#giant electric ray

[fellowrat]

Fishuary 2024 - Day 9: Ray @fish-daily

The giant electric ray (Narcine entemedor) or Cortez electric ray is a species of numbfish that, as its name suggests, is capable of giving electric shocks.

At first I was meaning to draw the lesser electric ray (Narcine bancroftii) until I realised that the pictures I was using for reference looked more like the giant electric ray. Then I went to Wikipedia and saw that it was possible that they might be the same species. So technically this is a drawing of both!

#giant electric ray #rays #fish #fishuary2024 #crayon

[nazrigar]

Mermay 2024: Merfolk Currency and Tidbits of the World of Urvara

This Mermay has a lot less content than usual as this was a MAJOR May event, with a lot of artwork to do for patrons, but I still managed to hash out some stuff for Mermay worldbuilding!

Primarilly, it's all about currency, because I always wanted to explore littler details like "what would Merfolk exchange with one another besides bartering?"

For the singular images, one focuses on the Sea Lord, specifically his final opponent. The Titan, a Titanichthys merman that was considered THE force of nature to beat.

The other focuses on freshwater refugees, as river systems and lakes become landlubber territory, and thus harder to keep hidden. A giant stingray mermaid may be the biggest fish in her old homeland, but she is still dwarfed by the likes of say, a Mer-Manta man. While "Greenwater" folk are immune to the deadlier aspects of moving from fresh to saltwater in comparison to their wild animal counterparts, it's a long and resource intensive acclimation process.

#mermay 2024 #currency #merfolk #mermay #mermaid art #worldbuilding #fantasy worldbuilding #beast fables #giant stingray #manta ray #electric eel

[nestedneons]

By Sandu

Prompt:

Bright rain/cloudy/dark summer day sci - fi blinding shinny exterior of intricate robotic electric blizzard azzuro planet light god rays shadows shimmering closeup detail concept art detailed painting with giant spaceship outside window of a cool industrial living quarters spaceship, lcd displays and light neop strips symbols huge over window with gorgeous galactic view, happy blade runner android, cool airvehicle cockpit, living bedroom office, droid parts in shinny clothes sitting on a fresco concrete wall, cool sci - fi vehicle utilitarian, 1970s astronaut cosmonaut white pastel suit and helmet ready, in the style of muted colorscape mastery, subtle realism, historical reimagining, industrial eerie sandu baciu style, i can't believe how beautiful this is, cabincore, concept art, 1900–1917

#nestedneons #cyberpunk #cyberpunk art #cyberpunk aesthetic #cyberpunk artist #art #cyberwave #megacity #futuristic city #scifi #scifi art #scifi aesthetic #retro scifi #scifigeek #promptsharing #midjourney #ai artist #ai art #ai artwork #aiartcommunity #thisisaiart

[penvisions]

of beskar and kyber {chapter 2}

Pairing: Din Djarin x Force Sensitive! Reader (the Mandalorian x Force Sensitive! Reader)

Summary: You come to realize that as much as you want your freedom, your new captor is someone you are afraid to run from. 

Word Count: 7.1K 

Warnings: mentions of narcotics, reader was drugged previously, withdrawal, insinuation of past SA, insinuation of sexual favors, mentions of past torture (not detailed), mentions of past trauma (not detailed) 

A/N: this chapter is brought early to you by the various albums of tool, copious amounts of coffee, and the buzzing of excitement to get this out to y’all. it’s a very intimate glimpse into reader’s internal monologue and i sincerely hope y’all enjoy this. it was very very fun to write and put down in concrete scenes ♡

ao3 link || series masterlist || main masterlist

The sounds of heavy breathing were harsh in the quiet expanse of the desert. The sun beating down suffocating rays that made sweat build up along your hairline and on the skin underneath your lightweight tunic. The fabric was old and frayed, from what you were beginning to think was a few years since you had donned it for travel. It was larger on you than it had once been, the weight you had lost during your captivity obvious. You ran the last few yards between where you had been trying to keep up and the figure that had just been rushing at a fast pace but now lay motionless.

You slid to a stop on your knees beside the fallen form of the Mandalorian on the rocky terrain that made up the desert planet. His body having landed on a heightened outcropping of softer gravel that was the base of a jutting rock formation.

The drugs were still waning from your system but not enough for them to have tricked you into seeing the absolute absurdity that was the unconscious man laid out before you giving chase to the Jawas as they fled the scavenged mess of his ship. After they had sought refuge on their giant crawling fortress and began to flee the scene in haste.

For someone who came across as so put together and focused while on a hunt, he had run off after the small beings with no thought. Granted, you’d be pretty upset too if you had traveled so far for work only to come back to your ship, your home, being scavenged beyond use. But it had been rather comical to witness a lone figure chased after such a large structure that was speeding away into the desert, until he had gotten injured. Until you realized what it meant.

Electric shocks sparked over him in disjointed waves as his armor whined at a low timbre. The wiring charred because of getting electrically shocked by so many guns at once thanks to the Jawas. They were small creatures and the electroshock weapons they carried allowed them to gain an even hand in the cutthroat world of scavenging and trading. He wasn’t making any noise himself, but you could hear the modulator picking up his faint breathing and displaying it for you. You glanced toward the horizon, seeing the crawling fortress that carried your way off this planet with it disappea from view.

Your hands were still contained in the binders fastened around your wrists, the mechanics of them too strong for you to break. But you weren’t too confident you’d be able to get out of them if you were at full strength, even with the Force. You had a feeling they would send shocks themselves, if tampered with beyond general jostling. With bated breath you hovered your open palms over the helmet, trying to get a sense of what to do, your skin felt the coolness of the metal despite it being in the sun as long as you have been.

Gaze wandering over the man’s form, you took in how broad he was, how solid. His armor surely lent him more than protection, the plates strapped carefully to his body allowing him to appear bigger than he was. But as you took in the width of his shoulders, the stockiness of his legs, you were beginning to think he was a wall of a man even beneath the armor. You felt your face flush as your thoughts wondered about him, unsure where the fascination was coming from. He was just another captor of yours, granted he had been contracted. Maybe that was why.

Because he was a professional, seen as someone of high value and skill in his field. Someone you knew your dearest mother would’ve requested to receive your tracking fob to ensure your return to her.

You wondered what the final trigger was, for her to reach out to the Guild. If you took the Mandalorian’s words as fact, which you felt like you could, then you had been ‘missing’ for five years. Out of those five years, your memory of time was warped. Your entire sense of what had happened and when was jumbled up and would take you serious time to try and decipher.

You recalled overhearing talk of an arrangement for you to be relocated, both you and your mother, to someplace that could offer more complete protection. To someone who could provide you with a life that was still caged and corralled but in a way that would seem like you weren’t. You had heard the term ‘betrothed’ that despite an addled state had triggered the sense to run and immediately began planning a way to escape in earnest. You wouldn’t be sold for some man’s amusement and posterity. To be a boasting point of someone’s accomplishments that were only brought on by money and status.

Memories of landing on Tatooine, of finding affordable supplies and as updated a map as possible flooded your mind’s eye. You had purchased everything needed to set up a small moisture farm for yourself, in order to live off of and provide for yourself in such a desolate place. You hadn’t been too keen on settling in the desert, preferring the rich shrubbery and canopy of leaves forests provided. The deep greens of plant life and the scent of rain in the air when storms approached on the horizon, but you had decided it would be too predictable. Too easy to track you down to a planet that appealed to you. With a sigh you reigned in your thoughts.

You looked over to the small green face of your other companion peeking out from his pod, worry in his large eyes and the droop of his adorable ears. You sucked in a breath before chancing digging your fingers into the material of the Mandalorian’s cloak that created a wrapped cowl around his neck to find a pulse. His skin was warm underneath your fingers, the softness of the man beneath the armor a little dizzying. His pulse was weak, but it was there, you removed your hands and marveled at the sensation his skin left on yours as you settled down beside to wait for him to rouse.

Shivers moved your body as chills traced heavily over your skin, withdrawal hitting you full force after not having anything forcefully injected into your veins in over twenty-four hours. The hinge of your jaw was sore from the force you were clenching it shut with, the pain reverberating from the crown of your head too much to handle. You don’t know what type of sedative they had kept you on but now that it was wearing off after however many consecutive days of it, your body was beginning to struggle without it.

You don’t know how long you sat beside him, it must’ve been a few hours at least judging by the movement of the sun from overhead to well into its descent of the day. You kept checking his pulse, which had gradually grown in strength. 

Relief flooded you when you noticed the change from his breathing being labored to even once again. Bound hands hovered over the rip in his sleeve from being cut, and you focused your concentration on the injury he had closed up hastily the night before. After a few moments the jagged, irritated skin smoothed out and it was as if he had never been injured to begin with.

You checked his pulse again, worried your healing would have spiked it and were about to remove your hand from within the fabric around his neck when one of his own shot out and gripped it crushingly tight. The Mandalorian jolted up from his laid out position, a string of grunts sounding through his modulator. His legs opened wide to help stabilize himself and he turned his helmet to face you.

His breathing was a little on the heavy side as he took in your form, your face a twinge red from being in the sun all day. Some of the flush from a fever you were sure that was beginning to take over your immune system. He took in the floating pod behind you, still occupied by his other quarry. Your hand twitched in his hold and he looked down to where he had it in a tight grip, his gloves encompassing the entirety of it. The creak of your bones beneath his grip had him dropping your hand and turning to face the trail left in the wake of the traveling fortress.

“How long was I out?”

You were slightly taken aback by his question, unsure if he was really initiating conversation with you. You rubbed at your aching hand, his phantom grip still on your skin.

An answer quietly followed, not wanting to enrage the man who had willingly run after the remnants of his ship in such a haste. Because despite how absurd it had been, it told you a lot about him. How he was willing to give chase, to hunt in the very depths of his core. He was devoted to it. It was who he was, it made him a challenge you had to acknowledge you couldn’t overcome lest you try to run yourself.

And while that terrified you, it also made you feel a swirl of emotions that you couldn’t name. You had spent nearly your entire life on the run, in hiding, keeping to yourself and keeping a low profile. But now that he had your tracking fob, now that he knew about the price on your head and taken on the responsibility of your capture, you doubted he would ever stop his pursuit. He took things personally, a way to prove himself. And while you prided yourself on your ability to hide, you knew he would find you because he was devoted to the chase. It would fuel him should you give in to your baser instincts and attempt freedom.

Even if you could get to your hideaway home here on planet, it wouldn’t matter a dank ferrick thing. Off world was the only option. But it was too bold of one without any bearings.

“A few hours, jatne vod.”

“You were touching me.” He moved to sit up straighter, stretching the muscles in his back with the motion. He stood from there, leaning down to reach for the tops of his boots with a deep breath. He stood at his full height and began to walk back in the direction of his ship. You fell into step behind him, the Child’s pod floating beside him. “Don’t do it again.”

“Apologies, jatne vod. I caught up just in time to see them all fire on you at once. That and the fall from the ship worried me.”

“Worried. Worried you would end up trapped out here with no way off world.” His tone was flat, stating rather than questioning. You both knew he was correct in his assumption of why you hadn’t run off. Why you had stuck by his side as he had laid unconscious. You didn’t say anything, there wasn’t anything to say. He was reading you as if you were projecting everything plainly for him. If he noticed the way you were literally shaking as if cold despite the sweltering heat, he didn’t comment on it.

“I healed that nasty cut you had on your arm, and I didn’t have to touch you to do it.”

You weren’t sure why you felt the need to tell him, he may not have even felt the injury any longer, but you recalled the way he had breathed so heavily when he had discovered it. The rough tissue from the fast cauterization of it had bothered you, the idea of a scar marring his skin had bothered you and weren’t sure why the thought had upset you enough to prompt you into healing him. No response was given but the helmet was aimed at you. The darkness of his visor captivated you, rooting you in your spot. You tore your gaze away, unable to take the direct attention.

You weren’t sure your chills were solely from withdrawal having caught a glimpse of him in action…

His ship was…for the most part just a frame. The basic structure of the ship was intact, but everything that could be pried from the frame had been taken. The area around where he had landed was littered with parts the Jawa’s had left behind in their haste to flee the scene. It was an older ship, surely the parts were valuable for them to have taken nearly everything they could from it. You remained quiet as you approached it for the second time that day, behind your captor and fellow captive. Sparks intermittently lit up the interior of the ship, the gaping holes in the hull and siding allowed for you to see as well as hear them in the quiet of the desert.

Sounds of things slamming and an attempt to start the engines had you walking towards what was left of the ship. You hesitantly stepped up the ramp and into what was once the hold space. Wires hung from everywhere, the source of the sparks that still flew every so often as power found no way to transfer and run the various mechanics. You looked around and took in the bare bones of what was once a pretty ship. You spied the Mandalorian seated just inside a small doorway that led to what had to be his sleeping quarters. His shoulders were slumped, his helmet hanging low as the man gathered his thoughts.

A small hand touched the back of your ankle and your head snapped down to see the Child had climbed out of his pod and followed you both up the ramp. His touch hadn’t elicited the same nauseating and painful effect as it had done at first. Which allowed you to conclude that he had been trying to show you that he remembered you, from long ago and that he was trying to connect with you when reunited. He had used the Force to try and push his thoughts into your mind, though he was clumsy with it and had flooded his own emotions of a time past into you along with them.

You leaned down to help him scramble over a large chunk of the hold space wall that was dented and on the floor with a gentle hand on his back. He stopped in front of the Mandalorian just as a deep sigh fell from the man’s helmet, the Child babbling up at him as if in response.

Words didn’t leave your lips, knowing what it was like to have the place you called home and returned to at the end of the day decimated. Both in the literal and metaphorical sense. When you had first returned to your home planet of K’ath, you had faced the same desolation he was most likely experiencing. Your home had been destroyed and for a fleeting moment you thought you had taken too long to return from training and that your mother had fallen victim to the obvious attack aimed at you.  Turned out she had relocated with the help of some kind people that helped her to raise you, to a smaller and more secluded part of the inland area.

Without a word, the Mandalorian reached down to pick up the Child and held him to his chest as he walked past you and back down the ramp. You watched as he carefully placed the small figure securely into his pod, making sure that the blanket in there was flat for him to sit atop it. You felt something flutter in your chest at the sight and tears sprung up in your eyes at the softness. You weren’t sure if it was because you missed when the touch of your mother had been soft toward you or if you were moved at seeing such a formidable man taking the time to ensure the comfort of such a small being. Emotions confusing you more than you already were at the way things were unfolding, you turned around quickly so they wouldn’t be seen by your captor.

“Move it.” And with that you followed them both back into the expanse of the desert, wiping the cuffs of your tunic underneath your eyes.

It was nightfall the next day when you stopped walking, the journey long and tiring on an empty stomach and no water. A complaint didn’t leave you, not one to bring up the impossibilities of your captor sharing however he was keeping himself nourished. His suit must’ve held some sort of food or drink because every so often you would see his hand reach up to the bottom of his helmet. The previous night when he had stopped for a few hours, he seemed to have been taking sips from a small pouch you hadn’t seen before.

There was a smattering of structures up ahead, surely the destination he was seeking out. There were lights on in the alcove over the entrance to a typical structure most lived in on desert planets. Equipment to farm moisture from the air. There was a beacon of some sort that jutted out tall on the landscape, a figure tinkering away at the top of it. As you approached, the figure spoke.

“I thought you were dead.”

The shuffling sound of the Child fidgeting in the pod urged you to reach down for him. The hard gaze of the Mandalorian weighing on your back as you did so. You carefully lifted him underneath his armpits, the rough fabric of his clothing against your fingers as you lowered him to the ground where he immediately began to play with a small frog-like creature that had been minding its own business. It was a rather endearing sight, the small coos falling from him prompting a soft smile to grace your features. 

“This is what was causing all the fuss?” The figure that you could decipher now, that of an older Ugnaught, climbed down and stood beside the Child, watching as you and the Mandalorian did.

“I think it’s a child.” The Mandalorian glanced over at the Child as he played with the frog-like creature, chasing it around the open area with small steps and gurgles. The man was standing with a foot atop something as he leaned over his knee slightly and messed with the cuff on his left arm that was emitted an even electronic glow up and down the entirety of it. You suspected his back was hurting him and he was subtly trying to stretch it out. That fall from the Jawas fortress must’ve hurt, as he had landed directly on his back onto the rocky ground.

“It is better to deliver it alive then. And who might you be?”

You just shook your head and bowed your gaze as the Ugnaught approached you. You were sitting down beside the pod, not sure where the Mandalorian preferred you but positive he would be unhappy if you weren’t within his range of immediate sight.

“Another quarry, to be taken back alive. Directly to the person who contracted the Guild.”

You didn’t look up as he walked away from you, going about his business.

“My ship has been destroyed. I’m trapped here.”

“Stripped. Not destroyed.” The Ugnaught corrected evenly as he piddled around his workspace before going to stand beside the armored man. A tool was handed over. “The Jawas steal. They do not destroy.”

“Stolen or destroyed, makes no difference to me.”

You scoffed lightly at the nearly petulant tone of the Mandalorian’s voice. At the movement of his helmet toward you, you huffed and tried to cover it with a cough. Though it wasn’t much of a performance as the noise deep in your dry throat had been too much stress. Your fake cough quickly delved into a fit of very real coughing. You waved off the Child as he approached you with drooping ears and wide eyes, plaything momentarily forgotten. The Ugnaught set down a pouch beside your feet, silently offering you what was inside it. You gingerly took the pouch, not drinking from it yet as you tried to wait for what he wanted in exchange for it.

“That is yours to keep, you must stay hydrated here on Arvala-7, it’s an unforgiving planet.”

You sputtered around the sip you had taken, trying to hold what little of your dignity you had left and not spit out the precious water in your shock. Surely you were just exhausted and your body strung out, mishearing what the man had to say. The sip you took glistened on your bottom lip as you stared from him to the Mandalorian just beyond him, both of them watching you as you struggled to swallow the water in your mouth like a fool.

“Wait, we… we aren’t on Tatooine?”

“No.” Such a simple word, a simple statement, but it tilted the axis on which you stood. Altering the very understanding of what was going on that you had just begun to grasp at over the last few days. You were standing quickly, mind moving a mile a minute as it tried to process the new information.

“….what- what planet are we on?”

“Arvala-7.”

“Oh.” You felt dizzy, vertigo rocking your entire body and making your knees buckle to try and right it back on track. Your knees hit the ground hard, and your palms followed as you tried and failed to catch yourself. A panic settled over you, you weren’t even aware of what kriffing planet you were on. Shame bubbled up and settled hard in your throat, making it hard to catch a breath. Gasping in breaths only made the vertigo worse and you felt yourself crumble completely on the ground, your vision spinning and your senses not comprehending anything.

“They- they drugged me and moved me across the fucking galaxy and I had no idea.” You muttered, face pressed into the cool sand of the ground now that the sun had set completely. You felt the heavy gaze of your captor but it was too calming a sensation to relinquish the way you laid on the ground, the coolness of it on your heated face. Shame flared up again, stronger this time and making your entire body warm, overwhelming you. “I-I don’t…no. No.”

You pushed yourself up roughly, standing on shaking legs and walked away from the two men and the Child. You were vaguely aware that the Mandalorian made to follow after you, but soft words from the Ugnaught stopped the man in his tracks. You staggered around the main part of his small abode, away from the sounds of their voices, needing a second to gather your swirling thoughts. You leaned back against the side of the building and let your body slink down it to settle on the ground. Bringing your knees up to your chest you crossed your arms atop them and laid your head down, face hidden.

“Give her a moment. She’s been through a lot if the stories about the compound are true. There’s nowhere for her to run.”

“Running isn’t the problem. She might kill herself.”

“She won’t.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I have spoken.”

“The Jawas are protected by the crawling fortress.” He went back to repairing his cuff, the Child’s sounds picking back up as he resumed playing. “There’s no way to recover the parts.”

“You can trade.”

“With Jawas. Are you out of your mind?” Incredibility genuine in the man’s modulated voice carried in the air over the building and you spared a curious thought mid mental breakdown as to what exactly his problem with the small species was.

“I will take you to them. I have spoken.”

“Hey! Spit that out.”

His raised voice made you jump, even though it wasn’t aimed at you and he couldn’t even see you.

Between a literal child and…the mystery of who you were beginning to get on his nerves. Each fob was a job but the two that had activated upon landing.  He took each job seriously, wanting to devote all that he had to them individually, but he didn’t have that luxury this time around. Both of you needing transport within sensitive time frames a little too much to be easy with how much trouble was occurring since securing you both. Things happening in too quick a concession for him to come up with a solid plan, especially in the wake of losing his ship.

You traveled through the night, a storm breaking and rain poured down upon your little group as you crossed the terrain. You, the floating pod, and the Mandalorian were settled on the transport that was being pulled along behind the blurrg that the Ugnaught was guiding. The blinding lightning and the subsequent boom of thunder had you curled into yourself, but you disguised your discomfort with the storm as trying to shield yourself from as much of the rainfall as possible.

It was well into the following day when you spied the structure of the crawling fortress that the Jawas called home. The Ugnaught directed the blurrg closer to the stationary structure. It appeared to be that they had stopped in order to access their recent scavenges. Small sunshades were propped up and items were strewn all around them, their figures milling about and taking stock of what they had. A wave of sound flowed through the air to your approaching group as they spotted you in the distance.

The Mandalorian removed the rifle from his back and held it at the ready. Wariness at seeing the Jawas again evident in the tension that you could feel coming off of him in waves. The Ugnaught held up a hand and shouted out a greeting to them from atop the blurrg as you cleared the remaining distance and came to a stop within the shade of their giant structure.

They raised their own weapons, ushering more of their people to make almost a blockade to protect their wares.

“They really don’t like you for some reason.”

“Well, I did disintegrate a few of them.”

“You need to drop your rifle.”

“I’m a Mandalorian. Weapons are a part of my religion.”

“Then you are not getting your parts back.”

A deep sigh left him as he weighed his options. You watched as he ushered a tight ‘fine’ and placed his rifle beside his feet, close to you directly on the transport. He stood from his seat and stood on the ground, a small motion of his hand directing you to follow suit. You stood and stepped down off the transport to stand just behind him, a few feet of space between you.

“And the blaster.”

You watched as the armored man clenched his fists, aggravation obvious. The Ugnaught approached the Jawas, speaking in their native tongue as he did so. 

You turned back around at a soft cooing sound and helped the Child down from his pod once again with careful hands. You placed him on the transport, hoping he wouldn’t try to hop off, he seemed content to stand there and watch the flurry of motion. The Mandalorian was suddenly in your space and causing goosebumps to sprout along your arms as he leaned so far into your space that your arms nearly brushed as he tossed his blaster onto the transport.

All three of you settled into a seated semi-circle, Jawas mirroring you a few feet away to create a full one.

“They will trade all the parts for the beskar.”

“I’m not going to trade anything. These are my parts. They stole them from me.” He pointed a gloved finder at them, his tone hard as he spoke. You remained still, back straight as the armored man leaned back on one hand slightly, one of his knees bent up to rest his pointing hand on. He was close, too close and your nerves felt like they were on fire as you silently watched on. Instincts urging you to put distance between you. 

He attempted to speak to them in their native tongue, his words clumsily fumbling from his modulator. It was an odd thing to hear, his low voice sounding unsure as he spoke. Shrill laughter sounded from all around as the Jawas poked fun at his lack of ability in their language. That only angered him further and he flung out the arm he had been leaning on and flames erupted from his cuff. You startled, drawing the attention of the Jawas even as they scrambled about in panic.

The Ugnaught reigned in the commotion quickly, asking what else they were willing to trade. When the main one talking with you pointed past the three of you and toward the transport you felt the need to move. Before you could blink, you were waving away two Jawas that had approached the Child, the Mandalorian shouting at them to get away from his as well. The prickle of their eyes focused on your figure set you on edge. 

More words were exchanged before the Jawas surrounded you in a rush of swirling black cloaks and glowing eyes. Your anxiety sparked as you felt small hands begin to reach out for you, but you didn’t move. You stood perfectly still despite the flurry of movement around you, continuing to shield the Child from them, the feeling of small hands patting at places on your body over your tunic.

You had the fleeting thought of using the Force to push them all away from you at once and make a run for it, but the glint of beskar out of the corner of your eye held you still. You were sure if you were in better health you would attempt to despite your earlier musings. But the truth of the matter was that you were stranded here just as he was without his ship. The desert was unforgiving to those who had no supplies. You knew from experience…

The Ugnaught was quick to respectfully usher them away with sharp words, oblivious to the loop of revelations running in your mind.

“What are they saying? She has nothing on her.”

“It’s not about what she has, it’s about what she is. They claim to have heard of the favors she’s done at the compound and want the same. In exchange for the parts you need.”

“They weren’t favors, I gained nothing from what those guards did to me.”

Seething aggravation dripped from the words you spat out without thinking. Your lips curling back in an ugly grimace as you did so, catching the two men still seated off guard. You hadn’t shown such emotion in front of either of them, only a glimpse of it as you had asked the Mandalorian to kill you just a few days before. But that had been desperation, not the white-hot fury that you carried with you for those that had kept you captive and tortured you.

It fell silent. Tension pulling your muscles taught as you prepared for this new captor to turn you over in order to get back what was rightfully his, what was stolen from him. You schooled your face into a mask, not willing to let them see the way you felt about it, about being used and traded as if you were credit, as if you were nothing, despite your outburst.

The Jawas watched you intently, their glowing eyes raking over your body. You remained in your spot between the Jawas and the transport. There was a hush of movement before you felt hands grasp your shoulders, the Mandalorian having stood and crossed the small space in a few strides. His touch shocked you, not having expected him to do such a thing, especially after his strict orders of no contact.

“She is not for trade.”

“They claim they do not want to keep her.”

“That’s even worse.” Large hands guided you back the few steps toward the transport. He held a hand resting steadily on the backs of your shoulders to help you to step up onto it and waited until you were settled by the Kid’s pod before leaning down to speak to you in a low tone that couldn’t be picked up by anyone else. The modulator masking any emotion in his low tone.

“I will not trade you for parts, you are not mine to do so with.”

You pressed your lips into a firm line, resisting speaking lest it be the wrong move. Of putting yourself in a situation that wasn’t playing out. If he were to trade you for parts, you’d have a better chance at besting the tribe of Jawas. But the issue of travel once again was the one thing tripping up your freedom. The helmet’s visor tilted slightly as he watched you for a moment, reading the things your face and posture were giving away despite you trying to reign them in. You didn’t like that while seated on the transport and him standing beside it put you at an even eyelevel.

“You have something to say.” You just nodded your head once, still hesitant to speak, he had been so harsh all those days ago, continued to be so, and you didn’t want to see what he would do if you disobeyed. You had been quiet since he had raised his voice at you, only speaking when he spoke to you as you quickly figured out how to best interact with him. “You may do so.”

“My saber, they would trade you anything you wanted for the saber. It’s highly valuable.” You nodded to where it was fastened to his utility belt, the metal of the handle glinting in the sun as it decorated his frame, nestled in with the rest his belongings.

“Beskar and kyber are not to be traded to those it does not belong to. If it is anything like beskar is to us Mandalorians, I will protect it as if it were my own until we are to part. It remains with those who value and respect it.”

The visor of his helmet was no longer trained on your face and his back was to you as he walked back to where the Ugnaught was speaking with the Jawas. You just watched, shocked at both his actions and his words.

You were silent as a trade was established and your group was ushered into the crawling fortress. The cramped spaces designed for the smaller forms of the Jawas had you leaning low as you settled into a seat while it spurred into movement.

“You run, and I will give chase. Do not forget that.” The Mandalorian’s warning chilled you as you knew all too well that he was speaking the truth. You stood beside the pod ramrod straight, not wanting any movement to make him suspect you were foolish enough to give in to your instincts. You nodded once to signal that you understood him, that you would remain out here and wait for his return. “Do not interfere, I need the credits and you are to be returned unarmed.”

All was quiet as his figure disappeared into the cave you had approached after leaving the crawling fortress, the reflection of the light on his helmet dimming until the entrance was pitch black once again. 

You don’t know how much time passed but it could’ve have been long, before the faint sounds of blaster fire decorated the air. The body of the Mandalorian came flying out of the cave suddenly with a shout. You watched as he landed with a sickening thud into the thick mud that had resulted from last night’s storm. Some of it splattered up from the force of his landing.

You fought against the urge to run toward him to see if he was okay when a loud roar echoed through the air from the entrance of the cave. You saw the damaged plate of his chest armor bent and nearly falling from his downed frame. The sound hit you deep in your bones, it settled heavily into your stomach and froze in your spot. You reached for the saber that wasn’t attached to the waist of your tunic and you felt utterly exposed.  

You could only watch as a large shape emerged from the cave. As the sunlight settled over it, a rather large mudhorn was revealed to be the culprit. Beside you, the Child cowered in his pod, ears drooping low as he tried to shy as far into the interior of the pod as possible while still being able to peer over the lip of it. You reached out a hand to rest atop it, prepared to throw it away should you need to.

The scene unfolded before you, the fight the Mandalorian tried to put up against the angered beast. But he was at a disadvantage, the creature far larger and far stronger than he was. His rifle jammed, allowing the mudhorn to charge him and fling him into the air once again with a hard hit of its ivory. The rifle flew from the man’s grip, splattering into the mud in much the same fashion as he did. The creature set its sight on you and the pod, altering its charge. 

You scrambled to put more distance between you and scaled the outcropping of rock behind you while the Mandalorian hit the panel on his cuff and directed the pod to fly away out of the direct line of the creature. Its horn connected hard with the rock formation you were clinging to, the force of it jolting as you tried to keep your hold.

Deeming you too high a target, the creature turned on its heel and set its eyes back on the downed Mandalorian. You watched from your perch as he got dragged and thrown around again and again, still fighting against the creature after every avenue seemed to prove pointless in overpowering it. Another particularly harsh fling had him crashing into the ground and when he didn’t move to get up you found yourself climbing back down to the ground.

Before you could think to do anything, the creature was rearing itself to charge him again. As it neared him, the Mandalorian managed to get up onto his knees and held out a small dagger in front of him. A frown pulled at your lips as you realized that was all he had left to defend himself. He struggled to get a steady hold on the small weapon, his head bobbing and his arms shaking. He bowed his head and held the dagger out in front of him with both hands as the creature closed in on him.

Your breath caught in your throat at the sight. You clenched your eyes shut and flung a hand out but concentration left you in the wake of blinding panic. Across the clearing, the Child did the same motion, mimicking you as he too clenched his eyes.

When sounds of the creature struggling finally wedged into your tunneled ears, you looked up with a gasp to see it being held steady in the air. Your head whipped around toward the pod, despite the distance it was obvious that the Child was using the Force to restrain the creature, effectively stopping it from killing the Mandalorian. Shaking off whatever he was feeling at the sight, the Mandalorian stood and slowly approached the floating, struggling creature. He spared a glance at you and then the Child when you nodded your head over toward it.

The Child seemed to lose his concentration, becoming overwhelmed with using the Force and he collapsed back into the pod. The mudhorn’s figure settling back onto the ground shook the clearing. All was still for a moment before the Mandalorian ran toward it. With a quick movement, he dug the dagger deep into its neck, collapsing as he did so.

It was quiet as he stood back up. Looking over the downed creature and twisting the blade in further before removing it completely.

A deep roar sounded from the mouth of the cave again, sending a trill of panic over you. One of them was enough of a challenge. Two of them would mean the death of the Mandalorian and subsequently you and the Child.

“Jatne vod, ogir's shol'shya!”

Sir, watch out, there’s one more!

Your shout was loud and sudden, voice harsh with panic. The already exhausted and beaten man had no more weapons, yours had been tucked into his belt, but you didn’t see it on his person anymore. The probability of it being lost in the mud somewhere from when he had been flung about like a ragdoll. 

You rushed across the clearing before the cave as a second, larger, angrier mudhorn exploded out from the entrance at incredible speed. You reached out a tether with the Force, trying to hone in on the kyber crystal that you could hear faint whispers from. You were just stepping in front of the man still in front of the first downed mudhorn when the handle of your saber flew to you from the depths of the mud.

He rushed from the fallen body of the dead mudhorn and ran toward the pod in an attempt to protect the now unconscious Child.

A split second later the mudhorn made a curdling roar as you reached a hand out to shove the creature back a few yards, getting it as far from the two recovering figures as you could muster. Rushing after it without another word. It was already back up and rushing toward you, angered at having been tossed in such a way, at seeing the corpse of its partner off to the side.

You dropped to your knees and used the slickness of the mud to slide entirely underneath its charging form. Reaching up you engaged the saber, the white light of the blade searing a deep cut above you across the entirety of the creature’s underside.

The creature fell to the ground, dead. And you let darkness take over you as you collapsed beside it, the saber falling from your shaking arms.

The Mandalorian watched from where he was kneeling heavily on the ground in front of the pod, his knees digging into the thick mud. Both you and the small being in the pod were passed out, the foreign powers you both had used draining you. That was two quarries that had decided to save his life despite the circumstances, two debts he now owed…

previous chapter || next chapter

scene dividers made by the lovely @cafekitsune​

#dev writes #the mandalorian #the mandalorian fic #the mandalorian fanfic #the mandalorian x reader #the mandalorian x you #din djarin #din djarin fanfic #din djarin fic #din djarin x reader #din djarin x you #din djarin x force sensitive! reader #din djarin x f!reader #din djarin x female oc #star wars #star wars universe #din djarin smut #order 66 #order 66 survivor #jedi reader #mando and grogu #grogu #grogu djarin #angst #so much angst #like oh my god the angst #but that's part of why we're all here #of beskar and kyber #ao3 #ao3 fic

[taxonomytournament]

Taxonomy Tournament: Results of Round 1

Long post, many stats.

The three biggest landslides were Opiliones (daddy longlegs) beating Parasitiformes (ticks) (87.89%, 334 to 46 votes), Terebellida (Pompeii worms) beating Scolecida (bamboo worms) (88.94%, 193 to 24 votes), and Hemiptera (true bugs) beating Phthiraptera (lice) (91.04%, 19 to 193 votes).

The three closest matches were Perissodactyla (horses and rhinos) beating Pholidota (pangolins) (50.6%, 747 to 765 votes), Caniformia (canines, bears, foxes...) beating Feliformia (felines, mongooses...) (50.28%, 538 to 532 votes), and Struthioniformes (ostriches) and Rheiformes (rheas) tying (50%, 144 to 144 votes).

To break the tie, I will discount my own vote (for Struthioniformes), so Rheiformes win.

Interesting that the top 3 landslides were all invertebrates (actually all top 7), while the 3 closest matches were all between Chordates (actually 4).

The average winning percent was 67.10% for all matches, and was 71.28% between non-chordates and 62.91% between chordates. So the chordate matches were closer in general.

As you may have guessed from the biggest landslides, parasites fared quite poorly. While the bracket started with 9 primarily parasitic clades, only 3 made it to this round (Hirudinea [leeches], Eucestoda [tapeworms], D. medinensis [nematode]) and all three were against other parasites.

The biggest landslide among Mammals was Didelphidae (possums) beating Hyracoidea (dassies) (80.26%)

The biggest landslide among Birds was Columbiformes (pigeons and doves) beating (flamingos) (72.34%)

The biggest landslide among Non-Avian Reptiles was Serpentes (snakes) beating Rhynchocephalia (tuatara) (60.60%). The closest match among Reptiles was Iguania (iguanas, chameleons...) beating Anguimorpha (Komodo dragon) (51.09%)

The biggest landslide among Cartilaginous Fish was Myliobatiformes (stingrays) beating Rajiformes (skates) (81.20%). The closest match was Rhinopristiformes (shovelnose ray, sawfish...) beating Torpediniformes (electric rays) (51.44%)

The biggest landslide among Bony Fish (and Chordates in general) was Osteoglossiformes (African Knifefish) beating Hiodontiformes (mooneyes) (84.71%). The closest match was Toxotidae (archerfish) beating Istiophoriformes (swordfish) (50.64%).

The biggest landslide among Echinoderms was Asteroids (starfish) beating Peripodida (sea daisies) (82.95%). The closest match was Echinacea (sea urchins) beating Gnathostomata (sand dollars) (55.38%).

The closest match among Annelids was Eunicida (eg. Bobbit worm) beating Phyllodocida (eg. Gossamer worm) (54.38%)

The biggest landslide among Gastropods was Neomphalida (volcano snails) beating Umbraculoidea (false limpets) (86.67%). The closest was Conidae (cone snails) beating Strombidae (conches) (51.39%)

The biggest landslide among Cephalopods was Sepiida (cuttlefish) beating Spirulida (Ram's horn squid) (77.53%). The closest match was Oegopsida (glass squid, giant squid...) beating Myopsida (European squid, reef squid...) (61.9%).

The biggest landslide among other molluscs was Polyplacophora (chitons) beating Scaphopoda (Tusk Shells) (84.35%). The closest was Heterodonta (edible clams) beating Palaeoheterodonta (freshwater mussels) (52.08%)

The closest match among Insects was Mantodea (mantises) beating Blattodea (roaches and termites) (72.9%). Interestingly still a pretty big landslide.

The biggest landslide among Crustaceans was Thecostraca (barnacles) beating Tantulocarida (parasites of crustaceans) (83.33%). The closest match was Branchiopoda (fairy shrimp) beating Copepods (56.54%)

The closest match among Invertibrates was Eucestoda (tapeworms) beating Amphilinidea (parasites of turtles) (50.65%).

Round 2 starts tomorrow!

#Animal Tournament #Animal Tournament Announcements #biology #taxonomy #animal biology #marine biology #evolution #zoology #tumblr polls #tournament poll #poll tournament #bracket tournament

[federationgothic]

Engineering updates

Noticed while skimming episodes the other day some changes in Main Engineering during the first couple of seasons that I hadn't noticed before (or just forgotten about).

Specifically, I'm going to focus on the back end of Engineering, where the Master Systems Display is located:

Nice and busy

Now that area doesn't show up in Encounter at Farpoint, the couple of shots in engineering are centered around the warp core and the catwalk surrounding it (the open elevator connecting the two gets a lot of use in there).

Hot elevator action!

The MSD appears in the next episode The Naked Now but it's all alone.

Nothing more than a repurposed wide corridor where we stuck a giant screen, and it's green (it will stay green for the first two seasons). There's also no isolinear stacks underneath the MSD, and the hallways panels are missing some LCARS. Oh and we don't have our pool table MSD table.

The next time we see engineering from this angle is The Last Outpost.

A lot of progress for sure, but it's not right. The LCARS panels have been added to the bulkhead and the isolinear stacks are now underneath the display. The MSD Table, itself recycled from Star Trek 4, hasn't fully undergone the TNG conversion and looks out of place.

Here it is in The Voyage Home:

The Lighting elements that are flush against the Display are the wrong shape, flanking it. for comparison:

And now, a brief interlude to Where No One Has Gone Before:

They're GREEN. I had not...it had not clicked with me before (at least not consciously) that the lighting panels were green for the episode. I don't know if they were still tweaking the look or decided it should be green bc of Kosinski's so-called upgrades but in any case it's green and distracting now that I see it.

table's still wrong:

I feel like they're going to show us some x-rays on here.

By the time we reach 11001001 the table looks right (hard to tell from this angle but looks like the entire surface is reflective now).

the big lights are off, for some reason.

Another quick detour, this time to Home Soil, where the MSD also acts as a viewscreen:

also when you put chairs there it really emphasizes how those controls look like navigation (you can control the ship from Engineering I guess you could set it up that way).

The rest of the season won't see any further changes. Season 2, starting with Where Silence Has Lease the lighting elements around the MSD will have been updated to the ones that will remain throughout the rest of the series

The lighting might have changed between Where Silence Has Lease and Q-Who or just might be colour processing.

Finally, season 3 brings us the updated MSD with more detailed okudagrams on it

There might be rubber duck in there.

It will remain mostly unchanged for the rest of the series, except at some point someone slapped a label on the bottom left.

(this occured at some point between s3-4)

A final, minor, update was brought to the MSD where the label was removed and two lines were added to the pedestal for Star Trek: Generations.

(similarly to how the runabouts had a bunch of random lines that looked like electrical tape to make the sets pop).

#chairs appear around the pool table whenever its necessary #Star Trek #Star Trek The Next Generation #TNG #Engineering #Main Engineering #Galaxy Class #Federation #Starfleet #starship design #MSD #Master Systems Display #MSD Table #federation gothic #long post

[babeilovemonsters]

Imagining a big tree monster right now, honestly. One limited by movement. They used to be human, you know, now fused with a giant tree, spending their days peacefully in the warm sun. Sure, it's kind of tough for them to move, and they can only lean over so far before their bark aches, but it's not so bad, really. People are nice. They were even transported to a botanical garden for safety, where they can relax, bathing in golden rays of sunlight, feeling the warmth in their very core as they watch over the colours of the park. It's calming just watching them, you find. The fact they're plenty friendly to the people around them is all the more welcoming.

You weren't sure about them, at first. I mean, a conscious tree person was quite unnerving, especially knowing how they came to be this way. But you find yourself almost drawn to them. It's almost hypnotic. Intoxicating, even, just to be around them. With every day, you arrived at work, needing to check their mental health. It didn't take long before you both began to get acquainted with one another. Then it escalated, with you spending your lunch breaks resting in their shade, just needing to be around them.

Until one day. You're about to clock out when you hear your usually calm friend whining in a stressed manner. Upon questioning, they explain how tired they truly are, feeling like they aren't human anymore. How much they worry about being stuck for eternity, never being able to live the life of romance and company they always dreamed of. You sit with them as they confide in you, speaking their tales and dreams of falling in love, of spending eternity with their beloved, feeling their partner next to them as they wake up. Pitying the poor, lonely creature, you climb their branches to plant a soft kiss on their cheek as reassurance, telling them you're sure they'll find someone willing to bathe in the sun with them.

There's a pause. Electricity. You can both see the cogs turning in each other's brains. They cough awkwardly, going to lean down to place you back on the ground. But you don't want to get down yet. You kiss them again, soft but eager, on their mouth this time, making them stop in place. With little hesitation, the tree creature gives in, and holds you tight and close as they kiss back at you, gently wrapping their branches around you in a protective hug. It feels warm. Safe. Good. You could stay here forever, tasting the sweet yet tangy sap in their mouth, and they certainly don't feel like letting you go either, having waited too long for such tender affection. It feels like an lifetime goes by, in your own pink protective bubble, just you and them.

The kiss is only broken when you shift a bit to sit more comfortably, and one of the clumsy plant's branches brushes against your hole in an attempt to shift with you, making you moan out in pleasure. They try to apologise, embarrassed by their error, but you shut them up with another kiss, this one more passionate and heated. You tell them not to apologise. To keep going, if they like. After all, toy tentacles can only so much, and you're filled with the excitement of wondering what the real thing feels like. Your tree shyly obliges, softly rubbing a small mossy branch against the fabric of your pants, making you moan out more before they slide one into your mouth, panicked at being discovered by the night staff.

They had only meant to keep you quiet, but you definitely know what to do next. Their concern for being found out quickly turns to confusion as you suck and lick at the appendage in your mouth, and that confusion soon turns to guilty pleasure, until they finally relax with you, whining and whimpering affectionately. They decide to return the favour, pulling off the fabric separating you both. You shudder in the coldness of the evening, but they soon cover you with mossy and leafy limbs, wrapping you up as warmly as they can, still interested in your wellbeing. Besides, wrapping you up so tightly just makes your hole easier to find, and soon enough, your cold body heats up as their now sticky plant member slides into you.

It's nothing like you ever imagined, it's so much better. To feel all their limbs swarming your body, to hear their deprived and loving noises, to taste their addicting sap, it's truly an absolute pleasure. You make sure they definitely don't feel alone, as they release load after load into you, flooding you with sticky sap, each new wave better than the last, until they're finally drained, and you're finally stuffed full. The two of you pant and groan as you watch the sun rise, exhausted from your passionate night of enthusiastic reassurance. They snuggle up to you, still tightly coiled, and ask if you'll be okay doing that again another time. You accept, definitely planning on fulfilling the tree's wish of having someone for eternity.

Night after night of messy, sticky, sweet writhing with your soft, kind monster, then getting to watch the sun rise over field after field of different flowers? Oh, what could be better?

#mlm nsft #wlw nsft #nblm nsft #nblw nsft #nsft #ftm nsft #nonbinary nsft #mtf nsft #monsterfucking #plant monster #plant fucking #teratophillia #terato #tentacles #kinda #aphrodisiac

[lovecraft-oc-and-canon-ask]

By evening you began to feel a certain anxiety, which, however, came more from inside your consciousness than from outside. For the past few weeks, your dreams have been heavy, filled with chaotically changing nightmare visions. Day after day, you convinced yourself that it was just fatigue. Maybe you shouldn't have stayed up late reading those strange books. Perhaps they shouldn't have even been opened.

This time everything was different. The bright but chaotic images from your dreams that night seemed especially meaningful. It was as if you were playing according to someone else's script, compiled by someone beyond your understanding.

At some point, the plot of the dream ended abruptly, as if it had been cut with a sharp razor.

You find yourself in a black, almost tangible void. Gradually, the space around you, the capacity of which you could not fully comprehend, for one reason or another, began to fill with smoke, spreading across the invisible floor. There was no need to breathe in your sleep, but if you did, you would smell the intoxicating aroma of incense, but you would hardly be able to distinguish what exactly it reminds you of.

It seems that the blackness is beginning to thicken right in front of you, if that is possible. You're not sure. Its outlines take shape. A tall, dark silhouette, he distorts the very space around him. Clouds of terribly dense smoke that block out light obscure his features. But not for long. You don’t feel fear, rather a bad feeling, as if what is happening is calling to some kind of internal memory. Something almost at the level of instincts suggests that this event will divide your further existence into “before” and “after”. If, of course, such concepts exist at all.

While you are thinking about this, images flash before your eyes like a giant kaleidoscope. Lifeless black rocks, painfully bright desert sands, a triple burning eye, a strange mechanical device crackling with electricity, a peaceful cityscape drowning in the gold of sunset rays, a wax mask, a box with strange drawings that were unlike anything you had ever seen before, darkness, darkness, darkness...

After a moment or a century, each asymmetrical part of the fragmentary images takes on a single form.

His features become surprisingly... human. The majestic face, which evokes in your memory associations with the images of ancient pharaohs immortalized in stone, seems deathly beautiful to you.

And then his lips break into a smile and he speaks.

-Greetings, dreamer! You are a curious creature, and I see it... The voice is deep, but not without an inviting softness. It seems to you that it sounds from everywhere and from nowhere at the same time.

-You are a soul wandering alone through space, exploring the endless mysteries of reality. I came to you in your dreams to guide you along your destined path through the endless labyrinths of the universe.

____________________________________________

WELCOME OUR FIRST CHARACTER!

NYARLATHOTEP

The Crawling Chaos is now available for questions

made by @slepoepyatno

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#Lovecraft #lovecrafian #artist on tumblr #art #ask #nyarlathotep #cthulhu mythos #the crawling chaos #welcoming #welcoming post #canon

[noddytheornithopod]

So with the Barraki undersea armies, Pridak had Takea sharks, Kalmah had giant squids and was in charge of the sea squids they used for ammunition, Carapar had Keras crabs and Pit War Tortoises, Ehlek had mostly venom eels and I think some other similar creatures like electric eels if I recall the books correctly, Mantax had an army of rays, and Takadox had... “underwater insects”.

Granted, you could argue that Mantax is vague with the ray army, but I always found it interesting how Takadox’s army was described very vaguely as just “uh, insects, I guess”. So that begs the question, what exact species COULD be in Takadox’s army?

I guess to start, like how the playsets have those weird ray looking mounts and I assume those could be some of the ray variants in Mantax’s forces, I think some of the arthropods could answer to Takadox in them? Like, there’s this one insect looking one in the Toa Undersea Attack set, but also with the Barraki Deepsea Patrol, the spider crab thing could maybe be Takadox’s? Like, maybe it being a “crab” could make it fit into Carapar’s forces, but his army seemed clearly defined while Takadox’s is incredibly vague.

So yeah, if anyone knows any specific Rahi that Takadox may have used that isn’t just me making vague guesses based on playsets.

Also weird thought on the side: imagine if some Visorak ended up in The Pit and were mutated, and being arthropods or whatever the Bionicle equivalent is, they serve Takadox. Like sure, the insect-like appearance is a thing, but also, the Visorak were servants of the Brotherhood of Makuta, and it could be a fun little way to hint at Takadox’s connections to them and how he was the one to betray the League of Six Kingdoms.

#bionicle #barraki #takadox #league of six kingdoms

[mintspidey]

just text me- ray toro

summary- you don't expect your tutor to be remotely attractive. you certainly don't expect him to care about anything other than his transcript. but seeing the recipient of the president's scholarship and the name on top of the dean's list shredding electric guitar on stage with his tattooed and pierced band members has you reevaluating your life; did you want to fuck your tutor? author's note and warnings- ray/ftm!reader, cunnilingus, sexual tension, nerd ray, suspicious gerard, pete wentz mention if you squint (comment if you find him), trans allegory, smut. enjoy :)

you stare blankly at the loading webpage, gut coiling at the speed of the buffering dots in the middle of the screen. rubbed, red eyes and undone hair bathing in the fluorescent light of the screen, instant noodles steaming near your keyboard in a cheap plastic cup, you lean back in your chair, the plasticky armrests pricking your skin. the only light source in your room is the laptop you were given last year, especially because the main white tubelight in your ceiling makes you depressed, something about the emptiness it casts over your room, reminding you of hospital lights; the feeling of being on display bothers you deeply. 

the digital clock on your nightstand reads 3:03 am; near the giant text is a small symbol reading the time you set for your alarm, 8:00 am. most days you would get less than four hours of sleep, so this was not surprising for you at all. you toggle your index finger on the mouse, scrolling down to the end of the page, clicking on “see available tutors.” incisors sinking into the plush flesh of your bottom lip, you skim through the math tutors listed on the pdf. 

most tutors were listed under first-year math courses, resulting in an immediate elimination from your shortlist. you word-search “fourth-year data statistics,” meeting with only one result. you pout at the lack of options but click on his profile anyway; not like you have a choice. 

there is no profile picture on his listing, just the words “raymond toro: fourth year, dean’s list.” your eyes flicker to his tutoring times and contact information, fingers reaching for the nearest pen and pad to jot down the information. you have definitely heard his name before in classwide emails about how he received the president’s scholarship. but, fucking hell, you never expected him to tutor people; you figured he was just too busy studying to do anything for others. 

shutting your laptop, you kick away from your study desk, looking over your roommate’s bed behind you to make sure she doesn’t wake up. she stirs slightly and goes back to softly snoring, making you sigh in relief. tiptoeing to your bed, you lift the covers as quietly as possible and climb in, switching your phone on and going over to instagram.

you ignore your inbox and any notifications that pop down from the top of your screen and focus on typing the tutor’s name into the search bar. you click the top result, the one with the most mutual friends. that has to be him you think, hoping his profile was public.

it was, but it didn’t help; his profile picture was an electric guitar, and he had not posted. furrowing your brows, you bite the inside of your lip, pressing on the tagged pictures. 

bingo.

the only picture he was tagged in was posted by the username “gwayyy.” your thumb is quick to scroll through the post,  barely paying attention to the owner of the account, tapping on each slide to see if any of the tagged people in the pictures is this “raymond toro.”

you end up in the last slide, meeting the back profile of a man with shoulder-length curly hair, a broad back, and a slimmer waist than you would expect. 

you pictured a gallon of hair gel slicking his hair to the side and a pair of thick-rimmed glasses; you know, someone who would get a hard-on from every a-plus they get in their classes. 

you switch your phone off, place it on the nightstand and shut your eyes, trying to fall asleep, even though you know you stay up past four in the morning every day. 

your eyes shoot open to stare at your wall, the queen poster staring back at you. the aircon sends a chill down your spine, triggering a pang of anxiety and turning your legs into jelly. you cannot afford to lose your scholarship, and your declining grades only add pressure to every fiber in your body.

you miss the first-year of your undergraduate degree, when you could pass exams without studying too much, get high every few days, and waste time with your friends. it definitely does not help that your family wants you to get a well-paying job right out of college, and you are already in your fourth-year, no clue what you want to do with your life. you barely meet with your friends now, forget about getting high for no reason and spending time at some rando’s dorm party getting tipsy, trying to flirt with the nearest warm body you find. 

the focused, determined student you once aspired to be had died, leaving but a husk of weak motivation. one part of you wants to graduate and leave this place, the other part does not want to enter the workforce that would put you in a cubicle with other mindless drones feeding capitalism’s drooling gluttonous gut. 

or something like that.

plugging in your headphones, you lie on your back, eyelids drooping down. the lulling melody submerging you under a thin layer of unconsciousness. 

you dream about a budding flower that night, a dahlia, it seems. it looks fake, though, almost like it is made of plastic. it grows thorns, roots growing deeper and stronger into the soil. dew drops slide into the center of the flower, swirling into a hurricane-like pattern, revealing a red rose. 

the enticing nature of the flower, the way it swings against the wind like its first breath of fresh air. the flower stands tall, taller than it did when it was a fake, plastic dahlia. rose petals glow against the moonlight, almost smiling. your chest feels warm, you feel your body rise to the air, disintegrate into rose petals. you are happy.

the deafening ringing of your alarm wakes you up, fluorescent rings of pink and yellow emerging from the darkness under your squinted eyes. 

“turn it off, bitch!” you hear your roommate muffle through her pillow, your fingers reaching for the top of the alarm to slam it off. your roommate was never a morning person, exactly like you, so you don’t mind her cussing you out even though she was basically a twenty something year old mother teresa if she were a stoner reincarnated any other time of day.

your phone in one hand and toothbrush in the other, you email the tutor, not putting too much thought into the message before sending it and shoving your phone into your hoodie’s pocket. dark circles curve under your eyes- remnants of last night’s anxiety keeping you up. splashing ice-cold water helps them depuff, you heard.

*

the library is colder than usual, making you bring the cup of coffee to your eyes and warming them one at a time as you walk toward one of the study rooms. the email he almost immediately replied back with, said he would be in room 102, followed by five exclamations. 

way too enthusiastic for a tutoring session. and nine in the morning. and data statistics.

the gray carpet in the building makes you sleepier for some reason, sipping on your drink and knocking on the door labeled ‘102.’ the liquid warms you, soothing your organs as the door creaks open and your head cranes up. 

“hey! nice to see you! i’m ray,” the boy flashes you a toothy smile, curly brown hair like you saw in “gwayyy’s” instagram post. you marvel at how tall he is, almost reaching the doorframe. you don’t know whether to feel inferior or attracted to his height, but you nod, reaching your hand out. 

his hand engulfs yours easily, fingertips clearly calloused by the way they feel against the back of your palm. your cold hands that were once rigid, are now warm and protected, almost making you gasp at the reintroduction of the aircon to your skin when he pulls back. 

he walks in, making way for you as you assess the room. pale eggshell-white walls, destroyed on the edges with water stains, envelop the two of you. it smells like old books and mothballs at first as you drop your back near the foot of the chair nearest to you, and take a seat, adjusting your clothes. 

“thanks for replying so fast, by the way. i kind of needed help with this class.” you state, bending down to fish your notebook out as you feel his footsteps near your chair. 

his backpack was perched on top of the other side of the table, near the whiteboard, so you knew he was coming near you. 

“of course! yeah," raymond speaks. his voice is higher than you expect, masked by a husky filter and you look up at the direction of his voice, surprised by how close he was. 

it isn’t weird, he is there to tutor you after all. all he does is pull out a chair near yours, and place his hand on the table, fingers sprawled across the wooden top. you take a millisecond to see how his hand was basically the size of your notebook before meeting his face, closer to getting a better view.

“you know, i don’t get many students hitting me up to tutor them, so this is refreshing. i was totally just going to rot in my bed all day.” he comments, rolling his eyes playfully, trying to make you warm up to him. you smile, looking down at your notebook and grabbing your pen. your go-to move with anyone, platonic or romantic, is avoiding direct eye-contact for as long as possible. you straighten your back, swearing you watched his eyes flicked to your chest before switching to the whiteboard across the room. 

“so, what do you need help with?” he asks, pushing his chair back against the rough carpet and walking to the other side, watching his tight black shirt bundle up near his waist. your gaze scans his figure, noticing how the flimsy black fabric hugs his back and trails down to the waistband of his jeans that hug his hips tight. you make a mental note to stop staring but where else are you going to look? you’re there to watch him teach. 

nope, you are there to learn, so you don’t fail your classes and lose your scholarship. 

that reminder makes you snap out of the staring contest you had with the small of his back and look back up at him, ready with an answer, “uhh. confidence intervals.” 

it comes out more like a question, spoiling how clueless you are with the subject and you see him smile and nod at your tone before grabbing a dry-erase marker. five pens lie on the thin metal tray across the underside of the white board, and of course, ray doesn’t grab the one that works well the first time. or the fourth time. 

you watch him struggle and cuss through the process, biting back a smile at the way his curls shake at every sigh of disappointment. 

“there we go!” he exclaims, writing down the concept name on the white board, involuntarily flexing the muscles bulging near the ends of his short-sleeves. you see the hint of a tiny tattoo under the sleeve but you decide to save that for later amusement and focus on his words. 

“so, it’s super simple,” he begins, rambling about the definition, something about how it is the range in which you expect your test value to follow, and you soon realize that it, in fact, was not super simple. 

you nod, wanting to let him know that you were listening and alert. your eyes widen, and an unknowing smile spreads on your lips. he talked with his hands. a lot. the more animated he was, the more his hair moved around his face, and the more distracted you were. 

“so basically that is how you end up with the test value, do you know how to figure out if it is a right or left-tailed test?”

fuck, what the hell was that? you look away from him, pretending to think, knowing full well you have no fucking clue what it is. you press your lips together and squint your eyes, “...no.”

“no worries, that’s what i’m here for,” he smiles this time, a toothy grin, almost unexpected from someone of his stature, flashing before he turns around to draw yet another bell-curve on the white board. you watch his shoulder blades move with every letter he writes, how the small of his back stands prominent with the tightness of his shirt. 

he looks back a few times to confirm your attention, his lips pursing before turning back to the board and continuing teaching. he likes to ramble a lot, you notice, but it isn’t unnecessary by any means. if anything, it helps you retain information. 

you ask him questions, pen gliding against the thin notebook paper as you write down what is on the board. he folds his hands, one arm propping up on the other and reaching for his chin like he’s thinking of the answers. 

as more time passes, his shoulders relax, the back and forth between the two of you reaching a comfortable rhythm. you ask a question, he goes on a tangent and you fill out another page with ease, all the pieces of puzzle from different lectures falling into place. 

you let out a couple astonished “ohhhhh”s, like you finally understood the meaning of life and your tutor just smiles at your surprise each time. you bite down on your lip and knit your brows as he asks you if you understand him or not. 

“holy shit, this makes so much sense now.” you drop your head in relief and look back at him screwing the lid of the marker back on. he walks to the chair near you as you pen down the last of the diagram he drew before shutting your notebook close. 

“i wish you taught this class instead of higgins,” you comment, stuffing your belongings in your back, “i swear he hates his students.”

“higgins can be a toughie, but he’s just old, you know? and maybe slightly senile.” 

you chuckle, “thank you, raymond, seriously,” you rise to your feet strapping your bag on and looking down at where he sits. 

“oh, you can just call me ray, raymond is more for the official student records.”

oh, ray toro. has a nice ring to it. 

“okay, cool. do you teach anything else, ray?” you don’t expect your words to come out as flirtatiously as they do, but you can’t swallow them so you go with it, flashing a smile to coat them as platonically as possible. 

“uh… not officially. but if you ever need me to look over essays, or whatever, i’ll do it, i don’t get much traffic nowadays anyway so i’ll probably be free unless i’m at a gig.” 

so that electric guitar in his profile picture wasn’t for show. 

“oh, you perform?” you ask, feeling like a stalker. 

“yeah, i play guitar in this band, you probably haven’t heard of us.” he waves it off, clearly not one to boast about his personal life. 

“i’d love to catch a show,” you blurt out, not expecting your statement to sound as intense as it does. 

he cocks an eyebrow, “oh, for real? let me give you my number then, we have this show tomorrow night.”

already exchanging numbers? you giggle internally, watching his fingers tap the screen before giving you his phone. 

“i’ll just text you the time and address, gerard's still working out the logistics.” ray explains, erasing the whiteboard and pushing all the chairs into place.

you tilt your head in confusion, “gerard…?”

“oh, he’s our lead singer. you’ll see him tomorrow. hard to miss him.”

*

ray is right, of course. the next night, after hours of stewing in excitement to see ray perform, you watch this “gerard” dance and sing around the stage, flicking his tongue at the crowd, glistening in sweat from the stage lights beating down on the band. they are good. 

you aren’t at the very front though, that space was occupied by people who look like they have been waiting all their lives to see ray’s band perform so you sit right off the pit, pulling your jacket taut into yourself. you squint, trying to gauge a feel for each member. there is one on the left, banging his head, his lips spread apart like he’s mid orgasm at any given moment, tattoos spreading up his arms all the way to his neck. there’s one on the bass, seemingly timid, a beanie pulled over his straightened hair swooped to the side, the only one with glasses on and the tightest shirt on the planet. 

then there’s ray whose gaze is fixated down at his guitar, his tongue sticking out like there is nothing more important in the world. his guitar is crystal clear even when the expressive, red-haired frontman screams into the microphone. you feel your heart race at the sight of him shredding on the instrument, bouncing curls and flexing forearms prominent under the yellow lights. 

the overpriced drink in your hand that is seventy percent tequila and ten percent juice has you nodding along to the song, even though rock was never in your top genres on spotify. it may be the alcohol or their talent in general, because they sound good. like, scream your heart out to their songs and want to be their groupie good.

okay, maybe the latter is the alcohol talking. 

mostly girls around you fawn over the band’s frontman, or the one playing the bass, mikey, you gather from their screams. as their set comes to an end, he girls beeline from the pit to the backstage, excited giggles erupting one after the other. you feel like shit. 

ray is probably straight. he probably fucks girls left and right, he’s in a rock band after all. 

the defeatist in you, however, soon fails as you find your fingers fighting the cold and typing out a message to ray. 

-hey, i watched your set. you were great!

a sense of superiority dawns over you. do the others have his number? fuck no, they don’t.

your eyes follow ray as he walks out the stage with his guitar in one hand and the amplifier in the other. fuck, he’s strong. 

the tequila has hit you, you realize, as you rake your eyes over his body from the crowd, a strange sense of jealousy over someone you met only yesterday pricking at your chest. your phone vibrates against your palm in your coat pocket, and you see a text from ray.

-super! you wanna come backstage?” 

bing-fuckin-o.

you send a thumbs up and begin your trail around the venue, budding anxiety popping like bubbles. your eyes scour for the backstage, or any group of girls bunched together. where there’s smoke there’s fire, after all. 

you hear your name through the commotion of screams and giggles and whip your head in the direction, spotting him. he waves from inside a shed, the door open for anyone who wants to meet the band. you flash a smile, feeling giddy that he has the same interest in you as you do after only a few days of meeting him. 

he’s just being nice, you tell yourself.

he wants to fuck you, you argue, immediately knowing which part of you is the drunk one. 

you fight the wind, running toward the shed that has a string of fairy lights wrapped around the inside of the room. the room isn’t huge; enough for about twenty people to stand around and mingle. a sudden warmth embraces you as you blow a tired breath out and approach ray who’s nursing a beer, his eyebrows shooting up.

“you made it! how’d you like us?” ray raises his voice over the slightly loud music playing over somebody’s bluetooth speaker. you look over at the noise and look up at him through your eyelashes, feeling smaller than him. 

it turns you on. 

“you were awesome! the way you shred, it was so fucking cool.” ray hears you curse for the first time and giggles, the same toothy grin flashing across his face. he takes a swig of his beer, bringing the mouth of the glass bottle to his- wow his lips were plump.

the shed is barely lit, a lavender-colored sunset light on the right corner of the floor was the only light source. a strong scent of cigarettes and weed lingers in the air and occasionally clears out as the door opens when someone has to go out to piss, you assume. people huddle in groups, some way larger than the others. but ray stood alone when you walked in.  

he leans down to you, and your heart stops momentarily. his breath fans the shell of your ear. his face was fucking near yours. 

“i didn’t think you would make it.” he says, this time at a regular volume now that his lips were right near your ears. you shiver when his breath hits your skin, failing to compute what he says for a second.

you lean toward his ear, pulling him in by his arms on reflex because he seems too far to your tipsy ass brain, “of course i did. i need to get my grades up!” you joke, hoping to god he sees the humor lacing your voice. 

he chuckles, oh how sweet his voice is, you think, relief fighting the cortisol in your brain. 

“ray! what are you doing all the way over-” you hear his name being called, a blur of red hair knifing through the little crowd around him. you could see girls’ hands drag across his chest and even grab his shirt and he flashes them an obligatory get-the-fuck-off-me smile before catching up to the man in front of you. 

it is gerard, his red hair dripping in sweat making him the most easy to recognize. you watch the shorter guy turn his head towards you, “who’s this, ray?”

ray introduces you, “i tutored him yesterday.”

gerard’s eyes scan you from head to toe, a polite smile appearing, “good to know you’re not trying to rip ray’s clothes off like that crowd back there.”

if only he knew. you chuckle at his comment, looking at ray nervously before turning toward gerard, “you guys were super great, by the way.”

“you’re sweet, aren’t you.” gerard tilts his head, his fingers massaging ray’s biceps. you believe gerard notices the way your eye twitches at his move on ray and the corner of his mouth perks up, “huh, maybe not.” 

the crowd filters out of the shed, leaving the band and a couple of their friends, you assume, to let their hair down and get a couple of drinks in. 

“how long do these,” you look around at people rolling joints and pout, impressed, “...afterparties go on for?” 

ray looks up, trying to come up with an answer, “uh, like a few hours, no one knows really. i live on campus so i leave whenever i want to, sometimes g and frank stay back. sometimes we see mikey come to practice the next day with the same clothes on,” he shrugs, “it’s different every time.”

you aren’t sober by any means, but you aren’t piss-drunk either when you meet frank and mikey, the shorter one with a scorpion tattoo on his neck, with closer inspection, betraying his onstage persona. mikey, who you’re told is gerard’s younger brother, is as quiet as he seems when he plays on stage. you smile at him and make small talk, compliment his neon genesis evangelion shirt and he grins in surprise, revealing his pointy canines. 

ray is across the room, mingling with some people who you assume are from other bands who performed before them. a man with a shorter stature and a fuckton of eyeliner, wearing a zip-up hoodie that barely hid his torso, a tattoo around his collarbone with nothing underneath, sips on a cigarette and talks to ray, looking up at him like you did yesterday.

you don’t realize how long you’re staring until ray finds your stare, downing the beer he holds so casually between his index and middle finger. your gut flips. heat spreads from your chest to your stomach, making you crush your paper cup and throw it away in dismissal. 

you dream of the same flower you did yesterday. an odd sense of belonging tags along the haze you’re merged in. this time with another rose beside it. the roots of the other, pinker rose intertwined with yours, the ends connecting and becoming one. 

you wake up the next morning with a headache you haven’t had in months. you’ve heard of hangover remedies like swallowing a raw egg yolk. but you would never do that, even if it meant you were throwing up in the paper bag near your nightstand. which you do. 

admittedly, throwing up makes you feel better before you realize what you have to do today. 

the stack of papers on your table resembles mount everest as you contemplate the quantity of it all. not only had you forgotten about the project, but it is also due tomorrow night.

grabbing a coffee and a breakfast sandwich from the cafeteria, you sprint back to your dorm, trying not to wake your roommate up who had worked late last night and met you on the way to your shared room after the afterparty with ray’s band. 

ray was offering and insisting that he drop you off since he invited you there, but you politely declined, horny and exhausted out of your mind. 

the way he looked at you last night. his gaze clinging to every inch of you before looking away, had not only given you some interesting dreams that may have involved getting fucked in the lecture hall, but also left a lasting feeling that there was a ball of fire in your ribcage. 

you consider asking ray for help on your project. 

no, you can’t. he has better things to do. 

scanning through the question on the paper only makes you lean into the idea. suddenly forgetting everything ray taught you the day before. time blurs for you, and you don’t realize you have already texted ray and asked him if he can help you, fixing your hair and second-guessing your outfit.

wait, why did you care?

your phone dings. 

-all of the study rooms are booked :( 

you throw your phone on the bed, the pile of papers making your stomach sink lower into your body. fuck, you’re going to fail the class. you’re going to fail all because you went to the show yesterday to look at this fucking boy, who caught your fucking eye, and you wanted to fuc-

-unless you’re okay with me coming over.

you would be lying if you said your heart didn’t pound so hard against your rib cage that your ears started ringing. you send the same thumbs up emoji, pretending to be casual, regular; anything synonymous with normalcy. the coffee in your system kicks into overdrive; you straighten out your room, tell your roommate to get the fuck out once she gets up and receive a bunch of sex jokes in exchange, all of which you blush at. 

“have fun blowing that dude,” she yells, probably loud enough for your neighbors to hear. she closes the door on the way out, missing the paper ball you threw at her. 

*

“oh wow, your room is way cleaner than mine.” ray appears at your dorm in another tight black shirt, this time with the iron maiden logo that has clearly fought the washer and lost the fight multiple times. 

you see him duck through the door frame, fixing his hair back into position, and you try not to feel your heart wrench at the sight of him being adorable. you bring the papers down to the floor, a signal for ray to mirror you. he sits next to the foot of the bed, leaning against the wooden leg. his hands wrap around his knee, neck craning near yours to get a better look at the questions laid out on the fluffy grayish white carpet. 

you don’t realize that the shorts you’re wearing ride up your thighs, almost presenting themselves to the taller figure in the room. your legs lay on top of each other, almost parallel to the direction ray faces. you prop yourself up on the ball of your left palm, the arm that is stretched behind you, leaning into ray. ray begins helping you, talking about the different mistakes you make as you go through the process of solving the questions. his voice rings near your face, and you find yourself adjusting your seat on the carpet, moving the hem of the shorts closer to your pelvis. 

ray begins stuttering, and for a while you wonder what that is about. he strokes his chin like he’s thinking hard but it is clear that he is pretending to do so. the room gets hotter and you turn your head to check the thermostat. 

it’s the same. 

maybe it is the way you meet ray’s eyes, his plump, berry lips curving into a smirk at every joke you crack, or the way he, at least you think, gets distracted by your legs on display. he bends down to the papers, the fabric of the shirt stretching over his back, and you can’t help but think about leaving scratches on his back and trailing your fingers down his spine. 

ray smells like soap and the kind of cologne that a college kid can afford, not too charming, not too repellant. his hair is nearer to you than his face, and you can smell his shampoo that’s kind of coconut-y and beachy, and you try your best not to audibly inhale. 

you go through the papers at the speed of lightning with ray there to coach you through it. you chew and bite your lip, working through the problems with utter concentration. sometimes you don’t realize that ray is talking, and you end up ignoring him and apologizing for spacing out at the project. 

“holy shit, you were focused huh? like shiva at his penance,” ray comments, and you don’t understand. and he figures.

“shiva is a hindu deity. he’s known to be the sage of all sages, nobody would disturb his penance on top of this mountain in india,” he says, like he's almost embarrassed about knowing trivia. 

“wow…” you trail off, “and you just know all this?”

he chuckles, ducking his head and looking back up, “i used to google things a lot as a kid…” you cock an eyebrow, not believing him.

“...and maybe i still do.” he admits, palming his face, hiding that smile of his you love to see. 

“i admire that actually. i used to be obsessed with dinosaurs, google was like my life for a good few years” you comment, not expecting his countenance to be that of enthrallment; almost childlike joy. 

“you’re kidding, right? i did too! if you ever come over, you’ll see dinosaur stickers on my laptop and some of my drawers.” and you try not to think too much about the implication of the statement. 

you sort through the papers to make sure you don’t miss a single page and then turn toward ray, who was closer than before. you see specks of gray and black in his eyes, the way his nose bumps up slightly, freckles adorning his olive-toned skin. you notice he has dimples, appearing with each smile. his toothy grin melts you, and you feel that similar warmth you felt last night blossoming in your ribs. 

your breath hitches in your throat before you realize you’re staring like a madman into his eyes. 

“good job today,” ray says, his hand shaking your shoulder, jolts of electricity branching up the point of contact. you look away, a tight-lipped smile masking the sudden pulse his compliment sent straight between your legs. 

“oh, thanks. i really couldn’t have done this without you.” 

ray waves you off, leaning away, upsetting you slightly, “of course you could have. i just pointed you in the direction, you were the one on the journey.”

“any chance you play dnd?” you question, almost teasing his attempt at being poetic.

“it’s that obvious, huh?”

you both laugh, voices ringing out. you don’t remember laughing like this in a while, especially with someone you admired this much. the laughs settle into a comfortable silence as the two of you look out at the plane passing through the window. 

“you know, you’re super talented.” you say, out of the blue, and immediately regret it, thinking you were giving away too much. he turns to you, you observe through your peripheral vision, almost like he knows you have more to say. 

“i mean. the way you just performed like it was breathing to you, it really is rare to see talent like that, especially in this dump of a town.” you finish, clearing your throat in the end, waiting for him to say something. 

“i don’t know what to say,”

“for starters, a thank you would suffice,” you quip, a humorous tone tagging along. 

he starts to rise from his seat, “thanks, i do appreciate it. it’s difficult for me to take compliments, though, if you haven’t figured it out yet.”

you ignore him, “oh yeah, you probably have to leave, sorry to keep yo-”

“no no! i love helping other students, you weren’t keeping me from anything else. i just have band practice in a few, so i have to get going,” 

you swear you hear regret in his voice but maybe you liked to lie to yourself. 

as you watch him see himself out, you wait for him to turn around, say something. 

come on, don’t leave without giving me something. 

“oh by the way,” ray turns around. you hope he doesn’t notice your eyes gleam at the sudden lightbulb moment of his. 

“there’s a mixer on sunday. the band’s gonna be there. you should come, if you’re not busy.”

you nod, and he leaves with a promise that he’ll text you the address. 

he does, followed by a text that says, “hope 2 c u :)”, and you receive a side eye from your roommate who watches you bury your face in your pillow and kick your feet. something about the way ray had to peel his eyes off your legs subconsciously makes you pick something that shows them off, ending up with fishnets and a short skirt you bought on a whim months ago that collected dust in the back of your closet. 

at this point, you know one thing. ray isn’t straight. you very well know you can imagine and exaggerate situations to fit your narrative, and that very well may be the case, but you don’t care. 

it’s your last year. it doesn’t matter if you’re rejected or if you really are imagining things. senioritis in university makes you hit a special low where you could care less what happened. you borrow a jacket from your roommate, ignoring the comment on how she would be really mad if you got ray’s jizz on it. 

*

sunday rolls in and your stomach does not stop jumping. you had somehow completed all your work ahead of time without having to ask ray for help. anxiety was nowhere to be found, just excitement and a little bit of nervousness to see him after days of texting him. 

he had sent you a picture of the dinosaur sticker on his drawer unprompted, and your heart skipped a beat at the notification before you began having conversations that extended late into the night. 

late night conversations turn into exchanging music recommendations and funny videos you find. he sends you videos of his band playing, and he’s the only one you watch, but of course you say, “you guys are going to make it big someday.”

saturday night before turning in, you text him.

-good luck. can’t wait to see you guys perform.

-you’re sweet.

you keep going back to the text, giggling at it throughout the day, even as you get dressed for the mixer. you keep telling yourself he’s being nice but you are at the event, looking around for ray or gerard, or anyone you know. a rotating light hung low in the middle of the floor, a small podium for people to perform at the mixer. people hover around the bar, clearly no age check involved in the process as they swipe drinks and trail off with a huge smile on their faces. 

you feel a hand on your shoulder, and you swear your heart jumps into your throat. 

“ray! i’ve been trying to find you forever.” you look up at him, a sliver of purple and pink lights from the disco ball light streaks across his face like an illuminated scar. 

“so have i, come on back, this place is just for the general public,” he nods his head toward the other direction, fingers grabbing your wrist and nudging you toward him.

“ooo, i feel like a groupie,” you comment, and you hear him giggle, thanking god he doesn’t take you seriously no matter how much you want your words to be true. 

gerard sips a cigarette indoors, frank tunes his guitar with an ear down to the strings, and mikey is nowhere to be found. gerard looks amused at you as he blows smoke out. ray steps out to grab drinks, and you feel vulnerable. exposed. 

“so…” gerard begins, and you know he’s not about to make small talk, “ray has told me a lot about you.”

“all of us actually,” frank interjects, and you look at both of them, bewildered. 

“oh,” he talks about you? “all good things, i hope.”

“oh yes, overwhelmingly.” gerard ashes the stick between his fingers on the crystal tray near him. you sense mischief in his voice as he gives you the same head-to-toe scan that he did the first time you met him. 

“ray isn’t the outgoing type,” mikey walks in. you turn around in surprise to see him without his beanie and glasses for the first time. you can see how similar his features are to gerard’s. 

“yet, here you are, after what?” gerard tilts his head, “a week of meeting him?”

his tone isn’t malicious, nothing he says could sound malicious because he knew how to talk to people, how to handle them. that’s what made him a good frontman. 

“would you be surprised if i say i don’t gel well with strangers either?” you shrug and straighten your back, trying not to seem so timid around them.

they chuckle with you at the irony of the statement, gerard simply says, “i like you,”

you tilt your head slightly, not sure what to say and gerard offers you his cigarette, “ray doesn’t trust people often. and when he does he’s rarely wrong.”

you wave his offer with a small “no, thanks,” and he continues, “i hope he isn’t wrong.”

*

“are you okay?” ray asks you after the show, a beer in his right hand as he leans back into the wall of the green room. 

“yeah, i’m fine, i think i was just too close to the speakers so my head hurts a bit,” 

you aren’t fine. you’re thinking about what gerard said to you, and you barely paid attention to the performance and focused on distracting yourself with a shot of tequila that burned deliciously down your throat. 

you make eye contact with gerard across the room who is sitting on frank’s lap for some reason, his stare less threatening at this point because ray is there. he can’t be obvious. 

gut slowly burning and the alcohol in your system climbing up to your head, you ask ray if he wants shots and before you know it you’re carrying a small tray of salt and slices of lime with two little vials of tequila. 

“do you know how to do this?” you ask, not knowing what you got yourself into. 

“yeah it's super simple,” you hear, trying your best not to giggle at his go-to phrase, “lick, shoot, and suck.”

you dip the back of your hand in the hill of salt, where the index finger and the thumb meet, you glance at ray once before nodding, and lick up a stripe of your hand. ray does the same and you try not to think about the fact that that is how he would look between your legs. you throw your head back in unison with ray, squinted eyes and sour face, sucking at the bright green slice of fruit before smacking your lips. 

ray sits beside you, thighs pressed up against yours, leaning into you, giggling. a rosy blush rises to his cheeks, and his eyelids lie lower than before. your body is on fire. tipsy words making you stutter and laugh for no reason, forgetting about what gerard said for a while. 

ray walks you to your dorm that night, stumbling on the street and giggling at nothing in particular. you clutch his shirt for support as you burst into a fit of laughter at a joke he makes, not caring if you’re loud. 

the lingering breeze in the air makes your skin feel less hot even though being near ray was enough to make you sweat through a leather jacket. the streetlights shine down on the two of you, slowing down in your path and strolling, kicking pebbles and making a game out of them.

you ask him how he got into playing guitar, he tells you a story about how he got ripped off buying his first guitar that broke in the first fifteen minutes of playing it. you tell him about your university experience, your plans for your career. 

he beams at you with genuine admiration in his eyes, eyes softening. the spirit had weakened its effects on your body; you walked with a straighter back and a higher chin than before. almost like a gateway opening for your anxiety. 

“so, gerard told me something,” you begin, not sure what you want to know from striking this topic up.

“hm? what’d he say?” he asks, kicking the poor pebble on the pavement. 

“he said you don’t make friends that easily.” it sounds bad out loud, but you know that he knows what you mean. 

he chortles, “yeah? what else did he say?”

you raise an eyebrow, as if checking with him if you should continue, “he just… he said he hopes you’re not wrong with me.”

the two of you enter your dorm, shuffling through pockets and keycards. ray stays quiet. you noticed he does that when he isn’t ready to talk just yet because he’s thinking of the most logical and rational answer possible.

“why did he-” he begins, and you listen, ignoring the fact that ray follows you to your actual room, trying to justify his friend’s words. 

“he said something about how you can’t stop talking about me and thinking about me,” you flash a shit-eating grin, his eyes widening immediately. 

“that fucker…” he trails off, his head dropping down in defeat. 

“so it’s true?” you ask, leaning your back against the main door, a foot propped up on the surface. your back is straight, if not arched. you feel the after effects of downing two shots of fireball take over, the haze of the liquor blurs the line between “study buddies.”

he steps closer to you. there’s barely anyone outside in the hallways, they are either out partying or fast asleep. his hand trails up the doorframe, palm against the bumped surface. he’s so big that he casts a shadow over you from the main light. you notice his eyes trace your figure, backed up against a door, at his mercy. 

his left arm trails up your waist and stays there, “do you want it to be?” 

*

your bodies move in the dark, an orchestra of heavy breaths and moans bouncing off your dorm’s walls. the posters in your room are but flies on the wall as ray carries you to your bed, your legs wrapped tight around his waist. you lick into his mouth, his warm and soft lips slick with your saliva engulfing yours. 

you breathe in, the scent of his sweat driving your senses into a frenzy and your grip on his hair tenses up. he pulls away to look at your face under the moonlight beaming through your frosted window. ray tastes like the tequila you downed with him, deliciously bitter and intoxicating, his shiny lips sending waves of lightning to your clit. 

neither of you have spoken a word, fingers and lips grabbing and groping each other like hormonal teenagers away from their families at summer camp. ray places you on your bed, your sheets suddenly feeling foreign to you with him hovering above you, his fingers nosing toward the curve of your ass. 

involuntary whimpers escape your throat as his fingers stroke down the back of your thighs; he hooks one of them to the fishnets and rips them in one go, handling your thighs like he starves for something more than open mouthed kisses over his lips that make his cock stir in his tight jeans. the gasp you let out is more out of pleasure and surprise, and less of you mourning the loss of your clothing. 

“all this time, toro, yo- ah, fuck you- you liked me?” you kiss his neck as he works on peeling the fishnets off your legs, throwing your legs over his shoulders, elbows digging into your mattress, leaving kisses up your inner thighs. your arousal was obvious, ray- even you- could smell it through your underwear. 

ray stops and climbs up to face you, his fingers stroking your happy trail and you buck your hips for more just at his touch at your sensitive waist. he asks you if you’re okay and if you want to stop, you need to tell him. 

you grab him by his collar and pull him in, teeth clashing, skin feeling like a burning matchstick, flame eating away at its wooden body. you blabber nonsense, not able to get enough of his full lips around yours; hands lacing around his waist pulling him so close that if he didn’t pull away you would be crushed by his body weight. he kisses down your stomach, his calloused fingers soothing under your hoodie and to your breasts, tracing under the mounds of flesh before his hands flew to your thighs. 

soft trailing kisses become warm, careful presses down your stomach. you breathe like you don’t want him to hear how bad you need him, but your efforts are soon wasted as he presses his nose against your clit. 

inner thighs pressing into his ears, hips bucking up to the warmth of his mouth over the damp cotton underwear, you look down at him, locks of curls falling beautifully over his eyes. his tongue licks a stripe up through the fabric, the frills of your skirt resembling one of those bell-curves ray drew on the whiteboard the first time you met him, with him underneath it.

skilled tongue that circles on your clit before curling his digits under the hem of your panties, yanking the fabric off your skin, a sudden chill making you feel exposed. ray doesn’t let you feel that way any longer; his tongue licks up the folds of your pussy, tasting you whole and you almost pass out from the sheer euphoria locking down the ends of your spine on your bed, the arch in your back pushing your clit further against his nose. 

you beg and beg and beg him to do something. he simply chuckles and swipes the pad of his thumb on your slit before dipping his middle finger into you, a guttural groan emanating from your throat. your feet move against his crotch and you feel his dick strain against his tight jeans, his tongue replacing his finger and tugging you into his face, delving into you. 

hands thread through his curls, clutching and pulling at him needing to feel a release expeditiously. the hotness of his mouth against your pulsing core has you palming your tits hoodie, playing and pinching at your nipples. 

teeth pulling at the skin on your thighs, making you moan helplessly has him circling your clit with his thumb, wanting to hear more of your voice. you chant his name like a prayer, like he would somehow lift your soul up to the heavens with his tongue. 

his stubble adds delectable friction to your cunt and you gasp like your life depends on him; you forget everything. every word, every person in the world, every fucking thing is wiped clean like patterns in the sand under the foamy waves of the ocean. 

your thighs clench around his head, the honestly fucking corrupt noises of him devouring your pussy muffling under the flesh of your tastefully bruised thighs. he hums lowly, gulping and licking and gorging, the vibrations of his voice (that you didn’t know could get that fuckin low) driving you closer to the white light of orgasm that seems so close. 

his moans crescendo as the heels of your feet grind into his cock, his lips pressing and sucking harder at your clit, his fingers that once moved carefully in your slick walls, now quickening and curling up into you. 

you plead, you beg, you pray to him, hips jerking againsts mouth as his teeth lightly graze over the swollen lips of your cunt, your nails scratch his scalp perfectly, the tip of his tongue licks up your clit perfectly and his fingers, oh his fingers, scratch an itch seated so deep inside you that you swear you see stars before tipping over the edge, bottom lips falling open in a silent plea.

you ride his nose, his tongue, you push his head down, fist his hair, do whatever it takes, to make your orgasm last as long as possible, ankles meeting at the back of his neck. the way your legs shake at his last lap on your swollen clit, moonlight reflecting off of his beautiful brown eyes and your arousal dripping down his chin makes you go dizzier- if it was even fucking possible- and you feel like you’re high on the world’s most euphoric drug. 

you smile down at him, fingers holding his cheeks gently, nudging him up to meet your face; his palms digging into your ruined sheets on either side of you, lowering his wet lips onto yours, wanting you to taste yourself against his tongue. you breathe into his kiss, his hair falling on your face, you feel him smile against your mouth and you suddenly remember. 

“ray, do you want me to-” you start, eyebrows twisting up in concern and he cuts you off with another sweet kiss to your lips.

“you expect me to not cream my pants when you’re splayed out like this in front of me, in this little fucking thing around your waist?” his words sound harsh, but admiration fills his eyes, and you know it’s just an amalgamation of what the both of you have been feeling for the past few days. 

“you fucking-” you sputter, still recovering from incredible high- the type of orgasm that the little toy in your nighstand or your fingers could never give you, “-you fucker.”

he sits back on the bed, pulling down your skirt and helping you up to sit, his hands sturdy as a brick wall holding you up while your legs still solidify. as viciously as he ate you out mere minutes ago, he was back to being himself, sweet, nerdy, kind ray. helpful as ever. 

“can i take you out tomorrow?” he asks, his thumb stroking yours, like he’s afraid he’ll break you. 

you kiss his neck and then his jaw, smiling up at him, “just text me the address.”

#writers #fanfiction #music #mcr fic #my chemical ray #mychemfic #my chemical fucking romance #my chemical romance fic #my chem romance #mcr fanfiction #my chemical romance #my chemical romance fanfiction #mcrfanfic #mcrfic #ray toro/you #ray toro x reader #ray toro #ray toro/reader #ftm reader #trans reader #ftm #gerard way #mikey way #frank iero #pete wentz #fanfic

[fakemon]

Vicious fang (Paradox Luxray)

This ferocious Pokémon is said to have been one of the apex predators of its time, with an aggression so strong, it sometimes have difficult telling friend from foe (not that there were many capable of befriending it, even among their species).

With giant fangs and a sharp tail and claws, this Pokémon was said to be pretty much a living weapon (or the perfect killing machine), using those not only to bite and slash, but to infuse their victims with electricity, basically maiming and frying them.

To top it all off, they had incredible eye sight, some saying they had night vision, infra-ray, ultraviolet and x-ray vision!

In short, if this Pokémon were alive today, there would be no hiding from them and no defense towards this efficient and persistent predator. The perfect killing machine indeed.

Ps. There was no option tag for electric type.

Electric/Dark

https://chysaliscreatorii.tumblr.com/

#fakemon #dark #submission

[growthgoddess]

Looming Lamia

Lamia had always been loyal to Dr. Vander. From the moment she had met him while she was at her lowest, she knew that he was unlike any other man she had ever encountered. He had a vision for the world, a new order that would break free from the constraints of society's norms.

She had joined him without hesitation, becoming his first henchwoman and his most trusted confidante.

Together, they had pulled off some of the most audacious heists in recent memory, hitting up corrupt banks and syndicates to fund their operations.

As Dr. Vander's organization grew, so did his reputation. People began to take notice of him, and his ideology began to inspire others to join his cause as henchmen.

But with success came attention, and soon the government had taken notice of Dr. Vander's unlawful activities. They began to hire the elite soldiers of the private military Liberator Corps to hunt him down.

At first, Dr. Vander had managed to stay one step ahead of their pursuers, but as the Liberators closed in, his schemes began to fall apart.

Lamia had been with him every step of the way, even when they had been caught in a crossfire with the Liberators.

She had nearly been killed in the conflict, but she had managed to survive. And she knew that she would do anything to protect her master.

Seeing his closest supporter almost lose her life for him changed something in Dr. Vander, and he slowly become more reckless, more desperate. It was when their lair, hidden in a volcano island, was soon to be cornered that he had hatched his most audacious plan yet.

He would use all of the resources at his disposal to create a growth ray that would turn him into a giant, allowing him to take on the Liberators himself, without risking any more of his henchmen's life.

Lamia knew that it was a risky plan, but she trusted Dr. Vander and would follow him to the end.

As they worked to build the growth ray, Lamia could feel the tension in the air with her fellow teammates. She knew that this was their last ditch effort to fight back against the government, and that their lives hung in the balance.

As soon as the device was ready, they wasted no time in preparing to activate the device for their master.

But as the growth ray hummed with power and supercharged its capacitors, disaster struck.

The entire facility's power ran out, leaving them with enough energy to power the growth ray.for a single shot. However, just as Dr. Vander descended from the control room, the Liberators arrived.

Bombs went off in the ceiling and troopers rappelled down, attacking the group.

Several henchmen died fighting to protect Dr. Vander, who was desperately trying to get in place for the growth ray. Lamia did her best for fight off most of the elite troopers and leading the henchmen.

But as the chaos raged around her, Lamia was blasted to the growth ray chamber and pushed Dr. Vander aside just as he activated the device.

Lamia was bombarded with energy that was enough to power their entire lair. She grit her teeth to endure the pain. She knew the plan has changed with this new development.

When the process was over, Lamia felt something strange happening to her body. She looked at her hands which had static electricity travelling between her fingers.

But before she knew it, she was growing. Her uniform tightened around her body and she saw her gloves tear apart as she was still looking at her hands. She outgrew her clothes, her chest overdeveloped under her leotard which began to strain, and her thigh high boots burst at the seams trying to contain her muscular thighs.

Her body, which was already athletic to begin with, bulked up further with her muscles bulging with newfound strength. She also felt her thighs growing thicker than tree trunks.

Lamia saw her perspective rising higher and higher, she looked at Dr. Vander to seek his approval with this development and he validated her with a serious face and a nod.

Lamia nodded back and focused on growing, but a sudden gunshot sound resounded across the lair which broke her trance.

She looked at herself for any pain, but there was none. But she slowly turned her attention to her beloved master, Dr. Vander, and... He was standing expressionlessly looking at her with blood pooling from his chest. He choked blood but took out his gun and tried to buy her as much time to complete her transformation.

"Alpha Mike Foxtrot, tango sighte-" the soldier was unable to continue his call as Dr. Vander blasted his head off with his sonic cannon.

Lamia screamed wanted to rush to her master's side. She tried to protect Dr. Vander, but her transformation was too powerful and she had to double down in tears as her body ached alongside her heart.

Dr. Vander dragged himself to the control room where the troopers were pouring in, and he threw a thermal grenade in to decimate the enemies inside.

Lamia felt helpless in the chamber, unable to help Dr. Vander, her body stuck bent down as it began crashing through the glass walls and tearing down the machines inside. She glanced at Dr. Vander who activated the intercom to tell her:

"Lamia... Vanessa, you look glorious... and I am proud of you-" he wasn't able to finish his sentence as a flashbang grenade detonated behind him. A loud explosion deafened the poor doctor and he collapsed writhing in pain on the ground.

A woman with shades entered the room and blasted wasted no time executing Dr. Vander with a single shot to his head.

Lamia was devastated, she screamed at the top of her lungs and forced her massive body through. But it was too late, the woman left the room just as the giantess broke through the observation window.

As she held unto Dr. Vander's lifeless body against her gigantic chest, something inside of her snapped.

Lamia forced herself to grow as big as she could, kicking through the lair's cavernous hallways and pushing herself higher and higher. She will not let them escape!

Now as a giant woman that nearly filled the evil lair, Lamia exacted her revenge on the soldiers. She smashed them and kicked anybody whom her body came in contact with, each blow was powerful enough to send them flying across the room. And as she continued to grow, she mourned for the loss of her team and her beloved master.

The Liberator leader, the mysterious woman, flew above the lair in her helicopter and watched how Lamia was outgrowing the whole volcano. She activated the detonator she was holding and observed how the thermal charges set under the lair exploded to trigger the volcano to erupt all around Lamia.

Lava gushed upward from underneath Lamia's massive body. The temperature was intense and she knew that she had to get out soon to avoid getting cooked.

She was a force of nature against another. A giant among men. She stood up triumphantly over the ruined remains of the lair and crushed the entire island underfoot to seal the volcano.

And as several of the Liberator choppers flew off, she gave chase, determined to take down anyone who dared to stand in her way.

She reached out and clenched her fist, an audible crushing sound is heard as she crumpled an entire transport chopper. The others tried to gun her down while escaping from her grasps. The high caliber rapid fire hit her but to no avail.

In the end, Lamia was able to take down the backup choppers, but the leader got away to the safety of the city's defenses. She stood alone, the last of Dr. Vander's henchmen. But she was something more now, something greater. And as she looked out at the world, she knew that she would never stop fighting for what Dr. Vander believed in.

No matter the cost, she will continue his legacy.

#giantess #giant woman #giantess growth #fmg #caption #female muscle growth #giantess caption #growth caption #giantess growth caption #ai artwork #asian giantess #female giant #female giants #giant women #large woman #large bust #huge titts #huge women #huge woman #big woman #big women

[the1entirecircus]

Task Force X Suicide Squad Pokemon Teams

Here is my picks for the pokemon the members of the Suicide Squad would choose.

---

Amanda Waller

Malamar- An obvious pick because of her manipulative and malicious nature.

Mandibuzz- A pokemon associated with similar death and malice that Amanda is known for.

---

Rick Flag

Watchog- Rick often overwatches the missions of Task Force X

---

Harley Quinn

Mightyena- Harley owns a Hyena called Bud

Mightyena- Lou is the other Hyena that Harley owns

Gliscor- Since she's a part of the Batfamily now, her gliscor reflects that part of her. Her Gliscor would also have the hidden ability poison heal which reflects her history with Joker.

Roserade- A nod to her relationship with Ivy that also involves part of Harley's color scheme

Tinkaton- Harley's best known weapon is her giant mallet.

Mega Lopunny- This Lopunny has been through everything with Harley, including the Acid bath that bleach Harley's skin. This turned Harley's Lopunny into a meta pokemon that can mega evolve.

---

Captain Boomerang

Marowak- Boomerangs

Manetric- Electric Boomerang

Perrserker- Bladed Boomerang

Excaldrill- Razor Boomerang

Galarian Rapidash- the toy unicorn he has in the movie

---

Killer Croc

Mabosstiff- Killer Croc is a crime lord in Gotham City

Feraligatr- Killer Croc is based on the alligator of the sewer myth.

Krookodile- Crocodile (well, Gharial, but similar enough to a crocodile) thats also a crook.

Druddigon- Croc's skin condition gives him a rough exterior

---

King Shark

Quagsire- Many often see King Shark as dopey thanks to The Suicide Squad movie.

Cetitan- Another creature that once dwelled in the sea but can walk on land.

Mega Sharpedo- Great White Shark (Well, not really, but its shaped similarly)

Tapu Fini- He is a hawaiian demigod.

---

Peacemaker

Braviary- Its Eagly

Seismitoad- Activate Sonic Boom

Chandelure- A nod to how he can see the ghosts of people he's killed.

Scolipied- Scabbies for all (its a stretch i know)

Haxorus- Doesn't he use an ax in the movie?

Incineroar- Peacemaker is sort of a heel in terms of wrestling. He also doesn't care but secretly does like Incineroar.

Peacemaker's team consists of pokemon that come from Unova and Alola given that Peacemaker is a Captain America parody.

---

Deadshot

Intelleon- Deadshot is known for his espionage skills so handing him an Intelleon was an obvious choice.

Luxray- A perfect pokemon for Lawton's job, its x-ray eyes can see through anything

Sandaconda- Another type of gun-related pokemon.

---

Katana

Ceruledge- This is Katana. She's got my back. I would advice not getting killed by her. Her sword traps the souls of its victims.

Mega Lucario- A nod to her spiritual ties

---

Enchantress

Mismagius- She's a witch!

Spiritomb- An ancient artifact containing an evil spirit or just evil spirits.

Cofagrigus- Another archeological pokemon

---

Reverse Flash (Daniel West)

Orthworm- Daniel gained his abilities in a train accident.

Elektross- Daniel's Elektross is a meta pokemon. Its able to manipulate metal due to the accident which gave it a connection to the Speed Force.

---

El Diablo (Chato Santana)

Skeledirge- Spanish in origin

Salandit- A male salandit which ties into his criminal history and partly to how he killed his wife and children. Again, partly.

---

Deathstroke

Intelleon- He's a bounty hunter, so Intelleon was a good choice for him.

Talonflame- A nod to his connections with Robin/Nightwing

Hydrapple- A nod to the film title of Deathstroke: Knights & Dragons as well as his ability to regenerate as his Hydrapple has that ability

Olympian Aegislash- Deathstroke has been known to hold the Godkiller Sword, a weapon that is able to kill gods.

Gardevoir- This is taking a darker turn as this is in reference to Deathstroke's manipulative nature as he manipulated this Gardevoir to be loyal to him.

Kingambit- Deathstroke is not only an assassin like many samurai but he is also a leader.

I wanted to give Slade a very good team, and while I'm not an expert on pokemon teams, I think this is the best I could offer. Like Batman, Slade has other pokemon at his disposal that are also in nod to his other skills.

---

Bloodsport

Kryptonian Minior- A reference to him shooting Superman with a kryptonite bullet.

Klinklang- Bloodsport's armor in the movie The Suicide Squad is made up of nano-technology. To reflect this, his Klinklang is a meta pokemon made by Lex Luthor.

Shiftry- This is a stretch, but this is a reference to his time in Vietnam in the comics, as that was a part of his original origin.

---

A lot of these guys don't have full pokemon teams because A) I don't know enough about them and B) some don't seem like they would have full teams.

---

Up next:

Batman Rogues Gallery

#Pokemon #Pokemon teams #Pokemon team #Dc #DC Comics #Task Force X #Suicide Squad #The Suicide Squad #Harley Quinn #Peacemaker #Amanda Waller #Deadshot #Captain boomerang #Killer croc #katana #dc katana #king shark #enchantress #Reverse Flash #Daniel West #El Diablo #Deathstroke #Bloodsport #dc x pokemon #dc comics x pokemon

[mhcoolfacts]

Monster Hunter concepts Pt. 8: the Fated Four

I think it would be cool to talk about more popular monsters, so today I will talk about these four peak design monsters that were introduced in Monster Hunter Generations: The Fated Four. While each one has a different theme, they are inherently part of the same core concept and thus must be explained collectively. I will try to keep it brief, but each monster is conceptually very rich so it will be difficult!

So what exactly are the Fated Four? Well as you may know, MHGen is the portable game of the Fourth generation, which started with MH4. MHGen was conceived as a celebration of the saga and its core theme is the number four: four villages, four hunting styles, and of course, four flagships: the scorching blade Glavenus, the lightning rebel Astalos, the immovable mountain god Gammoth, and the bewitching dance Mizutsune. Being defined as a group, each one of these monsters is intended to embody both a generation and a stereotypical archetype in a "hero team" (think of the Power Rangers, sorta).

Firstly we got Astalos, which is the rebel of the group, its color is green. Astalos embodies the First Generation being a Flying Wyvern and being found in the Forest and Hills (now Verdant Hills) near Kokoto, the village from the very first Monster Hunter. Its design is quite amazing, as it combines insect traits, with iridescent, semitranslucent wings, spiky legs and an earwig-like tail, its different insect-like parts charge with electricity as it attacks, a perfect reflection of its energetic and agressive nature. Its name in english comes from Astrapi (lightning in Greek) and -los to indicate it's the rival of Rathalos, which is much worse than its Japanese name Raizekusu (or Raizex for friends) which sounds way cooler, and is a combination of 雷 rai (thunder) and Insekt, the german word for, well, insect.

Secondly we got Gammoth, which is the big guy, the champion of the group, its color is blue. It embodies the Second Generation as a Fanged Beast, a class introduced in said generation, and is found in the Snowy Mountains (now Arctic Ridge) near Pokke, the village of MH Freedom 2 and Freedom Unite. This massive behemoth is based on a mammoth and also combines beasts from Greek mythology like hecatoncheires and cyclops, inspiring its weird armored head and and eye-like markings of its shoulders. Fight wise it covers its legs with snow and then tries to crush its enemies, as well as using its trunk as a versatile ranged weapon, however due to its enormous size with barely any back defense, its fight is possibly the easiest of the four. Lore confirms that its deep hatred for Tigrex is a result from childhood trauma (amazing). Its etymology is pretty straightforward, being a combination of the Hindu elephant god Ganesha and mammoth.

Thirdly we have Mizutsune, which is the girl (yes thats an archetype) of the group, its color is pink (cuz girl!!!!). It embodies the Third Generation as a Leviathan, a class first seen in our beloved wet MH3, and inhabits the Misty Peaks near Yukumo, which had never appeared in the west because it was only featured in MH Portable 3rd. This monster combines different traits from foxes, weasels, carps/goldenfish and snakes to create a really beautiful design. Mizutsune fights by secreting a soap-like substance to create bubbles, this slippery foam increases its movility while hindering that of its rivals, its gracefulness and agility allow it to face even powerful threats like Zinogre, using its giant brush-like tail as main weapon. Its etymology is pretty obvious if you are a bit of a weeb, "Mizutsune" is a combination of the Japanese words for water 水 mizu and fox 狐 kitsune, originally its Japanese name is Tamamitsune, which uses Tamamo-no-Mae, the legendary woman from the Japanese fairytale of the same name, instead of water.

And lastly we got Glavenus! The leader of the group obviously, its color is red, altho at first glance it may appear to be blue. Surprisingly, Glavenus is not the first fire-breathing Brute Wyvern that uses its tail as a sword, if you know your monsters you will know that Abiorugu from MH Frontier, while completely different, has these core traits too. In any case, Glavenus is still a really good design, who doesn't love a Carnotaurus with a giant blade as a tail that lights up like a 1000 degree knife? Its flame-shaped shell and horns also become red when enraged which give it a very fiery look, everything about its design screams fire. Interestingly, it is also mentioned in interviews that Glavenus was intended to be a land Rathalos, which would explain why it hates Rathian so much. Despite all of this, I still find odd that the monster that is supposed to embody the Fourth Generation is not from a class introduced in it (we need more Snake Wyverns!), overall it's the only monster in the group that does not really embody its generation all that well, but that's fine, we still love the top contender of the Jurassic Frontier (I guess Cretaceous Frontier was too long). In terms of etymology, "Glavenus" is a combination of the latin words Gladius (blade) and Fervens (burning) plus -saurus (cuz it's a dinosaur), while in Japanese Dinobarudo is a combination of Dinosaur, Nova and Halberd.

So that is all! Four banger monsters in one go, which one is your favorite? Do you also pray every night for Gammoth to return in the future or that it will remain forgotten like Gigginox? I really hope people find these ramblings interesting lol

#monster hunter #etymology #monster hunter rise #fantasy #lore #creature concept #monster hunter world #monster hunter generations

[fair-night-starry-tears]

Name: Ray Leech

Relatives: Floyd and Jade Leech (cousins)

Age: 17

Species: moray eels but more on the greener color

Height: 6’1

Likes: technology and vibing under the furniture

Dislikes: undisclosed

Favorite people: his cousins, Azul, Idia, Ortho, Vil, and Yuu.

Dislikes people: Rook (Ray: this man scares me.)

Unique Magic: Shock to the touch- he can shock people and put them into a paralyzed state for a few hours of interrogation. Then undo it.

Habits: being a giant powerbank/electric charge for everyone technology

Favorite food: Shrimps

Dislike food: edible flowers (no flavor to him)

Extra:

- he favors Yuu out of random, no joke

- he been attending classes off campus via waterproof laptop with a surprisingly good wifi spot in the water (magic logic) but attended after the first year around the winter semester

- he is like Floyd but throw Jade persona and you get Ray Leech

- he likes being under furniture and you know he’s there if you see this motherfucker grabbing people ankles

Funfact: me and Manga made this during eel videos and give him some extra details

Tagging: @adrianasunderworld @mangacupcake @writing-heiress @the-weirdos-mind

#twisted wonderland #twisted wonderland oc #Ray Leech

[thesmallmeggles]

Surf Rock Merfolk/Ocean Creatures AU

It's merfolk time! 🧜🧜‍♂️🧜‍♀️

Credit to Discord Buddies for some suggestions

Believe it or not, this all started from seeing @black-performer-blog 's Rain World crossover art. Though I have seen @rinto190 and @indigo-grimoire 's Mermay pieces. (And they are great 💙)

General Plot: Renown marine biologist Roxanne Vandelay vanishes on an expedition near Vandelay Island. Peppermint assembles a team to locate her.

🎸 Chai - Goldfish or Guppy? (Not 100% certain) Gains siren qualities through 🐟ocean magic🐟 (impressive considering he's freshwater)

(Cannot post guppy image because I reached the post photo limit)

🛠️ Peppermint - human marine biologist like her mom

🐱 808 - Catfish robot (as in catfish or half cat, half fish? It's Up To You!~)

Here's an actual catfish regardless.

💻 Macaron - Whale Shark. Worked closely with Roxanne before her disappearance.

🖍️ CNMN - Diving Robot (think something like OceanOne)

⚡ Rekka - Electric Ray (Other ideas I considered were shark, orca, and electric eel. I really wanted electricity though.) Maybe not the exact species pictured below but Sea pancake...

🍍 Zanzo - Octopus 🐙 Giant Pacific Octopus more specifically. (He's already been introduced in an earlier post lol)

Bonus Lionfish! (The Alternative)

🌪️ Korsica - Selkie (aka the reason why this AU isn't a true mermaid AU). Seal maiden, prominent in Celtic and Norse folklore.

🍹 Mimosa - Flying Fish. (The only traditional merperson besides Chai) Also has siren qualities.

🐺 Roquefort - Sand Tiger Shark (Recommeded by a Discord Friend @psychangels . My first thought was Dogfish for the funnies)

☕ Kale - Originally human, turned himself into Vampire Squid through, you guessed it, 🐟ocean magic🐟. Only Chai is unaware of the fact (Because he never asked).

That's about all I have for the AU so far. I may revisit this for MerMay 2024 (or sooner). No promises though

As with Shadows Across The Moon (Horror-Fantasy AU), you are welcome to build off of this

#hi fi rush #hfr #au #alternate universe #mermaid au #sea creature au #Youtube #cw eye contact #for the tiger shark #the au title is a joke but I might actually use it