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antimony-medusa · 11 days

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How To Set Up An Ao3 Exchange

One of the first things I say whenever anyone asks me about running exchanges is that if you have more than about 30 people in the exchange, do NOT try to match it by hand. That is so much work and takes so much time. Use Ao3's matching algorithm. And people say sure, and then they look at how Ao3 works and they go uhhhhhhhhhh I think we can make a google form work. Because google forms are reasonably intuitive to make work, and Ao3 exchanges are— not.

But the thing is, once you understand the underlying logic for Ao3 collections, they are not that bad, and seriously I can't overstate the benefit of having Ao3 do the matching for you. That's like the difference between 80 hours of curating data as it comes in and then matching it (what happened with hand-matching 325 people for holiday exchange), or 2 hours of double-checking the matching (what happened with matching 125 people for 48 hour exchange). You have to put in extra work to get an Ao3 exchange set up, but it super pays off in the end. So! Here is an intro to how Ao3 exchanges work on the back end. This explanation assumes you know how to sign up for an exchange because I've posted ones like that before, for example, here.

Let's get into it.

THE COLLECTION

The first thing you want to do is set up your exchange collection. If you go to your right-hand drop-down menu, you click on My Collections.

That brings you to every collection you have ever made, and you go to to the right and click "New collection".

That brings you into the back end of the collection. You want to go down and put in a name for the collection that will be the url (so no spaces), a display name, an email for the collection to email when something happens to the collection (this will be public, so use a fandom email), and a basic description.

There's places there to do custom icons and headers, but those are optional, but you can go in and make your exchange pretty later if you want!

We are still in the "setting up" stage of the exchange, so once we go to preferences, you want to select all the tick boxes and make it look like this.

Moderated means that you'll have to manually approve things to be added to the collection (not absolutely necessary but can keep out trolls, and it also means that you can manually check that gifts meet minimums before you let them in to the exchange), Closed means that no one can submit things to the collection yet (once you open your exchange you de-select this), Unrevealed means that any works in the collection will show up as "mystery works" and not be readable (so you keep it unrevealed until the posting date, so people can post early but not spoil the surprise), anonymous means that all authors will be anonymous (this depends on if you have an anonymous portion of your exchange, so it's optional), "show random works" just means that you get a selection of different works when people visit the collection at different times, "send a message to the collection email" is optional but is useful for moderation (like if you're checking people off a list when their gifts get delivered), and "type of challenge" you want to be sent to "gift exchange".

and then on this page the only other things of concern are places where you can put in an FAQ, a description and some instructions, but those are all optional! I normally host the FAQ on tumblr, so I just say "go check the tumblr at [link]".

And then you hit the submit button.

Now we get into the nitty-gritty.

First up is some optional stuff— you can add in the times that you're going to do things! This is useful for communication, but not necessary. We're still setting everything up, so you do not want Sign-Ups to be open, that is only selected once you have everything ready to go.

Then scrolling down, you get to Requests and Offers.

This is where you specify the absolute minimum ships or characters that you want people to give you to sign up. 10 is the maximum Ao3 allows, so I always set it to 10 for both "allowed", which is the maximum the site will allow. And required is the low number. I usually set it to a minimum of three, to make sure someone doesn't sign up with "i will only write one ship" or something. This way, people will have to do a minimum of three separate requests and offers.

The "requests visible" is part of the back end thing, and it's up to you if you want to select it or not. If you keep it unselected, the only person who will be able to see requests is the mods, and eventually each person will see their assignment. If you select it, people will be able to browse everyone's requests and both maybe target offers so they can write for a specific person, and be able to find treats (extra bonus gifts) to write for people whose requests they like. Each side has its own benefits or negatives, it's up to you which ones you want to go with!

And here we get into more of the matching info! Let's look at Request Settings.

Now this is what the settings would look like for a multi-fandom exchange. The "details/description" box you want to make mandatory because that is where people will put their DNW and their prompts (and you absolutely want to make sure everyone has a DNW), and the url is an optional one which lets people link an off-site letter on google docs or dreamwidth.

Fandom allowing up to three fandoms means that people can do crossovers if they want (or tag a request something like 3rd life/hermitcraft), and if I wanted to say that people had to request 3 separate servers I would say "must be unique" but I'm okay if people sign up with three Dream SMP relationships in this idea hypothetical exchange, so I'm not selecting the unique button.

I'm ignoring the characters button cause that's extra complication, the only other thing I want to look at is the relationship button. A minimum of 1 ship per request (and there's a minimum of three requests), and let's say you can go up to 20, so people can request LOTS of different ships. I did select "must be unique" so someone can't sign up with the same ship three times. The "allow any" button is off, which means that I will have to select relationships that fit under the fandom that I selected one up, I can't request Shubble/Niki Nihachu (Origins), and put it with a fandom request for Hermitcraft. This has set it so that the absolutely minimum someone can sign up with is 3 relationships (3 requests * 1 relationship each), and the absolute maximum is 200 relationships (10 requests * 20 relationships each).

Requests will look much the same, except I am not putting down details/description or a URL, because I'm not letting people submit requests about what ship they "really" want to match on, they are going to be equally matchable to everyone they offered. Some exchanges will let you submit a requests DNW, but honestly that is so much extra work for the mods, I would not recommend it unless you think it's necessary to stop people from dropping their gifts later.

Okay, so now we take a brief digression into a tag set.

THE TAG SET

Okay so basically a tag set is an extra set of sliders that lets you fine-tune your exchange. If you do not use a tag set, when people sign up they will be able to use every canon tag on the archive, and only canon tags. Which is a LOT of tags, but when I ran an exchange without a tag set there were multiple times of hitting non-canon relationships or tags. But it's also a definite extra complication, tag sets are extra fiddly work and they are even less intituive. If you just want to go without a tag set, skip down to the matching segment. If you do want to avoid hitting people signing up with non-canon tags, keep reading.

I'm gonna say right off the bat that tag sets are the single most like "oh I am getting into the GUTS of the machine" part of running Ao3 exchanges, but if you can make them work they can super streamline both the sign-up (for your participants ) and the matching process (for you).

Oh boy, tag sets. Here we start getting into how exchanges start squeezing the interface to make it do what we want it to. I'm using a tag set, so first I clicked on the "tag set" url there and I made my tag set, and then I came back and selected its name from the drop-down menu on the collection. I leave all the tick boxes open, because selecting them will again restrict you to canon tags, and we specifically want to be open to noncanon tags both because of issues like "ijevin & tiny tim" not being a canon tag, and because the way MCYT tags are wrangled and made canon does not work for how the exchange machine reads information. We specifically want a collection of non-canon tags tuned for our needs. More on that later.

So, I started a new tag set, and I'm over there on that screen, looking at it. What does that screen look like?

Okay so, part of the appeal of a tag set is that your participants are able to specify the difference between "Rendog & InTheLittleWood" and "Rendog/InTheLittleWood". You don't have to worry about people getting undesired shipping, because people were specifying if they wanted shipping when they signed up. You can reduce a great deal of people getting matched badly by using relationship matching, because most of the time even if people want a Tommy-centric fic, there's a pretty big difference between people who want "Tommy & Technoblade" and "Tommy & Dream". By specifying who you want the gift to be about, you remove a big hurdle of matching right away. That's why most exchanges run on relationship matching.

However, if there are 37 people on a given server, that's something like 2,600 possible combinations of people if you include both romantic and platonic, and that's before you start getting into trios, and that's just way too many tags for the mods to enter manually. So what you do is run a nomination period, and for a week or two weeks you go to all your participants and you go "do you want to sign up for this exchange? Nominate the tags you want to use now! If it doesn't get nominated, it can't be used!" And then people head to the tag set to nominate.

So, on this page, you want "visible tag list" to be selected, because you want people to see what's already been nominated so they don't duplicate, and you want "currently taking nominations" to be selected because you will be taking those nominations instead of doing them all yourself.

So you have to set up limits on those nominations.

The point of taking nominations is to make matching easier, so people normally use the same fandom and relationship limits as they are going to use on the sign-up, to make sure there aren't dozens of tags in the tag set that nobody's using, just cluttering up the space. It also helps stop the issue where someone sees a tag in the tag set, goes "oh man I love that ship" and signs up, but its an extra tag that no one intended to offer, so they don't match to anyone. That's why sometimes people keep the amount of tags that can be nominated low, I've seen people limit this to 10 tags, or even 7, so that's up to you.

And you save, and now when you link your participants the tag set, they will have a "nominate" button.

They will hurry over to press that button, and then they will see a page that looks like this.

This is a thing where you absolutely want to give your participants detailed instructions, because what Ao3 will try to do is auto-fill people's nominations with canonical tags. WE DO NOT WANT CANONICAL TAGS. CANONICAL TAGS ARE THE ENEMY OF EXCHANGES. CANONICAL TAGS ARE THE ENEMY OF MCYT EXCHANGES IN PARTICULAR.

Remember back when we clicked the button that says tags have to be unique? The canonical tag for Philza & Technoblade doesn't have a server on it, and people might want to be requesting that relationship for SMPEarth, Dream SMP, Origins SMP, or arguably even QSMP. If you only have the canonical tag, people can only request a specific dynamic once, for one server. And that is a problem for every situation where people interacted on multiple servers, and with the network of overlaps that is Empires/SOS/3rd Life/Hermitcraft and DSMP/Origins/SMPEarth/QSMP, that's going to lead to unhappy participants. So you tell people to nominate the ship and also "disambiguate" it, and add the server in parentheses. And then all your participants will hit the button to submit, and you will go into the "review nominations" button, and you will let those tags into the tag set.

Now I just distributed the tag set to a couple friends, so let's look at what this looks like behind the scenes.

Brace yourself, it's gonna be wild, but I believe we can get through it.

Now here is a perfectly standard look at tag set nominations after a few people have gotten into the tag set. This is why they pay tag mods the big bucks.

As you can see, there are a few things to be gathered. The first things is a bunch of people used the canon tags (because that's what Ao3 tries to get them to do), someone else nominated an x-reader ship, we have one tag there twice (spelled differently), and the tags are Piped (they have both the person's tax name and the username). (You can let tags in that are Piped, but I find that it makes the tag set harder to read, and usually exchanges are character-focused unless you're writing video blogging rpf anyways, so I ask people to submit tags unpiped, using usernames.) And for the tags that were nominated in a way that I want (unpiped, and disambiguated so they're unique), Ao3 is trying to get me to use the canon tag. But I don't want the canon tag, I want a unique tag, with the server on it, with no pipes. So.

So were I moderating the tag set, after a few minutes it would look like this.

That's going through and disambiguating the tags (adding the server, which I could tell because of the fandom it was nominated under), removing the piping and using the usernames instead of tax names, and then re-ordering the names so they're alphabetical so people can find them on the list later, rejecting the x-reader tag, rejecting the duplicate and allowing the one that's spelled correctly through. Amazing. I have tags that I want to use (I did some other tags that were ready to go in other fandoms as well). I hit submit. Am I ready to go?

No, because tag sets are the most complicated part of exchanges.

I open up my tag set, and if I scroll down to "Unassociated characters and relationships" there are a bunch of tags that are are lost, Ao3 doesn't know where to put them. This is because we very carefully made unique tags that have not been wrangled anywhere, and Ao3 said "i don't know where these go" and shoved them all together in a garbage bin at the bottom of the page. So we have to manually go in to associate them to the right fandoms.

You hit the Edit button on the tag set, and scroll down to the bottom, to "tag associations", and start selecting where tags go.

Honestly this is a great time to be listening to a stream or a podcast or something, and then you have the tag set open in another tab so you know what all the unassociated tags are, and you just go down the list like a databasing machine. It is not hard, cause you disambiguated each tag with its own server, it's just time consuming. Note. This is why people go in and accept tags regularly during the nomination period, because if you do this all at the end you've got a BIG job ahead of you.

So, you turned on your VOD playlist and you associated all your tags, and all the tags are where they are supposed to go. You have a beautiful tag set.

But wait, you say, looking at this beautiful tag set. Some of those tags look at little different. What is the "Dream smp and only dream smp" that a couple of them have?

Well.

You see.

Ao3 designed tag sets to work a certain way, and nobody uses them that way. It turns out that "Quackity/Wilbur Soot (Dream SMP)" is a wrangled canon tag, and the system goes "ah, I know where this goes, this is a sub-tag of the major tag, and the top-level tag is Video Blogging RPF, so it goes under Video Blogging RPF, as all MCYT tags do. I am very smart. I have stuck this Dream SMP tag under Video Blogging RPF. I am a good machine". And then you go AUUUUUUUUGH, and then you turn up the podcast a little louder, and then you sit down and you delete the old tag and you write out a new tag that the system doesn't know what to do with, and it goes uhhhhhhh and sticks it in "unassociated tags" and then you go in again and you manually associate it into the right server.

It's not hard, it's just time consuming. Shouting at the tag set like STOP TELLING ME WHAT TO DO as it helpfully tries to stick dsmp tags in SMPearth and you wrestle it out of SMPEarth and into the right fandom bucket.

Deep breath moment. Honestly that's the most fiddly part of a fiddly process, so if you can get through this you're absolutely golden.

Anyways. You got clean disambiguated unique tags, and then you associated them in the right spot, and then you found the ones that got sorted to the wrong spot and you associated them yourself, and now you have a beautiful tag set ready to go. It's a thing of beauty. Shed a tear. Your participants can select from anything in this tag set, and you know they want to use these specific relationships, because they submitted them to you. What next?

THE MATCHING

Okay. You have your tag set set up and it's accepting nominations. Your participants are filling it out right now. You go back to your collection. it's time to tell it how to match.

This is the "minimum number to match" pane, and this is the minimum numbers to make a successful match. You want 1 for Fandom, and 1 for Relationship, and that's it. People will show up to the machine as a viable match as long as they have submitted a fandom and relationship that matches someone else's offered fandom and relationship.

This is a minimum viable exchange. You're ready to go. As soon as your tag set is done (or immediately if you're not using a tag set), you're ready to go back and open your exchange to sign-ups.

Congratulations!

FURTHER TWEAKING

HOWEVER. There is more that you can do. For example, do you want to allow people to request or opt into NSFW? There's an easy way to do that! First thing is you go back to your tag set, and you scroll down to the "ratings" section that you've been ignoring.

You select G and E, and that way, if people are opting into explicit that means they're okay with NSFW, and if they only select G, that means they only want a non-explicit piece.

Then on the collection you switch the requests and offers sections to include a place to specify a rating.

You want them to definitely specify at least one, and if you maximum allowed is 2, people can opt into both and say "i'm good with whatever"!

Then you scroll down to the matching section, and you tweak that to make sure that people will match on Fandom, Relationship, and at least one Rating.

Bingo. You now have a toggle to turn NSFW on and off.

But a lot of people like to match by TYPE of gift too, specifying if they want art or fic or playlist or web weave etc. How do you do that? Ah, at this point you are master of all you survey, and you can make tag sets do absolutely anything you want. You go back to the tag set and you scroll down to "characters".

Now we were matching on relationships, so the character box is unused. And it lets you put in your own tags. So what you do is you start to add in custom tags.

And then you go back to the Collection settings, and on the requests and the offers you go in to the "characters" section and you say "must select at least one, can select up to six".

And then, you guessed it— you go back to "minimum number to match" and you set that "characters" tab to 1 minimum, 6 maximum. Now people who specified that they wanted Art can be matchable to artists who Offered Art. You have unlimited power, the world is at your fingertips.

There's even more customization that you can do, too! There's "additional tags", which is entirely custom tags you add yourself, that can be anything from specifying if people want fluff or horror or hurt/comfort etc— with the recursive exchange we used it to specify the works people were recursing— I'm considering using it for holidays with the holiday exchange. You can let people opt in or out of major archive warnings by selecting "archive warnings" as a thing that's in the tag set and that you're matching for. Once you understand how the underpinnings of how the machine works, you can wrestle it into almost any shape you want.

So. Whew. That's how exchanges work, under the hood. When I say that this is significantly easier than hand matching the holiday exchange, I ask you to picture just how complicated hand matching gets. Go forth! Thrive! Set up exchanges if you want! The world is your oyster!

Feel free to message me if you have further questions.

#mcyt on Ao3 #fandom exchanges #ao3

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tubborucho · 5 months

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For new twitter refugees Ghosties (and everyone else!), because I think it’s important to know:

We have our own moments here, you will see mean-spirited posts about BBH and others here as well. It is still a social media platform, there are people with bad or just different takes. There is toxicity. Tumblr is nicer than twitter overall, but it’s not perfect, and you need to be aware of it.

Main thing that makes it nicer here is Following tab, so PLEASE check that you switched your dash from ‘For you’ to ‘Following’. That way you will ONLY see posts from people you follow and their reblogs. It’s much easier to curate your experience that way. And in general, go through your dashboard preferences in settings, mine look like this:

But cater them to what you want to see (i would advice you to turn off ‘include followed tag posts’ if you don’t want to stumble upon occasional porn bot post on your dash LMAO). You can also turn off your likes and follows visibility, which a lot of people do!

If you need any help or advice, my ask box/dms are open, and I am happy to help :3

#liss writes posts #qsmp #q!badboyhalo #qsmp badboyhalo #<- sorry to maintag

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gravehags · 8 months

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something so precious

Pairing: Cardinal Copia x f!Reader (Curator!Reader)

Rating: Teen

Tags: reader being sad and lonely, comfort from darling Copia, terzo being a scheming little matchmaker, mention of RATS OHWHOOOOAHHHH

Words: 1,461

Summary: When Terzo asks you to eat dinner with the rest of the abbey, how bad can it get?

a/n: I hc Copia as being an extremely lonely person, particularly when he's a Cardinal, so naturally he would be the best person to receive comfort from when you're feeling isolated and alone.

~~~

“Terzo?” you ask, leaning back in your squeaky leather chair. “Why do none of the siblings speak to me?”

Papa Emeritus III, currently sitting on your desk twirling a pen between his fingers as he hides from whatever duties Imperator has requested of him on this day, stops his movement and looks at you askance.

“Well obviously, bella,” he starts in that smooth voice you’ve come to recognize as the signature tune he uses when he wants to convince someone of something, usually involving accompanying him to bed, “it is your immense beauty. Your stunning intellect. Your–”

You lean forward in your chair abruptly with a tired expression on your face.

“Cut the bullshit, please,” you say, snatching the pen out of his grasp, “I’ve been here almost a month and not a single person other than you, the other papas, Cardinal Copia, and Sister Imperator has approached me. Are my vibes that bad? Is it because I’m not a member of the church?”

“Eh…” he begins hesitantly, “the best guess I have is because you’re basically upper clergy, dolcezza. Most siblings don’t casually associate with anyone higher in rank unless it’s for…” his painted lips quirk into a lascivious grin, “...other reasons.”

You frown. “Upper clergy? How exactly am I upper clergy? I’m literally just an employee?”

“Well,” he says, hopping off the edge of your desk and slipping into the chair opposite you, “a cardinal once held the position you do. Performed the same duties you are performing. Therefore in a way, your status is equal to that of a cardinal. Capisci?”

“Oh,” you say, somewhat deflated. Terzo immediately picks up on your tone and hops out of his seat to stand by your side and take your hands.

“Come to the dining hall tonight, eh? I know you’re content to eat alone in your rooms but it will be good for you, I promise.”

You’ve been avoiding the dining hall like the plague since you got here, preferring to eat your sad bowls of cereal on your couch every night. Maybe it would do you good to have an actual square meal. You nod at him and he beams, squeezing your hands.

“Bene! I’m sure you will find your place at the abbey soon, mia ragazza.”

He pats a gloved hand on your cheek and bounds out of your office to go cause mischief elsewhere. You sigh deeply and prop your elbows on your desk.

“It will be fine,” you murmur to yourself before turning back to the work you had abandoned when Terzo came in, “you will be fine.”

—

This, you decided, was the worst fucking idea.

When you first walked into the vast dining hall you were taken aback by its beauty. Paneled walls lined the room and a dramatic arched wooden ceiling soared above you. After you finished gazing at your surroundings, you were hit with the fact that half the room was staring at you.

Oh fuck, you think, skittering over to the food line in an effort to blend in better. You gratefully take your bowl of hearty vegetable stew and sizeable hunk of crusty bread and turn around to face the room. Siblings eye you, whispering amongst themselves and suddenly you’re struck with the worst pit of anxiety in your stomach. The room is filled with a number of tables in varying sizes and as you scan the room, your heart sinks when you realize there are no empty tables. Shuffling with your food into the center of the room you’re about to panic and give up entirely when you turn to a four-person table in a corner with one occupant.

Cardinal Copia.

He’s hunched over his bowl, delicately spooning stew into his mouth when he spots you hustling towards him. Dropping his spoon, his mismatched eyes go wide as you approach the table, jaw falling open slightly.

“Can I, um,” you begin in a hushed voice, “can I sit with you?”

A beat passes and you’re starting to wonder if he heard you when he rockets out of his seat, straightening his black cassock. Before you can say anything he’s drawing a chair out for you, gesturing for you to sit.

“Please, signorina!” he says in a hushed, almost reverent tone as you take a seat. “Your company is eh, most welcome.” Copia returns to his own seat and gives you a nervous little smile that makes you smile in return. Graciously, he upturns your glass and fills it with water from the carafe sitting next to him on the table.

“Thank you,” you say, mirroring his hushed tone. “Thank you so much. This place…this place is like high school all over again,” you say in a rush as you finally spoon some much needed quality food into your mouth.

“Is it?” he asks, “I ah…wouldn’t know.”

You cock your head and your brows draw together.

“How so?” you say, leaning forward to take another spoonful of the delicious stew.

“I completed all my schooling within the church,” he says, pushing a carrot around his bowl.

“Oh! Were you raised in the church then?” you ask, truly intrigued.

“Sì…in Roma. I’ve been groomed for this position,” he sighs heavily, “my whole life.”

You had no idea the depth and breadth of the church’s reach throughout the world. Truly it both baffled and fascinated you. Not knowing quite what to say to his revelation, you both continue eating in silence.

“How are you…how are you liking it here?” he asks with a hint of concern.

“It’s beautiful. I can’t imagine a prettier place to live and work.”

“That’s not what I meant, signorina.” His eyes, particularly the white one that almost glows, burn into yours.

“I…” your voice chokes up a little so you clear your throat, “I don’t have a lot of people to talk to. No one will speak to me, you know? I left all my friends behind and I’m so isolated now and–” you cut yourself off, feeling the tears welling in your eyes. He looks startled by your confession, and reaches a gloved hand across the table to take yours. When he looks at you with more softness than you have seen from anyone in a very long time, you let out an embarrassing sob.

“I know,” he whispers, thumb stroking your knuckles. “Believe me, signorina. I know.”

You wipe your tears with the cloth napkin at the table almost viciously, feeling humiliated that you’ve let Copia of all people see you like this. You hold him in such high esteem and you cringe at what he must think of you now.

“I’m sorry,” you blurt out, removing your hand from his. “I…Christ this is so mortifying.”

“Not mortifying at all, signorina. I asked you a question and you answered with your heart. I…want to be someone you come to when you are feeling like this, sì?”

You nod, smiling at him gratefully as you watch him pick up his hunk of bread. He’s so…so wonderful and empathetic and charming and lovely and…and he’s currently picking apart his bread into tiny chunks and placing them within his napkin.

“Um,” you begin inelegantly, unsure of how to proceed, “what are you doing?”

“Hmm?” he looks up at you and his cheeks redden when he realizes you’ve been watching him. “Oh I…eh…”

You nod conspiratorially. “Midnight snack, huh?”

His painted lips twist into a smile and he chuckles, causing you to smile again.

“Not for me…for my bambini.”

“Peculiar babies who eat table scraps, no?”

“Eh…they’re…they’re rats.”

He’s positively glowing with embarrassment but your smile gets even wider.

“Oh!” you cry, clapping your hands together, “tell me about them! Can I meet them?”

He swallows several times before cracking a nervous half-smile.

“Sì, of course! They are such sweet little things…”

He’s got such a fond look in his eye, but you’re not sure if it’s regarding his rats or you. The thought makes you flush and look down at your lap.

“I’m glad Terzo told me to come to dinner tonight,” Copia says in a small voice, smiling at you. Your eyes widen at the revelation but you say nothing, simply mirroring his grin.

“He’s Papa for a reason,” you state simply. “Are you done eating? I’m dying to hear more about these babies of yours.”

Hours later, the two of you are the last people to leave the dining hall after being ushered out by irritated siblings. When you part, it’s with the promise that you will one day soon visit Copia’s rodent children. You bid your soft goodbye, hand lingering on his bicep when you thank him for his time and you begin the walk to your quarters.

Maybe the abbey isn’t so bad after all.

#cardinal copia x reader #cardinal copia x female reader #curator!reader #cardinal copia #copia #the band ghost #the band ghost fic #rachel writes

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little-miss-dilf-lover · 1 month

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hey!! how are you? I saw your requests were open and I had an idea. I would love a day with tan maybe after a tiring mission but he’s back and falling back to same routine together. like waking up together, getting ready together (maybe a shared shower 🧐), making breakfast together (while annoying eachother, so stupid shit like tickling, or smacking eachothers butt which I honestly think y/n or reader whatever whoever prefers to call it smacks tans butt more often mostly to annoy him), eating together, chilling, watching movies etc, also probably ordering in for dinner and both of them not being able to decide on what to get and ending up just getting something simple like pizza. getting ready for bed. basically just fluff, a bit of romance and annoying eachother through out the day. this might be a lot for one thing so I trust with whatever u do with this idea will be lovely and a great read 💓

hii my angel!! this is so cute, I love it!! I changed the format of which I usually write, so that I could include all the ideas you gave. thanks for requesting, hope you like it💌

DAY AT HOME.

tangerine x fem!reader — fluff

word count. 464

It was the first morning since Tangerine returned home from a mission, and as if it was muscle memory, both of you had slipped back into routine - doing things together as if no time had passed.

It all started with cuddles in bed as you adjusted to the day, snuggled into his side as he played with the ends of your hair - fingers twirling the strands as you both looked out into the gloomy sky through the window. Peace and quiet, and the way it should be - Tangerine back home safe.

After a little while lounging in the warmth of the bed, you reluctantly followed his orders to get up, though you were far too comfortable to move. So, to him, the only way to get you out would be the promise of a shared shower, and naturally, it worked like a charm.

Once both of you had washed and dried, you dressed for the day in comfy clothes, him in pyjama bottoms and a plain tee, you in sweats and one of his hoodies.

Each of you make your way downstairs, heading for the kitchen as if it were instinct to prepare breakfast together. Doing things seamlessly, as if neither of you had to think about it - you were washing and cutting fruits while he peeled and cubed potatoes on the counter next to you. Without as much as a discussion, you made your favourite breakfast. The room filling with smells of cooking and sounds of faint laughter, kisses and small taps on the ass.

You ate at the kitchen table, sat side by side, joined at the hip as you eased into the late morning.

After cleaning the mess of making breakfast and letting your food settle, you both head for the living room - one of you closed the curtains while the other flicked on the lamps, wanting the space to be cosy. Both settling on the sofa under the blankets, you snuggle into your lover's side as he works the tv controller.

Many hours and movies go past before either of you realise the time - far too occupied with one another to check your phones. After elaborate discussion and debate, you finally decide what to order for your dinner and settle on pizza from your favourite local shop.

After dinner and another quick movie, he suggests it's time to leave the dents you've been curating in the sofa - offering some fresh air with him out the back door while he has a smoke break.

For the last portion of the night, you continue your shared nighttime routines - washing in a shared bath before heading to bed, snuggling the same way you did this morning, ready to repeat it all again the next day.

this definitely isn’t my best, my bad😶

#request #abbiesrighttoe #tangerine #tangerine x reader #tangerine bullet train #tangerine fluff

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delta-pavonis · 3 months

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more doctor/curator pleeeaaaase? xo @hardly-an-escape

Far be it from me to deny anyone of more of these two sweet little whores... (I really really like them and will be back to their unhinged shenanigans after the Bang). More under the cut in the middle because NSFW.

Hob is shocked they make it past the entryway after the door to his flat closes behind them.

But, let's be clear, the only reason they do is because Dream sees the tapestry that hangs in the library that opens to the left of the foyer.

The room has no windows, bookshelves from floor to high ceilings on all vertical surfaces except for the rectangle of glass that encases the textile art in a climate-controlled space.

“My God, Hob,” Dream is walking towards it like he is being pulled in by a tractor beam on some spaceship, floating and not of his own volition. “Is this real?”

He comes up behind Dream and wraps his arms around the curator. “Aye,” he rests his chin on a black-clad shoulder, “family heirloom, late 14th century. The story is that one of my ancestors learned tapestry weaving in Paris and brought it back to Kent, taught her children, and their children. Gadling-made work supposedly hung in most castles in southern Britain by the mid-15th century. But this one was kept by the family. Why this particular tapestry over others is lost to time.”

A giant white horse rears up across the silken surface, narrowly avoiding the wolves that attack and weave around its legs. In the forest other beasts watch: owls, foxes, deer, squirrels, songbirds. It is very clearly not a unicorn, which is fascinating because it loses the religious symbolism typical of the period. The sun is setting in the background, making the leaves glow with a burnished copper color.

“It is exquisite,” Dream whispers, leaning back into Hob. “And explains your preference for the Middle Ages.”

“Got it in one,” Hob chuckles. He pushes his hands up the front of Dream's shirt, presses his palms to the flat of his abdomen and digs his fingertips into the trail of dark hair that runs down the center.

Dream sways into it, going pliant in Hob's embrace. “So what's your desired order of operations, doctor? Far be it from me to choose a schedule that might endanger the lives of others by leaving you short on sleep.” He grabs one of Hob's hands and slides it down into his pants, where his cock is sticky and half-hard already. “Also, I think I have a Christmas present I might request of you.” He presses his arse into Hob's groin with a rolling motion, arching his back and moaning obscenely loud when Hob's fingers find the frenum piercing.

Fucking hell this man is such a perfect whore.

“Oh?” Hob murmurs, far more focused on cataloging every little sound and twitch that different tugs and twists of the piercing bring about. Dream is rock hard again within seconds, practically writhing against him, yet he is also the one stringing sentences together.

“Oh yes,” he rocks forward into Hob's hand then back into his crotch. “I want to ride your face until I come with your tongue buried in my arse, then turn around and ride your cock until I come again.”

Hob shivers and groans and uses his free hand to open Dream's fly so he has the space to fondle his bollocks. “You want that before or after I put on my leathers and ride you?”

Dream cries out again, a generous spurt of precum ending up on Hob's hand when he tugs and twists the piercing; apparently a touch of pain isn't bad for this little dove. “Oh, after. Then I'll be on your face longer, waiting for my dick to get back into the game.”

“Mmm, then you'll be riding me even longer after that, just like you want, you insatiable slut.” Hob sucks on the side of his neck, digs his teeth in to bring a bruise to bloom. Dream moans and bucks with the hardest presses of teeth. “Like some pain with your pleasure, dove?”

“Only in small doses.” His long arms swing up and behind Hob's head, tugging his mouth back to his neck. “You?”

Hob gets distracted by expanding the hickey so it flows down to the top of Dream's shoulder. “Not my jam, but I am more than happy to do just about anything that turns my partner on.”

Dream laughs, breathless and happy-sounding, “No wonder you get typecast as a service top.”

Frustrated with the obstacle, Hob pulls Dream's shirt off, flings it somewhere to the side, then continues to paint the skin of his shoulder red and purple with his teeth. “And does everyone assume you're the twinky bottom?” He strokes Dream's cock slowly and grinds his own arousal into that pert little arse.

A gasp interrupts Dream's continued laughing as he grinds back, so much harder than before. “I love surprising people. Upending their expectations. Watching them lose their minds as I expertly take them apart, piece by piece.”

“Expertly?” He can't help but ask.

“What do they say, ten thousand hours to master a skill?” Dream sounds like such a smug little shit and Hob is beyond feral about it.

He moves one hand up to play with the hair on Dream’s chest, to tweak a nipple and hear that lovely little gasp again. “And how much practice have you had, sweet thing?”

“You sure you want the honest answer to that?” He can hear Dream's raised eyebrow.

“Go ahead. Shock me.”

“I stopped counting at one hundred seventy nine different partners.”

Hob freezes, a whine oozing out through his teeth. Bloody fuck.

“Hob?”

“Yeah, give me a sec. If I don't dissociate for a minute I am gonna come in my pants because Christ that is hot. Also explains a lot. My God, how many of those were multiples at once?”

Dream's laugh this time is a deep, sensuous rumble. “Not as many as you might think. And I’ve only been gang banged once.” He turns in Hob's arms, dislodging Hob's hand from his prick and leaning in to speak against Hob's lips, “But that was a long time ago. Now I am more interested in exploring how many different sensations I can have with one partner.”

“Oh, so you plan on going full fluid bond with me, do you?”

The blush on Dream’s face is a gorgeous, deep rose red. “I…” he looks down and away for only a moment and then holds his chin up high, proud and perfect, “yes.”

#Dreamling #Doctor/Curator AU #from that prompt about fake relationship video calls #sequel to “Placebo Effect”#Pavonis writes

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theoriginaldick · 3 months

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DEBAUCHERY ✧ 21+ ✧ THEY/DEY/IT + NEOS

NPD + ASPD + DID

ART TAG; #my art MAIN; @doyousouthfart

Feel free to draw my designs/characters. Just credit me every time you do/post it please, and don't take credit for the designs/claim you came up with them.

I block freely and without bias. If I don't want to talk to/interact with you or don't want you interacting with me I'll just block you. It's me curating my online experience so I can enjoy myself, it's not personal.

I'm critical of the content I watch! ^_^ However I will never make any drama related posts here and would prefer to stay out of drama!

Credit to my good friend screws-loose-boozer for this art <3 so much love to him.

I need everyone who follows me or who comes to this account to understand I am extremely unstable and have terrible taste in men, and it reflects in my fictional others.

I would say I'm sorry about all the horny/down bad Adam content I have been and will be posting in the future on here but honestly let's be real, that's the whole reason why you guys are all here. You guys have just as terrible of tastes.

Please do not use my Sinner AU designs for roleplay blogs. They're very special to me and it would make me uncomfortable! <3

#pinned intro please don't reblog it thanks

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nin-deer · 2 months

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Ch 143

i mean i think we all knew deep down the kiss was gonna happen based on the flow of the story but i think this chap reveals a lot about gorou and sarina

(uh warning this got a little out of hand so its pretty long lmao)

so.

i dont think anyone's completely in the wrong, but i definitely don't think they're in the right either. (not that i condone incest; its just that their motivations led them to this specific point. would the story have been fine without it? hell yeah. please i actually prefer it that way. but this is the direction the author decided to take it, so we have to take it as it is as a point of learning more about the character's motivations)

Let's first analyze sarina and gorou's relationship pre-reincarnation. I think I covered this in my last post where I rambled about onk, but gorou is doing a doctor thing where he "accepts" sarina's proposal just to make her happy. We learn in this new chapter that he basically catered to her every request, and that's what started that infatuation. we know from previous chapters that her bio family's shitty, so the only place she would get this love is from gorou. we also learn in this chapter that it's not actually a romantic love but a fanatic love, for lack of better terms. she sees him as her idol. does sarina even know what it feels to be romantically in love with someone? she spent her whole first life in a hospital, isolated from others her age. she spent her second life very curated and protected because of her mom and her future career; she couldn't really live a normal life. (we'll get back to this point later) all she knows about love is through her idols, so she's channeling it into (what she thinks is) romantic love for gorou.

gorou, on the other side of this, is an actual adult who had an actual life before all this, so he knows what a normal life is like. assuming sarina is one of his first patients, its obvious to see that he got attached, which is a very risky situation for scenarios like this. we see this attachment made her death worse, as he threw himself into following Ai to cope for her death. not gonna go too in depth about this here because, again, i made another post for this that i'll probably link at the end bc im referencing it more than i thought... continuing! he knows sarina doesnt have long left so he wants to do what he can for her, thus creating that "idol" persona sarina has for him.

we see in his regret in this new chap that he actually knows what he's doing and is aware of the consequences of his actions. ruby doesn't. she doesn't regret anything. as someone who reads a lot of isekai/reincarnation stories, its easy to joke that ruby and aqua are their old age + their new age, but that isn't necessarily true for ruby. sure, aqua is old and this could apply to him. but ruby? she didn't make it past 18 before she died. she's like,,, 13 times 2. double 13. she never fully developed in her first life, and she's developing in this current life. it's like a continue from where she left off. aqua actually was an adult, so he has all the knowledge and wisdom of an adult. why does this matter? shift your attention back to the concept of love for a bit. aqua knows what she's doing is bad and is trying to stop her, but the knowledge that she's sarina is making him automatically succumb to her wishes. a part of his brain, because of the trauma, still sees ruby as the sickly sarina he was caring for.

ruby is naïve. she doesnt know what love is. all the love she's ever been exposed to is whatever she saw online: idols. i dont even think she fully knows what the concept of family is. aqua is her brother? nope. aqua is the doctor she proposed to and now she has a chance to follow through like all the shows she's seen. she's closer than ever to him, so why give up the chance? even as ruby, she wasn't exposed to a lot of normalcy because of idol culture. she isn't able to learn about the difference between platonic love and fanatic love. we even see this with ai, who she sees more as an idol than her mom. the joy is in her idol being her mom, someone who's supposed to care for her. it's like shes living a fantasy made just for her. because aqua was so obsessed w revenge, he didn't have the chance to teach her anything, and it's not like he needed to learn bc he already knows. ruby doesn't.

aqua, as the one who understands these nuances, should have sat her down and explained things, but he didn't because of the trauma of sarina. ruby is ignorant and is treating things like a tv drama, now that her dreams as sarina can finally become true. aqua doesn't realize how serious ruby is about this because in his mind this is just a child playing house. ruby is like,,,, imagine you die and you wake up actually being sold to one direction. or whatever happens to you in your fav self-insert scenario/fanfic. idk a better analogy lmao but its like finally being able to play out your fantasies irl. she doesn't realize the real world impacts of her actions because, frankly, she doesn't care. she gets to live out her life as she wants. aqua was shocked after the first kiss with ruby because he realized then she was being serious, but he didn't speak out about it because, again, the trauma™. (we see him again uncomfy with the whole situation in the next page, but his lack of objection could be bc it's a scene in the documentary and he finds it more important to get revenge rn) ruby kissed him then because she purposefully created the mood like that so it would fit in the story she was writing in her mind.

so what does this mean? because of their shared pasts, aqua and ruby are put in this situation where ruby can do what she wants and aqua goes along with it. even if he knows its morally wrong, he can't bring himself to break ruby's immersion in all of this. BUT. big but. aqua shouldn't act like this. they're both capable of living out their lives as normal (barring the revenge and the whole idol stuff). he doesn't need to act like this anymore; ruby's not terminally ill. he's not a doctor. what he should have done was firmly deny her stuff he knows is wrong because then he can educate her about the reason why. as much as their personalities are inspired by their past lives, sarina and gorou are dead. they need to move on and live a aqua and ruby. (Harsh, I know, but because of this scenes like *gestures vaguely to the newest two chapters* happens. if aqua stood his ground and taught ruby about familial love and that what she's feeling is probably not romantic, i think this could have been avoided. but alas, we need it for the ~drama~)

sorry that went on way longer than i thought lmao. i think i covered everything i wanted to say but im too lazy to read back so fingers crossed

if you made it this far and are curious about the other post i mentioned in the beginning, its here. i just think its some context to my thought process but not necessary to understand this post

#my writing #oshi no ko #oshi no ko spoilers #onk ch 143 #jasdlkflsdkajfh #why did it take me longer to find that first post #than deciding to make this post #anyways #lots of thoughts #none coherent #i wasnt planning on doing this so sorry if its too jumpy #i just finished reading the chap and #i had the urge #man i was living glass half full #then this chap dropped #hopefully it gets addressed #i mean its that last panel that gets me #aqua looks so uncomfortable while ruby is beaming

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optiwashere · 2 months

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This seemed fun, so why not do this for my babies? Portraits taken from art in this post.

Some elaborations under the cut...

Stats

Ages are at the end of BG3. Shadowheart is at least late 40s in canon, but I always had her as 50 in my mind. She has her birthday in my fic canon during the post-Absolute Crisis rebuilding while Asheera's won't be for another few months.

Asheera is ~201cm tall, Shadowheart is ~170cm tall. Roughly 31cm height difference!

Ship Parameters

Shadowheart and Asheera both enjoy being the big spoon and little spoon, but Shadowheart prefers being nestled in Asheera's embrace. Doesn't mean for a bit that the roles aren't reversed now and again, though.

Shadowheart wears Asheera's clothes all the time. Constantly. They are, of course, comically oversized on her.

They both use pet names for one another, but Asheera fancies herself a bit of a romantic so she likes to come up with melodramatic ones ("my Heart") while Shadowheart prefers "love" and "my love." Shadowheart also calls Asheera "my Lady paladin" a lot in the fics, but IDK if you consider that a pet name or not?

Shadowheart is undoubtedly far, far, far more introverted than Asheera. In fact, Asheera is pretty extroverted in general. The extrovert/introvert ship dynamic is my catnip, how could you tell?

So, the affection one I took to mean what they prefer. Shadowheart likes quality time and affirmations while Asheera likes acts of service and quality time. However, if you imagined it as what they do then their placements would be flipped.

Shadowheart confesses love first. Affection and attraction, that's technically Asheera.

Neither of them really panic about bugs. Asheera has a bad habit of killing the little creatures though, and she has serious thoughts about her own oaths when she does it.

Horse riding... Listen, all I'm saying is Asheera riding a horse with Shadowheart behind her? Yeah. But, like, if we're literally talking about driving a car then Shadowheart can drive but if anyone else offers to drive then she's going to take the opportunity to sit in the passenger seat, curate the music, and fall asleep.

Shadowheart knows how to cook because she's an adult, but she's just terrible at it. I'm sorry, she is a horrible cook to me. Her taste buds are all fucked up from decades of sampling/testing poisons, venoms, and paralytics as a Sharran. Asheera's not much better, she just knows that if Shadowheart cooks it'll be a disaster for everyone.

Shadowheart prefers discretion and Asheera loves giving her wife big, showy kisses for all to see. They have an understanding.

Despite the jealousy levels, Asheera is prone to overprotectiveness. After everything that Shadowheart went through in her life, after everything that Asheera saw in her memories and in the events of BG3, there's no way she doesn't immediately come to Shadowheart's defense at pretty much any perceived slight. Shadowheart finds it very sweet, but unnecessary. She can defend herself just fine. Doesn't mean she hates it though.

Shadowheart has the age on Asheera by a margin, and she spent decades in a Sharran cloister. Calling them "relationships" is probably a bit much to be fair, though. This doesn't mean Asheera is some naïve virgin! She's actually more experienced with long-term relationships than Shadowheart.

Levels

They're both extremely horny, especially for one another, but Shadowheart wins out on this one by sheer excitement to try out anything and everything that she thinks Asheera would want to try. Asheera isn't a prude by any stretch of the imagination.

Shadowheart is awkward in that "sheltered in a cult commune" kinda way. She says the wildest shit sometimes and expects people to just move on from it. Someone who quotes erotica with their friend in public is going to cause others to feel awkward. Asheera on the other hand? She makes things awkward by either being way too serious about a situation or cracking bad jokes about it; there is no in-between, and nobody is sure what to expect.

Asheera doesn't get jealous. Shadowheart is jealous of things that aren't really related to their relationship. I don't think either of them gets jealous over that sorta thing. Shadowheart just has to manage her feelings about family given that Asheera has one that loves her and she was able to experience a childhood and such. That triggers jealousy which Asheera finds normal and reasonable and completely understandable. It's one of those aspects of Shadowheart's specific trauma that isn't really something you "get over" and Asheera, while finding it hurtful and hard to deal with sometimes, relies on her training and oaths as a paladin to manage that specific hurdle in their relationship.

#shadowheart #shadowtav #shadowheart x tav #bg3 tav #oc: asheera #my fic #also I did this in GIMP with a mouse and I have shaky hands so bear with me lmfao #don't mind me while I do this with every ship I have for this fandom...

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am-i-the-asshole-official · 5 months

Note

incredibly low stakes and online aita post; ☁ to find it later.

aita for blocking a person on discord without telling them why?

so, i like the occasional online rp, and was hankering for a new one, so i found a tumblr blog that posts people searching for rps to do. i interacted with a post that seemed interesting, and the blogger and i talked briefly in ims. they seemed okay, and they liked me, so we shared discords to continue talking and plotting our rp.

as the conversation progressed in discord, i started getting some bad vibes from this person. nothing too bad, just things i kind of disliked. for instance, they shared some political opinions that we did not see eye-to-eye on, details of how they lost their virginity, and would get upset if i "took too long to respond". mind you, this is the first time we met. there were some smaller things as well, vague preferences or how they worded things that irked me, but not as big of deals. basically, this stuff kind of piled up as the convo progressed, i decided i wouldnt have fun rping with them, and i ended up blocking them.

i did not communicate to them that any of the stuff they were doing bothered me. i did not encourage them to overshare information about their political preferences or sexual experiences, nor did i tell them afterwards that it made me uncomfortable - although i did try to change the topic of conversation. i simply stopped responding for while, they send in several messages trying to egg me to respond (to the tune of "are you there???" "??????" "hellooooo???" "dude, you cant just ghost me like this" "i see you online") over the course of around 20 mins., and then i hit the block button.

shortly after that happened, they started messaging me on tumblr again calling me "petty", "immature", and telling me to "eat shit and die". i then blocked them on tumblr. lmao.

so! i get i might have been the asshole because i didnt communicate with them well enough. however! i am a big fan of curating online spaces. i love blocking people. i also love it when other people block me, if they dislike me, because i dont want to interact with people i dislike, nor ones that dislike me. i have been in their shoes before (being blocked by some random person online who i had just met basically) and my reaction to it is "lmao". i genuinely dont care that much. i then get on with my life because i dont think it matters. i get feeling super bad if you were good friends with the person and knew them for a while, but we werent. we had just met. i dont think the level of betrayal was high enough to make me blocking them a huge emotional turmoil. i wouldnt have given this a second thought until they sent me the messages calling me a pos afterwards.

if it helps any, this all took place earlier tonight. i liked the post this morning, they reached out to me this afternoon, we talked in tumblr ims for about 10 mins., then discord for about 1 hour, i stopped responding for 30 mins. whilst they spammed me with requests to reply, i blocked them, then about 5 mins later they sent me the tumblr ims. i knew them for only a few hours. also we are both over 18, although im older by about 4 years and, frankly, i think their immaturity showed in our convo lol.

so, aita for blocking a person without telling them why beforehand? thanks for reading ✌

What are these acronyms?

#aita #am i the asshole

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sad-gay-cowboy · 11 months

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Having used both Reddit and tumblr (tumblr more as a user, Reddit more as an observer), here's a few tips that may be helpful.

Comparisons

FollowingSubreddits (Reddit) equivalent to Following Tags (Tumblr)

Upvoting (Reddit) equivalent to Liking (Tumblr)

Reposting (Reddit) equivalent to Reblogging (Tumblr)

Now with the last two there is some nuance, if you see some art or just a post you really want to show you like it and want to "boost" it, like and reblog. There is no limits to reblogs (or there might be but it's absurdly high so dw about it)

Don't feel bad about blocking people, it's not some grand statement. I block people who post specific kinds of fanfics that pop on my fyp. You can't see who blocks you, you don't get a notification, it's just another feature to curate your experience on here.

Report bots/pornbots under spam

Don't use tumblr live, you can hit snooze on it by going into settings->general settings->dashboard preferences and then scroll all the way down to toggle it.

Use the tagging system, it's fucked sometimes but if you stick with it it's pretty helpful.

I think that's it, have fun folks

#reddit refugees #Reddit #tips and tricks #reddit blackout #reddit refugee

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the-insomniac-emporium · 10 days

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random RL headcanons: game night edition

Mia is weirdly and inexplicably good at charades/any similar games. just anything to do with abstract communication. Poetry With Neanderthals is a personal favorite of hers.

(silly OC addition: Mia and Caldwell have a game they created for parties that's essentially just an alternate version of charades. Caldwell, who is cursed and cannot speak coherently, draws a prompt from a hat, and has to try to explain it. the audience is split into teams and attempts to guess the prompt. Mia, who is an expert at interpreting Caldwell's speech, is usually barred from playing (the exception being themed rounds where the theme is outside her specialties) and acts as a judge/curates the prompt list)

Angie is both very, very good and very, very bad at Monopoly Cheater's Edition. seems to get better the more she's had to drink, of course. gets caught cheating 90% of the time, but usually manages to pull off something insane near the end of the game.

Bela is surprisingly killer at games like Cards Against Humanity. nobody ever expects her to play the cards she does, no matter how many times they've played with her. equally an expert at games where having a good memory comes in handy.

Cassandra excels at games of deception, trickery, and mindfucks. playing a game like Werewolf with her is honestly insane. will attempt to "seduce" (i.e. distract) players she thinks are close to figuring her out. she's also decent at trivia games, but likes to narrow down the categories if the other players are cool with that.

Dani mostly likes chill, shorter games (the kind where you can play multiple rounds in one sitting), especially card games. I can see her enjoying Here To Slay, Muffin Time, and Happy Little Dinosaurs. on a semi-related note I think she low-key went through a magic trick/sleight of hand phase, but these days she doesn't usually do tricks unless she's had a couple drinks and someone brings it up.

Miranda prefers 1v1 games... on the rare occasion where someone (*cough* MC *cough*) convinces her to play. she's decent at actual chess, but is prone to starting out overconfident, only to end up getting flustered towards the end because she overthinks her moves. do not play checkers with her. she will win. you will lose. you will lose by an embarrassingly large margin.

Alcina is only slightly more interested in games than Miranda, and usually uses them as an excuse to socialize. likes big group games where there are opportunities to chat with other players while someone else makes their turn. probably plays the kinds of games that I've seen on TV a lot (classics like Mahjong) but don't personally have enough experience to talk about.

Donna kicks ass at pool, but almost never plays. you (and Angie) would have to talk her into it. totally worth it tho, because she'll have a lot of fun, especially if you're on her team and let her "show you the ropes". if you catch my drift ;) aka that thing where she'll lean a lot of her body against you, her arms alongside yours, helping move you into position. that thing tv shows/movies do to increase sexual tension between two characters.

Mia is also unfairly good at darts. it's honestly really attractive.

#I've been watching too much Smosh Games while doing art #it's my whole brain right now #resident lover #the angie hc is somewhat ironically inspired by angela from smosh #that shit she pulled in monopoly lives rent free in my brain

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muraenide · 2 months

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This miiiiight be oversharing personal sentiments a little bit but...

Ever since I changed my rules to include an explicit list of what I'm going to write on this blog instead of just a simple, brief statement saying "dark things will be present here" and started actively following people or mutuals of mutuals whose muses or writing I am genuinely interested in/have spiked my interests, I've grown a lot happier about the contents and people I'm seeing on my dash.

I felt like tum.blr rpers have grown incredibly judgemental and incapable of minding their own business. People all around me seem to have shifted their energy onto focusing on offending as few people as possible instead of trying to actually have fun, and the rpc has become a weird circle for activism when it shouldn't have been used as a medium for (false) activism in the first place. Not all of us are here to make a point or to establish a legacy. In fact, most of us are just here to have fun and scratch an itch in the brain or fill in gaps that canon source materials haven't been able to provide. But the idea of this is incomprehensible to some people who are actively ruining the rpc and making everyone fear that they're walking on eggshells while they spiral into a depressing state of existing to not offend anyone instead of existing to have fun.

I've lost count of the number of times people tell me that I'm on a DNI for "writing with pro.ship.pers" or "writing romantic ships with an adult and a minor" (<- said ship is between a 17 y.o. and a 19 y.o.) sometimes it's also ships about fake incest.

(Just as an aside, I've grown so desensitized by being on DNIs that it's no longer something to feel anything about. I'd just go through their rules with a very confused expression if to see what they took issue with. Most of the time I don't even know the mun personally.)

I've gotten more hate directed at me for writing fake in.cest rather than real ones, which is not only baffling but also incredibly ODD bc the fandom "decides" what is good and what is bad, which reeks heavily of manipulation and toxicity in my opinion. Fandoms aren't governed by a single party or a monolithic authority that decides its rules. Fandom rules are made by the community, and in every community, there should be different rules, made to ensure everyone is comfortable and feel inclusive. That is what makes fandoms special and detached from reality. Yes, you're entitled to not want to interact with certain content for reasons no one else is entitled to know unless they have your consent, but you're definitely not entitled to silence/stomp out everyone to cater to your whims or risk getting hate/harassment. Which is why I heavily encourage tagging content as-is instead of denying the nature of said content and praying that no one notices because that is the best way to make it difficult for people with different preferences and tastes to co-exist.

And ever since I changed my rules and actively followed people again, there has been a variety of content on my dash with varying tags. It's honestly very stimulating and uplifting, and if I firmly believe if a mutual were to take offense to anything I write or choose to interact with, it's on them as they clearly did not go through my rules when they followed/followed back. Additionally, I tag all my things.

A few months ago, my dash was exhausting, and boring, everyone (or most of my mutuals) was scared. Now I see posts getting tagged "necrophilia cw". I'm very happy for both my mutuals and their muses for striving for the peaks of how far fiction writing and the imaginative side of the mind can go.

I'd highly recommend anyone who has been in a similar situation to list down your dos and don'ts so your mutuals will know what to take to your tables and what to not. Personally, it felt like my dash had curated itself and it's been very pleasant to be on tum.blr lately even if I still have to vanish for a few more days due to inrl.

I think about my dash very often this week and I love all of you guys for being here and showing me your brainrots/muses! 💗💞💓

#𖦹 ⋆꙳ ⁄ ooc.#rant cw

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dulcesiabits · 4 months

Text

A lot of my lucas writings feel unshareable just because he's Like That, so I have to carefully curate the things I do choose to post. Anyways, have some snippets! Mild spoilers included, haha.

ii. la cuisine

“You’re bad at this.”

It’s the first thing you’ve said to him all morning, and the sound of your voice sends a pleasurable tremor down his spine.

Lucas smiles down at the clumpy potatoes in his hands, already reduced to mush from the force of his chopping. It’s difficult to gauge how much of his strength is needed for such delicate tasks. Vegetables turn to pulp. Cakes come out uneven and blackened. His soups turn marshy. He’s gone through several cutting boards just this week alone, often cleaving straight through the wood when he’s not careful. The most he knows how to do is to cut up fruits for you in lopsided shapes, skin still clinging to their flesh.

You never complain about his sorry attempts at food. You push around the mush he offers you sullenly, averting your gaze from his expectant face. Like a shy cat, you never eat when he’s watching, and you always leave leftovers.

It makes sense; he’s never wielded a kitchen knife before, preferring to buy food at the marche to supplement his nutrition. He could easily do that for you, too. It’s an unforgivable vanity on his part, but Lucas wants to cook for you. He wants you to eat the food he’s made, and to feed you by his own hand. He’s the only one who can take care of you in such a way.

“I’m sorry,” Lucas says to you.

“I don’t know why you’re apologizing,” you mutter.

Your voice is unearthly beautiful. If there was a way to bottle up the sound, he would carry it with him forever. What more could he do to coax you to talk to him? In his excitement, he squeezes the potatoes, and they explode outwards in a shower of mush.

“Oh my,” he says, sighing, shaking his hands. “I’m sorry, my angel. Dinner will take a while longer.”

“... Let me make something.”

“Hm?” Lucas turns, and you’re staring at the floor, bangs covering your eyes.

“Let me make something,” you repeat. “For dinner.”

“All right,” he says, carefully setting down his knife. You stand slowly, rolling your shoulders, taking careful steps towards the kitchen. You wrinkle your nose at his uneven cubes of meat and half-peeled vegetables, the upturned spice jars.

“What were you making?” you ask.

“Hm? Well, I was just going to cut and fry them up all at once,” he says cheerfully.

“Without a recipe?”

Lucas tilts his head. “Recipe?”

You sigh. “Just… sit down. I’ll make soup for us, or something.”

You snatch the knife from the counter, and pick up a carrot that he had set down while he had mangled the potatoes. With the flat of the blade, you begin scraping away uneven bits of skin that he had missed in his initial attempt. You work deftly, slicing your way through the vegetables, and copping the meat into more even-sided cubes. It’s like magic. Lucas stands at your back, watching the swift movement of your hands, the surety of how you step around his kitchen.

“Where’s the pot?” you ask.

Lucas swiftly opens a bottom cabinet to pick up a metal pot, placing it on the stove. “Is this good enough?”

You spare a glance, then nod. “Yeah. Can you fill it with water about half way? Turn it on to medium heat, too.”

Lucas flicks on the stove, the flames springing to life, as he meticulously fills the pot with cold water from the sink. When he’s finished, he moves back to your side, where you’re measuring spices with a spoon. Rosemary, thyme, onion powder, garlic powder, salt, pepper…

“What are you doing?” you ask.

“Watching you,” he replies.

“Why?”

“Because I like seeing how you manage the kitchen,” he says simply, “You’re lovely when you do so.”

You duck your head, hands stilling as you hold up the pepper shaker. “Fine. But don’t stand too close. I can’t focus.”

He backs up a step, and you continue your work. You dump the ingredients into the soup, stirring in spices all the while. In half an hour, the pot is bubbling merrily, and you’re stirring the contents.

For a second, Lucas lets his mind drift. What would it be like to come home to you like this? Would you ever be so comfortable to just relax with him in such a manner? Here you are, cooking in his kitchen. It’s the sort of normalcy he’s never even thought about achieving for himself before. To have you here at all, let alone be able to eat your food, is a blessing.

You ladle a small bit of soup, bringing it to your mouth to sip. You wrinkle your nose, and then shake a bit more salt into the mixture.

He steps closer, hovering over your shoulder. “May I try some?” he whispers into your ear.

You start, spoon shaking in your hand. Cute. “What?”

“I’d like to try some as well,” he says.

You stir more vigorously than you need to. “Sure. I guess. Just grab a spoon and–”

“But there’s a spoon right there,” he says innocently.

“Well… I…”

“Is it too much trouble?” he says again. He’s so close that he can feel the warmth of your body, a different sort of heat from the stove in front of you. He can see the swell of your throat, the curve of your cheek, and the flyaway strands of hair that he longs to tuck behind your ear. If he blew a puff of air into your ear, would you forgive him for such childish pranks?

You scoop up a bit of soup, and turn, holding a hand under the spoon as you offer it to him. “Fine. Just take a small sip. It’s hot.”

He leans forward, braid swinging, and sips. There’s a subtle flavor to it, but it’s warm and delicious and it’s your food, so there’s nothing but sincerity in his voice when he says, “It tastes wonderful.”

You abruptly turn around, splashing the spoon back into the pot. “Good. Go sit down. I’m almost done.”

“I want to stay here with you.”

“If you want.” There’s still a trace of wariness in your voice, but the hostility you usually spit at him is gone. When the two of you sit down for dinner later, he feels the heat of your skittish gaze lingering on the crown of his head, but never once looks up to acknowledge it. After all, you would look away if he did, and he wants the moment to last.

The attention of an angel! That’s something you earn, not something you deserve.

iii. la nuit

It is the selfish part of him that pulls you close to him on nights like this. When the blood has been washed off and the hearts collected, all he wants to do is sink into your embrace. His arm around your waist, your body tucked into the shelter of his body, curving around you. You’re warm, warmer than anything he’s touched before. It’s like holding the sun in his grasp. You always curl in on yourself, fists clenched tightly.

But there’s nowhere for you to run except into his arms. He’s made sure of that.

You never resist, but you never hold him back when he nuzzles his head on top of yours, pulling you closer to him. Closer, and closer still. Is there a way to pull you into his skin? So you’ll walk alongside him, and never leave? To have you with him forever?

You’re an angel. You’re an angel, and he’s a sinner. His pathetic life, for what little of it is left, is yours. To judge him. To save him. He could tear his own heart and offer it gladly to you, if only to hold you like this for a while longer.

#liya drabbles #virche evermore: error salvation #virche evermore #lucas proust #lucas stans unite!!!!!#when i think about lucas and ordinary domesticity. things he's been denied. well. it does things. to me

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marleysfinest · 21 days

Text

PUZZLE PIECE | reiner x jean college au

college au reijean

fluff, c/w implied weed smoking, alcohol, two dummies in love (they just don't know it yet)

wc 4.8k

this was originally intended to be part of @reijeanweek which was lovingly curated by my wife @fromriches-tosin but alas I am terrible at deadlines and stuff got in the way HOWEVER! I always resolved to finish it and I HAVE!! it is both below the cut and on ao3 if u prefer on there but anyway HERE! reijean fluff!!!

The University of Paradis takes on new life once spring calls round. The campus suffers months of naked trees, dull and damp limestone walls, and blanket upon blanket of grey clouds every year, winter often feeling as if it lasts longer than three months. But when the sky begins to brighten and the birds begin to sing, the campus sings with it. The sports fields and quod gardens breathe to life as the grass is once again vibrant, the trees start to regain their leaves, and the crocus begin to flower. The students continue to socialise after the holiday break, but it’s not until the weather warms that they really come back to life. Parties that had been spent huddled inside a single dorm or frat house can finally spill outside to make the most of the warmer evening air.

For roommates Reiner Braun and Marco Bodt, the warmer weather means finally breaking free of bitterly cold morning runs and drizzle-filled football practice, ushering in the season of shorts and vest tops and cooling down in the shade or campus swimming pool. The two are unlikely friends; allocated as roommates at the start of their studies eight months before owing to them both majoring in sports science and, while they’d gotten off to a stilted and awkward start, they found that they enjoyed one another’s company. At the very least, they were both tidy and respected each other’s space. Reiner, in particular, had been anxious about sharing his space with someone else having grown up an only child, but was pleasantly surprised. Marco had three brothers, a fact that made Reiner’s stomach tense when he’d heard it, but being the youngest meant that Marco valued his space and belongings perhaps more than Reiner did. It had been a happy accident that the two had been paired together. Looking at them, one wouldn’t have thought they’d make good friends. Marco’s tall and slender frame, with pale skin and jet black hair was a stark contrast to Reiner’s muscular build, blonde hair, and warmer tone. Aesthetic differences aside, they grew close and soon counted each other as friends. As is often the case at college, lives become condensed and what happens on campus is shielded from the consequences of the outside world. Students have their own ecosystems, their own set of rules and regulations that would never fly in the real world. Everything is amplified, although that wasn’t always a bad thing.

While their fellow classmates were diving headfirst into all that college had to offer over the course of their first year - including, but not limited to, experimenting physically - Reiner and Marco had a habit of keeping to themselves. They went to parties together and separately, each had their turns tying a sock around the doorknob warning their roommate not to enter, but in truth, they didn’t see the fuss about it all. They had shocked even themselves at how academic they both were - Reiner, seeing through every physical test with flying colours and Marco, scoring straight A’s on every assignment - and so their efforts were simply better served elsewhere. A couple of their friends had even joked that they’d become something of an “old married couple”, with their fondness for staying in on Saturdays and distinctly lack of one night stands. They did still thrive socially, just not in the way most people would “expect”. Outside of his roommate, Reiner had befriended Bertholdt Hoover and Annie Leonhardt at a rowing society social in the autumn, and the three of them had stayed close. Bertholdt and Annie were a welcome relief from the hardcore party-goers, instead more than content to camp out in Reiner’s dorm with a crate of beers while Annie smoked out of the window. The three would talk for hours, and occasionally Marco would join. He always seemed happy enough to tag along when it suited him, and Reiner was always happy to let him do so. Marco was the type to get along with anyone; easygoing, lighthearted, a little introverted, and he tended to attract like minded people - it was perhaps why he got along with Reiner, Annie, and Bertholdt.

Towards the end of the winter semester as the nights grow lighter, Reiner and Marco spend less and less time bundled in their dorm room, their only real time spent together now consisting of the late hours before bed, and the small hours of the morning. Marco mutters something about a new group of artsy-types he’s met at a social, but Reiner doesn’t catch the gist of his point, although nor is he particularly bothered. He held no ownership over Marco, there was no reason for him to know how his room mate spent every minute of his spare time.

The evening is crisp but pleasant as Reiner half-stumbles back to his room after drinks with Annie and Bertholdt. It’s not late, only just approaching 9AM, but Reiner has never been one to hold his liquor and letting Annie twist his arm into shots and beer pong after their last lecture of the day had only proven it. As he nears his room, he pauses at the sound of muffled conversation coming from the other side of the door. He hesitates, glancing down at the door handle to make sure he hasn’t missed a key detail, but sees nothing there. Has Marco just forgotten? Should he go in? The ground begins to shift beneath his feet, and Reiner knows he needs to collapse onto his bed. Urgently. With a deep breath and apology cocked at the ready, he hastily twists the doorknob and bursts into the room.

The dormitory is suddenly silent, as Reiner’s frame fills the doorway in its ever-intimidating manner. Time seems to slow down as he meets Marco’s (understandably) alarmed gaze from across the room, and breathes a sigh of relief that he hasn’t interrupted his room mate’s private time. But then, where were the voices coming from?

“Uh… you OK, man?”

An unfamiliar voice pierces the quiet, and Reiner whips his head around to see someone sitting in Marco’s desk chair, absentmindedly twirling himself left and right with a gentle push of his toes. Reiner doesn’t recognise him - although his mind is so clouded that he could have met this person before, he just isn’t in a position to recall. Although, even in a drunken stupor, he realises that surely he’d remember this stranger…

“Reiner?” says Marco, drawing Reiner’s attention, “what’s up? You look weird.”

“Uh…” Reiner’s mouth is suddenly dry as he realises just how intensely he’s put the spotlight on himself. In an attempt to shift the focus of the room, he turns once again to the stranger.

“You… you do not live in this room.”

His words are a little slurred and his stance wavers slightly as he limply raises a finger to point at the figure in the chair. The stranger’s eyebrows crease together, and from the corner of his eye, Reiner sees Marco put his head in his hands.

“No…” answers the stranger, “I’m hangin’ out with Marco. I’m Jean.”

Despite having just been offered a very plausible explanation, Reiner struggles to understand what this Jean is saying, and decides to further his interrogation after closing the door. He glances at Marco, who is sitting on his bed, hugging his knees, and has decided against intervening for the moment, the curiosity of just how the encounter will unfold getting the better of him.

“Just… just hangin’ out?” asks Reiner, folding his arms across his chest. Jean scoffs as he stops pushing the chair left and right, bringing a foot up to rest on his seat.

“Yeah, that alright with you?”

Reiner glares at Jean, not taking kindly to his cocky attitude. Jean is, after all, a guest in his room. In the background Reiner’s bed screams out, but it would have to wait. He had to know why this stranger was in his room.

“Well, that depends,” he slurs, “what are your intentions?”

Marco’s face is suddenly in his hands as Jean barks out a laugh.

“What are my intentions?! Oh my god, what are you, his dad?”

Reiner feels the heat of a blush flare in his cheeks, but struggles to determine whether it's through embarrassment or the liquor. Realising that he’s flattened any chance of an interrogation, he resigns himself to silence and heads for his bed, not once relaxing his scowl at Jean. So many comments gather in his throat - be nice to him, he’s my roommate. What was your name again? Are you his boyfriend? No, no, you don’t look like you have boyfriends. Hey, enough with the snide comments in my room - but none are verbalised as he crashes on top of the mattress. He hears quiet whispering as he loses the battle against his heavy eyelids, and soon falls into a deep sleep.

***

Saturday morning rolls around all too quickly, and Reiner wakes with a heavy head. The pillow feels as if it’s made of concrete as he rolls onto his back and is assaulted by the sunlight flooding through the curtains.

“Mornin’,” says Marco. Reiner slowly opened his eyes to see his friend sitting upright in bed, nursing a steaming cup of coffee as he scrolled the morning news on his tablet.

“Feeling rosy today?”

Reiner buried himself back into his pillow.

“Shut up,” he says, voice muffled and croaky. “Not another word.”

Marco huffs a laugh and takes a sip of his coffee, not sparing a glance at his hungover friend. He knew Reiner would be feeling all the worse for drinking - it wasn’t something he did often, in excess - and decided against pushing the matter any further than necessary.

“Whatever you say.”

The morning moves slowly in a haze for Reiner as he drifts slowly in and out of sleep, before finally clinging on to consciousness just before midday. Marco had long since gotten up and ready for the day, and had left to squeeze in some studying soon after finishing his coffee, leaving Reiner to wake up alone.

After washing up and returning to bed, Reiner picks up his phone for the first time that morning, realising that his memory of the night before is patchy. There isn’t much of a breadcrumb trail - some photos of Bertholdt and Annie playing beer pong, a selfie of them all walking down the street, presumably back to campus - and Reiner’s more than pleased to see that nobody had posted anything stupid on social media. With a heavy sigh and creeping hunger, Reiner sets his phone down on his nightstand and begins contemplating what his delicate stomach will keep down, when a knock on the door jolts him. A ripple of pain shoots through his head at the sudden noise and he lets out an exhausted groan; perhaps leaving the room wouldn’t be such a good idea. If this was what a knock at the door felt like, he didn’t fancy his chances if he came across an ambulance siren. It feels as if all his joints are screaming as he stands up. He swings the door open and is suddenly face to face with a stranger - is he a stranger? He’s tall, with unruly tawny hair cut into a haphazard mullet and faint stubble peppering his chin.

“Hey…” He greets Reiner with a coy smile, his voice trailing off and leaving the two in silence for a moment. Reiner can’t ignore that there’s something about the way the stranger is staring at him, something captivating and familiar.

“...Is Marco here?”

Reiner is snapped from his daydream and clears his throat loudly, leaning on the doorframe as he does so.

“Marco?” he asks.

“Yeah, name ring a bell?”

Why is this guy talking to me like he knows me? Thinks Reiner, still trying to decipher whether he’s put off by the person in front of him or… something else.

“Uh, no, no he’s… he’s out, sorry,” he replies, the vibrations of his own voice rippling through his head uncomfortably, prompting him to massage his temple while steadying himself on the doorframe.

“Ah…” remarks the stranger, before plunging them both into an awkward silence. Why isn’t he leaving? Thinks Reiner, although… he isn’t too bothered.

“How’s the head this morning?” asks the stranger, holding back a grin. It takes Reiner a moment to reply, as he tries his best to remember anything about the night before, thinking that he must have met this person recently.

“Not…great?” he replies, immediately feeling bashful that he was drawing a blank. The stranger huffs and takes a step back, signalling his imminent departure.

“Yeah, I’m not surprised,” he remarks, “you were kind of out of it last night. I’m Jean, by the way, in case you don’t remember. Marco’s friend.”

There’s a twang of familiarity in the back of Reiner’s mind at the name, but more than anything he’s pleased at no longer being in the dark about the stranger who interrupted his morning.

“Jean…” he repeats, “I’m Reiner.”

“Yeah, I know,” says Jean. There’s a beat of silence before Jean readjusts his rucksack and offers a half-hearted wave, turning on his heel. “Tell Marco I’ll catch him later.”

Reiner watches as Jean disappears down the hall, weaving between the students emerging from their own dorms or gossiping in doorways, until he disappears and Reiner is alone once more. His mind is flooded, suddenly, as an interest is piqued that hasn’t reared its head in a while. After a few seconds of seemingly staring into space, he’s snapped back into consciousness, and retreats inside once again.

***

“Yeah, and I told you I’m not drinking like that again!”

Reiner’s phone is propped up on the bathroom counter, only just keeping him in the frame as he talks to Bertholdt on FaceTime while shaving.

“You don’t have to drink!” argues Bertholdt, “just a couple of games of beer pong. No shots.”

“I didn’t agree to that!” Annie protests in the background. Reiner laughs as he watches Bertholdt push her away as she attempts to elbow her way into focus.

“Whatever,” concedes Reiner as he swishes his razor in the sink, “I’ll be there but no shots. Got it?”

Annie offers a grunt of approval as Bertholdt offers his reassurance before hanging up the phone. Reiner pulls the plug to drain the sink, and as he reaches for a soft towel to dry his face, he catches a glimpse of Marco rummaging around the room.

“What’re you looking for?” he calls.

“My shoe! How does someone lose one shoe?!”

Marco’s voice disappears into a muffled ramble as he squeezes beneath his bed in search of his lost sneaker. Reiner laughs at his friend’s misfortune as he goes to get dressed, offering a cursory glance around the room as he pulls on a t-shirt and jeans. Suddenly there’s a gentle thump from Marco’s side of the room, followed by a pained groan. Marco shuffles out from beneath the bed massaging the back of his head with one hand, and semi-triumphantly holding his missing shoe high in the air with the other.

“Hey, you found it!”

“But at what cost?!”

Marco laces up his shoes and stuffs his phone into his pocket before running out of the dorm with a hurried “see ya!”, leaving Reiner in the quiet. Since the weather had improved and the year progressed, Marco had been socialising more and more, his hermit-like habits apparently only reserved for the winter months, but Reiner didn’t mind. He liked the peace and quiet of being alone in the dorm, although he also had to admit that he was meeting with Bertholdt and Annie more often than usual. Despite being a homebody at his core, he had to admit that it was nice to have found a solid group of friends.

Reiner’s about to start the search for his own shoes when there’s a knock at the door. He instinctively freezes - Marco’s already left, and he was supposed to be meeting Bertholdt and Annie at the bar, they weren’t supposed to be meeting Reiner, but perhaps they’d changed their mind. Or had Marco forgotten his keys? Another, louder knock at the door shakes Reiner out of his daydream, and he goes to answer.

In an almost exact repeat of the week before, Jean is standing in front of Reiner expectantly, wearing an expression that gives absolutely nothing away. A flurry appears in Reiner’s stomach at the sight of Jean, as he realises he is as handsome as he remembered.

“Hey!” says Jean before Reiner can even form a thought, “Marco around?”

“Uh…no, no, you just missed him.”

Jean squints at Reiner, apparently unbothered by his friend’s absence.

“You’re not hungover again, are you? Am I being filmed? Is this a prank?”

Reiner is confused by the influx of questions and furrows his brow.

“What?!”

“This has to be a Groundhog Day style thing. No way are you repeating yourself word for word.”

Not knowing how to respond, Reiner feels himself panic and flounder for the right words to say. Why does he feel so nervous all of a sudden? Reiner’s no bully, but he’s no stranger when it comes to telling someone to back off if they’re bothering him, so why can’t he do that now? What’s stopping him from telling Jean to maybe text Marco instead of just turning up and hoping for the best? The more he thinks about it, he knows exactly why, but he’s neither the type of person nor is this the place to make a move on someone he barely knows.

“I’m not…I’m not hungover! Jheeze, don’t you have Marco’s number? Call him next time.”

He goes to close the door on Jean when he’s met suddenly with a protest.

“Alright! Alright, alright, I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I was just trying to be fun, guess that didn’t come across. Truce?”

Jean holds out a hand towards Reiner, who looks down at it feeling confused. Truce over what? Being an asshole? A cute asshole…

“I think Marco might like it if we’re friends, so, whaddya say?”

“O…kay?”

Reiner shakes Jean’s hand and tries to ignore the hairs on the back of his neck as they stand on end. Jean’s hands are calloused but soft, and after just a quick glance Reiner notices the numerous multicoloured stains across his skin.

“It’s paint, not dirt,” says Jean, releasing his grip and reading Reiner’s mind, “I’m studying Art History but that doesn’t stop me trying to turn myself into Rembrant, you know?”

There’s a sudden sincerity and almost nervousness to Jean’s voice as he explains the dulled splodges across his palms and blue tinge beneath his fingernails. Reiner doesn’t know how to reply - needless to say the arts were never his strong suit - and he tries to ignore the impulsive thoughts that are yelling for Jean to just keep talking.

“Uh-huh…” His voice trails off as the two are once again lingering in silence, but the awkwardness has subsided ever so slightly as the curtain of being strangers is slowly pulled back. Jean clearly knew more about Reiner than Reiner knew about him - all thanks to Marco’s penchant for oversharing, most likely - but despite his tendency towards privacy, Reiner doesn’t feel affronted. In fact, he acknowledges that he wouldn’t mind all that much knowing a little more about Jean.

“Anyway,” says Jean, piercing the silence once again, “I gotta go. Sorry to bother you…again.”

“No, don’t worry about it,” assures Reiner, trying to shake off his daydream and frantically searching for reasons to suggest that Jean stays. Of course, he doesn’t think of any in his panic.

“I’ll call Marco next time. See ya ‘round.”

For the second time in as many weeks, Reiner watches Jean hop down the hallway until he’s out of sight.

***

The ground shakes as the bass thumps rhythmically from the speakers, whipping up the partygoers’ taste for dancing and shots. The party has long since spilled out onto the front lawn and throughout the back garden, with people jumping in the pool drink in hand and coupling up in the dimming light. Inside the sorority house, the party rages with games of beer pong, groups socialising in the halls, and keg stands in the lounge. By the time Reiner, Bertholdt, and Annie arrive, the party is already well established, and they walk into something resembling chaos. The trio enter and gently elbow their way past gossiping students until they reach the kitchen, where a tipsy Historia squeals in delight at their arrival. Historia, head cheerleader for Paradis University, has a soft spot for Reiner and despite knowing that partying isn’t his scene, never fails to invite him to every party she throws.

“You came!” she bleated, leaping up to throw her arms around Reiner’s neck. He catches her small frame in his arms before gently placing her feet firmly back on the ground. She sways slightly but keeps a firm grip on the bottle in her hand.

“Beer?!” quizzes Reiner, “you are drinking beer?!”

Historia looks momentarily offended.

“Why wouldn’t I be?!” she asks, “I can drink beer!”

“C’mon, you, quit bothering everyone that walks through the door, you klutz.”

Historia is whisked away by Ymir, fellow classmate of Reiner’s, with a knowing nod and wink. Reiner would’ve been lying if he ever said he didn’t have a soft spot for Historia, too, and so knowing that she was in the capable, albeit firm arms of Ymir gave him some relief.

“Alright, I’m gonna find the punch and then head for a smoke,” announces Annie, realising she’d seen more sights sober than she’d wanted, leaving Reiner and Bertholdt to their own devices. Not always wise, seeing as they were both as timid as each other oftentimes. They each scoop a beer from a large cooler packed with ice in the kitchen and do their best to begin mingling.

By ten o’clock the party is in full force. Annie and Bertholdt are both deep in conversation with a group of Philosophy majors by the swimming pool, sharing long drags of Annie’s secret stash between muted arguments on the apparently tumultuous ethics of being a coxswain. Reiner had been with them on the sidelines but had long since lost interest in both the conversation and the smell - he didn’t mind either of them smoking, but it wasn’t for him, and soon the smoke was overpowering. He got up and disappeared inside as Annie began to roll another.

After scooping one of the last remaining beers, Reiner returns to the vaguely quieter porch outside and stops to observe the garden. Behind him is thumping music and rambunctious shouting and singing, but the party is a little tamer outside. People are playing in the pool - splashing each other and playing chicken - but the groups gathered in front of Reiner are generally more subdued and engaged in conversation. He huffs a sigh, and for a moment considers heading home when there’s a sudden presence beside him. To his right, he finds himself shoulder to shoulder with Jean. He’s taken aback momentarily, for some reason surprised to see him.

“Hey,” he says immediately, for once beating Jean to the punch.

“Hey! You’re not stuttering this time,” teases Jean. Reiner can’t help but laugh.

“Nope, not today,” he says, before glancing at his beer, “not yet, anyway.”

Jean returns a smile and the two resume gazing out at the party in front of them.

“What’re you doing here?” asks Reiner. He feels Jean shrug, and the hairs on the back of his neck prickle once again.

“Eh, was talked into it by Marco,” explains Jean, “he’s run off somewhere. I think he’s gettin’ lucky upstairs, truth be told, but I’m not about to try and find out.”

Reiner whips his head round in utter disbelief.

“Marco?!”

“I know!”

The pair share a moment in surprise at their friend’s good fortune - not because it was Marco, but because it wasn’t typical Marco behaviour - and Reiner raises his bottle.

“To Marco.”

They toast to their friend, and take a healthy swig.

After stealing some more beers and smuggling them out, Reiner and Jean find a quiet spot on the grass at the very back of the garden where the party turns into nothing more than a distant, muffled echo. They sit on the grass with their backs against the splintered wooden fence and begin to get to know one another, mostly via the avenue of Marco. Jean and Marco had met by chance at a job fair and, despite having polar opposite areas of study, bonded over their mutual love of Star Wars and The Ramones. For all his cockiness and confidence, Jean had found himself thin on close friends after the majority went to different universities, and so clung to Marco somewhat when the two had made a bond. Reiner was surprised to hear that Jean wasn’t swimming with friends - his impression had certainly been the opposite - and somewhat selfishly, it made him feel better. He didn’t want a city’s worth of people to call friends, and he was happy with the little handful he had, but there was something reassuring and almost validating to know that even the more seemingly popular on campus had struggled to adjust, just as he had done.

“Y’know, even though you looked like a bruised grizzly bear that morning, I was glad to see you weren’t a total asshole,” said Jean, prompting Reiner to turn to him.

“What?”

“Y’know, the morning I came to see Marco? And he wasn’t there? And you were hungover?”

“Yes,” interrupts Reiner, “I know when you mean. What do you mean I wasn’t a ‘total asshole’?”

“Well…” Jean’s voice trails off for a moment, “you’d given me the third degree the night before and, I don’t know, I was glad to see you were just drunk, I guess.”

Reiner’s memory fails as he tries once again to remember what had happened the night he’d returned home and apparently met Jean for the first time. A flush of heat hits his cheeks, and he finds himself glad for the dim light to hide his blushing.

“Ah…Well, I’m sorry for whatever I said. Or did.”

Jean scoffs suddenly.

“C’mon! You didn’t do anything. I guess you were just looking out for Marco. I was worried you were like… dating or something.”

Instinctively, Reiner tenses at Jean’s words, suddenly feeling panicked that he’d befriended the wrong person. If Jean was the type of person who disagreed with same sex relationships then Reiner knew he was going to have to make his excuses fast. A ball forms in the pit of his stomach, churning the beer in all the wrong ways.

“Uh, no, no, it’s not… it’s not like that with Marco, he’s my roommate…”

“No!” interrupts Jean, propelled forward by the volume, “no, I didn’t mean it like that! I don’t… I mean I do… fuck, that’s not what I meant. What I meant was… I thought you were Marco’s boyfriend. Which is fine! If you are. Or if you’re not. It’s really fine if you’re not. I’m not either, I don’t have a… OK, this is not going how I planned.”

Reiner is stunned into silence at Jean’s cool-guy facade crumbling before his very eyes. So far, every interaction with Jean had involved Reiner being the bumbling, stuttering idiot and Jean being the cool, calm, and collected one able to disarm Reiner with just a glance. He’d never imagined that he’d be sitting idly by while Jean fell over his own words, apparently trying to tell Reiner something important. Jean takes a glug of beer and a deep breath before angling himself more towards Reiner.

“What I meant was… I thought you were dating Marco, which you’re not, and I’m happy about that, not because I disagree with it or anything that fuckin’ stupid, but… I dunno, Marco told me so much about you, and you walked in all drunk and… big, and…” A force that Reiner would never understand takes over as he watches Jean continue to stumble over his words. In a split second’s decision, he discards his beer bottle and leans forward to bring himself level with Jean, planting a firm kiss on his mouth. The millisecond of bravery quickly subsides and Reiner is acutely aware that he might’ve done the wrong thing, until he feels Jean kiss him back, and within seconds the two fall into each other like the last two pieces of a puzzle. Something clicks in their minds as they sit and explore one another, beneath a clear night sky and away from prying eyes, and realise that they feel no apprehension. No nerves. No worries. A revelation that being with this person is as easy as breathing, and that, just maybe, things will be alright.

#reijean #reiner braun #jean kirschtein #attack on titan #shinjeki no kyojin #reijean fluff #fluff #college au

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