#you go one detail too much or one highlight too heavy and it's messed up

[ashesandhackles]

'Be brave like my mother, Professor'

I have always loved the Harry-Slughorn scene in the books where Harry coerces pushes Slughorn into giving him the vital Horcrux memory, because of how strongly it parallels Tom Riddle. The quality of willingness to do whatever it takes for a larger goal.

The scene begins with Hagrid and Slughorn singing drunken songs, and Harry refilling the drink in the background (already paralleling Tom who got Hagrid to fess up Fluffy information in a bar). That already adds a coercive quality to the scene, given that Felix felicis also assures Harry that Slughorn won't remember handing over this memory tomorrow (which the films try to make consensual cos they can't have hero doing messed up things, but HJP is a lil messed up. That's why he is a great protagonist).

Anyway, in my recent re-read, I picked up something I hadn't realised before:

“No — well, I was only one when they died,” said Harry, his eyes on the flame of the candle flickering in Hagrid’s heavy snores. “But I’ve found out pretty much what happened since. My dad died first. Did you know that?” “I — I didn’t,” said Slughorn in a hushed voice. “Yeah . . . Voldemort murdered him and then stepped over his body toward my mum,” said Harry.

I have highlighted a line that Harry can't have known until the next book - until he actually sees his parents' murder through Voldemort's eyes. Until now, this is the information he has:

James' death:

Then came a new voice, a man’s voice, shouting, panicking — “Lily, take Harry and go, It’s him, Go! Run, I’ll hold him off~ The sounds of someone stumbling from a room — a door bursting open — a cackle of high-pitched laughter 

Lily's death:

“Not Harry, not Harry, please not Harry,” “ Stand aside, you silly girl ... stand aside, now. ...” “ Stand aside, you silly girl ... stand aside, now. ...” “ Not Harry, please no, take me, kill me instead — ”

And of course, Voldemort's taunts in Philosopher's Stone, which he will reference. The detail about Voldemort stepping over his father's body towards his mum is constructed - something he may have imagined while replaying their last moments in his head in POA (which he is said to have done), and he particularly uses this line, of Voldemort casually degrading his father's body by stepping over it to really push Slughorn's buttons, to horrify him.

Respectability is important to Slughorn, and he will emotionally respond to callous details like this. Harry understands this, given what he observes about Slughorn over the course of this book.

And then Harry tells Slughorn what Voldemort said in Philosopher's Stone:

Slughorn gave a great shudder, but he did not seem able to tear his horrified gaze away from Harry’s face. “He told her to get out of the way,” said Harry remorselessly. “He told me she needn’t have died. He only wanted me. She could have run.” “Oh dear,” breathed Slughorn. “She could have ... she needn’t ... That’s awful. ...”

This is what Voldemort says:

but your mother needn’t have died ... she was trying to protect you. ... Now give me the Stone, unless you want her to have died in vain.”

Interesting how Harry uses a similar tactic on Slughorn later in the scene: "give me the memory or she would have died in vain".

Anyway, back to the scene. To make the scene even more horrifying for Slughorn, Harry infers Lily's motivations from what he has heard from his parents' last moments and says it to induce more horror:

“It is, isn’t it?” said Harry, in a voice barely more than a whisper. “But she didn’t move. Dad was already dead, but she didn’t want me to go too. She tried to plead with Voldemort ... but he just laughed. ...”

The idea that Harry replayed his parents' death over and over again back when he first heard their deaths, imagined their motivation, constructed a scene for himself is extremely sad. This is how he talks about it in POA:

D’you know what I see and hear every time a dementor gets too near me?” Ron and Hermione shook their heads, looking apprehensive. “I can hear my mum screaming and pleading with Voldemort. And if you’d heard your mum screaming like that, just about to be killed, you wouldn’t forget it in a hurry. And if you found out someone who was supposed to be a friend of hers betrayed her and sent Voldemort after her — ” “There’s nothing you can do!” said Hermione, looking stricken.

But the fact that he then uses something that is obviously a horrifying and personal memory against Slughorn is absolutely chilling.

Anyway, here is Harry taking the leaf out of Voldemort's book:

"But you won’t help her son,” said Harry. “She gave me her life, but you won’t give me a memory.” Harry looked steadily into Slughorn’s tear-filled eyes. The Potions master seemed unable to look away.

After which, Harry takes ownership of being the 'Chosen One' out loud to another person. That is, of course, important in context of next chapter because it also deals with statement and interrogates it.

It is only at the end of the scene that Harry offers mercy for Slughorn's guilt: "You'd cancel out anything you did by giving me that memory. It would be a very brave and noble thing to do."

#harry james potter #horace slughorn #half blood prince #harry potter #tom riddle #voldemort #the abandoned boys

[wilanserulia]

Just for fun, I figured it'd be interesting to post a "before and after" comparison, with the raw picture straight from the game on the left (before shaders) and my final edit on the right. I don't always do this, god I don't have enough time in the day to do this for every photo I take and in retrospect I could have probably spent my afternoon in better ways yesterday, but I think some shots really deserve the extra effort. So if that sounds interesting to you let me show you a breakdown of what goes into a shot like this!

When I decide bring a picture on the editing table, usually first and foremost I take a photo of the environment by itself, and a chromakey photo of just the characters of the foreground (I eventually cut out the rest of the floor by hand). These will come in handy for adjusting the elements of the picture independently later.

What I'll probably touch up on first is smoothing out polygons. Shoulders, knees and other joints tend to create unnatural sharp angles when bent too much, and muscles like the thigh here can't accurately simulate the way human muscles flex. Not to mention the body horror going on with that thumb.

While I'm at it, I painted over some parts of the model where the lighting got confused, and made it look a little more believable, like on the fingers of Wilan's hand here.

The biggest reason I did a photoshop pass however is the skirt. Everyone who has ever tried to pose with skirts, robes or capes knows that FFXIV isn't really built for handling cloth, and there's a lot of negotiating involved to make it look decent. I sent more time than I care to admit trying to get the best approximation possible, smoothed it out with Liquify and then painted over folds that didn't quite look believable and details that clipped in awkward places.

While I was painting over polygons, there were a handful of places where I couldn't avoid some clipping, and certain spots were more noticeable than others. For all the spots where the 3D models really wouldn't behave I resorted to just fix it manually.

Once that's done, I went over the lighting. Gpose's three posable lights did most of the work, but I still went in to take care of some details. In most places I just painted over additional highlights on shiny material, or I added subtle touches of rim lighting to make the pose more readable.

And then, for something less subtle, I sometimes just add more rim light for no other reason than to make the pose more dramatic or to further make it pop from the background. This is a photo with a strong pose and sense of motion, so it's worth taking the time to highlight it.

(speaking of which, the base pose I used for this shot was done by Nhagiri, even though as I almost always do when I use pre-made poses I spent plenty of time adjusting it and calibrating it to my two specific OCs)

This shot had pretty intense and dramatic back-light too, so since FFXIV's graphic engine usually calls it a day early when it comes to draw ground shadows I've just painted it myself.

And most importantly, the lighting was very carefully set but I couldn't manage to properly light up their faces without messing with the overall light and shadow contrast. So I carefully mixed in a different photo with better lighting on their faces, and then calibrated the luminosity and exposure to make sure they'd be the the centerpoint of the shot.

Well that's about it for the models, now off to the color correction.

Most of it was done in photoshop but a lot of the heavy lifting was made by shaders. My go-to presets are @owlincense's CandleBlooms (formerly known as Purple Cocoon), which I've used in pretty much every single one of my photos and can't recommend enough. For this shot in particular I've used her Tourmaline Colorful preset.

It looks great already, but I have some further touches in mind for the specific mood I'm looking for for this scene and I don't want to mess to mess with the shaders' interface to achieve them, so post-editing it is.

First of all I've adjusted the tonality of the background to be colder and more bluish and a tiny bit less saturated, while accentuating the reds of the two characters, bumping up slightly their saturation and contrast. I've also manually simulated bright light coming from the main hall in what's hopefully a convincingly seamless fashion, reinforcing the light source and making the strong highlights and shadows feel more justified, and a vignette to darken the far edges of the composition.

Just a little dash of particles caught in the light as the last touch, and that's about it! Wilan and Delen can enjoy their passionate tango, in a little quite corner to themselves, just outside the bustle of the celebration in the main hall.

[sauntering-down]

another dream post compiled from discord

ignore this lol i just like to have them all under one convenient tag...

i had an extremely detailed and vivid dream right before i woke up this morning, and for once i woke up AFTER it finished rather than in the middle... so ofc now i can only remember a few random bits

like the possibly-magical rose hips this dude got from another world

and my tattoo sleeves which had been hidden via magic and when some kind of potion was poured over my arms they all came back

and also my cousin and i wanted to go to the beach alone but i guess we couldn't?

and at the end, when the "adventure" was over, i was packing all my stuff into plastic bins to take home and i had so many i didn't think my dad could fit them all into the car...

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anyway i also had this delightful little dream where i took a train home from my old elementary school? like there was a station there... the entire school looked bizarre, but dream-me rationalized that as 'oh, i haven't been here since i was 12 and they've added onto it since then, i shall allow Lauren to guide me since she has younger siblings who went here post-renovation'. so we walked through the halls and to the station on the far side of the school. we had to wait for train 398 - there was another that came before it, but according to Lauren (a childhood friend who lived around the corner from me) that one didn't stop anywhere near our houses. mind you, i think our train stopped somewhere near the library, which is further from our houses than the school... but whatever. we let the first train pass and got on the second. sort of. mostly we clung to these poles on the outside and stood on the steps like it was some kind of trolley. i dimly remember thinking this was dangerous but not really caring lol. then the next day i took the train home alone and was very proud of myself, although i think i might've left something on it. there was also some later bit where i was in class at that same school and i'd been absent the previous day, so my teacher had moved my desk somewhere weird? he told me to move it back if i could, and it wasn't heavy so i could lift it and put it in place easily... idk. the end.

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hate it when i have interesting dreams but only remember snippets of them!! in one i was involved with some huge battle to decide the future of humanity or something world-changing like that... and it took place in a shopping mall for some reason. in another i was a boy named Nim who was sixth of eleven children - or, as he put it, "five on each side" making him the true middle child of the family, lol. they lived on this big wooded lot somewhere in Hawaii, apparently... most of his siblings also had weird Dweep names (there were two boys named Zolt and Melk) but some got away with normal ones, like the brother just older than him who was called Liam. last dream, my family had moved into a new house somewhere. we went to eat at this nearby restaurant several times and my brother and i kept inexplicably taking a table that these two older men liked? sometimes they'd sit with us anyway and we'd just ignore one another?? but then one time my grandparents (including my long-dead maternal grandmother lol) came too and some of them sat with us and suddenly the men were super chatty and nice and fatherly, it was weird. then we went back home and i showed my mother how much the lighting in my bathroom sucked, but at least the view from the windows in my bedroom was GORGEOUS - one faced a bunch of fields and rolling hills, the other looked out towards the ocean. i wanted to get some pictures or like a short video panorama to show you. and then i woke up.

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i had the weirdest fucking dream early this morning, right before i woke up. i wish i could explain it but it really was an incoherent mess. highlights include me actually going to a party a girl i knew back in school was throwing, her living in a place in Oakdale called 'Halloween', sliding headfirst down a hilly street at extreme speeds and somehow being fine, some sort of music or vocal contest at my school kinda like NYSSMA but some people were treating it like a gala and brought champagne and shit, some OTHER kind of school competition where we'd designed mascots and stuff for our teams, the school itself looking half like my high school and half like a Target or grocery store, buying an insane amount of expensive merch for this contest featuring our weird mascots... god it was so bizarre

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meanwhile i remember two dreams... one was the typical "i need to go to school but i have so much stuff to pack i'm running late" dream. in the other i was in this little town where a bunch of people i'd known as a kid lived... i went skateboarding with some of them, i think? i was bad at it lol. and one friend had a cool scrapbook of all the stuff our old friends had done since high school, which was a nice little "everyone's succeeding and achieving their dreams or at least LIVING and You Are Not", thanks a lot, subconscious. there was also this hotel called the "World Star" up atop this very steep little hill in the middle of town, which is funny because that exact same hill/hotel has shown up in my dreams from time to time and in this one i made a point to LOOK for it and there it was! it was a nice town though

it's ALWAYS atop that small but very steep hill

i've never been inside it but once or twice i've walked/biked up the driveway (which takes Effort because it's so steep lol)

i think this is the first time it's actually had a name!

thrilling development in my life

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dreamed my family and i were taking the cover off the aboveground pool at the old house and there was a cobra lurking in it. when we realized that we started ushering everyone (because there were a whole bunch of people there for some reason) inside, along with the cats who were inexplicably out. unfortunately the cobra followed us onto the deck and tried to get inside? since i hadn't made it in yet, i grabbed the snake behind the head, planning to toss it into the grass, but it twisted around just enough to bite my thumb. it also bit some random dude somehow. i kept holding it but now i was yelling for my mother to grab a knife and behead it, which she TRIED to do, but it took a really long time until she'd like... sawed through the snake enough that i could let go of it... it was gross lol. and then i was like "hm, should i actually worry about this bite? i know cobras are venomous but i don't feel much of anything. maybe my thumb is a little numb. skin looks sorta pink and swollen around the bite. eh, might as well pop over to the ER and make sure." so then i grabbed a tote bag from under my bed and started packing it in case i had to stay a day or two at the hospital - taking my phone and laptop and chargers and whatnot - and then woke up. honestly better than the previous night's "it's time to go to school but i haven't packed my bag yet and i have so much stuff it's taking forever to pack and i keep finding more stuff and i'm going to be late" dream.

The funny thing is I remember the other bitten dude being like “if it’s serious they might have to airlift you somewhere else” and I went “oh cool I’ve never ridden in a helicopter before! :D :D :D”

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good morning, i had a dream where i went to the dentist supposedly to have a tooth extracted, but we never actually got around to it... first i had to do some treatment that involved chewing what appeared to be a piece of red clay that was all gritty and sandy? and then the dentist and assistants were making sausage in the lobby and there was meat and casing everwhere??????

(Mary: ...now...hear me out on this...but i do feel like that's a huge red flag)

"dentist removed my broken tooth and also an unbroken arm. sent me home with some delicious sausages that gave my daughter a prion disease. 2/5 stars, dentist was very pleasant but i couldn't get past the mess in the lobby-slash-sausage-factory and also my daughter is terminally ill now."

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i had some rather bizarre dreams... one was a very weird little thing where my girlfriend (whoever she was) died of anaphylaxis after accidentally eating something she was allergic to. but that was just like, a premonition or something? so i was trying to prevent it??? except i failed to stop her from eating The Thing, so her mouth started getting super swollen and all - and also we had this dog who was sick i guess - and i immediately went to call 911 so hopefully we could get to the hospital in time. the 911 operator was basically like "lol sounds like nbd" when i told him about my girlfriend, so i told him about the dog too and he was like "oh okay, i'll send a helicopter to airlift you to the vet by the railroad." hung up like ?????? because i had no idea if he was serious... but then a helicopter landed outside? so i took the dog and my GF (who at some point along the line became my IRL cousin. wild.) onto the helicopter, thinking i'd call 911 again from the vet and maybe get someone who'd listen about my girlfriend-cousin's allergy. we make it to the vet, which looked more like a weird hostel or something, the dog is whisked away, and i'm about to call again when girlfriend-cousin is like "eh, i feel better, i'm just gonna go take a nap." and went to some little back room to do so. i was VERY confused and kept checking on her to make sure she was alive, and then woke up

also there was another part of the dream where i was back in my hometown, on a road supposedly near Vets Highway that definitely doesn't exist. i was riding my bike and took a shortcut through like... a video game store or a Best Buy or something??? idk why haha. but i wound up on a residential street where there were a TON of fruit trees. i saw a huge pear tree first, followed by a bunch of others, all loaded with fruit - several of them were like, banana and mango trees, which i'm pretty sure don't grow on LI but i didn't notice then lol. i was snapping pics with my phone, but i don't remember anything else

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k i had two dreams before i got up this morning... the second one was a really depressing dream about visiting an old university i'd supposedly been to at one point, so let's not. but the FIRST one? i went up to the Honda in Cocoa because i guess something had happened to my car and it was time to go pick it up. i get there and the guy's like "oh yeah, we had to do some body work but it's fine :)" and i was like :) and then... he shows me this tiny white car which is NOTHING like my actual car. and when i say tiny, i mean child-sized, like one of those battery-powered toy Jeeps kids can ride around in at 2 mph. i just shrugged and rolled with it lol. my dad texted me like "just got the bill and the repairs only cost $95 👍🏼" and i did not know how to explain what those repairs had done. so i get in this car and my legs do not fit. they literally dangle over the hood and almost to the ground. i had to sit on the BACK of the driver's seat in order to keep my legs in so i can work the brake pedal (the gas was controlled by this weird handle on the steering wheel??). there was no windshield or roof. it still accelerated like a normal car so i went "hm, not safe, whatever" and just hoped i didn't tip over or anything.

drove out onto the road. it was daytime at this point, but by the time i made it to the corner to get on route 1, it was like, midnight. didn't see anything wrong with this. car only gets to 40 mph max. i am getting passed a lot. finally decide maybe i should drive on the sidewalk for my own safety and immediately after that, the car slooooowed way down, then died completely. my childhood friend Lauren was there for some reason - we inspected the car a little and concluded it wasn't going anywhere. i said i was going to ask my dad for a ride and she didn't have to wait with me, she was like "...okay" but didn't seem too happy to leave because i was stranded in the middle of the night in a rough area, though i guess she did leave because poof, gone. just as i'm about to text my dad, a car pulls up behind me - it's my brother, who asks if i need a ride. he makes me remove my jacket and shoes first so i don't get his car dirty. his car is inexplicably really cluttered - he had a tea kettle on a burner in there and everything - but finally i was allowed to get in. we stuck my car in his trunk, lol, and that's when i woke up.

also at some point i was in this huge mall where i might have worked in the Hot Topic? not sure what that was all about... maybe connected to the university dream

the only bit of THAT dream which was funny was the part where i was in a dorm and elected to take a shower in this tub that was weirdly placed in the middle of a hallway, right next to the stairs. it was very inadequately hidden by two small shower curtains. people kept walking by and going "who are you and why are you in our shower????" while i'm just casually using all their hair products. or stealing them. literally walked out with a few.

and at the end one of the girls i met wrote me this little story and drew a picture based on some tale i'd told her earlier, and it was adorable and i was so happy i took a photo of it with the other girl's phone and sent it to my own so i could keep it

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god i just remembered the freaky-ass dream i had last night

where i was in some house vaguely resembling my old one and i glanced into another room and saw a man climbing in through the window

and i freaked out and ran to alert my brother, who was kinda going to help me but then... didn't really? and this dude's chasing me through the house, trying to hurt me, and i kept throwing things and hitting him and it wasn't slowing him down?? and at one point i managed to get away, went downstairs, and found my dad and brother. my dad was half-naked. not the half i would've preferred. anyway he was all concerned when i told him what was happening but when the guy showed up again he just... forgot?????? and didn't help me at all? so i gave up and got my hands on a knife and cut the dude's throat so deeply i almost severed his neck. no blood. it didn't kill him and he had what looked like layers of bacon and lettuce and tomato instead of bones and arteries and whatnot. my dad took a piece of tomato from his gaping-open throat and ate it. i think i willed myself awake at that point because what the fuck.

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i've been trying to explain the dream i had last night, but i'll be damned if i can actually put it into words. it started with a 'let's get the team together for a heist' scene which rapidly deteriorated into 'we're actually going to hunt a giant buffalo who killed my dad' and went downhill rapidly from there. the Google Maps screenshots... the weird side-trip into LotR where Legolas and Gimli were strolling through the woods... the main female character's Russian little sister also hanging out in the woods... building weird traps... finding out the New Guy we'd recruited had actually heisted something and was going to jail... except he didn't go to jail, he was just on house arrest... driving 75mph through a residential neighborhood... New Guy claiming his neighborhood was a slum but it was really gorgeous (though it may not have had electricity??)... the backwards mahjongg game... the $20,000 gold-encrusted piece of chocolate... the woman and Russian sister going on a Christian TV channel to promote watches... little sister hitting on the also-female TV presenter and casually flashing her boobs on live TV (she was like 13/14 so this was. weird)... something about Deadpool at the end and little sister getting an actual badass girlfriend... god it was a mess.

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right before i woke up this AM i had a dream where i was like... some kind of live-in babysitter or au pair for a family on an island in Canada? i was 18 - this was specifically mentioned - and i'd taken this job because of something to do with Pokemon. don't really remember the explanation. anyway the family was Mom, Dad, and a son around 7; he had a French name i don't recall. nice kid. their house was pretty but i don't remember that either. i just know they lived in a semi-suburban little area (there were also a bunch of really skinny townhouses) right on the edge of a forest. after we had dinner i said i was going to take a walk, and i followed this path that ran behind a bunch of other houses' backyards before curving off into the forest. kept thinking i should grab my phone and take pictures to send you, but i wanted to get some in the woods so i headed that way. right after you reached the forest, there was actually a clearing to one side where the local school was, this really gorgeous brick building... ofc just as i got there, a couple of cops kicked me and some other people walking around out of the forest, because apparently there'd been a murder?? idk i was really disappointed because i wanted to take pictures for you, but then i woke up

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can't remember much from last night's dream... my family lived in this little house and there was a sort of shaved ice or snowcone shop attached to it? i guess that was our business? only part i remember clearly was my brother and i sharing a bedroom and i left the window open one night and a guy climbed inside. i think he was planning to hurt or kidnap me but i started yelling and he escaped back out the window.

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weirdass dreams last night. one of them had something to do with Brambleclaw (he had a different name i don't recall - Leaf-something?? - but i still knew it was him) and i think StarClan was sending him shitty visions that made him have seizures. also dreamed there were a bunch of huge blisters on my left thigh and beneath the thin bubbly blister-bit was like, NOTHING. i could see straight down this HOLE in my leg at all the fat and muscle and shit. they stung really badly and i finally went to my ex-nurse mother and asked if i should be worried about this, but she was like "nah nbd". didn't believe her. thanks a lot for the help, mom

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had a fuckin... uncomfortable dream where i was on this hill that had a chairlift to get to all the houses for some reason. there was also a really nice park by a school - i went to the park and hung out for a bit, and apparently there was some event happening at the school at the same time, because when i left, there were a few cops directing traffic. one of them stopped me and asked if i had been at the school and if i lived around here. when i said no, just chilling in the park, he made me get out and pretty much grope-searched me?! for some reason he thought i'd gotten surgery to hide a gun under my skin and was suspicious of these "scars" i don't actually have???? it was really really weird... luckily i think eventually his partner told him to let me leave, i clearly didn't have a weapon...

didn't even MENTION the part where my dream-boyfriend and i were sleeping in a double bed and some rando aunt of mine inexplicably joined us and may or may not have died there??? dream-BF either made her go elsewhere or just. disposed of her body if she was dead lol, and in doing so spilled Oatmeal Square cereal all over my floor

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had boba tea in my dream!! got it from this little stand in the shopping center across the highway from my old house. shopping center actually exists, but the stand does not... anyway i was extremely nervous because i had no idea how/what to order, but eventually i got myself a black tea (in frappuccino/milkshake form) with boba! they were also pretty busy so the guy also forgot to charge me for it lol. i wanted to take a pic to send you, but it was taking FOREVER for my phone to focus because it was so dark - btw it was like 10pm - so i decided to walk to the other end of the shopping center where the McDonald's was, in search of better lighting. had to go that way anyway since i'd left my car in a parking lot further down the highway (WHY i did this involves the earlier part of the dream, which made 0 sense, so we'll skip it). the Chinese takeout place we used to get food from was still there, but now it was a freestanding restaurant; i was going to walk through there, but couldn't find the door out once i was inside. had to go back out the way i came. someone might've been held captive in there, not really sure. kept going along towards the well-lit McDonald's, drinking my tea... i think i woke up around then

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woke up this AM and fell back asleep and had a short but awesome dream... i guess my family had moved to another house and my new bedroom was HUGE. had gorgeous French doors leading outside and everything, plus this massive bathroom that had two separate tubs - one was just a regular if large bathtub, the other was a hot tub i think? and whoever had lived in the house before us must've left without taking everything, because their stuff was still all over my bedroom. i was sorting through my things and finding so much of theirs in the process... i tried on a dress that didn't fit... found a bunch of posters in a box beneath the bed... there were all sorts of unfamiliar books... also found photo albums in the wardrobe and i was about to check them out because i wanted to know WHO had lived here, but then my cousins arrived and i had to go hang out with them instead, and then i woke up

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had this dream where i was in the front/side yard of my old house (which didn't look very much like my old house, but whatev), digging up all kinds of Legos from the dirt?? like, i have no idea why they were there or who buried them, but there were TONS and i was digging them out, cleaning them off, and putting them in a bin. finally realized it was getting late, so i went inside to wash up... and then found out it was the night of my graduation from junior high (properly called the 'Moving Up Ceremony' lol). cue panic because we were SUPER late and i didn't have time to do anything but wash my hands. so we drove over to the school, which again looked nothing like my actual junior high, and my parents and brother went to the LGI to sit down while i met the rest of the 9th graders backstage. everyone's all dressed neatly and the girls have purses and whatnot; meanwhile, here i am in dirty denim shorts and a tank top, carrying an empty ziplock bag????? i was deeply self-conscious about this but nobody really seemed to care, or at least they didn't tell me about it lol. the ceremony started, but for some reason they decided to split it into two halves - sat through the first half, then we were dismissed for like an hour to go have a meal in this enormous cafeteria, then we'd have the other half and get our 'diplomas'. met up with the fam in the cafeteria, but i wasn't really hungry, so instead i went outside and found a friend of mine named Liam. fyi, Liam is an OC i made up for something once.

anyway, he'd come in a golf cart and we hopped inside and drove off along a path through a bunch of hills until we reached a HUGE stone building. inside was very dimly lit and the floor was just a giant mess of sand. bunch of other people were digging around - apparently there were TONS of archaeological artifacts buried in this place and everyone was finding stuff constantly. i was like "hell yeah, finally my Lego dig experience comes in handy" and started digging through the sand too. found a gold coin almost immediately, followed by a couple other random trinkets. i also found these two stone boxes that had to be EXPLODED open - i inexplicably had a bomb on me, and Liam had a lighter and offered to blow them open for me, but i was like "no, let's wait until we're done, we might find more of these boxes and i only have one bomb. also people might panic." and then i woke up, so i have no idea what was in the boxes or if i ever went back to school for the other half of the ceremony.

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hmmmm dreamed i was walking around some little town at night, when it was kind of cold - not LATE at night, there were places open and a bunch of people milling around, and it would've been nice except i was inexplicably carrying Jazz with me and she wasn't at all happy about it. and in another part of the dream, i had a twin brother named Jakub (because i guess 'Jacob' is too mainstream? come on, at least make it 'Jaiykub'!). he died when we were kids, though; he either fell or got hit with something and fractured his skull so badly it killed him. RIP

-----

dream last night was weird... in one part i was at school and this dude and i went into a classroom together because he was supposed to be sort of a guide for a new student, a guy who also happened to be blind... anyway they're all sitting at a table working things out and meanwhile i'm just in the background loudly sharpening a pencil??? and somehow i screwed that up so i showered myself and the new student in pencil shavings??????? idfk... different part i was playing with Legos, yay. someone had built a huge house and i was messing around with it and suddenly realized there was a whole hidden section in the attic above the garage. except then i was really there and as i tried to get back down through the hatch in the floor i slipped and fell into the garage and broke my leg.

and the house (not the lego version, the actual one?) belonged to an old lady named Samantha who had all these sculptures and miniatures and tiny replicas of stuff in her yard... not sure why i was messing around in her secret attic, but i think i was looking for a photograph

AND there was also a part where my mom and i went shopping at some department store and i found a skirt i LOVED - it had a bunch of patches and pins on it - but it was $100, SUPER short, and probably wouldn't fit me anyway. i was trying to take a picture of it but failed miserably.

-----

hmmm last night's dreams... in one i was in my grandparents' old house in Deansboro, though it looked pretty Wrong lol. i went down to the basement where the garage was (except irl it was not) and was looking for something in the middle of the night in the dark?? and then suddenly i saw a door opening and someone stepping inside, and i freaked out and slammed the door into the guy???? he fell on the floor, groaning, and my grandfather came downstairs just as the guy jumped up and ran away... apparently it was some neighbor kid who kept breaking into their garage lol. and there was something else about finding these 'uneven arrows' (arrows with one side longer than the other i guess) carved into things to lead me to a box buried by a guy named Troy, who'd hidden his journal in a box underground... /shrug

-----

most of what i remember of my dream was living in this really pretty neighborhood somewhere in New England, very rural, with this little abandoned building down the road that was being turned into a cute post office, and another building just a bit further that had a couple things in it, and one was a cafe that sold bubble tea - i was going to get some boba and send you a pic and i was all excited about it, but that was the end of the dream

-----

can't really explain my dream except i was taking some kind of class that could only be summed up as "Capitalism: The LARP" but also we were all playing Warrior Cats

we were all these business owners and shit, except like half the class was given a leg up by having their business ready to go when we started, so they could just start making money. meanwhile the rest of us had to decide what we were doing and get our offices together and dig tunnels (????) so we could get from place to place... and THEN we could start making money... but also we were cats

that'll be the next series, just you wait

you thought cats with magic powers was bad... wait until they start dodging taxes

-----

you were in my dream! i was visiting you or something! we went for a walk on this wooden bridge over a narrow but deep river and you decided we should go for a swim, so you jumped in. i was unsure.jpg but once you proved it was pretty deep and i would probably not be harmed by all the random bits of wood floating in it, i left my headphones (?) in a geode-shaped box on the bridge (but held onto my phone i guess??) and jumped in too. we swam down the river a little ways until we reached the cave it flowed into. the opening was REALLY small and i was like "hell no", you went in a bit but turned around before it got too narrow and came back out. then we swam back to the bridge. then i woke up because the fucking emergency alert test thing blared through my phone at 4:45 am.

-----

had a dream last night where i had a bunch of relatives visiting, so my whole family went to an amusement park (i recall a sort of children's rollercoaster which inexplicably had entire parts of the track separated so the train could 'jump' between them, but it was actually closed down and the track was being properly connected because i assume someone realized that was batshit insane), and then we came home and i went to bed. next morning i got up and it was the last day my relatives were visiting - one of them noticed an ad in the newspaper and we decided we'd all go to some local carnival because admission was half-price. and instead i went off into the foggy woods with a bunch of friends and we explored a creepy abandoned bunker we'd found and, ofc, were attacked by the terrifying shapeshifter who lived down there. @ myself this is why, when faced with the choice between 'creepy abandoned bunker in the woods' and 'carnival', you always choose the carnival.

#dream

[eulerami-art]

//thanks for the nice words about the Nacho portrait, I didn't expect the reception at all 🥺 I'm still working on him structurally and trying to simplify shapes and shadows and not overwork paintings so hard, but I feel a little better knowing I painted something at least. He's definitely getting closer. Might be able to write tonight since I'm at work forever

#its such a delicate balance #you go one detail too much or one highlight too heavy and it's messed up #his skin tone is probably a bit too light + missing some of those deeper shadows but it'll work for now #gotta just let pieces be and move on to the next one #stepping stones here 😤

[sugurugetofavoritemonkey]

14 February (Gojo x Reader)

✵ Pairing : Gojo Satoru x Female Reader.

✵ Summary : Gojo offers you lingerie for Valentine’s day and wants you to try it on for him. 

✵ Word count : 2.1k

✵ Warnings : smut, clothed sex, hot lingerie, bulge kink, creampie, size kink, Gojo’s ego is a warning of his own, lots teasing, nipple play, slight dumbification kink mb?, strength kink (is that a kink?), well tell me if I forgot something.

✵ Note : I think I never wrote that much smut, so tell me if that was okay or not. (At this speed I’m just gonna simp for every anime character on earth ugh).

Also why am I so bad at titles please that’s embarrassing at this point.

ENJOY <3

“Close your eyes for me”, you heard Gojo happily telling you.

It was Valentine’s Day and it seems that Gojo had bought you a gift that he was proud of. He had asked you to sit on the bed while he went fetching it, where he must have hid it. After a few seconds, you could hear his footsteps growing louder the more he was getting closer to where you sat. He placed something into your hands just before telling you to open your eyes. 

When you opened them to see a little red bag sealed with tiny white ribbons, your curiosity just grew bigger. Gojo wasn’t one to choose his gifts hazardly, he always put extra care in them, wanting to show his girlfriend that he knew you perfectly well. Gojo also won’t deny the fact that the compliments that ensue will boost his incredibly big ego, and he wouldn’t hesitate to tease you for it.

You started to pull on the ribbons that held the gift close, and put your hand inside, feeling lace material between your fingers, you then took the clothing out and raised it at eye level. It was a beautiful and sexy blue lingerie set. This set, indeed, couldn't be compared to the ones you already owned.

The gift included a beautiful bra, which was almost common if not for the little shape hearted holes at nipples levels. There were also a cute crotchless panties and a garter belt with thigh-high stockings. 

Except the stockings, all the lace lingerie was exactly the same color as Gojo’s eyes, an electric cyan blue, making the gift even more detailed, even though you already knew this set wasn’t meant to go outside, and that Gojo already had plans prepared in his mind.

“What do you think about trying it out right now, baby? Just to be sure if it suits you well”, he cheekily grinned down at you. 

“You think I don’t know what you want? I can already see your bulge, you horny pervert”, you laughed, while raising yourself to your feet with the lingerie still in your hands, on your way to change in the bathroom. 

When you close the door, you can hear Gojo screams at you in his annoying voice, “You should rather thank your fantastic boyfriend for giving you a wonderful gift, you ungrateful brat”. 

As you laugh at his attempt to make you boost his ego for the umpteenth time of the day, you remove all of your clothes and start to put on the blue lingerie, the bra, panties and the suspender belt with the stockings. 

When you’re finally done, you look at yourself in the mirror, noticing the way that you feel so exposed despite the fact that you took quite a time to put all of this on. You start to think that Gojo didn’t buy these for you but clearly for his own enjoyment, but you’re not surprised, this is Gojo’s style after all.

You opened the bathroom door and stepped outside of it to walk to your shared bedroom. You just let your head peek a little from the door to see your boyfriend sitting where you were earlier, calmly waiting for you. His legs are spreaded as usual, with his elbows on his thighs and his hands dangling between his legs.

When he notices you walking in front of him, he can’t help but smirk teasingly at your entrance. Even though he wears those round black glasses of his, you can definitely see the way his eyes are eating you whole. 

He extends a long arm to grab you by the waist to make you stand between his legs, admiring you while he still is sitting on the bed. 

He takes all the time in the world to look at you from head to toes. 

The way your nippples are hardening from the cold without any material to cover them, the heart shaped material highlighting them. 

The way your beautiful thighs are wrapped up in the stockings, the clips of the garter diving a little into your flesh. 

While his teasing gaze affect you the more he takes his time to devour you with his eyes, you unconsciously puts your hands in front of your cunny, getting wetter by the second, the crotchless panties making it hard to hide it, your juices starting to trickle down your thighs.

When he takes notice of that, Gojo removes the hand that was playing with the elastic band on your stocking, making it slap against your thigh mere seconds ago, and removes gently your hands hiding your pussy from his curious eyes. 

As he saw the mess he had already made of you without even touching you or saying anything, his ego was well boosted, far more than he expected. 

“It seems that I already had an impact on you sweetheart, does my gift pleased you that much? Or maybe you’re the horniest one in our relationship after all”, he laughed while removing his glasses and putting them aside. 

When his blue eyes looked at you again, taking a second look at your figure, and then sliding his fingers between your wet folds to tease you even more, you couldn't bear his taunting for longer . 

“Gojo...”, you whined out.

“What’s wrong sweetheart? You want something? You can tell me, you know”, he tantalizes you even more, now thrusting two of his fingers through your crotchless panties, your thighs trembling a little from the sudden action, making you put a knee on the bed to support yourself.

“You know what I need, just take me, you idiot”, you say through gritted teeths, but you already know that it won’t work with him, Gojo being the annoying person that he is. 

“Say the magic word and maybe I will think about it, sweet thing”, he mocks you with his smile, speeding his thrusts in your pussy and stopping when he wanted to, just to annoy you further.

When you refuse to give into him that easily, you decide to bring your fingers to your clit, wanting to bring yourself to climax yourself if needed. 

Your poor attempt at defying Gojo is pretty amusing to him, taking your wrist in his free hand to keep you from touching what you shouldn’t, without any struggles from his part. 

Gojo decides to take his fingers out from your pussy making you protest just before he takes your jaw in his wet hand, forcing you to look deeply into his piercing eyes, his mouth almost touching yours, almost giving you the kisses you so crave, almost.

“Come on beauty I know you can say these words, you’re a big girl after all hum?”, he smirks. 

Even though you don’t like to fuel his ego like that, just the fact that his mouth is so close to yours and that your wetness is dripping out of you due to your frustration are enough to make you beg for him, he always wins anyway. 

“...Pleease fuck me Gojo, pleease just do it, I need you”. 

He doesn't need further instructions and presses his lips to you, cutting the air out of your lungs just by the strength of his kisses. Gojo takes you in his arms to properly carry you on the bed, putting your head on the comfy pillow, making you lay under his towering presence. 

“That wasn’t too hard to say, hm? There’s no shame in being my little slut you know”.

When you try to give him a little slap on the head, he catches your wrist in his palm, again. 

“Tch, you know I’m stronger than you and way bigger, why would you try that, pumpkin?”, he mocks as he locks your wrist down the bed just besides your head, then putting his face close to yours, effectively proving his point.

Gojo doesn't bother taking all his clothes off, despite the fact that he’s teasing you all day long, he is after all the horniest in the relationship and can’t wait any more when seeing you so worked up. He only lowers his pants with his boxers and takes out his cock already dripping precum with his free hand. 

Even though he is ready for you, Gojo still can't help being the tease that he is and takes his time to rub his tip up and down your slit, wetting himself with your juices, and pressing his cock on your clit, in order to hear you beg even more for him to fuck you. 

After a few minutes, where he relished in the way your wet eyes alone were pleading for his teasing to stop, and your hips were pushing against his to make his cock slide into you, he finally entered into you, burying himself entirely with a heavy groan. 

He doesn’t wait much longer to start his rapid thrusts, his teasing had already made your poor cunny so much wet that you had almost drench the sheets beneath you, along your thighs and the new panties, the light blue color turning a deeper shade with your juices. 

The power of Gojo’s thrusts makes your body jolts towards the headboard, your head almost knocking against it, also making your clothed breasts jump into his face. Gojo can’t resist to take one of your nipples into his mouth, sucking and biting, practically drooling on them with the way he is overstimulating both of your nipples, alternating every few seconds, causing the little buds to turn red and swollen and making you tear out the prettiest moans from you lips. 

When he raises his head to look at his work, your nipples a pretty shade of red with little marks and his drool on them, he then remarks another thing, when lowering his gaze to your tummy. His cock is hitting you so deep and with so much force that a little bulge is showing at the level of your belly. He places his hand on the bump, pressing on it a little to feel the difference when he is in and out of you and he can’t help but let out a loud growl. 

“Baby, give me your hand”.

You don’t know how but you find the force in yourself to give him your free hand, considering the other one is still being pressed into the mattress by Gojo.

Gojo then takes your hand in his to guide it down your stomach, pressing it on the bulge moving as his dick enters and leaves your cunt. 

“Can you feel me deep inside you?”, Gojo asks you with heavy breathing. And when he catches you biting on your lower lip to hold on a moan, he knows that he isn’t the only one being turned on by this. It even makes him fuck you harder, if that’s possible. Causing the both of you to moan louder and louder in each other's mouths, swallowing the whines of one another as Gojo’s cock is kissing your cervix rapidly when he feels himself near his orgasm. 

It isn’t long before he spills himself into you, and he doesn’t stop from fucking his seed into you until you come just after him, your inner walls spamming around his still moving member. Exhausted, Gojo all but collapses on top of you, all his weight crushing you, while you still try to gain your breathing back to normal, your heart quickly beating. 

“You’re suffocating me Gojo”, no response, “Heyyyy don’t try to make me believe that you fell asleep on me, I know it’s not the case, you dork”. 

When, this time, you finally have the chance to slap him on the head, he puts his weight on his arms and let more room between both of your bodies to let you breathe. Gojo raises his head to look at you sweetly, white hair a mess, blue eyes shining, and as you take the time to admire his natural beauty, he does the same with you, letting you know in his own way. 

“You look so cute when you just got fucked dumb”, he smiles at your disheveled hair, bruised lips and half closed eyes. 

When he feels that you’re gonna reply back something, he just bends his head down to kiss your forehead gently, effectively silencing you with the sweet gesture. 

As you both get up to clean yourselves, you hear Gojo talking to you across the room.

“I hope you also got me a gift for Valentine’s day, baby”, he pouted at you like a child. 

“Well, maybe, maybe not”, you say seriously while waiting for his reaction, a smile on your face. 

“Heyyy! You better or I take back yours”, he says childishly. 

Yeah, Gojo Satoru was indeed a unique man. 

#gojo x y/n #gojo x reader #gojo satoru #saturo gojo #gojo #gojo smut #gojo x reader smut #gojo satoru x reader smut #gojo satoru smut #gojo imagines #gojo imagine #jjk #jjk smut #jjk reader #jujutsu kaisen satoru #jjk gojo #satoru smut #satoru x reader #gojo satoru x reader #gojou smut #gojou x reader #gojou imagine

[blutopaz15]

For the hurt/comfort prompts, number 8 please!! :D

Took me a bit here because I couldn't for the life of me work out even these vague setting details...but have some Rayla POV but Callum-centric hurt/comfort!

@shiramoonshadow also requested this one and another! :)

"you don't have to pretend to be alright around me."

hurt/comfort prompts

More and more since they'd been back in Katolis, Rayla found herself alone in the evenings.

...which wasn't really that bad. Sometimes she'd visit with whoever wasn't stuck in the throne room with the boys, or see if the training grounds by the Crownguard barracks were empty, or just wait for Callum, especially if it was before moonrise. 

She couldn't deny, though, how she wished they could go back to how they'd spent their evenings those very first couple of weeks she'd lived here with them: playing rolly-cubes with Ez winning and Soren making a mess of keeping score and Callum drawing between turns while she looked for a chance to sneak a second with her head on his shoulder, or that night that Ez had gotten Barius to bake a dozen different kinds of jelly tarts for her to try, or those times that she and Callum had managed to slip away all alone before the sun had even set...

They'd been too young, then, for all the responsibilities they had now.

The more of those responsibilities—duties, really—that teenaged Ezran took on, the more obligations Callum ended up with too, which lately had meant evening meetings she seldom belonged at. All that responsibility was weighing on them, too, Rayla could tell. Callum kept coming back home to her so much sharper than usual—no doubt having spent the whole time advocating for Ez and mediating discontent—once he finally turned up back in their shared quarters an hour—or sometimes two—after dark.

He was never this late, though...and she hadn't even had to go all the way to the throne room to figure out why.

Even from across the courtyard, she could see how on edge he was—his jaw set and stiff, grumbling at a volume too low to hear, his eyebrows knit together across a tense forehead. Even the way Callum scratched away at his sketchbook was harsh, each line made with heavy, sudden pressure.

"Did something happen?" she asked, unsurprised that he hadn't noticed her approach in the dark with how preoccupied he was with the messy sketch.

Predictably—he'd startled. "Oh," he said, seeing her and immediately melting back down into that sulky, slack posture to continue drawing. "Uh...no. Well, yes, but...it's nothing new. I'm—I'll be fine."

He shrugged, like it wasn't a big deal either...which was a load of fart-flowers. 

She let her hip bump against his shoulder on her way down to the step beside him. 

"Then why are you sitting here trying to scribble a hole into your book?"

His sigh was short as he bookmarked his page with his charcoal.

"It's just...Ez is counting on me, and I'm hurting more than helping with these negotiations." Callum looked down—his cheeks highlighting red with distress—and fidgeted with the seam of his sketchbook. "We...we had a fight after the meeting tonight. I got upset—angry, really—and it was stupid. I'm just...overwhelmed, and I have been for a while. I've been trying to keep it together because I don't want him to feel like he can't ask me for help. I'm supposed to help him, and I want to help him. I just...don't know how."

She'd suspected the gist of those feelings—even though he'd been trying to keep them down—but fighting with Ez...

These were bigger than she'd thought—bigger than stress.

"Did you tell him that?" she asked, her arm slipping around his tense shoulders.

"I was trying to...but it came out all wrong." Callum winced, his mouth staying tilted into a half-hearted smile, his eyes misted over...so heartbreakingly handsome. "You know me."

She did, and she loved what she knew—overactive temper and all.

"I do," she nodded, leaning close to press her lips to his cheek, and she felt his smile widen just a bit as she lingered there, making her wish that he would've told her all this sooner, that she would've pushed him to talk about the pressure. "You don't have to pretend to be alright around me, you know. I get why you'd want to around Ez—he's your little brother—but...I can take it."

"I know," Callum said, tucking his head down against her shoulder. "I just...didn't want you to worry."

"Yeah, cause I've never made you worry before," she teased. Her lips brushed his forehead before she jostled him off her shoulder, squeezing him tight enough to be silly. "Now then, what do you need? More big feelings time? Real big fulminus out here? Tea? Jelly tart?"

Rayla stiffened, realizing that Callum had nuzzled his way against her neck rather than taking her up on any of her suggestions.

"I think I just need to blow off some steam, honestly," he said, adding a ticklish hum against her ear, then kissing the seam of her collar...

"Blow off some steam, huh?" She lifted her chin, and Callum knew to continue. "And you need my help with that, mage?"

"Well, yeah." Callum's lips squished against her cheek as he chuckled in response, kissing his way closer to her lips. "You're the most important part."

#rayllum #rayllum fanfic #hurt/comfort prompts #ficlet #wip #fanfic #the dragon prince

[idrellegames]

which writing program do you use to write wayfarer? do you use scrivener or google docs? what's your workflow look like?

I use MS Word as my word processor, in addition to the Twine 2 editor and Notepad++ for coding. I've considered switching to Scrivener, but I'm honestly so used to my own system that I'm not too bothered to find a new one. 😂

My current workflow looks something like this:

Detailed chapter outline based on my game beat chart that breaks the current chapter into sections, the sections into scenes, and the scenes into beats.

I do almost all my outlining by hand since I like the tactile feeling of writing by hand. Because I think and plan very visually and spatially when it comes to managing branches, it's faster and easier for me to do things this way.

Draft in chronological order, section by section. Do not mix branches together; finish one branch before starting another.

When starting a section, revisit the outline and break it down into smaller pieces so it's easier to tackle and the branches are easier to see. I usually have my handwritten outline next to me and also a page for making notes while I write so I can keep track of things.

While writing, subdivide smaller branches and beats with colour-coding. Mark off each branch as they are finished.

The X is a marker to tell me that I finished writing the branch/outcome

I also add any specific coding notes while I write so I can remember to do specific things later on (usually conditional statements involving approval, previous choices, or what's in the player's inventory). I do not code and write content at the same time.

These are always colour-coded so I can easily see where one conditional segment ends and the next starts.

Once a section is done, I send the file(s) to my proofreader who fixes my typos and also flags any issues using Word's comment function

Once I get the files back, I edit and make adjustments

The game's raw text files are in subdivided folders. There's a main folder for the raw text files, then subfolders for each chapter. Sometimes each chapter has its sections put into subfolders as well. Each file is labelled with the chapter number and a title that references what's going on in that file.

So, Chapter 1's sorting system looks something like this:

I also have spare folders where I throw any major cuts I make (I may want to reference that content later) or any text inserts I make for a patch (an insert is basically a block of text that shows up in multiple places in the game that I need to add after-the-fact).

Worldbuilding notes and such are similarly subdivided and labeled.

Once I'm done writing a section, I'll start coding. I don't write a full chapter and then code--I'm working with so much content that it would be overwhelming to do everything all at once. When I reach the end of a defined section, I'll switch to coding.

The coding process is something like this:

I transfer the text from the Word documents into Twine. This is when I do the coding; I do not code in Word (it's generally not a good idea to code directly into your word processor; if you have curly quotes turned on, it will mess with any code that uses straight quotes. “this” is different from "this").

Since most of my systems are in place, coding involves a lot of copy/pasting bits of repeat code I have saved in Notepad++, so it usually doesn't take all that long.

These are my notes for any time the player passes or fails a skill check; I just need to copy/paste them into the appropriate passage instead of typing it out each time.

For code-heavy sections (like the Origin/Ancestry selection screens), I sometimes code in Notepad++ instead of Twine because I can see things better there and I can get syntax highlighting. I do all of my CSS and JavaScript edits in Notepad++.

To be honest, the coding in Wayfarer is not very complicated so I'm usually fine coding directly in the Twine editor.

I don't work in a single Twine file since the Twine editor lags once you pass 500 passages. On a game this large, I also find it easier for me to compartmentalize into sections, so I have multiple story files for each chapter, divided by section.

My current Twine library still has Chapter 1 in it, so it looks like this:

WAYFARER is the first file, it contains the landing page, the character creator, the Prologue and the start of Chapter 1. Chapter 1.1. is the rest of Route A. Chapter 1.2-1.6 is Route B. Chapter 2.1 is the first scene of Chapter 2. And the Codex is the codex.

The drawback is that because the story files aren't connected, I can't seamlessly playtest without first publishing and compiling the files. I tend to do most of my personal playtesting of the new file within the file itself. However, I'll test different choices/conditions by adjusting the variables manually in a specific file's StoryInit passage, so it ends up being a lot faster to than compiling the files, making a character from scratch, and running through the game.

Once I'm satisfied that the new file is working, I'll publish all the story files to HTML files. The HTML files are then compiled with Tweego into one file (takes about 3 seconds once the compiler is set up). I'll then compress the new master HTML file with the images/assets folder into a ZIP file, and update the build!

Any bugs/errors caught by the playtesting team don't usually take too long to fix as long as I know exactly where the error occurs. Once I make any fixes, I do a new compile and update.

#wayfarer #wayfarer if #process #interactive fiction #twine #twine game #twinengine #answered #long post

[angelicmichael]

What if Xavier had a kid he didn't know about and he meets them for the first time after he's already a ghost? Maybe there's a kindergarten group that takes a trip to the camp, and he just has this spirit intuition as soon as he sees them and KNOWS it's his child. Do you think you could expand on this idea? I'd love to see what you come up with!

A/N: This was so fun, thank you for this idea dear anon!! I'm sorry it's late but hopefully u like it 😶. Also, I apologize this is so dark and heavy- I didnt intend for it.. it just, kinda happened lmfao. I turned this into a 'x reader' and it starts with Xaviers POV and ends with readers perspective!! First few paragraphs are pretty dark and then the rest is weird.. angst fluff LOL.Hope yall enjoy 💖💖💖

Warnings: First few paragraphs discuss Xavier's thots about dying SO, it highkey gets dark yall I'm so sorry, mentions of anger?? issues, mentions of murder, stops getting dark roughly around paragraph 6 if u wanna skip all that, MAJOR ANGST, reuniting, very brief Xantana reference 😈, mention of kids, bit of fluff.. think that's it :)

In Xaviers eyes; the worst part of being killed in a desolate camp and having to reside there for the rest of eternity; wasnt the fact that he would have to handle Richard Rameriez and tolerate his peers for eons to come. Sure, both of those things required an adjustment period but.. the realization that his life with you was abruptly cut short, was what truly broke him.

It took him being stripped from everything he once knew to truly appreciate how heavenly life once was before Camp Redwood. He had a steady job, good friends, and a relationship with a actual living, breathing person.. Not to shade Montana or anything, of course. However he had taken all of those things for fucking granted; moving to Camp Redwood definetly had made him become humble- at the very least. He was now nothing but a mere shell of the person he once was; nothing to bring him out of this absolute living nightmare he found himself in.. At first this mindset nearly consumed him, it drove him to kill multiple times.

There was no point in trying to conceal the anger he felt, no way of trying to channel it out into a more socially appropriate way and at this point.. there really was no point in trying to do so. Out here in the forest, espically after he was killed, life outside of the forest soon seemed as if it was some type of myth or fairytale- something not real or attainable. Time in the redwood forest felt different- days quickly bled and melted into weeks, and then months.. trying to guess the date was something Xavier gave up on doing after about the first week.

As much as he tried to deny it, being dead and becoming trapped here had completly made him lose his grip on reality and his previous life. Soon enough, the thought that life even fully existed outside of the camp and that there was actual fucking laws against killing (something which was now a leisurely hobby) had completly slipped his mind momentarily in the beginning as well. Out here in the forest, nothing felt real execpt for his anger that he held onto so tightly.

It was really the only thing he had left; atleast for a while.

The pain of losing his partner, (y/n), still remained but letting that grief not consume him was easily the hardest battle he had fought in his life. Xavier realized he still had his friends - and if he really was going to live for eternity, he sure wasnt going to spend it angry.

After so many years of being 'cursed' to spend forever in this forest, keeping track of the time was something Xavier rarely bothered with, but - it was obvious by the suns posistion, and even the slight mist that made the grass wet that it was just starting to cut into morning. Xavier walked through the forest alone, nowhere in particular to go or to necessarily do, only a sudden need to go and be alone. Almost a beckoning, for him to go and be somewhere else. To witness something.

His days were more often than not purely mundane; he had absolutely no excuse to not listen to this odd and sudden attraction he felt toward a very particular spot in the camp.. so, that's what brought him to where he stood now. Close to the road that brought visitors (a nice word for victims) into Camp Redwood, right next to the mess hall which was rarely used close by.

Xavier felt wildly uncomfortable standing so close to the place which previously held so much trauma - and honestly still did.. The place where Chef Bertie died. Xavier paused, about to just say 'fuck it' and just give up and go back to where his friends resided (or atleast Montana) when.. he heard it.

His sign, the thing that seemingly enticed him in the first place.

It first sounded like the old, familar sounds of tires coming across a gravel road - Xaviers mind immeadietly jumped to perhaps this could be new people.. new vistors.. new victims.

His blood ran cold when he heard something else; an eerie ringing of chains hitting against the ground. Something that was mostly a associated with buses.. and hauntingly familar. He had little to no time to think or even act on his suspicion when he noticed that a yellow school bus full, and nearly combusting with children was pulling into the camp.

Xavier wasnt exactly certain the bounds that ghosts had when it came to certain bodily functions like vomiting, but hes sure that under normal circumstances he would certainly be sick by now. Nevertheless he could feel his body tense up and the other natural symptoms associated with anxiety also kicked in. Urging him to clumsily get out of vision; he stumbled behind a few trees that poorly blocked him from sight. He continued to watch in complete and utter horror as the bus came to a stop, and it didnt take long for kids to start pouring out of the bus. Xavier felt his heart drop and his blood run cold every time a kid exited the bus and stepped on the dirt soil of Camp Redwood.

Xavier whipped his head around; scanning the surrounding area to make sure no other ghosts were here to bear witness to this.. Xavier was nearly always down to commit murder, it was really the only thing that kept him from fully going insane from pure fucking boredom but - kids? There was no fucking way he would let anyone touch them.

While he thoroughly scanned the area, he noticed a few adults leave the bus out of his periphery vision. He thought nothing of it, chaperones were to be expected on elementary field trips but.. the strange beckoning feeling he felt ealier visited him again, urging him to turn his head fully and look at one of the chaperones more closely. Instantaneously, he then automatically realized why he felt so compelled to come to this spot.. Why he was meant to be here at this exact moment.. It was you.

At first he thought he was merely hallucinating; you definetly looked significantly different from the last time he had saw you but.. he knew it was you, his partner that he had before his life completly went to shit (minus the catastrophe that occured with Blake, of course). He knew instantly, it was your eyes, your stature and just.. your overall warm and familiar aura that gave your identity away. He couldnt believe that the person he had so fucking desperately wanted to see more than anyone or anything was only a few feet away - and now, that you were finally here... All he wanted for you to do was to leave.

As soon as he saw you he felt a sudden tightness posses his chest and throat which accompanied the formation of tears burning his eyes; hastily blurring his vision. He had to physically restrain himself from sobbing outloud; trying his best to just swallow down his tears. His whole body felt as if it was on fire with anxiety, but he chose to continue to stand still behind a few dainty trees - trying to pull himself together so he could actually have the chance to think critically and choose what the ever living fuck he was going to do next.

While he waited for his blurry vision to clear, he chose to focus on the semi distant figure that he knew was you. He took in the little details; like how the sun highlighted the colors in your hair and your simple but charming outfit. It took him several moments to think of why you would even be here in the first place, with a school bus- and thats when another dreadful realization hit him.

Only parents were mainly chaperones when it came to elementary field trips.. meaning-

No other thought crossed Xaviers mind as his eyes flicked down inhumanely fast to the child where (y/n) stood next too.. and immeadietly he knew.

The features the child shared of both you and Xavier were partially a giveaway, but most importantly.. it was the feeling he had that confirmed his belief. The initial anxiety he felt of the kids arriving still remained but was significantly muted and mostly replaced with a overwhelming sense of pure love. The feeling spread to every fiber of his being, and so did a odd urge to protect this small being which he knew was his.

Not ever in his entire life had he felt this way about someone (execpt for perhaps, you). He felt himself taking a few steps forward, at first completly involuntary but he knew he had to talk to you. Just the idea of reuniting tasted so fucking good but, he knew he couldnt get too greedy if he was going to talk to you. He knew confronting you had to be solely done in order to save you and his child, he couldnt get carried away. He wouldnt.

He tried his best to appear casual as he submerged from behind the trees, his hands held behind his back - the only way he could get them to stop shaking. He tried to relax his shoulders and appear confident as he strided up to you; your back turned toward him. He continued until he was directly behind you, he wanted to tap your shoulder but - touching you seemed out of the question. That would confirm everything, it would make it seem actually real and not like this just some torturous dream.

"(Y/n)"? He spoke.

Xaviers breath hitched as he watched you whip around to face him. He studied your features as you went from looking utterly confused to surprised beyond belief.

"Xavier, what-"

"We need to talk".

Xavier quickly grabbed your hand, leading you away from herd of kids and the few sparse chaperones that were amongst them. A few of them gave you two a few odd looks but neither you or Xavier particularly cared, after all this was the first time in years you two had seen eachother. You hastily followed his lead, feeling slightly embarrassed that it was obvious how nervous and simply caught off guard you currently were. Your palms (one of which was still holding onto Xaviers hand) were starting to moisten with sweat. These feelings only amplified once Xavier turned around to face you. The intensity that was in his eyes put you on edge - never in your time of dating or knowing him did he ever look so serious with you.

"What are you doing here"? Xavier spoke, his voice was still in a higher pitch, slightly breaking.

"What"?

After years of not being able to see you, in fact; years of you not even knowing where he went - this was how he chose to greet you?? Automatically your blood ran cold with the sudden realization that something was wrong. Seriously wrong.. but the feeling didnt just apply to your ex boyfriend. It was the entire camp.

"Its not safe here, you need to take the kids and leave". Xaviers voice more visibly shook this time as he spoke; as if his words physically pained him.

Your heart skipped a beat, the sudden pain and anguish starting to fully settle in. You couldnt believe it; after years of not seeing you - this was all he had to say? Was he fucking joking?

"What? A-are you kidding? Xavier, I havent seen you in years- I didnt even know you would be here-"

"I'm sorry (y/n). I'm so sorry but you have no idea what this place is like. You just need to go, and the kids. And promise me you wont come back".

It was torturous to watch tears gather in Xaviers eyes, and watch as they streaked down his cheeks. The sadness you previously felt was now washed away with red, hot rage. The feeling spread throughout your body like a wildfire that he was seemingly rejecting you.. but you knew now this wasnt some pathetic excuse. Something was seriously wrong here; and now it was starting to become too obvious to ignore.

Xavier looked hauntingly the exact same from the last time you saw him. He forever, looked as if he was still stuck in the same moment of time - like in the summer of 1984, which was when you last saw him.

You didnt realize you were still holding onto one of his hands until you reflexively tried to move it to brush away his tears that were still staining his cheeks; but awkwardly.. you chose to do so with your other hand. Squeezing the one hand you were still holding onto a bit tighter.

He winced as you touched him, and as much you tried your damn best to hold it together - you could feel tears starting to burn your eyes as well.

"I cant promise I wont ever come back, Xavier. I need to see you again, and what about-" you said softly, about to reference the child you two shared together.

"No, you'll see me again (y/n). I promise.. okay"?

He brought your hand up to his mouth to kiss your knuckles; the tears you trying so desperately to hold in were now sliding down your cheeks. Your breathing was now horribly choppy. You were on the brink of full on sobbing but you held yourself back - it was nearly time for you to go.

The fact you would have to go back to go the others and make up some bullshit excuse to leave, put a bitter taste in your mouth.. but your sure Xavier had a valid reason for ushering you to leave. Even if he didnt want to tell you right now; you trusted him with your life.

"Okay.. Fine. I'm coming back though, and I'm sorry I couldnt find you sooner". You admitted.

You dropped his hand that you were still holding in order to wrap your arms around him. To get one final touch to remember him by. You were desperate to fully touch him and to be wrapped in his embrace, something you had desperately and madly missed. As he held you; you tried to soak in his scent, his aura.. just the fact that he was even here seriously with you, in this moment.

You previously assumed Xavier had passed away; that was easier to come to terms with rather than thinking he willingly ran away or.. that something else more sinister had happened. A part of you wanted to be frustrated that you were leaving with more questions than answers but.. you didnt care. Your heart didnt care. You were just happy you were able to see your boyfriend.. no matter the circumstance or conditions it came with. Even though you were stupidly happy, your thoughts kept annoyingly circling back to the same question - how was Xavier here with you, living.. breathing.. in the flesh. How was this possible? You were about to speak your thoughts outloud when you first felt Xavier break away from you. You didnt get as much as a second glance just when you felt something soft on your cheek. Perhaps a goodbye kiss? and then.. just like he wasnt there at all, he was gone. Almost as if he completly disintegrated into the fresh, morning sky.

You felt your entire body stiffen as you realized he was gone.. again. It was difficult to pinpoint exactly how you felt. It was a nasty mix of both grief and anger that left you completly speechless and deathly still. You took a step back to combat the feeling, and attempted to look casual (and not like the person whom you were just hugging had completly fucking vanished). Sheepishly taking a look at the group you had arrived with and making sure none of them noticed your.. odd behavior.

Sure enough, none of them did. They all stood, and continued on conversing just like they were before you had broke away from them. Smiling and laughing as if nothing was wrong; just like they didnt have a care in the world - just as if the love of their life wasnt ripped away from them for a second time.

Even though Xavier was now gone, that odd, unsettling feeling still lingered with you. Like something was terribly wrong here, in Camp Redwood. The feeling wasn't entirely bad though; sure - the overall air in this place reeked of something terrible but.. now you felt something else mixed into it. A comforting essence of safety; Xaviers presence. You knew he wasnt directly beside you anymore but he was somewhere.. lurking. Watching you, as you begrudgingly walked over to the group you came with. Making up a bullshit excuse in your head so you could escape whatever this place was pretending to be.

Taglist: @michaellangdonstanaccount @langdonsexual @jimmason @blakewaterxx @dark-mei-rose @9layerdevilfoodcake @prophecy-is-inevitable @matildaofoz @beautyiswithinchaos @frenchlangdon @instincts-baby let me know if u would like to be added!! :)

#xavier x reader #xavier plympton x reader #xavier plympton fanfic #ahs fanfic #cody fern fanfic #my fic #inbox is officially empty now 💅🏻 #hopefully the pov switching wasnt weird LOL #it was my first time writing like that hehe #i lowkey feel bad i made this so dark so hopefully its still enjoyable LOL #also this doesnt rlly follow canon details that well but- idc djdjd

[softinkshadows]

Shingeki no Kyojin Astrology: sun-moon-rising combinations

I was looking around tumblr for detailed astrology speculations of my fave anime characters, but there aren't that many! Being q well-versed in astro myself, i thought why not do my own version (very spoiler-free, don’t worry)! I followed the birth dates given by isayama:

Eren Jaeger - Aries sun, Scorpio moon, Cancer rising Aside from the fact that he can be hotheaded and impulsive, Eren's feelings of vengeance run deep and explosive. Remember that time he was chained to the bed after the attack on trost, and his eyes were wild with the need to violently eradicate all titans? He's so tenacious and emotionally stubborn too (a Scorp moon trait) to the point of being closed off from everyone else, especially towards the end where he seems to take the weight of the world's burden on his own shoulders. And all for the sake of protecting his community and ensuring the safety of his friends for the rest of their lives. His comrades and family are his motivation. This is his Cancer rising steering his life.

Mikasa Ackerman - Aries sun, Aquarius moon, Aries rising "Look that moody brat is running off on her own again." Mikasa is similar to Eren in her impulsiveness and determination, but different in two ways- what they aim to protect and their extent of fearlessness. Eren is aware of his own weaknesses and helplessness, but Mikasa's amazing physical prowess makes her act without any hesitation at all. She's hella fierce and driven to keep herself in shape too, doing all those sit-ups and chopping firewood post-injury. I think she deserves a double Aries! An Aries rising means a Libra descendant too, which is reflected her whole-hearted devotion in her close partnerships (Eren and Armin). Her aquarius moon really shines thru with her stoic independence, focus and perseverance.

Armin Arlet - Scorpio sun, Virgo moon, Pisces rising He's the brain of the 104th cadet corps, and is second to Erwin in terms of strategy! An intelligent planner with low self-esteem often found second guessing his own analytical abilities, Armin is a true blue Virgo moon. His emotional self stands out the most from the main three protagonists - Eren & Mikasa mostly express anger and desperation, whereas Armin is usually shrouded in fear and worry. He's a very soft bb, hence the Pisces rising, not to mention he gets so dreamy imagining the sea, the vast plains, and the magical world beyond the walled universe he knows. A spiritually-attuned and curious explorer :")

Levi Ackerman - Capricorn sun, Scorpio moon, Virgo rising Levi is such a complex person, thanks to Isayama's brilliance. Like many Cap suns, Levi is authoritative, cold and incredibly savage. That's not to say he doesn't feel anything either. Levi is an evolved Scorp moon (maybe even moon in 11th house) because his feelings are never for himself, but he hurts so much for others - you can tell every death hits him so hard, but he doesn't show this to anyone else. He also exudes this quietly intimidating aura of natural competence, a common characteristic of this sun-moon combo. He can take things personally as well (re: height issues) but it never snowballs into more than passing irritation. The turbulence of his emotions and habit for violence is balanced out by his earthy Virgo rising, which is emotionally subdued, quite thin and delicate in physique, and super neurotic and nitpicky when it comes to cleanliness and health. Cap, Virgo and Scorp are some of the most guarded signs, and a combi of all 3 are hellish. You can tell this poor beautiful man is always caught between feeling and thinking, between maintaining his humanity and forsaking it.

Erwin Smith - Libra sun, Capricorn moon, Leo rising In another life, Erwin Smith would be the damn CEO of a global conglomerate because he oozes so much charisma. Hell if charisma were energy Erwin Smith would be its prime, eternally renewable source. His stature alone is so commanding, and I find some strong Leonine traits in his thickset physique, strong eyebrows, beautiful hair, and that way he shouted in full glory atop wall Rose in that one episode to the cheering masses below. He might be a Libra sun, diplomatic in political affairs, but his Capricorn moon is what drives his decisions. Cap moon has a rep for being cold and unemotional, but i believe they are way more than that! Cap moons rarely boast about their long list of achievements, instead looking forward to the next goal. They struggle with emotional expression, and are super driven and disciplined. Erwin is capable of making the hardest decisions, putting aside emotions to strive for an abstract ideal, and this is to be expected of the commander who takes on the role of the devil.

Hange Zoe - Virgo sun, Sagittarius moon, Gemini rising All hail our favourite mad scientist!! Hange is such a breath of fresh air in the Survey Corps, balancing out the heaviness of missions with their wacky tales of titan research and experimentation. Their penchant for study and higher knowledge is typical of a Sagittarius moon, who is drawn to advanced academic study and spiritual truths. It's also a lighthearted and optimistic sign, true to Hange's upbeat personality. The Virgo in them contributes to their sheer intelligence and obsessiveness with research subjects. We also know they LOVE to talk, and once Eren asks Hange about experiments, they cannot stop (Gemini governs communication). Virgo, Sag and Gemini are the most intellectual signs, and because they are mutuable Hange tends to follow orders rather than give them, making it difficult to adapt to their new role towards the end of the series. Mutable signs also means rapidly-changing emotional states, and a whole lot of chaos, which suits our beloved squad leader.

Jean Kirstein - Aries sun, Virgo moon, Taurus rising Our third Aries on the list ohmygod. The snk universe is full of feisty hotheads. Jean is always seen clashing with Eren, fuelled by Eren's closeness with Mikasa and his own adorable jealousy. I mean, they had a full on fist fight right after dinner in the mess hall, although everything went downhill after the first few punches. Our first impression of Jean during his cadet days is coloured by his desire to work in the interior, and this favour for material safety and wealth is perhaps common to a Taurus rising. Also, Taurus is ruled by Venus, planet of beauty and harmony, and thus often figures in the charts of artists. If you've seen Jean's drawing skills in that special episode, you'll know that his artistic abilities are the finest we have seen, exceeding even that of isayama himself. Jean's strong principles such as being averse to killing people and oftentimes cynical nature, is also characteristic of the moral and cautious Virgo moon.

Sasha Braus - Leo sun, Gemini moon, Taurus rising Not all Leos are showmans. Sasha is the type of Leo who displays more of the quirky, unabrashed personality suited to her opposite sister sign Aquarius. Authority doesn't exist when food comes into play, as we see when she breaks potato with Shadis and later steals a slab of meat from the officer's warehouse. Unlike the visual artistry that Jean possesses with his Taurus rising, Sasha's Taurus centers around her love for food, and hell she can have fiery determination for it (rmb the wild night she mistook Jean's hand for meat?). I love that both of them were pitted with each other in that cooking special episode. I considered placing her as a Taurus moon, but Taurus moons are usually steadier and classier in emotion, whereas Sasha is often breezy, gets nervous and chaotic, with stellar intuition, making her likely a Gemini moon.

Connie Springer - Taurus sun, Cancer moon, Gemini rising Although not much attention is paid to Connie's growth, his character development reminds me a lot of Aang from ATLA. Cheery and happy-go-lucky at first, before the incident with his mother made him more prone to feelings of anger and vengeance, especially near the later chapters. His strong protective bond with his mother is what compels me to say he is a Cancer moon, which is a moon sign that is very homebody and drawn to family and traditions. His goofy self and him referring to Sasha as "his twin" puts him as the spunky Gemini rising, another sign he shares with her.

Reiner Braun - Leo sun, Pisces moon, Capricorn rising Aside from his natural leader personality (Leonine), Reiner likes to take on the persona of the big brother of the group. His outward stoicism, decisiveness and task-oriented nature is typical of a Cap rising, who is often serious and solemn in appearance. He reminds me of that Cap rising workaholic who does his best in a corporate organization, working 9 to 5 plus overtime as it fulfills his sense of purpose. Beyond his stoic facade reveals a more troubled personality. Like a Pisces moon, Reiner is impressionable, and it's difficult to tell if his emotions and personalities are his own, wavering and absorbing traits from those around him. His internal war with his identity and the ensuing fatigue characterises him during the second half of the series.

Annie Leonhart - Aries sun, Aquarius moon, Virgo rising Annie is the kind of Aries that is so motivated to achieve her goals that everything else is sidelined, including her own emotions. She's quite ruthless in chasing her objectives, and her composure, focus and endurance is highlighted with an Aquarius moon. I'm guessing she has a 4th house influence somewhere because of her motivations to go home to her father and lead a normal life. I find the daintiness and delicateness of her features similar to Levi, who is also a Virgo rising. The Virgo effect also registers as a brutal, unfiltered honesty (also seen in Levi), and Annie doesn't hesitate to speak the truth about her own or her opponent's capabilities.

Other characters which I won't go into much detail about:

Bertholdt Hoover - Capricorn sun, Virgo moon, Pisces rising Bertholdt is quiet with an unobtrusive personality. His lack of supposed iniative and aggression can perhaps be attributed to the mutuability of Virgo and Pisces, which goes with the flow instead of charging forward. He keeps his feelings to himself, but reacts when the people he wants to protect are threatened.

Historia Reiss - Capricorn sun, Libra moon, Cancer rising Historia initially lives for the sake of others (esp Ymir), and is more co-dependent than many of her other squadmates. She also tends to put up a front of pleasantness, afraid of disappointing or offending people. She has a strong tie to family, and a profound sense of duty.

Ymir - Aquarius sun, Pisces moon, Aries rising Ymir is extremely astute when it comes to evaluating human behaviour. The religiosity of her background is also usually found in this sun-moon combination, which tends to attract paths of strong spirituality. She also has a bold and noble sacrificial streak for the sake of her companions.

Zeke Jaeger - Leo sun, Capricorn moon, Scorpio rising A headstrong, intelligent and radical character. In a way similar to Erwin in his ruthlessness, but emotionally darker and much more sinisterly private.

Kenny Ackerman - Aquarius sun, Sagittarius moon

Rod Reiss - Virgo sun, Libra moon

Dot Pixis - Virgo sun, Sagittarius moon

Hannes - Capricorn sun, Taurus moon

#snk astrology #snk #aot astrology #shingeki no kyojin #attack on titan #anime astrology #eren jaeger #mikasa ackerman #armin arlet #levi ackerman #erwin smith #hange zoe #jean kirstein #sasha braus #connie springer #reiner braun #annie leonhart #bertholdt hoover #historia reiss

[adventuresinwonderlust]

Title: Caution to the Wind: PART 3

For Part 1 Click Here and For Part 2 Click Here

Pairing: yoongi x reader ft. Namjoon (brief)

Warnings: smut, fluff, angst, a lot of first times, Solo (m), Oral (m) (f) receiving, hand job, triggering themes (anxiety attack), 

Rating: 18 and over

Permanent Tag: @mochilicious-yoongi @heyimtavia​ @loveyoongles​ 

AUTHORS NOTE: THIS PART IS SOLELY FROM YOONGI’S PERSPECTIVE. HOPE YOU ENJOY!!

Yoongi:

Yoongi sat there, outside of the music room, his leg shaking frantically, waiting to be called so he could submit his entry exam. He had been working on this beat for months and it was finally perfect. It was a requirement for this music program to pass an entry exam in order to use their studios during the semester. To say Yoongi was nervous was an understatement. He cleared his throat for what felt like the hundredth time. He scratched at his neck, yanked on his ear, and picked at his calloused hand. “Come on.” He groaned under his breath. He had already been waiting an hour, an hour he could've spent with Y/N. He took a deep breath, closing his eyes and thinking back to last night. How sexy she sounded when she moaned his name, her glistening core, and her gorgeous body under the flowing shower. “Calm down Yoongi.” He whispers to himself when he feels his cock twitch.  

He looks at the music room door, wondering what was taking so long with the student before him. He picked at his hand again, grumbling to himself, flashes of Y/N's pert nipples dancing in his head. He groaned, angry with himself that he was unable to shake her from his mind. He closed his eyes again, thinking back to the shower, her body on full display. She didn’t bother to hide herself the way he did, ashamed that he was once again hard after having just cum. Would she blame me though? Watching her wash her body was probably the second hottest thing he’s ever seen. He was sure to stand sideways, hiding himself as much as possible. “Aren’t you gonna wash up?” She giggled. “Yeah, you just take up so much space.” He teased, hoping she didn’t notice how much she affected him.

“Alright then, I’ll give you your space.” She smirks, rinsing off and ducking out of the shower. Yoongi was sure to peek from behind the curtain to be sure she was fully gone from the restroom before he began to stroke his aching cock. “Fuck.” He whispered, moving his hand quickly over his thick shaft. He couldn’t believe what just happened in that bedroom, couldn’t believe he had just showered with Y/N. Watching her play with herself was probably the highlight of his life. He was sure she would tell him no to his proposition. She was gorgeous, such a catch and he was... well.... him. They had been best friends for years, since they were kids, but that friendship had blossomed into so much more for him. She was his rock, his everything. The literal highlight of his day. How would she react if she found out that he had a growing crush on her? Maybe she felt the same way or maybe he was just fooling himself, either way he was honored she let him see her so intimately.

“Fuck Y/N, you’re so gorgeous. I want you so bad. Sss- So fucking hot.” Yoongi whispers under his breath, tugging at his balls. He bites his lip, feeling his body tense, that delicious tug in his scrotum. He moans as silently as he can, his hand working his tip furiously. His mouth falls open when that familiar feeling raptures his body, his balls jumping up right before he turns his cock up to unload his seed onto his stomach. He’s a panting mess, still slowly working his length, moving forward into the water to rinse off.

“Min? Is your name Min?” Another student calls from across Yoongi, snapping him out of his fantasy. Yoongi’s eyes widen, and he looks over to the student confused. “Are you Min Yoongi?” The kid asks again. Yoongi nods. “Okay then, you're up. The professor stuck his head out to call you.” Yoongi nods again, his cheeks reddening, the feel of his erection against his thigh keeping him from moving from his seat. Suddenly the professor sticks his head out from the music room, “I don't have all day! Is Min here or do I need to move on?” Yoongi throws his hand in the air, grabbing his backpack from the floor and using it to cover his lap as he walks into the music room.  

“Major?” The professor asks blandly. “Music Production.” Yoongi grumbles, feeling his face heat. The professor nods, taking a seat and nodding towards the open laptop. Yoongi looks over blankly. “Should I play my track?” He asks. “Well, I surely don’t want you to rap Mr. Min.” Yoongi clears his throat, moving towards the laptop and sticking his thumb drive in. He scrolls through the files, locating his track and playing it for the professor. He begins to nod his head to the beat, calming a bit when he sees the professor do the same. “Should I explain my method?” Yoongi asks. “Assuming I don’t understand music theory?” The professor counters. “No, I didn’t mean....” “You can turn it off.” He snaps, sitting up and scribbling on his notepad. Yoongi swallows hard, turning the track off. He feels his heart racing, waiting for the professor to give him his grade. “I like your work Min. Your mouth not so much. B+. You can expect an email with details on where to pick up a studio scan card on the day of move in. Have a good one.”  

“With all due respect sir. I feel like the track is worth more than a B+.” Yoongi scoffs, nervously. The professor nods, leaning back in his seat, “Play it again.” Yoongi moves to play the track again. The professor nods to the beat, leaning forward to scribble down more notes. “Turn it off.” He demands. Yoongi stops the track, staring at the professor. “B-.” The Professor declares. “What! Are you insane? Do you know how long I worked on this? I could sell this right now and make millions.” Yoongi word vomits. The professor smirks. “Like I said Mr. Min. I like your work but your mouth not so much. I like the beat, but it isn't perfect. If it were, you wouldn’t be here trying to get your degree would you. You’d be out there making said millions. Now can I assume that you still want that B+ or are we settling for a B-.”  

“What an asshole!!” Y/N shouts when you meet up with her and describe what transpired. “It’s fine. I took the B+. At least I passed the entry exam.” “That’s fucked up Yoon. You should report him.” Yoongi sighs deeply, holding open the door to the burger joint you both decided to eat at. “It’s fine really. I met a cool kid after. We exchanged numbers.” “Oh?” She stops suddenly. “Yeah.” “A girl or....” Her voice trails off and Yoongi’s eyes pop open at the realization of her assumption. “No! A guy,” Yoongi laughs nervously, “Namjoon. He’s taking Music as well. Passed the entry exam also, so we talked about possibly working together in the studio. I got good vibes from him.” “Well look at you making college friends already.” She teased, walking to the line to order. Yoongi shook his head, digging his hands into his pocket for his card to pay for the meal.

“You think I should go home tonight? Talk to my parents.” He asks, the pangs of guilt gripping him. “Finally ready to say sorry. Do you want me to come with?” “I didn’t say all that. I was just thinking maybe I’d try again to get them to see things differently.” “I feel like that’s a great idea Yoongi. If it feels right, then you should go for it.” Yoongi smiles watching Y/N order for the both of them. She was so supportive and knowing he could count on her made him feel confident. So confident, he moved towards her, waiting for just the right moment to plant a soft kiss on her lips. She giggles when he pulls away. “What’s that for?” She asks. “Being amazing.” He shrugs, moving forward to give his card to the cashier. “Sorry sir your card has been declined.” “Excuse me? That’s a mistake, can you please try again.” Yoongi swallows hard, shoving the card back at her. She swipes again and the machine beeps. She looks up at him and shakes her head. “It’s ok. I got it. Maybe the machine is messed up.” Y/N offers, pulling out cash.  

You both take a seat and wait for your number to be called. “Hey, you ok?” Y/N asks but you are too busy reading and re-reading the text from your mother. ‘Yoongi, until further notice, you have been CUT OFF.’ “Yoongi! Hey!” Yoongi finally looks up at Y/N, swallowing hard and turning his phone to her. “They cut me off. Its why my card didn’t work.” He mumbles, staring down at his feet. “Holy shit! What the hell?!? How could they!!” “I knew they were pissed but.... it's fine. It doesn’t matter, it doesn’t change anything. I’ll just get a job and work nights to pay for myself this semester and then apply for a scholarship next year. I can do this! I’m fine. It’s fine.” Yoongi assures her, even though it's really himself he’s trying to assure. His heart begins beating rapidly, the throws of anxiety slamming his entire body. “Can we walk?” He blurts out suddenly, a cold sweat hitting him. “Yeah of course.” Y/N jumps up just as they call your number. Yoongi runs out the restaurant, Y/N running to catch up with the bag of food in her hand.  

“Talk to me Yoons, you look sick.” “I can't breathe.” Yoongi confesses, his lungs feeling heavy with every breath he takes. “I just need to sit.” He says suddenly, plopping down on the side of the street, gasping for air. Y/N begins to wipe away the sweaty hair his forehead, but it only annoys him. “Please don’t touch me ok.” Yoongi shouts. “I’m sorry. Of course. Yoongi, please, take a deep breath. I think you're having a panic attack.” Yoongi feels sick, his stomach turning and heart racing. He drops his head between his knees, gasping for air. “I’m ok. This is ok. I can do this.” He whispers to himself. “Yoongi, you need to go talk to them.” Y/N whispers and with that Yoongi yells out to the universe. Everything inside him boiling over, tears flowing in succession with his struggled breathing. “I knew they were mad but fuck!” He throws himself into Y/N’s lap, who immediately rubs his back, rocking him back and forth. “It’s ok Yoongi. I’ll help you through this semester and we can come up with a game plan for next year. I promise you're not alone. This is a minor hiccup in what is going to be the best four years of your life.” Yoongi hears everything she’s saying but all he wanted to do right now was feel sorry for himself, he had no use for logic, logic he can use tomorrow. Today, right now, he wanted to hate them and himself.  

“You ready for this?” Y/N asked, the both of you standing outside of your parents' home. Yoongi only nods. “Let’s get this over with.” Yoongi puts his key in the door and attempts to turn it, but it doesn't move. “They changed the fucking locks!” He shouts. “Calm down. Remember what we talked about. You get more bees with honey than vinegar.” “Sure. Honey.” Yoongi responds, slamming his fist on the door. “Jesus Yoongi!” “Fuck them!” He snaps, slamming his fist on the door again. They don’t get nice, not after the stunt they pulled. “Hey! Open up. It's your son! The one you disowned but an hour ago!” The door swings open and Yoongi’s father is standing before you both. “Son.” “Father.” “We have much to discuss, perhaps better without Y/N here.” “She stays or I go.” Yoongi was not up for negotiating. “Fine. Come in.” Yoongi nods to Y/N to follow him in. “You can have these back.” Yoongi declares, giving his father the old keys. “Yoongi, please understand that we wish it didn’t come to this. You still have time to change things. A simple major switch.” “I don’t want to switch majors.” “Maybe study Medicine and minor in music. Compromise.” “I don’t want to be a doctor.”  

“Son. We want what's best for you.” “By cutting me off and leaving me to sleep in the streets?” Yoongi shouts. “You’re always at Y/N’s house!” Yoongi’s mother shouts from the kitchen. “You never make it, so I want to be here! Always pressuring me to be someone I am not! Why can't you just love me as I am?” Yoongi shouts at her. “We do love you as you are son, but music is not a future.” Yoongi’s father inserts. “I’m good at it. You just need to believe in me.” Yoongi all but pleads. Yoongi’s father sighs and Yoongi can see the ice chipping away. He drops to his knees before his father. “Appa, Jebal.” Yoongi feels his father's hand on the back of his head. “NO,” his mother screams, “You have one week to get out! You can go stay with Y/N until you move to the dorms. No compromise.” “Mrs. Min, please. He’s your son.” “Yes Y/N he is, and he has brought me no greater dishonor than this. Now, no more talk. Please leave.” Yoongi feels his heart break into a million pieces, and he makes his last plea to his father. “I’m so sorry Yoongi. Here, take this.” He digs in his pocket, handing Yoongi cash, and kissing him on the forehead. “You must go. Your mother will have it no other way.” Yoongi nods, standing up, tears burning to unleash. “May I gather some things?” He asks his father. “Of course.” His father replies. Yoongi bows and quickly moves towards his room.  

“Help me grab some of this stuff.” He tells Y/N. “Yoongi, wait a minute ok. Maybe we can talk to them some more.” Yoongi gives a pained chuckle, knowing she means well. “It’s over Y/N, I can give your mom this cash for letting me stay with you guys for a bit or maybe I can ask for an early move in date with the school, but this isn't an option anymore. So, please, grab the keyboard and the laptop. Let me get a bag.” Yoongi packs as much of his equipment as he can along with clothing and he and Y/N make their leave. “Son!” Yoongi hears from behind him. “Wait!” His father runs up to him. “Please, here, I like to put away extra cash just in case. You know we love you, but we have bigger dreams for you than you may have for yourself. If things get to be too much trouble, call me. I love you.” Yoongi’s father hugs him and hands him a rolled-up wad of cash, running off back into the house. “Let’s get a cab. This is too much to lug around on a bus.” Y/N offers. Yoongi doesn’t respond, instead looks back at his home, hoping to see someone in the window. I’ll prove them wrong; He thinks. I’ll make them proud of my decision. “I’m sorry Yoongi.” Y/N cuts into his train of thought. “Don't be. Just, thanks for being here with me.” He isn't sure if he could've been as strong if she weren't with him. “I’m always here with you Yoons. Let’s get to my place. We can eat and talk to my mom.”  

“Okay, so turns out my mom is pulling an all nighter at the law firm working on this huge case so she won't be home tonight, but we can talk to her tomorrow.” Y/N explains, tossing her phone on her side table. “No problem. Thanks for calling her, maybe it's better to just talk tomorrow. We can sleep on everything that happened today. I’ve been looking up information on emergency housing and early move in dates for the school ever since we got here.” “Why?” Y/N snaps. “Well maybe because I'm currently homeless.” “Yeah, but not really. My mom isn't going to say no to taking you in Yoongi.” Yoongi can't help but laugh. “It’s one thing to spend a couple of nights but not to live. Besides what happens when you get a boyfriend, or I get a girlfriend. I don’t think either will be happy with us sharing a bed.” Yoongi scoffs. The idea sounding stupid as it leaves his lips but still something he should bring up. Their arraignment was just temporary, and knowing this, he felt the need to remind himself often to keep his feelings at bay. “Yeah, well we don’t have either of those things right now so who cares about that,” She rolls her eyes, unabashedly changing into her pajamas in front of Yoongi, while continuing her rant, “For right now let's talk about you staying here at least until we move into the dorms. Now, I’m going to crash because it has been an eventful day. Try to get some sleep at some point.” Yoongi nods, watching her crawl into bed, ass on display in her red thong, his mouth open. “I'm just going to work on some music and then I'll come crash.” He assures her, wondering if this was the new normal. Seeing each other nude, changing in front of each other, soft kisses just because. He cleared his throat, trying to shake the idea from his head to focus on music.  

Two hours later, Yoongi rubs his eyes, shifting uncomfortably in just his boxer briefs. He really should get some sleep, he thought, seeing it was already 2am. He stretches his body, looking over to the bed at Y/N fast asleep, cuddling a pillow, her lips slightly parted. Why is she so pretty? He groaned, sliding his hand over his face. He released a sigh, opening a private window on his laptop. He looks over at Y/N again, still fast asleep. He clears his throat gently, typing in his favorite porn site. His cheeks heat with slight embarrassment. He shouldn’t feel as dirty as he does. After all the things they’ve done together, he should feel confident enough to wake her up and tell her he’s feeling needy, that after the day he’s had, he just wanted to cum. Unfortunately, he isn't, he’s still so shy, not to mention the fact that her taking control and talking dirty to him was such a turn on he thinks he may have a kink for her dominating him. He groans again at the thought, his cock slowing coming to life. He clicks on the sites search bar, typing in blow jobs. He looks over at his sleeping friend again. Coast is still clear. He begins scrolling through the recommendations, trying to find the perfect video. He needed someone who looked just like his sleeping Y/N.  

He scrolled and scrolled, the anticipation building inside him, until finally he found a video that was close to perfect. He clicks it immediately, no longer able to contain himself. He bites his lip watching the girl on the screen bob up and down with ease, never losing eye contact with the camera. Yoongi felt his body heat, his cock fully hard now and peeking out the thigh of his underwear. He leans forward, covering his mouth to keep from moaning at the sight of this woman work. She soon removes herself from her boyfriend's cock, stroking it gently. “You like that baby?” She asks and Yoongi can’t help but nod in response. “God.” Yoongi whispers when the girl quickly bobs on her boyfriend's cock again, faster than before. He has never had a blow job in his life but just imagining what it felt like had Yoongi’s blood on fire. “Ready to swallow my cum baby?” Her boyfriend asks. “Shit.” Yoongi whispers, palming at his warm erection against his thigh. The feeling so amazing he could swear he feels it riding up the back of his head. He moans a bit, rocking his hips, his headphones sliding forward. “Shit.” He whispers, going to grab them when he realizes, they aren't falling off but being removed from his head by Y/N.  

His mouth drops open and he scrambles to close his laptop. “I.... uh.... I'm sorry.” He panics. “Why?” She asks, lowering herself down to her knees. Yoongi’s eyes slowly widen. “I.... uh.... because.... wha- what are you doing Y/N?” He asks a little whinier than he’d have liked. “Trying something new.” She whispers, leaning forward to lick at the precum that has collected onto his thigh. Yoongi can't help but jump a bit, taken back by her actions. She’s so confident and forward. He wonders if she knows how much it turns him on. “Y/N, you're so sexy.” He whispers, moaning when she wraps her lips around his drooling tip. She suckles a bit before letting go the feeling jolting through Yoongi’s entire body. “Take off your underwear.” She instructs. He jumps up quickly, tugging down his underwear, his cock spring out. “Such a gorgeous cock.” She teases, licking her lips. “Ohhh, fuck.” Yoongi mewls, desperate for her. She smirks, moving forward, wrapping a hand around his length, stroking gently. “Oh God! Just like that.” He pants, his head rolling back. “Ask me.” She whispers with a flick of her wrist. “Wh-what?” “Ask me to suck your cock.” Yoongi’s breath hitches in his throat and he whines a bit at her command. “Please.” “Please what Yoongi?” “Please Y/N, suck my cock.” He begs, his cock twitching in her hand, lust flooding his vision. She smirks up at him, positioning herself between his thighs. She once again wraps her mouth around his sensitive tip, suckling on it softly. “Ah, fuck. That’s so fucking good.” He pants.

Yoongi grips the arms of the chair, trying to keep from losing his shit further. This was real and fuck it felt so good. He couldn’t help but stare at her work. How focused her movements were, how her hand held the base of his cock steady while her wet mouth worked his length, drool dribbling down to his pelvis. He was so happy her mother wasn’t home to hear the desperate, needy moans that fell from his lips. The same moans that seemingly fueled her to bob up and down on his length, taking more of him into her warm mouth. She was so fucking wet, hollowing out her cheeks and then relaxing her jaw as she worked his manhood. Yoongi moaned as softly as he could, gripping the chair, sure he would rip them off at this rate. He desperately wanted to hitch his hips upwards, the feel of her uncontrollable drool pooling under his balls had him wanting to grab her hair and guide her further down but he didn’t want to push things. She soon removes her mouth from around him, a soft whine escaping his throat when the cool air touches his hot cock. “Do you like this? Am I doing it well?” She asks. “Yes. It’s so good. So fucking good.” She smiles at his response, licking a long stripe from the base of his cock up to his tip. The blatant teasing driving him wild, he just can't help but hitch his hips forward when she licks another stripe up his reddened member. She chuckles softly, looking up at him with lust in her eyes. “Can I touch you here?” Her free hand tucking under his scrotum, massaging at his balls. Yoongi’s head falls back, this was something he loved to do to himself but to have her do it to him was something that he never imagined happening.  

She wasted no time waiting for his response, instead, gobbling his cock up again, bobbing quickly up and down all the while massaging his balls. “Fuck! Y/N, this feels so fucking good. You’re amazing! Tug on them. It feels good when you tug on them.” He instructs, so overcome and no longer worried of what she will think of his neediness. His body felt so warm, and his cock was harder than it had ever been. She gently tugs at his sack, and he cries out, not caring how loud he is. Something flips in her and she relaxes her throat a bit, allowing for more of Yoongi’s dick to slide into her throat. His legs falling apart a bit to aid her. Was she really trying to deep throat him? The thought sending him into overdrive, feeling a tug deep in his balls. “Fuck, Y/N, if you keep this up, I won't last.” He groans, sucking a breath in through his teeth. She comes up for air, unable to take all of him. She shakes it off, not taking much of a break, bobbing again on as much of him as she can, using her hand to stroke the parts of him she can't reach. Yoongi gasps, the feeling so overpowering, he can't help but thrust up into her working mouth. “Just like that, ohhhh fuck! I’m really not going to last. Ohhh God. Fuck. Y/N, please. I need to cum.” He grips at the arms till his knuckles are white. She shakes her head at him, and his eyes widen at the realization that she's EDGING HIM!!?!  

He drops his head back with a long-drawn-out groan, trying to think of anything but the burning need to cum. His mind goes to water and how much he hates getting wet. That one time in middle school when he came home early and his parents where fucking on the couch. He grimaces at the image. His need to blow his load slowly dissipating. He looks down at Y/N diligently working and the need to cum comes back with full force when she locks eyes with him, sucking and stroking like her life depended on it. “Ohhhh, no no! Water, ice cold water.” He groans, closing his eyes tightly. She stops what she's doing, drawing Yoongi’s attention back to her. She removes her sleep shirt, her perfect tits on display. Yoongi can't help but reach down and touch them, rolling her perky nipples between his fingers. “You’re so sexy Yoongi. So good for me. You wanna cum baby? You can cum now, just let me know when you're going to cum ok.” She instructs. He nods, panting like a dog in heat. She takes his length in her mouth again, bobbing and stroking so fast, it doesn’t take long for Yoongi’s orgasm to build up. He moans her name over and over, his abdomen tensing, his balls tightening. “Now, now baby. I’m gonna fucking cum right now.”  

She takes a moment to just suckle on his tip, sending surges of electricity throughout his body. “Shit baby, I can't hold on.” He pleads. She moves away, stroking his cock with one hand, and lifting her tits up with the other. “Cum on my tits. I want you to so bad baby.” She pants. “Fuuuuuck!” He exclaims, placing his hand over hers to stroke his cock, aiming at her gorgeous breasts. He growls at the amazing feeling that surges through him when his prostate begins to pump, that first spurt shooting out of his tip and onto her waiting bosom. She gasps when his warm seed hits her chest. Yoongi pants desperately, moving his cock around to fully cover her in his climax. They both stop moving their hands and she leans in to suckle at the final beads of cum that accumulate at the tip of his cock. Yoongi sucks in a deep breath through his teeth, overstimulation stinging. “Ah it's too much.” He moans. She unlatches and begins to rub his cum into her mounds. Yoongi is so turned on by her display that he reaches down, lifting her off the ground and carrying her over to the bed.

Yoongi lies her back on the bed, panting hard as he pulls her red thong off her body. “Yoongi.” She moans out when he drops between her thighs. He’s never done this before, but he’s never wanted to do something more in his life. In this moment, as he buried his nose in Y/N’s sex, if he had to choose between music and tasting her, he would pick tasting her hands down. “Yoongi, please, make me cum.” She begged causing Yoongi to take a deep inhale of her delicious intoxicating scent before his tongue darts out of his mouth, collecting her nectar on his tongue. He moans into her cunt, her taste a swirl of tangy and sweet. “So fucking good.” He breaths against her, resting his body flush against the bed, gripping the flesh of her thighs. She hungrily spreads her legs for him, gripping his locks, and pulling him close to her dripping folds. “Eat my pussy!” She growls, yanking at his hair. “Yes baby, anything for you.” He coos, diving into her wetness. He licks at her gorgeous folds first, swallowing back her juices with deep hungry moans. His mind begins to race. Am I doing this right? Is she enjoying this? Should I use my hands like in porn? “Lick here,” She pants, yanking him away by his hair to point at her swollen bud, “my clit.” He nods, licking her juices from his lips.  

He lowers his head between her thighs, gliding his tongue over her clit. A sharp gasp escaping her lips, her back arching. Yoongi’s skin gooses at her response and a surge of excitement courses through him. He begins to roll his tongue in quick flicks over her sensitive bud, the sweet sounds she’s making his reward. “Oh Yoongi. This is so good. Faster. G-go faster.” She gasps, thrusting her hips into his face. He groans into her sex, the feeling of her gyrating against him causing his cock to come back to life. He starts swinging his tongue side to side as fast as he possibly can, his appendage soon growing tired. “Can I use my fingers?” He pops his head up to ask. She’s completely out of breath but nods. “Just don’t put them inside me. I’m not ready for that yet.” INSIDE!! Yoongi’s brain screams. “I... No.... I won't.” He stutters, lowering back down. He brings a hand up, wrapping his mouth around her clit and slurping. “SHIT! Yoongi, oh fuck!” She cries out, bucking forward. Yoongi places his first two fingers on either side of her hardened nub and begins to slide them up and down quickly. The combination of his saliva and her juices aiding his moving fingers. She pants frantically, tugging at his now sensitive scalp, bucking into his face. Yoongi switches between suckling and rolling his tongue against her clit, moving his fingers in succession with his greedy appendage. “Yoongi! Fuck! Oh, Fuck! I’m going to cum.” She cries out, her walls beginning to quake causing her entrance to pulse against Yoongi’s chin.

He hums in approval at the feeling of her fresh juices leaking out on his face, her body tensing with one final tug on his scalp before relaxing. Yoongi finally pulls away when he feels her body relax, lifting off the bed, his massive erection on display. “Come here. Kiss me.” She gasps, arms outstretched. He gently falls into her arms, latching onto her soft lips and swirling his tongue around hers. He moans into her mouth when she grabs onto his cock, quickly stroking it against her abdomen. He tries to pull away, tell her she doesn’t have to, but she wraps her free hand around his neck to keep him latched to her lips. Her hand moves with ease, he’s so turned on, his cock is freely spilling pre-cum. He mewls and moans desperately into her commanding mouth. Her wrist twisting, hand twirling over his tip just how he likes it. He whines now, the only wat he knows how to warn her of his impending climax. His body tenses and his core tightens like it never has before. Before long, he’s grunting against her lips, his cock shooting the best climax he’s ever experienced between their bodies.

She finally releases his swollen pout, kissing him once more softly. “You didn’t have to.” He whispers against her lips. “I know. I really really wanted to though.” She smiles wide, leaning in to kiss him again. “Y/N?” “Yeah?” Yoongi doesn’t want to play games anymore. He just wants to be with her. He smiles softly, fighting against his shyness, the words on the tip of his tongue when he swears, he hears her door close. They both look up frantically at the door. “Shit! Was that your mom?” He whispers. “I don’t know. Shh. Let me listen.” She whispers, arm still wrapped around Yoongi’s neck. “I should get dressed. We both should.” “It’s ok. Don’t freak out. I’m sure she’s not home. She said she wouldn’t be home till the morning.” “Technically its morning.” Yoongi snaps, his heart thumping against his chest. “Just relax.” “Fuck. If she finds out about us. She’s going to freak.” Yoongi groans. “There is no us Yoongi. Just two friends hugging. Even if she walked in, she can't be sure what she saw.” Yoongi scoffs, swallowing back the lump in his throat. “No, yeah, you’re right.” “Exactly. So, what did you want to say before?” “Uh, nothing. I’m gonna shower.” “Ok.” She says, leaning forward to kiss Yoongi again. He closes his eyes even though he shouldn’t. His heart betraying him with a flutter when he knows this is just temporary. He gets up and moves towards the bathroom. “Hey!” She calls his attention. He looks over to her and she winks at him, throwing herself back into the plush bedding.  

#yoongi smut #yoongi fluff #suga x you #bts smut #suga x reader

[jawabear]

Hi~ Can I request a fic? for season 3 Javier Peña. Maybe some soft Javi. With y/n being a colleague, but struggling to get back to work because of mental trauma. If that's ok with you.

Don’t leave (Javier Peña X Reader)

Not my GIF

A/N: Hey! Here’s another request for my sweetheart Javi. Thanks to anon for helping out a little more. However, I feel like this isn’t great? But I really hope you like it. Thank you for requesting! I hope you enjoy it! Sorry for any mistakes. Stay safe.

Genre: Angst, fluff

Warnings: fem!reader, injury detail, mentions of blood, violence, tears, mental trauma, comfort

Summary: After a mission turns south and months of being off work, she has to face the reality of going back to work.

-

She didn’t know what came over her.

Everything moved in slow motion as one of the men lifted their gun and pointed it over at Javier. She wasn’t in control of her legs as she ran between them.

Her blood seemed to run cold when the gun went off. There was a ringing in her ear. She could hear another muffled gun shot and the muffled call of her name but she couldn’t move. She couldn’t do anything other than fall to the ground.

“Fucking shit (Y/N)!” Javi yelled as he crawled over to her lifted her shaking torso into his lap. “Why the fuck did you do that, you idiot!” he scaled her. He pulled his radio from his belt and gave an order to call for an ambulance before he threw his radio to the ground.

She looked up at him with wide eyes full of fear. She was barely breathing and her lips were trembling. He looked down her body to her stomach that was flooding blood that was seeping into her blue shirt. “J-Javi..” she whimpered. Her voice was barely there though.

“The ambulance is on its way (Y/N). You’re going to be okay” he told her trying not to cry at the sight of her lying petrified in his arms. “You’re gonna be okay (Y/N)”

Javier didn’t move from her. He held her almost lovingly in his arms, gently stroking her hair as he whispered the same words to her over and over again, it got to the point where he was more convincing himself than her was convincing her. But she never responded to him. She just continued to stare at him with the same terrified eyes.

“Peña, la ambulancia está aquí” (Peña, the ambulance is here) a voice came over the discarded radio beside him.

He picked up the radio and put it back on his belt. “Hold on (Y/N)” he whispered to her. He slipped one arm under her knees and the other under her torso and carefully lifted her into his arms as he stood and walked as quickly as he could outside where the ambulance was waiting.

The paramedics raced over to him seeing the state that (Y/N) was in. He walked her over to the ambulance and placed her onto the bed on the inside. She gripped hold of him like her life depended on it, because it felt like it did. She felt that if she let go of him, that would be it for her. “Don’t leave” she whispered desperately.

“I won’t leave you (Y/N)” he told her as he managed to pry her arms from him “I’ll come see you. But you need to go right now”

“Javi..” he had to ignore her as he jumped out of the back of the ambulance. He took one last look at her, tears beginning the fall down her cheeks, either from pain or from the fact he was leaving her. He felt unbelievable guilt wash over him but he had to close the doors.

(Y/N) drew in a sharp breath as she splashed water over her face bringing her back into her equally painful reality. She looked at herself in her bathroom mirror and hated the sight. Seeing how her eyes were red and puffy for her uncontrollable tears of fear. Seeing dark circles under her eyes from lack of sleep. Well, peaceful sleep. The sleep she had been getting was plagued of the memory of the event or nightmarish versions of it. Although she still hadn’t come to terms with the fact it was a reality.

But the scar on her stomach was evidence enough.

Taking in a few deep breath, she turned off the tap stopping the water. She stood there for a moment longer, griping the sink in both hands as to try and ground herself. She was trying to brace herself for today.

She knew it wasn’t going to be easy. She would most likely suffer for the whole day. But she had to go back at some point, and if she didn’t now, then she never would.

(Y/N) let out a slow breath and pushed herself off the sink and slowly made her way out of her bathroom. She now face a new challenge; getting dressed. She already had her clothes laid out on her bed, but she didn’t quiet know how to go about it. If she were in any other state, it would be simple. But the injury to her stomach made it all the more difficult.

It had been six months almost to the day since it happened. She had been at home for those six months, bored out of her mind and in incredible pain. She spent most of her day in bed for it was too much to move. Only getting up to use the bathroom, get a drink or make some food. But even doing that let her in excruciating pain and short of breath.

The highlight of her week would be when Javier would come round to visit her, to check on her. He always brought over some ice cream because it was easy to eat, plus she loved it. But since he had been delving deeper and deeper into the Cali Cartel, he had been flying between Bogotá and Cali quite a lot so his visits became less and less frequent, leaving her all alone with her nightmares.

But she didn’t blame Javi for leaving her alone. He was doing his job and she wasn’t prepared to get in the way of that. She was convinced that if it wasn’t for him, she would be dead anyway. She was immensely thankful to have him as a friend.

(Y/N) was also thankful that the ambulance showed up when it did. Not just because it meant she got to the hospital quicker, but because she was a second away from confessing how much she loved him. She believed she was in the verge of death and didn’t want to go without telling him, but she knew if she did, she would have to live with the embarrassment that he did not feel the same. They were friends. Just friends.

Somehow she managed to get changed into her fresh clothes. Today she was returning to work. Ambassador Crosby had warned her against it saying she still needed time to rest both physically and mentally, Javi said this too but she couldn’t spend another minute at home on her own. She had to get back to work.

The journey from her apartment to her car took twice as long than it should have, and the journey from her car (in her car) to the embassy was just the same, but that was partly due to traffic.

When she finally made it to the embassy, she couldn’t bring herself to get out of her car. She sat and watched people walk in and out of the building. To them, everything was normal. But to (Y/N), having to walk back into the building was like walking into the jaws of death.

(Y/N) leant her head on the steering wheel and squeezed her eyes shut, drawing in shaky breaths as she tried to calm herself down and hype herself up for going back inside. “Come on (Y/N)” she whispered to herself “you got this far. Just a few more steps and you’ll be there”

She drew in a few more breaths before grabbing her bag and pulling herself out of her car. She took her time in walking to the embassy, those who were outside gave her looks as she walked past them but she tried her best to ignore them. But when she got inside it was no better. Everyone looked at her and whispered amongst themselves. She was the desk agent that got shot. Thats what she was known as now. Not the smiley, happy, caring agent she was before. She was the one who got shot.

To get to her own office she had to walk past Javi’s. She looked into it and saw it was empty. She also noticed that Van Ness and Feistl’s desks were empty too, meaning they were all out scoping for leads in the Cali cartel, most likely in Cali.

Finally she got to her office and saw a pile of papers on her desk. At least she would have something to distract her. At the top of the pile was a note from the Ambassador welcoming her back and telling her to take it easy.

She sat down in her chair and let out a sigh as she examined the stack of files she had been left to deal with. She grabbed a pen and the top file and began getting to work trying to focus only on the paper rather than the nightmarish visions at the back of her mind crawling closer and deeper into her.

It can’t have been any more than ten minutes before she got a sharp pain in her stomach causing her to stop and sit back in her chair. She was overcome by sudden frustration at the fact that she couldn’t even do her work.

“What are you doing back?” Came a voice form the door way. She looked up and saw Javi standing there.

“Working” she mumbled picking up her pen again.

“Clearly you’re in a fit state to be working” he said.

“I cleared it with Crosby”

“And he told you to take another few weeks off” Javi stepped into her office and closed the door before taking the chair opposite her and crossing one leg over the other “like I did. Why didn’t you listen?”

“You can’t say that” she said with a slight smile “you didn’t listen to me. You remember when we were still in training and you literally shattered your leg? I told you to rest but you came back way too soon”

“That was different (Y/N)” he told her “that was my own fault”

“And so was this” she told him “I’m the one who jumped in front of the bullet after all...”

There was a heavy silence over the two of them as she just stared at the piece of paper on her desk. There were so many thing Javier wanted to say to her. So many things he could’ve said to break the silence but he was scare the open his mouth. Scared that everything he wanted to say would just tumble out of his mouth in a mess that she couldn’t understand and he’d embarrass himself in front of her. But it was selfish of him to be thinking about his own stupid problems when the woman he loved took a bullet for him. But there was one question that was at the forefront of his mind.

“Are you okay?” He asked quietly, his voice barely above a whisper. He watched her as she dropped her pen again and her bottom lip trembled. She brought her hand to her forehead and turned her head from him slightly.

(Y/N) drew in a sharp breath before she started to cry quietly. She didn’t want him to see but there was nothing that could stop him considering he was sat right in front of her. Javier stood from his chair and pulled it round to her so he was sat beside her. He rested his hands on her thighs, rubbing them in a loving manner.

“I’m sorry Javi” she sobbed into her hands “I’m so sorry”

“Hey,” he said softly as he reached out to grab her hands to pulled them from her face making her look at him. His heart sank when he saw her bloodshot, watery eyes. A similar broken look in her as to when it happened. “You’ve got nothing to be sorry for” he said rubbing the back of her hands with his thumbs.

“I was an idiot...” she sniffed.

“Yeah, you were” he agreed with a nod making her laugh slightly. “But I would’ve done the same for you” he told her quietly.

“Javi..”

“I’m serious (Y/N). Had it been the other way round, I would’ve taken a bullet for you”

“I wouldn’t want you to do that for me”

“And I didn’t want you to do it for me” he said “and...I’ve never been more scared in my life” he paused for a moment. His grip on her hands tightening as he swallowed thickly trying not to cry himself. “The thought of loosing you...I couldn’t do this without you (Y/N). I couldn’t live in a world without you. You mean more to me than you will ever know...”

He saw tears fall to her hands and heard her drew in shaky breaths. He moved further to her and wrapped his arms around her, pulling her into his chest. She gripped his suit jacket and sobbed into his shirt. “I’m so sorry Javier. I don’t want to live without you”

“You won’t (Y/N). I’m going to help you get through this. You will get through this” he told her placing a soft kiss to her hair “I’m not going to leave you. Not this time”

04/01/21

Taglist: @linkpk88 @phoenixhalliwell @lunaserenade

#javier peña #javier peña x reader #javier peña fanfic #narcos #pedro pascal #angst #fluff #fanfic

[itsclydebitches]

RWBY Recaps: Volume 8 “Dark”

Welcome back, everyone! Can you believe it's been six weeks already? I can't. Something something the uncomfortable passage of time during a pandemic as emphasized by a web-series.

But we're here to talk about RWBY the fictional story, not RWBY the cultural icon. At least, we will in a moment. First, I'd like to acknowledge that shaky line between the two, growing blurrier with every volume. A sort of good news, bad news situation.

The bad news — to get that out of the way — is that we cannot easily separate RWBY from its authors and those authors have, sadly, been drawing a lot of negative attention as of late. This isn't anything new, not at all, but I think the unexpectedly long hiatus gave a lot of fans (myself included) the chance to think about Rooster Teeth's failings without getting distracted by their biggest and brightest production. There's a laundry list of problems here — everything from the behavior of voice actors to the quality of their merch — but as a sort of summary issue, I'd like to highlight the reviews that continue to pop up on websites like Glassdoor, detailing the toxic, sexist, crunch-obsessed environment that RT employees are forced to work in. A lot of these websites requires a login to read more than a page of reviews, but you can check out a Twitter thread about it here. 

Now, I want to be clear: I'm not bringing this up as a way to shame anyone enjoying RWBY. This isn't a simplistic claim of, "The authors are Problematic™ and therefore you can't like the stuff they produce." Nor is this meant to be a catch-all excuse for RWBY's problems. If it were, I'd have dropped these recaps years ago. I'm of the belief that audiences maintain the right to both praise and criticize the work they're given, regardless of the context in which that work was produced. At the end of the day, RT has presented RWBY as a finished product and, more than that, presents it as an excellent product, one worth both our emotional investment and our money (whether in the form of paying for a First account, or encouraging us to buy merch, attend cons, etc.) I'll continue to critique RWBY as needed, but I a) wanted fans to be at least peripherally aware of these issues and b) clarify that my use of "RT" in statements like, "I can't believe RT is screwing up this badly" is meant to be a broad, nebulas acknowledgement that someone in the company is screwing up, either creatively (doesn't have the skill to write a good scene) or morally (hasn't created an environment in which other creators are capable of crafting a good scene). The real, inner workings of such companies are mostly a secret to their audiences and thus it's near impossible for someone like me — random fan writing these for fun as a casual side hobby — to accurately point fingers. Hence, broad "RT." I just wanted to clarify that when I use this it's as a necessary placeholder for whoever is actually responsible, not a damnation of the overworked animator breaking down in a bathroom. Heavy stuff, but I thought it was necessary (or at least worthwhile) to acknowledge this issue as we head into the second half of the volume.

Now for the good news: RWBY has reached 100 episodes! For any who may not know, 100 is a pretty significant number in the TV world because, when talking about prime time programming, it guarantees syndicated reruns. Basically, networks don't want audiences to get burned out with a show — changing the channel when it comes on because ugh, I've seen this already, recently too — and 100 episodes allows for a roughly five month run without any repeats, making it very profitable. RWBY is obviously not a television show and doesn't benefit from any of this (hell, modern television doesn't benefit from this as much as it used to, not in the age of streaming), but the 100 episode threshold is still ingrained in American culture. Beyond just being a nice, rounded number, it is historically a measure of huge success and I can't imagine that RT isn't aware of that. Regardless of what we think of RWBY's current quality, this is one hell of a milestone and should be applauded.

All that being said... RWBY's quality is definitely still lacking lol.

Our 100th episode is titled "Dark" — keeping with the one word titles, then — and I'd like to emphasize that, as a 100th episode, it definitely delivers in terms of plot. There's plenty of action, important character beats, and at least one major reveal, everything we'd expect from a milestone and a Part II premiere. The animation also continues to be noteworthy for its beauty, as I found myself admiring many of the screenshots I took for this recap. There are certainly things to praise. The only problem (one we're all familiar with by now) is that these small successes are situated within a narrative that's otherwise falling apart. It's all good stuff... provided you ignore literally everything else surrounding it.

But let's dive into some examples. We open on Qrow starting, awoken by the thunder outside. Robyn has been watching him and makes a peppy comment about how none of them will be sleeping tonight, followed by a more serious, "Sounds bad out there." Yeah, it does sound bad, especially when they all know — thanks to Ruby's message back in Volume 7 — that this is due to Salem's arrival. I think a lot of the fandom has forgotten that little detail because people often discuss Qrow as if he is entirely ignorant of what is going on outside his cell. Even if we were to assume that he's forgotten all about the pesky Salem issue (the horror of Clover's death overriding everything else, perhaps) he still knows that Tyrian is running loose in a heat-less city with a creepy storm going on and, from his perspective, the Very Evil Ironwood is still running the show. So it's bad, which begs the question of why Qrow (and Robyn, for that matter) hasn't displayed an ounce of legitimate worry for everyone he knows out there. Thus far, their interactions have centered entirely around Qrow's misplaced blame and Robyn's terrible attempts to lighten the mood, despite the fact that a war is raging right beyond that wall. It's another example of RWBY's inability to manage tone properly, to say nothing of balancing the multiple concerns any one character should be trying to juggle. Just as it rankles that Ruby and Yang don't seem to care about what has happened to their uncle, Qrow likewise doesn't seem to care about what might be happening to his nieces. When did we reach a point where these relationships are so broken that someone can be arrested/chucked into a deadly battle and the others just... ignore that?

So Robyn's otherwise innocuous comment immediately reminds me of how badly the narrative has treated these conflicts and, sadly, things don't improve much from here. We are thankfully spared more of Robyn's jokes when Qrow realizes that what he's hearing can't be thunder. A second later, Cinder blasts through the wall — called it! — and Qrow instinctively transforms. 

The only downside to this moment is that the whole ceiling falls down on Qrow and the others because APPARENTLY these cells don't have tops on them. Seriously. As far as I can recall we don't see the stone breaking through the forcefield somehow and this looks pretty open to me.

If it is... you're telling me these crazy powerful fighters who practice landing strategies and leap tall buildings in a single bound —

— can't just hop over this mildly high electric fence to get out? Qrow can't just fly away?

We're, like, two minutes in, folks.

We transfer to Nora's perspective as she wakes up, seeing Klein giving her the IV. He tells her not to worry, that "you and your friend are going to be just fine." What friend? Penny? Klein went upstairs prior to Weiss hugging Whitley or Penny crash landing outside. I had thought them bursting through the door with another unconscious friend was the first time he learned what the big bang outside was, but apparently not.

Penny is, obviously, a mess. While I now understand the choice to make her blood such an eye-catching color when that's crucial to the Hound's hunt, I still think it looks strange visually. Like someone has taken a copy of RWBY and painted over it. It doesn't look like it fits the art style. More than that, it implies some rather complicated things about Penny's humanity, especially in a volume focused around her being a "real girl." Real enough for Maiden powers, but with obviously inhuman blood that isn't even referred to as "bleeding." Penny "leaks" instead.

Toss in the fact that she's literally an android who is made up of tech — recall the running gags about her being heavy, or it hurts to fist-bump her, to say nothing of keeping things like multiple blades inside her body — yet Klein says that her "basic anatomy" is the same and he can "stitch up that wound."

I'm sorry, what? Whatever Penny looks like on the inside, it's not going to resemble a human woman's anatomy, and Klein might be able to stitch the outer layer of skin she's got, but that won't do anything to fix whatever metal bits have been broken underneath. Penny isn't a human-robot hybrid, she's a robot with an aura. Penny has knives in her back, rockets in her feet, and a super computer behind her eyes. When our clip introduced that Klein would be the one to help Penny, my initial reaction was, "Seriously? He's a butler and a doctor and an engineer?" But RWBY didn't even try to get away with a Super Klein explanation, they just waved away Penny's very obvious, inhuman anatomy. Yeah, I'm sure "stitching up" an android wound is just like giving Nora her IV. I hope the surgical sutures he used are extra strong!

In an effort to not entirely drag this episode, I do appreciate that Whitley is allowed an "ugh" moment about the non-blood covering his shirt without anyone calling him out on it. That felt like the sort of thing the show would usually try to make a character feel guilty about and I'm glad that, for once, he was just allowed to be frustrated without comment.

Then the power goes out and May calls, which raises questions about what state the CCTS is in and when scrolls are available to our protagonists vs. when they're not. But whatever. She's checking in because she just "saw another bombing run light up the Kingdom" and —

Wait. Bombing? Salem is bombing the city? I know we've seen explosions in the sky, but I'd always just attributed that to evil aesthetic. Why does this dialogue sound like it's from a World War II film and not a fantasy sci-fi show about literal monsters launching a ground attack?

May looks pretty against the sky though. I like her hair color against that purple.

I'm admittedly grasping at positives here because we finally return to her "You have to choose" ultimatum and — surprise! — May has pulled back completely. Ruby says that once they've helped Penny, "We'll...we'll do something!" which is once again her avoiding making a decision. Ruby still refuses to choose, instead falling back on generic, optimistic pep talks. They'll figure out how to stop Salem later. They'll think about the impact of telling the world later. They'll choose who to help later. Ruby keeps pushing these problems into the future where, she hopes, a perfect, magical solution will have appeared for her to latch onto. When that continues to not happen, others pressuring her to actually do something and stop waiting for perfection — Ironwood, Yang, May — she panics and continues stalling for time. Wait an episode and the narrative supports her in this.

Because initially May was forcing Ruby to decide. Now, May enables her desire to keep putting things off. "Don't beat yourself up, kid. At this point, I don't know how much is left to be done." That's the exact opposite of what May believed last episode, that there was still so much work and good to do for the people of Mantle. This is precisely what the show did with Yang and Ren's scenes too, having people call Ruby out... but then return to a message of, 'Don't worry, you're actually doing just fine' before Ruby is forced to actually change.

None of which even touches on May calling her "kid" in this moment. That continues to be a convenient way of absolving Ruby of any responsibility. When she wants to steal airships or Amity Tower, she's an adult everyone should listen to, the leader of this war. When the story wants to absolve her of previously mentioned flaws, she becomes a kid who shouldn't "beat herself up." I said years ago that RWBY couldn't continue to let the group be both children and adults simultaneously, yet here we are.

So that was a thoroughly disappointing scene. Ruby gets her moment to look sad and defeated, listing "the grimm, the crater, Nora, Penny" as problems she doesn't know how to solve. Note that 'Immortal witch attacking the city I've helped trap here' isn't included in that list. Ruby is still ignoring Salem herself and no one in the group is picking up where May left off, challenging her to do more than wring her hands over things others are already trying to take care of: Ironwood is fighting the grimm, May has gone off to help the crater, Klein is patching up Nora and Penny. Ruby, as one flawed individual, should not be expected to come up with a solution to everything, but she does need to stop acting like she can come up with a solution to everything when it matters most (office scene) and rejecting others' solutions when they ask for her help (Ironwood, May).

If it feels like I'm dragging the flawed, traumatized teenager too much, it's not in an effort to ignore those aspects of her identity. Rather, it's because she's also the licensed huntress who wrested control from a world leader and violently demanded she be put in charge of this battle. Ruby, by her own actions, is now responsible for dealing with these problems, or admitting she was wrong and letting others take the lead, without purposefully derailing their plans. She doesn't get to suddenly go, "I don't know," cry a little, and get sympathetic pats.

But of course that's precisely what happens, courtesy of Weiss.

During this whole scene I kept wondering why no one was celebrating Nora waking up, especially when Ruby outright mentions her. Have they just not noticed given all the Penny drama? Because Nora absolutely woke up.

Aaaand went back to sleep, I guess. What was the point of that POV shot? No worries though, she'll wake up again in a minute.

Willow arrives and announces that they can fix the power (and Penny) using the generator at the edge of the property. I'm convinced RT doesn't actually know what a generator is because the characters are acting like it's some super special device that only richy-rich could possibly have. Whitley says that it's the SDC executives who have their "own power supply" and that it's "extremely unfair." Now, don't get me wrong, a good generator powering large portions of your house can run you 30k+, but you can also get one that plugs into your extension cord and powers your fridge for a couple hundred. There's absolutely a class issue here, just not the one Whitley and Weiss seem to be commenting on. They make a generator sound like the sort of device that only a politician-CEO could possible have and it's weird.

Likely, it sounds weird because it's a choppy way of getting Whitley to bring up the wealth disparity so he can then go, 'That's right! We're crazy rich with a company housing tons of ships! We can use those to evacuate Mantle.' Awkwardness aside, I do like that the Schnee wealth is being used for good purposes, but... evacuate where? To the city currently under attack by a giant whale? In a RWBY that wasn't determined to demonize Ironwood, this would have been a great plot point during the office scene instead, with Weiss offering her services to Ironwood, even if the group decides that a continued evacuation still isn't possible.

Instead, we get it here from Whitley. Do I need to point out the obvious? That Whitley is the MVP of this episode? He's done more good in an HOUR than the group has managed in a year. Give this kid some training and make him a huntsmen instead.

We're given a (very pretty!) shot of the shattered moon because it wouldn't be RWBY if we weren't continually reminded that gods once wiped out humanity before destroying part of a celestial body... and absolutely no one talks about that lol.

Blake's coat might not make any sense for her color scheme, but it does make her easy to spot as she and Ruby run across the grounds. Oh my god, they're actually doing something together! It only took eight years. They even get a lovely talk where Blake admits how much she looks up to Ruby, despite her being younger, and once again I'm struck at how much more I would have loved this scene if it had appeared elsewhere in the series. It is, indeed, as sweet and emotional as all the RWBY GIF-ers are claiming... provided you overlook that this is the exact opposite of what Ruby needs to hear right now. She doesn't need to hear that she's more mature and reliable than her elders when she's functioning under a "We don't need adults" mentality. She doesn't need to hear that not knowing what to do is totally fine, not when that led to her turning on Ironwood, despite not knowing how to stop Salem. She doesn't need to hear that "doing something" — doing anything — is a strength, because Ruby keeps avoiding the big problems for smaller ones she's comfortable with, like standing by Penny's bedside instead of deciding between Mantle and Atlas. Blake's speech is heartfelt, but it's a speech that suits a Beacon days Ruby who is having some doubts about her leadership skills, not the girl whose impulsive — and now lack of — actions is having world-wide repercussions. Everyone is babying Ruby to a staggering degree. It's like if we had a med show where the doctor is standing by the bedside of a coding patient, fretting between two treatments. 'Don't worry,' their colleague says, patting their shoulder. 'I've always looked up to you. You'll do something when you're ready' and then they continue to watch the patient, you know, die.

Also: who does Ruby look up to? Everyone talks about how much they depend on and trust Ruby, but who does Ruby look to for guidance? A number of her problems stem from the fact that she has rejected the advice of everyone who has tried to help her improve: Qrow, Ozpin, Ironwood, even Yang. Ruby is presented as the pinnacle of what to strive for in a leader, rather than a leader who has only been doing this for two years and still has a great deal to learn.

Anyway, they get the generator on and the Hound shows up.

I am begging RT to just make RWBY a horror story. All their best scenes the last three years have been horror I am bEGGING —

Anyway, while Ruby waits to be eaten we cut to Willow and Klein, the former of which is reaching for her bottle, pulling back, reaching again, all while her hand shakes. This is good. This is what we should have gotten with Qrow. Which isn't to say that their (or anyone's) addiction should be identical, but rather that this is a far more engaging and complex look at addiction than what our birb got. Willow tells us that she doesn't drink in the dark despite bringing the bottle with her; tries to resist drinking when she's scared and ultimately fails. Qrow just decided to stop drinking after decades of addiction, seemingly for no reason, and that was that. Why is a side character we only met this volume written better than one of the main cast?

Blake manages to call Weiss about the Hound and she asks if Whitley can handle the airships without her. I mean, I assume so given that Weiss is looking at the bookshelves while Whitley does all the work lol. He makes a teasing comment about how he can if she can handle that grimm and she comments that they still need to work on his "attitude."

No they don't. Weiss stuck a weapon in her kid brother's face. Whitley made a joke. Even if Weiss' comment is likewise meant to be read as teasing, it's clear that we've bypassed any meaningful conversation between them. That hug was supposed to be a Fix Everything moment even though, as I've laid out elsewhere, it didn't even come close.

We cut back to Ruby getting thrown through a wall into the backyard and the Hound creepily coming after her. She's freaked out by this clearly abnormal grimm and Blake is weirdly... not? "It's just a grimm. Just focus!" Uh, it's obviously not. Have we reached the traumatized, sleep-deprived point where the group is sinking into full-blown denial? I wouldn't be surprised. They've been awake for like... 40+ hours.

Because the Hound knocks Ruby out with a single hit. Just, bam, she's down. "Focusing" is not the solution here.

Weiss calls to warn the others about the grimm, telling them to stick together. Willow (understandably) starts freaking out and flees the room (classic horror trope!). Klein is left alone when Penny wakes up with red eyes. Oh no!

Don't worry. You know nothing meaningful happens.

She shoves Klein before (somehow?) resisting the hack, her Maiden powers going wild in the process. Just when it looks as if Penny might cause some serious damage, Nora wakes up, takes her hand, and says, I kid you not:

"Hey... no one is going to make you do anything you don't want to do... It's just a part of you. Don't forget about the rest."

Okay. I want to re-emphasize that I love hopeful, uplifting, victory-won-through-the-power-of-love stories. Istg I'm not dead inside, it's just that RWBY does this so badly. I mean, what is this? It has similarities to the character shouting, 'No! Resist!' to their mind-controlled ally, but this is not presented as a desperate, last-ditch effort by Nora. She just speaks like this is the most obvious truth in the world. If you don't want to have your mind taken over... just don't! It's that simple. The problem definitely isn't that Watts has changed her coding and has implemented a command she can't override, it's that Penny has forgotten about the "rest" of her personhood.

And this works. Granted, not for long, but we leave Nora having successfully calmed Penny down and until her eyes unexpectedly go red again scenes later, we're left assuming that this is a permanent solution. That, imo anyway, is taking the Power of Love too far, overriding the basic reality of Penny being hacked. It’s not a personal failing she must overcome, it’s an external attack. I would have rather had Nora react to the scars she saw on her arm, or have a moment with Klein, or get some love from the group. Not a wakes up, falls asleep, wakes up again to save Penny with a Ruby level 'Just ignore reality' pep-talk, then back to sleep again.

So Penny isn't attacking her allies, or mistakenly hurting her allies with wild Maiden powers. Not that the group doesn't have enough to deal with, but still. Weiss arrives to help with the Hound and attempts a new summon, only to fail when two minor grimm burrow up into her glyphs. I really enjoyed that moment, both for the wing visual and the knowledge that Weiss' glyphs can fail if you break them somehow (which makes sense). Also, I just like that she failed in general? Weiss is, as per usual now, about to demonstrate just how OP she is compared to the rest of the team, so it was nice to see her faltering here.

The Hound tries to make off with Ruby and Blake does an excellent job of keeping it tethered. Ruby finally wakes, only to realize that the grimm is actually after Penny since it's staring at her power up through the window, no longer trying to escape. Moments like this remind me that there's someone on RT's writing team that knows what they're doing, at least some of the time. The assumption that the Hound is after Ruby as a SEW, the surprise that it's actually Penny, realizing it holds up because Ruby is covered in Penny's blood and Blake is not... that's all nice, tight plotting. More of that please!

The Hound drops her and Ruby's aura shatters when she hits the ground. I want everyone to remember this moment as an example of how strong the Hound is. The group may be tired, but unlike YJR they've been sitting around in the Schnee manor for a number of hours, regaining strength. We saw the Hound hit Ruby twice — once through the wall and once to knock her out — and then she falls from a not very high distance for a huntress, yet her aura is toast. That's the level of power and skill the Hound possesses. Decimating YJR, knocking Oscar out, same for Ruby, avoiding Blake and Weiss' hits, soon to treat Penny like a ragdoll. Just remember all this for the episode's end.

Blake tells Weiss she'll take care of Ruby, you go help the others. Yay breaking up the duos more! Bad timing though as the new acid-spitting grimm pops out of the ground and Blake is now left alone to face it.

Weiss re-enters the mansion, knowing the Hound is somewhere nearby, but not where. Suddenly, Willow's voice sounds through her scroll with an, "Above you!" which... doesn't keep Weiss from getting hit lol. But it's the thought that counts! Willow has accessed the cameras she's set up throughout the manor, watching the Hound's movements, and I have to say, that is a WAY better use of her separation from Klein than I thought we were getting. I legit thought they'd have Willow run away in a panic, meet the Hound, die, and then Weiss could be sad about losing her mom.

It does say something about RWBY's writing that this was my knee-jerk theory, as well as my surprise when we got something way better.

The Hound runs off, uninterested in Weiss, and she asks Willow to keep tabs on it. It heads for Whitley next (also covered in Penny's blood) and very creepily stalks him in the office with a, "I know you're here." Whitley is seconds away from being Hound chow before one of Weiss' boars pin it against the wall. He runs, then runs BACK to finish deploying the airships, before finally escaping assumed death. Goddamn this boy is pulling his weight.

I assume all these ships are automated then? I hope someone takes a moment to call May. Otherwise it's going to be super weird for the Mantle citizens if a fleet of SDC ships just show up and hover there...

I don't entirely understand how Weiss saved him though. She's nowhere to be seen when Whitley leaves and he runs a fair distance before he and Willow encounter Weiss again. We know her summons don't have to keep right next to her, but are they capable of rudimentary thought, attacking an enemy — and an enemy only — despite Weiss being a couple corridors down and unable to see the current battlefield? I don't know. In another series I'd theorize that this was a deliberate hint, a way to clue us into the fact that Willow, someone who we currently know almost nothing about, had training in the past and summoned the boar herself. Weiss and Winter certainly didn't get that hereditary skill from Jacques. Hell, we might still get that, Weiss reacting with confusion next episode when Whitley thanks her for the boar, but I doubt it. That scene with Ruby and the Hound aside, the show isn't this good at laying groundwork and then following up on it.

Case in point: Weiss says, "I didn't forget you" to Whitley after he gets away from the Hound, the moment trying to harken back to her promise to Willow. Key word is "trying." Because she absolutely forgot him! Weiss threatened and ignored Whitley until he proved his usefulness. I also shouldn't need to point out that, "Don't forget your brother" does not mean, "Don't let your brother die a horrible death by abnormal grimm." Weiss acts like her saving him is a fulfillment of her promise, rather than just the most basic of human decency. And also, you know, her job.

So that part is frustrating. The entire Schnee dynamic is a mess, from Weiss making a joke of her father's arrest, to Willow (presumably) fixing their relationship by putting a hand on her daughter's shoulder. Okay.

Then Weiss cuts off the Hound by summoning a giant wall of ice. My brain, every time this happens:

YOU COULD HAVE FIXED THE HOLE IN MANTLE'S WALL.

Moving on, Blake's fight against the acid... thing has some great choreography, including Blake using her semblance which we haven't seen in AGES. 

I really like the fight itself, just not what Blake is shouting the whole time. "I need you, Ruby! We all need you!" This has really gotten ridiculous. Ruby is presented as everyone's sole savior despite failing time and time again. It's not that I don't think Blake as a character should have faith in her leader, it's that I don't think the writers should be crafting a story where everyone puts their unshakable hopes in an untrained, disloyal, impulsive 17 year old. I mean, Ruby is currently unconscious, yet Blake is acting like if she doesn't wake up — she, as an individual, if Ruby Rose does not re-join this fight — then all is lost. If Ruby doesn't save them, no one can. Which is, of course, absurd on numerous levels. Blake doesn't need the passed out, aura-less Ruby right now, she needs the still very healthy Weiss pulling out multiple summons and an ice wall! Use your scroll and call for backup again.

But of course, Ruby wakes up and kills the new, terrifying grimm with a single hit. It's a preview of what's to come with the Hound and it's just as ridiculous here as it will be there.

Speaking of the Hound, am I the only one who thought this was... cute?

I can't possibly be the only one. That head-tilt is exactly what my dogs do and my brain instinctively went, "Aww, puppy!"

Murderous puppy.

The Hound realizes none of the Schnees are who it's looking for and runs off. Penny, meanwhile, has been fully taken over because, well, that's just what's convenient now. She resists long enough keep Amity up, then succumbs, then resists to apologize to Ruby, then succumbs, then resists because Nora asked her to, then succumbs once it's time to knock her out. If RWBY was willing to commit to consequences, Penny would have been taken over and that was that. The characters would need to deal with whatever outcome happens as a result. Instead, the show very carefully avoids any of those pesky consequences by having Penny successfully resisting at key moments, despite no explanation of how she's managing that.

She shoves Klein again (Klein is having a Bad Time) and starts walking down the main steps. When Whitley wants to know where the hell she's going, Penny mechanically responds that she must "Open the vault, then self-destruct." I suppose the change Watts made was the self-destruct order? Ironwood obviously wants the vault open, though not necessarily Penny's death. Think what you will of his moral compass, she's a damn powerful ally — a research project, perhaps — and a Maiden to boot. At the very least, her death may give the powers to someone even worse.

God, please don't let them have brought Penny back and made her a Maiden just to kill her again.

The Hound arrives though and, as said, knocks Penny out. We're back to square one with her, then. Note though that this attack is near instantaneous. She grabs its hands one second, is hanging limply the next. Wow, the Hound sure is a terrifying antagonist!

Not for long.

"That's enough," Ruby says and one-shots it with her eyes.

Now, I want to talk for a moment about the implications of that line. "That's enough." Obviously Ruby is #done with this situation and emotionally unwilling to let the Hound kidnap Penny (congratulations, Nuts and Dolts shippers), but there's a meta reading here as well. Not intentional, but glaring to me nonetheless. Basically, the idea that the Hound has, from a plot perspective, done enough. It has served its singular purpose. It kidnapped Oscar and now it dies. Never-mind how insanely powerful we've established the Hound to be, never-mind how Ruby's eyes also work or don't work according to whether anything of actual import is on the line. From a plot perspective "that's enough" and the Hound can be disposed of instantly. It got Oscar and gave us an episode of filler creepiness. Move along now.

The idea behind Ruby's eyes isn't bad, but the execution absolutely is. RT has undermined a huge portion of the stakes by giving their protagonist an instant kill-shot that always works precisely when she needs it to. Starting with the Apathy, we have yet to get a moment where Ruby's eyes fail to save the day when she really needs them to, no matter how incredible the challenge. The Hound was very intentionally written to be a grimm outside of the group's current power level. It thinks, it talks, they literally can't touch it. This creates the expectation that the group will need to grow stronger — or at least become smarter — in order to surmount this new obstacle, yet Ruby's eyes undermine all of that. The group hasn't grown in years, the show just makes enemies weaker as needed (Ace Ops), or has Ruby pull out her eyes as a trump card. It wouldn't be that bad if we'd at least gotten a good battle out of it, one where the group gets close to defeating the Hound on their own, but needs Ruby's eyes to finish it off. Instead, she literally walks up without any aura, announces to the audience that this antagonist's time is up, and blasts it out a window.

Granted, Ruby's eyes don't completely finish it. The Hound pulls itself to its feet and we see this.

Yup, that's a guy and yup, those are silver eyes.

I would like to issue a formal apology to the "It's secretly Summer!" theorists in the fandom. I mean, I still think it would be ridiculous (and at this point highly improbable) that Ruby's dead mother has actually been a grimm mutant this whole time, just hanging out in Salem's realm while she waits for the plot to start before attacking the world, and then sends some no-name faunus dude after the group instead of their leader's mother for extra, emotional torture... but you all were definitely right about the “It's a person” part! I... don't know how I feel about this. Admittedly, it seems to be a logical continuation of the other grimm-human hybrids we've seen — namely Cinder and Salem herself — and it finally explains why Salem wants Ruby alive (even though it actually doesn't because WHY did she want more SEWs for Hound grimm when she wasn't even attacking back then? And already has all these other insanely powerful tools??), but at the same time, it feels like it's complicating a story that doesn't need further complications. The group fights monsters and has an immortal enemy. You don't need to add 'Some of those monsters are secretly human' to the mix.

It doesn't hurt that this twist is giving me Attack on Titan vibes, which, ew. A dark time in my fandom life, folks.

The Hound staggers a few steps before Whitley and Willow dump a suit of armor on it. That's all it takes to kill the most dangerous grimm we've ever seen: a single flash of silver eyes and some heavy metal. This also wreaks havoc with the implication that Salem wants SEWs alive because they create such powerful grimm. Obviously not. I mean yeah, normal huntsmen are going to have serious  problems, we’ve seen that this volume, but any other SEWs nearby will take a Hound out instantaneously. For a villain with so many other powerful abilities — immortality, magic, endless normal grimm, her nifty soup — Salem would be much better served just killing SEWs straight out. Clearly, creating Hounds isn't worth the effort.

The Hound leaves some bones behind and Ruby collapses to her knees, overcome with the knowledge that this was once a person. Again, uncomfortable Attack on Titan parallels.

We finish our premiere with Cinder clearing away rubble to reveal Watts. Honestly, I like that we ended on this because her rescue is hilarious. She just slings him over her shoulders like a sack of potatoes and blasts off with her magic fire feet. Fantastic.

Note though that with this scene we've seen almost everything from the clip and the trailer. What's to come in the rest of Volume 8? No idea. Outside of Winter leading the charge with the bomb, we got it all here.

Time to update the bingo board!

I'm crossing off "Introducing new grimm that are quickly abandoned." Between the Hound and acid-dude both falling to a single blast/cut from Ruby, we've more than earned this square.

It doesn't look as if we'll get another Watts-Jacques team-up now that he's left, but you never know.

Maria's got me worried. I feel like her Yoda fight against Neo is the one thing she'll be allowed to do this volume, but given that we didn't see anyone except Ruby's group this episode, we don't yet know whether the story is now ignoring her and Pietro, or if they'll re-appear in another episode like YJR.  

Qrow is free. Will he get a drink before trying to murder Ironwood? Perhaps.

Still no bingo :(

All in all, the episode was by no means horrible. I think there were lots of horrible parts, but also some legitimately well executed moments, fun action, and scenes that I can easily imagine as squee worthy if you lean back and squint. Everything is comparative and in the growing collection of bad RWBY episodes, this one isn't securing a top slot. Which doesn't mean I think it's good, just... not as bad as it could have been and primarily only bad due to long-running problems, not things this specific episode has done. That's my bar then, so low it has officially entered the underworld.

Still, RWBY is back and a part of me is eager to see where this volume takes us, for better or for worse.

Until next week! 💜

[Ko-Fi]

#rwby #rwby spoilers #rwby volume 8 #mymetas #rwby recaps #rwby dark

[jpegjade]

Pact it in - Spencer

We have a new fic!! everyone handclaps for @hypotheticalforest for this great idea!! i made a tiiiiny detail change but it wasn’t huge. 

request: Spencer and reader are best friends that are both fed up with dating so they made a pact to get married if they’re both still single at 35? But then the reader starts talking to other guys and notices that Spencer is sabotaging things? Like coincidentally texting her while she’s out, point out their flaws, little stuff like that. Spencer doesn’t realize what he’s doing until she calls him out?

warnings: tbh i dont think there are any. a little angsty but i promise there’s fluff. 

__________________

“Spencer, what the hell is wrong with you?” You asked as he pushed open your apartment door. 

Spencer, as smart as he was, seemed to be a total idiot sometimes. 

“What do you mean? That guy literally was checking out the waitress when he should’ve been checking you out. Did he even make a comment on your highlighter? Your cheekbones look immaculate.” Spencer held the door open for you as you walked in. 

“How did you even happen to show up to the same bar where we chose to get drinks?” You asked, putting your bag down on the couch, collapsing next to it. 

“I didn’t know that’s where you were going. Morgan just asked me to stop by there with him.” Spencer shrugged. 

“Oh, so Morgan asked you to stop by the place where I had my date, profile him, make an ass out of both you and me, and then bring me home after almost punching the guy?” You questioned, skeptically. 

You knew Spencer could be an idiot but you didn’t know he could be so dumb to think he would sneak this one past you. 

“Y/n, I’m sorry. I genuinely didn’t know that you were going to be there and I thought a night with Morgan would be a good thing for me.” Spencer said looking down at his feet.

“Spencer, what are you talking about? You hate bars.” You wondered what Spencer could possibly be going on about. 

“I feel like you’re pulling away and we’ll miss the big day...” Spencer got quiet as he watched your emotions shift in front of him. 

“Spencer…” You said, all angry resolve melting off of you. 

Spencer didn’t look forward to his birthday. Too much had happened over the years and so little of it was good. He didn’t have much to celebrate so he didn’t bother celebrating it. His mom wasn’t doing that great, the team was constantly shifting, and nothing was stable for him except his relationship with you. This birthday was bound to be different. He had been looking forward to it ever since you made the pact.

A few years ago, you and Spencer decided that you needed to focus on your careers and not bother with dating anyone because nothing was turning out right. You both agreed that if you were both single at 35, you would date each other and if things went well, your happy ending would be with the other person. Your 35th birthday already passed and you weren’t seriously dating anyone. Spencer’s birthday was in a week and he made sure to stay single just for you. 

“Are you still serious about that?” You asked. 

“You aren’t?” Spencer could feel his heart breaking slowly. 

“No, I mean… Spencer, come on.” You looked at your shoes. 

There was a heavy silence between the two of you as you both thought back to the day when you made the agreement, putting it down on paper. 

***

“Y/n, please get up.” Spencer said, trying to pull you up. 

You hadn’t moved from bed in 3 days after you got dumped in the most humiliating way possible on Valentine’s Day: a text message after you booked a very expensive restaurant and bought the best champaign they had. They stood you up for an hour then said ‘Sorry luv. It’s not working out xx.” 

“I’m worried about you.” Spencer said as you turned over so your back was facing him. 

“You shouldn’t be. I’m just swearing off having a significant other for… Forever.” You said, sighing. 

Spencer didn’t like to see you upset, especially not over a romantic interest. He knew how it felt to lose someone you really liked. His job had taken away so many people he felt a genuine connection with that he hated to think you were giving up on something that could be so wonderful. Ever the realist, Spencer was a hopeless romantic at heart. 

“I don’t think you mean forever. Statistically, there’s no such thing, especially with matters of the heart.” Spencer was starting to get going on statistics about bad habits being the leading cause of breakups but you shot him a look that said you couldn’t handle statistics about your heart being broken. 

“Well, long enough to make me forget that there are actually people in the world who hate my personality enough to stand me up and pretend like they were going to come back to me or even talk to me again.” You said, turning over to face Spencer completely. 

“I like your personality enough to live with you.” Spencer said, staring at you. 

“Spencer, we’re best friends, first, and second, you’re gone half of the time so you don’t have to put up with me all the time.” You said, sighing. 

“That shouldn’t matter.” Spencer was confused at why being your friend would make anything different. 

“But it does. You know parts of me that I hide from new people in my life and look at what happens. I still end up crying alone in my bed.” You saw a new set of tears begin to obscure your vision slightly. 

“I don’t show all of myself and I lose people I love, even in the friend sense.” Spencer looked at you softly. 

He knows how it feels to be hurt and he knew you could be sensitive when you were really invested in something or someone and you were disappointed, especially if you admired it a lot. 

“What if we just married each other?” You said, sitting up. 

“What?” The air in Spencer’s lungs were sucked out of him. 

Of all the things he ever hoped you’d say, he didn’t think he would ever hear that one. 

“You and I should just get married.” You repeated. 

“Now?” Spencer was only capable of saying one word at a time as his heart was racing and his brain was overloading with happiness. 

“No, not now. Let’s give it a few years… Maybe if we’re still single at 35, we’ll date each other with the intent of getting married. I mean, hell, we’re practically married already.” You said, smiling a little bit. 

You always loved Spencer in a special way but you were always scared that he would turn you down so you never really went for it. You spent so much time burying the feelings that you didn’t think you even had a chance. 

“Let’s put this on paper.” Spencer said, yanking a piece of paper out of his journal. 

You wrote down the exact conditions you just outlined and drew two straight lines at the bottom for signatures. First, you signed. Spencer signed right after you. 

“Promise?” You said, holding your pinky out. 

“Promise.” He said, wrapping his pinky with yours.

***

“Do you still have the paper?” You asked, breaking the silence. 

“Yeah.” Spencer nodded. 

“Then the contract is still enacted.” You nodded slowly. You were trying to process what this meant. 

“Do you still want me?” Spencer asked, trying to keep it together. 

“Spencer… Listen.” You started. “I have spent years in love with you and it’s been hard. You’ve fallen in love with other girls and I’ve just been here. Waiting. So yeah, I started to look for other people because I don’t know if you even feel the same way, let alone still want to go through with that. Honestly, I haven’t forgotten about it. I just thought you would’ve thrown it out by now.” 

“I do.” Spencer muttered. 

“What?” You asked, making sure that you were hearing him correctly. 

“I do. I still feel the same way and I’m still serious about the contract.” He said, looking up at you. 

You were trying to find some hint of Spencer messing with you. You weren’t a profiler but this seemed too easy. This was going to lead in disappointment, right? 

“So what now?” You asked, almost in a whisper. 

“I guess we wait.” Spencer said, unsure what to really do. 

“Wait?” Your thoughts were racing but you didn’t understand why you would wait when you both wanted the same thing. 

“Yeah. It says we both have to be 35. I have one more week to go.” Spencer was so technical. 

“So does that mean I can’t kiss you for a week?” You asked, a small smile on your face. 

“The contract didn’t say anything about you giving me kisses…” Spencer blushed, his heart racing. 

“Well then I guess we found a loophole.” You said, closing the distance between you and Spencer.

#spencer reid #spencer reid x reader #spencer x reader #spencer reid fluff #spencer reid imagine

[thesleepiesthufflepuff]

Nothing More Than That

When Harry woke, the world was silent, the earth covered in a fresh layer of snow. Pale overcast light fell in through the crack in his curtains, highlighting small particles of dust floating through the still air. A blanket of coldness hung over the bedroom, sinking into Harry’s hands and seeping into his spine, and he burrowed further under the covers.

That is, until he remembered that it was New Year’s Day, and New Year’s Day meant going over to the Burrow for a grand lunch that Molly had poured her blood, sweat, and tears into.

With a heavy groan, Harry sat up and rubbed his eyes. After a moment he reached over to his nightstand, grabbed his wand, and lazily cast Tempus. Blue numbers appeared in the air, glowing against the early morning light, and revealed that it was eight o’clock. Rolling his eyes in annoyance, he peeled back his duvet and slid out of bed, the soles of his feet meeting the icy wooden floor. He padded to the bathroom, relieving himself before wandering to his wardrobe and exchanging his pajamas for a pair of fitted black jeans, a light pink cable knit jumper that complimented his golden brown skin, and canvas high-tops.

Once dressed, he ran a comb through his hair, although his black waves still sat at odd, unusual angles. After a minute or two he gave up, spraying himself with eucalyptus and pine aftershave. Then, giving himself a final once-over, he felt reasonably content and headed in the direction of the kitchen.

He sat in a stupor and drank coffee while the porridge cooked, occasionally casting a glance at the clock hanging on the wall to make sure that he was alright for time. By nine o’clock, he’d chucked on his coat and a matching set of a grey scarf, gloves, and a beanie that Molly had knitted for him several years ago. Then, stuffing his keys and wallet into his satchel, he headed out the door of his flat, down the stairs of the building, and out into the brisk morning.

The sky was heavy with dark clouds, threatening to unleash a new flurry of snow and slush at any moment. This caused Harry to frown, a deep crease settling in between his eyebrows as he made his way towards the nearest Tube station. The path was slick and wet with snow that had fallen overnight, and his shoes were already soaked and uncomfortable. Silently, Harry thanked himself for having been reasonable and putting on a second pair of wool socks over his first.

After hopping on his train, he arrived at his stop thirty minutes later. Weaving his way in between clusters of people on the platform, he made his way up the stairs and onto the street, turning right. Down the road a little ways, he could make out a wooden sign jutting out from one of the shops up ahead, reading Rosemary’s Garden in faded, light green print. He let out a sigh of relief, having found it.

Walking into the shop, he was immediately hit with the sweet, aromatic smell of roses. The right wall was made up of a refrigerator, which was filled to the brim with a variety of flowers. Harry recognized a few, such as baby’s breath, gardenias, and lilies. The rest of the shop was filled with premade floral arrangements and bouquet accessories, all looking rather attractive in the silver light that fell through the broad front window.

Harry looked to the till counter, but there wasn’t a shop employee in sight. However, there was a silver bell sitting on the countertop, which he diligently rang, the tinny sound echoing throughout the shop. He heard shuffling in what must have been the back room, and then a figure all too familiar emerged.

Draco sodding Malfoy. He looked better than he had the last time Harry had seen him, which had been at his trial seven years ago. Malfoy had looked worn then, his skin sallow and taut and a dull look in his pewter colored eyes. Now, though, there was a light about him, as though someone had flipped a switch. His soft, ashy blond hair was cropped just above his ears, shorter than it had been, and the frown lines that had riddled his face were now faded.

As Harry stared at him, he realized with quite a horrible shock that Malfoy was … fit.

Malfoy awkwardly cleared his throat, moving to his position behind the counter. He was clad in a charcoal colored turtleneck and, Harry was quite startled to see, blue jeans. On top of the turtleneck laid a forest green apron with the shop’s name embroidered in loopy gold letters on the chest.

“Potter?” Malfoy asked hesitantly, his voice breaking the deafening silence.

“I―” Harry began, his tongue suddenly feeling dry and far too large, “I didn’t know you worked here. Why … why do you work here?”

“Well,” Malfoy said, his voice weary, “I didn’t exactly have a choice, did I? With the wizarding world casting me into exile, and all.”

Harry was taken aback at his bluntness, and he recoiled slightly. “That makes sense. Do you … like flowers?”

The corners of Malfoy’s mouth turned upwards slightly. “I suppose.”

“Right,” Harry said nervously, looking anywhere but at Malfoy. “Well, I’d like to buy a bouquet of flowers.”

“That’s a bit … generic,” Malfoy said flatly. “Could you be more specific? Type of flower? Size?”

“Oh. Um, well, Molly likes zinnias. Dahlias too, I think. And nothing too fancy. She wouldn’t want that,” Harry said.

“Would you mind if I put some eucalyptus and baby’s breath in the bouquet? Just to break up the dahlias and zinnias,” Malfoy asked.

Harry shrugged. “You’re the florist.”

He swore he could see Malfoy smirk as he set about putting the bouquet together. Meanwhile, Harry wandered around the shop, putting all of his frazzled energy into admiring the different flora.

Ten minutes later, the bouquet was ready. It was filled with bright orange and pink flowers, which paired nicely with the paleness of the eucalyptus leaves and baby’s breath. A cream satin ribbon had been tied neatly around the stems, which were held in place by a plastic bouquet covering. It looked right up Molly’s alley, which made Harry feel thrilled.

“It’s perfect. Thank you,” Harry said, digging out his wallet. “How much do I owe you?”

“Sixty pounds even.”

Harry sucked in a sharp breath, not having expected such a steep price, but paid it nonetheless. He’d pay anything to see the smile that he knew would appear on Molly’s face when she saw the bouquet.

As Malfoy printed the receipt, he looked up, an amused look on his face. “So, I saw in the Daily Prophet that you’ve come out as bisexual. Is it true?”

Harry, after briefly choking on his spit, let out a surprised laugh. “Yes. Why?”

“Just wondering,” Malfoy said, handing the receipt to Harry. “I’m gay.”

“Oh,” Harry said lamely, his mind churning. “In that case, how would you feel about dinner sometime this week?”

Malfoy raised an eyebrow. “As in … a date?”

Harry nodded curtly. “A date. You’re rather fit, you know.”

The tips of Malfoy’s ears grew a steady pink, and he shot Harry a soft smile. “You’re not too bad yourself, Potter. Dinner sounds lovely.”

Harry could feel his cheeks burning as he took the bouquet. “Well, thanks for the flowers. Oh, and are you still living at the Manor?”

Draco nodded.

“I’ll send a letter your way with the dinner details,” Harry said, his stomach a mess of nerves and excitement as he wandered towards the door. “Happy New Year’s, by the way.”

Draco grinned, offering him a small wave. “Happy New Year’s, Potter.”

As Harry emerged back onto the bustling path, he thought about how he would have the opportunity to get to know who Malfoy was now, their schoolboy days long forgotten. He wanted nothing more than that.

#4 hours to go here until New Years #but hey! I got impatient! #happy New Years everyone #<3 #drarry #harry potter #draco malfoy #draco x harry #Harry x Draco #Drarry fanfiction #Drarry fic recs #my fanfiction #flower shop au #Drarry fluff

[sodone-withlife]

one sentence

i saw sumayyah‘s answer to an anon’s ask (so all credit for this idea goes to them) about that scene in Omnivore where Rossi is offering Hotch his gun and this thing pretty much wrote itself (which is exceedingly rare lmao), so here is something that i thought would be just a few hundred words but ended up being a really long interpretation of the Foyet arc with hurt/minimal comfort with a good amount of pre-Mortch (or you can see them as platonic, i think it’s up for interpretation). 

also, just a quick heads up, i love Papa Rossi, but for the purposes of this fic, it might seem a little bash-y towards him

warnings: quite a bit of suicidal ideation, (almost) attempted suicide, implied/referenced suicide, canon-typical violence, canonical character death

word count: 7.9k words

The highlighted words stared back at Hotch as Shaunessy’s words echoed in his mind.

A deal with the devil.

“Yes, that’s exactly right,” he told Garcia.

“Because I found it, do I get to know what it’s about?” the analyst asked, unrepentantly curious. Hotch sent her a look.

Might as well. Shaunessy’s not going to last much longer, and we’ll be called in…  “The Reaper,” he said simply.

“Like—the Boston Reaper?” Garcia lowered her voice as she named the notorious killer. Hotch nodded. “I didn’t even know the BAU worked on that case,” she remarked. 

“1998,” Hotch informed her, remembering caffeine-fueled sleepless nights and the palpable fear on the streets. “It was my first case for the BAU as lead profiler.”

“Correct me if I’m wrong, but we don’t have a profile for the Reaper in the system, do we?”

Not in the system, no. “That’ll be all Penelope, you can go home now,” Hotch told Garcia, turning to the bottom drawer of the shelf behind his desk as the analyst nodded and left. Pulling out a worn folder bursting with papers and photos, he placed the newspaper clipping and the evidence bag protecting the contract into it. He left it to the side and refocused on the folder in front of him filled with sheets of old handwritten notes filled with annotations and crossed-out sections. 

There will be no sleeping tonight.

Early September, 1998

“You’re sending me?” Hotch was sitting ramrod straight in surprise, blindsided by Gideon’s sudden decision.

“Yeah,” Gideon answered simply, leaning back in his chair as much as he could in the cramped space and looking supremely unperturbed. “Do you not want to go?”

Hotch shook herself out of his shocked state, scrambling to gather his wits. “No—I mean, I’ll go, but—”

“But?”

Hotch carefully evaluated his words. “I’ve only been here a few months, and you’re sending me to Boston—alone—to help with the Reaper case? The case that has been going on for three years, longer than I’ve even been an agent, involving a killer that could probably put the Zodiac to shame?” 

The older agent shrugged. “I have to stay and hold down the fort since we are severely understaffed, but I’ll always be a phone call away, and you’re mainly there just to act as eyes for the both of us. You’re not working on this alone.”

Hotch stiffened as a sudden—but careful—warm touch on his hand pulled him out of the spiral of self-doubt he had been teetering over and grounded him. He brought his eyes back to Gideon and was surprised to see complete openness and no signs of deception or maliciousness that he had been forced to learn long ago at the hands of his father. 

“I’m not Dave,” Gideon began seriously, “I wasn’t the one who pulled you over here or the one you started out shadowing under, but I do talk to people. I know about your record in prosecution, in Seattle, and in SWAT, and it is very telling. You never doubted yourself before, and I have no doubt that you can handle yourself, so why are you starting now?” 

He leaned back, clearly done with the impromptu pep talk that Hotch, still frozen, figured happened once in a blue moon based on what Rossi had told him about the unit before he retired. The cramped room was silent as Hotch felt Gideon watching him struggling with internal strife. Slowly, he released some of the tension that was coiled within him, and Gideon turned back to his stack of consults with an air of satisfaction. 

“Start packing, Agent Hotchner. Boston awaits your presence.”

Late November, 1998

“Do you know what the hell is going on?” Hotch immediately asked when the call went through, pacing around his hotel room.

“And a good evening to you too.”

“Gideon.”

“What is it, Hotch?” his tone changed from dry to worried in a heartbeat, hearing the uncharacteristic urgency in his agent’s voice and the lack of nervousness that usually showed his agent’s discomfort towards using the less-formal form of address.

“Shaunessy, the lead detective,” Hotch spat out, throwing the case file that was in his hand on the bed. “He closed the case.”

“And that warrants a phone call at eleven PM, why?”

Hotch bit back a sharp retort, letting out a sharp breath. “You know I’ve been re-interviewing the victims’ friends and family, going through everything they had and lines of investigation that may have been dropped, working the profile along the way, but there have been no viable suspects, even with the accelerated killings,” he said quickly, a mess of emotions swirling inside him. “Gideon, no arrests have been made but he closed the case, just like that.”

“Remind me, when was the last victim?”

“Just over six weeks ago, a month after I got here. I know what you’re thinking,” Hotch said when Gideon didn’t respond, “that the case just went cold, but there were still things I had people following up on. It’s not cold,” he insisted.

“Well, there’s nothing you can do about it, Hotch. I know you don’t like it, but the locals have point on this.”

Hotch sighed, but it did nothing to calm him down. “I know,” he said, annoyed. “I’m catching an early train back to DC, I’ll see you tomorrow afternoon.”

January 2003

“The Reaper?”

Hotch slammed the folder shut and looked up from his desk, startled. He sent Gideon a glare, glad that no one else was there to see his composure slip, but he only looked vaguely concerned. 

“It’s been just over four years,” Gideon commented neutrally. “You’ve had that folder at the bottom of your third drawer, and you’ve pulled it out at least forty different times since ‘98.”

Hotch stared up at him in a challenge. “Is there something wrong with that?”

Gideon shook his head. “Just be careful. Don’t get too drawn into the chase.”

~~~

Sighing as he rubbed the familiar ache on the back of his neck that always appeared during paperwork days and especially stressful cases, Hotch closed his battered folder of notes and opened it back up again. It was almost compulsive at this point, repeating every twenty minutes and each time with the hope something new would catch his attention.

Hotch shifted, the bedsheets suddenly feeling unbearably scratchy and coarse even through his slacks. The case details buzzed around his head incessantly, distracting him from feeling the physical exhaustion and strain caused by the lack of proper sustenance and the stress of a day filled with dead ends.

The sudden ringing shattered the silence of the room, knocking him from his focus. He got up from the bed and warily walked over to the source, picking up the hotel phone and bringing it up to his ear. 

“Hotchner,” he said out of habit, only to freeze as the hairs on the back of his neck stood up in reaction to the sudden, heavy breathing. “Who is this?” he demanded, throwing the folder he was still holding back on the bed with dread rising within him. 

“If you stop hunting me, I’ll stop hunting them.” His question about the caller’s identity went unanswered, though the cursed words of the contract spoken by the same distorted voice that was heard on the 911 calls from ten years ago was confirmation enough.

Anger flared inside him at the audacity, and he snapped back, “You think I’d take that?”

“It’s a good deal,” the Reaper replied flatly.

“I’ve misjudged you,” he said, some distant part of him wondering how Shaunessy felt when he himself got the offer ten years ago. “I thought you were smarter than this,” he was unable to help the derisive tone.

The silence was long enough for him to wonder how much he had caught him unawares with his response. 

“You should take it.” 

“And you’ve misjudged me.”

“This is your last chance,” he warned.

Hotch didn’t hesitate. “I don’t make deals. I’m the woman who hunts guys like you.” That got the reaction he was hoping for.

“There are no guys like me,” the killer growled, anger bleeding into his tone.

He scoffed. “You all think that.”

“You’ll regret this,” he warned.

It was said with such certainty that a chill shot down his spine, but it was overshadowed by his anger. “I’ll see you soon,” he promised, promptly hanging up without another word. He walked back around the bed, feeling a sudden need to put as much distance between him and the phone as possible. It was with some hysterical hilarity that he wondered if the next people to stay in this room would know about what had just happened—that a serial killer tried to threaten an FBI agent into surrendering in this room.

Those feelings faded away when a terrible feeling suddenly came over Hotch as he realized the Reaper knew which hotel—which room—he was staying in.

It wasn’t unusual during their cases for an unsub to contact another person in the midst of their crimes, but the memories of Elle in the hospital bed and Morgan in the interrogation room had been seared into his brain. 

Both times, unsubs directly went after members of the team.

Unable to remain in the room any longer, he went around unceremoniously throwing his things inside his bags before leaving the hotel room. Paranoia quickly crept back into his consciousness as he quickly made his way down to the parking garage with a hand near his gun, intent on heading straight to the field office.

Only half an hour later, Hotch was staring at the glinting gold ring on the bus driver’s hand, feeling oddly detached from the situation as he was confronted with the consequences of that cursed phone call.

“6 bodies, not including the driver,” Rossi said from the back of the bus. “He put them down with a gun—or, more likely, guns—and finished them off with his knife.” 

The call had come straight to the field office, just minutes after Hotch walked into the empty conference room that the team had taken command of. A beat cop had heard a series of gunshots and went to investigate, only to see the macabre painting of blood on the side of the bus with its occupants slumped over inside, unmoving. “Arthur Lanessa’s wedding ring,” Hotch heard himself say for the other agent’s benefit.

“What’d he take?” Rossi made his way down to him in the front. 

He snapped back into the present with a sudden surge of anger. “Does it matter?” he asked bitingly, turning and storming away from the crime scene for the relative privacy of a nearby alley.

“Hey,” Rossi called in worry, taken aback by the brash response. “What’s going on with you?”

Hotch stopped some way into the alley and took a deep breath, taking his time before turning to Rossi, who had followed closely behind. “He called me tonight at my hotel room and offered me the deal.” 

“What did you say?”

“I hung up on him,” his eyes burned with the sting of tears—whether out of anger at the Reaper or himself, he wasn’t sure. “And then he does this.”

“So you think this is your fault?”

How could it be anything but? He looked away, trying to hide just how shaken he was. “It is.”

The familiar sound of the safety of a gun being released pulled his attention back to the man in front of him. “Well, here, use mine,” Rossi said, holding out his gun to him. “You convinced me. No, no, you hung up on him,” he pushed as he waved him off, pinching the bridge of his nose. “You practically killed them yourself—”

You practically killed them yourself.

You practically killed them yourself.

Killed them yourself.

Killed them. 

Yourself.

You.

You did this.

You should have made the deal

Hotch flinched away from the touch of cold metal against his head only to freeze in his place, ice settling in his bones as he processed what was happening. Barely seeing the horror on Rossi’s face, he stared at the other man’s empty hand before he focused in on the gun that was resting against his own head, tilted at an angle. There were five things he knew:

I have a finger on the trigger. 

My hand is trembling. 

I am still one of the best shots of the agents that are not in a tactical team.

Make one move, fire the gun, only the hearing in my right ear will be gone and the darkness continues to creep towards me.

Make a different move, fire the gun, I’ll leave Jack the legacy of a coward and Haley the knowledge that her efforts back in high school and college were for naught.

You did this, a malicious voice in his head said, sounding oddly like his father. And suddenly, he recalled the memory of the blood droplets hitting him and the ringing in his ears the first time he witnessed a gun go off when he was nine.

Slowly, deliberately, Hotch met Rossi’s horrified and guilt-filled expression and lowered the gun from his head. Carefully measuring his steps, he moved forward and pressed the gun into the older agent’s hand, which dropped down to the side, the weight of the gun now accompanied by something unseen, something much heavier.

Not sparing him another glance, Hotch turned and walked back out of the alley.

This isn’t the time nor place to break. 

But in the end, he didn’t have a choice. 

“Foyet escaped.”

Hotch’s blood ran cold as he processed JJ’s words before he roughly placed his mug onto the desk and stood up from his chair, following JJ outside to the bullpen that was full of noise and movement.

“Guards found him in his cell vomiting blood and convulsing, they rushed him to the prison hospital,” JJ explained quickly as they made their way down the catwalk. Hotch twitched as he heard Rossi’s office door open behind him, the man coming out to see what the commotion was about.

“Get me the US Marshal’s Office,” Hotch ordered, making the executive decision to ignore the older agent in favor of getting down to business. 

“I already called Don Reilly. I offered our assistance, he said they’d call us if they needed it.”

Prentiss rushed to the trio, holding a phone up to her ear. “The Boston field office just identified documents from Foyet’s house,” she reported.

Reid approached the agents gathered in the middle of the room, holding out a printout of what looked to be a set of blueprints. “They’re schematics for the electrical, heating, and water ducts of the East Woburn Correctional Facility.”

Hotch looked at him blankly. “He had the schematics.”

“And not just for Woburn—for every jail, prison, and courthouse in Massachusetts.”

“And ten years to plan,” Rossi added, a heavy silence following as everyone turned to the TV.

Finally, Garcia turned around. “They’re going to find him, right?” she asked worriedly.

Eyes still trained on Foyet's mugshot on the TV, Hotch was completely certain in his answer. “No, they’re not,” he said, just as the memory of Foyet’s words rose to the forefront of his mind, unbidden.

If you know me so well, how come so many had to die to bring you here?

I’m going to be more famous than you realize.

“Excuse me,” he muttered, trying to get a hold of the wave of nausea that suddenly overcame him. He brushed past the team, purposely heading out of the bullpen for one of the bathrooms that was further away for the sake of keeping the team and their concern off his back.

Within minutes he was throwing up bile and the small amount of alcohol he had drank back in his office into the sink, thanking the god he never believed in that the bathroom was rather secluded so there wouldn’t be anyone catching him in this moment of weakness. His eyes burned for the second time in less than twenty-four hours—only this time, a few traitorous tears managed to escape from underneath his eyelids. 

The taste of bile was strong as he turned on the tap and splashed his face with cold water, stiffening when he heard the door swing open and closed. Looking up to the mirror, he was both relieved and unsurprised to see Morgan locking the door behind him. 

“You’ve been avoiding Rossi,” Morgan commented quietly. Hotch huffed a sardonic laugh, straightening up and turning around to face him, leaning against the sink for support. It was a familiar situation, one first started years ago when it was just them and Gideon, and stopped after the team started growing. Then New York happened and Hotch had to de-stress in a gas station they stopped at on the drive back to Quantico, and their secret rendezvous started happening again, when cases hit too close to home for either of them.

Somehow he always knows what the root problem is. “Was I that obvious?”

Morgan shook his head. “You know you hide it well. I’ve just known you far longer than any of the others, besides Rossi, of course.” He didn’t go on, waiting on the other to decide the direction the conversation would go. 

Deciding to go for complete honesty, Hotch swallowed, tilting his head up and avoiding Morgan’s eyes. “He called me at my hotel room and offered me the deal.”

To his credit, Morgan only stepped closer, face creased in concern and a hint of knowing. “I said no, and he shot up a bus,” Hotch continued tonelessly. “I lost it in an alley near the crime scene. Dave had pulled out his gun and was trying to make a point about self-flagellation, but—” he cut himself off and shook his head frustratedly.

“I don’t know what happened. One moment I was just angry, and the next moment I was aiming a gun at my head,” he met Morgan’s eyes desperately, stern facade completely gone. “I don’t know what I wanted to do—I don’t,” his voice cracked as he sagged against the sink and his trembling became more pronounced. He quickly covered his mouth as a sob tried to escape his throat, prompting Morgan to move.

It was surprising to both him and Morgan how willingly he melted into Morgan’s body when the man reached out to stabilize him, but the sensation of the embrace was oddly calming for both of them. Neither spoke as they stood in the bathroom, not even as Morgan felt his shirt getting wet from the tears that Hotch finally let fall, and not even as the crying became more audible. 

Now, they would stay in the bathroom and soak up the comfort that they offered each other. They would talk about Foyet’s taunts and what Hotch confessed later. 

But later never came, because life never waits, and neither do unsubs.

Soon, they were racing against the clock as Reid got infected with an engineered strain of anthrax

Soon, they were investigating one of the worst, stomach-turning crimes they had seen. 

When they got back from the pig farm, Hotch only asked the team for a bare-bones report of the investigation and let them leave to the comfort of their homes while he stayed behind and dealt with the rest of the paperwork and red tape that was involved because of their foray into Canadian jurisdiction. 

It was past midnight when Hotch finally left the office and entered his apartment with the intent of pulling out a glass of scotch and staying on his couch with a book, knowing there was no way he was going to fall asleep that night.  

But Foyet was waiting, and Hotch was weakened by the exhaustion and stress of two all-nighters in a row.  

That night, as his team was sleeping in their beds, dead to the world while he was slowly bleeding out and floating in and out of consciousness in his own apartment, he could only take comfort in the fact that his death sealed Foyet’s fate. There was no way Morgan the team—hell, even Strauss, or anyone in the bureau—would stop hunting his killer to exact their revenge. 

He faded into unconsciousness with the expectation that that was it.

He slowly regained consciousness to the sharp smell of antiseptic and the unpleasantly familiar beeping of a heart monitor. Fatigue settling heavily over his whole body was the next sensation that registered in his foggy mind, and then the sound of approaching footsteps.

“Where am I?” he forced out through a dry throat, eyes still closed.

“In the hospital,” Rossi, his mind told him. He opened his eyes only to close them again when he was met with blindingly bright lights, letting out a pained breath. 

“How did I get here?”

“Foyet drove you.”

Morgan. He drew in a shaky breath as dull, pulsing pain finally made itself known through the painkillers.

“Can you remember what happened?”

That’s Prentiss.

He vaguely felt his head loll to the side before the memories rushed back into the forefront of his mind. Foyet’s words, the same exact words he remembered thinking back in that alley echoed unpleasantly,

You should have made the deal.

Hotch swallowed again and forced his eyes open through the heavy fatigue. “What did he take?” he asked quietly, unwilling to delve deep into what he remembered and deciding to mentally run through the details about the Reaper case instead.

“What do you mean?” Rossi asked, uncomprehending.

“The Reaper always takes something from his victims.” you’re one of his victims now—shut up and think about that later “Do we know what he took?” 

“There was a page missing from your day planner,” his eyes flew open and he looked over at Prentiss as she continued talking, “in the address section, the Bs.” 

No— “What did he leave?” Hotch asked, eyes slipping shut as a trickle of fear went down his spine and his brain screamed out in denial. 

“I don't know,” Prentiss said, floundering.

“He also leaves something with his victims,” he trailed off in a breathless whisper, unable to sustain the volume he had been speaking at as the throbbing grew stronger.

“I looked over your whole apartment,” Prentiss told him helplessly. “Nothing felt out of place.”

A thought came to him. “Where are my clothes?” Hotch asked, slowly trying to force his eyes open again. He turned his head, watching Prentiss bring a plastic bag over to the hospital bed. Careful to avoid looking directly at his bloodied clothes, Hotch managed to pull the bulging manila envelope closer to him on his chest. 

His hands froze as his credentials slipped out and he noticed a folded paper tucked inside. Slowly, shakily, Hotch pulled them out of the envelope and carefully flipped it open. 

He sank deeper into the bed as the breath he had been holding was almost punched out of him by the sheer terror that pulsed through him, the treasured picture of Haley and Jack staring back at him tauntingly. That’s my blood, he thought blankly, staring at the red streak he knew was deliberately painted over his family’s smiling faces.

“Haley’s maiden name is Brooks,” he finally said, almost numb to the implications. “I always listed her in the Bs in my personal information in case it fell into the wrong hands.” 

Some kind of precaution it turned out to be. 

“He knows where they live.”

And that was that. As Hotch was stuck in flashbacks and lied to Prentiss about what happened, Morgan led the SWAT team in sweeping Hotch’s old house and picked Jack up from his playdate. As Hotch talked with Haley and failed to not think about that night in the alley with the cold metal against his head, Morgan played with Jack outside and failed to not think about Foyet using his credentials so he could continue to torture his friend boss. As Hotch remained confined to the hospital bed, Morgan watched through an upper-story window as Haley and Jack were driven off into the distance to a location unknown to anyone but a select few in the Marshals service. 

Nine stab wounds, thirty minutes down time, and six days in the cursed hospital.

The numbers circled through Hotch’s mind when he stepped back into his apartment and had to work through the panic that rose within as he stared towards the place where he knew Foyet had been hiding. 

In the end, what brought him back from the edge was when his eyes caught the new security panel that had been installed over where he knew the bullet had made a hole and the sticky note with what he recognized as Morgan’s handwriting that was stuck over it, concisely written instructions on how to use it. If he looked around carefully enough for other signs of Morgan’s presence, he could see where the section of bloodstained carpet had been replaced, and that was only because there was the tiniest spot that had been missed. 

The tiniest reminder was enough to send Hotch into a panic, but he knew there was no way he could tell Morgan about it. 

Is this what you felt like, Elle? Unsafe in your own home, having to sweep each room for fear of another one of the monsters we hunt lurking in the shadows?

Slowly, numbly, Hotch worked his way through medical leave and physiotherapy, during which everyone in his team came over at least twice, Prentiss and Morgan the most often to help change his bandages. He knew they worried, but he couldn’t summon the will to care nor the words to thank them for keeping him company and preventing the darkness in his mind from taking over. 

And maybe it was a good thing, because there were things they didn’t know, things that he lied to them about. He lied and he lied, and he knew that if he had the words, they would all come tumbling out, and what little of himself that he had left would be exposed for all to see. 

Even if Morgan had tried to take everything he might be able to use, there was still his mind, and so if he had the words, they would all know how many times he envisioned holding cold metal against his head just as he had back in that alley.

On the thirty-fifth day after he was discharged from the hospital, when they were discussing Darren Call on the plane, they came close to finding out. 

So why hasn’t he killed himself yet? Sprees usually end in suicide. If he's got nothing to live for, why hasn't he ended it?

It was much later, after a day of being on the receiving end of careful, worried glances, and overhearing Morgan’s firm declaration from inside his office that he realized his slip. 

“I’m not going to stand by and watch this man kill himself,” Hotch had heard Morgan snap towards Rossi. Moments later, Morgan passed in front of his office window and made eye contact with him, making it clear that his choice of words was deliberate. 

Suddenly Hotch was back in the alleyway with the gun pressed to his head and managed to talk himself off the ledge he didn’t know he was standing on while Rossi stood there, frozen and horrified that his brazen attempt at making a point had backfired so disastrously. His own words on the plane came back to him, then thought about what others would have seen when he walked into that house unarmed, and he understood. 

He hadn’t been thinking at all when he went in to try and talk Darren Call down, but though he didn’t have a background in psychology, there were some things that didn’t need expert opinion to be said, and so he knew exactly his action could be classified as. 

Don’t lie to yourself, you know exactly what that was.

Hotch swallowed convulsively and broke eye contact with Morgan, turning back to stare at paperwork until the other man walked back to his desk in the empty bullpen. As much as he tried, he couldn’t forget Morgan’s impassioned exclamation nor the depth of the worry that was present in his eyes when they made eye contact through the window.

Maybe that was the day when things shifted. It wasn’t a complete change—the team still hovered around Hotch in uncertain worry, his thoughts never completely disappeared, and he nearly broke down in the bathroom the day Jack turned four in witness protection after seeing what footage of his child on a playground Garcia could enhance. 

There was, however, a different air to his and Morgan’s interactions after that case. Perhaps it was a long time coming, stemming from the painful understanding that was formed that day in the secluded bathroom when they found comfort in each other.

It wasn’t news that the higher-ups were watching him again, but then he walked back to his office after helping JJ triage consult requests to see Strauss fixing him with a stern stare. The next few days he spent trying to work through the frustration of recording and justifying every decision while trying and failing not to antagonize Morgan. And so while he waited for Morgan to come into his office, he could only hope that he hadn’t managed to destroy the strange friendship that had been built between them based on their shared knowledge of just how close he was to the ledge sometimes.

I should give him more credit, I don’t know how he puts up with me sometimes, and he has more than enough reason to report me to Strauss.

“Come on, Hotch, nobody's gonna replace you,” Morgan said, incredulous at the notion of Hotch getting replaced. “Fight Strauss. I'll go to the mat for you, so will everybody else. You know that.” 

“Morgan, it won't work,” Hotch spoke over him, trying to get him to understand. “Decisions like this have their own momentum. Unless I step down—”

“Step down? What are you talking about?”

A foreign feeling Hotch recognized with some surprise as amusement wriggled its way into his consciousness as he anticipated Morgan’s reaction to his coming announcement, “I'm resigning as unit chief at the end of the week”

“What? No!” Hotch couldn’t stop his mouth from twitching as his feeling of amusement grew slightly stronger at the visceral reaction. “Hotch, look, yeah, ok, sometimes your actions, I may disagree with them, but it's not enough for you to leave this team.”

“I'm not leaving the team, I'm just no longer in charge,” Hotch corrected, continuing before Morgan could get in a word. “You are.”

He watched as Morgan’s jaw dropped in shock, before finally asking, “Me?” Detecting no deception from Hotch who had nodded, he continued. “Look, I had the chance to be unit chief in New York, and I said no. I turned it down because I like this team. Strauss can't just fire you like this.”

“She can reassign me, and we can avoid that if I promote internally.”

Unable to come up with a counterargument, Morgan was silent for a moment. “This is wrong,” he finally said. 

A strange thrill went through Hotch at the confidence Morgan had in him—their relationship, while slightly different now, ultimately had been built on unstated respect and the ease with which both were able to call each other out on their bullshit; it wasn’t built on such blatant declarations of trust and confidence. Hotch opened his hands, shrugging helplessly. “It's the only way to keep the team together.”

Morgan nodded consideringly before carefully eyeing Hotch. “So all of this,” he gestured between them, bringing up the tension that had built up between them in the last case, “this is why you've been pushing me so hard, huh?”

“I haven't been pushing you that hard,” Hotch denied, only to get a disbelieving look from the other man. He let out a faint smile before regarding the other with a serious look again. “Morgan, I need to know right now. Will you do this?”

He couldn’t articulate the relief he felt when Morgan finally agreed and continued to feel for the rest of the night as he introduced Morgan to the other parts of the job. Just like every other positive emotion he had felt over the past few years, however, it was short-lived, as Hotch had freed up time to dedicate to the hunt, even as he often stayed later to help Morgan get adjusted. Within months, they were called into a family annihilator case and Hotch was confronting Karl Arnold, one of the few unsubs that had continued to haunt him even after the case was closed and they were killed or incarcerated.

Of course, Arnold had to get in the last word, and oh, did he get it in. 

The cursed eye of providence, now drawn over a newspaper article about the attack months ago, never failed to create a surge of anger and fear within him, but never had it created such a storm of emotions before now. One torturous night of waiting as the envelope the taunts were sent in went through the lab, and the whole team was in the throes of the hunt, and in the process, fell victim to tunnel vision.

What if they had slowed down and remembered that Foyet worked with computers? Would they have managed to catch him at the apartment unawares? Would they have been better prepared for what Foyet had planned to do?

But there wasn’t anything Hotch could do except try and talk Foyet out of going through with his plans while trying to maintain as level of a head as possible.

“Your mother tried to protect you from your father, but she wasn’t strong enough, and you hated her for that, didn’t you? So, you decided that all women were weak,” Hotch suddenly brought up, hoping to catch him off guard as he vaguely wondered if the team was on the line, listening. 

“Those are your words, not mine,” came the grating, annoyingly blasé reply.

“What were you, nine when you killed them?

“It was a car accident. And, now that I think about it, our childhoods are eerily similar, don’t you think?” 

Caught unawares, Hotch jerked the steering wheel, barely managing to avoid crashing the car as Foyet continued. “But it was only your father who died, whereas your mother remarried.”

How—? He turned cold at the show of Foyet’s obsession, which was clearly much deeper than he or anyone in the team could have predicted.

“No response?” the killer taunted.

“My father swallowed a bullet because he couldn’t live with his self loathing or the cancer,” Hotch finally snapped, quickly directing the subject back towards Foyet. Even with the pit in his stomach growing as it became clearer that he was being toyed with, he couldn’t help but use every negotiation tactic he knew and taught at the Academy, desperately but futilely trying to dissuade the killer. 

“Haven't you gotten what you wanted?” Hotch tried, somehow having regained his composure after the unpleasant bombshell. “You've set yourself apart from anybody we've ever dealt with. You're not just a famous serial killer, you're the Reaper. We're going to study you and your methods for years and years.”

“You know what I've been thinking?” Foyet finally asked after a few moments of silence, his next words sending his heart pounding in fear. “Haley looks really good with dark hair. She’s lost some weight. Must be all the stress you caused her. Where's the little man?” No, don’t you dare— “Oh. There he is. Does he like Captain America because of you?” 

Hotch gripped his phone tightly as he heard the ringing of another phone. “That's your wife. Hold, please—Mrs. Hotchner,” Foyet took on an accent, tone turning jovial. “Open the gate and I'll drive in.”

Open the gate? That son of a—of course.

“Aaron?” the malicious glee was back, cutting right to Hotch’s core. “I really gotta go.”

Almost frozen with fear, he pushed the car faster, heading straight towards the old house and praying to whatever deity he could think of that he could get there in time. He wasn’t sure how long had passed when he got Morgan’s call, which was confirmation that the team had indeed been listening. He didn’t dwell on it and only continued to push the car, disregarding speed limits and almost hysterically glad that it was the middle of the day and the streets were relatively empty. 

When his phone rang, it was with numb, mechanical movements that he answered, fully prepared to beg and bargain for his family’s life if he had to, only to sharply inhale at Haley’s dearly missed voice, which turned shaky with fear when she realized the danger she was in. As Foyet undercut their exchange with his maliciously satisfied taunts, telling Haley all that he could never bring himself to confess about the case, Hotch could only think about how he was just too far away, Haley, I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry for lying to you about everything, I’ll never forgive myself—

But then Jack was on the phone, and the pure innocence and eagerness with which his son greeted him after months of no contact was enough to send a fresh wave of tears coursing down his face.

“Is George a bad guy?”

“Yes, he is,” Hotch answered, wanting to scream at him to just run away, get as far away from him as you can when an old memory was suddenly brought forth from his subconscious. “Jack, I need you on this case with me. Do you understand?” he tried to keep his voice steady, hoping with his whole being that his son would remember. “I need you to work the case with me.”

“Ok, Daddy.”

“Jack, hug your mom for me,” he requested, voice cracking and desperately trying to contain the sobs that were steadily building. He could only imagine the warmth his son was feeling from his mother now, potentially the last memory he would ever have of her. Hearing his son’s too-inquisitive question about his mother’s mood left him viciously biting down on his bottom lip, trying to maintain some modicum of control over himself.

“Is he gone?” Hotch finally asked, nausea joining the storm of emotions within him at the nickname Foyet had given his son.

“Yes,” Haley confirmed, letting her fear shine through now that Jack wasn’t there to see it. 

Each shaking breath was a stab straight to his core.“You’re so strong, Haley, you’re stronger than I ever was.”

Her response nearly sent him shattering into the pieces she had so carefully helped him put back together back in high school after his stepfather died.

“You’ll hurry, right?”

I can’t lie, I’m so sorry, Haley. I can’t lie to you. Not after everything I’ve already done, “I know you didn’t sign on for this.”

“Neither did you.”

Why does it have to be now that we finally talk about what caused the divorce?

“I’m sorry for everything.”

There was a short pause as Haley inhaled sharply, before leveling out into shaky breaths. “Promise me that you will tell him how we met and how you used to make me laugh.”

No, please— “Haley,” Hotch trailed off, unable to continue and almost paralyzed at the knowledge that these might be her last words because he’s too far away, I’m not going to—

“He needs to know that you weren't always so serious, Aaron. He needs to believe in love, because it is the most important thing, but you need to show him. Promise me,” she ordered him forcefully.

“I promise.”

The sound of three gunshots tore straight into his soul. 

And then he was finding Haley’s body, trying not to let the seams break when renewed rage roared to life within him at the extinguishing of the light that had been inside her and lit up every room she walked in. Minutes later, he was straddling the demon that had haunted him for over a decade, the demon that he finally caught up to but at a terrible cost and then he was punching—

I’m going to kill that bastard son of yours and I’m going to tell him it was all your fault— 

and punching—

You practically killed them yourself—

and punching—

You should have made the deal—

someone yelled his name—

Promise me.

“—dead. He’s dead,” someone was shouting as Hotch tried to lunge forward away from the person pulling him back and towards the man who killed my wife HE KILLED HALEY—

But all the fight that had been inside him suddenly disappeared, and he was left staggering backward, mouth open in a silent, rage-filled scream as someone—it’s Derek—kept a careful grip on his body, holding his shattered pieces together just long enough for him to gather his tattered seams close to his chest and fling himself away towards the stairs. 

Hotch collapsed to his knees in front of the chest, seeing no indication of any taunting messages and daring to hope that his son was—

And the sight of his son, unharmed and blinking at the sudden change in brightness, nearly sent him into a mess of relieved tears that were also tears of unadulterated grief because I got his mother killed—

He held himself together and lifted his son out of the chest, seeing all the features he got from Haley—her his hair, her his eyes, her his inquisitiveness—and struggling to maintain his weakening control as he told Jack to go to Ms. Jareau, who was waiting with open arms in the doorway to the room that had once been his office. 

Hearing their footsteps fade away and shaking with suppressed sobs, he slowly stood up, injuries that he sustained in the fight finally making themselves known as he made his way across the hall to the room he knew Haley was lying in—

He saw Morgan taking her pulse and for a moment he couldn’t help but hope that she was still—

But Morgan was pulling back and he was gently placing Haley’s right arm back on the ground and he wasn’t yelling for medics and—

“I’m so sorry, Aaron,” Morgan said softly as Hotch knelt down, his trembling becoming more palpable by the moment. 

If he looked past the unseeing eyes and the blood that pooled everywhere and her lying on the floor and—

He could almost convince himself that she was sleeping. For a moment, he was almost afraid to touch her, afraid to disturb her in her sleep, but in the next moment—

He was pulling her cooling body close to his chest and burying his face into the crook of her neck, gut wrenching sobs escaping his lips as a wave of grief shattered the flimsy show of control he had put up for Jack’s sake, his son who just lost his mother because his father was addicted to the chase and I broke my promise, Haley, I’m so sorry—

She’s gone. 

The solemn silence weighed heavily on the team as they waited for Hotch to finish testifying before Strauss and the brass. They had all expressed their outrage when they got the orders to come in for their statements, only two days after their leader nearly lost everything, but there was nothing they could do.

It had been painful to watch the man who had been a protector for so long, since childhood through his teenage years and into adulthood, try to maintain the post, disregarding his own health in favor of being the earliest in the office and last to leave, spending every free moment trying to get rid of the threat to his family. It was worse having to listen over the phone as his control started to slip while he tried so desperately to save his family from a madman. 

With the sight of him savagely beating Foyet’s dead body into the ground, all vestiges of the infamous controlled facade gone, they all hoped for Hotch’s sake that Jack had found safety and were beyond relieved to see him in JJ’s arms. Reality caught up to them, however, when they watched as Morgan had to physically wrestle Hotch away from Haley’s body so she could be transported to the ME’s office.

When they got the full autopsy, they could only be glad that Hotch wasn’t there to find out all that Foyet did to his first love.

And within a year, Hotch’s family had been ruthlessly snatched from his desperate, flailing grip and torn into broken pieces before being shoved back at him, misshapen with pieces missing. 

The faint sound of a door swinging closed had them all straightening up in their seats, turning to look into the bullpen where Hotch was walking up the stairs in front of his office, only to freeze right in front of the door with his hand just in front of the door knob. 

They watched worriedly as he let his outstretched hand fall back to his side and slowly backed up from the door, almost as if he were in a trance and startled when Morgan suddenly jumped up and ran out of the room and through the bullpen towards the man.

Their confusion cleared up when they realized that Hotch wasn’t stopping as he backed up, somehow unaware that the stairs were right behind him and stumbled, only barely catching himself on the railing. For Jack’s sake, they forced themselves to stay seated but watched out of the corner of their eyes as he tried to stand back up, only for his knees to buckle underneath him. 

Before he could hit the ground, Morgan quickly grabbed onto his arms, almost collapsing himself under his dead weight but managing to lower them both onto the ground, holding onto him in a way eerily reminiscent of what he had done when he pulled Hotch off of the barely-recognizable body of George Foyet. 

Hotch was still staring at his office door as if he had seen a ghost, and it was with heartbreak that Morgan realized what it represented to him—it was the source of so much passion and temptation that had gotten the love of his life killed. Looking back at the conference room and seeing the eyes focused on the two men, Morgan carefully pulled Hotch up from the ground and slowly guided him out of the bullpen, knowing that the team had Jack taken care of.

They walked through the winding hallways and into the bathroom that he followed Hotch into the night it all started to go horribly wrong. This time, it was different and yet the exact same, and after Morgan locked the door behind them, he pulled Hotch towards him, mindful of his bruised ribs. 

Surrounded by the four walls that heard so many of their small talks and witnessed their vulnerabilities, it wasn’t long before Hotch’s eyes began to burn as he finally melted into Morgan’s protective hold when the dam finally broke, letting out a wave of pain and anguish that was only made the slightest bit more bearable by the warmth of Morgan’s his friend’s care.

But even that couldn’t make that one sentence disappear.

You practically killed them yourself.

#criminal minds #aaron hotchner #derek morgan #hurting Hotch is so fun #aaron hotchner whump #hurt aaron hotchner #mortch #george foyet #haley hotchner #tw guns #tw suicidal ideation #tw suicide #tw character death #sodone one sentence

[sugar-petals]

Thoughts about blackpink lisa kibbe type? I think she leans as a Flamboyant natural with cute and youthful facial features. She has long limbs, big hands, blunt shoulders and extremely long vertical line. Since you typed jennie, rose and jisoo i want thoughts about blackpink lisa if you agree or not.

kibbe style comparison: lisa (flamboyant gamine) VS namjoon (flamboyant natural)

(+ some notes on hoseok)

i found the arguments for flamboyant gamine in the fandom pretty convincing. once you look at what kind of lines suit her, you see why pretty fast, i’ll show you what i mean with pictures.

once you see her in that type of outfit, it’s apparent how flamboyant natural can’t do anything for her style-wise — it doesn’t exhaust her options or brings out her character.

monochrome look, bulky and very wide material, sportswear, casual outfit and hair, understated make-up, oversized shirt:

... doesn’t hit home, lisa is no longer dominating the look. there are much more memorable styles possible. mind you, this is not inherently bad styling, it’s just not flattering for her case. yes, this can be surprisingly glamorous on someone! they just need to have natural lines, i’ll show you later in the thread.

meanwhile, flamboyant gamine clothes feel more customized on her. it’s very ‘lisa’, she carries that style effortlessly without being drowned out. naturals couldn’t pull that level of accessorizing off no matter how much they tried.

small ribbon details, stripes, sailor style, ruffled hair, strong red lip and whispy bangs, overally cute rather than casual look: sweet! her face steals the show, not the other way around. she looks great here.

let’s amp it up. cropped geometrics with a dose of sparkle, small sharp geometrics, fitted clothes with several colors at play, typical gamine line break: feels right, interesting and sexy. the bangs could have more contrast, but other than that: perfect and very memorable. especially the top fits her so well.

strong random mix of yin and yang — pearls on asymmetric suit, minimal waist emphasis, more square details, shorts & one shoulder free, very unflexible fabric (as opposed to romantic fabrics that flow): very eye-catching but still doesn’t distract too much from her.

you see the difference. she can handle all that detailing and randomness and quite some glamor. naturals are made to dress down, but gamines can go the other way, pretty far i’d say, with many materials. 

because: all gamines are not just good but great at wearing innovative fashion with clashing genres. you can put them into the strangest combinations and it works as a standard outfit. 

because their body is a clash of lines: adorable doll face with the skinny limbs of a dramatic, just shorter, even if tallness is possible. plus a little bit of natural muscle around the shoulders. lisa is just that. the face and body are like from different people. espcially the face, so much rounded, soft yin that’s nowhere else in her physique.

it’s the essence of gamine, a youthful mix of lines that catches you by surprise. you know it from yoongi, same principle. kibbe calls their impression fun and vibrant, and i’m starting to see why.

for comparison. the lines of flamboyant natural are the same everywhere. there’s no contrast. wide face, wide chest, wide thighs, wide arms, wide hands, wide brows, wide cheeks, wide neck. they are HUGE, never truly lean. 

no doll face or short skinny limbs in sight. it’s the most massive type, you can’t get past them because they’re a solid block. namjoon fills every frame, he’s flamboyant natural incarnate. this type looks like a raging sports machine.

and not just the guys of this type, it’s the exact same for female FNs. look at giant pink, she is a soldier. FN is by default very mature and strong-looking.

whereas lisa comes across as sweet, petite and narrow which all gamines do. the vertical line is moderate, the frame is not athletic. the limbs are short, close-set. gamines always leave a cute expression, flamboyant naturals have a ‘hard and heavy-hitting’ silhouette that towers over everyone.

and the styling follows suit for FN, you have to dress this type just like an athlete. where lisa’s sporty grey outfit looks underwhelming, it becomes charming, cozy and perfectly simplistic on namjoon. on naturals, sportswear and underdressing doesn’t look sloppy or boring, instead it becomes just right:

you can put super-large, flowing and bulky outfits on FN without a problem.

meanwhile, namjoon comes across as a little funny with gamine-esque sailor stripes. you wouldn’t even notice it on lisa, on him it sticks out like a sore thumb as if some optical illusion shit is going on 😂

let’s try stage wear. namjoon is a bit lost when they put a multi-color glitter concept on him. it’s not a bad outfit (save the chaotic tie maybe), but the certain something is missing. it feels like it’s hiding him a little.

naturals truly shine — as the name says — in nature. beach wear, leisure, loose clothes, ‘no effort’. make namjoon a relaxed holiday boy. it’s perfect on him, everything blends together.

put a straw hat on lisa and photograph her at the beach, something’s not right. 

flamboyant gamine has a way different archetype. they’re great as punk boys and girls, high school crushes, whirlwinds, tomboys, rebels, game changers. they can go wild using all sorts of materials and it make you go wow, what a body.

flames, dual color bob cut, gloves, sexy jeans shorts, accurate bangs, crop top, it feels like she isn’t even getting started and she’ll steal your guy and your girl. oh man, lisa!!

compare again. flamboyant natural starts to look hilariously uncle or aunt-like if you do as much as use one experimental thing on them. no pattern mix possible, and it doesn’t highlight their sex appeal.

meanwhile, as we saw, lisa’s outfit is meh when she’s not (!) experimenting. flamboyant natural, on the other hand, looks their best if you don’t do much at all. you have to throw the simplest, baggiest things on them. no wild colors or strange cuts. oh my, he just radiates. from meme uncle to husband material.

what looks like jesus just descended to the earth on flamboyant natural is way too large and unfitted on flamboyant gamines (see hoseok below, he shares types with lisa). it completely kills their sexy vibe. 

the outfit looks boring and makes them disappear behind all that fabric. you don’t notice the cute face anymore. flamboyant gamines are the born fashionistas screaming for experimental stylings, baggy natural type clothes are simply too minimal and gigantic on them.

they suddenly look older and tired, it fails to highlight them. which is such an irony because gamines radiate youth and energy. but like this, they’re completely gone from our radar:

they’re too petite to carry the fabric, and it’s not constructed enough. if you’re a flamboyant gamine and want to hide, use a flamboyant natural outfit. it’s like camouflage fo the face since the outfit is so large and undemanding of your body lines.

put some oversized winter coats on namjoon, oh wonder... it makes him even more charismatic.

it feels like he has the frame for it. you look directly at the face. because the rest fits together so well and doesn’t mess with the eye. namjoon can carry a singular block of color with no problems.

flamboyant natural: the more low maintenance, the better. the less they try, the sexier it gets. it literally needs the most uninspiring soccer dad clothes for them.

with hobi, it’s the same idea as for lisa: flamboyant gamine can go far with styling. the exact opposite direction as with namjoon. you can dress them in the most extra items, no holding back. bring the camp and all the effect fabrics, tattoo them, give them chains and gloves, style their hair to the moon and back. and they still look like they could add some more!

if you have five outfits prepared for flamboyant gamine? you can put them all on at the same time! fuzzy glitter and comic shirt, nothing out of the ordinary. it’d look too much on any other type.

BONUS: flamboyant gamines are killing the “rebel army leader” style. there’s a lot going on and it’s fitted. they could exaggerate it even more and it’d look good.

man, just look at that. we have the line break, heavy lip, eyeliner, sharp shoulders, tight cuts, and lots of details.

so, i’m pretty sure lisa is in that kibbegory. the takeaway here is: 

FG has many options, FN keeps it easy. 

the less suitable kibbe style will make you look older and hide you.

flamboyant gamines can experiment all day and compile as many contrasting accessories as possible. lisa pulls it off.

FN has the same lines everywhere: wide, wide, tall, and wide, and more wideness. FG have unpredictable looks that fuse cute faces with sharp yang bodies.

#anon #ask #cub mail 🐆 #kibbe #lisa #namjoon #hoseok #long post #bts #blackpink #analysis