#i changed a few details in game after making these screenshots but oh well

[glamrockcas]

Men of Letters Bunker from Supernatural, built in the Sims 4. Gallery ID: wiseupghost

My goal was to attempt to make a version of the Bunker that was as accurate as possible (within the limitations of the game), no matter how long it took. This is the end result! A few reference pics of the lesser-known rooms are also included here.

#supernatural #the sims 4 #ts4 build #ts4 #spnfandom #spn #mine #i changed a few details in game after making these screenshots but oh well #the sims #bunker #the bunker

[strawberrymilkgeorge]

Part Five. "You guys gossip about boys without me?"

warnings: swearing, mentions of emotional abusive/manipulation word count: 3.2k (not including pictures)

behind the screen (irl dream x f!reader) series masterlist ultimate masterlist

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Y/n dropped her phone on the bed and slowly rolled off and onto the ground with a soft THUD. She grunted, falling harder than she expected but the dull pain now present in her right shoulder felt deserved somehow. Why did she think she deserved it? Maybe because she was an unconfrontational worm even when the person needed to be confronted because he hurt her more than anyone ever had.

She closed her eyes and wiggled to get comfortable on the thin carpet in her room. Laying on the ground was relaxing to her, forcing her gamer back to straighten to how it was intended. It helped her think, being on the floor. She didn't know why but she didn't question it. Just laid on the floor in acceptance with the dirt and forgotten candy wrappers.

Why didn't she want to respond to Peter? Well, years of being with him and even the months of not being with him had taught her that her ex liked to get his way and liked to take his anger out in her verbally when he didn't.

You could say she's heard some terrible things over very simple inconveniences.

Y/n slowly pattered to her desk and slid on her headphones, finding the discord server Dream said he and George were on. It was a server that a lot of their friends were in, one that Y/n hardly went in since she still hadn't met a lot of them and wasn't super comfortable with talking in it yet.

She scrolled through the various text chats, one for boredom, one for stream questions, one for memes, one for pictures of pets, one for.... discussing the inevitable takeover of rats...? Y/n wasn't sure what that was about but she knew she didn't want to find out. The list went on. She was pretty sure they had made a channel for every possible message someone could ever send.

There were equally as many voice channels, most of them titled with the names of different games for when they only played with each other and didn't stream. Some of them were just random names and she noticed there was one to match the rat takeover text channel. Okay, who was responsible for that?

After what felt like an entire scavenger hunt and with many new questions in her mind, Y/n finally found the voice channel Dream and George were in and clicked on it. It was called memerz-only.

"I'm not a memer, am I allowed in here?" she asked. She hadn't realized how messed up her voice was since she hadn't talked all day.

"Holy shit, Bug, you sound awful."

She scoffed a laugh. "Thanks, Dream. Really means a lot." She did sound pretty scuffed. Her voice was a little scratchy from not talking literally all day.

"You doing okay, Bugsy?" George asked kindly, to which she hummed.

“I just have one quick question...”

“Mhm?”

“This is simple, please don’t elaborate further. There’s a channel on this server... did you guys mean rat as in BadBoyHalo’s dog or rats as in rats?”

Neither of them spoke for a minute before George understood what she was referring to. “Oh! Rats as in rats.”

“Okay, thank you.” 

“Yeah, Quackity—“

“No!” she interupted. “No! I said I don’t wanna know. I really don’t. I’m too afraid to understand.”

“Wha- HA, okay.”

“Good choice, Bugsy. I wish I didn’t know what it’s about. It’s a lot weirder than you’d think.”

“Now that that’s settled,” Dream said with a laugh. “How are you doing, Bug?”

"Neither of you are streaming, right?" she asked, doubling checking the twitch app on her phone to be sure.

"No."

"So I don't have to pretend to be happy and bubbly?"

"No, you can be as mundane as you'd like," Dream said. "We don't mind."

"Yeah, honestly, most of the time when Dream and I are on calls alone it's just us being super boring and hardly talking."

"That's..." she paused to find the right words and decided with, "actually really cute. You guys just enjoy each other's presence."

George scoffed and Dream giggled. "See, even Bug says we're cute, Georgie! Why can you tell me you love me?"

"I'll leave right now if you don't stop," George threatened. "Can we go back to how Bugsy's miserable?"

"I'm not miserable, I just..." she hesitated. She had already told George about why she was having a bad day, but Dream?

She didn't want to tell Karl because she knew he would yell at her. She didn't want to tell Sapnap because she didn't trust him not to tell everyone (on accident, of course). For some reason, it was a different kind of hesitation than with the others that made her not want to tell Dream. She didn't want to tell him because she didn't want to be... embarrassed? Maybe that was it. She thought it would be embarrassing to tell Dream about how her ex-boyfriend treated her like shit and how now he wants to get back together with her. Plus, she knew how everyone else individually would react but Dream was a complete mystery. Maybe he'd yell at her too and say she's stupid for being affected by an ex. Maybe he'd break down crying for some reason? Who knows?

"You don't have to tell us," Dream stated. "Seriously."

"It's embarrassing," she said, tucking her feet beneath her on her seat. As she said the words, she decided they felt right. She was embarrassed. "But George already knows."

Above everyone else, Y/n was okay with telling George about her situation because he and her tended to talk about their troublesome relationships quite often. He always came to her for advice and she to him. They were very similar in their ways of thinking and seemed to have lots of similar dating stories, even if neither of them knew what the hell they were doing. She knew he'd never judge her for thinking unclearly since he tended to do the same.

George hummed, not knowing what to say since she hadn't said much. She could tell he didn't wanna say something that might make Dream more nosey and start hounding her about telling him.

"What hap—never mind. Not my business," Dream said quickly.

"No, I mean, I kinda wanted to talk to George about it again anyway so I guess you can join in on the gossip." Guess my mouth decided for me on this one, she thought.

"Wait, what? You guys gossip about boys without me?"

"Oh my gosh, don't say it like that, Dream," George groaned. "Bugsy and I talk about relationship problems a lot, yes. Not just boys."

"How did I not know this?"

"Because you don't know a lot of things?"

"It's normally George sending screenshots of text conversations with girls and asking me how to let them down gently," Y/n explained with a giggle.

"Or Y/n talking about her asshole ex."

"George! What do you and Karl not get about not calling him names?"

"I'm so lost," Dream mumbled.

Y/n sighed. "Okay, well," she cut herself off with a groan. "It's so embarrassing. Basically, my ex asked me to 'chat' this morning which is code for he wants to get back together—"

"Do you know that for sure?" Dream asked.

"Yeah, we already decided that," George snapped. "Let her finish."

"Sorry."

"So he wants to get back together and I feel stupid for wanting to listen to what he has to say."

"How is that embarrassing?"

"Because he hurt me and I feel like an idiot because him even suggesting that means he doesn't realize how badly he hurt me. It makes me feel like, I don't know, like all the time I spent being upset was for nothing," Y/n explained in a soft voice. "And because his simple, like, five word text made me freak out all day to the point of exhaustion."

"I don't think you should be embarrassed, Bugsy," George offered.

"Have either of you, uh, have you ever considered dating an ex?"

"Didn't you just say he hurt you badly?" Dream asked. "You aren't thinking of getting back with him, are you?"

"No... but I want to stay friends so maybe I should hear him out?"

"Well, I've never gotten back with an ex," he said bluntly. "But to be fair, all my relationships have ended badly or for bad reasons so I've never wanted to see any of them again. Staying friends depends on why you and he broke up, I guess, but..."

"Um, how do I put this..." she trailed off. "He was mean to me."

"Then no? Simple."

"But I've forgiven him and I think he's changed."

"People don't change that easily. Didn't you break up like, a few months ago?" George asked.

"Yeah, but—"

"Honestly I think if a guy was ever mean to you he doesn't deserve any more of your attention," Dream decided. "So, no. Don't even be his friend. Don't listen to a single thing he has to say."

"That's what I told her," George agreed.

"If that were the case, you guys shouldn't be friends," she argued. "You're mean to each other all the time."

"But we know it's a joke," George defended.

"So you're saying if someone is ever purposefully mean to you just once, you drop them forever?"

"Well, no," Dream said. "Not exactly. But it sounds like he was super mean to you since it's why you broke up."

She took a deep breath. She didn't want to go into detail. She was already uncomfortable enough talking about her personal life so much, but she trusted both of them and needed to get it off her chest and they were there and willing to listen. They had already established wanting to listen to her if she wanted to speak and right now, she wanted to speak. Maybe not the full story, but at least some. "He, um, well, the mean things he said, he said because he was trying to get me to see what he thought was the truth about myself."

Both of them were silent for a few moments. "I'm still confused," George admitted.

"Me too... But you don't have to tell us." Dream explained again. She thought it was sweet that they kept reassuring her that.

"I know, but I want to. If it's not too much for you guys..."

"No, go ahead, if you want."

"Uh, he lowkey emotionally manipulated me by telling me I wasn't good enough for anyone and stuff and how he was the only one who could ever love me. The second part he said truly believing that he was being romantic. There are a lot worse and specific things engraved in my brain but that's the gist of what he would tell me. He made me believe that I could never leave him because I could never be loved by anyone else. But he said it all in a way that... he thought he was just... letting me in on something no one else had the guts to tell me."

George gasped. "What?! Bugsy, I'm so sorry, I didn't know it was like that."

"Woah, what the hell? No. Absolutely not. Don't give this guy a second thought. Cut him off for good," Dream said sternly, angry that anyone would say that to anyone, especially to someone like Y/n. "Wait, so, you broke up with him?"

"Yeah. After Karl yelled at me a lot and explained his outside point of view, I finally realized Peter was gaslighting me and emotionally abusing me and stuff so I dumped him. I guess right now I'm just upset by it because I thought we were past this and I was healing and him reaching out affected me again. I'm just emotionally exhausted. Like I said, it hurts to know that he doesn't realize what he did to me."

"I'm really sorry, Bug," Dream said softly. "Gimme his address and I'll punch him for you."

She laughed through her nose. "That's okay. Thanks."

"Yeah, she can go set his house on fire if she wants. She's proven that already."

"Shut up, George," she said with a small laugh.

"Wh......at?" Dream stuttered and George briefly explained.

"Well, Bug, just so you know, in case you weren't aware, you're really cool and sweet and funny and we really like having you around–" Dream started.

"Oh, ugh, no don't do this," she tried to joke but he ignored her as he continued his speech.

"–and you're way too good to be hanging out with either of us, and whatever that asshole was showing you wasn't love. 'No one could love you like he did' because what he was doing was not love, it was abuse." Dream's voice had a certain gentleness to it as he spoke that comforted Y/n and made her believe him. He was blunt but it didn't stab her in the heart like it should have.

If Y/n ever cried, she might have just then from how sweet they were both being. But she didn't because that wasn't something she did. She never cried over anything Peter said, never cried during movies, and didn't cry then. But she did smile very fondly at the Discord screen in front of her.

"Thank you, Dream."

"You know I'm not good with words, but, yeah, what Dream said," George said. "I'm sorry you had to go through that thinking it was normal. Please, please, do not get back together with him and please don't be friends with him."

"He's fine as a friend though."

"Bug. Whether he's fine as a friend doesn't matter, he doesn't deserve to have you as a friend. He treated you like shit, it's okay to be a little cold to him."

She sighed. They were right. "Okay." There was a long pause before, "thanks, guys. Sorry for coming in here and dumping my problems on you—"

"Don't be sorry," George said. "We're the ones that asked you to come in and share. We knew what we signed up for and don't regret it."

"Seriously, Bug, we care about you. You're allowed to, you know, talk about yourself." How did he know that's what she meant by that sentence? The way he could read her mind was heart-warming.

"Also, George knows this but Dream, there's a strict no-telling policy about this kinda thing. Please don't tell anyone."

"I wouldn't even think of it," he promised. "My lips are sealed."

"Good."

A soft animal noise came from one of their mics and Y/n strained her ears to listen. "Was that a cat?"

"Patches has entered the chat," George joked.

Dream chuckled. "Yeah, my cat just jumped on my lap."

"Aw, you have a cat? Lemme see lemme see lemme see!" Y/n begged. "Partly because I would love if we could stop talking about my ex-boyfriend and the other part because I love cats."

"There's pictures of her in the pets channel on Discord—"

"No, no I want a picture of her on your lap. Is she all snuggled up?"

"Yeah, she is."

"PleASE, Dream. I need to see the snuggly cat."

"Fine, fine, if you insist. Give me a second."

A few moments later, she got a DM from Dream and smiled at the picture. His room was dark but the computer screen cast a cold glow over a ball of fur on a lap clad in sweatpants. "Awww, she's so cute."

"Dream, I wanna see it too," George whined. "Send it to the pets channel."

"I'm literally making this my lock screen," Y/n informed, making Dream laugh.

"No, George, it's only for Bug. She's had a bad day so she gets exclusive Patches content."

"What? That is so messed up."

"You know what's messed up, George?" Dream asked. "You never come to me with advice on how to reject girls. We're on the phone for 12 hours a day but you can't talk to me about girls? Do you know how that makes me feel?"

"You'll just make fun of me."

"Why would I? What makes you think that?"

"Because Sapnap and I make fun of you? So obviously you and him would make fun of me?" George said with a laugh.

"....that's fair."

Y/n locked her phone and clicked the home button to admire her new lock screen. "I love her," she whispered.

Dream and George both laughed. "I'm regretting sending you that. You're gonna, like, make a shrine or something."

"What would be wrong with that? She's precious. She deserves a shrine."

"Yeah, Dream, you're the one that feeds her gormet cooked food," George teased with a laugh. "You probably have a shrine."

"That's normal! That's what people feed their cats! That's completely normal!"

"I don't," George countered.

"Then what do you feed your cat?" Dream asked.

"I dunno, normal cat food?"

"Wait! You have a cat too??" Y/n asked. "I feel like we're missing a huge detail and it's that George never told me he had a cat."

"And a dog."

"WHAT? GEORGE! Send me pictures!!!!!"

"I can't right now, it's like three am. They're sleeping. Look in the pets channel."

"You're the worst," she grumbled, clicking and scrolling to find his pets. She saw a lot of cute pictures of other peoples pets along the way but couldn't find George's.

"Hey, do your animals have English accents?" Dream asked, making Y/n laugh.

"What?" George scoffed. "You're so stupid."

"How would that even sound?" Y/n asked.

"Like..." Dream thought, preparing to test out how it would hypothetically sound. "Meow," Dream meowed in his best accent, failing miserable.

"Oh gosh, never do that again," Y/n begged.

Dream laughed into his mic. "That was disgusting. George, I really hope your pets don't have accents."

"They're animals, so probably not. And if they did, it definitely wouldn't sound like whatever that was."

"Oh come on–"

"OH I FOUND THEM." Y/n announced as she found a message from George in the pets channel with the message 'heard we're sharing our pets'. "GEORGE. THEY'RE SO CUTE."

"Are you gonna make them your background picture now?" George asked.

"What, no way! It's Patches!" Dream scoffed.

"Yeah, I'll make George's pets my home screen. Oh, what a good day." As soon as she said it, a metal bowling ball fell to her stomach, reminding her of all the reasons it was, in fact, not a good day.

She got off after a while, feeling the weight of a particular idiot man's stupid simple text catch up with her again. She thanked Dream and George for letting her join, they invited her to always hang out with them, and she went on her way.

Y/n fell on her bed and curled up under the covers as her mind started to wander from Peter to Dream. She was really glad she met him. He was a really good person and he was always so incredibly kind to her. George and Sapnap and Karl were all great friends, so caring and understanding and always looking out for her, but Dream was different and she didn't know why.

Maybe it was because he seemed untouchable still, like he had no reason to hang out around someone like her. But he wasn't untouchable in the celebrity was since he had a large following, because all of her friends did and they didn't seem untouchable. Then what was it? What set him apart from, say, Karl? She trusted Karl with her life and had known him for quite a while. She knew Dream for maybe a few weeks and almost trusted him the same amount.

Why?

She picked her phone up off the bed and pulled up Twitter, deciding to DM Dream since he was already existing in her mind rent-free. Might as well make him pay his rent by bothering him.

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PREVIOUS | NEXT

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A/N: EEEEEEEE I hope that all made sense lmaaoooo basically yn ex = gaarrbbaaagggeeeee and ruined her self-worth a lot!! not poggers!!!!!!  THANK U GUYS FOR BEING SO SWEET ALL THE TIME ALL FOR ALL THE POSITIVE FEEDBACK ON ALL THE  CHAPTERS!!! I love seeing you guys make predictions and tell me how aljkDFB chapters make you feel bc same :/

taglist: OPEN (at the time) @hydrate-tion @loraleiix @tinaswagbd @charsdummb @smileyyuta @1ghoste1 @cerberus-hellhound @gaysludge @queestionmark @carnations-red @letsloveimagines @the-fictionwriters-hairdo @boiled-onionrings @a-cryptic @fee-btheweeb @letsloveimagines @erwinss @just-a-stan @axths @kayleigh2703 @furiouspockettoad @sometimeseverythingsucks @powerpuffyn​ @itshaileyn @millavalntyne @automaticcomputerpaper @nikkineeky @fivedicksinatrenchcoat @sprucekot @jabby16 @mae-musicbitch @hungoverhellhound @dreamyteam @kuroo-icedtea @stuffforreferences @menacingaesthetic @sapphic-soot @fangeekkk 

#rpf #real person fiction #dream x reader #dreamwastaken x reader #dream x y/n #dreamwastaken x y/n #mcty x reader #mcyt x y/n #clay x reader #dream smau #dreamwastaken smau #smau #social media fic #dream social media fic #social media au

[nikatyler]

Adventures in TS2

Well, I did it, I opened TS2 again, for the first time in a while. I just can’t get into this game. At the same time, I see how amazing it is and from what I’ve seen online, I can totally understand why people still play it after all this time. It’s just...I feel like I’m getting into it way too late and there’s so much to learn and for some reason it’s just difficult for me (and, honestly, part of me is just too lazy to figure it all out). Well, I decided to try again, and hopefully I will be opening this game again soon.

I made a brand new sim that is not tied to any other sim in the R-BCU (Rose-Breeze Cinematic Universe; yes I’m calling it that, kinda as a joke but also kinda unironically). Meet Maddie Alvarez but beware, I’m not good at making sims in this game, or taking screenshots in this game. Still, I think she’s kinda cute. Not as cute as my TS3 and TS4 sims though, but maybe we’ll get there eventually.

That’s not her dog, unfortunately, but he was a very good boy and we became friends.

Then, people came! It goes without saying but I’m a sims 2 noob lol, so I was very surprised to see Tyler there. Then I realized it’s the same save file as the one I was playing a few months ago. Also, Tyler’s TS2 version is not very accurate. It’s not a bad sim but they don’t have the same vibe as the TS3/TS4 Tyler to me haha.

More under the cut because this will actually probably be long haha.

Tyler ate our cereal >:(( Friendship ended with Tyler >:((((

Kidding, friendship renewed with Tyler. They bonded over alien jokes, which...makes sense. Good old days. If you know, you know. If you don’t...well. Long long time ago, Tyler’s brother got abducted by aliens, things happened, and Tyler would never shut up about it. The mommy joke. Gone but not forgotten. But I’m glad Caleb is more than that nowadays. Anyway, that’s off topic, let’s get back to Maddie.

She’s...breaking shit. This was the next morning, I think.

I love that she actually walks to the car and opens the door. I’m surprised this isn’t in TS3. And well...it’s a little detail but I guess now I can see why people want cars in TS4. (As for me, I still don’t care about them, but if they added them I wouldn’t be mad at all.)

This got me thinking, wait a second, where’s my old camera?? And is it still working? Genuinely have no clue.

Also, I love how TS2, being an old game, is...well, old, and it shows when you look at the electronics and everything. 😅 Reminds me of my childhood and how so many things have changed since then. And I’ll stop here before I get sappy and overly nostalgic.

Anyway, Maddie met someone...a sim I literally made in five minutes and it shows lol. Meet Emery Woods.

Oh no.

Oh wait, oh wow...it’s almost as if they were made for each other, isn’t it? 👁👄👁

The next morning, Emery came for a visit, and this is how Maddie greeted him. And then I closed the game because I wanted to go do something else. And then I didn’t do that. Because something distracted me. Then I somehow ended up taking a shower. That’s a good thing but I don’t think I was planning on doing that yet lol. But yeah, it was a good thing, it’s after midnight sooo...and we’re getting off topic again 😅 So yeah, hopefully this isn’t the last time we’ve seen Maddie and Emery, and I’m off to do the thing I actually wanted to do after closing the game!

#ts2 #sims 2 #the sims 2 #my sims #maddie alvarez #emery woods

[white-tulips]

I spent most of this morning continuing playing through the hikikomori route, more of my thoughts below!! (major spoilers ahead!!!!!)

if you haven’t but want to read my first post on my hikikomori playthrough, you can see it [here]!! it’s been a month since I last played any, aha...

I played for quite a few hours earlier but I don’t think I really progressed all that much aha. most of my time went towards grinding and wandering around and seeing little things. oh, and also playing through Orange Oasis. I never actually did that in my first run of the game. it was okay.

I really love how many little details and things to go back to that there are, but I’m still a little bitter at just. how long everything is. I talked about this a lot in my previous post, but it irritates me that the first 15-20 hours (give or take depending on how fast you’re able to blast through this game) is just. exactly the same as what you experience in the main route. especially since now my hikikomori save file is even longer than my main story file, and I think I still have a decent ways to go until I finish. I don’t actually know! I haven’t been spoiled for this route, thankfully, so I don’t really know how much is left. I have a vague idea of a couple areas I need to go to, but that’s about it.

ok, on to my thoughts!! this post is probably just going to be me rambling about tiny details I found interesting since I didn’t progress through much plot stuff, I think.

when I opened up my save file, I. completely forgot what I had been doing a month ago and what I wanted to do next, so I decided to go back to the Last Resort. I don’t know what compelled me to go, but there was a lot of fun stuff there so I’m glad that I did!

I had never tried to use Aubrey to go into the girls’ bathroom before? it was very cute, I liked it. I don’t know why, but as soon as I walked in it really reminded me of Basil. I think it’s all the flowers, photos hanging from the wall, and general soft cutesy vibe. I’m not really sure what to make of that, but it was just my general impression. hmmmm.

I have no words for this other than it just made me amused. go get your vacation, king.

also:

I didn’t know Hero had a confirmed age!! all this time I had been assuming he and Mari were 16 years old, so it’s nice to have something set in stone!

I have no words for these, either. seeing all of the Hero pictures just made me laugh out loud a little I loved it.

when I was standing in Jawsum’s office, I noticed that the elevator behind his desk was shaking. I went to examine it, and was surprised when this was where I ended up.

the black space elevator.

something I completely forgot to mention in my last hikikomori post was black space!! it had completely took me by surprise so I can’t believe I forgot to talk about it.

last time I played and went back to Last Resort, there was a completely black car on the highway and it had really freaked me out. as soon as I clicked on it, instead of giving me some kind of prompt Omori just got in and it drove off. I was so shocked because I wasn’t expecting it fhgjdfhgj. it ended up taking Omori back to one of the black space rooms, and I had no clue what to make of it. I wandered around for a little while, and ended up finding this... friend?

I’m... not sure! who are you......

anyways, so I got in the elevator and we’re back here, now with more spiders.

the spider wasn’t interactable. not sure whether to be upset or relieved.

aaaand then there was this guy in the treehouse. I want to know what these black space NPCs are!!! as soon as I tried to interact with it, the screen glitched out (intentionally) and then it was gone. one day I’ll know what it means.

oh, another thing I spent quite a bit of time doing at the Last Resort-

getting statues made of everyone!! RIP to all of my clams, but these are so cute.

cuuute.

I really liked the comment on Mari’s! it made me happy that it highlighted her playful side.

after I was done reexploring Last Resort, I wanted to go back to Sweetheart’s castle. I was walking through Pyrefly Forest, and I noticed one of the picnic blankets had a cooler open (signaling that you can see a new picnic cutscene) so I went to go sit down and have a picnic.

so, when I was going around earlier and doing some stuff, there were a few picnics that I think I had skipped for some reason so I was doing them and mindlessly skipping through the text for no reason other than it would bother be if I just left them. nothing about the conversations was different even though Basil is here now, so I didn’t think anything would be different for the one in Pyrefly Forest, but I was wrong!! I almost completely skipped through everything aha.

it started off the same, with Hero being scared of the spiders, and then Kel prompted Basil to say something positive to try and make him less scared.

it’s pretty insignificant, but I thought it was interesting that he said pretty much the exact same thing he says in the spider room in black space.

when I got to the castle, I went straight to the library. something about the pattern of going to black space, plus being able to go into the barn in Otherworld, just made me feel like there would be something there. and oh boy was I right. the entire place was crawling with Something.

very good.....

I wasn’t able to get screenshots of them, but there were a couple text popups that really stood out to me. my memory is so bad I can’t remember all of them even though it was only this morning,,, but I’m pretty sure one of them had a popup that was just “Liar.” and I was like HM....

it just really had me thinking....

in my previous post, I mentioned that I had a gut feeling that the Something in the barn was supposed to represent Basil, not Mari. this kind of added fuel to that thought!

the barn in Otherworld was only used in the main route in reference to Basil, with it literally showing Omori a vision of him, and also having Stranger walking into it. now, the library also has a lot of connection to Basil! after picking up one of the keys, it shows us another vision of him, and it’s also littered with egret orchids. I don’t think choosing to have all of these Somethings in both of these places is just a coincidence.

now, about the “Liar.” line. in any fight with Something, if there’s a text popup meant to be Something speaking, it’s always done like this-

with the “???:” to indicate character speech. but the “Liar.” popup was just a standalone line. and it instantly reminded me of this room in black space-

and this just kept making my brain whirl.

in this room, there were all of these popups with “Liar.” and then of course there was-

see here how there also weren’t indications of who was saying ‘liar”, but there was for Something? my idea for this room was always that it was Omori repeating it to himself. because we all know by now that Something is Mari, and her saying “I love you”, especially in this form, is nothing but pure torment. and I think here, we have Omori unwilling to believe it. there’s no way Mari could love him/Sunny. she has to be lying.

soooo then, this brings me back to the library. having the “Liar.” popup there, keeping in consideration that the Somethings there might represent Basil, what could that mean?? it could be in reference to Basil’s words “Everything is going to be okay” because clearly everything is not okay. if all of these Somethings are meant to be Basil, it could fit!!!

... so there’s my long winded theory. idk! I think it makes sense, but I could be wrong!! that’s just my first impressions right now, maybe my thoughts will change when I play more!

moving onto the piano room-

this was when I thought “ohhhh so that’s why the wall always felt hallow. it all makes sense now”

and then I spent the next 30 or so minutes fighting all of the Somethings

I LOVED this. this was the first time a fight was put on a time limit, and since Something was so much more powerful, it felt actually stressful. I was stressed! but I managed to make it with 2-3 turns left, and I didn’t die. I did die about 1 or 2 times to arachnophobia and thalassophobia though F. but it’s okay because I got an achievement and also Omori’s suffocate skill is really good.

anyways I did some more mindless walking around (I had to kill time waiting for all my statues to be built, you know!)

this made me really happy. Big Molio I love you you’re the mvp and you deserve the world.

... looking through my screenshots I wish I could forget this one-

,, do I need to even explain it.

I remember a while ago, I saw someone on twitter post this and iirc the caption was something like “isn’t it a bit morbid to have the jumprope there” and, at the time, I had never gone through Orange Oasis, so seeing that tweet I had the wind knocked out of me. I was just sitting there like “fuuuuuuuuck”. and then I went through Orange Oasis today, saw it again, went “fuuuuuuuuck” and then forgot I screenshot it. it’s just a lot.

okay who knows how I filled the rest of the 6 hours I played because I didn’t take many screenshots of the downtime and running around completing sidequests I never did. the last point of interest today was I had went back to Humphrey.

I didn’t do too much, but I did fight Mutantheart.

I adore her!!!! so cute!!! Mutantheart my beloved.

I lost to her once, because I was a bit confused, but once I caught on to the gimmick of her fight, it was actually pretty easy. rest in peace, queen, I love you...

and then, uh. Her-

I tried 3 times. I didn’t win... all of the characters are maxed leveled at 50, but this is so difficult... well, the first half of the fight I found to be pretty easy, actually. but once she switches into full power mode it’s over. I don’t know how I’m supposed to win. farewell my dream of completing the foe facts book, it was a nice goal while it was realistic. 

and then I stopped for the day! I think I needed that month of not playing, because coming back into the game after a lot of my rage and burnout settled was probably best, and I had a lot of fun playing! hopefully it doesn’t take me another month to continue.

if you made it all the way through this post, thank you for reading! I hope you like my thoughts~

I’ll leave on this note-

king shit

#text #omori #omori spoilers

[tearblossom]

Orbital Station Scene Analysis: Part 3

Lmao here we go again. Ready to fall even deeper down the rabbit hole that is this scene with me!? This one scene functions simultaneously as my source of joy and depression and I watch it more than I would care to admit. So, naturally, I have even more to say about it! It’s going to be long. Sorry.

Part 1- https://tearblossom.tumblr.com/post/645095661644251136/scene-analysis-this-is-just-what-i-personally-feel

Part 2- https://tearblossom.tumblr.com/post/645776311115186176/i-was-thinking-some-more-about-the-final-scene

In this one, I’ll be going into more detail explaining the emotional mask that I believe Takemura is trying so desperately to keep on during this scene (and undeniably fails at several times, with it coming off entirely upon the scene reaching a certain pivotal moment) and also pointing out the instances that I feel the mask slips occur. Honestly, it’s pretty easy to tell for reasons that I will explain. I’m going to reiterate the fact that I am not a facial expression/body language expert. This is just one human being looking at another human being and trying to figure them out. This is just my personal interpretation of this scene. Prepare yourself for many, many screenshots and gifs. Also, I will be using the same video sources as the other two posts because I don’t have my own footage. 

https://youtu.be/ra-Ij1KU8r4

https://youtu.be/PUmQqVOq5oY

I failed to mention before the reason that Takemura even had to put up the cruel facade in the first place because I didn’t want to state the obvious and insult everyone’s intelligence. We all know the reason but I’ll just say it here anyway: Arasaka. 

Arasaka is listening to Takemura’s every word so he literally cannot say shit to V that would hint at any sort of affection for him/her and absolutely nothing that would indicate any growing uncertainty in said corporation. Words mean nothing here. He has to speak through his eyes and expressions because that is all he has to offer, the only cards he has to play. That is why the meaning of this scene can be so easily missed and flies over so many people’s heads. I do not fault anyone that may have missed this on a first playthrough or even those that are still unaware of it whatsoever because Takemura is very, very convincing at first (his face becomes an open book once the contract gets brought out but we’ll get into that later) and besides, to truly understand something that involves emotions as complex as these caused by equally as complex reasons or anything involving subtext really, takes multiple viewings to truly appreciate.

In summary, what I believe is happening here is that during the entire scene up until the contract gets brought out, his mental state is constantly teetering on the edge of a cliff so to speak. He is trying so hard to fight his sentimentality and control his emotional responses not only to V’s misery and pain but also his own wavering faith in Arasaka because they are watching, listening, and monitoring. And he succeeds extremely well at first but it gets harder and harder for him to maintain the mask. The closer he physically gets to V, the harder it is to pretend, to hide. His eyes alone betray him on several occasions but eventually the whole facade just crumbles and he falls. And when the contract comes into play is when he truly, honestly looks at V and the communication through his eyes really begins.

Here is the key thing- it is the most important visual clue to understanding when things happen: When Takemura is feeling any doubt or his emotions begin to overwhelm him or he fears that they might, he promptly averts his eyes to get himself under control and readjusts the mask that has slipped. 

He looks away from V during these moments!

(Just to clarify, I don’t think that every single moment in the scene that he looks away from V has this deeper meaning behind it. When people talk it’s completely natural for them to turn their heads, avert their eyes to look at other things, etc. These are just some moments that particularly stood out to me as signs pointing to my little theory.) 

Okay...let’s start deciphering this conflicted, broken mess of a man.

Scene starts. Takemura is fiddling with the Rubik’s Cube. He puts it down. Expression cold as ice.

mask on full display in all of it’s glory

They talk about Saburo being back in the body of his son and have this exchange of words:

V: “Saw Saburo Arasaka’s back. In Yorinobu’s body.”

Goro: “Yes. Justice has been done.”

And then it happens for the first time...

(Could this be...doubt perhaps? Has justice really been done?)

Moving on- he walks over to stand behind the chair across from V, telling them of their imminent death.

Goro: “I will be blunt - the surgery did not help. You will be dead before winter.”

And then he proceeds to make this face immediately after...

(Lovely, isn’t it? Just full of sympathy. His mask game is strong. But don’t worry though because V wins in the end BIG TIME.)

Understandably, V gets very upset upon hearing this news.

V: “How... how’s that possible? Arasaka’s got the best and the brightest.”

And then something happens again. Whatever could it be, I wonder!

But wait, there’s more!

(He couldn’t even wait until he finished talking before looking away! It’s getting more difficult for him to look at V with a straight face every second! Also, his expression here is the most broken looking yet.) :(

He must not reveal what is hidden behind this emotional wall that he’s worked so hard to build up specifically for this meeting because the room they are speaking in may just as well be made of glass with Arasaka’s unrelenting gaze, an ever-present entity, on the other side of it. He will do so soon though, when he offers V salvation. The contract raises the stakes. The rules change. He feels the wall breaking and there isn’t anything he can do about it and he knows it.

IT’S CHAIR TIME, CHOOMS!

He looks away another 6 TIMES! Leaning more and more over that edge. Feast your eyes...

IT’S CONTRACT TIME, BABY!

Oh, shit!

It’s happening!!

He does look away here but there’s no mask on when he looks back...only despair.

It’s gone.

TO SIGN OR NOT TO SIGN

The disguise is off now. From this point onward, Takemura looks at V with his true feelings on display. This is where the ability to read the emotion portrayed solely through one’s eyes really comes into play because even though he’s not trying to hide anything anymore, he still can’t say what he really wants to say. We have to feel it through his expressions. His thoughts are so loud during these final moments of the scene that we don’t even need words to know what he’s saying.  

REFUSE TO SIGN

SIGN

HOLY GRAIL MOMENT!

(I’m literally going to copy and paste what I have in my part 2 analysis about this section because I explained my thoughts on it about as well as I am able to there and have nothing else to add. My apologies for repeating myself but I feel the exact same way about it so it still applies here.) 

These reactions make perfect sense because we’ve always known that he cares deeply for V and never stopped. He just couldn’t hide it! But even with this treasure trove of emotional mask slips and unintentional displays of affection, I still wasn’t sure exactly how deeply he cared for V. In other words- if he was actually in love with V or not.

Is he already in love or is he still in the process of falling in love? Is it just a friendly love? (hell no! I knew that was definitely not the case but I still had to ask just so I could cross it off the list!)

And then the two of them walked to the door and said their parting words.

V: “Gonna see each other again?”

Goro: “I believe we will.”

V: “So… see you.”

Goro: “Visit me in Kagawa - I will show you what is real food.”

And then…

he proceeded to make these faces…

HOLY

SHIT!

(The mask isn’t just gone now- it’s burned, splintered, shattered, exploded in a million pieces, disintegrated!)

This man just had the biggest revelation of his entire life: the realization that he is in love with V. These are looks of love and I will not be convinced otherwise. I’m not a facial expression expert or anything, only stating my humble opinions here, but are you seeing this!?

He realizes the truth and it catches him so off guard that he has to look away. He contemplates these newfound feelings and tries to sort them out in the few seconds that he has left with V. And he does. He accepts them. He welcomes them. The gentle, knowing look he gives V when he looks back at them is saying just this.

He also knows that he is now fucked because his love for V is going to complicate things so much more than they already were. Now that he is fully aware that he is in love, these feelings are going to directly conflict with his duties to Arasaka later if a situation arises that places V and Arasaka on opposing sides and I think we all know that is most definitely going to happen at some point.

And now he has to see the love of his life die and just leave this place and go on with his day. Damn. This is turning into one of the saddest love stories I’ve ever seen. Something major is going to happen in the dlc that is going to force his hand one way or another: V or Arasaka? I hope that Arasaka somehow fucks up so bad that it makes his choice easier but my heart breaks imagining the amount of conflict and torment that await him.

The Beginning and The End

#cyberpunk 2077 #goro takemura #takemura #takemura romance

[stardestroyer81]

On September 11th, 2020, I posted this, a teaser for a 'faux Earthbound-inspired project' featuring four brightly colored silhouettes of its four main characters. The concept and characters were shrouded in mystery up until April 7th of the following year, where I posted yet another teaser in the form of an in-game screenshot, revealing the character of Lauren Henley and the project's placeholder title, Project 2000.

In that post, I mentioned that Project 2000 isn't the project's final name, and that I would be unveiling its true name later on down the line. The truth of the matter was that I could have gone and revealed the true name as early as... well, 2020 if I wanted to. But a lot of the project was still being figured out at that time (Including the designs of its main characters!), and I wanted to hold off on revealing anything more until I knew I was 100% ready to explain what this 'Project 2000' even is.

Now, nearing a year after I posted the initial first teaser, I feel as though it's about time to introduce a few more original characters of mine to this blog, and with that being said...

Let's talk about Override!

Shigesato Itoi's 1994 cult classic Earthbound (Known as MOTHER 2 in Japan) flopped due to misleading marketing when it came around to being released in the states, but its witty humor, nonstandard JRPG setting and its colorful visual presentation proved to be a hit to the American audience in due time.

This, of course, led to creators opting to shape games around a similar basis to Earthbound, whether its in terms of graphical style, humor, battle tactics, and much more. I think the most popular example when the phrase "Earthbound-Inspired RPG" comes to mind is undoubtedly Toby Fox's Undertale, which shared a lot of the same humor as its inspiration as well as a similar graphical style.

Some fans liked the MOTHER series so much that they wanted to take the franchise into their own hands and create the next installment after Shigesato Itoi stated that MOTHER 3 was the last game in the franchise, and MOTHER 4 began production by fans. Many Winter 2014s later, it was unsure if the game was still in production, though the project was officially rebranded as its own entity as Oddity in 2020.

Override is, essentially, my kind of Undertale/Oddity, mixing elements from Earthbound, MOTHER 3, the Y2K bug and the general 2000s aesthetic together into one. By that first part, I mean it's an Earthbound-Inspired RPG crafted by my own hand (Dating as far back as mid-2019); it, of course, isn't an actual game, but rather a collection of conceptual art pieces and faux in-game screenshots I've made detailing what it would look like as a real game (Like Mega Man Ultimate).

Oh, right, the plot! Bear in mind that a lot of the finer details of Override's story haven't quite been figured out yet, but I can say that I at least have enough to finally get around to talking about it.

Charles Feldman, CEO of Synergon Robotics, longs to spearhead a dystopian world with an invincible army of technologic law-enforcers, though finds it almost impossible to in his current time, the year 2095, where such technology is commonplace.

For years, he has meticulously shaped a plan where he, a team of subordinates and all the robo-security he could need would time travel back just before the year 2000, wherein he would corrupt all technology at that point with a 'Y2K Bug' and force the denizens of the world to live a lifestyle not unlike the events of the novel 1984, wherein humanity's every move is closely observed, and if someone steps out of line, they fall to the wrath of the Synergon Police.

His plan, for the most part, is successful. He travels back to the date November 18th, 1997 to have enough time to prepare for his eventual world-ruling plan on midnight, January 1st, 2000. The aforementioned Synergon police are armed with powerful devices called 'Psiometers', which are watch-like gadgets which connect to the user's neural network to unlock the powers of the mind.

Psiometers alongside other tech necessary for Feldman's ploy are transferred base-to-base in the middle of the night via drones, which are equipped with cameras and can hold up to twenty pounds of equipment. However, on the night of December 30th, 1999, a flaw in the wrap-up of Feldman's ultimate plan occurs, when a last minute drone delivery of two Psiometer units results in a crash.

The drone lands in the yard of the Henley residence. Nine and a half year old Lauren Henley overhears the crash and goes outside to investigate, finding the busted drone amidst the snow. After another brief malfunction, it shuts itself down, and Lauren, vowing to figure out its origins, drags it into the garage and goes back to bed...

December 31st, 1999. Lauren brings the Synergon drone to her neighbor's house, and shows it to her best friend, nine year old Casey Treverton. The two shortly discover the drone's contents, and Lauren instantly suspects there's more to the Synergon story. They ultimately are short on answers for the time being, and keep the whole thing a secret from their parents until later that night...

One minute until the new year. Casey and Lauren hurry to the downstairs of the Treverton residence to catch the ball drop for the new millennium. Whatever weirdness happened earlier is put on the backburner as the two flop down in front of the TV, eagerly counting down the seconds left of 1999.

"5... 4... 3... 2..."

Then, a nationwide power shortage. Nobody has any clue what's going on. Eventually, the TV flickers back on, and instead of the new year festivities they had been watching prior, the picture depicts a grizzled although finely dressed man in front of a white backdrop; Charles Feldman.

He states that his message is being broadcast across every television in the country, and reveals his lengthy plan to create a highly technical dystopian society overseen by Synergon Robotics, threatening to rewire any technology he pleases for the worst should anyone oppose him.

Casey and Lauren grimace at each other.

Three months pass. Not a lot has changed this early on in, though the citizens of Maywood are under close surveillance by various automatons to make sure nobody tries anything funny. Lauren decides that she has had enough of this 'Synergon Business' and asks Casey if he's interested in figuring out how the Psiometers work and using them against Synergon to ultimately take them down.

At first, Casey is unsure, true to his nervous personality. There isn't any rational way two children could lead to the downfall of an entity which has taken over the world, but Lauren is sure of their success, and with enough coercing the two embark on a mission to take back what's theirs. Who do they meet along the way? Just how deep does the Synergon plan run? And will they reign victorious? Only time will tell...

Well, now that we have the lengthy scene-setting out of the way, let's check out the good stuff; checking out the four heroes of Override which were teased last year! It's a good thing I chose to wait to show their designs off, because the silhouettes shown in the teaser weren't the same designs as what I have now. So, let's get right into it!

It may have taken much longer than I expected to show Override off, but at the very least that means I can now get around to posting/writing about what I've come up for it! I have a lot of Override-related content on the way, though I find that this is an excellent way to introduce its world! A LOT of work was put into this, so I hope you've enjoyed everything this post has to offer!

#Override #Project 2000 #Casey Treverton #Lauren Henley #Bradley Snider #MacKenzie Connors #My OCs #Earthbound-Inspired #Game Concept #Sprite Art #2000s Aesthetic #Y2K Aesthetic #Coolness #IT'S F I N A L L Y HERE. #It feels SO GOOD to finally show the Override crew off. #I love these characters a whole lot and getting around to talking about them was just so nice to finally do. #Trust me when I say a good portion of Override stuff is on the way: there's quite a bit of it! #I knew I couldn't post any of it until I got an introductory post written... #... which ended up being much longer than I thought it would... apologies #But I'm glad that it's finally up for all to see! #Fun fact: Do you see the font that's used in the character bios/section headers? #Yeah. I made that. #I designed an ENTIRE FONT for Override. #Granted a lot of it is pretty identical to EB's font but there are some tiny differences throughout the typeface #It's not the only font I've made either though more on that in a future post #Oh and uh #Long Post

[beauvibaby]

Across The Street — Part Two

read part one here

a/n: just a short two parted series for y’all, I hope you enjoyed it!

Surely this wouldn’t be easy.

Those words were all that ran through your mind, but, if you’re being truthful, you didn’t know if it was anything to be worried about. Considering how he just kissed you and walked off, who does that?

But then, he started texting you daily, and sneaking flirty comments in when you’d see him in public, just enough to keep your mind at ease. Not to mention the kisses stolen when it was just the two of you. He wasn’t used to something like this, for him it kind of just always happened, but with you, it was different. He wanted to show you how you should be treated, and he hated to admit that how he normally went about things wasn’t how you deserved to be treated.

“Good luck on your first day!”

His text read, following a good morning message as well, it was finally time for you to start watching Steven and Emily, you were beyond ecstatic to fall into a routine. You needed it, a constant in your life. You were at a red light, just outside the kids neighborhood when you sent him a thank you, and told him to have a good day. It sounded cliche, but the two of you didn’t have that awkward phase, you skipped straight into being comfortable together.

Parking your car, you went inside and proceeded to have an amazing first day, both of the kids so happy to have you there, putting their mom at ease. Emily clung to your hip most of the day, still being new to walking, but she happily babbled to you whenever she wasn’t napping, and Steven was proudly showing off his Lego collection to you, and adorably telling you how Emily wasn’t allowed near them because she tried to eat them. You gasped, making him feel proud that he at least thought he taught you something new. By the end of the day you were beaming ear to ear, and couldn’t help but call Tyler on your drive home, you didn’t think much of the gesture, but Tyler did.

“Hello?” He answered, confused, not expecting to hear from you, not that he was complaining. “Tyler! I just had the best first day, I’m already in love with those kids, they’re so sweet, and cute, oh my god!” You rambled, stopping when he began to laugh over the phone. “What?” You pouted, even if he couldn’t see you. “Nothing, it’s just–am I the first person you called?” He questioned, and your face warmed up, “maybe.” You sang, he laughed under his breath. “That’s sweet, baby.” The word slipped before he could stop it, and you swear you couldn’t get even redder than you already were. “Mhm, who else would I call?” You teased him, listening as he went silent, you heard movement before he spoke, “dunno, Cassidy? Henry? Jenny?” He offered, laughing groggily, “oh my god! I’m sorry, your nap.” You rushed checking the time, they were away for a game, the time difference, you felt terrible. “S’alright.” He mumbled, “go to sleep, Ty.” You demanded with a giggle, “call me after the game?” You added in a questioning tone, unsure if that was pushing the bounds of this new relationship. “It’ll be so late there.” He reminded you. “I don’t care.” You admitted, realizing how badly you wanted to see him now. “Ok, ok, I’ll call.” He laughed softly, “bye, Y/N.” He murmured, “bye.” You repeated, hanging up the call, chewing your lip, a smile evident on your face.

“Why are you so happy?” Henry teased the second you walked in, you rolled your eyes, slipping your shoes off by the door, “it was my first day remember?” You called, walking through the kitchen, “how was it?” He paused whatever show he was watching, looking over the back of the couch towards the kitchen. You pulled out something to cook for dinner, “it was great! They’re such a nice family.” You gushed, not boring him with the details, knowing he wouldn’t bother to listen anyways. “I’m going out with Jenny again tonight.” He spoke over his show as he turned it back on. Your eyebrows shot up, “really?” You squealed, bouncing in the kitchen. Henry only laughed in response at your enthusiasm. You were happy that the two were working out so far, and Jenny was the only one who knew about you and Tyler. Your mind drifted back to him as you cooked, about what it would be like to go on a proper date with him, not sneaking off when you were with your friends, or hushed conversations at night.

“Seriously, you're terrifyingly happy.” Henry grimaced, walking past you after he got ready for his date, you scoffed, trying to kick him as he walked past but he dodged it. “Am I not allowed to be happy oh dearest brother of mine?” You mumbled, scooping a spoonful of your rice and beef into your mouth. “I didn’t say that! It just seems like more than a good first day of work…” he trailed off, eyeing you suspiciously. “Is it a boy?” He raised an eyebrow, you shrugged, “don’t wanna be late for your date, Henry.” You pointed to the time, and he gasped, panicking as if she wasn’t just downstairs, but rightfully so, because then he’d have no excuse for being late. “Have fun!” You called as the door shut, slinking your way to your room after doing the dishes, you wasted time on your phone until the game was supposed to start. After making sure you had your things ready for work again tomorrow, your music cut off as you got a notification, making you rush over to your phone. A Snapchat from Tyler, a simple photo of his laced up skates, “almost game time, you gonna watch?”

You laughed, rolling your eyes, you already had the channel on the TV, and your Seguin jersey, of course you had one, it had been–at the time–a terrible Christmas gift from Henry, but now it wasn’t so bad. You walked over by the TV, taking a silly selfie, “of course I’m watching, I’m offended you thought I wouldn’t!”

He opened it nearly instantly, and you turned pink as you got the notification of him taking a screenshot. “That better be my jersey.” A chat, instead of a photo, “no, it’s Roope’s.” You laughed, receiving a string of angry emojis from him. You felt a little daring tonight, and you felt good, running off a high from today, so you stepped into the bathroom, turning to the side so the number on the sleeve showed, sending him a picture, the caption only being a winking face. This time you chuckled as he took a screenshot, he wasn’t shy, that’s for sure. He didn’t respond, which you expected as the game was supposed to start in a few minutes. You curled up against your headboard, plugging your phone in beside your bed and snuggling in for the game. Happy that Henry was out, giving you the chance to shout at the game as much as you want without him questioning your sudden concern for the players, Tyler specifically. But it was a good game, an easy game, which was good, as you weren’t sure you’d be able to handle anything serious happening when they were so far away.

When you woke up to your alarm, realizing Tyler never called, you were slightly upset, but it melted away when you saw the texts from him in your phone.

“Are you up?”

“Told you it was gonna be late, goodnight Y/N”

You laughed, typing out a congrats and good morning text before beginning your new routine for the day.

It went like this for a while, the boys gone on a string of away games for a couple of weeks, which felt like an eternity to you.

You were thankful for Henry’s ever changing work schedule, since he was working late tonight, installing traffic lights, you were going to Tyler’s house, he just got back this afternoon and insisted you come over, since you would have just been sitting alone at home. You were suddenly very aware that you were coming straight from work, your clothes reeking of the baby food Emily had spilt on you today. You grimaced, not coming to this realization until you were pulling up his driveway. No going back now, the dogs started barking when they heard your door shut, they came running out as Tyler opened the front door for them. “Hi puppies!” You shrieked kneeling in the grass, allowing them to smother you in licks and tail thumps. Gerry the youngest, and most excited jumped, putting his paws on your shoulders, sending you backwards into the grass. “Gerry!” Tyler laughed, coming over to you, you were a giggling mess underneath the dog, as he pinned you down, licking the sides of your face repeatedly. “Gerry, that’s enough.” Tyler spoke again, looking down at you with outstretched hands when the dog moved, you pouted, letting him help you up. “Don’t be so mean to him.” You mumbled teasingly as Gerry nudged between the two of you, Marshall and Cash calming down and sitting on either side of you. “Are you more excited to see me or the dogs?” Tyler questioned, wrapping his arms around your waist, you held your chin in thought. “Oh definitely the dogs.” You answered, laughing when he tried to move away from you. “No.” You whined, throwing your arms around his neck, “I missed you.” The words slipped from your mouth, but you couldn’t care to be embarrassed as he hummed in response before kissing you, maybe it was the two weeks apart, but this was definitely the best kiss you’ve had in your short relationship. He squeezed you a little tighter, “Ty.” You mumbled pulling away as he chased your lips, “Tyler.” You spoke again, laughing as he opened his eyes with a dramatic whine. “We’re still in your front yard.” You reminded him, he looked around, “whoops.” Dragging you inside, the dogs following happily.

You stayed tucked under his arm, giggling when he looked at you oddly, “what’s that smell?” He inquired, tilting his head to the side, you covered your mouth, hoping to hide the almost snort that fell from it. “Did you just snort?!” He gasped, trying his best not to laugh hysterically. “It’s baby food.” You answered, between your laughs, “the smell.” You added when he looked lost, “oh!” That sent him into a real fit of chuckles, “did you want a shirt?” He asked once he calmed down, you bit your lip but nodded, you saw his eyes flicker to your lips but he didn’t say anything. You followed him around the large house, trying to remember your way around. “So I was thinking.” Tyler trailed off, as he pulled a random stars shirt from his closet, “is that ever a good thing?” You retorted, watching as he gasped. “Well never mind then.” He huffed, handing you the shirt, making his way out of the room so you could change the material. “No, what is it?” You questioned following him, easily slipping the shirt on, it ended about mid thigh, but it didn’t matter as you had jeans on. “I was going to cook–“ he glanced back, eyeing you over, his words coming to a halt. “Uh, cook? Did you want to stay for dinner?” He managed to get out, you smirked, knowing his reaction was related to seeing you in his shirt. “I’d love to stay for dinner.” You answered with an innocent smile, resuming your spot under his arm, he nodded, clearing his throat as he walked. You laughed softly, such a guy.

You pushed yourself up onto the edge of the counter, swinging your legs girlishly, Tyler turned to face you, you motioned him closer. “You played so good when you were gone.” You mumbled, resting your arms over his shoulders, like this was a normal occurrence, his hands rested just above your knees. “Yeah?” He smiled, “you watched?” He questioned, hoping this was going in the way your touches were leading, but if it wasn’t, he wouldn’t be mad, he wouldn’t rush you. “I watched every game.” You mumbled, his smile only widened, “every game?” He smirked, sliding his hand up a little higher. “In your jersey.” You whispered, one hand moving up to play with his hair. He still didn’t make a move to kiss you. “Ty, do I have to spell it out, or are you going to make a move.” You whined, suddenly worried that he didn’t even want to be with you like that. You pushed him back, “did I read this wrong? Oh my god, I’m so embarrassed.” You rushed, hiding your face in your hands, Tyler grabbed your hands, moving them off your face. “No, you definitely didn’t read it wrong.” He pulled you in for a kiss, smirking when you sighed into it, his arms moved around your back the tips of his fingers dipping into your back pocket. You leaned away, keeping your forehead pressed against his. “I believe I was promised dinner first.” You teased, watching as he laughed, “I’m more of a dessert first kinda guy.” He mumbled, “Tyler Paul Seguin!” You shrieked, lightly whacking his arm, laughing but not fighting him when he pulled you back in. Yeah, it was a late dinner that night.

You looked in front of where Tyler parked, and over at him, then down at your clothes, “why are we so dressed up, to go to the park? At night?” You questioned, looking at him with confused eyes. Over a month of dating him, and he still managed to confuse you. Secret dating, keep in mind, so you were still learning somethings about each other. “Because, I didn’t want you to figure out what we were doing, and I thought you would like it.” He answered, cheeks pink, he shut the jeep off, demanding you stay in your seat as he hopped out. You giggled but agreed, not wanting to ruin his hard efforts, he opened the door for you, holding his hand out for you. “And they say chivalry is dead.” You laughed, allowing him to help you down, he grabbed your other hand, steadying you when you stumbled a bit in your heels. “Are we going in the grass?” You questioned, before he could shut the car door, “yes?” He answered skeptically. You placed a hand on his shoulder, using it to steady yourself as you reached down and pulled your heels off. “I’d sink if I tried to walk in the grass in these.” You laughed when he looked at you confused, he nodded, understanding what you meant. “Are you going to get cold?” He sounded concerned, releasing your hand to reach into the backseat while you threw your heels onto the floor of the passenger seat. He pulled out a basket, and your face fell into a happy pout. “Tyler, that’s so cute.” You gasped, leaning up to kiss his cheek. “Oh thank god.” He mumbled, the tension in his shoulders releasing. “You were nervous?” You asked, smiling as he laced your fingers together again.

“Of course, why wouldn’t I be nervous? I have to impress you.” He gasped dramatically, you smiled with a shake of your head, “you don’t have to do anything special to impress me.” You assured him, allowing him to lead you to a spot in the grass, a blanket already there, you smiled again, in awe of the effort he went through. “So cute.” You grinned, carefully sitting in your dress, he followed, sitting beside you, popping the basket open. You threw your head back in laughter when the food in the basket was takeout from your favorite restaurant, coincidentally the one you had went to the first night you moved here. “Surprise.” Tyler laughed, opening the container, “you remembered?” You gasped seeing the same pasta you ordered that night. He shrugged, looking down as he stuck a fork into his food, “aw, bub, thank you.” You placed your hand on his leg, “this is all really sweet.” You added, giving him a quick kiss, “I’m glad you like it.” He mumbled, shifting in his spot, taking another bite of his food. You put your food down, moving to be in front of him, holding back your insecurities, “are you alright, Tyler? You’re acting weird.” You questioned, sitting in front of him. “I’ve never done stuff like this.” He admitted, finally, finally, meeting your eyes. “What?” You didn’t understand what he meant.

“Romantic stuff, personal stuff, I just, I’ve never wanted to do it for someone before.” He explained, watching as you nodded, processing his words, “I’m flattered that you want to do those things for me, I really am, but Tyler. I don’t want you to think you have to do this to impress me, I’m perfectly happy spending our dates watching Netflix and playing with the dogs.” You explained, wishing he would understand that, this wasn’t how you wanted tonight to go. “Yeah, but you deserve this too.” He sighed, also frustrated with how this date started going. You shook your head, taking a bite of your food, “we’re trying too hard.” You deadpanned, and it was true, both of you were trying to rush this along, but you didn’t have too. There was no rush, there was no need to speed it up, you already knew each other, and maybe, just maybe, that’s why the two of you were trying to be farther along than you were. “I know.” He sighed, undoing a button on his shirt, slumping down more. “Let’s just talk then.” He added, relaxing as he realized you felt the same.

“Mhm, this food is cold but good.” You laughed, bringing your teasing back into the date, Tyler chuckled, desperately stabbing at his pasta, the noodles continuing to mush and roll away from his fork, “how’s work?” He asked, missing the stories you would call and tell him when he was on the road, you grinned and pulled your phone out, showing him the video you took of Emily walking completely on her own to Steven. He felt much more at peace as the two of you fell into easy conversation, and how he could look at you while you spoke and see the happiness you emitted as you talked about them. “They’re cute.” Tyler commented, smiling at the pictures of them you had, “I love them, it’s not even like a job, you know? I just love going to see them every–what? Why are you looking at me like that?” You cut yourself off, catching the way he was smiling, his most genuine one so far. “Cause you’re cute when you ramble.” He answered in a duh tone, “see this is much better.” You grinned, scooting closer to him, letting out a surprised shriek when he pulled you over one of his legs, leaving you sitting between them, your back against his chest. He smiled, placing a lazy kiss to your cheek, “can I ask something?” He murmured, wrapping his arms around your torso. “Anything.” You mumbled, leaning further into his hold, when he didn’t speak you looked up to see him smiling down at you fondly.

“It’s stupid, but I’ve always wondered–more so now, what you were really crying about on the dock that night.” Tyler explained, confusion settling on his face when you started giggling uncontrollably, never thinking you’d be having this conversation. “What?” He questioned when you looked at him and started laughing harder, you took a breath, calming yourself down. “It’s stupid, Ty, you wouldn’t understand.” You mumbled, it didn’t matter if he knew now, he was your boyfriend after all, you just knew he’d be confused. “Try me!” He whined, now really interested at the fact you were laughing about it now, but crying about it then. “I was the first one of my friends to have boobs.” You spoke bluntly, and he stared at you, trying to determine if you were being serious. “You were crying over that?” He mumbled, eyebrows knit together in confusion. “Oh my god,” you paused to laugh, smoothing the wrinkles on his forehead out, “it’s not like guys, girls were mean because of it. And older guys would stare, it was just not a good year.” You laughed, Tyler still looking at you uncertain, “why did I ask.” He muttered, nuzzling his face into your neck. “Dunno, babe.” You sighed, happy with his reaction to the pet name, you could feel him smiling against your skin. He was definitely the one that used your name less, but maybe now you’d start using his name less too.

****

Jenny smirked at you as you kept changing your mind about what to wear to this house party, more of a get together but you were certain there would be more people there than you thought. “You don’t want to be obvious.” She reminded you, being the only one that knew about you and Tyler, tonight would be the first time you two were hanging out in such a public setting with all your friends around, and you were wondering how it would go, and quite honestly, how you would keep yourself from kissing him the second you got there. “I know, but I also want to know that he’s looking at me.” You spoke sheepishly, holding the two options out for her to survey. “Oh, definitely this one.” She pointed to the light wash skinny jeans, and burgundy sweater, “with those cute cut out boots!” She added, clapping her hands in success. You laughed, but did as she said, feeling good about yourself once you had the outfit on. “Are you guys ready yet?” Henry groaned from the living room, the two of you laughed, Jenny pulled her sweater on, giving you a smile, “let’s do this.” You were so grateful that she was your friend as much as she was your brother's girlfriend, it was the ideal situation to get along with someone so important in his life. “Quit rushing us.” Jenny chastised him once you two walked out of your room, he rolled his eyes but gave her a quick peck before heading to the door.

You arrived at Tyler’s house, shooting him a smile when he saw you, nothing too conspicuous, Roope waved, as well as some of the other guys who were here. Jamie gave you a quick hug, you’d grown quite close to him over the past couple of months, considering how often he was around Tyler. You made your way to the kitchen, grabbing yourself a drink, jumping when you felt arms wrapped around your waist. “Hi, baby.” Tyler mumbled, spinning your around for a quick kiss, you smiled against him, “hi.” You breathed out, “don’t get us caught.” You demanded, lightly pushing at him when he placed a kiss to the side of your neck. “Just getting my fix.” He teased, giving you one last peck before putting some space between the two of you. He started a casual conversation with one of the guys while they walked into the kitchen, getting themselves some drinks too. You snuck out, squeezing past them, mumbling a sorry when your hand grazed over Tyler’s. He smiled at you, hiding a laugh from your purposeful action.

“Hey, Y/N.” Roope smiled when you sat beside him on the couch, “hey, how’ve you been?” You questioned, settling into random conversation with the group around you, Henry being across the room with Jenny glued to his side, Roope beside you, and Esa beside him with his girlfriend. “Good, what about you?” He answered, keeping the talking going. You soon drifted into talking about random things, from work, to hockey, to random stories from over the years. Your head snapped up when Tyler walked in, a girl trying to keep herself tucked into his side, your stomach clenched, and you had to resist the urge reacting. Of course, you knew that since you wanted to keep this a secret, he couldn’t just stop his normal behavior completely. You shifted in your spot, before deciding to go get another drink, you made it a little stronger than the last one. “Y/N, are you alright?” Jenny came in beside you, she watched as you shrugged, “yeah, it’s just weird.” You admitted, giving her a solemn smile. “Maybe you guys should just stop keeping it a secret? Henry would get over it.” She offered, and you wanted to do that, but you were nervous. “I’m just afraid that if we do that, things will change, it’s been so easy! Not having to deal with people's opinions, or the boys chirping him.” You explained, sipping on your drink, the girl that was attached to Tyler just a moment ago, walked in and got herself a drink, already seeming more than tipsy enough. You shook your head, walking out as the conversation ended now. Tyler watched you walk out the back door where more people had dispersed, he discreetly followed you, pulling you to the side. “Tyler.” You sighed, he pulled you into the pool house, “don’t be mad, it’s just for show. I haven’t don’t anything with her, and you know I wouldn’t.” He rushed to explain, afraid you were upset with him. “You can’t expect it to be easy for me, how would you feel if I walked out with some guy wrapped around me?” You retorted, not meaning to snap, his face fell.

“I wouldn’t like it.” He confirmed, reaching for your waist, pulling you closer to him, “baby, I would walk out there right now with you all over me if you let me.” He assured you, he was over keeping it private after just over a month of sneaking around, he wanted to show you off, and be able to kiss you and hug you whenever he wanted. You nodded biting your lip, “I know, bub, soon, not tonight.” You whispered, pulling him in for a sweet kiss, “I promise, soon.” You added, feeling him nod against you. “Do you think you could figure out a way to stay tonight?” He mumbled, pushing your hair back. “I’ll figure it out.” You smiled, kissing him once more before sneaking out, he waited around in there for a minute, making sure nobody noticed how you both had walked out.

Instantly you went to find Jenny, hating that you were asking her but you needed a way to stay here without Henry questioning it. “Hey, Jenny, can I talk to you for a minute?” You asked, she looked up at you, smiling, Henry released her waist as she stood to follow you. “I’m spending the night here, is there anyway you could keep Henry distracted?” You pouted at the slightly older girl, she laughed, “one step ahead of you, he’s staying at my place tonight, he won’t know you didn’t come home.” She winked, strutting back to him, your mouth agape, “too much information.” You grimaced before she reached him, she laughed at you but accepted your grateful smile. As you were walking back towards the center of the party, you passed Tyler huddled around some of the guys, his cheeks pink, “is it her?” Miro asked, Tyler shook his head. “No you guys it isn’t like that.” He mumbled, “then what is it like? That girls been all over you tonight, and you don’t get marks on your back for no reason.” Jamie chirped the younger guy, your stomach dropped to your feet. They didn’t notice you as you walked by.

Before you knew it, everyone was gone, and you had more than one to many drinks. You were sitting on the couch, trying to hold your emotions together, but the alcohol only made you want to cry more. Tyler sighed, sitting beside you, for the first time all night, and only then did he realize how much you had drank. “Baby?” He laughed, reaching for your hand, his face quickly falling when you yanked away from him, he wasn’t completely in the wrong here, you were the one keeping it secret, but now your insecurities were getting the best of you. “Hey, what’s wrong?” He tried again, you shrunk away from him, “I don’t want to talk about it.” You sniffled, wishing you could hide. He shook his head, moving in front of you, “talk to me, don’t do this.” He murmured, grabbing your hands before you could move again, you looked down at him as he kneeled in front of the couch, he rested your connected hands on your lap. “I just–are you sure you want this? Want me?” You whimpered, the water slipping over your eyes, if you had been sober, you’d see the way Tyler’s heart so clearly broke when you started crying. “Y/N, of course I’m sure.” He rushed, releasing your hands to cup your face, “but you looked so much better with that other girl.” You admitted, and he realized these tears were more about yourself doubt than anything. He shook his head, “no, I look better with you, baby.” He assured, wiping at the tears, “I promise, you’re the one I want to parade around with at parties, only you.” He tilted your head down, kissing your forehead, frowning when your body slumped with a cry. “I’m sorry.” You whispered, “for what?” He gasped, leaning away to meet your eyes again.

“For keeping it a secret.” You whined, feeling your head already begin to hurt. “It’s alright, princess, let’s just get you to bed, yeah?” He murmured lovingly, helping you to your feet.

When you went to sleep that night you could swear he whispered an I love you into your hair, but you were too far gone to be certain.

Your hands shot to your head when you woke up, the pounding being unbearable, you shifted in the bed, freezing when you felt the weight of Tyler’s arm over your waist. He groaned incoherently into his pillow, “my head hurts.” You whispered, he groggily chuckled into his pillow, lifting his head slowly. “Mhm, I figured it would.” He smiled, he left a careful kiss to your head before pointing to the nightstand and laying back down. You looked over and saw a water and pain killers sitting there, you quickly took some before curling back into the bed. He watched you with a lazy smile as you rolled closer to him, “Ty?” You murmured, a hand resting on his jaw, lightly rubbing against his beard, he raised a brow at you. “I love you too.” You sighed, he widened his eyes before a cheeky smile came over his face, “I didn’t think you heard me.” He laughed, quietly, not wanting to hurt your head anymore. “I kinda took a leap of faith, assuming that I had heard you correctly.” You breathed out in relief, laying your head back down, “we can tell Henry, but not until after you make it to the conference final.” You added, smiling when he shot up, “really?” He gasped, apologizing when you winced. “Yes, now shush.”

***

This was it, the game that would tell you if they made it to the conference finals. You were sitting in the stands with Henry and Jenny, all three of you anxious beyond belief, this was a huge deal, and you were praying they’d make it through. Tyler and you had decided that if they won, you’d tell Henry tonight, right after the game, because Tyler knew he wouldn’t be able to resist kissing you during his game winning high, and well, if they didn’t, you’d probably also tell Henry tonight because you’d be a mess worrying for Tyler.

Puck drop, your heart rate picked up, grinning when Jamie won it, and sent it flying behind him. A good start, setting the tone. You could only hope the game would continue like that.

The first period did, if anything it got even better, they were ahead by two, the other team not even scoring.

The second period, that’s where things began to shift, the score was tied, Tyler was on the end of a long shift. He had been a little bit more feisty tonight, and that’s how you saw it coming, the way the player from the other team was skating right towards him, it was definitely going to draw a penalty as Tyler had passed the puck long before the opponent reached him. It felt like slow motion as you shot to your feet before they collided, Henry followed right after you, not noticing how you gasped sharply and your hands shot to your mouth. You watched Tyler’s head bounce off the ice as he went down, how thankful you were that his helmet hadn’t come off in the hit. He slid a little bit before the refs were blowing whistles constantly, swarming over to them as the opposing team member stood there, they directed him to a penalty box, Jamie skating over to Tyler as he didn’t try to get up. You watched your boyfriends hands go up to his face, hiding it from the cameras. Jenny wrapped you up in a hug, allowing you to hide your face in her hair. “It’s ok, he’s going to be fine, I’m sure.” She tried to assure you, but even her voice was shaky, it was a terrible hit.

You removed your head from her hair, and saw the team doctor making his way to the ice, kneeling beside him, he felt around his neck and shoulders, making sure nothing was broken, eventually, what felt like hours but was only two minutes, they were helping him to his feet, slowly walking him off the ice. Jamie came over to the glass in front of your section, searching for you. Jenny spotted him first, pointing him out to you. “Go.” He mouthed, having figured out your relationship quickly, you looked to Jenny with tears in your eyes, Henry coming to his senses and looking between you and the ice, eyes moving quicker than you’d ever seen. “Why you? What’s–oh my god.” It hit him, as you scrambled to make sure you had your phone, “go, go.” Jenny assured you, seeing the way you hesitated, you didn’t wait any longer, and took off towards the tunnels you’d learned your way around so well. Henry was calling for you over the sound of the crowd talking, but you didn’t stop, you could hear Jenny faintly as she told him to calm down.

You reached the locker room in record time, the security guard telling you that you couldn’t go in until they were done, you watched as people kept going in and out. Only furthering your nerves, you couldn’t be bothered to care anymore, the second they came out and one of them looked at you, you lost it. “I’m guessing your Y/N?” He spoke, a soft smile on his face, you nodded vigorously, “you can go in there now.” As you heard the loud speakers, “number 91 Tyler Seguin will not be returning to play tonight” your heart dropped, not needing to hear anything else as you stormed in there. Tyler sitting in the corner of the room, in a chair with his eyes shut, a bandage over his shoulder, and his brows furrowed in pain. You froze, letting out a cry at the sight of him, so clearly in pain, his eyes fluttered open at the sound, the second he met your eyes you were rushing over to him.

“Are you ok?” You whispered, carefully cupping his jaw, he nodded, wincing, “don’t cry because of me.” He mumbled, smiling softly when you shook your head with a breathy laugh. “You scared the crap out of me, Ty, that was the worst thing I’ve ever seen.” You sighed, gently kissing his pouted lips. “How bad is it?” You asked once you pulled away, carefully touching his shoulder, he groaned, and you instantly pulled your hand away. “Dislocation and a concussion, they put it back in, but damn it hurts like a bitch.” He muttered. “I’m sorry, baby.” You spoke gently, sitting beside him, he nodded, resting his head carefully back against the wall. You carefully played with his hair, knowing it soothed him, he smiled at the gesture, “you’re gonna put me to sleep.” He laughed gently, placing his hand on your thigh, squeezing it reassuringly. “I love you.” You murmured, moving to place your hand over his, “I love you.” He repeated, so happy that you were here with him. He leaned his head onto your shoulder, also happy that you sat on his good side, “I think Henry knows now.” You whispered.

The door opened and both of you looked over, Henry standing there in shock. “Yeah, I know.” He snapped, arms crossed, neither of you made an effort to move, he shook his head, “don’t be a dick, Henry.” You snapped, Tyler laughing but stopping as it increased the pain in his head. “Careful, bub.” You whispered, returning your hand to his hair, ignoring your brother, if he wasn’t going to be nice, then he didn’t deserve your attention. “How long?” Henry asked, in a softer tone, aware of how Tyler must be hurting. You sighed, “almost three months.” You practically mouthed, but he definitely heard you as his jaw all but dropped to the floor. “Three months?!” He snapped, and you glared when Tyler groaned, squeezing his eyes shut. You carefully pushed him off of you, “let me go talk to him.” You whispered, pecking him quickly, before dragging Henry out of there. “How? Tyler I mean–the age gap, but he’s him.” Henry stuttered out, his face pale, you shook your head. “Henry, I’m not in the mood to do this. This is why I didn’t want to tell you.” You mumbled, arms crossed as you looked up at him. “You can’t expect me to just be ok with this all of a sudden, you’re dating my best friend, that’s gross.” He snapped, and that was the last straw for you.

You tuned out the sound of the final buzzer filling the arena as you got close to Henry, “I love him, and he loves me. You’re just going to have to be a grown up about this, so you can either suck it up, and be a good brother, or you can go home and I’ll stay here to take care of my boyfriend.” You snapped, Henry looked behind you at the influx of sad hockey players, you whipped around, taking in their faces. “Oh, I’m sorry guys.” You gasped, Jamie nodding solemnly, when you turned back around Henry was walking off, not daring to give you a second look.

And then, if it couldn’t be worse, you looked to your left and saw Tyler standing there, not taking too long for him to figure out what happened. “Damn it!” He snapped, slamming his hand against the cement wall, you were there in an instant, surprised when he hugged you, hiding his face in your neck. “I’m sorry, Tyler, it’s not your fault.” You whispered, hearing the guys moving past you, they were suffering too. “Hey, look at me.” You demanded, leaning away from him, he looked at you with glazed over eyes, “you’re gonna go in there, and carefully put some clothes on, you’re going to take a minute to be with your team, and then you’re gonna come out here, and I’m gonna take you home. Everything’s going to be ok, Henry can go be a pain, I don’t care, as long as I know you’re ok.” You spoke sternly, but still had a softness in your voice. “Ok, baby, please. It’s going to be ok, I promise.” You whispered, he nodded slowly, kissing your forehead before forcing himself back into the locker room.

Finally, when he did re-emerge, he seemed to be in slightly better spirits, allowing you to take him home and stay with him.

Although, the next day you had to go back to your place, having to get ready for work, Tyler protested, milking his injuries for all he could get. “I’ll FaceTime you when the kids are napping, you’ll live, babe.” You had told him as you walked out the door, despite his whining from the couch. A man child, that was your conclusion.

When you got to the kids house, you were surprised to see them with the hockey channel on, your heart stopped for a moment as they were discussing Tyler’s injuries, of course, you couldn’t escape it. “Oh, Frank had it on last night, I didn’t even realize when I turned the tv on.” Julie spoke when she saw you looking at it, “oh, honey. What’s wrong?” She questioned, sensing your off mood as she finished cooking the kids breakfast, having a late start at her office today. “What? Nothing, I’m fine!” You assured her, the two of you had grown close, she was like an older version of you, it was nice, she really cared for you. She raised a brow at you, watching as you picked up Emily who was grabbing at your legs, you kissed the girls chubby cheek, smiling when she giggled, “Tyler Seguin,” you motioned to the tv, where somehow they were still replaying the hit, “that’s my boyfriend.” You told her, Steven shrieked. “You know Tyler!?” He shouted, a grin over his face, you weren’t sure how hockey hadn’t come up, but now that you think about it, Frank did have some stars items in his office. “I do.” You smiled down at the boy, Julie still processing it, “he’s a lucky man.” She finally spoke, sending you a smile when you blushed. “Hopefully he’s doing alright.” She added, “Frank played in college, I hated it.” She explained, seeing the way you were looking at her. Oh, “he’s alright, he’ll be back at it before you know it.” You laughed softly, Steven rambling off so many questions, apparently sharing his dads love for hockey.

“Steven, calm down honey.” His mother laughed, helping him climb into his chair at the dining table while you strapped Emily into her high chair, “I really have to be leaving for work, hopefully he doesn’t bug you too much about this new information.” Julie smiled, you waved her off, “it’s fine.”

And it was, truly, and while he was eating breakfast and rambling about hockey and asking you questions, to which you answered to the best of your availability, you had recorded a clip to show Tyler, of how excited Steven was. Which Tyler loved, and made sure to get some stuff for you to give him.

You walked into your apartment, hoping Henry had already left for work but when you saw his boots by the door you knew he hadn’t. “Y/N?” He rushed around the corner, you looked at him with wide eyes, “I’m sorry.” He mumbled, sheepishly, his face showing his regret, you hadn’t spoken to him in over a week. Ever since he found out about the two of you, “I should’ve reacted better, I mean, I should be happy that you’re dating such a good guy. Someone that I trust.” He rambled, you stayed silent, you were still angry, it hurt for him to so blatantly choose to be upset over supporting you. “Ok.” You sighed, and he stared at you blankly, “ok? All I’m getting is an ok? When you’re the ones who hid it from me?” He looked exasperated, “that’s all Tyler said too. You guys are insufferable.” Henry muttered, this peeked your interest. “Wait, you talked to him?” You questioned, finally shutting the door to the apartment. “Yeah, like three days ago, he said he wasn’t going to say anything else until I talked to you.” He looked at you skeptically when you started smiling like a fool. “Damn, you really do love him don’t you?” He sighed, shaking his head. “Just don’t kiss in front of me and we’ll be fine.” He gave in, laughing when you jumped on him in a hug. “Deal, deal, deal.” You grinned, happily rushing off to your room.

You dialed Tyler’s contact, his face popping up on your screen shortly after, “hi baby.” He grinned, only smiling more when he took in the happiness on your face. “Why are you so smiley?” He teased, you shrugged, “I talked to Henry…” you trailed off, and Tyler nodded, “Mhm, and how’d that go?” He hummed, you rolled your eyes, “I’m quoting him, ‘just don’t kiss in front of me and we’ll be fine’.” You mocked your brother's voice making Tyler laugh deeply. “It’s about damn time.”

A couple of days later you told all your friends after a game, and the two of you FaceTime Cassidy and Candace, they reacted much better than Henry, that’s for sure. Then you made it public by posting a photo on social media, the two of you smiling brightly, Tyler towering over you as he was still dressed in his skates, you were looking up at him with a goofy grin as he laughed at something Jamie had said. His arm around your shoulders and your hand resting on his chest.

“Who knew moving across the street would lead to all of this…”

taglist: @vinceduhn​ @vincecdunn​ @kempe​ @literarycharleton​ @wtfkie​ @myjacketisblue @jackiesquinn​ @summer--infinity

#Tyler seguin #imagine #imagines #dallas stars #Tyler seguin fic #Tyler seguin imagine #Tyler seguin imagines #across the street

[thedevilliers]

Hey, I've been reading your story for a while, and I'm enjoying it very much. Following the De Villiers has been so fun, and you've inspired me to create my own royal Simblr!

Can you maybe share some tips about what to do with your royals? I'll be posting my family within the next few weeks, and I have already planned out several engagements + events, including visits to parks/schools/hospitals, parties, and news surrounding a royal pregnancy. I've also planned out the first arc. I don't know what else to do, and I've barely started! If you have any tips related to the beginning of your Simblr that you didn't cover in your other post, I would so appreciate them. I want to get all this nailed down *before* posting, so my blog is the best that it can be.

Also, if you have any advice on how to make things as efficient as possible (especially regarding posing sims, editing/writing posts, etc.), I would love that! I want to cut down on time wasted wherever I can.

Thank you!! :-)

AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA 🥺🥺🥺🥺🥺 me?!!?!?! ME ??????? omg 🧍‍♀️ thank u for reading my story 🥺 and AAAAAAAAAAAA your own royal simblr !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

ill answer everythin under the cut !!!!! spoilers: it got long sorry

first of all, remember we ALL started somewhere. you can look at my first like... fifteen and even MORE posts and they are BAD. oh my gawd idk why i thought they were good, but hey! i learned things from them. you will more than likely change your mind about certain things from the beginning of your blog to who knows, four months from now. don’t focus and worry a lot on ‘perfection’ and setting up ‘high standards’ from the beginning. treat it like a learning curve! this is something we all do for fun, so don’t get stressed a lot on it. you can always change and adapt things and that’s no problem!

i love lists, so im gonna list a few things of advice/tips basing myself on what you said!!!

i personally don't do engagements anymore, so i can't really help you in this regard of even more activities you could do 🧍‍♀️ what i could recommend for people to get to know your characters' personalities and private lives and grow attached to them, add in BTS posts.

continuing on my BTS’ post thing, they are a GREAT way to show more than what the public sees for your royals. because from a press and public point of view, you don't really know 'what goes on behind closed doors'. they could be all happy in public, but in privatE??!??!!?!?

as i said in my starting out guide, i did have around ~15 drafts done before i started posting. just so i could not stress about “oh my god i dont have any posts for tomorrow”. a LOT of ppl do posts and queue them as they go, and they have MANY posts done and usually they start accumulating and they are MONTHS in advance compared to what they’re currently posting. if this method works for you, you can definitely use it!

please, please please read your dialogue OUT loud. is it possible to say a 2093023902 word sentence without a singular use of punctuation? do people in this age and era really talk this way? also please if possible use correct grammar. just a little pet peeve, it can take a reader out of the immersion your story gives them.

we all have our lil dialogue habits. mine is starting sentences with “oh” and the infamous dash “—”. others use ellipses. just make sure you aren’t overdoing it. for example, doing a sentence like “oh— there you are. i was uhm— looking for you. how—how are you? its—i mean where have you uhm— been? yes—ive—ive been fine. you? i mean— your mom” ....just no 😔 it doesnt read well at ALL

you can always do lil filler posts, dont tell anyone tell you otherwise. post a little simstagram post, a little family portrait, updated portraits post, family hanging out, kids hanging out, etc.

for posing sims, i do try and remember where MOST of my poses are in the ingame list. usually creators’ correctly naming the poses helps a lot. for example i need a Mel Bennet pose; hers are usually ALL in the same spot and have the same lil aqua bg so i can easily find them. sometimes, i dl pose packs VERY specifically for a certain scene. am i gonna use them again? no. so i open the .package file in sims4studio and rename them to “00 for emi scene [rest of the og name” so when i open my game, they are around the top of the list! no more scrolling and i easily know what i need it for.

dont be scared to plan things that are happening MONTHS from now or anything in detail. some ppl dont like planning things in detail, or even dont like planning things AT ALL or things that arent happening say, in over 2 weeks because idk, they get bored. i recommend at LEAST having a list of things that HAVE to happen so you have ‘goals’ and you slowly plan out how you’re gonna get there. at LEAST theres some level of planning there. if you’re posting and PLANNING as you go, there’s gonna be holes. and it’s gonna be obvious.

editing wise, i don’t do much. my reshade does most of the work, i just add in my psd, add text and done! this is easily the fastest thing you will ever do.

if you get inspired by someone else doing, idk, a certain layout for the portraits, them adding little things to their captions, a certain edit, etc. if you want to do something similar and you ARE very much aware you were inspired by them, credit them in the caption. i beg. its free, its the nice thing to do, bc if not its rude.

if you get inspired by a certain storyline someone else did and you notice yours is gonna be similar, go ahead and send them a message to let them know and if they have any tips or feel uncomfortable with you doing this. simply put, if you don’t, you’re gonna look bad. we are all bound to do same storylines, such as assassinations, shooty shooty’s, stalkers, first loves, accidental babies, etc. but what changes is how each person approaches it. no ones gonna do it the same way as you and others. if you CONSCIOUSLY start copying else, stop it. and you could even be unconsciously be inspired by someone else too. it happens! just make sure you are able to look at the bigger picture and realize “hey, i’m doing something wrong”

same thing with dialogue. you like a line someone else said in their story? don’t just... steal it and incorporate it into yours word BY WORD

OVERALL: you can be inspired. give credit where it’s due. and don’t copy because someone else is doing ‘something others like’ and you want others to like your story. no no no !

im adding this AFTER i posted it but, be yourself. in the way you interact with others and send questions, etc. don’t try and copy someone else’s personality because they are liked and essentially absorb them. be yourself and i’m sure a lot of ppl will like you the way you are : D

for my writing dialogue etc, this goes back to my point 8. i use milanote, its free and you get 200 free thingies to use, and i plan out how every single one of my posts is gonna go. so i just have to go ingame and i already know what im gonna do. no thoughts, just taking screenshots. for example, this is how a part of my part 2, chapter 3 posts layout looks like. every square is a post that has what is happening, who is in it, what is gonna be said very vaguely, etc:

11. and the most important tip! don’t compare yourself to others. i did it at the beginning. i think we all did at one point. its not good for you at all. please always remember we all are here for share our lil stories with each other and it’s not easy get a following. you’ll get there and its gonna take time. be patient, be nice!!! and i cant wait to see your story!!!!!!!!!!

#ask #howto #dam. it loNG #Anonymous

[hideous-little-structure]

I think it's so interesting that one of the main reasons I've stayed on Tumblr this long is that the Nancy Drew games fandom is really robust here and I've met very few people irl who know the games or love them as much as I do, and yet here we are.

I joined the "clue crew" many many years ago after looking up a walkthrough for SCK because my weenie-hut-juniors ass was way to scared to finish the game after I blew up the diner by accident but I wanted to know how it ended. That was my first Arglefumph video and after that, I was hooked. I only owned SCK and HAU and the DVD version of CUR, but his channel let me experience every single game and I really loved watching the videos.

When I was around 15 I think, I was making my own little youtube videos and learning how to edit video. Michael's channel was still relatively small but he was gaining popularity and his videos started getting more ambitious. So, I reached out and told him I was a fan and looking to get more editing practice in, and that I'd love to edit for him. He said yes, and I made a couple of videos for him (a section of Everything Wrong With SCK and then the entirety of EWW CUR and CLK) and had a blast doing it. I asked to do them for free because I didn't need the money.

Afterwards, Michael and I became friends on Facebook and through him I met Paul Franzen of "Oh, a Rock" game studios. I made the trailer for the first Cat President game for Paul, a picture of my cat is in the second one, and I (as well as Michael) played a character in Internet Court which just came out on Tuesday. I was paid for all of these gigs at the insistence of Paul. I loved doing these as well and definitely would work with either of them again if they asked.

I'm transgender (non-binary sapphic) and started my transition at around the same time as I started working with Michael and Paul. Both of them have been friends with me throughout the entire process of me having top surgery, changing my name, and starting HRT. They have both been great friends and supporters of my transition. I have always felt safe with both of them.

I saw a post earlier today of some people upset that Her Interactive was promoting one of Michael's speedruns and had totally ignored a fan effort to raise money for charity. I don't know a ton of the details, but it's definitely common knowledge that being a part of the fandom entails a lot of ragging on Her Interactive, especially recently, as they have a track record of not being in touch with the fanbase. But people took it out on Michael, and as a friend of his, that bummed me out. I commented on it and someone messaged me and accused Michael of being racist and homophobic, as well as cheating on a speedrun. I told them about my relationship with Michael and that I didn't like that such strong claims were being made against him (I also looked into the speedrun thing, and to my knowledge he discovered an existing exploit in a game and Her asked him to take down his video because they didn't want the exploit to become widely known. I don't know the whole story though) especially because I know him personally.

Someone else screenshotted my comment and explained that their beef isn't with Michael on this one, which I appreciated, but someone else linked to a "your fave is problematic" Google doc about him. This frustrates me a lot. Here's the doc if you want to read it for yourself. I'm not gonna try and hide it because I've read through it and I'm not ashamed to be friends with this guy.

I don't know if he talks about it often anymore, but Michael used to be studying to be a Catholic priest. He's religious. But in my experience, he's always been kind about it and has never tried to force his beliefs on others. You can actually see in the doc that he treads pretty lightly. He's also a cishet white man with two daughters who just enjoys the Nancy Drew games and likes to share that joy with others. He was one of the first people to consistently make ND content and it seems like he was the intro to the fandom for a lot of people, so he's kind of become a cornerstone of the community.

There's a section of the doc about underpaying an artist, and I do feel for that person, but they didn't communicate about how they felt the work was worth more (I get it, I have social anxiety, I hate asking for more money, but I also understand that nobody can read my mind, especially not someone who isn't an artist or in touch with the artist community).

Michael is not a racist, or a homophobe, or a transphobe. He is a pretty nice catholic guy who tries to be considerate of other people and sometimes is uneducated but I've never seen him be intentionally malicious.

It's really hard to see someone you've known for years get thrown under the bus because he's just a guy who doesn't spend all his time trying to woke. His blog might have some stuff that I don't agree with, but he's the type of person to extend a hand to anyone who needs it, regardless of their situation or opinions.

I hope Her Interactive gets better about engaging with the fans and supporting all the really cool stuff that members of the community do, but I'm sorry, if you come for my friend like that, I'm not gonna sit there and take it.

#nancy drew #Arglefumph #clue crew #Her Interactive #Michael Gray #Sorry this is a long post but jeez this annoyed the fuck outta me

[actualaster]

Impressions of Episode 2!  Spoilers not just for the episode, but for the game--including parts towards the end of the game.  Screenshot-heavy

Also, NTWEWY Release Date Trailer reference at one point.

First up!  Love the proper intro!  Shame about what happened with the original intro being swapped out, there’s some spots where this version of Twister doesn’t quite fit.  But it fits better than the use of Calling they used as as a last-second sub in the first episode.

(For those who don’t know, one of the band members for the group that did the original song was involved in a criminal scandal so the music was pulled, apparently that’s not uncommon.  I feel more bad for the poor bandmates who’ve had their reputation tarnished by association, y’know?)

so!  first up on visuals!  New Noise!!  Wonder if these will show up in NTWEWY?  They don’t look as much like Noise as most others, missing that tattoo component, but they remind me of the Bats and the Sprogs.  Curious to see if that happens

FORESHADOWING with MR. PRODUCER HIMSELF.

So, we get some interaction between Neku and Shiki right off the bat when the episode starts, which involves Neku’s whole “I don’t like people” thing, and we see Beat and Rhyme join ‘em and they have a discussion.  Get some of the talk of everyone’s values colliding, which IIRC is a W2 sort of convo w/ Asshole Jesus?  Can’t quite remember...  Either way, get some more insight into the characters.

RHYME IS TOO CUTE HERE THIS IS SO PRECIOUS

Ahaha...  This sequence hurts.  The framing makes it so clear what they’re getting at with these two being siblings.  Also this entire bit is good, helps establish details about the characters both overtly through conversation and subtly, like the framing of this shot.

This part also hurts, Shiki getting so excited she forgets, just for a moment, what’s going on.

Honestly the entire sequence with the Prince is funny, and helps give some good insight into the characters.

Also. Same, Neku, Same.  That’s exactly my face when people start losing their minds over some RL celeb that’s apparently sexy or something lol.  But also starts to work in the importance of fashion and trends in this sequence.

The description is different but ultimatley the idea seems roughly the same for Imprinting--though Shiki knows what it is rather than Rhyme explaining memes.

(shame we couldn’t get “what’s a meme?” animated lol, but that’s probably just a funny thing in the ENG fandom and it IS based of the JP original ver)

Interesting way they handled Eri here, with her wearing a different outfit.

Dude talking to Makoto’s a Reaper, I’m betting--since he’s lacking that sort of washed out look the RG folks have.  Specifically planted here to give the Players the idea for what their mission is, if they’re paying attention to their surroundings and/or in the right area at the start of the day.

Nao and Sota make another appearance after their Ep 1 cameo!  Good way to introduce them before W2!

[knee-jerk reaction of screeching because THE FUCKING MOST ANNOYING FUCKING PINS EVER]

Also the fact that the dude in Red who was talking to Makoto says his boss is pressuring him to spread them around makes me pretty confident, aside from the “lacking the washed out RG look” that he’s a Reaper.

This was very interesting--the Support Reaper let them through because Shiki was holding a Keypin.  Setting the precedent for “this pin caused a wall to be cleared for us” but at the same time...  Not opening the wall itself.  And I wonder why the Reaper didn’t seem to care that a Player was holding onto a Keypin?  I mean, the Reaper addressed it with “take care of that pin”, so I suppose they’ve acknowledged it but still feels odd.  Then again, might be a case of “Player with a Keypin?  Higher ups didn’t say anything about that.  Welp, not my problem then.” and just not wanting to deal with it lol

also look at the Support Reaper (guy in red w/ the facemask)’s outfit.  Compare it to what “Neku” in the end of the latest (as of this posting) NTWEWY trailer was wearing--it’s pretty much identical except “Neku” is wearing black instead of Read (Harrier Reapers wear Black), is this “Neku” in NTWEWY a Reaper now?  Or trying to blend in and appear similar to a Reaper for some reason?  Or is it just coincidence?

see how similar they look?  (I know it looks purple here but the boxart it’s black so I assume it’s just lighting)

Then again, since the art seems the same between game and anime (or very similar, the eyes are handled looking the same it seems to me) it could be something else...  (Of course, who even knows if this is the real Neku?)

Anyway...

AHAHAHAHAHAHA Oh shiki, if only you knew that the second player pin is because of the bullet that wasn’t stopped XD

Working trends in somewhat, interesting to see that.  Makes total sense they’d do it this way since the “trends change based on what Players use in battle” is a game mechanic that I can’t see being easily worked into the story in another format, so this swap makes plenty of sense.  Using Imprinting on the Prince to get him to plug the advert makes sense.

LMAO.  SAME NEKU, SAME.  THAT IS SUCH A RELATABLE FACE.

I gotta wonder, though--using the Prince this way instead of the Players making it work, seems like that might not make Makoto get a big head about “his” success which would alter things in...  W2, right?  The ramen shop stuff’s W2.

So.  We have a few interesting massive deviations here.

First up, a look at the influence of the Red Skull pin on people.

And second...

A Familiar Looking Noise Symbol, found on the Shibuya River...  Megumi’s Noise Symbol.

Obviously a massive deviation as Players start getting Erased--despite the Mission being cleared.  Neku and Shiki are on the chopping block when...

A familiar bit of hair reveals their savior who’s not about to let Megumi end their little Game early using some underhanded tactics like “Earsing Players after the Mission is cleared”

I’m very not sure how I feel on a personal level about this decision, but on a narrative level I fully get where they were going with this.

It establishes a very powerful Noise, and if they remain true to the game later it’s foreshadowing that Megumi’s involved heavily.  AND it establishes (through subtle implication you’d not necessarily get if this was your first time watching and didn’t catch the hair) that Joshua is a very powerful person.  Before being in the Game.

Shiki comments on the unsualness of it, too!

I do, however, think they did real justice to the Eri and Shiki revelation.  I still wanna know what that “accident” is that killed Shiki, though.

And here we see a person having his ENTIRE WORLD rocked by the revelation that he’s dead.

Also we got a slight flashback to the incident that killed him, too blurry to see much but a little bit of one.  We saw a little of that in Ep 1, too, IIRC.

AND THAT’S IT FOR THE EPISODE

Well.  Except for the title card for Episode 3

WHO’S READY TO HAVE THEIR HEARST SHATTERED LIKE GLASS OVER THAT SCENE?!

#twewy #the world ends with you #twewy spoilers #twewy anime #spiderss #bc there's a screenshot of a spider monster #kage watches twewy

[thethousandyearwitch]

The Show Must Go On! Chap. 7

- A Youtuber AU you didn’t want and didn’t need -

Hisoka Morrow, italian Makeup Youtuber, enjoys his life in the comfort and occasional drama of his profession. But nothing brings more drama into his life than the eldest son of the Zoldyck fashion magazine empire.

Meanwhile, aspiring australian Twitch Streamer Gon Freecs forms a special bond to a Speedrunner commonly going by "Kil".

Chapter 7 “Montero” out now!

AO3 Link

What could be worse than taking care of a teenage boy who is developing a steady video game addiction?

There was a loud bang coming from the room above the kitchen, followed by laughter and cackling. The boys were in Gons room and tried their hardest to set up the sleeping cod. They refused help, naturally, convinced that they are just as capable, confidence heightened by being in each other’s presence, hyping each other up, and the consumption of their own body weight in burgers.

Another bang. A shriek. More laughter. Mito sighed so deeply that she feared a piece of her soul might have left her.

Taking care of TWO teenage boys who are developing a steady video game addiction.

Her phone vibrated with a new message. Gon had sent her a selfie of himself and Killua on the cot, which seemed to be standing securely. The boys were flexing their arm muscles (or lack thereof) with proud looks on their faces, and the only caption was “#success”. Well, at least they are having fun.

.

.

.

Bellissimo<3: Good morning. I am going to pick you up at 1pm, be dressed by then, and pack your bag for tonight’s show. We are going for a brief detour.

Hisoka stretched out on his bed and squinted at the too-bright phone screen. It was 10 in the morning, though the rooms curtains were drawn shut tightly as a defence against harsh sunlight. A lazy smile spread on his lips.

Hisoka: Are we finally running away together to get married in Las Vegas? I thought you’d never ask~~❤️

Bellisssimo<3: I am trying to reward you for not getting arrested last night.

Bellissimo<3: Do not make me regret this.

Hisoka: I should avoid getting arrested more often ❤️

Bellissimo<3: 1pm Hisoka. See you then.

Hisoka let his phone drop back into pillow-mountain. This was certainly an interesting surprise, and an opportunity that the make up artist wasn’t going to waste. Getting One-on-One time with the Zoldyck was something precious and rare to him. Because Illumi was a rarity himself. In a world of increasingly bland and repetitive personalities, especially in his field of work, Illumi presented a challenge of raw potential. Cold and calculated to the masses, an obedient dog to his family, a revolutionary in his work. Hisoka knew that he must be hiding so much more, and the more walls he encountered with the man, the more he wanted to tear them down with his bare hands. Hisoka hated calling whatever this was a ‘Crush’. Sure, he was affectionate towards the other man, and at this point he couldn’t deny the pleasant twist of his heart whenever they touched. But he didn’t yearn for lazy Sundays in bed together, didn’t want the peaceful domesticity that seemed to be inherited in being a ‘couple’.

What do I want?

Hisoka pulled himself out of bed, and made his way to the shower, determined to abandon this pesky train of thought. There was no point in pondering the unlikely. Though… Illumi had been indulging him. And he was going to indulge him again this day. Maybe he wasn’t the only one getting soft, even if neither would ever admit it. The thought brought another satisfied smirk to his lips as he massaged his favourite shampoo into his scalp.

He wondered how Illumis family would react, hypothetically, if they were to end up a couple. The eldest son of the Zoldycks, not just gay, but in a relationship with a makeup artist who is famous for starting drama whenever possible. They certainly would be a more feared and adored couple than if Illumi were to marry some busty heiress who hooks up with her tennis coach when he’s away.

Silva Zoldyck would drop dead right on the spot if Hisoka would ask him if he should call him dad, he was sure.

He stepped out of the steamy shower and mustered his refreshed face in the mirror. Maybe that’s all he wanted. To form something with Illumi that would be even more powerful than the Zoldyck empire, to make everyone else envy/fear/adore them. They had the capacity and the ability to do so, no doubt.

Or maybe he just wanted to have something he wasn’t supposed to have.

Hisoka shrugged to himself, before he went over his usual beauty routine. Today could prove very interesting.

.

.

12:45 pm, Hisoka leaned on his kitchen island, absentmindedly scrolled through social media to beat time. Illumi wasn’t going to be late, but he’s never been early either.

He decided to go with a casual look, fitted beige khakis, with an oxford blue button up, sleeves rolled up just above his elbows, debated with himself on how far unbuttoned would be appropriate-yet-slutty (Top 3 Buttons unbuttoned, was the conclusion). Under his eyes, rested on his cheekbones, he had painted his signature star and teardrop, eyebrows plucked to perfection, and after 10 tries he managed to get a satisfying cat eye done. It was perfectly normal to want to look like hell on wheels while meeting with your friend-partner-associate-crush-insertsatisfactoryterm.

The afternoons were always the worst time to check social media, the calm before the posting-storm that comes during the evening and night. Hisoka had already reached posts that were done last night, a few screenshots taken here and there for future reference and roasting purposes.

Almost fed up with endless scrolling, suddenly it appeared. Hisoka had followed a twitch streamer on twitter recently, some kid who was definitely going to screw up in some point of his career (they always do, when the fame gets to their heads), and didn’t want to miss that mess. “Foxbeargaming”, what the fuck is even a foxbear, he had thought.

He had seen the brat before, in his profile picture and clips of his streams. But that wasn’t the problem with the newly posted selfie.

The problem was that he also recognized the second brat in it. Remembered the way Illumi boasted about his talented little brother, the same wild hair and blue eyes as he showed him a picture of the kid. Killua Zoldyck is currently in the middle of nowhere Australia, and his family most likely doesn’t know about it.

Oh, this will be delicious.

Hisokas day had been upgraded from surprisingly interesting to extremely entertaining if everything were to go smoothly. Immediately revealing to Illumi before their date that his little brother is out in the desert trying to tame himself a boyfriend wouldn’t do either of them good. Let it simmer, let it fester, keep Illumi away from his phone the rest of the day.

Lost in his scheming, he just barely noticed that the clock hit 1pm. He grabbed his bag from the floor and stuffed his phone into his back pocket before he headed out the door.

Hisoka wasn’t sure what he expected, yet he was taken aback by the sight in front of him as he exited the apartment complex.

Illumi leaned leisurely against a black sports car, as if that were his only purpose in life. His sleek hair was tied into a neat ponytail, eyes hidden behind a pair of sunglasses. Hisoka let his eyes take in every detail of him. Peridot green jeans, fashionably washed out, paired with a simple grey polo shirt, the collar popped open just enough to reveal more neck than usual.

“Are you waiting on an invitation?” Illumi didn’t sound as agitated as he probably intended, giving Hisoka only more reason to push his luck.

“I was thinking about whether I want to pounce on you now or later.” He approached the other man, who in turn straightened up his posture in defence. But instead of any hostile movements, Hisoka simply took Illumis hand, and bought it to his lips for a caste kiss. “But I’d rather not spoil our date this early.”

Illumi pulled his hand away, though maybe with a second’s hesitation. “Not happening, also not a date. Get in the car before I change my mind.”

The car was equipped with fabric seats, which Hisoka was grateful for in the Italian heat. “Maybe I should film one of those Vlogs today, what do you think of the title ‘Partner takes me away for secret date’?”

“What about ‘Multimillionaire kicked me out of a speeding car’?”

“Touché.” Now Hisoka was sure that his companion had to be in a good mood, despite what he’d claim, he’d never go along with his jokes if he were feeling neutral-to-pissed otherwise. He rolled his shoulders back into the seat comfortably, golden eyes fixated on the way that Illumis elegant pale hands wrapped around the steering wheel. “I didn’t know you can drive, considering you always have someone to do it for you.”

“I prefer it over flying, and I still consider myself a better driver than half of our staff.”

“I’m sure you’re great at handling stick shift as well.”

“Of co-“Illumi pressed his lips together in sudden annoyance, he most definitely had caught onto Hisokas smirk as he waited for an answer. “That is repulsive.” That prompted the makeup artist to break out into self-satisfied snickering.

“No clue what you’re talking about, Tesoro.” This earned him an eye roll, and silence as the car made its way through mostly empty streets. Hisokas eyes fell onto Illumis phone that rested on the console of the car. “Ah, I’m sure mister multimillionaire has Spotify Premium, right? Let me turn on some music.”

“Use your own phone.”

“I ran out of data volume. Are you that afraid I’ll discover your disastrous music taste?” His teasing smirk was met with another, more defeated eyeroll and a sigh.

“Don’t play anything trashy. The passcode is 0707.” After a questioning silence, he added “It’s Killuas birthday.”

Hisoka replied with an appreciative purr, before he started scrolling through the others music library. No personal playlists, not even a profile picture attached to his account. He was almost offended at the man’s lack of care for something as deeply personal as ones Spotify account, something that surely could tell a lot about a person. “Tchaikovsky? I’m not sure if I am impressed or utterly bored. Oh-“ His eyes stopped on a familiar album cover. “Maybe you’re not a lost cause after all, dear.”

A button press later, and the familiar opening sounds to Tame Impalas “Currents” played. The faintest trace of a smile curled on Illumis lips, barely noticeable, but Hisoka wanted to burn it into his mind anyway. Never mind that he took the brief distraction to turn the others phone onto silent mode. No unnecessary distractions.

It took the rest of the album until Illumi pulled the car into the exit towards the nature reserve near Lago di Bracciano, the last notes of “New Person, Same old Mistakes” dying together with the engine as they parked.

Hisoka stretched at the warm sunlight that caressed his skin when he exited the vehicle. Birds sang happily in the trees that lined the path around the large lake, and the only other person in sight was an elderly woman walking a small white dog. As the second car door shut close, he turned around with a pleased smile that showed off his shining teeth. “I never took you for the kind to take afternoon strolls.”

His friend-or-whatever set a relaxed pace onto the path and looked out onto the deep blue water. “I can’t sit around the hotel room the entire day, can I? And Rome is crawling with sweaty tourists and noisy journalists.”

“So you wanted to get some quality time outside?” Hisoka absentmindedly ran his tongue over his own sharp incisors.

“Correct.” Illumi didn’t seem to notice, or at least ignored, the predatory gesture.

“With me.”

He missed a beat before a simple, “It seemed appropriate.”.

This earned him an appreciative purr, before the men walked in silence along the large lake. Italy still wouldn’t reach its heights of temperatures this time of year, but any breeze was still a welcomed change from the rising humidity and sting of the sun. Hisoka wondered how much the others pale skin would change if he’d expose himself for a bit longer to the sun, if he’d immediately burn up in red, or if he’d start to tan, even just the faintest bit. He’d definitely look more alive, less like a puppet on invisible strings.

They continued to walk in a comfortable silence next to each other, took in the different sounds and sights of nature and the others presence, until eventually they reached the border of one of the shore towns. Beautiful stone buildings climbed the side of a smaller hill, only interrupted by greenery sprouting up between them. The main path was lined with flower shops, cafes, and Gelateria, whose smells mixed into a pleasant sweetness in the air. But one store in particular stood out. It wasn’t super flashy, it could have been found in any city and any street, but Hisoka knew this one from memory.

Without hesitation, he grabbed the others hand, effectively stopping him in his tracks.

“Excuse me-“ Before he could free his hand, Hisoka intertwined their fingers and pulled him closer.

“Let me treat you to something as well, I promise you won’t regret it,amore.” As his flaming eyes were met with a wrinkled nose, the sunshades Illumi were as not-telling as his eyes, he added “If you do regret it, I’ll gladly let you drown me right here.”

There was hesitation as the other mans wrist twitched against his hold. “You’d love that, wouldn’t you?”

The absence of a struggle was still taken as accepting whatever had gotten him so excited, and thus Illumi was quickly pulled and seated outside the small café. Hisokas attitude had changed from a lazy yet scheming happiness, to pure, unfiltered excitement. It became almost impossible for him to sit still, he rapidly tapped his fingernails against the small glass table, until a waitress (in her mid-40s, he assumed) stepped out. She handed the men a small, leather bound menu, though both were immediately snatched by Hisoka and held back towards her.

“Non sarà necessario. Ordineremo la Cheesecake alla fragola. Grazie.”

“Certamente.” The woman replied with a smile, before she retreated into the shop.

“Cheesecake?” Illumi asked with a raised eyebrow, he had taken off his sunglasses by now and placed them on the table.

Hisoka tutted, “Not any Cheesecake, dear, it is the best Cheesecake you will ever have. I will have it at my wedding, funeral, and every occasion in between that.”

“I take it you’ve been here before.”

“When I had just moved to Rieti, I’d come here almost every weekend, though I unfortunately stopped when weekends became workdays as well.” He considered carefully how much more he was willing to share about that time of his life with the other, though the decision was taken off him as the waitress approached with two plates, each adorned with a generous slice of cheesecake, topped with strawberry slices and strawberry jam dripping off it.

His jaw clenched in anticipation as he watched Illumi take the first bite of the cake, reminiscent of all the rituals he’d do for him whenever he visited. It felt degrading to admit that he wanted to impress and gain the approval of the Zoldyck, but not degrading enough to stop the attention seeking behaviour.

A bite. Some careful chewing. Averted eyes because Hisoka was staringbut he did not care. He swallowed.

Illumi didn’t look at him as he spoke, seemingly engrossed in studying the décor of the shop. But his eyes betrayed him, Hisoka swore he saw something within the dark orbs glisten and flash to life. He didn’t know people could smile only with their eyes, but Illumi continued to be different in the most intoxicating way. “It’s… really good.”

Hisoka tried hard not to pick up his train of thought from the morning, tried not to think about what he wanted from Illumi or a relationship, and he especially tried not to think about the growing urge to leap across the table at that very moment to kiss him until their lips were sore. Instead, he started to eat his own cake, and failed to supress his sharpened smile.

They ate mostly in silence, safe for Hisokas muffled crazed snickering, and ordered espresso to chase down the thick cake.

“Hey, let’s play a game. What is wrong with that woman over there?” Hisoka pointed at a blonde who rested against a railing near the lake.

Illumi seemed to consider for a second whether he even wanted to play a weird game like that, before he stopped mid espresso-sip. “Ah. Those red heels are obviously spray-painted on.”

“Bingo~! It’s super obvious, right? You can still see the black shine through.”

“I’m more concerned about the uneven stitching on her shirt. Either she did that herself, or she has gotten scammed.”

Somehow that conversation triggered them to analyse the fashion choices of every stranger they encountered on their way back to the car with increasingly devilish tones. Illumi Zoldyck was a surprisingly good gossiper, and Hisoka filed that fact into the growing corner of his brain that he reserved just for him.

In the car, Illumi informed him they would just head to his hotel room to get dressed for the show, and then head there together. Any attempt at a joke about spending hotel-room-time wisely was, expectedly, cut off.

.

.

.

Illumi had never focused on the road this much in his entire life. He tried to be grateful that they had managed to get ready for the show in his hotel room without any major incidents, but now Hisoka was seated next to him again, wearing the suit he made for him. He looked good, annoyingly so. Naturally, Illumi wouldn’t grant him the satisfaction of telling him that though. He had indulged the man plenty enough for that day already and was holding back from chastising himself for it.

Last night had made him soft, Illumi decided. A brief waver of confidence and self-preservation that made him want to spend one-on-one time with Hisoka, in what may have resembled friendship to an outsider.

But his head was clearer now, cleansed from whatever foolishness had overcome him – the image of his mother recovering from a coughing fit and regaining her composure crept itself into his mind. Unrelated, he thought, though cleared his throat regardless.

“Machi says the crowd tonight is dreadful. Do you think she is just saying that to keep me from going~?” Hisoka tapped his long nails against the screen of his phone. Machi was a model they both have worked with in the past, though she was no where close to a breakthrough. A pretty face, objectively spoken, though smaller than most models, and the personality of royalty about to be executed. Do they always text each other?

“She’s there as well today?” He tried not to sound bitter. He didn’t have a reason to be bitter.

“Mhm, she’s modelling for a friend of hers it seems, though all the examples she sent me looked like someone with a priest-kink designed them, so it doesn’t hurt as much that she didn’t hire me as her artist.”

A moment of silence. “I see.” Illumi was not going to indulge Hisoka even more by inquiring about the nature of his relationship to the woman. It did not concern him; it wasn’t relevant to him or his work.

“Illumi?” Hisoka leaned over in his seat, golden eyes piercing into the side of his face.

“Yes, Hisoka?” Just now he noticed that he had been clenching his jaw uncomfortably.

“Are you jealous of Machi?” He didn’t need to look to know that Hisoka was smiling from one ear to the other, voice dripping with joy. He wasn’t going to look at Hisoka.

“You are insane. Why would I be jealous of her? I pity the girl, still having to work as a favour for acquaintances.”

Predatory eyes continued to drill into him, and a dangerous purr escaped the man, “Is that so?”.

“Yes, don’t be ridiculous.” They pulled into the valet line.

“Then you surely won’t mind that she’ll meet us in the entrance hall, wonderful!”

Illumi shouldn’t mind. It should be perfectly fine that instead of spending the evening alone with Hisoka, a good-looking young woman with an unclear relationship to him would meet them. He definitely couldn’t be jealous; it would be irrational and yet-

He threw the keys to the car at the valet and grabbed the number-marker without a word. His face wouldn’t give it away to others, that he was practically fuming, but Hisoka seemed to take pleasure in the subtle way that Illumis facial features tightened. “I heard jealousy can give you wrinkles~” Hisoka whispered cheekily as they approached the venue entrance, rows of reporters and interviewers lined at the sides, even more so than at the opening day before.

“You must have a lot of experience with that.” He hissed in reply and straightened his posture as they passed the crowd, mostly reporters who desperately tried to take pictures of attendees. Pictures, Interviews, all loathsome cries for attention that Illumi has always tried to avoid as much as possible without damaging the families reputation. He looked down the carpeted entrance and spotted the young woman known as Machi Komacine, clothed in a painfully tight black dress adorned with rosaries draped around her waist like belts, her messy pink hair pulled into a high ponytail. Her posture signalled boredom, but her eyes screamed murder.

Illumi was not a man who easily feared anyone, especially not a woman who stands at 5’2 proud; But he also was not necessarily thrilled to approach her. As he tried to hiss something in Hisokas direction again, something about not having much time to chat with their acquaintance due to meeting a client, he noticed: The other man had stayed behind, and was now busy posing for numerous cameras. Their eyes met, and with a mischievous grin, Hisoka held his hand out to beckon Illumi closer. For Pictures. Together.

Take pictures with Hisoka together in a public appearance that will most definitely set the gears of the rumour mill in motion; Or approach Machi alone and run the risk of uncomfortable conversation about our respective relationships to Hisoka?

He looked back at Machi, whose eyes met his instantly with a raised eyebrow. Fucking Hell-

Illumi made his way back to Hisoka, casually disregarded the hand that was held out to him and positioned himself as practiced – left arm leisurely to the side, right arm three quarters across his front. Not too strict, but not too relaxed either. In contrast, Hisoka had his left hand in the pocket of his suit, his right hand rested on Illumis shoulder as if were the most natural thing in the world. Journalists started to yell even more for their attention now, asking pesky questions that he tried to ignore, telling them to stand closer to each other, the likes. He kept the façade of his neutral face through the blinding flashes intact, even as Hisoka snaked his arms from his shoulder around his waist. “Do you wish for a public execution?”

“It looks better for the pictures~”

Illumi brushed a few strands of hairs behind his shoulder and used the motion to glance back to where Machi was waiting, her steady gaze on the two of them. “It’s rude to let her wait.”

“How considerate you are!” Hisoka snickered. “I know you aren’t jealous, caro, but I’d still like to reassure you of something.”

“And what’s that?”

“Machi and I look for, how should I say, very different things in a partner.” He tugged at Illumi waist and pulled him closer. “She’s looking for women and I am not.”

“Oh.” Illumi continued to look at the reporters cooing for their attention, as he tried not to think of the warm hand on his waist that felt searing hot and- Wait.

“OH.” He turned in Hisokas hold to properly look at him, who in turned grinned like the cat that ate the canary, then he looked back to Machi, and suddenly he felt stupid, which he didn’t experience a lot.

“Feeling relieved, even though you definitely weren’t jealous?”

“I think they got enough pictures.”

Illumi heard Hisokas snickering trail behind him as he made his way down the entrance. Machis eyes met his again, hands steady on her hips. Up closer now, he could observe the details of her dress, white seams stitched into crucifixes that crept up the sides, and the number “3” painted on every bead of the rosaries. It was cleanly executed, but Illumi was confident in the superiority of his own work.

“Miss Komacine.” He extended his hand to her, which she shook half-heartedly.

“Illumi. I’d like to get to business talk right away, so I don’t have to look at this clown longer than necessary.”

“Business talk?”

The young woman lit a cigarette for herself and shot a glare to Hisoka. “I assume you didn’t tell him I wanted to speak with him?” This granted her only a shrug and a smile from the man. “Fine, whatever. Illumi, I want to model for your next line, it would proof beneficial for both of us.”

“I don’t deal in women’s fashion. Furthermore, I do not see how I’d gain benefits from having you work for me.” Finally, a topic he felt comfortable to speak about, even it was only to criticize the woman for her awful attempt at business.

“I don’t mind wearing a suit, you should be at least competent enough to make smaller sizes, right?” She stepped closer to push a sharp index finger against his chest. “And about those benefits; Having me model for you would give me more exposure from a mainstream crowd, and thus exposure for my group. You would gain exposure to a wider audience of underground fashion-following, that isn’t influenced by your family’s name, meaning you could manifest a name for yourself. Unless you prefer being ‘a Zoldyck’ forever.”

The nerve. The audacity. Illumi considered just calling her a presumptuous cunt and leaving with his pride intact, but Machi looked like the kind of woman who knew how to slice car tires and break-wires.

A manicured hand curled around his shoulder, and Hisoka pushed himself between Machi and him. “What could be better than this; My two favourite people in this world, getting along, talking friendly business. Unfortunately, dear Machi, there’s some people inside that are dying to meet us tonight, so we’ll catch you later~”

Before he could object, Illumi was pushed through the entrance of the venue. The large runway was occupied by a high-end brand that premiered their women’s gala collection, mood-lighting engulfed the rest of the room, rhythmic beats of low music drowned out most of the talking crowd.

“Be a darling and just let her offer simmer a little. Machi can be very scary when she’s mad, and not in the way I enjoy.” Hisoka purred closer to his ear.

“Did you know she was going to ask?”

“What if I did?”

A waiter offered them drinks on a tray, and Illumi leisurely grabbed a glass of champagne.

“What does that even mean, ‘a Zoldyck’, as if it is something bad.”

“Don’t wreck your pretty head over it, you know how women are.” Hisoka laughed, and Illumi wasn’t sure how serious he meant that, considering that personally he had no idea how women are, and after newest revelations, neither did Hisoka.

But through the course of the night, Illumi couldn’t get it out of his head. He pretended not to notice how people approached Hisoka, addressed him by his name, first or full name, and talked with him about the content he has created, complimented on his most recent videos and looks. And he pretended not to notice how people approached him, addressed him only by his last name, and asked about the family business. “Mr. Zoldyck, are you going to write an article about this line?” “Mr. Zoldyck, about the next issue-“ “Mr. Zoldyck, tell my greetings to your father.”

No word about his own collection he had premiered. No one even uttered his first name.

He was ‘a Zoldyck’. Nothing more, nothing less.

“If looks could kill, we’d be ankle deep in a blood bath by now.” Hisoka snaked an arm around Illumis waist again and rested his hand on the tip of his hip. The designer took a long sip of the bitter champagne, casually slapped away the offending hand, and kept his dark eyes fixed on the crowd. “Still pouting because Machi was being a bully?”

“I am not pouting.”

“And you weren’t jealous either, got it~”

An eye roll, followed by “I have a headache, what’s the time anyway?” Illumi tried to reach for his phone in his pocket, though before he could grab it, Hisoka took hold of his wrist. They locked eyes, and even in the dim lighting of the venue, Illumi saw something wild glisten in those amber eyes. “Let’s leave, together, to my place.”

“Very subtle, Hisoka. I am not going to-”

“Indulge me, Tesoro, I want to show you something.” Determined to blame it on the repulsive atmosphere that had build itself up at the fashion show, Illumi let himself be swept away by Hisoka for the second time that day. The thought of getting away from noisy reporters and cockroaches of the industry who only knew him as the eldest Zoldyck.- former Heir to the empire, was pleasant enough, yet he also didn’t have to be alone and actively think about his reputation, name, and being a ‘lapdog’, technically a win-win situation.

The drive back to the apartment was oddly quiet, despite Hisokas prior excitement. The car tore through the dark night primarily in silence, only accented by the ‘The Velvet Underground’ album they agreed on after scrolling through Hisokas bizarre Spotify library. It definitely wasn’t the kind of music he was used to from the home he was raised in, didn’t fit between the classical music his mother used to play before her headaches made it impossible and the obscene noise music that Killua would play to trigger the same headaches.

“Could you check my messages for me?”

Hisoka hummed in response and grabbed the phone, manicured nails tapping on the screen, before dropping it unceremoniously back into the cup-holders. “Batteries dead.”

“That can’t be, I charged it before I went out this morning, the battery is supposed to hold for a minimum of 72 hours when idle.”

“Your dainty British batteries sometimes give out under Italian heat, invest in better engineering, and charge it at my place for now.”

“…This will better be worth the trouble.”

The streets of Rieti were expectantly empty, and Illumi parked the car right in front of the apartment (Was it a legal parking spot? Unlikely. But parking fines barely matter when seemingly half the world knows your families name.)

The stairs, the door, the entrance, Illumi knew all of these things about Hisokas apartment. “What is there to show me?”

“Patience. Come here~” Hisoka opened the doors to the balcony, white drapes gently tossed in the fresh breeze. The Zoldyck followed- with sceptical hesitation, but followed nonetheless.

He rested his hands on the railing, eyes turned sky-wards, a few strands of hair upset by the wind.

“If you took me here to just look at the stars, I’m not sure which one of us is the bigger fool.”

“Right, if we wanted to look at soon-to-be dead stars, we could have stayed at the show. But we’re not here for them. They are insignificant, always there to look at until one day they vanish and are forgotten. The real star of the show is over there.” He pointed a long nail at the night sky, and Illumi tried to follow where it pointed.

“The moon? Really?”

“Close, but also mundane and boring. Here- “Before Illumi could react, the strange man had placed their heads next to each other and started to correct Illumis position with a pointed yet gentle grip on his chin. “Look straight ahead.”

Just a little bit off to the left of the moon shone a star brighter than anything else, for a moment Illumi felt ridiculous for missing it.

“It’s Venus. Among all these long dead stars, she’s ever present, stands out the most, and is a rare sight to behold.”

“You took me away from the show to gaze at other planets?” Illumi turned towards the other man, suddenly all too aware of how close they were standing once again.

“I took you away from the show because no one there is capable of understanding your true potential. The way everyone there only sees you as an extension of your family is so infuriating, that it makes me want to ruin all their hopeless little dreams right in front their pitiful faces.” With a swift movement Hisoka had pinned the designer against the railing of the balcony. “You could crush all these people under your heel and make them beg for forgiveness. And there’s nothing I’d rather see than that.”

“I don’t need to make anyone beg, if I want something, I get it. It’s always been like that.” A cold thumb traced the line of his sharp chin, followed by a dark chuckle, and all of a sudden Illumi felt fatigued, all air leaving his lungs. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he remembers his mother recalling symptoms like that. It’s a sickness, nothing more nothing less.

“You get it because you’re a pretty show dog held on a short leash by your family.”

Fucking lapdog. The weight on his chest feels like it could crush his organs any second.

“I’m not asking you to bite the hand that feeds you. But I’d give everything to see what you could do if you were free of restraints.”

Feeling like he needed to hold onto anything, Illumi grabbed onto the back of the other man’s head, fingers buried in wild hair. “And why would you care so much? If you’re just trying to rile me up, there’s ways that don’t make me want to throw you off the balcony and watch your mangled body struggle for life.”

“It’s because you fascinate me, Illumi. You’re my Venus in a sea of dying stars. I want to observe you in all your glory as you outshine everyone else, in your full potential.”

“Who says I won’t crush you as well?” His fingers grasped harder on a few strands of hair. Everything in his body felt wrong, the way his skin was freezing all over, but searing hot wherever he made contact with the other man, the suffocating weight on his chest increased by the second, and in the back of his mind something about sickness echoes again.

They locked eyes, and just then Illumi noticed how close they truly were, Hisokas hot breath falling onto his lips.

And he should have pushed him away.

Should have slapped him, insulted him like the sorry maggot he was.

But he felt weak and sick and so cold, and Hisoka radiated pure heat.

Their lips met, softer than expected of either of them, and Illumi wondered if this is what it feels like to be saved from drowning.

A pleasant warmth seeped into his body, and his lungs felt weightless, like he could breathe for the first time in his life.

Hisoka kissed like each touch might be the last, and Illumi let himself be guided as he wanted, eventually wrapping his arms around the others neck, eager to steal as much of this intoxicating heat as possible.

The man kissed along his jawline, stopping just barely below his ear. “Stay here tonight, cuore mio.”

And Illumi placed a kiss to his temple, as gentle as a man who was never been taught gentleness with people could manage. “Let’s go inside.”

#hxh fanfic #hisoillu #killugon #hxh #hisoka marrow #illumi zoldyck #killua zoldyck #gon freecss #mito freecss #machi komachine #fanfic #fanfiction #I continue to have the worst update schedule known to man <3

[pinkbubbles-and-bigtroubles]

Wicked Game

Another round of the 5sos fic writing collab brought to you by @maluminspace​ and @h0tsos​. There are so many amazing writers involved and I highly recommend checking out the event master list linked below. Thank you to the Sagittarius sorceress  @sexgodashton​ for being very caring, patient, and kind while helping me tame this monster.  Massive shout out to @ghostofmashton​ for the photo edits, especially Ashton’s eye. that’s my favorite. You’re a rock star. Texas girls forever, love you to bits!

Event Master List

Prompt: Chef AU with Cashton

Dialogue Prompt: “Kissing you is all I’ve thought about since the moment we met” First person to spot it in the fic and send me a screenshot gets a personalized blurb request.

Word Count: 20K+ Team Long Winded Bitch strikes again, this will be posted in multiple parts over the next couple of days. This first part is about 5K

Rating: 18+ Slash fic Strong language, alcohol and drug use, and a misogynistic and racist comment. Sexual scenes including masturbation, toys, voyeurism, oral, and anal sex.

Summary: Ashton is ready to move on with his life after his painful divorce from Luke and the demise of the restaurant they’d built together. With the help of his protegee and sous chef Hima Singh, Ashton is ready to take on opening weekend of his new restaurant Anne-Marie’s. Calum is a reporter filling in on an assignment and is surprised when his past comes back to haunt him. Hima arranges an interview that takes an unexpected turn between the two men.

Part 1

"Great job, guys, we couldn't have had a better opening weekend. Thank you so much for making it happen," Ashton told the two staff members in the kitchen who'd closed as he unlocked the back door.

"No problem boss, glad to be here. We made money this weekend. See ya tomorrow," DeSean told him as he left.

Ashton locked the door behind them and walked out into the empty dining room, his steel-toed boots echoing heavily on the distressed blonde faux hardwood floors. He stopped to adjust a few tables, double-checking sightlines and looking over the layout of the tables. The upside-down chair legs cast long shadows in the soft pink neon glow. 

He looked up at the sign above the bar that read "Anne-Marie's." He smiled, not caring if anyone thought it was cheesy to name his restaurant after his mother.  His mom had always been his lucky star, and he couldn't have gotten through the last couple of years without her. 

"You look so serious,' a voice behind him startled him out of his thoughts.

"What the fuck Hima," Ashton yelped, clutching his chest dramatically. "I thought you were still in the kitchen." 

"The guys didn't leave me anything to do so I decided to change and have a drink with you before my brother gets here," she tossed her bag and chef's coat onto a stool grinning at Ashton. She hopped up to sit on the bar before swinging her legs around as she pushed off. Landing without a wobble she reached under the bar and grabbed a bottle of black label Bushmill's Irish Whiskey and two short glasses. 

"Straight for the good stuff, I like the way you think," Ashton smirked, taking a seat at the bar. 

"To simply mark the occasion, of course" she poured them each a shot before adding a splash of water.  She raised her glass, "Cheers to you, Boss, and to Anne-Marie's." 

They clinked glasses. "Couldn't have done it without you," he replied before taking a sip.

"Awwwwww thanks Ashtton, " she grinned at him. "Damn that's good, the whiskey makes me forgive the Irish for how dreadful Guinness is. Did you see Kevin Mackie snuck in last night? I expect a write up in the Metro on Tuesday and I know you saw Patricia Bennett," she rolled her eyes at the name.

"She makes herself hard to miss," he snorted. "I missed Mackie though. Why didn't you tell me?" 

"Because we were busy and I didn't have time for you to get all giggly and nervous. He got the crab puffs and the Mac and Brie and inhaled them. You were right about the nutmeg; I thought he was going to lick the plate."  She opened two bottles of beer before hopping back over the bar and taking a seat next to Ashton. 

"How did this weekend compare to the opening of ‘Lune Rouge’? Was it as good as the first time?" Hima finished her whiskey before shaking a pack of Camel Crush cigarettes out of her bag. 

"If you get ashes on the bar Paloma will flip her shit," Ashton warned. 

"I'm not afraid of her," Hima snipped, but she made sure to be careful. No sense in antagonizing their temperamental main bartender. 

"This opening was definitely smoother than the first one. We didn't know what the hell we were doing. The first night we ran out of duck fat and gorgonzola before the dinner rush was over. My sous chef's sister had to run to Whole Foods for emergency supplies. We got lucky the press ignored us for a couple weeks until we got a little buzz going. This time I knew what to expect but there was also more pressure," he paused, taking a pull on the bottle of beer. "This time I  expected to succeed right out of the gate." 

"You succeeded there," Hima stubbed her cigarette out in her empty glass. "I really need to quit." 

"You could get a puff bar and start vaping," he teased.

"I'm not a fucking junior varsity cheerleader. I can take my cancer like a big girl." She checked her phone. "Ugh it's almost nine, and it's gonna take me at least thirty minutes to get home. You're closing tomorrow with me right?" 

"Yeah, I'll be in around 11 all this week. Rafi is handling brunch with Gloria but I want to be here," Ashton double-checked his phone. "Tuesday I have that interview with Men's Life and they just emailed me." 

Hima saw his nose scrunch up as he read.  "What's wrong?" 

"I thought they were sending Taj, but instead of rescheduling the interview, they're sending Calum Hood," Ashton sneered. 

"Chill dude, it's not that bad," Hima was confused by the venom in his voice. "Yeah he's a bit of a goof, but he's hot and not a pretentious dickhead. They could've sent Felipe." 

"True, true," he grumbled as he saw a black Honda pull up outside. "Kabir is here." 

"Shit, ok see you tomorrow, Boss," she grabbed her stuff, gave him a quick kiss on the cheek, and ran out the door, locking it behind her. 

Ashton walked through once again. He made sure the lights were off in the employee lounge. Since many of his staff members used public transport or worked two jobs, Rafi had convinced Ashton to provide his staff with a decent place to take a break and get ready before or after work.  He built a small shower stall, lockers, and provided clean towels, and as his new kitchen manager, Rafi took responsibility for maintaining the space. Ashton took a last look at the bar, double-checking for any stray ashes Hima might have missed before setting the alarm, locking up, and heading home. 

Calum opened the email from his editor and swore loud enough to wake the scruffy brown terrier mix snoozing at his feet.

Hey Cal,

Sorry it's such short notice but Taj's mom had an emergency and I need you to cover for him. He's interviewing Ashton Irwin, remember him? He had the Lune Rouge a few years ago. Well, he's got a new place, diverse staff and we're doing a feature. Maybe even the cover if he's really pretty. Tuesday at 2 pm I'll send you the address and details after I talk to Taj. Oh, and my friend Nick is coming into town and I told him you'd show him around. It's been a while since you had a date but you'll like him. He's kinda short, but he's got big muscles, huge dick, perfect credit. You could do a lot worse.

Call me tomorrow

Sham

This isn't good, this isn't good. Calum's mind was racing. He rubbed his temples trying to think. Taj was notoriously reliable and responsible, so if he was taking off on short notice, it must be serious. It was just his bad luck it was Ashton Irwin. 

He usually covered travel and sports for Men's Life while Taj handled food and fashion. Calum didn't mind taking back food and dining for the time being. He'd started in that industry, working as a line cook while he went to school for journalism. He'd quit both when a flirty, older professor recommended him for an internship at California Culture and he managed to land a real job. Professor Davis had been highly disappointed to lose him as a student and catch him making out with her son who went to the same college. He'd found a tiny shitty apartment, spent his life on the road for work, and sent every penny he didn't need to live on to his family. He didn't even date for the longest time until he met a handsome blonde with sharp features and a sharper tongue.

He couldn't remember if it was four years ago or five, but he clearly recalled his review of Lune Rouge had not been nice. Calum was in a toxic relationship with the restaurant's sous chef at the time. He'd let his personal life spill over into his work for the first and only time. It wasn't something Calum was proud of and while he felt he owed Ashton an apology, the right time and place hadn't presented itself yet. He'd run into Ashton twice since then. The first time he was with his husband, and Calum wasn't about to humble himself in front of Luke. The second encounter came not long after their marriage broke up. Calum was dating a photographer at the time, when Ashton came to the photographer’s art show. They were briefly introduced but Ashton's chilly demeanor discouraged any further conversation, so Calum avoided him the rest of the evening. He remembered being unable to stop staring at the handsome chef with the sad eyes. He'd always hoped they'd bump into each other under better circumstances. I guess an interview will have to do.

********

Ashton sat out on his condo balcony overlooking Echo Park, taking in the night air and enjoying a second bottle of IPA. Hima was right, the opening had been a smash. Anne-Marie's had the best staff he'd ever had the pleasure of working with, and aside from a small mix up between gruyere and Havarti cheese, the opening had been smooth. The alcohol hummed in his veins as he allowed his mind to wander back five years. 

Lune Rouge's opening had been a chaotic mess of brilliance, balls, and blind luck. He was a year out of culinary school, newly married, and ecstatically in love with his husband. Luke was a trust fund baby; his dad ran a major studio. He put up the funding for their restaurant which procured a prime spot in trendy West Hollywood. Ashton had the idea of taking traditional French cuisine and turning it into "pub grub." Luke created a kitschy tacky cool interior with the ambiance of fairy light curtains, vintage 90's movie posters, an eye-popping pink and aqua come scheme.  Featuring a bartender who doubled as a DJ, the restaurant became an immediate hot spot.  

 The culinary press treated them like rock stars and it went to their head.  Ashton was portrayed as the mysterious boy genius, boisterous and foul-mouthed, he ran the back of the house, oversaw the business and created the menu. Luke, who's blonde-haired blue-eyed good looks were regularly described as "angelic", was the frontman, often schmoozing in the dining room, taking song requests, or slinging drinks behind the bar. They worked so well together until they didn't. 

Ashton shook his head, not allowing himself to linger on negative thoughts, not when he'd fought to regain balance. He'd spent the last year freeing himself from the wreckage of his partnership with Luke. Still, tonight after the opening, alone and overlooking the city lights, his mind kept going back to the exhilaration of that first opening night. After they stayed late with the crew for a drink to celebrate, Luke's hand wandered up Ashton's thigh causing him to almost choke on his tequila. Soon Luke started whining about all the paperwork he had to do before they could go home. The crew quickly bagged it out of there, not wanting to get roped into more work. 

Ashton swallowed at the memory before glancing around at the other balconies. It was late enough most of his neighbors should be asleep. Already hard, he reached down and squeezed his bulge through the thin fabric of his pajama pants. 

After letting everyone else out of Lune Rouge that first night he'd been puzzled to find Luke no longer at the bar. He heard noises coming from the office. When he opened the door, he found his husband, shirtless, and waiting for him. 

Ashton slid his hand into his pants swiping his thumb across the leaking tip. He heard a sliding glass door open and froze in place until he realized it was his neighbor below him chatting on the phone. He stroked himself and let his mind wander back to Luke. It had been too long since Ashton got laid, and Luke was still the best sex he'd ever had. He shuddered and bit his lip thinking about the way Luke grinned at him as he opened the office door. Before Ashton could say a word, Luke was sinking to his knees. A bit awkward given his long legs, but it didn't take long before he was letting Ashton fuck his throat. The thought of those blue eyes looking up at him as Ash's hands tangled in those blonde curls caused a moan to slip out, and his neighbor stopped talking at the sound. 

"I think somebody is having sex," he heard her whisper. He almost laughed. 

His dick was twitching flat against his stomach as he ducked back inside his bedroom, kicked off his pants, and grabbed a small tube of lube. Ashton shut off the light and stepped back outside. 

The breeze cooled his fevered skin as he stood there looking out at the city and stroking his dick. The idea that he could possibly be seen turned him on almost as much as his trip down memory lane.  He swallowed another moan thinking about how Luke's lips felt against his, their tongues tangled until he pulled back looking at Ashton with mischief and love before giving him a wink and turning around. 

Ashton's breath caught in his throat as he worked his cock thinking about it. The red and white striped pants his husband pranced around in that night had been blissful torment working him up until the moment he slid those pants down and bent over the desk.

"Come take what's yours, my love, I've been wanting you all night," he cooed, wiggling his hips. 

Luke was a whiny boy when he was getting pounded, and the memory sent Ashton closer to the edge. He felt his knees tremble as he increased his speed, the city lights becoming starbursts in his vision as he edged himself closer. At the moment of release, he swore he could feel Luke pushing back against him taking him in as deep as he could go. 

When Ashton opened his eyes, he found himself sweaty and streaked with his own seed. He was amazed he'd managed to stay quiet, but his neighbor was chatting away obliviously. He went back inside, cracked another beer, and took it with him into the shower, trying to focus on his day tomorrow.

 It was after midnight by the time he went to bed. His body was exhausted but the adrenaline from the opening weekend hadn't quite worn off. He found himself still restless and playing on his phone. After scrolling through Instagram, he found himself looking at the page belonging to the Galway Grill-- Ashton cringed at the name-- an Irish pub and microbrewery very recently opened by Luke and his boyfriend Finn. 

Ashton simmered with resentment perusing the menu; they'd recycled at least half of the Lune Rouge recipes, his creations. He'd heard they'd rushed their opening to launch the week before Anne-Marie's, and even with Daddy's deep pockets the decor looked slapped together, all flash no class. He came to a picture of the happy couple and couldn't help but notice how thin and tired Luke looked despite his huge smile. He felt a twinge of concern for his ex before pushing his phone away in disgust. Rolling out of bed, he headed to the bathroom and fished an orange prescription bottle out of the cabinet. He broke a valium in half and swallowed the smaller piece with a gulp of water straight from the faucet. He scrolled through different sounds on his phone before settling on crashing waves. He spent the next ten minutes stretching and practicing deep breathing to push out any lingering negativity and troubling thoughts. It was too late to drag up the past and there was nothing to be gained. Ashton crawled back under the duvet and sank into a deep sleep dreaming of blue eyes.

*********

Hima rolled into work a little after one, pleased to see a decent lunch crowd and multiple delivery orders going out. She ordered a chicken mojito wrap for her lunch and headed back to the office to find Ashton. She found him in his chair with his laptop open on his desk, a notebook in his lap while scrolling through his phone. 

"So what's the Monday morning report, Boss?" She asked, taking a seat across from him. 

Ashton was beaming as he spun the laptop around to show her. "We made 30% over our projected sales. We came in right at payroll, actually a little under if you can believe that." 

"I've checked the reservation book," she responded, flashing her phone. "We're booked solid for dinner Friday and Saturday and will call is 3 pm-7 pm. We're probably going to have to do that all week." 

"Whatever you need. This weekend is going to be bonkers. If you have any suggestions, I'd like to do something for the staff. That reminds me, I've got to talk to Maisie." He scribbled down a quick note.

"She's already on it," Hima laughed. "The servers who struggled are coming in for extra training with her and Dakota. I have no doubt she'll straighten them up or ship them out."  

Ashton nodded as Daniel knocked on the office door to bring their lunch. 

"How's it going out there? Let us know if you need anything," Ashton told him.

"We've got this, Boss, enjoy your lunch," Daniel closed the door behind him.

"He's Rafi's brother?" Hima asked before taking a big bite. 

"Cousin, Gloria is his sister," Ashton replied tucking into his roasted corn and quinoa salad with queso fresco. 

"Are you ready for this interview tomorrow? You look tired," Hima looked concerned. 

"I am tired," he shrugged. "I just wanna get this over with. I'm thrilled we're doing so well, but that's not what the press wants to talk about." 

"Don't think about it like that. Anne-Marie's will stand on her own. You've just gotta get through this week. I know it's a lot," her words were half-muffled by a napkin.

"Tomorrow is the worst of it. Mackie called and is available Tuesday at one or Thursday for dinner around four. Since he's already been here for dinner, I thought I'd let Rafi wow him this time," he told her.

"Good idea, try to keep it short because if he drinks he gets super chatty. He gave a lecture at school and came to the bar afterward; he would not shut up," she warned.

"Chatty bastard, got it," he replied and they both laughed. 

Anne-Marie's was his restaurant, but he couldn't have done it without Hima.  She was fresh out of culinary school working as a line cook at the Hilton when he'd discovered her a little over a year ago. Ashton only lasted four months before chafing under the corporate yoke and deciding to strike out on his own. She'd been the first person he'd hired for the restaurant, guaranteeing her first year's salary out of his own pocket. Rafi and DeSean were excellent managers for the kitchen, but Hima was a coach: she understood the business as a whole. He'd let her handle most of the press and promotion, and she'd scored two big interviews.

Gourmet Table had interviewed him last Thursday The piece wouldn't be that in-depth, but they'd spent three hours photographing food. He expected the Men's Life article to focus more on him and his personal life. Calum Hood was known for his sharp pen and take-no-prisoners style.  He'd given Lune Rouge two stars and a biting review during a brief stint at California Culture before he'd become known. It was five years ago, but Ashton still had the clipping somewhere. Calum had branded Lune's food as tasty and imaginative but thought the presentation was lacking in creativity. He'd ripped into the decor, calling it "somewhere between art house and frat house," and labeled Luke and Ashton "spoiled pretty boys pretending to be chefs." Luke had brushed it off with a laugh, but it still bothered Ashton. 

Unlike the Hemmings’, Ashton’s family didn't have money to throw around. He'd started at sixteen, washing dishes and peeling vegetables for Chef François at Bordeaux on Hollywood. He'd taken culinary classes after high school while working full time. Sadly, Chef François had a heart attack and retired around the time he met Luke. 

"You're not listening again," Hima complained, licking her fingers. "Rafi killed it with this wrap. The chicken is amazing, but the cucumber-mint salad and the tamarind chili mayo are next fucking level." 

"You're right, I'm not. Sorry about that," he pushed his plate aside.

"Ok, what's got you so rattled? You've handled the press like a champ up until now. Is it Mackie or Hood? Who needs to catch these hands?" Hima stood and assumed a fighter's stance, bouncing on her toes. 

"Easy there killer, I can defend my own honor. Mackie is an irritating little mosquito. He just wants gossip, but he's got enough readers so we all have to kiss his ass. Hood gave me one of the few bad reviews we got at Lune, and it stuck. He called us frat boys and said we were trying too hard," Ashton rubbed the back of his neck, embarrassed by saying it out loud. 

Hima raised her eyebrows and smirked, "I love it when you're petty. You're always so perfect and Zen, it's annoying." 

"My therapist would disagree. Oh shit, that reminds me," he straightened up in his chair and grabbed his phone. "I've got an appointment at 2:30. I'll be back before 4," he dropped his eyes to the floor. 

"Ashton," her voice was soft but commanding, and he looked up. "I don't know what's going on, and if you don't want to tell me that's fine. I want you to take care of yourself, whatever that takes. Ok?" He nodded and she smiled, "You can tell Dr. Claire that I've confirmed her for 8 pm Saturday, and you're going to personally cook her dinner. We've got the 50th anniversary that night so maybe you could flex and make your Pavlova's? I'll get the berries myself." 

"It's a deal; we can comp them champagne, too. I'd better get going before I get yelled at. She's a stickler for punctuality, I think it's a British thing."  

"I'll hold things down until you get back," Hima gathered up the dishes and headed out with Ashton right behind her. 

*********

Ashton drew a deep breath and exhaled through his nose as the reporter settled in the chair across from him.  Kevin Mackie's column in L.A. Metro was the definitive opinion for restaurants on the West Coast. His readers loved the snarky tone, celeb sightings, and bitchy gossip that peppered his column. His reviews could make or break new restaurants. 

"Let me start off by saying I love the decor of this place. It's rustic, but not in that played out, hipster-in-the-woods nonsense," he leaned in and lowered his voice towards the end of the comment with a coy smirk. 

"You'll find no Mason jars here," Ashton replied, taking the bait. Kevin liked people who liked him, and his most recent column was a snarky takedown of "Pinterest style interiors." Ashton found the article tedious and uninspired, but there was no need to be antagonistic right out of the gate. 

Ashton watched as the reporter ordered his lunch from their server Zia. He guessed Kevin to be in his forties, and he thought he could see fresh hair plugs, bleached blonde, and a bit of Botox. Rumor had it, he'd recently split with his long-time girlfriend over a fling with a much younger waiter. Ashton tried not to pay attention to industry gossip. However, his personal problems made their way into the column more than once, and he couldn't help but feel the tiniest bit of satisfaction at the other man's problems. 

After they'd both ordered, Kevin sat back and took a sip of his Pellegrino water and smacked his lips. "I was here the other night and I have to admit I was prepared to be underwhelmed. A menu based on sandwiches and comfort food sounded like an upscale Applebee's, but I really liked it despite myself. I was surprised to see your main girl was on the mature side, but she's efficient as hell so I get the trade-off." 

Ashton's body tensed at the insult to Maisie, and he took a deep breath. Exhaling through his nose he forced a smile that didn't reach his eyes. Kevin was prattling on with some bit of gossip as Ashton sipped on his iced coffee. 

"So let's start with something simple and ease our way into the rough stuff," Kevin set his voice recorder on the table between them. "Tell me how you formulated your top-secret house coffee blend." 

Ashton broke into a wide grin as he described taking two months to travel and sample different beans, learn more about the roasting and blending process. Kevin sipped his coffee and nodded as if deep in thought, but his eyes kept wandering to Ashton's biceps. He'd been baking this morning so he smelled of cinnamon, his black t-shirt damp and clingy from sweating under his chef coat.

"So we sell the house blend all year, but we have single-source coffee that's seasonal, all of it fair trade," Ashton finished proudly. 

"Coffee has always been your thing if I remember correctly," Kevin said.

"True, true, and once I started roasting my own beans it became a true obsession." 

Kevin followed it up with a couple more softball questions about menu details and sandwiches. Ashton expounded on his love of food. "Cooking for someone is a simple way to show care, to be enjoyed almost as much as dining should be. Food is caring and comfort; it sustains us. It brings people together in a shared experience."

 "Ooh that's a nice pull quote," Mackie chuckled. "I love when y'all have media training. It makes the bullshit flow much smoother.

Ashton seethed but said nothing. He'd watched this man's pettiness wreck a good opening, and Ashton couldn't do that to his crew. Zia brought their lunch. Ashton noticed Kevin had also ordered the chicken mojito wrap. 

"This looks delicious. I think it's a nice touch that you've got so much, let's say diversity, in your restaurant. That you're actually letting them make their own food makes your menu more interesting. Not all restaurants get it. Please tell me you've seen how horribly Finn ripped you off for that tacky Irish pub," Kevin glanced up at him a tiny smirk playing on

"I haven't paid any attention to that," Ashton wanted to end the interview right there. 

"Oh come on, you've had to see how much he's trying to recreate the magic you and Luke once had. The menu is tired, I don't give a fuck if he is Irish. Finn has no imagination yet fancies himself an impresario. Luke's still got it though. He even asked when I was coming here. I didn't tell him of course, I'm a professional after all." 

"Of course," Ashton nodded checking out of the conversation. The reporter talked as he ate which given the wrap he was eating proved especially messy and little flecks of food kept flying his way. Ashton watched the door, nodding at customers, silently willing someone to come and save him. Kevin was still talking about himself when Hima and Zia came out of the kitchen. Ashton tried to catch their eye when he felt a hand on his arm. 

"I wanna ask you about that one," Kevin leaned in so he could almost whisper.

"Who? Hima? What about her?" Ashton was pretty sure he wasn't going to like the answer. 

"What's the deal? I've only ever seen you with Luke. Did your palette change that much? India must've been a real spiritual awakening for you huh?" Kevin winked at him, thinking he was clever. 

Ashton controlled his breathing trying to keep his temper in check. He looked over at the reporter who kept talking oblivious to the situation. 

"Who doesn't like trying something exotic. She seems like a smart cookie. She's darker than most Indian girls you see, like a rich brown butter sauce. I bet she tastes like tumeric though." 

"Get out of my restaurant" Ashton hissed, his hands gripping the table to restrain himself from physical violence. "You are not going to insult my staff, my friends, in their restaurant." 

Kevin started to speak but Ashton cut him off.

"Not another fucking word" he kept his voice at a low growl so as not to cause a scene. He noticed a couple of the closest tables were already watching them. "You've said enough and I'm barely holding back as it is. Get out of my restaurant, don't ever come back, don't ever speak to me again, and if you trash me in this review I promise you I will find you and fuck you up personally." Ashton stood up and Kevin flinched, the sight would have made him laugh if he hadn't been so furious. He stepped back and the reporter scrambled out of his seat leaving his lunch unfinished. Ashton walked back into the kitchen, Hima fast on his heels. He kicked the door open to the break room and headed for the speed bag hanging in the corner. He'd learned the hard way punching walls usually resulted in the wall winning the fight so he'd given himself something easier on his hands. 

Hima watched him from the door, his back and biceps rippling as he went two minutes at full speed. When he finally turned around she could see the anger had cooled somewhat. She hated that her boss looked incredibly sexy when he was angry. 

"Are you gonna tell me what happened?" She asked when he turned back around. 

"Nope, it'll just piss me off all over again, and I gotta get ready for another fucking interview. With a guy who already doesn't like me," Ashton put this coat back on and headed into the line to check on Rafi. 

At least the second interview can't be worse, she thought, wishing she believed it. 

*********

Calum eased his beat up Range Rover into the parking lot of Anne-Marie's amongst the Mercedes, Audi's, and Teslas. He cursed the traffic when he checked the time. He was late, and they were busy. Not a good look he thought, grabbing his bag. 

He smiled at the ladies waiting for a table before introducing himself to the impossibly serene hostess. He was quickly led to a table in an alcove not far from the kitchen. As he pulled out his voice recorder and notebook, he noticed a young woman heading his way. Her black hair was knotted tightly in a bun on top of her head, and her chef's coat had a large streak of what might be hollandaise sauce. He remembered his editor, Jacqueline, telling him Anne-Marie's had a female sous chef. He checked the notes she'd given him quickly as she was stopped by a server. Hima, Culinary Institute of America graduate, 23, Indian maybe? 

"Hello I'm Hima Singh, you must be Calum Hood," she greeted him. From up close, he noticed that her eyes were a rich golden brown and that her smile didn't reach her eyes. He chalked it up to her youth; his editor said she was 23 but she looked like a teenager. He mentally stopped himself there. He'd become jaded by one too many husband/wife teams in recent years trying to rebrand a post-divorce startup as a "new adventure." While the divorce was true, Calum knew Ashton's history.

"Yup that's me, it's a pleasure to meet you, Miss Hima," he shook her hand, relieved to see her relax a bit. 

"Chef Irwin will be out shortly. He's helping with a problem in the back" she glanced towards the kitchen, and Calum had a feeling she was lying.

"Can I get you something while you wait? Do you like coffee? We have a house blend cold brew Chef Irwin selected himself that we roast and grind on-site," she asked motioning towards the sign listing the daily selection of teas and coffee. 

"Thanks, but maybe not coffee. I'm nervous enough without more caffeine," he admitted, "but the lavender and blackberry infused lemonade sounds amazing." He smiled and her face softened. 

"Absolutely," she signaled to Zia who brought Calum his drink and a basket of warm, fluffy yeast rolls with Anne Marie's cinnamon honey butter. The smell reminded Calum he'd skipped breakfast as his stomach began to rumble. 

"So you're Chef Irwin's sous chef? I heard a rumor you were a partner as well," he asked, almost drooling as he tore into the soft bread, watching the steam escape. 

"Yes sir," Hima's smile finally reached her eyes, and she sat down across from him. "When he got his core team together for Anne Marie's, there's three of us total. Desean and Rafi are his kitchen managers, and he gave us the opportunity to buy in as minority investors, no pun intended." 

"These rolls are incredible. Please take one before I finish this whole basket and ruin my lunch. How long have the three of you worked for Ashton, excuse me, Chef Irwin?" He asked.

"Desean and Rafi were part of his Lune Rouge crew. They go way back, but he met me fresh out of school and took me under his wing," she told him.

"Did you go to CIA?" Calum was jotting down notes, getting a feel for the story.

"I wish, it's so pretty up there. My twin brother attended Brown, and I went to Johnson and Wales so we could stay close." 

"You're a twin? Is he a chef as well?" Calum asked.

"Are you kidding? He's a lawyer, of course, my parents had to have one in the family," Hima laughed. 

Zia appeared beside their table. "I'm sorry to interrupt, but Rafi is looking for you, Hima." 

A worried frown replaced her warm smile and Calum felt his nerves bubbling back up. He glanced around and caught sight of Ashton, flushed and sweaty from the heat of the kitchen, poking his head around the corner. Their eyes met, and Calum felt like he'd been hit by lightning.  

Hima saw his reaction and whipped around to see what Calum was looking at. Spotting her boss she quickly excused herself and hurried to the back. 

Zia cleared her throat and Calum realized she was still standing next to his table.

"Would you like to try Rafi's plantain skewers while you wait? It's my favorite thing here, and it'll leave room for whatever these geniuses cook up," she asked with a smile and a wink. 

He nodded and she headed to the server station to put the order in. Calum looked around and started taking notes.  The most striking thing about the decor was how they'd used diffused skylights for soft lighting to accent the Nakashima-style crafted wooden furniture.  Thanks to his Mom’s love of Antiques Roadshow when he was younger Calum discovered his preference for natural grain wood and bespoke pieces. He liked the use of pastel neon signs to complement the muted green and blue tones of the mosaic tile floors and he thought the framed pictures of what he assumed were family photos of the staff provided a really nice personal touch. The largest photo was in the bar of Ashton and his mother, the restaurant's namesake, Anne Marie. 

Zia set a plate down in front of him. "The boss will be out in a minute., Let me get you some more tea," she told him. 

The skewers consisted of chunks of pineapple, plantain, red onion, and sweet potato grilled and dusted with chili powder and brown sugar served with a yogurt sauce for dipping. 

Calum was almost finished with the first one when Ashton came out of the back, making his way towards him. The chef stopped to talk to several customers, the hostess, and Zia before he made it to Calum's table. Cal licked his fingers, wiping his hands clean with a Sani-wipe before standing up and offering a handshake. 

Ashton took his hand and Calum wasn't expecting it to feel so soft. Caught off guard Calum stammered out an introduction as he sat, but he noticed Ashton just nodded, barely listening. 

"If today isn't a good day we can reschedule," Calum sipped his tea, his throat suddenly dry.

"I'm here aren't I?" Ashton snapped. He folded his arms across his chest, his hazel eyes narrowing at Calum. "I still remember your first review you know."

Calum's pulse was racing. He hated confrontation, and he hadn't expected Ashton to kick off right away. He knew he'd better suck it up and apologize if this wasn't going to go completely off the rails. 

"Listen, I wanted to apologize. I shouldn't have been such a dickhead."  As he spoke Ashton scoffed at him and Calum felt his cheeks get warm.  "I was young and stupid. I let something personal affect that review. I'm sorry." 

"Personal? With Luke? What do you mean by that?" Ashton went from annoyed to hostile.

Calum realized he'd said something wrong but wasn't sure what exactly. He was floundering trying to think of what to say next. 

"Nothing with Luke, no no no. I was involved with Finn and we weren't getting along. It's so stupid I know, but I think you're a great chef. The new place looks incredible, and Hima is a delight." 

The anger drained from Ashton's face, leaving him looking empty and sad. His head dropped to his chest, and Calum held his breath waiting for him to speak. 

"I'm really sorry, it's not you, but I can't do this right now. Maybe we can reschedule or something. My apologies, but I have to get back to work," Ashton mumbled, standing up. 

Calum spotted Hima watching them from the podium, chewing on her lip, her black eyes wide with concern as Ashton hurried back to the kitchen. Calum started to get up but she was too quick for him. 

"Well, aren't you lucky. I'm going on my lunch and I hate to eat alone," she slid back into the seat across from him. "Please forgive my boss. He's had a rough day, but I'm better company anyway." She waved to Zia who headed their way. "You gotta try the toasted gnocchi with gorgonzola cream sauce if you like cheese, but if you want something lighter the apple carrot kale wrap is excellent too," she smiled at him, and to her relief he smiled back, both of them realizing the situation might be salvageable after all.

(A/N: y’all my tag list, much like my life, is a hot mess. I know some of what I write isn’t for everyone. If you want tagged in part 2 of this fic or my upcoming smuts, pink kink series, or dad!calum series please let me know. I apologize for my previous mistake)

@sublimehood​ @tea4sykes​ @be-ready-when-i-say-go​ @scribblesos​ @kiiiimberlyriiiicker1995​ @wildmichaelflower​ @castaway-cashton​ @damselindistressanu​ @notinthesameguey​ @cashtonasfuck​ @irwinkitten​ @mermaidcashton​ @malumsmermaid​

#calum hood #ashton irwin #5sos writing collab #cashton smut #cashton slash #Calum Hood smut #ashton irwin smut #cashton #calum 5sos #ashton fanfic #ashton 5sos #5sos

[rayadraws]

end of an era

Oh my gosh anon, our waiting is OVER. Patiently, not so patiently yearning… wishing… hoping… dreaming… we have IT.

I gotta talk about it, because of course I do, ahhh! This will be long, sorry…

I got my hands on the OVA this morning, about half an hour before work. I watched it, yelled on Discord and then went to work, practically vibrating the whole day until I could go home and watch it again and write down my thoughts!

Before release I had seen what available video clips and screenshots we had, plus a summary given to me by a Japanese mutual, in somewhat limited English. I was unsure what to expect but I ended up enjoying it a lot more than I thought I might! I understand that there’s a lot one can be confused or perhaps even put off by in the OVA but. Well. I enjoy seeing a vulnerable Genos (if like 90 % of the fanfic I’ve written wasn’t an indication lol) so I just ate it all UP. And since I’ve written a fic about him getting amnesia specifically, I was very curious to see how off the mark I was.

I won’t give a proper summary, there’s a good one by Nysh for that. Nor the animation. JC Staff is what JC Staff is. I’m instead going to just… muse and compare and go wild with my own personal headcanons - in that regard, this OVA was excellent, because it does give some hints about what makes Genos tick. Hold on to your butts…

Oh, and need I say that there will be SPOILERS? XD

—

Before I wrote my own amnesia fic, I did some research. So, what is amnesia? Well, the popular TV show version is one thing, of course RL is another. There are several kinds of amnesia, with different causes and different treatments. But the two main categories are longterm memory loss, where you can’t recall past memories (often up to what caused the amnesia) and short term memory loss, where you have difficulty forming new memories. You can get one or both. In my fic, Genos deals with both. In the OVA, he appears to have longterm memory loss only, as he tries to find Fubuki again to help him defeat the monster (if only he knew Saitama would by far have been a better choice!), so he remembers her. Not to mention at the end, when he’s trying desperately to apologize…

There is no instant cure for amnesia. Emotional support is important, medication (if it’s caused by underlying disease, which it can be) and psychological therapy can also be useful. Saitama is doing the right thing in the OVA by remaining calm and trying to avoid agitating Genos or pushing him to remember.

After he first wakes up, Genos is very lost, he only remembers his name and that he’s a cyborg - but not why! It’s really heartbreaking when you think a little more about it - imagine waking up in a cyborg body and not remembering why/how that happened… We actually discussed that on Discord before we had the OVA, what if he wakes up and doesn’t remember… but nahh, that’d be too dark, right? APPARENTLY NOT.

I can’t explain why Genos would be so heavily influenced by media around him as he is. That’s just made up for the humour… but if I were to try to find an actual in-world explanation, hm… Well, we do know he can be a Drama Boy. We also know he tends to be very standoffish and reserved towards most people, which I think is related to his trauma, in a few ways (he doesn’t want to get close to people due to the risk of once again experiencing the pain of losing them - and spending four years more or less on your own during your late teenage years is not an ideal environment for learning how to socialize…). We also know that when Genos finds something or someone he considers important, he latches on. So you could see it as being part of that, perhaps. Lost and confused he looks for anything that would make some kind of sense, trying to find a sense of direction or idea on whom he might be.

What exactly did you forget? Your quest for revenge or the sale you briefly remember later? Knowing Genos, it could be either…

He reacts in confusion to his body telling him that there’s an elevated energy signature nearby - I LOVED this. I wonder if he saw it as a note on his HUD, or if it’s more ingrained, more subtle. The way he got antsy and couldn’t sit still… it’s like his proximity sensors act as an extra sense, like Spiderman’s spider sense…. An extra sense that’s probably saved his life on more than one occasion.

He takes off, feeling like it’s his body moving, not him. I don’t think his body has an separate will of its own, but I have always hc:ed that he probably has systems that can calculate stuff for him mid-fight - how to move, where to release his weapons and at what strength etc. A little helpful internal computer. It’s a LOT for one little monkey brain to keep track of, so it wouldn’t be crazy to think he has some help with that, I think. And here, I don’t think his body is truly moving on his own without him having any control of it… more like muscle memory? Like there are times where I think I’ve forgotten a password to my work computer if I’ve been away for a week but then I sit down and my fingers remember the typing motions on their own. I imagine it’s something like that. He doesn’t know what to do, so he’s going where his instincts tell him.

Fubuki, ah, ever the scheming one. I enjoyed her showing up and being casual at Sai’s place because that’s how I like to write her in my fics. You can see the exact second when she goes into Business Mode, playing hard to get to lure Genos closer. Too bad she didn’t consider just how much his personality changed too, came on way too strong in the end…

And!!! A couple of times Genos puts his hand in defense, without seeminly knowing why, or doing it intentionally really. Hmmmm where…. have I seen this before…

He jumped when a warning flashed at the corner of his vision. It was his proximity sensors going off, his HUD informed him. On instinct, he ducked down behind the nearest tree. He should go back. Kuseno would keep him safe. But if he moved, the stranger might see him too. Don’t turn your back on an enemy.

His sensors told him the direction and the general size of the approaching being, but he couldn’t actually see it between the tall trees. It was moving very fast. He ducked lower, ferns brushing softly against his cheek. On instinct, he held his palm out in front of him, open and pointed at whatever was approaching him.

I am SO glad that I called this in my fic, it’s a small detail but it adds a lot I think! Raising his palm as a threat is second nature to Genos, even when he doesn’t consciously know why he’s doing it…

It’s interesting that throughout, Genos keeps referring to himself as “boku”, which is usually reserved for a male who is younger than 16 (though there are exceptions - Amai Mask also uses it, probably as part of his charming idol persona). Usually Genos refers to himself as “ore”, which is mostly used by adult men, more informal and can be viewed as disrespectful, depending on circumstance (Genos is not typically respectful towards people, if they are not Kuseno or Saitama). Combined with how meek he is, man… Okay, ONE said that before the mad cyborg attack, Genos’ personality was about the same as it is now. So why is he so different? Well… I don’t think that’s too shocking, really. I mean, if you lost all your memories and sense of self, realized you were a cyborg for some reason???, ended up alone in a weird city, not knowing where you were or what to do, and suddenly people pointed at you asking you to fight a terrifying monster even though you have no idea how to fight… you’d probably be terrified too! I think we can assume his personality change is caused by his amnesia. But we can probably also assume that a Genos who never had his village attacked and never got involved with fighting/being a hero would not grow to be exactly the same as canon, anyway. He’d probably be a rude brat… but yeah. At least a few degrees less aggressive/ready to throw down!

Again with the hand!

A thought I had reading the exchange between the monster and Genos… it reads almost like how you might expect Genos’ meeting with the mad cyborg might have looked like, only in a sad, reverse kind of way. These lines - “I’m not ready yet… I’m not ready to die here… not yet!” - like, dude… that sounds exactly what might have gone through his head back then. Maybe the first inkling of his past returning to him at that second…

He feels something, remembers something, is shocked.. and it comes back… “I cannot win like this!”. And then he remembers Kuseno, and Saitama…

Once more, those lines together: “I’m not ready yet… I’m not ready to die here… not yet! I cannot win like this!”

We’ll probably never get it verified, but I find it very, very likely he used more or less these exact words, or something very similar, after meeting the mad cyborg.

Also, as much as I appreciate the closeness between Genos and Saitama, I AM glad that he remembered Kuseno first - he’s known Kuseno for four years, Saitama for less than 2 months, when this takes place. It’s only right and it fits very well with his character introduction too, where he thought he was dying and his last thought was an apology to Kuseno. A nice nod. I enjoyed that animation sequence a lot too!

When he remembers who he is, Genos feels so bad about his actions but he still can’t deny what he said before… Saitama’s face… omg… Bless them both.He brings Saitama wild/game meat - d'ya figure he bought it or, um… got it for free? I mean, that’s… exactly the kind of creature he fought… maybe he’s learnt Sensei’s ways…

And Saitama is happy he’s back. He cares about Genos! He likes him like he is, as intense and blunt and socially awkward as he is! What a sweet note to end the OVA on!

#opm s2 #ova 3 #anime spoilers #ova spoilers #amnesia #ahhhhAAAAAHHH

[recentanimenews]

OPINION: How Umineko Changed My Entire Approach to Fictional Media

All screenshots captured on Playstation 3 by author

  The following article contains a discussion of thematic elements and motives that appear during the second half of Umineko When They Cry. While no actual plot details will be revealed, some might still consider it spoilery. So if you want to experience one of the greatest pieces of fiction ever completely untainted, you should check it out on Steam right now.

  The internet is pretty rad, isn't it? You can follow your favorite creators, watch tons of awesome shows, and talk about your favorite things with other people. How about we do that right now? Well, too bad, because YOUR FAVORITE THING IS BAD, ACTUALLY! You made the mistake of posting about it online, so prepare to be sent lots of negative comments linking to 5-hour video essays pointing out every single flaw about your favorite story and why you are wrong for enjoying it!

    It's a situation I'm sure many of us have experienced at least a couple of times online. While the internet can be fantastic for finding like-minded people to chat with about things you deeply love, it can also be a gamble and sometimes you end up in a discussion where your conversational partner seems more interested in showing off their intellectual superiority over a work instead of openly discussing its merits or flaws. I certainly know — I used to be one of them.

  "As I've eaten my way through countless tales to escape boredom, I haven't really been eating them. I've just been killing them." - Hachijo Tohya

  The rise of social media has opened the gates for some incredible in-depth discussion and has changed the way I experience things over the years. But there is also a dark side to the discussions on the internet and that is the trap of wanting to feel intelligent in how you approach stories, which is often accompanied by not really being emotionally earnest. I myself tried to come off as perceptive by pointing out so many mistakes and bad things about media which led to exactly one thing: me becoming absolutely miserable. All I cared about was consuming as many things as possible (FOMO's also one of the many downsides of social media) and appearing as "smart" about them as I could. Until one fateful 10-month stretch in which I played a certain visual novel known as Umineko When They Cry.

    Umineko really is tailor-made for catching people with that mindset: It depicts a mystery story about how mystery stories are told and consumed — and what genre would be more fitting to challenge someone concerned with intellectual superiority than one that is all about the clash of Author vs Reader? 

  "Books aren't a competition. It's not about who's read the most. But boasting that you've read all your ever need to read is just as wrong-headed" - Battler Ushiromiya

  Umineko starts off with a well-known mystery trope: A family meets up in a mansion on a distant island, gets cut off by a storm, and then slowly gets murdered one after the other until everyone is dead. And just as in Agatha Christie's And Then There Were None (which served as one of Umineko's main inspirations), a bottle detailing the events of the incident to the public eventually washes ashore. But this only serves as Umineko's prologue, as its main character Battler quickly finds himself facing off against a self-proclaimed Golden Witch known as Beatrice on a meta-narrative level where he must prove these gruesome killings could have been committed by a human culprit, or be forced to acknowledge her existence and allow her to fully revive.

    Thus begins a game of chess filled with exceedingly preposterous murders in which our protagonist's family gets killed by demons, giant goat butlers, and sharpshooting bunny girls — all supplemented by the so-called Red Truth, a truth-revealing tell not unlike Martha's vomiting in Knives Out. Battler must use these authorial proclamations and find a loophole that enables him to explain the murders in a way that does not frame any of his beloved family members as the killer and still allows him to deny the existence of the gruesome and torturous witch.

    Umineko's all about how stories are perceived and told by both their creator and their audience. It explores how remarks by the author in every situation — no matter how off-hand they might be — can be used, applied, and twisted to shed a completely different light on a story regardless of its original intent. It shows how adding meaning to a narrative that wasn't meant to be there can both add to or subtract from its most important element: The heart its creator wanted to convey.

  "If I had found meaning in only exposing the truth, I would have sunk to the level of a truth-revealing witch and fallen into ruin, spreading only hatred, [...], crushing and refusing to acknowledge anything but the particular truth I seek, unable to escape the cycle of misery." - Ange Ushiromiya

  Umineko goes through many different angles of how we create, share, and discuss the tales that fuel our discourse. It ponders the importance of rules when creating storylines and tackles how easy it is to overlook major themes and motives by just focussing on minute details that are open to misinterpretation and irrelevant to a story's soul. It even includes the typical misanthropic yet oh so intelligent detective that usually gets idolized in most media (think BBC's Sherlock or House, M.D.) and puts them at odds with every other character because who would really want to cooperate with someone that completely disregards you as an equal human being and merely perceives you as an amalgation of hints, motives and alibis?

  "Sheesh! Just one more step and I'd have been able to take a heart as innocent as the smooth sand just after a wave had pulled back and tear it to bits. What a shame. This isn't fun anymore." - Erika Furudo

  And just when you start to really get into Umineko, it moves away from its main conflict, providing you important hints for its solution which most readers ignore as they aren't presented with facts and logic but on an emotional level distanced from the characters we long to get back to. But most importantly, it conveys how one single element is so indispensable to enjoying the narrative odysseys we embark on in our lives, to cherishing the characters that are presented to us in these tales, and to truly understand a story's message behind things like story developments, plot twists, and narrative tricks. I, of course, am talking about love.

  Be it the love you feel for characters, for certain staging elements, phrasings of prose, orchestrations of music, design of sound effects, implementations of themes and motives, or cinematographic puzzle pieces — the one thing that is indispensable to truly enjoy all kinds of media, is love. Or, to quote Umineko directly, "Without love, it cannot be seen."

    By the time, I was nearing the end of Umineko's eight main chapters, it had transformed from an intellectual battle between author and reader to an all-out war of a story against its community of readers who simply wanted to tear it down to cold, hard "facts." I had spent ten months and over 100 hours. The first half took eight of those months to get through (owing to a few lengths in Episodes 2 and 4), I finished the second half in less than two despite my busy schedule. I even dedicated a whole 15-hour marathon to the final episode as I was too glued to the grand finale to move away from it.

    A new me came out the end. I no longer had an interest in tearing apart media for minor missteps. I enjoyed them much more deeply and honestly and began taking my time with the things I consumed. Instead of filling my plate at the buffet of stories as much as I could, I gave each dish its own course on the menu so I could appreciate its flavor in a different way — one bite at a time and not stuffed up simply to give the outward appearance of a seasoned gourmet. And for that, I will never be able to thank Ryukishi07 and his co-creators at 07thExpansion enough.

  "The point of theory-making is not to create a culprit or to trample the truths that lie in the hearts of those who have not sinned. If you want to play detective, don't neglect the heart. Otherwise, we're just intellectual rapists. Don't forget it!!" - Willard H. Wright

  If you are interested in reading Umineko When They Cry, you can find both its Question Arcs and its Answer Arcs on Steam, GOG, and MangaGamer. You can also read the manga adaptation digitally on Bookwalker (though I personally recommend the visual novel for its award-worthy soundtrack alone).

  What work of fiction has touched your life in a profound way? Tell us in the comments!

      René Kayser works for Crunchyroll as a PR and Social Media Manager in Germany. You can find him on Twitter @kayserlein where he tries to get people into Umineko every single day.

  Do you love writing? Do you love anime? If you have an idea for a features story, pitch it to Crunchyroll Features!

By: [email protected]

#Anime #News #Latest in Anime News by Crunchyroll!

[satoshi-mochida]

The Final Fantasy Portal Site has published the first in a three-volume series of Final Fantasy IX interviews in celebration of the game’s 20th anniversary. Final Fantasy IX first launched for PlayStation on July 7, 2000.

The first interview is with Final Fantasy IX event design and scenario writer Kazuhiko Aoki. Volumes two and three will feature artist Toshiyuki Itahana and director Hiroyuki Ito.

Get the full interview with Aoki below.

―Final Fantasy IX is sometimes introduced with the phrase “returning to roots.” Where did Final Fantasy IX sit in the minds of the development team?

Aoki: “The slogans ‘returning to roots’ and ‘return of the crystal’ were there from the start. That’s why the setting of the game also has a medieval fantasy theme.”

―It is true that compared to the science fiction elements of FFVII and FFVIII, Final Fantasy IX made a sudden return to classic fantasy. There were even references to past FF titles, like character and vehicle names. Were those concepts also planned to be included from the beginning of development under the theme of “returning to roots”?

Aoki: “There were some things that were planned from the beginning, and then there were other elements that came about from those in charge of each part of the game during the creation process.

“The newborn chocobo, named Bobby Corwen…smash those names together and you get Boco.

“The foundation is 10 percent, and the remaining 90 percent comes from individual creators putting their own ideas and heart into a project. I think that’s the creation process of not only FF, but all games from Square Enix.”

―Each main character of Final Fantasy IX carries their own background story into the battles they face. Do you have a favorite character? Please tell us your reasons as well, if you have any.

Aoki: “I did my best not to have any favorites, so as not to be biased toward any specific character.

“There were backstories we wanted to elaborate on more, but sadly had to give up on due to time and data constraints.

“At the time I wished I could have developed how Zidane is afflicted by the difference in social status between him and Garnet a little more. Illustrating the breakdown of relations with the nobles in Treno due to their disapproval of Zidane and Garnet’s relationship, Zidane butting up against the social confines he faces and the incredible power Garnet holds as royalty, and how Zidane gets back up on his feet despite all of that—I felt that would have done a lot to help further portray him as a character.”

―The NPCs are also very well developed. What about them?

Aoki: “I don’t have any biases when it comes to NPC characters either. There actually wasn’t any differentiation in my mind between main characters and sub characters. Once the game’s story started to come to life on screen, my drive to develop each character even further – the steadfast reliability of Marcus or Garnet’s internal struggles, for example—only got stronger.”

―The Tantalus members Genero, Zenero, Benero and all their siblings are an unusual bunch. How did they come to be?

Aoki: “There wasn’t a trace of them until right before the game went gold. Not only limited to Final Fantasy IX, each FF series title has a period of about three to four months of quality improvements and brushing up after all elements that will be included in a game are implemented. How can we make it more interesting, what would make it easier to understand, what new discoveries can we find to add to the experience…as a creator you approach the process with a feeling similar to recreating something entirely. Those siblings came about suddenly right in the middle of that final tweaking for Final Fantasy IX.”

―The characters in Final Fantasy IX are built shorter than in previous FF games. Was there a reason for that?

Aoki: “I don’t know the reason for making the characters shorter in stature, but I did often hear that the cutscene team had a hard time making use of the know-how they gained working on Final Fantasy VIII. It was apparently a lot of trial and error.

“The characters in Final Fantasy IX excel at showing a certain sweetness or silliness, but even when they take on a totally different serious tone their expressions are so genuine. I feel that Final Fantasy IX had quite a good balance going in that sense.”

―Final Fantasy IX is known for its many popular and memorable lines. Whose idea was it to put together the loading screen of CG screenshots overlaid with words from the game and art?

Aoki: “The cutscene leader and event staff made that by picking out lines from the game. It was also the manifestation of a strong desire to show what kind of characters these were.”

―There were also many monsters with unique gimmicks, such as Ragtime Mouse’s quiz-style battle. Do you have a favorite monster or gimmick used by one?

Aoki: “I’m not sure if you could call it a unique monster, but my favorite are the black mages who appear in Cleyra. Your party characters don’t do a victory pose even if you win against them. That came from the battle system team’s consideration of the scene those battles take place in. You grow used to the characters celebrating when they win a battle, so I was really surprised the first time I saw that.

“I don’t know if this is still true, but development happened with next to no meetings between the event and battle design teams. Although that’s not to say that those teams didn’t get along.”

―Final Fantasy IX has a lot of mini games, many of which are quite difficult. Are there any you find particularly memorable?

Aoki: “Chocobo Hot and Cold. It came from the director wanting some contents that would allow traveling all over the game world. The concept came together in less than 30 minutes, but the actual creators who worked on the mini-game put a lot of time into it. Every last detail was done with such care.”

―Final Fantasy IX’s soundtrack was handled by Mr. Nobuo Uematsu. We feel that music is another important factor in expressing characters or story. If there are any songs from Final Fantasy IX that really stand out in your memory, please tell us about them.

Aoki: “That would be the song that Mr. Uematsu played for me the first time he worked at the Hawaii office.

“It was in response to me asking if he had any recommended songs from the new game—I got an idea for part of the story the second it came on. That song would eventually be titled ‘You’re Not Alone.’

“I asked, ‘Are there going to be any more changes to it?’ and he responded, ‘Yes, sorry… I’d like to tweak it a little more.’ It wasn’t finalized until the last minute, so I’m sure he really struggled with the composition of that piece.”

―Was there anything during development that was especially challenging or that sticks out in your mind?

Aoki: “The last few weeks were a battle with data restrictions. We had data increasing every day, having to think about where to divide the story so we’d end up with an amount that fit on each of the four discs. That fine-tuning took some real mental gymnastics.”

―If there’s anything else from your experiences during the development of Final Fantasy IX or messages for the many people who still love Final Fantasy IX you’d be willing to share, we would love to hear it.

Aoki: “There were about 300 people at the party celebrating Final Fantasy IX’s completion. It was developed by a team divided between Japan and Hawaii, so about one-third of the faces there I had never seen before…I was surprised all over again at how many people were involved in the project.

“I’m incredibly happy that Final Fantasy IX is loved by so many people; that’s been a huge motivator and confidence booster when facing jobs I’ve had since. I think that’s true not only for me, but also the many creators who worked on Final Fantasy IX as well. It would be nice to celebrate the game’s 20th anniversary with everyone who was at the post-launch party.

“Near the end of that party, there was a moment when the sound effect team went up on the venue’s stage. ‘In Final Fantasy X, there’s going to be this thing called Blitzball, and there will be a scene with the spectators cheering. We’d love if you would all be willing to help with that!’ they said. And I thought ‘…Oh, they’ve already started working on X.’ Just when I thought things were finished, they had already begun a new Final Fantasy. It really hit me being there, this is how the Final Fantasy series continues on forever.”

―Thank you for your time today!

Final Fantasy IX is available for PlayStation, PlayStation 3, PSP, and PS Vita via PSone Classics, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Switch, PC via Steam, iOS, and Android.

#Final Fantasy IX #Final Fantasy 9 #Final Fantasy #Kazuhiko Aoki #Square Enix #Gematsu #I never did finish IX. ^^;

[awhitehead17]

Can You Quit Life?

Tim & Jason, Hurt/Comfort, Jason is a good brother, Stress, Burn Out, Break Downs, Brotherly Love, General Rating.

Summary: He quits everything, actually he just quits life. Was that allowed? To quit life? Was it even possible? Tim’s not sure but with the way he’s going, he’ll find a way to make it possible.

Also on AO3

Enjoy! :D

He’s done. That’s it he gives up.

There’s so much to do but it’s like he has no energy left to do it. As he goes to do one of his many tasks he gets a few minutes into it and instantly wants to give up. One look at the screen where the document was just wants to make him tear his hair out. He’s now gotten to the point where there’s so much to do that he doesn’t want to do any it.

He wants to cry. He wants scream, shout, whack something. There’s too many emotions running through his head and its messing with him. There’s so many things that are demanding his attention, there’s so much that he’s trying to juggle around in his life and it’s all just stressing him out.

He doesn’t know what to do any more. 

Currently he’s sat at his desk in his room at the Manor, working on his laptop trying to do corrections on an essay for school. Well that was one task he was attempting to do, the other was a report for a recent Titan’s mission he had just finished.

The essay was frustrating him in many ways. The teacher had left comments on where he needs to expand his explanation, how he needed to add more screenshots and go into further depth with his analysis. He gets what he needs to do but how was he supposed to do it? It wasn’t clear on how much more detail he needed to go into, he’s pretty sure there’s no way he can explain his point any more than what he already has done.

Then there’s the report which was bugging him. As he tries to work on his essay all he could think about was the report, but then when he worked on the report all he could think about was the goddamn essay!

That’s of course not mentioning everything else on his mind and plate that he’s trying to deal with, these just happen to be the two current things.

The report was driving him mad because whenever he would type something it wouldn’t make sense. Then once he got further into the report the order and timings of things didn’t make sense, it was like all of his thoughts were just scattered on the page with no structure. Nothing made sense! He couldn’t give Cyborg a crappy report like that! It needed to be right, it needed to be perfect, it need to be exactly parallel to what happened on the mission.

He was ready to call it quits. After flicking between the two documents for the last three hours Tim was ready to cry and just give up.

Those two things were just start of the list. He also had the lingering weekly patrol report to write up which was hovering in the background, include that with all of his school work, then trying to fit in his social life (one that barely exists), then the training, patrol and even the time for himself. It was just too much and Tim was done with everything.

How do people do it? How do they manage to juggle so much around. Like working a full time job, then going home and looking after a family, they gotta go shopping at some point and they can still meet up with friends. How do they do it? Because Tim was struggling, he knows he was struggling. At this point he’s just on the verge of some sort of mental break down and burnout.

But it’s not like he could tell anyone about this. He couldn’t go to his family, they struggle enough with their own problems, they don’t need Tim’s grief added to their plates. It’s the same with his friends. They’re all busy with their own shit, they don’t need Tim complaining about his life to them when they have much bigger problems.

He leans back in his chair and takes a deep breath before letting it out. Okay, one thing at a time. That’s how it’s done right? He looks back at his computer screen and finds the report currently open, he scrolls to the top and plans on reading it through, maybe even just re-writing it and starting from scratch.

He only gets a couple of paragraphs in before he wants to smash his computer because of how frustrated he is with it. Tim reaches up and grips his hair and lets out a long agitated noise before thumping his head down onto his desk with a loud bang.

He doesn’t register the pain that spikes through his forehead at contact. All he could think about was why it wasn’t working. What was he doing wrong?

The next noise Tim lets out was close to a pathetic whimper. He was done. That’s it, he quits.

He quits everything, actually he just quits life. Was that allowed? To quit life? Was it even possible? Tim’s not sure but with the way he’s going, he’ll find a way to make it possible.

The sudden knock at his door gets his attention. Just as it begins to open Tim bolts upright in his chair. He spins around and watches as Jason strolls casually into his room, a smile was on his face and he was holding something in his hands.

“Hey Timbers, I was wondering – you okay?”

Jason changes his sentence halfway through once he looks at Tim. Tim watches as his older brother looks him over. The expression on his face must have given him away or something so Tim tries to make it go blank as possible.

He’s just as annoyed as he is relieved at Jason’s appearance. His brother was now offering a distraction from his work but at the same time he kinda interrupted Tim’s early mid-life crises and has put a hold on his breakdown. There was no way Tim was going to break down in front of his brother, in front of Jason of all people.  

Tim shrugs, trying to act nonchalant, “Nothings wrong. I’m fine. What’s up?”

Jason wasn’t buying his act. Tim could tell by the way his brother stares at him with narrowed eyes and the way his lips press tightly together.

Tim finds his patience was suddenly running low. He sends the older a glare, “Was there something you wanted Jason or not. I’m busy, so…” He trails off hoping to prompt the man into sharing.

It’s a few moments before he answers. Tim watches as Jason looks at him before glancing down at the object in his hands. After what seems like a mental debate, Jason tucks the object into his jacket pocket before taking a seat on the edge of Tim’s bed facing him.

“You know what,” Jason says leaning back onto his elbows, pinning him with a look, “It doesn’t matter. How are you Tim? It’s been a while since we had a catch up.”

Tim stares at him trying to understand what just happened. Jason was now lying on his bed, looking at him expectantly and Tim just had to somehow accept that? His brother does have a point, it has been a while since they had a catch up, but now wasn’t the time to do that. As Tim was stressing about just minutes ago, he was busy, he didn’t need to deal with Jason’s games at that moment, nor was he in the mood for it.

He takes a breath and lets it out, “Jason, what do you want? I know you didn’t just come up here for a chat. I’m busy so can we have this conversation later on, please.”

“Uhhhh, na.” His leg comes up and kicks Tim’s chair, “What’s got you so busy that you can’t talk to your own brother?”

Everything.

Tim slaps his foot away and glares at him, “Just a school report that I need to get done.”

No, that wasn’t it. It was a school essay and a Titan’s report. Great, now Tim can’t even tell the difference between them. God he needs a break.

Jason makes a humming sound, “Oh yeah? Is it interesting? Can I help at all?”

“Don’t you have anything better to do?” Tim snaps at him, having had enough. This wasn’t helping his situation at all, he was no closer to finishing both documents than what he was three hours ago.

Something in his tone must have finally snapped Jason out of his game because his brother was giving him a concerned look. “Hey, don’t get all snappy with me Tim. I was just asking. You seem off, is there anything you want to talk about?”

Tim grits his teeth to stop himself from snapping a second time. “I told you, I’m fine. Just busy.”

He could feel all of his emotions stirring once again, maybe stronger than before. The stress and the frustration blending into one where it’s becoming overwhelming. Tim could feel it building up inside of his chest. His breathing was getting faster and he had to start blinking to try and keep the tears at bay. He wasn’t going to cry. He wasn’t going to break down.

Jason pushes himself up and perches on the end of Tim’s bed facing him, he laces his hands together and rests his arms on his knees as he leans forward. Concern and worry crossing over his features as he quietly talks, any sense of humour or annoyance completely gone.

“Tim you’re not okay. I can see it dude. You’re struggling, trying to keep yourself together even when it all gets too much. Talk to me Tim, tell what’s going on.”

Tim takes a shaky breath trying to keep the last bit of control of his emotions he can, it was right in his chest, a pressure just waiting to burst, he could also feel it behind his eyes wanting to come out in waves of tears.

He looks away from Jason and swallows thickly, “There’s nothing to talk about.” His voice was rough and thick with emotion. At this point it was taking all of Tim’s willpower in stopping himself from breaking.

“Timmy,” Jason sighs, “I know you probably don’t want to hear this but I’m going to tell you anyway. It’s okay to ask for help, you’re allowed to say you’re struggling, that you’re stressed or that you need a break. It’s okay to talk to someone.”

Tim shakes his head in refusal and the first few tears escape his eyes as his breath hitches. He clenches his eyes tight and refuses to look at Jason. It’s not okay, it’ll never be okay.  

“I know we haven’t had the best relationship in the past Timbo, so it doesn’t have to be me you talk to. It can be anyone. Bruce, Alfred, Dick, Cass one of your Titan buddies. Anyone you feel comfortable with Tim.”

Tim shakes his head again, “I can’t Jason!” He chokes out. “I just can’t!”

“You can Tim. It’s okay. I promise, keeping it locked inside you like this doesn’t help.”

The tears were staring to fall down his face more freely and Tim couldn’t stop them this time. He swipes ferociously at his eyes in a poor attempt to keep Jason from seeing them. It was too late though. The pressure that was building inside of his chest was too much to ignore, he found it hard to breathe as every time he tried his breath would hitch with a sob.

“C’mere Timmy.”

Before he knew what was happening, Jason was there grabbing one of his shaking hands and pulling him up to his feet. Without any second thoughts Jason pulls Tim into a hug. His brother’s arms wrap around him and hold him close.

Unable to resist Tim buries his face into Jason’s chest, letting his arms wrap around the man and cling tightly to him as everything he had been feeling finally breaks free as the dam collapses. He sobs into Jason chest, letting out pitiful cries as he does. All the stress, frustration, anger and annoyance he had been feeling finally comes out in one big messy, snotty break down.  

Tim feels Jason’s arms around him as they hold him tightly. One hand was resting on his head, the man’s fingers gently going through his hair while the other rubs down his back and sides. Doesn’t that just make him cry more? Why was Jason allowing this? Wasn’t he just wasting the man’s time, uselessly sobbing into him, having an inevitable break down that’s finally caught up to him.

Tim didn’t understand, but all he could do in that moment was cry.

It was a while until he was able to calm down and get control of himself. Even when the tears finally stop he keeps his head tucked in Jason’s chest, a lame attempt to avoid making eye contact with his brother after all of that. His head was hurting now too, a throbbing going on inside of his skull from where he had been crying.

Didn’t he say that he wasn’t going to break down? Well apparently his body didn’t get the memo and what makes it worse is that he broke in front of Jason off all people.

Even after his crying tampers off Jason stays there holding him, stroking his back and head with comfortingly. Tim didn’t want to face his brother because of the embarrassment but also because this was nice. Now that his head was sort of cleared, he could appreciate the gesture even as embarrassing as it was.

Several more moments go by and soon enough Jason stops his actions, his arms release Tim from the hold. Tim doesn’t fight it as he’s gently pushed away from Jason’s body but he doesn’t exactly co-operate either. He refuses to look up at his brother.

Jason seems to have a different tactic however, he moves them around and pushes Tim down onto the edge of his bed while he settles in a crouch just in front of him. Tim adverts his eyes to stop himself looking at the man, how was he supposed to face Jason after that meltdown?

“How do you feel now?” Jason asks quietly, reaching up to brush a thumb underneath his eyes where there were now tear stains on his cheeks.

Tim swallows and responds, “I feel fine.” His voice was thick and sounded wrecked when he spoke,

At his answer Jason huffs and smacks him on the back of the head. Tim squawks at the treatment and snaps his eyes to his brother in a mild glare, “Hey! What was that for?”

The hands move so they’re now cupping his face, Tim finds himself unable to look away from his brother now. It’s only then that he realises that Jason played him. Annoyed as he was with the action Tim has to admit that was a good move.

“’I feel fine’ is not an answer Tim. I’m going to ask you again and if you say ‘fine’ or anything similar to that word you’re going to get more than just a light smack on the back of the head, you understand.” Jason doesn’t wait for him to respond, he quickly moves onto asking his question. “How do you feel now?”

Tim stares at him, biting down the instinctive response of saying he was fine. Why was Jason doing this? Why was his brother putting so much effort and time into making him talk and seeing how he was? Tim didn’t get it. As for his own emotions and feelings… well he didn’t really know those either.

He was of course confused, confused by Jason’s current behaviour. But inside, maybe lighter? He didn’t feel like he couldn’t breathe anymore, that pressure that was building in his chest was now completely gone, allowing him the room to breathe easily once again.

“Lighter,” he says eventually. “The pressure isn’t in my chest anymore.”

Jason smiles, “That’s good.” He let’s go of Tim’s face and pulls away slightly, making room between them. “I’m not going to ask you anymore on feelings because I know that you’ll just end up recoiling, so instead I’m going to ask, what made you get into this state? Obviously it’s all been building up but what pushed you over the edge Tim?”

Tim swallows and glances over at his desk where his laptop was, the screen now dark from where it’s clearly gone to sleep. He’s glad Jason didn’t ask about his feelings because he’s not entirely sure he could put into words what he was feeling.

He moves his focus back to Jason, “My work I guess. It was just stressing me out and then you came in and started questioning me on it and I got overwhelmed I guess and then boom, it exploded.” He makes a small explosion gesture with his hands as he talks

Jason studies him for a moment before he’s nodding, “Okay, you know what I have a plan.”

Tim frowns at hearing that, “Your plans usually suck.”

His brother makes a noise in protest and smacks his knee, “I’ll have you know I can come up with good plans, occasionally, this being one of those times.” At Tim’s sceptical look he rolls his eyes and explains his plan. “What we’re going to do is right now, absolutely nothing. We’ll set up shop in the media room and chill out watching a couple of movies before calling it a night.”

Tim opens his mouth to protest but Jason cuts him off with a stern look and a raised finger, “Then tomorrow you and I are going to go through one of your projects and get that completed. After that we’ll take a break and depending on the time we’ll start your second project.”

Tim stares at him in disbelief. Why was Jason planning this? Surely his brother had more important things to do than spend his time with Tim helping him on his projects.

“We’ll go through your work together, work out what’s getting you agitated and work through the problem together. It’ll help having someone talking you through on what you can write and in what order.”

Tim was still staring at him. Of course what he was saying makes sense but Tim couldn’t get over what his brother was offering. All he could get out was a quiet, “Thank you Jason.”

Seeming to know what he was thinking Jason stands up, stretches his legs and looks down at him, “Tim I care about you. That’s why I want to help. You clearly need it and this way you won’t be getting smothered by the Golden Boy or Daddy Bats. We’ll take it slow and together we’ll get through this, you’ll get through this alright.”

Swallowing again, Tim nods, “Sure. thank you, I really appreciate it. I’m sorry for breaking down on you like that. I really wasn’t meant to.”

“Don’t be an idiot Timbo. It was clearly long overdue but now it’s happened lets work on not letting it happen again yeah?” He holds out a hand to Tim to help him up, “Now come on, it’s movie time. I’ll even let you pick.”

Tim takes his hand and together they make their way down to the media room and Tim can say he feels lighter than before. He knows that it’s still going to be stressful when he goes back to the work but he thinks having Jason there to help guide him on what to do will be a major help. Both with his work and keeping his emotions under control.

He can do this, he can get through this. Well hopefully. He figures he’ll just have to take it day by day and now Jason will be there to help him through it, he thinks it may be possible after all.

#Tim Drake #Jason Todd #big brother jason #Jason is a good brother #hurt and comfort #stress #break downs #burn out #Brotherly Love #general rating #fanfiction #insecurities