#though I’ve not been crazy active in this fandom for a bit | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

dem-obscure-imagines · 2 years

Text

One Morning at a Time

Warren Worthington III x Reader x Kurt Wagner

Fandom: X-Men

AU: Soulmate

Summary: While waiting for the soulmark that would change your life forever, you meet a wounded, winged mutant named Warren and a teleporter whose personality is sunshine incarnate, Kurt. You can’t help but catch feelings for them, even though you have no idea where or with whom your destiny truly lies.

Note: Reminder that I write poly stuff from time to time. I’ve been working on this fic on and off for months and it’s finally done. Now that I’m out of school (forever!(I graduated)) I’ll hopefully be a little more active! Anyway, I love these boys so, so much and I hope you do too. Tried to keep reader gender neutral, but let me know if I slipped up anywhere! Also reader’s birthday is in the summer in this (mine is personally in winter, so just pretend lol)

Warnings: canon-typical violence, mentions of surgery, language.

Word Count: 7.4k

Reader is: Gender Neutral! Also, a mutant.

It was about three months before your twenty-first birthday, and as everyone knew, that was approximately three months until your soulmark, the thing that would define the rest of your life as you knew it, would appear on your arm. Well, given that your soulmate wasn’t older than you, in which case, it could appear sooner.

You knew it was nothing to stress about, and you knew the universe would sort itself out, but that didn’t seem to stop you from worrying that you were the one person on this planet doomed to not have a mark. It was more of an absent thought, something that came and went, but something that bothered you nonetheless.

“Come on, (Y/N), it’ll be fun!” Jubilee urged, trying to get you to agree to come to the mall. “Get your mind off of things, you know?”

You thought about it for a moment. Honestly, you didn’t have that much homework…you could probably get it done whenever you all got back. You let out a sigh before finally relenting. “Alright, fine.”

In the school’s main entrance, Jean was waiting for you and Jubilee along with Scott, who had arrived a few days before, and a student you’d never met before. He was tall and blue with the most gorgeous amber eyes you’d ever seen. A spade tail swayed back and forth behind him, and when he saw the smile on your face at the sight of him, he smiled back with what had to be the most adorable smile in the world. Despite the dark colors he was sporting, the boy seemed to be sunlight incarnate.

“(Y/N), this is Kurt, Kurt, this is (Y/N).” Jubilee introduced, taking note of the way the two of you were looking at each other.

“Nice to meet you!” You said, beaming up at him. “When did you get here?”

“Um…About twenty minutes ago.” He replied, laughing softly.

“Oh wow, didn’t even give him a chance to get settled in before dragging him to the mall, huh?” You asked Jubilee, which caused her to laugh.

“I think we all need a mall trip.” Scott said, twirling a pair of keys that were definitely Professor Xavier’s around his finger. “And we better get going sooner rather than later if we don’t want to get busted by Dr. McCoy.”

“You’ve been here for less than a week and you’re already getting us into trouble…” You rolled your eyes and followed the others out the door towards where the professor kept his cars.

Jean smirked and gave Jubilee a nudge with her elbow. “I’d say he fits right in, then.”

The ride to the mall wasn’t too long. You sat in the back, smushed between the girls, but having fun nonetheless. And while Scott’s driving was a little iffy at times, he got you all there in one piece.

“Um, (Y/N)?” Kurt asked once your group was inside the mall’s doors.

“What’s up?”

“I want to pick out some clothes to…help me blend in a bit better. Jubilee said you were good at that.”

You looked at Jubilee, who gave you a mischievous grin and then back at Kurt. So you weren’t crazy, then, Jubilee had picked up on it too and was already playing match maker.

“I think I’m decent, yeah.” You nodded, smiling. “We’ll get you hooked up, Kurt.”

He grinned. “Thank you!”

“Yeah, of course.”

It didn’t take long to find something that suited him. A bright red jacket might not have been the most subtle option, but it looked great on him; complimented his skin tone and really brought out his eyes. And seeing the look on his face when he tried it on, you knew it was perfect.

“How does it feel?” Jean asked.

“It’s very comfortable.” Kurt noted, moving his arms around in it. “I like the color as well.”

“Then I’d say our work here is done. Let’s go to the arcade.” Scott said, motioning towards the door, his hands jammed in his pockets.

“So impatient.” Jean shook her head.

Once everything was paid for, you all headed up the escalators and up to the second level of the mall, where there was a giant carousel in the food court, a movie theater, an arcade, and countless stores. No wonder Jubilee loved this place so much; you definitely understood the appeal.

Once Scott was satisfied at the arcade, you all grabbed snacks and settled down in the food court. And when you did, you finally noticed the giant bruise on Kurt’s arm, which just about blended into his skin.

“Is that a bruise?” You asked, trying not to let the concern slip into your voice. You knew better than most that some humans still didn’t take very kindly to mutants. Especially mutants with a mutation as visible as Kurt’s.

Kurt looked down at the spot and then up at you, somewhat self-conscious and perhaps even a little sad. He didn’t say anything, just nodded.

You stared at it for another long moment before raising your hand, as if to touch it, but looked up at him to ask permission first. “Can I?”

Somewhat confused, Kurt nodded. You reached out and gently touched the spot with your finger and, before his very eyes, the large, dark bruise evaporated to nothing, healing in seconds. Kurt’s eyes widened and he looked up at you.

“You…you’re a healer.”

“I am.” You smiled. “You don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to. I know…people can be cruel. I’ve seen a lot of injuries in my time at Xavier’s.”

“No, it’s alright.” Kurt shook his head. “Mystique just rescued me from Berlin. There was a mutant fighting ring. They…took me from my home, but…I like to think everything has a reason and,” he smiled, “I have a feeling I’m going to like it here.”

***

It was truly astonishing the difference a few hours could make. What had started off as an exciting, but normal day had quickly snowballed into what could potentially become the worst day of your life. You were on a plane to Cairo to stop the end of the world as you knew it, sitting next to Kurt and wishing beyond wishes that everyone on this plane and then some would make it back to Xavier’s in one piece. Well, what was left of Xavier’s…

“Have you ever done this before?” Kurt asked, his voice shaking.

“Not until today, no.” You replied, shaking your head. “It doesn’t feel real.”

Kurt nodded. That was the understatement of the century.

Mystique hashed out a plan as the rest of you listened carefully. She turned to you. “What can you do?”

“I’m a healer and I fly.” You told her.

She looked relieved when you said it. “Good. In that case, stay out of this as much as you can.” She paused and let out a sigh. “I have a feeling we’re going to need those healing powers.”

“Looks like they have a flyer too,” Hank noted. That was when you saw it, a flash of silver in the sky. Your heart leapt.

“And he’s got knives for wings.” Peter said, squinting out the window. “Wicked…”

“Great.” You scoffed.

When the plane touched down, everyone split off. Kurt was headed towards the pyramid to extract the professor. Mystique went up towards Magneto’s bubble with Peter to try to talk some sense into her former friend and you followed instructions, laying low until you were needed.

Well, until you saw the Angel of Death headed straight after Kurt. You looked to Hank, who hesitated before nodding. Getting the professor out took priority, and from the looks of it, Kurt could use all the help he could get.

A pair of yellow wings, not unlike a butterfly’s, sprouted from your back, glowing golden and made of energy. You ran, taking to the sky quickly and catching up to the angel without too much trouble. You tackled him out of the sky. Kurt looked back, his eyes wide when he saw you in combat with his pursuer.

“Kurt! Go!” You urged him, punching the angel in the face, causing him to stagger back. The way he was moving gave you the impression that those wings of his were heavy, and you didn’t want to find that out the hard way. “I’ve got this guy.”

He retaliated, a few sharp metal feathers dislodging from his wings and firing at you. You put up a shield, catching all but one, the one you missed barely grazing your cheek. It stung, but you stood your ground.

“Is that all you’ve got?”

His expression darkened. “Not even close.”

You had to admit, he was handsome in a threatening sort of way. He had soft golden curls and sad green eyes. Even though you were fighting, you could tell there was more to him. You had a feeling his alliance with Apocalypse was due to his circumstances rather than his beliefs. He looked so hurt. Tired.

“We don’t have to do this, you know.” When you said it, he almost paused for a moment. “We all want the same thing. We’re on the same side.”

“You don’t know anything about me.” He tried to kick your legs out from under you, but you jumped over his and countered, knocking him on his ass.

“I know you’re better than this.” You sounded so genuine when you said it, that he hesitated before starting to get off of the ground.

Jean’s voice echoed in your head. “(Y/N), Kurt has the professor. Get back here as soon as you can.”

You lifted from the ground just as Angel stood up. You flew out of the pyramid the way you came.

“Hey!”

“You’ve gotta catch me first.” You called over your shoulder, flying back to the plane in record speed, just as the others arrived. You watched for the Angel to follow you, but he was circling back for one of his other teammates, the one with the whip made of energy.

“Angel’s on his way to us.”

“Then let’s get out of here.” Hank said, raising the door you’d just come in as the plane began to rise into the air. You rushed over to the professor, looking over his injuries. His head was bleeding.

“Hi, professor,” You said softly, reaching forward. Your hand started glowing and immediately, the wound began to seal up.

“(Y/N), good to see you,” He said, relief flooding him as you took away his pain.

You chuckled. “Good to see you too.”

“You have a cut.” Kurt said, looking concerned. “On your cheek.”

You looked up at him and nodded. “I know. It doesn’t hurt that bad.”

He waited for a moment, watching you, but you didn’t make any effort to heal the wound. “Can’t you…?”

“It doesn’t work—” You were abruptly cut off by the sound of a horrible screeching noise near the back of the plane. “—on me.”

When you looked back, you saw a bright purple sword made of energy cutting through the metal and making an opening just big enough for the lady in the purple jumpsuit and the Angel himself to enter your escape vehicle.

“Everybody, grab ahold of Nightcrawler!” Jean instructed as the two intruders got closer.

Kurt’s eyes widened. “I’ve never done it with this many people!”

Jean held strong. “Get us out of here.”

One by one, everyone grabbed onto Kurt. You held his arm. Once everyone was secured, Jean used her telekinesis to lurch the plane forward, shifting the gravity. Angel fell, forced to the back of the plane, looking very uncomfortable, and Psylocke slipped out of the hole she’d just carved into the ceiling.

Kurt struggled to teleport, puffs of blue smoke appearing and disappearing around him intermittently, and in the moments the plane nosedived down, Angel managed to get to his feet. He dove forward, but just before he reached you, your surroundings changed with a poof.

There was a loud explosion somewhere in the distance. It was oddly still and quiet now. It took you a moment to gather yourself, and when you did, you saw Kurt laying there unconscious.

“Is he okay?” Scott asked while you worriedly wondered the same thing.

“It’s his energy,” Jean said, tapping into his mind. “He’s drained.”

“Kurt…” You moved closer to him, kneeling beside him and touching his cheek with a gentle hand. Your palm began to glow for a few seconds, and when you gave him your energy, you felt something dip inside you. He was really drained.

“(Y/N),” Hank said, his voice a warning. Sometimes you were convinced the scientist knew your limits better than you did, but as the resident doctor in the mansion, he often worked with the school’s only healer.

“I’m fine.” You replied, knowing fully well that might not be the case.

After a few long moments, Kurt’s eyes opened slowly and he looked up at you. “What happened?”

“You passed out.” You told him, sitting down beside him, very tired all of a sudden.

He focused on you. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah, I’m…I’m fine.”

“Take it easy, alright?” Hank said, gently pushing you back down when you tried to get up. “We’ve got it from here.”

You nodded, already feeling a little dizzy as you settled in. It couldn’t hurt to rest your eyes just for a few moments…

***

By the time you came around, it was all over. Jean had just finished off Apocalypse, and everyone was fine, for the most part. Kurt had been able to grab Peter just before his leg was broken by the ancient mutant, so the only person for you to heal was, well, yourself.

“How are you feeling?” Hank asked, kneeling beside you. He shined a flashlight in your eye and then nodded. No concussion. You were fine.

“Better. Is everyone—”

“Everyone is okay.” Hank nodded. “We’re gonna head out of here as soon as I can find a vehicle to get us out.”

“What about the plane?” Jean suggested.

Hank thought about it for a moment and then shrugged. “I mean, that’s an option…We can look into it.”

So the rest of you made your way to the plane wreckage, and, until that moment, you had forgotten about one crucial player who had been on the thing when it went down. Angel.

He was sticking out of the wreckage, his upper half pretty badly burned. You walked closer, carefully climbing through rubble.

“(Y/N), be careful!” The professor warned.

“Is he…?” Kurt asked, his voice quiet.

“No, I…” You got a bit closer, leaning into that extra sense of yours. “I think he’s alive. Barely.”

“His wings are damaged.” Hank said, looking him over as well. “He’s probably going to need surgery.”

“Are we seriously debating saving him? He tried to kill us.” Scott pointed out, not entirely convinced this was the best idea.

“So did she.” You motioned to Ororo, who was hesitantly following the rest of you in the hopes of getting out of there. “People change.”

You walked closer and knelt down, Kurt following you.

“Kurt, could you teleport him out of the wreck?”

“I think so.” He nodded and touched the angel’s arm, poofing him to where the ground was flat. You let your wings emerge and floated down from the pile of rubble to where Kurt had moved him. Meanwhile, Hank set to work repairing the plane with the aid of Jean’s telekinesis.

“I might pass out while I’m doing this, alright?” You warned Kurt. “I’ll be okay, though, I promise.”

Kurt looked hesitant, but nodded, his eyes focused on you while you reached forward, a hand hovering over the Angel’s chest, your power seeping into him as you examined him closer. The metal wings emerging from his back were broken off near the root of them. It looked like it had been painful. He had tattoos etched along the edge of his face.

“I know him.” Kurt admitted softly, watching for any sign of life on this rival of his’ face. “He was at the fight club where they took me. I…I burned his wings. I didn’t mean to, but I had to.”

“But they’re metal,” you said, confused.

Kurt shook his head. “They weren’t always. They were feathers. Beautiful. He really did look like ein Engel.” He looked so guilty when he said it.

“It’s not your fault.” You told him. “You didn’t have a choice.”

Kurt nodded, but he didn’t say anything, just watching for any twitch of movement. And then, finally, the angel’s chest heaved with a breath and his eyes shot open. He sat up with a groan, flinching away from you, but regretting it immediately, as all of his pain came flooding back as soon as he was out of the range of your powers.

“He lives!” Peter exclaimed, zooming over. He looked at you for what was probably the first time. “Hey, cool powers. Does it work on any injury?”

“Pretty much.” You shrugged, feeling a little dizzy, but not overwhelmingly so. As you sat back a bit, Kurt put an arm around you for support. “Within reason, I mean.”

“You…?” Angel said slowly, visibly still in pain. “You helped me.”

“Yeah.” You shrugged. “I told you, we’re on the same side. Now get back over here so I can treat your burns.”

***

Things got back to normal-ish way sooner than you expected. Jean and Magneto put the school back together in a single afternoon, and you helped all of the other students get readjusted. This included Warren, the Angel, who, Hank was right, needed surgery to remove the broken remnants of his metal wings.

He’d been on painkillers for a week because you’d been resting up after everything in Cairo, but now you were finally ready to help Hank with the procedure.

You walked into the infirmary to find Warren there sitting on the bed, in a gown, his arms crossed and a vacant look on his face. His eyes flicked up to yours once the door opened.

“How are you doing?”

He shrugged. “As well as I can, I guess. Not in too much pain.” You could have sworn he smirked the tiniest bit. “They’ve got me on the good stuff.”

“Good. I’m sure it would be awful if you weren’t.” You tucked a piece of hair behind your ear and looked over his chart. Hank walked in not long after.

“Oh good, you’re here.” He said to you. He was holding a binder in his hands and his eyes flicked nervously between you and Warren. “So, I was analyzing the samples I took when we first brought you here, and I didn’t want to get your hopes up—this is also the reason I insisted (Y/N) fully rested before we attempted anything—but it seems your natural wings and bones are…well, they’re trying to regrow. If we remove the metal, there’s a chance that—”

“That I’ll have wings again.” Warren finished quietly. “That they’ll go back to the way they were before?”

“Yes.” Hank confirmed, nodding.

“Well in that case…Do whatever you have to do to me.” Warren stared at the end of his bed. “I think it’s worth the risk.”

“Perfect. I’ll go get the operation room prepped.” Hank nodded and left the two of you alone again.

“How’s your soulmate?” Warren asked. He seemed genuine about it when he did. “That blue guy? Nightcrawler?”

“Oh, Kurt?” You said, laughing a little as you shook your head. “He’s not my soulmate.”

“Oh! I just assumed the two of you were—”

“I don’t turn twenty-one for another three months, so…even if he was, I wouldn’t know that yet.”

“Mmm.” Warren hummed, nodding. “Gotcha. Sorry I assumed—”

“It’s okay.” You shrugged. “No harm done.”

You prepped the IV with the anesthesia in it. “Well, Angel—”

“Warren.” He interrupted, looking unsure of himself when he did. You had a feeling it’d been a long time since anyone had called him that. “My name is Warren.”

“Well, Warren, I’ll see you on the other side, then.”

***

The procedure went without a hitch, and although you were drained from growing a pair of giant feather-covered wings basically from scratch, you were fine. You both were. You walked into the cafeteria for dinner that night looking very tired and weak. Kurt teleported in front of you, looking you over with concern.

“Are you alright? How did it go?”

“It went great! I’m just tired.” You said, reaching out to touch his arm so he could take both of you back to the table. In a puff of smoke, you were sitting at the round table with the others. “Big jobs like that tend to wipe me out.”

“And is he…” Jubilee started, looking around and lowering her voice. “Still…”

“I regrew his wings. His original wings. From scratch. That’s why it took so long.” You said, chuckling. “I could use some caffeine.”

Before you could even blink, Peter came back with a can of Redbull.

“Thanks.”

“You’re a miracle worker,” Jean teased, a proud grin on her face.

“Something like that.”

Jubilee’s eyes widened as she looked up at the entrance to the cafeteria. “Don’t look now, but…he’s here.”

You blinked a few times, focusing intensely on opening your can of desperately-needed energy drink.

“Holy shit, you did that yourself?” Peter asked looking up at Warren’s very much in-tact wings. “Impressive. Do you think if my leg fell off, you’d be able to grow me a new one?”

“I don’t think so.” You chuckled. “His wings were already regenerating. That’s why I was able to help him grow new ones. I’m just surprised I managed to get it all done in one day.”

Warren walked through the line, got some food, and then looked around the cafeteria for somewhere to sit. Just before he left to go eat alone in his room, Kurt waved him over. Warren thought about it for a long moment, hesitating. But then he saw you and Ororo sitting there with the rest of them and decided to give it a shot.

“Mind if I sit with you?”

“You can sit with us.” You nodded, motioning to the only empty spot, the one across from you.

He nodded and slid into place.

“How are you feeling?”

“Normal.” He said, pausing before continuing, “which is weird, all things considered. I’m not even tired.”

“My powers seem to have that effect on people, yeah.” You took a sip of your drink. “How are your wings doing?”

“They’re sore, but that’s normal. It happens every—” He stopped himself, shrugging. “Just sometimes, you know?”

“Yeah.”

“Hey, Angel, we’re thinking about having a bonfire tonight.” Jubilee said, raising an eyebrow. “You’re welcome to join us if you want. We’ll have s’mores and soda and stuff.”

Scott made a weird face, but Jean elbowed him before Warren noticed.

“I don’t know—”

“We have weenies to roast.” Peter said, disappearing for a single second only to return with a package of uncooked hotdogs. “The true American experience.” He nudged Kurt. “For ‘lil Kurt here.”

“He’s taller than you. By a lot.” You laughed at the face Peter made when you said it and he muttered something before running off to refrigerate the hot dogs until later. Kurt got a laugh out of it, too.

“Where are you doing this?”

***

It was the perfect night for this sort of thing, you decided. The sky was clear enough to make out each individual star, and there was a little breeze, but it wasn’t too chilly, even though it was dark. You’d made a fire out near the edge of campus, and the boys had pulled up some logs for you all to sit on.

You were sitting over by the cooler, watching the flames as they slowly ate at the wood. So far everyone was there. Everyone except Warren. Peter had brought his boom box out so the rest of you could listen to music. Jubilee had taken it over almost immediately and was playing ABBA, which you didn’t mind.

“Is this seat taken?” It was Warren’s voice, deep and quiet, right behind you.

“I didn’t think you’d make it.” You looked up at him, smiling.

“I didn’t think you would either, honestly.” He said swinging one leg over the log and then the other before sitting next to you. “You look exhausted.”

You laughed dryly. “I am. I should have taken a nap when I had the chance.”

“Thank you, by the way. For this.” His wings fluttered the tiniest bit when he said it.

“Of course.” You nodded. For a moment, you let your own wings shimmer into existence before making them disappear again. “Us winged folk have got to stick together.”

“Warren! You made it!” Peter rushed over, handing Warren a hotdog on a stick to be roasted. “One weenie, as promised.”

Warren laughed. “Thanks.”

Kurt walked over to you, holding up his marshmallow, which was barely approaching golden. “Is this cooked enough?”

“A little more, I think, but that’s just how I like mine. As long as it’s pretty warm, it’ll still make the chocolate all melty.”

Kurt nodded, holding the marshmallow a little closer to the flames for a little longer to get a little more color on it. The three of you were quiet for a long moment, Warren on your left side, Kurt on your right, the fire crackling calmingly. “Dancing in the Moonlight” started playing on the boom box, interrupting Jubilee’s ABBA music, but for good reason. You loved that song and couldn’t help but sway a little while it was playing.

“This isn’t the first time my wings have grown back.” Warren said quietly. The way he said it made it sound like he was unburdening something to the two of you he hadn’t told anyone in a long time. “When…when they first grew in, my…parents had them removed. Surgically. They thought that would fix it. Fix me. But…mutations don’t work like that, it turns out. It took three months of the worst pain of my life—well, until Cairo at least—but they grew back in. After that, they gave up. Just…made me cover them up when we went out.”

“Wow.” You said, your voice swallowed up by the sounds around you. “Holy shit, Warren. I’m…so sorry that happened to you.”

“Yeah, so am I. But, I think you healing me today affirmed what I’ve known…There’s…” He let out a huge sigh, his voice wavering. “There’s nothing wrong with me.”

You reached over and rested your hand on top of his, smiling softly. Kurt looked over, a gentle look in his eyes. “There’s nothing wrong with you, Warren.”

Warren’s wing settled around your shoulders, the ends of his feathers reaching Kurt’s shoulders as well. There was warmth in that moment, and not just from the fire. But you suspected that with the two of them around…that warmth wasn’t going to go away any time soon.

***

It was an incredibly hot summer’s day and your birthday approached ever quicker. It was only a month away now, and something you couldn’t help but think about in passing. Every time you did, the place on your arm where you mark would once be began to tingle ever so slightly.

“Earth to (Y/N)?” Peter waved a hand in your face, causing you to snap out of your thoughts.

“What, Maximoff?” You asked, looking up at him from your spot under the shadiest tree in the yard.

“Everyone’s hanging out by the pool. Jean sent me to get you.”

“Oh. Co—”

Before you could finish that thought, your surroundings changed entirely and suddenly you were dumped on a lounge chair beside the campus’ pool, nauseous as hell. Scott, Ororo, and Jean were currently in the water splashing each other and Jubilee was on the chair beside you. Over in the corner, Warren was perched on a barstool, sipping on what appeared to be a Shirley Temple. He tended to perch a lot, you noticed.

“Peter I swear, the next time you do that, I’m gonna puke.” You took a breath, willing your body to settle after being rushed there faster than the speed of light.

“Promise?”

“Ew.” Jubilee grimaced, shaking her head. She looked at you. “How are you holding up in this heat?”

“A little better now.” You shrugged. “Aside from the nausea, that is.” You looked around again, running a tally in your head. “Where’s Kurt?”

“He went upstairs to change into his swim trunks.” Jean replied. “Should be back any—”

In a puff of smoke, Kurt appeared about ten feet above the deep end, doing a flip before landing in the pool with a splash. He surfaced a few seconds later, a giant grin on his face. Meanwhile Warren shook the water droplets out of his wings, looking mildly annoyed.

Peter clapped, now holding up a sign with a 10 on it. “Perfect technique, Wagner. A very well-executed flip.”

“Thank you.” Kurt chuckled. He looked up at you and immediately, his smile, somehow, got even brighter. With another puff of smoke, he was beside you, dripping water onto the concrete. “How are you doing today?”

“I’m doing good! It’s really hot out today, huh?”

“Ja.” Kurt nodded. He glanced at Warren at the bar and then back at you. “Do you want a drink?”

“Sure!” You looked up at Warren, who looked lost in thought, somewhat flustered. “Hey Worthington, what are you sipping on over there?”

“Huh? Oh. Shirley Temple.” He replied, a smirk finding his features. “Want me to make you one?”

“If you want to.”

Warren nodded, setting down his drink and stepping behind the bar. God, he was so hot. He was wearing a Hawaiian shirt, the front of it open, revealing the abs you never realized he had. And of course, his massive biceps were on full display in those short sleeves. What a hunk.

Hmmmmm, interesting… you heard Jean’s voice in your head and immediately your cheeks reddened.

Jean… You thought, your tone warning.

I already knew. We all did. You’re not exactly subtle. But uh…what’s going on with you and Kurt?

You eyebrows furrowed. You looked at him. He was sitting on the edge of the pool now, his legs kicking in the water. Where Warren was beefy, his muscles carefully curated with hours of exercise outside of your normal training, Kurt was all lean muscle, tall and agile. You still held to the reality that his eyes were the most beautiful you’d ever seen, and his smile outshined the brightest stars in the sky, his pointed teeth only adding to his charm.

Your soulmate sure has a lot to live up to, huh? Jean asked, only now realizing the full scope of the emotions you felt.

You sighed. You’re telling me…

***

It was a week out from your birthday and the group had ventured once again to the mall. It had become something of a weekly thing, but this trip was extra special, as you’d be picking out something to wear to the party Jubilee insisted on throwing you. And, unbeknownst to you, it was also the day the two mutants you held nearest and dearest to your heart would be finding birthday presents for you.

The plan was to divide and conquer. Jubilee, Peter, and Jean went with you while Ororo, Scott, Warren, and Kurt went off on their own to “look at records.”

Jubilee pulled a top off of the rack and held it up to you, tilting her head for a moment before frowning and putting it back. You chuckled.

“What kind of party even is this, Jubes? I’m sure I have something suitable laying around.”

“Well, sure you do, but it’s special! It’s your twenty-first! Which means…”

“Right.” You nodded. “I know. I mean, if they’re younger than me, then there’s a chance it won’t show up anyway.”

“But it’s a fifty-fifty shot.” Peter pointed out, shrugging. “Pretty likely it will.”

“It’s just as likely that it won’t.” Jean countered.

Your heart raced at the thought. Of something so monumental coming up so fast. The universe finally revealing to you your other half. It was…nerve-wracking to say the least. Jean seemed to notice this shift in you and walked closer, touching your arm.

“You okay?” She asked.

You nodded, shuffling through the rack of clothes in front of you. “I’m good. It’s just a lot, you know?”

Jean did know. She and Scott had only recently found out that they were soulmates (of no surprise to anyone around them) on Scott’s twenty-first. They were good together and they were working it out, but for you, there was no way to know if whoever your soulmate was would be a good fit with you. Maybe they weren’t open to mutants. And worse yet, there was the issue of the two crushes you were already harboring. But somehow you had to figure it out. All of it. And now, you only had a week to do so.

Meanwhile, across the mall, Warren browsed a shelf of books at the Barnes & Noble, trying, for the life of him, to pick one that you’d like. He’d caught you reading countless times, but all of this romance novel nonsense was foreign to him.

“Have you found something yet?” Kurt asked, a similar look of panic on his own face.

Warren shook his head. “No. You?”

“No.” Kurt sighed, his tail drooping. “I don’t want to let them down.”

“Yeah, same.” Warren admitted, his feathers ruffling the tiniest bit in frustration.

“Warren.” Scott reached over and plucked a book off of the shelf, handing it to him. On the cover was a shirtless man with long, flowing golden hair, and behind him were an enormous pair of wings. It was…suggestive to say the least.

“Ugh, Scott.” Warren rolled his eyes and put the book back while Scott laughed.

“You two are overthinking it.” Ororo said, crossing her arms. “Whatever you get them will be good enough. (Y/N) isn’t materialistic. And…they obviously care about you. Something like a birthday present isn’t going to change that.”

“I know, but I—erm—we want to make it special for them.” Warren said while side glancing in Kurt’s direction.

Kurt looked at Warren, who was no longer looking at him, and nodded. Ororo looked between the two of them, something sparkling in her eyes. Maybe she knew something even the two of them hadn’t realized yet, but it didn’t take a rocket scientist to know there was more to their connection than what laid at the surface. If the way they’d met had shown anything, it was that they were intrinsically linked, pulled together by something much stronger than coincidence.

About twenty minutes later, the group left the bookstore empty-handed. According to Scott, Jean told him the rest of you were meeting in the food court to get some food. Their half of the group found yours relatively easily among the mall’s usual crowd.

“Find any cool records?” You asked Warren innocently.

He hesitated for a moment, forgetting that was the lie they’d told you so they could slip away. “Oh, uh, no, not today.”

“Bummer.” You chuckled.

“Eh, I’m not torn up about it. Jubes force you to buy something new to wear to your own birthday party?” He asked, smirking.

“Hey!” Jubilee protested.

“Yep!” You held up the shopping bag in question.

“It’s really cute, though.” Jubilee argued, trying to defend herself.

“It is.” You nodded.

“Hey I’m starving, are we getting food now, or…?” Peter asked, already looking around the food court to figure out what he’d eat first. Being a speedster, he had quite the appetite, given the amount of calories he burned every time he moved faster than the average person did. Which, in Peter’s case, was quite a bit.

“Yes, Peter, we’re getting food now.” Jubilee laughed, shaking her head.

***

It was weird how time worked, you mused. It was now the night before your twenty-first birthday. You were at the party Jubilee had thrown for you, sipping from a glass of cherry coke. As soon as midnight hit, you either would or wouldn’t get the mark that defined the rest of your existence. It was a lot to think about.

“Are you alright?”

It was Kurt. Of course it was Kurt. You looked up and met his concerned eyes.

“I’m hanging in there, yeah.” You let out a shaky sigh, tears welling in your eyes.

“Oh, hey, it’s okay!” Kurt said, reacting immediately. He guided your drink to the railing of the deck at the edge of the yard, where you were hiding out, and pulled you into his arms. You surrendered to his touch, wrapping your arms around him. You felt him rest his head against yours, holding you tight while he rubbed comforting circles on your back. “I know it’s scary, but…It’ll all work out, liebe. I promise.”

You sniffled, nodding against him. “Kurt?”

“Yeah?”

“Did…did you…?”

“I don’t have a mark yet, liebe.” He sighed, holding you a little tighter. “The moment came and went. I…” he chuckled to himself a little, “I check every morning, but…nothing yet.”

“How do you do it?” You asked, looking up at him.

He pulled away the slightest bit, stroking your cheek with his hand and gently wiping away your tears. “One morning at a time.”

You nodded and stared up at him for a long time. He was good at this, at comforting you. You knew that whoever Kurt’s soulmate was, they were incredibly lucky. And even still, there was a little piece of you that hoped it was you. But you’d have that answer one way or another in a few hours, you supposed.

“Go have fun. Take your mind off of it.” Kurt said and you smiled, nodding. “But if you need to talk, I’m always here.”

“Thank you.” You grabbed your drink and headed back out to the yard, greeted immediately by the cheers of the rest of your friends.

Meanwhile, on the deck, Warren walked up the steps and stood next to Kurt, his eyes locked on you and a glass of something a little sharper than soda in his hand.

“(Y/N) okay?” Warren asked, his arm just brushing Kurt’s on the railing.

Kurt nodded. “I think so.”

Warren looked over at Kurt, his eyes lingering on the teleporter’s before he asked, “are you okay?”

He nodded again before repeating, a little more unsure, “I think so.”

“Good.” Warren turned his attention back to the others, taking a long sip from his cup.

“Warren?”

“Hmm?”

“Do you…have a mark?”

“Nope.” Warren replied, smirking. His jacket was usually covering his arms anyway, so he was sure that information was a mystery to most of their friend group, if not all of them. “Lost track of time while I was in Berlin, but I’m twenty-two now. That day came and went and I never even noticed…”

Kurt nodded, quiet.

“Buddy, if you’re (Y/N)’s soulmate…I won’t be mad about it.” Warren said, fiddling with the cup in his hands. His wings were fidgeting due to the confession, tremors running through his feathers. Kurt could tell it was something Warren had been thinking about for a long time. “They deserve someone who’ll take care of them as good as you do.”

“You think I—”

“I think what the two of you have is special.” Warren said. It was the truth. He nudged Kurt’s arm with his own, earnest. “And if we’re being honest, I thought you two were soulmates after seeing the way you took care of each other in Cairo. It just…made sense. It still does.”

Kurt was quiet for a long moment, processing. “And…if you’re their soulmate…”

Warren scoffed, chuckling and shaking his head.

“I think you’d be perfect for them, too.” Kurt said, his heart racing in his chest. “You should see the way they look at you. It’s like something out of a movie.”

Warren nodded, but didn’t reply.

“And I’m sorry, Warren. For burning your wings. I—”

“You don’t have to feel bad about that anymore, Kurt.” Warren shook his head and reached over, tentatively resting his hand atop Kurt’s. “It’s not your fault. It was never your fault. And…” His wings fluffed up the tiniest bit as he spoke about them. “(Y/N) fixed me right up anyway.”

Kurt smiled, the weight of what he’d considered one of his greatest sins lifting off of his shoulders, leaving him unburdened on the warm summer night.

Warren motioned to all of their friends on the makeshift dance floor. “Now let’s get back out there with the others, yeah?”

***

It was finally time. Peter had run up to Jubilee and Jean’s room to retrieve a mirror so you could see the mark whenever it showed up. Any second now, your life would change forever. Or maybe it wouldn’t, and you would just have to wait and wait and wait for the day that it would.

But you had a feeling deep in your, well, your soul, that tonight was the night.

“Do you want a countdown?” Scott asked.

“No.” You covered your eyes with your left hand, as the mark would appear on your right arm. “Just tell me if it shows up. Or…or if it doesn’t.”

The next moments were agonizing and slow. Your leg bounced anxiously, waiting for anything, a gasp from one of your friends or a tingling sensation on your arm…any sign that it was happening. And then, slowly, a tickle swirled along your bicep, tracing out what felt like a very complicated soulmark. You were shaking now.

“Is it…?”

“Oh my god.” Jubilee said, covering her mouth with her hand. “Oh my god!”

You pulled your hand away from your eyes and turned to look. There was a mark alright. On it were two wings. One, the one on the left, resembled that of a butterfly, not unlike your own wings. The other, made of feathers, matched up next to the first. And then, gently, a very familiar spaded tail curled around them.

You looked at Kurt first, the tail in question wavering behind him nervously as he rolled up his sleeve high enough to check for a mark in the spot you’d received yours. Sure enough, there was an identical mark there, shimmering against his blue skin.

You burst into happy tears, immediately reaching for him. Kurt hugged you, lifting you off of the ground in the process. Meanwhile, Warren was frozen in place, Ororo and Jubilee trying to get his leather jacket off of him in order to check his arm as well. A few long moments later, he snapped out of his daze and helped them, sliding his wings out of the holes effortlessly.

He didn’t expect it to be true. It was…simply too good to be true. It had to be a dream, or maybe you and Kurt were tethered to another mystery mutant with wings like his, but sure enough, his bicep was branded with the same mark as you and Kurt. A soulmark, even after all of this time.

The two of you broke your embrace to look at him and Warren stood there with tears in his eyes, stunned in disbelief until you wrapped your arms around him, your head resting against his broad chest. Warren wrapped one arm around you while the other reached out for Kurt, beckoning him to join, and he did without hesitation. Once you were all huddled together, Warren’s wings slowly closed around the two of you, his soulmates.

And finally, it all felt right. Every twist in the path that had led all of you to that moment made sense. Kurt and Warren had always been your destiny, just as they had been each other’s.

“Did you know this could happen?” Peter asked Scott under his breath, looking on as three of their friends all simultaneously started dating each other.

“No, did you?”

“No, but…it makes a lot of sense.” Peter smiled. “I think they’re good for each other.”

Jean smiled that ever-knowing smile of hers. “I think so too, Maximoff.”

#xmen #warren worthington iii #warren worthington iii x reader #kurt wagner #kurt wagner x reader #nightcrawler #nightcrawler x reader #angel #angel x reader #poly #polyamory #soulmate au

479 notes · View notes

mcytblr-archive · 20 days

Text

Early MCYTblr Interviews: mcyt-quotes

today's interviewee is mcyt-quotes, one of the first MCYT quotes blogs, member of MCYTblr since SMPLive, and winner of the first MCYTblr elections! below is a transcript of their questions and answers.

Q: To begin with, what was your overall MCYTblr experience like? Does anything particularly stick out to you?

A: it was fun, by and large. a good outlet for me to talk with likeminded people, and a good distraction to get me through my senior years of high school. i’ve been a public figure in a few online fandom spaces, now, and i think what stood out the most in the mcytblr space is the fact that some of the larger blogs were almost treated like mini-content creators themselves ? i got fanart a few times, especially through the whole election fiasco, and i remember there being incorrect quote blogs etc that i would pop up on now and then. i’ve never seen it happen on that scale before - it was odd, but fun in its own way. defiantly gave early-mid MCYTblr its own personality

Q: Speaking of the elections, do you remember what it was like to run in them? I remember that you won, but I'm interested to hear what it was like from your point of view.

A: ahahaha that was an experience. i fully signed up as a joke - i wasn’t very active on discord or very close with many of the other blogs, and i didn’t realise that my follower count was on the higher end of the spectrum, so i didn’t think i had a chance. just wanted to muck around and procrastinate studying for my final exams. things sorta spiralled though - i got hooked up with two bloody fantastic vice candidates (@the-royal-bat-snake and @sosigshoney) who did literally everything, and i also underestimated MCYTblr’s tendency to do it for the bit. i remember my campaign being something to the effect of promising a militia of arsonists, kitten genocide, cannibalism generally, and a total removal of free speech and thought ? and then i was elected and i was like ah fuck, i don’t have time for this. and then suddenly i was in the middle of some vast RP conspiracy that i was mostly asleep through, being Aussie, and very lost

Q: You mentioned that in the MCYT fandom, blogs were treated like smaller content creators-- how was that different from your other fandom experiences, out of curiosity?

A: so that sort of environment has popped up in other fandom spaces that i’ve been in - most obvious would be (and i want no judgement) the instagram DC and Marvel comics community, where i spent a few years running a large page. there were definitely elements of it - pages would get memes dedicated to them, etc. but lore ? i’ve never seen that before. i think it might be something about the nature of MCYT - aspects of the fandom, especially post Dream SMP (when this behaviour became most common) was built on mythologising people. not in the sense of worshipping them, but more so in the sense of fitting them into fictional narratives, just like the Dream SMP. and the blog owners themselves were primed to happily accept RP scenarios (something which has historically been seen as ‘cringe’), particularly those which blend absurdism and emotion. so the prison blogs, the election and subsequent RP, the penis SMP, the incorrect quotes blogs dedicated to fandom blogs (literally fandom-ception) came pretty naturally

idk, with more and time and reflection there’s probably something interesting there - Dream SMP was pretty unique in it’s time, and tumblr (especially post 2012) is a unique platform, so it makes sense they combined like that

Q: That makes me wonder, too-- it hasn't come up much before this, but I think it's an important aspect to examine: Do you think that large numbers of people (especially younger ones) being quarantined contributed to the intense/fast-paced fandom?

A: oh absolutely. it was pretty crazy to watch as a (semi) outsider. i joined the fandom in 2019, when it was Very small on tumblr - there maybe three other blogs i could follow who were MCYT related ? and then Covid hit and it bloody exploded. as i’ve mentioned, i was in my final year of high school, plus my town was only quarantined for a small period of time, so i didn’t really get that classic quarantine experience of having nothing to do. but christ, you could tell that so many people were spending practically their whole lives living through MCYT. and i don’t think that was a bad thing - it was clearly a great experience for a lot of people. but that’s why you had things popping up like the high school au blog dedicated to other MCYTblr blogs (where i think i was actually used as some evil class president or something ?? idk), which you would Not have seen in any other environment, i reckon

and i cannot stress your fast paced comment enough - every time i woke up it felt like heaps of astronomical events had happened in the few hours of USA timezone that had passed

it was fun - i felt like a long suffering older cousin at some points, but i don’t mind. that’s part of why i leaned into the election RP - if i could be as evil as possible, i gave them something to have fun with

Q: Now that you mention it, it's really interesting how that played out almost exactly as it did in the DSMP itself! A less-invested party coming in with a cartoonishly evil plan and winning the election to be played off of in roleplay, it's amazing how it worked out like that.

A: ahaha and it wasn’t lost on people at the time !! i was known for quite a while afterwards as a Schlatt-kinnie, which i was happy to lean into. a lot of the plot after that was lost on me - it was my two vice’s that i mentioned before and the rest of the cabinet which really carried things, and i would just pop in whenever i happened to be awake to endorse kitten genocide or something like that then go back to studying. but i’m pretty sure it did continue to trace the DSMP for a while afterwards - i banned the cult party [silverfish2020], so they were pretty quick to form a rebellion group, while i just continued to make worse and worse decisions. to be honest, though, it eventually spiralled out of control - i was taking it so laissez-faire that i forgot some people were genuinely invested, and while i forget details i definitely genuinely pissed a few people off at some point. i remember pretty vividly at one point someone made a post where they said they were worried i was going to doxx them or something like that (?) and i was like damn, this shits more serious than i thought it was. so i arranged to have my character assassinated and noped out - i couldn’t tell you what happened after that (or, frankly, before it). honestly, if you’re interested in niche fandom history though there’s probably something interesting in what went down - worth looking into if you’re bored

Q: Do you remember any other 'Big MCYTblr events'? It's alright if you don't remember what happened during them-- if you can't recall, I'll use them to ask around for people who participated!

A: i don’t rlly remember any other events…i know they happened, but i really had no interest in getting involved beyond answering whatever asks i would get about them. the election from memory was the first Big one (unless prom was first ? idk they were close together) and after that i was very happy to let Quotes as a character die, and i mostly ignored them

plus, it was about that time i started leaving the fandom - maybe a month or so later. by that point the community was Big, and moving fast, and a lot of drama had begun to leak in. you’ve covered some of the controversial blogs etc, and while i didn’t care about them personally they were indicative that the fandom space was different. combine that with me moving out of home and starting university, and i pretty much shut the blog down

Q: What led you to create the mcyt-quotes blog in the first place?

A: ummm i reckon just to have somewhere to talk about minecraft monday. there wasn’t a very dedicated fan base, and fuck knows i wasn’t gonna be talking about minecraft irl in a public aussie high school (i don’t have a death wish) so it just gave me somewhere to collect my thoughts. nothing interesting 🤷‍♀️

Q: Now that you mention it-- what are some of your most memorable moments from Minecraft Monday, whether from creators or the fandom?

A: ahhhhh there were some good ones. the fandom was deeply toxic during minecraft monday, but in a fun way - it felt sorta like following a sport more than anything. a niche reference here, but it felt the same as being a fan of australia’s soccer leagues - everyone hates each other, the organisers are greedy pricks who have no idea what’s going on, and there’s a new, entirely avoidable catastrophe happening every week. i think top moments include: the /top incident, where the fandom was divided after a scandal where Techno used an exploit to beat Vikkstar in an arena game; the a6d beef, where a6d was banned for not having enough viewers and then snuck back in and got into twitter drama with Keemstar; the week were Carson tried to sabotage Techno, leading to some of the most awkward moments possible and resulting in a lot of hate for the guy when he was otherwise still popular; week 7, where literally everything that could be broken was broken; James Charles getting adopted by the Minecraft community after his first cancelling but before everything that went down afterwards; and week 14, where a hacker griefed the arena, destroyed the event, and then accidentally doxxed himself while streaming it all. a fitting end

the main outlet for MCYT back then was actually reddit - there was a very active MCM subreddit which had a ton of statistics etc. the fandom was very into statistics back then, and actually analysing who would be a threat. that increased even more when serious esports players were added to the mix, like XQC and T1yler. they brought the toxic sweaty gamer energy to the competition, and the MC youtubers generally found them hilarious

it’s actually funny how much the vibe of the fandom changes depending on what’s most popular - MCM felt like sports fans, SMPEarth felt like historians, and DSMP was a giant role play arena

Q: Were you a part of the subreddit? (And, if so-- was it any different from MCYT Tumblr?)

A: yeah, i was crazy active on that subreddit !! i was always rooting for either Techno, Schlatt, or James Charles - Techno because he permanently dominated, Schlatt cause i was a casual SMPLive fan, and JC for the meme - and because at the time he was pretty widely accepted, since people loved that he genuinely seemed to get into the competition. funnily, the only time i’ve seen this competitive energy recreated was in the Techno vs Dream duel (which i also got way too competitive about). MCM was the first serious introduction of old school MC youtubers to the new generation - it was fun seeing all the classics slowly come around to Techno when they realised he wasn’t a sweat he was just good, or seeing them try to navigate conversations with the SMPLive gang when the old guard was still trying to be family friendly. the best week was actually Week 14, when a collection of old MCYTbers and new MCYTbers (and James Charles) decided fuck it and went to play on Hypixel for a few hours. it was great. i was also, later, very active on the SMPEarth wiki (the main hub for the fandom in those days) - that place is a gem to this day, and i’m not just saying that because i wrote far too much of it

Q: As time went on, did you see the culture of the fandom shift? What was it like to watch?

A: it shifted a Lot between different phases. even the demographic changed, at different points. you would be hard pressed to imagine that the fans of SMPLive were the same as DSMP, even though there was overlap in creators. even something more recent, like SMPEarth to DSMP - totally different vibe. you can see aspects that influenced each other, though - for example, the SMPE fandom’s obsession with making flags for different factions and putting factions at war with each other absolutely led into the establishment of L’Manburg. then Eret had his betrayal moment, and it turned from SMPE style war roleplay (which you would have on SMPLive, even, for example with the Stal conflict) to actual personal role play, where there were characters separate from the content creators. that division had never been identified before. that was when u started to see a lot of the mainstay parts of today’s fandom pop up - e.g. the c! vs cc! shorthand, or the constant division of content creators onto duos or other groups, and (of course) the shipping debates started up. they had always been there, especially in the Dream side of the fandom (which evolved spiritually from the Skeppy side, imo, which had similar debates) but they Really blew up with DSMP

that’s sort of when i stepped out - nothing against that style of fandom, it’s just not for me

Q: I've heard a lot of people who were in 2019-2020 MCYTblr say that the fandom was a lot more close-knit during that time-- was that your experience of it, too?

A: very much so. it was inevitable, we were a small bunch. i wouldn’t go so far as to say that everyone knew everyone, but everyone definitely had a mutual friend. i mean, hell, even connections to the creators were common - a lot of people on stuff like love or host were fans themselves. of course, looking back at the way that power was abused by certain creators paints it in a different light, but at the time it was fun

Q: Are there any fandom in-jokes, copypastas, running bits, or anything similar that you can remember from your time in the fandom?

A: too many to name. most of them id get in my inbox and just be confused, tbh, like the Kroger anon or some of the kinnies. i’ll try to go through some pre-DSMP era ones from the top of my head. the Hey Wilbur copypasta was cursed, as was SMPRompa (which i actually read the first couple chapters of, out of morbid curiosity. it was an experience). Stal, of course, was iconic in its time, as was the cuck shed. there was Keemstar being referred to as a gnome, his beef with the Skeppy gang, the ‘I could kiss you’ incident, ‘Hey Technoblade’. Jschlatt’s love or host bit where he was a closeted, deeply christian man made the rounds. Technoplane, of course. the Carson crying meme, and Gumball killing James Charles. Petezahutt dropping MCM to spite Keemstar, and Keemstar lying about it. ‘Preston is rusty’ was a classic MCM era meme, after the two fucking dominated. the sheer amount of times MCM got hacked was a bit of an in-joke, as was who actually won week 7 (to this day we didn’t know)

Q: Alright, and last one! Is there anything else you can remember/want archived, or any comments about MCYTblr as a whole?

A: ummmm i don’t think so ! i’ve said pretty much everything that immediately comes to mind. definitely an interesting fandom - one of the most unique i’ve seen. i appreciate your account a lot ! it’s funny to see old posts pop up again

#Early MCYTblr Interviews #Volume 18 #mcyt-quotes

8 notes · View notes

sisterkosho · 2 months

Text

General Headcanons | Nanako Asano

Notes: So as I mentioned before, I’ve been having a bit of Tokyo Revengers brainrot as of late. And after some consideration, I figured I might as well just start letting it all out on here since the fandom still seems to be somewhat active compared to other sites. With that said, I offer you this little headcanon post centering around OC I’m currently working on. She’s still in the early stages of development so everything here is subject to change (and likely will be rewritten later), but for now I kinda just wanted to share the stuff that’s been floating around my brain as I work on her. Enjoy!

Nanako is a delinquent from the Roppongi district known for being particularly close to the Haitani brothers.

She first met the two when she was just 13 after wandering into territory they claimed was theirs. And while she wasn’t affiliated with any gang at the time, she was clearly a delinquent.

As such, the encounter inevitably led to a fight, and although she held her own surprisingly well given the circumstances of a 2 v 1 against boys clearly stronger than she was, she ultimately lost in the end.

However, perhaps because of her impressive skills in combat or her “natural charisma” as he put it, Ran seemed to take a liking to her over the duration of the fight.

Right then and there, he decided that he wanted to keep her around.

He’d have her join them, and nothing was going to change his mind,

This left Nanako… a bit taken aback, to say the least. It was all so sudden, and it sounded more like a demand than an offer. Just who did this kid think he was anyway???

She was fully prepared to tell him off, but once she actually took a moment to consider it… she realized that maybe it wasn’t such a bad idea.

It may have sounded crazy, but these boys were freakishly strong. So much so that they could easily take over the entire district if they wanted to. In fact, she had no doubt that they would sooner rather than later.

Getting in close with people like that could be the one chance she needed to make it big in the delinquent world, and that… well, that sounded fun.

And considering she did lose a fight against them on their own turf, a part of her felt like it would only be fair to accept. That’s how these kinds of things worked after all.

So from then on, Nanako followed behind them, serving as their right hand. And as expected, it wasn’t long before they had taken over Roppongi.

They became total big shots, and being associated with them gained her quite the reputation amongst delinquents in the area.

After all, the brothers were known for their independence and refusal to be a part of any gang, so for her to have gotten so close to them… she must’ve been something special.

It was thanks to all that that she eventually ended up becoming a part of the S-62 generation on Ran’s recommendation.

A part of her knew that maybe they were going too far by that point, getting involved in things they probably shouldn’t. But she couldn’t bring herself to care.

Even with the way things had turned out, she was happy. She was having fun. But most importantly, she had people she cared about more than anything in the world.

So when it came down to it, she didn’t care what kind of path she went down. She’d follow them anywhere, no matter what.

From Tenjiku to Bonten, she stood by their side. And never once did she regret a thing.

She was having the time of her life, and she wouldn’t trade it for the world no matter how many hardships they faced. Though really, she felt like she had it made most of the time.

To her, the Haitani brothers are like family.

Rindou is like the little brother she never had.

He started calling her “big sis” as a joke, but it ended up sticking.

She goes drinking with him sometimes and it always ends in shenanigans of some sort.

She always takes the fall so he doesn’t get in trouble.

They’ve played tic tac toe on Ran’s forehead on numerous occasions.

Ran calls her “Nana-chan”.

The two had this sort of unspoken thing going on between them for awhile until Rindou started trying to play matchmaker.

He wasn’t the greatest wingman but somehow it worked out.

In both the Bonten arc and the final timeline, Nanako and Ran ended up married.

In the final timeline, she works as a bartender at the Haitani brothers’ club.

#nanako asano #ran haitani #rindou haitani #nanaran #haitani brothers #tokyo revengers #tr #tokrev #original character #oc #fan character #fc #oc x canon #writing #headcanon #hc

9 notes · View notes

ewanmitchellcrumbs · 9 months

Note

I am very sorry for all the negativity you’ve been made to endure (and for no good reason, from my perspective, which must make it feel even worse). But I’d urge you to reconsider nuking this account, cause I can’t stress it enough how much joy it brings me and many others. Not only the fics (though I’d be devastated to have those gone), but the all the crazy fun & interactions that have taken place here. Those precious bits, that, unlike the works that’d remain on AO3, would be impossible to preserve.

Lately I’ve been reading this blog daily & it never fails to brighten the mood on a bad day for me, and has become something important, that I hold dearly. And I’ve never seen you actively act harmful towards another user, and I believe any one that claims otherwise is either misguided or wilfully misinterprets something. And that’s not worth taking down something many have grown to love.

I hope you feel better & see how valued you truly are. I remember people reaching out to you through your inbox, with things unrelated to fandom, just their personal confusions and troubles. And you have always been so supportive and understanding towards them. You shouldn’t let that be forgotten or erased, because that’s worth so much.

Obviously, you should do whatever you need to feel better, be it stepping away for a while, or even taking down this blog. I won’t lie, that would sadden me beyond words, but your wellbeing is the priority here. Just don’t let all your great work and connections with people be diminished because someone decided to stir up shit. You and your art and humour and all the positivity you bring into people’s lives are worth so much more than that. They are so much greater than some spiteful comments, that are likely far fewer, than all the people who love what you do.

This is really so lovely to read, and makes me feel a lot better about my place in fandom - thank you so much for taking the time to write this. You didn't have to, but the fact that you did really means the world to me.

My mindset was pretty much in the trash 12 hours ago, but having chatted with friends and seeing the outpouring of support from loving people, I will likely stick around. Just need to wait for the creative juices to flow again before I can write anything else.

#asked and answered

12 notes · View notes

torinighthawk · 1 year

Text

Harry Potter Headcanons (2/?)

My werewolf post has been lost in the forest and I can’t find it so...

Let’s talk Hogwarts Headcanons instead!

I’ve always been big on worldbuilding (and attempted writing) of Next Generation stories because of the huge potential of not only getting to go crazy creating a world that is familiar but more suited to my own tastes, but because I enjoy the move forward, the making things better, aspect of jumping off from canon into uncharted territory.

Harry Potter is no different. Most of the fics that are still half finished in my document folders on my computer are Next Gen, in fact I believe they may all be.

Since coming back into the fandom I’ve been working on a huge worldbuilding project that spans dozens of decades of the wizarding world past, present and future, and I thought I’d share some of the Next Gen Hogwarts School ideas I had here.

Firstly, Post War Magical Britain is a mess and I’ve always been like, yeah, McGonagall took full advantage of that to make the school hers and to make lasting changes that would survive her tenor as Headmistress for the better of all of the students.

With a portion of the Board of Governors either in Azkaban for their crimes as Death Eaters, or silenced by their past support of Voldemort (and not wanting anyone to know it), and you know the ones who survived the war (its weird that the only Governor we know is Lucius), new different minded people take their place and McGonagall takes advantage of that too.

The world is my (ahem, her) oyster. Her first order of business after the recovery and grief period was to address the Houses and Sorting. Some wanted the Houses done away with, others argued it was tradition, smart educators pointed out that classes would eventually be hell if they didn’t split up the students somehow. McGonagall took this all in and conferred with active and former students alike, as well as with the Sorting Hat itself, and it was ultimately decided to keep the Houses but resort the students.

Resorting sparked a debate (because of course it did), with some arguing it should happen every year, and other’s balking at the logistics of resorting hundreds of students every year. It was Ron (seconded chiefly by Hermione) who suggested that students be resorted before transitioning through the natural progression of their schooling, basically meaning Second Years would be sorted at the end of the school year before transitioning from basic classwork into their O.W.L classwork and Fifth Years would do the same transitioning from O.W.Ls to N.E.W.T classwork.

Students still had pride in their House but knowing they could be re-sorted twice and potentially end up in three different Houses (this is rare usually its only two) during their time at Hogwarts almost immediately saw students trying to make friendships and connections with students in other Houses (though it was hard to tell if that was because of the change or Post War sentiments in general).

Over the years House traits fell out of use, though the Sorting Hat itself still used a general personality trait guide to sort, students themselves no longer put as much value on those traits as needing to have to be a true member of [insert House]. Calling people who stayed in one House their entire time at Hogwarts a True [House] was said as more of a joke, than something taken seriously.

At some point only Quidditch and Dueling Club became true places of rivalry between the Houses and even that was done all in good fun with the expectation of no ones feelings getting hurt (or you know someone saying something they shouldn’t, and other’s responding with violence, and those people getting suspended from playing, if you get the reference you get it).

Once the Ministry got itself together under Kingsley, they realized it was better to work with Hogwarts than against it.

It’s always baffled me that wizards, who think themselves so above muggles, don’t have institutions of higher learning. I’ve kind of changed that a bit in that there are certain institutions like St. Mungo’s that teach and train employees after secondary schooling or secondary equivalent schooling is acquired, including The British Archives and Museum of Magical History (BAMMH).

So instead of having to train wizards and witches on the most basic aspects of what their job might require at the Ministry after they have already started working, the Ministry instituted classes, such as Government and Economics, Magical Law, Business and Leadership Seminars and Conferences, etc. be taught at Hogwarts for students interested in future careers in the Ministry.

With the Introduction of new classes and new teachers McGonagall and the Ministry (and Hermione at some point inevitably) wanted to make Hogwarts and Wizarding Britain in general much easier for Muggleborns, or Half-bloods raised in the Muggle world (poor kids like Harry), to transition into Magical Society while also not assuming anyone raised in the wizarding world would fully understand even the basics of it at 11, a new class called Wizarding Studies (think basic gov and econ plus magical folk relations plus how wizarding society differs from muggle society) was created for First and Second Years to take. With the new class came a new teacher who requested to be allowed to teach Latin to the students to even further help witches and wizards in their studies.

Eventually Latin becomes a required course.

I’m still working on how all these new classes work, maybe when I have it at a place I’m satisfied with I’ll share.

But on to more nuanced ideas:

I headcanon that collectively as a student body the students decided to focus on culture in order to further unite the Houses and institute healthy House rivalry as opposed to negative culture. With McGonagall’s approval they created new clubs that were inclusive, and a student council made up of Prefects, the Head Boy and Girl, and other student leaders that could help keep the culture going.

A special peer Study Hall was created that allowed all students to help each other. By the time Harry’s children go to school Students Helping Students, or SHS, is a time honored tradition for almost all students to attend every Friday evening (SHS is available everyday in the evenings but Friday is special) where raffles are drawn and door prizes are given and everyone genuinely has a good time learning from each other with little to no teacher interference (except to keep the peace and caution against dangerous activities).

Multiple fundraisers where the Home Ec Club sell their projects and the Theatre club put on skits or whole plays to help other students out are held every year, completely organized by the students with help from the professors when needed. One year a Hogwarts Student makes it to the Wizard’s Chess World Tournament and the students raise the money to make sure they get to actually go and play some of the greatest Wizard’s Chess Masters. Another year, a Muggleborn Student and their family loses their home to a nasty fire and the students raise the funds to put them back on their feet.

Even before his kids go off to Hogwarts Harry gets involved as a Governor on the Board and whenever it is needed he matches donations made by students for certain causes (Mental Health Awareness; Abused Children in Need; A new wand for every student, even the ones whose families can’t afford it), and he gets other’s with deep pockets involved too.

Hogwarts as a whole grows, and with it so does Magical Britain.

There is a bit more that I have mostly ironed out and a lot more that needs more work, so this is only a sampling of what I’ve had floating around my head for the last several months. Hope you all enjoy!

#harry potter headcanon #hogwarts #hogwarts headcanon #minerva mcgonagall is the greatest witch who ever lived #fight me #Harry Potter #why is there no wizard's chess club at hogwarts #dont worry i fixed that

21 notes · View notes

veliseraptor · 1 year

Text

2022 Fanfiction Round-Up

Total Year-Long Wordcount: 388,095 words written, though obviously not all of those ended up getting posted, since a lot of them were in WIPs that continue to be WIPs.

This year I wrote and posted: 36 fics, apparently. Which is more than I thought it was going to be! I feel sort of like this was a year where I was more chugging along with things than spinning them out into complete projects but I guess that wasn’t wholly accurate.

Overall Thoughts

Looking back, did you write more fic than you thought you would this year, less, or about what you’d predicted?

Less, I think, but also…I feel like I wrote a pretty good amount, all things considered. More than last year, which is nice, since last year was…real rough, writing-wise. Though also an especially crazy year for me so that does make sense.

What’s your own favorite story of the year?

I waffled on this for a bit but ultimately I think the story that I’m proudest of from this year is our love would live a half-life on the surface. It wasn’t the story I expected to write when I started writing it in 2021 as my Big Bang fic for that year (and then ended up going a different direction because I didn’t think I had enough material to make up the length), but it ended up being stronger for the change (namely, the one where I realized that I’d been trying to write a fix-it proper and that wasn’t what I was writing at all).

Did you take any writing risks this year? What did you learn from them?

Hmm. Unfortunately I feel like I have to say that I don’t think I did. Which kind of troubles me (am I stagnating as a writer?) but I’m going to try not to fret about it.

From my past year of writing, what was….

My most popular story of this year: In terms of kudos, somewhere between the heart and the vein by a fair margin (812); interestingly enough 4 out of 5 of the most popular fics by that metric this year were Kinnporsche fics, though I guess that makes sense given shiny new active fandom.

Most fun story to write: It’s sometimes hard to think back and remember what was fun to write at the time, but I feel like I have to go with the reluctant shishi for this one, because that was a fic that just flowed out of me very quickly and easily and I enjoyed pretty much the entire experience of writing, which is so rare.

Story with the single sexiest moment: I apparently wrote a shockingly minimal amount of smut this year, it turns out! Startling and appalling, what was I thinking. (I’m joking. Mostly.) I’m also in kind of a weird place with respect to my smut right now where I don’t feel like any of it is actually hot, so that’s making answering this sort of difficult. So I’m just going to leave that alone before I get too in my feelings about it.

Most “Holy crap, that’s wrong, even for you” story: It’s not really the one I actually feel this way about but I do still feel kinda funny about The Hand That Feeds, not so much that I wrote it (I’ve definitely written worse) but that I posted it. I didn’t write a whole lot of badwrong fic this year, though, apparently. In some ways I think our love would live a half-life on the surface might be the one that best fits this, though it’s less wrong and more just…more nakedly messed up than a lot of other things I wrote this year.

Huh. I feel like I’m losing my touch.

Story that shifted my own perceptions of the characters: I wouldn’t say it shifted my perception, exactly, but writing the rest of this world is gonna break your heart definitely got me thinking more about Jiang Yanli than I have most of my time in this fandom.

Hardest story to write: But so many of them are hard in different ways, how am I supposed to choose one! I feel like I might have to go with the fair and the brave and the good must die because (a) it’s the first and closest thing to an actual Wangxian fic that I’ve written (or probably will write, ever), so I was working with characters I haven’t spent as much time thinking about and (b) I’ve been writing it for about three years (off and on) so clearly it was giving me many fits.

Biggest Disappointment: I continue to be frustrated with the fact that I can’t make myself be happy with Liability and continue to feel vaguely bad about it as a work. Same with on a narrow road, actually. I don’t know what it is about some works that just leaves me with a weird feeling of “this isn’t what I wanted it to be/this isn’t up to my standards” but…there you go.

Biggest Surprise: There are always several of these because of my habit of planning absolutely nothing, but I feel like special mention has to go to heel, stay for initially being a fic that was just “put Xue Yang in a muzzle” and ended up being over 20,000 words of relationship negotiation featuring ace Song Lan. Didn’t see that coming!

Most Unintentionally Telling Story: I don’t know that I’d call it unintentionally telling unless I’m making it that by answering this question, but I’m going to say that writing like a trigger (get me ready to shoot) was deeply therapeutic to me.

Favorite Opening Line(s):

Once he reached a certain age, Xue Yang learned that mostly people didn’t touch you unless they wanted to hurt you. (how bright you glow)

Vegas remembered the first time his dad hit him, but he didn’t remember why. (the edge of thorns)

Within thirty seconds of seeing Xiao Xingchen Xue Yang knew he wanted to fuck him. (spin me right round)

It was six months after the life Vegas had always expected to have was eviscerated like livestock in a slaughterhouse, and things were…fine. That really was the right word. Not good, not awful. Just…fine. (walking shadows)

The sun was starting to poke weakly through the heavy mist by the time Xue Yang stopped working. (our love would live a half-life on the surface)

Favorite Line(s) from Anywhere:

1. "You only want to stick around because I fucked with your head enough to make you think you love me,” Vegas said ruthlessly.

Pete punched him. (walking shadows)

2. He didn’t remember putting a collar on his own neck and handing the leash to Xiao Xingchen but he could feel it there now. Not like he was being pulled anywhere, or anything, just that there was the weight and the pressure and Xiao Xingchen held the leash so, so lightly that it was almost like he wasn’t holding on at all. (it hurts at first (but it ain’t that bad))

3. People looked at Vegas all the time. He wanted them to. He liked that they did. He’d made himself a lure for people like one of those deep sea fish using a light to draw in their prey, dazzling them before devouring them. Pete saw the gaping jaws full of teeth first and chased the light anyway. (like a trigger (get me ready to shoot))

4. He held still, but he didn’t look away, either. Just watched as Xue Yang shattered and shattered in the jaws of an emotion too big for his ruined soul to hold. (nurture the tiger)

5. He was his father’s hands and his father’s knife. Vegas the weapon, Vegas the monster, Vegas the attack dog, turned loose and brought to heel. Hands and a knife, or sparking wires, or pliers, a drill, shards of glass. (Finders Keepers)

6. He wished he didn’t know. He’d been happier not knowing. He’d rather be marked as disposable, he’d realized, than erased as invisible. There was something bitter about realizing that he’d been both. (Once You Are Real)

7. On bad days Vegas wished they’d just gone with a nice, clean execution. It made him feel a little better that Kinn probably felt that way too, so by still being alive Vegas could ruin that for him. (cuddle you in the undertow)

8. He had years of ingrained loyalty and training that dictated that the bodies of the family – main and minor – were sacrosanct, to be protected. And now there were bruises on Vegas’s face and a gunshot graze on his arm and Pete had put them there. (somewhere between the heart and the vein)

9. She dreamed about it that night. Dreamed that she stood at Lotus Pier, looking out at the water, and she could feel her brothers at her sides – a-Xian on the left and a-Cheng on the right. But she didn’t want to turn her head and look. A-Xian took her hand with skeletal fingers, bone worn smooth. Welcome home, shijie, he said, in a voice like a terrible cold wind. But she wasn’t afraid. (this world is gonna break your heart)

10. Xiao Xingchen. Boundless compassion and kindness and generosity, heart full of open doors Xue Yang had snuck through like a robber into an unguarded house. But not for Xue Yang. (our love would live a half-life on the surface)

Top 5 Scenes from Anywhere You Would Choose to Have Illustrated:

The bit from nurture the tiger that’s just a (thoroughly battered, one-armed) Xue Yang sitting with a (fierce corpse) Song Lan outside and having a full-on emotional breakdown.

Ghost Wei Wuxian being really fucking mean to Lan Wangji from the fair and the brave and the good must die, actually. I think that one would be fun to see visually rendered.

Pretty much anything from this world is gonna break your heart with Jiang Yanli and Xue Yang, though maybe especially the scene where he first sneaks up on her while she’s practicing her demonic cultivation skills.

I can think of several from (you give me) fever that would be fun to see but maybe at the top of that list is sick, semi-delirious Vegas in a blanket cape.

Honestly anything from the Vegas/Pete smut I’ve written the latter half of this year. I miss smut art. That’s not the only reason this one’s on here but it is part of it, while I’m fantasizing about imaginary art of my fic.

Fic-writing goals for 2023:

I have a whole collection of fics I really want to finish, but at the top of that list I think are: the concussed Xiao Xingchen fic (been in the works for forever), the Xue-Yang-haunting-Song-Lan fic (also been in the works for almost as long), and making at least a significant amount of progress on both Redux and Walking Far From Home, if not finishing one (or both).

Finish et ipsi sunt jacula. I’m parsing this one out separately because I think it’s been on this list for at least two years now and I would really like to just fucking. Finish the damn thing.

Last thing on here I wanna say…write something really fucked up. Don’t care what it is or for what fandom. Just make it fucked, Lise. Go for it.

#fanfiction round up #confessions of a frustrated writer

21 notes · View notes

leafdrake-haven · 9 months

Text

I know it’s a bit early to be thinking about it but I just wanted to give a heads up.

I will most likely not be putting together a Fantober this year (I’ve just got a lot going on and idk if I’ll have the time/motivation)

You guys can use old prompts though if you want or other people can throw together events (which was always true, I don’t own doing fun fandom events xD)

But I just wanted to throw that out there early in case other people DID want to put something together, or if nothing else at least not be too disappointed very close to the event.

I know I have been less active lately, but I still want to get back into the swing of things eventually! I hope everyone is having fun and staying safe with all the crazy weather!

#tabby talks #mtg fantober #too many things going on #august is going to be So Much xD #good things but still Things #it’s been a weird summer #who knows maybe by then I’d participate in a fantober #but when i host it i like to try to read and comment on everyones’ entries if i can #and historically i start slacking and feel bad #so I’m just cutting to the chase this year xP

6 notes · View notes

justmeinatree · 10 days

Note

i love talking about my writing so i do not mind all the questions 😂 i've been part of too many fandoms to name here but some of the ones i was the most involved in include Supernatural (still love the show, just don't engage with the fandom much anymore), the MCU (stopped watching the movies after Endgame, went to see Eternals because Harry was in the post credits scene and then fell asleep halfway through and missed him), Star Wars (was more into this when i was younger, these days the only Star Wars media i really care for is Rogue One and nobody else seemed to like that movie lol), Star Trek (mostly TOS), Doctor Who (same thing as Supernatural, still love it just not in the fandom anymore, and the 12th Doctor is my favorite <3), Community (still love the show, probably going to be getting back into the fandom when the movie drops), Les Miserables (i've read the book, seen the Hugh Jackman movie too many times to count, and saw a performance of it a few years back! still love the musical but the fandom feels like it's mostly dead now), Harry Potter (for obvious reasons, I have distanced myself from this one as much as possible but I was a Ravenclaw if anyone was wondering), the Throne of Glass books by Sarah J Maas (actually planning to reread this over the summer! may get back into the fandom, we'll see) and I've been active in the fandom for just about every mainstream horror franchise (and plenty of the more obscure ones too lol). I could probably spend hours creating a comprehensive list of fandoms but i think this is enough for now, unless you're just dying to know more 😂 i started writing in first grade, so around 6 years old. i've known i want to be a writer almost my entire life. i think the first bit of fanfic i ever wrote was for Harry Potter actually, but i don't remember anything about it. and i don't actually know what got me into reading fanfic...i just kind of always remember it being my go-to form of entertainment when i was bored. i am SO sorry for putting a whole novel in your askbox...apparently we're both in very chatty moods today lol

dialogue is the hardest thing for me to write because i always have to rewrite the conversation ten times before i feel like it sounds the way two people would actually speak. i'm much better at giving overly flowery descriptions of the space, and of character's appearances, emotions, etc. i tend to try and limit dialogue as much as i can when possible. my other writing crutch is semi-colons...i simply cannot go a paragraph without including one.

now the pressure is on to keep the fic good for the two of you 😂 i think this is the first time i've been told that two of my readers were talking about my fic beyond the comments section.

i think she's 3 years old? but i always forget. i'll have to ask my mom next time i call her, she's the one that keeps track 😂

-🤘

wow, i cannot comment on any of the fandoms 🫣 don’t rip me apart or anything but i’ve literally never watched a single movie or episode related to any of them 😅 to be fair though, i rewatch the same like 10 tv shows on repeat and i’m not much one for movies 😬 but still that’s so impressive ! HOW did you find so many things that you enjoyed enough to join a fandom ? honestly love all of that for you, and apparently i need to broaden my horizons 😅

that’s crazy how it’s so opposite for us ! conversation is so easy for me to imagine. i wouldn’t even know how to avoid it 😅 semi colons !! never use those bad boys but i’m told i use too many commas. love me a good comma 😂

SHE’S SO CUTE !! i’ve seen the photos you sent and omggg she’s seriously adorable. i don’t know what i was picturing but honestly she’s surpassed the image ! such a fkn cutie 😍😍

#asks #🤘anon

1 note · View note

ashandflower · 7 months

Text

confessions of a pissed-off wannabe marauder

I once was a Harry Potter fan.

I was given the first book as a gift from a relative and refused to read it for a while. Then I read it and fell in love with it. I was maybe seven or eight at the time. I refused to read the next books for a while but eventually got around to the Chamber of Secrets, then Prisoner of Azkaban, and so forth.

I remember the deep and abiding HATRED little ten-year-old me felt for Umbridge. I remember feeling like I’d been punched in the stomach upon Sirius’s death. By the time I got to Deathly Hallows I was just sort of numb. Although I did feel excess shock upon Fred Weasley’s death.

I never much liked arguments. Or romance. Half-Blood Prince and Goblet of Fire were a bit of a drag that way. I don’t really give a fuck about who snogged who, you know? I just want my magic and friendship and mystery. And it was amazing when that came.

Then the transphobia came.

For a while I was still a Harry Potter fan. Desperately clinging onto a fading specter of escapism I no longer had, and I knew it. I refused to accept it though. Crying over why did JK have to do this, why won’t she apologize, why why why. Then everyone else starts pointing out things wrong with the series and I start shutting down.

Eventually I left the Harry Potter fandom. For my own good. The reassurances that ‘the books are yours now’ didn’t help. I tried to replace it with The Owl House, but it didn’t work for… convoluted reasons. I don’t feel comfortable explaining the whole story here.

I somewhat enjoy HP fanfiction now, because really the entire fandom hates JK at this point and if another fan is writing the characters I have the comfort of knowing they aren’t the same as canon. I don’t have to live with the worry that they carry the same prejudices as that bitch and goodness knows what else besides.

I have three very close friends in a group with me. Sometimes I mentally aliken us to the Marauders, it’s fun. But then I look at us and I feel guilty. We all grew up with Harry Potter and I may enjoy fanfiction, but my friends and to an extent me are people JKR actively hates and looks to destroy. And yes, before you ask, two of us are trans.

Oscar. Half-asian and brown. Funniest kid I’ve ever known, absolutely full of life, can perfectly contrast between serious and funny. Get yourself a friend like Oscar. But even so, he is half-asian, and I can’t help but feel JKR would dismiss him or use him to pat herself on the back. Harry Potter is undeniably a very white story, and also he’s a trans ally. Unforgivable I know.

Aaron. A trans boy who came out last year. Has the most sanity out of all of us. If there was ever a voice of reason he is it. Acts the least crazy, is the least crazy. But in JKR’s eyes, he is crazy. A ‘poor lost lesbian being groomed into being a boy’. How cute, she’s pretending she cares about lesbians. But she remains insistent that trans boys- that Aaron – are being exposed to ‘conversion therapy’. She pities Aaron for problems he does not have. She views Aaron as a ‘problem’. She likes to think she’s ‘saving Alice’ instead of destroying Aaron. (Alice is not Aaron’s actual deadname. But I do not think I have the right to reveal it in a public place.)

Ashley. Oh GOD Ashley. Loud, popular, liked by pretty much everyone, absolute best friends with Aaron. JKR hates her guts. In her eyes she is not Ashley but a ‘penised individual’. ‘A fox pretending to be a hen to get into the henhouse’. She sees her and girls like her as dangerous. She actively wants her GONE. I feel like she’d kill her if she could. She is nothing short of a threat to the existence of Ashley and girls like her.

And me. Since I’ve revealed everyone else��s real names I may as well reveal mine.

Rose. I prefer Rose Helen because Helen is my middle name and I think Rose Helen sounds cooler. I try to find somewhere to escape, I hang with my friends, sometimes we do stuff together. I think of myself as perfectly normal (Thank you very much. Haha.). I do lean into the oracle-card herbal-charm parts of witchcraft and enjoy it. I also happen to be a trans ally and someone hurt over JKR’s comments, or at least I have hurt feelings.

She’s also rather misogynistic, I’ve noticed. The treatment of Lavender and Parvati, calling Fleur a cow and mocking her accent in the text when she did NOTHING wrong, and there’s the fact that she praised Matt Walsh for ‘What is a Woman?’. I’ll say it now. If you ally with Matt Walsh, take the word ‘feminist’ out of any part of your identity.

Someone once asked her what she did knowing she’d lost so many fans over her transphobia. She replied ‘I dry my tears with my checks’ or something along those lines. Seeing that, I think, was the moment that really solidified it for me.

JKR doesn’t care about me. Who knows if she ever cared? I’m a pound note in her eyes. A piece of insignificant, lost money. And who cares about losing a pound when you’re a millionaire? An awful, dangerous, bigoted millionaire.

My friends she hates. Me she hates. And who knows if she cared before? She’s nothing but a transphobic, sexist prick who doesn’t know how minorities work.

I’m into the fanfiction Marauders. But I look at us – a collection of people JKR actively hates – and I can’t help but wonder if I’m hurting my friends too.

Imagining us as creations of a bigot. A bigot who wants us gone.

Fuck Joanne.

#harry potter #marauders #this sucks #fuck jkr

2 notes · View notes

cr-noble-writes · 11 months

Note

Fic writer asks, 17, 18, 29!

17. What’s something you’ve learned about while doing research for a fic?

Back when I was writing for the Supernatural fandom, I learned a lot of things about real life pagan religions and magic systems. At one point I did like 4 days of research to write a ritual that got one line in the fic I wrote it for haha

18. What’s one of your favorite lines you’ve written in a fic?

The Citadel still hangs in Earth’s sky, the tattered form of its broken arms reaching out as if to embrace the planet.

29. Share a bit from a fic you’ll never post OR from a scene that was cut from an already posted fic.

So, I have a bunch of letters from Kaidan to Shepard after an ending in which Shepard does not survive. I will never post them because I can't not give my boys a happy ending. But here's one of them

14 Feb 2187 CE, 23:12 GST

Message from: Capt. Alenko, K.

Message to: Cmd. Shepard, J.

Today’s been hard. You know, Valentine’s Day and all that. I’m still on extended shore leave, so I’ve been staying with my parents. Unfortunately, that means its a lot easier to see people celebrating the holiday.

I don’t how I’m ever going to get past this, Shepard. After everything we went through together, I just really thought we might finally get to have a happy ending. I keep expecting to have a response from you every time I open a terminal. Or something from Command saying you’re actually still alive on some planet in another system and it just took some time to find you. I mean, we never found your body. Even though I know there’s no way you survived that blast at such close range, there’s a part of me that can’t help but hope, you know.

This is so much harder than… last time. Going through this a second time… opens the old wounds. I started having nightmares again. Nothing as bad as yours were, but bad enough that I’ve been avoiding sleep. Probably part of why the doc won’t clear me for active duty. I wish she would. I’m going stir crazy stuck here.

Before all this, I’d always planned on coming back to Earth. It was home, you know. Where I belonged. But now, I feel like I don’t belong anywhere. No matter where I go, you’re not going to be there. And I belong with you. So, without you where the hell am I supposed to go?

Anyway, mom’s calling me. I think she’s worried. With good reason, I guess.

I’ll write again soon. I miss you.

Kaidan

#crnobleanswers #ask games #fanfic writer asks

3 notes · View notes

silentgirlspeaksout · 2 years

Text

The Terror: Book vs. Show

So I impulse bought The Terror novel a few weeks ago, not knowing much about it. It was definitely a pretty gripping read at points, though it had it’s problems. Anyway, I decided to give the show a try because a friend recced it. I’ve watched the first three eps by now and wanted to share some thoughts (also didn’t want to drive my friends crazy spamming them with my hot takes). Idk if there’s much of an active fandom still, but if people are interested in my Terror hot takes for some reason I might do a liveblog or breakdown of future eps

Spoilers for the first three Terror eps and the whole novel

I guess I’ll start off by saying that I think the cinematography and overall vibe of the show is great. Very atmospheric.

I also think the cast has all been great so far, though some of them look a lot alike which makes things a bit confusing even for someone who’s mostly familiar with the characters

To address something more serious I appreciate that the show has made Lady Silence/Silna a more active character so far and has really toned down a lot of the racism and sexualization of her character. Obviously it’s important to be aware of the racism of the period and pieces that are trying to realistically depict the time period (minus the giant bear monster) shouldn’t ignore it. But in the books there are a lot of scenes where she is nude and characters spend a long time thinking about her breasts/pubic hair (I think the author has a thing about pubic hair it comes up a lot) and it comes of as very creepy especially because she’s somewhere in the mid-to-late teens (we’ll see how this hold up).

On that note I’m also glad that they’ve aged Silna up. Her ending up with Crozier bothers me less now seeing her as an adult woman

Silna already seems a lot more dynamic in the show, in the books she’s very unexpressive and stoic, also she doesn’t have a tongue (like her father does in the show, not sure if she’ll lose it at some point) and doesn’t make any real attempt to communicate with the men. She’s just sort of mysterious and there which works ok in the beginning but really drags as pretty much nothing about her gets revealed until the very end (and then it’s revealed that she’s basically just been sitting around waiting to marry Crozier which ugh)

It’s also interesting that that Crozier (and a few other people) can speak her language in this version. On one hand I’m in favor because it will let them have some actual relationship development with some of the other characters (in the books she has a bit with Irving but that’s about it). And possibly give her a motivation to stick around other than her having a vision about marrying someone. Though I also wonder how they’re going to justify her not just... explaining what the Tunbaaq is. So far she seems to be isolating herself but that can’t last forever, though I guess she could revert more to her book characterization

I like that they haven’t shown much of the Tunbaaq yet, definitely keeps the suspense up

Sir John is more likable in this version, he’s still a pompous and bigoted fool but they do focus a lot on how much he cares for his men, whereas in the book he seemed a lot more self-centered and foolish. I was a bit sad when he died in this version, whereas in the book he really was a Manifestation Of The British Imperialist Mindset and I was kind of waiting for him to die

The one visual issue I’ve had with the show so far was him being dragged across the ice, it just looked a bit goofy to me somehow? Then snapped back to horrible when he fell down the ice hole to that coal bucket

Hickey is also a lot more ambiguous as a character, in the book he’s revealed to be terrible pretty early on, whereas here a lot of his actions seem shady but also more understandable. Also in the book the man he’s caught having sex with is intellectually disabled, whereas the guy in the show seems pretty intelligent and also honestly screws Hickey over. I’m wondering whether they’re just waiting to reveal how messed up Hickey is or if he’ll be more of a tragic character who felt he was driven to extremes (or there might be more of a divergence ig, I also assume some of this may because having your main villain be a deranged gay sexual predator doesn’t fly as easily as it did in the early 2000′s. Though I guess Outlander did it)

Honestly a lot of the characters seem at least a bit lighter than in the books, which I think is good. In the books there were only two or three characters I was that attached to, which made me much less invested

They’ve also gone with a more liner narrative in the show, the first part of the book bounces around the 2nd and third winters in the ice, so I think that makes things less confusing

Goodsir was my fav character in the book and I think they’re doing him justice so far, though they don’t really go into how much a lot of the other characters look down on him at first

I love the opening

Anyway overall I’m really enjoying the show so far and I think I’m in favor of most of the changes that have been made, though I’m curious how they’ll effect things dow the line ;)

#The Terror #The Terror AMC #francis crozier #james fitzjames

11 notes · View notes

oldjane · 2 years

Text

Okay, so, full disclosure, I wrote this fic originally for another fandom, but someone (cough @yusufs-stew-of-romance cough) told me I needed to do the environmentally responsible thing and recycle it. So have some phone sex operator Nicky.

“Oh, God, there he goes again!”

Joe held two pillows to his ears.

Booker and Andy were listening intently to the sounds coming from the flat next door.

For weeks, Joe had been complaining about his new neighbour. He was… loud. And Joe wouldn’t have been so upset if he had been banging around with pots and pans, or playing dubstep, or singing under the shower, or even yelling at an unruly pet at all hours of the day and the night. But he was really miffed that at all hours of the day and the night, he heard… moaning. Panting. Swearing. An endless litany of Oh yes and Feels so good and Gonna come soon and Italian pet names.

His neighbour was having a lot of very loud sex.

And it bothered Joe like hell.

He had not been seeing anybody since almost three years ago, when he’d gotten dumped by his boyfriend of almost ten years. Not that Joe missed Merrick, the bastard, but he did miss sex.

And he was really horny.

And his fucking – no pun intended – neighbour wasn’t helping at all.

So after weeks of no sleep, and ever-growing desperation over the sounds coming through the flimsy walls of his small flat, his friends had decided to come over to check it out for themselves.

“That is indeed loud,” Andy observed, after a couple of minutes of moaning and grunting.

Joe shuddered.

“And don’t believe him when he says he’s close, either. It goes on and on and on. Sometimes for more than an hour, and then fifteen minutes later it starts again.”

“Well, at least he’s got stamina?” Booker drily remarked.

“And so does his girlfriend, apparently,” Andy replied. “Or is it a boyfriend, Yusuf?”

“That’s the worst part…” Joe stated. “I think he’s banging several people.”

“Really?” Andy sounded way too interested for somebody who had been married for a decade. “Why do you think that?”

“Well,” Joe hedged. “Sometimes he will keep repeating a pet name, like tesoro. And then another time he will only call out a completely different pet name, like amore, and yet other times he will not use any pet names. And he never uses actual names, that I’ve heard.”

“So your neighbour picks up hook-ups literally every day?” Booker asked, incredulously, and maybe just a bit impressed.

“A bit jealous, Le Livre?” Joe smirked. “But yes, he does. A lot of the times more than one per day, even. And then he has insanely loud and often long sex with them.”

“Dude,” Booker replied, “do you think he’s a gigolo?”

“Uh!” Joe exclaimed. It’s not like he hadn’t thought along those lines either. “I don’t know. I don’t really care, either. All I know is his constant banging is making me horny and I need to go get a hook-up of my own before I literally go crazy!”

“Oh, Yusuf,” Andy piped up, “maybe go over to his flat and see if he’ll give you a discount.”

Joe groaned. Next door, the moaning had now changed into loud swearing. Joe really hoped this was not another hour-long session.

“What I wonder, though,” Andy said after they’d been sitting a few minutes, listening to the activities next door, “is why you don’t get even with him.”

“Like, have loud sex multiple times a day myself? If only I could, Andy, because fuck, I need a dick up my ass like yesterday.”

“Too much information, bro!” Booker exclaimer, to which Joe merely glared. It wasn’t like Booker didn’t tell them each and every new position he’d ever tried in way too graphic detail. Or, for that matter, hadn’t asked Joe for advice when he wanted to try anal sex with one adventurous girlfriend. At least he hadn’t ever come back describing how it went, so Joe could only hope he hadn’t been into it.

Andy laughed.

“I meant like put a movie on full volume or something, but your plan might be even better, Joe.”

Joe shrugged. He didn’t think loud movie sounds or music or whatever would deter the stud next door, so he’d never tried. And maybe, secretly, he’d jerked off once or twice listening to his neighbour, but the gang definitely didn’t need to know that, like, ever. The sounds were too loud, and went on too often, but god if Neighbour didn’t have the most sexy voice, and the most sultry moans, and –

Joe stopped himself.

“Well, yeah, as I said, would that I could. I’m seriously getting desperate.”

“Jesus, man,” Booker said. “Just download some porn and jerk off, it’s not that hard.”

“I don’t even like porn, though,” Joe replied, truthfully. “Have you ever seen gay porn? It’s totally unrealistic.”

“And straight porn isn’t?” Booker sniggered.

“How would I know?” Joe retorted. “But that’s not even what bothers me most, I think. I just… it’s too… static, I think? I think I’d like it better if somebody could talk to me or something? I don’t know.”

“Find yourself an onlyfans account of some hot guy then. Or a good looking camboy.”

“Really, Andy?” Joe raised an eyebrow. “Am I the only one who finds it strange how much Andy knows about the world of online sex?”

“She’s not wrong, though, bro,” Booker said calmly.

“No, thanks,” Joe waved the suggestion off. “It’s weird to look at a headless body playing with a dildo. And besides, that shit gets expensive really fast.”

“Seems you know quite a bit about it yourself, Yusuf,” Andy snorted.

“May I remind you I have not seen any action in like, this decade, Andy?” Joe replied, in a very dignified manner. “A man has his needs.”

“If you can’t afford online, you could always go the old-fashioned way. Phone sex is a lot cheaper.”

“Again, how the fuck are you so educated in these matters?” Joe exclaimed, hitting her with a pillow.

Booker joined in, and after a few minutes of raucous laughter, Andy declared herself the winner as the others laid flat on the floor trying to regain some breath.

In the quiet that followed, they noticed the blessed silence in the flat next door.

“Oh, thank god!” Joe exclaimed. “Let’s hope he’s done for the day.”

“Maybe we should go out anyway. Better safe than sorry, right?”

And for once, Joe couldn’t argue with Booker’s logic.

~~~

It was markedly silent next door, Joe marvelled, as he was laying spread out on his bed. He’d gotten home pretty late – or early, depending on how you looked at it – after the night out with his friends. It didn’t happen too often anymore now they were all respectable members of society with real, albeit somewhat shitty, jobs and actual adult responsibilities. And it wasn’t nearly as fun these days, when Andy left before midnight because she had promised Quỳhn to take her to breakfast. Booker at least had lasted until two a.m. or so, but then he too had bailed, claiming he needed to get some work done early the next morning or his boss would have his head. Joe had stayed and danced, bouncing up and down in a throb of strange bodies, grinding with some nameless guy occasionally. At about four, his dance partner had pointed to the hallway, and Joe had nodded, not really interested in the guy but willing to forget that for twenty minutes of heavy petting against the wall.

The only problem with twenty minutes of heavy petting against a wall was that it had left Joe aching for more.

He’d woken up late, sticky with sweat and his dick half-hard, and the usual heavy breathing and grunting he could hear next door hadn’t helped with calming down. Luckily, it had ended rather quickly – way faster than it usually did. Maybe Next Door Stud had picked up a disappointing partner for once.

Or maybe it had been really really good, Joe pondered, considering the absolute lack of further sounds for the last couple of hours.

Well, at least somebody on this floor was getting off, Joe mused. Maybe he should have gone home with the guy from yesterday, but Joe hadn’t been able to muster the enthusiasm to pretend to be into him after he’d come in his pants after just some grinding. Joe tried to take it as a compliment to his sex appeal, but he wasn’t about to go home with some guy who probably wouldn’t last long enough to deliver.

He thought about getting himself off, but he didn’t really have the energy. For once, he wished Next Door Stud would get going again. It didn’t always work, especially not when he was calling names and shouting compliments, but when it was just him moaning and whispering, it never failed to get Joe in the mood.

He remembered the conversation with Andy and Booker yesterday, about camboys.

Maybe they’d been onto something, Joe vaguely thought.

He grabbed his phone and started aimlessly googling some stuff. Nothing really stood out, though. The outrageous titles made Joe cringe rather than get hard and the cropped headless bodies in the thumbnails weirded him out.

Idly, he typed “gay phone sex” into the search bar, and was amazed at how many results popped up. Obviously, even in this era of video and social media, phone sex was still thriving.

Joe had no idea how to filter through the results, though. At least the camboy’s profile pics gave you something to go on.

He limited the search results to Amsterdam. Might as well, he thought, with no other filter criteria in mind.

As with the camboys, though, he was not interested in all the boastful claims. “Guaranteed to make you come in 2 minutes!” Seriously, Joe pondered, if I wanted somebody to not put in any effort, I could have gotten sucked half-heartedly in the bar yesterday. Some added blurry pictures of a face or a dick. No thanks, Joe thought.

He kept scrolling until he saw a link which intrigued him. It was just one word, “Destiny”. Interesting, he thought. Seemed like this guy was somewhat of a romantic. How on earth did that fit in with phone sex?

On an impulse, he clicked the link. On the page that opened, nothing much appeared, except some rates, a phone number, and a link to “Guidelines”. Joe ignored that, and stared at the number.

Then, he clicked away from the webpage, and sighed. He listened. Still nothing next door, though.

Ah, fuck it. He could always hang up. A bit nervous, he opened up his browser again and clicked on the number, listening to the dial tone. He almost chickened out again when somebody answered.

A deep, gravelly voice said into his ear: “Hi. Can I help you?”

Shit. What the fuck were the rules for this kinda stuff? Maybe Joe should have read the guidelines.

“Hello?” the voice repeated.

“Uh… yeah, uh, hi,” Joe stuttered.

“Hi,” the voice answered, light, easy.

“Uhm, yes, uh – well, uh…”

“Is this your first time?” the guy on the other end cut through the chase, not unkindly.

“Uh, yeah,” Joe mumbled. “Sorry, I don’t really –”

“Hey, no big deal,” the guy answered. “If you want to ask me some questions, go ahead.”

“Uh, what is your name?”

“Ah.”

The guy laughed, and it somehow felt like a million little bells cascaded down Joe’s spine.

“You go directly for the personal stuff, huh?”

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to…” Joe felt like an idiot.

“That’s okay. I can’t give you my real name, though. I could give you a fake one, if you’d like, but why don’t you choose a name for me, if you want?”

“Uh, okay, uhm, how about David?”

Joe had no idea why he chose that name. He thought he might have watched a movie with a character named David earlier this week.

The guy laughed again.

“Hmm, I like that. Like the statue by Michelangelo.”

He said Michelangelo with so much flourish that Joe nearly swooned. Italian, of course, Joe had already known that.

“I’m not sure you can live up to that,” Joe blurted out, then facepalmed. God, he was supposed to have phone sex, not insult the man.

A chuckle followed.

“Ah, well. How about you picture him, though? All those sexy muscles. Those strong arms, broad shoulders… Small waist… Intense stare… That your type? Maybe get comfortable while you imagine it, yeah?”

“Uh… okay.”

Joe was definitely imagining it now, that piece of male perfection. It was his type, as it happened, and if only he’d ever find a man who look like that, with a tight ass like that and large hands like that, he’d not need to call a phone sex line ever again. He thought he’d better do as suggested, seeing as the guy knew how this shit was supposed to work. So he laid back against his pillows, turned his phone on loudspeaker and pictured a perfect specimen of Italian naked man.

He wondered if the David he was talking to looked even remotely like this. Because that, combined with his smooth, velvety voice, could explain why he managed to get sex at all fucking hours of every fucking day.

“So, are you comfortable?” David asked in his ear, whispering.

It startled Joe. He’d almost forgotten what they were doing here.

“Uh, yeah. Picturing the statue. You think anybody looks like that in real life?”

David laughed melodiously again.

“Probably not, but we can dream, right? Tell me, what would you like?”

“Uhm…”

Joe had no idea. He’d never engaged in phone sex with any of his boyfriends, so how the fuck did you go about it?

David whispered again, softly.

“Do you want me to tell you what I am doing?”

“Uh, yeah, sure,” Joe said, uncertain.

David moaned softly.

“I am imagining you… your body… your big dick…”

Stupid, Joe thought. David had no clue how big his dick was.

“Uh, David? Maybe you can talk about yourself?”

“Mmmm. I’m hard already. I want to make this last, though. Do you want me to start jerking off?”

Even more ridiculous, Joe thought. What was it to him whether David jerked off or not? How was that supposed to get him anywhere?

“Sorry,” he said. “Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea…”

“We don’t have to do this if it’s not your thing,” David said, his voice calm, but soft, a bit hypnotizing. He really had a great voice for this kind of thing, Joe thought. “You can just hang up, if you’d like. Or we could talk a bit, see if the mood still strikes in a few minutes.”

Suddenly Joe had an idea.

“Uh, wait. Maybe you can… Nevermind. It’s probably stupid…”

“Hey,” David interrupted. “Just get it out. I can always say no, and then you hang up, no harm done.”

“Okay,” Joe agreed. “Uhm, I was wondering, if maybe, you could just… you know, instead of describing stuff… just let me listen to you? I mean, while you… make yourself feel good?”

A beat passed, and Joe wanted to hang up, mortified, but then David spoke again, intimately.

“Yeah. Yeah, I can do that. No problem.”

Good, Joe thought, as David softly started breathing in his ear. Gradually the breathing became heavier, faster, shallower, and Joe felt something stir in his boxers. He didn’t speak, and David seemed to understand that he should continue. He started moaning quietly, and then a bit louder, occasionally breathing out a soft Mmmmm, yeah or So hot. It really was rather sensual, Joe thought, listening to somebody pleasuring themselves. Just as David became a bit more vocal though, moaning louder, Joe’s peace was rudely interrupted by the usual sex noises next door.

Fuck, Joe thought. Fuck.

He didn’t want to hear his neighbour getting off, he wanted to hear David getting off.

And he definitely did not want to hear moaning and grunting in stereo.

And then he almost yelled out loud.

In fucking stereo.

He covered the speaker of his phone with his hand.

The sounds continued. Behind the thin wall, he heard moaning, gradually getting louder.

Holy fucking god.

“David?” Joe said.

“Yeah?” the answer came quickly.

“Could you call me darling?”

He put the phone under his pillow before David could reply and moved as close to the wall as possible.

“Sure, darling,” he heard from his neighbour’s bedroom.

Holy. Fucking. God.

He was having phone sex with his neighbour.

Fuck, fuck, fuck.

What to do now? Hang up? Continue? That last one was really not much of an option, as Joe’s semi was now completely flaccid again. He still heard David moaning, harder now, faster.

Oh, for the love of all that was holy. Joe pulled on some jeans and a shirt, and picked up his phone again.

“David?”

“Yes, darling?”

Oh, shit, the dude was good.

“Are you getting close?”

“Do you want me to, darling?”

“Yes, please,” Joe said, standing up and walking to his front door.

“Okay, darling… I’m close… I’m gonna come for you, darling…”

Joe stepped out in the hallway.

“Okay, David… I want you to come for me… Let me hear you come…”

Joe pounded on his neighbour’s door with all his might.

“Are you gonna come, David?”

He kept battering the door as loud as he could. He could hear his efforts through the phone.

“Uh, yes, darling,” David said, sounding a bit flustered, irritated.

“Come on then, David! Do it!”

Joe didn’t let go of his pounding, now adding some kicking for good measure. David was going to have to deal with this somehow, right?

Sure enough, he heard in his ear: “Just one second, darling… nearly there… Gimme just one second, okay?”

The sound went muffled, as if David had put his hand on the microphone.

Joe stopped his pounding just as the door opened to a furious looking guy who definitely was not seconds away from coming. He was fully clothed, his jeans were all buttoned up, and he definitely wasn’t out of breath.

“What the fuck?” he said, obviously enraged but quietly, with his phone in his hand.

Joe lifted his own phone.

“Hi, David.”

~~~

David was actually really hot, Joe noted, especially with that bewildered look in his pretty eyes, looking from Joe to Joe’s phone to the one in his own hand. And his hands did look rather big, too. And he stood with his hips tilted, a little bit like the statue.

Joe swallowed.

“What… Is this you?” David gestured to his phone.

“Uh-uh.” Joe nodded, and added for good measure, “Unless you’re having phone non-sex with two people who call you David right this very minute, of course.”

“Shit.”

David ended the call, and ran his hand through his hair. Messy, Joe observed, but somehow sexy. Nicely tousled.

“So,” Joe said. “I’m your neighbour, in case you didn’t realize.”

“Shit,” David repeated.

“Yeah,” Joe agreed.

“Fuck.”

“Well, that’s what I called you for, right?” Joe quipped, and then he couldn’t help himself. This whole situation was really too embarrassingly preposterous, and he laughed out loud.

For a few moments, David stared at him, trying to debate whether to yell at him or laugh alone, until he decided on the latter.

Joe pocketed his phone and leaned against the doorpost, laughing until his sides hurt. David mirrored him, standing in front of him.

“God, I’m sorry,” Joe said as he regained some of his bearing. “I’m not laughing at you, I swear.”

“Yeah, sure,” David answered. “You might as well come in.”

He pulled the door wide open, and gestured for Joe to step through.

“You sure?” Joe grinned. “Wouldn’t want to hold you back. Weren’t you right on the verge of an orgasm?”

“Oh, shut up,” David answered.

“No, seriously,” Joe giggled again. “I’m gonna want my money back. You promised me you were gonna come for me.”

David raised an eyebrow.

“Oh, so you want a show, then?”

Joe sputtered.

“What? No! I just…”

He caught David trying to hide his laughter behind his hand.

“Oh, fuck off, you wanker.”

“I wasn’t the one wanking.”

Another perfect eyebrow raise. It did things to Joe, truly, it did. He never knew he was into raised eyebrows.

“You think I was? I was fucking pounding on your door, I didn’t have a hand free.”

David looked at him, unimpressed, until they burst out in laughter again. Joe let himself fall down on a comfortable looking couch, and moved over to the side as David sat down beside him.

They stared at each other for a moment.

Joe took in David’s bright eyes, his strong jawline, his broad shoulders. He let his gaze wander a bit, over David’s chest, down to his hips, his legs in tight, ripped jeans. Not bad, Joe decided. Not bad at all.

Probably better than the marble David he’d been picturing earlier. More real, at the very least. Warmer, too.

Although the marble David was showing off his splendid muscles, his taut ass, and his impressive package, and real David kept all of those hidden. Joe wondered about real David’s assets.

He heard a small creak as David moved on the couch, and Joe quickly whipped his eyes back up to David’s face, before he got lost in trying to imagine what David was hiding underneath his clothes.

“So, David,” Joe started, but he was interrupted.

“Nicky. My name is Nicky.”

Joe looked over pointedly.

“I thought you couldn’t give me your real name, Nicky.”

Nicky shrugged.

“Okay, Nicky. I’m Joe.”

“Better than darling.”

It was Joe’s time to raise an eyebrow, but Nicky didn’t react.

“So, Nicky,” Joe tried again, “I must say I’m a lot less jealous of your sex life now.”

“Huh, what?”

Nicky seemed confused.

“God, I thought you were having sex literally all the time! But you were just faking it for your customers, weren’t you?”

“Mmmm,” Nicky replied. “You could hear all that?”

“Flimsy walls, Nicky.”

“Shit. I’m sorry. I didn’t think about that.”

“Oh, well. At least now I don’t think you’re the biggest playboy in the Low Countries anymore. I honestly was so confused. It sounded like you were banging somebody else every hour.”

“Ah. Well. As you found out, I try to be… accommodating.”

Joe smirked.

“You were very accommodating. Calling me darling, asking me if I wanted you to be close. That should have been my first clue, by the way.”

“Yeah, well. Usually there’s really nothing sexy about it for me. I need to keep my focus. I’m flattered you thought I could go five or six times a day though.”

“This is probably where I confess I have tried to curse you with a crippling loss of stamina.”

Nicky looked over, pretending to be hurt, placing a hand on his heart in a huge, floundering dramatic gesture.

“What?” Joe replied, grinning widely. “I’m sure it didn’t actually affect anything.”

“Let’s hope so,” Nicky stated. “Otherwise at least I know where you live, to come punch you in the face.”

Joe chuckled, and they sat in silence again, until Nicky turned on the couch, sitting cross-legged facing Joe.

“So why did you call me? If you had no idea what I was doing, I mean.”

Joe blushed.

“Ah, uhm, I mean – well, I have been single for quite a while and – well, hearing you getting laid all the time – or well, I thought you were getting laid, at least – anyway, it made me, well, you know – and I just wanted… some, uh, stimulation, I guess – uh, anyway, I – yeah.”

Nicky laughed.

“So you decided to call a random phone sex line for some help jerking off?”

“Fuck off. Your whole money-making scheme is based on lonely gays calling some random phone sex line for some help jerking off.”

“Hey. I wasn’t trying to make you feel bad. Especially since you were so sweet and innocent.”

“Really? I, uh – I had no idea what to do, really.”

“That much was clear,” Nicky chuckled. “But as I said, it was sweet. It was nice, actually, you not wanting me to describe how many fingers I had inside me or whatever.”

“Is that how it usually goes?”

Nicky shrugged.

“There’s all kinds, as I’m sure you heard. But I don’t really like that kind of stuff. I’m not good at imagining that shit. I usually keep it very vague. Some people don’t like that, and get angry. I don’t mind too much though, they’ll hang up and call somebody else and get their fix somehow.”

“But wouldn’t it be easier if you really played with yourself? I mean, it can’t be easy faking all that moaning and panting and yelling.”

“As we’ve established, ain’t nobody got the stamina for that. Besides, I usually work while I have somebody on the line.”

“You work? What do you do?”

“I’m an accountant,” Nicky said, blushing slightly. Joe found it endearing. “So, a lot of checking numbers on spreadsheets, usually.”

“Really? And you’re talking filth at the same time?”

“Yeah. It, it kinda helps me get in the zone? It was helping me make ends meet for a while, and then I guess it became a nice side gig, or something? I mean, it’s not like it’s hard work.”

Joe snorted, throwing a pointed look at Nicky’s lap.

“Not hard, he says.”

“Fuck off.”

Nicky swatted at his arm.

“I’ve said it before, dear David, that what I called you for.”

“Well,” Nicky said, and then stopped. He looked at Joe. His gaze was… heated.

“What?” Joe said, shifting a little, a strange feeling fluttering through his stomach.

“It might be better without a phone. And you’re here anyway, so…”

Joe looked at Nicky. He really was hot. And he sounded really sexy when he fake moaned, it might be interesting to find out if it was even hotter if it was real.

Joe placed his fingers tentatively on Nicky’s chest. He felt Nicky’s heart beating.

“How much would you charge for that?”

“Shut up.”

Joe laughed, loud and free.

“And what about my curses to your stamina?”

“Shut up, Joe.”

“Will you answer your phone while we’re at it?”

Nicky pressed his lips to Joe’s mouth, and took advantage of Joe’s half-hearted protest to lick into it immediately. Joe kissed back, hard and deep, until they broke free, gasping for air.

“I told you to shut up,” Nicky whispered.

“I’d rather you make me scream your name,” Joe whispered back.

“Maybe not,” Nicky said, cutting off Joe’s protest with a kiss. “My neighbour might get upset.”

“Oh, fuck you,” Joe muttered.

“That’s what you called me for, after all,” Nicky managed to grind out, before they stopped talking all together.

~~~

Nicky’s moans sounded way fucking better from underneath Joe. And his stamina was not affected by Joe’s curses at all.

#i write things #twice apparently #joenicky #tog #the old guard #kaysanova

35 notes · View notes