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#which makes me think that maybe i just miss that kind of intimate attention
stillmonsterz · 1 month
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when you split the heart open
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pairing: heeseung x reader, jake x reader (kind of)
genre: smut, angst (?)
summary: heeseung is dating the girl of his dreams. the only problem? he has to have sex with her.
warnings: unprotected sex, swearing, voyeurism, name-calling, manipulation, exhibitionism, dubcon, public sex, humiliation (?), heeseung is a cuck
word count: 5.1k
---
Heeseung had a girlfriend, and she was amazing. She was pretty, smart, funny, and her body was out of this world. She had a particular vibrancy and joie de vivre that made spending time with her invigorating. She was the opposite of a dead fish in the bedroom- she was vocal, enthusiastic, and loved to please him.
He disliked having sex with her.
Sometimes he almost pitied her; she would seduce him in any way she could, winding her hips seductively, crawling towards him on the bed wearing nothing but thigh-high socks, rubbing his crotch under the table when they ate out, anything to catch his attention. Of course, he didn’t pass up a good fuck – he wasn’t insane – but it did nothing for him but provide a quick release.
It wasn’t like he didn’t love her, he did. He was convinced that someday, he could even marry her. It’s just that he found that he loved her best when she was farther away from him, someone he could admire rather than keep. Heeseung found her beautiful at 11 pm, when she would dance alone in her bedroom wearing a baggy T-shirt. Or when she would shove her face into her pillow and thrust the end of a hairbrush into her pussy. It was an amazing night when he had caught that- he had been parked outside of her apartment complex, so he got a side-view, and the camera he had set up in her closet gave him a perfect shot of her smooth legs and raised ass. The day after that, when they had had sex in his van, the memory of her chasing her orgasm got him to finish.
Heeseung was a voyeur, and he was starting to think that it was becoming a problem. And it wasn’t even a problem he could complain about; in a moment of weakness, he had told his best friend Jay that he didn’t like how frequently his girlfriend wanted sex, and Jay had heavily implied that Heeseung was gay.
He was getting really sick and tired of having to fuck his girlfriend all the time. Heeseung had suggested mutual masturbation, which backfired. It ended up being too intimate for him and it just got her hot. She had pounced on him and ridden him as if her life depended on it.
At times, he missed how things were before they started dating. He had met her at her job, and had never revisited. Instead, he had waited for her shift to finish, followed her home, and tugged himself dry while he watched her undress in her room. The curtains were too sheer, and sometimes she wouldn’t even draw them. It made him think she wanted him to see her, and the thought of that always made him harder.
She had approached him at the local grocery store, as he was buying ramen noodles. She had said that she had wanted to see him again, Heeseung had made up some excuse, and through a series of events that Heeseung hadn’t lived through so much as passively observed, they had ended up dating.
It had been eight months of dating, cuddling, and sex, and he felt exhausted. He wanted things to go back to normal, but he also loved spending time with her. So he started making up excuses to not sleep with her. Headaches, shifts at work, weird erections from his medication.
One day, a few days after their eight month anniversary where Heeseung had reluctantly eaten her out, she confronted him. They were sitting on his couch, playing Mario Kart, when she turned to him.
“Do you still like me?” she asked, voice shaky.
Heeseung shut the TV off immediately. “Huh? Of course I like you- baby, I love you.” He rested his hands on hers as they clutched the controller.
“Then why don’t you like sleeping with me?”
“No, no, I…” Heeseung hesitated. This was the perfect time to come clean. They could work things out, maybe. It would be good to get it off his chest. “Okay. Okay, I’ve been having a…problem. It has nothing to do with you, I promise.”
Her eyes were wide and glassy. She was wearing his large hoodie and a pair of dolphin shorts. She looked perfect. “A problem?”
“Yes, a problem. I…I…look. I like you. I love you. You’re my girl.” Heeseung reached out and stroked her cheek gently. “The problem is that you’re just…like an angel to me. It feels wrong when I…when I fuck you.”
“What?” It came out as a squeak, and she recoiled from his touch. “Feels wrong?”
“No, no, not that you’re wrong, it’s me, it’s that…” Heeseung sighed. “I like to look at you I like seeing you move, it’s like art come to life. It feels like when I touch you, I’m sullying something beautiful, something that needs to be kept clean.” Heeseung thought that if he made it sound more romantic and less like a paraphilia, she would be more inclined to hear him out. And to his glee, she slowly leaned into his touch again, her cheek rubbing against his hand.
“You find me beautiful?”
“You are the most gorgeous woman I have ever met,” he said, staring her in her luminous eyes. “Too gorgeous for me.”
“You aren’t,” she said imploringly, holding his wrist with her two hands. “Heeseung, I love you. And I really like having sex with you. Why did you sleep with me all those times if you didn’t enjoy it?”
“I did enjoy it, I did. I just…I wanted to make you happy, baby.” Heeseung kissed her forehead. “Your happiness matters the most to me. I’d do anything for you.”
“And I’d do anything for you,” she said, leaning in to kiss him on the lips. He kissed her vack, cupping her face in his hands.
“Anything for me?”
“Anything, Heeseung.”
“I have an idea.”
He clambered into his room and pulled out his hairbrush. “Just…just use this to get off, okay?” He handed it to her, and she accepted it slowly, turning it over like it was a foreign object.
His girlfriend looked up at him. “Right now?”
Heeseung shook his head. “Not yet. Hold on.” He ran to his room again and found an old handheld camcorder.
She squinted at it. “You’re going to film me?”
“No, it’s dead,” he lied. “See?” He showed her the black screen. “I’m just going to use this to mimic the feeling of….uh, awayness. Like an extra screen between you and I.”
She fiddled with the hairbrush, feeling its smooth wooden end with her thumb. “Well…I mean, I’m not really in the mood right now….”
“You’re always in the mood,” he replied, frustration slowly building in him. “I swear you’re like a dog in heat sometimes.”
His girlfriend’s eyes widened again. “What?”
“You’re always asking to get fucked. You’re like a nymphomaniac, I swear. I bet you go home and hump your pillows right after I turn you out because you just can’t get enough.” Heeseung had seen exactly that from one of his midnight excursions to her place.
“I’m not a nympho-,”
“Oh, yes you are. Whores like to get fucked less than you do. I can only imagine how much you got around before I cuffed you.” He saw her shove one hand down her dolphin shorts. He raised the camera with a smile.
“I’m a whore?” Her face was flushed, and her eyes were squeezed shut.
“You’re a whore who gets off to being called a whore. Good fucking thing you’re with me, or else you would have been taken advantage of already, especially with that slutty body of yours.”
To his growing delight, she had tugged her shorts off and slipped her dainty little panties off. The end of his hairbrush slipped deftly in and out of her glistening folds.
Heeseung stopped talking, as so not too ruin the footage with his voice. He just watched her circle her clit with her manicured fingers, watched her pussy swallow the hairbrush.
“Heeseung,” she moaned, and he scowled, cutting the video short.
“Don’t say my name,” he said. “And keep your eyes shut.” When her eyes fluttered shut, he turned the camera on. He stroked himself in time with the insertion of the hairbrush. Seeing her splayed out on his couch, her head tossed back, his hoodie riding up to expose her soft tummy…it was amazing. And the fact that she didn’t know he was filming her made it all the better. It was forbidden, it was wrong, it was perfect. When she came, she nearly said his name again, but she cut herself off instead. He didn’t let himself cum, but he moaned and pretended like he did too.
Heeseung kissed his girlfriend, licked the sweat off of her face. “Perfect,” he murmured. “So perfect for me.”
“Thank you,” she whispered.
The second she left his house, he sniffed the couch, the exact place where she had sat as they had played video games. Her scent was so strong; he buried his face into the faux leather and inhaled deeply. Heeseung closed his eyes, imagined her masturbating herself all alone in room, and finished all over the couch.
He was going to have so much fun.
The platonic aspects of their relationship stayed the same. They would have simple at-home dates, occasionally going out to restaurants or the movies or anywhere she liked. Heeseung didn’t really care what they did as a couple. He just liked to be around her.
They still had sex, but it had gone from several times a week to once every two weeks. It was still a dreaded task for Heeseung, but it balanced out now that they had incorporated his voyeuristic tendencies into their relationship.
On movie dates, he made sure to get tickets in a theatre with a sparse audience. Then, he would leave his seat, sitting a few rows back, and watch his girlfriend play with herself, fondling her tits and slipping a hand into her jeans. If they went to the beach, Heeseung would take her to a secluded spot, tell her to lie down on a towel, and to strip. She would sunbathe completely nude,  rubbing lotion all over herself.
When she would go out with her friends, Heeseung would periodically text her, asking her to unbutton a few of her buttons, or to send him a picture of her panties. He asked her to fuck herself in public bathrooms and to send videos for proof. He would lazily stroke his cock to the grainy footage of her sliding her fingers in and out of her tight pussy. When she told him that men were hitting on her, he would text, “Good job.” Then he would tell her to unbutton another few buttons, or to part her legs as she rode the subway. What he would really like would be for her to walk around dressed in a tiny little crop top that showed the underside of her breasts and shorts that displayed her bare ass, but Heeseung knew he was already asking for a lot.
A few times, he had strapped her to his bed with rope, so that her arms and legs were bound. He had affixed a phone-controlled vibrator between her thighs, and he watched her writhe on his bed with glee. Heeseung watched her have orgasm after orgasm, and if she begged him to stop he would get angry. He would complain that she had ruined it. He would pry her mouth open with his fingers, and she would suck him off to completion. Then he would start the process over again, until her face was flushed, her legs would shake, and he could even glimpse her pussy clenching around nothing. It was fun for him, but eventually he grew tired of watching it. He had tried making it more interesting by binding her fingers in front of her hole so she could tremblingly fuck herself, but the rush of that wore off too. Heeseung needed something more, something that could sate his urges.
So he had asked for something else.
---
“You want me to do what?” They were at a café, and she put down the croissant she had been nibbling.
Heeseung raised his hands. “You don’t have to do it. It was just a suggestion.”
“Heeseung, I know you’re struggling, but…nude karaoke?”
He sighed and looked away from her. “I know, I’m sorry. It’s just…it’s getting hard, you know. I love you, and I feel like I’m not good enough for you. It’s really messing with me, up here…” Heeseung tapped the side of his head. “I feel like a freak.”
Her face softened, and she reached out to hold his hand. “You’re not a freak, my love. You’re just…”
“A perv who wants his girlfriend to get nude in front of strangers.” Heeseung laughed humorlessly. “Yeah, I’m really normal.”
“You’re not a perv, either.” She swallowed. “I mean…this could actually be good for me. It could help me explore my sexuality more.” She squeezed his hand and mustered up a smile. “I think we should try it?”
Heeseung didn’t allow himself to smile. “Yeah? I mean, are you sure?”
“I’m sure,” she said firmly. “I want to do this.”
He leaned across the table and kissed her all over her face. “Thank you, thank you, thank you. You’re the nicest girl ever.”
That night was nude karaoke night at a local var. When they arrived, there were only a five dozen or so attendees, mainly men. They were sitting around a makeshift stage in wooden chairs that had been dragged from the surrounding tables. A woman was there, warbling a song as she swayed her hips. The men seemed bored, and Heeseung started to feel prideful. His girl, who was wearing a loose white dress and had folded her arms tightly around her chest, was so much prettier than that other woman. These men were going to shit themselves when she started to sing.
The woman finished her song, and the applause was scattered. Then his girlfriend slowly walked onto the stage, her heels clacking against the floor. Her hands were scrunched into fists. As she adjusted the mic, one man yelled, “Take your tits out, now!”
Another said, “Don’t look so shy, sweetheart.”
Heeseung was elated.
She introduced the song she was going to sing – Fade Into You by Mazzy Star. Heeseung had heard her sing that one; her voice had always sounded so melancholic, fragile, and sweet. He smiled at her encouragingly.
The intro to the song played, and she pulled her dress off, revealing her stunning body. The men whooped and cheered, hurling vulgarities at her. She tried to sing, clutching the microphone tightly, but the jeering was loud. As Heeseung scanned the small space, he saw that the men around him were either stroking their bulges covertly or outright jerking themselves off.
His girlfriend kept singing with her eyes closed. Heeseung wanted her to open them, so she could see the effect he was having on all of those men. They were all drooling after her, calling her a slut, saying that she must be tight, that they would fuck up whoever got to tap that pussy. Heeseung jerked himself off right there, joining in the orgiastic atmosphere of the cramped little bar. He watched her sing, his heart full.
When she finished, the patrons begged her to keep singing. They tossed money at her, wadded bills. She glanced at Heeseung, who nodded, and so she continued to sing, this time quietly crooning In The Mood For Love.
A man told her to play with her tits while she sang, and she did, running her thumb along her nipples. It was more than Heeseung could handle, and he came halfway through the song.
After her second performance, she hurried off of the stage, collecting some of the money before pulling her dress on. She ran out, which was smart, because the men were starting to clamor for her to do worse acts. Heeseung followed after her, and before he opened his car, he kissed her in the parking lot.
“That was amazing,” he whispered, kissing her again. “So amazing. Your voice is beautiful.”
She scoffed. “My voice?”
Heeseung shrugged playfully. “And, you know, your body. You looked sexy up there. Everyone thought so.”
His girlfriend rested her hands against his chest. “Did you think so?”
“Of course I did,” he said in a placating tone, stroking her hair. “Of course, baby.”
“You’re the only person I care about,” she said quietly.
“Me too.”
She hesitated. “Did you…like what I did? How did that make you feel, me going up there, naked, and…”
Heeseung tilted her chin up with his finger. “I loved it. I fucking loved it. I came in mere minutes. You’re amazing, baby.”
She reached out to hug him, and he wrapped his arms around her. Heeseung held her like she would slip away from him.
--
After that, she became different. Without even asking, she had started to wear tighter, shorter clothes. She used to go out in dresses, worn jeans, or she’d just wear his hoodies. Now, she wore bodycon dresses, miniskirts that practically gave you peeks of her ass, and she had cut her shirts up so that they displayed her midriff. It was amazing.
He liked to parade her around the mall now. The sight of men and women alike ogling his girlfriend made his cock so hard, he would walk with a limp. When he couldn’t handle it anymore, he would take her into the family bathroom, or slip into a change room and fuck her in there. Public sex was marginally better than regular sex with her, because he liked to imagine that men were fantasizing about her. He would close his eyes and imagine her naked, standing like a mannequin in a store, and all of the men who had lasciviously eyed her in the mall being forced to see her but unable to touch. It was a glorious time.
The novelty wore off after a few months, and he lost interest in having sex with her again. She could tell, and he knew that she was getting nervous. She performed at nude karaoke again, but even that did nothing for him.
He knew what he wanted from her.
On their first anniversary as a couple, Heeseung had taken her to brunch at a restaurant she had been eyeing. She wore this little black crop top with a tiny skirt, and her makeup was perfect.
Towards the end of their meal, Heeseung dabbed his mouth with a napkin. “Baby,” he began, staring her in the eyes, “you are my better half. I can’t believe I’ve been able to spend a full year with you. You’re so kind, so sweet, so understanding, and so gorgeous.” He reached out and kissed her hand, and she giggled. “You’re the light of my life. You’re my reason to go on, and you deserve the moon. Unfortunately, all I can offer you is this.” Heeseung pulled a small black box out of his jacket pocket.
With a smile so bright Heeseung swore it could cause flowers to bloom, she opened the box. She gasped when she saw the charm bracelet he had bought her. “Oh, Heeseung,” she said, covering her mouth with her hand. “This is so expensive.”
“You deserve it,” he said softly, taking the bracelet and slipping it onto her wrist. “You deserve the world, baby.”
“I have it right here,” she replied.
They shared a kiss, then Heeseung leaned into her ear. “I was thinking…we could make this anniversary even more special.”
Her lips curled into a mischievous little smile. “How?”
“You said you’d do anything for me, right?”
She pulled away from him slightly, her lips setting into a thin line.
“Right?” he asked firmly, taking hold of her hand.
“Of course,” she said frantically, “anything for you, my love.”
---
The motel that Heeseung had driven them to was shoddy and sleazy. There were people outside smoking on lawn chairs, and dilapidated cars filled the parking lot. The neon sign affixed to the window flashed its name: Ethan’s Motel. Heeseung ushered his girlfriend inside, and he took note of the people populating the motel. Tweakers, men in sweaty wife-beaters.
He wondered which one would give his girlfriend the best fuck.
In the end, he told her to find someone while he set up the rooms. She asked how, and he told her to just be upfront with them. Heeseung had bought two rooms, which stunk of dust and reeked of bodily fluids. He hid a small camera in a flower pot- his girlfriend didn’t know about that – and shoved a nail through the wall to make a small hole, just to cover his ass.
Then he went to the other room to set up his laptop, which showed the feed from the camera. He set that on the small desk directly in front of his bed.
Within ten minutes, his girlfriend was leading a man into the motel room. He looked around their age and had a shaggy mop of hair. He was shorter than Heeseung, so Heeseung figured that his dick was probably smaller, too. But his girlfriend wouldn’t mind that, he was sure- who knows how much random dick she’d bounced on before they dated? Anyways, her hookup looked nice enough, but then again, he was hanging around a place like this.
“What did you say your name was?” she asked, still holding his hand. She sat down on the bed, and the guy followed.
“Jake,” he said. “And yours?”
She told him her name, and he nodded.
“Well, you’re…you’re hot as hell,” Jake said, laughing awkwardly. He scratched the back of his neck. Heeseung was getting really pissed off, but he told himself to be patient.
“You’re not too bad yourself,” she said lowly, tracing a finger down Jake’s chest. Heeseung shivered. “I think you know how to please a woman, right?”
Jake smirked and slowly pushed Heeseung’s girlfriend down until he was hovering above her. “Come find out.”
Heeseung watched Jake make out with his girlfriend. He watched his girlfriend lie, refusing to even touch Jake. It made him frown. She was supposed to be enjoying this. He wanted to see her in the throes of ecstasy, wanted to see her in all of her hedonistic glory.
Finally, she kissed Jake back, and he started taking his clothes off. He seemed as frantic as Heeseung was. She undressed, casting her clothes aside, and Jake was on top of her again.
Jake shifted around so that her ass was above his face as she lied on top of him. He started to lick her pussy, firmly gripping her ass with both of her hands. She started to suck him off, only licking the tip at first before throating Jake’s cock.
Heeseung whimpered, unzipping his jeans and only allowing himself minimal pressure as he palmed himself over his boxers. If he didn’t pace himself, he was going to cum before the fun truly began.
Jake continued to eat Heeseung’s girlfriend out, and Heeseung could hear his moans through the door. His girlfriend was being incredibly quiet, however, which was annoying. She pulled herself off of Jake and sat at the head of the bed. She spread her legs and looked up at Jake with empty eyes. Jake crawled towards her, and from that angle Heeseung could only see his hips moving rapidly and his girlfriend’s legs quivering. Her hands feebly wrapped around Jake and hugged him tightly as she pounded her.
Then Jake laid flat on his back and she got on top of him. The way she arched her back, practically dancing on Jake’s dick, made Heeseung moan. She gripped Jake’s shoulders and took him to the hilt, her eyes closed. Jake was holding her hips and whispering, “Fuck, fuck that’s nice, fuck.” It was annoying that this shmuck didn’t have anything better to say, but Heeseung didn’t really care. He was forcing himself to stroke himself at a snail’s pace, when all he wanted to do was rub his dick raw.
His girlfriend got off of Jake’s cock and went on all fours, so that she was facing the TV of the motel room. In other words, she was facing Heeseung’s camera. It felt like magic, like she knew or something. He couldn’t take it anymore, and Heeseung spit in his hand and started stroking himself directly. Jake kneeled behind Heeseung’s girlfriend and started ramming into her, one hand slapping her ass and the other pulling her hair back.
Heeseung took in the details of her body; the shuddering of her torso, the trembling of her arms as she steadied herself on the bed, the way that her ass pressed against Jake’s groin as he pounded into her, the way her breasts freely shook, the conflicted expression on her perfect little face, the sheen of sweat covering her from her head to her toes. Heeseung had always known that she was beautiful, but now he swore that she was an angel.
Jake panted, “I’m close, fuck, fuck!” so Heeseung rubbed his cock even faster, his other hand squeezing his balls. It was an Olympic feat to suppress his growing orgasm, but he didn’t want to mess this up. Not when his girlfriend was whimpering so prettily, when she was so consumed by her own pleasure, guilt, and embarrassment that she had probably forgotten all about the camera filming it all. Heeseung thought he might die.
With a guttural moan, Jake came in her, weakly thrusting a few more times to drain the last of his cum. Then he let her drop onto the bed, and she collapsed like a rag doll. Heeseung came as well, biting his lip harshly so he wouldn’t moan. He milked his cock with a white-hot fervor, riding out his high for as long as he could. When the aftershock hit him, all he could do was take quick gasps of air. Heeseung licked his lips and tasted blood.
Jake stroked his girlfriend’s hair, kissed her forehead, then whispered something in her ear. The sight of her limp and pliant, barely lifting her head to talk to Jake, was so arousing that Heeseung wished he had it in him to jack off again. This footage would last him for months.
As Heeseung closes his eyes to relive the memory, Jake put his clothes on. He dug around in his jacket, pulled out a few bills, and left them on her back. He left, closing the door with a soft click. Heeseung’s girlfriend remained where she was, as stiff as a corpse. Heeseung didn’t leave his motel room right away, the images in his head too vivid, too lush.
Heeseung walked inside of the motel room, and the smell of sex was intoxicating. “Baby, that was amazing- you, you were amazing.” His grin is stretched maniacally wide, and his steps towards the hidden camera were buoyant. “I came so hard, baby. It was perfect, just perfect.” He removed the camera from the potted plant and tucked it carefully into its bag.
She hadn’t said a word, just resting on her stomach. Her eyes were closed, and her breathing was shaky. Poor thing, Heeseung thought, she hadn’t had a fucking like that since we got together. Poor little angel. He walked over to her and lay next to her on the bed. He kissed her over and over, holding her slick cheeks in her hands. “You’re so perfect,” Heeseung whispered. “Thank you so much, thank you, thank you. You’re amazing, thank you, thank you.”
She opened her eyes, and her apprehensive gaze made Heeseung’s cock stir. “I feel dirty,” she said, voice choked with emotion.
“No, baby,” he said, kissing her nose again. He gently crawls on top of her, circling his arms around her waist. “You’re not dirty. You’re good, so good. You’re the best. There’s nothing wrong with…with exploring. Didn’t it feel good? Didn’t you enjoy it?” His girlfriend hesitated, so he firmly said, “You enjoyed it. Right? I could tell you did.”
She nodded, bucking her head against his chin affectionately. “I did.”
“You did,” Heeseung breathed out. “I knew you would, my sweet girl.” His hand trailed down to his pants zipper, and he pulled his cock out. He gave it a few strokes, but the sight of another man’s cum coating her thighs was all the motivation he needed. “You’re the best,” he cooed, slipping inside of his girlfriend. It was so easy because she had been fucked open by Jake, and she took him so well. The only sound she made when he entered her was a soft little sigh.
Heeseung closed his eyes and thought of her face again, the contortion of her features into that portrait of debauchery. His arms remained tight around her in a stiff embrace, his cheek resting on her head. He thought about how amazing it would be to see another man fuck her again. Maybe two, three, a train of strangers having their turns with his girlfriend, his beautiful, kind girlfriend. Heeseung couldn’t have pulled out of her if he had tried as the fantasies overtake him. He finished inside of her, hot jizz clamoring out of him in spurts, and wiped his tip on one of the bills Jake left on her back. The room felt like it was spinning, and every nerve ending in his body felt alight with fire. “Thank you,” he whispered, pressing a kiss to her neck, “I love you so much.”
Heeseung pushes the money off of her back and carries his girlfriend into the small bathroom. He placed her inside of the cracked bathtub and filled it with warm water. He left her there to get her toiletry bag, and when he came back she was staring at the ceiling. As he scrubbed her body, he pressed kisses to her skin. He washed her like a piece of alabaster pottery, washing her thoroughly. When he dried her off, he noticed that she hadn’t said a single word. “Baby?”
She doesn’t respond.
“Baby?”
“Yeah?”
“I love you.”
“I love you too, Heeseung.”
He carried her to bed and dressed her in her grey robe. He stripped to his boxers and kissed her cheeks before he pulled the covers over them both. He pulled her head onto his chest and stroked her soft, downy hair.
He had never felt so in love.
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tangledinink · 11 months
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Chapter Twelve of I'm Sorry, Teenage Mutant What Now? is up!!! It's the moment you've all waited for-- the reveal. :000 They boys discover some things about themselves (things they once knew) and visit an unfamiliar place (a place that was once familiar.) Read it on ao3 or below the cut!
[ prev ]
The group’s shocked silence lasted for two, maybe three seconds before it quickly morphed into chaos.
“That’s him! That’s the goat!” Mikey shrieked, pointing wildly. “That’s the goat who has Dad!”
“Leo! Call 911!” Raph commanded. Leo scoffed loudly.
“No way! I wanna kick this guy’s ass. Make Donnie do it.”
“What?! No fair! I’ve called 911 the last six times! It’s someone else’s turn!”
“You have not! I called 911 last time!” April protested.
“That one doesn’t count!”
“Well someone’s gotta--”
“Enough!” Goatman snarled, absolutely bristling, waving his arm sharply. The air around them suddenly felt colder and stiller, and Leo shuddered, gritting his teeth as his posture stiffened. “I am not here to listen to your silly arguments. I am here to bring you home, so you can finally fulfill your purpose.”
Leo gave a short snort of laughter. “Hm, yeah, tempting, but our Daddy actually taught us not to go with creepy sheep strangers, even if they offer us free candy, soooo…”
“What?! Candy? No! I’m talking about your purpose! The reason you were created-- to eliminate the human threat! Come with me, and I can unlock your full potential!”
“How many divine purposes have we got again? ‘Cause I’m starting to lose track,” Mikey complained. Leo rolled his eyes.
“Eliminate the human threat? Yeah, uh, maybe you haven't been paying attention, but in case you haven’t noticed, we’re literally humans.”
The yokai paused for a moment. His face twisted, and he hunched his shoulders back before he gave a forced laugh. “Humans?” He echoed. “Humans?! Surely you aren’t fooled by those silly trinkets! You can’t possibly, actually believe…”
“Oh my god. This guy is, like, for real crazy,” April observed, raising her brows.
“No, you are fools!” He hissed in return. “Humans?! These ridiculous forms are completely fabricated! These are not your true selves! You are experiments! You are soldiers! You’re mutated turtles-- my greatest creations! The creations of Baron Draxum!”
“Baron Draxum? Okay, well, we’ll deal with him when he gets here… Oh… Oh-ho-ho wait! You’re doing that, like, sinister talking-about-yourself-in-third person thing, aren’t you! Oh my god, that’s rich!” Leo snorted.
“Hey! Only Raph can use the third-person!”
“I’m sorry, did he say turtles?” Mikey questioned.
“Oh my fucking god…” Leo laughed, clutching his stomach. “Turtles? I’m sorry, we’re mutant turtles?”
“This guy can’t be serious,” Raph muttered.
“Uh, yeah, I’m pretty sure we would have noticed by now if we were reptiles,” Donnie scoffed, one hand on his hip. “Let alone subjects of some kind of biochemical experiments. Which I am intimately familiar with, by the way. Do you have any idea how many community gardens I’ve been banned from?”
“This can’t…” The yokai shook his head, a hand on his brow. “How could you be tricked by such simple magic? I will show you if I have to.” 
“Oh, I’d love to see that,” Donnie muttered.
“Come with me--”
“You are out of your damn mind if you think we’re goin’ anywhere with you!” Raph cut in.
“Maybe if you prove that turtle hypothesis thing you have going on, we can discuss it from there,” Donnie laughed, one brow quirked, sounding caught somewhere between exasperated and amused. Honestly, this whole thing was a little bit fucking hilarious. It was also fucking horrible and scary because their dad was missing and a magic criminal had them cornered in an alley, but like. Seriously. Mutant turtles? You can’t make this stuff up, dude.
Draxum sighed very deeply, scowling at their group.
“Very well,” he said, and he snapped his fingers.
Things became unfunny very, very quickly. 
If the air had become cold earlier, now it became startlingly hot, just for a moment, the alley rising up at least five degrees, and Leo heard this choked, startled gasp that he immediately recognized as his twin brother. At the same time, a blinding, almost familiar flash of white light overtook the alley, and Leo hissed, flinching away. 
When he looked back, he was horrified to find that where his brother had been standing just a moment ago there was instead some sort of green, scaled creature, their eyes slitted and their skin leathery and bumped, and he thought, what the hell happened to my brother? And after a moment of silence, all of them staring in dazed shock, the reptile flailed, floundered, held its own hands up to its face as if to examine them, and promptly began screaming. 
And Leo recognized his own brother's screams, so instead he was thinking: what the hell happened to my brother?!
“What did you do?!” Leo shrieked. Behind him, Mikey screamed, too, and he could hear April spluttering out an impressive string of curse words. He just barely resisted the urge to race over to Donnie’s side, to check if he was okay, (he’s not okay, he knows he’s not okay,) to try to help him, to fix it, because he couldn’t just turn his back on the enemy in front of them-- couldn’t ignore the very obvious threat.
“I simply removed the cloaking enchantment as he requested,” Draxum responded calmly. He even looked amused, almost, the very corners of his lips turning up.
“You what!? What the hell are you-- fix it!!! Turn him back!!!” Leo demanded, his voice rising with the very edges of panic, his pulse climbing ever-steadily higher the longer he listened to his siblings scream.
The other sighed deeply, tilting their head to the side. “Do you still not understand? Fine, then. I’ll show you as well.” 
Snap.
Leo wouldn’t describe the experience as painful, but it really wasn’t pleasant, either. He swore he could feel his skin being stripped away and reforming; it was like his skeleton itself was being rearranged, his entire body becoming fluid for just a split second before solidifying again in new places, new patterns, new spaces. An unfamiliar weight pulled at his shoulders, forcing his spine to bend, and his hands and feet fell in a way that now felt unnatural to him. His skin seemed to lay over his muscles differently now.
He was vaguely aware of Mikey screaming somewhere behind him a second time, echoing Donatello’s continued wails. 
“Guys?” April bit out, her voice high and frightened.
What the hell happened to him?
“What-- what did you do?” Leo repeated himself, his eyes wide, straining, because his vision was ever-so-slightly different than it had been a few seconds ago and he didn’t know how to adjust. He swore to god he was frozen in place. He wasn’t sure when he had ended up on his knees, but he was shaking so hard, he supposed he wasn’t surprised.
What the fuck happened to his body?
“Now are you convinced?” The yokai pressed. “Now, we will be going to my lab whether you want to or not. We can either do this the easy way or the hard way. I would highly recommend the easy way,” he hummed, giving a sharp sweep of his arms. Wind tugged at his back and Leo had just barely the presence of mind to glance behind him, his eyes widening in horror to see this huge expanse of black opening up behind him. 
Mikey-- (Mikey? They were small, they were wearing Mikey’s clothes, it must be Mikey--) yelped loudly, the inky cloud yanking him from his feet. April jumped, attempting to grab her baby brother, though she only succeeded in falling into him-- both of them swallowed up into the portal. Raph gave a strangled howl of protest, diving right after them, and Donnie was sucked up as well, disappearing from Leo’s sight. His heart thudded wildly in his ears. He could feel the magick yanking at him, trying to pull him in as well. 
But Leo had always been the fastest. 
Every shred of him was screaming to follow, to chase after his family, to go with his sister and brothers, but he tensed his muscles, his stance widening and holding firm as he set his sights back on the yokai towering before him. A tiny voice in his head whispered in his ears that following wouldn’t help--
No, he had to move forward. This guy was the one hurting them.
Get him.
Leo wasn’t sure if he had leapt forward or if he simply was there. Everything was moving too quickly for even him to follow, the blinding white of panic and rage eating hungrily at the edges of his vision, threatening to overtake him. Either way, he lunged, a cry of protective fury wringing itself from his chest.
 "Stay away from my brothers," he snarled, his own throat staggering painfully with the force with which he screamed out his warning, his hands flying forward to grab the yokai by his throat, slamming into him at full speed. He felt the alien velvet fuzz of Draxum’s skin beneath the tear of his fingernails (claws) even as the pair of them were flung from their feet. Gravity was stolen from them both, the portal behind them reaching out to consume them. 
Everything went black. For just a second, tumbling through nothingness, floating through the sizzling rush of magick itself, Leo couldn’t see anything. He couldn’t hear anything, all he could feel was the body of the yokai against him, struggling against his grip, attempting to throw him away. 
And then this bright, searing lavender light came singing through the world. It didn’t reflect or bounce; nothing was lit up by it. Leo still could not see himself, could not even find the outline of his own hands or fingers. But this brilliant, complex pattern of the palest, gentlest pastel purple lit up bright before him, swirling and twisting in foreign shapes, and Leo just barely recognized that the ribbon of runes they formed echoed the shape of the yokai he had just grabbed.
The body he was clinging to went limp.
The next second, the wind was knocked out of him as they made impact with stone, light coming streaming back into his universe. Leo found himself landing in a heap in their new location, the portal disappearing behind them. Oddly, however, the crash landing didn’t hurt near as much as he would have expected it to.
“Leo!” He heard Raph cry. Leo groaned, still dazed, looking around blearily. Where the hell were they? He glanced over at the yokai who he had yanked through the portal with them, only to find them in an awkward slump just a few paces away, completely limp and seemingly unconscious. 
“Are you okay? What happened?” Raph demanded, moving quickly to his side. Mikey was already all bundled up in his arms, shaking like a leaf and absolutely clinging to him for dear life like he was going to fall apart if he let go. And Leo couldn’t even blame him if he did. Mikey had always been the smallest of them, and Raph always the biggest, but Leo thought dimly that the size difference between them now was fucking bananas.
Jesus christ. Raph was fucking huge. And… spiky. Was he a goddamn dinosaur? What the fuck.
“I-- yeah-- I-- I think the goatman got knocked out--” He stammered, still reeling slightly, trying to collect himself, to gather himself, adrenaline still rushing through his veins like it was a racetrack. 
Somewhere in the background, Donnie fucking screamed, and Leo immediately forgot about everything else, his head whipping around. 
“Donnie!” He cried, on his feet in a second, rushing over to his brother’s side. He had no idea where they were, not having yet taken stock of the location. He was only dimly aware that they were someplace cold and dark, with stone and concrete above, below, and around them. Donnie had pressed himself up against one of the walls, his entire body rigid and his head bent forward, his arms fluttering wildly beside his head in such a way that Leo recognized he was fighting not to hit himself. Good job, Dee. The screaming continued, but every wail that wrenched its way out of Donnie’s mouth was short and grinding, repeating itself over and over like an alarm. It was fucking terrifying. Not for him, but for Donnie, because he could tell that they were completely, totally not in control. Just panicking.
“Hey. Hey, hey, it’s okay, I’m right here, Don. It’s alright. It’s okay, you’re safe, I’m right here, hermano,” he tried to soothe, forcing his voice down, calm, steady. He knew better than to touch Donnie, but he would reach over just long enough to tap a button on the side of his headphones that he knew would flip the device into white noise mode. Donnie jerked slightly in response, and the screaming stopped, at least, but he didn’t relax. His arms still fluttered and flapped anxiously, and he shifted just enough to begin rocking back and forth, clenching his jaw and grinding his teeth so hard that Leo was afraid he was going to hurt himself. His chest absolutely shook with the panicked, shuddering breaths he was taking, hyperventilating so hard that his entire body trembled in response.
“Come on, Donnie, it’s alright. It’s okay. We’re safe, Mikey and Raph and April are safe, we’re gonna be okay, but you’ve gotta breathe, dude. Can you try it with me? Like this? We’ve gotta calm down a little bit--” Leo pressed on because this was not his first rodeo. He wasn’t quite as adept at handling these things as their dad was, and at this point, Donnie was pretty good at avoiding meltdowns and panic attacks, armed with tools and tricks and years of therapy, but sometimes they were unavoidable and Leo had always known how to calm them down, always been able to step up and help, the same way Donnie could for him--
But Donnie wasn’t calming down. Donnie wouldn’t even look up at him. Rather, Donnie scrunched up harder, curled his lips, and fucking hissed at him.
And, okay, look, it wasn’t the first time Donnie had hissed at them. Donnie used to love to hiss at people when they were little kids, though nowadays he was more likely to express annoyance with declarations such as “groan” or “scoff” or “eye-roll.” But he didn’t hiss like this.
He sounded fucking feral. Even more than that, he sounded fucking terrified. He looked like a goddamn cornered animal, his eyes blown out and huge, the scaly skin that now made up his form stretched tight over shivering muscles and his lips drawn back over sharp, pointed teeth. And Leo looked down at his own clawed, three-fingered hand and came to a horrible realization.
He couldn’t help because Donnie couldn’t recognize him. They were panicking because they were in this crazy, fucked up body that wasn’t theirs, and Leo was in a fucked up body that wasn’t his, and looking at him was just a reminder of everything wrong. He was just scaring them more. His being here was just making things worse, and Leo’s throat tied itself in a knot, swelling up as the backs of his eyes pinched with the thought.
“April,” he called, his voice cracking slightly as he desperately turned to look for his sister. She wasn’t far off, watching from a short distance with obvious worry, and she blinked in surprise at the sound of her name.
“Help me.”
---
If Leo was being completely honest, he hadn’t even realized that Donnie wasn’t still nearby. The two of them typically stuck together like glue whenever they were at school. Leo would usually lead the way, and Donnie would trail after, with Leo doing most of the talking and socializing for both of them. And once Donnie got sick of whatever they were doing, he would simply drag Leo off to sit and read or work on some project or puzzle for a while, and Leo would oblige and keep him company. Donnie was always close by, and Leo wasn’t even aware that this wasn’t currently the case, too absorbed in his latest arts and crafts project, until he heard a telltale, high-pitched whine from across the room.
He was on his feet in seconds, abandoning the activity and his classmates to scuttle off in search of his twin brother. Luckily, he wasn’t too hard to find. Both because he was pretty loud, and also because their substitute teacher was crouched down next to him. She was nice enough, Leo thought, but not quite as cool as Miss Mitchelle was, and he wasn’t sure if Donnie liked her at all. It definitely didn’t seem like he liked her too much right now with how he was all balled up, and Leo wasted no time at all in planting himself physically between the two.
Donnie immediately gravitated towards his brother and Leo moved a bit closer in turn, giving Miss Substitute (he didn’t remember her name,) a very displeased look.
“He doesn’t like whatever you’re doing,” he declared firmly.
Miss Substitute’s expression twitched and faltered for a moment before it settled back into something patient and pleasant, though Leo still didn’t quite trust it. “Leo,” she said, “I was just trying to talk with your brother--”
“I can talk to him,” Leo assured immediately, not bothering to listen to the remainder of her sentence because he couldn’t imagine it would be all that important or interesting. He turned to face Donnie instead. “It’s okay. I can always understand him, ‘cause we have a secret twin language. We made it up. Only we can speak it,” he declared proudly, crouching down to lean in towards his brother, his arms wrapped around his knees.
Donnie was still whining a bit, curled up into a ball and shoved halfway inside of a cubby, his arms crossed protectively over his head as he rocked. And yeah, he was obviously upset, though Leo wasn’t completely sure why yet. As such, he got to work, conversing with his twin in the previously mentioned secret twin language.
… And.
Okay.
So.
They didn’t actually have a secret twin language.
But it was close enough! It wasn’t a language, per se, ‘cause it didn’t have words, just noises and chirps and trills and squeaks and babbles. But he still always got the gist of what Donnie was saying, and Donnie would get the gist of what he was saying, too, so it worked. Sooner or later, he could pretty much always get an understanding of what Donnie was meaning based on the inflection or tone of his noises, as well as calm the other down enough so that Leo could coax a couple of signs out of him, so Leo figured it was close enough to language.
Plus, the ‘language’ itself always seemed to kind of settle Donnie down when he was upset like this. Once Leo started humming and squeaking at him, Donnie gradually started to answer with his own chirps and clicks, and, little by little, Leo watched their twin’s body untense and unwind. Leo grinned, moving to sit properly by him, and Donnie moved closer, edging just a bit out of his hiding spot so he could shove himself up against Leo’s side instead, resting his head against his shoulder and settling in there, an indignant scowl still on his face.
Leo grinned, puffing out his chest a bit as he shot Miss Substitute a look. See? He told her so. He and Donnie always understood each other, no matter what, and he could always fix it when Donnie wasn’t feeling good! He was basically the best brother in the entire world. Confident that he understood the problem, he turned back to face Miss Substitute.
“He said you’re not doing the schedule right, and we’re supposed to do math right now,” he announced, crossing his arms over his chest. And he hadn’t even noticed, but Donnie was right, they did usually do math lessons during this part of the day-- not arts and crafts. “And also, he doesn’t like the paper fish we’re doing ‘cause the glue feels bad. So we gotta find something else to do,” he insisted. “‘Cause otherwise Donnie and I aren’t playing.”
Donnie nodded a tiny bit from behind him, and Leo beamed with pride. Understanding Donnie and calming him down wasn’t even that hard. He didn’t get why adults besides Dad had such a hard time with it sometimes. You really just had to listen to him. 
---
It took a while for April to calm Donnie back down, (or at least get him as calm as they possibly could be in such circumstances,) but she managed after a bit, his panicked breaths eventually dying down into something a bit more even and steady. Thank god. Mikey thought dimly to himself that he had never seen Donnie freak out so bad, but... he supposed he couldn't really blame him. 
He frowned a bit, looking down at his own, unfamiliar hands, and he curled up a bit more, his tail tucking in (oh my god, he had a tail,) as he clung to Raph's plastron (oh my god, Raph had a plastron.) And though it still held comfort, the fold of his biggest brother's arms, bundled up close and held there, this place that he had known his whole life... it suddenly felt foreign, too. Everything was hard and jagged and cold. And even worse-- it was unfamiliar. 
He kept staring at his own hands because he couldn't stop himself, and it made his stomach wobble. He wondered bleakly what his own face looked like because he had no idea. He wouldn't even recognize himself in the mirror. 
 Now that Donnie had finally settled a bit, though he was still curled up and pressed just against April's side, just barely not touching but still squeezed up small against her, Leo finally got up to his feet-- only to immediately lose his balance, falling over onto his back with a loud clunk.
"Leo!" Raph's eyes widened, his muscles immediately bunching up, ready to jump up and go grab his brother. Mikey could tell that he was just barely resisting the urge to scoop up all three of them and bundle them up in his arms and just hang onto them for a while. He had been sitting here long enough for Mikey to notice how fast his heart was beating. Mikey’s was keeping pace. Leo kind of flailed for a second before he managed to redirect the momentum to roll over onto his side, getting himself back onto his hands and knees. A wry, strangled laugh forced its way out of him.
"Alright. Well. Pro tip: center of gravity is weird now," he remarked dryly, his voice strained. "But the good news is falling doesn't even hurt anymore! So that’s great!"
It didn't get a laugh out of anyone. After a moment of hesitation, Mikey slowly wriggled his way from Raph's grip, making his way over to Leo's side. He didn't dare try to walk after watching Leo's attempt, noting that it seemed to be more difficult now without the rush of adrenaline to aid them, so he instead stayed in a crouch, sort of half-hopping-half-crawling over. Raph followed shortly after in a similar manner.
"Can I see?" He questioned softly, and when Leo didn't deny him, he leaned over slightly, moving his hoodie (which was now a very awkward fit,) out of the way enough so that he could examine the edges of his brother's new shell.
(Oh my god. His brother's shell. What kind of a sentence was that? What kind of weird, fucked up make-believe world were they suddenly in? Leo was his brother. He didn't have a shell. He had cool brown skin. He had bouncy blonde curls that Mikey had helped him bleach and dye a red streak in. He had vitiligo 'stripes' over his eyes. He had a bad habit of cycling through boyfriends and insomnia and a shockingly large vocabulary... but he didn't have a shell. He didn't have scales or stripes or claws or a tail.)
He looked anyway, running the tips of his fingers over the top of it, following the curve. He couldn't quite tell if he was feeling the texture of the shell, or just the texture of his own fingers, which were different than they had been; covered in scales, the skin thicker and rougher than it had been before. Bending his joints felt odd, and he couldn't help himself from doing it over and over, as if that might help him get used to it faster. 
 Every part of his brother’s shell was this cool, ocean blue, just edging on teal in some places, and Mikey thought to himself that, in the very least, it matched his life color perfectly. 
He swallowed hard and resisted the tears that were building up in his eyes. He didn’t want to cry right now. He didn’t even know what he was crying about. Because he was scared? Because he was overwhelmed? He wasn’t very good at not crying, but he forced it down, his hands trembling a bit with the effort of it.
 "Does it look the same as mine?" He heard himself asking, his eyes flickering over to meet Leo's (which were now not something he recognized, looking more animal than person, though they still retained the same, familiar almond shape. The color, however, he realized, was slightly different. Leo's eyes were brown. All of their eyes were brown, so dark that they were almost black, but now, instead, Leo's eyes were mismatched; one of them dark blue, like water in a cove, like the sea at night, and the other dark red, like ink with blood, like black cherries.) 
"I dunno," Leo laughed, though his voice was still shaking. "I don't know what mine looks like."
"They're... kinda the same…" Raph observed from nearby, leaning over slightly to examine them both. His voice sounded kind of hollow, like he wasn’t really there. Sort of far-off. "I mean. The parts I can see. Mikey, yours is more... orangey. And bumpier," he said. "And yours is spotty. Leo's is kinda... stripey." 
"Yours is huge," Leo observed with a chuckle, glancing over at their biggest brother, who was always the tallest and largest by a wide margin, but now absolutely dwarfed the rest of them. "And... spiky. You're all spiky. And… and fucking huge, dude. You look like you have fucking paws. And your mouth is all..." He laughed again, scrubbing anxiously at his face with his hands. "You look like a fucking snapping turtle."
Mikey paused a bit at that, glancing over at the other.
Donnie must have said or signed something that the rest of them didn’t catch, because April spoke up next, clearly addressing him. "Uhm, no, yours is... uh. It's kind of flat? And..." There was a pause. "Oh, oh my god, it's, like, squishy!" She squealed, everyone else in the room jumping in response, before she tamped down the noise, biting her lip and getting a handle on her reaction. "Sorry! Sorry, I just. I just wasn't expecting that texture, that's all! It doesn't... feel like what I thought a shell would feel like, I guess."
"Are we different kinds of... turtles?" Mikey questioned, tilting his head to the side. He wanted to laugh at himself when he said turtles. I mean, seriously, turtles? Of all the creatures in the world, turtles? Why were they turtles?
"I guess we must be," Leo sighed, resting his chin on his knee. "We obviously look different." 
Mikey frowned, and he thought that his lips might be trembling if he had proper lips anymore, but he wasn't sure if he did or if they could tremble or what that would feel like if they did. Okay, fine. Now there were a few tears. 
"Does that mean we're not brothers?" 
A beat of silence followed.
"We're not," Donnie said, and quite frankly, Mikey was surprised to hear him speaking. Small miracles? Kinda…?
"Yeah, we are. Don't be crazy," Raph immediately refuted, his brows (er... brows? Place where brows once were?) furrowing together, and Mikey was desperately relieved to see that the space in between still wrinkled into a crease the same way they always did. "Of course we're brothers."
"Evidently, we're not even the same species," Donnie hissed out bitterly, drawing himself up even closer, even smaller, into a little ball. "It's literally impossible."
"Come on, Dee--"
"We're not even human!" Donnie snapped, hunching up his shoulders. "We're not even people!"
"Hey, look, come on you guys," April tried to soothe, holding up her hands as if to calm the group. "It doesn't matter if you're turtles! It doesn't matter to me. I love you guys no matter what--"
"Oh, wow, what a comfort!" Donnie scoffed, and April bristled.
"Okay, look, I am trying to be helpful! I know that this fucking sucks but you do not need to take out your nasty attitude on me!"
Leo suddenly laughed-- loudly, painfully-- tilting his head back and letting his shoulders slump so he could stare up at the ceiling. "Oh my god. Jesus christ. We're not people," he bit out in between his barely restrained hysterics, squeezing his eyes shut. "We're freaks, dude!"
"Leo, c'mon." 
"We're not even people!!!" He repeated. "Fuck. We never even had a chance, and we didn't even know it!... Oh my god, we’re such morons!!! Hahaha-- welp! This is it! Pack it in, boys, it’s all over!"
"Leo, chill. What are you even talkin’ about?"
"Did you know I was gonna go on T?" He questioned, turning around sharply, suddenly, to face Raph. "Me and Dad were talking about it. For, like, a while now. And I was gonna start T, finally. Do you know how much I wanted to do that? Do you know how long I've been waiting to get to do that?"
Raph frowned. "Leo... This doesn't mean--"
"How the fuck is that going to work now!?" He interrupted. "How is anything gonna work now? We're fucking! REPTILES! Raph!!!"
"I KNOW THAT!" Now Raph was yelling, too, and Mikey flinched a bit, hiccuping softly as he drew himself down, retreating slightly, halfway into his shell (oh my god, he can do that now?) "You think you're the only one who was lookin' forward to stuff? I was--" He cut himself off, breathing in deep and then letting it out slow, his jaw tensed.
"Look. I know this... sucks. But it's not gonna help to just throw in the towel right now and mourn shit that we don't even know is gone yet, alright? We'll... figure it out," he said. "We don’t even know what’s goin’ on, so let’s just… let's just try to figure it out first. Okay?" 
Leo frowned. He looked down and to the side, tightening his hands into fists, but he didn't have any rebuttal. After a moment, he took a deep breath, pulling himself up to his feet for a second time. He tottered for a moment, his arms windmilling until he found his balance and this time he stayed on his feet. He looked around the room for a moment before his eyes fell on the limp form of Baron Draxum, still crumpled in a heap some odd paces away.
"What do we do with that guy?"
All of their eyes snapped over, as though they had all just remembered that he was there in the first place.
"Did you knock him out, dude?!" Raph questioned, his eyes widening slightly. 
"No! I mean. I don't think so. Not exactly," Leo said. "It's, like-- he grabbed me and some sort of mystic-magic-whatever thing happened. He lit up with a bunch of symbols and he just... went down. I dunno what happened." 
"Well," Raph said, sighing deeply before he pulled himself to his feet as well, doing a similar rock and wobble to Leo before he figured out the new balance he had to strike, correcting his own footing. His long tail swung back and forth behind him, assumedly on instinct, to help. "We dunno how long he's gonna stay down, so we oughta find a way out of here and put some distance between us and him ASAP. We already know where Dad is, anyway."
"Maybe we can figure out where we are," Donnie mumbled bleakly, pulling himself to his feet as well. He seemed to struggle much less than his brothers did, and Mikey noted that his back rounded less than theirs. April got up as well, sticking close to his side, but perhaps hovering a bit less now. 
Mikey watched as his family rose up, one by one, finding their feet again. And something in his chest unwound and loosened again. A breath he hadn't realized he had been holding came tumbling out of him.
He didn't know his own face anymore. And he didn't recognize his brothers when he looked at them.
But they were still them. Already, Mikey was completely sure of it. And the change, while still terrifying, felt just a tiny bit less devastating. 
He hadn’t lost them yet.
Bracing himself for the coming challenge, he rose up to his feet as well. The unfamiliar weight on his back was more than he had expected and attempted to drag him down, and he stumbled slightly, nearly toppling over onto his back the same way Leo had the first time-- but Raph grabbed his wrist before he could, pulling him forward and correcting him, and Mikey was relieved to find his center of gravity once more. Usually, he would complain about his big brother stepping in, preferring to do things on his own rather than being 'babied' by his older family members, but...
 Right now, it was actually okay. 
"Okay. Let's do this." 
(They took about three steps before Raph yelped and tripped over his own tail.)
---
Though they had tied up the so-called "Baron Draxum" with whatever rope and other scrap they could find in this place, (the longer they were here, the more Donnie began to suspect it was a lab of some kind,) none of them were very confident that it would be able to hold him for very long, if at all, and so they all got to work trying to figure out an exit. But to call this place 'maze-like' was a bit of an understatement.
"This is the worst landmark ever," April hissed in frustration as they turned a corner, only to once again be met with a hog-tied yokai, face-down on the concrete. "We keep going in circles!"
"Okay, look," Donnie sighed. "I know we don't want to linger here any more than we have to, but let's look around a bit and see if there's anything useful lying around to get us out of here. Clearly just walking out isn't getting us anywhere." 
There was a chorus of grunts and mumbles of agreement from the rest of his family, and the group slowly fanned out, beginning their search. It was dark here, wherever they were. The ground beneath his feet was cold, with him and his brothers having already ditched and stowed their sneakers and boots after realizing how awkward and painful it was to walk in them with their new wide, two-toed feet. 
The space was wide and almost circular, with various tunnels branching off at different levels, all leading away to who-knew-where. Several desks and tables were scattered about the space, each surface covered in everything from charts to pipettes to oddly-shaped jars filled with oddly-colored substances. Donnie just barely resisted the urge to sit down and start working, or to begin snatching and pocketing things as he found them. Instead, he took a liberal amount of photographs of everything they found on his phone.
 His impulse control could only get him so far, however, and his eyes narrowed as they fell across a small, purpley-pink gem that lay on the desk, suspended within a small glass case. This certainly looked interesting... Geology wasn't really a passion of his, but something about this just seemed... intriguing. He couldn't quite place it...
 Surely no one would miss this, right? It was small! It would be silly not to take it, quite frankly, and he slipped it into his pocket as quietly as he could when he was sure no one else was looking. 
Now, if only he could find some blueprints of the tunnels... But that would be too easy, wouldn't it?
"So," Mikey said after a minute or so of them searching, and Donnie sighed internally. Of course, they couldn't expect him to stay quiet for that long. "If Raph is a snapping turtle, and me and Leo are turtle-turtles, then what kind of a turtle is Donnie?"
Donnie rolled his eyes, scowling. "Okay, well, first of all, do we really have to discuss this?" He hissed, immediately bristling. "I’d highly prefer we not address the proverbial elephant in the room, thank you! Second of all, 'turtle-turtle' is not a species."
"Yeah, but, like, we have turtle shells!" Mikey explained. "But April said yours is squishy. So what does that make you?"
Donnie sighed deeply. Talking about this made his skin itch.
"A softshell turtle, I suppose."
"A softshell?" Leo questioned, raising a brow. "That's a thing?"
"Yes."
"How do you know that off the top of your head?" Raph questioned.
"Some of us actually paid attention during biology classes," he responded dryly. And having a near-photographic memory did, admittedly, help as well…
"Whoa!" Mikey absolutely beamed. "That's so cool! Now we just gotta figure out what kind of turtles me and Leo are!"
"Well, I'd look it up if we had any service. And also if it was even close to being an appropriate time for us to waste our efforts on something like that," Donnie said with a roll of his eyes. He knew that Mikey was just distracting himself, finding a silver lining so he didn’t break down, but Donnie didn’t want to think about it, didn’t want to think about how much of their entire lives was completely fabricated, about how--
He snorted, suddenly doubling over with laughter.
"What?" April questioned, raising a brow.
"I just-- I just realized!" Donnie laughed. "Our... our moms must be turtles! Fucking turtles!"
There was a beat of silence as this sunk in before Raph gave a similar reaction. "Damn! I guess you're right, huh?"
"Do you have any idea how much time I wasted in therapy talking about this?" Donnie squeaked out through giggles. "I spent so much time with Mossy talking about our mom and how she didn't want us or whatever the fuck and about the stuff she did to Dad and how I couldn't remember her, and she-- she was never even real! None of that ever even happened! She was just a fucking turtle, wasn't she!? We don’t even have a real mom!"
"Whoa! Mind... blown. I didn't even think about that..." Mikey gaped, his eyes wide. "This whole time I just assumed that our mom was probably the hotel lady..."
"Yeah, me too," Leo agreed.
Donnie blinked.
"You what?"
"Well, you know, that woman that Dad was datin’ right before he disappeared," Raph said. "And she runs the Grand Nexus Hotel, right? All the articles I ever read always mentioned her."
Donnie's eyes twitched. "You thought she was our mother?" He questioned.
"Well, that's who Dad was datin’ last! And for a long time, too. It'd make sense, wouldn't it?" Raph defended.
"Yeah. You didn't think that?" Leo said.
"NO! Why would I think that?!" Donnie was laughing again.
Leo huffed in offense, crossing his arms over his chest. "I'm sorry, do you know something we don't?"
"Apparently!" Donnie exclaimed. "Guys, you've seen pictures of her, right?!"
"Well, yeah?" Mikey tilted his head to the side.
"She's pale as fuck!"
"So?"
"And our Dad is Japanese!"
"And? Donnie, what's your point?"
"We're black!"
"... Ooooohhhhh," all three of his brothers said, nearly in unison, after Donnie's argument finally sunk in.
"Oh my god," Donnie laughed, covering his face with his hands, scrubbing tears from his eyes. "You're all so fucking dumb..."
"I guess our mom would have had to be black. I mean. We got the Japanese half from Dad, but... I never really thought about where the other half came from..." Raph admitted, his mouth still slightly agape like he was still rolling the thought about in his head. 
"Wait a minute," April said, her hands on her hips. "I mean, yeah, all that makes sense, but if you guys have secretly been turtles this whole time, then why are you black?"
"Dude, are all turtles black?" Mikey questioned, his eyes widening.
"I cannot discuss this any further. I'll get a migraine and furthermore cease to function, as I am, and I cannot stress this enough, just barely suppressing the gravity of this whole situation right now," Donnie sighed, gesturing to himself as he turned back to the desk in front of him. "Did anyone find anything yet?"
"Not yet," April sighed, shuffling through some papers. "What even is all this junk?"
"I'm not sure. Some sort of research, it seems like..." Donnie mused, sort of thumbing through a book as he spoke, reading key phrases and chunks of text as quickly as he could and making mental notes so he could refer back to it later. He was more than happy to have something else to focus on, though this would admittedly be a lot easier with human hands. "But I'm still not sure where--"
Shhhh shhhh.
Donnie paused mid-sentence, his brows furrowed. He hadn't noticed that sound before now. He tilted his head a bit to the side, turning in its direction, trying to zero in.
"... Donnie?"
"What's that noise?" He questioned aloud, though his voice was barely above a whisper.
Shhhh shhhhh.
He knew that noise. He recognized it. Where had he heard it before?
Shhhh shhhhh.
... Water, he realized with a start. The noise was running water. Of course. How had he never realized this before?...
That's what he was hearing. That's what he had heard.
"Dee? You good?"
"Guys," he said, turning just enough to glance over in their direction. His face suddenly felt like glass. It was odd. "I think... I think we're in the sewer," he said. "... And I think we've been here before...?"
Before anyone could say anything further, a new noise filled up the space.
Skrrrtttccchhhhh.
---
"What was that?!" Mikey shrieked, immediately leaping behind his biggest brother to hide. Leo and Donnie were instantly gravitating to each other as well, falling into stance on instinct as they stood back to back, each covering the other. 
"It sounds like something scratching," April said thoughtfully, and true to her word, the same skritching noise clawed its way through the air a moment later, echoing slightly against the walls. "I think it's coming from over here!"
"April!" Raph hissed off a protest as she took off, heading in the direction of the sound. "We don't know what that is!"
"We will if we go look!" She chirped in reply. I mean, come on, what was the benefit of hiding over here instead of investigating? Weren't they curious either way? Besides, they were stuck here regardless-- maybe they'd find something helpful.
The noise continued as April searched, peering around corners and down tunnels, until, finally, she found her prize. Tucked inside one of the off-shoot tunnels, one of the many dead-ends that seemed to surround this space, was a proverbial treasure trove. A variety of odds and ends filled the space; various amulets and scrolls and chests and even weapons were leaned up against the wall or stacked up on the ground. In fact, a lot of weapons were in here. Was this some kind of a weird armory? Or a trophy room? What kind of sewer has a trophy room?
But most interestingly, she found the source of the noise. Inside a small, dimly lit orb, looking as though it were made of some sort of glass, or perhaps even light, was one of the oddest creatures April had ever seen, clawing sadly at the surface of its prison. It had ears like a chihuahua, pointed and too big for its head, with tufts of fur poofing out from inside, but huge eyes like some kind of a cat. Pointed tusks stuck from its mouth like a boar, but soft, downy yellow-and-blue fur covered its entire, squirrel-like body, complete with a fluffy, wriggly tail.
"AW, you guyyssss!" She called out. "Come look! It's cute!"
"April!" The guys were right behind her, with Raph leading the charge. "You can't just run off like-- jumpin' jack flash! What the heck is that thing?!"
"I dunno!" April said with a shrug, immediately making her way into the room, scooping up the orb so she could examine it, looking for a way to open it up. The little critter inside pattered about excitedly, its claws clicking against the smooth surface. "Help me figure out how to get him outta here."
"Are you sure about that?" Leo questioned. "No offense, but we have nooo idea what that thing is! Maybe it's, I dunno, locked up for a reason?"
"What? C'mon, guys, we've gotta help!" Mikey protested, turning on them with big, pleading eyes. Nice, April thought, with Mikey on her side she had basically already won. Suck it, middle children. "Plus, he was locked up by Draxum. So he can't be bad!"
"Yeah! Ever heard ‘the enemy of my enemy is my friend?’" April added in.
"I'm not convinced," Donnie said, crossing his arms over his chest. "I mean, has anyone else noticed that pretty much everything else in this room is a weapon of some kind? Isn't that maybe a bit telling?"
"Aw, come on, Dee. Look at this face!" April insisted, holding up the orb to the others. The creature, to their credit, played their part, pulling an absolutely pitiful face which Mikey immediately echoed, turning to his brothers with watery eyes. 
Checkmate.
"Okay, okay, fine. Look, there's gotta be something in here that can help us bust him out..." Leo muttered, beginning to pick his way through the contents of the room with Raph, Donnie, and Mikey following suit shortly after. 
"Here, what about these?" Leo said after a moment, turning to face them with a pair of twin katanas in hand. "Think I could slice that bad boy open with these guys?"
April scoffed, clutching the orb close to her chest. "Uhm, and this guy in half, maybe!" She protested. "Can we try something a little less deadly, please?"
"Aw, come on! These are cool," Leo protested, grinning as he twirled them in his hands with a metallic shwing.
"You just like them because you always win at any swordsmanship event at tournaments," Donnie remarked dryly, grabbing a long wooden staff to hold in his hands, testing the weight of it. "... That being said, should we maybe grab some of these just in case?"
"Whaddya mean?" Raph glanced over at the other.
"Well, we haven't even made it to the Hidden City yet, and we've already been attacked once," Donnie reasoned, placing a hand on his hip and frowning. "So it wouldn't exactly be a bad idea to have some weapons on hand in case of an emergency." He spun the bo staff in his hands appraisingly a few times. "I mean, obviously this is a bit underwhelming, but I'm sure I could make some improvements once we got back home..."
"Sounds like a good plan to me! Look at all the stuff they’ve got!” Mikey cheered, immediately diving in, beginning to sort through all the various options they had in the room. He chuckled darkly, swinging a pair of nun-chucks in his hands. “These’ll do…”
“Yo, guys!” Raph called, waving to get his brothers’ attention before pointing to the very far corner of the room. “If we’re gonna take stuff, why don’t we take the glowy ones?”
There was, in fact, a weapons rack filled with floating, vaguely glowing weapons, tucked away in the shadows, which only made the glow all that much more tempting. They were simply begging to be taken.
Mikey and Leo, almost in unison, gasped, their faces absolutely lighting up as they raced over to join Raph. “Ooh, dibs on the sword!” Leo cheered, immediately snatching up the odachi and repeatedly striking poses.
“Hot soup! Check me out!” Mikey snatched up a bright orange kusari-fundo, absolutely beaming ear-to-ear. Raph was nearly drooling as he laid his claim on a pair of tonfas, beaming as he gave a few experimental swings. 
“They’re perfect! No one’ll mess with us now!”
“What about you, Donnie?” April questioned, tilting her head back to glance at the remaining brother. “Don’t you want a glowy weapon?”
“And add yet another unknown, uncontrolled variable to our current situation? I’m good,” Donnie scoffed, rolling his eyes. “I’ve trained with a regular, wooden bo staff. I’ll fight with a wooden bo staff, thank you very much. You all have fun with your likely-radioactive weaponry,” he said, waving them off. 
“Here, April, I got something for you, too,” Mikey chirped excitedly, scampering over to present his find to her. “Ta-da!!! Baseball bat!”
It wasn’t a baseball bat-- it was a club. But close enough! April gasped in delight. “It’s perfect!” She enthused, immediately snatching it up, rolling it around in her hands and tapping it against the side of her shoe a few times. Ooh, and the weight was perfect, too. “And I think it can help us get little guy out of this ball thingie, too! Leo, come hold it still for me!”
 "Aw man, why do I gotta hold it?" Leo muttered in complaint but did as he was told regardless, kneeling down to hold the orb steady, taking care in the placement of his hands to minimize the chances of broken fingers.
 "Alright," April said, backing up a bit, her tongue sticking out from between her lips with focus. "This won't hurt a bit..." 
She swung the club back, taking care to temper her strength, and brought it down on the little ball prison with a satisfying crunch. 
"Did it work?" Mikey gasped, his eyes wide as he leaned over. The orb was not shattered nor laying in pieces; but the side of it had caved in considerably, a spiderweb of cracks blossoming from it, and a second later, it simply dissolved as if it had never been there in the first place. The creature that had previously been trapped inside cracked one eye open, having squeezed itself into the very back of its cage, flinching at the oncoming impact, gave an absolute trill of excitement, darting about in celebration.
"There we go!" April said, grinning wide, her hands planted on her hips. "See, told ya I'd get you outta there! That's better, right?"
The little yellow beast threw itself into her lap, wriggling with joy and nuzzling at her with an enthusiastic wag of its tail. "Okay, okay! You're welcome!" April laughed, giggling as she allowed the creature to clamber about in her arms, allowing it time to bounce about before it finally began to settle again.
"Any chance you know how to get out of here, little guy?"
---
Raph looked up from his phone and his tea at the sound of mail plopping down on the table, glancing over to examine the letters his father had just tossed over in his direction.
"For you," Dad remarked, sorting through the remaining mail from the day.
"For me?" Raph echoed, his brows rising up. "Who the heck is sending me mail?" Curiosity took hold immediately, and he abandoned the wrestling video he had been watching previously in favor of tearing open the letters on the table.
He was surprised to find college brochures inside. His father, however, did not seem all that surprised at all, even adding a couple more to the pile.
"It seems you are in high demand," Dad teased, smiling the tiniest bit. "I have received a few emails as well from recruiters recently."
Raph paused for a moment, rolling this idea about in his brain, trying to figure out what it meant and what it tasted like before he forced a small laugh, rubbing the back of his neck nervously.
"Guess they haven't seen my grades yet," he joked weakly. Dad hummed softly, pulling up a chair so he could sit down next to his eldest son.
"Nonsense," he scoffed. "Your grades are fine, Raphael. You've simply tricked yourself into thinking they're not by comparing yourself to others," he added, giving the other a knowing look. "And besides that, this is hardly the only thing that matters. I have told you many times that grades aren't everything. My grades in high school were terrible!" He remarked with a laugh. "And your career in sports is very impressive."
"I guess," Raph said, wrinkling his nose up a bit as he leaned over the table. Easy for him to say. He had a hard time wrapping his head around the idea of colleges being interested in him when his three younger brothers were right here in the same damn house! Had they really meant to send these to Hamato Raphael?
Dad's hand moved to rub little circles into his back, and he nudged his son's teacup a bit. Raph agreeably took a sip, allowing the warm liquid to trickle down through his chest.
"I know you have not always enjoyed schoolwork, Raphael," Dad finally spoke again. "But you are not stupid. You may very well have the most common sense of any of my children!" He chuckled. "And you have many talents besides that. You are a remarkable athlete, and I know I do not have to drag you over to the trophy wall to prove this to you, but I will if I have to. You are only sixteen and you are already the captain of multiple sports teams... not just anyone could handle that! It is difficult to lead a team. But you have always handled this with grace. And teaching children! That is a talent in and of itself. That is no easy task. Trust me, I know," he said, smiling slightly. "But you are doing so well with your new job. And I am very proud of you."
 Raphael glanced over at his father, for just a moment, hesitating like he wanted to say something, but then biting it back.
"You don't have to go to college if you don't want to," Dad added. "If you decide that is not the path for you, that is fine. I won't be upset or disappointed. I did not go to college, either! But I would hate for you to not even consider it just because you don't think you're good enough for it," he pressed. "I know you've always said you intend to pursue a career in sports of some kind, but this is very much an avenue to achieve that if you'd like. Many professional athletes get their start through college sports, you know. And I can already name half a dozen universities off the top of my head who would be thrilled to have you on their team in a couple of years!"
He sighed softly.
"But you do not have to decide right now, my son. There is still plenty of time for you to consider all of your options."
Raph glanced over at his father, shifting a bit in his seat, before looking to the side.
"Uh. I dunno, Pops. I mean. I'm not good at tests and all that junk. I mean. College football could be good 'n all, but, uh..."
He hesitated a second, sort of scratching the side of his jaw, hesitating a bit. "I dunno. Maybe I could... I mean. We could look at it, at least. I was kind of wonderin’ about, uh. I dunno… Just, lately, I was thinkin' about... studyin' early childhood education, maybe?..."
[ next ]
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puckpocketed · 3 months
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19/12/2023 Seattle Kraken vs Dallas Stars
The Summer I Fell For Hockey - The Kraken Wagon: How to Stay Silly in the Face of Loss
I’m the asshole on the tram who’s watching hockey on their phone and not paying attention. This is how my afternoon commute home starts. I almost run into at least two people, I definitely trip a guy trying to get off the tram because I’m not looking, and I’m caught scrambling for the door after nearly missing my stop. My walk home is slowed by my unwillingness to take my eyes off the live feed. I’m sweating through an ill-advised sweater vest thrown on at 6 in the morning on my way out the door and my feet sting from the 5 hour shift I just finished — but I don’t care. The Kraken are down 0-2 and it feels like if I stop watching, if I even think about hurrying home through the swampy, muggy afternoon, the game will run away from us. 
“The Kraken are a wagon” is a sentiment I’ve come across repeatedly in my idle googling about my team. They’re a new team, my friend tells me over discord — she fell out of love with ice hockey years ago, some time back when the Kraken were first drafting their inaugural season lineup — and as soon as I hear it I am enamoured with them. A baby team! One that’s still building an identity, trying to figure out its core; and I’m already so charmed by their jerseys — toothpaste red, white, and blue, a squiggly tentacle ‘S’ for Seattle and a glaring sea monster’s eye — but a baby team? That’s the kind of story I can gorge myself on.
So they have me. I’m in and I’m reading primers and checking player stats, and I only find out about the “Kraken wagon” later. My squids have been in free fall all season, I learn this not long after I catch a game (their 0-3 defeat to the Minnesota Wild). This is what I get for choosing teams based on jersey colours, it’s not too late to swap loyalties — my regulars, who have by now heard all about my latent ice hockey obsession, tell me this as I pour their coffees. They don’t get it yet. If I truly didn’t like the Kraken, I’d have given up on them by now. The jersey colours, at this point, are immaterial. The jerseys are a cute bonus.
Here’s the rub: no one ever expected them to make the Stanley Cup playoffs in their second ever season of existence, but they did — or, some past incarnation of them did. The shadow that this playoffs run casts, even now, is where the “wagon” accusations stem from. But I didn’t join them when times were good. I joined them after an 8 game-long skid into the boards.
It’s hard to love something when all you ever see are the worst parts of it, some might assume. Looking through the Kraken tag tells an entirely different story. Loving the Seattle Kraken has come so easily to me largely due to the tiny group of die-hard followers I’ve come into contact with. I have a tab perpetually open on my second monitor at home when I’m watching games, set to the Kraken’s liveblog tag, and each time I’ve tuned in has been the ride of my life. It’s clear from the speed at which we like and reblog each other’s posts that we’re all regularly checking the tag when something happens. It’s like the world’s most intimate Twitch chat section, the world’s least intimate discord call. We’re mutuals and besties, strangers and fellow fans — I imagine if we were in the stands together, we’d look at each other when our Kraken score and cheer together, maybe we’d scream and laugh in half-disbelief.
The Dallas Stars are at the top of the Western Conference’s central division table, and they play like it. In the first few minutes of the match, Duchene and Seguin blast through and slip one past Daccord, no easy feat given he’s been on fire himself recently. Time after time, the Kraken’s power play is wrecked. The Kraken are being given the runaround, having to doggedly chase down intercepted pucks where the Stars’ passes always seem to connect. Recovery from 0-2 might seem impossible from where they are at the end of the first period, but the Kraken bring to the second period the same energy they had for their relentless puck hunting. Matty B and Tuna — Beniers and Tatar  — put us on the scoreboard and keep us in it, even as we lose Canner and Belly to injuries. Recovery from such an early and demoralising goal deficit isn’t impossible, just increasingly unlikely when you’ve got no superstars and are trying to throw off the wagon allegations.
That’s another thing: expectations are low. And not in a way that’s meant to disrespect the Kraken players — it’s closer to how animals might ball up and protect their vulnerable, soft bellies from harm. Losing, to be perfectly candid, fucking sucks. Reminding ourselves that any gains — no matter how trivial — still count as a win is one way to stave off the inevitable heartbreak. Another way we do it is, to paraphrase several Kraken bloggers,  “staying silly”.
If I were to distill the essence of silliness, I’d start with hockey itself. This game is a goofy one, in spite of my past assertions about warrior’s codes and narratives and unspoken honour. On-ice collisions can in fact be the height of slapstick comedy; and today the tension of a potential line brawl was broken with, of all things, the arena DJ playing Mortal Kombat music. As for the people? Even as the Kraken went down two goals halfway through the first period, the posts and memes rolled in. 
Watching sports is meant to be a leisure activity. If the stress of it ever becomes too much for me, stepping away is vital. Having the denizens of krakenblr being silly alongside me is like having an extra layer of armour between us and the heartache of loss. We crack jokes about manifesting wins, about freeing our boys from the penalty box (they’ve never done anything wrong in their lives, ever, and even if they did those assholes had it coming), about our players who are babygirls, about the endless double-entendre made by Forslund and Olczyk. For each time we scored, for each penalty taken, each power play and penalty kill the tone set by everyone was simple: stay silly. 
In the last minute of the third period, the Kraken rally for one final push. With Daccord pulled from the net the 6-man rush is relentless, and they manage to get up in the Stars’ faces. This is the grit that so inspired my admiration. Though the recaps on the news feed might only list one or two names on the assist, the last goal of third period is thanks to everyone on the ice. The Kraken players perform as their namesake implies: as one they are a many-armed leviathan, come to drag you and yours down, down, down, into the deep.
Vince Dunn — Dunner or Vincess depending on who you ask — keeps the puck from the blue line, Wenny snatches it away from a tight spot between two Stars, and everyone works to feed it back onto Bjorkstrand’s tape. Bjorkstrand’s shot cracks down the line and into the crease — and how’s this for poetry: from the same goddamn place on the ice he shot the last time he had to even up a game going into overtime — and the ensuing scuffle ends with Tolvy tipping it past Wedgewood. After a deeply frustrating review from the situation room, the goal is called good and we’re confirmed for overtime. Various posts to the effect of, “No matter what happens, I love you all. We’ll be okay,” flood the tag as I refresh my page. With them, it truly ain’t that serious; and going into overtime, even knowing the Kraken have one of the least impressive OT records in the league, truly cements it for me. The Kraken will be my team for the foreseeable future.
I won’t keep you in suspense, if you’re reading this from the outside looking in. The game ends in a loss. But I’m no heavier than I was when the game started. On the contrary, I’m lighter. The little reservoir of dread that had built up inside me in the early hours of the game has been emptied by a tidal wave of sweetness, of sincere well-wishes and optimism. To the Kraken fans I’ve interacted with so far: thank you all so much for what is possibly the warmest welcome I’ve ever received to a fandom space, thank you for making this game and this team so easy to love, thank you for shielding my tender flesh from loss and making even defeats a little fun.
So what if the Kraken are a wagon? It’s a clown wagon, and we’re riding it together; hand in silly hand.
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morrak · 1 month
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Untitled Wednesday Library Series, Part 142
I’ve been thinking a lot about criticism lately. It’s a thing I — we all — do often, of course, which probably makes it important. Some, but not all, kinds of criticism have traditions and vocabularies; you can (thought hardly anyone does) make a living writing about film or architecture or food. There are, on the other hand, some things about which a weekly column would have to get inventive. Spreadsheets. Individual songbirds. Tactile sensations. Rust.
I try pretty hard not to do the first kind of thing in these posts. Although that’s mostly because I fear committing to judgments on the record, it’s also (I think) an expression of sympathy toward the second kind of thing — not everything needs a critical tradition, but why not spread the attentiveness around, y'know? Maybe.
To such an end, posting about books is a pretty bad choice. You could argue that what I’m really reviewing isn’t the works themselves, but rather the choice to dedicate pieces of mind to them. I'm not sure why you'd argue that, but you could. If I’d thought this exercise through properly I’d have chosen some other thing I have several of, like 5V wall adapters or grains of rice.
Anyway, let’s talk about an art book.
Ben P. Ward’s 2021 I Dream of Dust, one of the four things Temper Books published before changing everything on their website to the past tense.
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The How
From some small bookseller whose name I’ve forgotten and wouldn’t tell you anyway. A few weeks back, @krieper and I visited a printing studio that hosted some stuff — zines and local prints, mostly — on a self-service rack up front. All cool stuff, but this especially caught my eye.
The (Sub)Text
So, the Eastern Plains, right? This is about those, sort of. I broadly agree with the thoughts of this reviewer about the voice it delivers differing from Temper’s promise — yes, this is what Eastern Colorado can look like if shot competently, and yes, the meditation works for me, but no, I’m not sure it’s especially subversive.
The Object
I cannot offer you a good feel for these photographs or their printing here. Ward is on other social media, I’m told; you can also find some of these on his website.
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This is a quiet project, which the printing respects. Thoughtful margins, easy blacks and whites, satin finish, more blank space than photo. Large format shots at this scale just work. I’m used to seeing posthumous collections or coffee table send-ups of painters, which are too often too full; this can breathe. Sensitive and inviting but only sparingly intimate. Glad for all that.
This first (and presumably final) printing comprised 500 signed copies in sewn hardcover bindings. Not unusual for a collection like this, but still nice to see and handle.
The Why, Though?
Because it mostly works for me, because it reminds me of other stuff than mostly works for me, and because the outing this came from involved talk of Colorado and Kansas and the Texas Panhandle, none of which I miss, I swear.
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turtlevariabilis · 12 days
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My story with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
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When I graduated from preschool, I was gifted the class pet: a red-eared slider turtle (now almost 20 years old and even has a similar companion). From that moment on, turtles have become part of my identity. If someone asked me about my favorite animal, of course I would say turtles. They are very interesting animals that do interact with each other and with humans; they have an enviable perseverance, enormous curiosity, and ninja-like abilities (they are fast, silent, and enjoy climbing, to throw themselves and performing some really strange acrobatics).
Well, today I'd rather tell you my story with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and how I came to be part of this fandom. It's actually a somewhat long story, but it has some funny details, and it's a way for you to get to know me a little better.
So, since turtles have always been a part of my life, it should have been natural for me to encounter the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles from a very young age, so I got to know them through the tmnt 2003 version. And yes, of course, they appeared on television and I was curious about protagonists being turtles... but the series didn't resonate with me.
When you're young, what you need are stories that you can somehow identify with, which is why the best stories will always be the ones that are most diverse in every possible way. And of course, any version of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is already a statement towards accepting what's different, promoting diversity. But this wasn't enough for me back then.
I was a girl who wanted to see girly things, shows with interesting female characters. And honestly, from what little I had seen of tmnt 2003 (maybe just a few scenes from an episode), I only spotted male characters except for April, who was an adult (so I preferred to watch Teen Titans). However, I already had my favorite turtle identified: the one with the purple mask, simply because it was my favorite color; funny how that hasn't changed.
When I was almost the age of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, the tmnt 2012 series premiered on Nickelodeon. It didn't catch my attention either. However, my sister L, almost three years younger than me, insisted that I watch it. So I did... and I guess I loved it. Because that's how my story with the Ninja Turtles began. That's how I met them.
My sister L and I were always on the lookout for when the series aired on TV; we literally ran to watch it, to make sure we didn't miss anything. And I confirmed that my favorite turtle was Donnie, but I actually loved them all.
A few years later, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie (2014) was released... I couldn't see it in theaters, but I was very excited about it, even though I knew it had nothing to do with the tmnt 2012 version (which I was very hooked on), and that's why I was a little disappointed. Plus, I hated how they sexualized April.
So yeah... you could say I was obsessed with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and although I hadn't realized to what extent, my parents and my two sisters did, so my 16th birthday party (just with these people) was themed around it as a surprise. They inflated green balloons, hung them up, and put on masks in the corresponding colors, and we ate pizza. They put a mini 2012 Donatello toy on my cake, which I still have. Now that I think about it, it was an intimate and very nice party... however, I don't like to show my tastes, so at that moment I did feel uncomfortable and dared to express that I would have preferred a normal party, instead of expressing how incredible it was, because it really was incredible. (What can I say? Although I have always been well-behaved and never caused any problems of any kind, I was also a teenager).
At that time, I was still following the tmnt 2012 series, and I used the internet to keep up with each new episode. I reached a point where I became impatient and had to watch the episodes as soon as they premiered, meaning I had to hurry to watch them on YouTube before the videos were taken down, even if that meant watching them in English and in poor quality.
I had a terrible level of English and I hardly understood anything. But doing this greatly improved my level, and I also started to take my English classes at school seriously to understand the episodes. Without exaggeration, everything I know about English is thanks to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Nowadays, I have a very solid intermediate level, and I still continue to improve thanks to them.
Still in that level of obsession with the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, I obviously searched for more on the internet, on YouTube specifically. In one of those many videos I watched, scenes from the tmnt 2007 version caught my attention. That rivalry, that epic battle between Leo and Raph, captivated me. So I watched that movie, and although I didn't find it good overall for several reasons, I was deeply moved by the story between the brothers.
But let's go back to the tmnt 2012 version. The ending of the third season was one of the most shocking endings I've ever seen. And when the fourth season premiered and the turtles were in space... that's exactly when I lost interest. And I really don't know why, since I really like science fiction and everything related to the universe. Maybe it was because I stopped understanding what was happening (remember I was watching the episodes in English). I don't know.
After that, from time to time, I would feel nostalgic and curious about this series, so I would watch a random episode here and there (in general, I'm not good at watching series; I'm capable of watching only the episodes that catch my attention, sacrificing understanding the overall plot). And when I found out it ended, I looked for the last three episodes of the fifth season... and they left me feeling really bad with that dystopian, hopeless, but realistic ending. It's horrible, but I guess that's what I liked the most. Let's admit it, we all like to be masochists.
Later, I sort of saw that a new version had been released with colors too vibrant for my taste and a 2D animation with too much hyperactivity that didn't catch my attention. Yes, I'm talking about the rottmnt version, released in 2018. Nowadays, you don't know how much I regret not paying attention to it.
Years passed and 2023 arrived. At the beginning of that year, I realized that we had Paramount+, and that meant that the tmnt 2012 series, in Spanish, was complete. And my younger sister R hadn't been able to watch it because she had been too young at the time. So I felt like introducing it to her, and that way I could watch the entire series in the right way.
It was like watching a marathon: we finished it all in less than two months, despite our various commitments (she had school and I had work, making it very difficult to coordinate schedules). Suddenly, my obsession returned, very intense. It was the only time that I've had the same obsession in two very different stages of my life. But I still wasn't open to discovering new versions.
(You're going to laugh at what happened next).
My sister L, the one who initially introduced me to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, seeing how much I enjoyed reconnecting with them, insisted that I watch the movie of the rottmnt version, which was on Netflix; she said it was very intense and good, well worth it, but that I had to watch it with an open mind because it had many radical changes.
Much to my dismay, very resistant and with my mind as closed as possible, I watched this movie. And yes, it was very intense and all, but I concluded that I didn't like it. I didn't feel like those were my turtles. Despite that, I watched it again... and then again and again. It's like the character of Donnie caught my attention a bit. It's like the animation wasn't as bad as I had initially thought. It's like the intensity they conveyed was starting to appeal to me. It's like it was somewhat entertaining. It's like I was starting to like the characters a bit and was beginning to identify and even understand them.
And suddenly, even though I kept insisting to myself that I didn't like this new version, I started watching some random episodes of the series... until I began watching them in order... and then I would rewatch some episodes that I had liked... I mean, it's just that there was no one to stop me and I had to stop fooling myself! The rottmnt version had many different things, but it was very well-crafted and very good. Of course, I loved it! And currently, for me, it undoubtedly surpasses the tmnt 2012 version by many reasons that I won't comment on this text.
When the official content of rottmnt ran out, I needed more. So I searched on the internet... and suddenly I got caught up in some fan-made comics... and then I found myself on Tumblr... and then I started to become interested in more versions and began watching them (like the first season of tmnt 1987, some episodes of tmnt 2003, I watched the tmnt 2007 movie again as well as Batman vs. The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, which I didn't mention, but I had seen before because I had a certain period in my life when I loved Batman).
And all of that was at the beginning of the year 2023, because then the trailer for the movie Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem appeared, which was going to be released in a few months. I had no idea that a new version was coming out that year, and it came just in time to keep increasing my fan skills. Of course, I went to see it in the cinema and loved it, although rottmnt is still my favorite version.
And nowadays, in 2024, I still feel like one of my central thoughts is the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and I want to keep learning more about them, both the old versions and the new ones that are coming. And I really look forward to continuing to contribute my bit to the fandom with this account. Hopefully, this will also be the year when I can finally watch tmnt 2003 properly.
And it's funny, because suddenly I know many references from many versions and I love that, although I know I have a lot to catch up on. For now, I've never stepped into the realm of comics, and I still don't know if I ever will.
Because I'm just a fan, and those of us who are fans of something should be so on our own terms, without the pressure of anything or anyone.
I've run out of words and I don't know how to conclude this text, but if you've made it this far, wow, I'm impressed! I send you lots of greetings and good vibes, just as Mondo Gecko would say.
•💜•
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Arthur Morgan (Modern Headcannons) What he’s like without kids
Okay, this was a request from @mrsarthurmorgan7 Who wanted to see what Arthur would be like if the reader didn’t want kids
We all know how our loving cowboy is with kids, so we have to see what the other side of the coin is obviously! 
Warnings!: NSFW as always lmao, arthur being fluffy, maybe a little bit of angst? Not too much no one panic lololol Female Reader 
Tags: @kieropal @photo1030 @cantchoosejust1 @6kaja9​
Okay party people lets do this! 
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Ok
So
Arthur is obviously a little bit more of a family oriented guy, and I think that’s mainly because he was just always surrounded by a big family, after he was adopted that is
That hand he just loves babies 
But
when it comes time to talk about having kids
and you tell him that you 
A: Cannot have kids 
or B: Do not want kids
DO NOT FEAR
it is not a deal breaker for him
He’ll probably be a little shocked at first, because he thinks you’re great with Jack 
And he’s probably kinda upset because he thinks that you’d look amazing pregnant
but he loves you
and respects you
because he drinks respect women juice
Granted he will be a little sad because of it, but he isn’t going to make you feel guilty for it
He understands that if you can’t have kids that’s not your fault in any way shape or form, you cannot control that whatsoever and in no way is he going to make you feel as though it is.
He also understands that not everyone wants to have kids, and that’s okay too
Again, he’ll probably be a little sad that you don’t want kids with him, but, he’ll get over it eventually
He loves you and respects you, so even if he might want some, he is okay not having any
plus to him that means he can have more alone time with you, and he can spend all the time he wants to spend loving you.
No kids means more date nights, and more....ya know 
It also means that he can walk around naked in the house without panicking that he’s gonna scar his children for life.
Plus, even if he’s a family oriented guy, you are his family, and he get all his love he needs from you! 
And ya know, Dutch and Co.
You can fill that hole in his heart happily
Without kids, you have less responsibilities too, which is nice on both of you, less bills to pay, and more money to go on vacation 
Now, listen here
just because you don’t want kids, or dont have any
does not mean he will not enjoy the act of how they’re created 
And without kids around
he’s got plenty of time, and literally the entire house to fuck you as he pleases
He loves to be intimate with you all the time
He loves you so much
I mean
He comes home and kisses you on the cheek, then the neck, then the shoulder, and then he’ll slide his hands under your shirt and bring them up to your breasts quietly
He’ll mutter in your ears the whole time
Asking you how your day was
but also calling you his beautiful girl
His wonderful wife
amazing woman
His woman
He enjoys everything he does with you 
He loves kissing you, holding you
His favorite thing to do is come home and catch you by surprise though
If you’re in the shower when he gets home he’ll come into the bathroom and just strip down without a word
he’s covered in oil and grease anyway so he needs to shower anyhow.
he’ll slip in behind you, usually scaring you because he’s literally dead silent
and he’ll just kiss you on the neck, and start cleaning you up
“How was work today?”
“It was fine until you nearly gave me a heart attack just now!”
“I’m a big guy, I ain’t that hard to miss Darlin’, ain’t my fault if you don’t pay attention to your surroundin’s.” 
He also wants to convince you to get a dog 
since you don’t have kids he will TOTALLY want a dog named Mayhem
He’ll want either a German Shepard or a Husky 
Hell both! 
He’d even ask for cats too! 
He loves all kinds of animals 
So he’ll be happy to have them! 
If you do get dogs he loves to see you cuddle up with them, it’s the cutest thing ever to him
He lets the dogs sleep in the bed sometimes
(You hate it because they nearly kick you off the bed sometimes but you love him too much to tell him to stop) 
He never gets upset with the dogs at all, well, that is unless they start to come bother you while he’s trying to make love to you 
“Get the hell outta here dog! Don’t I spend enough time with you, leave us be!” 
He does love his days when he gets to babysit Jack, however, sometimes after his bad days he REALLY understands why you don’t want kids
Jack causes him all kinds of issues, on certain days of course, other times he’s an angel, but sometimes he’s like a DEVIL 
He’ll throw tantrums and wreck your home, and Arthur literally can’t figure out how to calm him down
This is when he was younger of course
but those bad days really make him happy to turn Jack loose back to his parents rather than him having to worry about dealing with him all the time
Not to say that he’d hate any kids that he would have
thats not it at all, and he doesn’t hate jack either
but he is glad that it’s not an extra expense the two of you have as well as not having to worry about him fucking up as a parent, because sometimes Jack makes him wonder if he’d be that great with the way his temper rises so quickly
Arthur comes home with gifts for you all the time btw
He’ll tell you 
“Come out to the truck I got somethin’ for you”
And you’ll be confused as hell because like
you hate it when he buys you gifts
it’s money he doesn’t need to spend
but of course
he loves you to no end and other than your bills (Which he makes sure are completely covered before buying anything) you have nothing that needs money for
so he buys you gifts all the time
you’ll come out to the truck and he’ll have a whole ass pine cabinet in the truck bed for you
and it’s beautiful and you’ve been looking at it for a while
so he literally just 
read your mind 
He’ll get you smaller gifts and things too obviously
flowers
clothes
necklaces
he loves to buy you video games too
because he plays them with you
even though he’s really bad at them 
(He thinks he’s bad at all technology and to be fair he kinda is unless he’s used it forever lmao)
So he’ll come home with a bunch of video games to play with you
or watch you play
sometimes he likes to sit down with some popcorn and just sit and watch you play story games
like
Elden Ring? 
He’ll watch you play that for hours, he loves all the magic and like knights and things
Hes huge into the medieval stuff
He’s also big into the cowboy stuff, cause he’s a modern day cowboy lol, and the closest game he’s ever brought home that was cowboy-esk was The Last Of Us
Which 
He LOVES Joel, he relates to him SO much
(You love joel for another reason but you still think Arthur is hotter than him)
He likes Days Gone By too, he forces you to have a game night with him at least once a week
Which you don’t mind cause he cuddles up next to you and gets totally engrossed in the game at hand
like
he just
is completely engulfed
if you pause the game he gets mad
usually the game nights last until the early morning hours and the two of you have a great time playing together
and usually the day after both of you have the day off and you just sleep in until about 1pm 
He loves Yellowstone, and at least once a week you guys catch up on episodes, and you love to see how excited he gets
and your favorite thing is when he calls certain characters bitches
or fucks
or dumbasses
he also loves any and all moves with Sam Elliot in them 
and he watches them all the time
he’ll clean dishes from the kitchen and lean around the wall to watch the show
Like I mentioned earlier he loves to take you on vacation, since the two of you don’t have kids you don’t have anything to worry about in terms of expenses
therefore
you have enough extra money to go places
he takes you places you’ve never been to
anywhere you want
if theres a state you’ve always wanted to visit
that’s where he takes you
or an event?
Maybe he even takes you to meet some of your favorite actors and actresses
it all depends on you! 
He’ll take you anywhere, especially since you two can save up the money
The vacations are always fun
you see attractions your interested in
but you also see plenty of your bedroom too
Like
A lot of your bedroom
And he loves to take you swimming when it’s available
He just likes to see you in a swimsuit
Speaking of the hanky panky
He’s extremely careful
because if you can have kids but don’t want to
he isn’t gonna sit there and like ‘trick’ you into like having kids, he might want them a little bit but he isn’t like that
so he’s extremely careful to make sure you don’t fall pregnant if you’re physically able
He always pulls out, if he’s able to
of course the two of you wear protection for the most part and you’re on birth control
if he can’t pull out in time he always buys you a Plan B pill after
which
controversial topic to some people
he believes that a woman should have rights to her body
if you want an abortion that is your business and your choice, he doesn’t know what it’s like to be pregnant
he believes that you should do what you feel is right
and of course
a part of him pings because that could become a baby but he isn’t someone who says “Thats a full baby you can’t do that’
If it comes to that he will fully support your decision on what you do
again
he believes its your body
your choice
he’s a very supportive husband
If anyone were to get in your way for something like that he’d literally fight someone
He is here to make sure you’re happy and healthy, and he’s happy if you’re happy
He literally loves you so much
He can’t put it into words even
Okokokok This is another kind of short one
I really struggled for some reason with this one! (Probably cause I myself would like children in the future but thats nothing against anyone who doesn’t!) 
If by any chance anyone would like more of these please let me know and I’ll do my best to dig into it deeper! 
I hope you do like these though!!
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Okay, I mean this in no disrespect about Miphlink, Miphlink shippers *mwah* love you guys, but me for me personally I like Miphlink but only with it in the context of it being one sidded AND Mipha being 100% completely aware of it's unrequitedness.
Why? Because I. Love. Angst. I thrive off it.
Like Mipha is a sweet, compassionate girl with a heart of pure gold - but she isn't stupid. She isn't oblivious to the blink and you'll miss it searching glances that goes on between Link and Princess Zelda, the devotion he has for her that goes well beyond than just a knight doing his job. She isn't ignorant to glimmering shine that lights up in the princess' eyes every time she looks at her chosen knight either, the genuine expression that melts across her face that is all devoid of the facade she presents wherever on official royal duties. Love. Clear and obvious love that is impossible to ignore even if it stabs and knaws at the Zora princess' heart each and every time she sees it.
How she wished deeply in her heart of hearts, how she wished and pray to the goddess that maybe one day... Link would look at her the same way. But then she quickly realizes how silly and selfish that sounds every time and that breaks her heart even more. It'd be so cruel to wish something like that because then it'd be hurting both Link and Zelda and she absolutely doesn't want that - both of them are very dear friends to her and she doesn't want to warm that because of some... silly feelings. Silly, deep, feelings.
For quite some time she sits up on Vah Ruta's spout and truly recollects on the matter. Each day she thinks, traces her slight taloned fingertips over the blade of her trident and staring back at her reflection on its blade. She really did love the hero, she knows her feelings are true and much before the realization that his heart actually belonged to someone else she... started making him the armor. Since then she's hiddened it, far from any eyes to see and is positively sure the only ones to know about its existence is her father and little Sidon - who'd actually helped a bit himself in the stitching of the scales which even now still brings a small smile to her lips. There's no reason to finish it now, surely, but on the other hand something ate at her to accompanied by a voice saying maybe it'll be important one day to fulfill at least some kind of purpose, even if it wasn't for its original intention.
Mipha pauses on the thought, her eyes scanning over through the mountains and towards the direction of the castle in the kingdom's heart. She heard rather recently from Urbosa that Link has been sneaking Princess Zelda out of the castle at night to continue her sheikah research, going the King's direct orders.
A knight disobeying the word of his king. He did that for her.
The Zora sighs. That sounds very like him, she admired that about him and even so she's glad to hear the princess had still continue her research, it was no hidden secret that one of her main interests so if she continue to pursue it than that makes her happy. And the princess happy obviously made Link happy, which in turn makes Mipha happy at the end of the day.
Her mind crawls back to the armor.
...maybe... she could finish it. Not as some token of engagement as Zora tradition willed it, though she is aware exactly how it will look to most Zora when she gives it to the hero, how they'll interpret it and try to spin it off as a romantic thing but... the creation of armor like this without a doubt is a very special an and intimate one, very personal. So it'd have to mean just as much if she were to give it as a... blessing, right? Her personal blessing for Link and Zelda's relationship. Her token of acceptance, even if it stung.
She very quickly went to work.
Every single night, even after long days of training and attending to her royal duties she takes some time to work on the armor. She pays attention to fine detail - making sure every row of scales that aline the sturdy fabric are in the correct shape and positioning that would make the set suitable to be worn even years and decades from now. Regal - she makes it, with every pattern melted in the pauldrons and the pretty eye catching glimmer of sapphires that danced in between the threads of the fabric. Perfect, she wants it to be perfect. To symbolic represent how much Link means to her and how happy she is with his happiness and love to the princess. She loves seeing him happy and wishes for everything in the world just to keep him happy.
Even if she has to watch him grow old, together hand in hand with the woman he actually loves and eventually... die. And Mipha will still be young, and live life long without him, that's the sad truth between human and zora lifespans. So this all is for the best.
Weeks and months leading through the armors creation process, even in the final hours until its completely finished and ready to present.
She still can't stop the uncontrollable tears streaming down her face.
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isthereanechoinhere96 · 8 months
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The Clearing - Part I
Part 3 of Starstruck
Summary
Echo breaks up with you out of nowhere and you don't know if you will ever be happy again.
Rating: Mature
Word Count: 7006
Warnings: intense heartbreak, guilt, hurt no comfort, jealousy
AO3
You have never seen Echo eat.
Never.
After a mission gone wrong ended up with Echo and you making out which ended up in Echo going down on you and that led to Rex seeing you in this very intimate moment – luckily unnoticed by Echo – you offered to make dinner for the two of you. Maybe get things back to a normal level of the early phase of a relationship.
It had been only a few hours since you last saw each other. You parted in the early morning after you had finished the report about your mission. Rex had given you leverage to take more time but Echo couldn’t change who he was and just had to do it right away.
If you had ever seen him eat something, anything, you could have guessed what kind of food he likes. But you haven’t.
After a long struggle between a thousand recipes you chose a chickpea bowl with fresh vegetables. Nothing too spicy, pure natural taste, high on protein and fibers. You figured that would be an adequate meal for a soldier. It’s also something that doesn’t need to be cut so he can eat it with one hand and things wouldn’t be awkward.
After you made a big drama about what to cook you overthought your clothes. You wanted to look great but you also didn’t want to make it too obvious. You didn’t want him to see how much effort you put into this. In the end you chose a pair of plain trousers and a classic t-shirt with a slim fit that made your body look awesome.
What about the decoration? A flower would have looked nice on the kitchen table but all you had was a cactus and it surely wouldn’t reflect your intentions. And candles? Romantic but maybe a tad too cheesy. Or is this something that he would expect you to put there?
You roll your eyes about the nervous wreck that’s you. Echo pretty much already implied he had feelings for you. You know you would have to mess it up really badly to ruin this evening. Still you feel nervous.
You stir the food in the pot, lost in memories of yesterday’s events when the doorbell rings. If it's him, he's here too early. The butterflies in your stomach are immediately back. With a pounding heart you open the door.
Echo…
He obviously doesn’t know anything about having to make things look effortlessly – and you absolutely love it! He wears black trousers and a dark grey almost sleeveless shirt which already draws a lot of your attention but the black and red kama around his hips is the icing on the cake. And this is the first time you see him wear it. He never wears it because it sticks out too much, makes him look like a Mandalorian or ARC trooper, raises attention. But he decided to take the risk and put it on for you. Your heart misses a beat. You never thought you would go for a man in a skirt but the sight of Echo and his kama takes your breath away.
And again you feel how you felt when you first met him…starstruck…
“Come in” you stutter when you find your voice again.
Echo smiles shyly. He knows his kama has the intended effect on you. He looks around. “Nice place.”
“Thanks…Erm…” you don’t really know what to say so you loose no time. “Dinner’s ready…I hope you like chickpeas.”
Echo chuckles. “I have no idea what that is but it smells good.”
You go to the kitchen, still nervous, and take a bowl.
“Just tell me how much you want…”
You put in the first spoonful.
“That’s enough, thanks.”
You stare him in the face. “Erm…that’s not even half a children’s portion.”
“Yeah I don't eat that much…anymore.”
You laugh in disbelief. “OK I think I just made three weeks worth of food for you. Maybe you want to take a doggy bag with you?”
Echo laughs. “Do I have to decide now?”
“Smart boy, try it first...”
You sit down and pour both of you some water, then start to eat.
“So I may I assume that your cybernetic parts don't get the energy from the food you eat?” you ask as casually as possible.
“Yup.”
“Nuclear battery?”
Echo nods.
You raise your eyebrows.
“So are you…erm…radioactive? I mean if I spend more time with you do I have to take any precautions so I don't get cancer or end up sterile?“ The moment those words leave your mouth you already regret it. You’re a little lost about small talk with him but you don’t want to focus on his parts too much, don’t know if he feels comfortable talking about it, don’t want to reduce him to his technical side and you surely don't want him to think there is something about him you feel uncomfortable with. You pale. „I mean…I‘m sorry I didn’t…“
Echo smiles amused.
“Don’t worry…Tech - one of my former team members - he made a big thing out of it when I joined the team and he was very thorough. I can proudly say that I fulfill all OH&S guidelines and all spaceworthyness requirements - civil and military. I even have a certificate for electromagnetic compatibility with the Marauder’s avionic systems. And…” he makes it sound dramatic “I was the only crew member who was in the medical files AND on the equipment list.”
“Ok that was a stupid question I guess…”
Echo shakes his head. “Don’t worry. I don’t like it when people tiptoe around it.”
He takes another bite than looks up to you.
„So you want children?“
You almost choke on your food and cough.
„Erm…I…I think it’s a little early for that question…“
„Oh I…I just asked because you were worried about infertility.“
You laugh quietly. „I just want to keep all my options.“
Echo nods.
You both eat in silence for a while and you notice that Echo eats the chickpeas one by one to make sure he won‘t be done before you have finished.
After some time Echo puts down his spoon, rubs the back of his head and says “I...erm...I told Rex about...meeting you. I hope that didn't cross a line.”
For a moment you feel adrenaline shoot in your veins. Rex...he saw you...did he tell Echo? But if he did, Echo would probably have a different look on his face. It's cute how Echo avoided the word “date”. You never called it that so he doesn't want to be the first one to say it out loud. Which is hilarious because he. Went. Down. On. You. Just. Yesterday. But this is something different. Sex is easy. Feelings aren't. You sigh on the inside. You need to find out if Rex told him.
“So...how did he react?”
Echo shrugs. “He said he's not surprised.”
You raise your eyebrows. “Because...”
Echo laughs shyly. “We've known each other for a long time now.”
You nod and smile. Good. Rex didn't give it away. He knows it would hurt Echo and he has no interest in doing that. It will be your shared secret.
Again you eat in silence for a while. If you had a clock on the wall you would hear its regular ticking like in some of these old holomovies. You realize that none of you knows how to start some small talk. You could ask him about his hobbies but you are fairly sure he doesn’t have any. You already tapped into the „let’s talk about your parts“ trap and don‘t want to make everything about it. Bite by bite passes by with Echo sometimes shortly looking over to you and you sometimes looking over to Echo. The silence begins to become uncomfortable.
„Is it just me or was it easier yesterday?“ you ask.
Echo smiles. „I‘m glad you feel the same…well we didn’t talk that much yesterday…“
You raise your eyebrow. „I do hope that’s not all that this is.“
Echo purses his lips. „Me too.“
„So…why don’t you tell me about your former team. Is everyone as charming as Tech?“
It seems this was just the right cue. Echo has a lot to tell you about the funny team of misfits that took him in. And suddenly the conversation just flows.
You keep on talking until the food has long been eaten and you decide to move over to your sofa. You just sat down for a second when he puts his hand on your thigh and dips his tongue into your mouth. He’s not losing time.
Again it feels absolutely unreal to have him so close. But also so good. His kisses go deep and again you drown in desire. He really knows his way around...but today you want to be good for him too. So you softly run your fingers over his kama and put your hand on his thigh. „I think I still owe you one.“ You slowly move your hand up towards his crotch and seductively look him in the eye. You can't wait to see the arousal in his face, see him fall apart under your touch...and everything else you're about to do to him.
His thigh feels harder than you thought – he is probably still cybernetic there. Not what you expected but also kinda sexy. Maybe it'll look like those very long overknee boots...You image what he looks like with his long cybernetic legs, picture him from behind, naked, with his tight tiny ass, giving you a look over his shoulder, raising an eyebrow before you run your hands over his body from behind, down to his length...
You can't wait to see that and slowly move your hand further up.
Echo softly stops your hand. „We‘re not keeping score, are we?“
For a moment you are taken aback. This is a first.
„Erm no but…I would really like to make this as much about you as it is about me this time.“
Your hand and Echo's rest on his thigh, Echo still holding yours back.
„You know I really enjoyed what I did to you yesterday and I wouldn’t mind just repeating that…I had the impression you enjoyed it too…never change a running system…“
„I did, but Echo…“ You tilt your head. „I…I don’t want your service. I want us to be in this together. Share the moment with you. Hear you…feel you when I make you come...deep down inside me...feel you fill me up...I‘d really like that…“
Echo exhales loudly and waits a moment. „It’s been a long day. We didn’t get any sleep tonight because of the report. I erm…I don’t think I’m up for it.“
You’re a little disappointed but you also understand. It’s OK. Better than forcing it and things go south…that would be an awful start for the both of you.
You slowly retreat your hand. „That’s OK. Why don’t we just talk?“
Echo relaxes a bit. „You really don’t need anything?“
You slowly shake your head and force yourself to smile. „I‘ll wait until next time when you got more sleep.“
Echo nods and purses his lips.
So you sit on your sofa, a little insecure, nervous, desperately trying to find something to talk about. After some time Echo asks you about your hobbies and your day job and you start talking a bit, unsure whether you are just boring him to death or whether he really likes to hear what you say. Echo seems to be increasingly absent-minded and you try to change the topic, try to make it about him but you can see it...his mind is somewhere else.
After some time you sigh – no need to go on like this and wonder what's wrong. “Is everything alright? You seem to be a little distracted.”
Echo is startled for a moment, then he groans quietly. “I'm sorry...was it that obvious?”
You nod.
He sighs. “I promised Rex to screen and prepare some blueprints for a briefing and I completely forgot about it because of our dinner.”
Here he is, Mr. Overachiever. You are fairly sure Rex told him it can wait and Echo didn't accept it. It wouldn't be the end of the world if Echo didn't prepare them but he wouldn't find any peace of mind until he did it.
You sigh silently, then look in his eyes. “It's OK Echo, you can't change who you are. Just go and do it.”
Echo slowly gets up with some regret in his eyes, thanks you for the dinner and gives you a peck on the cheek.
Then he walks out the door.
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Nemec and Fireball are already waiting for you when you get into the underground network’s hideaway after you finished work the next day. “Hey party girl! Beach party tonight?”
“Erm…give me sec, I gotta check up on Echo then I’ll let you know.”
It's been only a few hours but you miss him already. You hope he got some sleep and didn't spend the whole night preparing the blueprints. Maybe he is in the mood for some action tonight. And hopefully he doesn't have another task on his mind.
Nemec and Fireball exchange a glance. They think they know what’s going to happen when you go to Echo.
You had developed a little game.
They would ask you to go out and you would then go to Echo and ask him to join you. When you did it the first time, you didn’t know any better. But of course Echo had better things to do, he always overprepared for his missions and was all work no play. So his two clone brothers laughed their asses off when you seriously asked Corporal Overachiever to join you for the first time.
But you kept on asking. Partially out of politeness and respect but increasingly for fun. It had turned into a running gag. Nemec and Fireball mocked you - both of you - in the background while you asked Echo to join you and he turned you down. You weren’t upset about it, you expected it. Started to ask him with a grin. Let him know you knew his answer already. Showed him it had turned into a little game. And after some time you could see his mouth twitch when you entered his office with the foreseeable question. The only moment when he lost his seriousness, even if it was just for a fraction of a second, only for you to see.
Now that you know he has feelings for you the memory of all these times of futile invitations and the little stifled smile feel even better.
Of course Fireball and Nemec can't know that your visit today would go into a different direction. And Nemec has reservations. “Yeah…maybe you shouldn’t ask him today. He’s even grumpier than normal if you can believe that’s even possible.”
“Yup.” Fireball adds. “He even threatened to shove his scomp up my ass.“
„Twice” Nemec adds.
„Yeah, twice…“
You grin. Whatever these two silly billies did today...It was not uncommon for them to have a confrontation with Echo even though they respected him. They surely deserved it.
You put up a confident smile. “You know what? I might even like that.”
Nemec and Fireball look at each other then burst into laughter.
The two clones whistle and hoot in the background and are still laughing when you knock on Echo’s door and get in.
He sits on his desk, his nose buried in a datapad. He looks up only shortly and probably doesn’t even see the bright smile you give him. These guys must have really pissed him off. Maybe you can help him forget about the trouble at work tonight.
“Hey Echo…how are you? You got any plans for tonight?”
Echo waves with the datapad and gives you another very short look.
“Mission briefings” he says with a serious tone in his voice.
You feel a little alienated to see him so unemotional and...distant. You have no idea what's going on...but your stomach does, it begins to hurt.
“Ok…uh…when will we meet again? I miss you already…”
Echo puts the datapad down and gives you a longer look.
“You know I’ve been thinking…you and me…it’s not gonna work.”
Your smile slips. The words go right to your stomach. You feel your face crumble. “What?”
“Yeah it’s just not a good idea” Echo states with a tone that accepts no contradiction.
Your mind is racing. “Did I do something wrong?”
“No it’s just…I don’t think we’re compatible.”
You stare at him. “I don’t understand…what did I do wrong?”
Echo just shakes his head. “Nothing. As I said. Just a compatibility issue. It’s not your fault. And now excuse me. I got work to do.” His voice is cold and the look in his face hardened.
You tremble and feel the hurt take control of you, feel its tight grip deep inside your chest. There is no talking him out of it. There will be no explanation. He made up his mind.
You swallow hard and leave his office, walk quickly past Nemec and Fireball, hope they won’t see the tears in your eyes.
“So are you with us or what?” Fireball asks.
You quickly shake your head and rush out.
They look at each other.
Nemec jumps up and marches straight into Echo’s office without knocking at the door.
“What the hell did you do to her?!” you hear him scream.
The last thing you hear before you leave through the door is Echo screaming “Fuck off!” when he slams the door.
You run into Chuchi on your way out, bump into her shoulder, mumble „Sorry, Senator“ and then just keep on walking home, tears running down your face, bewildered, shocked, alienated, sad, grieving for the short moment of happiness you had and lost so quickly. You go over your evening again and again, overthink everything you have said and done. And of course you’re not perfect and of course you could have done some things better and of course it was hard to find something to talk about but there is nothing you can think of that could have made him that bitter and cold. You wish he would at least tell you what you’ve done because you really have no idea…
And of course you had to run into Chuchi on the way out. Chuchi of all people. You just hope there will be a chance to get him back before she realizes that he’s available again and…
You freeze.
Chuchi.
It must have been her.
Maybe seeing him in your hoodie made her realize that if she doesn't tell him now it'll be too late.
Maybe Echo never noticed she was in love with him.
Maybe she was on her way to Echo to spend the evening together.
Cook him dinner like you did.
Maybe that’s why he was so keen on getting rid of you so quickly.
He didn't want you to see them together.
Why would he settle for you if he can have her...
The realization of what happened crawls into your limbs, your bones, your flesh, cold, merciless, cruel. You feel the pain take over your body, feel your chest tighten under its embrace, feel the despair flooding you, all of you, paralyzing you. You break down on the sidewalk and lean against a wall, tuck up your legs and bury your head between them.
Why did she have to take him away from you?
Why couldn't she do that before you even knew you had feelings for him?
Why did you lose this once-in-a lifetime chance with a man who used to so unattainable, so outer worldly, so out of your league but suddenly so close?
You never felt like this before. You always wanted to keep your independence, never be crazy for someone, never depend on someone's love with your happiness. But now it just happened. There was no stopping it.
And you have no idea how to ever be happy again.
When you are all cried out you slowly get up, walk home like in trance with dried-up eyes that just can't cry anymore.
Numb.
Dull.
Empty.
The next two weeks feels like a bad dream. You get up, go to work, hide your feelings away, do the things required of you, go back home, numb your feelings with meaningless holoseries until you fall asleep, wake up, realize you dreamed of him, cry, get up, go to work...
Day after day.
The underground network was more than just a place to plan missions. It was where you met your friends after your day at work. Had some bullshit talk with Nemec and Fireball before you went out together. Made up some silly stuff like patches for your missions or surprise parties for mission anniversaries. It's not like you feel like going out to party right now, but you miss the presence of others. You miss being immersed in their bullshit. You miss being distracted by sweet nonsense. But the least thing you want is to go there. Run into Echo. Or even worse: Echo and Chuchi together. It would kill you.
So you only have your four walls and work and the way back and forth between both.
Nemec and Fireball keep on texting you. They wonder where you've been, miss you, want to have a night out again. You make up a stomach bug. They would never understand that you fell in love with Echo who is no fun, no bullshit, no lightness at all. It will seem a thousand times more absurd than your pathetic attempts to get him to party with you. Maybe they are at the base right now, make fun of Echo and Chuchi. At least dating Mrs. Perfect won't seem to be that absurd to them. And she surely won't ask him stupid questions about his nuclear battery. And one day they will have perfect boring little children that will be all about work and discipline and doing things right and will always do their homework and will never have to be grounded because they are so fucking reasonable all of the time. You would have spoiled your children, would have shown them the worth of breaking the rules now and then...or more often. It would have made Echo crazy. And you would have loved to drive him crazy. And he would have loved to have someone to show him a different side of life.
But you didn't get the chance.
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After some time you realize that you signed up for another mission before Echo broke up with you. You promised to be there. You are an expert in your field and they don't have anyone else to do your job. Lives depend on you. You know you can't bail.
You've been mentally preparing yourself for that day. At least tried to. Echo will be on that mission too. He will take the lead. You don't want to see him, not at all. But you made a commitment. It is a one-time opportunity, a high-ranking imperial officer will be there and you have the chance to extract information from his datapad. They have been planning this for a long time now. It might even be a game changer.
So you pack up your stuff and go to the base with a pounding heart and an excruciating stomach ache. You try to harden your face, you don't want him or anyone to see how you feel right now. You take one last deep breath before you enter the briefing room.
Rex stands in front of the others and is about to start the briefing. He looks at you, relieved. “I'm glad you came. Is your stomach any better?”
You can see it in his eyes, he's not talking about the stomach bug, he knows exactly what's going on. His words are warm, full of compassion. He wants to comfort you.
You nod silently.
“We had a little change of plans. It's been way too long since I've been on a mission like this so I took over for Echo.”
You look around in the room. Only friendlies. No Echo. You could have guessed it – otherwise Echo would have given the mission briefing.
“Sorry for being late” you say quietly and look back into Rex's eyes.
He gives you a warm and understanding smile. “No worries. I already heard that stomach bug hit you pretty hard. I'm glad you made it at all.” He pauses shortly and looks into your eyes a little too long before he commences in a professional tone. “So now that we're complete we can start with a round table to introduce the field of expertise of all participants...”
The mission went better than you expected. It was full of tension and you had to stay alert all the time which kept you from thinking about Echo. You felt Rex's eyes on you a little too often but it felt good to have him take care of you. It doesn't change your plan, though.
After the debriefing Nemec intercepts you on your way out of the briefing room. “We should celebrate your recovery!” Fireball approaches you from outside the room – he wasn't with you on the mission because Rex soon realized that having both “bullshit brothers” there at the same time wouldn't increase their chance of mission success.
“You're back!” Fireball gives you a big hug then quickly retreats. “You're still contagious?”
You allow yourself a slight smile and shake your head. “No. Just still very weak.”
“Some drinks and junk food will help you get back on your feet!” Fireball shouts and pats you on the back.
“I don't think I can take any of that yet...”
“But you'll join us?” Nemec asks. “You were badass today and it seems like forever since we've gone out.”
You sigh and try to make up an excuse but suddenly both fall down on their knees, theatrically fold their hands and beg you loudly “Pleeeeeeeeeeeease!” The other clones and external supporters look at them and shake their heads.
You smack your lips. “Alright...just...stop that you idiots.”
Both look at each other in satisfaction.
It's been seven hours and 15 days since that fateful mission. And yes you keep on counting. You know time will heal your wounds. You know 15 days are nothing compared to what you'll need to feel something inside you again. But you hope it will be easier if you finally leave your place that reminds you of the evening with Echo and the sorrow of the last days.
But before you join them you have one more thing to do. You quickly pass by Echo's office, hope he won't get out while you're still here and knock on Rex's door.
“Come in.” Rex quickly removes his reading glasses. Yes, he's older than most of the others but he doesn't really like to show it, at least not this way. You remember the last time you were in his office after he caught you and Echo in the corner of the street in this very inappropriate situation.
Rex looks into your eyes for a very long time. You can see the compassion and care in his face again. Eventually you break eye contact and look down.
“Rex...I need to take a break from my activities at the network.” You don't have it in you to quit, you found too many friends here. But you also know you can't go on like nothing happened.
Rex sighs and sits down on the edge of his desk to better match your size.
“It doesn't come as a surprise” he answers quietly and swallows. “It will be hard to find someone with your expertise. And we will miss you dearly. Not only your expertise. But I understand why you have to do it.”
You feel a lump in your throat. Leaving this world behind is hard for you but you know that staying would be harder – at least for now. You try hard to hold back the tears.
Rex gets up and takes you in his arms, holds you tightly against his well-trained body. You let go and sink into his warm embrace, lean your head against his warm chest. You so needed that. Someone to comfort you. Hold your weak body and mind. Be strong for you.
It makes you realize how lonely your days of sorrow have been.
Rex slowly retreats and looks at you. “I hope you'll be better soon. You know you can come back anytime and we'll welcome you with open arms. And if you need someone to talk...please don't hesitate to contact me. I'm always there for you, OK?”
Rex's words come as a surprise. You always considered him to be an approachable leader but you weren't friends. You don't think you will ever come back to his unexpected offer but it is touching to see how much he cares. You have to try hard to suppress your tears. You breathe in and out. “Thank you, Rex.”
This feels so final...but it wasn't supposed to be.
Then you leave and let Nemec and Fireball take over.
The evening is...uneventful. It just passes you by and you feel like a bystander, watch things happen, listen to other people's conversations and forget what they say the minute after. Nemec and Fireball never tire to tell you how much they miss you on base and are devastated when you tell them that you will have to take a break due to the aftereffects of your stomach bug. They do their best to cheer you up and you do your best to assure them that you will still go out with them.
You go home early. No need to stay there the whole night, let alone sober. While you walk down the street and breath in the pleasantly cool air of the night you feel that you took one step forward. You will continue to go out and enjoy the company of others again. Maybe not as much as before but it will get better every day.
You are just about to open the door to your place when you realize someone is lurking in the shadow of a tree next to the house. Your hand reaches for the tear gas can in your pocket.
Rex steps out of the shadow and looks at you. You slowly let go of the spray can. How did he even know when you would arrive? He surely didn’t wait here all night...He must have asked Nemec or Fireball to tell him. One of the advantages of being a leader.
“Hey” Rex says with a husky voice.
“Hey” you answer. Seeing Rex gives you a warm feeling. The way he looked out for you during the last mission and the warm embrace left an impression.
“You wanna come in?”
“No thanks…this shouldn’t take long.”
You look at Rex. Maybe he just realized how much the network needs you and wants to talk you into rejoining. And you feel bad that you have to leave but you can't stay, not now. You look at him contritely. “If it’s about my part in the network…I can't do it. I really thought this through. I'm sorry to let you down but I need time, Rex. Probably a lot more.”
Rex softly shakes his head.
“I'm not here to talk about the network” he rasps.
There's something about his voice you haven't heard before. Is he...is he trying to hit on you? The long looks, the embrace...Maybe seeing you and Echo together woke something inside him.
Rex clears his throat. “I’m here to talk about Echo.”
You get sick to the stomach. In a way you are glad that Rex is not interested in you. But this is the first day you managed to go out even if it was just for a short time and you don’t want to get Echo back in your head again. You don’t want Rex to tell you about him and Chuchi and how much he disapproves of what he has done to you. You just want to be left alone with all this and try to forget him over time until he is just a faint memory of someone who screwed you over but no longer has the power to get under your skin.
“Listen Rex, I…”
“You know…Echo has been through a lot…and the injuries he sustained at the Citadel were quite severe…” Rex continues. “The thing is…”
“I’ll take it from here” you hear a low voice from behind Rex. Echo steps out of the shadow. The look on Rex’s face tells you that he expected him to show up.
Adrenaline floods your body and you start to tremble. You don’t want to see him. Not at all.
Rex turns around and doesn’t even try to look surprised. He looks back at you, gives you a nod, mumbles “I’ll leave you to it” and leaves.
Echo stands in front of you and looks very uneasy while you press your lips together and try not to fall apart. He clears his throat. “Can I..erm…can I come in?”
You cross your arms and answer quietly “No Echo. No you cannot.”
You don’t want to link the memory of Echo telling you about Chuchi and him to your place. And you don’t want to let him back into your life again. Your place is off-limits.
Echo looks down contritely and nods slowly. “Can we take a walk?”
You sigh and tilt your head to signal him that he can start walking.
You walk next to each other in unbearable silence only interrupted by the noise of a speederbike now and then and the sound of your breaths. Sometimes Echo’s breath is accompanied by a toneless groan or a sigh and you try your best to hide the trembling in your breath. It is summer but the cold of the night begins to chill down your body. You can see that Echo is very uncomfortable, he doesn’t want to be here anymore than you do. It is pretty obvious that Rex made him talk to you.
But you don't want to hear what he has to say. You don’t want to see him. All you want is to be left alone and fast-forward the time up to the moment when you are over him. Who forces you to walk with him anyway? Why not say „I thought about it and I don’t want to hear what you have to say to me.“
You don’t owe him anything.
But he...he owes you your heart.
The least thing you want is to spend more time with him than necessary and wait for the inevitable verdict, wait for the moment when he tells you that he's with Chuchi now and that he really didn’t see it coming and he was just as surprised as you are and he never thought he would have a chance with her especially after what happened to him at the Citadel. And all the other things he would say to make himself better.
You don't wanna hear it, you don’t need him to tell you something you already know and you don't need to hear his cheap excuses for why this happened, why he made you fall in love with him just to dispose of you two days later. But a small part of you knows that you have to hear him say it out loud to understand that this really is what's happened. How many times have you caught yourself fantasizing that he would just stand on your door in his kama and his shirt and contritely tells you that he realized his mistake and wants you back. Or tells you that it wasn’t Chuchi at all, that it was some kind of misunderstanding that could easily be explained. How many times did you wake up thinking you were together, living the dream, have his lean body lay in your bed next to yours.
You know you have to hear him say it out loud to move on. Maybe Rex knows it too.
But you don’t know if your little heart can take the pain.
At least it makes him feel uncomfortable. Maybe that’s another reason why Rex wanted him to do it. So he would man up and tell it to your face, see your heart break, look at the wreck that’s left of you and face what he’s done.
And this is probably the only reason why you keep on walking instead of running away. It will hurt to hear him say it but it will also hurt him and all you want is for him to feel how much of an asshole he is for changing his mind about the two of you without even giving you a chance.
You already left the city boundaries, walk on a dirt road between fields and approach a small forest. Echo know exactly where he is going, he knows all the maps by heart. He wants you to go to a remote place so no one can hear you when you make a scene. But you won’t. You will take the pain in quietly. You won’t beg. You won’t plead. You won’t ask why. You won’t scream. You will keep your dignity. You will cry, yes, not because you want to but because you can’t change it.
But you won’t dignify his bullshit by saying a word.
You enter the forest that is lit up by the silver light of two moons. Under different circumstances this could be really romantic. You feel heavy-hearted when you realize he might have picked this place for you to have a date one day. Or for him and Chuchi.
After a short time you reach a clearing and Echo stops. He turns to you with a dark expression on his face and swallows.
„You know I just wanted to let it go and let time heal all the wounds. But Rex insisted. He told me if I don’t talk to you he‘d take matters in his own hands. Which he was obviously about to do.“ Echo grunts, then he takes a few steps back and takes off his shirt.
You look at his skinny body with the crude cybernetic parts. The chest implant sticks out most and on his back you see a part of something that's probably a fairly dominant spine implant. Goosebumps spread over his skin and his nipples go hard when the cold of the night takes control of his body.
Why is he doing that? Does he think it will repel you, make it easier for you to let got of him? If so his plan has been everything but successful. All you can think of is how much you want to touch this body, hold him. Warm him up, caress him.
But he’s no longer yours. And he never even gave you the chance for a little skin on skin.
It didn’t work. It makes you feel the loss even more.
The light of the two moons reflects on his alabaster skin and casts shadows on his lean body, the skin under his rib cage and the bags under his eyes.
His chest heaves while he stands there and looks you in the eye with sorrow.
Time stands still.
The air of the misty forest feels cold on your face and dulls down the sounds of the night.
Echo slowly moves his hands to the waistband of his trousers and pulls it down, just two inches, just enough for you to see where the metal meets his skin. A lot further up than you expected.
Echo looks at you with a ton of hurt in his eyes and his voice is hoarse when he speaks again.
“You said you want it to be a shared experience. You said you don’t want my service. But my service is all I can offer.”
You break down on the inside when you begin to understand what you have done. Cold and merciless the realization creeps into your bones and mixes with the cool air of the forest. You get sick and all you can feel is how much you hate yourself right now. You would give the world to turn back the time and undo what you have done, unsay what you have said. You are a terrible person, despicable, horrible, unspeakable. How can he even stand there and look at you without repulsion.
It took you one date to ruin everything, to hurt this man beyond everything you would ever understand.
It was never about Chuchi.
“It was me…” you whisper with a trembling voice and tears in your eyes. “I fucked it up...”
Echo stands there and breathes heavily. You can’t look into his eyes.
Tears silently run down your face. Your body is frozen, stuck in this terrible situation that is the worst moment of your life.
You wish you could leave your body, rip out your sense of self and the atrocious person that is you.
“I need some time to process this…” you mumble, turn around and slowly walk away, leave Echo alone between the trees in the cold of the night. You don’t want to burden him with your presence anymore.
And the image of his skinny fragile pale body in the moonlight and the hurt in his eyes will be etched into your mind for the rest of your life.
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Part 4: The Clearing - Part II
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carefulfears · 10 months
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Alright, the whole vodka and cheese in Detour! Do you think Scully was actually flirting/making a move there? What brought it on do you think? Because it surprised me a bit by how forthright she was when she hadn't really seemed that way before
MMAnon 💙
oh she definitely wanted to get fucked.
i think she was trying to be very nice put together miss dana scully; she’s never going to be the one to make the first move, but also try to signal to him.
if nothing else, to spend time with him in a more personal and intimate way. and who knows, maybe setting that trend of “consorting in the same room” will lead to something eventually.
unfortunately he’s just not very bright and wants to go look for mothmen
(though i don’t think he was being completely oblivious, i think he ditched on purpose. which is another post.)
as far as what brought it on, i feel like this was their first case after reduxes. their first case after she didn’t die.
they’re all over each other in redux ii, they’re always holding hands and kissing on each other. she wants that kind of attention and time with him, and she’s hoping she doesn’t have to die to have it.
later, in the forest, she tells him that when she was sick she struggled to see the meaning in it. and that she realized that’s the struggle, to give it meaning.
that’s all she’s trying to do, with some wine and cheese in florida. give their renewed life meaning.
always good to chat with you, anon!! i’m SO sorry for what you’re about to watch next ❤️
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haraxvati · 1 year
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[rain roundup 2022]: under the queen's umbrella
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Under The Queen’s Umbrella (October-December 2022, TVN and Netflix, 16 episodes)
Four episodes in I really thought I was going to drop this drama. I adore Kim Hye-soo and I don’t have high standards for fusion sageuks, a genre I love. But the tonal shifts of this show were so wild that I was consistently put off. Emoji overlays on screen competed for attention with children’s deaths. Scheming mothers-in-law and mean girls elbowed for room with glowing, generously drawn supporting characters. Something about Miss Hye-soo herself felt unsettled. Was she trying to give us prestige performer, with that melting lean-in-to-listen delivery and glorious body language; or was she giving us slapstick clown?
Then, five episodes in, the worst thing to happen in the whole show takes place. A blameless and beloved character dies. And almost immediately, the show settles in and gets down to business.
In retrospect, it almost feels like the writer (Park Ba-ra, whose first show credit this is) needed the time to make herself do the brave thing and kill off a darling. Der aaye, durust aaye: the show never looks back after this. The sheer poise and confidence of its storytelling is something I haven’t seen in this genre of sageuk before. The closest parallel I can think of is Rookie Historian Goo Hae-ryung (h/t to @drivingsideways who also drew parallels between the two) which is far smaller in scale and not without its flaws.
@elderflowergin remarked on the striking fact that Kim Hye-soo has led two dramas this year in which she plays a grieving mother from completely different ends of the spectrum. I haven’t finished Juvenile Justice, because I find its premise (punishing minors? More harshly? I think????!) difficult to swallow. It’s in total contrast to Queen’s Umbrella, which goes very hard on modern ideas of good parenting, which involves being tolerant, protective, flexible, as well as doping yourself (with herbal energy balls, ha!) to keep up the energy of a battalion of horses. It not only includes giving birth to five sons but to keep them from dying of good intentions and himbo intellects. Its views on struggling to be good — as a mother, a woman and a self-sacrificing political player — are totally anachronistic, and totally in keeping with what I adore most about fusion sageuks. They just don’t give a damn for how people from the past are same-but-different.
I’ll repeat something I’ve said maybe tiresomely often already: I really envy this defiance of the burdens of the past. The BBC and, increasingly, US-American cinema and TV, have updated their casting requirements to reflect the changed demographics of their audiences and talent pools. They put ahistorical speeches in their dialogue and put sex on screen, which is fun and often entertaining. They have ready models in writers for whom the past is really and intentionally a link to the present. Their historical fiction is a story about how they and their contemporaries got to where they are. Like, that’s Shakespeare. That’s Hilary Mantel.
But historical fiction also holds up mirrors to our future, and nowhere does this feel more obvious and apparent to me than in fusion sageuks. First, I think this quality is inherent to many kinds of storytelling that prize romantic love and friendship, because, as we know, these can be the greatest enemies of ritual and custom both in imaginative and material reality. Fusion sageuks, whether romance- or otherwise-focused, recreate intimate life so vividly that they can’t help but imagine a utopian version of it into being. Much has been made, and rightly, of Queen Hwa-ryeong’s love for her gender non-conforming child, for whose sake she predicts: there will come a time when people with desires and identities different from our own may live freely. When Goo Hae-ryung in Rookie Historian reimagines the gendered and hostile workplace of the past, she is equally producing a longed-for vision of the future. These are illustrations of my feeling that sageuks aren’t stories about how we got here: they are stories about where we want to go.
The past is a closed book to all of us, but it’s a little more tightly bound for us postcolonial subjects. In a history already controlled by native victors we’ve had to further contend with the imposition of colonisers’ views of our own antecedents. Invariably these are peopled with our worst selves, and entirely de-peopled of our small, private, silly and desperately earnest selves; the selves that make lovers, workers, revolutionaries and sages. In south Asian mass culture we don’t even make fantasy historicals unless they faithfully replicate the power hierarchies of the present day. From this standpoint it feels like South Korea, where where social revolution has been more (or at least differently) successful, it’s possible to strike a blow for universal human dignity, if not freedom. And that’s an important basis for producing fantastic dreams of what our past might have been like, in order to dream of the future.
That long digression was to say that Under The Queen’s Umbrella does all these things in nice and charming and entertaining ways. I think there are two difficult things that it achieves particularly well. The first is how it balances out an unusually large cast with such verve: despite there being very strong leads, the vast chorus of princes, concubines, staffers and conspirators all emerge as distinct and memorable characters.
The second is its view of goodness, which I started out describing as an unusual and capacious vision of loving and courageous motherhood. But it is everyone’s job in Under The Queen’s Umbrella to be truly good, and to choose goodness over and over again. Therefore, with unusual success, its heroes become much more interesting than its villains. I will never say a word against Kim Eui-sung, Ok Ja-yeon or Kim Hae-sook, who are all magnificent actors (and let me digress again here to say that I think Ok Ja-yeon is simply the most beautiful woman to have appeared on screen all year in a k-drama).
But they don’t have all that much to do except steal the odd scene. It is the king who must choose to confront the burden of his twenty-year guilt. It is Seongnam, the second son, who must correct the mistakes of the past by keeping the faith with his elder brother, in contrast to their father who betrayed his own brother. The princes and their mothers must choose wisdom over personal desires. The strong must not simply protect the frail but honour them, and accept their inherent claim on society.
These are modest virtues for the modest dream of a liberal future. But they are also universal. I’ll leave it to the more prescriptive among this show’s viewers to deconstruct the alternatives. My own feeling is that this is really just a hard thing to do in a consistently interesting way, and I’m really impressed that everyone involved committed to it and upheld their views with gentleness and ferocity — and, yes, clownery.
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mediocre-eternity · 1 year
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What do you think of Daniel's new body since you turned him? Is it much different from how it was when you first fell for him? Do you miss his old body with it's all it's mortal imperfections and frailties?
I don’t think anybody has ever wondered about this before. I also don’t think I’ve asked this myself, though I have noticed considerable changes in Daniel, especially since we are close again.
Obviously Daniel and I cannot share our minds anymore. That is the most painful change, and consequently the hardest to get used to. I absolutely abhor it and I knew, I knew it would become a giant wedge between us. As I gulped his blood down my throat to change him into what he is today I was thinking of it. I don’t know why this is biological law for our kind, but it’s crushing and unfair. Imagine the soul that you can confidently call your soulmate, that you share everything with, that you trust more than any other person in your entire pathetic immortality has the most intimate connection shared severed. But I am too selfish and having Daniel as my companion for as long as this little stupid rock can spin is worth it. I just haven’t let the tragedy go yet. I’ve gotten better at communicating with him but the challenges are still there.
I shouldn’t talk. I suppose my Maker would love that type of privilege again. So much for unfairness.
And of course there’s all sorts of positives to Daniel being immortal now. Though largely his patience, gentleness and curiosity has remained the same, I feel as though other parts of him have unlocked, especially now that he’s regaining his faculties. He is much more charismatic and confident. Daniel has always loved meeting new people, especially the eccentrics, but now he will guide himself to find them. He’s even started to take my hand to lead me where he wants to go. He is…. Incredibly irresistible when he does this. It’s how I always wanted to see him and perhaps… maybe… what I always needed in him. I don’t know what I original goals for Daniel were, but this has now become the totality of it. That confidence. That embodiment of the monster that he is.
Ah, well. He begged for it. He can relish in it if he wants to. Louis always teases me that he earned it. Certainly, he did. He’s the only vampire we know of that clung to that hope until his dying breath. Serendipity or something.
But I’m getting off-track.
Again, I don’t really know what my original ideas for Daniel were. When I first met him at least. And perhaps for the first couple of years I got to know him. I unfortunately wasn’t really paying much attention to the limitations of a mortal body when I became his lover. Of course I knew what could kill him, that I could potentially kill him, and the minor dangers mortals face every single day. But the consequences of giving someone (almost) everything they want was beyond me at the time. Which is how he ended up with the disease that eventually killed him. I don’t miss that at all.
Sometimes I wish I could see his body react to my touch in a mortal way, again. It didn’t take much teasing, or much blood, to push him to a mortal orgasm. Oh certainly the exchange of immortal Blood is much more satisfying, but I could make Daniel utterly crumble in no time at all. Now it’s a bit more challenging, not that I mind. Again, Daniel has become very good at taking the lead in several different ways.
I do really appreciate having a lover with immortal stamina again, especially the one I’m devoted to the most. Getting to show Daniel the most intimate secrets of Preternatural Kind was unusual but is now so, so sensual. I wouldn’t trade Daniel’s body now for anything. The privilege of watching him extend how he can move and react is too beautiful. And now, I have a true companion.
That was the first time I’ve ever written that down.
Daniel is my immortal companion.
We are in hell and we will watch the heat death of the universe together.
Devil’s Minion, indeed.
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1-800-fabrik-girlie · 2 months
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we're on each other's team - hatchetfield
read under the cut || 1.1k, rated G Jackie, Brooke and Ruth have a date night.
"Do you need any help with the food, Jackie?"
A bit startled, Jackie turns around to see Ruth standing in the doorway of the kitchen. Half her face is covered with makeup - Brooke's been trying to convince her to let her do her makeup, and it seems Ruth has finally agreed.
Jackie gasps and cups Ruth's face, smirking: "You look so cute, babe! Holy shit, you're so pretty...you know what's crazy? Both sides of your face look super freaking kissable right now."
Dark brown eyes widened and a blush evident on her face, Ruth's eyelashes flutter and her gaze flicks to Jackie's lips.
Ever since they started dating, both Jackie and Brooke decided to make it their mission to make Ruth flustered, which turned out to be really easy and really fun.
"Um. So. Miss Holloway just let you...take all that? From her diner? For free?"
Jackie chuckles at Ruth's attempt to distract her and presses a kiss to her forehead: "Yeah, you know her. She loves me, she's like my mom."
"Isn't your mom like your mom?," Brooke, following Ruth into the kitchen while putting on lipstick, puts her arms around Ruth's waist from behind and rests her chin on her shoulder.
"I can have two moms!"
"We should get Donna and Miss Holloway to date."
"Please," Jackie scoffs, turning her attention back to their date night snacks she brought from her shift at the diner, "My mom's in love with her makeup woman. Like, desperately...why do you think we have the house to ourselves tonight? She's totally on a date right now. And Miss Holloway has that whole thing with Duke."
"Hey, then let's just be grateful your mom's makeup woman asked her out so we could watch...what did we decide on?"
"Twilight!," Ruth exclaims, "It's, you know. It's kind of fitting for us right now."
Jackie giggles and raises her eyebrows: "We could totally recreate that series. You're Jacob, Ruth's Bella and I'm Edward, but instead of fighting over her, we just all fall in love and get into a triad."
Ruth gasps and slaps her hand over her mouth: "That is the best freaking idea ever. And Richie could tape!"
"It's actually really weird how much fun that'd be."
As the three settle in the living room, with Ruth nestled between Jackie and Brooke, stealing glances at both of them and holding her breath every time they reach for some fries on the plate on her lap, they turn on the movie.
And it goes well. They all love Twilight. Not because of the plot or anything, Brooke likes the violence, Jackie thinks she'll learn something about her powers and Ruth is attracted to every character.
Sometimes Jackie kisses Ruth's head and sometimes Brooke takes her hand and traces little circles on it with her thumb, and Ruth is trying to keep calm but she doesn't quite manage and then, during one of the last scenes when Brooke laughs at the bad guy getting his head torn clean off and Jackie is hiding under a blanket, Edward drinks Bella's blood to save her.
Ruth watches. She watches his pupils dilate, watches the desperate expression on his face. Then, it slips out.
"Bite me."
Brooke raises her eyebrow at Ruth and half-smiles: "Hm?"
"Jackie, you should, um. Bite us."
Jackie comes out from under the blanket and frowns: "As in the thing we yell at people from Clivesdale or actually, literally, genuinely bite you? With my teeth?"
"Actually. I, I don't know, you've been saying how you feel tired and it's cause those capri suns aren't enough for you, and maybe you - and you don't have to, of course, but I just feel like it'd be a sort of...you know, a real intimate experience -," Jackie cuts her off with a kiss and giggles into it.
"You're insane. I can't do that! We don't know anything about like, vampire spreading. Miss Holloway doesn't even know anything about it, and she usually knows everything!"
Brooke leans over to kiss Ruth's cheek, who seems to be frozen in time.
"I don't know, Jackie. It sounds kinda fun."
Jackie gapes at Brooke: "You...can't be serious."
The blonde girl only replies with a wink and bites her lip.
"I'm not doing that! You could literally get hurt, you could die!"
"No! Look, Bella didn't die! Edward just drank some of her blood to save her. You could do that!"
Jackie musters a smile: "I'm. I don't think that's such a good idea."
Brooke thinks for a minute. Eventually, she gets up and sits on the other side of Jackie, putting an arm around her shoulder: "You're so cute when you're nervous."
"I'm, no! No, that's what we always do with Ruth, you can't do that with me!"
Brooke is right, though. Jackie feels deeply nervous, not because she's uncomfortable, but because the idea of drinking her girlfriends' blood makes her undead heart race.
And even though Ruth loves it when her girlfriends flirt with her like crazy, she finds that she likes being in control for once.
"You don't want to, baby?," Brooke murmurs, pushing a strand of Jackie's hair behind her ear. This seems to be more of a game to her, a game she's enjoys playing immensely.
Jackie opens her mouth, but no words come out. Instead, something happens that usually only does when she's thinking and biting her lip and accidentally pierces her skin - her fangs emerge.
"Woah," Ruth whispers, entranced. Carefully, she runs her finger across Jackie's canines, making her shiver.
They look at each other. Besides Brooke, who stares at them with a grin on her face, there's no one else in the world, no other sounds.
In a moment draped in shadows, Jackie, with a hint of hunger in her gaze, slowly leans toward Ruth's neck. The three of them hold their breath as Jackie's fangs make contact with her skin, piercing it and eliciting a gasp from Ruth.
Though it may only be a drop, tasting Ruth's blood makes Jackie tear up as she kisses her wound better.
A subtle shift, and Brooke, who stopped smiling the second Ruth was bit, offers her neck willingly. Jackie's fangs meet her skin and they both want to cry.
The tension in the room could be cut with a knife, but it wasn't awkward, it was something else none of them have experienced before.
"C'mere," Jackie mumbles and puts her arms around Brooke and Ruth. Both of them fall asleep quite fast, and though Jackie needs barely any sleep, she has never felt quite as alive as she does now.
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hon3ymo0n · 8 months
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I might be the only true believer that thinks the ear suck was completely accidental. He meant to whisper but got caught with a mouth full of ear. Ad he's not grossed out by anything Jimin-ssi he didn't recoil, quite the opposite, but he went with it and left the rest up to God and army to figure out.
So I saw this under a jikook post by a jikooker. What do you think about this take ? Was it accidental or not meant to be caught on cam ? And we are just analyzing it and giving it whole another meaning while he didn't even thought about it ?
Hi anon!🥹 such a beautiful moment, now I miss the 7 of them together on stage. Even if I never had the chance to actually see them live (and probably never will).
Accidental? Well, okay. It is a possibility, of course. We’ll never know what was actually going on in Jungkook’s mind. We just know that it was different, special. Even if Jungkook’s intention was to just whisper something to Jimin, and an ear got accidentally stuck in his mouth, the whole dynamic remains kinda intimate.
It’s not just Jungkook screaming “I love you”, or the way he hugs Jimin with his whole body, almost wrapping him up, but also the way he helps Jimin to stand up, and stays by his side till the end. They all (BTS) cry and hug each other, but something so strong and close only happened between the two of them.
In my opinion, and I repeat, in my personal opinion, that was intentional. Not because I want it to be real, as I said the entire dynamic has a strong impact regardless of the ear sucking. But If we look at the clip closely, and in slow motion, we can see that Jungkook opens and closes his mouth around Jimin’s ear. Till this point, if we want to be extremely rational, we can still say “well, maybe it was accidental”. But the fact is that he decided to flow with it. Even if that was not intended, Jungkook still decided to enjoy it and keep doing it.
But that’s fine too. You know, adrenaline, euphoria, feelings. Their bond was so deep and intimate to allow a WHOLE EAR SUCKING? Intimate enough to make Jungkook think “oh, I accidentally got your ear in my mouth. Nevermind, I’m gonna stay here”? Yes. Could we still say (🙄) “he didn’t intend to do it”? Till this point, yes.
What makes it more real, for me, is the fact that Jungkook opens his mouth, immediately closes it (so he doesn’t show any intention of talking, whispering, moving his lips), sucks Jimin’s ear, or maybe just kisses it harder, and stays there.
Look at it in normal speed. And notice how the members keep calling Jungkook, as he was in a whole different world and they wanted him back, “man, that’s enough” kind of vibe (this moments, ah, so many feels).
The sucking/kissing lasts 3-4 second. If you count them regularly, not like we usually and quickly do, you’ll see that it’s “a lot” for… an accident.
Jungkook doesn’t move. He doesn’t flinch. His reaction is not the one that someone who accidentally got an ear between their lips would have.
After that, and only after, he moves his lips and actually whispers something in Jimin’s eardrum.
I’ll leave this clip here which I think clearly shows what I mean.
As for the “caught on camera” stuff, I don’t think Jungkook thought about it. I see it as a “fuck it, let’s do it” moment. So if he thought about cameras but did it anyways, that still screams “I don’t give a fuck” to me. If he didn’t think about cameras at all, again, it screams idgaf. To me.
I just can’t believe that even if the moment was so intense and special, Jungkook just thought “oh, there are people watching. They can’t see this, so my hair (or whatever) is gonna hide it”. They’re clever, smart, anything we want them to be, but in this case, it was spontaneous. I personally see it as a personal moment, too. Something between the two of them (on a big ass stage in front of a big ass crowd), that was not affected by anyone’s eyes, attention, camera. Just by their feelings, Jungkook’s feelings in particular.
That man was itching to show Jimin how much he loves him. The emotion was so strong that he had to put it somewhere, most of all physically. And he chose Jimin’s ear.
He needed to feel him, beyond a simple hug.
I hope I’ve been exhaustive and clear. Thank you for stopping by💜💜💜
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hermannsthumb · 2 years
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For the autumn fic meme can you do number 7? (maybe Newt trying to be brave and failing miserably? >:3)
7. scary movies
from autumn fic prompts here
WHEW i've had an exhausting few weeks but things are finally calming down and i can devote time back to my beloved little dudes again. i have a longer fic i'm working on for spooky season but it's also HALLOWEEN PROMPT FILL SEASON once more!! here's an old old one I never got around to filling
--------------------------------------------------
"I am not," Hermann says, "as easy as you seem to think I am."
Newt's not sure what's more disconcerting here: hearing someone outside of, like, 1950 refer to themselves as easy, or Hermann apparently worrying that Newt might apply that word to him, in the lust-inspiring glory of his sweatervest, baggy wool slacks, stiff collar, daintily crossed ankles, the twelve inches he's left between them, and the full-body shudder of displeasure he gives whenever Newt makes the mistake of looking in his direction. And worrying about it so bad he had to reach over and pause the movie to make sure Newt had his full attention before making the declaration. Yeah, easy, that's sooo Hermann. He wouldn't even take off his shoes before he got on Newt's bed, because it would've been quote-unquote too intimate. What a harlot.
"I literally have no idea what you're talking about," Newt says. "Am I missing some, like, signals? Is this some sort of Gottlieb mating ritual?" The only thing Hermann has done all night is snap at Newt for burning their popcorn in the microwave (among a host of other offenses, ranging from breathing too loudly to keeping the brightness on his computer too high). Newt thinks he would've noticed if Hermann was suddenly fluttering his eyelashes or taking off his shirt or something. Actually, if Hermann considers picking fights easy behavior, then Newt suddenly has a whole lot of their relationship to reassess here. As in, all of it. Maybe arguing is part of the complex intricacies of Gottliebian mating rituals, the rest of which involve unstylish haircuts and submitting HR complaints. Newt should pay closer attention to these sorts of things.
"No," Hermann snaps. "I am referring to your invitation, which was clearly a pitiful attempt to seduce me, and my subsequent acceptance thereof, which was against my best judgement and that I began to regret almost immediately." He folds his arms across his chest and scowls at Newt. It's not as intimidating as he clearly hopes it'll be, because there's a decent amount of burnt popcorn crumbs clinging to the front of his sweater, and his glasses are crooked.
"I'm not trying to do anything but watch a movie, dude," Newt says.
"Oh, yes, for now," Hermann says. "But soon enough you'll be so terribly frightened that you'll need to turn to me for comfort, and then one thing will lead to another, and then—" He shakes his head darkly. "I can assure you now that will not be happening, despite any efforts to the contrary. Feign your fear all you wish."
That's the problem with trying to be anything but a mortal enemy to Hermann—the guy's always gotta act like Newt has some sort of dark, mysterious, ulterior motive going on. Cups of tea always have to be deliberately brewed too bitterly with too much milk (instead of just, y'know, the shop Newt went to messed up his order), invitations for excursions into the city or late night talks on the Shatterdome roof are trying too hard to make up for whatever Newt's crime against him of the week is. Hermann can never just accept kindnesses from Newt at face value. Technically, Newt supposes he did have a slight ulterior motive in inviting Hermann over for spooky movie night tonight that verged beyond selflessly giving Hermann a social life into self-serving, but he's been literally upfront about it from the start. And it has nothing to do with getting a hand under Hermann's four layers, thank you. "I want to watch this new movie," he said earlier in the lab, while Hermann eyed him suspiciously, "but it's supposed to be scary as shit, so I don't want to do it alone." If it gives him nightmares, then at least he'll have someone to commiserate with.
Newt's not sure whether he prefers Hermann to see him as a big baby or a skeezeball. Big baby is worse, maybe—at least the alternative means Hermann thinks he's, like, at least mildly suave and a mega-pro at seducing grumpy mathematicians. But it all also raises a very important question. "If you knew I was gonna try to seduce you, then why did you come over?" Hermann was being pretty quiet about everything, up to and including when Newt told him to make himself at home on his bed, until now.
Hermann coughs, and mumbles out something about not having anything better to do with his time, then something else about Newt having wily machinations. "Let's finish the damned movie," he says.
Though Newt's chosen to let Hermann believe he's speeding down the skeezeball route tonight, that doesn't actually change the fact that Newt is, at heart, kind of a big baby—but also only when it comes to sooome horror movies, because he's usually really awesome and punk about these things, and you don't cover yourself in tattoos if you don't have a high tolerance for discomfort, and Newt was watching monster movies before he had object permanence. Unfortunately Newt is not currently covering himself in tattoos or dealing with his dad's admittedly questionable age-appropriate media decisions, but rather curled up in a sweatshirt and watching an evil spooky ghost slash through teenagers like nothing on his laptop with Hermann. The reviews weren't wrong about the realistic special effects. Newt makes a small noise that's definitely not a groan and turns his face away, just a little bit. "I don't understand why you enjoy subjecting yourself to rubbish like this," Hermann says. He's wrinkling his nose. Newt thinks the fiery power of Hermann's disdain could stop the homicidal movie ghost right in its tracks, which strangely makes him feel a little better. "We could be watching an infinite number of other much better films."
"Great idea," Newt says. "K-science movie night, every Friday. You can make the popcorn and choose the flick next time, I'll order pizza." Pizza sounds great right now. He should have dragged Hermann out into the city for pizza night and drinks at the worst bar he could find and made him eat something for dinner with nutritional value for a change (well, okay, in terms of comparison to the scalding tea and toast he usually has for dinner, a pizza is like a damn salad bar), not lured him into his messy bunk for a scary movie night neither of them are actually feeling. Maybe it's not too late to change their plans. There are probably still a few 24/7 delivery stragglers out there in a city this big that haven't yet succumbed to being stomped on by kaiju. "Is that guy still getting chainsawed?"
"No," Hermann says. He looks up at Newt's laptop screen quickly—he'd been distracted, picking crumbs off his sweater—and corrects himself, only just audible over the whirring of the ghost's chainsaw. Not a very creative weapon of choice for a slasher. Chainsaws are kinda been there done that, Newt thinks. "Er. Yes. This has been a rather prolonged death scene."
"Yeah, dude, no shit," Newt says. He tucks his head in against Hermann's shoulder, because it's not like Hermann can possibly think any less of him right now, and he's relieved when Hermann acquiesces to the touch and doesn't boot him across the room. Hermann's sweater smells kinda weird, like he left it out in the rain and didn't bother washing it after it dried. It's still soothing to be this close to him. Ugh, not that Newt would ever, ever admit that out loud, how embarrassing.
"I told you your charms are not going to work on me, Newton," Hermann sniffs, even as he gives Newt's shoulder a pat, and then something, bewilderingly enough, that Newt might call a reassuring squeeze. He doesn't move his hand afterwards. "No matter how pathetic you look right now."
"Thanks? Um, I think?"
Something particularly gnarly must happen on screen, because Hermann suddenly winces and drops their popcorn bowl, sending the remainder of it (mostly vaguely salty kernels) scattering across the floor. He reaches out and angles Newt's laptop screen down, just a centimeter from being shut entirely. A slasher-chainsawing-ghost victim screams their heart out through the muffled speakers. Hermann closes the laptop the rest of the way. "I think we ought to pick something else," he says.
"Sounds great," Newt says.
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spitdrunken · 2 years
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OK LET'S SEE IF I CAN RECREATE THIS FROM MEMORY and not have tunmblr throw it in the garbage this time--
Emmet told himself it was only going to be one time at the glory hole. Obviously, he was lying to himself. We all know this man has no self control. He hates that other people get to fuck his brother in the glory hole; he wants to hog Ingo all to himself, so he watches and waits for Ingo to go again. It doesn't take long--only 3 days later--before Ingo says he's going to take his lunch elsewhere one day. Emmet doesn't pay attention to where, he knows Ingo is lying, and confirms it when he watches Ingo head towards the glory hole on the cameras
OFC Emmet knows the quickest way to the secret area the glory hole is located. He makes sure to get there before anyone else can, locking the door behind him so no one else can see his older brother like this. I imagine he's prepared either a cock ring or some aphrodisiacs this time as well. He can't repeat what happened last time...
Once Emmet's cum enough inside of Ingo to be satisfied, he walks away from the glory hole, and manages to radio Ingo back from his "break" early. He races back to the office and does his best to look like he was there the whole time Ingo was gone. There's a sick satisfaction in his gut, knowing that Ingo is full of his cum right now, even while he tries to strike pleasant conversation with his brother. (Ingo makes up some flimsy excuse when asked about the limp in his step; something about tripping up the stairs on the way to the local deli. He misses Emmet's smug smirk in response to that.)
Of course, this all brings into question how often Emmet could get away with going to the glory hole without anyone finding out. The mirror situation means that people KNOW they're fucking Subway Boss Ingo on the other side, so if people saw Emmet disappearing into the glory hole area at the same time... Makes me wonder how far Emmet will go to hide this from others and eventually try to prevent other people from visiting the glory hole. Then again, how long would it take Ingo to figure out that he's been sucking and fucking the same cock over and over now? And how long until he realizes how familiar it's starting to look to him...?
WANT TO START OFF BY SAYING THAT I LOVE THIS SO MUCH!!! i can’t add much to the earlier parts of this cuz honestly it’s just perfect already!!! I was thinking about!!!
notes: incest, not x reader
Emmet knowing exactly when Ingo is frequenting the place, so he makes sure to leave a note right before he typically arrives. (I’m imagining he makes one of his Pokémon put it inside when it’s empty, because it’s at least a bit less clear that it’s him who left it.) It has something written on it, clearly addressed to Subway Boss Ingo, about having created a special, different place for him- With more privacy! Ingo honestly can’t frequent the gloryhole even as much as he wants to, because the chance of too many people knowing about it and it leaking out to the general public + the awkwardness of running into a challenger who fucked you is just too awkward!! So maybe he could see the appeal in that.
He obviously keeps one of his Pokémon out there while approaching, so he can defend himself in case it’s just a trap. But it really is just a more tucked away, typical gloryhole situation: A simple hole in the wall, no mirrors or anything. (Which Emmet dislikes, but it’s necessary to keep this up for longer. And prevents anyone else from taking his beloved twin.) The most important thing is that it’s in a kind of blind spot among the cameras… So both of them can frequent it as much as they want.
But it doesn’t take too long for Ingo to notice that he’s always been fucked by the exact same person… They’re good at it, he’s not complaining, but that makes it just so intimate somehow, in a way that has him all kinds of flustered. If he realises how similar the stranger’s cock looks to his (or maybe even hears Emmet moan too loudly?), he’ll go inside the room as usual, but Emmet will find him waiting on the opposite side of the room, ready to see who’s been shoving their cock inside him daily for the past few weeks…
How it ends would depend on whether you’d want Ingo to be into it or not LMAO It could be very angsty or unrequited or they would just have sex for the first time without a wall in between them <3
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rantingcrocodile · 2 years
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I agree with all of that, Miss Croc, thank you. It also makes me so angry whenever people accuse bi women of us being lazy in wlw dating because if it were true that bi people are just a bunch of passive bums who just prioritizes straight relationships, then bi men would also show the same rate of being in mostly straight relationships as well. However, there seems to be a higher trend of bi men who have a lot of MSM and male-with-male relationships with other bi men or gay men, in contrast to bisexual women wrt same sex dating history. Bi men are statistically more likely to perhaps end up with a man than they do end up with a woman, but this trend also shows the same story with bi women. This should pose a serious question: Is this really a matter of the world being very phallocentric, or is it perhaps men as a whole are just way more flexible, open, and aggressive in trying to be with people intimately versus women, who historically and biologically speaking, tend to act more passive and harder to please, even among lesbians/bi women? Lesbians love to shit on bi women about us being more oriented towards being with men rather than with women, but like I stated before, they don't make wlw dating fun or at least as easy and simple than regular straight dating has been curated for us. For all the bullshit that can be found in straight dating and 'gay dating', one thing remains consistent: Men, more often than women, put on all the stops and try to make everything accessible to have all roads leading to dick. Sorry for the harsh joke there lol, but compare that to lesbi dating, where it seems like all the roads are either blocked or have various signs of "We don't date bisluts here go away", "Wrong road, go back", "Gold stars only", "If you have history with men/you're a late bloomer, STOP and go back", "Ew you're a single mom/divorced woman with an ex male partner? TURN BACK", and so on. All the roads that leads to pussy are then, essentially, closed off. Law abiding citizens are going to pay attention and obey the traffic laws and the signs that are telling them to go away, I don't know what else to tell you. :/ To which I will say, harshly, that people can't complain about bi women like this anymore, because if men can get all the women in the world to come with them, it says nothing about the women in question and everything to do with the fact that if a group tells a woman that she is disgusting and unwanted, she is going to go to the other group who tells her that they want her instead. Simple mathematics.
So yeah, let's stop blaming bi women and let's maybe discuss ways to make wlw dating, or bi4bi dating, a much better experience for the women who want to have a girlfriend, wife, and so on. <3
The biggest issue is that we will never know the true numbers of bisexuals in whatever kind of relationships until we're liberated purely thanks to the numbers of bisexuals in relationships who won't identify themselves as bisexual. There will be a ton of people who call themselves either "straight," "lesbian" or "gay" when they're actually bisexual because either a) they're closeted and are terrified of others finding out they're bisexual or b) haven't come to terms with their bisexuality. So the numbers right now really are completely useless.
If, hypothetically, we pretend that we know for certain that bisexual women most often partner with men, and that bisexual men most often partner with men, then I think that's a clear sign of biphobic oppression.
That sounds like a complete reach, but hear me out.
If, as the biphobes claim about bisexual women, it's all simply about it being "easier" to partner with the opposite sex to gain "heterosexual privilege," then surely bisexual men would simply partner with women at the same rates as bisexual women.
Instead, I would argue that while bisexual women are reduced to permanently consenting sex toys for men and presumed to always be open to and available to men for male use, bisexual men are presumed to be liars who are afraid to actually come out as gay. That heavy pressure resulting in minority stress would create a self-fulfilling prophecy. Bisexual women told that they'll end up with men and that their attraction to women is "predatory" and "fake" then internalise that, hate themselves, have little-to-no boundaries and then take any man that shows minor interest to feel loved. Bisexual men told that their attraction to women is fake and that they're using liars and manipulators will internalise that, hate themselves and then feel pushed towards partnering with men.
On top of all of this, because there's so much biphobia, even if individual bisexuals get through their own personal issues, it's highly likely that they'll believe in biphobia about other bisexuals, which makes it even harder to date.
Realistically, gay men and just date gay men and lesbians can just date lesbians, and bisexuals could just as easily date other bisexuals and have just as wide a dating pool. But with closeting, biphobia, internalised biphobia, internalised misogyny for bisexual women, then it's a minefield.
The bottom line here is that while we can discuss this all day long, there is an obsession with bisexuals and who we date (or don't date), which does nothing but reduce us to objects that are either good or bad depending on the sex of our partner. It's completely (and deliberately) dehumanising.
Lesbians are lesbians are lesbians, gay men are gay men are gay men, but bisexuals are examined and twisted and turned and only ever conditionally "accepted" on the thinnest ice depending on our partners or who we talk about wanting to partner with. We're never simply accepted as our own individuals with our own individual needs.
It literally does not matter if a bisexual woman only ever wants to date straight men and closets herself forever. She is still subject to the same baseline biphobic oppression that a bisexual woman who only ever wants to date lesbians and closets herself as a lesbian forever. Just as a bisexual woman who is celibate and closets herself as an asexual. It's all because they're bisexual individuals, whatever the rest of their circumstances, because they're people. But biphobes refuse to accept that and see that as ridiculous purely because they don't see us as human - they see us as some monstrous other.
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