#it's good that HT knows how to read between the lines

[randomprose]

393: the bicycle scene

He Tian watches as Mo Guan Shan plays around with the bicycle. 

He’s circling around the quad, pedalling without holding on the handle bars. Mo Guan Shan looks relaxed and the expression on his face looks so boyish and young. As if the events in the previous days were all just a bad dream. 

He Tian wants him to always be like this. He wants Mo Guan Shan to just be a regular kid and never get hurt ever again.

“Little Mo~” Mo Guan Shan turns to him at the mention of the nickname (Cute, he thinks, Like an angry kitten) and He Tian couldn’t help but smile. “Come here!”

There’s a frown and an angry pout on Mo Guan Shan’s face, but he pedals to the shade where He Tian is anyway and that too makes him smile. 

“What’s up?”

He Tian just makes a come hither gesture and Mo Guan Shan pedals closer. The protests come as soon as he figures out what He Tian wants, sitting sideways at the bike’s back seat. 

“This is buzzcut’s new ride. What are you gonna do if you accidentally break the rear wheel?”

That’s what he says, but He Tian hears what he’s not saying.

I don’t know how to do this. You'll get hurt, you know? And then what?

He Tian just waves him off. “It's not that fragile.”

I'm not that fragile. He’s not and he knows Mo Guan Shan will never hurt him willingly. I'm not gonna get hurt. Even if he does, He Tian will take it.

“Fuck, we're gonna fall,” Guan Shan says but he doesn’t brush off He Tian’s hand on his waist. 

This is not a good idea. We're not a good idea.

“Enough nonsense.”  Give him an inch and He Tian will take a mile. With Guan Shan not shaking off the arm on his waist, He Tian holds on tight and leans his weight against his back. “Start moving. I'm not afraid of falling.”

I'm really not. Shut up and move already. I’m ready.

“Move your hands away. Grab onto the seat instead.”

Let me go. You could do so much better. Just let me go.

He’s giving He Tian a last out, a last chance to leave and let go, but why would He Tian do that? He’s already locked in on Mo Guan Shan since the day after the fight with Jian Yi and Zhan Zheng Xi when he saw him eating a sandwich outside some convenience store. He Tian has decided to keep him when he called, stuck in the rain, and Mo Guan Shan, pissed and unsure wholly wary of him, came with an umbrella anyway and cooked him beef stew at his apartment (albeit under threat). He Tian already vowed to take care and protect him, shield him from whatever shitty thing the world is gonna throw at him, when he Guan Shan looked more pained than He Tian was when he saw his hurt hand. 

He Tian knew he liked him when he had that nightmare and his first instinct was to call him. By the time Mo Guan Shan told him he doesn’t actually hate him that much, He Tian already likes him too much he doesn’t know what to do with himself. He’s the only one he feels safe enough to come to, with all of his guards down, that he can allow himself to rest and sleep defenseless.

He Tian realized he loves him when they went to that aquarium and Mo Guan Shan said he’s too bothered by He Tian to ever forget him. When Guan Shan asked for new earrings, He Tian thought his heart would burst from how happy that simple request made him. He’s so in love with him he feels crazy with it. He hangs at every word Mo Guan Shan says, at everything he does, that if he tells He Tian to jump off a cliff he’ll be at the bottom of it before he could finish saying the words. If Mo Guan Shan asks for his heart, He Tian will carve it out of his chest himself and serve it to him on a silver platter.

He Tian is sixteen and already six feet too deep in love with Mo Guan Shan he doesn’t have any idea how to let him go even if he tried.

“No, I'm not letting go.”

And He Tian really means it.

#19 days #tianshan #he tian #mo guan shan #that whole scene #their whole conversation #it's a whole fucking metaphor #writing #wait is metaphor the right word #whatever #words they say vs what they really mean #it's good that HT knows how to read between the lines

[whatsaninterestingplacethisis]

Love Is A Losing Game

Imagine

Quinn Hughes x Latina!Reader

Synop: y/n has a crush on Quinn for months now and she finally sees a chance to tell him at a holiday party.

cw: mentions of getting high, mentions of drinking, cussing, sad unrequited love, angst + smidge of fluff ig

a/n: This is my failed attempt at writing pure angst. Brock x reader if you read in between the lines. quinn's gf in this story is someone I made up. Lowkey rushed and quick

+

"Are you absolutely sure he doesn't like you?"

Your friend from your hometown had came to visit you in Vancouver. She decided the first night she was going to spend here was to get high and try face masks.

"Well I'm not 100% sure, but realistically no, he doesn't see me that way."

Her visitation couldn't have come any sooner, you needed to talk about your Quinn problems with her in person.

"Then I don't I like him already." she said

"Quinn is a nice and sweet guy, he's just never made a move or hinted that he likes me more than a friend." you adjusted your mask, "actually I don't even think we are that close of friends."

"That sucks." she leaned back into her seat on the couch

"Thanks for the help." you scoffed at her calmness

"Well you can confess to him and it could or could not go well. It's your life."

"A complicated life." you finished what she wanted to say. She gave you a sad smile through her white face mask.

"You're phone is ringing. Here, it's Brock" she passed you your phone, "Hey isn't Brock the cute blonde one?" you gave her a quizzing, "I guess." you whispered before picking up the call

"Hey B"

"Hey y/n/n, are you busy this Saturday?"

Brock is the one who introduced you to Quinn. Well the team and of course Quinn was there. Brock became a close friend when you first moved to Van.

"Maybe, my friend visited from y/ht/n this week and we might have plans, why?"

"There's this holiday party one of the guys is hosting, it's a family and friends thing. You're invited" he said of the other line

"Uh give me a sec" you turned to your friend to ask her if she was okay with this party, she mouthed "let's go"

"Can my friend come along?"

"Yeah sure"

"Okay cool just tell me when and where"

"Will do, goodnight y/n/n."

"Goodnight B."

Your friend ripped her face mask off as got all excited, "A holiday party? Are you kidding?"

"No?"

"Oh my god, do you know what this means?"

"That it's a holiday party." you stated falty.

"Yes and there will me a mistletoe. You can make your move on Quintin!"

"First, don't call him that it sounds weird. Second, I'm not going to my boldly confess my feelings by kissing him under the mistletoe.”

“You have no idea, it could be a scene from a Christmas Hallmark movie!”

“Oh how I wish my love life was like a Hallmark movie, but no.”

++

When you first met Quinn, he was shy and self reserved which made your heart fall faster for him. You didn’t know why your type was guys like Quinn, but it was rare to see them be as kind as him.

For months you kept this crush a secret from everyone besides your friend. Even Brock, who would have just teased you. But you figured it had been long enough to not do anything. Maybe this party could finally be it, that is if he’s even there.

++

“Brock is this y/f/n, y/f/n this is Brock.” You introduce two of your great friends to each other when you stepped into the casual party.

They said hi to each other, while your friend had too bright of a smile on her face for staring at a man she’d just met.

“You dress nice” you complimented Brock’s button down and slick back hair that was already coming undone

“Thanks, you look great too.” To be honest, you didn’t feel that good about your appearance but y/f/n tried to convince you otherwise.

“There’s appetizers and food in the kitchen if y’all are hungry” he offered to take you and y/f/n’s coats and led the way to the kitchen.

It was stilly pretty early and you didn’t want to ask Brock if Quinn was here so you made rounds introducing your friend to the people you knew.

She would leave you to yourself though an hour into the night. You were getting antsy if Quinn was going to show up at all, so you decided to look for your friend. She was sitting on the couch with Brock by the fireplace, all smiley and giggly.

If anything, you thought, she was having a scene from a Hallmark movie.

It was too cold outside to get away from the social gathering so you found a closed off dinning room to sit in silence in.

It was unnerving to sit alone in silence when across a door there were people talking and Christmas music playing.

Y/f/n was wrong. Tonight was not a Hallmark movie, it’s a very depressing one.

“Oh hey, I didn’t expect to see you here”

You turned to the door and saw Quinn, also dressed nice in a black button down.

“Brock invited me” you answered his statement

“Oh I mean in this room. I assumed you would be at the party. Why are hanging out in here?” He walked towards you and pulled out a chair right next to you.

“So much talking that I would rather not do” you laugh nervously and he laughed too, rarely showing that smile of his.

“Yeah I get that. I just got here and immediately tried to hide.” Your heart skipped as you read into your common personalities but you sighed looking away from him.

“What’s up?” He asked taking notice of your sad demeanor

You couldn’t help but let out a chuckle, “just boy problems, very boring stuff.” you joke

“Well I’m not that good at advice but I could listen for the drama” he jokes too making you laugh

“There’s this guy, that I like but I’m pretty sure he doesn’t like me back. But I don’t know for sure or anything so I’m thinking I should just tell him but if I did and he said he doesn’t feel the same way then I would feel like an idiot.” you confessed inconspicuously as possible.

“Is he someone on the team?” He asked too calmly

“No he’s from my work.” you tried to lie as smooth as possible and luckily it went unnoticed

“Well personally I wouldn’t tell him” you turned to look at him, “I wouldn’t tell a girl I liked her if I knew for sure she didn’t like me. The fear of being rejected is very real and it hurts. But I also think any guy would be dumb to not like you.”

You felt your face start to warm up and hoped it didn’t show, “You’re a good friend, Quinn” You said with a small smile

“Thanks” he whispered “I try.” he said before making you laugh again

“What hell are you guys doing in here? It’s a party, you guys need to mingle and talk with people!” Brock’s loud voice echoes in the dinning room as his eyes look between the both of you.

“We’re not very mingling type of people.” You joke to your friend who looks like he has had a couple drinks now

“No duh. Huggy I need your help in the kitchen man.”

Quinn got out of his chair and turned to you, “I’ll see you around tonight” he says with a soft smile before being manhandled by the blonde.

You sat in the dinning room for a couple more minutes thinking about what Quinn said. Yes, rejection sucks but what he said about a guy being dumb to not like you. Was he hinting at himself?

+

You looked around the big house to find y/f/n again to tell her what happened but she was nowhere to be seen. So you found Brock instead,

“Hey B have you seen y/f/n?”

“Who?” Yeah he was a bit drunk.

“My friend who I came here with.”

“Oh yeah her, yeah no clue. I was talking to her on the couch earlier, she’s very flirty” He slurred

“Yeah that’s her, sorry about that.” you apologized for your friends bold behavior and left to circle the house again to find her.

You finally see her by the base of the staircase to the side. You smile as you’re about to run and tell her everything except when you saw Quinn on the base of the stairs with a girl, standing very close to the girl.

You watch them smile at each other. How his head hangs when he blushes and her arms wrapped around his neck. Your eyes follow hers and she looks above them, a mistletoe. Your smile drops and your body freezes as you see them smile and lean in for a kiss.

“PDA am I right? Disgusting.” Brock who had followed you from before saw the whole thing unfold. Even though your senses were going haywire you tried to keep calm

“Yeah, gross.” you whispered, “who’s she?” you tried to ask without it sounding like you were on the verge of tears

“Quinn’s girlfriend I guess” you felt your heart ache and a lump start to form in your throat, “oh, you’ve never seen her before?” you choke out

“Nah, I think this is their first public appearance.” Brock turned to look at you, even though he was inebriated he would always remember how glossy your eyes looked in that moment.

Your eyes were glued on the couple. Your friend was right, a scene from a Hallmark movie did happen tonight. It just didn’t involve you.

#nhl imagine #quinn hughes imagine #quinn hughes x reader #latina!reader #jells🪼imagines

[ecoamerica]

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[inkysandwich]

Aw, guys. This chapter made me super happy. Chapters with all four of them together are my favorites, but actually it's always the ones with Qiu, too.

I love this man.

He's more of an agent of chaos in this story than She Li is (was 🫤) Not because Q is unpredictable or poses an immediate threat, but because him being near generally indicates that someone else has plans. I mean... It's not totally unbelievable that He Cheng forgot to feed Q and he really is just swinging by the market on the way home to his now emptier, dogless home.

But is he?

I doubt it.

Though I do not doubt that he's using his current goose-wrangling babysitting gig to get in on that certified home cooked MGS action. Again.

Qiu is cheeky and bold and unyeildingly bulldozes his way into where he needs to be. Which is why he's the perfect bridge for HC to have between himself and the idiots. Do you think HC would have gotten the same reaction, stumbling into them and bribing himself a seat at the dinner table to keep an eye on them?

Q is crass--even his boss--and that makes him approachable. He's just a dude with a job he thought would be better (like MGS) that he got because he has a level of loyalty to a powerful man that he can't fully explain or probably even justify (like HT) and is now responsible for the safety of a flighty idiot that can't seem to stop getting kidnapped (like ZZX). But he's strong and capable and protects the people he needs to protect (like JY wants to be, HT too). Q can reach them in ways that HC's position would never allow.

He's there when they need more hands in a fight, when the kids are being scammed, when they can't build a fire, when they can't get to school on time, when JY needs to be un-kidnapped, when HT gets to say goodbye to his dog. He gets them ice cream (and king crab!) and guitars and firewood. He gives them rides on his motorcycle and lets them roughhouse but punishes them when they take it too far. He teaches them how to be stronger and when to show restraint and oh my god Qiu is the only suitable father figure in this whole damn story.

It's just a bonus that I'm never going to be sad looking at any part of him.

But his presence is a harbinger.

Of impending mafia send-offs? Of looming threats of rivals? Of teenaged hijinks or mindless street thugs? Of malicious neighbors with cat lasers toys?

We won't know until they strike. (Although, I have my assumptions)

I was going to talk more about the chapter, but this kinda became a Q appreciation post. I couldn't help it. And neither could I help the onslaught of senseless head cannon from taking over.

Because I really really want to see Mom's reaction to Q. He's a gruff muscles-definitely-for-more-than-show dude, but she lives with a prickly "delinquent" that towers over most people, so she knows how to read between the lines.

But--and I WILL die on this hill--she knows how to read between the lines.

Do I think we'll ever get the Momma confrontation I've asked for so badly for years now? Probably not outside of my drafts. But I don't care. She knows, and I know she knows, and you know I know she knows👃

Because in the same breath that I wish for her to react to the mafia presence, I also just... I want this single dad (yes, single. You're going to make him do all the childrearing, send him off to clean up the messes, AND STILL NOT FEED HIM?!) to be treated kindly by the mother of all mothers. I want them to commiserate on keeping track of these animals. I want him to reassure her that her son isn't going to be held back any more. I want her to make him soup that tastes so good he asks for some to go and she gives it to him under the condition that he comes by any time he wants a home cooked meal.

And HT dies a little inside. And so does MGS the first time "A-Qiu" takes her up on her offer...

I'll stop now before I make any grievous mistakes, but I'm sure you can imagine that my draft list of questionable prompts is growing 😈

#19 days #brother qiu #I was going to write this yesterday but i had to do my real job so sorry it's late #But I'm not sorry for letting my head cannon get out of hand at the end there #momma mo

[squat-lobster]

ARIADOL Shadow Puppet Pokémon

Ht: 4’ 8” - Wt: 80 lb

In ancient times, Ariadol were thought of as capricious forest spirits to be placated and appeased. If travellers did not provide a small offering to them, Ariadol would delight in stalking them through the woods and causing them great mischief on their journey.

Ariadol’s movements seem to be controlled by strange, intangible strings that manifest and disappear as needed, as if this Pokémon were being controlled by an extradimensional puppeteer. 

Sample Moves: Leech Life, Gunk Shot, Trick Room, Rock Blast, Glare, Knock Off, U-Turn, Phantom Force, First Impression, Trick, Copycat, Grassy Glide, Forest’s Curse

CLAYDOS Sand Trap Pokémon

Ht: 5’ 1” - Wt: 250 lb

Claydos’ constantly spinning abdomen holds the quicksand it uses to ensnare its prey. It can psychically control the sand even after it has left its body, hardening it in an instant to immobilize its prey so that it can feed on their thoughts and dreams.

People in ancient times would enlist the help of Claydos to create beautiful sandstone and earthenware sculptures, entering a trance state to mind-meld with Claydos so that the sculptor could make use of its abilities to manipulate the sand and clay. 

Sample Moves: Psycho Cut, Drill Run, Stone Edge, Hone Claws, Shadow Sneak, Psychic Fangs, Sucker Punch, Hypnosis, Dream Eater, Teleport, Scorching Sands

Claydol & Ariados evolve into Claydos and Ariadol when traded with one another.

(Design notes under the cut)

When I was a kid playing Ruby/Sapphire, I always thought Claydol was a spider. Like, I read it’s nipples as eyes and just thought its actual eyes were just red things or whatever. I eventually understood it properly, and I still love Claydol as it actually is, but part of me will always prefer that misread psychic spider. 

So that’s what inspired this line of thinking for these guys. Since the Ariados line’s gimmick is that they have a face on their butts, this seemed like a pretty appropriate way to go about getting my clay spider.

Ariados’s butt-face thing isn’t super obvious in its design, it kind of looks like a weird rabbit or something from the back.

The face thing is much clearer in its lost beta sprite, so I tried to take some elements of this precursor into Ariadol’s design.

Similarly to how Karrablast and Shelmet trade with one another to evolve into Escavalier and Accelgor, and swap some shit in the process, these guys trade and swap some traits too.

Chiefly, they swap which is end is their top and which their bottom. Claydos also gets spiderness from Ariados, and Ariadol gets “thingness” from Claydol. 

I feel like these guys also theme together well when you consider the Johto region ecologically and anthropologically. The idea would be like, the dudes who made the Ruins of Alph way back in the day, who were all associated with Unown worship, would have also been people who would have carved and created Baltoys and Claydols, who are also weird eye-themed psychic fellas, and are based off ancient japanese Dogū figurines. Add to this the fact that Spinarak and Ariados are so everpresent in the region, it makes a kind of sense that there could be some evolutionary interaction between these two.

Typing-wise I really debated for a while having them switch secondary typings, or getting entirely new ones, but I couldn’t do it in a way that felt like a “fair trade” between the two of them, if you know what I mean. Plus, I didn’t want to like entirely revamp their movesets, which are both already suited to their original typings so yeah.

Just made them switch abilities more or less, if claydol was able to have more abilities than just levitate I would have given claydos some more interesting stuff, but theres a bit of a niche as a trick room sniper sweeper with the moves it gets. 

Ariadol would be used as a trick room sweeper as well basically, I wanted to differentiate it from scolipede by having it gain bulk rather than getting fast, and merciless seemed like a cool way to do that, say after setting up a toxic spike at the start of the battle. Prankster toxic thread and glare and stuff with u-turn could turn it into a cool utility mon as well.

Ariadol: 

If you’re familliar with it, this dude’s look is pretty clearly based off of the Flatwoods Monster, which I thought was fun cuz i wanted it to be like a weird creepy forest cryptid. The string stuff comes from it being a spider and having webs, which through gaining some of Claydol’s psychic traits are now weird psychic puppet strings. I also felt like it lended it some creepy haunted puppet flavour. The design ended up looking a bit like mismagius, so I thought it might be some lore to have it like earn protection from predators from playing up that mimicry. 

Also theres some inspiration from real life spiders, like peacock jumping spiders and ornate harvestmen.

Finally I wanted the drooping legs and the design of the face to evoke some similarities with a leyak or penanggalan, which are spirits in indonesia and malaysia that take the form of like severed heads flying around with all the guts hanging out. 

Claydos:

Uhh so even though this whole idea was inspired by making a Claydol into a spider, this guy took a really long time to get to something I was happy with, and I still kinda like Ariadol better tbh. 

The main thrust of the design besides being a weird hovering spider is for the abdomen to look like a cement mixer, which I thought was a good way also to get that part of its body to spin, which I always thought Claydol’s should have done in the games. The end of it having a little cap was supposed to be a little shout out to trap door spiders. 

Tried to make the patterning make it obvious that the top isn’t the head anymore without changing the nipple eyes very much because I like them as they are. Theres a hint of spiderweb in there but making it too overt made it look too busy. 

I considered arranging the dots as a spider’s eyes are, but that was hard to make it obviously spinny as well and it was like well that part ISN’T the head anymore so. Then I was like ohh i could make the once-eyes into like little spiderlings that crowd around onto the abdomen like wolf spiders do, or even hover around like little Unown, but I really couldn’t get it to look right at all, even though i really liked that idea. 

Anyway that’s about it! sorry for rambling for so long in this section. Really happy with these guys.

#im planning for this fakemon series to be like my take on the johto region #improving some of the designs that were just like kind of bland by dint of being cutting room floor mons that didn't make it into gen 1 #also there are heaps that i genuinely love from this gen but that could just use a bit of a boost to be competitively viable #next time.... ledian :0 #and guest #pokemon #fakemon #ariados #claydol #squat-lobster #art

[notthatiwilleverwriteit]

Thoughts on the new extra? I know some people might think he tian was forcing himself on mo. but he was just teasing him and getting payback and it's part of character to push boundaries. tianshan don't have the "fluff" dynamic like zhanyi. if mo really hated that he would have reacted the same way like the first kiss. Maybe he tian wanted to actually kiss mo with the way he was touching his lips but he's afraid of the reaction. Mo might have some more dreams about he tian after that😅😂

 Hello, dear anon! 

Before getting any further, I’m using the translation by @1154lizz​ for this answer. Thank you for your speedy hard work for the fandom! 🙏

It sure seems like the fandom is being divided by the latest special chapter. Considering that Tianshan has always done that, I’m not really surprised but I do hope the conversation stays civil.

I also want to remind anyone reading this that the following is merely my own opinion on the update. I am not trying to tell anyone how to interpret or feel about the special. Everyone is entitled to their own take on it, and I don’t think neither side of the argument is inherently right or wrong. Even though I’m a Tianshan shipper, I don’t think people who feel uncomfortable with the pairing can’t make valid points. And just because we might disagree, it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t respect each other’s points of view.

Overall (drink up!), I have touched upon the subjects of Tianshan’s physical moments and if I think they are toxic/abusive:

What if HT kissed MGS again? (on the lips)

Is Tianshan toxic?

Is Tianshan toxic, vol. 2?

Intimate Tianshan moments I wish will happen

What Tianshan sex would be like in the future?

Those are probably something worth checking out to have a better understanding of where I’m coming from regarding these topics.

Now, let’s finally get to your ask!

“Thoughts on the new extra?”

To be honest, my initial reaction to the panels before knowing what was going on was “yikes 😬”. Especially, the first panels. I was a bit disappointed and put off that it seemed like we were going somewhat backward. So, I can understand why people might have been upset about the update. I think being taken aback and uncomfortable is a fair olive branch that can be extended even if you might disagree. It didn’t look good to me at first, either.

Then I read the English translation and got a better sense of what was going on. I got a proper context for the panels, and it started to look different (ch. 333):

So, MGS had accidentally kicked HT in the balls when HT scared the living bazooka out of him. And now HT was seeking revenge by making MGS “massage them”.

If you put the panels that admittedly didn’t look good in that context, they pretty much fall in line with the previous time HT’s balls were accidentally abused by MGS (ch 298):

HT took revenge by pushing MGS down and trying to “feel” MGS down there, most probably to return the favor. To me, this is the kind of juvenile humor that is well established in the comic already, and HT asking MGS to “massage them” was in that category. That kind of humor isn’t for everyone but I think it’s the type that is very typical to 19 Days.

Admittedly, the two panels have two very different environments and vibes which is why I also felt somewhat uncomfortable about the latest one. HT trying to feel MGS up after the accidental slap has a more playful atmosphere while HT pulling MGS’s hand towards his crotch in a dim bedroom comes across very differently. But in general, after reading the translation, the bedroom scene fit that whole revenge type of teasing already familiar in the comic.

Another thing that shifted in nature to me was the “forcing himself on MGS”. As I said, at first it did look like yikes to me. Then I read the translations and three things changed.

First of all, it became the kind of hot I personally enjoy in Tianshan dynamics (ch. 333):

As I said in one of my earlier answers about what I think Tianshan sex will be like in the future, I see them having some “spice” that stems from their push and pull dynamics. HT being physically in charge and having his usual pushy demeanor. And MGS would consent but also be his usual defiant self and kind of “if you want it, then you gotta take it” that I think fits his character.

I do admit that HT pulling MGS’s hand forcefully like that and MGS not being on the same page wasn’t exactly the kind of spice I meant but in general, I liked HT’s dominance and the hint of danger. That “I dare” by HT sent little shivers down my back and was just how I wanted it. Now, all we need to add to that is MGS getting more comfortable.

Secondly, another thing besides spice in my earlier post was “sugar” and “teasing” (or “seasoning” as @19elaine​ better put it). I think both of them were present in the special chapter, too (ch. 333):

HT was teasing and messing with MGS. He was looking for revenge in the way he knew would be the most “efficient” in the sense that it makes MGS regret kicking him for sure. But HT’s form of revenge also had sexual innuendos which I think is a big part of Tianshan’s interactions. Teasing and bullying not only pushes the boundaries in a titillating way but also upholds the sexual tension undertones between them.

The last panels also gave me vibes of “sugar”. I think when HT said he “can’t help it” (bullying MGS), he was teasing MGS but also being honest and vulnerable under the surface. I think he wanted to kiss MGS and show him that kind of affection but settled for something that wouldn’t cross big lines that MGS wasn’t ready to cross yet. But HT does want that kind of physical intimacy and affection, and on some level, it’s difficult for him to try and be patient. He doesn’t want them to have to them (aka to take them for his own pleasure) but rather because that’s what he craves for in a relationship.

Thirdly, I think this chapter showed that HT knows when to back off (ch. 333):

As I have said many times before, the seeming power imbalance in Tianshan is usually what comes across at first glance. But when you take a deeper look, I think MGS holds quite a lot of power and control in their relationship. HT pushes and bullies him for sure, but he would never want to knowingly hurt MGS or traumatize him.

For example, in that situation, I would have found it out of character if HT had French kissed MGS instead of the little “chus”. MGS wouldn’t have been ready for something like that, and it would have crossed lines in a bad way similar to when HT kissed him for the first time. That’s not how HT wants it with MGS because it would go against everything he’s trying to achieve in life. He’s not going to break the trust he has gained and hurt MGS the same way people like him have always done.

I also agree that if MGS had been against HT getting physical in the same way as when HT kissed him for the first time, he would have reacted in a similar way. He would have had a much stronger reaction. I do think MGS was still uncomfortable in that situation but...I think the vibe was vastly different. He wasn’t resisting with all his might. To me, it looked like MGS was bothered but also trusted HT. He was trusting that HT wouldn’t hurt him and knew where the line “truly” went for him.

Don’t get me wrong, I fully understand if “know when to back off” sounds problematic to some. That grey area isn’t everyone’s cup of tea. And I’m not telling anyone to feel differently about it if it goes against their heart. It’s just that I see that delicate balance being an essential part of the Tianshan dynamics both now and in the future.

On top of all that, I think there is also the cultural context to be taken into consideration. 19 Days is a work of the “boys love” genre and part of the conventions and tropes that come with that. I think Tianshan dynamics is a good example of the trope of a pushy, devilish “seme” who wants to bully and fluster his tsundere “uke”. Now, before anyone comes at me, that’s just how I see it based on the hundreds of works of BL (Japanese, Korean, and Chinese titles) that I have read. I think 19 Days is one of the very few BLs that has a lot of Western fans as well who aren’t perhaps that familiar with BL or comfortable with it. And sometimes those two different literal cultures clash. And there’s nothing wrong with that, but I would say this chapter was one of those times. (I realize I’m making big generalizations here. This is just my gut feeling.)

To summarize, I was taken aback by the panels at first but after I got a better understanding of what was really going on, I saw it all differently and that it followed the kind of tone Tianshan and the comic have always had. However, I don’t believe in trying to dictate how people should feel about the chapter. I can see where people who were uncomfortable are coming from.

Thank you for your question, dear anon!

#19 days #tianshan #answered ask

[eyessharpweaponshot]

hi there!! are there any fics you’re reading right now that you would recommend? i need something good after the season we’ve been given so far 😣

hello there!

I agree, this season has been disappointing - especially considering it’s the last one. but thankfully, our fandom is full of amazing writers that serve us goods regularly. I have so much to recommend, it’s a joke. so prepare for a long fic rec. In no particular order, let’s begin:

1. Chasin’ You - @burninghoneyatdusk

okay. you’re gonna see a bit of a theme with me in these fic recs because the authors I mention are some of my favourites in the world - sam being one of the TOP TIER ones. this fic is a modern au, written about clarke and bellamy as exes (a favourite trope of mine) that have went their separate ways. clarke has moved away and hasn’t kept tabs on bellamy but he's soared to the top as a country star, his hit single being about her and what they had. if there’s any fic from this list you need to start reading, it’s this one.

2. Voices in the Water - @burninghoneyatdusk

It’s the canon version we all wanted. set on earth, clarke’s aunt (nia) forces her into an arranged marriage with king bellamy to unite the clans. but under it all, nia has tasked her to kill him. obviously, as clarke falls in love with bellamy, it’s the one task wanheda probably can’t complete. I'm in love with the imagery and descriptions in this fic. there are honestly some lines that sam writes that I want to frame and put up in my house. absolute brilliance.

3. All Because of You - @burninghoneyatdusk

*sheepishly raises hand* - hi, it’s me again, fangirling over another one of sam’s fics. if you have followed me for a while, either here or on twitter, you’ll have seen me screaming about this fic. I've pulled over while driving to read an update that came through to my email. no lie. I don’t say this lightly but it is definitely in my top 3 favourite bellarke fics of all time. sam DELIVERS with this one. bellamy knocks up his sister’s best friend when they’re both young and they grow together in raising their daughter. this fic flashes between present and future in the most seamless way and we see how in love they were back then but too scared to admit it, combined with how in love they are now that they are mature and older - but yet can’t seem to take the leap. I can’t tell you enough how good this fic is. I'm in love and it’s one of those fics that I would happily have as a book on my bookshelf, the pages worn and falling out from the amount of times that I re-read it.

*I just want to note that sam is doing a fantastic job at running @bellarkefic-for-blm. This is an opportunity for the bellarke community to directly support the Black Lives Matter cause through reading and writing fanfiction. For every fanfiction prompt a participating writer receives, they ask that you donate to an organization that supports the BLM cause. This initiative includes non-bellarke the 100 ships and requests for other content (e.g. gif sets, icons, moodboards, fanart). please check them out and request a prompt (this also includes updates for the above mentioned fics)*

4. Count Your Teeth - @icantloseyou-too

let me tell you, you guys will be well fed after reading this fic. It’s one of the most original idea’s and we get so much bellarke and the blake siblings in this one. bellamy is a treasure hunter and married to clarke, after leaving his thieving days behind him. that is until his past comes knocking and drags him back into that world again - and clarke along with him. absolute chefs kiss!

5. Cups and Sorcerers - @icantloseyou-too

again, such a unique plot with just the right amount of fluff. clarke is a witch who owns a coffee shop and she ends up meeting someone just as unique as her. I’m invested in this to an embarrassing degree and it always puts me in a good mood when this fic is updated. such a light and heart filling read and ciara does a fantastic job of world building in this fic.

6. Paint me in Trust - @pawprinterfanfic

I'm sure this fic needs no introduction. everyone and their mother has heard of it and if you haven’t read it yet, believe me, you’re missing out. a harry potter au that runs alongside the last few movies without being involved with the main characters. essie manages to make an already existing world so different, thrilling and gripping. it emotionally upends you and takes you along for the ride without any intention of letting you off. I'm just in love with it and rightly so!

7. When the Wolves Come Home - @pawprinterfanfic

I don’t know how people aren’t RAVING about this fic more because I certainly am. it’s massive for me to even say this because I love all of essie’s work but it’s my favourite fic that she’s written. I can’t describe the feeling I get when I read how she’s written bellarke in this. it’s a percy jackson au but you don’t need to have knowledge of that world to enjoy this. I actually started reading the books because of this fic. essie writes it so well and incorporates a lot of fantastic elements from greek mythology while also keeping me on the edge of my seat with bellarke’s journey. HERE FOR IT ALL THE WAY.

8. I’ll Find You in the Morning Sun - @cominguproses13x

I’ve never seen a fic talked about as much as this one. with 60 chapters, it’s bound to satisfy any hunger you have for bellarke. it’s set in a post apocalyptic world and it is beyond a shadow of a doubt, my favourite setting to read bellarke in. I've actually stopped reading this fic on chapter 5 because im currently writing my own post apocalyptic au as it was a trope on my bingo card and I don’t want any subconscious spill over, but I fully intend on reading the rest of the fic in one go once my fic is published and done. it deserves all the praise and hype.

9. For Blue Skies - @kombellarke

kayla’s fics make me actually weep. her writing style is just unbelievable and she sucks me into stories so fast. this one is no different. I live and breathe for bellarke as exes and this fic is one of my favourites. it’s a modern au with clarke as a mother and she cascades back into bellamy’s life without warning. perfect angst and anticipation. in love.

10. Love Like Fools - @talistheintrovert

the way I love talis with my whole heart. I'm always obsessed with her fics and the way this one was written was just magnificent. enemies to friends to lovers, roommates, angst, emotional comforting? SIGN ME UP. the perfect mix of all of those and I felt so good after reading this. always a fan.

11. It Had To Be You - @useyourtelescope

I had the honour of pre-reading some of this fic before it was published and I felt so privileged. a regency au with a prank war sprinkled in? perfection. hana honestly writes this so beautifully and I can’t recommend this enough. it’s so unique and we are all so incredibly lucky that there’s something in the bellarke fic world for everyone.

12. Veni, Vidi, Vinci - @carrieeve

Again, proof of the pudding that there’s something in fic for everyone. I’ve never read one like this before and it THRILLED me. murphy and bellamy working together to steal a Vinci? it was the fic I never knew I needed. the bellarke interaction in this was beautifully written and I am just completely obsessed. we really struck gold with the bellarke big bang works this year.

13. A Twist of Fate - @queenemori

let’s be honest, soulmate au’s are always wanted and needed in this fandom and kara does an excellent job of serving us this one. we got some team cockroach in here along with some top tier quality bellarke. what more could you ask for? if you haven’t read this fic yet, you need to. so thankful for kara being the absolute gifted babe that she is.

14. Power Over Me - @sparklyfairymira

okay, if you recently watched the witcher on netflix like I did, believe me, you NEED to read this fic. if you haven’t watched the witcher, this fic will make you want to watch it. the smut in this, the plot, the WRITING. absolutely phenomenal. have I mentioned how lucky we are to have such fantastic writers in this fandom?

15. There’s a Serpent Lying Deep Down in These Still Waters - @shaeheda

post apocalyptic au? SIGN ME UP. bellarke thrown together in unkind circumstances? SIGN ME UP. this magnificent human writing a fic? SIGN ME THE FUCK UP. I'm so in love with this fic already and I haven’t even finished it yet. as I've said, I've stopped reading fics in this genre until my own is completed but I’ve read enough to tell you that this needs to be on your next to read list. forever in awe of the talent here and this fic makes me feel so lucky to be part of something so great.

I hope this satisfies you for a while and that you enjoy all the bellarkey goodness that comes from these fics. I'm gonna drop some of mine below because why not? just in case you’re in need of something more.

1. I Found Peace in Your Violence

clarke griffin has it all. she’s popular, an artistic prodigy and has a wealthy family to boot. so when her perfect world comes crashing down around her, it’s time to sink or swim. she tests positive for the Homicidal Tendency Syndrome gene, also known as the kill gene. clarke is plucked from her comfortable life and placed into a school with people just like her - carriers, delinquents. when she meets bellamy blake there, he looks like everything they say HTS carriers are. a monster, a criminal. yet, he’s the one who protects her.

2. I Am Lost This Time

a void!bellamy fic that we all deserved to have happen in canon. an au where bellamy hears clarke’s radio calls from earth, sees her memories in m-cap and where she really is the key: the one that unlocks his memories and brings him back to her.

3. Purple, Blue, Orange, Red

bellarke are childhood friends and teenage lovers, reuniting in the midst of the same grief that tore them apart.

4. Devil Side

post apocalyptic setting and my favourite fic to have ever written. both of them coming together to survive and protect those in their family, including two small children. bellarke started out as strangers, who would have thought that they’d end up co-parenting in the middle of a world that is too dangerous to survive out in the open?

5. Waste It on Me

a soulmate/reincarnation au that I wrote based off my own breakup and feelings. probably my most popular fic and should keep you going in terms of bellarke feels.

#bellarke #the 100 #bellarke fanfiction #bellarke fic rec #fic recommendations #jensfic #eyessharpweaponshot #wonderful writers #wonderful fics

[liyuesbian]

AAAA kokomi quest time :>

same here I thought it was a pretty solid quest overall!! agree that the first half was kinda eh because she just felt too Nice about everything, a little too willing to help people instead of saying "i have some stuff to prepare and am not available rn" (when the Watatsumi citizens were crowding around Traveler and her, I had flashbacks to Barbara's hangout event rip). but the second half got better thankfully. I think even though there's no morally gray kokomi, they still gave her character some flair that's different from before? like you said, the thing where she's forced by heritage to be the divine priestess but doesn't actually want to; i quite liked that, since although she's emotionally drained from her job, she's not like Jean or other characters that sacrifice themselves because they truly like their job and want to help people in that way. kokomi helps people out of obligation and would much rather be doing military strategizing and i love that for her. I want her to be a bit more selfish too, even if it's not in a villainous kind of way; perhaps a scenario where she pulls a xingqiu and just becomes a military strategist/general instead of the job she inherited (actually her and xq would be really interesting together, even if xingqiu doesn't reveal that he's the legend of sword author lol). somehow she gives me only child vibes hahsdjfs

agree!! when she said "it would be so nice if all my work could do itself" I Felt that :') her moments of childishness are very endearing 😌

YEAH the war was finally addressed in some capacity and the Not All Is Well mood, especially the mixed opinions in Watatsumi among both civilians and the soldiers. also agree that the npc opinions were very good and it's nice that some of them are dissatisfied for different reasons, like that old woman you mentioned talking about Watatsumi's god vs the soldier's grievances against the Tenryou Commission! It's not just quietly resolved and that's way better than how the ei quest went hsdfjs. I also loved kokomi's and sara's scene hsdjfsd I was surprised but thankful they actually showed them negotiating the treaty terms instead of just doing a cutscene and illustrating that kokomi (and sara) are good diplomats and know their stuff. they need to put their brains on display more. the quest is also warming me up to kokosara lol

it's fine villain kokomi lives on in our hearts (or in aus lmao)

also expand on kokomi and hu tao? o-o they sound interesting

-mystic

OH YEAH i forgot about barbara's hangout event !

mhm my thoughts exactly. omg i never thought about that.. her and xingqiu would make such great friends! the indirect interaction through his book ties everything together well too :O i'm thinking the whole author-book lover dynamic ajiodfsfiadjn kokomi gushing over her favourite author, [xingqiu's pseudonym]. OR maybe a modern au where kkm is xq's editor?! OR her as a super fan and beta reader?! honestly, kkm and xq are one of my favourite characters so far and it'd rly make me happy to see them interacting 😭 OH did u happen to see this fanart of the hydro gang in a book club? (while i was trying to find the link to the post, i also found this gem! AHHH they're both so cute!)

they rly are!

yep yep haha O I FORGOT 2 TALK ABT THAT KOKOSARA MOMENT !!! i agree, that scene showed us all that kkm is very much capable in doing her job despite it not being her first choice in career.

yes (!!! hmm this is giving me ideas for kokosara angst hc.. after the negotiations are over and peace has somewhat returned between both sides, kkm stabs them in the back, sara hurt by the betrayal and kkm seemingly cold-hearted and stern-faced, unaffected by the situation saying it was all necessary as the divine priestess, the current heiress of sanganomiya, to carry out the will of her ancestors and to sustain the protection of her people in watatsumi but deep down she knows she doesn't want to do this (the same canon wanting to stray away from her lineage). either way, it is too late now. the destruction of the shogun's govt and her vision of eternity was always meant to happen in due time.)

as for kokotao, i think what initially attracted me to their ship is similar to what first drew me to kokosara...

right off the bat, their clashing visuals/aesthetics HAHAHA

hu tao would totally be down to read kkm books as she falls asleep, kkm would do the same too! (if she can get ht to sleep that is lol)

their clashing personalities and way of thinking, ht's chaotic mindset and kkm's well-planned and tactician-like abilities... even their food preferences differ too! (god, reading their voice lines for kkm's least/ht's fave food srsly makes me think they were made for each other)

i think in a modern au (and in genshin too i guess), they'd be great "business" partners. as in, they kind of make up for what the other lacks (in both a domestic and working way) - kkm's strategic skills could be used to bring more customers in for hu tao and hu tao would be able to deal with the social side of kkm's job (just thinking about it makes me swoon, they'd be so in love)

let's be real here, i think kkm would be p easy to tease and ht would have tons of fun pranking her and telling her jokes etc.

in a gameplay perspective, ht loses hp and kkm is a healer !! (aww only true gfs fight alongside each other)

in the same way hydro puts out pyro, kkm can reign ht in when it get's a little too much (but not in a way where she's stopping ht from being who she is if ygm) and vice versa for ht being able to "give" kkm a bit of her own energy

I THINK THEY'D MAKE A FORMIDABLE DUO WHEN PLAYING FPS GAMES (AND LASER TAG/PAINTBALL TOO)

there's probably a lot more but those are my reasons for now haha

#oh no this was kinda long... #AIUSASAJSC why does it #look like i RAMBLED about kokotao :OOO #anyways......... #phi rambles #answered

[bleusimpstash]

Oh boy, I’m nervous sharing this but reading a bunch of Kraken!Sans musings from @aka-indulgence got me inspired enough for me to write a thing about it! I’ve got more ideas for this scenario, but since I’m not used to writing longer things (or just getting the courage to do so pfft) I’ll stick to this for now.

READER-INSERT STUFF, so if that ain’t your gig it’ll be under the read more!

As a quick summary, this is HT Kraken boi meeting Reader for the first time! They’re work in a mysterious underwater laboratory, and after singing a little for fun they come to realize that a massive aquarium isn’t as empty as it looked... >:)

~ SIREN SONG ~

You should have known better than to trust that a massive aquarium would be empty, despite how dark and lifeless it appeared to be through the large hallway windows. With it being your first night in this underwater laboratory, and as a janitor no less, how could you have known that something would watch and listen to your every move through the pristine glass?

If you’d known this, you wouldn’t have been singing as you mopped the metal floors, dancing and swaying to the rhythm of the song as you worked. Music was your secret passion, your outlet of emotions often times in a job that allowed you few creative freedoms, and there wasn’t any better time to sing than during your night shift, when everyone was sound asleep in the community dorms! With no one to bother you or critique your voice, it wasn’t long before you’d completely absorbed yourself in your chosen playlist, letting your cadence ring through the halls with no restraint.

However, your voice wasn’t only reaching through the many empty halls and labs of the underwater facility, it also echoed through the glass and into the darkened waters of the containment aquarium… attracting the attention of an ancient, primal horror. A hellish red pupil flickered to life at the bottom of the containment aquarium, drawn up towards the dim lights which glowed through the hallways that lined the enormous cage…

Oblivious you took no notice of the dangerous attention you’d garnered, as your favorite bit of the song came around your voice grew in volume as well, passionately singing along with the words. The scene the music inspires dances out in your mind as you daydream yourself far away from the dark, dank underwater laboratory you worked in, closing your eyes briefly to immerse yourself more in your escapism. Because of this, you weren’t able to notice the massive red light that slowly lifts itself into view through the window, the glowing orb illuminating a partial skull that was too large to fully see through the window, cropped to just above his mangled jawline and below the monstrous crack in his skull. Upon seeing a tiny human singing and dancing about, the sea behemoth freezes in place to closely observe your movements, drawn in by your voice.

Of course, the moment you open your own eyes, you notice the unusual red tint that covers the hallway around you. Puzzled by this you look around to see if perhaps an emergency light had somehow turned on, only to be greeted by something far more worrying when you turn to face the aquarium window.

You stood frozen in view of the massive eye, bathed in its glowing red light that now illuminated the dim hallway. The music was still playing in your ears, but now you may as well be deaf to everything around you, awed by the sheer size of the creature staring at you, and also internally panicking. What was this thing?! Why hadn’t anyone told you this giant aquarium was containing some sort of sea monster, and how had you not seen it earlier when you peered through the hallway’s glass window?

These questions were trivial now, as the red eye (that alone was taller than you were-) appeared to constrict slightly, as if the creature were watching your reaction with great intensity. Your next move was out of pure instinct alone, as you waved your hand shyly at it as if trying to shoo the enormous eye away. “M-move along, there’s nothing to see here…” You tell it shakily, gripping the handle of your mop as if your life depended on it. You weren’t even sure if the thing could understand you, or hear you through the glass, but there was some sort of reaction in how the eye suddenly shrank, making you jump out of fear of having angered this nightmarish being somehow. “No really! I’m no one interesting, just-just cleaning stuff for the night! I won’t bother you, I promise!”

A rumble comes as your response, a sound which gently vibrates through your body before the low pitch reached your ear. Your body shudders in response to the unnatural sensation, before you legitimately began to tremble when a massive clawed hand suddenly pressed itself against the glass, so big that you can only partially see the palm through the window frame! At this point you were all too certain this sea monster was trying to break the glass to eat you and were just about to flee down the hall, when another type of sound suddenly came from the beast…

… a strangely melodic hum, if you could call it that, where through the rumble you could pick up the different pitches and notes the monster was creating. The more you listened to the slow noise, the more you caught on to the fact that these notes were strikingly similar to the song you had just been singing before the massive eye caught you off guard!

Was this thing… trying to sing with you?

Your eyes widened with surprise at this realization, a new emotion blooming in your chest as you gingerly placed the mop against the wall, your full attention now on the red eye as it dilated and grew in size, seemingly having noticed the fear leaving your expression.

“Are you… singing?” You dare to ask, hesitantly approaching the window with newfound curiosity, despite caution screaming at you to run away instead of approach the much larger creature. The hum which shook your entire being ebbed away as you spoke, leaving a moment of silence between the two of you as you stared at one another, though the quiet did not feel so heavy or threatening as it had before. A light squeak from the glass drew your attention as the pale white hand (was that bone?) moved slightly, curling into a fist and allowing you to spot the sharpened claws at the end of this creature’s fingers. And yet… this didn’t feel like a threatening gesture. You focus again on the eye, as it bobbed very slightly up and down. The sea monster nodded.

“...You… heard me singing then, didn’t you?” You dumbly stated, pointing a finger at yourself as you took in the fact that this inhuman looking giant actually understood you and was capable of responding. Another slight nod of the eye comes at your response. “And it… didn’t bother you?”

Instead of moving up and down, the eye and the white socket around it (oh goodness that was bone-) shifted from side to side, a shake of the monster’s massive head. It was responding, giving yes and no answers, this was crazy-!

It was crazy, and yet for some reason you felt so giddy inside. You couldn’t help the wide smile that was suddenly on your face, the dimples you felt on your cheeks almost feeling foreign as you reached up to cover your mouth. When was the last time you’d felt this excited?

“Wow, guess you’re a musician too then, huh?” You muse softly, quiet enough that you wouldn’t think the creature would hear you and yet a brief rumbling… purr, proved you wrong. You labeled this sound a purr, mainly because of the glimmer you could suddenly see swimming about in the giant eye, a glimmer that you interpreted as amusement. A small laugh leaves you before you pick up your music player from the coat’s pocket, browsing through your song selection to pick another one to play.

“Well, I do need to keep working, but if you’d like I can pick something a little slower. Maybe you could... sing along?” You asked as you settled for a familiar folk song, slow but easy to hum along to. “This one’s not too hard, just repeat after me.”

While you weren’t certain how well this would work, you took your mop in hand again and began to sing the folk song of your choice, the notes far more melodic and gradual in pace. The old love song was one of your favorites, and you hardly needed to listen to the recording to know what words to sing, lost instead in the somber violins and rolling tones of the song. Once you had finished the first verse of the tune, already swaying to the rhythm as you mopped, the rumbling of the massive monster soon shook your body once more, reminding you of his presence as you peek subtly in the glass window’s direction, continuing to sing still as a low pitched wail joined you.

He matched you pitch by pitch, perhaps a little off key but still hauntingly beautiful with his own singing. Unlike your soprano cadence that allowed you to reach high notes with ease and confidence, the giant skeletal monster’s voice reached your core before your ears, vibrating with a primal energy that blended seamlessly with his song. Deep, otherworldly, and a stark contrast to your human vocals. You would have stopped in your own melody, feeling unworthy of singing alongside him, but from the equally enraptured glow of that surprisingly expressive eye… You couldn’t help but have the impression that he was listening very closely to your own voice as well.

And so your unusual duet with a friendly sea monster continued, as you slowly moved your way up the darkened hallways, keeping to the routes that stayed alongside the giant creature’s aquarium and allowed him to very gradually follow you from window to window. Once you finished the first folk song, the two of you easily continued onto the next melody, and just as quickly to the one after that. Song after song passed on your playlist, each one giving you and the sea creature a chance to hear one another and become lost in the music the two of you created together. It was… surreal to your own mind, you almost couldn’t believe this was actually happening, and yet every time you would glance to the monster’s enormous face to find him following your every move with a wide, dilated red eye, reality would prove you wrong.

But soon enough, you had to move onto the other sections of the laboratory. You’d get chewed out for a botched job if you didn’t clean the entire facility by the end of the night, and yet somehow that looming threat didn’t bother you as much as it normally would, finishing the last song with a heavy sigh as you placed the mop in the wheeled bucket. The sea monster appeared to catch onto the turn of your emotions, as his rumbling moans soon tapered off into a heavy silence, the red light illuminating the hallway growing more intense as he leaned closer to the glass. Leaning closer to you.

While you knew by now that he was friendly, being under that much scrutiny from a massive entity was still quite intimidating, and you couldn’t help but take a step back in surprise. You were quick to realize that this was likely him trying to figure out what was wrong though, so with a saddened smile you pointed a thumb down the turning hallway, which ventured away from his aquarium and into dim darkness. “Sorry big guy, this is where we part ways. I’ve got to mop up the rest of this place by the end of the night.” You explained with a disappointed tone, turning your focus towards your phone briefly and missing the drastic shrink of the monster’s glowing pupil. “It was nice singing with you though, you have a beautiful voi-”

You were nearly shaken off balance by the force of his clawed hand bashing against the window suddenly, followed swiftly by a deep guttural growl that tore through the air around you. A sharp gasp leaves you as you quickly turn to the sea beast, to see both his hands now pressed against the glass in front of you, his skull now in full view at the distance he was at and his anger all too clear through his beastly expression. It was barely human, his giant teeth were in full view and each one was razor sharp. His socket with the glowing pupil was practically searing the water around it, nearly a pinprick of light now glared at you while his other socket was a hollow black and narrowed. But most alarmingly of all, a detail that had been hidden by how close he’d been to the window before, was how an enormous portion of his skull was just gone, leaving nothing but a cracked husk in the top right half of the monster’s head. As drawn as your eyes were to the gruesome injury, with the beast snarling in your direction and pressing into the glass, you had more important things to worry about.

Such as the cracks you could suddenly hear from the window-

“W-wait! Stop, what’s wrong? Why are you so angry?” You yelped frantically, unwisely approaching the hands pressed against the windows with your own hands stretched out, as if hoping to push him away from breaking the precious barrier. If he broke the glass windows, the whole laboratory could be flooded, and everyone (mainly you-) would drown! “Please, be gentle with the glass, I can’t breathe in water like you if it breaks!”

Surprisingly enough the sea monster appeared to hear you through the ear-splitting growls he was making, and while he still radiated a hot fury from his sockets and far-too wide grin, the clawed phalanges are slowly lowered from the windows. You sigh with relief as the cracks you’d heard go silent, but still faced with an enraged giant you press your own hand against the glass, watching his expression desperately and trying to make out what had upset him. He’d started making a fuss when you said you had to leave…

“Do you… want me to stay?” You hesitantly asked, your eyes widening as his clawed hand returned to mirror your own hand on the glass, practically engulfing you in it’s shadow as his palm loomed over you, each of his fingers far taller than you alone. His face drew closer yet again, hiding his head injury to watch you when his hand had hidden you from his sight. The growls at last quiet down some, and grew more high pitched in tone. It almost sounded like a… pitying whine now, to your ears. You took this as a yes, he wanted you to stay.

“I’m… I’m sorry, I wish I could, but I can’t.” You said honestly, drawing your eyes away from his towering hand and towards his eye with a morose expression of your own. “I’ll get in trouble if I don’t clean the labs by the time everyone wakes up. I’m… I’m the janitor, after all, this is what they expect me to do.” You state the last sentence bitterly, clearly not wanting to be a janitor, but it was all you could do here without having the qualifications to be a scientist in these labs.

Showing your frustration to an already irate sea beast wasn’t the wisest choice however, as his cries went silent all together and a heavy silence fell all around you. His pupil was shrinking even further… Thankfully this time you caught onto his souring mood and tried to turn the tides as much as you could, offering him a hopeful grin instead through the glass and making your tone more cheerful.

“But, once I’m done I can come back! I do want to see you again, it’s not everyday you find a music partner after all!” You said as confidently as you could, watching the behemoth carefully for his reaction. “I promise I’ll be quick, you’ll hardly notice that I’m gone. So don’t be mad, kay?”

From the slight narrowing of his sockets you got the impression he was suspicious of you, but of what you couldn’t say. Perhaps picking up on the pleading tone of your voice though, the sea monster at last appears to relent and lowered his gargantuan hand from the glass, swimming to put distance between himself and the windows while his single red pupil remained intensely focused on you. A silent truce, allowing you to leave despite appearing hesitant about it still.

A wave of relief hit you at this point, though you did your best not to show this and instead gave the giant skeleton a happy grin and wave of goodbye, before beginning to scoot your mop bucket down the branching hallway and further into the depths of the lab. You didn’t stop until you felt the burning sensation on your back leave you, knowing that if you turned to see him watching you leave like a lost puppy you likely wouldn’t have the heart to go through with your janitorial duties. But you had a job to do, and you seriously needed the money, so you’d turn down your own wants for the next few hours until you were done.

After that, you’d be free to visit your bizarre, terrifying, yet exciting new companion.

#reader insert #kraken sans #my writing #I've got a lot of ideas for this story but oof... lets just stick to this bit for now XD #very much not used to sharing my writing in this way #also shout outs to indulgence and llama cause OMG you're both lovely and inspirational <3

[flamingo-writes]

Earrings — Zoro x Reader

Summary: After a fight with Sanji, the crew is flabbergasted to see Zoro actually meant to hurt Sanji. Confused by this, Robin talks to Zoro, who opens up about the history behind his earrings, and why he punched Sanji after making fun of them.

Word count: 2 K

A/N: I’m supposed to be doing homework xD but this idea hit me and I really really had to write it. Spoiler free, set somewhere between Water 7 and Thriller Bark. Long fragments in italics are flashbacks. 

Warnings: angst, mentions of death. 

For someone who was constantly arguing with Sanji, it never really came down to physical violence. If it ever came down to it, Zoro would use attacks Sanji could easily read, so the blond could block them. The intention, never to hurt Sanji, as much of an asshole he sometimes was to Zoro. Since the swordsman knew all too well he was an asshole to him too. Things were usually even. Things were usually fair. Senseless yelling and easy to predict moves. 

However, right after Zoro punched Sanji on the face, the cook fell on his bum, covering his bleeding nose. His eyes open in shock, as he realized he’d crossed the line. He’d never seen Zoro throw a punch, and for the first time, the mosshead actually meant to hurt Sanji. Which could be translated to: don’t you dare say something like that again. 

After the crew gathered around, yelling, telling both of them to stop fighting and competing for everything. However, when everyone met Zoro’s ice cold stare, words instantly lowered down. 

“Say something about her earrings again, you’re dead, you understand?” The seriousness in his voice made Ussop, Nami and Chopper shiver, suddenly afraid of their nakama. Franky frowned and looked at Robin who was staring at Zoro questioningly. 

Zoro turned around without saying anything else. The entire crew looked at the swordsman as he climbed the mast towards the crow’s nest. The tension dead cold between the crew, as no one dared to break the silence. At least until Luffy spoke. 

“What was that about? I’d never seen Zoro this pissed before” Luffy said frowning confused.

“Yes! What did you say?! You could’ve died! We could’ve died!” Ussop cried kneeling next to Sanji, holding his arm. 

“I-I made fun of his stupid earrings,” Sanji began looking worried and wondering what had happened “I didn’t think he’d get this pissed…” Sanji said cleaning his blood with the back of his nose. 

“He said ‘her earrings’?” Nami added looking at everyone for confirmation. 

“He did…” Robin whispered. 

“Who was he talking about?” Chopper asked as he helped Sanji clean himself up and making sure his nose wasn’t broken. 

“Someone very special to him if he reacted this way” Franky answered looking up at the crow’ nest. “I should talk to him…” 

“Franky, wait” Robin said. “I’ll go. But first, I want him to cool down a little bit, otherwise he’ll only get angrier.” 

The entire crew exchanged stares. All of them still surprised by Zoro’s reaction, and feeling worried for him as well. All of them curious as to what he meant and his motivation to punch Sanji. 

After almost two hours, two very sow hours, Robin finally decided to climb to the crow’s nest. The rest of the crew looked at her as she made her way up, hoping that thing wouldn’t blow up of proportion. Everyone was worried, except for Luffy who knew perfectly well that Zoro wouldn’t be able to seriously hurt anyone from the crew. 

“Zoro, how are you holding up” Robin said walking inside the crow’s nest, looking at Zoro who was lifting some heavy weights. 

“Training” He growled, the veins on his forehead popping out, and sweat dripping down his entire self. 

“I can see that” She whispered sarcastically, noticing how Zoro refused to stop working out, and to even look at her. 

“Great” He sighed, knowing why Robin was there. 

Right then, Zoro preferred to be alone, but he knew he’d eventually have to address what had happened. He’d never hurt someone from the crew before, and he slightly regretted it. And at the same time, he didn’t want to really explain what happened. He wasn’t precisely  the kind of guy who opened up easily, and in order to explain what happened, he’d have to give away bits of information about his past. 

“Can we talk?” Robin finally said.

“You want t know what the hell happened down there?” Zoro looked at her, his dark eyes looking into hers, as she could see Zoro’s mixed feelings about this whole thing. 

“Yes” 

“That stupid cook is an asshole” Zoro quickly answered, shutting his eyes closed as he kept lifting weights. 

“I’m gonna need more details than that” The archaeologist hissed rather annoyed at Zoro’ attitude. 

“Why do you care, anyways?” Zoro hissed. 

“I’d like to see if I can be of any help” 

“There’s nothing that can be done” Something in his voice changed, and Robin could tell. She looked at him raising an eyebrow questioningly. 

“Why not?” 

“She’s dead” Zoro’s words lingered on Robin as the questions kept multiplying. D the fact that Zoro had his eyes closed made him even harder to read. However, she could tell he was doing this on purpose. She cursed at his stubborn nature, even when she was there to help him.  

“Who is?” Robin asked.

“Doesn’t matter…” Zoro whispered in a low voice.

“Oh, but it does, Zoro...please…” 

He took longer than expected to answer. Robin’s patience was draining when he finally put the weights on the floor and finally opened his eyes. However, he kept avoiding Robin’s stare by looking through the window into the vast blue sea. 

“She was my—” He stopped, thinking of which word to use without giving away too much “friend…” He said coldly, knowing perfectly well you were much more than that, but he wasn’t willing to give Robin more information than necessary “[Name]” he mouthed.

“What happened to her?” 

The memories hit Zoro, as they usually did at night, scratching the scab on his heart painfully. He could still remember crystal clear, how you died in his arms, telling him to watch over your earrings, and give them back once you two met on the other side. 

“We better not meet on the other side any time soon, Zoro. If I find out you didn’t have a long fulfilling life, I’ll kick your ass, okay?” You said, as Zoro’s heart squeezed painfully.

“Hopefully, we won’t see each other for several decades” Zoro chuckled bitterly as his eyes teared up looking at your wounded body. “They’re going to be really long decades without you there, [Name]” 

“Don’t get sentimental on me, Zoro…” Ht tears fell down your eyes as you looked into his pained eyes. 

“The love of my life is about to bleed out in my arms, how do you expect me to react?” Zoro growled in a low voice fighting the lump on his throat. 

“I want you to think of all the good times we had, instead of remembering me as a bleeding mess…” Your hands reached one of your ears as you would occasionally do instinctively. “Have I ever told you the story about my earrings?” Smiling, you tried to relieve the painful tension between the both of you.

Zoro chuckled as he brushed your hair. Your head resting on his lap, as he looked down at you. His eyes growing progressively more and more wet. At the same time his throat felt more and more dry. 

“Your dad and your grandmother accidentally got you the exact same pair of earrings for your birthday, wasn’t it?” He said knowing the story perfectly well, since you loved that story so much and were constantly telling him about that day when you received two identical pairs of earrings. 

“Yeah. It was a great day” You chuckled, closing your eyes, feeling how your head got lighter and lighter, and your heart beat faster and stronger.

“You’re a dork for wearing all four earrings at once” Zoro joked, laughing so bitterly, failing at masking his pain. 

“How else were my grandma and dad know I wore both pairs?” The way your voice came out so cheerful made Zoro’s heart skip a beat. Surprised by even how in your deathbed you were able to say nice things. 

“You’re so dumb” Laughing, a few tears slipped down his eyes, as those same tears fell on your forehead. 

“Too bad I lost one while fighting that asshole…” 

“You should’ve let me handle him” Zoro whispered.

“Oh, so it was you the one bleeding out? I’m sorry, but no. You have greater dreams to achieve than I ever did” You answered right away, as Zoro looked at you.

“I failed to save her, that’s what happened…” Zoro finally answered Robin. “Before dying, she gave me her earrings” His voice faded out as he spoke. 

“I thought you wore them for fashion…” 

“She had four. Three on her left ear, and one on the right one...” Zoro said ignoring her comment. 

“I’d look dumb if I wore two on each ear. Like this” You said pointing at your ears “I look way cooler” You said crossing your arms and puffing your chest proud and confident of your new style. 

“You’re still dumb, what difference does it make?” Zoro laughed poking your forehead. 

“I don’t want to look dumber! Of course it makes a difference”Zoro laughed even louder when you agreed with him, and you smiled, feeling how his laugh tickled your belly. 

“Sometimes I can’t believe you’re real. I love you so fucking much” Zoro said running his hand through your hair and pulling you towards him, hugging you and kissing the top of your head. 

“Believe it! I’m the last one of my species!” You said in a muffled voice, since your face was pressed against his chest. 

“I’m sure you are” Zoo laughed. 

“I’m sorry, Zoro” 

“Don’t tell that dumb cook this but, I feel a bit bad for punching him. But he touched a very sensitive topic” Robin’s eyes widened in surprise at his confession “[Name] was my best friend, she meant the world to me. In the beginning was hard to keep going with my life right after she died” 

“Must have been rough” Robin muttered s Zoro looked back at her. 

“It was. I promised her I’d remember her as the smiling girl she was. I haven’t been able to keep that promise entirely, the memory of her death haunts me from time to time…” He kept saying, looking away from Robin, back into the ocean “Ironically, remembering her dumb smile helps me feel better, I’m glad I met her. I’m glad she kept up with my bullshit for so long. And I’m glad she left me something to remember her by” He said stroking his earrings gently with his finger tips. 

“Is there something I can do to help you, Zoro?” 

He turned around, looking at Robin once more. He was smiling. A gentle warm smile, the sort of smile you’d draw on his face whenever he remembered your radiant grin.

“It’s okay. I’m fine” He said confidently, as he remembered your voice echoed in his head. 

“I want you to think of all the good times we had” The echo of your voice came from his heart, soothing his pain. 

“Well then, if you need me, you can always find me on the deck” Robin smiled gently and turning round, returning to the ladder. 

“Thanks” Zoro purred looking back into the ocean as he could clearly see your face smiling at him, warming his heart. 

After Robin left, Zoro kept working out, letting out his pain through exercising. Whenever he closed his eyes to either lift a weight or do a squat, your face would show up. That gentle smile that he loved so much. How many times he fell asleep while looking at your soft smile. How many times he thought how lucky he was for having someone looking at him, smiling at him in that unique way? 

His favourite memory of you kept replaying in his mind. He didn’t know how long had it been since he’d woken up. The slumber was still fresh in his eyes. Zoro hadn’t realized he’d been staring at you in the short time he’d been awake. When you noticed his stare on you, you looked at him. Your bright eyes connected with his, and the most genuine smile he’d ever seen spread across your face. It hit him like a stone on the face, he suddenly felt overwhelmed by the way you’d smiled at him. Zoro couldn’t handle the eye contact with that smile underneath your eyes. He looked away, smiling softly, blushing, noticing for the first time his feelings towards you. 

#one piece #one piece zoro #One Piece Fanfiction #one piece x reader #roronoa zoro #roronoa zoro x reader #roronoa zoro imagine #zoro #Pirate Hunter Zoro #zoro imagine #zoro x reader

[twdmusicboxmystery]

TWD 10x04: Silence the Whisperers - Analysis

How did everyone like the episode? As always, I thought it was really good. The first thing I’ll say is that there isn’t nearly as much symbolism in it as there has been in the past few episodes. Not that there isn’t any, but you know how the past few have just been ridiculously overflowing with it? This one just has less. It’s one of those episodes that’s more action-oriented and setting up for what comes next.

***As always, spoilers abound below for episode 10x04. Don’t read until you’ve watched!!!***

Opening Sequence:

So the song playing in this sequence whispers “1, 2, 3” over and over again, which I think it significant. I already talked in an Ask about the wheel decoration behind Daryl, and how I think it represents the death fake out arc, and may show that Beth’s arc is about to come back around. Beyond that, Ezekiel is sad, Magna is having some issues, and a tree comes through Hilltop’s wall.

Hilltop:

We learn that 9 people got trapped in a building when the tree hit the roof and it caved in. They got all the people out, but this could be part of the Hole in the Roof theory. As the episode proceeds, the noise from the tree brings walkers and they’re afraid the whole wall will collapse. It’s already been weakened by the tree and now all the walkers are pushing in on it.

This hearkens back to two things for me. The first is the fallen trees in Them, which I always saw as significant. The second is, of course, when the church fell in S6, bringing down Alexandria’s walls and letting walkers in in 6x08/09.

Why would that be significant? Well, I think it’s obvious why Them would be significant, yeah? I mean, it’s after the storm and the fallen trees that the music box woke up. So if you want to draw a direct parallel, you might argue Beth will arrive after the tree falls. Honestly, I don’t see this as a big enough event to herald that, but it might be one of many small events that lead to her. More on that in a minute.

And how about paralleling it to S6? The biggest thing for me there is that that was smack in the middle of Glenn’s death fake out. After the church fell and let the walkers in, Glenn showed up, miraculously alive, and reunited with Maggie. Just saying.

In terms of the plot, I’m wondering (and this is pure conjecture) if Hilltop will eventually fall too. The Kingdom has already gone down, and I wonder if HT will too, forcing the entire group together at Alexandria. I’m not at all positive that’s where they’re going, but it crossed my mind.

Because the wall actually does collapse, but Michonne’s group shows up to help fight the walkers, and they do talk about fixing it. So we’ll see.

Ezekiel:

Given all the messages and Asks I’ve gotten about this, I doubt I need to explain it in great detail. Zeke has always had heavy parallels with Beth. Just as Daryl and Carol are very similar, so Beth and Ezekiel are too. Here, we have him contemplating suicide, much as Beth did in S2. Much like her, he realized he wants to live. 

As I mentioned in an Ask, this happened on one side of the now-broken bridge Rick was blown off of. So that connects him to Rick. And he wore a green shirt (Beth). So I think that connects him to the death fake outs and this functions as a foreshadow of Zeke’s own coming death fake out.

He also rode a black horse. It ran by Michonne after he let it go. That made me realize something. It’s not anything groundbreaking, but just a detail I hadn’t really thought of before. We’ve always seen as white horse = Beth and black horse = Daryl. The white horse also = life or being alive. But I realized the black horse also = death, despair, lack of hope. That’s how Zeke felt here, and how Daryl felt around the time Buttons died. Again, nothing we didn’t already know, but I just hadn’t thought of it that way before.

When Michonne and Ezekiel talk, she says, “it never would have worked between us anyway. We’re both too stubborn.” He says, “maybe in another universe.” I laughed at that. As in, the comic book universe? It’s obviously the writers’ way of acknowledging that this is a nod to their comic book romance, but it’s not going to happen in the show. (Add that to the list of things TD has been correct about.)

Daryl/Lydia/Alexandria:

This was obviously the biggest story thread in the episode. And I gotta say, I loved it! Gauge and his friends are mean to Lydia and bully her. She talks to Negan about it more and more, which Daryl isn’t happy about.

I was laughing hysterically when Lydia butchered the squirrel in front of them. How much like Daryl is that? Like father, like daughter, I guess. She’s rebellious just like he is. Which isn’t surprising since they come from similar, abusive backgrounds.

Daryl is older and wiser now and advises her not to provoke them, but he himself would have done much the same only a few years ago.

The three bullies attack Lydia and Negan saves her. I gotta say, while I was one who thought it would have been more just for them to execute Negan at the end of AOW, it’s really hard to hate him when he’s being sweet to Lydia. While rescuing her, he accidentally kills the woman who used to be with the highwaymen.

So, remember in episode 1 when I talked about how Negan told FG he didn’t want people’s fear of the Whisperers to blow up in his face so that they blamed him and wanted to string him up? I said that was setting something up and this would happen eventually. So this episode is the fulfillment of that. It truly was an accident and he didn’t mean to kill her, but no way people are going to let it go, now. So Negan takes off.

In truth, I’ve been waiting for him to take off. I’m actually really excited about this story line. Remember last season when Negan escaped and left Alexandria for a while? Judith tried to stop him, and he took her compass? Well, he was only gone a short time, but during that time we saw tons of callbacks to Still, saw him run from dogs, and saw tons of other Beth-ish symbolism. We weren’t exactly sure what it meant at the time, but now I think we do.

That small excursion from Alexandria was a foreshadow of this one. He’ll probably be gone much longer this time and the arc will be much bigger. It’s important to note that we saw not only Beth symbolism, but also saw Negan drink bad water and throw it up. That hints at the radiation/helicopter group stuff.

So I’m not saying Negan will meet Beth in the woods next episode—obviously I’d be great with that, but I’m sure it will be much more complicated and protracted—but just that something about him leaving will lead to Beth. I’m excited to see how it all plays out.

When Daryl talks to Carol, she says all the drama in the communities—both the stuff with Negan and Lydia, as well as the tree situation at Hilltop—are distractions from the true enemy: Alpha. I know there are lots of theories floating around about Carol being the one to have let Negan out. 

While I don’t think we have much evidence of that either way, I certainly wouldn’t dismiss it. It would mirror her killing Karen and David at the prison in 4a. Not that the action is the same, but this wouldn’t be the first time Carol took it on herself to solve a problem in a less than ethical way, because she thinks it’s for the greater good. But no one knows for sure what happened yet. They didn’t tell us in this episode. So we’ll just have to wait and see.

Meanwhile, when Michonne and Daryl talk on the radio, she tells him to protect Lydia. She’s afraid that if anything happens to Lydia, or if she leaves Alexandria, Alpha will attack them. Yeah, once again, that’s a setup. Something along these lines will happen eventually and bring Alpha’s wrath.

Near the end, Michonne, Judith and Luke head back to Oceanside because Rachel radioed to say they thought they saw some Whisperers near where the mask washed up in 10x01. So Michonne is going to investigate. She takes Judith and Luke with her. Where Luke is concerned, I kinda feel like he might die. I hope not, but they sure focused a lot on him saying heartfelt goodbyes to his group (Magna, Connie, Kelly, and Yumiko). That struck me as suspicious. Like that group might not all be together again.

Details:

I won’t do a full details post because there were only a handful I saw worth mentioning.

When Lydia said Gauge and his pals deserved what she did (with the squirrel), Daryl said, “I get it.” Obvious Beth line.

When Siddiq had another freak out, he put his face in ice water. Not a huge deal, but another example of water helping to (temporarily at least) heal him.

When Lydia was in medical, talking to Daryl, we see a bunch of IV bags behind her. Just reminded me of Grady.

Oh, and Lydia played around with a worm when she was talking to Negan. (Worm Theory.)

When Michonne talked to Daryl on the radio, she told him to be her proxy for the vote. This really isn’t anything official, but that word caught my ear. It had nothing to do with Beth in the plot, but how often does TD, in our theories, talk about Beth proxies? And I don’t think I’ve ever heard them use that actual word on the show before. So it just got my attention. ;D

When Negan disappeared, FG said the guards reported that the keys were missing. Key Theory. And reminds me a lot of all the keys we saw at Grady.

When Daryl and Carol talked on the steps, Carol had an interesting line. She said, “it’s like time never moves.” I wondered if that might be a reference to the clocks without hands. She also mentions New Mexico yet again.

We see Michonne and Judith fighting walkers side by side. Just look at this. I think it might be a callback to when Rick and Carl fought walkers together (with guns in that case) at the prison in 4a.

Finally, this isn’t really a TD detail, but they’re definitely setting something up with Magna and Yumiko. Their relationship is in a rocky place, but I feel like it’s mostly because Magna is kind of spiraling. She seems angry and like she just wants to kill everything. I don’t know what they’re setting up there, but something.

When Lydia butchered the squirrel, which I already said was very Daryl-like, it specifically showed that Father Gabriel (embodiment of the Sirius symbolism/Beth) was watching her. I’m not entirely sure what to make of that, but I found it interesting.

I loved seeing Daddy Daryl taking care of Lydia. It’s really sweet and compelling. I’m enjoying his interactions with Lydia. I always feel like he’s on the verge of telling her about Beth. But alas, he doesn’t. At least, not in this episode.

Lydia said she let Negan out, though when Daryl confronted her, she admitted she didn’t. But she ultimately wanted to stay in Negan’s cell because she felt safer in there. It just occurred to me that she currently has a Morgan mindset (from 6x06) where she actually feels more comfortable in a cage. Just kind of interesting.

Ending:

At the end, they repeat the “1, 2, 3” song again. We see Luke saying goodbye to everyone, which I already talked about. Then we see Carol on the roof, looking at a map. (Maybe evidence that she’s systematically looking for Alpha?) Then we see Daryl scrubbing the graffiti off his front door.

Guess what? The vest is back! Yaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!

That’s super important, guys. We really haven’t seen his vest in a LONG time. It’s return now, with the missing wing on obvious display, feels really important. Like Beth’s return (the return of his missing wing, perhaps?) is just around the corner.

The camera pans around, showing all the graffiti (there was more than just the stuff on Daryl’s door). It stops on one particular instance of it. And, this might be hard to hear, but if you put on the subtitles, the song ends, followed by the sounds of walkers. Then the subtitles say that a Whisperer is saying, “Shhhhh.”

Yeah, that feels like a very significant setup. I feel like these first three episodes were really intros or setups for the season. Now we’re going to get into the meat and potatoes of things. You know, either really get into the Whisper War, or else something else huge is going to happen. And whatever it is, I think it will lead to Beth. I saw the last sequence of this episode as evidence that the arc where Beth returns is about to ensue. That makes me happy.

Okay. Gonna stop there for today. As I said, I won’t do a details post for this episode. Either tomorrow or Wednesday, I’ll do a post talking about where I’m thinking the events of this episode (such as Negan leaving, Michonne going to Oceanside, seeing Daryl smoke last episode, etc) might be heading. So it will mostly be a predictions post. Sort of. Stay tuned. ;D

#beth greene #beth greene lives #beth is alive #beth is coming #td theory #td theories #team delusional #team defiance #beth is almost here #bethyl

[nightfayre]

I think that you somewhere wrote to ask you questions about your historical red string of fate AU (even though I can`t find it anymore). So here I go. Which time period will this story play in or will be inspired by? Will MGS and HT know each other from the beginning or will they get to know each other? Class distinction?Will LGBT discrimination play a role in the story? (I'm never quiet sure if I want to have this kind of element in a story or not. 1/2

On the one hand it unfortunately still is a cruel part of our society. And it can create angst and drama in a story. On the other hand I love my discrimination free world where everybody can love everybody and nobody cares. It's so good for my peace of mind) 2/2

hello!! yes! I’m SO happy that people are actually curious about this AU! thank you so much for sending all these questions!!

and yes, I did make a post asking for questions about this AU but I got a lot of anonymous questions asking mostly the same things, so I deleted it and decided to wait until I had time to sit down and answer all the questions at once. but then THIS nifty ask came along and not only introduced new questions but also included (mostly) all of the other questions other people asked, so — thanks again!!

and now my answers (I will try to keep them brief!):

1. as I said before, this AU is kind of a mix between 18th century eastern monarchies and 18th century western monarchies. there will be elements that resemble both cultures, but it will definitely be more focused on Chinese ideals/formalities/traditions (duh). hopefully nothing will seem too out of the ordinary, but I will do my best to put a lot of time and research into making things as accurate as possible!

2. this question is similar to ones other anons sent me, pictured below:

and my answer is that no, tianshan will not know each other immediately! they will meet each other by foul circumstance and gradually grow closer as time passes. gotta love that angst and slowburn :)

3. again, this answer encompasses these anonymous asks as well:

there IS class distinction in this AU, as per traditional Chinese culture (and modern culture, if you think about it). He Tian IS royalty, and Guan Shan is not. while I’m here, I might as well mention that Jian Yi is a noble, Zheng Xi is a commoner/well-ranked servant, and She Li is royalty.

yes, you read that right. She Li is royalty.

4. WARNING: RANT AHEAD.

*cracks knuckles* okay here’s the thing. while discriminatory homophobia is a huge real-world problem and definitely cannot be erased or undermined, I personally don’t see a place for it in my fanfictions. for many people, fanfiction is a place to escape from their outside world precisely because they identify or relate to characters within a fictional universe. as such, for the majority of an audience, they don’t want to see their favorite characters undergoing the same stresses/hurt that they might be feeling, especially when it comes to LGBTQ+ discrimination.

now don’t get me wrong — many people find that reading such content in which the characters prevail/overcome/“ignore” homophobia is empowering and (hopefully) emulates real life issues in a way that is hopeful and pleasing. and good for them!! I hope they enjoy such fanfictions, because everyone is entitled to their own opinions and coping mechanisms!

but in MY fanfictions, I would rather not drag these boys into such a cruel world, no matter how “accurate” these circumstances might be. I mean, in Old Xian’s canon content, Jian Yi already struggles (or rather, struggled) horribly with internalized homophobia and fear of what others may think, including his own best friend. it was heartbreaking to see Jian Yi go through that, and I’d rather not “make” him go through that again via my own hand. I thank Old Xian for bringing such issues to light, but I don’t want to try to further highlight the stereotypical “faults” of the LGBTQ+ community in my works and use this kind of terrible discrimination purely for an “angst effect.” that’s just not my cup of tea.

after all, I have many, MANY other different ways to create angst! ;)

oh and one last thing: the gay community is NOT a platform of which creators can exploit in order to build unnecessary/non-progressive drama or tragedy within a work. we are more than a plot device. we are NOT a tragedy. there is a reason why Bury The Gays is such a hurtful trope in many TV series and movies.

anyway... rant over!

5. and now to answer some other questions that people sent!

unfortunately, no, there will not be magical elements in this AU (unless of course you consider the Red String a magical element. it certainly isn’t nonfictional, that’s for sure!)

but don’t worry!! I already have many other magical AUs lined up for the future!

HAHAHAHAH oh BUDDY do I have a surprise for you.................

(in other words: yes. yes, they can be broken.)

:)

as per usual in most of my fics, the four main boys + She Li are around 22-23 and Cheng + Qiu are early-mid 30s!

and that’s it for most of the questions I received!! thank you SO MUCH to everyone who sent one! you guys are seriously giving me so much inspiration to continue with this fic!!

please, don’t hesitate to send more!!! ❣️

#19 days #tianshan #zhanyi #beautifulboysbeingbusy #mailbox #send more asks!! these were so fun to answer!! #and sorry about the rant :(

[pretty-boy-in-demand]

So I have this story on AO3 and I just kinda also wanted to put it here. So here is chapter 1 & 2. I’m putting them in the same post to save time for both me and whoever reads!

Chapter 1: Bases loaded

Ever since Whizzer was a kid, he would ask his mother why he couldn’t see color like she did. She would always explain to him that one day, when he found the person he was meant to be with, he would finally be able to see in color.

As he grew up he learned new things about himself. By the time he was 12 years old he had figured out that he was gay, and, even before that, he had figured out that he was really good at baseball. He always loved watching it on the Tv, his favorite team was the New York Yankees. He watched every single game, by the time he was 6 or 7 years old he knew that he wanted to grow up and play baseball.

Flash forward many years and there he was, Whizzer brown on the pitcher's mound. It was the final game they decided if they were going to go to the world series or not. The other team was up and the bases were loaded. It was the bottom of the ninth inning and there were three outs. The score was 14-13, the Yankees had 14. If Whizzer didn’t strike this batter out then they would lose the game and not advance. Before he the first pitch, he looked out into the mass of people and he gave a smile. His perfect teeth sparkled like no other. He looked back and took a deep breath, he set up and the ball was released from his hand

“Strike one!” the umpire called out.

In the large crowd there was a small family of three. A husband and a wife and their newly ten year old son. Today was the boy’s birthday and this was his birthday present.

The boys name was Jason, He was the son of a man named Marvin and a woman named Trina. They were a tiny ‘happy’ family, or so it seemed. On the outside they seemed perfect and happy. A happy marriage and a smart and happy son. But if you took a closer look, the family was falling apart. The husband and wife did not love each other. Their marriage was more forced on them rather then wanted by both of them. The husband also had a very big secret, he has been keeping it deep down inside for a very long time now. Since he was a teenager he has been suppressing some feelings.

The husband was very much a closeted queer. He knew since he was a young 15 year old boy he had figured it out. By that age he was supposed to be feeling something towards females. All he heard in school was about how guys just wanted to hook up with girls and get in their pants. But Marvin did not. He would much rather read a book or study rather then go out and try and get with a girl. Then a little later on, he started to notice how he would look at boys. His eyes always drifted to them. If he had to choose between a female and a male partner, without thinking, he would say male. But he soon learned that he could not do that, his parents always told him that he needed to marry a nice girl. He had to start a family to continue his family legacy.

Marvin did end up marrying a girl, but not because he wanted to. It was because he ended up getting her knocked up, and with both their families being very very strict jewish people, they forced them to get married so that their kid wasn’t a bastard. Now they were married and the only thing keeping marvin there was the kid. He loved the kid so much with all his heart and he felt like he couldn’t just abandon him.

Back on the pitchers mound, Whizzer was getting ready for another pitch. Once again, he set up and he threw the ball.

“Strike Two!”

As Whizzer was pitching, all Marvin could think about was how handsome the pitcher was. Marvin in reality hated baseball, he didn’t understand it at all. The rules, the players, the spots and all of that. It made him frustrated ever since he was a kid, so for as long as he could remember he just hated the sport. Since he hated it so much he never followed it, so he did not know any of the players or their names or anything like that. So he just admired the mysterious pitcher from the stands.

Eventually his son explained that the pitchers name was Whizzer brown, his nickname was ‘pretty boy Brown’. Marvin could 100% see why, the pitcher was very very pretty. His son had expressed that the pitcher was his favorite player in the past. So Marvin had a little surprise for his son, the pitcher luckily was doing some sort of signing after the game. So along with game tickets, Marvin had passes to go down and meet this ‘pretty boy Brown’ character.

It was time, the final pitch of the night. All the pressure was on him to get this last strike and win the game for the team,

One last time, he took a very deep breath and he calmed himself down. He focused his eyes on the box and ht brought the ball to his glove. He brought the ball back, and, with a spin he released the ball and watched it travel towards the plate. The batter swung and missed

“Strike three!”

The umpire yelled out and the whole team cheered. The whole stadium roared with cheers and laughter and happiness. Jason jumped around and hugged his father all excited. The whole team ran out onto the field and they surrounded and cheered for Whizzer. He did it, He won the game.

Chapter 2: Ocean blue

News people rushed onto the field and the announcers were going crazy

“The Yankees have won the game! They are going to be attending the world series!”

Whizzer was lifted up into the air and they were cheering for him, if it wasn’t for his marvelous pitching; then the yankees probably would have lost the game.

The Pretty boy could hardly believe what he was hearing and experiencing. This had been one of his biggest dreams since he was a little boy. He can remember little whizzer standing in front of the TV, watching the Yankees play. It was one of the only ways to get him to sit down and behave. When whizzers mother needed to get things done around the house, she turned on baseball and sat whizzer right in front.

Baseball was one of the things him and his ass of a father kind of bonded on, before the whole, ‘you are not allowed to live in my house because you like men.’ he even went to a few games with his dad. The once beautiful memories were now flooded with bitterness, anger and so many other negative emotions.

Up in the stands, the happy family got ready to leave the stadium. Little Jason thought that was it. He saw his game, they were going to go out for dinner and he would get his presents at his party on Sunday. He was pretty content with that actually. He got to see his favorite player win the game that would send then to the game of the season.

What he wasn’t expecting was his father making then turn away from the exit to the parking lot. The whole walk to the field he asked where they were going, the man kept his mouth shut and had a small smile plastered on his face. The smile would grow when he saw his son’s reaction to his surprise.

As Marvin brought the three of them onto the field, the ten year olds jaw dropped to the ground. He smiled the cutest smile ever and he jumped around for joy. Usually Marvin’s son was very well composed and he could keep his calm, but when it came to baseball? All of that was thrown out the window and he became more of a ‘real’ kid.

Whizzer agreed to do this a while back, he almost forgot about it.

As he was getting his things from the dugout his manager came down and asked if he was ready.

“Ready for what exactly” he asked in a tone that was still very happy but exhausted. Being a major league player was no joke. He trained a lit and he had a game almost every single week, and, in the spring he trained hard in Florida for days and days. So it was no surprise that the pretty boy was exhausted.

When he was told he realized he did forget about the whole thing, he was about to up and walk out of there and all the people who paid extra for this would have to go home disappointed. So he sucked it up, rubbed the tiredness out of his eyes and he grabbed the silver sharpie from his manager. He jogged over to a tent that was crowded by people and a few security guards.

The young player really hated security, they were way to much. They would get aggressive a little to fast and be rude to people who were just fans who were a little excited. Whizzer adored his fans and he loved meeting them. He always expressed that, even when he wasn’t told to say things like that. The player was a genuine guy. He was very open with the world and didn’t care if people knew things about him that other people (his father) thought the world shouldn’t know. That's why he was one of the few out celebrities in the country, whizzer was proud of his sexuality and he was going to share it.

The tight knit family waited on line for a little bit of time. People were allowed to talk to the baseball player for a little bit. The were not immediately rushed away so the next person could go. So the line move a little slower than normal. Marvin didn’t mind much, he was just happy to see his son happy

His wife on the other hand, she had a bit of a nasty look on her face, she tried to mask it but it wasn’t working to well. Her look wasn’t because she hated baseball and hated being here. She had the look because her husband had tried to top their joint gift. they both decided to get these tickets for this game, but she had absolutely no idea that Marvin was planning on doing this. Though she should not have been surprised, In the past few years Marvin had always tried to one up her. But along with trying to one up her, He was also just not around as much any more. He has been having a lot of long days at work and his car must be giving out because it keeps fucking up on his way home. At least that's what he says when he gets home very very late at night.

When people would come up to him, he would smile and say hello and have a small conversation with them. He knew if he was a million years younger and he was in their shoes, he was in their shoes; he would not be able to shut up. He would have been able to talk to his favorite players for hours beyond hours when he was a little kid, so he had a bit more of a connection to these people who were so happy to meet him.

But then something happened, he saw a kid that reminded him exactly of himself when he was kid. The kid wore shirt that was supposed to resemble his jersey. He had the brightest smile and his eyes sparkled in the sun. But the kids eyes were not the only eyes that had a sparkle to them. As whizzer looked up to see the people who brought the kid. His eyes met the most beautiful light eyes. Of course whizzer could not see the color of them, but they were pretty light, like their skin. The way the mans face was, serious and sharp, but still a little soft. The way he looked at his son with the most marvelous eyes he has ever seen

What snapped him out of his trance was the kid calling him, He was very polite and very formal.

“Mr. Brown? I just wanted to say you are the best player on the team! I have your shirt, See?!”

He turned around and showed him that his name and number were on the back. Just like your typical sports T-Shirt. Whizzer saw himself in tis kid. The way he was all excited and how his face seemed to be a bit flushed. He wanted to make this extra special. He really wanted to do it after he learned it was for his birthday. He only found out because the father put his hand on the kids shoulder to kind of calm him down, and, addressed him as ‘birthday boy’. That voice that came out of that mouth was so soft and velvety. Whizzer just melted on the spot.

When they got up there and marvin saw ‘pretty boy brown’ up close. He really saw why they called him that. He was slim but his arms were very toned. The way the night long sleeve muscle shirt hugged his arms under the jersey. He just had the most beautiful face and his teeth were so shiny and perfectly aligned. It was hard for a thought to enter Marvin’s head if it did not involve The baseball player.

The signing went quicker then he thought, when he was on line, it seemed to be moving like a snail, but now, it seemed like they just got there and now they were leaving.

But in that time, Whizzer has signed a foul ball that he hit when he was up, he gave his son a jersey that was pink because it was from the breast cancer charity game, and, they have all been talking well over 30 minutes.

Whizzers manager whispered in his ear that he had to hurry it up. So he began to wrap it up, this family were the last people on the line, so after this he just had to go to a few meetings and then he got to go to his house. Big, warm and empty. He lived alone in a huge house and he hated it. NO one was there to keep him company. He had his twin over sometimes and his friends. But other then that, he lived completely alone.

“Alright kiddo, i have to go to some boring meetings, but thank you so much for coming to the game, and, Have a great birthday. Enjoy that jersey. It's one of a kind”

He winked and he ruffled the kids curly hair, just like his dad. It was uncanny how much the two looked aline. The kid was like the fathers twin. They had the same face shape, The same eye shape, the same curly hair.

The father came up to him and offered his hand, thanking him.

“Thank you for that, this is going to make his year. Good playing out there”

The man said with a warm smile, the way his white teeth sparked. Whizzer found it hard to speak because he was mesmerized by the mans ocean blue eyes...wait, he could see that this man's eyes were blue. It couldn’t be…..

“Of course, any time, he reminds me a lot of myself when i was a kid”

He managed to squeak out, by the look on the other mans face and he way he now covered his eyes a little bit. He could tell they were both experiencing the same thing. Colour.

This had to be some sort of fluke, this man had a kid…. And a wife!

I hope you enjoyed these two parts! Feel free to comment and say something, I’m open to criticism and all of that. In fact I like knowing if something isn’t working or if it is.

[mona-rei-is-not-okay]

Heya. I'm the sibling asker ! H/s = honorary sibling. Hope you're doing fine

i love deep friendship gimme gimme

and there are NO MAYBES YOU WILL HAVE THE BONUS BOY ALWAYS especially with cute asks like these omg i love

i don’t know too much about MT!Paps though, so i’m sorry if my interpretation is a lil wonky. also h/s is teen, sorry if it isn’t apparent

UF!Sans: He’s really concerned about your low mood spell, but isn’t really sure what to do about it. As much as he relates to your apparent anxieties, he doesn’t know what to do to make you feel better. He’s not usually good at comforting words. What he will do is check in a lot. Make sure you’re generally doin okay and have everything you need. Again, if you need to vent, he’ll listen.

But he really doesn’t get why the cuddles make such a difference. Sure, he’s become a bit of a cuddlebug himself, but the way you completely relax like that? Unnatural. Especially since it’s the only thing that seems to be cheering you up. But then again, who is he to question what works? He won’t exactly cling to you from then on, but he’ll start following you around the house a bit more, snagging every cuddle opportunity. It’s still a little weird, but it’s a lot better than seeing his kid sibling all skittish. Eventually though, curiosity gets the better of him, and he just has to ask.

And your answer?

Congratulations, you have floored your big bro. Beet red in the face. Absolutely no composure. What did he do to deserve your trust?? Why are you so sweet?? Aaaaaah?!? He pets your head and tries not to let you hear his wheezing, but it’s obvious, he’s really moved and has no idea how to deal with it.

“h-heh… watch where yer aimin’ that sweetness, kiddo… i’m gettin’ a toothache… jeez…”

Anyway, was he tailing you before? Welp, now he’s become your guard dog. It doesn’t matter where you’re going, he’s comin’ with you.He’ll always be by your side, gently holding your arm and keeping his head on a swivel for shifty characters. If you ever need to navigate a crowd or a tight space, he’ll usher you behind him and get you to grab the fluff of his hood while he leads the way. He can’t exactly follow you to school, but he’ll shortcut to walk you between classes if you let him. Your teachers hate him. He’ll stop following you everywhere if you fend him off with a stick, but until your mood improves… well, he’s your personal escort now, deal with it

UF!Papyrus: He’s always wanted a little sibling. He loves helping people, and shows love through physical care.He’s a bit of a mother hen. It’s part of why he took in his cat, Doomfanger. To him, you are an absolute blessing.

So he’s already got some huge maternal instincts, but your mood has got him sent into overdrive. He’ll always be asking you if you need anything, fixing you comfort snacks, asking if you need help with homework, doing a chore or cleaning a room so you don’t have to. It might feel naggy or get a little overwhelming, and he’ll dial it back if you tell him to, but his first instinct will always be to take care of possible stress sources directly. It helps him feel better, too.

So when you settle down to cuddle and just… completely deflate, he asks about it immediately. He must know. He must help.

And when you answer…

His face is deep maroon. If anybody else had said that, he would have dismissed it. But coming from you? Wowie. He feels like he’s succeeded as a caretaker. He’s about ready to squeal with joy, but he contains himself. Smiling from ear to nonexistent ear, he loops an arm behind you and pulls you closer. He tries to mask his joy with a confident air, but the grin betrays him.

“WELL! THAT’S… PERFECTLY NATURAL!! AS THE GREAT AND TERRIBLE PAPYRUS HAS TAKEN YOU UNDER HIS PROTECTION!!!”

From then on, every time he starts an activity or chore, you’re invited. Help him put away groceries! Help him do laundry! Help him cook! Also, if you accompany him on errands, hand-holding is required.

“I HAVE TO KEEP TRACK OF YOU SOMEHOW! STOP GIGGLING!”

He just wants to make sure you feel safe. Even if it means walking you to and from school, fixing you lunches with positive sticky notes in the bag, and taking you with him everywhere he goes. It’s not cute!

MT!Sans: He’s not around as much as either of you would like, but he knows you’re feeling down. He remembers seeing his brother with such a similar look on his face. Young fool that Sans was, he started taking him with on small jobs to keep him company. And now Pappy deals in some of the same dirty business he does. He’s promised himself not to make the same mistake with you.

He does his best to help you take it in stride while he’s around, but he knows there’s only so much he can do. He feels a twinge of guilt every time he has to leave you in that state. He knows it probably doesn’t have much to do with him, but he feels responsible. Maybe if he were around more, or even just in a safer profession, you wouldn’t seem so worried all the time.

Cuddles are solace for both of you. He gets to relax and feel like he’s doing something, and you don’t seem half as rigid. Smiles all around! He already sort of knows why you relax so easily in his arms, or thinks he does, but he feels he should still make sure.

And…

Well, he didn’t know what he was expecting, but he can’t keep his grin from widening a touch. You’re the light of his life, you know that? Honestly, what did he do to deserve you? But the guilt sets back in. No wonder you’ve been feeling down… he’s been particularly busy lately, and he really should make more time for you. And if you didn’t normally feel safe, whose fault is that? Well… nobody feels safe in this part of town.

“well…” He’ll plant a small kiss on the top of your head. “take it easy, kiddo. i promise, someday, we’ll all get the hell outta here.”

He’ll get somebody to watch the house while he’s gone. He knows he can’t be there all the time, but he’ll be damned if he doesn’t know you aren’t safe. He’ll call you more often to check in, too. Also… he’ll start putting a little extra away, start saving for a little vacation. Maybe some time out of town will do all of you some good. You’re family, and he’ll take care of you no matter the risk or cost.

MT!Papyrus: He’s around more than Sans is, thankfully. He sticks around to fix you meals and offer cuddles and make sure the house is safe. It’s given him plenty of time to notice one of his favorite siblings’ low mood.

He does his best to help out in indirect ways, checking the house for wires and cameras and sweeping the perimeter every so often. He knows this helps with his brother sometimes, when he gets paranoid. But he isn’t sure that’s your problem. He feels a little lost, but is upbeat as ever. He has to set a good example after all.

He most likely won’t ask about the cuddles for a while. He’s more concerned with what more he can do to make you comfortable, and if this works, it works. Besides- openly nosy folk are seldom rewarded in his line of business. Eventually though, he’ll push back the instinct. He trusts you, and this could make a lot of difference in helping you cheer up.

And when you tell him…

He’s beaming at you with such genuine joy, he looks like he might just start crying. Just… wowie! He doesn’t really understand why you’d feel that way, he’s only decent in crisis situations, but the fact that you really trust him that much? Well, it’s not something he gets a lot of. He must be doing something right if you feel this way.

He’ll rest his chin on your head and give you a hearty squeeze. “WELL! I SUPPOSE!! YOU’LL JUST HAVE TO STAY IN THIS HUG!!! FOREVER!!!!”

He won’t move for a while, get used to him, he lives there now. From then on, he’ll start taking every opportunity to come home early and see you. He’ll ask you to cook with him, he’ll ask you to read to him, he’d even try to sneak you with him on jobs if Sans didn’t always seem to stop you. He tries to be around the house more in general, he wants his little sibling to know that he’s always around if you need him.

HT!Sans: He understands your mood all too well. He’s been through plenty of periods of fear and depressive episodes in his day, and he knows how it feels. Sometime he feels like the only way he can perceive the world is either through an all-consuming fog or with painful knife-point precision. But it’s hard for him to think back to what he wanted during more desperate times. Food? Safety? He’s pretty sure you’ve got those covered already. Maybe your head just acts up a little sometimes, like his.

He’ll make sure you have everything you need, regardless. You hungry? Tired? He’ll take care of it, just you relax. If you need to talk, he may not understand or remember everything you say, but he’ll do his best to offer comfort.

It doesn’t quite register how much you relax when you cuddle him, not for a while. He can be a little slow sometimes. He’ll get it eventually though, and he’ll ask about it. This seems important, had he asked before?

And what you tell him…

It almost brings a tear to his eye. He may have a trauma-induced forgetful streak, but he remembers a lot of things. He remembers a lot of nasty, horrible things. He remembers the taste of human flesh. He remembers the strain of keeping his guard up at all times. He remembers watching his brother slip away.

But you? You’ve been his second chance. You gave him the opportunity to make things right with himself. A sibling he didn’t have to fail. He most definitely felt he didn’t deserve you or your trust... after all, he had eaten people like you without a second thought. But you gave your trust just as freely. 

“heh…” He ruffles your hair. “hope that works out for ya.”

He’ll do his best to be available for cuddles (not that he has much to keep him away) and he’ll try to take you with him if he has to go somewhere. He always makes an effort to ask about your day, if anything bad happened, if anything good happened. He doesn’t feel like he can do much, but he’ll do what he can to make things easier on you.

#asks #imagines #undertale #undertale au #underfell #underfell au #mafiatale #mafiatale au #horrortale #horrortale au #underfell sans #uf sans #underfell papyrus #uf papyrus #mafiatale sans #mt sans #mafiatale papyrus #mt papyrus #horrortale sans #ht sans #friendship #siblng #honorary sibling #cute #this wasn't the horrible thing btw #trust me you'll know that when you see it

[thoseflashinggreeneyes]

Themes of secrecy in Reputation

Anyone who’s remotely paying attention knows that Reputation is absolutely brimming with references to secrets, duality, double meanings and private revelations. The album explores these ideas from a lot of different perspectives, and I thought it would be useful to get some analysis in one place. Let’s take it song by song, shall we? 

“...Ready For It?” -- This song has obvious public/private parallels that I’ve written about before, with the verses tracking Taylor’s dark public bearding and the choruses tracking her light, airy private loves. (ht @bikertaylor for being the first to point out to me that the verses and choruses seemed to be tracking two different ideas.) The theme of secrecy that I’m interested in exploring here, though, is even more personal: When Taylor writes, “In the middle of the night, in my dreams, I know I’m gonna be with you, so I take my time,” she’s writing about a hope so dear to her heart that it’s buried in her subconscious, bubbling to the surface only in her dreams. (Of course, a dream can also reference a wish or a fantasy, but I think the literal meaning is interesting here and shouldn’t be overlooked.) If you read this song as a conflict between Taylor and her own inner desires, fighting to break free, the music video can be read more literally as well: This song is about a fight Taylor’s having with herself. The battle rages within her own heart, and the “you” in the title might refer to us (her fans, the world) being ready for her to reveal her secrets -- but it might also refer to whether Taylor herself is ready. 

“Endgame” -- The line that piques my interest here is, “I bury hatchets, but I keep maps of where I put ‘em.” The first reading here is about her seeming apologies for her public dramas, a joke that she forgives but doesn’t forget. Many of those dramas, though, concern heartbreaks and bearding narratives -- and I’m really interested in the idea that each of these might be considered a hatchet, a weapon, an instrument of pain but also a tool of survival. She buries these hatchets one by one, but she doesn’t forget them, and they become a map of her psyche,

“I Did Something Bad” -- The line that sticks out here is, “For every lie I tell them, they tell me three.” A lie is of course one kind of secret, and it’s telling that Taylor and her “boyfriends” so regularly keep secrets from one another. Additionally, I like the way “every lie I tell them” might connote that she’s telling the same lie over and over -- namely, the lie about the true nature of her feelings and their relationship.

“Don’t Blame Me” -- This song is absolutely rife with themes of darkness, secrets, and hidden truths, and I love how these references are overlaid with religious iconography: “the darkest little paradise,” “halo hiding my obsession,” “I would fall from grace just to touch your face.” This song is also a continuation of Taylor reckoning with her own desires: “Lord save me, my drug is my baby, I’ll be usin’ for the rest of my life” isn’t a lyric about wanting to return to her past self, the one who plays by the rules; this is a plea to find acceptance for who she is and who she intends to be for the rest of her life. That’s why this song makes more sense as an LGBTQ narrative than, for example, a song about pre-marital sex -- once you get married, you would return to the “halo” state of playing by the rules, but if your “baby” is a queer relationship, you can’t play by the rules without changing who you are. That’s why Taylor’s name is whatever you decide, and that’s how she changed from an existence that was poisonous to herself and others into a daisy, a symbol of innocence. She’s using words associated with nature (and therefore associated with paganism and lesbianism) to redefine the traditional religious ideas of innocence and sin, darkness and light.

“Delicate” --  This is a song about a literal secret relationship (or the beginning of one), so of course I’m more interested here in the metaphorical lines, namely “Is it chill that you’re in my head?” and “Are you ever dreaming of me?” In this song, the first on the album that seems grounded in specific details of Taylor’s current relationship, Taylor is creating a distinction between the secrets she keeps from the public (that the relationship exists at all) and the secrets she keeps from her lover and even herself. 

“Look What You Made Me Do” -- Hear me out on this: What if LWYMMD is a song (at least partially) about bearding? Read this way, we can see that Taylor hates being made to play the role of the fool who can’t make a relationship work, that she had to get smarter and harder in order to protect her real relationships, that she accepts her role as an actress pretending to be someone she’s not. Many critics and listeners have commented that the chorus leaves them cold -- without a melody, without emotion, without the payoff promised by the rising action of the pre-chorus. But if Taylor is telling us that “what we made her do” is live a fake life pretending to be someone she’s not, it makes perfect sense that the chorus would feel lifeless and robotic. The fact that it’s a sample of “I’m Too Sexy” could also be a clever nod to the fact that the performance she’s giving is as a conventionally acceptable, heterosexual being appropriate for consumption by mass audiences. 

“So It Goes...” -- Now we come to the part (i.e. the majority) of the album where secrets are no longer subtext; they are straight up text. The brilliant lyrics about magicians and illusionists show us that the secrets Taylor is keeping are now public -- she is being honest with herself and her partner. No longer is she in her head and her dreams: “I know what you know, we can feel it.” This song marks a transition in the album, away from Taylor reckoning with her own secrets and toward her reckoning with how to keep those secrets away from prying eyes.

“Gorgeous” -- Our explicit secret here (“you touching my hand in a darkened room”) leads to an opportunity for Taylor to confront her own emotions about having to keep this relationship secret: She uses the words “furious,” “hurts,” “hate,” “sad,” and “mad” -- not exactly the kind of language one typically uses to talk about the excitement of meeting a new love. These negative words are juxtaposed against a joyous beat and melody (typical Swiftian genius), but we shouldn’t overlook the fact that Taylor’s circumstances are clearly making her feel horribly upset. Is she upset by meeting a new person? That doesn’t make a lot of sense -- it’s much more likely she’s upset that she can’t be with that person in public.

“Getaway Car” -- I like reading this song as an accurate retelling of her switching beards from CH to TH. “A circus ain’t a love story” is a great way to think about the media circus surrounding all of Taylor’s het relationships, and the narrative of she and TH being criminals fits with them perpetrating duplicity and lies. (More secrets!) Once we get to the outro, though, we see the true emotions behind this lighthearted heist: She was crying and dying in that car. If she didn’t have feelings for TH, as this song would suggest, and if she was ready as hell to leave her ex, why was she so upset -- if not for the deeper secret she was keeping?

“King Of My Heart” -- “Your love is a secret I’m hoping, dreaming, dying to keep. Change my priorities, the taste of your lips is my idea of luxury.” Here we see the unity of Taylor’s inner hopes (her dreams) with her outer identity: She has found the solution to her secrecy problem -- glass closeting. She changes her “priorities” to her “friendships,” and is then able to bring the person who rules the kingdom inside her room out into public. 

“Dancing With Our Hands Tied” -- This is where we get into the dark side of glass closeting, namely kissgate. This song is all about secrecy: “I loved you in secret,” “picture of your face in an invisible locket,” “I’d kiss you as the lights went out.” All those golden secrets Taylor and her partner keep tarnish and revert to poison when brought to the light of day. The “sacred oasis” of Taylor’s relationship is subjected to biblical plagues -- fire, avalanche, flood -- when they dance in public. Their only option is to go back into hiding.

“Dress” -- And, as it turns out, keeping secrets can be hella sexy! This feels like a yin/yang pair to DWOHT, the ecstasy of getting away from public toxicity and back to a golden secret paradise. But though their kingdom is small and secret, Taylor takes care to note its permanence with lyrics like “a golden tattoo,” “carve your name into my bedpost,” and “inescapable.” If a “beard” is the woman a man wears to seem straight, then it only makes sense that a queer woman would wear a “dress.” In that reading, J*e is actually Taylor’s “dress” -- the costume Taylor bought to show a good public face, while in private she removes her armor and becomes her true, permanent self with the person she loves.

“This Is Why We Can’t Have Nice Things” -- Here again, I’ve got a suspicion that Taylor is writing about more than her public feuds. “I’m shaking my head and locking the gates” feels like the same retreat into private described in DWOHT and Dress. What if -- in addition to the obvious narrative -- this song is also discussing why Taylor can’t have the life she wants in public, and we (her fans, the media, etc.) can’t have the true details about her life that we crave?

“Call It What You Want” -- Taylor taketh away but then, oh then, Taylor giveth. Because this is the moment where she lifts the curtain and lets us spend time with her in her golden oasis, behind her crumbled castle walls, her guard evaporated. She’s got her code here (het pronouns), but otherwise her secrets are all gone. I’ve written before about the language she uses in the chorus to reinforce the idea that her relationship is a secret escape, but the beauty of this song is that she invites us to run away with her -- if we’re willing to see the truth. Karlie what you want to; her name is whatever we decide.

“New Year’s Day” -- A circus ain’t a love story, but this song is -- literally! “Don’t read the last page” means that Taylor already knows the ending: she’s going to stay with her partner for the whole long road. In private moments cleaning up the apartment after a party, squeezing hands in the back of a taxi, recognizing each other’s laughs, they have found comfort, longevity, and lasting love in their secret world. They will hold on to each other, and despite the deep fears that the world would divide them, their joy and their memories see them through. 

This album is one long rumination on secrecy and how it affects us -- the secrets we keep from ourselves, from our lovers, and from the strangers who think they know who we truly are. In the introduction to Reputation, Taylor writes very explicitly about this idea -- but in her lyrics, she gives us an intimate view into her own emotional process in grappling with the secrets that have dominated her life. The album charts a beautiful progression from Taylor coming to terms with her own secrets, finding someone else to share those secrets with, and, finally, finding a comfortable and happy way to live with those secrets despite the public and the media bearing down on her from every angle. In refusing to give interviews during this era, she is living the solution she has shown us on this album. 

To state the obvious, Taylor’s het relationships are public by definition, charted in press releases and pap walks. It just doesn’t make sense to me that she would write an entire album about the idea of secrecy unless her life were riddled with secrets. Taken with the specific ways Taylor uses gendered language on this album, it seems abundantly clear to me exactly what secrets she’s keeping.

#kaylor #gaylor swift #reputation #I loved you in secret

[notthatiwilleverwriteit]

I always enjoyed seeing the contrast between tianshan and zhanyi. for example the christmas special and the spa, the couples are so different In their dynamic yet they are so lovable, what do you hope to see happening in the future for the boys?

Good evening, dear anon-san!

Future-related questions have probably been the most asked ones, so I’ve already talked about my visions and headcanons for both Tianshan and Zhanyi a few times. You might want to check out the following asks:

Tianshan being physical in the future

What if HT disappeared?

Could HT fall in love with someone else in the future?

Future Tianshan from MGS’s perspective

Will there ever be a Tianshan confession?

Will Tianshan be long-distance?

My take on future Zhanyi

Will HT be able to keep MGS safe in the future?

My Tianshan “timeline”

But I feel like your question was still slightly different from the ones I’ve already answered, so I browsed through the comic again. I picked character and relationship traits that I wish will keep developing or stay the same in the future. But for more comprehensive takes, I recommend checking out the asks listed above. 

Let’s begin!

In the future of Tianshan, I wish...

...MSG will tell his mother about his relationship with HT (ch. 177):

I feel like Mrs. Mo would be shocked at first, perhaps even conflicted but ultimately she would come to be happy for her son. She knows it’s not easy to get close to him, so if someone has slipped under the rope, they’re probably someone she could approve of and trust her child to. If her son has let someone get close enough to develop feelings for them, the gender is irrelevant. Also, their relationship strikes me as the kind that MGS would be able to tell her if such time ever comes.

...MGS’s quiet “idiot” will keep occurring (ch. 185, 243):

MGS is the kind of a tsundere that will patch you up or keep you from killing yourself while scolding you softly. In his mind, HT can’t be all right in the head if he’s so eager to fight and get hurt for MGS. It’s not something MGS is used to. A part of MGS is scared of such devotion and, even more worryingly, scared for HT but it also feels kind of nice and safe. It makes him feel complicated feelings, and all the conflict and concern comes out in a softly uttered “idiot” as he watches HT standing up for someone like him.

Also, if HT thinks MGS will just listen to him and run like a coward from his own damn fight, he’s sorely mistaken. Fuck that damsel in distress crap, they’re going to run together.

..MGS will come to trust that he’s not fending for himself (ch. 188):

It’s good that he wants to be independent, but there are pretty impressive people around him if he ever needs someone to rely on. Despite how little MGS thinks of himself, they’re ready to raise hell for him.

...when HT looks at MGS like that and says that, it will one day send good kind of shivers down MGS’s back (ch. 200):

Not that MGS will comply, of course. He won’t just bend over when HT snaps his fingers. But that look in HT’s eyes will give MGS something to look forward to.

...HT will keep looking at MGS with admiration and pride (ch. 210, 263, 305):

I doubt not many people have ever looked at MGS like that. When others see a good-for-nothing delinquent, HT sees someone who will never give in or back down. He won’t sneak behind your back. He’s strong. There is so much good in the angry red ball of fluff, but people mistakenly judge him solely based on his looks and reputation. HT and others could stand to become more like MGS.

...MGS will get more compliments (ch. 210, 290):

...HT will always come back (ch. 224, 254):

I believe Tianshan will be a long-distance whatever-you-wanna-call-it in the future. They will be separated most of the time, but their connection is stronger than ever before. HT will always come back, and MGS will always wear the black studs.

I recently read a beautifully written KiriBaku fic (X) that had an interesting paragraph:

The line. They serenaded it like fools with nothing to lose. As Kirishima puts it, the whole world and you. The whole world and Bakugou. Every damn thing that could matter to Kirishima on one side, and Bakugou on the other. 

I was kind of taken aback by the idea of putting a line between the world and this one person. “The whole world and you”. In the fic, the meaning was a bit different, but I feel like that would also apply to future Tianshan.

HT is the line, the barrier, between everyone and everything else and MGS. It’s his way of protecting and keeping MGS safe. But it also marks the duality of HT’s life, especially if he ends up working with his family in the future. MGS has to be kept separate from everything else, and HT is a different person when he’s in MGS’s side of the line. 

“The whole world and you” is both beautiful and sad.

...MGS will always be there (ch. 228)

I don’t know what would happen if HT ever lost MGS for good. 

...HT will always have a “safe place” with MGS (ch. 255, 291, 313):

Tired and weary. Starving for contact and closeness. Recharging after being away. It doesn’t matter what HT is needing, he will feel secure and safe enough with MGS to ask for them. He won’t necessarily get what he’s asking for but at least he can show those sides and needs.

...MGS will keep earning HT’s trust (ch.259):

Not that it would be in MGS’s nature to turn his back on others when they’re in need of serious help. But I want him to keep being his caring self especially for HT. I want MGS to awkwardly and a bit clumsily hold HT’s balled fists and grumpily say he better not die on him because that would result in a shitton of unnecessary paperwork.

...MGS will keep showing his confused face (ch. 273, 307, 313):

When he doesn’t quite know what to say or how to act. When he’s debating admitting something to HT or to himself. I want him to keep having conflicted feelings because it means the way he’s seeing his relationship with HT is developing. When MGS doesn’t have a curse launched on the tip of his tongue or it suddenly gets stuck somewhere, it’s a good sign. He’s at a crossroads.

...MGS will keep surprising HT (ch. 273, 284, 309):

...MGS will show confidence again (ch. 283):

I will never get tired of MGS’s calm and confident expression. He had thought something over and made his decision. And those decisions carry infinitely more weight than his grumblings and curses. I really hope we’ll get to see such resolve in the future, too.

...HT will keep getting better at communicating (ch. 295, 297):

I firmly believe that communication will be one of the biggest problems in their relationship in the future. It’s difficult for both of them but in HT’s case, its downside is often physical roughness or going overboard otherwise.

Don’t get me wrong, though. I still want those kinds of troubles to always be a part of their relationship because it makes them more complex and realistic. I don’t want them to be a perfect couple but actually prefer a twirl of darkness to always be there. But that doesn’t mean they can’t get better at it.

...HT will learn to say “I’m sorry” (ch. 303):

Again, I don’t wish HT to lose his edge. I want him to remain dark, pushy and mischevious but also be able to recognize when he’s overstepped. It doesn’t have to be “I’m sorry” necessary but some kind of sign he’s feeling bad. I think HT apologizing with some affection is also a way for him to show MGS his softer side.

...they will have these kinds of conversations (ch. 305):

No screaming, no cursing. Just them in a dim room and talking, getting to know each other. No emotional heart-to-hearts but rather HT showing genuine interest and MGS feeling like someone is taking his words seriously. I want MGS to say something and HT to be taken aback by what an amazing, outstanding person MGS truly is. 

...HT will keep looking at MGS’s ass like that (ch. 206)

Not that I think he wouldn’t keep appreciating MGS’s fine behind but I want to see him appreciating it. I want to see MGS’s butt make HT grin.

...MGS will keep believing in himself (ch. 313):

I’ve talked about that panel before. MGS had been looked down not only by other students but the teachers as well. And that’s pretty damn heartbreaking. It doesn’t have to be school and studying, but I want MGS to do something that shows all the teachers were wrong about him.

In the future of Zhanyi, I wish... 

...JY will never stop standing up for his friends (ch. 179, 185):

JY has the kind of explosive, oblivious courage that I can’t help but admire. Physically he’s the weakest of the four but not any less fierce. He’s the kind of friend who forgets to think things through when he’s stepping in. A brave idiot all of us should have on our side.

...JY and ZZX will always be together (ch. 198, 258, 297, 313):

We already JY will be gone when he’s kidnapped, and I already dread how badly they will handle the separation despite knowing they will be reunited. Compared to Tianshan, Zhanyi isn’t a long-distance relationship because these two need to have each other close. Being apart just isn’t an option because it will feel like a part of your very soul is missing.

...this will happen (ch. 207):

One day they’re laying in bed and ZZX looks at JY. He’s in the middle of babbling about something that happened that day. A bit confused by the intense stare, JY quiets down and smiles.

“What?” he says, and ZZX can hear the familiar sunshine in his voice.

JY’s fair skin looks soft to touch, and his eyes are so in love with ZZX it’s overwhelming. Without even realizing he’s moving, ZZX reaches to brush the unruly wisps of hair and tuck them behind JY’s ear. JY’s almost non-existent eyebrows shot up, and he freezes under the touch. ZZX thinks he even stops breathing for a while.

“Nothing.”

That. I want that to happen one day.

...ZZX will get more jealous (ch. 224):

JY gets even more touchy-feely than usual when he’s drunk. And it’s annoying to the max when JY drunkenly clings to ZZX but for some reason, it’s even more annoying when JY is like that with other people.

I want to see more of ZZX silently pouting in the background.

...JY will have surges of sudden happiness (ch. 224):

I don’t know how to explain that feeling exactly but I’ve always called them “surges of sudden happiness”. When you’re doing something completely ordinary but suddenly, you’re interrupted by this feeling of...”damn, I’m really happy right now, right in this moment”. It doesn’t last long but it doesn’t have to.

I want JY to look at ZZX and have that moment. When you’re looking at the person you’re in love with and think “damn, that person makes me so happy and I want to cherish them for the rest of my life”. He’s overcome by sappiness and affection and nothing else than showing it to ZZX matters at that moment.

As much as I love Tianshan, I need the fluffy cotton candy of Zhanyi to take my sappiness out on something.

...JY will become strong (ch. 280, 313, 314):

It’s not that I don’t want ZZX to protect him. I want JY to become strong for his own sake. He’s always felt inferior when it comes to physical strength and standing up for himself, and I want him to become better at it. I want him to start putting in the work and not feel like a weakling anymore. Even if it meant he can run away faster.

...JY will never stop being like this (ch. 259, 296):

And I always want ZZX to stand in the background, doing a facepalm and thinking “God, I love him so much”.

...JY can keep looking at ZZX like this (ch. 297):

JY is so stupidly straightforward when he’s happy, it makes my heart into soft, pink goo. He gives some of the softest, most loving and adoring looks in the comic, and I never want him to stop.

Overall, I most definitely agree that Tianshan and Zhanyi are vastly different kinds of relationships. That’s why I don’t expect them to end up the same way either. I believe they will both be happy in the way that suits their respective dynamics; Zhanyi being fluffy and gentle, Tianshan being more angsty and less conventional meaning of “happy”.

Thank you for your question, dear anon-san!

#19 days #tianshan #zhanyi #mo guan shan #He Tian #Zhan zheng xi #Jian Yi #answered ask