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#I know I've already done one similar But I have this story in my head still and keep coming back to it. Might try rewrite it one day
islandofsages · 22 days
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HEYY!! I love your writing from what i've read and i was wondering if i could ask for a gn reader (yuu) teaching the housewardens about like classic fandom lore- like imagine them turning into matpat to explain fnaf and undertale!! 😭😭 feel free to not do this and have a good day!! Thanks :D
characters: housewardens x gn!yuu
tags: platonic, fluff, crack kinda, imagines format
warnings: swearing
author's notes: SORRY THIS TOOK SO LONG also all the fandoms mentioned here are all fandoms ive been in at some point :D fun times mhm
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Riddle Rosehearts
He knows you’re very passionate about fandom culture but you never really had the chance to infodump about it to him
Until one day, you drop by Heartslabyul for a leisurely visit, when you see a not-so-clearly distressed Riddle sitting in the lounge
Not-so-clearly meaning he’s holding a teacup in his hand yet not drinking it, eyes closed as if he’s holding in all his emotions
You grow worried at this sight and slide next to him on the couch where he is seated, hoping you can help alleviate some of that stress
He sees you and he allows himself a sigh, then musters up a smile for you. He greets you and you cut straight to the point - can you help him with anything?
He releases a second sigh and shakes his head, telling you he only needs some sort of distraction. He just had a long day and needs to take his mind off things
You take a second to think of things that you can distract him with – that’s when a lightbulb goes off in your head. This is a prime opportunity for you
“Okay, I’m guessing you haven’t heard of Five Nights at Freddy’s since it’s a franchise from my world and all but the lore is crazy. So it starts like this…”
He wasn’t expecting to be paying much attention to the contents of what you’re saying but sooner or later, he ends up leaning towards you with his hand cupping his chin, mouth slightly agape at the story you’re telling
This inspires you to dump even more information about the media somehow at the rate that you’re going
By the end of it, he’s completely forgotten what he was so worried about. His head is full of creepy pizzerias for kids and haunted animatronics
He ends up having some trouble sleeping that night though. He’ll get you for that later.
Leona Kingscholar
He won’t lie, your interest in fandoms is too reminiscent of Idia for him – he doesn’t admit this to you obviously, since he hasn’t had the chance to
But on one particularly boring day, you decide to skip class with him and he lets you tag along for the hell of it
In the span of three seconds, he’s already off in dreamland. Sometimes you wish you had such a skill
Since you have nothing better to do and he’s way too deep in his sleep to even care anyway, you start rambling to yourself and a slumbering Leona
“Well, I’ve been thinking a lot about Undertale lately so I need to dump it all somewhere. So basically you play as this kid…”
Little do you know halfway through his nap, he wakes up from how much you’re talking. At first, he’s annoyed by your yapping but then he grows interest in what you’re saying
He’s almost tempted to try that game for himself and almost disappointed that it’s not available in Twisted Wonderland. Emphasis on almost.
When you’re done rambling, that’s when he stretches his arms over his head and yawn, commenting how noisy you were
You shrug it off. You're used to him complaining about you yapping instead of napping alongside him
…But then he asks you to tell him more about Undertale, if there's any more information you’re keeping from him out of the kindness of your heart
You smile smugly at this and his expression seems to say “don't make me regret asking” but oh, you definitely will make him regret even being friends with you in the first place
Needless to say, regrets were not the only thing he held at the end of that day.
Azul Ashengrotto
Similar to Leona, your fixation on fandom culture reminds him too much of Idia. not that that’s necessarily a bad thing - it’s more of an observation
And he gets more than an observation when you get the chance to show him what you’re made of: useless fandom culture and gaming knowledge
Speaking of Idia, he goes to you as a last resort to ask you to help him understand whatever the hell Idia’s talking about
You don’t know too much about Twisted Wonderland’s fandom culture just yet but when Azul explains the premise of a certain game and its fandom, it gives you an idea
“Sounds pretty similar to Yandere Simulator. Ooh, that one has a lot of history. Let me tell you about it…”
Unfortunately for him, he ended up unlocking your geekiness instead of having you address the things he was confused with
But at least your story makes it a bit easier to understand? He’s yet to decide that really but at least it sounds like you’re taking his lack of slang knowledge into consideration
Your infodump really gripped his attention though - it’s interesting to know another side of human culture, even if it’s not the humans of Twisted Wonderland
He would nod understandingly (or at least, politely) and thank you and your geekiness
He relays your story to Idia and finds it intriguing how similar fandom culture is in both Twisted Wonderland and your world
He would invite you to Board Game Club meetings so that you can rave and find out more about Twisted Wonderland’s fandom culture with Idia
He’d realize that was a big mistake and he may or may not have created the nerdiest pair in the world - but you guys are his nerdiest pair in the world.
Kalim Al-Asim
He’s very curious about fandom culture - he doesn’t know too much about it nor anyone who knows a lot about it so almost all the fandom information in his head are from you
He really wants to know more!!! So of course that warrants a hangout session fabricated as a study session to get Jamil’s stamp of approval
So there you are in his room, books laid out in front of the two of you but most importantly, a laptop
You two watch about a dozen videos on Twisted Wonderland’s fandom culture and as you absorb all the very-much-useful information, you sneak in tidbits from the culture of your world
“This one in particular is reminiscent of Danganronpa. Man, that one was a wild ride…”
It’s exciting to be able to talk about it with someone you trust wholeheartedly, especially Kalim, whom you know wouldn’t be so judging
He only nods in understanding at every point you made, his eyes sparkling with all the curiosity in his body
You were on your thirteenth video when you two are interrupted by a rap on the door and an unfortunately-familiar voice
So obviously you and your bestie hurriedly rush to close all the tabs on your laptop and open up something more academically-inclined
Which is obviously a…dictionary site
Jamil blinks twice at this, says nothing (but probably noting how it makes sense for you guys since you two are bumbling idiots) and walks away
If there’s any dictionary being read that day, it’d be a dictionary of fandom terminology, that’s for sure.
Vil Schoenheit
He doesn’t know too much about it - and doesn’t bother to learn much about it since he has better things to do - but since it’s you, he tries his best to be a good listener
The two of you sit down in the courtyard one day, the chirping of birds and rustling of leaves music to your ears; beauty truly is everywhere around you when you’re next to him
He’s talking about something. You’re not sure what because you’re entranced by the way his hair hangs above his eyes so elegantly. He notices this and calls you out for it
You shrug and excuse how you can’t help it - he’s like a dating simulator love interest in the real. He asks you what you mean by this. Now’s your chance to shine!
“Hmm, you know, something like Mystic Messenger? Hehe, let me tell you a bit about it…”
Unluckily for him, your “a bit” turns out to be a four-hour long ramble about the aforementioned dating simulator a little too reminiscent of Rook for his liking too
Despite his reservations, he really did enjoy hearing you talk so passionately about your interest; it’s a bonus that the topic itself is interesting
He tells you he wouldn’t mind trying out the game or at least finding out more about it though unfortunately it’s not available in Twisted Wonderland
You share his shame - until he says he’ll pitch the concept of the game to some authorities he know and perhaps make it a reality
Sorry, he’s going to what now?
You’re a little shaken. Sometimes you forget he’s a world-class model, despite his looks and mannerisms. You save your nerves for if a Twisted Wonderland version of Mystic Messenger actually ends up happening
He thanks you for enlightening him about fandom and video gaming culture. You use this as a cue to add another four hours of ranting about V’s route in the game.
Idia Shroud
You’re another victim for him to taint… or so he thought. You’re more of an ally than a victim at this point, considering how nerdy you are
He’d dump fandom lore on you and you’d reciprocate it right back. He’s genuinely so impressed with your knowledge, even if they differ by some degree due to being from different worlds
He gets more impressed when you pull up with knowledge about Twisted Wonderland’s fandom culture like damn, you really brushed up on your talking points already
Friendly rivalry aside, he really does enjoy talking about fandom culture with you and hearing about the things from your world - every story you tell adds a little color into his world
One day, the two of you are leaning on each other, on your phones because of course you are, even if you two are friends, talking still isn’t Idia’s strong suit
That’s when you blurt it out–
“Hey, wanna hear about this game called Persona? It’s a turn-based RPG and…”
Regardless of his response to your question, you ended up babbling away either way. It’s how conversations start between the two of you
You’re speaking so fast, he would have mistaken you for a rapper - or a doppelganger of himself even
Consider him entertained - he finds himself smiling by the end of your yapping and intrigued by your story
He then obviously starts to relate it to something from Twisted Wonderland, passing the listener baton to you
You don’t mind – you can stay there for hours and hours, just going back and forth with your fellow nerdy-ass friend.
Malleus Draconia
This man barely knows how to use a smartphone so you had to be a little patient with him when guiding him through the fandom culture trenches
He’s happy that you trust and cherish him enough to talk about your interests with no reservations or shame – and the feeling is mutual
On a certain weekend, the two of you are hanging out as usual. Chatting as friends would do
You don’t know why but the conversation reminded you of a certain fandom
“It’s kinda like Genshin’s community, I guess. They’re a riot, let me tell you that.”
Oh? What’s a Genshin and why is its community a riot?
You’re glad he asked – because you’ve prepared a 100-slide presentation on the history of the game and its fans
He asks you why and how did you find the time to make that. You tell him to shut up and that it doesn’t matter, he just needs to listen to you
You start and it feels like you’ll never stop – there’s just so much to say and Malleus has so much time in the world
Seeing his reactions to certain events makes you crack up and at times, you’d laugh at his shocked expressions (or sigh exhaustively, depending on the event you’re explaining)
When you finally stop, he gives you a one-man standing ovation. You blush a little at the attention and unexpected reaction but you appreciate his sentiment nonetheless. He tells you that your presentation has been very informative for him
You’re relieved to have been able to get that off your chest… and Malleus is more than ecstatic to relay the information to everyone he’s ever known. You obviously pretend that you had no involvement in his sudden investment of a game from another world.
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easy-there-leftovers · 5 months
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Hiii can I just say I’m OBSESSED with ISY,D!! Amazing work truly the best ❤️
I saw asks are open so I thought I’d slip in a little prompt 👀
Astarion and Tav have a bit of a spat at camp. Tav is trying to convince Astarion that ascending would make him just as bad as Cazador, but Astarion craves the power and the freedom. Tav, upset and frustrated, ends up leaving for a walk through the late night streets of the gate to clear their head. One of the vampire spawn out looking for their next prey find Tav, recognizing them immediately as Astarion’s love (and one true weakness) and kidnaps them to bring to Cazador. Cazador, being the sick fuck he is, locks Tav away and sends a note to Astarion that he finds the next morning, saying that he had Tav and that if Astarion wants them back he has to surrender to Cazador and go through with the ceremony. Astarion loses his mind and races to the castle with the gang in tow, praying that Tav is unharmed. Will he be there just in time to save Tav? Or will he be too late, will Cazador have already turned them by the time he gets there?
Sorry for the paragraph but this has been in my mind for DAYS and I would cry if you could make this story come to fruition ❤️
-🌸
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Hello 🌸anon!! Thank you so much for liking the series, I'm glad that it's something that you enjoy reading! Also, I've decided to include @simp-4-astarion's request as they were rather similar in nature!! Thank you so much for liking my work :,DDD
In addition!! Just a heads up for people who'd like to request or send an idea in, I don't just write for Astarion! Feel free to include your favorite romanceable pcs (and non romanceable npcs lol) into the mix!!
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That night at camp had been fraught with tension, like a fraying rope ready to snap. The campfire crackled, the tongues of the flame dancing and flickering about, mirroring the storm within the heated pair.
Your voice, something that he's come to find solace in as of late, quivered with frustration unlike any he's heard directed at him before as you tried to reason with him.
"I don't relish it. but my," He pauses, wondering what he should call them. "--Siblings lured thousands of people to their death over the years. I doubt Baldur's Gate would miss any of them." He seems rather taken with the idea, and you worry about what this could mean for him.
"But we don't even know if it's possible, Astarion. You're hypothesizing that you become the Vampire Ascended at the expense of eradicating the other spawn." Whether or not they had done things as horrendous as your,-- gods you don't even know what you are,-- as the ex-magistrate, they did not deserve to be subjected to such a ritual.
He paces around you, ascertaining your reactions, and making quick work to think about how he could convince you
"And so what? I've obviously thought about it. If I completed the ritual, this evocation, I'd have insurmountable power. And--" He nears himself to you, practically whispering the following words into the skin of you neck. As if anything he said would etch its way into your skin and carve you anew.
"I could walk in the sun without fear of becoming a mindflayer. Don't you want that for me, darling? For us?" The question instills an indescribable fear in you. Not the same fear that's been riddling you as you wonder if you'd perish in one of your many battles, but the fear you'd witness when you lost something dear to you.
It's as if he's giving you an out.
Agree with him, and you seal his fate as the Vampire Ascendant with a sure place at his side.
Or disagree, allowing all those spawn the same chance he had been given all those tendays ago, and snuff out whatever growing relationship you had between you.
He senses your uncertainty. And he feels lost. He figured that you would be so sure to keep him at your side. Doing anything it takes to make sure it stays that way, but now you're getting cold feet with his blatant proposal of companionship because of what?
These monsters he's hunted with?
These damned spawn that represent everything you've seeked to correct about the world?
"Astarion, please, give them a chance. They were just like you once, give them that much."
At any other time, he would've admired your efforts to help them. But in this moment, he thinks you a fool who could never truly understand what it means to be a slave and to want for power.
"You did not know them. And you do not know me as well as you may think, my dear, if you think they deserve a chance more than I do."
He doesn't know why it all happened the way it did. The way that his thoughts came tumbling out of his mouth and only allowing the worst of things to escape him.
All he knows was that it had surely hurt you and that he doesn't think he's ever seen your retreating form look as small as it did as you walked towards somewhere in the city.
And that he wished he had remembered where they were. So near to where his consanguines and he used to hunt.
So when he and the others are greeted with a letter smelling of undeath, telling them that they had their precious leader imprisoned in Cazadaor's manor, he knows not to tell them about the little argument you two had.
Knows not to tell them anything to dampen their mood as they search for you.
Knows not to tell them that the likelihood he kept you alive was slim to none, now that he has Astarion's attention.
Once they had been alerted of your whereabouts, a clear ploy to lure him back to his master, there would be no use for you anymore. They don't know Cazador like he did, and he was sure that by the time they reached their destination, you would be no more.
Stil, he's willing to take any chance he can get to get you back. No use in proclaiming you dead if he hasn't seen you, and he'd be damned if he let Cazador take any more from him.
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jointherebellion215 · 21 days
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If It's True
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Feyd-Rautha Harkonnen x female!reader
Summary: When an unexpected guest crashes your House's welcome feast for the Harkonnens, your life unknowingly becomes the start of a sad, sad song.
Word Count: 872
TW: Manipulation, Dark!Feyd-Rautha (so Regular Feyd-Rautha), she/her pronouns, AFAB reader, songfic
A/N: Hi, it's your friendly neighborhood shitposter. I'm taking a huge leap of faith with this fic, because I truly haven't written anything in YEARS. This idea has been bouncing around in my head for days, thus "the trilogy was born". This is meant to be Part One of a three part series, based on different songs from the musical Hadestown. I've obviously written this with very very dark interpretations of the songs and the themes. If enough people like it, I'll post parts two and three. Please let me know if it's any good, I'd love some feedback :)
AO3
Disclaimer: I don't own any of the Dune properties, characters, or storylines-- nor do I own anything related to Hadestown. The images used in this are not my own, and any similarities to stories other than what I derive inspiration from are strictly coincidence.
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What’s the use of his backbone
If he never stands upright?
“We welcome you to Kolhar, my lords Baron and na-Baron. Our House humbly offers our services and facilities to your use. I toast to our continued cooperation and to the strength of our Houses.”
As your father raised his cup, others of our House followed suit. The official welcome feast was well underway, though House Harkonnen had been planetside for at least a week already. The past few days had been for inspecting our mines and factories, ensuring that our production of their ships and swords were up to standard. 
Now? Pure pageantry. You found it a bit redundant, but it was necessary to ensure your good standing among the Houses of the Imperium. It was a grand occasion, in which the leaders of your father’s council were present, as well as the highest ranked mine workers. 
The doors to the large hall slam open, a familiar figure storming in. Your heart flutters at the sight of your beloved parting the crowds before him. The man who you had met by complete coincidence, one of the workers in a local steel mine, who you had spent the better part of a year meeting in secret—had crashed the court. You noticed a bruise growing on his cheek and blood trickling down his temple, indicating that his journey to enter through the doors was easier said than done. His voice soon bellowed throughout the hall. 
“My Lord Duke, I refuse to let your daughter’s hand be taken by the na-Baron. She cannot marry him.” 
The crowd gasps, as do you. You had spent the past week showing the na-Baron Feyd-Rautha around the grounds, the training of your most fierce warriors, and the best of your planet’s culture. You had shared a laugh or two and shown your prowess as a leader. Yes, you’d spent quite a bit of time with him, but marriage? This was news to you. 
You turn to your father, who gives you an apologetic grimace. Several Harkonnen guards step forward to seize the love of your life. You quickly stand to protest, but the na-Baron stops the guards in their track with a single snap of his fingers. He offers a hand to calm the crowd, an eerie stillness in his form.
“It is true, I have offered my hand to the Lady.”
I believe that with each other, 
we are stronger than we know.
“There must be a way around this. Even if this is in defiance of the court, they can’t punish all of us! We work their mines; they couldn’t truly function without us. We are the ones who truly hold the power! I implore you to stand with me, show them our strength!”
Your love stands strong, chin raised in the crowd, voice pleading with his brothers and sisters to stand beside him. He was convinced that this moment could provide a great revelation, that somehow your situation was different. That the consensus of a crowd could make the na-Baron stand down. Surely, your story could convince even the coldest of hearts that love can conquer all. He must have some sentimentality that resonates within him.
That's one of the main reasons why you fell in love with him. He's always so full of hope. Always willing to see the world as it could be, in spite of the way that it actually is.
But you knew better.
“This is treason.” Someone whispers in the room. Murmurs of assent soon follow, and your heart drops. The crowd around him quickly dissipates, as if the mere act of touching him promises death. 
And the ones who deal the cards
Are the ones who take the tricks
With their hands over their hearts
While we play the game they fix
You start to plead with your father to spare your lover. He doesn’t know any better, he wasn’t raised in the ways of politics or court. It’s purely out of his love and devotion to you, so please—
Feyd-Rautha stands up and the room is immediately devoid of sound. He cranes his neck to look at you.
“You love him?”
You swallow harshly, lifting your chin. “I do.” You went to your lover, making a bold statement in linking your fingers together. Presenting a united front. Hoping that somehow, your kind attitude the past week towards the na-Baron would allow this leniency.
A gleam flashes through his eyes, almost imperceptible. He gives a blackened smile, making show of placing his hand over his heart. Confusion fills you. He slithers down the steps towards the pair of you, boots echoing in the Feasting Hall, each step making your lover’s hand give a slight tremor. Your mind stands strong in its conviction, in the thought that you’ll have to fight for what you want. But a small tendril in the back of your mind gives the slightest hesitation. The smallest indication of hope. Maybe…
Piter leans towards his Baron, whispering concerns in his ears, but is quickly paused by the Baron’s hand. Vladimir gives a slow, menacing grin. He responds to his Mentat in a low voice,
“Don’t bother. You know that my nephew loves to play with his food.”
Is this how the world is?
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vasito-de-leche · 1 month
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;R1999 - Self-Aware AU
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Headcanons about an Alternate Universe in which everyone knows they're living inside a videogame. However, Vertin is the only one aware of the entity inhabiting her own mind, the real conductor - the "Player".
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this is one of my favorite AUs to slap on whatever media I'm into so here we are <3 not sure if anyone's done this already, but PLEASE PLEASE PRETTY PLEASE link me if you've seen any other ppl write for this AU! this one and any actor AUs are my absolute fave
this is just a word vomit introduction for fun, to get the basic ideas out of my head, so I can start writing for characters individually!
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Okay, okay! First of all, some context for the AU before I go deranged overexplaining my HCs!
Aside from the "Storm", there is something else that haunts the people of this world: the fact that their lives are nothing but a simulacrum, part of a game.
The requirements to obtain this "self-awareness" is unknown. Those within the Foundation believe it's related to their respective "roles", that only the main and relevant characters are given the chance to fully open their eyes to the truth. Those within Manus Vindictae claim that one must be strong enough to break through the fog of complacency and their assigned scripts, to have their full potential unleashed and obtain true liberation. Either way, similar to the "Storm", this is a well-kept secret for a very good reason - everyone wants to have the upperhand.
There is one outlier to this whole system. Vertin is not only aware of the truth of this world, but also of her duty as the eyes and hands of the "Player". She must experience it all for their sake. Or rather, whatever she experiences will be the story that the Player will see.
This applies to her suitcase, the place where the Player's influence increases tenfold, bending everything and everyone to their will through her own body and voice. The longer one stays within her suitcase - or within her general vicinity - the easier it is for them to become self-aware.
How does one become "self-aware" and what does it entail?
The requirements and the catalyst for a character to become self-aware are still a mystery. But that's mostly because I specifically wanted to keep them as vague as possible, to allow some flexibility for NPCs and other characters outside of Vertin's suitcase.
The whole process of gaining sentience or self-awareness is mostly described as waking up from a nightmare, or a very, very realistic dream. It's like a switch, something that happens in a second without any warnings whatsoever.
I like to think that most of the people who wake up are easy to spot, because it's a jarring experience and panicking is the most normal reaction - but that they're often taken care of by the Foundation or recruited by Manus Vindictae.
The levels of awareness also depend heavily on each individual - some only know that nothing is truly real, that everything they've done up until that point was just a carefully scripted lie, the most basic realization. Others can understand the rules that govern this game and use them to their advantage, either through observation and study or just inherently.
Overall, the experience of being sentient varies as well, with some describing a disconnect from their body, while others feel exactly the opposite. Again, keeping it pretty vague so that people can fill in with their own ideas!
I'll talk about Vertin's case in detail when we get to her specific bullet point, but the same way the Player is able to experience the "story" through her eyes, she's able to see the same things they do - this includes the UI, the menus and everything you can interact with in-game.
Vertin as a character and a vessel for the Player.
The most common thing I've seen in self-aware AUs in my years of fandom is to turn the player stand-in (the main character that serves for the player to experience the story through and/or project onto, depending on the genre of the game) into an obstacle, one that keeps the characters from truly interacting with the Player, capital P.
The second most common thing I've seen is to simply ignore the existence of this player stand-in and replace it with the Player themself, either through isekai methods or thanks to the customization the game allows, etc etc.
When it comes to Vertin in this AU, I know I want her to retain her role as the center of everything, instead of being sidelined by the Player. She's THE Timekeeper, after all.
There's still some details I'm trying to iron out, like whether she's always been self-aware or if she became self-aware at some point during her childhood at the St. Pavlov Foundation. But I like to think that her relationship to the Player is a parallel to her immunity to the "Storm" - neither of these two things are inherently good nor bad. Surviving the "Storm" is helpful, sure, but it's painful for her. Having an entity like the "Player" haunting her is scary, sure, but it can be an advantage. It's a matter of how she utilizes the assets she was given, since her adaptability and determination are big aspects of her character. Vertin makes up for her mediocre arcane skills with unconventional plans and strategies.
But this isn't to say that Vertin isn't affected by the presence of the Player. Ironically, she's the one person whose freedom is limited. During battles, her skills and Tuning are available to you, they can also prove to be vital to win a fight, but in the end you're still the one calling the shots and choosing when her friends get to attack. You're the one choosing the layout of the Wilderness. You're the one picking which one of her friends deserves to become stronger.
In the last bullet point I mentioned that some characters can understand the rules of the game - Vertin is the most extreme case, as she can see the same UI as you do. She learns the way you like to fight your battles, your own strategies, she can see this and more.
Overall it's a very complex dynamic. It's not as easy as saying that she likes or dislikes you, that she considers you a friend or foe. You're part of her, you influence each other in many aspects and are stuck together for reasons she can't even fathom. While you may be able to read her thoughts most of the time, she becomes invisible once you enter the suitcase - the main menu of the game. Sure, the character you selected to greet you every day is actually talking to her, not you, but she's out of your view and therefore, out of our range. That's when Vertin wonders the sort of person that you are, if you care about her friends as much as she does. Are you playing just to be entertained? Are you invested in these events? Will you be there for her until the end of her story?
Another detail I like to think about is that Vertin is the only one who knows your name. Because at the very beginning, you were asked to input a name and she was there.
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[screenshot was taken from this video, since it's the first one I could find that showed this specific part of the game lol]
Well, "your name" not quite right - she knows that whatever you wrote there is the name linked to your account, at least. And that's the name she knows you as.
Those who take residence in Vertin's suitcase or spend prolonged amounts of time with her, growing closer to her and all, end up becoming self-aware. This is a direct side-effect of your presence.
I like to think that characters who reach the 100% Bond can begin to sense the Player, to see the world in a similar way as Vertin does. Maybe even feel their presence EXACTLY like Vertin does whenever there's a battle. There is someone else on the other side of this screen, the fourth wall, who watches over them.
To some, it's hard to differentiate Vertin from the Player, as they just go hand in hand - but Sonetto, for example, has the easiest time telling the two apart.
On the subject of freedom and acting out of script.
The Foundation, Manus Vindictae, Laplace... It doesn't matter if they're self-aware and acting outside of what their script dictates, because they're missing one key ingredient: you. No one else but Vertin and her group knows about your existence, after all.
They don't know that the only story that matters is the one that Vertin is part of. The one that the Player gets to see and read and experience. And because the game gives you a very limited view into the lives of these characters, you don't know what neither Arcana nor Constantine do behind the scenes. You and Vertin don't see that, therefore, it never truly mattered.
Those most likely to start "acting out" are the troublemakers within Vertin's suitcase. Characters who are too curious for their own good, who are more susceptible to supernatural entities, who are just too impulsive - they would start to test the limits and see how far they can go, how much they can interact with the Player. Can the game be broken should they end up shattering the fourth wall? Is there a way for the Player to communicate with them? What will happen to Vertin?
I like to think that Vertin probably supports this, as she's rather curious herself, prone to questioning everything. She would also like to learn more about the Player, to truly tear into the game and see the full extent of your influence and her freedom.
Sometimes, Regulus and X will change their usual voicelines, just enough to be noticeable if one pays enough attention. Characters like Sotheby or Leilani might slip up and address the Player, rather than Vertin. Lilya, Pavia, Bkornblume have new animations and different expressions, ones you've never seen before - they stare ahead, as if searching for something, and then smirk or hum to themselves, deep in thought, like they realized something you're not privy of.
Sometimes, if you leave them as your selected assistant on the main menu, you can catch them muttering to themselves - idle quotes you never heard enough, about the outside world. Diggers does this the most, it's almost embarassing how easy it is to catch him talking nonsense, followed by Sonetto. If you leave Medicine Pocket alone for too long, you might come back to a screen covered in weird scratch marks.
On the subject of these characters being curious about the outside world and all, I think that a good chunk of them are generally content with the way things are?
We have to remember that in-universe, they're arcanists displaced from their respective eras. Their best chance at surviving is siding with Vertin, and if Vertin is content with the way things are, then there's no point in trying to disrupt what they have right now. They're curious enough to prod, but only as far as Vertin allows it.
And I think that's it for the word vomit!
There are some details I didn't know where to fit in, like the possibility of the fourth wall slowly dissipating the more time the Player invests in the game, leading to some characters being able to directly hear you if you talk while playing and whatnot. Or what would happen should someone outside of Vertin's suitcase figure out the existence of the Player, let alone interact with you in some way.
Or the concept of death being meaningless, unless it was pre-established by the game itself.
In Borderlands, there's this game mechanic where you can just be revived over and over and pay a percentage of your money as a fee, even though the canon that's established is that you play through the whole story without dying a SINGLE time - because the revival mechanics aren't canon. There's the divide between story and gameplay. That's pretty much the standard. But what about the deaths in battles in R1999? The amount of times I died to 1.3's UTTU's Flash Gathering is insane. How do self-aware characters feel about this, now that they know that they're bound to die over and over and be brought back because you have to do your Pneuma Analysis or reach the final stage of Limbo?
But that's pretty much it for now, I think I got most thoughts out of my system! Thank you for reading!
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thankskenpenders · 6 months
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And now for something new
So, here's something I was never planning on doing, but I just couldn't shake the idea... Thanks Ken Penders is gaining a sister blog featuring an entirely different comic franchise!
Introducing... Thanks Steve Ditko, a blog where I read the Earth-616 Spider-Man comics, starting all the way back in the '60s! It's gonna be much more casual and less thorough than how I run things here on TKP, though, which I'll explain in a sec.
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If seeing me post weird bits from old Spider-Man comics sounds fun and you need no further info, then just head right on over to Thanks Steve Ditko. But for longtime TKP readers, I know you probably have questions...
Number one: Why?
Spider-Man's always been my favorite superhero, and with the Spider-Verse movies kicking ass and my excitement building for the new Insomniac game, I've been in a Spidey mood. Inevitably, a thought occurred to me: Maybe I should actually read the comics that everything else is built off of and see the wildly varying contributions of all the original creators, rather than filtering them through big budget adaptations. If I can power through One Piece and all these other manga with hundreds of chapters, it can't be that hard... right?
And, well, after a few issues I quickly realized that my options were to either clog up my other accounts with random Spider-Man panels for years, or to just make a side blog. And so the side blog was born.
Two: Will this blog replace Thanks Ken Penders?
NO!!!!!!!!!
Okay but prove it
To allow the two to exist side-by-side, Thanks Steve Ditko will have a different format than what Thanks Ken Penders developed. Rather than an in-depth guided tour that critically analyzes every story beat of every issue, TSD will just be a place for amusing panels and brief thoughts as I casually read the comics at my own pace.
If you've seen me make a few tweets about reading Spider-Man recently, I'm basically just moving that to a dedicated Tumblr. It's a place for me to dump these things so that it doesn't fill up my media tab on Twitter for the next decade. (You know, assuming Twitter is still around in a decade.) There will be many issues where I only post two panels that I thought were funny. There will be issues where I don't have anything to say at all. Maybe I'll reach a run that I just cannot get into, and I start skipping around more. Who knows!
This may sound similar to what I thought this blog would be before it blew up. Aside from the simple fact that there's already mountains of Spider-Man commentary out there and therefore less of a void for me to fill, one of the main steps I'll be taking to avoid repeating the past is not enabling an ask box on TSD. I do not need people to ask me to go into ten times more detail on everything. I do not need to write seven essay-length responses to questions about Spider-Man minutiae every day. I do not need a place for people to chide me for not covering certain scenes, issues, or ancillary series.
It also won't have any kind of update schedule. I'm trying to keep it very casual. I'm reading these comics at my own pace, and if I feel like sharing a moment or commenting on something while doing so? It goes there. That's it.
(On the subject of format changes, I'm also listing the issue, writer, and penciller in the body of every post. This is a thing I wish I'd done on TKP so that people didn't misattribute every weird Archie Sonic panel I post to Penders.)
Three: So when will TKP come back from hiatus? You said it'd come back after you finished SLARPG!
I don't know! Sorry. I have a couple things on the backburner right now for TKP, but I'm not sure when I'll get back to proper updates where I read more comics.
I wanted to bring TKP back this year, and that's still possible. The main hurdle is that I want to reread my own archive (again) as a refresher, which is, uh. A lot of posts. I've developed a high standard for myself on here, and I feel like I wouldn't be doing my job right if I forgot half the ongoing subplots and character arcs and didn't bring them up in my analysis. Especially when I'm discussing the work of an author as obsessed with continuity as Ian Flynn. Unfortunately, the nature of this blog means that every time I go on another long hiatus for Life Reasons I have even more comic continuity to catch up on than last time.
(This is a big part of why I'm making Thanks Steve Ditko an extremely casual blog instead of promising to become a Lore Expert on 60+ years of Marvel.)
Mostly I've just been very burnt out this year after having finally finished a video game that took almost eight years to make. I haven't really had the energy for any creative projects, including TKP. But I feel a little bit of a spark here with Spider-Man, so I'm chasing that feeling to try to get back into the swing of blogging about comics - no pun intended.
So, basically, bear with me on this as I start this low-energy side project. But hopefully folks will enjoy Thanks Steve Ditko as its own thing, too.
Look forward to goofy shit like this
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bread-tab · 8 months
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okay random 4am rant time, don't take it too seriously, but: people need to recognize there's a difference between "bad worldbuilding" and "worldbuilding styles you personally don't like."
bad worldbuilding is, for example: internally inconsistent, bigoted, or something else that messes up the plot or characterization of the story itself. sloppy. careless.
things that are *not* bad worldbuilding:
minimalism.
i've been thinking about this in the first place because i saw a post about the Murderbot Diaries a while back (don't know who made it, don't care; this ain't personal) saying the worldbuilding in those books is bad and lazy. to me, as an avid sci-fi reader and writer, that is clearly not true. but i understood why they thought this. the series uses extremely minimalist worldbuilding which intentionally withholds a lot of detail, in a way that is consistent with the (nonhuman, robot, depressed robot) first-person POV. this could also be a feature of the author's writing style in general—i haven't read her other works—but i wouldn't bet too much on it.
the signature of intentional minimalism is that there *are* details about the speculative setting—they're just doled out very thoughtfully and sparingly. the intent is to leave you a little hungry for more. it's to make you think very carefully about the details you do have. this is best suited to stories that already have elements of psychological and/or mystery plot types. the worldbuilding you do see should still be believable, internally consistent, and have interesting implications if you think about it a bit. but you are for sure going to have to think harder to get it.
if you're not in the mood, i will concede, a minimalist style definitely comes off as a bit dry. if you are in the mood, it's relaxing.
whimsy.
this is a big one for sci-fi fans in particular. see: the constant debate about whether any particular story is "hard" or "soft" sci-fi, and whether soft sci-fi is bad, etc etc. but worldbuilding doesn't have to be realistic to be good. you're allowed to have Jedi and humanoid aliens and time travel in your sci-fi. you're allowed to have historical anachronisms and astrology and po-ta-toes in your fantasy. whether or not they're silly isn't the deciding factor on how "good" these worldbuilding elements really are.
the key thing is tonal consistency. you've got a serious high-fantasy setting with its own strict, un-Earth-like theology and magic system, and you throw Santa Claus in there? yeah, that's not gonna land well. but C.S. Lewis can get away with that in Narnia just fine. why? because the Chronicles of Narnia are whimsical children's stories with a strong Christian/Western mythological influence already, and their central conceit is a crossover between the mundane world and the magical world. of course Santa can cross over too. it's whimsical, but it's not actually random. (and if you ventured into straight-up comedy, you could get away with random too. as long as it's funny.)
the unreliable narrator.
i don't have a good example for this off the top of my head (maybe Murderbot again? idk, i'm sleepy, fill in your own) but i'll tell you how to recognize when this is done well.
by definition, an unreliable narrator has some key misconceptions about their own world. so how do you tell what's going on as a reader? how do you know the writer isn't equally confused?
you connect the dots. solve the puzzle. in practice this is similar to reading a minimalist setting—but instead of just sparse clues, you also have a boatload of red herrings. you can catch some of these misleading details by comparing them to your real-world knowledge and saying "wait, this doesn't add up." other times, the false clues intentionally trick you by subverting those real world expectations.
the trick is in the consequences. regardless of what the narrator says, their actions should still have logical consequences. there should be things going on that the POV character doesn't know about. the character will be forced to learn and adapt their narrative because of these shifting circumstances. you can catch them in a lie. the inconsistencies themselves tell a story.
...
i'm gonna stop myself there because this post is long and i oughtta be sleeping. just. this is a distinction worth making. is it really bad worldbuilding, or is it simply not the genre you're craving today? learn the difference for your own sake. you'll have an easier time realizing if a story is something you'll find enjoyable to read, regardless of its actual quality.
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What Do You Regret? | Tommy Shelby x Reader
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Request: yes by @cillmequick
Pairing: Tommy Shelby x reader
Summary: Tommy and (Y/N) talk about some regrets in life over a drink and a quiet moment at the Garrison. When (Y/N) suddenly brings up the topic of 'them’, she gets a pretty interesting response.
Warnings: language, smoking, drinking
Word Count: 2252
A/N: well I surprised myself with this one by writing it in one day after not writing for a few days…I hope it makes sense. The prompt I was given by the lovely Alex is italicized in the story. I have to say that I had a bunch of fun writing it. Enjoy! :)
PLEASE LET ME KNOW WHAT YOU THINK!
Comment/Message me if you’d like to be tagged in future stories similar to this one!
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"I figured you'd be here," (Y/N) said as she walked through the main doors of the Garrison. She immediately found Tommy, sitting at one of the tables in the middle of the empty room.
"Is someone looking for me?" Tommy asked, his eyebrows raised as he held his glass in his hand. It looked to be that he was about to take a drink from it, but stopped to talk instead.
"No," (Y/N) shook her head as she sat in the chair across from him, "I was just wondering where you'd gone off to...and took a lucky guess that you were here," she explained then.
"Someone's always been looking for me these past few weeks," he mumbled, still stuck on his previous train of thought as he finally took a drink from his glass.
"Well fear not...I was only wondering if you were ok..." she trailed off as she grabbed the bottle that he'd been drinking from and and the other empty glass on the table so that she could pour a drink for herself, "...if you were safe..." she continued, raising her eyebrows slightly as she looked over at him; bringing her glass up to her lips so that she could take a sip. "You had a second glass here...you weren't expecting someone, were you?" she decided to ask him.
"No. It's a habit," he brushed her off, shaking his head slightly as he set his glass down, exchanging it for the cigarette that had been smoldering in the ashtray. "What did you want, love?" he asked her after he exhaled a line of smoke.
"Nothing," (Y/N) answered simply, shrugging her shoulders slightly.
"Nothing?" Tommy checked, his eyebrows raised. There was always something.
"Nothing at all," she doubled down on her answer, smiling over at him.
Tommy hummed in response, nodding his head as he took another drink from his glass. He kept his eyes on her, not saying anything as silence fell in the room.
"What, is it so unusual for me to wonder where the person I've been seeing is?" (Y/N) then bursted out with a question, unable to take the silence mixed with his gaze on her.
"I didn't say anything," he said to her, holding his hands up as he bit back a grin.
"Your eyes were saying it," she told him, trying, and failing, to keep a glare on her face as she crossed her arms over her chest. He chuckled at her statement, shaking his head slightly as he took another drag from his cigarette before stamping it out in the ashtray.
Silence fell between them again. It was comfortable this time, and it made (Y/N) tip her head back to rest against the chair, allowing her to stare up at the ornate ceiling.
They sat like this for a few minutes until she spoke again, "what do you regret?" she asked as she lifted her head from the chair to look at him once more.
"What?" he asked, not because he hadn't heard her question, but rather because it had come out of nowhere.
"Do you regret anything you've done in the past?" she rephrased it for him, "like I regret the one time that I snuck out of my house at night to go and meet a boy that promised he'd meet me in the park, but when I got to the park I found him already with another girl. My parents found out about me not being in bed and when they asked, I told them that our elderly neighbor, Eloise, had needed me to help her with some stupid task," she then recounted a time that she regretted.
"Which part of it do you regret more?" Tommy was curious now.
"The boy...the lie didn't hurt anyone, and it was the only one that I'd ever told them. That boy though...it was hard going to school for a handful of days after it happened," she frowned at the memory before her eyes found his again, "so is there anything that you regret?" she then turned the question onto him.
There was a pause in the conversation as Tommy pursed his lips, making it look like he was thinking of any possible stories to share. "No," he said finally, the grin spreading across his lips being an almost dead giveaway that he wasn't being honest.
Seeing it made (Y/N)'s eyes widen, "Tommy!" she exclaimed as she sat forward in her chair, "you are lying right now!" she accused him, pointing to him then as she continued, "it's clear on your face!"
Caught in the act, he held his hands up in surrender, glancing over at her to see that she'd been trying to hold back her giggles. "Of course there's stuff that I regret," he said to her once their laughter had died down.
"Like what?" Now it was her turn to be curious, and she leant forward to prop her chin up on her hand as she waited for him to, hopefully, tell a story.
He took a deep breath and exhaled it slowly, thinking of where to start as he busied himself with pulling another cigarette out of its tin. "I regret telling off my teacher," he started.
"You told off your teacher?" (Y/N) made him stop as she asked in shock, her eyes wide in surprise. She was a good student all throughout her schooling years, so it shocked her that anyone would do such a thing.
"Yeah," Tommy nodded before continuing, "she'd looked over my work and told me that it wasn't good enough; that I needed to add more substance to it, and I told her that maybe if she'd of been a 'better fucking teacher' that I would have been able to write more. She wrote me up and told me to go to the headmaster's office, and I ripped that up as well and told her to go to hell, so she kicked me out of the class."
"Tommy!" she exclaimed much like she had earlier, "that's terrible! What year were you in?"
"It was in primary school," he admitted.
"That's even worse!" she exclaimed, her jaw going slack as surprise overcame her. She couldn't stop the smile from forming on her lips and the giggles from bubbling up though. It was hard not to as she pictured a young Tommy doing this to the poor woman who had been tasked to teach him.
"I know..." he agreed with her, trying to hold back his smile as well, "that's why I regret it," he paused for a moment, placing the unlit cigarette he'd been holding between his lips before he made a motion with his hands. He grabbed his lighter and flicked it to life so that he could light the cigarette before continuing, "she'd only been trying to get something more out of me. I told her she was a shit teacher and then disregarded her authority when she was disciplining me. I fucking deserved all of it," he ended his statement by shaking his head as he laughed softly at the memory. He glanced over at (Y/N) then as he took a drag from his cigarette, seeing that she pursing her lips together tightly. "What?" he asked her, his eyebrows raised.
"Nothing," she brushed him off with a slight shake of her head.
"Nothing?" he asked, much like he did when she'd first come into the tavern.
"Nothing at all," she repeated the exact phrase she'd said to him earlier, the callback to it making him smirk as he shook his head softly. Silence fell between them for a moment then before (Y/N) decided to continue the conversation. "Is there anything else?" she asked him, looping them back around to their initial topic.
Tommy took a drag from his cigarette as he contemplated how to answer her. Of course there were things that he regretted doing...he just wasn't sure if he wanted to elaborate on them to her. "I've done a lot of shit over these past years...some things maybe I should have handled differently..."
"Like me?" (Y/N) asked a little too eagerly before he was able to finish his statement.
"What?" he asked her, his brows furrowed in confusion.
"Like your relationship with me...like how you're going to go back to your estate once everything blows over with the vendetta here and I'm just going to be left here in Small Heath," she elaborated on her previous statement, her composure now more solemn in nature compared to what it was moments ago.
"(Y/N)..." was all Tommy was able to get out before she cut him off again.
"I'm sorry, I...I don't know why I just said any of that," she said, her words coming out in a frantically mumbled mess as she averted her eyes from his.
No matter how hard she tried, she couldn't stop the blood from rushing to her face as she began feeling sheepish for even steering the conversation in that direction. She'd finally got him smiling; surely for the first time since he'd been back in Small Heath, where he's been stuck while he and his family fought out the vendetta between the Changrettas.
They found each other by happenstance - the details didn't matter - and they'd entered into a sort of a situationship rather quickly. Despite the nature of how they began seeing each other, (Y/N) felt closer to Tommy than she was anyone else, and Tommy had found that he could confide in (Y/N). For him, she was someone that he could see and talk to that was removed from the fighting going on all around him. And (Y/N) liked that he let his walls down around her.
But now things had gone to shit....all because she'd decided to ask an unneeded question. She couldn't even look at him because she was worried about what he'd say.
Tommy noticed this rather quickly. "Hey, look at me love," he said to her, his words prompting her to do as she was told. He held their gaze and took a deep breath, a serious expression forming on his face as he got ready to speak. "Nothing about any moment I've ever spent with you will ever be a regret, do you understand that?" He looked at her with raised eyebrows as he paused. (Y/N) was only able to nod her head, but it was enough of a response for Tommy to keep talking, "spending time with you has made being back here worth it. It's helped me so fucking much; having someone to confide in like I do with you. And I'm never going to regret it, so don't ever think that I will, eh?"
(Y/N) nodded again as she swallowed the lump in her throat. "I...I just thought that since being back here has brought on all of this other stuff, you'd hate every part of it," she told him her worries, her voice sounding much smaller now than it did before.
"You've thought wrong then, love...very wrong," he continued to dispel her thoughts. He glanced down at the glass that he'd been spinning with his fingers for a moment then, pursing his lips as he thought of how to say what he wanted to. "If anything, you should be regretting the time you've been spending with me," he finally said after a few moments passed, looking back at her once he was done speaking.
(Y/N)'s eyebrows furrowed together as she heard his statement, "now why would I do that?" she asked him, "I've enjoyed every second I've spent with you," she then concluded, speaking definitively now.
The left side of Tommy's lips quirked upwards in a smirk as he heard what she had to say. He brought his cigarette up and took one last drag from it before stamping it out in the ashtray. He then nodded his head at (Y/N) before mumbling "c'mere." She heard him loud and clear, and a smile formed on her face as she stood from her chair and moved over to where he was sitting. He waited until she was sitting comfortably on his lap before he spoke again, "y'know, maybe there is something I regret about you and I..." he trailed off, looking into her eyes as she sat inches away from him.
A slight expression of surprise formed on her face as she processed his words, and she searched his eyes for a moment before asking, "what?" She waited on bated breath for his answer, worried that this was where the other shoe was going to drop, and he was actually going to say that he did regret the two of them ever getting together. But then logic came back and she wondered why he'd admit this when they were sitting so close that they were able to feel each other's breath.
Tommy looked at her for a moment before answering, "I regret not meeting you sooner."
(Y/N)'s worries were quelled instantly with those six words, and she let out a shaky laugh before she wrapped her arms around his neck, pulling his face close enough so that the tips of their noses were touching. "I think that's something I regret too," she admitted to him, a grin forming on her face before she closed the space between them and matched her lips with his.
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Tagged: @mgcldydrms @the-anxious-youth @cloudofdisney @look-at-the-soul @elenavampire21 @mrsalwayswrite @julkaamazing @evita-shelby @lilyrachelcassidy @notyour-valentine @shelbydelrey @december16-1991 @onlydeadcells @peakyswritings @just-a-blackhole @watercolorskyy @strayrockette @peakyduchesss @alexxavicry @captivatedbycillianmurphy @yummycastiel @dark-academia-slut @tommystargirl @stevie75 @lyarr24 @signorellisantichrist @zablife @anotherblinder @midnightmagpiemama @cillmequick @rangerelik @dandelionprints @letal-y-poetica @raincoffeeandfandoms @itscheybaby @gypsy-girl-08 @lora21 @insanitybyanothername @depxiety @dragons-are-my-favorite @acewritesfics @forgottenpeakywriter @cilliansangel @cljordan-imperium @areyenotfondofmelobster @little-diable
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number-onekidqueen · 24 days
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𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐩𝐮𝐭 𝐦𝐞 𝐨𝐧 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐬𝐚𝐢𝐝 𝐈 𝐰𝐚𝐬 𝐲𝐨𝐮𝐫 𝐟𝐚𝐯𝐨𝐮𝐫𝐢𝐭𝐞
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Luke Castellan x Poseidon!fem!reader
hi i have no idea if you take requests but if you do could you write for Luke x daughter of poseidon? I’ve been thinking about someone who’s similar to Luke who’s felt neglected by their God parent and when their half brother Percy comes and gets claimed within a week, she’s angry and jealous bc hers took almost a year. An angel in disguise, evil lovers trope 🥹🎀🫶 just wanted to share this concept that’s been itching my brain
comfort fluff
warnings: crying, gods being bad parents, jealousy, insecurity
The new blond kid furrowed his brow again, and you groaned internally.
“So we’re supposed to love them but they don’t even come and see us?”
The arrival of another kid was always exciting. They’d stumble over the border, scared out of their mind, and once they calmed down, you’d get to hear their story. They all had such different ones and all the details and quirks in them fascinated you to no end.
The less fun part was answering all the questions they had, and trying to make camp seem fun and exciting, when they were usually so broken. It never seemed right to you to talk about rowing races, as if they were antidotes for leaving your old life behind.
Percy Jackson, however, was proving to be more curious and.... confident than new demigods were typically.
You exchanged a look with Luke at Percy's comment, wondering how to answer this curveball of a question. You noticed his jaw was clenched, and he seemed to be making no kind of attempt at responding.
“Well, uh, yeah, more or less.” You replied lamely.
“I don’t get it. If we’re their kids why don’t they come down and visit us? Get to know us?”
“My question exactly,” Luke murmured bitterly to you, but then he grinned, clapping Percy on the shoulder. 
“Eh, the gods they’re busy and all. But you don’t have to worry about them. Burn a bit of your food, pray sorta regularly and they’ll be happy. And just enjoy-"
“Who's my dad?”
Another difficult question.
"Sorry Percy, we don't know," you replied softly. "you'll know when you get claimed."
"Claimed?"
You explained the claiming process, and your unease grew as Percy frowned more and more as you continued. It was obvious he was against claiming.
"So let me get this straight," Percy paused, his expression one of utter distaste. "I've gotta do something cool - something amazing - in my first few days at camp to make my dad notice me?"
You winced. "Yeah, something like that."
"He doesn't just come down, and recognise me?" He asked in disbelief.
"The gods don't really... come down, Percy," Luke corrected, also wincing.
"So, what, they-"
"Don't stress too much about it, Percy. I'm sure your dad will claim you soon, and then we can all celebrate." You reassured with a grin.
If only that had been right.
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And you had won! You whooped, joining the cacophony of victory that was the Hermes cabin, all gazing triumphantly at the flag Luke had captured and was brandishing with pride. 
When your eyes met Luke’s, your head spun. He had really done it! Your best friend, your amazing, brave best friend had won it again! He grinned at you, and your heart seemed to jump towards him erratically. Before you could think straight, you were running closer, and-
“Y/N! I think you have a brother?”
Huh?
Brother?
You noticed the atmosphere had changed drastically, and the campers had become hushed around you, whispering and pointing. And they were all… kneeling?
“Percy Jackson, son of Poseidon!”
At Chiron's call, you turned to where they faced and saw a dumbstruck Percy, thigh-high in water, squinting above him. 
At a massive, glowing green trident. 
Poseidon. He was your brother. 
What?!
After the initial tidal wave of shock, and even joy for Percy wore off, you were outraged. Percy had been at camp for what couldn’t have been two days. And he was already claimed? When it took you nearly a year of hoping and crying and praying to do so? 
What in the Gods did this mean? Were you not as special as Percy? Did your dad hate you? What in the- what- he- you- he-
You couldn’t think about it anymore, your thoughts incoherent and speeding through your mind. Your chest tightened, and you couldn't breathe, your lungs still and your eyes heavy with tears.
No, no, no, no. You wouldn’t ruin your brother’s claiming. 
Even though your father ruined everything-
You began stumbling back, walking between rows of kneeling campers, as quietly as you could. It still seemed thunderous to your ears. You could feel the stares, but you tried not to think about that either. Judgement was at the bottom of your stress agenda.
Once the forest obscured your form, you began sprinting, dodging trees and shrubbery as you made a rapid escape to your cabin. The anxious thoughts didn't stop, even as the world rushed past you.
Breathe in, breathe- my dad hates me- out.
Breathe- he loves my brother more- in.
bre- he'll never love me as much- out.
b- you weren’t good enough, and you never have been- r-e-a-t-h-e
Once inside, you collapsed against the cool door. Your breathing finally slowed, as your eyes travelled over the familiar blue scenery. Felt the slightly chipped paint beneath your fingerprints. Inhaled the salty, sandy smell. This was your home. You could safely cry in here, feel comfortable, do anything you wanted-
Until Percy came.
You wouldn’t even have five minutes in here before everyone came back, and swung the doors wide for Percy. And you would be forgotten, shoved into a lesser position to make room for your shiny, new brother.
Stop! It wasn't Percy's fault that Poseidon was a terrible father. Percy was innocent. He was just a little boy, wanting to be accepted. It wasn't fair to feel bitter towards Percy.
But you couldn't help it.
Either way, you wouldn't let the first sight to his new home be his crying, jealous sister. You didn't want him to feel guilty for belonging.
But where else could you go?
The beach?
No. The water was once a comfort, but it seemed a hellish sight in your mind now. You didn't want to go anywhere near anything that reminded you of Poseidon. Absolutely not.
The forest?...
That was perfect.
Steeling yourself for the outside world, you inhaled shakily before rushing out of the safety of your door. Thankfully, camp was still quiet, although you weren't going to wait around for it to become full and rowdy.
Taking off at a jog, you made your way into the forest surrounding camp, in the opposite direction than the one campers would make coming back. Sure, monsters could attack you, but at this point you were certain you were angry enough to wield your dagger with lethal accuracy.
Come get me, bitch, and you'll find out just how I feel, you thought to yourself.
You moved through the forest until the dappled light on your tanned skin, became dimmer, almost dark. It was then you stopped, hunched over, breathing deeply, stepped backward to slump against a firm pine tree.
You let yourself cry, as loudly as you needed. The ocean never hushed her screams, and now that you were alone, neither would you. It was cathartic in a way, screaming as loud as you could, sobbing as hard as you needed, draining your body of all its sadness, jealousy, insecurity.
No one would ever hear you. It would be a secret between you and this little green glade.
And then you could return to camp, fake all the smiles you needed. You would be happy for Percy. You would be grateful to your father for allowing you to have a brother. You would be faithful and in admiration of the Gods.
You felt sick at those thoughts, a pit growing in your stomach at having to betray yourself for others.
Why did it have to be this way? Why?
The pit in your stomach only grew as you heard fast-paced approaching footsteps. Your sobs immediately halted, and you stilled against the tree, wiping your tears and drawing your dagger.
"Y/n?"
It was Luke.
You exhaled shakily, debating whether to respond. But it was Luke, and surely he would understand.
"Yeah?"
His approaching footsteps resumed, and you caught a glimpse of his face, splashed with relief. Immediately, he sat beside you, and wrapped a tentative arm around your shoulders.
It was so comforting, and you began to cry once more, this time into his shoulder. His fingers tangled in your hair, and they were so soothing, your cries became even deeper and cracked.
You couldn't remember the last time you had been held and comforted.
"What's wrong?" he muttered softly.
"My-my dad," you replied croakily.
"Oh," you knew he understood, because he tugged you closer and pressed a kiss to the top of your head. You shuddered at the contact, flustered despite your current emotions.
"Your dad is an idiot for making you feel like this."
"You-you can't say that," you said nervously, shifting in his arms as you glanced around, anticipating a megatsunami or hailstorm.
"I don't care, y/n, let me drown the next time I swim. You need to hear it. You're one of the best campers there is, and all you do is love him, and he treats you like this! He's an idiot!" He said earnestly, laughing a little.
"I just can't believe he'd claim him so soon," you whispered, and the tears began again, "I just-- it's like slapping it in my face that he loves him more. That Percy did enough for him and I didn't."
"No, don't you dare think like that." He tilted your chin up with his fingers. His eyes were strong, angry. But his fingers were gentle, and they caressed your jawline with care. "You've done more than enough for him. You've done more than enough for anyone, don't ever make yourself feel like this."
"But-"
"No. No. Never." And he drew you back into a tight embrace as the last of your tears flowed.
You stayed like that for what could've been minutes or decades, the both of you breathing in sync, against the rough bark of the tree and warm heat of your camp tees. You began to grow sleepy, your eyes drifting closed, and that's when Luke shifted.
"Hey," he murmured, his arms still wrapped around you as he pulled the both of you to your feet, "let's get you home."
Off you walked into the dusky evening, your words and secrets left embedded in the canopy and grass of that glade and deep in your hearts.
For while you now knew there were two children of Poseidon, and you were most certainly the second choice - you knew you were the favourite to Luke.
And maybe that was what mattered.
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lurkinglurkerwholurks · 3 months
Text
If the Sky Comes Falling Down (For You)
First posted: January 25, 2019
Focuses on: Jason Todd and his various siblings
Favorite bookmark: "A variety of permutations and flavors of Robin h/c featuring Jason! The Baskin Robins of BatFam h/c, if you will."
Second favorite bookmark: "and so, step by step, the prodigal stray coaxes himself home."
Tier: #3 in hits & kudos & subscriptions, #4 in comment threads, #2 in bookmarks
This is my “behind the scenes” series where I indulge myself horribly by annotating my fics. Link to the fic itself above. Individual chapter notations below the cuts.
Chapter One
First, to note, the title came last and is from "Hey Brother" by Avicii because it was already on my BatFam playlist and gave me strong sibling feels, so it worked!
Okay if I remember correctly, this fic came about because 1) I had jotted down story ideas, all surrounding Jason, that were all just a bit too similar for me to feel comfortable doing them as one-offs, and 2) it was late 2018 when I start writing so I was deep in 5+1 IronDad fics.
This fic was so deeply indulgent from start to finish, which I think might be why people liked it so much? Like, if you're into the tropes into this fic, you're really into them. It scratches the itch just right, because it's my itch and I wrote it for me.
The plan was to do like I did for my other multi-chapter fics (except Nature and Nurture, RIP me) and write it all out before posting anything, so I could be sure that I would actually finish. I don't have that kind of self-restraint anymore. But it was a fun challenge to figure out what should happen to whom and in what order.
Jason didn’t sleep much anymore. He’d always been a rough sleeper, his years spent in low-security public housing and then on the street grinding away at his ability to rest with ease. He slept lightly, his consciousness skimming just below the surface, ready to spring awake at the softest noise.
As I've said before, sometimes I have an idea for a fic but then, when trying to start it, a sentence pops up immediately as my opener. That's always a wild ride because sometimes it seems to have nothing at all to do with where I want to go, so then I have to backtrack and figure out but why tho????
Moving to the Manor had helped some, after he’d assured himself that no one was going to scratch at his door or steal his shoes. The cold mornings had been the best, spent curled under a mound of the softest blankets imaginable atop a mattress so perfectly contoured to his bones that it’d felt like floating on the surface of a pool. He’d slept, truly slept, at the Manor.
I like the idea of, even at Jason's most toxic and vitriolic, the Manor itself still representing safety and comfort. Maybe sometimes he would twist it into stifling or grossly indulgent, but I think deep in his stomach he would know that distortion was a lie. The Manor was safer than anywhere else, even with his mom.
Those days of rest were long gone. The Pit had done a number on his brain—intensifying and altering his emotions, erasing some old habits and dialing up others, leaving dark chasms where memories should be.
I've seen other fics play with the idea of the trauma of Jason's injuries, death, resurrection, and the Pit all combining to some degree or another to swiss-cheese his brain (a phrase I lovingly borrow from Quantum Leap.) And that of course leaves a bunch of really fun room to play with—how much does Jason know he's missing vs. how much is gone or totally distorted without him even being aware? (Again, another thing I tease out in various fics like N&N.)
It was like someone had jammed a stick in his skull and given his brain a good stir. Or maybe that was just the crowbar. Ha.
I made myself snicker with that one. It's so voiceily Jason but also that ha is so guttural and specific in my head, you all will never know.
He was making progress with his budding criminal empire—splashy progress, as displayed on the crusting cuffs of his sleeves and the splattered toes of his boots, but also more subtle progress, too. The subtle form was harder, so much harder, but he knew its changes would be more permanent, in the long run. Splashy got people talking. Subtle got them bowing.
Jason! Todd! Is! No! Thug! He is smart and cunning and uses violence to make an impact and that's that on that.
And though he’d heard her speak before in the careful neutral of the middle-class, the sounds being beat out of her now were Crime Alley crooked.
I like the idea of Steph and Jason growing up in the same neighborhood. It's not a hill I'd die on, but it makes for some interesting fic.
The girl put up a good fight. She was rough, no finesse, no real training. All knuckles and elbows and feet and knees. He spotted some of the Bat basics pop up in the way she ducked and spun, but she wasn’t lithe like Nightwing or crafty like the Replacement. She was a brawler. And she was losing.
She is who he might have been, without Bruce and Alfred and Dick. A decent fighter, stubborn, willing to brawl it out, but ultimately destined to lose.
It sucked in an abstract way, the way it sucked that someone was going hungry halfway around the world, the way it sucked when a stranger missed his bus. It sucked, but it wasn’t Jason’s problem, and he couldn’t really bring himself to care. B needed to learn to pick up his toys.
Starting with Steph made the most sense to me. She wasn't (and isn't) a member I know super well, with so much of her canon backstory being things I have no interest in, and she's part of the Family but in that awkward "we're maybe siblings but also I have a mom and also I dated one of you too??" ways, so she's got a little bit of distance, for me as a writer and also Jason. She doesn't have the emotional heat of the others. He doesn't hate her, just what she represents. He also doesn't care what happens to her, except—
The knife glinted in the amber streetlight and cast a shadow across the yellow emblem on her chest.
She's not Batman. She's not a Robin. She's Batgirl. And that's a different thing entirely.
Jason knew what they saw when they looked at him. He was big now, broad-shouldered and massive in a way he had only ever dreamed of being as a scrawny, malnourished street kid. His helmet was blood-red and gleaming, its angles sculpted to subtly suggest a skull. And his clothes were still stained with actual blood. He was an Alley myth, a nightmare with more bite than the Bat, because he wasn’t afraid to do real damage. He was death.
Jason Peter Todd is scary smart, and he knows how to make the exact impact he wants.
“I don’t know you, but I know your colors. You’re Ibanescu’s boys.”
I had to google Gotham crime families. I know literally nothing other than the name.
It was one thing to let her get the snot beat out of her. And even if someone else had taken a shot at her, he wouldn’t have minded. But he couldn’t. Not in that suit.
:3
“It’s not about you,” Jason repeated, his voice gravelly and rough. He pointed toward the yellow symbol on her chest, the symbol that, in the world he’d left, the world he remembered, belonged to someone else. “I owe her a debt. And now it’s paid.” Jason was a murderer. A thief. A criminal. A drug lord. He had no illusions as to his own goodness anymore, no hope for redemption or grace. But he had his values, the few precious things that he would not allow. One of those, it seemed, was watch a man restrain and stab a Batgirl while he did nothing.
Someday I'll write more about that. The partner and friend and maybe mentor who was still reeling from trauma and hadn't yet found her way when Jason was snuffed out of existence.
Jason was tired, but the night was just beginning.
So that's where it starts. Jason tired, literally caked with dried blood, stepping in not because of love or hate or curiosity or concern but because he felt he owed a debt to someone else and that debt instead landed on the person in front of him.
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boytumms · 6 months
Note
Okay don't mind me, I've just been reading too much about various sorts of mythology stuff and... old myths genuinely have a lot more weird pregnancy things than you'd expect (I still find the fact that Odin's eight-legged horse in Norse mytholohy is the son of Loki - whom Loki was pregnant wirh anf gave birth to, mind - way too funny, although that's completely beside the point), so... this isn't inspired directly by a specific myth, but reading random mythology stuff is kinda what put this into my mind
Anyway, I've been thinking of a boy who somehow manages to royally piss off a fertility god. Perhaps he defiles their shrine, or steal some sacred item or mess with their priest - or maybe him just refuses to do something the god wants him to do. And because gods are so well-known for never being spiteful and always giving proportionate and reasonable punishments (extreme sarcasm), the god curses the boy to become pregnant, but unable to give birth unless some extremely specific conditions are met. Maybe he can only give birth at one specific location, or has to eat some specific hard-to-aquire thing to induce labor, or it's one of those seemingly impossible and contradictory "neither at sea nor on land, neither at day nor at night, neither alone nor with other people" kind of conditions (i pulled that specific one out of my ass but you can find similar kind of contradictory and stupidly specific shit in mythology sometimes, you get my point), or some combination of the above, or some other stupidly specific and unintuitive condition, idk.
And the boy doesn't know the condition, of course. The first nine months he simply waits for the pregnancy to run its course, but as the months stretch on past the ninth, past the tenth, with no sign of the pregnancy coming to an end, he realizes he's not getting off the hook that easily. By then, of course, he's so heavily pregnant that everything is difficult - he can't walk very far at once at all, he needs ridiculous amounts of fabric to have clothes that fit, the baby - or babies, rather; he can't tell but he thinks he must have two or three in there - are restless and kick and writhe so he hardly has a moment's peace from them...
So he becomes searching for some solution, some way to birth the babies. First whatever conventional ways there are to induce labor. None of them do anything. He prays and makes sacrifices to the god, groveling and apologizing and begging for relief. No response. Then, he begins to seek out wise people, priests and oracles and shamans, first close by, then traveling further and further away to find someone who could tell him what to do.
It takes years, years of incredibly difficult travel, of weird looks from others and humiliation and yet often having to rely on the aid of other people to get to wherever he's going this time, because really he's in no state to travel except he doesn't have a choice. After the initial nine months, the babies do seem to grow slower than before that, but they do still grow little by little, making the burden quite literally heavier to bear, and they are restless in his womb, as though they too would know it is well past their time to be born already.
But finally, after years of searching, years of torment, the boy finds out the condition, and figures out a way to fulfill it. Once that is done, though, there's still the incredibly long and painful process of labor and giving birth to the babies, now much larger than his body ever was designed to give birth to...
I loooove perpetual pregnancies like this!!! It could even be similar to the Greek story abt Leto, so he’s in labor as he tries to figure out how to break his curse. Imagine him having to suffer through contractions, feeling his baby’s head sooo painfully low in his hips as he tries to push but the curse prevents it from coming out all while he’s in search of a way to give birth.
After years and years of searching, his babies become massive. Even with the slowed growth, they’d be the size of 2-3 year olds by the time he finally manages to fill the conditions to progress his labor. Maybe as he’s finally giving birth to his first baby, the god that cursed him decides to come down, just to torment him one last time before his punishment is over. There’s nothing the boy can do to get way from the god, belly pinning him to the ground with the weight of his writhing babies, unable to escape the wrathful god. Each time his baby comes to a crown, the god pushes it back in, making his scream is sob in agony, begging to be let go as it makes his tummy twist and writhe. He tries to kick and push the god away, but he’s too weak after carrying such a burden with him for so many years, completely helpless in the hands of his tormentor.
It goes on for days, weeks even, the god switching between pushing his babies back into his belly, then and painfully squeezing the swell to watch him thrash. Once they’re sure he’s learned his lesson, they let the last baby slip out between his trembling legs, leaving him exhausted, alone, surrounded by half a dozen massive babies as he’s finally allowed to pass out
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kanerallels · 5 months
Text
My story for @sw-olives-and-grapes, which I finished JUST in time last night! It's a little messy and I'm not totally satisfied with the ending, but I hope you guys like it nonetheless!
Read on AO3!
(note for those who don't follow the link: Hera and Kanan's outfits are inspired by pictures I've seen of the Chinese hanfu! Also there are no real content warnings here)
“COME ON GUYS WE’RE GONNA BE LATE!”
“Since when is Ezra the one who wants to be on time?” Caleb Dume muttered, tugging at the collar of his tunic for the thousandth time. His formal Jedi robes might have been right for the occasion, but that didn’t stop them from being more uncomfortable than his usual attire.
Hera’s voice was muffled by the closed door of her room, where she was changing. “Probably since Sabine’s the one doing the fireworks after the ceremony. And he’s grown up more than we give him credit for, dear.”
“Don’t remind me,” Caleb said, sighing and letting the back of his head thump against the wall he was leaning against. “Seems like just yesterday he was falling off of roofs and causing international incidents with Mandalorians. Now he’s well on his way to becoming a Knight.”
As painful as it was to see his Padawan growing up, he was also proud. Ezra had become much wiser and more powerful since Caleb had first met him, and he was growing into a fine Jedi.
“You’ve done a good job of teaching him,” Hera pointed out, her tone knowing— as it always was. It sharpened into something a little more amused as she added, “And as I recall, you had a little something to do with that particular international incident.”
“Well, what was I supposed to do?” Caleb grumbled as Hera’s bedroom door hissed open. “Just leave you and Sabine to— wow.”
Hera lifted an eyebrow at him as she stepped out of the room. “You’re staring, Caleb.”
“I’m not,” Caleb said, staring. “You just… you look really nice.”
Nice didn’t quite sum it up. She was wearing a dress— a simple dark blue undertunic, with a full, fluttering skirt over it. It shaded from blue to a pale silver towards the hem, as did the light blue edged robe she wore over it. The upper half of the tunic had a blue panel, embroidered with silver and darker blue. Similar embroidery marked the hem of the robe.
The colors shimmered against her skin, and the flowing fabric made her look elegant and beautiful and Caleb felt his heart skip a beat at the sight of her, like it so often did. 
Judging by the half amused, half embarrassed smile Hera was giving him, he was still staring. Clearing his throat, Caleb said, “I, uh, I assumed you’d be wearing your dress uniform.”
“I was going to,” Hera said wryly. “But somehow, there was a mishap in the laundry, and Ezra turned it an unflattering shade of pink. And then it happened to be out when Sabine was working on getting the fireworks ready, and she set it partially on fire.”
Caleb snorted. “Wow. You’d almost think they were planning something like this.” Knowing Sabine and Ezra’s propensity for mischief, he wasn’t exactly surprised. Especially when he noted how similar the color of his blue and gray robes were to Hera’s dress.
Rolling her eyes, Hera said, “Oh, yeah. That would be such a shock, knowing these two.”
“HERA, CALEB, ZEB’S HERE AND HE’S IMPATIENT TOO,” Ezra yelled from down at the entry bay. “CAN WE JUST GO ALREADY?”
Exchanging an amused look with Hera, Caleb said, “We should probably get going.” Offering her his arm, he asked, “Are you ready?”
Looping her arm through his, Hera replied, “Always, dear.”
Together, they headed down to the entry bay. Ezra was waiting, wearing his own set of formal robes and bouncing up and down on his heels with impatience. Zeb was with him, looking bored and slightly fancier than usual in his Lasat Honor Guard uniform. Chopper was, for once, waiting near them without making trouble, although Kanan had a feeling that wouldn’t last long.
“Finally,” Ezra said, spotting them. “Let’s go! You look really nice, Hera. Uh, sorry about your uniform.”
“Don’t worry about it, Ezra,” Hera assured him. “And you’re right, we should get going. We don’t want to miss Caleb’s ceremony, after all.”
Letting out a groan as they headed down the ramp, Caleb said, “Don’t remind me.”
“What, you’re not looking forward to getting up in front of all those people?” Zeb asked, his grin just a little too wicked. “Getting that award and whatnot?”
“You’re enjoying this too much,” Caleb told him. “And it’s not an award, it’s just a ceremony honoring some of the people who fought in the last battles of the war here on Coruscant—”
“Like you,” Ezra said cheerfully. “And Rex— he’s gonna be there, right?”
“I think so— Ahsoka said she wanted someone there to distract her from being bored out of her mind,” Hera said, and Caleb snorted.
“Skywalker’s gonna be there. None of us are going to be bored.”
Together, they made their way to the speeder parked at the edge of the landing platform. As Zeb, Ezra, and Chopper slid into the back seat, Caleb took the front passenger seat, and Hera arranged her skirts neatly around her as she sat in the driver’s seat. Bringing the speeder to life, she moved them forward and into the flow of Coruscanti traffic.
Despite the general nature of traffic on Coruscant, especially in the evening, it wasn’t long before they arrived. Their goal, a small meeting hall in the upper levels, was lit up for the occasion, and surrounded by speeders— most of them piloted by droids dropping off their occupants.
As Hera brought their speeder to a stop nearby, switching it off, Caleb vaulted out and headed around to her side. Offering her a hand, he said, “Can I give you a hand?”
Accepting it, Hera let him help her out of the speeder, remarking, “Such a gentleman.”
“Well, I was raised right,” Caleb said, and behind them, Ezra groaned.
“If you guys are just going to flirt all night, I’m leaving.”
“Come on, Ezra,” came a familiar voice, and Caleb turned to see Ahsoka Tano heading towards them, grinning. She wore a sleeveless black dress with a high collar and a long skirt, her sabers hanging from a belt on either hip. “If you say that, you’ll be gone before they serve the food. Let alone the fireworks.”
“Fair enough,” Ezra said, heaving a long, dramatic sigh. “Guess I’ll just suffer.”
Rolling his eyes, Caleb turned to Ahsoka. “Good to see you— have you seen any of the others, yet?”
“Rex is inside,” she replied. “I came out here to look for you, and the Skywalker-Amidala brood.”
“I have a feeling we’ll hear him coming,” Hera said wryly. “Ezra, Zeb, Chopper, we should probably find our seats. I’ll be with you in just a minute.”
Ezra didn’t protest— another sign of how much he’d grown over the years, Caleb mused— just nodded and headed towards the hall, Zeb and Chopper on his heels.
Turning to him, Hera studied him for a moment. “Are you nervous?” she asked, moving forward to smooth down the front of his robes and straighten the sleeves.
Caleb let her. He’d be lying if he said he minded.”Not really,” he said. “Mostly it seems like a big deal over nothing. I didn’t even do that much, and it was years ago.”
“You and I both know it was more than nothing,” Hera pointed out. “There are people here today— Jedi especially, who wouldn’t be here without you.” Checking him over one last time, she added, “If it helps, I’m sure this is far from the only thing you’ll be remembered for.”
“As long as you remember me, that’s all that really mattered,” Caleb told her, which drew a smile across her face. Stepping a little closer, she pressed a kiss against his cheek, and Caleb had to resist the urge to turn it into a proper kiss, to pull her closer still.
Drawing back, Hera smiled at him in the way that said she knew exactly what he was thinking. And I’m supposed to be the Jedi around here. “I’ll be watching in the crowd. Good luck, love.”
And with that, she turned and headed inside, taking most of Caleb’s concentration with her. It was more than a few seconds before he registered Ahsoka calling his name. Glancing at her, startled, he saw her grinning at him. “Way to be subtle, Dume. You’d put Skyguy to shame.”
“Okay, that’s just mean,” Caleb told her as a speeder zipped out of the traffic towards them, coming to a sharp stop that nearly slammed into the side of the landing platform. Caleb was not remotely surprised to recognize Anakin Skywalker in the driver’s seat. He was steering with one hand, smiling easily as he hopped out and moved to assist his wife, Senator Amidala. The senator wore a dress of satiny, dark purple fabric, simply and elegantly cut. The bishop sleeves were a sheer, paler purple, beaded in sparkling patterns. Her hair was twisted up in a mass of braids around her head, strands of gems shimmering in the braids. This provided a sharp contrast to Skywalker himself, who wore simple dark brown and black robes and had his hair cut short.
Two of their children, Luke and Leia, were with them. Leia was dressed in simple but elegant white with her hair pulled back in braids twisted with silver, and Luke wore black, like his father. The blonde boy caught sight of Ahsoka and Caleb and waved as he followed his mother and sister inside. Anakin headed in as well, but not before stopping to chat with a group of men clad in blue and white armor.
“It’ll be good to see Anakin again,” Ahsoka remarked. “He gets so busy with his… mechanic shop that isn’t a front for any kind of vigilante activity.”
“I always forget how subtle your lineage is,” Caleb quipped, lifting an eyebrow at the Togruta Jedi, who rolled her eyes at him.
“You’re not much better yourself. How are you feeling about the ceremony?”
Caleb took a minute before shrugging. “Fine. It seems a little unnecessary to invite me— I mean, I barely did anything. Everyone handling the Chancellor were Jedi Knights at the very least. All I did was talk to one clone trooper at the exact right time.”
“You saved his life, and the lives of others,” Ahsoka pointed out quietly. “Don’t underestimate that.”
“Hm. And then there’s you, who—”
“Showed up fifteen minutes late with Spacebucks?”
“I was going to say who took out a former Sith lord, crashed her ship, and showed up here in time to help me,” Caleb said wryly. “But sure, that too.”
Ahsoka laughed. “Come on, let’s get in there before we get wrangled by some poor event organizer. The sooner it’s done, the sooner we eat.”
“Now you’re speaking my language.”
They headed into the hall, following Skywalker and a few others who were chatting quietly. The antechamber they entered into still held a few people, but Caleb could see most of them had moved into the main body of the hall. It was filling up quickly, and he felt his first twinge of nervousness.
“You’re feeling nervous now, aren’t you?” Ahsoka asked, sounding amused. “I’ve seen you wrangle bloodthirsty mobs— all you have to do now is stand there.”
“I know, I know,” Caleb grumbled. “Unlike you, however, I’ve never done one of these things before. Since, you know, I didn’t actually do all that much.”
“We can have this debate later. Come on, we’re supposed to be backstage.”
Heaving a long sigh, Caleb followed her down a side hall and into a back room, where there were a handful of others. Among them were Skywalker, Masters Tapal, Junda, Fisto, and Windu. The latter of which looked up at their entry, and gave Caleb one of his non-smiles. “Caleb.”
“Master Windu,” Caleb said, smiling at him and giving a respectful bow. “Good to see you.”
Ahsoka gave a brief nod, muttering under her breath, “I still can’t believe you two get along so well.”
“He’s my grand-master, Ahsoka. Besides, the only reason you don’t really get along is because your lineage is full of lunatics.”
“Okay that is not why AT ALL—”
The sound of applause from onstage cut Ahsoka off, and Master Junda said, “That’s our cue. Skywalker, Windu, take the lead?”
The duo exchanged a slightly amused look, and headed out onto the stage together. Caleb, resisting the urge to run a hand through his hair, followed the rest of the Jedi, Ahsoka right behind him.
The stage held only a podium, where Senator Bail Organa stood. Caleb knew the man— not well, but he liked him. Senator Organa gave them an encouraging nod and smile as they lined up behind him on the stage, along with a small crowd of clones. Caleb recognized Rex and Commander Fox, and gave them a quick nod as Senator Organa started speaking.
“Welcome, everyone,” he said, his voice amplified by the microphone. The murmuring crowds quieted down anyway, turning their attention to him. Caleb started looking for Hera as the senator continued.
“I’m glad to see you all here. Today we celebrate the twenty year anniversary of the end of the Clone War. While there were still battles fought with the Separatist remnants after this point, this was the day, twenty years ago, that the Jedi engaged and defeated the Sith Lord who had taken over our Senate, and, with the help of some of our noblest members of the Grand Army of the Republic, retook the Senate building from the troopers under his control.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Caleb saw Fox shift fractionally, and he held back a wince of sympathy. The commander had been one of the ones Palpatine had been controlling, along with most of his men. He’d nearly been responsible for a lot of lives lost.
“When the Jedi’s valor is mentioned, I find that, far too often, we gloss over the role of the GAR,” Senator Organa continued. “Both those who arrived on site with their generals and those who, once freed from the Chancellor’s control, joined our side. Without the help of men like Commander Fox, our Republic would not be where it is today.”
Caleb couldn’t hold back a grin as he heard raucous cheers coming from the audience, where several armored troopers were pounding their feet against the ground in approval. Senator Organa smiled as well, and waited for silence until he continued.
“The revelation of the Chancellor’s deception and his intention to tear down the Republic, replacing it with his dictatorial Empire, was a shock to everyone. Our trust was shaken, but we kept moving. Life as we knew it was suspended, an interim chancellor was put in place. We turned to the Jedi for help, and they came through as they often do, as did the warriors of the GAR, to whom we owe so much.”
The senator paused, looking somber. “There is much that could be said about this time. About how we finally righted some great wrongs against certain citizens of our Republic, or how we managed to bring the Separatists back. About how we managed to bring a time of peace. That last part is what I would like to focus on tonight, though. 
“Our time of peace was only brought about by working together, by setting aside differences for the greater good. And that, my friends, is something I would like all of you to remember.” Leaning forward, Senator Organa said, “Our greatest times will come when we work together. Not when we are divided by strife or arguments.”
He paused, letting the words sink in, then smiled. “But we didn’t gather here tonight so I could lecture you. We’re here to celebrate— to celebrate those who sacrificed their lives for us and those who are still here. And to celebrate the victory we achieved together. Because together, we’re better.”
As Senator Organa spoke the last words, Caleb finally found Hera in the crowd. She caught his gaze and smiled, and it was like she was the only thing in the galaxy that existed. Together, we’re better, he thought. I’ve never heard something more true in my life. A smile crossed his face.
He barely heard the applause as the senator ended his speech and the crowd rose to their feet. All that mattered was the moment when they moved off the stage, and Hera was with him, catching hold of his hand and giving it a quick squeeze.
Later would come dinner and reuniting with old friends, speeches from other veterans and Jedi and the most incredible fireworks in the galaxy. But all that really mattered were the people at his side now.
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y-umiko · 2 years
Text
TOKYOREV BOYS WITH A TSUNDERE READER BUT IS SECRETLY A SIMP
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CHARACTER(S): shinichiro . Rindou . Hanma . Mitsuya
WARNING/S: there were some cringe part but anyways...not proof read
Request
a/n: I've actually written something similar, if you're interested you can read it here.
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Shinichiro Sano
Shinichiro is a little slow on some things in life, like when he can't read the danger around him and acted on a whim for others, or why you keep saying no when your stomach was loudly gurgling or saying you don't care about his birthday but gotten him his favorite pair of shoes, or why you keep hanging out with him when you hate his guts, he just can't figure it out. until he heard you and the others.
"It was then Shin was sent flying across the room" Shinichiro heard one of the Delinquents tell, followed by laughter, he can only sigh as it was one of those days where the delinquents like to tell stories of their encounters with him, and he only wishes it was the good parts, especially when you were around."What do you think (Y/n)? did Shin look like a loser when you met him?"
And blood immediately drained from Shinichiro's face, of all the things he had done, his first encounter with you was not the best first impression he ever had, not only did he embarrass himself in front of you, but he also got beaten up without even having the chance to fight back.
"He was a total loser" you answered with no hesitation and Shinichiro's heart immediately sinks "But I-I think he was so cool standing in front of everybody when he knows he can't even land a punch"
and just like that Shinichiro's confidence was revived, all your cold and rude words for the past years forgotten as he walked into the room with his head held high.
"(Y/n)! I knew you like me!" He announces starling you and everyone in the room.
"I do not! we were not talking about you!" you quickly answered, a red face from embarrassment but Shinichiro can't hear anything as flowers and butterflies were floating around him.
it was a disaster that day, but later when he walked you back home with the same high spirits he can't help but glance at you and as usual, Shinichiro was a little slow to notice some things.
“your face is so red.. are you still mad”
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Rindo Haitani
Rindou often wonders why you were always mean to him, as if you didn't have any single good thing to say to him, especially when all he wanted was a compliment coming from you. but what he always fail to see everytime was the tinge of red on your cheeks as you walk away from him after saying a comment you didn't even mean to say.
and as if God heard his worries, he happened to overhear your conversation with his brother.
"Rindou was asking me if he should cut his hair, what do you think?" Ran asked casually as he was lounging on the couch. you immediately drop you phone and focus all your attention towards him.
"What?! say no! his hair was so pretty!" you said with no hesitation the words as clear as day as Rindou heard behind the door, his face immediately feeling hot. he didn't know behind every 'you're ugly' and 'you're blocking my way' of insults you throw at him was you thinking he was pretty.
Ran smirks, "If only you can be this honest to my brother"
you pouted, arms cross against your chest "Blame your brother for being so pretty, when I see him I get all frustered and I can't form any words. Why does he have to be so pretty it's so unfair?!"
Ran stood up and rougly opened the door to reveal the very younger Haitani "why don't you ask him yourself?" Both you and Rindo freezes on the spot, no one speaking or probably even breathing until Rindou reach over his long purple hair, a tinge of red on his cheeks.
"I think I'm keeping my hair long for a while"
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Hanma Shuji
Hanma already thinks you hate him, pushing him away, rude comments, cold and hostile towards him. it already settled on his mind, you probably hate him like everybody else, given he was not that likable in the first place, but it doesn't change the fact that he enjoys riling you up to see your reactions.
you hated him, that's what he engraved on his brain, so hearing you one day defending him against a group of bullies cornering you made him feel something foreign but most of all, pride swelling up.
"Not so brave now without Hanma with you are ya?" one of the bullies taunts as he corners you against the wall, the other two bullies blocking your exit. "why do you even keep hanging out with that junkie? once he gets bored with you he'll toss you away like trash"
"his not like that!" you interrupted the bullies slightly startling them including Hanma. "Hanma is a jerk but he- he values others around him and keeps only his closest friends unlike you…he's a man than you'll ever be !"
The bully mad, shouted "what did you say?!" and raise his hands to hit you but before it can even graze your skin he was roughly pulled back, and a rather strong backfilled your view, Hanma's familiar smell of smoke mixed with a hazelnut immediately filled you with comfort.
"(Y/n)~ I didn't know you pay close attention to me like that" Hanma whined dragging out your name.
"I-I'm not! Go away! I-I don't need your help or anything" you breathed, stuttering on some words.
"…If you want me to leave you to have to let go sweetheart" he chuckles but instead of letting go, he felt your grip tighten. and it doesn't even seem to be a problem as It didn't even take a second for Hanma to beat the bullies before clasping your hands and dragging you away from the scene.
"Starting now just hold tight and don't ever let go"
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Takashi Mitsuya
Mitsuya has a slight idea of your tsundere tendencies and even though your words sting sometimes, he knew you didn't mean it and finds it adorable that you don’t know what to do with your feelings when it was written all over your face. but Mitsuya being the kindest didn't push you and continued to hang out with you.
"I-It's not like I love this or anything, I-I might wear it when I ran out of clothes"
Those were your words as you took the sweater he personally sewed for you and quickly ran away the other way. the tips of your ears visibly red. Though Mitsuya was relieved that you somehow accepted his gift, he can't help but feel bad when he heard your friends talking bad about the sweater.
"Isn't it a little ugly? the color doesn't suit you at all" Mitsuya heard your friend say with a little disgust and he can't help but questioned whether he was only fooling himself into thinking that you like it.
"I love it, Mitsuya made it for me after all" you declared with so much conviction that leaves no room for argument. "This is so cute, Mitsuya is good with his work that it's almost a waste to wear it…"
the corner of Mitsuya's lips quirks up as he leaves in high spirits after listening to you listing all the good qualities that even he didn't know existed. the next day when you wore the sweater Mitsuya can't help but smile as he walks and stops next to you.
"You look really cute in that sweater," he said but sounding like a teasing to you, you playfully punch him on the shoulder.
"I'm not!"
and Mitsuya can only laugh because despite you acting harsh towards him, he could see through you and your small acts of kindness towards him.
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yaut-jaknowit · 1 year
Note
I don't know if you've mentioned Qui’oky's father, but I'd like to see him show up. But not as a toxic creep or jilted lover or something similar. Just a chill dude visiting his son and catching up with a woman he respects
Origin
Pairing: Gawtin x Reader
Word Count: 3240
Summary: A surprise from Qui'oky's father.
Author Note: I've never brought him up but this was my excuse to actually do some worldbuilding. I've been meaning to give some hints to him in my stories but kept forgetting. Thank you for the request!
Masterlist
Ao3
From Gawtin’s spot, her hearing picked up your soft, gentle thumping heart in the next room over. Said alien was working on something in there. She heard the light slaps of your bare feet on the floor. You stopped for a few seconds before moving again. The sound was soothing to Gawtin as she listened.
On the other hand, Gawtin scrolled through her tablet, picking up on some reading she’s been wanting to do. A few meters from her feet was Qui, happily playing with a toy you got him. Gawtin liked to tease you about stealing the heart of her child to get to hers. It’s working so far. Qui’oky was playing away with said device like the child he is.
The seat she had found herself in the living room was comfortable. Only a simple skirt hanging from her hips. Though, the position she was in had said skirt pushed up on her thighs.
A few of her sisters would disagree on the comfortability of the skirt. Their shared mother would have to fight a couple of them to get them on. The memories making Gawtin smile. You remind Gawtin of one of her sisters. Something, she would tell you often. She swiped to the next page and shifted a around on the chair. The positions Gawtin loved to sit in had you telling her she sat very gay. The analogy confused the alien. Whatever does that means.
Gawtin finally settled again, in another strange position. One you would be commenting if you were to leave the room next to her. The book in her hand had her full attention as her purple eyes scanned the words. Which reminds her about the need to finish her teachings about the Yautja language. The two of you had put a pause for a week. At least, it was supposed to be. You asked for the break when you smelled of blood. Gawtin already knew the meaning and allowed for the break. Yet, that was about three weeks ago. It was tim-
Knock, knock. This caught Gawtin’s attention. She wasn’t expecting anyone today. With a look in your general direction and to Qui’oky, she pushed off of the couch and started towards the front door. Her steps were light, carefully placed before stopping just before the door. She waited, letting whoever’s scent waft through the door.
Familiarity rolled over her. Yet, the name and face didn’t come to her, sitting on the edge of her tongue. Gawtin couldn’t keep them waiting and pressed the button for the door.
In all of his glory, Woy-Oky stood there. New scars decorated his older frame since the last time she had seen him. She was content to see him alive and well. “Woy, it’s good to see you,” she spoke politely to him and dipped her head.
Woy returned the gesture, though bending further than her. This caught her eye. Though subtle, she could read him well. How couldn’t she after spending a few too many nights with him? Those nights, the two rarely had gotten sleep. Then, once the deed was done, he left. The usual for male Yautjas after completing their mission.
Gawtin was smart, able to read people and situations without being told. This was no different. Mating season was arriving soon. The Yautja could feel it in her bones as the slowly growing need bloomed inside of her. The sight of Woy-Oky didn’t erect that feeling though. Instead, she felt no chance, no difference in her body. Her mind already on someone else nearby.
He was here to plead his case with Gawtin. Give little Qui a sibling of the same blood. Gawtin couldn’t see herself pregnant again this time. But, she stayed oblivious, seeing if he was truly here for what she believes.
Right on cue, an impressive skull of a Court’op was presented before her. Woy-Oky slightly bowed forward, skull resting upward in the palm of his hand. Gawtin didn’t react outwardly or inwardly. All she was stare as if she was asking more. Woy’s shoulders slumped at her lack of action, mandibles clicking. The gears in his mind spinning to work this in favor. Even though, Gawtin already knew it wouldn’t work.
“Will you be my mate for this mating season?” he questions, trying to plead his case to the court. Woy believed he was reading the scene wrong. Maybe he had a chance with Gawtin.
Without missing a beat, Gawtin answered normally. “No.” That’s all it took for Woy to stand straight and tuck the skull on his belt. He simply accepted his defeat and respectfully bowed his head at her.
Curiosity caught him in its sticky claws. An unfamiliar smell wafted from the doorway, one he’s never scented before. Is that reason she didn’t accept? “I must ask what is the reason?” he questions politely like the good friends they are. They’ve had their fair share of time together before. Not just for reproducing.
Gawtin stayed quiet for a few seconds. In that time frame, she focused on your humming and light slap of your feet on the floor. Your steady, firm heartbeat in her ears. She didn’t mean to let a small smile grace her face. It slipped between the sturdy walls she has up. Then, Gawtin’s focus returned to the Yautja before her. She sucked in air to speak but a door opening behind stopped Gawtin.
Your eyes were unattentively staring at the ground before spotting your gorgeous goddess out of the corner of your gaze. They light up at the sight. A smile grew on your features as your direction changed towards her. After three steps though, you realized the situation at hand and stopped mid bite of a fruit. Uh oh.
From your spot, you did not recognize the male Yautja standing at the door. None of his facial features, scars, coloring, or hair trinkets matched any of the known Yautjas that lived in the town. This put you on guard, hackles raising as you careful watched him. Yet, there was a slight familiarity that you had no clue what was about. You just stared there, ready for action. Living on a planet where it was eat or be eaten has pushed you to be this way.
“That is my reasoning,” Gawtin spoke coolly, keeping a passive look on her beautiful face. There was no way to hide the fondness that shined in her purple eyes though.
The only reaction Woy-Oky produced was the slightest shift of his head. A ooman. That was what the smell was. This took him completely off guard. Here was a mighty, high-ranking Yautja – not just because of her sex – with a ooman; one of the species he’s killed plenty of. A skull he’s gifted to Gawtin for the mating season.
There was something in the ooman’s eyes though. The way it stood. It’s body tense, as if it was ready to attack. Woy laughed inwardly at that realization. The thing couldn’t even hurt a cug, let alone him.
The decision had already been made by the looks of it. Gawtin would stay with the ooman, as much as he disagreed. Since she already picked the creature, he couldn’t even challenge it for the chance to mate with Gawtin. It’s always the female’s decision on whom they choose to procreate with. Maybe he’ll have a chance next year.
As you quietly waited for someone to move or speak up, you heard Gawtin talk in Yautja. After two years of constant listening and mostly training, you’ve learned a great portion. With the different mouths and vocal cords, you had trouble pronouncing a small amount of the language. You tilted your head at the sentence, a brow raised.
Then, the green goddess turned. Her purple gaze found yours, making you soften at just the look. Silently, you gave her a questioning look. One she’s come to learn what it means. “Come here, my little artist,” she called to you, voice even and gentle.
Your eyes darted to the unnamed Yautja at the door, then to Qui’oky. If Gawtin deems him safe to allow you to lose distance, then you listened. Your steps were careful, light as you came to stand side by side with her. A way to show you had no fear for this Yautja.
This Yautja stood, like usually, taller than you. Yet, when you had walked up to him, his head tilted down, following you. His gaze stuck to you, judging you by the feels of it. He was scanning you, sizing you up. Funny enough – even if you had no chance of winning a fight against him – you did the very same exact thing.
An unfamiliar skull was hooked to his belt, the fight thing your eyes found. It stuck out like a sore thumb against his puke green scales. This wasn’t one used for keeping items hidden in the brain cavity. It was far too big for any practicality you’ve come to know.
That’s when everything seemed to hit you all at once. For one, this male was courting Gawtin. At least he was going to try. He was going to try to steal your girl. Worst of all, you may have some ability to fight… but there wasn’t a chance on winning. You draw, an artist. You wield pencils, not weapons. He could easily kill you and take Gawtin from you. Your eyes narrowed at him, shuffling closer to Gawtin, skin to skin with her now.
Second, there was a reason he looked semi-familiar. The green, his eye shape, and face shape. This was Qui’oky’s father. He must not be happy about you being with Gawtin. His eyes and body though… they were passive, relaxed. Either he didn’t see you as a threat or that previous thought wasn’t true.
“This is why,” Gawtin broke the stare down. The two of you looked at her. Man, you must’ve missed something.
Gawtin let an arm slide over your shoulder, hand coming to lightly grasp your throat. A gasp sound from you, body tensing at the feeling. The way your form reacted and turned towards a submissive thought process so quietly should be embarrassing. Yet, that emotion never crawled underneath your skin. Instead, you felt a power rise inside of you. It empowered you to lock eyes with the Yautja. A smirk splitting your face.
Woy held his tongue to ask why she picked a ooman. He wasn’t jealous or angered at her declining him. It was only made him severely question at the fact she choose a ooman. It wasn’t his place though. “Understood, Gawtin.” Wof turned to face the lucky thing before him. It was leering at him, a glint within its weird eyes. The gaze made him feel uneasy. He pushed past it though. “What is the ooman’s name?”
If the creature was important to Gawtin – as it seems, he might as well get to know it. Even if the sight of it made him want scoff in disgust. It wasn’t even worth killing to gather the skull. It had muscle from the possible training it may have. It copied Gawtin as well. It’s posture the same, the gaze, the way it walked and stepped mindfully. This meant the female Yautja cared for it.
Said being introduced its strange name to him. The syllables nothing he’s ever tried to say before. “Artful one, this is Woy-Oky.” The name confirmed your earlier realization. This had to be Qui-oky’s father. “As you have already figured out, this is Little Qui’s sire.”
Now it was your turn to speak, in Yautja no less. “Does he know I already court you?”  you said this but your gaze was strictly on the newly named Yautja. Gawtin chuckled at your behavior, using her hand to pull you close to her. Silently reassuring you what you already know.
The words surprised Woy-Oky. Though, the pronunciation and accent was off. This ooman had spoken Yautja. And it was understandable. Then, he realized what you had asked. “I’ve come to that conclusion. I do have to ask, how was a ooman able to catch the attention of a high-rank female Yautja?” he asks of you, truly curious. Maybe, he’ll have to pull those tactics next year to win her back over.
You tilted your head slightly to the side and down, a brow smugly raised. “Why would I spill my secrets so you could still my girl?” Gawtin purred to you contently. She loved that fire you had deep inside of you. It was a rare thing to show, making her adore it all the more.
Woy returned his gaze back to Gawtin. “You’ve picked a good one this year. I shall depart, Gawtin. Keep an open mind if you see a message from me. I would love to go hunting once more with you,” he stated and bowed to the female before him.
“I will, Woy-Oky. Great hunting.” The male left without another word. The front door slide closed, blocking out the Yautja and sun.
The moment after he left, your shoulders sagged heavily as you leaned a great portion of your weight on Gawtin. She already knew how fast your heart was beat, feel the beads of sweat dripping down the back of your neck, notice the slight tremble of your hands.
In a heartbeat, the mighty Yautja knelt before you. Her striking eyes capture yours, hands doing the same. She brought them up to rest on her chest, right about the most important organ in her body. The nerves running through your form almost vanished at the sight before you. She knows. Oh, she knows.
Your head bowed, chin to chest to hide the fear filling your eyes. It was all a façade. Gawtin would always protect you, always. Yet, what happens when she leaves for something-someone better? What happens when she returns back to a sound mind and find a male Yautja? What will happen to you? You have no use besides the drawings you create.
With a single talon, Gawtin tilted your head back up to meet her gaze. Even kneeling, she was taller than you. How was that possible? “Do you know much you mean to me, Artful one?” was the first thing she said to you. It caught you off guard at first. Your brain already making up a thousand scenarios within it, unable to stop it.
Gawtin’s hands left yours, slid up the length of your arms before cupping your cheeks within her palms. Your digits stayed above her heart, feeling the steady, strong thump of the organ there. “You hold my heart.” She closed her eyes softly, a purr humming away. “You see me bare. I see you bare. I let you do this. Do you know why?” You made a noise to answer ‘no’. “No? Then I have failed with action.”
She let her head slowly fall forward, forehead meeting yours. The touch made you gasp quietly. “I do not how to say it in ooman to make you understand.”
“I care deeply for you, my little artist. Every little thing, I have kept. The necklace you have created to me is always around my neck, no matter what. All the drawings you have done for me, they are hung in our shared room. The rocks you have gifted to me are placed around our shared dwelling.” A single tear pooled in your right eye before rolling down the length of your face.
“You sleep by my naked side. A place where I am at my most vulnerable. You know this. You see this. You understand this. You sleep by my side.” A tear grew in the other eye then followed the first one down.
“You care for the child I have birthed. That include when I not here. You care for him like your own. You have won him over. You gift him trinkets to play with. You take him out to the market.” Now, you couldn’t stop the silent tears from pouring down your face.
“Do you now know how much you meant to me?” she questioned again, opening her eyes. From the scent in the air, Gawtin already knew you were crying. It was a natural reaction that she has come to learn. It’s okay to cry. It doesn’t always mean you are in pain. She used her thumbs to swipe away at the tears.
All of what she said kept hitting you over and over and over. It forced you harshly to continuously remember all that she has said. Everything was the truth. She loved you through and through.
Worst of all. You felt like you already knew this. You knew loved you deeply. Yet, as a human, your mind liked to remind you of falsehoods. Things that hold no truth when it came to her. “Yes, yes, yes. I do, love. I truly do. So much. So fucking much. I love you so much. I can’t even say how much I do,” you sobbed to her, hands grasping at the skin on her chest.
Gawtin snorted a quiet laugh. “Then get your ass into my lap, Artful one.” That made you giggle before happily listening to what she commanded of you. Your legs barely able to wrap around her hips, struggling to meet behind her. Your hands held the other at the back of her neck, underneath the warmth of her tress.
With ease, the Yautja stood up, one hand underneath your butt. Her large, muscular legs carrier her back over to the couch, where her tablet was discarded to the side. Gawtin sat down in the previous spot mentioned before. This time, with you. Her hand easily found her tablet again.
One hand was kept on your back, softly stroking up and down the length of it. The other was holding onto the forementioned device, retuning back to the book. A purr was vibrating in her chest as the two of found a comfortable position to enjoy each other’s company.
“Mama!” Qui called for Gawtin the moment after the two of you found peace. You turned your head to gaze down at the small child. He reached out with both of his hands to you. It was the universal sign to be picked up. One action you were happy to conduct.
Though, he was the size of a three old, his mass was about twice, possibly thrice of one. You were thankful for the hand on your back to help stabilize yourself. The kid was contently placed in the space between the two of you. Qui laid with his back to you, on top of Gawtin, in the same position as you. Little bugger stole the best seat in the house!
You sighed dramatically and mindfully flopped on top of him. Qui squeaked and squirmed underneath you. “Mama, mama, I squished!” he cried to his mother. Said parent figure gave him a look then returned back to reading.
You patted the top of his head. “You tried, kiddo.” Said youngster mumbled like he had my full weight on him random sounds. Qui stayed still now, content in his new position and quickly falling asleep. You gentle ran a thumb across his much smaller mandibles, softly gazing at him. If there was a possibility with Gawtin, you would have to think about having a child. But the one here, he was enough for the time being.
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strayrockette · 2 years
Text
The Promises We Keep
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Thomas Shelby Masterlist
Peaky Blinders Masterlist
Summary: Tommy intends to keep all his promises. In return, he hopes he can ask for one promise to be kept for him.
Trigger Warning: Character death, angst
A/N: This is for K's 'Halfway to 2K' Celebration. This work is loosely inspired by Hozier's "Work Song."
@runnning-outof-time
When my time comes around
Lay me gently in the cold dark earth
No grave can hold my body down
I'll crawl home to her
"Remember, you made me a promise, Thomas Shelby." Her voice echoed in the distance of his mind. Recollection of the worry and determination ever so present on her lovely face. She smelled of rosemary and lavender. He knows this because he buried his head into the base of her neck to memorize his favorite smell. 
He could hear himself echoing back with a sweet soft smile, a smile that did not know the hell he'd be thrown into, "I've made many promises, love." 
Her face contorted into annoyance and her soft plump lips parted as a sigh of exasperation left her-Oh, how he wished he could kiss her, to lay her body down and show her how much he loved her just once more-, "Keep all of them, then. Promise, you'll keep all of them." 
"I'll keep them." He remembered the softness of her cheek and the pleasant giggle she released when he hugged her. 
For all the promises he kept, he desperately wished he had asked her to keep one. 
“Mr. Shelby, Rosemary is looking for you.” 
With the barest hint of a nod, Thomas extinguished the cigarette and downed his whisky. He moved slowly, purposefully. Any faster and he might have broken down. Not that he hasn’t already done so in the confinement of his office. But not now. Not when he could hear Rosemary giggling in her room. 
He pushed the dark oak door open, and his eyes swept across the room. A bed big enough for a Queen, princess. “No, daddy, I’m the Princess. Mommy’s the Queen.” 
A large dresser filled with the finest clothes for all kinds of occasions, a desk for writing if it ever caught her interest, and bookshelves filled to the brim with magnificent stories that carried her into worlds far happier than this one. 
“Oh no, where did my precious princess go off to” Thomas feigned shock and worry. He stepped into the room, “I hope the bandits didn’t get her” 
He sighed, “I guess, I’ll just have to eat all the chocolate desserts I had prepared.” 
“NOOO” A tiny body scrambled out from under the bed. Her dress was ruffled and dirty from dust. “The bandits didn’t get me, daddy, I’m right here.” She launched herself at him, her tiny arms wrapping around his leg, “Please, don’t eat all the chocolate.” She gazed up at him with her big bright blue eyes. So similar to his own and yet she looked more like her mother than she did him. Thomas wasn’t sure if that was a blessing or a curse. 
He tugged at his pantsuit and squatted down to her level, his hands ghosting over her face in a sweet caress, “Ay, I won’t eat all of the chocolate.” 
Rosemary leaned into her father's touch her eyes searching his with suspicion, “You promise?” 
~~~~
“Promise me, Thomas Shelby.” Her brown eyes pleaded with him to answer her. 
He choked back a scream, “Not now, love.” 
His hands pressed into the wound on her stomach and he wondered how long it would take to get the image out of his head. 
“You’ll… k-k-keep th-them, won’t you?” Her eyes fluttered open, her gaze turning weak. 
“GET ME A FUCKIN’ DOCTOR!” His eyes avoided hers. Instead, he looked wildly around him, searching for anyone who would help. The ballroom had practically been cleared and those who stayed did so out of fear and shock. 
She cupped his cheek weakly, guiding him to look down at her. “Pro-promise m-me.” 
~~~
“I promise, love.”
Rosemary squealed happily, her arms now wrapped tightly around her father. Thomas dipped his head into her neck and inhaled, she smelled of lavender and a hint of sweat. She must have been rambling as he held her, he hadn’t heard a word but suddenly he wanted to ask her something. 
“I don’t want to interrupt, but will the princess permit it?” 
He was now sitting on the floor, his baby girl in his lap, staring up at him with curiosity. His breathing turned shallow but he forced himself to continue. 
“Promise me, you’ll always come back home. No matter what happens. Promise me, that you’ll find your way back to me.”
She rolled her eyes but smiled up at him without a care in the world, “Always, daddy. Don’t be silly.”
"Of course, how silly of me, love." His heart ached and he briefly wondered if one promise was enough.
“Promise me, Thomas Shelby. Promise me that you’ll come back to me. That you’ll find happiness with me in the present and in the future. Promise me, that you’ll always remember how much I love you.”
“Promise me, Thomas Shelby. You’ll do good by Rosemary. That you’ll find happiness with and for her in the present and in the future. Promise me.” 
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happilyhertale · 1 year
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Long Last Love - Aemond Targaryen x female!reader, Part 6
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Summary: You are finally engaged to Aemond Targaryen. As the daughter of Daemon and Rhaenyra, you will now live in King's Landing and no longer on Dragonstone. Your marriage to Aemond is imminent, as is your life together. The relationship between Aemond and your family has never been particularly easy, but the future will show whether your love will withstand this and subsequent tensions.
Pairing: Aemond Targaryen x fem!reader
Warnings: In some parts Smut (uncle/niece) as well as violence
Author’s note: Hey you (:
This is the follow-up story to "Long Lost Love".
The story starts just before the wedding of Aemond and y/n and goes over the events of the first season hotd. However, the events are not quite similar to those in the series. English is my second language, please forgive me if I made any mistakes (: Word count: 3.3k
Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, Part 7, Part 8, Part 9, Part 10, Part 11, Part 12, Part 13, Part 14, Part 15
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You enjoy Aemond letting his fingers wander over your tired legs. But after a while a servant appears at your door and informs you that your presence is now desired in the small hall. You sigh and Aemond helps you up from the sofa.
"You know we can stay in our chambers".
You shake your head, "No. I see my family so rarely. At least one dinner I want to enjoy with them."
Aemond nods at you as he puts his arm around your waist.
"And that means you have to behave," you grin at him.
"I think I've done quite well so far," he winks almost unobtrusively as he leads you out of your chambers. Slowly Aemond walks with you into the small hall. You walk more slowly than usual and Aemond does his best to adapt to your pace. You also find it difficult to breathe in a relaxed manner, which manifests itself in a few heavy breaths. At some point Aemond looks at you with a grin, "If you want me to carry you, you'll give me a sign, right?"
You look at him and don't dignify that with a response. Instead, he gets your elbow in his side again. "Ouch, one day my ribs will be all blue."
"Perhaps that should be a sign for you not to annoy me so much."
He chuckles lightly.
You arrive at the hall and thanks to your speed, the rest of your families are already gathered.
Aemond leads you to one end of the table where your family is standing. He greets your family and nods to them. He gently kisses the inside of your wrist before walking to the other end of the table and joining Aegon. Aegon, of course, is already busily emptying his wine cup. But you don't care about that today. Tonight you don't want to bother with Aegon, because you finally see your family again and have a chance to talk to them. Your mother hugs you warmly, as far as your belly will allow, and doesn't want to let you go. But your father gently pushes her aside and takes you into his arms. You could enjoy this for hours. Being safe in your father's arms. And today you feel like you need it. First the accusations by Vaemond, then the loss of his head and now a dinner with your family. And when the whole family is gathered, it rarely ends peacefully.
"If you don't want Aemond to be the father of your children, we can always deny it. We simply say that the baby's hair and eye colour is inherited from you."
You look up indignantly and hit your father when Jace adds, " I will also teach him sword fighting!"
Your gaze now wanders to him, "Him? Sorry, but perhaps it'll be a girl?"
He shrugs, "Well she has to know how to fight as well."
You laugh out, "And Aemond will teach her that, or him!"
"I'd still be there for that too," your father interjects again.
You give him an annoyed look as he puts his arm around you again and lightly kisses your head.
Your conversation is interrupted when your grandfather enters the hall. He walks weakened, the guard at his side but he smiles at you as he slowly passes you. His gaze looks more alert somehow. He still looks weakened, but it seems as if he really sees you now. He stops for a moment as he stands next to you, Y/n.... You are with child...?"
You nod happily, "Yes, your Grace."
He smiles and breathes heavily, "How long have you been with child?"
"Well according to the Maesters it won't be long now and we'll have another child running around here."
His smile widens, "And... And Aemond is the father?"
When his name comes up, Aemond interrupts his conversation with Aegon and looks over at you. Out of the corner of your eye you see his gaze fall on you.
"Of course Aemond is the father," you smile softly.
Your grandsire nods, "I'm missing too much..." he mutters. You gently stroke his arm and he places his free hand on yours.
"Well then, let's dine and drink and enjoy the evening" Slowly he continues on his way and walks towards his seat. You look at your father and see the worry on his face. When he notices you looking at him, he smiles at you, but his smile does not reach his eyes.
You walk over to Aemond and he holds out his hand to you. You accept it gratefully and he leads you to your seats at the end of the table. He helps you to sit down and sits next to you, to your left. To Amond's left sit his grandsire Otto as well as his mother Alicent. To your right sits Helaena and next to her follows Aegon. Across from you at the other end of the table sits Luke with Rhaena. To Luke's left sit Baela and Jace. Opposite them sit your parents. You don't think it's ideal that Luke is sitting right in Aemon's line of sight. But you are certainly not going to bring that up. You want to enjoy tonight and don't want to create unnecessary tension.
All eyes are on your grandsire, who sits between Alicent and Rhaenyra, until he speaks up, "How good it is.... to see you all tonight... together."
Alicent suggests a prayer before dinner. And so you pray briefly.
When Alicent mentions Vaemond, you briefly open your eyes. You can't quite believe that Alicent mentions Vaemon in her prayer. Vaemond has been wildly throwing accusations around, someone had to intervene, but Alicent is surely just trying to do the right thing. Your father catches your eye, staring angrily at the ceiling. You have to suppress a giggle as he shakes his head also. His eyes fall on you and he smiles at you.
Your grandsire speaks up again, "This is an occasion for celebration, it seems. My grandsons, Jace and Luke, will marry their cousins, Baela and Rhaena, further strenghtening the bond between our houses. A toast to the young Princes... and their betrothed."
Your father calls out almost pleasingly, "Hear, hear!"
You see Aegon lean over to Jace, and suspect no good as you notice how annoyed Jace puts down his cup of wine.
"Let us toast as well Prince Lucerys.... the future Lord of the Tides," your grandsire chimes in again.
This time it is your mother who answers with a "Hear, hear". Luke smiles sheepishly.
You notice Aemond staring over at Luke and you take his hand. He lets his gaze slide over to you, he smiles. "You wanted to behave," you whisper.
He grins and nods briefly.
Suddenly your grandsire rises and your eyes go to him. He breathes heavily and stands up.
As he stands, he takes the floor again, "It both gladdens my heart and fills me with sorrow to see these faces around the tables. The faces most dear to me in all the world... yet grown so distant from each other..."
Aemond takes your hand, which is lying on the table. As you look to him, his gaze goes directly in Luke's direction. You shake your head briefly, not wanting to be drawn into the squabbles between them tonight, and look at your grandsire.
"...in the years past. But tonight... I wish you to see me... as I am. Not just as a king... but your father. Your brother. Your husband... and your grandsire. Who may not, it seems... walk for much longer among you. Let us no longer hold ill feelings in our hearts. The crown cannot stand strong if the House of the Dragon remains devided. But set aside your grievances. If not for the sake of the crown... then for the sake of this old man who loves you all so dearly."
Aemond grips your hand tighter as your mother rises. You look at her, "I wish to raise my cup to Her Grace, the Queen."
Your eyes fall on Alicent, she pauses in her motion to help your grandsire sit down, and looks to your mother, "I love my father. But I must admit that no one has stood... more loyally by his side than his good wife. She has tended to him with... unfailing devotion, love, and honour. And for that, she has my gratitude... and my apology."
A brief silence follows as Alicent replies to her, "Your graciousness moves me deeply, Princess."
You see your father lean over and watch her closely.
"We are both mothers... and we love our children. We have more in common than we sometimes allow."
Your mother smiles briefly at her as Alicent stands up and raises her cup, "I raise my cup to you and to your house. You will make a fine queen."
As Alicent sits back down, you see your mother smile quietly down at her belly.
Light conversation begins to fill the room. You are eating a little when you notice Aegon getting up and walking over to Baela. You are quite annoyed with him today.
But you also notice that Aemond is somehow unrelaxed, you look at him worriedly, "Is everything alright?"
He looks at you and smiles, "Of course, my Love," he gently kisses your hand.
Like the others at the table you talk a little, as you do you keep putting your hand on your belly, the baby is still really restless. You exhale stressed and Aemond looks at you worriedly, "Is everything alright with you then?"
You try to smile, "Of course."
He leans forward and lets his lips slide gently onto yours for an almost passionate kiss.
Your gaze falls on Jace, Aemond's face still close to yours, when Jace suddenly slams his fists on the table and stands up. He raises his hand briefly and wants to make a speech. Your father looks quite amused, but you don't find it amusing at all.
When Aemond suddenly stands up too. You look at him, startled, but he and Jace simply stare into each other's eyes.
You grab Aemond's arm, "Aemond..." you whisper, but his gaze wanders back and forth between Jace and Aegon, who is just sitting down again. Jace playfully slams his fist against Aegon's shoulder, then takes a deep breath and raises his cup of wine, "To Prince Aegon and Prince Aemond. We have not seen each other since Aemond's and y/n wedding.... But I have fond memories of our shared youth..."
Aemond is still standing next to you, your hand remains on his arm and Aegon looks slightly bored.
"...And as men and because Aemond is now married to my beloved sister and they are expecting their first child, I hope we may yet be friends and allies. To you and your family's good health, dear uncles," Jace raises his cup and smiles at you. You look at him warningly. Again he playfully slams Aegon's shoulder and sits down. Aegon replies, "To you as well."
Aemond is still standing and you address him again, "Aemond. Please sit down..."
He looks at you for a moment and then sighs and sits down. He smiles briefly at you.
Helaena murmurs something beside you, but you are distracted because your grandsire speaks up again, "Well done my boy." You try to smile, but this whole situation seems awkward. And when suddenly Helaena stands up, you are a little speechless. What is going on here today. You begin to doubt that it will be a quiet, relaxed dinner.
"I would like to toast to Baela and Rhaena. They'll be married soon. It isn't so bad. Mostly he ignores you..."
Aegon must be uncomfortable too, he sighs loudly and rubs his hands together.
"...except sometimes when he's drunk."
Oh yes... that was the information you were waiting for. You would very much like to drink wine now.
Helaena laughs briefly and when you thought it was over, she turns to you, "Except Jace and Luke are as affectionate as Aemond! He is always very caring with y/n"
She smiles at you and Aegon rolls his eyes.
As she sits back down, you smile at her and squeeze her hand lightly.
You hear Otto talking to her and a "good" comes from his lips. Your grandsire asks for music and the musicians in the corner begin to play softly.
As Jace stands up again, you groan softly, expecting trouble. Aemond looks at you, but you just shake your head. When all of a sudden you see Jace come over to you and stop in front of Helaena. Jace asks Helaena to dance. That makes you a little happy. Helaena deserves to dance with a nice, funny man at a dinner party and not sit by Aegon's side all the time. You smile. That calms you down a bit.
But still, the evening is exhausting for you. The hall is filled with quiet conversation and laughter again, but you can hardly enjoy it. Your lower back aches like the seven hells. If your family were not here, you would already be sitting in your beloved bathtub. Aemond would certainly be sitting in the bath with you. Pressed close to you, he would whisper sweet nothings in your ear from behind, while you let your head fall back against his shoulder and he gently caresses your belly. But you're sitting here having dinner. You're happy that your family is here, but it's getting more uncomfortable by the second. On top of that, the baby kicks hard again. Aemond hears you gasp.
"May I please take you to our chambers? I will also make sure that a warm bath awaits us," he looks at you almost pleadingly.
You have to smile briefly because of your previous thoughts, but you want to stay, "No... I would like to stay. It's really nothing, he's just kicking".
He smiles at you, "Maybe she's just upset because the whole family is gathered.... After all, that's always a stress factor" You hit him lightly.
He takes your hand and kisses it gently. You stroke his cheek with your other hand, "You're lucky you're so sweet. Otherwise I'd hit you even harder".
He laughs up and kisses your lips this time.
The servants start carrying in various dishes, but your attention is drawn to your grandsire as he groans repeatedly. He slumps in his chair and seems to be in great pain. Alicent calls the guards over and asks them to take your grandsire to his chambers. You look worried and Aemond gently puts his hand on your thigh and strokes you gently.
When suddenly a suckling pig is brought in and placed right in front of you.
Barely audibly, you notice Luke starting to giggle, and as you look up, you see Luke's challenging gaze go in Aemond's direction. But before you can say anything to Luke, Aemond's fist hits the table. You flinch and Aemond stands up and raises his cup for another toast. The music stops and everyone looks at Aemond. Now you are really nervous and almost certain that it won't end well.
"Please Aemond... sit down again," you urge him, still startled. Alicent also looks at him, horrified.
Aemond looks briefly in your direction and smiles before looking back in Luke's direction, cup still raised, "Final Tribute."
Out of the corner of your eye you notice Jace turning to Aemond. His gaze briefly moves to Jace, "To the health of my nephews, Jace..."
"...and Luke. Each of them handsome, wise.... strong."
"Aemond!" you hiss. Now you are on the verge of your first outburst of anger, which is not unjustified.
"Come! Let us drain our cups to these two Strong Boys"
Aegon, of course, ready for a battle and immediately on Aemond's side, eagerly raises his cup and looks expectantly into the round. You would love to knock the cup out of his hand.
As you turn your attention back to Aemond, "Aemond enough!" you almost shout.
"I dare you to say that again," Jace suddenly interjects.
"Why? 'Twas only a compliment."
As Aemond suddenly walks around the table, you stand up too, a hand resting on your belly. The baby doesn't seem pleased either.
"Aemond, what are you doing?" you clutch at his arm. But he is so angry that he doesn't notice how hard you are breathing and claws at his arm.
"I was merely expressing how proud I am of my family, my Love. Mh... though it seems my nephews aren't quite as proud of theirs."
He pulls away from your arm as Jace suddenly approaches him menacingly. You stand next to Aemond, "Jace, please stop."
As Jace lunges at Aemond, you scream "No!" and reflexively push Aemond aside. Aemond did not expect a shove from you, he staggers a step to the side. Still, he grabs your arm and tries to pull you aside to prevent you from taking the hit, but Jace hits you hard on the shoulder. You lose your balance, stumble backwards and land on the floor. You groan loudly and hold your belly. Your mother cries out. Aemond sees you lying on the floor, breathing heavily and holding your belly. He can't help it, anger grips him.
He grabs Jace by the collar and aggressively pushes him across the room. He pushes him against the opposite wall and lifts him up by the collar so that Jace's feet leave the floor and dangle in the air. Alicent is the first at your side, she carefully helps you up, "Y/n are you all right??"
You nod and hold your belly. Your father is now at your side, closely followed by your mother, making sure you are okay.
In the distance you hear Aemond screaming, "I will kill you!!! Lay a hand on my wife!!! She is heavily with child!!!"
Jace just retorts, gasping, "I was going to hit you, you imbecile! I would never hurt her!!!"
Daemon strides away from you, over to Aemond and Jace. "Okay, there will be no more deaths here today", and he tries to pull Aemond away from Jace.
With great effort, he manages to pry Aemond off Jace as the guards hold Jace back.
You see Aemond trying to free himself from your father's arms when suddenly a sharp pain runs through your abdomen. It is stronger than anything you have ever felt. Your breath catches in your throat and you slump down. Alicent and Rhaenyra are quickly at your side, holding you. But then the pain is followed by a snap in your lower abdomen. Suddenly you feel that your legs are wet and you are standing in a puddle, and you are sure that you have not peed yourself.
"Aemond...", you whisper shocked. But you don't get any reaction from him. Alicent and your mother just look at you in shock.
You try again, "Aemond..." a little louder, but not loud enough. Aemond doesn't hear you. You look up and see your father still struggling to keep Aemond away from Jace. He and Jace are still busy insulting each other.
When a loud "AEMOND!!!" fills the hall. A long yell follows his name as you sink to your knees. Alicent and Rhaenyra go down with you and hold you.
Aemond looks at you, startled. He tears himself away from Daemon and is immediately at your side, "My Love, My Love! What's wrong???"
Alicent calms him down, "The baby is coming Aemond. We need to get her into a bed!"
Aemond nods.
He turns back to you, "My Love, can you walk? Do you want me to carry you??"
You shake your head slightly, "No.... No... I can do that, I just want to lie down."
He nods again and helps you up. You whisper another, "Aemond... don't leave me..." as he puts his arm tighter around your waist and carefully leads you out of the hall. Alicent, meanwhile, asks the servants to inform the maesters and midwives that the baby is coming and to prepare everything for the birth.
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The timing and occasion on which MC made the pacts with Lucifer and Belphegor should've been switched and here's why:
SPOILERS FROM LESSON 16 TO 20-14!!
I don't know if anyone has ever posted something similar to this but it's something I've been thinking about it for a while. I've never quite liked the way these two pacts were formed and to me, they were both timed weirdly and overall had little to no weight on the story, which sort of irritates me in a way.
I think our pact with Lucifer should've taken place at the party where MC was celebrated instead of the end of the season, it would've been much more meaningful that way and left way more impact than the disaster of a scene that lesson 20-14 was in my opinion. Because here's the thing:
Lucifer is the Avatar of Pride, one of the most powerful beings in all three realms, someone who's led an entire army through war and was maybe the first of his kind to rebel against its own creator. It's not easy to gain his respect, much less his trust, so for him to put his pride aside and offer a human the power to control his entire being, it's much more than a simple "possessive and horny confession", t's him placing his ultimate trust in someone, it's him showing just how much he's grown to care for you.
Because you deserve it. You were the human who put his dear family back together, who willingly ran head first into danger more than once just for the sake of protecting his brothers, who gave your life trying to help fix what he broke. You were much more than a simple exchange student, you were someone he had slowly come to cherish, who so gradually approached his heart that he didn't even notice you come in and before he knew it, all the irritation and distrust he felt towards you had turned into love and admiration. You were a precious presence in his life that he felt the need to protect but failed to do so.
So Lucifer offering to make a pact with you just shortly after all you had gone through was a way to let you know just how immensely grateful he was for all you had done for him and his family, to show you that you had not only earned his respect and trust but also his love. It was an apology for every time he had put you in harm's way and for not being there for you when you needed him the most. Lucifer offering you a pact it's him letting you know that he will never ever let anyone hurt you again and that he'll always be there for you from now on, it's him saying that you can lean on him as much as you need because you're now part of his family — the one thing he puts above all others and will do anything for.
Lucifer asking to make a pact with you it's him showing you mean the world to him while having no qualms about letting the whole three realms know you were remarkable enough to make the prideful Morning Star let go of his sin and give you all of him.
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Now, let's talk about Belphegor. As I've seen many point out, the reaction to MC's death after lesson 16 as whole was terrible. There was barely any acknowledgment of what happened, no apology coming from Belphegor, and the weirdest thing of all: MC was not only completely okay with being close to Belphegor but also the only one trying to help him when all the brothers were more than rightfully being awkward around him. So let's just put it this way: the whole situation was beyond bizarre and we all like to pretend it wasn't canon.
But back to the matter at hand: Canonically, MC's pact with Belphegor is formed at Diavolo's birthday party. After he disappears from the main hall where everyone is and MC goes to find him on their own. That itself already seems wrong, I mean, I don't know about you personally but if I had just been murdered by someone a few days/weeks ago, I definitely wouldn't want to leave the side of those I'm safe with to go find that person alone. But Canon!MC is very dumb and we can't do anything about it so our only choice is to follow him.
We are also not given the choice to refuse the pact when it's proposed nor MC has the chance to speak a word about it. Now the way I see this, it's a clear sign that MC doesn't want a pact with him. They are scared and pressured into making a pact with Belphegor because they're not sure what could happen if they refused. Because then again, this is the guy that murdered them not that long ago and laughed at their dead body like he was having the time of his life. And the last time MC refused to make a pact didn't exactly go well either, with Satan shoving them into a bookshelf and threatening the hell out of them.
And if Satan reacted like that, imagine Belphegor. And there was no one around either, Canon!MC had made the stupid decision to go find Belphegor on their own and had no one to protect them at the moment. So they have no choice, they are frozen with fear and are ""forced"" to make a pact with him even though they dread the idea. It's just awful and I hate that scene so much I can't even put it into words.
MC's pact with Belphegor shouldn't have been formed so early. They should've had the time to heal from all the trauma, time to distance themselves from Belphegor, and to process everything they had been through. And then only later they would slowly start to warm up to him again, after they know for a fact he's truly sorry for what he did and deeply regrets it. After they are ready to face him.
And for Belphegor's pact with MC to be formed on their last day in the Devildom, it would've simply been beautiful. Because then Belphegor would've also had the time to learn to appreciate MC, to realize how special they truly were, for what he did to become one of the biggest regrets he's ever carried. Belphegor would've had the time to see right in front of him how you treated those you had a pact with, time to realize that to you, a pact wasn't about gaining power and status, but about forming a deeper connection with someone.
The pacts you shared were proof of your strong bond with his brothers and all the love you had for them. And honestly, it broke his heart to be the only one in the family who didn't have that kind of connection with you. But he wouldn't dare ask for it, he couldn't ask for it. He didn't have the right, not after what he did to you that day. You were nice enough to forgive him, to treat him with kindness when all he deserved was your hate and loathing. He couldn't ask for more, no matter much he wished to.
So when you come around and ask him for a pact on your last night in the Devildom, he couldn't have felt happier. To know that you had come to trust him like that again even after all he did, for you to love him enough to want his pact mark on you for the rest of your life, it felt nothing short of incredible. He wondered what he had done to deserve you, because someone as caring and sweet as you should have no business staying close to someone as rotten as him. But he gladly accepts the pact after you confirm to him that's truly what you want. Belphegor then hugs you as tight as he can, sobbing in your embrace as he is filled with both the happiness of your newly formed pact and the sadness that you have to leave.
MC being the one to ask for a pact with Belphegor shows that they've come to trust him just as much as his brothers. And the pact itself is a sign that they've both come to overcome their past traumas and now feel more than comfortable with each other. It's proof of the strong and unbreakable bond they have.
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