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yourwildsimp · 1 year

Text

dreams and daiquiris

includes: Ghost, Soap, Price

warnings: nightmares, PTSD, graphic gore, mention and brief depiction of suicide

length: 6,008

summary: Ghost can't stop dreaming, always. They're getting bad. He's loosing pieces of himself and he can't take it anymore. Luckily, Soap is there, ready and waiting with two fancy glasses.

A/N: Make sure to look over the warnings! Anyways, this may or may jot be a vent post... Of you squint... A lot. Also, don't "take care" of yourself like Simon jfc

"Hell's bells, it's bloody boilin' oot there," Johnny whines, stretching himself out on the scratched up wooden floor with a groan. He's long since forgone his shirt, the top tossed carelessly somewhere over the couch. "Th' floor ain't even braw nae more."

"English, MacTavish."

Soap gives him a rather crude look.

"It's really fuckin' hot. Floor isn't cold," he spits, the anger more directed at the sun rather than Ghost. "Ah just ken yer aboot to burn, L.T," Soap stresses, ruling onto his stomach.

"Can it, Johnny."

Although in all fairness, Soap is right. Ghost's mask is a sopping puddle at the base of his neck, under his jaw, and around his hairline. The desert isn't exactly accepting of black cloth wrapped around his face.

He doesn't know why they're here, doesn't know their mission and the details and whatnot, but he does know Johnny is with him.

That's all he cares about.

He busies himself with cleaning his rifle, back to Soap as he keeps his eyes on the void-like horizon out of the window.

"Ghost…" Johnny whines, and Ghost rolls his eyes, ignoring him.

The heat is unbearable as is, he doesn't need bitching along with it.

"L.t." Johnny says again, voice high and tight. "'t's hot…"

Ghost huffs obnoxiously to get his point across for Johnny to shut the hell up.

"It hurts, Simon."

And, fuck, that pinched and ragged tone, the way Johnny's fighting for every word, makes Ghost whip around so fast he might have whiplash.

"Johnny-"

The words get caught in his throat, and he can't breathe anymore.

Soap's burning.

Johnny is on fire.

"Johnny!" The name tears from him before he can help it, and he's scrambling from the window to save him and-

Christ, Soap is screaming. Screaming bloody murder as the smell of charred flesh and thick smoke fill up the safe house. He's screaming and screaming and burning and Simon can't stop him, can't put him out-

Johnny is going to die.

He rushes to the sink, stumbling over himself on the way there, but the faucet is busted and dry as the desert they're in.

The screaming isn't stopping, not even letting up, and he's going to go deaf with the sound of Johnny fucking burning alive.

All of a sudden, Ghost is screaming too. He is in agony, his shoulder flaring up with the heat of the sun. He forces himself to turn around, to find why it hurts so much.

Soap is grabbing at him, at his shoulders, scrambling for a hold but… He isn't Soap anymore. He's not Johnny.

But Ghost knows him.

It's a civilian, one from years ago. A young boy, barely twelve. And he's still fucking on fire.

"Why didn't you save me?!" the boy screams, reaching for Ghost, reaching to set him ablaze, reaching for help.

"I-" and Ghost is gagging on the smell of burned flesh. His throat burns with it, eyes water, and he blinks through it to look around.

I tried.

"Why didn't you save us?!"

And Ghost screws his eyes shut, trying not to breathe.

I wasn't strong enough. I'm sorry.

He hears the boy choke on his last breath, hears him crumble into the dust. He makes the mistake of forcing his eyes open, to see where they are, to find Johnny again.

There are people all around him, each one of them lit up like a bonfire.

He's with Roba again.

Simon can feel the way his heart drops.

Please, not again. I can't go through this again.

Simon starts to run- run as fast as his legs will let him.

He doesn't get far.

He screams when a metal hook tears through his back and out in front of his ribs. Caught, like a fish on a line.

His fingers claw at the dirt, the screams now choking in his throat as he dragged backwards, back towards the burning, towards him.

Roba pulls him closer, like he were nothing more than a tug-of-war rope. And no matter how hard Simon claws into the dirt, how hard he forces himself to breath through the agony, how hard he begs-

He can't escape.

Simom wakes up screaming so loudly that he can feel it tearing the inside of his throat raw. With the tail end of a plea on his lips, he crashes to the floor, his legs tangled up all kinds of ways in his thin sheets.

Christ alive, he can't breathe. He can't even move and fuck-

One of his hands clutch at his pounding heart while the other claws against the floor in hopes of escaping him.

He needs to get away, needs to get out of here as fast as possible- but his legs won't move right and he can only crawl so far with one lousy hand and he just can't get any traction-

The door slams open, rattling on its hinges, and the room floods with blinding light. Someone's yelling, and he barely makes out, "Get down!"

Simon can't see. He can't see. Can't move or breathe and some is yelling, and he's fucking terrified, so he buries his head in his hands and curls up into a ball the best he can.

He feels like he needs to vomit out whatever is caught in his throat so he can catch a breath, to rip his heart out of his chest just so it'll slow down, to carve out his brain so the screaming will stop.

"Ghost?! Creepin' Jesus, what's-"

"Ghost? Ghost where-" the yelling pauses, catches itself in the air before settling into a low, hurried, murmur. "Ah, hell- Simon…" The door cracks almost shut, and the voice orders, "Go on back to your barracks! False alarm, everything's fine."

But it's not. It's not fucking fine because he knows he knows that voice, but he can't place it, can't stop hyperventilating to put a face to it-

The voice doesn't speak up again, and there's footsteps, a few, that shuffle away and down the hall.

And, eventually, somewhere in the midst of the calming chaos, his ears stop ringing. The high pitched whining fades away, and after a moment, his vision slowly clears. The black fuzz in his peripherals let up and nothing is blurry. He blinks, and notices the lights in the room aren't as assaulting.

"You with me, soldier?" Price murmurs from where he's crouched down across the room.

Simon opens his mouth to say he's fine, but all he can do is choke on his breath.

"Hey there, easy, Simon. You're alright," Price soothes, a sad look in his eyes. "Just breathe, kid. No rush."

¤¤¤¤¤

When he does calm down and he's no longer in his head, he speaks. His voice is gravelly and raw and it hurts just a bit, but Ghost speaks.

"What was with the bloody search party? Everyone wakes up yellin' now and then. Comes with the fuckin' territory."

Price presses his lips into a thin line as he hands Ghost his mask.

"Yeah, but not everyone begs for their life. Certainly not you, Simon." The name earns him a harsh, tired glare.

"I wasn't…" he feels his lips curl down more without his permission, the nightmare still whispering its giggles in the back of his mind. "I wasn't begging for anything. I don't beg."

Price gives him an odd look, one he's seen before but can't quite place.

He's fucking sick of that, not being able to place what he's experienced before.

"What were you dreaming about?"

Ghost clenches his jaw instantly, trapping his confession far behind his teeth. He beats the words down until they are nothing but a speck deep inside. Buries them together into the ground, in an unmarked grave, in the middle of nowhere.

Price runs a slightly shaking hand through his tousled hair and sighs, "Don't do this to yourself anymore. Just one word, that's all I need."

Ghost closes his eyes, and the image of Johnny and the boy and flames and the hook flash in the darkness. He shoots them open and feels his breath stutter in his throat.

Ghost can't. He won't. He's not that god damn pathetic.

"It's alright, son."

Fuck it all.

What else is he supposed to do but talk? How can he say nothing when Price talks to him like that? Like he's worth waking up for?

"Roba," he whispers like a curse.

And Price understands, because of course he does.

¤¤¤¤¤

He has another terrible one within the next week.

It's his fault this time. He should know better- he does know better.

It's all because tries to sleep with a weighted blanket.

Ghost figures he needs a tiny, controllable change. Besides, he read somewhere that the weight would help him sleep soundly.

God knows he needs a good night's rest.

So he wills himself to go out into the world off base and brave his local 24 hour convenience store for the stupid thing. He buys the first one he sees that isn't psychedelic and bleeding with color. It weighs a good 20 pounds through the whole blanket, but Ghost figures he's a lot to cover.

After an odd look from the short man at the register, Ghost goes back to the base to call it a day, a bit bitter from the silent interaction.

So what if he buys blankets an hour after midnight? Piss off.

He just… Wants to sleep everything away.

And so he tucks in for the night, hopeful, swapping the military grade sheet for his new weighted blanket that, actually, is quite nice. Eventually, after forcing every muscle to relax one by one, he falls blissfully asleep.

Soap's stupid mohawk was a mess of blood as he was dragged, kicking and begging, through the mud. Ghost was murdering men left and right to get to him, killing without a thought to save him, the blood soaking into his hands, leaving nothing but thin scars behind.

And then he sees it; the all too familiar grave. Unmarked and hardly four feet, just like he remembers.

And the Sergeant- Soap, MacTavish, John, Johnny, Johnny, Johnny- is carelessly tossed like a rag doll right into that grave.

And Ghost dives after him.

He has to save him because he couldn't save everyone else.

He has to.

But he can't.

Now that they're here, he can't get them out.

The dirt is piling on top of them too quickly, and he can't dig them free fast enough and Johnny is screaming and crying and fighting and-

And then he's silent. Quiet as the earth.

Ghost searches for him, wide-eyed despite the dirt all around him. And he sees. He sees his Johnny.

Sees that he's a corpse.

Rotted, at that. Old- days old, at least. There's no grin on his melted face anymore, no glint of mischief in his rolling eyes.

Ghost is too late. None of his sacrifices matter.

Still, he tries.

He tries to get out, scrapes and digs and hopes to get free, get on top, look down at the grass.

But he's only getting deeper- so, so much deeper- into the ground and he doesn't know why, he doesn't understand how-

It's Soap. It's Johnny. He's digging the wrong way, rotted flesh and tiny bones scraping in the wrong direction.

"Other way!" Simon shouts past the dirt in his mouth.

And John stops, skin sliding off of his face as he rattles his bones at Simon, unable to talk with his lips a puddle in the hole they're in. But he sees it, Johnny's wicked smile of teeth and a touch of gums.

Hears it, when he speaks into his brain: Oh? But, Simon, hell is this way.

¤¤¤¤¤

He's going to personally hunt down the author of the book that told him weighted blankets were a good idea.

Hell, maybe they are a good idea. At least, for anyone who doesn't dream of being buried alive.

The clock tells him it's been hardly two hours, but his body says it's been a lifetime.

Everything aches, more than normal, but he can't manage to sit still with these nerves eating at his skin. It feels like he's clutching a live wire instead of his pillow that's planted in front of his stomach and held up by his arms and knees.

It's going to be a long fucking day.

¤¤¤¤¤

He was right.

The day drags on forever.

By the end of it, Ghost considers killing everyone in the building, and then himself.

He feels too big for his skin, like he has to shed it like a snake, grow another one that's a better fit. Every breath he takes, he forces it to be slow and deliberate, focusing on filling his lungs completely.

Ghost spends most of the day in the gym. He tried working on what little paper work he's yet to do, but the words kept blending together and dancing from the page. And even if he wrangled them back, they weren't sticking. He had to read the same line four or five times in a row because his brain decided that English wasn't going to work today.

So he stays his ass in the gym.

Can't think if everything hurts, can you?

He starts with the treadmill and sprints for a mile, until his knees threaten to give way and he nearly slips. He moves, shaking, to the bench press, and makes the choice to work on lighter weights so he doesn't need a spotter. When that isn't clearing his mind, he makes his final destination the punching bag.

Maybe he gets lost in his head regardless. Maybe he loses himself. Maybe he bends a finger.

He only stops when Price practically drags him into the kitchen, still sweaty and gross and dead on his feet.

It wouldn't have been all too bad, if Price had kept the silence going.

"Therapy is a normal thing, Ghost, especially in this line of work. Everyone on the task force goes, even Kate."

And Ghost knows this. He knows how much it has helped Soap through the aftermath of Las Almas and Hassan and everything before, in between, and after.

Ghost knows therapy worked for them.

And he knows he's too damaged for therapy to fix.

Ghost moves his jaw just enough to pass as a nod, just to appease Price.

He can't find the honey for his tea and he's just a breath away from giving up on it and heading to the sniper range with a raw throat and trembling hands.

He doesn't understand where the honey went. It was right here. He left it right here yesterday morning. It's always right here. Always.

So where the fuck is it?

Price makes a noise, something between clearing his throat and huffing.

Ghost faces him at it, and snags the small container of honey before Price can question him.

Fucks sake, he almost spiralled because of honey.

He's pathetic.

"Where was it?" he murmurs, because it'll drive him up the wall for the rest of the day if he doesn't know.

"On the counter, Ghost. Near the fridge. No need to get ansty over it," Price answers easily before adding just as quick, "you know, I could enforce that therapy be mandatory."

"You wouldn't."

Price wouldn't.

Right?

"But I could."

"You could do anything, sir."

"Except help you, apparently."

"I don't need any help."

"You did with Roba."

The tea scalds his hand when he spills it all over the counter. Seeps into his glove and threatens to burn him alive, and he grits his teeth hard enough to feel his jaw creak. He pulls the glove off with his other shaking hand, and gives a once over to his pale hand that's now quickly turning an irritated shade of pink.

"Simon, at least think about it," Price sighs with the weight of the world. He's already carefully cleaning the hot tea from the counter.

"I have," Ghost bites, moving to the sink.

Price goes quiet as the cool water from the tap runs lightly over Ghost's hand, over his oddly bent finger. Ghost hopes that the conversation is over. He knows it's not.

"New orders, soldier."

Ghost takes a breath, stiffening and resisting the muscle memory of moving at attention, or at least parade rest.

"Sir?"

"You're drinking with the 141 at the end of this month."

Ghost lets himself whip his head around, and he can feel the fire in his eyes, the protest on his tongue.

"Don't cut me off."

And Ghost clenches his jaw to shut himself up.

Price hardly ever pulls rank on his team; he doesn't need to, with the respect the 141 has for him regardless. This? This right here is the closest he ever gets.

Price quietly huffs, looking over Ghost's hand that's still under running cool water.

Price holds the tone he always has when he's discussing the workings of a mission. "You'll drink with us, here on base in Soap's office. You'll try to enjoy yourself. Then, after two hours, you can peel off. Fuck about for all I care, but stay involved for two hours, at lease. Understood?"

Ghost thinks the old man has gone fucking senile.

"Understood."

"Involved, Ghost. Offer your two cents here. Say a shitty joke there. Have a drink or two."

"Sir."

Price huffs again, his mustache twitching with the force of it. He carefully cradles Ghost's burned hand. He's got a rag, wets it with the cool water, and lays it gingerly over Ghost's hand.

"Just… Consider it, Simon. Really, this time." Price murmurs, patting Ghost's shoulder with his dry hand. "And get your ass to medical before you terrorize the gym again."

Ghost doesn't know if he wants to strangle the man or hug him.

¤¤¤¤¤

They're standing on Ghost's favorite watch tower, Soap and Ghost, overlooking the quiet woods behind the base.

Johnny had wanted to see his knife collection, and for some godforsaken reason, Ghost shows him.

And as Ghost hands Johnny his favorite one, perfectly balanced and sharper than the devil's tongue, Johnny speaks something dangerous.

"I love you, Simon."

And Simon startles, gasps quietly as his heart beats faster and faster.

Is that just how it is? Effortlessly said, as if those words haven't been plaguing him for months? As if it's really just that easy?

Simon hopes so. Hopes that it comes naturally to him like it does to Johnny.

But he knows better than to hope.

There's not love in the world for people like him.

"Let me show you how much I love you," Johnny beams, switching his grip on Ghost's knife.

"Johnny…?"

Johnny stabs himself just above his navel with Ghost's knife, the slick shhk of the blade echoing in the abyss as Simon can do nothing but watch.

Blood pools over John's hips, down his strong legs, puddles at his feet, but the man is standing there, smiling and looking at Simon like he just hung the moon.

"John- Johnny," Simon forces, rising from his spot on the ground, trembling hands refusing to move from his sides.

"I have a gift for you," John smiles, like he isn't forcing the blade up his torso, carving himself open like a fish. He flexes what's left of his abs, and his small intestines tumble out of him like a massive snake. They fall on the floor at first, but a section somewhere in the middle tips over the side, and gravity sends the organ free falling from the edge of the watchtower, and his large intestines peek out from behind John's flesh. "Ready for it?"

Simon doesn't speak. He can't, mesmerized by how Johnny's free hand pulls the rest of his intestines free like they were as normal as rope.

Johnny then holds the bloodied blade between his teeth, taints those perfectly pearly whites, and uses both hands to dig inside himself.

His left kidney, maybe his pancreas, and his liver are carelessly tossed onto the floor. And Johnny is still smiling at him from beyond that knife. Standing there playing Operation on himself with hearts in his fucking eyes.

With a handful of yanks, his lungs are pulled free, dropped to the floor like the others. They're still functioning, too; expanding and relaxing, providing oxygen for a body a yard away.

And then finally, finally, he tugs his heart out of place with a fond chuckle from behind the blade.

He passes Ghost his heart tenderly, both of John's hands cradling it like it was the most precious thing in the world. And, fuck, it is. Of course it is. Simon tenderly takes the still-beating heart into one of his hands. The rhythmic beating of it sings to Simon, lulls him into a trace.

It's not bloody, Simon notices numbly. It almost seems to be glowing, even. Perfect and radiant and lively, all beautifully John Mactavish.

And Ghost crushes it.

Closes his hand in a fist so suddenly, so violently, that Soap's heart practically explodes.

He doesn't feel a thing when he does so. Blanky watches as Soap's face pales impossibly further, and his lungs, that are still on the floor, stop filling up.

Soap's dying.

He's murdered Johnny without a second thought.

Funny, how that works.

He really is a monster.

Simon wakes up with wet cheeks and blurry eyes. He gasps, shaking and silent. Tears slip down his face again when he blinks away the teasing remnants of the dream.

He gets his bearings together relatively quickly, but not even honeyed tea could stop the shaking in his hands.

He avoids Mactavish for the entire day.

It comes with a little bit of trouble, as the man sticks to him like glue, but Ghost manages. It's his job to disappear, to be a ghost, to be dead.

But fucking hell, maybe Mactavish is a medium.

Ghost will catch glimpses of him, in the mess, in the bath, in the gym, the range, the track, the gym again, the barracks hallway, near Price's office- everywhere.

He eventually gets cornered when he has to take a fucking piss.

Ghost hears Soap coming from miles away, but it doesn't matter. The determination in the man's steps alone make him huff as he tucks himself away.

Hell, Ghost is already running from his past. Adding MacTavish to that list isn't helping him.

He starts washing his hands the best he can with the small splint medical gave him when he feel eyes on his back.

"Sergeant," he murmurs.

There's a scoff, full of bravado and vinegar. "Lieutenant."

Ghost feels his jaw shift as he cuts the water to dry his hands. The bitterness in his chest at the title, foreign coming from Johnny, processes.

He's being hypocritical. This is how Johnny must feel.

"Can I help you?" Ghost says anyway.

"Can I help ye, he says," Soap grin to himself but it doesn't reach his eyes, doesn't sit right with his snarky tone. "Aye, ye can bother t' explain why ye've been dodgin' me like th' bloody plague."

Because I don't want to hurt you.

Because you're important.

Because I'm scared.

Ghost sniffs once, tossing the paper towels into the trash.

"Need some time to myself. Ain't nothin' personal, Johnny."

At that, Soap loses some of that tension in his shoulders, stops looking like a caged dog. He lets out the smallest of breaths.

"Aye…" he murmurs, hesitating. He licks over his bottom lip- Johnny often does that when he isn't sure what to say, tries to taste the words before deciding to serving them out or not- and takes a glance at the suddenly interesting floor. "Just… ah'm here, ye know? If… Ah don't know… If ye don't want time to yerself for too long."

"Yeah…" Simon lets out, accidentally. He recovers quickly, or tries to, anyway. "We'll see."

And Johnny licks his lips again, after a quiet nod. But he doesn't say anything. Maybe he didn't like the taste of his words this time.

¤¤¤¤¤

He dreams again and again. Always, he dreams.

Most recently, he dreams of Johnny.

Simon can't stand it.

It's affecting his waking moments now. It's making him affect Soap's waking moments.

After dreaming of that night in Chicago, of missing that shot on Hassan, of watching, hearing Johnny fall just about 50 stories to his death, Ghost spent a week straight making sure Soap stayed away from the high watch towers. He went as far as swapping patrols or having something 'suddenly come up' that 'needs the Sergeant right fucking now'.

After dreaming of missing Hassan, and shooting Johnny, he trained for hours and hours straight at the sniper range, foregoing meals and drinks and piss breaks just to make sure that his aim was perfect every time. Soap was forced to waste his evening by slowly convincing Simon that enough was enough, that he needed to eat, drink water, and get some fucking rest.

After dreaming that Johnny blew up into dozens of pieces of meat chunks protecting him, Simon had a panic attack when Soap was at the demo-range and an explosion went off. Despite not even a cut on him, Ghost forced Soap to medical (once his own breathing was stable enough). He banned an outraged Soap from the range for two days.

Once, he dreamed that Johnny killed himself. Put a barrel in his mouth and looked at Simon. Pulled the trigger without hesitating. Simon knew, just knew, it was his fault.

After every dream of Johnny dying in front of him, or worse, by his hands, Simon crumbles. Loses another piece of himself.

He doesn't know how many pieces of himself he has left to lose.

¤¤¤¤¤

When the night comes to drink, Ghost considers going AWOL.

Thinks about staying true to his call sign and vanishing into thin air, never seen again. He plans it out, even, knows what little to bring, what time to leave, where to walk to.

He stares at the mask he wears on base, just the balaclava with the infamous skull print. His gloved thumb runs over where a piece of the jaw design is cracking. He shifts his own jaw in time with his thumb.

Maybe there's no Simon left, he thinks, delusional.

Maybe it's just Ghost, after everything.

Now would be the time to slip away, Ghost reminds himself, and his grip on the mask tightens, threateningly pulling at the jaw bone design.

Now.

He slips the mask over his head, and slowly breathes. He considers.

The faint smell of cigar smoke worms its way under his door and into his room. He hears Gaz laugh somewhere down the hallway, hears Soap's soft footsteps padding towards his room.

No.

He stands wearily, takes another deliberate breath, and stalks to the door.

There's a knock, just as his hand reaches for the knob. A familiar pattern, one that makes him force a feeling that could possibly be described as giddiness down into the abyss behind his ribcage.

Knock, knock, knock-knock, knock.

He could still run. Now's the very last chance he'll get. Johnny won't let him out of his sights when this night starts. Ghost should vanish- it's now or never.

He swallows past the sting of bile in his throat and returns with a quiet knock of his own.

Knock, knock.

He hears Soap laugh quietly on the other side.

Never, he choses. Never.

Ghost opens his door, and there is Soap, leaning against the wall with a grin so wide that it could crack his face. His eyes brighten when he sees Ghost. His grin drops a little when he sees what look Simon has in his eyes.

Johnny furrows his brows slightly, darts his eyes up and down in a quick one-two.

Ye alreit?

Ghost shifts his jaw before steps into Johnny's space, just a little.

I'll be fine.

Johnny squints at him before dropping the silent conversation. He pushes himself off the wall and starts talking about a new project he's working on at the demolitions range.

Ghost follows him to his office, and hangs on every word.

¤¤¤¤¤

Soap's 'office' is more of a play room than anything, all regulation thrown to the wind.

Spotless, but filled with personal trinkets and such. Soap reminds Ghost of a crow, collecting little shiny things to bring home to show others. It would be almost cute if Ghost would allow himself to think that way.

Gaz isn't here, though. Neither is Price or Laswell, or anyone else.

Just him and Johnny.

He doesn't think about it too much, because if he does, he knows it's the old man's fault.

Johnny doesn't pay any mind to the lack of the other three, and instead buries his head around his thousand-and-some shelves to find 'the right glasses'.

"What are we drinkin'?" Ghost asks when the sound of rummaging starts to grate on his nerves.

"Oh, he does speak. Bless th' Saints, ah thought ye went mute,'' Johnny grins at him. Ghost narrows his eyes. Maybe he should have ran. The hum Johnny gives while pretending to think on it, possibly, changes his mind again. "Daiquiris," he settles on.

"What?"

"Ye know, those fruity, fancy cocktails."

Ghost could walk out the door right now. He should.

"Fuckin' hell, Johnny," Ghost drawls, casting his gaze to the draw that seemed to be the one Johnny was looking for, if his air fist bump was anything to go by. He pulls out two daiquiris glasses, one of them clear around the middle up and with the base a cool blue. The other- "What the fuck."

Johnny laughs at that and holds the other glass up proudly. It's hot pink with a little touch of purple at the rim and with a mini pink boa scarf at the base.

"Don't like it?" Johnny grins so bright it feels like Ghost is getting flashbanged.

"You would have that," he murmured instead.

"Yeah, yeah. Yer lucky 'm givin' ye the blue one. Gotta keep up yer masculine image, eh?"

"Whatever you say, Johnny," Ghost huffs, settling into the plush spare seat across from the desk. "Make it strong, yeah?"

Johnny hums quietly, his eyes lingering on Ghost's face.

Two hours. That's all he needs before he's calling it a night and fucking off.

¤¤¤¤¤

He doesn't know exactly when he got drunk, but he does know that he ended up with the pink glass two drinks ago. Maybe four.

Johnny isn't wasted like him; the fucker's been nursing his second drink for about an hour.

Right, fuck, he was supposed to leave…

He forces his eyes to drag up to the oddly silent clock on the wall. Ghost remembers Johnny telling him all about how he managed to rig the clock in a way the ticking sound doesn't happen. He said it drove him bat shit crazy, having to hear it over and over again. It was adorable.

Fuck, no, he needs to focus. The clock, the time.

Ghost tries again, squinting at it for extra measure.

Jesus, he was supposed to be out of here three hours ago.

"Ye alreit?" Johnny asks from his spot next to Ghost on the floor. Ghost hums at him in question. "I asked if ye're alreit, Ghost."

Ghost blinks at him, considering the question for an awfully long time, long enough for Johnny to sit up and gain that adorable furrow between his eyebrows.

"L.t? Seriously, are ye okay?"

He takes a small breath.

"Nah," he offers simply, running his hand through his tousled hair.

Simon dropped the mask all of thirty minutes ago. He finally got pissed off about having it bunched up on his nose and abandoned the thing.

Johnny blinked at him a time or two, the gears turning in his head at Ghost actually being honest.

"No?"

"Yeah, no."

Johnny blinks again and that furrow grows.

"Yes?"

"Nah."

"No?"

"Yeah," Simon grins at the stupidness of the conversation.

Johnny shakes his head with an exasperated sigh.

"Alreit, what th' fuck," Johnny tosses his hands up.

And Simon laughs.

He doesn't know that he is laughing until his sides ache with it. Johnny's laughing too, at first in disbelief and then with Simon at the situation. And when Simon comes down from a high he hasn't felt in decades, Johnny is staring at him- through him, deep into what's left of his soul.

"Wha'," Simon slurs, lips morphing into an odd, lazy grin.

"Nothin'."

"Nothin'?"

"Aye." Johnny's eyes linger lightly at his mouth before they harden and he sits up a bit. "Hell, Si, ye've got me all side tracked. This is important."

"Wha's important?"

"Ye are. Ye not bein' alreit," Johnny insists.

"Ah, sure," he murmurs, laying his head back on the side of Soap's desk.

"Ah'm serious," Johnny shifts closer, and Simon's eyes open lazily. "Why aren't ye alreit, Simon?"

Simon.

The abomination almost sounds pretty coming out of Johnny's mouth.

Ghost gets his shit together.

"You wanna know?" Ghost rasps, drinking the rest of his too-sweet daiquiri in his too-frilly glass.

"Aye. If ye'd tell me."

And Ghost gathers his drifting thoughts, pieces them together as he breathes slowly.

"I have killed you… Countless times." Ghost waves his hand simply, almost like he were shooing a fly. "Shot you, stabbed you, lit you on fuckin' fire, made you-" he forces a sharp breath. "Made you off yourself, just like that." His throat is getting tight, and he lifts the glass to his scarred lips again, knowing damn well it was empty.

"Simon," Johnny breathes, slow and steady hands taking the glass from him to set it aside. His hands return quickly, and it's placed on top of Simon's.

"I don't- I won't take it anymore." A sob desperately tries punches through Simon, and he covers his face like the coward he is. "I want to hold you, want to have you, Johnny."

And the fucking gleam in Johnny's eyes could fly Simon to the moon and makes him bring back arm fulls of stars for him.

"But- but everything I touch dies. And I can't… can't lose you to myself." The sob tries Simon again, and this time, it wins. He's crying, and he doesn't know how to stop, and it scares him. Scares him so badly that he can't do anything but press the heels of his palms into his eyes. He doesn't care that Johnny's hand falls away.

Really. He doesn't. Not… Not at all.

Christ, he is absolutely shameless.

Seriously, has he no pride? Breaking down over a couple of dreams? Crying in front of his Sergeant?

He feels his teeth grind together, feels his skull build up with the pressure of a thousand words, and by God and the devil, he has to let at least some out before they kill him.

"They felt so fuckin' real," he seethes past his locked jaw. "Woke up sometimes, 'n' I didn't bloody know if you were really dead or not. Felt like seein' a ghost everytime we passed."

Johnny's hand comes back, steady and tender, and guides Simon to lessen the pressure on his eyes.

Past the blur left over from the tears and the force, he catches Johnny licking his bottom lip.

"Ah'm not dead. Ye've touched me and ah'm still breathin' jus' fine, Simon. Promise- Swear I am," Johnny carefully caresses Ghost's forearm. "Ah'm not goin' anywhere." He grins a little. "Yer not that lucky to get rid'a me."

Simon takes a deep breath, one that shakes his rib cage and stretches his lungs. With Johnny's encouragement, he breathes slowly.

"Yeah," he murmurs, leaning his shoulder on Johnny's.

"Aye," Johnny agrees, leaning in time with him.

They sit there for some time, taking each other in, feeling each other's warmth. Simon nearly doses off to the feeling of Johnny's chest rising and falling.

"Yer gonna have a hell of a hangover tomorrow," Johnny chuckles, combing through Simon's hair.

And, honestly, Simon is powerless against the chuckle that breaks through.

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mud-castle · 1 year

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I was wondering since in this time line it's Mudstar instead of Onestar, what if Tallstar survived in this world just long enough to see Firestar, his lovers son, turn into a power hungry monster, just like Brokenstar.

Just like in lore, in his final moments he receives a vision from Starclan about the kind of cat Mudclaw will be as leader, a violent warlord who will do anything to keep windclan on top, except here it cements his choice to have Mudclaw as leader. After all, when you have monsters coming for you, what's better then to have your own monster?

So Wind clan becomes the counter balance to Thunderclan and Riverclan under Firestar and Mistystar, after all, you can't manipulate someone who's sole reason for existing is "fuck you, that's why", and you can't defeat someone who keeps disappearing into the endless hills.

Mudclaw basically becomes cat genghis khan, using temporary dens and being nomadic to prevent having their camp assaulted, and using their agility fully to their advantage to perform quick strikes into other clans and avoiding any larger forces. (Ignore this entire last part, this is just my worldbuilding going of the wall)

Ehhh, I would not compare dark!Firestar to Brokenstar or even Tigerstar. He's not going around stealing & killing children and taking territory and seizing camps and terrorizing his cats just because power.

The way he's seen to behave thus far has been specifically aimed towards Leafpool and Brambleclaw, one being a cat who betrayed him and the clan and the other being someone he never trusted to begin with...who then betrayed him and the clan. (Although Bramble wouldn't have done that if Fire had treated him better so who's really at fault here.) Cats who he views as his responsibility in some way and as such he must deal with their insolence.

If the season is good and prey runs well, then he won't bother you if you don't bother him. He can be violent yeah, but honestly no more than any other clan cat in the universe. He's more diplomatic than most cats, and saying no to him isn't a one way ticket to getting attacked. His main issue is that he's vengeful.

But anyway, yeah, Tallstar sees no future where Windclan and Thunderclan are allies after all he's seen, especially after Fire's brother's death. Mudclaw thus far has been more defensive of his clan than he's been offensive, so he remains best suited to Windclan's leader after Tall's passing. Mudclaw, unlike canon Onewhisker, has nothing to prove so while they're not allies, there is an uneasy peace between the two clans.

That and Thunderclan's a bit occupied dealing with Leafpool's group throughout half of PO3 and part of OOTS.

Aaand Mistystar has no need for moorland, and if there was a problem with prey, she'd be more likely to fight Shadowclan for territory than Windclan.

#warrior cats au #dark mirror au #warrior cats #firestar #mudclaw #mistystar

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godraet · 6 months

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ok this has been rotating in my brain (and i want it out of my brain before work) but i know i mention gan remembering all his lives completely out of order but here's some other fun facts- he's a different age in basically all of those lives too, and i can back that one up!

as he exists in his main verse, he's about 35 [as in he's in his early 30s when he finally shows up to meet with rauru] (at time of sealing), he has the build to prove it. i have no other way to describe this aside from he is just in general bulkier in build than younger lifetimes- and more lean than older lifetimes

"so what does that mean" ok so let's start with OoT (pre time skip), gan is still beefy because of course he is, but also he's notably more lean- broad shoulders yeah but damn he sure has a nice tapered waist lmao, also he behaves like he's younger- more prone to mocking his opponents and also he's impulsive and clearly doesn't actually have the current life experience to navigate through the hylian courts- this will come to bite him in the ass in TP timeline. so i slap pre-timeskip OoT gan at like ... 25 or so (which puts him at 32 or so after a 7 year time skip). he is a young ruler still, and his lack of experience shows, even if his words are pretty- and there's a fair chance that for as much as he thought he was playing the hylian court, they were actually playing him.

which leads into TP- if the premise of TP is that link goes BACK in time and tells people "yeah this dude's going to do shit", and soon after gan is sentenced to DEATH (and actually with what evidence other than the word of a kid who says he traveled time???), which means he's still that same rather inexperienced young man- and then he's banished to another realm since it turns out lmao he couldn't be killed by the sages!! and time passes weirdly there i'm sure, so his body has aged to maybe about 40 or so, he's definitely no longer the overconfident young man who first showed up to the hylian court!

in a similar energy, we have WW gan, who is definitely older- closer to 50 than 40 in looks; he's basically a wall of muscle, but he's also got a fair amount of healthy fat, which gives us our top tier dad-bod gan. except WW gan also has LIVED SO LONG and so he's super bitter because everything went to shit and actually not all of it was his fault!!!

HW gan is a more experienced warrior- he's got plenty of experience under his belt and is in his later 30s, pushing 40- he is a capable commander and it's more than just having natural charisma (which is something that he relied on as a young man in OoT- making up for a lack of experience with charisma and the ability to at least plan in some capacity- but in no way is OoT gan a masterful warlord, he's a better sorcerer than he is general, but a devoted king regardless),

anyway, all of these jumbled memories are why gan doesn't respond to rauru's summons until he's in his 30s (knowing if he goes when he's still "rather inexperienced" he's more likely to get fucked over), but it's also why he's overconfident (remembering how WW was ... arguably his win for a time, although it also means he has this sinking feeling that his victory will in the end be this lonely and hollow thing, and sometimes he wonders if it's really worth it) thanks for coming to my tedtalk

#hc tag tba #theogony‚ the legend of the forgotten god ╱ meta

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science-lings · 1 year

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So because I like to be really complicated, I've decided to throw my favourite part of pretty much every Link's design (ofc the ones that actually change the design - looking at you Toon Links) at you. Idk, I'm an overachiever and I love gushing about one of the best character designs in video game history.

Obviously with the 8-bit designs, all there really is are artworks and the manuals to go off of because Link is a collection of tiny squares with 4 max colours. TLoZ and AoL are the same character so to be honest, I just love his earthy tones and facial features. Big nose rep. Goes for ALTTP, LA, and OOT as well tbh.

Speaking of ALTTP, that pink hair he has in-game is literally one of the best thing Nintendo has ever done.

A lot of child Links have this, but the baggy boots introduced in OOT are literally everything. I want to wear them every day of the rest of my life. The Oracle games also give him the flared lining and I would die to have them. Peak footwear. And the bracers Adult Link gets add so much to such a simple design, it's literally unreal.

The Four Swords games were cute with the bright colour swaps. I'm so mad they drew the artwork for the game in the Toon Link artstyle. Seeing artwork for it in ALTTP's art would have been so cool like what came on the European box art. The Wind Waker/Phantom Hourglass came and introduced the most adorable Zelda artstyle. Like he's just a cylinder and I love him so much. It's a bit like FS(A) where he just got so much more colourful too. Spirit Tracks gave Link this cute engineer uniform that I cannot get over. Ever.

Twilight Princess. I'm sorry but he's just a whole hunk of man right there. The darker graphics went so far for him, his outfit was so detailed at the time and he's got such a masculine presence if you know what I mean. Oddly enough, there's so much I like about the design, it's so hard to put what I like into words other than 'a lot'. Sorry, I know it's not very helpful ^^;

Skyward Sword Link had such an amazing emotional range. He said absolutely nothing, but you could tell exactly how he felt, but unlike WW/PH/ST etc Link, his facial expression were really toned down and gentle. The most intense emotion he's ever had was fighting a god. Love that about him.

So I know ALBW technically shares ALTTP/OOA(/S) design, so I want to highlight the one thing that's different which is the giant, chunky bracelet he wears. Something about that makes me so happy for some reason.

Triforce Heroes' biggest accomplishment was the alternate outfits. Those boys literally strutting around in a forest in full gowns and costumes like it's nothing is literally peak fashion. Style over practicality any day.

BotW was literally a game-changer for Link's design in almost every way. I have no idea how Nintendo managed to completely change the design down to the fundamental GREEN of the Links before him to this cerulean blue and still keep the essence of what made Link a Link. And although Nintendo loves to go back on it in other material, I absolutely ADORE that they made his features so round and softly shaped, especially his eyes, compared to other Links. Nintendo will never take away how absolutely gorgeous that man is now they've achieved it. So we don't know much about TotK yet for obvious reasons, but he now sports literally the most revealing outfit in the franchise (other than him literally being half naked in BotW) and the fact it's paired with long hair is literally what I've been waiting my entire life for.

So yeah, I've probably made this so much more complicated, but there is literally so much I love about each Link, it's hard to choose my favourite overall features (except the boots, I love the baggy boots).

This is actually incredibly helpful thank you! I think one of the things I'm struggling most with the design is his hair, like he goes from a medium dark brown to pink to platinum blonde to bright yellow to almost orange and like... it's hard to make a decision lol. I do want to include bits of every game, whether that be with little accessories (like kinstones or belt buckles or jewelry) or more major features.

I am absolutely convinced on his schnoz though, he deserves a big pointy nose. It's going to be fun to try to balance some of his more harsh features with a lot of the softness we see in many other games, like he always has intense eyebrows (even in toon mode), but he also tends to have a baby face.

#im happy that this gives me more opportunity to look through the concept art books again #although i love the oot boots i think a major consensus is that I redesign the pegesus boots so I'll probably do that #maybe i can mix the designs somehow?#this guy is gonna be dripped out #ask andromeda #ultimate link redesign #loz

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giriduck · 2 years

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When people interact with media, they often identify with characters of their generation. An example is when you’re in high school and you watch a movie, you’re likely going to attach to the relatable experiences of the high schooler main characters, because you can empathize with parts of their perspective.

Then suddenly, one day twenty years down the line, when you re-watch that old movie, you find yourself sympathizing with those main characters’ parents, or their adult friends, because now their perspective is now more relatable to you.

The older I get, the more I actually sympathize with Wind Waker Ganondorf, but I can 100% understand why and how much younger players don’t.

I’m old enough now that I’m getting increasingly more nostalgic about how things used to be (I had a whole rant about climate change, but ripped it out because it was pretty depressing).

In Wind Waker, you have a person who is numerous generations separated from the current population. It’s as though you took a highly educated scientist from antiquity (pick your favorite cultural example) and tossed them into Waterworld (sorry, I just looked it up and that’s a reference older than Wind Waker itself; anyhow, it was like Mad Max: Fury Road but on the water). He doesn’t belong in that time, he struggles to adjust, but he’s powerful and determined enough to have a real chance at dredging everything—old world, and all—back up.

Is that a bad thing? Yes, but only because it was established in OoT and WW prologue that Ganondorf corrupts Hyrule when he rules over it. Whether or not that corruption is intentional is fully in the realm of player interpretation.

Regardless, Ganondorf cannot move forward. He can’t accept what is in front of him, so he researches in search of loopholes to get what he wants, because that’s what he does. That tenacity, rebellious spirit, and willingness to look outside the box is part of why I really like him as a character, but it’s also tragic because—for someone who has put in a bunch of time and mastered so much—he’s unwilling to grow out of this attachment. Instead, he’s caught living in the past—too attached to what was lost—bitter about the present.

I love the guy, but that is no way to live.

That refusal to accept and adapt could even be the core trait that he touched on in his famous speech. Maybe he just sees suffering everywhere around him to justify and frame his quest to obtain Hyrule as a noble one, when it’s actually driven by envy or greed?

Then you have Tetra, Link, and Arryl. They are not burdened with nostalgia. They were born into the world in all its watery glory. They’re doing fine. They have family / crew, friends, the comforts of home or ship, and Tetra has a thriving pirate lifestyle ahead of her, unaware and unburdened by the anchors of her prior lives. Life on the Great Sea isn’t viewed as hard; it just is what it is.

Ganondorf almost literally said that the denizens of the world are complacent because they don’t know any better; they only know oceans, oceans, oceans. Daphnes would most likely agree with that statement, but from the perspective that that knowledge of how it was is exactly what would taint these kiddos’ relationship with their environment (and that the days of Old Hyrule are gone, dude. You need to move on.)

Ganondorf talked about how the seas are barren and the world is pathetic now, but it’s possible that the kids and the people of the Great Sea don’t need saving, just like the Gerudo might not have needed saving, so long ago? All we know for sure is that Ganondorf wanted to get out of there, whether it was the desert or the ocean.

The older I get, the more nostalgia I accumulate, the more I actually kinda empathize with Ganondorf’s desire to go back home; the ache to return to a place and time that was lost.

Although I understand the value of acceptance, not attaching to the past too much, and moving on, that’s all fine and good because the bounds of our reality don’t allow for any other option. We accept because we have to.

But in the end, Daphnes had the chance to change everything in the blink of an eye, and he could have restored Hyrule and secured a future for all without the threat of corruption or future hostile takeover by his ancient nemesis. It could have been a world-changing, high impact yet low risk move, and instead, he decided not to allow any change; he chose to obfuscate the past, and keep things on their current course (a course that jumped the tracks when the Goddesses first flooded Hyrule… unless that was part of the grand design all along…).

If Ganondorf was lawful evil, then Daphnes was not good; he was lawful neutral.

Although the results of that decision were almost assuredly better for Hyrule and its people than Ganondorf’s dream coming true, it actually makes me a bit angry at how all that divine potential for a better future was absolutely squandered.

#legend of zelda #the legend of zelda #wind waker #ww ganondorf #long post #late night post

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powdermelonkeg · 3 years

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Hyrule Brochure: A Potential for BotW’s Future

Hyrule’s map in BotW is pretty sparse as far as cities go. Yes, it’s got more than any other Zelda game, but it also has like, 90% of its map being pure dead space.

So I decided to play around and make what I imagine Hyrule would look like, as far as cities go, if it were allowed to properly rebuild and not get totally wrecked by Ganon again.

Credit to Eragon2589 on DeviantArt for the free-to-use map icons. I love these little buttons so much.

So, these are the canon towns we get in BotW; Hateno, Lurelin, Tarrey, Zora’s Domain, Goron City, Korok Forest, Rito Village, Yiga Hideout, and Gerudo Town. I’m counting Yiga Hideout as a town because if the Yiga were a little nicer, it WOULD be marked one.

Adding the various stables on makes the place look MUCH less empty, but still; what can we do with this?

Well, I’ve spent the last several days locating all the significant ruins and landmarks, with one or two extra things thrown in, that I think would make this place much more populated.

Maps are free to use if you want them, btw. Have fun!

As a general rule of thumb, I want to make the towers and stables their own cities. The towers are a good landmark and beacon of safety, and the stables have all the building blocks to start building up a village.

If I’m particularly inspired, I’ll give some background on what the town is/does!

Starting off with the Rito! Their village has grown into a town, and the stable at its foothill is its own village now. I called it “fledgeling” because that’s where the Rito and Hylians would intermingle most, so the Rito aren’t exactly flying around here.

Beacon City is built around Tabantha Tower; the Rito have turned it into a sort of lighthouse, reflecting light off into the distance to help guide nighttime fliers home. Because of this, it’s a very popular stop for mail carriers, and where they go, development and cultural mixing follows.

Kaysa Town is built around Great Fairy Kaysa’s fountain; it’s a popular tourist attraction, and she gets plenty of offerings, so win-win!

For the Gorons, we’ve only got two more cities: Silversmith Village and Din’s Spire. Silversmith is built around the culture in the southern mines, and it has down-the-road access to the Goron Hot Springs. Din’s Spire is less of a town and more of a landmark, due to the sheer cliffs all around it, but the huge (and notably not in the burning death zone) hot spring lake makes it a popular rest stop for people on their way through.

I decided not to rebuild the northern mines; they’re pretty busted up and lava soaked, so my assumption is that they were abandoned either due to hazards or due to the ore being stripped out.

Korok Forest wouldn’t change much, besides the Royal Family declaring it a protected area. The Koroks don’t seem to have much interest in expansion, and they, as far as I know, don’t live in houses.

Gerudo Territory is MUCH more expansive than the others so far, and with good reason.

Gerudo Town itself is now Gerudo City, and the Kara Kara Bazaar has grown into a town. Canyon Stable has developed a village (mostly full of Gerudo husbands so they don’t have to travel a million miles just to see their families).

The Gerudo have control of one of the towers in their region, and the town built around it is Overlook Town. It mostly serves as a training grounds for young Gerudo warriors.

The City of the Seven developed when the Seven Heroine statues were recovered and restored; the town around them was built to honor them, and then it got a LOT of foot traffic from those wanting to see the legendary statues.

Tera Town rose up much in the same way Kaysa Town did up in Rito territory, centered around the Great Fairy Fountain.

Mesa Village and West Gerudo Town are both smaller Gerudo settlements; West Gerudo sprung up out of access to snowmelt from the Gerudo Highlands, and Mesa Village, because of its relative safety from Molduga and access to oasis water.

Finally, Gerudo Valley, in reference to Ocarina of Time. This town is a Gerudo-only zone, and is more a fortress than a town. It exists both to keep an eye on the Yiga and to gain control of the mountain pass, making people go through Canyon Village to get to Gerudo instead of avoiding Gerudo customs.

Speaking of the Yiga, they’ve taken two new spots for themselves; Gerudo Tower, which they’ve renamed Kohga Tower in honor of their late Master, and Banana Labyrinth, which serves as their highest security area. Imagine if you’d had to go through the LABYRINTH to get the Thunder Helm back.

Up next we’ve got the Zora. Truthfully, their territory spans as long as Zora river and WELL into the ocean, but these are the only cities that, technically, a Hylian with adequate gear can enter.

Mipha’s Landing is an above-water city built expressly for doing trade. It got its name from the late Mipha; since the tower reaches up into the sky, it was hoped that someday, her spirit would sit atop it for a rest and see all that her people had been able to do thanks to her sacrifice.

Lakebed Village is in Lake Hylia, and it’s actually a slowly-repopulating Lakebed Temple, from Twilight Princess. Meanwhile, Great Bay City is a port town above water and an aquatic metropolis below, full of music and dance and exotic wares.

And finally, Hylians.

Hoo boy.

I’ve split this up region by region but

THIS is how many living spots they’ve got.

Silver stars indicate military towns. Red stars indicate military outposts.

I USE THE TERM MILITARY VERY LOOSELY HERE. Hyrule, since it doesn’t interact with its neighbors, only has the Yiga and the various monsters to fight against. Anything labeled “military” means that it’s staffed by royal employ, meaning knights and Sheikah and the like.

Let’s start with Akkala. The northeast labyrinth has been converted into an emergency bunker, in case Calamity strikes and people need a safe place to hide. Not only is it difficult to break into, it also has a completely empty lower level that’s PERFECT for long-term seige.

City Tempest got its name for being near-constantly wracked by storms. Despite this, though, it remains a popular vacation spot for people who don’t mind a little rain; the Skull Lake and the giant flowers are worth it.

Valley Town rose up out of both East Akkala Stable and Robbie’s workshop. It doesn’t get too much foot traffic, but it doesn’t really need to.

Midna Village, I built where the ruins of Shadow Hamlet are. I figured it was a fitting name, and the area is almost constantly covered in the shadow of Death Mountain.

Four Brothers’ Base is a knight outpost that’s up extremely high, spanning huge bridges between the four Tingle isles.

Then Parapa Palace, in reference to Zelda II: Adventure of Link, was built in place of the Akkala Citadel and functions as a mini Hyrule Castle + Castle Town. In real life, monarchs would have several palaces to go between, kind of like how well-off people nowadays would have a summer home. So, I followed that trend! This is Zel’s summer palace.

And you guys know what Tarrey Town is. Although interestingly, as it expands, it goes vertical into the stone column it was built on.

Onto Central Hyrule.

Camp Rauru is training camp and lodging for new knights. Rebonae Village and Kasuto City were made out of the Wetland and Riverside stables respectively, though Kasuto (also an Adventure of Link reference) gets substantially more foot traffic due to being on the way from Castle Town to Dueling Peaks.

Outset Town got its name, lore-wise, from the fact that it’s the first bit of land Link from BotW visited after leaving the Great Plateau, and meta-wise, because it’s the starting point for Wind Waker Link.

Aquame City surrounds the Coliseum, which is how it grew to be so popular. The grand stage holds sparring matches and various other shows regularly, and it’s a pleasant boat trip from Castle Town to get there.

Saria Town was built out of the old exchange ruins, and it’s in walking distance of the ruined Sage Temple—which, at this point in time, would have been rebuilt—and its existence is both an AoL reference and an OoT one (but mostly AoL, I’ve kind of fallen in love with its map).

New Mabe is where you can find the new Lon Lon Ranch! The ruins there are actually called the Mabe Town Ruins in game, and they’re right by the Ranch Ruins!

Eldin’s pretty sparse as far as Hylian towns go. It’s got Gut Check Camp, where Sheikah train for endurance and elemental resistance, and Windfall Town, a place that sees a LOT of gemstones pass through, freshly mined. That includes rupee ore, mind you!

Faron Province is a little more spaced out, due to the nature of the region. Lurelin’s grown since BotW, becoming a trading bay; meanwhile Cora Lake’s Sheikah Tower has expanded into Parache Town, and the Highland Stable has become Malanya Village. Both of those locations are VERY fond of horses, and they’re a bit competitive, especially during archery season.

Ordona Hamlet is a tiny village tucked away into the middle of Faron. It came about due to the Lakeside Stable, and it’s named that because I am STILL salty that the Zeldevs didn’t put an Ordon Village reference in the game.

Eventide Outpost is more of a testing ground for boats than anything particularly significant, population-wise. The even tides that gave the isle its name make it an ideal location to work out the kinks in new watercraft (and occasionally, the lieutenant in charge of that base demonstrates how to launch a raft into the sky with octo balloons).

Hebra’s the most militarized area of Hyrule, and ideally, it functions as a reserve of men and tech in case Calamity rises again. If there’s anything that BotW’s era learned, it’s to never underprepare for Gann’s return.

Fort Lomei is a converted base, just like the Banana Labyrinth is to the Yiga. This one, though, is patrolled diligently by knights who use daily-changing codes, and it’s impossible to navigate without the locals’ help.

Fort Pikida is situated in that weird stone cavern-y area, and it’s a supply stach and Hebran monster patrol site. It’s the soldiers there’s job to make sure that the Lynels that like to roam the region don’t get too close to residential areas.

Hia Miu Outpost is a training spot for knights sent to the Hebra region; any new soldier to the area has to prove they can handle themselves by going into the Hia Miu shrine and taking on the Major Test of Strength Trial. (Fun fact, did you know that the X-test-of-strength trials reset themselves every blood moon?)

Snowpeak Fortress exists both because it makes a fantastic secondary base for the Hyrulean royals to plan, and because i am once again salty about the lack of Twilight Princess in this game.

Sturnida Resort is built around hot springs! It’s a nice spot for people living around Rito Town and Fledgling Village to take a vacation without having to trek all the way across the country to do it.

Snowfield City came from Snowfield Stable, and it’s the Windfall of Hebra; it sees a LOT of people coming in and out of the region, and the view of the northern lights you can get from there? You’d be hard-pressed to find a Hylian that didn’t have it on their bucket list.

New Tabantha was built on the ruined spot of the original Tabantha Village; you can visit there in-game! It’s a quiet town that raises highland sheep for a living, and its team won the Hebran Triathlon three whole years in a row.

Then, the Tanagar Restricted Zone. If you’ve ever been there, you know EXACTLY why it’s restricted.

Most of the Guardians inside have been dealt with, but the ruined temple remains a hazard testing ground for new tech. It’s off limits to everyone but those with the HIGHEST clearance; I’m talking a direct letter from Zelda herself.

The Thyphlo Secret Camp is exactly what it says on the tin. It’s a place for Hyrulean lieutenants to meet for top-secret missions, and it’s one of those places that you need to be SERIOUSLY high rank to even KNOW about.

Over on the edge of Lanayru, we’ve got New Goponga, built where the old Goponga ruins are, and the Crenel Garrison. The Garrison was built to take care of the Lizalfos problems in the waterways, keeping it safe for Hylians and Zora travelers alike. Goponga, on the other hand, is what Lurelin was in game; nice, friendly, and centered around fishery.

In Necluda, we’ve got New Deya where old Deya was ruined (I think BotW Link was born in old Deya!), Watchtower Village built around the lakeside of the Dueling Peaks tower, and then Dueling Peaks City, a HUGE trade hub that was once the Dueling Peaks stable.

Kakariko Village is now a Town, Hateno has grown into a full blown trade harbor, and a tiny village has started to form around the Hateno Tower, making Firly Overlook.

But what I most love is the City of Hylanay.

Back in the game, it was the ruins of the Lanayru Promenade. So I had the promenade rebuilt, then people moved in around it, and now, Hylanay’s basically Hyrulean Venice! I want to visit it.

On the Great Plateau, we’ve got Aboda Town, named after Spirit Tracks’ Aboda Village in reference to the starting point in each game. This Town has access to the original Temple of Time, but because of the nature of the isolated plateau, it doesn’t see a lot of new faces often.

Over around Thundra, we’ve got Tanagar Village overlooking the canyon, built out of the old Tabantha Stable. The village actually builds downwards into the canyon; people have windows carved right out of the cliff face!

Thundra Village is built into the rocky slopes surrounding Thundra Plateau and the Ridgeland Tower. Their houses are built in the shelter of the giant mushroom things that grow so well in the area, and they’re famous for their signature dish of escargot.

The Serenne Exchange is up north, encompassing both the old Serenne Stable and the Maritta exchange ruins. You can buy practically ANYTHING there; if ever there was a supermarket in Hyrule, it would be right there.

The Royal Lab was rebuilt out of its ruins post Calamity, and it’s directed by Purah, who still hasn’t cured her immortality yet. It’s not uncommon to hear explosions as you pass by that place.

And then Camp Rutile is a small observational outpost, meant to keep track of the activity on Satori Mountain. Supposedly, the mountain’s health reflects the state of the rest of the kingdom, so the researchers assigned there are tasked with monitoring it EXTREMELY closely.

And Hyrule Castle. It’s Hyrule Castle.

Now completely bolted into the ground! :D

If we put all these locations together, we get a very nice, very well populated Hyrule, with LOTS to see. This is how I would design the future of BotW’s Hyrule.

Thanks for reading!

#loz #zelda #worldbuilding #headcanons #MAPS #CITIES #I WANT A POPULATED HYRULE #botw

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destiniesfic · 3 years

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Agree that OoT Aleksander would be into the whole debauched Sankta Alina thing but how about in RoW he has this line "I will give them salvation until they beg me to stop" RoW certainly argues that he gets very, VERY into the Starless Saint stuff post-resurrection. do you think he plays into that persona/side of him at some point to OoTverse Alina? Also do see you a scenario where he would actually say that line to her (in an actual convo or during sexytimes)?

Regardless of whether or not this was meant to be a prompt, anon, it’s a prompt now (in conjunction with one I saw on Twitter). 669 words (nice), Timeless ‘verse, and it’s NSFW 🔞 immediately so it’s all under a cut. Bone apple tea.

Aleksander’s moan broke the quiet of our dacha in lake country like a stone skipped across the surface of a pond. He sat at the foot of our bed, running his hand through my hair. We didn’t always start this way, with my mouth on him, my head bobbing up and down between his thighs, but as we took advantage of these slow post-centennial days away from Os Alta, where we talked little and did much, and as I learned more, I was coming to relish this. The way his breath hitched, his combing fingers. The noises he made. The expression on his face when I looked up at him through my lashes. His need, the swelling urgency of it. His vulnerability, although he would deny it.

The only reason I didn’t get on my knees more often was because he became insufferable when I did.

“There are some who would worship me, you know.” He slid his hand around to cradle the back of my head. “Like you’re doing now.”

I pulled back. “I am not,” I began, indignant.

“All men like to be worshipped,” he said. He pushed my head down again. I wondered at what point I should remind him I had teeth.

But I didn’t wield cruelty as well as he did, and I liked his moaning too much. I liked the way he kept his hand in my hair, like he might be lost if he let go of me, if he didn’t keep hold of the reins. He gave a sharp tug when he was close. Sometimes I pulled away with the warning, but not this time. This time, after having had a little practice, I swallowed what he gave me.

“Alina,” he marveled, breathless, panting. It was worth it. It was all worth it. I leaned my head against his thigh and looked up at him, watching as the tension ebbed from his body. Not all men could be called beautiful, but my husband could. My husband. The ring, the proof, was on the hand resting in my hair.

Once he caught his breath, Aleksander pulled me up by my shoulders. When I closed my eyes, thinking he might lean in and kiss me, he tossed me over the side of the bed instead, and I pitched forward onto my stomach. I squeaked in a very undignified way. A lot about sex, I had quickly realized, was not very dignified.

I knew where this was going. He was not like most men, or so he said. Most men wouldn’t be ready for another round so soon. It took Aleksander almost no time to bounce back, and he was smug about that, too. Worst of all, his arrogance was founded. All of the sounds he’d made and the pulling of my hair had affected me, and the long fingers he was already using to stoke my arousal never missed their mark. I felt like I was melting.

“Forget worship,” I said, my own fingers scrabbling for purchase on the coverlet. “I’m—ah—oh, Saints—”

“Yes?” he asked, as he pushed my nightdress all the way up to my waist. His voice was as cool as ever, like I hadn’t just taken him apart.

“I am going to curse your damn name.”

“Prayers and curses are two sides of the same coin.” He sounded so pleased with himself. I hated him so much. I wanted him so badly. “But only one will get you what you want.”

His fingers withdrew, leaving me smoldering. “Aleksander,” I managed, half a snarl, half a plea.

“What do you want, Alina?” he murmured. He gave me another long, slow stroke with his fingers, and I whined. “Mercy? Salvation? Whatever I might give you?”

I didn’t want to say it. I nodded.

This time he really took his hand back, placing it on my hip. His voice, the icy trickle of a mountain spring, made me shiver. “Then I will give you salvation,” he said, “until you beg me to stop.”

#darklina #darklina fanfic #darklinafics #the darkling #fic: out of time #anonymous #ask

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alskaichou · 3 years

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I would love to hear your headcanons abt Sick!Links 👉👈 any at all

I would be very glad to give you some of my headcanons anon! I'll break them down by game because otherwise this reply will become a flaming hot dump of messy thoughts, more than it will be already. I have a mountain of text ready so I'm going to put it under a Read More.

OoT/MM: When he was growing up, any illness he caught (a rarity among Kokiri) would knock him ass over teakettle because the little gremlin didn't have much exposure to things, and he'd wind up in Saria's house while he's recovering because Saria thought it was too dangerous for a sick and feverish Link to climb that ladder up to his treehouse. Saria would mother him and he'd pretend to hate it but secretly it made him happy. She'd make hot herbal remedies from herbs she gathered in the forest. Once he's out on his adventure, he'd often be too far away from the forest to go there to recover. If he was in/near Market Town, he'd bunk down with the Dog Lady because she is super friendly and is sympathetic to strays, both for dogs and for people, and she would make him delicious soup. If he was near Kakariko, he would bundle up in a corner of the cuccoo coop to sleep, unless Anju/Cuccoo Lady saw him, in which case she would drag him into her home and make him sleep on a bed because he's a person not a chicken!!! And of course, his preference was always to go to Lon Lon Ranch if he could, because it was warm and soothing and Malon was a great comforting presence. This is especially true after he becomes an adult and liberates the ranch from Ingo. Malon is, in fact, extremely insistent that Link come to her for anything he needs, whether it's sleep, provisions, or just company. Lon Lon Milk is very nutritious, and if Link refused to drink it when he was sick, Malon would pin him down and pour it down his throat. He's still welcome in Kakariko, especially because people recognize him as the friendly green boy who was always running around 7 years ago. But Malon is the default. Once he goes to Termina, he usually sleeps in the room you steal from the Goron in the Stock Pot Inn, because for him, it is warm and easily accessible, even if it's not the greatest inn in the world. Although Link has many options, usually, to help his recovery, he often uses fairies on the road because they flock to him. Unlike the other Links, he doesn’t really have to seek them out, so fairies take precedence over potions, which he mostly uses to recharge his magic.

WW: If he's anywhere near Outset Island, he'll go home and let his grandma spoil him rotten, because he's still young and frequently homesick and his grandma misses him very very much. He dedicates one of his bottles to her soup, and if he gets sick, he drinks it and it helps him a lot. Because a good deal of the sea is uninhabited, he often ends up docking the King somewhere and sleeping in his hull, covered with the sail as a blanket (in case it rains). Ideally he'd find a sheltered cove somewhere for this, but beggars can't be choosers. Dehydration hits him more often than actual sickness, and he gets into the habit of making sure he has enough fresh water packed to last him to the next island. He's perpetually sunburned, and the merchants on Windfall make a fortune selling him the Zelda equivalent of sunscreen. When he slips up and fails to use it and gets ROASTED, he heads to the Forest Haven because of its cool, pure spring water and comfy shady nooks. The company of the Great Deku Tree and the Koroks goes a long way towards making his temporary discomfort easier to bear. Fairies are a bit harder to come by for this Link, so he relies more on soup and potions.

TP: Nothing beats the warm comfort of his bed in Ordon Village. This is Link’s default place to sleep off any illness he gets, especially once Midna is able to warp him around. When he’s here, the villagers tend to him, especially Uli. Link never comes here when he’s injured, though, because he doesn’t want them to see him bloody and hurt. If for whatever reason Ordon isn’t an option, he’ll head to the nearest Light Spirit spring and camp out, hit up Telma’s bar, or go to Renado’s in Kakariko. In fact, if Link is injured, he’ll prioritize a Light Spirit spring over any other place because of their healing properties. Midna isn’t much use when it comes to bedside manners, so if Link’s in a bad enough state that it will take him awhile to recover, and he’ll struggle to do things for himself, he’ll either go to Renado or Telma (depending on the nature on the injury/what he needs as far as support). If he has some of the Yeti’s soup on him, he'll knock that back, and he frequently warps back there when he can to stock up. He’ll occasionally sleep there as well, but usually in wolf form, because it’s so cold. Link mostly uses potions rather than fairies because there are lots of potion vendors. He usually keeps a single fairy in reserve, just in case.

SS: Since Skyloft is a great place to recuperate, Link always goes home when he’s injured or sick. The nice thing about having a connection to his Loftwing is the trust that comes with it. He knows his Loftwing will carry him safely home, even if Link is barely conscious and can’t give directions. The entire island mothers him aggressively, especially when he’s injured. It’s nice to know he’s loved, because prior to his quest, Link was frequently bullied and the adults on the island didn’t do much to step in. Now, though, they’re all very eager to look after him, and he appreciates it. This Link doesn’t use fairies or potions regularly. At most, he might keep a fairy or two to revive him if a battle goes sideways.

aLttP: He does go home whenever he can, but it’s empty now that his uncle is dead, and he has to weigh the emotional baggage of that versus the benefits of a warm, snug place to sleep. Kakariko’s sometimes a good place, because the knights aren’t always there and some of the villagers are willing to hide him. If there’s a heavy guard presence, he’ll sleep in the chicken coop because the knights never look there. Otherwise, he might hit up the Sanctuary. There aren’t many “safe” places for him to sleep in Hyrule, and so more often than not, he has to sleep in a bush somewhere, fitfully tossing and turning while he keeps an ear out for approaching enemies. As a result, this Link struggles with insomnia and has a hard time getting any rest. He duly relies more on fairies to heal his injuries/illnesses than the other Links do, and he always has several potions on hand to help him manage injuries while he heads to the nearest “safe” place.

Oracles: The warp seeds make it very easy for Link to get wherever he needs to go. Bipin and Blossom take him in the most, as Link helped heal their son Bipsom when HE was ill. They always have a bed ready for him, and they consider Link family because of all he has done for them. Whether injured or ill, this is where Link will go. Very serious injuries result in fairy use, though, so they only ever see him have more minor wounds. This is also where Link goes when he needs a good hot meal or just to sleep for a day or two in-between adventures. When he leaves at the end of the game, he is sorry to go. This Link doesn’t use potions or fairies very much at all, except in dungeons/battle.

ALBW: Link mostly sleeps off illnesses or recovers from injuries at his house. It’s complicated somewhat by Ravio’s presence, but at least there is someone there to help bandage him up or look after him when he’s too sick/hurt to do things himself. They have a strange friendship that’s half camaraderie and half capitalism haha. This Link also uses a fair share of potions and fairies, as he eventually becomes annoyed living in such constant close quarters with Ravio, and he just wants to heal faster so he can get back to work.

LA: Naturally, Link goes to Marin when he’s hurt or sick. She’s soothing and gentle, and when Link has nightmares or is in too much pain to sleep, Marin will sing to him until he settles down. It’s the safest Link’s felt in a long time. Because there are a few fairy fountains around Koholint, and because he can always warp back to either Marin’s village or the animal village (another warm, comfy place to recover), this Link doesn’t use potions or fairies much.

FS: This one’s interesting. There are four of them, but they each experience their own illnesses and injuries. The benefit to having a squad is the support system that comes with it. If one of them gets hurt or sick, the others can set up camp, stand guard, and look after him until he feels better. As a result, these Links don’t often have to find a village or other “safe” place to recover. They’re able to hunker down pretty much anywhere and take as long as they need to get better.

BOTW: The Sheikah Slate makes finding a safe place to recover a piece of cake for Link. Before he gets his house, this Link will hit up the nearest stable and enjoy the company of others while he sleeps off illnesses or bandages up his injuries. He has easy access to food and to fairies because of warping (once he's found the locations, at least), so he never lacks for supplies. Once his house is built, Link will sojourn there for however long it takes him to heal up. The toughest part of his journey is the very beginning, before he has access to all of these things. At that point, he's like aLttP Link, sleeping in bushes and keeping an ear out for enemies. He's much healthier and happier once he's found places that are safe.

LoZ/Zelda2: This poor Link. Hyrule’s such a desolate wasteland and villages are few and far between. He lacks the teleportation abilities of BOTW Link, and like aLttP Link, this Link has to sleep in bushes or in caves, keeping an ear out for danger. Fairies and potions are harder to come by for him, though, so he develops healing magic to shore up that weakness. It’s saved his life more times than he can count. Sometimes, though, he wishes there was someplace he could easily go to be looked after, instead of always having to fend for himself.

While I’ve played PH and ST, I don’t really remember them, so I’m afraid I don’t have any headcanons for this. Hope you enjoyed it anon!

#ask #anon #my son #loz #thanks for the question! I love dumping about Zelda

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zeroone-eleven · 3 years

Text

When all is said and done; Hwasa (Mamamoo)

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Summary: Hyejin had broken your rule "No moving" and since she was acting particularly bratty that day, you decided to dish out a punishment that would be satisfying for you yet nothing but painful for her.

Requested? ☑

"You love it how I move you, you love it how I touch you."

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Thirty one days, you told her that day. The day she had learned not to bite off more than she can chew.

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Hyejin acted over-confident when you gave her one task, raising her eyebrow at you as if she was daring you to do your worst. You swore to yourself you'd make her regret underestimating you, and you succeeded. You didn't bother tying her up and just promised her that if she lifts any part of herself off the bed she wouldn't be cumming for a month. Halfway through you having your fun and already you had rendered the alpha into a begging and panting mess. Hovering over Hyejin, you bit at her scent gland and pumped down on her length and she unconsciously bucked up into your hand.

You let go of her and put a hand on her stomach, you kiss her neck that's now full of marks and get off of your alpha. Chocolate orbs flutter open with unshed tears of frustration and overstimulation she grabs at your hand weakly although desperately Hyejin asks why you stopped.

You smile sweetly at her and tell her that you don't ever break your promises.

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To make matters worse? You count your days starting from zero and although it's a thing about you she already knows, the fact that don't leave her untouched in those thirty one days only served to further her torture. Unlike other doms; you don't set a time for when you'll have her all to yourself to tease her. You find pleasure in the anticipation that fills the air whenever you catch your Alpha alone, where her eyes never meet yours out of her own volition until you take her chin in your hand to guide her to meet your eyes.

Once before she had tried to hustle you into shortening her punishment time, she figured she could take advatage of your more laid back and soft dominating nature. The nature of yours to give her exactly what she asks for when she's been a good little Alpha for you. It backfired at her and she ended up with double the original length of time, that was the day she found out that underneath the soft dom act? You were a patient, strategic sadist that always finds a way to turn the cards in your favor.

Your 'Punishments' come in various forms ranging from subtle to mind numbingly dangerous. The subtle ones range from you wrapping your arms around her shoulders and pressing open mouthed kisses from her nape to her shoulder when she writes, a leg slipping in between hers with your knee pressing up against the back of her knot oh so coyly yet so painfully exciting, to you pulling her close to your body in public before letting out a split second burst of your scent smelling with unbridled want just to rile her up. It's times like the latter that she really has to work and fight to stop herself from letting the need take over which will then result in her panting and begging you to take her right then and there.

The dangerous punishments are dangerous for a reason, those punishments are composed of you seeing just how much you can make her fall into subspace and beg. The 'easiest' ones in this caterogry consists of you giving her touches, both fleeting and ligering, they're easy because she can use your touch to ground and prevent herself from slipping. The easy punishments are double edged swords as she always manages to resist your games that end with her in tears. The hardest punishments she hates and loves at the same time, it's the punishments where you use nothing but your voice to drive her into subspace. The need is frustrating and fulfilling altogether, these are the punishments that have her pumping her length all on her own, with her pace being controlled by your commands. Every time you go hard on her, you taunt her with empty promises of having mercy on her and letting her cum early, bringing your face close to hers as you tell her to look you in the eyes as you tell her how good she's being for you. Hyejin believes you every single time only to end up in tears of ruined ecstasy as your voice commands her to stop.

Everyday for thirty one days, you give her two punishments a day; a subtle punishment and a dangerous one. There's a way you keep her anxious, you made sure to let her know at the start of day zero that you're only only going to give her a harsh punishment when the sun has faded from the horizon and the sky turns dark. The hours of the night has never made the idol feel as excited as it has the past thirty one days. She hates the after-dark punishments and she loves them at the same time, because she suffers through it painfully so. But the aftercare you provide is nothing short of heaven, your hands stroking her hair as your lips rest on the shell of her ear, whispering praises phrased in a way that it makes her feel like she's the most important person in the world. Hyejin doesn't believe you when you tell her, but in your eyes she really is.

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Day 32:

You open the front door as silently as you can while praying to all your lucky stars that your Alpha stays asleep. You went all out with the punishment last night, as you needed Hyejin to stay asleep for quite some time for your plan regarding the end of her punishment time to come to fruition. You make your way to the kitchen to place the grocery bags down on the counter, boiling a oot of water as you take the items out of the said bags. Once every ingredient is laid out on the table, you waste no time in going to work. Cutting your potatoes into quarters before dropping them into the boiling pot of water, you then turn to making the sauce that's going to go with them.

With five minutes left on the potatoes, you move on to seasoning the steaks and once your pan is hot enough, you sear the fatty side of the meat placing butter on a pan you've heated. Placing butter in the pan alongside thyme, rosemary, and a few pieces of garlic. You baste the steak in the juices for a few seconds before taking it off the heat. Rinse and repeat, by the two pieces of meat are on a cutting board waiting to be sliced, the potatoes are ready. You take them out of the water and fry them in the left over steak butter.

Once the food is all plated up on a serving dish, you place the dome cover on. A timer for how long till the food goes cold starting in your head. You smile to yourself with pride before rushing over to your shared bedroom with Hyejin. You slowly slip back under the covers, wrapping an arm around her wrist before peppering her face with kisses.

"Wake up my little Alpha." She stirs, a frown forming on her face as she turns to you and slings an arm under and over your shoulder before burying her face into your neck. You let out a chuckle as she draws lung full breaths of your scent. 15 minutes. Deciding have a bit of time, you humor your mate and release pheromones into the air. The idol shifts, hold tightening as she pulls you closer to her, your bodies intertwine and she tilts her head upward, nose touching your scent gland as she turns into putty in your arms.

You run your hand up and down her back, the other playing with the hairs on her nape. Hyejin let's out a groan as she stretches her legs before hooking them with yours. "You seem reluctant to get out of bed." That gets you the attention you want. She pulls her head back to look at you incredulousy. "You seem confused about it. Do I have to remind you just exactly what it was you put me through?" You laugh, propping yourself up on one arm. "Careful now, that tone's what got you into that predicament in the first place." Teasjngly, you train your index finger from the tip of her nose down to her lip, you zone out as you absent-mindedly trace her lips. You're brought back down to Earth when Hyejin teasingly takes your finger between her teeth, waggling her eyebrows at you.

You take your finger out of her mouth. You grab a hold of her arm and swing your legs off your side of the bed. "As enticing as your offer is. We have to get up." A 'Why?' leaves the Alpha's lips in an dramatic groan, you roll your eyes fondly at her antics. Playing the suave card, you bend down to bring her hand to your lips, you place a kiss on each of her knuckles, keeping eye contact with her. "Trust me, I promise I'll make it worth your while." The idol smiles at you and gets up not a momeng later. You beam at her and you run to the door, holding it open for her before performing an exaggerated welcome bow. She laughs at your actions before taking your hand in hers.

You lead her to the kitchen before letting go of her hand. She turns the lights on as you pull a chair out for her, she walks over to you before sitting down at the chair you offer, her eyes trained on the covered plate the whole time. You shake your head in amusement before lifting the covers on both of your plates. Her mouth falls open at the food presented before her eyes and she looks at you before turning her gaze back to the food. She points an accusatory finger at you. "So that's why you smelled so enticing!" Your mouth drops open in offense, she laughs at your expression before waving her statement off as a joke.

"What brought this on?" You smile before taking her hands in yours, bringing both to your lips and placing a kiss to both hands simultaneously, her gaze softens at the way you keep her hands in yours. "You were so good for me the past month, so patient and so obedient. So I intend to repay you in acts of service for the honor you bring me by trusting me to be your dom." Hyejin puffs her chest out in pride and you shake your head. This alpha will be the death of you.

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A/N: My inbox was filled with smut back to back, to the person who requested this? Thank you so much for being patient, writing smut is difficult- Oh my god.

#Mamamoo #Mamamoo x Reader #Ahn Hyejin #Hwasa #Ahn Hyejin x Reader #Hwasa x Reader #Reader!insert #a/b/o verse #Alpha!Hwasa #Alpha!Hyejin #Omega!Reader #Sub!Hwasa #Sub!Hyejin #dom!reader

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shekorla · 4 years

Text

Linked Universe Zeldas

So last December I decided to draw my idea for the Zeldas on a whim. Found the WIP recently and decided to finish it.

Also, I typed up all my headcanons for them because I have a lot. They are below the cut.

And I put down nickname ideas, because I'm bad at naming things, and I think the LU discord has already decided on a set of nicknames that they like. Personally, I really dislike most of those though.

❖Corresponding Link: Four

o Age: Teen, just older than Four. Not a major difference, just enough that she can tease him about it.

o Status: Officially still holds the title of princess, acts more like a queen. Her father is extremely protective of her, but after Vaati he conceded that he couldn’t protect her forever. Since then she has been learning to fight, forge (not good at it), and taking over more and more responsibilities from her aging father

o Nickname ideas: Light, Picori, Force

o Fighting style: Mostly fights with a sword and shield. Has extremely strong innate light magic. (light force, although weaker now) Doesn’t necessarily know how to focus it yet (magic bomb, some healing). If you are going to be on the battlefield stop running around like that.

o Current relationship to Link: Best friends, practically siblings. When they were kids there was definitely some major crushing going on. Then everything with Vaati happened and things got… complicated. Neither she nor Link really knows what type of romance they want for the future. They still play lots of pranks on people. She helps keep him stable on the days when his colors get a little too wild.

o Random stuff: Hyperactive and cheery. Always something new to see or learn and she wants to do it. hates sitting still, she is always moving somehow (got turned to stone). Top is hers; Link made the sword (gift), rest is extras from four’s parts (stolen). Hair is naturally extremely curly, lets it down for formal things, tied up for adventuring. Helped four get back to functioning as Link after being four people. Will attack him to get him to take care of himself. Is taller than both four and wind.

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❖ Corresponding Link: Hyrule

o Age: At least a hundred. Was 18 when she was cursed to sleep, no one is exactly sure how long she was asleep.

o Status: Was a princess before falling asleep, offered the crown once woken up. Really over being royal. Link helped her get a job and lodging on a farm at the edge of Hyrule. Really likes that.

o Nickname ideas: Legacy, Farmgirl, First, Ancestor.

o Fighting style: Healer. Lots of bandages to patch everyone up. Doesn’t like to fight, but will stab a man if the need arises. The world is cruel, be kind. Has weak magic, a little bit of healing, and lots of prophetic. Knows the best places to hide on a battlefield.

o Current relationship to Link: They are good friends. He checks up on her from time to time, and she makes sure that he always has a place to rest and relax in safety. Their world is a little bit of a mess, everyone needs a support system.

o Random stuff: Has insomnia. Afraid of not waking up. Extremely wise, or maybe just world-weary. On tense but good terms with current queen Zelda of Hyrule. Forgives her brother, has come to terms with her fate. Taciturn and calm, probably depressed. Extremely sensitive to dark magic. (like an old burn wound) Dislikes people who use it to forcefully get their way. Doesn’t outright hate the principle of it, but will actively shy away from the presence of it.

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❖ Corresponding Link: Time

o Age: Adult, mentally/physically the same age.

o Status: Queen of Hyrule. She is married and has a daughter.

o Nickname ideas: Destiny, Sheik, Queen, Lyre/Harp (what is that thing?), Sage.

o Fighting style: Fights mostly with magic. Uses the harp to play songs (ironically fights like HW sheik) has basic sheikah skills. Has only been training to fight for a short time, is still fairly physically weak. One of the most proficient magic users all round. Can take down the basic mooks, but won't last long against a bigger enemy. Knows how to fight alone.

o Current relationship to Link: Strained. Not OOT sheik. Is MM Zelda. Only knows link as the boy who showed up to save the day, then left. Has had occasional interactions, she visits the ranch, he works with the guard. Only in the past year or two, she has had dream glimpses of the alternate timeline. She knows that she and link killed Ganon side by side, that she helped link disguised as sheik. Does not know about the seven years or most of the trauma. Basically, seen like five cutscenes and nothing else.

o Random stuff: Prophetic dreams. Knew she would be leaving on a quest. Kingdom is well set up to work in her absence. Loves her family, is an idiot who doesn’t know the importance of checking in via letters for anything other than politics. Snobbish, proud, put too much stock in titles. Best manager, not a great leader (doesn’t have the personal skills for it). Sees the world as extremely black and white.

❖ Corresponding Link: Twilight

o Age: Young adult.

o Status: Newly coronated queen, has been running the show for a few years now, it's just barely official

o Nickname ideas: Dusk, Dawn, Shadow

o Fighting style: Uses mainly rapier to fight. Also, a great archer. Because of temporarily sharing a soul with Midna, has access to powerful twilight magic. Not as strong as Midna, still strong. Has goddess magic (channel through weapons). Tries to hide twili powers mostly since it's “dark magic”, but only technically. She knows it's not true dark magic and really just wants to avoid a lecture (does not get along well with time’s Zelda). Knows her way around the edge of a battlefield.

o Current relationship to Link: They barely know each other. Only really interacted through saving the world things. Then they went separate ways. She considers Midna a sister and wants to slap both Midna and Link for not realizing they like each other. Once she knows Link better, she will probably tease him a lot.

o Random stuff: Unlike most of the other Zeldas, sees the world as being mostly shades of grey, rather than stark black and white. Somber and stoic. Secretly a massive gremlin. Has a few habits picked up from Midna's soul along with the magic. Is awkward around ‘normal’ people. Has spent almost her entire life in political settings. One of the best politicians. Rather open about her feelings, it's just small and easily missed. Feels guilty for the troubles that befell both Hyrule and the twilight realm. Hates having to stand back unable to help. Screw rules she is going to help.

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

❖ Corresponding Link: Wild

o Age: 118-120ish(?) I don’t know how long it has been since the events of BOTW.

o Status: Technically queen, currently is focused on rebuilding Hyrule. Has no intention to take up the throne any time soon.

o Nickname ideas: Scholar, Architect, Champion, Urbosa, Scientist, Little Bird.

o Fighting style: Not a great fighter but she is learning. Decent with a sword. Gets a crossbow from twilight and then makes her own out of sheikah tech. (currently has no magic and good riddance). Learning to navigate a battlefield.

o Current relationship to Link: They are good friends, but it's awkward. Neither of them are totally sure how to act around the other. Basically, either gremlin adventures, or awkward small talk. Past the first road trip, only interact a few times a month. She is caught between trying to mourn her knight and accepting her new hero. Cooking shenanigans.

o Random stuff: Loves learning new things. Can and will study and find the effects of every plant. Knows poisons, antidotes, elixirs, potions, and everything else. Still trying to come to terms with everything that happened. Frequent nightmares. Claustrophobic/minor insomnia. Knows all the languages. Loves studying sheikah tech, and finally gets the chance to as much as she wants. Hates the castle. So many things change culturally over 100 years and she has no idea what to do. Awkward, but sincere.

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

❖ Corresponding Link: Wind

o Age: Teen

o Status: Technically the queen. Hyrule currently consists of a single town on the mainland, and lots of plans. Queenish. Anjean is teaching her how to politics.

o Nickname ideas: Name is tetra that’s it.

o Fighting style: Uses a pirate saber as well as the phantom sword. (IDK if spirit tracks is part of Wind’s story, but I was not passing up the opportunity to give tetra a massive sword). Decent archer, and can channel light magic into weapons…. most of the time…... It’s a work in progress. Also has general goddess magic. Big explosion of light. Knows her way around a battlefield

o Current relationship to Link: Serve on a crew together. Best friends and partners in crime. There is a lot that needs to be done to start a country, they will do it together. It’s not going quickly. They keep getting distracted. Why do paperwork when you can steal things.

o Random stuff: Smol. Link hit puberty and got a growth spurt. She did not. Not a politician, this child should not be in charge, whose idea was it to let a pirate child run a country. Great leader. All the social skills. Shoot first… that’s it. Sassy. Trying her best to be a good princess and live up to her lineage. It's hard. There is no book. Feels like she is letting everyone down. Hates big birds. Occasional nightmares. Really hates being cold. (turned to stone)

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

❖ Corresponding Link: Legend

o Age: Older teen

o Status: Queen. Has ruled for a while. Amazing support system. They regularly keep things running when she gets kidnapped. Good relations with all surrounding countries.

o Nickname ideas: Maiden, Sage, Hilda.

o Fighting style: Doesn’t. Pacifist. She can attack with light magic, chooses not to. Healing magic, team buffs, defense. Just because she doesn’t fight doesn’t mean she will let her team die. Strongest support magic. Does not know her way around a battlefield.

o Current relationship to Link: Good work friends. They get along well enough. No massive personal relations. She asks him for help with killing monsters, he asks her for help with laws. It works for them. Occasionally they will get lunch together and catch up. (aka make sure he didn’t get himself killed.) Can use telepathy to contact Link at any time. Keeps it to emergencies only. Because he finds it massively annoying, and a little creepy.

o Random stuff: Massive romantic. Currently single. Misses being able to gossip with Hilda. Kind and compassionate. Does not stand for injustice. Will forgive until the end of time. Just because she is kind does not mean she is weak. Strong-willed. Good politician. Loved by her people, even if Ganon has attacked like five times. Ganon is the only person on the list of people she would happily shank. So much paperwork. Give the girl a break. Keeps craft supplies on her for long imprisonments. Scrying magic, and a little bit prophetic.

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

❖ Corresponding Link: Warriors

o Age: Adult. Older than warriors, younger than time or his Zelda.

o Status: Queen of Hyrule, and commander of its army. Her Hyrule has been in turmoil for a while even before the war with Cia.

o Nickname ideas: General, Commander, Tactician.

o Fighting style: Best fighter. Can use all the weapons. Summon a bow or rapier of pure light magic. Strongest understanding of how the goddess magic works with weapons. Mostly fights as Zelda (basically her gameplay style), still uses her sheik disguise sometimes (ironically fights similar to smash bros sheik because of extensive sheikah training.) Lives on the battlefield.

o Current relationship to Link: They work seamlessly together in battle and are friends outside of it. They haven't actually known each other very long so it's awkward sometimes. She still has to occasionally remind him that she doesn’t need a title. If they were two kids in a village then they would probably date. But they are not, and things are complicated. Duty to the kingdom comes first.

o Random stuff: Best makeup. Amazing, if ruthless, politician. Best historian. Blunt. No time for crap. One of the best leaders doesn’t have the pure charisma to outdo warriors though. Resting B Face. 90% of soldiers are scared of her. Comes across as harsh, rude, cold. Really, she is just a bit awkward and hides behind a mask. Can’t do people, can do basically anything else. Minor prophetic magic.

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

❖ Corresponding Link: Sky

o Age: Old teen/young adult. Older than Sky.

o Status: Technically the queen, but Hyrule hasn’t been founded yet. Officially goddess Hylia reincarnated. She doesn’t go around flaunting the title, but sometimes the memories of Hylia she gained will overwhelm her. Full goddess mode. Doesn’t stand for dark magic.

o Nickname ideas: Hylia, Sun, Swallow.

o Fighting style: trained at the academy and knows how to fight with a sword. Not a good fighter. massive bursts of power usually win her fights. Sometimes she can channel a little bit of her power, but usually, she just gets overwhelmed by all of it. General goddess magic, cannot channel through weapons. Thinks she does, but in fact, does not know her way around a battlefield

o Current relationship to Link: Do I need to explain? These two are head over heels. Sappy love birds all the way. Childhood friends. Everyone is surprised they're not engaged yet.

o Random stuff: More adventure-ready style to reflect working on founding Hyrule. Fierce and determined. Kind. But she will get her way. Struggles to balance her mortality and newfound divinity. Feels bad that Sky had to fight for her. Loves her bird. Beautiful singing voice. She is trying her best but is in fact very bad at being an adventurer. Good at sewing. Loads of people skills, working on leadership skills. Best with children. 6th sense type prophetic magic. (aka see a shot before it is taken, but not a coming calamity.)

That's it. Congrats on making it to the end. You get a cookie. 🍪

#linked universe #linkeduniverse #legend of zelda #princess zelda #zelda #loz #LoZ Fanart #long post #headcanons #my art #shekorla #sorry discord #yall are great #dont like almost all of the nicknames

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gifted-burnout-archive · 4 years

Text

Jim’s Best Friend

Part Twenty Five: Two Proposals

Word Count: 2.8K+

Author’s Note: This one was hard for me to write, not gonna lie. I have a plan to continue this to around chapter forty, see how I’m feeling from there, I hope that’s ok with all of you!

Warning: sad Jim.

For previous chapters, click here.

“Dad?”

June, 2008.

You were a master avoider.

Hell, you avoided your feelings for Jim by disappearing for months on a binge drinking, sex-fuelled road trip along the East Coast. And even when it came to smaller things, like Michael and Jan’s dinner party that you put off for so long, or Andy and his boat talk, you knew how to avoid things. Defer conversations, make up excuses, distract your boyfriend with sexual favours…

It had been two weeks since you stayed late at the office, since you locked up and headed to your car, destined for a movie night with your Jim. Two weeks since your father came back into your life after over two decades of absence.

And you still hadn’t told Jim.

It wasn’t that you didn’t want to, but he had been so happy recently, securing sales and really upping his game at work that you didn’t want to ruin his success with more of your family drama. It wasn’t fair to him, it wasn’t fair to you, and it wasn’t fair to Toby, who was heading off to Costa Rica to spend the rest of his days in the sunshine and amongst the palm trees.

That morning, Michael had called you in with Phyllis and Angela to take notes on behalf of the Party Planning Committee: a group Angela never let you join because you said you liked rainbow coloured streamers.

“First thing on the agenda, actually, the only thing on the agenda, is the status of Toby's going away party.” Michael sat at the head of the table, grinning like a child on Christmas. You knew he had been waiting for this day to come, of course he had, but his enthusiasm was edging on hysterical.

“We have a buttercream cake and a slide show of Toby.” Angela answered, sat to your right. Michael nodded, and Phyllis pulled two photos from an envelope, setting them on the table in front of Michael.

“Okay...”

“But so far we only have two pictures of him.” Angela finished, and Michael guffawed, you choosing to indulge his lunacy and shake your head in agreement.

“Michael, I really don’t think this will do.” You said, gesturing with your pencil as Angela gave you a side eye. Despite not often finding yourself being petty, it served Angela right for her behaviour at the Dinner Party.

“You’re right, Y/N. Toby is going away forever, and we need to do something very, very special. In some cultures when somebody leaves, like New Orleans culture, they have a parade, and a band, and people party in the streets.” Michael explained his vision, and you looked up, holding back a laugh.

“Michael, are you talking about a New Orleans funeral?” You asked, and Michael shrugged a little, prompting you to put on a straight face and nod, writing down his ludicrous idea.

“If the Devil were to explode, and evil were gone forever, what sort of party would you have?” He asked Angela, who shook her head, trying to manage her irritation. “Like, a beach blowout? Or a Toga? Toga, Toga! Tog-“

“You always do this.” Angela snapped. “We have a nice, modest party planned, and then you come in and demand the world. Let me be clear, there is simply no money for anything more than a cake, and to develop a few more slides… Although Toby won’t be in them.”

“I thought that you might say that.” Michael grinned, sitting back, and lifting one leg to cross over the other before, suddenly, removing his shoe and placing it on the table before you all. Removing the inner sole, a wad of cash appeared in your boss’ hand, and he began to count it out. “I want a party that makes me feel like I am flying through the air without this ugly weight holding me down. You know?” He directed the question towards you, and you nodded along, watching his eyes widen. “I want an antigravity machine.” Michael decided. “I saw it in a movie. You drink a potion, and then you just start floating around.”

“So how much antigravity potion do you want then?” You asked, playing along, and beginning to jot down Michael’s request when Angela intervened, yelling in protest.

“No! No, you know what? This is not a party planning committee anymore.” Angela said with a glare your way before turning her attention back to Michael. “And I don’t want your foot money, and I feel uncomfortable participating.” Angela’s arms folded, and without missing a beat, Michael turned to look at silent fourth party in the room.

“Phyllis.” He addressed her, Phyllis looking at him in surprise. “Can you do this?” He asked, a smile spreading across her face.

“Yes.”

Among other things, today was the training day of the new HR representative, and as you answered phones that morning, glancing down at your mobile every few minutes to respond to texts from a certain absentee father figure, she walked through the door, box of personal effects in hand.

“You must be Holly Flax, right?” You asked as she stopped by your desk, sending over a wary smile.

“That’s me.” She replied.

“I’m Y/N. If you just head through the back,” You paused for a second, your phone beginning to ring. “Dunder Mifflin, this is Y/N. How can I help you today?” You asked, covering the microphone, and turning your attention back to Holly. “Toby is waiting for you.” You stage whispered, and Holly smiled a little wider, nodding to you in thanks.

You took a few more minutes on calls before opting for a coffee break, your phone buzzing once again on your desk. You groaned at the noise, turning the device on silent and slamming it into one of your desk drawers, causing a few eyes to look over at you, primarily Jim’s.

Jim had noticed how on edge you were the past few weeks. You were missing date nights, taking calls in other rooms, constantly checking your phone; and while Jim wasn’t the jealous type, he couldn’t help but wonder what had gotten you so wound up to cause you so much stress.

When you went to the kitchen to sort yourself some coffee, Jim followed, closing the door behind him, and taking a spot beside you, preparing his own refill.

“Hey you.” You smiled up at him, “I should have asked if you wanted a top up, I’m sorry.” You apologised, but Jim shook his head in response.

“It’s fine, Y/N… I just…” He paused, catching your attention as he let out a sigh. It was his worried sigh; you could tell them all apart now. “Did I go too far with the proposal stuff?” He asked, and you felt your heart break a little. Your stress had radiated onto the man thinking about proposing to you, and he took it all the wrong way. “If I did, I can stop. I just see that you’re all stressed out about something and I can’t tell if it’s me or a friend or an ex or work and I-“ You chose to cut him off by pressing your lips to his, sharing a sweet, chaste kiss with your boyfriend before turning back to your coffee. A blush covered both Jim’s and your cheeks.

“I’m a truly, truly offended that you think I would ever say no to a proposal from you, Halpert.” You said with a giggle, turning to face him as you added sugar to your cup. “I’m sorry, it’s a… A work thing, sort of… Why don’t we talk about it later tonight? After the party?” You suggested, placing a gentle hand on Jim’s forearm, rubbing a circle with your thumb on his exposed skin.

“As long as you’re good.” Jim double-checked, a with a nod of assurance from you, Jim grinned. “Y/N, will you go to Phyllis’ party with me?” Jim asked jokingly, causing you to let out a laugh.

“It would be my pleasure.” You replied, “I need to go grab a snack from the vending machine, you want anything?” You asked, taking your coffee, and heading for the annex. Jim shook his head, sending you a wink before heading into the main office, a smile on his face.

“I, uh, I really hope nothing is wrong with Y/N… I know she would tell if it was, and we talked, so it’ll be fine but uh…” Jim smiled to himself, reaching in his pocket to pull out a small black box, opening it up and showing the camera. “I’m going to propose tonight… Holy crap!”

An engagement ring.

“I’ve already paid Phyllis 60 bucks to spend on fireworks tonight, make asking the big question a bit more special…” Jim explained, biting his lip in thought. “I really hope she says yes.”

“Y/N, have you met are glamourous new HR rep, Holly?” Michael approached you, Holly by his side, just after lunch. You looked up from your phone, tucking it away and holding out a hand.

“Briefly. It’s nice to talk without a phone call getting in the way.” You nodded, Holly shaking your hand with a big smile and light laugh.

“Y/N is one half of our office romance whole, with Jim over there.” Michael explained, looking rather proud of himself. “I made that happen.”

“I saw, you two sharing a moment in the kitchen.” Holly sent you a playful wink. “I’ll let it slide this once, but just make it an occasional thing, alright? Don’t need you two lovebirds ‘macking oot’,” the last two words were said in a terrible Scottish accent, causing Michael to burst into a fit of laughter. “and spreading the lovebug.” You nodded, holding a hand over your heart and a hand up straight.

“Scout’s honour.” You promised, glancing behind Michael and Holly to Jim, who sat at his desk, laughing and chatting away on a phone call. Just looking at his face made all your other worries disappear.

“-Yeah, so I just got the fax closing the sale, and, uh, it’s big. It’s really big.” Jim said over the phone, a smile on his face as he looked back at Y/N, who sent a wink his way.

“Congratulations.” Ryan spoke up on the other end of the line.

“Thanks-“

“Don’t interrupt.” Ryan scolded, and Y/N watched Jim’s smile drop. “Congratulations on doing your job. Did you enter the sale on the website?” Ryan asked.

“No, I didn’t. I just logged in.”

“All right, try to be a team player here, Jim.” Ryan spoke with a higher-than-thou tone of voice that brought Jim’s mood right down. “Log it in the website.”

“All right, well, it already went through.” Jim tried to protest.

“Don’t worry about that, just re-log it.” Ryan instructed before the line went dead.

Michael opted to give the office an early finish to celebrate Toby’s leaving in style, the whole office following Phyllis out to the parking lot as the clock hit three, shocked by what the woman had managed to conjure up in a few hours: A Ferris Wheel, bounce house, and plenty of seating and carnival food to house the entire office and company, not to mention Darryl and his band playing some smooth jams on a small stage. What’s more, the day had only gotten better for you and Jim with the arrest of a certain patchy-bearded temp, and after leaving some passive aggressive voicemails for the kid to pick up after he, you know, got out of prison, you felt like you could finally let your hair down.

You and Jim spent the afternoon together, taking a ride on the Ferris Wheel, chatting with Darryl, drinking beer. By the time Dwight put a racoon into Holly’s car, you were buzzed enough to not give a shit, which was when Jim switched you on to soda.

“You need me sober for something, Jim?” You teased as your boyfriend wrapped his arms around you from behind, handing you a coke.

“Wouldn’t you like to know?” He replied, pressing a kiss to your forehead as Darryl and the band began playing again.

“Phyllis should organise parties all the time… She got fireworks and everything.” You commented, a few of the warehouse staff setting up the light show, no doubt set for after the sun had fully set. Right then, the sky was painted in colour: warm oranges and yellows fading into pink and blue.

“You know I love you, right?” Jim asked, and you turned around to face him, taking his face in your hands and pressing his lips to yours. His hands rested on your waist, pulling you closer to him, pulling away for a breath only to kiss you again.

“I love you,” Before you could finish the phrase, you caught a glimpse of a man behind Jim, stood at the corner of the office building. “Too… Excuse me.” You said, breaking from your hold and running over to your dad, who stood with a smirk on his face and his hands in his suit pockets. “What are you doing here?”

Jim’s eyes followed you as you rushed towards the stranger at the far end of the park, his eyes roaming to find Michael: the man also happened to notice Y/N’s take off, and without a word spoken the two began in the same direction quickly.

“What’s going on?” Jim asked as he rounded the corner with Michael, looking between you and your dad, who was to both your boss and your boyfriend, a complete stranger.

“Holly looked at me, and her hand was on my arm and-“

“Not you, Michael. Y/N.” Jim stopped Michael’s lovestruck ramblings, gesturing to your estranged father, who stood by your side. “Who is this?”

“Who is this?” Your dad asked, looking Jim over.

“My boyfriend, the one I told you about.” You said quickly, and your dad narrowed his eyes at Jim.

“I don’t like him.”

“Yeah, well, you don’t get a say in that department.” You snapped, your eyes looking everywhere but at Jim. You didn’t want to see his confusion, or his hurt.

“Y/N, is this man blackmailing you for sexual favours?” Michael asked, causing both your father and you to look over in shock. Before you could ponder how he come to such a conclusion, Michael continued. “I can call the police if necessary. I don’t appreciate you breaking up the relationship I helped to build, Mister Predator Man.” Michael scolded, your father letting out a laugh. “What’s so funny? You know what? No. I’m calling the cops.” Michael decided, and you sighed, putting your hand over Michael’s keypad.

“Jesus, Michael, he’s my dad.”

Silence surrounded the four of you, and you finally found yourself looking up at Jim, who fiddled with something in his pocket, looking more confused than anything.

“I’m sorry, your who now?” Michael asked after a second. “You mean the man who abandoned you and your mother? Who left you fending on your own for, oh, almost a decade now?” Michael’s anger contrasted to Jim’s silence, and it made you uneasy. “Or did you not know your ex-wife was dead?”

“Michael-“

“No, I’m curious why he’s decided to come back now, after leaving you with nothing, Y/N.” Michael raised his voice a little, and Jim started to pace, your eyes never leaving him.

“I’ve offered her a job.” Your dad finally revealed, and you let out a sigh.

“A job?” Jim spoke up, finally, looking over at you both. “Is that what the calls and texts have been?” He asked again, and you nodded. What followed made you shiver, a cold laugh emerged from Jim you had never heard before, then he turned to walk to his car.

Jim wanted a chance to think, to breathe, to figure out what stopped you from being honest with him about it all, but heels tapped on the ground behind him, a hand catching his arm, you stood there close to tears behind him.

“I’m sorry.” You whispered, and Jim just shook his head.

“Why didn’t you tell me, Y/N? We could have done this together; we should have done this together.” Jim asked, and you looked down at your feet, guilty. Jim removed his arm from your grip, opening his car door, pausing to look over at the party still ongoing, the fireworks being readied to set off. “You know, I was going to propose tonight?”

“What?” You looked up, your lip trembling.

“Yeah… I thought it would be great timing, even got Phyllis to get fireworks…” He sighed, getting into his car, and closing the door. He turned on the engine, rolling down the window. “I’ll call you when… If I’m ready to talk. I love you, but I need time to think some stuff through, ok?” He said reassuringly, squeezing your hand. Tears spilled onto your cheeks as you nodded, letting go of his hand to let him drive away.

And there, as the first fireworks exploded overhead and danced on a darkening sky, you eyes were trained on Jim’s car brake lights, the car disappearing around a corner with the man you loved driving, leaving your heart cracked.

Tags: @imsuperawkward @poppirocks @rosie2801@onceuponahuntersrealm @aziggya @suitelifeofafangirl@legendaryoafhairdozonk @dxbriksx @retrodrummers @sugar-snap@art-flirt @biwwie-iwish @im-a-writer-right @hiyaitssans @hommoturttle

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underthedekutree · 3 years

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Gender and Race in Zelda Games - Pt 1

Hey, can we talk about how the Gerudo’s defining trait is their gender? It’s very explicitly marketed to the player that they are an all female race and that has a lasting impact on their culture and how they interact with other races, considering they are reproductively compatible with hylians (and is the only way to ensure their survival as a race).

Although Nintendo likes to distance themselves from any political statements, the Zelda franchise does give an insight into their views on gender identity and racial representation. I’m going to be mostly going off of Breath of the Wild (and a bit of OoT) for this.

There are 7 major civilised races in BOTW’s Hyrule, and they’re mainly based on standard tropes of the high fantasy genre, which has most of its roots in the works of J.R.R. Tolkien. Things like the Elder Scrolls and DnD follow a similar set of race tropes. Basically in a nutshell:

Hylians = Humans (protagonist material, has a far reaching empire, medieval aesthetic, predominantly white because yay colonialism amirite)

Zora = Elves (attuned with nature, long life/immortality, thinks they’re better than you, thin/sexy/youthful appearance, feminine)

Gorons = Dwarves (associated with earth, overtly masculine, stocky/stout appearance, b e a r d s)

Koroks = Halflings/Hobbits (smol, associated with plants and greenery, often the starting point in a story, disconnected from the world, humble people, old english farmer aesthetic)

Gerudo = Orc/Haradrim/Khajiit (the Oppressed Minority, often desert people, has an ”Exotic” accent/language, vague mix of middle-eastern, african and/or south american aesthetics)

Rito = Bird People (free spirits, archery for days, native american/canadian aesthetic)

Sheikah = The Asians (tm) (the wise philosophical ones, always has a shrivelled up old Confucian-inspired leader, are probs ninjas)

First of all, no, Hylians are not elven-coded; just because they have pointed ears does not equal elf. The way they are coded in the text is very much human.

So I’m going to elaborate a bit more on the Gerudo here for this post, since they are the strongest example of what my whole point of this is. I’ll be talking about the Gorons in another post later down the track (that’s a whole other can o beans).

Ocarina of Time is where we are first introduced to the Gerudo as a race, and red flag number one comes up: the main villain is Gerudo. The only man in an entire race of women, who has automatically assumed de-facto leadership because of his gender. Hmm. Okay then, game.

Because of Ganondorf’s actions throughout OoT, the Gerudo garner a sour reputation amongst the other races, and a lot of this context comes from reactions to Link wearing the Gerudo Mask. Many are terrified or unsettled by the mask, such as King Zora, some will comment on how it reminds them of a woman in their life, and Darunia very gruffly states how much he hates the Gerudo (wow dude, not cool). There is an everpresent stigma against them as a people, one that only compounds in the Adult time after Ganondorf takes over. In Windwaker, Ganondorf talks about how his original motivation was to take Hyrule for its resources, as his people were suffering in the desert whilst Hyrule florished. But his actions only caused them more suffering, as he seemed not to care for his people once he took Hyrule Castle, and the Gerudo could no longer mingle with Hylians, because this takeover increased the stigma against the Gerudo tenfold.

This stigma was so great that even in Breath of the Wild, thousands of years later, their people are still recovering from their collective shame (eg. Urbosa). Look how long its taken Germany to recover post WWII, and some still hold grudges against them, even though they’re now practically one of the most anti-Nazi nations ever. But clear strides have been made in Gerudo culture - they now seem to be a proud people, embracing both their strength and their femininity. But a new interesting issue arises.

It’s alarming how much suggestion there is in BotW that the Gerudo are being taken advantage of. Men are barred from city walls, and for good reason. All of the men outside of the walls are there for the sole purpose of entering the Forbidden Garden, as it were. Like the men at the bazaar who freeze up when they see lady Link. Or the creepy guy with the sand boots circling the town like a hawk in the hopes of catching a lady’s eye. There are a couple of guys in trouble on the other side of the desert you can save (from a lizalfos I think? If memory serves), and all they will talk about is how Gerudo Town is some kind of paradise of hot women, like they’re using their dicks as a compass. I hope they never get there. And to top it all off, there’s Voe and You, an entire dating class teaching women on how to interact with men, and how to walk the line between being cautious of predators, and not being Risa.

I don’t know how to articulate how this messes with my brain, and I’m very bad at conclusions. Nonetheless, what I am trying to say is this. What does this all tell us about how Nintendo writes women, and how the changing times have affected the representation of women in Zelda? Why are there entire races who are tied to their gender? This trend of coding races to a gender in video games isn’t confined to the Zelda series either, its present in a lot of Nintendo games (if I may gesture to the Lochladies from Mario Odyssey), and media as a whole. Is this a good thing? What is the purpose? I don’t know how to answer those questions. There is always a form of subconscious meaning ascribed to the stories we tell, whether we intend to or not. I don’t know what to do with this information really, its just something to think about. And this is a starting point too, there’s a lot more to be said if you start training your eye to look for these things in the games you’re playing, especially Nintendo games, since they seem to have been free from The Discourse because of how they market their company to be so Opinionless and therefore accomodating to people from all backgrounds. But they most certainly aren’t opinionless.

Disclaimer: I do not believe that Nintendo are trying to push some Political Agenda (the opposite, actually), it’s mostly subconscious coding and association due to, as I mentioned, for us as people to express our own views through story.

Segway to part 2: I said at the start that it’s strange how the femininity of the Gerudo is so heavily highlighted, and its a core part of their identity as a race. So why the hell does this not apply to the freaking GORONS?

Have a nice day, and thanks for reading my rambles :D

#legend of zelda #loz #long post #ocarina of time #breath of the wild #nazi tw #nazi mention

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ampleappleamble · 4 years

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oh god every spare minute is spent writing or daydreaming about writing or re-reading my own writing, why am i like this, why do i like it

ALSO! thank you all, as always, for your kind words! ao3 soon i prombise <3

Chapter 4: Watcher

Aloth sat alone at a small table in the corner of the tavern, silently counting out rigid increments of time, one after another after another. It had been 26 minutes, 45 seconds since she'd gone upstairs to his room. Their room.

This was a mistake.

"Ye dinnae conne tha' yet, lad."

He scowled into his goblet of wine. "Do not tell me what I do and don't know, rube," he hissed.

He made sure to keep his head down, face lowered behind the pages of his grimoire. Lest this evening's incident repeat itself. Although, he doubted any more trouble now after his and Axa's entrance almost an hour ago.

The foreigner gets frog-marched out of the tavern by three soused churls, only to return scarcely fifteen minutes later with another foreigner, who then proceeds to order two bottles of wine and nothing else...

"I stell whisht ye'd 'ave lemme batter 'em."

Aloth rolled his eyes, lifting his goblet to his mouth. "Your preference has been duly noted," he deadpanned softly as he took a sip.

28 minutes and 50 seconds. They had agreed on 30.

...Maybe. Maybe this was a mistake.

---

She was alone.

She looked around slowly at her new surroundings. Someone else's room at a run-down country inn.

Better than a dirty wooden floor in the common room at a run-down country inn.

Alone. She hadn't really been alone, truly alone alone since--

--the Land, before he--

Axa strolled a bit too quickly across the room, threw herself into a sitting position at the foot of the enormous, lumpy bed. Her hands trembled. She willed them to stop.

Let's think about something else. Right now.

30 minutes. She had 30 minutes alone, and then her new traveling companion would rejoin her. They had managed to get a good rapport going once she had been able to sit and relax a bit in the tavern, and they'd shared their histories with one another, although they had kept it cordially laconic. She was a “disgraced scholar looking for a fresh start,” he was a “wizard from a noble family looking for a patron.” Good enough for me.

He surprised her by proposing they travel together, citing that he found traveling with companions tended to be safer by far, especially in the Dyrwood, and she had already proven herself resourceful and courteous. Axa surprised herself by accepting his proposal.

--another lying, flattering elven man? you foolish--

He had graciously suggested they share his rented room upstairs that night ("Meaning nothing untoward, of course," he'd added hastily, ears reddening) and had agreed to give her some time to herself before settling in for the night. The next morning, they would most likely start seriously planning to make for Defiance Bay, to look for lodging, paying work, and some sort of expert on souls. Camping supplies, food, water-- all would be necessary for the trip, so doing some odd jobs in the village before setting out might not be a bad idea. Earn some coin, get to know the area, the customs.

Tell Calisca's sister about her death.

Axa paused.

She yanked her boots off of her aching feet and hurled them across the room as hard as she could in a flash of rage. The first tears hadn't fallen yet, but they were on their way.

...Ah. This part. Finally.

She rose to her feet unsteadily, pulling at her clothes. She didn’t have time for this crying shit, she had to get undressed, cleaned up, ready for bed. She was shaking too hard to get her belt undone or her scarf untangled, but she struggled with them until they were at least loose enough to pull her tunic up and off.

No. Go on. Let it happen. You need to feel this. You need to process it.

She clutched at her face, trembling harder, digging her fingernails into her flesh. Now the tears fell, hot and relentless, pouring down her burning cheeks.

Hey. You held on as long as you were able. Maintained yourself, your dignity and your sanity. But this was bound to happen eventually. You can let go.

She collapsed to the floor in her stocking feet and linen shift, curling up on her knees and elbows. Agonized wails tore out of her throat; great, heaving sobs that choked her, left her breathless and red-faced.

No one can hear you down there in the tavern, no one is judging you. Only the gods, and they don't count.

You're all alone, Axa.

She felt it.

---

32 minutes, 45 seconds.

Aloth clutched his empty goblet in his hand, knuckles white with tension. They had agreed on 30 minutes.

Maybe just... make it an even 35. Just in case.

"By th' Wheel, lad, quit yer ninnyin' an' gerrup them stairs. Am shattered."

The elf fidgeted in his seat, lowering his gaze to his lap. "I will, I will. I just... I'm not quite ready yet." He had been stalling, and he knew it.

"An' fer why I should haftae wait fer mah kip? 'Cos yer afeart o' th' wee lass?"

He gritted his teeth, grateful that only his half of the conversation was being spoken aloud this time. "I am not afraid of her," he whispered, slowly turning a page in his grimoire. 33 minutes, 50 seconds. "I just want to make absolutely certain that when I go up there, I'll have given her ample time to finish up any... personal rituals she might have wanted to attend to in solitude. It's common courtesy. Not that you'd know anything about that." He allowed himself a little smile at that, preparing to start to carefully and deliberately ease his grimoire closed. 34 minutes, 5 seconds. He could hold out for 35 even. Easily. He rose smoothly from the table, gliding out of his seat with practiced grace.

A harsh, braying cackle of a laugh. "If'n I conne ye true, lad, yer jes' sayin' yer afeart ye'll burst in oan 'er wi' 'er baps oot if'n ye're up too soon, aye?"

Aloth's fingers spasmed, and his heavy grimoire slipped from his hands, landing on the floor with a resounding thump that echoed in the half-empty tavern.

Every single remaining patron was looking at him.

He'd lost track of the time.

---

Oh shit. Oh fuck. Oh no.

Axa kneeled on the bed, brushing the red hot embers from the thick woolen blankets with her bare hands. She had somehow spilled her pipe while lighting it, and now it seemed she had this situation to deal with.

How had it come to this? She tried to remember. She'd had her cry. She'd laid on the floor for... a bit. She'd gotten up and washed her face and hands. She'd had her drink. Well, her second drink. The first one had been downstairs, with that elf. The weird one. Aloth. That was his name. She liked him. ...No! She'd tied up her hair. Then the second drink, the one she had up here, then the third, then probably one or two more. She couldn't really remember. But anyway. Once she'd had her drinks, it was time for her smoke, and--

...Smoke. The pipe? The blanket-- SMOKE!!!!

Axa discovered, to her dismay, that brushing the exact same spot on the blankets over and over while reminiscing about the events of the past half hour did not solve her problem in its entirety. The other clumps of smouldering whiteleaf strewn across the bed were quickly leaving hideous scars all over the already badly abused blankets, and she rushed to slap them out, wishing that she had tied back all of her hair and not just half of it for some reason.

Once she was sure she had gotten it all, she packed her pipe again-- carefully this time-- and stood in the middle of the room, smoking and assessing the damage.

Honestly... he might not even notice.

There was a knock at the door. She pretended not to hear it, smiling blithely at the rug.

"Axa? Forgive my tardiness, the time got away from me and-- and I, uh--"

Aloth swung the door open slowly and gently. He was met with a view of the little orlan woman standing in the middle of his room in her chemise, clearly drunk, clutching a lit pipe and regarding the brand new, still-smoking holes in the blanket on his bed.

She looked at the blanket, looked at him, eyes wide and bloodshot-- and exhaled a plume of smoke directly into Aloth's face.

He blinked rapidly.

"...Fit like, lass?"

---

He arranged some blankets and cushions for himself on the floor, even though she practically begged him to at least take the bed by way of a proper apology. He insisted, and she acquiesced, although not before expressly forbidding him from using the blanket she'd burned.

He lied when she asked if he minded her smoking, and she could tell he was lying, but she smoked until her pipe was burnt out anyway. It had been a hard night, and something told her sleep would not come easily.

"You always talk shit to people like that?" she asked, peering at his prone figure in the dark room. "In Hylspeak, I mean."

Aloth sighed, fidgeted in his bedding. "It's an old habit. From childhood."

"I see." Axa yawned and stretched, and he could hear her joints popping. "You might try to knock that on the head, friend. Or at least learn to insult yokels in a language they don't sort of understand."

He couldn't help but chuckle at that. "Excellent suggestion. Any recommendations? I hear Rauataian is popular these days."

She grinned to herself in the dark. Still can't get a straight answer out of you about all that, eh? Good thing I'm too addled to care right now. "I could teach you Ixamitl. Little bit of Vailian."

"As long as you're a willing teacher, I'm a willing student."

"As long as we steer clear of Ordhjóma, I'm a willing teacher." Gods, she was drunk, telling him that.

He wanted to ask, but knew better. "Fair enough."

The pair fell silent, and they fell asleep.

---

Axa had expected a difficult night ahead of her. After all, she'd had a difficult day.

Exhaustion, wine, and whiteleaf put her body and waking mind to sleep easily enough, as they tended to do. But her subconscious mind was restless and turbulent, thoughts and memories and half-dreams all swirling together in a maelstrom of emotion, fear foremost among them.

Whispers. Shadows.

It was all... familiar, somehow. The more she looked, the more she saw, and the more she saw, the more she remembered.

The pillars. The machine.

Had she... been here before?

No. That wasn't possible. She'd only ever been to Ixamitl and the Land before this. She had never been to the Dyrwood, never--

--from Creitum, my dear?--

Axa thrashed violently in her bed. Sweat matted her fine, golden-bronze fur and her breath came in shuddering gasps. Her eyes snapped open--

--and she was standing in front of that tree again, the one in the middle of town. The corpse tree.

The corpses were all wrong. She knew for a fact that the blond fellow who'd smiled at her as she'd started off toward the inn earlier that day hadn't been hanging from it last she looked. But he was hanging there now, still smiling his lopsided smile, still clutching his pipe.

"Welcome to our lovely town." He said it, but he didn't. She didn't hear his voice, and his face didn't move. But she heard him, in her mind, somehow.

Is-- is this what ciphers-- oh, Wael's eyes, am I a cipher now or something?

Axa had no time to dwell on the thought as the monstrous tree slowly began to move, twisting around and down toward her, brilliant violet flames flickering to life all over its gore-caked branches. It loomed above her, below her, all around her, blocking out all light except for the sickly purple glow of the souls hanging from it like overripe fruit.

And front and center, mere feet from Axa's own face, hung the dwarf woman. The animancer that horrible magistrate had so crassly introduced as "an example of what happens to those who lie to our Lord."

Axa could only stare in abject terror as the woman's corpse noticed her.

It lifted its head, wrinkled and deflated like a gourd gone rotten, and stretched out its swollen, distended neck, pushing its maggot-ridden face to within inches of Axa's own. The head tilted to one side and blinked its empty eye sockets, and if she hadn't been on the very bleeding edge of a complete nervous breakdown, Axa might have noticed it smile gently.

The corpse's mouth opened wide before Axa's quivering eyes, blasting her with a wave of rotting stench that threatened to overwhelm the little woman entirely. She didn't know how much more of this she could bear, but at the same time, she couldn't look away. This was, she somehow instinctively knew, far too important a message to look away from.

The dwarf's corpse, like the blond man's, spoke directly to Axa's mind. But it spoke aloud at the same time, evidently to ensure that her message made it through any and all defenses the orlan woman could offer up, whether mental or physical. The corpse's rancid breath, its voice like a dull blade drawn across a gravestone, her essence, all issued forth to assault and cradle and engulf Axa, all focused on the conveyance of one word:

"WATCHER."

---

Her eyes snapped open for real, this time.

A multitude of glowing purple figures stood over her, watching her as she lay in her bed.

She screamed, a shrill, panicked howl of pure terror. She flailed desperately to escape, and ended up landing painfully on the floor face-first before scrabbling madly for the corner.

Aloth was up in an instant, groping for his grimoire, clambering to his feet in a panic. "What's-- Axa?" The elf stumbled toward the cowering woman in the muddled pre-dawn light, reaching toward her with an open hand. "Axa? Are you alright? What's going on, did--"

She shrieked, throwing her arms up in front of her, shielding herself from him, from them, pushing herself against the wall with her trembling legs. "DON'T!! DON'T TOUCH ME!!"

Aloth did not. Instead, he froze-- then very slowly drew back, clutching his grimoire in front of his chest with both hands, trying to ignore the little woman as she shook and sobbed, face hidden in her hands.

I... shouldn't be seeing this. This isn’t right. I shouldn't be here. This is something private, and I'm intruding, and... He sighed, lowering his gaze to the floor, his ears drooping.

...This was a mistake. I should... I should tell her I can't--

"I want to go to that tree again."

Aloth snapped his attention back to Axa. She was still in the corner, sitting with her knees drawn to her chest, but her face peered out from beneath her curtain of crimson hair.

The apparitions were gone. "I want to see her. The dwarf in the tree. I have to see her."

Her amethyst eyes fixed themselves on his.

"Will you go with me?" Tears trembled on her eyelashes, but her voice was steady and strong.

"...Certainly," he replied softly.

---

#pillars of eternity #fanfic #fanfiction #watcher #watcher axa #aloth

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