#cuz i ended up having to play tech support for my friend so she could update her sims mods

[khentkawes]

Tony Stark-antis need to learn some chill and basic narrative comprehension skills. Like really? Again with this bullshit?

Dude, we are ONE episode into Falcon and the Winter Solider and people are already using it as an excuse to resurrect anti-Tony Stark bad takes. Like... WTF fandom? Do we really have to go through this with every single post-Endgame mcu project? Really? When are ya all gonna learn some comprehension skills and actually pick up on what the narrative is trying to say?

Say it with me: the bank loan scene was a not-very-subtle jab at systemic racism and the way black veterans have been treated in American for decades. It’s not an excuse to anti on about how “tOnY sTaRk DiDnT pAy ThE aVeNgErS CuZ hE’s A eVIL bILLIonAiRe!”

Are you all so afraid of talking about systemic racism that you have to blame Tony Stark for Sam not getting a bank loan? Really? After a year of BLM protests and extensive awareness-raising for systemic racism, and y’all still don’t get it?

That’s the real world issue that the narrative was trying to lay out, and it’s the in-universe explanation for that scene, which is trying to address out-of-universe real-world issues. But now let me be petty and go back to the in-universe issues of whether Sam got paid... because this whole take is just pissing me off and I have to rant. So...

Sam hasn’t had a paying job in seven years, and he chose to leave the Avengers when he defied the Sokovia Accords because he blindly follows everything Cap says without ever thinking for himself. He’s been badly written ever since he showed up at the end of Age of Ultron. And that bad writing means he’s just been playing as Cap’s lackey, and in doing so, he CHOSE to leave the Avengers, to reject a government paycheck, and take his chances on the run for two years as a fugitive. So yeah. Two years, no job, no pay. And as far as we can tell, he didn’t do a whole lot of awesome saving-the-world in those two years either. He was just hiding out with Cap and maybe punching a couple of low-level terrorists or something .There certainly weren’t any alien invasions that he stopped in that time. And after that, he was dust for five years. That’s not his fault, obviously, but no one can expect to collect a paycheck while they don’t exist. That’s why the post-Blip economy is probably a bit wonky at the moment. So in total... seven years. No job. No paycheck. Part of that is consequences of Sam’s actions and part of it was through no fault of his own. But yeah, after seven years with no paycheck, there’s a good chance he’s got money issues. Did banks seize assets of those who were blipped? Totally possible.

But now, in-universe, let’s remember that all this bullshit that antis are spewing about “Tony Stark should have set aside money for his friends and teammates” and “Sam saved the world from aliens so many times, so he deserves a pension” and “Tony could set up a trust fund for all of the avengers because they’re his friends!” Yeah. That’s all 100% BS.

First off, Sam Wilson and Tony Stark are not friends in the MCU. Never have been. In Civil War, Tony said, “I know we don’t know each other very well” because they don’t! They’ve NEVER FOUGHT TOGETHER ON THE SAME TEAM! Think about that. Tony wasn’t an active duty avenger between Age of Ultron and Civil War, and that’s the only time period where Sam was an active avenger. So they were never really “teammates” and they weren't friends. They were, at best, acquaintances or coworkers who never worked closely together.

And during that time, when Tony appears to have had little contact with the avengers, he was bankrolling the team. He says, “what, am I doing here? Running a bed and breakfast for a biker gang?” He made the compound and supplied all of the avengers’ tech. He gave them free room and board. It sure looks like they had everything they needed, so it’s entirely possible (even likely) that Tony was paying the Avengers during this time. But that’s all it was. Two years when Sam was an active avenger, Tony wasn’t, but Tony was still bankrolling the team. After that... Sam was a fugitive and then he was dust. So he spent 7 years with no job, and two of those years were by choice, because of Sam’s rejection of being an avenger and refusal to accept a government paycheck. He chose to be a vigilante with Cap, and vigilantism doesn’t supply a paycheck on its own.

And finally... Sam has never saved the world! And he’s only fought aliens during Infinity War and Endgame. So where are people getting this whole, “but Sam should be paid because hE sAvEd tHe wOrLd!”? Uh, no. Not really. He helped in Endgame. He tried to help in Infinity War. And that’s good. That’s important. It’s not nothing. But it’s also not saving the world. In this first episode of TFATWS, Sam literally accepted thanks from a guy who said “you brought my wife back,” when Sam had nothing to do with that. Bruce snapped and brought back all the dusted. Sam had no role in helping for that. Now I get that Sam was probably just being polite. But it’s contributing to this narrative that Sam did more then he actually did. Naw, man. Marvel never cared about Sam Wilson until five minutes ago. So they’ve never actually shown him doing anything that was, well, important. And that’s a fail on Marvel, but if we’re looking at it from a purely in-universe perspective... Sam Wilson doesn’t deserve any more or less than any other government/military contractor. Because that’s what he is now (he’s not an Avengers because the Avengers no longer exist), and that’s what he was up until the last scene of Age of Ultron. Most of his existence, he’s been a solider. He’s a military guy. So if he’s not been getting paid, that’s on the military. Tony, at most, would have paid him for two years of his time and work. The rest is all on the military, including Sam’s current finances.

Which means, you want to blame someone for Sam’s finances and his inability to get a loan? Well, there are three reasons. 1. Sam chose to leave the Avengers to become a fugitive with Cap, which means he had no job and no paycheck for two years. That’s the consequences of his actions. 2. the military either stopped paying him at some point, or hasn’t been paying him enough/quick enough in the past six months since the Blip. Military pay for veterans and veterans’ access to benefits is a real problem, but it’s a military problem. And it’s possible that any back-pay or pension that Sam is owed is tied up in red tape, which is probably only exacerbated by his time as a fugitive (which might mean he was made ineligible for any pension). And finally 3. systemic racism. His sister was pretty clear on the fact that “people like us” are the ones who always seems to be denied loans. She was saying that there is money available for loans, but it always go to white folks first. Maybe try listening to the black character explain why they believe they aren’t getting paid. Sam (when not on the run or blipped) was living a pretty cushy life as a supporting avenger for two years. He apparently didn’t have to think about how systemic racism could affect his family because he was temporarily insulated from it. Now that layer of protection is gone because he’s not living in a cushy compound away from the real world (which, for the record, is probably a good thing. I think the Avengers being so isolated from the real world is probably partially what led to the problems in Civil War). So now Sam is going to be confronted with the reality that systemic racism is real and can affect anybody, regardless of your fame or your job. And after the past year of discussions on race, the fandom shouldn’t be surprised by this narrative.

I am so sick of every single MCU project post-Endgame being twisted by antis who just want to use it to hate Tony Stark. I mean, seriously. Give it a rest, people! Try reading the narrative the way it was intended and stop twisting it for your hate-Tony-Stark obsession.

#falcon and the winter solider spoilers #tfatws spoilers #barely but still #tony stark defense squad #antis need to be quiet #fandom discourse is exhausting #yall make it harder for me to care about anything associated with captain america and now that's beginning to include sam wilson #khent rants #marvel critical #kinda #i wanted to like the new shows #but the marvel writers are shit #i did enjoy wandavision #even though it had some problems #and i loved seeing rhodey in tfatws ep #khent's marvel discussions #khent's posts

[adamarinayu]

Since I can’t draw right now (it’s like 1 AM) I decided I’d just write things down about Domestic DUno AU (I still don’t have a proper name for it!!) so here we go~

Info below the cut to spare the mobile users my ramblings~~

BACKSTORY STUFF 

-Donald first became PK as a teenager (14 or 15), pulling petty pranks and avenging perceived wrongdoings. He ended up accidentally becoming a hero after stopping a thief and unknowingly saving a young girl’s life, and he realized he could direct his temper, anger and frustration not at making other people miserable, but at protecting others. Gyro, who went to school with Donald (Donald and Della attended a private school that would accommodate their adventure schedule; Gyro, being the absolute genius he is, attended on a scholarship) was there and ended up helping, being the one to inadvertently provide PK with the weapon he fended off the criminals with. PK talked to Gyro and the two became partners in crime-fighting that way.

-After deciding to become a hero, it was small-town villains mostly that he dealt with. Thieves, and the like. He didn’t start fighting mutants and those kinds of things until he was 17 or so, and the Evronians didn’t show up until he was 18. This is when Scrooge gave him a summer job at his newly acquired tower, figuring since Donald didn’t want to go with him and Della on a three-month adventure (as Donald was needed in Duckburg, he couldn’t be gone for three months!!) then he may as well work and earn a little money. As Duckworth was still alive, Duckworth was in charge of the manor, so Donald didn’t need to worry about upkeeping the mansion.

-Donald met Uno after a failed attempt to fight the Evronians, and they partnered up, with Uno providing Donald with otherworldly advanced tech that Gyro... would probably understand if given the time and chance (come on, he built a time machine out of a bathtub, he could totally understand future tech). After the first battle with the Evronians that Donald eventually wins, he realized that the game had just just 10x more dangerous. Between working on his doctorate and interning for Scrooge’s science department (something the scientists working for Scrooge were salty about), Gyro didn’t have much time to work on new and improved inventions for PK so when Uno contacted Gyro about him stepping down from helping PK, Gyro agreed, acknowledging that the mysterious Uno Ducklair would probably be a better benefactor for the hero. He didn’t know PK’s identity, though, so he didn’t take the memory erasing candy. Instead he focused on his work.

-Years passed this way, with Donald and Uno working together. Of course Donald had his other adventures, such as with Jose and Panchito and Mickey and all them lovely folks, but Uno was his closest confidante and biggest supporter. He was the one he vented his frustrations with Della and Scrooge to, and the one to give him advice on how to deal with it and talk to them about it all.

-At some point during this time, Gladstone finds out Donald is PK. Of course it happens in the typical Lucky way- him finding out saved Donald’s life. Gladstone is shaken up by the knowledge that his cousin/brother is in danger every day and has almost died multiple times. Gladstone becomes a sort of third member of the whole Crime Fighting thing, yep, you heard it right, Cloverleaf is real here. He figures if he’s out in the field with Donald, then Donald will never die because of Gladstone’s supernaturally good luck. Uno, while frustrated with Gladstone’s unpredictable and illogical luck, accepts this. Donald is less keen because he doesn’t want Gladstone in danger’s path but when the gander makes up his mind it’s made up, yo.

-PK and Cloverleaf (CL from here on out) and Uno work together for 3 years before the Spear of Selene incident, where Donald is suddenly left with three eggs. Donald’s priorities now shifted, he quits being a hero and buys the houseboat so he can raise the triplets without Scrooge’s influence. Gladstone does what he can to help while trying to continue to protect Duckburg, and while watching CL on the news Donald has the sudden realization that Duckburg still needs him- new parent or not. So he (metaphorically!!) throws the eggs into their pram, rushes to Ducklair Tower, begs Lyla to watch the eggs for him and rushes off to CL’s aid. 

-After the danger is over, Donald collects the eggs, thanks Lyla for her help, then meets up with CL and Uno on the 151st floor where they have a serious conversation. Donald acknowledges that Duckburg still needs PK, but Della’s children also need him. The three eventually come to the conclusion that the kids would be raised by PK and Uno there in the Tower, where they would be safe- and they would be trained so they’re ready for anything thrown at them. (Gladstone is actually the one who is like “nah cuz you be their dad I’m not cut out for that, I’ll be the cool uncle, I don’t wanna live in the tower! No offense Uno” so it isn’t like Donald just decided to leave him out of the parenting)

-The eggs hatch and Donald names them sensible (AKA not Della’s list) names (and pronounces Llewellyn correctly dammit) and Donald and Uno have a time learning hands-on how to be parents. (“I’ve read twenty different parenting guides in the last five seconds and they’re all saying different things, Donald, WHAT DO WE DO-”) The whole “raising kids together” thing brings them even closer than before and forces them to have a chat about their feelings, too. 

-When the triplets are small and starting to run around, Uno baby proofs everything. He has a hard time keeping them from escaping their playpen (which is essentially a huge room with an amazing view of the city, he doesn’t know why they’re so intent on escaping). Then eventually the inevitable happens- both Don and Glad end up stuck on the other side of the world for nearly a whole month, and Uno realizes taking care of three toddlers is much easier when you have a body. So while they’re gone, he balances his time between advising them on their mission, taking care of the triplets and building an android body that can handle an AI as advanced as him (throw out that “an AI who is only good could never make a full person” shit cuz Uno can be petty as hell, he’s a whole ass person even without Due yo). By the time Don and Glad get back he’s testing his prototype. Donald is thrilled, of course- his boyfriend has a body now!

-The triplets gain a sister! Everett brings a child to them one day, a little Coronan girl who was for reasons I haven’t decided yet cast out of her family and Everett, with his weird Enlightened Powers shit, went and found her and brought her back to the people he knew would take care of her well (considering his own past failures...). And so the triplets have a little sister who is an alien! Yee! Yes it’s Asveya (Ve). She came to them when she was ~2 and the triplets were 3 or 4, and as she didn’t have a name Donald named her after a friend he met as a child, when he regularly adventured with Scrooge and Della, and whom he ended up meeting again as a young adult.

-Uno perfects the body over time as he learns more things about being a person (he very purposefully leaves out pain receptors, though he includes the best parts of being a physical person ofc- he wants his cake and he wants to eat it too!). Everett decides now that Uno has a body, it was time to introduce him as his son officially and hand the business over to him (stating that it’ll be good for the kids if at least one of their parents had a proper job and income, since savings don’t last forever), and as the kids get older Donald begins training them so they’ll be able to take care of/protect themselves if need be. Uno creates a training field/obstacle course that is fun and age-appropriate, and by the time they’re ten they’re like little superheroes in training. They can give Webby a run for her money. Ve is less interested in being like PK and more interested in being like Uno- AKA the techie behind the gadgets.

-The triplets are already playing with some rudimentary pieces of tech Ve made, playing like they’re superheroes (or villains, gotta have someone to fight!). Uno finds out when he reviews the Tower footage and immediately confiscates anything that can be dangerous, but lets them keep the more innocent stuff.

MODERN DAY STUFF (AKA the time the show takes place)

-As the kids got older Donald and Uno allowed them more freedom, even letting them go out on their own (with the promise of being back before dark, not telling anyone what their parents did for a living, they all stuck together and they didn’t speak to strangers beyond what was necessary). When the triplets were 10 and Ve was 8 or 9, Uno learned that a powerful artifact (not the gem) was in Atlantis and that if a villain got their hands on it, it would be... very bad. So Donald decides it’s time to put on his metaphorical adventure shoes again and go get it. By this time Gladstone got trapped in the casino (Uno has been looking for him, after not hearing from him for over a week) and Uno had a Big Business thing to attend, real important too, so they talk about getting a babysitter for the weekend they’ll be gone. The kids manage to convince them they don’t need one, as they’ll be safe in the 151st floor (“We’ll be safer there than anywhere else, right, Uncle Uno?”). Donald tried to call Lyla but she was unfortunately in the field, so he agreed to let them stay home on their own until Uno got back (Uno did the math and figured he could stay for a few hours to just make a good faith appearance, talk business with some stooges and then come home the same day).

-Of course, the kids get caught. Uno had already left out for his business thing at like 5 AM, and Donald was about to head out to Atlantis in one of the Duckmobiles. He happened to check on a whim the back of the mobile, where he found his surprised ducklings staring wide-eyed up at him. He knew then that he needed to cash in on a favour- he called Beakley and then drove the protesting children to the mansion. (“Come on, Unca’ Donald!” “It’s a mansion! We wanna go to the lost city, too!” “Come on, we’ve been doing real good in training!” “Please, dad? We promise we’ll listen!”) The excitement over meeting THE Scrooge McDuck is overshadowed by the disappointment that they can’t go on this mission.

-Besides, who cares about a mansion and a rich adventuring duck when your parents and uncle are not only rich adventurers, but they’re also superheroes???

-Donald gives them a forehead kiss goodbye and heads off, and Scrooge has Beakley put the kids in that old room. “It’ll only be a few hours” they said. “Until Uno gets back.” Unfortunately, Uno calls Louie and tells the duckling there’s been a problem and he won’t be back until later- Donald already informed him of the changed arrangements and he’s already contacted Beakley.

-The kids decide to escape the old room, putting their hero training into action, but are ultimately swept up into Webby’s trap. Webby is super excited to meet them when she realizes who they are (though she has no idea who Ve is), and she cuts them down from the net without them having to escape themselves. The kids know they’re not supposed to let anyone know about the “hero family” thing so try to act like normal kids, though it becomes apparent Webby doesn’t know how to be a normal kid either.

-Through shenanigans, the children inspire Scrooge to adventure again, and Dewey lets slip about lost cities and Scrooge has a moment of realization. Thus, he drags the kids to Atlantis with him. While there, the kids each get a chance to show off their moves (which they’re SUPPOSED TO HIDE but you know, when arrows are flying at you ain’t got no time to hide). Donald is pissed when he notices them in Atlantis, and Uno is pissed when he calls Donald and learns the kids are in Atlantis, right where they are NOT supposed to be.

-Things pretty much follow the episode, though with the triplets able to hold their own and Donald gunning for a completely different artifact. When they escape and get back to the surface with their respective artifacts, they’re met by a livid android who absolutely chews Scrooge out for dragging four ten year olds and an eight year old to a dangerous place like that.

-Donald decides that it might be okay for the kids to visit with Scrooge sometimes, to get a little real-world experience, and at precisely that moment something crashes into the 151st floor of Ducklair Tower. Uno is absolutely furious (“MY TOWER???”) cuz that’s gonna take a bit to fix- at the very least it’ll appear to take a while- and when the kids question “what now?” Scrooge offers up some rooms in the mansion. The kids are excited cuz they’ll get to live with Webby and explore a new place. Donald and Uno say “just until the tower is fixed” (Gladstone had Donald’s boat at the time he went missing so Donald doesn’t have it) which is good enough for the kids.

-Scrooge being sus of Uno for like a whole arc cuz he’d never heard of Uno Ducklair before recently and also his nephew?? got married??? 

-Gladstone finally gets a message out to Don and Uno for help, and they go immediately- but not before Scrooge makes it a family adventure. Scrooge is disparaging of Gladstone, but Donald is just worried about his cousin. They manage to save Gladstone without pseudo-sacrificing anyone. Scrooge gets a little sus when they get back to Duckburg, and days later the missing Cloverleaf has shown up again. 

-HDLV ended up spilling the truth to Webby as she got closer with them, but they swore her to secrecy. Of course Beakley found out because Webby is a terrible liar.

**So basically Donald + Uno parents, a kid that calls them her dads, good Uncle Gladstone, Brotherly Gladstone + Donald, Competent Cloverleaf, PK + Cloverleaf teamup, little-hero triplets. Gyro will end up teaming up with Gizmoduck when Fenton takes up heroing, too, just like Launchpad teams up with DW (DW’s story for this AU will be different, also, just a heads up) and basically all their combined kids become a badass team of children (Huey, Dewey, Louie, Webby, Ve, Boyd, Gos, and of course Lena and Violet join in later...) Gyro teams up with Gizmoduck because every hero needs a tech guy (even heroes who are also scientists....) and he’s not only very capable, he’s worked with a hero before so he knows the ins and outs :D

However it is now 2 AM and I need to sleep so I’m gonna end my musings here but I am thinking of them so much right now I’m

#Domestic DUno AU #I still need a proper title for it #DT17 AU #PK AU #DUno #I miiiight add some Drakepad and Fenro....... #I'm a sucker for hero/sidekick pairings #Also featuring science family! #I like Gandra I really do but the hero/sidekick mannn #I mean Fenton had two hands so maybe.................

[neokonewman]

Honestly? I think what tangled failed to do was make sure characters had good chemistry as friends. Seriously Cass and Rapunzel where like crude oil and the ocean. One single match from destruction. Season one is bottom barrel because it goes out of it's way to excuse Frederick for his shit. Season two was actually really good because Rapunzel was still herself and was making tough choices left and right. Season 3? Ohhhh boy. Season 3 was a half good half bad because while I do applaud her trying to bring her friend back into the fold? Cassandra wasn't wrong when she said "this has to stop now. This thing where you THINK you've been my friend". Cuz as far as I could tell? They were never friends. Hell even when being a slow burn villain, Varian had better friend chemistry with Rapunzel. When the show expects me to swallow "Cass and I are besties.and sisters!" whole sale? I'm not buying it.

Oooooh boy! This ask is just dripping with potential rant power. Sorry in advance for how long this answer is destinied to be!

First things first. I absolutely agree with you on how badly TTS handles chemistry amongst the main characters. Cass gets the worst of it because she is shoehorned as Rapunzel’s BFF off screen and suddenly she has equal sway on Rapunzel as Eugene? Her character can’t even be allowed to breathe most of the time because the show is obsessed with sticking her next to Rapunzel to the point that she can’t grow any further away from her. At least other show original characters like Lance and Varian have an actual introduction and a place in the world outside of Rapunzel, but even then they suffer because Rapunzel is upfront and center and there is very little wiggle room for interactions that don’t have at least have some involvement with her. It’s here where our opinions differ however.

I would make the bold claim by sayin that S1 of TTS is by far and away the best out of the three. Yes it has the glaring flaw of bias for Frederic and against Varian that makes me question whether or not it should be considered “good” but it’s much better balanced than the other two seasons that follow it. In S1 we actually get character who aren’t Rapunzel more chances to shine without her stealing the spotlight away at the last moment. In S1 we actually have an actual conflict that drives the story forward and at least pretends to care about developing the characters. Even the obnoxious bias could have still worked out in the shows favor if they were ever properly addressed in story and not swept under the rug like they were in later seasons. Heck, I would go as far as to argue that the worst parts of S1 is the fact that S2 and S3 make it worse retroactively.

S2 in my opinion is the dullest of the three, by a wide margin. With them never addressing what the mains left behind in S1 as well as taking the threat of the rocks away WAY too early, the conflict is particularly nonexistent. Not only that, but it does what I think is the worst thing a show can do during a season long journey. They never actually develop the world outside of Corona. They established that there are 6 other kingdoms in the alliance with Corona, but the most we get of any of them is the one throwaway line about them being close to the mountains of Koto in Freebird. Other than that we overstay in three separate places that end up being worthless to the plot as a whole. After spending three episodes in Vardaros right out the bat, we never return or what’s become of them afterwards. Them mains stranded on the Island is pretty dull and is only memorable to me because they had the guts of mentioning Varian again and established that Rapunzel STILL has an unhealthily delusional bias for Frederic despite of everything. The House of Yesterday’s tomorrow is just an excuse of shoehorning a bunch of magical hijink cliches that aren’t done very interesting. Heck, despite them spending a whole season getting to the Dark Kingdom, they only spend an episode and a half there and only a single night in universe. The rest of S2 is just filler that don’t even develop the characters or tell any interesting stories. Like, an enchanted forest episode even though the mid season finale takes place in another enchanted forest? A repeat of the first part of Tangled the movie with Cass replacing Eugene? Whatever the heck “Curses” was supposed to accomplish? The only thing interesting that S2 introduces is the Brotherhood, and we all know how little they are used afterwards.

I would also like to point out that at the start of S2, the mains just…. Stop developing almost entirely? Cass and Eugene never have any meaningful moments together like they do in S1, and are reduced to just taking potshots at each other to remind us that they have some sort of relationship. Lance is reduced strictly to comedic relief and in my opinion is just there to give Eugene something to do when he is removed from the plot because once again, the show is obsessed with making Rapunzel and Cass’ friendship be a thing that only matters. Hookfoot is just there to give his stand up routine about how marriage is terrible in the first episode of the season and just to exist afterwards, yet he SOMEHOW gets actual episodes focused on him while Lance suffers. Even characters properly introduced this season are cursed to never flesh out because Adira keeps pulling a vanishing act for no established reason, Hector is only gets any lines in his debut episode and never given any real focus again, and Edmund gets the same treatment as the other dads (except maybe Captain) by getting his entire character reduced to one trope later on in S3. Speaking of…

S3…. Ooooh boy S3. It’s not as boring as S2 for me, but that’s only because it’s a media equivalent of a train wreck that I couldn’t look away from. It’s like they took the two major issues of the past two seasons (the clear bias and shallow filler) and mashed them together while trying to savage it by inserting what worked in S1, (actual conflict) but completely missed the point why it worked in the first place. All pretense of caring about any other character other than Rapunzel and Cass is gone in this season. Even episodes that focus on anyone outside of Rapunzel, ends up ending with Rapunzel saving the day because she is the only one allowed to be heroic anymore.

They try to make Cass’ villain arc as complex as Varian’s but for some reason they think her blaming a literal baby for being kidnapped is enough grounds to go on a murder streak without one episode of hesitation. Lance is just there for bottom barrel dumb humor, yet the show thinks he is responsible enough to raise two kids on his own. Varian falls into the pigeon hole of just being the “kid character that hangs with the grown up mains” trope that he managed to avoid in S1 while also being just a plot device to not only give the mains access to tech, but also get shoehorned into scenes to keep the audience somewhat invested. Eugene is literal retconned in universe to be just a bland supportive boyfriend. Rapunzel, my gosh Rapunzel…. She treated is so painfully “perfect” to the point that she is completely unrelated. I’m not calling her a Mary Sue because they only ACT like she is perfect. She is still a hugely flawed human being, but the other characters just applaud her because she is “the magical, wonderous sundrop” and very little else. Also yes, Rapunzel being obsessed over Cass while playing off all the horrible actions her BFF as her being lost is the most frustrating thing ever. It’s as if she became Frederic from S1 and abandoned everyone else well being in favor of one person who doesn’t even want her attention, only worse because it’s made into a good thing. Again, S1 is made retroactively worse because of the seasons that follow it.

There is much more things wrong with S3 than S2, but honestly I find myself changing my mind a lot whether which one is objectively worse. Like making a show boring is arguably the worst thing you can do, but the choices, morals, and all around writing of S3 is just bad. Then again the writing in S2 is honestly pretty on par with S3 at times, so again, it’s a toss up.

Sorry again if this answer is a lot, but it was pretty fun at the same time. Thanks for the ask. ^^

#long post #tangled criticism #tangled discourse #negativity #negative #not tagging the main tags anymore to avoid spamming #discourse mention #also cass and rapunzel are just not sisters #not even in a sisters from another mister sense #it’s okay to just be friends with your friends #heck i would argue whether or not they should be even considered friends at all sometimes #neo muses #neo rants #neo answers #jade-rosepine

[starcookiechu]

ROTT Review

SPOILERS FOR THE MOVIE. You have been warned.

FYI: I just finished the movie. So my opinions may change a bit but here I am writing a full review.

Before I talk about the movie, I have to say this movie has fantastic animation. The music is as good as usual.

Ok now the story. Let’s start with the our Trollhunters.

Fair Lady Claire. My girlie Claire really brought her all into this. I’m really proud of the young woman she has grown up into. However for the sake of the plot and story they make her run out of magic juice quite a bit. But my girl is still the best and gives it her all.

Wingman Domzalski. I will be perfectly honest. Toby is kind of the annoying best friend at times and bothers me as a plus size person. (They really push the over eating thing to the point that it’s his biggest factor.) Toby is a very eager kid who is ready to get in the action. Never being negative to his friend but the best emotional support who will always be at his side. Sure Toby was used a bit as comedic relief in the movie but when push comes to shove, Toby will always be there to do the right thing.

Blinky is amazing as always. One of the best father figures out there.

Aarrrgh was there. Was great for the scenes he was in, but all together didn’t do much that altered the story.

Our Trollhunter, Jim Lake Jr. Someone I admire and basically see as my little brother/child. Kiddo really did it. I know everyone is upset that Jim’s arc was redone when we had the “Unbecoming” episode. If I could come to a peaceful middle ground, I saw we all need to blame Merlin. He really rocked Jim’s world and self worth. When the creator of the object you need to save the world with tells you “You’re not enough”, it really can be a great setback. But once we past that, Jim really pulled through. Amulet or not, he is our Trollhunter.

Mommy Dr. Lake was there. Barbara was mostly there for our emotions.

Dilf Strickler. I felt that he was changed a bit since we last saw him, but he had a new purpose. He was more cautious and happy because he had a chance at a happy life with Barbara. Which makes what happens to him more upsetting. 

Nomura my sweet. This movie did not deserve you. At least she was with Draal.

And Not-Enrique (seriously why didn’t they ever give him an actual name) just wasn’t in the movie.

How about some CreepSlayers?

BABY ELI PEPPERJACK CAME BACK LOOKING SO CUTE. So proud.

Bumbling knight oaf Steve the Palchuckian was great as usual.

I will say though. The whole pregnancy plot was just a way to get Eli and Steve out of the way. I could feel that the writers maybe didn’t like Steve so much since Wizards. But Steve was once again someone to laugh at. Pregnant and out of the way.

How about some Akiridions?

Aja my darling girl, oh how you’ve grown. I understand some think she has changed. However I must say that her preparing a plan B on the side was smart. She isn’t just a princess on earth anymore. She is a queen on a distant planet. So if she thought evacuation was best, it would ensure that everyone would live. And avoid losing more valuable people from her life. So no, I can’t blame her.

DJ Kleb was there. He was kinda doin his own thing and messing with Steve. Brother-in-law stuff.

It was good to see Varvatos Vex.

Stu was the man in the background working on the busy important things like working on the amulet. Personally I feel like the series REALLY underutilizes Stu A LOT so I was so happy to see him being a part of something huge.

And finally some Wizards.

Douxie my love, you were amazing as usual. His powers have grown greatly and have contributed to the adventure. But god the writers really do love to take everything away from him don’t they. It’s unfair.

Archie was kinda just there and just... I understand leaving Douxie but that doesn’t mean I like it.

Nari the sweetest. I can only imagine the guilt she felt to end Nomura. Her self sacrifice was probably the one in the movie most called for.

Alright now I’ll talk about the movie.

I can whole heartedly say this movie was rushed. To be honest I feel like the original writers weren’t completely in this. At least it felt kind of not so much Trollhunters or 3Below vibes but more Wizards, if that makes sense whatsoever. Something is off.

I just want to blame Merlin for everything. To hell with that guy.

The beginning sequence was great. A car chase to a moving train. Which ends up with Toby of course screwing up and breaking the brakes. Of course. The train falling off the tracks which ultimately ends up with Nari gone. Oh yeah, and video recordings of Magic, trolls and being taken in by the police. Great.

WHY TF WAS TOBY TELLING THEIR STORY TO THE POLICE. YOU DON’T MIX THE POLICE IN STORIES UNLESS YOU KNOW THE COP PERSONALLY. CUZ IT’S A MESS AND THE POLICE GET IN THE WAY. GDI TOBY.

Our heroes go back to base on the new and improved Camelot. Where we discover that Barbara and Strickler are now engaged. Happy news and would secure that Jim has another Father figure in his life and his mother’s happiness. Which explains Strickler’s “stay behind” advice. Now he has a family to watch over. He must be careful and warns that Jim’s actions could cost so much that he might not be able to afford.

Enters our Majesty Aja and the new stud on the block, Eli. Dang I wish puberty hit me like that.Truck-kun strikes again. And also enters... the pregnancy thing. I will say, I didn’t mind it too much... at first. But there are complications. Steve is too young to be a father and dang 7 kisses?? I can’t help but feel like Aja should have mentioned that or it was a last minute plan to write out Steve and Eli. (Which it was.) It was funny sure cuz omegaverse and ALIENS but all together it’s really iffy.

They really had Douxie preform a body-swap spell only so it would be undone. And undoing the spell only hurt them both?? C’mon. C’mon.

And they mention the Krohnisfere. We’ll get back to it. Jim gets a brand new amulet infused with Akaridion tech. However theres an issue. It was created by Merlin right? Who is a wizard right? Who uses MAGIC. Shame Douxie wasn’t there to help make it. Ya know. 1/2 of the original creator of the AMULET. So it’s missing a huge part and for the sake of the plot, Jim doesn’t test the Amulet which is out of character personally.

Toby makes a silly big deal over a penny. I was actually hoping they would make it a silly Chekhov's gun later on. But no, it’s just Toby being loud and comedic relief.

The titans are released and we visit a very pregnant Steve. Ok so it’s a rushed kind of thing. ok.

Aja suggests evacuation. You can say it’s out of character but we need context. When Aja helped in the Doomsday Battle, she was ensured a way out but if she let the people of Arcadia perish. She decided to stay and help. But now the Trollhunter himself can’t help. So to ensure the survival of everyone, evacuation. A best chance for everyone to survive. Plus she is now a Queen. She rules over a whole planet which must change her thinking.

Now our characters are split into 3 teams:

Blinky, Archie, Archie’s dad and Claire for the Krohnisfere.

Jim, Aja, Toby, Strickler and Barbara for the Glacial Titan.

Nomura, Douxie and Aarrgh for the Earth Titan.

Now here is where I have problems. WHY. DID. THEY. SEND. TROLLS. TO. BRAZIL. IN. THE. DAY. Nomura dying was just so out of pocket. Unnecessary. I couldn’t even grieve properly I didn’t have a chance to process. The best thought I could think was “At least she’s with Draal now.” 10 seconds later, Strickler makes the choice to sacrifice himself. Because of Jim’s heroic’s, Strickler decided to try to save the most important people in his life. The person who was always dishonest finally had a chance to live a happy life with his family. The one who played it safe now had to make the final impulsive move. And unfortunately, his death was in vain. These deaths were just so forced. It wasn’t in any way good. And Strickler being one of the best written characters just going in such a way was just off. He died for nothing. He could have turned back and fought another battle but... no.

(BTW Barbara was just there... for Strickler’s death.)

We move to Babara and Jim having a heart to heart. I’m glad she didn’t blame Jim but a small moment of anger. Something a little more real for me but no I guess. Barbara will always just be Jim’s mom. She mention’s Jim’s father and it passed so quickly I missed it on my initial viewing. I’m happy that Jim’s father is never revealed or made a bigger part in his story. This is good representation for those of us who did have our fathers walk out on us. That we can grow despite our parents failing us.

And finally team Krohnisfere. Archie just leaves. He’s gone. Poor Douxie. A mentor and now his closest companion.

Our heroes meet up to go against the Volcanic Titan. In comes Varvatos Vex on a Gun Robot. Nice to see some good ol Gundam with a character mentioned throughout the entire trilogy. However it doesn’t last. BTW for the sake of survival, Aja leaves Jim and Toby. Iffy.

Douxie pulls a “Jason stop. This isn’t you.” thing with Nari and is reunited with his friend.(+ points for the shippers. It’s kinda winning me over?) Also, Claire now has the power to teleport a Titan. I know she’s much stronger than she was for the Trollhunters Sn 2 finale, but cmon. You can’t just say she’s out of magic juice and then pull this. C’mon.

(btw did the titan make a War of the Worlds tripod sound? No? Just me?)

Nari sacrifices herself and takes the other god with her. Which takes away Douxie’s other companion. Mr. Stark I don’t feel so good. Why does this movie hate Douxie so much. (I am so sorry shippers. Angst.)

BLINKY DIDN’T SEE A PAGE? ADDRESSING IT IN THE SHOW DOESN’T GIVE YOU A PASS. I forgot the word but this irony isn’t greatttt.

Jim now has to pull out the legendary sword Excalibur. But he can’t cuz he hasn’t harnessed the power of friendship.

And Steve is giving birth. At the worst time. What is this a zombie movie??? C’mon.

Jim says “Magic is friendship” And Stu is finally being used for one grand act. Seriously Stu is just so unappreciated. So he fixes the amulet with magic.

Basically everyone who went on top of the Volcanic titan falls off at some point. Except Jim cuz of course some 1v1. 

ONCE AGAIN Claire is out of magic juice. Because... reasons.

Toby makes the choice to race to Jim’s side with the technology to cancel out magic. (Wait how does science stop magic again)

BTW, For the Good of all doesn’t hit as well BUT it’s not mentioning any glory towards stinky Merlin so I am happy with the change.

JIM HAS A NEW TRANSFORMATION. MY BOY. MY SON. I’M SO PROUD.

Toby races to Jim and his helmet falls off the taco truck. That honestly should have been a huge warning sign. I was worried he didn’t have armor but we know how this goes.

Jim defeats the final titan and everyone is happy. The fight is finally over.

STEVE HAS 7 KIDS. OUCH. 

Seeing Jim run to Toby was heartbreaking. Now this is the one scene where the movie really let out actually process a character’s death. How on earth can you process your best friend, your most faithful companion dying. Jim goes through too much I swear to god.

Now let’s discuss the time travel plot. I honestly feel like they pulled some kind of Attack on Titan ending. The main character burdened with knowing the future and what could have been. And if everything is meant to be how it will be, destiny will reconnect them again. (Jlaire reincarnation AU???)

I’m actually ok with this ending. I understand people would want the time stone to return only a few minutes. But even then, the kiddos still have police records, so many people dead at the titan’s hands (or feet) and now the world knows about the existence of trolls thanks to the internet. In New York no less. And people are still dead.

We return the the beginning of everything, reflecting the “Unbecoming” episode.

(NGL I’m bothered that they didn’t do anything to stop Steve from bullying Eli, but Jim can’t do it. He’s saving it for Toby.)

And now finally, let’s discuss Toby becoming the Trollhunter. From the beginning, Toby never considered himself good enough to be the main star. Always the wingman, the 2nd best. Support. Now it was Toby’s turn to climb the ranks and be the Hero he’s always wanted to be. It’s Jim’s turn to live an easier high school life. I don’t doubt that he won’t follow Toby. But now he knows what to avoid and how to make the story process more smoothly.

I understand some are unsatisfied with this ending, which is kinda trademarked with Dreamwork’s shows. I get it. But honestly as of right now, I think I like the ending.

The amulet didn’t choose Jim because this Jim is not the same Jim as in Sn 1 Ep 1. He is a new man. And I think we all can agree that it’s his turn to be happy.

---

I still love this series so much. It is my favorite cartoon. Of course it has it’s flaws, but this ending is at least satisfactory and not heartbreaking. Now it’s up to us to either continue the story or contribute our ideas in fanfiction. I look forward to everyone’s creations.

Don’t think. Become.

#rise of the titans #rott spoilers #trollhunters rott #wizards rott #3below rott #Trollhunters #3below #wizards #tales of arcadia #toa trollhunters #toa 3below #toa wizards #toa

[solalunar-eclipse]

Scars You Can’t See - Chapter 2

Chapter title: Escape (from the city)

Word count: about 3500

Some small word choice has been edited.

If you’re here from the updated first chapter, please scroll down to the bolded line! The story continues there.

Previous | Next

Rouge looked out the window cautiously, sliding along the wall and peering around the window frame. She snapped the curtain shut a second later, spinning to face the others. Her eyes were wide. “Crap. They’re here. G.U.N. is here. They want the file- and us, probably. Chaos...I wonder if they want to ‘disappear’ us like in those spy movies.”

“Now who isn’t helping?” Omega said snarkily, aware that Shadow seemed to be on the verge of an actual panic attack. 

Rouge glowered at him, before ignoring his comment entirely. “Alright, we probably have a few minutes, max, before they break down the door and try to get us. Omega, start packing. We need nonperishable food and water in case we can’t show ourselves in public, and we’ll want money. Hang on to our office supplies, too- we might need those. I am going to talk to Shadow and try to help him out a little. Good? Be ready to go in five.”

She sat Shadow down on the couch. His body was shaking slightly and his breathing was unsteady.

“Okay, hon, what’s got you so stressed?”

He shivered silently, refusing to speak- he could be very stubborn when he wanted to be.

Rouge rubbed his back cautiously. “Talk to me, Shadow. Just talk. We can work on solving everything later, but you’ve got to get it out there so that I can help. Please?”

Shadow gave in. Again. His friends were far too good at getting him to open up- words spilled from his mouth faster than he could say them, crashing into each other. “It- it all started when I had to carry the guns again- they were barely tolerable during the invasion, but now all they do is remind me of that day- I can’t help but remember that it was them who did it all to me…”

His voice was tight, but he fought past it. “It makes me sick thinking about it, and the idea that they could do that again. But- they have the power, I don’t want everyone to hate me...what if- what if they do it, tell the world lies about me to retaliate for outing them, and Tails, Silver, Sonic can’t look at me the same? What if they believe G.U.N.?”

Rouge kept her hand on his shoulder, not sure of what else she could do. The bat knew she had only scratched the surface of his struggles, and it was already painful for her to watch. “They won’t! They would never, I can tell you that. Right now, though, we have to focus on making sure we get the word out about this so that G.U.N. can’t do it again, alright? One step at a time. Then we’ll deal with whatever comes next. And I promise Omega and I will always be here for you, no matter what.”

“If you say so...okay.” Shadow sighed. He could deal with this more later. Right now, the agents were here, ready to hurt his friends. They had to run, and Rouge and Omega would support him through everything. That could hold him together. For now.

Omega appeared in the doorway. “Are you ready to go? I do not wish to be turned into scrap metal.”

“Yes.” Shadow said, his voice slightly stronger. “Let’s get out of here.”

------------------------------ STORY CONTINUES HERE ---------------------------------

The three jumped into the high-tech convertible from earlier- now plus two impressively packed suitcases- and peeled out of the garage at full speed. Rouge was driving, since Shadow still wasn’t at a hundred percent. They could all hear the G.U.N. agents shouting behind them as they drove wildly away, but Rouge forced herself to focus on the road despite them.

The hybrid picked up his phone, knowing what he had to do next. It didn’t make this any better, though.

He dialed the number.

“Hello. This is Shadow.”

“Hi, Shads! What’s up! You busy?” an instantly recognizable voice chirped.

“I am in fact busy at the moment. That is why I am calling.”

“Aw, really?” Sonic sounded disappointed. “I was gonna ask if you could come over and race.”

“I’m afraid I cannot. Rouge, Omega and I are currently trying our best to not be captured by about twenty angry G.U.N. agents, so racing is… not an option right now.”

He heard a gasp from the other end of the line. “What?! Wait, what happened? Is there anything you need?”

Shadow smiled faintly- that was Sonic, always looking out for others. “Omega stole some files on my sister and her death. We spoke to G.U.N. beforehand, and they refused to do anything about their actions or even admit wrongdoing, so. We’re calling them out on it by finding proof of what they did.”

“They wouldn’t apologize? For that?!” Sonic yelled. “Jerks! I can’t believe you work for them!”

“Well, I strongly suspect that we are all fired, so that solves that problem.” Shadow replied dryly.

“Good! But you should’ve quit- show them who’s boss! If you need a place to stay while you’re taking them out, you can come crash with us, y’know.”

“That is a kind offer, Sonic, but I’m afraid I must turn you down. G.U.N. is already going to come in and question both you and Tails, and I don’t want you getting in any more trouble than you need.”

Sonic groaned. “Ugh, this whole thing sounds like one of those overly complicated super-secret missions you guys always go on. Or used to go on, whatever. There isn’t any butt-kicking in any of this- wish there was some dude I could beat up and then it’d be fixed.”

Shadow’s smile grew wider. “If only.” Then it faded. “I hope you understand why I won’t be able to tell you where we’re going or what our plans are from now on. The less you know, the safer you are. Despite this, don’t let G.U.N. take you or anyone else anywhere. You might not come back.”

He heard the skepticism in Sonic’s voice. “Seriously? You think so?”

“I know so. Be careful, Sonic. These people aren’t crazy geniuses- they’re ruthless destroyers. Trust me. And...we’re all going to shut down our phones. We could be tapped or tracked at any time. We’ll only call in from public phones or the like.”

“Oh, chaos….this really is serious, isn’t it?” Sonic’s voice was small. “Hang on, put me on speaker.”

Shadow did. “You’re on now.”

“Guys?” Sonic said. “You’re all awesome- I know you’re gonna make them pay. Just don’t die on me, we need you for movie night.” he said, only half joking.

“We will do our best.” Omega replied.

“Tell Knux I love him, ‘kay?” Rouge shouted. 

“Will do!” Sonic replied, giggling. 

Shadow took him off speaker and told him so. 

“Sonic…stay safe. Please. I know you like to be the one who saves the day, but not this time, alright?”

The hero sounded tense. “Fine. But if I don’t hear from you guys for three days, I’m gonna start freaking out. You hear me?”

Shadow laughed bitterly. “I’ll make sure that doesn’t happen. I’d hate to come back and find your house destroyed.”

“Yeah…” Sonic said weakly.

The hybrid sighed. “I suppose I must go now. Tell everyone else, alright? I’ll confirm what you say via text before I shut down my phone.”

“Okay. Bye, Shads- talk to ya later!” Sonic made an effort to sound cheerful.

“Talk to you soon.” Shadow said, and then he ended the call.

Rouge grinned. “Awww, that’s sweet. Done talking to your boyfriend, Shadow?”

“He is not my boyfriend!” Shadow roared, blushing. “We’re only rivals, Rouge, get that idea out of your head now!”

“Suuure~” Rouge said, laughing at Shadow’s embarrassment.

They became serious again quickly, however. Rouge hadn’t quite managed to lose the agents yet. She drove through two alleyways (“I just cleaned the car yesterday…” Omega complained), ran several red lights, and played one horrible game of chicken with a streetcar before they were able to get away.

Shadow had nearly had multiple heart attacks by the time that was over.

He heard his phone ping with a message while he was in the middle of switching off the other two. Of course Rouge had the latest iCall 11, while Omega had a 10 that Rouge had gifted him.

Shadow himself had a Candystripe (shameful, he knew, but they were easier for him to use), and that was at least partly why the group always messaged through Entropy.

He opened it up to see Sonic’s ten texts.

--

sanic: hey guys shads just called

he & rouge & omega are running from gun

they stole some important files about maria (sorry about the name drop shadow)

& gun got stupid mad

they wouldn’t say sorry or do anything about what they did to her either

so i really wanna beat someone up for that ୧(๑•̀ᗝ•́)૭

team dark is kinda scared for their lives now bc of gun so we can’t text them for a while or anything cuz they’re turning off their phones

oh and knux rouge says she loves u

i’d make a joke but tbh i’m actually freaking out a little rn

this sounds crazy i kno but it’s true

milesperhour: Wait, what? Are you serious??

andknuckles: Rouge, stay safe, alright

Don’t get hurt

--

Shadow smirked. “Your boyfriend wants you to stay safe. He’s worried.”

Rouge blushed. “He’s sweet, isn’t he?”

--

notclairvoyantjustpsychic: WHAT 

CHAOS THEY DID NOT

edgehog: Yes, they did. Unfortunately. I’ve passed your message along, Knuckles. Please don’t scream, Silver.

Goodbye for now. We’ll get in touch later.

--

Shadow shut off his phone after that, but not before he saw one last private text.

--

sanic: i’m gonna miss u shads…. T-T

--

Shadow sighed quietly as he and his friends drove out of the city. He and Sonic had grown pretty close, and the blue hero was the only person outside of Team Dark whom he truly trusted.

He would most definitely miss Sonic as well.

...

Once the three had driven for the rest of the day- Omega took over once Rouge got tired- they pulled off into a small motel out in the plains of the United Federation.

A neon “Vacant” sign flickered faintly as the wind rushed through the golden fields. The sign for Cloud 9 Motel was faded and weatherbeaten, and there was only one other car in the parking lot. The sandstone-colored building was shaped like a blocky U, the front desk vaguely visible through clouded windows.

Shadow walked over to the motel doors and pushed them open, pulling out some money to pay for a room. Omega went with him- the robot needed to charge, and Rouge wanted some privacy for a minute.

The bat found an old pay phone off to the side and took a turn calling Knuckles. She stood there quietly, watching the sunset as she waited for him to pick up.

“Hi, sweetie.”

“Rouge?! It’s you?” She heard him shout away from the phone. “Sonic! Tails! It’s Rouge calling!”

She smiled quietly, but couldn’t quite bring herself to laugh. “You’re with your friends, hm?”

“Yeah- we’re figuring out what to do.”

Rouge frowned. “Don’t do anything- didn’t Sonic tell you what Shadow said? This is dangerous!”

Knuckles scoffed. “Dangerous? I led the Resistance against the Eggman Empire! Don’t talk to me about danger!”

Rouge facepalmed. She loved Knuckles so, so much, but he could be such an idiot sometimes.

“Yes, but the difference is, Eggman launched full-scale attacks that you could plan for. G.U.N. will not hesitate to shoot you in the back as you hang out with your friends.” 

“People would do that?!” Knuckles shouted. He was still awfully naive about the world, and Rouge tended to forget this occasionally.

“They absolutely would. I need you to promise me that you, Sonic, and Tails will stay out of this.”

“But what about you?” he asked. “And Omega and Shadow?”

“I see you’re even worried about him, hm? Well, don’t worry about us- we’re used to dealing with these guys.” Rouge snickered. 

Knuckles groaned. “I don’t hate Shadow, I just don’t really like him either. And he’s in danger too.”

“Thank you, hon.” she said honestly, appreciating that the echidna was starting to care about her friend. At least a little.

“I should probably go soon, but we’re currently at a motel in the middle of nowhere- I can’t tell you which one- and we’ll start planning our next move. Talk to you later, alright?”

“Talk to you later. Love you…” Knuckles said nervously. She could practically hear him blushing on the other end.

“Love you too, Knuckles. Bye!”

She hung up the phone and leaned against the glass wall of the booth, already missing him. He was really such a kind person underneath all that bluster, and that’s what she’d fallen for in the first place.

She looked up, noticing that Shadow left the building. He walked across the parking lot and opened up the door. “You’ll see him again soon, Rouge. All we have to do is get this footage and then we’ll be back home.”

“I know, it’s nothing.” she said softly.

The hybrid stood awkwardly for a moment, before quietly extending his arms. The gesture looked incredibly strange, but Rouge knew what he was trying to do and really appreciated it. She hugged him tightly and smiled. “You’re a good friend, Shadow.”

He held her a little tighter. “Take a look at yourself- you’re willing to go to Chaos-knows-where just to help me find some old video.”

She pulled back and smiled at him. “That’s what friends are for, right? Now let’s go check out that room.”

Shadow scuffed at the ground, sighing loudly. “Before you go in, you should know I used false names for all of us- the woman at the desk didn’t seem to know who any of us were, though she did say I looked like Sonic.” He didn’t seem pleased with that.

“I called Omega ‘Theta’ because it was the first idea I had. I haven’t given you a name yet because I thought you’d want your own…...less lame one.”

“Good...but what’s yours?” Rouge asked, smirking.

“I was on the spot.” Shadow couldn’t meet her eyes. “I used Apophis as my name. The ancient mythical chaos snake. It sounds so formal….”

Rouge grinned but held in her laugh for his sake. Shadow, despite his emo appearance, was definitely a nerd. 

“My name should be….Ruby. Like the gem.”

Shadow looked confused. “Why?”

“Because of my name, silly. It means ‘red’ in French, and rubies are red.” Rouge said lightly.

“Oh….I suppose that makes sense.” he muttered, looking a little bewildered.

They went up to the room and discovered that Omega had already plugged himself into the outlet in the wall. He looked up when Rouge and Shadow walked in. “This electricity is subpar, but it will suit my purposes.” he informed them.

Rouge couldn’t help teasing him a little. “What, does it taste bad or something?”

Omega would have rolled his eyes, if he could. “No. It is simply weak and limited so that you organics do not electrocute yourselves.”

The bat surveyed the room critically, noting the lack of certain furniture. “Really, Shadow? You know Knuckles is going to pound you into the ground if he finds out we shared a bed.”

“It was cheaper.” Shadow called flatly from the closet, over the noise of his attempt to put away the suitcases. “We don’t have an endless supply of money, and I can sleep in the desk chair if you have an issue with this.”

“No, no, I’m fine.” Rouge replied. “Besides, he knows that I’ve never been into that kind of thing. Or dating you, no offense.”

“Agreed, and none taken.” The hybrid came back out and sank down onto the bed. “Omega, would you mind pulling up the schematics of the G.U.N. facility we’re trying to break into? I know you were heading in that general direction, but where is it, and how would we get inside?”

“Processing. You know, you are very lucky that I downloaded all schematics early on in our work with G.U.N..”

“Very lucky that you got lost once and then refused to have it happen again, you mean,” Rouge shot back.

“We do not speak of that incident. Ever.”

“Alright, alright, now where are we breaking in?” Shadow snapped, his quills bristling. He looked tense, Rouge noticed. She sat down next to Shadow and gave him a quiet look to try and calm him down. He sighed.

“Schematic loaded. Accessing…”

Suddenly, a three-dimensional map of the facility appeared in the room, along with an address in the lower right corner of the display. Rouge patted Shadow’s back once before getting up to survey the map- as a thief, she was the most experienced and therefore the authority on breaking and entering. And stealing, of course.

“So,” she said after a moment, “we’re definitely going in through the side door. While the vents are more classic, they’re also a greater hazard and Omega wouldn’t fit. Sorry, Omega.”

“That is fine.”

“So, we’ll grab a couple of delivery uniforms- and we will return them, don’t worry-” she added, for Shadow’s benefit. She knew he didn’t like doing anything that would hurt people just trying to get by.

“-and then we can get inside through that door. We’ll navigate the halls and head straight to the video storage rooms, which are here.” Rouge pointed to a specific area of the map, which Omega helpfully enlarged. “We’re going to need to split up and search them quickly. Most likely, the video will be on a VHS tape, so that’s what we’re looking for. G.U.N. is nothing if not organized, so they’ll probably just have a box labeled ‘ARK Files’. Everyone clear?”

“Yes.”

“Affirmative.”

“Now then, there are guards on a rotating schedule that pass by the same area every fifteen minutes. We’ll need to avoid them and move quickly, because we don’t want to be seen. I know we could take out two guards if necessary, but we don’t want any of them radioing in to the security center and setting off an alarm.”

“I will remove any threat before it becomes too big to handle, no matter what.” Omega declared. 

“I’m not sure that’s the point of a stealth mission, Omega.” Shadow replied, a small smile on his face. 

Rouge noticed that this was the first time he’d smiled properly in a while.

“Alright, now let’s get some rest. We’re going to need it for the next few days.”

“The next few days?” Omega asked. “Why are we not attacking them tomorrow?”

“Because they’ll be expecting us tomorrow, Omega- all of G.U.N. is going to be on high alert.” Rouge said, exasperated. “We have to lie low for a while, make them drop their guard.”

Shadow sighed. “I can’t stand waiting, but if it means we’ll be safer, I suppose we have no choice.”

“Good.” Rouge replied, going into her “team mom” mode. “Now. Rest.”

It was strange for her sometimes, being the leader of the team. Shadow and Omega both acted younger than her, even though their ages were incredibly confusing. Shadow was either five, fifteen, or fifty-five, depending on how you counted, and Omega was essentially ageless. Yet somehow she, at eighteen, was the team leader in most situations. 

She certainly didn’t mind it, though.

As she lay in bed at night, her attempts to sleep were quickly foiled by the hedgehog next to her. Shadow could not lie still.

“Are you always like...this, Shadow?” she asked, trying her best to be polite. 

“...no…” he mumbled quietly, turning away from her. 

“This is a really stressful time for you, isn’t it?” she asked gently. 

He lay there for a moment.

“Perhaps.” he said finally, his voice flat.

Rouge thought about what to do next. 

“Omega, what’s the length of your charging cable?”

“Twelve feet. Why do you ask?”

“Get in.”

Shadow sat up quickly. “Wait- what?!”

Rouge smirked. “Get in, Omega. It’s time for a team hug session.”

Shadow attempted to protest, but Omega climbed onto the bed anyway and lay down on the hybrid’s other side. 

Rouge watched Shadow, feeling relieved when he began to relax. Omega’s computers were whirring away softly, providing a steady background hum that pushed her friend to sleep.

He sighed, murmuring quietly. “Good night, Omega. Sleep well, Rouge.”

“Night, boys.” she said.

“I will keep watch while you both sleep. Just in case.” Omega replied.

Shadow’s eyes began to close. “Heh. Thanks…. Omega……”

Rouge shut her eyes as well, pleased with herself. This was her team, and they were going to kick G.U.N. to the curb. But that could wait for tomorrow- right now, it was late, and she could rest. Finally.

#shadow the hedgehog #rouge the bat #e 123 omega #team dark #scars you can't see #introducing team sonic! #and also silver #shadow likes to pretend he's okay but he's really not #rouge and shadow are 100% ace #also just to clarify sonic and shadow really aren't dating #but they're definitely close to crushing at this point #sol’s fanfiction

[beecherdrysdale]

Hehe, we will be screaming the entire time!!. Yesss make those girls jealous, as you should. Like you got an entire hockey team + me and kesh to come. What a flex. A perk is that we are all good looking ;)). You’d look up to the stands and just see me and Ryan bumping each other “for fucks sake, Ryan” hehe sorry I just say that a lot. They’d be embarrassed to hold each other but still do bc they’re nervous. Yaa Quinner is having a tough time. I have a very strong hold. Oo ya dyl does seem like that, he would just be hiding behind me or something and whispering “how’s she doing?” “ is she winning”

Yes consider this as a gift from me and Ryan for the day. No promises that we won’t do it after the meet tho. It’ll be hard but we don’t wanna annoy you lol. Dylan and Jamie better step tf up. Honestly chipotle is just amazing, like I don’t really consider it fast food cuz it’s kinda healthy. Wbu? Applesauce is yummy, I never had the ones from the packet tho. Do you eat energy bars, like cliff bars? Going to Costco for ad are is a great idea lol . Not a lot of money spent. I always lose my mom in there, and it takes me forever to find her because she never answers my calls.

Ok I am living for this jump hug, it would be so cinematic. Then we will be trampled by the boys, and we will start chanting your name hehe. This would be such a flex.

Hehe okkk Brigid I see you . No team Canada jersey for you. I would probably never wear a USA jersey lol. Idk I mean cactus club is really good and Dylan Holloway knows about it so we can take you there. Ummm if thinking only about canadian restaurants there is this breakfast/brunch restaurant named Cora which is so good. They cut up a bunch of fruit with your meal and I love it:) their smoothies are real good as well.

Hahah okk I’ll look for you and cry because I got you all there :))) I’ll make all the girls jealous as well!. Ya my warmups are long but I can do them around you lol!. Somebody gotta make sure that I don’t over analyze and get to nervous. Like when I took my drivers test, full on shaking before I got into the car. But I’m better now lol. Lmaoo don’t worry about swearing my dad swears when I play. So y’all are good . Yaaa I would just hit a ball at you guys at the end of my match and hit Ryan in the face. Jamie gotta calm you down. I would probably be dying of laughter as well and Ryan would try to jump from the stands to go get payback. Awww Quinner is worried, I’ll give him a real good kiss after lol. Idk how nervous do you get if you watch sports- are you like me haha? Or different? Hmmm who else would be nervous lol?.

Ooo yessss dyl is holding onto your thighs.....😏.

I mean I would go on Quinners shoulders, he has broadish shoulders, but Braden has more broad shoulders. But also gotta make quinner jealous sometimes 😏. Okk Brigid, I’m going on your shoulder since you have great shoulders and #wedontneednoman. Ik i wanted to go so badly, he saw everybody 😭 Yaaa kesh, you and I have to dress cute! Like cute hair, cute clothes etc. Idk I don’t really wear makeup so I probably won’t wear any. Wbu? At Coachella you gotta dress nice but weather appropriate hehe. The boys would look hot tho .

ok so yet another long post lol

lmao yes you guys better be screaming the entire time. and making all the other girls on my team jealous lol. they’d be like “damn wags why didn’t you tell us you have hot friends” lmao. and then you guys would distract all the kids from the other teams for me lol. hehe and then i just look up into the stands to see you and ryan pushing each other around and i’m just like not again. and they’re all super embarrassed to be holding hands but they do it anyways bc they’re usually the ones playing the sport, not watching so they’re super nervous. and quinner’s hand is just dead, but you could make it up to him later😏 lol. and then dyl refuses to watch bc he’s too scared but he’s asking you for updates every 5 seconds and you’re just like “the race is right in front of you, just watch it” and he’s like “no i can’t” and then you can chirp him lmao

hehe ty for leaving me alone for once at least for during the meet. ig all bets are off after tho lmao. yes dyl and jamie you better be stepping up if you’re at one of my meets. yesss chipotle is amazing, ig it’s fast food bc it’s fast to get it yk, but i get what you’re saying, like it’s healthy so it doesn’t really count. also yes applesauce is amazing, the squeezy applesauce slaps. literally it tastes better when you eat it out of the pouch even tho it makes you feel like a 5 year old lmao. i don’t really eat cliff bars during meets bc they kind of make me feel sick while i’m swimming, but i’ll sometimes eat them after esp if i do a long race to replenish nutrients and stuff yk? hehe yes i literally want to go on a costco date so bad, and it would be so cheap too lol. haha same i lose my mom in there too lol, bc i go off and look for all of the samples and then i can’t find her

 hehe yes our jump hug would be amazing, and by the end i would somehow end up by a pile of hockey guys lmao. and then i would be flexing on all the other girls lmao. but if anything happens to my tech suit, i will kill each and every one of you bc that shit’s expensive

yeahhh sorry, no canada jersey for me, can’t go against team usa lmao. it’s just hard when you want to support your boys and your country at the same time lol. ooooh yes, i want to go to cactus club and cora now. i love fruit and smoothies, so i’m sure it would be amazing

yesss we’ll all be there to support you, and you’ll make all the other girls jealous lol. haha if you see us and start crying everyone will just be so confused, like what’s wrong with her lmao. yes you have to do your warmups by us so kesh and i can distract you so you aren’t thinking too much about your matches. haha that’s kind of funny about your driver’s test, is it weird that i’m not even a little nervous for mine? anyways, yes we’ll all just be screaming and swearing in the stands, and then at the end you’ll hit us a ball but it will end up hitting ryan in the face. and i’ll just be dying of laughter and then one of two things will happen, either i’ll start crying laughing or i’ll start choking from laughing too hard. and then jamie’s got to get me some water or something to calm me down. meanwhile, you’re dying laughing down on the court and ryan’s just trying to find a way down so he can get payback lmao. and quinner’s so nervous while you’re playing, but then he’s super happy once you win, and ofc you kiss him at the end, after our epic jump hug ofc. lol no i don’t really get nervous watching sports i just get annoyed when people aren’t doing how i want them too and i usually end up screaming at the tv lmao. idk who else would be nervous, i mostly see quinner lol

hehe me sitting on dyl’s shoulders and him holding me on by my thighs 😏 jamie might get a little jealous lol. and then you go on braden’s shoulders bc he offered, but then quinner gets superrrr jealous and you’re just casually sitting there lmao. and then you see quinner getting super annoyed and feel bad so then you switch to my shoulders instead. haha yes the three of us need to dress cute, but i’m not wearing makeup bc i hate it. literally i think the last time i wore it was school pictures last year, i refused to wear it this year lol. and we’ll have to put in sm effort but we’ll look cute, and then the guys will be looking hot without even trying which is not fair but whatever

so yeah, i love all of this 💗 it’s amazing

#ask answered #anon answered #skating anon

[catdemontraphouse]

I can say this here cuz nobody who uses tumblr seems to vtube nor does anyone seem to know I have this blog save for a few close friends... this has been really bothering me lately and I rly just need to like... air it out like say it and get rid of it. So apologies for the post in advance. Please do not reblog

I’ve been involved in a community called “vtubing” for a little while now. It’s virtual YouTubing, like think Kizuna Ai of AI channel, though she’s produced by a company, while very many of us are indie self-produced content makers. It’s like being a YouTuber but with an emphasis on anime art and emerging tech?

I was inspired to do it out of my own love for video production and comedy. I wanted to have fun while bringing a smile and joy to other people. I know how brutal life can be, and so I think, I want to be happy and have fun and if I can brighten someone’s day even a little while I try to enjoy life, that’s a good thing.

At first everything was quite positive. Ive met some really wonderful people that truly care about the community and their craft. They openly assist and share help with people, they show up to one another’s events to cheer on friends, etc. which is so heartwarming! But here’s the thing....

I noticed from the moment I began connecting with other English speaking vtubers on twitter and YouTube... the Japanese vtubing scene is NOT very similar to the English one. While virtual camgirls and things like that certainly do exist in the JP community, the English community is excruciatingly more geared towards sexual content and there is palpable peer pressure to conform to that mode of presentation. I have no issue with erotic virtual yotubers themselves, I support sex workers’ decisions to conduct business through online virtual methods. In fact I think ProjectMelody, the most successful English vcam girl has a hell of a hustle going!

That said, it’s toxic as FUCK (no pun intended) when the success of vtubers greatly hinges on their willingness to be “lewded” I.e. sexually objectified, playing to particular kinks, etc. I don’t normally tell people I am aroace off the bat. I try to avoid the topic entirely because often it ends poorly when people find out. But I could sense the oppressive aura of toxic “straigtness”TM wafting in the air the minute I joined in on the English vtubing community and stopped being a lone wolf. So I had to put it out there. Yes I felt that awkward about the “lewd” culture that I outed myself to an uber straight presenting community.

There’s actually a decent percent of the folks in our community who are LGBT come to find out, some openly so, while others are closeted. Maybe it’s cuz I have tumblr brain, but it’s just so alienating and weird to never see it brought up. We have openly trans women in our community but nobody ever talks about trans pride or anything. Nobody ever talks about being gay or anything. It’s very odd to me. It’s just a sea of “huhuhu anime boobies huge haha sexist remark objectify women openly some against their will, show me tits and I’ll give cash” literally Simp this, simp that.... shut up? Please?

There’s a really disturbing new trend of increasingly younger and younger girls “debuting” and being lured into potentially dangerous scenarios with money “donations”/ fame within the vtubing and streaming scene. The providers of said benefits seem to use this to try and gain sexual/romantic attention or favors. It’s quite troubling. I can just feel soon this boiling sea of bile is gonna overflow and something terrible will happen. I am concerned for these young girls. Many of the folks who have expressed concern about this are actually men. There are a lot of men who vtube that see these things firsthand and are vocally upset about it.

I’m just really tired of the whole thing. Not only is it creepy, but it’s caused this whole competition/animosity between vtubers who’ve been around a while and are being ignored and these new girls who get literally thousands of subscribers and money donations when they’ve never even uploaded a video yet.

I truly enjoy making content as a vtuber and it makes me happy to know I have brought smiles to so many people and made some rly wonderful friends. I may have to step aside from the vtubing community and go lone wolf again due to this situation. It makes me disappointed because I do really honestly enjoy all the heartfelt moments that do happen every day. But right now there’s just too much awful energy surrounding the whole thing. it’s just so toxic and I need to cut it outta my life and return to making videos alone for only myself and whoever happens to pass by. I do not want to continue to feel uncomfortable and peer pressured, like I’m never gonna change and it’s tiring seeing everyone else scramble to adjust to this new nightmare when so many of them are good people.

There I’m done I have written this solely for the purposes of clearing my mind and I do not expect anyone to read it or care. I am not looking to tackle this problem, I am not looking to incite any kind of reaction. I am just stating how I feel presently. This too shall pass, it’s a waiting game.

[stuff-from-the-void-matron]

Ice Cold Betrayal (Phantom x fem!Reader)

This is just an idea I had for a Phantom x fem!Reader! Meer wanted me to post it so here y’all go~! 

I didn’t clean this up or edit it at all lmao we die like men!

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

like okay my idea is what if anti wanted to cause some mayhem so he faked some pics of him getting frisky with phantom's s/o. and they looked REAL.  mostly because anti got a mimic demon he knows to shift into s/o's form for this shit.  and he went to phantom and showed him and laughed in his face and then bailed but phantom was furious. he'd been very busy the last month or so but you'd said you'd understood and he'd trusted you but then he finds out you cheated on him (u didn't tho) and he sorta just...snaps. he doesn't think he just reacts.

he ports into your shared penthouse and you smile when you see him and that just upsets him more and now you're worried because he looks really upset but before you can ask what's wrong he grabs you by your hair. you yelp when he drags you off the couch, you scream for him to stop but he ignores you and a split second later you're no longer in your suite, instead you're outside on the street behind his hotel. the freezing chill of the city winter has you shaking instantly, this not helped by how you were in just a comfy t-shirt and sleep pants (you had just been relaxing at home)

he dropped you onto the ground and you shakily stood up, shivering you look up at him in confusion 

 "Phantom what the hell-" 

he cuts you off with a snarl that has you stepping back in fear, actual fear. he tells you that you're banned from any and all businesses he owns or even partially owns and if you know whats good for you then you'll stay away. you're confused and hurt and ask him what's going on, why's he upset. he scoffs 

"Don't play dumb. You know what you did, and you know I don't allow cheaters in my establishments. Now kindly fuck off for the rest of your life." 

and then in a blink he's gone and you're left half dressed outside on the street in the dead of winter.

all the shops within like a 30 block radius are at least partially owned by phantom. the man has his fingers in a lot of pies and he alerted each and every one that you were not to be served or even allowed entrance. so there's not even anywhere you can go in to warm up. nowhere to get food or water either. you have your phone on you but you check it and see phantom cancelled the minutes (he paid for it so) you're stuck with nowhere to go, no way to call your family, and no money or shelter for the night.

well you've no way to do anything except for try to find somewhere to stay for the night and after getting glares from the couple shops you passed you decided it wasn't worth it to try going in. so with nowhere else to go (and your feet freezing) you shuffled as fast as you could to the nearby park where you curled up under the bridge that went over the bike trail. it was the only cover you could find. it started snowing soon after you settled into your spot.

you were out there for hours. you couldn't feet your hands, feet, nose, or cheeks. not to mention the fact that you were drifting in and out of consciousness. you vaguely heard a ringing sound but you were too out of it to think hard about where it was coming from. 

a bit earlier mare smoke traveled into phantoms place looking for you both. he'd tried texting you and then calling you but he got a 'this phone is no longer in service' message that had him confused.

he looks around, no you? but he finds phantom sitting in your shared bedroom drinking whiskey. he walks in and asks where you are and he's been calling for ages. that’s when phantom unloads the whole thing onto mare and mare just listens silently. mare lets him finish then silence sits between them both for a minute before mare asks  

"And when did this all happen? Like when did anti say this happened?" 

phantom says on so and so date three days ago and mare tells phantom he's stupid. phantom looks up from his drink and mare looks pissed, eyes black and the tear tracks under them black as well.

"I know anti's full of shit cuz she was with me then. We spent the day pulling pranks then we came back here and binged The Office til she fell asleep." 

dread starts to fill phantoms gut. mare starts screaming at him, his form half smoke as he calls phantom every shitty thing in the book, demanding to know where he left you. 

"Where'd you leave her asshole?! I've gotta find her so where'd you dump her, huh?!"

it's a huge scream fest but phantom pulls his phone out and makes a call and soon your phone is back to normal and he starts calling you over and over but you don’t answer. that makes them both nervous so phantom has his tech person track the GPS on your phone. you didn't get far. they see you're about 10 blocks down at the park. 

"SHE'S AT THE FUCKING PARK?! IN 20 DEGREE WEATHER!?" 

 mare is...upset.

well they find you, huddled under a bridge and passed out, and the skin on your face/hands/feet looks red. needless to say they take to to the ER. you're rushed in and they have to wait to see if you're okay. some time later a doc comes out and calls the two and tells them you've got the beginning stages of pneumonia and mild frostbite on your toes, a few fingers, and your ears. thankfully you weren't exposed to the cold long enough for the frostbite to be severe enough to need amputation but the doc says you'll need to stay in observation until you were in the clear.

things are...stilted when you wake up later. 

mare explains what happened (phantom is too ashamed to say anything) you don’t say anything for a time until finally you just say, 

"I'll stop by and pick up my stuff once they discharge me." 

oh boy that whips phantom into action 

“What, why? You don't have to do that." 

but you refuse to look at him. 

"No, I think I do. You made it clear that I'm no longer welcome there. I'll go stay at a friend's or something til I can get a job so I can support myself again." 

phantom tells you he's sorry for being so gullible and to please not leave. you don't want to hear it really. this whole thing was a freezing cold wake up call.

"Phantom when we started dating I had a job and my own place. And over time you convinced me I didn't need that job and you could support me and soon after you and I moved in together."

"....I completely relied on you and your support. Fuck...you even pay for my phone."

"I trusted you more than anyone else. And at the first shitty doctored photo you cut me off like a diseased limb and threw me out on the street like wet garbage. You didn't even let me try to explain my side."

"...I just....I can't rely so heavily on someone like that anymore. Not after last night. I have to stand on my own two feet. They're the only support I can unwaveringly trust it seems."

he says he understands he messed up bad but pleads with her not to just leave. he says she can stay at his hotel if she needs. but she stares down at the blanket in her lap and sighs. 

"I just...need to have my own space right now. The...level of trust you had in me apparently wasn't on the same level as what I had in you so I think some time apart will be good for us. I just...I need to think, Phantom." 

i’m not sure she'd agree to get back together with him tbh

if she did agree to try again, things are clearly different. before he would sometimes just spoil her with fancy dates and gifts and she'd shyly accept them. but now they make her uncomfortable at best. she no longer appreciates expensive gifts and would prefer having her own place. she also got a job and gave him back his cell phone and got her own. and it hurts him every time she winces when he buys her something. each frown she gives is a stark reminder of his catastrophic fuck up.

she accepts the stuff he gets her, begrudgingly. 

but he pops over to her place one day to pick her up for a date and she's still in the shower so he explores her apartment. it's small, but tidy. he goes into her room and stops when he sees the stuff he gave her. all sat neatly by her closet, all unopened and unused. 

he knew it wasn't because she didn't like the stuff. it was all stuff she'd desired but he knew in his heart she didn't trust him enough to use or wear any of it and that hurt more than he thought it would. he knew it was all sat like that, ready to give back to him, should he do something stupid like before.

i think things would slowly start to get closer to where they were before after one night phantom drinks a bit too much and actually cries all over s/o, telling her he's so sorry for hurting her like this and wishing he could go back to stop it but he cant. how she's gonna be hurt forever because of his shitty anger and she didn't deserve that and he doesn't deserve her but he loves her and he trusts her even if he was shit at proving it and if she gives him another chance then he swears he'll do everything he can to prove he deserves her love again.

s/o before then had never seen phantom cry, not even the night she almost got frostbite so this was a bit jarring. then she feels sad because this has apparently been eating away at him for a very long time. and despite her...more self sufficient behavior she really has forgiven him. she still wants to keep her job and pay for her own necessities but aside from that she's happy to start over with him so the next day, 

after he's gotten past his headache, she comes in wearing a red dress he bought her. he's like 'you're wearing it?' and she just smiles and kisses his cheek and asks him if he wants to go on a date. they end up getting some dinner at one of his clubs.

yeah it's gonna take a lot of time and effort on both of their ends, and communication but i think they can salvage their relationship.

~~~~~~~~~~

Here just thought maybe some of y’all might wanna see this!

@smolwash @sunrisehoneybee @sierracolorstheworldofwords @tiny-yan-anon

#my writing #phantom nwtb #phantom x reader #x reader #natewantstobattle egos #Phantom #egos

[otomates-a]

『 @rotinthedark​ said, 』 "There are days when I want to run away, and forget everything.” ( alex! )

               It’s funny. They’re the last two people he thinks most would expect to have anything in common : probably least of all Sebastian himself, if he really considers it. But as Alex glances up at him from where he sits, legs crossed on the ground, he can’t help the brief feeling of melancholy that washes over him, causing his brows to furrow in a show of concern. Though whether it’s for himself or his neighbor, he can’t tell. Maybe it’s both. His thoughts drift to years ago, when he used to stand on the side of city bridges and think about what it’d feel like to hit the bottom. He’d never been suicidal, not truly, not even in the depths of his pain, but it hadn’t stopped him from wondering what it’d be like not to feel suffocated anymore. Just because he didn’t want to die doesn’t mean he hadn’t wanted to escape. Back then, it’d manifested in the form of fantasies of running away with his mother, saving her from where they were. After she was gone, he’d just wanted to find meaning for himself again. The bruises from his father healed, even if some of the scars remained. At some point he had to stop running from monsters that weren’t chasing him anymore, but it’d been easier said than done.

               He hasn’t had anxiety constricting his chest the way it used to when he was with his father in what seems like forever, but still, beside him, Dusty lazily pushes himself to his paws before promptly draping himself over his lap. There’s a resulting pressure on his abdomen from the position and it almost makes him laugh. Old emotional support trick, he thinks, and he wonders if Dusty is relieved he doesn’t have to get up at three in the morning to lay on top of some poor kid having panic attacks instead of sleeping. He thinks it’s a little too bad he’s the only one sitting down ... he’s sure he’d do the same for the other man, if he’d let him. Smart boy.

               “That’s fair,”  he responds finally, one of his hands raising to rest on top of the dog’s head. If he scolded him for thinking that way, he’d be a hypocrite. There’s no way he knows everything that goes on in Sebastian’s life. From the outside looking in, he may seem like a strange person : but as egotistical as he plays himself up to be, beneath it all, he knows it must be a two-way street. No one is normal, everyone has their pain. In all honesty, he doesn’t know why he’s telling him this. Maybe he’d just been thinking aloud, but he doesn’t mind. It seems he’s the one who’s made a habit of accidentally invading this mountain spot, anyways.  “Sometimes running away is all you can do. Maybe it’s not what you should do and maybe it’s not forever, but sometimes, in the moment, maybe it’s for the best. Just for a while.”  To say otherwise would be ridiculous, not when he’d done exactly that, once he was able.  “I’ve done my fair share of running. Sometimes it was away from things. Other times it was straight for them.”

               Patting Dusty, he leans back, hands flat on the dirt path so that he doesn’t end up falling. He must look like an idiot  ——  disheveled from hiding up here playing fetch with his friend, but now he wants to sit around and pretend he has wise life advice to dish out. He’s in his twenties, sounding wise isn’t exactly in his cards, but if he has what experience he does with living, he supposes it can’t hurt to share it, every now and again.  “Forgetting wouldn’t do you any good, though,”  he mulls, turning his gaze away from Sebastian in order to look out at the world beyond this stupid hill. Big, crazy, loud, scary, wonderful. Lonely. It’s not as great as some people here think it is.  “Even painful memories are important. Whether you like who you are overall or not, those things shape pieces of you that you wouldn’t want to change. Small pieces. You may not even notice them.”  His nose scrunches in thought.  “Someone beats you up enough times, maybe you learn to start throwing punches. Or maybe you learn to stand tall in front of them so no one else has to get hit. There’s good in everything, you know? Every part of you. Why change that?”

               His way of thinking doesn’t exactly line up with most peoples’, at least not in this area. He’s an optimist, he knows that. Always looking for a silver lining, even when he’s dragging himself back from Zuzu with bloody noses and backpacking to fuck knows where trying to find himself. He briefly wonders, if given the chance to step foot out of this place, whether Sebastian would really be as depressing as he comes off. He’s never thought about it before, but maybe he feels smothered, too. Just another person locked up in a place they can’t escape, surrounded by people they don’t want to see every day. His eyes narrow at the sunset, but he doesn’t glance over at him and he doesn’t ask. It isn’t his place.

               “Look, dude, I know I sound like a greeting card, alright.”  Suddenly, he huffs and when he turns back towards him, his smile is back. He sits up straight, careful not to disturb Dusty, who he’s sure has fallen asleep, out like a light.  “My point is that, like, there’s  ...  a whole world out there. And you and I, we’re young! We have plenty of time. To explore, to heal, whatever. You don’t have to go running full speed at it, you don’t have to wipe your slate clean. Just start taking steps, right? I visit the city a lot just to have fun. You remember that, right? Fun?”  There’s a bit of a tease in there, but his eyes are shining : he’s trying to be encouraging.  “You like programming. They have super crazy tech labs in the public library now-a-days, did you know that? All this free software and stuff downloaded onto it that you can use whenever you want, ‘cuz it’s open twenty-four-seven. I have no clue what any of that tech stuff is, I just go to look at the books since it’s right by the gym, but why not try that every once in a while? You could even come with me some time if you’re scared of going to the big bad city.”  Laughing, he reaches up to brush his hair out of his face.  “You can’t run away unless you know what you’re running towards, Sebastian. ‘Cause forgetting things, it ... look, you know, it ... doesn’t really make you happy, it just kinda ... makes you lost. And I guess we aren’t really friends or anything, but ... I don’t know, the idea of you ending up like that ... it’s upsetting? You have a lot of potential. Joder, you’re leagues smarter than I’ll ever be. Don’t squander it over anything or anyone else! If you’re gonna take a leap of faith, whether it takes you where you want or screws up your life, at least do it for yourself, not 'cause something is pushing you away.”

#rotinthedark #「 rotinthedark | sebastian/alex ❛ ◟ if you’re ready‚ my heart is open and i’m waiting‚ come find me. 」 #「 alex ❛ ◟ y lo que me queda de vida quiero vivir contigo. 」 #me with tears on my face : would u like some Content #suicide mention --

[eerythingisshaka]

The Coffee Prince Pt. 7

(T’Challa x Reader)

*Part 1* *Part 2* *Part 3*  *Part 4* *Part 5*  *Part 6*

Word Count: 5.6K

T’Challa’s mouth hangs open as he tried to find the words to tell you what has been held back from you this whole time.

“(Y/N), I have to let you know that as King of Wakanda, I have more abilities than you know.  To have the throne, you have to have abilities bestowed upon you in order to protect it.  That is given to me through the Heart Shaped Herb-”

“So did you pass some ability to me?”  You ask, interrupting him.

T’Challa looks at you curiously.  “What do you mean?”

You sigh heavily, trying to get to the point.  “I mean, when we…” you glance from T’Challa to Shuri before whispering, “...you know... did it change me?  Am I changing on a molecular level?  Is that what Shuri saw in her wrist beads thingy?”  you ask, growing more stressed by the second.  “I had seen enough movies to assume that sometimes powers can be transmitted through contact with someone so maybe…”

T’Challa shakes his head, scoffing at your theory, “Ohhh, no, no.  That’s not possible, we just think you are pregnant.”  he says a little too matter-of-factly.

Your eyes widen as your mind goes blank with that word hitting your thought process. You then look down at your stomach, as if it would just start spontaneously growing.  You world moves slow as you look back at him, the man of your heart, who was supposed to protect you and have your trust.  T’Challa studies your face trying to read what’s wrong with you.  His mouth is moving but you don’t hear his words.  Shuri is back behind him a bit, looking like he is trying to diffuse a bomb.

Suddenly, you erupt.  “WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU MEAN I’M PREGNANT??!!”  You shout at the top of your lungs.

T’Challa jumps back, never having heard your voice at that level of anger spooked him.  “Umhle, please c-”

“I LOST MY VIRGINITY TO YOU AND NOW I AM PREGNANT?!  We JUST had sex!  We used condoms, what did you do??”  you shout in T’Challa’s face.  

Shuri has backed into the kitchen to give some level of privacy to the situation, while ensuring she doesn’t catch any second hand of the heat you were spreading.

T’Challa continues to try and talk you down sweetly.  “Love, I did, I know it, maybe one broke, but-”

“Did you use the regular ones, or the ones manufactured from home?”  Shuri asks from the kitchen.  

You and T’Challa look at her curiously.  The child was going to preach the birds and the bees to you.

She shrugs.  “Mother gave me the talk long ago, I am nearly grown!  But the ones here do not work like the ones from home.  With your enhanced abilities, semen-”

“Aye, aye, I don’t want to hear those words from you, Shuri.”  T’Challa says, shaking his head in disgust, plugging his ears.

Shuri looks at him with contempt.  “Grow up, T’Challa.  This mess is yours to straighten out, I’m just telling you facts.  If you had been honest completely from the beginning...”

You rub your temples trying to think, “Shuri, so his...you know….just, what?  Broke the condom?  Or seeped through or something?”

Shuri nods, “Something like that.  I remember Baba talking about a situation similar during a party.  It is how I got here…. and why I am the superior child.”  Shuri adds in jest.

“Enough!  I was never told any of this, I feel like if anyone should know, it would be me.”  T’Challa says.

Shuri holds her palms up.  “Well it’s not like there are multiple people with the heart shaped herb in their genetic code.  It was really just a rumor going around at first, but it may be fact proven today.”

You are pacing the floor, hyperventilating and trying not to go faint.  You sleep with T’Challa, who doesn’t tell you he is super human, or that his seed is, and that condoms don’t mean jack shit to him busting inside of you.  Perfect.

“(Y/N), did you not have birth control?”  T’Challa asks cautiously, not wanting to sound like he is placing blame.

You hide your face, frustrated at yourself now.  “Nooo, I hadn’t had to think about it before now cuz there was no point, so I just had an appointment made to get some afterwards, but I guess I’ll cancel that!”  You say, laughing like a person who lost their last brain cell.

T’Challa takes your hands, shushing you gently.  “Breathe, it’s fine, it’s going to be ok.  We will get through this.”

You look at him, heat rising from within you.  “What more can I get through?! Get through this past week and everything having happened in the last 3 hours??  How can I get through this, I still don’t know what’s going on!”

“Umhle-”

“No, T’Challa, no!  I have little patience right now for the sweet talk and-and calming tones, I need answers, not distractions!  You said you loved me, I can’t believe this.”  Your tears overflow as you begin to pace again.

T’Challa looks to you defiantly.  He cannot hide his offense when you tell him off.  “That was not a lie.  I have never lied to you.”

You turn towards him so quickly and stalk up to him so fast, Shuri hops up to come over between you two.

“Lies by omission are still lies, T’Challa!  You have been playing me for a fool, for what?!  To protect your precious kingdom from the gold digging, ignorant American girl that you just needed pop off in real quick?”

T’Challa looks away like you just spat in his face.  “Don’t speak like that.”

You shove him, what little that does.  “That shouldn't phase you,  huh,  Superman!  You don’t tell me what the hell to do!  I’m pregnant!  With a baby that I don’t know if I even want!  My friend is God knows where, going through God knows what with a madman wanting to kill you, me, or whoever he feels up to seeing bleed.  That’s what I’m going through, right the fuck now!  What about you?”  You point in his face, jaws clenched.  “What the hell would your father think of what you’re putting me through?”

Shuri comes back and breaks things up at this point.  “Ok, guys.  Take a breath.  We can’t fall apart before the mission even begins here.  You shouldn’t say things that you may regret (Y/N), sit, please.  T’Challa, hold your patience”

You sit down, trying to comprehend what you have to do.  Between your friend going missing and being a fresh 36 seconds pregnant, you were at the end of your rope.  And now T’Challa is just making things seem like a spilled milk situation made you resent him for not being as freaked out as you were.

T’Challa rubs his beard in thought, kissing his teeth.  “Do you...want to end the pregnancy?”

You stare at the floor fighting back the flood developing at the corners of your eyes.  “I don’t know.”

T’Challa scoffs, stretching his arms out before slapping them down beside his legs.  “I will support you…..whatever you decide….”  He doesn’t say it convincingly, before he starts to walk away.

“Do you want me to continue the pregnancy?”  You ask back at him, looking to him quizzically.

T’Challa remains still a moment.  “I don’t know how to answer that.”

“What does that mean?”

T’Challa’s shoulders rise and fall in exasperation.  “It means, I do not want to influence your decision.  I am here for you, either way.  I think this will affect our relationship either way, in what manner, only time can tell.”   T’Challa says.

Shuri speaks up as referee.  “Guys, it is probably best to get some rest for now.  I will contact Ayo, see if she can get a location on Erik and his crew so we can get Tavia back, ok?”

You nod absentmindedly as you lie back on the couch.

“No, you can have my bed upstairs, I’ll take the couch.”  T’Challa says.

You shake your head.  “I don’t want to be in there right now.”

“Then take a guest bedroom.  But you will not be sleeping on the couch.”  T’Challa protests softly.   You get up slowly, heading for the stairs.  “You do not have to treat me special because I am with child, you know.”

“I would not treat you any other way, in any circumstance.”  T’Challa says in a serious tone.  You decide not to test his patience any further as you head to a separate bedroom.  You lie down, turning over to observe the sky outside of your window.  You didn’t know how to feel, your head was pounding, you needed water from the alcohol at the club drying you out.  You avoided acknowledging whatever was happening within your body, as Shuri said, the scan could be flawed.  But either way, a Plan B is no longer a viable option for precaution.  Only an abortion from here on out.  Your stomach churned violently at the mention, so you get up to go get that water you desperately needed.  

Making it to the fridge to get a water bottle, you start up the stairs again, but pause halfway up as you notice voices from outside.  Shuri and T’Challa were talking in the back patio area.  You settle down on the stairs, clutching your bottle as you hesitantly listen in.

“What would the repercussions be to bring a child out of wedlock as a successor to the throne?”  Shuri asked.

“I do not know what the traditions are, but I can assure you, that I will not give up on my own flesh and blood for the throne.  You can take it, you know.”  T’Challa says.

“No, no.  Not in this lifetime, I like having you as my guinea pig for my updates to the tech.  Why would I willfully sign up in your place?  Anyway, you have the birthright, do what you have to do.  But then…..what if she decides to terminate?”

T’Challa pauses, hugging himself as he looks on into the distance.  “Then she terminates.  Simple as that.”

Shuri touches his arm with concern.  “But how would you feel, Brother?”

T’Challa looks down shaking his head.  “It would depend on when she did it, maybe?  The sooner, the better, but even that sounds wrong of me to say.   Even though she is hesitant too, I don’t want to seem disappointed in her for keeping it or for…..I just...I love her.  I care for her deeply, and the image of her being with child…”  He holds a hand to his chest.  “...warms my spirit, I admit.  Of course, I wish this had happened later than sooner.  It is still early in the relationship. I would’ve introduced her to Mother, married her, but these are the cards Bast has dealt.”

“You should've been more forthcoming, Brother.  Now she thinks the worst of you.”

T’Challa purses his lips.  “I know. It's difficult to gauge what to say, and when to say it.  I did have my position in mind, but it wasn't fair to her not to know.  Now she must feel she is having a baby by a stranger, so I have to make it right.  First by getting her friend from Erik and Klaue safely.”

“I am too young to be an aunt.”  Shuri say, making T’Challa laugh.

“Well you would have someone to boss around for once.  But do not speak of this with her.  I will remain indifferent until her mind is made.  I will not have anything to do with the decision making, it is all on her.  I just want to support her through it.”

On that note, you head back to your room for the evening to rest.  T’Challa’s words weighed heavily on you.  In no means do you want to hurt him intentionally with blame or saying you didn’t want the pregnancy, you just wished so much you guys were more careful.  In some way, you wish T’Challa would react to make your mind up.  If he would break up with you immediately, you couldn't have the baby.  But support and affection all just make you feel like nesting but like he said, what did you even know about him anymore?  Now other lives are in jeopardy due to his silence.

You swear you feel a flutter in your stomach but you pass it off as gas, still wanting to pretend your body is still yours alone in this bed.

In the morning when you wake up, you still feel tired from the other night but decide to get up and be productive.  Reaching for your phone, you see you have a missed call and voicemail.

“Chacha!!”  You call out, running downstairs.

T’Challa nearly collides with you halfway up the stairs.  “What is it?  What’s wrong?”

“She called, T’Challa, there’s a message!”  Your voice breaks as you speak.  Tavia is alive!

T’Challa’s eyes are wide with surprise, but maintains a cool head.  “Ok, we need to hear it.  She may have escaped and needs us.”

You nod as he leads you down the stairs.  Shuri comes from a back room after hearing the commotion.  “You have heard from her friend?”  

“Yes, we just got word from her.  Sit with us while we play it, we may need you to place her location.”  T’Challa tells his sister.

You all congregate around his coffee table, your hands shake as you imagine what the message might sound like.  T’Challa rubs your arm to put you at ease as you pull up your voicemail and put it on speaker.

As the message plays you hear Tavia breathing hard and frantic.  “(Y/N).....where did you go?......I don’t know where I am…..Please!  You gotta help me!”

The phone gets a bunch of background noise and movement is overheard before you hear the next voice.  “Don’t worry, I gotcha.  Heeyy, baby girl!”

Your blood ran cold as you recognized his voice.  That voice threatened to take you away on a cat and mouse game with T’Challa.

“Last I checked, your friend here was feeling me.  Shit, I don’t know what her deal is now…”

“Don’t fuckin touch me!”  Tavia says.  “OW!”

Erik kisses his teeth.  “Issa shame how pretty she is.  All that could change in a instant.  So you go head and tell T’Challa to bring your big ass back here if you wanna see your friend again.  We still gotta finish our drinks.”  

The message ends and you drop your head in agony, sobbing into your lap. Tavia was alive alright, in a living hell.

T’Challa kneels in front of your feet to comfort you.  “(Y/N), she is still alive, that is the best news we can have right now, remember that.  We can find her now, Shuri, can you trace the call?”

Shuri runs a geolocation program on her kimoyo beads.  “Way ahead of you.  He stayed on the phone long enough for me to get one…..Looks like a warehouse on 53rd and Ashland.”

“I will go there now.  Keep (Y/N) company while I handle this”  T’Challa orders.

“But he said he wants (Y/N) there!  You can’t risk going against his instructions, you don’t know what he may do.”  Shuri says.

T’Challa turns to her fuming.  “I will not risk (Y/N)’s life for his games!  He gets myself and whatever I have coming for him!  That is all he needs to worry about!”

You go up to T’Challa, wiping your eyes, putting a hand to his chest.  His heart felt like a speaker on blast in his chest.  “Don’t yell at your sister, Chacha, calm down.”

T’Challa closes his eyes tightly.  “You don’t know what this means to me to find him.  The fact that he got away from me, to get your friend in the first place shows my weaknesses and I must redeem myself.  It is unacceptable what has happened on my watch so far.”

You caress T’Challa’s face, admiring the wide innocence in his eyes to be the good man and great King he pushes himself to be.  The anger and insecurities etched deeply across his face, brow furrowed in intense inner monologues no doubt.  You bring your thumb up to his widow’s peak, brushing it upwards.  “Chacha, this is not about just you anymore.  This more than just bragging rights, this is my friend’s life, my life, yours.  Going in blind with emotion will only make it more probable to fail.  You gotta use your head, not your heart, to direct your strategy now.”

T’Challa eyes tell you so much more than he says.  They tell you you’re naive, that he is still very much so angry, that he loves you too much to fight against your words.  But as long as there was still respect for you, he would bend.  “You need to get dressed, but you will not leave my side.”  He says with a wag of his finger.  

You swipe his hand away, pulling him in for a kiss.  You hated to think so, but it felt more like a goodbye.

T’Challa drives you both down to the warehouse in question to get Tavia from her captor.  The drive over there is quiet as you were tensely biting your nails, not sure what to do with yourself.

T’Challa looks over at you taking your hand away from your mouth, kissing it.  “Everything will be fine.  As long as Tavia is out of there safely, all will be well.”

You hold tight to his knuckly, long hands; strong and determined against your shaky, uncertain ones.  “And you.  You need to come back too.”  You add.

T’Challa looks at you like he didn’t even think of that as an option, but quickly smiles.  “Naturally.  That is a given.”  

T’Challa stops the car a few yards back from the building.  “Remember, stay by me and be on the lookout for anything.  Let me know when something isn’t sitting right.”

As you all get out of the car, you look at the old and rusted abandoned looking building curiously.  No other businesses or main roads around, it was perfect to keep someone for an extended period of time.

T’Challa walks around the building entrance, pushing a button that should open a garage door but is out of order.  You continue to double check  your surroundings before he gets to a window and breaks it in with a nearby rock.

“Shit!  T’Challa be a little more quiet, eh?  How do you know no one is in there?” You say with a scolding  whisper.

T’Challa reaches through the window to the side of a door, working the lock to open it up.  “Shuri has the place surveilled.  She will let us know if we have company.”  

T’Challa steps inside slowly, looking right and left as you follow behind.  

“TAVIA, YOU IN HERE?!”  You shout out out of the blue.  T’Challa looks back at you like you’re crazy.  “What?  You said Shuri said nobody here.”

“Girl is that you??” a voice calls out.

You look around excitedly, “TAVIA!!  Where are you!?”

Tavia steps out from stack of boxes smiling and looking well.  “Oh my God!  Am I glad to see you bitch!”

Your legs lead you before your head can register your happiness.  You run over to your friend, arms outstretched as Tavia meets you halfway.

You both lock each other in an embrace as you both shriek in happiness, bouncing out your energy.

“Ladies, we will need to go soon.”  T’Challa insists.

You barely register his voice as you try to check in with Tavia.  “What happened to you?  After I left the club, I can’t believe you got taken.”

Tavia pulls back from you, fanning your face.  “Man, once you left, I wondered why the hell I was waiting so damn long by myself and went to check on you.  But when I did,  the dickhead Erik from the bar and Catwoman’s husband were out scrappin on the street!”

You shake your head,exhaling deeply.  “Girl, that was T’Challa!”

Tavia bucks her eyes out,  “Oh really??  Fighting like that?! Was that suit a part of the uhh, night y’all…”

Your jaw drops, pushing her arm.  “Tavia, shut the hell up!  I’m still just, ugh, girl, so much to tell you, come on.”

You take her hand to go, but she won’t move.  “Tavia, what’s up?  Let’s go, we can’t stay here all day, like you’d want to.”

Tavia looks at you with a defeated gaze.  “I’m sorry.”

You stutter in confusion, “Wha-what do you mean-”

“(Y/N)!”  T’Challa bellows.  As you turn around, you see T’Challa’s body become covered in little nano-looking parts, expanding all over him until he is enclosed in his signature catsuit, showing every curve and and cavern imaginable.  

“Whoa!”  You squeak in awe of his transformation.

Just then an explosion goes off at the front of the warehouse, sends you and Tavia staggering back.  A cloud of smoke covers everything as you try to make out where T’Challa went.

“T’Challa!!  T’Challa, are you alright?”

A figure emerges from the dust cloud decked out in armor and a foreign looking mask.  But it was not T’Challa.

“Wassup, baby girl?  You miss me?”

You cough as your lungs become upset from the blast.  “Who-”

“You don’t remember me darling?  That’s ok, me ya friend gonna keep good company with you.”  He says.

With a large pow, Erik gets brought down to his knees with a punch to the back of the head, T’Challa stands behind him in full garb.  

“Get out of here now!”  T’Challa commands as Erik strikes him in the shin to bring him down to his level as they fight on the floor.

You get up, covering your face to make your way through the smoke.  Tavia follows closely behind you.  As you both make it out into the fresh air, a van with the door open awaits you.  Coming around from the side of the vehicle, stands the surly looking white man that was Erik’s partner.

“Hello lovelies.  Fine afternoon, innit?”  His gravelly voice taunts you as he sneers.

You reach for Tavia to come with you desperately.  “Girl, we gotta run!  He and Erik were after me that night!”

Tavia looks at you with a hardened stare.  “I know I was there.”

You pause a moment, giving her a once over.  “Tavia...why are you so calm?”

Tavia laughs hysterically.  “Oh, sis, ain’t nobody gonna die.  This is dramatic though, right?  Well hell, I guess I done flew over the cuckoo’s nest now.  But honey, you ain’t gotta worry, we got you.”

You look from her back to Klaue, who raises a gun up in your direction.  “Just take some slow steps up to the van and we will handle the rest.”

Tavia waves Klaue off.  “Nah, I told y’all not to be like that, I got it!”

Your eyes pierce daggers into Tavia.  “Tavia!  You with them now?  The fuck is wrong with you??”

Tavia pulls a gun from behind her back, holding it by her side.  “Get in the van and I can tell you about it.  I won’t point this at you, but I want this to go as smooth as possible, without hurting you or anybody else, aight?”

Erik’s body flies out from the warehouse, landing hard on the concrete.  Tavia takes you by the arm to shuffle you into the van with Klaue.  She shuts the door behind you all as Klaue starts up the engine.  

Looking out of the back window as the van pulls off, you see T’Challa has Erik by the throat before tossing him away to start after the van, but falls back after short while.

You turn back to Tavia, fuming.  “What are you doing with them, Tavia?”

Tavia picks at her nails.  “Oh, stop.  Ain’t nobody gonna hurt you, I said.  This isn’t what this is all about.  You’re just a little piece to the whole puzzle, is all.”

“So then why are you doing this?”You ask puzzled.

Tavia turns to you like this is a candid girl chat all of a sudden.  “Well, I never got around to telling you, but I met Erik a couple weeks ago from swiping on the apps, right?  And I mean, he is really smart, and fine like come on!  And you know, he knows the world, and he’s been through a lot, and I really just support his cause.”

“His cause?  But what does he want with T’Challa?”

“Oh him?  That’s just family mess.  But I did not know that the leather bound kitty was your man!  Girl, you been holding out details on me, for what?!”  Tavia exclaims.

You blink your eyes in frustration.  “Tavia!  How are you talking to me like this is just some everyday shit?  Did he fuck up your head when he got you?”

Tavia chuckles to herself.  “Listen I am fine.  I’m seeing the world in a new light, is all.  Why are our people settling for handouts from the White man, when we can build our own shit, make our own laws!  People think we are progressing because there aren’t ‘colored only’ signs, but trust me, they are still there in the way they police us.  That’s what Erik wants to change, but he needs support from family that ain’t tried to find him.  Now, Erik getting ahold of you, was no part of mine, but he said he needed to get T’Challa’s attention, so that was the way!  He promised me he wouldn’t pull no dumb shit or I’d be out, quick!”

You couldn’t believe what you were hearing.  Nothing that Tavia was saying made any sense to correlate with what you were witnessing.  

“But Erik wants T’Challa’s neck!  He ain’t here to talk, you see they been fighting non-stop!”  you explain.

“That’s just some surface level, family shit!  Once that’s out their system, they’ll have time to talk.  T’Challa just mad someone can come for his throne now.”

“What do you mean family shit?  And he is already king, that’s a done deal...right?”  you ask.

“Oh no baby, that can be challenged, ‘specially since they first cousins!  T’Challa and the Wakandans never gave him a thought, they need to let him in.  T’Challa didn’t tell you?”

You rub your forehead aggravated.  “He hasn’t told me a lot of things apparently.  I got some much shit with him, that’s what I was going to tell you about but...I can’t trust you, girl.”

Tavia looked at you offended.  “Come on, ain’t nobody-”

The loud crash of metal on metal shakes you both up as you hold onto your seats to keep from getting ejected.  Over and over again the van is rammed from behind, you try and keep yourself grounded to see what the cause is.

“Girl, is that car driving on its own??”  Tavia squawks.  

You blink repeatedly, but your eyes are not deceiving you as you see the driver’s side is empty.  It was T’Challa’s car, but he was nowhere to be seen.

Klaue growls with anger.  “Dammit!  The Wakandans are here!  You have your gun girl!?”

Tavia shakes her head, looking ready to cry.  “No man!  I ain’t shootin shit!  I told y’all that!”

You feel heat coming from your Kimoyo beads as a light beams from it.  You hold your palm out as Shuri comes into focus.

“Hey!  Are you alright in there?”  She asks you.

You nod.  “Uh huh.    But T’Challa’s car is coming after us, but he isn’t in it.  No one is!”

Tavia looks around Shuri’s image cautiously.  “Girl, did iOS get and update?  We got hologram handhelds now?”

Shuri smirks apologetically to you.  “Yeah, that is my fault.  I had T’Challa put an remote control device on the engine so that I can tap in and drive if needed.  It never takes long for my services to come in handy.  Just hold tight, we are getting you out of there now.”

“Who’s we-”

A large thud hits the top of the van as a spear shoots through the ceiling between you and Tavia.  You both collectively scream as the foreign object retracts back.  

Klaue exclaims in fear.  “Shit!  Now we’re really in it.  Girl if you don’t get a weapon aimed now, they’ll have you head!”

Tavia is still screaming.  “The fuck!  I ain’t shootin nobody!  How you know that ain’t Erik?”

A loud whistle screams through the air as a gleam of light flashes in front of the windshield.  Sticking in the ground with a thwack, Klaue has no time to steer out of the way before the van goes airborne, flipping in the air, landing on its top.

You both took a tumble inside the van, you rub your head and neck from the whiplash.  “Gatdamn, Tavia, are you aight?”  you ask, trying to move your body from the twist it was in.

Tavia coughs.  “Yeah, just got the wind knocked out my ass.”  

“Good, cuz I’m going to kick yours once we oughta this, bitch, taking me through all this bullshit.”  you say through your teeth.

Tavia rolls over, sitting slightly upright.  “The day you kick my ass is the day the Kardashians swear offa Black men.”

“Fuck you.”  You quip.

“(Y/N)?”  a voice calls out from the side of the vehicle.

You turn slowly to look and see a bald woman, in beautifully adorned red and gold armor and garment, enough to make Grace Jones tumble into a puddle.

“Hello, my apologies for the rough stop.  I hope I have not hurt you.”  

“No, you haven’t, thanks.  Are you someone with T’Challa?”

She nods.  “The King is not with me right now, but I am part of his guard.  My name is Ayo.”

She smile weakly, thankful for some assistance on the right side of things.  “Your voice told me all I needed to know.”

Klaue writhes in the driver’s seat; looks as though he got a good hit in the front of his face, bloodied.

“We must hurry (Y/N), there is no time to stick around here.”  Ayo says holding out a hand to help you out.

As you come to standing you ask, “What about Tavia?”

Ayo looks to the car.  “That is her in there?”

You nod as Ayo peers down through the window again.  “Come on out then.  Are you seriously injured?”

Tavia crawls out, trying to avoid broken glass.  “No, I’m good.”

“Fine.  Then I also have orders to take you back to Wakanda with us, as well.”  Ayo says.

“What?  Why are we still going to Wakanda, you stopped them, haven’t you?”  You question, stress building up again.

Ayo looks to you.  “We still do not have a confirmation from the King on the combatant.  We hope to hear back soon, but for now my focus is to get you both out of here.”

“Well, why the hell am I going?  I don’t know a damn thing about that country, no passport on me, nothing.”  Tavia says.

“You will need none of that.  We cannot risk the life of (Y/N), or their child for your part in the combatant’s plan.  You will be segregated from the population until we figure out what to do with you.”

“There is no child!”  You say swiftly.  You still denied any kind of pregnancy until you could get to a doctor.

Tavia’s mouth moves in many ways until words fell out.  “Wait, what?  I never said I was fucking with people’s kids, man!  I don’t know anything about a baby!”  Tavia says.

Ayo looks confused.  “I’m sorry, I must’ve spoken out of turn…”

You sigh.  “No, I just want to make sure of things first.  And at this stage, it’s not a child anyway-”

“(Y/N), you pregnant?”  Tavia says, looking at you flabbergasted.

You roll your eyes.  “Not completely proven true yet!  Shuri just checked my vitals and found something to be off with hormones or whatever.  I haven’t even pee’d on the stick yet!”

Tavia smirks.  “This nigga busted his trojan horse all up in your barricades, huh?  Girl you ARE a FREAK!”

You fought back the urge to laugh.  Even when she was being insane in her logic, she still had that charm that kept you rolling.  “Tavia!  It wasn’t like that!”

Ayo calls something in Xhosa on her kimoyo beads, and soon after an aircraft appears in the distance like an apparition.

Tavia and you are still going back and forth about you getting knocked up when Ayo reminds Tavia that she is not to try and flee or fight, or she will face consequences.

“If you don’t want me out, why don’t you cuff me, sis?”  Tavia asks, suddenly tough again.

Ayo turns to her slowly, gaze unshifting.  “You did see what I did to the van, yes?  Imagine what else I can do.  The Dora do not require handcuffs.”

Tavia just nods, satisfied with the answer.  “What about Klaue?  You gonna take him?” you ask.

Ayo looks at the wreckage like it was a paper jam.  “Eh, let him bleed out.”

As the aircraft opens for them to board, you get on with all the anxiety in the world.  You felt woozy from the excitement, probably brought on by pregnancy sickness as well, and you still hoped that was all in your head too.  Nothing was ever normal anymore; from men to sex to getting from one place to the other.  You prayed T’Challa would get back soon, safely; you didn’t know what the hell to do in a country you’ve never seen, with people unknown.  Not even Tavia was a saving grace for you, since she became a part of this mess, how much more could you take.  

Part 8

Other Works:

King Kil’mawalls  

T’akia

N’Jadaka’s Helpful Hands

Some Weeks Are Better Than Others

Commencement Day

Wakanda Got Y’all

If I Could Do It All Again

#SundaySweat

Song of Stevens

Signs of Rain

World’s Best Baba

My Ragtag

@sweetpeachjones@scrumptiouslytenaciouscrusade@universalbri @therevolution-willbelive@you-like-this-chain @sarcastic-sunshines@airis-paris14@afraiddreamingandloving@kreolemami@lalapalooza718 @syreanne@thiccdaddy-mbaku@she-is-golden @wakanda-inspired @90sinspiredgirl@bidibidibombaclaat @sithlordslut@brujademente@chaneajoyyy @slimmiyagi @lewatigress @shesakillerkween

#t'challa x reader #t'challa x you #black panther au #fanfic #shakafic

[zayadriancas]

This is random and I don’t know if it will make sense but if you had to rank the next class plots in order from favorite to least favorite per episode (like each next class episode and then say for each episode out of the 3 plots like which plot you like the most then the one you like the second most then the one you like the least) Just curious how you would rank each plot per episode sorry if this doesn’t make sense

Don’t worry it makes sense! :)

BootyCall: (I didn’t really care for any of the plots in this episode tbh but)

1: Shay’s plot (it set up Shiny and no characters in this plot were either acting out of character or straight up petty/mean, plus it was Shays first actual plot and it could have been better but it wasn’t terrible)

2: Maya’s plot (I love Maya finally focusing on her dream of music again, but I hated the way they wrote Zig in this plot to suddenly be this clingy, sex obsessed, & apparently not talented enough to play guitar instead of supportive & just made him look bad for the sake of trying to shoehorn Jonah into the plot and basically set up Zig to be the bad guy for the rest of the season & even worse never truly delve into why he’s being so clingy, insecure, etc)

3: Tristan’s plot (I hated Tristan’s biphobic comments but at the same time I hate how Miles was made to look completely innocent, it was made to seem like he hadn’t treated Tristan like shit in their first relationship and led him to believe he was using him, which is why Tristan was so upset in this episode when he saw Miles flirting with that girl a day after they made out/hooked up. That doesn’t excuse his terrible comments at the debate but still. Miles wasn’t a saint and Tristan had a right to be mad, he just didn’t handle it properly. Basically Tristan wasn’t the only wrong one in this plot but they tried to make it seem like he was)

NoFilter:

1: Grace/Zoe’s plot: (my only complaint is that it wasn’t from Grace’s POV since not only are we just finding out she has a serious illness but before this she still hadn’t had a plot yet, but other than that the majority of this plot was great)

2: Miles’s plot

3: Frankie’s plot (I did like it, but I hate how after this episode they made her depression about boy drama instead of actually delving deeper into her mental health like they did with both of her siblings)

YesMeansYes:

1: Zig’s plot

2: Miles’s plot

3: Hunter’s plot

NotOkay:

1: Maya’s plot

2: Tristan’s plot (I didn’t like him and Vijay together at all but it was nice to see him realize he couldn’t lead Vijay on when he still had feelings for someone else because he knew how that felt, and honestly the plot itself was just amusing tbh)

3: Shay’s plot (mainly because it’s obvious they only had Shay turn Tiny down because they wanted to do the Shay/Tiny/Lola triangle, even though they tried to make it seem like it was about her parents not allowing her to date. But they said they’d reconsider if they met Tiny, and obviously when Shiny does end up dating they love Tiny even though we don’t see their official meeting on screen so, it was obviously just an excuse to make Tola happen)

ButThatsNoneOfMyBusiness:

1: Lola’s plot

2: Maya’s plot

3: Miles’s plot (I did like it a lot though this episode had 3 great plots)

NotAllMen:

1: Zoe’s plot (I didn’t care that much for it because it was kind of random/felt unrealistic with the whole David thing and then there’s no follow up of trying to find her actual real dad but it was better than the other two plots)

2: I guess Frankie’s plot even though this was the start of making her depression becoming about boy drama and I hate the way Jonah treated her in this episode, it at least featured a likable character (Frankie I mean) who did nothing wrong and the whole boy drama was the writers fault and not hers and it’s not her fault Jonah decided to be an ass for no real reason when he barely knew her and made her feel guilty when she did want to be there helping, but couldn’t find a way to get a hold of him to tell him she’d be late/not coming whatever)

3: Hunter’s plot

ThisCouldBeUsButYouPlayin:

1: Miles’s plot

2: Maya’s plot

3: Zig/Zoe’s plot

TeamFollowBack:

1: Maya’s plot (it was heartbreaking but the most intense/captivating of the 3)

2: Frankie’s plot (even though yes it was about boy drama which I didn’t like, it was tolerable and the only thing that made no sense was the Fronah kiss at the end, and I just honestly am mostly putting it 2nd because I didn’t like Tristan’s plot)

3: Tristan’s plot (everything about it was written so poorly and Tristan suddenly hooking up with tons of guys came out of nowhere, not saying that’s a bad thing but this was just a poorly written way IMO for Tristan to blame Miles for giving him chlamydia when he didn’t even know for sure if he had it cuz he hadn’t been to a real doctor and to our knowledge they only kissed at the pool party (they may have done more but it really didn’t seem like it, I feel like Tristan just blamed Miles cuz he thought that Miles was promiscuous so it “had to have been him” even though Tristan himself had hooked up with like 5 guys in that semester and if Tristan did have chlamydia why didn’t he think it could have been one of the other guys? Anyway this whole plot was just a mess).

SinceWeBeinHonest:

1: Miles’s plot

2: Frankie’s plot

3: Zig’s plot

SorryNotSorry: (another episode I didn’t care for tbh)

1: I guess Frankie’s plot. I know I keep saying I hate her boy drama plots but really this is the only plot that didn’t piss me off in some way

2: Maya’s plot (I hated it because of how they had Zig lie to Maya and try to downplay what happened but at least Maya herself did nothing wrong)

3: Hunters plot (it was intense and Spencer’s acting was great, but Hunter is a piece of shit so I couldn’t feel sorry for him one bit and honestly it’s a bit scary to watch in a way that wasn’t something I could enjoy if that makes sense, like not scary in a captivating way but scary in a I honestly have a hard time watching this kind of way.)

SquadGoals:

1: Miles’s plot

2: Maya’s plot

3: Frankie’s plot

TurntUp:

1: Hunter’s plot (this is the one plot of his I actually liked and it had potential after this and they wasted it)

2: Shay’s plot

3: Zig’s plot (I love him but god he was embarrassingly awful throughout half this episode, I know he meant well but still. He fucked up).

CheckYourPrivilege:

1: Yael’s plot

2: Tristan’s plot

3: Frankie’s plot (again like Zig, meant well but embarrassingly fucked up)

BuyMePizza:

1: Zoe’s plot

2: Lola’s plot

3: Grace’s plot

ThrowbackThursday: (aside from seeing the alumni I really didn’t like this episode tbh)

1: I guess Lola’s plot but it really should have been from Tiny’s POV, or even Shay’s. Yes Lola was trying to stand up for Tiny which was great but like this should have been about Frankie getting in no trouble for the banner as opposed to maybe like Kara/Northern Tech getting in trouble for their prank or something to show how racism affects things. Or like, have Tiny have gotten in the fight with a white guy from their school and have the white guy get less punishment than Tiny) I appreciated their efforts to bring attention to the BLM movement but it was written poorly and not from the POV of an actual black person which made it worse.

2: Tristan’s plot (I guess. Like I said I really didn’t care for any of the plots in this episode).

3: Frankie’s plot

ToMyFutureSelf: (another episode I didn’t care much for)

1: Shay’s plot

2: Zoe’s plot

3: Maya’s plot (not cuz of her but Zig and Grace acting the way they did. The only highlight was Sav and Spinner).

ThatAwkwardMomentWhen:

1: Zoe’s plot

2: Frankie’s plot

3: Shay/Tiny’s plot (I loved the Shiny moments but like I feel like this plot existed just to break up Tola and create more drama in the Shiny/Tola triangle. Tiny literally having his appendix removed is never mentioned again and was only like half from his POV but barely. He literally never had a plot from his own POV and the one time he kind of does his literal health condition is treated as secondary compared to relationship drama.)

RiseAndGrind:

1: Zig’s plot

2: Miles’s plot

3: Maya’s plot

TheseAreMyConfessions:

1: Shay’s plot

2: Yael’s plot

3: Grace’s plot (what could have been a good plot about her CF was turned into her having a forced crush on Zig, yelling at Maya for no good reason, and yeah it was just awful)

OMFG:

1: Zoe’s plot

2: Hunter’s plot (I didn’t so much like it but I’ll explain my reasoning in a second)

3: Shay’s plot (I love her and I can understand why she felt like she had to give up everything and was upset and she did have a right to be, but I don’t like her passive aggressive behavior in this episode and low key guilting Lola into giving her her blessing to date Tiny after Lola said no. When Lola asked permission it was different because Shay and Tiny hadn’t even dated yet, but Lola and Tiny just broke up and Lola had to deal with finding out the guy she loved had stronger feelings for her best friend. And this is after she’d recently opened up to him about her abandoning issues. I know you can’t help who you fall for but let’s face it, Lola was Tiny’s second choice from the beginning, I do believe he genuinely liked and cared for her but not as much as Shay. So anyway Lola wasn’t even mean when she denied Shay from dating Tiny and she had every right to not be comfortable with them dating, at least not right away. But after Shay started acting out and admitted it was partially because having to give up Tiny, Lola felt bad enough to give Shay her blessing and I just feel like that was low key guilt trippy and just wrong).

BreakTheInternet:

1: Zoe’s plot

2: Lola’s plot (even though she was acting petty part of me didn’t blame her(read commentary on my thing for Shays plot in OMFG) like it wasn’t the right way to handle it and I love Shay and Shiny but still. Plus I really loved and related to her quote about not being able to talk about her pain because it makes people uncomfortable

3: Miles’s plot

IWokeUpLikeThis:

1: Maya’s plot

2: Yael’s plot

3: Zig’s plot (just because the Zig/Esme stuff aside from their scene at the end made me cringe)

WorstGiftEver:

1: Shay’s plot

2: Goldi’s plot

3: Miles’s plot

PicsOrItDidn’tHappen:

1: Maya’s plot

2: Frankie’s plot

3: Rasha’s plot (I liked it but Miles bugged me so much in this plot and it didn’t get as much screen time as the others)

HugeIfTrue:

1: Lola’s plot

2: Frankie’s plot

3: Hunter’s plot

ThatFeelingWhen:

1: Zoe’s plot

2: Frankie’s plot

3: Miles’s plot

Unsubscribe:

1: Grace’s plot

2: Zoe/Rasha’s plot

3: Hunter’s plot

IRegretNothing:

1: Maya’s plot

2: Lola’s plot (I loved it almost equally to Maya’s but I can relate to Maya’s more so)

3: Miles’s plot

Woke:

1: Maya’s plot

2: Zoe’s plot (again I love it pretty much equally to Maya’s but Maya’s was more relatable to me)

3: Frankie’s plot

ImSleep:

1: Maya’s plot

2: Zoe/Goldi/Rasha’s plot (I really couldn’t tell whose POV it was supposed to be from lol)

3: Miles’s plot

BackToReality:

1: Yael’s plot

2: Grace’s plot

3: Esme’s plot

GetMoney:

1: Saad’s plot

2: Frankie’s plot

3: Shay’s plot

ILookLikeA:

1: Goldi’s plot

2: Miles’s plot

3: Hunter’s plot

RollUpToTheClubLike:

1: Grace’s plot

2: Goldi’s plot

3: Maya’s plot (I liked it but the involvement of gamer club, who literally harassed and sent death threats to her, bugged me so much)

Preach:

1: Zoe’s plot

2: Saad’s plot

3: Frankie’s plot

FactsOnly:

1: Yael’s plot

2: Maya’s plot (I loved it equally to Yael’s tbh it was hard to choose)

3: Zig’s plot (it could have been great if not for making it about a threesome instead of him actually focusing on not only his insecurities about not being good enough to get into school but planning his future or at least getting a general sense of what he wanted to do)

Fire:

1: Maya’s plot

2: Shay’s plot

3: Esmes plot (I could relate to it and I didn’t hate the plot itself but I just did not like her actions)

GetYouAManWhoCanDoBoth:

1: Lola’s plot

2: Shay’s plot

3: Tristan’s plot (the fact that it was mainly made about his relationship with Miles bothered me so much)

Obsessed:

1: Zig’s plot

2: Miles’s plot

3: Hunter’s plot

KThxBye:

1: Zoe’s plot

2: Maya’s plot

3: Esmes plot (I liked all 3 plots equally in this episode tbh but again with Esme, I could relate to her and my heart broke for her but still her actions weren’t okay)

#degrassi #anonymous #answered #long post

[shortmania]

Could you tell Ham’s backstory?

Sure thing, bud. Under the cut.

So let’s start with what I’ve already revealed in-story: Ham’s got feelings for someone and it’s messed him up. I know I’ve hinted as much. Someone told Pam that he’s “tainted meat” or something when she tried to hit on him. Not a shock, look at who his parents are, but the thing I’ve teased at for years is WHO. Who does Ham like, and why is it messed up?

K, so again, not gonna be a huge shock, but it’s Kori. Anyone shocked? You shouldn’t be, I’m not exactly subtle.

So I’ll stop roasting myself now and just go ahead with explaining. If you don’t remember Kori, she’s Gerald and Phoebe’s youngest kid. She was created by @feels-ova-woman​, actually, I just got permission to play with her. Pictures here, here, here, here, here–Mm, plug it in, plug it in. Anyway, she’s been Ham’s best friend since they were babies, like they had an instant connection from a young age and have pretty much always been attached at the hip, unlike with Zack and Jaron, who barely even blinked at each other before they were 10. They’re unique that way, the perfect amount of both their parents to get along like jam and toast. She’s his closest and dearest friend and he’s had a crush on her for… I don’t think even he knows how long, he just kinda realized it randomly one day when he was like 9-10. But Ham’s one of those kids who get crushes on rocks if they’re wearing enough makeup, so he told himself it wasn’t a big deal and – for a while – it really wasn’t. He dated other girls, had other “epic romances,” got his heart broken, moved on.

He got older, though, and the crush evolved into something more serious. By Breathing Slowly, when he’s 11, it’s started screwing with him. S'why he’s getting into arguments with her more often over silly shit. Phil’s whole thing during that period doesn’t help, either. Ham never talks about it, though. It’s pretty much just his dirty little secret until he hits 14, and Kori… Well.

The thing about Ham’s backstory is that it’s really Kori’s backstory. Everything leads back to her struggles and Ham’s forced obliviousness to them; the fact he’s supposedly got such strong feelings for her and yet has this habit of ghosting her at every turn–both out of an honest lack of scope and maybe just because ignoring the deeper aspects of her gets to be the only way he can be around her at all and not explode.

Because Ham and Kori have a lot in common. They’re both reserved, bold adventure-seeking types, and feel left out a lot in their own households. A great deal of Gerald and Phoebe’s energy goes into managing Taro (cuz… have you seen Taro? There’s a lot going on there) and Jaron (save him), so Kori can feel very pushed aside sometimes. Like she doesn’t really have anything of her own and she’s in this box. Her mom’s always busy, Taro’s always busy, Jaron’s always either busy or just being lame.

And it gets to be that even with Ham, the person she’s closest to and who can sometimes feel like the only person she can 100% be herself with, she feels stifled and trapped. Cuz Ham, for all that he has the heart of a sweet awkward little wallflower, is still a Shortman and people gravitate to him regardless of his attitude. He’s attractive, he’s talented, his dad is well-known and well-loved. It isn’t quite like that for Kori. By the beginning of High School, she’s gone from the cool, tech-savvy, keeper of legends to just some geek. She starts getting called his sidekick, that strange nerd always hanging around him, rumors start spreading that she does his homework and that’s the only reason he lets her hang around. And Ham gets more distant every day. It gets to be miserable very quickly and she grows to hate High School.

She grows to hate a lot of things.

So she joins the Skip It program and breezes through it. Graduates early. Before she knows it, she’s getting offered all these amazing opportunities. Universities overseas and fancy foreign engineering programs and whatnot. Things Taro and Jaron got offered but waved away, she grabs onto like a lifeline.

Because unlike Taro and Jaron, the only things holding her to Hillwood are her dad (who knows better than to keep her from her dreams), and Ham (who’d much rather she stick around with him cuz hey, he’s miserable, too, okay?!).

So, much of Ham’s chapter is Kori trying to talk to him and him avoiding the inevitable, I guess. Like literally my plan was to have Ham focused on all this other junk–other friends, girls, sports, his family, wrestling, what have you–and to have Kori kinda popping in from time to time being weird, and then you, as the reader, have only a vague suspicion of what’s really going on until the final confrontation. This is all rough since I haven’t written it, but the basic idea is they get into a huge fight, where Ham declares himself to her in a bid to keep her in Hillwood and Kori snaps on him and tells him she’s sick of always following him around, basing everything in her life around him, always him. But what about her? Has he ever even thought about her once? Has she ever mattered? Because she wants to matter. She wants to go to Japan, to meet and live with her relatives, connect with her roots, discover herself and what all there is of the world outside of all this other bullshit.

And Ham is flabbergasted by all this, because yeah, he really hadn’t thought about it, he hadn’t wanted to, and he yells back at her and yada yada. She goes, he says nothing about it, and they don’t talk anymore. Ham eventually stops being angry and starts hating himself instead, eaten up with guilt about how he reacted. Because she was always his best friend first, and he’d been a shit friend to her. Had tried to use his feelings as leverage to keep her locked in a situation she hated. And he doesn’t even know if she felt the same about him–in his desperation, her feelings, good or bad, had ceased to mean anything. He’d just wanted her to consider how she was making him feel. To pity him, if nothing else. It’s a lot for a depressed, hormonal fourteen-year-old to have to think about, and on top of it all, he still loves her and feels insanely jealous any time he hears any stories of what she’s up to and hates himself all the more for it. He doesn’t date anymore. Or, that was the plan before Pam showed up. His chapter’s meant to end with Ham finally taking that first step towards recovery and accepting Pam’s offer to a date. Which is cool, it’s good. I’m pretty happy with that outcome. Positive character development is tasty.

Phil’s supportive about the whole “unrequited feels for your ex-bff” thing. Or, well, as supportive as Phil’s capable. Zack’s a bich about it. Helga just hates it all a whole heaping ton for obvious reasons. And that’s it, that’s the end.

OH, and Ham and Helga have a heart-to-heart about the whole thing and he ends up the first (and only?) kid she confides the full extent of her romantic history with Arnold to. Like straight-up, she tells him about the shrines, and Ham’s like, “QUE?!” (sorry, had to). Anyway, so absent-mindedly one day, Ham makes a little pencil-version of Kori, realizes what he just did, snorts at it, and throws it away in a drawer to be forgotten. I think… Zack finds it, though? Yeah, I’m pretty sure it was Zack. And so that’s a thing that gets laughed about for years then, lol. If anyone even remembers the Shrine discourse from way back in Looking Up. Now you know.

So there it is. Not that exciting and probably exactly what everyone expected, but I just love Kori and I enjoy exploring the darker aspects of Ham’s character. I love him, too, though, I do. Poor confused lemon head. He just needs to grow up, that’s all. On his own time and without all the pressure and unearned expectations.

Hope it was all you wanted, Anon. Sorry for rambling a bit at the end there. Have a good day. 💛☕

#suprspeak #lwts #ocs #spoilers #lwts spoilers #ham #i need coffee #tw cursing

[bazypitchandsimonsnow]

Love, Snow

Rating: T

Genre: Fluff/Light Angst

Word count: 14050

Summary: Baz receives a secret admirer note, and starts the strangest correspondence with someone he doesn't know. How does he deal with this on top of his long standing crush on the football quarterback?

Read on AO3

AN: Confession: I misread one of my requests as "first kiss" and got too excited by this idea to re-check the request before I wrote 14k+ words. Oops. I'm very stupid. But hey I ended up writing a really fun AU and I still wanna share it so I'll publish it on it's own. I promise I'm still working on requests and will publish them asap. I hope this fic is a good enough explanation/apology for making those people wait. Very, very sorry. I hope you enjoy this for now :)

So this is like low tech "Love, Simon" and it's stupid but I love it. Also everyone is American because I really wanted the stereotype of "crushing on the high school football quarterback" for Baz. It's so stupid and cheesy I couldn't resist. Also big thank you to @carryonmylovelies for her unending support and the title.

———————————————-

Baz

“And that’s another touchdown, putting the score over with just 3 seconds to spare!” The student announcer shouts into a goddamn microphone. “Way to go #61, Simon Salisbury!”

Everyone jumps up and cheers. It’s way too loud. I wince, curling in on myself more. I do clap politely though. It was a good play. Even though this is just an exhibition game to kick off the year.

Salisbury rips off his helmet, throwing it up in the air with a triumphant shout. His bronze curls are sweaty and plastered to his forehead. He’s smiling in that way. Open mouthed, laughing, blue eyes sparkling. I savour it while I can, because soon all the other jocks crash into him in a big testosterone pile. They’re hollering like madman and congratulating Salisbury with pounds to the back. Christ, I hate how much I wish I was down there.

“Wow, Salisbury did a good job, again,” Niall chuckles.

“Yeah, I guess,” I mutter.

Dev glares at me. “Why do you come to these games if you’re always being such a downer, Baz?”

Because this is the only time I can stare at Simon Salisbury’s tight pants covered behind without anyone noticing, even if it is at a distance. I shrug. “I don’t know. I’m bored.”

“Oh, have you finally run out of books?”

I snort, pushing my glasses further up my nose. “I’m never out of books.”

“Yet here you are.”

I don’t answer that, because I don’t want to explain. I figured out I was gay three years ago, and I only finally accepted it six months ago. What’s even worse is that I’ve liked Simon for that long. Three years of pining after the most popular boy in school. Have I mentioned that my life is absolute hell?

The game slowly wraps up. The teams shake hands, the crowd slowly disperses, and I’m still sitting on the bench, just watching him. Of course he has to high five every single teammate before they go, and then he meets up with his friend. Despite Simon Salisbury being more popular than a lollipop in a daycare centre, his best friend is not another muscle bound jock. In fact, Penelope Bunce is actually my only legitimate academic rival. She has frizzy purple hair and glasses like a sassy librarian. Simon hugs her so hard she’s lifted off the ground. They laugh and smile together, and I’m so fucking jealous.

“Baz? You ready to go?”

I’m snapped out my daze by Niall. He looks at me with crossed arms and a raised brow.

“Yeah,” I reply, zipping up my coat, “let’s go.”

We walk down the bleachers. I can’t help but sneak one last look at Simon, with his arm around Bunce and a big dumb smile on his face. Fuck my life, I’m so screwed.

———————————————-

Watford High is like any other high school. Loud, smelly, and somewhere I desperately wish to escape everyday. I only like the academic aspect, and even that is occasionally lacking. I walk through it briskly, dodging other students on my way to my locker. I’m getting my algebra textbook when he decides to walk by.

“Hey, Baz!” Simon says with a grin as he walks by with Bunce. Why does he always do this? Taunt me with his perfectly messy hair and sunshine smile and big blue eyes? Of course he’s also wearing his letterman jacket that perfectly fits his broad shoulders.

“Hello, Salisbury,” I reply, keeping my voice very neutral, thank God.

“See you in English, yeah?”

“Yes, see you.”

He keeps walking. I (hopefully) subtly watch him keep doing. He’s saying something close to Bunce’s ear. It must be something stupid, because she immediately smacks him over the head. He pouts at her adorably. I rip my gaze away before I start blushing.

I’m pathetic. Here I am, mooning over a guy who I could never have. He’s popular, and a football jock, and straight. He was dating the bloody head cheerleader until the end of last year. He’d never be interested in me.

I walk as fast as I can to English and sit next to Niall as usual. Salisbury is sitting a few desks back with Bunce to his left. They’re murmuring over something. I do wonder what they’re talking about, but I focus on the front of the class. I won’t let my stupid crush affect my studies.

Soon enough, Ms. Possibelf starts her lecture. We’re studying Hamlet, something I’m already extensively familiar with thanks to my English Professor mother. I first read Hamlet when I was 12. I could do this in my sleep.

“And here we can interpret romantic undertones of Hamlet and Horatio’s relationship,” Ms. Possibelf says, pointing the quote on the slide.

“Ms?” One girls says, raising her hand and speaking before she’s actually called on. “I think it’s kind of silly to say Hamlet and Horatio were together. They were obviously just friends because gay people weren’t around back then.”

I raise my hand immediately. Ms. Possibelf gives me a look that’s both “yes, yes I know” and “don’t kill her, Basilton.” She does pick me though. “Yes, Baz?”

“Hamlet and Horatio’s relationship can be interpreted many ways, and romantic is certainly one of them. Considering that many scholars have theorised as such it’s a viable conclusion and something that should be presented to the class. Also, Shakespeare was very likely bisexual himself as he wrote sonnets that many believe were meant for male lovers. Which makes a romantic attraction even more possible. And finally, just because homosexuality was frowned upon in the era does not mean gay people were non-existent. To think so shows an ignorance of history.”

The girl gapes at me for a second, but it quickly becomes a glare. Others murmur and roll their eyes. Niall sighs but with a mildly impressed smile. I keep my back straight and head high. I’m at the top of the class, and I’m not afraid to show why. Mind you, that’s probably why my only friends are my cousin and the other boy I grew up with.

“Thank you, Baz,” Ms. Possibelf sighs, “you make excellent points. Now, let’s move on to the role of Horatio as the bard.”

She continues with the lecture. I ignore the constant death glare I’m getting from my history ignorant homophobe classmate. But I feel other eyes on me as well. A few desks back, from my left. Cautiously, I look slightly in that direction. Salisbury immediately looks up towards the ceiling, but he wasn’t fast enough. I know he was looking at me. Probably just to gape at the weirdo nerd like everyone else. My heart aches. Fuck, I despise my emotions being dependant on someone else, on Salisbury. I turn back to the board. If I can’t stop my own stupid feelings, I can at least ignore them.

———————————————-

I don’t see Salisbury for the rest of the day. English is the only class we share and he has football practice almost every lunch. It gives me fewer opportunities to look at him. I’m not sure that if that’s a negative or a positive, unfortunately. Before I know it, the day is over, and I’m free of this prison. I head towards my locker as fast as possible

“Hey man,” Dev says as he catches up with me, “still coming to my house, yeah?”

“Of course, it’s Friday. Got the good vodka?” I smirk at him. He rolls his eyes and nudges my shoulder.

“It’s never good and you know it, asshole.”

I open my locker, absentmindedly placing my textbooks inside. “Well, there better be salt and vinegars chips, or I’m-”

“Hey what’s this?” Dev picks up a piece of poorly folded lined paper, the only messy thing in my otherwise pristine locker. My name is written on the front in chicken scratch handwriting. He hands the strange thing to me. “Think this is for you, cuz.”

I pluck it from his hands, then unfold it with careful fingers. But I almost immediately drop the paper. The words on it warrant such a response.

Hey Baz I think your really cute :) - Snow

“Oh shit, man,” Dev chuckles, “you’ve got a secret admirer!”

Fuck. My. Life.

———————————————-

“I think you’re overreacting,” Niall sighs before taking another swig of the near empty vodka bottle. We’re going to need a new one  next week.

“I am not,” I snap, “and stop hogging that thing, you vodka hogger.” He rolls his eyes and reluctantly passes the bottle. I take a good drink, head draped back over Dev’s spinning desk chair.

“It’s just a little note. Someone thinks you’re cute. That’s a good thing!”

“No it isn’t! It’s obviously some sort of prank, some idiot who think it’s funny to tease the class weirdo.”

Dev groans through a mouthful of chips. “If I hadn’t grown up with you, I’d wondered when you became so self deprecating. But I’m pretty sure you were born like this.”

I throw the bottle cap at his head. “Shut up, dickhead.”

He, in turn, throws a bag of Doritos at me. Jokes on him though, I’m hungry. I eat an unnecessarily large handful of his chips with unflinching eye contact. He glares at me from his bed.

“Look,” Dev sighs, “you’re overreacting, man. It’s probably just some freshman who’s too nervous to talk to you.”

“Like I want to talk to some freshman,” I grumble.

“Then just ignore it! Whoever it is will leave you alone. It’s just one note.”

My lips twist. I don’t like the idea of that. First of all, leaving it alone could give this Snow the wrong idea. What if she thinks I’m interested at all? That I think anything about this is cute? (Okay, it’s a bit cute. Even though Snow misspelled “you’re”) Secondly, I like to have the last word. Leaving it unanswered is like accepting defeat. And I never, ever accept defeat.

I turn in the desk chair to face Dev’s disgusting little Ikea desk. (Seriously, it’s white laminate and covered in food and pencil lead stains.) I take a piece of printer paper and a pencil. Time to start writing.

“What the fuck are you doing?” Niall slurs from behind me.

“Crafting a response,” I reply.

“To a secret admirer note?!”

“Yes.”

From my peripheral, I can see Niall looking at me like a mad man. I ignore him. He flings his hands in surrender, walking towards Dev.

“Nope,” he says loudly. “I’m too drunk for this. Dev, you deal with him.”

“Why do I have to deal with him? I’m just as drunk as you are,” Dev groans. I ignore him as well and keep thinkin of what to write.

“He’s your cousin.”

“So just because we share blood, he’s my problem?”

“Yes.”

I growl and whip around in my chair. They’re sprawled on Dev’s bed with the vodka bottle between them. “Can you two stop talking like I’m not here?!”

Dev and Niall look at each, then back to me. They each take a long swig of the vodka and flop back down. They’re still speaking but quiet enough so I can’t hear. So I take that as, “no we won’t, but we’ll at least won’t be loud enough so you can hear.” I snort. They’re assholes, but they’re at least slightly considerate.

I go back to my letter. I’m not sure how long it should be. Long enough to convey my message I suppose. But what to say? Fuck it. I just start writing.

Dear Snow, Thank you for the compliment, but I don’t want you to get the wrong idea. I’m not interested in a relationship. (Well, with anyone but a certain football player, unfortunately, but I can’t write that.) I hope you find someone who can return your affections. Have a nice day. - Baz

There, perfect. Concise, simple, and exactly what I need to say. I’ll have the final word. And whoever this person is will back off. My life is already a living hell, what with Salisbury and school and everything else, so I don’t need more stress. I fold it carefully and write “Snow” on the front.

“Done,” I say. “I’ll leave it in my locker grill tomorrow and hopefully Snow will find it and this will be finished.”

“I don’t understand you,” Dev grumbles.

“Just hand me the salt and vinegar chips, ass.”

I flop down on the bed with them, and we start discussing which teachers we want to stuff down a toilet. And I try not to think about the boy I’m crushing on or the girl who seems to be crushing on me. My life is getting really unnecessarily complicated.

———————————————-

I leave Snow’s note just slightly sticking out of my locker grate. Far enough out for the “Snow” part to be visible, but not too visible tath any old passerby will notice. I can only hope that the real Snow picks it up instead of some random asshole. I’m probably overestimating the inherent goodness of Watford students. I stare at the paper for a long moment, wondering if this is actually the right thing to do. But I know I haven’t gotten this far by questioning my intelligent decisions.

I walk away from the locker physically, but my mind is still slightly stuck there for the rest of the morning. Between every class, I let myself sort of wonder what’s going to happen. Will Snow be angry? Sad? Yell at me for breaking her heart? I don’t care. Well, I care a little. I’m not a monster. I’d feel bad for her. I know far too well what it’s like to want someone who doesn’t want you back.

Even in English, while I’m subtly looking at Salisbury, I wonder if someone is doing the exact same to me. I miss parts of the lecture because of it. This is not good. I hate being unfocused by something I can’t control.

And I’m certainly not walking past my locker on purpose, even though it’s nowhere near the cafeteria. There’s going to be no change there. No change at-

Except that the note is gone. And there’s a new one written on pink paper sticking out of the grate.

I don’t rush towards it of course, I have dignity. Slowly, and perfectly casually I take out the note. Part of it has been scribbled out hastily, and something else has been written in its place.

I’m sorry if I made you feel uncomfortable. I just think you’re really cool and cute. I won’t leave anymore notes. I’m sorry I hurt you :( - Snow

Fuck. She thinks I’m cool? Me?! And who uses emojis in a written message? It’s sickeningly adorable. Whoever this Snow is, I sort of wish I could meet her. And maybe that she was a he. At least he would be more a possibility than Simon ever could be.

“What’cha got there, Baz?”

I jolt hard enough that I nearly bang my head against my steel locker. I stuff the note in my pocket.

“Nothing, Dev,” I reply. “What are you doing here? This is nowhere near the cafeteria.”

“Lost a pencil somewhere here.”

“Yeah, right. Come to see if my secret admirer left another note?”

He shrugs up to his ears. “Maybe. Wondering if you're stupid idea worked, too.”

“It's not stupid.”

“It's a little stupid.”

I narrow my eyes at him. “Shut up.”

We walk together towards the cafeteria. I distract Dev by talking about our least favourite relative, so by the time we're there he's not even thinking about Snow or the note. He and Niall eat shitty grilled cheese together while I stew. Which is good, I don’t need their unhelpful input right now.

I look over Snow’s note again and again. It’s so...gracious. No anger or even self pity. She only cares how that she made me feel bad. So, Snow is a very nice person. That’s even more infuriating. And it feels wrong to just leave her hanging, letting her think she’s done some sort of irreparable harm to me. It was just a sweet note. It’s not her fault I’m gay and hopelessly in love with someone else.

I rip out a sheet from my notebook. The message comes easily enough.

Snow, Don’t worry, you didn’t hurt me. I’m perfectly fine, and I did like your note. I simply have my own problems that are not your fault. It has absolutely nothing to do with you. The truth is that I’m..

I pause, pencil frozen over the paper. I’ve never announced anyone about my sexuality. Not even Dev and Niall. This feels weird. But...Snow should understand why it’s not her fault. She’s only been nice to me so far. I don’t want her to feel like it’s on her.

The truth is that I’m gay. So there was no chance to start with. I hope you can find someone that at least can be interested. - Baz

I fold it again. There, simple. I’ve just written down my second biggest secret for a stranger to read. A nice, gracious stranger, who seems to care about my feelings before her own. Who’s entire view of me hopefully won’t change with the knowledge I like men because she doesn’t really know me. And even if it does change, who cares? She’s not my friend, or my cousin, or my mother.

Yes, this is smart. Very smart...

———————————————-

Now that I know Snow responds to my notes, waiting is even worse. The afternoon goes by in a relative haze. I heard the lessons, but I don’t really absorb them. Everything post lunch seem irrelevant in comparison to the note. It’s not until the end of last period that something breaks me out of the fog. Or rather, someone.

“Hey, Pitch.”

I look up to Penelope Bunce. I’m a bit surprised. This is the first time she’s spoken to me in something that’s not during an intellectual argument in class. Though her tone is still calmly aggressive.

“Hello, Bunce,” I reply.

“How are you doing?”

“I’m...fine, how are you?”

“Fine.” Then she just glares at me. Well, half studying, half glaring. She’s looking at me up and down like I’m a specimen. What on Earth is her problem?

“Penny!” Salisbury rushes towards us, taking Bunce by the shoulders. He’s smiling brightly and apologetically. Wait, why is he here? This isn’t his class. I guess he’s here to escort Bunce. Or the universe is torturing me. Either is possible.

“Hey, Pen, we should go,” he says. He looks at me with his big smile and my heart melts into my shoes. “Hi, Baz! How’s it hanging?”

“I’m well, Salisbury,” I say, digging my nails into my palms under the desk to keep calm. “Bunce and I were apparently having a conversation.”

“Yeah, conversation.” The way Bunce says conversation makes me nervous. Her tone is colder than the Antarctic. What is her problem?!

“Oh awesome,” he chuckles awkwardly (it’s really cute), “but we have to go. Homework and stuff, right Penny?”

Bunce glares up at him. He raises his eyebrows and jerks his head towards the door. Either he really does need to go or he really wants to get away from me. Probably both.

“Fine,” she mutters, “let’s go. Bye, Basilton.”

“Bye Baz!” Simon says, running after her. I give one quick wave. What the fuck just happened? I’d say that was the weirdest that’s happened to me this week, but bizzare love note correspondence is still slightly above bizzarely tense conversation with your crush’s best friend.

I shrug it off, taking my books and going to my locker just like normal. But to my great surprise and reluctant delight, there’s a piece of pink paper sticking out of my locker. Slowly, carefully, I unfold it.

So you are gay? That’s cool, it’s really not a problem. Actually it’s great! I’m a guy. So if that’s the problem and you still want me to leave notes, I still think you’re cute <3 - Snow

Oh...this complicates things. But...

Fuck it.

Before I can overthink too much, I take out one of my post-it notes and scrawl my message across it. I don’t need full sheet of paper for this.

I wouldn’t mind more notes, I suppose. - Baz

I stick it in the grill and walk away, not even putting away my books. Fuck fuck fuck, what the hell am I doing? And why is my heart beating so fast?

———————————————-

It’s official: I have the weirdest pen pal in the world.

For the past week, Snow and I have followed the exact same pattern we created on that first day. I write something and leave it in my locker grate. He replies by the beginning of lunch, and I reply by the end. Then I pick up his final note at the end of last period. It’s a strange, silently agreed upon system. And it’s quickly become the highlight of my day.

I’m ignoring my sandwich in favour of reading the latest one.

Mr. Halvik really does sound like a nightmare! Who has you wander around with spot plates filled hydrochloric acid?! You could call him a PERIODIC failure :D (I don’t know science, forgive me.) I’ll punch his stupid face for you if you want. Omg I’m so glad I’ve got Ms. Reynolds. She gives us broken cookies at the end of class cause her husband is a baker who brings home the bad batches. I’m definitely not complaining. And hey, just wondering, what’s your fave food? Feels like something I should know :) - Snow

“Dev, he’s still smiling, I’m frightened,” Niall says with annoyingly exaggerated fear.

“Be not afraid child,” Dev replies. I flip them both off.

Niall tries to peer over at the paper, but I pull it away. “Are we not allowed to see your secret love notes?”

“Nope,” I say flatly. “Hence the ‘secret’ prefix. And they’re not love notes.”

“Yet you are smiling. You only do that when you’re reading something you love. So...”

“So, shut up.” I glare at him over my glasses. He doesn’t flinch, but he doesn’t speak either. Good man. He knows when to leave something alone.

I flip open my notebook, and begin to pen my response.

Thank you for the sympathy, Snow, but I don’t think physical violence will be necessary. I’m waiting for the day someone burns their skin off with the acid. Then maybe Halvik will listen to my concerns. Broken cookies sound far, far better than potential chemical burns. If I had room in my schedule I’d certainly transfer to that class. To answer your question, truth be told, I have a massive sweet tooth. I love overly sugary coffee and mint aero bars. I wish I had one to go with my sandwich. And I’m wondering the same thing, what is your favourite food? - Baz

I sigh, reading it over for good measure. Each of our messages have gotten progressively longer. Mostly stupid jokes and complaining about teachers. This is the first time he’s asked something about my interests. I smile a bit more.

He hasn’t said anything about who he is, so I assume he doesn’t want to be known. Therefore, I’ve quashed my usually inquisitive spirit and haven’t asked. I don’t want to scare him away. Weird...I think I actually like him. But, what about Simon?

“Hey! Back off, dude!”

We all turn our heads towards the shouting. From where the three of us are sitting, we can see a man in a profile staring down the resident asshole who’s name I don’t bother to remember. Someone with bronze curls, a determined expression, and donning a letterman jacket. Number 61. Speak of the Devil, I suppose.

“Chill, Salisbury, we were just having fun,” asshole replies.

“Fun isn’t pushing some freshman around. Leave him alone.”

“Or what?”

“Or, I’ll do to you what you’re doing to him.”

There’s a long pause. The cafeteria is completely silent, everyone watching with bated breath. I grip my pencil incredibly hard. I know Simon can take care of himself, of course. (He’s the goddamn quarterback. He could flatten most people.) But my chest still aches, because I don’t want to see him get hurt or in trouble. I wish I could help him. Or at least have someone to hold my hand while I fret. Someone like Snow.

“Pfft,” the other guys scoffs, “whatever. You’re such a spoilsport, Salisbury.”

The idiot walks away with hands in his pockets. Simon glares at him as he walks away, then kneels down to help the freshman to his feet.

“Hey, you okay?” he says in his soft, perfect voice.

The boy nods. Simon flashes that sunshine grin, and my heart skips at least two beats. He’s such a hero. Always putting himself on the line for others. If we lived in a fantasy book, he’d be the protagonist, the mighty golden saviour. (I’d probably be the weird loner, or the dashing villain. I have the face for it.)

The freshman says his thanks and scurries off. Simon visibly sighs and puts his hands in his jacket. I can’t help but stare. He looks happy, relaxed, and- Oh shit he’s looking at me. His big blue eyes are staring right back at me, blinking in probable confusion. I immediately look back at my note for Snow, praying the heat in my cheek isn’t the blush I bet it is.

Maybe that’s why I like Snow. I can just read his words and edit my own towards him. No chance for awkward moments when all you have is paper. It’s easier, I suppose. Because I don’t even look back at Simon, but I keep looking at the paper. I really am a coward deep down.

———————————————-

I pick up Snow’s note at the end of the day, but I don’t read it until I’m alone on the bus. (Dev and Niall get off before me. And our usual Friday night get together has been cancelled on account of Dev’s procrastinated history essay.) It’s not that long. His final notes tend to be on the shorter side, leaving a new conversation for us to start tomorrow.

Oh man I love mint aero bars too. They’re fucking amazing. I hide them under my pillow because my mum thinks I eat too much candy too lol. But my favourite food is easy, sour cherry scones! Especially with lots of butter. My mum makes them. They’re my fave thing in the entire world. We eat them for dessert every Friday. Sorry if it’s too intrusive, but I’ve got another question, what’s your fave movie? I just wanna know all I can about you :D - Snow

Christ, as if my heart needs more strain after Salisbury’s near brawl today. It feels both scary and wonderful to have someone this interested in me. Even if it’s someone I’ve never met in person. And he’s offering information about his homelife, opening himself up. How is he so confident like that? I’ve never opened up to anyone, other than my family or Dev and Niall. But...if Snow can do it, so can I.

I start writing immediately.

I’ve never had a sour cherry scone, nor have I heard of them before, but they sound delicious. I’ll have to try one some time. I’m glad we can agree on mint aero bars. My friends think they’re disgusting but they’re obviously idiots. The questions are not intrusive by the way. I actually like them. On my favourite movie, I’m sorry to say it’s quite boring by normal standards. It’s not technically even a movie, but an hour long TV broadcast. It’s the BBC’s 1986 production of “Oedipus the King”. My mother is a professor of both English and Greek literature. She had me watch it far, far too young, so I used to be scared of it. But now I love it. We rewatch it constantly. I know, very boring. What’s your’s? - Baz

I fold it up, tucking the paper inside my bag, where it will remain until Monday. A hurricane of butterflies occupy my stomach. And it will remain there until Monday as well.

When the start of the school week actually rolls around, my brain is buzzing for all of class. I barely catch anything the teachers say. I only remember to look at Salisbury a couple of times in English. He’s furiously writing and rewriting something in his notes, mouth adorably twisted in determination. When he looks up at me, he smiles warmly, and I hastily go back to looking at my own notes. I know he’s just being polite, but still, I’m already occupied with thoughts of Snow. I don’t need more distraction.

As I’m walking to lunch, I see a large piece of paper sticking out of my locker. It takes all my self control not to run towards it. Cautiously, I open it. And as I read the first few sentences, I chuckle in disbelief and a fair amount of happiness.

That doesn’t sound boring at all! That sounds lit. I mean, I’ve never seen Oedipus, but kings are always great and I love Percy Jackson. If other people call you boring they’re fucking stupid. I’m def gonna watch it soon :D My favourite movie? Man, get ready for a long ass note.

He proceeds to write a mostly page long rant/analysis of “The Incredibles”, including lots of the emojis and some more personal information. And I’m smiling so hard my cheeks hurt.

Fuck, I think I have another crush.

———————————————-

How have you never read Harry Potter?! Holy shit you have had a deprived childhood! My mom first read me Harry Potter when I was 11. Tbh, it was her way of trying to make up for the fact that my dad wasn’t around. Not like she needed to. It wasn’t her fault the asshole left. But it doesn’t matter, Harry Potter is fucking awesome. I have every book. You should really get them. Btw, Oedipus is really cool but really fucking dark. Like damn, he married his own mother? He loses both his eyes!? Jeez the greeks were twisted motherfuckers. Still cool to watch though. Thanks for telling me about it :D Question: If you could go to space, where would you go? - Snow

Growing list of things I know about Snow: 1. He’s in Ms. Reynold’s science class. 2. His prefered joke is stupid pun. 2. He loves sour cherry scones because his mom makes them. 3. His favourite movie is The Incredibles because it’s “fucking brilliant”, and it was the first thing that made his mom smile after his dad left. 4. His father left when he was 11 to travel abroad and has never come back. Apparently he only sends birthday cards. Usually on the wrong date. 5. He’s plagued with almost as much insecurity as me, both from his father’s absence and general teenage anxiety over being good enough. 7. His favourite singer is Troye Sivan. 8. And now, he loves Harry Potter.

So eight things. Considering we only started exchanging weird letters two and half weeks ago, that’s pretty good. It’s more than I know about Simon, since all I know is that he plays football, he’s unbelievably attractive, and he stands up to bullies. Nothing about his favourite food or absentee father. Somehow, Snow feels more real even when I’ve never seen him in person.

I start my own response, hunched over my desk.

I’m sorry for my lack of young adult fantasy knowledge. I suppose since you’ve watched Oedipus, I’ll give Harry Potter a chance. I just read mostly philosophy and textbooks. Reading narratives has never been my thing. But I’ll try. I’m glad you liked Oedipus though. It is quite dark, but I think my mother is correct in that it’s one of the most important stories in western literature. She-

“Basil? It’s almost time for dinner, little puff.”

My head snaps up at my mother’s voice. Like always, she knocks twice before opening the door anyway. I stand up and hide the paper behind my back. She sticks her head through the door. Her curly black hair is piled on her head. The smile on her face is slight but still warm.

“Mother,” I sigh, “you’re supposed to ask to come in.”

“Sorry, sorry, I keep forgetting,” she says, still smiling. “Dinner is in a few minutes so finish whatever you’re hiding behind your back.”

I inhale sharply. “I-I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

She gives me an unimpressed look with her own grey eyes, another way in which we’re far too similar. “Basil, you’re not as subtle as you think you are. Whatever you’re doing, I hope it’s truly worthy of that impressive blush you’ve been spotting for two weeks. Including right now.” I press a hand to my overheated cheek. Godammit. She grins smugly. “Dinner is soon. Please wrap it up.”

She closes the door with slam just hard enough to make me jump. Shit, well, I guess I’m not that sneaky. I huff and go back to my desk.

She’s very knowledgeable in those fields. Though she’s not as knowledgeable about me, I suppose. I’ve already told you I haven’t come out to her, but now I’m wondering if I should change that.  We have a wonderful relationship and I just don’t want her to think of me differently. I don’t know what your sexuality and parental situation is like, but do you have any advice? I suppose that’s my question of this letter. Sorry if it’s asking too much. Also, I’d go to Mars, to study it and live there. I'd enjoy the quiet. - Baz

I fold up the letter before I can overthink it too much, as usual. Maybe it’s asking too much of Snow. Maybe he hasn’t come out either. But I suppose it’s worth asking. He’s the only one who knows about me and who could give advice. I don’t like needing it though.

“Baz! Dinner, now!”

I sigh, jumping up from my seat. “Coming, mother!”

———————————————-

“Homecoming? Blech.” Niall sticks his tongue out as we walk past the banner a student is hanging in the main hallway.

“Not into school spirit, Niall?” I ask with a smirk.

“Not in this case. Homecoming is just fake prom in September. And it’s not even celebrating the football game because the game has to be held later. Why is it being held later anyway?”

“Field cleaning issues,” Dev chimes in.

“That’s dumb.” He and Dev stop by their computer club room. They want to see if it’s actually worth their time, while I don’t care. “See ya after school, Baz. Your turn to buy the vodka!”

I nod once firmly. “See you.”

Then we’re split up, and I’m perfectly ble to speed walk to my locker. I’m still scared over what Snow is going to say. Maybe he won’t say anything at all. Maybe I’ve scared him off with my deep seated fears and insecurities. He just thought I was cute. He never asked for my bullshit.

I stop in front of my locker, and let out a long sigh of relief when I see a corner of paper sticking out of the grate. Good. Haven’t scared him off just yet. I grab the note and stick it in my binder. I’m alone this lunch, so I’ll be able to read it in peace at the library. I’m glad to not have Dev and Niall pestering me.

I turn the corner quickly, and immediately smack into something hard.

“Shit!” I shout, falling right on my ass.

“Ouch,” the other person grumbles. Crap, I know that voice, and I know that mess of bronze curls.

Simon looks up at me with those big blue doe eyes and my breath hitches. He gives me a big smile and I nearly asphyxiate. “Oh, hi Baz.”

“Hello, Salisbury,” I reply. “Practicing your football tackles in the hallway now?”

He chuckles, shaking his head. “Nah, just not looking where I was going. Really sorry about that. Here let me help.”

He starts gathering up my books. When he reaches for my binder with Snow’s note, I make sure to snatch it quickly. It’s probably best for one of my crushes to not read my secret note to my other. Christ, what is my life?

We stand up at the same time. Salisbury hands me my books, which I kindly take. He just looks at me for moment, eyes roaming up and down. I can’t tell whether he’s actually looking at me kindly or I just want him to.

“So,” he says, “where are you off to, Baz?”

“Library,” I reply cooly.

“Oh cool! I’m headed that way too!”

I raise an eyebrow. “Were you not just heading the other way? Hence walking into me?”

“Um,” he rubs the back of his neck, shuffling his feet. Almost as if he’s nervous. But Simon, perfect popular kid, can’t be nervous, especially around me. “Yeah, but I’m turned around. I’m told I have a terrible sense of direction.”

I tilt my head to the side, silently wishing to every God that Simon Salisbury wasn’t so damn adorable. “Alright, understandable.”

He looks back at up at me with his goofy grin. I start walking, and he follows. It’s better to walk side by side. That way I won’t be tempted to keep staring at his face.

“So how are you doing in English?” He asks with genuine interest.

“Fine,” I reply. “And you?”

“Eh, not great. I’m not that good at English. Or any subject, really.”

“Your infographic on chosen one heroes of fantasy last week was quite brilliant.” Shit, why did I say that? I’m so obvious. It was a good project though.

He chuckles, shrugging up to his ears. “Thanks. Penny helped a lot with it though. I’d flunk out of all my classes if it wasn’t for her. Then I wouldn’t be able to play football and that would be awful.”

I snort slightly. “Truly a fate worse than death, I see.”

“Yeah!” He replies without a hint of irony. “I love football. The game is fun and stuff but I also like the outlet y’know? Bashing and hitting stuff.”

“That’s how you feel better? Smashing into things?”

He shrugs again. “Yeah. I mean, people who tell you that slamming and bashing into things won't make you feel better haven't slammed or bashed enough.”

I snort again, and it turns into a laugh. He laughs as well. It sounds like happiness. “I’ll take your word on that. I’ve never played football.”

“Yeah, I guess you haven’t,” he chuckles. “Speaking of which, are you coming to the homecoming game?”

Shit. I freeze up, muscles in my shoulders tightening. A few weeks ago, I would’ve said yes without hesitation, because I could stare at Simon more. But now I have Snow in my head as well. It feels like going to that game would be, betraying Snow almost. Or at least forgetting him favour of someone else.

“I’m not sure,” I reply genuinely. “Possibly.”

“Oh...” Surprisingly, Simon sounds disappointed. Why? Why is my presence important?

“It’s just that I may have school work to do. I don’t know.”

“Yeah, yeah, I understand. Not going to the dance either?”

I would, if someone in particular asked me. “Probably not,” I say truthfully.

“Oh, cool. I might go, I don’t know.”

“Don’t you have to go? Being the quarterback and all.”

He shrugs again , Christ, he does that a lot. “Technically yes. But I don’t know if I’ll want to. Not sure I want to Penny and her boyfriend’s third wheel. Have to go to the game though, obviously.”

“Of course. They’d lose without you.” Oh fuck, oh fuck, I said that before thinking. Shit, I hope the slight blush I can feel isn’t too obvious. I keep my head down in a futile attempt to hide it.

“Thanks,” he says. “Uh, here’s the library.”

I look up. He’s right. There’s the library sign. “Oh, so it is. Suppose I should go...study.”

“Yeah, I guess.” He shuffles his feet again, and it’s still painfully cute. He runs a hand through his hair too. I can’t help but think about how much I want to do that myself.

“Well, goodbye, Salisbury.” I turn on my heels and start walking briskly. The sooner I’m away from Simon, the sooner my heart slows down and I can think properly.

“Hey, Baz,” he calls out. I look back at him without thinking. He’s chewing on his lip. And when he speaks, it’s stalling with a slight stutter. “Um, y’know I...I’m, um. I...” He sighs, shoving his head in his letterman jacket. “I just, it’s been nice talking to you. I-I hope you do come to the game. It’ll be fun.” He looks down. “Uh, I’ve gotta go. Have fun studying, bye Baz.”

He speed walks off, leaving me standing there very confused. That was one of the strangest conversations of my life. Was Simon actually nervous? No, he’s always so confident. Must be a fluke, a bad day. And...he hopes I come to the game? Why? I’ve been to most of his games. Does he think I’m some good luck charm? Or...does he really want me there?

I go into the library. It’s mostly empty. I take a seat on one of the couches, knees pulled up to my chest. I take out Snow’s note, slowly unfolding it.

Don’t beat yourself up too much, Baz. Coming out is hard. It took me ages to tell my mum and she’s probably the most accepting woman on the planet. It’s about putting yourself out there, and that’s always scary. Why do you think I’m leaving you notes with an anonymous name instead of just saying hi? It’s terrifying to put yourself on the line. But I think you can do it. Maybe you don’t come out to your mum first though. Maybe start small. Tell your friends? That might be easier. I don’t know, it’s up to you. But just know that I believe in you. I know your braver than me. You can do it. You’re brave. - Snow

I fold it up again carefully, taking a deep breath. Could I do it? Be brave? Maybe, if Snow believes in me. One person. Is that all it takes? It feels like it. As if this strange day could get any stranger. I start writing my response.

I’ll think about that. It may be easier. Hell I think I could do it today. But just for the record, I think you’re brave. You’ve opened up to me in these letters and that takes guts. Just because I don’t know your name doesn’t mean I don’t know you. Sure, you could be playing me, but this seems like a very long con for a high school student. You’ve already put yourself on the line a lot. I hope you personally feel more brave soon. Because I already think you are. - Baz

I tuck the note away in my binder, then lean back in my seat with my eyes closed. Today is too much to process. First Salisbury and his oddness, now Snow and his kind words. How can I be so happy and so conflicted all at the same time?

———————————————-

“C’mon hurry up, Baz!” Niall shouts. “I wanna get buzzed!” A teacher glares at him, and Niall smiles apologetically.

“I’m coming,” I yell back. “Hold your horses, Jesus.” I pluck out Snow’s final note of the week. It’s the shortest one he’s left me since the first one. And it only says a few words.

Good luck :) <3 Snow

And I smile.

———————————————-

“Fuck Ronaldo, marry Messi, kill Rooney,” Dev says, counting off the soccer players on his fingers.

“What?!” Niall snaps. “Why kill Rooney?! He’s an amazing player!”

“He’s also an asshole.”

“No he isn’t!”

“Yes, he is,” I interject, trying to push my glasses up before they inevitably slide again. We’re all laying down with our heads hanging slightly off the edge of my bed. The vodka bottle is partially empty and abandoned on the floor. “He insults everyone on the field and got arrested for drunk driving.”

“Lots of people have done both,” Niall grumbles.

“Yes, and lots of people are jerks. Keep up, Niall.”

My friend grumbles and stuffs more Doritos in his mouth. Dev snorts, earning orange chips getting thrown at his face. I pick at my nails. I keep repeating Snow’s words in my head. You can do it, you can do it, you’re brave.

“Hey, guys,” I say shakily, sitting up so they can only see my back. I need to hide my face right now. “I, uh, have to tell you something.”

“Is it that you stole my teddy when we were five and blamed it on Niall? Cause I already know.” I flick Dev’s foot and he snickers.

“Shut up.” I do a deep inhale and exhale, squeezing my eyes shut and trying to will my hands to stop shaking.

“I’m gay.”

Everything is silent. I’m holding my breath, and Dev and Niall haven’t said anything. They haven’t run off or yelled at me, so I suppose that’s good. I’m really not sure how this is supposed to go.

“Okay,” Niall says slowly, “cool.”

“Yeah, cool,” Dev unhelpfully adds.

I whip around to face them. They look completely neutral. Anxiety bubbles in my stomach. “That’s it? ‘Cool’? Do you have anything else to say?”

Dev furrows his brow. “What else should we say?”

“I don’t know! Are you mad? Hurt? Disgusted?”

Niall sits up, and his look of concern twists at my heart. “Do you...want us to be or something?”

I sigh, hanging my head and rubbing my eyes behind my glasses. “No, I suppose not. I guess it’s just what I expected. Happens when you’ve been stewing in internalised homophobia for three years.”

“You’ve been sitting on this for three years?” Dev says, also genuinely concerned. “Shit man, I’m sorry.”

“No, it’s alright. I’m just fucked up.”

“Hey, don’t worry, we’re all fucked up in our own ways. We can just be fucked up together.”

I look at both of them. They’re smiling, filled with equal mischief and kindness. Behind all the teasing and prodding, they truly are good friends. I’m glad to have them.

“I suppose being fucked up together is more fun than fucked up alone,” I say smoothly

Dev slaps my back hard enough to make me cough. “Exactly!”

Niall reaches down off my head and brings up the vodka bottle. He holds it up high. “To being fucked up!” He takes a swig and passes it to Dev.

“To Baz being gay!” He says before his swig.

I roll my eyes and snatch the bottle. “To friends.”

The two of them chuckle as I drink. We fall back down on the bed, staring up at my ceiling. I truly feel like a weight has been lifted off my shoulders. They know, and they’re okay. I’m okay. The whole world has not imploded because I’m queer. What a novel concept.

“Hang on,” Nial says, “that person you’ve been exchanging weird letters with, is that a guy? Do you like him?!”

Okay, now my world is imploding.

I groan and cover my face. Niall laughs loudly. “You do like him!” he shouts.

“Maybe,” I grumble. “I don’t know. I don’t even know what he looks like!”

“Well, do you want to know?”

I shift uncomfortably, arms crossed over my chest. “Maybe. I like writing to him. What if meeting face to face ruins everything?”

Niall shrugs. “You’ll never know if you don’t see him. Is he worth the risk?”

I sigh and close my eyes. I know the answer, but I hate that it’s so obvious. “Yes, I think he is.”

“Then you should see him. I support you! Go gays!”

“Please don’t say that ever again.”

“How about ‘pro homo’?” Dev chimes in with a shit eating grin.

“Nope, that’s even worse.”

“How about-” I slap a hand over Niall’s mouth.

“I’m just going to stop you right now.”

Both of them start snickering. I roll my eyes and get up to go to my desk, leaving the two laughing straight boys to their potato chips. There’s something I need to write down.

Well, I just told my friends, and it went well. They’re okay with it and are already teasing me mercilessly like usual. I don’t think I would’ve been able to do this without you. You make me feel brave, Snow. You’re quite amazing. Thank you, very much. I do hope to meet you someday. Sincerely, Baz

I refuse to use a heart, and ‘love’ feels like too much right now. But I am very sincere. I fold up the note and stuff it in my school bag for Monday. Dev and Niall haven’t moved an inch, still stuffing their faces with junk food.

“How are you both still hungry after dinner?” I ask.

“I’m a bottomless pit,” Niall says through a mouthful of cheese puffs. “And y’know, come to think of it, it actually makes sense that you’re gay.”

I cock an eyebrow. “Oh really? Do I look gay or something?”

“No, that’s not what I mean. You’ve just never looked twice at a girl. I always thought you were just snobbish and picky.”

“Well, I am. Just not about women. Mostly about books.”

“Duh. I already know that.”

“Maybe you’re book-sexual,” Dev interjects with a giggle.

“I don’t want to screw books.”

“Now that would be a nasty papercut!”

We all burst out laughing. And it feels like that no matter what happens with my mother or Snow or Salisbury, I’ll be alright.

———————————————-

Leaving this note in my locker is very nerve wracking. I’m so distracted all morning. Ms. Possibelf’s words go right over my head. It takes me ages to notice Salisbury staring at me. When I flick my eyes over to him, he immediately looks away. What’s up with him? Keeping an eye on his football good luck charm? I wish he’d leave me to stew in anxiety in peace.

Second period is even worse. I’m jittery as fuck, leg bouncing underneath my desk. Dev kicks me in an attempt to stop it, but that doesn’t help at all. And my mind is still swirling when the bell rings. I’m off down the hallway at a very, very brisk pace. As I’m walking, I vaguely notice Salisbury running very fast down the hall. Huh, must be late for football practice.

I stop in front of my locker and...there’s no note. What the fuck?

“Huh, mystery man hasn’t left a note?”

I jump slightly at Niall’s sudden appearance. “When the fuck did you get here?”

“I saw you and literally walked just behind you. You’re so oblivious right now, dude.”

“Shut up.” I glare at the locker, like this is all it’s fault. “Do you think I freaked him out or something?

“Well, if he did get scared off, then he’s a fucking idiot and doesn’t deserve you.”

I turn to face, a half smile pulling up my mouth. “You really think that?”

He rolls his eyes. “Duh, of course. You’re my best friend.”

“Hey! What about me?” Dev strolls up next to us, looking mock offended.

“I can have two best friends, can’t I?”

Dev shrugs and bumps their shoulders together. “I suppose so. Now, can we go eat? I’m hungry.”

“Sure,” I sigh, “I’m hungry too.”

We walk off down the hall together. I look at my empty locker once more, and a storm of worry swirling in my gut.

Lunch passes the time quite well, It’s easy to fall into easy conversation with Dev and Niall. We talk about teachers, homework, soccer players, as usual. They do a good job of making me forget about Snow. But out of the corner of my eye, I can’t help but notice Penelope Bunce glaring at me. Even when I turn to look at her she keeps staring. What’s her problem now? I know we’re both vying for top of our class but I’m not sure that deserves such an intense death glare. It’s not my fault I’m brilliant.

Afterwards, the three of us walk down the hall, deep in a heated discussion about Ronaldo’s next season.

“I swear,” I say, “he’s going to break his record this year.”

“Uh, Baz-” Dev says from just behind me.

“Don’t fight me on this, Dev, I know I’m right.”

“Baz-”

“He’s doing far too well for anything else to happen!”

”Baz!”

I spin on my heels to face him. “What?! I’m trying to make a point here, let me finish.”

He rolls his eyes. “Well, I assumed you’d want to stop for that. ” He points to his left. I look, and I nearly drop my books.

Right on my locker, for everyone to see, someone has taped a single rose. And there’s an envelope sticking from the grate underneath.

I walk towards it slowly, like approaching a ferocious animal. I take the rose off first. It looks fresh, obviously bought just today. The petals are still as red as blood. Still slowly, I take the envelope. It hasn’t even been sealed. But I recognised the chicken scratch handwriting across the front that says “Baz.” With shaky fingers, I take out the paper. It’s folded in thirds. When I open the top, the words are short and direct.

I want you to meet me too, and I’ll do you one better than someday. Go to homecoming with me? :) Love, Snow

The last third of the paper falls open, and a homecoming ticket is taped to the bottom.

“Holy shit,” Dev whispers.

“Oh my god,” Niall oh so helpfully adds in.

“Looks like you’re going to homecoming, dude.”

I don’t reply, because my brain has completely short circuited.

———————————————-

Three days. It’s been three days since Snow left his invitation. Homecoming is tomorrow. And yet, I still haven’t responded.

I’m sitting on my bed, staring at Snow’s rose, turning it over in my hand. What the hell am I supposed to do? There’s no social protocol for how to respond to your anonymous secret admirer asking you to a school dance. And there’s certainly no instruction manual on how to deal with being conflicted over your anonymous sort of crush and your three year long one. I just wanted to meet him, not go on a date with him. At least, not yet. Niall and Dev think I should say yes, but they don’t know about Salisbury.

This is all so annoyingly complicated. I’ve liked Salisbury for years, ever since I first realised I liked boys period. But now here’s Snow. Someone I’ve never met, yet I know so much about him and he knows so much about me. I suppose I finally have to choose one. But is there even a choice? When one of them is impossible and the other is literally offering to take me out? It seems obvious. Yet...here I am.

“Basil? Are you still up here, sweetheart?” My mom says through the door.

“Yes, Mom,” I reply.

“You missed dinner.”

“Sorry. I’m still not feeling well.”

There’s a short pause. I can just barely hear her sigh. “May I come in?”

Shit. I put the rose under my sheets. “Y-Yeah, sure.”

She opens the door and walks in gracefully, as usual. Her hair is tied up, and there are food stains on her shirt from where my baby brother probably tossed food on her. She sits on the edge of my bed, hands folded in her lap.

“Feeling any better?”

I shift uncomfortably in place. I don’t like lying to her. “A bit. Just...worrying about things.”

She moves closer, putting a hand on on my blanket covered knee. “You know you can talk to about anything, right sweetie?”

I chew on my lip. “Yeah, I know.”

“So, if I may be so bold, does this ‘worrying’ have anything to do with those notes you’ve been writing?”

Oh fuck. I inhale sharply. When I look at her, she’s just smiling. It’s simple and kind but doesn’t stop my rapidly beating heart. “How did you know?”

“I accidentally found one.” She takes a crumpled piece of paper out of her sweatpants. “I was cleaning up, and it must’ve fell out of your bag. I only read the first sentence, I swear. Once I realised it was something for you I stopped.”

I take the paper. Yes, it’s one of Snow’s notes. But an innocuous one, thank God. It’s just him gushing about how much he loves Troye Sivan. Luckily, my mother is not up to date on pop culture and won’t know what someone liking Troye Sivan tends to mean.

“Oh...” is all I manage to get out.

“Have you been passing notes in class?” She says slyly. “I hope you haven’t been ignoring your teachers, Basil.”

I chuckle. My mother, always the academic. “No, not in class.” I look at my lap, fingers fidgeting. “It’s, actually been in my locker. We leave them there for each other. Sorta giving letters back and forth.”

“Ah, I see. Very...unusual.”

“Yeah, I know. It started as a secret admirer note and sort of weirdly spiralled from there.”

“Secret admirer?” She moves closer, grinning wide. “So someone likes you?”

Fuck. I can feel my stomach churning. My fingers fidget frantically. I keep looking down, because looking right at her would be too overwhelming. I know what I’m going to say, but it takes a few moments for me to find the courage. But I’m brave. At least, someone told me I am, and I want to believe him.

“Yeah,” I say quietly, “he does. And...I like him too.”

There’s a long silence. This feels a lot worse than Dev and Niall, and a lot scarier. I’m still as statue, just waiting for my own mother to either reject or accept me.

“Oh,” she replies, voice also low, “it’s a he?”

“M-hm.”

“And...you like ‘hes’?”

It’s strange to hear my usually eloquent and quick tongued mother speak so cautiously. “Yeah, I do.”

“I see. Do you...only like ‘hes’?”

I curl my lips in, and nod slowly. Christ, I feel I’m going to throw up. I’m even picking at my nails, something I haven’t done since I was eleven. But I’m so damn nervous I can’t help it. Suddenly, I see a pair of slender hands wrap around my own, stopping my assault on my skin. She holds them firmly, and it certainly feels reassuring.

“It’s okay,” she says. I can almost hear her smile. “Baz, it’s perfectly fine. Don’t worry, I’m not upset, I never would be. I love you, no matter what.” She tilts my chin up. Yeah, there’s her smile, and I’m very relieved. “You’re still my little puff, who loves playing the violin and debating Greek philosophy with me until you’re blue in the face.”

I chuckle and squeeze her hand. She squeezes back, then tucks a piece of my hair behind my ear. She’s been doing that since I was small. I sigh in comfort and relief.

“I’m sorry, Mom,” I say quietly, “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you earlier. I just, I didn’t know how. And I wasn’t sure-”

She immediately wraps her arms around me. I hug her back tightly. “Sh sh, it’s alright, Baz. It’s okay, little puff. I can’t imagine how hard this has been for you. Of course I’m not mad. I’m just glad you feel comfortable enough to tell me now.”

I embarrassingly sniffle. I’m fucking crying, because I’m more pathetic than I realise. I don’t know why. Relief? Happiness? Repressed pain? Who fucking knows. Mom pulls back and holds my face. She wipes away my stupid tears with her thumbs. Because she’s always such a mother. And a good one at that.

“Thanks for understanding,” I say weakly.

She laughs softly and smiles wider. “Thank you for telling me, sweetheart. Now,” she claps my shoulders, “tell me about this secret admirer.”

I groan, head tilting back. Of course. She’s a mother, which makes her naturally nosy. “Mom, please.”

“C’mon! You said that you’ve been exchanging notes with him? Is he nice? Should I get dinner ready for him?”

“Well, don’t get cooking yet, Mom. I don’t know who he is, really. Hence the ‘secret’ thing.”

She sighs, tucking my hair again. It does feel quite comforting. “Well, if he makes you happy and you like him, then maybe he shouldn’t be secret.”

I twist my mouth. Unfortunately, she’s right. Snow does make me happy, he’s more of a possibility than Simon, and I want to meet him, more than anything. Plus, y’know, I do love to wear suits.

“I guess,” I chuckle, “I’ve got to write something.”

“Okay. Want me to heat something up for you?”

“Yeah. Thanks, Mom.”

She grins and presses a kiss to my forehead. “You’re welcome, honey. I hope this all works out for you.”

With one last hand squeeze, she leaves my room. I let out a long sigh of relief. Man, that went way better than I thought it would. I want to tell Snow about it. And I suppose I can, tomorrow at homecoming. I pull a sticky note from my bedside, and I write three words.

Yes Love, Baz

———————————————-

I pace back and forth in front of the school. I keep checking Snow’s note from lunch over and over again to make sure I got it right.

Meet me at the south entrance at 7:30

Well, my phone says it’s 7:34, so Snow is late. I try to suppress my worry, fiddling with my sleeves and tie instead. It’s my favourite suit, because I'm the kind of person who has a favourite suit. Greenish black with a bit of silver with a blood pink tie. I hope Snow likes it.

Ugh, my feet hurt. I sit down on the bench, staring at my jittering shoe. Maybe he won’t come and I’ll just sit here forever. Maybe I’ll just die here. Honestly, that would be perfectly okay with me right now. Saves the embarrassment of waiting for a boy to never show up.

“Hey,” a breathless voice says from above me.

Wait, I know that voice. I’ve had it’s tone memorised since I was 15.

I look up to find a pair of plain blue eyes, with soft bronze curls hanging in front. Despite being breathless and a bit sweaty, he looks good. Actually, he looks positively stunning in that grey suit.

“Good evening, Salisbury,” I say smoothly.

“Hi, Baz.”

That’s all he says, then he just stares at me. What is his problem? “Um, I’m sorry I can’t talk right now. I’m waiting for someone.”

He bites his bottom lip. I wish I didn’t find that cute. “Yeah,” he sighs, “I know.”

My eyes narrow in confusion. What? Why would Simon know I’m waiting? Only way he would is if...

Oh.

Oh my god.

If I wasn’t already sitting down, I would be falling over right now. The world is sort of spinning. I’m just staring blankly at Simon, mouth open wide enough to catch flies.

“Holy shit,” I whisper, “you...you’re Snow.”

He smiles sheepishly, putting a hand on the back of his neck. “Yeah. Surprise.”

I keep gaping at him. It’s all I can manage to do. Simon Salisbury is Snow. My secret admirer and long standing crush are one and the same. I just simply can’t believe it. My worlds are colliding in the weirdest, most amazing ways possible. I’m so stunned that I barely notice Simon sits down next to me.

“Hello? Earth to Baz. You okay there?” He chuckles.

I shake my head, trying to get rid of the shocked fog my brain is clouded in. “Yeah, I’m just...I’m a bit astonished. Just, you like me?”

“Uh, yeah. I thought the ‘I think you’re cute’ note and all the ones after made that clear.” His wide, smug grin is so annoyingly attractive.

“But why?!” I blurt the words out before I realise it. I’m still too stunned and confused, as well as filled with the usual self loathing times a hundred.

He goes wide eyed and scoffs in disbelief. “‘Why?’ I mean, God Baz, why not? You’re fucking incredible! You’re like, the most brilliant person I’ve ever met. But don’t tell Penny I said that.” We both chuckle, then he sighs, running a hand through his wild hair. “You’ve always amazed me with that big brain and sharp tongue of yours. And when you tore down that homophobic girl in class? I was so blown away that I wanted to run up and talk to you after class but I was so damn nervous. I-I’m not great at talking, and it just gets worse around you. And I still wasn’t sure you liked guys, and it would be a disaster if you didn’t. So...”

“So, you left the note?”

He sighs, nodding slowly. “Yeah. It started as a joke from Penny, but then the idea got into my head and, well, I’m very impulsive. I didn’t expect you to...y’know, respond. Then I guess it became easier talking to you on paper when you didn’t know who I was than in person. I just, I get so flustered around you because you’re so cool.”

Both my brows shoot up to my hairline. “You actually think I’m cool? You...weren't kidding in the second note?”

“Uh, yeah!” He looks at me like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “You’re so cool and brilliant and, like, fucking beautiful.” His cheeks go very red. “Or, handsome, I guess. Gorgeous? Just...I mean that I like to look at you. Too much actually. Penny finds it annoying in English class.”

I think about every time I looked away from Simon, to look at the board or talk to Niall. And now I imagine him staring at me every one of those times. As well all the times I thought he was gaping at the weirdo. He was never gawking, he was gazing at me, just like how I gaze at him. The thought makes my stomach do wonderful, terrifying backflips.

I realise I’ve been gaping at him for an inordinate amount of time, and Simon now looks incredibly nervous. His whole face is completely scarlet and he’s staring at his wringing hands.

“Look,” he says with a nervous timbre, “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you earlier. I tried once before, when I dropped you off at the library, but I chickened out. The stupid notes were just going so well and I was terrified I’d ruin it if you knew it was me. I’ve liked you since last year, hence why me and Agatha broke up, and I didn’t want it to end. I know you think I’m just some dumb jock. If you don’t want it to be me, I understand. I’ve been hiding from you all this time and that’s shitty. Just, you said you wanted to meet someday, and I decided to take a stupidly big chance because I was so excited. But if you’re not interested or you’re mad I get it, and I’ll go.”

He’s jittery, eyes darting from me to the ground, foot bouncing up and down. Holy shit. He’s actually nervous. For years, Simon has been this unattainable perfect golden boy. But here he is, anxious and scared as all fuck, and I realise he’s just another awkward teenage boy. Just like Snow told me. Which means, all this time, Simon Salisbury has been just like me.

With all of this absurdity, I can’t help but laugh. A short breathy chuckle, that turns into a loud howl. I double over holding my forehead. When I look up, Simon is looking at me strangely. Some mixture between confusion and sadness.

“Did, did I say something funny?” He asks like he’s actually not sure, but is expecting a bad answer.

I sigh. Christ, this boy is adorable. I take both his hands in mine. He inhales sharply but doesn’t pull away. “Simon, I’m absolutely, positively fine with it being you. As a matter of fact...” I gulp down the nervous lump in my throat. “I’ve had a crush on you since I was 15.”

His beautiful eyes bulge out, and his grip tightens. I watch his jaw fall open so wide he’ll catch flies. “You’ve had a crush on me? S-Seriously?”

“Yeah.”

“On me? Simon -me?”

“M-hm.”

“Not just Snow?”

“Nope. I was actually agonizing for days over whether or not to accept your invitation and give up on, well, also you. Guess all that angst was for nothing.”

We both giggle. I want to make it my mission to hear him giggle everyday. Simon lets one of my hands go, but laces our fingers together with the other. His fit perfectly between mine. It feels unimaginably incredible.

“What big messes we both are,” he sighs.

“Yeah,” I say quietly, “I suppose we match.”

“I really think we do.” He sighs again, rubbing his neck and messing with his curls. “Wow, just...well, you asked me so it’s only fair I can to.” He looks me right in the eye unflinchingly. “Why the hell do you like me? Simon, not just Snow.”

I smile as kindly as I can. “Because I don’t think you’re just a dumb jock. You’re kind, brave, smart, and gorgeous to boot.” He looks very cutely bashful at that. “The notes just let me get to know you better and make me like you more, even if I didn’t know it. I found that Snow was very nice, interesting person through them. But I’ve also been pining after you, Simon, for years. I just didn’t think I ever had a chance. I didn’t even realise you were gay.”

He shrugs with a sheepish look. “Well, I don’t think I’m gay. Not totally. But I know I like you a lot. So I guess I like guys, but honestly it’s mostly just you.”

“Wow, I’m so honoured,” I say, only half kidding.

Simon grins, wide and filled with teeth. Suddenly, he stands, pulling me up along with him. “So, wanna get in there? Rhys is DJing and I asked him to play some Troye.”

I run my fingers over the back of his freckled hand, chewing on the inside of my cheek. “You sure? Everyone will know, that you’re- well, that you’re at least somewhat gay.”

“There go my job prospects.” I give him a deadpan look, and he sighs and tilts his head to the side. “Don’t worry, okay Baz? I’ve wanted you for quite awhile, so as long as I’m doing gay stuff with you, I really don’t care what anyone else thinks. Are you good?”

I smirk, then tug his hand to pull him closer. “I’ve wanted you for even longer. So yes, with you, I’m good.” I reach for his face, and when he doesn’t pull away, I cup his cheek, swiping over one of his beautiful moles. “You make me brave, Snow.”

He flushes down to his neck, and I’d tease him if I wasn’t pretty sure I was in the same state. We both smile, then walk towards the entrance.

The gym is decked out in green and purple, the school colours. I think it’s quite ugly, honestly. Even though the shitty dance music is deafeningly loud and the bustle should be distracting, everyone turns to look at us. I can feel all their wide eyes on our joined hands. I’m overcome with urge to run away, to avoid their prying gaze. But then Simon squeezes my hand, just once, and I feel okay.

“Want some punch?” Simon shouts over the music.

“Yeah,” I reply, “that would be great.”

We walk over to the table covered in drinks and food. Simon scoops some of the red liquid into two cups. He clinks our plastic together like we’re fancy or something. I chuckle. Yeah, this is nice. I like this a lot.

“Holy shit!” Two people next to us say.

Simon looks very confused. I’d be angry if I didn’t know those voices. “Hello, Niall. Hello, Dev,” I sigh.

The two look between us in utter disbelief. Their jaws practically on the floor. It’s quite funny.

“Mystery guy is Simon Salisbury?!” Dev says.

“Yeah,” Simon replies with his sunshine smile. “Hi, Niall and Dev. Nice to actually meet you.”

“Wow,” Niall chuckles. “You accidentally nabbed the quarterback, man. Nice.”

Simon laughs good naturedly. I scoff and knock his shoulder. Dev gives me a nice but slightly painful slap to my back. They’re such an assholes. Supportive and wonderful, yes, but assholes all the same.

The song changes to something slow. I recognize it as one of my aunt’s favourites, Nick Cave’s “Into My Arms.” Dev and Niall rush off to find their dates. I put down my glass, and look up to see Simon down his in one gulp. He tugs me towards the dance floor, and I follow, trying to not explode because I’m about to dance with Simon fucking Salisbury. Shit, I’m pretty sure I’m dreaming.

It becomes quickly apparent that Simon doesn’t know how to dance. He lifts his arms towards me, then quickly drops them. I sigh with a mock exasperation. I take one of his hands in mine and wrap the other arm around his waist. He inhales sharply, and his eyes go adorably wide.

“Put it on my shoulder,” I whisper.

Simon nods and complies. His hand feels unnaturally heavy to me, as my brain is still fully processing the unbelievable reality that Simon wants to touch me. That he wants to be this close to me in something other than my imagination. The song is so soft that we barely have to move. I don’t mind. Not when the literal boy of my dreams in only a few inches away.

My eyes catch something over Simon’s shoulder. Well, someone. A short purple haired girl with sassy librarian glasses and a deep scowl definitely directed at me.

“Your friend is glaring at me,” I say close to Simon’s ear.

Simon looks not so subtly behind him and sighs heavily. “Yeah, sorry about that. Penny is still trying to accept that I like you. She thinks you’re an asshole.”

“Well, she’s right, I am.”

He chuckles softly. “Yeah, I know. But you’re also really smart and pretty.”

“Oh thank you.” I try to sound sarcastic, but my voice still cracks with embarrassment. Simon notices if hia smug smile is any clue. “Was her dislike of me the reason for that strange conversation in last period weeks ago?”

“Yeah,” he sighs with affectionate exasperation. “She’s overprotective. I think she was trying to intimidate or glare you to death for brushing me off. Didn’t work obviously, since you didn’t know I was Snow.”

“Hm, I suppose. Wouldn’t have worked even if I did know.”

“Well, neither of us knew that at the time, now did we?”

We quietly giggle for a moment. Simon sighs, and lets his head fall on my shoulder. I try not to tense up from shock and elation. I let myself relax, just sinking into the sensation of Simon’s head resting on me and the soft melody of the song. But one thing is still bothering me.

“Hey, Simon?” I whisper.

“Hm?” He doesn’t move off my shoulder.

“Why did you go by ‘Snow’? Seems strange.”

“Oh.” He pulls back, chewing on his bottom lip nervously. “It’s, uh, actually my middle name.”

I can’t help but snort out a laugh. “Your full name is Simon Snow Salisbury? Seriously?”

He chuckles, cheeks going red. “Yeah, blame my Mom. She thinks everyone in our family needs a weird middle name.”

“Obviously.” He looks embarrassed, and of course my heart twists. I sigh and push a curl off his forehead. “I’m not one to talk though, what with the name Tyrannus.”

Simon snorts this time. “Yeah you’re really not.”

We go quiet again. Simon’s blue eyes roam over my face, and my pulse picks up when I notice them focus on my mouth. Fuck, I’ve spent three years thinking about that, but that’s a very far cry from it actually happening. I gulp own the lump in my throat.

“Is it my turn to ask you something now?” he says quietly.

“I suppose,” I reply, trying to control my voice.

He looks me right in the eye. “Can I kiss you?”

I take a deep breath, squeezing his hand a bit tighter than probably necessary. “Simon, I-I certainly want to, but just so you know...I’ve never, done that, before.”

His face morphs into an adorable lopsided smile. He slowly moves his fingers across my shoulder over and over. I can’t suppress the shudder that runs down my spine. “That’s okay. It’s actually pretty cute.”

I scoff. “I’m not cute, I’m hot.”

“Oh, very.”

That only increase my terrible blush. He’s still looking at me with his sweet, understanding face. And it  sort of obliterates all my defences. “Truthfully, Simon,” I say quietly, “I’ve just been waiting. I’ve...only ever wanted to kiss you. Pathetic, I know.”

“Hm, not pathetic. Still very cute.” He curls his fingers around the back of my neck, taking a miniscule step closer. Christ, he smells incredible, like something brown and sweet. “So, can I kiss you?”

I take a small breath, trying to steady my nerves. I let my eyes slide shut and lean a bit closer. My voice is barely a whisper between us. “Yes.”

My heart is pounding in my ears. I stay there, waiting. The seconds stretching out impossibly long. I almost pull back, embarrassed at my stupid eagerness and teenage fantasies.

But then he kisses me.

Is this a good kiss? I don’t know, I don’t have a comparison. But it certainly feels amazing. Simon’s mouth is soft as it’s firmly pressed against mine. All my senses are overwhelmed with him. His warmth, his sugary scent, his fingers pushing against my nape. I can tell that he’s done this before. He’s doing this thing with his chin that makes my brain melt. I try to copy the way his lips move at first, but I have no fucking idea what I’m doing. So I let Simon take the lead. The rest of the world disappears. And I’m fine with that, because I’m kissing Simon Snow Salisbury. Nothing else matters.

He does pull away eventually though, obviously. Our foreheads stay pressed together as we both let out quiet sighs. Simon lets go of my hand and wraps both arms around my neck. We’re pressed together, and part of me never wants to let go.

“Hm,” I chuckle, “I just noticed something.”

“What?” He mumbles into my jacket.

“You’re shorter than me.”

He half giggles, half scoffs. “Yeah. You’ve never noticed?”

“No. I guess I always thought you were above me, the perfect popular guy and all. Turns out you’re actually beneath me.”

Simon more scoffs this time. I feel him lightly kick my foot. “Asshole.”

“Mm, you like me.”

“Don’t make me regret it.” He somehow pulls me closer, even though we’re already pressed together. “I never would, though. Regret this. Regret you. I choose you.”

I sigh, leaning my cheek on top of his wild, sweet smelling hair. “Me too, Snow. Me too.”

———————————————-

I’m jittery as fuck. I’ve never really paid attention to a football game before, and it’s surprisingly tense. Watching everyone go back and forth, trying to gain that little bit of ground to get closer to the end. And if I thought watching Simon getting bashed around was hard when he was just my crush, it’s agony when he’s my boyfriend.

“Stop chewing your nails,” Bunce mutters. “He’ll be fine.”

I glare at her. We’re sitting together on the bottom bench on the seats Simon reserved for us. Dev and Niall are somewhere higher up. “Excuse me for being concerned.”

She sighs, patting my shoulder. “He’s got a thick skull. Hence why he’s so good at at this. Just calm down.”

I chuckle, then look back out at the field. Watford’s team is setting up again. Simon is at the back, squaring his shoulders. He catches my eye and smiles. I smile back, unconsciously tugging his letterman jacket closer around me. It’s a bit small but very warm. I’m not sure I’m going to give it back.

Simon shouts some words I don’t understand, then they’re off again. A huge of mess of boys in massive padding rushing into each other. I keep my eyes on Simon. He bobs and weaves past others, then jumps up and down like a mad man. Someone tosses him the ball, which he obviously catches. He runs off like a shot with everyone chasing after him. Fuck, there’s 8 seconds left on the clock.

“C’mon, Snow,” I whisper. “You can do it.”

4...3...2...1-

“Touchdown!” The announcer proclaims. “Salisbury brings in another victory for Watford!”

I’m running before I realise it. My overly romantic lizard brain is just shouting, get to him, get to him now! He rips off his helmet and tosses it to the side like always. But this time he’s running towards me as well. We meet in the middle, crashing into each other with far more force than probably necessary. I hold him up by his waist and he hangs on to my neck. We’re laughing like idiots as we spin around.

“You were amazing,” I say against his ear. “You’re so amazing, Snow.”

He grins beautifully, and suddenly pulls me down into a hard kiss. He’s sweaty and gross and certainly needs a shower, but I seriously do not care right now . I kiss him with all the desire and admiration I feel for him. Because I’m so damn happy.

“Woohoo! Get it, Salisbury!” One of his teammates shouts.

Simon pulls away to sigh and roll his eyes. “Sorry. Jocks, y’know?”

I chuckle, weaving our fingers together. “Yes, I certainly know now.”

The teammates come up to ruffle Simon’s sticky hair, congratulating him in that typical gruff, masculine sports way. Bunce, Dev, and Niall come onto the field too eventually. Bunce gives Simon a big squeezing hug.

“Y’know, you scared the hell out of Basilton,” she says with a grin. I glare at her for the second time tonight.

“Apologies for worrying about my boyfriend’s brains getting bashed in,” I add in.

“Aw,” Simon coos, “you’re worried about me.”

“Duh. If you die, who am I going to make out with?”

Niall and Dev laugh while Buce gags. Simon kisses my cheek though, so I don’t really notice or care. The three of them start chatting their shared/much hated humanities class. Snow sighs and puts his head on my shoulder.

“I’ve gotta shower,” he mutters.

“Agreed. Is the team getting celebration ice cream?” I ask.

“Yeah.” He looks up at me with his big blue eyes and my knees go weak. “Wanna come with Penny and me? I’m allowed to bring two people.”

I squeeze his hand. “I would like that very much. Meet you in the parking lot?”

“Awesome.” He leans up and presses another peck to my cheek. “See you in a bit, babe.”

In an overly sappy act I’d never do with anyone else, I rub my nose against his. It feels so stupid and so right. “See you, babe.”

We kiss deeply one more time, because we’re young and stupid and horny. And, at least on my end, probably in love. We’ve only been actually dating for two weeks though, so it’s too soon for me to say that, obviously. But...I do hope to say it soon. And for him to say it too.

Simon runs off and I watch him go, putting my hands in his coat. I don’t feel cynical, or anxious. I just feel...happy. And considering how long it took to get here, I deserve it. Simon and I both do.

We’re living such charmed lives.

———————————————-

AN: Aw, young, dumb, and in love. Good for them <3 Hope you enjoyed this teen romcom fluffy bs. I certainly had fun writing it. I'm really sorry for misreading the request though. That's my bad. I promise the request will be fluffy and cute af and def worth the wait. And if anyone wants to request, go here and drop a number in my inbox :)

#carry on #snowbaz #baz pitch #simon snow #penelope bunce #niall #dev #fluff #light angst #love simon elements #mysnowbazfic

[amidalogicdive]

Can you share any headcannons for Noctis or Nyx? Or both of them? Any headcannons and as much as you want :D You're like my favorite writers in the fandom! Thank you for writing your fics!

Asdfghjkl! Thank you, and I am sorry I have been slow at writing. I've been going through kinda a writing block-ish type moment. That said, I don't plan on abandoning anything, hopefully. That said, you want my headcanons. So let me talk about Nyx and Noct for a bit and explain how I see them. Now, take into account that some headcanons change from fic to fic so these will just be in general headcanons. Everything from here is my fan theory and headcanons:

When it comes to Nyx, this boy went through a lot. From the sound of it, his father isn't around and his sister was killed. We have no news on his mother, but I have the feeling she is alive somewhere. But, this man watched the Empire come in and take over a totally peaceful country. They destroyed everything that Nyx was raised to believe and know - that is really messed up.

I believe he came to Insomnia, yes because he wanted to pay back King Regis for saving him, but also leave behind all of the pain he's suffered. Yes, he's a Hero (if that's used in earnest or to mock him) but I think he hides a lot of his pain and anger behind this cocky, happy, smart-ass hero facade. It's obvious the boy suffers from PTSD, and I am sure nightmares come with that.

I see him as a man who doesn't want people to worry about him, he's supposed to be the protector. He's supposed to be the one to make sure people stay safe, even if that means he sacrifices himself. This leads him to do a lot of crazy, stupid crap - and either this man has the blessing of an Astral or is just really lucky, cuz he seems to come out of a lot of it with minimal scrapes. But, I don't think he sees himself as 'someone to worry about', he puts everyone before himself.

Noctis - I look at him as a man who has been through a lot in his short life. His mother died when he was born or very young, so he never knew her. He was also picked for a prophecy that would bring about his death and was almost murdered, twice... He couldn't walk, and his best friend (Luna) was taken from him by force and is now held by the very people who tried to kill him and his father. I know his father loves him, Papa Regis is the best papa and you can pull this headcanon from my cold dead fingers, lol. I honestly believe Regis tried to do as much for his son as he could, but he's also a King... in a war against a much more powerful nation and he has to protect his only son who will bring peace to the world.

I think this left Noctis alone a lot. Yes, he tries to go to a normal school and I'm sure he's polite and kind - but I see a difference between Noctis and Prince Noctis. I think the boy they talk about who was top of his class and everyone liked him - that was Prince Noctis. I don't think a lot of people got to know him but were more interested in the Prince. Prompto was one of the very few who tried to know Noctis for who he really was. I'm sure this left Noctis feeling very alone and isolated, despite his time in the public eye.

Seeing the two times he was almost killed and the trauma of the whole incident with Tenebrae, I'm sure this boy has some PTSD as well. You don't go through all of that and not walk away with some skewed as hell issues. Nightmares and belief in one's self probably go along with this as well.

That said - when It comes to Nyx and Noct, these two are very similar, despite their different upbringing. I think they can see their own issues in the other, and they love and support one another. When they are having a breakdown, or suffering from nightmares, the other can help and when they said 'I understand' they know it's true. I see these two as very loving and supportive of one another.  They make each other want to be the best for the other. They push each other out of their comfort zones and make them do things they might not do alone. Noctis makes Nyx want to be more careful because he wants to come home to Noctis. Nyx makes Noctis see he's more than what the people see him as, and that he can have a life outside of the Citadel.  They are a wonderful pair!

Now just a few more things -

Nyx likes to drink socially and got Noctis to like the Galahdian Beer he likes. Noct thought it was awful at first.

Noct doesn't like coffee, but he drinks it because its the only thing that gets him going in the morning.

Noct likes tea and got Nyx into drinking it more. Nyx actually found a really good spiced tea and they are both hooked on it.

Nyx likes being at Noct's place because of all the high tech stuff he has around the apartment, and he has the nicer bed. Noct likes being at Nyx apartment because he can forget the world for a while and hide away with his lover.

Noct is a huge animal lover (duh) and is always trying to talk Nyx into getting an animal - it has yet to work.

Nyx knew he was smitten with Noct the moment he saw him. It takes Noct longer to warm up to Nyx because he's not used to the blunt nature of the Glaive. People usually try and play nice with him, but Nyx is a kinda breath of fresh air to that.

Regis always finds out about them before they ever tell him - what's the point of having all those glaives and crownsguard if he doesn't know stuff first lol

There love is a love between two equals, They just look at one another as Noctis and Nyx. Not a Prince and Glaive, not royalty and commoner.

They're the perfect couple, the end! Thank you for the ask!!!!

#nyxnoct #nyx ulric #noctis lucis caelum #ffxv headcanons #ffxv #final fantasy xv #my headcanons #logicdive writes #my writing stuff #thank you for the ask! #Anonymous

[winchester-with-wings]

Black Eyes & Red Leather (Part 11)

~ The Flash / Supernatural Crossover Series ~

Request by @none-of-this-makes-any-sense : Okay so could you do a crossover where the reader is Barry’s gf who is really shy but then gets possessed by a demon… [I have redacted the rest of the request cuz of spoilers hehe]

Read Part 10 — SERIES MASTERLIST

Summary: The Winchester Brothers reveal to Team Flash what is wrong with you and how to expel Roxanne and end this all!

Pairing: Reader x Barry Allen, Demon!Reader x Barry Allen

Word Count: 2600ish

A/N:  Barry’s POV! This is the finale! Afterwards, I will post an epilogue but here we are! The climax!!

Mobile Masterlist Ko-Fi (buy me a coffee to support me & my writing) Ask Box

“Is anyone else even slightly concerned about the fact that these Feds knew we were here?” Iris questions as everyone makes their way to the S.T.A.R. Labs lobby from the cortex.

Cisco had instructed the federal agents to meet them at the public lobby doors which had been closed to the public for more than a year.

“Well maybe they were able to ping someone’s cell phone. I mean, we’re all here on a regular basis…” Caitlin suggests.

“Just everyone play it cool,” Cisco mutters under his breath, sounding more than a little paranoid. He unlocks the doors and everyone gives the two F.B.I. agents a once over look as they step inside. Cisco and Barry were not oblivious to the way Iris and Caitlin seem to look them over a little more than necessary. The insecurities in Barry couldn’t help but notice that these men were tall, well-built, and more than likely very familiar with attracting swooning women.

“So what was this about again?” Harry starts the questions, leveling them with his smart and stubborn stare. Being from Earth 2 and having the face of Dr. Harrison Wells, the murderer, had put up his defenses right away.

The men flash their badges once more and Cisco snatches one of them to inspect it for authenticity. Team Flash isn’t about to let just anyone into their base of operations. Introductions are passed around.

“Do any of you happen to know Y/N L/N?” The man with shorter hair asks. The other looks around the abandoned lobby.

“Yeah, she’s my girlfriend. Why do you ask?” Barry steps forward.

“What are you guys doing here?” The tallest one asks, disregarding Barry’s response.

“I inherited the building. Again...why are you asking about Y/N?” Barry crosses his arms over his chest, defensive...as if the team hadn’t just been speculating about Y/N only moments ago.

“We’re investigating a series of crimes that started in Nebraska and New York and we just want to know if she has any useful information for us. Is she here?”

“Well, Agent Cobain,” Caitlin starts.

“Please call me Sam,” he interjects. He flashes a charming smile and Cait definitely starts blushing.

“Sam...she’s actually at work right now but maybe we can help you? We’re all close friends and Barry actually works at CCPD too.”

“Sure, and is there any way we could possibly get a tour, Mr. Allen? I remember reading about this place before and after the accident,” Sam asks and his partner rolls his eyes.

Barry agrees to a bare minimum tour, sending Harry off to the Cortex to lock away the flash suit and anything else that could give them away.

“Have you noticed anything strange about Y/N?” Agent Grohl asks. “Did she happen to mention anything out of the ordinary on her recent trips out of town?”

“Well...she did go there to investigate a strange police matter…” Barry starts.

“Has she been acting...unusual since her return?” Sam repeats.

“Look,” Cisco interjects, “I don’t know if you’ve heard of Central City, but we’re not strangers to unusual stuff. Everyone's a little unusual. She’s not a metahuman, if that’s what you’re implying.” Barry appreciates his friends dedication to protecting Y/N, even if something is wrong.

“Well look, ComicCon,” Agent Grohl starts in on Cisco, staring him down and taking note of his superhero shirt. “This isn’t some science fair experiment gone wrong. Something has happened to your friend.”

Iris forgoes any act of surprise and looks at the agents. Everyone is now standing just outside of the cortex. “Let’s say we know something is wrong. Do you know exactly what it is…?”

“Dean,” Agent Grohl finishes her question with his introduction. Sam and Dean exchange glances. Sam takes a deep breath and his brow furrows into a look of compassion.

“We realize this may sound crazy… but we believe Y/N Y/L/N is possessed,” Sam offers.

“By what?” Caitlin asks curiously and obviously suspending her disbelief. They’d likely say a metahuman and then everyone would be on the same page.

“A demon,” Dean answers curtly. Cisco snorts.

“No freaking way,” he smirks and starts walking into the Cortex; everyone follows him. Sam and Dean look around the room and seem impressed by the tech and their own investigation notes on the walls.

“Are you crazy? Demons don’t exist,” Barry argues. But then Caitlin catches Barry’s eyes and squints.

“Barry…” she murmurs. “Ra’s al Ghul? Vandal Savage? Damien Darhk?”

“Well that definitely sounds like a real Legion of Doom,” Dean snarks.

“Not exactly…” Cisco rolls his eyes and smirks like he’s just told an inside joke.

“The--uh--The Flash and The Green Arrow have had their share of villains that claimed mystical powers…” Iris explains for the benefit of the FBI agents.

“Okay, so maybe it’s possible but how can we be sure?” Barry admits.

“What makes the FBI even qualified to deal with this situation?” Harry tosses in his speculation.

“How about the next time you have dinner with your girlfriend,” Dean offers Barry a silver flask, “splash here with a little of this. Then you’ll know.” Barry opens the flask and sniffs it.

“Or…” Sam glares at his partner, disapproving of his technique. “You can just say...Christo. If she flinches then you’ll know.”

“And then what do we do? I don’t know if we can wait much longer to find out.”

“You don’t have to do anything. We’ll take care of it.”

--

It doesn’t sit well with Barry, tricking Y/N. He doesn’t want to do it, but the entire team convinced him that afternoon that something was definitely wrong and steps had to be taken.

Caitlin analyzed the contents of the flask during the discussion.

“It’s just water,” she’d explained while Cisco had a field day looking up signs of demon possession. By the end of that research, he’d convinced himself that several people he knew were possessed, including his second grade teacher.

“It’s Holy Water,” Sam explains. By now, everyone has been informed that they’re obviously not FBI and they’re actually monster hunting brothers.

“This all sounds so crazy,” Caitlin comments as Dean offers up a drawing.

“Any crazier that a city with a superhero?” Dean smirks, winking at Caitlin. The Winchester brothers still don’t know exactly who they’re talking to, or just how right they are.

“It’s a sigil. A Demon Trap. The second she walks into it, she won’t be able to leave it. Won’t hurt her,” Sam reassures them all. “You guys don’t exactly have a rug to cover up the drawing so we’ll have to get creative.” Sam looks around the room for solutions but Barry takes the drawing from Caitlin.

“I’ll take care of it. Won’t be a problem,” Barry shrugs.

“She’s going to be strong. And clever,” Dean warns him.

“Well I’m stronger than I look,” Barry replies. “Once she’s trapped, then what happens?”

“Exorcism,” the brothers say together.

Iris comes up with the idea to lure her in by ordering take out and having dinner at S.T.A.R. Labs and then going out for drinks later. It’s a routine gathering that shouldn’t seem suspicious. Y/N agrees to it over the phone without protest or suspicion. Before Y/N arrives, Barry mixes some of the water into her usual tumbler.

Sam and Dean leave the Cortex, choosing to take cover in one of the rooms off to the side.

When Y/N arrives, Iris and Harry are unloading the take out and distributing the orders.

“Hey Baby,” Y/N greets Barry. She kisses him and prolongs it with her hand clasped on the back of his neck. “I thought about you a lot today,” she whispers near his ear. It feels like her tongue darts out to tease his earlobe and Barry flinches.

“Sorry, it just tickled,” Barry half-smiled. “Here.” Barry offers her the water but she doesn’t drink it right away.

“You know what I’d love…? To take you home, finish off a bottle of tequila and a box of chocolates, and then fuck in the shower,” Y/N speaks under her breath and close to Barry so that no one else overhears. Barry’s cock betrays him by reacting but he pushes that arousal off.

“Babe, you know I can’t get drunk.” Well isn’t that a red flag, Barry thinks to himself. She knew better. She plays it off and just kisses him quickly before greeting everyone else. They’re all watching her...eyeballing the drink in her hand.

Everyone exchanges pleasantries and discuss their days. Y/N seems to be acting normal...although Barry can’t help checking her out. He loves how she’s dressed and there’s an air of confidence around her.

He’s starting to wonder if everyone has been wrong and Y/N has simply made some personal changes…

But then she takes a sip of her water…

Hissssss!

“Ahhh! What the fuck!” Y/N lurches out of her chair, shooting the piece of furniture far behind her and across the room.

Everyone jumps out of their chair in alarm. Barry’s heart falls to the pit of his stomach, weighed heavily with guilt and devastation.

The smell of smoke is in the air and appears to be coming from Y/N’s mouth. She’s crouching and has spilled the water on the ground.

“Y/N? Are you okay?” Harry feigns ignorance as the person closest to her. Before looking up, she reaches out and touches a few drops of the water. The liquid sizzles on her skin. “Christo,” he dares to speak. As promised, she flinches.

“Oh...I think you know the answer to that.” Y/N’s gaze rises from the floor. Everyone takes a step back.

Her eyes are pitch black. She raises a hand.

Harry suddenly tenses, gasping as if his throat is constricted.

“Whoa! Hey! What are you doing?!” Cisco shouts. “She’s force-choking him! Like Darth Vader! Let him go!”

“Y/N, stop!” Barry steps in-between her and Harry and holds up his hands in defense. Her invisible chokehold doesn’t relent.

“Y/N’s not here at the moment,” she sneers, her voice overlapped by another. Cisco takes a step towards her. She waves her other hand and Cisco flies across the room; Caitlin cries out and runs to his aid. “Not another step!” Her voice is normal again.

With her eyes trained on Cisco, Barry seizes the moment. Lightning encircles Y/N, sweeps around her and under her. She stumbles and her hold on Harry is lost. When Barry is back at Harry’s side, Y/N is standing within a Devil’s Trap.

She looks around her and curses under her breath, shaking her head.

“What’s going on? What’s happened to you?” Iris asks, trying to control the situation.

“Bitch, you know exactly what happened.” She rolls her eyes and smirks at Iris. “Who told you? Fucking Winchesters, huh?” Rather than giving her the satisfaction, Barry sighs.

“I should’ve known something was wrong.”

“Yeah...Duh! You think little ol’ Y/N can rock your world in the sack like that? No. But I did you two a favor, huh?” Barry can’t maintain eye contact for a moment.

“What have you done with Y/N?” Caitlin asks, her voice quivering.

“She’s still in here. Her personality still shines through, doesn’t it? I know her every secret...granted there aren’t many...” Y/N shrugs. Sam and Dean enter the room. Barry notices that Dean is eyeing him warily. They’d seen him draw the trap. Y/N notices the exchange of looks. “Oops, secret’s out Barry. Now two more people know you’re the Flash. Way to go,” she snarks. Barry grimaces. He’s getting tired of the demon’s attitude and her dead black eyes.

“So which demon are we dealing with?” Dean asks. He brandishes a serrated knife with etchings in the blade.

“What are you doing with that?” Barry asks, panicking. Y/N struts to the very edge of the Demon Trap. She stops when Dean holds the blade to her throat.

“No!” Barry stands between them in half a second, pushing Dean backwards. The hunter looks both confused and frustrated at the interference.

Y/N peeks over Barry’s shoulder. “The Flash isn’t going to let you use that witchy demon knife on me. You’d kill us both,” she giggles. “I like to go by Roxanne nowadays,” Y/N trains her eyes on Dean and Sam. She’s flirting with them, even putting away the black eyes. “Are you a fan of my work?”

“You could say that,” Dean comments. “Crowley’s been looking for you too.”

“Oh? Are you his errand boys?” Dean’s smirk disappears. He gestures to Sam.

“Exorcizamus, te, omnis immundus spiritus, omnis satanic potestas…”

“Oh fuck. Come on boys, there’s gotta be a way around this…” Barry can finally hear a hint of fear in her voice. He starts to back away from her. She tries to take a step forward but can’t leave the Devil’s Trap. “Y/N and I are really good together! Let us show you a good time,” she offers, starting to unbutton her blouse. She rolls her head from side to side though like she’s in pain and trying to fix a crick in her neck.

“Hurry up,” Barry whispers. Sam continues the exorcism, reciting from memory.

“Barry, you’re not going to let them do this to me, are you? We’ve had fun!” He voice shakes and her face twists with agony. “I...I love you!”

She starts to plead but when she gets no reaction from him, she grimaces.

“Fine,” she barks; her eyes are black again. “I’ll leave but I can’t make any promises about Y/N.” Barry freezes and his eyes go wide. “For all you know, she’s got some fatal wounds and I’m the only thing keeping her alive. You sure you wanna risk that Barry?”

“Barry, don’t listen to her. Demons lie to get what they want,” Dean cautions.

“Are you sure though? How can you be sure?” Barry asks as Y/N’s body starts to shake and fall to her knees. Her head falls back.

“Just have to trust us!” he shouts over Y/N’s screams.

“Ut ecclesiam tuam secus, tibi facias libertate servire, te rogamus, audi nos!” Sam finishes and a dark cloud of smoke expels from Y/N’s mouth. She crumbles to the floor just as the demon smoke spirals downward to the floor and disappears.

When Dean gives the all clear, Barry rushes into the Devil’s Trap to cradle Y/N’s limp form. She appears to be breathing. In the background, he hears Sam explain to Iris and Caitlin that the demon was sent back to Hell.

“Y/N? Y/N, baby, please...wake up...please answer me...open your eyes, sweetheart,” Barry pleads, brushing her hair away from her face. She doesn’t appear to be injured.

Caitlin is standing by, ready to check on her as well. Iris is beside Harry and Cisco, covering her mouth and holding back tears. Cisco’s hands are tangled in his hair and Harry is frozen like a statue, a bruise on his throat is already developing.

Barry wraps his arms around Y/N, holding her close and rocking her back and forth.

“Please, baby, it’s me, come back to me,” he whispers, tears falling from his eyes and landing on her cheeks.

She stirs suddenly, gasping for breath as if she’d been held under water.

“Barry? Barry?” she gasps. “Where is she? Where’s Roxanne? We can’t let her get away!” she speaks frantically. Barry grabs one of her hands to stop her flailing.

“I’m right here. Right here. We’re all here for you. And she’s gone. Roxanne is gone.”

“Roxy’s gone?” she repeats.

“Yes, she’s gone.”

The entire room breathes a sigh of relief.

Epilogue coming soon!

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[ageekyreader]

The Whirlwind That Hit My Life

I finally have enough time and energy to sit down and share about my life exploding in a whirlwind. I would have before but, ya know, whirlwind. Ok, actually I did start writing it up a few days ago, but I didn’t get very far and it kinda looks like I wrote while my brain was all melty. Which I did. Hah. So here is the revised and updated version. It’s at least 10% less brain melty. ;)

Thursday was scheduled to be my day I packed to get ready for our SoCal trip I had done a few things the day before, but not as much as I had hoped. Packing is always a little complicated when you have health issues, and since I hadn’t been on a plane in several years I ended up spending a good hour of that scouring the TSA website to make sure I didn’t screw anything up.

On a normal day I take a nap. Thursday I was extra wiped because I hadn’t slept well the night before and trying to pack and figure things out just added to it. I tried to take an early nap to compensate, but it didn’t really work. Mostly I dozed.

It turns out it was a “good thing” I couldn’t sleep cuz I got back up earlier than planned and found Mom in the middle of our Internet being a Problem™

(The rest of the story is under the cut - it’s a little over 1000 words total)

I’m not entirely sure what things went wrong and when. I do know that Mom was trying to switch out the old modem for a new one, and that she had a customer service rep on the phone to help her. Should be simple right? Yeah, it probably should have been. It probably would have been if either Mom or I had remembered to make sure she knew the relevant passwords … and if the tech support person she got could keep the terms “modem” and “router” straight. If you are support tech for an internet provider you would think that’s a basic piece of knowledge you are required to have.

Mom had been on the phone for an hour when I joined in. It took two and a half hours to resolve after I started helping, and in the end it took first me, then my brother, to untangle the giant knot in the technology. (yup, I’m using real technical descriptions here)

Yeah, so by the time that was over my brain was pretty melty.

Except that’s not all. I had been pretty drowsy when I got back up. I had gotten a cup of coffee and was trying to figure out what was going on with Mom when I got a text. It was my best friend saying, “Hey, you know how my roomie and I are hoping to move? Well, we found a four bedroom and we were wondering if you want to join us? We need to know by Sunday and the move would be in thirty days.”

I wasn’t expecting to start seriously looking for moving opportunities for another year.

It’s all happening so fast because Mel and her roomie are dealing with having smokers living downstairs. They can’t open their windows or run their AC because the apartment fills with smoke. Not good when you live on the third floor and don’t react well to smoke. Their landlord said they could get out of their lease break fee if they put in the paperwork this weekend and give thirty days notice.

This resulted in a mad scramble in the few moments where I wasn’t actively playing IT Girl to see if I could afford to move now. Or afford to move into this living situation period. Oh yeah, and to make sure nothing was going to get screwed with my disability income.

Figuring out the last part took five phone calls over the course of the hour and a half we had before the offices closed, and then the hour they opened the next day before I left for the airport. Actually, we didn’t figure out exactly what the requirements were for sure until I was at the airport and about to get in line to go through TSA. Then we found out that it wasn’t going to be a problem anyway because we had added a fourth person to the mix so that dropped the rent low enough that I can just barely afford it.

Let’s recap where we are at this point because that was a lot of stuff all going on at once: I hadn’t slept well the night before, I’d spent the morning working on getting ready for the trip the next day, my nap failed, I spent a couple hours playing IT Girl, and also was desperately trying to figure out if I could move. Oh, and one more thing, my sister-in-law brought the kids over for dinner that night. At least that part was awesome even if it did add to the over all exhaustion levels.

Also - I hate making phone calls. Haaate it. Let’s just say I was very, very thankful for my anxiety meds.

This brings us up through Friday morning at the airport. Travel is hard for me because of my various health problems and having this all go down in the twenty four hours prior to leaving did not help in the slightest. I might have had a panic attack in the middle of going through TSA. Ok, I did have a panic attack. Thank the stars for my Mom and for, ya know, meds. Also? Coffee. Coffee helps many things.

I still don’t know for sure if it’s going to happen. The rest of the weekend was full of texts sent back and forth in-between family time and sleeping whenever I had a chance. All four of us have our applications in, and we are just waiting to find out if we can put the deposit down and if there are going to be any other complications. It’s first come based on deposit not application - and you can’t put the deposit down until you have a provisional acceptance based on your application. They don’t have to have the full background check done first I think, but they do have to have had a chance to review the applications and a couple of the basics.

We were hoping to find out yesterday but that didn’t happen because apparently one of the other girls hadn’t gotten her app in until last night. So I might find out tomorrow, or we might have to wait until Friday. If it all works out money is going to be tight, but when the government thinks you can live off $750 a month*, yeah money is pretty much always going to be tight.

I’ll let you all know as soon as I know ;) Lots more to share about the trip itself, but that can wait for a different post. Several different posts actually. I generally try to keep my posts shorter than this one turned out lol

*The current maximum payment for SSI for a single person Also - they have crazy rules that make things really tricky about using and saving your money. It’s a nightmare. At least I have something to live off of but yeeeesh.

Want to see more posts about the trip this whirlwind led into? Check out my SoCal Trip tag!

#my life #into the whirlwind #personal #moving #maybe #tsa #travel #panic attacks #medication cw #chronic health issues #spoonie #disabled #ssi #phone calls are evil #family #IT Girl #internet problems #so tired #all the tireds #did I mention I was and still am tired? #yeah #that #SoCal trip