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chairteeth · 3 months

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Nemu's life as a wheelchair user and how terrible f4 is at portraying it (or, well, Not portraying it)

Buckle up I have a list of PointsTM. I will be going into Japan's history with disability as well as what life is like on a wheelchair.

First though, because I want this to have the intended effect, I recommend going over Nemu's swimsuit costume story again. It is Very Relevant. I recommend you enjoy the fluff of it too, before I dump the depressing thing about it on you. Though I will say I really REALLY appreciate how far Touka always goes to make Nemu feel comfortable and supported and listened to and cared for in every situation and- is shot.

So, apparently this room has a big mirror, and Nemu gets uncharacteristically giddy and we get this scene that Will hurt you. She even says that she finds this just as important as the liberation plan.

They had ALL OF THE SETUP, ALL OF IT. And now I would like to also share a recent analysis of Nemu's wheelchair that I dragged some wheelchair users to do, then I'll start thrashing and yelling about the significance of such a change. For reference we mainly have the sprite right:

I'm going to provide the relevant texts directly for you:

no theres like zero leg support beyond the foot plate and even the way the foot plate is designed implies that she has pretty good motor control over her legs

ya no calf pads or anyting smh

and whats with the armrests those dont look v comfy??

i doubt she needs much body support beyond the walking there's proper cushioning elsewhere, though

I can't see a headrest either, and the backrest is not very high, so I'm pretty sure she just can't walk and everything else is largely fine

Me:

it's a separate continuity, but in the anime Nemu can stand. We don't see her walking but we see her standing a few times, and some of them are at points where she has to have walked at least a little bit, so I definitely think it's not "100% can't walk" but rather something more complex. Even before she was a magical girl we saw her standing in the hospital, though you could argue that was before whatever anime illness she has got worse

huh. that sounds like chronically ill person energy conservation to me at least in the anime. me and (name omitted) do that, were usually on our wheelchairs because a walk to the grocery store may be too much and we might keel over from the pain or exhaustion. what about the game?

Me:

I don't think she can walk at all in the game? The times she's not in her wheelchair, someone is carrying her, iirc. I told you that the cause of it was her shaving away her life force repeatedly, and I've explained the other symptoms, but truth be told, we don't see those other symptoms again post Arc 1 (which I think is just because she's under less stress and not constantly shaving away the aforementioned life force), and we were sadly robbed of any kind of "discovery" scene where we get her actual reaction and yk, her assessing the permanent damage done to her body?

Me:

I told you guys how soul gems work as essentially the girl's soul puppetting her body, right? My personal theory is that she did so much damage to herself that it significantly weakened part of the soul gem-body connection. I thought it may have been severed, but if that were the case, I'm pretty sure her legs would just rot off, since magical girl bodies rot when separated from their soul gems for too long iirc, plus she can feel temperature on them so

WHY DIDNT YOU TELL US ABOUT THE TEMPERATURE THING

Me:

I'M SORRY IT'S AN OBSCURE ASSUMPTION BASED ON A QUOTE OR TWO ABOUT A FUCKING KOTATSU, THEY NEVER FUCKING TALK ABOUT THE DETAILS OF THE LEG THING, I WAS TRYING TO STICK AS CLOSE TO THE TEXT AS POSSIBLE

Me:

she's also never complained about pain from her legs, she's lamented the whole being unable to walk once or twice ("this body of mine can't help in any significant way") but never said a word about pain or other complications. Granted, she's also a people pleaser who would rather put on a stoic face than mildly inconvenience literally anyone

yea then it might just be she cant do the walking motions reliably. didnt you say she has an overprotective gf? The gf may have argued for the wheelchair thing to be on the safe side

mmmmmmmmmm ye sounds about right

They also talked a bit about control pads and wheels but this was the summary one of them gave me:

So in short, Nahi: mobility and feeling all good, but no walkies or will fall on face and fracture skull

With that out of the way, I am going to go on my certified rant about living in a wheelchair. Let's start at the general inaccessibility of Japan. Nemu's wheelchair isn't exactly... compact or foldable from what I can tell so that doesn't help her in the least. Here is a non-exhaustive list of things to consider:

That's the analysis and conclusion of that part, which will help discuss the next one. Now, first of all... I have complained MANY TIMES about our lack of any scene where this permanent damage is revealed to the characters. They skipped over that. Which I thought, oh, okay, maybe we'll get it in a costume story for the wheelchair sprite. We did not get that! And that's important. Because see, Nemu I think might be able to hide her initial raw reaction depending on who was in the room with her. If she was alone or (preferably and probably likeliest) with Touka, she might not hide it, but it has to have sunk in that she would be dead to her family again. And for a character who so desperately wanted to fit in with her family, go camping with them, and presumably do all the outdoorsy and sporty stuff with them, YEAH, A SCENE LIKE THAT WOULD BE NEEDED

especially because Nemu has the tendency to both self-flagellate excessively (Touka also does this) and to hide all of her feelings and suppress them as hard as humanly possible.

- Less maneuverability or no access at all in some places, such as hotel rooms, restaurants, and stores

- Way longer wait times for nearly everything

- The temples are shitty to access because 90% of them have The Stairs, and the parks surrounding them have gravel grounds that make it almost impossible to run a wheelchair through (or at least, it's really hard. Think of when Sakurako had to carry Nemu on the beach, sand/sand-like ground and wheelchairs most often do not mesh, especially electric ones)

- The general congestion of large cities is not good but at least Japanese people tend to be nice and polite about it and try not to bother/touch wheelchair users, however this is unavoidable and oh boy haha rush hour

- In the end a wheelchair user in Japan is pretty limited in what they can do if not accompanied, which absolutely sucks

Streets are often narrow too so gestures at list. Plenty of buildings, especially old ones, are never really upgraded/don't have ramps or accessible elevators either, and I have literally seen a Japanese building that needed you to climb seven steps to get into the elevator?? Okay, alright, I will try not to bitch too hard. If using Yokohama as a base, the thing with large cities is that actually, the subway and train networks are generally good for wheelchair users (though they have to take extra steps and a trip that would take an able-bodied person one hour may take the wheelchair user double that amount of time, plus the station staff will choose your train for you). Everything else however, not so nice, and again The Stairs.

Let's start with showering and bath/general bathroom difficulties. First of all, it's MUCH likelier for a person in Nemu's position to slip and hurt themselves in the shower/bath, not even likely to be able to stop their own fall because Legs No Worky, secondly washing up unassisted when you're in a wheelchair both takes longer and is difficult/inconvenient, particularly if you don't have a specific chair or other thing to help you in the tub/shower (I am unsure if her family would be agreeable to this or if she'd even ask). For Nemu's benefit we are going to go with my interpretation that magical girls do not have periods, because otherwise oh dear god well that's way worse! But yes there's that whole complication and see, if you live with your family you have people you can ask for help. However we are talking about Nemu, and Nemu would rather starve under a bridge than ask for help (in 99% of cases). We have a section for internal effects of leg loss don't you worry but like, girl already felt like a burden before, imagine how she feels now when she actually does have to depend on others occasionally. Showering/bathing must be an absolute nightmare every single day for the poor girl. You don't realize how much you rely on walking and having usable legs inside the house until you lose that ability.

Now I go on the funny historical tangent! Around the 1960s in Japan, there was an increase in disabled children being separated from their families and placed in residential institutions, many of which were converted from the ones built for disabled veterans after WW2. At the age of 18, many of these children were then transferred to adult facilities where they would remain until death. As you may be able to imagine, these institutions were not great! Cue many many MANY human rights violations, including child residents being used as guinea pigs for their doctors in surgical procedures and disgusting amounts of incidents of sexual abuse towards female residents

the traditional Japanese notion that disabled people should be hidden by their families like a shameful secret was veeeeery prevalent! That is why these places even existed. Those beliefs are, Still ShiftingTM so to speak but it is much better now because hey at least they finally have an anti-discrimination law. By "finally" I mean that ten years ago they did not have one. You see, the literal basic anti-discrimination act for people with disabilities in Japan only came into effect in 2016 (for the reference of the Americans who may not know and for an easy example, in the US, the same thing happened in 1990, which is still recent-ish but not, "less than ten years ago" recent). That's only eight years ago. So let's not even talk about how VERY highly Not Possible a fully wheelchair-adapted/comfortable home would be in Japan. It ain't great chief, basic programs are still being implemented, and I highly doubt people are very widely educated on the matter unless it affects them personally. I think that is most of the funny historical tangent, so... time for me to talk about adapting to life on a wheelchair.

This leads me into another very funny thing: reach. Imagine having short person struggles. Okay, now imagine your height is cut in half and you have to be sitting down for everything. Who wants to bet you are now unable to reach A LOT of the things at home? Bathroom setups vary so that one you can circumvent, however! Consider the following: Nemu displays an enjoyment of cooking. Have you ever tried to sit down in front of most kitchen counters? They are pretty high up from that position. Which is fine when you're maybe just resting on the chair but can stand up/take steps around, but when you can't... well. Cooking just got a whole lot more inconvenient and complicated! Nemu seems to keep doing it, so I imagine she's figured out the kitchen table hack (kitchen tables are often lower than the counters and therefore often used to do the prep work instead of the counter because it's more comfortable). This still does not account for the stove but we haven't heard of Arc 2 Nemu cooking solo, only either with her mom or Sakurako, so I assume Nemu's family has the decency not to send her to make dinner like they do in Arc 1.

On the topic of short reach, have you ever realized how inconvenient doorknobs can be if you're sitting down? And doors in general when it's not so easy to move, really. This is more the case for those with less grip strength or less mobility than Nemu, but doorknobs are still generally placed high enough to be inconvenient, doors depending on how they open can be annoying (though sliding doors I've heard are better, so long as they're not too heavy), and let's not even talk about the heavy-ish doors that you have to push against. Because while that might be easy outside of a wheelchair... not so much on a wheelchair. The inconvenience of doors and doorknobs aside though, and back to public transport for a second, you cannot be spontaneous. According to a couple of Japanese wheelchair users I gnawed at for the purpose of research, you need to warn literally everyone at least 30 minutes in advance if you want to be able to board a train. If something comes up or is urgent, I assure you, you won't be able to hop on whatever train or taxi you want.

For Nemu in particular taxis may not be possible, but f4 ignores this really hard (like most things that have to do with Nemu's disability, given that it is acknowledged as a thing that exists LIKE TWICE after the initial timeskip scene at the end of Arc 1, mainly in Christmas string where she laments not being able to help with physical labor in any significant way due to "This Body Of Mine" [she's very dramatic about it but also this is an important hint to how she actually feels now that she's experienced at the very least months of living like this and now that she's alone with Touka instead of self-flagellating in public]). In Mokyu's MGS, I remember that moment when Touka calls for a taxi very much On The Spot and they both get on to follow Mokyu, seemingly very fast, and I was just like "????". I'm not really sure that's... a thing they can do that easily, f4...

But anyway, how about another item? Let's talk clothing. This is also not something able-bodied people usually consider or think about, but clothing generally was not designed for sitting. It will likely never fit right for wheelchair users, and many pieces of clothing may not even be comfortable, not to mention they may not be able to wear a lot of things (such as long/drapey fabrics that could interfere with movement, whether of the wheels, the control pad, or their bodies), and depending on how much mobility they have, changing itself can be another nightmare to do unassisted, or at least, it takes longer and takes more effort (we will get back to the "effort" part soon). This depends, sure, but it's often worse for kids and teenagers because they're still growing. It's okay though, I'm sure Touka would be really offended about this and would just take Nemu to get clothing custom made. What a good partner. The clothing issue is often overlooked, but Very Much A Thing. Some pants are not comfy to sit in for long periods of time, or maybe they fit well when you're standing but not when you're sitting... imagine only ever sitting.

I think I've made my point with the clothing aspect so let's move on to ANOTHER THING! Yes, I have more. Some things like transferring may be more inconvenient in Japan than they would be in the West. Transferring, in case you're not aware, is what a wheelchair user moving themselves from their wheelchair to another place to sit (such as a dining table chair, if they want, or a sofa), or back to the wheelchair, is called. It may be more inconvenient in Japan because well, The Floor. Transferring largely relies on upper body strength in most cases, and see, you can park a wheelchair next to a sofa or other chair and move yourself there reeelatively easily, but the floor may be a bit harder due to the difference in elevation from surface to surface. Once again, it depends on the specifics of the wheelchair user in question, overall. I've heard a couple of people say that the floor is Very Bad to transfer to and from, but one of them has mobility issues in the upper body and the other has arm weakness (he can only get back up because he's able to push a little bit with his legs).

For Nemu there's also the possible school complications, but I have not looked much into how accessible Japanese schools are for students on wheelchairs, though I do want to call a bit of attention to how we've seen Touka at school in Arc 2 but never Nemu, and I feel like that might be one of the reasons. Studying from home I suppose could be an option, though it would be iffy to me because of the whole part about being stuck inside and hidden away.

Before I move on to other things, let me. Talk about this other thing. That is specifically heartbreaking for Nemu. That being physical intimacy (we're talking hugs and the like, people, don't get ahead of yourselves). Quick quiz question for you to think about before I answer it, have you ever thought of how to comfortably hug a wheelchair user?

Normally, when put on the spot, the typical able-bodied person who has never thought about it says that well, you can just bend over to hug them! And while that kind of works, that is not exactly a "full hug" and also requires more effort and more Going Out Of Your Way on the able-bodied person's part than a hug to an able-bodied person that you can just easily walk up to and hug without any adjustment, which makes it less likely that the wheelchair user will get casual affection through that. A common one is the hug from the back, which works just like you'd do it for any sitting person, however the hug from the back is not exactly common and depends on how close the two people are. And then there's the other main way to do it, if it doesn't hurt for the wheelchair user. Which is the lap hug. Able-bodied person sits on the wheelchair user's lap and that is how the hug happens. Most wheelchairs should be able to bear the weight, since you have to account for things like carrying groceries or Other Stuff already, so the capacity to bear weight is built-in (some wheelchairs can carry up to 700lbs/317kg). However you will notice that a lap hug is a significant leap in intimacy that not that many people might be comfortable with, particularly in a less touchy culture like Japan. Personally I think Touka is princess enough, has enough of an ego, and enough of a bond/trust with Nemu that she'd have no qualms sitting on her lap, but Yeah. Holding hands is another one that may take a while to adjust to, since it's basically a MASSIVE height difference that you can't bridge, and also walking-walking vs walking-rolling (or whichever verb you prefer for wheelchair users) areeee different let's just say and speed adjustment can also be a bitch

What I'm saying is if poor Nemu was already affection deprived before, It Got Worse. I will touch on this more when I talk about the social consequences losing her legs must've had. To sum this all up so far, it's an entire reevaluation of the world you live in. Things that were once convenient are now inconvenient, or at best, don't help you anymore. People are often stumped as to what to say to you or what to do or how to act around you, especially if you bring up any and all struggles that have to do with the wheelchair thing. It's not Nemu's case but if she had a friend group, that would also mean possible distancing from them due to being unable to do as many activities with them or go to the same places as before. The world is built for the able-bodied, and the effort it takes to just navigate life in a wheelchair can be extremely draining. And SPEAKING OF EFFORT, it is time for the spoon theory! Those of you already familiar with it may skip this part, as I'm simply going to copy and paste from the original creator of the spoon theory, but for anyone who has never heard of the spoon theory, please, do read this part. It may help you understand something extremely important for the daily lives of so many people, and it may even give some of you who the spoon theory does apply to a new tool to use. This is the spoon theory:

As I went to take some of my medicine with a snack as I usually did, she watched me with an awkward kind of stare, instead of continuing the conversation. She then asked me out of the blue what it felt like to have Lupus and be sick. I was shocked not only because she asked the random question, but also because I assumed she knew all there was to know about Lupus. She came to doctors with me, she saw me walk with a cane, and throw up in the bathroom. She had seen me cry in pain, what else was there to know?

My best friend and I were in the diner, talking. As usual, it was very late and we were eating French fries with gravy. Like normal girls our age, we spent a lot of time in the diner while in college, and most of the time we spent talking about boys, music or trivial things, that seemed very important at the time. We never got serious about anything in particular and spent most of our time laughing.

I started to ramble on about pills, and aches and pains, but she kept pursuing, and didn’t seem satisfied with my answers. I was a little surprised as being my roommate in college and friend for years; I thought she already knew the medical definition of Lupus. Then she looked at me with a face every sick person knows well, the face of pure curiosity about something no one healthy can truly understand. She asked what it felt like, not physically, but what it felt like to be me, to be sick.

As I tried to gain my composure, I glanced around the table for help or guidance, or at least stall for time to think. I was trying to find the right words. How do I answer a question I never was able to answer for myself? How do I explain every detail of every day being effected, and give the emotions a sick person goes through with clarity. I could have given up, cracked a joke like I usually do, and changed the subject, but I remember thinking if I don’t try to explain this, how could I ever expect her to understand. If I can’t explain this to my best friend, how could I explain my world to anyone else? I had to at least try.

At that moment, the spoon theory was born. I quickly grabbed every spoon on the table; hell I grabbed spoons off of the other tables. I looked at her in the eyes and said “Here you go, you have Lupus”. She looked at me slightly confused, as anyone would when they are being handed a bouquet of spoons. The cold metal spoons clanked in my hands, as I grouped them together and shoved them into her hands.

I explained that the difference in being sick and being healthy is having to make choices or to consciously think about things when the rest of the world doesn’t have to. The healthy have the luxury of a life without choices, a gift most people take for granted.

Most people start the day with unlimited amount of possibilities, and energy to do whatever they desire, especially young people. For the most part, they do not need to worry about the effects of their actions. So for my explanation, I used spoons to convey this point. I wanted something for her to actually hold, for me to then take away, since most people who get sick feel a “loss” of a life they once knew. If I was in control of taking away the spoons, then she would know what it feels like to have someone or something else, in this case Lupus, being in control.

She grabbed the spoons with excitement. She didn’t understand what I was doing, but she is always up for a good time, so I guess she thought I was cracking a joke of some kind like I usually do when talking about touchy topics. Little did she know how serious I would become.

I asked her to count her spoons. She asked why, and I explained that when you are healthy you expect to have a never-ending supply of “spoons”. But when you have to now plan your day, you need to know exactly how many “spoons” you are starting with. It doesn’t guarantee that you might not lose some along the way, but at least it helps to know where you are starting. She counted out 12 spoons. She laughed and said she wanted more. I said no, and I knew right away that this little game would work, when she looked disappointed, and we hadn’t even started yet. I’ve wanted more “spoons” for years and haven’t found a way yet to get more, why should she? I also told her to always be conscious of how many she had, and not to drop them because she can never forget she has Lupus.

I asked her to list off the tasks of her day, including the most simple. As, she rattled off daily chores, or just fun things to do; I explained how each one would cost her a spoon. When she jumped right into getting ready for work as her first task of the morning, I cut her off and took away a spoon. I practically jumped down her throat. I said ” No! You don’t just get up. You have to crack open your eyes, and then realize you are late. You didn’t sleep well the night before. You have to crawl out of bed, and then you have to make your self something to eat before you can do anything else, because if you don’t, you can’t take your medicine, and if you don’t take your medicine you might as well give up all your spoons for today and tomorrow too.” I quickly took away a spoon and she realized she hasn’t even gotten dressed yet. Showering cost her spoon, just for washing her hair and shaving her legs. Reaching high and low that early in the morning could actually cost more than one spoon, but I figured I would give her a break; I didn’t want to scare her right away. Getting dressed was worth another spoon. I stopped her and broke down every task to show her how every little detail needs to be thought about. You cannot simply just throw clothes on when you are sick. I explained that I have to see what clothes I can physically put on, if my hands hurt that day buttons are out of the question. If I have bruises that day, I need to wear long sleeves, and if I have a fever I need a sweater to stay warm and so on. If my hair is falling out I need to spend more time to look presentable, and then you need to factor in another 5 minutes for feeling badly that it took you 2 hours to do all this.

I think she was starting to understand when she theoretically didn’t even get to work, and she was left with 6 spoons. I then explained to her that she needed to choose the rest of her day wisely, since when your “spoons” are gone, they are gone. Sometimes you can borrow against tomorrow’s “spoons”, but just think how hard tomorrow will be with less “spoons”. I also needed to explain that a person who is sick always lives with the looming thought that tomorrow may be the day that a cold comes, or an infection, or any number of things that could be very dangerous. So you do not want to run low on “spoons”, because you never know when you truly will need them. I didn’t want to depress her, but I needed to be realistic, and unfortunately being prepared for the worst is part of a real day for me.

We went through the rest of the day, and she slowly learned that skipping lunch would cost her a spoon, as well as standing on a train, or even typing at her computer too long. She was forced to make choices and think about things differently. Hypothetically, she had to choose not to run errands, so that she could eat dinner that night.

When we got to the end of her pretend day, she said she was hungry. I summarized that she had to eat dinner but she only had one spoon left. If she cooked, she wouldn’t have enough energy to clean the pots. If she went out for dinner, she might be too tired to drive home safely. Then I also explained, that I didn’t even bother to add into this game, that she was so nauseous, that cooking was probably out of the question anyway. So she decided to make soup, it was easy. I then said it is only 7pm, you have the rest of the night but maybe end up with one spoon, so you can do something fun, or clean your apartment, or do chores, but you can’t do it all.

I rarely see her emotional, so when I saw her upset I knew maybe I was getting through to her. I didn’t want my friend to be upset, but at the same time I was happy to think finally maybe someone understood me a little bit. She had tears in her eyes and asked quietly “Christine, How do you do it? Do you really do this everyday?” I explained that some days were worse then others; some days I have more spoons then most. But I can never make it go away and I can’t forget about it, I always have to think about it. I handed her a spoon I had been holding in reserve. I said simply, “I have learned to live life with an extra spoon in my pocket, in reserve. You need to always be prepared.”

It's hard, the hardest thing I ever had to learn is to slow down, and not do everything. I fight this to this day. I hate feeling left out, having to choose to stay home, or to not get things done that I want to. I wanted her to feel that frustration. I wanted her to understand, that everything everyone else does comes so easy, but for me it is one hundred little jobs in one. I need to think about the weather, my temperature that day, and the whole day’s plans before I can attack any one given thing. When other people can simply do things, I have to attack it and make a plan like I am strategizing a war. It is in that lifestyle, the difference between being sick and healthy. It is the beautiful ability to not think and just do. I miss that freedom. I miss never having to count “spoons”.

After we were emotional and talked about this for a little while longer, I sensed she was sad. Maybe she finally understood. Maybe she realized that she never could truly and honestly say she understands. But at least now she might not complain so much when I can’t go out for dinner some nights, or when I never seem to make it to her house and she always has to drive to mine. I gave her a hug when we walked out of the diner. I had the one spoon in my hand and I said “Don’t worry. I see this as a blessing. I have been forced to think about everything I do. Do you know how many spoons people waste everyday? I don’t have room for wasted time, or wasted “spoons” and I chose to spend this time with you.”

Ever since this night, I have used the spoon theory to explain my life to many people. In fact, my family and friends refer to spoons all the time. It has been a code word for what I can and cannot do. Once people understand the spoon theory they seem to understand me better, but I also think they live their life a little differently too. I think it isn’t just good for understanding Lupus, but anyone dealing with any disability or illness. Hopefully, they don’t take so much for granted or their life in general. I give a piece of myself, in every sense of the word when I do anything. It has become an inside joke. I have become famous for saying to people jokingly that they should feel special when I spend time with them, because they have one of my “spoons”.

And that folks is the spoon theory. The spoon theory of course applies to wheelchair users. In Nemu's case it's more of a magical affliction and doesn't seem to affect her beyond the part about not being able to walk, however, as we've covered, that part is significant. It takes a mental, physical, and emotional toll. Then, other than this whole thing, there's issues with agency and independence. Yk, being able to live unassisted. I think Nemu could mostly handle it because I mean it's all she's ever done (insert parentification issues and her basically having raised herself, etc etc). Now here is a fun topic. How about social consequences? They are in fact significant as well! We just don't see it as much because Nemu's social life generally starts and ends at Touka, who is arguably the best-equipped person for this. You can bet Touka pulled three all-nighters to do research on this the moment she realized Nemu was not going to recover or at least not in the near future, and we already know she's extremely attentive from what we saw in Arc 1, so. Literally the best possible person for Nemu to hang out with, who will also never try to encroach on her decision-making or her boundaries, never try to take freedom or agency away from her, etc. Unfortunately there are more people around Nemu who may not handle it as gracefully (or well. Whatever Touka is doing. Her stunted social skills are actually a good thing when it comes to this).

Let's go from worst to better: Nemu's family. They are literally not mentioned again after Arc 1's final battle, ever. Not even when Chapter 8 happens. Not at all, zero mentions, at least none as far as I know. Which is concerning. Nemu still speaks fondly of them in Arc 2, from the Christmas quotes, but I mean. Desperate for love. Desperately learning her family's favorite foods and colors, fretting over what gift to get her brother. Which is just extra sad knowing that she's probably dead to them (again). I don't think it's a stretch to say that Nemu's family would have ZERO CLUE how to handle the entire topic. Common reactions are either avoidance/pretending it's not there, or severe awkwardness and hesitation that there is no way the wheelchair user won't notice. Particularly if they're a very perceptive person who pays close attention to the people around them (Nemu). I think Nemu's family might be the avoidance type, since they're allergic to making any effort to get to know her or yk treat her as their daughter instead of, parentifying her to hell and back at best. But let's take another couple of examples: Iroha and Ui.

I think those two might be the awkwardness type. Which is, "I have never encountered this problem and I'm not sure how to go about it but I don't want to hurt or offend this person" and normally leads to general insecurity/anxiety about mentioning specific things around the wheelchair user, or inviting them to things, or assigning tasks to them because the person fears they might hurt themselves/be unable to do what you asked, feel worse, etc. It can manifest in many ways and is normally born out of politeness or genuine personal concern for the other, but alas wheelchair users are not (all) blind, so they do very much notice. On their side it's also awkward and hurtful, in most cases. It's bad too when they get condescended or infantilized or as I mentioned before people take their agency away. It's that thing where you assume the wheelchair user needs help for (insert task) and that you're just being nice by lending them a hand but hey, hey. Maybe ask instead of assuming and moving to do a thing for them that you don't know with 100% is something they need help with. Maybe they don't actually need your help (cough savior/hero complex) and I assure you they appreciate being able to do whatever they can by themselves. Yes, it's well-meaning, but that doesn't mean it won't hurt the wheelchair user or make them feel bad/worse about themselves. The infantilization thing is often related to this too.

Next and last, the inner consequences of a significant loss such as this one. This part is about self-perception, perception in regards to the world and to others, and obviously it ties into Nemu's previously established concerns, fears, and general IssuesTM. This is another "sigh where to begin!" moment for me, because as I have established before, Nemu has major issues. Take literally every issue Nemu has ever had and them pump them full of steroids, then assume that bits of those issues drop off the bigger issue blob and grow into new connected issues. That is what this caused. There is of course a fun set of new issues that relate to the old ones but aren't fully connected as well. That being the feeling of being broken, incomplete, defective. For a person like Nemu whose worth is in considerable part determined by how useful she can be to others, that's not good. She's very much the type to keep things in rather than express them, except the precious scarce few times when we see her alone with Touka (you'll notice that usually we don't get scenes of them alone together save for Christmas String where there was A Pressing Issue to solve, normally it's the rest of the cast going to them for something so it's not exactly the correct atmosphere or moment for a vulnerability moment, Nemu has them, we see some, but they are Very Few).

The one comment from when she and Touka were moving their books out of Touka's private room in the hospital (still real gay of Touka to casually of her own will give Nemu a permanent space in her private room just so she could store her books), the one where she gets all droopy about being unable to help with the whole book moving process? Yeah that's your confirmation that as suspected, yes, she was lying when she said "this is fine" at the end of Arc 1. This is not by any means fine. Sure she has accepted it and thinks she deserves it but this is Nemu "I am to blame for damaging the economy of Japan" Hiiragi (I have a screenshot of when she said this) so like gestures vaguely. By that point in Christmas String, as I said before, she's probably been on a wheelchair for months at the very least, so she's had a chance to experience what that's like, among other things. I can't imagine she feels great about it. While simultaneously thinking her intestines should be bundled up with a pitchfork every day at noon for her sins, of course (insert aforementioned self-flagellation issues). Because she blames herself for literally everything and likely also blames herself every single time her inability to walk leaves her unable to do something she could've done before, and may even push herself beyond what's safe and healthy for her at times. Therefore, internally, yeah, Nemu is way worse than before. FORTUNATELY the stress of the Magius and the physical strain from making uwasa are no longer a thing and she has a safe place to be in every day with her partner who understands and loves her and doesn't even think of any adjustments as "effort" (of course this is nothing for Touka, she's a genius, I can hear the Toukitty saying with her nose up in the air like that). So that is, one good thing. And she can likely read more easily.

Unfortunately, Arc 2 also brings stress and more guilt due to the factions. There's the NM guilt and the PB guilt mainly, but also the stress of the few people they care about besides each other (such as Ui and Iroha) being in mortal danger. And what bothers me is, the way this entire thing affects and stimulates Nemu's concerns and fears from before is so criminally overlooked and outright ignored? We saw from her quotes and personal memo that she desperately wants to be loved, desperately wants to not be forgotten, and to leave behind a legacy (this is about the being forgotten part too). A common issue for wheelchair users is, in fact, that they are neglected and forgotten about, often only an afterthought, particularly for the administration. And so it annoys me endlessly that f4 are allergic to handling their disabled main cast member whatsoever and neglect her in much the same way her family does.

Anyway, this isn't exhaustive, there's definitely more to unpack, but it's already very long and I thank everyone who has read this far for your time. I hope it helped you guys understand at least a little bit better.

#magia record #nishiposting #essay #nemu hiiragi

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a-court-of-moonlight-and-ire · 4 months

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Alright, today Ive read chapters 9-12 and honestly, at a certain point reading this book while knowing all the spoilers stops being frustrating and starts just being funny. Like, Ianthe brings up the fact that people are gonna want to kidnap Feyre for "breeding" to which Tamlin says that no one is gonna dare do that to Prythian's Saviour because then theyll be on the shitlist of the other six courts, but Ianthe says that Rhysand could and would do it because hes The Most Powerful(tm) and hes really manipulative and yeah. shes right. Obviously I know this is gonna be treated as unreasonable and as foreshadowing of Ianthe being evil all along, but shes totally right

Anyway, Rhysand continues to be unbearably annoying but not in any particularly interesting way, so I dont really have anything to say about him. I hate how hes so powerful that six courts all working together would be no match for the night court and he comes across as sooooo insincere. Like, I often talk about not being the biggest Feylin fan because its pretty boring to me, but atleast it was like, sweet because of how genuine and endearingly awkward Tamlin was

Speaking of Tamlin, guess who just keeps getting worse and worse? I had some hope for him when he reduced the guards and gave Feyre more freedom, but then he doubled them again and he did that thing with the barrier around the manor so yeah. Now, if I wanted to be a pedantic asshole I could point out that he listened to Feyre (who managed to very clearly tell him what she needs at the moment, freedom, which was great) and they were doing fine until Rhysand came back, but as much as I would like to blame Rhysand for everything, Tamlin's actions are still his own. And honestly, I find Tamlin keeping any guards around Feyre after what she told him very unreasonable

I think keeping Feyre safe has become a coping mechanism for him because he couldnt protect her from Amarantha back then so now hes trying his best to protect her from Rhysand (and others, but mostly him rn) who was essentially Feyre's very own Amarantha, and obviously its not his fault that thats a coping mechanism he developed, but it is actively making Feyre upset and making it more difficult for her to heal as well, and hes the older one in this situation, hes the guy whos dealt with intense trauma before, he should be listening to her and giving her space

The only thing where I'll kinda take Tamlin's side is him locking her in the manor when he was going to the western border and Feyre wanted to follow them, but even then the force field was way too much. But also, to me it very much seemed like he and Lucien were in a hurry to leave and it was a very hasty spur-of-the-moment decision, but also it felt like the narrative was trying to demonise him more by impling that it was more of a calculated decision. Like, idk thats the vibe that Lucien explaining to Feyre that everyone but her could pass through the shield gave me, but that might just be a personal thing. I mean, Tamlin is clearly being demonised here either way, him being so unreasonable is something that I find very OOC even with the recent trauma hes experienced. But, theres a lot of buts in this paragraph i know, I do also want to acknowledge that Feyre would likely not have wanted to go with Tamlin to this conflict-zone if he had listened to her wayyyyyy earlier and not doubled the guards again. I recognize this kind of behaviour because I also felt like I had no agency over my situation in the past and Im also a very stubborn person, and it lead to me also doing more and more reckless things in an attempt to make the people around me actually listen, and make them understand how serious I was about getting out of the situation that was upsetting me

(In case youre worried, Im completely fine now and Im leaving out a lot of detail for the sake of my privacy and so I can draw a cleaner parallel)

Speaking of Feyre's agency, chapter 12 ended with her having a panic attack because she was trapped and then Mor and Rhysand showed up and Alis just gave them to her??? First of all, insane behaviour, second of all, I hate that Rhysand is meant to be the choice guy or whatever but wont wait for her to come of her own volition. I think it wouldve been better if she had that panic attack and it ran its course and then she either called for Rhys or Mor or managed to winnow to the night court herself and thats how she got there. Also, and this is part of the same issue, I hate that Rhys is the one who originally forced her to read. I think at some point Feyre shouldve realised that all the people in the spring court are withholding information from her but!, she realises that they write shit down sometimes and exchange messages and whatnot so knowing how to read could really help her here and maybe she even thinks about Rhysand taunting her about teaching her UTM, so next time shes at the Night Court she demands that she be taught how to read herself

Because honestly, right now it seems like she has the same amount of agency no matter what court shes in, which is basically none

I was gonna end it on that snappy one-liner, but then I remembered all the stuff with Feyre losing weight and how Rhys remarks upon it and how Feyre notices herself getting thinner as well and I dont have that much to say about it, I just wanted to say that it just made me incredibly uncomfortable

But yeah, now Im done for realsies

#anti acotar #anti acomaf #anti rhysand #anti feysand #tamlin critical #flames and darkness liveblog

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warpspeedgirl · 4 months

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That day we talked about you dismissing my opinion you continued to brush off my feelings by telling me nothing you say is personal and that I could say the same thing to you. I wouldn’t say the same thing to you because when you said it to me, I was shocked by your words and tone and found it very very hurtful and rude to tell me what I think is irrelevant and a pointless thing to bring up in a conversation. Like when we were texting about it and you were like “Well I didn’t think personally about your opinion just so you know” it’s because I actually didn’t shut your opinion down. You’re STILL not getting it and I think that’s why your apologies don’t mean much. You’re still kind of turning it back to me that you didn’t think personally about it, but I did. I wasn’t being rude and shutting you down. You were. You don’t say “I’m sorry for….”. I don’t think you understand why it’s hurtful or rude. The way you were talking to me that day was condescending and hurtful. It’s actually pretty simple but your ego is huge and I think that’s why you can’t see it. To even say “I didn’t think personally about what you were saying” when I’m expressing that you were being hurtful, to say that at all and respond that way just says a lot about your character. You don’t have to try to be right all the time.

You told me a lot of things and your tone was nasty. You told me you weren’t getting frustrated because you knew we were saying the same thing but I told you I am getting frustrated because of how you’re talking to me and you even brushed me off saying that. You’re not getting frustrated? Okay well I am that’s why I said I’m getting frustrated. Because of the manner in which you’re speaking to me. We were not talking to each other the same way that day in any manner. No duh you’re not getting frustrated you don’t have anything to get frustrated about. When I told you certain things my parents would let me do like riding bikes to the park with my friends when I was younger you said “oh my parents would’ve never let me do that and I wouldn’t let my kids do that at that age” verbatim, with disdain. I didn’t say anything like that to you about how you grew up. It just hurt the way you were talking down to me. You were like “why are you talking about the kids I’m talking about the adults” “why are you saying we don’t know what happened, we do know what happened” “so you lied to your mom” you told me the fact that we’d go sit with ‘Whitdney’ because she’d get scared of the gardeners and bring milk or just neighborly things for each other was weird. Trying to essentially debate me when I wasn’t. I was more flustered about the fact that I almost just got into a car accident and you were trying to fight me on this topic that neither of us really care about. I felt really attacked and your tone was extremely condescending and aggressive.The conversation we had when you hurt my feelings REALLY hurt starting from how you were texting me and making it about you. I really thought you’d maybe think oh telling her her opinion is irrelevant and there’s no point in even bringing it up is rude, I’ll check on her. Nope I had to text you first and then you did make it about you. Not that I don’t care when I’ve hurt you too but you had your time to bring that up. That time I was bringing up something specifically from that day. Bring your stuff up later not when I’m reaching out to you. Not in a little way where we let things go. “chalking up the Whitdney thing as like when siblings fight over dumb shit and get over it, but I see that you took it another way” You took it too far for it to be that and I dont talk to my siblings like that. You hurt me and I told you you hurt me. I took it the way any other person would ‘take’ rude behavior. We weren’t talking to eachother the same way at all, that’s why you left scratch free.

I took it another way because you brought it that way and its really astonishing to me that you couldn't see how and it opened my eyes when you explained that you saw it as a nothing little argument and me feeling ‘something personal’ about it, and that you didn't take anything personally. Deflecting that you were being hurtful to me taking things too personally. This was different than one of the little things we let go and I felt like I saw something different in you. You were mean.Being mean, is inherently personal.

All I was saying was who knows what exact words were exchanged between who that day. Thats it! Every little thing leads to the next thing.

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stupid-o-clock · 1 year

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i still feel shitty around my friends. i ranted about this to my best friend earlier but i want to put this here so i'll basically copy paste my feelings.

i'm gonna call my friends P & V bc typing "friend"/"other friend" etc gets confusing after a while.

i was playing huniepop bc it's a fun game when u have nothing to do, but my P saw it in my discord status and immediately dmed the gc "BRO [me] IS PLAYING HUNIEPOP" and we started arguing about it bc she thinks these type of games are weird, idc lol. if u don't like them, don't play them, why get into my business? we have the most opposite opinions on so much shit like why even bother trying to start this

she complained about genshin nsfw popping up on her tl a while ago and told me to stop liking it, no? dont interact, click "not interested", block, even unfollow me idc not like we interact much anyway. gosh

she was so much better to have as a friend before we got close, i started having this feeling recently like once i get to know someone well it becomes weird. like damn, you know my trauma and ik yours? weirdo.. bye-bye! my gf, two best friends + two also pretty close friends are the only exceptions. but that's maybe because i got to know them before i started feeling like this?

tbh with these two it always feels like they've got something against me for no reason, that "no reason" also being im a dude. with all the shit they say n do it's a really toxic women>men type thing LOL and i can never say anything bc they'd team up on me!!

i don't think i'm ever included in those messages but thats bc im trans. if i was a cis dude theyd bully me into the ground, but i dont wanna be treated diff bc im a TRANS guy, im just a guy. the trans doesnt matter. treat me the same youd treat a cis one. and if you cant then we shouldnt be friends!

now this is about V and her boyfriend, theyve got a thing like he unfriends/blocks anyone she doesnt like going on. n one night he wanted her to unf all the dudes shes friends with, including me. personally idgaf but P got really pissed about it.

P said smth like "what did we say about not controlling women in relationships?" and like.. what? V is essentially controlling her boyfriend, so why can't he do the same? P just brushed it off tho bc V is an angel! and she could never do anything bad! her bf don't know that lol?

just like how i'm deffo not a love interest for her, everyone she makes him unfriend probably also isn't! maybe she got bad vibes or whatever that's ok! but god

also P used the r-slur when going off at V's boyfriend and that just rubbed me the wrong way. she's definitely "allowed" to use/reclaim it but it feels like an awful word, AND she was using it to insult someone which makes it even worse.

i feel like i can never disagree with P either bc she'll pull a "shut up ur a man" card. like- she's done that. she's done it as a joke but she'd deffo do it in a serious manner too-

also, i got into a fight- like- not a fight but i genuinely said smth really LOL i feel bad about it but P was shit talking me to xiya and then pulled up in my dms like Hey [me] i care aout you! You fucked up but it's ok u ust have to learn how to communicate

Like what is this? u can't tell me u care about me after spewing this shit into my girlfriends dms.

"i dont go out of my way to hurt people. he needs help lol" like bitch ik i need help. i did say the "joke" with intent to hurt V but it was in the MOMENT. yk how fucking frustrating it is explaining anger issues to someone who doesn't get it whatsofuckingever?

P has a load of her own issues that i dont ge tbut i at least TRY to understand her. also, first screenshot i wanetd to explain myself so V could see where im coming from?? LOL explaining ursef =/= makinf urself the victim.

i always overexplain shit, like my mistakes and why i think i made them. im also bad at explaining so i go on and on to try and make it make sense. i was literally blaming myself for hurting V and syaing sorry over and over again, how the hell was i making myself a victim?

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thekingofwinterblog · 3 years

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It’s all for his sake - Endeavor and the Sunk Cost Fallacy

My hero academia 301 is a pretty interesting chapter, but for me, the most notable piece of it was how Endeavour reacted to the realization that Touya couldnt surpass All Might.

upon realizing that his son might not be able to do it because of inborn physical limitations, he immediatly stopped his training, which frankly was the responsible and adult thing to do.

This stint of real parenthood did not last long however.

After taking the matter to a doctor, he is flat out told that not only cant Touya achive what endeavor wants, but it is a direct result of his incredibly selfish and irresponsible attempt to play god, by trying to breed the “perfect” hero into being.

It is how you react when you lose however, that shows who you really are, and endeavor illustrates that very, very well.

Upon being told in no uncertain terms that his attempts at Breeding an heir failed magnificently, producing a child that was not capable of resisting his own immense power, but also admonished by his doctor for even attempting it, and adviced not to try again, Endeavor instead doubled down, while focusing on the child he screwed over from the start with his attempt at genetic manipulation.

It was all for him you see. Endeavor doesnt use those words, but that is how he spins it here. it was all for Touya, all for his sake. if i stop now, then Touya was all for nothing, a mistake, im doing this for my son.

if im doing this for my son, then im not responsible for any of this.

his wife however, calls him out on it, as she understands Touya much, much more than endeavor does. or rather, she sees him fully as a human being, instead of as a thing, a weapon, a failed attempt at an heir.

Unlike Endeavor, Rei is able to see the way this all is affecting her son. She is able to see, and understand that Touya has fully accepted what Endeavor wanted him to be. a stronger, and better version of himself. however, unlike Endeavor, she only cares about him as a person.

Endeavour by comparison isnt completely uncaring about Touya. like most abusive parents, he does possess love for his offspring, but it is forever tainted by the fact that however much he might care, or not care about Touya, any familial love he has for his son is tainted by the fact that to Endeavor, he is a failed experiment, a failed heir, not his child.

He is the golden child that Endeavor was building up as his true and only heir, who he breed, trained, and molded to for that single purpose, and now that he’s reached a point where he cant continue that legacy.

so, its time to abandon him, and start over new, despite literarily having just learned how stupid this plan was, and that it can, in fact, go completely wrong, with a quirk that will fuck over the person he brings into the world.

Of course, Endeavor doesnt use those words to frame it. there is no way to pretend to be a hero, if you phrase it like that after all. Intead, this is the words he uses.

this is a very important series of panels for a great number of reasons, some that can be debated, argued, and we will probably never know the full truth to the questions because this is a series published in 2020′s shonen jump, and there are things that probably wasnt gonna fly with Hori’s editors, if it was the case.

but lets start with what can not be debated. Endeavor’s words here.

“If we want him to give it up, then we have no choice... Touya... Cant surpass him.”

These are very telling words, and however you believe The third and fourth children of the Todoroki family was concieved, there is not denying the meaning of what he’s saying here.

The only way that my son will stop being an idiot and fall into line, is if we have another baby. that is the only Right way to move forward. it is morally right, because if we dont do this, then he’s going to destroy himself.

there are two ways to interpret this scene.

The charitable way is to read it as the fact that he used Rei’s oldest son’s mental state as a justification of guilting his wife to have a third child, to give this attempt at a superpowered breeding project another shot, despite the fact that they now know that this can lead to a child who is essentially born crippled from his own powers, and despite the fact that Rei obviously understands the effect of them continuing this insanity will have on their oldest son.

the uncharitable way to look at it, is that he used this as justification for flat out raping her, and forcing a third, and then later a fourth child on her.

I personally believe the last one, given a number of factors shown in this chapter(the way this page is framed, the fact Rei obviously didnt want a third child, given she predicted exactly how touya would react, the way her eyes would latet turn when she looks at who is presumably touya which really brings to mind how she would later react to her youngest son’s face after her mental breakdown, etc.), but i’ll frankly admitt that withouth a direct quote from Hori, its impossible to know for sure one way or another.

either way however, this is a very good example of Endeavor both being influenced by, and using Sunk Cost Fallacy to justify bringing another potentially crippled child into the world for his own, selfish goals.

sunk cost Fallacy, is a mental reaction to when you invest more time and resources into a project, that you becomes so emotionally invested into said project that you will continue to invest into it, even if it reaches a point that it becomes clear that the resources you put into it, far, far outweighs the potential gains you can achieve.

because if you give up after having invested years, and years of effort to breed, raise, and train a kid, and then all that effort was absolutely wasted. hence he choose to keep going, despite having learned what a terrible idea this is.

He doesnt care about the fact that his next child might be even more crippled than his firstborn, he doesnt care about his son’s actual wellbeing. he cares about the fact that if he doesnt continue this insanity, then not only will he not achieve his dreams, but everything he did to get to this point was for absolutely nothing.

and endeavor cannot accept that. and so long as he can justify breeding more children into the world, and there being any chance they might inherit both quirks perfectly, he doesnt care about anything else.

and the moment he realised that this kid wasnt gonna cut it either, he did it again. it is not a coincidence, that the age gap between Endeavor’s second, third, and fourth children were all 3-4 years apart. because thats the age where you can usually tell when a quirk will manifest or not, as established earlier in the series.

While she isnt brought up directly by Endeavor as a justification, it is very telling that Endeavor decided on having a third child, only after his second child was old enough that he could tell that that there was no chance she could take the place as his heir instead.

So, he had his third child, and as time passed and it became obvious that he wasn’t gonna be able to fulfill Endeavor’s goals either, he dumped him, and instead breed a fourth child into existence.

and finally, he struck gold. he did it. he produced Shoto.

everything was finally worth it, and now, everything would be absolutely fine. the cost fallacy had reached its end, and it was now all full sails ahead.

except of course it wasnt.

His oldest son, now in middle school, had been raised from birth to believe he would surpass his father, only to be thrown away, and getting to see his father try to replace him, not once, but twice.

frankly, this scene is probably my favorite in the chapter, because it goes to show Endeavor’s mindset. Natsuo made a point that their father completely ignored his older children. and he did... from Natsuo’s perspective. however, having a more thourough picture of things, we can clearly see that this wasnt the case with Touya.

Endeavor genuinly cared for Touya, enough that once he got that child he tried to breed into existence 4 times, he genuinly wanted him to just abandon trying to be a hero. he genuinly thinks of himself as a good dad here, wanting his son to abandon the mission he set out for him before he was born. of course, with context, this heartwarming scene is incredibly sad and insidious, because we understand why Endeavor got so attached to his oldest child. because he WAS the golden child. he was the child Endeavor genuinly cared about, and invested in, and trained personally with great warmth and enthusiasm.

And not only did he abandon him as a failed project the moment he realized he wasnt gonna live up to his ridiculous standards, but he literarily created 2 more kids to try and replace him, just as his oldest son was old enough to understand what exactly his dad was doing. over the course of this chapter, we get to see Touya’s start as a 5-8 year old, his deteriorating mental state over the years, until he finally seemed to reach the breaking point with Shoto’s birth sometime in his middle school years 12-15.

Endeavor is in this scene, just not capable of understanding why Touya so desperately wants to become a hero, when obviously he isnt physically able to do so. he isnt able to understand that he is 100% to blame for the fact that his son is having a full emotional breakdown after literaly being replaced by his siblings.

In other words, Endeavor genuinly think’s he’s a good person. a person who has made a few mistakes along the way sure, but a person who was always justified in the end, and now that he’s having to face the fact that as dabi would later say “The past never dies” and has to face the aftermath of his inane attempt to play god for the pettiest of reasons, things simply arent going to work out.

He isnt going to have a happy family, who can now put the awful early years behind them, he put way too much effort, caused too much suffering and sacrificed too many years of his life for this not to work out as he wants.

after all, if he walks away from this project now, and lets Shoto have a normal childhood, and decide for himself, with no pressure from him, wheter or not to become a hero, then the sunk cost fallacy will have reached a negative end. it will all have been for nothing.

and we know he did eventually double down on this mentality, literarily beating into Shoto that he WAS going to become a hero, and there was not but’s or no’s about it.

there was no way that Endeavor was EVER going to let things be for nothing. His treatment of his older children could not be for nothing. His treatment of his wife could not be for nothing. His treatment of Shoto, and the way he beat him black and blue to train him, could not be for nothing.

Because if it all was for nothing, if everything he feels guilty about was for absolutely nothing, then he was in fact, a bad, bad person, who had no justification for anything he ever did.

#my hero academia #touya todoroki #dabi #endeavor #endeavour #enji todoroki #rei todoroki #character study #301 #meta

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casasupernovas · 3 years

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so i have been rewatching series 1 and 2 of doctor who and i have some thoughts about rose; rose is highkey bad vibes. like girl eye - okay so - you cried over thinking that micky was dead only to say "thanks for nothing" before leaving with the doctor, got jealous at that sickening tree lady, then forgot about mickey AGAIN when you got home and said to his FACE that the doctor is much more important than a boyfriend (yikes).

THEN! THEN! freakin' fathers day! i gave her a lot of sympathy in that episode because duh, it's tragic. but i completely forgot she said to the doctor when he told her off that she knew how "sad he was" (wtf!!! to anyone not used to british slang she basically called him a loser) and later when he told her to apologise her apology didn't feel very sincere, she literally put her head down like a kid and said "sorry" like a primary school kid. bless. and of course in boom town, she made that horrid comment about micky maybe dating a bigger girl. the nicest thing she did was not look for him when he decided to do what she did to him in the first episode. remember this moment because this is important...

we go further in and get to lynda with a y, and she was immedately jealous of her which i kind of get but it was a little catty especially when we had established that they were in a very dire situation. rip to poor lynda, and of course that very important scene which convinces jackie to help her get back to the doctor. i remember billie on the commentary saying that rose can be very harsh and i definitely agree, im talking of course rose telling jackie she met her father. she wasn't exactly tactful. and even in the parting of ways; of course rose loved him but rose was reckless - anyone who has seen torchwood and seen a smidge of the suffering jack had due to not being able to die...

fast forward to the christmas invasion - now again, i think rose is pretty valid in her grief and confusion but i found it telling that rose still thought she could have it both ways when she agreed to keep travelling. and tooth and claw. like SIS. one of the most annoying things i think the fans and the show did was make doomsday feel 'so unfair' when the truth was...it wasn't some cosmic the universe is so unfair moment. it was their own fault. it was their own doing. torchwood was created because rose and the doctor were acting like asses in tooth and claw. people are dying around you and you're laughing?! i was very surprised at this as rose used to be the one to tell the doctor to reign it in and inject some compassion before. oh how the turn tables.

anywho, we get to school reunion and dissing sarah jane has to be blasphemy right? lol. also when she started sulking about micky joining, i think that was the only time in the show where i genuinely disliked her. i know im making this post, but i dont dislike her, but in that moment i did. i just thought there was something completely unforgivable in rose hearing micky saying he wanted a chance to prove himself and not feel unwanted and for her response to be like a sullen child. it was very nasty and i didn't like it. moffat said he wasn't actually aware of this and said he would have written that into the girl in the fireplace if he knew.

but it also highlighted why im not too much of a fan of the 10 and rose ship, as whereas in s1, it seems very much that rose loved the doctor in all of his infinite alieness, but by series 2, she clearly wants something he cannot give her, and seemed to struggle more with his alieness when she appeared to accept it in the first season. and by giving the domestic life to her s4 as per the comics really didn't sit well with me. he is not human, so it felt like her love had become...i dunno? materialistic? artificial? she broke his heart to get that life. it was very selfish and again, it really shocked me. not too mention it was like a strange fanfiction. i have seen takes that it was very feminist to essentially make 10 created for her, but i dont think so, even if it is something we haven't necessarily seen before.

anyway, back to series 2, i give rose grace in the girl in the fireplace because steven wtf, and i dont like how he made classist comments about her. in the cybermen two parter i was rolling my eyes when she was even jealous of a character we never even see when the doctor quipped about finding info from another worker. like reign it in girl. i also think it's important to note that these episodes aren't kind to rose, and i think sometimes the show tries to make her have repercussions for her actions, but sometimes doesn't, like having pete reject her and jackie dig into her all over again. but here. this point right here:

remember when i said the nicest thing rose ever did for micky was not chase after him at the end of boom town? when martha leaves in s3, the doctor does something similar. he does not beg her to stay because he knows it would be cruel. but in the age of steel? rose suddenly tries to make him stay and even tries to make him feel guilty. rose never even had the courtsey to break up with him. "what about me, what if i need you." like baby are you serious?! you can't have it all? it is so selfish, and it's moments here i think billie was talking about when she said in her book that rose becomes more selfish in series 2. it was very telling of her.

and in the next couple of episodes, particularly fear her and the idiots lantern, there are some things that just dont sit well with me. like rose trying to get that boy with the abusive father to try and repair his relationship just because he was his father - it's not that simple and i was surprised that she had such a childish perspective. i know rose is young but she is not THAT young?? like dont try and make the poor boy feel bad. and fear her - this bit also links with what i said previously about rose wanting something the doctor can't really give her. in the impossible planet, the forums lit up when the doctor and rose spoke of a domestic life but i didnt think it was sweet. because rose would have known deep down inside he doctor wouldn't have been happy if that were something they got. it would be like putting him in a cage, and in fear her, rose even surprised the doctor by being so cold about chloe and the aliens pleas, which led to him revealing he was a father and rose could barely handle it. which. okay. sistren. how are you still shocked the doctor had a life before you? companions? the doctor hasn't exactly hid this but it's not like you ever asked him apart from the end of the world. in fact, it's martha who actually asked him about his life and gallifrey. gallifrey wasn't even mentioned by name until the runaway bride. are you telling me in all that time rose never asked the doctor what his planet was called?! it just doesn't feel right to me.

and poor jackie. it's inevitable that kids have to leave the nest, but i think the reason why jackie was so torn was that rose was still trying to have it both ways. travel with the doctor and also live with her mother - which could never work.

in doomsday, when micky returns, you can even see her trying to get her attention and micky doesn't even look at her and she seems sad that he's officially over her. and on bad wolf bay she says she doesn't care if the universe collapses which kind of sweet but simultaneously alarming and also the exact reason they've been seperated. i dont know why rose got called the defender of the earth because she almost let the shit burn twice haha!

even turn left, i didnt like how donna became a pawn, it felt like rose was sacrificing her which i doubt was the episodes intention but that's what it felt like. i also didnt understand how rose knew nothing of martha but knew all of the adventures donna would have wuth the doctor? if anyones knows the answer to this pls. also the "who's she" remark to martha made wanna bang my head against a wall. not to mention the "she's good" line towards martha later. i know russell wrote to be like see! no beef! but it felt like rose needed to be the one to give martha the seal of approval and i promise you she didn't need it. and of course, bad wolf bay. probably the most selfish thing she did. and i've seen a lot of rose fans hate this too. i dont even think billie was a big fan either. like i said, she broke his heart which didn't seem to make sense considering her declaration of love 2 seasons prior. for her to go so quickly to the fake changed that completely in my opinion.

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onionsaremeansstuff · 3 years

Text

You should have begged me to stay

Pairing: Jensen Ackles x reader

Gender: Angst & Fluff

Summary: Jensen is never home and you can’t stand this anymore

I dont own the character or the gif

Beta’d by @chaoticgaysstuff

Your relationship with your husband, Jensen was something.

You two have known each other since you were kids. He was pretty much your best friend. You two played together when you were kids and knew that you two would be close forever.

When you were 9 years old, you declared each other as boyfriends without really knowing what that meant because you both were two innocent children.

But as it turns out, you both were still boyfriends now that you weren't the innocent child you used to be.

As years passed, you both loved each other more than you did before. Hugs that you both gave each other when you were children turned into a pretty heated make out session that was behind closed doors.

When Jensen first told you how he wanted to become an actor, you supported him like you always did.

"I will never abandon you." Was what you had told him that night.

If only you knew everything that would happen with him becoming a world famous actor.

Hollywood wasn't the most acceptable place for LGBTQ people, so you both kept your relationship a secret, but there comes a price to pay when hiding something sometimes.

With each passing year, Jensen almost always became unavailable to you. You barely spent any time with him anymore.

Hell, you two only spent a minimum of two months together last year.

You were very frustrated, especially with that woman being Jensen's beard.

Now, you didn't have anything against her. You actually liked her, but she took a lot of time that you and Jensen were supposed to be spending together by pretending they were in a relationship.

And honestly, sometimes you felt that you weren't Jensen's true love.

---

Jensen would be back today from a trip and you were really excited. It has been so long since you've seen him. You couldn't wait to throw yourself in his huge arms along with having a night where you could talk about everything and nothing. Just like old times.

And as hours passed, Jensen still hasn't come home yet.

You've been sending him messages, but they were just left on delivered. He hasn't opened any of them and you were starting to get worried.

Was his flight delayed? Or did something come up? Was there an accident?

You paced back and forth, your mind consumed with worry.

---

When 3 AM came, the front door to the house opened and Jensen entered. You stood up from your spot on the couch, feeling fully awake and ran over to him. As you got closer to him, you immediately knew what he was doing.

Jensen stunk of alcohol and you noticed a purple mark on his neck.

What happened to you?" You asked, feigning Innocence.

"N- Nothing. I was at Jared's place and he had a party." He spoke, voice slightly slurred and you could tell that he was drunk.

"You know, a phone call or text message wouldn't kill you." You said and he snorted, walking straight to y'all room, completely ignoring you.

Jensen threw himself on the bed, falling asleep immediately before you could talk to him.

You sighed and went to sleep in the guest room. The smell of alcohol was essentially too much and you couldn't sleep next to him.

---

The next morning you prepared breakfast for you and your husband.

Although you were still a little hurt because of last night, you knew that it was because Jensen was drunk. So, you decided to make breakfast for him and actually talk to him.

When breakfast was ready, you went to wake him up as you grabbed some medicine for his hangover.

But, looks like he wouldn't need it after all, seeing how he wasn't in the room.

You searched every part of the house but there was no sign of him at all. You took out your phone to call him when a message popped up on his phone.

“D and I are going to breakfast and then will be spending time in the mountains. I'll be back next week.” ~Jensen.

As you read over that message, you let out a humorless laugh.

You barely spend any time with your husband and when he finally comes home, he decides to spend time with her. You cook nice and he's not here to even eat it.

And apparently he gave her a nickname, too.

You loved Jensen from the bottom of your heart, but you couldn't take this anymore. You couldn't take being the only one putting in any effort into this relationship, or if it could even be called that. You couldn't take being the one to text him first only to not receive a response. Couldn't stand being the person who waited for him to come home, only to never really come home.

You've had enough.

---

Jensen had texted you that he was coming home in an hour.

Your bags were packed with all of your clothes and stuff, and placed into your suitcase.

"This is for your own good, Y/N." You told yourself once again.

You glanced around your house one more time. So many memories have been here. Happy memories of you and him. They seem like distant memories now.

The door to the house opened and for the first time, you didn't meet him at the door like you'd usually do.

Jensen was surprised by this, having expected it. He walked over to you.

You didn't have the courage to end like this. Maybe he'll wake up and see what he has been putting you through.

"Hey, I'm gonna go to sleep. In a few hours I'm going to Vancouver."

You looked at him and managed to mask the hurt and anger that made it's way onto your face. Looks like he still hasn't realized.

You shook your head, "No your not. We're going to talk right now."

"Look Y/N I'm tired and-"

"You always seem to be tired when you're with me, right?" You interrupted him, standing up and looking at him in the eyes, "Always tired and can never have time with me. Can never stay with me."

Jensen looked at you confused, "What, Y/N? What are you talking about?"

"I'm talking about our relationship being one huge joke, Jensen." You stated.

"What do you mean by that?" He asked, not understanding what you are trying to say.

"You're never at home, Jensen! I always have to be the one to try and make our relationship work and you seem to be looking for an excuse to get away from me. Hell, last year we barely spent two months together!" You snapped.

Jensen laughed sarcastically before looking at you angrily, "Well, I'm sorry that I have to work. I forgot how selfish you could be. I need time to myself. It's not easy working my ass off to give this life. This rich life." He growled.

"Oh, well I'm sorry that wanting to spend time with my husband is selfish. And do you really think I care about being rich? I loved you since you had to ask money to buy candy. I never cared about money. I always wanted you and you clearly can't see how unhappy I've been."

The eyes that once looked at you with love now looked at you with hatred.

Jensen didn't answer for a second, thinking as he looked down at the ground before snorting and looking at you, "If you are so unhappy then why don't you just leave."

You looked at him with sadness in your eyes.

That was it.

Jensen no longer cared about your relationship and he didn't even fight for you. Or even try to make things better between you both. He just gave up.

Just like that.

And you felt your heart break.

"If this is what you want. I'll leave." You stated, trying your best not to cry in front of him.

You left the room and went to get your bag and from the bedroom, you heard the sound of Jensen's car engine taking off down the road.

You sighed as you looked around this room looking one last time.

'Do it for your own good Y/N.' You thought as you walked out of the house.

---

Seven months have passed since your break up with Jensen and you hadn't been doing well.

Jensen was someone who was always there for you since you were a kid. Not talking to him was a completely strange and new sensation to you.

You couldn't help but think about him.

When you saw something funny or when you had a nightmare you would always call Jensen.

Sometimes, you'd have your phone in your hand with his contact information, ready to call him.

'Would he answer me?' You asked yourself.

You shook your head, "He doesn't care about you. Move on." You muttered.

Both of your lives went on without one another.

"You will survive Y/N." You told yourself, "You got this man."

---

You were sitting in the cafe that was across the street from your job. The place was pretty empty and you sat there in a booth with a cup of coffee, enjoying the peaceful silence.

The place was in complete silence, except for a small TV near your table which was playing something.

You weren't paying attention to it until you heard the name Jensen Ackles coming on the TV.

"The actor, Jensen ackles who is best known for his role as Dean Winchester on the TV show supernatural, posted a video saying that he and Danneel Harris have been in a fake relationship for years."

Your eyes widened, staring at the TV as you sipped on your coffee.

"Well, there is no reason for him to keep her as his beard anymore. He must have found someone he really loves now." You sighed in exasperation.

"The actor also stated that this fake relationship has cost him a lot, especially the relationship with the love of his life." The anchor said but you didn't care.

---

You arrived at your old house after a long and exhausting day of work.

After your parents died, you refused to sell your old house. Jensen always said that it didn't make sense since you lived with him. Nowadays, you are grateful for not selling it.

You threw yourself on the couch and fell asleep quickly.

---

You were woken up later by a knock on the door.

"Who the fuck could be at the door this late at night?" You pondered, getting up off the couch and walking over to the door.

You opened the door, not fully awake and your eyes only half open, "What?"

"Can I talk to you, Y/N?" The sound of Jensen's voice made your eyes open, feeling fully awake at the moment.

Jensen stood in front of the door, holding a bouquet of your favorite flowers.

You stared at him before slamming the door in his face.

"Y/N, please open the door!" Jensen pleaded and you didn't respond, "I'll climb into your window, or break your door down and you know I can." He threatened and you sighed, opening the door for him.

Jensen was wearing Dean Winchester's classic smile as he held the flowers out to you.

"A beautiful thing for a beautiful thing." You looked at the flowers before looking at him again as you gave him a look that said, 'Just get on with it already.'

"Teenage you would have loved the fact that I gave you flowers." Jensen said as you took the flowers out of his hand. He walked over to sit on the couch.

"Teenage me believed you cared about me." You spoke up, and placed the flowers on the counter and walked over to him. You stood with your arms crossed as you waited for him to speak.

Jensen opened his mouth to speak, but nothing came out.

If you don't tell me what you came here to tell me, I'll call the cops." You said seriously.

"I'm sorry." Jensen spoke quickly and you waited for him to continue.

An awkward silence took over for a few seconds before Jensen coughed.

"If that's all you have to say, then you can get out of here." You exclaimed, turning away from him.

"Y/N I'm an idiot, okay?"

You nodded, "Yeah, you are."

"And I regret what happened that day. I should have asked you to say instead of telling you to leave."

"You should've but didn't. Close the door on the way out, will ya?"

"Y/N I-"

"Look Jensen, I don't know what game you are playing, or if your just desperate for sex. Or if the person you were staying with dumped you, but I will not continue to give my all to someone that isn't given back. You can leave."

"I'm not dating anyone Y/N, and I'm not here for sex." Jensen sighed, "I'm a complete idiot. I was so used to you being there that I was never aware of how much I needed you. "Jensen looked down at the ground as he spoke.

"Ever since you've been gone, I missed you like crazy and all I wanted was to hear the sound of your voice. I missed having you by my side."

"When we were together, you never slept at home and didn't even bother to call me, so stop bullshitting me." You shouted, feeling fed up with this crap.

"And I deeply regret everything that has happened. I was frustrated because I never had time for you anymore and I pushed you away. Not the smartest decision, I know and when you brought it up, I took my anger out on you, though I was angry with myself. When our relationship ended, I thought it was for the best, but i can't live without you!" He explained, tears falling from his eyes.

He crouched down next to your feet, wrapping his arms around your leg and hugged it tightly.

"I love you so much, Y/N. I'm such an idiot and you deserve better than me, but I love you so much. I've loved you ever since we were kids, and I promise that if you take me back, I'll drop everything for you. I'll quit acting, won't go to anymore conventions, all of it! I just want my man back."

Your pants were really wet now because of the tears from Jensen. You knew now that he regretted his decision.

And deep down you knew that Jensen was the one for you.

You ran your fingers through Jensen's hair which made him look up at you, sniffling a little.

"You have another chance, but you better not fuck it up again." With that sentence, Jensen stood up and started planting kisses all over your face, "And you don't have to give up your career for me, Jen. You just need to make sure that we spend time with each other, okay?"

He nodded, shedding a few happy tears. But they weren't sad tears. They were tears of Joy.

---

~ 6 months later ~

"Hey Karen, can you please give these files to Jenny?" You asked, holding the files out to her as she took them and nodded her head, "Thanks!"

Y/N L/N!" Your co-worker, Lily called out, walking into your office as Karen walked out, giving you a hug, "Or should I call you Y/N Ackles now? Congratulations! I'm so happy for you!!"

You looked at her confused and a little frightened. How did she find out?

Seeing how confused you look, she showed you her phone and it was pictures that Jensen posted on his instagram.

It was pictures of you and him. He posted 5 pictures of you guys together.

The first phone was you and him as babies, playing in the sandbox together which was taken by your mother.

The second one was of you and him in high school. He had a wide smile on his face as he hugged.

The third one was of you and him cooking together and smiling happily at the camera.

The fourth one was of you and Jensen the day you got married.

And the last one was of you lying on his chest.

The caption said: Today, I would like to show the world my handsome husband and the love of my life, Y/N Ackles! I have known him since we were kids and always had a crush on him. He is the most amazing and lovable person in the world and he's very out of my league. Unfortunately, I fucked up our relationship many times, but he gave me another chance even though I didn't deserve it. I love you Y/N Ackles!! Thanks for always being with me!

(Btw, I know he's hot, but he's mine!)

You were shocked to see that he told the world about your relationship and tears started streaming down your face.

"Are you okay, Y/N?" Lily asked, as you gave her back her phone. You didn't answer her question. Instead, you ran to the men's room and took out your phone, calling Jensen.

He picked up the phone after 4 rings.

"Hey Y/N!"

"Jensen, what was that all about?" You questioned.

"Did you not like it?" He asked, worried that you didn't like what he had done.

"I loved it. I loved it alot and I love you, but are you sure you were ready to come out right now? You know how Hollywood is."

"Fuck Hollywood! If they don't want me anymore for loving another man then I don't care. I have you and that's more than enough for me."

You smiled at the words spoken from Jensen and the two of you talked for a little while longer like two teenagers.

Your relationship with Jensen was strange and difficult at times, but you wouldn't trade him for anyone else.

#Jensen Ackles x male reader #Jensen Ackles x reader #male reader #x male reader #Jensen Ackles x male!reader #dean winchester x male reader #dean winchester x reader #dean winchester x male!reader #supernatural x male reader #supernatural x reader

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virtual-luvr · 3 years

Note

Hello I really like your jumin han stories, so I have a request for more. I don't have much of a plot but like male y/n is going to move in woth jumin and he has 2 male cats who are both neutered, but jumin is still complaining that the cats are gonna try and get Elizabeth the 3rd pregnant( even though it's not possible). Eventually jumin warms up to the other cats and y/n makes fun of jumin by taking pictures of jumin and the cats cuddling saying that Elizabeth is gonna be jealous. He/him for reader. Please and thank you.

Warming up

Pairing: Jumin x Reader

Pronouns: he/him

Content: you have two cats, jumin is scared-

Description: Jumin slowly starts to warm up to your two male cats

Note: ah im so glad you like my writing!! And thank you for requesting, i hope you like it !

------------------

Jumin liked to plan everything in advance, thats how he worked best. So when he had finally visited your apartment for once and seen your two...male...cats, he was incredibly frustrated.

He wanted you to move in with him, hell, you guys were both already planning on moving in together.

It shouldn't come as a surprise that you had two male cats but you had only told Jumin you had two cats, never did you say what sex they were.

You thought it was no bug deal but at this point Jumin was almost sweating, your calm and collected boyfriend had essentially flashed out of existence.

"Jumin you dont have to worry, theyre both neutered" you say with a laugh, you couldnt deny the situation was a little funny.

Jumin still seemed panicked as he looked at both of your cats.

"I cant have them near my Elizabeth, they'll get her pregnant"

Jumin stands close to you, inching closer and closer as your two cats move towards Jumin.

At this point his arms are around your waist and hes hiding behind you, your cats still moving closer to him. Of course they got very close trying to smell him since you usually came hone smelling like him as well.

You call for them to get closer but Jumin hesitates, arms tightening around you.

"Jumin why are you even running away from them?"

"Because if they get close then when I come home Elizabeth will smell them on me and I dont want that" he says, voice monotone but his eyes stood glaring at your cats.

You turn around and look at Jumin in the eyes, giving him a playful glare and softly grabbing his face so his attention is on you instead of your cats.

"I, your amazing boyfriend who would never ever lie to you, has told you time and time again that there is no way they can get Eli pregnant"

Jumin lets out a groan, adjusting his stance and looking back at you.

Suddenly his business like demeanor came back, you hadnt seen that in a long time since you guys started dating, he was usually much more open now.

"Fine, they can come to the apartment but they are not staying in close contact to Elizabeth, atleast not yet"

You chuckle but agree, you know he just wants whats best for Elizabeth and shes very dear to him.

You brought your face sloer to his and gave him a small kiss, which still somehow suprised him.

"What was that for?"

"To seal our contract"

"Oh i see, well can I have some that arent business inquired ones?" A small smile sets on his face as he looks at you after saying that, eyes soft but filled with love.

"Of course Mr. CEO" you say while leaning in.

"Dont call me that" Jumin groans out before kissing you back.

Forgetting your cats are there, while you had that whole conversation, they got much more closer then before. Now one of them wrapping his tail around your leg and the other pawing at Jumins shoe.

Jumins breathe hitches as he sees them but tries his best not to move, knowing he shouldnt be scared of anything happens.

While in that moment he didnt pet them or anything, it was a good start.

---------

Its been a few weeks, you're now settled into an apartment with Jumin.

Yours cats though, werent as settled in.

You were hoping in around a week they'd be able to get closer to Elizabethn Jumin was still hesitant.

Dont get me wrong, all cats were roaming around, it wasnt like your cats were in a cage or something.

Its just they have been under heavy supervision, if Jumin was not there he had a bodyguard watch over all three.

(He didn't trust you enough with this he knew you would let your cats cuddle up to Elizabeth as soon as possible)

This evening was one where both of you were not going to be at home, so Jumin quickly called up a bodyguard.

"He won't be at home and I currently have to get going to a business meeting, get here as soon as possible. You have the keys to open the door, do not let any of those two cats get close to Elizabeth"

Jumins voice was low and demanding, a little bit intimidating in your ppinion but you didn't mind-

He swiftly hangs up and looks back at you as he puts his blazer on, adjusting his sleeves and tie.

"I have to get going my love, enjoy your evening with Jaehee ill see you later" He gives you a soft kiss on your forehead and then your lips and with that he was gone.

You ran out and as soon as you left the door, a car stood waiting for you.

Quickly giving the driver the location, you wait patiently to get there, no rush since you werent late.

You got there pretty fast, traffic wasnt bad. As you look up you see Jaehee waiting at a table, coffee in one hand and a menu in the other.

"Hi Jaehee" you say with a smile, and with that you had an evening filled of Jaehee talking about Zen and eating plenty of amazing pastries and drinks.

The 'date' went by smoothly and you left only around a few hours after, it was getting late and Jaehee had to go back home to finish some workload.

You thanked them for the nice evening you had together and then went back into the car which was waiting for you.

The ride back went just as well as the first one, you got home pretty fast but when you got there you were met with a sight that you werent expecting at all.

There sat two cats, around someone. That someone being Jumin.

He had a cup in hand and an expensive looking laptop right in front of him, both cats laying a head on each of his legs. Sleeping soundly and peacefully.

He didnt react when he heard the lock of the front door lock, or maybe he just hadnt heard you enter.

You oull out your phone as quickly as possible, not even being able to fathom what was right in front of your eyes.

Is this a dream?

No, no, this is defently not a dream.

As you take a step forward Jumin looks up.

Once he sees you, a soft of nervous smile sets on his face.

"Weren't expecting this were you?"

"No not at all, how the hell did this happen"

"I didnt notice them coming towards me and...all of a sudden they were like this. I wasnt sure what to do so i just, let them"

You'll be honest, it was honestly such a nice view to see three of the people you most love be so close. You felt happy.

You take a few more steps and one of your cat notices that you're getting closer, now meowing at you. You grab him and sit down where he was just resting and isntead put him on your lap.

Now both you and Jumin sat close, one cat on your lap and the other resting on Jumin's leg. Soon enough Elizabeth came in too for some cuddles.

All in all, you looked like a whole family, and you all sat cuddling eachother. One of Jumins arms wrapped around you and you cuddled up to him, phone in hand.

You opened the messenger and quickly sent the photo of Jumin and your cats together before he could demand you to delete it.

Messages started filtering in quickly, many of them beung from the infamous seven o seven.

"What did you send to them.."

[1341 words; feb/11/21]

#virtual luvr is typing #male reader #x reader #x male reader #male reader oneshot #male reader imagine #mystic messenger x male reader #mystic messenger imagine #mystic messenger oneshot #mystic messenger x reader #jumin han x reader #jumin han x mc #jumin x male mc #jumin han imagine #jumin han x male reader #jumin fanfic

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rainydayotomes · 3 years

Note

helloo!! i dont rly like showing my account so would i be able to request here? it would b nice if u could write a van helsing x reader wherein we work as a government employee (how they met basically, post non lupin or van route) and he learns she doesnt associate much with her family for personal reasons after they share each others pasts? if its too much to ask for i can req something different! tyy

Hey Anon! Thats totally fine- its why I turned on the anon feature ;) and hey, thanks for being my first request! Essentially this fic is a little bit of a weird AU, where you don't end up with anyone and never met Van. I hope thats ok! If not, feel free to send in another request! Love you ❤ I hope you enjoy!

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There she was again.

That woman. The one who made his heart skip a beat at just a glance.

She laughed as she conversed with two men on either side of her. One of them, Van Helsing recognized as Victor Frankenstein. The famous alchemist.

The other one had long, red hair and had his jacket hanging off half his body. The woman who had caught his eye was sandwiched between the two; and was seemingly good friends with them. Van Helsing wondered who she was.

"Aha! Eyeing her I see!" A snide voice came from behind her.

"Tch." He closed his eyes and turned to the young king.

"Everytime you see her, you always stare. Why don't you go say hi?" Delacroix said with a loud smile that made Van Helsing sigh.

"No."

"Awww, cmon! Why not? We have some time to spare! Go have lunch with her or something!"

"No."

The young king frowned.

"That's an order."

....Goddammit.

"Tch. Fine."

He turned to see her walk towards the dining hall, where government employees and guests often met for lunch.

What the hell would he even say? He stalled for a moment, wondering what he would do when he got to her. Would he ask her for her name and run off? Would he sit down and just... eat across from her?

"Come on, let's go!" Suddenly his arm was yanked quite forcefully, and he was made to follow Delacroix into the dining hall. This was bound to be trouble.

"I thought I was only here escort and advocate for you? Not be forced into eating lunch with people unrelated to us."

Delacroix, with his hand still tightly around Van Helsing's arm, opened the door to the cafeteria easily and led the two inside.

"Well I consider you one of my loyal subjects now! And as your king, I want to see my people thrive and be happy!" He said proudly.

"Tch. All I am is your bodyguard and an advocate. What happened to wanting revenge?"

"Oh shut up about that already. Look- there she is!"

The young king pointed out the woman Van Helsing had been admiring from afar, now sitting alone at a small round table. It didn't look like she was waiting for anyone.

"Here we go..." He mumbled to himself as he was forcefully dragged right up to the table.

"Are you waiting for anyone?" The young king's voice cooly asked.

The girl looked up at him, and her eyes went wide.

"A-Ah! K-King Delacroix! N-No, I'm not waiting for anyone. Please, take a seat if you want." She said as she gestured to the two other seats across from her.

"And Mr. Van Helsing... It's nice to meet you both."

Delacroix sat down in one of the chairs, seemingly unaware how awkward this was for poor Van. Or maybe he just didn't care.

"Is this some type of torture...?" He mumbled to himself before he sat down.

"Well, it seems you know plenty about us! But what about you? My advisor has seen you around quite a bit, and he always eyes you as you walk by!" He said proudly.

Dear god, this really was torture wasn't it!?

She gave out a nervous laugh, a blush quickly dusting her delicate cheeks.

"At least this is cute." Van thought to himself.

"My name is (Y/N) (L/N), and I report to Her Majesty on public affairs. Stuff like how the different districts are doing, how crime is and such..."

"Ah, I've heard of you. You're friendly with everyone except your family, aren't you?" The young king said without hesitation.

"I-I uh..."

Van Helsing sighed at Delacroix's unapologetic nosiness.

"Delacroix, you forgot your coat in the meeting room." He said as he rubbed the bridge of his nose.

"Ah!" Delacroix rose from his seat in a slight panic. "I'll be back!" And with that, he took off faster then any human could run. Thankfully he didn't notice that he was still wearing his coat.

"Sorry about that." The soldier murmered to the girl.

"O-Oh no, it's ok! After last week's incident, I-I'm kind of used to this sort of thing..." She trailed off.

"...what happened?" He wanted to ask, but he knew he shouldn't. His unvoiced question lingered above his head, and she seemed to catch on to his thinking.

"Ahaha... well, one of my parents actually was at one of the meetings I was attending, and tried to talk to me... but I don't really... get along with them. So I tried to avoid them as best as I could, but... they kind of cornered me. I told them to leave me alone, but I was a bit too loud when I said it... the whole public affairs board saw what happened."

"I see." He replied simply.

"O-Oh, I uhm... I'm sorry. I know that talking about family might be a uh... little tough for you. I didn't mean to be insensitive. I apologize..."

It was pretty well known that Van Helsing's family was murdered, after the whole situation with Aleister came to light and he was sent to court. But it was still weird to hear that some girl he had never met before knew his past. But he doubt that she knew all of it.

"It's fine. But why don't you want to talk to your parents?"

"Ah.. it's... personal. Personal reasons."

Van Helsing closed his eyes in thoughtful silence. So she wasn't as naive to tell him absolutely everything when they first meet.

He hated to admit this, but he was definitely intrigued.

"H-Hey... I uh, have another meeting I have to get to. Do you uhm... want to go out later? For some tea or something? I'll be free around 5."

Van Helsing mulled it over in his head for a moment. Delacroix had a meeting at 5:15, but it wasn't one he necessarily had to attend. He could already practically hear the kid's voice telling him to go in his head.

He gave a nod to her.

"Sure. I've got nothing planned."

She perked up. Perhaps she wasn't expecting him to accept? He couldn't help but smile to himself over how cute she was.

"A-Alright, I'll meet you at the cafe down the street. The one-"

"-where the evening sun makes it look like the whole place is glowing?"

"Yes! That one!"

He nodded, giving her a "sure" before she got up and ran off.

He couldn't help but close his eyes and smile. She was pretty damn cute. It was pretty clear she wanted to go somewhere that would give them a little but of a fun, romantic atmosphere... but he didn't mind too much.

He was curious about her family, and why she didn't want to associate with them. But he knew that was none of his concern. Still, he quite enjoyed the thought of perhaps learning that reason one day.

Jeez, being with that kid really did make him soft, huh?

#abraham van helsing #van helsing x reader #code realize #code realize x reader #reader insert #request #otome games

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wolfsneedles · 3 years

Text

when cersei says, "she had a warrior heart, but the gods in their blind malice had given her the feeble body of a woman"

i actually felt it. no not the way she does ofc since she is essentially an antagonistic character but more like, the comparisons she makes the way she hates her own sex and wants power how she assumes herself as tywins daughter and how jaime thinks she call herself tywin lannister with teats, all point to her major disgusting internal conflict. ofc when we later see walk of shame it was worse the comments thrown on her body. in first books when we never had her pov i thought she too would admire herself her beauty, however cersei, in all her honestly hates her female traits and doesn't flaunt her beauty like i always thought or got idea from in first books. she is very mean and dehumanising to women and sees them inferiorly, not to say she herself was treated with a lot of hatred and sexism and then sold to marry a man she doesn't desire who himself was brutal on her, however i think she would have never been personally happy with anyone. cersei sees the entire point of being woman to please men with what she tells sansa, and then to be used as woman too . she doesn't like or meets appreciates strong women she hasn't seen or met dany obv neither would she ever have pleasant thoughts about brienne and arya even, she comments sometimes how woman is pretty but she herself always reduces her worth and others to just a girl to be sold and mounted. ofc her internal conflict i find is v interesting and confusing at times. she hates women but also wants other to accept her everything her every cruel practices even perhaps as woman. she doesn't like being woman to please people at all, yet its so sad and helpless to see her try to tempt jaime or osney even later just so they could listen to her. she hates the rampant sexism and misogyny in westeros even exhibited by her brothers and father but she doesn't realise she is using the same notion and definitions of sexism people have about women to demean and hate woman around her. its like she hates men definitely but she hates doing effort herself too to be a same female figure or woman we see other asoiaf women exhibit or do.

i was wondering if her behaviour towards women themselves, how she sees them inferior even when the men around her aren't seeing them like this, but she sees women with sexist approach too she mentions about rape or septa being or longing for rape, she ridicules and discusses margaerys virginity so much, she talks about uncensored stuff to sansa lol, when she is young girl literally, points to the fact how blunt and hateful cersei is of herself but also of female definition. i think this has a lot to do with her maybe not having to experience a mothers love??? i never liked how she was always surrounded ironically by men around her. we never see major strong female lannister representation i just realised. we only see or hear about tywin who had brutal approach to westeros the, holier-than-thou approach. we see jaime who is prob not worse like tywin at all but he also constantly tries to berate and pass quite nauseating remarks for women and ill hold this opinion about him until i see him say sorry to brienne lol (not to mention he does not hate women as whole even as being a man), we see tyrion also not really ideal partner and excessively morally grey character although i have never or maybe remember sexist or extremely insensitive remarks about women by tyrion until we see him in adwd only blurting out pretty worse sentences and maybe acting same like his father, and then we just know kevan who always well * saw cersei as not so perfect person and is kind of weird to her or idk maybe i never liked that lad because he also kind of sexualised her in childhood as cersei says maybe that men never looked at her like they do at others and she was seen with different eyes, all this time i wonder kind of where was tywin though he could have given or taught her good wholehearted valuable values anyway my anti tywin agenda not here today*, and then we see lancel, well for all we know he slept with her too but its just weird again that she slept with him to get rid of her obnoxious husband and well, lancel doesn't really hurt her though or ever saw her like her brothers do, considering his religious changes. but all this time im wondering cersei kind of missed having any wholesome woman in her life as, friend or companion which contributes to her internalised misogyny even more (its like she is opposite of catelyn hundred percent but cat also has internalised misogyny and i realised she never had loving sister cousin friend or companion) maybe im not thinking right but doesn't it click to u all that they both esp cersei of course see women in diff colours and not like how arya dany sansa brienne see women, because they lacked any stronger female character to look upto too. cats treatment of jon which is separate thing was quite questionable and so how she feels weird too when she sees mya stone! but cat or cersei never both, confronted their husbands or told them anything or even discussed any issues with them (this is for cat esp when she should have been angry over ned for jon :/ but she changed her energy to jon) . and it makes me wonder its also because they both were raised in a v male dominated society with diff kinds of fathers, uncles and brothers, that cersei especially has diff notion to what a random woman outside castle would even look like or act like and that all of them aren't really linked to their virginity or marriages and babies. i dont think ofc she would have been different if she had wholesome female friend but she did or should have had someone as girl who had her back when she was growing up???

(btw this isn't pro cersei thing at all - i was kind of horrified by her analysis of women we get to see in affc and then the melara thing at her young age was well fked up also pinching tyrion when he was baby "until he cried" or calling him "little monster" or whatever shows infact how she is quite disdainful of men like tyrion too and not just women. i was wondering maybe her losing joanna maybe played significant role only that being said, she is biggest antiparallel to dany and catelyn! )

#cersei lannister #meta #cersei lannister asoiaf #tyrion lannister #jaime lannister #asoiaf #valyrianscrolls #catelyn tully #asongoficeandfire #house lannister #tywin lannister #ok i hate tywin too

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some-cookie-crumbz · 3 years

Note

Hello 👋🏼, sorry if I’m bothering u but ever since the recent chapters of BNHA I haven’t been able to stop thinking about the Todoroki family. Not many of my friends are into this anime and I just couldn’t stop myself from sharing this with you because I need to let this out.

[SPOILER ALERT 🚨!!! IF U DONT READ THE MANGA THEN U CAN JUST IGNORE THIS]

First of all:

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!!!!

(I’m still screaming as I write because the backstories RUINED me.)

Poor Touya having this horrible obsession over heroics and having his father acknowledge him but ever since his quirk started reacting against his body the whole family got negatively affected by it.

Rei and Enji wanted to stop at two kids but with Touya’s sudden disadvantage and the latter’s craving for power, Natsuo and later on Shouto was born (the youngest getting titled as the perfect heir from the moment he was born). I got torn seeing Touya’s eyes succumb to absolute madness at the birth of his younger brothers.

What scared me the most was how when it was just Touya and Fuyumi, the two hardly interacted despite being only a year apart in age. Touya claimed that ‘girls just don’t get it’ this small foreshadowing was later brought to light in the most recent chapter where he once again rejects Fuyumi’s company in favour of ranting to only Natsuo and where he disregards his own mother— another ‘girl’ that doesn’t understand his obsession passion for surpassing All Might and someone who plays along to the acts of those stronger than them. Touya saw his mother as a weak person who had no choice but to marry for the sake of her family and have custom children. Little Touya firmly believed his very existence depended on getting acknowledged my his father and defeating All Might but it sadly didn’t come true😭😭

Also..... LOOK AT THE BABIES!!!! They’re all so CUTE!!!

Chubby Fuyumi!!!

Natsuo with a running nose

And Baby Shouto with a meme like face since the day he was born🤣🤣🤣🤣

So ADORABLE!

And another thing. FUYUMI WAS EVEN YOUNGER THAN I THOUGHT TO HAVE STARTED ACTING LIKE A SECOND MOTHER TO HER BROTHERS!! Look at the way she defended Natsuo when Touya went on a rampage and tried to attack Touya! And during moments when Enji and Rei fought the two most notable heroes were Shouto and Fuyumi; the former fighting on the frontlines to face his father while the latter stood behind to once again care for her remaining family that though weren’t involved in the fight, they still needed emotional support to get through it.😭

I AM SO SORRY TO BE GETTING TO THIS SO LATE ANON BUT I HAVE SO MUCH TO SAY!!!

TW: Spoilers, Brief Mention of Child Abuse (Physical, Emotional and Mental), General Fandom Wank

So, like, SO MUCH HAPPENED in those chapters and I ABSOLUTELY LOVE ALMOST ALL OF IT! There’s obviously all the things you mentioned above that were just amazing to see and learn! I know that a majority of the fandom has been absolutely livid about the reveals involving Touya being drastically different than what fandom thought they were all this time, but I think it honestly highlights how smart Horikoshi’s writing really is.

In Shoto, we see the effects of physical and mental abuse on a child, and how easily he could have ended up going down a troubling road much like Touya. Shoto’s saving grace is facing off against Deku in the Sports Festival, giving him an outside perspective and makes him realize that he can choose to be better, but that doesn’t just magically fix all of Shoto’s problems. Shoto still struggles with his feelings towards his Father and how he is perceived by simply being Endeavor’s son. We see that in the Provisional License Arc, where Shoto is so thoroughly rattled by Inasa. It’s even further pushed through how Shoto struggles with his feelings about Endeavor trying to better and whether or not he should forgive him. I feel like Shoto’s arc is incredibly strong and that his struggles are very realistic, which is why people love him so much. This whole concept is another thing I could rant about but I’m going to leave it here.

Meanwhile, with Touya, we see the effects of mental and emotional abuse on a child and how it can completely destroy them. I think people that act like Horokoshi “down played” and “ret-conned” Endeavor as a character to make him more sympathetic/ redeemable or that he’s simply writing Touya as “always being a bad seed” are missing the mark. This is, admittedly, something you see a lot when it comes to victims of abuse in the real world as well; the idea that if you weren’t physically or sexually abused on top of emotional or mental abuse, your abuse is somehow less “valid.” Now I’ve seen more voices speaking out against this mentality - which is relieving and positive - but it’s still a problem. The way Touya was abused is no less valid or scarring to himself as a person as what Shoto has been through was. Touya and Enji clearly had a deep bond as father and son. Hell, the fact that Enji is sobbing and saying he “can’t fight his own son” in regards to Touya, but clearly had less issue training Shoto until he got ill or passed out says a lot.

Touya was put on an incredibly high pedestal by Enji’s constant praise and attention. He was the apple of his father’s eye until the limitations of his Quirk were discovered. Enji had filled his head with promises and goals for what his future would be, essentially selling him what turned out to be a lie. We see Rei herself tell Enji that Touya “knows you expect something out of the kids.” Touya’s whole life up until that point was being told of all the great he would someday accomplish, and equating that to being deserving of his Father’s love, attention and affection.

And then he couldn’t live up to that expectation. And then his parents had two more kids following that revelation. The idea that Touya doesn’t realize that Natsuo and Shoto were meant to be his replacements - unbroken models that “deserved” Enji’s love - is clearly not missed by him. It’s evident in the way he looks at Natsuo after he’s born. He sees this as a sign that he is no longer deserving - no longer worthy - of love or support from the parent he absolutely adores.

We see this mostly from Enji and Rei’s perspectives, so we know the reasons they did it, but it’s clear they didn’t stop to think about the way this would be interpreted by Touya himself. This whole matter is only worsened by the fact that Enji refuses to make sacrifices for the sake of his oldest son. He pushes Touya to live a life outside of Pro Heroics while Enji himself refuses to do the same, thus setting a positive example and showing solidarity with his son. He instead pushes him away and distances himself, loses himself in focusing on Natuso and, once his Quirk turns out to not be what he wants, Shoto. Touya continues to push himself despite his limits in a desperate bid for Enji to look at him the way he used to; with pride and love.

What caused the fire that “killed” Touya? His anguish over being neglected and abandoned - left unloved - by his father yet again. It’s clear that Touya’s mental health is in need of some real focus that he has never gotten - due to both his parents negligence as well as the fact that mental health is highly stigmatized in Japanese society - and pairing that with the emotional and mental abuse he suffered at Enji’s hands broke him.

So many people are claiming Horikoshi is trying to make Enji “more redeemable”, but how do you get that? Enji abused Rei, his own wife, physically and emotionally and mentally until she had a psychotic breakdown, hurt their youngest child, and then robbed her the right to mother her children further by having her locked up in a psych ward for the next decade or so; built their oldest son, Touya, up only to then emotionally and mentally abuse him to the point he damn near killed himself in a frantic bid to garner Enji’s support only to return years later completely unhinged and looking to murder his entire family out of spite; neglected Fuyumi and Natsuo to the care of each other and hired help; alienated Shoto, his youngest son, from his siblings for his entire formative years, physically and mentally and emotionally abused him, groomed him to accomplish a task he never wanted, put him through such extensive physical training that Shoto would get sick or pass out.

Enji was a shitty father. He has a long ass road to continue walking if he ever wants redemption. The fact he didn't physically hit Touya doesn’t mean that Enji didn’t abuse his son and it doesn’t make Touya any less of a victim.

* End TodoFam Rant*

On a slightly lighter note, I also like all the information with Hawks’ past and all the parallels we’re seeing develop!

I’ve rambled briefly about this in other places the Huwumi discord but I want to expound upon this a bit more here.

I feel like Touya/ Dabi and Keigo/ Hawks are meant to be parallels to one another.

Back to back, we had proper name claims by these two characters. We had Dabi reveal his true identity as Todoroki Touya and then we have Hawks choosing to abandon his hero name to instead step up to fight as Takami Keigo.

I feel like “Dabi” was always a mask, of sorts. Dabi is typically pretty calm, cool, composed with the occasional bites of snark and cruelty. Meanwhile, we see Touya emoting and moving in a manner more akin to himself as a child, dancing about in manic delight over revealing his true identity and intentions. The pair of them are two drastically different people when you stop and look at it. “Dabi” was the mask he wore to gain ground to enact his revenge, and now that he is there? Now Touya can burn everything tethered to it down to ground.

Meanwhile, we have "Hawks” as he was forced to become as per the Hero Public Safety Commission. We had it revealed quite a while back that Hawks was a man of many faces, jumping from laid-back and chill to serious and focused quite frequently. “Hawks” is the presentation for the public and the Commission, groomed to be the perfect little canary in the mine that was Pro Heroics. The reveal of his true heritage, however, is not the killing blow Touya wanted it to be. Instead, it allows Keigo, the one who wanted to be a Hero to help people, the chance to truly dedicate himself to that. In being freed from the cage of “Hawks”, he is given the change to really soar as Keigo.

Now, I feel that “Dabi” and “Hawks” are most certainly parts of Touya and Keigo as well, respectively. Even though those titles were masks, they were masks made from parts of the men who wear them. I think what we’ll see going forward is the true elements of those masks bleeding back into the whole, and seeing the truest forms of each character.

For better or for worse.

#crumbles grumbles #half baked headcanons #Wow I haven't busted that tag out in fuckin forever #Might have to do more headcanon posts about BNHA #If any of yall wanna read me ramble about that stuff?#BNHA Spoilers

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oh-for-fic-sake · 4 years

Text

The Ground Rules

Geralt lays down the law with the help of yennefer after catching the reader haveing a bit of me time in the bath.

Masterlist

Ok this took all day as i couldnt stop tweaking it and i got to the point iv just got to step back and throw it out there or im gonna scream.Any way this is to go along with pastry negotiations its based after that one so could be considered part two? can be read stand alone tho in all honesty these modern reader inserts are gonna jump about in timeline cos my plot bunnys are twats. Im basing my Ciri on a mix of mature netflix Ciri and slightly mischievous witcher 3 Ciri. Any way i hope you enjoy this one im pretty pleased with it xx

WARNING: Adult Themes, Smut, DubCon Swearing MxFxF 18+

Dont like it dont read it.

Geralt snaps when you take matters into your own hands.

The Ground Rules

"Well someone is excited" Jaskier drolled as he watched your form slowly creating distance between you as you marched ahead.

As the small rickety town came into veiw you cried out a victorious and dramatic "still alive" causing eye rolls and chuckles in the group. Honestly this was the first real town you'd come to since being here and you were thrilled. Sure you'd passed a tiny smattering of houses four or so days ago where you'd traded for some bread, tiny amount of dried meat and a few other essentials oh! and yenn had managed to replace your pastry to the amusment of the resident witcher. They'd both been more open with you since the whole pastry incident-which you thought was an off handed comment on yennefers part but she and geralt had since indicated otherwise.

The people in the village had mentioned of a near by town that was rumoured to have a contract out on a nest of some monster thingamajigs that you hadn't botherd to remeber the name of .You looked down the verge towards the town with immediate thoughts of eat, bathe and sleep- on a bed, a real fucking bed ,ok so it wont be a temper mattress but you could live with that-oh my fucking god hot water,a nice loooong soak you moaned in your throat the thought alone brought tears to your eyes. You walked ahead trying to usher the group.

And maybe you could have your own room. Honestly sharing a bed with the couple was becoming an issue for you,your crush on them was definatly getting out of control now constantly blushing under their heated glances and they are becoming more touchy feely, Hands lingering longer than nesscasary or leaning in so close so thier breath tickled the hairs on your neck basically doing anything to get you flustered and you swear to god yesterday yennefer copped a feel whilst helping you threw a small steam which you didn't need help with;not that she listened. Bottom line you were becoming sexualy frustrated pretty much staying in a constant state of arousal a night away from them to take care of business would be very much appreciated.

"Come ooooonnnn guys keep up" you turned looking back at them drawing out your whine befor resuming towards the town

"Someone should catch up with her she looks like a girl on a mission" Yennefer commented

"Yes. Ciri would you keep her near the main gate and out of trouble while we settle roach in the stables ,here take her this she should cover up befor anyone gets any ideas" geralt grunted as your form began to dissapear down the brow of the hill ,ciri looked between the two before shrugging grabbing his offered cloak then ran to catch up with you.

You glanced to the side as you heard footsteps noticing Ciri fall in step with you she held out his cloak.

"Here geralt said to cover up before people get any ideas" you sighed it wasnt your fault his shirt hung off of you showing a large amount of shoulder and chest luckily when the hoover portal of doom sucked you in you were in fleece lined black leggings that had been durable enough to survive the last 3 weeks on the road(your stitch t shirt hadn't survived your initial fall) because you doubt he'd have anything your hips would get in to. Rolling your eyes you pulled the heavy fabric across your shoulders repostioning it so that it wasnt draging on the floor to much but was still sheilding your body.

"He's such a dad" Ciri giggled nodding in agreement befor reciting what esle geralt had requested ordered. You scoffed shaking your head

"So he doesnt even trust me to walk through a town, he does realise im an adult right? That i can do things with out causing trouble. i mean for god sake im not jaskier" she snorted

"I think its more like he doesnt want other men trying to sleep with you" you did a double take

"The hell you know about that sort of shit? has Jaskier been corrupting you?"

A knowing smirk crossed her face as she held her hands up coming to a halt facing you just inside the wooden gates of the town.

"You think i havent noticed whats going on by myself, Geralt likes you so does yenn jaskiers noticed to, think he's going to write a song"

"He better bloody not and anyway maybe i want to find a companion for the night." You announced tersely crossing your arms only to freeze as you heard a growl from behind you.

"Oh yes, i may have forgot to mention that witchers are senses are really sensetive" she smiled sweetly, you gaped why were you only being told this now. Looking between her and the others approaching.

"Wh-what how the fuck you leave that out? d-do you think he heard us? from back there" She nodded

"Most definitely" you gulped feeling yourself shrink into Geralts cloak a little at the looks you received from Geralt and Yennefer as he spoke to her telling her what youd just said.oh fuck.

"when you say senses you mean all of 'em? Not just one or two?" hoping beyond hope that something had been lost in translation.

"Nope all of them sight, smell, hearing the whole lot" she replied watching the colour drain from your horror sticken face. You'd been getting wet over the past few days. And the realisation that he probably knew embarrassed the shit out of you. Geralt smirked obviously he heard.You were so fucked.he knew and if he knew then she knew.oh my god. You were sooo fucked.'whelp there goes my dignity' you thought. He strode past you to the mediocre stables with roach in toe ready to hitch her for the night.Jaskier and yenn followed pulling some of the bags off of the horse then passing them out to their respective owners. Geralt then stood before you all giving you all the 'game plan' as you call it.

"we will find an inn and eat after that you get settled in for the night whist i see about this contract."

"don't bother about me tonight im going to catch myself a young fair maiden for the night" you scoffed at Jaskier's announcement drawing his attention

"Sounding like a creeper there Jask, what? you gonna do throw a net in the tavern? don't think they'd take to kindly to that" he huffed through his nose aggravated.

"No im going to sing in the tavern and lure a beauty to my side for the night" you played along widening your eyes in false realization

"oohh so your gonna go pay for it, how does it work exactly is it by hour or-" Geralt quickly intervened covering your mouth one to stop the inevitable spat and two before you could corrupt Ciri any further Jaskier deadpanned giving you a flat look.

"you're welcome to come find out for yourself im sure your just Itching to get some relief-"

"JASKIER! you go ahead at least try to keep a bit of coin back this time" Jaskier 1 Y/n 0.

You glowered behind Geralt's hand as he dismissed the smirking bard who turned on his heel prancing off quite pleased with himself. You smacked Geralt's hand away wiping your mouth with the back of your hand before slowly making your way down the street into town.It had taken nearly half an hour to find a decent inn that had room for the four of you. A room with two double beds that had a heavy curtain to split the room into two it was usually rented by traveling families. You groaned as you walked in, now you really couldn't take care of business, you followed Ciri as she placed her bag on the bed on the left following suit you placed yours on the other half of it only to have Yennefer quickly relocated it to her side of the other bed. Ciri snorted giving you a knowing look.you sighed then stomped across the room. Knowing all to well that it was futile to argue with the sorceress ,the witcher was stubborn but she was something else. Geralt handed a small pouch of coin to Yennefer.

"This is for the new clothes Ciri needs a thicker cloak preferably fur lined maybe new boots to not sure how long those will last in the mountains." yennefer hummed as she pocketed the money.

"And the clothes for Y/n as well?"

"Yes, should be enough there for what we discussed if not i'v got a bit more saved" you raised your brows blinking at them.

"err what was discussed? guys? what did you talk about? was it about me? helloooo" you waved as they ignored you.Yennefer pulled off her cloak leaving it on her side of the bed. you and Ciri followed their lead only for Geralt the tug yours back across you giving a sharp look as you rolled your eyes.The group made its way down into the quiet main room of the family run inn where you were served a meal of roast beef with vegetable trimmings ,before you knew it Geralt had left to find out about the contract with a final 'Behave' thrown in your direction.To which you grunted in response,too full to even tell him to 'jog on' - a phrase that still frustrated the witcher as he didn't know the meaning-. Yennefer had asked for a bath before your meal which you were just informed was ready leaving you alone with the sorceress. You had all decided Ciri would have the bath first then you, yennefer and finally geralt if he was back before it got cold.

"I cant breath" yennefer laughed out loud you rubbed your tummy closing your eyes

"I mean honestly, I think theres food in my lungs" groaning leaning back against the chair she gave a sympathetic smile

"Well you did inhale your food, maybe next time take it easy."

"Can you blame me, been the first meat iv recognized since i got here" It was true so far you'd been living on meats that you wouldn't have necessarily chose to eat back home rabbit,mutton venison ect.

"After we've bathed we will rest for the day but tomorrow we have to run over to the seamstress and get your new clothes, not sure how long we will be here and might have to order some or have them taken up,you are a little thing.Might have to have some leather work done too." you squinted pointing an accusing finger at her

"You calling me a midget? we going for shots now are we?" she smiled sheepishly

"No .no shots?. i just meant your petite don't worry its very cute. Anyway we are only picking up the basics a few day dresses ,Riding clothes boots that sort of thing" you blinked owlishly flushing as she called you cute.

"Riding clothes yes. Dresses no thank you" she stared unblinking at you for a few moments making you squirm at the calm expectant gaze that was getting heavier by the second, it was like the eyes of a mother when you'd been caught doing some dumb shit you knew you shouldn't be doing.

"Stop it....Yenn no... cant i just get something like Geralt has..please... i'd be much more comfortable...even Jaskier i mean im not one for the puffy bits but 'd make do....."

she blinked slowly

"Oh fine but only one or two no more and your not getting rid of these leggings either" you gave in, her gaze was to unnerving and it did things to you. Her face lit up. She was looking forward to seeing you in feminine gown instead of a her and Geralt's shirts not that she minded but it'd be a nice change to your strange stetchy leggings (not that she minded you in the form fitting bottoms) She moved leaning in to your side hand on your thigh patting it lightly.

"Thank you, don't be so worried i will take good care of everything" you gulped as you felt the flushed skin of your face grow hotter,your core clenching and warming at her sultry reply you closed your eyes trying to regain a bit of control. Suddenly her attention was drawn to a pink skinned Ciri who had finished her bath and changed Yenn nodded and released your thigh. You bolted upstairs hearing a chuckle as you did.

Once in the room you sighed in relief, making your way towards the screened off section that held a large oval tub full of steaming water. Discarding your clothes as you all but melted into the hot water.You submerged yourself getting your hair wet scratching tentatively at your scalp that had begun to ache under the grime. Spotting a small stool with what you'd consider toiletries, a bar of hard sweet smelling soap and a few vials.You grabbed the soap, opting for using it for your hair as well unsure what vials did what and went where.After scrubbing all the built up sweat and dirt you you closed your eyes lounging back against the slanted end tub you relaxed a few moments it wasn't long before you were feeling much better ,tired muscles succumbing to the soothing hot water.your body hummed. 'no one would have to know' as your summarized that this was the perfect opportunity to relieve yourself of other tensions,

'its not like geralt could smell you under water, i mean i dont think dogs can thats why criminals cross rivers when their being hunted on tv isn't it?' biting your lip you peaked an eye open and listened out carefully feeling naughty when you began moving your hand to the apex of your thighs gasping as your finger ghosted over your hardened bundle of nerves .Fuck. Your clit was sensitive not surprising when Geralt and Yennefer had practically edged you for nearly a week. You whined quietly as you began a fast rhythm on your clit ,other hand slinking down to your opening rubbing your fingers up and down the warm weeping hole. You bit off a groan as your hips gyrated against your roaming hands. Stomach tensing as you drove yourself faster and faster to the edge.Almost there.Fuck almost-you jumped hissing 'shit' ,ripping your hands away from yourself , sitting up fast enough to make your head spin splashing a wave of water over the floor when you heard the door open slamming the wall beside it.

"err theres some one in here!" you called out loudly, angry at who ever just interrupted you.You got nervous as the heavy steps quickly made their way towards you.Realizing who ever it was didn't care for your modesty as they were coming your way you slung your top half out of the tub to grasp the towel screaming because before you could grasp it and cover yourself a large calloused hand enveloped your shoulder shoving you back into the water.

"WH-GERALT THE FUCK? WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU? YOU SCARED THE SHIT OUTTA ME." you shouted at him as he released you then you looked down slapping your hands down to cover your self as he raised his eyebrows and gave a lop sided grin.He defiantly looked like the big bad wolf in that moment eyes ablaze with a hunger you wasn't sure you wanted to explore or not. Collecting yourself swallowing dryly before scolding him in a voice that seemed to become smaller with each word.

"hey! get the fuck out im trying to bathe you prick" you heard the door open and close again in a less violent fashion. And suprize suprize yennefer glided into view behind the .

"Thats not all you were doing tho was it? i can fucking smell you" was growled at you as geralt wet his lips you squeaked.

"huh? b-but.. i thought..w-water" you stuttered out as your brain malfunctioned on on an epic scale. Yennefer gave out a loud laugh.

"so thats why he tore threw the inn like that.honestly Geralt i thought something was wrong" she continued laughing as she replayed the way geralt had all but vaulted the tables to get to the stairs. you pouted throughly humiliated

"something is wrong" he ground out before kneeling beside you .Shifting you tired to create some distance from him. He was having none of that wasting no time thrusting his hands into the water tugging away your shielding hand the other forcing its way between your legs. You slammed back against the tub gasping trying to get away. All you'd achieved was his hand pinning your hips to the back of the bath by your pussy

"GERALT WHA-"

"Lets lay down some ground rules" He squeezed your throbbing heat in his hand curling his fingers dangerously close to your opening you bucked moaning breathlessly .Your eyes searched Yennefer's for help but she wore a similar hungry look that he had. Another slow squeeze brought your attention back to the brooding alpha male in the room.

"This is ours.ours to lick,suck and fuck as we see fit, to do what we please with and is off limits to your wandering little hands we clear on that?" You groaned out as he emphasized certain words with teasing brushes of fingers and a slow rub of his palm. Realizing that he might actually be serious.You nodded quickly babbling as he rocked his hand back and forth igniting the heat that you had built alone.

"C-crystal-please Geralt PLease" You threw your head back as his hand moved deliberate and teasing.

"You think you deserve it? after being caught up here playing with yourself?" You nodded then shook your head confused, unable to really concentrate on anything apart from his magnificent hand ,half lidded eyes and clenching your fingers tight around the thumb he was using it to control your movements as your body whithered under his ministrations.

"Really?" He said smirking as he held completely still you sucked through your teeth biting back curses.He chuckled smug bastard. moving trying to get some friction to no avail.

"Well we have been teasing the poor thing ,of course shes going to try sorting herself out the first chance she gets .Honestly Geralt what did you expect? i did tell you" yennefer reasoned as she stood behind you combing threw your wet hair you before grasping your free hand pulling it up out of the way kissing your palm before ghosting her nose down your neck pressing soft kisses along it you mewled at her and tried to coax geralt to continue again by rolling your hips.

"I suppose we could let her off this time" His voice was pure sex as he glanced down before giving into pushing two thick fingers up into you. his breach of your walls had an initial sting but was incredible as your needy walls tried sucking him deeper greedy to be filled.

"oh-oh fuck Ger-please" you arched your back pushing down onto his hand clutching onto Yennefer's wrist. you were so hot .fuck.he was gonna make you cum too quick. You panted throwing your head side to side as your legs tensed then raised up towards your torso, your pussy wrapped tight around Geralts fingers as he held them deep every few thrusts making you feel just how your walls rippled around him. he alternated between fast and shallow then slow and deep trying to build you up slowly he wasn't going to rush you, he was skilled enough to walk you up to the edge and throw you off whenever he damn well pleased. You'd never been this desperate in your life . Yenn's cool fingers delicately teased out your nipples pinching and flicking them until they stood out provocatively. You rocked against the both of them as Geralt made sure to start dragging your clit up and down with his palm as he finger fucked you curling his fingers searching for that small spot that'd send your mind reeling. Yenn had leaned down kissing your cheek and begun whispering lowly into your ear.

"He knows what he's doing doesn't he?Iit wont take him long to find every single spot you have, thats the thing with bedding a witcher they are much more observant then regular men. I have no doubt he will know when your going to orgasm before you do.He has the ability to force them out of nowhere when ever he pleases.. He is quite cruel like that" you moaned out loud snapping your head back high pitched and vulgar sounds tore from your throat as Geralts invading fingers began rubbing furiously back and forth on a soft spot inside of you.Unable to control yourself as your legs and tummy spasmed erratically as your tearfull moans and pleas filled the room

"Thats it oh i think iv found it~" he boasted as he moved his elbow pinning a knee to the side of the tub leaving your clit cruelly exposed for Yennefer,they shared a look as she moved her hand down to join Geralts taking over to rub small firm circles on your exposed clit.

"oh-OH fuck noNOno i cant please i ca-UGh to-Too much please FUCK" Yennefer was quick to swallow your moans in a kiss of clashing teeth and tongues before any one could hear ,tears streamed down your face as your body ached your pussy contracting painfully around his swiping digits. Pulling back for air the sorceress placed open mouthed kisses over your shoulders leaving red marks with her teeth and sucking bites.

"Good girl your being sooo good you don't have to ask this time" she praised as she reached your ear befor sucking harshly below your jaw. you were quickly becoming putty in their hands Geralt growled as he picked up the begining tremors of your orgasm.

"Look at me" you obeyed instantly moaning as you watched the white wolf pull his lip up in a snarl that would have scared you any other time.

"This is what you were made for, your ours, we own you, mind body and soul we own every whimper ,every tear ,every orgasm and hole they are ours for the taking when ever we choose,from now only ecstasy you will know is what we give you" You'd never have guessed how filthy his mouth could be but it seemed to have the desired effect as a sudden rush of heat was your only warning before rearing up screaming out, not sure if you'd shut your eyes or blacked out for a moment as you gushed into the bath water.Geralt pressed into you persistent while Yennefer's hand continued the tight circles efficiently drawing out the best orgasm your ever had.Finally their movements ceased and your body went limp wracked trembling in the aftermath as your orgasm ebbed away slowly. After giving you a few moments to come down and catch your breath Geralt removed his fingers you whimpered inside's still so sensitive after your orgasm, sucking on them he moaned deep and feral before plucking your clenched fingers off his thumb. Yennefer quickly wiped your pussy gently clearing the cum from between your swollen lips. Making you twitched as the cloth ran over you.Pulling you from the bath was a joint effort as they rested you on the bed and began patting you dry with the towel.Moaning in protest as your arms waved loosely trying to take over only having your hand smacked away as they finished.Lying back looking up at them bleary eyed trying to stay awake you felt like jelly, giving up fighting you rolled over yawning tucking your arms below your head Yennefer tilted her head stroking your hair sending you into a relaxed sleep.

"Poor dear ,Oh look at her geralt shes all fucked out and we haven't even fucked her yet"

"hmm she'll be ok we just need to work on her stamina" he replied patting your bottom as he pulled the cover over your washed out form.Geralt panicked

"Shit wheres Ciri?"

"well when you came charging in down stairs i told her to go find Jaskier and stay there until one of us came to get her" Yennefer said with a sly grin he shook his head and scooped her up kissing her passionately. As he took a few steps to the now vacant bath

"well the bath is still warm care to join me?"

"with pleasure lets try not to wake her tho"

See you soon xxx

#geralt x yennefer x you #geralt x modern reader #geralt x yennefer #geralt x y/n #geralt of rivia #geralt smut #witcher fanfiction #witcher imagine #witcher fic #witcher smut #geralt x yennefer x reader

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kareofbears · 4 years

Text

desperate as that sounds

Five times Ryuji ran for Akira (and one time he ran for himself.)

—

read on ao3 or below the cut :)

It’s 4:45 am with the weather sitting at a brutal -3 degrees when Ryuji really starts wishing that he brought another jacket.

People are lined around Akihabara by the hundreds outside of closed electronic stores, and the sun has yet to even rise. Some people are yawning, some are clutching their rapidly cooling coffee in a death grip, and most have dark, purple bags underneath their eyes—proof of the battle scars that they’ve acquired. Every person here had the same goal in mind: To get what they need and get out as quick as possible.

As it turns out, if everyone has that same mindset, it creates the violent, yearly November tradition that is Black Friday.

Glancing around, he notices that people came in packs, teams. Teenagers and pre-pubescent kids are all scuffling around, hyping themselves up and creating strategies for the war to come. The more seasoned veterans of the yearly massacre came in pairs—the smaller the group, the faster you move, the move land you cover.

At the biggest electronic store in a region that’s already been nicknamed ‘Electronic Town,’ he is fourth in line—an impressive feat, especially for a first-timer. But it came with a heavy toll: he is completely and utterly alone.

”Skull, do you read me?”

Well, physically alone, anyway.

“Loud and clear,” he replies, readjusting the mic in his ear. “Not that I mind, but what’s with the codenames?”

Futaba scoffs. “You think Black Friday is just about the physical aspect? Foolish boy—the psychological aspects are half the battle. If I get you into the mindset that we’re in a Palace, then you’ll get into infiltration mode, and you’ll be OP compared to the nerds out there.”

“Ooo, I like it! Your brain is effin’ galaxy sized!”

“I do what I can for my faithful pack mule.”

“I’ll try not to take that personally.”

His deal with Futaba had been a simple one. She helps Ryuji navigate the horrors of Akihabara during Black Friday in exchange that he acts as what is essentially a drug trafficker sans the drugs. Despite her rigorous societal training she’d undergone with the Thieves, something about entering a borderline stampede still seems somewhat unappealing to her. Besides, he doesn’t mind. He’d always wanted to do something nice for Futaba anyway, and the store that has her computer thing is the same store that holds what he needs.

”Five minutes to go,” her voice crackles into his ear. ”Infiltration route—go!”

Their deal had also come in with an intense tutorial session that ended up lasting until one in the morning. “Floor 4, down 3 aisles, 8 steps in, turn right, second shelf, grab a box that says ‘GTX graphics card.’ Pink, if possible.”

“A+, Skull! You know, if you can memorize that, I seriously don’t get why you’re failing English verbs.”

“Please, this is actually important.”

Futaba cackles. “Now you’re speaking my language. With your legs and my navigation, this’ll basically be a Tuesday afternoon in Leblanc.”

People around him are starting to straighten up, some going as far as to remove the extra layer of clothing and shoving it in backpacks for maximum speed and minimum restrictions. “Damn, people here look more intense than some dudes in my track meets.”

“If you’re throwing out portable chargers with 30-hour battery life for only 800 yen, you’d be a little intense too.”

Ryuji scoffs and begins to stretch, being extra sure to get his right thigh. “I’m plenty intense. Just last Saturday, I almost beat the Big Bang Burger challenge.”

“Pretty sure Akira beat that on his second week in Tokyo. You know, you still haven’t told me why you’re bothering with this whole Black Friday mess. I didn’t peg you for an electronics type of guy, and your phone is as crappy as your posture.”

“Rude! But I can’t argue with that.” He starts to run in place, and for a brief second, he wonders if he should’ve packed a protein shake.

“Well, too late now. If your thing sells out because you didn’t want to give your Navi information, that’s on you.”

“Gimme some credit, Futaba,” an employee who looks equal parts sleep-deprived and terrified approaches the glass doors. “Ain’t no way in hell I’m failing either of us this morning.”

The glass slides open, and as if sunlight was released from the captivity of the clouds, or perhaps a meteor just broke through the earth’s atmosphere, the people start pushing, shoving, and flooding inside. The crowd looked both impenetrable and unwavering; an unstoppable force and an immovable object rolled into one giant stream of desperate shoppers.

Ryuji spares a split-second to crack his neck. Mission Start.

The moment he breaks through the initial threshold, people who were only one step behind him suddenly became ten, twenty, thirty. Weaving through crowds and aisles with the precision of a seamstress, Ryuji evades it all with ease.

”Skull, status report.”

“Smooth sailing, Oracle!” He ducks as an overly buff businessman turns around with a 3-metre pole used for studio lighting threatens to bash his head in. “You’re totally right about the codenames, by the way. It’s almost like I’ve got Captain with me.”

“Right?” She laughs. “It’s all about the mindset.”

Ryuji turns, and finally gets to the stairs—the most brutal section and the biggest gamble. It’s the reason why it was essential that he’s one of the first in line. Once the stairs get jammed with people, it’s game over. Making a mad dash up four flights of stars, he thanks any God that may be that Palaces are fantastic for rehab.

He makes it to the top, panting. It’s empty, save for a few nervous-looking employees. He hopes the smile he throws their way came off as ‘pleasant and grateful for their service’ rather than ‘a delinquent asshole who might steal loads of shit.’

“Down 3 aisles, 8 steps,” he mutters to himself as he quickly scans the fourth floor. “Turn right, second shelf,” eyes landing on his target, he grins. “I effin’ rock.”

”You got it?”

“Of course I did!” He fist pumps before swiping the box. In his excitement, he nearly runs over to give a random employee a high-five. “Alright Oracle, you’re up.”

”I love you so much in a non-weird way. Okay,” he hears the clacking of keys on the other side of the mic. “What do you need?”

“Two words: game console.”

The clacking stops. “You’re joking.”

Ryuji snorts. “I ain’t waking up at 3 in the morning for a joke.”

”Those are hard enough to get as is, and on a day like this—”

“So you can’t do it?”

In the same way every one of the thieves know they could bait Ryuji with a few choice words, it’s a lesser-known fact that Futaba is quite nearly as bad when it comes to open defiance. “Jerk. Of course I can.”

“Then let’s do it!”

“Ugh, fine!” The clacking resumes, more vigorously. “Yikes, only 3 left. Make it quick!”

“Got it,” he replies. He turns around and his stomach drops as he sees people rushing in. “What floor?”

“Third.”

Ryuji groans. The stairs, with people packed in like sardines, are a circus. It would take at least two minutes to try and go down a single flight of stairs. The elevator is even worse, and he honestly wouldn’t be surprised if it had already started to malfunction. Only one choice, then.

He takes a deep breath. “Pray for me.”

”Godspeed, soldier.”

Ryuji, like a wild animal on the loose in the streets of Tokyo, jumps on the handrails and begins his descent that way, begging to the skies that he doesn’t slip and create a domino effect that knocks down a dozen people.

In thirty seconds flat (with no small amount of cursing from both the customers and himself) he jumps off and lands (tumbles) onto the third floor, grinning triumphantly. Eat your heart out, Sumire.

“Oracle, I’m here. Almost broke my ankles. Where to?”

”Straight ahead,” she replies. ”Only one left, though. Better make it quick.”

His eyes land on the last game console, and he sees someone making their way towards it. “Not a problem.”

Ryuji sprints.

Throwing every societal rule and common courtesy into the air, he makes a mad dash and, somehow, miraculously does not bump into anyone or knock down any huge shelves.

In approximately 3 seconds, he grabs his treasure and yells a very loud but completely genuine “sorry!” over his shoulder as he half runs back to the stairs, face red for multiple reasons.

Delving back into the sea of the crowd, trying to navigate himself to the cash register, he sighs. “I’m going to hell.”

”Mission success, then?”

“I had to steal it from some guy! I feel so bad. What if he’s like, buying it for his long lost son or something?”

”Whatever! That’s just part of the Black Friday spirit. Congrats! At least you finally got a game console.”

“Huh? Oh, I already had one.”

Static crinkles in his ear, before, ”WHAT!?”

“Ow! Don’t yell!”

”You already had one and you still did this shopping run?”

“Yeah…?”

”Why?! Are you gonna sell it? Are you one of those sleazy men who take advantage of the good will of gamers, Sakamoto?”

“Hell no!”

”So—“

“Oops, almost at the front of the cash register. I’ll drop off the goods at Akira’s. Talk to you later, shortie.”

Click.

”Wha— Hey! Ryuji!” Silence. “Ugh!”

————

After a much-deserved nap, Futaba climbs up the stairs to Akira’s attic.

“The star has arrived!” she says in lieu of a greeting. “Where’s Ryuji?”

“He left,” Akira answers. He’s looking at something on his worktable. “Your stuff is on the bed.”

Futaba whoops and snatches up the little plastic bag. Peering inside, she sees an adorable GTX hot pink graphics card, and a note. In a horrific scrawl, it writes: dont tell him plz ;)))

She looks up quizzically when her eyes land on Akira’s desk: A shiny new game console.

“Um…”

“Hmm?” he looks up. “Oh, Ryuji dropped it off. Said his mom won it at work, and since he already had one, he gave it to me. Nice, right?”

She opens her mouth, before closing it with a clack. Just two weeks ago, Ryuji had asked Akira in the group chat if they could play video games at his place. Sometimes, it’s easy to forget about Akira’s situation: false accusation, an attic for a room, no definitive meals, not even a proper bathroom in the building, but Akira plays it off like it’s easy. He answered by making a joke that he’s too poor for something like that when you can buy faux battle axes and realistic shotguns instead. Everyone had forgotten about that interaction.

But apparently, Ryuji hadn’t.

He’s an idiot, Futaba thinks. To which boy she’s referring to, she’s not sure.

“Yeah,” is what she says instead. “It’s nice.”

====

The dust motes flying around the attic of Leblanc are lovely. Swirling in senseless formations, floating through the still air like snow. The way none of them collide with each other, as if they have some sort of motion detector that tells them to move out of the way. It’s pleasing to look at.

It’s a shame Ryuji doesn’t give a single shit about them at this moment.

He’s sitting on Akira’s bed, back pressed against the window sill with his hair tipped up, staring unfocused at the wooden beams, eyes glazed over. He’s been like this for the better part of the day, and now the evening is slipping by him. Time continues ticking on like a rigged bomb; an ongoing reminder of how many seconds he’s losing, and how much more he can lose.

He’s considered moving. To walk around the room, shift the dust that’s surely settled on him. Getting up, stretching his legs, outwardly expelling some of his trapped, balled up energy is a good idea. Healthy, even, if those shitty YouTube videos he’s watched on his phone about anger management were on to something. But he can’t. He shouldn’t.

Amidst all the uncertainty and the wound-up anxiety that has currently made permanent residence deep inside his core, he knows that if lets his joints unlock, he’s going to fucking lose it.

Slam a fist inside the dry wood, tear up a blanket, throw the adorable ramen bowl he gave Akira against the wall until it shatters into a hundred pieces. He’s so terrified of ruining this room that he won’t even give himself the option. And Ryuji would rather let hell freeze over than scare Futaba again in his fit of fucked-up rage that comes with the package that is Sakamoto Ryuji.

So he’s stuck on the bed for God knows how long.

Footsteps come up, and he doesn’t need to look down to know who’s going to chew him out. If it’s not Akira that’s going to chide him out of his stupor (which it isn’t, even though Ryuji would do anything if it means that Akira’s back here with them), then they’d send in someone who’d drag him out of it with her nails perfectly manicured.

“You look terrible.”

“Screw off,” Ryuji spits automatically, and he cringes inwardly. Ann doesn’t deserve the sharp end of his horrible mood. It’s not her fault that it feels like his insides feel like they’re trying to eat their way out.

She ignores him and moves to hop on top of the old work desk. The wood creaks underneath her. “You’ve been here all day.”

“I know.”

“Did you sleep last night?”

“Yes. No.” He feels Ann’s stare burn into the side of his face—a ghost of Carmen’s presence. “I don’t know.”

“He wouldn’t want to see you like this.”

Irritation swells in him. She’s never learned to take a hint in her life. “Really? Are you seriously saying that?”

“Are you saying he would?”

“I’m saying he’s too busy having the living shit beat out of him to see me like this.”

His body twitches, and that’s all he needed for his resolve to break down. He jumps from the bed, feet landing heavily enough that he’s sure they can all hear him from the floor below. Unconsciously, his feet pace around the small room; quick with agitation but heavy with dread. Anything to distract from doing something stupid.

“You’re worried about me, what, not sleeping? For lying down on this damn bed for too long? Screw that. Akira’s being grilled like cheap meat for the past couple of days and you’re expecting me to act normal about it? That’s bullshit.”

Bad. This is bad. His fingers are already curling in his fists, eager and all too willing to be used. He settles for balling the edge of his shirt instead.

“He isn’t here. That’s the fact, isn’t it? And what the fuck am I doing about it? Freaking out? Trying not to throw a tantrum about it like some kind of stupid kid? Am I really this messed in the head that everyone on the team is—-is hiding from me like I’m some kind of—” he cuts himself off.

Delinquent.

Ryuji takes a deep breath, fully inhaling and slowly exhaling. He focuses on the dust motes again. In and out. Countdown from ten. He can do this. He can get a grip on himself. Thank God it was Ann that came up—if it had been anyone else, he doesn’t think he can put his pride aside as easily. (Unless it was Futaba. God, he loves her so much.)

For a while, it was silent except for his breathing; it stuttered occasionally, but eventually it evens out. Ann only watches from her perch.

When he feels stable enough, Ryuji drops to sit on the hardwood.

“Okay?” she asks. Ann never babies him when he gets like this—she’s good that way.

“Okay.” And he really is. Not completely, of course not. His nerves weren’t strung as tight, but he still feels a heavy weight right in his stomach.

She hops off the desk and goes to sit in front of him on the floor. Crossing her legs, Ann waits. They regard each other for a long minute.

“He’s the toughest guy I’ve ever met,” he says. It feels weird saying this out loud, instead of repeating the mantra in his head like a broken record. “If anyone can handle this, it’s Akira.”

She rolls her eyes. “Duh.”

“He’s going to be okay.”

“I know that.”

“Sooner than later, his dumb ass is going to be walking through the door downstairs.”

“You bet he is.”

“And I get to yell at him as much as I want.”

“Get in line.”

“I’m not going to lose him tonight.”

Ann reaches over—slowly, giving him plenty of room to shift away—and places a hand on his knee. “You’re not going to lose him tonight.”

Ryuji laughs, a little breathy but still genuine. He prods at her hand. “When’d you get so good with me, Takamaki?”

“I do the Lord’s work around here, free of charge.” She grins, before her tone drops again. “Can you do something for me, though?”

“Lay it on me.”

Ann pulls back and leans on a propped hand, her blue eyes piercing. “When Akira comes back, and he will—”

“And he will. No doubt about it.”

“Obviously. He’s the best person for this. But when Akira comes back, he’s…” Ann gnaws on the inside of her cheek. “He’s not going to be okay, Ryuji.”

Somewhere in his mind, he already knew what she was going to say. While the biggest of his worries is that he’d never see Akira walk through the doors of Leblanc again, there was a quieter fear. A very specific fear, one that Ryuji knows all too well. Because stories don’t just end at the climax of a single event—they keep going. It’s the fear of what happens once he does see Akira.

The aftermath.

The bell chimes downstairs.

His heart lurches, and he makes the briefest of eye contact with Ann before he’s gone.

He’s the toughest guy I’ve ever met.

It’s like his feet have a mind of their own.

If anyone can handle this, it’s Akira.

In an instant, he’s scrambling towards the stairs on all fours before pushing himself up.

Sooner than later, his dumbass is going to be walking through the door downstairs.

His hand finds its hold on the old wooden railing as he sprints his way down. More than once, he almost trips and bangs his head into the wall.

And I get to yell at him as much as I want.

Rounding the corner, he jumps on the landing, ignoring the sharp pain that shoots up his thigh. He ignores the stares from everyone else. Looking up his breath catches in his throat. Gray eyes meet his brown ones. He takes one step forward, and then another. And then he sprints the rest.

He’s going to be okay.

Ryuji stops himself right in front of him, an arms-length away. Akira’s face looked like it’s been through hell and back. Split lip, black eye, bruised cheekbone. An intense fury flares up his spine when he sees the grime and dirt up along his temple.

He hesitates.

As much as he wants to reach forward, close the gap, to make sure that this boy that he can’t afford to lose is real… he can’t do it.

Because he knows what would happen if he tries to cross a boundary that isn’t ready to be crossed—he might not be ready. Ryuji could hurt him by touching any injuries he doesn’t know about (God, how much more is he hiding in there? He’s this close to either throwing up or throwing a punch). But what he’s most scared about, what he’s terrified of doing, is touching Akira in the state of mind he’s in right now. For someone to grip him, grab him, even just brush past him right now, it might be too much. Judging by how beat up he looks just from his face? That does shit to people. That changes you.

Ryuji would know. So he keeps his distance.

Akira’s eyes turn dark, and for a second, Ryuji is terrified that he must’ve overstepped a boundary.

Then he throws his arms around Ryuji, the force knocking them both back by a couple of steps.

“Akira?” he asks, bewildered. Never in their friendship has he seen Akira act like this. It sends alarm bells ringing through his head. “What—”

“Don’t,” Akira cuts off, voice hoarse and quiet, so quiet that even this close, Ryuji is straining to hear him. The arms around him tighten. “Don’t be like that. Please. I can’t. Not right now, Ryuji.”

It hits him all at once. And in his sixteen years of living, Ryuji doesn’t think he’s ever been stupider.

Akira’s been trapped in an interrogation room with nothing but a bunch of make-believe police officers. He got the shit beat out of him, had to stage his own suicide.

And Ryuji just tried to push him away.

He lets his arms wrap around Akira tightly; not too tight, but enough to make sure he won’t slip away from him again. (Never again. Not if he can help it.)

“I’m glad you’re back,” he whispers. Tilting his head up, he stares at the soft lighting of Leblanc, forcing his lungs to breathe evenly—not for fear of losing his temper, but for fear of exposing the tears silently streaming down his face. “So fucking glad.”

Akira doesn’t answer. He only buries his face deeper into Ryuji’s shoulder.

Ann was right—Akira isn’t okay. Not for now, not for awhile. It’s up to Ryuji and everyone else in their group of friends to fix that. That’s fine. They’ll all take as long as they need. He isn’t okay right now, but he will be. They can work on that.

But one thing was clear.

I’m not going to lose him tonight.

====

Summer in Mementos is pretty gross.

Granted, it’s always nasty in here—there’s a perpetual air of moisture, like the inside of a whale, if Ryuji had ever been in one (he’s basing that off of an American movie Ann showed them last week; he didn’t even know it was possible for a fish to get lost in the ocean). There’s also the ongoing sound of trains passing by them on loop, and to him, trains are just inherently cramped and humid and always too sticky for his liking.

Of course, there’s the disgusting, weird amalgamated Shadows that litter every level of Mementos. At least in Palaces they sort of resemble something from the real world, but he guesses they didn’t even bother with these ones. The worst part of all this is that right now, it’s hot, but not hot enough for the Shadows to process a heat wave.

So essentially, they’re fighting with additional bucket loads of sweat, but with none of the usual reward that comes with it.

Well, not that they needed it.

“Fox.”

“As you wish.”

Yusuke’s boots skid to a halt as he points his katana at the fast-moving Shadow, the tip perfectly still. “Your assistance, Goemon.”

They’re on their weekly Mementos grind, the list Mishima keeps updating finally too long to ignore. (Akira hates it when things pile up. It’s a big reason why Ryuji hastily cleaned up every time he wanted to come over. Now though, he doesn’t even bother.)

The current All-Star team includes Yusuke, Makoto, Ryuji, and Akira, with the rest of them keeping a close eye in case they need a quick shift in strategy.

From his katana, black ice crawls in the ground beneath rusted train tracks, the air suddenly chilly despite the humidity that was there a moment ago. Frost shoots forward, encasing the legs of the Shadow only to shatter with a strong jerk forward. It roars, the ear-piercing sound causing the scattered debris around them to vibrate. Akira clicks his tongue.

Strong against ice. Easy fix. Ryuji mouths the words along with Akira when he says, “Panther, you’re up.”

“Finally!”

Ann darts in, high-fiving Yusuke as he rushes out. Ryuji can see Makoto pat Yusuke on the back, sympathy etched on her expression and Futaba mussing his hair. He always took it the hardest when he had to be switched out.

Akira’s gloved fingers brush the edge of his monochrome mask. “Come, Principality.”

As if a human version of justice has been summoned down to earth, the winged statue floats for a moment, eyes filled with scorn as she casts a simple, yet effective memory loss spell. The Shadow shakes its head aggressively. It works, but it won’t hold for long.

“Skull.”

“Don’t mind if I do!”

He grins and sprints right, squeezing into the Shadow’s blindside. It tries to twist around to take a swipe at him, but Ryuji is too fast—he slides right between its legs to confuse and disorient it. Once it seems like it completely lost sight of him, he raises his hand to grip the edge of his black mask. “Come on out, Captain!”

It’s a classic tactic; make the enemy lose focus, stun it, and stop it.

A pirate straight out of the Caribbean materializes from the embers of his mask—Captain Kidd in all of his glory regards the Shadow with a look of disdain before sparks fly from the hull of his ship, and an intense streak of lightning bursts forth, shocking its target like something from a regrettable movie about torture, knocking it down to the ground, a buzz perceptible even from here. He might have overdone it.

Ann whistles. “You didn’t even let me get a chance with it.”

“You can have the next million Shadows we bump into, I promise.” He calls Captain back into his mask, fragmented pieces forming together impossibly quick. “We good, Leader?”

Akira nods. “Just let me get the loot,” he smiles at Ryuji. “Awesome voltage on that last one, Skull.”

A grin stretches over his face before he can stop himself. He won’t deny it—getting a compliment from Joker was always something he filed away for later.

He’s too busy feeling pride surge through him that he can’t even bother to get ticked off when he hears Morgana scoff. “It doesn’t matter how good that attack was; he got in the way of Lady Panther’s finishing blow. That’s a crime in my eyes.”

“But doesn’t that just mean he saved her from doing anything?” Makoto raises an eyebrow. “Technically, he prevented any danger from befalling her, right?”

“Queen, as a gentleman, I have an obligation to tell you that that is a sexist notion.”

“You did not just say that.”

Something makes Ryuji pause. Immediately, his eyes flicker around them automatically. He tunes their chattering out, and finds himself tapping his foot, a slight jitter overcoming him. His nerves are trying to tell him something. Or maybe he’s imagining it? Is it just an aftershock from the intense lightning he cast out? No. It’s been too long since he’s had any problem with electric moves, and he’s never had problems from ones that he threw out himself.

Something was wrong, and he can’t put his finger on it.

He rattles his brain trying to figure out what it is. No one’s hurt, everyone’s safe and together. Well, mostly together, since Akira’s still approaching the Shadow—

A cold sweat drapes the back of his neck. Akira is still approaching the Shadow.

The Shadow hasn’t disintegrated yet.

“Akira—!”

The name slips past his lips, codenames forgotten. In slow motion, Ryuji sees Shadow’s body tense, its mouth frothing with what looks like liquid magma made from pits of hell—specializes in curse, and a strong one at that; Ryuji can feel the potency of its malignancy from where he’s standing. He watches as Akira stiffens, fingers twitching towards his mask, ready to retaliate, or at the very least, defend. And like a domino effect of bad luck, Ryuji feels bile rise to his throat.

Akira is good at what he does. Infuriatingly good. Took the whole Metaverse bullshit like a fish to water. But even he can’t switch Personas the same moment he summons them.

Principality would crumple like tissue paper against the Shadow. And Akira along with it.

You’re too late, a voice whispers in his head. You wouldn’t make it.

A heartbeat passes. And then Ryuji is flying.

It’s never too late, screams back something stronger, something unshakeable. Not ever. Especially not for him.

His boots hit the ground like the first strike of lightning amidst a storm—impossibly fast and unexpected. Lungs wheezing and legs throbbing, he crossed the distance in the span of a breath.

The Shadow throws the curse at Akira, red and black and filled to the brim with intensity, and Akira’s eyes can only widen, pupils dilated wildly to the point where there’s only black—a mirror of what’s about to hit him if Ryuji isn’t fast enough.

He doesn’t hesitate.

Ryuji shoves Akira, hard enough that he crashes onto the ground and he can hear the breath forcefully leave his lungs, and suddenly Ryuji can’t hear anything at all. His fingertips are fire and ice, his sense of surroundings have completely dissipated. Any energy in his body is being drained, like a dam cracked into millions of pieces—and all he’s left with is air. Vaguely, he can hear a choking noise, a broken sort of sound.

The blow is not just a violent one—it never is, with curse attacks. Instead of just feeling his skin bruised or blood running down his temple, he also feels himself get weaker, his mind growing heavier. An attack on the mind and body; a perfect cocktail of fucked up.

The last thing he sees before he loses consciousness is the glint from Akira’s knife slicing through the Shadow’s throat.

====

Tokyo is currently at a wicked thirty two degrees.

The sun radiates scorching temperatures down from the sky, the concrete eagerly absorbing every bit of its heat, making something akin to walking across hot coals. It’s hot enough that a mirage is visible to the naked eye. It’s hot enough that every ice cream store has a forty-minute line-up. It’s hot enough that no birds were flying, in fear that they may truly be fried by the sun above them.

Basically, it’s hot as hell.

“Ryuji-chan, pick up the pace!”

But Haru is more vicious than any conceivable temperature.

Looking like a survivor who was lost in the desert for several days, Ryuji lets out a half-garbled battle cry and sprints the last dozen meters. Haru clicks her stopwatch.

Sitting on a lovely lilac blanket, she tsks from underneath the shade. “Three seconds slower.”

“Ugh!” he collapses beside her on the cool grass. If she looks at him from a certain angle, she can see the steam positively radiating off of him. “I’m going to beat the living shit out of the sun.”

“You know I’d support you in anything you do, Ryuji-chan, but I don’t think you’d be fast enough to catch it,” Haru says. She hands him a cold water bottle. “Drink slowly.”

He rolls over so that he can squint up at her. “You’re mean.”

“I’m harsh,” she corrects, shaking the bottle in her hand. “There’s a difference.”

He takes it. “Have you done this before?”

“Helped someone train in running? No. But,” she rummages through her pastel pink tote bag, and proudly shows him a handful of books. He squints at them. “Since I’m so new to the group and everyone has such broad interests, I decided to try reading up on them! Did you know that drinking cold water after running results in less dehydration than drinking warm water?”

Ryuji stares at her. “I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“For saying you’re mean. You’re not mean. You’re real nice, Haru.”

She smiles at him and pats his head, despite the overflowing heat and moisture settled on top. “You’re very sweet Ryuji-chan, but that’s not going to make me go easy on you.”

“Yeah, yeah, you’re the tough-love kind of coach.” Ryuji sits up, cracking open the seal. Chugging down the water, he makes eye contact with Haru before slowing down substantially.

He dumps the rest of it on his head, sighing and shivering in relief. “That’s the good shit.”

“Why not wait for the sun to go down a bit?” she suggests. “The heat is really scorching, and there’s still plenty of time to keep training later.”

“Nah,” he stretches his arms behind his head before he stands again. “I gotta keep going while I still can.”

Haru frowns. “Overexertion isn’t going to help anyone.”

“Don’t you worry your fluffy head! I may be stupid, but I know when to stop when I gotta.”

“I really think you should rest for a bit.”

“I will when I’m done, I promise.”

“You looked rough in that last lap—”

“Haru,” Ryuji is grinning, but his tone leaves no room for argument. “I’m going to keep training.”

They stare at each other for a few moments, before Haru’s shoulder sags slightly. “Alright.” He’s about to say something when she cuts him off. “But only if you tell me why you’re so insistent.”

Ryuji shrugs. “If that’s what it’ll take to prove it to you, then sure. It’s kinda stupid, though.”

“I’m sure it’s not.”

“Oh, wait till you hear it,” he laughs, a little shy. “So you know how Mona and Futaba are, like, the Metaverse experts? And Makoto is the big brain? And Yusuke does the whole calling card part?” Haru nods, and he continues. “Well, I’m not really… anything. Ann already took the role of moral support and there’s no way in hell I’m the ‘brain’ in anything. Jeez, last time I picked up a paintbrush was in kindergarten. So I figured, I’d be the fast one, you know? The one that can get to someone fast enough to help them out.” Ryuji’s grin turns into something softer; less edge and more fond. It does something to her heart. “And if it’d help ‘Kira down the line, then it’d be worth it, right?”

Haru stays silent.

“Anyway! That’s enough of that cheesy shit.” He moves back to the track, running shoes scuffing at the concrete. “Wish me luck, maybe I can actually catch up to the sun this time. Teach it a lesson.”

“Ryuji.“

Looking back, he gives her a curious look. “Yeah?”

Haru hesitates.

I never once thought you were stupid. You’ve given so much more to the team than you can imagine. You have no idea how many times you’ve helped Akira without even lifting a finger.

“I have a cooler full of water behind me, so… please try your best out there.”

Ryuji gives her an enthusiastic salute. “Yes ma'am!”

He runs off, the sun continuing to beat down him relentlessly.

====

Somewhere in the back of his mind, Ryuji knew they were all going to die someday. It’s inevitable. The circle of life, the winds of time, la vie en rose, etc.

He just didn’t expect it to happen at the age of 16, on the sinking cognitive ship of their next Prime Minister, wearing a wack-ass leather outfit surrounded by his panicking friends.

“We’re going to die!” Futaba wails, knees shaking uncontrollably to the point where she can hardly keep standing. “I don’t know how to swim!”

“It’ll be fine,” Akira spits through gritted teeth. He’s far tenser than anyone else, red gloves formed into fists and eyes constantly darting around to see what can save their lives. “We just need to focus.”

Makoto points to something on their right and shouts, “There! A lifeboat!”

Sprinting down the slowly escalating ramp, their eyes widen at the single lifeboat propped at the very top of the bow—which is slowly approaching a ninety degree angle. They all had one thought in their minds.

“We’re not going to make it in time,” Yusuke says, quietly.

Akira bangs his fist into a nearby column. “To hell with that. There’s no way I’m letting us die here.”

A heavy silence falls over them. The air is practically crackling with electricity and pure agitation, but there’s also a determination between all of that. Everyone’s overcome with a need to protect their friends and teammates, but they were at a loss of what to do. A quiet realization overcomes the group—there wasn’t going to be a miracle to save them.

Ryuji’s eyes land on Akira. He’s scanning the area, Third Eye activated but unable to pick up anything that isn’t the lifeboat. There’s no panic in his clear, gray eyes, but the terror in it is the most prevalent out of anyone present.

It hits Ryuji, all at once. The boy in front of him may be his age, and even younger than some members of their group, but he is undoubtedly the leader of the infamous Phantom Thieves. Every decision he made had led them here, in this moment, in their imminent death. And if he lets them all get taken, whether it’s through the ocean or the approaching explosions behind him, the truth of the matter is Akira feels that he would be responsible. That it’s his fault that a cognitive boat would take the lives of his friends.

Yeah. That’s not happening.

Ryuji clenches his eyes shut for a few seconds and slowly opens them. He begins to jump in place, hyping himself up.

“Skull…?” Haru asks, brows furrowing.

“Hang tight, guys,” he says, taking quick breaths. He can do this. “I’ll nab the boat.”

A chorus of gasps and heated objections rang through the air, and Akira steps forward, more shaken than Ryuji’s ever seen him. “No. Skull, please—”

Ryuji throws him a wobbly grin, more for Akira than himself. In one smooth motion, he jumps down and hits the ground running.

“No!”

Immediately, he feels his knees and thighs begin to protest, only intensifying the further he sprints up. For a minute, if Ryuji closes his eyes, he can imagine that he’s in a meet. A race. That the screams he hears behind him are his track mates, and not teammates, friends, best friends that would die if he failed to get to the boat fast enough.

He pushes himself even more.

It’s a miracle that he gets to the raft before his legs give out, and he feels a satisfying crank underneath his palms when he rotates the lever. As he throws a thumbs up at his friends, seeing them safe, healthy, alive, he feels relieved beyond words.

He makes eye contact with Akira, and he really should’ve expected the explosion that comes next.

====

His ceiling has seventy-nine plastic stars.

Ryuji stares up at it from his bed, arms crossed behind his head; they’d long since lost their cheap light. It was raining hard outside, enough to rattle against his window like pebbles calling for his attention. He ignores them.

It’s been years since he got those stars—dating all the way back in middle school. He got into a bad habit of sneaking out in the middle of the night to look at the sky from the roof of their apartment building. It scared the shit out of his ma when she finally caught him, scolded him to hell and back. By the end, they found a compromise: she’d buy him a crap ton from the hundred yen store, and they’d stick it up together. When they did, it kept falling down, so she went back and bought him a bottle of superglue. Now you can’t take them off, even if you tried to use a little scraper.

It bothered him, for a while. Young boys were cruel, and anyone who came to visit always poked fun of him for it. It wasn’t until he visited Akira’s room one day, saw how pleased he was that Yusuke bought them for him that he couldn’t help but revel at his own stars again, after all this time.

Ryuji twists his body sideways, ripping his eyes away from the plastic figures. Enough of that.

His eyes have long adjusted to the darkness that surrounds him, allowing a clear view of his room in the limited moonlight. Laundry splayed around his tatami mat from his sprints training today, gaming controllers scattered on the center table from when Akira came over a few days ago. That was a blast. He helped him beat a boss he’s been stuck on for weeks, and Akira beat it like it was nothing, it was the coolest shit ever—

Ryuji forces himself to flip over to glare at the wall. Sleep. That’s a better idea.

He takes a deep breath, forcing his breathing to go steady. There’s lots to do tomorrow—school is a drag, but they plan on meeting up at Leblanc afterwards. The thought allows his muscles to relax. Really, the atmosphere of Leblanc is just so pleasing to him. The warm lighting, the run-down booths, even the smell is a welcome presence. Well, that’s mostly because Akira drags it with him wherever he—

Slowly, his eyes open.

It always comes back to him, doesn’t it?

He rolls onto his back, in a position to stare at the stars again. The rain hammers on.

Ryuji’s a dumb kid.

It’s not a self jab, it wasn’t manifested by some sort of long-standing insecurity. It’s a fact. He’s never been good with a book, never done anything half-decent by picking up a pencil, his mind was never programmed to listen and retain information in long classes. It’s definitely not like he’s the brains of the Thieves, never a strategist of some kind. His ma encouraged him to take on a tutor in the past, and he’d rather bite a finger off than spend her money on wasted potential, so he found himself wandering the streets of Central Street as a way to pass time.

Ryuji’s a dumb kid, but even he knows he’s irrevocably, completely, stupidly in love with Kurusu Akira.

He sits up and ruffles his hair, frustrated. There are too many things wrong with that sentence, too many things that can go wrong because of that sentence. Of course, he finds the one thing that can mess up the unshakeable foundation that he and Akira built for each other. He must’ve really pissed off some God upstairs for him to have a hell-bent queer awakening with his best friend.

No, that’s wrong. It was the furthest thing from hell-bent—it was soft, it was gray, it was raining, and most importantly, it took its time.

They were halfway through Kamoshida’s Palace when Ryuji realized it; the sheer amount of power that hindsight gave him made him pause long enough to get clocked out by a Shadow.

Doesn’t matter. It doesn’t matter. It can’t matter, because he would never, ever do anything to fuck up what he has. Not again.

Wait, no, that’s not true. Even before Kamoshida, he’s never had something like this. He’s never had someone like him. He’s never had someone who’s so entirely on the same wavelength as him, who’d have his back even when his was against a wall. Kurusu Akira is…ethereal. Out of this world. Cool as fuck. (Hot as fuck, too.) If you lined up the entirety of Tokyo and told him he could pick one. One person out of the whole lineup to be his friend, he’d have his answer in a heartbeat.

See, now that isn’t something that changed with hindsight—Ryuji’s known that he’s been in love with Akira since before they completed Kamoshida’s Palace. And when he figured it out, he didn’t feel shock. His eyes didn’t widen, his heart didn’t start thumping like crazy. It’s more like he just scratched his head in a huh kind of way. It felt like his life had been waiting for that day in April, like everything was at a standstill until he finally met Kurusu Akira. It made sense. Everything just makes sense when Akira’s involved.

Which just makes this all the more fucked up.

He knocks his head back against the wall, eyes stuck on the raindrops’ rapidly moving shadows on his bedroom floor. Karma. That’s probably what’s happening. The world still hasn’t forgiven him for losing his shit, so they decided to make him pine for the only person that he can’t afford to lose.

He can’t even stomach the idea of trying to get over it, to try and put distance between himself and Akira. He spent a lifetime waiting for a miracle, for someone who didn’t know existed. He’s not giving up a single second of time with him. That’s probably why the world relentlessly shits on him; he’s selfish enough to keep the feelings that he has. But he can’t bring himself to regret that decision. Not with the way his breath hitches in his throat whenever Akira walks into the room.

Ryuji’s in love with his best friend, and there’s absolutely nothing he can do about it. He’s accepted it. Just like how the sky is blue, or that he well and truly hates Calculus. It’s a factor of life.

The rain seemed to fall harder, droplets sounding like rigorous hail against the windowpane. He lets out a long yawn.

Ryuji’s in love with his best friend, and there’s absolutely nothing he can do about it.

That’s not the reason why he can’t sleep at night.

Akira is a quiet guy. He gets his point across with as few words as possible, as if each letter costs him fifty yen to say out loud. So he speaks through his expression; a quirk of his brow, a tilt of his head, a certain smile is enough to carry half of the conversation.

And, every once in a while, Akira gets a look.

It comes up at the weirdest times—when the two of them baton pass in the Metaverse, when Ryuji eats ramen too fast and gets sick, when he helps an old lady cross the street. Plenty of times it’s because Ryuji is doing something incredibly stupid (like when he said that the square root of sixteen is six, because if you just get rid of the one, then that makes sense, right?), or when they’re laughing so hard neither of them can breathe. But sometimes it comes up in quieter moments, too. The two of them talking quietly in the attic at Leblanc, or when Akira confesses that he’s relieved Ryuji’s always there for him. (As if there would ever be a time where he won’t be.)

The look is subtle enough to miss but easy to find if someone knows what they’re looking for. The usual attentiveness that resides in Akira’s eyes disappears, in its place a softer gaze; his pupils get dilated, and the edge of his eyes get all crinkled like Valentine’s tissue paper. A half-smile rests on his lips, never quite turning into a full-blown grin, but that’s okay. For some reason, it all reminds Ryuji of the moon. Of soft moonlight. Of streetlamps on empty roads.

Ryuji’s in love with his best friend, and there’s a small, tiny, infinitesimal chance that his best friend might love him back.

His eyelids slide shut, though he knows that it won’t be enough to let him rest.

Realistically, he’s probably wrong. Akira isn’t in love with him, and he’s only seeing what he wants to see. With every eligible person seeming to fall in love with him at some point in time, how would it even be possible that Akira would love him?

He rubs his eyes, desperate to get rid of the unending fatigue that’s plagued him for months on end. It doesn’t work.

Bad excuse. Akira does love him, just like he loves everyone he encounters and befriends and ends up risking his life for. Ryuji’s surprised Akira hasn’t passed out yet, given his bleeding heart for the entire population of Tokyo.

Lightning flashes and thunder rumbles as he rubs his eyes harder.

But what if he wasn’t wrong? What if the signals he’s seeing aren’t based on misunderstood yearning?

When his eyes start to burn, his fingers move up to his hair.

There’s no way in hell he’d ever risk losing his best friend. His partner. His Akira. It’s not something he can gamble. It’s not worth it.

He begins to tug, hands shaking, and he can barely feel the sting of pain from nearly pulling his hair out his scalp.

It’s not worth it. He decided that in the very beginning.

Ryuji buries his face into his palms.

But he is so, so exhausted of being tired.

Lightning flashes, and for a split-second, his room is bright.

Fuck it.

By the time thunder rumbles through his apartment, he’s already out the front door.

His sneakers squelch against the wet concrete, soaking his unsocked feet. He’s sprinting fast enough that the street lights around him blur, and he can feel quick breaths getting pulled out of him. It takes him a few seconds to realize that he forgot to wear a raincoat, but he doesn’t care.

Akira is his best friend. Akira accepted him, flaws and all. Akira loves him, one way or another. That’s what held him back. He can’t risk losing that.

Ryuji quickly checks both sides before running across the street, wiping the rain off his brow, and keeps going.

But that’s what should’ve pushed him into confessing sooner. Because if that’s all true, then that can only ever mean that Akira would accept this part of him too, right?

He jerks out of the way as he almost barrels over a fire hydrant, making him step into a deep puddle. It doesn’t slow him down.

Maybe he would’ve realized it sooner if he wasn’t too fucking tired to think straight.

His lungs begin to complain, his breaths turning to wheezes, but he ignores it in favor of going faster.

Too late for that now. All the matters now is to talk to—

He skids to a halt.

In front of him—eyes wide, hair drenched, no shoes—stands Kurusu Akira.

Ryuji’s mouth falls open, and for a minute, he almost laughs. Of course. He should’ve known. Just as he’s willing to sprint to Akira at an unholy hour in the night…

He smiles sheepishly at him, and Ryuji feels his chest constrict in the loveliest way possible.

…Akira would do the exact same thing for him.

The rain slows, and the thunder ceases for a moment. The world pauses long enough for both of them to speak in the same breath, the same heartbeat:

“I’m in love with you.”

#fic tag #akiryu #pegoryu #fanfic #writing #ryuji sakamoto #akira kurusu #persona 5 #persona 5 royal #mine #desperate as that sounds #and yeah man thats a jon bellion song #fic

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macklives · 4 years

Text

session 92 end (bye 413...)

this session was so long but so fucking hectic what the fuck

im going to try and slim it down to its bare essentials rather than go on a full rant because im pretty sure i want to make a post later on about vriska’s characterisation (not anything about me liking her/disliking her, just an analyse on her life really, so it wont be too bias because thats not the point of an analysis. i also want to do one on aradia, been meaning to for a while... hmm... damn i havent done much analogies lately, and i THINK the last long post on a character i made was about davesprite??? so its been a fucking while. that being said, ill leave a lot of details out for this end of session notes so i dont just repeat myself later on. rather will keep to plot points here and then make character points in another)

alright

first we had a page or two where aradia confided in nepeta about her being dead which means nepeta is the only one to know this revelation. im pretty sure aradia confided because there was no other way around it, since nepeta was her server player, so it was inevitable. either way, aradia still put her trust in nep, which means, if you think about it, nobody else knows and nobody else ever will. and considering aradia asked nep to keep it a secret, it probably wont get explored by others until MAYBE later on, whenever its plot relevant, so everyone will be in the dark about it for a while which ill have to remember for future dialogue and scenes with aradia in them

then we met vriska

which, yes, is a meme. i may not have been on a lot of fandom platforms, but you cant escape some of the stuff that goes around the internet. even if you dont know undertale, im pretty sure you know of sans. or komaeda if you have/havent seen danganronpa. its just.. the memes, ya know? ive heard from many sources of the “vriska did nothing wrong” quote (even through mbmbam which??? WHAT) but since i didnt even know what it meant, i never explored it so then i never knew it was a homestuck thing. imagine my surprise...... i think even at the time, i wouldnt have known what homestuck was either honestly so it wouldnt even matter. i only recently learned about the fandom.... uhh, maybe half a year ago??? yeah, august, so my knowledge was slim but vriska is a thing ive heard before, which still shocks me

goddammit

anyways back to her

so her intro was something, we pretty much found out she likes DnD (a FANATIC in fact) and feeds her lusus the flesh of living trolls. which is fucked up. but i wont get too much into detail about that until i make a post about her life on alternia and the consequences of such. or maybe just alternia in general...?? or *both* heheheh but i feel i need more information before i go off on a tangent about that

then we met??? white text dude?? who is a major asshole but an asshole with insults that hURted, to think i felt bad for VRISKA when that happened. woah.

i said before, but... karkat, he cant really hit deep because his insults are just HIM and his way to express himself. like some people find it natural to just go “FUCK YOU” to show emphasis on a point, and thats just karkats way. he may do it so aggressively that it takes you a second to realize what he said, but usually i dont take anything to heart whenever he spurts out some insults. ive progressed to the point where whatever he says, is just “karkat” and not him trying to be actively mean. rather, its now funny whenever he does say anything SOMEWHAT creative, dude has an imagination that goes on for miles

but vriska?? she IS trying to be a bully, you can tell. but i feel theres something much more to that. like shes trying to prove herself and her “blueblooded” demeanours or whatever the hierarchy is. she doesnt want to show emotions so she makes herself a barrier by being mean is what i can gather from her conversation with kanaya. im pretty sure youre not supposed to understand her until its pointed out and rather see her as an “antagonist” at first, but yeah, her insults are more pitiful than anything and i also cant take her too seriously. i may not like her as a person but her character is interesting because you cant always have the goodie two shoes as the protags. it doesnt diversify the characterisation so i like vriska as someone who makes the plot work and it becomes more interesting since you have someone that makes it harder for the main crew to progress. a happy-go-lucky adventure with no trouble and no turnabouts would be boring in a way. so having a character like vriska, or like this new white text guy, it makes you stop for a second and realize oh shit okay, here’s where shit CAN go wrong and WHY. and i do especially like it when these bastards of characters somehow have more depth than being the “bastard characters”. kinda humanizes them in a way. doesnt mean you have to LIKE them continuously, but theyre humans (trolls whatever) in the end and every person has their own story whether its for better or for worse

for example, i like her being placed into the story, along with white text, by how its all leading to this “accident” and is slowly showing us hints on what happened, but in the end, it wont be until later that we know the full story. even if it was in the past, it apparently is very vital to the plot and shapes how the characters act in the future, so important aspects like that are to look out for. and usually they only occur when theres been some trouble within friend dynamics. so without these bastard of characters, plot wouldnt grow AS strong and i often keep that in mind when i explore a story.

anyways, I HAD A POINT TO THIS: so vriska and karkat are characters who are yes, mean, but it seems to be their personality, and the way they either show emotions and convey feelings (karkat) or make a barrier so they DONT show emotions to produce vulnerability (vriska), white text guy seems to mostly be out to be an asshole. he told vriska she was useless to sum it up but im not too sure if this is one of those “first dialogue” to mould out a bias opinion before we even get to the character themselves, but judging by how vriska and karkat played out, he surely means something bad and i dont know how to explain it. but i cannot base anything off from one piece of dialogue. i dont even know what else to call him other than white text guy so...... ill just leave that out for now, until we finally get his introduction

though, i do wish to mention, and will expand on, im not wrong when i say karkat and vriska are similar but in different context. sorry if youre favourite is karkat and you dont like vriska, or vice versa, but uhhhh their introductions are so similar its uncanny and the way they’re portrayed is the same except one is more on crack about the meddling, while the other is angry about the meddling. similar to how it was with karkat, we were introduced to vriska talking with someone we knew (tavros) whom she obviously didnt like, so obviously, from her point of view, she wanted to be menacing. like how karkat was menacing to jade because she wouldnt listen to his point... he got angry, so he lashed out. but us, the readers, didnt know that. we thought “oh god its this asshole” until we made it further in the story and started to warm up to karkat. it may not be the same with vriska, she may be a bully regardless, but you cannot tell me we moulded a bias towards her character as we did when we first read karkat. theyre both truly mean to other people, maybe both for different reasons, but i do want to point out the similarities and not leave that out. im pretty sure andrew basically gave us a conversation that formed our opinion of a character right off the bat rather than go into depth of WHY they did it, and how they are naturally without the conditions of the game. which, you can also see with vriska when she conversed with kanaya. andrew started off with a character who only appears to speak once, and makes you judge them from first appearance alone, without any explanation as to why they said what they said and how they are with other characters, let says. so you assume they were simply a rude character. now look how karkat turned out. so im guessing in homestuck, the first impression should never be the opinion you stick with until MAYBE 5 more conversations with that character (each one different)

OKAY done with the vriska introduction, now to slutquius

yes, hes kinda weird, i have stated that many times. i have no idea what to say about him other than he likes porn, he likes centaur dick which just so happens to be his lusus as well and if that isnt a red flag idk what is

he also likes his lusus milk, right from the udders of his guardian

fun times, fun times

my opinion of equius kinda.. differs. which i should really put in place the “dont judge by first impression” rule, because at first i thought he was rude with, then i thought he was hhh okay, because i understood why he was being so protective over nepeta and her team placement, since the people she was going to play with WERE dangerous. but if you think about it, both sides will probably put you in danger. it just depends on which ones you confide in more to protect your back rather than those which would cause trouble on purpose, in my HONEST opinion. so equius was a little overdramatic on that part, but i got what he meant. he was on the blue team and he didnt want to leave nepeta alone without him on the red. but then this session happened. and he went back to being weird again because of the whole porn thing, especially being so open about it like dude chill youre 13. but the thing is, then i felt bad for him because hes basically touch starved. to say that he could break anything he touches, i doubt people would go up to him for hugs. in fear they would be crushed to death by a simple hug. so im guessing hes rather lonely and doesnt really know how to interact because of this. so i felt sad that he had to live a life where he needs to be careful of everything he touches so it doesnt break randomly. see? poor dude. but then things got weird. and im pretty sure hes a masochist. so my opinion on equius is a fucking cosine graph

which brings us to the final point:

gamzee and equius’ conversation

i dont even know.....like.........gamzee was unaware that equius was using him for his own power play roleplay, right? gamzee knew it was a roleplay but it had had some.. idk.... obvious sexual implications? and i bet gamzee didnt really know that? he thought they were only venting out through a simple roleplay and trying to get closer because he originally thought equius hated him, considering equius flat out said “i hate you” and gamzee went “you tell me everyday and im okay with that” so.. gamzee probably wanted only to get closer to equius so he helped out his little problem which.. thats so sweet but i feel bad he was coerced into something he didnt get, especially since he was innocent enough to go along without knowing equius’ true gain

anyways, equius was getting off with the hierarchy thing. considering he’s “lower” than gamzee, and gamzee is surprisingly ...high on the spectrum??? so equius wanted gamzee to boss him around, because it felt only natural to him since he’s the “inferior one” and gamzee is The Big Man. like i get that, but it was written in a way that was so uncomfortable, that i wish i didnt. equius is just a weird character... hes not BAD per say, but hes... hes something alright

but im really liking gamzee. the two things which struck me in that one conversation, was the “i dont get why we should dictate people by the colour of their blood, i just see people as people” piece of dialogue and “i cant go around pleasing just everything so its alright if you hate me”

thats... so good, idk. i really liked that. i also really liked when kanaya said “youre dangerous but dangerous people are needed and are important because it shapes you” like <33 my fucking heart

god homestuck may be a tad on the weird side with some of its characters but it surely knows how to create great lines of dialogue

and that concludes the long 4 hour session i did, hope you all enjoyed it

with that, i rest

#homestuck #homestuck liveblog #hs92 #hs92 end #i wrote more than i should have but i had a lot to say #just you wait for those analogy/analysis posts

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ma-lark-ey · 4 years

Text

Nick Close had never been a very fantastic child. That much was very obvious. Granted, most of the dumb and illegal shit they did was for their fathers attention (however rarely that option actually worked), but it was still dumb and illegal shit.

Tonight was not one of those dumb and illegal nights, however; tonight was still a night Glenn Close could never find out about. Nick prayed he'd never find out about.

Nick had always been closed off from their father. How couldn't they be? When they were little, it was always Nick and Momma at home, while Daddy was on tour or doing shows. Glenn only started being home once in awhile when Mom died. And yes, Nick calls him Glenn. Glenn was never... He was never 'Dad.'

And this, this was certainly one of the things Nick kept tightly closed off from their father. That thing being one of the biggest secrets Nick may ever keep; their gender.

Nick didn't *mind* to be a 'he,' don't get them wrong. Some days, they really enjoyed being a 'he.' But today? Today... Nick was a she. And she couldn't deny that. Some days she felt so fucking confident in her body, like she could throw on a baggy t-shirt and slightly too-big pants with a beanie and fight god. Others, her body felt like someone else's and she wanted to rip her skin off and start over. Dress like those beautiful alternative women she saw on TikTok. With the demonias, fishnets, skirts, ripped up shirts, messy hair. God, some days she didn't know if she wanted to be them, or be with them.

Tonight, she definitely wanted to be them.

She had done up her makeup in the most extravagant way she knew how, eyeliner to the gods. Fishnets under a faux-leather, checkered print pencil skirt she found thrifting with Grant a few days ago. She had one a torn up old t-shirt she'd cut into a croptop and not to mention her Docs. She felt like she could fight god with her chain belts and dramatic jewelry.

Nick knows Glenn would never care if he knew his 'son' sometimes felt more like his daughter, but she wasn't ready to give him that kind of trust. Grant? Grant got that kind of trust. Henry got that kind of trust. The twins got that kind of trust. But not Glenn. Glenn hasn't proved he'd deserved that yet.

And maybe Nick didn't want to take the time to explain why Grant sometimes called her Nickie beyond "Its just a nickname, Glenn."

And she was okay with that. She knew that she wasn't ready. Maybe she'd never be 'ready,' and Glenn wasnt in her life enough for it to matter.

...

Why'd the front door just open? Why is Nick hearing a car lock? Why is the front door opening? Glenn's not supposed to be home from tour until tomorrow. And here Nick is, in the living room. Looking like a pretty well passing woman. She had learned plenty of tricks over her last two years of presenting feminine some days. The lanky, stickman build the had was the one thing Glenn had given to her that she was thankful for.

But the genetics of Glenn Close that were gifted to his child were not the problem at hand. The problem at hand is that *Glenn's home.*

Glenn's home. Glenn's home, and Nick is not in her Glenn Mode. She's vulnerable. Vulnerable to a lot of questions she doesn't want to answer tonight. Doesn't want to have to explain where all this women's clothing came from, nor why she's dressed as one. It can't pass as drag, but she's obviously not in drag makeup. Fuck. Fuck it all. Fuck her life and her shitty decision making skills. Fuck Glenn for never communicating his plans. And fuck the stunned way he's staring at her now.

The awkwardness of the room was palpable at this point. Nick felt like a deer in headlights. Nick felt like melting into the floor and disappearing from the world. Nick felt like her whole world was about to collapse in on itself. What if Glenn hated her, what if he didn't want her to act like this or be this person, what if-

"Well, don't you look nice. Got a date or something, kid?"

Thats... That's not what Glenn was supposed to say. That's not what he's supposed to say! He's supposed to be upset or revolted or-

"I- I uh..." No. No don't cry. Fuck. Why are you crying, Nicholas? Nicole? Fuck what even if your name right now?

Glenn's here. It should be Nicholas. That's your name when you're a boy. But its a girl day. You want to be Nicole today. Glenn is here, and you're Nicole right now. And Glenn is here. And you're Nicole. And Glenn-

She heard a bag drop on the ground and footsteps come toward her. She stepped back and tried hide behind her arms. No words. She can't speak.

Oh fuck. Oh fuck. Oh fuck.

She remembers the time she went to school in feminine clothes and a couple of guys almost jumped her, before Lark pulled a knife on them and got them both suspended.

Hands grab onto her shoulders, a gentle hold. She can feel the calluses on Glenn's fingers from his guitar. When was the last time he held her?

Her knees feel like jello. She remembers when she started posting on her second TikTok, open about her gender and pronouns because she didn't have to keep up a cisgender face when her dad didn't have the account. And how transphobes sent her deaththreats until she blocked all those words from her comments and the DMs got disabled.

She's a few inches taller than Glenn in her platform Docs. Which she realizes when he pulls her into a gentle hug. She feels makeup running on her face. And she's crying. Why is she crying?

She remembers being ten years old standing at moms grave, standing next to Glenn. Just after the burial. It was the first time she'd seen him cry.

Her chin's on his shoulder now, his arms around her upper torso and holding her against him. She realizes she's shaking. That he's just holding her. He's holding her. Daddy's home.. He's giving her a hug...

She remembers the last time Glenn had hugged her. At Mom's funeral. She was sobbing at her grave, and so was Dad. He pulled her into him and held her so tight. So tight she thought he'd crush her. But he just held, like she was the entire world. Like if he let go he'd loose her to. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders, hid her face in the mix of long hair and his suit jacket. He felt like her whole world in that moment, too.

Nickie brings herself back to what's happening. Glenn's holding her, her arms are awkward resting on his back, He's clutching her by the shoulders. She remembers these hugs. The hugs that he used to give her every time he left and came home. The ones he gives where every second of it is embued with love. It felt like that now.

She could tell he loved her. But those words felt like lies in her head.

Lies. Lies. Lies. So many lies. So so many lies.

"I'll be home by nine, Nick." It was a lie, Glenn didn't come home for three more days. "I promise I'll be home on your birthday." He wasn't. "I'll be there." He wasn't. "I'll make it, promise." He didn't. Everytime. Everytime, where Glenn shouldve been, it was Mom. And when Mom died, it was Henry. Or Ron. Or Darryl.

But he's here. Right now. And he's holding her. It doesn't make it okay, it doesn't excuse it. But he's holding her. Her knees go weak, and she crumbles. He crumbles with her.

She sobs, he doesn't force her to say anything. She doesn't return his hug, he doesn't expect her to.

"You're supposed to be mad." Nick mumbled after she doesnt remember how long. Glenn gives a light chuckle and adjusts his grip on her.

"And why would I be?" He asked, not protesting as Nick shoved him off and shuffled back a few inches. It felt weird to be so close to him after sixteens years of so much distance.

"Why wouldn't you be?" She spat, crossing her arms and staring at the ground. "Nick's fucked up again. That's my whole brand! Being a total and absolute fuck up! The disappointment! The druggy, the- the... The mistake." She felt more hot tears behind her eyes. She could feel Glenn staring at her in concern.

"Nick, you are not a fuck up. Or a mistake. Or whatever else. Nick, you're my baby, and I-"

"Then why did you leave? If you're gonna pull that bullshit, and say you love me no matter what, and that I'm your little girl, and that- that you wanted me from the very beginning and wouldn't give me up, why did you leave? Why dont you care now? When you come home, and woopsie! Your son's dressed up like some goth chicken. Why are you acting like everythings fine!? Everything is NOT fine, Glenn!" She hit the floor with her hands and growled in frustration. It wasn't fine.

Glenn stared down and took a deep breath. Then he sighed. "Yeah, I can't blame you on that one, kiddo. Alright, full disclosure, Nick. I already- I knew. I knew about the pronouns, and the name. I knew. Henry told me."

"H- Henry... Did what?"

"He told me. Soon as you told him. He called me that night, let me know what you had said. We have a rule in our group, we've had the rules since Grant came out. If one of the kids comes out as anything, you tell the other dads. Especially if its a name and pronouns thing. Cause, we agreed that since well, we were all kind of one bug cluster fuck of parents to each others kids, it was better if everyone knew who was what. So we didn't fuck it up."

"So you have a rule to out kids to their parents? That's-"

"No! Not any kids. Its just you, Terry, Grant, and the twins. Just you five. Because, here's the thing, Nick- Nickie? Whatever. Us dads? We arent- we're new to the whole queer scene. Its not as normal for us to just fliparoo what pronouns and names we call people as it is for you guys. So, we would practice to each other. When you told Henry you liked being called Nickie, he came to us and essentially said, 'I'm gonna say Nickie to you guys as often as i fucking can do I don't end up deadnaming.' "

Glenn took Nick's hand into his and held it tight. Nick still felt like punching Henry in the fucking face for outting her to Glenn.

"You know that I love you, Nick." Her body went rigid at that. And she looked uo at him, glaring as hard as should mister with how fucking teary eyed she was.

"Do I? Do I know that you love me, Glenn?" And his face fell. It was like she just sucked his soul out of him. Good. That should be one hell of a wake up call.

"Nick, of course I love you. What would ever make you think I didn't love you?" Nick but her lip, thinking over her words before she said them. She thought on a lot of things.

"You left. My mom died, and you left. My *mother* was dead and you went back to touring in a matter of weeks. My mother was dead, and I was ten years old. And I was home, by myself, for weeks. Glenn, I was alone for months. Sure, there the nanny. But that wasn't Mom or Dad. I needed my parents. I needed my dad. I needed my dad to give me a hug, promise me it'd be okay. That we were okay. And he fucking left. He walked out that door, didn't come back for months, only called every three weeks. Missed birthdays, holidays, soccer games, and whatever the fuck else. Why on gods green earth would I think that you loved me when you fucking abandoned me, Glenn? Why? Would you think I loved you if I fucked off to god knows where after being home for just a couple days? Huh? If when I found out you'd been up in drug city with your mates and getting caught by cops doing a bunch of stupid shit, all you got was a slap on the wrist and a phonecall that last three minutes?"

Glenn stared at the ground for a long time. He didn't speak. And he pulled her back into a hug, practically dragged her across that distance to hold her again. Hold her like the whole world depended on Glenn never letting go again. Like if he let go everything would come crashing down, like Nick was the entire fucking world and he just wanted to protect her. He held her like he had when Mom died.

"God, Morgan... He's just like you." He mumbled, clutching Nick so tight she couldn't breath. She didn't care he used the wrong pronouns, she didn't care he'd barely even addressed the elephant in the room, she didn't care her heel was digging painfully into the back of her other leg. Her dad was here. He was holding her. He was making sure she knew he loved her. Dad finally came home.

Glenn let out a painful sob into Nick's shoulder, he said something. Nick thinks it was an apology, but between the sniffles and the hiccups and layers of clothing, its impossible to tell. Glenn pulled her up into his lap, held her like he would when she was five or six. Her head on his shoulder, his arms around her middle as he sat horizontal across his lap. Her legs were too long to curl up like they used to, so they sat awkwardly half-stretched across the floor. It was nostalgic in a way. It felt Glenn was just realizing how many years he'd wasted. How much time with his child he had lost.

"I'm sorry, Nick. Im- I didn't realize. I'm so fucking sorry, Nick." He was still crying. Crying more than Nick had ever seen him cry. She could hear the self-hatred and the regret in his voice. She reached an arm around his neck and pulled him that much closer.

"Just don't leave again... Please, Dad." Nick doesn't remember that last time she had called him 'Dad.' But, it felt right in that moment. It hasn't felt right in a long long time.

#this is a whole mess of angsty Close boys #genderfluid Nick is the only kind I will accept in my writing anymore #dndads #dungeons and daddies #Glenn is a shit dad but I will accept a redemption arc for him

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