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#literally whole stream i was trying not to unleash hell but at the end i had enough
moskaisley · 3 years
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tonight i chose violence :)
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attemptinghaikyuu · 3 years
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Atsumu’s Fangirls Falling For His Best Friend
A/n: this is inspired by a piece I saw about Oikawa’s fan girls falling for his s/o, it was by luvbub !! Their writing is awesome, so check em out~
*G/n reader
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You’ve been friends since middle school
It all started when Osamu sat next to you and started stealing bits and pieces of your food
You moved away from him and he wouldn’t stop followed you?? Sadly, the atrocity of him taking your food would never stop
It was fine most of the time, it was also helpful when you had food you didn’t like
Him taking your favorite sweet one day had you fed up and without thinking you shoved him away... except it wasn’t him
Atsumu was just going over to talk to the cute person Osamu had been grabbing food from, only to end up on his butt in front of the whole cafeteria
It was friendship from there baby✨
Nah, it was more like: petty fights, arguing, laughing at stupid stuff other people did, and eventually admitting you’re friends
Once you’re friends? You were inseparable, you even got dragged into being Inarzarki’s manager
Running around helping the team, you never got much of a chance to befriend people outside of volleyball
It was frustrating, volleyball had taken over
Spotting some girls walk in to watch your friend, you decide to try to talk to them
Maybe you could talk about something that wasn’t volleyball :D
You just wanted some friends who weren’t sweaty and completely volleyball obsessed😔✌️
Telling Tsumu and the team you’re plan you found it a bit discouraging when Atsumu said the girls wouldn’t care
“Too obsessed with his charm” he laughed
You were about to argue but noticing more girls show up, you choose to jog over to them instead of getting into an argument
The team watches as you animatedly try to talk to the group, feeling sorry for you as the girl’s faces’ morph into “excuse me? You’re NOT Atsumu Miya, why are you talking to us.” 😒
You first attempt fails
The fangirls aren’t interested in your friendship... at least not yet!
Refusing to give up this easily, you find yourself putting in the effort to talk to each of them daily
When you see any of the girls in the school halls, you wave and make sure to say hi along with there name
You take the time to ask about there hobbies and WOW you forgot how nice it was to talk about literally anything that wasn’t the sport that followed you everywhere
The girls find your stream of chatter a nice change compared to the annoyed huffs Atsumu gives them
Y’all start to get pretty close and they eventually call you their friend :,)
The team is just standing there as you enthusiastically capture the fan girls’ attention with a story about Atsumu choking on his onigiri
Atsumu steps in and denies it, claiming it was Osamu as he tries to pull you away before you can say more
However, it ends up making you laugh, and all of a sudden the girls are asking themselves when you got so cute??
And wow, you’re always super supportive of them too???
How did they not see how amazing you are sooner
It begins....
They’re going out of their way to run over and give you hugs in the halls when you greet them now (much to Atsumu’s annoyance)
And you’re getting mysterious gifts on your desk
Atsumu’s upset at the lack of hanging out he gets with you
And when he sees Hana, the old Vice President of his fan club, pullout a box of chocolates, giving them to you with a blushing face and flirty compliment
He finds himself feeling a sudden strong dislike for the girl
He stomps away scowling, not sure why he’s so uneasy
Osamu knows exactly what’s going on and promptly tells him to do something, before Hana or any of the other fangirls confess
“The hell ya talkin’ bout Samu?”
He smacks Atsumu on the head, points him to where a few girls are cheering you on as you do some managerial tasks, and waits for him to realize
Takes a solid minute before the way he’s been feeling, the way he’s always felt, clicks
He’s so surprised pleaseajdhjbxdt
Before it’s all processed, he’s walking over and telling you he has something to say
This panicked you
“ListEN IT WAS AN ACCIDENT I SWEAR I DIDN’T MEAN TO-
“What?? No,” he shakes his head, taking a breath. “I wanted to tell you I liked ya and ask if you might wanna date me.”
He’s unleashed chaos
All the girls are freaking out and exclaiming there own feelings
Hana, (who was probably the closest to you out of all the girls) jumps in front of a disgruntled Atsumu, and grabbing your hands makes a whole speech about how you showed her how important it was to be in a relationship that was equal
She finished it with exclaiming how much she valued you and what you had taught her, and if you felt the same... she would look forward to more happy memories together as your girlfriend
Dammit, now Atsumu’s wishing he could redo his casual confession
Turning to wait for your answer anxiously, they all plan on staying friends with you no matter your answer
The only question now.. is who are you gonna choose? 😳
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popculturebuffet · 3 years
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Legend of the Three Cablleros: Nazca Racing and Mexico A-Go-Go
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Saludos Amgios and welcome back to The Ride of the Three Caballeros! And we’re almost at the finish line! After this reviews only 4 episodes, 2 reviews and a top 12 list/celebration of this long and fun as hell journey, this one for free to thank kev for paying for all these reviews and because without him this probably woudlnt’ of happened for some time and I thank him for that. Point is we’re so close I can taste it to being finished here so with nothing else to cover, after the cut we’re diving right into adventure.. literally. 
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Nazca Racing: 
So we open at the outside of Sheldgoose Manor as while we’re not at the scene of the action YET, the show has kept it’s tendency to have intresting intros as it goes on. Point is Xandra is incredulous about the guys claims of a magic barrier.. for some reason. Seriously Sheldrake is a powerful sorecerer, has a lair, even if they don’t know about that part, why WOULDN’T his place be shielded from you guys? Still she has to test it punchiing it , arrowing it and throwing a rock at it.. and the rock does take out a window prove it even if i’ts vandalism but that wasn’t a crime thousands of years ago and no one saw them so we good. 
Our heroes brainstorm back at the Cabana what to do, ignoring the girls suggestion that since the cabs can’t get through the barrier they can but are ignored because ... I dunno. I seriously dont’ know, they haven’t treated the kids like this before or since. Also if you were wondering why not humphrey, spark of life. Too risky. But this discourse is interupted as there’s a signal in peru. The trap has been sprung and the girls warn it might be since they KNOW the cabs will show up where they are and have time to plan but are brushed off. We also get the start of a thread with Jose as he gives all his money to some kittens who are actually con artists. Turns out that’s WHY he’s poor: he gets money easily but donates it all to bogus charities. You know like Louie’s kids or PETA. It’s a nice character trait, showing despite being a lady’s man and having a bit of an ego.. he’s still a very good guy if very, VERY gullible. Hopefully it comes up againa s this smacks of a flaw brought up and solved in one episode, and while ti’s adressed her it really dosen’t get resolved, but with 5 episodes left after this I HIGHLY doubt it. 
So our heroes are off to the Nasca lines of having gotten there with the help of a shady pilot... instead of you know.. porting there.. but given the Nazca Lines are best seen from air according to wikipedia and best shown off that way, as well as the fact it’s revealed you can enter the realm the creatures represented in the lines inhabit via plunging into it, it does make sense. She could’ve TOLD them all this before going but this is one of her off days. The Nazca Lines are a real life set of geoglypys that look really damn cool, and show up in all sorts of works, the two off the top of my head are Mega Man Starforce 2 where their used as the basis for the villians, and Yu-Gi-Oh! 5ds, where there used for the basis for the earthbound immortals.. also villians, a series of powerful and evil gods, and naturally represented by cards, that bring people back from the dead to serve as their avatars, known as the dark signers. 
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As you can see they also look really fucking awesome. Sadly I have not had a deck with them as I haven’t really thought about it and you need a field spell to keep them alive, but still good stuff. Really need to watch that arc in full some day. 
Point is the plane starts to fall apart because the pilot swindled them, or rather Jose, and they have to jump without a parachute as there’s only one. Xandra of course leaps first forgetting her friends don’t have god strength or durability and will just go squish if her logic doesn’t pan out. Panchito naturally leaps without thinking and Jose decides why not and sky captain and the crappy plane he bought for 5 bucks decides to snatch the parachute so Donald’s forced to leap.  It does work though and we do get one of the best parts of the series thus far: our heroes are drawn in chalk which is beautiuflly animated and a really creative idea. Granted the magic chalk thing dosen’t make a LOT of sense given the lines are carved in.. but at the same time we’re talking about three talking birds and a goddess chasing after an overweight one percenter, his talking staff and said talking staff’s son/lover/donkeybatmonkeyrat. Exact accuracy to real life can be waved just a smidge. Point is they find Mono, a monkey and one of the guardians of the lines, who Feldrake apparently trapped, though Xandra is suspcious. NOW, after their already in the trap basically. 
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But yeah Mono tells them Feldrake is going after the Nazca Gyroscope, a device at the center of the earth that keeps the earth orbiting the sun. 
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Point is our heroes have to stop him though Xandra is again suspcious as Feldrake wants to conquer the world not destroy it....  forgetting the whole lava lizard scheme... just.. seriously what was his plan there. rule over a pile of ashes.. actually given Feldrake’s competence and intellegence so far. that’s probably exactly it. Why is Sheldgoose the one getting called fool a lot again?
So we get another really stellar Musical Number, draw the line as our heroes progress through the Nazca world. Also I forgot to mention but earlier, in a nice bit of setup, we set up both that jose is a talented artist, which comes in handy here, while donald struggles and doubts himself. Can.. .can relate. Say that a lot but REALLY can relate. They end this wonderful song easing on down the road while our villians watcht hem.. instead of you know going ahead up and erasing them as is their plan. 
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Meanwhile, the trips sneak into Sheldgooses mansion trying to find some sort of evil scheme or lair or some clue they can use. But instead june, looking for some secret in the money vault, instead is caught by security so a chase insues and our heroines spend the episode barely outrunning the security dogs.. who SHeldgoose apparently raised. 
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Don’t.. DON’T want to think about THAT any longer than I have to. Point is they find Feldrake’s hidden lair we saw in the second episode where Sheldgoose found the staff. Not bad stuff, just really not something I need to spend an hour recapping. 
So our heroes continue along encountering Hanzy, another guardian with giant hands who they free from a finger trap.. and her reasoning is both adorable and chucklesome, as Sheldgoose, having a piece of the chalk, drew a finger trap and never having had one in her size she just had to try it. So the party gains another member as they tread carefully past the spider, the final guardian and one who will eat them without a second thought.  With that they reach the gyroscope.. and Mono turns on the cabs revealing Sheldgoose tricked him into thinking they were the bad guys and this is naturally a trap. And that is part of the episodes problem: the tension from “well their walking straight into a trap” is kinda.. nonexistant. OUr heroes ran in blind, and even when suspicious in the liens being on their guard amounts to nothing and we know from last episode this is a trap. It’s one thing to have a plan turn out to be a trap for the heroes or for the villians, as we’ll see later this week, that’s fine.. but either the audience isn't aware or there’s general tension from our heroes not knowing. Here there’s none of that. 
So our heroes are trapped in a cage while Sheldgoose and Feldrake head up top to erase them, as if their drawings on hte line, the way they came in are erased so are they. It’s a good plan.. and the tension is dissipated again as hanzy just casually tosses the cage off, mono apologizes and our heroes use the chalk to draw themselves flying machines, with Donald only having a balloon and a basket. Comedic gold.  Despite once again any dramatic tension this episode evaporating like ..t ears in the rain? I dunno I don’t have a metaphor that works here. Despite this the race is genuinely thrilling with sheldgoose busting out a shark rocket launcher since neither Feldrake nor Xandra’s magic work in the lines. Nice touch by the way. But he runs out of chalk (”You should’ve learned how to conserve space!”) though our villians reach the exit first by unleashing the spider, who Jose tries to smooth talk into not eating them.. and Donald, like me afriad of spiders, iconically shouting “KILL IT, KILL IT WITH FIRE!”
The heels erase Hansy, which is genuinely sad. Our heroes do escape in time though before he can get them and while Feldrake makes a speech in an awesome moment, Xandra just.. ignores it and fills him full of arrows.. well the g rated equilvent about that, I don’t think any of us want to see Wayne Knight bleed buckets. I”m still not over that scene from Jurassic Park where we saw nothing but I imagined it all right.. I.. imagined it *shudders*
So i’m scared for life but our heroes are free and revive hanzy with the chalk and we get a really sweet payoff to Donald’s trouble drawing as his new finger for her is a bit crooked but she loves it. It shows even if your art isn’t as good as other people’s it’s still worth something. A nice message. Feldrake once again berates Sheldgoose who points out the cabs can escape death again and again... giving Feldrake the idea to go talk to death personally. And yeah these teases... while I get this series was made for streaming.. they keep hurting the story slightly like they did here. Though I will give them credit this one.. ends up ratcheting up the tension next time so props. 
Final thoughts on Nazca Racing:  This one was decent. The animation was gorgeous and always the jokes were top notch, and the subplot was a nice opportunity for the triplets to take the stage and have an adventure.. but the plot banks a lot on our heroes walking into a very obvious trap and that just sours things for me. Still it’s not a bad episode like “World Tree Caballeros” or “No Man is an Easter Island” for the reasons stated above. And there was no daisy for an episode so while I badly wanted to find out how she’d react to the events last episode, we also got a break from her being bitchzilla, queen of monsters for an episode.. for an episode. “Sigh”
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Mexico-A-Go-Go:
Okay back on form. Our heroes return home to find.. a conspiracy board all around the house. 
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Sadly it’s not that but it turns out the girls haven’t slept since the mansion and while Donald objects to their breaking and entering, they soon reveal what htey found: The Sheldgooses have all been linked to eveyr major disaster over the centuries... ever since Feldrake, who we see as a mortal for the first time, holding his OWN book as a counterpart to the heroes. They also uncovered a connection to Clinton coot and the sheldgooses but don’t have time to elaborate before Donald waves them off to check his messages.  Unsurprisingly it’s Daisy who says “In light of recent events” i.e. you know seeing Donald’s friend save her life, dapper abandon her and seeing donald fight an evil sorcerer and wrangle a bear, to give him one more second chance. 
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Yeah i’ve spent a good chunk of this series complaining about Daisy.. and given she appears in the final two episodes i’m probably not finished. But this is just.. wow. So now she KNOWS, if not all the details that Donald and his friends are entangled in something big and scary, that involves a lives bear and actual fucking magic, so that his ducking out on her last time was NOT him being irresponsible or going to hang with his pals or something stupid, but probably something pretty important, she’s not fully aware of everything but she’s aware ENOUGH to know Donald really is making something of himself or at least is trying and really didn’t mean to mistreat her.. and she STILL is giving him fucking ultimatums!
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I just.. i’m so done with this whole fucking subplot. All of it. Not just Daisy, Donald constnatly having a moan about loosing her and whining about going on missions to save the world instead of keeping this ungrateful, bossy, self esteem shattering, shrill, selfish, gold digging, impossibly high stand’s keeping big gulp full of bitch. 
Donald.. buddy YOU CAN DO BETTER. Xandra’s right there and even if she’s not interested there’s a WHOLE TOWN of rich, eligible ladies. Go woo one of them! it’s hard getting out there, believe me I know, it’s VERY hard and i’ll probably die alone.. but your a good man, you have good friends. Friends who’ve screwed up yes but good friends to wingman and wingwoman for you. Just... leave Daisy behind. It’s not good for your mental health to keep bending over backwards for someone who wants you to be something you’ll NEVER be. Who wants someone sophisticated and with a steady job.. and the latter part’s never going to happen now your a Caballero, and given that’s more important.. good! If she can’t see what you do or won’t take the time to fucking listen... MOVE. ON. I know moving on’s hard but you have to. For your own health. Staying stuck in place over a person just hurts you and them. 
And as for Daisy..  this is easily the worst version of the character. And I went into this FULLY KNOWING this version was bad, FULLY KNOWING she was going to be grating and some of the things she’d pull like Dapper thanks to spoilers. It’s why I held off watching this for so long.. and turns out while it was worth it, the series is quite good, my fears were JUSTIFIED and no amount of reading it could prepare me for how terribly written and horribly damaging this all is.  And I do mean damaging: Kids pick things up from media. And while I should’ve caught on sooner, can’t fully blame a cartoon, I did as a kid and teen get my idea of romance from cartoons and tv and thus got the idea that pining after someone in secret was okay and they’ll come around eventually and starring at them and what not is entirely fine and not creepy. Of course it isn’t, of coure you have to say something, and of course you have to let it go if there with someone else. I know that NOW, and there have been much better geek gets the girl plots. .but it still seriously fucked with my autistic brain’s view on friendships with women, something I still struggle with at times.  And that’s why I take this shit seriously: Because while thankfully I never bought into THAT , shit where “it’s okay if it’s a WOMAN, abusing a MAN”. Men can be abused to. It’s why we had SO SO MANY unfunny stalker characters in the 2000′s, and so many plots like this where the guy is wrong.. because h’es male and his partner being domineering and expecting him to change everything without doing anything for them or treating them as an equal.. is just not okay.  And it speaks to a bigger problem.. out of touch writers who assume because THEIR wives are only with them out of obligation that’s how ALL relatoinships work, when no it’s not get a divorced please god. The Duckverse REALLY doesn’t need this According to Jim, My Wife and Kids, George Lopez, Home Improvement, Cleveland Show, King of Queens, Dinosaurs, Rick and Morty, Glen Martin DDS, etc all bullshit. People break up and Donald deserves better. And I genuinely blame both EP Matt Daner and Tony Anselmo for this. And I have a LOT of respect for both guys, i’ve made that very clear.. but Matt as EP and thus the one in charge fo the overall storyline is clearly the one who thought of this and Tony, who helped write for Donald this series, didn’t either get Tress, whose been doing daisy for two decades and is as knolwedgle for her as he is for donald the same courtsey or chime in given he should know daisy better. Both of these men should know better. Danner wrote for Xiaolin Showdown, that had great female characters for the most part and Tony is a grown ass man whose worked with women and is married as far as I know. Figure it out.  This Daisy thing has EASILY been the worst part of this retrospective as a whole, the worst part of this series and probably the worst thing i’ve seen in a duck property.. and again I saw daisy ACTUALLY HIT DONALD. 
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And this is worse. Because instead of one moment of terrible writing and misplaced slapstick that comes off as abuse, it’s just a constnat barage of emotoinal abuse treated as if i’ts DONALD’S fault. Donald did nothing wrong to her and his only crime is obessing of this hellspawned hardian. Fuck this entire plot with a garden rake lined with acid.
Also just a quick note before we speed through Daisy’s screentime to get to the good part of the episode, there’s, at least no yet NO proper reaction to Donald’s new life and it bothers me it bothers me a lot. She learns he has this whole secret life and has no fucking questions just more of the same old bullshit. “SIGH”
So yeah this b-plot: Donald wants to stay for Daisy
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And the others drag him along though this time.. Donald comes off as the asshole because he KNOWS they need him, knows he’s useful and knows this is more important but drags his feet anyway for someone who again, has done NOTHING good for him. And even with the girls saying the’ll help and telling him to keep the mirror handy, he still keeps complaning up until the plans reveaeld. 
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The plan, which.. May I think, the orange one. I know June is purple, but while May isn’t on board for this, the plan is to have April and June do the totoem pole trench and have donald be the face. So the entire plan is basically this
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They have an actually nice date till the ruse is revealed, and while he says “I can explain” which he can.. she PUNCHES the mirrror saying explain this. 
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So our heroes need to go to Mexico, Panchito’s homeland and somehow, in a series based on and starring primarily south american characters... one of the two times we visit the region and the only time we visit one of the cabs two home countries. Now the latter part i’m fair on since they were likely saving Brazil for the season 2 that never happened and didn’t want to blow their load just yet. The other part.. not so much. I’m not saying set the entire series there, there’s a lot of world, but most of the locations aside from the world tree are pretty common for globetrotting adventure: Easter Island, Stonehenge, Mt. Rushmore, The Pyramids, the Moon, and coming up Camelot and Shangri La. These aren’t BAD settings mind and are used creatively and probably will be in the two I haven’t seen, and the setups involving king arthur and a yeti spa do sound like they wont’ dispoint, but you had a real opportunity to teach kids, and my grown man self, about South America and ya blew it. 
But we’re in Mexico where after meeting a spooky cloaked guy who says they might not leave alive
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So our heroes enter the temple and the other side and find a bunch of chickens who see Panchito, who insisted on the trip due to his luchadores code of always helping the incident, as a god and their chosen champion for the goddess of light as the preistess explains. So we get a montage of Panchito getting pampred while the other cabs get pushed around, ending at a restraunt.  Xandra is naturally suspcious as the locals are being AWFUL vauge about what’s going on here, and this is getting pretty midsomar. Donald is distracted by daisy and Jose is distracted by a beautiful senorita, leaving Xandra to TRY and get panchito to think.. before being distracted herself by a mysterious handsome latino gentleman in black. Though during the dance with thier respective partners, Xandra and Jose both remark that it’s weird.. but are distracted by the sexy long enough for it to be revealed what Panchito’s duty is: as the champion of life.. he has to fight the champion of death. No Prize for guessing who. Though unlike with “Nazca Racing” where the teaser removed all tension since we knew it was a trap, here the teaser last episode helps, as we don’t see Team Feldrake till this moment, and we know something involving death itself.. and finding out panchtio’s representing life just ratchets up tension: we know the bad guys are involved.. but we don’t know how or what they’ll do. 
And the how is simple: A one on one wrasslin match! 
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Or lucha match since we Panchito’s a luchador and we’re in mexico. He’s wearing his usual outfit while Sheldgoose is wearing standard wrestling tights.. so a superstar babyface versus a heel comentator... but actually entertaining this time. As you can tell I love wrestling. While i’m more of a casual fan, I watch OSW and some other wrestling youtubes and don’t really watch the product at the moment, I do love and respect the sport and love a good wrestling episode or series of television as a result, so this hits the spot. 
So the match goes on and Panchito has the clear lead as Sheldgoose is playing by college wrestling rules and Panchito is playing by pro wrestling rules. And while you can use standard holds well you gotta mix the two together kurt angle style. Eventually Xandra decides to confront the sexy bird and sexy boy, and finds out, in a twist I didn’t see coming they ARE the god of life and god of death, respectively. While I knew this was a fight to the death, as death explains, a symbolic battle between the two with real stakes to keep ballance, I thought these two were just illusions brought up to keep Xandra and Jose from leaving or digging deeper. Instead they were just doing it on their own and as the god of death shows, they were genuinely intrested. I mean... why not get some while preparing to have your champions do battle. God for you death god, multitasking like that. Same for you goddess of life. Get it girl, you get after it. Jose is a fine man. I’d tap that if I could. Get after it.  So Xandra warns Panchito who finds taking life against his code and Jose again shows his awesomeness by pointing out the obvious: the match is timed, so if they run out the clock it’s a draw. Might lead to something but it’s better than nothing. So Panchito TRIES this, but Sheldgoose has leopold “Throw mommy to daddy” (One of my faviorite gags of the episode), and wacks him with feldrake before the whole thing becomes a brawl. And the god of Death does not take DQ’s or outside intefernce well and instead kills them all for breaking the rules. 
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Not kidding. The main cast is DEAD minus Xandra, as Death still wanted to bone her, but she refuses. So now Xandra is left while al lher friends are dead while the god and goddess head off in his caddy to go knock over mailboxes I guess. 
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Final Thoughts on Mexico-A-Go-Go:  Outside of .. certain parties, this was a REALLY fun one, with a great wrestling theme, a great mystery and the awesomeness that was the god of death, who was smooth, cool and thoroughly interesting and I wish there was a second season and his and xandra’s dynamic was really interesting. One of the series best, helped by the fact the Daisy bit while thoroughly irritating, was religated to a pretty funny subplot, with May being understandably skeptical of the plan, it somehow working and the sheer redicuonsess. It dosen’t make daisy tolerable, but it makes the episode better. 
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happymetalgirl · 3 years
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Five* Outside albums of 2020
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I do this little list every year of my favorite albums that fall mostly “outside” the metal sphere and weren’t so metal-adjacent that I reviewed them formally during the year. The past three times I have written this little piece, I have kept it to five, but *this year, I’ve just had a hard time narrowing it down, so I figured, why do that? Well, I could go through a few dozen albums or so that I fucked with this year outside the metal sphere, but I’m compromising with the addition of a new, quick (we’ll see) honorable mention section.
So, in the interest of keeping my verbose tendencies in check, I’ll cut this introduction off and get into the honorable mentions.
Honorable Mentions:
Anna von Hausswolff - All Thoughts Fly
I did review Anna von Hausswolff’s previous record, Dead Magic, back in 2018 as part of my bunch of metal albums reviews that year, because it was kind of tangentially metallic. It wasn’t a lot at a technical level, only a few metallic elements here no there, but it had a lot of harrowing qualities that I thought metal listeners might appreciate. For the Swedish singer and pipe-organist, that album really was the closest she ever came to metal’s territory, and I don’t think any flirting with the genre was intentional on her part. Most of what she does is haunting, neoclassical, organ-based music that’s usually not as wild as what Dead Magic was, and this year’s album is a real scale back to her roots and an appreciation for the pipe organ. While I do miss her bewitching vocals on this entirely instrumental album, All Thoughts Fly stands well on its own merits as both a solid tribute to von Hausswolff’s organ playing and as a beautiful, incredibly immersive ambient album that does so much with its relatively small palette. I’ve talked a few times on here about really shitty ambient music that’s approached with a clearly lazy attitude because of its supposed background role. Rather than being made to be ignored, All Thoughts Fly pulls you in and around in a swirl of lush sounds that aren’t too common in ambient music, and with a relatively minimal approach, relying on the naturally serene tambre of the instrument to fill the space with a lightening, floating ambience and well-structured movements to do the gentle moving. It’s a beautiful example of what an ambient album can achieve if it’s actually made with a lot of love and care.
Shabaka & The Ancestors - We Are Sent Here by History
Okay, that first one went pretty long. I’ll try to keep the rest of these here relatively short. Sons of Kemet band leader, Shabaka Hutchings, takes his other group on slightly less chaotic Afro-jazz odessey that what Sons of Kemet have been delivering us. While more contained on the surface within the genre’s usual light grey areas, Shabaka & The Ancestors move with freedom and flexibility on this album in a way that highlights the natural appeals of the Afro-jazz sound pallet through constantly engaging arrangements from masters of the craft.
Lady Gaga - Chromatica
I know we’re all well aware of Lady Gaga, but the pop icon has been relatively quietly been making the best music of her career since taking the edge rather than the center of the spotlight, from 2013’s diverse Artpop to 2016’s more bare-bones Joanne. And now, after her mellower, more traditional Americana-influenced album in 2016, Gaga cranks the volume and the fun way back up. Chromatica is a blast of an album whose wide span of dance pop albums influences new and old keeps it varied and lively all the way through. This album feels very much like it’s Gaga unleashed, just doing her thing and having a good time with a bunch of dance music styles that she’s always loved, and it’s impossible not to feel that enthusiasm secondhand, and groove the hell out along with it.
Black Thought - Streams of Thought, Vol. 3: Cane & Abel
Black Thought has had nothing to prove since the relative inactivity of The Roots this past decade, but he has sure been rapping as if he does have something to prove on his solo work. The Philadelphia rapper put out a couple of EPs back in 2018 that showcased his impressive modern lyricism and flow, and the third, LP-sized installment in the series is just another offering of further proof of the man’s lyrical chops. There’s a little bit of an understated delivery in the music overall, but Black Thought really lets his words speak for themselves more than his moderate bravado. It’s not super flashy because it doesn’t need to be.
Phoebe Bridgers - Punisher
Indie folk has always loved to soak in the puddles of personal sadness, but Californian singer Phoebe Bridgers takes the style to whole new depths of personally gripping, bordering on the outright emo, and that is by all means a compliment for rather than a shot at. The album’s candid journaling of Bridgers’ personal struggles is so tangible and so genuine that it would probably rival Connor Oberst’s best work with Bright Eyes. It is just a beautiful, yet tear-inducing album.
Alright, now on to the five “main” “non-metal” albums of the “list proper”.
Hexvessel - Kindred
Hexvessel are a Finnish six-piece whose sixth album of psychedelic folk here manages to touch on the same haunting, gothic tones that groups like Opeth and Gazpacho do at their most forest-y. Indeed, Kindred is an enchanting album, with sprawling styles and a full-bodied sonic pallet to keep it interesting the whole way through. And it’s as strong in its more bombastic song like that which opens the album as it is in its more stripped back acoustic tracks like that which closes it. Songs like “Magical and Damned” straight-up evoke Mount Eerie, while songs like “Kindred Moon” hearken to The Beatles at their most minimal and folky, and there’s plenty of spooky, mystical energy to go around. Definitely one of the best finds of the year for me.
The Strokes - The New Abnormal
Coming at the end of a seven-year gap between it and their previous album, 2013’s somewhat fan-polarizing Comedown Machine (which I liked a lot), The Strokes’ aptly named return is a return to the spotlight, but hardly to normalcy or the musical roots in garage rock that so many of the band’s fans have been sweating for. Twisting the electronic alternative rock of their Angles era into some odd, but mesmerizing forms, The New Abnormal is a subtly wild ride of an album through lots of melancholic overtones and undertones whose impact is made all the more potent by the occasional teasing of sorts with the few more traditionally rockin’ moments on here. It doesn’t take long to pull back the seemingly preppy synth rock or 80’s rock curtains to find the melancholy beneath “Brooklyn Bridge to Chorus” and “Bad Decisions”, respectively. But the band aren’t even that subtle with the immediate depression of just the straight-up guitar melodies on songs like “Selfless”, “Not the Same Anymore”, and the chill-inducing soar of “Ode to the Mets”. The album’s prize piece, though, has to be the utterly gorgeous and empathetic minimalist synth song, “At the Door”, whose simple melodies and bare delivery make for one of the most gently heart-piercing songs I know and of my favorite songs of the year and probably my favorite Strokes song ever, as hard as it is to listen to. Welcome back Julien and company.
Rina Sawayama - Sawayama
Quite possibly the best outright pop album I have heard in a long while, Sawayama sounds simultaneously fresh and vintage in the landscape it was born into, making use of a lot of early 2000’s pop rock instrumentation, even some heavy metal guitars here and there, but most importantly, a real sense of passion that seems to be flat-out absent from so much of the pop that I (usually inadvertently) hear. I don’t want to overstate the prominence of the metal elements, but the album does have a bubbling, infectious energy both vocally and instrumentally from front to back that the occasional bursts of heavy guitars between Sawayama’s charismatic, dance-inducing performances do provide a good snapshot of. Furthermore, there’s a rich diversity of song types across the album that dive into the pop sphere beyond the standard trend-hopping that dominates streaming playlists and make for a dynamic and fun, rather than disjointed, pop album. And that’s all only possible with the consistently tight compositions o the album. Indeed, this is one of the best pop albums I have ever heard, certainly in recent years.
clipping. - Visions of Bodies Being Burned
clipping. are the second artist to be on here two years in a row after last year’s spectacularly spooky There Existed an Addiction to Blood, and Denzel Curry’s one-two punch of TA13OO and Zuu in 2018 and 2019 respectively. There Existed an Addiction to Blood was a thrilling and fresh take on many tropes of horrorcore with the band’s already forward-thinking and creative noise-driven instrumental production guiding harrowing stories of femme fatales and street violence in a more modern setting that often flipped the script on victims and perpetrators, as well as settings themselves. Visions of Bodies Being Burned is quite literally a continuing sequel to that explosive album, also released in time for Halloween this year; the material was recorded in the same sessions as the previous album and in the same unique vein. Consequently, there’s not really a whole lot I can say about this album in contrast with the last without getting way too in-depth and spoiling the fun. Whereas MC Daveed Diggs’ hooks were one of the biggest strong points of last year’s album, the creatively noisy production is the big star on this album. The fans seem to be leaning a bit more toward this year’s release, but I think I’m still a little partial to There Existed an Addiction to Blood. Nevertheless, Visions of Bodies Being Burned is a blood-pumping follow-up not to be missed.
Mac Miller - Circles
The posthumous release from Pennsylvanian rapper Mac Miller captures the man at his most chill and contemplative. The album is more of a minimalist ambient singer-songwriter sort of album than hip hop and its serene atmosphere becomes kind of inadvertently tragic in the posthumous context, but it serves as a beautiful swan song for the creative rapper whose struggles with addiction sadly prevented him from being able to bask in the deserved wide appreciation of his sixth album. Circles is a soulful, bittersweet cap to Mac Miller’s legacy that I think anyone will be able to feel the love and raw humanness of.
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if you dont mind me asking, why do people ship spifey and tapL? it seems cute and all, but are there some interactions or collabs ive missed because i dont know how the ship actually started ( or maybe just, why do you ship it?)
oh dear anon, you have no idea what kind of pandoras box youve just unleashed on the world. and ofc i dont mind you asking! ive wanted to talk about this for a while <3
if u wanna hear my spifL ramblings, click read more bc i dont wanna clog up everyones feeds:
1. starting off with the thing that got me interested at first: roommates. Spifey, TapL, and Skeppy were roommates for like three months in LA from I think December to February? Or January to March. It’s not a secret that a lot of people love the dynamic of roommates in ships, and it so happened that skephalo has always been super popular, leaving Spifey and TapL as the obvious roommates to ship.
2. height difference. My numbers may be wrong but apparently Spifey’s like 6′2 and TapL’s like 5′6? I’m sure those aren’t the accurate numbers, but it’s pretty clear there’s a big height difference between them and I just thought it was kinda cute!
2.5. On that note, the general size difference between them. This is most apparent when you look at their hands. I’m not gonna go out and actively look for them for this post bc that feels a lil weird to me, but Spifey’s done a handcam for a video and TapL’s shown his hands both on Twitter when he shows off his nails and on YouTube in his 100 burgers video. I wouldn’t call TapL’s hands small by any means, but I’d say it’s clear Spifey’s hands are bigger than his. And like, one of the staples of fandom is smaller person and Tall Person.
3. Then you get into the kind of content they make. Spifey’s main content is using mods and other packs to confuse the hell out of his friends. TapL’s main content is hosting different UHC scenarios. While they don’t seem similar on the surface at all, both are the kind of content creators that need to keep innovating for their stuff to land to an audience, the kind whose creativity is vital to the success of their channels. I’m aware that the creativity aspect applies to other creators as well, but this only plays a small part in why I ship it. They’re both immensely creative people who I think would benefit from hanging around each other and feeding each others’ creativity.
4. They have a lot of history, though not too much is really public since TapL doesn’t do collabs with people outside the PvP sphere very often. They both appear in Skeppy’s 2018 vidcon vlog, so they had to have known each other for at least two years. But they seem close in the video, so tack on another half a year or so and they’ve been friends for a long time.
5. And their dynamic. The ship has a softer, quieter sort of dynamic than a lot of the Big Ships. TapL and Spifey are both on the quieter side of their friend groups (though I hesitate to say they’re quiet because really, they’re not) and tend to be more quietly chaotic than they are overtly (see: all of Spifey’s videos with Zelk and Vurb in them and that one time TapL leashed a fox on the Idots SMP and called it Fundy and actually treated it well compared to how the Idots treated their pets in the game). I think that makes for a really interesting dynamic where they both know how to have fun and laugh with each other, but they also have just as many moments of quiet between them where they’re just enjoying each others’ company. It’s the sort of dynamic where they can either join the chaos others are creating (and their friend group certainly creates a whole lot of chaos) or they can sit back and watch them fight while snickering to each other. Variety of possibilities!
5.5. That being said, TapL is definitely the more loudly chaotic and confrontational of the two of them. Spifey laughs a lot while being chaotic and he doesn’t usually raise his voice unless he needs to. On the other hand, TapL COMMITS to the bit and is quicker to yell (see: that one time Zelk tried to make ZapL a thing). I just think the dynamic of one (1) man trying to rein in his stupid boyfriend’s chaos while still remaining generally supportive is a funny one to imagine.
5.75. As another note on their dynamic, TapL is one to catch onto the bit very quickly while adding his own flavor of humor to the whole situation, and Spifey’s the one to create the bit in the first place. Those sorts of personalities mesh well together. You can’t have a bit if there’s no one to escalate it, and you can’t escalate a bit if there’s no bit to escalate in the first place. (see: that one stream where Spifey started eating a banana sideways and TapL saw him so he decided to take a banana and eat it sideways. Additionally, their collab on Spifey’s channel)
6. this is really stupid but they both also have nicknames? Like, people call TapL Harv and they call Spifey Geo and i just thought that was pretty neat.
7. They’re literally so supportive of each other and it’s so clear they respect each other so much and they’re such great friends i just... ANONNNNNN IVE SPENT TWO HOURS ON THIS POST I JUST LOVE THEM SO MUCH ;-; heres some interactions to make up for my lack of words
“BRITISH PEOPLE ARE NOT REAL” “3 months in la - i was merely an illusion” “You were nothing more than a bunch of mirrors and reflections”
“hey, thanks for existing ❤️“ “anytime ❤️ i miss la”
[picture of a spider on Spifey’s face] “UK spiders be like: “Roight, wots ol this then ?”
“@spifeyy happy birthday 🎉🎉🎉“ “<3″ (i would also like to note that TapL posted the birthday tweet just a bit after it hit midnight BST, not in his time zone)
Spifey’s perspective on vidcon 2018 
the skittles thing on spifey’s vlog channel (tapL shows up near the end)
And also they teaming for MCU along with Vurb and Finn!!!!
anyone, feel free to add onto this! and once again, thank u for the question, anon <3
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knifeshoeoreofight · 4 years
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Part 2 of ? 
(part 1 here) 
Sid can’t sleep. He’s lying in a barracks-style room, listening to the hum of the HVAC system and staring at the bottom of the bunk above him. He’s jet-lagged out of his mind but his thoughts are still spinning from what he’d learned that day. What he’d seen. 
What he’d heard. 
Help me. 
After that moment he’d been so stunned he’d gone along when Bettman had tugged on his sleeve to take him to the labs where analysis was being done. Sid had followed him in a daze, the scientific part of his brain noting equipment, perusing read-outs. He’d been shown the massive hanger containing the strange craft the being had been piloted when it had crashed. He said nothing when introduced to a cluttered conference room full of the world’s brightest linguistic and cryptographic minds. They were hopelessly mired in failed efforts to establish communication with the being. 
It has only spoken to him. 
Sid turns restlessly onto his side. The hallway outside the barracks is brightly lit, forming a rectangle of light around the cheaply-hung door. He’s the only person in this particular room, although there are at least six bunks. He figures people at this facility sleep in shifts-- he can hear the footsteps of people going up and down the hall. He feels, suddenly, very alone. What the hell is he going to do? How can he possibly help someone contained in a facility with this kind of security? Is the being dangerous? If he did somehow manage to free it, what, exactly, would he be unleashing? 
He’s about to flop over to his other side in frustration when the door opens, spilling light inside the room. A woman dragging along a mop bucket steps in with a cheery remark in Russian. Before Sid can tell her that no, it’s fine, no need to clean, she’s closed the door behind her and flicked on the room’s lights. She turns to Sid with a grim expression completely at odds with her light tone and holds a finger up to her mouth in a shushing gesture. 
Sid blinks at her. She’s on the older side of middle age, sturdily built with warm, tired eyes. 
“Natalia,” she tells him, indicating herself. “You, come.” 
“What-- why?” Sid sputters, but she’s already bustling forward, taking his pants from where he’d hung them over a chair back and tossing them at him. She mutters in Russian to herself, and then meets his eyes. 
“Help. He’s ask you.” 
Sid’s insides go to ice at her words. “He?” 
She throws his shirt at his face. “He’s ask. Come.” 
Dazedly, Sid yanks his clothes on and follows her. She walks briskly, as if she has every right to be where she is, but she takes odd cuts across hallways and down seemingly random stairwells. After he notices her glance at the ceiling he realizes she’s avoiding security cameras, and a cold sweat breaks out on his skin. 
Somehow, they end up back at the observation room. The being is pacing like a zoo lion in front of the window, glowing tentacles swirling in agitation. It- he? Goes still when he sees them, and the lights on his body flare. 
Natalia goes up to the glass and pats it with a stream of fond-sounding Russian. She turns to Sid and waves him closer. 
“He’s good boy,” she says emphatically, patting at the glass, and Sid has to suppress the inappropriate urge to laugh. He turns to the being, whose lights throb rhythmically in what Sid somehow senses is a pleased manner. 
“Uh. A good boy, huh?” There’s a hysterical wobble to the words, and the corners of his mouth want to twitch upwards
That same sense of pressure fills Sid’s head. 
Close. Enough. 
Sid can’t help it then-- he throws his head back and laughs. He’s standing in an underground research facility in whereever-the-fuck Russia, with a cleaning lady and an extraterrestrial who is, apparently, a good boy. 
The being’s lights twinkle in pulses of color. It reminds Sid of laughter, somehow. But then the being goes still and leans in close to the glass. 
Please he speaks into Sid’s mind. Help. 
“I… I have so many questions,” Sid stammers. “Why me? What will you do after you become free? How would I even begin to help you I--” 
Difficult. To send. Words. Wait. 
Sid shuts up, and waits. The being draws its appendages in towards itself for a long moment, colors dull, then continues. 
Won’t hurt anyone, he says, the words coming a little more smoothly. I need. My ship. 
His wide, glowing eyes feel like they’re illuminating even the most shadowed corners of Sid’s soul. 
I’m dying. 
Sid sucks in a breath. 
Your planet. Killing me.
And then: I asked. Because your thoughts... were kind.
***
Through a lot of hand gestures and stilted English (and even more stilted telepathy), Sid begins to piece together at least part of the situation. 
Natalia has been about as horrified by the whole situation as Sid was, and she and the being had started communicating with each other when she came in to clean at night. Sid can’t help but watch in wonder as she clucks and fusses over him in a way that seems almost maternal. Sid had spent a little time with a Russian phrasebook during the interminable flight over, and he’s pretty sure the name she keeps using to refer to the being is the Russian equivalent of “sweetie.” 
The being in turn crouches almost deferentially next to her on the other side of the glass, as if he doesn’t want to loom over her. 
“Want to help,” she tells Sid, as they watch the patterns of light on the being’s skin together. “But I’m old woman. Just clean.” She looks at Sid. her eyes suddenly even more tired, her shoulders sagging. “You are young, and strong. You have--” She struggles with the English she wants, and leans towards the glass. After a moment looking into the being’s eyes, she turns back to Sid. “Secu-rity clearance.”  
Bettman had made sure that Sid was given a keycard with 24 hour access to the labs. “I know how it is with you genius types!” he had said indulgently. “Burning the midnight oil and all that.  I can’t wait to hear what you discover!” The naked greed in his eyes had made Sid’s skin crawl. Bettman was the type of man who used people. 
“They'll know,” Sidney says, apprehensively. “The reader will store the card information. I’d rather not spend the rest of my life in a Russian pri--” He realizes suddenly who he’s talking to. 
“I’m so sorry,” he says, abashed. “That’s pretty hypocritical of me.” 
The being’s lights go dark violet, and Sid can feel something like grief roll over his mind. 
I would not want...this for you the being tells him. Or Natalia. 
Then, he brightens, literally. Come with me. They won’t… find you. They won’t….know about Natalia. 
“On your ship,” Sidney says slowly. Oh my god.
Sorry. Not God. A ripple of color again. But. If you want.
“Was that a joke,” Sid asks incredulously. “That was a joke, wasn’t it?” 
Smug amusement washes gently up against Sid’s mind. The being makes a very human shrug. Sid wonders where he learned that, until Natalia makes an almost identical gesture a few moments later. 
“We need try,” she says softly. 
Sid notes the flaking, discolored patches on the being’s skin, the way his sides rise and fall with labored breath. 
“We will,” he promises. “We need a plan, but we’ll try.” 
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ff-imagines · 5 years
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General headcanons: salty tofu
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I saw a man so beautiful I started crying?
• baby boy.... baby boy....
• salty having a crush on you is... gonna make things difficult for both of you
• he’d rather walk a mile barefoot over legos that are actively on fire than admit he has feelings for anyone
• so as a result he’s... very defensive and quick to end your conversations
• he’s essentially the third grader who’s mean to you cause they have a crush on you lol
• honestly it doesn’t take much to break down that wall though
• even the most basic kindness has him looking at you differently
• but he’s still gonna be high and mighty about it lol
• “don’t you have other duties? Or is this you submitting to being my toy?”
• “I don’t need your attention. Go find someone else to dote on.”
• proceeds to get sad cause you’re not paying attention to him
• you’re gonna have to make the first move, baby boy is a lil bit oblivious when it comes to romance
• and general social interaction
• the second you do, his walls come completely down and he’s a big ol’ cuddly softie
• he also drops the whole toy thing pretty quickly when he sees you’re not happy with it
• “Oh? Do you want to be my toy forever? ... Eh? Why is your expression so unsightly? ... Darn it, okay I was wrong, I won't call you a toy again... So... smile.”
• gets frustrated super easily over small stuff
• most of the time it has to do with people making him feel uncomfortable, or hurt
• he likes to pretend words don’t hurt him, but they really do.
• sometimes if he’s hurt enough, he’ll tear up
• he’s got a sorta hiccup-y cry, his throat locks up making it hard to talk, and he hugs himself tightly. Sometimes he’ll wipe at his face to get rid of the tears.
• if you tease him or poke fun at him for crying he’ll loose his shit
• he can dish out teasing, but he cant really take it in return, especially when he’s vulnerable like that
• but he’d also never tease you for crying either, he mostly just starts feeling angry at whatever made you cry
• “salty you can’t fight a tv screen” “W A T C H M E“
• the best way to cheer him up when’s he’s sad/grumpy?
• be needy
• he likes that you rely on him, even for small things like a hug
• another quick way to get him in a good mood?
• spa day!
• face masks, bath bombs, cucumbers on your eyes, diy manicures, he loves it all!
• his favorite bath bomb is black with just enough glitter that it’s not excessive, and it smells like apricots
• he can’t really relax unless he has some kind of white noise, so you both take turns picking a music playlist
• on days where you just can’t come to an agreement on what to play or who’s turn it is, you both just settle on the 24 hour lo-fi stream.
• likes the water skin boilingly hot, so good luck lmao
• sometimes sits across from you in the tub and just chills, but mostly prefers to have you back against him as to two lean back and enjoy the smells and feeling of the water.
• likes manicures, but can’t paint his nails well himself without making a mess on his fingers
• his hands are just a little shaky as a default, so hes gonna appreciate any help he can get
• won’t admit it tho so you’ve gotta being it up
• “hey maybe we should do each other’s nails!” And run before he does yours
• he also loves getting his hair played with
• there have been times where he’s actually fallen alseep while you messed with his hair because of how relaxed it made him
• he doesn’t like messing with makeup as much
• don’t get me wrong, on himself he wings eyeliner so sharp it can stab someone
• but on someone else? His hands are twitchy as ever and he’s too worried about stabbing you in the eye
• he just sticks to styling your hair
• he’s not absolutely phenomenal with hair, but it doesn’t look bad either, and he tries his best.
• as time goes on he’ll get better with it, and his styles will slowly get more and more impressive.
• chews on his tongue piercing somtimes when idleing
• also he talks a lot, that causes the metal to knock against his teeth somtimes
• because of that his teeth are a little sensitive, so he doesn’t like ice cream or any cold food that much cause like.... ouch
• prefers marzipan and punishingly dark chocolate
• plays his guitar often, would love if you did too!
• if you don’t know how to play very well, for your sake and his, don’t ask for lessons from him.
• he won’t be mean to you, just light teasing
• but his patience level is -18393024 so uhm
• he’s not a very good teacher :(
• he’ll try!
• he can help you with a few chords, but frankly?
• he’s not only been doing this for a long ass time, he’s also just naturally gifted when it comes to music and pitch recognition
• so if you take a while to get it he’s just gonna be “????? Why confusion this easy ?????”
• he tries his best but eventually just sighs and pulls out his phone to play a YouTube tutorial lol
• if you’ve not already got piercings, he’d love to see you with some!
• if you asked about getting them he’d at first tease a little about you wanting to be like him
• then he’d tell you basic care etc cause he’s not a healer, he can’t really help you if you get infected
• he gets really upset to see you in pain so he kinda dotes on you a lot, getting a piercing does nothing but encourage him to make sure you’re doing ok.
• honestly he’s cool with whatever you wanna do, don’t want piercings? “That’s fine, now listen to three days grace with me I’m bored”
• honestly is very laid back when it comes to hanging out with you alone.
• he trusts you with everything he has, why have worries when you’re right here?
• he likes to talk, but he enjoys just sitting in comfortable silence with some kinda white noise just as much.
• literally anything you want to do, he’ll go with you
• not without complaints, but he’ll go
• you don’t even really have to warn him either
• “ I wanna go hiking up an active volcano” “aight lemme grab some snacks and some bug spray”
• normally doesn’t really have a ‘schedule’, just kinda goes wherever. He lives day by day, making time for his basic needs.
• on rare days he’ll drag you around town looking for something to do
• but for the most part he looks to you for plans and schedules because he legit can’t be assed what you two do as long as he’s doing it with you.
• he kinda has this weird thing with math
• that being that he’s freakishly good at it
• it’s just another thing that he just gets
• he also knows that he’s good at it and he’s pretty proud of that
• will be beaming if you ask for help with any kind of math
• will also be proud if you ask him for help with really anything
• gives the classic “ what, can’t handle it yourself?” line and then immediately gets whatever you need done
• very much likes to hug you
• very very much likes to hug you
• his fav is wrapping his arms around you from behind, and if you’re short enough, placing his head on the top of yours. If you’re a bit on the taller side, he settles for your shoulder.
• but there is one thing he likes more than hugs
• cuddling!!!!
• “tonight, I want to hold you as you fall asleep~”
• and he definitely means that.
• he sleeps on his side, only on his back if he’s tired enough to pass out immediately, never on his stomach as it makes him feel weirdly queasy.
• he loves when you’re on your side facing him, and he’s got you in an arm prison.
• tuck your head under his chin and he’ll actually melt into a puddle
• he’s always very warm but he has this weird tick where no matter how hot a room is, he thinks it’s cold
• “cold...” “salty it’s 94 degrees” “c o l d . . . ”
• cuddling with him is pretty pleasant as long as you don’t get hot to easy, cause he piles on the blankets and curls into you like you’re a fire on a -27 degree night.
• honestly when it comes to you, sweet tofu is obsession, salty tofu is possession.
• don’t get me wrong, he’s not keeping you on lockdown
• but he gets jealous very easy lol
• of course more reasonably, he’s not gonna be crying while holding up your phone going “WhO tHe FuCk iS mOm??”
• it’s more that if you’re in public and someone’s gaze lingers just a little to long
• he’s got an arm around you pulling you closer to his side and he’s glaring
• he might be your living teddy bear, but he knows how to make himself look very menacing
• he doesn’t like random strangers talking to you, mainly because he doesn’t know them and therefore does not trust that they don’t have bad intentions
• “He was asking for directions to the chip isle salty” “didn’t like the look in his eye” “he was 15” “and”
• he finds the stories you bring home of being hit on or asked out off putting, but he mostly laughs, saying “did they really think they had a chance with what’s mine?”
• he feels safer knowing that not only will you turn down others flirting, but you’ll openly laugh with him at that person for even trying.
• it’s an ego boost, but it also makes him proud of you for being able to stand your ground.
• but... if someone ever makes advancements toward you on front of him?
• oh no.
• The fool. The buffoon. They have no idea the absolute hell they’ve just unleashed upon themselves.
• he has no qualms defending you with actual violence
• if the time ever comes where he turns his back for a few minutes and comes back to see you looking uncomfortable while some person is trying a little too obviously to flirt with you?
• beat someone’s ass mode: engaged
• he’d come up beside the person and just grab onto their forearm with one hand, the other hand is at his side in such a firm fist that his palms are turning white
• he’s squeezing them punishingly tight as he leans close to their face and asks what the fuck they think they are doing
• safe to say the creep is no longer bothering you.
• poor baby kinda stands for a bit and just pulls you tight into his side, shaking his head and muttering about how shameless some people are
• call him your knight while he’s muttering, it’ll catch him off guard and you’ll get a rare blush from him
• just take him home and cuddle the teddy bear. His poor heart can’t take the thought of some gross stranger taking you away from him.
• the only reason for his jealously is because of his insecurities.
• “what if one day I’m not enough?”
• those thoughts happen less and less as he spends more and more time with you.
• you’ve only proven that you’ll stick with him till the bitter end.
• with your love, and his rock playlist at full blast, can’t really ask for anything else.
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Giving Love a Bad Name – Confessions of a Fanfiction Writer
I know we’re supposed to blog about our major projects this week and I promise I will get to that soon, but I’d like to go off book for a moment to address something that’s been bugging me since last Thursday’s class. As someone who’s always tried to engage with fandom in as creative a way as possible, I hoped a class on user generated content would offer a fresher perspective than the usual amount of prejudice and self-righteous superiority that sadly seem to accompany the subject of fanfiction even amongst people that make stories and their passion for it their bread and butter.
Guess I should have known better.
In the world of professional writers, fanfiction is still a filthy word. It sums up everything that’s wrong with the people you’re sharing your stories with: the obsessiveness, the entitlement, the disregard for boundaries, the penchant for making everything about sex. Worse, gay sex, as unspeakably dirty as it’s hilarious. Be warned, writers: if you make it big, your stories will inevitably become a free-for-all at the mercy of those people. A worse fate than even George R. R. Martin could wish on his own characters.
I’m used to seeing the world of fanfiction belittled and disparaged, of course, and I’m the first to admit that the community is often its own worst enemy. But for some reason it still hurt a little to sit in class and listen to people I’ve come to like and respect during these past few months buy into every bad stereotype associated with the form. Not because I felt called out (though yes, I do write fanfiction from time to time, and I happen to quite enjoy reading it too), but because of the underlying assumptions that 1. something that’s not 100% original cannot be art, it’s a violence in fact, especially if it twists someone else’s creation into something it was never meant to be (in this case, queer representation); and 2. there’s something wrong with creating exclusively out of love, without ever expecting to be paid for it. And I have Strong Opinions on that.
So let’s talk about fanfiction.
Actually, scratch that, let’s talk about my favorite subject – yours truly. As you may have gathered by now, I love fanfiction. A whole fangirly lot. My gateway drug into it was my obsession with Lost about 10 years ago and its pesky habit of offing every character I was foolish enough to get attached to. But lo! Someone was keeping them alive through their stories! I felt blessed. I got to spend more time in a world I loved, and I stopped flirting with the idea of giving up on the show every time another character I liked bit the dust. Everybody won.
Even more than as a fan, though, I appreciated the world of possibilities that fanfiction opened up to me as a non-native speaker. I come from a small town in the north of Italy; the access I had to foreign books in their original language was limited, and if I wanted to read something in English I’d have to spend quite a lot of money on one of the very few novels (usually chunky airport bookshop thrillers or housewife romances – not exactly my preferred genres) that shared a single shelf in the bookstore with German, French, Spanish titles. But fanfiction was free, accessible, and there was so much of it. If I didn’t like a story, all I needed to do was move on to the next. Suddenly there was an infinite library of engaging stories to help me make my English better. True, they didn’t all read like a published novel would – there’s a lot of unpolished, error-plagued, stream-of-consciousness-y material out there. But there are also so, so many beautifully written works, and believe me, even for a non-native speaker it’s very easy to spot the difference.
Fanfiction also gave me the chance and motivation to practice my English writing in a way school never could have done. I’ve been writing my own stories since I could hold a pen, but I didn’t dare write in English until I was a fanfiction-loving teenager. It was a marketing decision, really – my first foray into writing fanfiction was for a fandom so small that I wouldn’t be surprised to find out I’m the only Italian representative, so if I wanted any kind of feedback on my work I’d have to suck it up and try my hand at writing in a language that didn’t come natural to me. I would never argue that the feedback I got on my works made me a better writer – contrary to popular opinion, the fanfiction community is made up of the nicest, most supportive people, and alas, you’ll never get a comment on everything you did wrong with your structure or even just pointing out common grammar mistakes from them (though I was lucky enough to have someone explain to me how dialogue punctuation works differently in English than in Italian, so I guess something can be learned even from the Internet). It did motivate me to keep writing, though, and that made me a better writer. If you think I’m being too dramatic, dishing out this monster of a post nobody asked for just to declare my eternal devotion to fanfiction, it’s because it’s personal to me. I can’t even count the number of times I’ve been told that I write in English as well as native speakers, and fanfiction is a big part of why that’s true. I doubt I would even be in this course if it wasn’t for it.
And then, of course, there’s the gay thing. I’m not going to argue about how heteronormativity sucks and representation matters because I’m sure everyone’s as sick of talking about it as I am, but please try to understand how it felt for a gay person like me, used to be depicted in media as a plot device or token secondary-character representation if at all, to be able to step into a world where queerness was the default for once. Where queer protagonists had meaningful queer love stories and queer friends and got to save the world from the Apocalypse too. Or to fight the Empire or go to Hogwarts or everything else fictional straight people have had a right to do since the dawn of storytelling in addition to romancing the hottie of their choice. I’m not asking you to feel as passionately about it, of course, but (especially if you’re straight) you might try and empathize the next time you think a fanart of two boys kissing is something deserving of your amused contempt.
I hope I’m not coming across as the person that screams “homophobe” at everyone who disagrees with her because I guarantee that’s not what I’m trying to do here, but I think the general distaste for slash says a lot about the way our society sees heterosexual relationships as love and homosexual relationships as sex. Yes, there’s a lot of gay porn in the world of fanfiction. But you know what you’re most likely to find? Romance. Not in the saucy literary sense of the word, but in its simpler, most literal acceptation. Fanfiction is just one more way for humans to express themselves, after all, and love has always been front and center in our art. Love, not sex – even if it’s gay. In fact, explicit material doesn’t even make up the majority of what you’ll find on a fanfiction website. Don’t worry, I don’t want anyone to taint their souls by visiting one of those dens of iniquity so I pulled some stats myself. Here’s the number of works for each rating in three of the most popular fandoms on Archive Of Our Own, the current go-to website for the fanfiction community (sorry Fanfiction.net) – Harry Potter, Supernatural and the Marvel Cinematic Universe as of 9/3/2019:
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Even counting both Mature and Explicit works as straight-up porn (which I don’t think is quite fair, but that’s a discussion for another day), they only make up less than 1/3 of the material. Kinda disappointing, for a medium that’s supposed to be all about filthy graphic gay sex. Imagine if only one in three musicals actually featured singing and dancing, or superheroes weren’t in the majority of superhero movies. They’re lucky fanfiction is shared for free, or I’d be screaming for my money back.
Maybe I’ve just been brainwashed by SJWs, though, and this has nothing to do with my being an immigrant or a lesbian. Maybe my inability to see what’s so bad about appropriating someone else’s intellectual property for your own amusement is a cultural thing. I apologize – as mentioned, I’m Italian, and we all know Ancient Roman culture was basically just a ripoff of everything those inventive Greeks came up with. It’s in our blood. Hell, our 2€ coin, the biggest, has the face of Dante Alighieri on it, a writer most famous for having written 14.000+ verses of self-insert real-person-fic in which the girl he fancied as a teenager, his favorite author, and God himself all fall over themselves to tell him how awesome he is and he gets to prophesy an eternity in Hell for his political enemies. Talk about wish-fulfilling entitlement. Not to mention all those creatively arid Renaissance “artists” celebrated for stealing characters from the Bible and Greek mythology (seriously, the fact that Greece hasn’t unleashed an army of lawyers on us yet is nothing short of a miracle) and putting them in their cheesy paintings. Other countries can rely on a much stronger moral backbone and endless imagination – I’m sure Shakespeare, Milton, Goethe, those creative geniuses at Disney and countless others never had to resort to something as cheap and despicable as borrowing other people’s characters to tell the stories they wanted to tell.
Either way, I can’t help it – I see the prospect of creating something that will resonate with people so strongly that they’ll make it a part of themselves, that it’ll compel them to make more art, to reach out and connect with other fans, as something incredibly beautiful rather than scary. Maybe this is my usual naiveté speaking, and I will come to eat my words. It’s certainly disturbing that a bunch of entitled fans bullied the Mass Effect developers into changing the series’ ending, and sending actors explicit fanart of themselves is straight-up harassment, but is fanfiction really the problem here? Or is it social network culture, with its power to destroy all barriers and foster hive mind? To give resentment a platform to spread and be heard? I promise that the average fanfiction writer wouldn’t campaign to get an ending changed. They’d just roll up their sleeves and write a better one themselves.
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mangled-dreams · 6 years
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Pickles and Cotton Candy
For @destinggirl who requested:
Okay so... Wilford or Dark x Reader with the lines, "I'd kill for coffee... literally." "It's six o'clock in the morning, you're not having vodka!" "Did you just hiss at me?" "Do you really need all that candy?"
And since in the last one I couldn’t find a way to add in the fourth quote “Do you really need all that candy?” I have made this one. Also, because the last one was for Wilford, this one is for Dark.
Now, without further stalling here is Pickles and Cotton Candy.
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It's almost midnight but sleep eludes you as you find yourself in the kitchen cutting pickles in to spears. It's not unusual to find yourself munching on something low calorie in the late hours, at least you try to keep your midnight snacks to the lowest calorie as possible. Sleeping has been getting more and more difficult as the weeks pass by. You blame it on the fact that Dark has been away more days than he's been with you and it stings. It really stings. Frowning you drop the dirty knife into the skin and pick up your fairly full plate and take it to your bed room. You wonder if it's because you've started to gain weight. It's not a lot but enough to make you concerned about your calorie intake. You blame most of it on your stress eating. Work has been more difficult and you've been having a hard time concentrating on the tasks at hand, so you raid the sweets drawer your co-worker Allison keeps for everyone. You love Allie, but also despise her enabling. She's been teasing that you're moving out of the honeymoon faze of your relationships with Dark and into the seven year itch. You prefer to ignore her when she says things like that, but it just fuels your anxiety even more. You honestly worry that the spark you and Dark seemed to have has been lost or worse he wants to break it off with you. Groaning you take a bite of your pickle spear and settle into your bed. In the morning you'll text Mark and see if he's been with Dark. "Do you really need all that candy?" Mark asks spotting you with a huge thing of cotton candy on a stick. He'd taken the whole Markiplier group to the fair down at the peer and you'd tagged along just to keep yourself busy while waiting for Dark to show up again. Swallowing the large glob in your mouth you stick your pink, blue, and purple tongue out at Mark. "I'm sorry not all of us can have such self control." you mock looking at the foot long hotdog in his hand. Mark looks at the food he's holding then to you. "Touche." He says before taking a large bite of the hotdog. You sigh and turn away from Mark eyes looking down at the cotton candy in your hand. Maybe he's right. You don't need this much sugar coursing through your blood stream, but in the same moment you don't want to let it go either. Sighing again you walk over to the trash can and toss the mostly complete wad of cotton candy into the bin. It's just cotton candy but you feel like it symbolizes something much larger, or at least you think it does--otherwise why would you be crying over candy? You hate this goddamn emotional roller coaster you're stuck on. Dark still hasn't contacted you and there'd been some photos recently of him with another woman looking all chummy together. Covering your face with your hands you try to think rationally. Dark is a lot of things but he boasts he's never cheat on you. "Hey, Y/n?" Mark calls when he notices your strange stance. He watches you quickly wipe at your face using the hem of your shirt to clear away your tears and frowns. He doesn't quite understand what's happening between your and Dark but he knows it's not good if you're reacting like this. Mark is there when you're finally able to turn around and you know he seems the red in your eyes and how irritated your skin is. "What's going on between you and Dark? I've never seen you so worked up before." Mark says taking you away from the others to a secluded park bench under a large umbrella for shade. You both sit down almost simultaneously and let the silence stretch even as the world around you is loud and full of laughter and cries of excitement. "Y/n," Mark prompts earning a startled response from you. You'd actually checked out for a few seconds. "Sorry, I just... I don't know what to do Mark. I thought everything was going great and now... now I have a legit fear that Dark doesn't want to be with me anymore." You finally gush in a moment of panic. Mark--to his credit doesn't react the way you had feared he would with total denial that Dark would so something like that too you. "How long have you been worrying about this?" Mark asks knowing for a fact that is not the case. Dark had sworn him to secrecy under penalty of being thrown into the ocean--which, come on would scare anyone and Dark has the capability too do it. Glancing away you look at a booth with bright colorful lights then back to Mark. "A few months. He's been so distant lately and I..." You pull your phone from your pocket and unlock the screen. With a few pokes of the screen you slide it over to Mark letting him see the photo an "anonymous" sender had emailed you. Mark looks the photo over and you can see a hint of anger behind his round Indiana Jones glasses. "Mark," You plead softly. "If there is something I should know-" Your stomach lurches and you nearly fall of the bench in favor of the dirty trash bin. Mark is at your side in an instant pulling your hair from your face as you throw up just about everything you ate earlier in the day. Marks feels you shiver from the after taste and leaves you  to grab his bottled water. You gladly take the offered beverage and rinse your mouth out before taking a long drag. That's the second day this week you've gotten ill. You tried to think of the food you may have eaten to upset your stomach but can't think of anything consistent. Mark watches you without words as you unconsciously rub your stomach. Instantly a thought pops into Marks head and he can't help but ask, "Are you pregnant?" Freezing you look down at your stomach. You haven't noticed anything different than usually. You've gained weight but nothing that would indicate that you've got a growing child inside your womb. Your periods have always been a little off, something not coming for months that you just don't pay attention anymore, but that was before you had a boyfriend. Looking at Mark you feel all the blood drain from your face. "I...I can't be... he's not..." You can't finish your thought and end up throwing up again. "What's the test say?" Mark asks from outside the bathroom door inside your apartment. He'd given some lame excuse and took you to the pharmacy to pick up an at home pregnancy test then took you to your apartment. As of this minute the truth is staring you right in the face. "Positive." you mutter quickly covering your mouth with your hand as tears begin to gather in your eyes. How can you be pregnant? Dark isn't even human. What will your baby look like? Will Dark even want to be apart of your life now? Audibly sobbing you drop to your knees ignoring the pain of the impact of your weight on your knees. You don't like this feeling of uncertainty and fear. How are you going to raise a child on your own? Will you have to quite your job for a while? Can you take maternity leave? If so then for how long? Mark knocks on the door again and when you don't answer he opens it spotting you on the floor curled into yourself as you cry. He knows you well enough to know what's going through your mind. Kneeling next to you Mark wraps an arm around your back, opening himself up to you if you need him. Peeking through your swollen red eyes your lips quiver and you turn into his chest unleashing everything you'd been holding back. Your wails carry through your apartment even as it's muffled through his shirt. You have no idea what you're going to do or who will be there for you now. "Shh, you still got me, Y/n. The whole group will be there for you when you need us." Mark promises brushing a kiss to the top of your messy hair. He feels your hands grip a little tighter at his promise. He doesn't know what's going to happen with Dark hears about the pregnancy but he preys he's steps up. Mark stays the night that night sleeping on the couch after you'd cried yourself to sleep. He'd texted Amy and a few choice others letting them know there's going to be a big announcement in a few days if not in the next day. They asked for details but Mark informed them it was not his announcement to make. He then sent a text to Dark tell him it is emergent that he return home. He leaves out the pregnancy announcement. When you wake in the morning Mark is making breakfast with freshly cut fruit. You laugh at his antics and talk a little bit more about the pregnancy. He encourages you to let the group know and you feel hesitant about it, finally deciding to wait until after you get checked out first. You want to have a living baby and not a false positive pregnancy test. Midway through the morning Amy shows up at your apartment and you let her in on the announcement, well, possible announcement. She's elated to hear about your possible pregnancy and helps you make your first appointment. She promises to help your through your pregnancy, more excited for the possibility of a baby entering the group than you are. Of course she doesn't have to worry about the father possibly being a cheater. The rest of the day Amy and Mark chill out at your apartment before leaving for the night. Its shortly after they leave you begin to cry again. You still have no idea what the hell you are going to do and Dark still hasn't shown up or reached out to you. This isn't the way you wanted to find out you're pregnant. "Well, miss L/n, you are pregnant alright." The tech tells you as Mark and Amy crowd around your head to look at the grainy screen above you. You look at the tech then back to the screen not sure if you're seeing things right. "What's that?" You ask pointing to a second beating heart just to the right of the first. "Good eye. You are going to have twins. They look healthy and from my measurements they are about fifteen weeks old, so if they decide to play nice, I should be able to tell you what you will be having." The tech says moving his hand around your stomach, pushing with the rounded ultrasound wand into your flesh. You feel the urgent need to pee when he pushes down but hold it to your best ability. You watch them man take a few photos and a few more measurements before chuckling. "What? What is she having?" Mark asks looking to the man then the screen with curiosity. Amy quickly pauses Mark and asks you, "Do you want to know? I mean, a lot of parents keep it a secret and do a gender reveal." She says looking down into your eyes. You really have to think about that. Of course you want to know what you're having, especially now that you're having twins, but part of your kind of really likes the idea of it being a surprise. "C-can you write it down and give it to Amy?" You ask wishing instantly you hadn't but refuse to take it back. The tech smirks and writes down the genders of both children, folds it in half and hands it to Amy. To her credit she doesn't look right away, instead she opens her purse and puts the slip of paper in her wallet. You smile at her and look again at your tiny babies growing inside of you. "You're very lucky, some women can't carry twins that look as healthy as yours are. I wish you an easy pregnancy." The tech tells you before printing off a few snap shots for you and cleans up your stomach. Two separate silhouettes are captured forever on paper. "Fifteen weeks." You whisper looking from Amy to Mark then the photos again. You wish Dark were there, but you don't want to start crying in the ultrasound room of your OB/GYN's office. Entering your apartment you close the door behind you and go into your kitchen. You need pickles and ice cream--strawberry ice cream to be exact. Your pickle craving have increased to a point you know you have a problem but they have little to no calories, but you do have to watch the sodium intake. Taking out your favorite brand of dill pickles you open the jar and shove a hand in grabbing the fattest pickle in the jar. Pulling it out you rinse your hand off--because you're not a heathen and take a bite. Turning around you run nose first into what feels like a brick wall. "Ouchie." you groan rubbing your nose with your non pickle hand and back up, looking directly at a crisp dark grey suite. Following the suite up to a very familiar and sorely missed face you nearly drop your pickle. "Dark." You breath blinking a few times before setting your pickle down and really wash your hands. "W-when did you get back?" You ask drying your hands off and toss the towel on the counter. Dark doesn't respond, instead he just looks you over before letting his gaze settle on your slightly protruding stomach. You feel embarrassed for whatever reason and wrap your arms around your stomach as if to hide it. "You're pregnant." Dark says without emotion. It hurts, you're not going to lie. To have the father of your twin babies say that without any hint of emotion is a real blow. "You've been gone." You respond trying to sound just as cold but it doesn't quite reach the mark. You want to scream at him, to tell him how much he's hurt you by ignoring your ever plead, but all you manage is to cry. "Where were you? I needed you!" You cry shout, your voice cracking as tears obscure your vision. You hate how weak you are right now, but you know a lot of it is coming from fear. You thought you had one child and now you have two to worry about. Dark doesn't respond. He doesn't know how to. He'd come as soon as he could but seeing you in Mark's arms had stopped him. He didn't understand just what was going on. Then you threw up into the trash bin and Mark's question...it was too much. For the first time since enter the world he didn't know what to do and did something he wasn't proud of. He left. He knew how much you needed him, he could feel it in his soul how much pain and fear you were experiencing but he couldn't... he still doesn't know what to do. Pregnant? He didn't even think it was possible. He'd lovers before, not a one conceived a child, and then you come along.  "I need you Dark, I can't do this alone... I can't... I'm so scared." You end up just sobbing covering your face with your hands. You feel like one big ball of emotional stress and gross sobbing. You hate this feeling but it's all you have right now. The mask slips while you're not looking and he realizes just how badly he's fucked up. He's realizing just how much more this has affected you. You'll be the one the baby looks to for comfort and affection and protection where he's here or not. He failed you in the biggest way he could fail anyone. He has a physical pain when you pull away from his touch, your hear lifting just enough to meet his eyes. He knows he has a lot of work to do to earn back your trust again. "I'm so sorry." Dark says kneeling before you with every ounce of grace he possesses. You are the woman that has captured his heart, and he thought... he doesn't know what he was thinking anymore. You watch with wide watery eyes as he bows his head to you, even kneeling he reaches well to your breasts. "D-Dark," You whisper continuing to watch him. His arms reach out and wrap around you, waiting to see you reaction before pulling you to him. You can't hold back the soft sob, pressing the back of your hand to your lips as he rests his head against your swelling stomach. You've never seen Dark look so humble, so at your mercy. "Forgive me, Y/n." Dark whispers holding you and you unborn children close to him. "Oh, Dark." You whisper smiling sadly at him. "I love you, of course I'd forgive you." You tell him meaning it. "I love you so much, Y/n." You show Dark the ultrasound snapshots as you sit on the couch and talk a little more. You'd learned that the woman in the photos you'd been sent was a woman that had invited herself to the seat next to him. When you looked at the photo again you can see the look of annoyance on Dark's face now that you have context and his own accounting. You wait to see if Dark can spot the two hearts, wanting to let it be a surprise until you forget and end up falling asleep next to Dark. Dark lets you sleep on the couch, taking up being your partial bed and resting as well, even as he doesn't sleep he still needs to rest. His heart flutters when he sees the two hearts and texted labeling them Baby #1 and Baby #2. Twins, he thinks look down at your relaxed features. You're giving him twin children. Brushing his hand through you hair it just solidifies he needs to step up his game, but he knows that he will love these twins with everything in him, just as he loves you.
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medea10 · 6 years
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My Review of Hell Girl: Fourth Twilight
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◆ Out Of Character Information ◆
Name/Age: Nana/20 Preferred Pronouns: She/Her Timezone: GMT Desired Character: Zadkiel
◆ Character Information ◆
(1) What pronouns will your character be using? Would you like to list their sexuality at this time?: She/her, Zadkiel will be pansexual.
(2) Any changes or comments? I want to headcanon that Zadkiel uses her vessel’s name sometimes, depending on the characters she encounters during the game. I hope this is okay.
(3) Why this character? I’ve never played an angel before. Like honestly, how cool is THAT? I’m super excited to explore this species for the first time. In addition to this, I have to admit that I’ve never played a character who is as driven by a cause as Zadkiel either. I’m incredibly smitten by her sense of justice and goodness. At this point, what really intrigued me about her biography the most though was, that she would do anything for her cause. I want to know where exactly her limits are and what she would do upon meeting them.
(4) Interpret this character: When I read Zadkiel’s biography and history for the first time, I immediately thought that jealousy and bitterness might be major qualities of her character. If you consider her age and the events she’s been through, it would make sense. As a Power/Authority within the heavenly realm, it has always been her task to execute fatal judgement over her fellow kin. For this reason, I’d like to believe that there is no one (except God himself) who knows as much about their own species as Zadkiel. Thus, there is no one more aware of their own limitations than Zadkiel as well. Painfully so. Although angels are said to have a will of their own, it is in fact not as free as it sounds. As angels, her kin is supposed to serve the Lord above anything else. Humans on the contrary though, who were also created by God, did not have such boundaries and truly had a free will of their own. If they made a mistake or submitted to sins, there was no immediate punishment waiting for them at the end of the road. They did not have to wear burdens upon their shoulders and bear the responsibility of watching over a whole world in its own.
Hence, if you follow this train of thought, one might think that having to watch over humanity for as long as Zadkiel did must have made her overcome with jealousy. Angry even, at how unfair the differences between the two races were or how easily humans allowed themselves to become and do evil; that they were evil.
The more I thought about her character however, the more I came to the realization that Zadkiel has never harbored any ill or bad feelings toward humanity at all. If she did, she would have long joined Lucifer’s Army; but she fought against it, which says a lot about her. I’m not suggesting that there wasn’t a time when she didn’t feel at least a silver of bitterness about her kin’s situation, though Lucifer’s Rebellion made her erase any doubtful sentiments entirely early on. As a matter of fact, I want to headcanon that his mistakes had caused her to see the true value of humans and the potential they held. That they were genuinely something precious, something that was meant to be protected because it could so easily be influenced and could not protect itself. Perhaps their existence served as a grander plan even, but such matters were none of her business. As a consequence, Zadkiel grew to care deeply for humans.
She was probably extremely curious about their world when she had left Heaven for the first time, as well as filled by an overwhelming feeling of duty and honor. All those years of merely watching were frustrating to her and when she was finally tasked with a mission that allowed her to act, to become active rather than passive, she was definitely one hell of a happy angelic bean. To finally be able to break through the emotional turmoil her harrowing journey has wrought – you better bet that she is going to take this mission very seriously.
Since her duty is to eradicate any threat that shows itself in front of her (aka anything of demonic nature), it goes without saying that Zadkiel has a fierce personality. She is a warrior who has fought many battles and must have seen and experienced things no one could put into words, ever. Consequently, I want her to be tough and strong, a little exasperated from time to time too – but also inherently good and full of love (even at the expense of a headache or an annoyed groan). While she might not like you for example, she would still safe you nevertheless. Not for the sake of fame or the glory, but because she cares, in the simplest and most sincere ways. And this is what makes her beautiful in my eyes. I JUST LOVE HER.
About Zadkiel’s holy dagger: Although I have no concrete image for it in mind yet (this will probably take me a good while), I want Zadkiel to be the only one who is able to wield it. Only she should be able to activate it’s power of measuring one’s Karma, as it is her domain. Hence, if anyone else but Zadkiel should try to use it, it will be nothing more but a normal dagger. An ugly one even, seemingly rusty and old, as I’d like to imagine that it would also only be in its physical glory in the angel’s hands as well.
As a last comment, I imagine that encounters with vampires will probably be the most conflicting for her, especially if the said vampires were turned against their will.
◆ Interview Questions ◆
(1) Question One: Is it difficult to manage your vessel when you have always resided in Heaven? Is something in particular about the vessel incredibly annoying?
“It has… needs. It requires an abundance of care. It restricts me in many ways.” Zadkiel made an annoyed gesture with her hands. Who would have thought that a human body could be this exhausting? If Lucifer had known as much all those thousand years ago, perhaps he wouldn’t have started a rebellion. A self-depreciating smile bends her lips as she was lost in thought. “I hate to admit it, but I was lucky to have found such an attractive vessel. It is frightening how important physical appearances are in this world. You must never refrain from hygiene, which brings me back to my first point.”
(2) Question Two: Now that you are on Earth and are witnessing humanity live on with free will, did your task in Heaven involving casting judgement upon your kin wound you more deeply?
For once, the angel knew of no immediate reply or quip. Not because she was hesitant to reply but because she was searching for the right words to say. She’d spend a lot of time thinking about similar questions already. Though at some point, she’d also come to terms with her way of life. She’d concluded that everything and everyone was unique in their own ways, and that this was the only way to keep balance between the worlds. “No.” At last, her answer was simple but final, spoken in a way which did not allow room for more questions. Her good will would never be shaken twice.
◆ Writing Sample ◆
When Zadkiel decended from Heaven, the Earthen plane sighed deeply. The world that had once been far was suddenly close; it shuddered underneath the angel’s holy presence, just as did she. Gone was her familiar environment and sanctuary. Gone was she for the purpose of one divine mission – completely and irrevocably in the name of the Lord until her orders would change.
It turned out that she had landed in Crescent Grove, amidst a row of beautifully blooming orchid trees. Darkness surrounded her and for the first time in her existence, Zadkiel found herself trapped in time. It changed down here. Day became night and night became day in a seemingly endless circle, though she knew better. This was the realm of mortality. Nothing here was meant to last forever, really. It was entirely different from her own and herself – she was created and born into immortality. Thus, an alien feeling clawed at her being. She felt strangely incomplete.
Considering the village’s old history, it came as no surprise that it was the first place the angel was made to visit. Great bloodshed had taken place on its very soil and the stories and legends which remained of it served as a reminder. A reminder of how frail and fickle the human free will was. While it was certainly not her task to sway and influence the minds of the humans who resided on Earth, she’d be damned if she allowed the scales to shift in Hell’s favor. These thoughts weighed heavily upon her shoulders and caused her to move forward.
Although her quest for a compatible vessel had been a short one, it was also one of fate. Her vessel was a woman named Naza. True to her name, which meant honesty, purity and justice, Naza turned out to be someone whose heart was in the right place – yet lacked power. For only moments before their fortunate encounter, she had gotten herself in a dangerous situation by risking the wrath of a vampire. The vampire had forced himself on a woman and Naza attempted to stop him. With her being only a human though, the situation became dire. And that was precisely when Zadkiel found her and reached out to her. A blinding stream of light seemed to transition into her body. Both of them strived for the same goals and needed each other just as equally.
Who are you? What are you?
My name is Zadkiel. I can help you. I want to help you. Become one with me.
Fueled by Naza’s wish for permanent retribution and Zadkiel’s will to protect, they bonded instantly and unleashed a rain of flames, burning the vampire to tiny ashes until he was no more. It was also that night, that rumors started to spread about a powerful witch from Crescent Grove who was capable of wielding fire magic like no other.
Therefore, one could say that Zadkiel’s arrival on Earth was a literal blast, though not one which would have an end to it for as long as there were threats to her Father’s precious creation.
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dantediscoversfic · 7 years
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Chapter 16: Rules
One of the reasons I liked Ari so much was that though we differed in opinion about many things (like which are the best comics) and though we had what might seem from the outside as diametrically opposed outlooks on life (his was much darker than mine; in fact he once claimed that brooding was healthy because it was good exercise for his eyebrows) and though he enjoyed yanking my chain about a lot of things, when it came down to it he made me laugh more than just about any other person on the planet. We were like seatbelts: we just clicked. He might not have thought so himself, but he had a big imagination and was very thoughtful and philosophical and funny and sensitive and kind. There was also a sadness in him that he tried to hide from me, but I could see it in his eyes sometimes. We never talked about it, though. He was better at not talking about things than I was.
In truth, I liked it when he argued with me (though argue isn’t really the right word, since we never got angry at each other; debate would be more accurate). And I especially liked when I was able to win him over. I’d been on Debate and Speech teams since middle school so he must have known that he never stood a chance when I got into that point-counterpoint mode but he never got cranky with me. (Or if he did, I knew it was all for show).
One area where he eventually came around to my way of thinking was my thing about liking rules. I have a general respect for rules and discipline and technique. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a pro-fascist or anything like that and I like the idea of chaos and nihilism just as much as the next teenager longing for independence. And I also know that breaking the rules is fun, too, and often a necessity in creating art and living the life you want to live. But I can see why rules are useful, too, especially if they grant you freedom within structure. I think your brain starts working differently if you’re trying to compose a sonnet in iambic pentameter vs if you’re writing a stream of consciousness journal entry. Neither is better or worse, but rules can be part of the fun and the challenge.
My thing with liking to cuss, for example. I liked cussing but knew that I wouldn’t relish it quite as much if my parents allowed me to throw around f-bombs any old effing time I felt like it. Or my thing about not liking to wear shoes. Who was the puritanical jerk who decided that it’s a Western societal norm that everyone has to wear shoes everywhere they go, anyway? If I want to take my shoes off outside or on the bus or in church or in the movie theater and I’m not hurting or offending anyone by letting my toes feel the wind and sun and air, why should I keep my shoes on when they cause me nothing but torture and discomfort? When did taking off your shoes in public become as bad as breaking one of the Ten Commandments? And it’s a good general life rule to follow in Jesus’ footsteps, right? I just choose a literal interpretation of that since he didn’t wear shoes either.
But where things like games were concerned, I liked rules. I thought of rules as being like a container or a cup for water (in this metaphor water=fun and freedom). Without the container, what do you get? Just liquid spilled all over the front of your shirt.
I liked coming up with new games for us, with the caveat that we played by the self-established rules. The first game we made up together was the shoe toss game (or as I named it: Urban Javelshoe). It started out simply because I felt like throwing my shoes around (because shoes are a nuisance and may as well be walloped for all the good they serve). At first he griped at me because I wanted to measure with chalk exactly how far each of us could throw our shoes on the street. He said it took away the fun, which to him was the act of throwing. I argued that the fun was not just the throwing, but the whole system we created together: deciding how many tosses we made per set, using chalk and a tape measure to record each of our throws, deciding how many sets qualified for a win. Just throwing shoes around for no reason? Plebian. This was much more interesting and systematic and fun. He came around, eventually. And though I won the game, he ended up having the longest recorded toss, which I could tell he was secretly pleased about.
Here are some of the other games we made up that summer:
Tap-Out. One of us would tap or punch out the beat to a song on the other person’s arm and the other would try and guess the song just based on the rhythm. We’d decide on the genre (such as Top 40 or The Beatles) and if the person didn’t guess right after three tap-outs then the tapper could hum the rhythm once (with no varied notes, just the rhythm on one straight note). After five rounds, the winner got to choose which music we listened to all afternoon.
Lava Ground. We’d play this in the yard or up in my room. You’d have to leap from place to place and land on furniture, cushions, pillows, clothes, shoes or basically whatever you could maneuver to land on as long as you didn’t touch the ground (because it was made of lava). If your bare skin touched the ground you had to act out a horrific death. The loser also had to clean up everything that we ended up spreading out on the floor or grass.
Passenger Palaver. We’d come up with stories about our fellow passengers during our afternoon bus rides. At first there were no rules but then I decided that one of us should make up a line or phrase for the story and the person telling the story would have to somehow include that phrase. Or sometimes we’d trade off after each line, making up the story together as we went along.
The Superhero Origin Generator. We’d go around my house and each of us would pick out two objects (such as a rolling pin and toothbrush). The other person would then have to make up how those two objects led to the creation of a superhero’s powers. For example: Mikey’s mother is a baker. One day her collection of rolling pins falls on her head and she tragically dies before young Mikey’s very own eyes. He grows up hating anything sweet. He despises cakes and donuts and cookies because they remind him of his dead mom. As a result, he becomes obsessed with brushing his teeth and never has a single cavity. But one day he has a mysterious tooth ache so he goes to a dentist’s check up. He doesn’t know that this dentist is in fact evil and while he’s in the dentist’s chair getting his teeth X-rayed, the evil dentist Dr. X turns up the machine to unprecedented levels. Mikey’s teeth become radioactive blasters. After that, every time he smiles, it unleashes a ray of toxic light more powerful than the sun. From that day forward he becomes: Gamma Tooth Man. If something we came up was particularly good we might make our own comic about it. Ari wasn’t much of an artist, so I’d draw and he’d come up with action, dialogue and concept. We made a good team.
Telenovela Lipread. We’d put a soap opera on silent and make up our own lines of dialogue. The only rule was that each character needed its own distinct voice or accent. Ari was surprisingly good at playing naïve love struck heroines (ironically, of course).
One day, after I’d just finished reading all of The Lord of the Rings books, I got the idea that Ari and I should make up our own language, like Elvish.
When I told Ari about my idea, he snorted and said, “So you’d rather make up an entirely new language than learn Spanish? You really hate Spanish that much?”
“If we had our own language we could write each other notes and letters and be the only ones who understand them. If they’re in Spanish our parents could snoop.”
“If you wanted to write in secret you could just make up a code, not a whole new language. That seems like a lot of work.”
“If Tolkien could do it how hard can it actually be?”
“How the hell do you go about making up a new language anyway?”
“I’m not sure. We might have to do some research.”
“Research? During the summer? For no other reason than you think it would be cool to undertake the massively insane project of inventing a new language?”
“Yeah. We’d be be like C-3PO when R2-D2 beeps and no one else knows what he’s saying.”
“Yes, but they’re talking in droidspeak. It’s probably just randomly generated gobbledygook.”
“Or maybe it’s as poetic as Shakespeare. But we’ll never know. Don’t you want to know what it’s like to speak a language only one other person on the planet understands?”
“It sounds exclusionary. I’m a man of the people.”
“You’re a man of the lazy. Come on, let’s go to the library so I can search the card catalogue about books on linguistics.”
So we went to the library. I love the library. I love the card catalogue. It makes finding the perfect book like going on a treasure hunt. While I was talking to the librarian, Ari wandered away from the desk and told me he was going to look around. No card catalogue for him, he was a browser.
It took awhile but I eventually located some potentially useful book on linguistics and went looking for Ari. I looked in every section I thought he would be, but he had vanished; I even looked in the bathroom and outside on the street. I went up to the 2nd floor and he wasn’t there. I looked on the 1st floor again. Nothing. I was starting to get worried. I went down to the ground floor level and that’s when I finally spotted him. He was sitting at the microfilm reader of all things. I went up to him to see what he was looking at.
“Hey,” I said.
He jumped. I guess I’d startled him.
“What are you looking at?”
“Nothing. Just old newspapers and stuff. I didn’t realize they had all these old articles on microfilm down here. The librarian just told me about it.”
“Anything in particular you’re looking at?”
“No, just browsing.”
“Just browsing El Paso Times articles from ten years ago for fun? And you call me the weird one?”
“Whatever. I thought it might be cool. Like a time machine or something. Are you done? We can leave.”
He pulled the film he was looking at out of the reader and returned it. I also saw that he had a book with him.
“What’s that book? You going to check it out?”
“It’s nothing. Just about the Vietnam War. I was just flipping through it while I waited for you.”
He put the book back on a return cart and we left. On the way home he didn’t talk much and I could tell something was bothering him. But he didn’t tell me what it was and I didn’t press him on it, even though I really wanted to. Like I said, he was better at not talking about things than I was. I thought maybe if we had our own secret language made up already he’d want to talk to me, but I knew that was wishful thinking. We’d only been friends for about a month, but I’d already guessed what most of his rules were.
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paperok4-blog · 7 years
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Rift chapter- 5
I Share Thoughts With A Demon
-Kimberly-
I almost tripped over a rock, walking around in a foreign forest in the dark not very smart. I wiped some sweat off of my face with the sleeve of my sweater yeah when I ran out of Gordon`s house I snatched my sweater from the clothesline. Somehow, Cera managed to find me and give me my knife,
Isn’t there anyway to get rid of him?  She had asked me, his laughter shook my mind at that, there was no way to get rid of him I already knew that. Moreover, since he took control earlier he's probably going to roam around in my head for a while fighting for control.
-Oh come on- the voice urged –it is not as if you do not enjoy my company, you gave in to your anger you let me out now I want you to do it again-
“Go to hell” I stopped walking “I will never let you hurt anyone else” he laughed, as always jumbling my thoughts
-Mark my words girl; I will have you slay someone before the night is up. Just like that time- before I could deny him someone screamed from the way I came then the night fell silent again
“HELP ME!” the voice screamed again “PLEASE SOMEONE HELP ME!” Thomas! I started running toward his voice, shut up Thomas before you attract something that will eat you, or worse.
-yes, yes worse, what could be worse than being eaten? Maybe getting slain by your sister would be-
“Shut up!” I almost tripped over my own feet “I won’t hurt Thomas!” tears burned my eyes why was he even out here? It’s almost midnight damn you Gordon. “Thomas!” I shouted, “Where are you?”
“Kim? Is that you?” Thomas` voice was just ahead, but I could hardly see anything
“Tho-” I literally ran off a cliff, I barely had time to curse before I fell into the pit and right onto somebody
“Ow! Get off of me!” after a minute or so of struggling to untangle ourselves, we managed to get away from each other “is that you Kim?”
“Thomas?”  Anger welled up inside of me “what the hell are you doing out here? Where is Cera?” it took a few seconds for Thomas to answer but who could blame him,
“It was you wasn’t it”
-Ah here it comes-
“You killed all those people three years ago”
“What? How do you know about that?” the air seemed to be getting colder, my knife grew heavy in my pocket. I couldn’t see Thomas` face but something was wrong
“While you were sleeping and Cera was in there with you, Gordon told me about how a kid slaughtered three whole villages, including his wife and son” realization settled in
“Thomas,” I started
-Yes! Release your anger! – No, NO! Leave me alone! –this boy’s death cannot be prevented! Kill him now!-
“SHUT UP!” I grabbed my temples as if I were trying to keep my head in one piece
“Who are you talking to?” he asked, I looked toward the sound of his voice for some reason he was standing up
“Thomas.” I tried again but I could barely formulate a sentence the voice kept screaming at me to kill
“I'm sorry” what? “Hey lady!” Thomas yelled, “Hurry up before she gets away!”
“What are you-” I was cut off when everything started shaking then lights shined down on us from above and cage bars closed over the opening of the pit. I looked at Thomas “whats going on?” Thomas didn’t respond. We started rising into the air along with the pit, for a few seconds the lights blinded me. They reminded me of when I was arrested for fighting Rhea, at least four cop cars were outside of our house with their blinding lights. Dirt fell away revealing the structure we were trapped in; it was a cage the pit was a cage it was suspended by a cable attached to a tree, apparently a strong tree.  Spotlights from the ground were aimed at us and someone was standing on top of the cage
“Thank you Thomas Strander” a woman’s voice said, “Now I can unleash all of my anger on this damned primion!” the figure leapt off the cage, somersaulted through the air and landed on the ground.  “Come on out” the wall of the cage fell open “just jump, I promise the worse that could happen is a few broken limbs”
“Thomas! What did you do?” I looked up at him; he seemed to be trying to figure how much damage jumping would do “Thomas!” I yelled
“She caught me in her trap, and I agreed to be bait to catch you.” Thomas turned to face me his eyes merciless “you killed all of those people”
“Thomas!” Thomas jumped but before he hit the ground, he stopped midair. The woman was extending her arm to him she was like me
“Come on down” Thomas lowered to the ground slowly until he finally touched down “now for you” the two of them stared up at me. I had to find a way out of here
“What are you going to do with her?” Thomas asked
“I'm going to kill her of course” the woman grinned “once she comes down here”
-Kill them- the voice returned after a luxurious period of silence his will overtook me in a matter of seconds – KILL THEM- I jumped from the cage toward them and ripped the knife from my pocket the woman barely had time to react when I tackled her to the ground.
“You bitch!” an invisible force tried to push me away and it probably would’ve propelled me into the air but somehow I held on to her shoulder and her hair
“Kim stop!” Thomas yelled, “Please stop!” I wrestled to pin her down; my knife ended up stuck in the dirt as she kicked me in the gut then started crawling away
“Whats wrong?” someone else’s voice spoke through my mouth as I got to my feet, the lights were blinding but I could see her crawling away pitifully “no more magic?”  Thomas wrapped his arms around me in an attempt to restrain me but I hit him in the nose with the back of my head then broke free of his grip and snatched up my knife “get back here!” the woman got to her feet and I walked into an invisible wall, the fear was clear in her eyes. I pushed against the wall and started pushing it back gaining ground on her by the second, but she didn’t back down. My magic was too powerful, she fell to her knees still pressing against me I knowing if she let go now she would get pushed into the dirt
“Kim!” Thomas kept his distance this time “you’re killing her!”, that is when I woke up standing over a woman using telekinetic force to push her down and she was pushing back, but just barely. I let up on the force, a fatal mistake; I was pushed to the side into a tree. It took a second to regain my balance but in that second the woman got to her feet
“This is for my daughter,” she growled but before she could act, I reacted throwing my knife with perfect aim.  It lodged itself right between her eyes and she crumpled to the ground.
-What did I tell you? - The voice mocked Thomas stared at me, his horror filled face illuminated in the light. I stood up and Thomas ran
“Thomas Wait!” I yelled but Thomas vanished into the darkness
-You killed her- tears streamed down my cheeks –you killed her and you didn’t even know her name- I collapsed onto my knees –why do you think I chose you? You are the perfect one to free me from my prison- he was right. He stopped controlling me before I stopped pressing her I killed her. I cradled my head in my arms staring at the fresh corpse; it would happen all over again. Just like that time and I couldn’t stop it.
https://www.booksie.com/471581-rift
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