#and this white lady running the class saying I think its ok to say the n slur um this is why I skipped the first hour of the last half

[robotpussy]

get me out of hereeeeee white ppl are saying dumb shit abt race ad racism againnnnnnn

#no way am i hearing white ppl in here debate whether saying 'black' is ok and we should call all non white ppl poc...... SHUT UP NOW #and this white lady running the class saying I think its ok to say the n slur um this is why I skipped the first hour of the last half #of today im sick of you all 🙏 #like just say the race of a person unless they say 'just refer to me as poc' like I don't ever want to be called 'poc' I am BLACK #and im not bothering to say anything because idk if I want to sit here and get into all of it rn like I hate creative spaces so much #so many white ppl who dont know shit just saying anything abt race I've had enough #i think ive found the subject for my documentary 😐

[loousir]

Soulmates {Oikawa Tooru}

Oikawa Tooru x Male Reader Part One

Anime: Haikyuu!!

Warnings: I dont think there is any?

Masterlist | Part Two

AU: Soulmates can have a different way of finding their partner. Yours is after both partners are at least 18, on the youngers birthday, they will swap bodies. They have to share their first of something together in order to return to their respective body. (Ex. Sharing their first kiss, first drink etc.)(If one has already kissed or shared a drink, for example, it wont count as sharing a first) Oikawa's is knowing what their first words to you are.

Originally Posted on February 2, 2021

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

Today was finally your birthday. That meant that you would get to find out who your soulmate was. You were nervous but knew about it so you were prepared. A little.

You were getting dressed to go to school today and thankfully it was the end of the week so you'd have all weekend to find your soulmate. What nice and convenient timing. You did your morning routine before getting changed into your uniform. After pulling up you striped brown pants and adjusting your white jacket, you slipped the red tie around your neck before grabbing your things and heading downstairs.

You said a quick goodbye to your mom after stealing a toaster waffle and your lunch. You slipped on your shoes and headed out to school.

On the way there, you ran into Iwaizumi and Oikawa. You were very good acquaintances but not close enough to consider friends, like hanging at each others houses kind of friends. You and Iwaizumi shared class together but the three of you almost always walked to school together.

"Happy birthday (Y/n)-kun! You're finally 18 right?" Oikawa asked, slinging his arm around your shoulder and leaning on your slightly smaller frame. He poked your cheek gently as you ate, trying to get a reply out of you. "Shittykawa, cant you see he's eating something? Let him chew first." Oikawa pouted slightly at his "nickname" and sighed.

You finished chewing and nodded. "Yeah, I'm 18 today. I'll find out who my soulmate is tomorrow and I really hope it isn't you." You said in a serious tone as the three of you continued walking to Aoba Johsai. Oikawa whined on the way there with Iwaizumi butting in to shut him up.

The trio finally made it to school and went their separate ways, aka you and Iwaizumi in one and Oikawa right next door.

---

The day started and went on normally til lunch.

Iwaizumi and Oikawa usually go to their practice but today they invited you to eat with them. You accepted not exactly knowing why.

"So (Y/n)-kun~ Who do you think is your soulmate?" You shrugged as you ate your bento, glancing up at Oikawa. "You really wanna know?" You asked taking another bite. Oikawa nodded as he ate his own bento. Iwaizumi smirked over to you as he ate his lunch as well. "You should tell him (L/n)-san."

"I hope it turns out to be Kageyama."

Oikawa practically snorted out his drink and stared at you in shock. "You cant be serious?! Him?!" You laughed at the water running down his face and shook your head. You grabbed a napkin you had and wiped the pretty setters face. "Of course not."

Oikawa let out a sigh of relief. "I'd want Daichi to be my soulmate." You said in a dreamy tone as Oikawa choked on his rice. Iwaizumi had nothing today besides laughing at the scene in front of him. Oikawa leaned on his good knee over to you and gripped your shoulders. He shook you gently as he cried, saying something about 'anyone but the wingless crows.'

Iwaizumi pulled him off you after a minute and scolded him. You finished up your bento and checked your phone. There was 40 minutes of lunch left when you looked to the best friends. "So, what did you guys invite me to hang for?" Iwaizumi looked over to you and tilted his head slightly. "Are we not allowed to invite a friend to hang out?"

You leaned back on your hands and closed your eyes, letting your head fall backwards. "You are, it's just, weird. The Cap and vice Cap of the volleyball team invite a lowly art club member to hang out at lunch together. Sounds a bit odd doesnt it?"

Iwaizumi nodded and Oikawa didnt respond. You lifted your head up to see Oikawa a bit of a distance away, surrounded by a flock of girls. "Its your turn to pull him away. I'm gonna go check something." You sighed and stood up.

"Hey, shittykawa." Oikawa instantly turned around at the nickname and his fan girls became upset with you calling him that. "(Y/n)-kun~ You're taking after Iwaizumiii~" He said walking over to you. "And we were supposed to be hanging out." You said acting all coy. "You promised me we would this morning..." You whispered just loud enough for everyone to hear.

The girls were jealous and talking amongst themselves as Oikawa just looking at you, shocked. He had a deep blush covering his cheeks as you folded your hands together in front of you and looked to the ground with a pout. "(Y/n)-kun..." You looked up to him with puppy dog eyes. He suddenly wrapped his arms around you and pulled you into a tight hug.

"(Y/N)-KUN! IM SO SORRY!" He said as if he actually forgot he promised you to hang out. You smiled and giggled, gently prying him off of you. You grabbed his hand and started to walk with him. "C'mon. Let's go back to our spot." You said as you watched the lady flock disperse. Oikawa followed along, apologizing for forgetting a promise he never made.

Once the two of you were alone you sighed and let go of his hand. "Oikawa." He shut up and looked up to you with teary eyes. "You didnt promise me we'd hang out. Its ok." You may be mean to Oikawa but theres something about him that you love. You just cant be mean to him all the time... Ok yes you can but sometimes you want to be nice to him.

Oikawa smiled and pulled you into a hug again. You cautiously hugged back and patted his back. The bell signaling lunch was over rang and the two of you pulled away. "I'll stop by the gym after school to say a quick goodbye." You said grabbing yours and Iwaizumis stuff. Oikawa nodded and grabbed his stuff as well. He had a big smile on his face for some reason but you just brushed it off.

The rest of the day passed by pretty quickly. You had told Iwaizumi about stopping for a quick bye and he said, "Just be prepared for Oikawa." You didnt exactly know what the meant because you always were but before you could ask he had left for practice.

Once you were ready, you head down to the gym and pulled open the door. The lights were off and you furrowed your brows. "I thought there was practice today..." You mumbled to yourself.

Suddenly the lights turned on to show they gym and the volleyball team to be all dressed in nice birthday attire. You only stared shocked at the scene in front of you as the all shouted, "Surprise!" Oikawa appeared in front of your vision with a wide grin on his face and a small gift in his hand.

You blinked a few times and looked up to his eyes before looking to Iwaizumi who was approaching the two of you. "Y-you guys... Did this for me?" You asked, still surprised by what happened. Iwaizumi shrugged and tilted his head to the side saying 'kinda.' "It was Oikawa's idea."

Oikawa smiled and grabbed one of your hands, putting the gift in it. Iwaizumi put a party hat on your head before walking over to a table full of sweets and a cake. "Can I talk to you outside for a second?" You asked Oikawa. He smiled and lead the two of you outside the gym and away from prying ears.

"What did you wanna talk to me about?" You held the gift in your hand and pulled him into a tight hug. He stood tense for a moment before hugging back. "What's this for?" Oikawa asked with a small laugh. You buried your head in his chest and started to tremble slightly. He demeanor changed when he felt his shirt get slightly wet. "H-hey, (Y/n)? Are you ok?"

You nodded and kept hugging him. He hugged back and gently stroked the back of your head. "No ones ever done something like this before. So it's kinda a lot." You said clearly, having calmed down from your previous state. Oikawa laughed and pulled the two of you away to look you in the eyes.

"Really? Well then I'll have to step it up next time!" You smiled up to him softly before sadly looking down to your shoes. "I'm nervous Kawa..." His smile fades away to a sigh. "Me too." You look up to him in confusion. "I... Really hope tomorrow, I'll wake up in your body, Tooru..." He looks to your eyes and he has tears in this.

Dont ruin this moment shittykawa

"Me too."

You look up to him and smile a little. "C'mon, let's go back inside and par-tay a little before it's too late!" Oikawa said with a smile as he dragged you back inside. You saw Iwaizumi standing by a punch bowl with a knowing smirk but you didnt think much of it.

---

Everyone had hung around and "par-tay"-ed till about 7pm. They decided to call it there and start cleaning up. You tried to help but both Oikawa and Iwaizumi stopped you. "Why dont you and Oikawa head back first? The least we can do is clean up."

"But you guys did all this for me, I have to try to help even a little." Iwaizumi put your things over your shoulder and pushed you to an already raring to go Oikawa. "Just head home. Its ok." Oikawa gently grabbed your hand but you stopped and addressed the whole team.

They had paused to look at you and listen. You bowed and thanked them, your bow hiding the tears in your eyes. You stood up straight and smiled to them before going with an impatient Oikawa.

---

The walk to your home was filled with comfortable conversation about the party. "Hey, (Y/n)-kun? Could we have a sleepover at your house?" You looked up to him and tilted your head slightly. "Like the whole team? That's a lot of people and I dont know if my parents would even let me since there away right now-"

"No, not the whole team. Just us." You blushed at what he said and looked away, slightly embarrassed for rambling. "Oh... J-just the two of us?" He nodded and you just shrugged. "I-I guess thats... Ok. I dont think they'll mind." You said rubbing the back of your neck. "Let's goo then!" Oikawa said, dragging you to your house.

Once you two arrived, you unlocked the door and let him in. "Your house is so much bigger on the inside." He said looking around. "Wow thanks." He laughed, "I didnt mean it in a bad way!" You rolled your eyes and walked upstairs to your room thinking, "How the fuck does this dude make me flustered so easily..."

You didnt even realize Oikawa had followed you, thinking he would just stay downstairs for the time being. When you turned around to close the door you jumped at his presence. "I-Im gonna change so you can just hang out downstairs till I'm done." He smiled and gently rubbed the back of his head before asking, "Do you think I could use your shower actually?"

"Oh, yeah, go for it. It's the door behind you." You said pointing over his shoulder. He thanked you as you got him a towel he could use. You closed the door to your room and got changed into some comfy pjs. The shower could be heard through your door but you didnt mind and decided to make yourself comfortable on your bed and watch some tv.

After a few minutes, the shower turned off and after another couple minutes, the door opening to reveal a shirtless Oikawa wearing sweatpants. You looked over only to look away just as fast. Oikawa smirked and jumped into the bed with you. You squeaked a very manly squeak as he hovered over you.

Your eyes looked up to his but couldn't be stopped when they looked at his chest. 'A tattoo?' You looked back up to him and asked, "You have a tattoo? Since when?" He just smiled and shook his head. "Since I was like twelve. Look what it says." He said sitting the two of you up. Oikawa was basically sitting on your lap but you didnt mind.

'You're in the way, stupid trashcan.'

It was written in beautiful cursive. You smiled and tried not to laugh but couldn't help it. Oikawa watched as the love of his life laughed at the first words he ever said to him.

"I said that when we first met! Did you really get it tattooed on your chest?" Oikawa rolled his eyes and shook his head. "Its illegal to get a tattoo when your twelve." You tilted your head slightly. "Then how did you get it?" He looked at you unamused before becoming nervous. This made you nervous too as he laid the both of you down in your bed.

"(Y/n)... Did you study soulmates?" You nodded and asked why. "Theres a chapter about two soulmates having different ways of finding eachother." You nodded again and tried to process the information but he spoke again. "Mine was the first words they say to you are tattooed somewhere on your body."

You looked at him and fully processed everything. It clicked. "Is that why you... Did all this stuff for me over the last year? W-why didn't you say something sooner?" He glanced out the window and seemed nervous again. "Theres a chance that you can actually have a different soulmate than me..." You furrowed your brows and sat up to look at him.

He didnt look at you and just glanced out the window. "What do you mean by that?" He looked over to you and directly in your eyes. "When we both have different ways of meeting our soulmate, theres a chance that you could have a different soulmate even though you're mine."

"That means when we wake up tomorrow... I wouldn't be hugging you, but your soulmate... And... I dont want that."

Oikawa looked away and you just looked at him shocked. "You're so weird out of character." You said leaning down and pulling him into a hug, laying on top of him in the process. "I'm being serious y'know..." You nod and nuzzle your face into his neck.

"I know. I dont want something like that to happen either." He shifted so that he could look at you properly and cupped your face. His eyes held clear care and adoration.

"Let's sleep now, and if I dont wake up to you tomorrow... I'll find you ok?"

--- 2552 Not proof read too well

#m4m #mxm #x male reader #oikawa x male reader #oikawa toru x male reader #oikawa tooru x male reader

[bloodbenderz]

humaniterations (dot) net/2014/10/13/an-anarchist-perspective-on-the-red-lotus/ this article from oct 2014 is very dense — truly, a lot to unpack here, but I feel like you would find this piece interesting. I would love it if you shared your thoughts on the points that stood out to you, whether you agree or disagree. you obv don’t have to respond to it tho, but I’m sending it as an ask jic you feel like penning (and sharing) a magnificent essay, as is your wont 💕

article

i know this took me forever 2 answer SORRY but i just checked off all the things on my to do list for the first time in days today so. Essay incoming ladies!

ok im SO glad u sent me this bc it’s so so good. it’s a genuinely thoughtful criticism of the politics in legend of korra (altho i think its sometimes a little mean to korra unnecessarily like there’s no reason to call her a “petulant brat” or say that she throws tantrums but i do understand their point about her being an immature and reactionary hero, which i’ll get back to) and i think the author has a good balance between acknowledging like Yeah the lok writers were american liberals and wrote their show accordingly and Also writing a thorough analysis of lok’s politics that felt relevant and interesting without throwing their hands up and saying this is all useless liberal bullshit (which i will admit that i tend to do).

this article essentially argues that the red lotus antagonists of s3 were right. And that’s not an uncommon opinion i think but this gives it serious weight. Like, everything that zaheer’s gang did was, in context, fully understandable. of course the red lotus would be invested in making sure that the physically and spiritually and politically most powerful person in the world ISNT raised by world leaders and a secret society of elites that’s completely unaccountable to the people! of course the red lotus wants to bring down tyrannical governments and allow communities to form and self govern organically! and the writers dismiss all of that out of hand by 1. consistently framing the red lotus as insane and murderous (korra never actually gives zaheer’s ideas a chance or truly considers integrating them into her own approach) 2. representing the death of the earth queen as not just something that’s not necessarily popular (what was with mako’s bootlicker grandma, i’d love to know) but as something that causes unbelievable violence and chaos in ba sing se (which, like, a lot of history and research will tell you that people in disasters tend towards prosocial behaviors). so the way the story frames each of these characters and ideologies is fascinating because like. if you wanted to write season 3 of legend of korra with zaheer as the protagonist and korra as the antagonist, you wouldn’t actually have to change the sequence of events at all, really. these writers in particular and liberal writers in general LOVE writing morally-gray-but-ultimately-sympathetic characters (like, almost EVERY SINGLE fire nation character in the first series, who were full on violent colonizers but all to a degree were rehabilitated in the eyes of the viewer) but instead of framing the red lotus as good people who are devoted to justice and freedom and sometimes behave cruelly to get where theyre trying to go, they frame them as psychopaths and murderers who have good intentions don’t really understand how to make the world a better place.

and the interesting thing about all this, about the fact that the red lotus acted in most cases exactly as it should have in context and the only reason its relegated to villain status is bc the show is written by liberals, is that the red lotus actually points out really glaring sociopolitical issues in universe! like, watching the show, u think well why the fuck HASN’T korra done anything about the earth queen oppressing her subjects? why DOESN’T korra do anything about the worse than useless republic president? why the hell are so many people living in poverty while our mains live cushy well fed lives? how come earth kingdom land only seems to belong to various monarchs and settler colonists, instead of the people who are actually indigenous to it? the show does not want to answer these questions, because american liberal capitalism literally survives on the reality of oppressive governments and worse than useless presidents and people living in poverty while the middle/upper class eats and indigenous land being stolen. if the show were to answer these questions honestly, the answer would be that the status quo in real life (and the one on the show that mirrors real life) Has To Change.

So they avoid answering these questions honestly in order for the thesis statement to be that the status quo is good. and the only way for the show to escape answering these questions is for them to individualize all these broad social problems down into Good people and Bad people. so while we have obvious bad ones like the earth queen we also have all these capitalists and monarchs and politicians who are actually very nice and lovely people who would never hurt anyone! which is just such an absurd take and it’s liberal propaganda at its best. holding a position of incredible political/economic power in an unjust society is inherently unethical and maintaining that position of power requires violence against the people you have power over. which is literally social justice 101. but there’s literally no normal, average, not-politically-powerful person on the show. so when leftist anarchism is presented and says that destroying systems that enforce extreme power differentials is the only way to bring peace and freedom to all, the show has already set us up to think, hey, fuck you, top cop lin beifong and ford motor ceo asami sato are good people and good people like them exist! and all we have to do to move forward and progress as a society is to make sure we have enough good individuals in enough powerful positions (like zuko as the fire lord ending the war, or wu as the earth king ending the monarchy)! which is of course complete fiction. liberal reform doesn’t work. but by pretending that it could work by saying that the SYSTEM isnt rotten it’s just that the people running it suck and we just need to replace those people, it automatically delegitimizes any radical movements that actually seek to change things.

and that’s the most interesting thing about this article to me is that it posits that the avatar...might actually be a negative presence in the world. the avatar is the exact same thing: it’s a position of immense political and physical power bestowed completely randomly, and depending on the moral character and various actions of who fills that position at any given time, millions of people will or won’t suffer. like kyoshi, who created the fascist dai li, like roku, who refused to remove a genocidal dictator from power, like aang, who facilitated the establishment of a settler colonial state on earth kingdom land. like korra! she’s an incredibly immature avatar and a generally reactionary lead. i’ve talked about this at length before but she never actually gets in touch with the needs of the people. she’s constantly running in elite circles, exposed only to the needs and squabbles of the upper class! how the hell is she supposed to understand the complexities of oppression and privilege when she was raised by a chess club with inordinate amounts of power and associates almost exclusively with politicians and billionaires?? from day 1 we see that she tends to see things in very black and white ways which is FINE if you’re a privileged 17 yr old girl seeing the world for the first time but NOT FINE if you’re the single most powerful person in the world! Yeah, korra thinks the world is probably mostly fine and just needs a little whipping into shape every couple years, because all she has ever known is a mostly fine world! in s1 when mako mentions that he as a homeless impoverished teenager worked for a gang (which is. Not weird. Impoverished people of every background are ALWAYS more likely to resort to socially unacceptable ways of making money) korra is like “you guys are criminals?????!!!!!” she was raised in perfect luxury by a conservative institution and just never developed beyond that. So sure, if the red lotus raised her anarchist, probably a lot would’ve been different/better, but....they didn’t. and korra ended up being a reactionary and conservative avatar who protected monarchs and colonialist politicians. The avatar as a position is completely subject to the whims of whoever is currently the avatar. and not only does that suck for everyone who is not the avatar, not only is it totally unfair to whatever kid who grows up knowing the fate of the world is squarely on their shoulders, but it as a concept is a highly individualist product of the authors’ own western liberal ideas of progress! the idea that one good leader can fix the world (or should even try) based on their own inherent superiority to everyone else is unbelievably flawed and ignores the fact that all real progress is brought about as a result of COMMUNITY work, as a result of normal people working for themselves and their neighbors!

the broader analysis of bending was really interesting to me too, but im honestly not sure i Totally agree with it. the article pretty much accepts the show’s assertion that bending is a privilege (and frankly backs it up much better than the original show did, but whatever), and i don’t think that’s NECESSARILY untrue since it is, like, a physical advantage (the author compares it to, for example, the fact that some people are born athletically gifted and others are born with extreme physical limitations), but i DO think that it discounts the in universe racialization of bending. in any sequel to atla that made sense, bending as a race making fact would have been explored ALONGSIDE the physical advantages it bestows on people. colonialism and its aftermath is generally ignored in this article which is its major weakness i think, especially in conjunction with bending. you can bring up the ideas the author did about individual vs community oriented progress in the avatar universe while safely ignoring the colonialism, but you can’t not bring up race and colonialism when you discuss bending. especially once you get to thinking about how water/earth/airbenders were imprisoned and killed specifically because bending was a physical advantage, and that physical advantage was something that would have given colonized populations a means of resistance and that the fire nation wanted to keep to itself.

i think that’s the best lens thru which to analyze bending tbh! like in the avatar universe bending is a tool that different ethnic groups tend to use in different ways. at its best, bending actually doesn’t represent social power differences (despite representing a physical power difference) because it’s used to represent/maintain community solidarity. like, take the water tribe. katara being the last waterbender, in some way, makes her the last of a part of swt CULTURE. the implication is that when there were a lot of waterbenders in the south, they dedicated their talents to building community and helping their neighbors, because this was something incredibly culturally important and important to the water tribe as a community. the swt as a COLLECTIVE values bending for what it can do for the entire tribe, which counts for basically every other talent a person can have (strength, creativity, etc). the fire nation, by contrast, distorts the community value of bending by racializing it: anyone who bends an element that isn’t fire is inherently NOT fire nation (and therefore inherently inferior) and, because of the physical power that bending confers, anyone who bends an element that isn’t fire is a threat to fire nation hegemony. and in THAT framework of bending, it’s something that intrinsically assigns worth and reifies race in a way that’s conveniently beneficial to the oppressor.

it IS worth talking about how using Element as a way to categorize people reifies nations, borders, and race in a way that is VERY characteristic of white american liberals. i tried to be conscious of that (and the way that elements/bending can act in DIFFERENT ways, depending on cultural context) but i think it’s pretty clear that the writers did intend for element to unequivocally signify nation (and, by extension, race), which is part of why they screwed up mixed families so bad in lok. when they’ve locked themselves into this idea that element=nation=race, they end up with sets of siblings like mako and bolin or kya tenzin and bumi, who all “take” after only one parent based on the element that they bend. which is just completely stupid but very indicative of how the writers actually INTENDED element/bending to be a race making process. and its both fucked up and interesting that the writers display the same framework of race analysis that the canonical antagonists of atla do.

anyway that’s a few thoughts! thank u again for sending the article i really loved it and i had a lot of fun writing this <3

#this is 2.1k words LMFAOO #asks #analysis #do i have an analysis tag? #crit #lok crit

[w-h-4-t]

Homemade, organic, non-GMO Josephine and Cole Banter

I plan on making more parts one day bc my heart, my soul, my sweet lil Cole. *** Cole: *appears*

Josephine: Ah! C-cole. It’s just you. Maker’s breath, please stop doing that. Cole: I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you. Josephine: I know your intent is good but I’m afraid the visiting dignitaries do not share my views. Comte Farrier has already announced to his peers that Skyhold is haunted. Cole: I used to think I was a ghost but I’m not. Maybe there’s another me somewhere? Josephine: That’s not what-…*sigh* ***

Cole: Names rattle around resurfacing when needed, plucking words like harp strings that tie the world into a bow. You’re very good at what you do, Josephine.

Josephine: Thank you, Cole. It is the product of dedicated study, rigorous tutelage and consistent social battles. Let the soldiers say what they will, Finishing school is not for the faint of heart. Cole: White-hot pain, my hands stinging as the teacher brings the ruler down again. I only forgot once, please. “You will excel or get out of my class”. I cannot cry, I mustn’t, Cozette glances at me from her seat, snickering with her friends. I hear the words, piercing like arrows in the back of my skull, “Look at the Montilyet dog, fighting for scraps”. I mustn’t cry. Josephine: Though your talents must come in useful, I truly do not appreciate you doing that. I am kindly asking you to desist, Cole. Cole: The girls are far away, the Madame is far away. No one is perfect, it’s ok to cry now. Josephine: Please…stop. Cole: I’m sorry…I didn’t mean to upset you, I just wanted to help. Josephine: I know, Cole…That is why I’m far from furious. Most people require time to process their past and having it brought up so suddenly can be quite jarring. You are not at fault but do keep what I said in mind. Cole:…I won’t forget. *** Cole: So many masks hung up on the shelf, every day you pick one out, settling, sinking into the familiar shape. Latching tightly, you force its hold even when the painted porcelain starts cracking. Josephine: Your words will never cease to surprise me. I can always expect something incomprehensible and mysterious to come from your mouth. Cole: Does that make you happy? Josephine: I…suppose it is something to look forward to each day; the world is truly less dull with you around. Cole: That’s good! I’m happy you’re happy! You’re not the mask, you’re Josephine. Letting it crack doesn’t make you less you, it makes you more. Summers in Rialto, uncovered laughs, I run barefoot on the beach chasing seagulls. They want to make a Lady of me, I laugh again. Josephine: Your kind words have been noted, Cole though returning to such an uncontrolled state will be detrimental for the Inquisition’s reputation. Cole: I can hear it like a raindrop rippling on water, “Maybe one day”. You’re allowed to have dreams, Josephine. Josephine: *small laugh* Yes…maybe one day but not today. *** Josephine: Cole, I know you are rather attached to your current clothing but have you ever considered…a different style? You would look dashing in Velveteen. Cole: Varric asked me about my hat before. I didn’t know what was wrong. All I know is that I like my clothes. It’s the form I’m familiar with, plastered to starving bones; the last thing he wore. I wouldn’t ask you to change your skin. Josephine: Oh! I meant absolutely no offence! I was simply seeing if you were amenable to a wardrobe change is all. Please excuse my poor choice of words. Cole: Bright blue, muted red, brush back his hair or trim it. Platinum blonde goes well with brocade. Ring velvet is too strong, he’s sweet, sensitive, sublime in something softly coloured. Do you really think I’d look that nice? Josephine: There is no doubt in my mind. I can see you carrying a spring-themed doublet with nothing but regality. As I said before, you would look so dashing. Cole: Can I keep my hat? Josephine:…*sighs deeply while crossing out her notes* Autumn-themed it is.

#ladies gentlemen and non binary friends i present my two favorite characters in DAI aka my muses #the cinnamon bun duo #long post #Love those two #In Advisor banter Cole literally tries to insert himself into everyone's life like a scarecrow angel because he's Cole #dai #dragon age banter #dragon age companions #da cole #dragon age cole #dai cole #dragon age josephine #josephine montilyet #dragon age inquisition #dragon age textpost

[hendrickfw]

A ray of hope/LU AU

The end was near. An enormous asteroid, a hundred kilometers wide, was about to impact Earth. The last time it happened was about seven hundred years ago, during the golden years of heroism. A young white duck astronomer wearing a red jacket watched through his telescope, noting the object getting closer to Earth.

-Jet? Please turn off the light and get to sleep.

Jet´s brother, Turbo, was sleeping in a blue pajama. He stood up and walked to his brother.

-I can´t. I´m a witness of a cosmological event never seen before!

-Wait. Space, you mean?

Turbo loved space. He pushed his brother apart and started watching through the telescope. His eyes opened wide at the incredible sight of the rock.

-Guys, someone is trying to sleep here- said Rebel, putting his pillow over his head.

Jet, Turbo, and Rebel were triplets, all brothers of the large Duck family. They lived in Acmetropolis in their uncle´s Nash Duck house. Their mother traveled through all the galaxy, so she rarely was with them. The trio also passed their time with their uncle Ebenezer McDuck.

Rebel went with them after his complaints were unheard. He used some green pajamas. He wasn´t so happy about being out of bed.

-Wow, that´s so cool! You never told me a pink lady was flying over there!- exclaimed Turbo, making Jet curious.

-Pink lady? What are you talking about?

Jet pushed his brother and started watching through the telescope, impressed by the phenomenon before his eyes. A strange pink-dressed woman flying near the asteroid fired some kind of ray to it. The meteor was destroyed, although some debris continued its trajectory to Acmetropolis.

-That´s impossible! That is some abnormal event! How is a woman able to fly? What did she fire? Why...?

-Kids. What are you doing?

Another white duck opened the door. He was Nash, the uncle of the ducklings. He seemed mad after seeing his nephews out of bed late at night.

-Nothing, Uncle Nash- responded the three, hiding the telescope behind them.

-You should be sleeping. Remember that tomorrow we´ll visit your uncle Ebenezer.

-Ok, Uncle Nash- the trio responded again in unison.

The ducklings returned to bed, ready for the next day. Although, the strange event they have just seen got them intrigued.

While they were sleeping, some meteor debris fell to the city with some cosmic energy. Fortunately, it wouldn´t affect any individual. Right?

Acmetropolis University

It was a summer day in the city. The people could feel the heat of the day. There was, at least, one person, or animal, without that kind of problem. He was Tech E. Coyote, a Ph.D. student of the Technology Department of the biggest and most important university in the city.

Tech, as his ancient name suggests, was a coyote with brown fur. His green eyes, concentrated on his latest invention, still showed a wild persona, but also wisdom. He was wearing a lab coat. Despite someone's sound entering into the lab, his concentration didn't leave the device in front of him. Smith Pierce, Tech's professor, entered the lab. The coyote did not hear his presence until he felt someone touch the chair where he was sitting.

“You should rest. We're going to have a meal with the rest of the class at Pizza Fest. You coming?”

“I don't think so, sir. If I want to investigate the astrological phenomenon of the time, I must finish the intercosmic suit.”

Of course, the genius knew about the asteroid in the direction of the planet and wanted to investigate it closely. Very close. Smith, as much as he wanted to convince Tech to get out, knew he wouldn't make it. The professor sighed and walked out.

“If you change your mind, we will be waiting for you. Warner Street corner with Mouse.”

Tech nodded from afar, still adjusting the suit's protection systems. There wasn't much time, as the asteroid would arrive in a few days.

“You know? If you listened to me, I'd introduce you to my friend the roadrunner. Both could complement each other very well in the lab” asked a female voice. Tech had to start paying more attention to his surroundings while he was working.

“The delivery guy? You know I don't trust working with anyone since Casey, Lexi.”

After Smith's departure came Lexi Bunny, a tan fur bunny. She didn't study anything related to science. Instead, she was an athlete. She had been a cheerleader in high school and was now looking to pursue basketball. Despite this, she had taken some physics and engineering courses (specially to learn more about those subjects than his brother) under Tech's mentoring. Since then, they have become good friends, although Tech has had confidence issues.

And that's why Lexi wants to include him in ger close group of friends. In addition to the roadrunner whose name went through Rev, there was his older brother Ace. Rev also claimed to have two friends who would introduce them today. Just the ideal situation to take Tech.

“Today Rev will introduce me and my brother some friends. You should come, it'll be fun.”

“I can't. I have to finish this before I miss the opportunity.”

“Then do it as a favor. Remember the time you...?”

When Lexi pursued an objective, she usually made it. That's what he admired her. Well, he had to admit that, from the few times they'd come out, he'd had more fun than usual. Maybe he'd do the same this time, even though there'd be more people outside of her brother and herself.

“All right, all right. I 'm going. Just help me put some things in store” the most he tried to hide his smile, he just couldn't. He really enjoyed the company of the bunny.

As they both began to pack the objects Tech used, Tech recalled a recent comment from the bunny. That would serve to kill the silence in which they were involved.

“And... are you sure you want to do it?”

“I don't know. It's a big step and, so far, Ace hasn't taken it well.”

“We can postpone it so you can think about it better, discuss it with him and, well, with me. We haven't decided everything.”

“Doesn't it bother you? It's a decision that's yours too.”

“Not at all. I'd rather you be comfortable, specially.”

Lexi felt unsure of the action to take, but at least she was happy to have Tech's support. It was comforting to some extent.

Once they both finished storing everything, they left the University and walked to the city subway, from where they took transportation to downtown. Tech felt somewhat uncomfortable about being in such unhygienic, crowded environments, but at least having Lexi by his side giving him conversation took those thoughts out of his head. Soon they arrived and took to the streets of the metropolis. A short time passed, and they entered the Pizzarriba establishment.

Pizzarriba was a pizza restaurant created in the 21st century, miraculously afloat after losing almost all its establishments to Pizza Fest. Luckily, the original restaurant was still standing. It continued to maintain the same style as in its founding years, specially to attract customers.

Lexi, followed by Tech, walked through the door. It was Tech's first time on the establishment. Lexi quickly ran to one of the tables. Tech recognized her brother, Ace, whose grey fur was unmistakable for the coyote. He wore a jacket and jeans, his typical outfit after finishing his auditions. He was the only one on site, probably saving space for the group. The table was big. How many friends would the roadrunner bring?

- What's up, Doc? Ace asked Tech after hugging and greeting her sister.

-Hi, Ace.

Ace gave room for both of them to sit down. Lexi sat next to him and Tech was left next to her. Before they could start chatting, the three of them heard the door of the restaurant open with an unusual sound of someone talking.

“... a-robot-commissioned-by-my-dad-so-I-had-to-look-for-a-replacement-and-you-know-how-difficult-it-is-to-find-a-modulator-at-the-middle-of-desert-so-I-improvised-putting-together-several-remnants-of-old-inventions-with-something-of-cheese--which-reminds-me-have-you-proven-this-pizza-is-delicious-and-look-there-are-my-friends-hello-Ace-Lexi-and-you-should-be-Tech-is-a-pleasure-Lexi-told-me-a lot-about-you-and-your-inventions-sound-awesome...”

Tech started to feel dizzy. He didn't know what it could be, but it started a little after the roadrunner arrived. By focusing on his problem, he failed to hear the last words of him, at least until Lexi interrupted him.

“Hello Rev. Tech, he is the friend I have told you about.”

Tech tried to return to his posture and reached out to say hello. He didn't expect a loud, quick handshake from the roadrunner. He heard that he continued to speak with the same speed and joviality, which caused the coyote more dizziness. It was nothing to his liking. Rev was the typical roadrunner one could find in the desert, with blue plumage on the body and violet on the tail. He was wearing a sports suit because he probably was used to run a lot. After the introduction, Rev returned with his friends and introduced them.

“He-is-Slam-the-Tasmanian-demon-and-he-is-a-professional-fighter-and-very-good-at-it-I must-admit...”

Slam was a little bigger than the average Tasmanian demon. He was huge in Lexi's opinion, but behind his smile she saw the personality of someone friendly rather than intimidating. They hoped it would, even though Lexi didn't hesitate. Tech failed to understand Slam's growls, but by his raised hand he suspected it was a greeting.

“... and-he-is-Duck-and-between-him-my-brother-Rip-and-I-we-are-best-friends-practically-brothers-or-what-do-you-say?”

The black duck was crossing his arms, without saying a word. Everyone noticed that he looked coldly at Ace, who looked back at him the same way.

“Rev, I didn't know you knew the duck.”

“Umm-yes-why-do-you-know each other?”

"Unfortunately," Duck replied.

"And this got awkward," Tech said louder than he wanted. Slam made sounds agreeing.

The three newcomers sat in front of those who were already there. The large size Slam occupied in the chair explained the size of the reserved table. Lexi was the first to break the tension when she saw Duck's shirt.

“Where did you get that? I've been looking for that shirt for centuries!”

Duck watched his shirt. He changed his expression of discomfort to a smirk. He looked at the bunny pointing at his shirt.

“This shirt? Please, the biggest fans of Duck Dodgers are the only ones who can carry them.”

"I-didn't-know-that-you-were-fan-of-Duck-Dogers-too-Lexi-I-mean-it-is-fantastic-other-thing-that-we-have-in-common.”

“Well, lady, it is your lucky day. I´m the Duck Dodgers fan club leader so I may allow you to join us. Do you know where we are?”

“Please give me something easy. Here was Dodgers' first fight in 2021 during the concert of a famous band of the time.”

“2021? Wasn't he a hero in 2500?” Ace asked, intrigued or her sisters´ knowledge of the character. He knew of her love for the hero, but not how much she had dived into his history.

“Actually, no. It's a common mistake. Duck Dodgers debuted at this restaurant in the 21st century but is best known for his heroics in the 25th century. Besides, it wasn't at a concert by a famous band of the time. The Caballeros were not popular when they played in the incident" corrected Tech. Everyone looked at him and Tech felt uncomfortable. “What? You can't be the only ones interested in superheroes.”

“Told you” bragged Lexi to her brother with a big smirk.

"Sure, I already knew that." Duck bragged too, though everyone distrusted his sincerity.

“Wouldn’t-it-be-amazing-to-have-superpowers-or-what-do-you-think-guys?” Rev asked with his speaking speed. “I-mean-I-already-run-fast-but-I-wouldn´t-be-annoyed-if-I-was-faster-or-which-powers-would-you-guys-like-to-have?”

"Definitely jump higher, be able to reach places I couldn´t." Lexi replied, already knowing the answer.

“Besides the intellect, which I already possess, probably some form of technokinesis. It would be helpful to me when working.” Tech replied, showing off and being honest at the same time.

Slam made incomprehensible sounds to others again, but Rev interpreted them as the ability to eat more.

“I don't want superpowers. With my agility I could kick any thief” said Ace confidently.

“Finally, you share my opinion, Ace. I wouldn't need either. Duck Dodgers never needed. I just need my natural duck strength.” Duck added.

“Where was that strength when you needed my help moving a ladder in the supermarket, Duck?” The others couldn't help but laugh a little bit about the anecdote.

“The ones with wheels to move around, Ace?”

“Nice deduction, Tech.”

"You are despicable..."

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

The afternoon passed quickly and was fun, even for Tech or Duck, who were the most apathic. After eating the pizza and getting to know each other a little better, everyone returned to their homes. Everyone had their own responsibilities to attend.

Rev was the first to get home thanks to his speed, despite being the one who lived the farther away. The roadrunner arrived at his parents' house. Ralph, his father, greeted him immediately, diverting the little attention paid to his son Rip. He asked his favorite son to help him build his new Robo-Amigo as Rip was too "inexperienced" in the robotics area. Without hesitation the roadrunner arrived to the garage, where he began to work.

Slam, after lunch, arrived at the arena where he had a contract to fight. At the moment his fights were against unexperienced players, as his sponsor, Pierre Le Pew, still kept him to fight the great cup champion for later. The demon didn't want to serve just cheap entertainment because he wanted to have fun with the fights, besides being able to have an extra income if it wasn't too much, because the economy wasn't going well lately for him.

Duck came to his apartment, which was extremely messy, with dirty laundry all over the place. It looked like a homeless man lived there. And, honestly, it was near the truth. Despite the ducks´ confident and arrogant behavior, Duck was nothing but a drag on society. Not even that house was his: it was an unpaid hotel room for four months. Duck's life was miserable, and he knew it very well. Only his job of picking up trash from a public pool said it all. Duck threw himself in his bed and looked at a photograph of his adoptive parents, dead at that point. Duck missed them and would do anything to bring them back. It was the best thing that ever happened to him.

Tech returned to college, to the same lab where he spent the rest of the week working. He was already late and had to continue with his armor. He had Lexi's insecurity in mind. The coyote hoped she could solve the problem. But the voice of the roadrunner didn't go out of his mind either. In truth, listening to him speak so much, with that force and speed caused him a terrible headache. He didn't dislike him, on the contrary, they were almost “birds of a feather”, but that voice detail was still there.

Lexi and Ace returned to their apartment. It was humble, the best they could get. With Lexi's scholarship and Ace's salary as a stunt, it was the best they could rent. It was cozy, but Lexi wanted to change. Between the two brothers several discussions had been emerging and Lexi thought the best was to take some time apart. Luckily, she had found support in a coyote, who was willing to share the same roof with her. It was a possible way out.

Ace, meanwhile, was saddened by the constant conflicts with his sister. He understood that she needed her space and was no longer a child, but he was the older brother and their parents had commissioned him to protect her. Was he wrong to want to do his job?

But, despite each other's problems, the same event brought them together. It wasn't their meeting at Pizzarriba. At about 6:30, they all fainted without any apparent explanation. It was only a matter of time before someone noticed and they were taken to the hospital.

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

Some general stuff. This is my AU fanfiction of Loonatics Unleashed where the heroes have some solo adventures before they form the team. This is an awfully done introduction. I don´t really trust my English writing abilities, so please tell me if you find any grammatical mistake. If any hero wants to help me with that part I will not be able of thank you enough.

I finally decided to make it a shared universe with my other fanfiction: Los Tres Caballeros viajan de nuevo. I´m not sure if I´ll use any characters referencing that story because I want to focus on the show cast. For now I just want to put the important pieces on place before starting everything.

And feel free to comment. I´ll try to upload more but, I´m finishing this semester and the exams and essays will take my time. Anyway, for those shippers, I may have some Tech/Lexi at the start but I´ll transition it to Tech/Rev and Danger/Lexi.

I hope you like it and happy weekend to everyone.

#loonatics unleashed #tech e coyote #lexi bunny #ace bunny #rev runner #slam tasmanian #danger duck

[shiny-procrastinates]

(re)Watching Magia Record S1 - part 1

Hello and welcome everyone to the first post on this watch-along commentary of the first season of Magia Record! Whether you are just now watching it for the first time, or are re-watching in preparation for the second season, or have only played the game and are curious about the anime (in which case I'd be surprised you even exist) I hope you can have some fun reading these ramblings as I try to put my thoughts into words  (actually turned more into narrating the show) throughout all 12 13 episodes.

Before we can get to it, though, I have a few warnings to give:

1 - As much as I'd love to be able to memory swipe so I can watch this fresh all over again, such an ability is sadly still beyond my grasp. In other words, this isn't my first time watching (or second, for that matter; more like the sixth… or seventh…). That being the case I can't claim that these are my first impressions and it's very likely this commentary will be somewhat biased by my previous knowledge. However, I can guarantee one thing: I will do my best to keep this spoiler-free, so you don't have to worry if this is your first time watching.

(I will, however, be assuming that you have watched the OG series and Rebellion, so beware of that).

2 - Please don't come into this expecting it to be Madoka 2

Also no, this is not a continuation of the OG, it’s an alternate universe spin-off.

This one's for first-time viewers.

Well, ok, this sounds like vague tweeting and I'm kind of whining here, but I have seen a number of peeps on the internet saying that Magia Record is bad only for their argument to boil down to "because it isn't OG Madoka!"

Yeah it isn't. I'm pretty sure there's "Side Story" written somewhere in the title too.

Leaving aside the matter of nostalgia glasses and whether the original series was that much of a masterpiece or not (it's been over five years since I last watched it, so I can't say anything either way.) it seems kind of weird to me that someone would bash a spinoff on the grounds of how close it is to the original. Because here's the thing: to me, the whole point of spinoffs is taking an already existing scenario and putting a spin on it to make something new. That's exactly what makes them fun!

MagiReco didn't need to be a Madoka clone or to try hard and beat the original. That would probably have made it bad, actually. What it did need to do was to create an interesting story using the world set up by the OG Madoka and the other spinoffs, and that, in my opinion, it did, so I hope people can give it a chance and judge it on its own merits rather than only compared to the original. I'm not saying you can't hate it, either, I myself have my own problems with it, it's just that I want to see more reasonable reasons than "it's not the OG so it's bad".

3 - As you can probably already tell from these warnings, these posts are bound to get looong, so I'd recommend setting aside a fair amount of time and getting real comfy if you're gonna read it all. I also don't mind if you just skip ahead and only read the interesting parts, I'm not the internet police.

3.5 - I don't want to use it as an excuse, but I think I should make it clear that English is not my native language, so I apologize in advance for any mistakes and awkward/stilted text. It's hard to tell by myself, so feel free to correct me if you find something.

SO, with that out of the way let’s get down to what’s really important:

Puella Magi Madoka Magica Side Story: Magia Record Episode 1

Whew, now that’s a mouthful.

You know, in my mind I always thought a “side story” was something that happened alongside a “main story”, like another POV, so I’m not sure that’s the most appropriate title, but who am I to judge?

So here we go, we’re off with some beautiful futuristic scenery already, that’s the Madoka series I know.

As the classic Sis Puella Magi plays in the background, two unseen narrators tell us the tale of the so called “magical girls” as we are shown the reality of being one, meeting our first witch for this series.

Risking your life to save a cat doesn’t seem like the smartest of things. Rather, witches eat cats? That’s mean.

No, you really, really don’t. This narration definitely seems made to make everyone who saw the original say this, particularly with how silly are the wishes these girls suggest. 

And hey, look, even this girl who supposedly had her wish granted doesn’t seem very happy.

Hang in there, this is only the first episode.

Man, this scenery really is pretty though.

After an exciting fight with a witch in the train, our girl here silently goes home to find

Whatever the heck this is.

So, our girl here seems to be having strange visions whenever she enters her room, that is very very suspiciously cut exactly in half. Protagonist, you sure have an unique sense of interior decoration.

She goes on with her day, makes two lunchboxes and… oh, it seems she’s all alone.

Is this something you should be telling your own daughter?

Long story short, Iroha’s parents are abroad right now (as is suspiciously the case with many a anime protagonist parents). I actually love the parallel this scene draws with OG Madoka: whereas Madoka’s parents seem responsible and Madoka even looks up to her mom and they’re a happy united family, Iroha comes off as being the responsible one in her family and her parents are gone from the get-go. This way, the lonely atmosphere of the previous scene also starts making sense.

So, it seems like there’s something Iroha wants to do here, and that’s why she decided to stay behind.

Perhaps. Did you wish to save a black cat?

Wow, this teacher is speaking fast. Calm down lady, we’re not here to speedrun the content, geez. Though I guess we should be happy she’s at least giving a proper class, unlike a certain other teacher…

Oh great, it's this guy.

Ok, Iroha doesn’t remember what she wished for and Kyuubei doesn’t know either, although he knows she used her wish for the sake of someone. Kyuubei theorizes that the reason she doesn’t remember might be that not remembering was part of her wish, but Iroha doesn’t think she’d wish for that. I don’t think you’d ever think to wish for something like that until you had to wish for something like that though.

She’s got a fair point. After all, wishing in this universe is basica— the heck is going on in the background there?! O-kaaay…

Iroha was having a weird think-spot mental conversation with Kyuubei there, and missed speedrun teacher’s lecture entirely. Being meguca is suffering.

We get some school motto propaganda, and now we’re on the roof. Oh? Where did all the friendship stuff from the propaganda go? Seems like Iroha’s not following the school spirit. Unless she considers the white weasel a friend, so that’s why she gave him her extra… wait, Kyuubei can EAT? I thought he was some alien machine-like being. H-Huh...

Classmate A: Tamaki-san, maji tenshi!

She’s probably just shy. According to her classmates, Iroha used to be busy doing something or the other, but no one can remember what that is.

Cute. 

But maybe don’t do that somewhere someone could easily walk in on you, Iroha.

Iroha gets a call by the girl from the combat scene from before, whose name is Kuroe. I couldn’t tell from their conversation if they’ve known each other for a while or if they just met each other for the first time in the fight before.

On the train, although she’s the one who called her over, Kuroe remains silent. Iroha, clearly uncomfortable, tries her best to make conversation. Poor Iroha, I know the feeling.

We learn from her that the number of witches around has been decreasing. She comments that being unable to get Grief Seeds is troubling, but it’s better than having witches causing trouble. Poor girl has no way to know just how much of a bad news it is running out of Grief Seeds.

What’s with pink-haired girls and lacking self-esteem? Iroha, are you sure you didn’t wish to save a black and forget that you did? You did save a white one just before.

Kuroe finally decides to talk, and she tells us this:

If you go to Kamihama, you’ll be saved. To anyone that saw the OG, the first thought that comes to mind is that they’ll be saved from their destiny of turning into witches, but it seems Kuroe doesn’t know the truth yet. She just doesn’t want to fight witches anymore. I think.

The train lights up, and…

...this is extremely unsettling considering the truth about witches and the conversation they’re having right now. There’s a lot of this, but this just hits different having watched the original.

Iroha’s not inclined to believe what Kuroe’s saying. Of course, despite not remembering her wish, she’s the type that’s happy with fighting witches if she can save someone, and Kuroe’s not being very convincing either. The whole thing is apparently a rumor spread by some girls who saw a dream that told them that.

Except that Kuroe actually had the dream too.

Like most magical girls, Kuroe made a short-sighted wish, and regrets it. She now wants to be saved, so she’s going to Kamihama.

...or she was, but before that, they’ll have to defeat the witch they let escape the other day, ‘cos she’s back for more.

I actually have so many questions about this scene. Weren’t Labyrinths pocket dimensions? How come this one’s moving in physical space? We know witches themselves move and their Labyrinth goes with that, but I thought it was more, like, the entrance to the Labyrinth moves. Then how come witches can escape if magical girls get carried with their Labyrinth when they move…? Just... just... what?

The answer to all of that is probably “magic”.

Like that, Express Witch Labyrinth crashes right into what seems to be a train station. Labyrinths don’t have brakes, confirmed.

Brutal.

Looks like it’s not only magical girls who have territorial disputes going on. Although it’s nice that they won’t have to fight two witches at the same time, this is not exactly a relief when you consider these two were already struggling with the previous one, and this one just ripped it apart like crab.

As expected, Iroha’s arrows do no damage at all. When all seems lost…

A wild singing mini Kyuubei appears! Is this a shiny?

The singing Kyuubei distracts the witch and jumps towards Iroha, who uses her pro white cat catching skills to grab it, and… something happens. Whatever this Kyuubei did, Iroha’s having some flashbacks now. Sadly, the middle of a battle isn’t the best time to be having a BSOD and, despite Kuroe’s attempts to snap her out of it, they’re sitting ducks right now, a black and a white one.

Thankfully for them, though, they’re not alone in this barrier. This mystery blue haired girl spams flying spears and makes short work of the witch Iroha’s arrows didn’t even scratch earlier. She’s clearly at a whole ‘nother level.

Also, chibi Kyuubei’s gone. Totally not suspicious. Nope. Not at all.

So, from this OP miss get-the-heck-out-of-my-territory, who didn’t even bother saying her name, we learn that not only there is no salvation in Kamihama, there are more, stronger witches, and there are currently no Kyuubei. She gives them the Grief Seeds from the two witches before, and passes on a warning to them. Not the friendliest of magical girls. Though if you consider what happens when you run out of Grief Seeds, one could understand why it’d be undesirable having too many magical girls in the same place.

With this, Iroha and Kuroe take the train back to their town and things are totally awkward again.

Welp, seems like Kuroe doesn’t want to chat anymore, so we’ll have a dream sequence instead.

Forgive my lack of words, but this scene doesn’t need them. This is just… you couldn’t ask for a better representation of what being a magical girl wishing for salvation is like. Everyone has their own reasons, but in the end, having known despair, these girls are desperately clinging to this last hope called Kamihama. It’s almost a pilgrimage.

“Let’s go to Kamihama. We’ll be saved there”

And in the midst of all that is the mysterious girl from Iroha’s dreams.

(the track here, Paradero de Memoria, is also great btw)

Now, with various wishes written all over in the background, we get Kyuubei’s spiel about magical girls. I think this is word-by-word the same from the original too.

We now get to finally know what our protagonist’s wish was.

So Iroha wished to cure her younger sister’s illness, but the sister in question is now nowhere to be found. Worse: everything related to her is gone. Even Iroha, who made a wish for her sake, didn’t remember her existence until now. Oh man, that’s no normal disappearance. What happened? Guess that’s what Iroha will have to find out now.

With that, we conclude the first episode of Magia Record(’s s1)!

This is a really strong first episode in my opinion. It decently introduces our protagonist, sets up the mysteries we will be dealing with from here on and also manages to trace connections with the original, while using the viewer’s previous knowledge to give a whole different impression to some scenes. You wouldn’t be like “hell no” at the rumor there at the start if you didn’t know the truth about magical girls, and I doubt that final scene would hit that hard either. It’s just really good at this and it’ll continue doing that from now on. I love it.

Speaking of the final scene, me having watched the original over five years ago might also be part of it but that is really my favorite scene in Madoka overall. I just really really love that scene. (Seriously, I’ve watched this scene so many times I know it by heart now. Help.)

Alas, I lied, the episode’s not over yet, we still have our classic anime first episode ending-opening to watch. So let’s listen, to Gomakashi:

This logo’s real pretty.

So yeah, pretty standard anime opening. If you pay attention, there are some references to Connect too, what with the selfcest and whatnot. Although I managed to mistake this when I first watched, this one’s actually sung by the trio TrySail rather than ClariS. That’s the VAs for Iroha, Asakura Momo; Yachiyo (the get-out-of-my-territory girl), Amamiya Sora and Natsukawa Shiina, whose character we’ve yet to meet. TrySail has a lot of cool songs, so do check them out if you haven’t already. (free ad)

This time, in fact, the episode is over! Whew, I did say this was going to be long, but not even I thought it’d be this long. By the time this is posted I should have a backlog of these, so my plan is to post one everyday until we are done. I hope you had fun reading this here rant and I’ll be looking forward to meeting you guys again tomorrow, same place, maybe same hour, so we can go on and watch episode 2 together!

(P.S.: I am considering doing a series of posts at a later date comparing the anime to the game, but we’ll see. The first few chapters are fine, but the game is stupidly long, so I feel it’d take a lot of motivation and stamina I’m not sure I have at the moment. There’s also the possibility watching the first arc again would bring back my yt copy-apocalipse grief back and that’d suck, definitely don’t wanna go through that again.)

#magia record #puella magi madoka magica #pmmm magia record #this post apologizes for existing

[just-some-fiction]

Just You and Me Part 15.1

Ok so this is probably one of my longest chapters. It’s Chapter 15 on AO3, a look into their teenage years, with some subplot and common themes. For those of you who are only reading on Tumblr, ya’ll gonna need this one x 

“If your mom gets home and finds us,” she warned as he pulled her towards his bedroom.

“Come on mama,” he drawled, pulling her against his chest as they walked, “empty house, be a crime to waste it,” his hands gripped her hips.

“Babe,” she sighed as he kissed her neck, not stopping him as he pushed her onto his bed. Somehow he convinced their physics teacher to pair the two of them together on a project.

“The things you do to me babe,” he groaned, kissing down towards her cleavage, his hand slipping under her skirt.

They haven't had sex yet. Just some heavy petting. He never pushed her or anything, letting her take the lead. As soon as she was comfortable he'd take over. There have been plenty of drives to secluded areas in his car which ended up with his mouth wrapped around her clit and fingers buried inside of her. Alternatively she'd find him at a house party or after a meeting and proceed to suck him off in an empty bedroom. Most times they'd end up in his bedroom though.

She could feel his hardness against her thigh as his fingers traced her slit over her panties, “You don't have to be anywhere tonight right?” she asked as she pulled away.

Looking down at her through hooded eyes he shook his head, “Nah, sent my boys on patrol and boss doesn't need me,” she stiffened at the mention of his boss, who happened to be her uncle and legal guardian while her father was in prison and until her eighteenth birthday in a month's time.

Stroking her cheek he pulled his hand from her skirt and pulled her onto his chest as he rolled onto his back, “Hey,” he tilted her chin up to look at him, “we're almost done babe, aight, he won't hurt you, besides, no way will he take on my moms if he finds out where you are.”

That was true, Yolanda Ramirez was not a lady you picked a fight with. She was the old leader's widow who fought just as dirty as any of the current bangers. She made it known that Lucia's uncle was just a figurehead while Rio was finishing school. However, Lucia had a feeling it would be harder to get her uncle out of power than everyone thought.

Straddling his waist, she bent down to kiss him, before pulling away. Biting her lip she looked at him.

“Where's your ma?” she asked shyly, playing with the buttons of his jeans.

Smirking, he ran his hands along her thighs, “Work and then dinner with Chuck's mom,” confirming that they'd be alone for the rest of the night. Lucia pulled her top off, leaving her in a white bra.

“And your sisters?”

“Sleepover.”

“We locked the front door right?”

He nodded, “And pulled the car into the garage so no one knows we're here.”

She rubbed her center against his, reaching behind her to unclasp her bra. Before she could pull it down her arms, Rio sat up against the headboard, pulling her closer to him. He pushed the straps down her shoulders. Soon she was tugging his shirt off, peppering kisses along his shoulders and neck. His hands were roaming across her back and hips.

“Christopher,” she cupped his jaw, he looked at her as she nodded.

“You sure?” she nodded again, “Nah Lucia, I need you to say it, cos once you give me permission everything changes,” she knew that. In their world things worked differently. Especially when it came to someone who was being trained to be the king.

“Please baby,” she ground down lightly. He groaned, grabbing her hips to keep her still. It's been a while since he's fucked anyone and he didn't want to come from her dry humping him.

Soon they were both completely naked. He made her lay against the headboard, trailing kisses down her stomach and towards her pussy. One of her hands was tweaking a nipple, while the other was resting on her thigh. Rio kissed the junction where her pelvis and thigh met, suckling on the sensitive skin. One of his arms was resting on her abdomen, keeping her in place, the other gripping onto the underside of one of her thighs. Pressing a kiss right in the middle of her pussy, before running his tongue along the folds.

The room was filled with the sound of her heavy breathing as well as the sound of him eating her out. She felt his tongue circle her clit, locking onto the sensitive bundle of nerves. Pulling away for air, he pressed a kiss against her thigh, gently biting the sensitive skin. Catching his breath, he trailed a finger through her wetness, before plunging two into her and latching onto her clit again.

“Oh fuck,” she cried, feeling herself let go, “oh fuck baby,” she was coming against his mouth. He sucked onto her clit, pumping his fingers in and out of her as she came. Pulling her down so that she was laying with her head on a pillow, he kissed her.

“Do you have any idea what you do to me?” he all but growled, his voice low, his eyes trained on her, “After tonight everyone gonna know who you belong to mami,” he stroked her cheek, before leaning over towards his night stand and pulling a condom out of the draw.

“Papi please,” she moaned, rubbing her hands over his shoulders, as he rolled on the condom.

He kissed her, gently rubbing the head against her opening. Slowly he pushed forward, watching her face scrunch up slightly, eyes closed. Fully inside of her, rested his forehead against hers, he let out a shaky groan - she felt good around him.

“You ok mami?” he whispered, “Look at me baby,” lifting her leg over his hip, he slid deeper into her, “fuck Lucia,” he groaned.

Opening her eyes she looked up at him. It wasn't as painful as she thought it would be. A bit uncomfortable but slowly her body was adjusting to him. The urge to have him closer kicked in and she pulled him closer, his chest flush against hers, wrapping her legs tightly around his waist. Christopher was a dangerous guy, even at the age of eighteen he had a reputation of being ruthless, but she's never felt safer with anyone else. He started moving inside of her, his head buried into her neck groaning at the feeling of her clenching around him.

“So good mami,” he said into her neck, “been thinking of this since we were sixteen,” she laughed at the confession. It was no secret that he was into her for a long time, but she was always apprehensive, especially with his lifestyle. Soon his movements sped up, his hand finding its way to her clit, stroking her until she clenched around him and milked him dry.

“Rio,” she squealed, this orgasm much different than the ones she had in the past.

“Oh shit,” he groaned, feeling her gush over him, moving faster, he came, holding her tightly against him.

They laid like that for a few minutes, before he pulled out of her, removing his condom and getting up. He disappeared out of the room only to return with a washcloth and proceeded to clean her up. When he was done he pulled her to him, not bothering to get under the covers.

“How you feeling mama?” he rested his head on hers.

“Good,” she sighed, snuggling closer to him, one leg over his hip.

“Didn't think I would make you squirt on your first time,” he chuckled as she buried her head into his neck to hide her embarrassment, “made a mess baby.”

“Shut up,” she flicked his ear.

“Don't gotta be embarrassed baby,” he grabbed her hand, placing a kiss on it before lacing their fingers, “it made you feel good didn't it?” she nodded, he smirked and stared down the length of her body, “can't wait to hit it without a glove one day,” he felt her tense up, “when you're ready mama, I ain't gonna push you.”

She kissed his neck, sighing, enjoying the feeling of his body under her,  she kissed along his jaw, her hands rubbing over his shoulders, her eyes trained on his hands. She loved his hands, loved watching him use them, especially when he boxed. Recently she's started going with him to the ring and he started teaching her some forms. Most girls go to watch and stake out any banger who was willing. She wasn't one of those girls. If she was going to be part of this life, she was going to do it right.

“How did you get Mr Anderson to agree to pair the two of us up for the next class project?” she asked out of the blue.

“Threatened him,” he stated, she swatted him, “kidding babe,” he laughed, “you know good ole Andy loves me.”

It was true, their physics teacher seemed to have a soft spot for him, letting him get away with murder most of the time. To the annoyance of everyone else in the class, especially her. It didn't help that he was a straight A student when it came to maths and science.

“Told him he'd be helping me get lucky this weekend,” he hissed as she pressed her knee into his stomach, “I'm kidding you psycho,” he laughed, “nah, I happened to see who you were gonna be paired with and I wasn't gonna have it.”

There was no way he'd let her get paired up with another banger or someone from a rival gang, “Who was it,” she traced the tattoo on his shoulder.

“Who you think?” his voice went low.

She laughed at the look on his face, “Alfred?”

“Dumbass,” it was an automatic response he had whenever that name came up. Ever since it got around sophomore year that he was interested in Lucia, Alfred has been trying to worm his way in.

She pulled his head towards her and kissed him, still laughing against his mouth, “You funny papi,” he rolled them over in retaliation, pinning her under him. Before he could do anything his phone started to ring. Rocking his jaw he looked over at the offending object. Mike's name flashed on the screen.

“Thought I told you I didn't want to be disturbed tonight,” were the first words out of his mouth. Lucia rubbed the back of his neck soothingly as he listened to Mike. It seemed like whatever his right hand was telling him was pissing him off.

“Give me 30 minutes,” he said, not waiting for a reply, he hung up, squeezing his eyes shut and clenching his jaw, “Cia.”

“It's ok baby,” she pulled him close,  “I know,” she kept stroking his head.

“No it's not,” he growled, “dumbasses can't do anything right,” he lifted himself up, rolling off of her, “just wanted one night where I ain't have to do anything, ‘specially tonight.”

She could tell he was getting worked up as he pulled his boxers on, “Hey,” she sat on her knees behind him, placing her hands on his shoulders, “you can't go work if you worked up, throws you off,” she pressed his shoulders.

“I know,” he sighed, leaning against her, “fuck just wanted to spend the night with you, naked,” she laughed, kissing his head.

Bringing her arms to rest around his shoulders she leaned against him, “Just think Rio, all of this is gonna pay off, then we can spend entire weekends together naked,” only after the words left her mouth did she realise what she insinuated.

“You gonna be here for the long run mami?” he turned his head, nudging her cheek with his nose, she nodded, turning her head to kiss him.

“Go,” she unwound her arms, “I'll be here when you get back,” she watched him pull his shirt on, grab his gun and pull on his jacket.

Biting his lip as his eyes trailed down her body, “Don't put clothes on,” he leaned down and kissed her, letting his hand travel between her legs, “keep this nice and wet for me.”

“Be careful,” she whispered, holding his face in between her hands.

“Always mami.”

Later

He walked into his room, closing the door behind him. Lucia was sound asleep, wearing one of his hoodies, his pillow nestled in her arms. It was still early for a Friday night. After he was done dealing with his boys, Lucia's uncle called him as well. He had half a mind to ignore the call and go back home and bury himself in his boss's niece but fought the urge. He made it clear if anyone else disturbed him, there'd be problems.

Stripping down to his boxers, he stood at the side of the bed, letting his eyes roam down her bare legs. He wanted her now, wanted to sink into her and stay there. Kneeling down, he stroked her cheek, rousing her from her nap.

“Hey,” he moved closer.

“Everything sorted?”

“Mhm,” he bit his lip, letting his hand trail down her legs, “thought I said don't get dressed.”

She pushed his hands under the hoodie, “Who said I was dressed,” moving his hand between her legs, “besides, how many times have you thought about fucking me while I wear this?” he noticed what she was wearing and smirked, it was his school boxing hoodie, the one with his name on it.

“Fuck mami,” he groaned, “you're killing me.”

She smiled, “You said I could suck you off papi,” by now she was sitting up.

“Knees,” his eyes went dark as he watched her slide off the bed and sink to her knees, palming him through the boxers. Soon she was bobbing her head as she sucked him. His hands were in her hair, supporting her head as he started to thrust his hips. He watched her, eyes tearing, dribble running down her chin and still dressed in his hoodie.

“Lucia you look so good like this,” he groaned, “fuck mami, you my girl baby, don't need anyone else,” she sucked on the head, running her tongue over the slit at the top, “feel like I can do anything when you with me baby,” he hissed, “fuck don't stop,” he bit his lip as he felt his balls tighten and soon he was coming down her throat. She continued to suck him after he came, making sure she got every drop. When she was done, he picked her up, and hoisted her up around his hips. Kissing her as he laid them down, moving down to settle between her thighs and proceeded to eat her out, until she had to push his head away from over stimulation.

“I can't,” she breathed out as he tightened his grip on her thighs and continued to suck on her clit, “baby I can't.”

“Yes you can,” he growled into her pussy, “you coming so well for me mami,” he kissed her inner thigh, looking up at her, “you taste so good ma,” he pushed two fingers in her, “nah, don't close your eyes Lucia, you gotta watch this baby,” she opened her eyes and watched him finger her, “there's my girl, you like watching me finger you huh?” he chuckled as she gushed over him.

“Yeah mama, you love it,” he smirked at her before sucking on her clit. Tears were starting to roll down her cheeks. Her entire body was ringing with pleasure. It was too good, they were fucking like adults and she wanted more.

As if reading her mind, he pulled away, wiping his mouth against his hand, “Gonna fuck you one more time before we call it a night mama,” she nodded, tugging him closer by his arms, he wasnt expecting her to use so much force and he toppled forward onto her, “woah, careful baby,” he laughed, kissing her cheek, “I'm right here,” he whispered, reaching over and grabbing a condom.

“Fuck,” he hissed, “one day, imma fuck you raw baby,” his thrusts were sloppy, “gonna feel so good,” he growled, gripping her jaw, “gonna wreck you for anyone else.”

“Only want you,” she rasped, “only you.”

She held onto him as he fucked her. Her legs were wrapped around his waist and he was pounding into her at a brutal pace. The room was filled with the sound of her moans and his harsh breathing as well as the sound of their skin.

"Fuck mami," he growled, "take me so good," his thrust became sloppy as she gushed over him again, "wanna come on you ma," he groaned, pulling out of her and pulling the condom off. He knelt between her legs as he pumped himself to completion.

"Cum here baby," she whispered, pointing at her pelvis, holding the hoodie up. Soon he was shooting his load onto her lower abdomen, watching as it dripped down her body. Before it could run off her, she scooped it up and rubbed it over the outside of her pussy and pelvis, looking at him as she did it. It was something she enjoyed doing, especially when she'd blow him or give him a hand job.

He took the hoodie off of her and picked her up, carrying her to the bathroom, grabbing his hoodie and a pair of sweatpants as they left the room. She stroked his neck as he placed her on the bathroom counter.

"So good for me Lucia," he held her face between his hands and kissed her, deepening the kiss for a bit, "ain't nobody I want more than you mama."

Pulling away, he turned on the shower, while she put her hair into a messy bun at the top of her head. Hopping off the counter she pulled two towels out of the cupboard. Staring into the mirror, she saw him looking at her in the reflection, walking to stand behind her as they waited for the water to heat up.

"Love you," he whispered.

"Love you," she replied.

They got ready for bed, before grabbing his laptop and settling for a movie. If his mother came home and found them naked in bed, she'd shoot them both with his gun. Well she'd shoot him and just be disappointed in Lucia. His mother knew he wasn't a saint and knew she couldn't control him, but she expected him to respect her home and her rules, which he did. If his sisters were here with him he'd never have sex in his room and whenever Lucia stayed over he made sure the bedroom door was always open.

Before he could get his laptop, she straddled him, “Love me,” her tone was the tone she used when she wanted something, a tone he could never say no to, even when they were younger.

They just sat in that position for a while kissing. He gripped her hips, under his hoodie, as her nails raked down his bare chest. He kissed down her neck, sucking on the skin, pulling the zipper down, he kissed down towards her breasts. She started grinding down against him as he sucked a nipple into his mouth.

“Gotta stop mami,” he groaned, “before we make a mess again,” but he didn't stop, “fuck Lucia, you really gonna kill me,” he huffed humorously as she kept grinding.

“So good baby,” she mewled, watching him get another condom and slipping his dick out and pushing her panties to the side. She ripped the package open and slid the condom on, before sinking down onto him.

She rode him, clutching onto his shoulders. It felt so good. She didn't care if she came or not, she loved the feeling of being this close to him. This time it was her phone that rang. They both froze. He raised an eyebrow at her. Reaching over he picked up her phone and swore.

“It's your uncle babe,” he groaned, handing her the phone, “answer it,” she made to get off him, but he kept her in place, placing a kiss in the valley of her breasts.

“Hello, uncle,” she kept her voice neutral. If she didn't answer, her brother would call and then him and Alfred would go looking for her. The last thing she wanted was Rio shooting her brother and his friend in his mother's home, if they were to find them here.

Stroking his head as she listened to her uncle speak, “I need you to be home on Sunday,” he told her, not asking where she currently was thankfully, “we're having some people over, we need to make a good impression.”

Rolling her eyes as her uncle continued speaking, “Others including Christopher will be there too, he was here tonight to go over the details, I've decided I want you here as well,” she looked over at him and clenched her walls around him, “and Lucia, he needs to be on top form so no distractions,” her uncle didn't know the details of their relationship, believing them to just be childhood friend and seeing her as a distraction to Rio. She also knew he wanted to use her to reel potential partners from other crime families outside the area in, something both she and Ramirez family were against.

“Yes uncle,” she answered and the line went dead.

“Bout Sunday?” he asked. She nodded, biting her lip as she started riding him again.

“Your uncle seems to be having big plans mami, but we know who's really in charge, yeah?" he said softly, stroking her cheek.  His father built up this empire and her uncle and father almost destroyed it after he died. Now her father was in jail and her psycho brother and power hungry uncle thought they could take over the Ramirez Empire.

Later

They were laying on their sides facing one another, eyes closed and foreheads touching, the blankets around them and the bedroom door open as per his mother's rules. Her hand was stroking his neck. `A few weeks after he turned eighteen he got his neck piece done. It took him a long time to decide what brand he wanted, but ultimately he went with the one like his father.

“How you feeling Lucia?”

“You asked me that already.”

“Asking you again.”

She moved her leg over his hip, to get closer to him, “I feel safe,” she kissed his nose, “and happy,” kissed his cheek, “and sore,” he made a smug noise at the last comment, opening his eyes to look at her, only to find her looking at him already.

“Safe huh,” he raised an eyebrow, “with a banger?”

“Yes I do,” she confessed, “only feel safe with you and when I'm here.”

“I got you mama,” he pulled her close. Slowly they started drifting off.

#rio nbc #rio good girls #good girls nbc #manny montana #lucia x rio #lucia x johnny

[reimahowaido]

I’ll get to those Magic Crafter Dragons I sweeeear But first, fun stuff from Discord. Dunno who made the original, it was just posted on a server, but yeet I did it anyway First of all, I don’t play a lot of games. I like games and the idea of them. I enjoy people playing stuff, I love watching others play. It’s that little sibling culture. But lemme toss a word or few about all of these. Though first of all, I only own 4 of the 8 games listed and even still I’ve only played 3 of them xD R.I.P. Pokemon Cafe Mix - The game is just Super Cute. Like oh my god Aesthetics! Adorable, every pokemon looks so nice and I just want to go to the cafe and taste everything and just chill. Please. It looks so cozy and relaxing. Gameplay is fairly simple too. Sometimes things seem a bit BS but in one way or another I’ll get through every stage etc. so it’s not too bad. Most of the time relaxing, can be addicting because of how simple things are. But really I love the game and I hope one day they’ll add more of the pokemon I like xD Buizel is my current favourite <3 It’d be nice seeing Mienshao or Mienfoo for one, maybe Glameow as it doesn’t get a lot of attention. We got Gogoat, but I wouldn’t mind a Sawsbuck or Deerling Pokemon Black 2 - To keep the Pokemon trend going, this is my fave out of the mainline games. I’ve been a fan ever since the first generation, I’m older than Gen 1 at that. But yeah, we did buy games but Nintendo stuff was too expensive and so I never really got to play those growing up. Black 2 was the first game I ever bought, for myself, with my own money. It was my first game and I loved it dearly. Still do and man I’d Love to replay it, but the curse of only 1 save file is cruel. I don’t want to restart my first ever save file. Currently I have no way of transferring anything over and I even have a Shiny Gothorita there (as underwhelming as it is, it was my first ever shiny). I love these games~~ Lots of different pokemon to choose from, great story, the fact that it’s a sequel is so freaking cool and unique I Love It So Much. Of course it’d be cool to have some extra things to do in it, like cleaning my badges, contests would be cool, I loved the mining stuff in Gen 4 when I got to try it on my friend’s Platinum save file as a kid. Speaking of, Gen 4 games would probably be my favourites, if I ever had the chance of owning and playing any fully. They have soooo much to do in them! Gen 5 is good and certainly up there in faves, but bruh, Gen 4 had all sorts of extra stuff, especially Platinum, and in HG/SS you had Pokemon following you like bruh that’s Crazy and I’d love to have that for a game I own, it’s like a dream Honorable mentions to Mystery Dungeon and Gen 6′s Pokemon Y for some grand memories. Firstly Pokemon Y, the second game I ever owned I think, great fun. I played that game for hooooooooours and it’s the only Pokemon Game that I’ve both played as a Nuzlocke and actually reset to play again. Also the first gen where I actually really got into competitive stuff, breeding for natures and stuff, and I’ve caught so many shinies in Y and Omega Ruby (mostly Y, OR has 1 shiny in Pidove, while Y has Ninetales, Pachirisu, Burmy, Gligar, and perhaps some other ones I caught/hatched myself). Mystery Dungeon games get a mention for having cool stories and I like the idea of the personality test and stuff. I’ve never played or owned any of these games, but I’ve watched Marriland play a handful of the games and currently am enjoying MDB playing through the first games in the series. Also a quick bloop on Colosseum being Cool as heck, and Battle Revolution gets a shoutout for looking so freaking good, having amazing music and making me search up videos with my favourite pokemon and just looking and watching hundreds of videos just because they looked so nice

Fire Emblem has to be the 2nd series of games I’ve gotten the most into. Although I’m a fairly new fan and my experiences and knowledge are limited, I do still enjoy the series and games - both old and new - a bunch. I only own Awakening, Conquest and 3 Houses, but I’ve again watched others play the past games a bunch, so I have some knowledge and memorable moments from those games too. Now I haven’t actually gotten myself to play 3 Houses yet, I’ve seen playthroughs of the game already and know the story etc. But yeh. Still, I’d say that I’ll probably like 3 Houses more than Awakening and Conquest. Awakening is nostalgia galore for me, but it does have its things with the story and characters and stuff. It’s nice, but I dunno, I just feel 3 Houses has an edge on it in some way. Maybe it’s just... Less controversial? Less Flame Wars? Maybe? Fates games, well, we all know the big glaring thing here. The story. And some of the characters suffer from this too. I kinda do wish that the Player had a biiiit more control in how the story went and played out, like I feel you definitely could have saved Scarlet in some way still, and all that. But eh, there’s enough stuff for me to go and prefer 3 Houses over it. And yes, I like choosing the members of my team and playing however I like, so giving me the ability to class my characters however I want is going to be a mistake as I’ll just make everyone a mounted unit and get destroyed but hey! Options :2 Variety :22 Great tiiiiimes~ Also it’s Blue Lions for me, Golden Deer Second Now for the games I don’t own. I chose Radiant Dawn because the Tellius games are just so good. I love the character in them, the story is pretty solid and the worldbuilding is cool too :2 I like both of the games, and while Path of Radiance is more coherent and doesn’t give split the characters up a bunch, Radiant Dawn has More of the great characters :2 Yes I know, not all of them are as fleshed out and thought out as the first game’s characters, but yo I still love them. I love a good continuation to a story. I love a ‘hey maybe it wasn’t as Black & White as we were made to believe’ twist. Also just hella good memories from watching BigKlingy play these games. The audience memed Aran to the final levels. We did it, he did so well, Aran deserved to be there xD Radiant Dawn also brings us Nailah, who is just. Yeah, you speak to me on so many levels, I’m easily readable. But also, woman, wolf, strong, yasss~~ Also I love the idea of the Jaegan character being a Thief/Assassin. That’s just so different and cool to me after all these Horse Units. And I’m the one guy who likes Levail and would love to see more of him. Give us more of Levail, the man who almost made it to being playable. Man. Levail is probably the one reason I’d pick Radiant Dawn over Path of Radiance xD The other game I’ve watched BigKlingy play through (and that’s my only experience on that game) is Sacred Stones. Pretty solid game all in all. Story, characters, but speaking of that story, if you really think about it, it’s Hella Dark, and that’s actually kinda cool in a way. I’m not that into dark stories, but here it worked. Also watched PhoenixMaster1′s playthrough on the Echoes game. I do like the game, if i find it one day I Might buy it but I’m not like in a hurry to get it. It was cool though, different for reasons but hey~ Also, Berkut, yes. I’m one of those people who like this angry man. But come on, he was really good xD Spyro I’ve already talked about in my lengthy little thing that I’ll get to continuing eventually xD But yes, I freaking love Spyro, my childhood, still very enjoyable experience full of great memories Metroid Fusion - Oh boy here come the nostalgia~ I’ve actually never played any Metroid games myself. I got introduced to the series in the early 2010s through youtube videos. I’m fairly sure it was me looking through dozens and dozens of Top 10 videos, several of which were on ‘the scariest bosses’, either unexpectedly scary or something else. But guess what, Nightmare from Fusion was in there, and I Think the person in the video said something on not wanting to even show the final forms of Nightmare’s face because it was that horrifying to them. And honestly? The fact that they didn’t show how bad it got, mixed with my morbid curiosity and woop, here I go~ Down the Metroid rabbithole where I watched a lot of videos on people fighting Nightmare and the other bosses in the game, eventually going into watching full run-throughs of the game and enjoying my time. Game looked pretty good, soundtrack was really nice too. And so I ended up on listening to a lot of the game series’ music and getting more familiar with the other games and the lore too. Learning to know that Samus was a lady was also hella badass. Fusion started it all for me, and while Super Metroid is cool, people also just play it a loooot, especially the Speedrunners, there’s also plenty of hacks based on that game and yeah I get it the game is Good, but that makes Fusion all the more special to me~ Devil May Cry 3 - Ok so again, I’ve not played any DMC games myself. This one again though is nostalgia ocean for me~ 2010 or such, I’m on some forum, said forum has a forum game based around songs or such and someone links one from this game. I Think it was the Doppelganger battle theme, or then I just found that one and listened to it for hours among the other battle themes these games have because they’re soooo gooood~~ DMC 4 was fairly new at that time, but I remember Gredo’s and Agnus’ themes being up there in songs I listened to a lot too. My experiences and stuff on this series was fully based on the songs, images on said songs, bits and pieces of the cutscenes of these games I saw and comments I read. I didn’t get too deep into DMC back then though, but I did have a bit of knowledge here and there, even if my idea of the stories in all the games was, well, I wouldn’t call it warped, but I definitely had imagined the story going differently to how things actually went xD Still, as a few years back I returned to DMC out of that feeling of nostalgia, and discovered DMC 5 had Just been released, boi, I was In. And I watched through cutscene compilations, playthoughs and what have you on all the games (Except for DmC, boot to you ReBoot), and it was quite the hype time~ I enjoy the chracters, the story that there is around them, and just how carefree and fun stuff can be. The party sure did get crazy~ Lost Dimension - The last game I have on the list there. This might be a weird one and I get that yeah. How many have even heard of this game? I sure wouldn’t have ever known of it without BigKlingy’s playthrough of it. But that playthrough was full of memories, I should really rewatch it one day~ I may not remember an awful lot about the game, but I do keep coming back to it in one way or another. I liked the character designs, the fact that all of them were unique and had their own abilities, there was a bit of story around all of them, the traitor system had you thinking & made each run a little different... That’s some Cool Stuff! The game might be a bit obscure and seriously not known at all, but for what it was, it was great and I enjoyed it a bunch! And now for stuff that wasn’t on the list but I kinda still want to mention. Because why not~ IB - This Almost made it onto the list, but I felt a little closer of a connection to the other games on it. But IB is one of those games from the early 2010s that I also got introduced to through the wonderful world of Youtube. I have forgotten the name of the person whose playthrough in the game I watched. But I watched a ton of people play this game. It was just. So cool. The puzzles in this game were nice and the fact I myself could solve and understand them too was pretty nice to me, and for some reason I just enjoyed watching other people react to the game and try solving stuff. It also had a couple different endings so watching and seeing what the other people got was also interesting. Great memories~ Witch’s House / Ao Oni / Mad Father - And all sorts of other horror games that kinda fall under this grouping and style and stuff. Yeah, IB kinda opened a bit of a thing for me as I realized I greatly enjoyed the horror games with puzzle elements to themselves + a bit of story here and there. There’s definitely much much more than these 3, I watched soooo many of these games being played by others. Ao Oni I may have discovered through my Hetalia phase though, HetaOni, if any of you still recognize that name. Daym. Although at first I didn’t want to watch HetaOni because of the portraits. Pfffff I thought the person who made them was being mean to some of the characters, but nah, I’d later learn that those were simply just mimicing the ones from the original game. But yeah, Ao Oni had a dozen variants and things inspired by it so those kept me busy for a whiiiiiile Hades - Now here’s a cool recent game! Again, haven’t played it, but it looks cool. The story is nice, character designs are God Like (hehe), soundtrack is super cool, aesthetics and oh my god everything is voice acted oh my gooood. This game is just. So cool. And the team who did it seems really cool too and are seemingly full of nice amazing people. This is definitely some great example work on how things should be done :2 Definitely something to look up to, I love everything about them~ The only reason Hades isn’t up there is because of its recentness and my brain not managing to think of it somehow even as I struggled to come up with stuff (I was mostly trying to think of stuff I had played, so that’s one thing. I even struggled to remember DMC because my current hyperfixations are elsewhere and that’s freaking Wild considering how much I enjoy DMC) But yeah, Hades is Super Freaking Cool Crash Bandicoot - These games I did play as a kid actually, the 1st one was way too hard and the 3rd one was my favourite. I like Crash, these games were nice too and I have plenty of good memories with the game, just not enough to make it up there on my list. Yeah it sounds stupid that I’d take out a game I actually played and replace it with stuff that I didn’t, but... Hey, my list Minecraft - Watched several videos on other people pllaying this game, I know of it, I respect it, but I’ve never played it myself and stuff. It’s cool but didn’t make it on the list Animal Crossing - Riiiiiight, these games seem adorable and I wouldn’t mind owning an AC game one day. I’d probably reset continuously though to get Skye in my town/village/island, she’s my favourite xD If the recent game had cost lest I might have gotten it. 60-70€ is just, a lot of money Persona - I guess I’ll mention these too. My experiences are through Bigklingy’s videos again. 3 is a fave, 4 seems cool, 5 I don’t know a lot about but it seems nice too. I probably wouldn’t be able to play these games myself, since some fights kinda need certain things and strategies and you can’t really just pick whatever and whom ever and roll through with brute strength. I mean, I Guess you could, but that might not be as fun in the long run? Who knows, but it’s not exactly like Pokemon or Fire Emblem in those regards you know The big conclusion is that I like all sorts of different aesthetic looks, mostly probably natural with some brighter colors in it. Stories are good, I love stories! Good characters with nice designs and backstories are really nice too. Things being thought out and built nicely is great you know? A little bit of strategy, fantasy here and there. Nothing too dark and gloomy or ‘hyper realistic’ or what have you. I guess no first person shooters either, though combat is fine. Games where I can pick and choose what to use and what kinds of ‘teams’ I build and the ‘members’ I use in them is nice. I do love watching others play, but with games like Pokemon & Fire Emblem I have that drive of choosing who to use and having my own unique experience kinda gets me to buy the games.

#Games #Lists #Text #Some sort of 'fill this' meme I think

[wishonastar7]

Timely Fate4

Starting the Paid Service(3)

There were different reactions once the dokkaebi disappeared. Some tried to get off the train, then there were the ones who frantically tried to call the police. Yoo Sangah belonged to the latter group.

"T-the police aren't picking up! What should I do...what do I do..."

"Yoo Sangah-ssi," I said, putting Gilyoung down and taking my headphones back but keeping his line of sight away from all the gore surrounding us. "Calm down." She gave me a pitiful look, tears welling up in her eyes as she stuttered.

"Yoo Sangah-ssi," Dokja said, hands on her shoulder. "Remember the game that the development team made? Have you ever played it? A game where the entire world was destroyed and, in the end, only a few people survives."

"H-huh? W-what are you say..."

"Think about it in this way, we are in a game right now."

Yoo Sangah silently licked her lips, her trembling calming down. "Game..."

"Yes, a game. It's a game, so don't hesitate to do the things that Ha-Neul and I tell you to do, ok?"

"O-ok. What should I do, now?"

"Just stay still." He straightened his back, a sigh of relief escaping his lips before he closed his eyes and opened them back up. He looked around.

[Three Ways to Survive in a Ruined World]

The descriptions that had once existed only in a novel now unfurled themselves before his eyes.

[The dokkaebi stretched out its antenna.]

[The bodies scattered like trash in the carriage.]

[The bloodied office worker trembled.]

[An old lady groaning in her seat.]

It was like Neo in the Matrix. Observing, questioning, and then eventually accepting it. It felt odd to be able to accept such a crazy thing like this as reality, but it was our reality now.

"Come on everybody! We should all calm down. Let's all start breathing calmly." Someone stepped forward exactly five minutes after the dokkaebi had disappeared. "Are you calm yet? Everyone, please stop what you're doing and pay attention to me."

The ones that had been crying as well as those who had been frantically making calls, stopped. Once everyone's attention was gathered to him, he spoke once more. "As you know, in the event of a national disaster, small disturbances can cause large human casualties. That is why I will now take control of the current situation."

"Wait, who are you?"

"A national disaster situation? What are you saying?"

Some people belatedly recovered and strongly resisted the word 'control'. I couldn't help but roll my eyes.

"I am currently an Army lieutenant serving in the 6502 unit. I just received a message from my unit." People gathered around his phone to read the message.

I on the other hand stayed behind with the others. It was a national disaster situation, people were bound to be afraid. The things that happened next would only let their fear grow stronger,

Army Lieutenant Lee Hyunsung.

He was one of the main supporting 'characters' for 'Ways of Survival'.

[Steel Sword Lee Hyunsung]

"Soldier-nim! What is happening?"

"I have been trying to contact my unit, but.."

"Blue house! What is the Blue House doing? Please contact the president quickly!"

"I apologize. I'm just an ordinary soldier so I don't have a hotline for the Blue House."

"Then why are you taking control?"

"For the safety of the citizens."

It was at this moment that I realized the description the novel had given the man wasn't incorrect. Rather, it was extremely accurate. He was upright and attentive. He cared for his country and the people in it. He was a good man.

"The Prime Minister is making a speech! It is a level one disaster!" Everyone turned on their smartphones at the person's cry.

To my fellow citizens, unidentified terrorists are currently in an unspecified number of areas, including Seoul.

'These terrorists will have all of Seoul playing in their palms just for entertainment.' I thought, the idea suddenly startling me. I wasn't listening to the speech, rather I was looking through my bookbag.

"Ah-ha!" I muttered out, pulling Lee Gilyoung closer to me. "Here," I handed him a blue fanny pack and then took out two boxes of matches and put them inside the fanny pack. I took out a few lighters and placed them in, a small pocket knife, a spare taser, and batteries.

"I always carry extras with me. These are for you. Keep the taser at hand at all times. The knife will only be for desperate situations. Press this button to activate it. No, don't press it now! Later." I gave a small sigh as I ruffled his head. "Use these to protect yourself when I can't. The fanny pack is waterproof and so Is everything else but I put everything in a Ziploc bag in case of water somehow getting in. Make sure that the matches never get wet. I wrapped them in a layer of plastic wrap before putting them in the small Ziploc but it doesn't hurt to be careful."

I helped him strap it over a shoulder and under the other one before zipping my bag back up and picking him back up. He gave me a look before snuggling up to my neck. I looked over at Kim Dokja and Yoo Sangah to see they were looking at me with contemplative looks.

"Y-you carry that around with you...all the time?" Yoo Sangah finally got out.

I looked at them before responding. "And more." They shivered as I purposely deepened my voice. I picked up the cricket Gilyoung had dropped and put it in the box and into my bag with the others.

"But where is the President? Why is the Prime Minister making the speech?" The commotion continued. I took a chocolate granola bar and a juice box out of my pockets and handed them to Gilyoung. I loved spoiling him.

"The president has already been hit." Someone responded.

"What! Really?"

"I'm not sure. A Naver comment-"

"Naver! Then it's false!"

Of course, it wasn't.

"Uwaaaack! What?" People dropped their phones as gunshots were heard. It came from their smartphones. Chiiiiick, there was a loud sound and blood filled the screen. Everyone held their breaths as they realized what had just happened.

"P-Prime Minister." His blood filled the screen. The Prime Minister had died in real-time. His head had exploded. The next thing that appeared on the screen was a dokkaebi.

[Everyone, I already told you. This isn't a game like 'terrorism'.]

[Do you still not understand? This won't do. This isn't a game.]

It sounded so ominous though his tone was relaxed.

[According to the data, the people of this country are good at games. So why don't I try raising the difficulty?]

Beep. A huge timer appeared in the air. At the same time, it started decreasing.

[The remaining time has been decreased by ten minutes.]

[Ten minutes are remaining.]

[If the first killing doesn't occur within the next five minutes, all lives in that compartment will be wiped out.]

The words of the dokkaebi drastically changed the situation to a point that Lee Hyunsung couldn't fix it.

"T-There is a murder back there!" Someone shouted, directing everyone's attention to the bloody scene taking place in carriage 3907. The murderer's complexion was white.

[All types of access to the compartment will be restricted until the scenario is complete.]

"W-what?"

Once again. The voice of the dokkaebi rang out through we couldn't see where he was. [Haha, some places are quite fun while others have yet to start. Alright, I'll give you some special service. Let me show you what will happen if the first killing fails to occur in the next five minutes.]

A giant screen appeared out of nowhere.

A boy bit his fingernails as he muttered. "Is that the school uniform of Daepong?"

Beep, beep, beep- an ominous beeping sound was heard.

Then the high school girls began to scream.

[The given time has run out.]

[Paid settlement will now begin.]

Once the announcement ended, the head of the girls sitting in the front row exploded. One by one, again and again, the heads of the girls exploded until one girl managed to strangle the girl next to her until she slowly ran out of breath and collapsed.

In the end, she was the only one remaining.

[#Bay23515 channel. Daepong Girls' High School, Year two Class B Survivor: Lee Jihye]

The figure of the girl on the screen disappeared. Then the dokkaebi asked, how is it? Interesting?]

The dokkaebi spoke with a smile. Everyone started looking at each other nervously, others turned vicious. Slowly people started spreading out, getting farther and farther away from the others. The only ones who remained in the same area were Lee Hyunsung, Kim Dokja, Yoo Sangah, Lee Gilyoung and me.

I could see Dokja panicking. A flicker of realization passed through his eyes and I felt like smacking myself. He had gotten a PDF from the author but didn't realize that it was the entire novel. And he was still waiting for him to appear.

Yoo Jonghyuk.

My best friend for over ten years.

And the protagonist of 'Three Ways to Survive in A Ruined World.'

(1540)

#ORV #OMNISCIENT READER'S VIEWPOINT #FANFICTION #OC #ORVSPOILERS #YOO JONGHYUK #KIM DOKJA #YOO JONGHYUK X OC #KIM DOKJA X OC #SLOWBURN-ISH #MUTUAL PINING #FRIENDS TO LOVERS #KOREAN WAS GOOGLE TRANSLATED #KOREANWEBTOONBASED #KOREANLIGHTNOVELBASED

[promethes]

dumping the horrendous unconventional short story I wrote for my midterm under the cut to get it off my mind bc I do not like it.

ENTRY 1

I think I will make my life’s motif a bird. It shouldn’t be too hard. They’re everywhere and pop out at the most opportune moments. I’ll find a way to tie them in.

ENTRY 2

Stood in line for way too long at the cafe. Can you believe the girl in front of me didn’t even look up to plan her order until she was physically at the front of the line? I knew what I wanted to order before I even stepped foot into the place. They need to change that. I’m on the lookout for some kind of online suggestion box to submit to since they decided to forgo an in-house one for some God forsaken reason. There’s not a lick of common sense in anyone these days. Saw a robin on my way out and flicked it a sesame seed from my bagel.

ENTRY 3

Would you listen to this garbage? They’re planning on tearing down my favorite bowling alley. “Didn’t pass inspection” my ass. It’s an important cultural landmark of our city and I’m marching down to the mayor to set him straight. I can’t stage important life moments around the cardinal themed bowling alley if there is no bowling alley to have a cardinal theme!

ENTRY 4

Mom’s in the hospital. Driving over now, she said it has something to do with her cholesterol. It either spiked or dropped real low, but I can’t be sure. Either way, she’s in the hospital. I don’t know why she chose the one that’s so far away though. The vending machines in the other one have way better stock.

ENTRY 5

Forgot to say. I didn’t run over any birds on the way there.

ENTRY 6

I don’t think I’m spiraling yet but I’m close to it. Mom’s fine, she’s just staying overnight in case anything acts up again. I, on the other hand, am NOT. Car won’t start and I’ve been sitting here in the parking lot for almost four hours now. Embarrassed beyond belief. A weird old man with a huge shiny truck offered to help and he’s been good on his word lending me his car to jump-start mine, but his bumper stickers make me nervous. His truck has custom lettering too. I’m a big guy, so not too worried, but a little concerned. 

Anyway, it didn’t work and I’m calling a tow truck now. I tried to thank the guy and offered to buy him coffee, but he just said “No way, Jose” which was weird. He smacked the top of my car before he left and said I need to “dress this little lady up.” Maybe I’ll get a sparrow bumper sticker online. Everything’s online these days.

ENTRY 7

Starting to rethink the bird motif thing. Not much goes on in my life anyway, and there’s only so much material I can get out of waking up early to chirping. Maybe I should aim lower. I could choose a color instead. Red would be a cop-out, it’s too obvious. Blood! I need something that’s at least a little challenging. We’ll see. I’ll sleep on it.

ENTRY 8

GREAT NEWS! Sister got a BIRD. A real-life living breathing chirping flying bird. It’s a sign and I’m not going to ignore it. My life’s motif is a bird and it’s not going to be one of those unbearably hidden motifs from English class required readings either.

(Although I did like some of them. That spoon in Middlesex…… I want my bird to be his spoon. To take up space in an almost eerie way. I’ll find a way to make it work.)

ENTRY 9

Laying the groundwork. These things don’t come easy, so I’m sowing the seeds (birds do that, right?) Told everyone at work that my great great great grandfather’s name was Starling. Drilled up a lot of curious questions and I even got to know some of the people I always just miss talking to. They were all VERY interested. Tomorrow I’ll bring in a picture of an actual starling. I don’t think Andrew quite knows that it’s a kind of bird.

ENTRY 10

Don’t remember the name my sister chose and I couldn’t remember if I tried even if I squeezed my eyes shut before blinking really fast like I usually do because this bird (Polly I’m going to call it Polly because an annoying bird deserves an annoying name) is so incessantly annoyingly unbearably loud. I can’t believe this thing is my sign.

My sign is chirping me into the basement and into a frenzy. At least I have my old sleeping bag handy until I can figure out how to shut it up. Why must my motif be so unbearably annoying?

ENTRY 11

Update on the car: starter wires snapped. Haven’t seen any birds around lately (except for a crow but I hate crows and I won’t be counting them) so I was hopeful and asked the mechanic if there’s any chance a bird could’ve pecked at the wires until they got so worn down that they snapped in the hospital parking lot.

He looked at me like I was crazy. I know that was what the look meant because he said, “Are you f****ing crazy man? The wires are deep in your car under the hood.” (I’m censoring the language. I don’t want language taking away from my story. If this is to be read in a future child’s English class to teach a lesson about motifs, I can’t be including foul language.)

I’m not f***ing crazy but I am extremely ticked off. Does he not realize how little birds come out in the cold weather? I need whatever I can get.

I’ll just tell people a bird got stuck under the hood of my car. I’ll change this entry later. Mechanic man doesn’t deserve a spot in a child’s English class; he didn’t even have the decency to watch his language for them.

ENTRY 12

People at work are finally starting to catch on! Got called “bird guy” by Kathleen (Catherine? Kristy? Whatever.) when she saw my shirt. I knew it’d be a good move when I saw it on sale at Walmart. I’m thinking of making the cover of my book Hawaiian print, but I’ll tell my future publisher I’m not married to the idea. Can’t be too picky on my first book! I’ll leave that for the second.

ENTRY 13

I will enjoy my day today I will enjoy my day today I will enjoy my day. Sister needs to get control of Polly. I’ve moved down my whole mattress now. I will enjoy my day I will enjoy my day I will enjoy 

ENTRY 14

Can’t believe I overlooked eagles and hawks. Of course sparrows and starlings weren’t doing the trick! Classic oversight, focusing too much on the mundane. I won’t be making that mistake. I blame it all on that incessant chirping. Mom says it’s not too bad but I’m fairly certain that cholesterol has gotten to her ears. She must be going deaf. She’s lucky she’s ill or else I’d be very extremely sore at her for making that face at me. I know it’s a bad face because it’s the same face that f***ing mechanic made and I don’t think he’s ever made a good face in his life so if my mom made that same face then I really don’t like that. She gets a pass for the cholesterol. 

ENTRY 15

I feel amazing. Bought an eagle bumper sticker at a roadside gas station and after a few strategic snips, it’ll be ready to go on the car. I’m dressing this little lady up! The red, white, and blue has got to go first though. Decided a while ago not to let colors mess with my motif, and I’m not going to slip up on that again! Snip snip.

I’m considering this a debt paid. Dressed the little lady up. Two birds, one stone! I’m making that my new catchphrase.

ENTRY 16

Should I make this a love story? I’m thinking about making it a romance. Doves are right there, really just waiting for me to weave them in. On the other hand, I don’t think that’d work to create much of a conducive learning environment for the kids. I think I’ll stick to a Mark Twain type story instead. 

Reread the beginning and don’t think it’s working. I’ll be cutting all that out. I spoke too much about mom’s cholesterol. Too many side characters and not enough focus. Where was I going with this again? 

ENTRY 17

Writer’s block. It’s ok, I still had that major breakthrough with the hawk/eagle thought. Put in my two weeks to dedicate all my time. I’ve found a bird-watching site that I hope will bring me more peace than f***ing Polly.

ENTRY 18

These birds are really working to stay in my New York Times best-selling children’s novel. Knew this would be a challenge, but they really do never stop conversing. If only they could read, I’d write them a best-selling manual on the best ways to speak inwards rather than outwards. Chirp chirp chirp needs to turn into ______ ________ ________.

ENTRY 19

Sister’s going to be f***ing pissed but it was the only thing to do.

ENTRY 20

Honestly, it was just a bird! If it was really part of our family, you’d think that I’d know its name by now.

ENTRY 21

I said that Polly’s in a better place now, but set her off with the “Polly”. Maybe this was a mistake. She said I “begged” her to get the bird but she shouldn’t say that when she’s the one reacting like this.

ENTRY 22

Books should come with suggestion boxes. No more birds. Story’s six feet under just like Gladys. See, I can finally remember it now that I can hear myself think. 

#eugh #og #emptying notes #essays

[girlofmanyfandoms]

Advocates

A/n: So, I feel bad for not posting lately, here’s my AU where I take a slightly different take on the Keeper of the Lost Cities series. A few changes that I’m trying to make: more friendship-based, no love triangle, probably more gay, more racially diverse cast (without any harmful stereotypes). I’ll try to stay true to each character’s personality!

I’ll also take this time to say there’s stuff I haven’t released yet, so tell me if you want me to release those!

Disclaimer: This is in no way hating on Shannon’s series, I just wanna see where the story would go if we took a slightly different approach!

Warnings: I didn’t edit this at all-

Word count: 2868

Tag list:  @everyonehasthoughts @imaramennoodle @bookwyrminspiration @holesinmyfalseconfidence @percabetn @an-absolute-travesty @linhammon-roll-bromance101 @linhamon-roll @holesinmyfalseconfidence @linhamon2 @a-lonely-tatertot @loverofallthingssmart

Let me know if you want to be added or if I forgot to tag you!

“Uh, no boys, she’s sitting with me.”

Jensi raised an eyebrow. “What’s wrong with her sitting here, Marella?”

“Nothing! I just need to pull her to the side for some girl talk.” Marella pulled Sophie’s sleeve, navigating across the cafeteria to an empty booth in the corner. Sitting down and adjusting herself, she extended a hand. “Marella Redek. No nicknames. I know the ins and outs of everything around here.”

“Sophie Foster,” Sophie introduced, shaking her hand, though her response came out as a murmur. She brushed her hair out of her face, trying to shrink as small as possible. “But I’m sure you knew that.”

Marella nodded. “You must’ve caused the Council a lot of trouble if you’ve gotten your way into Level Two right after being with humans. What was it like, by the way?”

“Pretty normal, I guess. Well, not for me, I was a highschool senior at 12, and my parents wanted me to attend community college instead of an Ivy League. Even the newspapers were talking about it, and that ticked my parents off big time.”

“What?”

“I know, crazy, right?” Sophie started digging into her lunch. “Why would the news choose a story about a child over actual breaking news?”

“No, I meant those words you used. A high school, college, a new paper? What do they mean?”

“Oh, that’s right! Those are more human terms, sorry,” Sophie apologized. “There are levels of human school: Preschool, which is usually ages 1 to 4, elementary school is from ages 5 to 10, middle school is ages 11 to 13, high school is ages 14 to 17, and college is at least four years, and gives you the certification you need to get a good paying job. Newspapers are just mini books made completely of paper that tell you what’s going on in the world.”

“Oh,” Marella said, looking off into the distance. “I guess I never really thought that human school would be so different from Foxfire. We just have these levels, and then the elite levels. What was your human family like?”

Sophie tugged out an eyelash, which didn’t go unnoticed on Marella’s end. “U-um-“

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t be pushing you so much on your first day. I should be helping you adjust.” She toyed with her food. “So, how’s our world been for you so far?”

“A little overwhelming,” Sophie admitted. “I don’t feel half as glamorous as anything around me. We don’t exactly have crystal houses and fancy ball gowns in San Diego.”

“You don’t?” Marella shook her head vigorously. “Right. Sorry. Let’s get back on track. Anything you think you’ll need to know that I can help you with?”

Sophie clutched her knees, now rolled up into a ball. This Marella girl was a bit intense at first, but maybe she wasn’t so bad. After all, she had saved her from sitting with some yes-boys. The declared leader of them seemed friendly, but a little too hyper. No, she decided, Marella wasn’t half bad. “I don’t know. Anything really, you know best.”

“Alright, then. This place is sort of a maze, try to find someone with a similar schedule to you so you can walk together until you know your way around. You know Stina Heks?”

Sophie shivered and nodded, thinking back to seeing her raging through the halls screaming about someone making her bald. She could’ve sworn she heard her say “Disney,” too.

“Stay away from her. Stereotypical bully, not afraid of fighting dirty. The Vackers, Keefe Sencen, and their little bubble are all the buzz. They’re pretty nice, and Sencen’s a bit of a flirt, but if you don’t like attention, maybe steer clear from them.”

Sophie let out a bitter laugh. “Easier said than done. The Vackers are the ones who found me. Fitz brought me here, Alden sent him out to find me, and Della helped me get ready for Foxfire.” Sophie paused to pull out another eyelash. “I don’t think Biana likes me much.

Marella’s eyes widened in shock as she leaned back and blew out a breath.

“Is that bad?” Sophie was panicking a bit now. What had she screwed up now?

“Well, it’s not good for your social status, that’s for sure.” Marella started slicing her food, which resembled Jello. “If you’re on her bad side, you’ll want to stay away from Maruca, too. They’re best friends.”

“Great,” Sophie sighed. One day in and she already had a long list of people to avoid. “Anything else I should know about?”

“Oh, yeah, but I’ll stick to school stuff. Your most difficult subjects are gonna be Elementalism and Alchemy.”

“I can help with that,” a boy called, sliding next to Sophie in the booth and placing his tray down. “Dex Dizznee, by the way.”

“Sophie Foster.” She grinned a bit. Edaline had gone without her to the apothecary and mentioned the “Disneys.” This must’ve been who Stina was shouting at. “I saw what you did to Stina earlier. Wicked move.”

“Finally, someone understands the genius! She deserved it, too, after what a pain she was last year. That’s where the alchemy comes in handy.”

Marella rolled her eyes, and Dex leaned back casually. “Don’t act like you don’t think she deserved it Marella. You know she did.”

“Ok, it was kind of satisfying seeing her run around like that-“

“Yes!”

“-but don’t take it as a sign that I’ll join in. I have a reputation to protect.”

Dex snorted. “Yeah, as the gossip girl.”

“I don’t gossip, I have connections,” she corrected.

“Whatever you say madam,” Dex relented jokingly. “What about you, Soph? Got anything you could build a reputation for?”

“Not really,” she expressed. “I don’t want the spotlight. I just want to make it by here.”

Marella took a bite of her lunch and scoffed. “Good luck with that.”

“Tell you what, my next class is Multispecesial Studies, I can walk you to Alchemy,” Dex offered.

“Really? That would be great, thank you!”

“No problem. It’s hard making it by for people like us.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Marella chugged down her lushberry juice.

“We’re different, special.”

“So, outcasts?” Sophie rested her head in her hand and stirred her drink nonchalantly, taking in the view of the cafeteria. It was remarkably pristine and clean, its white walls with blue accents not showing a hint of grime. With the barstools at tables all around the center and the booths to the side, it looked like every diner’s dream.

“No, not outcasts. Think more sideline supporters.”

“So, advocates,” Sophie helped. “I don’t really see that, but maybe one day. Right now I just want to pass.”

“Well you can’t do that on an empty stomach,” Marella chided playfully. “Eat up. Lady Galvin is a stickler for accuracy.”

————

Fantastic. Sophie had only been there one day and she had already ruined her Alchemy teacher’s favorite cloak. Marella was right, Alchemy was tough. She’d have to take Dex up on his offer. She wandered through the halls, trying to find the way to her next class, P.E. She strolled like this for a few more minutes before a snobby voice called to her from down the hall.

“Lost, new kid?”

Sophie winced. Great. The number one person on her People To Avoid list had already found a way into her world. She attempted to speed walk, but the clacking of leveled boots followed quickly, and she was spun around with a harsh push.

Stina laughed, and for a 12 year old elven child, it sounded quite maniacal. “Why so frightened? I don’t bite. Much.”

Somehow Sophie sincerely doubted that. There had to be some fangs behind that evil smirk. But maybe she could play it cool with this demon in disguise.

“I’m not frightened, just lost. Do you think you could point me to P.E.? I don’t want to be late on my first day.” Sophie held her breath, hoping she came off as casual.

“My pleasure,” Stina grinned a sickeningly sweet smile. “In fact, I’ll walk you there. Wouldn’t want our newest prodigy to miss class because of some weak instructions, now would we?”

“No, of course not.”

Stina linked their arms, acting as if they were old pals going on a walk in the park to catch up. It was silent except for the shuffling of their shoes, so Sophie made sure she was hyper aware of her surroundings, trying to memorize the numbers on each locker and how they connected to the twisting, winding paths of the school.

At this point, she was sure Stina planned to do something crazy to her, like stuff her in a locker or hide her body, so she had to think fast. Luckily, this was her specialty.

“Oh my goodness, I’m so sorry,” Sophie began, stopping abruptly. Stina stumbled a bit, but regained her composure in seconds. “I forgot something at my locker! Oh, I’m so sorry, but Edaline told me I’d need what was in my locker. You go ahead, I shouldn’t keep you from your class! Don’t worry, I’ll find my way to Phys Ed.”

Sophie speed walked away, leaving Stina in the dust. Once she rounded the corner, she took off, speeding through corridors and halls until she ran out of breath. Giving up, she rested her head against the wall, trying to clear her head when she was forced to her feet and slammed into a locker. There was a click, and through the slits, Sophie could see Stina’s eyes crinkled in smugness and satisfaction. Yet through all of this, the only thing Sophie was thinking of was, That was pretty lame on a scale of bullying-ness.

“Good luck getting out of there, Foster,” she remarked. “Now, you get comfortable, I have some business to attend to.”

“Gonna go sharpen your claws?” Sophie snapped.

“No, newbie, I’m going to put the princess of Everglen in her place. Don’t worry, I’ll keep you updated!”

And with that, Stina clacked away, her footsteps receding and the silence finding its way to creep back in.

________

Sophie had no way of telling time. This she had learned when she realized she had in fact left something in her locker: her Imparter and the Ruewen crest. She let out an audible groan of frustration, and tried to occupy herself with her temporary home. There were books about unicorn breeding on the shelf above her, to which Sophie wrinkled her nose. Next, there was a box of animal pins, glittering and shiny, and she was very tempted to stuff a few in her pocket, but she restrained herself. She took to examining the pictures on the door with what little light she had and realized, to her disdain, that this was Stina’s locker.

Sophie shivered in disgust and tried patting herself out and getting the Stina vibes off of her.

“Well, if I’m going to be stuck here, I might as well take advantage of it,” she decided. Sophie put all of her energy into memorizing the photo album beside her, and wound up with some lovely photos of baby Stina, along with some other cherished memories. She was scanning through Stina’s diary and chuckling to herself at her inevitable revenge when yelling came from around the corner. Sophie dropped the journal and shuffled forward a bit, peering through the slits. This could be her saving.

“MESS WITH BIANA ONE MORE TIME-” Maruca had her pinned to the wall and looked ready to murder her, but Stina remained unfazed.

“Relax, duchess, you might be the heir soon,” Stina responded coolly.

That was the breaking point. Maruca opened her locker, which was, unfortunately, next to the one Sophie was trapped in, and slammed it shut.

“Maruca!” Sophie yelled, but Stina rattled in her locker, and shouted curses over her, both to insult Maruca and to put an end to Sophie’s escape plan.

Maruca was quick to exit, and soon enough it was just Stina and Sophie, trapped in their lockers, trying to determine the other person’s next move.

“Do you happen to know how to break down locker doors?” Stina commented dryly.

“Would I still be here if I did?”

“Fair.”

“You got a hairpin?” Sophie asked. “Or some thin piece of metal you can slide in between the crack of our lockers? I might be able to break out of mine by picking the lock.”

“And what about me? Gonna leave me here to rot while you run free?” She harrumphed. “I don’t think so. If I’m suffering you suffer with me.”

“I’ll get you out too, just answer the question and slide the metal through the crack.”

Stina huffed, but Sophie heard the sound of metal on metal scratch as something hit her foot. “My family crest. Do not scratch it.”

“You got it.” Sophie used her fingernails to get a little bit of extra room before sliding the crest through the door. She maneuvered it a bit, and the door let out a click as it swung open. Sophie fell forward face first, but sat up and whooped in victory.

Stina cleared her throat. “I’m still here.”

“Oh, I know,” Sophie poked smugly. “But if I’m going to break you outta there, you’re going to owe me a favor.”

“I do NOT-“

“Fine, then stay there. And spend all day, heck, maybe even until tomorrow, stuck in that cramped locker with no food or water whatsoever.” Sophie began to stroll away slowly, biding for time just in case Stina changed her mind about the offer.

“Fine,” she grumbled. “Just get me out.”

Sophie cheered to herself silently and crouched down in front of the locker and got to work. Stina was peering through the slits in the locker, and for a moment they felt each other’s breath on their faces and they met eyes before glaring at each other and backing up a bit. The door swung open, and Stina came crashing down onto Sophie.

Stina pushed herself off of her quickly, seeming very flustered. She reached out a hand to Sophie, which she took. Stina shook Sophie’s hand off of hers.

“I need my family crest,” she said, looking off to the side uncomfortably.

“Oh,” Sophie frowned, unsure why she felt a little disappointed. Probably because my back hurts and I was just refused the little she could have given as thanks, she thought. “Right. Take it.”

Stina’s fingers brushed against Sophie’s as she took it back and pinned it onto her cloak once more. “Well.” Stina lifted her nose upon in the air, regaining her haughty facade. “Until we meet again, Foster.”

“Yeah, Sophie nodded, getting back to her feet. Once Stina was out of earshot, she muttered, “Hopefully that’s never.”

Sophie dusted herself off, finally registering her circumstances. She was late for class, and she looked disheveled. Stina had just walked off, leaving her lost, confused, and just waiting for a punishment of her lifetime. Sighing, she walked along the edges of a pyramid.

“Ms. Foster,” a cold voice crowed from behind her.

Sophie recognized that voice. Dame Alina. “Yes, ma’am?”

“Is there a particular reason that you’re not in class right now?”

“Uh-“

“Incoming!” a boy screamed from the top of his lungs, a bunch of verminions on his tail. Alina shrieked and ran into a neighboring hall for shelter. Sophie took this as an opportunity to find her way out of this maze and escape Alina’s grasp. She followed the boy until they reached the Healing Center, where he hid until the verminions passed by. Sophie stopped. She could go in and ask whatever medic was present for directions, but the thought of going anywhere near a doctor made her sick to the stomach.

“Can I help you, new girl?”

Sophie jumped. The boy she had been following was right in front of her, and she instinctively slunk back.

“Chill, I won’t hurt you. The name’s Keefe, but you can call me-“

“Sorry Keefe, but I’m really late for class, do you know where P.E. Is?”

He furrowed his eyebrows and massaged his neck, looking a bit hurt. “Uh, yeah, take a left after the next three halls.”

“Thank you!” Sophie bolted to class and arrived there out of breath.

“Sophie! Just in time for us to start splotching,” Dex waved her over. “It’s easy, you just use your telekinesis to move this marble into the other person. If you succeed, it bursts and you get a paint splotch on you.”

“Great,” she muttered. “You won’t believe what I’ve just gone through.”

“Tell me at the end of class. We’re gonna need all of our focus for this.”

“Alright,” she sighed. She couldn’t be upset, seeing Dex that excited lifted her mood just a bit. And that was just the boost she needed.

________

This was it. It was down to her and Fitz for the Splotching Champion title. Sophie gathered her concentration. She could not mess this up.

The splotcher was thrown in between them, and Sophie gave it her all. The marble exploded with a loud boom, and they were both thrown into opposite sides of the room. Sophie saw nothing but the green paint, and then darkness.

#hopefully you liked it 🥺 #it was really fun to write so I’ll continue if you want it #lemme know #kotlc #keeper of the lost cities #kotlc fanfic #sophie foster #dex dizznee #marella redek #jensi babblos #stina heks #maruca endal

[the19thduckpotato]

In the Shadow of a Smile (Pt 3)

Part 2

Izuku grinned. “Woah, that’s a lot of places! You sure we have time for all of ‘em?”

POOMPF!!

"ALL MIGHT ALWAYS HAS PLENTY OF TIME!"  He roared enthusiastic laughter then coughed and disappeared in a cloud of steam.  Toshinori waved the cloud away and rubbed the back of his head, still snickering. "'Cause, you know...retirement...and stuff."  Spoken as casual as possible.

Izuku nodded, responding just as casually. “Ah, fair point, yeah.” He leaned his head against Toshi’s arm. “Don’tcha get tired after a whole day out, though? I do. N I know I don’t... really... have an excuse, but....” He scrubbed at the back on his head with a sheepish grin. “I do, anyway.”

"No excuse?  I disagree!  You're training to be a hero AND training at UA, which is daunting enough as it is.  On top of that--"  Toshi made a show of glancing about, making sure they wouldn't be overheard.  "--One for All.  Especially with all this new stuff, the vestiges, the Quirks."  He ruffled Izuku's hair.  "And don't forget, you're still a growing teenager.  That's the height of your body going through a bunch of stuff that's going to leave you exhausted." He stopped and looked to Izuku as if only just now considering this.  "Promise me you'll let me know when you have had your fill, ok?"

Izuku bit his lip, still feeling a little weird about... quitting when tired?? if he wasn’t sick or injured?? isn’t that for wimps?? but... “Okay.” Maybe if I see you getting tired, I can ask to go too... or even if I don’t, I don’t have to feel bad about saying I wanna go because I know you push yourself n you hide it n—

Mentor sideglanced student then let his gaze drift to the river.  "There's nothing wrong with taking care of yourself.  Remember that." Uh huh.

“W— e-ell... is it REALLY necessary, though... like, I do want to quit far more often than I should. At a lot of things. I can’t just stop every time I feel like it! ...Right?”

"My experience with ya?  You never quit when it really matters." "He takes after you, Toshinori.  ...that's not a compliment." "You're consistently fighting, working harder, pushing farther, to show you're as worthy as anyone else to be where you are.  I trust your judgment.  Don't run yourself into the ground and don't slack on improving One for All when you can.  We can't have an exhausted Symbol of Peace now, can we?" He grinned companionably as he-- i'm tired of being tired --heard the thought flit through.  He mentally batted it away and made for the popcorn shop.

“But... doesn’t everything matter?” Izuku tilted his head.

Toshi chuckled fondly.  "Easy, don't overthink it.  You remember what I asked you, way back when?  When you saved your friend Bakugo from that sludge monster.  I asked what prompted you and you said your body just moved without thinking.  And those are the times that, if I'm forced to say so, are the ones that matter most.  So your body needs to be in its best form as much as possible.  So that means resting when you need to and--" Toshi made an embarrassed noise and dropped his raised arm.  "Oop, I'm lecturing again." Like you think you have any idea what you're talking about. A very faint protest noise and his fingers curled in.  But the nails didn't dig in.  Not this time.

“No no, I like it!” Izuku nodded up at his mentor reassuringly, then sank into overthought, knuckle coming up to his lips. But... what if I’m overthinking in an important moment and don’t move?? There are DEFINITELY things that are important that I’ve messed up— and— ...and I’m overthinking NOW... but does that mean this moment isn’t important?? That CAN’T be, it is, I know, I’m here! I can see it! He looked around as they entered the door of the popcorn shop, distracted by all the new sights and sounds and SMELLS, OH WOW, THE SMELLS— It made Izuku a tiny bit dizzy with the sudden intensity of it.

Toshinori waved cheerfully at the greeting calls of "oh hello, Mr. Yagi!" A plump lady with her hair wrapped up beamed and bobbed welcome.  "Just in time for the fresh batch--and who is this?" Toshi grinned.  "This is Izuku, my student.  Izuku, this is Madame Popol.  I've been talking up your skills all afternoon so you might want to break out your best flavors." Madame Popol looked delighted at that and bustled off to do just so.  Toshi took a seat at the nearby bench and breathed deep.  How he missed the scents that mingled here!

After flashing a grin and small wave at Madame Popol, Izuku took a seat beside his dad, smiling up at him fondly. He looks so happy...♡

Madame Popol soon returned with a circular wooden tray carved with multiple notches.  In each notch sat a handful of popcorn, each a different shade of color.  The plump lady began to describe the flavors and Toshi made his mind wander. remember when you used to get bags full of popcorn all the time?  And Torino would bark disappoint at your snacking habits while Master would just roar laughter and steal a few kernels? "...now this one is strawberry, over here is smokey chipotle, and this one is classic white cheddar." Toshi's mouth watered a bit and he glanced about at the brightly colored bags, tied with equally bright ribbons. Then, unbidden, a sudden urge to rise up and plunge his hands into the barrels and bags of popcorn.  Sink in, elbow deep, and start wildly stuffing his face. that would be incredibly stupid. I know You'd land yourself in the hospital with a stunt like that. I know. And so Toshi busied himself with watching Izuku's reactions to the many flavors presented him.

Izuku’s eyes were wide as he listened, not remembering all of the flavors in the list but making a beeline for the strawberry, picking up a kernel and popping it in his mouth. “Mm!” His eyes somehow got wider. “That’s really good!”

Madame Popol winked.  "Excellent!  Sweet taste for an equally sweet boy.  Don't you worry now, Mr. Yagi, I got some of yours all prepped and ready to go." Toshi began to pull his wallet out and Madame Popol cheerfully swatted his hand. "Poppi!" "You just let me borrow this one's tastebuds for a few more flavors and we'll call it even.  ...how about cookies and cream, Izuku?  Or pickle?  Bet you never heard of that before!"

Half of Izuku’s face scrunched, though he kept smiling amusedly. “Bet I have!”

"But have you actually tried it?"

“Wwwwwwell....”

Madam Popol held out the tray. Toshi leaned back on the bench and smiled, closing his eyes and breathing deep again. just one handful surely it wouldn't be that bad A really small handful, even

Izuku took a piece.... His whole face scrunched up.

Toshi was finding the temptation getting a bit too strong and turned to Izuku to stammer out some sort of excuse-- --saw the kid's face-- "What on earth?!" --and gave in to a helpless bout of laughter. Madame Popol beamed at both of their reactions, still keeping a knowing eye on her lanky regular.  "Isn't that marvelous?" she chirped.

"I'm... not sure it's... my cup of tea." Izuku shook his head, a tiny bit of blush on his cheeks, but being honest. Really don't like pickles....

"It isn't for everyone," Madane Popol agreed, not even slightly put out.  "Now then.  As you can see, we're pretty talented here.  So I need to ask--what is one flavor you'd never expect to taste on popcorn?  And not anything too weird or wild.  I'm asking from a curious business owner standpoint."

Izuku thought for a bit. "....Well I wouldn't want to eat it, but... horseradish?"

Madame Popol nodded thoughtfully.  "And what about something you would eat?  Something like--" With a sudden expert motion that surprised even Toshi, she snatched a small bag from behind the counter and tossed it to the tall blond. "Mr. Yagi," she scolded fondly but firmly, "My dear, have a munch on that and please cheer up.  And you--"  she said, pointing at Izuku.  "--flavor?" Toshi looked sheepish as Madame Popol dropped a large cloth bag in his lap and began filling it with assorted flavors of popcorn. "How many kids in your class again, hun?  I'm sure our lovely Mr. Yagi will make sure these all get to them, won't he?"

"Uuuuhhh...." Izuku thought more. "Really, I just like the cheddar stuff, mostly." He popped one in his mouth, smiling at the flavor. "Strawberry is good, but I could eat these about forever." Am I being too familiar? This is oddly easy. If the words are coming this easy, are they really good? Or am I just not paying enough attention.... He looked around at Toshi and Madame Popol. They do seem unoffended though... maybe it's good, maybe I'm just being funny... yes, play the clown, I can do that... be sure not to try too hard, though, no one likes that-- stOP OVER TH I NK I N G

Toshi froze as the cloth bag filled up.  Was I that easy to read?  Crap.  I need to get better about that.  To stop making it so visible. He glanced at Izuku--my anchor--and grinned.  "You heard him, Madame Popol, biggest bag of cheddar you got." She pretended to look offended.  "I dont think you realize just how big the biggest bag I have is.  I daresay you'd need to bring your big self out to haul it away."  She flexed one arm and giggled. Toshi gave a gentle smile at that.  "Sounds like a challenge," he returned, a little less enthusiastic than he had meant to sound.

Izuku covered his face and squeaked happily at that. "I didn't mean FOREVER forever!" Oh noooooo, that's too much! I can't let him buy that for me... but I can't STOP him! He grinned widely, though not missing Toshi's tone of voice. He didn't quite know what to make of it, though, so he filed the fact away while keeping it in reach.

Madame Popol wedged one last portion of popcorn (bacon jalapeno) into the cloth bag and tutted at Toshi's protests.  "Now now, I dont expect you boys to carry any of these around all day.  You look like you have other places you want to visit.  I'll just have these sent to your office, Mr. Yagi, darlin." Toshi shifted for his wallet again and she cheerfully hmphed.  "This man," she sighed in frustrated adoration, "he doesn't even eat yet like I ask and yet still tries to pay before services rendered." "Poppi--" "Shoo with you now!  Out of my shop, no, out, I'll send you the bill later.  Izuku please, one moment."  She beckoned to the boy while still shooing Toshi out.

"--?" Izuku looked between Madame Popol and the currently-leaving Toshi nervously. He could feel his muscles tensing at the idea of staying behind alone, but... his gaze settled on her.

She produced a pocket sized bag of strawberry popcorn and pressed it into his hands.  "Whatever you're doing, keep it up.  This may sound odd but...you're very good for him."  She sighed softly and gazed about her shop.  "Would that I could show him my appreciation for all that he's done with more than just popcorn but that's what the heavens saw fit.  So that will be as I keep doing.  But you--" Her eyes twinkled knowingly.  "--you've been blessed with the ability to bring his smile out."  She looked like she wanted to say more, then shook her head and waddled back to the counter.  "Come back anytime, lovey.  There will always be a bag of your favorite waiting here for you."

Izuku gazed up at her as she spoke, completely understanding what it feels like to want to support someone you're grateful to but... not being able to. He smiled down at the bag of strawberry popcorn in his hands, glad he had met this Very Warm Person. "Thank you," he said softly.

She gently tweaked one of his freckled cheeks.  "No no," she replied.  "thank you."   Then, returning to form, she cheerfully flapped her apron at him.  "Get on, now!  That man has long legs and could be halfway to Kyoto by now.  Go catch up!"

He squeaked and ducked at the tweak, and hurried obediently after Toshi out the door.

((part 4))

#bnha #mha #boku no hero academia #my hero academia #izuku #midoriya #deku #broccoli son #sunflower dad #all might #dadmight #toshinori #co-op rp #mander writes! #ducky writes! #in the shadow of a smile #itsoas part 3

[karma-jinx]

ML New York Special Babbles *Spoilers*

Ok so! Coming outta me hiding hole to bring you this ramblings. These are just my thoughts after seeing the new episode. This ones a LONG one.

I’m told that this particular episode takes place between seasons 3 and 4. A sort of bridge episode maybe idk. I mention this because there are some things it connects to in the past and introduces some new stuff. (In regards of what’s going on in Paris.)

The ep starts with LB and CN yet AGAIN fighting Mr Pigeon. Apparently for the 51st time. He wants to take the Eiffel Tower to space with his piegons???? Idk just an excuse for the hero’s to use their new power ups. Which tbh is kinda lame because we don’t even see them in the new forms for very long.

The light hearted banter between LB and CN about the rose was kinda nice. I say this because it seems like CN is maybe FINALLY going to give her space and not try to woo her every moment. Tbh I can’t recall if he actually did flirt with her in that scene. So that’s cool. (Boy did stroke his own ego by kissing his muscles.)

Marinette really out her denying she still simps over Adrien. (She does it through out the entire episode and no one believes her claim that she’s over him and that they’re “friends”)

Also uh.... so Miss Bustier is preggers???? Interesting cuz I thought she was single since we’ve never heard of any sort of partner she may or may not have. Also its Miss, not Mrs so I don’t think she’s married? But idk she can’t go to the trip so Ms Mendeleiev goes in her place.

And can I just say how hurt she looked when the students complained that she’s lame and wouldn’t be as fun as Ms B. Yeah Ms. M is strict and all but she’s fair across the board. Unlike Ms B. (If you don’t know what I’m talking about just look up Ms B salt.)

Random but why was Chloe SO Adamant in not wanting to go to New York? I mean didn’t she want to go to New York with her mom? Was it cuz it was a class trip instead?

Lila was there too but fuq her honestly. Lila was only there to push Marinette to claim they gotta convince model boy’s das to let him go to New York with them.

Why’d the WHOLE class go to Adrien’s house if Marinette was the only one let inside? Sure it could be argued that either the dad only allowed her in. Or her classmates pushed her to do it alone since it was her idea. Either way seemed unnecessary for them all to be there. That’s just my opinion.

Side note as this was happening Adrien and Kagami had another fencing match. (One she won becuz boi was having sad times)

But she him!!!! And such an odd scene too becuz it LOOKS like she MAY have kissed him on the lips. But I don’t think she actually did. I say this because Adrien showed no reaction to it until she pulled away. He was still sadly looking at the ground until she was leaving. So???? I still don’t think they’re a couple. Yet????

My girl Marinette being a responsible hero trusting CN to look over the city in her absence gives him a flipping kitty alarm. I want that!

Random comment but ofc marinette would miss the bus that’s taking her to the airport because why WOULDNT she right?

Luckily friend Luka was there to haul ass to catch up on it on his bike right? (Is he a wimp or not? Like???? Yeah we know he likes her but he also treats her like a friend. So idk of this scene is him kinda simping or him being a good friend.)

That plane scene huh? I feel like some ppl are gonna be mad about what happened. As the trailer shows Marinette and Adrien are seated next to each other. When boarding the place Adrien is actually happy, maybe even excited to see Marinette.

He runs down the aisle to help her with her things and find her seat. He even tries to help her work the ac over head. All in all he’s just happy to be near her. And everyone might’ve thought FINALLY some progress right? Only to see her beg for help because she couldn’t do it. She couldn’t spend HOURS seated by the boy she likes.

Why? Because at the end of season 3 we’re told that she chooses to bow out in the race for his affections because she thinks he and Kagami like each other. She couldn’t handle a few seconds by him so she knew she wouldn’t be able to handle hours seated by a guy she still very much likes but chooses she can’t have. As frustrating as it is I can at least see WHY she acted the way she did.

Alya and Nino being 100000% over these to but still trying to help them out. The patience they have for their idiot friends.

Everyone on the plane as it’s being attacked: scared and full surprised.

Alya: *nerds out about the super heroes helping*

She still hasn’t changed huh?

Why’s Majestia’s daughter and Android? I really wanna know the story there. Idk how to spell her name so I’ll be calling her by her hero name. Uncanny Valley, which I also want to know why is that her name. As well as the full extent of her powers.

Yay for Sabrina having fun away from Chloe for once.

Why are there SO many heroes in New York anyways? And some are random af. A guys who’s ability is that he can open a door to where ever he wants to go.

A hotdog hero with ketchup and mustard theme sidekicks? (Maybe)

Dude makes hotdogs filled with random temp abilities. Which explains wtf I saw a clip of Adrien and Marinette dancing in the air.

Sooooooo..... does everyone just think of convoluted schemes? Or meddle in things just willy nilly? Anyways Uncanny Valley and Jess’s scheme to “help” Adrien and Marinette confess sure was top tier wild idea. Alya and Nino just WENT WITH IT! They’re just like, “kay sure why not?” Sure ok!

Ladybug and Chat Noir are an efficient crime fighting duo. And Paris’ sworn protectors!

Can’t function for shit as civilians.

LB has sole custody of their brain cells. What happens to it when they change back is a mystery to me.

CN is an idiot for never telling LB that he was leaving Paris. Til it was too late and problems were happening in Paris. Caused by Mayura. Rip Natalie who seems bed ridden? But also if the miraculous is fixed is she still going to suffer the affects from when it was broken? Or is she healing from that?

Anyways a messy fight ensues. CN hurt he broke his Lady’s trust and almost killed Uncanny Valley. If LB weren’t there to fix things who knows what would’ve happened?

Still, he gives up his ring and is forced to leave since his father blames Marinette for convincing him to allow Adrien to go to New York. SCREW YOU GABRIEL BITCH NEEDS TO GET DUNKED ON IS ALL IMA SAY.

(That was a NASTY skid Marinette did. Like OUCH)

Why did Majestia’s skin tone go fucking white in her civilian form???? Her and her gf/wife’s skin tone was just, weird?

On topic of random/weird why did Jess HAVE to pretend she was a boy hero?

The explanation they gave was rushed and weak imo.

The eagles miraculous confuses me tbh. Even after seeing how it worked I’m perplexed by it. But seeing as it takes place in ‘Muerica land of the Free with an eagle Kwami its “on brand”. Sure.

HM really out here really to destroy the world without a second thought huh? Guess I shouldn’t be surprised.

Shouldn’t also be surprised that LB and CN saved the day with their new friends either. The ending was pretty rushed tbh.

LB and CN are thanked/praised for helping. Paris understand why they were absent now.

Jess gets to keep the miraculous and *le gasp* there’s another protector of the miraculous.

Alls well that ends well right?

In all honesty the special was kinda like any other episode. It did bring new lore like the heroes of New York. NONE of them seemed to be miraculous based type of heroes. So I makes me wonder the extent of unnatural aspects that have or could happen to make someone have super abilities. Or am I to assume that it’s like marvel/dc or any other super hero like comic book story. Because it that’s the case then that opens a whole can of worms I can’t get into rn.

There’s also the other guardian of the miraculous. How many more are there? Do they keep in touch? If so why’d Master Fu make Marinette the new guardian???? Just.. jakakandjfns

Why claim its SOOOO important to hide their identities then show how New York Heroes don’t seem to really give af about secret identities?

Might’ve missed some things but this is long af as it is.

#my thoughts #miraculous ladybug #ml spoilers #ml new york #ml special

[hypnodesires]

What if I hadn't waited?...

I often look back on my life, on all the crazy things I have done in the past that I know for a fact, I could never do at my age now (I'm making myself sound like I'm 80 but trust me I'm way younger than that)….  For me at least being a first-time mom took a lot out of my body and mind (along with the damn drama going on in my family is not helping), so I can't see myself getting it on in the back of a movie theater or a quickly while the family is in the next room or out in a park…. Fuuuuuck that shit, I have had my fun but in all that time I never told anyone about hypnosis or my love for it….. I can't even imagine what someone would have done to me if I had shared it with the wrong person… (keep in mind I lost my Vcard at age 14 freshmen year) and that guy played me for a fool… of course I fell into it, I didn't feel loved in my own home. Everything and anything that happen was always blamed on me… and all the house duty fell onto me as well, while my younger sister was clearly the favorite and got away with it all. I made lots of bad choices just because I wanted to be love, Not to mention the body-shaming my mom put me through that still effects me and my sister to this day….. being told no one would love me being as big that I was (keep in mind I was 150 compared to what I am now 223 lb or my biggest that I ever was 265 lb) but After falling for that fuckface with a small ass dick who played me, I knew then that I couldn't let it happen again.

I don't know what others would do if they went through what I did, the rest of my relationships following that event had to wait more than 6 months to get any action from me….. And for a teen girl or boy that shit was hard lol (I was a good ass tease though wink*). I wanted to know that the next person was into me as a person and not just wanting sex, I kept my true kinks to myself and if asked I would say "3sum, roleplay, etc" even in roleplay I would never bring up hypnosis, none of the men I was with ever mention it…… but if they had ooooo I was going to have a good time, I mean it was role play, why waste it right, not like they would know. After I dated fuckface, I dated a metalhead for 2 weeks… he left me only to date another girl the next day….. my only guess is that she was willing to put out the same day, in a way it just reinforced my mindset on making men wait (trust me, ladies, the payoff is glorious) but I know not everyone has the same will power but I have my weaken too, I am only human after all haha. I was single for a short time after that metalhead, where I soon became the target of a dirty (I mean never took showers) white guy, An old friend of mine told me he never took showers until he started to ask me out over and over. In high school, I would get there an hour before classes just so I could eat with my friends before school and one day he showed up along with some other guy who I thought was much cuter but was gay sadly, we'll call the gross guy Jim. I don't know what he saw in me that he just could not leave me alone, I had turned him down twice but I'm guessing he got some of my friends to get me to give him a chance….. How I wish I hadn't, this guy was so pushy about wanting to do stuff and my no's fell on deaf ears. Asking people to help him but my good friends stayed out of it (you could warn a bitch damn lol) inner thoughts, I was approached by two teachers at different times while I was with him. I was told by one that Jim would throw fits like a toddler in class and scream if things didn't go his way, they just wanted to make sure I was ok and he wasn't doing anything to me (not at that time) but after the second teacher confronted me about him, I was already seeing some signs….. he wanted to follow me into the girl locker room until a teacher kicked him out, he would run to my last class of the day just so he could walk home even though we lived in a different direction, the thing that creeped me out was when he called me while I was out at the movies with my friend but I never told him what movie I was in and 20 min into the movie I hear the theater door open all hard and when I turned there he was looking around to find me….. and he did. I found myself wanted to get away from him but I still stayed up until he moved away….. Well, even then I still stayed… I'm not proud of it but I was young and dumb plain and simple, I know that if I would have left him while he was still in the same city I would have ended up on the ID channel (google it if you don't know ). I can't even imagine what he would have tried to implant into my mind had I ever told him…. I shudder to think. I was in my senior year of high school and still with Jim, he would text me all day and once home I would hope on yahoo massager and we would talk the rest of the day…. But I met my main man that year in my second semester, we became friends through a mutual friend of ours, he knew I was with Jim but told my love I was single. In a way I'm glad he did that, I don't think I could of left Jim on my own. As time went on I knew my love had the feeling for me and so did I, I woke up on Feb 14, 05 at 5:00 am out of a deep sleep full of energy blurting out "he is going to ask me out today!" something in my gut was screaming at me that it was going down, I worked up the courage to break up with Jim….. yes on that same day…. I was scared… I called and prayed he wouldn't pick up…. I pulled a Mosby (how I met you mother reference) I left a brake up voice mail and before any more of you looks down on me, ANYONE and EVERYONE is allowed to break up with a CRAZY/UNSTABLE person over the phone that is the only exception that is appropriate and not to mention its much SAFER.  The day went on and I kept checking my phone surprised that he hadn't blown up my phone yet, my love asked to walk me home and he did. While we walked I kept checking my phone but not a word from Jim, we made it to my house and my love gave me some candies, a beautiful card with his feeling written down inside… at that moment I had forgotten all about Jim, forgotten my fear, my dread. Looking into the eyes of my love I felt safe & that I found someone who truly loved me, to this day I still can't fully explain how he made me feel in that moment all I know it was a beautiful feeling... All I know is that no one ever made me feel that way since. Of course, once he left and us being a couple now, I was on cloud nine…. It would be short-lived. Once I hopped onto yahoo messager I made sure to stay invisible as to not be seen, Jim was on and had already sent me a hello message… I was surprised he was so calm, surely he'd already heard my voice mail?…. I had sent it first thing in the morning but it was already 4 pm, I switch to online and asked him if he wasn't mad?  He said mad about what? I then told him I was sorry but my voice mail would tell him and I "log off"  1 min goes by and I got call after call from Jim. He left voicemails with each call he made and there was a pattern, first message he left was him crying "please Quinn pick up, I love you don't do this to me" next massage in a raging voice "I'll fucken kill you, pick up your phone you stupid bitch" next message "I'm going to kill myself plz Quinn PICK UP!" and start all over with the sobbing and begging for me to comeback…… I did pick up the phone after he left over 50 voicemails and told him "you need to stop, I can't do this anymore and you are scaring me…." Before I could continue Jim said, "please talk to my mom PLEASE!" I agree and while on the phone with her, I could hear Jim screams and his mom yells out to her husband "get the pills away from him! Jim, you need to stop!.... sweetie what going on?" I told her I was scared of her son and that I was no longer going to move up there with them, she understood and told me "you know that ring Jim gave you? it's my engagement ring, could you send it to me. I gladly agreed and asked her to mail me back some of my stuff Jim had taken from me and she did, though not all of them, I was happy he was no longer in my life. He did continue to call my cell, my sister cell, and my grandparent's house phone just to talk to me, until my dad picked up the phone and asked him to pass the phone to his dad which he did & that was the last time I heard from him over the phone, he did try a few months later but I never picked up… so I think he gave up.

I was with my love for 3 years until I ended it due to, growing apart and I didn't like being put down or made to feel bad just cuz I didn't want to do something. We met in 05, the same year that How I met your mother premiered, and got back together the same year the show ended in 2014. my reason for leaving him, to begin with, was the fact he got too comfortable just taking off and sayings things like "I guess they're not much for me here then, I'm all done here then" and he would just leave if I didn't put out for the night?! our break up was necessary for us to make the changes that ultimately made us stronger. I was a freak in the sheets it was his fucken loss, he knows that now and say he will never let me go. I know we did a bit of role-playing of my kink when we were first together, but he never took it seriously and I never made a big fuss about it…. but it was hot. Then I was with Kyo (it was my pet name to him because he didn't like his name) I was with him for a while and I fucked up…. WE both fucked up, meeting him online and being apart I had a relapse and slept with my love….. I know why would I sleep with him if I left him in the first place…… no one is perfect but I made it clear that this was NOT going to continue, I felt extreme guilt and told Kyo…. He forgave him as we still had not even met yet, but little did I know he was still talking to some women he had been seeing and fail to tell me he hadn't ended it with her….. but once he moved in with me it was over but something inside me was telling me to look through his laptop so I did, I found he still had photos of his ex... nude photos of her… including emails of him making it seem like he was still with her but he told me they broke it off and he deleted everything. From the start I should have known this wasn't going to work, we all make mistakes and I have defiantly learned from it. But as time went on Kyo discovered he was into cross-dressing with the help of my best friends, I encouraged him to be himself and that was the only time I saw him happy…. We would give him dresses, do his makeup, wax his whole body, and take him to the clubs to strut his stuff. At the end of the night, we'd go home and enjoy some sexy time and he loved being in his outfits while we got it on and I loved it as well…. With many outing that we have done, I decided to finally tell him about my kink…. Keep in mind I did what I could to get him off whatever he wanted I tried, he likes it when I would jack him off with my panties, blow jobs, and doing it while dressed up…. So when I brought it up, he was like "that weird" (really guy?!?! I'm weird! Get your bitch ass out of here with the panties jerking and cross-dressing) I was hurt…. I had welcomed all he wanted and never made any faces or made him feel bad about it cuz there is no need to kink shame, but he couldn't do the same for me? He barely gave it a try. More time went on and my love for him had faded away, I didn't feel loved by him…. I had done so much to make him feel welcome with all my friends and showed him how much I cared but I never felt like his #1, I felt like an afterthought with him… like I'll get to you when I can…. I knew that if we didn't last, his childhood friend would hop on that dick when I left him. He took it hard and called him mother to tell her everything….. we both made mistake but I'm sure I was made the main villain, Kyo kept telling me he wanted to try again and he still loved me but he was joining the marines. I had told him before he ever thought of joining that I could never be with someone who joins the marines/army/etc, etc… and I kept good on that but my best friend called him out on his bullshit about "loving me" as he had shown her photos of him at base camp but failed to remove the nudes photos of the girl I knew would take him once I was gone, my friend just told him "you love Quinn huh? You can cut the shit you have moved on, so stop acting as if you miss her".  From what I know he is married to her, she doesn't like his cross-dressing and won't sleep with him if he does dress up cuz it makes her feel "uncomfortable"…. He told me this on the last conversation we ever had, I could hear his sadness but I could hear him try to play it off like it wasn't hurting him or bothered him…. How could it not? For almost 4 years he had encouragement, support, and lots of love from a woman who fully accepted every part of him to a woman who thinks it's weird…. How the tables have turned.

I didn't stay single for long as I reconnected with my love and soon started dating again, since we last were together  we sure did a lot of growth in that time apart. It made us even stronger, I honestly can't see myself with anyone else (maybe Johnny depp lol) a girl can dream right hahaha I can feel my love's eyes rolling back hahaha. When I first told him about my love for hypnosis his reaction was the best, with a calm loving look he says "oh that's new" since then we have had our fun with it, even tho its more for me then it is for him. he is coming around to it so that makes me happy. 

i’m happy with how thing have been going on in our sexy time department, getting our kinks out and what not. i’m just glad i don’t have to worry about someone fucking up my mind, its mine! ya i want someone to play with it and get freaky with it but at the end of the day i’m still me! and not with abuser or crazy person. so watch your mind ladies and gentlemen not everyone is going to care for you so choose wisely we only have one mind, so dont loss it!

[gworlinterrupted]

Dreamboy Episode 7: The Rally

Hi I’m back with another Dreamboy transcript, this is a great episode! Sorry for any mistakes I might have made.  Also: if you’re looking to hire a transcriptionist for your podcast or anything else please feel free to shoot me a message, I’m always looking for work!

LITTLE KIDS [sung]

She won’t be able to run in the grass

She won’t be able to lay in the sun 

She won’t say hi to the people who pass

She won’t see hi to anyone

She won’t be able to love or dream or anything else that we said 

Cause zebras can’t do anything after they are dead

[CROWD CHEERING AND CLAPPING]

DIANA

Thank you! Thank you! Keep it going for Ms. Hernandez’s second-grade class from Pepper Heights Elementary, with the shockingly accurate little ditty that they wrote! Wow! Thank you, kiddies. Now don’t let your energies flag, kids. Everyone, I know it’s getting late, I know we’re tired and scared and wondering whether this is all gonna lead up to anything useful, but it is. We’re gonna stay here and we’re gonna.. we’re gonna keep our feet planted on the ground until our demands are met. I, Diana Greasefire, am determined to have our voices heard. I will stay here with my zebra striped sleeping bag and my zebra striped mask, and I will sleep here until I get answers. Alright come on how’re we, how’re we doing out there?

[CROWD CHEERING AND CLAPPING]

DIANA Good? 

[CROWD CHEERING AND CLAPPING]

DIANA Oh, I can’t hear you.

[CROWD CHEERING AND CLAPPING LOUDER]

DIANA Yeah? What do we say?

CROWD

SAVE ZOE!

DIANA What do we say?

CROWD SAVE ZOE!

DIANA WHAT DO WE SAY?

CROWD 

SAVE ZOE!

[CROWD CHEERING AND CLAPPING]

DIANA That’s right. Now, we have a long night of rallying ahead so have some coffee. It’s free over at that table, donated by the lovely folks down at Settler’s Coffee. 

[SMALL GROUP CHEERS]

DIANA

I tell you this little sexy zebra print number has served me well the last few weeks down at The Hussy, but if I’m honest, now that I'm outside in this cooler October night air, I just wish there were a little bit more of it. But then again, how else am I gonna get Mr. Kritch to come out and talk to us?

[CROWD BOOS]

DIANA We know you’re in there, Kritchy! We know you ain’t leaving anytime soon, cause your car is currently surrounded by morbid second-graders. 

DIANA [to child]

Go on sweetie, yeah you can stand on the car, jump up and down.

DIANA [to crowd]

Okay. so, I'm gonna bring up my co-host, you may know her from other animal activism activities. She is currently working to educate uhhh people about uhh, hang on I have to read this part. “The effect of deforestation on the delicate symbiotic evolutionary relationship between the Madagascar Honey Orchid and the Madagascar Honey Wasp, its only known pollinator.” Well, that’s a mouthful. Anyway, please welcome to the stage Carol Buxtrom!

[CROWD CHEERS AND CLAPS]

CAROL

Thanks, Diana. Uh, you look really good. [clears throat] Whoa, okay. All of you out there you all are really rad to show up for a cause like this. When I think about this issue, I just get so worked up and angry, and I didn't trust myself to not get all emotional up here, so I wrote it down. So I’m just gonna read this and try to, you know, stay calm and Carol on. Okay, here goes. [clears throat] Last summer on August 29th, just after one A.M., a scared and defenseless wild animal had its space violated by an intruder, and in a split second reaction of fear, defended itself to the best of its ability. The intruder was a boy named Ian Harris, and he was killed. Our hearts go out to his family, but that wild animal is a zebra named Zoe that has spent nearly sixteen years interacting with the publics here at Pepper Heights with no incidents. Tomorrow morning, Judge Elizabeth Gardner [sobs] is set to. Sorry. [sobs]

[CROWD CHEERS]

CAROL

Is set to announce her decision about the euthanization of Zoe the zebra. She could very well decide to end Zoe’s life based on incidents that were not at all her fault, but we still have tonight to let her know how Pepper Heights really feels, so let’s be a loud voice in her ear. Everybody: 

[CROWD CHEERS]

CAROL

Get out your phones and tweet: #SaveZoe at Judge Elizabeth Gardner. Go ahead, everybody, do it now. Or you could email too, [email protected]. 

DIANA

Hotmail? Oh my god. Can I hear some of her songs on Myspace? [laughs]

CAROL

While you guys do that, I wanted to read some uhh zebra facts to you that you might not know. Uhhh, okay. Zoe the zebra’s latin name is Equus quagga. 

[CROWD CHEERS]

CAROL When zebras stay in groups, their stripes confuse the eyes of would-be predators, making it hard to single out an individual. The stripes of each zebra are unique, like...

DANE [to listener]

The all-night rally. I totally forgot it was tonight. It’s fucking going strong now too in the parking lot. Jesus, like everybody from Pepper Heights is here. I’m just wandering through the crowd, everybody all around me in their zebra shirts with their “SAVE ZOE” signs, and my head is killing me because I haven’t eaten like anything all day, and I just got escorted out of my work place by Sheila fucking Panzarelli and then told to wait here by a fucking twelve year old. Which, I was so out of it that I actually did for a minute before I was like “what the fuck am I doing?” Also, why the fuck is Sheila doing security sweeps? [sighs]. I should probably just go home. Hey, I know that guy from the coffee shop. Wait, maybe they have free food here. The crowd is starting to get very bored of the wasp lady’s zebra facts. 

CAROL Zebras are not horses, people.

DANE I see Luke looking down at his phone on the side of the crowd. He looks up, and for some reason I do that thing where I act like I don’t see him, and I think I’ll just look back in a couple of seconds and casually see him, but when I look back he’s walking away, like maybe he didn’t see me the first time? So I start to thread through the crowd to follow him, but I keep losing sight of him, and the boring science channel stuff on stage apparently signaled bathroom and coffee break to everyone, so they’re all moving around. And all of them are wearing zebra stripes so they all blend together, like, my eyes hurt. Where the fuck did he go? I think- there, there. No. there! No. I literally feel like a starving lion trying to pick a meal out of the black and white swirl. Jesus, this really works, good job nature. So I start moving quicker through the crowd, and I think I'm turned around, I'm going to the middle again? People are really starting to jostle me now. The murmurs have turned into full on talking, like no one’s even pretending to pay attention to the stage, which is somewhere behind me at this point. There! I see him again. He’s just fifteen feet from me, facing the other way.

DANE [to crowd]

Excuse me, excuse me, sorry, sorry.

DANE [to listener]

I bump into some teenage boys, I pass a  family, almost tripping over a stroller. Finally I get up to him, and I reach up and tap his shoulder.

DANE [to boy]

Luke. 

DANE [to listener]

He turns around, but it’s not Luke. it’s just another boy. 

DANE [to boy]

Oh, s-sorry. No I just… I thought you were someone else. 

DANE [to listener]

I turn back towards the stage. It’s just a sea of writhing zebra stripes. Then someone taps my arm. I turn around quick, but I don't see anyone. Wait, it’s a kid. Like, seven years old maybe? Standing there and looking up at me. 

DANE [to kid]

Hey. Do you need help?

DANE [to listener]

He hands me a flier. I take it and look at it, but it’s not a “SAVE ZOE” flier. It just says “#WHATABOUTIAN” in big, bold type. I look back up at him, but he’s already running back out of the crowd. And then he disappears into a smaller crowd at the side of the rally that I hadn't noticed before. They’re counter-protestors. Some of them have signs that say the same thing: “#WHATABOUTIAN”, and others have signs that have two pictures side by side on them. The first picture is Ian as a little kid, smiling and playing in the grass, but the second picture is the police photo of when they found his dead body. Wow, it’s intense.

CAROL 

A group of zebras is referred to as a herd, dazzle, or a zeal. Ha! which is totally neat. Of course, Zoe is a single zebra which is, you know, just called a zebra. Umm-

DIANA

Ok, Carol, thank you. 

[LIGHT APPLAUSE]

DIANA

Let’s do more facts later.

CAROL Oh, Okay. Anyone who has questions can talk to me later.

DIANA Okay! [sighs] Okay Kritchy, you coward! I am standing here in my zebra striped dress with my zebra striped sleeping bag, in case this goes long, and my thermos of hot toddies and my zebra slippers, and I am waiting for you to get up the courage to come out here and look me in my face. What do we say, everyone?

CROWD SAVE ZOE!

DIANA What do we say?

CROWD SAVE ZOE!

DIANA

That’s right!

[CROWD CHEERS AND CLAPS]

DIANA

I think we should try to enchant Mr. Kritch out to talk to us with a little song. 

[ACOUSTIC GUITAR CHORD]

DIANA What do you say, everybody? You wanna sing together with me? Come on, you ready? Here. 

[BEGINS TO PLAY GUITAR]

DIANA I’ll start us off.

[GUITAR INTRO]

DIANA [sung]

We shall overcome

We shall overcome

We shall overcome someday 

PERSON IN CROWD I love you Diana!!

[CROWD CHEERS AND CLAPS]

DIANA [sung]

Deep in my heart

I do believe

We shall overcome someday

DIANA

We’ll walk hand in hand!

CROWD [sung]

We’ll walk hand in hand 

We’ll walk hand in hand

We’ll walk hand in hand someday

[SONG CONTINUES UNDER THE FOLLOWING]

DANE [to listener] I swear I just heard Luke’s voice. Like, close by. I look around, but I don't see him. Then, a huge zebra striped balloon floats by, and I look. I watch it pass, and then Luke is right there, just ten feet from me. He sees me too. He doesn’t seem surprised, though. I walk up to him slowly, and he puts his phone in his pocket and straightens up. As I get closer I can see his face. It’s sort of a mix of shy and embarrassed and glad and pouty all at the same time. 

LUKE Hey. 

DANE Hey.

LUKE

What’s up?

DANE Nothing, what’s up with you?

LUKE Nothing. 

DANE AND LUKE

[unintelligible]

[BOTH LAUGH]

LUKE Yeah, so look, I just um, you know-

JENNIFER

There you are, jesus! Why didn’t you stay over there?

DANE

Fuck, Jennifer! Because I'm not your poodle. Like, for being an anti-fascist you really are-

JENNIFER We don’t have time for this.

DANE [to listener]

The twins, Merryl and Sherryl, walk up behind her. Jennifer looks anxious. She looks down at her watch and then scans the crowd. Luke looks at all of us with a wrinkled expression.

LUKE 

What are you guys doing?

DANE We are doing nothing. I don’t know what she’s doing

DANE [to listener]

For once, Jennifer doesn’t look angry or mean or smug, she almost looks like a kid. She gets closer to me, looks right at me.

JENNIFER

They are keeping an animal I love in the dark alone in there, and it’s killing her. Tonight, I’m gonna go get her out of that dark. 

DANE That’s, like, literally what happens at any zoo.

JENNIFER Exactly! They’re all animal jails. 

LUKE So you wanna jailbreak Zoe? You’re a little badass. 

JENNIFER Yes, but...

DANE [to listener]

She takes a deep breath and closes her eyes, then lets it out and opens them and looks at me JENNIFER

I need your help.

DANE [to Jennifer] What are you talking about, you’re crazy. Like, you’re twelve years old, what the fuck are you planning on doing?

JENNIFER First, I’m almost thirteen. Second, growing up is a myth. And third-

DANE [to listener]

She looks back at the twins, standing on either side of her, and then back to me with a weird smile

JENNIFER We have a plan. 

DANE [to listener]

Then she sees something to her left behind me, and her eyes go wide and her face gets serious

JENNIFER Oh no. He’s early. 

DANE [to listener]

I turn around and follow her stare. On the back edge of the parking lot, far from the crowd, there’s a utility truck parked under a light pole, and a man in a bucket on a crane coming up from the truck, and the bucket is rising. It gets to the top and then stops. 

JENNIFER Okay, okay, it’s go time. Merryl, Sherryl, stay on the time markers no matter what? Got it?

TWIN 1

Got it.

TWIN 2

Uh, okay.

DANE [to JENNIFER]

What is going on?

JENNIFER No more time.

DANE [to listener]

She looks at me and Luke.

JENNIFER

You in or out?

DANE I don’t… I don’t even know what you’re talking about, like in what? 

DANE [to listener]

Her face looks strange.

JENNIFER Please.

DANE [to Jennifer]

Please what?!

DANE [to listener]

The power goes out, the lights on the stage and everything. The crowd stops singing and everyone starts shuffling and murmuring, slowly starting to panic. People start yelling for their kids. The only light is from the billboard for the exhibit way at the other end of the parking lot. Luke steps forward and looks at Jennifer. 

LUKE We’re in. 

DANE [to listener]

I look at Luke. he won’t even look back at me.

JENNIFER Great. Follow us. 

DANE [to listener]

She takes off through the crowd, the twins just behind her. I keep looking at Luke, but he just takes off after them. 

[SILENCE]

Jennifer, the twins, and Luke are all standing in front of a hole dug under the fence in front of the zoo. Right as I walk up, Jennifer kneels down and starts to go under the fence. I look around, but nobody sees her, everyone's just scrambling in the dark and paying no attention. The power going out was a classic diversion. Did she plan all this? Like, what organization are they a part of, the CIA for kids? Jennifer goes through the hole, then the twins, and then Luke. [sighs] I look around one more time. Fuck. [sighs] I follow them through. [panting] I get up and brush myself off, and then I go over to where they’re at, in the shadows against the souvenir stands and ticket booths. 

[DREAMBOY SONG PLAYS IN BACKGROUND]

DANE [to group]

Guys! Am I the only one worried about getting caught? Like, what about the security guards? Or Kritch, Sheila.

JENNIFER Kritch is watching the livestream of the rally in his office, I bet you fifty bucks, and the security guards follow the same routine every single night. Three guards, three booths, they rotate between the three booths every thirty minutes.

DANE [to listener]

She looks down at her watch. 

JENNIFER We have another twenty-five minutes before the next rotation.

DANE [to Jennifer] What about Sheila? Like, she’s the scariest one.

DANE [to listener]

Jennifer considers the question. 

JENNIFER

She is sort of a wild card. But it’s a risk we will have to take. The good news is, she’s not exactly good at being covert. Everybody just look out for a wheezy, cussing thing with a lightsaber flashlight.

DANE [to Jennifer]

Look, this isn’t just about getting banned from the zoo or me getting fired, like we could all get arrested. On serious charges! Which is a big deal if you’re not a little kid. 

DANE [to listener]

Luke still isn’t looking at me. 

LUKE

It’s weird they leave the music on all night. 

TWIN 

It’s for the animals. 

JENNIFER

Okay, let’s go. 

DANE [to listener]

Jennifer runs off into the shadows, weaving between food stands, pausing whenever she can, looking at her watch. God, it’s like she was made for this. Her legs flick in and out of the dim light, and the twins are in lock step right behind her, and Luke is right behind them, his legs almost as quick, and I'm following with legs… legs of a person that doesn’t wanna get arrested. 

[CICADA NOISES]

DANE [to listener]

[sighs] The twins are whispering things to us like little tour guides

TWIN 1 Over there’s the rides.

TWIN 2

And the Candy Clown

LUKE

[sighs] I used to hate the Candy Clown. 

JENNIFER

Come on!

DANE [to listener] Jennifer’s moving like a little Navy SEAL, doing that thing where she points at her eyes then points ahead. 

TWIN 1

There’s the swan. 

DANE [to listener]

The other twin points to a single white swan next to the pond. It looks blue in the night, its head is hidden in its wings. I stop. There’s an information kiosk in front of us, but there’s a movement inside. 

DANE [to group]

Guys, wait. There’s someone inside that booth.

DANE [to listener]

The twins both look back and smile.

TWIN 1 Lost and found.

TWIN 2

All the phones. 

DANE [to twins] Oh, jesus. Okay. 

DANE [to listener]

I look in the window as we pass it. There’s a cardboard box full of phones. A lot of them are dead, but some are flickering with messages. “Where are you?” “Are you mad at me?” “Hey.” 

JENNIFER Come on!

DANE [to listener]

We round another food stand, walk along this low wall for a few seconds, and then I see it. 

TWIN

The animal gate.

DANE [to listener]

There’s this tall, decorative iron gate set into a high stone wall that separates the animal exhibits from the rides and food and stuff. It’s this overwhelming, intricate scene of animals all sculpted with wrought iron, their bodies all twisting around each other and their faces all looking up. It’s like a gothic mural but with metal animals, but I’ve never actually really looked at it cause it’s swung open when the zoo is open. Now that I see it, it’s really beautiful. Luke slowly walks forward and looks up at the gate.

LUKE Oh my god. I remember when I was a kid, getting here early enough to see them open the animal gate was like the most magical thing, and then once we got inside my mom and I would always do the same exact thing every time: chocolate ice cream cone with a hard dipped shell and then visit Zoe. I remember her being almost close enough to touch, it’s like so weird to think that-

[JENNIFER GRUNTING]

DANE [to listener]

I look over off to the side of the gate. Jennifer’s trying to unlatch the huge metal bar attached to the stone wall. 

[JENNIFER GRUNTING LOUDER]

DANE [to Jennifer]

Mmm, need help? DANE [to listener]

Then the latch comes loose and the gate swings free with a loud deep groan.

[GATE CREAKING, JENNIFER PANTING]

DANE [to group]

Wow, lotta good that does keeping people out.

DANE [to listener] Jennifer steps back onto the path and brushes her clothes off, a little out of breath.

JENNIFER

It’s not meant to keep us out, it’s meant to keep them in. 

DANE [to listener]

Then she walks through the gate; the twins follow. Luke goes through behind them but stops when he sees I'm not following. He turns around and looks at me, for the first time since the parking lot. 

LUKE You coming?

DANE

[sighs] I don’t know. What if I say no?

DANE [to listener]

He walks up to me. His face is really soft and sweet, and he doesn’t look mad at all, like does he not know he didn’t text me all day long and like left me hanging? Like, what the fuck is he thinking?

LUKE

Are you really gonna say no?

DANE [to listener]

He reaches out and grabs my hand. My body twitches like an electromagnet.

[TWINKLY MUSIC]

DANE [to listener]

The animal section of the zoo is dark except for a few random bluish-white lights that make everything look dead and icy. Luke is still holding my hand. 

LUKE These lights are weird. Also, isn’t the power out? Like- 

JENNIFER Those are emergency lights. Backup generator, only essential systems.

DANE [to listener] She keeps her eyes ahead as she talks. And all three of them, the not girl scouts, are walking in front of me and Luke at that specific speed of children that want you to know that they know where they’re going and that they’re not afraid. And Jennifer starts whispering things too and pointing. It’s like all three of them have the whole history of this place memorized, but I can’t quite pay attention because all I can think about is Luke’s hand. 

JENNIFER

That’s the creepy-crawlies building. My dad says that it’s just an old shed they like infested with bugs, and it’s a crime that they make people pay to see it. TWIN

That’s the parrot William something. He’s old. He talks but he just says numbers.

JENNIFER

There’s the lion and tigers and bears exhibit. A lion, a tiger, and bear that used to be movie animals. The tiger’s been dead for years, though.

TWIN 

So now it’s just a lion and a bear. 

DANE [to listener]

I’m trying not to look at Luke, but there’s this feeling between our arms. It’s like a buzzing. 

TWIN There’s the new exhibit. They’ve been digging holes over there for months now.

DANE [to listener]

There’s a low wooden barricade in front of the new exhibit with a sign that says “coming soon” on it and another sign that’s half ripped down that says “Forgotten Sea”. The buzzing feeling surges. We both yank our hands away. 

TWIN That’s a bathroom. 

DANE [to listener]

I hear a tarp snapping in the wind somewhere over in the dark of the new exhibit. Something in my body turns over. Then I hear music. Opera. 

[OPERA PLAYING FAINTLY]

JENNIFER That’s Madam Beauregard’s radio. She has to listen to music when she sleeps or she has nightmares. She used to be a NASA flight test chimp, and she went to space once, but she came back crazy. Then she lived in the swampy part of Florida where some man made her do this sideshow act on the side of the road.

TWIN

Made her wear a nightgown and read a paper and drink coffee

JENNIFER Yeah, but he actually gave her real coffee, so she got addicted. Now she has to have coffee right when she wakes up or she goes insane. 

LUKE Wow. How did I not know any of this stuff? 

DANE [to listener]

We come around a curve where the main path sort of narrows and then ends at this long iron fence. Just darkness beyond. Jennifer walks up to the fence and stops. 

JENNIFER Zoe’s exhibit. Or, used to be. 

DANE [to Jennifer]

I mean they still let her outside a little bit, way far back there so people at least can still see her.

DANE [to listener]

Jennifer looks at me with a pathetic look. Then she hops up and starts to climb the fence.

DANE [to Jennifer]

What the fuck are you doing?

DANE [to listener] In no time she’s over and standing in the artificial savannah, looking back at us. 

JENNIFER Come on.

DANE [to listener]

The twins go over. Then Luke. I'm starting to sense a pattern here, so I put my foot on the fence, but it immediately slips, and I hit my knee hard, and I fall a little bit, and I do that thing where it hurts so bad that you just hold it and rock back and forth while everyone waits. [grunts, breathes deeply, sighs] I try again. I really don’t know if I can do this. Jennifer’s trying to coach me, but it’s just annoying. 

JENNIFER

Ughh, just put your foot on the wall.

DANE [to Jennifer]

Yeah. JENNIFER Put your other foot on the fence. Now grab the- No no no.

DANE [to Jennifer[

What?

JENNIFER

Hold on with both hands and kind of swing your hip, yeah. Swing your hips. Okay, no, like that but do it better.

DANE [to Jennifer]

I’m trying.

JENNIFER

Just swing your hips, yeah, now pull- pull yourself, now pull yourself, okay.

[DANE GRUNTING]

JENNIFER

Okay, there it is.

DANE

Goddamn.

DANE [to listener]

I finally make it over and land with a grunt in the dirt. [groans]

TWIN 

This is the spot where the Harris boy climbed in.

DANE [to listener]

The twin is looking right at me, then she points to a spot on the ground by the wall.

TWIN 

And that’s where he died.

DANE

Whoa. 

DANE [to listener]

I look at the spot. I think about the picture I saw on those signs in the parking lot.

JENNIFER

He wouldn’t have died if it weren’t for toxic masculine peer pressure. 

DANE

What? TWIN

It’s a tradition for high school boys to break in here at night and touch Zoe. 

DANE

But he was like eleven.

JENNIFER

Exactly. He heard about his older brothers doing it and wanted to be cool like them. Stupid boy stuff. 

DANE Exactly. Stupid. And here we are doing the exact same thing, like-

JENNIFER Trust me, I have a plan. 

DANE [to listener]

I look down at the spot on the ground again. I think I can still see blood stains, but it’s so dark I can't be sure.

JENNIFER

Now, let's go!

DANE [to listener]

We tip-toe through Zoe’s artificial environment. It’s made to resemble a rocky outcrop in an African savannah, so what look like rocks from the front are actually just plastic and hollow in the back. But, I mean, I guess this savannah wasn’t made for Zoe anyway. 

JENNIFER

[breathes deeply] Okay. This is it. Where’s your keys?

DANE [to listener]

There’s a door. It’s made to look like stone. 

DANE [to Jennifer]

That’s the help you needed? My keys? I told you I only have keys to the ride building and the broom closet, that’s it, those two. So looks like we’re all just gonna go home, good plan. 

LUKE

Wait, we’re not actually gonna go inside-inside are we?

DANE 

No we’re not, not without keys. 

DANE [to listener]

Jennifer walks up and looks at me and slams her brow down over her eyes.

JENNIFER

Listen: come in or not, I don’t care, but I’ve been planning tonight for months, and all I need is to get through that door, and then you can go. After that door is open, I don't care where you go. 

DANE [to Jennifer]

Yeah right, and let you just get killed by a murderous zebra? They’d put me in jail for letting you in, stupid. 

JENNIFER

I told you already, Zoe died months ago. Give me the keys and I'll show you. 

LUKE Wait, what?

DANE

These keys? 

DANE [to listener]

I take my keys from my pocket, and I throw them at her feet. 

DANE [to Jennifer]

Go ahead, try them. I told you they don’t fucking go to these doors, so have at it.

DANE [to listener]

Jennifer grabs the keys from the ground, walks over to the door, and sticks them in. The broom closet one immediately works. The door swings open. She yanks my keys from the knob and throws them back at my feet. Then she snears at me and disappears into the dark. The twins follow. [sighs] I don’t understand. Like… I don’t understand. 

LUKE

Zoe’s dead?

DANE [to listener] 

I’m still looking at the dark of the doorway where Jennifer and the twins disappeared. Almost talking to myself. 

DANE [to Luke]

I... who knows? I don’t know. She could be, I guess.

LUKE

Zoe’s dead.

DANE [to listener] I hear something edging in Luke’s voice. I look over at him. He’s looking down. His eyes are distant. 

DANE Well, we don’t know that yet.

DANE

He kneels down quickly and starts to pick up pieces of gravel just to have something to do with his hands, it looks like. The whole time, he’s looking off in the distance. I walk up to him slowly and kneel down beside him. His lip is trembling. He can’t look at me. I wait a few seconds, unsure of what to do, and then I reach out and put my hand on his shoulder.

DANE [to Luke]

Hey…

DANE [to listener]

But as soon as I touch him, he just start sobbing like he can’t hold it back anymore 

[LUKE SOBBING]

DANE

And he falls into me, and he wraps his arms around my torso and cries onto my neck. I feel the wetness on my skin. It feels weirdly good that he’s crying on me, and then I feel weird that it feels good. 

DANE [to Luke]

Hey buddy, you’re okay, you’re okay.

[LUKE BREATHING DEEPLY]

DANE [to listener]

After a bit, his rhythm slowly evens out, and his fingers unclench from my shirt in the back, and he buries his face in my neck and just breathes. I breathe too. Our breathing is lining up. 

[DANE AND LUKE BREATHE]

DANE

We both pull away, and get to our feet. We don’t really look at each other. Instead, our eyes fall on the open doorway. 

LUKE

We have to go in there. We have to make sure they don’t get hurt.

DANE 

[groans]

LUKE [sighs] Yeah, I know.

DANE 

The darkness in the doorway seems to be looking back at us like a giant eye socket. I don’t wanna go in there. But I know whatever’s going on with this zoo and this zebra is weird. I mean, everything about this place is weird, but I just feel like the answer’s... the answer’s through that door. 

[DISTANT SCREAM]

[DREAMBOY THEME PLAYS]

ELLIE HAYMEN

Dreamboy is co-created by Dane Terry and Ellie Haymen. Developed and directed by Ellie Haymen. Written, composed, and performed by Dane Terry, featuring Michael Cavadias, Dito Van Reigersberg, Renata Friedman, Morgan Meadows, Avery Draut, Gianna Masi, Alice Tolan-Mee, Somerset Thompson, and Jake Sellers Sound Designed, Engineered, Mixed and Mastered by Chris Weingarten at Bananappeal Studio. Edited by Alexander Charles Adams. Creative Producer and Assistant Director: Ashlin Hatch. Associate producer: Adam Cecil. Executive Producer: Christy Gressman. A very special thanks to Night Vale Presents. You can find us on Twitter and Instagram @dreamboypodcast. For more info and for merch check out dreamboypodcast.com.

#do i have to put a disclaimer? idk how these things work. this isn't my podcast i'm just a fan #dreamboy #dreamboy podcast #night vale presents

[venactricisfics]

Malibu Desert

It was just supposed to be a workout.

A Mayans based Story Adult Content

Master List

Chapter Nine 

 “Are you going out like that?” Bishop asks as I bend down to tie my sneakers. I look down at myself wearing yoga pants and a crop top and hop up on the stool. 

“Yeah, just going to the yard to work out with Gilly,” I give him a confused look. “What’s wrong with what I’m wearing? Do I need to change?”

“Are you comfortable, querida?” he sets a cup of coffee in front of me as he goes back to the stove to fry bacon. I nod. “Don’t change. You wearing that is just gonna make it hard for anyone to get any work done.” 

“Stop,” I chuckle as I take a sip from my cup, “No one but you looks at me like that.”

“Everyone looks at you like that,” he responds. “They don’t act on it because you’re my queen.” 

“Your queen?” I quirk a brow, slipping from the stool to make toast. I could successfully make toast without burning it.  That’s still cooking, right?  

“I’d never call you my ol’ lady,” he places the cooked bacon on plates and we sit together at his kitchen bar, “at least not to your face.” 

“That makes you a very smart man,” I peck his cheek, “Another reason I love you.” 

“No, it’s cause without me you’d starve,” he says back, giving my thigh a gentle squeeze. 

“That too,” I slide my arms around his neck from behind and give him another kiss before taking a piece of bacon from his plate. “I gotta meet Gilly in fifteen, see you at the yard?” 

“I don’t like the idea of you going out alone,” Bishop’s word’s stern. 

“It’s fifteen minutes.  Straight there, no detours, I promise,” I say. “You’ve still got to get showered and dressed.”

“I still don’t fucking like it,” he stated. “That shithead is still out there.”

“I know that more than anyone,” I grab my keys from the table by the door, “I can’t be watched twenty-four/seven. Yesterday I had to stop Coco from coming in the ladies’ room with me at work.”

“Alright,” he agrees reluctantly, “text me when you get there.”

As promised in fifteen minutes I shift my SUV into park and type out a text: 

"Now I'm thinking about you naked in the shower alone," I smirk and hit send. 

"That's not what I meant when I said text me. I've already got your ass in those pants on my mind. Be good. See you soon," he sent back. 

I send him a wink and a heart emoji then step out of my SUV. I give Chucky a wave as I cross the yard to the cage. 

"You ready, hermana?" Coco greats me.  He takes in my confused look. "Gilly is late. Asked me to get you started." 

“OK,” I drop my duffle by the gate mentally preparing myself for my lesson. 

“I was thinking,” he said, “you’re little, right? There’s no fucking way you can take down a huge guy by yourself.”

“You and Bishop aren’t exactly huge and you hold your own,” I state.

“Si, but we’ve been training for fucking ever.  Our fucking life made it where we had to from the fucking womb,” he said. “And we don’t have that kind of time. Imma teach you something that will fucking keep you breathing. And put the other asshole in the fucking ground.” 

I nod listening to him. I knew at my core he was right. There was no way a few days of learning how to kick or punch would stop Warren or any one of his men from doing whatever they wanted to me.  I could slow them down but just enough to piss them off. And then I’d still be running and hiding. Coco’s way was a permanent solution. 

“Take this,” he pulls his piece from the pocket of his kutte. “You ever shoot before?”

“I used go skeet shooting with my dad,” I hold the 9mm pistol in my hand studying its weight, “Nothing like this.” 

“The fuck is a skeet?” Coco asks.

“Clay target flung in the air. I was pretty good,” I curl my fingers around the butt of the gun letting testing how it feels.

“Rich white people making up shit to shoot at,”  he snorts a laugh, “that,” he motions to the piece in my hand, “you use that to put down a guy. Nothing fake about killing a man. You do what you gotta hermana. The rest of the bullshit fades away.”

I nod, “I get it. We’re not that much different. Life may have fucked us in different ways but we both got fucked. And now we’re here. You’re teaching me how to keep from getting fucked again. That’s something.”

For the next couple of hours, Coco taught me to hold the gun, aim, and shoot. Gilly arrived and showed me the best ways to take a guy down unexpected. Side and groin being the best targets.  Kicks would be far more impactful than a fist.  My legs are stronger than my arms. 

I move into the shade and take a drink from my water bottle and reapply sunscreen. Getting a sideways look from the guys. “Not all of us are blessed with caramel skin. Y’all should wear it too, melanoma is a bitch.” 

“Take your fair skin inside,” Gilly laughed tossing a sweaty towel at me. I wrinkle my nose and toss it back at him. 

I close my eyes, feeling the cool air hit my skin when I walk in the clubhouse. I didn't realize how hot it was outside until I savored the air-conditioned room. I reach my arms up in the air to stretch and then bend down and lift my foot to stretch the backs of my legs. I was a little sore. But nothing a few stretches couldn’t fix. 

"Fuck," I hear Bishop mutter behind me, "you are making it really fucking hard to concentrate." 

I glance back at him over my shoulder seeing that he’s clearly checking out my ass from his table with Taza and Hank, “I am not doing anything.” My lips tug into a slight smirk as I stand. I rather enjoyed the way he was looking at me. 

“You are doing plenty, querida,” he says back. “Come sit.” I give a gentle kiss to his lips before taking the seat beside his. 

“I didn’t mean to distract you,” I move my gaze between the men. 

“It is a welcome one, sweetheart,” Taza says. “Beer?” I shake my head, “Too early for me. I’ll take a Diet Coke if you’ve got one.” 

“Just regular,” he responds grabbing a can from the fridge. “I’ll put it on the list for the Prospect.”

“You don’t have to do that,” I open the can and take a sip.

“You’re here almost as much as we are,” he states, “It’s not a big deal.” 

I nod realizing just how much I was here. If I wasn’t hanging out with Bishop after a table meeting I was helping Chuckie with the yard books. Or EZ clean. I wasn’t privy to all the details that happened on the other side of the stained glass door. But I knew enough. 

“It doesn’t bother you that I’m here so much?”  

“Na, you class up the joint,” Hank responds. I shake my help with a smile. I knew he was flattering me. It was nice to have people.  For so long Warren kept me from people. I was isolated. And now I had freedom. I could be fully myself. And I couldn’t thank Bishop enough for that. 

My thoughts are interrupted by a bang and a loud crash from outside. Without another thought, the four of us push out of the clubhouse door. The noise was coming from the garage.  

“Mother fucker,” Angel lies on the garage floor as Coco and Gilly lift the bike off of him. I rush back to my SUV and grab my medical bag. I couldn’t stand idly by since there was something I can do to help. I drop to my knees beside him. My eyes quickly scanning over him and I shine a light in his eyes. Watching his eyes dilate.

“Doesn’t appear to be any brain damage,” I give him a slight smile, “well not much.” His pulse was racing, his breathing was labored. “Look at me, Angel. You’ve got to stay calm.” My hand moves along his side and find a screwdriver lodged in his side. 

“Fuck calm,” he grunts as he starts to get up. I shove him back, “Be still you moron.” I hold the screwdriver steady keeping the blood from gushing more. “You have a dislocated shoulder on top of a puncture in your side. It’s in there pretty deep. We really need to get you to the hospital.” 

“Just yank it out, Malibu. Give me a bandaid and a beer,” he groans. 

“And have you bleed all over my shoes, no fucking way,” I responded. “You don’t have to act all macho.  I know it hurts like hell.” I glance back as the guys surround me in a semicircle, waiting for instructions.  I lock my gaze with Bishop’s, “Bring my SUV over and put the back seats down. I can’t fix this here.  And I don’t want you dragging him through a dark, dirty tunnel.”

We hadn’t talked about what happens on the other side of the border, but I knew.  Not everything but enough. Some of the shit that happened they couldn’t explain in a traditional hospital. But Angel is legal and he fell in the garage. 

“Get him in the back,” I keep pressure on his side as Gilly and Riz hoist him up. I climb in as they load him through the hatch. I look down with a half-smile, trying to keep calm. But he was weak and the color was fading from his face. I meet Bishop’s eyes in the rearview and give a nod. “Hurry.”  

It felt like an eternity as we drove the few miles from the scrap yard to Santo Padre Memorial Hospital.  I had the ER on the phone and they were ready as my SUV pulled into the ambulance bay. The hatch opens and the ER doctors help unload him onto a gurney.  I was so focused on keeping my hand pressed to Angel’s side I barely heard the doctors and nurses telling me they got it.  

“You can’t come back here, Nova. Now let us work,” Dr. Ramos says as she takes over keeping the pressure on the wound. The warmth of his blood flowed through my fingers as I let go. They wheel him through the double doors.  I stop and stare after them relaxing only after I feel Bishop’s hands on my shoulders.

“Did someone call EZ or their father?” I wipe my hand across my face as I’m lead to the waiting room. 

“They’re on the way,” Hank says and hands me a rag to wipe the blood from my hands and face. 

“Thanks,” I slide my arms into the dark hoodie that Bishop offered then take a seat beside him.  I didn’t realize how much blood and grease was on my body until I slide the zipper up. I didn’t care how shitty I looked at the moment.  My eyes bounce from the nurses' station to the door watching as Felipe Reyes walks through the automatic doors. He’s met instantly by Taza and Riz. They explain how the bike fell from the lift and fell on top of him.  

I stand up when Ramos comes from the back.  I relax reading her expression.  I knew Angel would be OK before she spoke. He needed fluid antibiotics overnight and he would get to leave in the morning.  Take it easy for a few weeks.  EZ and Felipe are lead to the back to see Angel. 

“Take me home?” I slip my arms around Bishop’s waist. 

“Of course, querida,” his arms around my shoulders as he leads me out of the hospital and to my SUV.  I walked straight from the car through the house and into the bathroom. Bishop helps me strip my clothes from my body.  It wasn’t seductive, it was comforting.  I let him take care of me. He followed me into the shower.  The blood and grime rinse from my body and swirl down the drain. He scrubs my hair and body clean.

I settle with my head resting on his chest in my bed. We lay there quietly as he rubs my shoulder lightly with his thumb. The day had everything. Joy and Fear. I know above anything, that here is where I belong. I just say simply, “I love you.” Before closing my eyes. 

#Mayans #Mayans MC #mayansfx #Bishop Losa #Bishop losa x OC #bishop losa x reader #Bishop losa smut #SOA #sons of anarchy