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the-green-little-lion · 5 years

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Mate

Kidge werewolf au

💚🌕❤

He dreamt of the forest as he had all his life. He was no longer Keith Kogane. Not a man made of flesh and blood, but a beast made of fur and moonlight. He could feel his paws dig into the soft earth with each step. The trees whizzed by as he ran and the wind caressing his fur. He knew the feeling all too well, the moon calling to him, to shed his mortal skin and run, hunt, and howl into the darkness as he was born to do.

However even as he did, there was something at the end of the maze of trees that called him. It had no voice or sound, but the pull remained and all Keith knew was that he needed to find the source. As he ran, a familiar scent filled his nose. Pine, nuts, and flowers led him until he found a clearing, with a lone figure standing there.

The petite female turned to him, eyes gold and warm like a candles flame. She smiled and opened her arms and Keith went to her gladly. Her fingers ran themselves through the thick black fur, and Keith had never felt more at home.

He woke with a start.

Damn dreams. It wasn't unusual for him to dream right before a full moon. But Pidge was the new addition in the past few weeks, and Keith wasn't sure why.

Then his father's words echoed in his head. You've found a mate, boy. She's it. He groaned, the sound more growl like than anything else, as he buried his head into the pillow.

Mate. Mate. Mate.

Keith didn't know the first thing about that. Despite all the journal's his mother had left behind for him, and his father's accounts, it was still not something he could not fully comprehend. It wasn't a matter of what he thought.The wolf side of him decided it's ideal partner, and it wanted Pidge. Not that he disliked the thought of it. But it felt odd. In the months he had known the biologist, Keith had told her his closely guarded secret, allowed her to study him, let her move into his home. It was all too much too fast. Keith had been too accustomed to being alone, and he wasn't sure how to handle any of these developments.

Reaching for his phone, Keith checked the time. A couple hours till sunset and the moon. He had to wake up and prepare.

Walking out the dark bedroom, his eyes adjusted to the lights in the living room and kitchen where Pidge was now.

She was putting food into the dogs bowls when she heard him stumble in. “Evening sleeping beauty.”

“Hey,” he greeted as he opened the microwave for the food he had left there. “How long have I been out?”

“Couple hours.” Pidge looked at the stove top clock then out the window. “Getting ready?”

He only nodded as he tore into the meat.

Pidge put away the dog food and flipped open the binder she seemed to always keep around. Keith knew it held her notes on him, she always consulted it in case she was learning something new or to see if it was all old news.

“Do you usually sleep like a log before a full moon?”

He nodded, wiping his mouth with a napkin. “Yep. Transforming takes a lot of energy. I need to rest and eat as much as possible. Or else I'll feel like dead weight.”

Pidge nodded, looking him up and down. He hadn't bothered to put a shirt on and she was probably looking at all the scars big and small that littered his torso. The product of years of hunting and prowling.

“Do you always feel tired, even if you do all the preparation?”

Keith nodded, crossing his arms in thought. “Yep. It hurts like hell. And you're just left laying on the forest floor, legs like stones, having to keep your eyes open. It's not a fun time.” He pointed to the scar that ran down his left side. “I got this for being dumb and not prepping.”

Pidge strode over and eyed the scar that stood out against his pale skin. Looking at him as if for permission, Keith nodded before she ran a finger along the length. He took a sharp intake of breath. Bad idea. “You must have been really dumb then.”

He nodded. “Yep. I was young and wasn't paying attention to the moon cycles. I ran out the school fair and into the woods. I was stumbling around and passed out. Rolled down a particularly rocky hill. Pops found me all scratched up.”

Pidge looked saddened at the thought of him banged up on the forest floor. “It really was just you two, huh?”

Keith nodded, trying to not think of the soft hands that lingered on his scarred skin. “You get used to it.”

“Wolves thrive in packs.”

“I had my dad, and Kosmo. We were a pack of three.” there a pause before adding, “Well make it four now.”

Pidge tilted her head in confusion.

“You're part of the pack now.” He grinned. That part of him that called out to her growled in approval. Mate or not, Pidge was part of the pack now.

Her face flushed red, and Keith could hear the frantic beat of her heart. Before he knew what he was doing, Keith leaned in closer to Pidge. Eyes closing as he felt her breath…

He pulled back quickly. This wasn't how he wanted it to happen. Although Pidge looked shocked, her arms empty, the sight made his chest ache.

“What's wrong?” She asked. “Are you changing?”

Keith shook his head. Although he was beginning to breathe heavily, the first signs of change. “No, no. It's just…” he had to get himself sorted. Pidge didn't know about the mate thing. He had to warn her, though he wasn't sure on how without scaring her.

Pidge did not understand why he was acting so strangely. Especially since it appearing they were about to go somewhere before he pulled back. Reaching out, Keith pulled away. His dark eyes slowly turning yellow as he looked at her hungrily.

“Keith, tell me what is wrong.”

“It's nothing, don't worry about it.” He turned away, hands holding onto the counter edge.

“You aren't acting like it's nothing.” she stepped in front of him so he would look at her. “You've been acting weird. Why?”

Keith shook his head. “I don't want to scare you.”

Pidge could not help but roll her eyes. “There's very little at this point that will surprise me. Besides,” she added more gently. “I'm not afraid of you, Keith. Now just tell me what's wrong.”

A silence enveloped the kitchen. Keith looked away from her as if he were contemplating something. Then he let out a deep sigh. “Mate.”

“Mate?”

“You're my mate.” his face went red and he looked everywhere but at her.

Pidge was unsure of how to process that. Of course, she knew nothing of how it worked. But she would be lying if she said she did not find Keith attractive, or that she did not care for him. Looking up at him, Pidge had never seen Keith look so… ashamed.

“Its ok Keith.” she reached out to touch his arm, to offer some sort of comfort, but he pulled away once more.

“Look Pidge, I can't control…” he groaned. “I just want you to know not to worry. I'm not going to do anything weird. I only thought you should be warned.”

Crossing her arms, Pidge leaned against the countertop next to him. “Why me?”

Keith sighed and looked at the white tiled floor before shrugging. “To be honest, I don't know a damn thing on how it works. No one ever taught me. But…” he trailed off in thought. “what my mom's journals say, is that the wolf decides. That part of me knows what it needs, and when you find that person, than that is your mate. The one who has what you lack but equal in every way.” His face remained when he added, “The wolf, I, need you, Pidge.”

There was a pause. Her heart raced a mile a minute. She had hoped for months that Keith had harbored something for her as well. Before she could dwell on it, Pidge said. “Ok.”

“ok?” Keith raised a brow at her. “I tell you you're my mate and all you got is ‘ok?”

Pidge rolled her eyes. “what if I said I'm ok with that?”

“define what you mean.” He was finally looking at her again. “Ok can mean a lot of different things.”

“I mean…” dear god, she could not believe the words coming out of her mouth. “I've liked you for a while now. So if you are willing to try, then I am too.”

Now Pidge was the one to look away in embarrassment.

There was a low growl that Keith was making. The sound of it sent shivers down her spine. “You need to tell me no, Pidge.”

She looked up at him, his eyes were now full yellow, he looked hungrier than ever. “Why?”

“Because I doubt there's any going back after you say yes.”

Pidge couldn't help but grin and step a bit closer to him. “Yes.”

That was all Keith needed to hear. He cradled her face in his hands and kissed her, a pleased growl resonating from the back of his throat.

Pidge wrapped her arms around his neck. It was only a moment before the world was scooped up from under her feet and Keith had planted her onto the countertop so he wouldn't have to lean down to kiss her. Wrapping her legs around his waist, Pidge did her damndest to bring him closer to her.

Keith was a damn furnace, and everywhere she touched burned. Her fingers knotted themselves into his thick black hair as he kissed her neck. She could feel the scrape of fangs not quite out yet gently graze her skin. They pricked her flesh and pulled his hair in surprise, which earned her a pleased growl.

Something caught on into her sweater, and looking down, Pidge saw the claws that began to sprout.

“Keith…” she said warily as he continued trying to kiss every inch of her throat.

“Hhhm?”

“Claws. I think you're changing.”

That was enough to get him out of the mood. He pulled away, and Pidge could see his yellow eyes, the sprouting fangs, and already sprouting a heavy amount of stubble.

Looking out the kitchen window, his eyes widened in panic. Keith swore, voice significantly lower now. “I gotta go!”

“Wait for me!” Pidge called out as she slid off the countertop and made a mad grab for her field journal and a pen. “You promised I could watch this time!”

He was already running out the door. “Keep up then!”

Shoving her feet into a pair of boots, Pidge ran after him into the woods.

Keith was only partially aware of Pidge behind him as he ran into the woods. Twigs and autumn leaves crunched beneath his bare feet as he ran. He had to make away from the house and road, or else risk being spotted. Despite the fact that people hardly ever drove by, it was better to be too cautious than not at all.

Bursting through the trees, Keith came into the clearing he usually changed in. His breathing was labored now, the chilly night air pricked his bare skin as he stared up at the sky. The newly risen moon looming over him.

Keith doubled over in pain, landing on his knees, hands in the dirt. He watched as his arms sprouted pitch black fur and his nails steadily grew into claws. He could feel the curve of his bones change and expand and flesh replaced with fur. Each major change more tiring than the last until it finally ended, and Keith let out a painful howl.

Tired, he was so tired. His stomach growled but he couldn't get up to hunt.

That's when he heard it. The shallow breaths. The heart racing like a frightened rabbits.

“Keith…?”

Keith managed to turn and saw Pidge at the edge of the clearing. She never looked so small, so frail, so appetizing…

The wolf moved on its it's own as it crawled its way towards her. The woman stood her ground and did not flinch as he made his way towards her. The closer he got, the more her scent filled his nostrils. She smelled like peanut butter and fresh pine. But all of it was buried under a smokiness that he recognized as his own.

The wolf towered over her as he eyed her curiously and sniffed. Seeing all the red Mark's that littered the pale flesh of her neck. This woman reeked of him.

Mate,mate,mate…

the word echoed in his head and Keith recalled where and who he was once more. Pidge stared up at him with wide golden eyes, the only thing in the clearing that rivaled to moon above. He whined for her touch, and Pidge reached out for him. Hands tangled themselves into pitch black fur, and Keith never felt more at ease.

#kidge #werewolf au #werewolf #i was gonna post around Halloween #but then didnt #but screw it #better late than never #Pidge #keith #adult!pidge #adult!Keith #keith kogane #katie holt #vld #voltorn

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sleepymarmot · 6 years

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Twilight Mirage liveblog 5/5 (finale & post-mortem)

64-67

Found a new shortcut to my heart: announcing your finale is going to be a mashup of The Quiet Year and Firebrands

Why is it surpising that the Qui Err Coalition allies with the Waking Cadent? That was my first thought when Iota was making her speech! The Qui Err thinks the humans should leave, the Cadent thinks the humans should leave, sounds pretty compatible to me.

What's the logic of “When Crystal Palace arrives, we will blow up this system”? It's not a bomb! But it will be in danger if a bomb goes off right next to it!

Oh no, Ali is doing the classic “shoot yourself in the foot on purpose” move

I don't get how Grand Magnificent got promoted from “got paid once to retire” to “is trusted to do actual missions for Advent”

Why the hell does Gig want to kill Ballad

The players keep underestimating how “horny” the scenes in Firebrands are and Austin is increasingly exasperated

I would like to thank Jack from the bottom of my heart for choosing dance as a framing for making contact with Grand. Also I completely lost it at “there are talons on my shoulder”

I must have missed something, what's so bad about the Splice and Our Profit that everyone's so excited to fuck them over? The Mirage is made a renewable resource, right, so the Splice isn't a drain on anything?

The Echo-Ballad scene is so frustrating that I can't even feel appropriately bad about it! Come on Echo, just help Grand go back to Advent as an undercover spy, it doesn't have to be a competition this time!

I still don't understand Independence II… How do you send your new very conspicous and recognizable design to friends in rival factions without blowing your cover

The timeline here is really weird… Echo rescues Grand and brings Ballad with them, Ballad calls off his people, Grand sends out his new mech design… And a week later, Grand's still on Qui Err territory having a friendly lunch with its leader? If going back is still an option, how is that going to look without making Advent seem like total idiots? Ah, it's only a day after? Okay…

I'm very glad the Volition problem was solved so peacefully!

5 minutes later: “Quire could die!” How about no??! I was so busy preparing to mourn Volition. I am completely unprepared to lose Quire just like that.

Memorious was alive and also an axiom worm this whole time? Wut

Fuck, do we need another opportunity to kill off Ballad?! This list of NPCs is making me very nervous, I don't want any of them to die… As soon as they said “tactical skirmish” I started screaming internally and likely won't stop until it is over… Wow, Ali, that was cold Oh no, Keith is really on a mission to murder Ballad

Grand how could you bring a bomb to Christmas dinner what the hell RIP bird leader / avian boss, he had an amazing unique voice and, in my head, a really cool cartoony design

Thanks for 9.5 hours of fun. Now I guess it's time for the 4 hour long brutal and heartbreaking final boss encounter

Full offence Gig, but I wouldn't log off even the real internet for lawn games

Signet fucking saved everyone single-handedly, twice. Two biggest threats. Incredible. What is the rest of the game even about

Seriously, do the players know something about Advent that I don't?! Otherwise please stop calling your cheesy space mafia “nazis”

I've been waiting for Even and Cascabel stealing time together since the beginning of the finale! For 11 hours! Finally! This finale is in dire need of more romance content I like that everyone immediately starting dragging all Bioware games at once

I don't see how a secular virtual reality is more of a “weird cult” than an augmented reality in which people maintain an actual religion worshipping the union of human and synthetic life for 30k years. Can we not do the hypocrisy again please. Why is it okay for the Divine Fleet to build their own take on utopia but when the NEH does it's portrayed as a threat and all characters treat it with suspicion and contempt

OK all these ideological debates are fine and dandy but people really should ask more practical questions like “you don't have to rush, why don't you just go back to the previous eco-friendly methods we have previously agreed upon” Glad Fourteen won, but ideologically, as you can guess from this entire liveblog, I'm with Our Profit

I don't like how Tender started with the intention of attacking Our Profit / the Splice but very much like how it somehow turned into her offering to help them and solve everyone's problems in one move

Grand Magnificent building a pseudo-Divine to blind the Crystal Palace with the power of bullshit is the ideal happy ending for him

Good on everyone for doing the best possible things with the Divines, except for the DFS for managing to do every possible bad thing simultaneously!!! My dislike of that faction is vindicated but at what cost Oh god it's even worse

“Echo Reverie, who knew well both the value and the cost of violence, and who dreamt powerfully of peace” is such a beautiful and concise summary of their character arc God I just love how organically Echo and Gig's arcs led them to help a decolonized society lead independent, peaceful and joyful lives

A new Fleet with a healthier relationship between the Divines and everyone else is nice, thank you Signet

Oh my god, the ending titles are Gig interviewing everyone, that's so sweet!!! Really the perfect sentence to end this campaign with.

(I feel like a jerk mentioning it but… Whenever there's music overlayed with the voice track, it's almost always too loud and I have to strain my ears to hear the words… It's been like that since season one. Am I really the only one with this problem?!)

Whew! Hard to believe this long, long listening experience is over. I have mixed feelings: sometimes it was exciting or inspiring, sometimes it was fun but I felt I could as well be doing something else, sometimes I listened to the outro and thought “this music and the montage for it in my head right now make me feel so much more than the episode I just heard”, and sometimes the ideology of the narrative or characters'/players' opinions and actions clashed enough with my worldview enough to poison the entire experience. What's new is that, unlike the previous arcs, I didn't have an urge to shake my friends and yell at them “you absolutely must listen to this!” and that made me sad. But that might be just me getting used to this show and taking its good features for granted.

Post-mortem

Oh god, the production of the final sequence sounds like absolute nightmare

Thanks for validating me with the speech about the Fleet's lack of engagement with its “original sin”, Austin

Thanks, Janine, I hate it! This religion didn't need to get any creepier!

Yes tell us how many ears Tender has! I need to know!! Tender's fursona is the Russian food cat?! Amazing The livestream practically starts with googling animal pictures. Classic

Honestly Echo's disability was barely noticeable to me as a listener… There wasn't a lot of visible difference between the way they accessed the mesh and other PCs did, and after the nanites did activate, I don't think it was ever brought up again…

Yeah I'm genuinely upset that Tender and Fourteen didn't get together, by the way! Or at least have an overt romantic storyline! Give me that sweet sweet PC/PC romance my soul is starving Like I get what Jack is saying about the value of depicting friendship and normally I'd be on his side but 😭 😭 😭 On the other hand I didn't know Echo/Grand was a thing (And now feel kind of bitter it got more official endorsement than my ship that has more canonical foundation) This universe is actually about Austin inventing NPCs who have crushes on Keith's characters and then Keith pointedly avoiding the subject How could anyone forget about Tender's wild fangirling over Waltz lmfao

Austin calmly talking of all these things I screamed about above like “yeah that's what I intended”. Like on the one hand I'm glad, but on the other why couldn't you make it less frustrating to listen to

The rehabilitation theme is another thing that is present thematically but was not discussed on screen enough imo. One thing my mind kept returning to re: Contrition's Figure was the question of forgiveness for serious crime, personal boundaries and principles, and the policy of not disclosing the inmates' crimes. I imagine a survivor of rape or abuse wouldn't want to share space with someone who did the same kind of crime that hurt them. Even if they wouldn't be made to interact, of course, but what if that person believes those kind of people don't deserve rehabilitation at all? What if they reject that system on principle? You often encounter seemingly serious statements like “abusers/rapists/nazis should die”, especially lately. I've heard that about “fascists” (which is a separate issue) in this very campaign. Where do people with these opinions go in a utopia? Do they not exist? Do people who commit horrific crimes not exist either? Because I was listening to that arc and thinking “What if one of those undisclosed crimes was csa or serial murder or something like that? Would I be expected to shake hands and play chess with that criminal? How could I rehabilitate, heal, re-socialize, learn to trust in a space where anyone I meet could be Shrodinger's rapist?” And that leads to the bigger question of what a utopia is. Is it a better society – or better human nature? If latter (and Austin said so) – then to what extent? Because the theoretical people who are so much more advanced than us that they are, en masse, incapable of extreme cruelty, must also differ from our generation with their entire psychology. And a psychology so different would be unimaginable, unplayable, and would not provide necessary dramatic conflict or antagonistic characters. Which is why most alien characters in most stories, including this one, are just humans in silly costumes or prosthetics.

Oh dear god, that must be the heaviest personal story yet… But I understand better what Declan's Corrective was about.

Oh I've been definitely thinking about static utopias vs utopias of process while listening! When I wrote at some point that they made me stop and consider what a utopia is, it was one of the things I meant.

Yeah, sure, in our world the Splice would be terrible because of the existing power dynamics. But that's a Counter/weight story! Twilight Mirage and the Divine Fleet have been about the technologies and ideas that could have been, or were, used to terrible ends, but miraculously, we got to see them used in good faith with genuinely good intentions and good results. Divines have been all kinds of threats over the ages, and yet the Fleet managed to build a community around them that was a small paradise for 30,000 years. So why do the NEH and the Splice not get the same benefit of the doubt? Why is narrative not treating them with the same respect? Why are they always a threat? Why isn't there a major, likeable NPC whose life was enriched by the Splice to the extent that it is central to their identity, who could be our advocate for that point of view? Why are some powerful and potentially infinitely dangerous things, like Divines or religion itself, shown as more valid than others? And don't tell me that our player characters are from the Fleet – none of them are Qui Err either, and yet by the end it is a respected, lovingly portrayed player faction.

Oh, and also, speaking of the Splice's dangers, and what would have made it dangerous in the real world – one of the things that bothered me about it was that these dangers weren't actually described and addressed in the show properly! Probably at least in part because this techology is so magical it's hard to codify how it works. If it gives an indefinite amount of time, how do you sync up all these infinite amounts of timelines? Whenever anyone logs in to visit Tender, how do they know if it's been a day for her, like in the real world, or a hundred years? (Oh and by the way, I waited in vain for the explanation for these strange duplicities and possible time anomalies; what was going on with Ache and Acre?) If opposing the Splice and the NEH were about solving specific problems with the Splice, I would be all for that!

But yeah, I really do appreciate “processes that self-regulate and address their own issues”, how the story and specifically the finale were about the work of building a better world. I like the finale especially because it shows the social processes more clearly; TM's lack of a faction game and its focus on “bigger picture” was palpable, so I was happy to see again that aspect of the show I think is really good and unique. At first I thought it was anticlimactic that the main threats of the finale were solved so easily, early, and pretty much single-handedly. And, indeed, in a tv show that would have looked pretty strange (and require some rewriting, because with how it went down, Signet should have been the sole protagonist from the start lol). But on the other hand, it gave a lot of space and focus to what the whole story has been about: building a better society and future. Not just saving it from an external threat and drawing the curtain on that – but making sure the world we won is the one we want to live in. Preserve the environment! Decolonize the land! Shut off the tyrannical prophecy machine! And that's a good thing, and from my perspective very characteristic of this show. Before it, I didn't even know there were games about building and preserving communities and addressing civil issues! For years I thought “Well, stories of adventure are fun, but they don't address the real issues”, but turns out, there are people and systems that at least try to combine both. And that's a thought I can find comfort in, even if the specific choices of this campaign make me frustrated sometimes.

“I also tried to move away from violence this season and ended up making an arms manufacturer”

Somehow the end of the post-mortem feels sadder and more final than the end of the show proper

#friends at the table #blah blah blah

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