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bakerstreethound · 2 years

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I’ll Take Care of You

Kinktober: Cockwarming

Relationship: Strawberry!Sherlock Holmes x fem!reader

Warnings: 18+ SMUT, cockwarming, soft sherlock, gentle praises, tooth rotting fluff involved (lots more than smut probs)

Summary: You grow desperate for Sherlock’s presence and when he’s not in bed with you the early hours of the morning you start to worry, but when you wake the second time, you are pleased to find him safe and sound in your arms. You then decide to take matters into your own hands and show/tell him how much he means to you.

All writings belong to me @bakerstreethound (Do NOT claim, repost, copy or translate my works to other sites. I only publish here and on A03 under the same username)

Word Count: 1.2k

A/N: Going forward I am making these prompts a mix of fluff/kinktober, but they will still be rated 18+ due to the nature of the kinks. I hope you guys enjoy some soft Sherlock. He is addicting in so many ways. Please keep in mind that Strawberry!Sherlock encompasses the gentler side of Sherlock no one sees except for those special few close to him. As always, I do my best to remain in character as to maintain the integrity of Benedict’s Sherlock. This wasn’t beta read so there may be errors.

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“Sherlock…” You murmur sleepily, reaching out for him and his warmth, only to be met with cold emptiness. You sigh in exasperation, wiggling out of the cocoon of warmth so carefully crafted hours before. The clock blared at you, its face reading 1 am. Your stomach flopped, turning into knots.

Where was Sherlock?

You were used to this but surely, he would be back at a reasonable hour, ruffling his fingers through your hair, before pulling you in for a kiss and promptly burying his face in your neck, wrapping around you to cling until you drift. A yawn overtakes you and you ignore your twinging heart, clinging back to your body pillow once more, which offers you some solace. You still crave for his touch, to wrap him in your arms, to bury your face in his hair, savoring his scent and his warmth. These thoughts guide your eyes to droop, falling back into the familiar rhythm of sleep.

Your arms reach out again, and the soft material of your body pillow is now solid, more real as you nuzzle against it, inhaling sharply, warmth spreading through your body making you tingle. He was back, safe in your arms. Even in your sleepy stupor, you can’t help but smile, ruffling his curls with your free hand, the other still wrapped around his waist. You sigh in relief, groaning softly against his ear kissing along his neck. He squirms against you a bit, mumbling incoherently, something about Anderson no doubt.

Then you pull him closer, stroking his sides, loving the way he responds to you, the way he leans into the palm of your hand, nuzzling it in the way he does his muscle memory finely tuned to your touch. You savor this, this gift he gives you of seeing him at peace utterly vulnerable and content with the world. With you near he can sleep, feeling more refreshed than he had in weeks prior. Your hands run lower, and you gently kiss his neck, leaving a few marks as you do so and he gasps, his eyes fluttering open, adjusting to the soft lighting of the rising sun. He grumbles huffing, reorienting himself to the closer position, to you doting all over him before bringing him in for a gentle kiss, the brush of your lips against his tempting, drawing him further under your spell.

“Wha-What are you doing?” His cheek quivers as if in challenge, but partly in confusion as he puts two and two together.

“I’ve missed you and want to make it up to you, show you how much I adore you, my boy.”

He swallows, eyes widening with each word you speak, his grip on your waist tighter.

“I don’t have work tomorrow, either it’s okay I promise. I want to reward my hardworking boy. Is that too much to ask?”

When his lips part, exhaling shakily and he kisses you with fervor and underlying desperation, you know, oh you know he’s given in, ready to accept anything you freely offer him. For you already gave your body and mind to him, things he never considered precious before, but that was before you and John entered his life. Now, he can’t comprehend life without either of you in it.

Softly, you tug of his shirt, admiring his alabaster skin in the light highlighting his beautiful chest, those gorgeous cheekbones you’d willingly cut your fingers on any way, illuminated perfectly in the shadows contrasting against the lighting in the room. He looks close to a greek god in the moment, his curls ruffled, falling against his brow, bedding tangled, all in disarray.

Fuck he looked so irresistible so ready for you.

His hand cups your face as you trail your index finger along his jaw, enjoying feeling of the blossoming stubble as your thumb brushes along his lips. A wet droplet falls from your eye no matter how hard you try to stop it. “I’m so lucky to have you, to call you mine.”

His lips find yours with practiced ease, bringing you in for a kiss and you taste a thousand memories, particularly the time where he first kisses you in the rain, so elated and overcome with the outcome of a particularly baffling case. You’d held the umbrella, fumbling it like a fool when he bent down to kiss you, enveloping you in the Belstaff to keep you safe and warm. You thought it was a joke at first, another in his never-ending line of experiments, but when he pulled away from your lips gasping softly, a tint of pink flushed on his cheeks, you knew that couldn’t be the case.

“Please…” his voice anchors you back to the present and your fingers tangle in his hair tugging his neck back, exposing the soft hollow flesh of his neck, which your lips attach with fervor. You dare to grind against him searching for the friction you had long denied yourself, unwilling to admit the sight of him this way does unspeakable things to your body, making you want to claim him over just to feel him inside you making you whole again.

So, your fingers tug his curls harder, eliciting more gasps and whimpers from his pretty face at both touches from you. With his head thrown back further, your lips kiss and suck, navigating the soft spots on his neck, nipping before gently kissing over the marks properly.

A soft whimper falls from his lips once more as you stroke his straining length. “Will you let me warm it for you, Sherlock? Think of it as other experiment. You can do that for me, right? I want to feel you again, it’s been too long.”

“Yes,” The broken answer falls as you finish tugging off his sweatpants and underwear, stroking him, making him desperate for more, his hips desperately thrusting into your hand.

“It’s okay I’ve got you, that’s right.” You continue with your ministrations, already growing wet at the sight of him. When you finally settle down on him savoring the stretch quenching your ache, he’s panting slightly, eyes glimmering and blown wide in awe blown wide in awe and ecstasy, glancing at where your bodies are joined. His already fucked out look awakens something feral in you, yet you rein it in, wrapping your arms around his neck still straddling and laying on top of him, savoring how he fills you up in all the right places.

“You feel so good, Sherlock.”

“S-so do you, hell,” he swears, drawing in a shallow breath, tempted beyond all measure to move and feel you make you fall apart for him. “C-can I?”

You stroke his cheek lovingly, pressing a kiss there. “Not yet my boy, perhaps in a couple of hours, but for now, I want to hold you and feel you.”

He nods, running a hand through his curls as he sighs in defeat, carefully maneuvering the both of you so you are on your sides spooning each other, gazing into each other's eyes. You pull him in for another slow passionate kiss, eager for the impending hours and oh, what a time that will be.

******

@bakerstreethound @disneymarina @groovy-lady @viper-official @lilythemadqueen @sherlockfanficwriting @frostandflamesfanfic @feral-for-strange

Sherlock tags: @coping-via-clint-eastwood @andreasworlsboring101 @ilovefanfictions @clussysposts @ravencatart @starks-hero @alienoresimagines @aephereal @turkisherlockian @evelynrosestuff�� @french-vanilla-in-the-clouds @classickook @sherlocksgirl91 @battledress @azu21 @sylvieofasgard @strangelockd

#Sherlock Holmes #sherlock x reader #sherlock holmes x reader #strawberry!sherlock #strawberry sherlock #sherlock holmes x you #sherlock holmes imagine #bbc sherlock imagine #sherlock fanfic #bbc sherlock #benedict cumberbatch #sherlock tv #sub sherlock

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ilovemybooks · 1 month

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Different dimension? Part 2

Ridoc Gamlyn x reader

Warnings: ⚠️ cursing, how to train your dragon, fourth wing characters/dragons.

....

Hether's POV

As soon as I am past the gate all hell breaks loose cadets running in different direction and dragons killing those who get to close. I look to my left and give my brother one final nod befor running torwds the pull that I feel in the pit of my stomach, and then I hear something no someone multiply someone's " we have got to kill the generals kids they will be favorites with every person they meat because of that emotionless excuse of a mother." I know the first voice without looking Dagger or Dagger the fucking deranged as we all call him. Well so much for just finding a dragon now I have to find Dillen too, so with that I run to the one place I know Dillen would go straight to. The monstrous nightmares a stoker class dragon with substantial speed and strong capibul of setting itself on fire 'this boy really is a Pyromaniack.' As I arrive I can see there's only a good five people here and one just got to close make that four, I just have to tell Dillen to wach his back and then I am on my way I continue to walk and to my surprise none of the nightmares roast me and to my relief I find dillen esaly. "Dillen! Wach your back Dagger is on a hunt for us." I wisper yell at him from behind a rock that I hide behind. "Hether were are you? I can go with you so nether of us is alone when they attack!" "No find your dragon and get to the sky I just came to warn you." With that I leave and the pull is so much stronger that I am practically forced into a run but were am I going?

Ridoc's POV

"Why are we going straight up !?!" I mentally yell at Aotrom. "Oh calm down up there this is how we get to a there dimension." He says it like the most obvious thing in the world. "It is the most obvious thing in the world. Why else would we be going straight up?" " Well no need to be rude." Aotrom cuffes and doesn't respond. We continue up and up and up for a good forty minutes and then after about 10 minutes of flying straight torwds a mountain side Aotrom tells me to get low and hold on tight. After another 5 minutes Aotrom says I can straighten up again I look to my left and see Violet, Rhiannon, and Xaden doing the same and on my right with Garrick and Liam. "Look ahead we are in enemy territory." Aotrom says with a hint of worry in his voice. "What kind of enemy?" I ask and he doesn't respond. 'Well this will be fun.' I think with to myself. Time to meet my dragons mate and her rider. I wonder what her rider looks like?

Hether's POV

The more I run the more I can feel the pull getting stronger so I decided to take a page from Violets book and clime a nearby tree for a better view, and am I glad that I did. In the valley ahead of my is dillen fighting off 5 others probably some of daggers friends 'lovely' I think and clime down to go help my idiot brother live to tomorrow. "Dillen!" I yell once I am close enough for him to here and they all stop fighting to look at me and they split of 3 on Dillen and 2 on me "we have orders to kill you." The one on the left says with a sneer and the one on the right just chuckles and draws his sword as I draw my axe. That charge at the same time and seem to have their moves coordinated 'interesting' I think as one swings for my torso and the other my neck. I can imedently tell which one is the better fighter and of course its the one on the right that dose not use words to try and intimidat ther opponent as the one on the left draws his sword to strike wing beets sound behind me and I don't spare them a glance now is my time to attack and seems Dillen has the same idea we both charge at the same time and there's more wing betts how many are there? "I will take the three on the left you go right." I says to Dillen and he nods the first one is a boy I took my second dagger from in challenges our first week he was not happy about it and tried to kill me after with some of his friends but ended up with a broken arm and his friends left before they could get to hurt. The second is one I have never seen before and the same with the third but they souldent be that hard to beat right? As the first charges I slide under his sword cutting into his calf and taking his knees out from under him shaping his neck once I gain my feet the other two charge at the same time and I pull a small knife from my leg holster driving it into his shoulder as I duck under the seconds sword kicking his side with enough force to send him sowring across the opening we are in. I look to see if Dillen needs help before killing the one that is two feet in front of my with a knife in his shoulder the same way I did to the first but when I look up the third is nowhere to be seen. "Fucking cowered" I say as I go to see if Dillen is alright but before I can I feel eys on my multipul eys as a matter of fact I turn to see dragons but not dragons from here there from Basgiath. And they have riders two but there's also two dragons from or dimension a Razor wip and a Monsteres nightmare. "Hello dreary my name is Windsher daughter of Corinth and Darius." A female voice sounds in my head and the Razor wip looks straight at me? Dillen is sprinting towards the monstrous nightmares for leg and I do the same to the leg of Windsher. As soon as we are mounted we are In the air flying throw loops and dives turns and climes before we report to the roll keeper. Once we land on the flight field I see the same dragons and riders from the valley. 'I wonder what they are doing here?' "They are here because of my mate Aotrom he and his rider Ridoc." Windsher says and I can feel the happiness through the mental bond. 'Interesting'

Ridoc's POV

"We have made it through enemy territory without detection" Aotrom says after another 30 minute flight. "Good I was getting anxious." Aotrom cuffes in amusement. Once we clear the cloud cover I notice that threshing is still going on here and the is not one dragon on the flight field. 'Weird' I think to myself. But as I look to the left I see the courtyard 'there's all the people.' I think "yes but we are going over here" Aotrom says as he moves his head toward a line of trees and I can see someone's silhouette with a long flowing braid in one of the trees. "god's be dammed its another Violet!" I say to Liam and Xaden who hafe moved at some point durring our flight here causing them to laugh and earning me a death glare from Violet. But of course the humor is short lived as we see the person jumping out of the tree and sprinting to the valley in front of her. "Where is she going in such a hurry?" Aotrom cuffes along with Tairn Deigh, Chradh, Feirge, and Sgaeyl. "There's a problem in the valley ahead of us." Aotrom says but two dragons are watching from the mountain side and I can see they are both just as big if not bigger than Tairn. But then again all of our dragons seemed to get bigger the longer we are here. We land on the right of the valley and I see the same flowing black braid bit know I can see who it belongs to. But she is with a boy around a year or so younger than me, " I will take the tree on the left you go right!" And they are off both have amazing fighting skills and she has such speed, stragth and is so graceful too. But the dragons on the side of the mountain are know beside us watching like they are the judges of a trial. With they probably are not going to lie, the girl kills two of her opponents befor the there'd runs like a fucking cowerd. But the boy killed both of his opponents with no problem, the two turn to look at us and seem confused with our presence but before they can ask the dragons from the mountain both seem to have there full attention the boy is first to start sprinting towards the red one then the girl towards the silver one. "Are we going to see your mate or just wach threshing?" I ask Aotrom "you just did the silver razorwip is her." Aotrom says seems that I have some learning to do befor I meat them both.

#ridoc gamlyn x reader #garrick tavis x reader #liam mairi x reader #xaden riorson x reader #fourth wing fanfic

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deadtired-highkeyenergetic · 1 month

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I'll Be There

I thought I'd try my hand at writing my own OC in an attempt to grasp his character better. So far he's been trying to resist the urge to kill everything on sight but sometimes, especially when he's in stealth mode, he really wonders what would happen if he shot someone. And since he secretly craves physical contact he just wanted to hold hands with Gale but Gale took it the wrong way.

Summary: Astarion and Hayate (my male ranger fire dragonborn durge oc) learn to open up to each other.

Deep breath in, draw the bowstring back, hold it steady. Eye on the target, slowly exhale. Release.

His arrow finds its mark again, piercing through the gullet of the paladin leader and his cloak turns him invisible, its familiar tendrils coiling around him. His footsteps are soft and quick, gliding over the dirt with practised ease as he positions himself in the perfect spot. He lifts the longbow once more, battle calm washing over him and slots an arrow through another paladin’s gullet.

Without batting an eye at the blood that colours the ground crimson, he changes position once more. He doesn’t need to think anymore when hunting his prey, every movement has become muscle memory, ingrained in him for a reason that is out of his reach. He hates the haze that clouds his memories, hates the black that blots out the moments he tears into innocents, hates the euphoria that bubbles within his chest when blood spills all over a shocked face, but something about the thought of choosing who and what to slaughter sends thrills up his spine.

So he chases the feeling, hoping it will bring him closer to uncovering his memories despite the bile rising in his throat each time he looks at his bloodstained hands. How much blood has he spilled? How many innocents has he torn apart with his claws? How deep is the blood he is swimming in?

More importantly, what other vile acts has he committed?

The creature that claims to be his butler has dropped hints that he has committed the vilest of acts, but for what reason the butler refuses to elaborate. Something about being unable to interfere with his business or something, leaving him with an unscratchable itch in his mind.

“Hayate.” A quiet whisper snaps him out of his thoughts before they can drown him. Astarion. Of course the vampire would know where he was, invisibility couldn’t hide the smell of his blood. The vampire spawn shoots him a look of what seems like concern but he can’t quite place an emotion on the look before the vampire sneaks off to kill the trader before she can escape.

With a shake of his head, he pushes the thoughts out of his mind. A familiar yet unfamiliar voice echoes in his head, warning him against being distracted during a fight before disappearing just as quickly as it had appeared. Yet another mystery to solve, he thinks as he surveys the battlefield. A small part of him wants the memories to never be recovered, amnesia has been a good excuse for the atrocities he’s committed so far and something within him quivers in fear thinking about the need to take responsibility for all his actions.

Looking at his companions, he wonders if they will accept him for who he is when they find his missing memories with him. He watches from the sidelines as Gale heaves a sigh of relief once the battle ends as no one has died this time, Astarion rummages through the dead bodies for loot and Shadowheart scouts the area for any potential threats they might have missed.

“Are you alright Hayate? You seem out of sorts,” Gale taps him on the shoulder, startling the dragonborn who bares his teeth out of instinct. The wizard raises his hands in surrender and takes a step back, apologising.

“It’s alright, I’m the one who should be sorry for startling you,” Hayate shakes his head. “I’m feeling fine, how are you?”

“I’m quite alright, although I am concerned about you. I saw you space out in the middle of a fight,” Gale rightly points out, brown eyes searching the dragonborn’s heterochromatic gaze for hints of what is going on in his head.

“It’s nothing,” Hayate frowns, eyes narrowing. “We ought to sort through the loot before Astarion makes off with another enchanted dagger without any of us knowing again.”

The dragonborn forces a smile, hoping it will reassure the wizard and breathes out a small sigh of relief when said wizard nods and heads towards the bodies just as Astarion sneaks something into his pocket. A small squabble ensues but Hayate pays it no mind, he knows the two will sort it out by themselves with little to no bloodshed. If anything, it provides a spot of entertainment after the exhausting fight.

“Something is bothering you.” A female voice sounds from behind him. Hayate stops himself before he can let out a groan of annoyance and smiles through his teeth at Shadowheart.

“It’s nothing to worry about.” He really doesn’t feel like talking about his dark thoughts, it isn’t a pleasant topic in the first place and the urges already circle in his mind all the time, he doesn’t need them brought to the surface. Needing to talk about the tadpole wriggling in his brain is already exhausting enough, he would rather not add on to the number of issues he has shared about.

Shadowheart frowns at him but doesn’t press the matter further. She knows what it’s like to not want to share personal matters and it’s not her place to dig further. Astarion on the other hand, may be the only one who can reach the dragonborn. The two had become quite close ever since Astarion had revealed himself to be a vampire spawn, with Hayate going as far as to offer his blood every night to keep the vampire satiated and happy.

Then again Shadowheart wasn’t that surprised by how quickly they had bonded. Both enjoyed some bloodshed here and there, took delight in putting a surprise arrow through their enemies’ necks and had a knack for pickpocketing.

She makes her way towards the vampire and gestures at Hayate. Astarion raises an eyebrow at her, “so it’s my job now to poke my nose into our darling leader’s business?”

“You’re the one he talks the most to.”

“Have you ever considered it’s because I don’t glare at him all the time?” Astarion huffs dramatically but a flash of concern flickers across his eyes when he looks at the dragonborn standing off to the side, deep in thought.

Shadowheart rolls her eyes, “if you don’t talk to him I’ll tell Gale you stole the magical item Hayate was going to feed to him.”

“Excuse me darling, you’re the one who stole it in the first place. I was going to kindly give it to Gale like the gentleman I am but you took it before I could do anything!”

“As if. Now go and talk some sense into your dearest dragonborn,” Shadowheart gives the vampire a shove in Hayate’s direction, ignoring the little threats spewed as he stumbles forward. Astarion scowls at her but does as she says, only because if their leader was out of sorts the party wouldn’t quite hold itself together, and that wasn’t favourable for himself.

Yes, that’s the only reason why he was going out of his way to do this.

“Hello darling, I can’t help but notice you seem a little down,” Astarion purrs. “Perhaps I could do something about it?”

He leans in close, the smoky scent of the fire dragonborn filling his nose and prepares himself to feverishly slot his lips against the drgaonborn’s but Hayate pulls away with a hiss, heterochromatic eyes glowering with fury.

“Quit it!” Hayate snarls with such ferocity that Astarion instinctively flinches, quickly hopping back to put distance between him and Hayate. The dragonborn’s keen eyes don’t miss the flash of fear in the vampire’s ruby eyes and immediately his heart plummets.

“Sorry. I shouldn’t have snapped at you.” Hayate looks down at his feet, toe claws digging into the dirt. Yet another thing to add to his already long list of disgusting qualities.

Astarion lets out a hollow laugh, a practiced smile plastered on his face, “don’t you worry darling. Your teeth are just a little too sharp for my tastes, but it’s something I can work around.”

Hayate shakes his head, “just…leave me alone for a bit alright, Astarion? I promise you can still feed on me later tonight.”

“Then I’ll see you later in camp, darling. Don’t keep me waiting for too long.” Astarion winks, turning around to head back to the others.

Hayate lets out a breath he didn’t realise he was holding and sighs. Why did he always drive away those he wanted by his side? Had he never been taught to let others into his life? One more mystery to solve on top of the mountain of other mysteries he already had. At this point, Hayate was sure said mountain dwarfed him, and he was by no means a small dragonborn male.

“Let’s make camp and rest up,” he says once he’s gathered his thoughts enough to form a sentence that wouldn’t provoke anyone. The others nod, and go their separate ways to pitch their tents. Hayate can barely force himself to put together a shabby tent before collapsing onto his bedroll with a groan. His head throbs, his hands feel sticky and his throat feels dry. Should he tell Astarion he’s not feeling well tonight and apologise for being unable to make good on his promise?

His tent flap ruffles and said vampire peeks in, inviting himself into the tent when he sees the dragonborn lying on a bedroll with an arm draped over his face.

“There’s something you’re not telling me, darling.”

Hayate blearily rolls onto his side, facing away from Astarion who makes himself comfortable on the unoccupied side of the bedroll.

“Drop the matter already,” Hayate groans. Astarion neatly arranges the various items strewn about on the tent floor and carefully picks his way over to the dragonborn.

“I distinctly recall someone telling me that it’s not good to bottle one’s feelings up, especially the negative ones.”

“Screw off.”

“Well, that was a tad bit more polite than I expected.” Astarion lies down next to him, looking up at the ceiling of the tent. “I was waiting for you to start cussing me out.”

“Would you rather I do that?”

“Not really, but if it makes you feel better be my guest.”

In all honesty, Astarion has no idea what he’s doing. He’s just running through the motions he remembers Hayate doing when he felt trapped in his own mind, disgusted at his body, but if it worked for him it might just work for Hayate. The lack of a response from the dragonborn is a start, he decides, and sneaks a glance to make sure his lover is still there. He reaches over, gently tracing along the warm scales that line his lover’s bare arm from the elbow all the way to the clawtips, cautiously pressing his cold palm against Hayate’s warm scaly palm.

“If you don’t want to talk about it, we could always just lie like this,” he murmurs. “I don’t mind.”

Something sparks in Hayate’s eyes. Confusion, surprise then recognition. He intertwines his clawed fingers with Astarion’s long slender ones, giving Astarion’s hand a gentle squeeze. “I distinctly recall someone saying the exact same thing some time back.”

Astarion can’t help but smile when he sees the corners of Hayate’s lips quirk upwards but refrains from stealing any kisses, lest he crosses any boundaries. If Hayate wanted a kiss, he would have to initiate it, not Astarion.

Maybe it’s because of the quiet bliss that the night brings but for whatever reason, Hayate’s walls just come crumbling down at Astarion’s words. He lets out a heavy sigh, turning around to face the vampire, “are you sure you want to know?”

The resolute look in the vampire’s eyes tells Hayate everything he needs to know and his grip on the cold hand tightens.

“Would you still love me if I was the vilest creature in all of Faerun?”

“Come now, darling. How could you possibly be the vilest creature in all of Faerun? You wouldn’t have been able to recruit the do-gooder hero Wyll Ravengard if that was the case,” Astarion chuckles but quickly stops when he sees how serious Hayate is being.

“What makes you say that about yourself, darling?” He asks quietly, gently cupping Hayate’s cheek.

“I have…these urges…that call me to slaughter innocents, bathe in their blood, drink their misery.”

“I know, darling. You’ve told me this before and yet I still chose you.”

“No, it’s not just that.” Hayate growls, frustrated. “What you don’t know is that a part of me enjoys doing those, craves it even, and it scares me. I’m scared that I’m so messed up to the point where I’m beyond saving, and I don’t want to burden you with this, not when you’re already dealing with your own problems.”

“Darling, you could never burden me.” Astarion curses the lull of the peaceful night that softens him. The line between performance and genuineness blurs under the soft crackling of the campfire outside as he dances dangerously close to the edge, and falls right off as he stares into the sad heterochromatic eyes of the fire dragonborn. He plummets, but Hayate catches him, cushioning the fall.

Hayate dances his own dance as he loses himself in the dark ruby eyes of the vampire spawn. He doesn’t know if this night is just another performance, perfected by centuries of practise but he dives right in, trusting that Astarion will catch him as he falls.

“When we find out how much blood I’m swimming in, will you still be there by my side?” Hayate breathes out. His heart thunders, afraid of the two letter word that may fall from the vampire’s lips and squeezes his eyes shut, steeling himself for the worst but Astarion’s next words catch him off guard.

“Of course.”

Hayate cracks an eye open, checking that none of this was an illusion conjured by his deranged mind. The chill of the hand clasping his and the glint of the firelight outside reflected off the ruby irises looking at him with such softness are far too real to be an illusion. A dream perhaps but if all this is a dream, he doesn’t want it to end. Ever.

“Astarion…” His voice trails off. “I…”

A ‘thank you’ is all he can manage tonight, but it’s more than enough for Astarion who remains by his side for the remainder of the night, the promise of a meal long forgotten. Hayate lets the undead chill from the body of the vampire wash over him and warm his heart, burning away all his doubts for the night as sleep comes to claim his exhausted self. He swears he hears a soft whisper, a promise that the one he has bared his heart to will be there when he wakes but it just as well could be a trick conjured by his tired mind. Still though, Hayate holds onto the promise as he drifts off, for with it comes the prospect of a brighter future, a future where he no longer needs to feel alone.

#baldur's gate 3 #bg3 #astarion bg3 #astarion x durge #baldurs gate astarion #durgestarion #bg3 durge #durge oc #astarion x oc

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lovecolibri · 1 year

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SaL anon here friend, thinking about how not only (as pointed out) that this season of OG is mediocre but LS has also been pretty Meh and remarkably for similar reasons. So because I have too much time on my hands today and too little willpower to be productive, here I give you my vaguely thought out character parallels between the two shows this season, and how they've made the season frustrating.

Eddie and Nancy: Both of these characters have had no plot or arc all season. Basically they're moral support and comedic relief.

Maddie and TK: Both have had a sort of half plot to themselves but ultimately are there to be supportive, be sad when their loved ones are in danger, and generally remind us Madney and Tarlos exist.

Bobby and Mateo: Both had exactly one plotline to themselves, both those plots came out of nowhere, and both were centered around another character that was mentioned maybe once before.

Athena and Paul: Both had a single plot centered on their past that was actually interesting and believably important for the character (though in LS at least it didn't require its own episode away from the group). The problem was that there was little to no follow up or any sense of closure, we're just kinds left to assume some sort of conversation happened.

Chim and Tommy: Both have been fairly visible this season (definitely Tommy more so than Chim except for the last few OG episodes) and had some pretty good best friend moments. But both had had incredibly frustrating plots that just didn't make sense or serve a purpose (Chim forgiving his parents and Tommy - a Mom - trying to one up an actual child).

Hen+Karen and Judd+Grace: Both were strong points for the their shows season (I'm firmly of the belief Tomorrow was the best episode of either show this season). Only a relatively minor complaint for both, namely the WTF did this come from of the Denny plot and that Grace's recent storyline has the 5th crime investigation on what's supposed to be a weewoo show.

The 911 Guest Cast and Owen: Basically these always seem to drag the show out of the firehouse and into some bullshit no one asked for. The exception is Ravi, who is the equivalent of Owen when the focus is on him being a captain to his team.

Buck and Carlos: Frankly both their plotlines have been a mess (though Buck has twice as many as Carlos), didn't go anywhere, and are full of missed opportunities for character development, especially in the realm of having an honest conversation with their parents.

If you've been keeping score I have left out of the list Marjan. This is because between the shows I feel like Marjan's character has been handled the best, even almost perfectly. We got backstory, character building, and even a cute dating plot.

Anyway hope you enjoy my afternoon musings!! This is also in part me trying to pretend this season is over (for OG at least) and I can draw these parallels instead of facing the fact we have 2 more episodes to slog through.

Bestie, were is the lie????

This is so spot on though and I laughed so hard when I read this! I've been...not necessarily avoiding but certainly not reading any LS spec because I'm just to tired to do that and OG but whooo boy am I side eying some of the stuff I've seen floating around. LS pulling the old RNM line of Tarlos having to "earn" their wedding like 🙄🙄🙄 Plus there was something about "tragedy" striking and WHY would they need more new drama when they had a whole unexpected WIFE that got sort of brushed off and the resolution for that happened off screen, and Carlos DIED and then it was just like, never mentioned again, and TK is going into his wedding without his mom. There's already so much there, why on earth would they need to invent something else?!

And don't get me started on OG doing the same thing but also packing the guest cast with a thousand people to wrap up Buck's 700 arcs he's got started that they just did nothing with until the last couple episodes apparently. I am...so tired.

Agreed though that the Marjan stuff has been good this season when she had stuff going on! I honestly don't know WHO was in charge of OG seasons 1-3 and the arc planning and pacing because Timmy is over on LS and it's having the same messy issues as OG in that regard when OG had like, the PERFECT formula those first few seasons. What was going on over there?! And more importantly, how do we get it BACK?!

#my sweet nonnie friends #sleeping at last anon #911 #911 spoilers #911 lone star #lone star spoilers #this honestly made me laugh out loud reading it #no lies detected

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mistycreeper · 1 year

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i think i misunderstood your message and sent my matchup request to the wrong blog 🧍 so here it is again!

may i get a romantic overwatch matchup please? any gender is fine, but i prefer characters 25+

im 5'3 and nonbinary

I'm very shy and reserved at first but once i open up im very friendly and warm and a huge dork. im creative and i like to make things for people, whether its sewing or crocheting or drawing etc.

im easily flustered by anything flirty. im a good listener and i value communication greatly. i cry easily bc im sensitive and i struggle with emotional dysregulation. im a very caring person and can sometimes overdo it trying to be there for everyone. im also very stubborn, especially when someone either tries to make me do something i don't want to do, or says i can't do something. i have anxiety and often wake up at weird hours of the morning bc of it.

tysm!

Hrmm...in my humble opinion, I match you with:

☆ Reinhardt! ~ ☆.。.:・°☆.。.:・°☆.

[ Want one too? See here: (insert link to post ill make later) ]

(Warning: Long 'Keep Reading')

(Warning: Angst)

TLDR: He's anxious and caring too. You build each other up, and he especially nurtures you/ see last paragraph

It could go a number of ways. It was a bit of rummaging to find the right one, but if you like Rein I think it'd work out pretty good!

I can imagine you working in Overwatch when it got big in a teensy assistive position, occasionally bumping into the fabled heroes, usually for professional reasons.

And dear god, it was terrifying. That looming itching feeling of social pressure as you have to talk to them. At a work party Tracer had made an effort to try and talk to you, which kind of worked- you quietly babbled back and forth but the atmosphere with so many strangers was just kind of overwhelming. Cassidy had teased you, both simultaneously putting a blush on your face and a bubbling feeling of frustration. You wanted to prove his smug face wrong.

And you did. You were out of your shell, one way or another, and spiralled down this one-sided? Requited? God, who-knows - situation-ship with Cass that did you more harm than good. It was nice for a while, colourful, passionate, but fickle. The verbal equivalent of scraping at a smooth wall in your effort to help him as he slipped into Blackwatch. His ever-waning attention to your beautifully crafted gifts; his ignorance.

However, during that time you did meet the heroes personally. You caught Reinhardt's attention particularly. You were amazing! He'd look over your shoulder in awe in what you were making for Cassidy, spouting words of encouragement, saying something about how you should teach him so he could crochet for Ana and Fareeha. When someone dared you couldn't take your turn arm wrestling Rein, you did, and won! Crazy strength, right? Just kidding, he let you win. When you complained, you stayed up as everyone trickled out continually trying to beat him. It was very comical sight; opponents crouched over a table, one 2ft bigger than the other. When you were shy, he would offer a hand on your back as you entered the new thing together instead of alone. Reinhardt was always very clear with his emotions, which was quite grounding and you started to unintentionally imitate him a bit. You'd had your bubbly, loud conversations, but when Ana and Cass had left (and during Cass' stupid antics)- they sometimes became more quiet, and solemn. Seeing him awake too at ungodly hours of the night-morning, you had reached out to him in worry despite your state. The two of you had exchanged woes carefully and ending up in streaming tears in both sides, both of anguish and relief, ending in an all-encompassing hug underneath the cloudy night sky of Gibraltar. It was hard not to rely on him, because he wholeheartedly let you.

And that's it. Overwatch was...over? You remember that last day as your co-workers began to pack on to company helicraft to go back home from Gibraltar. Looking at Rein through the crowd, distraught. Ana was missing. You had sincerely guaranteed you would stay in touch until press had died down. With a tugging heartstring you returned home.

Looking at your comms device your stomach churned over Reinhardt's contact, finger hovering over the screen. What if he'd forgotten? Does he still want to speak? Is it saf- your thoughts cut off as the device lit up. A video call from Reinhardt. It was an initial image of a confused old man before he saw you, and his holographic face lit up. He corrected himself, asking of your safety, and if you are free to talk, etcetera. When you dizzily but enthusiastically agreed, he jumped back into over joyous questions, compliments and jokes. In this time apart, you would chat now and again. How Brigitte was; your latest projects; if you couldn't fall asleep or you woke up too early... It was nice during a time of ever-growing political tension.

Eventually, you were invited to visit for the holidays. As soon as you stepped off the hoverbus Reinhardt was there, asking you before scooping you up in a hearty hug and laugh. You'd missed that. As he gushed about his hometown you couldn't help but look over. He was overflowing with joviality- but weathered, more than before. An added sense of maturity and intelligence. You understood. And, it looked quite handsome on him. Not to mention the juxtaposition of his parental looking cardigan against his massive scar-strewn form.

This odd kind of new..adoration began to weasel its way into otherwise familiar interactions from back in Overwatch. Becoming more familiar with his bouts of depression, (Ana's death, all his friends disappearances...) consolations especially became more tender and intimate in the quiet hours of the Lindholm household or out on the green hills. Sometimes you'd wake up at a horribly early time, and going down the stairs you would find Reinhardt carefully cooking. Anxiety wake-ups didn't seem as bad anymore- actually, they became less frequent as you would just exist together into the night, sometimes even cuddle. Sometimes Torbjörn would shout and make you cry, leading to Brig and Rein to scold him and then comfort you, Reinhardt more calmly. You'd go grocery and material shopping (for Brig) together. Reinhardt would ever so subtly wince at loud metallic noises, and you would hold his hand. You'd take over for Brig in tending his wounds when he tried to 'stay in shape'. You weren't trying to be an opportunist, but god his body was pretty too. Maybe you paused a little too long, because in-between a pained grunt he chuckled. This confused you, as minute as it was, but it wasn't long before he began gently dropping more smart-mouthed compliments and half-jokes in a lower tone than normal. One night that you had stayed up late together he had pulled you aside. With the same sincerity and nervousness of when he had initially contacted you post-Overwatch; and the same cloudy night sky, he articulately confessed his growing romantic feelings for you.

If you reciprocate? He is overjoyed to a silent smile, forehead bumping against yours as he offers a calloused hand to rest on your cheek. He eventually looks through to you, a small smug smile as he articulates something cheesy but tender. Boundaries and expectations are shared, and it's pretty easy to trust each other. You have your own business to attend to, but when you do meet, it is loud and beautiful. Boisterous, passionate holidays and days together. He remembers what you taught him, and presents to you a bad crocheted..blanket (?) as big as his hand that he's proudly holding it with. You slam the table harder than him as you're so close to winning a stupid family board game against him. He princess carries you often just-cause. Quiet and meaningful talks as he holds on to your every word.

It's nice.

--------------------------------------------------BTS ↴

#reinhardt x reader #overwatch matchups #i have dcd we're square brutha *handshake emoji*#always more to say but cutting it here fo no GOODNIGHT #overwatch #reinhardt #baiiii

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milleraudrey · 2 years

Text

They drew you! Pt.1

Characters: Klee, Diona and gn! reader

Fluff and maybe slight angst

———————————————————————————

Sorry for disappearance! And sorry for grammar errors! -Rey

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Klee

You (as a really kind soul) helping Jean, Albedo and Kaeya with babysitting Spark Knight.

You can understand that Jean is really busy and Albedo also busy, but for Kaeya you have some thoughts. Diluc once told you, that insted of sitting with Klee he was in Tavern.

Today was a busy day today, you helped Sara with meal delivery and you helped Noell with few heavy things. And the last thing you need to do is - take Klee from Albedos Dragon spine “office” back to Mondstadt.

You actually did that. You managed to get up on cold and dangerous mountain where Albedo set up his camp, how many times you asked why they dont fix this wooden bridge. And finally you found Klee and her Brother Albedo! What a relief.

- Yes!! Y\N you did it! Klee and brother Albedo started getting worried about you! I thought that you where fighting with Big Ice Monster!!

- Big Ice Monster?

-Khm, unluckily yes, I spotted Lawachurl on the way to my base but luckily for you he went different way after short time. - said Albedo

- Oh, Klee also want to give you a present, right Klee?

- Ah Yes! Hehehehee, here! Drawing of you Y/N! Brother Albedo helped me with your hair and eyes, cause Klee dont remember how they looked.

Helped with haird and eyes, so thats why he stared at you for few minutes.

Klee gave you a drawing. There was you, Klee, Albedo and who’s that? Oh thats Kaeya. You where holding hands with Albedo and Klee while Kaeya was holding Klees hand and in other hand he holding … a sword or a bottle…. Lets think that its a sword. Oh, and she havent forgot her best friend, Dodoko! And there is a big red heart above everyone. And when you looked on the other side of drawing there was a massage for you:

“Y/N! Thank you for playing with me and saving from Master Jean! You are the great hero for Klee, Klee is hoping that you will have more time with Klee because loves you!”

Oh wow, thats really sweet of her, you can stop smiling! You carefully put drawing inside your bag and hugged her!

- Awh, Klee that so sweet of you. And surely i can spent more time with you!

———————————————————————————

Diona

You become really close friends with Diona. You 4 time a week visiting her in Cats Tail.

When you too met each other for the first time and you havent ordered an alcoholic drink but instead you ordered milkshake/juice/nonalcoholic coctail, that surprised her!

One time you walked her home after your and hers work. That was late night and rainy. You already falling asleep at your big,comfy bed with warm blanket you heard knock at your door. You sleepy went to open the door

-Uhh, whos there?

- Can you let me in? Its cold outside..

Wait what? Diona ? Ofc you opened door to her

- D-diona what are you-

- Hes drunk again! I can’t believe it!! - she angrily said and went to your house

-I need to destroy wine industry!! And why my dad not listening to me!? - her ears when down and her eyes become teary

- I just want to end this…

Thats it, can you adopt this kid please? Okay, think Y/N what can you do to make her happy? You dont have much to do, maybe drawing competition?

- Hey, wanna have a drawing competition? You can draw whatever you want and whos drawing going to be best wins!

-I- uh, you better be ready! Cause im already wining!! Hehe

And competition started. You noticed that she sometimes looks at you but you dont really care cause you trying to draw a horse. You never thought that horse are so hard to draw.

-Im done! Your not? Faster im curious!!

- hey, wait a little bit! I have only few things to end with!

- nope, its late already i have work tomorrow!!

- uh, okay okay.

You set against her and you both showed drawings at the same. You where pretty confident about your drawing but-

- Is that me?? WOW Diona, i never thought you can draw like that! Thats amazing!! - You took her drawing and slight blush appeared at your face. - I’ll save it

- What!? Thats just a drawing nothing special about it!! But thanks. - and she was blushing with small smile on her face

You knew that actually meant “Really thanks! I really appreciate it!! I tried hard!”

- And your horse is pretty good.

- hey! More emotions, I tried hard!

- pft haha

After few more conversations you both fall asleep. That was a nice evening.

#genshin impact #fluff genshin #diona fluff #klee fluff #genshin impact fluff #diona genshin impact #klee genshin impact #genshin YN

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canmom · 2 years

Text

Animation Night 110: Berserk

That manga... No... too large to be called a manga...

Hello once more my friends! Happy Thursday. It’s finally time for Berserk!

So. Today we’re going to be looking at one of the adaptations of Berserk - not the renowned 90s TV show, although I will tuck in an episode of that, but the movie trilogy by Studio 4°C that ran from 2012 to 2013. But first! Let’s talk about the manga...

What has not been said about Kentaro Miura’s genre-defining epic? Probably very little, but that’s never stopped me before!

So. Berserk is a ‘dark fantasy’ manga series that ran from 1989, when Kentaro Miura was just 23, until his death in May last year - a span of 32 years. At this point I have read up to

The story has gone, as you’d expect, many different places, but broadly it is a projection of the horrors of the European Wars of Religion into a heightened fantasy world - all centered on the character of Guts, a badass traveling swordsman who, marked for demonic sacrifice, persists in the world out of sheer stubbornness and battles the demonic ‘Apostles’.

The real meat of it begins with the Golden Age arc, the point where we see just how great a storyteller Miura really is. He precisely lays out a kind of grand Shakespearian tragedy, following Guts’s growth to adulthood with a mercenary band led by the iconic ambitious (evil) femboy Griffith, and the grand betrayal that set him on the present path. Even though we have some idea how it will end, the story rolls on with a feeling of terrible inevitability.

One of the great strengths of Berserk is the sheer variety of emotional tones Miura can convey. It is of course best known for its incredibly vivid and detailed battle scenes, the splattery panels of people being hacked apart by swords - and certainly Miura is one of the best at composing action, and a ludicrously methodical illustrator. Berserk loves to deliver the spectacle of, say, a massive cavalry charge...

(Look at all these horses in distinct, active poses and dynamic perspective, the use of value in the composition to make sure it reads, the sheer amount of effort put into precise hatching around the muscle shapes of each horse. I can only imagine how long it took to draw just this one panel.)

But more than that, Miura is capable of portraying moments of painful tenderness and wicked humour. The Golden Age arc wouldn’t work nearly so well if we didn’t feel the sense of camaraderie in the Band of the Hawk, watch Guts warm up to them, or even ourselves come to believe in Griffith’s dream. The horror of the eventual climax at the Eclipse depends on all of these moments leading up to it.

Yet that’s only the first quarter 100 chapters or so of a manga that has so far reached around 364 (with Miura’s assistant Kōji Mori now set to continue). Following this point, the story enters the Conviction arc, beginning with relatively self-contained stories but building up into a new story about a depraved inquisitor. Miura has a good eye for turning these stories into not just a monster of the week, but compelling self-contained story in its own right (usually a very sad one!), embedded in an overall arc of the traumatised Guts cracking his cynical shell and slowly growing to once again accept connections to other people and become more of a protector figure.

So by the following Falcon of the Millenium Empire arc, the central cast has expanded considerably: Guts, now on a mission to heal his wife Casca who has been traumatised to the point of taking on a totally childlike demeanour, gradually finds himself joined by a whole party. Puck the elf (here more like a fairy than a LotR elf) is a fourth-wall-breaking Greek chorus present from the start; alongside him arrive Isidro, a young boy who idolises guts and tends to form the comic relief; Farnesse, once an aristocratic witch-hunter fascinated by flames; Serpico, her loyal retainer and secret brother; eventually even Schierke the young apprentice witch and her own elf companion Ivalera.

One of the biggest concerns of Berserk is to show how these various characters came to be as they are, and show the events unfolding as a chain of causality. Every so often, we’ll dive into a flashback to flesh out one of the central characters, and honestly these tend to be some of my favourite parts of the story.

This idea of causality is actually explicitly discussed by characters like the mysterious Skull Knight, implied to be something of a predecessor to Guts who seems to have a sense of how the plot will unfold; Guts is described as existing outside the chain of causality by virtue of being sacrificed - and though he has become a kind of homo sacer to be killed with impunity by demons, this also gives him the opportunity to intervene in events. But how is in question; Guts is torn between two impulses: his desire for revenge on Griffith, his desire to protect Casca and the others who came under his wing, mixed his fear about hurting people in rage and bloodlust during fighting.

All this must sound very macho, and yeah, it often is - but right from the very start of Berserk it’s balanced by symbols of effeminacy as well, whether in the form of Puck the neotenous elf (who the camera loves to linger on) or, of course, Griffith - and the relationship between Griffith and Guts is very heavy on sexual tension...

So, wherever did all this come from?

Prior to Berserk, I don’t believe this particular kind of fantasy manga was well-established. Certainly pretty much all subsequent works in the ‘dark fantasy’ genre, from other manga like Claymore (2001-2014) to games like Drag-on Dragoon (2003) and Dark Souls (2011) cite it as a massive influence.

In the 80s, Western fantasy works were enjoying a wave of popularity, particularly in computer RPGs attempting to capture the experience of D&D - which of course ended up with quite a different lineage in Japan (a divergence exemplified by the Wizardry series, which spawned a completely different line of sequels in Japan and the West). And by this point, Dragon Quest (1986) and Final Fantasy (1987) were on the scene; there was a big interest in fantasy art. However, the tone of these games was quite different, targeted much more at children.

Here we’ve got to tread a little carefully to avoid muddying the picture! When we talk about the ‘grimdark’ movement of Western fantasy novels that kicked off with A Song of Ice and Fire in 1996, there’s a narrative that claims all prior fantasy was highly moralistic and full of uncomplicated romantic heroes, but thanks to authors like Martin, there was a turn to cynical realpolitik, bloody violence and torture, and sex (and in particular lots of rape). But it’s not true; this narrative erases the whole ‘sword and sorcery’ and ‘dying earth’ subgenres from existence; in fact there has been ‘dark fantasy’ pretty much from the start, at the very least from the 1960s. Such works, particularly the writing of Jack Vance, Poul Anderson, Michael Moorcock, and (sigh) yes Lovecraft and Howard formed a major part of the fabric of D&D in 1974.

And indeed, Miura cites two major sword-and-sorcery works as part of his inspiration for Berserk’s setting: the 1982 film adaptation of Howard’s Conan the Barbarian (featuring Arnie!) and Moorcock’s Elric of Melnibone series. I think the Elric connection would be very interesting to develop, because Moorcock was definitely interested in the same sort of grand themes as Miura, but I’ll have to actually read it first lmao...

Alongside this, Miura cited some other works from the West, namely the films Mad Max (you can kinda see it) and Star Wars (bwuh?).

Of course, Miura also had plenty of influence within manga. Buronson and Tetsuo Hara’s post-apocalyptic fighting manga Fist of the North Star (北斗の拳, 1983-88) frequently comes up as a big influence, and we can certainly see the resemblance between Kenshiro (above) and Guts, as well as the general post-gekiga art style full of heavy hatching and intricate, thin lines that Miura would pick up so well.

Alongside that, Miura’s demons unsurprisingly owe a lot to Go Nagai; he also heavily praises Osamu Tezuka’s historical manga Dororo. But there’s actually another line of influence that may or may not be surprising: shōjo manga, particularly that of the Year 24 Group...

Miura commented about the influence of shōjo manga on the series, stating that it is about "expressing every feeling powerfully."[17][23] Particularly, he mentioned influence from Yumiko Ōshima,[17][23] and that the anime adaptations of The Rose of Versailles and Aim for the Ace!, both directed by Osamu Dezaki, inspired him to read The Rose of Versailles manga and the works of Keiko Takemiya, notably Kaze to Ki no Uta.[16][24]

Dezaki we covered previously on Animation Night 95, and we watched the anime adaptation of foundational yaoi manga Kaze to Ki no Uta back on Animation Night 69 - and, like, yeah! You can certainly see how Griffith in particular, with his flowing curly hair and pouty lips, looks like he comes straight from a shōjo manga - something perfectly fitting the larger-than-life charismatic hero role he assumes. And in general, this old school shōjo approach to storytelling proved an absolutely perfect fit for the quieter, emotional parts of the story: repeated lines to establish a certain cadence, panels which don’t show events but just establish mood, a certain wistful beauty.

It is the contrast between these two elements that makes Berserk sing. It invites you to indulge in its gleeful fascination with fever-dream ultraviolence but it’s also very determined in observing its consequences on the survivors.

Surely the most controversial aspect of Berserk is how frequently it portrays rape. Make no mistake, it is quite a lot, and if you do not want to deal with that, just don’t read Berserk.

So, how exactly does it go about this? Notably, the main three characters of Berserk are all survivors of sexual violence. Guts was betrayed by his father-figure early in life; Casca was rescued from rape by a noble by Griffith; a young Griffith did deeply traumatising sex work for a different noble to fund the Band of the Hawk in its early years. All three of these events, while they might be a bit absurd and melodramatic on some level, are treated with a great deal of care and gravitas - in particular, the arc of Guts and Casca sharing their respective stories and growing closer together and creating a more positive form of sexuality is one of the most affecting parts of the Golden Age arc, frankly the best het scene I’ve ever read lmao.

Furthering that approach is effective use of rape as an element of horror, namely the climax of the Golden Age arc, where (spoilers) the tortured Griffith, rescued from the king’s dungeon but too injured to ever carry on his rise as a mercenary leader, chooses to sacrifice the entire Band of the Hawk to demons in order to make himself a kind of demon lord. Most of them are torn to pieces, but Casca is raped, first by tentacle monsters and then by Griffith himself while Guts looks on powerlessly. The manga forces us, like Guts, to watch; it is one of the most viscerally upsetting scenes I’ve read in manga, even by contrast to the blood and guts and deaths of beloved characters throughout the rest of the eclipse.

At the same time, there’s a lot of rape or attempted rape that’s just kind of... there, part of the broader texture of violence that fills the series. Our actual and would-be rapists include mercenaries, apostles and at one point monstrous trolls; Casca in particular gets the absolute worst of it, with many attempted rapists showing up both before and after the eclipse. The first time I read Berserk, I felt strongly about such portrayals and couldn’t read much further than the Golden Age arc - now I’ve evidently changed my mind about what’s appropriate to treat in fiction in general.

At this point I think it’s up to each person to decide what they’re comfortable reading and all I can do is just, tell you what you’re in for.

Perhaps it’s worth digging into what role this serves. Berserk is of course deeply concerned with the subject of violence in general. Guts’s defining feature is his connection to violence; he has killed hundreds if not thousands of people and is separated from the rest of the world by the fact he’s attacked nightly by demons. It does a good job of depicting violence as both alluring and repulsive and in many ways, nihilistically treating it as just natural; we’re often reminded that the people slaughtered for Griffith’s dream or because they got on the wrong side of Guts are often just people, other mercenaries, who probably followed their own charismatic leader or just went to war because they had no other way to make a living. Moreover, it is very interested in notions of domination and powerlessness, and this is where the sexual violence fits in. And honestly, these kinds of ero-guro elements seem appropriate for what this story is about.

And yet, the way it treats rape is curiously... limited. It seems even a giant monster completely divorced from humanity will only ever get the tentacle dick out because they see a woman. Casca is often quite awkwardly depicted as ‘the girl one’, with most of her conflicts stemming from that - there’s even a plot point where she goes into battle and can’t fight as effectively because she’s on her period. Often it seems like the only way Miura can think to give a conflict to Casca is by having someone try to rape her. (By contrast, women who appear later in the story like Farnesse and Schierke tend to get very different conflicts - as much as even early Berserk features brilliant writing, I think Miura surely matured while writing it.)

One possible explanation I’ve heard is that Miura’s editors at Young Animal magazine knew that the sexual violence sells, so they would pressure him to put in things like rapist trolls to satisfy that side of the audience. Right now I don’t really have any evidence to confirm this one way or another.

So... all in all, it is what it is I guess. Know what you’re going in for and make your decision appropriately.

Berserk has been adapted to animation three times. The best known one is the TV adaptation by Oriental Light and Magic (OLM), best known for their adaptation of Pokémon(!), which actually began at the same time as their Berserk in 1997. It’s hard to imagine two more completely different franchises. Their adaptation, and in fact subsequent, focused on the Golden Age arc - unlike the manga which introduces the Golden Age as a flashback, it starts the story from the beginning.

This 90s anime series, although inevitably limited by the bounds of TV animation, was very well-loved and was for many people the first introduction of the series. Even with two cours (25 episodes) to play with, it had to cut a little, and due to TV censorship I’m told it ends rather abruptly in the middle of the eclipse sequence.

Notable is the soundtrack by Susumu Hirasawa, who would later become famous as the composer for almost all Satoshi Kon’s films (Animation Night 16, Animation Night 42). It’s got that classic 90s end-of-the-cel-era look, with muted colours and frequently impressively detailed drawings. It’s of the kind of vintage where encoders will be quite particular about preserving film grain or not!

However, two cours of anime is too much for Animation Night, so this is not the version of Berserk we’re going to cover. Instead, we’re going to look at Studio 4°C’s take, a trilogy of movies released 2012-2013.

Here, I may refer you to youtuber SteveM, who made a good retrospective on the trilogy in the context of 4°C’s broader work:

youtube

The impetus for this one comes from Lucent Pictures, who approached 4°C after seeing their work on films like Tekkonkinkreet and the Animatrix. Producer and 4°C cofounder Eiko Tanaka was actually unfamiliar with the work at the time; the decision to focus on the Golden Age arc comes from the screenwriter. First came a pilot in 2008, which earned Miura’s approval; the subsequent single movie ended up splitting into three to contain the material, and still cuts a lot compared to the pacing of the TV series.

4°C’s overall approach was to combine cel-shaded CG with traditional animation, an approach which would allow them to take on the enormous battle scenes and complex suits of armour. As SteveM describes, the result is... a bit of a mixed bag, visually speaking. 4°C are definitely one of the best when it comes to merging 2D and 3D, but this time they were applying it to living creatures rather than environments or machines for the first time. The results often looked awkward and uncanny in motion, with the attempt to animate the CG on 2s to mesh better with the 2D frequently ending up with the worst of both worlds. This was improved a lot by the time of the third movie, but still an unfortunate weakness.

Despite this, this is anything but a passionless project; they got in HEMA practitioners to choreograph the fights and went to considerable effort to include historical armour and weapons - perhaps a misguided effort since historical accuracy was never especially the point of Berserk, but definitely a sign of something. And at least going by the reactions of critics, the troubles were largely ironed out by the third movie, which finally got to deliver the Eclipse sequence in its full horrible splendour. In the comments of that video, there are some interesting discussions of what 4°C did better: some people point to the romantic scenes between Guts and Casca, the moment where Guts accidentally kills a child, and the amputation scene in the eclipse arc.

I don’t have an opinion yet! Right now I’m purely a manga reader and haven’t seen any adaptations of Berserk. So I’m looking forward to seeing how all this hangs together in full tonight. Berserk is something that’s impossible to adapt without some sort of compromise, so the strength of an adaptation will be what it chooses to make of the material.

And oh, god, look at the time - that’s about all I have time to write. Thanks for bearing with me. We’ll be starting the Berserk movie trilogy very shortly, at our usual spot, twitch.tv/canmom - hope you can join me, I’ve been looking forward to this a while!

#animation night

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commehter · 1 year

Text

Traveler - Gravity Falls Fanfic

Rating: General Genre: Angst Pairings: None Characters: Ford Summary: A string of sixteen one-hundred-word drabbles offering a peek into what might have been going through Stanford's mind shortly before and after stepping through the portal that brought him home.

~.~ 1 ~.~

Stepping from one dimension and into another is always a new experience. No matter how many times he has done so, or how much he has learned, there is always some new facet to each world that he has never encountered before. Sometimes, it is immediately apparent that the dimension is very different from any he could be fooled into thinking was the one he originally came from; other times, he spends weeks hoping that this time he has finally returned "home."

He has learned to hate that hope, but he has never been able to let go of it.

~.~ 2 ~.~

The portal appears mere feet from him. At first, its sudden appearance startles Ford. It has been a while since he has encountered a dimensional-rift such as the one before him.

Nevertheless, he already knows what he will have to do. Somewhere out there in the multiverse, yet another Stan Pines is searching for his brother -- and he has gone to extremely dangerous lengths to find him. It is Stanford's responsibility to fix the resulting damage, as best he can, before it has a chance to escalate any further. To do that, he will need to go to the source.

~.~ 3 ~.~

Ford takes a moment to make sure that he has all of his belongings. Traveling the multiverse means packing light, but there are certain essentials it would not do to leave behind and experience has taught him that there will likely be no coming back to collect them should he forget them the first time.

Once he is satisfied that he has everything of true value already on his person, Stanford takes a deep breath, closes his eyes, and walks through the tear in space-time. What comes next will be unpleasant, but necessary. He knows firsthand; he's done this before.

~.~ 4 ~.~

I'm sorry, Fiddleford!

No one should ever be here . No human, at any rate. They're just not built for the Between.

I'm sorry, Fiddleford!

Keep your eyes closed. Don't look. It would drive you mad. Hold your breath. There's no air to breathe here. Think as loudly as you can. Maybe you'll be able to drown out the screaming.

I'm sorry, Fiddleford!

The original portal technology had been so much cruder than it needed to be for safe interdimensional-travel. He hadn't known. Neither had Fiddleford. But Bill had.

I'm sorry, Fiddleford!

Bill had designed it to be.

I'm sorry, Fiddleford!

~.~ 5 ~.~

Feeling his boots connect with solid ground again causes simultaneous relief and anxiety. The sight that greets him is one that he has seen many times before and yet does nothing to quell the troublesome hope buried within him. Experience has taught him how this will end, though, and he is not looking forward to it.

He's learned the hard way how best to approach acclimatizing to a new dimension, particularly ones that seem so much like home. Namely, he must be a scientist: methodical, objective, unattached. He cannot afford to think of any of this as his, after all.

~.~ 6 ~.~

His first visual sweep reassures him that the likelihood of any immediate threats being present is low. His second sweep brings his attention to the journal lying on the floor. Time for test number one.

Bending down, Stanford places his hand over the cover. He's vaguely surprised when the outline matches perfectly. Six long, slim fingers and a wide, rounded palm. The thumb makes it obvious that it is the left hand that decorates the cover. It's just as it should be; it's only the first of many steps in the process of invalidating this universe as being his own.

~.~ 7 ~.~

Ford slips the journal into his coat; he'll be sure to read through its entries once he has the chance.

Voices draw his attention (and that's test number two passed: they speak English) back to the other people that are occupying the room: Stanley -- of course, Stanley -- but also Michael, Mabel, and Soos. He wonders in a vague sense how alike they will be to the other versions of themselves he has been able to meet. He promises himself that there will be time to find out later. (He isn't so sure he believes in even his own promises anymore.)

~.~ 8 ~.~

He greets this Stanley the same way he's greeted every version of Stanley for the past...ten years? Fifteen? It doesn't matter. What matters is it's effective.

One swift blow ensures that this Stan won't hover and dote and interfere. It ensures that he won't cling to a twin that isn't his.

It also helps to vent the frustration that manifests whenever he encounters another version of Stan disregarding all efforts to safeguard the multiverse. (And there may also be a part of him that is angryhurtjealous that some other Stanford has a brother trying so hard to save him.)

~.~.~.~.~

You can read the last 8 drabbles on AO3.

16 Drabbles

1.6K Words

Posted 04/11/2016

Happy reading!

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dottores · 2 years

Note

I don't believe I have told you how much I love your writing.

This is the third time I read the most recent chapter of LDA. What can I say

You've rendered me speechless yet again

The way you touch on character development. I have to tell you right now. I never, not once, understood why she would ghost them for 8 years.

But the previous chapter and this one really go into the complexity that it was to leave them behind, her companions, her friends.

I wholeheartedly believe that Izana and YN could have ruled the world if things would have been different for him.

It's devastating when she finds out that Izana is dead. The anxiety and the build up to that moment is perfect. Throwing in the face that she has a small sort of relief when she notices that Rin and Ran are both okay.

She doesn't get to grieve the loss of who I believe is to be her best friend. Instead she has to make herself cold and hard as steel to deal with South, the person responsible for all of them being in the infirmary.

♥

When you write the soft scenes, I'm floored. It is not just softness, but also the inner turmoil that we all feel as individuals in times like these. Unable to stop our brains from wanting to destroy such a perfect moment. To believe that something so good would happen to someone with blood in their hands, even when we can't control the situation and we have to roll with the punches.

To believe that Rindou may be a figment of her imagination and her need to touch him to make sure he is real 🥺

The way they both hang on to her as if she is seafoam, ready to disappear in their hands as the water draws back.

The sweet banter they all have going on before things take a turn for the worst. I have to say, they are all so alike and so different, always wanting to do what is best for the group even if it means giving themselves up.

The fact that Ran seriously says to leave him behind, like ahhhh!!! It had me screaming and throwing my phone, only for YN to do the same thing at the end of the chapter.

The way she almost hesitated with the first kill ever. Not because she was taking a human life, but because she was taken back by the fact she was not the target!!!! She killed to protect them, she had gotten her hands dirty more than once for them, and it doesn't surprise me that she will do it again and again.

I can't stop thinking of the way Ran begs her not to go. The way that Rin wants to stop her but he has to think of his brother too. It's all just too much, so much pain and all of it trying to be rational about the situation.

I love them, all three of them. Their dynamic. I'm beyond thrilled, excited and heartbroken for what I know will come with the story.

You are a wonderful writer and I am so happy you share your works with us in this godforsaken app. Thank you, sending lots of love!

^ actual image of me when this ask came in

THEY WOULD HAVE BRO THEY WOULD HAVE — i headcanon in the toman timeline where naoto got killed by kakucho and izana, yn was working with them in that timeline. she was handling the more legit business side of things and feeding them money and information and technology while izana handled the shadier sides of things. they deserved so much better </3 i have so many headcanons on the two of them pls

THEY DO THEY ALL CLING ONTO EACH OTHER SO MUCH NONE OF THEM BELIEVE THAT ANY OF THIS IS REAL YET THEY ALL THINK ITS SOME SICK DREAM

she would literally do anything for them </3 and they would do anything for her 🥹

and rin :((( poor rin had to let her go, i can’t wait to get into his thoughts next chapter sobs sobs sobs

i love you sm 🥹🥹🥹thank you for sending this

#my asks #series: little dark age

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dogstxrsirius · 2 years

Text

Location: Prewett Estate Date: June 27, 1984 With: @asphodelroot

Sirius hadn’t been to Prewett Estate since the meeting had concluded after the mission. It was something of a miracle that everyone had made it out of the mission relatively okay, but it was clear now more than ever before that there was a spy, and Sirius was frustrated. Again, information had been leaked, and they’d almost lost one of their own - his stomach had dropped when he’d heard about Lily’s injuries - nevermind the dozens of injuries sustained by the rest of them. The mission, while ultimately successful, had been a shitshow, and they still were no closer to finding the spy.

But they’d encountered Dark Magic - new magic - that Sirius hadn’t seen before, hexes and enchantments that required quick reactions to stop irreparable damage, the Fiendfyre that acted as though it could think as it had encased the house. The more Sirius thought about it, the more he was convinced that the Death Eaters had the upperhand over them, especially with someone inside their ranks infiltrating the Order. And so, more than ever, he felt the need to act, to do something, because sitting around just wasn’t an option.

Exploring Dark Magic allowed him to do something, even if he hadn’t made much headway on his own in the months since James had returned. His time had been occupied, of course, by having his person alive and back, and thus his venture into Dark Magic had taken a backseat to James. But the thought was ever-present, as working at the Flaming Dragon allowed him access to characters and the information and stories they would unwittingly share after having a drink too many. Sirius was learning, expanding his horizons into new types of magic, and practicing his spell-work on his own when not with James.

But that was the problem, was that he was nearly always with James, and in his friend’s return had come sides being chosen and lines being drawn in the sand, and one casualty had been his and Lily’s friendship. In breaking up with James, she had broken up with Sirius - always a package deal - and Sirius was upset with her. So, he did the most mature thing he knew how to do: essentially cut her out.

He didn’t anticipate missing her quite so much, nor did he anticipate her nearly getting killed on the mission. And it was that that had pushed him to writing a quick note - “Prewett Estate, the old room. Wednesday at 6. Be there -SB” - and sending it off with an owl.

The room was once a bedroom with a small sitting area, but most recently had been claimed in the name of their Dark Arts foray. It was tucked away in the Estate enough to not draw too much notice to its use, but it had housed many late night debates as to practicalities and techniques while pouring over collected tomes of information. There was almost a sense of nostalgia that crept over Sirius as he settled onto the edge of the old bed, the frame creaking beneath him.

He glanced over only once he heard the door open and Lily appeared, and a ghost of a smile flitted over his face. “Evans,” he greeted, “Glad to see you’re still alive. From what I hear, you had a rough go.” There was something to be said about the first few words spoken to someone after not speaking for months - it brought something like a sense of relief. “But I am, uh, glad you’re okay. Really.”

#//sorry this got very rambly please ignore me #thread&.{lily evans}#location&.{prewett estate}#date&.{june 27 1984}

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cheeze-and-sprinklez · 2 years

Text

In response to this post I've made before:

I'll probably share some prompts once in a while depicting the moments where that very OC of mine interacting with the Moon Boys OR with other characters OR another OCs too. Their moments in the AU I thought of have been playing at the back of my head and I felt like venting some of it out.

Sorry if there's no actual context about the OC, though I'll have you (the ones who might read this) know that he is an artificial being made of a data who slowly became sentient thanks to the after-effects of the Mind Stone flowing inside Vision's body.

Before JARVIS got uploaded into the vibranium body created by Ultron in the 2nd Avengers movie and became The Vision, JARVIS had a backup data where it extracted from its programming to assist it on milder or minor tasks (eg. internal chores navigation throughout the Tower etc. This however did not NOTICED by Tony or Bruce.

(IF IT'S ILLOGICAL THEN PARDON ME BECAUSE THIS IS SUPPOSED TO BE FICTIONAL AS IT CAN BE 😂)

JARVIS, now is The Vision, and after MANY OTHER contextual events prior- Gave the said data his name so it could have a sense of belong- sense of being... Alive. So now the OC is practically called as Jarvis (with no ALL CAPSLOCK).

Also ADMITTEDLY treated by Vision like a younger brother he never thought he would have. Oh Wanda is very skeptical about Jarvis at first, now she's an overprotective sister-in-law to him too because Billy and Tommy loved having their Uncle Jay around. (There's a build up event to this too- Might elaborate if there's someone interested at knowing more about this AU 🙈).

TL;DR

Now Jarvis inhabits a body created by another existing Marvel character who is a rather frightening guy from Agents of Shield. Clue: The big bad during the Framework Arc where HYDRA reigns.

(This too, have other contextual build up where I might share if anybody's interested at knowing more.)

This is solely a tribute to my older days of getting into roleplaying way back during 2014. Sometimes, I miss those RP days so much and writing whatever crosses my mind on my phone's note phone could give myself a sense of relief :')

There will be some OCs of my old RP buddy I'm gonna throw in as a tribute too. Thinking how their interactions are gonna be nothing more but domestic and warm.

Wish I could relive those days again but I'm such a wuss when it comes to interacting with people. Totally on me to blame :')

AND ON TO THE ACTUAL PROMPT NOW- WHAT A LONG RANT!!!

🔷 MAIN FIC TITLE - Built This Way (And Maybe More?)

🔶 PART 1/CHAPTER 1 - Being Hooman Is Sufferin.

🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻🔻

[11.30 AM - At a Convention Center somewhere in New York.]

Make it the 6th time where he got himself mistaken as an intern sent by a distinguished vehicle company. The lanyard with some details written regarding the event he attended have a questionable way of laying out the wearer's name. It's written using a bland font not bigger than the size for a newspaper header!

'Jarvis' is written on it. Nothing else came after that particular word. His name. He tucked the lanyard in between his suit, rubbing his eyes from the sleepiness that had been clinging since he had taken his first step in the hall.

Sometimes, he wondered if Anthony Stark, the Iron Man, took great effort in his parenting because...

He glanced at the convention's entrance where locals or people across the world entered the hall, into an event for car ethusiasts. SUPER CAR ethusiasts to be exact.

Ting...

Came a chime from his pocket, a new message;

< Morgan said no, Pepper said no but I said yes. How's the event going? Did you find anything similar like the drawing tacked at the pin-board in her room? >

Jarvis sent him a reply;

< Fortunately, there's one AKIN to it but it didn't come with a unicorn horn sports rim. >

Ting, another incoming message;

< Oh damn... Yep, you guys are right. We'll wait until she's older ✌ >

He exited the chatroom thread. With his phone on one hand, he tugged he strap of his sling bag and repositioned it onto his shoulder. Time to go.

He decided to take a hailing service rather than driving from his apartment to the city. He's not that patient when it comes to traffic honestly and aside from this event, there's another more being held at the other area of the Convention center.

The road is jam packed.

But walking between the blocks and avoiding clogged roads with cars under this summer heat is starting to get to him. To think he is getting this feeble thanks to that...

Curse from the the hidden tomb back at the underwater sea cavern during a covert quest at an estranged island in Egypt. Another special task ordered by his 'observers' who could revoke his 'rights to live' anytime they wanted if he failed to commit to his duty as an artificial being capable of 'multiple feats'.

Yes, he is slowly succumbing to being a human... Flesh and blood, skins and bones...

Though nobody should knew about that... Not the Starks... Not The Visions... Not his colleagues from SHIELD (the observers) and not even the Aria family whom he's feeling far closer compared to the others.

Then again, he wasn't built or programmed to execute any form of extreme measures so feeling feeble while the curse is spreading throughout his body could reflect just as much. What special feats? Even he was left in the dark by the original creator!

It's fair since watching him struggling to live like a human being has been part of his 'active experimentation in the field' for the last 5 years afterall. That sadist fuck. Can't believe he has a relative bearing the same look like he was from Phil Coulson's team.

Except that he is the worse kind of him and he's waiting to claim HIS head when the time is due. The body... Is his property afterall and he is just a stray data who foolishly bite the bait setup by him to permanently host his invention.

Jarvis didn't realize he had walked quiet far from the main convention's building while lamenting the same thought over and over in his head. It's not that jam packed here and there's a bus stop he could take a shade while searching for a ride home in the hailing app.

He's starting to regret this. There's no way in hell anybody would drive here when the roads are stuffed with people heading to the events held at the convention center. Be it commuting via public transport or yourself, there's no difference.

Jarvis tapped on the 'search for a ride' button for the 7th time. The app's indicator kept circling in motion, tracing whoever would accept a ride request from this lonely guy at the bustop fighting against the afternoon's heat.

At a less crowded courtyard of the convention center's area... There is a stunning Mercedes in a shiny granite coating with a none-seeing through tinted windows. The person at the driver seat simply watched the app on his phone ringing over an incoming ride request not to far from where he parked.

He propped one hand on the arm rest of the driver seat, resting his head slightly on his gloved knuckle. A mischievous grin escaped his lips when his app ringing for the 8th time now. He tapped on the screen, accepting the ride at last.

After he locked his phone and the screen dimmed to black, a reflection is caught looking back at 'him' with the most "Are you kidding me?!" expression ever.

The driver's gentle Alter caught him red handed. For making the young man wait eventhough he received his ride request for the past 30 minutes!

As the car cruise to the requester's destination, the gentle Alter of his retreated back deep into their headspace. Someone has to know about this.

Marc has to know about this.

Jake is acting on his own, again.

🔵 TO BE CONTINUED 🔵

I gotta stop for a bit because this post is hella lengthy thanks to my earlier rants as well!

I will continue with the 2nd part later on (maybe?)

Because cliffhangers are fun! 👁👄👁

{And you can visit the link below to read on A03 since I will be uploading both places, tumblr and A03}

#moon knight #marvel oc #marc spector #steven grant #jake lockley #agents of shield #marvel #moon knight fanfiction #original character

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n0bamak1s · 3 years

Text

whisper of the heart- megumi fushiguro x reader

summary: you begin to take notice of the name “megumi fushiguro” on all the tops of your library checkout cards. a semi-retelling of whisper of the heart featuring you and megumi. (genre: fluff, high school au, meet cute)

warnings: none! except maybe slightly ooc megumi

word count: 3.2k

a/n: hi everyone! ty all again for being so patient with me publishing this. i’ve been very busy with college apps lately, but i’m gonna try to keep this blog as active as i can while balancing it with school life. anyways, i had a lot of fun writing this, but i’m definitely not used to writing megumi, so feel free to leave feedback ^^ i also changed some details from the original movie and left it a bit open ended, so feel free to let me know if you want a part 2!

“who the hell is megumi fushiguro?”

your gaze was fixed on the faded ink reading the now all too familiar characters. the characters spelling out a name that managed to keep showing up on the yellow tinted checkout cards tucked into the books you borrowed.

nobara glanced over your shoulder, inspecting the piece of cardstock tucked between your fingers. wrinkling her nose in disgust, she plucked the card from you, holding it closer to her face.

“whoever it is, they have terrible handwriting.” she stuck her nose up, turning back to you with a playful smile. “i don’t know how you managed to get ‘megumi fushiguro’ out of that chicken scratch.” a face of mock distress crossed her features as she did air quotes around the name, as if she couldn’t believe such a delicate name would be given to someone with such handwriting. she’s always had a tendency to be a bit over dramatic about trivial stuff like this.

with nothing more than a huff in response, you snatched back the card, tucking it neatly back into your library book. your fingers grazed the worn down cover for a moment, gliding along the slight tears around the corners and the stiffness of the yellowing pages.

‘i wonder how many of these creases came from megumi fushiguro?’

“whoever it is, it seems like that name shows up in every book i check out in the library.”

nobara kicked a rock as she walked, leaving a small cloud of dust around her feet. “maybe you’re just imagining it. you always stay up so late doing whatever the hell it is you do in your free time that you’ve probably begun to hallucinate.” she nudged you playfully, eliciting a dead pan expression from you.

“i’m serious nobara. i mean, i’ve never really believed in fate but there’s no way it’s completely coincidental!”

she raised an eyebrow, as if to say you can’t be serious. “i think you’ve been reading too many romance novels, for all you know this person could totally be just some weird old guy with nothing better to do than visit the library.”

“hey!” you acted as if that last bit was a personal attack on you, and knowing nobara it probably was. “i’m not saying this megumi fushiguro person is my soulmate or anything, i just think it’s a very strange coincidence.” you shrugged off your backpack as you talked, putting away your book. noticing the suspiciously light weight of your bag, you rummaged your fingers around for a moment to find that your sketchbook had gone missing.

crap.

nobara turned to you, perceptive as ever of your suddenly altered demeanor. “forget something again?” it was almost annoying sometimes how well she knew you. was it really that obvious?

“just my sketchbook,” your hands rifled through your bag one final time to make sure you really didn’t have it ��probably left it on the park bench or something, it’ll just be a minute to get it.” you turned to her with a sheepish smile, silently pleading her to follow you there. she stared blankly at you for a moment, probably having one of her internal monologues about how lucky you were to have her as a friend, before rolling her eyes and following suit.

“this better be quick, i have places to be you know!”

“no you don’t.” you turned around before you could meet her melodramatic glare.

behind you, you could hear her huff of dissatisfaction, though she made no move to leave, reassuming her position next to you, giving you a gentle nudge as she brushed next to you.

as you walked, the sunlight peeking between trees framing your pathway began to warm your face, highlighting the ends of your eyelashes and the tops of your cheeks with the warm glow of the first hints of summer time. for a moment, you closed your eyes, letting yourself be enveloped in it, before your fleeting thoughts were interrupted by the sound of a bike coming in your direction. you felt as if you’d jump out of your own skin in that moment, hearing a “move out of the way!” from a husky, disembodied voice.

it probably looked pretty ridiculous how you jumped out of the way, kicking up a fleeting cloud of dust as you avoided the sudden presence of the biker. grounding yourself, your eyes flickered up to the source of the voice, being met with the gaze of stormy blue eyes, framed by long, dark eyelashes that nobara would most definitely be envious of. taking in the boy’s whole figure, your eyes were drawn to the messy black hair atop his head, formed at the ends into contradictorily gentle looking spikes. the sleeves of his white button down were rolled up taut around his forearms, leading your gaze to his hands wrapped tightly around the bike handles.

oh, right. he’s still biking.

you turned your focus back to keeping to your side of the path momentarily, before the sight of your name written atop the sketchbook peeking out of his bag came into your field of vision as he continued to move past you. before you had time to think rationally, you turned to his now retreating form, breaking into a jog, kicking up a few more dust clouds as you did.

ignoring nobara’s incredulous calling of your name, you tried to call to the boy who had no intention of slowing down. “excuse me!” you cupped a hand around your mouth, hoping to project your voice louder. “hey!” the irritation in your voice was clear, but you breathed a small sigh of relief as the bike slowed to a stop, and the spike headed boy turned to your direction.

after an awkward moment of your continued jogging to him while he stood with a blank expression, you stopped in front of him, an accusatory look grazing your features.

“i think you have something of mine.” you tried your best to imitate the confident attitude you always admired from nobara, placing a hand on your hip and using the other one to point to his bag. his gaze followed the direction of where you pointed, his eyebrows raised while the rest of his face remained stagnant.

“oh, this?” he tugged the cardboard covered sketchbook out of the pocket it had been placed in, examining the cover. his eyes flickered between your name written in the top corner, and your currently annoyed looking face, as if he was playing some sort of word association game. you simply nodded in response, anticipation clear in your actions.

as he held out the sketchbook to you, he leaned down so his face was closer to you, as if to tell you a secret, voice low and eyes trained on you. “you should be more careful next time. you’re lucky i’m nice enough to not just steal this from you right now.”

you didn’t have an explanation as to why your heart began to race.

taking your silence as a response, he pushed it into your hands, his fingers brushing against yours gently. “nice drawings by the way, i recognize your friend over there from the portrait you drew of her on the first page.” his face remained stoic as he pointed at nobara, who was tapping her foot in boredom.

face warm from embarrassment, you snatched the sketchbook from where his hands lingered on it, muttering a bitter sounding “thanks” before stalking over to nobara once more, who looked relieved that she’d finally be able to go wherever it was she was going to.

“what an asshole.” you glared at him over your shoulder as he biked away, your gaze lingering a second too long for someone so insistent on hating him. nobara shook her head in response, clearly annoyed at your own obliviousness after witnessing the whole interaction.

a smug smile crossed her soft features. “maybe that’s megumi fushiguro.”

you raised a brow as you glanced at her. “as if!”

despite your insistence on your distaste for the mystery boy, he managed to have flooded your thoughts. ‘he must be using sorcery or something to keep himself on my mind, weirdo.’

still, you couldn’t deny how just a few more of your portraits were accented by ocean blue eyes, or pointed ends to the different mops of hair you sketched. how did you manage to keep attracting mystery people into your life?

when you returned to the library, you gripped a thick science fiction novel, the pages brushing your soft fingers as your marched it up to the checkout counter. as the librarian wrote the date on a small piece of cardstock, you took note of the fact that your name would be the first one there. had megumi fushiguro missed out on this one?

a pleasant smile stretched across your face as the librarian handed the book back to you. scrawling your name at the top of the checkout card, your eyes flickered to a stamp of ink beneath the slot for it.

donated by fushiguro.

of course it was.

the library door squeaked quietly as you pushed it open, one hand on the door, and the other placing your new book in your backpack. zipping it up and throwing it over your shoulder, you were met with the feeling of a dog sniffing your leg. your eyes trailed down to a dog almost akin to a small polar bear brushing its nose against your calf. reaching your hand to scratch softly against the back of his head, you coo gently at the not-so-little little guy.

“what’s got you all by yourself buddy?” an involuntary smile creeps onto your face at how he calms at your pats.

wordlessly, obviously considering this is a dog, he turns and walks a few steps forward, before pausing and tilting just his fur covered face toward you, egging you on to follow him just as you had the other day with nobara. you considered for a moment, before shrugging and giving in to his pretty minimal amount of convincing. nobara would be out getting lunch with maki today anyways, so you could use something to do today. after all, it could be fate.

it was almost as if you were one of those people who walked their dog without a lash, but in reality, it was more like the dog was walking you as it lead you down tall, sidewalk-lined hills and through parks filled with young parents having picnics with their children and couples going on walks. you wondered to yourself if this was a worthwhile excursion, was he just leading you to a dead end, or worse, was he some dog trained by a gang to lure people into danger?

after walking a few minutes more, you found out the spot you were being lead to was, in fact, even worse then both the possibilities you’d been brainstorming in your head, when you were met at the bottom of another hill with the stoic expression of that spike head. his eyes softened at the sight of the dog, a ghost of a smile tugging at his lips that quickly vanished as he met your gaze, his eyes hardened in contrast with the bashfulness that shone on his cheeks.

“oh, you found him. thanks for that.” he cleared his throat awkwardly, shifting his gaze back to the dog. you shifted your weight from one foot to the other. to be fair though, what did you expect you’d do when you found where the dog was leading you?

“i should probably go.” your usually collected demeanor had been replaced with that of a puppy with its tail tucked between its legs. with a stiff wave, you took your leave, turning on your heel.

“wait.” his voice wavered, as if trying to catch himself before he spoke. “i can walk you home if you want. it’s the least i can do after you got him home.” he forced a smile onto his face, though it made him look more constipated than inviting. what happened to the snarky, aloof boy who had handed you your sketchbook just a few days ago?

still, you nodded, lips pressed into a line that you hoped resembled somewhat of a smile. surely, you should have been more worried about his sudden change in demeanor, but the relieved expression on his face seemed to soothe your nerves a bit. he assumed a spot next to you, tucking his hands in his pants pockets.

“your little buddy there lead me all over the city trying to find you, so i don’t exactly know how to get home from here, but maybe you can just lead me to the library.” you turned so you faced him, now aware of the close proximity between you two. nobara would probably laugh in your face if she could witness the moment you paused, stunned by the eye contact he made with you under his thick eyelashes. had you been perceptive enough in the moment, you may have noticed the blush creeping up his face. he nodded his head, which was already tilted down to face you fully, with eyes hazy and lips slightly parted.

“it’s just this way, i’ll show you.” he removed his hand from its pocket to point up the hill that had brought you to him in the first place. you gripped the straps of your backpack and faced in the direction he pointed to obediently, hoping to ignore the weird tension in the air. what could you talk to him about?

before you could continue your internal dilemma, he cleared his throat again. “you seem to like the library a lot, huh?”

by god was this boy terrible at small talk.

“i guess i do, but i don’t know how you came to that conclusion considering i only just brought up the library.” you cocked an eyebrow as you looked at him, probably sounding more annoyed than you’d intended.

he smiled knowingly at you, a hint of disbelief on his features as he raised his eyebrows. “i guess you wouldn’t know since your nose is always buried in a book, but i see you there like every day.”

your eyebrows furrowed so they practically touched, trying to rack your memory for seeing him in the library. “i’m sure i’d be able to recognize you if you did.” you were completely oblivious to the implications of how memorable you found him that laced your statement.

he shrugged nonchalantly. “believe it or not. i even tried sitting down in front of you a few times, but you were always too focused on your books to notice.” his smile was almost bittersweet as you waited by a stoplight. before you could respond, he continued. “it’s kind of admirable though. i think it’s nice that you’re so passionate about your books.”

you took a chance to look at him, really look at him, for the first time since you’d glared at him biking by. he held your gaze, eyes gentle. there was absolutely no way this was the same boy carrying your sketchbook in his bag from a few days ago.

“well if you think i’m so nice, what was with you trying to be all smart about my sketchbook?” ever the stubborn one, you were.

he shrugged his shoulders, shoving his hands back in his pockets. “you really should be more careful of your stuff. i was just letting you know. it’s not like i would have put in that effort for just anyone’s sketchbook. i guess i was just trying to make sure you wouldn’t lose it again. sorry if i offended you.”

the way he was blushing would have made any bypasser believe he’d just asked you to marry him.

“it’s just…” he continued “after seeing you in the library all the time, i thought you were really impressive. i thought if i tried to return your sketchbook, i could impress you too.” he kicked a rock that touched the edge of his sneaker.

“why would you wanna impress me?” your obliviousness was excruciating for the poor boy, though it was completely sincere on your end.

“you know, for someone so smart, you really are dense.” he pursed his lips, feigning annoyance. “and here i was thinking i was so obvious.”

at this point, you were nearing the library, and suddenly desperate to continue this conversation that you would have been dreading at the start of this walk.

“when it was obvious you weren’t gonna look up from your book, i tried checking out as many books as i could to get on your radar.” his smile had a weird hint of sadness behind it. you stayed silent, piecing together facts in your head.

“recognize the name megumi fushiguro?”

oh.

it pained you for a moment to know you’d have to tell nobara she was right.

“you’re megumi fushiguro?” your eyebrows shot up in surprise, mouth slightly agape. he seemed to stifle a laugh at your expression.

“i mean, what were you expecting?” he looked a little too smug for someone who was too scared to talk to you in the library.

“some weird old person, probably.” you shrugged, still with an incredulous look on your face. “i’m glad it wasn’t though.”

“oh?” he really did have a nice smile. “i guess you’re glad it was me then.” even he was unsure of this sudden confidence.

you pondered his question for a moment, but your body moved before your brain did, nodding your head slowly. he seemed to loosen up then, hands out of his pockets again, making you aware of how close you stood to him with the way his fingers brushed yours every few steps. a slight sadness filled your being as you stopped in front of those squeaky library doors that suddenly seemed so uninviting.

“i’ll tell you what then,” he started confidently, juxtaposing the bashful way he avoided eye contact with you all of a sudden “come to the library again tomorrow, and i’ll meet you there. really meet you this time, not just walking past your table. i can show you my favorites there and you can show me yours, it’ll be…fun.” he looked up almost worriedly for your reaction, slightly angry at himself for his sudden shyness, you seemed to have quite the effect on him.

there was a beat of silence, and he almost cut the tension in the air by taking back his request and booking it back home. before he could fully hatch his master escape plan, you reached over to grab his hand, his slender fingers lacing through yours. you gave it a light squeeze, and swore you could feel him jump a little at the contact.

“i’d like that a lot,” you looked in his eyes, which had gone from defensive to doe like in just your five words “megumi fushiguro.” he loved the way his name sounded coming from you. his anticipation cracked into a smile as he squeezed your hand back, and you prided yourself on getting to make him smile again.

“i’ll see you tomorrow, then.” he leaned down slightly as he said it, reminiscent of how he had scolded you about your sketchbook just a few days ago. you nodded in response, unable to stop the giddy smile stretching across your face.

tomorrow couldn’t come any faster.

#megumi fushiguro x reader #fushiguro megumi x reader #fushiguro x reader #megumi x reader #jujutsu kaisen x reader #jjk x reader #jjk headcanons #jjk imagines #megumi fushiguro #jujutsu kaisen

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ladyvesuvia · 3 years

Text

Moniker Origin

PAIRING: Sirius Black x Fem!Gryffindor!Reader

SUMMARY: Befriending a stray dog not only leads to a routine rendezvous every midnight but also the story of how Sirius got one of his many names.

WORDS: 5.5k

WARNING(S): Just fluff but involves cursing, name-calling, nicknames, mentions of celebrities/characters from the 70s, mentions of eating and food. || SECOND PERSON

A/N: can u tell this is kind of an indirect prequel to i’m a dreamer hsjsiw anyway i hope u like it!!! for @meiitanoia my beloved sirius black lovebot <3

[NAVIGATION] [MASTERLIST]

You woke up with a start. The curtains to your four-poster bed danced gently, as if attempting to put you into a trance. It worked: You watched it, transfixed more than ever until you slowly gained proper consciousness, or at least enough to let you yawn.

You reached out to push the curtains a bit to find that it was still night-time. You could hear light snores coming from your roommates, but you ignored it in desperate hopes of falling asleep again. You couldn’t; not that you didn’t want to, because you really did. The reason for your tossing and turning at this late hour was most likely because you slept around six p.m., an unideal hour for sleep on a weekday. You’d passed on dinner, and told yourself you’d just take breakfast early in the morning.

Giving up, you threw out your feet off the bed, feeling the cold surface of the floor. The clock told you it was half past eleven as it kept ticking and ticking and ticking.

Before you knew it, you were trudging down the deserted halls of Hogwarts, half-melted dark chocolate in one hand and your lightened wand in the other. You bought it from Honeydukes just last weekend on your visit to Hogsmeade. You didn’t know where you were going, but you just wanted to be somewhere else, maybe even do something exciting.

For cautionary measures, you looked in every direction every time you reached a turn in fear of getting caught by any roaming person of authority. Peeves would probably make a sound that’ll draw Mr. Filch’s attention; Mrs. Norris could appear, and that in itself is bad news already; Mr. Filch himself could catch you and start throwing insane threats; or maybe someone from the faculty could catch you and put you in detention, and you knew full well you did not want to spend time doing an absurd task.

When you managed to slip out unnoticed, you walked over to the bank of the lake, the rocks crunching under your feet. It was probably one of the things you find in horror movies when all is still, all is sleeping, and the monster is yet to come—

Your pulse skipped a beat when the sight of something running away from the forest shuffled past. You realized it was just a dog, but it gave you a shock nonetheless. Just a dog, you thought. Just a dog.

You pulled out the chocolate from your pocket, unwrapping it carelessly. It wasn’t until you took your first bite did you realize the dog was right behind you, watching you with curious eyes.

“I’d give you some but dogs aren’t allowed to eat chocolate,” you said to the dog, who then whined in response as it sat down. “I really can’t, I’m sorry.”

One might think a big black dog sneaking up on you in the middle of a night would cause a fright, but it was strangely more comforting than eerie. After all, it was just a dog.

Just looking at the creature reminded you of Snuffles, your very own dog who died while you were away from home and sitting in History of Magic, unaware your best bud had passed. You looked down hopefully at the dog in front of you.

“Snuffles?” you inquired hesitantly, reaching out your hand. Please don’t bite, you chanted more to yourself than to the dog. To your relief, it approached you gingerly and let you pet its head. “Is it you?”

Highly unlikely, you knew that, but it wouldn’t hurt to hope that it was, right? You’d spent your entire childhood with that dog: Sleeping together under a poorly done fort until daybreak; getting lost in the neighborhood together, earning disapproving opinions from the neighbors; and most of all, countless birthdays.

Well, just to name a few.

Maybe it was the moonlight reflecting off of the lake’s waters, but you could’ve sworn you saw the dog wink. You took your hand back to rub your eyes before studying the dog. “Are you Hagrid’s?”

The dog simply sat there, looking at you curiously. “Right, like a dog’s gonna talk back to me.” You chuckled, laughing at yourself. “Come, I’ll bring you back to him.”

It didn’t move. “Look, I can’t give you chocolate. Maybe I can sneak you some steak or something next time if you’re still here. I’d give you dog food but they don’t have that around here. But I reckon Hagrid has some, though. Do you want me to get you food?”

Once again, maybe (just maybe) it was only your imagination, but you got the sense that the dog disagreed. You didn’t push it any further and so you simply made yourself comfortable even under the rocks. You set down your cloak under your bottom to serve as a mat. It didn’t do much, but it was better. You gestured for the dog to come closer.

“I’m gonna call you Snuffles now,” you said as you picked up a stone. “Watch this.” With a swing of your arm, you sent the stone flying into the lake, skipping three times. “I used to be able to do four. You’d know, you were there!”

Snuffles your dog from years ago indeed was there with you when it happened on your family trip to your lake house, but this was not Snuffles; this was your very own classmate and Housemate, Sirius Black himself. He’d never talked to you before, much less noticed you, so it was a surprise to him that he’s spending his time with you at this late hour.

Nevertheless, it was a time well-spent even when it was mostly (entirely) just watching you skip rocks down the lake as you talked about the aforementioned Snuffles. He didn’t know how long you two sat there, but sat you did anyway. Twice he thought of a joke to tell only to be disappointed for of course, he couldn’t voice it out.

“I named her Snuffles because she used to cry a lot when we first brought her home from the shelter and mum didn’t want us to call her Sniffles so I went with the next best thing.” You put your legs in front of you. “Poor little thing.”

It wasn’t until the sky brightened a bit did you realize you were thirsty from all the talking you were doing. You would've stayed for the sunrise but, well, schedules would tragically overlap.

“Crap,” you thought as you began picking up your cloak, “I’ll end up dozing off in class! Anyway, I’ll try and bring you steak later, Snuffy.”

With a wave, you ran away from the lake, cloak in your arms, unaware that you had left your wand behind. Sirius was watching you until you disappeared from sight before he spotted the wand, which he then picked up.

He de-transformed on his way just a bit by a wall, and as soon as he did, he tucked your wand into his own cloak. He glanced back just for a second before running back to the castle. By the time he got to the painting of the Fat Lady, he halted at the sight of the girl from earlier — you.

“—you know me already, ma’am. I just forgot the password is all. Please let me in.”

“No password, no entry,” spat the Fat Lady. “And it does not do to wake up a sleeping person.”

“Well, you’re just a painting,” you mumbled. And if Sirius could hear it from where he was standing, the Fat Lady probably heard it too.

“Hmph!” exclaimed the Fat Lady. “Children are foul.”

“They are, aren’t they?” you chimed in hopes of getting on the Fat Lady’s better graces.

“I was talking about you, child,” said the Fat Lady with disdain. “Now scoot!”

You were about to walk away when Sirius decided to walk in. You froze.

It was only until then did it dawn on Sirius that he did not know your name because you had not told him anything earlier. He turned to the Fat Lady.

“Spondulicks,” said Sirius. The Fat Lady merely grunted as the painting swung open to reveal the room. “After you, m’lady.”

It was like he was seeing a different person; you refused to meet his eyes as you hurriedly walked into the opening of the painting, arms crossed. He was almost about to give you your wand but realized what a bad idea that would be, and so he kept his mouth shut.

You kept walking straight ahead, and Sirius had to stifle his laugh at the sight of you missing a step on the stairs to the girls’ dormitory, especially when your pace quickened after this.

That morning at breakfast, you were nowhere to be found. Sirius took his seat next to James while skimming the length of the Gryffindor table.

“What’re you looking for?” asked James, curiously scanning the table as well.

“This girl with [Y/H/C] hair,” Sirius replied absentmindedly as he slowly settled down, still looking for her.

“A girl? You’re gonna have to be more specific, mate. But bagsy snogging her.”

“What — you can’t bagsy her, you haven’t even met her,” spat Sirius. James was rather taken aback but still seemed to be stifling his laugh at the outburst nonetheless. Sirius cleared his throat. “And need I remind you that you’re trying to get Evans?”

“Mhm, I was just trying to see how interested you were in this girl to be preoccupied with looking for her instead of petting your hair.” More and more people began to file in to the common room and Sirius’s attention went to the door after determining you were not seated in one of the tables.

“It’s called combing, and you should try it.” Sirius ran his hand through his hair. “It would do you good to look fresh at least once.”

James snickered. “What can I tell you, Pads? The ladies like the rugged look.”

“I don’t think they do,” remarked Remus.

“Oh trust me, Remus,” James started with a smug grin. “They do. The key to it is—”

But Sirius never found out what ‘the key to it’ was; at least, not today. After a group of younger Ravenclaws walked in, he finally spotted you right behind them and his back straightened even more. For what, he did not know.

You took your seat beside a couple more Gryffindors and helped yourself to food on your own plate. You were busy rubbing her eyes, giving Sirius more time to watch. When you finished, you caught him looking at you, but he didn’t break the eye contact; instead, he smiled.

“Oh, her?” exclaimed James, trying to get a better look. Sirius gently kicked his foot at how obvious he was, but he nodded in confirmation. James blew a raspberry. “I can’t bagsy, can I?”

Sirius scowled. “No.”

“Then I call dibs.”

“Wha — that’s the same thing! You can’t just call dibs.” Sirius cleared his throat once more, for James was raising a brow to signify he’d proved his point. “You can’t.”

“Wouldn’t hurt you to go on over and talk to her, would it? After all, you do it all the time.” James stretched out his arms and made gestures of triumph. “Hook, sink, liner.”

“It’s actually ‘Hook, line, and sinker,’” said Remus.

“No it’s not. Get a load of this guy,” James joked (or not). “Anyway, come on, I’ll come with you. But I apologize in advance if my hair works better than yours.”

When they made it over to where you were sitting, you appeared to be manually wiping your plate with a tissue.

“Excuse me,” started Sirius, gesturing at the plate, “May I?”

Hesitantly and still not meeting his gaze, you handed him the plate. Sirius pulled out his wand and with a small flick, he said, “Tergeo!”

When he handed it back, you simply nodded your head in thanks and began to stuff it in your bag.

“Wait, are you stealing a plate?” James asked with a grin, on the verge of laughing. “You wouldn’t want to do that. See, our friend’s a Prefect and he’ll totally tell Professor Meownerva — pun courtesy of Peter, by the way.” James snickered. “I wish I’d thought of it first be—Ow!”

Sirius had stepped on James foot. “I’ll take it from here, Bambi.”

James managed a scowl before leaving the scene. You didn’t know what to do; so in your mind, you started devising ways to get yourself out of that situation: Make a run for it or melt on the spot; neither seemed like a good option.

“Why are you stealing a plate?” he asked.

“Er — long story. Have a good day.” Then you stood up and began to walk away, backing up a bit to grab a piece of sandwich before completely storming off.

When Sirius returned the other three were there, laughing out loud together.

James leaned closer. “Her name’s [Y/N].”

“Then why didn’t you tell me?” exclaimed Sirius, annoyed.

“Hook, sink, liner,” said James confidently.

Remus cleared his throat again. “Again, it’s ‘Hook, line, and’—”

“Yeah, sure, whatever,” dismissed James.

▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰

On your first class (Transfiguration), the two of you clearly could not at all suppress your yawns: Sirius was doing fairly better compared to you, for he had the decency to not let his head plop face down on his desk, but he was sleepy nonetheless. This was no surprise to Sirius. After all, he hadn’t slept that morning. As for you, he did not know whether or not you slept but according to your peaceful and sleeping face, he kind of had a clue.

He wasn’t listening, and so when everyone brought out their wands, he just cluelessly followed the others. Professor McGonagall approached the middle row and stopped just right next to you.

“Miss [Y/L/N]?” started McGonagall. “If I’m not mistaken, bedtime ended hours ago.”

You merely grunted. McGonagall cleared her throat. “Excuse me, Miss [Y/L/N]?”

The professor put the back of her palm against your forehead. She lifted your face off the table and her eyes widened. “Heavens! Child, you look positively ghastly. Remus, kindly take—”

“I’ll do it,” said Sirius. “I’m her. . .” As he trailed off, all eyes went back and forth from you, McGonagall, and him. He opened his mouth again to add, “friend. We’re friends.”

Although McGonagall appeared to be reluctant, she let you go, advising you to visit Madam Pomfrey. Sirius risked a smug look in James’s way before following you out the door, eager to speak with you.

“So you’re feeling unwell?” asked Sirius.

“Look, buddy, I appreciate it but I honestly just want to go to bed.”

“Didn’t Minnie McG tell you to visit Madam Pomfrey?”

You halted. “I’m not sick.”

“What do you mean? What about the drowsy eyes and the head hurting and the red nose—?”

“Okay, now you’re making my head hurt.” You faced him, hands on your hips in defiance. “Here’s what’s gonna happen, Black: I’ll go back to my room and you’ll take a walk to the Hospital Wing and back to class.”

“But you’re sick.”

“Buddy, I’m really not,” you said with an irritated laugh. “I haven’t slept yet and I lost my wand. How do you think I’ll be able to go to class without a damn wand?”

Sirius scoffed. “Then what about your runny red nose and teary eyes?”

“Really? Are purebloods really that dense not to come up with basic ways to get out of class?” It was almost ironic. After all, you’d heard tons of brilliant things pureblooded wizards could do. Clearly they weren’t as crafty. You snorted. “Do you really want to know?”

“Do I? Of course I do.”

And with a bit of consideration, you recounted your gimmicks: collecting two chili peppers from the table and lightly patting your finger under your eyes to make it teary (it badly hurt), pinching your nose as soon as you left the Great Hall and sprinkling a bit of pepper on your sleeve to get yourself to sneeze, taking a quick hot shower without getting your hair wet, and more.

“Wow,” he exclaimed under his breath, astonished. You shrugged in response, turning around to walk away. “Wait, then why did you agree for me to take you instead of Remus?”

“Eh, well, your friend who’s trying so hard to be Michael Landon said that the Remus guy was a Prefect so I figured that he’s probably a snitch.”

“Trust me, he’s not a snitch,” Sirius said with a laugh. “Wait, I don’t even know who Michael Landon is but could you say that thing again but to James’s face tomorrow morning at breakfast?”

“No.” You turned your back on him, walking away. “May we never talk again.”

“You’re welcome, by the way!” He watched as you made a turn, disappearing from view before making a face. “Ungrateful chick.”

That entire day, you spent your time in bed, tossing and turning to keep yourself awake. Whenever someone came in during vacant time, you made sure the curtains to your four-poster bed were sealed shut while pretending to sniffle.

It was Friday, so you were thankful for the time to rest. You were thinking of just looking for your wand tomorrow when you remembered the dog. You shifted in your bed as you slowly stood up, peeking through the curtains of your bed. Your roommates were probably still in the common room, so you peeked your head out to grab your bag from beside your bed and pulled it in before shutting the curtains close.

You pulled out the plate you got from earlier that morning and waited.

Waited for your roommates to come in and chat for a while.

Waited until the lights went out.

Waited until the only sound you could hear was the ticking of the clock in the room.

You were about to fall asleep when what you could only assume was a bird hit itself against the window, jolting you awake.

It was dead silent. And just like you did hours ago, you threw your feet out of your bed. Going out at this hour without a wand felt threatening, but you reassured yourself, just thinking over and over that it would be just like old times back when you didn’t know you were a witch.

There was no one in the common room by the time you got down there. You tightened your grip on the plate in your hands, thinking about how good a weapon it would make (it probably wasn’t, but it was good enough to make you feel like you had a chance).

You slipped out, unaware once more of the same boy you had talked to the night before following you.

The walk down the halls and stairs without a light made your tour all the more frightening: Jumping when you accidentally graze your hand too much on one of the paintings which often earned an angry grunt from them, feeling for the next step of the stairs in fear of tripping over, and so on.

Sirius resisted the urge to just approach you and give you your wand, resorting to just staying behind to make sure you got out safely. He was about to keep going straight ahead when you made a turn, confusing him.

It took a few more turns for him to realize you were headed for the kitchens. He had to wait outside until you came back out a short while later with something in the plate.

Laughing silently to himself, he followed you again to the grounds, your wand in his cloak pocket, feeling like a hundred pounds weighing him down.

You went back to where you were last night, scouring the rocks in hopes of spotting a distinct shape among the round shapes. You cursed under your breath in disappointment as you set the plate of steak aside, your eyes falling to the dark surface of the lake. Gulping, you tied up the pant legs of your pajamas, mumbling inaudible words to yourself at what you were about to do.

Only your feet were in the water when you heard a loud bark, causing you to jump a bit, toppling backward at the sight of the black dog. You felt the water soak your back and a bit of your head.

“Snuffles?” you asked the dog whilst shaking yourself dry as you stood up. “There’s steak over there. It’s for you.”

If it weren’t for his physical state, Sirius would be laughing right now. The least he could do was walk your way, sitting right beside the plate of the steak.

“I know it’s not as good as I promised but it’s the best I could give, I’m sorry,” you said to the dog as it looked at you curiously. You bent down to pick up your cloak, drying yourself and wrapping it around you. With a huff, you squeezed the water out of your hair and sat down on the rocks once again. “I only came down here to look for my wand. It probably rolled down to the bottom of the lake already.”

You yawned. The lack of sleep was already taking a toll on you and you couldn’t let the sun rise before you could lie down in bed.

“Do you not like the steak?” you asked again. “You know, I got that plate for you.”

The dog’s ears perked up, and you reached out to pet it.

“Thank Merlin I got away from that fruitcake.”

▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰▰

“I’m a fruitcake,” Sirius told his friends that morning as they fell in line for their Hogsmeade trip. James looked at his friend as if he had gone mad (well, one can say he’s halfway there). “Out of all the things I could be, I’m a fruitcake.”

“Took you long enough to figure that out,” said Peter, who then brightened when James burst into a laugh.

“You sure?” said Remus, adjusting his tie. “If you are, then you’re far too salty to be one.”

“Guys, I’m ser—” He cut himself off, aware that they were waiting for an opening to pick fun at his name. “I am not joking.”

“Because you’re. . .?” James said, encouraging him.

Sirius let out an exasperated sigh. “Serious.”

And just like that, the entire group howled in laughter. Rolling his eyes, Sirius scanned the crowd again, but it was the same thing as yesterday — you were once again nowhere to be found.

“Wait, where did you get this fruitcake comment from?” asked Remus.

Sirius recounted your past encounters with him, earning a whoop of cheer and a pat from James.

“I have a plan,” said Sirius. “I’ll just so happen to ‘run into’ her in Hogsmeade and she’ll think I’m charming because I did my hair better today.”

“I don't know, I reckon it’ll be hard to jump from fruitcake puppy to charming knight and shining armor,” said Remus.

It wasn't until they were near the front of the line did Sirius realize there was still no sign of you. He then stepped out of the line, earning sudden protests from the rest of the group.

He made a show of waving at the other three as he disappeared from view before darting down the halls and up the stairs until he made it to the common room, where he plopped down on the couch. A couple of first and second years were gathered by the window playing chess.

Sirius kept his head down as he waited for you to come out until finally, about almost ten minutes later, heavy steps came from the girls’ dormitory as it descended down the stairs. Sirius kept his face down so as to hide himself for you, cursing at himself for being too. . .what’s a nicer way to put creepy again?

He followed you again like the night before, going over the things he wanted to say.

Hello, I’m actually Snuffles.

I’m Snuffles.

Hi, I’m not really a reincarnation of your dog because I’m actually a fruitcake!

It just kept getting worse in his head the more that he dwelled on it, and so he resorted to just focusing on his step when you halted, causing him to run into you.

“You,” you started, stopping with your finger pointed right at him, daring him to speak, “why are you following me?”

“Because. . .” Sirius trailed off. Why was he following you?

Because I'm Snuffles and I have your wand. Because I can turn into a dog. Because while I am Snuffles, I'm also not really Snuffles. Because—

“Because I found your wand,” he blurted out. “Well, consider it as a token of appreciation.”

“For what?”

“For being a good friend. . . ?”

“As far as I know, the first and only time we ever even talked was just yesterday,” you said, gesturing with your hands. “What’s your deal?”

“I want to take a walk,” Sirius relaxed, grinning at you.

“Then do it yourself!” you exclaimed.

“With you, I mean.”

Sirius’s tone calmed you down at least a bit, and so you cleared your throat. Come to think of it, he’s probably not that bad.

You began to walk with him on your way out to the grounds. “And what do I get out of this walking thing of yours?”

Sirius waved his hand with a flourish as we jogged ahead to stop right in front of you, tipping an imaginary hat. “Bragging rights, madam.”

You halted. “You’re gonna have to try better than that, Vinnie Barbarino.”

“Er — that’s good, right?” he asked, tensing up again as he composed himself.

“Depends on how you look at it.”

“Well, does he have nice hair?”

“Again, depends on how you look at it.”

“I don’t have a good feeling about this.”

“You and me both, Vinnie,” you told him with a huff as you two set foot outside.

“It’s certainly better than fruitcake,” he muttered under his breath. You leaned in closer, your brow raised in question. He shook his head and told you it was nothing.

By the time you made it to the bank of the lake, you found yourself unconsciously searching the rocks for your wand.

Sirius snorted. “You can keep looking but it’s not there.”

“Wasn’t trying to.”

He watched as you bent down to pick up a rock and moved closer to the lake. Just like you did a few nights ago, you swung your arm to skip a rock. It was kind of like a movie for him; the way your shoulders sunk a bit after getting only three skips. “I used to be able to do four.”

I’d know, Sirius thought as he grinned at the irony. I was there. Maybe I really am Snuffles.

“So, when are you going to give me my wand?” You turned around to face him again, dusting your hands as you did so.

Sirius wanted to tell you about his alter-ego badly. But at the same time, it was right there and then Sirius realized something. He normally hated the idea of a routine; loathed it, even. But he figured that maybe, just this once, he could make an exception. He didn’t mind going out every single night as Padfoot or Snuffles if it meant the world to you to have something to look forward to. In fact, the line was starting to blur between all his names: Sirius Black, Onion, Padfoot, Snuffles, Fruitcake.

Sirius cleared his throat and told you, “Monday morning when you have breakfast with me.”

“I’m not gonna have breakfast with you.”

“You are now because you’ll get a coupon.”

“What coupon?” you asked, crossing your arms.

“Bragging rights for spending time with me — Sirius Orion Black.”

“You’re awfully presumptuous.”

“Why are you so mean?” Sirius feigned pain by clutching his chest, making a show.

You bit your cheek in attempt not to laugh. “Look, just give me back my wand.”

“Give me your word that you’ll have breakfast with me first.”

“Fine,” you told him. “Now will you give me my wand back?”

Sirius let out a long sigh before taking a step forward and bending down to pick up a rock. He swung his arm backward as he made a shot.

One, two, three, four.

He faced you. “Hook, sink, liner.”

“It’s ‘hook, line, and sinker,’ how could you mess that up?”

“Damn it, James,” he cursed under his breath. “Anyway, here’s your wand.”

This definitely took you by surprise, especially when he pulled it out of his coat pocket and handed it to you with only a friendly smile and without any hesitation.

You grabbed it as fast as you could just in case he changed his mind at the last minute.

Sirius fought the urge to pick fun at the fact that this was close to what one may call fetch.

Wow, he thought. Merlin, I’m literally Snuffles. Sirius could hear his friends’ jeers light years away: Playing fetch with her, Snuffy? Will you also let her walk you? Oh, wait, you already did!

“Thank you,” you told him. “I was literally prepared to dive down there just to get my wand. I know what a big hassle it is to get it replaced and everything.”

“I know,” he said, pertaining to how he knew the lengths you were ready to go to just so you could find your wand, but you took what he said an answer to what you said last.

Sirius began walking again, and you followed. “Why didn’t you go to Hogsmeade with the others?”

“Eh, I’ve been there a lot of times. We’ll go there next time. I’ll take you to—”

You halted. “Woah, woah, who said I’ll be coming with you?”

“Time,” Sirius protested. “It tells you things even you wouldn’t be able to know.”

You scoffed as you kept walking alongside him. “Eh, well, we got Professor Trelawney for that. What do you say we visit her classroom and play with balls? I mean, orbs. No, stop laughing.”

But he didn’t stop. And honestly, neither did you; not even when you completed a turn around the grounds.

That night was a brilliant one: You were headed back downstairs, this time keeping your wand tight in your hand as you did so.

Just like as far as always can go, Snuffles sat by the lake, looking at the ripples that danced along its surface. Why did the dog suddenly look familiar?

You stood right next to Snuffles, who was now looking up at you curiously.

“I can’t stay for long,” you told the dog. “I have to sleep early, you know. I mean, you don’t, but — whatever.”

You bent down to pick up a rock again, watching it skip three times. You cursed under your breath, “How’d he do it?”

Snuffles, originally Sirius himself, snorted. You turned to the dog and shook your head, telling yourself it was your want of sleep playing tricks on you.

“Fruitcake’s actually not that bad,” you started as you picked up another rock. Sirius looked up again. “I think I’ll give him a chance.”

When you finally gave up on skipping rocks, you sat down right next to the dog. “He kinda left a ring of his, see?” You showed the dog Sirius’s ring. The dog blinked. “I’m not planning on keeping it, I’ll give it back to him on a good day.”

A bird flew by, causing you to jump a bit. “Yep, I’m gonna need to sleep this out. Go to Hagrid’s will you? Actually, no, come with me.”

You lead the dog to Hagrid’s hut and told it to stay there. Sirius thought it was funny seeing you boss him around in a gentler manner.

With a wave, you ran back to the doors and dashed up the stairs until you reached the dormitories, where you hastily got in your bed and tucked yourself in.

When breakfast came and you casually sat down right across from Sirius and beside James, a thought came to Sirius’s head again: He wanted you to know him as Sirius Black, no disguises involved. Sure, maybe he’d learn more of you if he continued doing it but . . . he wanted you to learn more of himself, too.

As for telling you his secret identity (not Batman), he decided that it’d be best to let his future self deal with it and just enjoy breakfast with you, which is hopefully just the first of many.

One last thing, though: Snuffles grew on Sirius. Safe to say that he got attached; so much that even when time told new people new fates, he found a way to let the name stay by using it as a safe codename as an attempt to become a lovable stray in the time of danger.

But that doesn’t matter just yet, not when the group was busy having one of the most brilliant Mondays to date.

Taglist: @gingerale2017 @sfdlm @maybanksslut @hey-there-angels @elevatorsdoor @mrzweasley @gwlvr @1-800-itsfreerealestate @marrymetheonott @booksarealwaysbettersworlds-blog @sexysirius @turn-to-page-394-please @greenlyblue @henqtic @badass-yn @meiitanoia @gaycatlord-stuff @just2bubbly @awakendevildays @dracomalfoyposts @crazy-beautiful @adoreyou976 @catching-the-train-to-hogwarts

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jdrizzle15 · 3 years

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Her Second Return

Just like all of you, and especially my fellow Penny fans, I am absolutely devastated by the Volume 8 finale. I had been in quite a state these last few days, utterly heartbroken, and actually nauseous at times. It feels strange to me to be legitimately grieving a fictional character, but it’s not a bad thing to feel this way. To me, this just shows that CRWBY loves her just as much as us to have written her so well that we connect so completely with her, that it feels like we lost an actual piece of ourselves when she’s gone.

But as you can probably tell by the title, this mega post isn’t gonna be about accepting this end, not in the slightest! Today I want to share canon evidence that can point towards another return of our beloved quirky red headed cinnamon bun! I’m here to spread this hope that I and others in the Nuts & Dolts dolts Discord server have!

I have this separated into many different sections to keep these thoughts organized. With that said, here goes…

A Father’s Words:

In Episode 7 of Volume 7, ‘Worst Case Scenario’ we learn the origins of Penny’s aura, and thus her soul. We also learn that it takes more aura each time she’s brought back. This leaves open an option that could be used at a later point.

Many people theorized that Pietro could indeed revive Penny one more time, which he would absolutely do. But there also lies the possibility that someone else could donate some of theirs, I’m not sure about this as I feel like it’s akin to blood donation where compatibility matters or there's a high risk of altering her, but the possibility is definitely there.

Now, the conversation in Chapter 5 of Volume 8, ‘Amity’ that Pietro and Penny have is an important moment for both Father and Daughter. It was there to show how her death in PvP all that time ago really did have a heavy impact on him and is still affecting him to this day.

Instead of continuing to pretend that everything is A-okay, like he had done for most of Volume 7, he finally lets his true feelings about how it come out to Penny for what is quite likely the first time. Even going so far as to say "Are you asking me to go through that again?" when she offers to take the risk of trying to lift Amity with her power. He wants Penny to be able to live her life.

This entire scene with Pietro established “this is what will likely happen” even if circumstances are much different now, it doesn’t negate the fact that this is a key part of Penny’s story. Scenes like these have a purpose beyond simply making an eventual death all the more heart wrenching. Her never actually getting to live her life makes those scenes basically moot. It makes them effectively pointless from narrative point of view. Unless there's more to it.

Building Relationship:

The build up between Ruby and Penny the last two volumes has been absolutely phenomenal with a definite destination in mind, and this doesn’t feel like that destination. So much of the arc of this season was to help Penny. This girl that our main protagonist absolutely adores and treasures, it would just be awful to throw all of that out for what amounts to an avoidable end. Why use so much of their precious and very limited runtime on deliberately building up this relationship only to end it abruptly, and permanently, when they’re separated?

In my opinion, RT is definitely smarter now than to intentionally set up what was really looking like a budding gay relationship only to kill one of them for good. If N&D wasn't actually going in a romantic direction, why would they leave in all of the romance-adjacent stuff that they got, that's not how ‘just friends’ act. And that is not something you use such valuable time building up for absolutely no pay off whatsoever...

Representation of Hope:

At its core, RWBY has always been about hope. It’s not at the forefront the whole time, but there's been an underlying theme of hopefulness that has persisted since it began. Some describe the show as a Hopepunk, I personally find this to describe RWBY really well. This genre of storytelling is about caring for things deeply and the courage and strength it takes to do so. It’s about never submitting or accepting the way things are. Fighting for what you believe in and standing up for others. RWBY fits all of this extremely well. How does this relate to Penny? She has been shown to be a sign of hope for everyone, but especially for Ruby, the main main protagonist. A prerequisite for a Hopepunk story is the hope.

Her first death in V3 was something that fundamentally changed Ruby. For the first time in the series, we see our main character all but broken by this event. With the loss of Penny, immediately afterwards, Ruby’s hope followed. She made up for it through determination and force of will. We see it affect her multiple times throughout the journey to Volume 7. But upon her return in V7, Hope reached a high point for everyone, the sheer relief on Ruby’s face is plain to see!

In V8 chapter 5 ‘Amity’, Penny literally raises hope by lifting the arena into the sky so Ruby could spread her message. And when she falls, and Amity with her, the connection is lost and hope plummets again. From there things take a very negative turn with the hack begins to take Penny’s agency.

In chapter 11 ’Risk’ is the point in the arc where everyone is reunited for the moment, so two separate hero stories are no longer a thing at that point in time. For the time being focus seemed to be shifted to care about the characters and how they’re going to solve the current problems. This is also where Ruby reaches her lowest emotional point in the season.

It’s not huge, but it’s interesting how connected this is. Before Ruby and Yang share a good cry over learning the possible fate of Summer, Yang brings up restoring optimism and hope to Ruby after the younger sister storms out of the room in frustration. This is where Penny’s scenes take up the rest of the episode. Getting Penny back in control of her own body and safe again is what makes the ending of the episode much brighter, when just 5 minutes before Ruby had been distraught and scared. This then spills over into the group coming up with the plan to use the staff, putting the main group in a much better mood. Of all the things to go right, it’s interesting that it’s Penny.

Things go wrong with the plan in the end and Penny dies. I find it interesting that once again, Penny got them hopeful in their chances of doing something right. Given said plan succeeded but at the cost of Penny of all people, Penny is shown to be the beginning and end of hope for them

The highest and lowest points for hope seem to directly correlate to when Penny’s around. When she comes back again, hope will return too, just like it had before. And because she’ll likely be back for good this time, the second return will probably be close to when Ruby is nearing the complete abandonment of hope. This would be pretty par for the course of the show honestly.

A little aside, but in a sense, Penny also represents Unity. The CCT in Vale fell after her first death, knocking out global communications and the unifying connection it gave. When it was restored for the briefest moment, she was there. Her body connected so she could allow for its launch, her soul lighting the night to hold up Amity with every ounce of her strength. So of course when the Hack succeeds and she falls, she takes global comms down again with her. At a smaller scale - even at the Hack's second last attempt to control her, she draws everyone in the Schnee Manor together. At the start of the volume, Yang states the one thing that they all agree on is not surrendering Penny.

Unity seems appropriate for one whose first song and wish was for but one friend, who would go on to find so many more in the process, and permit for a moment the possibility of all Remnant becoming friends once more. Where she first died, the name of the episode devoted to her story - Amity, "friendship", from the Latin root amicus, "friend" - she almost lives and dies with the very possibility of a united Remnant. It's no wonder she's a priority target for Salem, the great divider, and it seems natural that her next restoration may very well allow the next bid to bring the world together.

The Void Screams:

Moments after Penny's death, we hear a weird scream in the void space. It was a guttural, pained, angry scream, almost like the void space itself was crying out. All the portals shuddered and flickered when it happened.

Some think that this scream was Salem returning, but that happens earlier than Penny’s death, her return is signaled with cinder's arm acting up. We know this because after the arm finished flailing uncontrollably, Cinder said triumphantly "she's back." If it were Salem screaming, it would have happened after she fixed herself, but it didn't.

And I doubt Cinder would have been surprised or unsettled by it considering she was happy Salem returned not long before it. And why would a Salem scream affect the portals anyway, she has no connection to the staff or it's magic.

Another thing to consider is the fact sound is not transmitted through the portals. Otherwise, they would've heard Oscar and the rest calling for them, or the screams of the citizens of Mantle and Atlas. This lowers the possibility of that scream being from Salem even further.

The sound really seems to be coming from something else entirely within the void, and that something is not at all happy. There’s also the fact that Penny was the only person who died in the void space, everyone else was just thrown out of it like Ruby and Co. The only logical cause to me is Penny. Her body was a product (or byproduct) of the same creation magic that made the void space, her blood seems to have been a trigger.

Now I can't be sure about it, but this makes me feel like Penny is almost a part of creation itself? For whatever this thing is to be so angry, that is the only explanation I can think of currently. But all of this could possibly relate to the Narnia allusion of 'the willing victim killed in a traitor's stead' that others have brought up, which will be covered next.

Narnia Parallels:

Atlas has several parallels and references to fictional places (putting aside real world ones like the United States). One of those is that of Narnia, both on the surface and on a deeper level. It is a land of winter year round, where people struggle to survive and there is a present divide between those loyal to the current Monarch and those who are not. James is a parallel to Jadis, the White Witch, a ruler whose thoughts and cares aren’t exactly centered around the actual well being of the people. The hologram table in Ironwood’s office is designed to look like stone, like the Stone Table which features prominently in the Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe. He has a handpicked cadre of special agents/secret police, like how Maugrim and his wolves served Jadis. Another key parallel is how Jadis’s winter sets in to oppress and kill everyone in Narnia, but the Witch provides aid and protection to her loyal followers. She has all the power to spare harm to others, and uses it only for the loyal. As soon as Mantle splits from James and Atlas, no care is taken to protect them from the cold of Solitas even though he has every ability to turn the heating grid back on. His protection is only for the loyal.

Now that the parallel is established, let's look into the details. Starting with how James plays the role of Jadis.

"I had forgotten that you are only a common boy. How should you understand reasons of State? You must learn, child, that what would be wrong for you or for any of the common people is not wrong in a great Queen such as I. The weight of the world is on our shoulders. We must be freed from all rules. Ours is a high and lonely destiny." These are the words Jadis says in the Magician’s Nephew to justify the blood civil war she and her sister had waged for rulership of Charn, before she came to Narnia. She won that war, technically, but only after the last battle had been lost and her sister had marched right up to her so that they were face to face. Jadis’s troops were dead, her followers had surrendered, and the capital was under full control of her sister. But, she still had one card, one ultimate play to win and prove the throne of Charn was rightfully her. The Deplorable Word, a piece of old magic that killed everyone and everything except for her on Charn. It was monstrous, senseless, cruel beyond measure. But it got her that hollow victory. This mindset, the disregard for the people except as tools for her own will, the ultimate ‘aoe’ destructive move that no one had even considered her using, the unwillingness to stop even when by all practical measures the war is over, is a shocking parallel to James. In many ways, he is Jadis in mindset and deed.

Then there is the shared desire for A Thing that both James and Jadis have. For James it’s the Winter Maiden and control over her. For Jadis it’s the Silver Apples from the Tree of Youth. And funnily enough, the Maiden Powers parallel the Apples quiet well. These apples grant power and a life of eternal beauty, but should not be taken or eaten on one’s own initiative. They must be given, a gift granted by another, or only suffering will come from obtaining them. "For the fruit always works — it must work — but it does not work happily for any who pluck it at their own will. If any Narnian, unbidden, had stolen an apple and planted it here to protect Narnia, it would have protected Narnia. But it would have done so by making Narnia into another strong and cruel empire like Charn, not the kindly land I mean it to be.” Jadis’s immortality, and some of her power, come from the fact that she ate an Apple of her own will after stealing her way into the garden where the Tree of Youth had been planted. She gained the eternal life she had wanted and the power along with it, but she did so by taking it and was cursed because of it. Her skin turned pale and her lips blackened as if she were a frozen corpse given life. She will be trapped in a life of misery and hate according to Aslan- oh hey Cinder, how’s having stolen the Power you always wanted working out for you? Cinder had the power she wanted, but she only got hungrier, eager to claim more and increase her might. But in her pursuit she was defeated and humiliated by Raven, had to steal her way out of Mistral, and then suffered defeat after defeat while in Atlas. Only in the end, when she didn’t keep pursuing the Maiden Power, did she get any kind of victory.

The reason these parallels to Narnia are so important is one of the most famous events of the series. The cracking of the Stone Table and the rebirth of Aslan after his death. ‘When a willing victim who had committed no treachery was killed in a traitor's stead, the Table would crack and Death itself would start working backward.’ Well, the ‘Stone Table’ in James’s office has cracked, and Penny strikes me as a pretty willing victim. She has never actually committed any actual treachery or harm, as she was the Protector of Mantle, and fought for its and Atlas’s people until the very end. And because of her death, the actual traitor, Winter, who loyally served James until he had gone too far, was saved. Through Penny’s self sacrifice, Winter was saved. So now Death itself will start working backward.

(Major props to my friend @catontheweb for writing this section, I was getting nowhere with it, if they weren't there this part wouldn't exist!)

Norse Mythology:

The tree we see in the post credit scene gives off some serious Yggdrasil vibes. Also called the World Tree, it is essentially all of creation in Norse Mythology. It connects all nine realms, including the God realms of Asgard, the human realm of Midgard, and the underworld of Hel.

Humans are born from the branches of Yggdrasil. The web of Wyrd is woven for every person once they're born, and their path is set from there regardless of how many times the souls cycle over. But at the end, they're destined to end up in one of the worlds, for a myriad of reasons.

I believe Penny landed closest to this giant tree. She was on the center platform in the void space, so if that space is directly above the island(?) the tree is on, it makes sense for her to fall by the center nearest to the tree. This would not only open up all kinds of possibilities for the volume in general, but it would also create options for Penny.

The whole of Yggdrasil’s representations fit well into Penny’s story. Birth, growth, death and rebirth. We can count Penny’s appearance in V7 as birth for now, her growth is all her development in leaving =the military and becoming a Maiden, her death just happened, and her rebirth would be her revival. And this is a cycle she’s gone through before.

The Norse god Odin and Yggdrasil have quite a connection. In one story, Odin cut out one of his own eyes to gain knowledge from a pool underneath Yggdrasil. The only one that fell whose eyes alone are incredibly significant to the story was Ruby. So, they could choose to have her allude to Odin by having Ruby make some kind of deal with whatever entity likely rules over this magical place. An eye for Penny’s life.

There’s another story about Odin, Yggdrasil and the pursuit of knowledge. Odin so loved knowledge, that he sacrificed himself in a quest to learn the deeper magic of runes. It was believed one could only learn the magic spells from runes in death. So, Odin hung himself on Yggdrasil for nine days as an offering, and teetered between life and death. After he mastered the last spell on the ninth night, he ritually died and all light was extinguished from the world. Odin’s death lasted until midnight, when he was reborn and light returned to the world.

This story doesn’t fit Penny perfectly, but allusions often don’t. So If she really did land near the tree, she could be another loose representation of Odin’s story here. What she did wasn’t for knowledge, but to save her friends and keep Cinder from getting the Winter Maiden power. She believed it necessary that she sacrifice herself to achieve this end. As we established, Penny represents Hope, so her death means the loss of hope. This parallels Odin’s story of his death meaning the loss of light itself. So if this theory holds up, it would make this death temporary, until her rebirth and the return of Hope with her once again.

Alternatively, Ruby has the potential of loosely representing Odin in this story as well. Odin later uses the knowledge of the runes to do many things, but the most relevant one right now is awakening the dead. Both of these stories are about making a personal sacrifice to gain something that is desired. Ruby would absolutely make such sacrifices if it meant saving Penny.

It is said that Odin lived “according to his highest will unconditionally, accepting whatever hardships arise from that pursuit, and allowing nothing, not even death, to stand between him and the attainment of his goals." This sounds like Penny's arc of accepting the WM powers. This is more just a general connection between Penny and Odin, but I found it interesting.

Side Note: I encourage anyone who’s interested to look into RWBY connections to Norse Myth, there’s a surprising amount of things that feel eerily similar to the show. Likely just coincidental, but it’s fun to think about!

(If I got any of this wrong, I sincerely apologize by the way. I researched as best I could, but I admit it could have been lacking.)

Ambrosius and the Staff:

Ruby told Ambrosius "we kinda wanna keep her around longer than that" as part of her very specific instructions. Then Penny died about ten to fifteen minutes, at the absolute most thirty minutes later in-universe. I don’t know about you, but to me that seems very short to be considered ‘longer than that’. Technically it is, but when writing a story and a character says something like that, you typically don’t just kill the character they were referring to basically right away. It makes sense for a week-by-week watch, but in a volume binge, which many viewers do, it becomes ironic how fast Penny dies after being removed from her robotic body.

The first time we see the staff of creation being used, it's to save Penny. Using the staff of creation to help Penny is a sign of how incredibly important she is.

They’ve even got this entire transformation sequence for her, so it wouldn’t make sense for them to throw all that away two episodes later. In a meta context, it’s a massive waste of time and budget considering the asset creation for Penny.

Penny is a character who has already hopped bodies two times. And now we're supposed to just believe that this time it really is a final death? Just two episodes after we were explicitly told her body isn't what matters, that "Her soul is who she is" and that "the mechanical parts are just extra"? From a writing perspective, it feels strange, like your breaking a promise right after making it. And frankly, CRWBY is better than that, which makes me think this is not the actual end for her.

A possible connection between Penny, Ruby, and the Staff (thus Creation) can be seen in the intro. As Ruby is falling and being dragged down into the darkness, she is shown reaching for the staff. In the void space, Penny is the one with the relic. So with Penny having this strong connection to Creation, and the lyrics “fight for every life” playing as Ruby reaches for the staff, it’s a safe assumption to make, with the knowledge we now have, that the Staff of Creation represents Penny in this particular moment. Which could mean that V9 will be about, at least partially, fighting for Penny’s life.

Musical Hints:

In terms of music, Friend, as a song for Penny, is very dissonant from the episode itself. The song is oddly cheerful for Penny’s recent untimely death, and it overall highlights the wrong parts of death. It’s simply too happy to be a song about losing one of the most, if not the most joyous characters in the entire show. The song also abruptly ends. There’s no outro, and while this could symbolize the fact that Penny died young, it could be that the song itself is unfinished in a story sense.

What do we hear just before the song finishes, though? A progression of notes that sounds eerily similar to the last line of the opening of Volume 8. The notes for “Fight for ev’ry life” and “Who fin’lly felt alive'' share a similar melodic structure, they aren’t perfect clones of each other, but they are incredibly similar, to the point where it seems intentional. Penny may very well be the life that the opening song is fighting for. It is also worth noting that the line “Fight for every life” comes just after “Sometimes it’s worth it all to risk the fall,” which is the exact wording used for the description in the Volume 8 finale. Team RWBY risked the fall, yet, strangely the opposite of fighting for every life happened with Penny’s sacrifice. Perhaps the time to fight for every life has yet to happen, and we will see it come Volume 9.

For another thing, the lyrics for Friend are entirely centered on Penny’s feelings for Ruby, to the point where they read very much like a bittersweet love song. The music itself is incredibly cheerful, as mentioned previously, creating a mood whiplash with the end of the volume. Why would we hear a song about Penny’s feelings for Ruby, sounding like a love song, if her death is supposed to be a tragic sacrifice akin to Pyrrha’s? The song may very well be giving a clue into its future use in the show proper.

If this was meant to be a good bye song, why make it so cheerful and romantic sounding? There's only one part about her dying and even then, it's just too accepting and goes right back into cheerfulness. The song is also pretty hopeful, telling Penny's story in a fairly chronological order. And the part where she talks about sacrifice is quite pointedly followed up by one about feeling alive. It also ends with the super cheerful chorus, the word "alive" being the last... (Remember the episode title: The Final Word)

(I want to thank my friend @shadow-0f-x for writing the majority of this section! I was struggling to choose how to tackle it as I am not well versed in music theory.)

What We Didn’t See:

It is likely that Penny understood Jaune's semblance better than him and figured something out about it’s abilities in the same way that she understood Ruby's semblance better than her. She had plenty of time to observe his semblance up close as he boosted her aura to stave off the virus. Because of that intentionally timed cutaway in the finale, we don’t get to hear her explain herself after her strained “Trust me.” All of that seems really suspicious to me.

Pyrrha Parallel:

Pyrrha and Penny both sacrificed themselves to stop or stall Cinder. Jaune tried to convince the both of them to stop. With Pyrrha, he failed, while with Penny he actively helped her sacrifice herself. Doesn’t make sense for the guy who was determined not to let anyone else do what Pyrrha did, unless of course Penny assured him she’d be alright.

The Moment:

RT including the suicide hotline in the description shows that they're aware that Penny basically committed assisted suicide, seeing it as a noble sacrifice worth doing to save her friends. They're aware, and I believe they're smart enough to condemn that decision to hell and back.

The best way to do that in my opinion is to pull her back into the land of the living and let her witness first hand the consequences of throwing her life away so freely. This would show Penny how her actions affected others so maybe she could learn to truly value herself. To not think herself expendable. It would be bold and unwise to portray this choice as something good, unless it was going to be called upon later and be pointed out for how horrible it really is.

On top of this, Penny was way too content with her death, happy even. There's no way team RWBY is letting her stay content with it. It’s almost as though we're supposed to join Ruby and Co. in calling bullshit on what Penny is saying and doing because no, Penny, this is not how things are meant to work. It's as if Penny was basically saying "I want to die for my friends" because most of the volume had been about everyone else making sure she didn't die. She knows it will hurt them. She knows.

At the peak of it all, a choice like this will totally destroy Ruby. It may very well be her breaking point for Volume 9. Curiously, the moment itself is written like it’s the first choice Penny’s ever made, yet the entire Volume shows this isn’t the case. However, this is the first choice that Penny’s made solely independently and it’s rather pertinent that the choice she makes is a mistake. Outside of giving Winter the Maiden gift and saving the day temporarily, this sacrifice will not have any lasting positive effects. Jaune will be saddled with the grief of killing Penny. Ruby will have to live with losing her best friend and not being able to protect her a second time, and Winter now has the burden of the Winter Maiden abilities, making her a target of Cinder. This is a bad thing, and Penny needs to see the long term consequences.

Transfer of Power:

As we all know, colors in RWBY are really important and get a lot of focus in the show. That means the yellow we see as Penny gives Winter the Maiden Powers was intentional and likely important, no matter how insignificant it may seem. It’s possible that the transfer effect being yellow could have something to do with Jaune’s semblance. When Fria gave the power to Penny, the effect was very much blue, so this transfer should have been green since she was the one giving it this time. The weirdness of this transfer and the focus on color in RWBY really makes it look like something’s up with how that went down.

A little off topic, but Penny saying "I won't be gone, I'll be part of you." makes me think... Winter is smart, so when she gets time to think about what Penny said, maybe she'll arrive at the same question many in the audience came to; if she's literally part of Winter, can they be separated again? If Winter starts questioning that, the possibility of Penny coming back just skyrockets.

Fria actually tells Penny "I'll be gone" before giving her powers up, which is an interesting contrast to Penny telling Winter "I won't be gone". She may have gotten that line from Winter be all philosophical in V7, saying Fria was now a part of Penny, but it hits differently coming from an actual Maiden. S5o it’s possible that Maidens usually actually will be gone, but Jaune's semblance did something to change that.

This could go well with the theory that they won't need to find an aura transfer machine, or build another one, because Jaune will have a semblance evolution allowing him to do the transfer instead. It might actually be that this evolution already happened and the golden light we saw was Jaune transferring penny's aura to Winter in some way?

An observation that I find interesting is when Penny gives winter the powers, not only is the aura yellow but penny completely glows yellow too, and she obviously starts to disappear, but she doesn’t seem to fully disappear, she just glows.

It's possibly a fading out effect and she does fully fade but animation makes bright light easier, and so we don't actually see her disappear because she's dead and not gone. But it does once again emphasize the color yellow here!

And the color is coming from Penny, it does go up Winter's arm a bit, but Penny is clearly the source. This transfer is so weird and I’m not really sure how to interpret it. There's just actually no reason that we are aware of to make the effect yellow here is the thing. Unless it has something to do with either Jaune or Ambrosius, or potentially a combination of both...

Jaune’s Aura:

The way we see Jaune's aura break in the finale is strange. His aura shouldn't be breaking here. It had been long enough since he was boosting Penny, he's had time to recharge, and it didn't look like it was a strain on him at all. Plus, we know he has a lot of aura, so there probably wasn't too much to recharge in the first place.

He has a massive amount of aura, it has never broken before as far as I remember. Even if it has though, that doesn’t make this occurrence any less odd. It should absolutely never be a one-hit KO. We didn't see anything that would've drained it, that should not have been enough to break his aura. Unless he did something - something that would require a huge amount of aura - that we just didn't see. That amount of aura drain is far more than just an attempt at healing would do, Jaune absolutely did something with his semblance that took up almost all of his aura.

Pinocchio Allusion:

As any Penny fan knows, her character allusion is Pinocchio, the puppet who became a real boy. Penny deviates from the allusion by having always been a real girl, as Ruby is quick to point out, but she shares many story beats with her original story including multiple deaths. In the original story, Pinocchio dies from being hung by his own strings due to his poor decision making and he dies. Sounds a little familiar, does it not? This is where his tale originally ended. Readers were unsatisfied with this ending however, so the author decided to change the story by reviving Pinocchio and teaching him to be more careful.

Unlike Pinocchio making all the wrong decisions, Penny often makes the right ones, or ones she thinks is right, when concerning others. While usually a good thing, this has meant Penny almost giving herself up multiple times during V8, her last attempt being successful. This is where Penny and Pinocchio begin to share similarities again. They are both very reckless when it concerns themselves. This carelessness comes from different places, but it ends with the same result of them endangering their lives and even sometimes losing them.

In the Disney movie, Pinocchio dies by drowning after going to rescue Geppetto and washes up on the shore (like the beach in V8’s post credit scene). His father is devastated and takes him home to grieve, but as a reward for his selflessness in rescuing his father, the Blue Fairy returns and brings him back to life, as well as granting him humanity. Penny sacrificed her life as well, and it stands to reason that she should be rewarded for it, much like her allusion was.

Penny got her maiden powers from someone with blue aura and then gave her powers to someone with blue aura. So it could be that not only Ambrosius, but Fria and Winter as well represent the Blue Fairy. It could be set up for Winter helping to bring Penny back to life once more. It’s an out there theory I admit, but it’s not outright impossible either. The Blue Fairy in Pinocchio saved him three times that I know of, so RWBY having three representations does make sense.

Geppetto wished for him to live as a real boy, but it depended on what path Pinocchio took. This is very reminiscent of Penny and Pietro. Pietro wants to see her live her life, and surely with him absent in V8C14 that didn't work, despite Penny choosing. Her father did not see her happy enough to live her life, and will only be able to learn her death through others. But Pinocchio's themes were life and being alive. So the likelihood that this is not her end yet is quite high!

A Girl That Fell Through the World:

Penny could be the girl who fell through the world. The girl in the story fled the consequences of a choice. The only person who chose her ultimate fate was Penny. The others were pushed into the void, but she chose to die. The consequence of her choice is Ruby’s grief first and foremost, which Penny won’t see. The girl who fell through the world does come back though, and the world will be changed severely with Penny’s absence. Alternatively, it could also be Penny coming back to Wonderland or wherever they currently are, as long as it’s unrecognizable to her.

What Returning Brings:

Others might say another return would have no story relevant purpose, but I wholeheartedly disagree. Penny gives a profoundly youthful, joyous, and wondrous outlook on the world and story that we hadn't seen since Ruby in Volumes 1-3(not the end), Penny returning would bring a much needed levity back in after the despair they will undoubtedly be going through. While not necessarily a huge thing in most other shows, for RWBY, a show largely about keeping up hope, an ounce of such relief is a necessity.

As much as I hate saying it, Penny’s death does actually make some narrative sense because she had to pass on the Maiden powers. (They could have done this in a number of ways, and I personally think they chose rather poorly, but I digress.) Throughout this whole volume, we can see Penny seemingly being set up to join the main cast, but would have been too strong with the powers. This also accomplishes ridding her of the burden of responsibility that comes with being a Maiden and lets her obtain the freedom that’s so important to her character.

Once she returns, seeing this grief that her actions caused, particularly to Ruby, will get her to realize more that her actions can have serious repercussions. She made a choice, but that choice hurt the people she loves. She must have known that it would but I’m not sure she ever realized just how much.

I didn’t want this post to be heavy in the shipping department, so I largely left it out, but I am going to say this one thing that could have an impact. If Nuts & Dolts is on its way to being canon, which this volume makes it feel highly likely, this could be a catalyst.

It could prompt an arc for the both of them in which Penny learns to live her life fighting for her loved ones, rather than sacrificing it for them. A relationship could potentially start from there. And Ruby seeing Penny learn these things may also help her to stop doing the occasional but very dangerous and reckless things she does. Ruby witnessing Penny coming to terms with what she did to the people that care about her would actually make her stop to think “wait, is this how everyone else would feel if I got myself killed?” That would be a very important moment of character growth for her.

I’m certain there are other significant things that Penny returning can bring to the show. And there are definitely more sections I could add to this. At this point though, assuming anyone even made it this far, I think I’ve been going long enough already. So let’s just roll into the outro!

As painful and hopeless as it seems, I'm choosing to trust them with this because there is absolutely no way they didn't see backlash coming. The way this finale went makes me think that they calculated for backlash and aren’t jumping into something they don’t have a plan to recover from. Whether this trust is unfounded or not remains to be seen, but I don’t think it is currently. I do think, however, that the cause of this backlash was a major misstep. Now that it has happened though, they have a chance to do something good with it.

I know for a lot of you, trust in CRWBY has been damaged, some even irreparably so. And for those that feel this way, I don’t blame you. My trust in them took a hit too, but isn’t broken completely yet. There are many ways that they can bring her back that would make sense with the narrative, they have the ability to make it right, and after going over all of the hints and general weirdness of things many times, I think they will.

I'm feeling pretty confident now and I really didn't expect that to happen at all to be honest. But discussing and theorizing with the discord server seriously helped get my hopes back up surprisingly fast! It’s actually thanks to all of them that this gigantic post even happened! So thanks a ton my fellow Dolts! And a special thanks to!!

@arcana-amicus

@catontheweb

@cosmokyrin

@gaydontmesswithme224

@jammatown919

@shadow-0f-x

They really helped get this thing across the finish line!

And thank YOU for reading all~ of this! I sincerely wish it gave you some of the hope and confidence that I now have!

#RWBY #rwby vol8 #rwby v8 #rwby spoilers #Penny Polendina #nuts and dolts #mechanical rose #a little #Essay #more like dissertation #I haven't written this much in #probably ever actually #Have HOPE people!

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