ever emerged from Wrench while Ray had been around him.

“I’m surprised you didn’t go with your boyfriend,” Ray said, more just to fill the silence than anything else. Wrench was clearly happier when around Marcus. Perhaps at the moment Marcus’s company was exactly what the doctor ordered as far as Wrench was concerned.

Ray wasn’t sure how he had expected Wrench to react, but it certainly wasn’t for Wrench to immediately splutter and protest.

“Marcus isn’t…” Wrench argued. “He’s not… We’re just… we’re not, all right? Marcus is my friend. Like, the best friend I’ve ever had, but just a friend.” 

And Ray certainly hadn’t been expecting that.

“You’re fucking kidding me!” he yelled at the younger hacker. “But you’re obviously head over heels in love with one another. Is this one of them stupid ‘no homo’ things? If you love one another then who gives a fuck, right?”

“Marcus doesn’t love me.”

“Bullshit he doesn’t. There’s a reason I thought the two of you were dating you idiot. Besides, I can’t help but notice you didn’t mention how you feel about him.”

“That’s because there’s nothing to mention,” Wrench immediately shot back. “I love him; end of story Ray. That’s all she fucking wrote, all right? Congratulations; you win a fucking prize for noticing. It’s not like everyone else hasn’t worked it out as well. You know something; maybe Marcus has noticed it as well, and he’s just not saying anything because he’s too nice to say ‘oh hey Wrench; that apparently super obvious and massive crush you have on me, yeah, that’s not going anywhere!’ Because it’s not and he is!”

“Woah…” Ray said. “Calm the fuck down Wrench. What the hell are you even talking about anymore?”

Through Ray and Wrench’s conversation the other Dedsec members in the hackerspace had been relatively quiet, but it was at that moment that Sitara chose to join the conversation.

“Hey, at least Wrench is actually willing to admit that he’s in love now,” she said as she glanced up from the sheet her printer was pumping out. “Believe it or not Ray, that’s progress.”

Ray shook his head. Sometimes it was easy to forget that he was essentially working with a bunch of inexperienced kids, and then there were days like this.

Naomi liked Wrench well enough. It had only taken them one date and about ten minutes of sitting down and chatting over coffee for them to establish that a romantic relationship had pretty much zero chance of working out between the two of them, but she did like him. She was more than happy to have him as a friend, and every so often he would still swing by for coffee and donuts and the two of them would chat.

It was a few weeks after their very brief date that Wrench showed up at 10 Donuts with a friend in tow; not just any friend either, but the one that had prompted the two of them to actually sit down together and talk.

Naomi already knew the guy’s name; Marcus. After all, Wrench had told her so much about him. In fact it almost seemed like the masked man could barely shut up about this particular friend. Nevertheless Wrench took the time to quickly introduce the two of them while Naomi was taking their order, and Marcus smiled sweetly at her.

Naomi watched from her spot behind the counter as the two of them sat down, Wrench talking animatedly to his friend, his hands flying in all sorts of expressive gestures as they talked, and the mask on his face rapidly switching between expressions. There was no sign at all of the shyness that seemed to occasionally grip Wrench when he was talking to Naomi. He just seemed so relaxed and happy.

It was nice to see, and Naomi found herself grinning widely as she took Wrench and Marcus’s order to their table.

“So how’s it going between the two of you?” Marcus asked Naomi after she had set their drinks down. His eyebrows waggled in a manner that was probably supposed to be suggestive.

Naomi couldn’t help but giggle at that.

“Oh, we’re not…” she started, but was grateful when Wrench interrupted her. The disappointed look on Marcus’s face had almost been too much; like a kid that had just been told that Santa wasn’t real.

“We’re not dating M,” Wrench said with a sigh, leaning back in his chair and spreading himself out, the very picture of comfort.

“But I thought…” Marcus began. Damn, those puppy-dog eyes were ridiculous.

“We’re not really er… compatible,” Naomi said. “Romantically.”

“Yeah,” Wrench added, his mask’s eyes smiling happily over at her.

“I love animals,” Naomi said.

“And as you know M,” Wrench said. “I can’t stand the little shits.”

Marcus scoffed.

“Come on guys, that’s nothing…”

“I fucking love me a good steak,” Wrench added. “As you must have also worked out by now.”

“And I’m a vegetarian,” Naomi added.

“I love shitty action films and science fiction and stuff whereas Naomi here…”

“Thinks you have terrible taste in movies and need to sit down and…” Naomi began, rolling her eyes at the other man.

“She likes art house…” Wrench whispered loudly to Marcus, as though it was some sort of horrible secret. “And she actually reads fucking literature Marcus. Like, really pretentious bullshit literature.”

Naomi punched him lightly on the upper arm.

“Hey!” she exclaimed.

Marcus was actually laughing at the two of them now.

“We do have the same taste in music though,” Naomi said, feeling as though somehow she owed it to Marcus to at least give him that much. “That’s something, right?”

“Eh… sort of the same taste…” Wrench conceded.

“Yeah… Sort of,” Naomi agreed. “There’s at least some overlap, but yeah; I really don’t think we’d work out as a couple.”

“No way guys!” Marcus exclaimed. “But you’re really cute together. Haven’t y’all ever heard that opposites attract?”

Naomi and Wrench shared a knowing glance and then grinned over at Marcus.

“Should I tell him?” Wrench asked her. Naomi shrugged.

“We’re not compatible… um…” Naomi said, trying to work out a delicate way to say what she needed to and failing miserably. “Sexually.”

Marcus almost choked on his water.

It was the truth though. Wrench’s preferences and hers did not line up at all, even worse of a match than their taste in food and animals and entertainment were. Considering how outrageously Wrench dressed, Naomi had actually been really surprised at how vanilla the other man was.

“Naomi is still pretty cool though,” Wrench offered when he noticed how heartbroken Marcus looked on their behalf. “We’re friends now, right? So it’s not like you hooking us up and stuff was a complete waste.”

“He seems nice,” Naomi commented once Marcus had left the two of them by themselves.

“Yeah,” Wrench said, gazing out the window at the retreating form of Marcus’s back. “He is.”

He sighed wistfully, and for just a moment his mask displayed a pair of sideways love hearts.

“Oh,” Naomi commented. “That nice huh?”

“Yeah,” Wrench sighed. “That nice.”

“Does he know you like him?”

Wrench scoffed.

“Come on,” he said. “What do you think would happen if I actually told him? No way does he return my feelings. He wouldn’t have set the two of us up if he did.”

Naomi couldn’t really fault Wrench’s reasoning. She wished that she could, but she couldn’t.

“Love sucks sometimes, doesn’t it?” Naomi offered. “Tell you what; how about I get you another coffee. I’ll even put a free shot of butterscotch in it.”

“Thanks Naomi,” Wrench said, the smile returning to his mask if not his face or tone of voice. “You’re really awesome, you know that?”

“I know,” she said, winking at Wrench.

“Something’s wrong,” Wrench said, staring at his phone in obvious irritation.

“What do you mean?” Josh asked from the other side of the room.

“Marcus hasn’t texted back,” Wrench said. “He always texts back. Fucking always.”

“It’s only been a few hours though,” Josh said. At least, he thought it had only been a few hours. It hadn’t been that long since Marcus had been right there in the hackerspace with them, had it?

“But this was about the new Avengers trailer guys! No way is Marcus going to stay silent about that.”

They hadn’t paid any attention to what Wrench was trying to tell them. Perhaps they should have.

When Marcus had called them up, explaining that the Bratva had taken him captive and had almost succeeded in killing him, Wrench had cursed and screamed and then punched a hole in the wall right above his bench. Josh didn’t think he was angry though.

Well, he was angry; the new hole in the wall was testament enough to that, but it was more complicated than that. Josh was pretty sure that Wrench had actually been terrified. For just a moment he had been scared that he had lost Marcus and it was pretty clear that he had no idea how to deal with it.

“It’ll be okay,” Sitara tried to tell Wrench, once they had all hung up on Marcus and let him get on with business. “Marcus got out, right?”

Wrench nodded, but he still looked pretty upset. 

He spent the next hour or so messing around at his desk, cursing and growing angry at whatever it was he was trying to do and, Josh suspected, ultimately achieving very little.

It wasn’t until Marcus had returned to headquarters, safe and sound and in one piece, that there was a change.

As soon as Marcus greeted Wrench the masked anarchist was throwing himself at Marcus, wrapping his arms around the other man’s shoulders and holding him as close as he could. Wrench’s head came to rest on Marcus’s shoulder and he finally, thank god, seemed to relax.

Josh wasn’t really good at judging these things, but even he thought the hug went on for far longer than any of them probably expected. Wrench’s head came to rest on Marcus’s shoulder, his arms held him close, and it didn’t look as though he had any intention at all of letting Marcus go. Marcus didn’t seem to mind though, silently enduring, or perhaps even enjoying the hug and gently patting Wrench on the back. There was something in the silence of the scene that made it seem oddly intimate, and Josh found himself quickly looking away, leaving the other two hackers in their own little world.

When they did finally break apart Josh found himself accidentally eavesdropping as Wrench explained, quite loudly and enthusiastically to Marcus how they were going to go after the Bratva and burn their shit to the ground. Wrench was still angry, out for revenge and wanting to hurt the people who had dared to go after Marcus; who had almost taken him away from Wrench.

Marcus eventually agreed to Wrench’s rather violent plan, and then curled up on the couch to rest for a few hours, claiming that he was exhausted. After what he had been through Josh certainly couldn’t blame him.

Whatever Wrench had been working on; explosives, from the look of it; work slowed to a crawl over those hours. Josh had been hard at work himself, trying to patch up a gap in their security that he had found earlier in the day, but it seemed like every time he glanced over at Wrench he found him staring at the man asleep on the couch.

Wrench had to know that he was doing it. Everyone in headquarters could see him staring, and there was no way that any of them could fail to notice the love hearts that kept flickering onto his mask whenever he did.

“You’re doing the heart eyes thing again,” Josh said.

“Yeah,” Wrench replied quietly. “I know.”

Josh wasn’t blind. He’d seen Wrench’s mask form heart eyes plenty of times before; when they were gearing up for the Cyber Driver stunt, at Swelter Skelter, after Wrench had been taken by the FBI and a dozen other times besides.  

“Fuck man…” Wrench added, surprising Josh by his openness as he continued. “I’m so fucking in love with him. I don’t… I don’t know what to do. I’m not used to these sort of fucking stupid feelings. When he… when he was in trouble I just… I just couldn’t think straight, you know? If I lost him…”

“You didn’t lose him,” Josh said.

“I know,” Wrench said. “But what if I did?”

Wrench had never been this open with any of them before. Perhaps he had been with Marcus; those two were closer than any of them; but he had never been like this with Josh or Sitara or Ray. This was clearly getting to him even more than Josh had thought.

“What the fuck am I supposed to do?” Wrench asked, his shoulders slumping.

“Fucking tell him how you feel kid!” Ray called out from the other side of the room. “It ain’t that difficult!”

Wrench looked like he was just about to shout something back at the older man, but then Marcus stirred a little on his sleep and whatever Wrench had been about to say died on his tongue.

“He’s right you know,” Sitara added. “You should just man the fuck up and tell him Wrench.”

“Why the fuck is that always everyone’s answer!?” Wrench said, half yelling, and then, seemingly realizing how loud he had been and how close he was probably coming to waking up Marcus, he continued in a much softer tone. “Do you idiots really think that’s going to help anything?”

“Well, it’s not like he’s going to hate you or tell you to fuck off just because you’re in love with him,” Sitara argued. “He cares about you Wrench.”

Wrench scoffed.

“You think I don’t know that?” he shouted back, getting dangerously close to waking Marcus up once more. “Marcus is a great fucking guy. He won’t be pissy with me. Instead he’ll just look at me with those big damn fucking puppy dog eyes and tell me that he’s sorry and he wants us to still be friends and he’ll mean it, you know, which will make it even fucking worse, but then things will be awkward between us and our friendship will never be the same again and I just couldn’t fucking take that. He’s too important to me to risk ruining everything like that.”

Josh’s heart went out to Wrench, it really did, but that didn’t change the fact that Wrench was being really stupid about the whole thing.

“Or, you know, he might feel the same way,” Josh said.

After all, Josh wasn’t blind. He had seen Wrench sending heart eyes in Marcus’s direction, heard him sigh and scream and pine quite loudly and pathetically for the other man, but he had been watching Marcus as well. He had seen the shy smiles that the self-proclaimed not-a-hipster had been sending in Wrench’s direction for about as long as the two had known one another, he had heard the anger in Marcus’s voice when Wrench had been taken by the FBI, and he was pretty sure that Wrench’s feelings weren’t quite as unrequited as Wrench seemed to think they were.

After all, Marcus hadn’t pulled back from that ridiculously long hug either.

“Just fucking tell him,” Sitara told Wrench, echoing Josh’s feelings on the matter.

And then Marcus was stirring awake, for real this time, and all discussion of feelings was quickly put to one side and forgotten about.

The fireworks had been spectacular; far more than Marcus ever would have expected.

Wrench had been like a man possessed; completely insistent on getting their revenge on the Bratva. Marcus had a sneaking suspicion he knew why that was as well. As much as Dedsec would claim it was connected to the human trafficking ring they had uncovered, Marcus knew without even having to ask that Wrench had gotten revenge for him.

It was a weird thing to try to come to terms with.

Marcus cared about Wrench. God, he cared about him so much. Loved him even, although he had yet to say anything to that effect to the masked man, sure that Wrench was straight and that any attempt to change the nature of their relationship would just end in awkwardness for both of them. Marcus had grown pretty good at hiding his crushes, especially where other men were concerned, and so he had told himself that he was perfectly content just being Wrench’s friend, and he’d tucked away that part of him that spent far too much time thinking about what it would be like to kiss Wrench in the most dark and hidden corner of his mind that he could.

Lately though he’d started to wonder if perhaps his love for Wrench wasn’t quite as unrequited as Marcus had always assumed. Sure, Wrench had always flirted with him, but Marcus had always assumed the other man was just fooling around and didn’t really mean it.

Wrench had been so upset when the Bratva had taken him though, had wrapped his arms around Marcus when he had returned to the hackerspace and clung to him so hard and for so long that Marcus thought he might never let go. And Wrench’s insistence that they get revenge on the Bratva?

Marcus wasn’t sure that anyone had ever cared for him so obviously or so ferociously before. Around Wrench he felt like someone special, like he was truly loved and cared for. There had been moments too when Marcus had caught the eyes of the other man’s mask turning into love hearts when he looked at Marcus. It had never been for very long, and Marcus wasn’t even sure that Wrench had realized he was doing it, but it gave him hope.

He was beginning to think that maybe, just maybe Wrench was in love with him as well.

As the fireworks continued to go off Marcus found his attention not taken up by the explosions of color and light, but by the man standing in the boat next to him. The fireworks were lighting up Wrench’s mask, bathing it in silver and blue. It looked absolutely beautiful, and Marcus was entranced.

They took the boat back to shore, careful to give the site of their fireworks spectacular a wide berth. Sitara bid them farewell, shared a fist-bump and a quick hug with Marcus, and then turned her attention to Wrench.

Marcus waited and watched as his two friends said farewell to one another. Sitara smiled softly at Wrench, leaned in close and whispered something to Wrench that Marcus couldn’t quite catch. Whatever Sitara had said, the confident smile on her face did not stop Wrench from shaking his head in reply.

Sitara playfully punched Wrench on the shoulder, and then she was off, neither the shake of Wrench’s head or the suddenly downcast set of his shoulders apparently enough to remove the smile from her face.

As she passed Marcus she winked at him, and then she was gone.

Marcus wondered whether Sitara knew there was a little more between him and Wrench than mere friendship alone could account for. If she did then she was clearly trying to encourage it.

Maybe this was it. Maybe tonight was the night that Marcus finally actually said something.

“Hey Wrench,” Marcus said, and the masked man immediately looked up at him, a pair of question marks lighting up his eyes. “I don’t know about you, but I ain’t really ready to head back yet.”

“Say no more M,” Wrench said, throwing an arm around Marcus’s shoulder. “Feels to me like if we headed back to the hackerspace now then we’d be wasting a perfect opportunity to party until the sun comes up.”

They did not party until the sun came up. In fact they didn’t really party at all. Instead they swung by the local convenience store for slushies and candy, and just walked around Marin for a bit, geeking out and laughing until eventually they found themselves sitting on a hill with a pretty good view of the bay.

They had both just recovered from a fit of laughter brought about by Marcus’s frankly awful impressions of half the Star Wars cast and were silently looking out over the bay, the clear sky above reflected in the water, the lights of the city at night glowing softly in front of them, when Marcus found himself just watching Wrench again.

Marcus found himself struck again by just how amazing Wrench could be. Marcus wasn’t sure he could even put all of the reasons he was in love with the other man into words.

“Thanks man,” he tried as a start. “For today I mean. You didn’t… you didn’t have to do all of that for me, but you did.”

Wrench waved a hand at Marcus, the lights of his mask blinking the same happy approximation of a grin that they seemed to have been stuck on for the last few minutes straight.

“Don’t mention it M,” Wrench said. “I mean really, it’s nothing. You would have done the same for me.”

Marcus smiled softly at the other man, and, feeling a little brave thanks in part to the stunts they had managed to pull off that day, he reached out to place his hand on top of Wrench’s own, where it rested on the ground between them.

“Yeah,” Marcus replied, giving Wrench’s hand a brief squeeze. He made sure to look Wrench straight in the eye as he continued, needing Wrench to know how much he meant what he was about to say. “I would.”

Wrench immediately grew far more flustered than Marcus had anticipated. He could see the skin on Wrench’s neck flushing bright red beneath the edges of his mask.

”Well, of course…” Wrench muttered. “I mean, you already sort of did with my mask and stuff. And you know, I was pissed off with the Bratva too after what they did so really this was as much for me as it was for you and… uh… Oh fuck. What the hell…”

Wrench began to move the hand that Marcus had pinned under his own, and for just a moment Marcus thought that Wrench was going to pull it away, but instead Wrench turned it around, so that he was now holding Marcus’s hand just as tightly as Marcus was holding his. 

The masked man intertwined their fingers tightly and gave another squeeze. He kept his face turned away from Marcus as he did, hiding it just enough that Marcus couldn’t make out whatever symbols were being displayed on his mask at that moment.

“Marcus,” Wrench muttered, his face still turned away. “I… um…”

Marcus gave Wrench’s hand another squeeze, and rubbed his thumb gently over the bare skin on the back of Wrench’s hand.

The set of Wrench’s shoulders changed, he took a deep breath, and he looked straight at Marcus once more.

When he did there was a pair of less than three style love hearts right there on his mask where Marcus could most definitely see them.

Marcus’s heart skipped a beat. He might have caught tiny glimpses of love hearts from Wrench before then, but the other man always glanced away, and it was usually only for a moment, and Marcus had never been entirely sure whether he had just been imagining those moments and whether Wrench had meant for them to happen, but there was no mistaking how deliberate these love hearts were, or whether Wrench had intended for Marcus to see them.

Marcus just hoped that they meant what he thought they meant.

“Hey Wrench?” Marcus muttered, surprised to hear his own voice emerge far smoother and confident than he felt in that moment. “Can you take your mask off? Just for a second I mean, and uh… don’t… you know… it’s fine if you don’t want to… I just…”

Wrench stared at him for a moment, the love hearts turning into exclamation and then question marks, but soon he was reaching up with both hands, having gently extricated one from where it had been tightly interlocked with Marcus’s own. He removed the mask with hands that were shaking, and Marcus caught just a second of the confusion and discomfort on Wrench’s actual face before Marcus was closing his eyes and leaning in towards Wrench.

Marcus pressed his lips against Wrench’s own, hoping as he did that he wasn’t making a terrible mistake.

The kiss was short and sweet; Wrench’s lips warm and pliant beneath Marcus’s own.

When Marcus pulled back he realized Wrench hadn’t even closed his eyes during the kiss. He had however turned bright red all over.

“Oh,” Wrench muttered. “Um…”

He finally moved, and that was to stare at the ground.

“You… you just…” Wrench stammered. “You… I mean… Holy shit Marcus. You just kissed me. That’s… that was what that was, right? You actually… Holy shit…”

“Hey Wrench…” Marcus tried to interrupt, but Wrench was so flustered it was almost like Marcus hadn’t spoken at all.

“Holy shit,” Wrench muttered. “Holy shit!”

“Hey Wrench!” Marcus practically shouted, grabbing Wrench’s hand again as he did. That finally seemed to get the other man’s attention.

“Yeah?” Wrench asked.

“I love you,” Marcus said, feeling a smile break out as he finally, at long last, said the words.

Wrench’s eyes went wide, and then he was smiling as much as Marcus was.

“I love you too Marcus,” he replied.

“I mean, shit, obviously I love you,” Marcus floundered, not wanting there to be any confusion at all about the matter and worried that he was making a complete mess of the thing. “But I mean, like, I love you love you as well, like, I am in love with you Wrench.”

“Yeah,” Wrench muttered. “Me too.”

Marcus felt like his heart was about to burst, it was so full of joy and love.

“Awesome,” he concluded, right before he leaned forward and kissed Wrench again.

They soon discovered that kissing could be rather awkward when both parties involved couldn’t seem to stop smiling, but despite this, they didn’t pull apart from one another or speak again for a very long time.

Wrench lay on the cool grass and stared across at Marcus, the man who was his best friend, or was it boyfriend now? He didn’t know exactly which it was, but he knew that they loved one another.

They had just stopped what had been a quite frankly epic make out session, stopping not because it had been anything less than perfect but because they both needed to breathe eventually. In the minute or so since they had stopped the two of them had just lain there on the cool grass, smiling across at one another and not saying a single word.

Marcus stared at Wrench, his eyes so full of love that Wrench wondered how he had managed to miss it before then. His hand and Marcus’s own lay entwined tightly between them, Marcus’s thumb tracing lazy circles on Wrench’s skin.

It was incredible. Everything about this; about Marcus, about what had just happened, about the fact that somehow, despite everything that was wrong with Wrench, Marcus had managed to fall in love with him; was incredible. It was almost too much to take in, and Wrench thought he might explode from all the happiness and love inside of him.

It was so damned sappy and stupid, but he wouldn’t trade it for the world.

He was so content, lying there with Marcus, that for a long while he had even managed to forget that he wasn’t wearing his mask.

Wrench knew, without a doubt, that if he had been wearing the mask in that moment, it would be stuck on a pair of less than three style love hearts.

Hopefully he would still be able to get the message across without the mask.

He shuffled closer to Marcus and pressed another gentle kiss to the other man’s lips.

#wrencus #marcus holloway #wrench #watch dogs #watch dogs 2 #my fic #five plus one #sort of #fanfic #pining #mutually unrequited love

[wordsablaze]

Across Every Battlefield

(alaw pt.5) There might be different kinds of battlefields but Alec somehow manages to get the best of all of them. A bamf!Alec scene written for Alec Lightwood appreciation weeks 2017. Enjoy!

A/N:  I'm sorry for those of you who aren't massive fans of malec, I find it very hard NOT to include them in some way...

By the angel.

Alec groans as he feels his phone beep with the all-too-familiar tone of the institute's demon alert, his mental battle over whether or not to ignore the call sparked once again. In the end, he lets himself lose the battle for the sake of duty and pulls back from Magnus' warm embrace to grudgingly answer the call.

"Sorry dude," Jace says immediately.

"Oh come on, I literally just left you!" Alec complains, but they both know it's only for the sake of it, and there's no question about Alec being on his way as soon as he's told where to go.

"Well, actually…"

"Jace, what is it?"

"We need the warlock too," Jace admits eventually.

Alec can't tell if he's relieved or worried.

Thankfully, Magnus decides for him and takes the phone from his hand, asking Jace where to go and thanking him on behalf of Alec but also sassily reminding the blonde shadowhunter that he has a name other than 'warlock'. Alec can't help chuckling as Magnus ends the call before Jace can make a remark, then entwines their hands and clicks his fingers to conjure a portal.

"Ready, sweet pea?" Magnus asks with a smile.

"More ready than those demons are," Alec replies, smirking.

"There's my Alexander!" Magnus exclaims lovingly, and, with that, the two of them step through the portal together.

It's only a second after they've both stepped through that there's a demon aiming its tail weapon at them. Alec doesn't even think before firing an arrow, catching the demon's eye and causing it to shriek, before promptly disintegrating.

"Where are we?" Alec asks as he aims another arrow at the demon behind Jace.

"On the warehouse mile, aptly named due to the dozens of stagnated… well, warehouses." Magnus manages to sound extremely disappointed in the human race even whilst facing a hoard of demons.

Alec smiles.

But it's short-lived.

"Magnus!" Raphael calls, and Alec realises he hadn't even noticed the vampire.

"Sorry Alexander, I think my assistance is required…"

"I'll cover you; go!" Alec tells Magnus, having to yell because of something exploding nearby, which probably means that this battle isn't going to end anytime soon.

Magnus nods and makes a run for it, the aura of his magic hugging the air around Alec like a cosy goodbye. As he runs, Alec almost senses the demon behind him and curses, spinning on his heel and aiming an arrow before the creature can even think to attack.

It falls in the form of dusty rain but something else crashes into him and he ends up stumbling to the floor. He springs up almost instantly but the creature lunges again, and Alec winces as one of its claws catch his side. Of course, that doesn't stop him from pulling out his dagger and simply stabbing the thing into oblivion.

"Magnus…" Alec mutters to himself as he turns back to his warlock, and his eyes widen when he catches sight of the demon smugly poised to strike, "Oh no you don't."

Two rapidly fired arrows later, the demon is showering his boyfriend with ash.

Magnus doesn't react other than to stiffen slightly, preoccupied with whatever Raphael has requested of him, so Alec smiles to himself and cracks his neck, turning back to the demons near him.

"Bring it on!" Izzy is heard yelling, before the sound of her whip snapping echoes around them.

Alec only has time to shout something unintelligible but somehow clearly motivational to Izzy before he spots another gang of demons heading towards them. He motions to Jace, and the two of them share a grin before running at the attackers.

His arm moving like machinery, Alec fires arrow after arrow, destroying half of the stupid creatures before they even notice him. It's times like now – when some of the demons require multiple hits to be vanquished – that Alec internally thanks Magnus for charming his quiver to never run out.

"Six o'clock!" Jace yells, and Alec is spinning, reloading, and firing before he can blink.

Unfortunately, the demon only slows down, so Alec has to duck to avoid being injured. Staying low, he simply kneels and fires another arrow at the demon, which somehow manages to stay alive and growls, displaying an alarming set of teeth, a set of teeth that Alec wants nowhere near either of them.

He exhales and aims at the creature's open mouth, well aware of the flames building up inside the thing, and waits. Jace yells at him but he stays motionless until the creature freezes, ready to blast a wave of heat, then pulls his arrow back and releases his grip, watching it fly into the demon's mouth and grinning when a pile of dust is all that remains of the threat.

"Jace, watch out!" he calls, firing an arrow before Jace realises there's a demon behind him.

"Thanks!" Jace calls over his shoulder, his seraph blade swinging through the air once again.

After that, it's not long until the whole gang is nothing more than littered ash and dust. Jace, sweating enough to make him seem positively shiny, claps Alec on the shoulder as the two of them head back to where they'd started.

"No!" Jace is already running towards Clary, who's stumbling, but Alec is quicker, his arrow flying before the demon can lunge again. By the time it does recover enough to try again, Jace has pulled Clary behind him and plunged his seraph blade into its skin, or rather, scales.

"Alec! Have you seen Simon?" Izzy asks as she pauses in front of him.

"Probably with Raphael," Alec replies as he rolls his ankle, ignoring the dull spikes of pain.

"You okay?" Izzy frowns, concerned.

Instead of an answer, Alec shoots another demon, sending Izzy a small smile when it roars in defeat and dies with a wail. Izzy shakes her head but she's smiling, reassured, as she heads to find Simon for whatever reason.

Alec stifles his wince as he heads to Magnus, which is where everybody seems to be headed anyway. Six demons and nine arrows later, Alec reaches the cover of Magnus' magic, joining everybody else.

"What's going on?" Alec asks one of the vampires, still not sure why they're even with them in the first place, not that he's complaining about the extra help.

"We're trying to reverse the portal Camille helped open."

Oh.

So that's why the vampires have decided to help: because it's one of their own who'd caused this mess.

"Where's Magnus?" he demands without having to really demand it; they're a well-known and respected couple so it's not unusual for everyone to be ready with directions.

He nods at the vampire when she points for him to go left and starts moving, pausing only once to aim his arrow at an approaching demon but not bothering to watch it hit its mark, then follows the pull of Magnus' magic until he can kneel beside his boyfriend.

"Mags? You okay?" he murmurs.

"Alexander?" Magnus seems surprised. "There's something… something blocking the portal from opening and I can't seem to..."

As Magnus trails off, Alec notices how tense he looks, and how tired he appears to be. There are different types of battlefields and Alec knows that Magnus' is equally as exhausting despite what it may seem to onlookers who haven't lived with a warlock.

He wraps his arms around the warlock and shuts his eyes. "Magnus. Take what you need from me."

"Alexander, I can't, you're already-"

"Just do it, Bane," Alec whispers, knowing that his use of Magnus' last name will both amuse and persuade him to do it.

Magnus chuckles softly but does as Alec requests. Soon enough, Alec can feel the pull on his strength but he doesn't let go, tightening his grip until Magnus gasps and the two of them are pushed backwards, a ridiculously bright light exploding from the ground.

"Cover your eyes!" Alec has the energy to yell as he pulls a rather drained Magnus back, and he hears a few people repeat his order before they're surrounded by dozens of shrieking, dying demons being sucked into the portal.

"Thank you, love," Magnus murmurs quietly, and Alec has to fight his blood rush, biting his lip to hold back his smile; there's just something about Magnus' genuine gratitude that lures his smile out in even the most perilous of situations.

"You did it!" the vampire who'd given him directions declares proudly.

Magnus nods, using a touch more magic to seal up the crack in the floor. Before he can try to magically clean up the whole place, Alec glares at him, a silent argument taking place within their gazes and eyebrow movements.

Alec wins, and, much to Raphael's amusement, interlocks one of Magnus' hands with his own, turning back to everyone else. "We'll be heading back now. I trust you can make the rest of this mess disappear?"

"Yeah, sure, we've got this," Izzy assures him, so Alec pulls the laughing warlock with him as he starts to walk away.

He can hear Izzy and Jace laughing behind him, and soon enough, he's chuckling too, rubbing his thumb on the back of Magnus' hand. "Portal or Feet?"

"Really Alexander? Is that even a question?"

Moments later, the two of them are closing their eyes and practically falling forwards as the portal whirls in front of them. Alec emits a mixture of laughing and groaning as they land on the carpet of their bedroom, and Magnus frowns.

"Are you injured?"

"Nothing serious," Alec says, propping the quiver and bow up against the wall and sitting up.

"What do you say we watch a movie and fall asleep halfway through again?"

"That was one time!" Alec protests, trying his best to fight his instinctive pout away.

"Yeah, one time every week," Magnus retorts, raising an eyebrow.

Alec coughs to hide his laughter and nods. "Okay, fine, we'll do that. But we're not watching Disney again!"

"Alexander!"

"Magnus…" Alec mimics, determined to at least win the battle for their evening entertainment.

"But it's Disney!" Magnus all but whines, running a hand through his hair as he stands up to match Alec's folded arms.

Alec tries his best not to be distracted by the sheer fluffiness of his boyfriend's hair. "And I would like to watch something else."

"Like what?" Magnus inquires.

Alec hadn't prepared to win this fight, so he doesn't have anything to name. "Uh, like that spirit… away… thing you showed me…?"

"Spirited away?" Magnus asks, his voice already akin to an overexcited toddler.

Alec nods.

"Okay, alright, you win, we can watch that!" Magnus declares and plants a small kiss on Alec's check before flopping onto their bed with a smile.

"Really?" Alec asks, surprised that Magnus had given in. Well, no, he was more surprised that Magnus had given in despite how unsure Alec is of himself at the moment.

Magnus just taps the space beside him and Alec smiles, sliding into said space, the two of them shifting around a little so they can get comfortable. Before Magnus can waste his magic to turn the lights off, Alec picks up a stray cat toy and chucks it at the switch, smiling when dim darkness surrounds them.

"Show-off," Magnus mutters.

"You love it really," Alec replies.

"Obviously." Magnus rolls his eyes.

"Now I can prove to you that I do not fall asleep halfway through films."

Magnus snorts. "Love you as I do, Alexander, I can't deny that you're absolutely awful at staying awake for the entire duration of a film."

"Hey!" Alec protests once again. "I can too!"

Magnus just pulls a face, his thoughts on the matter quite clear. Alec half-heartedly rolls his eyes, elbowing his boyfriend. "I will prove you wrong, warlock."

"I'd like to see you try, shadowhunter," Magnus smirks. "This isn't the same as shooting an arrow on a battlefield, you know."

"I can win on any battlefield, even when that battlefield is consciousness, thank you very much." Alec pokes Magnus again, smiling when he jumps and grins widely, but still holds back his laugh for the sake of proving his point.

"We'll see."

"Yeah, we will, because we'll both be awake."

With shared stifles smiles and daring winks, the two of them settle to watch the film, knowing that no matter who wins the argument, this battlefield is one they're happy to stay on for as long as it takes, even if it takes an eternity and they reach an impasse that can't be overcome.

Of course, that doesn't mean Alec is okay to lose…

He's going to be victorious across all of the battlefields.

Obviously.

like/reblog but don’t repost, thanks!

#alecappreciation2017 #Alec Lightwood #magnus bane #malec #bamf!alec #Jace Herondale #Isabelle Lightwood #Simon Lewis #Clary Fray #clace #sizzy #raphael santiago #shadowhunters #the mortal instruments #fanfiction #oneshot #series #humor #action #adventure #fanfic #cassandra clare #my writing

[the--walking--daryl]

Concrete (pre-apocalypse!DarylxReader)

Thank you @dxsturbxa for the prompt!

Prompt- Hi!  can i request an imagine with Daryl based on the song Concrete from Tom Odell?<3

Summary:

Y/N and Daryl are hanging out in an old, abandoned hotel on the outskirts of Georgia and talk about their hopes for the future. One thing leads to another and Daryl ends up accidentally confessing his feelings for Y/N and… well you get it.

In this, I’ve made Daryl around late teens-early twenties?

Warning: fluff, not really smut but a lot of making out and clothes flying all over the damn place so its kind of implied??? idk im really uncomfortable with writing full on smut. strong language and mentions of abuse.

*NOT MY GIFS*

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“Daryl, come on!” I giggled, running up a ridiculous amount of stairs.

“Calm down, you’re gonna get us caught.” Daryl grumbled, despite slightly speeding up.

Daryl and I had been wandering around for hours, only to discover that we’d stumbled across a run down hotel that had been completely and utterly abandoned. The insides were derelict and messed up, but were still relatively intact. The wallpaper was peeling, the furniture in the lobby was damp and the rugs were worn to oblivion.

“Daryl, who’s gonna catch us? There’s nobody around for miles. Live a little, damn.” I chuckled, finally reaching a floor that didn’t look like the plague had hit it.

“Wow… this place must’ve been classy back in it’s day.” I panted, catching my breath.

“How’d you figure?”

“Because I don’t know about you, but I’ve never felt more out of place in my entire life.” I joked, still astounded by the decent condition of the halls.

Daryl and I became best friends when we were younger because we grew up on the same street. We’d go and hide in some park or woods whenever we got scared of our parents. Daryl’s father always beat up his brother Merle, but as soon as Merle left, it was Daryl’s turn. My Dad died when I was little and my Mama started drinking and beating me when she did. Occasionally, I’d get away before she could and find Daryl.

This was one of those times.

“So, what now? We just stay here for the rest of our lives instead of going back?” Daryl sighed.

“Obviously not, we have to go back at some point, but I figured we could just have some space for a little while.” I replied, then headed off to look inside some of the rooms

I found a large room that was surprisingly full. A bed with numerous amounts of pointless pillows, nightstands with decorative lamps, paintings of fields and ominous looking strangers, and near-mint condition rugs.

“Daryl! Come look at this- oh.” I yelled, only to find he’d been standing behind me this whole time.

“Not too bad,” Daryl sighed and jumped onto the bed.

“I’ve definitely seen worse.” I scoffed, shutting the door behind me and wandering around the room.

“We’ve fuckin’ lived in worse.” Daryl uttered, slinging the throw pillows across the room.

I came across a painting of a woman in a long robe-like dress, a glass of red wine adorning her hand and her hair trailing down her back. She had these amazing brown eyes, but they had absolutely no depth or warmth behind them. She looked soulless and quite frankly, a bit lonely.

“Pretty hot for a painting.” Daryl piped up.

“Shut up, Dixon. Keep in in your pants.” I laughed and hopped onto the bed, the oddly soft sheets sinking beneath me. 

We laid there for a little while before I propped myself up on my elbows and let out an elongated sigh. 

“Daryl, where do you think you’ll be in five years?” I asked.

“God knows. Either in jail or dead, probably.” I wanted to believe that he was joking but he genuinely thought that.

“Where do you want to be in five years?” I rephrased.

Daryl thought for a moment, as if he’d never actually considered it before.

“I don’t know. Maybe in a mechanics. Maybe just kind of riding around. Not back with my old man, that’s for damn sure,” He sighed. “What about you?”

“I don’t know either. I want to do something to help kids though. Don’t want anyone else to go through what we went through. Maybe a teacher?”

“You dropped out of high school.” Daryl chuckled.

“True. Maybe I could open a home for abused kids. Start a business.” I shrugged.

“It’s not a bad idea.” He nodded.

I fell back onto the bed again and tapped my stomach in an uneven beat. Daryl placed a hand over mine to stop me, but I continued over his hand. This went on for another five minutes before he grabbed me and pulled my body onto his and wrapped his arms around me, trapping my arms by my side.

“Daryl, come on! Let me go!” I squealed. He loosened his grip around me and I turned over to face him.

“You’re an ass, Dixon.” I laughed, sitting up and leaning back against his bent legs.

“Yeah, what’s new?” He smirked, not realizing he had his fingers intertwined with mine.

I smiled and let out a small giggle at his self-depreciating comment.

“I really do hope you open that home y’know. I hope you get out.” Daryl said.

“No, I hope we get out. We’ve had each other’s backs since day one and we’re not stopping anytime soon. When I go, I’m takin’ you with me Daryl.” I told him.

He smiled a little and then propped himself up on his elbows.

“You don’t want to drag me around.” 

“Yes I do. You’re my best friend. Even if you are the biggest pain in my ass.” I joked.

We both laughed hysterically, but it all came to a halt.

“God, I love you.” Daryl laughed.

I stopped almost immediately, taken aback by his words.

“I mean, uh… I meant… Forget that I said that,” He chuckled awkwardly.

“Let’s not forget it… You mean that?” I asked softly.

His eyes searched around the room, desperately trying to think of something to say, but he didn’t have to. 

I placed my hands on each side of his face and pressed my lips to his, and in response, his hands found their way to my waist. Daryl sat up properly and leaned back against the headboard, allowing him hold onto more of me. His hands traveled down to my hips and rested there, gently digging his fingers into my jeans every now and again. My hands switched from his face to the hem of his shirt, which he then fluently pulled off like it was nothing, only breaking the kiss momentarily before continuing. He tossed it across the room, exposing his sculpted, slightly bruised torso and well-placed tattoo. I ran my hands up his stomach and chest, his skin burning up with anticipation. He flipped us both over so his body was hovering above mine, his hips rolling against mine on occasion. I sat up and tore my shirt off, sending it flying in the opposite direction to Daryl’s. 

“You sure you want to?” He asked between kisses on my neck.

“Positive.” I confirmed, running my hands through his hair and across his shoulders as he made his marks over my neck and throat.

The next morning, the first thing I felt was Daryl’s warmth radiating onto me. My head was buried in the crook of his neck and his arm was protectively draped over me while he still slept peacefully. I gently placed his arm back by his side and got up slowly as to not disturb him. The first item of clothing I found is Daryl’s shirt, which was at least two sizes too big for me, but I threw it on anyway. I stepped outside onto the balcony and laid my eyes upon miles and miles of emptiness, bar two old women walking their dogs. One of them realized that I was in the abandoned hotel and laughed. She waved sweetly and continued walking, so I figure that she must’ve done the same sort of thing when she was my age. My legs trembled slightly due to the sore, yet oddly pleasing sensation in my core. Suddenly, Daryl joined me on the balcony, wrapping his arms around my waist and hugging me tightly. Glancing back, I noticed that all he was wearing was a sheet hung loosely around his hips.

“Hey, gorgeous.” He whispered in my ear.

“Hey.” I replied, grinning like an idiot.

“What you doin’?” He asked, resting his chin on the top of my head.

“Nothing, just… thinkin’.” I sighed.

I turned to face him and placed a long, lingering kiss against his lips.

“Thank you for last night, Daryl.” I smiled contently.

“It was beyond my pleasure, baby.” He laughed.

“Y’know, I get that this hotels nice, but… I would’ve spent last night with you on a bed made of concrete with no sheets.” He told me.

“Me too. Even though, the bed was kind of a bonus,” I chuckled. “I don’t want to go back…” I said sadly, resting my head against his chest.

“We don’t have to. Let’s just stay here. Or run away.”

I laugh at his outlandish proposal.

“I’m bein’ serious. Y/N… run away with me.”

I look up into his eyes and for the first time, I see genuine sincerity.

“Okay… Okay, lets do it. I love you.”

#daryl dixon #daryl dixon imagine #daryl x reader #daryl dixon fanfiction #twd #twd fanfiction #twd oneshot #twd requests #requests are open #norman reedus

[williamsjoan]

Does the PlayStation Classic’s Lineup Live Up to the Original System’s Legacy?

The console race of the 1990s has reared its head again in recent years. However, this time it’s presented in a miniaturized format. What started off with the now iconic NES Classic from Nintendo soon gave life to a whole range of tiny machines imitating the heavy hitters of days gone by.

Since then, we’ve seen Nintendo jump back into the fray with a rendition of the SNES, SEGA kicking things into high gear with its upcoming tiny Genesis, and even the ’80s-era Commodore 64 getting a bite-sized new lease on life. Of course, with the wheels officially in motion, it was only a matter of time before Sony Interactive Entertainment dipped its toe in the water to bring new life to its oldest gaming conquest: the PlayStation.

“The PlayStation didn’t just feel like a console, it felt like a movement; a gargantuan push forward towards a more advanced gaming world.”

The PlayStation Classic is tasked with carrying the weight of a generation-defining machine on its tiny shoulders. When the original PlayStation launched more than two decades ago, it changed the way we play video games forever. It bravely made the leap from 16-bit gaming to fully fleshed-out 3D experiences, a generational leap the likes of which we’d never seen. It gave birth to a number of titles and characters who have since become household names, and it did it all with a hyperactive edgy overtone that would appeal to players in their teens.

Put quite simply, the original PlayStation was ground-breaking. Its shockwave was felt throughout the gaming world and its effects have spilled over to the subsequent generations of consoles that followed. The PlayStation didn’t just feel like a console, it felt like a movement; a gargantuan push forward towards a more advanced gaming world. The edgy titles and attitude that coincided with it were rebellious in nature, and it genuinely felt like gaming was growing up from its childhood years to embrace a more mature outlook on life.

Is it possible to instill that feeling, that effect, and that attitude into a device that can fit into the palm of your hand, or is the PlayStation Classic doomed to fail? In order to decipher this, we’ve got to take a look back at what the PlayStation really brought to the table, and what games are included in its cute little modern outing.

The PlayStation’s “I-don’t-care” attitude didn’t just come from its completely over-the-top advertising campaigns which embraced the true nature of just how wild the 90s could be. No, instead it was the games that really propelled the machine. Looking back now, more than two decades after the system first exploded onto the screens of our old CRT TVs, there are a number of titles that instantly come to mind because they changed the face of gaming forever.

First and foremost there was the machine’s unofficial mascot, Crash Bandicoot. Crash, like any characters that could be referred to as a mascot at the time, starred in platforming games. Proudly sporting its cartoonish 3D graphics, this anthropomorphic little animal sprinted through busy levels while spinning his foes into oblivion. The fast-paced, reckless nature of the game made it an instant hit and the system followed up with two direct sequels, each of which improved upon the original’s rocky beginnings, and a number of off-shoot titles which saw the cast of the Crash’s universe engaging in go-karting (which is getting its own remaster very soon) and other silly party games.

“The unfortunate truth is that a good chunk of games that would be seen as PlayStation heavy hitters are similarly tied up in this day and age.”

Something about Crash Bandicoot stuck a chord with players and, although he has appeared on Microsoft and Nintendo consoles since, he’s seen as being synonymous with the original PlayStation. Unfortunately though, possibly due to the recently-released Crash Bandicoot: N. Sane Trilogy, the crazed jeans sporting animal didn’t end up making a triumphant return on the PlayStation Classic.

The unfortunate truth is that a good chunk of games that would be seen as PlayStation heavy hitters are similarly tied up in this day and age. The 1990s’ adorable little dragon, Spyro, for example, has also recently starred in a gorgeously remastered rendition of his original adventures. Old Sir Daniel Fortesque of MediEvil fame will also be seeing a PlayStation 4 remaster in the near future, so that pretty much crosses the concept of his title making an appearance off the list too. The same could be said for fan-favorite Castlevania: Symphony of the Night which was recently included in a downloadable bundle.

Next up is the now iconic Lara Croft. The first Tomb Raider title has aged surprisingly well throughout the years. Overshadowed in many ways by Tomb Raider II, 1996’s original introduced us to a character who dominated the gaming scene for the remainder of the century. Perfectly timed and riding the wave of the Spice Girls’ movement of “girl power,” Lara Croft was a no-nonsense action hero whose ferocious combat skills and agility were surpassed only by her boundless intellect.

Lara Croft quickly became another iconic face of PlayStation, and indeed the face of gaming during that era. She appeared in soft drink advertisements, toured with U2, and made the cover of then-popular magazine The Face, and this was all before Angelina Jolie portrayed her in 2001’s major motion picture adaptation of the franchise (and the accompanying 2018 film starring Alicia Vikander). Bizarrely though, she too seems to be absent from the PlayStation Classic’s lineup, likely because of the recent reboot titles from Square Enix.

“It would be unfair to say that there aren’t any fantastic games pre-installed in the cute little machine.”

The list of classic characters and games that haven’t made the cut for the PlayStation Classic seems to go on and on. Early PlayStation titles such as Loaded would have fit right at home on the bite-sized device, as would the likes of Die Hard Trilogy. Iconic characters such as PaRappa the Rapper and memorable games Pandemonium! didn’t make an appearance either, and neither did any of the entries in PlayStation’s signature futuristic racing franchise, Wipeout.

With all of these games lacking, what exactly does that leave for the PlayStation Classic when it comes to representing the era it came from? It would be unfair to say that there aren’t any fantastic games pre-installed in the cute little machine. Final Fantasy VII, for example, leads the charge and is regarded by many to be one of the greatest games ever created. Tekken 3 is by far the best 3D fighter that the original console had to offer, and it still plays fantastically today. Grand Theft Auto is a fun little title that now serves as an interesting history lesson for fans of the series and Rockstar Games, proving that great things are possible from incredibly humble beginnings. This top-down 2D title laid the groundwork for what was to become one of the most successful franchises of all times. Then there’s the bizarre but charming Oddworld: Abe’s Oddysee that certainly deserves a slot, as does the original Destruction Derby for nostalgia’s sake.

To top it off, there’s no denying the sheer power and influence that the original Metal Gear Solid had over gaming as a whole. It integrated cinematic story-telling into video games in a way that we’d never seen before and single-handedly revolutionized the very concept of narratives within games. Again, this is a front-runner on the PlayStation Classic, and rightly so. It has earned its place as one of the system’s greatest and most well-loved titles.

Following these stellar games, though, are some seemingly bizarre choices that tend to miss the mark again and again. Mr. Driller and Super Puzzle Fighter II: Turbo both seem entirely out of place here, almost like last minute choices that simply didn’t pay off: Intelligent Cube also falls under this category. Cool Boarders 2 is a nice addition, but could and should have been swapped out for Tony Hawk: Pro Skater 2, which is superior and infinitely more popular in every way.

“The PlayStation Classic sadly seems like it will go down in history as a misfire.”

None of these titles are bad. They are all decent in their own rights, but they are by no means classic, especially not when compared to heavy hitters such as Tomb Raider, Silent Hill, Medal of Honor, Legacy of Kain: Soul Reaver, Rollcage, Tenchu: Stealth Assassins, Driver, or Dino Crisis. Even choices such as Twisted Metal seem a little unusual considering how badly this particular game has aged. It seems stranger still when you consider that its vastly superior sequel Twisted Metal 2: World Tour still plays brilliantly in 2018.

There is a sea of phenomenal games spread across the original PlayStation’s thick and robust catalog, but it simply seems like all we’ve got here is wave after wave of wasted potential and missed opportunities. What should have been a sure-fire line-up of stellar genre-defining titles wound up being a mishmash of games that might make you think that there was a misunderstanding about the definition of the word “classic.”

The PlayStation Classic sadly seems like it will go down in history as a misfire; a half-cocked attempt to follow in the footsteps of Nintendo’s miniature consoles but without truly knowing what made Sony’s original voyage into the world of gaming magical. Perhaps there are lessons to be learned here, and we’ll see a revised release at some stage in the future. For now, though, the PlayStation Classic seems destined to sit in the shadows of Nintendo’s outings to think about where it went wrong until it eventually drifts into obscurity.

The post Does the PlayStation Classic’s Lineup Live Up to the Original System’s Legacy? by Eoghan Murphy appeared first on DualShockers.

Does the PlayStation Classic’s Lineup Live Up to the Original System’s Legacy? published first on https://timloewe.tumblr.com/

[newstfionline]

This brave ex-chaplain is still haunted by the Vietnam War’s most desperate siege

By Michael E. Ruane, Washington Post, January 22, 2018

WAUWATOSA, Wis.--Retired Navy chaplain Ray W. Stubbe leaned over his diary and ran his finger to the entry for Feb. 23, 1968, the 34th day of the Vietnam War’s siege of Khe Sanh and the day the bunker was hit.

The small, sandbag fortress was on the perimeter. He had spent the night there three weeks before, as a half-dozen nervous young Marines sat under a single lightbulb, making coffee in a ration tin and playing a recording of “I Heard It Through the Grapevine” over and over.

Now the bunker had been smashed with some of those Marines inside, and Stubbe, then 29, a bespectacled Lutheran minister, rushed from a nearby medical shelter to help.

What he found would haunt him for years. The Marines inside were in pieces.

“I knew them all,” he wrote. They were barely out of their teens. One had been an altar boy. Another had a death wish since he had accidentally killed several buddies in a friendly fire incident during an earlier tour of Vietnam.

“I took this very hard,” Stubbe wrote.

Sunday marked the 50th anniversary of the start of the war’s most famous siege, a 77-day struggle for a rain-swept plateau in central Vietnam that riveted the U.S. in 1968, and opened a year of often-bloody social upheaval that resonates today.

The siege was front-page news for almost three months. President Lyndon B. Johnson pored over a scale model of Khe Sanh in the White House. He vowed that the base would never become another Dien Bien Phu, where a besieged French garrison surrendered to the North Vietnamese communists in 1954.

In 1968, Khe Sanh heralded the start of the enemy’s sweeping Tet offensive, in which Vietnamese forces launched a barrage of deadly attacks across South Vietnam, stunning American officials. Tet wound up souring much of the American public on the war and set the stage for the gradual withdrawal of the U.S. troops.

It also opened the bloodiest year of the war, and for many of the 6,000 Marines and others besieged there by 40,000 North Vietnamese, it left physical injuries and disturbing images that would last a lifetime.

Hundreds of Marines were killed and thousands were wounded at Khe Sanh, as the enemy rained as many as 1,300 shells, rockets and mortars on the base a day. The Americans burrowed into the reddish earth, and shared a muddy, subterranean world with the well-fed local rats.

The prospect of death was ever present, and oblivion could come to anyone in a flash. (A Catholic chaplain, Father Robert R. Brett, was killed in a rocket attack the day before the bunker was hit.)

Stubbe developed a fast, 10-minute service focused on the Bible story of Jesus calming the stormy sea. He once conducted 13 services around the sprawling base in one day.

Ray Stubbe sat down at the kitchen table in his brick home in this Milwaukee suburb one gray day earlier this month and began his story.

He is 79 and lives alone. He never married, has no close family, doesn’t use the Internet and doesn’t like to travel out of the area--a legacy, he believes, of Khe Sanh. He said psychologists call this a “sense of foreshortened future.”

“Part of it was the siege,” he said. He and others developed the mentality that every day might be their last. “We could never count on another day.”

He was affected by other things at Khe Sanh, and suffered so much from PTSD after the war that he had to be hospitalized twice.

For a time, Khe Sanh colored everything in his life, like dye in a clear liquid, he said. “It was all that there was.”

Now it’s “become increasingly set in its place,” he said. “It doesn’t overshadow. It doesn’t preempt. It doesn’t monopolize.”

He gradually realized that his recovery from the trauma of Khe Sanh would be helped if he chronicled the details of the siege. As an historian of the battle, he could step outside his experiences, he said.

He was already a beloved Khe Sanh figure: “A couple of the Marines swore they once saw him walk across a puddle of water and not get his feet wet,” veteran Steven A. Johnson wrote in a memoir.

“He was the real deal,” said retired Marine officer Kenneth W. Pipes, who was a company commander at Khe Sanh. “He did an awful lot of good for an awful lot of people. ... Pretty much fearless. ... [Stubbe] turned up at the key places at the right time for the right reasons.”

In an oral history for the Wisconsin Veterans Museum, Stubbe recalled that he once recited Psalm 91 while holding the hand of a wounded Marine--Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night; nor for the arrow that flieth by day. Another time, he wrote, he fed cookies to a Marine with burned hands, as if the snacks were Communion wafers.

After he got home, he immediately transcribed his diary. “I just had to get this out of me,” he said. He retired from the Navy in 1985 and established a ministry in a Milwaukee church visiting shut-ins.

All the while he researched Khe Sanh, exchanged letters with veterans and their families, and gathered memorabilia and artifacts.

He wrote books, essays, and sermons, and his work is often cited by historians. He founded the group, Khe Sanh Veterans Inc., in 1983.

When Stubbe donated much of his material to the Wisconsin veterans museum in 2005, he said it took two trucks to carry it all away. And still, an upstairs room is filled with mementos, photographs, maps, plaques, news clippings and boxes.

One famous photograph, which appeared in Life magazine, shows Stubbe conducting a service at Khe Sanh. He stands with head bowed, hands clasping a piece of paper, as a group of Marines sit around him in prayer. Rugged mountains and mist where the enemy lurked appear in the background.

Stubbe said he realized later that nobody was wearing a helmet, a potentially catastrophic mistake at Khe Sanh.

Khe Sanh was relieved by American ground forces that April, and the base was destroyed and abandoned in July, according to historians.

Throughout his ordeal there, Stubbe said, he never had a crisis of faith.

“I always knew that God was with us,” he said, as he sat in his kitchen. “I saw many of the good parts of people. ... Especially there. It was very apparent to me how good people were to each other.”

Marines shared food, water, letters from home, and gave their lives for each other.

“These are mainly 19-year-olds … happy, friendly, frolicking kind of people playing practical jokes,” he said. “But also just had that genuine sense of caring for each other.”

Those seeking to destroy them were largely distant and unseen, he said.

“I’ve really been enriched,” he said. “I think we’re enriched by the difficulties we pass through, as long as they don’t crumble us.”

Even a half-century later, Khe Sanh still is instructive.

“For those of us that were there, it isn’t 50 years ago,” he said. “It was, like, last night.”

#Vietnam War #Khe Sanh #chaplain Ray W. Stubbe

[heroesoftherepublic-blog]

Dawn

The reluctant darkness returned the hills of Rome to the light, the first conquest of the daily struggle. Clients at the doors of their patrons, families gathered around their shops and ateliers, turning the sitting in something more welcoming for the Fortune-favored at the top. Two palms above the rest of the crowd, Lidia navigated it with calm confidence, head humbled low and a joyful smile, letting herself be cradled by the routine and simplicity of her morning duties: fill the enormous bronze vessel under her arm, not much heavier than her conscience.

Her grin widened as she found herself beneath the shadow of the magnificent stone structure whose massive raised arches invaded Rome. The legacy of the spoils seized from Pyrrhic’s ambitions that turned the dream of destruction into life-giving elixir.

Through way of human ingenuity the Anio valley was persuaded to abdicate its precious water, singing across new paths, gurgling about freedom and harmony.

Lidia allowed her mind to wander, resigning herself to wait; dozens of women, children and slaves waited for an opportunity to approach the fountain. It was arduous and ungrateful work, whoever, one essential to the industry and survival of Rome.

Hugging her vase, Lidia waited patiently, appreciating the lazy beams cast by Apollo Sol as they caressed her face. A shadow befell upon her and interrupted this moment of casual leisure, her eyes opening wide as she recognized that quickly replaced contemplation with horror. The metallic clamor of bronze hitting the stone slabs communicated the end of the placid hour, spreading murmurs and pointed fingers as all attention turned to the top of Aqua Anio.

A young woman, her arms covered in bruises and a vitreous gaze climbed the aqueduct; her limbs shook and trembled due to the effort, only finding strength in her despair. Finally reaching the top, she turned and looked back to the city that slowly woke hill to hill, a city that had no place for her. She discarded her sandals and approached the edge, where stone and water wielded to the domain of air. Behind her, only tragic oblivion.

Forwards, the only opening for liberty.

At her side, a speeding scarlet streak.

“I swear to the Manes, I will throw myself if you get one step closer!” She shouted, threatening that which soon took the shape of a tall woman covered by a scarlet hood. “I really mean it! I need this more than life itself!”

wind dances across the rushing water of the aqueduct, marking with ripples the silence between the two women.

“I understand.” Aeneid declared after calm observation. “It makes sense that you wish to end your life. Your life sucks.”

The suicidal woman stopped, mouth gaping wide. Lidia shrugged and crossed arms.

“Am I wrong’ Is it only apathy that brings you here, without a driving despair that seeks a solution of such finality?”

“N-no.” The youth muttered, not without hesitating for an instant, the slightest hint of incredulity in her own words. “It is true, my life is horrible. I am well within my rights to see it over.”

“Who knows, maybe you will complete it this time.”

“How do you...”

“I was the one that saved you the last three times” Aeneid extended her hand, palm open towards the sky. “Despise my striking looks, I can be discreet when I wish to. The majority of folks do not need more than a few nights of reflection after a close encounter with Dis Pater to find other alternatives; so many only need a nudge in the right direction. Someone must be in deep trouble to force me to reveal myself.”

“I do not understand what is going on.” Genuinely confused, the youth wondered what had brought Aeneid to the top of the aqueduct. “Are you here to persuade me to live?”

“Let me put this in no uncertain terms: if you throw yourself down, I will catch you. If you try to drown in the Tiberis, I will drag you to safety. If you leave home at night and wander the alleys of Rome in search of a violent end, I will follow you and assure that you will not find any ruffian until the new dawn shines again.

“What did I do to deserve such cruelty?” The eyes of the youth brimmed with tears. “Do you want to me to blackmail me into living this life? This is ridiculous. What do you care about it or what I do with it? Are there no tyrants to kick or fires to put off?”

Aeneid closed in despise the previous warning, pulling her hood back just enough to present the youth with a most radiant smile.

“If you finish this, you will be the first person to make such attempt for the fourth time after I tried to save them. I think that once you do that, your situation becomes extremely important to me.”

The youth unleashed a cynical laugh.

“I should have expect something of the sort. I insulted your heroic pride.”

Steady in her strong and inspiring smile, Aeneid did not say another word; if it helped the youth to believe that pride motivated her, let her continue to believe that is the truth. Despise her deceptively casual tone, Lidia’s mind was galloping furiously, trying to cover all the dark paths that could have led the woman to this mire. If she was definitively determined to end her life, she would have killed herself in secret at her house, where Aeneid or others would have problem intervening. Such public suicide attempts were a cry for help, a tragedy in the making all too easy to avoid with just a pinch of empathy. If the youth really believed that there was nothing worth to live for, the first step had to be validating her opinion, confirm her fears and finally extend a reassuring hand after having established themselves as someone that comprehended your problems. Having achieved this grounding gesture, Lidia finally could focus efforts in improving the fate of the other woman.

“What is your name, girl?”

“Novia.” She replied, bored. “Can we go down? I have other things to do if I am going to see the end of today.”

Aeneid leaned her head.

“Curious words. The dead people with which I usually deal do not have that many plans for the rest of their lives.”

“My husband is expected to return back from his voyages during the next days. I want to have the house well-tended and a new tunic waiting for him.”

Hymen Clementis. Husband? The girl was not much more than a child, Lidia uncertain if she had had her first period. And there she was, married and with a household under her care.

“They sound to be like happier plans than those that brought you all the way up here.” Aneied approach and put her left hand over Novia’s shoulder. “Houses and tunics are only things. How much would your husband suffering, arriving to a home in mourning?”

“Relief, most likely and little else. He would finally get rid of me.” Novia bit into her lower lip. “I am dead weight imposed upon him by our parents, a way to transfer proprieties in Pompey as dowry and to establish a new branch that could directly manage such houses. We are both mere pawns for the ambitious of our elders, cold tools without any bonds between them. He is nothing to me, a stranger without care and whose gestures fail to touch me.”

The youth winced, Lidia immediately reading the implications hovering over them, unsaid. Intimacy and love would only open new fears and dangers to someone that young.

“Why did you not just sell the proprieties?” Aeneid inquired.

“We would be left at the mercy of the decisions of the State and Municipium, as my father does not have full citizenship.” Novia explained the best she could, doing rather well for her limited comprehension behind her matrimonial situation. “This assuming that the family of my husband would have in the first place the means to pay a fair price; who has that amount of money in coins and metal? Talks dragged on and eventually my father was convinced that this union would be an opportunity to assure that the houses will bring prosperity to the family. After all, eventually he would have to set aside a dowry for me anyway.

Sad chuckle.

“They probably thought this would be the simplest and most obvious solution.

Aineid released her and turned her back to the youth.

“Maybe it was such for them. But here are the two of you, forced into a marriage without friendship, without common purpose or dreams.”

“Not even a common life, Triumphant. As miserable as that would be.” Novia followed Lidia and pulled the corners of her cloak. “You do not know how lonely my existence is. He spends weeks between our proprieties in Pompey, collecting rents, sending money to our parents and following suit with outrageous plan after outrageous plan. What do I have? An old house in the Urbe that I try to maintain by myself. Rome scares me and I do not know or trust anyone, leaving me alone between four walls and with all too much idle time.”

Fertile ground for living nightmares and transforming anyone into a mere prisoner of dread and terror.

“Married life is arduous.” Said the technically single woman without stable relationships or a marriage in sight. “It is made of high and lows; this period is one of the most painful, however, the situation can only improve. Rome can become your home, comprehension will bloom once you have time to know each other, good Fortune can germinate between the two. “

Novia turned her head away, passive way to communicate how much she disagreed with Aeneid.

“Ah. Of course, we are talking about it atop the aqueduct, is it not so?” Lidia was quick to correct herself. “Obviously you do not believe this can improve. This is all that your life can amount to.”

The youth faced her again, eyes shining with a hope she dared to feel again; someone that could understand her, would such thing be possible?

“Shortly after our wedding, myself and my husband traveled to the land of the ancestors of his family, so that I could present myself to her Sabine relatives and be accepted as the new heirs of their legacy, honoring it without with our union. I was beyond happy.” A soft smile crossed her lips. “I felt in love with the region and found everything charming and exciting. It was when we reached the necropolis that a dark cloud descended upon me and never dispersed. I read epigraph after epigraph, finding myself surrounded by the testimony of generations of young brides and mothers, not much older than me. Their story terminated before it even started.

Lidia started to choke; Noiva took her hands against her chest.

“There, between those epigraphs, lies my destiny; that is where this tormented path leads and there is no escape for me. I belong to the Underworld, I will never meet the person that I can become, or whom my sons and daughters will be. This idea took root, making a final solution tempting; my life is miserable and will end in a bloody bed. Why should I postpone the inevitable? Why should I not spare everyone the suffering that I cause me and the others by sustaining the illusion that I might survive?

Aeneid was struggling against tears, reminding herself over and over again that she was supposed to be the inspiring torch standing against despair. Bowing before Novia, making sure that her hood covered wet eyes, offered the woman the biggest smile of her life, to much torture of her gums and cheeks.

“Such thoughts do not belong in the mind of a brilliant girl with her life ahead of her.”

There it was, that shine in her eyes.

But what was Lidia offering?

What she could do to save Novia’s life?

Which words could drive off the specter of the history of horrors that she had faced in the necropolis? How could cheering words compete against those that the youth had read?

Wait. Read? Novia was literate.

Tears refused to be restrained any longer; Aeneid released warm and comforting laughter in an attempt to distract from them.

“Is it not obvious what do you need, Novia? A divorce!”

The youth opened her mouth wide, horrified.

“Our families will never accept such thing! I am lonely enough as it is, I cannot become a pariah in the eyes of my own, I have already enough problems.”

“Trust me, Novia. I am sure that your family will eventually validate your choices as soon as they see how much it benefits all parts.” The smile remained firm, immune to all the negativity.”

With the divorce the proprieties shared as dowry do not revert to your father, but to you, assuring its financial autonomy. Your husband returns to Rome, you return to Pompey; everyone where they belong. The houses will be administered by an entrepreneurial girl that knows more about the family business than they give her credit for. Your in-laws will become investors, and once both of you are mature enough, you can renew your vows.

Lips closing towards Novia’s ear, she added.

“Years will go by and Novia will grow, not only as a woman but as a citizen. Who knows the friendships she will cultivate in the meanwhile. Who knows if broken vows can be reforged. One thing is certain, the Novia that we still have not met will have a family the sort the one in front of me cannot even imagine.”

“I have no legal representation.” Novia replied, stepping away from Lidia. “None of our patrons will help me in what they will see as an act against my husband and his family.”

“Do you think I am the sort to make empty promises? The biggest threat for the freedom of a people is the difficulty the poor and oppressed have in obtaining just and fitting legal representation. I have in my team one of the best legal minds of this generation and he will be glad to defend your case.”

Crying of happiness, Novia hugged Aeneid’s waist. Caressing the girl’s head, Aeneid took the opportunity to cry together.

#ancient rome #super hero #story