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feyreswaterybowels · 24 days

Text

⭒The Silent One⭒

#3 Azriel x Fem!OC

⭒Part 1⭒Part 2⭒Part 3⭒Part 4⭒

Word Count: 3.6k

Summary: Azriel finds the guy that sold Cassandra. Lots of bonding happens with Cassandra, Azriel and other members of the IC. Slight cliffhanger.

Warnings/Tags: mentions/implied rape. Mention past sexual abuse. Mentions pregnancy from rape. Slow burn. Violence. Brief victim blaming. Found family. Protective!azriel. Protective!IC. GRAMMER ERRORS—I plan on going back to edit this please don’t judge me too hard I’m gonna have a busy week and just really wanted to get this posted for y’all🩵

Authors Note: all reblogs, likes and comments are welcome, appreciated and encouraged! Let me know if you’d like to be added to the tag list for the next chapter. Regular italics are inner thoughts and bold italics are mental communication.

⋆ ݁⟡ ݁☾ ݁⟡ ݁⋆

Azriel stands in the darkness of night watching. Waiting. Body thrumming with anger. Calm cold anger. The kind that got people killed if they didn’t give him what he was looking for.

Only moments after Cassandra’s departure had his shadow returned to him. Telling him where to find this Vale. This horrid male who was taking females away from their family and selling them off—profiting off of them like livestock.

He sees the male, recognizes him from the briefs flash of memory Cassandra let slip at dinner, the one where this mad had choked her, slammed her against the wall just for needing to use the restroom.

The male is loading something up in the back of a wagon, the building behind him dark and dingy. Azriel let his shadows take him closer. Closer. Until he was standing in the alley between this man's house and another. The smell was horrid, small creatures scurrying about looking for their meal for the evening.

The male retreats into the building and Azriel lets a shadow loose to follow him—to be his eyes inside of this building. Inside is just as dark and dingy and piled high to the roof with…stuff. The blue skinned male navigates the maze of boxes and bins and trash with ease. He seems to be the only one here but Azriel knew better so he waits following the man through the seemingly endless maze.

That’s when he hears it, his shoulders going tight, his jaw clenching. Crying—no sobbing. A girl begging to be left alone as the male grabs her and pins her down to the floor.

“Fuck,” he growls. He pounds his fist against the outside of the building, taking chucks of the stone out. It’s loud enough to distract the man, to get him away from that girl as he rushed from the room under the floor, locking the locks and coming out. Looking around wildly for the source of the sound.

Azriel winnows, leaning against the wagon the man had been loading before, whistling to get the man attention. He whirls around, black eyes narrowed in anger, freezing in place when they land on him.

“Shadowsinger?” He grunts, narrowing his eyes at Azriel. “What brings you to these parts?”

Azriel looks him over, the smell of shit, piss and rot was overwhelming even from this distance.

“Vale,” Azriel says, to let the male know he knows who he is, rightfully see the fear in his eyes. “I’m looking for something and I hear you’re the one to help me.”

“I ain’t got nothing you need, pretty boy,” Vale sneers, crossing his arms, looking Azriel over. Trying to come off as tough but it’s actually laugh-able.

“Are you sure?” Azriel asks, pushing off the wagon. Letting his wings spread wide, walking closer, towering over the male. “See, I’ve got this female telling me you bought her from her dad and sold her to a pleasure house. I mean, tell me I’m wrong, man. I’ve just gotta check on these things. It’s a pretty serious accusation and all.”

“That chick’s got the wrong guy. I would never do something like that. These bitches are always trying to get us males in trouble,” Vale said, seeming to relax. Big mistake.

“You think so? Just tell me if you know her man. About this tall, really pretty, tan skin, white hair. Wings.” Azriel growls the last word, the man’s eyes widening again, taking a step back.

“Look, man, it’s not like that. Her dad owed me money, so he gave me her instead cause he couldn’t afford to pay me back, okay? So I didn’t technically buy her,” He stammered out, trying to explain himself.

“Oh,” Azriel said, nodding his head. “Well, I mean, if you didn’t technically buy her then no law was broken.”

“That’s right!” The male nods, sighing in relief. “No law was broken, man. I wouldn’t—I wouldn’t do that—”

“Yeah. I get it,” Azriel nods, shifting. Looking towards the building, then back to the low life in front of him. “And that female inside? Did you buy her? Is she here of her own free will allowing you to rape her daily?”

“Fuck,” Vale whispers, turning and running down the cobble stone road. Azriel stands there watching, a grin stretching his lips as he lets the male think he’s getting away.

“Send Morrigan,” He calls out to Rhys as he watches the male.

“She’s coming.”

Then he's gone again, just as Vale looks over his shoulder to try and spot him, only to smack hard into a body that came out of nowhere. He looks at the shadowsinger towering over him, swallowing thickly.

“What do you want from me?” The male nearly cried out as Azriel grabbed him and pulled him up, slamming his face first into a stone wall. The resounding crunch of his nose breaking is ever satisfying.

“Her name is Cassandra,” Azriel snarls into the man's ear. “She told us what you did to her. What you did to that female you have locked in that disgusting building. We know there’s more girls. We will find them all and when we do, I’ll let each one take a turn with you. Their weapon of choice. And you’ll feel exactly what they felt.”

“Ple-please. Please, just kill me,” The man begged, fighting in Azriel’s grasp but he was no match for Azriel’s strength.

“And what kind of justice would that be? Did you stop when those girls begged you to? Did you give them death with they would have preferred that over you using their bodies?” Azriel asked, scenting the smell of urine as the man pissed himself. “You deserve everything you’ve got coming to you.”

Before the pathetic excuse of a male could beg or plead any more Azriel grabbed the back of his head, smashing it into the wall, letting him fall unconscious to the ground. He left him there binded and hidden by shadows, stalking back to the building where he spotted Morrigan easily.

“Don’t tell me this is where he’s been keeping those poor girl?” She asked when she spotted him approaching.

“Unfortunately, I think it is. She said under his house but he could live here. I’ll question him more. I know there’s at least one female inside,” Azriel explained, guiding Morrigan into the building. Be could get the female on his own but he knew it was safer to have a female companion—after all they’d been through the least he could do was make sure a female was the one to comfort them.

They get to that basement floor, unlocking the various locks and pulling the hatch open. It’s as dark and dingy down here as it was in the rest of the building. Morrigan enters first, taking Azriel’s hand to steady herself on the old wobbly stairs.

“Your wings won’t fit down here,” She said, hushed. He nods at her. “Send a shadow if I call for help.” It’s said jokingly but he knows she’s serious. He’d rip the floor from this building to help her if she needed it.

Mor squinted her eyes in the dimness of the sellar, resisting the urge to plug her nose from the horrid smell.

“Hello? Is anyone down here?” She calls out, looking up from at Azriel when there’s no reply. “Hello, my name is Morrigan. I work for the High Lord. The male keeping you here is—”

Morrigan’s cut off when I body slams into hers, knocking her to the ground. She cries out in surprise when a sharp sting slices across her cheek.

“Stop, hey, stop! I’m here to help!” Mor calls out, trying to catch the hands of the female fae on top of her.

“Mor!” Azriel’s deep voice calls.

“I’ve got it!” Mor calls back, grabbing the girls wrists. “Please, stop! Vale is gone! He can’t hurt you, please, stop!”

The girl stops fighting then still tense where she’s straddling Morrigan’s middle section.

“He’s gone?” She whispers and Mor nods.

“Yes, he’s gone. He can’t hurt you any more. I swear,” She promises. Eyes finally able to take in the sight before her.

A fragile, naked, malnourished body sits atop her. Eyes not only shut but scarred as if they’d been cut—maybe by the same person that took Cassandra’s tongue. But what really got Morrigan, what had her ready to lose the contents of her stomach was the rounded belly attached to that nearly skeleton body. Her eyes welled and she helped the female to shift off of her body.

“Are you pregnant?” Mor whispers, trying to keep her voice from breaking as the female nods.

“Please, don’t let him take this one too,” She cries, reaching out to find Morrigan’s hand, squeezing it tightly. “Promise me I get to keep my baby.”

“I promise, no one is going to take your baby away from you,” Morgan swears, a single tear falling down her cheek. “What’s your name, sweet girl?”

“Neema, my name is Neema,” She answers and Mors eyes widen. The girl Cassandra told them about.

“You and your baby are safe, Neema. We’re gonna take you away from here, okay?” Morrigan says, standing and helping the pregnant female stand as well.

“I have my friend Azriel here too, he will not touch you, he’s only here to make sure no further harm comes to you. He’s handing me a cloak for you to wear,” Morrigan explains so the female doesn’t feel uncomfortable. She nods, allowing Mor to wrap the cloak around her.

“Are there any other females here?” Azriel asks gently, wishing he hadn’t with the way she clenched at the deep mess of it.

“Not—not that I know of. The females come and go. There’s been no others for months…” Neema answers, grasping the fabric tighter around her body.

Azriel and Mor share a look the last females had to have been Cassandra and the other two she mentioned.

“I’ll stay and check the building before I head back,” Azriel informed, consciously softening his voice so as not to scare the female again.

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Morrigan winnows away with Neema and Azriel searches every inch of the building with his shadows. No signs of any other females. He leaves the building, needing to relieve himself of the horrible stench.

He retrieves the still bound and unconscious male, winnowing him to his dungeon. He strips him, places a gag in his mouth, dumps him into a chair and binds him to it. He would be dealt with later.

The sun would be rising soon and he wanted to be there when they informed Cassandra they found the male and the female—her friend?

He enters Rhys' study, Cassian and Mor there too.

“How is she?” He asks, glancing at Morrigan then his brother.

“Resting,” Rhys answers. “Madja looked her over. Thankfully the baby seems healthy, Madja’s main concern is getting Neema to gain some weight and begin healing herself.”

“We offered her to live amongst the priestesses in the library, she agreed,” Morrigan said, her brown eyes bloodshot and cheeks flushed.

“Good, that’s all good, they’ll help her heal,” Azriel nods his head crossing his arms. “I have the male in my dungeon.”

“Have you gotten any information out of him?” Rhys asks, standing from his desk.

“Not much. He admitted to knowing who Cassandra was, receiving her from her father and holding her. He never admitted to selling her but that information won’t be hard to get out of him,” Azriel explains and Rhys nods in agreement.

“You get whatever information you can out of him and then he’s dead,” Rhys orders, Azriel doesn’t need to confirm he already knew what Rhys decision would be.

“Are we telling Cassandra?” Cassian asks, the first words he’s said the whole time.

“We are. She needs to know he’s here, it may bring her some comfort knowing he’s locked away and Neema is safe. I think you should be the one to talk to her, Azriel,” Rhy says, turning his attention to the shadow singer.

“Me? Not Mor?” Azriel asked, a bit confused.

“Yes, you. She’s comfortable with you. You’re the one that apprehended him. I believe she would prefer to hear it from you,” Rhys nods.

“Okay, I can do that,” Azriel agreed.

“You handle that, I’ve got some business to attend to with the priestesses. We’ll all meet up in a few hours to discuss further action.” Rhys stepped around his desk, patting Azriel’s shoulder when he passed by him.

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An hour goes by before Azriel tracks Cassandra down. Finding her in the library, flipping through a book where she’s sat in the large window seat that overlooked the city below. A steaming cup of tea next to her.

“I thought you couldn’t read?” Azriel asks, leaning against the door frame, grinning when those green eyes meet his.

“I can’t. I’m looking at the pictures,” She said, holding up the book, some romance book from the looks of the two people in a colorful garden.

“Ah,” Azriel says, walking further into the room. Trying not to focus on the way her eyes track up and down his body the closer he gets. He holds his hand out for the book, flipping it over the read the title, snorting at it. “Secret Garden Romance, huh?”

She shrugs, taking the book back.

“I asked the house for a book with a lot of pictures, this is what I got,” She said, a small sweet breathy laugh escaped her lips and he couldn’t help his own smile.

“Did you end up getting some sleep?” He asks, watching her set the book down and grab the warm mug.

“I slept but not great,” She shrugs. “I can’t stop thinking about my sisters.”

“We’re gonna do everything we can to find them, I promise you that,” Azriel said, not even waiting for a beat. He would find her sisters and he’d beat the shit out of her father too.

“You know I took my older sister's place. It was supposed to be her he sold off but the way she had cried when he told her. I couldn’t let him do that to her so I told him to take me…I didn’t really know what he meant when he was selling me. I thought I’d be a servant like the ones we had when I was a kid or something. I never thought…” She trailed off, taking a deep breath.

“You’re not to blame for what happened to you. You were protecting your sister. You did a very selfless thing. You're safe now and your sisters will be, too,” Azriel said, resting his elbows on his knees as he leaned towards her.

“Well, what about you?” Cassandra asked, gently changing the subject. “Did you ever get any sleep?”

Azriel sighed with a head shake. “No, actually. That’s kind of why I came to talk to you.”

Cassandra fixed him with a curious look, leaning forward as if to give him her full attention for whatever he needed to say. He looked into those glowing green eyes, filled with curious concern.

“We found that male. Vale. We found him,” Azriel said, watching the vast range of emotions flash through those emerald eyes.

“He’s here?” Is what she asks, fear tinging her voice. Azriel straightens his back.

“He will not touch you,” he declared, holding her gaze. “He won’t even come near you.”

I’ll fucking kill him if he does. He thinks but doesn’t add it out loud.

“He can’t get out of…wherever he is?” She asks, and he wants to reach out so badly to comfort her. The ache in his chest drawing him to her.

“No. He’s being held in a very secure place. I promise you’re safe here. You’re safe with us.” Azriel promises. You’re safe with me.

“Were there any females with him?” She asks and Azriel nods.

“The girl you told us about, Neema. She was the only one there—it had been only her for months.”

He watches as her eyes fill with tears, offering his hand for her to hold. She takes it, thumb tracing his scars unconsciously.

“Just her…alone with him for months. Gods, is she…I feel like okay isn’t the right word for what I want to ask,” She says, sadness written all over her face.

“She will be okay,” Azriel said. “She’s in bad shape. Pregnant, malnourished but we have an amazing healer and a library below the mountain. Many priestesses live there. Many of them have experienced similar traumas. They’ll help her heal.”

She looked thoughtful for a moment. He wasn’t sure what was going through her head as she sat there silently, grasping his hand and tracing his scars.

“I want him to die.” It’s fierce. Heated. Emotional. And it does something to Azriel’s heart, to his brain. He squeezes her hand. “I want him to feel everything we felt. To know the fear he put us through. I want him to suffer and then I want him to die.”

“He will die. I swear to the Mother. I’ll get every drop of information from him and when it’s time his death will be painful and slow,” Azriel swore, gently swiping a tear from her cheek.

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The next day is a day Cassandra would remember forever. She hadn't slept much the night before but Morrigan had practically begged her to have lunch.

Cassandra wasn’t entirely sure she was ready for a day out in the city but she felt safe with Morrigan. She nearly asked if Azriel could come too until she learned he would be spending the day collecting information from Kamari and Vale.

Morrigan picked out her outfit for the day and it was one of her favorites she’s worn since being here. A flowy silk top that tucked into a dark pair of slacks that raised high on my hips. They emphasized her longer legs in a way she had never noticed before. She had also pinned Cassandra’s hair up and out of her face.

She liked the way Azriel smiled at her when he saw her dressed this way. She blushed but was quickly rushed away by Morrigan, shouting something about wanting you to herself for the day for girl time.

Their first stop was a place she called the River House. A beautiful home that her mother would have loved. Morrigan had only had them stop here briefly to grab a few tote bags, wanting to shop while they were out but promised to bring her back and give her a proper tour of the house.

The city was even more beautiful when you were in it. The sun was shining bright in an endless blue sky. Better than any dreams she had ever had about it.

They went to bakeries, where Cassandra single handedly filled half a tote with various pastries.

Then a clothing shop where Morrigan helped her pick out some new clothes. A few everyday pieces. A gorgeous gown she wasn’t sure where she would wear it but Morrigan swore she would need it sooner or later. And then the softest, satin, dark blue nightgown—it had reminded her of the stones that glowed atop Azriel’s hands. Morrigan herself had picked out quite a few outfits and gowns of her own and a lace set that looked like something the girls in the pleasure houses would wear but she paid no mind to it—she was sure it would look gorgeous on Morrigan wherever she planned to wear it to.

Then they went to a place near the river for lunch, the glistening river was the perfect view while they ate.

“Do you feel like you’re settling in okay?” Morrigan asked, sipping on some kind of iced fruit tea while they waited for their food.

“I’m still…adjusting. I enjoy the company of everyone. I feel like I can trust you all. It’s just odd.” Cassandra says, taking a drink of her tea that was just slightly too sweet but she wasn’t complaining.

“What’s odd?” Morrigan asks gently.

“Trusting strangers more than I’ve ever trusted anyone else,” She says it like a confession, like she should be ashamed for feeling that way.

“I don’t think that’s odd,” Morrigan shrugged. “You’re around people like you, people you can relate to and get to know. It’s easy to feel safe with us in turn, causing your trust. There’s nothing wrong with that.”

Cassandra smiles at Morrigan.

Their food comes soon after and they talk the whole time. Morrigan gives her the rundown of how Rhys, Azriel and Cassian all knew one another. She explained more about their titles and what each one of them did as a member of the inner circle. She told her about so much that Cassandra could believe she’d spent her whole live knowing practically none of it.

When they go to a bookstore Cassandra looks at a few before putting them back. Morrigan grabs them and tells her they’ll teach her to read—that she’ll love these books and so many more.

And when they finally get back to the House of a Wind it’s late. She's exhausted from carrying around nearly overflowing tote bags and eating more muffins then she can count.

A top the house where they have to land they’re greeted by the three males. Their solemn faces wiping the smile off your face. She caught Azriel’s eyes, sees the look of pure death there—a look that she just knows means he wants to kill someone.

And just like that, her perfect day with Morrigan took a turn straight down hill.

Tag List: @aelinwya @starlightandsouls @fullmoon-94 @aetherl0l @caticorn61 @lilah-asteria @blackgirlmagicforever @div94 @purple-writer8 @little-missbookyworm @saltedcoffeescotch @namelesssav @slytherintaco @whatsupb @little-missbookyworm

#azriel playing games with that male in the beginning lives rent free in my head #I just know he enjoys fucking with guys like that #thinking they could be all buddy buddy making them feel safe then bam he fucks them up #az and Cassandra got a bit of bonding in #as did Cassandra and Morrigan #besties for the resties #acotar #azriel #azriel fanfic #azriel x reader #acotar fanfiction #slow burn

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wowevenmoreloveonearth · 4 months

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You know what? I have become a gaylor sympathiser

This is going to be a long post, sorry! Please read the full post before even thinking about commenting.

Over the past few days I’ve seen a few posts on my dash about taylor swift and her fans that have left a bad taste in my mouth.

I know that a lot of people think that some fans of her are “trying to make her gay” and I just wanted to put the record straight and defend some people after actually looking at what’s going on. And I know I’m probably opening myself up for tumblr’s poor reading comprehension but before I start I’m going to say this:

I do not think taylor swift is a lesbian

Ok? Now let’s have a conversation.

First of all from what I’ve seen most of the fans who talk about Taylor swift and queerness do it from a point of literary analysis and learning queer history. This is a huge part of the community and lots of people have said that they never would have learnt so much about queer history without reading taylor swift’s works through a queer lens.

Adding on to that point, it seems a little hypocritical for the gay site which loves queer readings of books, tv shows, songs, musicals, films etc to be bullying a pretty small group of people who are mainly doing queer readings of lyrics. Especially when those people get near constant death threats. Instead of bullying these people (who don’t think or do what you think they think and do) why don’t you go outside and think “does this affect me? No. Do I agree with them? No. Am I going to cyber bully them because of this? No.”

Secondly, for the people who believe that any speculation on a real persons sexuality is 100% wrong. I used to think this too but I have changed my mind a bit about this recently after stopping and thinking about it properly. I’m not trying to change your mind at all I just want you to stop and think for a minute.

If you only get mad when speculation is queer in nature, then maybe think about that for a minute. Why is it totally wrong to think a person might be queer. We probably do it in our daily lives with people we know and they likely do it with us, back in the day that’s how queer people found each other-by speculating on sexuality. Would you be upset if you found out someone that you know thought you might be queer? I wouldn’t, maybe you would but if you would, why? Why is it terrible to think someone might be queer (this is NOT about hounding a person to admit to being queer like shawn mendes, this is just thinking in your head and on your small blog that the person will likely never see). Also this is literally the website where we talk about historical (real people) being gay even when they would have never said something to the equivalent.

An addition to this point before people start saying in the comments is that this is NOT the same situation as with kit connor. The issue there was people assuming that he was straight and taking that role away from a queer person. Speculating that he was queer was the opposite of what happened in that situation. So this is not an example of what happens when you speculate queerness.

Final things to say:

1) don’t believe every post you see with someone looking insane about taylor swift being gay, a lot of them are fake.

2) before anyone says “they should listen to real queer artists instead” most of them very much do. There’s a lot of fans of Hayley kiyoko, girl in red, Janelle monae, tegan and sara, zolita, kehlani etc.

3) there are some queer flags that are there. Sorry but there are. Hairpin drops, lavender, the ladder, flag colours, songs about women, friend of dorothy reference. Whether they are intentional is a different matter.

4) shipping real people is not what is happening for the majority of the people in the community. Also this comes back to queer vs straight again. Plenty of swifties ship taylor with men she’s been seen with and no one goes into their inboxes and sends death threats even when they are the ones making taylor swift all about the men she may or may not have dated.

5) taylor swift has never stated her sexuality. I know this may be hard to belive based off of how some people act, but it’s true. She has made vague statements which could have many meanings but she has never clearly stated anything. When gaylors get upset with taylor it is not because she said she is straight, it’s because they are getting death threats and doxxed and she seems to either be unaware of it (which is unlikely given how she seems to be a little terminally online) or she doesn’t care enough to tell her fans to stop.

6) if she does explicitly say she’s straight then there will probably be disappointment in her use of queer history and flags and her potential queer erasure (as we saw with lavender haze, with straight women describing their relationships as lavender) and centring herself in queer spaces (like the you need to calm down music video) but no one will be angry that she’s not gay. And a lot will probably be grateful that she actually explicitly stated for the record to absolve any confusion. The main issue would likely be other fans ramping up the death threats and bullying.

In conclusion: these people who do queer analysis of Taylor’s work are not trying to out her or make her gay etc. if you don’t understand it that’s fine it’s clearly not for you and you can go quite easily without seeing any of it. It’s not illegal to read works through a queer lens and if it means more people know about queer history then I think that’s a very good thing.

I changed my mind after looking at what a lot of people are actually saying rather than what people perceive them to be saying and maybe you will too?

Just be kinder to people online please and if you don’t like what people are saying block them and do not engage!

#taylor swift #long post #gaylor #gaylor swift #friend of dorothea #friends of dorothea #lgbtqia

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am-i-the-asshole-official · 1 month

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AITA for not supporting my friend’s relationship?

(@aita mod I pinky promise that this is not an “aita for thinking/feeling something” submission, I’m just a long winded mf)

Okay this is admittedly stupid stupid dumb but it’s bothering the hell out of me so here we go. I (26X) have a friend (23NB) who recently got into a nice, stable(?) relationship after a string of messy short-term ones. They’ve been dating for ~2 months now, and the guy (early 30s?M) seems really nice and genuine. My friend is very happy and gushes about him constantly, which makes sense because the relationship is fairly new and their most recent previous relationships were with people who weren’t very open or communicative at all. I feel like the only valid reason I could possibly have to not like this dude is the age gap, which is more of a personal ick as I’m not really comfortable with dating anyone more than 5 years older/younger than me. They’re both adults and it’s their love life, so whatever.

The thing is, I just…do not share their enthusiasm for this guy. At all. He seems like a cool guy, but the fact that he’s dating my friend just isn’t jiving in my brain for whatever reason. I’m getting an inexplicable weird vibe. When I see a picture of them doing cute couple shit on instagram or wherever, my reaction isn’t “that’s adorable, I’m so happy for [friendname]!” or even “I’m glad they’re happy!” It’s more like “eugh, why are they doing that? I don’t want to see this.” This isn’t a normal reaction for me at all. I’m usually very supportive of my friends’ relationships as long as there are no obvious red flags. The only reason I can think of as to why I might be reacting this way is that an acquaintance of mine was pushing me to get with this same guy a couple years ago for NO REASON, and I was absolutely not interested, so it might be leftover discomfort from that. I don’t (consciously?) hold that against him though, that was 100% my acquaintance’s strange bullshit. I’m mostly into women and fem dudes, so there’s no latent attraction to my (masc leaning) friend or their bf involved either.

Here’s the part where I might be the asshole: because of my weird uncomfortable reaction to seeing this dude and my friend together, I haven’t been liking or commenting on posts/messages/etc about them being together or how wonderful this guy is. Social media interaction/validation is a big thing for them, and eventually they noticed that I wasn’t interacting with anything pertaining to their relationship. I don’t think I was obvious about it or anything, just operating on the “if you don’t have anything nice to say…” principle. Regardless, they asked me about it, and I went completely deer-in-the-headlights. I ended up saying something like “I just didn’t have anything to say about those posts, it’s not really my business” but I could tell they weren’t convinced. They asked me what I thought of the guy and I told them he seemed nice but I didn’t know him that well. I think that just made them more suspicious because I’ve been working for the same company as the guy for about 3 years now, but it is technically true. After my first few months I got transferred to a different department and haven’t seen him since.

They looked really disappointed and asked me if I could try to be a little more supportive of their relationship online, reminding me that this is “the first nice person [they’ve] dated in years” and that they “went through hell to find him.” (I think they were referring to their most recent breakups and exaggerating hardcore. They were messy, but I’ve heard every little detail about those relationships from them and they sounded like they ended due to plain old incompatibility/lack of interest. I would only call one of their recent exes “not a nice person.”) They ended the conversation by telling me that they trusted me and my approval was really important to them, which made me feel like shit, but it didn’t really make me see the relationship in a different light or anything. l definitely FEEL like an asshole, because even after they talked to me about it I have no plans to lie and act super into their boyfriend when I’m not. I realize how petty all of this sounds, but it’s obviously affecting my friend a lot, or else they wouldn’t have spoken to me about it in person. It just feels like I’d be an even worse friend if I started regularly lying to them about what I think of their relationship, even though I don’t have a valid reason for feeling the way I do. AITA?

What are these acronyms?

#aita #am i the asshole

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northrnfool · 7 months

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Here’s my take on Lokius, because I’m seeing a lot of posts with people saying they just see friendship there.

You’re pointing out a key ingredient in a good love story: it is a friendship at it’s core. As my girl Scully once said on The X Files, “Well, it seems to me that the best relationships - the ones that last - are frequently the ones that are rooted in friendship. You know, one day you look at the person and you see something more than you did the night before. Like a switch has been flicked somewhere. And the person who was just a friend is... suddenly the only person you can ever imagine yourself with.”

A real love story is about connection, trust, reliability, communication, bringing out the best in the other person. And Loki and Mobius tick every one of those boxes off. Also, the chemistry is off the charts, so that definitely helps.

When I look back on Loki’s history, on his relationships (and he’s probably the only character in Marvel that I’ve cared about through the whole MCU run), he’s never had someone who is capable of keeping a cool head around him, of consistently not falling for his tricks, who’s seen his entire life and has compassion for him, who not only doesn’t see him as a villain but actually sees the best he’s capable of. Who is capable of actually building trust with Loki - TRUST! Loki actually trusting someone and being trustworthy back! Someone who can calm Loki down with a touch (a lot of touching, actually. Wow) and a few words. Who is willing to put his own life on the line because he believes in Loki. To sum up, Mobius is everything that Loki needs in a partner. And Loki, in return, brings the spark, the push to find the truth, the desire to actually live, to Mobius.

Even going back to a comment I made a few days ago: On Our Flag Means Death, Stede asks Mary what it feels like to be in love and she says, “It's just like breathing. He understands my idiosyncrasies. We expose each other to new things, new ideas. And we laugh a lot. We just pass the time so well. I'd call those things love.” I see all of that in their relationship.

So… yeah…. I very much doubt Marvel will make them canon, but I really don’t care. There’s a beautiful love story there, no matter what.

#lokius #loki #Mobius #loki x mobius

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verlierer-is-lost · 3 months

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I have been wanting to talk about this for a while, especially since I keep seeing it on Twitter

For the most part, I agree with this tweet. I struggle to make the PJO cast look like themselves. It’s really important to get those features right. That being said, we also have to remember that a good chunk of the PJO fan artists are inexperienced artists. While there are a lot of artists who are just flat out racist, there’s also the group of artists who have a harder time drawing from life. I’ve seen so many amazing artist who clearly know how to draw black people, but their Annabeth fanart still doesn’t look like Leah.

No hate to the op, again I think she’s right to an extent, but it is so frustrating seeing mainly non artists saying this. And there are so many people in the comments saying “it’s so easy” when it really isn’t. Drawing from life is a skill that comes with practice. And whether you know how to draw black people or not, you’re probably going to have a tough time drawing any of the PJO cast if you don’t have that skill. Thankfully tho, there are a few simple ways you can improve on drawing from like:

I have some notes for Walker and Leah specifically, just because I think they’re the hardest to get right. (I know this probably seems creepy, but it’s so helpful to look at refs) This is all basic info you can find anywhere, it’s not revolutionary or anything

Walker:

-The eyebrows to me are the most important part. They’re much darker, and close to his eyes.

-He also has a pretty straight nose. Drawing him with a button nose will make him look like a random white blond boy

Leah:

-Again, the eyes and eyebrows are pretty important. Her eyebrows are thin and long. And her eyes have shadows underneath(plus she kinda has doll like eyes)

-round face

To show what I’m talking about, I did a quick doodle of Leah from reference. For me personally, when I draw from life I like to pick out a few distinct features that makes them feel real. It’s pretty bad because again I’m not the type of artist to typically draw from life, which is why art study’s can be super helpful to spend time on.

I really dislike when non artist complain about what fan artists are doing. We do this for free, in our free time, for a community that we love. But I also think it’s important to LISTEN TO CRITIQUES. If someone is telling you your Annabeth fanart is too light, you need to listen. As much as I agree with OP that this is predominantly a Leah issue, it isn’t just Leah. I can see throughout the fandom that a lot of artists are having a hard time drawing the characters(and I’m one of them). The PJO fandom has not had real people to base their drawings off of until two years ago, which is probably the reason a lot of us are having trouble with it. Even outside of this fandom I have a hard time with this. It took so much practice for me to get Alex and Henry right from RWRB, and I still can barely draw Henry 😭

Even some of the most experienced artist have difficulty drawing from life, again it’s a skill that takes practice. Anytime you see PJO fanart that actually looks like the actors, it’s probably because they just have more practice, or they’re more experienced artists.

I’m honestly having a hard time finding what OP is talking about when she said “artists draw Annabeth as a random black girl while referencing Walker for Percy” I was looking through saved work of other Percabeth fanart, and I see the same issue for Walker. I don’t doubt that there is work out there she’s referring to, I just can’t find it myself.

Sorry if this was a garbled mess of a post. I know it was really long, but hopefully this can help some artists to pick up on distinct facial features and replicate it in their own artwork. Trust me, as an artist I know it isn’t easy, but practice will always help. Best thing about being an artist is there’s always room for improvement

(Also don’t forget to give Leah black features 👍🏽)

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dulcewrites · 1 year

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Fool Me Once (part 10)

Summary: As tensions arise in King’s Landing, you make moves to assure the safety of your children. Final breaths are taken, pacts are made and broken, steel is drawn and the dragons dance.

Warning: mentions of stillbirths/pregnancy issues, allusions to self harm, some unreliable narrator if you squint. In our f&b bag fr!

A/N: you guys 🥺 we are finally on the last part. First, I want to say I am sooooo sorry about how long it took to get this one out. By the time I’m posting this I’m sort of like, do people even still care lmao 💀. Life has been hectic and tbh I’ve been putting some focus onto other things. Shameless plug to my other, more happy Aemond x oc series, on ao3. As well as I’ve gotten so much amazing feedback and interactions about this fic that I was slightly worried about how people would take the end. Speaking of feedback, and moving on to the more sappy stuff. My writing side blog has grown exuberantly since posting part 1 of fmo last year. It genuinely makes me emotional thinking about the little community that’s come from it. I hope to continue to make more stuff that I’m not only happy with, but further pushes said community ❤️❤️ if y’all have any hotd request let me know. Please reblog, like, and comment. As well as come chat in my inbox if you see something you like.

Slight housekeeping, though if you made it this far you probably already know. This fic does change the dance for self indulgent reasons (lol) and for the narrative of it all. This started as a cheating story and has sort of spun into something entirely else.

Fmo masterlist

Blog masterlist

Ninth moon of 129 AC

Rhaenyra’s voice could be heard from down the hall.

You wanted to reassure yourself that you had heard those screams before from Helaena, or even from yourself giving birth. But there was something so terribly guttural about the ones Rhaenyra was making.

As if outcome of the birth hung in the air. Lingering with the ghost of the past death that happened in the Red Keep. You try not to focus on the sheer look of panic on Jace’s face once you leave him at the door.

By the time you got to her chambers, Rhaenyra is already surrounded by midwives as she is hunched over, palms spread out against the wall. Midwives, and Alicent, whose face was terribly pale. Almost as drained of color as Rhaenyra. Her normally straight blonde hair wavy and stuck to her forehead with the sheen of her own sweat.

Alicent spots you, and gets away from her position from around her. She pulls you over to the side, but before she can even speak you interrupt her. The midwives begin to move Rhaenyra from her standing position to on the bed.

“Has this happened before,” you watch as Rhaenyra pleas lessen and lessen, her state becoming more sedated than what is probably normal.

Alicent shakes her head. Her auburn curls had been released for the night from the tight updo they were in earlier.

“No, at least not the first three,” she swallows hard before coming closer to you. “I fear - I fear this labor may go awry. I think we need to make preparations for if…”

The words catch in the back of Alicent’s throat. She is here with Rhaenyra; she has always been with Rhaenyra. Even when they were at odds; two ghosts haunting each other’s memories. Two sides of the same coin, causalities of the cruel fate. You want to feel sorry her; knowing that she is watching a close… companion go through this, but your mind has been elsewhere since earlier that day.

“Your son has made preparations,” you cross your arms. “All of them actually.”

Alicent brows furrow in confusion, and it dawns on you that Aemond and Aegon never clued their mother in on their little plan.

“You do not know, do you?”

“No, I do not know what your husband has been getting into. I rarely do these days.”

You and her both.

Rhaenyra lets out another groan.

“Where is Daemon,” you ask as Rhaenyra begins to mumble things incoherently to the midwives.

“He took one look at her, and left the room,” Alicent frowns. “She called for him but he went to get Jacaerys instead.”

And Jace came for you on the behest of Alicent. Tis the way of men you suppose. Often, they are absolute nuisance in situations like this, but you could not help but think that mayhaps if Daemon had stayed to seen her in this state, he would not put her through such things again. But that is giving him far more credit than you know he deserves.

“Alicent,” Rhaenyra manages to mumble out the name louder. Her eyes fluttering open and shut.

Alicent instantly rushes over, dropping the conservation she has started with you.

As you watch Alicent coax Rhaenyra through this, her words ring out. Though she did not elaborate on what those plans should be, she was right. Aemond had taken the reigns from your hands plenty times before. Safety will not be completely ensured until any threat is taken out. You have never been to battle nor war, and even you know that. A slightly morbid thought creeps into your head.

If Rhaenyra dies, Aegon could descend the throne.

It was laughable for Rhaenyra, or anyone who supports her claim, to believe known bastards would follow her in the line of succession. Or that Daemon would not bypass Rhaenyra’s first three boy in order to ensure power for her last two. It would mean an all-out war between Aegon and Daemon… but maybe it did not have to go that far. Not if plans were made to undercut whatever moves you know Daemon could put into place.

They are all back in King’s Landing, no longer under the false tranquility they tried to spin at Dragonstone. Amongst their patrons who already have much to say about Rhaenyra’s still short reign.

Aegon on the throne would ensure the safety of all of the kids. And not only the kids, but the kingdom as a whole. A war of succession, especially including dragons, would only bring destruction. Rhaenyra’s boys would have a chance to swear obeisance after Daemon is out of the way, and if not, their presence will not be needed. Bastard blood being spilt is nothing compared to the life your children.

They could go back to Dragonstone and live their lives out there with young Egg and Viserys. With the possibility of Daemon for a father, they would be better off for it.

Your thoughts are broken by the midwives telling Rhaenyra to try and push.

There was already a significant amounts of blood trailing where Rhaenyra had been. Her pushes do little to soothe the position she is in. In frustration and pain, eventually Rhaenyra, much to the chagrin of the midwives and Alicent, shoos them all away. Reaching down to pull the babe out herself.

Letting out an already grief-stricken scream as she does it.

The air is sucked from the room as a gush of blood rushes out of Rhaenyra, followed by a tiny body.

A tiny… silent body. Wrapped in scales and slightly deformed.

No one speaks as they watch Rhaenyra pick up the baby from between her legs and rocks it as if trying to lure it into crying, into breathing. But nothing comes. Just silence, and the aches of a daughter stuck in the self-fulfilling prophecy of a mother that is no longer around.

It is not proper nor lady-like, and you can hear your own mother’s voice in the back of your telling you how rude it is in a time like this, but you just turn and leave. Without a word or peep. Suddenly feeling sick you go back down the hall, back to your chambers. Ignoring Jace who calls your name out in confusion by the sudden silence coming from his mother’s room.

By the time you make it back to the room, Aemond had gotten himself ready for bed. Completely casual as if the events earlier meant nothing to him.

“What’s happened,” he notices your ashen face.

You take one look at your husband, you think of your children away in a place foreign to them, and the stillborn baby Rhaenyra clutched in her arms.

The bile comes up quick. So quick you barely make I to the basin on the other side of the room. The dry heaving reminds you that you barely ate anything today, too worried about the task at hand.

You flinch when you feel a cold hand on your back. Shrugging Aemond’s hand off, you turn head with a glare.

“You made your move,” you mutter. “I’ll give you that. But now we are going to this my way. And Aemond, so help me, a single hair on those kid’s heads is harmed and I am not with them, I burn it all to the ground, you with it.”

You don’t know how and when, but you would do it for them if it came to that. You’d do anything for their safety. It may be time for others to realize that.

— — —

Princess Visenya Targaryen is set on the pyre a day and a half later. A small swaddled body lit on fire once Rhaenyra croaked out the words. Syrax blowing a mighty flame to burn Rhaenyra’s only little girl.

She was advised to stay in bed. Though her outward physical ailments had started to heal, it was clear Queen Rhaenyra was sick. Pale skin still prickling with sweat despite the cool air outside, dark bags starting to form under her eyes as she leans gently against the cane she was given.

You stand next to Aemond, Helaena, and Aegon. The only warm you feel from the fire in front on you.

It was slightly shocking when Helaena came up to you before the funeral with guilt written over her soft features.

“I just had… a funny feeling about the kids being here. I’m sorry.”

She knew.

You were not happy about once again feeling like you’re on the outside looking in with people you are supposed to call family. At least Helaena had the decency to feel ashamed by the omission. The decency to apologize. Guilt and Aemond is laughable being in the same sentence, and Aegon had been avoiding you. A thing that has not happened in months. Helaena was always right about these things; the scary part is that you all never really knew till the outcome already happened.

You run your hand over your black mourning dress. Peering out from under your veil, you make eye contact with Daemon across the fire.

Normally mirth filled eyes, and folly written all over his face had been replaced by an emptiness that scared you. Often, you had felt the unearned confidence and ambition around you was just noblemen living up to an expectation put on by others around them. But a Daemon, already known for his rogue behavior, feeling emboldened by the death of his brother, daughter, and the newly weakened state of his wife, made you nervous.

Only compounded when you think about the conversation shared at Dragonstone. Your loyalty was not expected, but even demanded. You can’t help but wonder if the kids not being around has only put a fiercer target on your back, or even on theirs.

You look over at Aegon - messy hair, bored expression, purple circles under his eyes. But he is no worse for wear compared to Rhaenyra.

If it one thing you have learned since being around this family, it is appearances often make up for everything. Slap a smile and nice outfit on, and people tend to believe what they see versus what is underneath the surface.

The funeral ends, and you make a sharp beeline towards Otto.

“I need to run something past you.”

You rake your knuckles against Aegon’s door, and get reply in return. You do it again, this time with more vigor, slightly embarrassed at Ser Arryk just watching you pound away.

“He is in there,” you question, turning to him.

“The last time I checked, he was my lady.”

The last time he checked?

You supposed not ever sworn protector can be as diligent as Quinton, and not every subject can be well behaved.

“Aegon,” you knock once more.

Blowing out frustrated air through your mouth, you turn to go but the door eventually swings open.

His hair is crumpled on one side, shirt unbuttoned, and reeking of wine. It had not hit you that he may be with someone.

“If you are… predisposed, I apologize. I can come back”

A dopey grin breaks out of face, before he hitched the door open wider. “No one is with me. Oh, dovelet were you worried about that?”

You look over to see Arryk raise a brow at you. You push at Aegon, further annoyed. “Go.” Forcing him back into his chambers.

“Everyone is so touchy today.”

You were there, before the funeral, when Alicent fussed at him about going to it. About trying to look engaged, which he clearly did not. You think about the conversation you had with Otto in his office.

“He is not going to like it. He has long come to terms with not wanting to be king.”

“But his wants are of no concern to you now, are they?”

When put that way, you can’t help but feel a bit bad. But it is true. What Aegon wants right now means little to you. He will eventually learn to like it, and if not like it, he will learn to tolerate it. The way others have to tolerate their fate in life. We are all stuck in the same miserable cycle; the only difference is some of us will not be able to call ourselves King of the Seven Kingdoms.

“We need to talk about some things.”

“Black is one your colors,” he changes the subject. “You should wear it more often.”

“Aegon, I’m serious,” you pinch your nose.

“Is this about the kids? I thought you would be happy they are out of harm’s way.”

“They are not out of harm’s way,” your voice raises, and this is not going the way it was supposed to.

You must push him with a gently hand. A woman’s touch.

There was a something slimy about how Otto ended the conversation. Sending you to Aegon to enact a woman’s touch… whatever that meant.

“But they could be,” you lower your voice. “If - If there was someone else at the helm. None of us would have to worry about their safety. About our safety.”

Aegon give you a funny look before flopping down on his bed.

He is drunk so he may not remember any of this by next morning. You sit next to him on the bed.

“There is no running from this. Despite what you may say, you know you would not be able to live with yourself if you left your family, your kids. Aegon, you are too smart not to know what this is all coming to.”

Though not something you voiced yourself, running was an option that crossed your mind. Finding a way out to Oldtown, grabbing your kids, and running. The logistics seemed all to wash away when the word dragon comes along. Traveling with two young kids would be difficult enough, managing to travel discretely with a giant dragon would not work. You don’t know how you would tell Daella to leave Vermithor.

And then a chill would run up your spine. Where could you go where he would not find you on dragon back?

The two of you sit in silence before Aegon sighs softly.

“Share a drink with me,” Aegon whispers. “Before we all die.”

It makes you laugh. Because that is all you can do at the folly that is your life. You nod softly.

The wine is a Dornish Red. Sweet, warm, and sultry tasting drink. It reminds you of the look Aegon is giving you.

Alicent peaks her head into the door.

“Rhaenyra,” she sees baby Aegon and Viserys sitting on their mother’s bed. Both babbling away over each other. Rhaenyra weakly waves her in. Both Egg and Viserys give Alicent tiny little bows. They do it to everyone, even those who technically do not have the same amount of power toddlers do. Bowing at guards, nursemaids, and court members alike.

The boys are eventually escorted out by one of the maids, but not until they both tell Alicent about the flock of lizards they found in the garden. It’s sweet, Alicent thinks. Reminds her of when her kids were that age. Not yet tainted or disrupted by the life around them. Alicent supposes she also has herself to blame for that when it comes to own children.

Both boys not understanding the position their mother is in. She knows that Rhaenyra is grateful at least two of her kids are not aware of her vulnerable state.

“How are you feeling,” Alicent sits at the edge of the bed next to her, taking in scattering of notes around Rhaenyra. Members of Rhaenyra’s small council have written notes for Rhaenyra to read while she is abed. From things as simple as the mouse problem in the Red Keep to things more serious. Like the Shepherd’s continued teachings; this week sermon’s going as far to say the death of the Visenya was an act of the Gods. That this is Rhaenyra’s punishment. Punishment for the dragon, the incest, the Targaryen of it all.

Alicent makes sure to only visit Rhaenyra when she knows she will not run into Daemon. He flaunted around the castle as if he has never left. Still the same air of arrogance and fire, only now swathed under a layer of coolness. The passing of Viserys, clearly leading him in a quieter path.

So many awful things lead back to that man. Alicent is sure of it.

All Rhaenyra can do is give a small smile and the shake of the head.

“A bit better now that you’re here.”

Alicent just ducks her head shyly.

Rhaenyra was always good at that, making Alicent feel like she was a girl again. Ten and four and completely out of her depth when it came to her feelings. An issue she worries she still has not gained control over.

“I am thinking of naming Daemon protector of the realm,” she then croaks out. “I do not know how much I can get done while in this bed. Watching it all crumble beneath me.”

Naivety. It is the only word that comes Alicent’s mind when it comes to how Rhaenyra handles Daemon. Ironically, it is the same way Otto describes her relationship with Rhaenyra. Her father never forgets a chance the remind her the nostalgia of girlhood, and security she wraps in Rhaenyra. The same way Alicent does not know if Rhaenyra has convinced herself that Daemon’s will head her council above anyone’s else is her true feelings, is the same way Alicent does not know if she holds onto the good parts of Rhaenyra because they still exist. Or because without holding onto them, she would be again flailing and alone. Once again left with the cold, empty feelings that comes with duty above else.

The only person Alicent saw ever cut Daemon down to size is now dead, rotting and finally silent. If Rhaenyra thinks the bond, she had with Daemon is anything more than him trying to hold onto the last semblances of Viserys he could find, she has been sorely mistaken.

“Mayhaps, you should speak that over with the rest of your council,” she pushes the duvet further over Rhaenyra. It is not her job to advise. She doesn’t know if she has it in her advising another clueless monarch. Another seemingly well meaning, but headstrongly clueless monarch. Rhaenyra gets her same propriety from her father.

Rhaenyra is not a bad person. The same way many people would say Viserys was not a bad person. But when all things are said and done, Viserys will be remembered as peaceful. Alicent worries history will not give the same charitable read to Rhaenyra. Who fumbles and doubles down on her bad actions in the way she learned from her father. Terribly misguided in each path they take, paying no mind to the carnage left behind.

Too much trust in Daemon. A fault both will have to live with or die by.

“Everything will be fine, once I recover,” she takes note of Alicent’s distant eyes. “It will be alright.”

You look so much like your father when you lie to me. So much like him with false hope and no tact. They riot in the streets over your reign already, and you are sure it will be alright.

Alicent just squeezes Rhaenyra’s hand. The way she used to when she used to get the urge to pick at her hands. She looks around the room. Rhaenyra, now laying in the same bed her father did before her. Alicent just hopes the morbid memories of Viserys do not haunt her in the way Aemma’s ghost still haunts Alicent to this day.

Aemma was right, and they did not even know it at the time. The birthing bed was their battlefield. And it feels like it is all catching up to them.

It has been a few minutes since your parents welcomed you into their parents, and in those few minutes your mother has done nothing but pick at your hair and fret over your outfit.

The sun was at its height in the sky, brightness peaking through their windows. This morning you woke up, and did what have for the past couple of days. Remember your children are not there for you to kiss and hug, and look over at your sleeping husband. Multiple ways of smothering him popping into your head.

“Wearing your hair back makes you look so severe, my darling,” she fiddles with bun. Your hand goes up the move it way. “And grey is not slimming on everyone.”

“Yes mother,” you try to grin and bear like you have always done. Your resolve faltered when she gushed about how lovely of a father Aemond was for wanting the kids to spend more time with their uncle, the excuse the both of you had parroted whenever someone asked here Daella and Alaric were.

“I think it may be best, if both of you go back home,” you sit both of them down. “I just worry that things may get a bit hectic, and I would feel better if you both were far from it.”

They both give you a curious look. There is only so much you can say without giving all away. Your father gets up and pulls you to the side.

“There has been… rumblings,” he mutters. “About the Queen and her state.”

He chooses his words wisely. As if he was worried others are listening.

“I want you to know that whatever path may arrive. The full backing of the house is behind it. Your uncle and I will make sure of that. If there was a change in power.”

Tears pinch and sting your eyes. It should be reassuring but it only makes you realizing that backing comes at the whim of others. This will always come back to who is ruling, and who people think should rule.

That is why you married Aemond right? To be put in the best position for your house.

“Thank you, father.”

He kisses you on the cheek, before leaving. You turn towards your mother who sits on the bench in front of the bed.

“I do hope your little excursion has renewed your spirit,” she gets up. “Your husband seemed just beside himself after you left. No wife, no children around. I can only imagine how hard that was for him.” You just stand there as she comes towards you. She stares at you for a moment, taking in your new dark dress, and hair. You cannot tell if the look is unimpressed, or filled with sadness. Your mother’s faces tend to blur together into nothingness.

“Of course, that is what you took from it,” you mutter.

“What was that, lamb?” Another hand runs over your hair.

“Nothing, mother.”

Your mother laughs a bit, in that cold, jilted way she does. The joy never reaching her eyes.

“It’s always been that way. Sweet with him, distant with me.”

You stare at her in slight shock, slight mortification when she leans back. Is that how she’s read the situation? You choosing your father over her. Not the paralyzing fear that came with having to please her. The heart arching want to make her proud of you, even at the expense of your own wants.

“You made it that way. I - you sent me away to - to this place and -“

“Oh, here we go. You got married to a Prince, you had your babies, and I am still the evil mother.”

She bows her head as is she about to cry. Initiatively, you put a hand on her shoulder.

“You’re not evil,” you don’t understand how the conversation how switcher so fast. How now you have to the one to comfort her. “We just don’t see certain things the same way.”

An understatement.

“Mayhaps, I was never meant to be a mother,” she looks up, eyes dry. She says it so casually.

“What?”

“I should have taken the hint after the first miscarriage. But your father just begged and begged about wanting a child.”

You just watch in horror.

She runs another hand over your hair, nagging on the bun and frowns.

“Some women just aren’t meant to be mothers. Too headstrong for it, too weak for it,” there is an air of pity when she says it.

She leans in, and her breath hits your ears. “Be careful, my lamb. The softer the heart, the harder the fall.”

You swallow hard. She’s fed a poison that is hard to be weaned off.

— — —

Leaving the room, in a slight daze. Softly shuffling the opposite way of your chambers, and up the large stairs. You had promised Rhaenyra you would come see her soon.

The only thing that breaks you out the trance is the heavy footsteps of Daemon. You stop and lower your head in acknowledgment.

“My prince, I have not been able to catch you to give my condolence.”

Daemon hums. You’ve noticed how he walks around with Dark Sister attached firmly on his hip. Sometimes sheathed, other times unsheathed as he leans against as some sort of crutch.

“I suppose I should be sending you sorrows too,” a small smile on his face. You tilt your head in confusion.

“Your children.”

Your blood runs a bit cold.

“They are just with their uncle. Taking it the beauty of Oldtown. We want them to see many parts of the realm.”

“With Vermithor?”

You just nod. “You must know how important the bond is between dragon and dragon rider. More importantly during these early stages.”

Daemon’s mirth grows as he comes closer. “I do remember our conversation. About how your loyalty would be not only expected but rewarded. I would absolutely hate to see anyone get hurt, especially as our queen is recovering.”

You smile, brightly and sound.

“Of course, it would be quite a shame if anyone was putting their own needs ahead of Queen Rhaenyra’s. Those close to her must be diligent, and kind.”

The two of you exchange more fake smiles before he steps around you, sword glistening under the flicker of flames in the hallway.

Trying to compose yourself as you make your way to the master chambers. You are slightly relieved by the changes that were made by the time Rhaenyra arrived and settled in. The model Viserys spent even his last days speaking about that collected dust had been removed. Different drapes that let the sun in, the furniture moved around a bit, and the smell. Thank Gods, the smell was different.

The smell of rotting, and noxious air replaced by something a little sweeter. You know that Alicent would come in daily and light different incense for Rhaenyra.

The guards let you in, and she is still in the same place she, day after day, the large canopy bed. The bed you see Viserys lay in as you visit him with Daella and or Alaric.

“Rhaenyra,” you pull back the certain a bit, to let light in. “Have you eaten today?”

You walk over and lay a hand on her forehead. She is burning up. Her fever spiking again. All you get is a groan and the shake of the head.

“Rhaenyra, you need to eat something.”

She just gestures toward the table. Different tonics, drinks, and glasses on top of it. You walk over to see tea as well as a familiar milky substance on it.

You remembered seeing how Viserys was when he was on milk of the poppy. Hells, you understood the strength of it, and you only took it while having Daella and Alaric.

It was the beauty and ugliness of the drug once it was taken too much. The pain was gone, but then came a new problem - the grogginess of the mind and withdrawals.

“The Queen only needs five dops of it,” said the maester, a sour look on his face once asked to leave when you visited her a few days ago.

In all her paranoia, Rhaenyra had asked only those closest to her to help administer it. Not trusting the maesters the very same way she did when it came to Viserys. Out of part guilt of what she just went through, and frankly fear, you agreed when she asked you. But now, as you feel the tides changing once again for the battle for power, your hands shake a bit applying the remedy to her tea.

One. Two. Three. Four. Five….. Six. Seven. Eight.

Before you can change your mind, you a twist cap back on the milk of the poppy.

You walk back to the bed, giving a pale Rhaenyra a strained smile. “Let’s sit you up.”

Rhaenyra winces, eyes in a faraway stare as you help her lean up in the bed. The same bed she had been beholden to for the past week. You bring goblet to her lips and watch her all but chug most of it.

A part of you wants to say a prayer to the Father. Perhaps he will forgive you for all that will happen beyond this point. Understanding how stray animals often act when they are backed into a corner. Teeth bared and fighting for their lives.

She will name him Protector of the Realm if she stays abed any longer. Despite the mistreatment, Daemon has always had a way about him when it came to Rhaenyra. I have no way to stop it. Did not back then, and do not now.

Guilt only mounts when you think about the sadness in Alicent’s eyes when she said that. But then you think about your daughter’s laugh or the wide-eyed innocence of your son, and the guilt fades. All that is left is resentment. A deep hole where you think your heart used to be.

You have to shudder thinking about anyone from this family sitting the throne but at least you know some options are more… malleable than others.

“I can come back to give you more when you need it,” you brush a stray hair behind Rhaenyra’s ear. “Maybe I can read to you too.”

She gives you a tired smile, and nod before her eyes begin to flutter. You watch as her breathing labors as she drifts into a hazy state. In and out of sleep. Here she lays, a victim of the birthing bed like her mother. Ill equipped, and far too foolish to see the damage she will leave behind like her father.

“What is all of this?”

You walk into your chambers to find a table of food in the room. Aemond hops up from the bed. You take a look at the array of breads, and sweets on the table.

“All this for me,” you question, popping one of the lemon candies on a lemon cake in your mouth. “How romantic. The last time I had the pleasure of such a spread, you were telling me you got your mistress pregnant and it sent me into excruciating labor.”

Aemond face falls, and for a moment you understand what it has been like for him the past few years of marriage. To hold power over him, even if it is small and fleeting in the moment. Dangling kindness in front of his face to rip it away for no reason other than you can.

You continue to pick at the food, as Aemond just stares.

“Are you gonna say what this all about or just stare with that silly look on your face?”

His face flashes from sad stoicism something a bit angrier. Ah, that’s your husband.

“I am trying to mend things with you, and all I ge-“

“Oh, that is your first mistake,” you hold up a finger. “Well, not the first. You know your first. But trying to mend something that was never there to begin with? And with food that I could get myself. You’re smarter than that Aemond,” you tut at him.

“So, what now? We spend the rest of our days hating each other?”

If we even get that far.

“It has worked for others,” you shrug.

“It won’t for you,” he rebuts. “The hate will eat you alive. You’ll be miserable.”

Promise?

He speaks as if he is so sure of it. As like Helaena does at times, he has seen into a murky future, and pulled this out. You utterly miserable as you let that dark voice in your head play out all your morbid desires.

“But you would like that, wouldn’t you,” you think about the look he gave you when you wanted to reach for his knife. “Why else would you put through all of this but to make me as miserable as you are?”

It hang on the tip of your tongue. You could push you luck again, and tell him that she is gone, and never to be seen again. Twist the knife that you already have point at his back. But then you would have to be sure of things yourself. Dreams have dissolved into nightmares. Blood mixing the salty water of Dragonstone.

Then you wake and Otto’s words ring in your head. He took care of it. Now you are left trying to sort out the mess of memories that makes up your head. Guilt, anger, and sadness all managing fuck with your head in ways you could not imagine.

You eye the wine on the table. As much you admonish Aegon for it, you do get why he turned to it from such a young age.

The few hours of solace it gives is wonderful. Fleeting but necessary when everything else becomes too loud. Too much.

“It was not an absence in you. It was one in us… in me,” he looks so young when he says it. It almost reminds you of him when he ten and five. Fresh off a growth spurt. Terribly shy, terribly distant. But that was before. Before the expectation of marriage, of children and semblances of loyalty and care.

That boy is gone, and you are surely not the girl you were once you came to King’s Landing. You mourn that girl, the way you mourn the boy Aemond was before he lost his eye. You did not know him then but you always wonder what strings in him broke when that happened. An unjust act with no reconciliation to follow. If any of that led up to the man standing before you today.

“Well, at least that is something we can agree on,” you look down, trying to get rid of the hot tears in your eyes.

You have spent time trying to build up an armor in front of him. You’d hate to have it crack now.

“My grandsire told me about your little plan.”

It makes you look up. Aemond’s arms are crossed in skepticism.

“Your sister’s health is declining rapidly. Aegon needs to ready himself for this.”

“And he has agreed?”

“Your brother will fall in line as he realizes this is the only way to keep those dear to him safe,” you fiddle with the chocolate tart. “He already has actually.”

Helaena and him took a trip to one of the orphanages down in the Red Keep. It is about time people outside of this castle get a look at those in power. Aemond still does not look convinced.

“Does that upset you? The thought of him being king?”

“No more than it does having my useless sister or foolish nuncle on the throne.”

“What, no mention of the bastards technically in front you for the throne right now,” you think the joke falls flat till Aemond narrows his eye, and tilts his head to side in merriment. You have to do a bit of double take at the slight smirk on his face.

“You danced with one of those bastards.”

So, he remembers that.

“A tactical move,” you roll your eyes. “And when I advise Rhaenyra and Jacaerys that he should go back to Dragonstone as the new heir to the Irone Throne and Prince of Dragonstone, it would have payed off.”

“Leaving Rhaenyra as she’s abed, and stuck with Daemon? How would you manage that?”

“I can be quite convincing,” you shrug. “Not that you would understand.”

He takes another dig on chin, uncharacteristically good natured this day, but he gives you that look. The look where you don’t know whether he wants to skin you or kiss you. No one really has ever looked in the way Aemond has. As if he sees nothing of what you’re really made of while managing to look right through you at the same time.

“Better yet, I may even tell Baela and Rhaena that they should take this time to be with grandmother and grandfather, especially as Corlys may stand a similar fate as Rhaenyra.”

“What about the other one,” Aemond frowns.

Your brows furrow in confusion before it dawns on you. Both him and Lucerys had done a good job of avoiding each other since you all came back from Dragonstone. But you can tell the tiptoeing has created strain and awkwardness for everyone.

“If Baela and Jace are gone with Moondancer and Vermax in toe, that just leaves a clearly petrified Luke and Arrax. I think Vhagar, Sunfyre or Dreamfyre can handle that, no?”

Aemond raises a brow. “You want them to die?”

“I don’t want anyone to die,” well that’s not entirely true, and the look Aemond gives you lets you in that he does not believe that as well. “As few casualties as possible is the goal. They can swear to Aegon when the time comes or be put the King’s Justice. As of now, we should take advantage of the uncertainty that rest amongst everyone.”

Aemond laughs, like really laughs. It takes you for surprise, and only upsets you. He laughs as if he finds your thoughts funny in the way seeing a squirrel run up a tree is funny. “What?”

“Nothing…. Lady Hightower.”

You scoff and throw the pieces of the fruit on the table at him. “Fuck off.”

“You make those faces and turn up your nose at Aegon being king, but you and I both know you will be the first to defend his throne,” you throw a strawberry at him but this time he catches it and eats it. “This is all for the kids, right? It is why they are not here, away from their mother?”

“They are away from their father as well. For their safety.”

You just hum.

“I want to write to them. They did not even get to say goodbye.”

“That could be dangerous.”

“I do not care, Aemond,” you raise your voice.

There is a knock at the door and Quinton comes in with a note in his hand. He eyes the food on the table as you read the note. It is from your father, assuring you about your parents soon departure back to the Riverlands.

“Are you alright,” he whispers. You nod softly. Quinton had been hovering somewhere in the background whenever Aemond was around, especially with the children gone. Clearly not trusting him around you.

Quinton should probably be more worried you around him. His cape swishes behind him when he goes to leave the room.

“You can write to them when the timing is better,” Aemond continues once you two are alone again.

The timing is never right. Not with him, not the with situation you are in.

The end of ninth moon of 129 AC

As you walk down the hall, a soft hand brushes against your arm.

“Are sure you are alright,” Quinton’s voice rings in your head, and tickles your ears softly.

“Of course,” you give fake smile, tilt of the head. He stops in the middle of the empty hall. Though he is your sworn protestor, you feel it is best to keep Quinton on the fringes unless needed otherwise. The less he knows, the safer he is you assume.

“I know you are not well without your children around,” he sighs. “But I would not want you to… sully yourself with things before you can get back to them.”

Sully. You take a long look at Quinton. There is something sweet about the way he views you. Entirely too earnest at time but sweet. You wish you could tell him he had nothing to worry about, and meant it. The pedastal he puts you on, my would it be a hard and long fall.

“I appreciate the concern, but I am ok,”’you reach up to touch his cheek. “You will be the first to know.”

He gives a half-hearted nod before then both of you continue your way to Rhaenyra’s chambers. When you get there the maidservants are beginning to place lights out in the hall for the night.

When you walk in, Rhaenyra is perched where she has been for some time now. Fiddling with the books on the shelf in the corner of the room.

“Maybe something a bit more upbeat. A love story,” you whisper. You go sit next to her on bed, flipping through the large brown book in your hand.

Rhaenyra begins to mumble as you shush her softly.

“It’s ok,” you reach over for the cup next to her bed. Sniffing the cup, you take note of how differently it smells compared to the tea and milk of the poppy mixture you used to.

The tonic seems different, stronger than usual. You put it to her lips and watch Rhaenyra drink it. You wipe her mouth. Even if this weakened state, you find her tragically beautiful. Like a fallen Angel. She resembles her siblings in that regard.

“I need - I need,” her eyes flutter open and shut. “The Prince that was Promised.”

You frown.

“Aeg- Aegon…”

“Your brother?”

“Tell Jacaerys.”

She trails off. Your back straightens as you watch as Rhaenyra’s eyes close, and her breathing slow.

The Prince that was Promised… Aegon.

You lean down and kiss her forehead. Mayhaps, in another life things could’ve been different for her. For her siblings, for her children, for you… for your kids. Climbing off the side of the bed, you gently tuck Rhaenyra in.

When you walk out, you see Quinton standing at attention. You motion for him to come with.

“I need you to do go get Otto,” you mummer. “We have business to get to.”

You cannot see the look Quinton gives you as move to walk ahead of him, and to that you are grateful.

Sullying is your only other option.

In the tenth moon 129 AC, the bell connected to the Royal Sept tolled for thee.

The death of Queen Rhaenyra, First of her Name, sent ripples through the Realm. But that was just beginning of the great strife that would follow her passing. A years peaceful period of reign for the Targaryen family ended by infighting.

Histories will say the first problem came the moment the then Princess and heir decided to sire bastard heirs. Others would say it began the moment, Rhaenyra left her succession vulnerable to her young brother. Not ending his line the moment she had the chance to.

Throughout her short reign as queen, there were festering rumors of usurping. That Lord Otto Hightower would hold secret meetings planning for the best moment to strike to get his grandson son on the throne. Others dispirited this claim, saying that the Dowager Queen Alicent’s afflictions for Queen Rhaenyra would never let that happen.

Ironically, it was not the death of the Rhaenyra is not the official start of what would later be called the Dance of Dragons. Instead the death of Prince’s Aemond One-Eye Targaryen’s lady wife’s parents triggered the domino affect. An escalation of plans.

Most would say the overflipped carriage was a tragic accident, but others whispered about something more serious. An inside attack from a member of the Targaryen family themselves. It was this tragedy that led to a public outcry from the members of the house in the Riverlands, coupling with the public crowning of a new king.

It was Ser Criston Cole, member of the Kingsguard, who crowed King Aegon, Second of his Name, in a private ceremony. Only flanked by his new crowned Queen Helaena, Prince Aemond and his wife, and Lord Hightower. King Aegon was crowned in front of the septon of faith, dawning his namesakes crown.

Back on Dragonstone, Jacaerys Velaryon recieved the news of not only his mother’s death, but also the usurping. Except it was not allies with the news, but foes. Jacaerys was slain at the footsteps of the castle.

It is still debated which side has more to gain to having Jace out of the way. King Aegon or Prince Daemon. But in the end, it was the later who eventually set up him home base at Dragonstone. Fleeing under the watchful eye of his spies in the Red Keep. With only two of his sons with him.

Both sides strategizing their moves. Daemon labeling Aegon and his supporters traitors to the realm, while Aegon set out to kill his uncle himself in given the chance. Under the insistence that it was him who accerlated Rhaenyra’s already bad condition.

Support the amongst the realm split as some supporter the efforts of the new king, far more open to his tactics than one of the Rogue Prince or Rhaenyra’s Bastards. While others scoffed at the boldness of Aegon the Usurper.

Those called on the opinions of the sons that remained at King’s Landing. Rumors of the Lucerys and Joffrey Velaryon being chained arriving. But it was not Daemon who negotiated the release of the boys. It was members of House Velaryon.

But there was one condition. It would be Baela and Rhaena, of both House Targaryen and Velaryon, that recieved equal titles after the passing of Corlys. Lucerys would be stripped of title of heir to the Driftmark Throne. It was rumored that this was not a cruel twist of fate from team green, but instead a plea from Lucerys himself.

It was Rhaena Targaryen, in all her wisdom, that worked through the terms. With a heavy heart, and no more bloodshed in her pleas. The more bold sister of the twins, Baela, had other plans. Sensing the release of Lucerys and Joffrey was a trap. She climbed on top of Moondancer, despite the calls not, and made her way closer to King’s Landing herself. But she was not alone. Her grandmother was with her.

Never one to sit from a battle himself, it was King Aegon who climbed his dragon to take them both on. All three dragon and riders fought diligently. Moondancer sustaining life ending injuries, while both Sunfyre and Aegon were injured at battle. But the most costly lost came at the hand of the One-Eyed Prince himself. Taking out Rhaenys and Meleys before further injury could come to his brother.

Enraged at the news of the death of Moondancer, and the almost costly lost of Baela, Daemon began his March. But he also had other plans at play. In efforts to lure the new Prince Regent out of the castle, he sent spies to Oldtown. Where not only Prince Daeron worked with all of Reach to support King Aegon. But also where the young Prince watched over his younger nieces and nephews.

There was an attempt to take the Jaehaerys Targaryen, son of Aegon and Alaric Targaryen, son of Aemond. But the plan was thwarted by a terrible beast. Vermithor lurched and lured over Oldtown like a tower himself. His flames as green as the Hightower Beacon. Highly protective over his new rider and those close to her. At just six and seventh month, Daella Targaryen was feared as her father.

Still not wanting to be outdone, Daemon sets his sights towards not only Harrenhal, but another certain house in the Riverlands. His march pillaging those close to Aemond’s wife. Still grieving the lost of parents and seperated from her children, it was rumored the lady became more quiet, drowning herself in her cups.

It was she, with Queen Mother Alicent and Queen Helaena, who pleaded for Aemond to not take the bait. But it was too no vail. After he heard of the attempted kidnapping, he set out with men of his own.

His march mirroring his uncle’s not only through the Stormlands but as well as the Riverlands. There were whispers of inhabitants at Harrenhal. It is still speculated by both Daemon and Aemond did not burn the structure to the ground, when they had to chance. Tales would be written of a certain magic soiling the ground. Keeping safe from harm.

Though those tales are all rumors, what was undeniably true, is that two Targaryen princes breathed their last breaths over God’s Eye on the sixth moon of 130 AC. No one saw the battle, but the sound of snapping dragons and the sight of green and red flames that called attention.

Vhagar and Aemond both fought a valiant effort but it the wounds to both proved to be to substantial. Aemond Targaryen died on top of his crowned dragon. The burns from Vhagar burning Daemon beyond repair.

When their deaths made it back to the Red Keep, the halls recount the Queen Mother tearing her hair in anguish, calling for the deaths of not only everyone who supported Daemon, but Aegon the younger and Viserys alike.

A story of crowns and iron thrones whittled down to death and fire. The grief felt by team green only compounded by the body of Aemond’s lady wife found charred in their chambers. It was Ser Quinton, her sworn protector, who lived to tell the story of having to fight off several guards before it was too late. In a matter of days, Daella and Alaric Targaryen missing from their places in Oldtown.

Both jobs speculated to be last minute plans carried about for Daemon Targaryen, done by his loyal Gold Cloaks. It is said that King Aegon never fully recovers from the death of not only his brother, but his good sister. Punishing those he deems responsible once he comes to.

But there are merchants in Essos that believe they have spotted a beautiful lady hand in hand with her children. One with sparkling white hair, the other with blonde streaks through her dark curls.

taglist: @florent1s @floraroselaughter @afro-hispwriter @snh96@holy-minseok @voniikg @evienorville @tremendouswolfsaladranch @crispmarshmallow @strawbrryquinn @widemiffyhappy @msmarvel-19 @dc-marvel-girl96 @xkennobi @fanfics4ever@hydrationqueensworld @lyra689 @blazzlynch @httyd-marauders@bregarc @b00kdiary @grey-water-colors @mercedesdecorazon@flowerpotmage @bstorn @poisonedsultana @papery-maniac @its-sam-allgood @yu3kkii @hvx @leoramage @neenieweenie@stargaryenx @rey26 @lazypinkpig @blackravena @s0urmarvel@elleclairez @rebelfleur22 @inpraizeof @luvremlu @clora95@blacpiink @let-love-bleeds-red @iwanttohitmyself @alastorhazbin@kitkat-writes-stuff @carrielle @aloneatpeace @ensolleildelune@landlockedmermaid77 @deadunicorn59

#im truly screaming crying throwing up about this being done #I hope y’all enjoy this and thank you again #aemond x fem!reader #aemond targaryen x reader #aemond targaryen #prince aemond targaryen #aemond fic #aemond targaryen x oc #aemond x you #aemond targaryen imagine #aemond imagine #prince aemond #aemond x y/n #aemond one eye #aemond fanfiction #aemond x oc

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heliza24 · 3 months

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Being a physically disabled Dimension 20 fan breaks my heart sometimes

I’ve been thinking about this since last Wednesday’s episode when we finally got a real scene with Lydia, one of the few physically disabled characters in the entire canon of the show. It was nice, but it was really just a lore dump. An excuse for exposition. A moment for Kristen to look good by expending sympathy/pity. (I’m a little frustrated about how that interaction went down. Extending the help action was nice but patronizingly touching the neck of a full-ass adult without consent was not. It was weird and not something she would have done to a nondisabled character).

I have watched almost all of D20 (still missing a couple of seasons) and as far as I know here’s where our list of canon physically disabled characters stand: Lydia Barkrock, Jan de la Vega (who feels pretty problematic to me, maybe more on that in a later post), one of the Dwarven statues in the temple in The Seven (who is not given the dignity of being brought to life like Asha), and Pete’s coworker in TUC2 who is in exactly one episode and is so unimportant I have forgotten his name. I guess you could make an argument that Gunny is disabled, but I don't feel that Lou or Brennan really talk about him or play him through that lens. So in terms of canon physically disabled PCs-- that leaves us with 0.

We do a bit better with neurodivergent characters and characters with mental health problems; Ayda (my beloved) is very well developed and Adaine is a PC. There have been some openly neurodivergent players, like Omar and Surena, whose characters also read ND to me. But that isn’t labeled or discussed in canon, so it's hard for me to know where to class that. I am going to focus the rest of this post on physical disabilities, since that is my area of lived experience. If another fan wants to write about their perspective of neurodivergence rep in the show, I would love to hear that, and will happily amplify.

There has never been a character with a sensory disability or a limb difference or a chronic illness (not a fantasy one, a real one) on Dimension 20. The only NPCs we have are nondescript, similar wheelchair users. And there has never been a physically disabled player at the table. On the flagship show of Dropout, a company founded on diversity and inclusion. It feels extremely pointed to me.

In fact as far as I can tell there has only been one (1) physically disabled performer on any of Dropout’s shows. (Shout out to Brett, you were great on Dirty Laundry.) Obviously I haven’t seen every episode of everything they have produced. If I have missed someone, please do let me know in the comments/reblogs. But it’s a problem. And Sam Reich even agreed with this criticism when I asked him directly about.

I do really hope they’re working on it, as Sam says. But why has it taken so long?

Dimension 20 has had trans and nonbinary and queer players. It has had players of many different races. I’m not saying that the diversity here is perfect; there should always be more POC in the dome, more queer people. We should keep pushing for that. (And we should also push for performers at the intersections of these identities!) But we’ve seen the ways this diversity has expanded and improved the different seasons, because diverse players create sensitively drawn, diverse player characters. They add details to their PC’s experiences that make them feel rich and alive. I’m thinking about each of Ally’s PC’s incredible capital G gender and Aabria “all my characters (even the stoats) are Black” and how excellent they all are. D20 would not be the show it is without this input.

And yet. And yet.

There are 1,000 interesting and complicated themes to explore around disability. Dealing with access. Dealing with ableism. Dealing with compassion and community care. Dealing with none of it and just being a cool fantasy or sci fi character that happens to be disabled. We don’t get any of it.

I watch my favorite show and I see myself in the ace rep and the female characters. But I don’t see all of me. I see a silent but ever present message: you aren’t quite welcome here.

I have this fantasy that I play in my brain sometimes that someday I’ll get to talk to Brennan in person, like maybe if I buy a VIP ticket and risk Covid to go to a live show or we run into each other on the street or something. I am able to look him in the eye and articulate why he NEEDS to include a physically disabled player in an upcoming season. I reference the ways he’s talked about inclusion and writing diversely on Adventuring Party. Maybe I hand him a handwritten letter, or hell, a printout of this post. And because he really cares about diversity and his shows and his fans he would listen to me, and cast a physically disabled performer in the next season.

But I think that might be giving that nondisabled man (whose work I adore, who I respect so much) too much credit. Because he’s had Jennifer Kretchmer, a physically disabled actual play performer, on adventuring academy to talk about access in gaming. He’s hired disability consultants. He knows about physically disabled people, enough to give us shoutouts as inconsequential npcs. And he still hasn’t thought to include us at the table. In over 20 seasons. None of that other stuff matters if we aren't given a seat at the story telling table, and the agency to craft our own narratives equal to other participants in the game.

When Lydia was telling her story in the last episode, I kept wishing for a prequel, where she is more than a plot delivery device and a kind but unimportant parent. I want to know about her adventures with her adventuring party. I want to see a talented, wheelchair-using actor play out the scene when she decides to put the gem in her chest. I want to hear about what happened after. I want to know how she survived. I want it so badly it hurts.

I am in the process of trying to find new indie actual plays that feature more disabled talent. I am learning how to GM myself so I can tell these kinds of stories. But it’s not the same as being a fan of something. Sometimes I don’t want to have to make my own representation. Sometimes I just want to turn on my favorite tv show, the one that I have cosplayed from and written metas about and loved whole heartedly, and see myself included.

If you’re another disabled or neurodivergent fan I’d love to hear your thoughts on this. If you’re not, I’d love for you to reblog this. I would love for the absence of physical disability in this show to be a topic of fandom conversation, at the very least.

#dimension 20 #d20 #my crip media reviews #being a fan is hard sometimes #and being disabled means you get left out of “diversity” all the time #I love this show so much it hurts #I wish it could love me back a little bit more #fantasy high junior year #fantasy high #my meta #dropout #dropout tv #Sam reich

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carryonafi · 1 month

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where did the party go.

ashton irwin x reader; ANGST

a/n: heyyy lovers!! 2 posts in a row (almost) whaaat!! i’ve been working recently because i just went through my entire google docs and sorted everything out 😭 this is something i’ve been working on for quite some time now and requires a little bit of backstory. there will be another part to this series, and possibly a third? let me know if you want to hear about some of the key moments in the 2013–2016 period! so without further ado, this is part one of “where did the party go.”! 🤍

content warnings: sexual innuendos, heavy drinking, smoking, mentions of declining mental health

words: 2.4k

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷

background: Your relationship with Ashton has been public ever since the beginning, starting in 2013 and continuing to flow and experience the life of 5 Seconds of Summer all the way until the band went on a break at the end of 2016. During those years, you took on the struggles that Ashton and the rest of the band faced which left them all having you as a permanent resident in their life. However, your relationship becomes rocky when Ashton refuses to communicate until the very moment he can’t take it anymore. His impulsive decision leads to you moving out, yet still being in his life because of the others and their friendship with you.

— POV: Ashton —

I could see nothing beyond her. Of course she would be here… of course. Heart stuck in my throat, I turned my attention away from her as soon as she started to look in my direction. We had ended. Months ago, yet I still couldn’t pull myself out of the mindset that she was still mine. I was still waking up next to her every morning, head on the fluffy pillow she claimed when we first moved in and hovering over the shadow of her figure in our bed. Yes, it was still our bed. It would always be. Everywhere I went she followed me whether it be the scent of the hair mist which stuck to the bathroom tile, the fluffy blankets she had chosen for the house, a few products left behind like she was coming back… she wouldn’t.

The music was bass heavy, rattling the table which in turn shook the floor and bounced off of the walls, reverberating in the guest’s ears. In the house I was suffocated, wanting and feeling like a beggar when I so much as looked her way.

“It’ll be like the iHeart Radio night all over again!” Michael made the comment, the rest of the group lightheartedly laughing despite the known tension. I left the circle almost immediately after that, not being able to bear hearing her sickeningly sweet giggle as she clung to any one of my friends besides me. I secretly wished the same, just over a year ago we were sharing smiles at each other and trying each other’s drinks, unable to separate as we made our way to the escort and back to the hotel in a blur.

The back porch brought an odd comfort to me, it was a change of pace from all of the lights inside. Calm, soft, warm yellow lanterns and fairy lights above proudly grown ferns. Although I did feel like an asshole for exiting at a time when people were talking to me, I just couldn’t handle the voices that weren’t her’s. I couldn’t handle her’s either. The vast green soothed me and the euphoria of a deep breath from a joint hit quickly, the blue smoke wandered together, then parted once hitting a certain point in the air. When it couldn’t carry the oxygen anymore. Familiar… Maybe. Maybe that’s why there were now tears obstructing my vision.

A sudden rush of consciousness and self pity struck my senses, cutting deep and forcing me to stand up off of the porch and make my way back inside the house within seconds. Hours felt like seconds and once enclosed, nothing was real. Not the people, not the music, not the house which was once our’s and now holding me alone, not the slow drift of which my rationality began to slip.

“Come on, Ash…”

She was real, though. Touching me, feeling for the stairs with her high heels, whispering words that I couldn’t understand— I went weak. I let her hold my weight, and her soft touch was replaced with a mattress. Clouds. Heaven. She was down with me, pitifully listening to me stutter apologies through tears and a lack of sobriety, begging her to let me hold her one last time before she found better. I mumbled with full confidence that I loved her. I loved nothing more than my weakness.

“I… I can’t.” She uttered those words which was the only blur I remembered hearing, it had to be the worst of it. Not her reassurance or her hushing my pathetic tears, I had to remember what she had pledged herself to. She wasn’t coming back.

Her dress was in my arms during the hours until I woke up, like she had vanished with all that was left being her clothing and a sweater missing from my closet. Everything came creeping in pieces, coming back with each step I took down the party soaked stairs. One led me to her hands, the next led me to her voice, breathing my name and encouragement to help me, then my knees led me to the hardwood of the living space. It was impossible to exist without thinking of her, from the moment I’d wake up it would be torture right away. I wasn’t lying next to her figure. I wasn’t waking up and rolling over to the side, her small, warm frame snuggling up to mine making soft hums and mews in her sleep. The smell of her hair, the freckles lightly dusting her cheeks and nose. All for me, just for me. Her morning voice, mumbling my name into my neck and chest as she desperately tried to get closer to my comfort. My arms enveloped her until she disappeared, then I remembered she wasn’t here again. She couldn’t.

When I walked around the house I imagined her happily skipping alongside me, dragging me over to the couch just to cuddle and burrow in the soft blankets for the rest of the day until one of us had to eventually finish a task.

No more fleeting kisses, no more shoulder rubs, no more long nails tracing my shoulder blades while my fingertips gave the same treatment to the dimples on her back and the dips in her hip bones. No more of her cheek pressed to my chest, arms wrapped around me in a tight embrace because she just didn’t want to let go. No more of the stubbornness which kept me smiling at how ridiculous she could be.

When I got home I would expect a long hug, she always stood on her tiptoes to hug me so her lips could meet my cheek.. or my own. Always warm, everything she possessed was warm. Her giggles, her lips, her voice, everything. Without her everything was just cold. I never rested comfortably because it was so, so damn cold.

I could feel her. Right there. The rise and fall of her chest, hips flush to mine as her soft, pink pout glossy with need stared up at me as a way to beg for attention. Her doe eyes, big and wanton silently telling me how much she needed my love, for my hands to trace her skin and plush valleys. For her small ones to grab mine tightly, tangle in my hair, whisper against my lips about how I needed a haircut before I shut down the sense of coordination for her thoughts with my hips meeting her thighs.

The days lulled by slowly without her there, I thought back to the night she left every single day. My words were not the right choice, she was willing to be there. She was willing to help me, but I didn’t think that something already broken could depend on something else the way I did to her. I had nightmares about the sounds of her heart wrenching, yet gentle sobs as I told her my thoughts. The promise ring still sat on my bedside table on her side just waiting for the day that I could really pull myself together and face her. My only weakness. My only reason, which could have been mine from the beginning if I was smarter. If I had worked harder.

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷

“Looking dapper, aren’t you?” Michael had noticed that I’ve been emptily staring into a mirror for what felt like forever. The abrupt sound of his voice pulled me from my thoughts as I blinked, looking at his reflection behind me.

“Oh, totally. Just can’t get enough of myself.” I replied in a sarcastic tone of voice, rolling my eyes as I smoothed a hand down the front of my suit. Award shows were fun, for the most part. A lot less stressful if we didn’t have a performance, we didn’t have to worry about becoming presentable once again. What can I say? We put our all into anything we play.

Michael grinned in a silent laugh at my reply, scrolling through his phone while Calum did the same and Luke was idle in front of the other mirror. He’d started wearing a lot of eye makeup, not that it was a bad thing. He was getting incredibly good at it, just to think a few years ago he barely felt comfortable putting on some chapstick in public. “Listened to Y/N’s new single yet? Pretty dope.” Michael hummed, nudging Calum’s shoulder to show him something on his phone which was presumably the cover or something… because he nodded in approval and made a comment that I didn’t hear. The sound of her name made me shiver, I took a deep breath and pulled myself away from the mirror to sit across from the others. Their conversation made no sense to me as I was still quite caught up in my own mind, my world of thoughts surrounding me about what this song could sound like. Would I ever listen to it? No, to save myself, probably not.

The one thing missing from this was her by my side again, squeezing my hand and holding on through the swamp of cameras and flashing lights. I could always remember her being the only thing I felt, in all of the chaos. I hadn’t even registered that we had made it out to the car and were sitting in the back already, I snapped back into reality again.

“You good, dude? You’ve been sorta spacey today.” Calum did the same as Michael did to him earlier and nudged my side, I defensively nodded and silently dismissed his worries. If I talked about it, I feared that it would all come out at once without being able to put a filter on my thoughts. Soon enough, we were back in that atmosphere again. Hopping out of the car and putting on an attitude towards the cameras but a different comfort for the fans who just wanted to see us up close, another car rolled in behind us after our driver had gone but I didn’t look. I started hearing her name again, hushed in comparison to all of the other desperate shouts and calls for attention. Fuck, wasn’t I lucky? I just had to keep moving, smiling, waving, making jokes and avoiding the mention of the girl haunting me.

This night was slow. So fucking slow, I just wanted to sit through this and get out of the venue as quick as possible. I wanted to go back to our bed, hold her knitted crop top up to my face and breathe in her scent which was long gone by now. However, we had to mingle. We just had to walk around and talk to people, I couldn’t leave by myself… it was worth a shot to try to enjoy the last few hours of the event. So far, I had been holding myself together pretty well and Luke stuck by my side to make sure I wasn’t left alone in my head. I knew he would do this for me, he wouldn’t hesitate to help me when I needed it. Even if I never vocalized it.

– POV: Reader –

There it was, the movie moment. The prolonged eye contact before an invisible pull drew the two closer to each other until they finally met in the middle, though that didn’t happen. You saw him from afar, shuffling alongside Luke and unable to hold eye contact. His hair was tame, but you knew it at its best. Thick, messy curls, damp from a shower, hanging over his lustful eyes at your favorite times, pushed back into one of your clips so they weren’t disrupting his focus. You knew the best of him, and you needed to see that again. It wasn’t you that ended things, but the chase after he realized his mistake hadn’t stopped until 6 months after you two ended. Bad idea, maybe? Your heels clicked along the tile, drowned out by the natural sounds of people laughing and congratulating, drinks flowing, claps on the back. You was drawn to him the minute Luke had pressed a hand to his shoulder and left his side.

“Hi.” One word that spoke a thousand all at once, Ashton turned with a look of… fear in his eyes. It didn’t go away when your eyes met, but his expression definitely softened.

“Hey, stranger.” He breathed, the soft ring of honey around his iris and between the forest green majority shrinking as his pupils dilated out of love. That was it, from the moment he spoke you knew that the pieces were already mended. There was healing. You bit your lip to hold in your smile, but you just couldn’t. It was contagious, Ashton shared a hesitant smile back with relief. ‘Are you upset with me? Have you forgiven me for making one of the biggest mistakes of my life?’ He wanted to ask, but better yet, your eyes told him more than enough. “I loved the song.” Ashton lied, he hadn’t listened to it.

“Oh, yeah?” You stared up at him, from the trouble he seemed to be having with eye contact earlier, he sure wasn't having any now.

“Yeah, you really deserve that nomination.” He mused, pupils darting up and down from the tip of your toes all the way up to your done-up, hairspray and product doused hair.

“I appreciate that.” You gave a warm smile, hands knitting together neatly in front of yourself. It wasn’t until you made eye contact again that you realized you were wearing his favorite color, his favorite cut– a nice baby blue tight around your hips and fanning out around your frame. Time was cut short, the award ceremony was starting in less than 10 minutes now.

Ashton cleared his throat, checking his watch. “We should… probably get to our seats.” He said softly, still lingering like he didn’t want to leave you behind.

You simply nodded in agreement, bidding him an awkward goodbye before stepping away and letting that invisible string loosen its hold.

The interaction left you slightly lost, even more lost than the moment you actually ended your relationship. It felt like walking away from an opportunity, the real embodiment of stepping away from a chapter in your life. Were you at peace? Maybe, but it was unfinished. You couldn’t sit through this award show, with performance after another the wait was getting more and more unbearable to handle

You needed to speak with Ashton, burn the bridge or rebuild it.

Where did the party go?

ˏˋ°•*⁀➷

Part 2

#5 seconds of summer #5sos fanfic #ashton irwin #calum hood #luke hemmings #michael clifford #5sos series #5sos smut #5sos x reader #ashton irwin x reader #5sos angst

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teamhappyme · 4 months

Text

an adjustment period

josh lyman x female!reader

word count: 2.7k

warnings: politically inaccurate portrayal of the white house, aka the west wing, projecting all my feelings onto josh lyman

a/n: me? posting two fics in one month? groundbreaking. I really am in my josh lyman era sue me idc.

“He will call you back at his next availability. I don’t know when that will be, Congressman.” You pulled the phone away from your ear as the Congressman yelled at you through the receiver. “I will let him know. Thank you, have a nice day Congressman.”

You slammed the receiver against the base until the rest of the communications bullpen looked over at you.

“I swear to god,” you mumbled to yourself as you barged into Sam’s office. “This is the first and last time I ever fill in for Ginger. Congressman who-gives-a-shit wants you to call him back at your earliest convenience.”

Sam looked up from his briefing, a small smirk on his face. “You would rather help me with research for the state of the union than answer my phone? I’m shocked.”

“Sam, if you don’t give me back my encyclopedia and the keys to my office,”

“Relax,” he interrupted, throwing your keys back to you which you caught easily. “I have a meeting in the oval, walk me there and I’ll give you your precious encyclopedia.”

“Fine.”

You walked through the communications bullpen, bumping into a frantic Kathy juggling a stack of papers in her hands.

“Sam owes you lunch everyday for the next two weeks until he leaves,” you told her, a small smile spreading over her face. “And if he tries to give you a hard time, call me, and then the President.”

“I’m not made of money, you know.” Sam piped in while leading you back into the route of the Oval Office.

“I have three words for you: Gage Whitney Partner.”

“Touché.”

The two of you rounded the corner past Josh’s office, and you couldn’t help but peer in to see if he was there.

It was a habit that started first out of survival. In the beginning of your tenure in the west wing you couldn’t walk past Josh’s office without him singing the Yale fight song. Then, after a heated argument in the Roosevelt room between the two of you over the relevance of the Oxford comma, you took every opportunity to occupy his free time to support your argument in favor of the beloved punctuation mark.

Four years had gone by, and somewhere along the way, the small squabbles turned into advice sessions on policy or speech writing. Sometimes, if either of you were feeling sentimental, you would share stories of your times at Yale.

Over time, it became part of your everyday routines to check in on one another, and it was one of the best parts of your day.

Behind writing speeches for the President of the United States, of course.

“Remind me to edit the concluding paragraphs of the President's speech to the education forum. Toby told me I’ve been using too much passive voice.”

“You do use too much passive voice.”

He stopped in front of Charlie’s desk, glaring at you for the comment.

“Hey, I like the passive voice as much as you, but Toby hates it, therefore I don’t use it.”

“He’ll be ready for you in a minute.” Charlie told Sam before leaving his desk for the Oval.

“Hey, have you guys found a new you yet? Toby has gone through like ten interviews and half of them left looking like they were going to cry.” You said as Charlie waved him in to the Oval. “I mean, the solution to this would be to not have you leave and become a congressman, because that’s boring and you can’t even write your own speeches. In fact, that’s exactly what you should do.”

You walked him to the doorway of the oval, waiting for him to hand you your encyclopedia that had been held hostage.

“Why don’t you come and join me and the President, he would like to be the one to tell you who we picked.”

“Why can’t you just tell me now? You know I have absolutely no patience for these things.”

He didn’t answer you, instead he looked into the Oval Office, a small smile on his face. You looked in after him, curious as to what he was so amused with.

All you saw was the President leaning against his desk, staring at the two of you, I’m sure not happy to be kept waiting.

“I don’t have all day you know,” President Bartlet joked before waving you both in.

Wait a minute.

“Sam,” You looked over at your boss, his smile now grinning from ear to ear. “No, Sam, it can’t-“

“Come on,” he interrupted, pushing you into the oval with a steady hand on your back.

You’d been in here plenty of times; usually with a group of people, and usually not when you’re getting offered the job of a lifetime. But when it’s just you and the President, it’s the most terrifying place in the world.

“I’ve never seen you scared a day in your life, don’t tell me today is the day you decide to be scared of the White House.” The President commented as you tried to relax.

“Well if you offer me a drink from the fancy decanter I can promise you I’ll be a lot less scared, sir.”

You and Sam sat down across from the president, and waited for the rest of your career change.

It was hard for you to listen to anyone praise your work ethic, character, and dedication to your job, let alone from the commander in chief himself. You worked for Toby, so there weren't a lot of warm and fuzzy feelings being spread around. So when the president mentioned that, yes, Sam recommended you for his position, but it was Toby that practically locked him in the Oval Office saying it had to be you, you were more than shocked.

You knew deep down he was a softie.

After accepting the position with absolutely no hesitation, it was off to the races with another meeting for the president.

“Mr. President, just one more question.” You asked as he walked you out. “Is there any way we can rework this position so that Toby answers to me and not the other way around?”

“Dream big,” the President said through his laughter, which brought a smile to your face.

Once you and Sam cleared through Charlie and Mrs. Landingham, you landed a sharp smack to his chest.

“What the hell was that for?” He asked, resting his hand over his hurt chest.

“You couldn’t have told me that you were going to nominate me for your job? Or that the president was going to offer me the job himself in the Oval Office?!”

“Well, then I wouldn’t be able to see your anxious shaking and clammy hands as the President raves about you.”

You rolled your eyes as he wrapped an arm around your shoulder, and the smile quickly returned to your face.

“You deserve this. I’m just sad I won’t be able to see you and Josh fight in Senior Staff meetings.”

“Oh don’t worry, we’ll be visiting you on the hill.”

Sam walked you back to your office and handed you the responsibility of finishing the President’s remarks for tonight’s Town Hall meeting.

“If it isn’t the new Deputy Communications Director in the flesh.”

Josh was waiting for you in your office, holding a gold box in his hand while swiveling around in your office chair.

“Technically we’re equals now, so I can tell you to get the hell out of my chair without fear of losing my job.”

“Technically, I outrank you, but since you don’t answer to me, I’ll let it slide.” He stood up from your chair, moving to stand across from you. “Did you quake under the stress of wondering what the president wanted from you?”

“Did you come here to congratulate me or make fun of me?” You asked, a smirk appearing on his face. “And is that present in your hand for me or your new accessory?”

“Do you have to ruin all the fun?” He commented and handed you the present.

You opened the box, taking out the tissue paper to reveal a book, The Social Contract to be exact.

“I know we both went to Yale, but I’m not sure I share the same affinity for the literature of Rousseau that you do, I’m more of an Austen or Didion kind of gal.” You joked.

“I thought I’d get you something that you could quote from in your State of the Union address. You know the President loves the cheese.”

You opened the cover of the book to find a note from Josh written on the inside. There were butterflies in your stomach before you read the first word, because that’s just the effect he had on you.

The relationship you shared with Josh is one that you greatly cherished. Your work rarely overlapped, being an underling of Sam in the communications department didn’t leave a lot of room for talking major policy with Josh. But after your own squabbles, and then overhearing a debate between you and Toby only days into your tenure at the White House, he quickly found any reason to work with you.

He would volunteer to work on research with you when he had any spare time, and he always requested you when he needed an extra hand when heading over to the Hill. You finally asked him about it a few months into the arrangement, and he shrugged before admitting he’d never seen someone stand up to Toby like that.

“You’re gonna go further than a speech writer in the communications department. One day I think you may run this whole building.”

You read aloud from his note, the same thing he said to you three years ago on your walk to the Hill.

You didn’t think he meant it then, and you surely can’t believe it now.

“I told you I’m good with words, Sam and Toby just never give me a chance.”

You closed the book, the weight of this new position pushing you back against your desk. You’re senior staff now. You’re in charge. You are going to be in the room where it happens.

“What if I’m not good at it.” You admitted in the open air.

“Hold on-“ Josh tried to interrupt you.

“Sam, Toby, and the President of the United States just told me they want me for this job. I don’t have a law degree, Josh. I have a Bachelor’s degree in English and a Masters in Political Science from Yale, but I don’t make laws. I don’t have an illustrious career in politics, I’m not even a head speechwriter for Christ’s sake. I crumble under the image of the Oval Office, and unless I’m correcting Toby’s grammar, I don’t particularly like to debate with people. I am going to be in charge of a department, responsible for people to get things done the way I want. I barely get things done the way I want. I am not going to be good at this.”

“Hey, I went to Yale, don’t drag her down.”

You threw him a look as he moved from his spot in the doorway.

“For the last three years, I’ve watched you handle more crises and speeches than any other deputy in the communications office. Sure, the President showered you with compliments for your writing skills, but it’s you, the person behind the speeches, who is going to make real change here.”

“Josh,” you protested, your voice becoming a whisper as you grew uncomfortable with the accolades once again.

“I’m serious,” he began, moving to stand in front of you. “No one ends up in the West Wing by chance. You were meant to be here. And I have no doubt in my mind that you are going to run this building one day.”

You shook your head, letting your hair fall in front of your face to shield Josh from seeing the tears forming in your eyes. No one has ever believed in you like Josh does.

“Hey,” he worriedly said, slowly reaching for your hand. “What’s really bothering you?”

You looked down at your hands, fingers laced with his for what felt like the hundredth time. The line was always a bit blurred with Josh. You worked on so many projects together, spending hours on end in one office or another. Three years of small spaces and critical decision making led to post-meeting breakdowns, confiding in people you spent hours on end with.

Josh quickly became your person at work, and after the shooting, you became his. Neither of you spoke of it, you just knew that he would be there for you whenever you needed it. Josh knew it all, from screaming matches with Toby, to family emergencies, and the never ending question of what your purpose in life is, which was looming over everyone’s head that worked in the West Wing.

You had always felt something more for Josh. Maybe you read too much into it when he would walk you home from a late night event at the White House, or how he would call you in the middle of the night to get your thoughts on how to best proceed with policy. It was easy between you two, and with Bartlett’s second term in the White House now halfway through, you thought this friendship would finally shift to something more.

But now that you were equals, senior advisors to the President, holding extreme responsibilities for the republic in your hands, you knew that the dynamic would change. There was no room to slide into a new relationship.

“Things are going to change now, between us. And I know that nothing has really been said but, I’d like to think something was… shifting into more.” Your voice trailed off at the end, embarrassment taking over.

“There was.” Josh reassured you, a small smile breaking over his face.

You nodded, and in an attempt to hide the goofy smile crossing your own face, you continued to look down at your hands. You reached out for his other hand, which he gladly surrendered to you.

“Things don’t have to be different. There are no rules against a devilishly handsome Deputy Chief of Staff dating a gorgeous Deputy Communications Director.” He joked, trying to get a laugh out of you.

He was right, there really wasn’t a rule against it. And if there was, you’re sure it had been broken before.

“I’m sure you’re right. But if I really want to make a difference here, I need to focus on this job, and not be distracted by an annoying Deputy Chief of Staff.”

“I understand,” he said with a smile, giving your hands a squeeze. “And I think a two month adjustment period is plenty of time before I ask you out on a date.”

“Josh,” you said through a laugh, “Are you really that impatient you need to put a timetable on it?”

“Yes. Four months sound better?”

“Six months.” you said, but as you looked at him longer, you knew you couldn’t possibly last that long. “With a check-in at the three month mark to see how I’m adjusting.”

“That sounds like a great plan.”

A great plan indeed.

To an outsider, the two of you looked like school kids interacting with their first crush. And that’s exactly how you felt, butterflies in your stomach and your brain all fuzzy.

“Josh!” You could hear Toby yelling through your closed office door, and you couldn’t help but sigh.

“You’re Director is a real pain in my ass.”

“I tried to get his job while I was in there, but the President said no.”

He laughed and tried to pull away, but you held on to his hand even tighter.

“Josh,” he turned back to you, and you couldn’t help but wrap your arms around him. It took him a minute, but his arms wrapped around your waist, and you finally felt like you could do this. “Thank you for the book.”

“You’re welcome. You’ve got this.” He said and dropped a kiss to your shoulder, then your cheek before pulling away. “I’ve gotta go find the dictator before he breaks every door down.”

“Go ahead, I’m going to spare myself from him for as long as I can.”

“Ok, I’ll see you in Senior Staff tomorrow morning. Newbie brings a full breakfast.” he joked.

“In your dreams,” you said with a roll of your eyes as he went to exit your office.

“You really are going to do great here.” He winked and wrapped his knuckles on the doorframe before yelling into the bullpen himself for Toby.

Yeah, there’s no way you guys are lasting six months.

****

#josh lyman x reader #josh lyman fic #josh lyman #the west wing #the west wing fanfiction

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longtallglasses · 1 month

Text

it’s very interesting to me amongst the different fandoms i’ve been a part of in regards to their attitudes toward nsfw fanworks bc with the marauders those teens are always wildin’ - smoking, drinking, sleeping together - if they’re not i would even say it would be out of character for them? wolfstar is messy and horny and so in love, even if in a lot of fics they won’t admit it to each other. in atyd everyone is shagging up a storm, the girls, the boys, it’s still juvenile of course the way they discuss it and go about it. very little communication, feelings are hurt, they don’t know what they’re doing all the time. and it makes sense, they’re teenagers!

i have never once heard of discussion around it being ‘wrong’ to write them this way. that it’s ‘objectifying’ and if you’re thinking about it you must be weird or unnecessarily sexualizing characters. sexualizing characters? they’re already sexualized wdym? they have a sexuality, everyone has a sexuality, whatever the author/artist wants to give them, whether that’s a sex crazed maniac or the most sex repulsed asexual, they Have a Sexuality! even before the exact moment they turn 18, they have a sexuality. it’s just another facet to explore character through, to understand them more fully, and also sometimes for the author to help understand themselves.

i’m sorry age doesn’t matter when it comes to fictional characters. it just doesn’t. they’re not real you can’t hurt them. if someone wants to write through trauma, something ‘wrong’ and ‘problematic’ let them use fictional people. it may seem gross and you don’t have to read it, but its existence does not mean promotion of harmful behavior. it can mean so many different things to that author but it doesn’t equate to that.

i say this bc i myself have written some horrid things. i’ve never posted them, was not in a place where i wanted to, i wrote it all in a period of my life where i was seriously hurting, and writing fucked up horrific things stopped me from hurting Myself. i’ve read some ‘problematic’ fics that made me feel better, hurt me in a good way, reading comments of people who related and appreciated what was being explored.

most people who write about fucked up shit, SA, or some form of trauma porn or whatever it is have probably gone through something similar in their life. the people who read it and seek it out are usually drawn to it for a reason but we don’t need to know why. there is also just curiosity. and being curious doesn’t make you a bad person, it doesn’t mean you ‘like’ it. you may like the power dynamics at play, you may be intrigued by desires different than your own, you may… ANYTHING what you enjoy to read or write speaks to nothing regarding who you are in your day to day life. your morals, your beliefs, or what you want sexually or otherwise. i say this to a younger me, there’s nothing wrong with you!

with all that being said… there is also porn that is just porn. and that’s perfectly fine and good too. people have always written porn about whatever and whoever they want and they always will. if you don’t want it, scroll pass. you won’t be given a gold star for announcing you think it’s gross or wrong, you just look silly. i’m not saying that you must like it too, but attacking the moral character of those who do partake, shows an immaturity and lack of tack when it comes to these subjects. go out in the world and you will discover just how ‘abnormal’ and ‘depraved’ sexual desire can manifest itself as.

as someone who grew up a Very sexually confused person. not knowing i was queer or on the ace spectrum exploring sexuality through fiction was like my saving grace. and those books and those fics that made me feel seen, made me go huh! woah! ooooh my god that’s me! or made me go … wait why do i kinda like that? more often than not they were written by adults. bc they had made it through to the other side so to speak. and as An Adult now i find the traditional adolescent experience very intriguing as i did not have that growing up. the sexual experiences i’ve had now have shown me so starkly that that feeling which accompanies a new experience never really goes away. people are fumbling well into their 20s and 30s. reading the plight of a young person discovering who they are sexually i don’t think will ever not be relatable or make someone reflect. that includes the sweet and innocent as well as the ‘gross’/depraved horniness. it is not necessarily enjoyed on a basis of attraction to these characters, it is enjoyed on a basis of ‘i know this feeling’ or ‘i also do and have yearned for this kind of intimacy’. and if who you are isn’t represented in those stories, oh well damn, looks like i have to write it now. that’s how we have Are you there God, it’s me Margaret and the edge of 17 (the ‘98 and ‘16 iterations), all these stories written by Adults! that make us all sigh in relief and laugh and cry and aaahhh

fiction is fiction, idek what anti-ship means, let people be freaks in peace, fandom spaces are created to have fun in, let’s pls have Fun!!! explore and write and draw and fantasize whatever your heart desires bc there can be no right or wrong, it is just discovery.

if you feel kinship with characters and it feels natural to extend yourself to them, to take them and make them your own, amazing, gorgeous, beautiful. play dress up with them in all the ways you can, do whatever You Want!!

#i really surprised myself w how much i wanted to say here but #i started writing and just couldn’t stop #byler #marauders #spicy byler #fandom #fandom discourse #fandom discussion #fanfiction #byler fanfic #marauders fanfiction #stranger things #speaking my truth #bc i can’t believe what i see sometimes #gritting my teeth as i post this #i just feel like this message needs to be reiterated #i know there are a lot of young people in this fandom and i find this censored attitude so harmful #longtallglasses

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gonzo-rella · 4 months

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The Benevolent Girlfriend | Kim Pine (ft. Wallace Wells)

MASTERLIST | AO3 | KO-FI

Relationship(s): Kim Pine x sick!gn!reader (romantic), Wallace Wells x sick!gn!reader (implied romantic)

Summary: Your roommate Wallace is repulsed by your cold, so he gets your girlfriend Kim to come over and take care of you.

Warnings: You're gross and sick, sorry. (Let me know if I need to add any)

Word count: 0.8k

(A/N: I finally rewatched Scott Pilgrim vs. the World, because I wanted to watch it before I watch the anime (haven't seen it yet, but once I have I'll make a post and add it to my fandom list), and damn I'm in love with Kim. I've been enjoying writing these sick fics whilst I recover from the common cold, so I figured I'd try writing something about Kim, and I was motivated to write something that wasn't just headcanons, which I've already done with the Yellowjackets ladies, Abed and Annie from Community and Charlie, Todd and Neil from Dead Poets Society. This is my first Scott Pilgrim fic, so hopefully it's alright! I tried to capture the spirit and tone of the movie and characters. I'd like to write more for both Kim and Wallace specifically. Maybe I'm delirious from being sick but I'd love to write a fic where the reader is the S/O of both Kim and Wallace to indulge myself because I'm in love with them both.)

A mattress on the floor in a very cold country surely couldn’t have been the best place to recover from a cold- an idiot could tell you that. Wallace had very kindly made you soup and brought you countless glasses of water, but he had hauled his chair as far away from you and the bed as he could manage in the small apartment because, to quote him, you were ‘repulsive and contagious, no offence’. He had been very gracious in letting you pick out what daytime TV crap you wanted to watch.

It reached the late afternoon when there was a knock at the door, and, with a huff, Wallace got up to get it, leaving you to stare absently at the TV through the mist of your mild headache and clogged ears. Your neck was beginning to ache from craning it to look up at the screen.

“Kimberly. You’re here. What took you so long?”

“Nice to see you too, Wallace. Are they awake?”

Wallace cast a glance in your direction and tilted his head; he then looked back at Kim.

“Well, the lights are on, but it doesn’t look like anybody’s home.”

He punctuated the sentence with a shrug.

“Kim?” you said finally, voice hoarse and nasal from your sore throat and blocked nose respectively.

Kim peered at you over Wallace's shoulder then barged past him. She stood at the foot of your ‘bed’.

“What are you doing here?” you mumbled. “You didn’t have to come.”

“Wallace texted me that you’re sick.”

Wallace left the door ajar, prompting you to wrap your blanket tighter around you. He reached over to grab his coat and slid his arms into it, then stood beside Kim.

“I’m going out with Other Scott, and I thought it’d be cruel to leave you alone, so I told your very benevolent girlfriend-” Kim rolled her eyes as Wallace indicated to her with a nod. “That you were sick and that she might wanna come over and take care of you in your equally benevolent roommate’s stead.”

“Okay. Thanks, Wa-”

You were interrupted by a sneeze. It was so sudden that you made the split-second decision to cover it with your hands. When you peeled it away, droplets of snot coated your palms.

You groaned.

Wallace scrunched up his nose.

“That’s disgusting,” Kim commented monotonously.

“I’m sorry,” you muttered. “I’ve been told.”

“And, with that,” Wallace said, stepping over to the door and swinging it open. “I’ll leave you kids to it. Good luck, Kim. And, I hope you feel better soon, dear.”

“Thanks, Wallace,” you mumbled.

“Fuck off, Wallace,” Kim said dryly, in unison with you.

He waved at you both then closed the door. There was a moment of silence in which you and Kim just stared at one another. Your snot-covered hands were still held out in front of you.

“So, you’re sick, huh?”

“Yep.”

“Are you going to clean that up?”

You stared at her blankly, before realising what she meant.

“Oh, yeah. Sorry.”

You went to reach for your box of tissues before you realised that they were on the kitchen counter after Wallace had used a few to shield his hands from direct contact with your glass of water. Kim’s gaze followed yours, but her attention returned to you when she noticed that you were readying yourself to get up.

“One sec. I’ll get them for you.”

You relaxed as Kim made the very short journey to the kitchen counter and knelt down to put the box next to you. She yanked a few tissues from the box before placing them in your hands, careful not to touch your snot.

“Thanks, Kim.”

“No problem.”

She stayed kneeling down beside you, watching as you cleared up your hands. There was a look of contemplation on her face.

“You need anything else?”

You glanced up at her and smiled.

“No, thanks.”

“Alright.”

She climbed over you and took a seat beside you- shoulder-to-shoulder- on the mattress. You looked at her incredulously.

“Are you sure you wanna get so close? Wallace hasn’t come near me all day.”

She folded her arms.

“I don’t care.”

“But, I’m disgusting.”

Kim smirked so faintly that anyone who didn’t know her wouldn’t have registered that it was there.

“I wouldn’t be your ‘benevolent girlfriend’ if that bothered me.”

You chuckled and rested your head on her shoulder, and Kim rested her head on yours.

“Holy shit, you’re hot,” she stated.

“Thanks.”

“I meant you have an alarming fever.”

“Oh. Right.”

There was a pause, and Kim huffed.

“Fine. You’re the other kind of hot, too.”

“Thanks, Kim, that’s very-”

You broke into a series of coughs and doubled over. You covered your mouth with the inside of your elbow. Kim rubbed your back soothingly. Once again, the faintest of smiles tugged at her lips.

“Sorry,” you groaned. “That wasn't very hot.”

“Maybe not,” she said. She rested her hand on your shoulder and pulled you closer, once again resting her head on yours. “But, I love you anyway.”

#scott pilgrim #scott pilgram vs the world #kim pine #wallace wells #kim pine x reader #wallace wells x reader #x reader #x gn!reader #x gn reader #x gender neutral!reader #x gender neutral reader #ficlet

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fancifulplaguerat · 10 months

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I have a light rant/appreciation post for Eva Yan because I have been thinking about her a lot recently. I find her character concept compelling, being a utopian in love with utopia itself; with miracles, love, and dreams. All the utopians (excluding perhaps Vlad and Mark) desire miracles, and seemingly resolve that desire through an obsession and commitment to their respective utopias, i.e. the Polyhedron or defeating death. It’s interesting how Eva fits in here, as a utopian utterly “in love with her own dream,” as Clara describes her. I don’t think her aspirations are completely directionless, though—they’re centered on the Cathedral, and I have thoughts (derogatory) about how the game handles this.

I will say that I actually like Daniil and Eva’s similarities, and what their dynamic communicates about the two of them. I particularly want to dissect this conversation Eva has with Clara:

Eva Yan: Is [the chasm between us] that great? Not really. He longs for miracles; he needs living evidence of the impossible... Yet was this not what I used to brood on daily and nightly? Was this not the reason I shed so many tears over our useless Cathedral?

> Look at me, Eva. I can work miracles. I can sense their nature. Mark my words: neither you nor he will get any miracles for as long as you're expecting them with such greed and entitlement!

[...]

Eva Yan: Those who watched Scarlet Nina build the town, who watched Simon play with our children, would never say it's futile to demand a miracle... One can, and in a way, one must!

It strikes me how Eva claims that she and Daniil need ‘living evidence of the impossible,’ like it’s not enough for them to merely dream about utopia—they want proof that it’s achievable, and to enact miracles themselves. Eva’s rebuttal to Clara also shows a similar adherence to hope that Daniil expresses, and in my opinion runs through all the utopians. After all, they are described as “those who believe in the power of the human spirit and the infinite scope of creativity.” The utopians are ultimately about humanity, even if they are often careless towards others; it’s all in service to an idealistic greater good. Daniil and the Kains likewise claim to be motivated by love, which is central to Eva’s character; this is why I don’t inherently hate Eva becoming infatuated with Daniil. It makes sense in that she is a Romantic and Daniil embodies many of her ideals, but at the same time, I hate how her obsession with Daniil is treated, especially how it comes into play on Day 7.

Eva says that she didn’t sacrifice for Daniil: “Don’t torture yourself... Do not assume I’ve done it for you. Not at all. I just wanted to inhabit this place. To bring the Cathedral to life a bit... so that there were at least something miraculous here.” And likewise Daniil writes that, “All she wanted was to put a miracle into practice and become the living soul of the lifeless Cathedral.” With this context, I was willing to put my side-eye away and entertain that her choice was the consequence of her being so eager for a miracle.

But then the game makes it explicit that she did in fact do this for Daniil. It’s especially damning in Clara’s Route, where Eva asks her, “Will you take care of him when I die? Maria let slip that he has three days left to win; it's a commitment he is bound by. I will have to give my own life so he may survive...” which contextualizes the murmurs about Maria somehow convincing Eva to do it. Clara alludes to this in the Bachelor Route, writing, “I know why Eva did what she did. Would you like me to tell you? [...] The true blasphemy is your negligence. You were meant to achieve victory yesterday. You did not.” And there’s more: Eva tells Daniil, “You know... I’m almost happy now, my dear Daniil... I’ve found a way to help you! But hush... for now it’s a secret!” and tells Clara “I’m sure that the Cathedral will spring back to life very soon—for his sake. And I will help...” And besides all this, Eva makes constant comments about how she wants to help Daniil, how she would turn herself inside out for him, and there’s this fucking line, which makes me bite and scratch: “The moment his boots stepped on the dusty soil of our roads, the moment he took a deep breath of our air, the moment his shadow fell on the cobbles of our town, I knew that my life had changed, and that it was approaching its acme. He has come, and now I live for his sake...” like good god I’m sorry I hate it.

To offer a tepid defense, I do think this fits into a larger pattern in Patho about one person giving their life for another, which is particularly prevalent with the Utopians/Humbles. But I still really dislike Eva making this choice for Daniil’s sake, it takes away from it being her personal, if tragic, way to resolve her utopian desire for the miraculous, and does a disservice to her characterization—instead of her motivation resting in her inner conflict, it again becomes “she’s obsessed with Daniil.” And obviously this is complicated, but the entire thing leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I just think they did her dirty and I hate it because I really enjoy her dialogues, like I love her perspective about the disease and the events of the game. I’m so sorry for what they did to you ms yan

#pathologic #eva yan #daniil dankovsky #patho.txt

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whinlatter · 7 months

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HEYYY I really want you to reflect more on Ginny’s insecurity when it comes to her relationship with Harry. I’ve been thinking about it since your latest chapter. I don’t know how you can portray all these emotions tbh😭 it’s just way too perfect

ok the inbox is aflutter with questions along these lines so! with no spoilers for the rest of the fic, here's a little (big) lunch break meta on my read on the tensions and insecurities in harry and ginny's post-war relationship, and where harry and ginny are at at this point in beasts. thank you anon! 💞

spoilers for chapter 9 are below the cut!

in chapter nine, we see harry and ginny physically the closest they have been to each other in months, but beginning to discover the real distances between them at play in the current version of their relationship, and see the symptoms showing up in their interactions and (lack of) conversation. after the flashback, this chapter begins with ginny, back an awful time at school, waking up in her boyfriend’s bed, enjoying the luxury of time together and opportunities for physical intimacy. as @ashesandhackles pointed out in her very lovely comment, physical touch - particularly a very natural and instinctual expression of intimacy - is a defining feature of harry and ginny’s romantic relationship in the canon series. canon’s also full of examples of them communicating silently/non-verbally (their in-jokes, as early as PoA, but also the various moments that the two read each other’s minds or have entire interactions without having to say a word). these are obviously important, lovely things and something both of them value in their relationship. but, in this case, where ginny is hiding so much, they can quickly become things to hide behind. tellingly, ginny does not wake up thinking oh good now I have all this time to tell harry what’s up with me, and, over the course of the chapter, finds that secrets have a way of slipping out even if you try your very best to keep them under wraps.

why won't ginny open up?

without spoiling the rest of the fic (!) i think there are few things to bear in mind about why ginny isn't opening up to harry, and what insecurities she might have about the relationship that are preventing her from being honest about the hardships she's going through.

the first is that ginny, canonically, is an extremely guarded person who does rarely opens up, including - or especially - to harry. late canon is full of examples of harry seeking reassurance and emotional comfort in ginny, but examples of ginny doing the same in harry are few and far between. 'lucky you' is a reminder that ginny's own distressing experiences credential her as someone harry can seek reassurance and answers from; it is not a cry for reciprocal help or support. her mentioning riddle's diary in HBP when she finds out about the prince's book works similarly - though harry reassures her about it, her concern is for him, not herself. in the birthday kiss scene, only the 'there's the silver lining i've been looking for' line gives away that ginny has been going through emotional difficulty. in fact, it's ron who conveys that ginny has been 'really cut up' over the breakup. throughout the series, ginny consistently practices a kind of emotional selflessness and self-sufficiency. she understands how important she becomes as a source of comfort and safety for harry, and she is happy and proud to fill that role. she cares deeply about harry, she wants to meet his emotional needs, and she does it very well. she's canonically a fantastic liar, too, which is maybe my favourite characterisation note from her - while hermione and ron are both very easily emotionally read, ginny has an incredible poker face and can lie so well she can have literal dung on her hands and convince her own mother that it was crookshanks throwing dungbombs at the door of the order meeting. in canon, we see ginny crumble only once in her emotional stoic-ness in front of harry (in her bedroom after the birthday kiss - and even then she turns away and tries to hide it). we can speculate about why it is that ginny is like this (...), and i talk more about what this means for harry and ginny long term below. but for now suffice to say that ginny doesn't have a track record of divulging her emotional state and anxieties in very many people, including harry.

the second is that ginny is fiercely protective of harry and tries to shield him from pain, including her own. from CoS thru the rest of the series, ginny cares about shielding harry from criticism, distress, and emotional harm ('leave him alone!') it makes sense that, given ginny's interest in safeguarding harry's happiness and keeping her own sufferings private, she would also seek to protect him from information about herself that would upset him or make him feel worse when she recognises he's already going through a tough enough time. (harry himself practices this form of love in his parental relationship with sirius, eg. trying to retract 'my scar hurts' in GoF - sweet child).

the third - relatedly - is that ginny has begun to link her symptoms to her own wartime experiences, and to torture she endured under the carrows, the full extent of which hasn't been addressed at this point in the fic and which harry doesn't know. harry spends most of DH ignorant about what is happening at hogwarts - he worries for ginny post-sword-stealing, but he's reassured that she won't have been tortured because she only got sent into the forbidden forest. cue neville in the hog's head tunnel quite modestly revealing what really has happened at hogwarts, that the torture of children by way of the cruciatus curse has become a daily occurrence, and that the DA, ginny especially, have gone through a fresh hell. that harry crucioed amycus carrow for so much at spitting at mcgonagall tells us something about how harry might take the news of what actually went down at hogwarts during the war and especially what happened to ginny. in ginny's mind, the idea of strolling up to harry and banging on at length about the sufferings she has endured would be to lay more at his door than he deserves to have to worry about.

there's also this other point, the only issue between harry and ginny that is verbally addressed (but not resolved) in this chapter, which is ginny's lingering insecurities about her relationship with the trio, which also colours all of this. the conversation with harry and ginny in bed about harry staying for at the burrow christmas in ron and hermione’s absence is actually the first section i wrote for this chapter, and one of my favourite parts to write. it picks up this theme of ginny’s ambiguous relationship to The Trio as a unit, something i think a lot about and which i play with a bit in other writing (it comes out at a few points in orchards). i want to write a proper meta about this one day, but running thru this canon is a dynamic of ginny constantly being left out of the trio, from ‘go away ginny’ in PoA (‘oh, that’s nice!’) all the way thru DH. ginny only rarely explicitly complains about this exclusion, though it’s clear she has both noticed it and is irked by it. by the series’ end, this dynamic remains unresolved, even though ginny has become emotionally important to all three of the trio individually.

so why doesn't ginny get angrier about it? we know ginny is a stubborn person perfectly capable of sticking up for herself when being mistreated. that we would expect someone as outspoken and stubborn as she is to actually kick off many more times suggests not that ginny doesn't care, but that she has learned to actively fight her impulse to raise the issue and demand better for herself. my read is that the trio excluding her is, like harry's chosen one fate, just another thing ginny has had to (privately) be hurt by, but get her head around and accept because she recognises it’s part of a bigger picture and, by hbp, connected to a broader more serious quest that has something to do with the. (lots of hinny fics have ginny get mad at harry after the war about the break-up and for keeping her in the dark, and, sometimes, for keeping her out of the trio, but i think actually ginny is too far down the self-denying i-just-have-to-deal-with-this path to get mad without external stimulus. she hasn’t let herself be mad about this sort of thing for a long time, much as she has a right to). as a result, the ginny we see in beasts is a person who has become very self-denying, and who has spent a lot of time telling herself she shouldn’t be selfish or let her ego or pride get the better of her, and to accept certain lots in life for the greater good. would harry/ron/hermione be horrified if actually made to confront this? yes, i think so, absolutely! but they have done this to her and are yet to face the music on how they have excluded her so consistently throughout her teen years. it's a tension that absolutely still needs to be raised and resolved.

what will happen now harry knows something is up?

this chapter sees harry start to realise something's going on with ginny. he finds out ginny saw her ex, michael, about a health condition he's having that might be related to hogwarts last year, that ginny describes 'DA stuff'. luna later accidentally clues him onto the fact ginny, too, has had some mysterious health issues she hasn't raised with him, despite their near constant letter communication over the past four months (luna, your bluntness is extremely narratively convenient, thank you). ginny's blurted out question to harry - ‘you still want to stay, right?’ when finding out romione aren't spending much time at the burrow that christmas - echoes harry’s own at the start of the fic (‘you’ll write, right?’). it’s meant as the same act of a character blurting out a revealing question that speaks to a big insecurity and need they have. when harry calls her up on it before bed later that night, ginny tries to reassure him by showing him some of this mental work she’s done over the years to understand and accept what he + ron + hermione are to each other, reassuring him that she doesn’t want to intrude on that, and to go as far as to say that although he’s extremely welcome at the burrow for christmas, he doesn’t have to spend his christmas there if he’d rather be with his best mates. and what we have in harry’s response is him having to face up, for the first time, not just to the extent of ginny’s exclusion from his friend group, but how much work she has done to be at peace with her exclusion from parts of his life and particularly from his friend group which includes her own friend and brother. in her most insecure thoughts, ginny’s thinking oh god what if harry doesn’t want to be here with me as much as he does with ron and hermione; harry’s like, i’m just now realising the person lying next to me seems to think i want to leave to go hang out with my friends instead of spend christmas with her during this awful time for her family, seems to think i’m doing her a favour by staying, and seems to be hiding something from me that is connected to her own wellbeing.

what will harry's reaction be?

i will be keeping my cards reasonably close to my chest on this one, but i will say this... it was important for me to have two issues come up at the same time: harry working out ginny's keeping secrets while also finding out that she feels much more insecure about how important she is to him and how much she just wants him to be happy even at her own expense. i also wanted it to take place in a chapter that hammers home how much the weasleys, including ginny, are people grieving a great loss and struggling with it, harry a witness to ginny's attempts to hold her family together and make this time together special. of course harry's suspicious, and, likely, hurt. but he's also aware of what she and her family are going through, watching them all suffer extreme pain, and he's also just accidentally been informed of some of his own failings and shortcomings when it comes to ginny and her insecurities about her place in his life. that harry isn't immediately demanding answers and calling ginny out is a sign of him both processing dynamics years in the making, but it's also him reading the room. it would be extremely entitled to storm in and demand answers from ginny when he is seeing her and her family in such extreme distress - so instead he's keeping quiet for now, showing her wordless physical affection, and really deeping what's going on here.

harry and ginny will be facing the music very (very) soon. so far in the fic, the moments where ginny has come closest to giving the game away have been whenever harry and ginny are physically in the same place (st andrews, hogsmeade midnight field picnic). i wanted all the issues to start to come up this chapter now that harry and ginny are back together 24/7 and can't hide behind carefully chosen words in letters, and for their physical displays of intimacy and affection to start to stop working as well as strategies to paper over deeper conversations that need to be had. hence ginny waking up in harry’s bed with no nightmares after physical intimacy at the start of the chapter, but going back to the nightmares despite his proximity and physical displays of affection by the time we get to the chapter's end. their coping mechanisms are running out of road.

would harry be jealous of ginny telling michael?

harry (and ginny) are canonically a bit jealous, absolutely. but they're only really jealous when they're broken up and have more reasons to be insecure about their relationship (ginny with cho, harry with dean/krum - all are tensions that happen while they're broken up. when they're together, it's something they laugh about, eg. romilda and fleur). some of the responses to the fic (understandably) have focussed on oh my god ginny saw her ex. but i think ginny seeing her ex (which she doesn't deliberately keep from harry but realises after the fact she should tell him about, and is careful not to lie to him) is less likely to be upsetting to harry than the idea that ginny went and saw someone that she shared intense, traumatic experiences with that harry wasn’t a part of, and that, throughout DH, he’s in the dark about. that it's michael doesn't improve things, but it's the bigger context that makes the act more upsetting.

are harry and ginny doomed?

a lot of hinny critics cite various versions of the above dynamics as reasons why hinny would ultimately not make it long-term as a couple. i (obviously) disagree with that, because i believe these are two characters willing and able to make this relationship flourish and thrive. with that said, i don't think people writing harry and ginny as a pairing should ignore the existing dynamics within hinny as a relationship that would need to be unpacked and worked on as they rebuild their relationship as a foundation for a happy, healthy future together. this includes the fact that their relationship has been uneven in the level of mutual emotional support in canon, and full of cultivated omissions and silences. i'm not blaming harry (much) for this - i think harry has had, if not good reasons, then understandable reasons why, in the canon timeline, he gives ginny less emotional support than she gives him, not least because 1) he has (frankly) needed more (not to diminish ginny's post chamber trauma, but i think this is fair to say), 2) because ginny has great trouble accepting emotional support, and 3) because the arc of the later series is harry slowly accepting the role of the chosen one, deciding that he is not a normal person, and setting himself on a singular path to destruction stripped of ties to other people, even though he longs for the life of a normal person deep down. less dramatically, harry also ends the series a repressed 17 year old boy with some obliviousness issues and some growing up to do in ways that make him actually extremely typical of even emotionally healthy teenage boys (do i think every kind supportive man i now know in my late twenties was the best at emotional literacy and maturity at age 17? no no i do not. having met some of them at that time, i can you for a fact that they were, in fact, Not, and none of them were the subject of a terrible prophecy and all fought in precisely zero wars).

i believe harry wants a mutually supportive relationship with ginny. i believe him capable of having just that, and willing to do the work to build it. we know in canon he wants to build a family and instinctually practices reasonably healthy dynamics within one (in his familial relationship with sirius, it's often harry who sets the boundaries and healthy precedents). harry also often worries about ginny's wellbeing, physical and emotional, in his internal monologue, and sincerely wants to make her feel better about the awful things going on around them and that he is putting her through (see the birthday kiss scene - his instinct is to comfort her, and it's ron's rage that stops him). i'm always struck that in DH he starts to watch ginny on the map not when she might be in physical danger (eg. when she comes into contact with carrows/snape), but when she is in bed, alone with her thoughts/dreams/nightmares, and imagines himself reaching into her brain and hoping she's doing ok. in the battle he tries to reassure ginny in the thick of fighting even though he knows they are 'empty words'. across all his relationships more generally, he does show capacities for emotional awareness and generosity, consistently building loving, supportive connections with other characters throughout the series arc, and worrying particularly about the emotional state of the people he views as family (sirius chief among them).

when push comes to shove, harry potter, by the end of DH, is getting much better at knowing how to make his closest loved ones feel better. my favourite example being his perfect detonation of words and physical comfort to ron in the forest of dean - ron feels forgiven, loved and understood by harry so beautifully in that scene. i argue that he would take this hard-won work-in-progress trait and run with it when it comes to building his postwar relationship with ginny. but i think harry has a lot still to learn about how to communicate effectively, how to verbalise that concern and action it into meaningful emotional support and comfort, and at this point in beasts, he's perhaps beginning to realise how deficient he's been in this department. ginny, too, has a lot of work of her own to do. and it's my pleasure to try and figure out how they do that, and i'm grateful for the faith in me having a go at writing a version of it in this fic!

#beasts #TL;DR hinny grow old together #emphasis on the grow #full author's note to come but first too many words on harry and ginny's emotional constipation #hinny #meta #harry x ginny #ginny weasley #beasts spoilers #hinny meta

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