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aces-drew · 7 months

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Hi! I just wanted to drop in and say that I adore your two Nace fics so much to the point that I have probably reread them about 20 millions and if you ever want to write for them again I would be more than WILLING (and to tell my soul) to supply you with a slew of ideas because I have plenty <3 your writing is absolutely BEAUTIFUL!!!

hi anon, you have no idea how often i think of your ask and how much i've come back to it since you've written to me. i hope you're still around and still somewhat part of the nd fandom, and that the series finale was something you could enjoy and be satisfied w! truth be told i fell out of the fandom at the end of the third season, it was for a lot of reasons - personal and just the time passing, and with it also came half-baked word docs of nace fics i started but never really got around to finishing. and i never wanted to answer your high compliments with the answer of never considering to write for them again, and in all honesty i forgot my written drabbles in a folder on my laptop for the better part of the last two years. but i went through it on a whim today and actually found something i think is worth sharing, and since your message has stayed with me, i'm going to post it for you and you only, as both a thank you and im sorry i couldnt really give you more. writing for nace was one of my greatest joys in a truthfully very difficult time in my life, and im so glad it was as special for you as it was for me! so here's almost 5k of nace being in their pre-relationship, best friends in tension phase dated to the 21st of dec 2021 - it's certainly not my best work and may seem a bit half-baked, but there is so much love in it, and its happy and sad and hopeful all at once, and reading it again with fresher eyes, it would've been a shame for it to rot in my gdrive with no audience, so yeah thank you for reading this my dear anon. i hope you like it, take care!!

***

Ace let out a soft mumble of a curse under his breath.

‘Florence, this is not the time girl.’

The exasperation in his tone was refreshing to Nancy. Rarely was Ace ever off-centre; he was always the one who held down the fort, who grounded everyone, and especially her, to whatever it was they were working through at any given time. So the fact that car trouble was what got Ace ticking made her chuckle.

And among other things, she had to admit how adorable it was – his brows creased in annoyance, hands resting on his steering wheel, fingers drumming on the small surface in agitation. (Nancy tried to force herself to look away when her mind started to focus on how long and sturdy his fingers were in comparison to the lining of the steering wheel, ignoring the unnatural hike in her pulse).

Nancy observes his leg start to bounce restlessly in its place, his growing frustration rivalling Nancy’s ease. He looks at her through the rear-view mirror, sparkly blue eyes that seem to brace for her remark knowingly, ‘You’re not allowed to say I told you so.’

Nancy playfully clicks her tongue, ‘I told you so.’

He groans in response, but there’s only levity in his tone. When she looks at him amidst her unhelpful giggle, for the briefest of seconds, she sees a ghost of a smile on his lips.

‘Okay I’ve got Earnie on speed-dial, he should be here in like 45 minutes.’

He looks at her readily, waiting for her to take a jab at the fact that he’s on a first-name basis with the Horseshoe Bay’s finest mechanic and tower of cars, but she chooses not to indulge him.

With a small smile, she pulls out a pack of skittles and crinkles it open, offering him a hand-full of carelessly assorted yellow skittles in ceasefire. He looks at her in mocking question, ‘You think giving me my favourite colour of skittles is going to convince me into giving you a pass on the next 45 minutes where you tease me about this incessantly?’

Nancy smiles the brightest smile she can manage, teeth barred like a girl scout selling her cookies door to door, ‘Yep.’

He concedes, nonchalantly shaking his head and turning over the skittles from her hand to his, ‘You know me too well.’

(Nancy ignores the way he touches the pulse point on her wrist when he transfers the candy onto his own hand, how his fingers ever-so gently wrap around her entire wrist, electrifying the skin under his touch).

They sit there chewing in comfortable silence - on the candy as well as their thoughts; it had been a long day. They were heading back from another dead-end lead on de-tangling George’s soul from Odette’s, and though it had been a long shot, the sting of failure extinguishing the little hope that had slipped through to everyone in the group at the beginning of the day was subtly unrelenting. Nancy tried to keep the fear at bay, closing her eyes to refocus away from the painful pulses lightly throbbing at her temple. She couldn’t even think about reliving George’s death again, but the image of her bloodied body on the floor of the Claw re-emerges without permission, and along with it comes bile up Nancy’s throat.

In an attempt for comfort, she reminds herself of what George had to said to them when they regrouped at their cars to drive back to Horseshoe Bay, ‘I’m a fighter guys, and I live every day with intention, I’m happy and in love and I have no regrets. We’ll figure this out.’

She recalls George’s soft smile at Nick, her smirk at Bess when Addy asks for the two of them to carpool back alone together, her hugs for Nancy and Ace – she reminds herself how good it feels to relish in the warmth of her best friend. Taking a few deep breaths, Nancy wills for it to make her feel a bit better.

A gentle tap on her shoulder gets her to open her eyes again, and before she can turn to face Ace in question, she finds herself enamoured by the starry night sky looking down on her through the upper windshield. She wonders how she hadn’t yet noticed the glimmering specks of silver tattered against a canvas of cloudless navy blue, both beautifully and terrifyingly spanning the expanse of her entire eyeline, nestled between tall, dark oaks and pine trees on either side of the road they were currently grounded to.

‘You have to stop worrying about her, we’ll solve this too, we always do.’

That snaps her focus right back onto Ace, and she realises that despite the fairly long drive in darkness, the reason her attention had been obscured from the remarkable night sky was because it had been elsewhere, particularly on a concerning distraction that had been sat next to her this whole time.

She studies him, not rushing her response. She registers the way his lips have come into a fine line in resolve, starkly different to the smile lines that had lifted the plane of his cheeks just a few minutes ago, how the flecks of grey within his clear, sky-blue eyes zap like lightning, reflecting the twinkle of the stars above him – confident, persevering, determined. Her chest expands at how his expression still emanates warmth, a still of comfort when her mind is too convoluted to function, to find the gravity below her. Looking at him, she doesn’t necessarily blame herself for not noticing the night sky.

‘I hate that you can read me.’

She finds the grin in his eyes before his lips, ‘You have to stop being so predictable.’

She mock-scoffs at him, ‘Says the guy who knew his car was going to break down but was too stubborn to back down from subjecting it to a long road trip anyways.’

He takes his turn feigning hurt, ‘Touché.’ He chuckles, ‘Nancy – 1, Ace – 0.’

She sobers up at his still subtly insistent stare, he doesn’t want her to drop the subject just yet but he doesn’t ask again; his delicate push gets her primed enough to voice her thoughts, ‘I can’t watch her die again.’

She hates how her voice fails her, vulnerability and fear lulling her to a whisper, as if she’s afraid the universe will hear her. Ace responds with a shaky breath, returning to her gaze with the truths she’s been trying to convince herself with, ‘We’re trying our best. We’ll get there, and we’ll find what she needs.’

His eyes don’t waver from hers, ‘We can’t live in how her death is something we can’t avoid just yet, you heard what she said Nance, she’s living her best life day after day, and we owe it to her to do the same.’

He says his words with such conviction that Nancy lets out a breath she didn’t even know she was holding, (she tries not to melt at how his nickname for her drapes itself so softly on his tongue). ‘None of us will ever give up on her, on any of us.’

She lets out a small smile in understanding, a tear escaping to her cheek before she’s able to get a hold of her glossy eyes. For a spilt-second Nancy sees his fingers reach out for her, possibly to wipe the tear away, but he stops himself, and Nancy tries to ignore the way her stomach hollows out at his reluctance. Instead, he gives a genuine smile in return.

Before the slight awkwardness can stew between the two of them, Ace speaks up softly, clearing his throat, ‘Alright, come on.’

He gestures to the trunk of the car as he gets out of the driver’s seat, and open’s the passenger door for her to follow him; she wordlessly steps out despite her confusion. The cold wind hits her skin immediately, passing through the soft sleeves of her sweater as if they weren’t even there. She hugs herself, tracing her hands up and down her upper arms to create some insulation.

Ace opens up the trunk and unzips a large duffel bag, pulling out three blankets and two cushion pillows. Taking the especially woolly chocolate and cream checkered throw, he swings it over Nancy’s back and gently swaddles her, ‘Better?’

‘Better.’ She responds, warmth immediately encapsulating her. Before she can ask why they’re outside his car in uncomfortably cold weather, he explains, ‘The stars are out tonight,’ he says looking up, ‘I thought we could kill some time while we wait for Earnie, and a distraction wouldn’t hurt the both of us. Two birds, one stone.’

Nancy follows his eye-line and stares at the sky, ‘Definitely.’

Within five minutes, he lays out the largest blanket he has onto the hood of Florence and sets down the two pillows for them. Forgetting the added weight of the throw, she grabs his hand to get onto the surface, and predictably, loses balance almost immediately, tripping to fall face first right onto Ace’s chest.

Before Nancy settles into how mortifying it is, Ace’s arms instinctually wrap around her waist and secure them in place, his chest reverberating the chuckle he adds to the night air.

Her shoulders loosen, and Ace looks down at her with a smirk, a glint of mischief within those blue eyes Nancy adores, ‘Comfortable?’

‘Shut up.’ Nancy groans, and Ace readily manoeuvres her waist to help her rest next to him, the two of them fully laughing now. (She ignores the way his fingers come into contact with some bare skin on her hips when it happens, a result of her sweater hiking and the blanket falling on top of the both of them when she fell; she tries not to focus on the imperceptible movement of his thumbs against her exposed skin).

As they recover from their laughing fit and Nancy settles more comfortably onto her cushion, shoulder to shoulder with Ace, they both find themselves looking up at the incredible vastness above them. Away from the other’s gaze, and suddenly incredibly aware of how small they were in this expanse of time and space, Nancy feels almost blindingly comfortable with Ace, willing to tell him anything if he asked.

Ace seems to get the same idea, ‘Okay, game time. I give you a story and you give me one in return, could be prompted by a question if either of us have something specific to ask, but otherwise it’s free rein.’

Nancy considers the proposition – she supposes it is dangerous territory, and that she would be tiptoeing between everything she wants to disclose and keep hidden, especially because she was already so comfortable leaving her heart at her sleeve with Ace, but ultimately the urge to get to know Ace better wins her over.

‘Okay,’ she agrees, slightly hesitant, ‘But you start, since you clearly have something in mind.’

She sees him nod in her periphery.

‘My mom used to take me star-gazing to help with my anxiety,’ Ace says, his eyes focused on the sky. ‘I couldn’t sleep after what happened with my dad, and there were a good few weeks where he was comatose in the hospital, and I couldn’t get that image of him out of my head every time I closed my eyes.’

‘I stayed up for like four days straight after the accident, hopped up on energy drinks and just gaming or coding night after night, getting by on twenty minute naps that would just happen because my body was so exhausted,’ he sighs, seemingly disappointed in his younger self, ‘It wasn’t long before my mom noticed the bags under my eyes and asked me to explain myself - I just broke down, told her how his limp body was all I could see if I let my mind rest for even a second. That’s when she invested in Florence, a seemingly temporary rental at the time,’ he chuckles fondly, ‘and every night my dad stayed in the hospital after that, she took me up to the bluffs so that we could see the stars as clear as they were in Maine.’

She imagines a young Ace, so scared of his father not coming home that he wills himself to become his own problem, shielding himself the only way he knows how, and finding himself unwilling to depend on anyone, even as a child. Even though the irony of how similar they are is not lost on her, it hollows out Nancy’s chest.

She can’t also help but find small comfort in the karmic coincidence that the bluffs were somehow similarly significant in both their lives – a place rooted in contentment equally as much as trauma. Nancy wonders why fate sometimes writes in intricately entwining strings so cruel when it comes to her.

‘She pointed out all the constellations, and eventually I learnt them too, and her explaining everything would send me to sleep. It was a lot easier to close my eyes to the stars instead of a dark ceiling, and she always said ‘It’s okay to be afraid, but when you are, just look up, and you’ll be reminded of how vast and complicated this universe is. And if you can believe in that, you can believe that things will work out for the best’. And that hope? That hope has weirdly never really left me, no matter what’s happened since then.’ He finishes.

Nancy can tell that his voice is thicker, and she doesn’t push to ask him why he thought she should know something so intrinsic about him. She breathes it in nevertheless, savouring a piece of his past that has been delicately placed in her hands, an olive branch for her to know him better.

She decides to take him up on it and share something that’s been kept in the dustiest shelves of her own heart, ‘That day the Aglaeca came to claim us, I actually fell off the bluffs.’

Nancy feels him turn his face to her in surprise, the only thing she’d told them was that she’d almost tripped over - she’d never considered talking about the truth till now; she pushes on, talking at the stars, ‘I kept screaming for help, but obviously nobody came. I was meant to die there, just like my mother, and for a second, before my survival instinct kicked in, I almost let go… almost wanted to let go,’ she feels her voice wobble, unable to carry the weight of her words, ‘I felt my own weight on my fingers, felt them give, and I was so tired, so I almost let go… instead of choosing to try and climb up.’

She had never admitted that to anybody, least of all herself, but it felt liberating to do so, to be overwhelmed in how enormous all her trauma seemed at the time, ‘I think it’s because I’d felt helpless for a long time, I didn’t know how to be somebody that other people couldn’t depend on, and I couldn’t get the conversation, or fight, we all had out of my head,’ she adds quickly, with a hollow, humourless chuckle, ‘but I did, I did climb up, and when I looked over at the sea, sitting there, all alone, I wasn’t necessarily glad that I had. I still felt empty, even when I knew we survived.’

Verbalising the last admission felt like a tonne of bricks on her shoulders, but it all came out in a few short breaths – like domino after domino falling in a way she couldn’t really stop once it started. She’d felt so small in the face of everything she’d been through, and even though she knew that life is always the right choice, and she’s convicted of that that definitively now more than any other time in her life, it wasn’t something that came intuitively to her that day. Her introspection is cut short when she realises that Ace has fully turned to face her now, and she struggles finding the courage to look at him.

When she does, the pain in his glassy eyes knocks the wind out of her, ‘Nance, I-I-, shit. I’m so fucking sorry Nancy.’

His voice breaks, faltering as he sits upright with his apology. She follows, sitting up cross-legged next to him, ‘Hey, hey,’ she insists, resting her arm on his bicep, willing him to look at her, ‘I wasn’t done… You know what helped me through that? What made me realise that it had obviously been the right choice?’

Ace’s stormy blue eyes look back at her, and he seems to recognise her desperation for levity, ‘Therapy?’

They both chuckle, cutting through a little bit of the tension, ‘Yes, of course therapy,’ she agrees, ‘but unlike therapy, this isn’t something I’ve had since I was eight.’

She takes a deep breath, hoping her persistent eye contact conveys the principle she that she grounds herself to, ‘It was all of you. Seeing you that day when I walked into the Claw that night? With Bess, and Nick and George? With your relieved smiles, and hugs that were insistent on making sure I knew how glad you all were that I was alive? That’s what rushed all that relief into my body. For a spilt second, the Aglaeca highlighted all of my trauma so that I couldn’t see through to the love I was given, and yes, it didn’t help that we were our worst selves that day, fuelled by fear and regret, but when I’d gotten back into my car and drove back to the Claw, I knew. I-’ she drew another breath, trying to gain coherence; there was so much she had to say about that night, so much she’d packed away into a tiny little box in her mind, ‘when I walked in that night, I knew that I’d made the right call, that from then on, whatever near-death experience I was going to get catapulted into, I would always choose to stick around.’

She could feel her throat closing up a little, her voice thickening, ‘The love that I’ve gotten from all of you, and now even Ryan, has changed my life, and it has forever changed the trajectory of who I am, and I whoever I’ll be, and that’s something I’m only grateful for. I know I don’t tell you all that enough, but seriously, I am so, so grateful.’

The tears fall down Ace’s cheeks freely now, and in the vortex of them under a beautiful night sky with their hearts strung out in the open and them alone in between the woods, his reservations seem to lower just enough. His other hand comes over the hand of hers that’s still resting on his bicep, and he intertwines his fingers with hers, a soft whisper following, ‘Still, I’m sorry, what we said was really fucked up, there really isn’t an excuse for it. We all made the decisions that got us to being prophesied to die that night, and it wasn’t you. Nance, you didn’t bring us to our deaths like lambs to slaughter, it was on us, we chose to be there.’

It’s his turn to pierce right through to her heart through his gaze, conviction steady in his words, ‘You are not a cause, and you are not an omen. You are anything but that. And honestly Nancy, I don’t even fucking know what I’d do with myself if we lost you that night.’

Nancy feels relieved in a weird way, the vindication is anything but hollow and ingenuine, it feels good. She laughs lightly, trying to mask a little bit of the subtle discomfort she feels; she knows the sentiment would be undeniably the same the other way around (except Nancy knows that’s partly also because she can’t really comprehend the enormity of what Ace means to her, how he was somehow so much more than a friend), the heaviness in his tone makes the implications of the statement much more intimate that she’s ready to decrypt. ‘Well at least George wouldn’t have died.’

And there it comes, that exasperated ‘Nancy, using humour to cope with your trauma is not funny’ face comfortably settling on Ace’s expression before she’s even done with her sentence. She chooses to laugh it off again (and pretends not to notice how Ace’s fingers tighten around hers perceptibly more).

Neither of them lets go of the other’s hand, and Nancy eventually lays back down on her cushion, with Ace following suite, ‘Okay on a lighter note,’ she refreshes, ‘where do you see yourself in 10 years?’

He hums in thought, ‘Uh, I don’t really know, haven’t thought much about it really.’

There’s an awkward hitch to his voice, and Nancy knows he’s picked up on her picking up on it, and he concedes into a slightly more nuanced response, ‘I’d like to have the standard stuff y’know?’

She looks at him pointedly, ‘The standard stuff?’

He avoids her gaze, ‘Yeah, the standard stuff. I’d like to be in love, and if I’m lucky, possibly even married. And yeah, eventually something like two kids, a white picket fence, y’know, the whole thing.’

The response surprises Nancy for some reason; it’s such an open admission of domesticity, and she unintentionally pictures herself with him in his ideal.

‘You think it’s dumb.’

She’s frayed from her thoughts, and registers that she’d been quietly daydreaming for embarrassingly longer than acceptable, and that Ace perceived it as the opposite of what she was currently thinking.

‘What?’ Nancy tries to steady her heart beating frantically in her chest, the enormity of mapping her entire future with Ace now settling swiftly on her shoulders.

‘Oh my god, you totally think it’s dumb.’

Nancy tries to think through what feels like her brain is melting, ‘I do not think it’s stupid Ace, come on. It’s endearing!’

He looks at her unconvinced. She tries to centre herself, refocusing from the image of two toddlers with his wonderful hair and her fiery eyes, she looks up and away from him again, ‘I’ve always wanted at least two kids too, I never had any siblings, and I’ve always thought that companionship is really important when you’re young. A boy and a girl… would be nice to have someday.’

When she meets his gaze, there’s something indecipherable about them. She tries to not to let how intensely he’s looking at her waver her in staring back at him (but it’s hard, she feels her stomach jump to her throat).

The finally, he speaks, ‘At least two huh? Never pegged Nancy Drew for the big house, big family type.’

There’s a hint of an endearing tease that laces his tone, and she knows it’s meant to annoy her; she chooses instead to be honest, ‘Yeah, actually.’

A small smile of satisfaction finds her lips as Ace’s eyes widen for just a second, ‘You’re not the only one who wants the standard stuff y’know,’ she says, imitating the tone he’d used, ‘I would also really like to be in love, married even, and settle down. Maybe here, maybe somewhere else. Either way, I definitely do want a legacy. And what better legacy to leave than to love the people you love, maybe even slip into a life with that one special person I love and work to be with, and hopefully they’re a best friend and someone I completely depend on, and I’ll get to create a family with them someday.’

She places intentionality in her last sentence, letting Ace know that maybe this person she hopes to have all that with isn’t some far away concept, but the wonderful friend and companion she’s been able to completely trust and depend on these last few months. His eyes seem to darken as he processes her words, blue pushed to the edges of his irises; she gets the feeling that he might’ve picked up on the implication.

There was no doubt that they’d been recently tip-toeing around what their friendship was evolving into; between Nancy recovering from the Wraith, Ace getting kicked out and Amanda breaking up with him, they’d both changed into such different people in just a few weeks. They’d both seemed to realise that though their entire worlds had shifted axes, the two of them were the same – they were Nancy and Ace, detective and hacker, a mind racing a hundred miles per hour paired with a rational, calm decision maker, a comet free orbiting in space and the sun’s gravity that grounded it, two best friends. They were comfortable here, safe in the boundaries of their friendship that was a little more than friendship, in confessions through glances and grazes, where the fear of having to figure out how they fit with each other, who they were and what they wanted was too scary for them to consider. For now, the implication was enough.

‘Yeah,’ Ace seemed to agree, his voice a little dreamy, ‘someday.’

#nace #nancy drew cw #nancy drew x ace hardy #nancy drew #user:alexjatp #cwnd #nancy x ace #ace hardy

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arkanistan · 15 days

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Bloodthirsty Tom Cotton is going to get someone killed

By David Ramsey

There he goes again. Sen. Tom Cotton, our robotic junior senator, overcome once again with teenage bloodlust, continues to call for violence against American citizens.

His blanket depiction of pro-Palestinian campus protestors is a naked lie and grotesque bit of propaganda, but if a leader is going to call for a Kent State redux, the first move is to squeal that the kids on campus are pure evil. Just in case, say, the violent response that Cotton is calling for winds up hurting or killing American citizens for merely protesting.

Cotton is not dumb. He knows what he’s doing.

He has already asked for vigilante violence, urging citizens to go outside the law and violently assault peaceful protesters if they cause an inconvenience. Senator Sicko fantasized about all manner of gore: People should throw protestors off the bridge or worse. “It would probably be pretty painful to have their skin ripped off,” Cotton mused. “But I think that’s probably how we would handle it in Arkansas.” No law enforcement would be necessary to carry out the torture, assault and potential murder, he was quick to clarify. He encouraged people to “take matters into their own hands.”

Cotton himself would not do this, mind you, but he thought maybe he could inspire someone back home to give it a try.

But Cotton’s lust for violence is best served by the authorities. If you really want some death and destruction, you need to send in the cops or the troops.

And there’s no mystery about what can happen if universities send in revved-up police units in riot gear or if state governments start calling up the National Guard.

The protests convulsing American universities generally aren’t violent. Mind you, the crime that Cotton is so mad about is trespassing: In many situations, the students who have set up encampments are violating university rules or state or local laws.

But Cotton, as ever, wants to insert violence where there is peace. We have seen this play out on campuses from Columbia to UCLA already in recent days. The authorities initiate a violent confrontation, carry out thuggish arrests, knock professors down to the ground and provoke physical altercations with those who don’t comply with their orders. Many are arrested and dragged off to jail, only to have the half-baked charges dropped.

Do this enough times, and eventually, something very bad will happen.

College kids aren’t children, but they are our youngest cohort of adults. Cotton wants angry men with guns storming onto campuses to take them down.

Cotton led a press conference Wednesday alongside several other grandstanding GOP senators to sputter his contempt, with the standard canard that protesters calling for a ceasefire in Gaza are “pro-Hamas.” He called the protesters’ encampments that have sprung up on college campuses across the nation as “disgusting cesspools.” The protestors themselves — young Americans expressing their opinion in a democracy! — are “fanatics and freaks.” They are “lunatics.”

The dehumanizing language, while certainly natural to Cotton, has a strategic edge. If you can depict people as fanatics and freaks, the hope is that others will lose sympathy for them as fellow human beings. They are the dangerous “other.”

Cotton wants to grease the wheels: It is OK to wage war on these kids, he’s implying. They’re just a bunch of freaks. If something really goes wrong, and someone gets seriously hurt or killed — well, that life was not a valued life. Just a lunatic.

In a kind of reversal of Christian ethics, Cotton has a quasi-Pagan belief that virtue is earned via crushing the weak. Violence is his God. You can see it running throughout his career: His zeal in wooing hardliners in Iran to try to kill the Obama nuclear deal; his call for the mass slaughter of Palestinian civilians in Gaza; his unreconstructed neocon support for George W. Bush-era misadventures in the Middle East; his frequent cheerleading for U.S. military action against Iran; his truly unhinged call for federal troops to be sent in and commit war crimes against Black Lives Matter protestors.

He is the kind of history buff who skips around to the gory bits. For him, the slaughter taking place in Gaza is not enough. You shudder to think what would happen if he ever had access to the nuclear button.

Cotton, perhaps trying to overcompensate for his leaden and soporific speaking style, keeps coming up with ever more bombastic ways to broadcast his violent urges. This is mostly because he’s hungry for attention. But there’s an even more depraved element to the behavior of Cotton and the other lawmakers at Wednesday’s press conference. This is an election year, and they’re making a political calculation. Cotton thinks that spasms of violence at otherwise peaceful protests will benefit the Republican Party. The longer that campus protests stubbornly remain peaceful, the more Cotton wants to change the dynamic by initiating a violent response.

Here is where you might say that if something like that happens, Cotton would have blood on his hands. But that’s the sickest part of all: Cotton seems to genuinely want all the blood he can get.

#Tom Cotton is a violent adolescent freak and does not represent me #Arkansas Times

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religion-is-a-mental-illness · 6 months

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By: Peter Juul

Published: Nov 28, 2023

More than twenty years ago, the philosopher Michael Walzer famously asked whether or not there could be a “decent left.” After seeing the left’s reaction to the heinous October 7 terrorist atrocities in Israel, the answer is clearly no, there is no decent left—and we shouldn’t expect one to come into being any time soon.

It seemed that this indecent left had gone into remission with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. Outside a subset of inveterate anti-American ideologues, it was left to self-proclaimed realists to make the case for letting Moscow’s aggression against Ukraine stand—or, failing that, negotiate a settlement that would reward the Kremlin with chunks of Ukrainian territory. Indeed, a number of individuals affiliated with the so-called “restraint” school of foreign policy disassociated themselves from their erstwhile comrades while Democratic political leaders brutally smacked down half-baked calls from progressives to negotiate away Ukrainian sovereignty on terms favorable to Vladimir Putin.

But the indecent left roared back to life with a vengeance almost immediately after October 7, excusing and “contextualizing”—and sometimes outright denying—deliberate mass murder, rape, and kidnapping of ordinary Israeli civilians and foreigners. Outright anti-Semitism permeated the indecent left’s reaction to the Hamas terror attacks from the start, with a number of left-wing activists, academics, and intellectuals alike either celebrating or apologizing for the pogrom as soon as it occurred. At best, the left issued impotent calls for an immediate ceasefire that amounted to demands that Israel do nothing after 1,200 of its citizens were brutally massacred and another 240 or so taken hostage by Hamas and its allies.

If anything, the pathologies Walzer described two decades ago have only gotten worse. This is not a political movement that wants to think seriously or coherently about the war between Israel and Hamas or foreign policy and armed conflict more generally; as Walzer wrote twenty years ago, “ideologically primed leftists were likely to think that they already understood whatever needed to be understood.” An epidemic of denial has characterized the indecent left’s response to October 7, one marked by three great refusals.

A refusal to deal with the problem at hand: what to do about Hamas?

Many ceasefire calls mean well: ordinary people are understandably appalled by the death and destruction and quite reasonably just want it to stop. While this humanitarian sentiment is commendable, it fails to address the question at the heart of the current conflict: what to do about Hamas in the wake of October 7? Other much-touted ceasefire calls from politicians like Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR) essentially amount to terms of surrender for Hamas—immediate release of all hostages, giving up arms, and relinquishing control over Gaza. Likewise, the hostage release deal the Biden administration and Middle East partners brokered between Israel and Hamas only temporarily pauses the fighting.

Most immediate ceasefire calls coming from the indecent left essentially call for Israel to do nothing in response to October 7. Occasionally they come with provisions requiring Hamas release the hostages it took during its attack, but typically they amount to demands for a unilateral Israeli ceasefire without any explicit reciprocity from Hamas to, say, stop firing rockets into Israeli cities. Worse, they fail to take into account repeated threats by Hamas leaders to carry out October 7-style pogroms over and over again, much less the terrorist group’s long-standing, recently restated objective of destroying Israel itself. Since October 7, it’s obvious that many on the indecent left would have no problem with that outcome.

When asked what Israel—or America and the world at large—should do about Hamas after the cruelty of October 7, the indecent left’s repeated calls for an immediate ceasefire make clear that its answer is, at best, “nothing.” There may not be any good answers to this question, but “nothing” remains a grossly inadequate response.

A neo-Orientalist refusal to take either Palestinians or Israelis seriously

By and large, the indecent left has also demonstrated a remarkable lack of curiosity about either Palestinian or Israeli society and politics. It’s part and parcel of what TLP’s Brian Katulis dubbed neo-Orientalism: the use of nations and people overseas as props in America’s own domestic political debates. In particular, the indecent left spouts simplistic slogans while it professes “great concern and sympathy for the people of the region, while remaining largely indifferent to the diversity of backgrounds and perspectives within particular countries and societies.” That’s especially acute when it comes to discussions of Israel and the Palestinians, where the indecent left attempts to force the conflict into its own parochial ideological frameworks of “decolonization,” “white supremacy,” and “systemic racism.”

In other words, the indecent left thinks it already knows everything it needs to know about any given conflict—and especially any conflict that involves Israel. While “decolonization” provides the indecent left with a marginally coherent ideological framework, it amounts to little more than a “historically nonsensical” but nonetheless toxic stew of Soviet-era propaganda, half-baked academic theories, and contemporary identity politics. That includes the vogue to blame anything and everything on a mystical, all-pervasive white supremacy of which Israeli Jews somehow bizarrely partake. Why should the indecent left engage with the particularities of Palestinian politics or even give so much as a second glance to Israeli society when its ideology already gives it all the answers it needs?

As a result, the indecent left engages very little with actual Palestinian politics and society. It refuses to grant Palestinians any real agency and therefore refuses to acknowledge any real politics among Palestinians themselves, much less the fact that Hamas has repeatedly put forward an openly genocidal program or that it violently suppresses dissent among the Palestinians under its authority. Instead, many on the left fantasize about a single binational state in what was once the British Mandate of Palestine—something few Palestinians actually favor. Other leftists endorse slogans calling for a single Palestinian Arab state, but either way few of them actually delve into the complex power dynamics within Palestinian society—including those factions that don’t respect the basic rights and freedoms of a wide range of people.

If indecent leftists generally fail to engage with Palestinian politics and society in any meaningful way, they actively avoid any sort of real engagement with—or even understanding—of Israeli society and politics. At best, the indecent left ignores Israeli society and politics; at worst, it views Israeli society as somehow counterfeit. Other segments of the indecent left, especially in academia, actively discourage any engagement with Israelis and Israeli institutions. With zero understanding of Israeli society and politics, it cannot understand Israeli fears or motivations in any real way. The indecent left doesn’t know anything about Israeli society, and it doesn’t want to know anything about it.

A refusal to make elementary—if difficult—moral and ethical distinctions

In its rhetoric and analysis of the war between Israel and Hamas, the indecent left frequently equates the deliberate and premeditated murder, rape, and kidnapping of ordinary civilians with the inadvertent and unintentional deaths of civilians in what appear to be otherwise legitimate and legal military operations. Here as elsewhere, the left refuses to make what Walzer calls “one of the most basic and best understood moral distinctions: between premeditated murder and unintended killing.” At some fundamental level, many on the indecent left understand this distinction—as seen by the strenuous effort to portray just about any and every Israeli military action as unlawful and illegitimate by definition.

It may well be the case that the Israeli military has played fast and loose with the laws of war or committed war crimes in its war against Hamas. The sheer amount of ordnance dropped on Gaza between October 7 and the start of the Israeli ground offensive roughly three weeks later remains stunning—but it’s not necessarily illegal. It’s entirely legitimate and very much appropriate to question how well or how seriously the Israeli military takes its obligations to protect civilians, but as Walzer points out it’s impossible for any military to fight a war without putting civilians at risk. The Israeli military can and should probably do a better job protecting civilians, but it’s unrealistic to expect any war to end with zero civilian casualties.

By contrast, the indecent left remains either silent or in denial about blatant Hamas war crimes. It’s been an open secret for well over a decade that Hamas uses hospitals, schools, mosques, and other protected civilian buildings and facilities as command centers and bases for operations against Israel; sources ranging from the New York Times and PBS to non-governmental organizations typically unsympathetic to Israel like Amnesty International and even UNRWA attest to this fact. It’s not surprising to see the maze of tunnels uncovered beneath the Shifa hospital complex, nor is it shocking to see that Hamas brought hostages seized on October 7 to this medical facility. These Hamas abuses don’t even cover the deliberate and premeditated targeting of civilians for murder and rape on October 7 itself.

Then there’s the moral equivalence many on the indecent left have drawn between Israeli hostages held by Hamas and Palestinians jailed by Israel. There are many flaws and abuses in the way Israel treats detained Palestinians (particularly in East Jerusalem and the West Bank), but it’s hard to know what drives people to try and establish a moral equivalence between a four-year-old abducted by Hamas after terrorists killed her parents and a failed car bomber. However, that’s typical of an indecent left that tears down posters of hostages held by Hamas after October 7.

In its failure to make difficult but necessary moral distinctions, the indecent left contributes in its own way to the erosion of both the laws of war and the idea of crimes against humanity. It diminishes the force of both while giving the perpetrators of actual war crimes and atrocities effective political and moral cover. If there are no relevant distinctions between legal and legitimate actions in war and illegal and illegitimate ones—much less between legal and legitimate military operations and deliberate atrocities like October 7—it simply makes war even more brutal and appalling crimes against humanity more likely.

* * *

The pathologies of the indecent left burst out into the open once again after October 7, but they’ve been present in large swathes of the left for decades now. It’s difficult to escape the conclusion that these pathologies are inherent to and embedded in the left, and that no amount of argumentation or persuasion will eliminate or mitigate them. There are many decent leftists, but there is no decent left.

What should liberals and decent leftists do, then?

First, recognize that the indecent left is not your friend in any way, shape, or form. Indeed, the indecent left sees liberals and decent leftists—not conservatives or right-wing populists—as its primary adversaries. Even when there are ostensible areas of agreement, the underlying analysis and motivations and goals of the indecent left stand at odds with those of the broader center-left. It may not seem like much, but it’s important for mainstream liberals and decent leftists to understand this basic fact.

As a corollary, it’s important to note that the indecent left remains a small faction in American politics—it’s a paper tiger that garners excessive attention through activity on social media platforms and destructive political tactics. Different polls use different definitions and give different results, but the “progressive left” amounted to just six percent of the population in a 2021 Pew poll and eight percent in the 2018 Hidden Tribes poll.

Next, quarantine the indecent left. Much as mainstream liberals and decent leftists did in the late 1940s, today’s liberals and decent leftists must establish intellectual and political firewalls against the indecent left. That’s easier said than done, especially given the structure of contemporary center-left politics; unions and political parties that once filtered out bad-faith actors and indecent politics have weakened enormously in the intervening decades. Many of the same problems that plague domestic politics—an overreliance on college-educated professionals from foundation-funded non-profit institutions to staff government offices and agencies, for instance—likewise make it more difficult to combat indecent leftists on foreign policy.

Finally, liberals and the decent left need to articulate their own vision of foreign policy. The Biden administration and others on the mainstream center-left have been slowly groping their way toward this vision, particularly after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. But liberals and the decent left need to accelerate their own efforts to establish a foreign policy that stands in opposition not only to the indecent left but the isolationist America First right and the technocratic approach of the post-Cold War era. It’s an urgent task that can no longer be postponed.

Liberals and decent leftists did it once before, albeit under vastly different circumstances. But that should give us hope that we can do it again today.

#Peter Juul #indecent left #hamas supporters #antisemitism #liberalism #liberal ethics #liberal values #islam #islamic terrorism #hamas #hamas terrorism #moral confusion #illiberalism #religion is a mental illness

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thatstormygeek · 3 months

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And the message of these inspiring uncommitted voters, both in interviews and in messaging from the organizers, has been clear. Biden has lost our confidence after backing a genocide. He must do more. He must take action like cutting off the flow of weapons and bombs to Israel. He must stop funding Israel. He must use his very considerable power to push Israel to end the genocide in Gaza. This has been made clear, repeatedly. Yet it’s still being deliberately misconstrued. Instead of listening to the points made soundly and repeatedly by a broad coalition of Democratic voters, the effort to malign the uncommitted campaign is in full swing. John Fetterman is one of the avatars of this push, spamming social media with half-baked memes and commentary making fun of his own party’s voters, and fellow Democratic members of Congress like Rashida Tlaib, for backing uncommitted. Again and again he says that this movement to show Biden just how much backing Israel’s genocide could cost him is helping Trump. It’s a non-existent logic that’s both totally wrong and debasing to those making it in that it feigns a complete misunderstanding of the primary process.

Now some voters won’t come around. For them, it’s too late. And I understand that. But what the critics, the dishonest commentary surrounding the uncommitted movement appear to not understand is that they are hurting Biden, Palestinians, and democracy. Their efforts to circle the wagons rather than listen to thousands and thousands of dedicated party voters is hurting their own cause. They are further alienating these vital constituents, and futilely attempting to diminish the Palestinian cause.

It’s impossible to know what the White House will do next. But people are organizing, and escalating. It’s not just hundreds of thousands of people voting uncommitted, it’s people disrupting political events, disrupting Israeli real estate events where occupied land is being sold, locking themselves to the gates of weapons factories. Millions have boycotted Starbucks, to the point where they’re acknowledging the impact on sales and profits. We are taking economic, political, and direct action, and our voices are breaking through the noise. Above all, countless Americans are getting organized, allowing us to act collectively and do more.

Don’t let anyone get it twisted, this mass campaign isn’t anti-democracy or pro-Trump. It’s a movement against genocide using the democratic process itself, and the White House knows it. The majority of this country wants a ceasefire, wants to stop sending weapons to Israel, wants an end to the slaughter in Gaza. No matter how anyone tries to distort that reality, we will keep making it clear, and we will keep increasing the pressure to make peace a reality. Hundreds of thousands of people are turning out at the polls to say: one way or another, we will make ourselves heard and force the issue, we will force the United States to do everything it can to end Israel’s genocide in Gaza.

#us politics #ostrich dems #joshua p hill #i/p

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mixedforestkitchenwitch · 6 months

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White Chocolate Pistachio Brownies with Rose and Cardamom

A prayer for Free Palestine

INGREDIENTS

8 oz (226 g) high quality white chocolate bars, chopped, or chips

3⁄4 cup (168 g) unsalted butter, chopped into small cubes

2 eggs

2 egg yolks

1 1⁄4 cups (250 g) granulated white sugar

1 tablespoon (15 ml) vanilla extract

1 3⁄4 cups (219 g) all-purpose flour, spooned and leveled, or weighed

3⁄4 teaspoon salt

1/2-1 cup of roughly chopped unsalted pistachios

A lot of powdered sugar

Rose Water

3-4 cardamom pods

3 Tbs of whole milk

NOTES:

I scaled the recipe up by about a third to bake them in a 9” round. I found out that they come out better if you make them square according to the recipe as is.

INSTRUCTIONS

1. Preheat the oven to 325 degrees. Lightly grease a 9x9 pan and set aside. (You can also line the pan with parchment paper for easier removal.)

2. Melt the butter and the white chocolate together in a double boiler over medium-low heat. Stir continuously to ensure the white chocolate gets heated evenly. Then remove from the heat.

3. Add the eggs, egg yolks, sugar and vanilla to a large bowl and whisk together until pale and smooth. (You can also use an electric hand mixer on high speed to make it easier.)

4. Pour in the white chocolate mixture and whisk until combined and smooth.

5. Fold the flour and salt into the wet ingredients with a rubber spatula just until combined. Then fold in the pistachios.

6. Pour the white chocolate brownie batter into the prepared pan. Use a mini offset spatula to smooth the batter out.

7. Bake the brownies for 30-35 minutes. Then let the brownies cool completely in the pan on a wire rack.

8. Once cool, use a butter knife to loosen the edges of the brownies from the pan, and turn over to gently release. Cut into 16 squares.

9. Make the rose and cardamom drizzle. Warm the milk in a saucepan and break open the cardamom pods. Simmer them in the milk on very low heat until the flavor has infused. Usually 15 minutes to a half hour. Taste the milk to confirm.

10. Strain out the cardamom pods and let the milk cool to room temperature. Add 1/4 tsp rosewater to the milk (you can add more later if you want a rosier flavor) and begin adding powdered sugar. Add a quarter cup to start and stir until no lumps remain. Continue adding powdered sugar until you get a nice thick drizzle-able consistency. Taste and adjust the rosewater content if necessary.

11. Split the icing into two batches. Add pink food coloring to one and green food coloring to the other.

12. Put each icing into separate sandwich bags/piping bags. Cut a very small hole in the corner and use the bag to pipe the icing. Alternatively, you can just use a fork to do the drizzle. Allow to set.

13. Call your reps and demand a permanent ceasefire in Gaza. Go to protests. Boycott Starbucks, HP, Puma, Sodastream and the other companies that support the violence against Palestinians, found at this link. Do everything you can. Don’t look away.

“When Prophet Ibrahim was thrown into fire by the oppressor of the time, Numrud, a bird took drops of water in her beak and dropped it over the fire.

The other animals laughed: ‘what will your drops of water do for the largest of fires?’

The bird replied: ‘it may make no difference to the flames but when God asks me, ‘my Friend was burning, what did you do’ at least I won’t be ashamed.’

When you speak, when you protest, when you write, remember that.

God’s friends are burning. Let us not be ashamed 🇵🇸”

Taken from @zainab_alavi1 on instagram.

When this is over will you be able to face yourself?

#free palestine #free gaza #from the river to the sea palestine will be free #baking #magical cookery #color magic #cottagecore #witchythings #kitchen witch #witchy #witchcore #cooking #honeycore #white chocolate #brownies #cookies

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calamityandme · 6 months

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It’s the day before Thanksgiving and it’s been a busy day.

I’ve been sick for three days. The past two days I couldn’t get out of bed except to go to the bathroom lol. I was beat. I got it from Danny. He didn’t seem to have it as rough as I did. Idk.

Today I woke up and actually felt like I had some energy. Amazing. Finally lol. Thank goodness because I had to clean for R today. I contemplated turning around on my drive to R’s house, telling her I’m sick and can’t go. Yet I ended up parking outside her house and waited until it was time to clean.

I think I did a good job cleaning. I felt very easily irritated because R asked me to start doing something a specific way lol. It just irritated me in the moment even though I can definitely start doing it.

I listened to Class by Stephanie Land. I’m using Spotify’s Premium feature. Wow, she inspires me so much. Her story is just so real and even though I’m not currently in a domestic abuse relationship or a single mom, I just relate so much to her narration. It makes me feel seen. Although it also is a stabbing reminder I need to finish my stupid degree.

After I cleaned I flew to my bank and then the nearest Walmart.

My last minute grocery list:

rotisserie chicken (I’m intimidated by cooking a Turkey)

canned cranberry sauce (couldn’t find it)

toilet paper, because I used up most of ours as tissues

tissues

shredded cheese that I definitely bought way too much of but there were so many angry people everywhere and I needed to get out of there

velveeta cheese block, because Danny wants his mom’s cheesy broccoli rice casserole and I didn’t realize it called for it until last night

chai tea concentrate, because I wanted to treat myself

half gallon of milk because we never finish a whole gallon

frozen broccoli for the cheesy broccoli and rice casserole

Thankfully R gave me a variety of medicine before I left so I didn’t have to buy anything today. She labeled pills in baggies for me. She’s a sweetie.

Then I came home, put groceries away, exchanged keys with Danny and said goodbye before he left for work.

I’ve been baking today. I made an apple pie. Dough is frozen but I peeled 8 fucking apples today lol. Then I made homemade Reese’s bars.

I just got out of the bathtub. I’ve been watching the new Scott Pilgrim anime. I still feel sick but I am definitely getting better.

With the state of the world right now it doesn’t feel very festive lol. I have sent emails to government officials asking for a ceasefire. Now there’s a 4-day ceasefire. My heart breaks for the Palestinian people. I wish I had more money I could donate to get Palestinian people phones. I want to do more. I heard today that their department of education has cancelled the school year. This world is very bleak

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tf2-hellhole · 3 years

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can we get some fluffy tf2 headcannons? giving you full creative liberty over this one! :)

Idk if you meant tf2 x reader headcanons or just general head canons, so I did two sections for each merc; the first point is a general headcanon, the second is X Reader.

sorry this took forEEEEEEEEVER, I was just experiencing burnout and working on a prize for a contest on my server (BTW WE HAVE A NEW DRAWING CONTEST GO CHECK IT OUT)

Scout:

Scout is actually really self-concious about his intelligence. He’s not very bright and he knows it, and it makes him feel horrible. He had flunked out of high school and struggled in most of his core classes. He honestly feels really stupid and he hates when people point it out. But luckily for him, a lot of the other mercs understand what it’s like to be looked down upon and empathize with him. Quite a few of them help him relearn the skills he never mastered in school. Engie helps him with math, Spy sometimes helps him with writing, and even Pyro has him read children’s books to them to improve his reading.

Scout absolutely loves little casual dates. Stuff like going out to eat lunch, going to the movies, maybe just cuddling up in his quarters and watching a movie. He tries to plan one every week. His dream date is taking you back to Boston to meet his family and go to a Red Sox game. But obviously, since you’re both in New Mexico at the time, he’s going to have to shelve that dream for a few years.

Soldier:

Soldier is an excellent raccoon dad. At first, the other mercenaries thought they’d all end up dead by the end of the month when he first found them. But surprisingly, they are are very well cared for. They’re all fed regularly and basically have his entire assigned quarters to themselves. He loves every single one of them dearly, even the ones that hiss and scratch him every time. The raccoons, at least some of them, are kind of like weird, quiet dogs, and actually get along pretty well with most of the other mercenaries.

Soldier is a surprisingly very physically affectionate partner, and he’s not at all opposed to PDA. He loves hand holding, cheek kisses, cuddles, the whole nine yards. Whenever he’s particularly excited, he loves to run up to you, scoop you up into his arms, and press a hard, sloppy kiss to your lips. Of course, he’s careful to not hurt you, but he’s a very intense, emotional guy and he needs to express all that love he has for you!

Pyro:

Pyro is and excellent listener, so they’re a person a lot of the other mercenaries depend on to vent. Demo often comes to them to vent about his emotions, Scout, Sniper, or Medic will rant about what’s bothering them, and even Engineer will talk about his stress. And of course, Pyro doesn’t understand a lot of what is told to them, but they’re still happy to help them feel a little better, and they would happily do it a hundred times over to make their friends feel better.

Pyro has a hobby of baking and making candy/treats, and they love sharing everything they make with you. When they first gave you a treat, you honestly thought it’d be burnt or bad in some other way. But to your surprise, it was amazing! They’re actually and excellent cook, but they just love making sweet things the best. They’ll make you just about anything you could ask for without hesitation, but they’re best at making anything sweet.

Demo:

Demo obviously has the potential to pretty emotional when he’s drunk, there’s no doubt about that. But on the off-chance that he’s sober, he’s actually pretty sweet and considerate. Though he still is a rough-housing joker, he’s much more considerate of his friends’ feelings and has deeper and more meaningful conversations with them. He often likes to go to bars with his friends and co-workers on ceasefire weekends, having lots of fun conversation, drinking together, and generally causing chaos around town.

Demo, to put it simply, doesn’t like himself. He’s critical of everything, from his skills to race, because people have always put him down about them. His mother told him he’s lazy and unskilled too many times to count, just everyone makes fun of his eye, and many have made fun of his skin color. But you make him feel so much better about himself. Just the fact that someone so kind and gorgeous is actually with him makes him feel like he’s not as horrible as he thought. There’s been a couple of times where you’ve accidentally almost brought him to tears with a sweet compliment or show of affection, because he never thought in a million years that someone would love him and care for him like you do. He feels so blessed that he has someone like you.

Heavy:

I know the fandom’s decided that Engie is the Team Mom and makes the food, but I also think that Heavy cooks a lot too. He makes all of his own food, so he often makes a lot of extras to feed the team because a lot of them just eat junk food and Medic’s always complaining about their eating habits. Heavy often takes like half the food for himself (he does have a huge appetite and loves food, so he likes to take a lot) and just boxes up the leftover portions and leaves them in the fridge for the team to take. He says he’s only doing it because they can’t work properly if they’re unhealthy, but he also does it because he cares about their health. A little bit.

At first, you wouldn’t think Heavy’s the most cuddly guy. But surprise, he actually loves giving and receiving physical affection. He just doesn’t show it often out of respect for your boundaries, and doesn’t do it around others. His absolute favorite thing is to cuddle you against his chest. Sometimes it’s when going to sleep, or cuddling on the couch, or maybe just a quick hug. He just loves the feeling of your head resting against his chest and your arms trying (and failing) to wrap around his torso. It makes him feel like you’re safe. Nobody could ever get you when you’re wrapped up in his arms.

Engie:

You’d think Sniper’s the only nature nerd on the team, but Engie absolutely loves the outdoors, as well as animals. It’s because his father would often take him out camping every couple of months. It was often the only time he would get 1-on-1 time with his usually very busy father. So he does love the great outdoors, especially that of his home state. He especially loves animals. He was raised on a farm and helped take care of lots of injured wild animals with his mother. He absolutely loves pets and would like to have many when he retires. His dream is to have is own ranch, with horses and cows and a bunch of dogs and the whole shebang.

Engie absolutely loves playing the guitar, so of course he loves playing for you. He learns all sorts of sweet love songs to sing to you. He’s an excellent player and actually has a pretty decent singing voice (think Johnny Cash, he kinda has that singing style). I hope you like country music, because that’s all he’s going to sing to you until you give him some requests or he finds out your favorite artists or genres. You can tell how happy he is every time he gets to surprise you with a new song he learned, and he’d be a giddy, laughing mess if you sang along with him.

Medic:

You’d think this guy takes horrible care of his birds because of the environment he keeps them in, but his birds are actually exceptionally well cared for. He buys them only the best and most expensive bird food, gives them super high-quality water with vitamins n stuff in it, takes them to the vet regularly, the whole shebang. Yeah they get a little dirty from sitting around in his lab, but he always gives them a little bath at the end of the day to get all the blood and guts off.

Medic is honestly such a playful partner. Of course, around his co-workers he’s a little more professional; he still gives you soft touches, a kiss on the cheek, or a big smile, but that’s about it. In private, however, he’s such a sweetheart. He’s always sweeping you up into big hugs, kissing all over your face, and calling you all sorts of adorable nicknames in a variety of languages. It comes as a surprise, because you’d think he’d be a little more formal, but that’s really only for special occasions. It honestly brings him so much joy to have someone like you by his side, and every day he’s going to make sure you know just how grateful he is to have you in his life.

Sniper:

Sniper is an incredibly independent and self-sufficient man, but he’s also secretly a real mama’s boy. He loves his parents dearly and has a particularly close relationship with his mother. As well as sending them money every month, he sends them all sorts of gifts, letters, postcards, and souvenirs. He also makes sure to call them regularly. He goes home every couple of months to visit them, and one could see that he loves helping around the house and chatting with his parents. His mother loved gardening, so his number-1 favorite thing to do is help her in the garden.

Despite Sniper’s obvious lack of knowledge on self-care, he takes a lot of time out of his day to make sure you are happy, healthy, clean, and well-fed. He doesn’t hound you like a helicopter parent but he likes to ask how you’re feeling, if you’re hungry, stuff like that. It feels nice to know you’re taken care of or take care of you himself. If you switch it around and try to take care of him, however, he’s honestly baffled as to why you would care so much as to make sure he’s doing well. He does absolutely love the affection and attention he gets out of it though, it makes him feel loved.

Spy:

I’ve mentioned this before, but I have a head canon that Spy has a dog. Her name is Charlotte, and she’s an elderly Chihuahua. One would think he’d buy a French breed, but he found her out in the pouring rain one day and fell in love with her fluffy ears and spunky personality. She’s now 17 years old, extremely frail, missing most of her teeth, and extremely aggressive to anyone other than Spy, but he loves her dearly and pays for all of her medical expenses without batting an eye. And of course, she expresses her thanks with lots of kisses.

Spy loves dancing, and knows all kinds of dances, from flamenco to ballroom dancing to the Charleston to, canonically, disco. So of course, he’s dying to share all of the most romantic dances he knows with you. He’d love to actually teach you how to dance, rewarding you with kisses every time you finally get a move right and laughing softly when you make mistakes. But in reality, he just wants to use it as an excuse to dance with you against his chest and smother you in affection.

#tf2 #team fortress 2 #tf2 x reader #tf2 x s/o #tf2 x y/n #tf2 x you #tf2 imagines #tf2 headcanons #tf2 scout #tf2 soldier #tf2 pyro #tf2 demoman #tf2 heavy #tf2 engineer #tf2 medic #tf2 sniper #tf2 spy

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zee-writes-and-draws · 3 years

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Normal world AU where the different buildings are just random groups of people and all of them ended up moving to the small village near the supposedly ‘haunted’ mountain that Samon and Enki grew up on bc property values are low as shit, and all of the minors are adopted by the guards. Qi has basically just grabbed Upa and Liang and ran the hell away from the Chinese mafia. Samon sees this random man dragging two half-dead children with him and this is now the very first time any of the new residents of the village find out the ‘hauntings’ that lowered property values were just a teenage Enki post massive growth spurt and a very small and over-energetic Samon that haven’t been seen in well over a decade.

- Hajime has, unfortunately, agreed to look after Jyugo and Nico while Rock and Uno try to find legal jobs, but it’s a lot on him. He and Seitarou help Uno and Rock fight a case to get custody of the two minors. Yamato is helping Tsukumo get a restraining order against his former agent and various paparazzi, as well as going to therapy so he doesn’t constantly feel the need to put on a persona in front of others. Hajime is a teacher at the local school (since there’s a decent number of local kids and then the building children), Yamato is the school’s coach, and Seitarou sells uniforms/cute festival stuff but is also occasionally seen working with the age 7 and below kids because they’re all very small and nice.

- Kiji is trying to cure Honey of his anger management issues and Trois of his pyromaniac tendencies. His day job is making and testing makeup that everyone buys, like mascara and eyeliner and hair gel. His second in command is working in one of the other small shops, selling everyone clothes (he and Seitarou make the clothing together).

- Kenshirou is only here because some of his dogs are sick and this village has been weirdly good for their health. Along the way he lets Musashi and Hitoshi stay with him because they help on chores and the dogs love both of them very much. He helps with the local stray problem by opening a shelter and rehabilitating most of them (the few who can’t be fixed to near-perfect health are still loved and cared for). Hitoshi bakes lots of food and sells it at Shiro’s restaurant, which is also why his presence is appreciated. Musashi tutors online part-time after Mitsuru rigged up wifi for them. Between all three of their jobs they can afford a place that’s small but has four tiny rooms so each person can a private space. (They sleep in the living room that’s been transformed into the group bedroom).

- Mitsuru is considered the local nuisance in so many ways, but after all of his loudspeakers and amplifiers have been confiscated he’s forced to resort back to regular hand-made instruments, so he at least gets to learn something entertaining as he irritates everyone with his noise-making. He and Momoko live in the same house but there’s a line drawn on the inside and outside that splits the house in half so everyone realizes in all of ten seconds they’re not actually together together, just saving on rent as long-term friends. Momoko works on managing the more official stuff to keep the town from being erased. She’s the unofficial (until the next election of course) mayor of the town at this point. Mitsuru’s day job is rigging up stuff like wifi and helping Hajime with his shop class at the high school.

- Shiro moved here after hearing how wonderful the cuisine is. He approves of being able to gather fresh ingredients on the mountain. Rock is frequently seen at his restaurant, both as a customer and as a worker. Hitoshi was recruited within a week. (Hajime has some mixed feelings but Rock mostly stops acting like an idiot after the first day, so it works out well)

- Inori and Ruka moved here years ago (and dragged the Daisen brothers with them) and are pretty much the only residents who were here before everyone started moving out and the buildings moved in. They’re the only ones initially who know the story behind the hauntings and never shared it out of indifference. Inori works in construction of new buildings/clearing rubble from the old, the Daisen trio help train the different sports teams at the school, and Ruka technically co-owns the makeup business with Kiji but his preferred job is as an unofficial swimming instructor because the two of them don’t get along.

- Samon and Enki bring the village supplies and materials from the mountain and trade this way. Samon has a notable weakness for ice pops, popsicles, and zakuro shaved ice, which he gets to surprise Enki on days it seems like he might want it. The new residents are all pleasantly surprised by how sweet Noriko is. Shiro offers her a job after trying some of her desserts. She bakes on weekends and holidays only to avoid overexerting herself, but the rest of the time her jobs include checking people in, taking orders to Shiro and Rock, and keeping peace if someone starts arguments. Houzuki is the area acupuncture specialist and medic until the Otogi family moves in, but he switches to full time acupuncture and massage therapy after they take up the practice. (they’re better than him at medicine anyways and he’s ok with admitting it).

- Liang and Upa love training on the mountain. Rock joins them frequently, often chatting with Liang as they race up. Qi is marginally less interested in physical activity, but he’s willing to make the hike up with them because of the amazing plant both during the hike and at the arrival itself. In the long run, doing some exercise in this form helps him with his mental health a lot and makes him happier. Tsukumo joins occasionally and talking to Qi helps him gradually come out of his shell.

- Trois takes to the challenge of trying to be constructive in building things instead of weapons and explosives. The downside is he frequently teams up with Mitsuru (who has the most equipment necessary) and therefore there are unique ways of getting around the idea of non-destructive inventions. Honey figures out ways to get Mitsuru his speakers back on the condition that he can use the wiring for his capsules.

- Nico ends up really sad about the lack of wifi so he tries to work with Mitsuru to improve tech, but he’s got a hard time reading the manuals so now Musashi, accompanied by either Uno or Trois depending on the day, can be seen teaching Nico how to read instruction manuals.

- Yamato is still very proud of his Japanese heritage, but he also frequently encourages others to appreciate the culture they live in and the culture they came from. Thanks to him, there’s a small festival hosted each year where everyone brings something like food or games or clothing from their culture and share it with everyone.

- Kiji takes it as a personal challenge to help teach normal world culture to at least one of the Gokuu brothers. Enki is far less willing to go along with the idea that he needs help from someone, so it’s Samon. Inori, who had a similar idea for the last eleven years, is currently trying to teach Samon how to drive. It’s yielding mixed results, but he takes really well to motorbikes. Hajme and Samon have a brief ceasefire whenever the subject of motorcycles comes up.

- No one is allowed to bring up the time that Hajime got lost in the mountain. No one.

- Kuu comes and goes as he pleases. Mostly he stays at Hajime’s house but sometimes he’ll somehow appear wherever Samon Enki and Noriko are presently staying and lies down in the lap of whoever is trying to meditate. Enki tries to ignore Kuu (and fails), Samon will give him small scritches and complain about Hajime in a quiet tone, and Noriko feeds and pets him.

- In their spare time, many of the adults critique the prison systems they rescued the others from. Kiji, Hajime, and Kenshirou work with Enki to fix things on a bureactraic level, frequently accompanied by Momoko when she isn’t a sole representative in front of various international governments. Hajime knows the prison model perfectly, Kenshirou understands the police aspect that ties into it, and Kiji has several decades of experience serving as a prison guard, and their combined knowledge leads to many of their proposals being pushed pretty far up the ranks.

- Samon is working on fixing prisons on the level of how each inmate is treated. All the official and formal changes in the world don’t change that there’s also issues with inmates not receiving care, sufficient entertainment, decent things for purchase and not just whether or not they can afford them, all sorts of stuff that slips past the cracks in the paperwork. He’s also the one who’s pushing for more rehabilitation programs with Kiji and Mitsuru’s help. Between Samon’s knowledge of physical needs of people, Kiji’s balanced addition of general knowledge of what kind of education and paperwork prisoners need for proper rehabilitation to stick, and Mitsuru’s experience in communication, they have a very solid structure. Mitsuru’s ability to middleman and talk to Momoko also helps push their ideas forward.

- Slowly the buildings become more friendly towards one another. Upa smiles more because Nico helped him get out of his shell, there is a photo of Tsukumo laughing as himself for the first time hanging on the wall of Shiro’s restaurant, and Kenshirou’s dogs all adopted different humans to befriend and bond with. Qi gradually gets over his fear of dogs thanks to Musashi and ends up adopting one who works as a service dog for him and keeps him away from panic attacks and self-harming attempts, as well as (gradually) learning how to tell what kind of health Upa and Liang are presently in and alerting the doctor if necessary.

- The time-honored tradition of feuds between the different non-inmates and adults in charge of them continues, but they added in some new competitions. There are now options for multi-building tug-of-war, kids vs adults (and variations) relays, one v one competitions, and general tomfuckery. Most of the time Momoko is the referee, Mitsuru commentates, and although they rarely join in, they tend to tag-team and secure a near-effortless victory. If it’s every person for themselves, Momoko wins unless distracted by Hajime, at which point the rule of funny is frequently used to determine a victor.

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bouwrites · 3 years

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Re: The Miraculous Ladybug/Housamo crossover

Claude is absolutely both rich and stupid enough to pick up all the Berserkers and casually go visit Taurus in Paris

Chloé and/or Lila realizing Daisuke effectively works for someone absolutely filthy rich.

Bathym is mistaken for an akuma but akuma is just demon in japanese so Bathym is straight up like “you know it baby ;)”

Horkeu Kamui meets Ladybug and Chat Noir. Chat Noir has a new dad now. Horkeu Kamui might be planning something after he finds out about Gabriel.

Horkeu Kamui and Tom and Sabine baking together and sharing recipes.

Bathym sets up Taurus, Chat, Marinette, and Ikutoshi on a “play date” while their dads (Horkeu Kamui, Tom, and Bathym himself) coo over them.

(I’ve got a lot of feeling about the dads okay)

Ikutoshi has no idea why he’s here but Kagami fights him so he’s not too irritated.

Pollux just going full tourist with Snow and Claude absolutely following suit.

Snow and Chloé’s butler Jean meeting and either going a more passive aggressive Snow/Melusine route or becoming immediate best friends I haven’t decided yet. (Maybe both depending on the topic lmao)

Macan seeing a cat boy and trying to adopt Chat and getting into a high key dad war with Horkeu Kamui over him. (Ceasefire comes when they find out about Gabriel and decide on joint custody. Chat Noir has no part in these discussions.)

Macan joins the dads during the play date but really just encourages the kids to do something extremely dangerous so Horkeu Kamui has to put him in time out

Macan is also mistaken for an akuma but he’s just like “nah that’s Bathym!” and grins with his teeth the size of an average man’s head lmao.

Bathym trying to get Ladybug and Chat Noir to fight him as an “akuma” so that he can show off on live Parisian TV. (Taurus offers to MC, Chat is swayed, Ladybug adamantly refuses.)

Claude definitely doesn’t tell Taurus about this ahead of time so he basically just rolls up to the school to pick him up one day leaving everyone but Taurus, who is used to Claude’s bs, completely shook bc limo???? Beefy lion butler????????? Someone was definitely screaming??????????????

Lila’s like “since when was he RICH????” Taurus is just like oh hi Snow please tell me you didn’t bring Macan

Macan bursts out of the limo causing both an akuma scare and also for half of the school to see their lives flash before their eyes.

Macan is just really excited to see Taurus again and doesn’t even notice.

Lila is considering if cosying up to this guy with uber-rich connections is worth it if it comes along with That.

Claude actually 100% adores Chloé and no one knows how to feel about it.

OH MY GOD DO THEY BRING GARMR they definitely bring Garmr everyone loves Garmr

The goodest boy gets so many pets. So many.

#speak #hint hint #tokyo afterschool summoners #i could go on literally all day #or night lmao #but for my sleep i’m gonna stop now #Nyarl shows up to cause trouble for no reason other than that he can

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glassworkspiderlilies · 3 years

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verglas

Piofiore no Banshou | Nicola/Liliana, Gilbert | AO3 Summary: At the height of summer, Liliana Adornato arrives at the Visconti manor in the hands of Nicola Francesca. There are unresolved issues between them. This becomes everyone else's problem, too. (Or, Lili wages some psychological warfare against Nicola. The Visconti manor experiences a premature and very severe winter.) Notes: COULDN’T MOVE ON FROM PIOFIORE WITHOUT PAYING TRIBUTE TO MY FAVORITE BOY, NICOLA FRANCESCA....I LOVE HIM. and therefore i shall bully him, just a little.

At the height of summer, Liliana Adornato arrives at the Visconti manor in the hands of Nicola Francesca.

The latter is met with thinly veiled hostility. A traitor is a traitor, but Gilbert has made his orders clear: Nicola Francesca is not to be touched. The former, on the other hand, is met with both politeness and interest; though she had been under the protection of the Falzone Family, she is merely a normal girl, and one from the church, at that. There is no problem there.

It's expected that Nicola will be trouble, the largest upset, internal ceasefire notwithstanding. After all, he’s not just any traitor to his Family—he was their Underboss, and a talented one at that. Simply by way of his being here and what he’s already done—he will always be an outsider, no matter how many years he stays with the Visconti or how many feats he performs under their name. As Oliver says: once a traitor, always a traitor.

The Visconti do not expect the lady to be anything but demure and well-mannered, as she has already shown herself to be. Sure, she was living in the Falzone manor awhile and sure, the Visconti are friendlier than most mafia, but both Families are still mafia, and in Burlone, it’s the mafia that rule. As a citizen, Liliana knows how to show her respect, to stay within the unwritten laws.

But. Within a few days, it becomes apparent that there’s something between Lili and Nicola. Despite the fact that it was he who kidnapped her and brought her here, she looks for him at every turn and is far more at ease in his presence than anyone else’s. The Visconti soldati see her face light up at any glimpse of him, though Nicola rebuffs her approach at every turn, far too busy to entertain her. Otherwise, he never spares a glance. The two have had at least one proper conversation behind closed doors, presumably in which Nicola had reaffirmed her situation and his true colors, but it doesn’t change her behavior.

The soldati shake their heads and think she’ll get over it; it is apparent she has outlived her usefulness, and even they have heard tell of Nicola Francesca’s pretty string of broken hearts. Eventually those ladies learn to stop lamenting over a mafia boy, and move on.

The soldati are wrong.

Liliana is darling and sweet, kind and optimistic. She is also stubborn.

All of those are weapons, and consciously or not, she uses them.

There are unresolved issues between her and Nicola.

This becomes everyone else’s problem, too.

He is avoiding her.

Some interaction is inevitable, yes, but he makes the choices where he can. If she is in the dining hall he will not eat then; if she is in the kitchens he will make his drink later. He leaves the manor before she wakes and returns well past her bedtime. If he must see her or speak to her, he averts his gaze or cuts her off mid-sentence and pushes past him.

Lili had thought him kind, but he’d warned her—he is also a cruel man.

And yet—Lili mounts her rebellion, undeterred.

First is during lunch one day. Nicola walks into the dining room and the chatter quiets before it picks up again; he is used to this by now, more relieved that he does not see Lili in their midst. He goes to the serving table, frowning a little at what he sees. Broiled bream in lardo is the main course.

He hates lardo.

He considers his options, but before he can choose anything, the volume of the chatter fluctuates again, and when he turns he sees Lili sweeping into the room. His heart doesn’t even have time to sink before she’s in front of him.

“Here,” she says, and though her tone is pleasant as ever, her eyes are challenging.

In her hands is a plate, loaded up with food. It looks no different than anyone else’s, but upon closer inspection, he realizes that the fish has been baked, the accompanying lemon sauce a little different. It has no lardo.

Nicola looks at her, and she stares back. Back at the Falzone manor, she’d made a very similar dish to today’s main course, and he’d eaten it without complaint because she had served it to him so happily. It was later that she found out his preferences, but he assured her hers had been an exception.

Now, she serves him the opposite. Despite his treatment of her, she remembered and went through the effort of preparing something else for him.

Lili waits. All around them, the chatter has quieted to a low din, everyone watching the strange almost-fight between them. Nicola should refuse, like he’s always done. She’s tried this before, offering him food, trailing after him and begging him to eat or rest.

She’s not begging now; it is an attack, as much as it is an offering.

Her eyes flicker at his hesitation, and she tilts her head a little.

How much do you hate me? She seems to ask, limpid and melancholy. Will he rebuff her food again this time, despite the other options being something he hates or an unsatisfying combination of side dishes?

“You must have a lot of time on your hands,” Nicola says with a frown, trying to spurn her anyway.

“I’m staying put,” Lili responds, without missing a beat, “So yes, I do. But you won’t waste it, will you?”

Her ample time, or her food? Either way, Nicola can’t think of anything else rude to say. He lets Lili push the plate into his hands.

“Thank you,” he says stiffly, and Lili beams at him.

Nicola sits. Lili does too in the seat across from him, after preparing her own plate. It’s the same as his. The dining room is unable to return to its normal ambiance, a strange sort of frigidness still present between the two of them.

I make what you like. I eat what you like. I sit with you, I eat with you—I am with you.

It is a message, all of it, to him and the Visconti both whether she intends both or not. She stands by him and him only, even now.

Nicola cleans his plate, almost against his will. She’s a good cook, always has been, and the food is…familiar. Comforting.

“I’ll get it,” Lili says softly, reaching for his empty dish, and Nicola looks at her.

Her actions so far have all been servile, but when she looks at him now, satisfaction evident on her face, Nicola feels like a fly caught in a spider’s web.

Nicola is exhausted when he walks through the door, and moreso when Lili pops her head around the corner. Her face brightens even as his darkens, and she offers him a plate of fresh panzerotti, which he curtly refuses.

“You don’t look so good,” she continues, coming closer and practically blocking his path as he tries to move forward, peering at his face. “How about a cup of espresso?”

Nicola freezes at the familiar words, though they must seem innocuous to everyone else. His eyes narrow almost imperceptibly, and Lili takes advantage of his pause to flit towards the kitchen.

“I don’t need it,” he calls immediately after her, his brows furrowing, but when he finally follows after her, she is already in the middle of preparing one. “I thought I refused.”

She doesn’t look at him, pointedly ignoring his words.

“You look pale. Having something warm will make you feel better,” she tells him serenely, and Nicola stiffens again.

He remembers this exact conversation when he first brought her to the Visconti manor, only their roles were reversed.

In another few moments, she is handing him the freshly brewed cup.

“Here,” she says, smiling, and Nicola sighs, looking vaguely pained.

“Lili…” he sighs, but she merely continues to hold out the cup of espresso as she pins him with her stare.

The coffee does smell good. He accepts the cup and sips, and she looks a little relieved—had he truly looked so tired, and in need of a pick-me-up?—before turning to make herself a cup of what he presumes will be a caffe latte. She looks vaguely surprised when she turns around and he’s still there, and perhaps it is testament to how exhausted he is because he doesn’t move.

They stand in silence, sipping at their drinks, a world unspoken between them once more.

“I’m happy to see you,” Lili says, very softly, and Nicola sighs.

“Liliana…don’t,” he says, almost apologetic.

Her mouth twists a little, having expected this anyway.

“It’s the duty of an Italian lady to please the man in her life,” she says flatly, sipping at her coffee in an apathetic manner.

Nicola looks at her in slight disbelief; the fact that she remembers the things he’s said with such clarity to use them against him in such a way…despite himself, he’s impressed.

“You’re not pleasing me, Liliana,” Nicola half-purrs, half-sneers. “Why do you keep doing this? Just be the good girl you’ve always been—“

“The fact that you think that is already a mistake.”

He freezes. Oh, she is good.

Lili is smiling at him, the picture of innocence and elegance, and though she could very well just be repeating his words back to him, suddenly he is questioning whether or not she means it—or rather, how much. She’s not good enough at subterfuge for her entirely personality to be a lie—plus the Falzones have watched over her for a long time. But her behavior has been different lately, hasn’t it, and Nicola wonders—why?

“Liliana,” Nicola says carefully, “I already told you why I brought you here. If you’re looking for the act I put up back at the Falzone manor—“

“What,” Lili interrupts him, setting her cup back on its saucer with a loud clink, “An unfortunate misunderstanding.”

This time, it’s she who walks away first, letting winter crystallize behind her.

He’s been unsettled since their last conversation, though he tries to put it out of his mind. It makes him more exhausted, and he hears Lili’s voice in his mind, telling him to rest, which he ignores too.

Nicola had told Gil to use and abuse him while he still could, and he still means it. He’s used to being worked hard, but it’s Lili that makes him tired, it’s Lili that—

He sighs deeply, running a hand through his hair. It’s time to admit that he does, in fact, need to rest, and thus drag his body back to the new, uncomfortable room he must call home.

As he steps through the door of the Visconti manor, he hears a low, distressed voice, and his feet are already moving before his mind can catch up.

Lili is standing in front of her door, crying. Gil is in front of her, making soothing noises, but the sight of Lili’s tears cuts Nicola to the bone, knocks the air out of his lungs. What happened? What happened?

“It’s just hard,” Lili is saying, as she puts her hands to her face, “I’m just…a little tired.”

“I can imagine,” Gil responds, leaning a little closer. “Say, Lili…”

She looks up, and Nicola’s breath catches in his throat—she is vulnerable now, scrubbed raw, and Gil…

“What if you make a different choice?” Gil asks, and Lili blinks, confused.

“What…?”

“I’m just saying that I would never make a pretty girl like you cry,” Gil says, smiling. “Instead of Nicola, why don’t you give me a shot instead?”

“Gil, I—“

The Visconti Boss leans close, opening the door behind her just as Lili steps back, and in a moment he’s practically pushed her into her room.

The door closes.

Nicola is moving again, feeling cold, cold, slamming the door open again with a bang. Lili has fallen onto her bed, eyes wide, and Gil is smirking. He rips Gil from Lili, and she sits up, a hand over her heart; Nicola struggles to remain calm as he questions just what on earth is going on here. Gil is suspiciously calm in the face of his vitriol—Nicola truly did not think Gil was this sort of person. But after some time, Gil shoots Lili a wry look.

“Guess I won that bet, huh? Or did you want to see more?”

“N-no…” Lili breathes, and Nicola glares at the Boss.

“Gilbert…what do you mean, bet?”

“Your girl here looked so pitiful that I decided to do a little role playing. Say, Nicola…how about ditching the lies for once and saving your effort for the truth instead?”

He laughs then sails out of the room. His words sink in, and Nicola curses Gil’s back with fervor.

And then, it is just the two of them.

“…Thank you, Nicola,” Lili ventures hesitantly, though she doesn’t look at him. “I didn’t think Gil was going to go that far.”

He sighs deeply, shoulders sagging.

“Well, I could tell that you truly were not enjoying the situation,” he frowns. “…Don’t scare me like that.”

She meets his eyes then, and though his brows are creased in anger, she can tell it’s not directed towards her. For a moment she looks hopeful, but then she stares down at her lap, her shoulders tensing as though she is already expecting rejection.

“Can we rebuild our relationship from the beginning?” she blurts, and she puts her face in her hands for a moment. “I don’t mind if it’s not exactly the same as before. Just…please, Nicola, don’t…don’t push me away.”

He stares at her, and she looks up at him. There are still tears clinging to her lashes, and he remembers: I’m just…a little tired. Suddenly also remembers back at the Falzone manor, where one of his men had politely warned him don’t play around with her too much, followed up by Leo’s cheeky please treasure her, okay? We believe in you!

He sighs heavily. There is an end to all things.

“I won’t treat you as kindly as before,” he warns, but she brightens anyway, and for a second it seems like she might throw her arms around him.

He finds that he wouldn’t mind. He finds that despite his words, he wants to treat her kindly, if it means she’ll smile at him like that again.

“That’s fine!” Lili exclaims warmly, the tension bleeding out of her body. “Thank you, Nicola!”

He shakes his head; there is nothing she should show gratitude for.

“Why are you so happy?” he murmurs wryly, and she giggles a little.

“I just am,” she says, and gazes back at him.

For a moment, it is spring again, and though he still has things to do and burdens weighing upon him, Nicola leaves her room a little lighter.

The soldati have gotten used to turning on their heels and fleeing the premises entirely when they see Lili and Nicola together. If people linger around the edges of the snowglobe the two create for themselves when they speak, they get frostbitten—it’s always snow and sleet and squalls around these two. As such, it takes a while before some of them manage to register the softening. Lili is still the one that talks more while Nicola listens, but his lips are turned up ever so slightly now, and his eyes are gentler.

Civility. In some ways, this is scarier; the soldati have only ever seen them at odds, and though what is happening now is certainly better, it is also somewhat unsettling. Spring could be coming, or it could simply be a false alarm before a blizzard kills them all. Burlone has mild winters, but Gil grew up in America, and they’ve heard stories about how bad their winters can get, how freak storms can happen just when you think it’s starting to warm up.

The soldati watch in apprehension, Oliver watches with suspicion, Gil watches with amusement, and the temperature of the Visconti household is still entirely reliant on the two who don’t truly belong there.

They talk at night.

It’s truly the only time Nicola can spare, when Lili should really be in bed. But she stays up for him and her smile is so bright when he knocks and opens her door that he forgets he is tired. He owes this to her, at the least; he hadn’t bothered to think it might mean anything suggestive when she’d asked him for this favor, even as he sits on her bed, but he did tease her about it anyway just to see her blush so beautifully. It’s—comforting, to see her react this way again.

“Despite everything…I thought you’d continue to ignore me,” she admits, and he give her a wry smile.

“I should have been about to lie to you without any remorse. But you…how do I say this…” he shakes his head, shrugging helplessly. “You were…surprisingly stubborn. Even I thought I might have treated you a little too coldly, but…you really have no sense of self preservation, do you?”

She laughs a little.

“Maybe just when it comes to you,” she says, “But I also don’t believe everything you did for me was a lie.”

He’s floored on two accounts—her unintentional flirting and her optimism, though she isn’t wrong about the latter.

“It always confused me, why you were so kind to me at the Falzone manor…so when I learned it was only just to use me, well…it was oddly…relieving, to have an explanation.”

Nicola laughs disbelievingly, absolutely mystified.

“You didn’t curse me or hate me or despise me? Not even a little?”

She tilts her head, her brows furrowing as she considers, though he answer is near immediate.

“It was painful to be ignored. But hating you didn’t cross my mind.”

Nicola gapes at her.

“You’re unbelievable,” he mutters, and she simply beams at him. “Unbelievable and impossible.”

“Only to you, Signor Francesca,” she says, her eyes twinkling, and Nicola…Nicola resists the urge to reach out and touch her.

“Well?” he says instead, with a slight cough, “What do you want to talk about tonight?”

It is evident that she wants to ask about his betrayal, but she curbs the topic just a little to ask about his and Dante’s childhood instead. Once he starts talking, it spills out of him with abandon; by the end, she’s crying, and his heart softens at the sight of her tears. She’d been downcast the first time he told her about his past too, that day he’d fallen asleep on her lap, and he’d felt an odd sort of sadness for it. Now, he is grateful for her sorrow, though it’s mixed with that same sort of strange pain.

A tear escapes her eye and rolls down her cheek; Nicola reaches out and brushes it away, his hand lingering.

“Thank you, Liliana,” he says softly.

“I didn’t do anything,” she protests, but he smiles.

“You cried for Dante, and that’s worth my thanks,” he murmurs.

They are silent for a moment; Lili looks up at him, eyes glistening, tears caught in her long lashes. Nicola gazes back; his hand cups her cheek, her lips form his name, and—

“Good night, Liliana,” he says, and rises from the bed.

Nicola leaves her room before he does anything more.

He is shaking by the time he makes it back to the Visconti manor from the casino, Lili in his arms, injured but alive after attempting to take a bullet for him. His mind is awhirl; she had been so strong at the summit of all the Bosses, standing her ground against the three most powerful men in Burlone, so unwavering and perfect. The meeting had gone well, despite him having to see Dante face-to-face again finally, and then…

The appearance of Roberto de Feo, his unusual interest in Lili, and the absolute inanity of his attempting to kill a mafia member in broad sight, on Arca’s neutral territory. Nicola never thought Lili would jump out in front of his shot; Roberto had been distressed too—in fact, that only one who wasn’t shocked was Lili herself. Instead, she’d been so angry at Roberto, so defensive over his slander and attempted murder of Nicola.

She’d only abated when Nicola put both hands on her shoulders and leaned in, forcing her to look at him.

“Calm down, Liliana,” he’d said firmly, and she’d reached out both trembling hands to cup his cheeks in such sweet relief.

He could have kissed her, right then and there. But she was bleeding, her armed grazed by the bullet. There was no longer any need for either of them be at the casino, and so he’d whisked her away to safety without looking back.

“Nicola,” Lili murmurs, worried, and he bites down hard on his lip.

Even now she’s more concerned with him than herself, when she could have died.

He kicks open the door to her room, seating her on her bed so carefully as though she is made of glass.

“Why did you do that?” he demands, the floodgates cracking, and she looks at him with bewildered eyes. “You could have been killed!”

She gapes, face scrunching up.

“So could you!”

“I’m mafia! We all know what’s coming! I’ll die one day for what I do and it won’t matter. But you?” Nicola looks at her, half wild, then turns away, running a hand through his hair. “Not you, Lili.”

“I’d do it again,” Lili says hotly, her eyes suddenly flinty, and he whirls back, “I saw what was going to happen and I wasn’t thinking when I moved—all I knew was that I didn’t want you to die. You were in danger! Nicola, I—“

He closes the remaining distance between them, kissing her hard and desperate. Lili topples back onto the bed, and Nicola leans into her, twining their fingers together. She’s surprised at the turn of events but only for a moment; she squeezes his hands back tightly, her mouth opening to taste more of him, just as desperate. Nicola presses into her, his kiss all teeth and tongue and unrestrained hunger, and when Lili finally untangles their hands she is fisting hers into his hair, pulling him closer, closer.

Liliana Adornato is a giver; it is her nature, to help and to serve. It’s what she likes to do. But here, with Nicola on top of her, tears clinging to his lashes and his turquoise eyes seeing nothing but her, Lili wants to take. She’ll give him everything he wants, but for once, she wants everything of his, too—his hands, his lips, his attention, and the heat that is vaporizing any bit of ice remaining between them.

“Nicola,” Lili gasps, when they part for air, “Nicola.”

“Liliana,” Nicola murmurs back, raw and ragged.

“I’d do it again,” she whispers, and he doesn’t know if she means jump in front of a bullet or kiss him back or both. “I’d do it all again for you, Nicola.”

“You’re unbelievable,” he whispers back, and kisses her again, gentler this time, and sweeter.

He mumbles something she can’t decipher, but she repeats his name against his mouth, sounding almost like a prayer.

The second time they part, he stares down at her, torn between agony and desire. She is flushed underneath him, breathing hard, her hair a mess and her shawl having slipped from her shoulders. But then his eyes trail to his handkerchief binding her wound; his face contorts as he regains his proper senses and he tears himself off of her.

Lili sits up, lunging forward and grabbing his arm before he can escape her room.

“Please,” she says, and Nicola looks like he’s in physical pain as he looks back at her, “Nicola, please. Don’t go.”

He goes still and they stare at each other.

“Don’t go,” she repeats, softer this time, and Nicola back towards her, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear.

He surrenders.

A light knock sounds at Lili’s door late into the night.

“Come in,” Nicola responds, and it opens just enough for Gil to slip inside.

The Visconti Boss closes the door gently and leans to the side, smiling as he meets Nicola’s eyes. He keeps his voice low as he speaks, as does Nicola.

“Oh? When you responded, I expected to see some clothes off when I opened the door.”

Nicola rolls his eyes.

“Spare me your perversions, Gil,” he says, though he shifts a little as though to shield Lili’s sleeping face.

He’s sitting up in Lili’s bed, perfectly decent, legs stretched out. The girl is nestled against his side, sleeping soundly, one hand entwined with his.

There had been no salacious activities, though the knowledge of the line almost crossed was intoxicating between them, and the sight of each other’s swollen lips was…invigorating. There had, however, been more kisses shared, but in the end he’d simply held her close and stroked her hair as she listened to the steady rhythm of his heart.

Gil smirks, but the expression bleeds from his face quickly enough.

“She okay?”

“Yeah.”

“And you?”

A pause.

“I will be, especially once all this is over,” he says, a little bitterly, and Gil shakes his head, sighing.

“You still thinking about breaking her heart, after all that? And this?”

He gestures vaguely, and Nicola shoots him a rueful look.

“Haven’t I already?” Nicola asks, and Gil smothers a derisive laugh.

“Far from it. You can be a real idiot sometimes, you know that? Or if you’re waiting for her to break yours…if it even happens somehow, it’ll only be the death of you. You’re in too deep already, Nicola.”

He laughs softly.

“This is a lot of meddling, even for you, Gilbert,” he says, and Gil shrugs.

“I don’t know if you’ve noticed but—oh, who am I kidding? You know damn well both you and the signorina have turned my manor upside down since you’ve gotten here. Call it self-preservation, for the Family. And besides…I like you, Nicola.”

“Heart’s already taken, Gilbert.”

“Oh, now you admit it?”

Nicola looks down at Lili.

“I’m a dead man walking,” he tries, echoing a past conversation of theirs, but Gil snorts.

“For God’s sake, Nicola, just let her win.”

Gil walks out without waiting for a response, and Nicola is left alone with Lili again.

She’d fallen asleep quickly, despite their heated kisses earlier; all her adrenaline from the casino had finally worn off, leaving her exhausted. He’d assured her he would stay until she fell asleep, laying a hand over her eyes, so reminiscent of her first night at the Falzone manor. He feels at ease beside her, at peace looking at her sleeping face and hearing her breathe slow and even.

He hadn’t been lying to Gil, a moment ago. He still is a dead man walking, no matter how much Gil likes him. It’s Family first, in the mafia, and though he may be a Visconti now, he isn’t one truly. It’ll be an easy choice, if it comes down to him or another Visconti member. He is no longer a Falzone either; betrayal isn’t tolerated, and even if half of the Family doesn’t believe in his betrayal yet, the other half is out for his blood.

Hell, and Roberto is too, so that’s part of the police force as well.

The odds are stacked against him, but he still has his goals to achieve, plans that he’s laid for years. Since childhood, when Dante told him through tears that he hated the mafia and no longer wanted to be a part of it.

Nicola will see his plans come to fruition or die trying—freeing Dante is the one thing he will sacrifice himself for. Liliana…precious as she’s become, she does not supplant that.

The girl in question shifts, pressing herself closer against him, sighing softly.

“Nicola…” she murmurs, and he brushes a curl of hair from her cheek.

He only said he would stay until she fell asleep. Nicola has sat here for hours now, unable to bring himself to move.

Slowly, gently, he disentangles his fingers from hers and bends down to press one last kiss to her forehead.

He’s still there in the morning.

#piofiore #piofiore no banshou #piofiore fated memories #nicola francesca #liliana adornato #gilbert redford #fanfiction #I LOVE NICOLA SM...!!!!!#i love the falzone boys #may i now finally move on for piofiore and play a diff otoge #head empty just nicola francesca in my heart #i'm both laughing and exasperated that this is also 4k+ words #will i ever write anything that is like. less than 3k or something??? my god #this should have had 8000 more winter metaphors but i did my best

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