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#or even if i am i don't deserve to have that fact torment me my whole life

suiana · 3 months

Note

Sometimes I feel like I see a lot of mean darling (no offense to the mean people out there, do whatever you like with your pathetic yanderes)

but what do you think of a darling that’s super nice and friendly but then one day someone says something stupid (like a homophobe or smtn lmao 💀) and they just immediately say “Kill yourself” with no hesitation, then when people tell them they can’t say that they just say “whatttt I’m just saying what we’re all thinking”? You don’t have to answer, I just really am going insane because I’m too scared to write this myself 😭

i like ur idea anon

(yandere! tsundere x gn! sweet reader) (reader is secretly very unhinged)

"ugh you're so- i hate you! you don't deserve to-"

"kill yourself."

the tsundere, who is your classmate, immediately shuts up, staring at you as his mouth drops wider and wider by the second. what did you just say? are his ears working right? there's no way you could've said that haha...

"what? could you repeat that?"

"i said, kill yourself."

your tsundere classmate and you maintain eye contact, standing in silence as the weight of your words sinks in. the reality that you had just cursed at him comes crashing down on him like a ton of bricks and all he can do is stare at you like a dumb fish. and the fact that you don't have your usual cheery smile and aura is adding to the shock factor.

like seriously?

did you just seriously tell him to kill himself?

...

did you get possessed?

hit your head on something?

or maybe you were threatened to act like this?

the tsundere puts aside his pride for a second, walking up to you and observing your face with a careful expression. hm... you look okay...

"h-hey are you okay? you can't just say that you know-"

"I'm just saying what's been on my mind."

the tsundere is even more shocked now. flabbergasted even. what happened to the sweet and friendly darling he knew?! who is this person?!

"who-"

"I'm the person you've always tormented. i just couldn't handle you acting like you hate me anymore that's why i said that."

you shrug at him before going back to being all happy and cheerful.

"anyways remember to do the homework! it's due tomorrow! bye bye!"

you then skip out of the classroom, humming a merry tune as you leave your classmate alone with his thoughts. he stares at the spot you once stood at, completely stoned as his brain lags and he tries to compute what just happened.

there's no way you actually said that... kill himself? are you serious?

but somehow, he can't help but feel even more attracted to you. huh...

maybe he's a masochist.

#suiana's sinners #yandere #tw yandere #yandere x reader #yandere drabbles #yandere imagines #yandere scenarios #yandere concept #yandere tsundere #yandere tsundere x reader #gn reader #suiana rambling #suiana brainrotting

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ss-skyearn · 1 year

Text

Took Too Much

❝They say your love lasts forever if you see the first snow together.❞

PAIRING : Hwang Hyunjin x female!reader

WORD COUNT : 4.5k.

GENRE : Angst, Smut, Fluff.

WARNINGS/CONTENT : explicit sexual content, substance abuse, longing, mutual pining, vulnerability, they're in love and just want each other, angst with a happy ending.

SMUT WARNINGS : grinding, dry humping, foreplay, petnames, launderie kink, desperation, WORSHIPPING (quite literally), unprotected intercourse (don't try at home).

A/N : This piece is a little heavier than what I usually write but am particularly fond of it; feedback much appreciated. As usual, enjoy, lovelies. ♡

But it's a silhouette you'd recognize anywhere.

Those legs that you were trapped between during stolen moments of vulnerability.

Those large palms that held you down while you shook from the white hot pleasure the same hands brought you.

That soft blonde mop of hair that tickled your inner thighs when the same head was buried in your heat, almost every chilly night like today. And every warm one too.

It's funny.

How a single 'ding' can mean so much, can seize your heart, can threaten to bring out what you have been trying so hard to suppress.

It was a heat of the moment thing, done in good fun.

"It gives me a special privilege," he'd said.

"That makes no sense. You already occupy the largest unit in my heart," you'd breathed against his lips.

Moving back an inch, he'd whined, "It'll let you know it's me and that you have to abandon everything to give me attention. Pretty, please?"

You never could say no to his doe eyes, a fact he exploited on the daily.

So you'd given in, changing the ringtone for his messages and calls to one that is seperate from the rest of your contacts.

So really, it was a spur of the moment decision he'd proposed after having been interrupted mid make out session, him claiming a special place on yet another part of your being.

It's funny, honestly.

How the tone that once was the cause of butterflies going rampant in the pits of your belly, now has reason to cause grief of the same, if not more, measure.

You know who it is before you even chance a glance at your screen, but you look all the same.

Not knowing what you were expecting, the sorrow burning a deeper shade of red is felt and you reckon that it's the price to pay for reaching out to something you know would elicit a reaction such as this.

Hyun<3

You hadn't deleted his contact, the reason you're unsure of to this day. Perhaps a reminder that he did in fact once exist in your life, had a grounding presence, a place reserved all for himself in the mainland of your heart, and not someone entirely dreamt up.

It surely felt like it at times.

The silence from his end hurt you, broke you, shattered you, despite having been at your request. Days seemingly never ending, nights even moreso, your house empty, bed cold. All of it ate away at you a little at a time, leaving behind a silhouette tainted with holes, torn and run down at the edges.

You'd be lying if you said you didn't imagine, didn't long, didn't yearn for this very moment. The moment his side of the silence ceases, the moment he, despite your asks, reaches out.

So why does your heart feel about fit to burst at the seams? Why do you so badly want to run away? Why do you feel the air suddenly burning its way into your lungs?

"Hello?" your voice is but a whisper, foreign to anyone who's known you.

"Baby?"

Eyes closing shut, you let a long drawn sigh escape your nostrils. Being all too consumed in the eagerness of the manifestation of the moment you'd been wanting, you didn't stop to consider what his voice was capable of inflicting, underestimating your own longing for everything that's him.

"Baby, you there?"

"Why are you calling me?"

A rustling sound follows, as he lets out his own well deserved breath of air.

It's a sense of relief, if anything. Knowing that you're not the only one tormented.

A sick, sadistic kind of relief, sure. But relief all the same. Labels stopped meaning much to you a while ago.

"Missed your voice," he mumbles, tone having an unusual tilt to it.

You don't respond. Or rather, you can't. For if you will yourself to speak in this moment, a choked sob is about all that'll make its way out.

"Missed you," the tilt deepens and you catch yourself mere moments before voicing out your concerns. Not having spoken to him since the pair of you parted ways, it's going to take time adjusting to the fact that he's no longer accountable to your questions, your worries. And you're no longer expected to care for him.

You are no longer wanted.

"Why are you calling?" you echo, the fact that your voice is growing quieter by the second not lost on you. If anything, it's the same fact that withholds you from saying more.

"It's the first snow today."

You know what he's thinking. It'd be a lie to say you haven't been thinking the same all day.

You stay quiet, waiting for the blow.

When did you turn into such a masochist? You know the next thing coming out of his mouth is going to tear apart your tattered heart that you've been fixing up the past year since he left you.

"We met on the day of the first snow."

Alas, bandaids don't fix bullet holes.

They're ripped apart, shredded to nothing. Tattered and frayed, used for all their worth. Leaving behind the pieces of your heart, desperately clinging onto each other, trying and failing to stay in league.

"They say your love lasts forever if you see the first snow together."

A dry chuckle follows, filling the air with despair, a feeling contrary to the act in of itself.

"That's all fucking bullshit, isn't it?" the tilt to his voice wavers, a little sniffle enough to withdraw one from you too.

"Look where it got us," the silky voice breaks, the same one you adored.

The voice that once called you 'love', whispered confessions into your hair, your ears, your core. The voice that took on a hoarse tone when you woke up in his arms on late mornings, the one that promised to be with you always.

Empty confessions. Empty promises.

"Why are you calling?" seems like this is the only thing that's making its way out of your throat tonight. The only thing that can make its way out.

He hums, then chuckles again. The same hollow laugh, detached, impassive, phlegmatic.

"You always were stubborn, weren't you?"

"Hyunjin," your voice is stern, indicative of a warning.

But he finds no such emotion behind it.

"Keep going."

"Wh—"

"Keep saying my name. Please."

It's only going to take so much for the choked sob that you've been holding at the back of your throat to be let out. And it's taking every fibre, every alight neuron within you to keep it in.

"Why?" a meek whisper. Your voice wavering.

"Because I love it. Love you," a quiet sob. His tone trembling. "Still," A single word. Sealing in an entire universe worth of meaning.

Eyes falling shut again, you don't stop the trail of heat that burns your cheeks. For the first time in a year, you let yourself go. Let yourself feel.

Even if it's grief. Even if it's sorrow.

Your let yourself feel.

A huff of breath is heard through the receiver, followed by a shudder.

"You were always better than me with cold."

Your eyes snap open, back ramrod straight and despite knowing what you'll find, you hastily draw the curtains aside. And sure enough, the snowfall is steady, windy breeze rustling leaves off their petioles, streets emptier than they should be considering the early hours of night.

And for good reason.

"Hyun, are you out?"

"You still have me all figured out," he lets out, and you can almost see his breath condensing in front of his face, courtesy the coldest day of this year's winter.

"What are you doing out? Get in right now," the assertive tone isn't something you've used in a while. Maybe you just didn't have anyone to use it on anymore.

He chuckles again, seemingly the only reaction he's able to give you, the only reaction that doesn't involve speaking, lest the wobble to his tone give him away.

"Hyun, seriously. Get the fuck in."

"Can't."

"Why not?"

"Don't know where I am," the sigh that follows lets you know that he just closed his eyes. It's the one he let out every night when he laid behind you, his chest to your back, him buried deep in you. It's when he felt the most at peace, he used to say. Coming home and being with you, feeling you, inside out. Quite literally.

Though what he's finding peaceful about the biting cold is beyond you.

"What do you mean you don't know? Hyun, don't fuck with me right now."

The next chortle is almost a laugh, the irony of your statement not lost on you. You think you hear something eerily similar to "how I wish" through the microphone, but you choose to ignore it.

"Hyunjin. For the last time, where are you?" even as your tone indicates your growing impatience, your body works on autopilot. Before you know it, you're getting up and reaching for your car keys, all while throwing a fleece jacket over your shoulder.

"Is getting you mad the only way to make you say my name?"

He's not listening. Something you're not used to. Sure, not listening and communicating is what got you both where you are today, but it's something you've never been at the receiving end of. It's the complaint he always had. And the complaint you always brushed off.

You suddenly remember another spur of the moment thing you did back in the day.

You pull out the app where you had your locations visible to each other, knowing of the other's whereabouts at all times. Your friends had called it a red flag, that he was possessive, obsessive even, to suggest something of this sort.

Little did they know it was your idea.

You see him, his little bitmoji some ten kilometres away from your current location.

Even as you're making your way to the car, shoving the steady falling snow out of the way, you make a show of protesting, "Use goggle maps and drive home."

"Can't drive either."

"Why?"

Silence.

And it gives you reason to fret. Despite the unnerving tilt, he's been responsive and dare you say vulnerable all throughout, the shake to his voice not holding him back from letting his feelings known.

So the first time he's silent is enough to make you break into a cold sweat.

"Hyun, why can't you drive?"

You hear him drag a hand down his face, some rustling of clothes following shortly after.

Another deep exhale, another beat of silence.

"Hyunjin," you settle on it as the last measure, knowing it's the only way he'll answer, the weakness he has for you saying his name made plenty clear today.

"I'm sorry," the whisper is barely there, almost lost in the sounds of your engine revving.

But he's the only one you've ever had ears for.

So you hear him. You hear him loud and clear.

"Why?" while he may not be egoistic, apologising isn't something either of you are good at. It's always been that way. A constant push and pull, a tug of war, a battle of wills, seeing you caves in first, who loses first. Hardly a healthy partnership, but what you had with him made it all worth it. More than worth it. He's the closest thing to a soulmate you'll ever have. If they do in fact exist, he's your other half.

He once was. He always will be.

"I- I just.. I'm sorry, baby."

Ice cold panic grips your heart, the external cold fading by comparison. He's apologized twice in a row now, and while your past self would call it improvement, in this moment, dread is the only sentiment you feel.

You stay silent, stepping on the race, praying he doesn't pick up on the sound of your engine accelerating.

A long moment of daunting silence later, he says something you don't understand, or rather refuse to understand.

"I took too much."

Its beyond refusal, a feeling akin to denial.

You deny to process what he just said, what he just implied, what he just meant.

"Stay right where you are," so, much like everything else, you choose to ignore it.

He seems taken aback for all of three seconds before his tone softens, "You coming to get me?"

You choose to ignore this too, convincing yourself that this is just mindless rambling to him.

His words suddenly hold no weight, his confessions empty.

Like always.

You glance at the GPS mounted to the dash.

One kilometre away.

"Do you remember when I kissed you?"

"You've kissed me more times than I can count."

Even as your heart is splitting in two, even after the recent realisation, you somehow find yourself reponding.

It's honestly all you've been wanting since he walked out of the bedroom, out of the apartment, out of your life that late September night.

"That day. The day of the first snow. The day we met."

You don't respond.

He takes it as a sign to continue.

"I knew it then. I know you knew it too."

Eight hundred metres.

"That you were for me. And I you."

Silence from your end again.

"How did we end up here?"

You know how. He knows how.

Five hundred metres.

Suddenly, a loud beep resounds, the call abruptly ending. That sends you into a chill panic, grip on the gear tightening. You pull over, and try tracing his location again. To no avail.

The location is gone. The ringtone goes straight to voicemail. Messages not delivering.

You squeeze your eyes shut, trying to remind yourself between deep breaths that he's capable of taking care of himself.

But then comes a gush of memories. Of a time when he walked straight into a pole while facetiming you once. You'd laughed then and called him a manchild.

The memory, albeit fond, doesn't help ease your worries, only aggravating the uneasy churn of your stomach.

Exhaling loudly, you talk yourself down your own anxiety first, realising that this is the first step if you want to have any chance at getting to him.

This is the general location, you remember. Once again, you kick start your car, the frantic rumble of the engine echoing down the empty roads, signifying the urgency of the affair.

It takes another twenty minutes and a slow drive down the snowy streets for you to spot a silhouette in the distance.

The person is slumped down against a rusty pole, back pressed to it, long legs propped up with feet flat on the snow covered pavement, head resting on the bend of their elbow thrown over upward knees. With their head buried in the crook of their arm, their face isn't visible, the thick smog hovering around them adding to the haze.

But it's a silhouette you'd recognize anywhere.

Those legs that you were trapped between during stolen moments of vulnerability.

Those large palms that held you down while you shook from the white hot pleasure the same hands brought you.

That soft blonde mop of hair that tickled your inner thighs when the same head was buried in your heat, almost every chilly night like today. And every warm one too.

You don't know when you got off your car, for now you find yourself looking down at the same silky golden locks.

Your boots sink into the snow, the ice underneath them melting.

He gives no indication of knowing of your arrival, and you wonder if he's managed to somehow fall asleep here.

Tiny snowflakes having made themselves home on his hair, almost forming a halo, he looks angelic. You reach out, wanting to dust them off his head before your stop, hand hovering.

You're suddenly tentative, when you didn't hesitate to tug on these very locks whenever he was in you.

That simple knowledge brings forth the harsh reality.

He's here. Right in front of you. Yet so far away.

Hand still in air, you're entirely unprepared when his head suddenly shoots up, palm grabbing your wrist.

"Baby?" his voice is gravelly, eyes bleary.

Yet he's the most perfect piece of art you ever did see.

He's gorgeous, your mind says to you— as if the fact could've ever been hidden, been denied even in incoherence.

But it's when you look closely that it comes crashing down. The realisation.

His slim face is gaunt now, eyes red and hazy, bags prominent. He's gorgeous, sure, but not as stunning as he once was.

You're suddenly knocked off balance, back pressing into the pole he was just resting on, the surface hot from his warmth.

It takes far too long for you to perceive what it is that's actually happening. His fingers dig into your hips, large palms splayed over your back, winding to the front, thumbs meeting. Warm breath tickles your neck, forcing out a gasp of your own.

"You're here," his voice is hushed, reverent even, afraid that the illusion of you would disappear any moment.

You nudge his shoulder, trying to shake him off, albeit unwillingly.

He removes himself from where he's nestled, looks you in the eye before closing them, forehead resting against yours.

From what you were able to make from that brief glimpse into his orbs, they're bloodshot, not the kind that result from lack of sleep nor the ones that speak of tiredness.

No, they are indicative of him being far away from the realm of normal thinking. It's the excuse you allow yourself to live, the reason you don't push him off you.

He's not thinking.

His tongue darts out, gliding over the plump of his lower lip, the texture of which you know by heart. Parting open, quick breaths leave him, and the proximity is to blame for the fact that it goes right into your mouth.

He puffs rapidly as if suddenly breathless, lips quivering, seemingly trying to find something to say, or perhaps trying to not say what his heart wants to.

"Tell me you're real this time."

This time?

"Hyun—"

"Just- just tell me you're really here," his eyes open slowly, drowsily, forehead still pressed into yours, hands sliding from your hip up your sides, caressing, feeling, landing on your nape.

Once again they circle you, this time overlapping over the back of your neck as he pulls you closer still, "That I'm not making you up again."

"What happened to you?" looking into his eyes again, you know it's not him. He's gone. For now.

So it's more of a question to yourself than to him.

What happened to him? What happened to your artist, your lover, your Hyunjin?

And just as you surmised, your question fell on deaf ears for he is a man on a mission.

"Baby, you're here right? With me? You came to me?"

Moving to close your nimble hands over his big ones, you relish in their warmth for a moment, the reason of said unnatural heat another thing you choose to ignore for now.

You can wallow in guilt by yourself later. All you want.

But now that you've allowed yourself this moment of weakness with him, you plan to bank on it.

"Yes, Hyun, it's me. I'm here."

Encircling your arms around broad shoulders, you pull him to you, into you. His own hands slip to your hips, squeezing you right back.

"I keep seeing you everywhere, everyday. Wherever I am. Whenever I'm awake."

You think you hear a sob, but don't let it show, for you're not immune to the sorrow either.

Maybe the apathetic front was just that, after all. A front. One you had to put up, one you had to believe in— fool yourself into believing in, if only for self preservation.

"You're not making me up this time."

He doesn't reply with words, doesn't need to. The way his hold on you tightens, lips brushing the side of your neck speaks volumes.

Hot, wet kissed trail up the column of your throat, their heat melting off any snow falling on you. Surroundings be damned, you throw your head back, giving him the silent consent.

That seems to be invitation enough for him, as his kisses turn to sucking, sucking turns to biting. He's marking you, something he enjoyed partaking in quite a lot back in the day, and you already know the colour of each of the marks that he's leaving, only through the pressure and the ratio of tongue-teeth action he spares your skin.

You permit it, indulging him, indulging yourself.

But it's when he noses his way to your jaw and finally lifts up to look into your eyes that you're reminded of reality, of his incapacitated state.

You jolt back, practically shoving him off.

He's understandably puzzled, brows creasing, panting.

"Wh— did I do something wrong? I remember you liked when I did this? You don't anymore?"

"No. It's not that. I do like it. Maybe even more than before."

The crease to his forehead eases out as he takes a single step forward, to which you take one of your own. In the opposite direction.

He stops dead in his tracks, the bend to his brows deeper than before.

"Baby, why are you going away from me?"

You try not to look into his eyes, the branching redness visibly growing new stems by the second.

"Don't go away from me."

Unlike what some might assume, you're not put off, not repulsed by gleam to his eyes, nor by their sanguinence. In not too proud of a moment, you'd say you're even used to it.

It's what you see every time you look into the mirror. What you hate, what you need.

A vicious cycle. A cursed affair.

The glint in your eye reflects his, ignites his, the two light beams meeting to string together.

The profane symphony. The impious consonance.

You did try. Tried not to let it take over you, it's been more than half a day since you last indulged in a sniff, after all. But Hyunjin is nothing if not a vice to your repressive instincts.

Your kryptonite. Your aphrodisiac.

One look at his bloodhsot eyes and you know this is it. He is the one. Who else could be the other half to your broken, tattered soul? Who else could be the mirror image of your own intoxicated orbs? Who else could slot into your cracks?

He steps forward, and this time you don't have it in you to recoil. Closing your lids, you let him snake his arms around your waist, pull you impossibly close. His face finds the comfort of your neck again, hot breathe laced with desperation marking the seeping away of the last of your restraint, taking with it any hope you had to do this right. For once.

"Don't go."

You've known him long enough to realise he's pulling apart your guard, piece by excruciating piece. You've known yourself long enough to realise you're caving, embracing the pain that is him.

"Let's get you home."

You don't see anything, too consumed in the fire that is him, his touch.

You're kissing him like you need him to breath. He's kissing you like he needs you to survive.

His hands pull down the zipper to your shirt, legs guiding you back onto the bed proper, step by step.

You land on your back with a soft thud, shirt thrown off somewhere. His own following suit soon after.

His eyes land onto the black lace adorning your chest, shining and all too inviting. The same lace he got you for your two year anniversary, the same lace he had you in that day, the same lace he had you in on countless days after that.

He places one knee between your legs, the duvet dipping, and nuzzles his face in your cleavage, taking in a long inhale.

Nosing about, he whispers, "Are you doing this on purpose?"

You know what he means. He never failed to mention what this set did to him, to his brain, his length. And you'd made it a point to use it against him every chance you got.

Today however, was not that chance, but you're grateful for the fateful coincidence.

He gets up only to slowly peel off your leggings and partially hovers over you, knee between your legs again, this time much closer to the warmth of your core.

His eyes trail down your figure, taking in all the curves, the crevices. Remembering all that once was his, learning all that he wasn't there to witness during your time apart.

His hands gently move up and down your sides, caressing and massaging, eyes going back and forth between the two lace pieces.

They're the same pair, but your body has changed quite a bit since he last had you in it.

You've somehow managed to surpass your own beauty and it's nothing if not a detriment to his sanity.

And his stamina. He's suddenly not too proud of it, if the exponential build up of his arousal is any indication.

The heavy caresses have now pushed you down the bed, your heat coming in contact with the rough patch of denim on his knee. You gasp at the contact, your core tender from how drenched you are from all his staring and fondling.

He picks up on it and uses his hold on your hips to begin grinding you on his knee. You groan, your thin silky lace and his thick rough denim adding to your arousal. Never would you have imagined that simple gliding, over the confines of clothes no less, could feel this good.

This is what being with Hyunjin is always like. Trying, experimenting, tapping into uncharted territory, with the knowledge of safely, of assurance, of security.

Sleeping with him, you got to know of your own body, what made it tick, your likes, your turn ons.

Being with him, you got to know of yourself, what made you you, your talents, your strengths.

Existing with him, simply made you whole.

So if this is all you get, you'd be content.

Moans and whimpers echo in the room that's now empty without his studio table nestled in the corner, without his clothes piled up in random heaps, without music equipment thrown astrew on the wooden floor.

Empty. Empty. Empty. Without him.

"Goddess."

A loud moan rips from your throat, the sound unholy. Your eyes snap open, in shock of your own reaction.

"You like that?"

Staring up at him with wide eyes, you're not sure what to say. It's yet another uncharted territory, yet another epiphany. And you're grateful it's with him.

Leaning forward he captures your lips between his soft ones, tongued clashing, spit mixing, swaying his head side to side, smearing your collective essence all over your cheeks and jaws.

"Like it, my goddess?"

Another equally loud moan echoes, even as his grinding has ceased. Your response is unprompted, no physical stimulation in sight.

While it might have been embarrassing, you're anything but.

Simply because it's him.

And you're not yourself. And he's not himself.

But you're together. All else rendered trivial.

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thepaintedlady00 · 2 years

Text

The Sandman and The Girl Without Dreams

TW: dragged to Hell, blood, gore, violence, witnessing attempts of suicide, mentions of nudity, protective!Dream, we're in Hell y'all, buckle up it's gonna be a ride! 😈

Chapter 7: Hell Has 1825 Doors

Morpheus couldn't take his eyes off of her as she stepped out into the downpour of rain and smiled at him. She was so beautiful, far more than he'd remembered. Everything about her felt like it was part of some dream, one of his own making. She was warm and bright, smelled of lilac and peonies and rain, she was kind and thoughtful and far too good for him. Penelope Barlow, the girl he shared a bond with, the girl that had tried to free him, the girl whose smile and eyes held the entire night's sky within them… the girl he adored with every part of him was far, far too good for him. It was so much easier to love her when she was dead… Easier because he didn't have to fight against it every second. Now, standing with her within his reach he struggled to resist pulling her into his arms and never letting go.

He watched her twirl and laugh as she danced through the courtyard, a sight he never thought he'd get to see. He watched her until she disappeared beyond the buildings and went on her way back to her home. Home. He thought, reminding himself of her life here, the life she deserved to live without him complicating it more than he already had. Roderick Burgess may have been her captor, but he had been the one that doomed her to share in his isolated torment. Dream didn't care that it had been out of his control, he only cared about the part he had played and in his mind that made him just as bad as the all the others that had hurt her. He would make up for it, he'd decided not long after she'd given him Jessamys' ashes, that he would not allow Penelope to lose anything else because of him. Even if it meant he had to swallow his heated thoughts and push the constant ache for her touch down into the depths of his shattered soul.

From the ground beside him Matthew cawed. "So… You and Penny?"

"I am not discussing this with you..." He replied harshly before adding, "There is nothing to discuss."

"Riiighht, whatever you say." His annoyingly mocking tone had Dream sending the bird a pointed glare. "So, what's our next move?"

"I am going in search of my helm. And you are going back to the Dreaming."

"Or, hear me out, you can take me with you and we'll never have to have this conversation again!"

"That does sound tempting," he admitted when something occurred to him. Lucienne. He'd already spent a century away from home without giving her any warning or explanation. Looking down at the raven he decided, I will not risk abandoning her with no warning again. Kneeling down in front of Matthew he said, "In fact, where I am going I may have need of you."

This visibly caused Matthew to perk up. "Yeah? Where are we going?"

"Hell."

"Hell. Hell as in Hell-Hell or are you being metaphorical? Either way we should probably check in with Lucienne first right?" He chuckled nervously. "See how she's feeling about it. I'm gonna go out on a limb, which is something birds actually do, and say she will not be in favor of hell going."

Standing he retrieved his pouch from within his coat, pouring it out over his palm watching the bird ramble on as the sand swirled around them. "Buuutt I don't get the sense that you're listening so fuck it, let's go to hell!"

As soon as Dream's feet hit the dry ground he could feel it, an unnerving scream forced down the bond, and the mark on his wrist ached in a way that made his stomach twist. Something was wrong, and as he looked out over the vast ash covered realm that was Hell, he had a strong suspicion as to who was responsible.

***

Lucifer Morningstar. The devil stood before me clothed in white robes with great bat-like wings spread out on either side of them. As I looked up at their face through the fire that stood between us I realized why Lucifer had been God's favorite. They were so beautiful, their skin smooth as marble, their heavenly eyes, golden hair that curled around their face. They looked angelic, all except their smile… The cold upturn of their lips held no joy, at least not true joy, only the mocking facade of it.

They moved gracefully, like the flames of the fire, as they tucked their wings in and stepped around the table, moving closer to me. With one mere twitch of their fingers two demons pulled me up from the ground, their hands course and their grip far too tight. A finger lifted my chin and their eyes examined my face closely. "Such a beautiful thing you are. So bright, even here, even after everything that's tormented you. Tell me your name, mortal."

My mouth stayed closed. Out of defiance perhaps, or more likely it was simple fear that stilled my tongue. Their smile widened. "It appears the mortal needs encouragement."

A gnarled hand wrapped around my throat, squeezing and lifting me up off the ground. In a voice that made my ears ring it spoke a simple command, "Your name."

The grip loosened ever so slightly, only enough for me to suck in a tiny breath. "P…Pe… Penelope."

Lucifer waved their hand and I was dropped to the ground, gasping for air. When I looked back up a woman stood in front of me, silver plates of armor glistened in the firelight, dark hair falling over her shoulder and the entire left side of her face melted and burnt away to the bone. Without a word she grabbed my arm and pulled me to my feet before following Lucifer to the other side of the table. They beckoned me with a finger, but before I could move on my own one of the demons had grabbed me and thrown me into the side of the table.

My ribs cracked, if not snapped, and all the breath was sucked from my lungs and I held onto the edge and gasped. "Sit." The demon growled. Slowly seating myself in the chair beside me I glared up through the now dwindling fire at the now pleased grin of the devil as they took a seat opposite mine.

"I must say I'm... Disappointed." Lucifer said with a sigh. "You don't seem nearly as frightened as I'd hoped."

"Oh I'm terrified," I admitted. "I'm in hell, getting thrown around by demons and having a conversation with the actual devil."

They tilted their head. "Yet I see no tears, hear no begging!"

"I'm not much of a beggar," I said, trying not to focus on all the horrible possibilities this meeting of ours could end with. "And I have a feeling that if you'd wanted me dead or strung up and tortured we wouldn't be sitting here. You want something."

They restrained a smile. "Clever, aren't you?"

"No, not at all. You're just making it obvious."

The fire in the room roared. "I'd heard the rumor ages ago, the great Dream of the Endless soul bound to a mortal girl, a preposterous thing." Soul bound? My mind caught the words and clung to them. Now wasn't the time for questions, but later… If there would still be one. "Still, I was curious and I sent my demons to see if these rumors had any merit. For years nothing and then all of a sudden… You. All it took was one bump to the shoulder and there you were."

My jaw clenched at the recollection of last nights near accident on the sidewalk. The demons guttural groans echoed as he, they, moved to stand behind me. "I'm still confused as to what I have that you want."

"Oh nothing!" They laughed lowly. "But you do make a lovely piece of bait for our dear sweet Dream. He's on his way here now, and I wanted to have something grand to greet him with."

"He's not stupid enough to fall for that."

Lucifer pursed their lips. "You don't know how important to him you are do you?"

"Not more important than saving his realm."

"We shall see." They motioned again. "Sagthes, please prepare our guest for The Journey."

Before I could ask what they meant a heavy mass slammed into the side of my head, knocking me out.

***

They had followed Squaterbloat, played his games with the forests of mists and bodies and Nada, until, at last they came to the path to the palace. If Dream hadn't been angry before he certainly was now. The memories of Nada curling around him like a thorned vine, squeezing a part of him that still felt love for her, a part of him that regretted his cruel response to her refusal. It hadn't bothered him before, not like this, not at all, but things had changed since then. It was now more clear than ever as to why he and Nada could not have been together.

For all he'd loved about her, for everything they'd been to one another Nada though strong, wise and everything he had wanted would not have truly been his equal, nor had she wanted to be. Dream knew, somewhere deep down that Nada had never desired eternity with him, or perhaps eternity at all. She did not want to be a goddess nor did she want to be his queen and he hated her for it as much as he hated that he let himself be so hurt by her refusal. He also knew somewhere deep down that his siblings part in their relationship had caused at least some of this outcome, but the decision of her fate had been his. Nada would have been a great lady and queen, but she would not have been his lady, his queen. Those titles belonged to another.

He saw now, more clearly than ever, that Nada had not been forever. None of his past lovers had. Penelope, however much he wanted to keep her far from him, he could not deny was something… Someone that would be. He felt it through their bond, her undoubting and unwavering feelings for him. If he asked her for forever she would say yes, but he would never ask… He could not. Her usual hum of strong emotions had gone silent since they neared the palace. Whatever game Lucifer was playing, Dream feared he'd have to play along. His only hope now was that this game was one he could win and one Penelope could survive.

He entered the mountain palace with an iron grip holding his anger in check. No matter how badly Dream wanted to storm the palace, demand the release of that which belonged to him and kill any that had even dared to breathe the same air as her, he could not. He was a guest, above that he was weakened. He ascended the stairs to the large circular room and through the fire Lucifer's tall wings and white garb stood out against the grey skies and black rock.

He clasped his hands together in front of him, gripping them tightly as he said, "Hello."

Wings turned as Lucifer smiled at him. Wordlessly they descended from the balcony, dimming the fire of the large round table in the center of the ornate room, and stood in front of him. "Hello, Dream."

"Greetings to you, Lucifer Morningstar." He said calmly, every inch of him vibrating with the want to say her name, to demand her safe return to his side. His eyes shifted to the figure lurking behind one of the tall gold adorned pillars. "And to you Mazikeen of the Lillim."

"Greetings, Dream Lord," Mazikeen said.

Lucifer smiled. "You look well, Dream. Are you well? And your family, Destiny, Death, Despair, and the others?"

His smile was tight, forced. "I presume the Ruler of Hell knows this is no social call."

"Have you come to join forces then?" They tilted their head slightly. "To ally your realm to ours? To acknowledge the sovereignty of Hell?"

Do they truly intend to draw this out? He thought his jaw clenching. "You know my feelings on that, Lightbringer."

"Feelings change. Especially when one has been caught and imprisoned by mortals. We expected better of you, sweet Morpheus."

"I have come because my helm of state was stolen from me. I believe one of your demons has it. I should like it back, along with the mortal you've taken." His voice strained as he tried to sound calm. "Now."

"We've taken many mortals, which is it you're searching for?"

He strangled a low growl. "You know which one. The girl."

They tilted their head. "Her name, Dream... Say it."

"Penelope."

Their wide smile and a fake look of sympathy nearly sent him over the edge. "Oh, Dream, if only it were that easy. But, there are rules, you see, protocols that must be followed." They turned, moving back toward the fire. "Which will come first I wonder? Your helm or the girl?" He stiffened. "Such a pretty thing she was."

"Where is she?" His words were dark and angry.

Lucifer turned to him, still smiling. "Why, she's here… Resting."

He took a step up forward bringing Mazikeen out into the light. "What have you done to her?"

"Is she what you wish to discuss first then, Morpheus? Not your helm?"

"Yes." He answered , his voice laced with the anger he felt. "Now tell me what you've done with her."

"The girl is safe, for now." They said. "But, I'm afraid our laws demand a challenge be completed to buy her freedom."

"You dare abduct my lady from the waking world and then demand I play your games to win her freedom?" He seethed.

"Lady?" Lucifer questioned with a quiet chuckle. "Was this title officially bestowed?"

Damn them. "No."

"Then we have broken no laws, and this is one of ours, Dream. The laws of Hell do not bend for you." Lucifer did not budge.

"She may not have the official title of my lady, but she is still soul bound to me. That law you have broken."

A soft hum. "Perhaps. If it's only her body you want, you may take it with you upon your departure, but her soul will remain with me unless it is won."

Disgust roiled in him hearing them speak of her as if she was nothing. He ground his teeth, doing all in his power not to let his face show his rage or his fear. "What challenge would you have me complete then?"

"An old one." They said, "One of our oldest."

Off to where the side room had been now stood a path leading to a metal door with the number one scratched into it. He stepped closer to it, the pit of fear sinking lower. "The Journey."

"Yes, one of our favorites, though it never lasts long. Most mortals don't survive past door two."

"How many?" How much pain would she have to endure, survive, to at last be back beside him?

"1825." Lucifer said, the joy clear in their tone. "Your Lady has quite a lot of tormented memories."

Five years, he thought. The years still missing in their history, the ones that it seemed were too painful for her to even think of. If they were anything like what he'd witnessed in their shared prison of the Burgess home this was going to be difficult indeed. "Tell me the rules then, Lightbringer and let us get on with it."

"It's quite simple, at the end of the doors lies your lady, all you have to do is walk forward. If you lose yourself to her memories you'll both be trapped within them indefinitely. If you reach the end and she has died you will be free to go, but she will remain." They chuckled softly. "On the off chance you both manage to survive, her freedom will have been won. Do you accept our terms?"

"I accept," he said, moving to approach the door.

"Good luck to you, Dream. And to, Penelope."

As he walked the landscape stretched into a well tended lawn and a long straight pathway leading up to the brick building he could only assume was the asylum. It was larger than the Burgess mansion and looked well kept, if he hadn't known better he'd think it a normal facility, but the memory of her manic laughter and disheveled appearance was forefront in his mind.

Beside him Matthew hopped along the path. "Are we really gonna do this? You don't think this is kind of... I don't know, an invasion of Penny's privacy?"

"It may be," Dream said roughly, unable to think of how she would feel about such painful things being revealed to them without her say so. "But it is the only way to free her."

A loud caw echoed. "What is this place anyway?"

For a moment Dream had forgotten the raven wasn't with them in the years in captivity. "An asylum for the insane. Our shared captor, Roderick Burgess, sent her here when it became clear she'd no intention of helping him."

"Okay… That sounds pretty bad, but what happened here that makes it Hell worthy?"

"I do not know."

"So we have absolutely no idea what we're walking into?" Matthew sighed. "Perfect."

The door stood before them and with one last look to the raven Dream said, "Prepare yourself, whatever lies beyond these doors we cannot let it consume us. These are memories, the past, and nothing we do will change them."

That would be more difficult that the dream king imagined. As the metal door swung open with an eerie creak the white walls and shining floors echoed with the wails and screams of the poor souls damned here. It wasn't unlike Hell, a Hell for the waking world. Beside him Matthew cursed under his breath. Dream felt his heart drop into his stomach at the sight of Penelope running frantically down the hall towards him. The other patients either cheered her on or chanted for her to fall. It took everything in him not to open his arms to her as she drew closer.

She looked so afraid, so desperate as she dodged the tall men in white for as long as she could before they grabbed her and threw her to the ground. The whole vision around them shook and the next door appeared beyond the sight of her thrashing and biting and screaming. Dream walked around them and went through the next door, relieved to find himself in a normal looking room, less so to find Penelope curled into the corner.

The door opened and a man in a long white coat entered, fixing his glasses and looking at the paper in front of him. "Ms. Barlow?" She only answered him with a glare. "My name is Doctor Elias Shenton. I'm here to help you get better."

"I'm not sick." She spat.

"That may be so, but your behavior as of late certainly doesn't reflect that." He looked down at his papers again. "Twenty escape attempts in the last two months, five stabbings, twelve broken bones and the list goes on."

Dream felt the echo of pride. The doctor stepped closer and knelt down with a smile. "I do not think you're sick, Ms. Barlow, but I do think you're special."

They walked through the next door as the room shook and horror filled him. Penelope was strapped to a table, a gag of some sort in her mouth, trashing and clawing in attempts to escape while the doctor stood at the top of her head, holding two rods that connected to an odd little machine. The doctor smiled at her and he felt the rage in him triple. "You'll want to bite down on that hard Ms. Barlow, this can be quite uncomfortable."

The instant the rods touched her temples her entire body seized and he could feel the current rush through him, stealing the breath from his lungs. The door appeared and Dream made his way to it instantly. He had to see more, had to know what they had done to her, all of it. Door after door the same mistreatment. Starvation, beatings, shock treatments, isolation, so many drugs he'd lost count. It wasn't until door fifty that things changed for the worse.

This time when he opened it the first thing he saw was blood, her blood. They were cutting her open, testing the limits of healing they'd discovered in their other cruel acts. Dream looked down at her face, unconscious but only barely. His gaze turned to the doctor who raved about how miraculous the disturbed operation was. He clenched his fists and took a step towards him when Matthew cawed, "We can't change anything, remember? This has already happened boss, we need to keep moving forward if we want to help her."

Matthew was right. He could not hurt this man. Not yet at least. He could not save her from this torment because she had already been through it. She had survived, he told himself, trying to keep the thought in his mind to help push him through. She was alive and waiting beyond these doors, he just had to keep going forward.

Now behind every door was one grotesque operation… Experiment after another, all to see what made Penelope different. Behind every door was the sounds of knives slicing her skin and her blood spilling to the floor. Door after door the sound of the doctor's voice speaking about Penelope as though she was nothing more than a pig brought before him for slaughter. Door after door Morpheus felt his anger knot and twist inside him. He watched every memory, committing all that took part in her torment to his own. If any of them still lived they would pay, he would see to it personally.

Door three hundred and seventy four was when things descended further. The drugs had now stopped working, so in the middle of every procedure Penelope awoke and felt every second. This time they used a hand drill, held by a shaky intern, to dig into her back. This time when she woke her scream was one he'd only heard before here in Hell itself. Still they pressed on. He tried not to feel the deep ache that filled him at the sight of her losing her will to fight, to live door after door.

The sight before him, like all the others, was one of blood and pain and torment. Is this what lay behind all the remaining doors? he wondered looking down at the vision, the memory, of her strapped to the table screaming. With a deep sigh he reminded himself of his purpose and turned towards the door. Her hand shot out and grabbed his, her grip was tight, desperate. It felt so real that for a moment he'd forgotten it wasn't. "Please..." His heart broke at the sound. "Please kill me..." With tears in his eyes he pulled his hand free, moving for the next door as her wails echoed behind him. She is alive and waiting for us. He had to keep repeating it to himself to make his legs move forward, to not turn and go to vision of her.

The shaking of the memories had grown constant and so strong he could scarcely walk. Penelope was holding on, but the pain was too strong for even her to ignore. So he continued, pushing forward through the blood and the screams until one memory made him stop. She was in her cell, beating her head against the wall, throwing all her body weight into every motion until blood began to paint the space behind her. She continued, a determined look in her eyes that Dream feared. He wanted to tell her to stop, wanted to console her, but knew he couldn't. The white coats stopped her, but he knew this would not be the only time he'd have to watch her attempt to take her life. Beside him Matthew whispered a quiet, "Oh god."

Door five hundred and one. This memory he knew would plague him for the rest of his life. The doctor and his staff had left the room, Penelope lay, tube shoved down her throat and head bound in place, her ribs practically exposed as they poked and prodded at her lungs. Above them a hazy vision of the night sky swirled. When she broke her hand free of the restraints and grabbed the small blade Morpheus almost looked away, he almost had to. When she dug the blade into her own arm his eyes closed tightly, tears escaping down his cheeks. The scar on her arm that she'd tried to hide from him in Constantines' office had been carved by her own hand. The shame, the fear, he'd felt then made sense now.

She had spent all those years away enduring a fate far worse than he could have ever imagined, a fate that made Rodericks barbaric beatings seem like a blessing… A fate worse than death. Every door only added to the well of anger he'd built over the last eighty years, so much so that every part of him longed for the moment his power was restored and he could hunt down every last one of these monsters. He would show them what fear was, what pain was. Every scar they gave her, or forced her to give herself they would pay for.

Finally nearing the end, door one thousand eight hundred and ten revealed her father, old and worn with leathery skin and a receding hair. He was exactly how Dream pictured him, a miserable and hollow shell of a man that used fear and threats to intimidate his way to power. Not unlike Roderick. He watched him spit threats down at Penelope, her arms bound to her sides and ankles shackled to the bedpost. He watched something pass on her face, a fleeting rage, before she sat up and tore his throat open with her teeth. For the first time in ages he saw that fire return to her eyes, and while the sight of her covered in blood made the guilt and pain in him twist further, he was proud. Even after all the horror and pain she still held that fire, it was a feat not many could claim.

At last the final door. It began the same as almost the others, blood and screams and insane ramblings, but this one ended with Paul. As he watched the memory, listened to her as she fought and pleaded with Paul to let her free the sandman, him. "I tried to bargain with them for you too." He had much to make up for, much to repay and so as Morpheus turned to the last unnumbered door he made a silent promise to himself and to her. Never again will she be alone. Never again would she have to plead to anyone for anything.

The visions faded away as he opened the door to a decrepit garden covered in frost. There in the center, naked on an altar with gnarled vines and twisted roots wrapping around her lay Penelope, pale, bruised and covered in dead leaves and ash. As he drew closer the vines and roots unwound and slithered away from him. He looked down at her, fear filling him. Had he been too late? With gentle hands he lifted her head, cradling her face. Her lips were practically blue and her skin felt ice cold, even under his touch. "Penelope."

A small breath filled her lungs as her eyes opened ever so slightly. "Dream…" Her lips curled into a weak smile as her body trembled. "I knew you'd come."

He smiled as he pulled away and shed his coat, wrapping her in it tenderly. "For you, nothing could keep me away."

Lifting her into his arms he let out a relieved sigh at the feel of her curling into him. She was alive. She was back where she belonged and he'd be damned if he ever let her go again.

***

The pain of the memories faded with each step Dream took with me curled into his arms. He was warm, which was weird for him, but I pressed further into it anyway, my forehead practically glued into the side of his neck. Eventually the ground shifted from ash to black stone and heat wrapped around us, burning against my skin.

"I'm impressed," Lucifer's voice sent a shiver down my spine and Dreams' arms tightened around me. "No ordinary mortal would have survived such horrors. She is truly special, your lady."

"I need to attend to her, then I shall have words with the demons that left these marks upon her skin, as your laws say is my right." His voice was raw power. "And then, Lightbringer, we will discuss the return of my helm."

"But of course, Dream. My side room is open to you and the needs of your lady." Though the words were kind, the tone of their voice was angry and tense. Their plan hadn't played out and Lucifer was pissed.

Once in the next room Dream addressed Matthew, who'd been silently following us the whole way back. "Go wait. Keep them out until we return."

"You want me to keep the devil out of a room in their own palace," he questioned. I assumed the glare Morpheus gave him was what changed his tune as he followed with, "I, uh, I'll do my best."

"Can you stand?" He asked me, throat vibrating against my head.

I nodded, pulling away and letting him set my feet on the warm floor. My legs shook a little, but Morpheus kept me from falling. He moved only slightly when he was certain I was steady, his eyes roaming over me as I clutched his coat in my fingers. A fleeting feeling of contentment and longing filled me before being replaced by the storm of rage that filled him, but before I could ask he moved to a table where the blood stained and torn up remains of my dress, necklace and shoes sat.

"May I?" He asked, gesturing to the clothes, his voice almost a whisper.

I nodded again, unable to form the words, unable to comprehend that Dream of the Endless wanted to help with such a lowly task. He pulled me closer to the table and moved to stand behind me, a gesture meant to help soothe my nerves no doubt. He slid his coat off my shoulders with a gentleness I was still so foreign to. The air around us stung, the warmth of the fires still trying to heat my chilled skin. I curled my arms over my chest, naked and exposed and vulnerable in front of him.

If this had been different I would have made a joke, something to try and unwind the tight knot of rage that had settled in my stomach, his rage. He'd grabbed what remained of my tattered dress and held it behind me for a moment, when it came back into view it was changed, a simple gown of pale blue silk. I wanted to ask how, but quickly forgot the question as he pressed a kiss, soft and warm, to the long jagged scar along my shoulder. That kiss solidified the fear I'd been trying not to let consume me. He'd seen it. He'd seen all the memories that had plagued me on that altar.

I swallowed a hard lump as he helped ease the dress over my head and helped pull my arms through the thin sleeves. He kept my right arm in his hand and lifted it so he could press a long kiss to the scar from over my shoulder. A shuddering breath left me. Did he pity me now? Did seeing the insanity I'd fallen into make him think less of me? Were the attempts I made to end my life enough for him to hate me?

He moved to stand in front of me, sliding my necklace over my head and pressing another kiss to the scars Roderick had left on my neck and collarbone before he sank to his knees. One of his hands, now beginning to feel cold against my warming skin, gently lifted the hem of the dress up and cupping the back of my leg to examine the long scratches that marred the skin. He hummed, a noise that sounded like a strangled growl as he pressed his lips to my thigh, earning a sharp gasp I hadn't been able to contain. "I shall see to it that this offense is answered."

With a gentle wave of his hands I felt a soft thread wind around my calf, wrapping the cuts gently. He grabbed my shoes off the table and slid them onto my feet, using whatever magic he had been to turn them into more comfortable flats. This was too much. It had to be out of some sense of pity or an attempt to ease the blow of his coming disgust… something other than what was obvious. As he lowered my dress and began rising to his feet I squeezed my eyes shut, a few soft tears streaming down my cheeks.

"I am sorry you were forced to relive the horrors of that place," He whispered in a pained tone, thinking my tears were from the memories.

"That's not..." I sighed. "I've relieved it all before. That's… It's not what I'm afraid of."

"Then what is?"

I closed my eyes tighter. "I... I don't want it to have changed how you see me."

"Penelope." Cool fingers lifted my chin. My eyes stayed shut, terrified of what I'd see when they opened. Pity? Disgust? Disappointment? "Penelope, look at me." Not a whisper, but a gentle command.

With a deep breath I followed his instructions and opened my wet eyes, slowly meeting his. There was no pity, no disgust, only him. He looked sad, but he felt angry, more angry than I'd ever felt before. It wasn't aimed at me, but at what they had done to me. My lip quivered at the realization and as he wiped the tears from my eyes I whispered, "I'm sorry."

"You are beautiful. All of you." He said it so easily, said it like it was a fact everyone knew. "Nothing would ever change how I see you."

Our faces drifted closer until we shared the same breath. His blue eyes glistened in the dull firelight, looking at me with want. His hands dug into my hips as I pushed into him more, tilting my head back further. More. More. More. My body sang. Wings beating echoed from the doorway as Matthew returned. "Hey boss, they're getting kind of, oh! OH! Uh, sorry, I'll just... umm… See myself out…"

Morpheus' jaw clenched. Frustration and disappointment filled us both, pushing and pulling between us like ocean waves, the echoes of want flowing with them. I lowered myself back onto the flats of my feet and pressed a soft kiss to his throat. His hands squeezed my hips tighter before they released me entirely. "Thank you for coming for me."

His lips returned the gesture to my forehead, his cold breath fanning down my face as he answered, "Always."

"Well," I cleared my throat, "We shouldn't keep the devil waiting."

He chuckled. "I suppose not."

He offered me his arm and led me back into the main room where Lucifer and their silver armored friend stood with The demon Lucifer had called, Sagathes and another demon kneeling before them. A forced smile spread on their lips. "The demons responsible for the harm done to your lady, Dream."

"Their names?" he said from my side.

"The Sagathes," Lucifer gestured to the demon I'd seen in the elevator. "And Vornen." Their hand moved to the other demon, the one I assumed had thrown me into the table. "In accordance with our laws you may choose their punishment."

He thought for a moment before saying in a lethally calm voice, "I choose The Pits."

Lucifer nearly sneered. "Very well, a fight to the death it is."

After Lucifer turned and announced the display to whatever crowd was at the bottom of the balcony, cheers erupted through the palace and the two demons evaporated into smoke. They turned back to Morpheus and shrugged a shoulder. "Satisfied?"

"At present. Now, onto the matter of my helm."

"Which demon has your helm? Name it and we shall bring it here."

"I confess I do not know the name." He moved closer to the balcony, beside Lucifer, and gave my arm a reassuring squeeze.

"Your punishment has summoned all of them." The sight from the balcony was as far as the eye could see filled with demons and large pits of flame. In the center of the cheering crowd the Sagathes and Vornen pitted against each other, fighting with a cruel brutality that I'd never seen before, nor did I want to see again. "There, now, Dream you may inquire. Which demon has your helmet? Shall we summon them one at a time or…"

"That won't be necessary." Dream gave Lucifer a look and turned back to the main room, leading me toward the stairs where Matthew waited.

"It surprises us how easily you would give up, Dream. We know how you relied upon your tools. But, tools are the subtlest of traps. We come to rely upon them, and in their absence we become vulnerable, weak, defenseless."

"Not entirely." He let go of my arm with a quiet request for me to wait beside Matthew as he handled his remaining business. Turning to Lucifer he pulled the pouch from his coat and knelt, dumping some of it into the stone floor. "I have recovered my sand. It brought me to Hell. Now it brings that which is mine in Hell to me."

The sand began to swirl around him, glittering in the firelight as it moved and swirled a few steps away. A figure appeared in the center, holding what I assumed was the helm he was here to retrieve. The demon turned, clutching the helmet tightly as Dream stood back up, glaring at him with dark eyes. "Tell me your name, demon."

Glancing at Lucifer he replied, "Do I have to tell him?"

"That is Choronzon. A Duke of Hell." Lucifer said, sounding less than pleased at this development.

"Choronzon," Dream said. "The helm is mine. You must return it to me."

"No. It's mine now. I traded it from a mortal for a paltry thing. It was a fair trade. I've broken no laws and if the Dream King wants his helm back, he will have to fight me for it."

My heart hammered in my chest. Surely Dream wouldn't agree to fight a demon in Hell. Surely there was some other way to- "Very well." God damn it. "I challenge you, Choronzon."

The demon chuckled, stepping closer to Dream. "You know the rules, Dream Lord."

"If I win you will return my helmet."

"And if you lose, you'll serve as my slave in Hell for eternity."

"I accept the terms." Matthew cawed from beside me, equally as not into this plan.

Lucifer looked too happy as they said, "And whom shall you choose to represent you in the battle?"

This is a trap. "I shall represent myself."

A concealed smile. "Choronzon, whom will you choose to represent you?"

"Hmm…" The Demon stepped closer. "I choose you, sire."

Lucifer smiled and in the blink of an eye was dressed in shining black leather armor as they stepped behind Dream, who smirked at their clever plan playing out. "Apologies Dream, but the laws of Hell demand that I become his champion. But if you would not fight me."

"I have accepted the terms." When he turned to Lucifer he was also dressed in leather armor. "Let the challenge begin."

Lucifer first proclaimed the winner of the Pit fights as Vornen, who’d joined us in the room, standing beside the woman I learned was named Mazikeen, then Choronzon took over and began the announcement of the current fight. As Dream joined Lucifer and Choronzon on the balcony to announce the challenge Matthew tutted beside me. "So, this is like the worst idea ever right?"

"Oh absolutely," I answered, my eyes glued to Dreams leather clad back. Damn him and that leather, tight in all the right places. His head tilted slightly, reminding me that he could in fact hear my thoughts. Or some of them… The dirty ones it would seem. I felt the heat rise to my face.

Matthew hopped up onto my shoulder. "Sorry about going through your memories, by the way, you didn't deserve that… Or what those people did to you."

I smiled, sadly.. "Thank you, Matthew. For all of your help."

"Oh, and, uh, sorry about walking in on the, uh… thing going on in the side room."

If my blush hadn't been noticeable before, it was now. "It… It's okay. You didn't…" my voice trailed off. Didn't interrupt anything? But he had… we were going to kiss, or at least I was going to kiss him. I hadn't even thought of asking if he wanted to kiss me first. God I'm an idiot. Of course he didn't want to kiss me we're in HELL trying to get his things back! I hardly noticed Dream walking towards us until he had grabbed hold of my arm and gently pulled me aside.

"Matthew, I need you to return to the Dreaming with Penelope."

"What? No!" The bird said before I could.

"It is the only reason I allowed you to come here."

"So I could leave you?"

"If I should not be allowed to leave this place I would not have Lucienne left alone with no word as to my fate, not again." He looked back up to me. "The sand will take you both back."

"I'm not leaving you." I said firmly.

He sighed. "We do not have time to argue."

"There is no argument." I took his face in my hands. "I will not leave you. Not again. So, if you want me out of Hell you're going to have to walk out with me."

"Morpheus," Lucifer's false sweet voice said from beside us. "Am I interrupting a preliminary bout of some kind?"

Matthew hopped between us and bowed. "Just a ringside pep talk, Your Majesty. We came here for the helm and we're not leaving without it."

"We shall see." They smiled, turning to stand in the center of the room.

Matthew flew up to one of the pillars as I let go of Dreams face. He looked at me for a moment before saying, as casually as he could. "This may... perhaps be a good time for a token of luck. A kiss perhaps."

Clever, I thought as I smoothed my hands over his leather clad chest until they came to shoulders. I internally groaned. You have no right looking this good in leather, my lord. I thought, knowing he'd hear. His eyes flared as the words reached him. I lifted myself up using his shoulders as leverage to press a kiss to his cheek beside his lips. Once my feet were back on the ground I smiled up at him. "Win and I'll give you a real kiss, Dream Lord."

He smirked, bowing his head. "As my lady commands."

I did my best to ignore the way his words made my stomach flip as he walked up the stairs and took his place in front of Lucifer. Matthew flew down to my shoulder as I took my place out of the way. “You think he’s got a shot?”

“Of course he does,” I replied. “If not, you might want to get used to the scenery.”

Dream looked over at us for a moment, shoulders tense and eyes swimming with stormy night. I smiled, a simple thing to try and reassure him that no matter what happened Matthew and I would be beside him. He was going to win. He had to, or we were all stuck here.

“As the challenged, I set the meter and take the first move.” Lucifer had done a poor job at hiding their glee ever since Dream had accepted the challenge.

“Very well,” he replied, “Make your move.”

“I am… a dire wolf. Prey-stalking, lethal prowler.” A vision of the great wolf growling entered my mind. It was odd, as was the sensation that washed over me, but from what I gathered part of whatever this game was.

“I am a hunter. Horse-mounted, wolf-stabbing.” A horse and its rider entered the vision, the rider a hunter, drawing his bow he shot down at the wolf. Lucifer groaned in pain, lurching forward holding their abdomen with their hands. I saw a flash of red on their palm before they stood up straight and continued.

“I am a serpent. Horse-biting, poison-toothed.” A snake struck out of the darkness, teeth digging into the leg of the hunter's horse. Dreams' head twisted to the side revealing dark veins consuming his neck and face, pooling his eye with red. The mark burned on my arm, drawing out a startled breath from my lungs. Dream’s eyes fixed on me for a moment before he spoke.

“I am a bird of prey. Snake-devouring, talons ripping.” The hawke swooped down and grabbed the snake, twisting its talons into the scaled creature. Lucifer’s head whipped down, as if they’d just been struck, their hand cupping their cheek.

“I am a butcher bacterium. Warm-life destroying.” Dream was on his knees, arms holding onto himself as his face lifted revealing black splotches of decaying flesh taking form. The mark burned more, and I grit my teeth to keep from screaming. His eyes met mine again, dark and desperate.

“I am a world. Space-floating, life-nurturing.” All around were fields of green and bright sun filled skies. Lucifer looked around for a moment as the birds chirped and life hummed in the air.

“I am a nova. All-exploding, planet-cremating.” The sky filled with a bright ball of searing light. Fire tore through the green field, burning everything away until nothing but ash remained. Dream lay on the ground, skin burnt and breath weak. I gripped onto my arm tight, nails digging into my skin, trying to lessen or dull the pain any way I could. He needed to focus on winning, not on worrying about me.

“I am a universe. All things encompassing, all life embracing.” The beautiful array of bright stars and cosmic clouds filled the vision.

“I am anti-life. The Beast of Judgment. The dark at the end of everything.” Darkness quickly overtook the stars and clouds until there was nothing but darkness. Something I’d grown tired of seeing. Dream, still on the floor, turned deathly pale, his cheeks began to hollow as he gasped trying to find breath. “What will you be then, Dream Lord?”

Black veins began to spread on my arm, the mark burning so hot now I could hardly breathe. I leaned back against the pillar, trying to keep myself on my feet as Dream tried to push himself up off the ground. “I…”

Matthew flew from my shoulder, hopping toward him. “Boss… Hey boss!”

“Still with us Dream?” Lucifer purred.

“He is, and it’s his move, Your Majesty.”

Lucifer looked down at him. “There are no more moves. What can survive the anti-life?”

Matthew glanced over at me before turning to Dream. “Hey, boss. Listen to me…" The voice of the raven dipped so low I couldn't hear it.

Dream glanced up at Lucifer and then his eyes met mine. Through the pain, through the spinning of the room I smiled at him. Come on, Sandy. Not an inch, remember? I pushed the thought to him as hard as I could, only hoping that somehow it was one he heard. “I… Am…” He slowly began rising from the floor as Matthew cawed beside him. “Hope.”

The room flooded with bright light as Dream rose to his feet, his eyes meeting Lucifers'. Their voice was laced with disbelief, “Hope.”

“Well, Lightbringer? It’s your move. What is it that kills hope?” The pain gripping me vanished along with the light. I caught my breath for a few seconds before ignoring any possible formalities and going to Dreams' side. I put one hand on his arm and the other on the side of his face, examining him for any injuries as he lifted my marked wrist to his lips. “Are you alright?”

I smiled, trying to stifle the relieved laugh that built up in my chest. “You just dueled the devil, I’m pretty sure I’m supposed to ask you that.”

Lucifer had twisted around, voice no longer light and pleasant but dark and growling. “Choronzon, give him his helm.”

The demon clutched it tighter. “No. I won’t. It’s mine. Please.”

Vornen and Mazikeen both moved, predators stalking their prey. Mazikeen grabbed the helm while Vornen threw Choronzon off the balcony and into the cheering crowd below. Mazikeen handed the helm to Vornen, who turned and presented it to Dream. “Your winnings, Dream Lord.”

Dream bowed his head slightly, but did not thank the demon, instead he said in a cold voice. “If you should ever seek out that which is mine again nothing shall stand in my way of retribution, do you understand.”

“Yes, Dream Lord.” the demon said, casting his eyes down.

Helm tucked under one arm and his other curled keeping me safely behind him, Dream turned to Lucifer. “Thank you, Lightbringer. The Ruler of Hell is honorable, indeed. I will not forget this.”

“Honorable?” Lucifer's face twisted into a sneer. “You joke, surely. Look out there, Morpheus. The billion Lords of Hell stand arrayed about you. Tell us. Why should we let you leave? Helmet or no, you have no power here. After all… What power have dreams in Hell?”

“You say I have no power here. Perhaps you speak truly. But to say dreams have no power in Hell… Tell me Lucifer Morningstar, what power would Hell have if those imprisoned here were not able to dream of Heaven.”

Lucifer's lips twitched. “One day, Morpheus… We shall destroy you and everything you hold dear.”

Dream bowed slightly, eyes never leaving theirs. “Until that day, Lightbringer.”

He placed a hand on my back and began leading me towards the stairs when Lucifer suddenly called out, “Penelope.” My jaw clenched and every inch of me crawled at the sound of my name from their mouth. “One last thing, before you leave us. A gift.”

I didn’t turn, but Morpheus’ eyes darkened slightly before he looked down at me. I was about to ask what was wrong, and then a voice I hadn’t heard since the night of Roderick Burgess’ party echoed off the stone. “Pen… Penelope.”

I turned slowly, a quiet sob catching in my throat at the sight of my mother knelt in chains before the devil, eyes looking at me filled with guilt and desperation. “Is this real?” I whispered to Dream.

“Yes.”

“Please, Penelope,” My mother begged. “Please.”

I looked at Lucifer. “What is the purpose of this?”

They smiled. “Your mother is here because she, while not directly, sent you on the path of torment you've endured. She wronged you, betrayed you, denied you the life you wanted. Only you have the power to free her.”

“Free her?” I asked. "How would I free her?"

“Your forgiveness,” Lucifer clarified, eyes looking past me to Dream, who’d stiffened beside me.

I looked at her, small and shaking bound in chains, not unlike I’d been for those eight long years of being a captive. Ascending back up the stairs until I stood in front of her, I asked. “Did you know?”

She sniffled. “I… I…”

“Did you know what they were doing to me?” I asked again, louder. “Did you know where they sent me after they were done?”

She looked down at the floor. “Yes.”

I clenched my jaw and blinked away tears, drawing in a deep, hot breath. She’d done nothing to directly hurt me, but just like Alex, her inaction added to the suffering I’d endured. She should rot here. Part of me thought. But, as I listened to the rowdy cheering crowd of demons and watched Lucifer smile… No. I knelt down in front of her, lifting her face with a soft hand. “I want you to know, in whatever afterlife awaits you, that you are no longer my family. You are nothing to me. I forgive you."

Rising to my feet I watched the chains that bound her turn to dust for a moment before I turned, putting her begging and pleading at me to hear her out… to let her explain herself, behind as I walked back to Morpheus’ side and took his arm once again, leaving the palace of Hell together. All while we walked I could feel him watching me, could feel the question lingering in him. “You’re wondering why I forgave her.”

“Yes,” He admitted softly. “She contributed to your pain and she deserved to suffer for it.”

“Maybe,” I said. “But her suffering wouldn’t have brought me peace. It wouldn’t have changed anything. Ultimately by giving her my forgiveness I’ve set not only her free, but myself.”

“Yourself?” he pressed curiously.

I shrugged. “For so long I held onto that endless and suffocating anger towards her. But anger is a consuming thing, Dream, the longer you hold it the more it takes from you.”

He looked thoughtful for a moment before we came to a stop. "I can send you home now."

"I'm coming with you," I stated.

"Penelope…"

"The last time we parted ways I ended up getting dragged to hell."

"That will not happen again. You are going home, where I know you'll be safe while I recover my ruby." His stone-like features told me this wasn't a fight I was going to win. "Please."

I sighed. "Fine, but… Please be careful. No more duels with devils."

He smiled. "My ruby is the last of my tools I must recover, and it should be the most simple."

"Will you come find me when you're done?" I asked, almost embarrassed at how desperate it sounded.

A cold hand stroked my cheek. "I will. I promise."

He grabbed his pouch and poured the sand into his palm. With one blow it swirled around me, faster and faster until Dream and Hell were no longer visible. When the sand fell away I was standing in the middle of a road. What the fuck? I looked around, trying to find anything familiar, but I didn't know this place. Why would the sand send me here?

I quickly made my way towards the little diner I'd popped up by, maybe someone inside would be able to help me figure out where I was. The little bell rang and the waitress, a lovely woman with black hair and a green uniform, hollered out, "Be with you in a minute hon, just grab a seat!"

She sounded American, and that certainly didn't bode well. I hadn't been back to America for a long time, not since the cult had followed me here. The little diner was quaint, kind of exactly what you pictured when you heard the word diner. The checkered floors were worn from years of foot traffic, the green accents and walls were adorned with old American posters and random décor, the lights were all old and every leather seat and booth was scuffed and scratched. It felt oddly homey.

I moved to the counter, hoping that if I stayed close enough to the door I'd be easier for her to remember. She ran around between tables, filled cups of coffee and ran back to the kitchen a few times before she huffed and settled in front of me. "Hi! What can I help you with?"

"Um, hi, I think I'm a little l-"

"Lost?" She finished my thought and then smiled. "Don't you worry. We get a lot of lost out of towers around here, let me go grab you a map sweetie."

The bell rang again and a hum of power rolled over me. I knew that feeling. Turning toward the door I looked at the man standing there, clothed in striped pajamas and slippers and carrying a dimly glowing ruby in his hand. "You've got to be fucking kidding me."

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#the sandman series #dream of the endless #dream of the endless imagine #dream of the endless x reader #dream the endless #morpheus imagine #sandman morpheus #the sandman x you #sandman netflix #the sandman fanfic #dream imagine #dream x reader #king of dreams #lord of dreams #the sandman netflix #the sandman

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altraviolet · 4 months

Note

I really need to know what Rodimus was thinking throughout this whole scene, because even though it’s written from his perspective, we don’t get a lot of his thoughts, and I’d love to understand his thought process/why he was saying what he was saying. Because Rodimus gets kinda ugly in this scene? (Idk if that makes sense) But yeah! I love this scene so much, it’s very heartbreaking. I hope you’re doing well! And happy almost new year’s!!

“I'm not doing this again, Soundwave. I'm not. I can't.” Rodimus wanted to grab that visor, yank Soundwave down so they could talk face to face. He settled for jabbing a finger up at it. “We're doubling down on the trust. We're not leaving the arena 'til we figure this out. If you think I won't camp here until you speak up, you're wrong.”

“How long?”

“As long as it takes.”

Soundwave smacked a tentacle against the floor. “Mirage's spark pulse: constant torment. Interfered with everything. All thoughts, all actions. How long has he been watching me?”

“Do you remember the ship-wide meeting where I announced I was giving you more freedom?” Rodimus patted his hand against his chest. “I asked you if you could hear my spark pulse.”

Soundwave displayed a video of Rodimus looking up at him. An empty bottle sailed through the air behind him.

“You said you couldn't hear it. That was the price for your freedom, Soundwave. We'd let you roam around, but we had to keep an eye on you.” Rodimus took a step toward him. “After what you did? No one wanted to give you free rein. Even after you saved the ship from the supernova! But I knew you deserved it.”

A complex waveform manifested on the visor.

“Put yourself in my place, Soundwave. I bet you would have done the same thing. Or worse.”

Angry static.

“Okay, how about this: we gave you a second chance after you tried to kill everyone. You wanna give me a second chance?”

Soundwave played snippets of different voices from the crew. “What good is a second chance if the foundation broke apart?” He snapped his uninjured prongs. “Of course I fucking trust you!”

“Know what? You're right.” Rodimus stepped to the side and yelled, “Mirage!”

They stared at each other in cool silence as Mirage returned. Behind him, Ultra Magnus was escorting a concerned Megatron over to Perceptor.

Mirage held his palms up. “Captain, I must-”

“I'm absolving you of your tracking duties,” said Rodimus. He looked Soundwave right in the visor, willing every ounce of his sincerity into the stare. “You are no longer required to follow Soundwave. In fact, you may not follow him. Because we all trust him now.”

“Er, very well, captain,” said Mirage. “But of much more pressing concern is the-”

“Dismissed,” said Rodimus.

Mirage's biolights blinked. “No, captain. Respectfully, I shall not go until we speak on the matter of traversing dimensions.”

“So help me, Mirage, you had one job and couldn't do it. I'll talk to you when I'm done with Soundwave. Clear?” said Rodimus.

“But you swore on-”

Soundwave snapped his prongs at Mirage. He played Whirl's voice. “You made me feel insane.”

Mirage backed away, arm inching over his chest. “I don't know what you're talking about.”

“Dismissed,” said Rodimus. When Mirage was gone again, Rodimus continued. “What else? Get it out, Soundwave.”

“Danger: not desired.”

“Then don't do the danger.”

Soundwave's field flashed with irritation. “Stability point: required.” The tentacles roiled back on themselves.

This was a motion Rodimus hadn't seen before. He wasn't getting any helpful feedback from Soundwave's words or blank visor, but the tentacles... Rodimus always watched the tentacles. “What kind of stability point? What do you mean?”

“If you think I am a monster, than I am a monster.”

“Like hell you are. One, I never said that. Two, that logic is for people who don't have options and choices. You have options. You have choices.”

More angry static. A tentacle swung around. Tendrils danced in front of Rodimus's chest. For a second, Rodimus was back on the hull. Tendrils crept under blue polycloth. Dozens of cool touches, snaking and coiling around his Autobot badge. Around his spark.

Rodimus had not been afraid then and he wasn't afraid now.

“You're stuck with us, Soundwave. You're stuck with me. No getting around it. You know you have a place here. You have friends. You have your crystals.” Rodimus reached for the tentacle. It pulled away. “You want to do this the hard way? Fine. I do trust you, Soundwave. With my life. But not with my ship. You're literally made of data tendrils and you lied about using them. Can you blame me?”

The visor displayed quick cuts, various rooms around the Lost Light.

“Yeah, that. I called Mirage off. It's your turn to stop doing the bad thing. That's what the options and choice stuff is all about.”

Soundwave said nothing.

“If you're going to dig into the ship, I don't think we can stop you. I can order you to stop, but maybe you'll just do it anyway. Then what should I do?”

Soundwave said nothing.

“Permanent tier one chore cycle? Is that what you want?”

Soundwave played a video of Swerve screaming.

“Yeah, I'll bet.” Rodimus sighed. “It felt weird, Soundwave. Sitting next to you at game night, never knowing what you might truly be thinking or planning.” A tentacle darted toward him. It pulled back at the last second. “Punishing you forever isn't going to make you a happier mech. So, what are we going to do? Mirage isn't going to follow you anymore. Are you gonna stop digging into the ship?”

Soundwave's visor displayed their hab suite hallway. “There is a camera outside my door.”

“It's outside both our doors. I don't like it, either, but it's not going anywhere.”

Soundwave said nothing.

“Ugh. You're such a pain in the a-” Rodimus cut himself off. “I mean, let's try another approach. You literally built a steerable portal! We can go back to 0001 and get direly needed supplies. This is your great work, right? We should be celebrating, not having difficult conversations! I hate difficult conversations!”

“This is not my great work,” snapped Soundwave.

“It's not? Well, damn, I'm looking forward to it, then.”

Soundwave's tentacles continued their slow undulations. The visor looped waveforms.

This isn't getting anywhere. Argh. “You need a time out. Think about what I said, Soundwave. We should put this behind us and start fresh. I stop. You stop. We're even.”

Okay I'm working on the next ch today and was hoping to get it done by 2024 so I won't be super thorough in this answer. Here's a bullet point list of what's going on:

-Rodimus has just been put face to face with a Decision he made (have Mirage trail SW. he indirectly lied to SW about Mirage having an outlier power, SW just figured out Mirage has been trailing him and is angry). Rodimus does not like being wrong. He doesn't like facing the consequences of his actions, but he will face them. Head on

-one thing for people to remember is that TEG Rodimus is more mature and slightly 'softer' than MTMTE Rodimus. MTMTE Rodimus was a dick. You're such a pain in the a- is mild compared to things he's said and ordered others to do in canon. Like seriously there are a couple lines he has that make you (or at least me) really not like the guy. In fact, he was never one of my favorite characters. SO while he's been pretty understanding and patient for most of the fic, here we see him pushed to a situation stressful enough to bring back that more inherent attitude, one that takes work to soften. Kindness takes a lot of energy.

-“I'm not doing this again, Soundwave. I'm not. I can't.” this refers to the recent distance SW had from Rodimus. After the Irradion, SW avoided him, and Rodimus doesn't want to risk that happening again. It was deeply hurtful.

-Rodimus's thought process here is basically "SW thinks in a literal and direct fashion, but his default expression is to be quiet, so I am going to literally and directly ask him about this so we can figure it out." He asks direct questions because he knows SW's default is to be silent. Rodimus wants to get this conversation over with asap, but it won't go anywhere if SW is quiet. Hence "We're doubling down on the trust. We're not leaving the arena 'til we figure this out. If you think I won't camp here until you speak up, you're wrong.”

-Rodimus receives abstract answers to his questions. He keeps asking SW for clarification and repeating himself because he wants to get to the bottom of this. He wants to clear the air between them. This pattern is repeated several times. I'll simplify the conversation so you can see what I mean:

“What else? Get it out, Soundwave.” [Rodimus is asking directly for info]

“Danger: not desired.” [SW gives him an answer that doesn't make sense]

“Then don't do the danger.” [Rodimus gives what he feels is a good solution to this thing that doesn't make sense]

“Stability point: required.” [SW gives him another abstract answer]

“What kind of stability point? What do you mean?” [R asks for clarification. He wants to help SW]

“If you think I am a monster, than I am a monster.” [SW gives another abstract answer. This response does not answer R's questions on stability points and from R's point of view makes no sense]

“Like hell you are. One, I never said that. Two, that logic is for people who don't have options and choices. You have options. You have choices.” [R reiterates that SW has choices and options. He doesn't think SW is a monster. He wants SW to know that and to move on from the abstract answers]

From here, SW says nothing, so R gets very, very truthful. He spells things out exactly as they are.

“You're stuck with us, Soundwave. You're stuck with me. No getting around it. You know you have a place here. You have friends. You have your crystals.” This is meant to be self-evident. R is reiterating that SW has a place on the LL. Rodimus reached for the tentacle. It pulled away. “You want to do this the hard way? Fine. I do trust you, Soundwave. With my life. But not with my ship. You're literally made of data tendrils and you lied about using them. Can you blame me?” This is R telling SW the naked truth about what's going on.

The rest of the convo goes similarly, with Rodimus trying to get to the root of the issue and Soundwave being quiet or evasive. At one point Rodimus even tries to spin the convo to a positive note, highlighting SW's amazing recent achievement. You literally built a steerable portal! We can go back to 0001 and get direly needed supplies. This is your great work, right? We should be celebrating, not having difficult conversations! SW rebukes it. This goes on until Rodimus realizes the conversation isn't accomplishing anything, and he ends it.

We don't see Rodimus's thoughts directly because there's a LOT going on in this scene. In a dialog-heavy scene, written out thoughts can be intrusive and distracting for the reader. Rodimus's frustration and repeated attempts to communicate are conveyed through his words and actions instead. What he's saying is what he's thinking, here.

#ask #anonymous #rodimus #long post #maybe it is a thorough answer lol

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aghostwithnoname · 1 month

Text

Official Fuck Raphael/Hope Appreciation Post

Okay, so this is probably going to upset people but I don't care. I'm real sick of this "Raphael is so hot" BS. Like, firstly, that man is MID at best. Secondly, are we not gonna talk about the fact this man is a certified abuser in every sense of the word? Like, sure he's sweet-talking and clever (most abusers are imo). Newsflash: real monsters are rarely people you find unattractive!!!

What really grinds my gears is that you can stumble on Raphael making a deal with a literal child re: my sweet baby Mol and people are like, "but he's hot though". You can walk through his fucking house filled with all the poor bastards who never stood a chance making a deal with him, stuck forever being punished for their "sins", and people will be like, "Omg, my little cringe man" like??? (Holy god, that whole quest fucked so hard with my religious trauma.)

But if not the BIGGEST fucking red flag for this public adoration of Raphael is how he's treated Hope. It's like to them, she doesn't even exist!! Like, my girl has been stuck in that House of Horrors for gods know how long, still refusing to give into his charms and his sweetly worded promises of power (unlike Korilla, who gladly abuses her sister for Raphael). And Hope helps you because for once, she finally sees a way out. The personal notes kept by Raphael on Hope's torment that you can find throughout the house are difficult to read: he tried to break her in the most insidious of ways. He was physically, emotionally, and mentally abusive to her, purely for his pleasure. Purely for the reason that he finds it amusing that he can literally torment Hope in hell.

I get that we don't have to morally approve of every character we like! For comparison on liking "bad" characters, say what you want about Astarion -- He's not a great guy! He's done some pretty bad shit! BUT he was FORCED to do all of those things by Cazador. (Also, kindly fuck the Cazador apologists, seriously.) Astarion's jaded selfishness is not who he really is, which is slowly revealed when you show respect for his personal autonomy and literally the smallest amount of kindness, whether or not you romance him. Raphael, on the other hand, wants to hurt people because it feeds into his "Daddy Mephistopheles didn't give me enough attention" superiority complex -- and tbh, that's just fucking pathetic.

The REAL OG who you all should be praising is Hope.

She has been tormented for centuries. She has been victimized by her own flesh and blood for her abuser. She has been shattered and ground down into her smallest pieces until there's almost nothing left… and yet, she hopes. She hopes for freedom. She hopes that her sister will return to being the person she so fondly remembers from her childhood. She hopes she can trust you, in spite of everything she's been through. Not to mention, when you do free her, Hope is literally one of the most badass companions you can have to help you win that fight! (For all these reasons and more, she reminds me a bit of my other fav girl Karlach.)

The reason Raphael delights in torturing Hope is because hope is a dangerous thing to have when all seems lost -- and that's the entire fucking point. This scared shitless little man sought to bend Hope to his will because her persistence/resistance threatened him, and by the gods, she is my favorite NPC because of that.

As someone who has been abused, by other people, by insidious ideologies, I can never ever, ever side with someone who so clearly mimics the very things that tried to break me and kill what remained of my hope. I see myself in Hope. Her indecision, her fear, as she dares to believe freedom is a possibility. The way her dialogue is delivered (much kudos to her voice actor) directly mimics that same scared voice in my head that second guesses myself, that worries I am not enough, that my abusers were right, that I wasn't ever deserving of happiness or being alive -- and then that same scared voice cuts through it all and screams to survive out of spite, to live happily as the best form of revenge.

Again, I get that we don't have to morally approve of every character we like! I totally understand it -- but I also want you all to expend some critical thinking as to perhaps WHY so many people are fawning over a man who is so clearly is a thinly veiled piece of shit over a woman who dared to challenge him, suffered for it, and emerged victorious.

Hope is fucking amazing. She is a gods-damned survivor. She is fury and vengeance and sorrow and joy all at once. She stays in hell to help the other souls tormented and abused by Raphael. She asks that you visit her some time. She strives to create a home of out the house that was her prison… and truly, I hope every day to be more like her.

#bg3 #bg3 spoilers #bg3 hope #bg3 thoughts #don't @ me #you can't change my mind #fuck Raphael and not in a fun way #hope is literally a fucking menace to Satan himself and I love her forever #cw religious trauma #tw abuse mention #baldurs gate 3

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hannibalruinedme · 6 months

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Hannibal and my life long suffering

I know I'm late. I know you all have been in my shoes and survived. (or did you?)

I'll keep it very simple. I'm a very normal person. Once in a blue moon I stumble upon a piece of media so beautiful that I let it take over my whole soul. The media I consume, consumes me.

Long story short: I've finished watching Hannibal 2 days ago and the ache I feel in my heart is PHYSICAL. If anyone ever told me that I had yet to discover something which would make me feel the way hannibal made me feel, I wouldn't have believed in them. But boy I was wrong. I just know that this masterpiece of a series will forever torment me slowly. I'll never be able to NOT to feel pain whenever I come across Hannigram edits. It'll forever have this tormenting yet not welcomed grip on my heart. Am I suffering? Deeply. Do I want it to go away? No. Do I need more? A thousand times yes. This has to one of the best Achillean shows out there and we did deserve more of it. We still do.

It feels tragically unfair that there is little to no hope for a season 4. Yes I know, the s3 ending is very beautiful in it's own way. But was it worth giving up hannigram over? I don't think so. I wholeheartedly believe nothing will ever HIT home as much as Hannigram does. Once you get the taste for it, nothing ever feels the same.

I'm completely shattered and depressed. I'm not being dramatic when I say that I sigh all day and stay up late watching old Hannigram contents over and over. I've literally texted Bryan (lol) on Instagram begging for more and I Google "Is there any hope for Hannibal s4" 5 times a day. Even tho the fannibals are always thriving (I love you), seeing a content which has "8 years ago" marked under it, makes me feel terribly lonely. It's deeply saddening to me. The phase I'm in right now, I don't believe I'll ever stop waiting for season 4. I've realised, after doomscrolling on reddit, that most of you've accepted the fact that it's over. Well, good for you. I hope one day I'll be able to reach that stage and be happy with how things ended.

But not for now, right now, I'm on edge. I wake up with knots in my stomach and go through my day feeling miserable. (it might sound extreme to some of you but if you've ever fallen in love with fiction deeply, you'd know). So if you're one of the fannibals who's hopeful (delusional) that there might be a chance of a season 4, please, pick me up. I need consolations from all of you. Please tell me what do you think. Is really there ANY chance? Please give me some hope. If it continues someday (someday...) with more Hannigram (as Bryan has already promised in the last online cast meet up) on the toe, I'd be the HAPPIEST person alive. The HAPPIEST. Even a film would do. Just something. Just a bit more of our murder husbands GOD PLEASE.

#hannigram #hannibal #will graham #hannibal lecter #dr lecter #hannibal season 4 #bring hannibal back #fannibals #not liking it is humanely impossible #best thing ever #season 4 #hannibal season 3 #hugh dancy #mads mikkelsen #save hannibal

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wreckingtickles · 7 months

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Kaminari & Mx Rake (NSFW)

In which Kaminari learns that electricity and water don't mix.

The Auction Masterlist

Words: 4,274

Water slides. From that singular observation, Kaminari’s short-circuited brain began reconstructing its usual patterns. That thing is a water slide. And so is that one. When did I last go to a water park? Summer, was Kiri there? And Kyoka? That’s a very small water slide. It’s not a real one. It’s a model. So many water slide models. Functioning, with water running down them. Why are there so many water slide models in this room?

Why I am in this room?

The ceiling and walls alike were draped in darkness, so Kaminari had no idea how large the room actually was. He could only make out the gray floor, concrete-like, and dozens, if not hundreds of colorful water slide models of different sizes and shapes. All of them poured water directly onto the ground.

But far more alarming was the fact that he was fully restrained, wearing aught safe for a pair of bright yellow boxers and white ankle socks. He was lying on his back on some padded apparatus, his legs raised vertically and his knees bent so his shins were parallel to his torso, if at a higher elevation. His ankles were enclosed in two padded metal rings topping spikes firmly planted into the ground. Similar tools held his biceps and wrists, which were bent so they were just above his head, and connected to a metal ring around his forehead that prevented him from lifting his head. Two leather straps secured to his inner thighs prevented him from bucking or sliding up and down the padded device he was lying on.

The moment he realized he was restrained, the gale of memories came rushing back, and he remembered the horrid tickling he’d experienced earlier. He started struggling against his binds with no second thoughts. He had a slimmer build than many of his more muscular classmates – Greek god Kirishima, V-shaped Bakugo, stocky Midoriya, broad-chested Ojiro – but he was no less toned, with slightly broader shoulders than swimmer-bodied Todoroki, though that still failed to score him babes. In fact, his classmates had all grown quite fed up with him constantly flashing his abs to impress the girls, which was how the latter found out his abdominal muscle was off-the-charts ticklish.

And as his lean muscles bulged fruitlessly, he heard a splash. He froze in terror, and between his raised thighs he saw a tall shadow standing mere inches away from the lower half of his body. The shadow leaned down, bringing into view a mask that was like a massive deer skull, massive antlers sprouting from its top.

“Calm yourself, Yellow. None shall hurt thee,” both threatened and promised a deep, echoing voice.

“Don’t tickle me. Please, mister, don’t tickle me anymore!”

“Mixter. I am called Mx Rake.”

“Mixter Rake, please, sire, please please please, let me go, don’t tickle me, I can’t stand it, I’ll die, please!”

“Thou shan’t perish. Thou shan’t even be hurt. The plain crown thou wearest shan’t allow thee to fulminate thine brain.”

“Please no, please… What?”

“The thing around your head won’t let you short-circuit yourself, you dumbass!” snapped Mx Rake.

That was very bad, actually. It meant Kaminari would be fully conscious through his torture. He resumed mewling with even more fervor. “Please please don’t tickle me, I’ll do anything!!!”

“Anything?” enquired the voice pensively.

“Yes, anything!” Kaminari would have nodded furiously if his restraint allowed it.

“Wouldst thou lend thy services in titillating thine friends till they lost consciousness?”

“Yes!” exclaimed Kaminari, starting enthusiastically, then doubt creeping in the last letter.

“Who wouldst thou torment? Red?”

“No, Kirishima’s my friend! Granted, he might enjoy it…”

“Orange?”

“Oh god no, he’d kill me!”

“Green? Gray? Pink?”

Denki stayed silent and gulped. None of them deserved it.

“Mayhaps White? Or Black?”

Kaminari really didn’t know Inasa and Shindo well enough to feel much sympathy for their current predicament… or so he thought before they were offered up as alternative victims. What kind of hero would accept that offer?

“No. I won’t do it. Do your worst,” he forced himself to say with as resolute a face he could put on.

“I am pleased. Forsooth, your agreeance would not have spared thee mine fingers,” uttered the shadow, two long arms protruding from its dark form, massive hands tipped by metal claws.

Denki went pale. “No no no, I changed my mind, I’ll do it, I’ll do it!”

“Too late,” proclaimed the figure as the hands retracted… and all 10 claws immediately got to work scratching at the bottom of Kaminari’s socked soles.

Kaminari instantly burst into laughter. “HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHA HAHAHAHHA HAHAHAHAHAHA!!! NOHOHOHOHOHAHHAHAHHAHAHAHAH HAHAHAHAAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAA!!! NOHOHOHOT THEHEHEHHEHEERE!!!”

“Wouldst thou favor a different target?” teased the shadow, fully aware that Kaminari was in no condition to understand irony.

“HAHAHAGAHAHAHH HAHAHA HAHAHHA AHHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAH HAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAH HAHAHAHAHH HAHAHAHHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAH!!!”

Denki’s classmates had noted how he’d always scream at the top of his lungs when he was tickled. It didn’t matter where or how, if it tickled even a little bit, Denki was out. It was like he was fully unable to rein in his response, even when the tickling wasn’t as bad… and from what he remembered, the metal claws raking at his arches weren’t even half as bad as what his abs had experienced prior to his last short-circuit.

“HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHHAHAHA!!! IT TIHIHIHICKLES!!!! HAHAHAHAHAHHAHAA IHIHIT TIIIICKLEEHEHEHEHEHEHEHSSSSS!!” he shouted as Mx Rake focused on his arches more, which he’d found to be more sensitive than the balls of his feet and his heels, scratching down repeatedly and giving extra love to Denki’s instep.

“To what extent does it ‘tickle’? Answer me.”

“HAHHAHAHAHAHAA! TOOMUAHHAHAHAHAHACH! HAHHAHA HAHAHAHAH HAHAHAHAHAAHHAHAHAHAHAHA GHAGHAGHAHHAHAHAHAHAAA!!!”

“Answer me, or thou shalt be tickled forevermore.”

“A THOHAHAHAHHAHA! A THAHAHAHAHAHOUSAHAHAHAHND!!! TEHEHEN THOHHHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAAH!!! ONE MIHIHIHLLLLIOHOHHOHOHNNN!” Denki tried to answer mid-hysterics.

“Comprised between 1 and 10, the number of the claws currently scratching under your wiggling toes.”

“HAHHAAHHAAH TEHEHEHEHEHEHEN!! TEHEHEHEHEHEHEHHHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! HAHAHAH TEHEHEHEHEEHN TEHEHEHEN!!”

“It does not, Yellow. I know it,” replied the shadow matter-of-factly as the metal claws raked at the white cotton. Denki could curl his feet and even wiggle them from side to side, but Mx Rake didn’t mind. They weren’t his primary target; and once he’d start really being mean, restraints wouldn’t matter, he’d been assured.

Short on stamina as he was, Denki’s struggling became weaker, though no less desperate, same as his laughter: as Mx Rake had been informed, that confirmed that his feet weren’t even that ticklish.

Even so Denki screamed “NIIHIHIHHIIHIHIIHHINE! NIHIHHHIHAHHAAHAH HAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHAHAHAH NINIHIHAHHAHAHANINE!!! HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!”

The shadow didn’t relent. “Dost thou seek to deceive me, child?”

“NO NONO HAHAH NOHAHAHAHAHAH!!! NAOAHAHAHAHAH AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH HAHAHAAH HAHAHAHAHAH AHHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!” Not even Denki knew if he was answering Mx Rake’s question. “EHEHEHEHEIGHT!! HAHAHAH HAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEIGHHIHIHIHIHIHI!!”

“Such underhanded machinations warrant more torment,” proclaimed the shadow’s rumbling voice, thundering even above Denki’s crazed laughter, immediately before he went back to scratching at Denki’s insteps, causing his tortured vowels to stretch even longer.

“GHHAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! HAHAHAHAHHAHAHA!! SEHEHEHEHEHEVEEHEHHEHHHE!!! SEHEHEHEHHEEHVEEHEHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!”

“Thou needst to speak clearly, Yellow.”

No. Not these stupid games. He hated the, hated being teased about his ticklishness, but even more, he loathed being asked to do something while being tickled, because he simply couldn’t. And yet… he’d got enough training from Bakugo and Kirishima that he managed to eke out a “HAAAHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAH! SEHEHEHEHEHEHEVHAHAHHAHAAHAHAHAH! SEHEVEN! SEVEHEN!!!!”

Surprised, Mx Rake actually paused, and Denki never thought he’d find himself being grateful for the tickling his two sadistic friends put him through on a semi-regular basis.

“That is correct,” confirmed the shadow, though that didn’t sound at all right to Denki. With a flash of fire and Sulphur, a partially unrolled scroll appeared in Mx Rake’s large, clawed hand. “I hold thine ‘Tickle Chart’, Yellow. Your feet rank a 7. Only thine armpits and chest art less sensitive. Thou art a ticklish one, verily.”

Normally Kaminari would have flushed with embarrassment, but now he was groing even paler. Because that wasn’t just information, it was a threat. Or worse yet, a promise.

“No more, please I--"

“Silence!” command Mx Rake, his clawtips making contact with the cotton again. Denki whimpered and complied.

“Thine luck is bountiful, Yellow, for my targets art few,” proclaimed the shadow, and Denki almost dared to be relieved. “Where thine good fortune be deficient, however…” Mx Rake began as his arm stretched several meters to grab at the closest water slide model. He lifted it over Denki’s right foot, letting the water it spontaneously produced run down the cotton of his sock. “…is thine own power.”

Denki didn’t understand, but he kept his mouth obediently shut. The water was almost soothing, washing out the lingering phantom tickles and cooling down a body part that had got far too much heat.

When his right foot was thoroughly drenched, Mx Rake tipped the water slide so it’d do the same to the left. The fabric grew more tight-fitting, though Kaminari knew from first-hand experience that being tickled on his bare feet would have been worse… especially with those hellish metal claws, and that was before his own damned Quirk reacted to it!

When Mx Rake laid the water slide back on its pedestal, Denki’s nerves got the best of him. “What are you going to do?”

“Demonstrate,” replied the shadow, and suddenly, all ten claws were back to work ruining Kaminari’s life, scratching at the damp cotton that had taken a pink hue.

“GHAHAHAHAHHAAHAHAH ANANANANANANAHAHAHAH!!!! NAHAHAAHAHHAHA AHAHAHAHANOHOHAHAHAT AGAAHAHAHAHAHAINN AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAAH!!!”

Denki’s laughter came back full-force… and it would stay much, much longer. For where Mx Rake was still somewhat exploring before, he was now honing in on the most ticklish pots on Denki’s soles, meaning his arches and, especially, his insteps bore the brunt of his fury. The shadow only ever targeted his heels, or the balls of his foot, or his toes when he sensed that Kaminari was getting too accustomed to that targeted torment, and would switch back as soon as the sensations were fresh once more.

Denki laughed, screamed, begged, promised as the minutes tickled by, but Mx Rake took his loquaciousness to mean that he was nowhere near his true breaking point. So he kept tickling, raking, scratching, until…

Clck. Zzap! Zzap!

Sparks began arcing off Kaminari’s drenched socks, crackling as the metal fingers made contact… and Kaminari experienced a completely new sensation: every single micron of his feet being poke-tickled at once. His laughter, which had been diminishing, skyrocketed. “HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!! HAHAHA HAHAHHA HAHAHAHAH AHHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHA HAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!”

His Quirk was tickling him. But not just focusing on the same spots as the metal claws like before, no. It was wreaking havoc over his entire sole.

Water. That was what the water was for. It was conducting his electricity, and tickling the hell out of him as it did. It was almost like being bombarded with insanely ticklish vibrations, but that wasn’t quite it, because the sensation was much more uneven than that; and through it, he could still distinctly make out the metal claws, like ten dazzling lines in a luminous sky.

Even so, he missed them retracting several minutes after the thunderstorm began, because even when Mx Rake stopped tickling him, his own sparks didn’t, ensuring his soles would remain shrouded in a ticklish cloud that fully dispersed about a minute afterwards – which was experienced as much longer by Denki himself.

Overdramatic as always, he was left panting and whimpering as ticklish tears rolled down the sides of his head and along the peaks and valleys of his ears. His neck cramped from the effort to raise his head so he could get a better look at what Mx Rake was doing to his feet, but his restraints ensured that his feet would be at the very bottom edge of his vision, taunting him.

Suddenly, one of the water slide models was hovering right above his face.

“Drink,” commanded the shadow before water flowed the model into Denki’s parched mouth. “Thou art parched, art thou not?” he asked and, without allowing Denki to answer, he positioned the model on a pedestal right next to the electric blond; in fact, the shadow hadn’t remained idle while Kaminari was busy tickling himself, as all the models were now looming much closer to him on their pedestals, pouring water to the sides.

Mx Rake snapped his fingers, and all the water slides rotated, pouring water directly on Denki’s body, cooling him off and drenching him from the shoulders down.

“Thanks,” uttered Denki before he could stop himself. With all that thrashing and screaming, he had worked up quite a sweat. Granted, the feeling of the drenched underwear clinging to his most private parts wasn’t altogether pleasant, especially as they made his barely concealed form even less obscure…

“Hast thou not comprehended yet?” asked the shadow, and though his deer-skull could not smile, Denki recognized his bemused tone. That’s when it dawned on him.

The shadow relished in the horror that showed on his face. “Endeavour to restrain your power, should thou wish to forestall utter torment.”

“No, no wait, you can’t--!” started Kaminari before being abruptly cut off by all ten metal claws landing on his outstretched, vulnerable, terribly ticklish abs. “AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!! HAHAHA HAHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAH AHAHHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAH HAHAHAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHAAAHA AHHAHAHAHAHHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!”

Though even louder, Denki’s laughter was, perhaps surprisingly, lower-pitched: that was because all performative agony was gone. What Kaminari was feeling was genuine, unadulterated ticklish agony, and the laughter bursting forth nothing other than the sound of a ticklishness 10 spot being exploited by capable, metal-tipped fingers.

The hands were so large and the fingers so long that they could cover the whole expanse of Denki’s stomach with ease, from the waistband of his soaked underwear to his sternum, side-to-side; and what was even worse, each of them could move independently from the others, so one thumb was circling and dipping into his bellybutton while three other fingers raked at his lowest set of abs, just above his waist, while other fingers still ran up and down his lats and along the bottom of his ribcage.

It was horrible. Absolutely horrible. Only that time Sero had taped him to the common room floor and all their classmates had ganged up on him with rubber gloves compared, and barely. they had been vicious, but not many had been this skilled, this precise. And somehow, throughout it all, he was supposed to hold off his Quirk?!

The scratching got faster, even faster, and Denki dipped into silent laughter, and somehow he knew it hadn’t even been 10 seconds, so he forced himself to laugh himself crazy again, because even that tiny bit of release helped him fend off the spontaneous manifestations of his own Quirk, the weapon that the metal claws and water would turn on him…

“……………………………………………..HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!! HAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAH HAHAHAHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHHAHA HAHAHAHAHAHHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!”

It was thanks to all that hostage training, controlling his Quirk so he wouldn’t harm the pretend-civilians, that he’d been able to hold out that long, when normally his shocks would have freed him from the hands of any sadistic classmate. The effort was superhuman…

As he kept raking at his taut belly, drawing the outline of each muscle, savoring the vibrating mirth, Mx Rake leaned down, his deer-skull mask an inch from Kaminari’s mirth-filled eyes, and he proclaimed “20 seconds have passed. 20 minutes still.”

Two things happened almost simultaneously. First, sparks began to trickle out of Denki’s skin, attracted by the metal fingers, and making the tickling that much more unbearable; and since Denki was already at his breaking point, that extra dose of torture tipped him over the edge, and he short-circuited: the whole room was lit by a flash as thunder crackled…

But he didn’t derp out: the circlet holding down his head sent the electricity back down his body, and a massive surge of ticklishness enveloped him from the neck down.

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!! AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!! HAHAHA……………………………… AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAH AHHAAHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHH!!!”

What came out of him could barely be called laughter, it was mirth-filled shrieking. His everything tickled: his feet, knees – god, his knees – thighs, torso, even the underwear-clad portion, everything was subjected to agonizing ticklish vibrations, pure and unfiltered. And even through all that, he could feel the claws trace their horrid patterns on the sensitive skin of his stomach.

Mx Rake made sure to make every single promised second the absolute worst it could be, the ever-changing patterns on Kaminari’s abs never allowing themselves to falter below the cloud of sensation that his own Quirk was inflicting on him, and kept inflicting on him for a solid few minutes after the promised time elapsed.

As soon as Kaminari was able to feel surprise again, he marveled that he made it through without passing out, since being tickled for that long and that hard without short-circuiting was uncharted territory for him. There be monsters.

But the second surprise was unveiled to him by the shadow’s tilted head, as Kaminari realized that among all the soreness of his thrashing, there was unexpected tension.

Kaminari was hard. Not a half-assed boner, he was fully erect in his soaked, still crackling underwear, or he would have been if the yellow fabric allowed him to grow to his full length – average, maybe even slightly above average, though he felt small.

He instantly knew what happened. That fucking water. His nipples weren’t ticklish, though his groin was a bit, but the continuous discharge had had a secondary effect on those areas, one that he hadn’t been able to focus on while every strand of laughter was pulled out of him.

“A surprise, to be sure. Yet a welcome one,” muses Mx Rake, his massive palms resting on the inner side of each of Denki’s thighs.

“It’s!! It’s not my fault, the electricity--!!” protested Denki, but the shadow’s imperious palm silenced him.

“Wishest thou for deliverance?” ask the hollow eyes. Kaminari doesn’t understand the literal meaning of those words, but the amused tone is eloquent enough.

Kaminari mouths unintelligible words before a timid “N-No!” He’d always had to take care of his own arousal. Well, there was that one time where he was so desperate he almost asked Kirishima to help him out, he knew his friend wouldn’t judge him… but he certainly wasn’t going to say yes to some shadow demon or whatever hell-bent on tickling him!

Mx Rake nodded, and two water slides swiveled, drenching Denki’s chest, each stream aimed directly at one nipple.

“I shall bide my time, then. A thousand rotations, I would say.”

---

“GGGGGHHHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!! HAHHAHAAH HAHAHAHAHHAHAHHAHAHA!!!!! OKHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!! OKAHAHAHHAHAKOKHAHAHAHHAHAHAHA!!!!” desperately pleaded Kaminari as 4 fingers completed their thousandth rotation along his lower belly, while the other 6 glided clockwise along the edge of his ribcage, which he’d painfully learned was the most sensitive spot on his extremely ticklish midsection.

Throughout the rotations, the water slides had kept pouring water on his nipples, which crackled with electricity. Kaminari wasn’t normally ticklish there, and the light tickles he felt were perfectly negligible compared to the electric hell that were his abs, with the metal claws acting as lighting rods that further enhanced his torment… but another part of him was responding very strongly to the attention to his erect nubs, soaking his damp underwear with pre-cum.

But even stronger than the endlessly frustrated arousal was the need for those damn claws to leave his horribly sensitive abs alone. He’d come to regret every single crunch he’d done.

“HHAGHAHAHAHAH AHAHAHAHHAHAHAHHAAHAH!!! DEHEHEHELIVER DEHEHEHEHELIVEROOOHOHOHOHHAHAHAHAHAHAH HAHAHAHAHAHHAHAAH!!!”

The clawtips stopped for a moment, though the electricity kept crackling.

“A thousand more rotations.”

---

Kaminari had never been that exhausted, sweaty, or horny. In fact, he was convinced the arousal built by the relentless nipple stimulation was the only thing keeping him awake. That and the discomfort of the damp underwear constraining his erection.

“Wilst thou embrace deliverance?” thundered the echoing voice.

Denki tried to nod, too tired and raspy to answer, but the circlet prevented it. So, eyes closed, he simply mouthed his answer.

A splash of cold water on his nether regions revitalized him, the slight pressure more than enough to wreak havoc on his excited system.

But his eyes opened when he felt the claws on his abs once again.

“No, please…!” he whimpered as the claws glided ever so lightly, ever so slowly up and down his ticklish flesh.

“I have paid the toll. I am owned my time in full,” lashed the shadow, but his touch remained gentle. It wasn’t pleasant by any definition, except it wasn’t anywhere near as torturous as before, but it forced Denki to maintain a steady stream of giggling, on the very cusp of laughter but without getting enough stimulation to be allowed that release.

It didn’t take long for Denki’s Quirk to manifest again, and he gasped when the tickling intensified and the vibrations spread to his groin.

“Oh. Oh… ohohahaha oh! Ohhahaha oh! Oh! Oh!”

Even as it was indirectly fueling his arousal, the tickling was also distracting Kaminari from it. Those claws, those damned claws…

But the electricity around his cock felt so good, like a vibrating sleeve, that he didn’t know what to beg for. He kept moaning and chuckling for what to him was an unbearably long time, but was really probably less than a minute, until…

“Ohoho ha haha oh! Oh! O—Ooooooooooohnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnghhhhhh! OH! OH! OH! OH!!!” he cried as he spurted in his underwear, the pressure being far too much, and for those massive seconds, the claws almost felt pleasant on his skin…

And as wave after wave of pleasure crashed down on him, Denki passed out.

---

When Kaminari opened his eyes again, he was lying face-down on the wet floor, elbows propped up, belly adhering to the cold surface, and his cock… wait, his cock was dangling through it?! Like in some sort of hole filled with liquid. Why was he naked?!

He was secured to the ground through his forearms, waist, thighs, and ankles, so he looked like his plank position crumbled and he’d remained stuck there.

He looked around. No water slides. No shadow. Nothing. He’s alone. Or so he thought until he glanced down and saw a deer skull looking back at him from below the surface. The antlers pierced the water, rising up from the ground, the head, until it was level with Kaminari’s.

“Please. Let me go,” begged the blond, though he already knew he wasn’t getting any mercy.

“I have paid the toll. Thine vanishing spells shan’t keep thee from what I’m owed.”

And the cold touch of the metal claws makes itself known once more, dragging up and Kaminari’s exposed buttocks.

“Oh no come on no no, nohot there!”

“It shan’t be there,” Mx Rake responds, oozing mischief. The claws trail down Kaminari’s legs…

“Oh no wait wahahait!!” Kaminari panics as they glide down his kneepit, stopping at the top of his shin muscle.

“I have stopped.”

“Nonononono, keep goihing!!! Tickle my feet, my, my armpits, my thighs, my belly – no wait, not my belly--”

“Thou hidest more than one ten,” remarks Mx Rake, and he reverses course, dragging the claws up Denki’s kneepits, then down again…

“NonoNOHOHOHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!!!! HAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!!!! HAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!”

All control lost right away, sparks immediately fly off Denki’s buttocks, traveling along the water’s edge so they crackle against his balls, waist, and much more tragically, his abs; and down into the water, enveloping his entire flaccid length.

“GOOOOOHAHAHAHAAHAD!!! HAHAHA HHAHAHAHAHAH HAHAHHHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHA HAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHHAAHHAAHHAHA!!!!!”

Thus begins a new cycle where Mx Rake gently glides his claws up and down Denki’s kneepits, often lingering just beneath it, in the interstice between the two muscles, which is just as sensitive, just as torturous as his abs; and as Kaminari laughs his head off, sparks fly, stimulating Denki’s abs again, as well as his scrotum and his entire length, soon growing into an erection, which makes it even more sensitive.

The ticklish agony slows it down, but the arousal keeps building up, up, a two-steps-forward-one-step-back proposition between the two contrasting pulls that keep Denki on the edge for way, way, way longer than he’s ever experienced – then again, he’s never been tickled that hard or that long either…

Until the pressure is too much, and Mx Rake hears his voice cut off abruptly. He doesn’t need to see the blond’s slack jaw or his unfocused pupils to know what’s going on, he simply continues wreaking havoc on those kneepits and shins, so Denki’s Quirk will continue to torment his abs and cock… allowing him to discover just how much more ticklish one gets after an orgasm, especially on their cock.

Denki screams, laughs, coughs, wheezes, hiccups, but the shadow doesn’t stop for one moment, and neither do the sparks. And when Denki feels himself growing hard again, having learned what will be in store for him once he cums, he begs Mx Rake not to let him cum, which is tantamount to pleading with him to stop with twice as much emphasis, so it’s all wasted effort.

Kaminari peaks again, and again, and again; all struggling, laughter and even pleasure steadily leaving him, but still, Mx Rake doesn’t stop; when he knows his time is almost up, he sets up one of his trusted water slide models so the water will run down Denki’s back and into his buttcrack, gifting him a more powerful and ticklish orgasm that rouses him from his near stupor, before he passes out once again.

When the Interdimensional Auctioneer appeared to set Denki free and return him to his world, he notices that Mx Rake still has a little time left.

The shadow’s voice betrays a smile. “I am satisfied. Keep the change. Mayhaps I shall reclaim those remaining few minutes in the future.”

#mha tickle #bnha tickle #spicy content #tickle content #tickle fic #tickletorture #ticklish!kaminari #lee!kaminari

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sorcerous-caress · 5 months

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Don't worry I'm definitely not rushing!! There's so much content and I'm still learning- stuff like wizards and warlocks scare me since they seem so complicated so I've been using Karlach and Lazael since they seem more straight forward for now. Astarion is definitely my favorite playstyle though- I've always loved Ninjas so being able to do 2 bonus actions is...*so* nice! Yeah- I can't say I'm surprised at the fixation 😅

Admittedly, I do absolutely adore him and am looking forward to writing for him; already have a fic in progress in fact- but I've seen a very similar thing happen to another character where he's either made entirely negative and insane or entirely positive and has to be "protected" when it's really a mix of both. Some parts of fandom I think are just like that 😅 Glad I found here and other more indie blogs who focus on npcs and niches though too so I get a wider variety!!

I'm so weak to being patronized and being talked to all condescending like and I just imagine this mean, bully male drow just targeting this crybaby Human in camp. They try to act all tough, but the drow just knows they're being a brat so he'll put them in their place. He's so damn *mean*- and he only gets worse when they run to their camp mates for help, or to hide. He steals your diary, telling you to "come get it" in a note he leaves them and they have no choice but to reluctantly leave their camp mates tent to go into the forest. It's dark- and even with their weapons, the Human's hypervigilant- but they still get taken off guard. Pulled back against a tree by their fragile little throat. Reading their most personal thoughts to blackmail them- ugh. Their crush in camp- how desperate they are, maybe even their secret kinks and desires? Gods, I'm so weak.

Oh God- or imagine a Human who's *scared* of the dark? Or a Drow who makes them scared of the dark by constantly frightening them during it? The predator/prey dynamic? *Please*. Also, self-indulgent(like all this *isn't* lmao-) because I'm sick atm and can't take large pills but Drow watching a Human work themself up to taking the medicine and just- taking it himself and then kissing them to force it in their mouth, not breaking it till they swallow, purple fingers dragging down their throat to make them shiver and raise thier shoulders. You've ruined me author. I can't do this. 😭 When I transfer my side blog to my new main blog I may have to write something for this dynamic because of you. So glad I could make your day a little brighter like you do ours lovely! Thank you for all that you do, as always! Sorry this is so long- the writer inspiration hit out of nowhere lol ❤️ -S

Fuck yeah ninja Astarion, let's fucking go!

That sounds wonderful anon, feel free to share your fic whenever you're finished <3 I'm sure it will be amazing.

And god yes, you get it, the whole human kink thing. Especially how condcending the elves would be with it, fuck especially the drows who already think they're above other elves.

Like maybe the other species keep their restraints a bit while in the party with the human, as much as their mind runs wild, they attempt to show some decorum and dignity. Only act like the perverts they are when the human isn't watching.

But once the male drow joins them? He's picking on the pathetic little human on his first day. Pulling and picking at your clothes, asking if humans really just walk around wearing slutty clothes all day?

He probably gets off on tormenting you, reminding you how he's hundreds of years older than you so you should shush your pretty little mouth and let him do what he wants, afterall aren't you humans so obsessed with showing respect for age? Then show him the respect he deserves whenever he pulls you on his lap, out of the blue and without a care to whoever is watching.

It's like second nature to him how casually he demeans your entire being, everything you ever hoped to achieved he probably has already, every place you wanted to see or travel to he has already seen, most historical events you read about he has lived through himself.

So in every way, he tells you that he clearly better than you. So don't go whining whenever he steals your diary and taunts you with all of your embarrassing secrets, or whenever he takes something precious from you and make you beg for him to give it back.

He teaches you some words in drow elvish, excepts they're completely not what he told you they meant. Watching you confidently call yourself his personal slut when you thought you were saying something else. Refuses to give you his name, makes you use all of these titles that are so humiliating to yell outloud midbattle, but he won't help you if you don't use them so poor you.

#♡human kink #♡drow kink #♡male drow #♡human reader #♡-S

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rileytwenty · 1 year

Text

IDIA || an Avatar story (x Neteyam)

Chapter 10

Masterlist

(English Na'vi)

Morning passed slowly. I was too upset by Neteyam's emotional admission to be around him, so I avoided him.

How could he say that he doesn't want me to feel like an outsider, when he treats me like one? How can he say that he doesn't want me to feel like I am lesser than, when his whole family acts like I am either a demon or a burden?

After lunch, Tsireya and I were the only ones left in the marui. She was doing some weaving, and had agreed to sit with me so I had some company.

"Tsireya, can I... can I ask you something?"

"Of course, Idia."

"What happened to Neteyam's hands? Do you know?"

She let out surprised giggles. "Yes, I know, but I'm sworn to secrecy. I'm sorry."

"Please, Tsireya, I'm worried." My tone was too concerned to leave space for more of her gentle giggles.

Her smile faltered into confusion for a second. "Okay, but you can't tell him you know. I think the embarrassment would kill him."

"Alright, fine. Now, tell me."

"He was trying to shuck oysters, but he didn't know how and did it wrong for hours. He said he'd get the cuts treated but I think he got too embarrassed and backed out."

I burst out into deep chuckles from my gut and Tsireya joined in. "Here I was worried that he got into a knife fight or something, meanwhile he was just shucking oysters?! That's too good!" I laughed out.

"Tsireya!" Oh shit. "You said you would keep it a secret, skxawng!" Neteyam growled through barred teeth, entering the marui with footsteps heavy enough to shake the netting.

Tsireya raised her hands in surrender, laughing as she hurriedly left the structure. "Sorry, Neteyam. I guess I just like Idia better," she added as soon as she was far enough away to be out of Neteyam's reach.

He clicked his tongue and his tail swished in annoyance.

"What are you doing here? I thought you were supposed to be training for a hunt with Ao'nung." As in, he was supposed to be somewhere that I was not.

"Yeah, the ass was nowhere to be found." He seated himself next to me at the water entrance of the marui, dangling his legs next to mine. "Look, if I have a free moment, I want to talk to you. I know you're trying to avoid me after what I said last night."

I heaved a sigh. "You might just be right. What about it?"

"Listen, I meant what I said. I don't like the way they treat you. It's not right."

I knew that. It was obvious. But to hear someone else say it, especially someone from the clan? It was nice, to say the least.

"I appreciate you saying that, but as I said, you would never say that in front of your parents."

He rubbed the back of his neck anxiously. "Maybe not, but that's because my parents are terrifying and stubborn. That doesn't change the fact that you don't deserve the treatment you get."

"I know I was dealt a bad hand, I don't need you to tell me. I know I don't deserve the isolation and humiliation and torment the whole fucking clan gives me. You act like this is news, but it's not. It's been like this since I was born. Did you know that I was raised on synthesized breast milk after my parents died because none of the lactating mothers would share their milk with a demon? It's always been this way, even if you never realized it."

"I..." He ran a hand through his braids, tousling them about. "I'm sorry. I didn't know how bad it was. I wish that I had noticed your suffering sooner. Maybe it could have been easier for you."

I rubbed the crease between my brows. "Don't worry yourself about it, Neteyam. It is the way it is." I patted his shoulder in reassurance.

"No. They still treat you terribly, and they shouldn't."

"Well, Tonowari and Tsireya are pretty nice. It's better here than at the mountain base. I'll be fine."

"No, no. You deserve better than 'fine'." He rose to his feet and began to walk off.

"Neteyam." He was too focused on wherever he was going to stop.

I groaned. If he was going to stir up trouble with his family, could he not at least wait until I was healed?

-----------------------------------------------------

"What have you done?" Neytiri barged into the marui, storming over to where I was sitting.

"What?"

"What have you told my son? Filling his head with lies? Turning him against me?" She hissed, her ears flat back against her hair and her eyes wide, standing in a predatory stance.

"I didn't do anything, I swear." I rose to my feet, holding my arms up defensively. Standing on my leg made it sting.

"Mother! It was my own opinion. Now, leave Idia alone," Neteyam defended me, entering the marui behind his mother. Neytiri hissed and snarled at me, ignoring her first born.

"He comes to me saying that I, his mother, am wrong for how I act? He speaks as if I didn't see the massacre of my people at your family's hands! How have you manipulated him like this? Tell me!"

"Mother, please. Can you not take a second to think about it? Idia spent her whole life apologizing for something she didn't do! Her parents' actions are not her own."

Jake entered the structure, clearly stressed out and trying to diffuse the situation by comforting his mate, but she was having none of it.

"She has their blood!" Neytiri erupted in rage, now directed at Neteyam. "She has murderer blood, and you, my son, are giving her your pity!" Her voice lowered to a malicious whisper, "I am ashamed of you."

"Neytiri!" Jake scorned her, looking at her as if he did not recognize her.

Neteyam looked beyond shocked. His tail froze mid-swish. "Mother?"

"Get out, both of you. I do not wish to see either of you right now. Pray I do not carve out your tongues when you return." She shooed Neteyam and I away. Neteyam stood unmoving, stuck in the moment in which his mother had shamed him.

"Neteyam, she said we should go." My statement seemed to draw him back to the current moment.

"Yeah, I fucking heard her." Neteyam's swear drew Jake's attention from his wife, but he said nothing. Neteyam raged out of the marui and across the beach and I tried my best to keep up with him.

"Neteyam look, you're angry right now, okay? Don't do anything stupid because of it," I warned him cautiously. He said nothing.

I was falling drastically behind, and called out for him to slow down. He acted as if he hadn't heard me. My leg was burning again, badly. I winced, sucked in a breath and dropped down to the sand. "Neteyam, please!"

He let out a aggravated sound, but turned around to come help me. Wrapping my arm around his shoulders and encircling his other hand around my waist, he started hauling me forwards.

"Where are you even going?"

"Lo'ak showed me this place that Tsireya showed him, we can wait there until we're allowed back. It's not far now, you can make it."

taglist: @im-kaii@itsemy01@isabel-ffl-xoxo@useryourbut@hoodiepandaninja16 @slutforsmut4ever @ihonestlydontknowwhattonamethis

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grislyintentions · 8 months

Text

@nekasu (x)

"And you are still not listening." Even after hearing everything she had to convey about her unease, he still clung onto the belief that he is justified for wearing away at her. That he had no part to play for her pain. To believe that it bears no validity just because he believed his intentions were not to hurt still does not justify nor diminish the fact that it does. What good is there to be achieved when he alone continues to shirk responsibility under the pretext of 'explaining his perspective'?

"You are doing exactly what you claim to not be doing. If you truly cared for my opinions or me even the slightest, you would acknowledge that you have caused me pain. Not prioritise explaining why you don't think you have or why I should see that you were not trying to." Was this how he treats her sister too? Or was it just because it is her that warrants such cruelty? "I do not need you to instill doubt in me. I alone am able to create such doubts, to analyse the situation and seek differing perspectives to close gaps in what I could not. If you believe that you have been fulfilling your role as an advisor, then you are sorely mistaken. All that you have done, all that you continue to do, is suffocate me. To poison me with so much distrust over my own capabilities that I hesitate and hesitate even further to conduct anything at all. That constant mistreatment is not something that would 'aid me in pushing past my doubts' or 'drive me towards improvements'. My ability to learn, to push past my doubts have all been hampered by your constant torment." Ridiculous. "I am not Makoto. I will never be her. I will never govern Inazuma the way she does. And I do not require you to make up whatever it is that you think I need. If you truly cared, you would ask what I needed and how best you could aid me. If you truly cared, you would accept that all your efforts to 'help' have only worsened things. If you truly cared, you would neither patronise me nor force me into mind games in order to ascertain what you meant. If you truly cared, you would trust me to do what is best for the people and plainly explained or guide me into areas where I am unable to relate to. Instead of speaking in vague expectation and then punishing me for not comprehending. You say your intentions were to aid, yet I only see your penchant for acting above all others and thinking you know better. And until you can reflect on where it is you have failed on your part to guide me, until you can reflect on how it is that you were cruel, I do not think we will be able to hold that conversation on equal terms. You are not hearing me. You are telling me how all you do was for my own good: And I am telling you now that it is not."

She may not be the perfect archon, nor is she one that her people deserved. But at the end of the day, Ei continues to persist in spite of never wishing to step into her sister's role in the first place. It is laughable for one who does not bear the weight of the entire nation on their shoulders to point, criticise, judge, preach and punish her for her efforts.

"What you have done is no different from what members of the Commission who colluded with the Fatui had done with the Shogun. Think about that."

#nekasu #angst cw #minimising tw

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dgcatanisiri · 1 month

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This really is one of those times that I just want to escape into fantasy world, because y'know... Reality genuinely truly sucks, and there's not a lot that makes me feel like I should bother with its bullshit.

I mean... What holds up a lot of the things I want to do is that general anxiety feeling of "oh god, why am I not doing X, why do I want to bother with doing this when [thing] is going on" etc. etc. blah blah blah. So escaping to fantasy world, even if as just a temporary reprieve, is just a nice idea in general.

But the fact that right now, the fact that I'm actively seeing my mother decline, knowing that it'll be what kills her, knowing that it will be sooner rather than later at this point, AND knowing that when that happens, everything - EVERYTHING - in life will be upended, not just because of losing someone who'd always been there, but because we legitimately depend on her income to be able to live in this house, and so the only way to keep a roof over my head is that both my aunt and I will have to go out and get some kind of job, a thing that is going to be difficult for me because my life has been in caregiving for family, so on paper, it's considered a "gap in work history" that has lasted for more than a decade and a half...

Like... We deserve to be able to continue living in our home. My aunt deserves to be able to remain officially retired. For that matter, my mother deserves to remain my mother.

Y'know, as much as "fuck cancer" is a thing, I wish there could be even a slightly catchy response about neurological disorders, the disorders that rob you of YOU. The diseases that not just have that brand of horror in general, but we kinda don't even really want to talk about BECAUSE we don't want to think about that horror, or acknowledge the fact that all it takes is a little metaphorical shake of the noggin to scramble what we consider the foundational aspects of who we are.

And seeing it happen to those who we care about is its own brand of torment. But on top of that is the fact that our society is built in such a way that we don't even get the chance to breathe, to think about that loss, to prepare ourselves for it, before the demand to just emotionally move on hits, because dammit, why aren't you producing more money for the rich people?!

#dg rants #dg gets pissed #dg gets personal #dg has mother issues #dg's mind is all over the place right now #dg could use a cocoa and a lie down #dg needs to stop referring to himself in the third person

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todayisawthewhxlewxrld · 4 months

Note

Guys I love and miss Gojo so much. I'll be having a good day and remember that he is in fact gone. Also I can't remember where I heard this, but I remember someone saying there was an official tweet or like statement, where they said that Gojo might come back but in a way we won't like. So now I'm sitting here making theories? Idek if its true, but if it gives me a thing to do so here I am. I don't my little Sukuna to die either, but if Choso dies to him Istg. I might start treating him the same way I did with Mahito when he killed Junpei (Rip Junpei, gone WAY too soon. Still grieving because he was a good character, and he didn't deserve what he went through. Like this poor kid trusted Mahito, and they literally ENDED off his mom, but Junpei had to find out personally. Then manipulated him into "getting revenge" on someone who didn't do it. ONLY TO HAVE HIS SOUL MANIPULATED TO BREAK DOWN YUUJI? The pain I felt at Junpeis "help me" was so immense. Sometimes I hope he'll come back, he had the WORST of it istg 😭 Bullied? Watching his mother die? Manipulated by a gross ass cursed spirit? Then dying in front of his only good friend?? It's actually insane. Ily Junpei </3, I miss him sm. Cause he honestly was a good character.. 😕

Anyways, what I'm saying is, it'll be different if Choso perished than when Gojo died. Just because Gojo was a really OP character, and it was necessary for Yuujis character, he needs to be the one to end off Sukuna, cause like yk? Sukuna caused him so much torment, lmaoo (it isn't funny but I'll preten). Like ig it would be necessary for Choso too, but it's just.. I mean he kind of JUST started to become a part in the actual story. So it'll be too tragic, and I'll sob, then never return to Jjk ever again. 😕

I'd also sob if and when Sukuna died too, because I grow a fondness of everyone. (I miss you Nanami.), I also grew a fondness of Toji. Which I didn't think I'd do when I first got into Jjk, but he redeemed himself with Megumi. I mean.. Sorta? Idk I just defend all the characters atp. Besides Mahito, he needed to fucking go. 😭 His wails are still in my head, as a reminder that he can't hurt anymore mfs. (I'm still HEAVILY grieving Nanami.) Anyways, sorry for the 2nd rant 😔

-👽 (Ignore this baesy)

i get so many like gojo theories on how he will come back on my twitter and ngl??? SOME OF THEM COOKED LIKE OKAYYYY WHY DOES IT MAKE SM SENSE???? but then i rmbr gege doesnt care that much LMFOAOAOAOAO gege wants this manga OVER WITH!!!!

sukuna can go do a backflip off a cliff for all i care fr. choso dies and i’m deleting my whole tumblr if i can’t be happy no one can.

nah cause junpei’s death was crazy not even bc of what u said but bc of how they make his ass look so important and integrated into yuji’s friend group ONLY FOR HIM TO DIE LIKE THAT LIKE OMG THATS SO SICK???? STOP PLAYING WITH ME

toji is just sexy idk that’s his only appeal to me like okayyyyy dilfff😍😍😍😍🤞🤞🤞🤞 stares at my toji oneshot idea….

ANYWAY STOP APOLOGIZING FOR UR RANTS THEY R ENTERTAINING 🫶🫶🫶🫶

#axel answers ☆⋆｡𖦹°‧★#axel answers// 👽

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nikialexx · 2 years

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all of your WIPs sound amazing and I am here to request details on the dark academia/fwb and/or the young royals/RWRB fic are you kiddinggg both sound genius <3

(obligatory apology for how long its taken me to get around to this <333)

I’ve already answered the young royals/rwrb one here, so I’ll tell you about the dark academia/fwb fic!!

I'm still working out the details of this one, specifically that pesky little detail called a 'plot', but I think I can share a few of the general ideas:

It's a bit canon-divergence in that Remus is not turned into a werewolf at five, he (and Lily) are sorted into Slytherin, the two of them are best friends with Snape, and Remus and Sirius have been rivals for about the entire time that they’ve known each other.

(They’ve also been sleeping together for the better part of a year, but no one else needs to know about that, especially since they will swear to anyone that asks, and themselves, that they actually hate each other. The sex is just for practical reasons, you see ;))

It does, however, make things complicated when Remus is attacked by a werewolf the summer between sixth and seventh year-- and Sirius, of course, finds out about it.

The fic is going to follow them throughout the entirety of their final year at hogwarts and deal with fun things like self discovery in the wake of having your entire world turned upside down, the thin line between love and hate and obsession, the mortifying ordeal of being known best by the person you hate most in the world, the inherent eroticism of having an academic rival, and my favorite trope ever: 'only i'm allowed to hurt you and i'll kill anyone else who even tries <3'

here's a snippet!!

"Nox," Sirius murmured, and the light at the end of his wand went out.

The hallway was cloaked in darkness again, the two of them more than well-hidden from anyone that might pass them by, but Remus could feel that Sirius was still unsettled. The taut way he held himself hadn't let up even after Severus' departure, as if the mere fact that he was in such close proximity to the Slytherin Common Room in any capacity caused him tremendous pain.

Remus almost asked him if he wanted to move, just to spare Sirius some of that obvious torment, but he held himself back. Meeting up in empty classrooms and sneaking into each other's dormitories was okay, but Remus would not ask Sirius Black to accompany him on a midnight stroll across the castle grounds. That seemed a step too far- and likely to get him laughed at, if he knew Sirius at all.

"You really should make better friends, Lupin," Sirius said, tilting his head back against the wall with the infuriatingly casual air of someone who was having their time reluctantly encroached upon, instead of the other way around.

Remus wondered if it was possible to hate someone so much it felt like your lungs were on fire whenever you were near them.

"I could say the same to you,” he said, instead of any of the numerous curses that had pushed themselves temptingly to the forefront of his mind. It was an honestly miraculous display of restraint, in his opinion.

Sirius laughed, “Is this about James again?"

"You don't complain about my friends,” Remus said, “And I won't complain about yours."

"Your friends deserve the complaints," Sirius said. Purposely, he glanced in the direction Severus had just walked off to, "Ask me who I saw lurking around the restricted section of the library earlier."

Remus forced himself not to react- at least not in any way that could be perceived by Sirius. He couldn't really help the way his insides seemed to turn to molten lead at Sirius' words.

So he'd been right then.

The fact that Severus had been making use of his time by visiting the restricted section was not surprising. But that he had lied about it?

Remus needed to get back to the dorm.

Sirius, however, was still looking at him, using those maddening few inches of height he had on Remus to stare Remus down like he was both the most fascinating subject in the world and also the most uninspiring.

Remus held his ground, and stared back.

"What were you doing there?" he countered, "I’m starting to get concerned, Black. Do you just make a habit of spying on people?”

Sirius smiled. It was entirely without humor. "Only the suspicious ones."

"Is that what I am?"

"Well not anymore,” he pointed out, waving a hand dismissively, “I already know all of your secrets. Now I have all the time in the world to dedicate to your awful friends.”

Remus rolled his eyes. Sirius had seemingly been as helpful as he intended to be for the night, and despite Remus' newfound confirmation that Severus was, in fact, closer to uncovering the truth about him, it didn't exactly help him in any way to stand about discussing that with Sirius, of all people.

He shoved his hands into the pockets of his robes and turned to walk away, "Goodnight, Sirius."

Sirius reached out and grabbed his arm before he’d even fully stepped out of their shared space, firmly yanking him back in, "Wait."

"Sirius," Remus warned, even as the other boy crowded him back against the wall and Remus made no real effort to escape, "I have to go. Severus will-"

"Don't," Sirius groaned, "Don't say his name. Nothing kills the mood faster."

"Severus will come looking for me," Remus said, enunciating the word just to see Sirius grimace again.

Sirius, the infuriating arse, didn't give him the satisfaction.

"So let him," he said instead, "He can watch. I'm sure he could use the lessons, Merlin knows he won't be getting them anywhere else. It will be my act of community service this week, helping out the less fortunate."

"Salazar, you're insufferable."

“Me?” Sirius glared at him. "Have you forgotten about your little werewolf situation?"

"Fucking hell, Sirius,” Remus snapped, shoving him back, “Can you keep your voice down?"

"Are you hearing me at all? Snape is starting to suspect you.”

"I can take care of myself-"

"You share a room with him," Sirius reminded him, as if Remus could have forgotten, "All I'm asking is that you be more careful around him, since I don’t presume you’ll agree to my original plan of throwing him into the Black Lake."

"I don't understand why you even care so much."

Sirius sighed, long and low, as if Remus' general presence took out an extraneous toll on his sanity.

"Your other friends might be insufferable gits who'd turn on you in less than five seconds, Lupin," Sirius said, with the exaggerated patience of someone speaking to a five year old, "But Gryffindor's have more honor than that. I look out for my friends."

"We're not friends," Remus felt it necessary to remind him, and ignored the voice at the back of his head that insisted on asking stupid questions like, well, what are we then? "We fuck each other, and when we're not fucking each other you're going out of your way to annoy me."

"Or protect you, as the actual evidence suggests.”

“I don’t need you to protect me,” Remus said. He pushed Sirius away from him again, and took the split second of opportunity it provided to slip himself out of the corner and into the hallway. “Are we done here?”

Sirius watched him, his lips pressed thinly together, something unreadable in his expression.

Finally, he nodded. Remus held his gaze for another second before turning away.

"Lupin?" Sirius called.

Remus, hating himself more and more, turned.

Sirius raised a brow. Whatever had been clouding his gaze just a few seconds ago was gone already, replaced by his usual bored arrogance.

He smiled, "Our usual time tomorrow?"

#u know those fics where ur like 'i have an aesthetic and a vibe and a few characters i really love. must i also have a plot?'#that's what this is #i wanted to write about wolfstar being murder boyfriends #and this entire thing stemmed from that #my writing

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pluckyredhead · 2 years

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What did Tom King do to Kara?

you don't like woman of tomorrow? thats interesting, from what i can tell that seems to be one of king's least uncontroversial DC works and gets unanimous praise from the fandom + comic readers in general (not that i've read it myself, just from what i've seen)

Combining these two related asks!

I want to start out by saying that ALL of my problems are with the writing - Bilquis Evely's art is breathtaking and I wish it was being used to tell a story that deserves it.

I have two problems with Woman of Tomorrow:

King does the same thing to her that he has done with literally every other character, which is to cherrypick their history to tell the bleakest, most nihilistic, least heroic story possible. It's not super noticeable with Batman because Bruce is kind of always in that zone, but it's very obvious with characters like Wally West (Heroes in Crisis: Therapy Is Bad and Will Kill You), the JLI in Human Target, and Kara. His Kara is a depressed, foulmouthed, murderous drunk who spends the entire book suffering physical and mental torments. I am just so exhausted by the lack of creativity. Dude is a one trick pony and I don't understand why this isn't more widely recognized. (Oh wait, I do, it's because pessimism is so often mistaken for genius, and also he loves a nine panel grid which too many people think immediately makes a comic Deep (TM) instead of just copying Watchmen.)

THE STORY ISN'T EVEN ABOUT HER!!! The main character is Ruthye, the alien girl who hires Supergirl to avenge the death of her father. Ruthye narrates the book. Ruthye drives the plot. Ruthye has the emotional arc. Kara could be replaced by any Super or other strong alien - J'onn, Sodam Yat, fucking LOBO - and the story would be exactly the same. (Because it would be True Grit. It's literally just True Grit But Supergirl Is There.)

Now, there's a place for bleak and even completely pessimistic, nihilistic stories - but Supergirl ain't fucking it. Supergirl was created to give little girls a heroine to look up to who had all the powers of Superman. She is aspirational and inspirational. She is joy.

Woman of Tomorrow is aggressively Not For Little Girls. To me, it radiates a deep contempt for the idea of Supergirl as a happy, kid-friendly character. It drags her through the mud on purpose, and then looks at you like it's making a point, but the point is just "mud exists." Yeah, Tom, I know. WE ALL KNOW.

(In general, King seems to really hate the idea of "nice" girls - look at what he did to Tora in Human Target. There's an issue of WoT that flashes back to Kara's origin and the destruction of Krypton - except it goes all the way back to the Silver Age, which is a generally bright and happy era, and pulls directly from that version of events while also making it as bleak as possible. Like, at one point Kara finds a dead baby on the sidewalk. HE PUT A DEAD BABY IN THE SILVER AGE. HE IGNORED THE FACT THAT THIS ORIGIN IS FOUR REBOOTS OUT OF DATE IN ORDER TO PUT A DEAD BABY IN THE SILVER AGE.)

I wouldn't be nearly as angry about this book if it wasn't capping off 20 years of DC treating Kara like shit, but since she returned in 2003, they have had her try to murder Clark, had her sexually preyed on by Darkseid, implied an incestuous relationship with her father, had her be abused, made her a blood-vomit-spewing Red Lantern (an arc I actually liked because Guy Gardner as Kara's Space Dad has my whole heart, but it's part and parcel of Angry Violent Sexy Kara), had her infected by the fucking Batman Who Laughs, and more. And that's when they even bother to publish her! They refused to give her a 60th anniversary special in 2019 because "she has a TV show," even though Two-Face got a 75th anniversary special a couple years before. Fucking Two-Face!!! Kara didn't even have a regular comic for much of the run of her show, because why court an audience of millions when so many of them are icky women?

Grant Morrison said it recently and said it best (they were talking about "Superman as fascist," but I think it applies to this too):

"Why, I say, oh why, is it so hard to simply serve the concept and write the adventures of a smart, creative and kind-hearted teenage girl with superpowers?

[...]

"To undermine the fundamental appeal of superheroes like Superman and Supergirl by re-casting them as anti-heroes at best or outright monsters - dragging imaginary childhood paragons off their pedestals to reinforce a fairly facile point about the tendency of real world heroes to exhibit feet of clay, struck me and strikes me still as imaginatively lazy.

"Using kids’ adventure heroes to make hackneyed observations about typical human behaviour that does not in fact apply to made up comic book characters strikes me as – I don’t know - whimsical? Dilettantish? A squandering of energy and creativity?"

Supergirl isn't for the edgelords of the world. She isn't a tool for reiterating, yet again, that life is pointless and full of pain. She is intended to inspire little girls, and anyone who doesn't understand that has no business writing her.

#supergirl #kara zor el

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sparksnevadas · 1 year

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I've feeling so many emotions. They're all so relationship constipated god bless em. When mumbo and grian were joking about their single braincell ping-ponging between each other when they're hanging out all i could think of was "no its pingponging between every single person in this building." none of them know how to interact with each other god. It's like watching several unsocialized chihuahuas trying to have a friendly interaction. Mwah. Exactly what I wanted from a GIHASM update

And the Pearl and Grian interactions are so good. Sibling stamp of approval frankly. They torment each other so much it's so good. I love them so much. Wriggling my fingers in the taste of a plan we got, but I do love a good Rebellion Against An Organization. Mmm mm mmm

God they're all so cute when their braincells are and arent functioning. Grian I am holding your face. Why are you so dumb. God. I. I'm knocking Mumscarian's heads together like sacks of potatoes being moved on the back of an old farm truck, tbh. Maybe eventually that braincell will start triangulating.

'dont teach the child about crime' is certainly a sentence being said I love them so much. Also, do teach the child about crime, actually. Grumbot deserves a little crime, as a treat.

Its all the little details that make me love GIHASM so much. Mumbo Jumbo flubbering his words and going for 'time-clingy-. Scar passing off all his bell peppers. The medicinal muscle salve. How Bdubs using his vines to gesture. Ahhh its so good. The worldbuilding spice of life.

Also that whole interaction w Bdubs and Grian in the Kitchen im - bdubs I will SQUASH you excuse you. You leave my bird chicken man alone. We are so close. We are SO close. Bdubs I swear. I love that Scar swoops in to save the day though just. Bdubs you are like a bug I am putting inside a cup, pray I poke air holes mister.

I love that Etho is long suffering but I just also love etho. 😍 My long suffering nincompoop. I don't think plan is technically in Scar's vocabulary. Also that whole scene where Grian lifts Scar up with ease is everything to me. It's so funny.

God the CHARACTER INTERACTIONS. the way the entire infirmary scene parallels the opening where Grian leaves to now, where Mumbo is basically confirming he wants him to stay. I am feeling so soft about them. I love them so much. AH

BELLE OH MY GOSH!! I wasnt expecting an actual ESSAY in my inbox after you read the update!! but im so grateful!!

"none of them know how to interact with each other" i mean... YEAH, grian doesn't even know how to interact with his own feelings. hopefully not too annoying to read, but either way... we're nearing the point were grian has to confront himself head on ; )

the pearl and grian scene is my baby,,, that's the oldest part of this new chapter, probably done in late october. I wanted them to feel authentically sibling like and also i had just started watching pearl more often so i had a good grasp on her voice! I'm glad it didn't lose its spark (heh) after so much editing around it. I was so excited to finally write her beyond a few sparse lines

they are idiots. / affectionate

Grumbot can and will commit voter fraud and get Mumbo elected, please don't teach him about crime belle, please-

time clingy my belobed,,, I love making all of them sound and look silly. theatre of the mind and all that :D

THE KITCHEN SCENE. okay this is the part that was the hardest for me to write but grian needed to confront the fact that he can literally leave whenever he wants but he hasn't even thought about it. like hello? (grian if you werent in love how could anyone justify staying that long, sleeping in the same room, CUDDLING--) bdubs apologizes after so please poke holes and give him a bottlecap of water belle im sorry orz

grian lifting scar up was funny. I literally wrote it, thought "this might be too silly" (and also as an ace/aro spec i dont really see the appeal of getting lifted but i like doing it to others to be silly) and sent it to you/atherix and a friend (Ash) and all three of you loved it. A genuine stamp of approval in my eyes hehe

I love parallels :)

Thank you so much for the ask/comment Belle!!! <3

#its belle!#gihasm #talking to friends

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