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anthurak · 8 months

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Funny thing I’ve recently realized: With just two minor changes in events, you could negate basically ALL of the major arcs/conflicts in Adventure Time post-Islands.

First, Finn doesn’t accidentally stab the Finn Sword with the Grass Sword during his fight with Bandit Princess in I Am a Sword.

Second, Patience St. Pim doesn’t walk in on Ice King and Betty while they’re hanging that we see in the flashbacks of Bespoken For.

The first point is pretty easily to explain. No Finn stabbing the Finn Sword means no grass demon corrupting and merging with the Finn Sword to create Fern. So everything with Fern just goes ‘poof’.

The second point on the other hand is a bit more complicated: To start, Patience not meeting Betty means she doesn’t get the idea to use her as a magic super-battery for her Element Awakening spell. Which in turn almost certainly means NO Elemental Apocalypse. Of course, the Elements Mini-series probably still happens in some form. Patience seems quite adept at making problems for everyone else. But it most likely ends up being not nearly as bad as what we see in the show.

So no Elemental Apocalypse likely means our heroes don’t have to hit the LSP-powered elemental-reset button. And that means Punchbowl, Crunchie and Manfred AREN’T reverted to their original forms. Meaning NO Uncle Gumbald and no Gumbaldia arc.

And then we have BETTY to consider. Because looking back at Bespoken For it seems that Betty was just about ready to actually try LETTING GO of her obsession with ‘fixing’ Simon. To finally ‘take him as he is’ as Tiny Manticore suggested. Instead however, Betty ends up getting frozen by Patience and used as an Elemental super-battery, which leads to her getting access to the Enchiridion thanks to Finn, which in turn gives her the idea to try and rewrite history. The failure of which sends her to Mars and puts her in contact with Normal/King Man, which in turn led to her getting the idea to summon GOLB.

Meaning that no Betty getting frozen by Patience means no GOLB, no GOLBetty, and no Ice King being reverted back to Simon. Also, no Gunter becoming Ice Thing either. Instead, we could very well see a Betty who tries to accept Simon as he is now, much like what we see with Marceline.

To really break this down, looking at episodes following a version of I Am a Sword where Finn avoids stabbing the Finn Sword and retrieves it from Bandit Princess, leading up to the Islands arc; most everything plays out basically the same, save for events directly dealing with the fallout of the original I Am a Sword, ie; the episodes The Music Hole and Two Swords which simply have no reason to exist. Though speaking of Two Swords, I do think the events of its preceding and succeeding episodes Reboot and Do No Harm NOT related to Fern play out mostly the same. As in, Finn’s grass-prosthetic still lashes out at a berserking Susan to protect him, though without the Grass Demon seizing remote control over the prosthetic, perhaps Finn is able to avoid hurting Susan quite as bad. Regardless, I imagine Finn’s grass arm does go somewhat out of his control and Susan still gets hurt, which means Finn’s time in Do No Harm can play out unchanged.

As for the Islands arc itself, I can’t imagine Finn having the Finn Sword and Grass arm changes things too much. Save maybe Finn having to convince his mom to not immediately remove his weird magic arm when they reunite. Though considering that part of the big resolution of the arc was Finn convincing Minerva and the rest of the humans that the weird magic/mutant shit of the outside world WASN’T something to be afraid of, I imagine this doesn’t change anything in the long run. It might lead to an interesting situation where Minerva tries to forcefully remove the Grass arm, leading it to lash out at her, which in turn leads to Finn making his mom see that his arm is not inherently aggressive but simply trying to protect him, again trying into the original resolution of the arc.

Now trying to envision a full version of the Elements arc where Patience doesn’t use Betty as her magic super-battery is WAY more than I’m prepared to do for this post. Like at that point I’m just writing a full blown fanfic. So for the sake of argument, I’m just going to be assuming three main points: No Elemental Apocalypse, no Betty trying to hijack the Enchiridion to try and change the past, and no need for the LSP-powered elemental reset-button. Heck, maybe whatever shit Patience stirs up in this version gets resolved before Finn, Jake and BMO even get back to Ooo.

Now one wildcard in all this regards Jake getting reverted to his ‘true’ half-alien form in the aftermath of the Elements arc. On the one hand, this may not happen at all in this version of events, especially if they play out before Finn, Jake and BMO return from the Islands. On the other hand if Finn and Jake are around to participate in this version of Elements, even if there isn’t a full-blown Elemental Apocalypse perhaps Jake still winds up afflicted with some form of elemental contamination. And when said contamination is reverted, this brings out his alien nature just like what happened in the series proper.

So in the latter scenario, the events of Abstract play out unchanged. In the former, they don’t play out at all.

Going into the final four episodes of season 8, the events of Ketchup, Fionna and Cake and Fionna and Whispers play out basically unchanged, save for some of Marceline’s recapping in Ketchup. Whispers is notable here because despite Fern featuring heavily in that episode, it’s worth remembering that he wasn’t able to actually DO much of anything against the Lich Hand. Finn was the one to chase the hand to its lair, while Sweet Pea was the one to battle and defeat it. Fern basically being useless was the point, as it led him further into turning on Finn. So Fern’s absence doesn’t really change the events of that episode.

Now however, things start getting really interesting. As with the setup we’ve made so far of ‘Finn not stabbing the Finn Sword’, ‘No Mass-Elemental Reset by LSP’ and ‘Betty not obsessively chasing a way to fix Simon’, we potentially have only TWO of the remaining fourteen episodes able to play out unchanged. With just two or three others potentially having at least minor changes, a further three or four having MAJOR changes, and a potential SIX episode simply not happening at all.

Because with these three simple changes, we have No Fern, No Uncle Gumbald (and friends) and No Betty trying to summon GOLB. Plus potentially one other thing…

Without Fern or Uncle Gumbald being a thing, Three Buckets and Wild Hunt straight up DON’T happen. No Gumbald also means the second half of Always BMO Closing just can’t happen.

Son of Rap Bear plays out unchanged, and ironically Bonnibel Bubblegum can potentially play out mostly unchanged, with Bonnie still having a reason to explain her backstory to Finn and Jake (I personally like to think Marcy already knew :D). The only change being that Bonnie doesn’t get some dramatic realization that her Uncle has returned at the end.

Speaking of which, no Fern and no Gumbald means the major conflict of Seventeen just doesn’t happen and Finn’s seventeenth birthday party goes off without a hitch. Or at least, without a Green-Knight-and-Gumbald-and-co. hitch. You never know what other shenanigans might happen XD

Ring of Fire is the other episode that can play out completely unchanged by our alterations. Meanwhile, no Gumbald means no Chicle/Crunchy to cause trouble at Marcy’s concert at the end of Marcy and Hunson.

Now The First Investigation can play out MOSTLY unchanged, but this is also where that ‘one other thing’ I alluded to earlier comes into play. Because if Jake doesn’t get afflicted with elemental contamination and in turn draws out his alien physiology, that could potentially lead to Warran Ampersand NOT seeking him out and taking Jake to space at the end of TFI.

Now Jake potentially not being off-planet means Blenanas can potentially play out unchanged (Jake is simply off doing something else leading to Finn hanging out with Ice King), with major changes (Jake goes with Finn and Ice King), or just no happen at all (Finn and Jake are just doing something else).

Of course Jake not being taken off-planet by his evil alien dad means Jake the Starchild and Temple of Mars simply DON’T happen at all. If he is, then the former episode likely plays out unchanged while the latter still undergoes major changes, simply because in this version of events, Betty isn’t on Mars with King Man.

Now we come to the last two episodes of the series, which in this version of events simply CAN’T HAPPEN. No Uncle Gumbald means no Gumbaldia.

And with no Fern, no Gumbald and no Betty obsessed with ‘fixing’ Simon, literally ALL of the conflicts of Come Along With Me simply do not exist. No war with Gumbaldia, no big conflict between Finn and Finn-that-got-possessed-by-a-grass-demon, and no Betty summoning GOLB, no GOLBetty and no Simon being fully separated from the crown.

Now of course, all this isn’t to say everything would be all fine/dandy/boring for our characters and there won’t be anything of interest or conflict in this time. Just that it would be something completely different than what we see in the series proper. In particular, this series of events has Betty not only actually hanging out with Simon/IK, but even gradually integrating herself into the main cast of characters, which certainly would create all kinds of interesting situations (Betty having an actual conversation with Marceline anyone?).

Rather, I thought this would be a fun little thought experiment on how just a couple changes could have massive effects on late-series Adventure Time.

#adventure time #adventure time ramblings #adventure time au #rambling about the butterfly effect in adventure time #finn mertens #finn the human #fern the human #jake the dog #betty grof #patience st pim #uncle gumbald #how to make almost all of adventure time season 9 not happen with two simple changes

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leefi · 9 months

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The Flower That Bloomed Nowhere Read-through | Part 1: Chapters 1-14

Hi!!!! I've been reading through this webnovel after seeing @ot3's pitch for it and started writing down some thoughts on the characters and worldbuilding and imminent murdering. This story is very, very long and I only reacted up to about chapter 33, so most of my thoughts will involve the worldbuilding and less the murder mystery aspect -- so if you're looking for theorizing you won't find much of that here. Since I'll be continuing eventually, I wanted to post what I did make note of to revisit later!

Most of these are not marked by chapter/section because I was lazy and I'm not sure how easy it will be to follow as a result, but everything is chronological.

everyone here is hijabi mashallah

The visual I'm getting of the solar system/local system/dimension they inhabit is kind of a blend of steampunk and fantasy and uhh some secret third thing. With the walls of their "universe" painted in that puella dollhouse witch lair style. Does the sun bounce around like a screensaver. Does it orbit their earth or is it on a fixed axis flung out into “space”? Does “space” even exist anymore? I’m assuming they’re in an enclosed area that they've created. Do they actively use arcane resources to keep objects (ie star and planets) sustaining themselves, or have they made them self sufficient?

everyone is so mean to Ptolema leave her alone what the fuckk let a bimbo live i want to kill you all you’re so annoying. Ptolema I WOULD be your friend and not ask all these weird ass questions. and we would hold hands and skip and giggle

Yes shes an airhead nepo baby but you guys could try doing anything other than snickering and rolling your eyes whenever she says stupid shit. If she starts arguing back about government war crimes during the Revolution or something then you have my blessing to beat her ass!

I HATE kamsurepa i HATE her i HAYE Her and her stupid ass name

Ran and Su have no chemistry its insane that theyre always hanging out every conversation is like uhhh (awkward silence) (rude comment from Ran) *Su voice* wow she gets me so well. every time they talk im like what the fuck just happened.

Su’s internal narration is too self aware for me. it’s like she talks like she knows she’s a character? or something. it's self-deprecating in a very bizarre way

im sorry i don’t know if i can continue with this. i know too many med students irl and these characters are literally pissing me off. compliments to the author for realism you knocked it out of the park

Oh, thank you very much!" Kam said, reverting back to her smiley-diplomatic form for a moment before stepping away from the counter and continuing as she handed us the cards. "...as far as it seems to me, the desire to reproduce is essentially an immature form of pursuing life-extension - this idea that you'll 'live on through your children' that's patently pseudo-mysticism justifying what is ultimately an animal instinct." ⬇️ I’m going to grab her ginger head and swing her around like bowser in mario 64. SHUT UPPPPP SHUT UP please tell me shes the one that dies

You know," I mused idly, my eyes wandering. "I think this is actually the fourth glass ceiling I've seen today." "Mm, it's true that you don't see a lot of women working in Aetheromancy," ⬇️ I know this is a small nitpick but aren’t we really far into the future why do they keep using terms like this 😭 gendered stuff like this still exists billions? trillions? of years into the future?

Why has the disco elysium skill tree randomly started talking to su. Is this her future self nagging her. Is she pulling a han sooyoung. when do we get to the various utsushikome ego deaths

"prosognostic overlap"…do ppl repeat faces? Are most people cloned at this point? What triggered the need for cloning surely medicine is advanced enough that childbirth or test tube babies are feasible? Can bodies be cloned and reinhabited to inhibit aging? Is there some disturbing psychological element to seeing someone with the same face as you? Does it make your brain short circuit? Kam mentioned having children earlier which I assume means people still give birth or have test tube babies, so i don’t know if it’s the result of cloning…but it does sound like a sameface sort of thing. What else would it be if not that though?

Actually, if they’ve figured out teleportation (whatever it was called when they went up the aetherbridge) - let's say they can atomize a body and reforming it elsewhere (though we don't know for sure yet, could also be a fold in spacetime) - transferring consciousness to an empty clone of yourself (and therefore effectively doing away with aging or death wholesale) sounds a lot more efficient and technologically practical than maintaining an organic system that naturally decays. Why keep on finding ways to push the human body past its limits when you could simply transfer a person to a new, identical vessel?

I feel like the key to immortality isn’t maintaining an organic body, which naturally tends towards systems of entropy (being a biological thing, entropy=decay), but rather delineating and separating human consciousness from its host and replicating its original environment perfectly. I’m not talking about making a copy of consciousness, which is just glorified cloning - I’m talking about *transferring* a consciousness.

You could almost call dementia itself the mind's tendency towards its own kind of entropy?

Though if you transfer a consciousness to a younger body, the dementia issue could still potentially remain. Depends on if it the author sees it as a solely physical phenomena (atrophy/buildup of inhibitors of the brain) or there's some metaphysical anomaly about amassing too many memories/"existing" too long in general

The way spellwork is described is really cool and feels super believable. Optimizing multiple concurrent spells into one “function” is intricate and sophisticated, and you have to dedicate a lot of brainpower to doing the math in your head. It’s like they’re coding the real world. I love the way lurina describes this it's awesome.

#tftbn #woof #the flower that bloomed nowhere

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west-tokyo-incidents · 9 months

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IVE GOT IT.

The masters are regular pokemon that have been altered by their connection with a strange new kind of pokemon that's appeared. Similar to Ultra Beasts, possibly! To be determined. But once their form change has been triggered, they can't change back and can't be renamed.

Vice/Ultimo/Milieu would be ones that have been altered by humans for a terrible experiment, each thought to embody evil/good/neutrality. The others are all generally natural, or at least naturally occuring.

For our mythicals, each one exists in both versions, but you can only get them by having the corresponding Evil or Good legendary, so they're post-game and technically if you get traded the other version's legendary, you can get both in the same game.

There's a Luxray called Fusataro. She's one of a long standing line of Shinx who've been guarding an ancient theater, each who are partners to the current head of the family who's owned the theater. She is stalwart and aloof at your presence, at least until you finish the game, where she shows some interest. She will lead you down a secret tunnel in the theater, and you face her, in place of a trainer, and the guardian of the theater, Dark/Electric type weasel-bull based pokemon. She changes form during the battle and becomes Electric/Dark. If you defeat the Rage pokemon and thus her, you can capture Rage and if you do, she'll volunteer herself to go with you.

On the other side of the coin, there's a Lucario named Murayama who guards a police station instead with an almost identical story. A line of Riolu who've served the police force for centuries. Sophia is a Psychic/Steel, and Murayama becomes a Steel/Psychic upon changing forms.

The two families are at odds, with the theater group being more about freedom of expression and loud music, while the police force are about order and control. But at the core, both sides are corrupted by money. Their pokemon lines see in you a chance to return their families to what they once were, and offer you the chance to meet and befriend the ancient god-like pokemon both sides worshipped long ago before they were sealed away.

If you get both, there's probably some heartfelt cutscenes.

For Paresse and Regula, they're probably teased with a mountain pass you can't enter, the way blocked by a strange, one-eyed Banette or an odd, darkly colored Kirlia. For the Evil line, you'll get news of a Banette causing trouble and harassing everyone it comes across in the town closest to the mountain pass. For the Good, you'll hear word of a weird Kirlia causing people to forget things for seemingly no reason in that same town. When you investigate, both will lead you, in a seeming panic, up the mountain.

The Kirlia, named Sayama, will lead you to a Buddhist temple that looks to be ransacked, and you both have to find and then help calm a panicking Fighting/Fire pokemon who lost its previous connection pokemon in a battle, a Hariyama. The Kirlia will then take the Hariyama's place and both will join your team.

The Banette will do something similar, but takes you even higher up the mountain, to the peak, where you find the Fighting/Grass pokemon in mourning over something in its coils. You and the Banette have to journey to find something to get it to let go of what it's clinging to, and when you return and get it to... cheer up, essentially(it's a Pokemon game it can be light-hearted), you find that it was mourning a one-eyed Absol.

Both cover the idea of what happens when one of these dependant pokemon-god-things(still pending) loses its previous Master pokemon.

As for the other douji, I'm not sure if they should be the exact same concept. I feel like it could make there be too many legendaries. So maybe there are a slightly less powerful version of the same bonding mechanic, where certain already-existing pokemon can take forms when paired up with the right partner pokemon, but they can be reverted back?

Idk. Thoughts happening.

#fakemon au #idk if ill include OCs #at least not yet OTL #maybe as the elite four #Shear Garion Kia and Anzhuō #and idfk who as the champion ngl #maybe Dunstan and he can be both champion and the antagonist.

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menalez · 10 months

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Hello Mena! I was hoping if you can maybe help me with confusion about my ethnicity. I am from post-ussr country and so interact in english spaces less and not sure about few things. I am mixed ethnicity, various slavic and central asian ethnicity. But I am not half and half, rather from what I learned about my family tree I am a bit more then 1/3 central asian. But, as you can imagine, with woc women marrying into men of dominant culture, I was able to find only very little of my asian female ancestors. I mostly seen myself as white, but the genes of my asian female ancestors show on my face. I did not know about any of these when I was teen, I was just sure I am 'ugly'. I spend great deal of time trying to make myself 'pretty', which was kinda white washing myself. If I bleach my hair, shave my eyebrows, avoid sun like plague and paint my face I can be quite white passing, just with weird nose and small and dark eyes and wide face. I also struggled with people being very prejudiced towards me through my whole life, like they start right away acting as if I'm stupid and a bit slow. I have been wondering for my whole life if maybe I am weird or slow indeed in a ways I am not aware. I would never know if that is because of my face or not. But when I moved to less white region, it has been long time and no one acted towards me that dismissive. I also stopped worrying about my nose and keeping skin as white as possible, bc I don't stick out so much anymore. Hairdressers sometimes still try to convince me to bleach my hear, because I would look good, but I reject it. The thing is, if I talk about these in english speaking places while only mentioning my location, women (I suppose mostly white, who do that) try to convince me I am just a bit mentally unwell, imagined prejudice where it did not happen, obsess over my looks etc. If I mention my ethnic compound, they revert to blanket validation, which is also weird to me, bc it's so overt and suddenly they take me seriously. When they do it, I honestly feel like impostor. Or I guess before that they imagined slavic blonde like stereotypically shown? (It's actually wrong stereotype, but it's another topic.) My question is, I don't really I can call myself woc, I would be imposing on woc with actual problems. If I was say half and half with equal connection to both cultures, it would be another matter. But I also treasure my asian ancestry and what I could find of it, the genes of my asian grandmothers are seen in my face, and I think it is not fair to them if I don't mention that. Maybe you have some advice on that, on how can I indicate my ancestry better without imposing on others who deal with actual oppression unlike me? Sorry it turned out a bit long.

hi anon!! first of all, i feel like you’re questioning your perception & intelligence and just so you know, you don’t seem stupid at all to me. at least based on this message, you seem to be an introspective and well-spoken woman, albeit with clear confidence issues.

in terms of how you can accurately describe your ancestry, i’m also mixed but not 50/50 as it is intergenerational, so i understand how it can be difficult to describe ur experiences. i simply state im mixed & if ppl assume it means i’m half black and half MENA, i correct them and state that is inaccurate to my reality. you could say the same, basically calling urself mixed white + central asian or just mixed. even the term biracial does not necessarily mean half & half although some people assume that to be the case, so u could use that too. u could even say ur white-passing biracial (although im not sure if white-passing describes u accurately? since u said u feel like u look more similar to central asians when u live among them). u could also say ur white with asian ancestry if u feel like being white defines ur experiences more prominently

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evan-algore · 1 year

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I haven't been active on any pro Ana anything in a while.

I haven't gotten diagnosed with any ED as of now (if I were to self-diagnose; it'd be EDNOS/OSFED) though I'm finally talking about it in therapy.

I haven't acted in any ED related behaviors in a while and the intrusive thoughts are near non existent. It's been almost a year since I've stressed over my meals and I've lost weight from it. Ironically, I expected this. (See; EDNOS/OSFED)

From 10y/o to 19y/o, I stayed between 147lbs and 130lbs despite destroying my digestive system and heart trying to be 118.13lbs (BMI of 18.5) or less. My eating disorder had been such a central part of my adolescence.

I don't know how, but around 2020, I guess I just had bigger fish to fry than my body, or maybe not having lost any real weight over a decade disillusioned me. Mentally; I was at my worst over quarantine and still kinda since so its primarily due to that. Just a temporary shifting of tides realistically.

These days, I struggle to remember the calorie counts of this, that, and the other thing I used to have memorized like gospel. I've been working as a cook at a restaurant for almost 2 years and find myself being able to sample the foods I make without anxiety.

I still had a lot of anxiety when I started the job but it feels like forever ago now.

I'm officially underweight as of a couple days ago. I put on a few gw cloths and I feel nothing. Not gratification nor shame. More like casual acceptance. (I think it was my 3rd gw that was 118.13. I remember it was my ugw up until I was 14y/o)

My mental health is still ass but the personification of ana in my head has since taken on a far more realistic and accommodating character personality.

I've reverted back to my old eating habits in which I easily forget to eat and never seem to be hungry anyway. It always bothered me how this went out the window when I started trying to restrict. (Again, see my assumption on EDNOS/OSFED lol)

Oily and greasy foods have always made me nauseous so that hasn't changed but, otherwise, I have no fear foods anymore. Milk was a fear food but I find myself drinking it as a meal replacement when I don't have an appetite or otherwise can't stomach solid food.

I've finally mentioned it in therapy but, all things considered, it's a low priority. There's still a risk of it coming back (I know that ed's can't just get up and walk away) so it will be addressed soon. It's kinda nice not having to deal with it so I want to make sure it stays that way. It's distressing how much of my day and life revolved around it.

I never expected to be in this position. I don't know how to feel. I was always terrified of being taken off my medication once I got diagnosed with an ed and I'm still terrified of that happening now (I've been taken off them before; long story short, an ed would be the least of my problems). I can only hope I can prove to my doctor's that I'm presently well enough to stay on my regiment and maybe being an adult will allow me more influence on that decision. I may be required to gain weight for that and another reason anyway so even my cw is likely temporary. Regaining the weight may summon my ed back into existence but time will tell.

Time will tell.

I figured I'd post some kind of update even though I didn't get much interaction on this account when I was active. The fact that this account still exists keeps popping up into memory and it feels weird to just leave it as is.

I just changed my bio from; "Male-19-cw:130lbs-hw:152-lw:128-hight: suffer.__I'm mostly posting memes (like my last two deactivated accounts lol) and not much else. I'm also five foot seven lol. I'm not that insane."

Throughout this, I did gain a lot of experience about how ed's tend to work. I'll end this with some advice that made it a little easier to live;

----If the alternative is a feeding tube, just eat something. If it works to threaten your anxiety with a 2k+ calorie feeding tube being shoved down your nose if it doesn't let you eat a can of tuna, do it.

----Eat or drink dairy before purging to neutralize the stomach acid and prevent stomach ulcers and tooth decay.

----Keep safe foods on hand when you can in case the anemia or protein deficiency becomes impossible to ignore.

----However much you'll eat that day, always make sure to eat after a workout, even if it's a small amount.

----Keep some kind of emergency kit somewhere you can reach in the event you can't physically get out of bed or get sick beyond management. (I kept aspirin, vitamins, tuna packets/protein bar, water, and an electric heating pad)

---- Otherwise, have an emergency plan if things go wrong. You know your health and you ed better than anyone else, take advantage of that for the sake of your life.

Listen to your body and take care of it for the long term.

Don't let your ed out-live you.

I don't know exactly what's going on with me or why it is the way it is so please don't think you can do the same one day; I still remember very vividly how powerless I really was to my ed when it was at it's prime.

Stay safe out there. I love y'all.

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leviathans-watching · 2 years

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a problem if you're looking at it close

includes: satan & mammon, beel, belphie, asmo

wc: 1.8k | rated t | m.list | pt 1 | cross-posted on ao3

a/n: the third and final piece for my sequel lottery! for @definitely-yours who wanted a sequel to this work with the rest of the brothers included! i didn't manage to get much levi in it, but the rest are there haha so i hope that's okay! (by the time i noticed it would have been too awkward to put him in :(() title from lefty by dizzy!

warnings: cursing (only like once though), insecurity

please like, reblog, and give it some love on ao3!!

“No, but really, it’s probably nothing to worry about. So what if Lucifer’s been nicer? So what if Mammon’s been less scummy? That’s not out of the question.”

“You realize how weird that sounded coming out of your mouth, right?” Satan asked flatly.

“Okay, yeah,” Belphie replied, a little bit of disgust crossing his face. “It felt wrong to even say it. I’m sure it’s fine, though.”

“Yeah, me too,” Beel agreed, reassuring him slightly.

“I’ve never seen Lucifer like this before,” Satan admitted, and Belphie looked at him for a moment, quiet.

“I forget you weren’t an angel with the rest of us,” Belphie eventually said, making Satan stiffen. “Lucifer used to be like this all of the time." Belphie smiled sadly. “I think that’s why none of us are really saying anything. We miss the old him, you know? We don’t really want to upset things and make him revert again.”

“Of course, if he did, that’d be fine,” Beel added, “we love him either way, but… it’s kind of nice.”

Satan felt like an outsider, not for the first time. Every once in a while he was reminded of his differences from his brothers, fit in as he may.

Satan watched Mammon and Lucifer work together, more in sync than he’d ever seen them before. Bent over a project proposal, they conversed quietly, tossing ideas back and forth as if it was something that they did naturally.

“When did they start getting along so well?” Satan asked, turning to Asmo who was bent over his own work.

“Hm?” Asmo questioned, looking up. He followed Satan’s gaze over to the two eldest and raised his eyebrows. “I’m not sure. It’s been weird though, hasn’t it? While Mammon’s been on better behavior, Lucifer’s been more chill too. I wonder what the cause is.”

“That’s what I’m wondering as well,” Satan said quietly. As far as he knew, there wasn’t anything that could have caused this. They were both acting out of character, but only with each other and only on a small scale. “Maybe it’s nothing.”

They watched Mammon burst into laughter, pushing at Lucifer’s shoulder slightly. Surprisingly, all Lucifer did was smile indulgently. Satan felt weird; for so long he and Mammon had bonded over their mutual dislike of Lucifer, and now it seemed as if things had changed. Not that Satan really had a leg to stand on, though. He and Lucifer’s relationship had been okay, lately, so maybe the same thing was just happening with Mammon?

“I don’t know,” Asmo drawled. “Something’s up. I’ll get Levi on it. He might have an idea or something. One of his crazy hypotheses may just apply.”

Maybe Satan shouldn’t have brought it up to the nosiest of his brothers, but he was curious too. Watching them for a moment longer, he eventually returned to his own work, though he often foins his gaze straying back to them.

The days that followed were the same sort of weird. Satan kept waiting for something to give, for one of them to step out of line or something, but it just never happened. Satan couldn’t recall the last time they had gone so long without fighting. Not even when you were here did they remain so civil to each other.

And civil wasn’t even the right word. They were warm. Personal. More like the brothers on TV shows that Satan sometimes watched with Asmo than he’d ever thought possible. Satan knew he wasn’t the only one to notice it; ever since he’d brought it up to Asmo, he’d been poking around, and he’d overheard Levi and Belphie talking about it as well. Even Beel, arguably the slowest on picking up on stuff like that seemed to be noticing something was up.

Lucifer wasn’t only being nicer to Mammon, either. He seemed to have eased somewhat in his strictness on everyone. While it was nice, Satan began to worry. Both of them were deviating. In a way he hadn’t predicted.

“Stop worrying so much,” Belphie told him, catching his attention suddenly. Belatedly, Satan realized he had been staring at them, lost in thought. “I can see it on your face.” From beside him, Beel nodded.

“Do you know what’s going on with them?” Satan asked, hoping Belphie would have some answers. Belphie only shrugged.

“No, but really, it’s probably nothing to worry about. So what if Lucifer’s been nicer? So what if Mammon’s been less scummy? That’s not out of the question.”

“You realize how weird that sounded coming out of your mouth, right?” Satan asked flatly.

“Okay, yeah,” Belphie replied, a little bit of disgust crossing his face. “It felt wrong to even say it. I’m sure it’s fine, though.”

“Yeah, me too,” Beel agreed, reassuring him slightly.

“I’ve never seen Lucifer like this before,” Satan admitted, and Belphie looked at him for a moment, quiet.

“I forget you weren’t an angel with the rest of us,” Belphie eventually said, making Satan stiffen. “Lucifer used to be like this all of the time. More affectionate, even. But when we fell and he had to sacrifice so much for us, he changed.” Belphie smiled sadly. “I think that’s why none of us are really saying anything. We miss the old him, you know? We don’t really want to upset things and make him revert again.”

“Of course, if he did, that’d be fine,” Beel added, “we love him either way, but… it’s kind of nice.”

Satan felt like an outsider, not for the first time. Every once in a while he was reminded of his differences from his brothers, fit in as he may.

“I’m sorry,” he apologized. “I’ll stop pushing, then. I had no clue. I just wonder what inspired the change. Obviously, it had to do with Mammon, but what specifically?”

“Yeah, I don’t know,” Belphie said. “And don’t sweat it. You couldn’t have known.”

Satan contained to observe the new relationship between Lucifer and Mammon. They only continued to get closer, and, Satan suspected, more like their old selves. The rest of his brothers were changing as well, no doubt influenced by their older brothers, and it made him feel a little weird. He had never been him without his wrath, never been a paragon of goodness or whatever it was they all were before.

Not that he particularly wanted to, mind you, but still.

“Okay, what’s up?” Speak of the devil, Satan thought wryly, turning to look at Mammon, who had thrown his door open.

“Can't you knock?” he asked irritably, shutting his book with a snap. “I was in the middle of something.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Mammon said, waving his hand. “Now, what’s been going on with you?”

“Nothing.” Satan crossed his arms. Mammon raised an eyebrow.

“Nothing? Then why have ya been sulking? Don’t think I haven't noticed.”

Satan felt offended. Sulking? He hadn’t been sulking, had he? “I’m not sulking,” he said, and yeah, okay, he could see how that could sound a little sulky. “But what’s up with me? What’s been up with you?”

“Me?”

“Yeah!” Satan continued. “All of the sudden you and Lucifer are all buddy-buddy. Quite suspicious, if you ask me.”

“Wait, are you feeling left out?” Mammon asked, and Satan rolled his eyes.

“No, you idiot, I’m just confused. It just seemed like this really came out of nowhere.”

“I don't really see how we’ve been acting different,” Mammon defended, leaning against the doorway. “Maybe you’re just imagining things.”

“No way,” Satan said. “You guys are all acting more like you were before you fell. to what’s what Belphie said anyway. Obviously, I’d have no way of knowing. But I’m just trying to figure out what caused the change.”

Mammon pursed his lips. “Okay,” he said slowly. “A lot to unpack there. But I’ll start with the easy one. Lucifer and I had a little heart-to-heart about some older brother stuff, nothing to worry about, and we reconciled some differences, is all.” Bullshit, Satan thought but didn’t say. “And you’re feeling weird because we’ve all been acting different and it’s new for you, right?”

Damn, Satan had forgotten how intuitive Mammon could be sometimes. There was no use denying it. “I mean, a little but,” he said, jutting his chin out, “there just seems to be something weird about the whole thing. The last event I can remember taking place was Lucifer scolding you for the studying council thing…” Realization dawned on him. “Oh, something happened with that, didn’t it?”

Mammon shifted, a little uncomfortably. “Well, after that, I guess. I was having a moment of insecurity- don’t look at me like that, even I, The Great Mammon can get insecure sometimes, and Lucifer caught me in the middle of it. I said some things in the heat of the moment, leading to some realizations on both of our ends on how our actions have been affecting one another. Like I said, older brother stuff.”

Satan didn’t remark on the insecure thing. Mammon’s face was an open book and Satan could read him well. “I see,” he said stiffly. “I’m glad we cleared that up, then. Thank you for being honest.”

“Woah, hold on,” Mammon said, stepping forward towards him. “We’re not done here. I’m a great listener, you know. I told you my thing so if you want to tell me yours, that’s only fair, right?”

Recognizing Mammon’s awkwardness as the olive branch it was, Satan bit his cheek. “I mean, it’s not a big deal, anymore now that I know the reason behind your actions. I was just getting worried because I hadn’t seen either of you like this before and it seemed very sudden.”

“I can see how that would be worrisome,” Mammon said, and Satan scowled. He wasn’t worried! “You don’t have the same experience as the rest of us and therefore all of this seemed really out of place on us.” Sighing, Mammon smiled a little. “Ya know, before the fall, Lucifer and I were quite close, so I guess it didn’t seem that weird for us to go back to it, once we got used to it, but I can definitely see where you’d get concerned. Satan,” Mammon insisted, holding his gaze. “We’re still us, you know? Even if we seem to be acting a bit different, Lucifer is still Lucifer and I’m still me, and whoever else you were worried about is still whoever.”

“I don’t really handle change well,” Satan said, clearing his throat.

“I get that, I totally do,” Mammon said. “And if you ever want to talk you know I’m here.” When Mammon put his mind to it, he was really good at the whole older brother thing. “And I’ll make more of an effort to not act so weird. Or include you in the weirdness. Just yell at me if I’m not doing a good enough job at it.”

There were a million things that Satan could say but none of them were quite right. How was Mammon able to see through him when he was;t even aware of his true feelings?

“Thanks,” he eventually managed, and Mammon smiled, canines gleaming.

“Of course. Now, it’s been too long since I’ve caused some trouble,” he said. “Wanna come to the casino with me? I could use a card counter on my team.”

“I don’t cheat,” Satan defended, making Mammon laugh.

“Of course not. Now, want to see who can make that vein in Lucifer’s forehead throb faster?”

“Well if he continues to be all nice and stuff then probably not you,” Satan muttered snarkily, casing Mammon to laugh once more.

“We’ll see,” he said, clapping his hand on Satan’s shoulder. “I know all of the right buttons to push.”

“I knew you did that on purpose!” Satan grumbled. “Fine. Let’s do it.”

As he followed Mammon through the halls, he found he felt better than he had in a while. Maybe there was something to that whole heart-to-heart thing Mammon was talking about.

leviathans-watching's work - please do not copy, repost, or claim as your own

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phoebelovingcare · 2 years

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Because Why Not 2: ID-F86 Is GNC AF

Because I am easily entertained I like listening to youtubers who weren’t paying enough attention guess the pronouns of the thing they’re fighting. The first post about this was about Flamberge - given that she has a few masculine traits, I have heard he, she, AND they used for her by mostly well-meaning but confused gamers.

Now, however, we face a new challenge.

Canonically, these are the pronouns of Fecto Elfilis - every instance they are ever given a pronoun:

- Based Leongar is supportive of his tyrannical angelic psychic overlord: "They're incomplete without their other half." - Elfilin uses "it" during the end cutscene before the truck segment: "it wants your planet to collide with this one!" - Fecto Forgo Larva Figurine: "When ID-F86 arrived, it began attacking all of the native wildlife. [] The native inhabitants used it to create tech beyond their wildest dreams." - Fecto Forgo Figurine: "Their only refuge was the realm of their dreams. [] the animals they reached." - Fecto Elfilis Figurine: "Without a soul to temper its power, [] now that they're whole again, they're already planning their next invasion..." - Forgo Leon Figurine: "[] fled to Forgo Dreams to plot their next steps: [] as their own [] to force them out, ID-F86 had no choice but to reveal their own phantom form." - Leon's Soul Figurine: "After their fight with Kirby, ID-F86's body was destroyed, but their powerful mind remained. They fled to the isolated isles of their own dreams... [] they cast out Leongar's soul,"

In conclusion, Elfilis uses they/it pronouns! Hell yeah, gender!

Youtubers playing through the game however, might not notice such a thing. Plus, with the addition of the he/him Elfilin in the equation, some people are even MORE confused.

I present to you, a compilation of Elfilis being The Most Gender Ever Of All Time.

Kirby Saves The Forgotten Land - Vernias “OH NO! OH NO THEY’RE LITERALLY EATING EVERYONE!” “Oh god he’s gooping all over the place-” “It seems to be calming down a little bit-” “Oh god don’t tell me that’s a fricking Void Termina reference with its attack-” “Very cool man very frickin’ cool-” “THAT’S NOT EVEN A GOOD IDEA DUDE!!”

So the ending of Kirby... - Failboat

“...top five things I did not want to happen. One through five, it opening its eyes.” “I didn’t like it while it was moving-” “gONNA SHOOT IT IN THE GODDAMN HEAD-” “FINISH ‘EM! That- that did not finish ‘em they’re doing the thing in the boss fight where I killed them definitely but they’re not dead-!” “oh what are they doing...”

can always count on Failboat for those nice neutral pronouns :)

I was WRONG about Kirby and the Forgotten Land - Choctopus

“Oh I can just j- okay. He’s getting hit with my backslash.” “If he’s got any more forms you gotta tell me-” “Oh my GOD, it’s a Pokemon. YO he’s got like like, a giant spear?!” “What’s he got like, light beam attacks?” “We got him! Finish him off, Kirby!” “Shouldn’t he revert back-? Oh he’s melting.” “Hell yeah, man! We’re gonna kamikaze it!” “It’s like ‘you DARE test ME?!’” “Dude- he’s getting hit by a truck!” “He died the same way.” *interesting note is that this one started using it right after Elfilin did before going back

FINAL BOSS - Kirby and the Forgotten Land - Part 15 - ENDING (Blind) - Roamer

“Bu- it’s not complete though right?!” “Ohhh and he- he even absorbed the lion!” “They’re, they’re holding us back a little bit! Oh, do we have to fight it?” “No-! Ohhh now it’s gonna be complete...” “It’s actually beautiful, like- I always feel bad destroying it!”

and now for the reason I wanted to make this Kirby and the Forgotten Land [16] “ID-F86″ - Fatguy703 *two-player

“Fecto Forgo. Okay it’s infection let’s go!” “Is he not gonna stretch towards us anymore?” “Is it still gonna be a weird blob?” “[Elfilin] you’re being a-! Meanie-boy-pants right now!” “...wait [Elfilin] was a lady cuz this definitely- feels female-! [is stabbed, rightfully so]” “I thought she was targeting you, she’s facing you!” “aaaand she’s targeting me again.” “I stabbed its butt multiple times,” “I burned it.” “I let him- I don’t-” “Did he heal?!” “Oh no they’re going for you-” “It’s not dead. It’s not dead!”

BEHOLD: THE COMPLETE BINGO CARD OF GENDER.

what have we learned today? Idk. Pay attention when the game offers you some pronouns, I guess? Elfilis is the most gender of all time? Youtubers/gamers have a bad habit of defaulting to he/him? Doesn’t matter. I made this for almost no reason at all anyways.

#pheb speaks #kirby and the forgotten land #katfl #katfl spoilers #kirby spoilers #kirby and the forgotten land spoilers #forgotten land #forgotten land spoilers #remember kids: if you write it down it's technically science!#ask to tag #cw misgendering (?)#wolpertinger

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rhysiana · 3 years

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Untamed Romcom AU Chain

Over on Twitter the other week, @iamwestiec wrote me a tiny little fic about modern AU Jiang Cheng finally taking a vacation, and it reminded me of a Sangcheng idea I’d had a while ago based on the premise of a cute Jackie Lau romcom novel. (Her books are great mind candy full of diverse characters, many of Chinese heritage, and heavily feature the Toronto food scene, so do not read while hungry.) This then turned into ideas for a chained set of hypothetical modern AU Untamed fics. (There are three; I’m going to post the next two as additions.)

First “book”:

Premise: An overworked CEO is put on mandatory vacation by his family and doesn't know what to do, so he hires a person he noticed really savoring things at the coffee shop to teach him how to enjoy life.

And I just think: Sangcheng. NHS is definitely the kind of person who would jump at the chance to get paid to not go to work and hang out with a very rich guy in his swanky apartment, teaching him about the local food scene beyond what his PA orders for lunch meetings.

They are going to do tasting menus! Go to museums and weird little art galleries and art installations along the river that may or may not be officially sanctioned! A whole day at the bird sanctuary! (The only day NHS allows them to leave the house early.)

It's all fun and games for NHS, he's doing *so well* not developing a crush on this overly serious but very hot man, until his family comes for an unannounced visit to make sure he's not sneaking work during his vacation and he witnesses JC with a-Ling. NHS doesn't even want kids! But the way that child has JC wrapped around his finger with a single "jiujiu" is too much!

He'd call Dage to complain about it but he can already hear the lecture about his lack of self-preservation skills when NMJ learns he's living with a stranger for 2 weeks.

Jiang Cheng, meanwhile, is experiencing... emotions... about watching NHS enjoy stuff. Which is exactly what he wanted! But it also seems like a lot! Surely most people don't, like, *feel* so much in the normal course of the day? (Feelings that aren't annoyance???)

Eventually there's a serious conversation on the couch late at night where NHS talks about how aimless he's always felt, and how hard that is with an older brother so full of purpose and drive ("a lot like you, really"), so he taught himself to really enjoy small things. JC, in turn, admits he never really felt like he had a choice about his job/future, he just had to fulfill family expectations. He's good at it, sure, but he's never figured out how to enjoy things, so he just works all the time and hopes it will someday be enough.

Outings after that feel a lot more like dates, but they're both aware of the end of their time together, and JC doesn't want to say anything because he's sure he'll revert to spending 12+ hrs/day at the office, so what would be the point?

I think the resolution would have to be something like: Idyllic bubble time comes to an end, but JC finds himself constantly distracted thinking about NHS. He holds himself back because surely NHS is back to enjoying his great life without some grumpy uptight jerk in it.

WWX tells him he's being an idiot, which he promptly ignores, but then JYL follows it up with a sweetly reasonable reminder that making himself miserable isn't actually a requirement. The company is doing well, their parents are more than comfortably retired, he can do this.

NHS, meanwhile, is pining and miserable on Dage's couch and NMJ doesn't know what to do about it. Something something JC turns up with flowers at NMJ's door and asks NHS out for real. He learns to balance his time, they go on many dates (& vacations!) and live happily ever after.

(I very cleverly and totally intentionally set this up for NHS to live a wonderful trophy spouse/supported artist life. Good job, me. We will now assume this is what's happening in the background of the loosely chained sequel romance following Nielan's get-together, probably.)

[Part 2: Nielan]

[Part 3: Wangxian]

#romcom AU #sangcheng #the untamed #chained romcom thread #rhys's stuff

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lifewithdavefarts · 3 years

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DaveFarts - Episode 9 “Trapped In The Closet” [Episode List] Following the most blatant sit-com tropes you can think of, Dave decides to spy on his girlfriend, Dana, because he thinks she’s hiding something. Tim reluctantly decides to join his friend, but the two end up stuck in the girl’s closet, which will eventually turn into a gas chamber.

Trapped In The Closet

“Yeah Dana. Sure. No problem.”

Tim was working on some college tasks, but couldn’t help but to eavesdrop Dave’s conversation with his girlfriend, Dana, on the phone. He could only hear his friend’s replies, which being only the 50% of what they were talking about, it didn’t make a lot of sense. Not that he was interested: Dave was simply hanging out in his room because he had nothing better to do during that warm Summer evening, apparently, and so he simply showed up to Tim’s place with a couple of beers and a remarkable amount of procrastination powers.

Despite being relatively hot outside, Dave was wearing a t-shirt and a pair of long, grey levi jeans, kinda loose as usual. Something that Tim hated about his kink is how quickly he checked his friend’s outfit, something that he always did since Dave is now basically his “fart bud”, against all odds.

“Yeah… yeah… I love you. No… I love you more!”

Kinda funny how Dave, 24, would revert back to an awkward teenager at times whenever he and his girlfriend were on the phone. They probably even acted like that on purpose, because love is doing stupid things together after all.

“Tim. Car. Now!”

Dave hung up and turned weirdly serious, got up and walked downstairs, saying something about getting in the car.

“Wait, what?” Tim asked, questioning whether his friend was being serious or not, but he did follow him to wherever he was going.

“We don’t have much time, Tim. Dana will come back soon. She’s out with her own friends and we have… like… 15 minutes.”

The two walked outside and headed towards the girls’ house, actually only a few blocks away from Tim’s. Tim himself reluctantly followed his bro into this, knowing that, at best, it may turn into a funny mishap to tell to their other pals while being drunk and laugh about it.

“I’ll just pretend your words make any sense, like I usually do…” Tim chuckled, sarcastically, but still following his friend.

“I think she’s hiding something.” Dave explained, walking at a fast pace, Tim right behind him. “She’s been strangely elusive lately and I want to check her room for clues.”

Tim just chuckled in response. “Dave, you do realize that this is not a 90s sit-com, right? Her room? Really? What are you hoping to find out, exactly, anyway? That she’s having some kind of affair behind your back?” he asked, trying to reason with him.

“An affair? You think I’m that kind of guy?” Dave answered, looking surprisingly offended by Tim’s question. “I just want to make sure she’s fine. She seemed worried about something and she’s like this organized haf-woman/half-machine hybrid who keeps sticky notes in her room to keep an eye on her busy life.”

“Oh…” Tim replied, rather sarcastically. “Now that makes a lot of sense.”

“Leave your sassiness for later, dork. Can we take your car?” Dave asked.

“Why? We’re already right in front of her house…”

Dave realized that he was so worried that they did, in fact, walked for a couple of blocks and found themselves stepping in Dana’s backyard without even noticing. He just laughed a bit about it.

“Sorry. Love makes me blind.” he joked, knowing that it was a rather silly thing to say anyway.

“Not the words I would have used, but ok.” Tim answered.

“Come on, let’s get inside.” his bro said, with a smirk.

“Alright… but please, let’s keep a low profile and no awkwa-”

But as they approached to the girl’s house, Dave awkwardly started muttering some kind of theme song that was oddly reminiscent of the Mission Impossibile’s most iconic soundtrack. This guy has a girlfriend, everyone.

“So much for keeping a low profile, Ethan Hunt…” Tim joked.

Dana’s room, following the usual “average american house tropes” that the writer of this story grew up with in the 90s, was on the second floor. Luckily, the house was empty, so both Tim and Dave could easily climb it without fearing of someone noticing their totally legal actions.

“Look at Tim, such a rebel! Such a fast climber!” Dave whispered, noticing how good Tim was at climbing the girl’s house.

“Thanks. I learned it when I visited your mom.” he joked.

“I thought you’d prefer my dad, you know.” Dave played along, with a rather noticeable reference to Tim’s homosexuality.

“Just… just let’s get done with this.”

After some awkward climbing, the two found themselves in front of a window leading to Dana’s room. The duo was sitting on a small portion of slanted roof, wondering how to get inside.

“Alright. I could just punch through the window and open it. But you know I don’t like violence against windows.” Dave said, somewhat joking, but really trying to come up with a way to get through this final obstacle.

“Never mind, it’s open.” Tim said, as his hand passed right through the window. “Or, you know, I got ghost powers all of the sudden, but I doubt it.”

“You’re so funny I forgot to laugh.” Dave commented, as he got inside his girlfriend’s room, making sure no one was there, immediately followed by his sassy friend.

The room was fairly big and messy, books and magazines scattered all around the floor and the bed. Dana was a busy woman: she got a degree in economics but, given the tough times, she had troubles finding a decent job lately. Dave actually suspected that this was the reason she was being nervous about, well, everything, understandably.

“Why don’t you just ask her instead of acting like the perfect boyfriend material that you are?” Tim stated, in his usual snarky tone, noticing Dave basically rummaging through Dana’s more personal stuff.

“Just… let me do my thing ok?” he was serious again, trying to find something that could be clue, deep down knowing that all of that was quite non-sense and even ridiculous, but his stubbornness was showing. “Wait…”

Something drew his attention. A red (therefore important, according to Dana’s code) sticky note on the nightstand. Something was written on it.

“Oh… I guess I was right…” Dave whispered, eyes glued on the note.

“Something about her job?”

But Tim didn’t get an answer, as they heard someone coming from downstairs. They probably were so focused on their mission that didn’t even notice how someone got inside the house minutes after them. They went silent and tried to listen to the person’s footsteps.

“Yeah. I’ll keep you posted.”

They heard a muffled female voice getting closer, probably talking on her phone. A voice that was very familiar.

“Fuck! It’s Dana!” Dave whispered.

The two looked around, looking for a quick solution or a place to hide, blatantly ignoring the window they used to get inside in the first place.

“The closet!” Dave said.

Without even questioning whether this was a good idea or not, the duo sneaked inside Dana’s closet and closed themselves inside just as the girl came into her room, still talking on the phone about something.

Tim and Dave managed to mess things up however, as they ended up in a very small section of that apparently big, spacious closet, so they had to arrange themselves in a weird position. Dave was standing up, towering over Tim, who found himself sitting on the floor instead, right behind his friend… with his face perfectly aligned with his loose jeans butt. As his eyes got adjusted to the dark, Tim started to distinguish the seams and texture’s on Dave’s jeans ass, and the tiny red Levi tag on the right back pocket. He couldn’t help but take a look, which he felt really unnecessary, given the context.

“So… this is where you lived for most of your life…” Dave joked, looking around, as if the closet was some kind of fancy mansion.

“Haha! Another gay joke! Great timing, Dave!” Tim muttered instead. The last thing they had to do was talk.

The two waited for a couple of minutes, hoping that Dana would just leave again or even just go downstairs, so they’d have enough time to get out of there in the hopes that Dave didn’t leave any clue of his presence.

“As long a we remain silent…” Tim whispered. “We have nothing to worry about.”

Only moments after saying that, he felt a very familiar sound greeting his face. It was a long, rumbling sound coming from Dave’s denim ass. It was one of his usual, well-known loud farts, a fart that he was desperately trying to keep as silent as possible. Luckily, Dana was too busy with her phone to even notice the weird noise coming from inside of her closet.

“Dave! What the fuck?!” Tim hissed.

The gassy friend tried not to laugh, realizing how idiotic the whole situation was. “I’m sorry dude.” he murmured. “You know what happens when I’m nervous!”

The smell was unbearable already. Being in a such small space didn’t certainly help. Those were probably some of the smelliest farts Dave ever managed to rip in Tim’s face, although this time was, against all odds, more like an accident.

“Tim…” Dave whispered, carefully placing his butt closer to his friend’s face.

Another fart erupted, sounding dangerously louder than the previous one. The rough surface of Dave’s denim gently caressed Tim’s nose. The blast of gas then turned into something much more subtle, but still otherwise bubbly. Tim felt his nose burn, as really he had no choice but to breath all of that in.

“Dave I swear. If you don’t stop, Dana’s gonna–”

But another “slow-paced” rumbly fart cut him off. Dave was seriously trying to contain his well-known farting abilities. Tim, instead, was trying to remain calm, feeling like the Universe was somehow messing with him. That was an insane situation: he certainly wasn’t new to Dave’s farts, but in that context, it felt almost like one of his weird dreams about his fart fetish.

“Tim I’m sorry, at least I know you don’t mind… I hope”

Funnily enough, despite the slightly amused tone in his whispering voice, Dave sounded genuinely sorry. Yet he was right: Tim was insanely enjoying it, but knowing that Dana was out there made the whole thing almost surreal. And, once again, as much as Dave always proved so chill about this stuff, he couldn’t help but feel somehow awkward about having his friend face-farting him so non-chalantly.

And yet another “ninja” fart was ripped all over his face. Being nervous really turned Dave’s stomach into a messy cloud of gas, and Tim’s nose was there to vacuum it all up, completely defenseless, standing before the sheer power of the gassy friend’s powerful denim-covered anus.

Even though the situation was absurd, Dave couldn’t help but chuckle a bit. After all, the smell hit him too, and it was getting insane even for the farter himself, whose gas just didn’t stop building up.

“Sorry bro… I have to do this.” he whispered.

Tim felt Dave’s hands gently grabbing the back of his head, holding it still, as he pulled him in the clutches of his denim butt. The warm fabric of the jeans was soaking in that unbearable smell. The sniffer then felt the weight of his gassy friend almost crushing his skull. Despite being dark, Tim realized that Dave was basically sitting on him, using his head as some kind of human stool.

The fart was directly ripped in Tim’s mouth at that point, that rumbly sound once again renewing the already destructive stench. It was supposed to be loud, so loud, that Dave had to basically use his friend’s face to deadpan its impressive thunderous noise. The gassy bro was trying to rip it in the form of a long series, hoping that Dana would fail to hear (or even recognize) his well-known gross, but rather impressive talent.

Tim heard his friend’s sighs of relief after each, rumbling fart, but Dave was also trying not to burst into a laughter that could blow their cover. Fart fetish or not, he couldn’t help but to find it more hilarious than gross.

As much as the lack of space in that closet wouldn’t really allow it, Dave even lifted his right leg a bit, while still “sitting” on his stool-friend, as a way to facilitate the impressive amount of gas gushing out from his anus. It’s not like he had to worry about Tim passing out or finding it too gross, anyway.

That fart itself was lasting longer than both of them anticipated. They lost count of how much time passed, probably a full minute. Tim’s face was warm and sweaty now, still trapped in the clutches of his gassy bro’s denim butt, directly living in person that thin line between Fart Heaven and Fart Hell.

A final sigh of relief, followed by a louder toot and a chuckle. “Sorry, bud.” Dave muttered, hoping that his plan worked.

Indeed, Dana didn’t hear a thing. She hung up and left the room, her footsteps slowly turning into a far, muffled sound, until silence announced that the duo was now free to get the heck out of there, especially considering how they were almost both choking on farts.

Tim forgot what fresh, non-fart air felt like in his nostrils and so took a deep, refreshing breath the moment he stepped out of that gas closet. Ironically, Dave did the same, maybe even wondering how would Tim even endure something as overwhelming as his farts, but he didn’t really mind anyway. Despite everything, that was oddly hilarious, as the two stared at each other and then bursted into a laughter.

“Now let’s get out of here…” the farter suggested.

But before the two could even walk towards the window, Dana showed up again in her own room. She didn’t even startle.

“What are you two doing here?” she asked, sounding more like an inquisitive mom than an angry girlfriend. She was fairly mature, after all. “I don’t know what you Dumb and Dumber are up to, but I swear if you–”

“I heard the news, Dana. We were just outside your window…” Dave explained, slightly tweaking the truth. “We wanted to play a stupid scary prank but then I heard it, while you were on the phone you know…”

Dana shook her head and laughed a bit. She hugged her boyfriend and kissed him.

“Yes! I got the job!” she giggled. “Sorry I’ve been so cold lately. The job interview made me so nervous…”

“It’s fine, Dana. You’ve always been stone-cold anyway!” Dave joked, earning a playful slap on his chest by his girlfriend.

“Yes, that’s a very import–wait what’s that smell?” the girl asked, sniffling loudly the air around him.

Tim’s heart almost stopped while Dave did his best to not just laugh like an immature prankster. His hair, clothes, skin, were completely “soaked” in his gassy bro’s gas, so naturally he’d himself smell like flatulence.

“Never mind. It must be you, Dave. He farts like crazy when he’s nervous, Tim, I swear.” she said, disgusted but slightly amused as well.

“Ow… it’s part of my charm, babe.” Dave replied, using what he would have considered an irresistible flirty tone of voice, which was super awkward instead.

“And yeah. Tim’s very aware of my skills, right?” he joked, winking at him, like the big teasing bastard he’s always been since he found out about his fart kink.

Tim just shrugged, faking a disgusted look, his heart racing fast, knowing that all he had to do after that was take the biggest shower in the hope that such unbearable stench didn’t fuse with the atoms in his body.

“Well, it’s gonna be a wild ride!” Dana exulted, happy about her new job offer.

“How about a round of beers to celebrate?” Tim suggested. “It’s on me, no worries.”

“Great idea, but I’m paying. I got the job, you dumb-dumbs get to drink!” Dana replied. She was in a very good mood.

“It’s fine, Dana! It’s the least we can do after-“ but Dave interrupted him.

“Come on Tim, stop living in outdated gender roles and let the pretty girl buy you a drink.” he said, faking a serious tone.

The girlfriend simply rolled her eyes and left the room “Just… meet me downstairs when you’re done saving the world, ok?”

As Dana was nowhere in sight, Dave simply turned to Tim and let another huge, long one rip.

“Shhh. Just tying up some loose ends here.” he said, shushing the gay friend, blasting what was left of his gas out.

“Are you finish-“ “Not yet” he simply said, as if he was making sure no particle of gas was left behind.

With one high pitched final note that was met with some immature laughter, Dave sighed in relief.

“With that said” he chuckled “You might want to take a shower.”

Tim simply nodded with an unamused expression.

“Oh, and you might want to leave the other closet you’ve been hiding.”

That was out of nowhere.

“No pressure bro, just know that we’re all always more than happy to have a beer with you.”

“Thanks Da-“

“Despite your bigoted views on gender roles of course.”

“I’m going to punch you now.”

The duo then headed downstairs and no one got punched luckily.

Tim thought about his friend’s words and how it was probably time to leave that metaphorical stuffy closet soon or later, not that he felt forced or anything.

Dana’s closet, however, that’s probably the only one he enjoyed being trapped into…

End of Episode 9

#fart story #eproctophilia #fartkink #davefarts2 #gayfart #malefarts

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ackerpreach · 3 years

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This ending .... I can name 500 reasons and I will name them right now, because I don’t think I’m the only one who is upset with how things turned out. (Also, A positive message for all of you at the end)

MAJOR LEAKS SPOILERS/ READ WITH CAUTION

Update: after reading more theories from fellow RM bloggers, and sleeping over it one day, this entire chapter might be an april fools... Don't fully lose hope yet beautiful people. It's me just giving a review on a possible fake April fools chapter

After following this franchise since 2013, so nearly a DECADE. this ending is a pure disserve to the entire fandom. I feel like Yams has rushed it just for the sake of being done with the entire manga. So many things are left open, characters and their developemt are reverted back all the way to chapter 1 or are left even worse than that...

Mikasa’s worthless character development/ Aaronmika’s horrible toxic codependent relationship

Oh honey... Let’s start with how horrible Isayama has treated her. We were all rooting for her, because we all felt like she was so misunderstood. She had a horrible childhood and imprinted on a guy who treated her like trash 99 percent of the story. And then, slowly but surely, she starts to realize she has to stop obsessing over him in the uprising arc with the help of a real man who treats her like a queen, more importantly, he treats her like a real human being. This man sees her for her abilities and that she has the power to be self dependent. She learned parts of herself, that she was able to work together with him like no one else could. She learned parts of herself she was unable to do so if she kept obsessing about Aaron. All this love, care, mutual understanding and RESPECT these two shared.

but...NAH FUCK THAT, right Yams?? Throw all this development away, all this bonding. Let’s make the main female lead even more yandere than she already was in the first season. Let her make out with his decapacitated head (like dude, this is also pure disrespect to Aaron’s dead body btw) and let her obsess even more about the guy who has treated her no better than a piece of toilet cloth 99 percent of the time. The guy who was never really appreciative in front of her for saving his ass billions of times, who always pushed her away, who yells at her and snaps at her whenever he can instead of reasoning and talking calmly with her in mature way. (EVEN PARODY YOUTUBE CHANNELS WHO DONT SHIP ANYTHING MAKE IT A TROPE WHERE AARON TELLS MIKASA HE HATES HER GUTS WHENEVER HE CAN)

Then after all that, suddenly Yams tries to last minute persuade us Aaron’s always been head over heels for her??? He should have build their relationship better which he hasn’t even tried to do so... He must be thinking his fans are stupid for eating this from his hands.

Like seriously??? What is this???

Isayama is just fully contradicting himself. It’s like someone tipped him off with a buttload of money for him to write Aaron like this to satisfy shipping needs and to cash in those extra money’s from it. Even if he tried to cater to Erem*ika, this is not how you write a loving and caring couple which people will root for.

This next two panels just freaking infuriates me to the core of my soul. I can’t even describe how dissapointed I am with Mikasa.

Why is she clutching that head so obsessively like that? Why is she walking and turning her back away from her comrades? After everything they have done for her, after all they’ve been through?! After everything Armin has done? Standing up for Mikasa, beating up Aaron for hurting her. I feel like even Jean, Connie and Sasha have cared more for her in a healthy way. Sure, Aaron cares for her romantically too apparently (What a twist Yams :)), but has he aided her to becoming a mentally healthier individual? Has he aided in her mental stability? The answer is a big fat NO! All I see between these two after today’s raw Chapter’s are too Yandere obsessed individuals who have no clue on how to maintain a healthy relationship.

Love should only go as far as the heart can endure and it seems like her character is not willing to be aware of that. Even Armin was able to let go of Aaron in those latest panels. Why does her entire character resolve around this guy??? I really do not understand. Her Ackerbond and her age is not an excuse for her to throw her life away like this.

Shonen’s disgusting portrayal of women

I’ve seen this countless of times in the many years I’ve watched anime. SasuS*ku from Naruto, Ichih*me from Bleach, Shinji and that oranged hair girl from Neon Evangelion.. Why do these women get decreased to simpletons with one single goal? And that is to obsess over a bland male lead who either treats them like trash or doesn’t notice them up until the last last chapter (LITERALLY WHAT YAMS HAS DONE). Some go even as far as the male leading wanting the kill the female love interest and yet the female lead is still in love with them???. It’s disgusting for him to write the MAIN female character this way.

It’s dissapointing we believed in Isayama doing Mikasa’s character right. That she’s finally being able to let go of her codependency and to live for herself maybe live in Hizuru and find more about her roots???, but every single time she shows some improvement, it’s burried deep in the ground again by the Author. It almost seems like a lowkey kink of some of the male Mangaka’s to write about a girl obsessing over them no matter what. I see this so many times to the point that I truly stand behind it that some of them might have this fantasy.

I wished he didn’t portray her last panels like this. Everyone else is living their lives while Mikasa is still grieving about him. I’m not saying she’s not allowed to grieve and everyone takes it at their own pace, but cmon... Show her living her life too. This is too much. Her being next to his grave and grieving him as her last panels just shoves it in our faces that YET AGAIN, BEING OBSESSED WITH AARON IS ALL HER CHARACTER STANDS FOR.

I truly despise how Isayama handles her grieving, kissing his decapacitated head, carrying it around like some handbag, and her last panels being thissss.

The world leaving Paradis alone miraciously after all that???

It’s so weird and out of place with so many political feuds and disagreements between the world and Paradis, the entire Rumbling happening and we can see Mikasa just chilling outside in Paradis with no one bothering them. You can see the rings of the walls in the picture below. I don’t know the exact reason behind as the manga is still in Korean, but from what I see, the story went the route of: throwing a happy ending without enough proper reason and it was all fixed just like that in a snap! It doesn’t fit the entire narrative of attack on titan for things to be so peacful out of nowhere. When it comes to the narrative, how things work in that world, how hard it is to achieve peace, everything made somewhat sense up until chapter 138. 139 seems so so out of place... It’s like I’m reading a chapter from a totally different manga.

Aaron Yoghurt got defeated so easily/ Aaron’s character assassination

The build up on the first part of the rumbling was great, those kids carrying coins. You could feel humanity’s fear and Aaron’s hatred in those pages. As if he truly had a goal and he has turned away completely from his comrades and his closest friends with no return. The world seemed truly doomed, but he got defeated just like that. He was in the nape all this time (because screw the warhammer power of hiding yourself elsewhere in his ginormous titan body). There is no master plan as we all expected, and in the end he just acts all yandere in the paths with Armin and that’s it... They massacared his entire character as well. Many fan theories created a better ending with his character. Him being reincarnated as Historia’s baby would be so much better. For him to still keep on seeking and to strive for power. It has always been his motive. It’s his personality from the start until chapter 138. Even if things are okay, to keep on going and to seek that adventure, but then.. He’s so weak and directionless suddenly.. It’s so weird... This is not Aaron at all???

Using Aaron for him this entire post, because I don’t want others to invade our tags... :)))

Historia’s baby

The only panel we got from Historia’s child was this. Just a normal kid, normal life... Why did Isayama put so much effort in highlighting Historia’s pregnancy if it was nothing too spectacular anyway? It seemed he had major plans for this kid and for their development too??? It’s again, big plans, big developments, big relationship dynamic, but all got thrown out of the window...

Don’t read the next sentence if you are a minor :’)

It’s like almost ejaculating, but stopping right before it and repeating that every single Arc.

My energy when writing about this chapter is the same as Nostalgia Critic and his hatred for atla the live action

In Conclusion...

I know us fans should not be deciding on how this story should end, because this is Isayama’s story after all, but I truly wished for him to wrap up things much more rounded. There are so many unanswered questions... Again, I think for the sake of being done with this manga, he rushed all of it. He’s become a millionaire from this story and now his pockets are jammed full, I guess he doesn’t need to put in any effort anymore, right? Perhaps a controversial opinion, but I really wished he cared for his fans a little bit more with this last chapter by giving some answers that make sense at least. It’s his fans who gave him this platform and the opportunity to tell his story and for him to at least give in a bit of effort especially in the last chapter is the least he can do. Rivamika being canon or not, he truly rushed it without thinking much about the entire story line. He expanded it so much, he didn’t know how to bind it all together.

Even after all this, I’ll still ship them in the headcanon type of way. I do give credit to Isayama for giving us a template for such a beautiful dynamic between Levi and Mikasa. He decides to waste it, but that doesn’t mean we have to. I want to thank all the people with amazing writing skills, the ones who give us beautiful art like @carmenlee @phit chan @vialesana and many more. I want to remind all of you that we can create something beautiful of our own and we don’t neccesarily need canon lore for that. The art I’ve seen, the fanfictions I’ve read have touched me deeper than Isayama ever could at times.The Mikasa in our mind is appreciate of Levi, is mature, classy and has a strong will for herself. They spend their remaining days together peacefully. Keep writing, keep drawing, stay creative.

I love you all so so much, I’ve only been publicly active since March, but thank you Rivamika fandom for giving me so much joy as a lurker these past 7 years <3

#rivamika #snk leaks #snk 139 leaks #levimika #mikalevi

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myhockeyworld87 · 3 years

Text

What Happens In Vegas...Doesn’t Always Stay There - Jacob Markstrom - Part 5

Word Count: 6,353

POV: Reader

Warning: Language, Smut, NSFW, Pregnancy stuff

Notes: Sorry I meant to post this last night, but that game left me barely able to function. As such, you are getting this today. This fic takes place during the 2018-2019 season and during that season Jacob’s dad was still with him, so I will be mentioning him in this and the next chapter, along with his cancer. If that bothers you, please skip this and the next chapter. I just felt that it needed to be written into the story. As always feedback is welcome. Happy Reading!

What Happens In Vegas…Doesn’t Always Stay There Masterlist

It took three weeks back in LA to get everything taken care of before the move to Vancouver. Work thankfully wasn't a problem. With more and more movies and television shows being filmed in Canada, the firm liked the idea of having someone closer. Most of your work could be done remotely anyhow and you could just video chat conference calls or anything else you needed. It ended up being a win for everyone.

By the time you could actually move in, Jacob was on the tail end of a ten-day road trip. He'd insisted on hiring you a moving company, even though you said you could handle it, not that he thought you couldn't; he just felt you didn't need the added stress. Though packing wasn't the stressful part. It was the unpacking and not knowing where to put things with Jacob not being there that was causing your anxiety to rise. You felt like you were invading his home. Most of your furniture you kept in storage, but you still had a few things you wanted to take with you, yet you didn't know where to have the movers place it. Then there were your clothes. Jacob had a gorgeous master bedroom, with a closet to die for, but all his things were in it. You were unsure if you should move them to make room for yours or just take up the closet in the spare room. Which while spacious, was nowhere near as nice as the one in Jacob's room. Everything would've been much easier had he been here.

In the end, you split everything up, putting half your stuff in his closet and half in the other room. You figured the two of you would be doing a lot of compromising and this would just be one of them. You had his office moved around to accommodate your work desk, since you'd be working a lot from home, and you had to wonder how often he came in here, as the pile of papers on his desk looked like the size of Mount Fuji, volcanic eruption and all. You were tempted to straighten it out for him, but opted not to, not wanting to invade his privacy.

You were just putting away the last of your stuff when you heard Jacob walk through the door. "Prinsessa, I'm home." He'd taken to calling you his Swedish princess lately and you had to admit you didn't hate it.

"In the bedroom," you hollered back. It was late in the evening, too late for you to be up, but you wanted to see Jacob and make sure everything you'd done so far was fine with him.

"I was surprised to see all the lights on when I pulled up. Couldn't you sleep?"

"I just wanted to finish putting away a few things." He dropped his bag on the floor and came over to you, wrapping you up in his arms and dropping a few kisses to your lips.

"I missed you these last couple of weeks." It was weird but you'd missed him as well. You had talked every day, sometimes several times, but those few days that you'd spent in Vancouver, had just brought a new closeness to this relationship. If a relationship was what you could call it. He did refer to you as his girlfriend, but the way you two had gotten here was definitely the road less traveled.

You slid your arms up his chest, savoring the feel of his well-toned muscles there. "Funny...I didn't miss you at all." You had a hard time keeping a straight face.

"Really?" Jacob asked. There was this twinkle in his eyes, right before his hands slid under your ass and he lifted you on him. You didn't even have a chance to wrap your legs around him, though he held you with ease. "Maybe I need to do a better job at leaving you some reminders for next time." His mouth went to the crook of your neck where he sucked on you and gave you little love bites. You were pretty sure there were going to be marks there.

"And here this whole time I thought they called you Marky because of your last name," you teased, yet moved your head to the side to give him greater access.

"Oh, I plan on leaving more than just this one." He carried you over to the bed, where he gingerly lowered you down. You loved how he could be slightly rough with you one minute and then next so gentle. Admittedly, you'd like to see a little bit of his rough side, but hopefully, that would come with time.

His hands slid under your shirt, along your sides; the callousness of them rough yet the touch tender, making you shiver. "No bra?" he asked, eyebrows shooting up with delight as he skimmed along the undersides, before cupping each breast.

"I opted out of it a while ago." Though your body hadn't changed much in these last ten weeks, you did notice your breasts were more sensitive and sometimes you just couldn't stand having them confined longer than necessary. Tonight happened to be one of those times.

"Well if it's an option, you don't ever have to wear it again." There was a devilish look in his eyes. "I like this ease of access." He was rolling your nipples between his thumb and index finger, eliciting moans out of you so that you had no chance to answer. Scrunching your shirt up, he dipped his head down to lavish attention on those same nipples he had been tweaking. Your body squirmed, as he swirled his tongue around it before sucking on it gently. He wedged his thigh between your legs and you found your body grinding against it while he played with first one nipple and then the other. "Oh prinsessa, I think you did miss me."

There was no denying that your body missed this. Craved was more like it. You had a feeling there would never be a time that you didn't want him. What was surprising was the sense of loss that came with just simple day-to-day actions, like brushing your teeth together and sharing a meal. Those were the things you'd found yourself longing for these last few weeks.

Jacob started to travel down your body. Trailing kisses as he went, yet stopping to whisper something in Swedish to the baby. He didn't spend long there, and before you could ask what he said; he was pulling your sweats and panties down. "Du gor mig galen med hur vat du ar." (you drive me crazy with how wet you are) You were going to have to start picking up Swedish or something in your spare time, as he seemed to always revert to his native language in the heat of the moment. There was no time to ask what he said, as he dove right into your pussy. Licking a stripe right up to your clit causing your hips to lift off the bed.

You sucked in a breath when he repeated the action again, your body on fire like never before. When he flicked his tongue over your clit, you were gone. The orgasm hitting you hard and fast like never before. "Fuck," you screamed out, as your body trembled and spasmed.

Jacob worked you through it, somewhat astonished with how little he had done to make you cum so quickly. Once, you finally stopped shaking he picked his head up from between your legs. "Are you alright, prinsessa?"

"Yes," you sighed in a state of bliss, not knowing if it was the pregnancy or the fact that you hadn't seen Jacob in three weeks that made you climax like that.

You lay there panting, still catching your breath. "Shall we do that again?" The smirk on Jacob's face had you laughing, but after a long day of unpacking, you knew your body wouldn't last long.

"Do that and I may be done for the rest of the night." You were only half teasing but he chuckled and made his way back up your body, taking the hint.

"Rather have this," Jacob flexed his hips into you and moaned out into the room again. He was out of his boxers in no time. Cupping his cock in his hand, then guiding it into you. "God, prinsessa, you always feel like heaven."

"Mmm," was all you could answer back as he was buried deep in you, for he felt like heaven as well. When he finally started to move it felt like every nerve in your body was alive and tingling. With each thrust he took you to new heights you never knew were possible. "Oh Jacob," you moaned. "Don't stop...please...yes...oh god..."

"Yeah, you like that prinsessa?" A smirk of satisfaction crossing his lips at knowing he was bringing you such exquisite pleasure. "Does my cock make you feel good?" He was pounding into you and you didn't know how much longer you were going to be able to hold on for. He must have felt the small flutter your pussy gave, as the first tremors of orgasm began. "Cum for me (Y/N)." You shattered at his words, climaxing once again with a force you never felt but just minutes ago. "Fuck, ya." He groaned out, spilling inside you as his orgasm hit as well.

Your body was still quaking as he rolled you both onto your sides. His cock going flaccid yet still inside you. "God, you're beautiful," Jacob whispered those words, as he pushed strands of hair out of your face, before dropping kisses to your nose and lips. "If this is what happens when I get home from a road trip, I can't wait to go on another one."

"Stop," you said playfully swatting at his chest.

"I'm just teasing, prinsessa, though I do like coming home to you here. I think this will be good for us." You hoped it would, considering that you both had a lot banking on this working out. If this were to go south, then what would you do? Move back to LA with the baby? Stay here so that Jacob could be a part-time dad? There were so many questions swirling around in your brain, but when Jacob softly took his thumb to rub your cheek they all seemed to evaporate. "I didn't get to ask how you're feeling today?"

"I'm good, well, we're good. That's three whole days without morning sickness." It was small, but it was progress. Hopefully, you were on the upswing of that as you went into your eleventh week.

"Good, I can't see how that's good for either one of you." You couldn't either, even though everything you read and everyone you talked to, said it was normal. "When you were moving in did you figure out which room you wanted for the baby?"

"I thought the smart thing would be to keep it next to our room. Oh, I mean your room."

"No, you were right the first time. This is our room." He kissed you quickly before adding, "If we're going to make this work then everything is ours."

You yawned, completely exhausted from the babe and moving in. "Ok," you somehow managed to get out, agreeing with Jacob.

"Sleep, (Y/N). It's late." You weren't sure if it was the combination of his soft whispered words while he rubbed your back or sheer exhaustion, but the minute you closed your eyes you were out.

Jacob just chuckled to himself as he watched you fall asleep. He was fighting the feeling himself, though he just wanted to steal a few more glances as you slept on peacefully in his arms. It was strange to him, someone who wasn't ready to settle down, how much he loved this. Just holding you in his arms and watching you sleep. Ever since he'd met you, something inside him had changed. You made him want more than just random hookup after random hookup, and now he had that something more with you. Though pretty soon there would be a little one as well. His hand stole down to your belly. He thought for sure there would be a bump there, after not seeing you for three weeks. The little blueberry inside you had grown to a strawberry now. He knew this because of course, he had to google it, along with so many other things. Like how to change a diaper, and what he should expect at each week of your pregnancy. He knew that right now you could start with mood swings, and be crying one minute and happy the next. He was just waiting for that to happen. He was trying to be prepared as best he could to help you out with the baby growing inside you. His baby. God, it sounded weird, yet so good at the same time. It was thoughts of his little one that had him drifting off to sleep.

Jacob was home for the next five days before off on a short road trip before Thanksgiving. It was after a one point loss that he brought up finally being able to tell people about your pregnancy. The two of you were driving home after the game and you could tell his mind was preoccupied, you just assumed it was about the game. That was until he spoke. "I think we should tell everyone." It was sort of out of the blue and you had to admit you weren't sure if you were ready.

"I don't know Jacob."

Before you could say more, he looked over at you saying, "why?"

"It's just...I'm the new person here. I've only been to three games counting tonight." He looked over again when you came to a stoplight, confused by what you were saying. "They're going to judge me." When he still didn't understand, you added, "They're all going to think I baby trapped you."

"No, they won't."

"Please, I know women, and you said it yourself; they're a family. I'll be looked at as the outsider that wanted to get her claws into a famous athlete."

"I don't know about famous," he joked and you noticed that he tended to do that a lot. When you just gave him a look, he reached over and squeezed your thigh, letting his hand rest there after doing so. "I'm teasing (Y/N). I know these guys, they aren't going to think that way once we tell them. Hell, I'll take full blame. I mean I should've worn a condom, but if I'm being honest...I'm glad I didn't."

You were shocked at his words, to the point that you had none yourself. "Don't look so shocked," Jacob said breaking the silence. "I'll admit, that kids weren't in my plans right now, but they were in them. And I have to say now, once I saw blueberry, who's now strawberry; I'm kind of excited to be a dad. I guess that's why I want to tell everyone."

Well, shit, now he had you all weepy. You understood where he was coming from, there was something about seeing the baby on the ultrasound, even though you had no clue what you were looking at, and then hearing the heartbeat, well it made you feel the exact same way as he did. "Ok."

"Ok?"

"Ok, we can tell people."

"Really? I didn't say that to make you change your mind or anything." His hand was running up and down your thigh now, more in an excited manner than seductive, yet it still sent tingles through your body.

"I know, but I'll be twelve weeks in a couple days and then we're pretty much out of the woods according to the doctor." That had been your main concern, having a miscarriage. It would be hard enough on you let alone having to tell everyone who was sharing in your happiness.

"Oh," Jacob exclaimed and you could tell that was something that hadn't really crossed his mind. "Well, we can wait then."

"What if we compromise." After all, the two of you had been doing that a lot recently, no reason to stop now. "You're only gone a couple short days. We can tell everyone when you get back, at Thanksgiving." When you were with the other wives and girlfriends tonight they had mentioned that they were going to be doing a group thanksgiving dinner for those who wished to celebrate and didn't have family in town. It was a no-brainer to say yes, though you probably should've talked to Jacob first. It was too late for that now, as you were already down for bringing a couple pies for dessert.

"That actually sounds like a good plan. Even if I didn't know we were officially going." There was that damn squeeze of your thigh again to let you know he was teasing. This time you played along.

"Hmm, I don't remember you being mentioned in the invite, but I'm sure I can bring a plus one." You were half tempted to reach over to grasp his thigh, but you settled for just linking your fingers together with his, liking the fact that you two had this easiness with each other.

"I'm fine with being your plus one anytime, prinsessa."

Once the matter was settled the two of you concentrated on other things until you got home and he whisked you up to the bedroom. You had read that your sex drive might decrease some during these weeks of pregnancy but you were not finding that to be the fact. If anything, you were constantly, well the only word for it was, horny. Just being in Jacob's presence drove you wild, and it seemed to be the same for him. Though the two of you did have your tender moments, where you cuddled up on the couch to watch hockey; Jacob explaining the premises of the game better to you. There were also nights you would just lie in bed and talk about the baby. Jacob gently caressing the small bump on your belly that wasn't even noticeable unless you were naked, which around him seemed to be often.

Before you knew it, he was off on another road trip. Immersing yourself in work during the day was easy, it was the nights that were long. Game nights, you found yourself at one of the other ladies houses watching the game together or just laughing and enjoying each other’s company, but then you would head home to an empty house and an even more vacant bed. It wasn’t lost on you that just a few short months ago, this was the life you wanted. No craved. Now here you were wishing that Jacob was home with you, preferably in bed, but just being in the house would be enough for you. Though you couldn’t complain too much as Jacob would call and facetime you several times each night.

It wasn’t too long of a roadie, and before you knew it, he was back in Vancouver and you were getting ready for Thanksgiving. With each pie you baked, you had to admit you were getting more and more nervous at the idea of telling Jacob’s teammates. You’d taken the morning to tell his parents, who while not exactly thrilled about the way it happened, were happy for the both of you and excited about having a grandchild. Yours were pretty much the same, now understanding that your move to Canada was more than just business.

Hours later, you were in the car headed to Chris Tanev’s place, where he and his girlfriend Kendra were hosting. You couldn’t stop your legs from bouncing as you went past neighborhood after neighborhood. “I’m telling you there’s nothing to be worried about,” Jacob insisted, placing his hand over your knee in an effort to get you to stop.

“Yeah, well I’ll be better when it’s over and I don’t have to see the disapproving stares.”

“You weren’t this nervous telling our families.”

“I was for yours. I just wasn’t showing it on the outside.” Admittedly, you had been scared about telling them, but Jacob’s parents were just so kind. There were also words exchanged in Swedish which you had no clue as to their meaning, but Jacob assured you it was nothing bad at all. “Besides our parents aren’t going to judge us at the end of the day. Family kind of has to love you, even when you make mistakes.”

“Mistakes, huh?”

“That’s not what I meant.”

“I know, just trying to take your mind off of everything. So, you’re cool with my parents coming over for a bit. I mean dad and I will be on the road a couple of days, so it’ll just be you and my mom, but I know she’s really excited about meeting you.”

“Yeah, I’m actually looking forward to it.” Which was the honest to god’s truth. You wanted to learn all about Jacob and his family, for no matter what happened between the two of you, they would always be a part of the baby’s life. “I’m sure she’s got some good stories about you growing up. You know the ones that are way too embarrassing to tell, but mom’s do anyhow.” He groaned and you laughed. There were obviously some he didn’t want to be told and you were looking forward to hearing about those the most.

“Maybe I should be rethinking this.”

“Don’t you dare.” As the words rolled off your tongue, you realized you were pulling up to the Tanev residence.

“Ready?” You took a deep breath, steeling yourself for the next few hours. You planned on just following Jacob’s lead. It wasn’t like you were going to walk in and simply announce that you were pregnant; however, and whenever, he wanted to tell them, was his choice.

He squeezed your hand one last time before the two of you exited the car. You grabbed the desserts, tossing two pies at Jacob before taking the last two, and heading to the door. “Welcome, guys,” Chris said as he opened the door, then took one of the pies off your hands. “Come on in.” Not everyone was there yet, which was rather nice. There were a few of the single players there, along with Sarah and Erik. You knew for sure Holly and Bo were coming as well and a few more of the couples, that you weren’t extremely close to yet, they just hadn’t arrived yet.

Mike Del Zotto was quick to come up and throw an arm around you. “Hey (Y/N), it’s good to see you. Glad you two decided to join us. I thought maybe this guy would keep you all to himself. I know I would.” He gave you a quick wink, but it was the look on Jacob’s face that had you laughing. He was not happy with DZ flirting with you by any means.

“Keep it up and we may just have to head home,” Jacob countered, though in a joking manner.

“Men,” Sarah said, grabbing you from Michael’s hold so that she could hug you. “Why don’t you boys run along and watch football or something. Let’s go put these in the kitchen.” She took the pies from Jacob and headed off.

Jacob came over and pecked you on the lips, before slyly asking, “You good?”

“Yeah,” with that he gave your hip a final squeeze then went with the other guys to the movie room.

“These look amazing,” Kendra told you, checking out the baked goods. “Where did you get them from?”

“Oh, I made them. I hope that’s ok.”

“Ok? Oh my god, of course, they’re probably way better than store-bought. Though you have me feeling guilty now because I did not make any of the food.” It was then that you noticed large tinfoil pans here and there in the kitchen with a couple in the oven. “I like to cook, but not for this herd. I don’t have enough oven space for the number of turkeys we’d need.”

“Well, I’m still amazed at you having everyone,” you told her, for it had to be a feat hosting this many hockey players along with their significant others. “Everything looks amazing and your house is gorgeous by the way.”

“Thank you. Would you like a glass?” Kendra held out a bottle of red wine, literally your weakness any other time than right now. “I was just pouring us a second.”

“Yeah, join us,” Sarah added. “We’re going to need it with all this male testosterone today.”

Somehow at the last couple of get-togethers, you’d managed to get out of drinking simply by saying that you had work the next day, but that would not be the case tomorrow. “I really shouldn’t, but a bottle of water would be great.”

“One water coming up.” Kendra headed over to the fridge when you saw Sarah eyeing you funny.

“Ok, so I have to ask.” This from Sarah as she still had that look on her face. It was the one Kennedy always made when she knew something. Nine times out of ten your best friend was always right, but then this was Sarah, someone who you considered a friend but didn’t know near as well. “You haven’t been drinking at any games and you’re not today. Are you….?” She paused letting the word pregnant just hang in the air, for you to fill in the blank.

“Are you?” Kendra asked now fully into the conversation, yet still, neither said the word.

All you could do was take a deep breath and say, “Yeah, I am.” Still not saying the P-word as if that would change the circumstance of your situation.

“Oh my god, congratulations.” Sarah came running around the island to hug you. "That's amazing." You were stunned there wasn't a hint of disapproval on her face. And when you looked back at Kendra who was waiting her turn to hug you, all you could see was happiness as well.

"Jacob is going to be a great father," Kendra told you when she wrapped you up in an embrace. "How far along are you?"

"How far along is what?" Chris asked.

"I hope you mean dinner because I'm starving," Del Zotto added.

Bringing up the rear of the trio was Jacob and all you could do was give him a sheepish grin as Kendra broke the news. "Congratulations, Daddy."

Both Michael and Chris turned to him, with shocked looks on their faces. "Why didn't you tell us, man?" Chris spoke first, as he clapped Jacob on the back then gave him the standard bro hug.

"I planned on it today," Jacob answered while giving you a look both shocked and thrilled that you were the one spilling the beans. "Just hadn't found the right time."

Del Zotto came up and hugged you first, followed by Chris, and the next thing you knew the whole place was congratulating the two of you. It was nothing like you thought, not one person questioned the fact that you'd just moved in together or started to see one another. Jacob had been right all along. They were just like your family, supportive of the decision the two of you had made. You were beginning to believe that this may work out. Especially, as your relationship with Jacob only seemed to grow stronger with each passing day.

After Thanksgiving, things seemed to be moving in fast forward. You hit the twelve-week mark in your pregnancy, which meant another ultrasound and another chance for you and Jacob to further bond over the baby. It went from being a strawberry to being the size of a lime, according to the chart, and this time you could both see it was an actual baby growing inside of you. There was a distinct shape to its little arms and legs, which made the whole thing that much more real and exciting. Which is how you found yourself asking the girls how you would go about getting a little Canucks jersey with Jacob’s number and Daddy written on the back as a Christmas gift for Jacob. It was the first baby item that you bought and it felt so perfect.

As Christmas drew near, you found yourself decorating Jacob’s house for the holiday season. Even though you’d been living in the house for several weeks, it still didn’t feel like your home quite yet. Jacob had few holiday decorations, so you found yourself shopping more than you cared to admit. By the time he arrived home, you had the house transformed into something worthy of a Hallmark movie. It wasn’t what Jacob was used to by any means considering the Swedes are more classic and subtle when it came to holiday décor, but he loved it all the same.

Christmas was a quiet affair. You opted to stay in Canada with Jacob, figuring that you might as well start making some new traditions, like celebrating on Christmas Eve as is done in Sweden. The two of you tried to mesh your holiday traditions as much as possible, so you agreed to open one present Christmas Eve after you had eaten some classic holiday dishes from Jacob’s homeland, then opting to open the rest Christmas morning as your family had always done. Jacob bought you a beautiful charm bracelet. There was a Welcome to Vegas charm, as well as a hockey stick, and Canucks one, but the one you loved the most was the one that had Mom to be written on a heart.

“This is beautiful,” you said leaning over to give him a kiss. “Thank you.”

You handed over your gift to him, which he took with a silly grin on his face. Tearing through the paper, he unwrapped the box in no time, then pulled out the tiny hockey sweater. “This is great (Y/N). I can’t wait to see him or her in it at the game.”

“There’s more.” He looked at you curiously then peered back inside the box, seeing the gold chain lying inside. You’d seen him wear one on a few occasions but this had a little charm on the end. He looked at it several times before you finally gave in. “It’s the doppler sound of the baby’s heartbeat. I had told you I’d record it for you before we did the ultrasound here in Vancouver, but I still wanted you to have something to remember that moment.”

His eyes started to well up, just like they had that day when you heard the heartbeat. “This is…wow…I love it.” It was Jacob’s turn to plant a kiss on your lips, only this one became a little more heated. He finally pulled away, but only to say, “Can you put it on me?”

Thankfully he was seated on the couch, so you got up and placed the chain around his neck. The moment it was secure, he looked down at the charm and smiled, before reaching to grab you and pull you close again. This time speaking hushed words to the baby in Swedish as he always did.

“I think for my New Year’s resolution, I’m going to learn Swedish. I’m dying to know what you tell the baby.”

“That time, I said that they are so lucky to have the most wonderful mom in the world.” Well, if that didn’t make the heat rise to your cheeks. “There might have been a few other things as well. I’m more than happy to teach you though if you’d like to learn.”

“I think I would. It would be nice to teach our child your native tongue, and they say to start as early as possible. Which it seems that you are.” He just grinned then hauled you down on his lap, cradling your small little bump once you were seated.

“Well here’s your first lesson. You say God Jul for Merry Christmas in Swedish.”

You repeated the words, butchering them a bit, then repeated it again much better. “Very good, prinsessa. Obviously, you know that one as well.”

“I do. Though I wonder if I shall still get that title if we have a girl.”

“Hmm, might have to change it to Drottning.”

“I have no clue what that means, but it’s not nearly as romantic.” Jacob let out a bark of laughter.

“No, I don’t suppose queen sounds as good in Swedish as it does English. I guess I will just have to think about it.”

“Which makes me wonder, do you want a boy or a girl?” Everyone knew that all you both wanted was a healthy baby, but you wouldn’t lie and say that you’d love to see Jacob with a son. One he could teach all his hockey moves to, though he could just as easily do that with a girl. Maybe it was that you wanted a boy just so that you could see Jacob through him. One that had his sense of humor and good looks. Though your child would probably never be in trouble if he could replicate his father’s grin. It melted your heart every time you saw it. You had to shake yourself from where your thoughts were leading for you never saw yourself as this person; the kind that wanted to see the man that they loved reflected in their children.

Did you literally just think that you loved Jacob? Certainly, you had feelings for him, but love; no, it couldn’t be that. You hadn’t known Jacob long enough to say you were in love with him. Hell, the two of you were in the process of getting a divorce. Weren’t people falling out of love when that happened and not into it?

“Either will be fine, just healthy.” Jacob's voice brought you back to reality and where your train of thoughts was leading. It wasn’t that you didn’t want to explore those feelings; now was just not the right moment for it. Later, you thought, when you weren’t wrapped up in his arms with this warm fuzzy feeling from the holiday season already bubbling inside you.

“Well, we both want that, but isn’t there one you want a little bit more than the other?” You probed further, ignoring those earlier thoughts.

“Not really prinsessa.” He had to have some preference just as you did.

“So, then you don’t want to know what we’re having?”

“Not if you don’t.” He was too damn accommodating at times or was that he was disinterested. He was always talking to the baby, so you didn’t think that it was the latter.

“We have a few more weeks to think about it.” No point in making the decision right now, maybe he would change his mind. “I made the next appointment for when you’re back, on the fifteenth. We’ll have to know by then.”

He kissed your temple, hands running under your shirt so that he could caress the tiny baby bump. “We will, for now though, we better get to bed before Santa comes.”

“Is Santa coming the reason you want to go?” you teased as you could feel his erection growing against you.

“Well, if you let me, prinsessa, Santa won’t be the only one cuming.” God, you loved his sense of humor. There was that word again. It had you jumping off his lap in order for your mind to not wander down that path again.

“Guess we better head to bed then.” He was swift to follow you, sweeping you off your feet and carrying you to the bedroom, where he definitely kept his word.

It was two days later that he was headed off on a ten-day road trip. You were definitely not looking forward to it, as the house always seemed empty without him in it.

The team played on New Year’s Eve and had it been anywhere else than New Jersey you would’ve gone to watch only so you could ring in the new year together. Instead, you spent that night with all the Canuck ladies, facetiming Jacob as the new year approached. Jacob was still going to be on the road for another five days, so you busied yourself by taking down all the holiday decorations. You decided to make the place a bit homier, adding pictures and artwork here and there. The place was really starting to feel more like home.

The only room that still needed work, was the office. While your desk was neat and organized, Jacob’s was a disaster. Had been since the day you moved in. You were seriously starting to wonder how things got done with the mountain of papers on his desk. All those papers had been driving you crazy every day you came in to work. Jacob needed someone to organize him, or at least that’s what you told yourself as you sat in his chair and started to sift through piece after piece of mail and documents.

There was a pile for bills, all of which somehow got paid, though you didn’t know how. A pile for legal documents and a miscellaneous pile that you needed to figure out where to put. Once you organized the first two, you moved on to the random ones that you weren’t one hundred percent sure of. You were halfway through when you came across a familiar envelope; the same one you’d sent the divorce papers back in. Why it hadn’t caught your attention when you first separated it, you weren’t sure?

You opened it up, assuming it was a copy of the document you’d signed. What you found inside shocked you. It was the original paperwork. The blue ink you signed it in staring back at you, but that wasn’t the part that told you it was a copy. It was the fact that Jacob’s signature was nowhere to be found. He hadn’t signed it. Why? You’d both agreed to the divorce, it was practically a done deal, only now it wasn't.

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#What Happens in Vegas series #WHIVDAST #Jacob Markstrom #Jacob Markstrom imagine #jacob markstrom imagines #Jacob markstrom smut #nhl smut #nhl imagine #nhl imagines #nhl fanfic #nhl fanfiction #hockey smut #hockey fanfic #hockey imagine #hockey imagines

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izzabeean · 3 years

Text

Chapter 11 : Apprehensive

SUMMARY

You never thought it would be this hard to open up.

pairing : ushjima x f!reader / oikawa x f!reader / iwaizumi x f!reader

genre : angst + fluff

word count : 2,376

content : profanity

tags : alternate universe - college/university, post-break up, friends to lovers, pining, slow burn

a/n : Hello! Apologies for this late post. Everything has been a bit hectic lately and I’m struggling to keep up with work and my free time. I have started to slack a bit on my writing. It’s a bit on the shorter side but here is the next chapter!

Because I’m new to this and have bit more off than I can chew, I’ve noticed some timeline errors when writing this chapter. I couldn’t just let it go and had to go back to correct them.

For those who do not wish to re-read chapter 8 (I understand, it’s a hefty one), please note that at the beginning of the chapter, Y/N and Iwaizumi have a heart-to-heart. Originally it jumps to the same day, but that is an error on my part. The rest of the chapter actually takes place later in the week. So Y/N has spent almost a week at Oikawa’s apartment.

I appreciate you all for tagging along for this ride. I definitely have been aching to write about Hanamaki or Matsukawa, but will once this series has been completed! Thanks so much xx

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Walking into the empty corridor, you blink at the torn-up flooring exposing the bones of the apartment while noticing dust in the air from the sunlight trickling in through the living room window. Living here for almost four years gave you the alone time you needed. But now it felt foreign. The familiar serene getaway from the pressure of your parents breathing down your neck was now emanating dark energy. A place once full of bright memories seems to turn into the last place you wish to be.

“What is?” Iwaizumi exclaims, following behind you.

“It’s just weird,” you murmur, smiling up at Iwaizumi. “I haven’t seen it this empty since I moved in.”

That day didn’t feel too long ago.

As cliche as it sounds, it almost did feel like yesterday. Getting settled into the new space, unsure what to do with yourself in the silence of the apartment. But it wasn't long before you made friends with Oikawa who would come over to study together. He'd always bring snacks from your favorite dessert place and sometimes, if you could convince him, he would stay over to watch your favorite series. Yes, he would complain that he hated it, that it was slow, uninteresting and he's seen better. Then he would shut up and watch knowing that you enjoyed his company in the lonely apartment.

Your gaze shifts to the bedroom doorway. The last night you spent there, it was with Oikawa, but before that, it was always Ushijima. Not every single night, but when he did, you felt safe pressed up against his broad frame under the covers. Thinking about it now, it makes you regret that you didn't indulge in it more back then.

When you started seeing Ushijima, he became the priority. He would come over for study dates and you'd never have to ask twice to persuade him to watch television series or movies with you. Truthfully, you miss those days. Everything was so simple and new. It felt like a breath of fresh air that you were aching to find.

Yet here you are now just remembering what you wish to forget.

“Are you sure you don’t want to just move in with me?” Oikawa sniggers, analyzing the janky water-damaged walls that look like they could disintegrate at any moment.

"What? You finally have the balls to say this place isn’t good enough for you?" you mock, raising an eyebrow at him waiting for his answer.

"No, it's just…” he pauses before continuing, half-heartedly afraid he will offend you. “Old."

You roll your eyes. Yeah it's older than any twenty-something-year-old would want to live in, but you didn't care because of the location to the university and honestly, in your eyes, the apartment is quaint and homey.

“You always have something to say. Don't you, Shittykawa,” Iwaizumi fumes, eyes sending daggers in Oikawa’s direction.

You couldn't help but let out a snicker that catches Iwaizumi's attention, shooting you a little smile. The natural draw your body has towards Iwaizumi is intoxicating. Your entire mind turns to putty when he looks at you like all your worries will just disappear upon his gaze. Maybe that's why you unconsciously kiss him the other night.

You don't want him to leave. You want him to stay. But how can you say that when you haven't known him for very long. The Iwaizumi now is so much different from the Iwaizumi in elementary school. Yet you wanted to get to know this person standing in front of you so much more and the limited time made your heartache all over again.

"Are you excited to move back in?" Iwaizumi asks, his eyes still locked on you.

“Yeah,” you utter, the sound of your heartbeat feels louder than your words. “I can’t wait to settle back in. I miss--”

Ding!

The sound reverberates from Iwaizumi's pocket.

“Shit, one second,” he exclaims, voice emitting a hint of embarrassment as he takes out his phone to read the text message he just received. “Fuck, I totally forgot. I'm supposed to meet up with some friends.”

“Oh,” you stammer. The words are laced with disappointment, but you remember you don't have Iwaizumi all to yourself. No, he isn't yours, unfortunately. And with that, you quickly switch forcing a smile to hide the gutted feeling encompassing your body. "It's fine!"

“I’m so sorry, I’ll catch up later. Just text me if you guys end up going somewhere else,” he calls out before rushing out the door.

The sound of the door shutting cues a rush of anguish flooding your chest as you wonder where he’s gone off to in such a hurry. He did say friends, but friends could mean anything including a girl.

Oikawa continues to walk around the apartment and you feel your face pale as you wonder what he's thinking if he knows who Iwaizumi's friends are.

Stop. You couldn't let yourself spiral into those thoughts. It wasn't like you to think this way, but you can't help yourself when you fear the same disappointment that surges you on the day you saw Ushijima and Sara together.

Fuck. At least insurance is giving you a bit of a break with the repair costs.

“Landlord says another week until repairs are done," you finally say, breaking the silence. "Then I can start moving my stuff back in.”

“Maybe don’t celebrate just yet, knowing your luck.” Oikawa taunts.

“Oh, is it because you’re going to miss me?” you scoff, attempting to make him squirm, but he plays right into your hands without hesitation.

“Yeah right, thought you said you were sick of me," he japes, taking a swing at the words that practically stung before.

“I guess you could say that...” you breathe.

Your words taste bitter with a drop of guilt as they leave your tongue. Perhaps you felt you owed a lot to Oikawa for basically saving your ass.

With the apartment.

With Ushijima.

You look at the bandage on his face and your eyes trail down to his bruised knuckles. Perhaps you wanted to do more than just buying him his favorite drink. Yet, you didn't even know where to start or what he would want to make things even.

“I-- I’m just joking, just to clarify. Of course, I’m not sick of you,” you sigh, reverting eye contact as you muster up the courage to express your thoughts. “I’m very happy to have you.”

I don’t know what I’m saying, you think while peering at the confusion spread on Oikawa's face. You don't normally open up to him about this kind of stuff and you feel your body burning under his gaze.

“Sorry this is a bit weird,” you exclaim as the nerves take over and you bite your tongue before you say anything else.

“No, no, I’m interested now,” Oikawa purrs.

“Well, maybe now I don’t want to tell you!”

"Of course you do," he persuades slyly grinning.

Normally the gesture makes you recoil as you witness his flirtatious nature that you've never succumbed to because that's just how Oikawa Tōru was. But instead, it just pushes the words out.

"Th-- thank you,” you say unable to even look up at him. “For everything. You’ve really been there for me when no one else has.”

At first, you think he's going to laugh in your face. In fact, you expected it so, but when you trail your eyes back to meet his, he sends you a small smile.

“That’s what friends are for, right?” Oikawa comforts.

With a deep breath, you stare into his chocolate brown eyes, drinking in his gaze and he��s giving you that look. It’s the same look he gave you last night when you were patching up his wounds. And it makes your heartthrob.

“You’re really something Tōru. No wonder all the girls fall for you,” you tease, in an attempt to push away the flush of embarrassment from his words.

“I wouldn’t say all,” Oikawa chuckles.

His voice is low and sultry, and you wonder what he means by that as contentment warmed you from within.

The exchange lingers but you clear your throat and turn away to walk around the apartment. The gesture causes Oikawa to shift his weight from side to side looking at your figure in the small space.

“I think I’ve seen more than enough,” you exhale taking one last glance out the living room window. “Shall we head out?”

“Sure.”

Oikawa walks down the short hallway, while you take a moment longer to soak up your apartment.

“See you soon,” you whisper before turning your back to leave.

Just as you close the door behind you to lock up, you hit your back into Oikawa’s frame who is standing firmly behind you.

“What’s wrong?” you ask, then peak behind his body to see Ushijima standing at the end of the hallway.“Wa-Wakkun… What are you doing here?”

“I need to talk to you,” he demands.

Although you can't get a good look at him in detail, you can see his face is bandaged up from Oikawa’s punch.

“I don’t--”

“And you think I’m going to let that happen?” Oikawa rages, placing his body in between you and Ushijima.

“Tōru, it’s okay,” you reiterate, touching his shoulder lightly to reassure it's not worth his energy.

“Or did you not understand anything from last night?” Oikawa continues ignoring your words and shaking your hand off his shoulder.

“Maybe we should ask Y/N instead of you making decisions for her,” Ushijima booms, remaining calm.

“Tōru, come on,” you sneer, grabbing his arm to pull him along, but he wiggles your hand off once again.

“I know for a fact she doesn’t want to talk to you," he sputters, eyes narrowing on Ushijima.

But your patience hit its limit. This time your anger couldn't be pushed down as your blood starts to boil. And you unleashed it in front of Oikawa, stepping in front of him shooting him a furious glare.

“Are you going to fucking listen or not?”

Your voice snaps him to his senses seeing your eyes glossed over but filled with rage.

“You don’t speak for me,” you thundered. “Let’s go.”

You grab his hand and yank him forward, walking by Ushijima ignoring him.

“Y/N, please,” Ushijima pleads.

Yet you don't turn back. You can't. It isn't in your best interest to talk it out or hear his point of view. This isn't something that can be fixed with words. He hurt you and you could not surrender what is left of your dignity. You had to move on, in your own way just as he's doing.

“Don’t fucking do that again,” you bark as you continue to drag Oikawa behind holding his hand tightly.

“That guy is basically stalking you,” Oikawa argues trying to keep up with your frantic strides.

“So what? I can handle it myself.”

“I was just trying to help--”

“And look what happened last time!”

Your legs come to a stop and you swallow thickly. Your voice erupts as your heart sinks at the realization of how angry and guilty you feel, of how mad you are at yourself for letting Oikawa get in the middle of your issues with Ushijima. The familiar sense of dread returns and the look from Oikawa’s shocked wide eyes make you regret your outburst.

“You got hurt because of me,” you manage to breathe, slowly sliding your hand out of his.

But before you let go, he grabs it tight then pulls you in close, your face enveloped into his chest and his chin resting on the top of your head. The sensation offsets your frustration and anger, you hadn't known it, but once you received the warm and comforting embrace you realize it’s what you really needed all this time.

“If we left at the beginning of the night, you would’ve been fine,” you gasp, trying to get the words out, but your voice breaks a little. Your chest feels tight like your heart is going to burst any moment now as it continues to descend deeper and deeper into dread.

Oikawa doesn’t say a word, afraid that he’ll ruin the moment if he does. His worry grows as he takes a deep breath in expecting you to smell like nicotine or ting of smoke, from the secret you have been keeping from him. But you have this indescribable scent that draws him in closer heating up his entire body as he presses yours into his. Not wanting to let go.

“But because I had to prove a point, we stayed,” you continue, and feel tears beginning to form, blurring your vision. “I’m the one at fault here.”

"No Y/N," Oikawa says trying to soothe you. He thinks he can forget the throbbing pain in his chest as he looks at you undone before him. "You didn't do anything wrong. I'm sorry for involving myself."

"It's okay," you say taking a sharp breath. He smells so good and his hug is doing wonders for your mental health but you pull away worried that you've overstayed your welcome.

“Why do you hate him so much anyway?” you sniffle, wiping the tears with your sleeve.

“Mmm don’t know…” he murmurs.“I just don’t like him.”

You frown at his reply. Does he really not have an actual explanation?

“Well that’s stupid,” you breathe, unsure if you actually believe it. “Did he steal a girl from you or something?”

“No!” he responds, quicker than he wishes he did. He remembers when you first mentioned Ushijima’s name, there was a sparkle in your eyes he’s never seen before. At that moment, he promised himself to not get in the way and remain neutral, but Oikawa was much pettier than that.

“Who was it?” you snort, only half sure he’ll actually tell you.

“No one,” he chuckles. “We don’t have the same type anyway.”

“Why? I’m not your type?”

Your voice is soft and innocent as he pauses to analyze whether you are being serious or not.

“Kidding! Obviously,” you snarl.

By now, there’s this ease of tension between the two of you as you lapse into silence. Nothing more needed to be said.

#haikyuu x reader #haikyu x reader #haikyuu angst #haikyuu fluff #oikawa x reader #oikawa x y/n #ushijima x reader #ushijima x y/n #iwaizumi x reader

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marimo-o · 3 years

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ok so im making a long ass post about Abzu (the game) within the context of mesopotamian mythology because I'm insane. It's gonna be a doozy and likely incomprehensible so <3 below the cut it goes! There's gonna be TONS of spoilers for the game, and, like, I guess for the mesopotamian creation epic, so. Play Abzu if you haven't and if you wanna read the Enuma Elish that's also cool. Good for u

(a note from afterwards: it's long. like, REALLY fucking long, holy shit. if you actually want to read the whole thing, be. prepared or something idk take breaks! the last two paragraphs (i know they're walls of text pls bear with me) contain most of the important information. like, the final hurrah of my brain after working on this for multiple hours! So if u wanna save time and avoid some of the redundancy, just skip to those last two <3)

So "Abzu" referred to two things; the fresh water people got from underground aquifers (also as the void-sea which was underneath the Sumerian underworld, Kur), and the deity; he only appeared in the creation story, Enuma Elish, because a big part of that whole thing was that oh no! He dies! And that's also a thing I'm gonna touch on (sorry about the lack of accent marks in advance, it's not available on my current keyboard^ ^;)

I'm gonna start off with a brief tale of what happened with Abzu the deity, and then move onto how both the deity and the concept relate to the game!

So like I mentioned, Abzu the deity only really appears in the creation myth. The story goes that the Primordial Soup divided into two beings, with Abzu representing the freshwater and Tiamat being the saltwater. They were married, and together birthed some of the first formative gods! Some of these gods, jealous of Abzu's power convinced Tiamat to kill him (or, I thought it was started by Tiamat growing resentful of the younger gods, one of those). Either way, Abzu was killed, and Tiamat ended up lashing out, creating the first "dragons", or perhaps becoming one herself; with "poison instead of blood". She is killed by Marduk, the god of storms and the child of Enki (one of the first gods created by Abzu and Tiamat), and from her body the heavens and the earth are formed. Imagine getting killed by ur grandson lol cringe /j

Now! The waters itself! This also brings Enki into the equation, who kinda took over as god of the waters in place of his dead father. He's also the god of creation, intelligence, crafts, mischief, and more! Very important guy.

Abzu refers to both the groundwater reservoirs that people depended on for both accessible clean water and for some agricultural work, and also to the void-sea beneath the underworld, where it is said that Enki rests. He had a temple at Eridu, a now-ruined city, and I remember hearing somewhere that he lived in a temple in an underground aquifer? But I can't find wherever I read that anymore so don't take my word for it. Anyway, the basics of Enki as a deity is: child of Tiamat and Abzu, widely worshipped in his time, god of the waters, generally a cool and important dude.

And now. Finally. We move onto the game. My head hurts.

So, for a quick (post-writing: lol it's not quick) overview of the game; you play as a funny little diver, who woke up in the middle of the ocean and, as the player, are given no clues as to who or what you are. You explore through the ocean levels peacefully at first, and with the guidance of a scarred shark (painted as a bit of an antagonist at first with the audio cues) you make your way to wells at the bottom-center of each level that revitalize the space around them; as they progress, many levels start out as barren, empty landscapes that give you a foreboding, nervous feeling going in, before using an energy from yourself to rekindle the life. Huge coral growths, seaweed, and a myriad of ocean animals spring to life. The player character can also ride on the sides of the bigger ones! The game also puts a big stress on unity between yourself and the environment; there's not a whole lot you can physically interact with, but you can play with the animals there and, like I said before, ride on some of the larger animals. There are also "meditation spots", statues where you can sit and explore the wildlife from more of their point of view, able to follow them seamlessly and see what the different kinds of fish and such are called. It's a calming experience, and really the most interaction you get with some of the more timid animals, letting you still see them up close even if you can't get there as the player character.

The story of the game is told via writings on the walls, which you can light up and access by solving small puzzles regarding connecting reservoirs of glowing waters, similar to that of the almost cosmic area you go to between levels; one thing I read described it as a kind of "rebirth area", which I can definitely see hehe!

At the end of the game, you've held the shark in its dying moments, you've discovered a strange factory that builds the weird triangular prisms that deliver anything that touches them a shock, the little flashlight dudes that you've found over the levels, and little divers that uncannily resemble yourself, and you've seen yourself disassembled to your funny little mechanical skeleton, weak and slow as you try to walk on land, before you are rebirthed from the void-cosmic-water area once again, fully yourself. There's a wonderful ending sequence where you swim through all these rivers, bringing life with you as you go, with the shark once again by your side. The whole game, you saw no land when you poked your head above water, just miles and miles of water, but you've travelled far enough to reach a reservoir. You cut the chains to a central triangular prism, and it grows over with moss. It gives me goosebumps just thinking about it, really, it feels like such a... grand gesture as you play through it. It feels personal.

Okay. Theory time. Finally, we're getting into the meat of it. Fucking hell.

So, imagine that you are this being. You're wandering an oceanic wonderland, observing and caring for what you need to, doing as any good little diver should. After a bit of poking around, you discover the start of the engravings on the walls; they tell the story of the people that were here before you, who built these temples and halls and used, or at least stored, the strange blue glowing "water" that you connect and move. It's a water of life, of sorts, one that they truly valued. You come to an impasse between areas, and this massive, scarred-up shark cuts in front of you. You're gonna stay hidden, that thing is terrifying! You try not to move. It doesn't spot you, or at least doesn't move to attack you. However, once it's safely out of view, you do follow it, and it leads you to a dark, desolate, empty chamber. This is wrong, you think to yourself. This isn't how it should be. There's a well, towards the bottom, and you approach it, taking... a fragment of light, from your chest, and imbuing that spark of life into the well. And, lo and behold, that intuition proved helpful, because the world around you springs back to life. Congratulations! You did it! And you continue to, as you work past puzzles and challenges and the appearance of these strange triangular mechanisms, that shock you when you get too close. These people worshipped a shark, as well, likely the same as the one you saw; the guide, now old and scarred, that brings you to where that spark is needed. Even later in the game, you see depictions of the triangular mechanisms, at first heralded as a positive, before these things are found to be the reason for this society's collapse. As if that wasn't perplexing enough, you see a depiction of a being that appears suspiciously similar to yourself, once again treated with reverence from the past civilization. In their hand is a ball of light, similar to the one shown when you revitalize the oceanic chambers. Well, that's certainly odd, you think to yourself. Perhaps this was a being that postponed the death of the civilization, or first allowed for those small chambers of life to exist in captivity instead of the open, natural landscapes you explored at the start. Regardless, it's now a relic of something long gone; but it still gives you something to think about. Later on, that strange coincidence of your similarities to that person are explained; you find a manufacturing plant, full of the vicious triangular mechanisms in each tight hallway, and right at the center of it all... multiple iterations of yourself, running down an assembly line, a spark not unlike what you saw before imbued into each of them. My, look at that; you've been responsible for part of this destruction all along, haven't you? Borne from that same ill that has been forcibly removing that spark from each of the places you've gone to. A bit inconsiderate of you, no? And yet... look at all the good you've done. You've rebirthed, revitalized, purified these ocean fragments, is that not enough? You are the keeper of these waters, regardless of the evil you had come from, despite the terrifying empty things may have reverted to. You, who trusted and followed the shark that seemed so scary at first. You, who followed it as it tried to attack a source of the evil, of the thing that was draining the oceans of their life. You, who held and comforted that shark as it lay dying, despite any fear you may have had. You, who attempted to traverse a minefield of those triangular machines, shocked over and over again and at the final moment, unable to make it to the finish line. You, who was rebirthed in full regardless by the oceans you'd cared for, by the void-sea you always returned to, to rest. You, who traversed a now-ruined citadel, temple, all of which had been flooded and had been dedicated to you. You, who brought life with you.

I hope you see what I'm getting at here. You're serving as a figure not unlike Enki, god and guardian of the waters. In the wake of Abzu, the avatar of the fresh waters, now confined to irrigation canals so as not to kill the younger gods, Tiamat lashes out. Her husband is dead, as far as she is concerned, and she goes to those younger gods to seek her revenge. The dragon, that which sucked the life from the seas and poisoned the waters. That which Marduk killed, to carve new life from. I would say that the shark is Marduk, even; given how the shark is the only one who is openly on the offense to those mechanisms, and who comes in at the endgame to finish them off, bringing new life with it. Even in how it all shapes up with the civilization before, in connection to the constructs; Tiamat was the mother of all in existence at that time. She was surely loved; but she turned hostile and violent. She could no longer be safely loved. And Abzu, both the glowing water we use to open doors and the light that we hold and the deep void-sea we enter between levels and father to all in existence, he was confined to small canals and reservoirs and put in a deep sleep so that he would not kill his own children. And by you, no less. Enki put him there. That is why you can use that water from the start; you lived in the Abzu, you came from it, and each time, that is where you return. That temple, now submerged and decrepit, is Eridu; the place where Enki was most worshipped. The other diver clones are the other gods, or perhaps the "dragons", now, that Tiamat had mothered. The smaller prisms definitely count in that "dragon" category; purely harmful beings that seek to destroy life. And in the end, indeed, you restore life; you and your son, upon killing Tiamat, return life to the world from her body. Perhaps you could not save those who once worshipped you, perhaps those structures will forever be in ruin. But there is no more danger, now; there is space to build and replenish. There is space to grow.

Fuck ok that was long as hell. Hi if u made it this far i love u. god fucking damn im never writing anything again after this. it took about as long as a full playthrough of the game, coincidentally!!

#my writing #abzû #abzu #giant squid studios #ancient history #the moss mumbles #im not joking this is horrible. like it's all just word vomit about sumerian legend -> the game -> the game again (but in second person)#and THEN we get to The Point. god christ

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