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kujakumai · 1 year

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Wherefore Art Thou 5,010 words; Complete [AO3 Link]

Atem has come out the ceremonial duel not with death but with a life of his own, and with that comes questions, problems, paperwork. He'll need a checklist of things, a birthday, an address, a hometown, a last name. A weighty decision, a name. They already went through so much trouble getting the first one.

About being in the right-wrong body at the wrong-right time and the chances we never expected to get; about how I was always me and you are no one else but you, and we'll never be like that again, but there are still things we can share with each other.

Or: A story in which Atem writes some things down, gets a new shirt, and fails to buy eggs.

Sunlight. That was the first thing you noticed about the house, the way the Ishtar siblings had angled everything towards it, falling in through wide-open windows and flooding the kitchen, bouncing off golden antiques brought up from the tombs and settling over the plants Rishid left on counters and shelves. In a place with too much sunlight, where it radiated over the sand without end, this place welcomed it, as if there could never be enough.

The second thing that came to mind was that there was something off about it, like you couldn't tell when it was supposed to be. It was half in old Egypt and half in 1998, shiny modern convenience sitting next to remnants of the old ways. Artifacts and incense, videogame systems and new athletic shoes, crashing up against each other without rhyme or reason like a patchwork quilt, like an odds-and-ends drawer, like a warzone. Atem found it unpleasantly mismatched and a little ugly, but oddly comforting in a way he could not describe.

It wasn't big enough for an extended visit, but while they were all in Egypt the Ishtars insisted that they stay for dinner at least once—Rishid, they were informed, was an excellent cook. So Atem, Yugi, Jonouchi, Anzu, Honda, Otogi, and Bakura were all piled into the cozy too-small living room, strewn about couches and on pulled-in kitchen chairs, and even then a lack of space left Bakura cheerfully sitting cross-legged on the floor. Ten people, too many, laughing about nothing and everything, about Anzu's study abroad plans, Ishizu's work, Shizuka's health, and a brief tangent where Honda and Marik traded bike specifications in arcane mechanical terms that left everyone else out of the loop.

"Ateeeeeeem, you're so quiet." Jonouchi flopped onto an overstuffed chair that Honda was already sitting in, elbowing him in the face and squishing in over his objections. "This is your party!"

"Ah, sorry." He had been quiet, listening to the conversation without hearing it, letting everything wash over him.

"Leave him alone, he's busy." Anzu scolded. "Atem has to get those papers done for Marik, or we can't leave."

"Atem has time! He should relax."

They were all saying his name a lot, more than was natural. He suspected they'd all gotten together when he wasn't in the room and agreed to practice it so they could stop accidentally calling him "Yugi." So they tacked it on to the end of every sentence, Atem, Atem, Atem, a very old name in new voices that had never spoken it before, or maybe a brand-new name in old and safe and familiar ones, or both at once or neither depending on your point of view. They all kept saying it a little wrong, reflexively adding the shadow of a "u" at the end, not used to the foreignness of it. Atem knew he should tell them that wasn't quite right but he loved it, and every time he heard the way they said it it tugged at something in his chest and made him want to smile.

Atem was sitting on the couch next to Yugi. Because he could do that now, sit next to him, because he had a body. Because a day ago he and Yugi dueled, and instead of taking him away forever like everyone expected the doors opened up and spat him back out, flesh and blood all his own just like the day he died, and before he even knew what was going on he'd been tackle-hugged by four or five people and everyone was sobbing. So he'd walked back out into the world and the sunlight, a little dazed and on his own two feet. He'd left his crown and cape at the hotel, kept his earrings and his cartouche, and put on a t-shirt someone had hastily grabbed from a tourist tchotchke shop. It was bubblegum pink and had a cartoon sphinx on it, and didn't fit quite right because they bought it in Yugi's size.

Yugi leaned over his shoulder in a way that very real and warm and solid and definitely not incorporeal, which Atem somehow never expected no matter how many times it happened. "What's it say?"

Atem offered him the two or three pages he was holding. "You can read it if you want, partner." Was it weird to still call him partner? Partners in what? They weren't in the same body anymore, so they couldn't duel together, exactly. Should he call him something else? If he stopped saying partner, would Yugi notice? Would he be hurt? What was the better word, then?

"This is a lot of info." Yugi's eyes traced down the page. Not so much a form as a handwritten list. Name, date of birth, place of birth, address, parent's names, blood type. "Marik really needs all this?"

"Yes. The more the better." Marik was sitting on the floor, eating nuts out of a bowl on the coffee table and trading cards with Bakura. "You can make up the stuff you don't know, just try to keep it believable." He looked up and gave them a mischievous smile. "Or don't. Go wild, if you want. I'm just putting it on paper, if you get stopped at the airport because your expertly forged new passport says you're three thousand years old, it'll be on you."

"I think," Otogi noted, from the opposite end of the couch, "if you're inventing a whole new identity from scratch, you're obligated to include at least one thing that's a little crazy. For fun."

"Exactly."

"Please don't listen to anything Marik says." Ishizu Ishtar was dressed more casually than any of them had ever seen her, but she carried herself with a practiced grace that always somehow emanated authority. She walked in with a silver tray covered in mugs of something, and held it out to Marik with a look that wordlessly communicated the ancient sibling art of I did this part, now you do the next.

Marik made a face, but stood up and started passing out drinks, and as he walked by Atem caught his own distorted reflection in the polished surface, which startled him because he looked exactly like he was supposed to look and not like Yugi Muto. Same hair, certainly, but not much else. An inch and a half shorter, because Yugi had grown but he hadn't, broader shoulders, not as skinny, warm brown skin. It shouldn't be that weird, just to see himself in the mirror. He'd has his memories for a month, even if the body was new. He knew what he looked like.

Tiny little discrepancies in his new existence, like someone secretly moving all the furniture in your house two inches to the left. A thousand irritants too subtle to notice, too minute to bother complaining about. Food that tasted a little wrong because he was used to someone else's tastebuds, the abrupt change in eyeline that made all his friends slightly the wrong height, the sound of his own voice in his ears, now lightly accented, because his head still knew Yugi's perfect Japanese but his new (old?) mouth wasn't practiced with the sounds. He'd picked up a phone this morning and stood there for thirty seconds like an idiot, waiting for muscle memory to kick in, until he realized that it wouldn't and had to search and press each button in a way he knew was slow and wrong. The weight of the puzzle was conspicuous in its absence. He was so used to it hanging from his neck and resting against his chest that the lack of it was odd, an empty triangular space where something should be, the way you suddenly notice background music when someone turns it off.

Ishizu sat down with perfect posture, somehow made a displaced wooden kitchen chair look elegant. "If you do have problems at the airport," she said, "call me first. I know people at the embassy."

Rishid leaned casually out of the kitchen doorway. "You won't have problems." he said, a spatula in one hand, his Japanese polite and careful. "Marik's work is good. We have never had issues." He smiled. "Easier than god cards."

"My papers are real," Ishizu said, with the tiniest smirk, "but you don't have time for that, pharaoh."

Jonouchi half-stood up and reached over and snatched the papers out of Yugi's hand. "So how far didja get?"

"Hey!" Yugi objected.

"Dude," Honda squinted at it from next to Jonouchi, "did you write anything yet?"

"I was thinking." Atem said, not at all defensively.

Jonouchi reached over to a side table and grabbed a pen, and clicked it. "C'mon, let's get this done with." He skimmed the page and seemed to pick at random. "When's your birthday?"

"19th of—" he started, automatically, before realizing midsentence that it was not the sort of date that anyone could use. "Shemu Epiphi." he finished, out of momentum.

Jonouchi did not write down "Shemu Epiphi," or anything like it, and just looked at him blankly, pen at the ready, awaiting clarification. Atem did not have any.

"Low water," added awkwardly, was the best that he could do.

Ishizu threw him a life raft. "That would be in the summer. Somewhere in July, I would think."

"It is not." Marik objected. "That has to be May or June. Early June."

"I'm sorry, Marik, do you have a degree in Egyptology?"

"No, but I—RISHID! Epiphi is early summer, right?"

"I cannot hear you, I'm cooking!"

Ishizu curtly gestured at Jonouchi to continue. "We will do the math later."

"Alright, easier one." Jonouchi resumed. "Place of birth?"

"Nowe." he said. The name rolled easily off his tongue. Capital city, on the river's east bank.

Jonouchi clearly did not recognize the name, and didn't write this one down either. He shot a glance at Ishizu.

"That's here." she corrected, or perhaps merely offered. "Luxor." She gave Atem what he was sure was supposed to be a reassuring smile. "Of course, in the interim it was Thebes, and in the Old Kingdom before your time they called it Waset, and there are several other..."

Jonouchi nodded and scribbled something on the page, and Atem felt weakly like he should object, because he wasn't born in Luxor, and this city was new and strange to him, and it wasn't the right answer. The right answer didn't exist, though, not anymore. There were only the ruins of what had once been right answers, crumbled to dust and built over by strangers, studied by experts and marveled at by tourists.

It wasn't wrong, it just wasn't right either. How he and Yugi kept bumping into each other because they didn't expect to both be corporeal, how the Ishtars' decor was confusingly out of time yet entirely correct, how he was alive and with his friends a day after everyone expected him to die and how the whole place smelled like food and sounded like laughter and it was supposed to be for him but for some reason he wasn't happy, how he mostly felt strange and tense and like he was doing everything wrong. A pervasive sense of not-rightness, all over his skin.

"Alright! Making progress! Next up is the easiest one of 'em all, name. First is Atem, aaaaand..." He paused. "What's your last name?"

Atem thought about this. Technically as pharaoh he had six names, none of which would sound normal on a birth certificate. "That's not really how it worked."

"You gotta have a last name, Atem."

"I don't know what to tell you. That's not how we did it." He smiled. That's what you're supposed to do, when you're alive and with your friends and at a party and everyone is staring at you waiting for an answer, is smile. Smiling always helped, when you didn't know what to say.

Yugi was thinking, and he leaned forward and tapped the back of his foot on the bottom of the couch. "I guess you can just pick something?"

"If you want to be boring, you can just choose something common." suggested Marik. "Omar, Sayed, Hassan. There's a ton of Hassans."

"He wants to be a Japanese citizen though, right?" Bakura piped up. "If he doesn't want to stand out, he could be a Satou, or a Tanaka."

Discord erupted. Suddenly everyone had a suggestion.

"I think he's going to stand out regardless..." "Just use your dad's name, maybe?" "He doesn't look like a Sayed." "Atem...puzzle? No, that's stupid." "Something related to pharaohs? Lots of names that mean king." "Takahashi sounds nice." "How about—" "What if—"

In the midst of the fracas, new names dueling on all sides, Yugi had his own polite suggestion, offered from right next to his ear. "You could always be Muto." he said, with a tiny shrug, like it was nothing. "Grandpa already thinks you're his grandson anyway." he added, with a smile.

The discussion continued but Atem froze and felt his mouth dry up, the world still moving while he stood still, and all of it turned to noise.

Names were still being thrown across the room but somewhere between "Kamiya" and "Qadir," Rishid poked his head out of the kitchen again. "I hate to interrupt, but I'm short an egg. Could someone run to the corner and—"

Atem stood up a little too quickly. "I will go." he announced, in the solemn tone of someone volunteering for a dangerous quest to save the realm from evil and not going down the street for a minor kitchen staple.

"You...sure, Atem?" Marik never added the phantom u. He pronounced it like he'd been doing it all his life. "We can make someone else go."

"Or you could go, Marik." Ishizu remarked.

"Nah, I'm good."

Atem was already extricating himself from the living room. "No! It's fine. I need the fresh air. And it's nice to see more of...Luxor." Keep smiling. No problems.

Atem escaped before anyone could say another word, out into the evening air. The desert didn't hold heat, but it was the end of summer, so it was only pleasantly cool. He was mostly looking for a place to breathe. After a block or so of wandering while looking very much like he knew what he was doing, because nothing in this city was where it was supposed to be anymore, he settled for a quiet bench under a date palm where there weren't many passersby.

And he managed to breathe.

He had lungs now, to breathe in. His own lungs, without borrowing. He tried to calm his antsy heartbeat and it didn't work very well.

Breathe. You're alive now. It is a good thing, to be alive. You are alive and everyone is so happy to see you.

He just hadn't been expecting it, was the problem.

"You can tell us if it's too much, you know." Atem nearly jumped out of his skin when Yugi spoke, appeared from nowhere, nearly silhouetted against the sunset. "It's okay. You've only been back for a day."

"No!" Smile. "No. I'm fine." He almost said "partner," and then didn't. Of course Yugi noticed. Of course Yugi went after him. Yugi, always after him. Yugi, always behind him, always standing just out of view.

"I wish you wouldn't lie to my face." There wasn't any malice in it. Yugi said it plainly, merely politely stating a fact in that incisive way he did. When did that happen, that Yugi stood up so straight and spoke so plainly? He tilted his head and gave him a small, sweet mile, the one that seemed to say You are not as good at hiding your feelings as you think you are. You get away with it because I let you.

Atem tried not to let a muscle in his face move, or show the way the words pierced right through him. Sometimes talking to Yugi felt like getting caught.

"Can I sit down?"

"Of course." Atem moved over.

Yugi sat down and bumped against him, in a way that continued to be very warm and solid and he should be getting used to that why isn't he used to it and why does it surprise him every single time stay cool stay cool stay cool.

Evening was turning into dusk and porchlights and windows were flicking on, yellow spots across the neighborhood. He and Yugi sat in silence.

On instinct, he mentally reached out Yugi in the way he always did, linked hearts and minds, and instead smashed facefirst into a brick wall in his own head. There wasn't any way out of himself. No other heart, no second voice or presence to be detected. Just his own thoughts, bouncing back at him over and over again when he least wanted them. He was so used to their peculiar sort of cohabitation, Yugi's thoughts drifting at the edges of his own, Yugi's memories crystal clear, Yugi's joy and Yugi's grief and Yugi's rage, tangled together until he lost track of what belonged to who. That was all gone now, had stopped abruptly at the start of the ceremonial duel. Whatever was going on in Yugi's head now was fraught and unknown to him. He put a hand up to his chest, instinctively, but there was no hefty chain to grab, so instead it wrapped around the much smaller cartouche, pressing the hieroglyphs into his palm.

"Sorry." Yugi looked up at him, sheepish. "I keep thinking things at you. None of that works anymore, but for some reason I keep expecting you to answer. It's weird, right?"

"I was thinking the same thing."

Yugi laughed, short and bright. "We have to get better at talking to each other."

"We do." He nodded, watching the sunset. "But some things are harder to say out loud."

Yugi considered this quietly. "They are," he said, "but we have to try."

More silence, easier this time. It was starting to get cold. Wind ran through the grass.

There are a lot of things, in fact, that are very difficult to say out loud. Many of them can arise from a situation wherein roughly 24 hours ago you were going to die, or more accurately that you asked your friends to kill you, and they did, because that is what they thought you wanted, because that is what you insisted you wanted. That you were a weight around Yugi's neck who did not belong in this world and whose time had long passed but now the chain was broken and you suddenly had a whole future in front of you that no one had told you was an option before and you have no idea where it goes or what happens next.

Atem was usually very good at knowing how to say things. He knew how princes were supposed to speak, and then learned how kings are supposed to speak, and then how friendly ghosts and great duelists were supposed to speak. None of those scripts fit anymore, and he didn’t have one to fall back on. He had assumed he would be dead by now and therefore had not written one. Another empty space where something should be. Now he had, what, another 70 years? That sounded like a very long time. He didn’t know of a script that went on that long and no one seemed set to provide one.

There were no clouds in this part of the desert, almost never, since there was never any rain, so the sky was clear and endless. More empty spaces, this one too big and dark to look at without getting vertigo, too much to look at at once. It seemed like it could swallow someone whole.

"There are endless options." He blinked at the sky, not looking at Yugi. "And it's so important. You only get one. How am I supposed to know what to do with it?"

Yugi smiled. "It's just a name. You can call yourself anything you want. It's up to you." He added, "You get two, technically."

"The first one is already done."

"Then that should narrow it down, right?"

"Anything that I want." he repeated, but he said the words reluctantly, like describing a pain he didn't want to trouble everyone by complaining about. He closed his eyes, as if tired. "I was never expecting to have to make the choice."

"I guess it is a lot." he said, looking down. "Sorry if I upset you earlier. You don't have to be a Muto if you don't want to." He was pretending not to be a little sad. "It was just a suggestion. I know you have your own name, and family."

Atem scrambled to ensure that Yugi didn't feel like he'd done something wrong. "It's not that." He struggled, again, in the search for the right words, a feeling that continued to be alien in its frustration. "It's not about that."

Yugi looked at him, curious, waiting for an explanation.

He didn't know how to explain it. That he was trying not to impose. That was all he'd done, for years, was impose on something that wasn't his, and Yugi had quietly let him and Atem didn't want to anymore. That Yugi let him have everything, and it wasn't right. He did not want to be the reason Yugi didn't stand up straight, and he was trying to find the right way not to be.

There had to be a way, for him to live and for them to be different. There had to be a balance, a way for him to be here and for Yugi to stand on his own, a way for them to sit together and be alone in their own heads, a way for them to share so much and be such different people, a way for them to rely on each other but in the right way, in the way you're supposed to, and not the way where they become each other's crutch. There had to be a way, because he couldn't be here and alive if meant that Yugi was going to keep standing in his shadow, because if there wasn't a way he would have to leave, and he didn't want to leave. He didn't want to leave. He never wanted to leave. How do you say all of that, though? Where do you even start?

Well. Out loud, maybe.

Yugi stood up off the bench and stretched, watched the strangers walking down the street. "You don't have to go back with us, if you don't want to." he said, his back still to him.

"What do you mean?"

"We all just kind of assumed." Yugi wasn't looking at him, quiet and plaintive. "This is where you're from, right? If you decided you wanted to stay, we wouldn't be mad at you. You should do whatever feels right." Yugi Muto's brave face, a shallow fake-cheer Atem knew very well, how Yugi swallowed fear the same way he covered up spiked accessories.

"No!" He said it a little too fast, a little too loud. "I told you, I want to be with you forever." He felt very stupid, saying that so loud, like it was obvious, a cheesy promise from years ago.

Yugi looked back at him again and smiled, relieved.

"It's just that I—" he started, attempted, still no script, he hated not having a script, looking like an idiot fumbling through uncharted territory.

Yugi waited.

"...We can't be," he said, "the same person."

Yugi wasn't expecting this answer, and after a moment of surprise he seemed to think it was a little funny. "That's what you're worried about?"

"You don't need me to take your place." he insisted. "It is yours, and I won't take it from you. You have to stand on your own."

Yugi glanced at the ground and murmured to himself, thinking. "Not in my place, and not in front." He sighed. "Can't you stand next to me?"

"What?"

Yugi's smile, sheepish, uncertain, polite, but always with more determination in his eyes than most people expected. "I don't want you to be me. We're not doing that anymore." Yugi stood up straighter, resolute. "I'm Yugi Muto, and I'm no one else but me." he recited, a day-old quote and a tongue-in-cheek imitation, and not a bad impression either. Atem felt a deep twinge of embarrassment hearing his own words thrown back at him. "And you're Atem! The only Atem in the world." He reached out a hand. "But if it's okay, I was thinking we could be Yugi and Atem together."

Atem took it, hesitantly, and let Yugi pull him off the bench, with more strength than he expected from Yugi, but there it was. Solid and strong and mutually corporeal.

"I'm glad you didn't really have to go." Yugi said. "If you left because of me, I don't know what I would have…" He trailed off, frowning.

"…Let's go back." Atem said, gently. "Before they worry about us."

And Yugi and Atem set off for the night, together and apart.

"What about the eggs?"

"...I don't have any money."

"Atem! What were you going to do?"

"I would have figured something out, partner."

"ATEM!" There it was again, that phantom u. Jonouchi was standing up as tall as he could make himself, face bright beet red in the way it got when he knew that whatever he was about to say was horribly schmaltzy and embarrassing but was going through with it anyway. Oh, god.

Atem smiled. "Yes, Jonouchi?"

"We were talking while you were gone." he said, crossed his arms, standing brazenly in the middle of the Ishtars' living room. "And I just wanted to, well, that you should know, maybe, thaaaat..."

"Spit it out, idiot!"

"Shut UP, Honda!" Jonouchi hissed, and you could hear at least three people snicker.

"I wanted to say," he continued, "that as a token of our friendship, and our unbreakable bond as duelists, if you really needed a name," he said, "You could be a Jonouchi. If you wanted."

"I am honored." he said, with the utmost gravity. "I will keep that in mind."

And Jonouchi nodded at him, and he nodded at Jonouchi, and this was all either of them needed to say.

"Um," Bakura started, politely raising his hand as if asking the teacher to call on him, "I pulled up the site I use to name role-playing characters and searched by etymological root, and I got a bunch that have meanings I thought you would like."

"And we," Marik said, with an arm around Otogi, who tolerated it with an awkward smile, "told him which ones were awful and made him cross them off the list until only the good ones were left."

"Thank you." he said, and meant it. "Anyone else?" he asked, as a joke.

Anzu looked like she wanted to say something, but when his eyes fell on her she just blushed. "It's not urgent. You'll think of something."

"He'll figure it out." Honda said. "We already almost died getting the first one. I think he can handle the next name by himself."

"I will." he said. He again reached up reflexively to touch the puzzle, but there was nothing there, so instead he just let it rest on his chest, which was his and no one else's, even if that still felt a little wrong. He would get used to it. He could.

Ishizu, standing in the doorway of the kitchen, sensed an end to the conversation and promptly intervened. "You know, you can all eat dinner as soon as you're ready. Any time now."

Somewhere around two in the morning, a couple of hotel rooms sat empty because everyone was having too much fun to leave the house once it got too late and the adults did not have the heart to kick them out. Instead Honda and Jonouchi had fallen asleep in one chair, curled up in a position they would both be very embarrassed about when they woke up in it tomorrow morning, which they would not do until after Otogi took photos; Anzu and Atem were both using Yugi as a headrest, close on either side of the couch; Otogi held a throw pillow and snored. The only ones left standing, Marik and Bakura, were still playing cards in the half-light until eventually ever so softly Marik asked, "So is he really just...gone?" to which Bakura smiled vacantly, opaquely, and did not answer except to put his deck back together, mid-game, and say he was going to bed.

Eventually the sun rose over the Nile, but there was no palace and no pharaoh for it to shine on, because there hadn't been a king of this country since 1952. Instead it fell through the windows of an ordinary house and on a very ordinary boy in a pink t-shirt, who wasn't a king of anything but just another exhausted teenager in a pile, drooling a little and holding tight to another ordinary teenager who bore a faint resemblance to him. When he woke up he would realize that he had no idea what he was going to do that day, and that was scary, but probably fine; and very soon he would go home and meet grandpa, properly as himself, and not realize until a few days in that he had been saying "home" and "grandpa" automatically and no one had tried to correct him, not once.

That would be in a few days, though. Today they would visit tourist traps, and buy a shirt that fit him better, and hand Marik a stack of papers, to which he would chew on the end of his pen and nod before returning less than an hour later with an ID and a birth certificate, and a copy of the left leg of Exodia as a freebie.

M U T O , A T E M 7 / 2 7 / 1980 KAME GAME 4-1-8, DISTRICT K.C., DOMINO-CHOU

#alt title: The Only Atem in The World #if you remember the text post from way back i based this one on u get a gold star #ygo #hashtag content

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skylermadness · 7 months

Text

Illegal Hiring Practices (Anthro Bullet Bill TF/MC)

(Original Date of Upload: August 5, 2023)

Original Description:

My half of a trade with guacandchips on DeviantArt/FurAffinity. Their half can be found here: DeviantArt / FurAffinity This story is directly based on artwork drawn by ArticulatedArtisan! The original art can be found here: DeviantArt / FurAffinity Another trade complete! This one was honestly really fun to work on. So fun that I ended up accidentally writing what accumulated 16 pages and 7.3k words on the document. Either way, I'm really proud of how this one turned out! Especially since this is probably the first time I've written TF of a character that is moreso a generic mook than anything else. But I think that's where the appeal really came in, especially with the MC. Plus a very unique anthropomorphization in terms of design as well, really made me put more thought into the head changes! This story just contained so many unique systems to work with... Definitely one of my more favorite solo stories of the year! Overall, a very enjoyable story to write and a very fun trade to be had! I honestly wouldn't mind doing something else like this again~ Rated Mature for described bulge/nullge.

Bowser's Castle was always considered to be one of the land's most heavily guarded fortresses. With its strong usage of lava pits and an assortment of traps, alongside the various guards constantly roaming the premises, the castle grounds were a place that would usually be considered of high difficulty to penetrate. Right now, however, the halls of the castle were uncharacteristically empty. Very few of Bowser's minions could be found patrolling the grounds, and it would seem there was quite a staggeringly low number of them that made up the current army serving the fierce Koopa king. And now up in a hallway that was within the higher levels of the castle, a discussion was being had about this strange occurrence by two of the highest ranking individuals in the kingdom. The sounds of a mixture of light and heavy steps bounce off the gray bricks in an echo as the talk unfolds.

"It's uh, evident that forces in the kingdom have been dwindling drastically, my king…" one of the voices reports. Higher in pitch and nasally in tone; it was one that belonged to a short, blue-robed, and bespectacled koopa by the name of Kamek.

The deep and booming voice of the Koopa king, Bowser, responds not long after the report is given. "Is there any particular reason that we can't just get more?"

"Well there is a the finite supply of people in this kingdom, and it has grown fairly obvious that we just can't seem to hold much of their loyalty anymore-"

"And what do you mean by that?" Bowser spits out, a noticeable fury formulating in his tone of voice.

A bit of sweat forms on Kamek's brow as he instantly notices the change in tone. "W-well, they are getting tired of the constant amounts of injuries and hazardous encounters th-that ensue during your schemes, m-my King."

Bowser lets out a dismissive snort. "They get better, don't they?"

"Y-yes, by the repetition of it all-"

"Their complaints are on repetition?" Bowser stops walking to turn towards the magikoopa advisor, "They are the ones that signed up to be in this army, and they are the ones that swore loyalty to me-"

The feeling of betrayal was tangible in Bowser's voice. He was being given such weak reasons behind deciding to drop out what is easily one of the most powerful armies in this land! The only one that could defeat them is that blasted plumber, but it's only a matter of time before they slip up and Bowser can get the drop on them!

The Koopa king clenches his fists, claws digging into the scales of his palms. "Pathetic," he turns away and continues walking. "All of them, pathetic! Their weakness is tarnishing the Koopa Kingdom's name and reputation at this point!"

One of the king's hefty fists slams into the wall of the hallway, Kamek letting out a yelp due to the sudden act of aggression. A couple seconds later he speaks up again in an attempt to calm his lord, "N-now, my king, I'm sure we can-"

"I don't need excuses, Kamek!" Bowser's arm slowly removes itself from the crack he punched into the wall. "Just imagine what the other kingdoms see in me now! A ruler who can't even keep his own men under his control. Ooh, and think about how pathetic I might look now in the eyes of Peach…"

Bowser's anger dripped into self-loathing, Kamek mentally making note of that and seizing this as an opportunity to spitball some ideas. "W-well, we are in an intermission between schemes. We have the time to replenish our forces!"

Bowser glared at the magikoopa. "Your reports seem to imply that idea is an impossibility. Loyalty is waning, and if I can't keep hold of that I can't maintain an entire army."

"I mean, you have me," Kamek says, seemingly in an attempt of reassurance.

"I don't need your pity-"

The feeling of reassurance drops instantaneously. "No, I mean you have me, one of the most powerful mages in this kingdom. We could easily use my magic to propagate and restore the kingdom's army to its former glory!"

Bowser stayed silent for a few seconds, seemingly trying to rationalize the idea in his head. "That… that could work! Bring my army back- oh, or even better, make them stronger. Loyaler…"

"E-exactly!" Kamek brings out his wand. "It'd be rather easy- I could probably turn any of the dissenters back onto our side!"

"Mmmm," a low rumble of concern escapes Bowser's throat. "I feel as if that isn't a permanent solution, though…"

"Wha…?"

"Well, I mean, wouldn't something inevitably happen if we try to use magic on people from this world? That plumber always has his way around finding some way to undo whatever spell might be cast. I worry he would just come in and ruin everything we rebuild, especially if he were to find out about it…"

A silence descends into the hallway, both koopas now lost in thought as they try to come up with a way to circumvent the brought up problem. But after a couple seconds Kamek's eyes widened, an idea popping into his head.

"Then we don't use this world! It'd be quite easy to use magic to travel to so many others…" A devious smile begins creeping onto his snout. "While my knowledge on other worlds is a bit lacking, there's one that intrigues me…" he stops talking to chuckle a bit at the thought entering his mind.

Bowser raises a brow, curious. "What are you planning?"

Kamek fully smiles. "Earth. There'd be quite an abundance of people there that I can easily influence with my magic. Humans have always been quite susceptible to magical influences after all. Physical… mental…"

Bowser's own eyes begin to widen in realization, followed by a sinister, toothy grin forming on his muzzle. "Yes, that sounds like the perfect plan!"

The king fully turns towards Kamek and points forward. "I hereby order you to head to Earth and enact this plan of yours! And don't think about coming back until we have a new army that rivals the strength of the older one!"

"Of course, my king…" Kamek bows before Bowser before fully unveiling his wand, a reddish-purple glow beginning to emanate from the gem encrusted atop it…

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

Oranges and reds had set the sky ablaze as the sun's descent can be seen through the glass of the massive window that made up one of the office space's walls.

A stark silence is noticeable within this space. Despite the room's size, it's evident that there didn't initially appear to be any signs of life within it. Considering just how late the day was it could easily be presumed that anyone working here would have gone home for the day. However, the fragility of the silence gets easily broken…

"Crap, just how late is it?" a voice asks in a low mutter.

Within one of the cubicles of this office space was a singular person. This person was Bill, a young adult man with swept back, brown hair; wearing a simple light blue polo shirt and jeans; and focusing intensely on the Excel sheet open on his computer. Although it also would seem he was winding down whatever work was being done, the man typing slower as whatever documenting that was being done was coming to a close.

Bill had found himself working overtime for the night as he was given the brunt of documenting a good chunk of paperwork that was required to be completed soon for the insurance firm he worked at. Not necessarily a favorite job of his, but it would seem he was the only person in the immediate offices that had any expertise in Excel. If he were being honest though, such an assignment was more than tiresome for him.

A yawn escapes Bill's mouth as his hand reaches over to the computer's mouse in order to save the document. By the time his eyes refocus he couldn't help but glance at the computer's clock. 8PM…

He gets up from his chair and stretches, eyes catching a glimpse of the sunset outside. By now he also comes to the realization that he's legitimately the only person left in the office. "Great, everyone else must've gone home already."

He yawns again before putting on the darker cyan jacket that hung from the back of his chair. He gazes at some more physical paperwork that adorned his desk, mind contemplating if he should take that home or just leave it here for tomorrow. Unfortunately, his overachiever tendencies seem to win out here as he reaches towards the papers with both hands and levels them on the table before slipping them into his satchel that he kept beside his work computer.

"Going to work myself to death at this point, aren't I…?" he said with a slight smile. He jokes, but if anything he was just going to pass out once he got home.

With everything packed the young man extends a finger towards the computer's power button, fully ready to shut it off and leave for home. He doesn't seem to get the chance, however, as the computer (alongside seemingly everything else in the office) is turned off simultaneously in some kind of power outage. Bill's head proceeds to shoot up to look over the dividers of his cubicle, the man finding the room almost completely dark with the exception of what outside illumination penetrated the windows.

"What the…?"

His ears then catch onto the sound of electricity crackling at the far end of the room. His head slowly turns to the supposed source, and he begins moving his body out of his cubicle and towards where he's hearing the sound. It seemed like it was coming from the hallway that led to this office space. Bill steps out slowly from the lanes of the cubicles and towards the hallway entrance. The sounds of electric crackles only intensified the more he grew closer, a lingering feeling of eeriness now entered the man. Was there some kind of weird electrical problem going on? Is he going to have to call the builder's repair technician or something? …does the building have a repair technician? Eventually he reaches the threshold dividing the office space from the hallway, but he stops walking as his eyes widen in shock at what he finds in the hallway.

A small, sparking ball of purple and red light floats a few feet away from the threshold. Crackles and pops eerily emanate from it as it idles there, stationary.

"What the heck is-"

He doesn't get a chance to finish his sentence. The ball of light almost instantly starts rapidly expanding, and Bill is forced to shield his eyes as the mysterious object goes off like some sort of explosive flash bang. A massive BOOM! resonated throughout the area, force causing the man to tumble onto the ground while everything was momentarily engulfed in a purple luminescence. The blast of light then shrinks back into itself, imploding just as fast as it exploded.

Bill groans, starting to attempt to get up off the ground and blinking his eyes in a panicked haze as he tries to regain an understanding of his surroundings. The room was illuminated back to its previous state, an indicator that the power had been restored after that explosion. There wasn't any debris or anything though. He also could smell… smoke? Panic welling up again, he jumps back to his feet and turns around to find a massive cloud of smoke billowing from the threshold. Thankfully there was no fire, but there was a small and dim glow within the smoke, and accompanying that glow was a series of coughs followed by a voice.

"Agh, long distance travel is always so explosive-"

Bill steps back. "Wha- who's there??"

He doesn't get a response. All he gets is that dim glow stopping before slowly moving forward through the smoke, ominous and terrifying. The shadow of a figure then starts to make itself known, the shape looking to be extremely triangular. Bill continues moving back as the shadow steps closer, and closer, and closer…

The eeriness then comes to a screeching halt as the figure appears to trip over itself, flopping out of the fog face first to reveal a weird reptilian being in glasses and some kind of wizard's hat. The creature descends into a coughing fit shortly after, wheezing and gasping for air. "Too much smoke, too much smoke!!!"

Against better judgment Bill steps forward to get a better look at the creature. He's startled backwards again though as the creature snaps it's head from off the ground to seemingly glaring at his direction.

"I-I don't mean any harm!" Bill says, panicked. Of course he didn't, but did the creature share that intention?

The strange reptile tilts its head, then practically jumps back to its feet while dusting off its robe. This allowed Bill to realize just how small the being was in comparison to him.

"Bah, of course you don't mean any harm. All you humans are so soft and squishy…" the creature speaks in a nasally voice.

"'You humans'?" Bill repeated. "Are you some kind of alien or something??"

The reptile seemed to deadpan at that. "Alien… I'm Kamek, and you'll make sure to remember that."

The young man swallowed a forming lump in his throat. Perhaps exchanging pleasantries meant he could try and be friendly with this thing? "O-oh! I'm uh, Bill…?"

"Bill?" Kamek repeats almost judgmentally. "Cliché, but I can work with that…"

"Work with- just what are you doing here??"

Kamek's brows ascended a bit before descending, as if it were some kind of indicator of an eye roll behind his glasses. "I don't have the time for explanations," he then points his wand straight at Bill, "Now let's just get this over with, then I can be off to continue my job!"

Bill takes a second too long to comprehend what was going on while Kamek waves his wand, a reddish-purple light exuding from the spherical gemstone atop it. All the man could yell out was a panicked, "W-wait!" before a red beam of magic shot out from the wand and engulfed Bill's form.

A couple seconds passed before the magic dissipated around him and the beam slunk back into the object. Kamek now had a very noticeable look of satisfaction on his face, meanwhile Bill just felt… weird.

"A-agh, what was that…?"

He didn't get an answer though. All he did get was a budding feeling of something welling up inside him. Like his body was slowly beginning to get packed and overstuffed with something. In truth, that was just the magic starting to course its way throughout Bill's body…

The strange feeling he felt was one that overtook his entire body. The effects of the magic seemed to be one that surged through the entirety of his form all at the same time, an event that was signaled by strips of red light emanating off his form.

One of the first visible changes on his body was with the appearance of splotches of discoloration across his skin. Bits of darkness slowly began to form in his body and face, meanwhile there was a contrasting whiteness that was forming at the very tips of his fingers. The changes in tone would be followed by a more drastic type of physical shift after a few seconds passed, however.

The clean white continued to etch down Bill's fingers, the splotches continuing to travel their way downwards to reach his hands proper. At the same time there was also a series of changes in size that washed over his hands. With the change in coloration quickly overtaking all of his fingers, each one was prompted to thicken in size. Each passing moment caused the appendages to get chunkier, plumper in comparison to their previously thinner form. Alongside that was a weird change in biology, the mysterious white seemingly making the cells in his skin harden and shift into something that wasn't quite human. A certain smoothness slowly made its way across each appendage, fingernails getting glossed over and assimilated into the newly established texture as if these changes were attempting to wipe out any imperfections in his form.

His fingers weren't the only things changing though, as both of his hands were mirroring the transformation that was occurring. Palms stretched out in all directions as they were forced to grow in length and width. A sizable meatiness was in the process of packing onto them as well, muscles progressively thickening in size within that region to match the growing proportions of his fingers. All the while the increasing paleness of his skin only grew more prevalent, skin smoothing over more and more while the creases in his palms were washed away by the progressing wave of white.

Even more splotches of discoloration continued to form across his entire body, his arms easily getting dotted by the formulation of stark white while the muscles within them were in the process of getting stimulated to grow in size. A tightness was in the process of budding within the long sleeves of his jacket as a bulkiness was slowly being added into his arms. Within his forearms the muscles that composed of his flexors and extensors thickened, easily extending and expanding outwards with each passing moment. This was starting to cause a tremendous strength to surge within his newly developing muscles, power and heat cycling throughout them in some kind of magic-fueled current.

This would only continue to progress as this constant feeling of sheer power was built up within his form. While muscles formed in his lower arms, they had also been forming beyond his elbows and within his upper arms as well. His jacket sleeves continued to tighten, his biceps bulging outwards while his triceps grew in tandem alongside them. Creases already began forming within the deep cyan fabric as his newfound musculature developed more and more, growing out further to the point it began looking like he actively worked out. Seams tighten across his swelling limbs, small rips steadily forming across the boundary between sleeve and jacket due to his now increasingly developing deltoid muscles. The ends of his shoulders were in the process of steadily broadening in size, only growing out rounder and heavier with each passing second.

The rest of his shoulders had not been exempt from this intense transformation either as his overall form had concurrently been broadening as all these changes occurred. It wasn't long after the initial blast that Bill's polo shirt had started to strain against his form, the two buttons of the placket easily pinging off the shirt thanks to his thickening torso. This allowed the first few changes in his chest to be visible, a slight cleavage having formed in the middle of it while splotches of black and gray started to tint his skin.

Spots of gray were entering the young man's face too, a pressure steadily budding in the front of his skull as the tonal changes stretched across the lower area of his face. "Wh-what's going on?? Why does my… everything feel so tight!?"

Eyes darted around as he tried to make sense of the situation. A glance at his hands proved how large they have gotten, a smooth white shine having almost completely overtaken them. He slowly moved his focus up his arms, watching as his muscles grew out to fill his sleeves, them continuing to do so as the ridges that divided his continuously developing muscle mass etched themselves into the fabric of his jacket. The sight of such an occurrence caused so many thoughts to swim in Bill's head. What had Kamek done to him? Why?? And what was even going to become of him after this???

"Try not to worry too much," Kamek's voice resonates from in front of him in what he felt was an almost mocking tone. "You're going to be of quite some use to us!"

Bill could only blink in response to the words. "W-what does that even mean?"

All he gets is a smirk on the reptilian entity's face, the said entity just watching as their magic continues to do its work. Bill could feel a constant welling up of strength in his chest, his shirt continuing to be forced to stretch further over his torso while the muscles within it built up over time.

The cleavage he had developed in the middle of his chest continued to grow prominent while slowly indenting itself into his polo more. The tightness of his shirt had also been progressing steadily, getting even more prevalent with the swelling that was going on in his pectorals. Muscle mass steadily accumulated in the region as both pecs were in the process of growing out. A solid firmness had entered them both as they swelled forward, further pressing into his shirt as it all more easily outlined in the light blue fabric. Such a strong meatiness was just slipped into his pectorals with ease, although the two hard slabs of meat would soon start to get glossed over by the changes in his skin, smoothing out and gaining a practically metallic shine to them.

The same thing was happening to Bill's lower torso as well with another crease forming in his shirt. This time however it was because of his abdomen pressing forward. More development being put into it each passing second, hard abs bubbling and rippling forward in a gradual and almost sequential matter in how they rose from his once flat stomach. One set of two manifesting straight beneath his pecs, growing forward before another set formed and followed that example. Another couple seconds would pass before a third set repeated that event. All the while the muscles in his side slightly burned as his obliques were forced into a workout, his form somehow getting a little wider in the process. This had caused his polo to just strain more, the amount of pressure being put into it causing a few rips and tears to form in the fabric.

Another chorus of tearing pierces the air from behind him as the back of his shirt splits open, strong trapezius muscles bulging outwards and giving his upper back more definition. The neck of his shirt was also in the process of getting more strained as well, his own neck steadily thickening out into more of a trunk in its diameter. He could feel his throat tingle as the internal mechanisms reshaped themselves, his breathing growing deeper and heavier as time continued moving forward.

"S-so much… strength…" Bill speaks aloud, the last word ringing deeper than the others had. His muscles had only continued to bulge out and develop further, the sleeves of his jacket splitting open more to reveal the complete pale shine that had overtaken his beefy arms. There was a heat in his very core as his pectorals pushed forward and his abs developed even more, everything indenting into his polo and forcing a rip down the middle.

Bill still felt confused however. All of this was well beyond the young man's comprehension. Something wants him and wants to transform him into some jacked up creature! With all this muscle it felt like he was going to be put in some kind of body guard position. And what was this diminutive lizard going to do to him once he was fully transformed? Did they have more weird magic up their sleeves to make this even weirder? Did… did they transform anyone else before h-

He wasn't given the chance to finish that thought as a sudden piercing shot through his brain. "U-urgh-" he stumbled backwards, sides of his pants ripping open a bit due to the sudden movement. A strange cloud was entering Bill's mind now, thoughts and ideas phasing in and out of existence as they got obscured by the sudden haze. All he could muster out was a single question of, "What's happening now?!" before he shut his eyes and grunted in pain again. All the while, Kamek stands in front of him and silently observes his distress.

Even more changes had still been happening within his body, his lower half inevitably not being unaffected by the magic. The leather of his belt continued to strain across his waist as his hips pushed out even further and wider. The button of his jeans evidently had trouble holding together his broadening form, and in general it seemed that his pants just couldn't hold in the swath of changes ensuing across and around his legs.

Smooth darkness continued bleeding forward in the skin around his lower half, and the intense growth in muscle was a continuous effort throughout Bill's very form. So much of the upper portion of his jeans filled out, the seat of them getting closer to splitting as his rear was bloating up more and more. Gluteus muscles developed further while a certain level of sculpting was placed into his ass, all of which worked to round it up to thick and smooth perfection. The frontal region of the area wasn't spared either as the smoothing ensuing from his skin changes reached his groin. The button and zipper of his pants were easily forced to snap open as a thick roundness was formulated within that region, shining metal overtaking all of his parts and meshing and melding into a single rounded, completely nullified bulge.

Meanwhile in his legs the musculature of them had been mirroring the changes occurring throughout his entire form. The very shape of his legs pushed into the denim of his pants as their structure was enhanced; hamstrings and quad muscles within his thighs bulking up as the region got wider with each passing second. Tears and splits within the material grew more and more prevalent as the sides opened up to reveal his constantly hardening skin, and this only got more visible with the area around his knees practically opening thanks to his earlier movement to show just how much his skin had changed.

Meanwhile at the crus of his legs, his calves bulged out as the constant looping of strength was pushed into them. Bulky, powerful muscles constantly swelling up in size due to the steadily progressing nature of the spell that Bill was hit with. Legs getting so much stronger in order to support his hefty, heavy body. Pants continued to get torn asunder against the sheer magnitude of size that was impounding in his maturing muscularity. It was only a matter of time before his body would grow too large for all of his clothing.

This was a truth that had been getting easily proven by the man's footwear. As the splotches of pure black steel washed over his feet, and his body was all in the process of transforming, his feet too had been growing this entire time. Lengthening out longer, stretching out wider. Thickening in sheer size and girth. The sides of his feet pressed up against his shoes, and his heels dug into theirs. The material of his footwear had easily started ripping apart at this point, cracks and splits forming as the upper portion tried desperately to free itself from his soles. The bridge of his feet constantly pushed up against each loafer's tongue, furthering this building pressure more as his feet continued getting larger with his proportions.

Perhaps the most drastic change came with his toes though. As everything had been in the process of growing, his toes had also been pushing forward more to the point that the cap of his shoes bulged and rounded thanks to his bulking toes. But the more they got pressed into the cap, the more they seemed to squish into his feet, melding into the hardening skin as a perfect smoothness overtook it all. The rounded bulges in his cap continuously shrunk away as his toes pushed and merged into the balls of his feet. It wouldn't take very long before they had completely disappeared, leaving his feet as two massive metallic slabs. The front of them would still burst through the cap of his shoes however, as the rest of them obliterated his loafers in one large burst thanks to the footwear's inability to contain them.

It was by this point that his muscle growth had reached a substantial size. A certain apex had been reached with Bill's clothing, all of it seemingly coming to some kind of mutual conclusion that it would be unable to hold his absolutely hulking size.

A single tink entered the air as Bill's belt snapped apart and blasted off his waist. Then, in a single instant, almost all of the rest of his clothing came apart in one massive fusillade.

Dark blue fabric blew off from his beefy arms, shards of the sleeves of his jacket being shirked off the mostly white-colored limbs with ease. The remainder of his jacket had easily come undone as well, bits and pieces sloughing off Bill's back as his expansive form rendered the article of clothing into nothing but scraps. His polo shirt experienced the exact same fate with pieces of it becoming nothing but refuse against his large, beefy chest and back muscles. The shirt seemed to have one of the more explosive tearings as well with all of its remains being sent into the air and drifting downwards to the floor. His pants did undergo a similar experience though, the size of his legs causing them to bust apart in one fell swoop with bits and pieces of denim also floating in the air alongside the remnants of his polo. Any aspects of his former clothing that remained were tattered rings of his jacket and shirt that still clung to his shoulders, and a portion of his pants that remained wrapped around his hip region.

All of this gave way to fully revealing just how much of his body had changed. While his size was still growing, Bill had been absolutely filled with muscle to the point that his formerly skinny and twinkish form was subsumed by the build of a hulking bodybuilder. The constant changes in tone within his skin has caused his hands and arms to take on a predominately white shade by this point, meanwhile the rest of his body was still garnering the deep black coloration. Bits of his body shine in the office room's light as this development constantly grants him a more metallic form, increasing the visible strength of him by quite a lot. The surface area of his integumentary system would only end up getting more consumed by this, the wave of black and white metal continuing to overtake the remainder of his form.

A simple clunk resonates in the air as Bill places one of his large hands onto the side of his head. Pressure was still wracking his skull, and it felt like his face was just pushing out. Strands of dusty brown had also started to fall off his head as his hair began to disconnect from his scalp. But all he could really focus on was this pang of pain in his forehead. "Nngh, this headache. Hard to… think…" His jaw clenches, and after a few blinks a pair of hypnotic spirals enters the man's eyes.

There was a certain anger that began to practically boil within Bill's mind. So much so that the changes in his vocal cords allowed him to growl as he felt this feeling slowly intensify within him. Something about him knew how uncharacteristic this was, but there was just an overwhelming feeling of aggression burning it's way into his head. His usually calm personality was turning into nothing but steam as this rage welled up within him. He just wanted to fight! To just give something a good punch, get into a brawl and come out victorious!

"A-aahh, n-no, I…" he tries to resist. To go against these thoughts. And yet much like the strength he's been given physically, all of this was overwhelming him mentally as well. Something about not fighting was starting to leave a bad taste in his mouth. A voice in his mind practically yells at him that he should live to fight! To take out all his aggression and retool it into something of use!

After all, isn't that his purpose? To just charge up aggression and expel it at full force. Doesn't that just sound so alluring…?

"Nn…nnnngh-" his jaw remained clenched as these weird thoughts assaulted his brain. The shifts in his face only progressed as well, pressure building up and the frontal portion pushing out more and more. At first it had just looked like he had been granted a simple snout, nose pushing into it while his nostrils became simple holes at the snouts out. His jawline hardened, chiseling out more as the muzzle-like appearance of his face grew more prominent. But it wasn't long until the strange muzzle prompted another swatch of changes across his head.

His very skull structure was changed, reshaping and shifting into something that could only be described as inhuman. The upper section of his head pushed downwards as his muzzle overtook more and more of the front of his face. Within his mouth his teeth altered, every single one of them sharpening to a fine triangular point while becoming slightly flatter in shape. The hairs of his eyebrows trimmed and faded into nothing while the ridges grew more prominent, becoming thick and chunky while sticking out significantly above his eyes. All the splotches of black continued to make their purchase across his face; ears sinking into his skin until there was nothing left and his hair only shaving itself more. The once neatly swept back style had shrunk away with each follicle disconnecting and falling off his scalp. It wasn't long until all he'd be left with was a small tuft on his scalp, and even then that didn't last long as the transformation persisted so that it could soon leave him smooth and hairless.

Once the hair had receded from the back of his head, his balded crown pushed out more as it gained more of a defined shape. The roundness of it flattened as the structure shifted and changed to something more cylindrical. After some amount of time the cylinder found itself differentiated slightly from the rest of his head, the crown's shape giving way to what could only be described as how the primer of a bullet would look.

The bullet motifs didn't really stop there either. As his face shifted, the shape it took seemed more and more akin to that of a bullet's body. The rounded muzzle of his face was like that of the bullet's projectile, meanwhile the portion between that and his head's crown was the remainder of the cartridge. The best way to describe his new head shape was like that of a ten caliber bullet, albeit with a bit more of a rounded tip and much larger in size than a normal bullet.

A growl continued to exit his throat, his mind continuing to be ravaged through all these changes. That burning aggression from earlier was like a flame rushing through his brain. All that was once Bill just fell to dust or boiled into steam. Such a weak and useless job dealing with office work, there's nothing fun to destroy in an office! What's he supposed to do with numbers anyway? Useless little things, all he needs is his fingers to count off the number of rounds he could fire off!

"U-uuuurgh…" he continues to hold the sides of his bullet-shaped head in between his hands. Thoughts of violence and destruction were filling his head, each one causing the ends of his mouth to curl upwards in a smile. A small chuckle escaped his throat, only to intensify as all these desires continued to light his mind ablaze. "Ggggeheh… heheheh…!!"

A level of pure unhingedness was overtaking him. All those thoughts of late nights and work getting thrown to the ashes. Memories of number crunching, accounting, math; such things were useless to a man such as him! Years of learning were getting sundered, his brain constantly dulling with time. He obviously wasn't the brain of any operation, just one of many brawns. His muscles ached at such a thought. Brawn, power, strength, that's what truly mattered!

Of course with all of that he'd still need at least a speck of knowledge, in this case that being working with artillery. It wasn't anything complicated though, all he knew how to do was adjust a barrel and fire whatever weapon he's been charged with utilizing. Even then he'd much prefer a physical fight. But either way he'd always be the best at doing either job!

Any aspect of his old personality was quickly overtaken by a new one. The aggression was one thing, but his soft and kind personality was all replaced with pure cockiness and arrogance. A drastic contrast to his own self, but then again he'd find such a personality weak anyway. There's no room in his brain to be soft, only strong and powerful to go toe-to-toe with someone! If anything he felt like he'd always be moments away from his gunpowder setting off and rocketing him into a tussle!

But of course, all of this strength isn't for himself. The only thing that would truly remain of the original Bill was the overachiever aspect of his personality, but here that gets shifted and changed into loyalty. He wants to devote his strength to his lord. The king that forged him, the king that commands him to fight, the one that gives him a sense of purpose. The name Bowser is what comes to mind, and thinking about him gives the newly changed man an intense feeling of allegiance. His loyalty is to Bowser, always and forever, and nothing can be done to strip that. He wants to do everything in his power to make his king, his lord proud.

"AHAHAHA!!!" The transformed creature let out a loud, deep laugh that had a gravelly tone to it. Any fear and confusion he was feeling was gone, replaced with a certain overpowering drive to fight for his king. Anything that was once Bill has been gone. All of him had been overtaken, forgotten, substituted for a single new being.

A Bullet Bill, that was what he was. A singular piece of ammo in the barrel that was Bowser's offensive army. Being one of many didn't matter to him though, his only purpose was to use his strength to serve and protect his king. Such a thought makes him smirk, the newly forged Bullet Bill giving one of his beefy muscular arms a good strong flex and watches whatever weird cloth that surrounded its shoulder rip off and fall to the ground.

After spending a good few seconds admiring his muscles, he lowers his arm and smiles. "Ready to serve, my…" he trails off as he notices where he was. "...king? Eh? Where the heck am I?"

He then looked down at his body. Why was he wearing torn up shorts? He has no use for those! He grabs onto the tattered denim pants and tears them off with ease, taking note of the other strip of cloth on his left arm and instantly going to pull it off as well. It left his perfectly sculpted, chiseled, metallic form visible. Smooth, yet rigid with muscle. He had the right components to punch through a wall, or survive sudden impact towards the top of his head. Looking at his muscles just made him want to admire his strength again…

"...ehem," a voice clears its throat from in front of him. The Bullet Bill's thoughts are broken from that, looking around at his height for a few seconds too long before realizing he could just look down again to find the source. Said source was proven to be a familiar-looking, blue-robed, and bespectacled magikoopa. One that he instantly had clocked as his superior.

"General Kamek! I didn't see you there, considering you're so short and all! Heheh…" In comparison to the Bullet Bill, Kamek was indeed extremely short. "So General, mind telling me where we are?"

Kamek just deadpanned, his focus hanging on the jab at his height. "...I'm not in the mood for this," the magikoopa holds up his wand, a reddish-purple glow activating in the gem, then twirls it before turning around to fire a beam into the hallway he fell into. The beam stopped in midair, formed a small sphere of light, then instantly grew into a large portal that was slightly taller than the Bullet. Within the portal one could see that it led to the gray brick halls of Bowser's Castle.

The Bullet Bill just eyes at the portal, seemingly awaiting orders. At least they have that going for them, Kamek thought to himself. "And don't worry about where this is. As your commander I request you head into that portal and find your way to the armory, then await for instructions from Lord Bowser."

A toothy grin formed on the Bullet Bill's face, the creature nodding a single time in confirming. "Yes, sir!" Then, without even thinking twice, he jogs his way towards the portal as a mental map of Bowser's Castle forms in his mind. One of the only things he would ever deem remembering, it would seem. His heavy steps stomp past Kamek and straight into the portal, the newly forged Bullet Bill now properly enlisting in Bowser's steadily growing army.

This also left Kamek alone in the office space. Holding up his wand again he waves it, the portal shutting itself in response. It leaves a small purple and red light orb, but it snuffs itself out a few seconds after the portal closes.

The magikoopa then sighs, mentally checking off another box on the ever vast list of recruits he needs to make. He admittedly didn't anticipate just about how much work was going into transforming random folks into suitable minions for Bowser. Repeated magic like this was always rather exhausting to perform for a little guy like him. And he's definitely going to have to push himself to his limits if he's going to fulfill this request per the king's desires, especially within the next couple days!

"Ah, so much work…" he begins walking forward, his small feet practically silent on the ground of the office space. The only sound that was heard was the wood of his wand clunking to the ground every so often as he uses it as a cane. All Kamek thinks about is how he plans to attain more victims to transform into loyal soldiers. Perhaps if he were lucky he might someone so other people in this building and-

Ding!

The noise echoed through the empty office area, followed by the sound of doors sliding open. A couple footsteps are heard followed by a male-sounding voice speaking. "Did somebody leave the lights on here…?"

Kamek remained unseen for the time being, but the smile forming on that face proved that wouldn't be the case for very long. Ideas and thoughts flowed through his mind as he began to make his way to the source of the sound. Another person to transform! Yet another soldier for Bowser's Army! Although perhaps he should go with a common Koopa Troopa this time around.

Only a few minutes later a bright flash of red light illuminates that very floor of the office building before dimming back to its previous dimly lit appearance. This would be one of many for this night as the plans to propagate Bowser's Army continue onward. Soon it will be brought to full strength…

…or perhaps it will be at an even fuller strength than it ever was before.

#character tf #species tf #transformation #muscle growth tf #tf

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thdrama2 · 21 days

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what the other anon said about art payments is so true. as much as i love getting artwork from people of my ocs so many people just go ghost even with months of pestering them 💀 rn im dealing with someone who completed one half of an art payment, but it’s been like 4 months and they STILL haven’t completed the second part even though all they have to draw is a headshot. so now the adopt i was gonna trade them is just stuck in limbo because it’s not like i can cancel the trade

To get out of such limbo you would need to pay them something else in exchange for the work already completed and then cancel the remaining trade.

They could not earn the character without full payment but one completed artwork for another should suffice to end the waiting.

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moodindigov · 7 months

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hey guys nerd moment about the title of the fic (this is long im sorry)

mood indigo was actually a jazz song released in the 1930’s by duke ellington, barney bigard with lyrics by irving mills, except bigard said that its real credit is derived from his clarinet teacher, Lorenzo Tio’s, melodies. so that clarinet part like biagrd’s solo? yea that was Lorenzo tio’s melodies that weren’t full developed and when bigard did finish them and show them so ellington, he liked it and it was included. and like its almost impossible to tell where ellington’s collaborators part begin bcs apparently he’s js that good at blending that stuff idk (dont take that last part as a fact thats purely from what i remember.) anyways, mood indigo is about a little boy and little girl who are eight. girl loves boy and while they never acknowledge the feelings, the girl waits at her window bcs the boy visits her. and the song basically describes the feeling the girl had when the boy didnt visit her. so you may be asking, duct why would u choose something like that as a title for a book about the slump in london 1930s and about criminal organizations? well, dear anon, here u r:

1. literal (?) meaning; im gonna be so honest with you i purely got this idea from brendan and neksa / jess and morgan. i couldnt stop thinking about that wonderful art i found of brendan and neksa it was of neksa as a raven or crow i dont rmb but point is that its gorgeous and stunning i love it. the idea that brendan denies his feelings of love for her purely because he half doesn’t want to acknowledge that he’s become so attached to a person in such an intimate way and half because he just cant risk his father (or anyone) finding out that he’s gone and practically betrayed his dad’s whole like symbolism in tje trading world (remember they don’t like the library. yk how contradicting it would be to have one of the biggest illegal book trader’s son dating someone from the library, especially someone who works in like the same facility as the archivist? yea its damnable like no ones gonna trust ca. brightwells or his business anymore.) anyways the literal meaning: girl is sad bcs boy didn’t visit/come back to her. brendan literally left neksa (the woman he was oh so deeply in love with) because he didn’t want to hurt her and played it off as the fact that he didn’t love her. and when jess comes back as brendan (lmaoo) i feel like you can imagine the smallest sliver of hope she had that they can be something again but its practically disappeared next to the pure anger and grief in her heart. and when neksa dies, brendan can’t visit her anymore. its literally not possible. (until he died then maybe they could be happy tgt). this is so many words words words guys i promise im not actually this much of a nerd on a daily basis this is just interesting to me. anyways, once again, girl is sad bcs boy didn’t visit her one day. umm we can go back and look into jess’ past: boy is eternally sad bcs his brother died. aka: boy is sad bcs his brother can’t visit him. like ever. sad sad sad moments💔💔

2. this is like an actual stretch but um i consider it okay so basically girl being sad is jess boy who didnt visit (or wont anymore) is a semblance of love or sanctuary. throughout the series its obvious that jess just doesn’t trust his family. im pretty sure he even says it like he does not trust them. but hey, maybe he did once. maybe he did when he was a little boy who had an older brother who he could rely on—one that taught him how to walk and that taught him the basics. someone who he could go to for advice and who could help him keep his head above water. now we don’t have a characterization, but i’m going off of @thegreatlibraryfangirl’s advice and kinda semi-making my own..so um sorry if u dont like that guys..but anyways i feel like the moment jess starts to really rely and trust the other’s is the moment that melancholy feeling, that mood indigo, goes away. it doesnt go away completely, theres always gonna be a solid chunk never satisfied but thats okay because he has people he can trust with his life that will help him get through it. not only this but the bond that jess and dario (will) share in this au represents that. they’re both young—maybe 13 max but they both lack one thing that only they can give esch other; sanctuary.

#oh my fuckin god that is so long #im dorry i put you through reading this #i oromise im more than a nerd #tgl #the great library #the slumps tgl #mood indigo #jess brightwell #dario santiago #christopher wolfe #wolfe pack

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alpaca-clouds · 1 year

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Fluffcember Day 20: Only With You

Yesterday's Fluffcember - the prompt was Traditional Cooking.

Fandom: Castlevania (Netflix)

Shipping: Striga/Morana

Genre: Domnestic Fluff

Length: 1095 words

[A03 Link]

Working for humans was demeaning. Humans were stupid, feeble, weak. They cared about so many nothings in their short, short lives. And they would die. So easily. Even Morana, who did not consider herself a fighter, could snuff out their lives without even breaking a sweat. And yet they were here, in Szombathely, working for fucking humans.

She had been right – of course. The humans had not been particularly choosy, when it came to who was filling up their ranks. The political situation in Europe was volatile – had been volatile even before Dracula rained hell onto Earth for half a year. Many had died. Soldiers, too. So offering a squadron of undead soldiers had made them quick friends, even if those undead soldiers needed to feed on human blood at least once a month. They were defending the city, for now, waiting it out until the end of winter. And she, Morana, was working for fucking humans, helping them bring their stupid human affairs in order, plan out their trade routes and all the things humans were still so bad with.

It was annoying. Humans were annoying. The fact that during this night alone three men had tried to explain the things she had spent centuries perfecting to her, did not make it any better. Oh, she had been so close to ripping that one guy's throat out – and that would've been her letting him of easy. Because aside from trade, administration and certain tactics, she had also perfected the art of torturing humans. How much she would've loved to making the man scream for hours.

She could not quite stifle a sigh when she returned to the small house the local lord had given over to them. It was a small house with but one room. Nothing compared to the comforts she had grown so accustomed to during those last 400 years. But it was something. A little thing.

Much to her surprise she found the tangy smell of sour cream, as well as the scent of fried pork belly hanging in their one room, when she entered. She had not eaten normal food ever since they had left Styria. It was just not a thing they could afford right now.

Yet, there Striga was, standing in front of that tiny stove they had, a pan over the open flame.

“You are back,” she said softly, without turning around.

“I am,” Morana replied. All the anger from her night vanished from one moment to the next, as she was seeing her wife at the stove. Striga was hunched over, as the stove – or anything in this house really – had not been made for someone her size. Yet, she was cooking.

Morana went over to her. All she wanted to do was hug her, hold her for a moment, so she did. Putting her arms around the muscular body and hiding her face between those wide shoulders.

“You had an annoying night?” Striga concluded.

Morana could not hold back a groan. “You have no idea. Those men… they are infuriating!” It was a thing she had always agreed with Carmilla on. Humans were bad. Human men were worse. Because they acted as if the entire world belonged to them, as if the world should feel blessed for them having set a foot on it. They were so completely unable to understand how unimportant their own lives were. And the more power such a man had amassed – and vampire men did not really differ from the human ones – the worse they became.

“I know,” Striga muttered. “I know, my beloved.”

“I want to kill them,” Morana murmured. “I want to…”

“I know,” Striga said again.

A part of Morana’s mind had long gone over the possibilities. They had about 200 vampire soldiers with them. Could they not just overpower the humans and take the city? It had a castle. Not a nice castle like the one in Styria, but a castle never the less. How many of their people would they lose in the process? Would they be able to hold the city?

The latter point was the big struggle, wasn’t it? They were in Hungary right now and Hungary still had a standing army. Sooner or later they would take the city back. And their soldiers would die. And without the soldiers she and Striga would die as well. Then it would be all for nothing.

“Once the winter is over, we can move on,” Striga promised. “Once the winter is over…”

But they both knew, it wasn’t quite true. Even with the winter over there was the fact that they could just not return to a comfortable life like they had before. They would be on the road, always just a smidge away from dying in the sun.

Morana relinquished the thought. She would have to deal with it. The humans were stupid, but wasn’t she more so for holding a grudge? Those humans were barely more than animals. She would not hold a grudge against a stupid dog biting her, right?

“How did you get the food?” They were, after all, not paid money, just blood.

“I gambled for it,” Striga replied.

“But what did you stake?”

“Ah, nothing much.” Striga just shrugged, before taking the pan of the stove. “Sit.”

Morana could not quite help a smile, before she sat down by the table. A simple wooden construction that lacked any sophistication. “What did you make?”

“Machanka,” Striga replied.

It was a dish Morana remembered. A Slavic dish, made with onions, sour cream and cheese, as far as she remembered. Served with bread and fried pork belly.

“It was something I made for my siblings back when…” Striga stopped herself, shaking her head, though Morana understood.

Back when she was human. Though it had been a long time since then, too, hadn’t it? 400 years. Though other than Morana, Striga still remembered her human life – had even held it dear. For Morana… it was just too long ago. She remembered the place, but nothing more. What had her family been like? She had not idea. She just remembered being an undead goddess over a city for many, many years – before the winds of time had crumbled the city to dust.

Maybe Striga guessed her thoughts, even though she said nothing. She just bowed down and kissed her onto the forehead. “It’s good,�� she promised, before filling the soup into two simple wooden bowls. “Not fancy, but good.”

“I know it’s good, my love,” Morana replied. “It has been you, who cooked it.”

#Castlevania #castlevania fanfiction #castlevania netflix #striga #Morana #striga x morana #sapphic #lesbian #domestic fluff

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magnoliamyrrh · 2 years

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"capitalism leads to more innovation" is a lie for so many reasons but a particularly tragic and obvious one is that it doesnt lead to more innovation, it just funnels most of the innovation into the higher classes & corporations

in terms of artistic, day to day innovation at least, this was much more accessible back in the day. not only could one make a reliable or semi reliable and anyway, decent living being an artisan or knowing a trade; which sometimes you were born into sometimes you could learn, but peasants had the access, time, and resources for the creation of unique products and items of personal/family use (things also used to have spiritual and religious value at some point but whatver were way past that now). whereas, today, art, craft, creation, etc. are often innacessable to the lower and middle classes because of both cost and, again, lack of time. whereas, today, everything is mass produced and imported and exported for pennies by massive inhumane corporations; and despite how theres such a push to commodify every possible talent you have and every minute; competing and making a living from artisanal talent - necessary for much of traditional culture to survive - is quite hard (making a full, complex, traditional costume, from scratch, or a complex rug. - things that used to be so common. whose gonna pay that much money and then wait - what - 1-2-3 years for it to be complete nowadays? whats gonna keep you alive in the meantime? so the traditional costume becomes more and more simplified so that it may be mass produced and also probably commodified for tourism, bc this is the only way it can be profitable enough vs the time invested) (im pretty sure by this point, if i were to have the skill to replicate one of the full traditional costumes i have. and i werent to undervalue the work and time, it would cost way more than buying an old one did; bc ive seen new blouses which were more complex but.. not very, go for at least 150 (more like 200+) dollars. which may sound like a lot, but, doing the math; for the wage to be at least 10 dollars an hour (lower than the min wage here by 5-6), the whole blouse would have to be completed in 15 hours. which... maybe can happen with w a machine. but a hand made, hand sown, somewhat complex blouse is going to take much, much, much longer than that. so, what you end up with is that at least in the online market of today where youre most likely going to be trying to sell this thing... a blouse which through the will of god alone you managed to complete in only a week and a half (10.5 days of 8 hours of work per day, 84 hours total), would be at least 840 dollars. which is an insane price mostly nobody is going to pay you and also, youre not gonna finish that thing in a week and a half anyway....and so. what. a full costume would cost, easily in the thousands of dollars? even if we do the calculations on romanias minimum wage of 15.2 ron/h, approx ~3 euro/dollars, a blouse completed in a week and half would cost ~ 250 dollars; which already means you likely wont be able to consistently sell them every week. and a costume you could complete in 5 weeks of working 8 hours a day, would cost at least 1000 dollars anyway already, on a 3 dollar wage...maybeeee this would b profitable living in the balkans and selling in euro and dollar and not working alone but even then i dont know whose paying this much money when old ones of similar complexity would be exponentially cheaper. these arent fursuits lmao theres no market for this. and thus, uniqued innovation and artisanal craft, cannot survive, in the face of mass scale Capitalist Innovation from Hell)

#someone needs to take my phone away from me #enough of the tumblr marxism enoUGH #to be fair tho im waiting for these samosas to bake and i guess. this is what i do instead of finding something else productive to do in 20 #min

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ravio-rants · 2 months

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2 for any, uhh I cannot remember what it is but..7 for any, cause it’s my lucky number :smiles:

Why does your oc look the way they do? What are your reasons for their appearance?

gonna answer this for most of them bc its fun lol

Raide is actually way different than they originally were designed. she used to be a sona, or, my sona (ravio)'s opposite twin thing. i didnt like that idea anymore so i revamped him completely, and ended up mashing together "skull pattern bc its cool" "keep her hair similar" and "colors i like" and ending up with what we have now. oh, her hair actually originally was designed after a spatoon oc i had, and then i Hated drawing the hair so much that i never drew him, so, with my siblings advice, i made them wear a crown that looks similar to his old hair, and her new hair still has similar vibes but is much easier to draw.

Calen actually hasnt changed too much, to be honest. he used to be just an offbrand version of a character i liked from a fandom im no longer in, and because i had already made him kinda my own, i kept him around and changed him into a twili to match Raide. his colors are blue and gold because thats what his colors originally were, and his skin is tinted green because i didnt want All my twili to just be black and white. thats boring.

Vang was the first of the twins to be made, and was also my first twili oc, so she kinda became the outline for them. Her and her brother, Kalt, are supposed to look like siblings, but also look closer to Midna from canon, because they are part of the royal lineage, and i wanted them to match more with the canon looks we are given for twili.

Kalt is vang but to the left, design wise, honestly. they probably looked Very similar, if not identical before she transitioned, but neither of them minds. he has the same hair as The Hero (link from twilight princess) because he looks up to him and wants to be cool. (aka he started as just a twili Link design but i made him my own.)

(all of the twili are actually undergoing mild design changes currently. undecided if some of the new design choices will be part of an au or not, so i wont be explaining them here, since they arent complete yet anyways.)

Hobic the wizard design choices? uh. slutty gay wizard with his tits out. that was the whole design idea. also green. i dont think too deeply about these things, he's entirely a joke character.

The M Crew, Moss, Marble, and Media are actually mostly three colors. green, purple, and orange. Moss is Purple with green clothes, Marble is Green with orange clothes, and Media is Orange with purple clothes. the intent is to make them look fine on their own, but also like a fun group when put together. Media is supposed to look simplistic but kinda punk. (the end result is them looking like a bouncer at a concert but thats okay lol.) Moss is supposed to have a similar outfit to what i usually wear. letterman jacket, combat boots, ripped jeans. Marble.. marble was a struggle and a half and i dont like her outfit at all. she looks like she got a witch costume from spirit halloween and called it good, so i have to fix that.

Does your oc have any notable skills or good personality traits? Why did you give them those traits? Why do they exist in-universe?

hm. Raide is good at most forms of art. i gave them that skill because im a jack of all trades, and my oc's are almost always an extension of myself. Raide is a good artist in universe because she loves art a lot, and doesnt want to be a royal guard anyway, so why not try Every type of art while he finds out what they want to do? right?

Calen is good at mixing potions, and is pretty charismatic. honestly hes had these since being created so i dont know why he has them. as for in universe explaination: potions are his job, so hes been trained on how to make them(and he Has to know how to make potions.. because they keep him alive..) . charisma is also job related. hes a merchant of many wares (potions are just the ones he makes himself.), so he's gotten pretty good at being charming but honest. it helps people buy his shit.

this got long lmao- and those two are the only ones i could think of answers for quickly(they may or may not be my fav oc's of mine...) so if you wanna ask about other beans feel free!!

#oc tag #ravio rants #calen lunaile #kalt twiliri #raide solaire #twili oc group #vang twiliri #moss the lynx #marble the manta ray #media the raven #hobic the wizard #ravio replies

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gorematchala · 3 months

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I have completed Star Ocean!!!!

So I only have one negative thing to say about First Departure R and its minor. To get it out of the way, this game has the same disease many RPGs have which is "bad final area and last boss" syndrome. I made the strongest sword I could possibly get for Roddick and half the enemies at the end, including the final boss, are healed if you hit them with it, I assume because they absorb dark element. I will be maining the Soul Eater next time

But there is currently a next time because I really liked the game! Its old and arcane and items are super important even though you'll never need even a fraction of whats available, and all of that PSP jank is so good, I love it. As a remake/remaster/port thing I really love the way the devs stayed true to the SNES game and the PSP game at the same time somehow. Its like the most respectful remaster ever

Besides just liking the game I've started a second playthrough because there are a lot of characters and I want to play with some of the ones I couldn't get before. Unfortunately it would take 3 playthroughs to use all of them and idk if I would go that far so soon after my first clear but the other reason I'm playing again is I understand the skill system now and I wasted so many points and so much EXP before that i basically just wanna see how broken overpowered I can get lol. I feel like theres an upper limit for sure cuz damage caps at 9999, but I wanna max out all skills for everyone and smith some fucked up armor and buy all the expensive items and stuff. Its got all the components of the kind of RPG I'm always looking for, even though just like with FF8 I wish it was just normal turn based combat. The spritework is really good though and it helps the fights be fun

I started the demo for second story and so far I really like the characters and the art and stuff but it kinda encapsulates a problem I have with sequels and modernizing things. The stagger system and all the battle stuff is fuckin awesome, I love it and its what drew me to the game in the first place, but the 3D environments look kinda crusty and the menus are all just blue and samey looking. The SO:FD menus let you change the background color and all the different tabs have colored icons next to them. And its nice cuz theres a lot of menus in that game. With Second Story its like you trade the PSP swag for convenience and sick battle systems. But I reallyyy like the PSP swag is the problem

#star ocean #First Departure R

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cc-mr-vip · 3 years

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Season 3 Initial Thoughts

- ℂ𝔸𝕄ℙ ℂℝ𝔼𝕋𝔸ℂ𝔼𝕆𝕌𝕊 𝕊ℙ𝕆𝕀𝕃𝔼ℝ𝕊 𝔸ℍ𝔼𝔸𝔻-

Holy shit, this Season was a doozy. I absolutely loved this season. It was a lot more intense than both Season 1 and 2, but had the realism from Season 1 that I loved so much.

Also I was fucking wrong, boys. Well not completely. I did make the prediction that they’ve been on the island for at least 2 months, because for some reason that was a reasonable number in my head. A nice believable number for the kids to have survived and did all they did, but six months!? Like half a year!? They would have been 1.5 years away from getting blown up from the volcano in JW2. Bruh...

The Scorpius Rex probably had the most terrifying design I had ever seen for a hybrid dinosaur. It felt way more threatening than both the Indominus and Indoraptor, probably because of it’s very odd hodgepodge of a design. I also love the twist of it being extremely unstable and causing other dinosaurs to lash out after being poisoned. Having this thing chase around the kids was definitely terrifying to say the least. Also wasn’t expecting Sammy to get spiked by the poison too (and turn an odd shade of green, sorta narmy lmao). I knew she wasn’t going to die, but I wasn’t expecting a nice squick shot of the quills in her abdomen that was a fun treat.

Also finally! Kenji, my boy, finally has some character backstory and development! I will probably do a more deeper analysis on Kenji’s drawing of his family, but is already kinda confirmed what kind of person his father is. He didn’t care enough about his son to want to put pictures of him on the wall, only himself. It makes sense why Kenji was so self absorbed as well. I found it pretty heartbreaking that Kenji risked his life to try rescue his father’s “precious” art statue. I’m not sure if he tried to rescue it because he was scared of his father scolding him or if he just wanted to bring it back for his father for a pat on the back. Either way, it’s just brings up sad implications all around.

Honestly Kenji had some absolutely great development this season, in my opinion, way more so than the others had and way more interesting too. I think the episode that really marked a change in Kenji was Episode 5 (Eye of the Storm), when Kenji took it upon himself to be in charge of packing. For most of the episode, he was acting like typical Kenji, but he began to take his job way more seriously when it came to the safety of his friends. When Darius took after Ben, he properly took charge of the group (nice contrast to Season 1 where he was more nonchalant about it and tried to pass off responsibility). It was around this point that we didn’t see Kenji acting all high and haughty anymore, he was fully devoted to saving his friends.

I definitely wasn’t expecting Kenji to run off with the laptop to make the trade and save Brooklynn. The boy tried to fight a man with a loaded gun to save his friend, how foolish and brave of him to try do so. It was amazing to see Kenji, who spent most of the series cowering behind others, fully devoting himself to protecting Brooklynn in the finale (leading her to safety and shielding her with his own body). I do think that Kenji has some issues regarding losing friends; I think that the Camp Fam really is the first friends he’s ever gotten, which is why losing them hurt him so much (Sammy’s faux death and Brooklynn getting kidnapped).

The way at the end when Kenji refused to forgive and accept the idea that they were going to risk Brooklynn’s safety over the laptop...it was a very mature way to handle that situation. Pragmatically, Kenji was absolutely right, they shouldn’t be risking their lives over a stinkin’ laptop. It’s not they’re responsibility, they’re just kids. But his friends were good people and Kenji played along, but decided to take matters into his own hands. His friends are important to him and he’s going to do anything to keep them safe.

From haughty jock who only seemed to care about himself to a team member willing to risk everything to keep everyone safe, Kenji really has grown so much as a character.

All in all, I’m surprised the kids actually made it off the island this time. My friends and I were placing bets on whether or not they would make it off the island this season. Everyone had voted that they wouldn’t, but they did...hopefully? They got a stowaway so I’m wondering how they’re going to deal with that. Go back to the island? Keep going? Clearly it all isn’t over because Kenji’s character arc isn’t quite solved yet. I wonder how many more season CC will have. I do enjoy the series, but there’s only so much they can keep right?

This initial thoughts ended up more of a Kenji reaction post, so I’ll dedicate the end here to some other thoughts I had overall:

Yasmina and Sammy’s friend-(or maybe more)-ship was really cute and wholesome. I found Yasmina’s chumminess afterwards Hello-Zuko-Here levels of second hand embarrassment xD (Are they a maybe-couple? When Brooklynn mentioned crushes that Sammy might’ve had she mentioned Yaz lmao).

Thank god, Bumpy didn’t die. She has her own family now...for at least 1.5 more years until the volcano explodes...

Ben, you stupid child, of course you want to get off the island. I would have knocked you out and dragged you on the boat myself.

It was nice of the pilot and mercenary to board the kids upon finding out they were children. Even though they died / ended up splitting up the kids, the meant well.

I can’t believe Dr. Wu was in this season. He isn’t as much as a bad guy as I thought. He still left the kids, but at least he didn’t...kill them? Set the bar too low maybe?

And that’s all for now. This being a chock-full Kenji season, I’ll probably be doing some analysis or posts on him, but thought I’d make a reaction post with all my initial thoughts for now!

#jurassic world #jurassic park #jurassic world camp cretaceous #camp cretaceous #jwcc #Darius Bowman #kenji kon #Brooklynn #sammy gutierrez #yasmina fadoula #ben pincus #dr wu #season 3 #spoilers #bumpy the ankylosaurus #scorpio rex

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azenkii · 4 years

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A Long List of Trash Fire Lord Zuko Headcanons

...that i couldn't get out of my head:

(warning: SUPER LONG POST i havent figured out how to trim posts yet)

he's the one who unchains azula despite iroh's protests. she doesn't even try to fight him, just cries into his shoulder and keeps mumbling about how father's going to be so disappointed in her. he takes her to her rooms and has her drink a sleeping draught, then stations the best guards he has left outside her chambers.

his first council meeting takes place literally a day after sozin's comet. he hobbles into the council chamber shirtless with his entire torso covered in bandages and every council member just looks at him like '...what'

he does NOT sleep for like,,a week after sozin's comet and then another two weeks after his coronation. katara, aang and suki try to persuade him to sleep and he doesn't listen. eventually sokka, toph and mai team up to literally drag his ass to bed and tell him he's not allowed to get up until he sleeps (does mai pin him to the bed with her knives? yes. is it kinky or sexual in any way? definitely not.)

he drinks So. Much. Tea. at this point it's practically tasteless to him but he drinks it anyway because he just needs something to do and tea is something familiar. he keeps iroh on his toes because he's constantly asking for new tea blends, uncle, i think i actually tasted the last one,

he flat-out refuses to grow his hair for at least a year after ozai's defeat. the second it starts getting close to his chin he shears it off himself, with his knife, and his stylist has a heart attack every single time

when he's tired he'll occasionally jump up when one of his guards moves. it stops after a bit, but for the first month and a half or so he's really twitchy. when sokka asks, the only explanation he can come up with is that he's not used to having people stand behind him silently and not want to kill him, much less want to protect him (sokka immediately takes him out for a shopping trip and makes a point of walking behind him the entire time, but only on zuko's right side, where he can clearly see it if sokka moves towards him)

when the healer declares azula mentally unstable and in need of an institution, he shuts himself in his office for the rest of the night. no one's allowed in, not even iroh. he finally emerges in the morning, eyes red from crying and sleep deprivation, and tells the librarian that he'd like a list of the best mental institutions in the country, please, the best in the world if you can get them

he loves theatre (is this even a headcanon?). unfortunately it practically died out in the fire nation along with the rest of the creative arts, leaving nothing but small troupes like the ember island players. one of zuko's personal goals (meaning things he wants to accomplish that aren't as important as restoring his country) is to bring back theatre; he finally manages to do it after about eight months or so of being fire lord, along with other arts like dancing, music and sculpture

he establishes a national day of mourning, on the first day of autumn every year, to commemorate the genocide of the air nomads. from 100AG onwards, every calendar printed in the fire nation has it marked. at first it was called the day of repentance, but aang persuaded him to have it changed (by arguing that he didn't want guilt to be a literal staple of fire nation culture)

he introduces literally So Many educational reforms, plus a mandatory class that teaches students about the cultures of the other nations (air nomads included) and how some of their traditions overlap

he turns down the offer of having a statue put up of him in the capital. toph ignores him and does it anyway.

he visits azula regularly, makes sure she's (relatively) comfortable and well-fed, and sometimes just sits down outside her door and tells her about everything that's going on right now ('some of the far colonies have developed their own standardised writing, azula, you wouldn't believe it, and i've asked the fire sages to come visit more often—but you never liked them, did you? oh, well; i'll make sure none of them go into your chambers by mistake')

(he doesn't know it, but when he does this azula sits by the door and listens. she wonders what kind of writing the colonists have developed, and whether or not the fire sages have taken on some new recruits.)

he hates being above anyone else. never sits in the throne if he can help it, nor does he sit on the dais in the council room. when he talks to people shorter than him, he finds himself stooping a little bit to talk to them on their level (the exception to this rule is sokka, who he mocks for being shorter all the way up until sokka grows taller than him, the bastard)

the first time he visits the earth kingdom, the earth king's ministers call a toast. he ends up being the only one who has to sit out, because he's too young to drink by earth kingdom law

once his servants figure out he won't kill them for talking to him, they start becoming a lot more bold, telling him off when he doesn't take care of himself. at one point, they force him to let them take care of him so much that he literally just bolts into the gardens and hides there until the staff rope in mai and ty lee

when he needs to escape, he does one of two things: (a) he dresses up as the blue spirit and does some parkour until he calms down, or (b) he goes to work at the jasmine dragon. (b) happens less often bc the jasmine dragon's in ba sing se, but there's been a few memorable incidents when an earth kingdom diplomat walks in and yells, 'LEE?!' when they see the fire lord

the first court artist who draws him also happens to be the one who drew azulon and ozai. he draws zuko without his scar. zuko takes one look at it and tells him, very calmly, that he'd like him to leave, please.

zuko burns the portrait. he doesn't fire the court artist, but he never calls on him again unless he has to. a second court artist is called, and can't help but be a bit confused when the fire lord tells him to be sure to include the scar

he forgets the crown. a lot. sometimes he walks into council meetings in his sleepwear with his hair tied up in a messy ponytail and a bunch of scrolls tucked under his arm. none of his councilmen have the guts (or the heart) to tell him that this is not, in fact, formal council wear

he goes to feed the turtleducks when he's stressed. he thinks he's being subtle. he's not. the entire palace knows, and they consciously give him space when they see him in the turtleduck garden

most of his staff are older than him, so they look at him and see this teeny tiny fire lord who is So Small and who Must Be Protected. the day after zuko's coronation, the head chef holds a meeting where they commence Operation Do-Not-Let-That-Boy-Turn-Out-Like-His-Father (subsection He's-The-Only-Good-Thing-We-Have)

one night he wakes up to find suki sitting in his room, decked out in full kyoshi warrior garb and makeup, and just about screams blue murder. suki tells him there are suspicions of an assassin in the palace, and would you please stop yelling it's very distracting, we won't be able to hear anyone coming over that racket

zuko gets very, very paranoid of random spirits after that. yeah, suki looks like a possibly malevolent spirit when she's wearing her makeup, what about it? (when he tells sokka he's highkey terrified of spirit shenanigans, sokka just looks at him and says, 'man, the stories i could tell...', and THAT'S when zuko remembers sokka spent like six months more than he did travelling with the avatar)

on his first visit to the southern water tribe, he removes his boots and leg guards, rolls up his pants and kneels barefoot in the snow. even though chief hakoda immediately starts trying to pull him up, he's stubborn as hell and stays kneeling for the entirety of his very long, very sincere apology-on-behalf-of-the-fire-nation speech. he nearly loses his toes to frostbite after that, and both sokka and katara never stop giving him shit for it

the first time he grows a 'beard' is completely accidental. he's stressed over some trade miscommunications with chief hakoda, hasn't slept in a few days...and then when sokka arrives as water tribe ambassador to help smooth things over, he takes one look at zuko and says 'man, facial hair does not suit you'

zuko: facial what now

he checks a mirror to find that he's got stubble covering his chin, dark enough that it almost looks intentional, and holy gods how the fuck did he not notice this before

'UNCLE WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME' 'i assumed you were doing it on purpose' 'WHEN HAVE I EVER DONE ANYTHING ON PURPOSE'

he shaves it all off immediately, of course, which prompts a lot of teasing and rib-poking from sokka until zuko finally snaps that he's scared it'll make him look like his father. sokka stops after that.

(the day after sokka leaves, zuko finds that a mysterious someone has scribbled all over ozai's royal portrait, giving him a frankly ridiculous beard and moustache that literally CANNOT be grown in real life. oddly enough, he can't bring himself to care about the defamation of royal property. he's too busy laughing.)

his paths cross with toph and sokka more than any of the others, because sokka is ambassador and toph is technically still a beifong. most of the time, at formal functions, he ends up sequestered in the corner with toph and a hoard of snacks, and they talk and swear much more than they usually do (zuko's ministers once heard him when he was drunk with toph, and the servants swear the older ministers' ears started bleeding)

he restores fire nation cultural festivals, and in doing so subjects himself to learning a lot of complicated dances

during one memorable week, he wrote so many letters and drafted so much legislation that he ran out of paper. he had to go visit the nearest school and ask for some

he keeps up with his firebending and sword training even though it's hard to fit into his schedule. his ministers refrain from reminding him that he has guards to protect him now; it's still hard for zuko to trust his safety with anyone but himself (team avatar is the exception).

he started sleepwalking about two months into his reign. no one knew why. one time, he nearly sleepwalked right off the edge of a balcony, and one of his guards had to grab him by the back of his robes.

the sleepwalking stopped after around a month and never happened again. at this point it's practically palace legend.

after freeing the war prisoners, he went around collecting every single earthbender-proof wooden cell he could find in the capital and surrounding areas. when he'd gotten most of them, he gathered them into a huge pile in the city square and set fire to them with his own hands.

unfortunately he couldn't do that with the waterbender metal cells but he did get toph to come in and bend them all into pretty shapes (well, toph thought they were pretty shapes. everyone else thinks they're meaningless squiggles)

he learned how to write with both hands at the same time out of sheer necessity (he refused scribes until it became clear that he'd be putting some people out of a job; that was when he started letting scribes write very, very minor things, but all important documents/drafts/letters are still written by him)

he once put the wet end of an ink brush in his mouth instead of the wooden end by mistake. didn't even realise until he bit down to keep it in place and ink went oozing everywhere

when his guards rushed in to find him coughing and spluttering black liquid all over his desk they thought he'd been poisoned but no he's just stupid

on his 17th birthday, his first one after being crowned, he got tackled by team avatar in the middle of the ballroom and ended up at the bottom of a cuddlepile for like ten minutes

this cuddlepile happened at an event that was very much public and very much formal. it was a scandal for weeks

just. fire lord zuko, guys. so much potential

#holy cow this ended up so much longer than i intended #atla #avatar #zuko #firelord zuko #headcanons

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dr3amofagame · 3 years

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haha your snippit abt the dispenser got me thinking.

Dream gets let out of prison and he talks constantly, whatever is on his mind. And he's positive all the time. To a fault where people walk over him. And it doesn't make sense because he was tortured right???? But after an incident they find out it's because he hates the sound of silence and needs constant reminders that other people are there. Also he was punished for any negative emotions in the prison so his default is happy now,,,

hi anon !! this concept makes me SO goddamn sad ,, the idea that he Has to be happy bc anything else would mean punishment im so *punches the walls*

this ,, ficlet is honestly. pretty ooc, not really related to the ask at all, and mostly an excuse for me to cry abt c!dream and c!punz for an excessive amount of time (technically the vote on twitter was supposed to have this as c!sapnap pov, but i just wrote one for him so i went for c!punz instead. mostly bc i wanted to write him LMAO). hopefully someone enjoys it despite *gestures vaguely* all of that mess

tw: trauma, disordered eating, implied torture/abuse, blood, injuries, unhealthy coping mechanisms, emotional distress, thoughts of murder/mercy killing, mentioned animal death, dark content

In the end, it’s all rather anticlimactic, the complete opposite of Dream’s vault and the whole fiasco of adrenaline and theatrics that had made up that day. Quackity ended up having one too many drinks, bragged about the wrong thing to the wrong person - Punz doesn’t know the specifics, only knows that one thing has led to another and suddenly Sapnap was screaming at his ex-fiancé, sword pointed at his chest and tears streaming down his eyes in the middle of the Community House floor, everyone else stood around and watching. A look into Quackity’s office said everything he didn’t - the chests and chests of used and new tools, shiny and sharpened and completely rusted over with blood and everything in between. There’s been a balled up shirt in the wastebasket, completely unsalvageable from how saturated it was with blood, more red than white, and perhaps most chilling of all the calendar, marked with X after X in red pen, going back months and speaking to their utter failure to see what had been happening all but right in front of them.

With Quackity down, Sam caved not too long after, and with his input getting into the prison was no challenge at all. The only thing holding them back were bad memories and the tense, worried edge to Sam’s jaw as he led the small group of them - himself and Sapnap, actually entering the facility, Bad and Puffy waiting outside - carrying them through winding corridor after winding corridor and lava pit after lava pit, until they’d come to stand before a chasm filled with flowing lava, slowly draining before the main cell.

“I- I have to warn you,” Sam had muttered, uncharacteristically hesitant, “it looks…pretty bad,” and Punz would’ve questioned him further, but the lava had fallen far enough to reveal the topmost edge of the cell, so they let Sapnap hound the Warden for information as they directed their full attention on the cell itself and holy shit.

Nothing Sam said could’ve possibly have prepared them for the sight - it was a complete fucking bloodbath, crimson painting the walls and smeared over the floor and splattered over every visible surface like some abstract art experiment gone wrong. The stench of iron and burning flesh and viscera was awful, even over the gap marked by the still-draining lava. Punz strained his eyes; at the very back of the cell, huddled, unmoving, was a similarly bloodstained shape that must’ve been Dream. They remember the crack of Sapnap’s knuckles meeting Sam’s face and breaking his nose, remember themselves chucking a pearl and feeling along Dream’s neck desperately for a pulse - everything beyond that became a swirl of voices and panic and crying that makes their head hurt to think about, so they don’t.

Recovery is…messy. The physical side had been bad enough - pulling Dream out of the cell, barely breathing, limp in his arms and far too light, all Punz could think about was a sheep he’d found a year ago, frail and struggling to breathe, one he’d ended up killing - quick and painless - with a sword through the skull because it seemed kinder than letting it suffer. Watching Dream struggle on the bed, laid up in Bad’s mansion because none of them knew if he’d survive going any further, body resisting the potions they’d slowly forced down his throat after being so over-saturated on them, temperature spiking and heat baking into his skin like the lava from the prison had been imprinted onto his body, Punz feels the same strange mixture of pity and unease, wonders if it’d be a hell of a lot kinder if they just put him out of his fucking misery.

Still, because Dream is a stubborn bastard, against all odds, he ends up surviving - his fever breaks, the potions begin taking effect, and a few tireless, aching days later his eyes flutter open, lucid for the first time in a week. Punz isn’t even in the room when he wakes, only knows that it happens because the too-quiet room suddenly erupts in noise and activity, muffled thumps and sounds of a struggle undercutting Bad’s frantic calls for someone to help, anyone, and they run into the room to find Dream thrashing on the bed, wounds reopened and blood dripping onto the sheets, eyes wild and wide as his head whips from side to side so hard Punz is half-afraid that he’ll straight up break his neck. Somehow, worst of all, not a single scream falls from his lips, nothing but muffled whines squeezing past his mouth, clenched shut, and for a singular, awful second they wonder how long it took before he realized that screaming was useless.

Fortunately enough for them, or unfortunately, it’s not like he can tell the fucking difference anymore, the panic and strain end up with Dream passing out altogether, and they trade uneasy glances with Bad before going to clean off the worst of his wounds. If everything they’re doing feels hopeless, dressing up wounds that’ll be torn open hours later when Dream is awake enough to feel fear but not much else because he’s forgotten what it’s like to not be afraid - well, that’s for them to think and everyone else to pretend not to agree with.

Weeks pass along the same vein - Dream wakes up, panics; they try to calm him down, fails; he falls back into unconsciousness, and they move on and pretend that they’re cleaning up wounds from battle and not from someone that’s literally been tortured for months on end. People stop by, occasionally; Puffy spends more time than not inside the mansion, but hardly ever enters the door into Dream’s room, Sapnap and George drop by occasionally with potion brewing supplies that the rest of them can’t go out to get; once, he’d gone out to the front door to find a chest with an enchanted golden apple, sender nowhere in sight. He knows that the server is busy; Quackity’s admission had brought more than a few secrets to light, and from what they understand, the political fallout has been pretty damn messy. Still, he stays in the mansion, and watches.

He doesn’t exactly know why he stays. They’re not a stellar healer, not beyond what they know to dress their own wounds, and spend most of their time doing odd-and-ends tasks for Bad, who looks more tired than ever. Maybe it’s because he’s seen Dream at his worst more than the rest of them, had been there through his entire fall from grace, watched as his eyes became clouded with anger and madness and a single, desperate hope that he’d chased at the cost of his world and himself. Maybe it’s because they have no ties to the rest of the server - not to Las Nevadas, falling apart under the scrutiny of the eyes that now fall upon it, not Snowchester, caught up in the chaos, not the Badlands, half-dissolved after the fiasco of the Egg and with Sam’s actions having just come to light. Maybe it’s because above everything else, he feels guilty.

They’d thought the prison was the answer. It’d seemed too simple, back in that Vault - a perfect answer, because everyone else was perfectly happy to watch Dream die another time and some part of them had clenched painfully at the thought even thought they knew it was for the best. The prison meant that he’d be alive, if angry, and at some point when he had the time or the nerve or the guts he could go and visit, and they would talk, and Dream would be angry but with time maybe he could even understand.

They hadn’t wanted this. He can’t imagine anyone wanting this.

“Punz?” They don’t jump at the voice at their back, they don’t, but Bad still has a tiny, tight-lipped smile when they turn around anyway, eyes creased in the corners and still not as bright as they’d been before the Egg. Bad looks at him knowingly, setting a bowl of soup into his hands. “For Dream, if you can get him to eat.” He shifts a pointed gaze towards the door. “Maybe you two could talk.”

“About what?” The words come out harsher than they intend, and they take a moment to bite back the mostly self-directed anger that Bad doesn’t deserve to receive the brunt of. “I just-” he waves his hand in the air, trying to articulate the mess that is his relationship with Dream without the words to explain it. “I don’t know, man.”

“You don’t have to talk about everything,” Bad says, calm as always, eyes flicking down to the bowl of soup in his hands. “Just start with the soup.”

Punz sighs. “I’ll try.”

He enters the room in a single, fluid motion, mostly because he knows that if he were to stop at the door then he’d never actually make his way in. Dream flinches back when they enter, eyes going wide and stance going rigid, and the familiarity doesn’t make the sight any easier to bear as they wait, as always, for Dream’s eyes to clear enough for him to realize he’s in the mansion and not stuck in that same obsidian hellhole.

“I brought soup,” they say, finally, when Dream looks up. Dream’s lips twitch up in what he probably means as a smile; between the still-healing gashes on his face and the fear that flashes over his expression, still, it comes out as more of a grimace.

“Thanks.” Dream looks away. “I’ll eat it later.”

Liar, Punz thinks tiredly, moving closer to set the bowl down on the nightstand by the bed. They frown as Dream’s expression goes slack and distanced, again, eyes fixed to stare blankly at the wall once again.

“You should have some now,” he tries, careful to keep his words even. “You need the calories.”

“I’m good,” Dream says, automatic, just shy of sincere. “Thank you.”

“Dream,” they don’t quite succeed at keeping a displeased sigh from falling from their lungs, and bite back a curse at themselves when Dream pulls back with a silent flinch. It’s so goddamn hard, to talk to this version of Dream, both of them feeling around the edges of their relationship like walking on goddamn eggshells. A few months ago, he would’ve straight up called Dream out on his bullshit, get it through his thick skull that the whole ‘I’m fine and don’t need anyone’ act was stupid and completely failing to convince him. Here, they bite back another sigh, look forlornly at the bowl of the soup on the nightstand, sure to go uneaten once again, and force themselves to sound completely neutral when they speak again. “Alright. You’ll have to eat at some point, though.”

“Mmhm,” Dream hums noncommittally, once again staring at the wall. Punz stares at his hands. This is so fucking pointless.

“So,” they say after a few seconds, Bad’s words echoing in their head - they can try to make an effort to talk, sure. It’s just that Dream’s not going to cooperate. “How are you, man?”

The words come out stilted, awkward. He looks up to watch Dream’s expression, as the other man begins to gnaw on the inside of his cheek.

“I’m good,” he says, words deliberately light. “You?”

“Dream…”

“I’m fine.” Dream’s voice sharpens suddenly, breath hitching, before he shakes his head and turns his head away. “I’m fine.”

Punz looks at him incredulously. “Are you serious? Do we need to get into exactly how not-fine you are?” They wave a hand in his direction, jaw clenching when he rears back. “Do ‘fine’ people lose their minds from someone waving at them, now?”

“I-” For a second, Dream glares at him, eyes burning with a familiar, irritated fire that Punz knows all-too-well from having it directed at him a few too many times, before it suddenly dies and Dream is swinging his head back to the bedsheets, hands tightening on the cloth as he stammers. “I- What do you want?”

Punz breathes a soft sigh, regret blooming in the center of their chest. “Sorry,” he mumbles, careful to keep their gestures overly-telegraphed and away from the other man’s face. “I’m just- you’re not okay, man. No one’s expecting you to be okay after...all of that.”

“But why?”

Dream’s voice is small, nearly a sob, and Punz directs wide, alarmed eyes to where he’s hunched in over himself, knees pulled to his chest, hands staring at the sheets pulled over them. “Why?” he says, again, quieter, lip trembling slightly.

“Because you were tortured,” Punz begins, words slow as they watch Dream’s expression, trying to pull out the thoughts behind his averted eyes, “Because the cell was inhumane, and nobody deserves to be treated like that. Because you were hurt very, very badly because of what we did, and none of us are expecting you to be fine right after going through months of trauma.” He pauses. “You know that, right?”

“But I’m out,” Dream says, quiet, disbelieving, instead of answering their question. “I’m out of there. It’s over. It’s- everything’s good,” he whispers, more to himself than to them, hands curling into fists and then uncurling. “I’m- they said I would never get out. And I’m outside, and it’s not- not the cell, and I get real food, and Quackity doesn’t visit anymore,” he shakes his head, eyes squeezing shut as his breath catches in his throat. “I’m happy- I should be happy. Right?”

“Oh Dream,” the other man flinches back, breath quickening, and Punz’s hand stops short from where he’d almost let it fall onto the other’s shoulder. “You don’t have to be happy, man. Not- not after all of that. Not if you’re not ready yet.” Dream’s eyes, wide and wet, rise to look at their own, and they feel more than hear the soft, wounded noise that leaves their lips. “It’s ok to be hurt. It’s ok to be scared. No one’s blaming you, alright? No one’s gonna hurt you anymore.”

This, more than anything, seems to be the breaking point, because Dream collapses forward, hands flying up to pull at his tangled hair before Punz manages to ease them away and into his own hands, watching as he grips onto them until his knuckles go white. His breathing shudders, quiet, even his sobs muffled as to make as little noise as possible, and they murmur meaningless croons and hums as he cries into their chest.

“I wanna- I wanna be okay,” he hiccups, and Punz smooths his hair back behind their hand.

“I know,” he swallows around the lump that has risen in his own throat. “I’m sorry.”

#tw trauma #tw disordered eating #tw torture #tw abuse #tw blood #tw injuries #tw unhealthy coping mechanism #tw emotional distress #tw murder #tw animal death #tw dark content #tw unhealthy eating habits #-> my writing #my writing :D #my asks !!#-> my asks

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