#also I hope people know what the last panel is a reference to | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

katiexpunk · 7 months

Text

Heat Wave | Pairing Javier Peña X fem!Reader

Summary: In the sweltering haze of a Colombian heatwave, everyone's on edge, including you, your nerves fried crispier than plantains in a hot skillet. Even Javi is not immune - his nights spent tossing and turning, the relentless heat driving him mad. Imagine his surprise - and yours - when he knocks on your door late one night, a little buzzed and sweaty, craving a distraction. What's a generous soul to do but let him in and share some cool, sweet cholado? As the night unfurls, the heat outside might be unbearable, but inside, things are just starting to warm up.

Rating: 18+ Minors DNI. I say this with love -- GTFO.

Word count: 5K

Warnings: Javi wasn't super nice to reader and has to gravel a bit, female masturbation, references to the cartels, use of pet names (Hermosa, Cariño), emotions, reader cries, sweat, fingering, female stimulation, face-fucking, blowjob, praise kink, unprotected sex (wrap it up, don't lead by my written example), direct p in v, pussy slap, somewhat rough sex, sensual sex, creampie, and cum eating.

Authors Note: Eek! This is my first time writing for Javi, so be kind to be hunnie bunnies. Joel will always have my smutty heart, but damn, Javi can fucking get it. Special thanks to @sydneyinacoma for being my personal hype woman on this one, and to @josephquinnswhore for telling me this premise wasn't total trash. Ily bbs.

Also I often edit after I post (hello typos) so if you saw one originally sorry 🫣

The window is wide open, but the curtains aren’t moving; only offering a slight flutter now and again, offering a deceptive promise of a breeze that you know will never come. You lay there, restlessly, the cotton sheets sticking to your damp skin. The eerie silence of the room was punctuated by the whirring fan overhead, its blades churning the stale, hot air in a slow, hypnotic rhythm. It’s nearly midnight, hours since you’d gone to bed, but yet, you find yourself staring at the ceiling, cursing why you ever decided to move to Colombia. Had you known it would be the hottest summer on record, you might have thought differently and denied the job.

You turn to your side, annoyed at the hair clinging to the back of your neck and forehead like velcro. You stare at the alarm clock on your nightstand, watching the numbers slowly change, like a shitty version of trying to count sheep, but there’s no point. You’re wide awake, and there doesn’t seem to be anything that can change that.

You roll onto your back to splay out like a starfish, hoping the gap between your limbs will somehow offer you some reprieve from your burning core, and you stare at the ceiling. You wonder if you’ll actually get any sleep tonight. The heat was enough to keep you awake, but there were other things that would probably prevent you from dozing off if the heat weren’t a factor.

Outside of the thud of your own pulse, it’s completely quiet in your apartment. You’re sure people are awake, but no sound comes from Steve and Connie’s apartment next door; nor from Javi’s. Odd, you think, considering work has been slow as of late and most of Colombia, even the cartels have hidden themselves away from the relenting sun and suffocating humidity, too tired to do anything substantial.

In your haze, eyes transfixed on the ceiling panels above you, you try your best to think about something else, anything but him, but your last conversation replays in your brain like a bad rerun.

You knew he wasn’t really the type to settle down, and you were more than aware of his reputation, yet you let yourself hope that this situation might be different, that you might be the one to change him.

He had insisted that it was for the best and that he wasn’t the right guy for you; that it should be simple for you to move forward and erase any trace of your connection, and that he should do the same. Perhaps that was the reality of it; maybe it was only you who had experienced a heightened sense of joy during those countless nights he held you close. When wrapped in his embrace, the burden of your conscience seemed to lighten, and you couldn't help but wonder if he had ever found comfort in your presence as well.

Your mind begins to drift to the ways he made you feel like you were the most precious thing in the world. You can still feel his pillowy lips leaving a soft trail of kisses up your neck and across your jaw, cock buried deep inside of you. The memory of it sits low in your belly, adding to the stickiness between your thighs, now a cruel mixture of sweat and arousal.

Your mind swirls with thoughts of him, and you decide that there might be one thing you’ve yet to try that might be able to help you fall asleep. You lay there, trying to focus, to let your mind sink into better days, better nights, ones you had spent wrapped around him in every way possible.

You tease your fingertips along the thin fabric of your tank top, trying to ignore the way the sweat that’s seeped into its fibers causes it to bunch up as you stroke your hand down your sternum. You circle your nipples through the fabric, trying to call forward any sense of arousal or sensuality. You slide your hand under the waistband of your linen shorts and place your hand between your legs, resting it atop your lace underwear, already wet, courtesy of Colombia and your incessant thoughts of Javi.

Your fingers are quite delicate compared to his, and you miss the thickness only he can seem to provide. You slide your underwear to the slide, and drag your index finger through your folds, bringing your slick up to your clit. Your hips lift at the sensation, and you let out a little moan.

You begin to slowly draw small circles, eventually increasing your pace enough to provide a nice mix of movement and pressure. Your restless thoughts of him have you so keyed up, already so close to the cliff of your orgasm you can practically taste it. Your body heats even more as you chase your high, desperate for a release, practically begging for an escape from this inferno. Like a cord about to snap, you swear you’re starting to see stars when you hear it – knock, knock – and the distraction cruelly pulls you back from the edge, your pressure gauge falls, and your orgasm retreats back inside you like you scared it.

No! Fuck.

Now hot, tired, and sexually frustrated, you let out a long sigh. You slide your underwear back in place and withdraw your hand from your shorts. You wipe your wet fingers on the fabric beneath you, gaze at the clock once more, and wonder who the hell would be at your door at this hour. You rise, legs still a little shaky from your would-be orgasm, and walk over to answer it.

Your aggravation at the disruption vanishes the moment you clock his face through the peephole. You unlock the top and bottom lock and release the chain from the door, opening it to completely see him.

He looks like he’s been chewed up and spat out, his hair a disheveled mess of thick, dark, damp curls, small beads of perspiration collecting on his lush, tan skin. You’ve seen him like this before, a look of affliction, hiding behind soft brown eyes. But there’s something else flickering in his eyes – some kind of yearning. For what? You haven’t got a clue. He’s made his stance on your relationship very clear, or at least, the parade of women filing in and out of his apartment speaks volumes.

You lean up against the door frame, waiting for him to speak, to give some sort of explanation as to why he’s on your doorstep.

“Hey,” is all he says, eyeing you up and down, eyes lingering a little too long on your exposed stomach.

You’re positive you must look like a mess right now, but you don’t really care, you feel like one.

“Javi – is everything okay? It’s late,” you answer quietly.

He crosses his arms, then uncrosses them, then shifts the weight from one hip to another, unsure of himself, obviously uncomfortable.

“I know, ‘m really sorry to bother you. Can I come in?” he asks, looking at you with his big puppy dog eyes, and you can’t turn him down. You step aside so he can enter your small living room, hoping he can’t smell your arousal on you, hoping that he’ll assume the musk lingering in the air was just from the cracked window, the outside world seeping in.

Your apartment was rather small to begin with, but with his presence, it seemed to shrink before your eyes. He walks over to the center of the room, and pauses once he sees the couch; a memory of him railing you on it flashes through his brain.

No.

No, he won’t let himself think about that. He swallows the thought, and palms at his jeans to adjust himself. He’s not here for that, he’s here to gravel.

You let out a sigh, and walk over to him. You come to stand right in front of him, giving him the opportunity to commit the sight of you like this to memory – all pretty, skin clammy, cheeks a darker shade of pink than normal. You pause before saying anything, still unsure why he’s here in the first place.

“Can I get you some water, whiskey, anything?” you ask, cringing at how awkward it feels to play hostess with him now, considering he’s explored every inch of your body with his tongue.

Javier shakes his head and runs a hand over his forehead to wipe away the sweat collecting there as if he’s deciding what to say.

“Mmm, no. Probably shouldn’t have any more whiskey tonight,” he admits. “Some water would be good. You don’t happen to have anything cold by chance, do you? This heat is fucking killing me,” he says.

“Actually, yeah, I do,” you say, your voice an octave too high, remembering your creation earlier this evening. You nod to Javi to take a seat on the couch, giving him a perfect view to watch as you saunter over to the kitchen. You open the freezer and reveal a container with a kaleidoscope of colors. It closes with a thud, and you open the fridge next, pulling from it a bowl of fresh fruit – juicy chunks of mango, sweet pineapple, zesty oranges – and a can of whipped cream. Javier watches intently as you gather it all neatly onto a little tray, glide over to the end of the tiny kitchen to grab two spoons from a drawer, and close it with a quick thrust of your hip.

You place the tray on the coffee table. The couch lets out a little squeak as you find your seat next to his.

“Fresh cholado – made it tonight,” you say, offering him a spoon.

You neatly assemble the fruit on top of the colorful slushy mixture. The sound of the whipped cream releasing its contents onto the top of the fruit causes the hair on the back of his neck to rise to stand.

“Go ahead, dig in,” you say, offering him a kind smile. God, you’re always so sweet and nice to him, even when he doesn’t deserve it.

Both with a spoon in hand now, you delve into the sensory masterpiece, pausing in silence as you savor the blend of textures and tastes, a welcomed escape from the heat.

Javier closes his eyes and lets out a small hum in delight.

“This is so good, holy shit,” he praises, not even finishing with his latest bite before he’s digging in for another.

“I’m glad you like it,” you say, and you really mean it.

The elephant in the room becomes harder and harder to ignore.

“Why are you here, Javier?” you ask, voice a little unsure.

His eyes hold your gaze for a moment, and he swallows his last bite and then places the metal spoon onto the tray in front of you both. He doesn’t say anything, instead, he holds out his hand, his eyes pleading with you to take it. You hesitate, before deciding to place your palm in his, allowing his fingers to wrap around yours. He stares at it, the pad of his thumb tracing over the back of it, and he inches closer to you.

Neither of you says anything, but your brows furrow and you look at him, hoping he can see the pain – the hurt he inflicted on you – in your eyes.

“Cariño,” he whispers softly, and you sense the obvious change in his tone. His hand releases yours, and he brings his palm up to land on your cheek. Maybe it was just the heat playing tricks with your emotions, but the simple action causes tears to well up in your eyes.

“I can’t do this anymore,” he admits.

Oh god, he already broke your heart once, was he here to just do it all over again? The thought causes your already battered heart to sink into your stomach.

“I can’t pretend like I don’t need you anymore,” he continues, “like you’re not the only thing - the only person - in Colombia preventing me from losing myself,” he adds.

The sudden truth bomb he’s dropped leaves you speechless.

“I —” you start to say, but the broken silence is all it takes before Javi pulls you in closer, hugging your waist, dragging you up onto his lap, your knees straddling him. You try to ignore the uncomfortable press of his DEA badge digging into your inner thigh but secretly hope it leaves a mark.

Fuck, it feels so good to be on him like this again. You shouldn’t feel this way, but you do. You rest one hand on his shoulder and instinctively run the other hand’s fingers through his hair. Old habits die hard. For the first time in a while, you feel a bit of relief; you wager he must feel the same by the hefty sigh that escapes his lips.

“Javi – I don’t,” you pause, your words trembling, “I don’t want to get hurt again,” you say, allowing your hands to wrap around his torso and your head to fall into the crook of his neck. Hot tears begin to spill from your eyes and fall to the fabric of his shirt, the weight of your confession compounding with all of your other frustrations from the evening.

“I know, baby. I just…fuck, I don’t know how to do this. I suck at the emotional,” he admits, gently patting the back of your hair and holding you close to him. He pauses before guiding your face up to look at him and continues, “I’m so sorry I hurt you. I was just scared; didn’t want to get hurt, or even worse, hurt you, but I realize now that I did, and I was wrong. I was so fucking wrong. Shit. I just… I need you, I need you more than I need air in my lungs,” he adds, and you hear the break in his voice.

“You do?” you ask, hating how pathetic you must sound, your eyes puffy and cheeks wet from your crying.

“I’ll always be here for you, cariño, if you’ll let me. I know I don’t deserve it, but do you think you can forgive me?” he softly mutters. Seeing you trying to blink away the silent years trailing down your cheeks, he reaches up and swipes away at them with his thumb, and his hand stays there, cupping your face.

You nod yes in response.

Just like that, it’s almost as if everything were still the same; as if it were just you and him against it all. A thought of doubt crosses your mind, one saying this might just be temporary, your heart still unsure if you can trust him, but you allow yourself to cave into the feeling all the same.

He holds you quietly against his chest, the pressure of his strong arm around you is soothing. You feel his cock begin to stiffen under you, and it causes something to stir in your lower belly. God, you want him. It was less than half an hour ago that you were coaxing yourself to orgasm with just the thought of him inside you.

Your chest begins to flush, and the heat your bodies generate together mingles with the warm air in the room around you. You slightly press off of him to find some reprieve from the burning surface of his chest and place your hand on it, his shirt slightly clinging to it as you do.

You lean forward and press a soft, breathless kiss on his lips, one laced with the taste of tears. It’s delicate at first, as if to test the waters of your reunification after so much time apart, but it’s not before long that it deepens; his tongue exploring the recesses of your mouth, your mutual lust boiling to the surface. His hands glide down from your waist to your hips and he grips onto the delicious flesh there, inviting you to grind against him.

Your hips roll on him, and you feel a sudden disdain for the clothing that clings to your skin like a second skin. The fabric is damp and heavy, and with each roll of your hips, it chafes against you. Your eyes tell you that you’re not the only one who’s uncomfortable, Javier’s face in a slight twist, one that screams both pleasure and pain.

“You know, Colombia’s hot enough without the two of us making more of it,” you say, letting a little giggle out as you do, tilting your head back, letting your hair fall behind. Javier trails kisses down the side of your neck and then darts his tongue out to lick the hollow of your throat. The action causes your breath to hitch.

“You’re right, Cariño, we really should do something about these layers, hmm,” he purrs, and you catch his drift.

He releases both of his hands from your hips and helps you lift your tanktop over your head, your perky tits bounce in response and the friction of the fabric on your nipples causes them to stiffen. One of his hands finds its home on your hip, and the other comes to grab your breast. He rolls your nipple between his fingers, the feeling sending a tiny zap through you as he does. His mouth finds your chest and his tongue trails the valley of your breasts before slowly making its way over to the stiff peak of your other exposed nipple. A low, hungry growl leaves his chest, it’s a needy and desperate sound that goes straight to your cunt.

“Javi –” you moan, “clothes,” It’s not a question, but a request, one he’s happy to oblige.

He begins to undo the buttons of his linen shirt, and you watch in anticipation, his stiff cock under you making you impatient. His shirt joins yours on the floor, and you trail your hand down the expanse of his chest, noting the little freckles that pepper it; the small detail drives you to another level of impatience.

You swing your leg over him, feet coming to the floor; a temporary but necessary adjustment so you can step out of your shorts and panties. You stand there before him, happily naked, pleased to be free of your cloth prison. The air is thick and hot, but it feels good to have so much exposed skin for the first time tonight. With his eyes dragging over every inch of your body, you eagerly watch back as his hands come to his waistline and he undoes his metal belt buckle.

You look down and notice his boots are still on; you drop to your knees in front of him and you swear you hear his heart thump in excitement at what you might do. You look back up to lock eyes with him, and you reach down to his shoes and begin to undo the laces of his boots. Fuck, that’s definitely not what he thought you were going to do. With his feet free, his fingers fumble for the button and zipper of his denim jeans, and he slowly undoes them, lifting his hips slightly to let them over his ass as he drags them down, taking his briefs with them, until everything is off his body.

Now both totally naked, you rise to take a seat on him, but his hand darts out to your shoulder as if to hold you in place on your knees. He spits into his free palm, and takes his heavy cock in hand, slowly gripping the length of it up and down. You salivate at the sight, the tip of him is red and weepy with pre-cum.

“I think you look pretty good where you are, Hermosa,” he says, “always so pretty, especially like this,” he adds, still stroking himself.

You love when he uses his Spanish on you, his words sending a surge of desire through you like a bolt of lightning, your body responding with intensity as the sticky tread of arousal pools between your legs.

You inch closer to him, your hands finding his knees, and you gently pry them apart, creating just enough space for you between them. You look at him as if to say let me, and he releases his grip on himself, and you take over stroking his length. You lick your lips and position him at the entrance of your mouth. You place a soft kiss on the head of his cock, and smear the precum that’s gathered there on your lips like chapstick.

You hum in delight as you sink down onto him, letting your jaw relax so you can take him deeper, savoring the salty taste of his skin. He gathers your sweaty hair into a makeshift ponytail and holds it back from your face, allowing you to work him without distraction. And god, you’re into it – the sounds are filthy, but your delighted little moans have Javier unraveling like a runaway spool of thread. You look up at him through your wet lashes and let out a little wink, an innocent act considering your practically sucking his sanity out through his dick and having fun with it.

“Fuck, baby. Gonna have to stop or you’re gonna make me cum,” he says, holding the hair on your head taught as if to warn you to slow down, letting his head fall to the back of the couch, staring at the ceiling as if to think about something other than how good you’re making him feel. You let out a satisfied mew, and release him, a little pop sound fills the air as you do.

“C’mere –,” he says, a little breathless and sweaty. You rise to stand, your knees pink and sore from the ground, and he stands to join you. At full height, you have to look up to see his face, and you feel him grab both of your hips and twist you around onto all fours, your upper body resting on the couch for support. “My turn to taste you, Cariño,” he says, using his knee to nudge you, and encourage you to spread your legs open for him.

With your tummy flat on the couch cushions, your ass is on full display, and he fucking loves it. Using his middle finger, he inserts it into your needy cunt, gently curling it to sweetly abuse your g-spot. The moans that escape your lips only encourage him further, a light chuckle follows when he reminds you that he’s only using one finger and that he’s just getting started with you. He uses his other hand and pushes your hips and ass deeper into the couch, while his one finger stays in place, gently rubbing the spongey texture of your g-spot without breaking, making you squirm under the bare minimum he’s providing you.

You’re already wet, but once he thinks it’s enough, he extracts his finger, and uses his hands to lift your hips up, making you arch your back for him. He crouches down further to plant a tender kiss on your ass, biting into it very dimly, eliciting a little yelp from you in response. He slowly begins to move lower and lower, kissing the lines where your ass meets your thighs. He taps your cunt a few times with his thick fingers, each time getting a bit rougher, sending a stinging sensation through your whole body. The rough taps eventually become a full-on slap, and you move your hips in desperation, a mellow whimper escapes your lips begging him to give you what you need. He flattens his tongue, and moves it across the expanse of your dripping folds, lapping at you like you’re the cold refreshment he needs.

The tip of his tongue finds your clit, and he stays there momentarily to give it a little suck before moving it upwards, licking the whole length of your pussy. He continues to do this a few more times, before finally stopping and focusing his attention on your now swollen clit. You’re barely breathing as his tongue relentlessly pleasures your needy little clit. He brings his forearms onto the back of your ass, and uses his thumbs to spread your outer lips open completely for him.

“Javi – holy fuck,” you moan as he slides his greedy tongue inside you, moving it in and out as breathless moans continue to leave your lungs.

“Taste so good, sweeter than the fuckin’ cholado,” he praises, and you’re nearly gone at his words.

He continues to eat at you, but releases a hand and then brings it back up, under you this time, as his fingers begin to circle smooth circles over your clit once more; your whole body begins to shake, it’s so much. You’re moaning and whimpering at the feeling of both his hands and his mouth on you.

“Come for me – want you to soak my face,” he says, his encouragement is all you need and you snap. Your vision goes white, and your whole body tenses under his attention. He rides out your orgasm with you, ensuring no drop of your sweet juices goes to waste. Once your shaking has subsided, he lifts his chest and you readjust, bringing your weight to your forearms on the couch.

“Javi, need you, god, please,” you’re all but practically begging for him.

‘I’ve got you baby,” he coos, “gonna give you what you need,” he says as he strokes his cock a few times, and then places the tip at your slick and waiting hole. Both of his hands come to your hips, surely leaving little bruises under his strong grip. Your slick makes it easy for him to bury himself in you to the hilt, your greedy cunt taking every inch of him like it was your fucking job, like it was made for him.

He begins a relentless pace, thrusting his cock deep inside of you, the obscene sounds of the clapping noises, a song made as a result of your wetness and his thighs, spurs you on. He reaches out and grips the back of your neck, and jerks you backward into him, forcing you to arch your back against him. The new position lets him take you deeper, harder. Holding you against his chest, he snakes a free hand around and his fingers find your clit once more. He makes soft circles on your clit, working you with each thrust until he once again has you climbing the ladder to your climax.

“Just like that, you’re so perfect, Cariño, taking me so perfectly,” he praises, voice low.

You squirm and babble something of the likes of gonna come under him, and he holds in place as you begin to unravel once more for him. Your hole contracts around him, your perky tits bouncing as he continues to fuck you through it. You’re so tight, your sweet sounds have his own orgasm not far off.

Suddenly, without warning he stops fucking you and pulls out. You look back at him, brow creased, wondering why he stopped.

The sight is one you’ll remember till the day you die, Javi all sweaty curls, ragged breaths, hard and throbbing cock in hand, shiny with your slick, looking at you through needy brown doe eyes.

“Why – why’d you stop,” you ask, breathless.

“Turn around, Hermosa. Lay on the couch. Want to look you in the eyes as I cum,” he rasps.

You do as he says, and spread your legs open for him. Within seconds, he’s back on you, filling you up to the base of him. The dark hairs at the base of him tickle your swollen clit as he rolls his hips into you. A tingling warmth pools in his belly and surges through every sensitive nerve on his body, accompanied by the surge of blood that rushes to every corner of his flesh, his response making it obvious that his release is imminent.

His hips slow, and he lets out a rough moan, spilling inside of you. He pauses there, and you feel him gently pulsate and twitch as your walls drain every last bit of cum inside him.

He collapses on top of you, working to catch his breath, an exhausted mix of sex, heat, and general tiredness from the restless night. You wrap your arms around his broad shoulders, and intertwine your fingers around his now full-on wet locks and trace small patterns onto his back. You stay there like that, in your sticky embrace of sex and emotion, until your heart rates return to normal and your breaths find a manageable pattern.

He slips out, bringing with him a glob of cum that pools on the cushion beneath you. He leans back on the other arm of the small couch and watches as he slowly pools out of you. “Mmm, sure do love watching me drip out of you,” his gaze doesn’t move from the filthy sight of it.

He leans forward to drag his pointer finger through your folds, causing your body to twitch at the unexpected sensation on your tender clit. He slightly presses the tip of his finger into you, and his cock twitches and begins to swell like it’s ready to go again. He drags his finger out, now coated with a mix of you and him, and he brings it up to your lips.

“Taste us,” he says. You open your mouth to welcome the cum-coated finger onto your tongue. You savor the taste of the mix of you, an overly salty, heady mix of sweat and semen.

Once satisfied, he removes his finger and leans back once more.

In your fucked out state, you tilt your head toward the coffee table, noticing that the remaining cholado has turned into a sticky, syrupy mess.

“Sad that’s melted, I could really use something cold right about now,” you say as you reach your arms up and try to secure your wet hair into a little bun on the top of your head.

“How about a cold shower,” Javi offers, a smile on his face. He stands and offers his palm to you for the second time tonight.

Without saying anything, and without hesitation this time, you place your hand in his, and he pulls you off the couch and into his arms. His chest firm against yours, he brings both of his palms to cup your face in an embrace. He pauses momentarily before leaning down to place his lips against yours.

“And then maybe some breakfast?” He says, tilting his head to the side, signaling to the window.

The sun is now rising, bringing with it what you can only imagine is going to be another tortuous day.

Well, almost as torturous.

At least now you have each other.

Although you’re pretty confident you won’t be getting any sleep tomorrow night, either.

END

Tagging some moots: @darkheartgatita @elegantduckturtle @alltheglitterandtheroar @hotgirlbedtimescenarios @reddedmiller @morallyinept @theywhowriteandknowthings @beefrobeefcal @secretelephanttattoo @ruinmepedro @papipascalispunk @dins-riduur-anthe @untamedheart81 @planet-marz1 @pascalpvnk @elvinaa @joeldjarin @javiscigarette @cavillscurls @bastardmandennis @janaispunk @endlessthxxghts

Oh hey! You made it to the end. Cool. Thanks for reading. Since you're here, I'll pass on a reminder that I'm just a horny little wannabe fic writer trying to make her way on this hell site and write things that make people turned on happy. Likes and comments are wonderful and much appreciated, but reblogs are really what counts in making people see this, especially for smaller blogs like mine. If you like this, please consider reblogging.

#javier pena narcos #javier pena smut #pedrohub #javier pena x reader #javier peña #javi pena #javier pena fanfiction #narcos #javier pena x you

199 notes · View notes

mysteriesgalplusdamianthings · 7 months

Text

We Got More Info!!!

The newest update just came out today, and we get some more information on our girl Maps. Buckle up because this is going to be a long one.

We're diving back into Maps' abilities.

○ So it turns out Maps had designed and created her own technology to Teleport and Time Travel. Which is a crazy feat all on its own! So teleporting requires her to have some sort of line of sight and organic material. Which means it's safe to assume she can appear just about anywhere she wants. (Sort of like instant transmission)

○ Another thing about her "instan transmission" is that it only applies to herself. So there isn't much she can do in regard to teleporting multiple people at once. But does that include objects? I feel like this could be a downside in the long run, but I can also see the benefits.

I like that she fizzles in and out of places, like lighting. The voice changer on her helmet is a nice touch, too.

○ Her fighting style is something to be desired, though. She uses an electronic shock to attack her opponent. I was hoping to see her use some offensive/defensive styles that the Bat family could have taught. (Cough Damian cough)

I definitely wanted to see another set of her abilities outside of just her device. But just seeing her in action was nice. Maybe once the real fight starts, we'll see more of her defense.

Another thing I noticed was a lack of a mask. I'm not sure how safe it is to not be wearing a mask without her helmet. I guess it's not a big deal since she introduced herself using her real name from the beginning.

But I doubt she does this in the future, Batman must not have been her mentor if this was allowed.

○ The time traveling isn't really explained much in the chapter, but what we do know is that it's only got a limited time frame, in each time period.

Referring back to that time, when she got that little notification on her device.

We're not sure what the "specific limit" is, but it's safe to assume it's not long. On top of her limited time remaining in the past/future. She probably won't give out much information about her future and how she became Meridian.

I've said this before, but I hope Maps gets her own issue about her journey of becoming Meridian. That would be so hyped!

All I'm all, I love the amount of "screen time" Maps is getting in this chapter. Hopefully, we'll get more action in the last chapter.

Bonus:

Their faces in this panel sent me!!!!

72 notes · View notes

beesmygod · 7 days

Text

today is webcomics day. i am bea and i make "A Ghost Story" - part 3: sketch 1

ed note from the future: this got long. its going mostly under a readmore for everyone's sake. and i didnt even finish sketching, just trying to explain what is going through my mind while trying to sketch. look, if i write down my process in exhausting detail people will realize im completely insane. this is a net benefit to anyone trying to interact with me in the future who thinks i can be reasoned with. community service. thank you for allowing me to post this shit lol

hmmm. giving up on the first few panels for right now. here's what i'm thinking about as i sketch this:

too many of my panels were talking heads or constantly relied on one point perspective. i have been trying to work against this for a while with mixed results. sometimes the result is so bad i have to scrap what i did and start over but sometimes it's "good enough for TV"* and i hit publish on it. no risks, no reward after all. can't get better if you don't try.

in this first panel, i have two people having a back and forth conversation through a weird magic hole in the floor/wall. maxine is laying on a couch with hole right above her head. homestar runner will demonstrate what i mean:

however, there are logistical problems with maxine that homestar runner doesnt have. maxine's right shoulder is dislocated, so she can't lay on that side, or any side that would put pressure on the joint. im realizing i don't actually know what position would be most comfortable in her situation or how she would instinctually arrange her body to avoid pain. i start looking up videos from physical therapists on how they recommend patients sleep for some ideas.

also i start looking up what women look like sleeping on couches. how does the human body fold up. because this isn't it.

anyway, this was my first effort with the first panels.

for reference, the last page ends like this:

the top left of the sketch would have been the hopi clown back on the shelf with the "camera" tilting above it to reveal maxine. while this keeps the relevant object from the previous page in frame as a piece of connective tissue between updates....i'm struggling to fit the second character in. the one talking from the hole. maybe there's still hope for this? it's not terrible. initially i nuked it but maybe i can make this work.

fuck! she needs a pillow or two to make this work. this video is right, that DOES look naturally comfortable compared to the standard fetal position that would pull the affected shoulder inward. i didn't draw any pillows into the stupid establishing shot of the office bc its not the kind of couch you are expected to sleep on!!! this is a man's business office!!! i thought i was so smart!!

basically every couch comes with decorative pillows though, and the shot of the room didn't include the wall the "camera" was up against. my 2-point perspective failure might have paid off here lol. if i can establish that the second character is talking through the hole, he can use his rayman hands to reach across the room and get the pillow for her. it can be part of his personal campaign to show maxine he means her no immediate harm. the pillows were just out of frame. lurking. ok let's try it again. uhhhh after i eat some lunch

---

*my friend kelly had an anecdote from working in animation that im going to retell badly from memory. her boss would take the work she labored over to meet by deadline and would laugh at it, saying "ah, its terrible! but good enough for TV". and while extremely mean, he had a salient point: it never has to be perfect. it just needs to be good enough to be seen. sometimes i seriously think about this anecdote when im dissatisfied with my own art. it's bad. but it's good enough for tv.

#a ghost story #web comics #webcomics #webcomic #webcomic day

23 notes · View notes

runabout-river · 8 months

Text

Thoughts on JJK chapter 236 (spoilers)

😭

This chapter starts with a gut punch. A time displaced reality where Gojo suddenly sees his dead friend again and realizes, together with the readers, that he lost. Is this a figment of Gojo's imagination or a gathering of souls before they depart to the afterlife?

The souls have some heartfelt conversations with each other and Gojo talks about how strong Sukuna was (my analysis from two weeks ago is null and void at this point but my point that Sukuna isn't finished and that Gojo still needs to be taken off the picture has come true at least.)

We get a panel of Lotus flowers, and apparently they represent resilience and rebirth but more on that later. Gojo also talks about a father. His own or is this about Toji that Shoko will deal with now?

Nanami references a conversation he had with Mei Mei about choosing a path in your life. Going North for starting anew or going South for staying who you are. These directions have meaning in Buddhism but I don't know too much about it.

Nanami chose south and went back to being a sorcerer and the title of this chapter is also about going south. But what about Gojo? Does the north/South decision apply to him as well?

I wonder if the start of the anime season 2 influenced Gege into drawing this scene like this. And of course, Toji photo bombed the panels again. Overall, this scene has such a serene energy to it. Even in death, people can find peace, unfortunately I can see the death count reaching Demon Slayer heights like this. But also...

Is he dead? Completely and utterly dead? As we learn, Mahoraga is dead but Sukuna used its adaptation as a manual to find a way to circumvent Infinity and he succeeded. Sukuna straight up cut the entire space around Gojo making Infinity useless. Still, Gojo's head is still attached to his torso and in a later panel we see him smile.

Sukuna is actually happy right now, completely at odds with everyone else except Kashimo. Did Gojo show him what true love is? Will that love follow him to the future or will it be something fleeting? Will Sukuna yearn for this fight later on?

What will happen now and is Gojo truly dead. Some thoughts.

- "Go South" is a solitary chapter as it has no number in it, meaning next chapter will start the Kashimo fight as its own mini-arc

- There are actually multiple ways in which Gojo can still survive, most prominent being that his head is still attached to his (separated) torso AND Shoko's absence in this chapter. The Lotus flowers also strengthen a rebirth/survival theory.

Gojo himself had told Toji that he should've cut his head off to kill him properly and that principle still applies here and we see Gojo smiling in his last panel

Basically everyone from Hidden Inventory got to shine this chapter at the airport but Shoko, the only living person from that time, was conspicuously absent in the later panels. We see Yuji, Yuta and Maki but not her

Up until now, we could make a good guess on how Gojo's fight went by looking at Shoko's reactions. That she's missing here is telling in that a shocked face e.g. would've cemented Gojo's death

Shoko can use RCT on others and Gojo can use it on himself. In addition, as long as Gojo is conscious he can make a binding vow to help his healing, even if in this case it's about re-ataching his torso with his abdomen

Take note that Gojo lost this fight. He is the loser and he accepted that in the airport. He has no regrets regarding this BUT I will not believe that he won't have regrets in leaving his students behind with a sorcerer who even he couldn't defeat.

My hope is that Gojo will sacrifice his 6-Eyes in a Vow to save his life. This might be the decision he has to make on going North or South: going North to Nirvana or going South on the path of a Boddhisatva. The title says South.

How I see the next set of chapters going: The Kashimo/Sukuna will start and it will take centre stage but somewhere in the background Shoko will get to Gojo and try to save his life.

After overcoming the initial shock and going through a short grieving process over this fictional character that means so much to me, I've come to partially accept his death actually. I still hope for his survival and I'm sure that at least on the editorial side of JJK nobody would be completely on board with Gojo getting killed. Gojo is more of a face of JJK then Yuji in some ways. This character is important to the manga on a meta level and him getting killed before the end of the manga seems unlikely.

That the break happened last week on not after this one could be a sign that no one in Jump wants the "Gojo is dead" scene to fester too much before it's revealed that he will be saved, too.

#jjk #jujutsu kaisen #satoru gojo #sukuna #meta

115 notes · View notes

oluka · 9 months

Text

Thoughts on Invincible Iron Man #8 and #9

When I read Invincible Iron Man #8, I couldn’t believe my eyes. A reference to Iron Man #182, in my Iron Man comics? More likely than I thought. The fact that the reference was tasteful and also showcased Duggan’s understanding of Tony’s character was the icing on the cake. To sum up the scene: Tony just got hurt very badly by two Stark Sentinels and is half conscious. He reaches out and asks Emma for help. She gets into his mindscape, which we discover is a snowy alley full with empty bottles and sad tags on the walls.

“No way out, safe, hope”. This is the melodrama I want to see in my Iron Man comics. I also loved that Emma didn’t dismiss Tony’s trauma: “It’s real, but it’s not what’s happening right now.” She helps him get out of this flashback/mindspace, and the fight goes on.

There’s this beautiful panel where Tony surrenders his suit to save Emma:

Look at it!! Look at the colours! Look at the lines! The motion!

Anyways. Tony manages to get Emma away from the fight, taunts Feilong to kill him. Then in issue #9, he refuses Steve’s help when he arrives (because he needs to be alone and he wants to protect his friends) and then he meets up with Emma in the sewers, runs back to his workshop to make her a ring to conceal her from Orchis, and comes back to her. He also bandages his own injuries.

He gets down to the sewers again, and gets into an argument with Emma about his and her actions (or lack thereof) against Orchis/Feilong. And then…

Tony has a panic attack. Which I think is the first time, ever, we see this happening explicitly in an Iron Man comic (I’m happy to be proved wrong). He has a panic attack because everything is going to hell and Rhodey is getting hurt in prison and Feilong is trying to kill Rhodey and Tony. Tony is hurting, physically and mentally, and Duggan does not shy away from showing that. I think that Frigeri made an excellent job in drawing Tony so angry and literally foaming at the mouth: he’s not doing well, his emotions are all over the place. He cries (!!) and asks for help, again. I’m really surprised that Tony asks for help twice in as many issues. Is it because he trusts Emma to calm his mind? Is it easier for him to ask her instead of his friends because it’s less personal? Or is he so desperate that there is no other way? I don’t know. Regardless, it’s interesting.

This time, Emma brings him to his happy place:

His happy place, his “idealistic self-image”, is him surrounded by the Iron Man armours. Emma’s comment about there being less unsavoury people and “tramps” than she’d expected pleased my vindicative heart. But more importantly: last issue, we got to see Tony’s worst mindscape, where he falls into when everything is going to hell and he’s dying. And it was him, alone, in the snow, surrounded by his biggest weakness and fear: alcoholism. In this issue, we see his happy place, which is essentially: Iron Man. What Tony loves most about himself is Iron Man, what he hates most is his alcoholism. AAAAAAAA. This is such quintessential Tony. It’s him. I think I haven’t seen such a good characterization in Iron Man comics in a decade. I still barely believe it.

The following panels set up Tony and Emma’s alliance for the upcoming comics. Judging from the solicits for IIM 12 and 13, they’re going to be a team for at least until those issues, and maybe further.

Emma’s ruthlessness and Tony’s genius can make for a deadly combo. They’re not playing around. I hope we will see them shine together. I can’t wait for them to give Feilong and Orchis what they deserve. Also, note the way they phrase their alliance: “To their deaths.” Add to that the way they are framed, both dressed sharply and facing each other like that, and my mind immediately made the connection to wedding vows: “Until death do us part”. Am I reading too much into it, or was this intentional from Duggan and Frigeri? Maybe future wil tell.

To end this long post, here are unrelated thoughts:

1. I love the current trend of Avengers actively helping Mutants fight against Orchis. We have Tony, of course, but also Steve who reformed the Uncanny Avengers to fight against Orchis; Thor just saved a mutant in Immortal Thor #1, we’ve had mentions of Vision, Reed and T’Challa helping on the information side… It’s great. Between AXE Judgment Day and Fall of X, it seems that Marvel writers/editorial have decided to stop pitting the X-men and Avengers against each other. Let’s hope it stays that way. Avengers help everyone, and it’s nice to finally see it even in x-men books. Also, it gives us awesome panels:

2. Tony is his own nemesis confirmed. Thank you, Duggan.

And that’s it! If you’ve read this far, consider telling me in comments or tags what you thought. I might start doing posts like this for every Iron Man comic week.

#tony stark #Invincible Iron Man (2022)#emma frost #iron man #wednesday spoilers #long post

126 notes · View notes

transhawks · 1 year

Note

I remember that Hori referred to Hawks (and Ochako) being a 'light of hope' in 2021. It's also interesting that it was Hawks who commented on Ofa and how it connects people's hearts. Do you have any thoughts on this?

I think that arc was very dark for Hawks specifically and the anime's rendition of it is very dark. However these chapters... in 323-325 it is a bit different. It's where I think Hori was honest and where I do think Hawks and especially Ochako are at their brightest, narratively. So, uh, to go back to my writing for Graduation Day, I remember debating whether to analyze this scene because I thought it was relevant. I eventually decided that six thousand words is enough and to spare y'all, but let's get into it because I think it confirms my thesis that vulnerability is needed for connection in BNHA.

Ochako's first panels in 324 have her saying, admitting actually, that she cannot reassure people. She acknowledges they're all scared and worried.

This was the best thing she could have done.

The deification of heroes was something that led to the system they have now. Somewhere in the glitz and hero rankings people forgot these are regular people.

We see this repeatedly as an issue of identities - why Toshinori seems a shell of himself outside of All Might, most of Enji's issues boil down to him not knowing how to be Enji versus Endeavor and screwing his family up for it, and Hawks is...well, everything about Hawks is about being a Hero rather than a person, which is why Horikoshi had him kill someone literally named "humanity".

Ochako doesn't allow this to go on. She makes it clear they're all scared, they're all people who want safety, comfort, and want to be clean from mud and dirt, same as any other. It's why she's one of the Savior Kids; she's geared to try and humanize the other side. It's why she's paired with Toga. See below, as she thinks of Toga while giving a speech.

Essentially she reached the people in that crowd by reminding them who Deku is - a kid with way too much on his shoulders, a person just like them. Not a symbol, not a quirk, like AFO is treating him as. A boy. Or "regular high school kid" - yeah, I should have put this in Graduation Day, lol.

Symbols aren't meant to be fragile or have to come out from the rain. Deku does because he's a person.

So what about Hawks?

This isn't the last time Keigo is going make metaphors about One for All. Remember the line so many people read in bad faith about him comparing Endeavor "linking" people together too? He was talking about connection, pure and simple, realizing that much of his own motivations and Inasa's are connected through Endeavor, or their perceptions of him.

Truly, it's just him remarking that seeing society as holistic, as a whole rather than a part, is the key to solving their issue.

I think the emphasis on showing your soul, ugliness and cracks and all is one of the keys to reaching the villains. Something that doesn't position them as moral superiors, which is where Keigo failed drastically with Jin. He didn't give him a good choice at all. He also wasn't willing to be fully vulnerable with him. But I also think there's another dimension to this. More and more I think Horikoshi is actually criticizing individualism and the idea of "the great man". In his depicting of bystander system that has become an issue from society delegating acts of kindness and heroism to an actual career, I think he's critiquing the idea that one person can shoulder that burden.

It shouldn't be a person but a village, so to speak. It says a lot that the characters we know as villains are both seeking connection but also saying, in the depths of despair, that their individual will can change the world.

I still interpret this scene as Dabi deep in denial. Uh oh, he actually FELT something, time to double down and reiterate he doesn't give an actual fuck when truth is he DOES, he just doesn't want to. Otherwise he has to FEEL.

Anyway, the emphasis on the single person and single convinction is another one of those clues I think Horikoshi is leaving us about the "Great Man theory".

The great man theory is a 19th-century approach to the study of history according to which history can be largely explained by the impact of great men, or heroes: highly influential and unique individuals who, due to their natural attributes, such as superior intellect, heroic courage, extraordinary leadership abilities or divine inspiration, have a decisive historical effect.

I remember balking when I read this. Maybe it's because here in the West, there's little uhh agreement over Napoleon being heroic. Maybe it's because my history teachers were unsual but I've never really seen anyone seriously consider Napoleon heroic. There always seemed to be agreement he was a power-mad tyrant who took advantage of the Revolution to enact a military coup and then actual progress made by the Jacobins. So the fact chapter 3 of BNHA has Mic quoting him as a great hero was always weird. At the time of my first read through, I wrote it off as maybe Japan doesn't take this approach to Napoleon and the Revolution. One person's tyrant is another's hero, you know? But more and more I think Horikoshi has been debunking Great Man Theory with his manga. First off the premise of Great Man is usual that the Great Man is born, that his Greatness is congenital. That there's a natural aptitude for greatness, like superior intellect, etc. BNHA is absolutely refuting that, has from the first page. In fact the characters who get into the trap of believing they are born "anything" are shown to be trapped or not in a good way (see Redestro, or see Tomura and Keigo believing they are born to destroy/have dirty wings respectively). So much of who Deku has become is supposed to change this idea of biological predisposition to greatness.

Even Dabi, who has struggled against the circumstances of his birth, falls into the trap of believing some people are born with everything and are born to everything, essentially internalizing the worst of his father's own beliefs.

The story isn't kind to people who give us this rhetoric - that depending on others is wrong, or weakness. It's why Deku had his arc, after all.

Which brings us to my second point - the story isn't the triumph of individuals against evil. It's about people coming together. That's why Ochako and Keigo had their moments of realization in 323-325.

It's not about one person. It's about people.

Lastly, and this is conjecture, but there's a curiosity to the Great Man theory from a cultural standpoint. Now each culture has its Great Man to some extent. I've spoken about how All For One is likely trying to emulate Oda Nobunaga with his Demon Lord talk. But the emphasis on individual actions over collective ones, the commercialization of heroism, and the idea of competition breeding innovations/results are distinctively Western Capitalist ones. And in...a clumsy way, I think Horikoshi has been hinting at this being part of his own criticism.

Did you ever notice how the Japanese anime has them say "Hero/Hiro"? It's an imported word. Japanese has other words that mean hero, like yusha or eiyu, which have different meanings that all relate to the English hero as either a brave person (yusha) or a person of greatness/importance (eiyu). Why then use hiro, a foreign word as the title for this career?

Because the hero system is canonically imported. And so perhaps are the ideals it brought with it.

#asks #bnha meta #hawks #ochako #bnha

149 notes · View notes

aro-comics · 2 years

Text

Growth (Part 2)

Growth, Part 2/3 – ITS REALLY NOT THAT HARD!! 😭😭 Lol sorry but the last panel is absolutely me when I think about amatonormativity as a whole, it’s really silly the more you think about it and I can’t believe that it’s so deeply engrained in most of the world.

I think I should mention I don’t have any specific narratives to reference for the tropes described in this comic, as much as I would like to, as I started panelling this a year ago and past me GOOFED and didn’t leave many notes on what examples she was specifically think of. Again, feel free to let me know any examples you can think of in the comments or via DM! I’ll pin them if they’re in the comments and I might make a follow up Tumblr post listing examples 😊

Also, while I was researching this general topic I did go through TV Tropes “The Singles” (as a character type? Category) page, and I found something very interesting. There’s a literally a section describing the tropes that “explain” why a character was not in a romantic relationship … and literally they have ever “Excuse” for why a character might be single except for. Maybe literally they’re aromantic 😭 The closest is “Allergic to Love” (which like, relatable. But also not inherently an orientation).

Just like …. OH MY GOD. People sometimes try to act like we’re being dramatic about leting people know being Aromantic is possible but STRAIGHT UP. IN POPULAR CULTURE (and often OUR WHOLE LIVES BEFORE WE DISCOVER THE TERM, AND ACCEPT OUR IDENTITES) THE IDEA OF BEING AROMANTIC IS JUST NON-EXISTENT, WRITTEN AROUND WITH EVERY OTHER POSSIBLE “EXCUSE” OR “EXPLANATION” Because apparently the idea that someone could just not feel romantic attraction is too much for this world 😫

I don’t have too much else to say, other than I hope you’re all holding up okay and taking care of yourselves.

Image Description:

Slide 1: Celia holds her hand up to her chin, contemplating. “The whole idea of growth being tied to romance is reflected in other tropes too –”

Slide 2: A split panel is illustrated. A south asian girl is shown crying as she types on her phone. She mutters to herself “Ugh, I’m SO done with dating. I’m putting myself first for once.”

On the other side of the panel, she is shown to have gone through a *transformation* (a la early 2000s makeover), and bumping into her destined love interest.

“The character’s efforts to “work on themselves” and “get away from romance”, are ironically what lead them to finding their “happy ending”.

Slide 3: Alternatively, a character finally accepting that they are happy single is seen as a “stepping stone” to being “ready” for a relationship.

In this scene, a brunette wearing a yellow shirt and dark skirt proclaims “I can be happy as a single woman”. In the background a spotlight flicks on as her “right” love interest appears. “Achievement unlocked: True Love interest” is overlaid in a font reminiscent of classic video games.

Slide 4: Celia speaks to the viewer. “Again, there’s nothing inherently wrong about either of these stories. It’s amazing if someone who gave up on love due to frustration, not a lack of desire, finds it again through pure fate and luck.”

Slide 5: Celia gestures now as she tries to explain, “But the problem is that these moments are framed as more of a “gotcha”, where this idea of pursuing growth purely for oneself, or holding any disdain of a romantic relationship in this process, is inherently wrong. In the end, even growing for yourself is really about growing for a romantic relationship.”

Slide 6: Celia rubs her hands through her hair in frustration. “Like … not everything is about being in a relationship! It’s not that hard.”

#regularcomic #GrowthComic

765 notes · View notes

senkusphone · 5 months

Text

Dr. Stone chapter 3D trivia post

Hello, um. I hope yall had a pleasant solstice celebration of your choice- I've been pondering whether what we just saw merits a triva post, but let's try to squeeze some for the sake of completion, shall we?

Check out also my trivia posts for chapters 1D and 2D.

They're the same picture.

It took me way too long to notice what was off in this cover, it seems to be nothing but an aesthetic choice. Other than these off colors, this specific suika melon design first appeared during the Treasure island arc, right after Ryusui punted her off the Perseus.

To directly quote what I wrote at one time on the wiki:

Too bad, the ship Chelsea shows up in is not the Perseus D. Monkey from chapter 214 (which itself is a One Piece reference, as Boichi is a big fan).

Interesting that we get a nearly identical shot, instead of Kohaku standing behind her, it's Ruri and Matsukaze.

This posture done my Matsukaze is called Namaste (with other names such as Namaskar), which is used both as a greeting and as an indication of reverence all over the southern parts of Asia, along with other similar gestures. I know this is familiar to many myself included but I had never looked into the deeper details until now.

Figurines showing this pose have been excavated from the Indus valley civilization dating to between 2700 and 2100 BCE, making this piece of cultural heritage at least 7800 years old by the time of this panel.

Xeno has clearly had his hand in the architecture of the Japan side of the KoS, with some new constructions resembling his own Evil Disneyland back home.

Hold back yer tears

Kaseki has lived well. It's hard to tell how old he is now, he lived longer than the timeline's consistency thats for sure, I blame time travel.

At the time Taiju got wed, he was around 70 years old.

Kaseki and Chrome go back way further than the KoS, the fanbook tells us that Kaseki helped Chrome build his shed when he was just a boy.

Feel your heart a bit shakey? hang on there, we now get to talk about whyman's sorrow, and a small observation that I've made

Whyman can have emotions, the circuits that process that can be switched on and off, but the fact that a message can, or needs to be "left" for themselves, as well as his farewell for all eternity, has an interesting implication: once switched off, whyman loses the recollection of any experience they had in the meantime. These circuits allow whyman to feel, and also to then forget. This is useful, as emotions help them survive, but forgetting prevents the emotional baggage from growing infinitely over a virtually immortal life.

"If we remembered every single parting person, it would only be a few generations before the sorrow would pile up to the point it became unbearable. Maybe it is a blessing to forget. Forgetting allows us to get even. Forget sorrows as new ones replace them. Life can go on, if tragically. No accumulating loss that would one day make everyone struggle to survive and eventually pass on; though that last thing does also sound very much like today."

(10B points to the ~2 people who know where this quote is from, I digress)

So that's cool, and heartbreaking, but so what, does it connect to anything we've seen before?

Well...

In ch. 232 we see that Whyman does not know what created them.

How could that be, if they can remember things over deep time?

Maybe it is that Whyman chose to forget their creators, and everything they felt about them. Beings that they may even have loved in the deep deep past, and could not cope with yearning for.

The blonde, bangs & ponytail lineage.

The village graveyard. Last time we saw it, Byakuya's gravestone was opened to reveal the glass record.

A lot of recognizable headstones are still up now, some appear to have moved.

Other headstones might be gone or be different... The one with four dots that was there originally can't be seen in this new shot but it can be seen later in the chapter.

Also, I hate to break this to you, but there's more headstones now than there were before.

I counted 45 in the original shot, 50 in the new one, not including any that Chelsea and Senku may be covering. Granted this is likely just an oversight.

(I should mention that in order for them to match bottom to bottom, the top image is flipped horizontally).

(omg look at the babiesss)

What Xeno is telling Chrome is that if whyman went and altered their own past, then what they are seeing currently is the result of that, since whatever changes they made, are in the past after all.

They already happened and they are part of the timeline that leads them to where they are now.

Assuming they actually found Byakuya (or a petrified time traveler) means that either whyman created some sort of causal loop that is self sustaining (ie, the ramifications of the changes in the past include whyman going back to do them in the first place), or more in line with the many worlds hypothesis, that going back to the past and changing it creates a new parallel timeline where the repercussions of that happen, with no effect in the first one.

In the latter case it means the timeline we see now was altered by the whyman from a parallel universe.

The stone axe is a bit dissonant with where they are, technologically speaking, yes? Thing is, that's the one Senku took to the moon with him.

He's had it since chapter 1.

A few people I've seen mystified about this structure they unearthed at the cementery:

This is a collapsed building just like the structures that the Tsukasa empire occupied.

(shoutout to that guy about to die in the back)

Interestingly, this means that Ishigami Village is established on top of a once urban area.

I am always pumped for any extra bits of village lore I can get.

Did Suika's handwriting trigger your AI generated image senses? it did for me.

We were bamboozled again. If it ends up happening it's gonna be like the tale of the wolf. The moment we stop taking it seriously, Inagaki is gonna smack us across the head with it.

We were actually preparing for the poop on a stick to hit the f.a.a.n on discord. What do I make about the ending? I don't know, I got no big analysis this time around but I believe it's very likely we'll see more at some point.

30 notes · View notes

keulixeutin · 2 years

Text

A Little Bit of This (& A Little Bit of That)

a/n: i am so tired of rereading this thing. i’ll probably have to come back an edit it again in a few days; i just gotta get this posted kajsdlfkja. is it ooc? dog i don’t know but we doing what we can lmaooooo. also, what city are they in?? yeah idk that either lolol. also also, have y'all see loweater's shinsou fanart? hot firstly. secondly i won't tag bc this is a smut story LOL but go check out their pretty pics man!! LASTLY i hope y'all enjoy this piece.

summary: you find your own little adventure after losing your group in the club. shinsou x reader.

cw: 18+, smut, adult content, au, car sex, public sex, exhibitionism, voyeurism, alcohol, shinsou refers to reader as angel and sometimes baby, some degradation, dirty talk, fingering. inexperienced!reader. afab!reader. she/her pronouns.

word count: 7,136 words

The club was dimly lit with atmospheric glows of reds and blues. There was the occasional flash from the lights on the stage, flickering in time to the vibrating bass of the live band. None of it was helpful to you though, more mood-setting than visual help. Shadows still licked along the walls, obscuring the people swaying to the beat. You couldn’t figure out where your roommate and her bachelorette party disappeared off to.

You had gone to the bar to grab a drink; it had only taken a few minutes, but when you had returned to the exact spot you had left them, you found yourself alone in a sea of swaying strangers. You sighed, running your hand through your curled hair. It was fine, you reassured yourself. As long as the bride was having fun, you didn’t mind catching up with them later. Besides, you couldn’t keep up with their wild energy, and you had been internally begging for a chair to give your blistered feet a break for the last forty minutes.

You turned around to make your way back toward the bar, hoping you could find an empty seat. As you maneuvered through the crowd, someone stepped backward and bumped into you. You only had time to catch his short blond hair coming into your vision, unable to avoid the collision.

“Shit,” you muttered as your drink sloshed, spilling over the rim of your cup and dripping down your hand. “Sorry! Did it get on you?”

When you looked up to him, pretty blue eyes glinted back mischievously. He said something, but his words were swept away with the pulsating music.

“Sorry, what?” you yelled back.

He leaned forward to be better heard; you felt wet lips and warm breath brushing against your hair as he tilted too close to your ear. “I said, it’s fine. Getting spilled on is a risk you take inside clubs.”

The feel of his words pressing against your curls and skin made an uncomfortable shiver slip down your spine. Whatever curiosity had been flickering at the color of his eyes immediately extinguished.

You leaned away from him, as subtle as you could. “Very true,” you answered back. Then, shooting him a polite smile, you turned to eagerly disappear into the crowd.

Abruptly, though, a firm grip on your wrist yanked you back.

“Hey, wait, wait,” he said, projecting his voice over the pulsing bass. “Where are you going so fast? Are you here alone?”

His hold had loosened as soon as he had your attention, allowing you to tug your hand easily out of his grip. “I’m with a bachelorette group,” you responded, trying to maintain some type of distance despite the club being packed. “And I really need to find them, so…”

“I’ll help,” he said, grinning. “What do they look like?”

“Uh, no, it’s fine—I’ll—”

He reached out for you again, fingers brushing against the skin of your waist, exposed by the cut out panels of your black dress. It was a cute detail when you had seen it online, but now you thought it was less cute, seeing as how a stranger was taking advantage of the easy access to your body—and how he wasn’t bothering to hide the long, lingering looks at your low cleavage.

“Let—” You flinched, stumbling backwards out of his reach and into something hard. From behind you, an arm snaked around your midsection. The dread that had been growing from the blond’s advancements suddenly shot into a heart-spiking fear as worst case scenarios passed through your mind—until you saw a left hand grab a hold of the blond’s wrist, keeping him from getting closer.

“I’ve been looking for you, angel—” The voice, low and smooth, rumbled from above you, cutting through the intrusive thoughts and vibrating music.

You looked up—past the hard chest peeking through an open, dark gray shirt, the thick neck with a simple silver chain, the shaved, sharp jaw—to the stranger’s half-grin and purple eyes. He looked friendly enough, but his eyes were staring intensely at the blond. He released his grip on him, but kept the other around your waist, still holding you loosely and gently even as he pressed you against him.

“Who’s your new friend?” His tone was relaxed despite the weight of his stare.

“I thought you said you were here with a bachelorette group,” the blond said to you, glancing at the new guy with irritation coating his tense smile.

So, they didn’t know each other? Was it just luck that this person had come by and stepped in?

The purple-haired stranger interrupted with an easy lie: “It’s a mixed group.” He tilted his head minutely, the shifting of it giving his once nonchalant smile a new pressure, as though he were daring the other to question him. “And this one,” he continued, “is supposed to be my buddy for the night, but she always slips away so quickly. You should really let me know when you’re running off, angel.”

You glanced between them, analyzing the situation, the stakes, the risks—the feel of one hand that stayed loose around your waist and the memory of the other one that had tightened against your skin.

You mustered a sheepish smile; you weren’t the best at lying (your face gave too much away), but you hoped the shadows hid whatever uncertainty was present in your cheeks. “…Sorry,” you finally said. “I’ll be sure to tell you next time.” You looked back to the blond. “Thanks for the offer anyways.”

The blond didn’t answer right away, still suspicious of the new man’s appearance and trying to figure out if there was anything he could do about those suspicions. Ultimately, though, the only other play left was a retreat, so he simply said to you, “Come find me if you get lost again,” and then turned and waded through the sea.

You absolutely would not, you thought to yourself, letting out a sigh of relief.

As you were about to thank your hero, you felt him shift his hold from an arm around your waist to a hand on your hip. He leaned toward your ear, keeping distance between his mouth and your hair, unlike the other guy, and said, “Sorry for my hand still on you, but he’s still watching. Third window from the door.”

Of course he was, you thought.

A hand squeezed your side gently. “It’ll be fine,” the purple-haired stranger said, giving you a reassuring smile. “You’re heading toward the bar, right? I’ll go with you. Got a seat saved.” He stepped behind you and placed both hands—light, calloused, and warm—on your exposed waist. You were suddenly very aware of the size of his hands, the breadth of his chest hovering behind you, and the light sparks that suddenly danced up your back, originating from the warmth of his hold.

You let him maneuver you through the crowd to the barstool against the wall. He raised a hand in thanks to the bartender that tilted his head toward the empty seat.

“Sit,” he said, and because your feet were aching so badly, you disregarded your need to decline several times before accepting, taking the seat instantly with a a grateful sigh at the weight and pressure lifting from your bruised feet.

“God, thank you,” you muttered, resisting the urge to take off your suede heels and massage your pulsing toes.

“It’s just Shinsou,” he said with a cheeky grin, and it took you a second to understand the joke.

He leaned forward against the counter, grabbing the attention of the dark-haired bartender to request a drink. They chit-chatted for a bit, seemingly friends, and it gave you the chance to fully take in your hero as you sipped on your watered down mojito. Logically, you knew that the bar was brighter so that the bartenders could effectively make drinks, but you felt as though the universe was spotlighting Shinsou just for you.

(The thought was embarrassing, maybe a little cringe-inducing, too, but that didn’t stop you from looking anyway.)

He had broad shoulders and he was lean, as far as you could see from his half-buttoned shirt (as far as you could remember, being pressed against his chest moments before). He was dressed well; you particularly liked his jewelry, the chain around his neck and the dangling earrings. His face was handsome, too, the chiseled jaw, the high cheek bones, the messy hair.

But what made him really handsome, what cemented your interest and curiosity, was how he held himself. He had a calm presence and a confident posture, neither a straightened back from nerves nor a curled spine from fear. There was a fluidness in the way he filled the space, shifting his movements like water filling a cup, touching every part around him without the fear that he was taking too much space. It was a surety that you yourself had been chasing for years.

It showed in his easy smile, too. It wasn’t a trait you had ever given though to, but Shinsou’s lopsided grin had stayed on his face during the interaction with the blond and after, unwavering, and you found that—captivating. He looked like he was in on a joke that no one else was privy to, one between him and god—or the devil.

When he turned to look at you after the bartender turned around to make his drink, your breath caught in your throat. His gaze was intense—not fierce or piercing, but heightened, sharp—secretive even, if the soft shadows under his eyes were any indication. He looked aware and watchful, but unbothered and untroubled, like he knew the effect he had on others but simply didn’t carel.

His brow shifting upwards in curiosity and his smile tilting into a full smirk made you realize that you had been staring at him quietly for too long.

“Got something on my face?” Shinsou asked, amused.

“No, I was just”—you scrambled for a reason—“realizing that I actually never gave you my name.”

He didn’t say anything. It took you a flustering amount of time to register that he was waiting for you to then say your name.

“…Which is [Name],” you finally said, clearing your throat. “That was…super awkward, sorry.”

He laughed. The sound was nice, sending goosebumps down the line of your spine. Too bad he was laughing at you. You mentally berated yourself.

The bartender came back and slid two drinks in front of Shinsou, who then passed one over to you.

“Rum and coke,” he said.

You didn’t want to tell him that you needed extra coke with this, not after he had just laughed at you, so you resisted the reluctant grimace and simply thanked him.

“So, you’re here for a bachelorette party?” he asked.

You nodded, pushing your mojito to the side and taking a small sip of your new drink—god, more coke would be better. “Yeah, my roommate’s,” you responded. “A whole group of twelve other girls that I somehow lost.”

He seemed to have noticed something in your tone and said, “Not your friends?”

You gave a guilty grin. “They’re all her high school friends.” You tried to keep your tone light, not wanting to sound bratty. “All of them have known each other for years, and I’m not super used to clubbing, so it’s been hard to keep up with them… It’s fine, though! As long as the bride’s having fun, it doesn’t matter if I get lost a few times in the crowd.” You wondered if that was as long-winded as it sounded to your ears. “…Um, so, are you here for anything in particular?”

“I flew in for a friend’s birthday,” he replied. “He’s dancing with someone near the stage.”

“Oh, fun,” you said weakly. You took another sip of your drink, swallowed both the bitterness and the wince, and wondered if this was the extent of your conversational skills. You had been wearing your social hat all day for your roommate’s friends, so maybe you could blame your social stumbling on that—and the fact that Shinsou was more intimidating than you had expected.

Not that he had done anything to make you scared—just that he was overwhelmingly attractive, and you were pretty sure people didn’t make friends in clubs. You were wildly unprepared to handle all of that, all of this. Everyone always hoped for a fun story, but you never thought you’d be so ill-equipped should it ever happen.

He didn’t say anything more, opting to look at you instead. You tried to match his stare, but you felt warm under the heat of his eyes and ended up looking away.

“You’re not as I thought you’d be,” Shinsou remarked suddenly.

This wasn’t a conversation that you were used to having, but one you were aware of. You knew he was trying to reconcile how you looked—dark lipstick, low cleavage, mini-dress—with how you acted—hesitant, awkward, inexperienced. He would probably leave soon; they usually did, after realizing that you didn’t match whatever energy you were putting out.

“Right, less interesting?” you said, relying on your habit of self-deprecation to avoid hurt feelings.

“Less…shy.”

It wasn’t a bad word, but you had never been called that before, not since high school, and you didn’t know why it bothered you so much. “I’m not really shy.” You tried not to sound defensive, but you could hear the way your tone betrayed your intent. “I mean—I wouldn’t consider myself to be.”

His hand slid across the table toward you, inches from your hands cupping your glass, but he didn’t touch you. “I didn’t mean it offensively,” he said. “I meant that I thought the way you’re dressed is different from how you act.”

You cleared your throat. “I’m confident in myself. Generally.” You glanced at him. He was still looking at you. You felt self-conscious before, but now you were on another level of distressingly aware. “I just don’t have as many experiences as other people, so sometimes I come off, um, weird.”

You felt your self-esteem take a hit, starting to compare yourself to the other people around you—and then you you steeled yourself, forcibly interrupting your own spiral.

This was not the first time you had said something off-putting in front of people, and he was not the first cute guy you had done it to either. This was fine, and if it wasn’t fine, it would be fine.

You took a longer sip from your drink, calming your nerves.

You weren’t in high school anymore. You weren’t going to whip yourself for feeling unsure. You were just as glamorous as the rest of the women around you; maybe you weren’t as experienced, but that was okay. You weren’t ashamed—just a little embarrassed whenever the light was shined on you.

Maybe a lot embarrassed, but no matter.

The hand that had been in your peripheral suddenly moved into your line of sight, his fingers looping around your wrist.

“Yeah…I should probably clarify, angel,” Shinsou announced, “that I think it’s cute, not weird.”

“Oh.”

Well, that was a bonus.

And an ego boost.

The back of your neck tingled from both his declaration and pet name for you.

Shinsou released your wrist and shifted to lean his back against the counter. You noted that, in swapping positions, he had closed the few inches between where he was standing and where you were sitting. Your knee buzzed as his shirt tickled your leg every time he adjusted or breathed, and you realized that the new angle allowed you to see further into his shirt. You couldn’t help but cast a glance at the new skin, see a glinting piece of metal against a brown nipple.

Ah, maybe you shouldn’t have looked.

Your cheeks warmed; your stomach flipped.

When you flickered your eyes back up to him and saw a tilted chin and a tilted smile, you wondered if he had done that on purpose.

He was different than how he looked, too, you thought.

“So,” Shinsou began, “since we’re confessing things, I’ll admit that I had a secondary motive for helping you out.”

He paused, as though savoring the sight of your stilled chest as you held your breath for his confession.

“I wanted to talk to you,” he said. “And I was tired of watching you talk to him.”

The redness of your cheeks expanded to your ears and the back of your neck.

“It was only two minutes,” you said.

Shinsou sighed exaggeratedly. “And those two minutes were exhausting.”

You laughed. Any previous awkwardness of the conversation (or awkwardness you had conjured in your mind) slowly melted away with his admission. “Your confession is more interesting than mine, actually. More relevant, too. And shorter.”

“Mhm, and what about sufficient?” he asked. At your confused look, he continued, “I’m trying to convince you that I’d like to kiss you.”

Instinctively, you bit your bottom lip.

“Um, sure, yes.” At the feel of the small, creeping anxiety of watching him leaning in, you said quickly, “I feel really obligated to say the whole making-out thing is part of the inexperience.”

Shinsou still entered your space as though he had been waiting for this moment the entire conversation and nothing—not even your hurried divulgence—would stop him. He tucked the disobedient curl of your hair behind your ear and then tangled his fingers into the rest of your strands, gently gripping the back of your head. Your heart was beating rapid-fire in your chest as you let him angle your head the way he wanted.

“How much have you done?” he asked. His breath, tinged with mint and alcohol, and his purple eyes, darkening as he looked down at you, sent chills down your back.

“Everything, I guess,” you answered—abashedly—excitedly—softly. “I mean, I’m not a virgin.”

Shinsou didn’t say it, but you could see in the teasing glint of his purple irises that he was laughing at you, that he could show you how little of everything you knew.

He closed the distance with a soft press of his lips against yours. It was a kiss that was slow and chaste, like he was testing the waters, like he was holding the smallest wildflower in the large palm of his coarse hands. His free hand danced faintly over your body, following the edge of your dress down your cleavage, down to your uncovered waist, down to rest on the little peek of your thigh at the end of the hemline.

He pulled back a few seconds later, checking your face for any signs of discomfort.

Your face was hot. Underneath the sharp mint and bitter alcohol was the boyish citrus musk of his cologne, wrapping around your senses in a dizzying manner.

“You alright, angel?” he asked. So close to him, you caught the way his voice ended in husky notes. Your gripped the edges of the stool in anticipation, thinking that, of all the men you had dated or kissed, you hadn’t felt this type of stirring electricity before.

“I’m not that much of a prude,” you said, trying for a light comment.

“Oh, so you are a bit of one?”

You made a face. You should’ve worded that better if you were trying to avoid turning even redder, you thought. Still, feeling emboldened, you were determined to maintain eye contact, to show him that you were interested, that you were interesting, that there were things you had done and things you wouldn’t mind doing—but you, once again, buckled under the intensity of his violet gaze.

You heard him chuckle.

“Dress like this but act like that,” he said, more to himself than to you.

The hand that had been tangled in your hair pressed against your lower back, nudging you to the edge of your seat so he could stand slotted between your legs. Seeing Shinsou lean in for another kiss, you angle yourself toward him and closed your eyes—but then a second went by where you could smell his scent but not taste it. When you opened your eyes to check, you found him staring with a quiet laugh at your puckered lips.

Shinsou closed the centimeters with a firm kiss before you could voice your complaints. His tongue traced your lips and probed the boundaries, and then he crossed them, the slick appendage dipping behind your lips and teeth. You reached out to touch his chest carefully; the muscle flexed under your caressing, and the surprised noise you made—somewhere between a strangled gasp and groan—was eagerly swallowed.

Fingers slowly ghosted up the inside of your thigh, higher and higher, leaving a trail of goosebumps in their wake. His thumb brushed over your clothed clit, and you trembled under the anticipation, under his tantalizing scent, his consuming kiss, his contracting muscles. The noise of the world around you, the background conversations humming under the loud bass, fading into a hazy muffle.

He kissed your jaw down your neck, latching onto a space that had you wanting to writhe and squeeze your legs together. When he hooked his fingers through your underwear, purposely rubbing at your heated skin with his knuckles as he did so, a moan fell from your lips.

“You wanna come back to my hotel room?” he asked. He nosed against the smooth expanse of your neck, inhaling your skin and floral perfume; you hoped the scent was just as dizzying to him.

“I don’t think I should leave the bachelorette party,” you muttered. Even though you couldn’t even find them, you thought reluctantly.

“Well, angel,” Shinsou said, “I have a Plan B, if you’re interested.”

“You’re not going to tell me what the Plan B is, are you?”

With his hand still under your dress, rubbing circles against your thigh, he pulled out his phone and said, “No.”

Moments later, Shinsou helped you down from the stool and took your hand to lead you through the crowd. The two of you passed by the blond near the exit, to whom Shinsou winked cheekily. You also caught sight of one of your roommate’s friends (of course it would be now, you thought). You made eye contact with her; her brows shot high into her forehead as you did an awkward wave before exiting the club.

The night sky was filled with a late summer heat and the booming bass from all of the clubs crowded onto that street. Groups of bachelors, bachelorettes, visitors, and townspeople intermingled throughout the shadows, cups and cigarettes in their hands as they made their way from one end of the block to the other, searching for flesh and fervor.

Shinsou glanced down at the Uber app on his phone and then scanned the parked cars, finding a black SUV some feet away. Still holding onto your hand, he led you toward it, opening the back passenger side and sticking his head in.

“Hey,” Shinsou said. “$100 for you to just park your car in a less crowded location.”

You tried to keep the surprise off your face. You had a risqué memory in the back seat of a tiny Honda, but you had a distinct suspicion that this Plan B would quickly eclipse that.

The driver didn’t look up from the game he was playing on his phone. “$150,” he countered, voice low and raspy like he had been screaming all day.

“$120,” Shinsou said.

There was a pause. Finally, the driver looked up from his phone and turned to Shinsou, eyes finally landing on you. He had a black jacket with the hood up, but beneath the shadows, glowing red eyes looked you up and down.

“$120,” the driver agreed in his cracked voice. “And I get to watch.”

You stiffened.

If you were Shinsou, you would’ve laughed, too, when you had answered him everything.

“Up to you, angel,” he said.

“Um.”

You felt warmer than the night air under the stranger’s scrutiny and Shinsou waiting. You wanted to—and that thought surprised you, even scared you a little. Was it bad that you wanted to? Or—did you want to because you were truthfully interested in an experience like this, or were you just trying to impress a pretty face? Or were you trying to prove something to yourself, to your roommate’s friend that had watched you leave with wide, disbelieving eyes, prove that you weren’t just dressing like this and acting like that.

“Hey.” Shinsou’s voice shook you out of your thoughts. He wrapped an arm around your waist, pulling you close as he maneuvered hs body to block the driver’s impatient, crimson stare. He kissed the top of your head, the move affectionate and comforting. “It’s whatever you want—don’t think about it so much,” he murmured. He gave you a tilted smile. “I like that you’re a little bit of this and that.”

You bit back the instinct to say that he didn’t know you, that he couldn’t know what this and that were, because for the short time you had spoken to him, you could already see in the dark lavender gleam of his eyes what he would say—that, though he didn’t know you well, he liked what he found; that, though he didn’t know you truly, he knew you enough.

“This is embarrassing,” you muttered.

“This is hot,” Shinsou corrected.

“This is dragging,” the driver complained. “Hurry up, or I’m kicking your request off the app.”

You took a deep breath, feeling reckless and red and hot and heavy, and you blurted out, “Okay. Okay, let’s—let’s go for it, fuck it…!”

Shinsou laughed. “The dress is starting to make sense,” he teased, letting you climb in first. He dug his wallet out of his pocket, flung a wad of cash at the driver, and then followed in behind you, slamming the door shut.

The SUV was clean with old, leather interiors. There were two back passenger seats; the third, middle one had been folded downloading to the back of the SUV. It wasn’t a bed—or comfortable—by any means, but it’d get the job done.

As the car drove off without any warning, you fell forward into the back area, hands out to keep from falling onto your face. The moment you turned around to try and get a grasp of your balance, Shinsou’s large body encompassed yours, his mouth pressing heated kisses against your neck, traveling down your to your collarbones, down to the swell of your breasts where he lingered and licked and sucked, leaving marks that you wouldn’t be able to ignore in the morning.

Your rolled your head back, ignoring the pain that erupted from hitting the ground haphazardly. Shinsou didn’t bother with the buttons at the back of your dress, opting instead to slip your breasts out of their fabric constraints. As soon as the new skin was exposed, his hands and mouth were on you, exploring with his teeth and tongue, searching for all the places that had you whimpering and pulling his hair, for all the places that had him groaning in anticipation. A chorus of sighs left your lips, filling the vehicle with hot breaths and fast pants. You hadn’t realized that the car had stopped until that moment, arching your back to press your chest further into his face as he worked you like an easy instrument.

In a daze of hot ecstasy and pleasure, you barely registered Shinsou pulling off your underwear and throwing it somewhere behind him.

“Come here,” he murmured. He climbed over you, helping you shift positions; he sat with his back against the car and with you sitting in between his legs, facing the front. At this angle, you could see the driver’s red eyes in the rearview mirror, and you immediately remembered the deal. The sight of him staring at you—watching you—sent an exhilarated heat down to the wetness between your legs.

“You like this?” Shinsou whispered. His tongue flicked out to trace the shell of your ear, sending vibrations down your spine. “You like him watching?”

Your breathing was heavy, eyes wide with lust and an excitement for something you didn’t know could turn you on. You didn’t know how to answer, weren’t sure if anything you could say would effectively convey whatever emotion this was, so you opted to stay quiet, attention desperately glued to the driver who reached into his pants and pulled out his hard cock, glistening under a street light. There was still the feel of thundering music around you, muffled by distance and metal, but you could still hear footsteps and movements and chattering conversations. The knowledge that you could be discovered—that there could be more watching—only made you warmer.

Both of Shinsou’s hands palmed your breasts, pinched and twisted your nipples. He was making it a show, you distantly realized through the cloud of pleasure; he was showing the driver how his fingers sank into your skin, how he gripped the fleshy mounds, how there were already bruises and red marks and slick saliva across the entirety of your chest.

“Spread your legs for him, angel,” Shinsou said, nipping at your shoulder.

Slowly, you bent your legs and spread them apart.

“A little more—that’s it. That’s a good girl.” His tongue flickered up your neck to your ear where his mouth latched onto your lobe, sucking it into the a heated and wet cavern.

“You want me to touch your cunt, baby?” Shinsou whispered. The word was strong and vulgar, sending a flush of desire down to your already dripping core. “Hmm?”

You watched the driver start pumping himself.

One of Shinsou’s hands slid down your body, putting pressure against you as he mapped out a path to your pulsing cunt. “So quiet,” he remarked. He gripped a handful of fabric and pulled your dress up to your waist, revealing all of you to the driver who you saw clench his jaw and heard grunt a swear.

You swallowed a moan, suddenly aware of the rise of an uncomfortable and unknown guilt, one you didn’t know had been cultivated somewhere in your life, pitted against your growing arousal. “I—”

“It’s okay,” Shinsou murmured, as if hearing the lustful confusion in the high pitch of your voice. “You don’t have to say anything. You can just be loud.” Shinsou nipped at your cheek. “We don’t have go all the way. A little bit of this and that is fine.”

“I’m—” You swallowed a thick lump; you didn’t know if you were about to complain or agree or just plead for him to continue, but you closed your eyes, let your neck relax as you leaned back against Shinsou, feeling his hardness against your backside, the steady beating inside his chest. He kissed your neck gently—tenderly—patiently. You were surrounded by the smell of weed and old leather and unknown cologne in the car, intermingling with the circle made of your floral perfume and Shinsou’s citrus scent. You could hear your rapid heartbeat, your own shallow panting, and beneath it, you could still hear the soft grunts from the front of the car and the desperate sighing of Shinsou breathing against your neck, even as he waited patiently.

“I’m okay,” you whispered, feeling your lust and longing overtaking whatever hesitation had been placed inside you years ago. “I want—more.” You reached back to reassuringly tangle your fingers into his soft locks.

He kissed your cheek. “This goes on for as long as you’re okay with it,” he reminded you.

The hand that had waited against the bunched up fabric of your dress finally dipped down to its destination, paying a visit to your twitching clit. You shifted and jerked, arching your back against his hold as you felt his other hand reach in between your legs, fingers probing at your slick tightness. Every gasp and movement and stiffening of your body jerked and jolted your breasts, and the driver’s dark red eyes drank you in thirstily. He made eye contact with you, and you found that you couldn’t break it, mesmerized by how much you felt craved and exposed between the two men.

Shinsou whispered in your ear as one finger entered you. “Look, baby, he likes the show. Fucking loves it. He’s imagining himself touching you like I am”—another finger entered you as the pressured circling of your clit intensified, eliciting a frenzied whine from your lips—“imagining that it’s his fingers knuckle deep in your sopping cunt. God, just listen to you—make that sound for him again—yes, that one, god fuck—”

You felt a third finger slip inside you, your walls trembling to shift and accommodate his thick, coarse fingers. The car filled with the lewd nosies of his fingers pumping in and out of your wetness, the sound of your pants and cries steadily growing louder as you pulled farther and farther away as you lost yourself in Shinsou’s expert attention.

“Dressed like a fucking slut, but you’re such a good girl, aren’t you? So sweet and innocent, so good. You gonna cum for me, angel? Fuck…” He was rutting into your back, biting needily onto your shoulder. “Fuck…!” Your walls pulsed and tightened around his fingers, three curling his name inside your walls with a fourth probing outside still. You were dizzy from the pleasure, dizzy from his words, dizzy from his smell, from the way he held onto you so desperately as if there weren’t anything else but this, nothing else but you and the way you arched and panted and chanted his name.

Your climax was building quickly. Every touch, every obscene word whispered against your skin, every press and rub and sound of his fingers inside of you, against you, your whimpering and the driver’s grunting and Shinsou whispering hotly and feverishly in your ear—you were climbing farther and farther into a blinding whiteness, reaching the peak of your pleasure. Shinsou bit down on your neck, quickening his movements to push you father, raise you higher. Your walls pulsed and tightened around his fingers, but it’s the way Shinsou groaned against your skin—dazed and dazzled from your smell, from both your cunt and your desperate hands squeezing him—that made you come and fall with a tight shutting of your eyes and a loud cry, louder than you’d ever been with any of your partners.

There was no break, though, no pause to catch your breath. At your next inhale, you were jolted, feverishly shifted to fit a hard body between your legs. You opened your eyes to see Shinsou’s face close to yours, his lopsided grin having been replaced by an urgently frantic need.

“Sorry, angel,” he grunted, undoing his belt and zipper. “I wanted to tease you some more, but I’m gonna fucking lose it if I wait any longer…”

He leaned forward to kiss you, taking both your breath and your sanity away. You felt him at your entrance, still sensitive and coming down from your orgasm.

“I’ll pull out. Didn’t expect to meet anyone as interesting as you tonight,” he said by way of an explanation. His finger brushed against your swollen and twitching clit. “Ready for round two?”

Feeling emboldened, you unbuttoned the rest of his shirt and said, “I’ve never cummed twice before.”

He smirked. He looked handsome with his ruffled hair falling into his eyes. “Is that a challenge?” he mused.

“More like—setting expectations,” you remarked cheekily.

You gasped suddenly as he pressed into you, pushing through the tense ring that, though wet with pleasure, was still tight and aching.

“So mouthy,” he whispered, grinning smugly at your reaction. “We’ll see how long you can keep that up, [Name].”

Him using your actual name sent butterflies in your stomach, but the feeling was quickly replaced with another growing heat in your lower belly as he pushed further into you, playing with red and puffed nub to help ease the process. You were still so sensitive, though, and you instinctively shuddered and writhed. He gripped your thigh fiercely to keep you still and close, right beneath him, right where he wanted you to be so that he could see every open mouth gasp and fluttering lash as he pushed further inside you.

“Shinsou—” you gasped out his name, and he still managed a self-satisfied chuckle. He leaned over you, sucking on the meat of your breast as he shifted the last few inches needed to fully fill you up. You whimpered at the feel of his veins vibrating against your stretched-out walls, eyes almost rolling to the back of your head.

“This view’s all for me,” he whispered.

You gripped his shoulder as he started to rock his hips.

“God, you feel so good,” he muttered. “Shit…”

You opened your eyes, hearing the adoration and strain in his low tone, and your stomach did multiple flips. He was staring right at your face, eyes flickering between watching himself enter you and watching your hazy, needy expressions, obsessively honing in on your parted lips as you let out throaty exhales with every move of his hips.

Despite the cramped interior of the car, Shinsou shifted your legs against him as best as he could, sinking further into you with a pleased grunt. The position wasn’t the most comfortable; your legs burned with his weight and you wanted nothing more than to have the open space to writhe and grip at heated sheets, but the feel of being filled, his hand still rubbing against your clit, his intense gaze and groans and murmurs, the words dirty and degrading and hot, helped push you toward another climax along the steady strokes of his cock impale you with a quickening speed.

“Nothing smart to say now, huh?” he said, shifting his hips just so to get you to make that noise again, the gasping and guttural one that he and the driver liked so much. When you felt him brush against that spot inside you, the moan fell from your lips, and Shinsou gripped your legs to and pressed against that spot again and again and again, listening to that moan like it were his favorite song.

“Fuck, you’re so tight—you want to cum on my cock so bad, don’t you, baby? Wore this dressed because you wanted to get fucked in the back seat of a car, huh?” He was lost in chasing after his own pleasure; the words spilled mindlessly from his lips. What had been initially said to rile you up was now for him to reach his own high. Your walls squeezed and tightened around him, your second climaxing approaching quickly as you trembled beneath him. “You feel so good, angel—shit…!”

With him swearing and muttering in pleasure, pumping in and out of you, with your hand snaked in between your bodies, providing tense rubs against your clit, you saw white and stars. With a final cry, your walls spasmed around his cock, and you came, hotter and heavier than the first time.

Shinsou pressed hs mouth against yours to get one last piece of you as he abruptly pulled out and came onto your thigh, the seed dripping down your leg and onto the car.

It sounded like the driver came too, as the three of you were heaving in the dimness of the car.

As you slowly caught your breath, you opened your eyes, letting your vision adjust to the dim light. You could see Shinsou’s tiled grin, so close to you. He leaned forward to kiss you gently, one hand holding himself up so he didn’t crush you with his weight and the other against your thigh, smearing his cum against your skin.

“Did you have fun?” he whispered, pressing open-mouthed kisses against your chin, your cheek, the sweet spot beneath your ear.

“Yes,” you responded, voice still husky.

He chuckled. “You better stop that or I’ll give him another buck-twenty,” he teased.

“Hey,” the driver interrupted, “I’m dropping off you off.” The car began to move, and you saw the familiar lights and buildings as he took the two of you back to the club, giving you no time to bask in your post-sex haze.

You didn’t feel like you were in a decent enough state to go into a crowded public space again, but you know the bachelorette party was still there—and there was something hot about being in the club with your dress barely covering the paint of cum on your thigh.

Shinsou pushed himself off of you and sat on the passenger seat. He zipped himself back into his pants but kept his shirt open, more interested in unabashedly watching you tuck your breasts back behind thin fabric and wipe off some of the dripping cum with your dress. You looked around for your underwear, but didn’t find it—your eyes glanced to the driver.

“Consider it tip,” Shinsou muttered with a snicker.

The car stopped, signaling your arrival. You stepped out, feeling the driver’s gaze on your legs, but he drove off without another word.

You stood on the street in front of the club and avoided other people’s gazes. You probably looked a mess, you thought, smudged make up, ruffled dress, disheveled curls, standing beside a man with an open shirt and lipstick markings—but you found you didn’t care. You were warm, and satisfied, and pleased.You probably looked a mess, you thought, smudged make up, ruffled dress, disheveled curls, standing beside a man with an open shirt and lipstick markings—but you found you didn’t care. You were warm, and satisfied, and pleased.

“You okay?” Shinsou asked, touching your arm gently.

“Yes—yeah.” You flushed. “It was fun. I enjoyed it.”

He grinned, and it wasn’t a crooked one. “Good. What’s your number, angel?”

You gave it to him, stomach lighting up with butterflies at the intensity of his attraction to you—the intensity of your attraction to him. He texted you his name so that you could save it—Hitoshi. His first name was pretty.

“When do you leave?” he asked.

“Two days. I have the afternoon flight.”

“I have an evening flight that day. If you want, we can do this again.”

“…Maybe a little bit of something else, too?” you said. “I…know of a cute brunch place, nearby our hotel.”

Shinsou smiled, another uncrooked and even one that had you smiling back. He pulled you in for another kiss, tasting the sweetness of his name on your tongue. “Okay. I’ll call you,” he said. “Go back inside before I call that Uber back.”

Shinsou answered his buzzing phone as you walked away and entered the club. The bachelorette group had caught you as soon as you arrived, pulling you aside to demand an explanation and call for community shots as congratulations. You laughed as they berated and interrogated you, feeling, for once, just as wild as them.

#smut #bnha smut #shinsou smut #smut tw #18+#shinsou x reader #bnha x reader #shinsou hitoshi x reader #bnha fanfic #╰【 TAGGED AS … 】❖ ━━━━━ ❛ fandom「 bnha 」#╰【 TAGGED AS … 】❖ ━━━━━ ❛ character「 shinsou 」#╰【 TAGGED AS … 】❖ ━━━━━ ❛ reader「 she/her 」#╰【 FILED UNDER … 】❖ ━━━━━ ❛ 18+ 」#╰【 FILED UNDER … 】❖ ━━━━━ ❛ novae writes 」#╰【 TAGGED AS … 】❖ ━━━━━ ❛ titled「 a little bit of this (& a little bit of that) 」

304 notes · View notes

drstonetrivia · 6 months

Text

Chapter 209 Trivia

Why would you remove your shirts!? And how did you not die of an ebullism before you could artfully arrange your capes around your waists?

The Senku 11 here is a reference to the Apollo 11 spaceflight which landed people on the moon for the first time in 1969.

Also, the return of Suika's full melon helmet!

Aluminum has two usages for the rocket: the body, and fuel. It's strong and light-weight, but alone it can't handle the heat of reentry. This is fine since Senku doesn't plan to return.

As fuel, it needs special conditions to release energy, such as those made with thermite.

Cape York Peninsula is where Senku was headed, specifically for Weipa and Amrun, which account for most of Australia's bauxite production. Australia produces around 105 million metric tons of it per year, compared to China (68 million) and Guinea (64 million).

Bauxite itself is a dull, reddish rock made from a mix of aluminum minerals and iron oxides, and the main raw source of all aluminum on Earth. It's usually strip mined as it's found near the surface, and can be done environmentally responsibly by replacing the topsoil afterward.

A few people seemed confused by this random person here: the KoS had already begun reviving people in Australia (hence the buildings show in the previous panel), but they were running low on supplies to revive/feed the manpower they required to get sufficient amounts of bauxite.

Bucket wheel excavators are some of the largest vehicles ever produced, with a few of them featured in the Guinness World Records for their size, though not all of them are huge. They're used to continuously dig up large amounts of dirt and transport it away using conveyor belts.

In the Japanese version, Gen only says "bake*… Excalibur?" rather than the full joke the English translator @CDCubed came up with, "basket-weave Excalibur".

*Bake here is pronounced "bah-keh", and is a shortened version of "baketto" meaning "bucket".

The ship here has influences from the Americans: zig-zag patterns and stripes. The boat's name seems to be "NXN" but I couldn't find a meaning or a reference for it. It's a catamaran— it has two hulls to increase stability and reduce drag, allowing it to be more fuel-efficient.

The food here is all made from corn: corn tortillas to make burritos and tacos, cornbread muffins, then what I assume is corn chowder or soup.

I hope this isn't Yo since he's clothed in the next image, but Suika appears to be getting flashed by a naked person with spiky hair covering themselves up with a tray…

Last chapter we had a moon phase near the new moon, and this time we have a full moon, meaning at least 2 weeks have passed since the mathlympics.

Ryusui, Senku, and Tsukasa are shown on the surface of the moon, but they are not necessarily the three going on the mission itself. The roles they need to fill are "pilot", "scientist", and "warrior", that trio simply fit.

We also know that Tsukasa's choices were Taiju and Chrome, but that was before Ryusui was introduced.

In addition, we've seen that Chrome won't let Senku go on a suicide mission.

I wonder if we'll get an Australian character added to the team, or if the KoS will move on immediately.

I just think Australian slang would be a great addition with Chelsea and Gen around…

#trivia #dr stone #chapters #209

21 notes · View notes

battle-of-alberta · 9 months

Text

Hi and welcome to this thing that's sort of a prequel to the timeline I'm working on. The working title is Alberta Story, but as you can see I kind of changed directions midway through as I thought about it more, I figured if I was getting frustrated then surely Ed was also getting frustrated with it so I turned it over to him to express that, haha. I wrote the first half of this last fall and stewed on it for about a year and decided, screw it, I don't know where I'm going with this but I will slap on a few more panels and figure it out as I go.

This might be the closest thing to a reboot of the BoAB main storyline for a while. I wanted to do something that gave a cursory outline of Canadian / Albertan history for people who are new to it, but of course it runs the risk of repeating every narrative Canada / Alberta have about themselves and that's quite frustrating, to be honest! Particularly when you are trying to write characters who lived through a great chunk of it.

I was trying to think about where to "start" the story of Alberta, particularly after reading Mavericks: An Incorrigible History of Alberta. A lot of the tongue in cheek ahistorical assigning of Albertan-ness to even protozoic life rubbed me the wrong way even though I found it an interesting narrative, so I wanted to illustrate the difficulty of "beginning".

Additionally: I really find it frustrating in the Hetalia fandom when people kind of take Himaruya's approach and suggest the colonized personifications almost predate colonization somehow, like they were "always there", or the approach that they are direct descendants of some ambiguous ancestral "Native America" that mysteriously no longer exists. At the same time, I sort of understand how it also happens with the narratives we construct ourselves, in textbooks and museums, that have long illustrated "pre-history" (Indigenous history) as opposed to "history" (the "Real" history of Euro-Canadians). It's a cultural underpinning that needs to be undone.

I don't make any ambitious claims to produce real, decolonizing work, I realize there's this big gap in this universe I'm building that acknowledges municipal personifications and only vaguely gestures at the idea of others and there's a myriad of issues with that, but it's a place that I as a euro-canadian myself am starting with and I hope to continue learning and growing from here.

"Here" is summed up as: isn't it crazy that a company that was just gifted 1/12th of the surface of the Earth not only predates the idea of this country and its cities but also still exists and is just a place you end up in at the mall now?

More detailed explanation of each panel follows.

Diver's Claw: Several stories in different First Nations cosmologies reference the Creator or another figure making a flood that covered the whole earth, where a survivor (Wisakedjek in Cree/Ojibwe stories, Na'pi in Blackfoot, etc) sends down a succession of animals to the bottom of the waters to retrieve a piece of the old earth, which they can then use to create anew.

Mounds of Earth: When the Northwest Mounted Police were sent out west from Canada after purchasing the territories (including Alberta) from the Hudson's Bay Company in 1870, they marked the border along what would become the 49th parallel between Canada and the United States with piles of dirt.

Descent from the Stars: This is supposed to be a depiction of Manitou Asiniy, also known as the Manitou Stone or Creator's Stone, a meteorite that has spiritual significance to many Indigenous peoples. As I write this, he (as a sacred being, he is referred to with these pronouns) is currently in the custody of the Royal Alberta Museum which has recently agreed to return him to the site where he was originally taken from near Hardisty in 1866. Currently, the gallery is open for worship and ceremony until it is time to repatriate him.

Bodies liquified in coral: this is NOT a scientific illustration, haha. The idea is that a lot of Albertan identity comes from about 400 million years ago in the Devonian period. At the time, a big chunk of "Alberta" was covered by ocean. The organisms lived, died, and over time became crushed by sediment layered over them. Coral has a lot of holes perfect for holding this sludge and fossilizes nicely here, and it is this layer of Earth's long history that speculators are looking for when drilling for oil.

Lips to a book: Alberta joined Confederation on September 1st, 1905, which our last premier tried to commemorate with a holiday that no one showed up to. Back at the turn of the century however, it was a massive party attended by Prime Minister Wilfrid Laurier and the Governor General, a position in Canadian parliament that represents the King or Queen of England. Govenor General Grey (his grandpa was the Earl Grey the tea was named for, I believe) was the one who kissed the bible at this inauguration.

Prince: The prince here is Prince Rupert, who Rupert's Land was named for, and the king in question is Charles II of England (yes, the Restoration and Great Fire of London party guy from the Stuart era). Rupert's Land centred on Hudson's Bay and made up over 40% of what is now considered Canada. The Hudson's Bay Company was granted the charter to all this territory - if they found the Northwest Passage while they were at the business of acquiring beaver or otter pelts, it was certainly a bonus.

The rest is fairly self explanatory, I hope. Like I said, I felt like I was falling into the trap of the same old story of pioneers and exploration that has been absolutely done to death in Canadian history, and I didn't have anything particularly new to say about it that would maintain this storybook level of accessibility so I just. Stopped! Shifted gears! haha. Still, I think the fur trade is a very important piece to the puzzle that often gets either a bit overhyped or glossed over in favour of railroads in Canadian history and almost entirely ignored and forgotten in American history, and it makes sense to start there, particularly for Ed who has a lot of Complicated Feelings about it.

Enjoy! Maybe one day I will figure out part two.

#historical hetalia #hetalia oc #hws oc #aph oc #projectcanada cities #pc: edmonton #hapo art #digital art #clip studio paint #edward murphy #i wanted to have this comic take place at city center #BUT THE BAY IS GONE!!!!!!#so southgate it is i suppose #since it is close by a certain trail to a certain other city

31 notes · View notes

fivekrystalpetals · 1 year

Text

Glens, Children of Misfortune and the Baskervilles

[When I say Glens, I am referring all Glens- past and present: Levi, Oswald, Gil and Leo. Hella lot of lore is here that I wanna write about ;-; so I might divide this into different posts let's see. Also fair warning: I might criticize Oswald's actions-past and present- a bit, since I love looking at characters from an unbiased pov. Also, maybe some characters' past actions in order to point to their character development so that too.]

[ Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 ]

1] Glen, Jury and the knowledge of the Abyss

Starting off with this panel, although it is passed off for gags, I realized something very important here (and got me to love Leo even more lol droopy eyed jerk yeah!!) (Retrace 103:)

Only after reading Retrace 93 onwards and actually visiting the Sablier from hundred years ago do we get the real, undistorted lore of why Children of Misfortune exist, what exactly is Glen, where the Juries come to play into this whole scheme and so on. But before I elaborate on the above panel, let's go back to go back to these ill-fated panels—the literal start of everything going wrong—Oswald casting Lacie into the Abyss for her sin of being born as a Child of Misfortune. (Retrace 69)

Two things to remember here:

i.) Oswald can't go against the Glen's orders until after the succession ceremony. He is bound to his master, the then Glen, Levi by the oath on his left hand so the only way to break free of it is by cutting off his hand like Gil did. ii.) Immediately after the last chain, the fifth one- Jabberwocky is transferred to his body, Oswald becomes the next Glen.

Now, if I think about it, with Jabberwock having been transferred into his body, Oswald had already become Glen when he was saying these words to Lacie. He was Glen when he cast her into the Abyss. He was Glen, the absolute head of the Baskervilles, whose orders can't be disobeyed by any of his people.

Maybe, this doesn't seem much significant. It didn't, to me, while I was reading this chapter,, because I was still under the impression that 'Glen' was a spirit passed down from one host to another as the Will of the Abyss said here to Vincent (Retrace 39)—

If that were the case, then, well, nothing. Oswald's body would have been taken over by 'Glen' at the Succession Ceremony. Nothing of Oswald's soul would remain,, so, it won't be Oswald, but 'Glen' that's casting Lacie into the Abyss— Lacie who is not the younger sister but a sinner bearing the Eyes of Ill-Omen as far as the spirit of Glen is concerned.

But... later, we get the reveal it's quite not the case. (Retrace 91)

It was because the tale would be boring otherwise.

Everything was a story for the Juries who have been collecting and preserving these for centuries. In their stories, worlds exist where humans never walked the earth at all. Or, stories where the world ended within a century of its beginning. Or even, stories where the world ran identical to this one but decisively different. The main point is the Juries decide whether the tale is interesting enough to continue or to be brought to an end so it can be 'shelved in their library'. There comes the significance of Glen. The Juries are present in every story and use a turning point (here, the Abyss and the Glen) to try and bring the tale to a climax. In this case, they were probably pinning their hopes on Oswald.

Anyway, back to the night of the Succession Ceremony. Glen, now we know is just the title given to the head of the Baskervilles who is a potential candidate for generating a main turning point for the Juries, the reason why they keep an eye of them. It's no spirit hosted in Oswald's body or some such but Oswald himself that cast Lacie into the Abyss.

Why I stress this again is because—Oswald could have stopped her execution. Just like that, he could have given the command: 'As the new Glen, I have decided that we are no longer executing Lacie, does anyone have a problem with it?' Yeah. Just like that. Like, who'd dare challenge his decision? The previous Glen? Levi? A guy left with a broken body and no chain? The rest of the Baskervilles? The same people who obey his every order without a question?

No, the only ones who could and would veto his decision are the Juries. Because they know that only a Child of Misfortune has the power to affect their tales in an unpredictable way since this child was birthed directly by the Abyss (Retrace 91)

However, this aside, I want to point out that Levi, who was the Glen at least three generations before Leo, did not know the actual reason for casting a Child of Misfortune back into the Abyss up until this moment. I am honestly appalled.

So, my first point of this section: i.) severe lack of knowledge about the Abyss/little knowledge is dangerous—

—since even the Glen, who is supposed to be the protector of the Abyss, the origin of all Life, does not know the exact reasons for why things happen as they do; they simply take things for granted. Levi does speculate that the chains are what hold up the world from being swallowed up by the Abyss. Although proven wrong in Retrace 91/92, ig there is some truth to his speculations after all—Jack, believing his words, goes about cancelling the chains and succeeds in sinking Sablier into the Abyss before Oswald and Alice manage to stop him.

The reason for this practice of taking things for granted is my second point. ii.): Every Glen was raised as a valet to the previous Glen.

The Glens are valets before they become the next head; they are practically raised to be good servants, not good leaders. They don't even think of questioning anything their master/Jury tells them.

Truth be told, they are probably programmed from a young age to be subservient to their Master, to kill all of their Master's enemies etc. etc., by either brainwashing, intensive training or torture. See here, Retrace 38:

Think of only your master. Serve only your master.

In fact, as early as Retrace 13, Break questions this extreme devotion of Gilbert's, bordering on obsession.... and wonders if it is not abnormal (although he, as well as Gilbert, think his loyalty is for Oz):

Since Gil had lost all his memories of his past, there was no way for them to know that he had been brainwashed into absolute obedience and this was not natural. (more on this in part 2)

Plus, we don't know what else they have been conditioned to accept as the indisputable truth.

As I said earlier, Oswald was already Glen at the point. Why did he not deliberate if he really wanted to cast Lacie into the Abyss? He had become the sole absolute command there; he had all the powers of the Abyss. Why did he not question the whole point of it? Why did he not even make an attempt to save Lacie?

Well, this is the reason. The Glens were never meant to be someone strong enough to decisively change the story. The Juries needed someone to make wrong decisions so that the 'tale' can be brought to an end. They were waiting for the Glens to mess up. And it was passed down from Glen to Glen, and taken for granted that if they were to become the next head, they had to take in five chains and cast their red-eyed sibling into the Abyss.

In fact, what Levi says about the Children of the Ill-Omen born with the to-be Glen isn't the truth either, just some hearsay (Retrace 69)—

Because you're supposed to properly dispose of what you have created.

I don't think any of this is necessarily true. Because Kevin Legnard (Break), a Child of Misfortune, lived in an age around 10+ years since the Tragedy of Sablier. He served in the Sinclair family since a young age where, yes, a massive tragedy did occur, but it was only in his adulthood and due to political complications, more or less. So really, I wonder if the whole story of Children of Misfortune —the only threat to the Juries—attracting "misfortune" is not one cooked up by the Juries themselves, then accepted as such by generations of Glen? And even spread to the locals because both Lacie and Vince were bullied for their red eyes. Perhaps, so that such children, even if they might not become Baskervilles, will be tortured and eventually killed/take their own lives, and the tales of the Juries will not be interrupted.

This is why the first panel of Leo ordering Levi is so important to me. It's about the choice of your free will (which Oswald never had, he simply went with whatever was asked of him,, more on this in part 3). Leo started to actively fight for what he felt was right and even commands the previous Glen to obey his orders because "I am the current Glen! When I tell you to do something, you shut up and do it, you droopy eyed jerk!"

Oswald could have done this at the Succession Ceremony. I am pretty sure Levi would be more amused than angry at the rebellion against the status quo.

Because, even here, amused by Leo's words, Levi spurs into action only after this exchange: (Retrace 103)

Finally, it's Leo who puts an end to the ostracism of the Children of Ill-Omen—

—and discussed the problem of the Core of the Abyss learning and knowing what it is like to be lonely instead of merely looking upon her as something dangerous and to be untouched by anyone including the Glens.

I don't think he could have brought about such a major change without facing some kind of major uproar from the Juries, yes? In spite of that, Leo (with the rest of the Baskervilles) decided to stand by what he thought was the right thing to do and not condemn his first true follower, Vincent, for no reason but for being born with a red eye.

[ Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4]

75 notes · View notes