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avaritia-apotheosis · 3 years

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Phantom Children Ch. 8

What's this? An update! Massive thanks to my betas for helping me get through this chapter <3

In Which: A few answers are given to the family and Danny is rudely awoken

[Side note: If you wanna know the general ages of the batfam, its listed in the AO3 version. I also talk about katanas in the end notes ^-^]

AO3 | Prologue | 7 | [ 8 ] | 9 DAMIAN INFORMED TODD—and Drake when he arrived on his bike sometime later on—that the boy whose face is plastered across the monitor was neither a picture of himself nor of Father.

Drake took one glance at the monitor and sighed, pressing his fingers against the bridge of his nose. “Just when I thought this day was getting better.”

“What, did that café on 5th finally let customers supersize their drink?”

“God that would be the dream, wouldn’t it?” Drake sighed wistfully. “Nah, but I did get a lead on where some of that stolen Cadmus tech might’ve ended up. I was gonna spend the night following up on it, but I guess we have to deal with,” he gestured to the monitor, “whatever this is.”

Todd leaned against the edge of the computer, arms crossed over the red bat insignia on his chest. “What are we dealing with this time, brat? A clone? An alternate universe counterpart? Magic shenanigans?”

Maybe. Perhaps. All of those were perfectly valid conclusions for the enigma that was Daniel James Fenton. (Why Fenton and not al Ghul? Or even Wayne?)

Damian, too, was a genetic experiment; a ‘test tube baby’ as Drake put it at times. Damian was born for greatness, created to be perfect. The perfect soldier. The perfect assassin. The perfect heir. Was this boy—Daniel—like him as well?

A failed one, then. Perhaps the precursor to Damian’s own existence. But that would not explain why the boy was allowed to exist for so long. His grandfather demanded perfection, especially from those of his own blood. If the boy was a failure, he would have been eliminated immediately, not sent to live with some eccentric scientists in the Midwest.

Damian was not naïve enough to think that his mother and grandfather did not keep secrets from him. On the contrary, he expected it. The League of Shadows dealt in secrets as often as it did in death. Certain information was worth its weight in gold, whether it was given or buried away.

But he could not help the sharp pang in his chest. A lightning strike, quick and electrifying at the notion that they kept secrets about their family from him.

His father’s face flashed in his mind. The shock turned into a slow, dawning horror. That flicker of light, of recognition, as he scrutinized the contents of the flash drive and cross-referenced it with a public database.

And grief.

Damian recognized the grief.

Alfred, too, nearly dropped his tray of fresh-baked cookies when he stepped in front of the monitor. His usual unflappable demeanor was momentarily broken at his father’s whispered “Sixteen years. Alfred— he’s sixteen years old.”

His father knew of the boy. He was allowed to know of Daniel when he was not allowed to know about Damian.

------

Grayson returned to the cave with a distinct lack of energy in his step. His mask dangled off the tips of his fingers, chin angled downwards and covered largely by his hand. For a split second, their eyes met. Grayson shifted his gaze away, scratching the back of his neck. Father told him, then. Damian wondered how much Father revealed to his favorite son.

Damian clucked his tongue and buried himself deeper into the chair, arms crossed and pointedly looking away. If it was not for his accursed ankle, he’d have headed out to the training ring to take his frustrations out on the dummies.

“Oh, thank god you’re here, Dickface. Damian’s completely out of it.”

Damian shot him a look. “Shut up, Todd.”

“Leave him alone, Jay. Is Tim back yet?”

Drake emerged from the changing room in a dark green shirt, a fresh cup of coffee in hand. He took one long sip before exhaling. “Yeah, I’m here.”

“O-kay…” He pressed his hands together, mouth thinned into a grim line. “Uh, hey Tim, glad to see you back safe. Bruce is coming down soon to explain some things.” He let out a deep sigh, carding a hand through his hair. “This kind of thing would probably be better with the girls around, but I—god, I don’t know.”

Todd raised an eyebrow. “Don’t know whether to call Steph and Cass in Hong Kong, or don’t know what’s going on?”

“Yes.”

------

When Father arrived, Pennyworth following dutifully behind him, it was with an aching slowness in his gait. His steps measured and precise, preternaturally quiet as he made his way to stand by Damian’s chair. Damian sat up straighter, shoulders squared and back an inch away from the backrest. The rest, even Todd, stood at attention; an ingrained habit among Robins and an amusing instinct even among the senior heroes of the Justice League when it came to facing the Batman.

His father kept a steady hand on Damian’s shoulder, and Damian, shamefully, leaned into the touch; his head inclined towards his father’s hand so much so that he could feel the ends of his hair being pushed up slightly as he brushed against his father’s forearm.

He spoke with his usual monotone, as if he was heading a Justice League meeting as opposed to unveiling the secrets surrounding that boy. He brought forward the few photos they obtained from the flash drive. “A few weeks ago, we were alerted of suspicious movement from the League of Shadows in Amity Park, Illinois. Their objectives are, as of now, unclear, though it appears to be tied to the death of Amity Park resident, Daniel Fenton.”

One photo was a standard ID picture people get for their driver’s license, the lighting deliberately horrible so that any attempt to look decent would always end in failure. Another photo was a little better; a candid scene of him chatting with two others his age, a Caucasian girl in gothic-style clothes and an African-American holding a sleek, but still very outdated PDA. His blue eyes crinkled at the corners, hand reaching up to his face to stifle a laugh. There were other photos like this, some candid, others posed. At the forefront of each, a boy that looked too much like his father, too much like Damian.

His father glanced at the photos. He shut his eyes and when he opened them again, he fixed them on some distant stalactite in the Cave. “Around six months ago, Daniel was pronounced dead in a vehicular accident. A body was present, but according to police reports, he was identified via his driver’s license as opposed to any kind of DNA profiling.” He leaned over Damian’s chair to pull up a profile of Masters. “Our source—Vladimir Masters, mayor of Amity and a friend of the Fenton family—indicated his belief that Daniel is actually alive. I am inclined to agree.”

“He’s your son, isn’t he,” Drake said, more of a statement than a question.

Father gave a curt nod. “I cannot say for certain until I can perform a DNA test, but I highly suspect that to be the case.”

“First the demon spawn, now this. Great.” Todd made a hand motion towards the screen. “You know, Bruce, not knowing you have a kid once might be a coincidence, but twice? How do you do that?”

“As of three hours ago, I was still under the impression that my son never made it to term.”

“What?”

“Over sixteen years ago I was involved in a mission that put Ra’s and I on the same side. During that time, Talia and I entered a relationship that resulted in a pregnancy. Though initially ecstatic, she eventually led me to believe she miscarried the child and pushed me away. For what ends, I do not know, but trust me Jason, if I knew—” He paused, the hand that was not on Damian’s shoulder curled into a tight fist.

Father pinched the bridge of his nose. “Why she hid it from me then doesn’t matter. Why Talia wants him back now is important. Judging from Daniel’s records, he was adopted into the Fenton family as an infant and has since lived a seemingly normal life as a civilian. His adoptive parents, Jack and Maddie Fenton, are brilliant scientists and engineers focused on the field of paranormal studies. Eccentricities aside, they have zero connections to the League of Assassins or any other concerning parties.”

“So why now?” Dick asked, shifting his concerned gaze from Bruce to the static picture of Danny’s tired smile. “Why, after all this time, decide that now would be the best time to recover him?”

------

Danny’s experienced plenty of rude awakenings before, but waking up at the ass-crack of dawn to avoid his kidnapper-slash-assassin-slash-biological-mom launching a surprise attack takes the fucking cake. He can’t believe he’s saying this, but thank god for all those late night ghost attacks that conditioned him to be a light sleeper. And, of course, the League’s insistence that everyone be in optimal condition regardless of how little sleep you actually got.

Danny kicked Talia off of him, ripping his blanket away before scrambling to his feet. Seriously, if the universe decided to spontaneously give him powers again, he’d really like an upgrade to his ghost senses, please and thank you. Something that works on humans and not just ghosts. Like spidey-senses. He’d really, really like some spidey-senses.

“Your reaction times have improved considerably,” Talia said.

He eyed the katana sheathed beside his bedroll. “Thanks. Who could have guessed that constantly challenging someone to a spar in the unholy hours of morning would make them paranoid to sleep too much? Really, how am I supposed to grow taller at this rate? ” If he could just get it--

She smiled, taking a step forward. “Prepare yourself.”

“Heh.” Danny stepped further away from Talia, keeping his back to the mouth of the cave. One hand stretched in front of him and the other, coated in a green light, was kept hidden behind his back. “Am I actually gonna get some answers today?”

“Let us make it interesting. Last 10 minutes against me and I shall tell you more about your brother.” Talia twirled her blade. “If you happen to draw blood, you may ask any one thing of me.”

“Anything?”

“Within reason.”

His face caught between a grimace and a smile. He’d rather be sleeping right now, but if he had to be awake, then he’d better make the most of it. “Deal.”

Talia’s smile dropped. She veered her body to the right, barely dodging the streak of bright green that whizzed from behind her. The ectoplasmic energy that surrounded the katana bled away as the handle connected with Danny’s outstretched hand.

She quickly glanced back at Danny’s bedding. Beside it lay an empty sheath. “You have telekinesis?”

He shrugged. “It comes and goes.” Yeah, no way was Danny gonna admit that seven-out-of-ten-times he forgot that he had telekinesis. Besides, that shit was hard to do when he wasn’t Phantom.

“A surprise attack from behind is a sound strategy, Daniel. Though it’ll take a lot more than that to harm me.”

Danny pointed to the side of his cheek. “Are you sure about that?”

Talia frowned. She reached up to her face. Her fingers brushed against her cheek and came away with a thin streak of blood.

Danny grinned, pointing his blade at his opponent. “First blood goes to me.”

------

Fact: most fights don’t last long. An average street fight could last anywhere between 25 to 40 seconds, and sword fights rarely last over a minute. Like Talia said, the goal of a fight was to end it with as few injuries to oneself as possible. Humans, even the most skilled ones, can rarely last long in a fight. Prolonged combat is suicide; it makes you tired, makes your muscles heavy. It’s nothing like what Hollywood would have you believe.

Even with Danny’s own enhanced stamina and Talia holding back, he couldn’t last a full ten-minute spar. If Talia didn’t finish him within twenty-five seconds, then he’d fall by his own human limitations.

But the goal wasn’t to spar continuously for ten minutes.

He only had to last that long.

Danny sprinted out of the cave. The sun barely peeked out of the horizon, a thin line of deep orange breaking apart the wide expanse of blue-black sky above. He couldn’t see shit; great news since that meant there’s a good chance Talia couldn’t either, but that doesn’t fix the fact that he can’t see.

Nearly stumbling on the ice, Danny veered to the left. The edges of the lake stopped at towering rocks twice Danny’s height, leaving little room for cover. Though if he remembered correctly, there should be a few crevices here and there to hide in.

“You’ll have to be faster than that, Daniel.”

Shit—

Danny stopped. He brought his sword up to parry Talia’s strike and twisted away, putting distance between them.

Well, so much for just avoiding her for 10 minutes.

He adjusted his grip, keeping his sword steady and eyes trained on Talia as they circled each other. Danny lunged with an overhead strike. Talia used one hand to block the downswing by gripping his wrists. She thrust her sword forward, the tip harshly poking Danny’s abdomen.

“Less than three minutes.” Talia let his wrist go, Danny’s arms slumping to his sides.

He sighed as he sheathed his sword. “Damn, I thought I’d last longer than that.”

“You made a good effort,” Talia assured him. “Putting as much distance between us at the beginning was a good strategy. You recognized the win conditions immediately and attempted a battle of attrition.” She placed a hand on his shoulder. “I am very proud of you habibi, especially as you managed to draw first blood.”

A warmth grew in Danny’s stomach at the words, heating his cheeks. Sheepishly, he scratched the back of his head. “I wasn’t entirely sure that would work, honestly.”

“It was clever; half a second later and you might have even killed me. You are an al Ghul through and through” She brushed his hair out of his face. “What would you like as your prize, then?”

Danny’s heart clenched. He frowned, dropping his arm to his side. If I was such an al Ghul, then why didn’t you keep me? The question lodged itself in his throat, stifling his thoughts. It was something he’d been wondering for a while, actually, in the moments of solitude he had at the compound. Talia, during their training, would always remark at his potential. How talented he was, how adaptable he was, how much greater he would have been if he had been trained at a younger age.

Well then, why wasn’t he? Why did she give him up?

But each time he tried to ask, his tongue would turn to lead and the moment would pass, the question still left unsaid and simmering at the back of his mind. A Pandora’s Box that held none of the world’s evil but all of Danny’s possible shortcomings.

He could ask the question now.

He could.

He didn’t.

“Why did you take me?”

Talia tilted her head. “It is because you’re my son.”

“No. Not that. It has to be something more than that. You had sixteen years to come back for me—or, hell, you could have just never left me.” His breath hitched, fingers mussing his hair and hiding his eyes. “Why else did you take me?”

“It is true that there was more than one reason why we decided to retrieve you from Amity Park. One of which is because you are my son and an heir of the Demon’s Head.” Talia stilled. The dark skies of dawn made it impossible for him to read her. “The second reason was to protect you.”

“You kidnapped me…to protect me?”

“Knowledge of the ghosts of Amity have spread through the more insidious parts of the world. There are many out there who would pay exorbitant fees to study one of you or to use you.”

Use him? What did she mean by—

Oh.

Ghosts—Amity Park’s brand of ghosts—were a new element that the world had to contend with. Amity Park might have a crime rate of zero but that wasn’t the case everywhere else. Theft, assault, murder; the world was rampant with crimes and criminals clawing their way to the very top. Having ghosts, even ones with the most basic powerset, would be a huge advantage.

“There’s no way that would work,” Danny insisted. “Most ghosts just want to be left alone, and the ones that want to wreak havoc would never work with humans. The only reason they even work with halfas like me at times is because they still consider us as ghosts.”

“If my sources are to be believed, ghosts might not even get a choice.”

Danny’s blood curdled in his veins.

No.

Someone’s found a way to control ghosts.

#danny phantom #batman #danny phantom x batman crossover #dp fic #phantom children.txt

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lune-hime · 3 years

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Garden of Tulips (Levi/Reader) Chapter 10

~Click me for more chapters~

“What did it look like?”

“Hmm?” Levi looked up from his place next to your sleeping form. “The titan that tried to snack on my darling granddaughter.” “Ugly as fuck.” “Aren’t they all?”

Levi recounts memories of the reader and their shared life together while she recovers from a serious injury.

!!WARNINGS!! - Violence, gore, smut, wholesome content ;)

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

Tulipa alba coreulea oculata ~ A modest tulip of pearl hue that awakens before its sisters in the early spring. When she blooms, the inky beauty of her indigo heart is revealed.

↞↠↞↠↞↠

Colors danced in soft swirls under your closed eyelids. They were so thickly painted that you felt as if one swipe of your hand would intertwine their chromatic trails and mix their hues. You recognized this work of art as your euphoria; the painting of which you dreamed of many moons ago.

The delicate hands of your little muse patted your cheeks in a gentle reminder that you were too close to the surface to drift back into darkness. Here you waited in this limbo with the young girl, watching as the colors spun faster against her obsidian locks. She was the culmination of everything you could have in the future where you recovered.

The colors gained ferocity as the natural lighting from the wide window above your bed assaulted your eyes. It was as if you were an infant gazing upon the unfamiliar world so intensely it was painful. The searing brightness crinkled your brow and pinched uncomfortably at the corners of your eyes.

Sharp pain bombarded you just as the light did. It’s ivory beams peeled the lengthened sleep from your body and left a dull aching in its wake. The discomfort that now hugged your form was worth it, though, for when your vision gradually sifted up from the murky depths of unconsciousness you wanted to cry on spot at the valkyrie before you.

He contrasted so vibrantly against the pearly essence of the wallpaper of your room that you weren’t sure if you were still actually dwelling in your painting. An overwhelming urge to mold into him wracked your sedentary muscles. You were agitated at your weakened body, irritated that it couldn’t give your mind what it desired. The magnetic sensation was so strong that, willing your mind could override your physical short circuitry, it would have ejected itself out of its damaged shell and crashed into his open chest.

“Lee-” You rasped. Your voice was an exclamation within but manifested into a barely audible moan.

The minute noise grasped his attention, though.

Your phantom limbs bounced with touch starved compulsion when his head whipped around. You finally laid actual eyes on your favorite features sculpted by the universe.

“Lee-vi.” You croaked. The excitement of saying his name sapped what little energy you had from you as you fell into the little girl’s awaiting palms once more.

You lingered momentarily on the rickety bridge between consciousness and nothingness, listening to his muffled frantic calls. A warm wind rocked the bridge as his hands against your cheeks hit you like a summer heat wave. His touch endowed you with newfound vigor and your eyes opened once again.

He hovered mere inches from your face. The skin you longed to embrace was carved with petal-soft streams of tears that pooled from his desperate eyes and traversed porcelain slopes to drip down his chin. Your eyes instantly brimmed with salty gratitude upon being able to swim in those stormy seas of silver.

“Levi…” You breathily whimpered, the corners of your mouth quivering upward as what felt like years of being trapped in a bottle. Ten minutes he had grappled for his name on your lips but to you, it had left like a passing fancy.

“It’s me. It’s me-Y/N, it’s me .” He reassured for both himself, and for you. His voice wobbled with the desperate tambour of a colt eager to stand on its own among spring grass. The sheer quaking of his form; from his deeply furrowed brow, to the tears that fell in divine pools, to the frantic hesitation of his touches was in a magnitude that you had never seen in him before.

“Levi.” You sighed again, a weak smile sluggishly tugging at the corners of your lips. Like a chick learning to chirp you repeated his name as a mantra.

And by Ymir every time you chirped he vibrated at a frequency you couldn’t outwardly match.

“I’m here, Y/N.” He cooed as his emptiness finally filled with the colors of your essence. He pressed your foreheads together and basked in the warmth of your skin. “And you’re finally here.”

The simple physical touch satisfied both of your needy minds; Levi to know you were awake and you to feel like you were present. He wanted to say more. Explode with everything he had seen and felt these past few days. To unload what felt like months of unshared memories in your absence. But he didn’t want to overwhelm you any more. So he settled on four words.

“I love you, Y/N.” He uttered. You could hear the incoming flow of tears diluting his tone. Those words had fallen from his lips countless times since your accident, both internally and externally, but now they actually fell upon you. And it felt like nothing else mattered. “I love you, I love you.”

“And I love you.” You cried, fingers ever so tiredly trailing up his arm to weakly touch the softness of his hair. The strands glided between your languid flutters. There you stayed basking in the feeling of home and letting the bulbs of your love bloom between you.

“Wh...where are we? It looks like…” You trailed off as your head lolled onto his shoulder. Your eyes trailed the room, from window to wall and bureau to bedside table.

“We’re at Oma’s.” Levi explained as he smoothed down some hairs tangled in your drool from the corner of your mouth.

“Oma…” Relief was evident in your exhale. There was no other place and no other sheets you would rather be cocooned in than your childhood room after the last image your eyes captured was that carrion swamp of toothy rocks.

“She’s here then?” You asked, blinking to make sure you were actually awake.

“She left a bit ago to run errands with Felicia-”

“Felicia…” Your lips wandered over their names as if you were recalling them from a story read long ago.

“Mhm. She and Oma have been taking care of you.” Levi checked your eyes for any signs of dilation and disorientation as you processed everything. Everything seemed fine until you groaned when a chord of pain shot up your taught muscles.

“My side hurts.” You complained as your body reflexively stretched.

“I know. Don’t try to move too quickly.” Levi instructed gently. He tried to reposition you into a less painful sitting position with as much sweetness as his voice.

“How bad is it?” You bared your teeth as he shifted you. Levi kept his face from cringing at the memory of Oma fabricating a new seam for your flesh. He played with your fingers to keep your attention on staying awake.

“Oma had to stitch almost your entire side. You...had lost a lot of blood already before I found you. But I was able to put enough pressure on it to keep you-” Levi swallowed and finished his sentence with a deep inhale.

The grotesque images of the incident were painted in thick brush strokes along the bow of your brain. To push them down you focused your gaze on Levi’s doting touches and the smoothness of his milky skin.

“Do you remember what happened?” He pressed, gentle and hesitant.

You hummed in affirmation. You were sure not even the void could remove the scars left upon you by death’s cradle; both physically and mentally.

“Connie and I were alone. We were clearing out the titans to the west when Reiner knocked the wind out of me and I fell right into the abnormal…” You felt Levi’s fingers twitch in aggravation. You were too exhausted now to feel that intense hatred that had been palm-up body slammed into you.

“It grazed my side with its teeth...but I managed to take it down.” You drew in a ragged breath, the pseudo-smell of carcasses overpowering the sweet smell of the tea still steeping in the kettle nearby.

“I...I felt like what being chewed alive is like, Levi.”

Your utter outpouring of torture and fearful tears had Levi’s heart shattering all over again as it had the moment he retrieved your limp body from that sticky pool of blood. He caged the animosity that steamed under his skin for Reiner’s negligence, for the titan’s bloodlust, and for the dangerous oath both of you had taken. He had more to be grateful for right now than angry over.

His thumbs pressed feather-light kisses to your water lines, drying the flooded areas. He brought his hands to your cheeks and leaned in close so you were forced to reside within the shining slate mines of his irises.

“You’re alright now. You’re here, I’m here. You made it out, sweetheart, and nothing will be able to bring you back to that moment.” Levi said with a firmness and sincerity that bathed you in immediate serenity.

Levi rarely used pet-names with you. His terms of endearment came in the form of actions and gestures rather than words. Only when he wanted to communicate something deeper, a feeling he would never come close to conveying with his vocabulary, did they break through the surface.

“I’m assuming I fucked him up since I’m still alive.” You tried to joke as dizziness further loosened its constricting grip on your head.

“From what I saw, you absolutely fucked him up.” Levi cracked a smile when you wheezed out a laugh.

“Did Eren-?” You began. Your blackout had left you with many unanswered questions.

“I don’t know. By the time I had seen your flare they had already disappeared.” He answered.

“Don’t even.” He added. He sifted through your disorientation and hurt to find the fledgling tendrils of guilt creeping up your brow.

“None of us expected that attack. We all did what we could and no one can fault us for that.”

You chewed the inner corner of your lip and let his words sink in.

“You fought so well. You protected Connie and killed that abnormal who most likely would have gone on to kill someone else. I’m proud of you.”

Your bottom lip quivered under his earnest praise.

You strained towards him and Levi realized you were attempting to give him a kiss. He hesitated momentarily, afraid of embracing you in a sore spot or accidentally pressing you backwards at an awkward angle. With a delicate crane of his neck he met you more than halfway. His lips fell upon yours with the tenderness of a newborn fawn’s footsteps but the ferocity of lovers parted by a great ocean.

He drew back to see a pout where his lips had just resided.

“What is it?”

“I really have to pee.” You stated.

Levi’s rocking waves of baritone laughter and his steady arms lifted you from your bed.

“I want to try walking.” You proclaimed with determination, gaze focused straight ahead on the ensuite bathroom.

Levi was impressed with how well you tottered across the room, with his structural support of course. He would wince every time you did but you didn’t let the fire in your side impede your locomotion.

“Do you need me to stay?” He asked in genuine concern. He watched you skeptically as you wobbled above the toilet.

“You pervert.” You huffed, grimacing at the tightness in your thighs as you crouched down. “But yes please.”

Once business had been taken care of and you had assured him you felt coordinated enough to slowly walk back to bed yourself, Levi had gone to clean up his fallen tea cup. He had just finished dabbing the bedside rug with a rag when your sniffle dragged him to his feet.

The fabric of your nightgown, despite being silken to the touch, had snagged the rough skin of your stitches like sharp brambles as you bunched it up to your breasts. With your torso fully exposed to your morbidly curious gaze, you had never been more disgusted with yourself.

Your body resembled the two sides of a coin in how starkly different they looked. Supple curves flowed beautifully into strong and nimble legs. Across the way, a crescent moon of scissored flesh dug its hooks into your once smooth skin. Lightning bolts of broken blood vessels and bruising held your thigh to your hips like a haphazardly made corn doll.

“I’ve never looked so weak.” Your disbelief manifested itself in a dark chuckle. The image of your battered body had left you in shock at your forced metamorphosis. Your fingertips barely tapped at your stitches as if they were repulsed to be in the vicinity of your wound.

You couldn’t tear your eyes away from your tears until Levi’s body carefully wrapped around yours from behind. He didn’t dare touch your scarring, but he did intertwine your hands with his and placed his head on your shoulder.

“I don’t think you’ve ever looked so strong.” He whispered with an airy kiss to your neck. You looked up to meet his eyes in the mirror and your chest clenched at his unfiltered adoration.

“You will heal. And to speed that up you need to not push yourself.” Levi gently ushered you away from the mirror and turned you back towards the bed.

As you walked, your gaze fell to the open bedroom door. Your eyes began to water once again, pooling at your bottom lids like the body of water you now cried for. Levi anxiously regarded you and your newest bout of tears.

“Levi...is Puddle?” You coughed. A heavy rock of dread plummeted into your stomach. You couldn’t recall the last time you had seen your other beloved boy. Levi grinned fondly.

“He’s fine. He’s out in the pasture.” He assured you. He felt the breath you had been holding release against his side and you continued your journey back to bed.

Once you had practically deflated back into the blankets, it dawned on Levi that you would need sustenance.

“Are you hungry? Thirsty? Lightheaded?” He mused like a mother hen.

“All of the above but I don’t think I can stomach anything right now.”

“I’ll just get water, then.” He decided and dipped out of the room. The steady tick-tock of the carved clock and the twittering of the birds above you almost lulled you to sleep when Levi re-emerged.

The water was unpleasant; too cool against the dryness of your throat. As you forced yourself to gulp it down, you registered Levi’s outfit. The realization made you lightly gasp.

“What’s wrong?” Levi bristled, fearing one of your organs decided to pop.

“Those clothes…” You whispered as you licked the final droplets of water from your lips.

Shit, were you upset he had borrowed them? Maybe he was encroaching on something precious.

“Y/N I didn’t-”

You shook your head and smiled sweetly.

“They look good on you.” You giggled at the blush that rose on his pale cheeks.

“The pants are a little too long though...shorty.” You winked weakly. Levi was relieved that you felt alright enough to tease him. It was a more than welcome nuisance.

“Not my fault everyone in your family besides Oma seem to be giants.” He countered as he sat down on the empty side of the bed.

“Oh Ymir, I’ve been out for...how long have I been unconscious?”

“Two and a half days.”

“ Shit , that means you’ve been all alone with Oma.” You whined. “I take full responsibility for anything she’s done or said.”

Levi shut you up with another kiss the consistency of butterfly wings. He pulled back and your heart fluttered at the light in his features.

“We get along pretty well.”

“She hasn’t scarred you yet? That’s a first.”

“I didn’t say that.” He replied with impish jest.

“We...understand one another.” Levi stated simply. You beamed at his comment and gave him a once over, noting his seemingly pristine physical condition.

“You’re doing okay? You look fine.”

“My shoulder is bruised and I feel stiff but that’s it.” He reassured with a spirited flex of his shoulder blades.

Your mouth hung open in incoming speech when a crashing at the base of the stairs followed by two sets of groans interrupted you.

“Dammit Felicia just-place them at the bottom of the stairs. No! See I knew this was going to happen, your arms are the consistency of chicken legs. You could have easily made a second trip from the carriage.” Oma scolded her with fiery disappointment obvious in her tone.

You and Levi exchanged amused glances at the antics below the stairs.

“Levi, are you up here?” Oma called as she ascended to the second floor. You bit your lips in anticipation of your reunion with your grandmother.

“I’m in here.” Levi replied with a squeeze of your hand.

“That foolish girl has just spilled half of her suitcase onto the floor.” The old woman complained as she approached your bedroom. A pair of crutches under one arm and a fresh package of bandages entered your room just before she did.

“I mean, really, she has to be aware that she has the strength of a bumbleb-”

“Hi Oma.” You hiccuped. Your cheerful greeting faded into a whimper at the sight of her. She looked as lively and as lovely as you had last seen her. The crutches fell to the floor with a sharp clatter and she turned to you with wide eyes.

“ Oh , my darling.” She croaked, gliding to your side and smothering you with careful kisses on every corner of your face. Levi pulled away to let the weeping woman embrace her kin. You buried your head into her shoulder and sighed into her familiar cradle.

The beautiful, joyously tearful reunion drove that stake of peculiar familial warmth deeper into Levi’s chest as he silently watched on as Oma and you began to catch up.

“Y/N!” Felicia screamed. She stood at the foot of the bed utterly petrified with relieved shock.

“Hi Felicia.” A grin parted the wetness on your face. She was quick to take you into her arms as well, and held you there as she rambled on about how ecstatic she was that you were awake.

“Thank you for taking care of me.” You said as she pulled away. Your eyes crinkled and her’s mirrored yours.

“All of you.” You added, looking to every one of your earthly angels around you. “What time is it?”

“Half past three.” Oma said, squinting at the clock.

“Aw, I missed my morning coffee.”

The once fragile room was filled with hearty laughter and smiles for the rest of that afternoon.

↞↠↞↠↞↠

After spending the next few hours lazing with second swigs of tea and half eaten dinner plates, Levi gave your interlocked palms a squeeze. He broke away and padded out of the room to give you and Oma much needed alone time. The clanking of porcelain against the sink drew his attention to the kitchen archway and he paused momentarily along his descent.

“It sounds like an earthquake is breaking all of your dishes.” Levi commented dryly. Felicia yelped in surprise, generating even more clanking.

“Eek, I apologize if my cleaning has been bothering you! Oh walls, has it been loud enough to disturb Y/N??” She buzzed in anxiety. Levi threw her a half smile.

“I was joking. Clearly you didn’t take it that way...do you need help?” He said and leaned in the archway to the kitchen.

“O-oh...ahahah.” She sputtered and offered a wiggly, but calmer, grin back. “No, I’m all good here despite the noise. So no need to trouble yourself! Although I know you do love cleaning…”

Levi deadpanned into a single nod and continued out to the front porch. Two rocking chairs perched themselves along the ornate railing as they relished in the feature film that was the evening tulips. The fields were dulled by the blue haze of the encroaching moonlight.

He plopped down into the aged wood and took in his new favorite smell; country air. He had absolutely no idea what he had been missing with the must and dust of the underground and the metallic smell of blood against pine needles outside the walls.

He let time take the backseat to his rocking as he mildly entertained himself by finding shapes in the swaying flowers. His hand absentmindedly fiddled with the contents of his pocket. He sighed contently and brought them out of their cotton resting place and into the open. The two little bands of gold were illuminated against the pale floral sea.

A snort jolted the rings back into his pocket and whipped his head to the source. His body stiffened like an agitated teenager harboring stolen alcohol. Oma had appeared with a pony, a creature of small mousey brown and stout stature. It bore a harness with large wicker baskets hanging from either side of its chubby shoulders.

“Wanna help a brittle old woman with some last minute harvesting? I’m extremely behind on today’s work for obvious reasons." Oma invited with spice in her tone. If she had seen the jewelry, she was very convincing at hiding otherwise. Levi indulged in the rocking chair, creaking back and forth a couple times, before heaving himself up silently.

“It will do you good to get those muscles moving.” She said, patting his good shoulder as he neared. Once he was standing next to her she gripped his collar and yanked it downward. Levi faltered at the unexpected grapple and stumbled backwards. She peeped under the cloth, admiring the progress of her handiwork.

“Looks good still.” She affirmed, playfully snapping the band back and she waltzed into the field. “Damn I’m one hell of a seamstress.”

Levi followed the pony’s hoofprints down the main lane until the house was barely in view. They arrived at a patch of tulips the color of midday sunshine and lemon drop candy.

“Alright, look here boy.” She rubbed her hands together in anticipation. Levi regarded her as she kneeled down in front of her chosen flowers, one of the wicker baskets loyally resting at her side.

“It’s not as simple as pulling the damned thing up, you might tear the bulb out that way. If you do that you owe me whatever I would have earned from the re-cultivation of that tulip.” She sternly explained, sending him daggers in her eyes he had come to recognize held no malice.

Levi watched carefully as she dug out around the base of the stem, twisted gently with a firm grasp, and lifted, effortlessly releasing the flower from its anchor. He kneeled down in his picking area and mimicked her movements. After a couple broken stems and constructive criticism they had fallen into a steady rhythm.

“So...do you want to show me what’s jangling around in your pocket?” Oma inquired with a sly innocence. Levi eyed her with his grasp mid stem. Her features were smug with knowledge.

“You want to see what is inside my pocket?” Levi quipped back as he yanked the flower from its birthplace.

“Uh-huh.”

“Like...lint?” Levi returned matter-of-factly. He was grateful straight facing was his most coveted skill in interrogations such as these.

Oma cackled and blew the excess dirt from her fingertips.

“I saw the rings, Levi. No use playing dumb with me.” She stopped her harvest and gauged him for a reaction.

Levi cleared his throat and continued working.

“How do you know I wasn’t keeping them safe for Erwin’s wedding to his eyebrows?” Levi replied with an even tone. He cringed at his bullshit.

“Now that’s a wedding I’d like to be invited to.” Oma laughed, and Levi couldn’t help but grin at his absolute shitty cover up.

“It doesn’t- didn’t - really matter that much to me. Getting married.” He began as his hand hovered over the wind kissed petals of his next flower. It took a couple of soft sways for him to decide how to articulate his feelings.

“Why should I let a piece of paper, a circlet of metal, and some holy man manifest a promise that I’ve already committed to her myself?”

Oma hummed along in acknowledgment.

“But...realizing how much marriage meant to her made me place my opinions aside and realize I was being selfish in my reservations.”

A grasshopper popped in and out of the columns of stems.

“She’s never made a big deal out of it, but I’m not blind. I see the way she fawns over wedding dresses and how her eyes light up when she sees families on the street.”

His tone grew somber as thoughts of doubt flooded his mind. When the thought of becoming a husband and even a father crossed his mind he shoved them immediately into the darkest corners of his subconscious. But despite those intimate fears, he would never doubt he wanted to make you happy for the rest of his days.

“I want to give Y/N something that she can cherish for a long time in a world where everything we have seems so temporary. And standing through a ceremony celebrating our commitment...I guess isn’t the worst thing I could think of.”

With a slow exhale, he removed the rings from his pocket and held them up. Oma noted he regarded them with the same tenderness he reserved for you. His self awareness and lack of confidence intertwined with the utter devotion she could see he had for you brewed a hearth in her chest.

“Well, congratulations. They’re lovely. She’s going to absolutely love them.” Pure fondness spread through every crevasse in Oma’s face and overwhelmed Levi with domesticity. He averted her gaze and repocketed his trinkets. He grunted awkwardly with a nod.

“Thank you.” She said and began working again.

“For what?” Levi’s brow furrowed as he too resumed.

“For loving her, and receiving her love in return. It sounds like a lot of fairy-tale bullshit and troll scrotums, but love is quite the powerful ally.”

He rose his head to a crinkled smile and he nodded with a half moon of his own on his lips. His smile, however, did not betray the bleakness in his features.

A comfortable silence fell over the two of them as they continued to pluck the beauties from their earthy homes. They eavesdropped on the occasional yowl from a fox and the croaking of toads.

“Do you know what makes a good, sturdy, lively tulip, shorty?” Oma asked as she strong-armed one from the ground. She examined the flower with eyes that Levi’s own vision would never be able to duplicate.

“Water.” He guessed offhandedly, flicking a worm off of the roots of his own flower.

The older woman scoffed at the blandness of his answer.

“If that’s all it took, I’d be richer and my lower back wouldn’t ache like a bitch.” She cackled. “You’ve got the basic idea. But you haven’t even scratched the most important bits.”

Levi’s verbal silence pressed her to continue as he scooted over to the next patch nearest to him.

“First you need rich soil. If you live where that soil is contaminated-ya know too much clay, too little nutrients. Then you need to physically make the soil capable of growing life.” She began with a bulky wheeze as she lifted her basket to reposition herself over her floral children.

“Here, thankfully the soil is loose, airy, and just a bit sandy. But that wasn’t the case at our old place. A downright hard job it was to get those little bastards to grow. But we did.”

“Once you’ve got your soil sorted out, you need the bulbs. Some of the bulbs won’t make it. That’s just how it is. But the ones that do poke their little heads above the ground and leave their dark incubations.”

“Then comes the water.” She looked at him pointedly and he rolled his eyes. “It’s the one constant thing in a tulip’s life that nurtures it into maturity.”

“How versed are you in tulip anatomy?” Oma asked as she held her latest victim up. Levi blinked at her.

“Expertly.”

His sass made her smirk.

“Well, then you’ll know that petals-arguably the most cherished and viewed piece-are a part of the tulip. So is the stamen, pistil, and pedicel.” She lectured while supporting her points with gestures to the places on the plant she was talking about.

“While they are all interconnected with the flower, they aren’t the whole tulip.�� She stated. She threw the saffron colored flower in an underhand swoop to Levi who caught it effortlessly. He twirled the soft skin of the largest petals between his thumb and index finger as she talked before tossing it into his own basket.

“There’s a lot nature can teach us about ourselves. I mean we’re all natural beings, even the titans.” She said with pursed lips and swiftly grabbed at the pony’s halter when she saw him mouthing for the buffet in her basket.

“That’s why I’ve stuck with this job for so long. By looking at them, they remind me that my oddities, mistakes, and what-have-you, may linger with me and be a part of me...but they aren’t all of me. There’s still a bulb down there under the earth waiting to re-blossom.”

Levi now understood the depth of her analogy. Normally, if someone was beating around the bush to tell him he needs to cheer up he would have either slammed the door in their face, or their face into the door. But this didn’t feel like that. Her words seeped into his heart and rested there in what he could only begin to grasp as...parental warmth.

“That’s what you need to do to help yourself, I’ve learned. To cultivate learning to live with yourself and then in turn others.” She sighed as she pressed the disturbed soil back into place.

When Levi looked down, his hands were suddenly so small and so caked in dirt. But not dirt from the fields. No, it was an oily, slick dirt that tasted like oxidized metal when he ate stale bread from them.

“Tulips don’t live forever even though they blossom every year. Life could not exist without death, and it only hurts yourself to deny mortality in you and in others. It only makes you suffer, not the loved ones that have passed before you or the ones that slipped through your fingers.”

He was shaking like he used to when his malnourished body constantly teetered on the edge of starvation. His bony wrists buckled under the immense weight of the flower and it tumbled to the ground in front of him. He wore a once expensive sleeping gown gifted to his mother by one of her regulars. It was clearly for her, but she had given it to her poor son to provide him with that extra warmth when she was too sick to wrap him in her love herself. It was tattered and stained from years of wear. But it still smelled of her.

“Everyone and everything in this world of ours must die. Life is a precious gift with that knowledge. And a gift so precious can’t be wasted on beating yourself down for existing, for living . Self proclaimed demons and mistakes in all.”

Levi felt the childish pressure of tears building behind his eyes. He wished to choke out a whine, to let them burst out, to feel the safety of his mother’s chest against his wet cheeks instead of her lifeless embrace. He felt the tantrum of frustration at all of this emotion he kept so expertly under lock and key. His bare toes sank into the flowers behind him as he knelt on the soil just as he did the cramped trailer where he resided when his mother worked in their room.

He finally felt like a child in the presence of a mother’s comfort. Oma’s consolation brought back that gangly, mute, shelled boy. The boy who had to grow up into a man overnight, surrounded by reflections in knives and last words as screams. The boy who never had the chance to cry it out about foolish things like his mother not being able to take him on a walk through the city, like his bloated belly eating itself instead of dinner, like never being able to see the sun. The boy who was always the pillar for others and never had a guardian to stroke his head and tell him that better days are coming.

“I’m rambling like this because I see the intense self loathing in you that I used to feel for myself-” She half chuckled to make light of her weighted words. The dry laugh faded into the air with the rest of her sentence when she gazed upon him. Her smile dropped as bubbling tears cascaded over his dark bottom lashes.

“Oh, my dear.” Oma gasped out a breathy coo. She instantly dropped her basket, not caring if her naughty pony ate some of her crop. She flew to him; her knees before his and her hand pressing his head to her shoulder. Her other arm rubbed ginger ovals into his back that urged him to crumple into her strong embrace.

For a moment, he wondered if this is what his mother would have felt like if she hadn’t been so frail. He could only guess that this is the feeling he had missed. The childhood was never nurtured into him. The childhood he had forsaken for survival. And in a twisted way, he was now more than ever thankful for the horrors of his youth as he nestled into Oma’s loving arms. Because he was beginning to understand that his own life was precious. Not just yours or Oma’s or Felicia’s or Erwin’s or Petra’s or everyone he fought for.

She was right, and Levi was too prideful to tell her how grateful he was for her in this moment.

“I.” He fought to swallow his shame in his childish behavior, but the soft strokes of her fingers through his hair and the solace in his chest at her gentle rocking plunged it down his esophagus.

“I needed to hear that.” His voice quivered into the puffy fabric of her shoulder.

"We all do." Oma hummed and continued her ministrations, allowing him to tearfully bleed a lifetime of juvenile sorrows onto her and out of him.

Maybe he did need to let his withered leaves and wilted colors fall from his body, leaving him with just his skeleton and his heart.

↞↠↞↠↞↠

The creaking of the wood under his boots was the only sound in the dim darkness of the newborn night as he made his way upstairs. He paused at your door, glancing in to see you tucked back under the sheets. A half smile carried him back to his temporary chambers to wash up. He managed to fully wash the silt from under his fingernails and his knuckles while still keeping Oma's comfort there.

When he deemed himself fully cleansed, he slunk through the crack in your doorway without causing the hinges on the old wood to groan. He deftly sat in the chair still positioned next to your form. His eyes softened at the slight twitch of your nose and your steady breaths.

Just as he began admiring the warm glow of life rising back up into your skin, your eyelashes fluttered in greeting.

“Did I wake you?” He whispered, his voice devoid of anything but airy tenderness.

You shook your head, the plushness of your pillow swallowing your face then regurgitating it up.

“No, I was just resting my eyes.” You blatantly lied through a smile that was blinding in comparison to the muted candle light.

“I’ve slept too much these past few days. I don’t want to right now…” You began with the saddest attempt at a pout Levi had ever witnessed. Just speaking that sentence already almost sent you into another deep slumber.

“Then just keep resting your eyes then, instead of sleeping.” Levi whispered as you trailed off in obvious exhaustion. He pressed his hand to your forehead, blissfully cool from the tap water, and moved your hair away. In its place, his lips placed the sweet hum of affectionate proximity on your skin.

You registered the chair rubbing against the floorboards through the incoming sleep.

“Will you stay, Levi?” You asked, doe eyes blinking up through the gray.

You didn’t even have to ask him.

“I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else.”

You felt the bed dip to your left. He settled in beside you on his side, his arm a firm resting place for his head as he gazed upon you through the night veil. He didn’t draw you to him as he usually would. It would scar him if he selfishly undid the hard work of Oma and Felicia. For now, just basking in the aura of your wellbeing was enough of a security blanket. You weakly shifted so your head was perched in his direction.

The two of you laid in silent fear of sleep. You didn’t want your beautiful little angel to carry you back into the void. Levi didn’t want his demons to vouch all of this as a practical joke and take you from him when he rose the next morning.

“Levi.”

“Hmm?”

“You called her Oma.” You mumbled, finally relenting into the arms of rest.

“I did.”

#Levi fanfiction #Levi Heichou #levi x reader #levi fluff #LEVI ACKERMAN #AoT #aot fluff #aot x reader #snk x reader #snk #attack on titan #attack on titan fanfiction #shingeki no kyojin #shingeki no kyoujin fanfiction #anime fanfiction #Jean Kirschstein #bisexual jean #hange zoe #levi ackerman x reader

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cherryobx · 3 years

Text

5+1//JJ Maybank x reader

requested?: YES “Hey! I love all your fics so much and I was wondering if a could request a 5+1 JJ fic? So it would be the five times y/n thinks about kissing jj, and the one time she finally does it🤍”

A/N: a little christmas present to you guys! merry christmas to those who celebrate it!!!

summary: the five times you think about kissing JJ and the one time you finally do it

warnings: a few curse words (and by a few i mean 1), kissing, mentions of domestic violence, hurt!JJ

WC: 1829 (the longest fic i’ve ever posted!)

(not my gif! creds to the owner!!!)

It was a scorching day at the Outer Banks and you had an idea to go swimming with the pogues. Just to cool off a little bit. The fans in the chateau weren’t helping with the heat much and swimming in the cool water seemed like the only reasonable option.

Everyone grabbed their towels and headed to the back of the chateau. None of you had the strength to go anywhere further.

The boys dropped their towels and immediately ran splashing into the water. You, Kiara and Sarah, took your time.

Testing the water first, you tipped your toes in. The water was the perfect temperature, not too cold nor too warm. You went in and the closer to the boys you got, the more they started to smile.

As soon as you reached them they started splashing you with water.

“You idiots! Three against one is unfair.” You splashed some water right back at them, aiming for their eyes.

JJ grabbed your hands in an attempt to stop you from “drowning them”. Their words, not yours.

The moment JJ grabbed your hands, you swore your heart stopped beating for a second.

You had been crushing on him since the day you met him several years ago. You couldn’t explain it but there just was something about him that pulled you to him.

You looked up into his ocean blue eyes. For a second, his eyes darted to your lips, making your heart beat faster and faster by second.

He let go of your hands and stepped back a bit, giving you space again.

You released the breath that you didn’t realize you were holding.

Of course, you had thought about kissing JJ before but after that incident, you started thinking about it more and more. Wondering what his lips would feel like against yours.

“JJ, stop! I’m going to fall!” you shrieked trying to balance yourself, which seemed like the most difficult thing ever at the moment.

Everyone in the Outer Banks seemed to be really good at surfing. Not you though. And now JJ had taken it upon himself to teach you how to surf. It was his goal for this summer.

“You’re not going to fall, I’m right here.” For some reason, those words awakened the butterflies in your stomach.

You slowly sat down onto the board, facing JJ who was standing next to you in the water, trying so hard not to fall.

“I don’t understand how you do this shit every day. It’s exhausting. And difficult. Very difficult.”

“It’s not difficult once you get the hang of it, sweetheart.”

He placed his hand on your thigh. It was meant to be a comforting gesture but your breath hitched in your throat.

The butterflies were almost unbearable.

You wanted to kiss him so bad.

But you didn’t.

“You want to go surfing? I can go sit on the beach for a bit,” you offered.

“You don’t want to try anymore? C’mon! Don’t give up now.”

“I’m hopeless, JJ. And I know you’d much rather surf than teach me.”

“First of all, not true, but I mean if you really don’t want to you can go.”

You jumped off the board, standing in front of him.

“I’ll wait up for you then.”

“You sure?” he asked, raising his eyebrow.

“Yeah,” you nodded.

The truth was, you just wanted to see him surf. It was an incredible sight to see. Not only was he really good at it, he also looked very very hot while doing it.

You made your way to the beach and sat on your towel, the feeling of his hand on your thigh still vivid.

Most nights of the summer, you slept at John B’s house. So did JJ. Occasionally Pope and Kiara too. You thought it was pointless to go home when you’d just go there to sleep. So you stayed at the chateau a lot.

It was 2 a.m. and you were sitting on the kitchen counter. You couldn’t sleep. You wanted to but your mind was awake, racing with many different thoughts.

You almost screamed when JJ appeared out of nowhere, standing in front of you.

“Shit, JJ! You scared me!” You placed your hand on your heart and felt it beat in a fast rhythm.

“Sorry.” He chuckled.

Then he leaned closer to you, stretching his arm behind you.

Your faces were so close and for a second you though you had seen him look at your lips. Was it finally going to happen?

Then he pulled away, a glass in his hand and a smirk on his lips.

He filled the glass with water and then took a sip out of it. Placing the glass back onto the counter he sent you one last smirk before saying “I was thirsty.”

Again, it was late at night and you couldn’t sleep.

You went to the small dock behind the chateau and sat down on the edge of it.

It was a beautiful night. The stars were shining so bright, illuminating everything.

You were just sitting there, stargazing, when you heard steps behind you. Turning around, you saw JJ walking towards you.

He sat down beside you, not saying a single word.

“Is this going to be our thing?” you asked, looking at him.

He turned his head towards you. “What?”

“You creeping up on me at night.”

“Maybe. I mean if you want to.” He turned his head away again, staring up at the sky.

The light coming from the stars made his skin glow, making him almost look heavenly. He was the most gorgeous boy that you had ever seen. And that moment right there made you fall for him even deeper.

The thought of kissing him popped into your head again.

You wanted to kiss him, very much. But the fear of losing him as a friend was bigger. So you didn’t.

But you knew that one day you wouldn’t be able to hold the urge back anymore. It was bound to happen.

You and the pogues were at The Wreck since none of you (except Kiara) were good at cooking.

Her dad was quite annoyed with you all but since he was a good man, he let you do your own thing and eat there.

Kiara brought all the food to the table and then sat down next to you.

“Where’s JJ?” you asked, noticing his absence.

“Umm… he’s over there.” Kiara pointed to the direction where JJ was supposed to be.

You looked over there and saw something that made your heart physically hurt.

JJ was talking to a girl, flirting with her. They were standing really close too. JJ grabbed a strand of her blonde hair and twirled it between his fingers while telling her something and making her laugh.

Your mood was instantly ruined. But the thing that made you hurt the most was that they kissed. Right in front of you. You wanted to cry right there and then.

And the pogues noticed it too. It was no secret that you took interest in a certain blonde pogue.

“I think I’m gonna go home.” You stood up from the table, not hungry anymore.

“Do you want me to come with you?” Kiara asked, a worried look in her eyes.

“No, it’s fine. You stay here.”

While walking home, the scene of JJ and that girl kissing played over and over again in your head. And again you were wondering how it would feel like to kiss him.

You wanted to be the one JJ made laugh. You wanted to be the one he kissed. Was it too much to ask for?

It felt like you had made it very clear with all the subtle hints that you were throwing at him occasionally but after seeing what happened at The Wreck that day you were proved wrong.

It was a few days later. You had been staying at your house for all that time. Your parents were on the mainland, visiting your grandparents for the weekend so you were home alone.

You quite enjoyed it actually.

The peace and silence was all you needed right now.

All of the pogues had texted and called you but you ignored all of them.

You needed some time to be alone.

10 o’clock was rolling around and you were preparing to go to sleep when you heard a loud banging on the front door.

Putting on a big oversized hoodie to cover up, you went to see who it was.

Opening the door, you saw JJ standing there. He looked very bad. He was beat up, blood coming out of his nose and many cuts on his face. Since he was wearing a shirt you couldn’t really tell if he was hurt on his body too or not. But seeing the state of his face you assumed he was.

“What happened to you?”

“My dad is what happened.” Was all he mumbled.

You were one of the few people who knew how his dad treated him. But still you were shocked to see the damage.

You opened the door wider, gesturing for him to come in. You closed the door and locked it after him.

“Come on, let’s get you cleaned up.” You grabbed his hand and gently pulled him towards the bathroom where the emergency kit was.

JJ leaned against the sink while you took out the kit and all the stuff to clean his cuts.

To clean his face you had to be very close to him but right now you didn’t care. The most important thing to you at the moment was his well being.

He winced when you started cleaning his cuts. Out of pure instinct he placed his hands on your hips.

“I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay, it’s not your fault.”

“I know but I feel like I should've done something.”

“You didn’t know.”

After cleaning all the cuts on his face you asked to see the bruises on his body.

He tried to take off his shirt but you saw he was struggling due to the pain, so you helped him.

“Oh god.” His whole chest and torso was covered in dark purple bruises. You wanted to cry. He must have been in so much pain.

“I didn’t do anything, Y/N. I couldn’t stop him.” There were tears in the corners of his eyes and soon enough, they rolled down his cheeks.

You placed your hands on his cheeks, wiping away the tears with your thumbs.

“I’m sorry.”

“Please make the pain go away. I can’t take this anymore.”

You felt your eyes get glossy too. “I can try. I will always try.”

You leaned closer to him and connected your lips for a kiss. This isn’t what you imagined your first kiss with him to be like but you needed to be there for him. You wanted to be there for him.

taglist: @www-imbored-com @delightfullynlove @tomhardybby @kindahavefeelingskindaheartless @ilovejjmaybank @allycat449-blog @teenwaywardasgardian @copper-boom @canibeoneofthepogues @ifilwtmfc @bedazzledbanks @jeyramarie @themaddies-obx @pink-meringues

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theydontknowaboutusimagines · 3 years

Text

This Christmas - A Harry Styles Series (Part 12)

Two life long friends. Secretly in love. Home for the holidays. Will they risk everything by telling the other how they feel? Or will they spend another year loving from afar?

Read these first

Prologue Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11

Waking up the next morning alone in your childhood bedroom was a little disappointing. It was a strange feeling not waking up with the warmth of Harry by your side. The fact that it had only been a couple of days meant you were in for a rude awakening once you went back to your flat in London. Speaking of which, neither you or Harry has brought up what would happen next, but it looks like you’ll have your trip to discuss it.

After washing your face and brushing your teeth, the realization it was Christmas morning and the aroma of your mother’s traditional Christmas morning breakfast taking over the house quickly brought your spirits up. Once you were done, you went straight downstairs, still wearing your Christmas pajamas, and your mouth watered at the sight of food on the table.

“Happy Christmas!” you smiled, hugging your mother.

“Happy Christmas, honey,” she smiled. “Everything is almost done.”

“Awesome, need any help?” You asked.

“Want to grab plates and then get your father?” She asked.

“Sure thing,” you smiled.

You went over to the cabinet taking out enough plates for everyone and placing them on the table. You decided on going ahead and getting everyone drinks as well before going in search of your father, who was in his office getting the present for your mother. It was something he always did. He had to wait to put it out last minute because if she knew he had purchased something for her, she would make him take it back.

“I really think she’s going to like this one this year,” he smiled, holding the box in his hands.

“You say that every year and while she does usually like them, she still complains,” you laughed.

“True, but she only stays mad at me for a couple of hours and then she lets herself enjoy the gift,” he shrugged.

“Traditions, right?” You smiled.

“Gotta love ‘em,” he said.

After stuffing your face with all Christmas breakfast, it was time to open up presents. You all took turns opening your gifts. Thank yous, gasps, laughs, and a few tears were shed with each opened present. At the end of it all, there was nothing but wrapping paper and empty bags and boxes scattered around.

“How is that we have grown children and there’s still a mess on our floor on Christmas morning?” Your mother laughed.

“Because everyone’s a kid at Christmas,” you smiled.

Next up on the family traditions was watching another Christmas movie before getting ready to head over to Anne’s. This time you picked How the Grinch Stole Christmas. You helped your mother clean up the mess while you watched the movie and spent the rest of it cuddled up on the couch, drinking yet another cup of hot chocolate.

When the movie was over, you went up to your room to get ready. You always wanted to look nice on Christmas, spending extra time on your hair and makeup and wearing a nice outfit. However, this Christmas you wanted to look extra special. Luckily, you packed a new deep shade of green dress that fit you perfectly. It wasn’t too tight, but it still flattered your figure, which you loved.

You paired it with red heels and a deep, red lip. To add in a little extra festiveness, you put on your Christmas tree earrings. They were definitely a little much, but you loved them. When you met your parents downstairs, they both smiled at you.

“What?” You blushed.

“You look absolutely beautiful,” he smiled.

“Thank you,” you smiled.

“Okay, ready to go to the in-laws?” Your mother smirked.

“What?” You laughed.

“Well, now that you and Harry are dating, we’re all officially family, right?” She smirked.

“We’re only dating, Mum, not getting married,” you laughed.

“Not yet,” she winked.

You shook your head with a laugh before following them out the door.

Harry woke up yet again to a pillow being thrown in his face.

“Go away, Gem!” He mumbled, throwing a pillow towards the direction of his sister.

“Harry Edward Styles it is Christmas morning and it’s time for you to get your ass up,” Anne scolded.

“Mum?” He snapped up, instantly regretting the sudden movement.

“Yep. You have five minutes to be downstairs,” she smirked.

“Sorry!” He called out after her.

Harry groaned laying back in bed trying to wake himself up. He had gotten back only three hours before and he was slightly regretting his decision on sneaking out of the house. But who was he kidding, it was well worth it. Any time spent with you was worth more than lack of sleep.

Finally sliding off the bed, he goes into the bathroom to brush his teeth and wipe his face. Looking into the mirror, he noticed a few remnants from the previous nights. Your lipstick stained his lips and various places across his chest and neck. He smirked, remembering the details of each one as he took a washcloth to try and get the red smear off. He would have loved to keep them there for the time being, but he didn’t need to advertise his whereabouts only a few hours ago.

When he made it to the living room, piles of presents were separated based on the three of them. This was always their thing. All the presents under the tree would be piled together based on who they were for and then they would each take turns opening a present. It would have been easier to just let one person go and open all their presents, but it made the magic of opening presents last a little longer.

“Happy Christmas,” Gemma smiled, hugging him.

“Happy Christmas, Gem,” he smiled, hugging her back.

“MY babies!” Anne smiled, wrapping her arms around both of them and pressing kisses to their cheeks.

And that was something she has done every single year and probably will continue to do when both of her children are well into their fifties.

“I can’t believe it’s Christmas,” Gemma said, sitting down on the floor next to her pile of presents.

“I know. The fact that another year’s over, too,” Anne said.

“Okay, John Lennon,” Harry joked.

“Smart ass!” Anne laughed, throwing a pillow at him.

“For fuck’s sake, I’m taking all the pillows in this bloody house and hiding them forever,” He laughed.

“Hey, we don’t get to do this very often, so we have to make it a good one,” Gemma shrugged.

“And what’s that? Bug the piss out of me?” He asked.

“Exactly,” she smirked.

He rolled his eyes, getting himself some coffee, before sitting back down near his own pile of presents. He enjoyed getting presents, but he enjoyed giving them the most. He loved being able to buy his family things they wouldn’t be able to purchase for themselves. He was happy he was in a position to help his mother and sister whenever they needed it. Of course, being who they are, they didn’t need it quite so much, but it was there when they did.

After presents that included multiple gag gifts causing them to laugh uncontrollably, they all sat around eating breakfast and talking about different Christmas memories. Next, everyone went up to their rooms to get ready for everyone to come over. Of course he was the first one back downstairs, so he started getting things ready to cook while he waited for his Gemma and his mother to get back down.

Anne came down first and the two of them got going on the cooking. Harry’s job was to slice and dice everything, while Anne did the rest of it.

“So,” Anne said. “Are you and Y/N official?”

“Um… yeah, we are,” he smiled.

“And you’re happy?” She asked.

“The happiest I’ve been in a long time,” he smiled.

“I know,” she smiled. “I can tell.”

“I don’t even know why I’m asking this because I’m pretty sure I already know the answer, but are you happy about this?” He asked, throwing chopped veggies in a bowl.

“Honey, all I’ve ever wanted for you is to be happy and to live a life that you want,” she said. “I’ve always thought you and Y/N would be each other’s person, but I knew I couldn’t be the one to tell you that. You two had to figure it out on your own and sometimes the only way to find your way to who you’re meant to be with… you have to be with other people.”

“So, you’re saying it was probably a good thing for me and Y/N to just now get together?” He asked.

“I do,” she nodded. “Think about it Harry, when all of this… when you were in One Direction you were still so young and traveling around the world the majority of the time. You weren’t ready to have a serious girlfriend and had you and Y/N tried back then, it really could have fucked up any chance you two might have had. And then what? You two would have missed out on a life together.”

“Wow, I guess I didn’t think of it like that,” he said.

“Which is why I’m happy you two are trying not to focus on the past,” she said. “I know it’s easier said than done, but everything has its way of working out. It may not be when we want it, but it’ll come when we’re ready for it.”

Harry smiled, wrapping his arms around her, “I love you.”

“I love you, too,” she smiled. “And next time you want to sneak out and in the house in the middle of the night, please just use the front door like a normal person.”

“Uh… you know about that?” He winced.

“You’re needy son, I’m surprised it took you that long to sneak over to Y/N’s place,” she joked.

“I really don’t understand why everyone keeps saying that like it’s a bad thing!” He laughed.

When you arrived at Anne's house, you suddenly felt a little nervous. You weren’t sure why, but wondered if it was because this would be the first public outing for you and Harry. And it wasn’t even public, just close friends and family. You hated to know what it would feel like when you actually did accompany him in public, which is something else you would have to discuss.

Before your father could even knock, Harry had opened the door with a huge smile on his face.

“Happy Christmas!” He cheered.

“Oh boy, someone’s already had a few glasses of wine,” your mother jokes.

“I’ve not!” Harry laughed.

“Well we’re bloody in for it when you do,” she laughed, kissing his cheek. “But Happy Christmas to you, too.”

You giggled when Harry looked at you, “I don’t know if I should be offended or not,” he said.

“If you have to ask, you already have your answer,” you said.

He smiled, slipping his arm around your waist, “You look beautiful…. And those earrings… are lovely.”

“Smooth,” you laughed. “This is my Christmas earrings. I’ve worn them every year for like four years.”

“That doesn’t exactly shock me,” he said.

“I might have to get you a pair,” you smirked. “We could match.”

“I’d love to, but sadly I don’t have any piercings,” he sighed, dramatically.

“Oh, we can change that with a sewing needle and a trip to the bathroom,” you said. “It’s not stopped you before.”

“You heard about that?” He winced.

“Of course, I heard about it. You act like I’ve been living under a rock for the past six years,” you rolled your eyes.

“Sorry, sorry,” he put his hands up in defense.

“Anyway, how was Christmas this morning with your family?” you asked.

“Entertaining,” he laughed, handing you a drink. “Yours?”

“Traditional,” you joked. “And also very entertaining.”

“Maybe one day we’ll have our own entertaining tradition filled Christmas morning,” he winked.

“Can’t wait,” you smiled.

The rest of the day is filled with games, food, laughter, and drinks. You were having the best time and it felt even more special having Harry at your side. Eventually, Anne brought out Christmas Home videos and you all laughed at the memories. But there was one you had forgotten all about. It was of you and Harry probably about five or six. You two were cuddled up together, holding hands, and watching a Christmas movie.

“Who is your best friend in the whole world?” Anne smiled, pointing the camera at Harry.

“Y/N!” He smiled.

“And Y/N who is your best friend in the whole world?” She asked.

“Harry!” You smiled.

Both of you wrapped your arms around each other in a great big hug.

“That’s when I knew,” Anne smiled.

“Knew what?” Harry asked.

“That one day she would be officially a part of this family,” she smiled. “And on that day, I would give her this.”

Anne held out a wrapped box, the one Harry was supposed to have given you the other night. You looked at her confused before ripping off the paper and opening it up. Inside was a stocking with your name on it. The same exact stocking and font that match Anne, Gemma and Harry’s stocking hanging on the mantle.

“You always wanted one,” she smiled. “And now you have it.”

You smiled, tears forming in your eyes, as you wrapped her up in a big hug. “Thank you,” you whispered. “I love it.”

“You’re welcome, sweetheart,” she smiled.

As the night died down a bit, you and Harry headed outside to the backyard.

“Christmas day is such a bittersweet feeling,” you sighed.

“How come?” He asked.

“Because once it’s here… it’s over and soon after the magic of Christmas… the feeling of Christmas is gone until next year,” you sighed.

“Well, at least we’ll have each other,” he smiled. “And we’ll know it may have been the magic of Christmas that brought us together.”

“Okay, how many Hallmark movies have you been watching?” You laughed.

“It’s true,” he laughed.

“Yeah, it is,” you smiled, wrapping your arms around him. “Whatever the reason, I’m glad we’re finally here, together.”

“Me too,” he smiled, holding you close.

And to make the moment even more romantic, it started to snow.

“Oh wait! I forgot, one more present,” he said.

“Harry, seriously, I’ve had enough,” you giggled.

“I think you’ll like it,” he said, handing you a box.

Inside the box was mistletoe, causing you to laugh.

“What’s more romantic than this… kissing under the mistletoe while it’s snowing on Christmas Night,” he smiled. “Merry Christmas, baby.”

“Merry Christmas,” you replied with a smile before pressing your lips against his.

And that is how This Christmas quickly became your favorite.

THE END! I hope you all enjoyed this series and look out for the companion series coming soon! :)

#Harry Styles Imagines #Harry Styles Fanfic #Harry Styles Fanfics #Harry Styles Fanfiction #Harry Styles Fanfictions #Harry Styles Christmas Series

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moon-rabbit-music · 4 years

Text

Alright so I’m writing a Teba x Link x Revali fic, and it was originally supposed to be a 1000-2000 word oneshot, but...well, let’s just say I’m at almost 3000 words now and only about 10% of the way through the plot, so. Yeah.

Anyway, I’m impatient and want to share, but I don’t want to break this up into sub-2000 word chapters, so...I’m just posting a big ol’ chunk of it as, uh, a really long teaser, I guess! I hope y’all enjoy :)

___

Teba knows he’s fucked from the moment he meets Link.

He’s met a few Hylians before, but this one stands out. He’s more...colorful than any other Teba’s seen before, with his golden hair and electric blue eyes and the strange hoops adorning his pointed ears. Teba can’t help but think that he’s far prettier than a Hylian male has any right being, a thought which he immediately pushes out of his mind with an angry huff.

At first, it’s easy to ignore. They have business to attend to, and if he feels a twinge of worry every single time Link narrowly dodges one of Vah Medoh’s lasers, that’s just because he can’t live with another injured warrior on his conscience. The ache in his chest when he leaves him alone on the deck of the Divine Beast is just disappointment in himself, for being foolish enough to get himself injured, and for leaving what should be the business of the Rito to a Hylian stranger.

(The genuine worry in Link’s eyes makes him feel a little better, though.)

When Vah Medoh perches directly above the village, there’s a flurry of panic. After a few minutes, as it seems content to simply sit there with its beak pointed toward the castle, the mood turns to conspiracy, which is only elevated when Harth and Mazli fly up to investigate and return with the unconscious bodies of Link and a Rito male that no one in the village recognizes. Teba misses all of it, laying on a small cot and staring dejectedly at the crossed wooden beams of the infirmary ceiling, and by the time Link and the stranger are brought in he has fallen asleep.

He awakens the next morning to see Link curled up on a cot a few feet away from him, clutching the blankets, a hole the size of his hand burned into his shirt on the left side of his stomach and charred flesh underneath. On the other side of the room, a mess of dark blue feathers lies crumpled in a hammock.

Saki and Harth drift in and out of the room all morning, fussing over the three of them. Link wakes around noon, bringing a hand gingerly to his wound and wincing. Teba sits up and clucks disapprovingly, and Link’s gaze swivels around to him.

“How’s your leg?,” he signs, and Teba huffs.

“Better than your side. What the hell happened in there?”

Link laughs, a breathy little sound. “There was a monster, possessing Medoh. I managed to kill it, but it was a hard fight.”

Teba nods slowly. He finds it hard to believe that this tiny Hylian single-handedly calmed the beast that had shot so many of their finest warriors (including himself, he thinks with a grimace) out of the sky, but according to Saki, it had been completely still for the roughly 16 hours since it landed. And, on some instinctive level, he trusts that Link is telling the truth.

“So who’s this?,” he asks, gesturing at the hammock, and Link looks over. His eyes widen, and he starts to push himself up before falling back onto the cot with a small whimper. A flood of worry rushes through Teba, and before he has time to think about what he’s doing he’s on the floor next to Link, carefully placing a wing on his chest.

“Hey now.” He intends it to be soft, comforting, but it comes out gruff. He tries again. “They’re gonna be okay. Saki and Harth will make sure of that.” Link relaxes a little, and Teba nods approvingly. He stays there, watching carefully, until the silence stretches on for a little too long and he coughs awkwardly and shuffles back to his cot. “...So?”

Link frowns, glancing back over at Teba. “I could tell you, but you wouldn’t believe me.”

Teba raises an eyebrow. “I didn’t believe you when you said you could calm Vah Medoh, and yet here we are.”

“I suppose.” He fiddles with the hem of his tunic, looking uncomfortable. Teba watches with a slowly growing sense of trepidation, wondering what could possibly make him so hesitant to answer such a simple question. Eventually, he spells out a name.

“Revali.”

“...Revali.”

Link nods.

“As in—”

Link nods. Teba can feel the feathers on the back of his neck rising. “This stranger had the gall to claim to be Master Revali, one of the most celebrated Rito warriors in history, who lived one hundred years ago...and you believed him?!”

“He didn’t claim anything. He was barely conscious enough to land Vah Medoh. I...recognized him.”

Teba just...stares. He recognized him? What the hell does that mean? Link swallows and looks away, and Teba starts guiltily.

“Sorry,” he mutters, and Link gives him a thin smile.

“I told you, you wouldn’t believe me.”

“It’s not that I don’t believe you, I just-” He shakes his head. “You recognized him? That doesn’t make any sense.”

Link shrugs. “I could explain that too, and then you’d really think that I’m off the deep end.”

“Try me.”

Link laughs again, louder this time (and Teba’s stupid heart flutters, just a little).

“If you insist,” he responds, and Teba nods. “One hundred years ago...I was the Princess of Hyrule’s appointed knight. I knew all of the Champions, including Revali.” He grimaces. “After we lost, I was...my body was taken to a shrine on the Great Plateau. It healed me, but took away my memories. I’m only just starting to get them back...”

“Link,” Teba says quietly, and he looks over. Teba hesitates for a moment— it feels cruel, somehow, to question what he says, as wildly unbelievable as it is. He forges ahead anyway. “Do you...do you have any proof of this? At all?”

Link gestures helplessly. “I know it sounds insane. Your Elder, he recognized my Sheikah Slate. He believes I’m a descendent of the Hylian champion, which I guess is a lot more believable.”

“I guess.”

They sit in silence. Link looks at the ceiling, then over at the hammock, then back at the ceiling. Teba thinks about his tunic, a shade of blue more vibrant than he thought possible to make fabric in, an unsettlingly similar blue to Vah Medoh’s lasers. And the eye on the back of the strange slate he carries, identical to the eyes of Vah Medoh’s cannons.

Saki pokes her head in. “Oh, good. You’re awake. And you—” she points at Teba, “you should be lying down.”

“I’m not putting weight on it,” he counters, “and it’s healing quickly. It was a shallow wound.”

“Hm.” She doesn’t push, and he’s grateful for it. Instead, she walks over to the hammock, bending over to carefully examine the unconscious Rito. “I may have to ask Amali to make him another elixir. His external wounds seem to be mostly healed, but his breathing is still shallow.” She turns to Link. “How are you feeling?”

She dresses the wound on Link’s chest and worries over Teba’s leg before leaving, and a few minutes later Harth comes in with two plates of steamed salmon. Link insists that he can feed himself despite not being able to sit up, and it’s not until after he’s dropped three entire bites of salmon on the floor that Teba insists upon helping him. He apologizes profusely, but Teba waves it off. He’d done the same for Harth last week. Link goes back to sleep not long after eating, leaving Teba alone with his thoughts again. He watches for a few minutes, wondering at the strange sense of protectiveness he feels toward this strange Hylian he met only yesterday.

He doesn’t think Link is lying. Even to him, it’s clear as day that he believes every word he’s saying. Which means that either he actually did wake up in a strange shrine on the Great Plateau with his memory gone, or he’s horrifically delusional. Teba knows which one of those answers he prefers.

Then there was the strange tablet— a Sheikah Slate, he’d called it. On his hip, it appeared to be a plain stone slab, elaborately carved and painted but otherwise ordinary. Teba knew, though, that on the side facing inward it was not stone, but a strange, smooth surface that started off dark and lit up when touched. He hadn’t gotten a good look at it, but Link had mentioned that it let him fast-travel to any of the shrines he’d visited before.

At first, Teba had shrugged it off as some fancy adventurer’s technology, but now that he thought about it, it was...strange. He’d only ever seen two shrines, the one just outside the village and the one near the Flight Range, and they had both essentially just been elaborately carved hunks of rock for as long as he or anyone else could remember. They’d both flared up with mysterious orange light about a month ago, the same day that mysterious tower had risen in the east and Vah Medoh had appeared, circling ominously close to the village. Maybe he should ask Link what he knows about them...

He sighs and turns away, moving back to his cot and collapsing backwards, suddenly aware that he’s tired as well. He should get some more rest, hopefully be able to leave the infirmary by tomorrow and get back to training within the week. He’s not 100% convinced that Vah Medoh won’t start causing problems again, and if it does, he needs to be ready for it, with or without Link’s help.

It’s difficult to fall asleep— he’s not used to sleeping in the same room as other people, it feels weirdly invasive— but after a while of turning the same thoughts over and over in his head until they dissolve into mush, he manages.

He wakes up to dark skies and Saki holding a platter of meat skewers and three elixirs. She hands Teba and Link one each of the former and puts the platter down between them, before moving over to the hammock and carefully pouring the third into the unconscious Rito’s mouth. She briefly examines Teba’s leg as he eats and tells him that he should stay in the infirmary overnight. He nods.

“Thank you for everything,” Link signs as she re-bandages his wound. She nods in acknowledgment.

“Thank you for helping Teba,” she responds, “and our village. We are all very grateful.”

Link flushes, and Teba tries not to think about how cute it is.

He can sit up now, albeit with a bit of a pained expression. It fades as he eats, but he still collapses back into his pillow as soon as he’s done. “You guys have good food,” he signs, and Teba chuckles.

“Amali is a good cook.”

“How’s your leg?”

“Healing well.” He frowns. “You’re in much worse shape than I am, you shouldn’t worry about me.”

Link just shrugs.

“Well, I do,”

he responds, and Teba has nothing to say to that.

___

Fuckin uhhhh yeah

Keep your eyes peeled for the rest of this in like, three months or something IDK

#breath of the wild #teba #revali #link #revali x link #revalink #teba x link #tebalink #teba x revali #tevali #teba x link x revali #tevalink #yes i just made up three ship names don't @ me #my writing #i'm writing these tags like 1000 words in #and oh my god this is going to be so much longer #and have so much more dialogue #than i was planning #edit: i was right

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fu-yao · 3 years

Photo

tagged by @leonzhng thanks for making me dig through my most embarrassing crushes 😭✋

i’ll tag @highwarlockkareena @yibobibo @lan-xichens @purplexedhuman @aheartfullofjolllly @lanzhansmiles @nyx4 i feel like i tag you guys in everything i am so sorry please ignore this if u don’t wanna do it !!

putting this under a read more for reasons

MEN 2010 – 2016

literally nothing more embarrassing than falling on the same type of white man over and over again (with the exception of minho from shinee bless his heart)

tommy joe ratliff → he was the bass player for adam lambert during his glamnation era (think of songs like for your entertainment and if i had you) idk why exactly i liked him so much but i just did.... however i searched him up again quite recently and found out he’s one of those republicans that says the dumbest shit on twitter so Big Yikes

harry styles → “baby you light up my world like nobody else, the way that you flip your hair gets me overwhelmed, and when you smile at the ground it ain’t hard to tell...” and BOOM 13-year-old me was sold for well over two years

louis tomlinson → basically i liked harry most until around 2013 when for some reason i started to like him a little less, and i got more focused on louis tomlinson, and although i didn’t like one direction anymore louis tomlinson always had a special place in my heart

ashton irwin → so ashton is 5sos’ drummer, i discovered 5sos through one direction & i stanned them until late 2014

harries twins → the harries twins (jack & finn) are basically the reason i started spending a lot of time on youtube, they were funny and pretty and they just had good videos in general, so for almost two years i’d watch their content regularly

choi minho → my first steps into kpop happened bc i was watching videos on youtube (most probably the harries twins) and suddenly i saw the sherlock mv in my recommended videos so i clicked on it and then 14-year-old me proceeded to fall for minho like an idiot

brooks twins → still youtubers, the brooks twins were 3/5 of the janoskians (jai & luke brooks, beau brooks, daniel sahyounie, & james yammouni), an australian youtube comedy group that was active from 2011-2018 though i was only around from 2012-2014 (when jai brooks was dating ariana grande)

jc caylen → surprise! another youtuber! jc caylen was part of o2l (our2ndlife) a youtube collaboration channel on which each of the 6 members posted videos on a certain day in the week (mondays with connor, tuesdays with ricky, wednesdays with sam, thursdays with jc, fridays with trevi (my 2nd favorite member bc she participated on the x factor), saturdays with ricardo, and then they had surprise sundays every week) and i remember how much joy jc & the others always brought me with their silly videos

misha collins → up next, you might know him as the gay angel that was sent to superhell after confessing his love to the homophobic hunter on supernatural, it’s misha collins! basically misha was a huge source of comfort for me, and i even went around calling myself emmisha for almost two full years (cringe)

henrik holm → he played even bech naesheim in skam and my crush on him reached that level of ridiculousness where i actually tried my hand at learning norwegian (i can only remember how to introduce myself and some curse words i would make a great first impression on him)

MEN 2016 – 2021

min yoongi → okay so my baby steps into kpop happened through shinee’s sherlock, but i only got really invested when yoongi dropped agust d 1 because Holy Fuck y’know??

kim namjoon → oh man i remember thinking namjoon was cute and a very good leader and then BAM he dressed like THAT at the 2016 mma’s and i fell in love. hard

park seojoon → i started liking park seojoon whilst i was watching hwarang (you guessed it, i watched it bc of taehyung), although he wasn’t my favorite character by far, but he was very silly off camera & i liked that (i’m not that into him anymore tho </3)

kim seokjin → OH BOY LET ME TELL U i liked seokjin from the very beginning (i got to know bts in late 2014) and i always liked seeing him perform and be himself and god once i realized i had a crush on him it just hit me like a mf truck, and he’s still one of my favorite people to this day

jung hoseok → god fake love era hoseok really hits different.... also yes i know i have all of bts’ hyung line on my list BUT bts was a really big part of my life for almost 6 years soooo honestly they deserve it i still think they’re great guys

choi san → when ateez made their debut in 2018 i immediately fell in love with san, he was such an amazing dancer and he captivated me right from the very beginning, to this day he’s still my bias in ateez uwu

xiao zhan → AND THEN, OCTOBER OF 2019 HAPPENS AND I WATCH CQL AND... i fall in love with xiao zhan, something i’d never expected would happen bc when i watched cql for the first time i wasn’t as invested in the story, but i really really really liked xiao zhan and one thing led to another and now here i am as a xfx

wang yibo → the thing is, i’ve known yibo since eoeo except i didn’t know cql yibo was uniq yibo (bc i’d forgotten his name) and when i looked it up i can tell you my jaw dropped to the floor bc holy shit????? also he is very silly and i love him loads ok

lee minho → ah, the man who has been my skz bias since 2018, not only is minho my bias i also kin him (there’s a lot of aspects of myself that i see in minho and vice versa) and he’s very comforting to me

bang chan → honestly, it was only a matter of time before i’d fall for bang chan, i knew the moment i got into skz again that i’d start biasing him and, well, here i am, double biasing chan & minho

WOMEN

this list is shorter bc i’ve in general always had less crushes on women than on men??? blame society forcing me into thinking i was straight for a LONG time

ariana grande → remember the 2011 layout of twitter?? where u could not only have an icon and a header, but also a background and ur twitter page was smack in the center of ur screen with the big ugly menu bar at the top??? yeah ariana grande was always my background for my l*rr* st*l*n*s*n layouts

perrie edwards → this was right around the time she was dating zayn & little mix was breaking out into the spotlight, yeah i just really loved her

andrea russett → okay so remember o2l?? andrea russett was kian’s girlfriend for a pretty long time and they always did videos together and i always thought she was super pretty

lily collins → maybe i don’t like clary in tmi all that much but i sure liked the way lily collins looked

alona tal → MY BISEXUAL AWAKENING, it’s only when i saw alona tal in spn that i realized, fuck i might be gay

park jihyo → i discovered twice (my 2nd jype group after day6) through the like ooh-ahh mv and red-haired jihyo really did something to my heart (i just rewatched it and god zombie bang chan is so mf cute)

kim jisoo → when bp made their square two comeback i was immediately smitten for red-haired jisoo in playing with fire, it’s also when i realized she was my bias out of the four members

shin ryujin → the reason that i have blue hair is partially bc of ryujin and her amazing intro in wannabe :D

xuan lu → her portrayal of jiang yanli was SO ON POINT and she’s just such a kindhearted wonderful person wow i want her hand in marriage

lee yoobin → god i’ve known dreamcatcher from back when they were still called minx and ever since i’ve always looked at dami that bit more than the rest, i was also able to see dreamcatcher live in october of 2019 and the whole experience was just so amazing !!

FICTIONAL CHARACTERS

there’s a whole lot more than just these 10 but i wanted to fit the evolution into one (1) slide as best as i could lmao

peter pan → this movie came out in 2003 (?) and he’s honestly the first fictional character i remember ever having a crush on

legolas → i was really doubting between placing haldir or legolas here but i only really got a vague haldir obsession when i was like 14

zuko → LOOK. ZUKO IN ATLA? HOT. ZUKO IN LOK? HOT EVEN IF HE’S AN OLD MAN.

will turner → man was annoying sometimes but i really liked him and his relationship with elizabeth was cute

jo harvelle → gosh i can’t believe she’s the only female character in here???? yeah she was one of my two spn faves and i’ll never forgive the screenwriters for the way they killed her off

castiel → does your fave ever get sent to super hell for being gay? no? well. mine did

kili → fili and kili’s storyline tore my heart out, spit on it, and then laughed straight in my face, KILI WAS LITERALLY MY FAVORITE DWARF

howl → i only watched this movie for the first time in 2020 so i kinda fucked up the tl cause i watched cql in 2019 but shh, anyways howl with his blonde hair was good looking but howl with his black hair just hits differently. i want a howl

lan jingyi → MY BABY BOY, TINIE LITTLE BABIE WHOMST I MUST PROTECT ok no but seriously this kid. i love him a lot

mu qing → BARK BARK. that’s all (that’s not all i love him a whole lot and it hurts me to see so many people misunderstand his character and only see the bad parts of him when they can forgive others for fucking up (eg. xie lian himself & feng xin) but bc mu qing doesn’t deal well with emotions suddenly he’s the bad guy??? i s2g if ppl are gonna do to him what they did to jiang cheng in the tgcf la i will RIOT)

#thanks for the tag hanyi my hands hurt now </3 #tag game

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lizabethehampton · 3 years

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so i’m writing a book

and i saw a writing tip where you write a scene from each characters point of view to get to know them a bit better. i think it’s kind of cringe but my friends like it so here’s a scene i wrote for my favorite side character sibling duo :)

“Carissa, darling, you need to calm down.”

I was simply minding my own business, I was. Tanwen was hungry, and despite my orders to her handlers, they refused to feed her more. Something about typical dragon diets, etc etc. I argued with them about how Tanwen isn’t a typical dragon- not the sort from the northern mountains beyond Collis that they’re used to dealing with -and that she needs more to eat. But, of course, dragon handlers are stubborn fools, so here I was, sneaking into the kitchen to steal some raw meat for my mare.

It wasn’t my fault I heard Prince Devlin calling after my sister, piquing my interest. And when I saw her storm down the hall past the kitchen doors, the boyishly handsome Devlin Ryoko struggling to keep up, I just had to know what the fuss was about.

Conveniently, a lovely looking servant girl happened to walk by, so I flashed her a charming smile and said, “Sorry to interrupt your day, but do you mind doing me a favor?”

“Anything, Your Highness.” She curtsied.

I handed her the brown sack of meat I’d stolen. “Walk around, and to the first pair of guards you see I’d like you to give them this sack. Tell them it’s for Tanwen. They’ll know what to do with it. Thanks!”

I winked at her before whirling around and dashing after my sister and her prince, not giving the girl a chance to respond.

I found the two stalking down the shadowy corridor that led to the training hall where the guards usually honed their skills to the point of lethality. No surprise that Carissa would run here when she was upset. I knew of her late night adventures throwing knives at various targets once all the guards had returned to their posts or beds. I also knew that she hit the bullseye every time.

I stayed a well enough distance from them to go unnoticed but still within earshot.

“If you tell me to calm down one more time, Devlin,” Carissa snarled. “I’ll cut out your tongue and make sure you never tell anyone anything ever again.”

Devlin paused for a moment as if her threat had actually frightened him. Then he chuckled with amusement, continuing after her. “Very cute, Carissa. But you need to relax. It wasn’t that serious, and it’s not like they said anything wrong. I’m not even sure why you’re upset.”

My sister whirled on him. “Not like they said anything wrong? Not like they said anything wrong? They disrespected the servants, they disrespected me, and they disrespected females in general.”

“You’re being dramatic, Carissa. You need to stop this or rumors will start going around.”

She let out a harsh, breathy laugh. A sound I knew was dangerous from years of growing up with her.

“You’re just like them.” Carissa scowled.

“Oh, really. And what are they like?”

“Entitled, incompetent, selfish, sexist, and downright embarrassing to be associated with!”

I had to stifle my laugh to avoid being detected but I couldn’t stop the wolfish grin. That’s my sister.

“How dare you! I’m going to be your husband, and you dare talk to me that way!”

“I’ll talk to you however I like. Let me remind you, Prince Devlin Ryoko, that until we are married- which is a long way off -I outrank you. Therefore, I can do what I will. In fact, I could kill you and say it was self defense after you attacked me with that foolish cane you carry around and everyone would believe me because I’m just weak, young, darling little Princess Carissa who couldn’t hurt a fly.”

Her intense glare was in conflict with her sickly sweet sarcastic tone. If Devlin was smart, he would walk away and leave her be until she cooled down. But he wasn’t, and instead he laughed. He laughed at her.

Carissa shook her head in annoyance, turning once again and taking the last few steps to the training room doors. She pushed through them and stalked inside. Devlin, struggling to compose himself after his fit of laughter, followed her.

So I trailed after them, not bothering to hide. Stealth was now the least of my concerns. Especially now that I was debating whether to high-five my little sister or pummel Devlin. Possibly both. Nodding to guards I recognized as friends, my feet carried me into a brisk walk to keep up with Devlin and Carissa.

I heard the prince say, “Carissa, where are you going? This is no place for a lady.”

“In that case, good thing I'm a princess and not a lady.” Carissa said dryly.

She came to a stop at the small shooting range in the far corner of the training room. I finally made my presence known.

“Young Prince Devlin, surprised to find you here.” I clapped a hand on his shoulder a bit more harshly than one usually would, smirking once I saw him grimace. “And Carissa, my baby sister. Found a new target to practice on, have you?”

She grinned wickedly at me as she picked up one of the firearms off the wall next to me. “Yes, brother. Darling Dev here was happy to volunteer.”

“What?” A nervous chortle escaped the boy’s lips.

I chuckled, winking at Carissa. “Have fun. Don’t spill too much of his blood, please. It’ll be such a hassle to explain to King Laden why his son is rather...discolored.”

Devlin let out an uncomfortable sound from deep in his throat.

With one last grin, I turned away and moved toward the staircase that led up to the balcony area. It wrapped around the whole training room so that any interested in watching the guards train could at their will. Usually, it was filled with various ladies who were visiting the palace for whatever ball or luncheon was occurring that week; ladies who wanted to get a good view of the more handsome guards during their free time. Now, though, it was relatively empty.

The captain, a close friend of mine, was already there, overseeing the training of the newer guards. Arrow Tatsuya, a good looking man appearing to be no older than a mortal 30 year old. He was good at his job, protecting the royal family of Koilada with his life. He had fought many battles with my uncle and my father centuries before I was even born. I respected him. He looked after me and Carissa, too, so we were never really rid of him. He was always around every corner, never far from us.

“Arrow,” I nodded at him and leaned against the railing. His greeting was hardly more than a grunt, but he was never one to be particularly friendly.

Upon noticing Carissa at the shooting range, Arrow turned his attention from his men to the princess. We watched Devlin try to tell Carissa to put the gun down, that she was going to hurt herself, or worse, someone else. His words, not mine.

We watched Carissa roll her eyes and load the pistol, then, without warning, pull the trigger 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, times. She refilled and fired again. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. The resounding booms echoed through the training room and silenced everything.

Everyone turned to watch as the princess lowered her arm, then turned to the prince next to her.

“The next time you decide to piss me off,” Carissa said with deadly calm. “Think about this moment.”

Then she dropped the gun into the case on the floor and sauntered out of the training hall. This time, Devlin was smart enough not to follow.

The silence was broken by the sound of dozens of feet shuffling over to the shooting range. Someone brought forward the target Carissa had fired at and the crowd erupted into murmurs and gasps and whispers.

Every shot, straight through the bullseye. Not one an inch away from the center.

It seemed my little sister stayed true to the guards’ reports of her late night adventures. It also seemed that the world was in for a rude awakening. Turns out their weak, young, darling little Princess Carissa wasn’t weak or darling or little at all.

I let myself fade into the shadows, let their misty, cool essence carry me downstairs. And in a flourish of black smoke, I appeared before the crowd, a smoking bullet in hand. Warm to the touch, it was one of the bullets that had embedded itself into the steel wall behind the targets after Carissa had pulled the trigger.

Tossing it up into the air and catching it again, I grinned at the crowd. “Gentlemen. I think you’ll find my sister is a lot more than she seems.”

And then I stepped forward, the crowd parting for me.

Just before I exited the doors, I turned around to look up at the balcony area where Arrow still stood. There, on his face, was a rare smile. I smiled back, saluted him, and walked out the doors. They didn’t close behind me fast enough for me to miss the, “Stop gawking and get back to work!” the captain shouted at his men.

I chuckled, walking the halls and stuffing the warm bullet in my pocket.

When I turned the corner out of the corridor, Carissa was standing there waiting for me.

“I can hardly believe I did that.” She said, pushing up off the wall.

I smiled, swinging my arm around her shoulders and pulling her close. “I can.”

My sister laughed and together we walked to the aerie where we found two terrified guards struggling to get close enough to Tanwen to feed her meat from a brown sack.

so yeah um...that’s it lol. thanks for reading!! let me know if you liked it <3

#teenwriter #fantasy #oc #wip #writer #writing #mywriting #character building #princess #prince #brotherandsister #siblings #siblingduo #my characters #writing a novel

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depressedtransguy · 3 years

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don't read this unless you're @thedragonemperess or I will come to your house and shave your teeth with a razor

@angelwiththeblue-box you can also read

10/07/21

Stephen took me to the carnival for our two year anniversary yesterday night. It was... phenomenal. Normally I don't like going out so publicly on our dates, especially in something as popular as a carnival, but it might be my favorite date of ours so far. He picked me up in his dad's Lamborghini at around 7:30, just as the sun was beginning to sink below the tree line of this stupid little town, and kissed me up against the car as soon as he got his hands on me. The start of his beard pricked me lightly as we did. Then he squeezed my hand lightly and told me he had a surprise that he hoped I liked. I told him if it was from him then I'd adore it. We shared another kiss through giggles before we slipped into the car and began to drive off. Our hands were intertwined on the center console the whole time. He always told me that it was hard to keep his hands off me with me in range and my consent. God... I love him more than anything. But, anyway, the carnival. As we neared, his thumb slid over mine and he told me to close my eyes, which I properly did. He's the only one I trust enough to do that with. I could tell he was excited and a little anxious just from the way he kept squeezing my fingers. It was adorable. Even cuter when we stopped and he temporarily let go as we stopped, only to move to my side of the car and slowly lead me out onto the gravel of the parking lot, practically buzzing with anticipation. I didn't even care what it was at that point, whatever made Stephen this thrilled to show him had to be good. Then he told me to open my eyes. And Jesus Christ I think I audibly gasped. I didn't know what I was really expecting, but when the bright lights spread all throughout the fairgrounds, exploding the navy sky with color, I could swear I was in another realm. As Stephen asked me if I liked it, I noticed his eyes were nervous, so with sparkling eyes I pulled him close and told him I loved it. The smile on his face was worth everything and more. He actually told me the same thing about mine. That was before he took my hand once more and led me past the ticket taker, pulling them out of his jeans and handing them off, us receiving a smile from her as we continued walking out onto the grass. "I know it's not traditional, but when I passed this place the other day I suddenly wanted to take you here," is what he said. "We can leave any time you want." "As long as you're here, I don't care where the date is," is what I said back. And boy was I right. It didn't matter that there were a ton of other people there, they all faded into nothing but background characters as Stephen miraculously won the balloon pop game and happily gifted me a little goat stuffed animal, one that I held close to my heart as I beamed at him. As I pressed my body close to him on the roller coaster, my fingers digging tightly into his bicep, and he held me steady as I stumbled onto the platform post ride. As the ferris wheel stuttered to a stop as we sat at the top, Stephen's hand on my thigh and my hand on his shoulder, and we kissed there, surrounded by nothing but the lights and the infinite abyss of stars. Once the night was over we had slow, sappy sex in his car, too filled with adoration and the need of skin against skin for us to drive back to one of our houses. I lazily drew shapes in the mist on the windows as I was brought back to my place, my mind filled with a soft bliss, and my body feeling like I had been washed over. I had never felt more at peace. And I still did, even as we had our long goodbye kiss and I went to sleep alone, the goat pressed against my chest. I was at peace. So how the hell did I end up here?

A tear slipped off of Loki's cheek and splattered onto his messy handwriting, bleeding the words together and making the many sections of his diary incomprehensible. It made him want to cry harder. That night could very well be all he and Stephen had together, and he was destroying the only stable record of it. Loki tilted back his head and squeezed his fists as tightly as possible.

On 10/07/21, at approximately 11:27, while driving from Loki's house to his, a speeding car struck Stephen's from behind and sent him spinning out of control off a cliff and forcing him to end up upside down near the river below. The person who caused the accident is yet to be found. And Stephen had been in surgery for 17 hours by the time Loki arrived at the hospital after school, right after he had gotten the news. He was still unconscious by then and practically looked like he had been forced through a meat grinder. Loki couldn't even glance up at him anymore, it made his heart twist into knots and make him want to throw up and sob. Not because he looked disgusting, although he certainly didn't look great, it was solely because of how his state reminded him of how hurt his boyfriend was. Loki couldn't imagine how much pain he was in. The cuts and scrapes on his face, the bruises on his arms, and the absolute wreck that his hands appeared to be, it all made him want to tear the skin off his bones. It hurt so much.

With a loud curse Loki snapped his notebook shut and pressed his face into it, doing his best to clear his mind instead of thinking all that he and Stephen had had together. The late nights of 'studying', the private dates, the stolen kisses at school... it had all slipped through their fingers because of one fucking idiot on the road.

Maybe it was his fault. Maybe, despite it being a school night, Loki should have insisted on Stephen staying the night with him. None of this would have happened if he had done that. Of course it's my fault.

Although they were trembling badly and the fact that he was still on the verge of tears, Loki slowly opened his fists to check up on the mess of blood that was beginning to pool up under the curve of his claws, smeared across his pale skin and nails. As he heard the door open, Loki closed them tightly once again with only a tiny hiss of pain. It was the doctor.

"Please tell me he's going to be okay," Loki whispered after a few seconds of nothing but tentious silence between him and the doctor, the concerned expression that she had exhibited when she entered and noticed him already making his stomach churn. "I don't care if it's not the truth, please just tell me he's going to be okay."

She-Dr. Palmer, as it read on her name tag-sighed gently and walked over to the young man, placing a hand on his shoulder as she sat down next to him. He didn't consider that a good sign. "I'm not going to lie to you hon. But let me ask first. How are you connected to Stephen?"

"He's-*hic*-he's my boyfriend."

"Alright honey. I'll give you the bad news first. His hands have suffered an extreme amount of nerve damage to his hands, and the surgeries so far have done nothing to correct them. It's looking like his hands are irrefutably damaged. He's never going to be able to use them normally again. But that's only if he comes out of the coma, which he only has a 50% chance of," Dr. Palmer explained as gently as was possible as it was to tell a teenager how badly his partner was injured.

It was like Loki's already broken heart shattered. The previous night could very well have been their last time together. And sure, it was perfect, but was he satisfied with never being with Stephen again? "What?" Loki choked out.

"I am so sorry. I truly am, but there is some good news. The probability of his awakening has only been getting higher, so that 50% chance of him not coming out of the coma could very easily become zero percent in no time. And you can help with that too."

For the first time since the school day did Loki look hopeful. "I can? How?"

"Talk to him. Despite his state, he can hear you in there. Talk about your time together, the past- I know it might hurt you, and please don't push yourself out of your comfort zone, but do what you can. Okay?"

With a bit of hesitation Loki slowly nodded, once again removing his nails from his palms. "Okay. I can do that," he told her.

Dr. Palmer gave him a small smile and gently patted him on the back before she stood up again, quickly checking Stephen's vitals, and then left to most likely check on another patient. Loki then took advantage of the silence and pushed his chair over to Stephen's bedside, ignoring the blood smearing on the chair's armrests as he did so. He still stared down at his lap once he was close, fearing breaking down in tears for what seemed like the hundredth time, but he did have the courage to lift up one of his own hands and rest it on his bicep. "Hey." An immediate voice crack wasn't a great start. Not that he knew any other way to begin. Any thoughts of their past two years together made Loki want to sob, now especially since he knew that he could very possibly never make any new ones with him. But he couldn't just stay silent. He had to say something, anything to make his guilt of not making Stephen stay the night with him lessen just a little bit. And according to the doctor, talking about their happy memories together could actually help. Hopefully. But it was nonetheless better than crying his eyes out for no reason. "Remember how we started dating?" Loki paused as if he was asking for an answer. "We were sophomores. You were in my chemistry class, and I always thought you were really cute, but I was too scared to talk to you and you were too nervous to, so we passed nothing but awkward glances and sarcastic comments for months on end. Until we got paired up for a project and you asked for my number. I gave it enthusiastically of course. From there we started talking and flirting a bit, although still too anxious to actually make a move, until you grabbed me when we were in the library and pushed me up against the back wall and asked to kiss me. You can guess what my response was." He chuckled dryly. "I might be able to say that I was already in love with you when you pulled back for air and gave me that little gorgeous smirk of yours, pulled my hips to yours, and whispered 'can I do it again?'. I was putty in your hands in the Greek philosophy section."

Loki quickly fell silent at the mention of his hands. With a small swallow, he managed to continue with a low voice. "When we were science class partners, you would tell me about how much you wanted to become a doctor. A neurosurgeon to be specific. I didn't exactly know why yet, you told me that a few months into our romantic relationship, but I eagerly listened about your plans for Columbia nonetheless. Not that-" he was crying again, "-not that that'll be possible now." Loki cleared his throat and tried to wipe his tears away with his trembling hands. "Even if you wake up." The student began to gently stroke his boyfriend's bandaged bicep while still staring at his lap, watching water splash onto where the excess of his oversized hoodie was rolled up and darkened the gray fabric.

It was Stephen's hoodie.

Using his feet, Loki slowly began to push his chair back until he eventually hit the wall, bunching his hands up in the hoodie's collar and raising it up to his nose, inhaling the signature cologne that he had fallen in love with over the last two years. The hood was soon flipped over his head and his knees were brought up to his chest, curling himself into the fetal position, and then finally letting all his tears out into the secure housing of Stephen's smell. That's where he had always been safe, and no matter either of their states, it still worked. Loki actually fell asleep like that after half an hour or so.

Stephen's parents found him in the morning and called Loki's family, and Thor ended up carrying him back home.

But as soon as he woke up he went back to the hospital. He wasn't missing the possibility of Stephen waking up.

10/31/21

I've still been going to school. Because my parents want me to. But I'm not doing well. My grades are beginning to sink from it, and the teachers don't care. I can't focus in class, I'm just thinking about if Stephen's going to wake up or not. What if he's waking up alone while I'm in Calculus? What if he flatlines when I'm in history? There's just too many probabilities. I don't give a shit about my grades, I just want Stephen back. I know that's such a stupid little kid thing to say since we are high schoolers, but it's been two years! And he's shown me so much love and care in that time that I don't know what I'd do without him. Not that anyone else seems to care. This is why I want Stephen back, he's the only friend I have left. In real life friend I mean. And I don't say that like I'm attached to his hip all the time, we have our own private time that I respect, but they all moved away. Why am I defending myself to a notebook? God this hospital is making me crazy. Stephen looks better, which I'm really glad about. Dr. Palmer tells me I've helped a lot by staying and talking to him, he should most likely wake up soon, but she did tell me that I can go home soon instead of only leaving for school and for showering. But I'm not doing that. At least not until he wakes up. If- WHEN he wakes up, I bet I'll get a lecture for not taking care of myself well enough just for him, so I'll probably be forced to go home more. God, I want him to lecture me. Just to hear his voice again. It's been over three weeks. I don't think I've worn anything besides underwear that isn't his. Jeans, sweatpants, shirts, hoodies, everything. It's the least I can do to replace the feeling of him being with me. At this time, I can't help but think of our Halloween's together. The first one we weren't even a month into dating, so we just bought a bunch of candy and ate candy at home while watching horror movies. But the next year, after a full 12 months of being in love, we dressed up as Gomez and Morticia Addams. Stephen looked unfairly hot in that striped suit with his hair slicked back and a teasing smile on his face. That was some good sex we had later on. Stephen said he had a thing for the dress I had on, as well as the red lipstick, which I believe since his hands barely left my hips the entire time I had it on. He also grinned from ear to ear when he saw the lipstick kiss marks I put on his collar. I love him. God I do. Please... I need him back.

Loki closed the notebook after his last few words of desperation and slipped his pencil behind his ear, raising his head up to look at Stephen with glassy eyes. He looked peaceful. By then all his scrapes and cuts were mostly healed, which made him look way better, but his hands were still pinned up in suspended holds with ragged scars lining his rough skin. More surgeries had been done on them, and Dr. Palmer once again said that he would be permanently disabled when he woke. Once again it hurt Loki's heart to think about how much pain that he must be in. The swollen scars didn't look like they felt nice. "I'm so sorry," Loki whispered as he reached up to his face and gently brushed his overgrown hair out of his face, still feeling guilty about the incident. "If I just made you stay you would still be here with me." Moving around the bed's guard rail, Loki sat on the edge of the mattress and sunk his fingers into his thick hair once more, gently toying with it as he began to talk again. "Remember junior prom? It was on February 26th; on the same night as the public prom that the school had put together. (We wanted to be alone.) You put on this navy blue suit of yours that perfectly brings out your eyes, and I bought this short green dress that made you grab my ass as soon as I came out of the house. You gave me an Agapanthus corsage that you had made yourself. And then, you kissed me, and told me that the flower meant 'never-fading love'. Like ours." A tear fell down Loki's cheek and plopped down onto Stephen's bare bicep. "I don't exactly know where me telling this story was going, my mind is a bit fuzzy and has been for weeks, hospitals being bad places to sleep plus depression isn't really an equation for good sleep, so I'll just say this. I'm not going anywhere until you return. And when you do, I'm not leaving either. Your recovery, physical therapy, going back to school, I'm going to be by your side. Okay?" Loki gently kissed Stephen's forehead and continued to stroke his hair, his other hand resting on the crook of his elbow and gently stroking his skin as if he was soothing him. "So please wake up."

With one last small peck Loki reluctantly slipped off the bed to enter the hospital bathroom, quickly using the bathroom before rubbing the sink water on his face as if that would wake him up from the haze that he had been living in, just moving from the hospital to school to the hospital to school and so on so forth. It was just a cycle of being depressed and near and being depressed and far. Fun.

Just deciding to repress his emotions for the billionth time that month, Loki shoves it down and goes back out into the main room, taking a book of Hamlet out of his bag to pass the time before he uncomfortably fell asleep in the chair. Most likely in just an hour or two since it was almost midnight. Every time he knocked unconscious in the overly small hospital chair with no support whatsoever, in front of the bed that Stephen laid in, Loki missed their cuddling more and more. Stephen's arms around him and his nose buried in the back of his neck was always the highlight of Loki's day/night. And it had been weeks since he was actually held. And by god did he need it.

But these thoughts quickly made him feel selfish. The thought that he was whining about not being held or not having his boyfriend confirmed as okay while Stephen had been struck disabled and in a coma sickened him to his core. More and more guilt stacked on top of his chest until he felt like he couldn't breathe, forced to snap his book shut and slam it on the floor. Why did everything have to hurt so much even though he didn't have a scar on him to show as evidence of his pain? It just made him feel so fake.

Loki sunk down into his seat and covered his once again teary eyes with his palms, bouncing his leg against the floor and digging his nails into his bare forehead, letting everything crash over him like a third wave tsunami. Not as extreme as the first, but it just made the present damage worse. Stop it. Stop it. STOP it. STOP IT. Loki was three seconds away from screaming out all the pain in his heart. But then he heard a groan that didn't belong to him echo in the otherwise empty room.

His palms flew to his thighs and he looked up at Stephen.

And his eyes were open!

With a gasp Loki jumped up from his chair and cupped his boyfriend's face, trying not to get too close to shock him, but just needing to hold him and let him see him. "Stephen, you're up!"

"Dewdrop... what happened?"

The student wanted to cry. He could speak. His voice was a bit strained, clearly tired and weary from lack of use, but it was there and that was all that counted. But besides that, the question couldn't be ignored. "You were in a crash baby, right after you left my house. Someone tail-boned you and you skidded off a cliff. Darling... it's Halloween."

"What?!"

Maybe he could have put it better. But Loki didn't really know how to explain it in any other way. "It's okay, darling, it's okay. Please, just focus on me for a second. Could you do that? Not the pain, not the fact that it's three and a half weeks later than you can remember, please look at my eyes and focus on me," he instructed as best he could, gently stroking his cheekbones with his thumbs and praying that he didn't glance down at his hands that he most likely could barely feel. He wanted to break that to him gently.

"I can do that."

"Alright, good. So yes, you were in a car crash and have been in a coma for about 25 days. Most of your scrapes, cuts, and bruises, have thankfully been healed. But your hands... they were crushed on impact.

#i hope you like it #to delete later #i am totally not hella nervous #lower your expections #now #do it

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skvaderarts · 3 years

Text

Hiraeth Chapter 54: Domestic

Masterlist can be found Here!

Chapter Fifty-Four: Domestic

Note: The reception the last chapter received warmed my heart. I seriously loved reading your comments! They were so wholesome! V needed a friend, damn it! I was worried that taking a chapter for something that slow would kill the pacing, but you all seemed to enjoy it. So thank you! Coming up next, like two solid chapters of unpleasant revelations and plan making. Boy oh boy, is this a blast to read. I can’t wait to see the horror on your faces in the next chapter. Well, not literally, but you get the idea lol XD

(-~-)

Sun pierced the thin shear shroud that hung over the window like a bridal veil, blanketing the room in semi-darkness. What little light shone through was just enough to disturb the occupant of the room who turned to the side in an attempt to avoid the blinding light that he suddenly found in his eyes. Even with them closed, his eyes still didn’t find pleasure in the presence of the outside light. It seemed that being part devil was enough to make one a bit photosensitive. But considering that devils were creatures of darkness, that made perfect sense.

He couldn’t remember the last time that he had slept so well, turning his head to the left to discover that the love of his life was indeed still in the bed with him. Her arms were wrapped around his waist, head buried in his chest and shoulders. It was honestly difficult to see anything more than the top of her head from under the covers, her satire compared to his placing her much lower in the bed than himself. It would never stop being funny to him that she was so put together when she was awake but was so entirely capable of decimating a bed cover when she was asleep. Quite the juxtaposition if you asked him.

It was early in the morning still, so that made sense. She had no reason to be up yet, and she more than deserved her rest. The children wouldn’t awaken until the smell of breakfast made its way up to their room. And if he remembered correctly, it was Saturday. Crepe day. Perhaps he could just lay here and pretend to be asleep until it was time to devour them?

But it was not to be so. A moment later she turned over, releasing her and popping her head out from under the bed covers like a turtle’s head exiting its shell. He resisted the urge to giggle like a schoolchild at the sight, instead turning over onto his back as he raised his right arm over his face in a bid to block the morning light. They genuinely needed some blackout curtains. The sun was just awful this time of year.

“Goodmorning, Nero. Are the boys awake yet?” She yawned deeply as she stretched her arms over her head, her face down in the pile of about eight pillows that she had insisted upon buying and knitting little pillow covers for. He could barely understand her due to how muffled her voice was, but he’d caught the gist of it easily enough. It seemed that despite the fact that she was speaking, she wasn’t quite awake yet. He’d yet to see a single eyelid open.

Mornin’, Kyrie. Hope you slept half as good as I did.” Nero slid up into a sitting position, stretching his arms over his head, stretching. He’d arrived late last night, just before the boys had been sent off to bed. And just in time to let them taste the leftover pasta he’d brought from his older brother’s house for them to try. “No, they’re still asleep. Haven’t heard anything yet. Probably because it’s still so early.”

“Oh. I hadn’t noticed.” She turned in the general direction of the window, her eyes still mostly shut. She seemed to be making an effort to squint, though. “What time is it?”

Nero looked over at the clock on the bedside table. He still didn’t understand why it was on his side of the bed. Kyrie was the only thing he wanted to wake up to. (Oh my god I’m soo cheesy please help.) “It’s a little past 6 am.”

Bolting upright, Kyrie’s eyes were suddenly very open indeed, the young woman clearly startled by her partner’s answer. That had not been the answer that she had been hoping to receive. “Oh no oh no oh no… I’m so sorry! I’ll go make breakfast right away!”

In her haste to get out of the bed, she became tangled in the blankets, tumbling forward. Nero quickly migrated towards the edge of the bed, confused and probably unreasonably worried considering the fact that they were on a floor covered in a plush rug. “Kyrie are you ok-”

“Whoops. Silly me. I guess I’ll have to make up the bed before I get started.” She giggled uncomfortably, squelching her head down between her shoulders as she smiled in obvious embarrassment, he cheeks turning a bright pink that only served to highlight her pretty freckles. “I’m alright. Not to worry.”

The youngest descendant of the dark Knight Sparda let out a sigh of relief, sliding over the side of the bed to help her up. There had been little potential for actual harm to come to her, but he was still glad that she hadn’t hit her head on the wardrobe or something. The last thing he wanted was to see Kyrie come to any sort of harm.

“Forget about the bed. I can take care of that. Are you sure you’re okay?” He stood up and grasped both of her hands in his own, pulling her carefully to her feet. Kyrie had a habit of being slightly clumsy when she was in a hurry, something that this little scare had definitely made obvious. He was just glad that she seemed to be just fine. It was far from the worst thing he’d ever seen happen to her, much to his distaste and her misfortune. What had gotten her so flustered in the first place? “What’s going on?”

She giggled in embarrassment again, closing her eyes for a moment as she scratched the back of her head. A stray strand of bed hair snagged on her nail, coaxing a small yelp from her as she rubbed the spot in question. She then let out another small yawn, her eyes watering slightly as she rubbed the last of the sleep from them. “Nothing. I’m fine. I just don’t want to make you late, so I meant to get up about an hour ago to make breakfast. I know you said you have something important to do with your father today, and I don’t want to hold you up, but I don’t want to send you out the door hungry, either.”

Nero blinked in confusion. And then he paled. Oh no, he had totally forgotten about that! He wasn’t late just yet, but he absolutely saw her point. There were supposed to be making a plan to deal with Belial today, sometime within the next two hours! He hadn’t given it a single thought since he’d woken up. His only thoughts had been on the delicious breakfast that he was so looking forward to.

Hurrying down the stairs, kyrie ran off to prep whatever she was going to need to make breakfast before Nero left. They had just under an hour and a half before he needed to be back at V’s house, so she was going to need to hurry if he was to leave on time. And unfortunately, crepes were not one of those things that could be hurried, much like many of the dishes from the food’s country of origin. But to be fair, that was what made them so enjoyable to eat.

Quickly throwing the blankets back onto the bed and layering them into something vaguely akin to a satisfactory condition, Nero headed after her. He couldn’t really cook. Okay, he couldn’t cook at all. He’d once burned the water they had been planning to use to cook some pasta with, and Kyrie had tried her level best and somewhat failed not to burst into hysterical laughter. But that didn’t mean he couldn’t help her in some way.

As Nero made his way down the last stair and crossed the threshold into the living room, he caught sight of the clock. 6: 37 am. It was barely light out despite the bright light that had made its way in through the windows. That was the curse of their window position in relation to the shoreline. The water made sure that it was always too bright in their room. Nero realized he was probably the only person to not want a waterside view.

But as he turned to join her in the kitchen, something stopped him. Something had just occurred to him for the first time. The earliest ferry didn’t leave for at least another hour and a half. Even if he left right now there was no way that he could get back to V’s house before Noon; 10 am at the earliest if traffic allowed it. “Kyrie wait. Slow down. I’ll just call them. I can’t get there that early anyway unless he comes and gets me.”

Kyrie paused, clearly confused. And then a look of understanding crossed her face. “Oh, that’s right… the ferry.” She laughed to herself in embarrassment, dying inside as she realized that she’d sent them both into a panic over nothing. “I’m sorry, Nero I-”

She was quickly silenced by a surprise kiss from Nero, her body melting into his arms as he scooped her up into his arms, hugging her tightly. He didn’t need to say that it was alright. He knew that she understood. She always did. “Don’t worry about it, Kyrie. You meant well. Let’s just enjoy that breakfast before the kids wake up and Nico eats all the fruit that’s supposed to go in the food. Just you and me. Wadda ya say?”

Again, Kyrie giggled. Although this time, not from embarrassment. “That sounds like a wonderful idea, Nero. I would love that.”

Nero snuggled her tightly for a moment before releasing her, realizing that neither of them could do anything if they were not able to move. “And hey, and maybe I can help this time. It can’t go any worse than the last time, right?”

The young songstress paled. “T-that’s very true Nero. I’m sure you’re right about that.”

(-~-)

Dante and Vergil had arrived just a short while ago, the eldest of the two insisting upon heading over nearly an hour earlier than they needed to in a bid to make sure that they were not late. It seemed that the fact that the only one setting this deadline for them was the eldest Son of Sparda himself had been completely lost on him. Sometimes Dante wondered if Vergil actually thought about those sorts of things before committing himself to them. But regardless, V and Morgan were both already at the house, and Brenowin was with them, so it didn’t seem that it was going to matter much in the grand scheme of things. Only one person was coming from any distance away, and he knew that his youngest son understood the importance of being there.

It was around this time that Vergil realized that he was forgetting something. This clearly threw him for a loop and drove him slightly mad. Not having everything accounted for in his own plan was one of the things in this world that made Vergil question why he even got up in the morning. After all, if he couldn’t trust himself to get that sort of thing ringtone, then he was supremely doomed, wasn’t he? Or perhaps overthinking every minor detail was how he missed the bigger picture? At this point, he was in two minds over the subject, and that alone threatened to take his last shred of sanity.

After about a half-hour of staring at the clock, Vergil had, unbeknownst to himself, become obviously uncomfortable. Nero should have been there by now, should he not? And the wat that his eldest son was staring at him with a semi amused look on his face from the other side of the living room was not helping in the slightest. Had he missed something? Or more obviously, was there something on his shirt that he had missed? It was hard to tell what V was thinking without asking him directly.

“You’re staring at me,” Vergil stated plainly, fully aware of the fact that he was stating the obvious. He knew that V knew he knew that V was staring at him, so there was really no compelling reason to bring it up other than to point it out in the hope that he might stop doing so. He couldn’t really pinpoint why this bothered him as much as it did, but he couldn’t deny that he found it uncomfortable.

“Oh, I know.” V petted Shadow absentmindedly, the large panther occupying the space in front of him and silently commanding his attention. She seemed to be slightly on alert as a result of the strangers who were in the house. Flora she recognized, but Morgan and Bren were still a bit unfamiliar to her.

“Is that a particular reason for you doing so that I should be aware of?” Now Vergil was equal parts annoyed, anxious, and confused. Was he being unknowingly conspicuous again? That seemed to be something that he was good at.

“Perhaps. I’m wondering how long your error will take to occur to you” V said softly, scratching the backs of his familiar’s ears. If her rumbling purs were anything to go by, he was doing a more than satisfactory job. “It is an easy enough mistake to make. I imagine that you are still having quite a time with, well, the time. It takes time to acclimate yourself to something so different from what you have become accustomed to. I’m sure it simply didn’t occur to you.”

Vergil’s brow furrowed. “What didn’t occur to me?”

“Without contraries, there is no progression. Attraction and repulsion, reason and energy, love and hate, are necessary to human existence.” V said simply, more than slightly pleased with himself for finally having an opportunity to indulge in one of his favorite quotes. Well, at least to the capacity that someone might be able to understand and use for self-reflection. He’d been given ample opportunity to use it. “Requesting that someone remember to attend a meeting that they cannot get to and then forgetting yourself that the time you picked is the reason they cannot attend.”

Sirrus smirked from the armchair next to V, nearly spilling his tea as he held it up to his mouth. He understood that one. He didn’t comprehend all of the reasons for its significance at the moment, but the concept was not lost on him. Vergil looked over at him for a moment before returning his attention to his young son. He had forgotten something? “I do not follow.”

Tilting his head slightly to the side, V shifted his sitting position to accommodate his back resting upon the back of the couch, relinquishing his hold on shadow, much to the panther’s dismay. He never wanted to get off of this couch again. It was supremely comfortable. “Nero called a short while ago. It seems that you may have failed to take on of the obstacles in his path to arrival into account.”

Vergil sat there in silence for a moment before something subtle changed in his facial expression. He then stood up and withdrew Yamato as he headed towards a more open area of the house. Sirrus shook his head, reaching over to offer to refill Flora’s cup. She peeped up from her book but then shook her head politely to decline. Sirrus then turned his attention to V, silently nodding in the direction of the other empty cup on the tray. Vergil had allowed his own cup to cool off, but there was still tea left, and considering the fact that Dante was barely awake at the moment, he didn’t suppose that offering a cup of hot tea to him on a brand new and expensive couch would go over well. Besides, he and Lucia were reading as well. Best not to disturb them. “If I may?”

Looking over at him with half-lidded eyes that betrayed the late night that they’d spent conversating, V nodded. Perhaps that would help him stay awake.

Sirrus filled the cup and set the pot down, returning to his own drink. He took a sip before continuing. “Why not tell him when Nero called?”

He now understood what Sirrus meant. He sat up to take the cup and fix it to his liking. “I wanted to see if he would come to realize his oversight. It is not always the fault of others that simple mistakes are made. That, and Nero seemed excited about breakfast.”

“Fair enough,” Sirrus said, finishing off the cup and setting it down. He had held off to allow his younger brother more time to eat? That had been kind of him, considering the circumstances at hand. He had much to lose should they not make haste in resolving this situation. Perhaps the most to lose out of all of them on a personal spectrum aside from Morgan. And even then, from what he had come to understand. After all, his newfound knowledge was why he was here today. This wouldn’t be good.

A moment later, another voice could be heard from the kitchen. It was Nero. It seemed that the Darkslayer had stepped away to remedy the situation that he had accidentally caused, and that he had now returned with his youngest son in tow. Excellent. Now they could proceed with the reason that they had all been asked here.

“Kyrie asked me to bring you these,” Nero said as he handed V a Tupperware container filled with crepes. The whole thing had been wrapped in foil in an attempt to keep them warm and preserve their texture and flavor. V sat down his drink and headed towards the kitchen to tend to them, unwilling to wait and see what they were. From the smell alone, he had some idea what was in the container, and that excited him. And only kyrie would wrap up something that was going through a portal. She was too kind.

“She also asked me to ask you how you made that pasta. She and the kids loved it.” Nero said, gesturing towards Sirrus as he sat down next to the spot where V had just been. He would return shortly. He had some concept of the importance of what was going on. After all, it centered around him for the most part. V was a lot of things, and Nero didn’t consider “inconsiderate” to be among them.

An amused look passed over the man with the red hair’s face as he shook his head. He was wondering if that dinner had actually been good, or if everyone had eaten it just to be polite. It was good to know that there were at least a few people who liked his cooking. He wasn’t sure he’d met this Kyrie or the children in question before, but that didn’t much matter to him. He was sure he would eventually under better circumstances. And it seemed that she knew Nero, so she couldn’t be all that bad. Perhaps his significant other? Were the children his? So many fascinating questions to be answered. Such a scandal! Oh, how the little things excited him.

“It would be my pleasure. I’ll jot it down on something for you as soon as I get the chance. Or perhaps I can deliver the information to her in person?” He shrugged, waiting for V to sit down with his newfound meal. He hadn’t even made it back to the living room before he had begun to devour what seemed to be a plate of raspberry-covered crepes. He couldn’t blame him if that was the case. Cold crepes were disgusting, at least in his experience. ”But I must deliver some news to you first. I was called away late last night to attend to something troubling that is pertinent to your predicament, and I feel that you need to hear about it. It may be helpful to build our plan around.”

Vergil returned as Sirrus finished talking. “You have my attention.”

Sirrus nodded. “Good. And I shall need the attention of the rest of our house guests as well. After all, you mentioned that they are involved at dinner last night, and something tells me that from what I overheard you explain from outside of Lucia’s house that day about the attack that you both barely survived a few years back that this will not be pleasant news. And for that, I am so sorry. Settle in. This will be a long and unpleasant story. And I think that much of it shall genuinely surprise you.”

(-~-)

I wonder if any of you have made the connection between a few of the events that have occurred in the story. If not, then some of them shall be revealed in the next chapter. And I’m certain that one of them that’s coming up will genuinely surprise you all. It’s got so many messed-up layers to it that it’s probably the most DMC thing I’ve ever written on that merit alone hahaha! See you all next week for the truth and answers that I know you seek. I think devoting like two whole chapters to it was the best way to go. The flow will be much better that way. See you all in the comment section, and talk to you soon! Have a good, safe weekend!

#V #My OC #My Post Devil May Cry 5 AU #Nero #Dante #Vergil #Lucia #My Post Devil May Cry 5 AU OC's #My Post Devil May Cry V AU Fanfiction #DMC #DMC5 #DMCV #Devil May Cry 5 #Devil May Cry V #Devil May Cry #Vitale

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icharchivist · 3 years

Note

Thank you for answering the previous asks and hope you're prepared!

How much, out of ten, are you of each winter troupe member?

Have a good day :3c

ahah thank you for doing that all the way!

and oh boy i thought i was prepared but turns out-

okay notewise.:

Tsumugi: 7/10, Tasuku: 3/10, Homare: 4/10 Hisoka: 9.5/10, Azuma: 10/10, Guy: 6/10

(if you're supprised Azuma is actually my ultimate kin and it's not Hisoka: congratz i fooled all of u. the only reason i don't have an Azuma icon is that i genuinely think he looks too sexy in some arts and it doesn't feel Me despite everything else. The more u know.)

And. i need to warn that i went much more into personal details for Hisoka and Azuma under the cut to the point where it may be overwhelming. And that Azuma's entry alone is 2.1k words long. What the fuck me.

Relating to team "we have so much trauma" is going to be so much fun.

coughs, anyway take care :3c

(Links: Spring, Summer, Autumn , Winter ranking)

Winter my beloved, this is going to be a normal, non emotional ranking at all.

Tsumugi: 7/10 I relate to his lack of confidence, and the way he gave up on everything he loved when his spirit was crushed (re what I was talking about with my Kumon rant). On my down time I did study a bit of psychology and though I wouldn’t put myself at the same level as a psy student I’m often told I read people mostly in an accurate way so I can relate to that. I can use my powers for Evil like nudging people in some direction or knowing where to attack, but I am super aware of that and I’ve been extra conscious about not having it happen again for over ten years now DLKFJDLF (Azuma is kinda like that too). But yeah the fact he is like that too makes it relatable.

I also think that the whole “feeling you fucked up and took all the responsibility when a friendship broke apart” is also something very relatable. So is “ghosting your friends after that”. I relate to the fact he’s a nerd too. I relate to him more than not but I guess I just removed points because of how while I relate to specificities the whole thing doesn’t connect as much as it could?

Tasuku: 3/10 he’s probably the one I relate the least to. I honestly didn’t understand Tasuku much until Nocturnality on my first read, and it’s only then that things clicked. Legit I saw him the way Azuma saw him dLKFJDKFJDF. But I do feel it relatable that he feels responsible for failing his friend and that he took it upon himself to try to read more into how people are behaving to try to prevent it from happening again. But else he’s. genuinely not like me KDJFKLDFJDFL

Homare: 4/10 mhmm. I think I relate to the way he is passionate and how much he genuinely loves. I also relate to the fact he is pretty analytic, though the details of what makes his struggles are not something I relate to easily. I have felt broken before, I was told i was broken or unfit in some ways, so this particular pain is something I completely understand. I also did use to be an artist and a writer so I can relate to that passion of his, although as I mentioned in others ranking *shrugs*. That said he’s very much more exuberant and confident than I am and I would assume I know how to deal with people emotionally a bit more.

Hisoka: 9.5/10 oh boy where to start. This is going to be a tough one to get into without getting extremely personal. To start with, I’m a sleepy baby. I sleep a lot DLKJFDF though not much at night. I used to fall asleep in class all the time my friends had to always be on the watch out for me. I don’t have much energies. I love plushy and I love being comfortable in some places. I also really love sweets tho not as much as him. I also do care ways too much for my specific plushies and pillows (I do have huge penguins plushies too).

I, too, have memories issues, though of course to a lesser extend. I have a lot of trauma and for a lot of them I ended up getting fuzzy memories. I used to be in a pretty toxic environment where I constantly had to make use of my memory to survive, and so when my memory started failing me, I was terrified. My parents gaslight me all the time and pretends a lot of things that happened didn’t happen and that I’m crazy for believing it happened, so the moment my memory started to fail me I started to panic a lot. It terrified me to not being completely sure whenever I could trust myself or not. It made me feel extremely unreliable. It’s still something I struggle with a lot.

This would have been my answer pre-awakening moon at least. I always related to him to some degree so Awakening moon was a slap in the face in a way I wasn’t ready to deal with, and this is where I have to be uncomfortably personal.

I am the youngest sibling of 3. My eldest sister ran away from home when I was 6, never to be seen again. My other sister resented me because I used to be very close to the eldest and she was jealous about it, and while the reasons were linked to our parents, who were extremely toxic to us and kept us into this toxic environment for years on end, my sister took all her anger out on me. While we’ve discussed it as adults now, our relationships is too strained to fix it nowadays.

It took me a long while – it took me Azuma’s arc actually – to realize that the way I feel for my eldest sister is more akin to grief than to abandon. I don’t even remember her. I don’t remember her and still apparently the way I was close to her was the reason my sibling hold it against me. I couldn’t even remember *why* my sister was mad at me because I don’t even remember being close to my sister that much. All I know is that she left because the situation at home was too toxic. It was.. so messy.

I have. Much more trauma linked to that specifically but that’s the root of something that hit me in the face with Hisoka’s arc. Because I can’t remember a person that disappeared from my life, and yet it was enough for it to break and shape everything I’ve lived through since. I couldn’t even start to talk about how it still impacts me now 20 years later. I’m just now making peace with the fact this was grief. This is the gist of the reason Hisoka’s arc hit me as hard as it did (and the fact that Chikage is actively undoing all the bad things his own grief pushed him to do on Hisoka is the reason Chikage is so compelling to me. My sister could never lol.).

I felt also that I had to take all the responsibilities for what happened. I felt like I could make things easier for the family after this trauma, at the rip age of 7, and no one stopped to think maybe a child shouldn’t have to be dealing with a collective family trauma like this. But well. Here we are.

I relate to the fact Hisoka also struggles to accept everything that happened. And that now he’s trying to make things better for others people he can relate to. It’s so… complicated.

Also I can’t forget the fact Hisoka tried to kill himself and :/ as someone who has had a lot of suicidal idealization in my life this really hit a lot harder than it should have.

In general I would just say that socially I’m not really like him except with people I’m comfortable with teasing. Hisoka can be a little too rude and it’s where I can’t relate lol. But otherwise man I care him so much I feel so seen. I’m just removing 0.5 points for that and I don’t give him full mark because of what I’ll explain next.

Azuma: 10/10 This one is going to be a trip. It’s about twice the length of the Hisoka’s rant. Mister took me by the throat too. As I think it’s clear now I cannot relate to the fact he genuinely loved his family and how much his family cared for him. Yet I relate… to about everything else.

On the surface I do think I seem more approachable and easy to talk with. I try to be the kindest person I can be, to not be judgmental. I’m conflict avoidant, just like he can be, and if I’m annoyed with someone I’m muuuuch more likely to use passive aggressiveness like he does with Tasuku when he’s pissed at him. (sidenote: I do find it funny that Tasuku was the only character I really felt I didn’t get until Nocturnality, while Azuma was having the exact same problem, and then he became one of my fav the moment it clicked. Azuma is my braincell.)

More often than not, there’s a smile on my face and I try to be soft in the way I can be. I’m generally pretty calm, I’ve been told I was soothing, or give good hugs, this sort of stuff.

Now onto the heavy stuff.

I have a lot of nightmares and night terrors linked to a lot of my traumas. I’m honestly scared sometimes to go to sleep ^^”. But in general, if Hisoka reflects a lot of a personal trauma and how it would personally affect me, Azuma reflects a lot on how I would behave with others people in general and especially when I’m unwell. I’ve coped most of my life with, everything that happened to me, by just. Trying to keep people at armlength. I don’t want to let people close to me, especially irl. Discussing all of that online gives me a distance that allows me to discuss it but, I remember in high school I was going through very bad things, and a few years later I was hanging out with a friend and I happened to open up about those things. And she was going livid because, she had known me for what, 6 years at that point? And she never knew any of this. We talked a lot then, we were close, but she never knew all those things about me until years later. It kinda scared her because to her I was always a sweet and cheerful person and she never expected that I was doing this badly. I remember then she brought up something we discussed back in a party with many of our others friends from high school and similarly they were all. “how did we never know any of this.”. Seeing Azuma in Nocturnality kinda brought me back to that convo tbh LKDJFLKDFJFD.

But I’m good at pretending I’m closer to people than they think. I’m an excellent listener. A lot of my friends tended to rely on me as the person they could talk about their problems to. I used to do it much more back then but I also used to pour a lot of energy trying to make it easier for people, solving their problems. Full on Therapist Friend:tm:. It does help that, as I said with Tsumu, I have basis in psychology so sometimes some observations I can make help much more than expected. Just like Azu tbh lol.

Oh also I am cuddly with my friends in general. I’m super touch starved but also to the point I feel uncomfortable to seek hugs because I just don’t get any on a normal basis and my body isn’t used, but I’m super cuddly and when I’m with my closest friends I’m like a koala.

And it gives people the impression to people that I’m very close to them because I know them well, and I know the ins and outs of why they behave the way they do. But. I kinda feel like it’s one sided more than not. And it’s all because of me, because I keep my walls up very high and it means people don’t generally expect that I’m hiding things.

I’m good at distracting too. I don’t relate to how flirty Azuma is but I keep seeing it as him distracting others. It’s flattering, and just embarrassing enough that the person ends up dropping whatever they may be pressing on Azuma to talk about. And, while not with flirting, I do that a lot, especially using compliments like that. (That said my kindness or teasing has been misinterpreted as flirting before DLKFJDLKF I’m trying to be extra conscious about not having that misunderstanding happen nowadays but man it happened a lot).

Azuma knows a lot of people, and has been supporting a lot of people, but he doesn’t let people in as much.

And a lot of it is linked to his own sense of grief. Of the fact he has lost so much he can’t afford to go through the pain of losing something again, so he distances himself from it before it can hurt. And I do that a lot.

I mentioned in the previous rant but it’s seeing Azuma’s arc that made me understand how much it’s more grief than abandon that makes it so hard for me to move on. And a part of me kinda just. Grieves the family I could never have, the normal life I wish I could have lived and clang too all of my life. When Azuma told Guy “I was always so lonely. Everyone had families they could take for granted but I had no one.” Oh my god it destroyed me. And how he mentions just afterward that while he has new people to rely on, it couldn’t change the fact he was still feeling this pain of losing his family and it just. Man. Might be crying right now.

It’s like… I think the reason I especially related to that is that, in therapy I’ve often discussed my problems in the lenses of neglect and abandon but the problem with that lenses is that, at least with the therapists I had, they tend to focus on the fact that therefore I /must/ be still yearning for them to change and turn around, like I could change something. But I don’t. I was resigned at some point. And it’s really only when I read that that I felt this exact resignation I have been feeling all that time. I think I mentioned once how reading a3 felt like going one step toward recovery I didn’t know I could get and this was exactly the scene I meant. It legit took a weight off my heart that i've been carrying for decades. It was the strangest feeling in the world.

Anyway more in general too, on top of keeping people at distance, I am also a pro at “suddenly disappearing/ghosting when I get too close and/or have a relapse”. When Azuma starts to pull his relapses like we see in Nocturnality, I see myself. Legit had a friend who read a3 who called me out about that DLKJFDKLFJ. Acting weird like this, closing yourself in like this, coming back to some harmful coping mechanism as a way to connect back with your own self, those are all things I do. And it sucks. Like. The things I put my friends though sucks. But I really can’t help it sometimes.

I’m good at listening and observing, I’m generally good at picking up why people act a certain way, but I’m still very distant. I do everything I can to pretend I’m not distant and generally it fakes an idea of intimacy that I don’t specifically see as such.

And I see all of that in Azuma in ways that are terrifyingly relatable. Another thing Azuma says in this convo with Guy, about how “Everytime I would go to sleep, I would wish the morning would never come” me. Mood. Holy shit. Feel seen. I hate it. Just in general though the way he talks about morning as this terrifying thing is me. Between the night terrors and the fact morning genuinely makes me feel horrible, that’s kinda why I end up oversleeping until the afternoon DLKFJDF Azuma my lord I feel you.

Because of my nightly panic attacks I do try to come up with ways around it mainly by drinking some relaxing tisanes and stuff. Oh and I did have a huge period in life where I HATED being in the sun, and I fucked over all of my melanin because of that. as a kid I would tan very easily, but now the sun hates me as much as I used to hate it. So when Azuma is a drama queen about not wanting to stay in the UV too much I’m just like. How dare you pull out a mirror on me I didn’t ask for this. (also I have been called a vampire by people esp when I was a teen but that’s just how people called edgelords like me. Still. Reo my beloved.)

There is honestly so many little things with Azuma that reminds me of myself like this that it makes me go nuts. If Hisoka is who I relate to in term of specific trauma and how I cope personally, Azuma is more like, the direct physical impact of my trauma on me and the way it makes me relate to others people, as well as just every little behaviors here and there that are just so specific.

One of the only thing I really don’t relate to Azuma about is his love for Alcohol but I think if you replace it with like, my addiction to juice it works out the same.

Oh and, that’s a stupid but funny thing to me, I project hard on how much the reason he keeps his hair long is a form of mental stability for him, because I legit keep my hair long for my own mental stability. I have tied ways too much of my recovery process to my hair that when I see Azuma coping with grief with his hairstyle and how almost cutting it would be him spiraling down, I felt seen.

also i have 0 stamina just like him.

ANOTHER THING is also the fact Azuma is genuinely yearning for connections with people but he spent so much of his life keeping people away that as much as he’s yearning for it, it takes him so long to be able to lower those walls because he’s been so used to keep people away that he can’t reply to this yearning. And the way how, once he actually ends up feeling this bit of vulnerability toward people, he would suddenly shut in like it suddenly scares him? Mood.

One last thing (i promise) (i think) is that, if it wasn't obvious from all my ranting.... So much of myself and the way i view myself is defined by my trauma. I struggle to exactly come to term with my identity in any shape or form that isn't deeply related to my trauma. Even if you asked me what my sexuality is (please don't), my actual answer would be completely shaped by the fact i have so much trauma linked to sexuality, romance and gender, that i don't want to process it at all and can't actually manage to "fit the boxes" because i cannot see myself as something else than my trauma, or explain my feelings without linking it to my trauma. Honestly at times i find it kinda cringeworthy from me because i really, really can't tell about anything about my identity without thinking of my various traumas (i talked about a few of them in those rankings but it's not even the tip of the iceberg for a lot of stuff.) And when i see the way Azuma is in particular, maybe i'm projecting, but i feel like a lot of it is the same. Like not processing his age because if he does it reminds him of how he outlived those he loved (which is an headcanon but com'on.) or how even his hair is linked to his trauma. Or how he doesn't drive because it's linked to his trauma. I feel SO seen.

If it wasn’t for the fact he genuinely loved and was loved by his family, I would have felt exactly the same about everything regarding him.

But I still give him a full mark because the way Azuma’s arc has affected me is beyond any possible words I could use. And also because I legit wrote above 2100 words just on how much I related to Azuma ALONE. Even Hisoka took me 800 WORDS. HELLO. Guy: 6/10 Back to general coping here, Guy isn’t exactly relatable to me except in well. For exemple the ways the others relate to him, especially Hisoka and Azuma. So his memory loss to cope with intense family trauma is relatable to me, the way he can have nightmares and night terrors is also hella relatable to me.

But something that’s more Guy that I relate to is the whole “Step dad kept talking down on him and verbally abusing him until Guy basically completely closed himself in” because man. I won’t elaborate but I’ve really felt from reading that verbal abuse the same way I felt thinking back to how my ex-step dad used to talk to me. It made me so angry on his behalf. And the way he internalized it to cope was something deeply relatable.

Another thing with Guy is the fact that Guy did genuinely believes himself inhuman and tbh there was a time when I was very young where I would catch myself unable to feel a bit of humanity mostly from how I kept shutting myself in. (The reason I don’t relate to it with Homare is that this “inhumanity” was never actually there even if Homare did believe in it. But for Guy he went the extra mile convincing himself to the point where he denied this humanity as far as possible in a self destructive way and :/).

SO YEAH Winter is like. Therapy for me. The problem with “Trauma: The Troupe” is that saying “I relate to the Winter troupe” means “I may have problems and so what.” And it sucks.

if you read that wordvomit, congratulation, was it worth it?

Take care!

#closes eyes and pretends i didn't just type all of that for azuma ANYWAY #bows down thank you for indulging in my fav passion of 'therapy via a3' the more we go #ichafantalks a3 #pandapillow #ichareply #also man Risky Game is going to absolutly murder me isn't it.

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high-fructose-lesbianism · 4 years

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A Subjective Ranking of all 18 Books in the Vampire Chronicles Extended Universe

18. Blood Canticle (2003)

It took me the longest to read Blood Canticle of any of the books because I couldn’t read more than about 25 pages at a time before the urge to throw the book out the nearest window got too strong. The story is bad, the characters are the worst they’ve ever been and the writing style is full-on terrible. Blood Canticle is one of the worst books I’ve read full stop.

17. Taltos (1994)

I hated the Mayfair Witches trilogy. While Taltos was at least the shortest of the three, it was a terrible conclusion to the trilogy. The Taltos are one of Anne Rice’s worst ideas. Each of the books delves more into their mythology and it gets worst the more it’s explored.

16. Blackwood Farm (2002)

A major issue I have with Anne Rice is she insists on telling these extremely lengthy backstories of characters we’ve just met who I almost never give a shit about. That’s the entirety of Blackwood Farm. It’s the backstory of a character I just met and don’t care about whatsoever. Blackwood Farm evokes the classic Anne Rice style of bad where it switches between just being insane and being fucking boring at the drop of a hat. I skimmed most of the book because it was so boring. But then I’d tune in to some insanely weird shit about intersex vampires or ghost twins giving handjobs or whatever was happening and yeah, my attention would of course be held by such insanity. But invariably, the book would drift back into describing wildly uninteresting events with too much detail and I’d tune out again.

15. The Witching Hour (1990)

The Witching Hour has a three paragraph summary on Wikipedia. It is an accurate summation of the events of the book. So then why is this fucking book 968 pages? That’s my main grievance with The Witching Hour; it’s way too fucking long. It’s the least insane of the Mayfair Witches trilogy but also by far the least interesting.

14. Prince Lestat and the Realms of Atlantis (2016)

These fucking bird aliens who inhabited Atlantis are just the Taltos 2.0. There’s a lot of insanity and also boring backstory in this one. I skimmed the backstory of the Atlantean bird aliens and don’t feel like I missed anything. What saves this book from ranking lower is I’m a slut for the main VC characters interacting and this one did have such a thing, plus some good Louis/Lestat moments which is my other big priority with the series. Simultaneous highlight and lowlight of this book is when that one dude looses a hand but it gains sentience, breast feeds off him or something and then becomes his perfect clone. Fucking insanity.

13. Lasher (1993)

Lasher is the best of the Mayfair trilogy because there are genuine moments of horror in this horror novel. On the downside, the Taltos are as always, insane. Also, another signature of Anne Rice’s is sexy and sexualized teenage characters which there is a lot of in this book in the form of 13 year old Mona Mayfair, her affair with Michael Curry and the many scenes where this is excused, justified or even somewhat celebrated. That disturbed me and not in the way I want a horror novel to disturb me.

12. Memnoch the Devil (1995)

In terms of writing style, Memnoch is a lot better than many of the books that will rank higher than it. But this is a subjective ranking and I didn’t give a shit about Anne Rice working through her weird, religious baggage in a series that I’m reading to hear about the exploits of sexy, bisexual vampires. The majority of this book is again, a long backstory from a character we just met and I don’t care about. In this case it’s literally Satan which is a good start but Anne Rice sure has a way of taking too long describing everything which leaves me extremely bored by the narrative.

11. Blood Paradise (2018)

Blood Paradise should be lower in this list. It’s objectively extremely poor. Blood Paradise is basically the inverse of Memnoch; I really liked the story but hated the writing style. This one only ranks so high because it is a story that focuses on the lead vampire characters who are my priority. And yeah, I liked the outline for the story. It’s character-based, no major new characters interrupt the narrative and no insane additions to canon are added. Too bad the writing style feels extremely half-assed. Where usually I’m critical of Anne Rice taking way too long to say anything and focusing on unimportant details, this one is the opposite. It feels extremely rushed. A lot of major, emotional scenes that occur between characters are only a few sentences or paragraphs long. But still, at least this one gave me story content that I could just expand upon in my head instead of insane additions to canon that I’d prefer to ignore.

10. Merrick (2000)

Merrick actually might have my favourite ending to any of the VC novels. I loved Lestat resurrecting Louis from his suicide attempt and then that descends into Lestat, Louis, David and Merrick living in what seems to be perfectly happy polyamory. I totally dug that. But of course, the majority of the book is a backstory of Merrick, a character I just met and don’t care about. Also, we get a bit of David backstory which I seem to remember being him mostly creeping on some young boy who was in expedition with him. Not ideal.

9. Vittorio, the Vampire (1999)

Vittorio is a fairly effective historical horror. Anne Rice did a lot of research and it shows. That’s not exactly my interest but she did well with it. There’s also some really horrific moment where Vittorio meets a clan of vampires in an old castle who do keep humans like cattle and eat babies and stuff. The major downsides is just that this is a character who we’ve never met before and never see again. Also the fact that Vittorio is 16 and is absolutely sexualized. I’ve really grown tired of Anne Rice’s constant belief that’s in almost all of her writing that teenagers are sexy and it’s totally fine to fuck them. It makes me uncomfortable to say the least.

8. Pandora (1998)

This one’s just pretty good. I’ve no major complaints but no specific bits of it I want to champion either. Again, a lot of historical research is done which is not interesting to me but well done. Also nice to have at least one book with a female vampire protagonist.

7. Prince Lestat (2014)

Prince Lestat is not objectively better than the last two books. I rank it this high mostly out of relief. For ages, Blood Canticle was the last book in The Vampire Chronicles. So, when Prince Lestat was released, it was impossible to see this as anything other than a huge upgrade. And of course, I liked that this book returned to focusing on the lead characters of Lestat, Louis, Marius, Daniel etc. It’s still a baffling idea to have Lestat be the vampire head of state or whatever though. But oh man, that Louis/Lestat moment near the end of the book made me feel a whole lotta feelings.

6. Blood and Gold (2001)

This one is another excuse for Anne Rice to do a lot of historical research. And you know what? Better she spends her energies doing that instead of creating weird, tall supernatural beings with specific quirks that are impossible to take seriously. I like the framing of this one because it’s sort of the inverse of usual. Thorne, a new character is introduced but instead of him telling Marius his story, it’s established character Marius who tells Thorne his story. And he does this the first day they met after Thorne’s awakened after several hundred years and they’ve taken a bath together. That’s just good story structure right there. The most memorable part of this story for me is keeping a vague tally of all the people Marius fell in love with throughout the course of the story. In one 100-page stretch, Marius falls in love five separate times. This grew tiresome but I also just thought it was funny.

5. The Vampire Armand (1998)

I’m the most morally against The Vampire Armand. It’s basically the peak of Anne Rice’s love of sexualizing teens. That’s sort of the whole book. I don’t think it’s a coincidence that around the time of its publication, Anne Rice got back into religion. I think she looked over what she wrote and was like yeah okay, maybe I do need Jesus. But I dunno, I remember really liking it. It was well-written and Armand is one of my favourite characters. I think Anne Rice did actually hit the right mixture of the story being sexy, horrific and rather tragic. Also, that bit at the end where Armand eats a drug dealer’s face and heart in front of some new, human friends is one of my favourite scenes.

4. The Tale of the Body Thief (1992)

There’s a lot of good and a lot of bad in Tale of the Body Thief. I love the body swap aspect and this one has some of the best interactions between characters. On the downside, there absolutely is a 2-page description of Lestat taking a piss, he absolutely commits a rape and him turning David into a vampire was #problematic. But even there, the Lestat and David scene is really well-written and works because Lestat is an absolute piece of shit. Tale of the Body Thief is for better and worse, Lestat at his most Lestat. Still didn’t need to hear about him taking a piss in that much detail, though.

3. Queen of the Damned (1988)

Akasha is the only good villain in any of the Vampire Chronicles books. Plus, Queen of the Damned brought all the characters we’d met in the previous two books together and I was absolutely all about that. At this point in the series, I actually did care about the majority of main characters and their interactions were absolutely spectacular. Only downside is again, we get a lengthy backstory of Akasha that I absolutely skimmed.

2. Interview with the Vampire (1976)

Yeah, it’s only number 2. Because while this book is better written and the start of this whole damn phenomenon, Louis is far from my favourite narrator. Dude’s too morose and shit. Still, the writing style is exquisite and it introduced great characters. As the series went on, Anne Rice clearly ran out of ideas but because this one is the first book, that’s not the case. There’s a lot of ideas here and they aren’t even fucking insane.

1. The Vampire Lestat (1985)

I’m really only into this series because of how much I love Lestat as a character. I read Interview and thought I was done with the series. Interview was fine but I didn’t think I cared about the sequels. However, six months later when I decided to read The Vampire Lestat, I knew within the first two pages that this was going to be a problem for me. This is exactly my brand of bullshit. It’s just Lestat being a sexy and shitty person who makes out with everyone and overreacts to everything. I love him. And in the third act when it’s revealed he’s been in love with Louis all along and then Louis shows up in the present day and they reunite???? Oh my god. 16 year-old me nearly exploded. The Vampire Lestat is really the sole reason The Vampire Chronicles happened to me as hard as it did. I love this book and its ridiculous narrator/protagonist.

#the vampire chronicles #vampire chronicles #vc #tvc #the mayfair witches #lives of the mayfair witches #anne rice #new tales of the vampire #generally homosexual

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thegirlwholied · 3 years

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SW anon - So I have tried to watch the whole thing before but I could never really get past the start. I watched ep IV a few years back (and in 2018 I watched it while it playing with a live orchestra which really enhanced the experience) and ofc I’ve known most of what happens bc my mom and brother have been fans of it (and ofc all the references to it in shows and it being everywhere) but the thing about the original trilogy that I found difficult to watch was very much the acting being off

Gov SW anon continued - but I think I’m gonna watch the clone wars show next as I feel like the general universe and people speak to me more than the skywalker and co. story speaks to me. But I’ll probably try and get back to the prequels afterwards (at least just to have seen them) but also bc I’ve been on tumblr for so long and I’ve encountered so much about the new movies with Finn, Poe and rey (I already know I don’t like kylo) that I’m interested to see what comes before that

Seeing Ep IV with a live orchestra sounds fantastic as the music is incredible. <3

I must admit I haven’t gotten properly into the Clone Wars show! I’ve tried, & did jump in to (and enjoy) the finale ~ and certain Mandalorian episodes strongly remind me of the show’s tone ~ but it has yet to hit me right in the place where I care. What I appreciate about it & what it’s brought into the Star Wars universe is still on a more distant level, not visceral.

I most love that The Mandalorian is truly exploring & taking advantage of the wider Star Wars universe beyond Skywalker & co. (but boy do I also love Skywalker & co.) There is an exciting amount of potential in the newly-announced projects too I love characters outside of a universe’s main chosen-one story. In 6th grade, I was obsessed with the X-Wing book series, which were definitely really marketed toward adult guys but whoops, I had found the deep Star Wars section of the library! And the first line of that series, introducing the main character, is “You’re good, but you’re no Luke Skywalker.” And in a way, that’s the Mandalorian too, to the audience if not himself ~ good, but no Luke Skywalker. Not a Jedi, not meant to bring balance to the Force, a sidestory in the main universe’s struggle. I (from what I’ve seen/know of) get the impression that’s how Ahsoka sees herself ~ ‘you’re good, but you’re no Anakin Skywalker’.

Of course, for that contrast to work, first you need a Luke Skywalker.

it’s interesting you mention OT acting feeling off as I would use that exact word to describe how I feel about the acting in some episodes of The Mandalorian. In some I love it! Other times... I hesitate to say ‘like a video game’ as I mean no insult to the well-developed video game characters out there but yeah, it hits me like the actor’s aware they’re essentially in a live-action video game cut scene.

But. I truly love the acting in the original trilogy! ...but also as I type this I’m watching a movie from 1944 and acting style certainly varies by decade, & mileage varies as to personal taste... but also I will never be objective about Star Wars which I have loved since I was six... but also I studied film history in college and firmly believe Star Wars, the original trilogy is just objectively good if not quite everybody’s cup of tea (...okay maybe Return of the Jedi is not quite as objectively good, but I still love it so much and given the work it had to do wrapping up the original trilogy, hey, it did its job successfully and with Ewoks).

I love the twinkling, wry humor & also gravitas of Alec Guinness. There’s that sense of amusement as he talks to Han, as he waves off the storm troopers, and even in the “let go, Luke”... but always the right weight in the right moments imho

Luke & Han particularly can both be petulant in different ways, & they’re all quippy & brash & even cavalier at times in what in context ~ especially when you rewatch A New Hope right after Rogue One ~ in Very Serious Situations! and I love them for it.

Carrie Fisher’s accent does shift in the one scene (which I have never minded and definitely went around as a kid trying to say ‘Governor Tarkin’ exactly the way she does), and young Mark Hamill’s Luke can be Dramatic & the Most Petulant but understandably (& prettily) so, and... yeah I probably could muster a criticism for Harrison Ford but also I *can’t*! There are some ridiculous Han Solo moments in Return of the Jedi especially, but also I love him/them/just about every choice these movies made. They just hit on magic.

The magic’s there for me from the music swelling as Luke looks yearningly into the twin suns (the cinematography!), but where it really hits is the up-and-running chemistry between all three of the main actors starting the “Luke, we’re gonna have company” scene, and then, boom, it’s the garbage chute, it’s the you’re-braver-than-I-thought/he-certainly-has-courage, for-luck, here-they-come of it all and the movie is flying.

...and I will never forgive the sequels for, avoiding spoilers as it sounds like you’re familiar but haven’t seen them, not giving us any true interaction scenes between Rey & Finn & Poe all together until the 3rd movie. While I still so appreciated finally getting that & what we got, for me it was just not just too little but too late. I love the casting & acting for all 3 of those characters, but while fandom’s taken and run with the combination, and they had plenty of chemistry... it should have been up-and-running so much sooner.

And the prequels just... well, even seeing them in theaters at a susceptible age, the Lord of the Rings movies were coming out at the same time and that did them no favors in comparison. As someone who judges movies above all on dialogue, that... also did them no favors. (Beyond the OT I may have a Nontraditional ranking of Star Wars movies).

The short version of my prequels & sequels take is that both missed that cinematic magic for me, outside of certain scenes, though I still enjoy them as part of The Whole Thing That Is Star Wars Which I Love. Rogue One had that magic; I know and see the criticism of the early editing & introduction-of-Jyn’s-background-and-Krennic-and-Galen scene, but, to me, that movie is perfect. Solo was solid - maybe not magic, but reliably enjoyable, and I’ve been meaning to rewatch. The prequels & sequels... the lows are very low and the highs are very high, in terms of how they hit me.

I feel like I’d probably sum them up as Prequels: Good Star Wars, Bad Movies, and Sequels: Good Movies, Bad Star Wars, which may seem a little harsh or too kind on one side or another but gets at my take at the worldbuilding vs. just the cinema of it all. The bread scene in Force Awakens, the salt planet in Last Jedi, the dyad-duel-in-dual-locations in Rise of Skywalker? Gorgeous. Individual scenes’ acting & dialogue is sound for me. And yet. All three sequels’ choices in respect to the entire Star Wars universe and existing characters AND its new characters? ...Tonally inconsistent with each other *and* ultimately with the themes of the OT. Whereas the prequels did so much worldbuilding, and its politics, and I’ll see gifs and think ‘yes actually, is it better than I remember?’... and then I’ll catch one on TV & it’s the Padme & Anakin romance or even Anakin & Obi-Wan’s buddy scene dialogue at the beginning of Rise of Skywalker and the answer will come, clearly: “noooooooooooooooo.”

(...this got long. Which I tend to do when I care, about fiction in any form, and with the prequels/sequels: the ingredients were there to be magic. And just-misses are more frustrating than swing-and-misses. A la, you won’t find me complaining about the Star Wars Holiday Special!)

(...OK so I haven’t seen all of the Star Wars Holiday Special, and I’m sort of aiming to watch it through this holiday season, since what other year than 2020 seems more appropriate? So I won’t promise not to complain about the Holiday Special but I mostly expect to laugh at it.)

(That said I found the Lego Star Wars Holiday Special an absolute, surprising, laugh-out-loud delight; 9/10 would recommend & yes, 1 point deduction as I will nitpick character consistency even when they are Legos.)

#answers!#star wars #star wars ot

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sw-daydreamer · 4 years

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More fan reactions!

SOURCE: tvsourcemagazine.com/2019/12/the-rise-of-skywalker-roundtable/

First Impressions of the movie?

Cam: Honestly, the first thought that kept repeating in my head as I continued watching the movie was “Who greenlight this?”. Too many hours spent on pointless plot points, bad dialogue, character regression and a clear intent to take digs at the previous movie.

April: The first time I saw the film I found it largely enjoyable. It reminded me of “old school” Star Wars films, which fits with J.J.’s nerdy love for the original films. However, there were glaring issues, largely that, in an effort to make every fan group happy, J.J. created a film where every fan group instead found something to nitpick. He bent to the will of the racist fans from “The Last Jedi” and shrunk Kelly Marie Tran’s role to nothing, he created women out of thin air (Jannah and Zorrie) to stand as helpmates to the men around them, just to name a few things. But as an end to Luke Skywalker’s story, it’s acceptable.

Anika: Thanks to spoilers, which I actively sought, I already knew what to expect. While I didn’t hate the movie in it’s entirety, my dissatisfaction with it made it the only Star Wars movie that I am quite happy seeing just once. So much of it just felt cobbled together and didn’t make any sense. It felt like the writers were trying to please every Star Wars fan base with this film, but never quite managed that feat.

Logan: As the credits rolled I thought, “Well, I enjoyed a majority of that movie until the end.” Originally, I said I enjoyed about 80% of the movie but the 20% I didn’t like were huge plot points. After thinking about the movie for a week, I’d say my percentage of enjoyment has majorly decreased.

Maggie: Unfortunately, I was entirely spoiled by Reddit and Burger King by the time I sat down to watch The Rise of Skywalker opening night. I mostly felt dread throughout the entire film and struggled to even enjoy the enjoyable moments. I think “fever dream” is the best way to summarize my first impressions.

Jenna: Like most people, I was spoiled by Reddit leaks that none of us could have ever anticipated being true. Sadly, they were. Although I knew what was going to happen, I still tried to go in with an open mind. While I did enjoy some of the movie, those feelings were unfortunately overshadowed by my intense dislike of the major plot holes and the poor messages this movie conveyed.

Heather: My first impressions were from Reddit Spoilers months ago because I am a known Spoiler Whore (I don’t like surprises) so if we’re going from the leaks my first impression was, “There’s no way this is true. It’s so stupid. Most of this doesn’t even make sense. Nah. I’ll wait for the LA premiere and the real leaks.” Little did I know.

When did you become a fan of Star Wars?

Cam: I have first watched Star Wars when in 1999 (Phantom Menace), then I watched the rest of them in 2015. But I only became a fan on 2017 when I watched The Last Jedi.

April: I was introduced to Star Wars when I was 7 years old. My cousin, 10 years my senior, had been tasked with babysitting me for the night and, in her desire to keep me quiet and happy she did what most teens would and plopped me in front of a VHS tape playing ‘A New Hope’. Within moments of R2-D2 and C3PO showing up on the screen I was enthralled.

Anika: I was 11 years old when I first saw Star Wars. The story of Luke, Princess Leia, Han Solo and a galaxy far, far away was an immediate obsession for science-fiction/fantasy nerd girl me. A New Hope is my favorite childhood movie and the saga, along with Rogue One and Solo, continues to be my obsession. I cried when I saw the first trailer for TROS because the movies were a big part of my childhood and teen years and knowing this would be the last story ever told about the Skywalkers was an extremely emotional moment for me.

Logan: The better question is when wasn’t I a fan of Star Wars. I grew up with a brother who is 10 years older than me and he was small during the theatrical release of Empire and Return of the Jedi. I grew up watching them because he watched them and I immediately wanted to be a part of that world.

Maggie: My father took me to see The Phantom Menace opening weekend when I was six years old. Despite the devastation of losing Qui-Gon Jinn, Star Wars basically overtook my life from that moment forward. For twenty years I’ve collected Star Wars ephemera and read through nearly the entire library of the Extended Universe.

Jenna: When I was around 10 or 11, the first six episodes were playing on TV for about a week. I saw my step dad watching one of them and I was captivated by it as soon as I walked by. I asked him what order I should watch them in, and then I could be found that whole week in front of the TV watching them every time they came on. After that, I didn’t watch them for a long time, but my love for the franchise returned when The Last Jedi was in theaters.

Heather: Star Wars has been a part of my life in a mostly passing way since I was nine years old when I was brought to see one of the prequels in theaters. My aunt and uncle and I also watched the originals and prequels at various points when I was a teenager though admittedly my interest was fleeting at best. In January of 2016 that very same aunt and uncle were back in our hometown visiting from England and they wanted to go see The Force Awakens for their third time. I had absolutely no interest in going to go see it but I wanted the family time so I did and I’m glad I did because I walked out a huge fan. For all of the grief I now give JJ Abrams I will say that he set out to make TFA both for old fans and to create new fans and he succeeded in that.

What did you think of Rey’s journey in this movie?

Cam: A complete regression of whatever it was supposed to be. I can’t explain it in a different way. From the beginning Rey was alone, in a desert planet, begging to find her parents and a belonging. As the movies progressed she finally learned she had to continue her life, she couldn’t be stuck in that place forever, and that she could find other people who would love her, “the belonging you seek is ahead” and all. She realized she could be powerful and important just for being who she is on the Last Jedi. She didn’t need famous parents to matter.

On Rise of Skywalker they reverted all that, she did need famous parents indeed and she never should have had to learn how to move on from her pain and self doubt regarding them since they were always good people that had loved her. Despite her entire journey, the movie frames her ending as someone who was again alone and again on a desert planet (despite arguments that it didn’t mean she would be alone, when a movie ends in a certain note that’s what you want your audience to take from it). It’s just a terrible regression that didn’t care for all the things this character needed but that instead cared about online complaints regarding her surname.

April: Rey’s journey in this film felt, in many ways, unfinished. We’ve always known that the Star Wars Saga was ultimately Luke’s story, even as we had other protagonists in the prequel trilogy it was clear that we were watching the beginnings of Luke (Padme and Anakin wind up being his parents and we watch the birth of his ultimate foe, Darth Vader). Unfortunately, “The Rise of Skywalker” (and indeed the entire sequel trilogy) struggle with the idea of Rey being anything more than just the final piece of Luke Skywalker’s story. Perhaps this would have read better had Rey been a Skywalker (as was clearly J.J. Abram’s (director of “The Force Awakens” and “ The Rise of Skywalker) initial plan, but instead Rey doesn’t actually begin her journey until the moment she stares off into the sun on Tatooine as the music swells dramatically. While it’s not unusual for a story to end with the hero heading into a new adventure, for this to be the “end” of Rey’s story feels almost empty, because we never truly saw her beginning.

Anika: Where do I start with Rey’s journey in TROS? Quite honestly, except for Rey becoming the powerful Jedi we all knew she would be, I don’t think she had much of a journey. She wanted to know her place in all of this and she does learn it along with a few other truths, but her reaction to every thing she learns was virtually non-existent. Rey’s journey is the saddest part of this movie. She finds the belonging that she wanted, but she has lost a maternal and paternal figure, a mentor and her other half in the Force. Rey is at the end of it alone again. How is that a happy ending for her?

Logan: Trying to think through my opinion is making me realize she didn’t really have much of one in this film. She started a strong Jedi and ended a strong Jedi. She started out as part of The Resistance and ended as part of The Resistance. The only changes to her journey revolve around finding out her lineage, which didn’t change any part of who she is, and also loss. Loss of Leia. Loss of Ben. Isolating Rey’s journey leaves me sort of depressed. So, my thoughts are that I don’t like it.

Maggie: At the end of The Last Jedi Rey was posed to have an incredible final act, unfortunately The Rise of Skywalker ended up being a regressive ending to her story. Her journey is rushed, disjointed, and nonsensical in this film. We never get her reacting to the revelation that she’s Darth Sidious’ granddaughter, which is perhaps one of the worst mistakes this film commits. The main protagonist is presented with a life changing detail about her past and is denied the chance to react verbally to the revelation. Not only was the implementation lacking, but the reasoning behind her having to be related to someone felt unnecessary. If Palpatine had always been the endgame for the trilogy, he should’ve been alluded to in the previous two films.

Jenna: Not only did I think that Rey had no growth in this movie, but I would even go as far as to say she regressed. In The Force Awakens, Rey’s story began with her living in the desert alone and waiting for parents that would never come back to her. In The Rise of Skywalker, Rey’s story ended with her living in the desert alone and isolating herself from the friends and family she has come to know. At least, that’s how I interpreted it. The Last Jedi set this movie up to have Rey realize how special and loved she is regardless of who her parents were, but this idea was thrown aside in favor of making her special only because of her family name.

Heather: Hated. It. I loved the message of TLJ that you don’t have to come from a powerful bloodline to be special or important and it was completely re-written. You’re only special if you come from one of these two families. Sucks to suck for the rest of you.

What was your favorite part of the sequel trilogy?

Cam: Ben and Rey’s ever growing understanding and love for each other. And Kylo Ren/Ben Solo’s entire arc that showed his pull to the light and his pain regarding the darkness.

April: The chemistry between the new trio (Rey, Finn and Poe) is hands down my favorite aspect of the new trilogy. Oscar Issac, John Boyega and Daisy Ridley play excellently off of each other and their interactions are a joy to watch. One thing The Rise of Skywalker did tremendously well was highlight their relationship and it is my opinion that Rey is now happily touring the sky with her boyfriend (Finn) and his boyfriend (Poe).

Anika: It’s a tie between the Throne Room scene and the hand touch scene in the hut. In the scene where she touches Kylo’s hand, we get to see both their vulnerabilities. He’s admitting that what she is going through, her loneliness is how he feels, too, and she’s reassuring him that it’s never too late to change that. The Throne Room scene is the best one in the trilogy. It was perfection in it’s execution. They way moved in sync with each other, watched each other’s back and that heartbreaking end when he offers her his hand and she knows she cannot take it was beyond anything else I had seen.

Logan: Admiral Holdo lightspeeding through a Star Destroyer. Hands Down. For me, Holdo was one of the most memorable characters of the sequel trilogy and that moment was followed by an eerie silence in the theater that I will never forget. Aside from that is all the confirmation of Jedi Leia, the return of Han, Poe’s introduction in The Force Awakens, the glory of Rose Tico. There are many moments that I will remember for many Star Wars films to come.

Maggie: The Throne Room scene in The Last Jedi will remain my favorite part of this entire trilogy. The fight choreography is incredible and I felt like it was really a defining moment for both Rey and Ben. Watching them fight back-to-back was pretty amazing to see. Not to mention it’s some of Adam and Daisy’s best acting in the trilogy. So many emotions play out from the start to end of that scene. It’s flawless.

Jenna: The Throne Room scene in The Last Jedi, by far. Adam so clearly showcased the emotions passing through Ben’s mind when he decided to take down the man who had been abusing him his whole life. When Ben and Rey stood back-to-back to fight together after Ben ripped Anakin’s lightsaber through Snoke I could feel every cell in my body start to scream in excitement. It felt like such a pivotal moment in not only the movie, but the entire trilogy. Seeing a clip of Ben leaning forward so Rey could grab onto his thigh and balance herself on his back to kick one of the Praetorian Guard is actually what convinced me to watch the sequel trilogy.

Heather: Reylo. Kidding…mostly. I can’t deny that their chemistry and the thrill of a possible enemies to lovers/good girl & bad boy story was what made me originally interested in the first place but I think my favorite part was all of the fandom anticipation. Who would Rey be? Would Kylo turn back to the light? Would the Resistance survive? Would Leia keep her role as General? In between each movie fandom was always alive with theories and speculation and there’s a sort of magic and unity in that that I’ve always enjoyed.

What was your favorite part of TRoS?

Cam: Ben Solo being redeemed, as he should have. And all of the amazing scenes between him and Rey.

April: My favorite part of The Rise of Skywalker would have to be the reinforcement of the idea of “togetherness”. You see it, perhaps most clearly, in the moment when, wrapped up in his devastation about leading his forces once more into a hopeless battle, Poe hears Lando’s voice over the radio. When he pulls up and sees the crowd of ships full of “just people” to quote one First Order combatant, it’s such a powerful feeling. That same theme makes itself present again in Rey’s battle against Palpatines, when she is at her most defeated and we hear the voices of Obi-Wan, Anakin, Yoda, Luke, Ashoka and more, reminding her that she is not alone, because she is “all the Jedi”, it’s also repeated throughout the trio’s interactions, they even go so far as to use the word “together”. It’s a constant message in this film and it’s so necessary in our current time. It’s a reminder to each one and all of us that there are always “more of us” then those who would seek to keep us downtrodden and together, we can spark a true revolution.

Anika: Without a doubt, Han and Ben’s scene on the Death Star. Leia reached Ben, but it was his father’s love and forgiveness which truly made the difference. Ben was never the same after killing Han and he needed to make peace with what he did and to accept that forgiveness is possible. Change is possible, even if we veer so off course that we can’t possibly see the way back. My two favorite characters in Star Wars sharing a much needed cathartic moment literally made me tear up.

Logan: If I’m picking just one thing then I’m choosing General Leia Organa. My gasp at the flashback of her and Luke was loud and probably annoying to everyone around me. She has a lightsaber. She’s a Jedi Master. She’s fearless and selfless and as bad ass as she ever was. I got to say a beautiful goodbye to Carrie Fisher and that meant more than anything else. Honorable mentions, though, to Harrison Ford returning as Han for one brief shining moment and to Kylo/Ben’s redemption arc that I never for one second thought I would ever buy into and yet somehow did. (Also, D-O and Babu Frik because how can you not love them?)

Maggie: I wish I could say the Reylo kiss was my favorite part of the film, however the moment was so rushed and poorly orchestrated that I struggle with enjoying it. I can’t even think of dialogue in this film that I enjoyed. With The Last Jedi so many lines stood out — lines with substance. I suppose I enjoyed seeing the porgs one last time.

Jenna: My favorite part was when Ben showed up on Exegol to help Rey. The second you saw him running, you knew you were no longer looking at Kylo Ren. This was now Ben Solo. From his hair to his loose sweater to his quiet “Ow”, there was no question about who was on the screen. When Rey and Ben finally used their forcebond to help each other and she gave him Anakin’s lightsaber, I could physically feel my heart squeeze in joy. Oh yeah, the Reylo kiss was pretty amazing, too. Too bad he had to die right after.

Heather: The final force bond between Rey and Ben when she gives him the light saber and he pulls it out from behind his back. That was a moment. I also really liked when after the trio fell through the quicksand stuff Rey lit her saber to light the way and Poe turned on his little flashlight. It was a cheap way to make the audience laugh but it worked and I did.

What was your least favorite part of TRoS?

Cam: I could say literally anything else but i’m gonna go with Ben Solo’s death.

April: The sidelining of Kelly Marie Tran’s Rose along with the insertion of Jannah and Zorrie feels purposeful and wrong. It was recently announced that Rose had only about one and a half minutes of screen time in the entirety of “The Rise of Skywalker” which seems particularly egregious when one considers how prominently she was featured in “The Last Jedi”. Even worse, she is almost “replaced” by the insertion of Zorrie and Jannah, both of whom serve no true purpose to the overall plot of the film.

Zorrie is there to forcefully remind us that Oscar Issac’s Poe is straight and that’s it! You could argue that she put them in contact with the tiny alien (Babu Frik) who wound up highjacking C3PO’s memory drives, but, Poe was a spice runner in this same crew and thus already knew him. We never even see her entire face, but we do get to see her modeling a skin tight pink catsuit-to emphasis her femininity.

The same thing happens with Jannah, an ex-Stormtrooper who exists only to provide a point of similarity with Finn and also to be Lando’s daughter (something that’s not even clearly told in the film. She’s tough and strong and has grit and determination in spades. She doesn’t hesitate to run into battle and in fact supports Finn as he makes what could be a suicide play to take out the lead ship. Both Jannah and Zorrie serve almost as opposites of Rose, in Zorrie: the ultrafeminine and in Jannah, the toughness that Rose wasn’t allowed to have. They even manage to strip Rose of her leadership, refusing to allow her to wear the badge of her station (commander). It’s a disgrace and it should be discussed far and wide.

Anika: I have two that really ticked me off. I absolutely hated Rose Tico’s arc in TROS. New character Beaumont had more lines than she did. After playing a big part in The Last Jedi, I expected more interactions between her, Finn, Poe and Rey, but instead she played the part of an extra, more or less. TROS made it seem as if she was an afterthought for Finn. I never got a chance to see a Rey and Rose friendship or even Rose on a mission with the others. She lost her voice because whiny, entitled fans were upset for no other reason than she was a woman and a person of color. It is even more upsetting that their vitriol was rewarded. The second thing that really bugged me was the predictability and, therefore, unoriginal end of Ben’s death. For once, it would have been nice to see the redeemed hero live.

Logan: There are two least favorite things that are tied for how enraged they make me. One, the obvious sidelining and invalidation of Rose Tico. Which is thanks to Abrams and Company caving to racist and misogynistic nerd boys. Two, the death of Ben Solo. I am by no means a fan of Kylo Ren. Prior to this movie I did not believe for one second that he could be redeemed. (Check my tweets, seriously). But his death does not enrage me for Ben’s sake but for Han and Leia’s. They sacrificed their lives to reach Ben and hopefully save his life. Ben’s death makes their sacrifices pointless. My two favorite Star Wars characters of all time were killed for nothing. Great. Perfect. Thanks, JJ Abrams. That feels fan-freaking-tastic.

Maggie: Where do I even begin? There was about 131 minutes of content I didn’t care for. I will die bitter about how they reduced Rose Tico’s role in response to racist men from the worst parts of the internet. The lines that were given to J.J.’s buddy Dominic Mongaghan could’ve been given to Rose. The fact that the only real lines that Rose had in the film were lines were she rejected joining the main plot seemed far too intentional. Outside of the #WheresRose issue, what they did with Poe Dameron’s character was perhaps my number one complaint coming out of the film. The entire subplot with Zorri Bliss was unnecessary and only served to remind FinnPoe shippers that Poe had a girlfriend and change his backstory to incorporate an unfortunate Latinx stereotype that he was a drug smuggler. Outside of yelling Rey’s name, what was Finn’s role in this film? Coming out of The Last Jedi he had matured as a character, but throughout The Rise of Skywalker it seemed like J.J. had no plan for what to do with him. Wouldn’t it have been awesome if he’d actually been able to say he was Force Sensitive and we didn’t have to get that information from subsequent interviews and an Instagram post?

Jenna: I could probably write a whole book about what I didn’t like about this movie. Plot holes (how Palpatine is alive, Palpatine wanting Rey dead then all of a sudden wanting her alive, how a spaceship that’s been underwater for years and has been torn for scraps actually works), character stories (Rose being sidelined, Poe being a drug dealer, Ben’s redemption arc fading away with his body), and many many more aspects of this movie keep me up at night.

Heather: The sloppy editing, the incoherent storyline beats, how much this movie wanted to be an action movie with all of the “pew pew!” instead of focusing on character and emotional beats and attempting to distract the audience with bright flashing lights and loud sounds so that they wouldn’t notice how nothing was actually making sense with the plot.

If you could change one thing about this movie, what would it be and why?

Cam: I’d definitely make Ben Solo live. Perhaps this sounds simple for some but the fact is, for one if that happened I would have hope for the Skywalkers. All of their suffering, from Anakin Skywalker to Ben Solo wouldn’t have ended in such a bitter note. The Star Wars Saga have always been about the Skywalkers and while a lot is wrong in the last movie, you would think they at least would have respected the legacy and the theme of a 40 year old saga. But the way Rise ended the story Palpatine was able to manipulate and ultimately end their bloodline. It wasn’t a victory, it was a tragedy.

(I won’t even get into how watching the death of a character that felt lost and needed redemption is just a terrible message as well. The number of people that felt utterly defeated and left the movie crying speaks on its own)

April: The kiss between Kylo and Rey. I’ve seen the movie three times now, once alone, and two other times with people who are aware of the films but are not superfans. In every instance the kiss feels out of place, abrupt and unearned, not just to me but to those I attended with. I believe there were other ways to show the connection between Kylo and Rey (and in fact we’ve seen it highlighted in both “The Last Jedi” and “The Rise of Skywalker” via their force connection) without having them kiss. It is perhaps even more jarring to see them share a kiss in the moments before Ren’s death because we’ve never seen Rey or Ren acknowledge the injuries he’s dealt her, both physically and emotionally. It’s impossible to form an emotional investment in a relationship that is built on dishonesty, lack of trust and no genuine affection between either party. Perhaps if Kylo had actually been redeemed it’s a conversation worth having, but he wasn’t and thus, it isn’t.

Anika: Ben Solo’s death and, therefore, the end of the Skywalkers. When I say Ben deserved more, I am saying it from a place that wanted, needed and expected better for the last Skywalker and the child of Leia Organa and Han Solo. Ben Solo has never really known a moment’s peace. I wanted him to live so he could discover who he was without a Sith Lord in his head, to atone for the things he did and to finish the work his mother started. It was lazy and easy writing to kill Ben.

Logan: I’m gonna change two, because if you’re giving me this chance I’m pushing my limits. One: Ben lives. Two: Rose goes with our Main Trio. Ben lives so that Han and Leia’s deaths have meaning. Rose goes with the trio because the amount of times they needed a mechanic were numerous and Rose was wasted staying behind with Leia. (Obviously considering Merry from Lord of the Rings had all the dialogue Rose should have had.)

Maggie: That’s a loaded question. If I had to choose one singular change, I would’ve started the film with Leia having died in the time between The Last Jedi and The Rise of Skywalker. In that situation, J.J. wouldn’t have been limited to playing around unused The Force Awakens scenes. Poe would’ve been General Poe outright, rather than handing him the role in Act 3 without any follow through. The pacing of the film would’ve likely been better and the stakes would’ve shifted.

Jenna: There are many things I would change in this movie, but if I had to pick one, it would be that Ben would get to live in the end. I’ve heard arguments that he deserved to die because of everything that he’s done, but I would argue back that he deserves to live for those same reasons. Dying is easy, but living is hard. If he had lived, he wouldn’t have just been able to jump into the Resistance with open arms. He would’ve had to work for forgiveness. He deserved to live so that he could eventually earn that forgiveness. Not to mention that his dying also ripped away not only the first love that Rey ever had, but also her Force equivalent of a soulmate.

Heather: I’ll give you three because I do what I want:

Ben Solo should have lived and earned the right to his redemption. Being redeemed through death is cheap and manipulative and had already been done in the original trilogy. Tell a new story. Let the villain earn his redemption by actively righting their wrongs instead of just killing them off.

Rose going on the adventure with the trio. Her underutilization is disgustingly criminal.

Not making Poe a drug runner just for a laugh and a plot point. There wasn’t even a hint of shady behavior in the other two movies so pulling it out of left field was not only jarring but for fans who actually read the supplemental material, noticeably false.

What unanswered questions would you like to have been addressed?

Cam: How is Palpatine back? Why didn’t Rey’s dad show up to her all these years if he was Force Sensitive? If Palpatine created Snoke why didn’t he know about the Force Dyad until the end of the movie? Why didn’t Ben Solo’s force ghost show up? Why didn’t we see Rey mourn her canonical soulmate? What is happening between Finn and Rose? Why was Kelly Marie Tran so terribly sidelined?

April: What is the confession Finn is trying to make? Yes, it has been purported that it’s pertaining to his force sensitivity. But this is a fact already known since The Force Awakens and one that he would not seek to hide from Poe, especially not in his potential dying moments. In fact, he mentions to Jannah that what led him away from the First Order was the force. We have no reason to believe force sensitivity is truly the secret.

Why didn’t Lando search for his missing daughter? The Visual Dictionary advises us that Jannah is Lando’s daughter and yet we are to believe that Lando has not spent the past 20 years searching for his daughter but stuck on another desert planet doing exactly nothing. Even the ending scene is ambiguous about who Jannah really is.

How did Palpatine survive being thrown down a shaft by Darth Vader and blown up in the second Death Star? We’re given no hints about that, although we are shown Palpatine hooked up to a crane like device receiving constant transfusions to a zombified corpse.

When did Palpatine even have time to have a child? Given the time frame, the only possible time for Rey’s father to have been, well…fathered is between “Revenge of the Sith” and “A New Hope” and I don’t know a lot of people who would have slept with Palpatine the way he looked back then.

How did Luke and Leia discover Rey was a Palpatine? Did Luke discover it in the Force? Was it just a feeling he had? Why did neither of them think to mention it to to Rey? Why did they continue to train her after discovering it?

Anika: How is Palpatine still alive and, if he created Snoke, why didn’t he know Ben and Rey were bonded? If Palpatine could find Ben in Leia’s womb, why couldn’t he find his granddaughter who shared his blood? Why didn’t Leia become a Force Ghost until Ben’s death and why didn’t Ben become one at all? Most importantly, I need to know where the Sith death eaters came from?

Logan: Does Rey ever find out that Finn has been pining for her for three films? That seemed like something important they introduced in The Force Awakens that got dropped for no reason. (Bonus: How was Palpatine behind Snoke this whole time? That made no sense whatsoever.)

Maggie: Why wasn’t Ben a Force Ghost at the end? Why did Rey decided to bury the lightsabers on Tatooine — a planet Luke despised, Anakin hated, and Leia never visited. How is the galaxy going to react to the granddaughter of Darth Sidious? How does Rey feel about the revelation? Why didn’t Rey mourn the loss of Ben? Why was Maz smiling when Leia vanished, given that Ben had died? Why was there so much focus on Rey staring at children? What was the point of the Force Dyad? What was the point of the visions in The Force Awakens? Why did the Knights of Ren exist? Why didn’t they just say Jannah is Lando’s daughter?

Jenna: How did Palpatine survive? What happened to Finn and Rose’s relationship? What was the point of Rey’s vision in The Last Jedi signifying that she was a nobody if she was a Palpatine? How did Ben not die after being thrown off the cliff? Why did the Jedi not help Ben? Why did the Jedi not do something to help heal Rey when she died after killing Palpatine? Why was Ben not a Force Ghost in the end? Why did we see such little reaction from Rey when Ben died? Why did Rey bury the lightsabers on Tatooine? Why did Leia wait to become one with the Force until Ben died, as if that’s something she wanted? Why did Rey take the Skywalker name instead of embracing that she didn’t need a name to make her special?

Heather: So many questions. How is Palpatine back? How did Ben get to Exegol if Rey stole his Tie Fighter on the Death Star? Why did Palps not know Ben and Rey had a force bond if Snoke claimed to create it and he created Snoke? Why did both Snoke and Palpatine want Kylo to kill Rey if in the end he wanted Rey to kill him instead? How was Poe ever a drug runner when in his comic he was born and raised on the Rebel base? If killing Palpatine would bring all of the Sith in to Rey’s body and she did in fact kill him, do all of the Sith and all of the Jedi live in her now? Why did Anakin say, “Rise and bring balance to the force like I did.” when Palpatine wasn’t dead meaning he didn’t bring balance to the force (and really his whole arc is now obsolete since he was in fact, not the chosen one after all)? There are more but if I kept going I would have an entire essay.

Were you satisfied by the ending of the trilogy? Why or why not?

Cam: Not at all. This trilogy ended making an even bigger tragedy out of the Skywalkers, I can barely watch the other movies without thinking “this was all for nothing.” The one character that knew enough about the Skywalkers and survived the ordeal (Rey) is alone. What is there to be satisfied about?

April: As an ending to Luke’s story I am absolutely satisfied with the ending of the trilogy and as a fan of his, I’m happy with what we received for him, Leia and even Anakin. As a fan of the new trio, I find myself wanting more of their stories. Who are they besides a former scavenger, spice runner and stormtrooper? Yes, Rey is “all the Jedi” and the granddaughter of Palpatine but who is Rey? We’ve spent three films with her and her primary focus has always been saving a male of the Skywalker line, in “The Force Awakens” that’s Luke and in “The Last Jedi” and “The Rise of Skywalker” that’s Kylo.

Who is she when that’s not her primary focus? Now we’ll never know. Yes, Poe is a child of the resistance, a spice runner and, now, a general, but who is Poe? In both “The Force Awakens” and “The Rise of Skywalker we see the beginnings of his story, a child of the resistance who, perhaps due to his parent’s deaths winds up a spice runner (something I don’t find as objectionable as many do-historically People of Color often do things deemed objectionable to support themselves or their families in troubled times) before coming back into the resistance fold with the return of information about Luke Skywalker’s return. We are given hints of his time as a spice runner, a possible past romance with Zorrie and then nothing else.

Finn is perhaps the biggest mystery. Even his name is not his own, given to him by Poe upon their first meeting. We will never know who he came from, what specifically about “the force” drove him to leave the First Order and trust the Resistance. We’ll never learn more about his force sensitivity and what that means for his potential future as a Jedi, we’ll never learn about the other stormtroopers who are also potentially force sensitive. So much is left up to guesswork and it is the worst part of the ending to me.

Anika: I was not satisfied at all. As I said before, the redeemed hero dying is so predictable. The story of the Skywalkers ends as one of tragedy and not hope(I’m sorry saying you are a Skywalker does not make you one). Rey is back in the desert again. I really don’t see how some found this satisfying.

Logan: No, because now Han and Leia died for nothing. That is the worst ending I could have imagined for two heroes of their caliber.

Maggie: No. I genuinely do not know how anyone can be satisfied with that ending. Han, Leia, and Luke died for nothing. The Skywalker line is dead. A Palpatine is using their name. Rey is back on a desert planet, right where she began.

Jenna: No. I felt like I left the theater with more questions than when I walked in, and that’s never something you want from the conclusion of a trilogy. I walked out literally feeling used and abused.

Heather: No. I am not satisfied at all. As a whole this movie was a mess. I know that JJ Abrams and Chris Terrio want to place the blame of that on to literally everyone but themselves but the fact of the matter is Rian Johnson dismantled everything in The Last Jedi which gave them a fresh start to tell a different story. Instead, they pretended that TLJ didn’t happen at all, retconned everything that happened in it, and once again fell on to using what worked in the original trilogy, instead of doing what their paid to do and giving us a cohesive, good, imaginative story. Putting all of your faith in to a trilogy and thinking it’s going to lead somewhere that they assured you was hopeful and good and having the rug pulled from under you is not what I would call a good time.

Kylo Ren; Redeemed or not? Do actions speak louder than words?

Cam: Definitely yes. Adam Driver was given nearly 0 lines after the redemption, so it’s hard to speak about words here, but ultimately his character did everything in his power to fight Palpatine and save Rey, so, yes.

April: I do not believe that Kylo Ren was redeemed, nor do I believe it was ever in the cards for him to be redeemed. There is a common belief that Kylo turned due to abuse, but we are not canonically shown any evidence of this. Yes, a voice whispering in your head can be stressful, but Kylo was born to two of the biggest heroes in the resistance and nephew to another, even if he didn’t feel comfortable turning to Luke (and who can blame him) in the aftermath of Luke contemplating killing him, his parents were still there. In choosing to run to Snoke, Kylo made a choice that would forever taint his life. In each movie of the franchise, we continue to see Kylo choose darkness and power.

In “The Force Awakens” he slaughters a village to obtain information about his uncle. He kills Snoke to become the Supreme Leader, in “The Last Jedi”, and when Rey offers him her hand, the final opportunity to truly do good, he refuses because his desire for power is stronger. Even as “The Rise of Skywalker” begins he is once again slaughtering people (who, to be fair, were a cult loyal to both Vader and Lady Corvax-but again, this information is not shown it is told in the Visual Dictionary). When he is searching out Palpatine it is, once again, to kill the person standing between him and the potential for true power. Kylo is, for all intents and purposes his grandfather all over again and neither of them deserved redemption in the true sense of the word.

Kylo’s last few acts, to run to Exegol, to fight against Palpatine and to give his life force to Rey are-ultimately much the same as his grandfather’s. He realizes that he’ll never truly have the ability to atone for his actions and so he gives his life to Rey, allowing her to be the balance his grandfather was always meant to be. This sacrifice is the most noble thing Kylo is ever shown to have done and because it comes so late in the trilogy, literally the final act of the final act, it is largely worthless. It is possible to give characters like Kylo real redemption (see Zuko of “The Last Airbender” fame) and it would perhaps have been possible even for Kylo, if only they’d begin his journey to that redemption in the end of “The Force Awakens” or the beginning of “The Last Jedi.”.

Anika: Redeemed. It’s been something I have wanted for him since The Force Awakens. I expected more with his redemption, however. He never got to express himself through words and I hate that he was sidelined for the fight with Palpatine. I’m glad we got a redemption, but it felt a little anti-climatic.

Logan: Not a fan of Kylo Ren, but I would say yes. I think as Han said, Kylo Ren is dead. We were seeing Ben Solo by the end of that movie and I wish we hadn’t had to say goodbye so soon. Adam Driver made him the perfect combination of Han and Leia and that could have been a joy to watch for more than just a few minutes.

Maggie: I have been rooting for Bendemption since The Force Awakens. The execution of redemption was awful. I would love to know what J.J. has against Adam Driver, because from the moment Kylo Ren is “redeemed” he speaks a single line of dialogue — “ow”. While I love the moment where Ben fights the Knights of Ren, I would’ve preferred some sort of dialogue as a trade. Not to mention the film starts with Kylo Ren reduced to his The Force Awakens persona and seems to forget The Last Jedi even happened. I got redemption, but at what cost?

Jenna: Kylo Ren being redeemed was one of the things I was looking forward to most this movie, but I was severely let down with how I got it. The scene with Kylo and Han was cheaply ripped straight from The Force Awakens. I believe they could have done this in a good way, but sadly, the way they chose to do it wasn’t the best. However, I did enjoy his scene on Exegol when he fought against the Knights of Ren. Unfortunately, this was also downplayed by Ben’s lack of dialogue in the whole end of the movie. After his redemption, we never get to hear him talk again, and then he dies.

Heather: Absolutely redeemed. Not only did Han explicitly say (and it doesn’t matter that it was in Kylo’s head because it’s what the writing wanted the audience to take away from the conversation by explicitly stating it) that “Kylo Ren is dead, my son is alive.” But Kylo threw his saber in to the ocean, picked up a blaster, and became Ben Solo. His mannerisms, his wardrobe, everything screamed, “I’m a different person now!” So, yes. It’s funny that you ask if actions speak louder than words though since the only word he said after his redemption was “Ow.” Don’t get me started.

Would you like to see more of the Skywalker saga? Is it put to rest?

Cam: Before watching Rise of Skywalker I would say no, but right now I kinda need one last movie to actually give justice to the Skywallkers. Just saying.

April: As I stated earlier, I believe that “The Rise of Skywalker” puts paid to the Skywalker Saga. I believe that their story has reached it’s natural, hard fought conclusion. I am satisfied with where our original characters have been left, with perhaps the exception of General Leia Organa but we all know why her story ended the way it did. With that being said, I would be interested in following the story of our sequel trio for one more film, watching them truly discover themselves and their reason independent of the influence of the Skywalker family. I’d also love a story about Rose Tico and Paige Tico, if Kelly Marie Tran would be interested.

Anika: In the current state of affairs, no. If they explain that Ben isn’t really dead, but exists in the World between worlds and there is a quest to bring him back, I’m all for it. I don’t see how you continue the saga without a Skywalker. Again, I don’t count Rey as one because she says so.

Logan: Unless they can give me a do over of this entire movie then no. Leave it lying in it’s own mediocrity. It’s what Abrams, Kennedy, and crew deserve for allowing fear of a fandom to dictate their every decision. They were afraid of giving any one group something so, as a result, no one got anything. Let’s just put the Skywalkers out of their misery and move on to new characters and new sagas. (Once again, unless I can get a do over of the final film in the saga which will never happen.)

Maggie: Look, if it’s the actual Skywalkers and not Rey Palpatine using their name, then sure. I keep saying I would love to see them create something like The Clone Wars to improve upon this terribly rushed film.

Jenna: I would only like to see more of the Skywalker saga if they would bring back Ben. Put an actual Skywalker on my screen, or I don’t want it.

Heather: I’m not particularly thrilled that at the end of the “Skywalker Saga” all of the Skywalker’s are actually dead. In fact, I’m downright bitter about it and don’t find that satisfying in any way whatsoever. So, I think after a rest (perhaps 5-10 years) I would like to see more of the Skywalker Story. Maybe Ben is in the World Between Worlds paying penance, maybe Force Ghost Luke is getting up to some after life shenanigans. I don’t know but I do know that I’d love to see it.

Who is your favorite character of the sequel trilogy?

Cam: Ben Solo.

April: My favorite character in this last installment of the Skywalker Saga is Finn. Former stormtrooper turned resistance hero his story is what a lot of people wanted Kylo Ren’s to be. He’s bold and protective of his found family. He’s kind and generous and, even as he makes mistakes, he works consistently to correct them. He has never left a friend behind. He is loyal and fair. His choice to consistently do “the right thing” when every piece of his upbringing tells him otherwise is hero-worthy. I’m so grateful that he was created and so grateful that John Boyega was chosen to breathe life into him.

Anika: Kylo Ren, hands down. He was more of an emotional, adult child still seeking love and approval than a real villain to me. His struggle with the Light that’s still a part of him, his connection to Rey which is his first real connection to anyone in years, his vulnerability and his redemption made him more than a one dimensional villain. No one could have done this character any more justice than Adam Driver did.

Logan: If I discount one off characters then Poe Dameron. He’s a lot like Han Solo, who has been the love of my life for as far back as I can remember. Also, his introduction in The Force Awakens is one of my all time favorite sequel trilogy moments and I loved him butting heads with Holdo all through The Last Jedi. He was also was the sole character in our main trio to truly keep me invested in this last film.

Maggie: I’m torn between Kylo Ren and Poe Dameron. I think they’re both phenomenal characters and I only wish that the final film had done better with their storylines.

Jenna: Kylo Ren is my absolute favorite. Watching his internal conflict turn to redemption, hate for Rey turn to love, and everything in between was what captivated me to this trilogy. It also helps that Adam Driver is such an amazing actor. He could make watching a cactus interesting.

Heather: Despite being Reylo Trash (which I am and have the necklace that says so to prove it), after much thought I think I’m going to give my favorite character award to Rose. While she was disgustingly underutilized and truly only got one movie to show her stuff I find myself often thinking about “We win not by fighting what we hate but saving what we love.” I find Rose to be an inspirational character. She’s tough but loving. She seems less like a character and more like someone I would know in reality. I don’t know if my love for Rose is for the character herself or because of Kelly Marie Tran’s performance of her but that’s my final answer.

Do you agree? Disagree? Love it, hate it? Either way sound off below in the comments or find us on twitter @TVSource. Thank you to all of our wonderful participants for giving us your wonderful, well thought out answers!

#reylo #tros #fan reactions #from different sides of the fandom #roundtable #reviews #interesting

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