#it just depends on what brand of pathetic you decide it is I guess

[rentumblsstuff]

Every time I hear that one viral audio that’s like

“Babe, come back to bed!”

“Not now, Darling, I’m not done with my online banking.”

“FUCK, that’s so hot!!”

“That’s why I do it.”

I always think of Paulkins and Lautski and I can’t figure out which it fits more lmao

#hatchetfield #starkid #where is this audio from #paul matthews #emma perkins #stephanie lauter #peter spankoffski #paulkins #lautski #it could be more Lautski because Steph is sapiosexual and finds his nerdy shit hot #or it could be Emma because in Forever and Always Emdroid says it’s a turn on that he stays at the job he hates for health insurance #it just depends on what brand of pathetic you decide it is I guess

[pokemoncreepypasta]

Tommy Boy

[STORY SOURCE]

It was one of those sleepovers, just me and my bestie, when we got bored and had a dumb idea. Well, she got the brilliant idea anyways.

Apparently, she thought it would be “fun” to try and perform one of those summoning rituals, even though she knew anything and everything paranormal gave me nightmares for weeks. Which is why I think she wanted to do it so bad.

Of course, I wouldn’t willingly go along with the ritual, so my friend had to persuade me by offering her Darkrai plushie which I had coveted for a few weeks now. I remember wondering if the risk of eternal damnation was worth it for just a toy...

Apparently the answer was yes, since I eventually went along with this freaking idea.

The requirement for the ritual was paper, pencil, a candle, 6 random dolls, and 60 minutes of your time.

It had to be in a dark house, or in the middle of the night. We did it around midnight, after everyone else was asleep.

The first step was to put the 6 dolls in a circle.

Then draw a summoning circle on the middle of the paper and put it in the center of the circle of dolls.

After placing it on the floor, recite, “Any entity, you may enter.”

Wait for a while, around a minute, then prick your finger and put your bloody fingerprint in the middle of the summoning circle.

Recite, “By blood we are bound.”

You then turn off all the lights, if any are still left on, then light your candle and recite, “Whomever loses may never leave.”

Afterwards, you stumble around in the dark and play hide-and-seek with whatever you just summoned, if you even successfully summoned anything.

You must switch the room you’re hiding in every 10 minutes or else you will automatically be found by default. If you candle doesn’t blow out within and hour, then you win, and allegedly whatever spirit you summoned will be bound to your eternal service.

If it does blow out, then you’ve been found and you lose. Whatever happens afterwards depends on whatever spirit, peaceful or malevolent, that you summoned.

While me and my friend were huddled in the laundry room whispering and giggling about stupid things, the candle flickered out. I promptly flipped and hid in the corner with my hands over my head waiting for the worst to happen, while my friend laughed at pathetic little me.

After about five minutes of trying to convince me I wasn’t going to die, she told me she had blown out the candle herself. That made me feel a little better, even thought I still didn’t believe it.

Though, the Darkrai plushie I received the next day helped wash my worries away.

Though it wasn’t enough to wash away everything else that was about to happen.

Later on that day after my friend left, my little sister had begged me to let her play my Pokémon Emerald. I let her, since all she did was pretty much give free training to my Pokémon.

I was watching TV, and was a bit peeved when she ran into the room and started nagging me about a green Trapinch, so I waved her off. It took me a few seconds before I realized my grave mistake, so I quickly snatched my GameBoy back.

I was pleasantly surprised to see my sis had somehow managed to find a shiny Trapinch.

I told her to back off and let me handle this, since I wasn’t about to let her try to catch it. Although, things looked bad as my Pokémon were all too strong to weaken it.

But I was feeling confident with over 40 Ultra Balls in stock along with a few backups, so I kept throwing and throwing until one of them worked.

The trouble was, this stubborn Trapinch didn’t want me as its trainer. 

I might not have been able to weaken it, but it still chewed through nearly every one of my PokéBalls.

I was awash with horror at the thought of failing my first ever shiny. That’s when my sister offered to catch it for me.

I didn’t want to hand it over to her, but then my mind rationalized it by thinking that if she failed it, losing the Trapinch would be her fault, not mine.

I was shocked again as she handed me back the GameBoy less than a minute later with a brand new shiny Trapinch in my party named Tommy Boy.

The only response I could think of at first was, “Tommy Boy? Why name it that?”

“Because, it’s a boy and I wanted to name it Tommy, so Tommy Boy!”

I didn’t even want to know what went on in my sister’s head, but I quickly stopped caring and all I could do was just stare at my newfound shiny.

I went to immediately test him out and see what he could do against a wild Sandshrew.

“Tommy Boy refuses to attack!” 

I tried to fight, but I got this refusal instead. I tried to attack the Sandshrew again, but I just kept getting the same message.

“This is a load of crap.”

“Oh, I can make him attack!” My sister stole the GameBoy back and then proceeded to defeat the Sandshrew with no further issue.

“What the... How did you do that?!” My sister gave me a stupid grin, “He listened to me because I’m his mommy!” Sure, whatever, I thought privately to myself.

I was happy to let her train this Trapinch into a Flygon for me, anyway. I was puzzled by its behavior, to say the very least, and decided not asking anything would be better for my health and just kept watching TV.

I thought she would grow bored of training the Pokémon, but no. For the rest of the day and deep into the night, she worked tirelessly to gain experience for Tommy Boy. I wondered how someone could stand training the same Pokémon for so many hours without getting bored at all.

Finally, around 11 PM, she had to go to bed. Unwillingly, she saved the game and turned it off, but not before saying good night to Tommy Boy and kissing the GameBoy goodnight.

I was still allowed to stay up longer, so as soon as she was in bed, I quietly grabbed my GameBoy out from under her bed sheets. Emerald was already in, so I simply switched the game on.

Once the game was loaded, I saw that Tommy Boy was the only one in the party, for some reason.

But he was already evolved into a Flygon, and at level 66. Too bad she only had interest in training Tommy Boy, so much that she decided to stuff all my other team members in the PC.

I started to leave the desert where my sister had last saved when I ran into a wild Baltoy. I lovingly sighed as Tommy Boy came out sparkling. Then, my expression became a bit more serious.

That freaking pixel better listen to me this time.

I clicked on “Fight”. He had new moves: Crunch, DragonBreath, Sandstorm, and Hyper Beam.

I selected Hyper Beam, and desperately hoped that he would obey. I held my breath.

“Tommy Boy refuses to attack!”

“Dang it!!” I yelled at the screen.

Tommy Boy got hit with and attack, which didn’t do too much damage. I kept cursing at the Pokémon. I couldn’t believe I had a shiny in the palm of my hands and it wouldn’t even listen to me!

I selected DragonBreath, despite knowing he wouldn’t obey anyways.

“Tommy Boy wants his mommy!”

I gawked at this line of text. I surely hadn’t seen any Pokémon do that before. I almost wanted to laugh, the way that line was written almost sounded funny, but I was off-put and confused. Tommy Boy got hit with another attack.

“Come on, can’t you at least show some pity for your aunt?!” I spoke aloud to the game, like my sister had started doing. Tommy Boy offered me no pity and kept refusing. I didn’t want to deal with him getting knocked out, so I just turned the game off and begrudgingly went to bed.

The next morning, I found my little sister leaning back in a chair contentedly playing the GameBoy. I realized she snatched it from my room while I was asleep, which I guess was an equal exchange. I asked her if anything weird was happening with the GameBoy, but she said all was fine.

Then she asked me why I was playing on the GameBoy last night.

“Uhh... because it’s my game? I should still be able to play it too.”

She eyed me. “Just don’t mess with Tommy Boy again. Just because you’re his aunt doesn’t mean he likes you.”

She immediately changed her threatening disposition by cheerily calling out, “Oh, good boy, Tommy! You showed that Sandshrew! You make mommy so proud!”

I decided to shrug it off. I wasn’t about to get into an argument with my sister about a video game.

A few days into this, I was over her shoulder watching her play.

She was in the desert, and kept battling the Pokémon there over and over again. Tommy Boy acted like a normal Pokémon, and did nothing unusal.

“Why do you only battle Pokémon in the desert?” “Because, Tommy Boy only likes to battle Pokémon here.” She kept playing, as if everything was normal. After a moment, I thought of another question, “Why will he only obey you and not me?” “I told you, he’ll only listen to his mommy.” “It’s my game he’s on, so I should be his mommy, shouldn’t I? How does he know YOU’RE his mommy?” My sister paused for a moment. After a minute she responded, “Tommy Boy says screw you.” She giggled, while I gave up and left, fuming.

However, days turned into weeks, and my sister had been spending our entire vacation so far just sitting in her room. Apparently, she had started neglecting to eat or drink anything, and would only ever fall asleep when she passed out, GameBoy still in her hands.

It started getting so bad that my mom told me at one point she threw up blood. We’d tried taking the game way from her, but she’d screech at us like she was possessed and tear the whole house apart trying to find it.

Mom said they were arranging for her to see a therapist and get an opinion on what the heck we should do, but for the meantime she was allowed to keep the game, to make things easier for everyone until getting an appointment.

But I wasn’t satisfied with that. I needed to intervene.

One night, I decided to work up the nerve to confront her about her addiction. I found her in her room, as always. She was on the bed with the covers over her head. One would think she was sleeping, but the quiet sounds of the GameBoy gave her away.

I pulled the sheets away from her and she hissed briefly at me before continuing with her eyes glued to the screen. I hardly recognized my happy-go-lucky sister. She looked half dead. I tried holding a conversation with her, but all I got were distant “Mm-hm”s and “It’s fine.” The only way I could get her to talk to me was to attempt to take the game away, to which she immediately responded.

“NO! He’s my baby!!! He NEEDS me!” My sister screeched at me. 

“IT is an inanimate object! It doesn’t NEED anything!” I yelled back at her, clutching her arm that was holding the GameBoy. I managed to rip the Emerald cartridge out of the game while it was still running, causing it to let out horrible screeching sounds. I then pretended to throw it out an open window into the darkness outside of our house, to which my sister immediately pushed me onto the floor and jumped out into the yard after it. 

Picking myself up, I noticed she had dropped my GameBoy, too, so I discreetly plopped the game back into the system and stuffed it into my pocket.

I spitefully closed the window behind my sister. She could come back inside once she realized what this game was doing to her.

What... WAS this game doing to her, I wondered?

Once my sister had collapsed from exhaustion and been carried back to bed by my confused dad (to whom I lyingly explained I had no involvement in this), I decided I would find out for myself.

When I booted up the game, I was in the middle of my secret base in Route 120.

I checked my party to find only Tommy Boy, at a whopping level 100. Since it hand only taken her a day to get him to level 66, she must’ve reached 100 long ago, but she’d still been playing this all month.

Was she seriously doing the same battles over and over, despite him not being able to go any higher...?

When I exited the party screen and was back in the base though, a circle of six Pokédolls were around me that I hadn’t noticed before, which quite frankly creeped me out.

When I tried to move, a text box popped up saying, “Any entity may enter.”

“By blood we are bound.”

A strange red circle appeared in the middle of the circle of dolls, and I quickly realized I didn’t want anything to do with whatever was about to go down.

I tried to step away again, but another text box appeared. 

“Whomever loses may never leave.”

I tried running for dear life out the exit, but I was stopped.

“You may never leave.”

A shiny Flygon appeared in the middle of the circle and let out what I assumed was its cry, albeit I was too horrified for my life at that moment to care much for details, and the game froze.

I shut the game off, stared at it for a second, then suddenly every memory of what I had done earlier in the summer came flooding back at once. I knew exactly what Tommy Boy was now, and I was absolutely terrified.

I wanted to hold myself, cry my eyes out and throw this game into the woods where no one would ever find it, but then I thought about my sister. I thought about how if I didn’t get rid of Tommy Boy now, things would probably get worse and soon I’d wake up to find my little sister stabbing herself to death, or me.

Through my tears, I turned the game back on.

“It’s just you and me now, Tommy. Rematch. Double or nothing.”

If he won, he could take us both. But if I won, he would take his sorry demon hide back to wherever it was he came from. He seemed keen on my offer, as the game started up with no problems.

Once the game was up and running, I found my character in the middle of a dark cave. 

I instinctively went to my party to make someone use Flash, but then I remembered more than likely Tommy Boy was going to be there.

I braced myself...

But I was pleasantly surprised to find there were just some random Pokémon instead.

Of course, I didn't have the HM for Flash. Or the TM for Dig. Or any Escape Rope.

...

Wonderful.

So I stumbled around in the dark, trying to find my way out of this mess.

I kept bumping into walls and rocks, climbing up and down countless ladders, but there was no exit in sight. Or any trainers in sight, for that matter.

In fact, I hadn't run into any wild encounters either, until I came to the conclusion that there was only one Pokémon I would be running into here, and that I should avoid it like the plague.

Was spamming Super Repel going to protect me from a level 100 demonic Flygon? Probably not, but I couldn't be too careful.

After some time nowhere near an hour, I found myself in a small room that had nothing in it. I tried to go back the way I came, but I was stopped. My character wouldn't move. I started to tense up again.

The light surrounding me in-game was snuffed out, and all that could be seen was darkness. I was about to turn the game off before something happened, but before I could, something happened.

“Found you.”

The text in red popped up with a Flygon cry to accompany it, and the game froze again.

"No!" I yelled desperately, flickering the game off and on again. "One chance, give me one more chance!"

Instead, when I loaded the file, I was met with a glitchy, pixelated mess of a screen flashing multicolored lights while blaring the loudest beeping noise I'd ever heard in my life that sent my ears and eyes ringing. I quickly shut off the game and stared at the empty screen in disbelief for I don't know how long.

Had I lost the game?

I couldn't accept that. I was going to play this game all night if I had to. One of us would be leaving tonight, and it wasn't going to be me. Bracing myself, I tightly closed my eyes and powered the game on again. I expected another cacophony of buggy sounds and flashing lights, but surprisingly, I was able to boot up my save file just fine.

But, unfortunately, I didn't get the Round 3 of hide-and-seek that I had vainly asked for.

Instead, I was at the bottom of Mt. Pyre.

I still had the same team as before, unable to Fly or Surf away from this nightmarish set of circumstances that I'd been put in.

I don't know what Tommy Boy was getting at, or what he wanted from me now, but I knew the only way to understand exactly what I was dealing with would be to play along, just for now.

My only option left was to climb Mt. Pyre.

I felt a mounting suspense that kept rising each floor I went to, although I didn't know why. Maybe it was because every floor, even indoors, were all unusually foggy.

However, the wild Shuppet started to make quick work of my low leveled Pokémon.

I then got the sudden idea that maybe this wasn't such a bad thing after all. If my entire party fainted, I could get sent back to a Pokémon Center and escape the boundaries of Tommy Boy's "game."

When they all fainted though, I didn't get sent back. Instead, I was still trapped on Mt. Pyre.

All of the Pokémon that were protecting me were gone now.

I still ran into Shuppet, except I kept sending out a large "?" where a Pokémon should've been.

I kept whiting out, only to return to the position I'd started the battle in.

After a nerve-wracking climb though the graveyard, I reached the top.

Surrounding the pedestal at the top were six PokéBalls.

As I checked each one, a picture of a Pokémon would pop up.  They seemed really familiar, and soon I realized all the Pokémon here were part of the team I was just using.

After I checked the sixth Pokémon, I found my character to be trapped in the center of the pedestal with no way out.

I frantically mashed the D-Pad in hopes of finding some way to escape.

In the midst of my panic, a glowing red circle materialized on the ground, connecting all the PokéBalls surrounding the pedestal, with me still in the center.

I remember at that moment thinking, I'm going to die I'm going to die I'm going to die, and I wholeheartedly believed I was going to.

Then, a large text box in all red with a Flygon cry popped up...

“YOU MAY NEVER LEAVE.”

That right there sealed the deal.

I wasted no shred of time pulling out that Emerald cartridge and cutting it into an unrecognizable pile of green plastic with my scissors.

In my desperation, I brushed the remains of the cartridge into my trash can, wrapped up the trash bag, and went to the extent of escaping through my window and throwing it into the woods. Screw littering, screw the police, I didn't want that thing in my house.

And especially screw Tommy Boy. Screw his little game, screw the thought of him having any sort of control over me.

The only way to win is not to play, and I made sure no one would ever play this game again.

The next morning, my much more well-rested little sister asked where my GameBoy was, and I was about to tell her she was never allowed to touch that thing for as long as she lives, but then she asked to play Mario Party Advance on it.

I was baffled, to say the least, but found no problem in it and let her play it. She showed no signs of becoming obsessed and got bored of playing it after an hour, so I was relieved and assumed that the worst was over.

You can be sure I am not, and will never, plan on performing any more summoning rituals any time soon.

Thankfully, my little sister's gone back to being completely normal. If anything, her only sign of change is that she's getting into that "girly stage". She'll get Pokémon plushies and sit them all in a circle and play tea party with them in her room. At least, that's what I think she's doing with them.

Doesn't matter to me though, I'm busy with my own things. I'm happily content with my dear Darkrai plush that took entirely too much effort out of my life to obtain. I feel really bad for neglecting him these past few weeks, but it's okay.

I won't be giving any more of my time or attention to anyone else except my little baby.

#Pokemon Creepypasta #Pokepasta #Flygon #Tommy Boy

[ladyanput]

A Drop of Bourbon: Caline Bustier

Sorry about the wait on this, guys.

Caline awoke to feeling as if she had been hit over the head with a steel pipe. Her head throbbed with pain and she grit her teeth ever so slightly as she sat up. The teacher sat up slowly, then took in her bleak surroundings. A white room, with no furniture, nothing.

"Hello? Is anyone there?" She called out as she groggily got to her feet, massaging her temples to try and calm down the throbbing pain in her skull.

"Well, Caline, I can't say I'm surprised that you're one of the last ones to wake up." The voice caused Caline's head to snap in its direction, seeing Veritas seated in a chair that certainly hadn't been there before.

"Who are you, what have you done to my students?!" The teacher took a step forward, but froze in place when the akuma held up a hand, the sight of those long sharp nails causing Caline to rethink a few things.

"Your students are safe, though every part of me wishes that I could dangle a few of them over a crevasse.” The akuma gave a smile, one so bleak that it sent a shiver up Caline’s spine. “Sit. I wish to talk.”

Caline eyed the chair that certainly hadn't been there before, then hesitantly took a seat, folding her hands neatly on her lap.

“What is it exactly that you want with me? Did I do something to you personally? I don’t see my students having done anything, they’re good kids, so please, if you have any grievances, let me deal with them.” Caline begged to the akuma, who merely smiled that bland smile once again.

‘Caline, you and I both know that you do not possess the spine to deal with anything. You’re a rather lazy teacher, if I may add." The akuma purred out the words, using a hand to cup Caline's chin, one of her sharp nails tagging the corner of Caline's eye.

"Wait.. Evangeline? What happened, why did you get akumatized?!" Caline's eyes widened as she stared into those purple eyes. "I mean, what happened? Surely, it was a misunderstanding."

"Little things building up over time." Verita gave her cheek another tap. "Lila, Alya, the rest of those delinquents you call students. Well, Rose isn't too bad, neither is Juleka. But, my goodness, you're a pathetic teacher. You let them run like rabid dogs, in fear of akumatizing them."

"Evangeline, remember what I've said, you need to be an example for your students, to help them become better. This.. This isn't going to fix anything, it's only going to make things worse, you need to think of all the other Evangelines in the world." Caline grasped her wrist, giving it a light squeeze.

Those purple eyes shimmered as her smile grew, but it did nothing to settle Caline's words. No, it only worsened them.  

"You naive little bitch. You don't punish anyone, Caline, you know Lila is lying, you know Alya and the others have been ignoring Marinette, have been taken in by Lila's lies." Veritas' hand slid from her face to her neck, the grip tightening slightly. "You are supposed to help your students, to help them grow, to become better people. Sure, you can't help every single student, but this is your entire class, Caline. Save for Rose, she's working with charity, or Adrien, that silver spooned boy will end up inheriting the Gabriel brand, so I guess you'll be famous, hm? Being known as the teacher to so many famous students. I think that's why you don't cause much of a stir, because you see how 'famous', your students will be. The famous model, Nino possibly being the famous filmmaker and musician, Rose is working with many charities, Alya is aiming to be a famous reporter, Kim an Olympic swimmer, Max an inventor and genius." The hand tightened around Caline's throat, making her gasp softly. "Marinette as the famous designer. I mean, it's not like you've been gaslighting your students, when someone does them wrong."

"You don't know my students like I do. I've stopped them from becoming akumas thanks to my exercises, they're doing so well, they're getting so many opportunities now.."

"Opportunities from Lila? Surely you don’t actually buy into that stuff that she sprouts, Caline, you know she’s a liar, yet you let her get away with all of her schemes.” Veritas leaned close, so that they were nose to nose. “You are a spineless coward, Caline. You do not deserve your teaching license.”

Veritas’ voice did not fluctuate, not once. It remained that flat, even tone that sounded so bored with what was going on around her. Yet those eyes of hers held onto Caline, as if staring into her very soul. 

“Do you remember that day, your birthday, where Marinette poured her heart and soul into a purse she handmade just for you? Remember how Chloé decided to ruin that purse, because she didn’t have the common decency to remember your birthday and get you a gift?” The hand left Caline’s throat, the akuma taking a step back and slashing a nail across the air. The scene of Marinette’s outrage was in full sight, as well as Bustier’s answer of how she would cherish the purse and think of both girls anytime she used it.

“You spit right back in Marinette’s face when you did that. And then the schools had you dragged the next five years with them as their homeroom teacher, because nobody else wanted to even be associated with that class as their homeroom. They are now in their last year of lycée, Caline, and they’re rabid fucking dogs, who will get nowhere in life. You know that comic Nathaniel and Marc Anciel were working on? Thanks to Lila, he broke off from Marc, the poor boy, now Nathaniel is working on this big comic, without a fucking writer, with Lila promising him that she found him a company in New York who wants to feature his work.”

Caline stood, then stumbled back when Veritas stepped forward, tearing scenes into the air as she went, showing Caline the tears of her students as they faced disappointment after disappointment with Lila, Marinette’s tears as she was abandoned by all of her friends, every single akumatizations of her students, so many akumatizations…

“Your entire class is known as the Akuma class at the school, Caline. You wonder why I favour Marinette, why I try my hardest to protect her? I love her, she is the only family I have. You stand by and let her and others like her get hurt, be forced to swallow down their feelings and avoid any conflict, because you’re scared of an akuma. Think hard about this, Caline; what do you think Marinette as an akuma would be like?”

When Caline really thought about it, ice shot up her spine.

“You, Lila Rossi, Chloé.. You’re all really good at making akumas, aren’t you? At dragging people to their lowest. You know, you probably wouldn’t have been akumatized if you had punished Chloé properly and hadn’t gaslit Marinette about being so rightfully angry.” When Bustier tripped and fell onto her back, her eyes widened as Veritas loomed over her, tears now beginning to flow from Bustier’s eyes. “Perhaps I should rip the spine from your back. You certainly won’t be using it.” 

“No!” Caline squeezed her eyes shut and held her hands out to shield herself. 

There was suddenly a long stretch of silence, the cries and screams stopping abruptly. 

Caline hesitantly opened her eyes, then glanced frantically around. Her mouth dried up when she saw her students scattered around the classroom, some sobbing, some sitting and scarily silent. 

“Miss Bustier, you’re okay!” Kim rushed over and helped the shaky teacher to her feet. “We were afraid that the akuma got you too.”

“That was crazy..” Nino muttered, eyeing over where Juleka had her arm wrapped around a hysterical Rose. “Kind of scary too.”

“I thought she was going to kill us!” Mylène wailed out as she clung to Ivan’s shirt, her eyes filled with fat tears, as her boyfriend stroked her back in an attempt to soothe her.

Caline looked at her students, her lovely dependable students. 

Evangeline was wrong, she was an amazing teacher. When Ladybug would finally beat her, Caline swore to be there, waiting with open arms and a few easy lessons on how to be a better role model for the misguided and understood. 

Taglist: @demonicbusiness @2sunchild2 @realrandomposts @virgil-is-a-cutie @mochinek0 @ranger-gothamite @alienjoyful @ladyearlofgrey @zalladane

#Caline Bustier bashing #bustier salt #miraculous ladybug #Evangeline Bourbon

[snorlaxlovesme]

Walk Me Home

So I guess I wrote this fic for a SoMa week prompt last year and then didn’t post it??? I found it in my drafts and was really confused what a fully completed one-shot was doing staring back at me lmao

So. Here’s a fic for I think the “2am” prompt. Title a reference to the P!nk song, since I’m pretty sure I spammed it while writing this.

                             ____________________

“Hey. Hey!”

Maka hears Soul’s voice call out from behind her, but she doesn’t turn around. She doesn’t want to talk right now; she wants to leave.

“Jesus, why are you walking so fast? Slow down, fuck’s sake.”

The grit of the sidewalk digs painfully into the heels of her bare feet. It doesn’t slow her down, nor does it stop her. In fact, when she hears Soul’s panting from behind her, she petulantly picks up her speed until his hand is landing on her shoulder and pulling her to a stop. He tugs her around despite her best efforts to keep walking.

“Hey, you wanna tell me what the problem is? Why did you leave the party?” He doesn’t even look mad at her, just concerned, which somehow makes her just feel worse. Soul continues, “I went to go talk to Kid for a few minutes and when I came back everyone said you left. Did something happen?”

Clearly something must have happened. She knows he can see it all over her expression, in the way she bolted away from him. Hell, he can probably feel waves of it coming directly from her soul.  

But she doesn’t want to talk, so she pulls her shoulder away from his grasp and keeps walking, marching towards the direction of home, probably. She’s still a little tipsy, even though she only had a couple drinks at the party. But whoever Kid hires to bartend at the Gallows Mansion has a heavy hand when it comes to mixing drinks. Either her cocktails were stronger than normal or Maka really is the lightweight every assumes she is. She keeps walking despite her protesting feet and the way the world is swaying around her.

“So you’re just not gonna talk to me?” Soul asks, still trailing behind her. She can feel his hand come to rest on her shoulders every now and again, steadying her when she tips a bit too far in one direction, but pulling away once she’s righted herself. Protecting her while also respecting her boundaries. It’s infuriating.

Soul keeps talking to her back. “Was it something it something Black Star said? You know how Star gets when he’s drunk. He’s got no fucking boundaries.”

It’s not Black Star. It’s not anyone specifically. It’s just everyone. It’s everything. It’s nothing. She doesn’t want to explain it, because that would just be another weakness to add to the ever-growing pile.

“I can kick his ass if you want,” Soul keeps trying, knowing full-well that he could never take Black Star in a fight. The pathetic offer almost makes her smile, but she gulps it down and tries not to cry.

Soul circles around in front of her. “Look, you don’t have to tell me, but could you please stop for a sec? You’re not wearing any shoes and your feet are gonna get all fucked up. There could be glass or something.” Maka, being Maka, doesn’t give a damn about potential dangers to herself, and continues marching forward, leaving Soul to roll his eyes and pick up his pace to catch up with her again. She’s trying not to look at him, but she can see the way his eyes widen in his ‘I have an idea’ face, and two seconds later he’s transformed into a scythe in front of her, hovering a few feet off the ground beside her. His wings flap quickly and silently to keep steady beside her.

“Please?” His voice comes his weapon form, tinny and desperate.

Now Maka is the one rolling her eyes. His winged-form only rubs salt in her emotional wounds, but her feet are admittedly in a lot of pain after almost a half mile of walking on cracked concrete. She concedes and throws a leg over his handle. She grabs onto him with both hands, expecting him to whisk her away to their apartment above the buildings of Death City. Soul surprises her by hovering another foot in the air, so her feet don’t drag on the cement, but flying at the same pace she was walking.

The quiet extends before them into the night. The farther they get from the Gallows, the harder it is to hear the booming bass of the music. Soul lets Maka direct them with her soul through the residential neighborhoods and away from crowded streets. She started this walk with the intention of being alone.

But, ten times out of ten she’d rather be with Soul.

She swallows. “Do you care what people think about you?”

On a normal day he’d snark at her for finally deeming him worthy of conversation, but today he’s quiet as he thinks of what response she might be looking for. She can feel he’s trying to pick apart the meaning of this starting question, but eventually just decides to answer honestly.

“Yeah. All the time.”

It’s the truth, Maka can feel in his soul that it is, but she still doesn’t believe it. In the time that Maka has known Soul, he’s grown so much. She’s always admired the way he just lets things roll off his shoulders, not giving a shit what others think about him. Maybe he’s just been faking it, but he does a damn good job playing the Cool Guy he’s always wanted to be as a kid. He makes Maka’s version of the same kind of make-believe feel like child’s play. No one believes in her flimsy brand of confidence.  

“Do you care what people think about us?” she asks.

There’s always been something in the way people talk about the two of them. Soul, the powerful, confident demon weapon that took down Arachne and helped save the world from madness on the moon. Maka, the meister who just managed to hold on for the ride. Maybe that’s not exactly what they say, but it’s implied. In the way other students will look at him with admiration, with appreciation, and then how they look at her, like they’re surprised it was little unstable Maka Albarn who managed to produce a Death Scythe. She knows she’s weak, but do people have to throw it in her face all the time? Like she was the last person they expected to be helpful in the apocalypse?  

Even at a freaking party there are people coming up to Soul and asking him for autographs while Maka stands right next to him. Like somehow they know the exact imbalance of strength between Soul and Maka and they’re disappointed in Maka the same way she is with herself.

Just thinking about it has her unconsciously pulling Soul forward down the street a little faster. She breathes deeply. Just a few more minutes and she’ll be home.

Soul finally speaks, breaking her out of her own internal pity party.  

“No.”

Maka blinks.

No?

“Our partnership is no one’s business but ours. If people have something to say about it, whatever. I only care about one person’s opinion when it comes to our partnership. And that’s you.”

God, it’s such a simple yet complete answer. And he’s totally right, like always. She doesn’t know why she gives a shit what other people think about her and Soul. None of it matters in the end, but God, does Maka wish for once that when she thought of the word “strength” she could picture herself embodying that word instead of never measuring up. Instead of feeling guilty for somehow always thinking she’s holding Soul back.

“You know there’s nothing wrong with you, right?”

Maka’s soul spikes so suddenly in surprise that Soul comes to a halt in the middle of the street.

“I’m serious. I know you wanna be the best meister you can be, but you’re too stuck in your own head to realize how fucked I would be without you as my partner.” He quiets in a way that means he’s gathering his words, and Maka listens with bated breath.  

“You’re the smartest and bravest person I know, okay? And you’re also a reckless moron who pulls some of the craziest shit in battle that I’ve ever seen in my life. It sucks that I have to keep saying this to you, but I’ll keep reminding you until you believe it. The only reason I ever had a prayer of becoming of a Death Scythe was because you’ve been my meister. Stop thinking that you’re not good enough, because you’re better than every asshole at the party. You did something they never could and now never will be able to do.”

Maka closes her eyes for a few heartbeats, allowing this to sink in. Even now, at 2am with the sky pitch dark because of the blackened moon, it’s hard to imagine that she was involved in that fight. She helped save the world and she’s still convinced that she’s somehow not good enough. Maybe Soul’s right, and what they have could only be accomplished with the two of them together. Maybe no one else matters but her and Soul.

“Soul? Transform for me, will you?”

Without hesitation, Soul morphs back into human form, holding her now on piggyback instead of on his weapon form. The shift from being supported by his handle to hanging off his backside is so natural that Maka doesn’t even have to think about it, just adjusts her arms so they’re tighter across his shoulders. She presses her face into the side of his neck in gratitude.

“You always know what to say, you know that?”

Soul snorts and hops a little to scoot her higher up his back. “It’s easy when your soul is practically screaming at me what you’re upset about.” He starts walking again, refusing to put her down because of his stubborn insistence that she’ll hurt her feet. “So. Party sucked for you too, then?”

Now it’s Maka’s turn to snort. All of a sudden the night’s whole emo conclusion feels very overstated. She feels foolish for being so dramatic but remembers that Soul thinks she’s strong even when she’s a drama queen. Depends on her even when she gets caught up in her own head. The reminder calms her soul down considerably.

“Think I drank too much,” she says, nestling closer to his back and laying her arms heavily over his shoulders to remain balanced. “Ox said some dumb shit about me being the weaker partner and it made me sad.”

“Alcohol is a depressant,” Soul says, kind of snooty. He’s repeating what she’s told him on his Moody Drinking nights.  

“Wait a minute,” Soul says. “Did you say Ox? Who the fuck is he to talk about being a weak partner?”

“I thought you said you don’t care what anyone thinks about us.”

“Yeah, but that was before I found out it was fucking Ox Ford who was talking down to you. I could totally take his ass in fight.”

Maka laughs for the first time all night. Soul continues ranting all the way home about how he’s going to beat Ox’s face in the next time he saw him (he won’t) and Maka thinks that maybe real strength is remembering that you always have someone on your side.

#soma #soul x maka #soul eater #soul eater evans #maka albarn #like its not the BEST thing ive ever written but damn kelly you could have at least POSTED IT #se fic #my writing

[chaoticallysapphic]

the great divide part two

summary: Who knew that eight words would be your undoing. If you had known then what you know now you wouldn't have signed up for Suyin's dance troupe, you probably would have left Zaofu just to be safe. But you didn't and fate had branded you with a path that chained you to someone who would break your heart. 

a/n: toxic level has decreased a bit, sort of. Thank you @medeliadracon​  for beta reading this!

word count: 7k

“For now” 

turned into two and a half years. You had slipped up a few times causing Kuvira to punish you by leaving you alone for the night and each time you did you became more cautious with your actions. 

One time a young man around your age had started to flirt with you while you handed out supplies, you tried to politely brush him off but he didn’t seem to get the message so he kept persisting until finally Bolin intervened and said Kuvira needed you to grab more crates from the train. 

Another time you had blown up on Baatar when he tried to kiss Kuvira in front of everyone, she wasn’t much for public displays and you knew she would have stopped him if you hadn’t but your fuse was short that day and you paid the price. After that first night of celebration, Bolin and Varrick expected you to join them at the next town but you politely declined and even left earlier than Kuvira did. It felt like there were too many ways to mess up and you grew anxious about all the ways you may upset her.  

Varrick took back his remark about you being fun, which hurt a little bit, and after a few times Bolin gave up on asking. You still missed dancing and that night reignited the passion you had for it so on days spent travelling you’d practice either in your room or in the gym, depending on how many people were already in there.

You hadn’t mentioned your desire to pick up classes again once you got back to Zaofu. A part of you was worried that she’d get angry about it and punish you once more so you decided to wait until you were married, she wouldn’t be able to hold him over your head like that anymore.

On days like today where the need to talk about work has come to a short lull and therefore Baatar fills it by talking to your soulmate, you have to remind yourself that one day you’ll get to hold her hand in front of everyone and proclaim she’s yours. You try to bury your nose in a book about chi blocking (you picked it up in the previous town and it was pretty fascinating) to distract yourself and for a few chapters it works, but when Baatar and Kuvira enter her office alone, the words on the paper become a jumbled mess and you can’t take sitting nearby as you envision what they may be doing. 

You doubt she’d do something salacious with him during the daytime where someone could walk in, but you also didn’t think she’d sleep with him at all and look how that went. You slam the book down on the coffee table, effectively scaring Bolin awake who had fallen asleep on the couch across from you, and storm off to the gym. 

You weren’t much for combat of any kind but suddenly you felt like hitting something, dancing wouldn’t do. So you changed into a pair of sweatpants and a white tank top and walked over to where there were rolls of bandages meant for your knuckles. 

You begin punching at the punching bag hooked up to the ceiling of the train, it’s a bit pathetic seeing as you can’t even seem to make the bag move a little bit but you keep going, keep pouring all of your stress and heartache into each punch. 

“Wow,” comes a voice from behind you, you look over your shoulder and see Bolin leaning against the doorway with his arms crossed over his chest. “What's pissed you off?” You shrug and hit two more times at the bag, your sweating and you’ve only been doing this for a few minutes, the muscles you had were meant for elegant strides, not uppercuts. 

“Just woke up on the wrong side of the bed I guess.” You lie through your teeth and you know he can tell, so to try and distract him you ask “will you spar with me? Maybe teach me a thing or two about holding my own?” He stays quiet for a minute as he looks at you, as if trying to see how you're doing, you try your best to shove everything rising within you down. “Well?” 

“Okay, I guess I should probably make sure I’m not rusty in case we get attacked or something.” He takes his jacket off then wraps his knuckles in the bandages. You spread your legs until they are aligned with your shoulders and hold up your fists. Bolin is good, far better than you which isn’t a surprise seeing as he’s fought numerous battles whilst all you’ve done is read and dance throughout your whole life.

 In Zaofu it was common to join the guard, especially for your young adult years but you’d opted out of it since you were more of a pacifist and therefore didn’t want to enter an altercation with someone if the job demanded such. You feel stupid now for not taking that opportunity as you narrowly dodge Bolin’s fists, you land a decent punch on him after a couple of minutes that temporarily stuns him. 

You punch again but he grabs your wrist and pushes you back, you stumble, and trip over your feet. Falling onto the wrestling mat with a thud, Bolin, who was still holding your wrist falls on top of you. He pulls away but is still on top of you as he worriedly exclaims “Oh no, I didn’t hurt you did I?” 

You groan due to his weight on top of yours but otherwise, you're fine, the mat is soft enough that it cushioned your blow. “I’m fine but can you get off of me, please? It’s kinda hard to breathe.” Bolin’s eyes widen and he immediately rolls off of you, opting to lay beside you on the mat as you catch your breath. 

“Aren’t you a dancer, don’t you have to have a really good sense of balance for that?” He questions and you frown, you're not officially a dancer and you had only taken about two months' worth of lessons before leaving with Kuvira. 

Your practices just consisted of you doing the handful of things you learned in the dance studio or saw someone do at one of the many town celebrations. “Not really, I just do it for fun.” 

“Oh, you just seem so good at it that I assumed,” he sits up but doesn’t move to stand so you follow and cross your legs over one another. 

“I took some lessons back in Zaofu before I left with Kuvira, but I’d only been doing it for a couple of months” you look down at your lap as you remember the freeing feeling of flying in the air as the petals catapulted you to the next. Or how it felt to gracefully spin in the air with your wire. You’d wanted to learn more about aerial moves from Suyin who seemed to be a professional at it and even planned to ask her for private lessons after the performance. 

“I think that still makes you one if you want it to be” he offers, you throw him a grateful smile before looking back at your legs, you pick at the frayed hem of your sweats and sigh. “Are you okay, y/n?” 

Your head shoots up to look at him, your brows pinch together in confusion “what do you mean?” 

“You just seem really sad all the time, or angry. Zhu Li said you haven’t been eating much either.” That’s because you lose your appetite anytime Baatar is so much as in the same room as you and you all tend to take your meals together. If he so much as smiles you imagine throwing your butter knife at him. 

Now that you think about it, your thoughts weren’t always this violent and loud, you’d never let someone's mere existence bother you before even when you got made fun of at school when you were younger. But now you want to rip things apart whilst crying, you want to be destructive especially towards him. 

You must be silent for too long because Bolin places a hand on your knee which causes you to look up at him, it's then you feel how wet your cheeks are. You bring a hand up to your face and once you pull it away you see the telltale sign of wetness, of tears. “‘m just lonely is all,” you say, and it’s not a lie. 

You think about telling Bolin, maybe he’d be decent at keeping a secret but you know it's too dangerous. You don’t want to think about what’ll happen if Kuvira’s grand plan is compromised by you and the young earth bender. 

He pulls you into a hug and suddenly the floodgates burst open, you grip onto the back of his shirt to keep you grounded as you let out all the pent up rage and sadness within you. You think about the last time she didn’t show up to your room, how you stayed up all night in hopes that she just got caught up with some important documents. How when the sun rose and she still hadn’t snuck in, you felt so hollow and alone. 

You grew up on the story of your parents and their perfect meeting, how they clicked instantly, and got married a year later. Your dad still bought her flowers every Friday and your mom still laughed at his awful jokes. You’d hoped for that kind of love when you were little, expected it even. When you met Kuvira for the first time a rush went through your body after she spoke and you just became so entranced by her every movement. She filled all your senses and when she wasn’t around she was all you could think about. 

You’d kept it all for her, you never dated growing up or even kissed someone. You knew your soulmate probably wouldn’t do the same but you didn’t care. You just wanted all your firsts to be with them. You love her so much, you’d do anything for her and it's apparent in your current suffering. 

Slowly as the days roll on telling yourself it will have been worth it when you’re married lost its comfort. You don’t know how long you cry into Bolin’s shoulder but you do know by the time you’ve calmed down you feel so exhausted that you may just fall asleep on this mat. Slowly, you pull away from him, there’s a large wet stain on his undershirt but he doesn’t seem to mind. 

“We’re all here for you, y/n. You’re not alone.” He places a hand on your shoulder and gives it a comforting squeeze, you offer him a thankful smile as you pull yourself up onto your feet. “Thank you, it means a lot.” 

When you're in your room you pull your hair out of its updo and fall onto your bed, you're so exhausted that you decide to just sleep through dinner despite the grumble of your stomach. 

You’re awoken a few hours later, you assume, the sun is down and it’s almost pitch black in your room if not for the glow of the moon through your window. Kuvira softly closes your door behind her as she climbs into bed. “Bolin said you seemed too tired for dinner, are you sick?” She wraps an arm around your waist and pulls you close. You wordlessly shake your head and snuggle into her side. 

Kuvira runs a hand through your hair, slowly you feel a bit better about earlier as you begin to relax. “I have to tell you something,” she says softly, almost hesitantly. She’s never hesitant, always sure in her words and actions. You pull away, suddenly nervous at what she has to say. She’s not pregnant, right? Because you can’t raise his child, you just can’t. “Baatar proposed.” 

Your heart stops, “you said no, right?” The silence that follows is enough and suddenly you don’t want to even be in the same train car as her. You sit up and press yourself against the wall since she’s caging you in. “ ‘Vira… no.” She sits up and grabs your face between her hands, you try to pull away but she’s persistent and looks into your eyes pleadingly. 

“I’m not going to marry him, y/n. It’s just to placate him until we win and we’re so close to winning. Only a couple more months, I swear” her words do little to mend your cracking heart, suddenly you don’t think she’s telling the truth. She only said this would go on for a while, she never said she’d sleep with him and accept a stupid proposal. 

“I can’t keep watching this… It’s killing me” you whimper, she pulls you into her arms, you don’t want her to touch you but you also don’t have the energy to push her away. 

“I love you” she begins to pepper your face with delicate kisses, each kiss is accentuated with those three words and soon enough she’s laying you back down as she climbs on top of you. “I only love you, I hate him, I swear.” She pulls you into a soft kiss that conveys her feelings, you slowly kiss her back, your hand cupping her cheek. Slowly she makes you feel less lonely as she pulls your shirt off. 

That night she tries to remind you of how much she truly loves you, and it temporarily works.

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“For now,” turns into three years. After Kuvira’s announcement in Republic City, which wasn’t all too well received, you guys head towards Zaofu. Kuvira had kept you from seeing Suyin in the city, claiming she needed time to calm down before a reunion to which you agreed. 

She eases up on you after the proposal, she hasn’t ‘punished’ you since despite accidentally upsetting her quite a few times in public. There’s still that fear of her doing it again, but she always crawls into your bed and pulls you into her arms. She doesn’t wear the ring around you.

 After the announcement you just kept staring at her hand as you tried to fight the tears threatening to spill. A few days after catching you staring, she tells Baatar it was best if she kept it tucked safely away so it didn’t get damaged or accidentally used for bending, but her real reasoning was to help ease your pain.

Kuvira even spends more time with you during the day, much to Baatar’s chagrin. If she wasn’t in some important military meeting she was usually seen reading with you. After a bit of psyching yourself up, you ask her if she wants to practice dancing with you, she looks up from her book and into your eyes before slowly nodding. 

Bolin ends up teaching you how to properly fight someone with your fists and as the months go on you improve greatly. One day you ask him if you can try something on him, he’s a bit apprehensive but relents, before he can even ask what you're going to do you close your fist except for your pointer and middle finger before hitting him in his chi. 

Bolin’s eyes widen at your action, he tries to bend the metal of a dumbbell but nothing happens, “w-why would you do that? How did you do that!” Shock races through you as he keeps trying to bend, spirits you just chi blocked someone. 

“I’m sorry! Some old lady gave me this book about it in a town, she said her grandson was an equalist and she wanted it out of her house. But look, I can block people’s chi’s in a fight!” You bite your lip to keep from grinning as Bolin looks at you as if you're insane.

“You're a bender, why would you need that?!” 

“What if I’m up against a powerful bender? I need to have something to even the playing field.” You bring your hands to your mouth to hide the pride you feel for yourself. “I won’t ever use it on you again; I just wanted to see if it’d work. I’m sorry.” 

A few days later you're sitting in Kuvira’s office with Baatar and Kuvira whilst they discuss how to get Zaofu on their side. Baatar had called for Bolin some time ago, their plan was for you and Bolin to convince Suyin to sign the papers. You felt a bit off about it but the night before Kuvira assured you that it was just because they were still bitter about her dating Baatar, which had caused you to flinch. She knew you didn’t like to talk about him, especially after the proposal.

The morning after she told you, you had stayed in your room for most of the day and when you snuck out to the gym around midday Bolin had entered and told you about their announcement over breakfast. If he noticed you hitting harder than usual, he didn’t mention it. 

“Am I in trouble?” Bolin asks cautiously as he eyes the three of you, you send him a comforting smile which has Baatar quietly scoffing from the other side of the couch. The guy was a real dick and once Kuvira left him you think you might have a word or two with him. 

“No. In fact, I have good news. We want you to be part of our inner circle,” she gives him one of those smiles that only you, and maybe Baatar, know is fake. Bolin looks like he’s practically vibrating with joy as he shouts out “inner circle? No way! Yes!” He begins to fist pump the air before realizing who he’s in front of, which makes you snort (Baatar sends a glare your way at that), and composes himself, “That is a great honor… What does it mean exactly?” 

“It means you’ve proven your worth,” she takes a step back and gestures to the map that has one large piece missing from it, Zaofu, “we’re so close to uniting the empire but Su has some resentment towards me and Baatar that might cloud her judgment and stop her from making a wise decision. We believe you and y/n can help her see clearly.” 

“I can do that!” He says eagerly, “by the time we finish telling her all the great things we’ve done, she’ll be begging to join.” 

“Good, because we’re here.” She bends the blinds up, you look out the window in front of you and notice all the troops waiting outside… She didn’t tell you about this. “Vir-Kuvira, what is this?” You quickly correct yourself. Bolin adds to your question “aren’t all these troops going to send the wrong message.” 

“The army is here to project strength. You’re here to present-” she looks over at you as she continues, her gaze hardening in a warning, “-peace.” You sink into the cushions of the couch and soon she turns away from you to look at her map once more, Bolin looks uneasy and suddenly you feel unsure. 

Kuvira kept you out of some of the meetings in the past because she said it was boring nonsense that consisted of military talk which you knew nothing about so you always shrugged it off. Now you're worried those meetings weren’t nonsense at all. You didn’t even know the army was this big. 

You thought your return to Zaofu would be filled with excitement and joy, you’d listed off all the things you wanted to do in your head, the top one being seeing your parents again. But the tram ride through the city has your stomach twisted in knots. 

When the doors open and you all walk off the people of the city, people you’ve known your whole life, give you looks of disgust. You look down at the floor, unable to stomach the glares they send your way as you walk into the Beifong estate.

You all stop in front of a set of double doors, you’ve never been in this house before, it's massive and honestly seems like a sprawling palace. When the doors open you aren’t met with open arms, the entire Beifong family (sans Baatar) stares at you four with disapproving glares. 

There’s a hint of surprise in Suyin’s eyes when they land on you and suddenly you want to be enclosed in the metal flower like all those years ago. Bolin rushes over to Opal, trying to hug her but she turns her back on him and crosses her arms. 

That feeling in your stomach twists and tightens, you don’t think you can get through the speech you had planned now, it feels like there’s a fist-sized ball stuck in your throat. 

“No, you’ve chosen your side,” she says. Kuvira looks over at you, urging you forward and so you hesitantly walk to stand beside Bolin. “Sides? There shouldn’t be any sides. I know, why don’t we all stand in a circle, huh, maybe hold hands?” You want to slap his arm but you don’t, it doesn’t seem like the right time. 

Before you can say anything, Suyin looks at Kuvira and says “I’m not giving up Zaofu. I don’t care if you brought your entire army.” 

Kuvira lifts her hand and speaks in an earnest tone “Su, I didn’t bring my army to threaten you. I wanted to show you all that your son and I have accomplished.” You bite your tongue, wanting to blurt out that Baatar’s hardly done a thing, and it takes all your might to keep those bitter words down but you manage, somehow. 

“You must realize what your doing goes against everything your father and I tried to teach you,” Suyin seems so disappointed in him, you wonder if your mother is disappointed in you too. 

“Son, you belong here.” Baatar Sr. says.

“Why?” Baatar forces out between gritted teeth, “so that I can go on living in your shadow?” Baatar Sr. 's eyes widen in shock and he looks so hurt, Suyin replies for her husband and says “don’t say that, can’t you see she’s brainwashed you?” 

Kuvira guffaws at that, it’s true, she has brainwashed and manipulated him, twisted him around her finger with her husky voice and promise of love and devotion. “Ha, I didn’t brainwash him. I set him free. And now he’s accomplished more with me than he ever could have with you.” Towards the end, Kuvira’s eyes set into a glare and you decide to jump into action. 

“Obviously there is a lot of personal conflict between you all, but we should be talking about the good of Zaofu and how we can help this great city,” you say, Suyin looks at you pitifully which has you feeling uneasy. 

“Whatever she’s told you y/n, it’s a lie. I know you, you're too sweet and innocent to be siding with her if you knew the whole truth,” her tone is sympathetic, you furrow your brows and look over at Kuvira who looks to be struggling to keep her composure. “I would never lie to her or to Bolin.” 

“You know what I think we need to do? Focus on the future and the future is bright. Let me tell you. I’ve seen it, yeah I saw it last month. We went to this town that had nothing. Most of the people there had never even seen a satomobile before but now they have two satomobiles, running water, and a magnet train that goes right through their town. I mean how awesome is that?” 

You place a hand on Bolin’s shoulder, trying to silently communicate with him to shut up, “they also have plenty of food now, most towns we go to are on the brink of collapse.” 

Opal crosses her arms and glares at the two of you, “they might have been happy when you first arrived but I’ve seen what happens after you leave. Citizens are forced to work as slave labor. Dissenters are sent off to who knows where.” You drop your hand off of Bolins shoulder and take a step back, you guys had actually never revisited any of the towns you helped. You chalked it up to being busy. 

“-But I am giving you the 100% Bolin guarantee that we’re making the earth empire a better place to live!” Bolin says. You were too lost in your thoughts to hear the first half of his speech, there has to be a time someone at least mentioned what happens to the past towns and villages you helped. But your mind comes up short. 

Suyin takes a step forward and says with anger laced in her tone “I can’t believe you brought Bolin and y/n here to try and sway us.” She keeps walking until she’s directly in front of Kuvira. “Leave. Zaofu will never accept you as their leader.” 

“Then you leave me no choice. You have twenty-four hours to agree to join the earth empire or we take the city by force.” No, that was never part of the plan, it can’t be part of the plan. Your family is here, your mother is part of the guard. Suyin kicks you guys out of her estate, as you begin to exit through the front door, Suyin calls after you. 

“Y/n, your parents are worried sick.” You look over your shoulder at her, she gives her a pleading look but before you can even comprehend a reply you hear Kuvira call out in a bored tone, “C’mon y/n. We’re leaving.” 

You rush after her, leaving Suyin and your family behind. You take the tram out of the city then reboard your train that takes you to the center of the camp where Kuvira’s tent is. Throughout the ride, Bolin keeps giving you nervous glances that you try to ignore. Once in Kuvira’s tent she goes to sit behind her desk, you lean against said desk as Baatar stands a few feet from you and Bolin stands in front of Kuvira. 

Bolin decides to break the silence “I mean, you’re not really going to attack Zaofu… are you?” 

“When people don’t cooperate we must find other ways of convincing them to join” she replies smoothly. Your heart drops, she knows how much your family means to you, how much you still love Zaofu. She can’t really be willing to march through there and destroy everything you love.

“Other ways? How many times have we used these other ways in the past?” Bolin tilts his head in confusion. Your knuckles turn white as you grasp at the metal desk behind you while the struggle to keep quiet becomes harder by the second. Suddenly the idea of her punishing you tonight doesn’t seem so bad if you can somehow get her to remain peaceful. 

Kuvira slowly stands from her desk, “It’s not for you to worry about.” Bolin fiddles with his fingers as he tries to figure out what to say next, you know you should intervene, the words are on the tip of your tongue but it feels as if someone’s sewn your mouth shut. 

“So… what happens to all those towns and villages after we leave? I just realized I’ve never really gone back and checked on them.” Kuvira makes her way around the table until she’s in front of him.

“Those people are my loyal subjects and they contribute to the empire however I see fit.-” You push yourself off the table but Baatar grips your shoulder and pushes you back against it to keep you from getting involved, “What do you think you're doing?” you spit out, Kuvira ignores the spat going on behind her as she continues “-Now that you're in the inner circle, you're going to have to learn some hard truths.” 

“You don’t need to be getting involved” Baatar replies smoothly, Bolin seems caught up in trying to figure out how to properly word his response as you glare at your soulmate's fiancee. “You touch me again and I’ll rip your arm off.” 

Baatar laughs, “I’d like to see you try.” Suddenly all the reasonings you ever had to keep your anger at bay slowly start to diminish. “You won’t be laughing when I’ve finally had my piece of you.” He must not see you as a threat, he just shrugs you off and turns to proudly watch Kuvira.

“Maybe I’m not really an inner circle kind of guy. Or- Or we don’t take over Zaofu we could just let them be on their own, then yay the empires united! Congratulations to us.” Kuvira towers over Bolin as she threateningly stalks after him, her fists clenched. 

“ I didn’t know your personal feelings for Opal were stronger than your loyalty to me.” He leans against the table behind him as she stares him down, her behavior is so familiar, you furrow your brows. Is that what she looks like when she’s angry at you? “- Zaofu will join us. The only thing I’m second-guessing is the decision to bring you along. Maybe you need to spend some time in a reeducation camp.” 

“I thought that’s where we sent people to learn new trade skills…” He trails off, eyeing the two of them, his eyes even drift to you for a second, to see if you're in on this but your expression must give your surprise away because the tiniest bit of him relaxes. “Hard truths, Bolin," Baatar drones.

“Your loyalty seems to be wavering.” Kuvira crosses her arms across her chest as she stares him down, Bolin shakes his head thrice. “No, no I’m totally on your side, completely 100% loyal.” He salutes her. It seems to do the job because she simply glares at him for a minute before swiftly turning away. “Everyone, leave.” 

Bolin practically sprints out of there and Baatar slowly follows after, you take your time and at the entrance of her tent you turn around to stare at your soulmate. “Vira-” 

“I said leave!” She shouts, her hands smacking down against her desk as she glares at you. You stumble out, surprised by her outburst, before making your way back to the train to hide away in your room once more. As you pass a large tent pitched near the train's entrance someone grabs onto your shoulder and roughly yanks you to the side so you're both hidden from view. Before you can yell at whoever touched you, Bolin comes into sight. 

“We need to leave, now” he claims, he grabs your hand and tugs you towards the ladder that leads to the roof of the train. “Guards are stationed at Varrick's door, we need to break in from abo-.” 

“Bolin I can’t leave” you whisper, he whips around to look at you. “Are you delusional, did you not see what I saw in there?” 

“You don’t understand, I know what happened was wrong but…” tears collect at the corners of your eyes and you feel that familiar feeling of fear claw up your throat. “She’s my soulmate, Bolin.” 

His eyes widen and he drops your hand as if suddenly you might be diseased, it hurts to see the look he’s giving you right now. “But Baa-” 

“She’s using him, she has for years. Why do you think I’m always so sad? If I leave her she’ll never forgive me.” 

“She’s going to march on Zaofu and probably destroy it. We can get in there and warn them about how strong her forces are,” he tries to reason with you. “y/n the Kuvira you fell in love with is gone.” You look away, a part of you knows that with all this power she’s collected she’s slowly lost pieces of herself. She’s always been a bit controlling and aggressive but it’s gotten worse over the years. 

“I think I can bring her back, You need to head to Zaofu and try to figure out some kind of peaceful solution with Suyin and I’ll try to calm Vira down.” You know you're running out of time, “go Bolin, you need to hurry.” You push him towards the ladder that leads to the roof of the train, before he climbs up he pulls you into a quick, bone-crushing hug. 

“Be safe,” he says softly, giving you one last tight squeeze before climbing up and out of view. You look over your shoulder, eyes drifting to Kuvira’s tent, some of her soldiers are currently erecting tents nearby for your group, much smaller ones but you didn’t mind. 

“You can do this” you whisper to yourself, trying to psych yourself up before marching back towards the massive octagon-shaped tent. 

Once at the flap you gently push the fabric apart so you can step inside, Kuvira is sitting at her desk, reading over a pile of papers when she notices your presence. “I thought I told you to leave.” 

“I wanted to talk to you, about Zaofu.” You try to keep your voice from shaking as you walk closer until you're standing in front of your desk. “My parents are in there, Vira.” 

“They won’t get hurt, you said they're smart so they should know to stay out of my soldiers' way,” she sets the paper in her hand down so she can look up at you, giving you her undivided attention. “We need Zaofu, y/n.” 

“What if we worked out a deal where they remain independent but offer to give us a certain amount of supplies a year in exchange for peace. It could work.” She’s silent, hope festers in your heart as she mulls over your idea. 

“It would make us seem weak to the rest of the world,” she counters and you sigh. You can’t give up, besides the longer you keep her talking the less chance there is of her going to check on Varrick. 

“It would make us seem merciful and benevolent. You told me our image is incredibly important and it’s in a delicate balance right now. Marching on them will make us be seen as no better than the earth queen, the other nations will hate us.” 

Kuvira pushes her chair back and stands, her hands rest on the desk so she can lean closer to you until your faces are only a few inches apart. “If I think about it, will that make you happy?” Her voice is husky and smooth, she’s speaking softly to you and that pesky part of you that’s practically entranced by her is trying to rip through your focus. 

“Yes, it will” you whisper back, she leans forward to bring you into a quick kiss filled with passion and love. You're surprised by her actions, technically anyone could walk right in but you know most people would knock on the wooden post outside before entering. It fills you with hope that she’s willing to kiss you in broad daylight. 

Kuvira pulls away and goes to sit back in her desk chair, you're frozen in mild shock which must be evident in your demeanor because she looks up at you with a smirk. “I’ve told everyone for safety reasons I’ll be staying in your tent, expect me there tonight.” 

Before you can answer, there’s a knock from outside and Kuvira waits a moment before saying in her usual commanding voice, “come in!” A soldier walks in, as he was trained he immediately bows upon entering before walking closer until he’s a few feet from her desk. You try to compose yourself so it’s not obvious what just happened, your cheeks feel warm.

 “What is it?” She quirks a brow and looks up at him, her demeanor towards her soldiers is much calmer and you’ve seen her joke with them a couple of times. One night you asked her why, it just didn’t seem like her to which she replied “if, for whatever reason, I can’t protect myself, my life is in their hands. Why would I not be nice to them?” 

“Baatar asked me to inform you that Avatar Korra is here,” his back is ramrod straight and his eyes are trained above her, as all soldiers are taught. Kuvira stands from her chair once more and rounds the desk, walking over to him, “take me to her.” You follow after them a few paces behind, your hands held together behind your back to appear professional and strong, as Kuvira taught you. 

That smug bastard Baatar is standing beside the Avatar, you had caught a glimpse of her once in Zaofu but she looks so different now with her cropped hair and earth kingdom clothes. ”The Avatar is here to see you,” he says, glancing at her before his eyes shift back to your soulmate. 

“Korra, it’s such an honor to see you again. The last I heard you were still healing in the south pole.” Baatar notices you beside Kuvira and gives you a hardened glare, one of these days you were going to break down his ego for all the pain he’s unknowingly caused you, and all the hatred he has towards you despite not knowing what you do to his fiancee whilst he sleeps. 

“Well, I’m feeling much better now.” 

“That’s wonderful news.” No, it's not. Not for Kuvira’s plans at least. But maybe Korra can help you convince Kuvira to back down and save Zaofu from the impending invasion. 

“I’m here to ask you to back down. Please, take your army and leave.” Kuvira’s brows pull together just a fraction, you know her and you know that means the Avatar’s request didn’t work. 

“I think we both know that’s not going to happen,” she says. Korra’s face sets into a firm glare as she stares her down. “I can’t let you take Zaofu.” 

“Look-” Kuvira gestures to the camp around them, “- I was tasked with bringing stability to the earth kingdom. Zaofu is the last holdout. Why should I treat it any differently than any other state?” She clasps her hands together behind her back once more. Treat it differently because it’s home, because there are people we love inside! The voice inside your head shouts.

“What you're doing isn’t right,” Korra’s face softens as she tries to get through to her. This isn’t working, if anything it’s just giving Kuvira more ammunition to attack, you want to tell the Avatar to shut up and leave. 

“I understand you're just trying to do Su a favor, but you can’t come to me as I’m on the verge of reuniting my nation and tell me to stop. The world was descending into chaos while you were gone,” Korra looks down when Kuvira mentions her absence, looking solemn and remorseful, “and in order to fix it, I had to make some tough decisions.” Yeah like, get engaged to Baatar… 

“I know what that’s like. I’ve had plenty of people mad at me about decisions I’ve made,” Korra looks back up at Kuvira. 

She takes a couple of steps over to the Avatar, “exactly. Korra if you really want to help,” she places a hand on Korra’s shoulder, “go back to Su and try to talk some sense into her. Let’s call a temporary truce. I won’t make any moves until you talk to her and get back to me.” 

“Maybe that will be for the best…” Korra leaves shortly after, rushing to the metal city. Once she’s out of earshot Kuvira glances at Baatar and demands “prepare us for the worst, and go check on Bolin.”  

Your eyes widen and you look between the two of them before speaking up, “I can go find him, we usually spar around this time anyways.” You try to keep calm, Baatar scoffs at your offer “now is not the time for you to run off into some closet for a quick stress relief.” 

You gasp and take a step closer to him, “Bolin is my friend and nothing more. For you to accuse me of sleeping with someone who is happily in a relationship, with your little sister no less, is disrespectful and wrong.” Kuvira steps between you guys, glaring at you both. 

“Baatar, go find Bolin, y/n I need help with some plans in my tent.” Her tone is icy cold and your heart drops, does she believe Baatar? You anxiously follow after her and once you're inside the large tent once more she heads over to a large table with maps scattered across it. Slowly you walk over until you're standing beside her, your gaze locked on the side of her head. 

“You don’t believe him… do you?” your voice is small and she places her hand flat across the table as she stares at the Gaoling province on the map. “Vira…” 

“I don’t think you would, but I wouldn’t put it past him to have feelings for you and I know you can be quite vulnerable at times.” She finally looks up at you with an inquisitive stare, “has he ever tried anything?” 

“No, Vira, he loves Opal just as I love you. If he had ever tried something I would have told you by now, I promise.” You place your hand atop hers and give it a gentle squeeze. She flips her hand so her palm is facing upwards and threads her fingers with your own. 

“Good, I don’t think I could keep myself from fighting him if something had happened between the two of you,” she says possessively while your stomach drops at her insinuation. She pulls you into another quick kiss and your mind is clouded with confusion at all of her affection today; it's foreign and strange. “We only have a few steps left before this great nation is stable due to our hard work. Only a little while longer until I can propose to you.” 

“I love you,” you say softly, one of her rare genuine smiles appears on her face as she gives your hand a gentle squeeze before pulling away from you. “I love you too.” 

Maybe there’s still a chance, after all, Bolin should be in Zaofu by now.

#kuvira #the great uniter #the great divide #kuvira x reader #kuvira/reader #lok #lok fanfic #legend of korra #bolin #varrick #opal #suyin #baatar jr

[thanksjro]

More Than Meets the Eye #21- Situations in Which it is Appropriate to Stab Your Roommate

You know what’s generally considered bad for your health?

Getting fingers stuck into your brain meat.

Tailgate reveals himself to be immune to Tyrest’s “fall down on the floor” signal, because his hearing’s gone to complete shit due to Cybercrosis. Tailgate then turns off the “fall down on the floor” signal, allowing everyone back up. Tyrest dislikes this turn of events every much- so much so, in fact, he’s turned into a Nazgûl out of sheer rage.

Rodimus, feeling a bit bolstered by the fact that he’s gotten his hands on one of the massive guns the Legislators dropped, tries to talk a big game at Tyrest, before being reminded that a lot of their party is still at risk of dying, by way of their souls cheese-wizzing out of their heads.

Tyrest, now using Tailgate as a hostage, tells everyone to back off so he can go hang out with the Guiding Hand, otherwise he’s gonna poke holes in Cyclonus’ morality pet. Tailgate screams for Rodimus to fire, finally revealing that he’s been dying this whole time. Rodimus has a weird moment where the plot overrides his knowledge of his situation as a character, as he claims shooting them both is unnecessary, as it looks like someone’s already working on it.

Not sure how he saw the gun and not the man it was being held by. And Minimus has some fucking explaining to do.

Outside, Star Saber is yelling about everyone being unworthy of God’s grace, save for himself, because Real Bastard Hours are 24-fucking-7 with him around. Cyclonus decides that he’s going to deal with the stress of not being able to find his dying roommate through violence, and agrees to a religiously-inclined sword fight.

Star Saber has a good start, sucker-punching Cyclonus in the chin, holier-than-thou as he goes. Cyclonus turns the tables however, when he uses his remaining helmet horn to gouge one of Star Saber’s eyes out, revealing his fashion statement to be a deadly weapon in its own right.

Then we get a taste of Cyclonus’ personal brand of faith.

That’s a mighty high opinion of Tailgate you got there, pal. Quite the jump from “I think you’re pathetic.”

Unfortunately, having this little character moment gives Star Saber enough time to warp the hell away from Cyclonus’ Nazgûlian wrath.

Back with Zombie Bullshit Part 3, we get some friggin’ answers.

Minimus looks super tiny here, but remember that he’s still at least ten feet tall. This is not a man you can invite inside your house for a tea party.

After Minimus’ head got crushed, he had to Alien chest-burst his tiniest self out, which allowed him to grab that gun that’s as big as he is and shoot Tyrest in half. Rodimus has to be reminded again that people are still dying, including Brainstorm, which is weird, because he made it seem like he was forged a few issues back. Perceptor runs off to try and parse the Killswitch, and Pharma offers to help, striking a weirdly sultry pose as he does. Everyone ignores him, because that’s just what happens when you become evil and cut your old coworker in half hotdog-style- you get ignored.

Off in the corner, Swerve is talking to Tailgate about the fact that he didn’t tell anyone he was dying, then makes a joke about his impending demise, because Swerve has a lot of trouble handling serious situations. No one has helped him pop his nose back into place, either. This entire team is just falling apart.

Skids stares blankly at Ratchet and First Aid as they check to make sure all the cold-constructed ‘bots are still dying- they are- then remembers that he’s supposed to be watching Pharma.

Prowl only hires the best, clearly.

Skids runs for the portal, with First Aid right on his tail because there’s a gotdang score to settle, and also Rung for some reason. They find Pharma chilling in the tunnel, completely unable to get through to the other side, not because he’s guilty, but because there’s a forcefield in place.

Of course, because Tyrest was an engineer, and you can always find a running theme with everyone’s work, Rung theorizes that the forcefield is working with Aequitas rules, and actually can sense guilt- not of the legal sense, but of the personal variety.

Which sort of implies some unfortunate things about the Aequitas trials as a whole.

Skids starts sinking through, whereas Rung is hitting a wall. Rung, the hell you got to feel guilty about? What sort of horrors have you inflicted upon the world, you skinny creamsicle of a man?

Skids, people are dying. Can your personal nirvana not wait until after this galactic-scale crisis is resolved?

While Skids fucks off into the portal, First Aid’s taking care of Pharma, as Rung watches and has a Nam flashback to issue #6 in the distance.

Sometimes I wonder if First Aid is somehow aware of how Eugenesis went for him, and that’s why he’s so aggressive all the time in MTMTE.

With his revenge exacted, First Aid finally has that breakdown that’s been a long time coming.

You know what we haven’t had in a while? Gratuitous religious imagery.

“They call it the Eugenesis Code. Has something to do with intellectual property, I dunno.”

So this move they’re about to pull might kill Rodimus, and is for-sure going to annihilate the half of the Matrix they have. Bummer. Perceptor goes to finish setting up, leaving Rodimus and Minimus alone to discuss that thing Getaway brought up about Ultra Magnus luring the Lost Light to Luna 1.

Over on the floor, Tyrest isn’t dead, because of course he isn’t, and enacts the homophone game with Swerve and Tailgate as he relays an order to the Legislators.

Outside, all the Legislators stop whaling on Whirl with their swords and start parroting prime numbers at the sky.

Back with Rodimus and Minimus, it’s revealed that Magnus/Minimus/Miniminimus DID lure the Lost Light to the moon, but it was to have Tyrest yell at Rodimus for being a crappy captain. He didn’t know that Tyrest had gone completely bonkers.

The worst part is that Minimus doesn’t know the half of all the bullshit Rodimus has pulled since the end of the war.

No wonder Rodimus was so upset before the funeral- Overlord was partially his fault.

Prowl, prior to the Lost Light’s launch, had wormed his way into Rodimus’ brain, convincing him that an Autobot Phase Sixer was absolutely necessary for the safety of everyone. He, along with Drift, Brainstorm, the Duobots, and eventually Chromedome, assisted in what culminated in one hell of a bad day.

Rodimus would really prefer if this whole space-crucifixion didn’t kill him, because he’s feeling like he’s got a lot to make up for. Which, yeah. I’m guessing all of Tripodeca’s friends are going to be mighty sore about this whole thing once it comes to light.

And that’s a series wrap on Rodimus!

We get a brief intermission, as we find out where exactly Skids got to. It’s… somewhere. Not even he’s sure. He tries to ask for directions, but it would seem there’s a language barrier.

It really speaks volumes to Skids’ sense of self-confidence, that he’d see a giant ball of technicolor light and decide he’s gonna go try to talk to it.

Back at the current crisis at hand, Rodimus screams some more, the Matrix shatters alongside any hopes of finding the Knights of Cybertron, and Ratchet has himself a little smile, because that did the trick.

The reason we aren’t seeing Crankcase in this set of panels is because his head wound was also spewing oil, and he looks super nasty right now. Well, nastier than any of the Scavengers usually are on a day to day basis. They regularly drink corpse juice, they can’t NOT be nasty.

Unfortunately, we aren’t out of the woods yet, as that whole Legislator thing still needs to be taken care of. They pour into the room, throwing Swerve along with the steel door, as he shrieks in terror.

Back outside, Cyclonus and Whirl are having a little breather up on the edge of the smelting pool, since all the Legislators they were fighting went inside. Whirl, who is looking just awful, brings up that little deal he cooked up in issue #19, where Cyclonus would stop trying to murder him if they got through this fight. It’s important to remember that verbal contracts aren’t binding, and that Cyclonus didn’t agree to anything.

And that’s a series wrap on Whirl!

Actually, no, Cyclonus was just daydreaming. He agrees to put the past behind them, then shoots off to go find Tailgate.

Back in Legislator City, things are getting dicey, as Rung screams for Skids to come back, because if nothing else, he knows he can depend on Skids when the chips are down.

Skids, playing to Rung’s expectations, vaults over Pharma’s headless body out of the portal, and starts kicking ass. In the background, some creepy tentacle nonsense pulls Pharma through the portal. This, surely, will never come up again, nor will it be a major plot point down the road.

Because Tyrest decided he was going to play fast and loose with the law, Minimus has no idea what “one one” is meant to refer to. Tailgate decides that cram school did serve a purpose after all, and books it towards that massive computer off in the corner. After a bit of combing through the index, he finds what he’s looking for and makes a few choice edits to the Autobot Code. The Legislators freeze in place, and Tailgate reveals that he’s just completely voided a section of the law.

Just off panel, Minimus barely contains the urge to pop Tailgate’s cubic little head off of his neck. Not that he’d have much time to do it anyway.

Smash cut to the next day, where Tailgate’s laid out in a dark room, Cyclonus sitting by his side. Chromedome is also there for some reason. Rung is nowhere to be seen, despite him likely being a better fit for this situation than the guy whose husband died less than a week ago. Chromedome leaves, because this is a very intimate moment between these two guys who are roommates.

Tailgate, who has developed an honest-to-god “guy-who-is-going-to-die-by-the-end-of-the-movie” cough, tells Cyclonus that he made him something, and it’s waiting in their room for him. I’m going to guess it’s a macaroni art picture of the two of them fighting a dragon.

Tailgate has literal minutes to live, and Cyclonus just sits there, Nazgûling with grief, until Tailgate decides that NOW is the time to reveal his hand.

…Well, there’s the answer to the Babygate question.

Tailgate’s come to the conclusion that all his wanting to be important and a hero was a bit misguided, because as it turns out, it kind of sucks when it’s your final act in the world of the living. He really would have preferred to do just about anything else with his last days, even if it had been just chilling in his room with Cyclonus.

Tailgate asked Cyclonus off-panel to do him a solid and kill him before the Cybercrosis did, a plea which Cyclonus couldn’t agree to. Then he gets a call, and the tension of the scene is somewhat ruined by some goofy-ass cinematic parallels.

Where the hell is Tailgate, that Cyclonus has to book it down the hall to make it to the medibay? That isn’t clear, but what is is that Tailgate has the rottenest luck in the world; they figured out a cure for Cybercrosis, but his case is too advanced for treatment to be effective.

Cyclonus thinks that this is a major bummer, but thanks Ratchet for trying anyway. Whirl tries to talk to him, and he better watch out, before that little deal he made gets thrown out the friggin’ window.

Tailgate hits the final two minutes, as Cyclonus returns, sword in hand.

And that’s a series wrap on Tailgate!

…That was almost a sincere one, you know. Tailgate was supposed to die here, in an earlier draft of the story. He didn’t, because Roberts realized it would completely nerf Cyclonus’ character development. I can’t even begin to imagine who Cyclonus would have been if both the Rewind/Chromedome thing hadn’t gone over well, AND Tailgate got offed.

Later on, Ultra Magnus is back in action, Minimus Ambus having redonned the armor to reassume his position as S.I.C. of the Lost Light. He discusses the changes that have come about as a result of their time on Luna 1 with Rodimus, who’s pretty bummed about the whole situation. A quick rundown of all the nonsense that happened:

The mystical portal to the Guiding Hand no longer works

Hot Spot faded out and won’t come back on

Ambulon is dead

First Aid is very sad about Ambulon being dead

The ship is falling apart

The only person who seems to have had any sort of a positive experience is Brainstorm.

…James, did you put that baby inside that robot?

Anyway, so yeah. Luna 1 sucks butt. One star, would rate zero if I could, I don’t care if it has sweet rocket thrusters strapped to the back of it and is super mysterious, and might potentially be an idea pulled from the delightfully earnest Children of a Lesser Matrix.

Later on, Magnus makes his rounds, stopping by Cyclonus and Tailgate’s room to check the vibe. Turns out that stabbing sick people is considered medicine on Cybertron, at least when you’re using a Great Sword to do it.

Whirl had the awesome idea to slap Cyclonus’ weird spark energy into Tailgate’s frail body, so it could kickstart his heart and give him enough time to actually get treated for Cybercrosis.

Ultra Magnus is impressed, and perhaps a bit concerned with how easily Cyclonus was willing to risk dying so that Tailgate could potentially live. So much so, in fact, that Cyclonus gets an achivement- he’s finally collected enough good karma to be allowed to have friends!

Looking mighty fresh-faced there, Cyclonus. And is that a new horn? Someone’s got a plastic surgeon on speed-dial.

No, this is actually the gift that Tailgate made him, the one he was working on in Hoist’s workshop back in issue #15, just before the Overlord attack. The one we never got to actually see, probably because it would be very easy to tell what it was and who it was for if we had. The set up for our slowburn romance has to be just so, no shortcuts allowed.

#transformers #jro #jro punches me in the face #mtmte #remain in light #issue 21 #maccadam #Hannzreads #text post #long post #comic script writing

[erin-bo-berin]

Darkest Storms & Brightest Rainbows (Part 1)

MASTERLIST

Part 2

Part 3

Hard Love (unoffical part 4)

Finally, the first part of my “Cat fic” is here! I kept some lines and plot lines from the show, but I also added some different elements. For example, there’s a lot of scenes/references from Entropy and Date Night later on, but I didn’t include much from Red Light. You’ll soon see why.

I began this at the end of last year and didn’t think it would see the light of day as it wasn’t going anywhere. But after some inspiration, I finally finished it. I decided to break it into three parts in honor of the three Cat episodes. Besides, if I had wrote one long fic it would’ve probably been around 15k words. Anyway, this way I can leave you guys hanging in suspense for a little bit (mwhaha 😏). Lastly, I just wanted to say I chose this title for this 3-parter because the characters go through some dark storms but also experience some bright rainbows along the way throughout this story. Enough of my rambling, I hope you all enjoy. 🥰

Spencer Reid/Reader

Rating: G (part 1 only has some angst)

Word Count: 4,143

It’s truly fascinating how one small drop can create a ripple in the water.

That was what meeting Spencer Reid was like.

It was a typical day at work at the coffee shop you’d been employed at for almost a year. Life had slowly been getting somewhat back to normal for you. It had been a hard previous year when you lost both parents to a car crash. Living alone was difficult, but you were making it work.

It was like a breath of fresh air to find work in a DC neighborhood cafe. You loved being able to form relationships with some frequent customers and hear about their days; it was surprisingly very cathartic to connect with so many people after feeling so much loss. 

There had been a small breather between waves of numerous customers when he had first appeared at your counter for a coffee.

His order was just as unique as he was; coffee with whole milk and a little bit of honey. 

He was cute. He was really cute. 

His shaggy brown hair was probably just a touch too long and in need of a cut, but his loose curls made it work and it looked good on him. He had light eyes that would shift from green to brown, depending on how the sun shone through the window next to the counter and a smile so bright it rivaled the sun’s rays.

Something else you’d noticed, he was tall. Possibly 6 feet, if you were to guess. With a lean frame and a slight shyness about him, you were instantly intrigued. 

You saw him more often, never managing to get his name, but managing to pick up the tiniest details about him.

There was a slight cleft to his chin, a shadow of a feature that was dominant in some others, but only was fully shown on him at certain angles.

The same went for the chameleon like dimples he sported, only showing up now and then. Every time, they made your stomach flutter, just about as much as he did.

He had a smattering of freckles that you could mainly see only up close. Not the usual freckles that would be across the bridge of the nose and cheeks on an average person, but random ones. A few under the outer corner of one eye, a lone one on the far side of his forehead, one on the side of his cheek, just along his cheekbone, another larger one on the opposite side just underneath his earlobe, plus many more tiny ones scattered everywhere.

Everything about him was unique.

His hands were large and gentle, always carefully handing you money for his drink and taking his order from you.

He was sweet and always polite, asking you how your day was going, wishing you a good day when he left. 

He also had these small habits of licking his lips or squinting his eyes just the tiniest bit, without even being aware of the actions.

It was actually a bit pathetic how much you’d learned about this stranger yet couldn’t even muster up the courage to ask for his name.

It was one day, maybe six months after you’d first met the handsome stranger when you decided to take a chance.

He’d come in bright and early before 8 am dressed in gray dress pants, a purple dress shirt rolled up to his elbows and a two toned purple tie. Slung across his body and resting on his hip was his usual tan satchel that you’d seen him with every day. You didn’t even have a clue what his job was.

“Morning,” he greeted with a bright smile.

You greeted him back, automatically reaching for his coffee that’d you’d been in the midst of preparing. 

“Large coffee, whole milk and honey?”

“As always,” he chuckled.

Unlike other larger chains, it wasn’t a normal thing to label a person’s drink with their name, so it wasn’t easy to find out his name; hence why you still hadn’t learned it.

You were fastening the lid, about to hand it to him when you asked.

“Um, just out of curiosity, who would this coffee be labeled for?”

The minute the words were out of your mouth you wanted to take them back. It sounded so awkward and weird. Labeled for? You wanted to hit yourself.

A small smile tugged on his lips.

“Spencer. Nice to meet you—” he paused, waiting for you to fill in with your name.

“Y/N.”

He took his drink, turning to leave before pausing.

“Have a great day, Y/N.”

Less than a month later, you’d gone on your first date with Spencer.

•

Three years later, life looked a lot different. 

You no longer worked at the coffee shop, but now worked from home. It took a little time, but you eventually found out you had a passion for being a social media manager for different brands. You loved social media and posting content for brands was rather fun.

You and Spencer had hit it off during that first date, considering you’d been dating for almost three years now.

As much as you missed your previous work family, you had a big new family that you’d come to be an (unofficial) part of, within these last few years.

You had finally found out after a few dates that Spencer worked for the FBI in a unit called the Behavioral Analysis Unit as a profiler; a position that uses an art of studying behavior and a lot of psychology to catch killers. It was interesting, but dangerous work. It did come with some good things though, like a work family that was like a real family. You, too, had grown close to his team members through the last few years. They were like the family you had desperately needed since your parents’ passing.

It wasn’t always sunshine and rainbows in the BAU between the long hours and dangerous cases, but you were always there for Spencer. You were so proud of him and impressed by how good he was at his job; you were also proud to call him your boyfriend.

Recently, the BAU was dealing with a group of assassins, some that were hired through the deepest parts of the dark web. It had begun with one hit man that specialized in making his hits look like accidents. He had been seeking revenge on his customers and that led to the BAU discovering that there were a whole network of hitmen, each known for their own method of killing.

There was a chemist.

A sniper.

A bomber.

And the deadliest of them all, Ms. .45.

A black widow, Spencer called her.

She’d been the only one to evade capture and Spencer was going to be the one to lure her out. 

You were freaked, to put it mildly. Just from what Spencer had told you about this woman, you knew dangerous didn’t even begin to describe her. 

Unlike her former “co-workers”, she liked to be up close and personal with her targets. She played her games and when she was done, she’d shoot them without a morsel of guilt to drag her conscious down.

“Spencer, I really don’t think you should do this.”

You were sitting on the bed, watching him loosen his tie as he simultaneously told you about this case and changed out of his work clothes.

“Y/N, it’s better if I do it,” he said, turning to face you, his tie now hanging undone around his neck.

“Why you though?”

It wasn’t often that you argued and you couldn’t exactly count this as a fight, but you both definitely stood on opposite sides of this matter.

“I’m the closest to her age on the team. If anything goes wrong, she’ll be most likely to negotiate with a peer.”

“But Spencer,” you frowned, “I don’t like the sound of how dangerous she is. If she believes that you’re a client, she could kill you.”

“We aren’t going to let it get that far,” he assured, sitting down on the side of the bed, next to you.

“I just worry about you, always being in dangerous situations. I know it’s just a part of dating someone who works in your profession, but what if something happens to you?”

You can’t help the tiny crack of emotion in your voice and he pulls you into his arms.

“Nothing will happen to me, okay?” 

You nodded into his chest and he pulled back, frowning at you.

“I don’t like to see you sad. I want to see that pretty smile of yours.”

His fingers tickled your side and you tried to hold back the laugh bubbling in your throat. You were extremely ticklish and he only ever used that against you at a time like this.

“Stop,” you squealed, trying to wriggle away from his touch, but he kept tickling you.

“Nope, not a chance,” he grinned.

You fell back on the bed, laughing and squirming as he continued his tickle torture.

“There we go,” he smiled, satisfied, “There’s that smile.”

You grinned more shyly as he cupped your face with his hand and kissed you gently.

“Just be safe, okay?”

“Always.”

He kissed you again, his lips parting from yours to trail down your jaw to your neck.

“Is this your way of distracting me?” you chuckled.

“Hmm, maybe,” he smirked.

“No complaints from this corner.”

His lips returned to yours, kissing you with such intensity, it left you breathless for a moment. Your lips moved with his, your hands tangled in his hair.

The rest of the evening was spent doing nothing other than a little fooling around.

•

“Are you sure you want to do this?” Garcia asked.

On the screen of her computer you saw Spencer entering the restaurant and speaking to the hostess before being seated.

“I’m sure,” came a moment later.

“We’ll protect him Y/N.”

This statement came from Aaron Hotchner—Hotch for short—, Spencer’s boss. You were grateful that Hotch had even let you be here, yet still the dread twisted in your stomach.

Garcia had hacked into the cameras to allow you three to see what was going on during this take down. Spencer sat facing the camera.

Only moments after he’d been seated at the table did a petite woman walk up.

She was slim with a short, angled cut. Her dark hair seemed to be in perfect place, just like the fake smile she was showing. She was dressed in a form fitting teal, sleeveless dress. The bottom was embellished in some sort of sparkling beads or perhaps rhinestones. She looked harmless enough, but you knew better. Looks could be very deceiving.

“Reid, we have you over her left shoulder. Do you copy?”

You watch as your boyfriend briefly glances straight towards the camera and taps a quick, stealthy answer on the table, with two fingers.

“I already hate her,” you glowered at the screen, watching as her hand lingered on his arm, seduction written all over her face.

“Put the claws away tiger,” Penelope muttered.

“So, how far along is your wife?” the hit woman you now know was named Cat, asked.

You watch Spencer swallow nervously, playing the part of an apprehensive first time customer.

“A few months. Do you, uh mind if we don’t talk about her?”

Cat was quiet for a moment. You can’t see her face, but somehow you just know she’s studying him.

“Let me see your ring.”

He furrowed his brows, but took it off handing it to her.

“You say you’ve been married for four years, right Spencer?” She studies the band, turning it over in her hand.

“Yeah.”

“For a 24 karat ring, it sure looks rather cheap. Apparently she loves you as much as you love her,” she tossed the ring on the table with a clank.

“Also, if it were four years old, it’d look more worn, don’t you think?”

You hear a click over the audio. It sounded suspiciously like a gun cocking and your eyes widened in horror.

Penelope gasped.

“Is that what I think it was?” 

“Yes,” Hotch answered her, “She knows.”

“You’re not married Spencer.” Her gun was pointing at him under the table, unbeknownst to the other diners in the restaurant.

“And guess what? I didn’t walk into your trap. You walked into mine.”

“Oh no,” Penelope breathed.

“I’ve got a gun pointed at your crotch right now, Spencer. What’s to stop me from taking you and the little ones out right now? It’d be such a shame; doesn’t Y/N want kids?”

“Hotch,” you growled, “He didn’t sign up for this.”

“He knows what he’s doing. Let him handle this. If it truly becomes a dire situation, we have backup in there with him.”

You pick at your nails, tuning back into Spencer and Cat’s conversation.

He ignored her remark, continuing to stare her down.

“You honestly think I’m dumb enough to waltz in here thinking you’re just another deadbeat asshole that’s tired of his wife? I know way more than you think I do. The BAU is the only one that got this close to us. But I’m still the only one left,” she smirked.

“Doesn’t mean anything. I’m good at what I do,” Spencer retorted.

“Tell me. Are you this cocky with Y/N?”

Your eyes narrowed, glaring at the screen.

“I’d love to shove my foot right up her-”

“Y/N,” Hotch chided.

“Sorry.”

She’d scooted around the booth closer to him, her hand sliding into his suit jacket and down his button down shirt. You couldn’t clearly see what she was doing, but you got the general idea. He jumped when her hand brushed his crotch before reaching into the waist of his pants, pulling out his gun with a smirk.

“So tell me, did you actually knock her up or was that just part of your cover? I mean unless you’re here to put a hit on her which is totally fine by me. I’m not one for commitment either.”

“You leave her out of this,” he growled, glaring at her.

“I bet you’re wondering how I know about her, right? Probably the same way I know that Blondie over there is part of your team, just waiting to take me down. Am I right?”

Spencer stayed quiet, his gaze hard on her.

“Do me a favor and tell her to take a hike will you?”

“Stand down,” Hotch says from next to you. You know enough about the plan to know that the entire team can hear messages from him here at the BAU.

You watched as JJ set the drink she’d been sipping on, down on the bar. She’d dressed in leather pants, a low cut black top with a quarter length sleeved, maroon fur jacket over it to appear as just another fancy dinner guest. She passed their table before disappearing into the kitchen.

“Thanks for playing, sweetie,” Cat smiled at her disappearing form.

“Now, tell me more about yourself Spencer. Why don’t you?” 

Cat rested her chin in her hand and watched him, her gun laying by her side where she could have easy access to it.

“Don’t you already know all about me?”

“True,” she made a face, “Then tell me all about me.”

“Well, for one, you’re quite loquacious.” 

“I’m gonna pretend that means sexy,” she grinned flirtatiously.

“Gag me with a spoon,” you mumbled.

“Now, like I said,” Cat continued, “Tell me about me.”

“You’re a psychopath that runs a different course than the rest of your fellow hit men. You like to be up close and personal, watch men lie and try to seduce them all before turning on them and killing them. Which in itself speaks to many deep rooted issues.”

“Is that your way of saying I’m just another woman with daddy issues?”

“You said it, not me.”

“So, how exactly did you find me?” She rested her chin on her laced fingers and cocked her head at him.

“Does it matter?”

“Of course.”

“Fine. It all started unraveling when we first took down what we thought was a lone hit man. One who specified in making hits look like accidents.”

You can hear Spencer still talking through the monitor as you paced back and forth behind Hotch and Garcia, your nerves getting the best of you.

You jump when you hear loud feedback from the mic.

“What was that?”

“She muffled the mic. We lost audio,” Penelope grimaced.

On the screen, you can see Cat’s hand on his tie, thumb over the microphone, her mouth moving as she says something to Spencer. He turns in the direction where Rossi was slyly approaching their table. 

With a few words that were unheard to the three of you, Rossi backed off, heading towards the kitchen.

“She caught on to Dave being there too,” Hotch mumbled.

“Hotch, this is not going as you planned, is it?”

Your question remained unanswered and by the way his posture remained rigid you knew you were right. That did little to reassure you.

“Entropy reigns supreme in this whole situation,” you grumbled.

You looked over and saw Hotch and Garcia staring at you quizzically.

“What? Isn’t another definition for that, lack of order or predictability or gradual decline into disorder?”

Hotch arched an eyebrow.

“Okay, maybe I used it wrong. I’ve heard Spencer use it before. This is why he’s the genius and not me.”

Nothing else was said on the matter as you three’s attention was turned back to the screen where Cat was talking to Spencer again.

“I’ll let that slide considering I learned something important about you.”

“What’s that?” Spencer questioned.

“Your backup. I’ve flushed them out. It’s just you and me now.”

“Guess again, bitch,” you mumbled.

You knew, as well as the rest of the team, that Tara and Morgan were still in there.

“I know you’re stalling, but why?”

“Cause I know there has to be a pretty impressive crowd of agents out front, just waiting to take me down.”

“You’d be correct,” Spencer deadpanned.

“Which is why you’re going to walk me out of here. I get away with no issues and no one gets hurt. If not,” she paused.

She ran her fingertips over the gun that she’d moved to the table, just in his line of sight.

“I have a fully loaded gun that can do quite some damage.”

“You won’t do it though,” he challenged.

“Oh wouldn’t I?”

“No because shooting up a restaurant isn’t your style. You’re more calculated than that. You like less mess, more mind games.” 

“So you do understand me, Spencer,” she smirked, “Then you’d understand that I need you to call off all the FBI agents so I can leave quietly.”

“I’m afraid I can’t do that,” Spencer shrugged, not breaking his eye contact from her, “I’m not letting you walk out of here if I have to hold you down myself.”

“Would you hold me down and leave bruises that wouldn’t go away?” she purred.

“Is that what you want?”

“I bet that’s what Y/N wants,” Garcia mumbled.

You opened your mouth to respond, not sure if she meant you doing bodily harm to Cat or your wanting Spencer to do that to you.

“Focus,” Hotch reprimanded.

“No, I want the agents cleared.” Her hand tightened on her piece.

“Everyone stand down,” Hotch ordered, “We let her walk. Reid let her go.”

“Well?” Cat pressed.

You saw him bite his lip, clearly trying to make up his mind what to do.

“Reid. Let her go.”

“Spencer?” 

Cat was getting annoyed, that much you could tell and you knew she was definitely a person you didn’t piss off.

“Fine, you can go.”

She gathered her things, standing up to leave.

“But you won’t,” Spencer said.

She turned, gazing at him.

“Excuse me?”

“I found your father,” Spencer challenged.

“Reid, what are you doing?” Hotch asked, glancing at Garcia who just shrugged in response.

“Spencer, no,” you whispered, anxiety flooding your senses.

He was playing with fire and if he wasn’t careful, he was going to get burned.

“Tell me where he is,” Cat demanded.

“Sit down and I will.”

You glance at the two next to you.

“This wasn’t part of the plan, was it?”

“No,” came the terse answer from Hotch.

You see her sit once again across from Spencer.

“To prepare for tonight, I had to do my research on you,” he started.

“Is that so?”

“Lewis, Morgan, try to clear out the restaurant as subtly as possible. If this goes wrong, she could start shooting. I don’t want any injuries on my conscience tonight,” Hotch commanded. 

You didn’t see their movement on the screen, but within a few minutes there were more than the normal amount of waiters moving along the tables.

“I found your father Cat,” Spencer continued, in effort to distract her.

“You’re lying.”

“Does it look like I’m lying?”

“No, but I know you are because I never mentioned that I found him myself. He’s been dead for years, Spencer.”

You saw her reach for her gun at the exact moment a commotion towards the front of the restaurant broke out. You couldn’t see on screen what was happening, but it was all the distraction she needed.

Hotch was barking orders and you heard Spencer shouting something to Morgan.

It was later you found out that against Lewis and Morgan’s wishes, someone—most likely a waiter—had started freaking out. Whether that caused the following events to happen or not you would never know, but it sure didn’t help them either.

“Oh my god,” Penelope gasped.

Your eyes were glued to the screen and the horrible events that were beginning to unfold.

Cat had Spencer by the arm and her gun was pointed directly at him. She had him in her claws and she wasn’t about to let him go without a fight.

“Get everyone out of here!” Spencer hollered.

You heard the rest of the people fleeing the dining room, Tara aiding them, but you didn’t take your eyes off of Cat and Spencer.

“Well lookie here,” she grinned up at Spencer, “Back where we started. You and me and a gun.”

“We can talk this out,” Morgan said, slowly approaching, his gun still aimed Cat's way.

“I don’t know Agent Morgan,” she smirked, “I don’t like liars. How do I know that Spencer is true to his word? He’s already lied once.”

“Let him go and we’ll talk,” Morgan said.

“It’s too late for that.”

A loud crash came from the front of the restaurant. Distraction number two. You couldn’t tell if it had been planned by Cat or not, either way, it was her perfect moment to strike.

Multiple gunshots sounded. 

Time slowed down.

Penelope cried out.

Hotch cursed.

You fell to your knees.

In a split second Cat had shot Spencer and he went down, bright red blood beginning to stain his dress shirt. 

Shots were fired from Morgan’s gun. Tara went running after Cat, Morgan went running to Spencer’s side.

There was commotion on the screen. Tara came back in from the direction of the kitchen where Cat had run. Luck must have been on her side because she had disappeared into the night.

Everything changed in one quick moment.

Spencer had been shot and Cat had gotten away.

•

You had no memory of how you’d managed to get from the BAU to the hospital, but here you were, fidgeting in a chair, tears streaming down your face. You hadn’t even had a chance to see him before you got to the hospital and you were wracked with worry with how he was.

The last thing you remembered was falling to the floor, your head feeling woozy as you tried to process what was unfolding before your eyes. 

Spencer had been rushed into emergency surgery and you waited anxiously with the rest of the team in the waiting room. You were positive you hadn’t stopped shaking since you heard the gun go off.

The awful sound rang in your ears and every time you closed your eyes, all you could see was Spencer falling to the ground, blood soaking his shirt.

You looked up when you heard the click of heels and saw JJ coming back with an update on Spencer. The look on her face sent a feeling of cold, icy, fear through your body.

“He didn’t make it,” she whispered.

A buzzing sound rang in your ears and you were sure you’d heard wrong. 

“What?” you croaked.

“Spencer’s gone,” she choked out.

The guttural sobs that came from deep within you didn’t even sound human. Your anger and your pain melted into one.

Cat Adams would pay for this.

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[imtryingthisout]

Sunglasses and Serenity

[a fic inspired by @nachosforfree @sanderssides-magicalgirlau check them out]

[Warnings: Descriptions of a Panic Attack]

[Pairing: Sleepxiety]

[Word Count: 2283]

——————————————————————

It was not a quiet night. The sky above was dark, the pearly stars hidden behind the neon verbosity of downtown. 24 hour shops and businesses had windows that never dimmed, pinpricks of artificial lightings blurred together creating an abstract mess of blended color.

The moon itself was distorted by the light pollution. It’s natural autumn glow paled in comparison to the vibrancy of the busy streets.

Remy both loved and hated it.

Growing up with summers spent in his family’s old Villa in Italy, secluded in a valley side miles away from the nearest approximation of a town, he had always known how the sky was darker blue than black. He and his cousins loved to climb upon the rooftop and find the stories hidden in the stars. The earth around them was quiet and peaceful, but never silent. The symphony of crickets and other night creature laid in the background of every night spent there. A distant murmuring, Tellus’s lullaby.

Moving to the city had been akin to dunking his head in a bucket of ice water and screamo pop.

Shocking, painful and utterly disorientating. But after the ringingness faded- strangely exhilarating.

Remy has thrown himself headfirst into the city’s night culture. Staying up late partying, trying all the best coffee houses, hanging around the hidden-and-not-so-hidden drag shows,gaining a reputation and a caffeine addiction along the way.

But this was not a night where he would be going out, not when everything he needed was with him.

“Penny for your thoughts?”

Virgil really was a sight to be seen, his skin was pale, like the white-petaled sunflowers that grew by the valley, that seemed to glow in the moonlight. But his starkness fit in perfectly with the gleam of the industrial lights. Heterochromatic eyes, green and purple, stunning as murano glass and pulsing as strobe lights.

Achingly familiar, yet enticingly foreign. Home and longing rolled up in one boy, a boy who has stolen one of his sleep shirts for his own nefarious (adorable) use.

And who probably wanted an answer. Quick Remy, think of some witty remark to be entertaining!

“You ever notice how bright it is sometimes?”

Damn it! Guess we’re being genuine.

Virgil quirked his head to the side, giving Remy a piercing look, before nodding his head slightly . “Yeah,” he said, “Used to overstimulate the crap outta me when I was younger.” Then he paused, debating with himself over continuing- but decided to press forward. “Is that why you always wear those stupid shades?” The last words said in jest.

A surprised laugh escaped his through before he could stop it- Virgil almost reaches out to comfort him, but tensed up, too many bad memories stilled his arm.

“Girl, I’ll have you know these are designer glasses right here” he made a gesture around his face, “Iconic one of a kind Remy Hypnos Original Shades. Don’t go dissing my brand babes”

Virgil just snorted and rolled his eyes, “Uh, I’m pretty sure the designer thing on your face are those-eye bags you have hidden under there.”

“Damn right, even the bags under my eyes are Gucci”

“Oh Gods did you steal that off tumblr you sleep-deprived asshat? Oh don’t give me that look you totally did.” Virgil’s words had started off biting, but slowly devolved into a giggling mess.

(He really was just too cute for this world, Remy thought)

“Oh Ha ha, laugh it up” he snapped, ignoring his blushing cheeks and hot ears.

(Virgil could always tell how flustered Remy was by how red the tips of his ears were. A dusty pink for flirty, A warm rouge signaled embarrassment or arousal. Virgil loved watching the colors bloom on his skin. Memorizing what each shade meant- he could take any cochineal-colored paint swatch and map out Remy’s mood in the margins. It made him so easy to read, and so much fun to mess with.)

Soon the laughing and jeering subsided, and Virgil turned to look at Remy, “But seriously man, Is that why you always have those things on? Photophobia?”

“Can’t it be enough that I look rad as all Hell’s in them?”

“Not with that deflection it can’t” Virgil wasn't giving up it seemed, so Remy let out a deep sigh and gathard his words. “Remember highschool?”

“Kind of hard to forget.” High school was an absolute trainwreck for Virgil, he’d been on and off meds that screwed with his moods- making the already hormone fueled circus that was over a thousand teens trapped in one building, like a pack of sardines- even more emotionally taxing.

But if High School was a disaster for Virgil, it was absolute Hell for Remy.

Remy and his cousins had been homeschooled by their many relatives since they were children. Growing up learning in his family’s study. Rich mahogany floors, dim golden lighting bouncing off the variety of nick-nacks and treasures that line the shelves. Learning to read in his grandfather’s library, his worn and wrinkled hands guiding his young fingers along the words.

His cousin Alessia longed to go to a public school, and pleaded with her mother for ages before she relented. With the condition that she would allow her to go- but only if one of their own went with her.

So Remy, proving himself as her favorite, offered to accompany her.

The blinding smile on Alessia’s face as she squealed thank you , thank you amata cugino, favorito benedetto, was totally worth it. ‘It’s only one year’ he thought, ‘how bad could it be?’

Until he actually got there.

Virgil could think back and recall in semi-perfect clarity the day Remy Hypnos graced the halls of Sandershore High. Roman had become a central hub for gossip , and he’d heard whispers that of new transfer students, which in of itself wouldn't be news. But Hypnos was a household name, owning some of the most ridiculously pretentious Itialian Restaurants in the country. The kind people got engaged at, those levels of nice.

Needless to say when Remy and Alessia strolled into Sandershore’s gate. With perfect olive skin, rich brown hair and clothes nicer than Virgil’s single mom income could ever afford. Virgil fell in hate easily.

(The kind of hate that has him staring at him out of the corner of his eye during Calculus. Thinking about what his eyes looked under those darkened glasses. The kind of hate that wasn’t really hate)

Remy had all the perfect components to rule to school. Pretty, rich, with a startling amount of charisma and people skills for someone so unsocialized.

(Know one knew how he picked up slang so fast in an attempt to hide to slight foreign tilt that laced his words. Never knew how when he first heard someone mock Alessia’s body he punched the guy’s lights out without ever thinking. No one knew how he hadn’t had a night's sleep since school started. How fake he felt, his mannerisms esageraged and twisted to suit the liking of the student body- till he felt like a caricature rather than a person.)

By second quarter Virgil and Remy’s seeming distaste for one another had spread far and wide. They couldn’t be in the same room together without having some sort of verbal showdown. If you asked Virgil he would say that Remy was a self absorbed prick with an ego the size of Mt. Rushmore. If you asked Remy he’d say that that Virgil was a clingy mood-killer who couldn’t see past his own issues.

(Remy didn’t know how empty Virgil felt. How much the crushing weight of his own thoughts threatened to pull him down under. How his dependency on Patton was more sinister than a clingy best-friend. How sometimes his nightmares left him gasping and clawing- begging for them to come back. How his mother never really could fill the emptiness in his house. How Virgil sometimes felt like a puppet going through the motions.)

As the eye bags under their eyes grew darker and heavier, and autumn grew colder and colder. Both boys felt the pressure crushing them under its weight.

(Turns out they both used their arguments as cathartic release from the world around them.)

(Some things never change.)

It was winter when they found each other. Both on the verge of a breakdown-

(It was always too bright. There were no warm wooden floors just chilled title and harsh- fake- lights. The entire building smelled like body odor and cleaning supplies. The teachers were strangers, uncaring distant- he heard what the girls were saying about his cousin. He just felt so-)

(Empty. Hopeless. Patton was gone where did Patton go? He was lonely. And so so pathetic. He needed to get himself under control needed. Don’t be a burden- they all hate him- don’t slip up. They’re going to leave him. Everything felt so distant- drowned out by the static- he was drowning-)

Where the fate’s looking down on the two powder keg boy. A spark away from igniting. Weaving their strings together for a happenstance in counter. Or was it merely coincidence that they went to the same storage closet, to have a moment's respite.

Was it just chance that the door was automatic-locked.

“This is just great” Remy hissed under his breath, he just wanted one moment- just one! Of some cooled peace and solitude. Away from the buzzing gossip and fake friends. Away from the sensory hell outside. A little kernel of bitter anger swelled within the pit of his stomach. One moment, just one.

Then he turned to look at the other person in the room.

Remy had seen lots of sides of Virgil Anxiti, the sarcastic commenter, the horrible-yet oddly insightful- student, the debater .

(He hadn’t seen the devoted son, the caring brother, the friend who would do anything for his loved ones)

But he’d never seen him… blank.

Curled up in the corner of the closet, arms hugging his knees as they were pressed into his chest, was Virgil. Eyes dead and dulled as stone. The muscles in his face were relaxed completely- which unsettled Remy more than crying would have.

Remy wasn’t a Knight in shining armor, or even a comforting person in general- but unqualified as he may be, he couldn’t just let his favorite rival just sit there and do nothing to help.

Alessia needed physical touch when she was upset , their whole family was practically comprised of touchy people. So when one of them was sad, it was a one way ticket to hug time. Somehow Remy didn’t think that would be well received.

“Hey, babes I’m going to touch your arm- that good with you?” He didn’t reply, not that Remy thought he would- but still. So slowly, cautiously, he layed a single hand on Virgil’s arm.

The change was gradual, but noticeable. Hear bloomed under Virgil’s complexion, bringing back warmth into his skin. The glassy oversheen of his eyes subsided, and his entire posture just… relaxed. And so did Remy.

When he had gathered enough of himself, Remy guided Virgil though his breathing exercises. In and out, In and out. Hand never leaving his arm- grounding him to the world.

The door was still locked when Virgil regained his senses. “Guess we have to wait until someone notices we’re missing” Which nearly set Virgil off into another spiral. Until they rembered that technology exists. And so they used Virgil’s phone to text Logan to come and unlock it.

“He’s the only one who won’t make a big deal about us being locked in a closet together”

But there was time between then and there. Time to talk, if only to fill the awkward silence.

To talk about school.

“Girl I have no idea what they put in those ‘school provided lunches’ but they are not food.”

“What rock have you been living under? I once got food poisoning from drinking some of the milk in 6th grade- and that still wasn’t the worst thing I’ve eaten from there.”

About Friends.

“I met Patton when I was six and we’ve been best friends ever since. Dee joined in when we were all about nine and we first saw Lo’ and the twins when they started freshman year”

“I cannot honestly tell you the names of half the people who hang around me”

About Family.

“Hon you could bust down every wall in this building and still wouldn’t have enough room to put all my fam”

“It’s just been my mom, little brother and Patton since I was eight and my dad walked out. Still don’t know who I hate more for it- him or me”

If Logan took just a tad longer route to the closet- he didn’t mention it. He also didn’t mention when Remy started joining their table for lunch. Matching Roman and Remus in all their theatrics- offering to set up a ‘play date’ between some of his younger cousins and Dee’s many siblings.

(If he noticed how much happier the two were after that, how much more healthy Virgil seemed, how more secure in himself Remy acted...well that was just one more thing he didn’t mention.)

Present Day Remy took off his glasses, letting them rest gently in his hand. “My Nonna gave them to me the day before I started school. Said they would come in handy. They did of course.. they just kinda.. became more” he rubbed along the temple’s rubbery tip. Eyes focused in on the way his fingers move up and down the slender frame.

Virgil gently takes the glasses into his hand, and sets them down on the bedside table. He has to stand on his toes to reach Remy’s face, but when he does he tenderly places a hand onto his cheek, gazing into his deep brown eyes- the same shade as his espresso cups and just as rich.

And Remy melts into him. Allows himself to be led away from the window. From the bright lights and traffic noise, and into Virgil’s embrace.

#sander sides #sander sides fic #fic #writing #remy x virgil #Virgil Sanders #sander sides anxiety #Remy Sanders #Sander shorts sleep #sleepxiety #sleep x anxiety #Logan Sanders #deciet sanders #roman snders #remus sanders #patton sanders #ocs #oc alissa hypnos #oc Nonna Gina #tw panic attack

[goingknowherewastaken]

This is a writer shaming post.

Maybe “shaming post” isn’t the most accurate description for this post.

“Tip/Heads-Up Post On How Writers Can Get More Readers” is a more accurate description...with the twist that it is written in a salty and Done^TM manner thanks to the amount of bullshit that’s happened in the past year.

Basically, I am fucking done with it. Done with the pathetic bullshit that has been going on for the past how many fucking months - hell, this goes beyond months! Fucking years this shit has been happening in the fanfiction community and I am done with seeing this shit continue to happen. 

Fucking. Done.

Anyways first and foremost before I get into this, I am not forcing anyone do any of these. Then again maybe I should be because these things are all things that have been repeated by all of a lot if not all of us writers and many writers have not bothered to improve on different points that I am about to make. So maybe consider these and how badly you want to improve your writing and note count, yeah? And dear god please stop with the bitching and moaning.

*sips tea* So, let’s get started, shall we?

♦♦ No one is obligated to read your work because SURPRISE everyone has their own preferences. 

What does that mean????? It means that not everyone likes everything so they may skip it if they don’t like what their reading. If what you put for the fic is a turn off then they won’t bother reading it or if halfway through they realize they don’t like it then they will leave it. 

So maybe the reason you aren’t getting notes is because it’s simply something that some people aren’t into. And don’t you dare get mad at the readers for that nor should you be trying to force them to read your stuff.

► Follow up point! There might also just be a small fandom for whatever it is you just wrote for!! Just keep writing!!! You never know, people might become curious and join the fandom for your content :D

♦♦ You gotta know your audience (for Reader Inserts).

Who are you writing the fic for? Women? Men? WOC? Trans men? Everyone?

Everyone has preferences for their fics, but the preferences get more intricate when you look at various demographics. 

Women of Color are not going to finish a reader insert if they see details (from terms to gifs) that would make the reader a white woman. Men are not going to read a fic for a female reader. 

It’s fine to tailor a fic to a specific demographic. Great, actually! But you need to be mindful and respectful of it. If you say the fic is going to be a gender neutral fic then you gotta make sure that it is gender neutral. Reader Inserts should always be race neutral unless you are tailoring it to a minority. Don’t try to get high and mighty about the “what about white people????” shit. Just don’t.

Speaking of which...

♦♦ Step away from what you know.

A phrase that many cling to often gets brought up in these moments: Write what you know. 

A dangerous phrase.

“I don’t know how to write for X because I’m not X.” It’s the usual statement said when people are asked to write for something that they are unfamiliar with.

Now, if you’re a new writer - I mean brand, spankin’ new - and are still figuring out the writing world - you get a pass to say this, but the longer you’re writing...

No. N - fucking - o. 

Sticking to what you know and not exploring new themes and views stunts your growth. You do not improve. You do not grow as a writer. You do not grow as a person.

Challenges and learning new things help us grow and become better...and get more readers.

♦♦ Just because you can write it doesn’t mean you should.

Oooooh boy. 

Everyone raise your hand if you’ve ever had a bunch of people come at you telling you that what you wrote is bad. By bad I don’t mean that they’re saying that it was badly written, but that what you wrote was insulting and/or wrong and you should never write that again.

If you raised your hand then I sure as hell hope that you heard those people out because if you didn’t and you just went into a pissy “waaaah these people are being mean and telling me to stop this and I don’t understand why and I don’t want to stop” mode then you need to pull your head out of your ass.

Sometimes, we do get readers who just want to nitpick everything and it’s easy to dismiss them. I had a person once tell me that I needed to stop using large spaces between paragraphs because they didn’t like large spaces. You’re damn right I ignored them because it was a stupid thing to pick at. (The spaces were due to the writing program I was using fyi.)

Other times, though, if many people are bringing it up, then it is something to be listened to. 

► Example - Cisswapping. I said Cisswapping not Genderbending. Both deal with changing the gender of a character for a work. Now there are instances of genderbending that are acceptable - like if the character can canonically shift their gender at will and/or identify as genderfluid; there can never be enough fics written about trans characters or readers.

But Cisswapping - just changing the character’s gender...now that is a massive no-no. Like, saying that James T. Kirk (Star Trek)(male) is going to now be Jamie T. Kirk (female) - not making the character trans or genderfluid, but saying that from birth Kirk is actually female in your work - that is shitty. How do I better explain how bad this is? Hmmmm...you guys know how shitty it is when a POC character is whitewashed? 

It’s that shitty and insulting. 

Cisswapping characters erases and disregards so many people and their stories and struggles. See, fandom ships usually M||M and the majority of the time the people that are disregarded are people who are gay and/or trans. These are people who have gravitated to fanfiction to see themselves and those like them reflected in works because popular culture is still trying to catch up to them. We can now see more gay and trans characters and celebs in our movies and TV screens and such than we could years ago, but fanfiction will always be a sure place to find that representation. 

So to suddenly find that Jane Doe decided that she wanted this popular M||M ship to be M||F ship... You bet your ass people are gonna be pissed. It takes strength and bravery to transition...but you just said that that means nothing compared to having an M||F ship. 

If you are that desperate to have a character in an M||F ship, just make an OC. 

Just leave the idea of Cisswap behind. 

(PS - thank you @insane-sociopath ♥)

►► Follow-Up Point - Do your research before going and writing your fic. There are plenty of sources online - not to mention people to talk to - that will help you out.

► Example - And rpf ships because those involve real people whose personal lives you are disregarding for your “fantasy” and no matter how many times you cry “but I respect them!!!” the dozens upon dozens of fics and fanart you post (both sfw and nsfw) about the rpf ship says otherwise. And the hyper-analyzing of photos and stuff to say that they’re in love…it’s on the creepy side of obsessive.

Not to mention you guys tag the celebs in the ship in your posts... Like, you guys do realize that the internet is not a vacuum right? Celebs and those who know them personally can see your shit and the process is made all that easier when you tag the celebs so it shows up in the celeb’s tag. Platonic and romantic relationships between celebs have been damaged after finding out about the rpf ship you guys have been creaming your pants over.

If the rpf ship in question are both single it’s just a tad bit less weird (still weird though) and if they are a legit couple in real life it’s definitely less weird to ship them (writing nsfw stuff for them is disturbing as fuck though). If one or both are in a committed relationship with someone who is not the other half of your rpf ship then uh-uh no way did you not read the start of this example?????

Reader inserts involving celebs can be looped into this as well if you think about it. There’s usually more acceptance for reader x celeb fics, but it doesn’t mean that they are accepted by all nor that you shouldn’t be treading lightly.

To wrap up this point, you might have scared off readers because they are tired of seeing you writing something that you shouldn’t be writing. This isn’t a “well you just said that people can have preferences and don’t have to like everything” thing. This is a “you’re probably being a tactless dick” thing.

*note - many do get a lot of notes on celeb content, this section was more addressing the hate that gets sent 

♦♦ People rarely have time to read your work right the minute it’s posted.

Did you know that mankind created this thing called Time and that the Earth is divided into timezones? No? Well, you’re education failed you. 

See, when you post a fic online, the following people will see it - those who you tagged in it, those looking in the tags you tagged it with, those who have selected the option to be notified every time you post something, and those who are simply scrolling through their dash. The latter point is what we are going into right here, right now.

Posting it once and assuming that everyone else will do your dirty work on spreading the news that the fic is up for reading only allows for a certain number of people to see it. It is highly encouraged to reblog your own shit. A lot. Like, ten times a day or even days on end. Hell, you should still be reblogging it long after you posted it. When you reblog your work you are putting it back into people’s dashes and giving it a better chance of being seen by other people. Depending on when you post could mean if an entire country and it’s residents (aka - followers and readers) is enjoying their free time, sleeping, attending classes, or working. 

So maybe the reason you’re getting no notes on it is because barely anyone has seen it due to it being posted at a bad time for them. 

Also, even during free time people are busy; they could have also seen it and are waiting until a later date to read it. Or they just aren’t in the mood for whatever theme your fic is. Regardless, don’t fret or be like “well I guess no one wants to read this now” or shit like that. Give them time. Patience. 

♦♦ How is your fic written? 

You don’t become a fantastic writer overnight. It takes time and effort and practice. Sooooo much practice. Some people who have been around for a while will only read fics with good grammar. A thing which is actually rather rude considering those writers with “bad grammar” are usually people who are in the early stages of their writing career or they are writing in a language that is unfamiliar to them. And I give you writers in those two categories a damn huge KUDOS. Do not stop writing because a reader is rude and is like “blah your writing sucks!” 

Writing takes practice and with every fic written and read we all get better and better. 

►► Some extra tips for us all to look out for:

+ Research! Research! Research!

+ Massive blocks of text scare people off. Try breaking them up into smaller paragraphs when you can.

+ Take a look at your tenses. This is something I myself am working on improving in my own writing.

+ Find yourself some beta readers! They are a huge help when it comes down to figuring out your fic!

+ If it’s a long work, please use the read more option. Hitting a long post on tumblr mobile without a read more is one of the worst things and it puts many readers off. 

+ Use a mix of said and adverbs; don’t be afraid of either. Adverbs can help set the scene more, but too many or using the wrong ones just makes the writing tacky; said gets boring after a while and only brings forth so much to the table. 

+ Make a masterlist - preferably a mobile friendly version!! You can do this by making a text post and linking your works and then embedding that link in your tumblr bio!

+ Read! Read! Read! Reading a wide variety of fics can help improve your own!

+ Don’t steal anyone else’s fics!!!! This is just really obvious people.

♦♦ Did you do anything at all to introduce your fic to people?

This is a huge point. See, most people don’t bother reading a work if they don’t know what it’s about. I don’t. If I can’t immediately see the ship or characters involved (not everyone likes every character or ship), warnings, a summary, or even the fandom (there’s so many Steves guys...you gotta include the last name of a Steve if you’re not gonna put their fandom) then I don’t even bother reading it. Books and movies and TV shows introduce us to these things; why can’t you?

And warnings.

♦♦ Did you post any warnings about your fic?

There are two types of people in this world. Those who see no warnings and don’t bother reading it because they don’t know what’s in store for them and others that will see no warnings and will then assume that the fic is safe. 

Big surprise when they’re caught off guard by something serious and they refuse to finish the fic. If people know that you are a chronic non-warner of sensitive content then they will not be returning to read any of your work. SPOILER - NOT WARNING PEOPLE ABOUT SERIOUS AND/OR SENSITIVE CONTENT NOT ONLY EARNS YOU NO NOTE ON THAT FIC BY PEOPLE BUT IT ALSO MAKES YOU A FUCKING JACKASS IN THEIR EYES

Warnings save a writer’s ass.

I cannot stress this enough - include warnings for your fic!!! Ao3 is built on warnings (the tags are warnings people) and people seem to get readers fine there. What’s your issue with putting warnings on tumblr fics? And they help summarize a fic (summaries also can act as warnings fyi)!!!!

Some people will argue that warnings = spoilers. They don’t want to give a heads up about sensitive content in lieu of not letting anyone know a single detail of what happens. Do I need to point out what’s fucked up with this statement? You are putting spoiling your fic above the mental and emotional health of your readers? (I swear to god if you try to argue that a trigger is only something that sets off self destructive behavior you need to check yourself. What about those that end up suffering panic attacks or emotional breaks? Or that writing doesn’t trigger anything? How does seeing other visual stimuli set off a trigger but not text? People can be triggered by any number of things; it all depends on the person. We can’t tag or warn for every trigger because there are so many, but the least you can do is warn about the mains ones (sexual assault, violence, abuse, self-harm, injury,...).) If you’re really gonna be anal about that then a trade off will be putting them in the tags and then telling people they can find the list of warnings there. But you gotta tell people where to find the list of warnings.

Not to mention that this stuff will dictate where someone reads your fic. Now, a lot of people read some really sexy or violent store bought books in public, but that is strictly text. I’ve seen a lot of fics with some nsfw gifs and moodboards slipped in. Most of us are already fearless when it comes to reading nsfw stuff in public, but the visual things can get people into a shit ton of trouble. And of course you have plenty of people who are mindful of what they read in public.

Or that they don’t have to use warnings because movies and tv and such don’t give warnings. Oh, yeah, you read that sentence right. There are people who have not been paying attention at all to movies and tv and such created over the past several decades. 

Or that ‘real life doesn’t have warnings’... I’m sorry have you checked the labels on medicines and other products? Or have you seen road signs? We have warnings everywhere people!!! It’s about fucking time that written works got better with it. 

If you don’t have anything serious to warn about then don’t put any warnings, but if you do then dear god you should probably do some warning.

♦♦ Make sure to tag!!!! 

On tumblr there are two different types of tags - the @ and the #.

The @ tag - Tagging people means that those people will be notified that you posted a fic (or they should be assuming tumblr is working properly)! If you don’t know who to tag, pose a question to tumblr asking if anyone is interested. A lot of people also are open to and encourage you to tag them if you have something that you think they may be interested in. And regardless of if you do tag people or not, people will often times approach you through comments, replies, asks, and DMs with requests to be tagged in future works. 

The # tag - using tags on your fics is so fucking important. These tags are how people find your stuff. Tag wisely. 

► Example - Let’s say you wrote a Bucky Barnes x Steve Rogers fic; expected tags should be - bucky barnes, steve rogers, captain america, the winter soldier, marvel, stucky, bucky barnes/steve rogers, bucky barnes x steve rogers, captain america x the winter soldier, avengers,... 

Honestly, I could add more tags to that. 

Another example - A Bucky Barnes reader insert fic; expected tags should be - bucky barnes, marvel, reader insert, bucky barnes x reader, bucky barnes/reader,  the winter soldier, bucky x reader,...

You get the idea? 

Tag your shit, but don’t over tag it. Stick to the necessary tags and don’t skimp on those, but don’t tag the unnecessary tags.

What are unnecessary tags? These tags are tags that have nothing to do with the fic and/or are not the main focus. Bucky Barnes x Reader fics should not be showing up in the Sam Wilson tag if Sam is not a main focus in the fic. Spirk fics should not be in the McKirk tag if McKirk is not the main focus of the fic. 

Many people will not read your work on purpose if you pull this shit because they’re pissed that your cluttering the tag with unrelated work for not reason.

But tumblr used to say that only the first five tags will be counted towards where a post shows up in searches, but I’ve sort of found this to be false? I’ve found many posts show up in searches where the tag I searched is actually far past 5 tags in. Basically, all of the tags are valid.

So tag responsibly people!!!!

And I think that wraps it all up.

I was going to do a section dragging readers, but I think that will be for another time because this is a little on the long side. Because sometimes us writers can follow all of the above and still have no notes. 

Anyways, once again, I am not forcing anyone to do any of these; it’s all up to you what you want to do in regards to your writing. I and a whole bunch of other people are just exhausted with the bitching and moaning people are doing in regards to not getting readers when there are several easy actions that could be taken to change that.

#long post

[purplesurveys]

519

Honestly, when’s the last time you genuinely liked someone? Right now. Is there anything on your mind bugging you right now? The traffic tomorrow morning is already bugging me and I know I should be sleeping now, but I miss my free time so I’m still up taking this survey. If you found out today that you were pregnant, what would you do? Find a new home. Is there anyone who you miss more than anything? Sure. Do you have any brothers or sisters? I have one of each.

Do you have any names picked out for your kids yet? For the girls hahahaha yes. I haven’t really picked out boy names because I don’t want a son lmfao. Are you Team Jacob, Team Edward, or you just don't care? Edward till the end bitch. Jacob was grumpy and jealous and violent and a big crybaby. Y’all liked him because of Taylor Lautner’s abs but no one’s ready to have that conversation yet hahaha. If you could have any super-power what would it be? Time travel.  Are you more of a hopeless romantic or do you just not care anymore? Hopeless romantic, definitely. Have you ever had your heart broken in the past? Yes, for various reasons. What would you do for a khlondlike bar? Get to know what it is, first of all. We don’t have that in the Philippines. Is there any girl/guy is specific who you wish would just fall off Earth? Y E S Do you know anyone with the name Emily? Nope. Not a common name in these parts. There aren’t any Emmas either, and I only know one Emilia. Who’s the last person you texted? Gabie. Do you like anyone right now? ^ Do you know how to make a heart out of a dollar bill? Nooooooo, I’m absolutely hot garbage at origami. Back in high school we were once taught how to make paper cranes - I lost my teacher as soon as we went beyond folding the paper in half. When you heard about the Haiti incident did you care? I’m sure I did, but I barely remember it now.  Do you like the rain or sun more? Rain. I hate the sun. Do you like it when questions are long and make you think? Not really. I like short ones, which is why surveys are perfect for me. Or do you like questions that are short and simple? ^ Have you ever volunteered anywhere? Mmm nope, but I’ve always had my eyes set on volunteering over at PAWS. I dunno why I never got around to it. Maybe one of these days. Describe your dream guy: Well first off, my dream person would not be a guy. If you had to choose between Brangie or Brennifer who would it be? I never really got to catch the peak of Brad and Jen so by virtue of my Gen Z-ness, I’d have to go with Brad and Angie. Do you like Speidi or do you think they're overrated? I’ve never even heard of that. I had to Google this because I thought it was some kind of brand of handbags lmfaooooooooo Have you ever had love at first sight happen to you? No. I did have a weird experience involving Gabie back when we were 4...but I’ll save that for another survey question. What color looks best on you? Olive green and black. Why are ferret's illigal in Califonia? This question is a trainwreck. Is there a subject in school which you like? Currently, I’m enjoying my Kas 117 class - social history of the Philippines :) I’m also taking a porn class this semester but I still can’t decide if I like it or not. Do you think Avatar is really all that great? I was never interested in both the Airbender show and the blue-people film. When do you think will be the next time you kiss someone? Maybe tomorrow or next week, I’m not really sure. Have you ever gotten so many butterflies you felt nascious? NASCIOUS, that’s very creative hahaha. Anyway, uhhhh sure I guess? Maybe in the early days of me having a crush on my girlfriend haha. When's your birthday and how old will you be? April 21. I already celebrated my 21st birthday this year. If you had a chance to go to the moon, would you do it? YES. That would make my astronaut dreams come true. Love or trust? Trust. Do you think everyone learns from their mistakes? No. They can, but some choose not to. What do you think about sexting? Whatever floats your boat man. Have you ever done it? Yeah, until I quickly realized I hated it. If you had to choose between money and true love what would you choose? Money lmao Is there such a thing a heaven? No. Have you seen the movie Lovely Bones? I haven’t, but it’s been on my to-watch list for a while. Would you ever swim with dolphins? If they are in their natural habitat, yes. Do you ever want to get married? Yesssssssss. If you had the chance to be famous would you take it? I wouldn’t have a talent, but sure. It’d be nice to travel and get free stuff :))) Have you ever believed a stereotype? Only those that have been proven several times to be fairly accurate, like how kids from certain private schools act/speak. Have you ever been accused of stealing someone’s boyfriend? No. Would you ever go on Tough Love? I have no idea what that is. Is that a show? Do you think everyone has good in them? Initially, yes. What is the best way to say it’s over? There are a lot of ‘best’ ways to say it; it just depends on the condition. Do you think you'll ever fulfill your dreams? Yes. Is it hard for you to move on? Yup. Have you ever been so madly in love that it hurt? At the beginning lol, sure. I would cry myself to sleep and do other teenage angsty stuff. It was pathetic but then again I was 16, so I get why I did all that. Do you speak any other languages than English? Again, yes. I was raised to speak Filipino. I mostly learned English from school and Barney. Do you wish to move to another state/country? Always. Canada, I’m coming for you. Is there anyone you'd take a bullet for? Absolutely. Do you wish to fall in love one day? Already am. Have you ever tried marijuana? No and not interested. Do you consider yourself a good or bad influence? Meh, I can be a little bit of both. Is there any reason you should be in jail right now? I don’t think so. What should you be doing right now? SLEEPING, which I’ll do now byeeee

#survey #surveys

[bholenathvalsan]

Horror Branded Content

(~2300 words, 9:30 minutes read)

Branded Content Outfit: a firm or group of firms covering many niches related to a subject or topic. A branded content network or distributor has different sub-divisions or products that can be unbundled from the chain as a standalone brand or line each.

I think I’m seeing this marketing modality badly executed. I’m seeing it this way pertaining to the horror film industry.

Let’s look first towards a successful horror fiction writer. I was going to write an article on Stephen King, but I decided not to. Even if I love his novels, it’s not pertinent for me to write about him on this Tumblog since it would be straying from the subjects I decided to focus on.

Yet, I wanted to mention him, because he is a great example for those looking to make a dent in the horror brand arena.

I think he transcended the branded content stage, first creating his personal, consistent and interlocking mythopoetic horror world, and ultimately becoming a horror household name.

If you read my previous post, you know that I used to be addicted to reading books when I was a child. Thankfully, skater/hc-punk friends pulled me out of that when I was a teen, and I didn’t read again until the fag-end of my teen years.

My way of exploring branded content, without having to invest a big amount of money to do it, was resorting to identity design.

I have the capacity of liking and being enthusiastic and passionate about an above-average quantity of things. My challenge was organizing all my niches in ways that minimized the disparity between the topics.

I achieved the needed organization classifying my subjects and creating a different identity for each broad niche and its sub-niches. This was a basic coping-mechanism for my ever increasing list of interests. I started doing this years ago, not knowing that it would be very useful to me when I decided to put to good use my knowledge and skills.

Even if coping mechanism can’t be called branded content, it has some points in common with it, at the personal level.

Let’s analyze a few branded content firms that specialize in the horror genre.

Production Outfits and Streamers

Shudder

A great idea, that I personally think would benefit if it expands to global markets. Seen from the audience's side, I think it would definitely benefit horror fans outside of USA if they opened the service to non-US subscribers.

I don’t have Shudder and haven’t even tried it, but just seeing its offer, especially the things they produce makes me wish I had it.

Netflix’s User Interface Horror

Since Netflix as a production company still has a lot of room for improvement in the horror genre, let’s just bash it about its user interface.

After a little over a year as a subscriber, my personal conclusion about Netflix is that it’s great for horror TV series. You can sample and watch from the big series catalog they have. Their offer of original and licensed horror series is big.

Still, Netflix’s selling point to me is its price, since the balance between price and quality is beneficial for the subscriber. My personal opinion is that you get a lot of bang from your buck when you subscribe.

I don’t understand those that dis Netflix. Maybe they had a preconceived idea that it was going to be a substitute for having a personal film library, which is way removed from what Netflix has to offer. You’ll have a library of the movies you like that Netflix was able to license only.

Compared to a collectibles marketplace. If you know the business model of Valve/Steam, you know that Steam game buyers don’t physically own the games in their libraries.

The nightmare of Steam video game collectors is if something happened with  Valve/Steam and the loss of their collection of games. Netflix has an equivalent to this, the Steam games owner’s worst nightmare. But dealt to the user in smaller, albeit constant, doses.

You can have the greatest curated movie list on your Netflix account, but movies can and actually do disappear from it. I don’t have much of a problem with this, but I do with the way this happens.

When for some reason Netflix pulls a movie from the catalog, it stays in your list, but you aren’t able to watch it. Obviously, the only way of finding out is clicking on it, which is, I think, preposterous. You have to depend on a site that tells about imminent pulls in advance to cope with this.

Another thing, that due to the outdated interface, obliges you to work outside the portal to make your use of it more efficient.

Beyond the licensed classic movies and blockbusters (that for me are the hardest to find), I take it as a sampler and viewer of licensed series and in-house produced movies and series, what’s called Netflix Originals.

It’s good to have because I guess everything Netflix produces is impossible to find elsewhere. Even on the p2p networks.

Still, one thing that I see as very, very bad of Netflix is the minimalist interface. It’s difficult to curate good movies and organize your list.

The simplistic way it orders the movies in one’s personal list is a letdown because you can’t sort or otherwise order them in any way unless you install a Netflix-experience-breaking browser extension or use the User Ordered mode of the list. The User Ordered mode could have fields with information about the movie, like genre and year. But it doesn’t, and that makes it useless.

There’s the possibility of narrowing movies with the genres menu, but that still is inefficient compared with the possibilities of a more streamlined and feature-richer interface.

Search engines showed me alleged browser extensions to deal with this problem, but they don’t work. Don’t bother to install the browser extension that uses grease monkey, it doesn’t work and the provider is a twitch to keep it around, same for the search engines that take one to the pages that have it for download when searching for a solution to this Netflix problem.

I tried it (it’s called Netflix Queue Sorter) with Greasemonkey in Opera, Waterfox, and Firefox. It’s forget it, Pablo, absolutely nothing appears on Netflix page with the extension enabled.

Blumhouse

I don’t know the nitty-gritty of branded horror cinema like what Blumhouse is doing for some years now. What I can say is that, for me, the end product leaves a lot to be desired.

The ultimate insult was to see an article that compared Jason Blum to Roger Corman. I didn’t bother to read it.

It’s wrong when the company’s approach is a profits-based one. Give Blumhouse credit as a profit-turning company, but their movies aren’t comparable to Corman’s by a long shot (no pun intended).

I guess I get the business model of Blumhouse. By keeping the production costs lean they have spare resources to make a greater quantity of movies in a shorter span of time.

To have an assorted and big catalog like that, and integrating all kind of marketing techniques before and the during the promotion, gives them a clear view of what audiences want. Then they have just to allocate resources to the properties that resonate with the audiences. And then... the numbers speak for themselves.

Why I think a system like this wouldn’t be sustainable, and why I dislike Blumhose so deeply? Because I’ve watched, I’d say around seventy percent of their movies and I can’t remember almost any scenes from practically any of them.

What’s more, when I remember a scene of any one of them, if I’m able to do that at all, the only thing that I remember is that I was disappointed by the movie while watching it. This is a basic sign that the movies aren’t good. Even if you go with practically null expectations into them, like I went into these movies.

I must have watched Paranormal Activity two, three or four years after it was released, and I really liked it. The low budget, indy approach was a highlight of what attracted me to watch it.

That’s why I kept on watching Blumhouse movies. But my disillusionment with the brand didn’t take long to make its presence felt.

It was depressing, to watch succeeding movies, each and every one of them having a lower value for me than the previous one.

Especially the Paranormal Activity series. From their whole catalog, I can say I like only the original Area 51, Paranormal Activity, Hush, Lords of Salem and Sinister 2.

That’s a pathetic low count of liked movies. The worst part of it all is that these movies cheat, you get used to them and end up enjoying them, but the non-memorable fact is the ultimate truth of them, they aren’t that good.

My final opinion about this company is, one, that they are trying too hard. Two, they go too much by the book. They’re doing what they were told to do in film school: a low-production-values, scarce-funding-resources approach to movie making, to be efficient in business and turn a profit. The result may be the investors getting rich, but a market flood with trash movies.

While I researched for this article, I was confronted with the unknowns. 

Companies that I haven’t heard about, nor about their movies, but that slowly seem to be approaching movie-making the way Blumhouse does.

Other Horror Producers

(still in business)

Zide/Perry Productions Hard Eight Pictures Practical Pictures Matinee Pictures New Line Cinema Parkes McDonald DreamWorks Pictures Benderspink New Regency Vertigo Entertainment Solana Films Room 101, Inc Twisted Pictures Lionsgate Platinum Dunes

Most of the contemporary horror movies are created by any of these companies.

On the other hand, these below I found them when researching for this article, and I think I haven’t watched any movie by them:

Dark Matter Dark Rift Films Terror Films Thriller Films Roller Disco Massacre Aventus Dark Dunes Eleven Film Last Doorway Productions

I have still to check out these companies.

Internet-based Horror Branded Content

One easy way to find out if a site is part of a branded content web chain is to look at the footer of the said site. If there are additional domains being offered, that’s most probably branded content.

Horror.net 

The aggregation system doesn’t have any flexibility for serious horror curating. It’s obvious that the horror community didn’t adopt it because of the obtuse and lacking features design.

This promotes a random frame of mind that pre-conditions one to accept whatever is given. Seriously, what were the designers thinking when they did this? It reflects on the content, very old, non-updated things.

A great idea badly executed. Naysayers will say it’s just a museum now. But let’s see it for what it’s worth. I’m sure that going through the pages of these portals would be a field day for curators.

Someday I’ll curate entries from this horror portal that survived through the years. I tested links, some are dead, but some took me to horror bloggers and such, sites still being updated that seem interesting.

I guess if your intention is learning about horror, its age makes it valuable due to the entries being so old. If the horror things they link to are still up, that does mean something.

Buried.com

A monster site about horror. As I see it, the fun factor of for this site was very intended.

Horror Movies Database (12555 movies) Horror Movies Reviews (4900+ reviews) Horror Fiction Reviews (1000+ reviews) Horror Interviews (300+ items) Horror Editorials Horror Conventions Classic Horror Films: links to Horror.net’s tribute sites

Tribute Sites:

　　The Texas Chainsaw Massacre 　　The Evil Dead 　　Friday the 13th 　　Halloween 　　A Nightmare on Elm Street 　　The Living Dead

Samhain.com

Halloween search directory. Sixteen sections with links to more than 1000 sites. The sections seem to cover almost everything related to Halloween. From the history of the holiday to even Halloween cooking to safety.

HauntedHouses.net

Haunted houses directory. Currently broken.

Horrormovies.org / Brimstone Pit

Horror movies database. Has a basic initial-based organization. Still, it also allows searching horror movies with its search function. It can be a broad search or narrowed down by title, plot, actor, director, producer, writer, composer or keyword.

ScreamQueen.com

A directory for scream queens. I have to give credit to this site for the concept. It’s a really original and helpful concept to make a directory of scream queens. This is an important niche for many horror fans.

Cryptcrawl.com

It’s another horror portal-cum-directory touted as horror and Halloween search. It has sixteen niches, that are similar but also different from horror.net’s twelve.

FirstFright.com

Another original idea, a hub for press releases related to horror. A great idea, but they’re no longer accepting press releases.

Frightmaster.com

Horror recommendations. Has a home feed of recommendations, the Frightmaster’s own database of endorsed horror movies. A nice idea, but the site is way, I’d say ~84%, out of order.

Bloody Disgusting

From the site’s About page: “An independently owned champion of the horror genre established 2001”. 

Bloody Disgusting mimics the branded content modality, with a silo approach to horror content. It also became a film production company and released more than half a dozen films.

Bloody Disgusting’s sections are:

Movies

TV

Reviews

Editorials

Videos

Video Games

Podcasts

Forums

Bloody Disgusting Select

Distribution company releasing genre films in AMC theaters and on DVD, Blu-ray, and VOD. They have distributed around twenty productions.

HorrorWorld.org

Something I noticed from this chain of content and collectible distributors, is that almost every site has a different founder.

JournalStone.com

Horror books bookstore. Has PDF, .epub, .mobi and paperback formats available. If you buy the paperback version, you get the electronic one free.

DarkDiscoveries.com

A quarterly color/glossy magazine published by JournalStone. It covers the horror, dark fantasy and science fiction genres.

BizarroPulpPress.com

Another publishing outfit, related to JournalStone. The site has articles by Vincenzo Bilof. The ones I could find were either titled Meet The Author and The Tough Questions. They were brief interviews of authors. It has a link to Sean Leonard’s reviews at horrornews.net.

HorrorReview.com

All kind of horror-related reviews.

BuyZombie.com

A site dedicated to all things zombie.

Hellnotes.com

Horror fiction, movies, and art. Similar to the other sites by HorrorWorld.org, but it has the best about page of the lot.

Outro

This article was my way of getting started in knowing internet distributors of branded horror content. I thought it was more valuable to make it something public for others to benefit from it and give input if they care.

It wasn’t easy to find this kind of businesses without a pre-planned set of keywords. Worse if you stick to B, G, and Y only. You have to get used to using like a dozen more search engines.

Photo Credits

Wikimedia Commons 1,2,3

#horror #branded content #content design #content distribution #content management #content development #love of camp

[sophisticated-angel]

It Went Like This

Characters: Mostly Dean

Warning: Bad date

Word Count: 1,255

Pairing: Dean x daughter!reader

Request:  Can I just request a daddy!dean with a teen!daughter reader. Nothing too specific. But can you toss in a little father/ daughter bonding mixed with angst mixed with family fluff and hell why not through some Uncle Sam and uncle cass in their too.other than that you have full range

Fic:

    It started a little something like this:

    Your father was off in the alcohol getting the beer he would definitely not be letting you sample. Never. Your uncle was in the produce section gathering what you and your dad affectionately call 'rabbit food'. You were twirling your hair and deciding which bakery item would magically find its way into the cart and through the checkout. He was a boy your age who was lingering too long by the cakes and none too shyly glancing your way. When you met his gaze, he grinned in the self-assured way of a boy used to getting a certain reaction from girls. In reply, you cocked a curious eyebrow and sidled over to a different table. Game on. Would he follow you?

    He would. He sauntered over in his name brand jeans and Hollister shirt intent on getting your attention again. Barely giving him a look, you pretended to read the ingredients on a box of muffins.

    “I'm Caleb,” he stated.

    “Hi, Caleb.”

    “Say, are you doing anything later?”

    “Depends on where you want to take me.”

    Caleb shrugged. “Girl like you probably enjoys pizza, right?”

    “I might. You buying?”

    “Of course. There's a place in that strip mall across the street. Meet me there at eight?”

    “Meet me there at eight . . .?” you baited.

    Caleb huffed a laugh. “Meet me there at eight please.”

    “Eight it is.”

    As he began to walk away, he turned back for one last question. “Hang on, I didn't catch your name.”

    “Don't worry about it.” You winked. “I didn't say.”

    Later, back at the motel, you broke the news to your father and uncle. That went like this:

    “Is this a date?” your dad asked.

    “Rather sounded like one.”

    “Alright. What time should we get there?”

    “I am getting there at eight. You are staying here.”

    “Nope. Either we both go, or neither of us goes.”

    Pursing your lips, you breathed deep to dilute a flare of frustration. You know you're a pretty girl, just the right mix of your mother and father, and your looks have gotten the attention of classmates more than once. At school you're no stranger to hallway kisses and lunch hour 'dates', but school is like Vegas: what happens there stays there. Little of these happenings are ever revealed to your family, and when you told your dad about that date, you should have expected a little resistance. You did, however, have your uncle on your side.

    “I think she's old enough to go by herself, Dean,” Sam interrupted. “She's got a driver's license, she's responsible, and she can take him out if he tries anything.

    “Listen to him, Dad.”

    With a bit more convincing, he folded and gave you his car keys. “Not a scratch on the car,” he warned, “unless it's from running him over.”

    The evening itself went like this:

    Caleb pulled out a chair for you and didn't ask why your purse was so bulky – it contained an assortment of things including pepper spray, a small dagger, an inactive hex bag, a tin of salt, and a handgun. He spoke confidently and sat easily, and initially he was good company. As the night passed, he grew disinterested in doing much talking, and he wasn't paying attention to anything you said. You caught him checking out other girls in a conspicuous way, confirming your suspicion that he no longer wanted to be there. To his credit, he stuck it out long enough to pay for dinner like he promised and walk you outside.

    “I don't see us having a future,” he confessed on the sidewalk.

    “Me neither. I guess not everyone works well together.”

    “Guess not. I mean, you're a nice enough girl, but I only date eights.”

    You should have slapped him. Your hand should have made direct, forceful contact with his face, but it didn't. Instead, he got a tasteful comeback and a pleasant smile. Then you strode away. Hurt, you stalked all the way to a bench that was out of sight of everybody and sat down to fume. Hot anger pulsed in your chest and between your temples, and for half a second you considered going after Caleb and teaching him a lesson. He deserved pepper spray in his eyes and a knee in his crotch, and who knows what curse the hex bag would have brought? You didn't move, though. You just sat and let yourself boil.

    “Are you alright?” a familiar voice asked.

    Looking up, you saw Castiel standing over you, head cocked to the side. Why lie? You shook your head. The angel sat beside you.

    “Dean told me you were on a date,” he said. “He asked me to check on you. I assume it ended badly?”

    You bit your cheek and nodded sullenly.

    “Should I smite him?”

    A smile formed unbidden on your face. Castiel had an eyebrow raised and looked joking yet fully prepared to blast your date off the face of the Earth. “No. That's too good for him.”

    Castiel reached out and squeezed your hand. “Let me drive you back.”

    You gave the angel the car keys, and he drove the Impala back to the motel. That was the first time you've seen him driving your father's car. Back at the motel, your father and uncle were waiting for your return. When you walked through the door, the conversation went like this:

    “How'd it go?” asked your dad.

    You shrugged off your purse, barely glancing at him as you sat on the edge of the nearest bed.

    “What'd he do?”

    “Nothing.” You shook your head and picked at a loose thread in the blanket. “Just a bad date.”

    “Bad how?”

    “Just . . . bad. We weren't each other's type.” You tried to swallow around a lump in your throat. “Or I guess I wasn't his.”

    “What's that supposed to mean?”

    “Nothing.”

    “(y/n)-”

    “Nothing, Dad!” It came out sharper than you intended, and the pang of shame was enough to make you hide your face in your hands. Caleb's words came back to you, the sting of them as fresh as the first time. I only date eights.

    You knew you shouldn't have let him get to you. He was a pathetic lowlife who didn't know what he was missing. Still . . . what part of you wasn't an eight? What part of you didn't meet his standards?

    Beside you, the bed dipped, and your father wrapped you in his arms. He was silent as he kissed your head and rubbed your arm. You didn't cry, and he didn't ask anymore questions. When he finally spoke, it was gentle and comforting.

    “Whatever that son of a bitch did you to you,” he said, “you didn't deserve it. Whatever he said to you, it's not true. You'll never see him again, and the off chance you do, I will send his ass straight to Hell.”

    “Thanks,” you said through your fingers.

    “No problem.” He squeezed your shoulders and kissed your hair again. “Hey. You're my girl. You're my beautiful girl. Nothing some mouth-breathing kid will change that. And tonight we're gonna binge on junk food and watch B-movies until we can't stand them, okay?”

    “Yeah.”

    He kissed you again. “I love you, beautiful girl.”

#supernatural imagines #dean winchester #reader insert #one shot #request #daddy!dean #father #daughter #date #x-reader #fanfic #fanfiction #sophisticated-angel