#a few smashed pots isn’t the worst thing

[ink-through-her-veins]

Merlin stands, a little too carefully and gingerly for a man who has repeatedly tripped on his own feet and nothing at all. He limps a few steps.

“What have you done?” Arthur asks with a dramatic put upon sigh.

“Nothing!” Merlin says, far too quickly and not at all innocently.

Arthur rolls his eyes. “Do you care to explain how nothing has left you walking like a crippled old man?”

“I do not.”

“I am not asking Merlin.”

“Technically, you did ask.”

“Merlin!”

“It wasn’t my fault. I was in the market buying herbs for Gaius and there were these thugs trying to shake down one of the shopkeepers. What was I supposed to do?”

“What did you do?”

“Well I couldn’t just let them get away with it.”

The tension behind Arthur’s eyes grows steadily with each word Merlin says. An image of an entirely destroyed marketplace comes to mind. He can only imagine the damage that Merlin has done and that would no doubt be traced back to Arthur somehow.

“How much damage did you cause?”

“There was one broken pot, one broken nose, and a black eye. And I will have you know that I paid for the pot.”

Arthur shrugs. After all he’s broken his own share of pots.

#merlin #bbc merlin #arthur pendragon #merlin bbc #merlin emrys #merlin fanfic #fanfic drabble #at least it wasn’t someone’s favorite pot #a few smashed pots isn’t the worst thing #ITHVmerthurficlet

[crispycostumes]

And we have reached the fourth part of this sordid tale: a list and kind of analysis of every time mint is mentioned in conjunction with gansey in trk because i still think too much about this (all the other posts for those interested: post one, two, and three)

the first time we encounter this in trk is a fair bit into the book when noah tries to dig out blue’s eye

“Suddenly, hands gripped her shoulders, wrenching her away from him. She was surrounded by warmth and mint. Gansey held her so tightly that she could feel him trembling against her. The hum was everywhere. She could feel it in her burning face as Gansey twisted to put himself between her and the buzzing fury that was Noah.” 

(and once again gansey is mint) (also adding this while editing, he still consumes mint on such a regular basis that he still smells very strongly of it) (edit two: he is warmth to her and i think this is lovely, yes i'm aware it could also be a physical warmth but let me have this)

the second time is after gansey gives adam the “don’t break ronan” talk

“They looked out the window again. Gansey took a mint leaf out of his pocket and put it in his mouth. The feeling of magic that he had felt at the beginning of the night was even more pronounced. Everything was possible, good and bad.”

(he obviously felt anxious and out of his depth during this talk, he doesn’t want to fight with adam and he knows that he’s not good with words. also, he’s worried about ronan. they’re still in the middle of the post matthew-and-declan-leaving-so-they’re-not-killed-by-this-fucking-demon party. everything about this is a perfect cocktail to manifest some mental issues he doesn’t want to “bother” other people with. and so: mint leaf) (as far as methods of self soothing go it's not the worst but i wish he would just talk to his friends and let them help him instead of doing the gansey thing and just wishing that his love be returned)

Third time:  

“Gansey had been here before — seven years and some change. Impossibly, it had been for another Congressional fund-raiser. Gansey remembered that he had been excited to go. Washington, D.C., in the summer was airless and close, its inhabitants reluctant hostages, bags over their heads. Although the Ganseys had just taken an overseas trip to visit mint farms in Punjab (a political trip that Gansey still didn’t fully understand the purpose of), the travel had only served to make the youngest Gansey more restless.”

(foreshadowing that only comes into play after the events have transpired? in this series? well i’ll be damned)

the fourth time mint is mentioned is when ronan is fighting the demon. one could argue that this isn’t in fact in conjunction with gansey but one could also be wrong. Ronan’s dream battles and dreams have always been filled with metaphors and shit so the mint being there while gansey is talking about his sacrifice (sacrificing his life) literally just a few feet away is not a coincidence.

“The demon kept pulling him unconscious, and in those short bursts of blackness, the dreamer snatched at light, and when he swam back to consciousness, he thrust the dream into reality. He shaped them into flapping creatures and earthbound stars and flaming crowns and golden notes that sang by themselves and mint leaves scattered across the blood-streaked pavement and scraps of paper with jagged handwriting on them: Unguibus et rostro.”

(so much analysis could be pulled from this. Tempted to one day make a big doc analysing all of ronan’s big metaphorical dreams and dreamthings and dream battles)

We also know from blue’s vision of their first kiss that he smelled like mint during it. There isn’t much more to say than what has already been said

The fifth and last time mint is ever mentioned in conjunction with gansey is just noah reflecting over his murder at his end

“Sometimes he got caught on a loop of constantly understanding that he had been murdered, and rage made him smash things in Ronan’s room or kick the mint pot off Gansey’s desk or punch in a pane of glass on the stairs up to the apartment.”

(i don’t know if the mint pot and the mint plants are supposed to be different things) (also i want so bad to do an analysis of noah goddamn)

#the fact that there was no mint in the epilogue makes me so happy #thank fuck #i would not have survived him still reeking of mint after all this is over too #i know he probably does but i want him to be happy and feel safe #is that too much to ask #also just the subtle reminders that yes he still reeks of mint during all this #it isn’t constant eating but just like #this ever present understanding that the reader is now supposed to just assume and immediately associate gansey and mint #like you just KNOW he smells like mint in every scene in this book #because that’s what gansey does #what he IS #mint #and thus the reader has come to do the exact same thing as the characters #the mint saga #shutting up now #trc #the raven cycle #trk #richard campbell gansey iii #gansey

[planetchii]

THE NICHIASA SHITPOSTING REPORT

ACTUALLY ON TIME, NEW HIGH SCORE.

ON TODAY'S EPISODE, MINORI TAKES US ON A JOURNEY INTO A WONDEROUS LAND WHOSE BOUNDARIES ARE THAT OF THE IMAGINATION; NEXT STOP, THE TROPICAL ZONE, SPIDERMAN GETS A BELT AND EVOLVES INTO KAMEN RIDER SPIDERMAN, AND FINALLY, KAITO AND STACEY TAKE FREAKY FRIDAY A BIT TOO FAR.

Tropical Rouge PreCure: Minori tells us that it is a special episode of 10 stories.

A samurai story with Atsuka and Manatsu. But the swords are rubber and their rods. Goes as well as you’d expect. Ends as a baseball bat fight.

The girls find a magical turtle. Turns out Smug Fish has heard of this mythical turtle.

Manatsuu and her smug fish girlfriend and mom are trying to eat dinner. And all the ocean life decides to take up residence in the house. No one can decide who can use the bathroom first.

In a haunted story, we find how the Chongire figures out what to feed the Witch of Delays, how Numeri heals her and Elda entertains and takes care of her. Butler isn’t happy with the slacking. There’s work to be done. Like the organization of books. The witch just wants to go to the bathroom. Manatsuu has a rather active organization.

The girls just want to go to the aquarium, but it seems the fish are on a lunch break. Good thing they have a smug fish to cosplay as a fish.

Manatsuu, in her excitement, almost breaks the Aqua IPad, and Auska and Sango have switched bodies. Asu-Sango isn’t as excited about it, but San-Asuka is ready to pump iron in Sango’s body. But now, everyone has switched bodies. Including the monster.

Chongire tries to summon a Yaraneda, Flamingo smashes it into the ground. After a good while, congrats everyone, the entire earth is a Yaraneda and fighting back against humanity.

The girls transform to fight a Yaraneda. So does Kururun. I told you Cure Kururn would happen. Even in a dream.

HEARTCATCH PRECURE SIGHTING. The little ones will now see Heartcatch transform. 2011 is back with a vengeance. The Tropical girls will watch this show, but they have questions. Marine doesn’t like the fact that they are being questioned. They saved the world from a desert, damn it.

The girls are now working on how their final attack should work, and how they will need to do to make it work. Minori has a few names to offer. So does everyone else... “Kururun kururun kururun run” is the best. But screw it, if you can’t figure which one you like, use it all.

The Aqua Pot releases a picture, and man it’s haunted. With Laura’s hand wanting some jellies. Another with Sango wearing a mask and Kururun running fast. Laura likes taking pictures.

And Minori ends the episode, asking how everyone liked the episode. And that there were actually 11 stories. And both the Tropical and Heartcatch girls dance in the end.

Kamen Rider Revice: There’s a robbery on foot. The thieves are not that good. They need their Deadman just to help them. But at least Ikki has the full backing of FENIX now.

Meanwhile, George is on a skateboard. For Scientific reasons. Vice makes a decent ringtone.

Also, don’t call George Kari Chan. Nor will he take this slander for his work. He worked hard for his fandom and now he’s so angry he’s slipped into English. Now Ikki has to deal with reprimanding him. I’m sure George will make sure Vice’s Rider form is even worse.

Meanwhile, Daiji is still sulking about all of this. He doesn’t care about anything then getting his brother knocked down a few pegs. Do you know who else is sulking? Hiromi. The dude still doesn’t have his old position.

Meanwhile, some gamer dude is playing Tekken. He’s also a thief, and probably not a good one. I mean, one of them got caught last time.

Bou-san is a spy, isn’t he? How does he get all of this information?

Hiromi has come to tell everyone that Daiji has passed out, and somehow put on his worst goth stuff. He seemed confused when he woke up. But he could do better than his current goth look.

Meanwhile, Ikki and Vice find a level 2 Deadman when they get notified about an actual threat happening. Their teamwork needs some work. Especially when Vice just throws Ikki into some shipping containers.

Elsewhere, Sakura is in Karate. Someone asks her how her mom is doing, and Julio decides to do his best, “How do you do, fellow humans” impression. All while the Deadman is still scheming about how to deal with both Revice and their new puppet, Dr. Jackal and Mr. Hyde Daiji, who just gave himself 7 years of bad luck.

In order to beat the new Devil, Ikki takes Vice to apologize for his words and get a new stamp. George refuses but is forced to by his hire ups. George isn’t happy. And now Hiromi has to do the deliveries. But at least there’s a chance he may get to transform and get his position back.

While that is going on, Ikki and Vice are looking for the Deadman, who may or may not be getting ready to burst out of jail with his friends. Even though he did the whole robbing thing.

When Ikki tries to deal with the Deadman that suddenly attacked a police box, Evil arrives. Luckily Hiromi arrives with a new stamp and the guts to actually transform. Congrats Hiromi, you are now Kamen Rider Spiderman!

And now, Kamen Rider Spiderman has decided to start fighting Evil, while Revice tries out their new Stamp, and George gets his final revenge of turning Vice into a skateboard. We have reached 1000% levels of radical. Levels that shouldn’t even be possible. On the other side, Hiromi is trying to interrogate Evil with both his words and his fists. Evil still leaves.

But with a Rider kick, the Devilman is defeated to reveal an old dad who just wanted to spend time with his son. Too bad, they both go to FENIX jail now.

Kikai Sentai Zenkaiger: We begin with Stacey looking at the Hakaizer unit getting an upgrade. He’s not all that interested, but he has a report that he has to fill out. Work sucks and all.

Meanwhile, Kaito and the Twokaiser group are walking after a nice lunch date and getting ready to say their goodbyes. At least Kaito was finally able to say thanks for the help. And while Vox was happy to receive it, he has things to think about. Like how is he going to break the news about beating up his boyfriend’s father?

On his way home, Stacey pops up. He wasn’t invited and he’s not all that happy, even if he gets thanks for helping with all that tennis stuff. The two transform and start to fight, but the Inverted world of today has decided to switch their bodies. It’s more that the Inverted world didn’t realize he fucked up. So now KaiStacy is going to take this as a chance to get into the Tojitendo world to look for his parents, while StacKaito gets to pretend he has an actual support group with the Colorful group.

KaiStacy finds a bunch of people in prison and decides he’s going to use the cannon to break them out with some police Sentai.

Meanwhile, while pretending he has amnesia, StacKaito makes the entire Zenkaier go full-powered to look for the new world. He stays behind to help with opening things.

Back at Tojitendo, the higher-ups knew he wasn’t actually Stacey. He acted a touch too happy, and a touch less emo.

Meanwhile, the Twokaiser group has also changed. Which allows the Zenkaiger group to realize Kaito hasn’t been acting right.

FLINT TRANSFORMS. Even if it’s only because her Vox switched places.

Meanwhile, Gaon and Magine finally get it out of him that Kaito is actually Stacey. And Kaito is currently making a mess of Tojitendo. A group that now is hunting him down for identity theft.

In order to fight the Inverted World, KaiStacy looks to transform into his Zenkaiger form. Unfortunately, all he has is the Geartozinger Stacey usually has. You know what, let’s roll with it, we’ll fix the group pose in post. The Zenkaiger and TwoFlintEr group starts fighting, while StacKaito has his eyes set on the dude that made his afternoon full of so much awkward.

Stacy, wearing Kaito as a skin, transforms into Zenkaiger, and immediately starts acting like HR trying to punish a worker. It was at that moment that the Inverted World realized they’d fucked up.

The mechas use the machines for the Patarangers. #justice4thePats

After the fight, the Zenkaiger group takes this as a chance to catch Kaito up, who’s just upset he couldn’t do more to wreck the Tojitendo world.

Back at the Tojitendo world, Stacey is starting to have second third fourth fifth sixth seventh eighth ninth tenth thoughts about all of this.

#precure #tropical rouge precure #pretty cure #tropical rouge pretty cure #kamen rider #kamen rider revice #kikai sentai zenkaiger #zenkaiger

[classic80sand90smovieloves2]

Meeting and Dating Seymour Krelborn

(Not my gif) (Requested by anonymous)

(Audrey 2 is sort of mellowed out in this and is still called Audrey even though I’m sort of omitting Audrey 1 from this)

- Skid Row is arguably one of the worst places you’ve ever had the “pleasure” of living in. You absolutely hated it and yet, even Skid Row had a little bit of a silver lining; Mushnik’s Flower Shop. 

- Every week, you’d stop by the shop and have a look around, scrounging up enough money here and there to buy a little bouquet to brighten up your dreadful looking apartment. And, as of lately, to see the adorably nerdy florist. 

- You first met Seymour a few months after you moved to Skid row. You’d been cautiously wandering around the city, trying to find some interesting place that you’d actually like to visit. That was when you finally came across Mushnik’s shop. 

- It was everything that you were looking for, cozy, comforting, ...not dangerous. It soon became routine for you to visit, especially after a rough day. 

- You had the pleasure of meeting Seymour a week or so after you first found the place. You’d just been looking around when he cautiously approached and asked if he could help you with anything. The two of you had a short, pleasant yet awkward conversation and you left. 

- Things went on like this for a while, you’d visit, make some small talk with the man and then you’d leave. You’d never really had any serious or in depth conversations with the bespectacled man but you didn’t mind, it was nice just speaking with someone who didn’t ogle or creep you out. 

- It took him quite a while to ask you out; just cut him some slack, he almost didn’t do it at all. 

- You’d been looking at Audrey 2 for a while when you heard someone beginning to approach, prompting you to turn around. That was when you tripped “over your own feet” and fell... right up against Seymour. 

- Believe me, you have no reason to be embarrassed, he knows exactly whose fault it is and it isn’t yours; if you catch my drift. Audrey 2 had to hear Seymour gush about you for weeks and lets just say the mean green mother had had enough. 

- Poor Seymour could hardly even manage to say a single word to you, too shocked to form coherent sentences as he straightened both himself and you out. 

- You apologized, embarrassed and contemplating never returning, before you quickly made your way out of the store; though not before taking one last look at the big odd plant. 

- Seymour had a feeling that it would be a while before he saw you again and decided that he would finally just try his luck. He followed after you, calling your name and all but running to catch up. After a moment of panting, he nervously stuttered out an offer for him to take you out to lunch the next day. Obviously, you agreed.

- As promised, he showed up at your door the next day with an odd yet pretty, exotic potted plant and took you to a nice restaurant nearby. 

- I don’t think it’s possible for someone not to fall in love with Seymour so; of course, you were happy to see him again. In fact, you were more than happy to never stop seeing him again. 

- The two of you had your first kiss after he got chewed out by Mr. Mushnik for dropping a bunch of flower pots. You went after him, trying your best to comfort him before you told him that you loved him. His eyes snapped wide open and it took all of three seconds for him to smash his lips to yours. 

-  You have a bit of an odd relationship. One day you’re at a cafe making goo goo eyes at each other and the next you’re scrubbing blood off of a giant plants pot.

- He loves pda. The fact that you actually want to be seen with him blows his mind so being able show people that you’re a couple and express his love for you out in the open is wonderful to him. 

- Holding one of his arms whenever you walk together, usually with his coat draped over your shoulders. 

- This mans lips are ... so soft?? Yet his kisses are so strong. They’re perfect, you can’t get enough of them.

- You get your very own unique nickname once you start dating. It’s something special about you or something you experienced together and it makes you smile every time he calls you it. 

- He nerds out whenever you go to flower shops/anywhere with odd plants. He pulls you along, telling you all about each and everyone of them while muttering quiet ‘wows’ to himself. It’s adorable.

- He most likely got you a job at the shop so that the two of you could spend more time together. Plus, he didn’t want you getting swindled by a less reputable business. 

- You’ve definitely caught him singing about you when he doesn’t think you’re around. 

- He always gets embarrassed when you ask him to sing for you but he secretly enjoys the fact that you think he’s a good singer and want to hear him. 

- Stealing his baseball caps. 

- Straightening out his glasses and ties for him.

- Wearing his button ups when he stays the night. You would do it when you stay the night at his place but he lives at the shop and you’d rather not be interrupted by Mr. Mushnik. 

- He never watches you change, it doesn’t matter how long you’re dating. He won’t do it unless the two of you are married, he just feels like it’s disrespectful. 

- You’ll most likely be the one to initiate a lot of things: cuddling, kissing, hugging, ...sex. 

- He doesn't really have a favorite way to cuddle, he’s happy as long as he’s holding you. 

- He’s incredibly easy to fluster. Believe me, even if you think you’re bad at flirting with or seducing people, you’ll manage to find success with him. 

- He sort of just lets you do whatever you want to him. Poke his cheeks, play with his hands, mess with his hair, etc. It confuses him but he allows it. 

- Getting tugged into kisses by your waist. He’s probably dipped you into a kiss before and it was more wonderful than you ever could have imagined. 

- He compliments you every day. Even before the two of you started dating, he would try to compliment you or say something sweet every time he saw you. He makes you feel like the most beautiful girl in the world and to him you are. 

- He would 100% bridal carry you if your heels were hurting you or if you for some reason couldn’t walk properly yourself (like if you were drunk or hurt). 

- Any nickname or pet name you give him makes him melt. 

- He prefers quiet nights in with you over any other kind of date; there isn’t much to do in Skid Row anyways.

- Talking about your dreams and aspirations with each other. The two of you are constantly promising each other that you’ll one day leave the city together and never look back. 

- He would genuinely do anything for you. If you ever needed anything, anything at all, he’d be there for you. 

- He’s the most loyal guy you’ll ever meet. There’s only one girl out there for him and that’s you. In fact, you’re really the only girl he’s ever loved and he’s certainly not ashamed to admit it. 

- You’re probably taller than him, especially if you wear heels, so he’ll occasionally ask you to grab things off of the top shelf for him.

- He stands behind your chair whenever you’re sitting, holding and rubbing your shoulders while he talks with someone or watches what you’re doing.

- Picking up different gardening books from the library for him.

- Letting him show and gush to you about his new plants. You’re often asked to help take care of them, especially if you like gardening. 

- He always gets this big smile on his face whenever he sees that you’ve kept the flowers he’s left on your doorstep/given to you. 

- Helping him whenever he clumsily breaks something or hurts himself. He’s torn between staying quiet and cherishing the moment or trying to make jokes in an attempt to make himself seem “less pathetic”. 

- Going with and supporting him when he goes to speak with news/radio stations. 

- Twoey has definitely touched your ass before. Seymour has had several stern talking to’s with him.

- Trying to persuade him to put an end to the Audrey 2 fiasco before it’s too late. 

- You help ease his guilty conscience. If he was truly a bad person, why would he have a girl like you by his his side? 

- Warm and comforting hugs. 

-  Walking home with him everyday. Skid row is a dangerous place and he wants to make sure that you’re alright.

-  If anyone hurts or insults you, they mysteriously disappear very soon after. He never directly tells you that he had something to do with it but you can guess what happened. Plus, Twoey has proudly told you exactly what happened on more than one occasion.

- Even though he loves you dearly, he feels like you deserve better. He thinks you deserve the world, not some loser like him.

- He’s definitely an insecure person and that isn’t going to change anytime soon. He overthinks everything and is constantly apologizing, no matter how many times you tell him he doesn’t have to apologize. It’s just the way he is. 

- A part of him feels as though it isn’t his place to get jealous, that he should be lucky you’re even with him, so he tries his best to keep it to himself even if he gets jealous. 

- The two of you don’t fight, you just don’t. He doesn’t have it in him to get angry at you or bring himself to start a fight and the two of you rarely have anything to fight about. 

- Shy and nervous “I love you’s”. 

- Oh to live in a world of green with you. What better life could he live?

#seymour krelborn headcanons #seymour krelborn headcanon #seymour krelborn imagine #seymour krelborn imagines #little shop of horrors headcanons #little shop of horrors headcanon #little shop of horrors imagine #little shop of horrors imagines #80s movie imagine #80s movie headcanons #80s movie headcanon #80s imagine

[lesbian-dp]

Cold-Blooded Killer

Natasha Romanoff x Reader

Words: 2,359

Warnings: Fighting, violence, blood, hate, finger fucking, wall sex, talks of bondage... p sure that’s it.

Request: Nope.

Summary: You’re a cold-blooded killer. And Natasha’s been on your ass ever since you could remember.

Ko-Fi

18+ ONLY.

Being an assassin for hire a lot of things were thrown your way.

Hit's, of course, were obvious. That was your job after all.

There were also the rich snobby assholes that you had to deal with. The hellish time schedules, changing for every hit. The background checks on all of your hits and hires.

People may think you're a cold-blooded killer, that will take on any job, as long as the pay's right.

But they were wrong. You did have a moral compass still, albeit warped. But you still made sure that the people you hit weren't about to cure cancer or solve world hunger. And for that, you gave yourself a moral win.

Not to mention the, oh so many, bounties on your head, and the targets on your back. The guilt on your hands. But the worst of all being the fact that S.H.I.E.L.D. was constantly on your ass.

The main pain in your ass being none other than, Natasha Romanoff. The Black Widow herself.

Said Black Widow currently occupied by smashing your head into the livingrooms wall, of your not so safe, safe house.

You hissed in pain. Natasha never once removing her palm from the side of your head, keeping you tightly pressed into the wall. As she pointed the barrel of her gun at you.

Watching out of the corner of your eye, you saw blood dripping from her nose, and busted lip. A bruise beginning to form above her left eyebrow.

You would bet every penny you had on the chances that you look so much worse than she did.

"God," Natasha scoffed, "How are you even an assassin? And a successful one, at that."

Smirking a bloody smile at her, you raised your arm, pushing Natasha's back and away from your temple. Your other arm snapping up to block her from shooting you. The bullet streaming past your ear and straight into the wall behind you. Lastly, you harshly brought your head down onto Natasha's, sending her stumbling back dizzily.

Natasha brought her free hand up to hold her now throbbing forehead. Giving you the opportune moment to pull your leg up and kick her square in her abdomen. Making her tumble over the back of the sofa, then onto the floor.

Picking up her dropped gun, you said, "You can hardly talk."

Hopping over the back of the sofa, stepping off of the cushions, you looked down at Natasha, laying on the floor winded and dazed.

"You doing alright there, firecracker?" you cooed sarcastically.

"I fucking despise you."

"Trust me, the feeling's mutual." You placed your hands on your hips. "Need a hand, sweetheart?"

"I don't need anything from you!"

"Sure ya don't! That's why S.H.I.E.L.D. makes you follow me. All the fucking time."

"What do you expect? You're an assassin," Natasha replied, uneasily getting up, with a hand still caressing her forehead.

"Talk about the pot calling the kettle black," you snarked.

Natasha glared at you, "I don't do that anymore."

"It looks like you don't do many things anymore."

"What's that supposed to mean?!" she snapped.

"You know exactly what that means, baby girl," you sneered, "I know just as well as you do, how much you're craving a good fucking right now."

Natasha groaned in disdain, "You're disgusting."

"And you love it!"

"I hate you."

You laughed at her words, throwing your head back as you did.

"You didn't seem to hate me all that much, when I had you under me, as you begged for more."

Natasha sneered at you, knowing just how much she wanted to shoot you, right then and there.

"There's just something so satisfying, about fucking someone you hate, isn't there?"

"Shut, the fuck, up," she snarled.

"Why?" you asked with a smirk, "Getting horny?"

Natasha laughed darkly, throwing her head back as she did.

"I cannot wait until I throw you into prison, and I never need to see your face again."

"Until it's time for a conjugal visit," you sassed.

"Who said you will ever get one of those?"

"The fact that you can't get enough of me."

"We haven't had sex in almost three years," she scoffed.

You were close to her now, after having thrown Natasha's gun to the side, and across the room. Bearly an inch from being pressed up against her gorgeous body. Able to whisper in her ear.

"And that's what makes you want me so much."

Whatever breath you had, was harshly pulled from your lungs. When Natasha roughly pushed you away from her, causing you to stumble back a few steps.

"I think the only one here who wants sex, is you," Natasha sneered.

"Oh, really?" you asked.

"Yes."

"Then, please, tell me why your nipples are so hard that they're popping through your suit."

Natasha shot you a weary look, before deciding to bite the bulled and peer down at her breasts. Seeing that you were, in fact, right.

Laughter poured from your chest as Natasha's shocked face snapped up to look at you.

"It's cold in here," she tried to explain it away, with a haphazard excuse.

"Oh, honey," you cooed sickenly sweet as you moved closer to her. Finally pressing your body against her lithe one, that had also moved to press up against the wall behind her, "I'd thought you'd do better than that."

"Fuck you!"

"You will."

***

"You're a fucking monster!" Natasha screams at you!

"Oh, that's real rich, coming from you, Natalia! Or do I have to remind you of your past?!"

Well... this was not what you expected to happen.

Everything was going fine- Well, as fine as they could be, considering everything. Natasha had been pressed up in between you and the wall, one minute. Her nipples, hard enough to rival diamonds, pushed against you. Then you were ten feet away from her, screaming at each other, the next.

Natasha knew that you would run before she even got a chance to take you in. So, she secretly called for back up, while you were too distracted with her being "trapped" between you and the wall.

Now the only thing she had to do was keep you here until they came. And having a screaming match was one hell of a way to do that.

"You see! That's the difference between you and me!" she yelled back at you, "I changed! And you're the same old assassin low-life, who took my virginity!"

"You say that as if you didn't want me too!"

"I wish I chose someone else, that's for sure!"

"What the hell is that supposed to mean?" you asked, face and voice devoid of the previous anger, that was still burning away below the surface, "To my recollection, you seemed to enjoy yourself. Quite a lot in fact! I distinctly remember you begging for it. Multiple times- That night, and the many other times we had sex too, in fact."

Something that sounded like a mix between a scoff and a chuckle came from Natasha.

"We were both stupid eighteen-year-olds." Natasha shook her head, looking you up and down. "I just wish it wasn't you."

"Like I wanted to fuck you!"

She was digging at you. And you knew it. But you just couldn't see to break away from this spiteful web she had suddenly ensnared you in.

But, lucky for you.

You knew exactly how she worked. And how you could make this go in your favour.

And hers.

Not that she would ever admit that.

"Anyway!" you began before she could vocalise her reply. As you slowly stalked towards her, "It's not like you could ever see what was right in front of your eyes!"

"What?" she scoffed. "Like you?"

A low slam echoed throughout the room, from where you harshly pushed Natasha, against the wall. With your hand wrapped around her throat, the other holding her hip, keeping her in place. As her hands held onto your forearm.

Her eyes were almost pitch black with the lust swimming inside of them.

Good to know she wanted this just as much as you did.

"Yes," you hissed, her hair flying with the intensity of how you spat out your breath, "Me."

"You're so fucking full of yourself!"

You chuckled for a second, licking your bottom lip, and smirking when Natasha's eyes followed the movement.

"That may be true. But, don't deny. It so fucking turns you on."

She wasn't given the chance to speak. Not with you harshly claiming her lips in a searing kiss, and your hand squeezing her throat.

Your other hand coming to rip her zipper down. Pulling away from the kiss, breathing as harshly as the other. Natasha's hands grabbing your clothes, trying to rid them from your body as fast and as roughly as possible.

But it was just so much easier for her to get naked, thank you, in that tight as all hell cat-suit.

One swift click and her belt clattered to the floor. Her suit now finally fully open.

God.

You missed the sight of her soft skin.

And you missed feeling it even more.

Sliding your hands over her collar bones, you dragged the suit down, until it hung around her upper thighs.

A sinister chuckle sounded, from what you saw.

No bra or panties, huh?" you squeezed her waist, making her breathe heavy, and let out a quiet moan. "It's almost as if you knew what was going to happen, baby girl."

Your eyes never left her, as you stood there, not too far away, panting slightly. Your clothes hanging off of your body. Just watching as a Natasha rose her hands above and next to her head, running them softly against the wall, trying to entice you.

And fuck was it working.

"God, look at you," you husked, "You're fucking dripping onto your suit. Be careful. You don't want to ruin it."

"Just hurry up and fuck me, would you?!"

Ah!

There was the fire showing you that Natasha was still angry. The lucky thing was. So were you.

"Keep talking to me like that, and I'll just have to drag it out until you're crying to come."

You were really starting to grow tired of this back and forth bickering match that you were both in.

Natasha laughed darkly. "You act like you can even do tha-" Her sentence was cut off by a high-pitched, shocked moan, as you pushed two of your fingers into her soaked pussy. Her hands flying down to your forearm, in hopes of keeping you from pulling away.

"I'm sorry. What was that?"

Her only reply to you was a stern glare. One you were sure could light you on fire if she had that power.

You growled low in your chest at that look.

"Fuck, you're so wet," you cooed sadistically, "Don't you just take my fingers, so fucking well? You love them deep inside of you, don't you? I can tell from the way you're trying to bounce on them."

"Then how about, you cut your bullshit, and let me do that then?"

You laughed.

"Not a chance. Do you know how pathetic you are? Pushing back on my fingers, like the wanton slut you are. You've been desperate for this, haven't you? Fucking craving me."

"You're my enemy, you know that?"

You could tell that she wasn't just saying that to remind you of that fact. She was also saying it to remind herself. And that, what you two were doing, wasn't what enemies are supposed to do.

You decided to fuck with her.

"Does everyone fuck their enemies like you do?" Natasha moaned as your fingers ploughed into her faster, and your free hand found its way to her neck. "Like, do you think Captain America is going around spreading his cheeks for the leader of HYDRA?"

"Fuck you," Natasha gasped out.

Chuckling, you curled your fingers perfectly, hitting that spongey spot within Natasha that could make her sob. Using that leverage within her core, you helped pull the moaning red-head into the middle of the living room. Guiding her to lay down upon the coffee table.

"Maybe I should tie you up..." you contemplated in a mutter. "Bet you'd look great with my belt wrapped around your wrists. Again."

Natasha whimpered at your words, arching her back, pushing her chest up closer to where you hovered above her.

"Bet you'd like that, wouldn't you?"

No reply.

"I asked you a question, baby girl," you said sternly.

"Yes! Yes!"

You hummed. "Well... it's such a shame that I'm gonna make you come like this first, isn't it?"

You didn't want a reply to that question. And so, you ensured that you wouldn't get one.

Natasha's moans came out at a fast pace. So fast that she could hardly catch her breath. Thanks to the brutal pace and force that your fingers were dealing out your thumb going just as fast against her pulsing clit. Before she came with a loud scream.

Natasha was catching her breath, you were peppering open-mouthed kisses all along her neck and chest.

"Well..." you started, "As you say, “you’re going to drag me to prison”. So, if that means that this is the last time I can have you like this." You paused, looking her up and down, with a devilish smirk upon your lips. "I might as well ruin you, while I can. Come on, sweetheart," you told her, dragging her to her feet, "We're far from done."

“I fucking hate you but, God, you’re the only person who can ever make me come like this.” Natasha smiled drowsily.

***

Natasha was peacefully asleep, surrounded by soft pillows and covers. While you re-dressed, ready to skip town before The Avengers arrived.

Yes. You had known this whole time.

After all.

You are a professional.

Softly, you stepped closer to Natasha, leaning over her, and, unknown to her, pressing a gentle kiss to her temple.

Pulling away, you whispered, "Until the next time, Natasha."

And with that, you left.

Leaving Natasha naked and happily fucked out, for The Avengers to find, not long after.

#original work #original fanfiction #natasha romanoff x reader #natasha romanoff imagine #natasha romanoff #marvel #MCU

[tempesthound]

I tilt my body to the side as I move my motorcycle between the dead cars on the highway; the wind hits the top half of my face, making my eyes water a little. I have to slow my bike to a stop as I got to the highest point on this stretch of road. I could see just what I had come to: a traffic jam. Pulling my hood off my head, I take a drink from my canteen, swishing the stale water around in my mouth before swallowing. It had been a month tops since humanity’s extinction event, and looking around, you would think it had been years. I look inside the car beside me; a corpse laid forward, its head on the steering wheel. It had smashed into the front end of the vehicle. I guessed this lady must have broken her neck upon impact. Pulling my scarf over my nose, I grab my hunting knife and open the door, dragging the lady out. I gagged a little as I searched her body, then the inside of the car. A box of pop tarts under the driver’s seat bless whoever is listening. Popping the trunk, I find a knitted blanket, some chapstick, a backpack with some girl products, which is always an excellent find. I check a few more cars and find a few things before I siphon some gas into my bike. It gave me a few minutes to think about it before.

“Ali, be careful. I heard about some strange attacks happening lately; why don’t you extend your brake a little, tell these attacks to cool down,” Sam says as she touches my arm with a concerned look in her eyes. I sigh, and roll my eyes as I lean on the hood of my car. “I will be fine. My dad didn’t spend years and hours training me just for me to fail at stopping some attacker. Also, I worked too hard to get into this college not to go; I’ll be fine, and it’s just four days from here. If it gets crazy, I’ll come back out to this middle of Nowhere town.”

I should have stayed looking back now; it wasn’t even three weeks later that the world went to hell; I had been making my way back to my hometown. My entire life, I had made jokes about being ‘Zombie apocalypse ready,’ so when I saw the signs, I emptied my bank account on supplies. Water purifiers, battery packs, a few MRE rations, first aid kits, things like that. Then I got in my car and drove, staying off the highways. I headed for the backwoods, but first, I had to go through Missouri. There I lost my car but gained my bike, which I hated for the exposure but loved the gas I saved using it. I heard about the safe zone in Atlanta. Did I believe in it? No. Shaking my head, I cap off my small gas can and strap it down in the saddlebag that I had on the side of my bike, putting everything else in my bag. I get on my bike and start it up. I look around before I take off-putting in one headphone. I start my music, something I had because of several battery packs that were my veritable treasures to keep my phone working for as long as possible.

I slowly drove up to what looks like it was once a camping zone. I parked my bike against a tree. I cover it in the tattered blanket. Then I climbed the tree, wrapping a rope around myself to keep myself from falling out. “Best place to sleep for tonight,” I say as I bunker down, wrapping my arms around myself along with a heavy hoodie for warmth.

Nights like this always made me think back to the good times, times before the dead were ripping into every living creature.

I turn on the news it was, talking about violent attacks worldwide for the past few days. The attacks didn’t sound like they were going to let up soon.

As the news on the riots ended, I shake my head; this was like the start of a cliché horror movie. People broke into Walmarts, riots in food stores, people stalking up on guns and the needed ammo.

“Uncle Jhonny is laughing in his grave now,” I say to my mom, who is humming away in the kitchen, my youngest brother Luke, on her hip like the monkey he was. “Alice!” my mother lightly scolds me. “He called it; he said we would kill ourselves before anything else” I look at the photo of a fiery red-haired male with a smile stretched cheek to cheek as he holds a golden-haired girl with matching green eyes. That was one of the good days when cancer hadn’t eaten away at his bones and taken his mind. “You remind me of him; all his crazy theories filled your head, Rabit” I turn to face the angelic voice of my mother, her little monkey fast asleep in her arms, a smile on her face as she called me that.

Looking back now, it was days like this that I would miss the simple days, days at home with Luke and Mom. Days when my only trouble was school and work; Now I had to worry about walkers and, worst of all, those who survived.

I lean my head back against the tree; I ignore the tears running down my dirty face. Once clean, pale, freckled skin now always smeared with dirt and sweat. The golden blonde hair my mother loved a greasy mess. No, I knew tonight the demons in my mind would keep me awake.

Faster move, don’t stop, don’t look back, when someone is chasing you, you never look back, it raises the risk of you tripping over something in front of you. The words of my trained military father fill my head. My lungs cry out for air, my legs are all but jelly under me, but I can’t risk stopping now. They are too close. The screeches and groans of the man-eaters chasing me are enough to push me past the limits of my weak body. Days of rationing, my food, and water have left me malnourished. So I force myself until the air I’m taking in no longer reaches my brain or muscles. The branches of trees cut at my exposed skin as I push them out of my way, growing dizzier. I jump over a fallen log and stumble as I reach the other side, my legs finally giving out on me.

The once faint sounds of the walking dead now all too close, The dead woman trips over the log falling on top of me, its jaws snapping at me, its grotesque graying skin falling off in places, hollow eyes stare at me, dried pieces of something in its teeth. Reaching for the hunting knife in my boot, I use one hand to hold it by its throat as my hand easily slips through the decaying flesh above me. I turn my head and, using all the force I can, slamming my knife through the temple of the thing’s head, the spray of black blood that hits my cheek and chest is thick and smells worse than rotten eggs. This dead thing that was once alive woman falls like the dead weight she is. I pull myself from under her and lean against the log. The other dead seem to have forgotten me or too far behind for my exhausted body to care.

I don’t know how long I sat there, slowly letting my body catch up to my mind, letting it rest. I had run over five miles of unknown terrain on a body that hasn’t eaten or drank anything in three days. I sat there staring at the dead thing. It had the burned body of a woman. Half her face is gone. It was missing some hair, and it smelled of rotten pork, which made my stomach grumble in emptiness. I pull my bag and look in it. I had a protein bar half-eaten and half a water bottle with boiled river water in it. “Yummy,” I say half heartily.

The woman she probably hadn’t turned over three weeks ago, maybe four. I shake my head and stand my legs, only wobble a little before they decide to work with me instead of against me. My lungs no longer feel like they will jump out of my chest, and my throat doesn’t feel like it’s bleeding. I finish my water, shoving the bottle in my bag—no need to add litter to the decaying world.

Keeping my eyes and ears open as I’m walking munching on the protein bar, it wasn’t more than maybe half an hour when I hear the men’s voices, the sounds of their heavy footfalls and wolf whistles that fill the air in a dangerous song. I stop moving the sound of my feet on the dry leaves on the ground go silent, but the others take a moment, dropping my bar. My movements are quick reaching for the pistole that I had in a hostler on my hip. I pull it out, cock it, and keep walking. Spotting one man, then another, I can hear one more before I pick up my pace, and I sprint. That’s when the chorus of cheers and the chase truly began.

The men are faster than the bitters are they can think and plan when I zig, they zag, I dance through the woods, monitoring the two men at my sides, not daring to slow down, I’m coming up to an opening in the trees, no place to hide, no safety. It’s a battleground. As I break through the woods, I feel two arms grab me wrapping in me in a menacing hug.

I slam my foot down and throw my head and elbows back. I hear the satisfying crunch and groan of an injured man.

“Bitch” The unknown man says as I jump forward, the gun pointed at the man’s head.

“Back off, I know how to use this,” I growl out. I keep backing away from the man, his buddies showing up, their weapons raised. They all looked like the stereotype of an inbreed hilly billy, ratty matted, unwashed hair, and overalls. One even had a potbelly, the man who grabbed me had smelled like he never washed even before the downfall of humanity., none of them had guns. Still, three against one isn’t in my favor, no matter the training, not when my body wasn’t at its peak.

“Three against one honey, come with us nice and quiet, and maybe just maybe you get out of this alive” Lie, I won’t survive what they have planned for me, my body might survive, but my mind won’t. I pull the trigger and shoot the man who grabbed me.I can’t hesitate not when my life is on the line.

“MATTIE, You killed my brother!” Pot-belly yelled he came at me first, and I shot him in his chest twice with two quick pulls of the trigger. I had three bullets left with Potbelly down. I quickly aim at the other one. He came at me at once. Brown hair sticking to his sweaty skin, his arms spread out wide. I brace myself for the hit from him. He takes me to the ground, my gun falling from my hands and away from the us.

He hits my sides and face as I struggle under his weight; I bring my knee up between his legs as he grabs at my leather jacket, pulling at it, trying to tear it off my body; just as my knee reaches his third leg, he holds my hair. Pulling it as he groans, I claw at his face as he slams his fist on my face again. When I scream, he hits my head into the ground. I use my arm to feel around for my knife, my finger brush against the smooth metal at my thigh; he holds my arm down, stopping my movements; I squirm myself under the man as he feels up my body pulling at my thin tee shirt. I bring my head up and slam it against his face. I feel the blood run down my forehead. He falls backward, and groans as my fingers hook around the hilt of the hunting knife. I jump on top of him and slam the blade into the man’s face three times; I bring it down until he stops moving bright red blood, sprays against my face covering my hands and chest, my jacket hangs loosely off my shoulder, my white shirt torn and bloody. I’m still on top of the dead man when I hear a whistle.

“Well, damn, look at these boys” The voice was cocky, and as I turn, I can see why he was tall with a thick beard and messy black hair, a leather jacket hung with grace off his shoulders, a baseball bat with barbed wire wrapped around it like a Christmas tree lights in his left hand. He screamed Alpha male; he was dangerous. The five men behind him didn’t intimidate me as much as he did and the guns they all held.

“Take one step closer. I fucking dare you” I spit out a mix of my blood my victims and slowly stand adrenaline coursing through my veins, my blood knife held in my hand.

“Now wait a damn minute, we’re not here to hurt you, Doll,” Alpha male said as I move away from my bloody victim, picking up the gun not a few inches away from where I shot Potbelly, who was groaning and moving again. I slam my booted foot down on his head over and over, cursing him to hell.

“Then I can leave you and your men, stay there, bury your friends here, and I will go. They would be alive if they didn’t try to kidnap and then rape me.” I feel my adrenaline high slowly coming down; my body suddenly feels very heavy after killing the last attacker I need to get out of here. I walk away from the bodies. My gun still pointed at the Alpha man and his team.

“Names Negan Doll and those sad sacks of shit ain’t my men Number one rule to run with me, no rape,” Alpha man or rather Negan says.

“Then you’re not here because I just brutely beat and shot your men,” I say, lowering my weapon and taking a deep breath, the entire ordeal finally catching up to my brain. I have just been violated, it hasn’t even been a month since the world ended, and people were already taking and killing people. I had just killed someone. I killed three someone’s

“No, in fact, I like a woman who can handle herself,” Negan said his men, relaxing at the sight that I had lowered my gun on their boss. Negan takes this as a sign to walk closer to me. He was a good foot taller than me and huge muscles, no fat on his body covered in denim and leather. Almond brown eyes and a dimple smirk.

“God, Doll, you’re a mess; how about you come with my men and me? We have a nice little house not too far from here. You can wash up, relax, have something to eat. No one will hurt you as long as you’re with me.”

I tilt my head up and look at the unknown man. He pulls out a scarf from his jacket, and cautiously he raises his hand to clean the blood off my face.

“Your one badass woman just kicked a bitter’s head in, took down three shit heads all by yourself, got me all tingly in all the right places” Is he flittering with me right now? Negan is wiping blood human blood off my face and flirting with me, and he’s not scared of me at all. He finished wiping off all that could be when he offers me his hand.

“Come on, Doll, let me take care of you.”

Negan was my savior that day, and we filled the days that followed with flirty words and sarcastic comebacks. We fought but grew closer. He never treated me like I was fragile, never made me stay back when the Bitters came. I was a warrior in his eyes, and he treated me like a queen.

“Never hide from me, Alice, you are a warrior, you are a survivor, a badass built for this world, never forget that”

Then that day happened, the day that the world reminded me that nothing in the apocalypse is safe; nothing is forever.

We had grown in number more men, and the youngest one was 17. I was no longer the youngest in the group, and we moved on from the small farmhouse to just being on the road. We had stopped for the day one scout had spotted a mall that appeared not to have gotten raided. The cars were waiting for their owners to come back to them< I was apprehensive about going into the mall if the vehicles were still there, then where were the people or bitters.

“Don’t worry, Ali-cat, Lucille will watch out for you,” Negan said. I glared at the six-foot-one man.

“I’m not scared, just worried you can’t be too careful, Bossman,” I say, poking his chest; he grabs my hand and kisses it.

“No need to worry, Doll, this will be easy in and out.”

If only that were true, if he had just listened to me, we would still be together.

When we got in, it was quiet, and Negan made it known that he was right; the mall was safe. We were laughing and grinning, going in and out of stores gathering supplies. His men kept a respectful distance behind us. Negan takes my hand and pulls me into an open Forever 21, where Negan is pulling out dresses and heels. I roll my eyes and look around, my eyes falling on a perfect gift for him.

“Hey, look what I found,” I say as I hold up a red scarf as Negan holds out a black choker with a golden letter ‘N’ hanging from the middle.

“I found you something as well,” He says as we swap gifts, “Help me put it on,” I feel his warm hands brush my golden blond hair over my shoulder, slipping the black felt choker over my neck clasping it in place.

We walk around just a little more when we hear the tell groans and moans of the dead outside one door of the indoor theater; we look at each other and head back to the group. I drop Negan’s hand as I see one of the younger guys; Gary reaches for the theater room’s main doors. “DOn’t,” I yell just as he opens the doors; it was too late. He pulled both doors open; the swarm of Biters that came out was overwhelming. We didn’t stand a chance. All we could do was scatter. I feel Negans rough hand grab for mine, but then the dead get between us. It wrenched Negan from me. The sounds of our men’s guns overran the mall, firing shots and the screams of those who were ripped and torn apart. I see Negan’s beloved bat coming down on the heads of the monsters and the men who were too late to be spared as he and the inner circle of men make their way out. “ALICE!” his voice calls out as I pull my knife from the skull of another Bitter “NEGAN, I’LL FIND YOU, I SWEAR,” I call out as I push myself to the main door shooting three more bitters in the head.

“STAY ALIVE DOLL” I hear his voice one last time before I make my way out the fire door of the mall. Stay alive; that was his final order to me: stay alive for Negan for my savior. I make my way to the woods, one hand reaching to touch the necklace at my throat. The sounds of the dead following me as I found myself back at the beginning alone and chased by the deceased.

#negan x oc #the walking dead #negan smith #rick grimes #Spotify #SoundCloud

[probablyottrpgideas]

Tabletop Asks

In reference to the previous post: 1.) Game Master, Player or both? Why? 

I am currently lucky enough to be player in one game and DM in another (both 5e D&D), however ordinarily I am overwhelmingly the DM/GM. 

2.) When did you start role playing? How old were you? 

My first start with published tabletop adventures was actually quite late, in my second year of university when I was about 19, so 11 years ago now, with D&D 4e. However, I think my first freeform roleplaying experiences were with a mate of mine all the way back in primary school, where we had this quite extensive worldbuilding and characters. It was my first introduction to the idea that I wanted to be a writer.

3.) What was the first role playing book you ever owned? 

The 4e PHB, DMG and MM all at the same time. I had a job then, missed playing, decided “fuck it, I’ll start my own” and dived in.

4.) Describe the first game you ever ran or played in. 

A 4e Starters Box run on Keep on the Borderlands. I played a Dwarf Fighter out of the box, which I named Xzienne (which some of you know is my regular online handle). He was fun; in my oh-so-extra way, I kept my game notes as In-Character journal entries.

5.) Which system did you grow up with? 

D&D, all the way. Fourth edition and then Fifth, with a look at Third in between. But I’ve played about a dozen or two different systems all up.

6.) Which system do you play now? 

Predominantly 5e

7.) Longest campaign you’ve run or played in? 

My D&D “Empires Intelligence Services” campaign ran from 2016-2020.

8.) Where did you meet your current gaming group? 

I tend to throw my groups together from among various people I know from all over. My favourite group ever was the one formed entirely of cast members from our local theatre company production of Wicked.

9.) Strategic combat or dramatic plotlines? 

Does it need to be either/or? I feel like good drama gets you invested in the character’s outcomes, good combat (or puzzles or traps or whatever) gets you invested in the character’s actions. You want people to achieve their goals with emotional satisfaction but without just narrating to them; they need to feel involved in the process of making those goals come about. Challenges are not just there for the Power Gamers and the Slayers, they make the plotlines feel satisfying for everyone.

10.) Favorite RPG genre?

I love Science Fiction and I love Fantasy, and my own work so often smashes the two together. I write a lot of Contemporary/Urban Fantasy, and my D&D world is a magepunk magitech setting with spacefaring aircraft and so forth.

PLAYER CHARACTERS - Describe:

11.) Your first character. 

Xzienne the Dwarven Fighter, mentioned above. My first character I made though, on the other hand, not including NPCs, was much later. I think it was probably Tetsuo, my Shin-jin from a Dragonball RPG

12.) Your favorite character. 

Definitely Ortlinde. An Aasimar Witch who was the granddaughter of a Valkyrie, and was mad that the gods would be so callous as to bar her mother from Valhalla just because she wasn’t a warrior, and so tried to stage a coup against Asgard. Fuck she was cool.

13.) Your most ridiculous character. 

If not Ortlinde, then possibly Parian, my 13th Age Bard whose “One Unique Thing” (a 13th Age mechanic that I love) was that he could modify his spells on the fly by casting the verbal components as full poems, which I would write and perform in-session. I once got to add a Fear effect to a Thunderwave because I made it sound like the trumpets of judgement day, and I managed to cast Charm Person but with an allied player as the focus of the target’s charm by making the poem about their character.

14.) The best in-character line you’ve ever had. 

Not a lot of what other players have said have stuck with me, really. Possibly my favourite was Alice’s ranger in Castles and Crusades who said a whole lot of buckwild shit until my halfling begged her not to talk. 

Whereupon she shortly thereafter discovered a secret Dryad home inside a tree, and didn’t mention it to the party. When asked why?

“You told me not to talk.”

15.) Your most epic death. 

I haven’t died that often, to be honest. Probably the most memorable death was Parian, who got crushed in a moving wall trap and had to be scooped up in a bag and carried around as “bard soup” until a True Resurrection could be cast.

16.) Your most disappointing death. 

See above.

17.) Something that shouldn’t have worked, but did. 

Meliorn Metcalfe, Tiefling Spellbinder, orchestrating an ambush in a town square against the people who had been sending thugs to attack the party in their beds and stealing shit from the townsfolk. I set up traps (clay pots filled with caltrops and poison), used sunrods to blind the attackers while we had our backs to the light, and we greased the buildings around the area so that they couldn’t climb to safety. It went perfectly, even after they rocked up with a gargoyle.

18.) Something that went hilariously awry. 

Just recently I was playing in a Wildemount game which saw the party running Benny Hill style around an ancient lab from a Wight. In the process I got nearly killed by both flying knives and a very angry carpet.

19.) Your most memorable in-character moment. 

Ortlinde’s speech to Frigg, lambasting the Gods for their mistreatment of mortals. 

20.) The coolest item you ever got and how you came to possess it.

The Masque of Clavicus Vile, from the Elder Scrolls games, pulled from Niddhogr’s treasure hoard and buffing my Spell Save DC to 27 (including other stuff like class features for the Witch and another item which synergised with those). 

GAME MASTERS - Describe:

21.) Your favorite NPC and how the party reacted to him/her 

By far Celia Sapienza, Eladrin Kensai, who became the party Mum even though she was younger than a few of them. She’s now the head of the Empires Intelligence Services Northern Branch.

22.) A game you wish you could run or want to run someday. 

I’ve been eyeing off Dread, Skullduggery and Leverage for years, but I also recently got the Dishonoured game which looks sick as, and Blades in the Dark, and...

23.) Something you made up on the spot. 

So so much, but most recently I had a Marid sailor NPC who I had to improvise and entire story of his previous voyages. I did it in a Brian Blessed voice and the players, no shit, fucking applauded. 

24.) Your most successful game. 

The Wild Huntresses, finally figuring out who had killed the town alchemist and facing off against her and her pet Water Elemental in the caves beneath the hills. Such an epic game. God I miss that group.

25.) Your least successful game. 

Paranoia, but that’s just built into the premise.

26.) The craziest thing your players have ever done, and how it affected your plans. 

I had a player walk straight out the front doors of a castle under siege. I hit him with 2 dozen crossbow bolts. That guy was an asshole.

27.) Your favorite setting or game location. 

I massively love the idea of Eberron, and I love the MTG crossover settings like Ravnica and Theros. 

28.) Your creative process when you plan a game. 

Typically write about a page of notes for every 2-10 hours of gameplay, depending on the amount of combat expected. Things like important NPCs and what they want, where the party are expected to go in general terms and some ideas for things to throw at them when they inevitably wander off the path, that sort of thing. If it’s really plot important, though, I’ve been known to write pages and pages of lore and character info to hopefully seed into conversations. I also once wrote a full script that we did as a table read for a big conversation between a bunch of NPCs that the party were there to listen to but not be involved in. 

29.) The best / worst character concept you’ve ever heard. 

No character concept that fits within the rules is ever really bad, although sometimes the execution isn’t great. Some are very, very dumb, like say every character ever built or played by the asshole player I mentioned a few entries back.

30.) What makes GMing fun for you.

Players getting invested in the world and in each other’s stories. Nothing makes me feel better as a GM than being able to sit back while the players have a full in-character conversation with each other.

#tabletop #asks

[totally-incorrect-theatre-quotes]

After the Rain (Fanfic)

Beetlejuice

In which sibling chaos ensures and Lydia comes out to Beetlejuice. 

Guys I think this might be the most angst-free fic I’ve ever written

TW: Reference to Suicide (non-descriptive), bullying mentions

_______________________________________________________________

There was something going on in the house. Things had been a little too chummy around here ever since Lydia had gone back to school. Beetlejuice was annoyed to lose his partner in crime for seven hours out of the day plus all those hours she would spend in her room yelling at her homework. He hardly got a chuckle when he offered to eat her homework so she could blame it on the demon living in her house, she just rolled her eyes at him as she curled up another sheet of what she considered wrong answers and tossed it in the trash can next to her desk. The first week everything was fine, he was lonely but when she came home she was still excited to see him and talk about her day. He didn’t tell her how extremely boring it was, but sometimes her stories would drone on and she’d get into these tangents that he didn’t quite understand. For example, she came home on a Thursday and complained about for a solid hour about her geometry class and how difficult it is to find the circumference of a circle. He thought that was pointless but she seemed worked up over it. It all just seemed like normal teenage stuff to him for the first while back to school, but the second week she stopped coming in all smiles or huffing about some stupid question she got wrong on the quiz. She would spend more time shut up in the room, not wanting to talk to anyone. 

He wasn’t good with the whole emotions thing, any time he tried to help her he usually made the mess a whole lot worse so he figured he’d just let the breathers figure out why she was mopping around so much. It was a boring waiting game though, he heard fragments of what was going on some kids were being pricks to her at school but she rejected his offer to “take care of things” because his idea of taking care of things was apparently “immoral” and “illegal”. He was walking past her bedroom one night and he heard her crying, and something was thrown against her wall. He peered in cautiously wanting to do something, even if it was just distracting her with a stupid joke but she noticed him, walked over and gently shut the door in his face. He took the message and gave her space, but he couldn’t help but to feel a little hurt when he heard her talking to her father in his bedroom about how she was feeling. She was glad though that things were getting better, she seemed happier after that conversation and though he didn’t understand what exactly was going on he was happy to have his friend back. 

“Do you ever worry you’re avoiding doing something really important?” she asked him while he was absolutely destroying her at Mario Cart

“Constantly, I was supposed to give Chuck the keys to his car back like a month ago.”

“Wait my dad let you borrow the car?”

“Borrow isn’t the word I would use, I would say I took it without permission and have been avoiding giving him his keys back to not get caught. I’m surprised he hasn’t said anything, I have no clue how he’s been getting to work all this time.”

Lydia glared at him, “He has a second set of keys? He thought he lost his at the store or something.”

“You aren’t going to tell on me are ya, Scarecrow?” 

“No, I’m not a snitch. You just owe me now.”

“The usual?” Beetlejuice lowered his voice while Lydia tried to hold back a giggle as she nodded, “Okay fine, you’re a tough customer. I’ll find a way to get you more Capri Suns but it might take me some time.”

She wrinkled her nose at him just like she did any time she thought he was funny. He liked it when she laughed, he was so used to seeing her somber and upset during those first few days he knew her, and he still shuddered when he thought about when he found her crying in the bathroom...a bottle of pills thrown in the garbage can. Thankfully unopened but his mind instantly went to the worst. Seeing her happy was the closest thing he got to feeling alive again, and it was much nicer than the rollercoaster of emotions that first time around. 

“So what are you avoiding? Telling Chuck about a bad grade or worse...telling Barbara about a bad grade? What was it in, because I’ll have you know I graduated for Julliard and I’m sure I can figure out whatever easy stuff they’re teaching you, sixth graders.”

“I’m in high school BJ, but no it’s not that. I don’t know, it was dumb of me to ask. It’s just kind of confusing and I’m sure I’ll figure it out eventually but,” she was getting flustered trying to explain, “I’ll tell you another time.”

He shrugged and they went back to playing their video game. He was heavily insulted to realize that there wasn’t even a second controller to the console and that the whole time he had been using a flower pot and thinking one of the cars was his. She had let him go on like that for almost two hours before she eventually broke down laughing and told him the truth. Said flower pot was then smashed on the floor and the two had to quickly fix it before Barbara found out. 

Another week or so passed by with Lydia getting more comfortable with her new routine. Every Saturday she made time to spend with him just hanging out, doing friends things while listening to her talk about her week. He had been planning an amazing prank with Lydia to play on her father. The two struggled to figure out where he, a dead guy, and Lydia, a child would be able to purchase fireworks, but they figured they could just cross that bridge when they got to it. Friday nights though he was kind of the odd man out, that’s when she went up to the attic to hang with the Maitlands, so he usually either popped back to the Netherworld or recently he found out he had a lot more in common with Donna than he thought, he even finally figured out that he named was actually Delia. That Friday night Delia was busy though, selfishly going on a dinner date with Charles leaving Beetlejuice to his own devices, he thought about crashing the attic party but when he got to the door he heard Lydia sniffling about something and figured this was a whole lovey-dovey thing that he shouldn’t interrupt. He couldn’t help but feel left out, wishing that sometimes Lydia would come to him with this kind of stuff too but he figured the Maitlands or her parents knew better, he should just stick with being the fun one. 

Lydia woke up the next morning feeling so much lighter after having told the Maitlands what was on her mind and she was ready to unleash the master prank her and BJ had been planning for almost two weeks now. Though it took some work and possibility lying about her age on the internet they were able to secure three bottle-rockets and fourteen confetti poppers, she wasn’t exactly sure what was going to happen but she was just excited to see the look on everyone’s face if they could actually figure out how to get it to explode the colors they had picked. The two of them were out in the backyard, trying not to draw attention to themselves when she realized she hadn’t told BJ yet. He was just as much a member of her new family as everyone else was, and she felt bad for not telling him sooner. 

She didn’t know how to approach it with him though, it had been an accident with Delia, a serious conversation with her dad and the Maitlands, and none of those seemed like options for telling him. A joke seemed too casual but he wasn’t the serious conversation kind of guy. She looked over at him kicking a rock at the fence in the yard because “it was looking at him the wrong way” and she decided there was no right or wrong way to do it. 

“Hey Beej, can I tell you something?”

“Is it how to get vengeance on a rock because that fucking STONE over there is getting on my last damn nerve”

“No, it’s not that dumbass.” She rolled her eyes at him, and lead him by the hand over to the porch swing, “I want to tell you something, and it’s kinda important so don’t be weird about it, alright?”

“No promises.”

“I’m gay.”

“I’m a hazard to society.”

Lydia jerked her head back, “Wait what?” “Oh, I thought we were saying things that were obvious.” She smacked his arm roughly and he gave her a toothy grin, “What? Come on you think I didn’t know that my best friend wasn’t into dudes?”

“You literally married me!” 

“Oh my god, how many times do I have to tell you it was a green card thing! It was funny the first time you joked about being my widow. Besides, that sham of a marriage was mutually beneficial.”

“I fail to see how I benefitted from it besides it being an interesting topic to discuss with my therapist.”

He groaned as if it was the most obvious thing in the world, “It was meant to serve as a message to reinforce that men are trash.”

“Aren’t you a man?” Lydia tilted her head at him

“Am I not trash?”

“And don’t you have like a massive crush on the Maitlands? I can’t say for sure but I’m pretty sure Adam is a guy.” She laughed when she was tints of crimson flush on Beetlejuice’s cheeks. They both laughed for a little bit before Lydia sighed, “I’m glad I told you, even if you’re being annoying about it.”

“That’s my job.” He ruffled her short black hair affectionately, “...I’m glad you told me too.”

#lydia deetz #delia deetz #adam maitland #barbara maitland #charles deetz #lawrence beetlejuice shoggoth #beetlejuice #incorrect beetlejuice quotes #beetlegeuse #beetlejuice the musical #beetlejuice fanfic #beetlejuice fanfiction

[amixiifish]

Heat- Chapter 59: Melon Lord

The Gaang stands on some rocky cliffs near the beach.

Sokka clasps his hands together. “Gather round, Team Avatar.”

He puts a carved melon on top of a draped mannequin.

“In order to take out the Fire Lord - or in this case, the Melon Lord - our timing has to be perfect,” Sokka explains.

He kneels down on the ground and uses a stick to draw a line heading toward the Melon Lord symbol.

“First, Suki, Jet, and I will draw his fire. Then, Katara and Zuko charge in with some liquidy hot offense, and while the Melon Lord is distracted, Aang swoops in and bam! He delivers the final blow.”

Toph raises a hand, “Uh ... what about me?”

“For now, you're the Melon Lord's forces,” Sokka says.

Toph ponders it for a moment. “So I get to chuck flaming rocks at all of you?”

Sokka shrugs. “Whatever makes the training feel more realistic.”

Toph grins. “Sweetness.”

After a few moments, Toph was surrounded by boulders coated in grease with small bowls of fire set out in front of each boulder.

Toph flails her fists, casting the rocks to move. “Mwah-ha-ha-ha!”

Katara and Sokka look at Aang and Momo who look at Suki and Jet.

Sokka signals to the others to start moving.

Sokka, Jet, and Suki run toward the Melon Lord, but become confronted by stone Fire Nation soldiers, who suddenly rise out of the ground.

Sokka cuts one stone soldier in half and Suki kicks down another one while Jet decapitates the third.

They keep running, but a large burning rock boulder falls out of the sky in front of them.

Suki jumps over the boulder while Jet skillfully manages to slide under before it hits the ground.

Sokka finds himself fallen down just a few inches away from the flaming boulder and jumps up.

“Watch it, Toph!” Sokka yells.

“I am not Toph. I am Melon Lord! Mwah-ha-ha-ha-ha-ha!” Toph cackles, lighting up more boulders.

Toph lights a second boulder on fire and sends it through the air at Zuko and Katara.

They run around the boulder and become surrounded by a circle of stone Fire Nation soldiers, which they quickly destroy.

The two flash each other a grin before continuing.

“Now, Aang!” Sokka calls.

Aang jumps, preparing to strike the Melon Lord with his glider staff.

Aang looks at the Melon Lord and changes expressions from anger to uncertainty.

When he lands, Aang stops his attack just before smashing the Melon Lord.

He slowly backs away.

Zuko gawks at him. “What are you waiting for? Take him out!”

Aang shakes his head. “I can't.”

Sokka walks up to Aang. “What's wrong with you? If this was the real deal, you'd be shot full of lightning right now.”

Aang bites his lip. “I'm sorry, but it just didn't feel right. I didn't feel like myself.”

Sokka takes out his sword and slices the melon in half.

Aang winces as he hears squishing sounds.

Sokka sheaths his sword. “There, that's how it's done.”

A piece of melon falls on the ground near the Melon Lord.

Momo slurps some melon juice out of the piece.

Aang's face shows horror at the scene.

Later that night, Team Avatar shares a meal outside.

Aang faces away from the rest of the group.

Katara runs out of the house, a scroll in her hands. “I have a surprise for everyone!”

Toph points at her with a grin. “I knew it! You did have a secret thing with Haru!”

Jet, Sokka, Zuko, and Suki look at her weird.

Katara looks at her unamused. “Uh, no. I was looking for cooking pots in the attic, and I found this!”

She unravels the scroll, showing a painting of a happy dark-haired baby playing at the beach.

“Look at baby Zuko. Isn't he cute?” Katara coos.

Everybody except Zuko laughs.

“Oh, lighten up. I'm just teasing,” Katara says, poking Zuko’s side playfully.

Zuko shakes his head, lips pursed. “That's not me. It's my father.”

Katara rolls up the scroll as everyone goes quiet.

Suki looked appalled. “But he looks so sweet and innocent.”

Zuko sighs. “Well, that sweet little kid grew up to be a monster, and the worst father in the history of fathers.”

“But he's still a human being,” Aang blurts out.

Zuko looks shocked before he looks furious. “You're going to defend him?”

Aang raises his hands in mock surrender while standing up. “No, I agree with you. Fire Lord Ozai is a horrible person, and the world would probably be better off without him, but there's got to be another way.”

Zuko narrows his eyes. “Like what?”

Aang perks up. “I don't know but maybe we can make some big pots of glue, and then I can use gluebending to stick his arms and legs together so he can't bend anymore!”

“Yeah, then you can show him his baby pictures, and all those happy memories will make him good again,” Zuko said sarcastically.

Jet and Sokka laugh.

Aang looks at Zuko excitedly. “Do you really think that would work?”

“No,” Zuko says bluntly.

Aang sighs before pacing back and forth. “This goes against everything I learned from the monks. I can't just go around wiping out people I don't like.”

“Sure you can. You're the Avatar. If it's in the name of keeping balance, I'm pretty sure the universe will forgive you,” Sokka said.

Aang turns to Sokka, anger clear on his face. “This isn't a joke, Sokka! None of you understand the position I'm in.”

“Aang, we do understand. It's just-” Katara consoles

“Just what, Katara? What?” Aang snaps.

Katara reels back. “We're trying to help!”

“Then, when you figure out a way for me to beat the Fire Lord without taking his life, I'd love to hear it!” Aang yells, walking away.

Katara walks towards Aang. “Aang, don't walk away from this.”

Zuko puts a hand on Katara’s shoulder. “Let him go. He needs time to sort it out by himself.”

#atla #toph #jetokko #jetko #zukka #zuko #sokka #jet #aang #suki #omegaverse #heat (amixiifish) #katara #our fic

[tothedarkdarkseas]

What do you think is the REAL difference between Stu and Murdoc? Is it upbringing, age, personality, or cocktail of things?

I’ve gotta tell you, of all the kind asks you sent (and what a nice thing that was of you to do, thank you, they were fun to ponder!) this is the one I’m like… jittery to answer because there’s just so much to be said. Put under a cut because it ended up kinda stupid-long.

I mean, what has to be determined first is– are Murdoc and Stu that different? I tend to think they’re not, not as much as they are alike. That’s actually what I like best about them and something I usually play to when I can, how much they both resemble a certain stereotype but with their own twist. Many of their differences are a little superficial, like Stu being a bit more geezery with his football and all, and Murdoc being less uptight with his hobbies (be it involving cheeky GTA or a gimp mask.) I joked the other day that the biggest difference between the two is just that Murdoc does uppers and Stu does downers, and that’s pretty much it. I do think on a “deeper” level, like a more innate behavioral level, they’re a lot more similar than they actually realize.

But with all that being said, of course they’re not identical, and there’s a lot that contributes to where exactly they differ. I think that everything you said is absolutely relevant to that!

Let’s start with age and upbringing. The age difference between Murdoc and Stu is actually fairly stark when you just look at the years, but it never feels quite that bad to me because Murdoc and Stu are both so emotionally stunted and immature. There’s a line in Bojack Horseman than I think is incredibly on-point here, about how “the age you are when you get famous is the age you stop growing.” I think for Stu, it absolutely damned him to become famous at around 20, it locked him mentally into an age where he should’ve been learning everything wouldn’t be given to him, and instead it was just… given to him. In excess. If you follow that reasoning Murdoc’s sort of odd though, in that he never actually achieved fame on any major scale until he was in his 30′s. It seems more like Murdoc’s exaggerated sense of self-importance (probably a response to knowing, very much knowing, that he was not in fact something towering and impressive at all, and there’s like… something absurdist in really choosing to think he is. That’s almost the ultimate form of his Humor As A Shield– what could be a bigger joke than not hating himself?! Ha! It’s funny because it’s sad!) set in way before he actually became famous. It’s more like his maturity is stalled at the time he started trying to be famous. Stu didn’t actually try to pursue music at all before, while Murdoc spent a decade absolutely convinced that it had to work and doggedly not accepting when it wasn’t. It feels like these two approaches enabled (or damaged) them in different ways, but both end up with the result of men who don’t act their age for many years and have hedonistic, stereotypically rockstarish ways of living far beyond that of their bandmates. Stu can barely claim he knows better though and is perhaps more… people are gonna yell at me for being so hard on him haha, but more spoiled and therefore more ignorant because he never actually lived a responsible adult life. (Does that mean Stu hasn’t had difficulty in that life? Absolutely not. The man has at least three counts of massive head trauma and was in a coma for an undetermined period of time, he has a permanent physical impairment that likely impacts his vision, I think he’s earned a few perks.) Murdoc on the other hand is very aware of what it was like to be a failure, to be conventionally unemployable, and to have so little to lose that he’d make incredibly stupid decisions that could’ve ended his free life. His indulgence now is frankly more extreme, but Murdoc has an even greater sense of believing he earned that and he owes nothing (whether that’s completely true or not.) 

And that’s just touching on the ends of their “upbringing,” not the actual 18+ years that went into it. It goes without saying that Stu and Murdoc had very different home lives– Rachel and David Pot are suggested to be rather precious with Stu out of some probable guilt for his first head trauma, in complete contrast to Sebastian’s humiliation and neglect– but on top of that, what seems to be glossed over at times is how they grew up in very different regions at very different time periods. I’m far from an authority on this or on anything (as always I really suggest asking @elapsed-spiral if you want better information, don’t let the hiatus thing fool you, Danni’ll still talk about British Shit Innit) but I’m told the British school system Murdoc would’ve endured in the 60s and 70s was unremittingly bleak and damaging to a child’s development. Despite his immaturity and my feelings that their age difference isn’t really so pronounced, Murdoc is older than Stu and unfortunately he experienced a much colder and rougher school environment, and it’s tough to argue that didn’t have an effect. (Though on the flipside, Stu was in school during Section 28, a thing I’m also not an authority on. Go figure a working class and very closeted bisexual man in the 80s might internalize some homophobia! The go-go 80s aren’t all they’re cracked up to be.) It’s not exactly surprising that Murdoc, who grew up on the lowest end of working class, in council housing, in an unglamorous Northern town like Stoke with a neo-fascist brother and a neglectfully-abusive alcoholic father, would come away an emotionally repressed and embittered person. It’s almost a bit bold that Murdoc is as “flamboyant” as he is (even if it comes with a hefty side of toxic masculinity)– he could’ve become hateful in a more stony way, but instead he’s like a giddy-cruel showman out of spite. You can argue that Murdoc’s lack of support system results in him feeling much more unfettered. He has no one to thank for getting him out of that and no one he credits for getting him where is. He very much has the mentality of “I take what I can and do what I want, because the world owes me everything.” And in a way, I can see where that’d come from.

He’s wrong though. Because Stu’s there. And Stu owes Murdoc nothing.

I know I’m really running on here, and I think you probably already have a picture of what I see Stu’s upbringing and childhood as. Rachel Pot is the unsung best character in Gorillaz, Stu was quite coddled by his parents, and Stu admits to being largely unmotivated and rudderless. It’s notable that Stu is in fact also working class but he’s presented like he’s not, I think just as a result of looking a lot better in comparison to Murdoc and us Americans not fully knowing the details of the British class system as compared to ours. (I don’t want to condescend to you anon, you may be British and know all this a lot better than I do. But because I am American, what would be more American than assuming everyone’s American?) I would say Stu’s family places on the higher end of that though (again, council housing for Murdoc, Stu had a garden with what must’ve been a decently big tree for him to fall out of) and isn’t portrayed as struggling in the same way. His job at Norm’s seems more like something he does because he’s not allowed to sit in the house all day, and he likes messing with the keyboards and he likes having spending money because he’s too old for allowance, and girls he’s fooled around with occasionally pop in to his work and bring him a pastry from the Tesco Express she works at and they make out in her car. Stu comes away from Crawley with quite a few “tethers” that disallow him from feeling as “loose” as Murdoc– he has a good relationship with his parents, a handful of mates, probably a handful of girls he wasn’t on bad terms with, at least one who’d end up becoming his girlfriend. So why does he have some of the same “cruel showman” qualities as Murdoc? Why does his entitlement end up looking much the same? That’s all personal interpretation of course, but I’d say it’s because Murdoc drove a car into his face and stole an unspecified amount of time from his life. I’d say because he’s out of his parent’s house for the first time in his life, and he’s going full throttle into being this person now. I’d say that in one night, and many unconscious nights following it, Murdoc smashed that same embittered attitude into the front of Stu’s skull. To be clear, that isn’t writing off Stu’s faults on Murdoc; it isn’t to say Murdoc made him egotistical or promiscuous or immature. But the attitude that you are fucking owed something is really only an attitude they share because Murdoc gave Stu someone to spite where he didn’t have that before.

(I recognize this whole dynamic isn’t for everyone and I do get it, and for what it’s worth I think it’s totally correct to say Murdoc gave Stu all the best things in his life. He just also gave him the worst bits too. The reality is neither would be here without each other, for all the good and bad that implies. It’s true that Stu’s famous because of Murdoc, but it’s also true that Murdoc’s famous because of Stu. What a tangled web!)

I’m sorry, I’m so off the question now, I just love this stuff. So, personality! That’s unquestionably a factor, the answer to the nature vs nurture debate will always be a little bit of both. I think if you tallied up all of Stu and Murdoc’s traits, desires, and behaviors after they’ve been living together a few years, you’d find a longer list in the similarities column than the differences. The environmental influence doesn’t just stop at where you’re raised, I think the environment you live in and the people who inhabit it continue to have an impact on you pretty much throughout life; even if moving to a richer city doesn’t “change” you, it changes the way you look at things, understand things, respond to things. It just inherently does. Still, I recognize that’s my own characterization of them and if you just look at the characters in canon, you’d be hard pressed to say they seem like the same guy. There are things about them that are just innately different, some of it learned through their upbringing and some of it dictated by… the way they’re wired.

Which is a point I’m really hesitant to comment on too much, but– mental health. It probably doesn’t look the same between Stu and Murdoc. There are other blogs who will discuss in more depth their neurodivergent headcanons and I see nothing wrong with that, I don’t really think there is any case that can’t be made, but I’m not especially confident making those cases myself. What I’ll say is that I don’t necessarily read Stu as having any specific learning disorder, because I fear it’s a little… iffy to have so many jokes in canon about him being thick or being slow. I think it really is just that, even prior to the injuries I reckon Stu was “a bit thick.” Head trauma doesn’t help that, though. Lifelong migraines and impaired motor function came about from the brain damage, absolutely, and I do imagine he must’ve suffered some neural response slowing, but his “lower intelligence” I feel a little less comfortable casually ascribing to anything and more to just Stu being Stu. Murdoc is also a case to be careful with, but within phase 3 it seems fair to say Murdoc suffers a psychotic break and is dealing with some delusions. Dangerously, I kind of lean into thinking this isn’t something that “just happened” because of the events of El Mañana and Plastic Beach, and that Murdoc had perhaps needed to be on an anti-psychotic like lithium well before that point. Again, I don’t want to insensitively represent this so I try not to really put such a fine point on things, but… I’m a little inclined to think Murdoc went undiagnosed in his young life and still may be demonstrating some effects of that. So, y’know, make what you will of it, but there’s that.

Sorry I nattered on about this, I do really enjoy examining both characters. Jokes about the drugs and stuff aside, I’ve always felt that the biggest difference between Murdoc and Stu is that Murdoc is adaptable, and Stu is malleable. Where that stems from is probably a combination of all these things. Murdoc knows what he wants and has no loyalties, he’s been without a future, he does what he can to succeed because he’s already done what he can to survive; Stu doesn’t know what he wants and he does have “loyalties,” but he has no sense of purpose, and he’s easily nudged in the direction you need him to go. While he can be stubborn, just like Murdoc, he’s also more sincerely shaped by his experiences even later in life into multiple, sometimes disparate versions of himself– I might even wager that’s why Stu becomes such a contradictory character without any of the contradictions feeling inauthentic. The two of them “being what they need to be” is part of the reason they accomplished as much as they did. But it’s also hard to say that they really “held on” to each other through the years, or if they just melded together in parts.

#Anonymous #sorry i'm late with this but i can't shut up #headcanon posts

[sleepingfancies]

We Need to Talk About SJM

I was recently anonymously asked what exactly my issue with Sarah Jane Maas is, and ended up writing what was essentially a thesis paper about it. Unfortunately, Tumblr pulled a Shitty Website move and deleted everything I wrote under the ‘read more’ tab, so I’m compiling my reasons here on a masterpost, for your reading leisure.

EDIT: Read more tab continues to not work for me, so I apologize to all of you who have to suffer through this. I’ll tag is as a long post accordingly.

Let’s get started

                                                        ***********

Reason 1: She preaches messages that no young girl needs to (or should) hear.

Granted, I know the a lot of the YA genre are adults who are no strangers to smut and aren’t phased by toxic behavior in characters. But on the same token, a lot of the YA genre is fueled by young girls age 12-20. Now I’m not going to sit here and pretend like girls in that age range aren’t reading/writing smutty fanfiction or dating. I know they do, I did, most of my friends did. But at that age, young girls are still trying to figure out who they are and who they want to be, including in terms of relationships. That’s where my problem with Maas comes in.

Maas writes, almost exclusively, toxic relationships - at best. Straight up abusive at worst. At one point in ACOTAR, I had to put the book down because I was so disgusted by what happened. Rhysand assaulted Feyre. I’m not kidding. He kissed and groped her against her will, telepathically asked whether she was wet about it, and wondered aloud what she looked like naked. The entire goal of doing this was to piss Feyre’s then-boyfriend off, and for Rhysand to assert his dominance as a Fae lord or whatever the fuck (y’know, like rapists do). Feyre was left shaking, nauseated, and scared for her life. But the worst part? It was written like this was something sexy and desirable. Literal penetration was all that stopped this from being a horrifying rape scene, and I couldn’t believe Maas wrote about it like some hot erotica. It wasn’t romantic. It wasn’t cute. It was disgusting, violating, and I was furious when I read it (especially given Feyre actually ends up with Rhysand eventually. What the fuck).

In Throne of Glass - and subsequent sequels - there are couples (namely Rowan and Aelin) who quite literally spit on each other, punch each other, and bite each other. No, not “love nip” bite, I mean “I’m trying to tear your skin off” bite. But we’re meant to believe they’re endgame, meant to be, and a totally healthy relationship. Let’s not even get into emotional abuse and manipulation, because holy fuck does every single character in these books act like a goddamn villain if we were to go over that in detail. All you need to know is that “if you don’t do xyz then I’ll leave and never come back” “what made you think I cared about you? You’re nothing to me. Just kidding, I love you” and similar sentiments are rampant in these series.

While we’re here, what is up with this “mates” nonsense? Every character pairing we see by the end of the ToG series has a “mate,” and swears off everyone they’ve had before, claiming them to be “false mates.” This whole “mates” business sounds a lot like somebody desperately trying to reassure their insanely jealous partner that they don’t still have feelings for their ex. That’s not healthy! That’s not okay! Your exes helped you narrow down your search. They helped you understand yourself more and what you want (or don’t want). And y’know what? It’s okay to have happy memories with an ex. It’s okay to not hate your ex. Telling young girls that all that matters is their future husband (which erases LGBT+ girls, as well as straight women who don’t want to get married) is harmful as hell, and contributes to the idea that a girl is only “complete” when she finds her “soulmate.”

Girls 12-20 really do not need to be given the message that it’s normal - nay, romantic - for their partners to hit them, humiliate them, or assault them. You may be saying, “Clara, come on, girls know fiction isn’t reality and no girl is actually going to stand for that kind of thing in real life.” But I can’t tell you how horribly my own view of relationships was corrupted for several years after all the books I read as a tween where the protagonist had to defend her flirty boyfriend from the advances of other girls. I didn’t trust boys not to cheat on me. I didn’t trust my girl friends not to try and steal a boyfriend. I thought girls who dressed up and wore makeup and dated a lot were sluts. It took me years of conscious effort to unlearn those ideas. Fiction can and does influence the reader. So again I say: teaching girls that it’s “hot and sexy” when men literally abuse you is not a message a 12-20 year old should be hearing. Ever.

                                                     ***************

Reason 2: What exactly does Maas want her readers to be?

Y’know, Maas thinks Caelena/Aelin is a role model for young girls. But here’s a brief list of things Celery/Alien has done throughout the Throne of Glass series:

1. Tried to smash a flower pot over a girl’s head for showing interest in courting Prince Dorian. Despite said girl literally being present at the castle for that purpose and Caelena was not.

2. Very nearly murdered Dorian for absolutely fuckall reason, and then she got mad at Chaol for trying to stop her (keep in mind: Chaol and Dorian are supposed to be best friends. So like... yeah, he’s gonna come to Dorian’s defense).

3. Straight up said, “if I get bored being queen I’ll just go and conquer more lands for my kingdom.” Imperialist there much, Aelin?

This is Maas’ role model material? Half the shit she does from Heir of Fire onward could be described as “war crime” and the other half could be described as “selfish.” Maas seems to think that a shit ton of half-baked “witty” lines and a few “badass” fight scenes completely makes up for having an amoral character as the protagonist you want to flaunt around as an icon for young girls.

It would be one thing if Maas said, “I don’t want anyone to be like Celery/Alien. She’s not a good person and I want my readers to be able to identify how and why she isn’t a good person. The moral is what not to be like.” But she does the opposite and claims time and time again that Celery/Alien is some kind of feminist warrior, when in fact Celery/Alien is the very epitome of white feminism and false feminism. She’ll be all kinds of gung-ho for herself, but as soon as another woman mentions her own unique problems or lifestyles, Celery/Alien thinks she’s a “whiny bitch,” “dumb slut,” or something similar. Celery/Alien ends up looking down her nose at basically every other female character. The lack of female friendships in Maas’ books is frankly astounding.

No girl needs to be Celery/Alien. Celery/Alien is not a role model, she is not a feminist, she is not a figurehead of a well developed female character or even a compelling antihero. She’s sexist, she’s misogynistic, she has serious anger issues, she’s manipulative, she’s abusive. This is not who young girls should be looking up to.

                                                       ************

Reason 3: Maas has no place in the YA genre.

I’m not really sure I need to elaborate much on this. Let me give you a scenario:

Imagine you’re at a book signing for your fans. They’re mostly girls 15-20, so you kind of just sign their copies without thinking much about it. But then a smaller girl comes up to the table, you ask her age, and she says “I’m ten.” A 10 year old girl is standing in front of you, clutching her copy of your book where you wrote and published the scene, “he buried in to the hilt and roared. Over and over he spilled inside of her, the lightning outside flashing soft and lovely long after he stilled.”

Look me in the eye and tell me that shit is appropriate in the YA genre. At all. Ever.

You wanna write romance? Go for it. It can be cute! It can be healthy! It can be intriguing! But this? This? This is just... erotica. If you’re publishing stuff like this in the YA genre, in a book that isn’t even on the ‘tween/teen romance’ shelves, then you better be ready to take full responsibility for teaching 10 year olds what a blowjob is, what an orgasm is, what BDSM is, what a fucking foot fetish is.

I know JK Rowling isn’t the most popular right now, but even she did better than this. The first 3 Harry Potter books you can generally find on the children’s/middle grade shelves. They were cute, fun little adventures about wizards and magic and fantastic creatures. Books 4-7? Those are on the YA shelves. People are dying, magic is dangerous, fascist organizations are on the rise -- it isn’t fun for Harry anymore. It isn’t about the wonders of magic. It’s about life or death, war, and fear. So yeah, of course those book aren’t going to be on the children’s/middle grade shelves! They’re dark! They’re scary! That kind of material shouldn’t be advertised as appropriate for younger kids!

Maas never extended that courtesy. Maas took her books full of badly written erotica and plopped them down right where all the rest of the completely tame YA books went, because she wanted the sales. She didn’t care if she was exposing kids who were too young to explicit sex scenes. She never posted a disclaimer, she never posted any kind of warning on social media when the books came out. Nope. She just silently took advantage of the market knowing she’d get more sales in YA. But it has no place in YA. It’s not YA. And I don’t think I’m ever gonna be okay with that.

                                                          ***********

Reason 4: Diversity? Never heard of it!

Maas’ books are so incredibly white and straight that it’s painful. Rowan and Aelin? White and straight. Feyre? Rhysand? Chaol? Dorian? Manon? Hey, you guessed it! They’re all white and straight (despite Chaol, Dorian, and Manon being heavily LGBT+ coded for like, the entire series till the last book)!

“He looked at his friend, perhaps for the last time, and said what he had always known, from the moment they met, ‘I love you.’” (Queen of Shadows)

Hello? Sarah Jane? I’m all for male friendships, but there’s male friendships and then there’s actual romance. Chaol and Dorian are about as gay-coded as they could fucking get. And this isn’t even the only time this happens! Check this out:

“Dorian surged from his chair and dropped to his knees beside the bed. He grabbed Chaol’s hand, squeezing it as he pressed his brow against his. ‘You were dead,’ the prince said, his voice breaking. ‘I thought you were dead.’” (Queen of Shadows)

But wait, there’s more!

“‘I’m not leaving you. Not again.’

Dorian’s mouth tightened. ‘You didn’t leave, Chaol.’ He shook his head once, sending tears slipping down his cheeks. ‘You never left me.’” (Queen of Shadows)

I mean come on, Sarah!

Also, Manon. My girl Manon hated men, pretty explicitly, for the entire series. In case you don’t believe me:

“There were few sounds Manon enjoyed more than the groans of dying men.” (Heir of Fire)

Oh, and other characters even imply Manon has never had a heterosexual relationship in her fucking life. See:

“‘That golden-haired witch, Asterin...’ Aelin said. ‘She screamed Manon’s name the way I screamed yours. How can I take away somebody who means the world to someone else? Even if she is my enemy.’” (Queen of Shadows)

Tell me that’s not gay as fuck. I dare you.

Manon had a whole lot of love to give women! She was always affectionate towards other women. Particularly Elide. This is a woman who was about as lesbian as you could get. Had no interest in men, every interest in women, rejected typically expected roles for women (getting married and having kids, etc.) but guess what happened? Guess what fucking happened?

This warrior who was friends with and rode on a big fuckoff wyvern completely and totally submits to Dorian as her lover. I don’t mean that metaphorically. They literally do some BDSM shit where he’s her “master” and she “kneels to him” or whatever the fucking fuck. This entire thing pissed me off more than Chaol and Dorian being all “no homo bro,” because Maas used every possible symbol and subtext for Manon being gay, and then said “just kidding!” Her relationship with Dorian came out of nowhere. All of a sudden she was just as thirsty for mediocre dick as Aelin.

At this point I honestly have to wonder if Maas is really this ignorant or if she’s - dare I say it? - taunting her readers who have complained about the lack of LGBT+ representation. Maas has, historically, not reacted well to people criticizing her work. I would not put it beyond her at all to intentionally queer-code characters only to turn around and rip the rug out from under her readers by pairing them up in heterosexual relationships. And not only is that shitty writing, but it’s... really malicious and rude.

Of course then there’s the issues with racial representation. Again, Maas doesn’t even try. She includes 13 characters of color only to immediately kill off all of them in a suicide pact. So there’s that. Not sure I need to say more than that.

Maas knows what diversity is, but as per her famous quote, “I just don’t want to force diversity into my books.” So. Y’know. Writing a black or gay character (or!! God forbid, both black and gay!!) is asking a little too much of her, apparently. She doesn’t want to force anything as unbelievable as someone who isn’t white or straight, don’tcha know? In these books about fae people and dragons and gods fighting mortals and explicit erotica, an LGBT+ character or a character of color is high fantasy, not YA. *Sarcasm*

                                                        ************

Reason 5: The woman can’t write.

This is pretty straightforward. She cannot write. My proof? She plagiarizes the living fuck out of everything she can to avoid actually writing her own original work.

1. “You’re gonna rattle the stars.” - from Disney’s Treasure Planet

2. “The Queen Who Was Promised” - from GRRM’s ASOIAF, where Dany Targaryen is often toted as the exact same thing. Oh, and The Prince Who Was Promised prophecy in ASOIAF also mentions Azor Ahai being “the Heir of Fire” so, uh.... yeah.

3. Aelin basically being Aragorn. Lost royalty spends years as an outcast, denies their claim, teams up with elves (fae in Aelin’s case) to defeat a greater evil, becomes known as the people’s champion, falls in love with an elf (fae) and makes them their consort, crowned by the people, ends their coronation scene with a “you bow to no one” (I’m not kidding).

4. Nehemia dying for Aelin and it later being revealed that Nehemia was “grooming” Aelin to face great evil, and potentially give her life to stop it. How much you wanna bet Maas tried to give Aelin a name as close to “Harry Potter” as she could get?

5. Manon lighting a series of beacons across a mountain range to call for aid during war. I mean seriously? This is one of the most iconic scenes in Peter Jackson’s rendition of Lord of the Rings. It’s moving, it’s powerful, it’s awe-inspiring. And Maas knew it. So she just... took it. I don’t have a lot of respect for writers who can’t write their own moving scenes.

6. Kingsflame blossoms, which only bloom when the rightful monarch is on the throne. So... the White Tree of Gondor. Got it.

7. The Hand of the King being a royal court position. Like... jesus. GRRM, come get ya world-building, SJ stole it again.

8. A paralyzed Chaol has a specialized saddle made for him, because he wants more than anything to ride a horse again. GRRM! Please! She’s taking Bran Stark’s story now!

And besides all of these horribly plagiarized points, there’s nothing even slightly compelling about these books. There’s literally zero substance, and the last few books in both the ACOTAR and ToG series have been nothing but a smut-fest. Plot who? We don’t know her.

Trauma, both physical and mental, is erased at the drop of a dime (Aelin lost physical scars, Chaol’s paralysis was basically cured, series of events that should’ve left characters absolutely fucked just... didn’t phase them). The battles are rushed and sloppily written, and Maas has a particularly nasty habit of focusing on exactly the wrong people in the middle of what should be an action packed scene. Instead of showing alliances forging and plots being made behind people’s backs, instead of showing us people gearing up for battle by saying tearful goodbyes to their infants and spouses, Maas shows us Rowan and Aelin banging on a beach, or a tree, or a ship, or wherever the fuck they happen to be at that moment.

None of these characters lose jack shit. There is no sense of urgency or stakes, because we knew since Heir of Fire that Aelin and her precious uwu fae “mate” would be just fine. Why? Because nobody shipped Rowaelin as hard as Sarah Jane Maas did. Consistently the only people who suffer in these books are background characters (who, coincidentally, are almost always the characters of color and LGBT+ characters). By the end of Kingdom of Ash, literally everyone is fine. And paired off to be married, too! Because a happy ending isn’t a true happy ending if it doesn’t end with Babies Ever After and everyone in a heterosexual relationship, of course, right?

                                                        ***********

Reason 6: World-building doesn’t even go here! Sorry, she just wanted to be a part of something.

Maas’ world-building is... how do you say... shitty. New lore pops up in every book, having never been mentioned before, and is for some reason of utmost importance (but only for this book. It’ll be forgotten again as soon as it isn’t relevant). Religions who? Culture where? History what? None of these things exist in Maas’ world. None.

Now before anyone jumps down my throat with “but The World of Throne of Glass is coming out this year!!!1!1!!” let me gently establish something. Speaking as a fantasy author: if you do not have your most basic world-building - that being religion, culture, language, and history - already established, then you have no business making a “world of” book to cover all the bases your ass never bothered with in the original series.

I said what I said.

Tolkien and GRRM are masters of world-building because they spent decades working to forge their worlds before they ever put a pen to paper and wrote their stories. Not to toot my own horn, but my own fantasy series has been developing for almost 7 years now. What am I doing with it? I’m outlining governments in different societies, why people came to worship what they do, and I’m making a fucking world map on my bedroom floor (that now has cat paw prints on it, so it’s not exactly final product material anyway).

I give not a single hoot for Maas’ “The World of Throne of Glass.” She could be saying anything she wanted to and it would all just have to be canon, because she’s establishing what this world is after already finishing her series. Yes, it does piss me off, because it’s pretty obvious she didn’t have a clue what her world was, or who was who, or why things were the way they were. She made shit up as she went along, nothing more. There was no grand scheme. There was no planning, and it shows.

                                                       ***********

TL;DR: I have a lot of issues with Sarah J Maas’ writing, including her world-building and handling of diversity. But most of all I despise the potential impact she has on the YA genre and on the young girls reading her work. They deserve better than this. They deserve better than Sarah Jane Maas.

#anti sjm #anti aelin #anti rowan #anti throne of glass #anti a court of thorns and roses #anti tog #anti acotar #anti acomaf #anti acofas #anti hof #anti qos #anti kos #anti eos #anti tod #masterpost #anti rowaelin #anti manorian #listen i'm really trynna mind my tags here so it doesn't show up somewhere pro #i know this seems excessive but catch me being respectful even as i drag sarah jane mess through the mud #clara says stuff #longpost #long post #anti celaena

[malicious-fisheeves]

I wrote a little thing for Tens. There is Violence

        Tens has the habit of mostly just swimming through one day to the next. He would like to think it’s just due to his age-- now that he’s in his thirties for the second time. If time is a river he’s gotten trapped in some eddy, like a leaf dancing on the surface, spinning in circles.

      It’s not a terrible fate...

      On this day, he’s made his way back into the tavern while the spring rains begin again. Within seconds of his entrance, it starts pouring. Big rain drops smack against the window and he can hear the roar of wind and rain pounding against the thatch roofing.

      He sighs.

      Taking a seat at the bar, the warmth from the hearth at his back, he allows for the worst of that afternoon’s chill to slip away .

      The bartender and presumably tavern owner is an older woman-- a little worn by sea salt and the bone chilling winters, streaks of dark hair mixed between mostly white and grey. Her face reads as “I take no shit” but she seems entertained enough by him. There’s a little crescent shaped scar on her lip that bends when she smiles, which he finds charming.

      “What else can I get for you young man?”

      “Anything warm, miss-- could I by chance have your name, actually?”

      She raises an eyebrow, but has a warm expression. “Margraid.” She turned around to fetch something from the pot behind her, bringing a ceramic bowl of soup out.

      He rubs his hands together, luxuriating on just being able to feel the heat return to his fingers. “Thank you, Margraid. How much do I owe you?”       “Soup’s free.”

      “No it ain’t!” someone barks from the other side of the bar. Companions       surrounding him guffaw.

      “It ain’t free for you, Siaghal!” Margraid yells back, earning more laughter. Siaghal curses, rolls his eyes, and goes back to his drink while his friends tease him.

      He takes a sip to stifle his laugh.

      “So how about you then, lad?”

      Tens hums for a second. “Just Tens.”

      She quirks a brow, leaning on her elbows. “Now that’s an interesting name, how’d you get it?”

      He considers his response for a moment. “Ah, well, you know how mainlanders are-- not the best at pronouncing our names, so I shortened mine to Tens, and it just fits.” A half truth.

      Margraid has a pleasant look of surprise grace across her face. “Ah, I had a feeling you were from Skellige.”

      Tens hums again, smiling even though it makes him feel tired, before taking another sip of his soup.

      “What brings you back then? Must have been some time for you to sound like a mainlander” she says, but it’s not barbed by cynicism. He has merely earned her curiosity.

      “Ah, I’ve been travelling for a while now, I thought it’d be a good time to come back.”

      She leans her chin on her cupped hand. “How long have you been travelling?”

      Tens lets out a puff of air, counting on his fingers for a moment. “Well this time around I’d say it’s been about thirty years”

      Her jaw drops for a second, then she laughs-- it’s a big, hearty laugh, clapping him on the shoulder. “Damn, I wish I had whatever you elves did. You barely look twenty-five.”

      Tens tittered, doing a rather poor job of hiding a smile.

      Margraid gives him a warm grin before turning around to attend to others.

      The night is, at least, uneventful at first. He’s mostly left alone, although a few curious young men entertain him by asking questions.

      “What brings you here?” one of them says, not doing well (or not trying to) hide the up-and-down look Tens gets.

      It doesn’t really bother him. “The rain, mostly.”

      He’s earned a few chuckles, before being left to his own devices once more.       Tens usually didn’t mind chatting, it was a good way to pass the time and find something to do. Invite himself onto caravans, into bandit rings, or into some noble person’s, ah, entertainment. But this week was a bad week. He was tired.

      Tens looked around and found plenty of others smoking, so lit his own pipe and sighed. Some of the tension eased away.

      But before Tens could finally relax, four dipshits barged through the door. With a clatter, the glass window in the door rattled, almost threatening to shatter.

      He sighed and did his best to make himself small, though that wasn’t something he was good at, given his height, so he mostly just hunched over the counter and tried to look away-- but he couldn’t help but notice Margraid had a rather frightened look on her face, though she masked it well by frowning and folding her arms.

      “I already paid you this week, Donaidh” she hissed.

      The tavern got awfully quiet.

      “Yes, well, the tax just went up” said the man in the middle-- he was stout and square and looked like a prick.

      There was a larger man behind him while two more flanked him on either side.

      Margraid sighed and reached under the bar to fiddle with something before taking out a grey coin purse and tossing it at one of Donaidh’s dogs.

      Despite everyone’s wishes, Donaidh and company sit at the bar. They seemed to relish in the negative attention. Without much a fight Margraid gives them free drinks and food all the while looking like she hopes they’ll just get out. Tens watches, a little sad, but isn’t exactly trying to get into trouble-- not yet, at least. Not this week.

      He mostly stares into the grain of the wood that makes up the bar and tries to lean closer to the fire and away from Donaidh.

      “Who’s this here?” one of them notes.

      Tens can’t see him, but knows they’re talking about him. “Tens. What’s it to you?”

      “Tense?” he says, clearly not bright.

      “It’s his name, Artur” Margraid corrects, low in tone.

      “Never heard of a man named Tense” Artur grumbles. The stool shifts as Artur decides to look down at him.

      Tens sighes, but says nothing.

      “Elves always got funny names” Donaidh decided he needed to point out.

      “Yes we’re just full of humor” he remarks. If his words were poison, Donaidh might have dropped dead from the potency in his tone.

      Donaidh scoffs and gets off the stool.

      Shit.

      Tens smooths back his hair and sits up, turning to watch as Donaidh and company decide to surround him.

      “You think you’re funny, don’t you?”

      The big one decides to shove him a little, but Tens doesn’t let it push him off his seat.

      “Listen, sirs, let’s not do this. Miss Margraid here has given you your money, and your food, and your drinks, don’t give her a mess to clean up.”

      He tried to put on his friendliest face, but all things considered he was having a lousy week and he was a hair's breadth away from losing his fucking mind. There was something sensible somewhere in him telling him it was a bad idea to go four on one, though.

      Then, Donaidh decked him. It would have hurt, normally, but Tens was admittedly not all in. He felt blood trickle down from his nose. He did groan, gritting his teeth.

      Artur had enough mind to put a dagger up to his throat. Dandy.

      “I really don’t want to do this with you” he hissed.

      Donaidh chuckled darkly. “Aw, well too bad.” Ugh, what an ass.

      Tens rolled his eyes, which probably wasn’t smart, because he got punched in the stomach then. He doubled over, hissing through his teeth as the metallic taste of his own blood  filled his mouth.

      He had half the mind to grab his staff but one of Donaidh’s goons scooped it away as he went to hug the back wall.

      “Donaidh that’s enough” Magraid tried to command.

      “Shut up, girl.”

      Uuuughh. He was going to regret this. He knew he would. But he was so fucking tired of Donaidh’s stupid mouth.

      Before he could get punched again, he took his elbow and jabbed it into Artur’s throat. The man made a sort of gurking sound, lifting his hand up and drawing his knife away. Idiot. The next thing Tens did was bull rush him to get off his chair. It hadn’t taken more than a second or two-- the man was a twig.

      “Bastard!”

      Tens rolled over Artur, springing onto his feet. Donaidh hissed and roared “get him you idiots!”

      Unfortunately for Tens, the big guy was a lot faster than he’d have assumed. One lunge, and Tens was barely out of the way, but getting backed up towards the entrance.

      Artur had collected himself and took a swing at him with the knife, which almost hit home. After taking a few more swings, Tens was nearly back against the wall-- or rather, the door.

      He felt someone yank his hair and he yelped. Before he could take any action, one large forearm had wrapped around his throat and squeezed hard. Tens tried to bite down, and though the man cursed, it only made him squeeze tighter.

      “Gut this fucker!” he screamed as Tens drew blood, trying to tear more flesh by making a sawing motion with his teeth. If only he had fangs.

      Artur surged forward, but no one had thought about the fact Tens was almost six and a half feet tall, most of which was legs. So, he picked his feet off the ground and bucked Artur hard in the chest. Nothing broke, but it definitely knocked the wind out of him. Though the man holding him was strong, his grip loosened as his weight suddenly dropped towards the floor, and one of Ten’s hands loosened.

      He reached up and jammed his thumb into the man’s eye. He screamed, and felt first tears, then blood, on his hand, but kept pushing until the man let go, dropping him quite suddenly.

      Tens gasped for breath as Artur tried plunging the knife in him again, but this time Tens kicked out his knee with a crack and Artur fell down-- gasping in pain. The knife fell out his hands. He kicked Artur again, sending him sprawling on the floor, taking the knife, and jammed it between the big man’s ribs. Before he had time to retrieve his new weapon however, Donaidh had grown a brain and tried smashing him over the head with a chair.

      Though he missed and instead shattered it against his soon-to-be dead buddy, Tens didn’t exactly have a lot of space. Without really getting the chance to get his bearings, Donaidh shoved his back over the nearest table and went in to throttle him, gripping him by the throat.

      Tens was exhausted, and already out of breath. His limbs felt heavy, and everything was getting dark. He could hear something pop and crack in his windpipe. He tried to do something with his hands, but they were quickly becoming distant, useless things.

      Magic was a funny thing. It always started at his chest, then sort of swam down the veins of his arms. A warm, electric feeling-- usually, like electricity, it was fast, but while the life was being choked out of him it felt glacially slow.

      He hissed, feeling the searing spell as he forced it to  his finger tips.

      He smiled, or perhaps snarled-- maybe in that moment they were the same thing.

      “Wh--” Donaidh didn’t get a chance to finish.

      Tens jammed his thumbs into Donaidh’s eyes, fingers glowing like molten metal. The skin of Donaidh’s face did not so much burn but melt-- it was always a bizarre feeling, though he had to say melting the white flesh of a man’s eyes was a first. He screamed and thrashed but Tens was holding him by his head.

      Once he let go of Tens’ throat, he was shoved off, crumpling to the floor. If he wasn’t dead, he probably wished he was.

      Tens took a few gasps of breath, sights and sounds and senses flushing his brain, overwhelming it. He remembered something important though.

      “Hey-- you, asshole, give me-- give me my fucking staff back” despite his exhaustion, the crazed and bloodshot look in his eye was enough to scare Donaidh’s last man into swiftly handing it over.

      “Thanks” he hissed, yanking it out of his grasp, before turning to limp out of the tavern, finally.

      God, he just wanted some fucking soup.

#tens tag #sorry about the formatting it was kinda a pain because tumblr hates the tab key??

[btsybrkr]

What A Time To Be At Home!: The Best And Worst Coronacontent The Internet Has To Offer

Remember that joke that’s been around for ages, but was being told literally everywhere back in 2019? The one that went something like, “I hate it when people ask me where I’ll be in a year’s time - I don’t have 2020 vision!”?

Well, I bloody wish someone did.

In fact, in early January, I wrote out my own predictions for the decade ahead right here on my blog. They were obviously entirely hypothetical and - I thought - ridiculous. They were just a series of daft ideas that I thought I could take the piss out of, in the hope that people might read it and take a second out of their day to do an amused little nose exhale for me. But now, even the post-apocalyptic TV show ideas I pitched in that piece seem less ‘far-off dystopian chaos’, and more like they could be pleasant additions to the BBC Summer schedule.

The world is in the throes of a global pandemic, the likes of which haven’t been seen since… I don’t know, The Black Plague, maybe? As a result of that, the instructions have been clear: stay home, save lives. 

At first, the thought of being given a period of Government-sanctioned laziness seemed like a dream to many. We could write our autobiographies! Learn Klingon! Build ourselves a whole new house! But six weeks in, it appears to have started messing with the collective consciousness of the human race. Brains are fried, your Weekly Screen Time is up 103%, stomachs are full to the brim with banana bread and dalgona coffee, and certain celebrities’ egos are in a fight to the death with their common sense. In a time when we’re all supposedly doing nothing, there’s still so much going on. 

With that in mind, I thought we could recognise some of the things we’ve seen online that have kept us talking in lockdown, not just because of Coronavirus, but in spite of it. 

Welcome to the first (but hopefully not annual) What A Time To Be At Home! awards. The WATTBAH!’s, if you like.

The ‘Why On Earth Did You Think This Was A Good Idea?’ Award

Over the last few weeks, we’ve seen a sizable handful of blunders by the rich and famous that have, at worst, knocked them down a fair few places in our estimations and, at best, have left us scratching our heads, wondering what response they were expecting in the first place. 

With that in mind, it’s only right that this title goes to the original celebrity lockdown mistake: Gal Gadot’s ill-advised acapella cover of Imagine, featuring a variety of different Hollywood stars - not one of whom had the foresight to ask “are you sure this doesn’t make us look like complete arseholes?”, which, unfortunately, it absolutely does. 

Between the bizarre and insincere ‘I have a dream’-style speech at the beginning, the boldness of some of those featured to be quite clearly just taking the piss, and the fact everyone appears to be singing ever-so-slightly below the note without ever actually hitting it for the entirety of the song, this was tone-deaf in more ways than one. It’s even worse when you realise that this was posted less than one week into the lockdown, but then what would I know? Maybe madness sets in faster in multi-million dollar mansions. Probably because it echoes louder and bounces off the walls of your massive living room.

The ‘I Had To Suffer Through This, So You Do, Too’ Award

This award recognises content we’ve been witness to over the last few weeks that was so awful, so completely uncomfortable to watch, that after you’d gotten over the initial disbelief at what you’d just seen, you immediately had to send it to somebody you know, so that you can suffer through it together.

Despite how many celebrity lockdown moments have left me with my head in my hands over the last few weeks, this award could only go to a very recent contender - one which isn’t simply an embarrassing piece of celebrity lockdown content, but will likely haunt the inner corners of my brain long after this virus is simply a topic taught about in GCSE History lessons of the future. 

I am, of course, talking about Olly Murs. I’m talking about Pringlegate. I’m talking about Olly Murs removing the bottom of a can of Sour Cream and Onion Pringles to trick his own girlfriend into touching his penis. On video, on TikTok.

Twitter: @buckyw1ng

There’s something inherently quite chilling about Pringlegate. It might be something to do with the 10,000 watt grin on Olly’s face as we watch him carefully maneuver a tin opener around the bottom of the can, or perhaps it’s just the question of how long he’d been sat there holding it around his naked penis as he and his girlfriend watched a film, patiently waiting for the moment to strike. Perhaps it’s the way the video freezes as she reaches over for a Pringle, allowing time for Olly Murs’ to add in an audio clip of himself, shouting “SAY HELLO TO MY LITTLE FRIEND”. 

Maybe it’s the uncontrollable show of amusement he launches into as she snatches her hand back in shock, laughing away, heartily, as if to say “Ha! You thought it was a normal can of Pringles, but it was actually my PENIS covered in Pringles crumbs! You just got PUNKED!”, like it was all simply a clever ruse. 

Above all else, I think the most uncomfortable thing about it is that I can’t help but feel like all bets are off in 2020, and that this is a fairly tame warm-up for things to come.

So, Olly Murs, you are inarguably the rightful winner of the ‘I Had To Suffer Through This, So You Do, Too’ award. Congratulations! Don’t do it again, yeah?

The ‘Are You Actually Aware Of These Words Coming Out Of Your Mouth?’ Award

I’ve said some stupid things since this lockdown started. Personally, I put it down to the lack of social interaction, which I think might be frying my brain a little bit, or at least that’s what the ornament of a turkey that sits on my kitchen windowsill told me the other day. However, I don’t think I or anybody I know has said anything even one fraction-of-an-iota as void of intelligent thought as Vanessa Hudgens’ terrible opinions on social distancing, shared in a now-infamous Instagram live last month. 

“It’s a virus,” she clarified, helpfully, before going on to explain, “I get it. I respect it.” 

I’m sure your respect means the world to it, Vanessa, but do you ‘get’ it?

“But even if everybody gets it, like… yeah… people are gonna die,” she explains, in a tone so chirpy that the word ‘die’ might as well be replaced by the phrase ‘have such a bloody lovely old time’, “which is terrible, but, like… inevitable?” 

In all fairness, death is inevitable, but I don’t know if suggesting speeding up that process for thousands of people because you were disappointed that Coachella was cancelled is an equally logical take.

After a brief - and probably quite profound - moment of self-reflection, she laughs “I don’t know, maybe I shouldn’t be doing this right now”. Oh, you think? Which bit? Just holding these insane ideas, or actually broadcasting them to your 39.1 million Instagram followers? 

She did post a video the day after, clarifying that - despite what she said - she is staying at home, and is urging others to do the same. I guess she does respect the virus after all. Now, if everyone could hurry up, catch it and die from it, so that she can go to Coachella 2021, Vanessa Hudgens might respect you, too. 

I guess We’re All In This Together, after all.

The Show Of Support Award

I’ve already talked a lot about the rich and famous here, so maybe it’s time to take a break from that madness - although, I get it, I respect it - and have a look at how the rest of our lives look at the moment.

One weekly occurrence that seems to be set to stick around is the weekly round of applause for the NHS. Whilst it’s nothing short of blood-boilingly annoying seeing Boris Johnson absent-mindedly clapping in celebration of a service that he recently admitted he hadn’t even noticed the strain on until he, himself, nearly died of the virus, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with the rest of us getting involved. If anything, it’s heart-warming to see the videos of NHS staff being applauded by neighbours as they leave for work, and to hear the cheers echoing through the streets at 8pm every Thursday. There’s a lot of people being quite cynical about it. We obviously know it’s not going to stop Coronavirus in its tracks, but sometimes it’s just nice to be nice, alright?

One thing I’ve noticed recently is how many people have adopted different noise-making strategies, possibly in an effort to effectively boost their support by a factor of 300%. Banging pots and pans together appears to be the most popular, but the winner of this award saw your pots and pans and said “how sweet”, before showing us how it’s really done.

I present to you, a genius. The ultimate hype-man.

Twitter: “a deeply disturbed national psyche” - @willuminare

There’s something so chaotic and angry about the energy in this video, just one man, a cricket bat, and a wheelie bin, banging away to show his gratitude. Just living in the moment. I wish the neighbour who’d captured it on camera had caught more of it, or at least just enough to edit the footage with Electric Youth’s soaring synth anthem  ‘A Real Hero’ from the soundtrack of the movie Drive against it.

I’ve been trying to learn to play the keytar in lockdown, to near enough no avail. Maybe at 8pm next Thursday, I’ll just take it outside and smash it against the pavement. You know, for the NHS.

Honourable Mentions: The Very Best In Coronacontent

It’s not all been so questionable - there’s been a lot of uplifting, funny, positive and thoughtful things shared online over the past few weeks. John Krasinski’s YouTube series Some Good News has provided a much-appreciated contrast from the bleakness of traditional current affairs programmes. There’s five weeks worth of episodes on his YouTube channel at the moment, so I would definitely recommend checking it out, especially if you feel like you need a lift! 

Over on Twitter, there’s been a lot to laugh about, as ‘front camera comedians’ are well and truly in their element (my personal favourite recently has been Alistair Green), as well as plenty of other users who are utilising their free time to create some brilliant stuff - this six-part opera based on a 2007 Facebook argument by Archie Henderson is genuinely one of the funniest things I’ve seen in weeks.

Twitter: “I made a six-act opera out of a conversation between some 14 year olds on my Facebook from 2007″ - @jazzemu_

All in all, these are obviously bizarre times that we’re living in. We don’t know how many more weeks of lockdown we’re going to have, when we’ll get back to normal, or even if ‘normal’ will mean something completely different from now on. 

What we do know is that the internet, and everyone on it - whoever they are or whatever they’re saying - will continue to surprise us, inform us, entertain us, provide a place for our quizzes and conversations, and keep us together in some sense, when we have no choice but to be apart. 

Thanks to anyone who’s read this far. I hope that you and your friends and families are keeping well, and that you took even a slight shred of lockdown enjoyment from even one thing I’ve said over the past couple thousand words! 

Finally, before I go, I thought we might share a little song. It goes like this:

Imagine there’s no heaven....

if you like, can follow me on twitter here or instagram here :-)

[doubleoh7q]

Short 5/15: Dictator

The doorbell rang on Q’s day off. It took a minute to work out what the noise was. The list of people that knew his address was short, four of the five people on it had a key. The last one was R. Sure enough, Q opened the door to reveal a frazzled R. Before he could ask what in the blazes are you doing here she spoke. ’48 hours Q. That’s all I need from you.’ ’48 hours?’ Q furrowed his brow in confusion. ‘What for?’ ‘To take Sergeant Mayweather for the next couple days?’

‘Sergeant who?’ In response, R’s body tilted as she hefted a cat carrier off the ground. ‘My cat.’ Q stood silent and was halfway to saying I suppose we could take care of him when Bond came out of their bedroom to see what was happening. James had seen the cat for all a second when he spoke. ‘No.’ Q was looking back at his boyfriend, James met his eye. ‘We do not need another cat. You have four.’ R butted in, ‘Only for two days! He’s friendly!’ James scoffed, ‘I have never met a friendly cat. Only tolerable ones.’ ‘She’ll pick him back up on…’ He looked back at R. ‘Monday?’ She nodded. ‘Monday. It’s for two days.’ James still looked sceptical, but it was Q’s flat, so he vetoed the agent. ‘We’ll take him.’ Bond huffed off to the kitchen. He needed coffee if there was going to be more than four furballs under his feet. Meanwhile, R had set Sergeant Mayweather in the lounge and was rattling off vet details and contact numbers and diet needs and what embassy to talk to if they needed her. Oh and he only answers to Sergeant so don’t skip his title. Dutifully, Q chimed in with the occasional we will, or an, of course, don’t worry. Once R was satisfied, she lent down to pat the Sergeant and then headed out the door. The only trace she’d ever been there at all was the giant pile of caged fur meowing at the top of his lungs. Left alone, both men hesitated to let the Sergeant out of his carrier. Leaning down with their hands pressed against their knees, they got their first proper look at R’s cat. Bond spoke first, ‘Are we sure that’s a cat? Like really, really sure?’ ‘What else would it be?’ Q asked. ‘Q, if that’s just a cat, then I’m just a house husband.’ Q rolled his eyes. ‘It’s a Maine Coon, they’re a bit bigger than the average cat.’ Keeping eye contact with Sergeant Mayweather, Bond leaned over to whisper in Q’s ear. ‘It’s like it knows all our weaknesses. You think R briefed it?’ Q turned to his fiancé, incredulous. ‘Really, Bond? It’s a cat.’ Defensively, Bond turned to Q. ‘What? She might have.’ Q didn’t respond, didn’t want to dignify the idea. Instead, he opened the carrier door and offered to cook breakfast in a blatant attempt to distract James. Ten minutes, four eggs, two slices of toast and a cup of earl grey later, the distraction had worked. They’d pushed their plates to the side and were working on the Sunday crossword when the first crash sounded from the living room. Bond had moved to stand between Q and the doorway before Q had even looked up. He was used to weird noises in the apartment, after years of living with cats, Q tends to suspect them before an intruder. Bond was not as adjusted, years of fieldwork meant he was hardwired to react to the worst-case scenario. After a minute or so of silence, the couple decided to investigate. A quick assessment of the living room revealed a pot plant in the far corner as the source of the noise. But having stood upright for more than a year, they doubted it was a victim of the wind. Another look round the room found Sergeant Mayweather behind James’ armchair, the Maine Coon’s head covered in soil. ‘Guess we found our man.’ Bond muttered. Q was quick to explain. ‘He’s settling in.’ ‘He’s terrorising our house plants.’ James countered ‘He’s just getting situated.’ ‘He’s worse than Spectre.’ Bond said. Q swatted his arm. ‘You’re comparing knocking over a plant to terrorism.’ ‘All I’m saying is that at least Spectre has their reasons. Cats are just…’ he paused, thinking. ‘They’re destructive for fun.’ James finished.

While the two newly engaged love birds bickered over the morals of cats, with Bond standing firm and Q expressing his concern for assigning human ideals onto animals, Sergeant Mayweather had moved from living room to kitchen. It took precisely two minutes and forty-seven seconds for James tor realise the cat had left the room. And he stopped Q mid-sentence. ‘Where’s the cat?’ ‘He probably got sick of looking at you.’ Q quipped. Bond gave him a mock glare, about to shoot off a line about how Q loved looking at him when a second crash came from the kitchen. They didn’t have to move from where they were standing to see the remains of Bond’s favourite mug on the floor. James took a breath. ‘We are never cat sitting again.’ Another crash sounded, and a spout, detached from its teapot skated into view. ‘James-’ Bond held up a hand, cutting Q off, and took another breath. Q gave him that mug for their first Christmas together. That teapot was a gift from Moneypenny when Q’s tech saved her life.  That cat was out to get them. ‘I take it back. This isn’t cat sitting, Q. This is an attack.’ Q was right on the edge of expressing just how ridiculous James sounded. He was talking about a cat like it was a dictator for Christ’s sake! Only his concern was reallocated when the sound of glass clinking started up. Q pushed past his fiancé to stand in the kitchen entrance. The main coon was perched on the countertops, his front paws resting on the shelves above. The shelves with the crystal glassware Q had inherited, and the decanting set Bond had recovered from Skyfall. Bond pressed behind him, both men’s eyes locked on Sergeant Mayweather’s precarious position. ‘Do we move it?’ Bond whispered. Q didn’t think that would help. ‘What if it sees us coming and jolts?’ ‘What if we lured it away?’ ‘With what?’ ‘Catnip?’ Bond suggested. Q couldn’t believe he’d said that with a straight face. ‘You want to get Sergeant Mayweather high?’ ‘If it would help.’ Bond said, apparently serious. Q considered that it couldn’t possibly make the situation any worse. ‘Do you have catnip?’ he asked. Bond looked at him in disbelief. ‘You don’t?’ With no other suggestions, they went with plan A: grab it. Q volunteered Bond as the grabber. ‘Why do I have to do it?’ ‘You suggested it.’ Q reminded. ‘Right. Okay. Just grab.’ Bond moved in front of Q towards the Sergeant. Then paused. ‘Q?’ ‘Yeah?’ ‘What do I do once I’ve grabbed him?’ ‘Get him out of the kitchen, I’ll close the door.’ ‘Right. Bond moved towards the cat again. He took slow, cautious steps right up until Sergeant Mayweather took a swat at a whiskey glass. He moved quickly after that. Pulling the cat off the counter and heaving it out of the kitchen. Bond set him down in the hallway. Q closed the kitchen door and then set to close the living room off as well. Once they were left standing in the tight hallway, they realised their mistake. Sergeant Mayweather’s hackles had raised, and he was stalking closer, hissing furiously. ‘We could lock ourselves in the bedroom.’ ‘This really isn’t the time to be flirting, Bond.’ ‘Not like that. To get away from the thing that looks like it wants to kill us.’ ‘Oh.’ Q said, almost disappointed. ‘But if you wanted to…’ Bond glanced at Q, trailing off with a raised brow. ‘James.’ Said Q, firmly. ‘Right. Not the time.’ Maybe later, James thought. The cat pounced, taking a claw to Bond’s dressing gown. Bond pushed him off and the cat prepared to attack again. ‘On second thought..’ Q said, and they moved into the bedroom. Bond slammed the door behind them, and an ungodly assault from the other side of the door started up. ‘Call her.’ Bond said. ‘We’ve had him less than three hours.’ ‘Call her.’ Bond said again. They stared at each other, the Sergeant’s assault on their bedroom door continuing in the background. ‘Fine. Q relented. He crossed the room to his phone and dialled her number. After four rings, she picked up. ‘What’s up, Q? How’s my kitty? ‘Alive.’ He wondered how to put it. ‘Look, you need to ask Mallory for the key to the flat.’ ‘Is everything alright?’ She asked. Bond pulls the phone from Q to yell, ‘No. It is not alright!’ before handing it back. Q is slightly calmer. ‘You need to come and get your cat.’ R was starting to get concerned. ‘Is he okay?’ ‘Presently, and he’ll stay that way as long as you come get him in the next hour.’ ‘Why?’ ‘Because after that I can’t guarantee that I won’t hand Bond a gun and tell him to shoot.’ ‘I’ll be there in twenty.’ The line clicked out. The bedroom door continued to be the target of an all-out war. The Maine Coon appeared to be winning. Twenty minutes later, the scratching suddenly stopped. The two men listened, cautious of the creature outside the door. They strained to hear paw steps in the hall, and then R’s voice rang out, sounding higher than usual. ‘There’s my Sergeant Mayweather!’ And then a few seconds later. ‘’It’s safe now. boys!’ Sheepishly, James and Q cracked open the door, checking it really was safe before stepping into the hall. The gawked at the sight of R, rocking the Maine Coon in her arms. ‘What did you do to my cat?’ She asked. Bond was outraged. ‘Us?’ He blustered, stepping forward. Q put a  hand out to hold him back. ‘The carrier’s where you left it. You need to find someone else to cat sit.’ R got the message, and she was gone in less than a minute, taking Sergeant Mayweather with her. James opened the living room door to see soil strewn across the carpeting. Q opened the kitchen up to be greeted by smashed wares. Both of them stepped back into the hall, closing the doors again. They looked at each and silently agreed that this was a problem for later and that right now they should get dressed and then go for lunch. It was their day off, after all.

#team00 #007 fest #00Q #james bond #Q #R #doubleoh7q writes #001 #15 Bond Short Fics

[detective-redstar]

Journal Entry N.02 || Chapter 1

|| This journal will act as a recap for everything that has happened during Chapter 1. This means there will be information that Airi would not realistically know. This is only for the sake of the recap. If you’re confused on who’s who, here’s a link to the roster page. ||

@despot-despair

It’s been some time, hasn’t it? A lot has happened since I last wrote in this journal. This may take a while and my wrist will probably hurt from writing this much, but I’ll survive~

I was able to get around and mingle with lots of people after we escaped that wretched dungeon! I have a sneaking suspicion not many of them like me. It’s a bit upsetting, to be honest :’(

However! I’m not the most hated person here, since Yuu decided to stir the pot even more. During our first conversation, which got rather heated, he threatened to rip my nails off. My beautiful nails! Thankfully, I escaped with all my nails in tact.

Apparently, he also got into huge shit with Hitomi and Ivy too. Yuu grabbed the rabbit girl by the ankle and started dragging her across the courtyard so he could dunk her into one of the ponds. Hitomi was there and, in an attempt to stop the local blue menace, hit him right in the neck with his gas tank. Ivy was freed, but I guess that encounter scared her pretty bad. Hitomi must’ve felt guilty too, ‘cause he stormed off the second Yuu was knocked to the ground. 

That isn’t all. He also bullied Tsuguyo, the small origami artist, by giving her the same treatment of grabbing her to drag her along the grass. Apparently he was trying to throw her into the nearby pond. Only after Tsuguyo bit and threw rocks at him did he let go, due to being knocked half-unconscious.

Yuu’s honestly such an annoyance, and that means something coming from me.

A day or so passed and Raiouji announced that he prepared a feast for everyone. Some sort of welcoming party, maybe? Either way, it was far from welcoming, as the dinner quickly took a turn for the worst when the dead body of Sujaku was discovered underneath one of the serving domes. He told us that we needed to investigate what happened to the phoenix or face punishment, aka mass execution. 

Safe to say, not many were pleased with that. But we had no choice, so everyone split up to investigate.

I had paired up with Kliment Holloway, the Clarinet Boy. All was going smoothly, when, in one of the stalls in the restroom, we found some graffiti that said “Airi x Koko best ship.” I still have no idea who wrote it. Kliment had absolutely no idea what it meant. At the time, I was disgusted. Funny how much my feelings have changed since then. I’ll... get to that later.

z̵̬̩̳̾͛̏@̸̫͉̠̼̭̪̇̐̉͊Ȇ̷̮̠̠̥̰ͅ@̷̡̼̝̫͍̔̏̀͗͑̉͗̇͘̚C̷̛̙̦̓̅̍͂̆̀̍:̴̬̜͓́̽̆̉̈́͐̎͗̈̈́͠͝]̷̢̢͔̲͎̻͍̩̲̱̝̘͆͗̽͊̌͐́]̵͔̬̦̑͂̂͛̾̒̃̋̒͘]̷̬̦̈́́̈́̏͛̊̇̑

In any case! We were going to have a trial. A trial for a robotic bird. It was a joke, so I treated it like one. To add onto the stupidity of this mock trial, Klim entered the graffiti we found as actual evidence. I wanted to die of embarrassment. Explaining what a ship was took forever, and I still don’t think he gets it.

The trial ended pretty quick - faster than any trial I had been to. Turns out Yunime stomped Sujaku to death because Sujaku had spoken ill of Raiouji. As stupid as it sounds, it was written in the rules that it’s forbidden to insult him. No one was killed for it, as Raiouji deemed Yunime’s actions as acceptable punishment.

In the end, we avoided execution and were to resume our lives in captivity. Mukuro, Sujaku’s mate, was pretty upset about the whole thing. Not sure why she’d stay loyal to Raiouji after that.

Raiouji, however, wasn’t going to sit around and just wait for a body to appear. So he prepared a motive - an incentive to kill. After gathering everyone in the foyer, what could only be described as the screams of the damned started blasting throughout the castle. Mukuro confirmed that it was Sujaku’s mixtape. Yes, his mixtape. It sounded awful.

Remembering what happened after that... really annoys me.

I made a joke. One simple little offhand comment about how Koko should die first. Then those witches decided to swarm me while pretending to uphold some bullshit justice. Sakura and Mari especially. Sakura hit me twice, yet she pretends to be some righteous hero who opposes violence. What a bunch of hypocrites.

x̶̢̡̰̻̜̪͇̝̠͇̥͇͖̓̍̇͊͘͝ͅ ̵̢̨̛͕̬̼̘͈̯͍̜̩̏̆̔͊́̑̋͜9̵̧̧̜̱͇͍͍̲̩͔͔͎̗̿̂̍̽̄͑͗̋͋̋͜2̴̛̦̫͗͂̆̾͛̉Ę̶̼͔͇̰̮͗̽̍̿̾̈́̿̈́̍͗͝6̵̩̭̱̻̈́ ̵̢͈͚̥͎̰͎́̐̈̂͑̓͒̆͗͜E̷͖̭̱̯̞̥̼̠̞̬͔̘̍̓̉͋̍̾̏̾̉̎̈͆͘̚͠9̶̡̙̪̘̺̯̙̯̪̰̱̏̕͘͘6̶̡̞͖̭̱̖͕̈́͊̋͆́̀̇͌͝͠>̶͙̩̯͉͍̹̜͍͉̺̟͊ͅ]̶̧̛͎͈̗̩͇̼̤̦͙̐̔̃̅̉͜ͅͅ

I was so mad and I had to get out there before I did anything reckless. So I left to the dining room, where I found Ivy looking downcast. She tried to comfort me, in a way. Ricky Boy was there too, but I’m sure he was only wanting to hear some gossip. He isn’t sincere in the slightest. 

I cracked. I freaked out and told them about how I was going to make their lives miserable. I even snapped one of my nails off. Writing about it like this reminds me of how crazy I must’ve looked. Ricardo and Ivy panicked and took me to the bathroom to wash the blood off. Though Ricardo only came after I promised to give him what he wanted: that scalding hot tea. (I hate myself for writing that.)

Ivy retrieved a ribbon from her room and used that as a makeshift bandage. Honestly, I’m really grateful for it. I wouldn’t be able to stand having some ugly wound ruining my perfect appearance. Ricky left after we subtly threatened each other and that was the end of it. 

I still haven’t forgotten though. Of the unfair treatment I received simply because I’m deemed the villain. Oh no, this was only the beginning. 

Once the motive was dropped, there was tension hanging everywhere in the castle over whether or not someone would truly kill over this. Hitomi, %̷̨̢̍̔̅̃̕9̴̲͙̹͓̑6̵̭͇̯̊͐̈́ ̸̨̭̗̥̈͑3̷̛̻̘̘̬̋̎̓͜@̵̞͂̃͌̾͝@̴͔̼͕̞̙̓Ě̵̥̜͠ ̷̻͝=̴̛͈̀̇̿̕͝:̵̢̧̜̞̉͋̅͛4̵̭̻̻͇̯̱̍̅̌<̴͓͓̽͐͊̉6̴̟̜̰͈̣̄̏̂͘̚͝C̷̡͙͎̯̊ Sakura and %̴̩̥̖̌̈̀̾̚ͅ9̸̧̛̿̌͗6̴̩͙̘̣̈ ̶̠̐3̸̛̥̓:̸̢̺͔͙͎̓͜E̵̛̦̱̗̣͓͉͗͋̑̑̕4̶̤͖͙̳̗̼̊9̵͛͌̃̏ Mari tried to brainstorm some way of preventing such a killing from taking place. They created some rules to enforce - rules they never bothered to tell anyone else. Quite the oversight I must say~ 

Their plan failed. 

But that’s enough about them! Time to talk more about me ★ And Koko. She’s pretty important to this equation.

If I could trace back a specific point in time which was the trigger for everything, it would be that fortune telling session Koko hosted for all who stopped by. I, of course, don’t believe in any of her garbage spirit talk, but I was interested in what she would say. I went second, after Gam, and I was given a rather positive reading. The reading itself wasn’t the start, but a simple comment meant to tease me. Koko joked that she was 0.1% attracted to me. I’m not sure why it bothered me as much as it did, but I was quite distressed over it.

Later on, I went to her room, Room 7, to confront her about it. Call it petty, but I needed to clear the air. We were supposed to be rivals! Everything changed with that single visit to her room. 

Koko confessed to me. Koko had feelings for me. That Koko, who berated me and I insulted in turn. She liked me, for some reason I couldn’t comprehend. I kissed her, after she dared me to. I don’t think she expected me to go for it, since her face turned bright red. I’m sure mine was just as red, too. 

We talked for a while. She gave me a name, her real name. Kotori, she said. Told me that she and I were quite similar. It opened my eyes. For the first time, I found someone who knew what it was like. Though it was slightly different, she knew. She understood. I had an ally and I couldn’t let her go.

The following event was one I honestly wasn’t expecting, even though I was the instigator. After getting into a slight argument with Cai Collins in the group chat, he challenged me to a fight out in the courtyard. Of course, I wasn’t going to back down. We met outside, with a few others watching.

I taunted him quite a bit, as he seemed hesitant to hit me. I know how to take a punch, so I wasn’t afraid of him. He did hit me, though it was only in the gut. That was when I decided to turn up the heat. I took a nearby rock and smashed it into my head, throwing it to Cai’s feet in an attempt to frame him. I passed out shortly after, so I’m not sure what happened between then and when I woke up. Kotori and Liya were by my side in my room, having patched me up. They told me my plan failed, as everyone believed Cai’s side of the story. I was really disappointed. Although, I took some satisfaction in knowing that I traumatized Cai-chan just a little bit. It was worth the concussion I gave myself. Does that make me a horrible person? Hahaha~

One night, I found a tarot card taped to my door. It was The Lovers, with some drawings on it. An apple and a star. Not a difficult riddle. I went out side and found Koko waiting for me. She said we were to stargaze for a bit. I didn’t quite understand, but I agreed. So we laid next to each other, looking up at the sky and talking about lots of different things. We kissed a second time. I believe that was the trigger for my own feelings to start bubbling to the surface, though I wouldn’t realize it until the next morning. 

When I did, I needed to tell her. It was so early in the morning and no one was awake, but I needed to tell her. She didn’t seem surprised. Was it so obvious to everyone but me? I’m honestly a little embarrassed, but I’ve never had these feelings before, so how could I know what they meant!? In any case, we were now an official couple.

If only I knew that I would soon lose her.

The next day, we were met with quite the horrid sight. Ami Mochizuki, the SHSL Librarian, was found dead atop the chandelier. The killing game had started and we were to have a real trial after some investigation. I have to admit that, as a detective, I was a bit excited to expose the mystery behind this murder.

I did my investigation with Ivy, who was rationally upset and scared by the killing. She didn’t like to approach anything relating to blood or the body, which was fine by me. More investigation work for me~ I got to jump onto the chandelier, so that was fun! Ami was clearly stabbed with a knife, but the question was who did it and how the body got onto the chandelier. 

The evidence we found wasn’t much, but it was all we had as we went into our first official trial with a real trial grounds. Though this one was different from those I was used to. We were all standing in a circle. I guess it was so we could see one another as we accuse each other.

The trial went on for some time as new evidence came to light. Ricardo had the room key to Ami’s room, and Yuu’s Primpod was missing. Both were suspicious, so they were two major suspects in the case. I even accused Ricky Boy. Hopefully he didn’t take it to heart~ 

The damning evidence was a piece of cheap gold found in the Treasure Room. I immediately knew who it belonged to and my heart had sunk into my gut. I didn’t want to believe it. I couldn’t believe it! 

Kokoro-koro was voted to be the killer. And it turned out she was. She killed Ami by stabbing her in the Treasure Room. Ami had apparently threw herself onto the chandelier. I have no idea why, but I didn’t care. Kotori was the killer. 

And she was to be executed for failing to get away with her murder.

Before that, she had approached my podium. She gave me her final words, as well one to remember her by. I... I need to figure it out what it meant. It wasn’t a Japanese word. Kotori kissed me one last time, before knocking me out with a punch to the jaw... so that I wouldn’t have to see her execution.

Apparently it was rather horrible and depraved, one that humiliated her before she died. I’m glad I didn’t have to see it. I know I wouldn’t have been able to handle it.

When I woke up, she was gone. Kotori, the girl I liked and wanted to be with, was dead. I still struggle to accept the fact that she’s never coming back. I could never hear her voice or hold her in my arms.

I lost it. Consumed by my grief, I went off the deep end. To be honest, I don’t remember much of what I said. I know that I made a promise. A promise to bring everyone else here to their knees with despair. They took my happiness away and I wasn’t going to let them get away with it. 

I will see it through. Until my heart stops, I will assure that I destroy everyone here, no matter the cost.

Signed, Airi Akahoshi

#journal #chapter recap #despot despair #chapter 1 #shsl detective

[our-smooty]

Twice the Strength, Twice the Power

Fandom: Gorillaz

Rating: Mature

Relationships: 2AceDoc

Tags: Relapsing, References to Drugs, Past Abuse, Hurt/Comfort, Ace2Doc 

Summary: Murdoc doesn’t like who he is sober

OK, so it hadn't been his best night.

But it hadn’t been his worst night, not by a long-shot, and that was something, right? Murdoc gave a small depreciative laugh at himself as he sat leaning over to toilet bowl. The bathroom smelt like sick and sweat and every breath he took in made him want to puke whatever was left in his stomach out. He’d been at this for at least half-an-hour, had been sleeping fitfully before. And before that he’d been--

Well, he wasn’t too sure what he’d been up to, it was all a blur. But he knows the pounding behind his eyes and the ringing in his ears well enough to know it wasn’t good. Especially since he’d been trying to cut back, especially after he’d promised to give being sober a go.

The thing was, Murdoc wasn’t so sure he liked who he was when he was sober. Where before he’d been lively, prone to mood swings but generally active, sober he could feel the ache in his bones from age and the tiredness that came with years of substance abuse. He was less enthusiastic, less motived, less everything. So maybe he should have seen his little binge last night coming.

Oh, hold that thought, he was going to vomit again. There was hardly anything but bile in his stomach, but he heaved anyway. It made his eyes water and his chest ache in the worst ways. Satan he hoped he didn’t do something too stupid last night, didn’t fuck his body up beyond saving just as he was trying to save it.

“Murdoc?” Flashes of last night accompanied that voice. A bottle of something dark, and argument, plates smashing and shouting. So it’s been that bad, had it?

Ace was leaning down beside him now, bare knees against the tile. He was wearing a pair of 2D’s boxers, the purple ones with little blue stars. Murdoc had told him he looked like a twat, but really he though the colour popped against his skin tone.

“Lemme get you some water,” the younger bassist said, filling one of the variously used cups around the sink and holding it out. “Take a sip of that, alright?”

Murdoc did, spitting the first few gulps back out to wash his mouth. He finished the glass and let it clank to the floor, resting his head against the bathtub and his arm.

“Thanks.” Was that it? Shouldn’t he be apologizing for last night? Why bother really, it wasn’t like he deserved the chance at forgiveness.

If you don’t apologize, they can’t reject you.

“Can you stand?” Ace asked, still hovering just to the side. Murdoc didn’t want to look up at him, didn’t want to pity so he shook his head no. Ace sighed and sat beside him, close enough to touch but not initiating anything. It hadn’t taken long for Ace to realize Murdoc didn’t like being touched without warning.

They sat in silence with Murdoc retching every few minutes and Ace watching on with concern. It wasn’t long before he heard another set of footsteps outside the door. Please don’t be Stu, he thought, please not both of them at the same time.

“Oh, uh, hi!” Dammit. The singer stepped into the room and sat up on the counter, looming over both bassists on the floor. “You alrigh’, Murdoc?”

“Fantastic,” he spat out gruffly. The lights of the bathroom were too bright, the pressure to talk too much, his head felt like it was breaking in two.

More of last night was coming back to him. After he’d thrown and smashed the dishes, Stu had walked in and begun trying to talk him down. The details were still fuzzy, but he had the distinct memory of his hands on the singer’s chest, pushing him away and into the doorway. 2D had cried out a little in pain, but Murdoc hadn’t cared. He was too busy stomping up the stairs, probably in search of more booze.

“We told you to slow down last night,” the singer sighed, twiddling his thumbs idly. Ace shot him a look but didn’t say anything in Murdoc's defence. He didn’t mind their bluntness, he deserved Stu’s ire. “I’ve got a bruise, you know.”

Murdoc groaned and sat up, gagging into the toilet for a final time before flushing the contents. Out of the corner of his eye he saw 2D’s eyes widen a little at the shake in Murdoc’s limbs.

“Stu…” What was he supposed to say? Fuck he’d promised to stop doing this, and then he’d gone and cocked it all up spectacularly.

“Why don’t we get you back to bed, Murdoc. D, help me get him up.” 2D hopped down from the sink and Ace stood. They each looped an arm around him and got Murdoc on his feet. The older bassist tried his best to stand under his own power, but he’d used all of his strength getting to the loo in the first place. He let the two of them practically drag him back to his bedroom, and into his dirty bed.

For a few seconds, the other two stood around aimlessly. Murdoc couldn’t blame them, a few months ago he would have snapped at them to get out and fuck off.

“D’you need anything?” 2D asked. Murdoc shrugged and rolled over away from them. Maybe they’d get the hint and leave him alone to wallow for a while, or maybe they’d finally get smart and leave him altogether.

Unbeknownst to him, Stu and Ace shared a look. Of course, they knew what happened last night; they’d both been drunk too, but sober enough to know Murdoc’s behaviour had been bad. But they also knew the older bassist had been trying very hard to be a better person. 2D gave a tiny nod then gestured for Ace to get on the bed.

Murdoc felt Ace climb up onto his XL mattress. He crawled over so he was laying on his side in front of the Satanist, and was quickly followed by 2D laying down by Murdoc’s back. Their larger bodies bracketed Murdoc’s smaller one, caging him in and keeping him safe. It was a kind of comfort he didn’t feel he deserved in any way and that forced him to speak up.

“What’re you doing?” he croaked, resisting the urge to give into their embrace. He didn’t have much choice though, Stu was wrapping an arm around his waist and Ace was leaning in, fanning his fingers out against his chest.

“Isn’t it obvious? We’re holdin’ you,” Ace answered quietly, moving his hand up to cup Murdoc’s face. He resisted the urge to flinch away from the gentle touch.

“But I--” he couldn’t finish, didn’t really know how to. Behind him, he felt 2D sigh and nuzzle closer.

“We know, Muds. But we also know you’re sorry, and you’re tryin’ to do better.”

Ace nodded. “I know it’s hard, trust me I know. You’re not alone in this.”

Murdoc ducked his head. He knew he shouldn’t accept their forgiveness, that he hadn’t earned it at all. But he was so tired, and his chest still hurt but not nearly as much as his head. He could be weak just this once right? He was allowed to need things too.

With trembling arms, he reached out to Ace, a sob building in his chest. 2D tightened his hold and began leaving little kisses against Murdoc’s neck. He felt so loved, so safe, so undeserving.

“I-I-I’m s-sorry,” he sobbed into Ace’s chest. The younger bassist shushed him gently.

“We know babe, we know.”

“We love you Murdoc,” 2D hummed. Murdoc couldn’t answer, too overcome with an emotion he couldn’t pin down. It wrapped around his blackened heart like a balm, soften it. It made him cry harder.

“I don’t--don’t deserve this,” he snivelled while watching the wet stain on Ace’s shirt grow. “I-I’m bad, I-I’m--”

Ace cut him off with a soft kiss. Murdoc inhaled sharply but melted anyways. “Murdoc,” Ace said after he pulled away, “everybody relapses, everybody has bad days.”

He was shaking his head as Stu piped up. “You remember how hard it was for me to get offa all those pills?” It’d been hell, holding the singer close through body-wracking shivers, or holding him down when the want for relief became too much.

“But I hurt y-you,” Murdoc answered. He looked back over his shoulder at 2D with a teary gaze. “I p-promised I would never do t-that again and I did. ”

Knowing how important this was, Stu took a few seconds to formulate a response. “You did hurt me, but I know you didn’t mean to. Ace thinks so too. I was a little tipsy and I lost my balance. You didn’t mean to push me that hard.”

“I didn’t, Stu, I swear I didn’t.”

“Then we’re OK,” 2D said it like it was easy, like it was a simple fact and not bogged down with years of baggage. Again, Murdoc didn’t have the energy to fight. All he could do was give in to their attempts to comfort him and offer whatever comfort he could provide in return.

“Love you Doc,” Ace whispered, smiling. Murdoc let out a slight laugh, more a gasping grunt. “And I love you, Stu-Pot.”

The singer giggled as well and brushed one of his hands through Ace’s hair. “Love you too Acey, I’m glad we’re all here together.”

“Yeah,” Murdoc sighed, tired eyes closing as he listened to the singer talk. Ace and Stu noticed and they both smiled at the older man. They would be there for Murdoc when he needed it, just like he was there for them, for as long as possible. Especially if that meant getting to take more group naps.

#2acedoc #2doc #Acedoc #murdace #2Dace #tw past abuse #tw DRUGS AND ALCOHOL #relapse