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ms0milk · 1 year

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𝟏 | 𝐀 𝐖𝐨𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐫𝐟𝐮𝐥 𝐖𝐚𝐲 𝐭𝐨 𝐒𝐭𝐚𝐫𝐭 𝐚 𝐓𝐞𝐫𝐫𝐢𝐛𝐥𝐞 𝐓𝐫𝐢𝐩

ー✧ prince!bakugou x royal guard!reader

"The prince meets you with a ferocity that probably stops people’s hearts and with his mother’s halo of silvery hair and decisive eyes, it’s lovely enough to stop yours too."

no cw big time fairytale castle, blunt bkg & silly co. reader's a lil stiff bc character arcs aren't built in a day, let the slowburn begin. i am not immune to aizawa in any universe. author does not attempt to hide how very badly she wants to ******* *** **** bkg's mama. 3.9k

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Waking up is so peaceful this morning. Gentle and warm.

"..…"

That sweet kind of rise between waking and dreaming, where you’re able to say goodbye to your dreams and the people in them with a tip of your hat and wave goodbye. Forgiving and patient.

“..Y/n…”

The queen was in your dreams tonight. And you were back in your hometown– you’re there now. The fields are golden and heavy before autumn harvest and your neighbors have no need for locks on their doors. She is beautiful today, and she is your sister, your mother, your Lady when you try to look past the sun’s rays to her face. Up, up, up into her eyes, why can’t you find what you’re looking for? Higher and higher until it’s the stars you’re on your knees for.

“Y/n.”

You jolt at the sudden sensation of falling with a quick and panicked grip on your pillow but you’re back in your room, stuffed mattress and all. Every part of your body is grounded to woolen blankets and the weight at your feet. Someone laughs at the foot of your bed when you sigh in relief and you jump again, because this time it’s the queen.

“I’m sorry to wake you.”

She smiles behind her hand. You’re staring. And then it’s been a second too long before you gather yourself like a member of the castle with some respect and make a move to stand for formal greetings. But you only get as far as sitting up when she stiffs her palm to your forehead.

“Stay.”

From your spot still tucked in bed you muster a, “Yes, Your Majesty.”

The queen’s hair is wild and silvery by the light of a candle she holds at her chest. The only light in the room. Heavy fur cape clasps fit neatly into the bodice of her nightgown– gown almost wasn’t the right word. You love her. There isn’t a citizen alive that doesn’t love her.

“I have a question for you, Y/n.”

“Anything, Majesty.”

What time is it? Your curtain is drawn, but still there doesn’t seem to be any morning light trying to peek through.

“My son’s been invited east to celebrate a new observatory.” The queen pulls a once-neatly-wrapped envelope from her pocket, “the end of some momentous constructional undertaking or another,” she laughs. She extends her hand to you and smiles at just how dumbstruck you still seem to be by candlelight.

“I’m sorry it’s so early.”

“Not at all.” You move too quickly and too slowly somehow– you curse yourself– while taking it from her, and feel like a silly child the way she has you perched against your pillows. In your nightclothes for gods’ sake,

“I just received word from a Takoba messenger. A letter from their queen.”

You nod to her. Turn the letter over in your hands until it falls open.

“He’s leaving today and I would very much like you to accompany him.”

Dumbstruck doesn’t describe how you look anymore, doesn’t do it justice. Your apartments on Castle Southside feel less like a single modest room and more like the very stables you live above, wholly unfit for royalty. She’s still smiling at you. You’re still goddamned tucked-in.

“Majesty, me?”

“If you wouldn’t mind.”

You jolt up again and catch yourself in a way that seems amusing to her, “Not at all Your Majesty! But wouldn’t– shouldn’t Master Jeanist go?”

“Jeanist stays with me.”

And you realize in horror– truly too many emotions at this point for one woman to manifest only minutes after waking up– that you implied the queen may have made a mistake.

“Don’t apologize,” she catches you before you can open your sleep-addled mouth again, “Captain of the Guard stays with me. But you’ve trained with Jeanist for years Y/n, you’re going to be my son’s Captain, I know you will.” She’s scooting closer to you and gods, she’s taking your hand, “Can I trust you with this mission?”

It feels fuzzy in the room when she uses your name.

“With anything.”

Queen Mitsuki handed over one more letter before leaving you to prepare for your morning shift. Just a thank you card, she’d said. For you to deliver to the eastern queen, the Queen of Takoba.

As long as it was her asking you’d be able to do anything, although she may have a touch too much confidence in your future. Captain of he Royal Guard? Spending the most time with Jeanist doesn’t mean you have a future as his successor, only the next monarch can decide that. Spending the most time with Jeanist only means that you don’t have any friends.

The click of your heels down the stone hallway line up with another’s as you round the corner to your station. A tree today.

Trees and wildlife grow freely in the Bakugous’ Aldera Castle and make the palace warm even in the dead of winter. Knobbly trunks and grasping vines twist in and out of windows, fruit rolls down the halls in fall. Squirrels and birds get in so regularly that members of the guard each have one shift a week exclusively for helping the creatures get back out.

Fresh air never feels far away. In the springtime you are all tasked with sweeping blossoms off the castle floors before they wither or trip a royal guest, and from the very second the first magnolia blooms in March you’re swimming in flowers til June.

Jeanist stands under the lichen of Castle Southside’s oak tree when you arrive, and the soldier he was speaking to has already strode away. Tall, black hair.

The oak tree is four stories tall to have an arm reaching this far inside and is older than any member of the castle is able to recall accurately. It is precious family. It reaches up and over the banister at the edge of the hallway and dips down into the library like a leafy chandelier, causing much headache in autumn when the tallest ladder ever made is procured for the poor novice whose job it is to clean the books underneath of it.

“Good morning, Y/n.”

“Sir.”

Jeanist only smiles under the high collar of his red uniform. You rarely get the chance to stand beside your mentor anymore, now that the prince is getting older and needs a senior guard on diplomatic errands. You love the way your uniforms look in a line together– feel next to each other. Yours are the only two of their kind and your mentor made these himself. Blood red gambeson and white bone pin clasps. You assume your position beside the tree and stare dead ahead, happy, if only for a second, if only on the inside, to belong once again to this group of two.

“Y/n?”

“Yes, sir?” You don’t break eye contact with the far wall. It’s still relatively dark on the fifth floor of Southside and so all you have to entertain yourself is a tapestry you’ve memorized every stitch of, until another soldier comes to relieve you.

“Did you speak with the Queen?”

“Yes, sir. Early this morning.”

“Earlier than dawn?” Jeanist chuckles and turns to gaze out the window through the ancient knots of the oak tree. The sun crests the mountains somewhere farther than you’ve ever traveled and spills into the folds of his uniform. It warms the back of your head. “What did you tell her?”

“That I would be honored to comply with Her Majesty's request.”

“And how do you feel?”

“Privileged, sir.”

“Y/n,”

Your eyes tug at your periphery, confused by the general chatiness of the old guard this morning.

“I’m proud of you.”

Your head turns fully at this, in surprise and without your permission, and you realize it hasn’t yet struck you to ask why he’s at your post in the first place.

“Master Jeanist?”

“Go on.” He’s looking at you too now, he’s been doing it the whole time, “They’ll leave without you at this rate.”

You stare for another two seconds at this strange mentor of yours. You try to keep your heart from spilling onto the floor is actually what you do; it’s all you can manage.

“Yes, sir.”

If anything you’ll be the first of the entire party to arrive in the Great Hall, but you still let Jeanist assume your position in front of the oak and even turn in surprise again when he rests a hand on your shoulder as you’re making to leave. He taps one of your small golden earrings with a gentle finger and with his other hand unclasps the dragontooth brooch from his breast.

“How long did you stare when the queen spoke with you this morning?”

Your ears go hot immediately under his knowing gaze, but he only smiles. He pulls your hand forward and rests the dragontooth in your palm with an amount of pressure that can only mean, be careful. And so you will, you determine, and turn to make your way to collect your things.

“Word of advice!”

In a neverending morning of spinning, you drag your foot and face him again. Jeanist is nearly laughing and trying very well to hide his worry, “If you stare at the prince the way you have the tendency to do, he might just take your head off.”

He doesn’t get to see you smile often, but it does feel fitting now for you to nod your goodbye to him with that sneaky grin of yours he loves so much.

“He might try, sir."

It didn’t take more than a few months in the castle, at six years old, for the prince to rectify his opinion of you. To clarify his disdain in the event that his mother’s favoritism towards the orphan gave anyone the wrong idea about his personal priorities. Though it hardly mattered. Hundreds of new faces fill the castle every year and he had forgotten yours just as quickly as you had been whisked into Jeanist’s care to begin your training and earn your keep.

Today your satchel is packed, your hair’s braided back, and the prince thinks no more or less of you than he always has. Indifference will make your job easy.

The whole sprawling maze of stone buildings warm in the morning sun as you make your way to Castle Northside, although autumn is close and soon heavy curtains will need to be draped over windows and trees. Soon too, it’ll be time to sweep fallen leaves out of the hallway and collect ripe peaches from the branches of the western stairwell. You’ll need to have your winter uniform cleaned when you return so the white fur of the collar glows, because when the queen happens to see you on duty she always remarks on how well you care for her colors.

Even your earrings– tiny suns, gold and dangling– represent your love for Aldera down to the smallest detail. They were a gift from her, and you swell when her eyes jump from one carefully polished detail on your body to the next. Jeanist always says that she’s the most meticulously crafted person he’s ever met. You know that’s why he loves her. Each giant winter cape in her collection drops her into the background of some priceless painting or ethereal scene and for this reason alone, winter is your favorite season.

Sometimes in the cold weather, when she sneaks to the kitchen in the middle of the night, Her Majesty wears heavy battle gauntlets to stay warm and looks altogether too silly and beautiful in delicate furs and armored gloves. If you’re on duty overnight, she’ll bring you a warm loaf of bread and whisper something to the tune of, “I’ll call another guard to your post, I don’t like you staying up so late.” Or “Hide under my cape and I’ll sneak you to bed.”

It is just at this moment of routine admiration that, out of an auxiliary hallway to the kitchen, pops a tall boy you’ve never seen before wearing white soldier’s greaves. On top he’s in a worn undershirt like you’ve just walked in on his getting changed– well– he just walked in on you– while getting changed– more importantly, he knows your name and he calls to you as he approaches.

“Yes soldier?”

His limbs are knobbly and his mouth hitches uncomfortably upwards when he finally gets close enough to you to speak, “Hanta actually, Sero Hanta.”

Tall and disrespectful.

“What is it, soldier?”

“Master Jeanist sent me to get your halberd from the smithy but when I came back you–”

“I don’t keep my halberd in the smithy.”

He shifts his weight between two legs too long for his greaves like he has somewhere else to be, “Well whoever’s it is, Kirishima has it now and we’ve all been searching Southside like madmen trying to find–”

“Who–” You shake your head and turn to face him fully now, “Stop, why does Master–”

“Sero! Oh my everloving gods you found her!” Another boy, quite blond, scrambles out of a different hallway– oh, he’s tripping on the decorative runner– out of breath to the soldier’s side. “Kirishima–”

“You found her!” Yet another voice shrills over the banister of the hallway above. This one belongs to a lithe pink girl and she hops the last five stairs to land at your side, “Don’t you look nice today Miss Guard.”

“Excuse me?”

She’s already moved on, “Where’s Kirishima?”

You have half a mind to take the closest person by the arm and hold them for questioning. How have they gotten so far into the center of the castle unaccompanied? Who do they belong to?

“Identify yourselves.”

“No time for that,” Soldier Sero snaps and links a hand under each of his companions’ arms, “We’ll parse out introductions once we’re not all about to be hanged.” Without direction or permission, the three of them are down the last stretch of hallway quicker than north wind through bare branches and great iron doors scream open.

You’ve walked the Hall ten thousand times and so the gold trim and the two-story fireplace and the relentless smell of pine and the rows of mismatched wooden tables long enough to seat an extended family of dragons, only bring tears to your eyes sometimes. The floor is cobbled with river stones that catch fruit and nuts in their grooves but glow purple and red like hot glass when the sun comes in through the windows. It gets hotter than a roosted hen when it’s full of staff at mealtimes so you take your dinner elsewhere when it’s time to retire.

It’s too cramped. You’ve never managed large crowds in tight spaces very well, so times like these are precious, when it’s empty before breakfast and still clean from the night's housekeeping. Except it’s not empty now, is it? There are three fools and two brand new strangers loitering in front of the fireplace at the other end of the room, just waiting for you to call for reinforcements. Sero begins to take off his pants–

“Soldier!” You shout down the Hall almost as quickly as you cross it.

“Good morning,” An altogether new voice pools between your exclamations.

Of the five people in the empty room, two of them obviously belong someplace very far away. Somewhere unkind. Blue tunics and windswept hair. You slow your warpath and try to take in the details of the two new men that your three fugitives have approached without an ounce of concern or respect for personal space.

The younger of the pair tries to repel hair ruffles and claps on the shoulder from the three trespassers while the taller man, worn and travel-sallow, peers over the bustle to you.

His eye contact doesn't match the way he holds his exhausted body. It is this one part of him that threatens, surely only in your own tired mind, sudden and practiced violence. You move closer.

“I am Master Aizawa."

When he blinks the threat vanishes and you buckle a bit in the whiplash from danger to gentle authority. You are unarmed for a second– feeling suddenly like a school girl again being pitied by her teacher in a classroom full of people who he knows haven't quite figured out how to talk to the child soldier.

"Your party will be under my protection and instruction beginning today.”

Disarming eye contact aside, Master Aizawa, this fourth stranger of the morning, looks as if he could barely be trusted to remain upright on a sunny day, let alone manage other people.

“This young man is Hitoshi Shinsou,” he tips his chin to the boy trying to stand tall beside him, still speaking only to you over the chittering crowd, “My apprentice and your second in command.”

Windswept, violent, exhausted, trespassers, guests, useful, useless– these people do not matter. You’re supposed to be waiting for the prince and his convoy not chasing strangers in circles around the castle, when quite the terrible thought slips into center focus.

In your rush this morning it hadn’t even presented itself as an option, that this group of people might share your objective. The iron doors grunt open again in your confusion but louder than the doors are the people walking through them.

“Oh amazing, you found her!”

“I could hear you horrible fucks all the way from the courtyard.”

Your blood doesn’t rush properly for a second most likely because your heart has stopped pumping it out. It’s the prince. You square your body to the back wall immediately and bow with fists at your side. Trying to bury the incorrigible urge to stare.

Even from half a Hall away you feel the tremendous confidence that swells to every corner of a room when he enters. He’s in an open-chested vest lined with furs and you know the clasps at his neck are solid gold because the queen wouldn’t settle for less. The red cape they grip sweeps in an arc as he navigates tables, and walking duly tall beside him is the prince's Champion, Kirishima, who holds a polearm in one hand while waving to the group with the other.

The two familiar faces put you at a strange kind of ease. Kirishima is a relatively new addition to the castle but always seems to have a smile for you in passing, and the prince– the prince has gotten taller since– well, actually– you realize it’s been years since you’ve stood near him properly. Unless it’s the queen (and even then you really should), all castle staff bow their heads when a royal walks past. You’re fairly familiar with the details of his boots but not much else.

“Good morning, Highness,” Master Aizawa is the first to reply and his voice simmers just above a growl. You raise your head so that you’re standing tall when the prince finishes his march to the group but you’re too practiced in looking away to keep your eyes up when he trudges past.

“Long time no see old man.”

“Ready?”

“Let’s get this over with.” The prince doesn’t offer you a glance, not even a blink, before he’s tossing a rucksack from the man’s outstretched arm over his shoulder.

Soldier Sero calls after him, “You clean up nice,” and lifts his arm to give the prince a playful swat, but you’re already holding his wrist behind his back and he’s standing on tall tippy toes to keep the pressure in his knobby elbow from breaking it. You have a nasty habit. It’s full of panic. The queen always laughs when you’re too quick to confront so you haven’t tried to stop. It saved her life once. The prince squares himself to the yelping and now he’s looking at you.

“S-sorry Y/n! Friendly fire.”

You drop Sero’s arm and try to speak– it's your only chance for appropriate introduction– but the prince meets you with a ferocity that probably stops people’s hearts and with his mother’s halo of silvery hair and decisive eyes, it’s lovely enough to stop yours too. His red gaze is quick and flickering. Like he hopes to avoid looking at you altogether. You try to speak even less successfully than the last time, to wet your lips, try to make a sound, but he’s already rolling his eyes and ushering the two blue guards towards the door.

“I don’t need a fuckin’ babysitter. The rest of you, hurry up.”

They do. The prince, two escorts, and three unnamed guests, are back out the iron doors without so much as a greeting, explanation, or itinerary. You stand next to the cold fireplace, still half bowed in greeting.

As the Great Hall stills, empty now except for Kirishima, the redhead sidles a bit closer in the quiet. He watches you excitedly, as you exhale and adjust the travel bag at your hip, eager to present you with the weapon he’s been carrying.

“Good mornin’ Y/n. I think this is from Jeanist,” he chirps with a smile and precisely no clue just what exactly it is he’s handing to you. He’s straightforward and confident and warm.

It’s been a long time since a day so new has been so active. Since dawn, nothing but one heart palpitation after the next. One pair of red eyes to the next. The prince’s red burns your vision like a sunspot, Aizawa's turn grapes to wine, but Kirishima’s feels patient. You’re slow to remove your gloves before handling the weapon and take it from the Champion who vibrates in the new quiet. He is not particularly good at standing still.

Shifting up and down in your hands is a halberd. Its balance is unfamiliar and it’s not the cherrywood weapon you’re familiar with, the one that’s hopefully still hanging up in its slot in the Keep. This weapon is a deep blood red from shaft to socket. You nod your head without taking your eyes off the shimmer of the metal polished so fine it's turned white, and you’re sure there are tears in your eyes.

Kirishima is still smiling as you fiddle with the rivets, “You have lovely taste, it’s beautiful.”

“It’s not mine,” you whisper, because it’s Master Jeanist’s.

Outside of the castle gates, a particularly dazzling blue carriage is waiting, pulled by a team of white horses. You squint at the three fools wrestling with each other next to a quilted door of the most delicate vehicle you’ve ever seen in your life. Like something out of a storybook, like something built by fairies. The prince tiffs with a less-than-interested Master Aizawa in the grass a ways off and taps his foot angrily just like his mother.

“Are you the Aldera escort?” Shinsou, the spitting image of apathy, appears between you and Kirishima as you trek the stone path to join the party. He hands you each a sizable knapsack.

You nod, “Y/n, apprentice to Captain Jeanist.”

“The one and only?”

“Captain?”

“No, the only apprentice,” Shinsou corrects and smiling eyes betray his disinterest, “I’ve heard stories. It’s nice to meet you, Y/n.”

“Likewise,” you murmur as he leaves you with a bag in both hands, and strides back to the crowd to help load luggage. The Champion is long gone and mingling with friends too and so you’re alone again, left to fiddle at a distance with your halberd and the leather sling used to carry it on your back.

When you gaze back over the group from afar, it does seem that everyone but you already quite likes one another, and it probably feels that way because it’s true. They know each other somehow and you are the only stranger.

Next to the stack of luggage, you watch Sero open the door for his two friends and then watch them all curtsy dramatically before trying to beat each other inside. Shinsou catches the blond when he trips backwards on the single carriage step, Sero is finally wearing pants that fit him, black and pleated, and the prince is now stamping his foot on the ground in conversation with the most unfazed man you’ve ever met. Master Aizawa, you suppose, from Takoba.

Behind you the warm castle whistles with wind and morning activity. Your home. In front of you the pink-haired girl blows kisses to imaginary admirers and Kirishima hoists the prince into the carriage by force. It hasn’t been more than an hour and you are already sure this group of people will try their absolute hardest to get you all killed.

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tagged angels ✧.* @nnubee @cherrykamado @nonomesupposedto @zombiewarprincess @kotarousproperty @strawberry-mentos69 @sveetnn @eirlysian @lunrai @cherripunch26nch26 @km74744 @arayoflia

could not tag for some reason

(there was an issue with this post the first time, so I wont clog my angel's notifs with a retag on this second try 😅)

#welcome welcome to the show!#the first two chapters are the slowest so i'm killing two birds with one stone tonight #and publishing them at the same time #the payoff is worth it swearsies #bakugou x reader #bear with me!#trust the process #a hymn to black water #and thank you so much to my tagged angels!#bnha #bnha x reader #mha #mha x reader #bakugo x reader #fantasy au #mha fantasu au #bnha fantasy au #fantasy au bakugou #fantasy au bakugo

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reasonsforhope · 16 days

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"The world's coral reefs are close to 25 percent larger than we thought. By using satellite images, machine learning and on-ground knowledge from a global network of people living and working on coral reefs, we found an extra 64,000 square kilometers (24,700 square miles) of coral reefs – an area the size of Ireland.

That brings the total size of the planet's shallow reefs (meaning 0-20 meters deep) to 348,000 square kilometers – the size of Germany. This figure represents whole coral reef ecosystems, ranging from sandy-bottomed lagoons with a little coral, to coral rubble flats, to living walls of coral.

Within this 348,000 km² of coral is 80,000 km² where there's a hard bottom – rocks rather than sand. These areas are likely to be home to significant amounts of coral – the places snorkelers and scuba divers most like to visit.

You might wonder why we're finding this out now. Didn't we already know where the world's reefs are?

Previously, we've had to pull data from many different sources, which made it harder to pin down the extent of coral reefs with certainty. But now we have high resolution satellite data covering the entire world – and are able to see reefs as deep as 30 meters down.

Pictured: Geomorphic mapping (left) compared to new reef extent (red shading, right image) in the northern Great Barrier Reef.

[AKA: All the stuff in red on that map is coral reef we did not realize existed!! Coral reefs cover so much more territory than we thought! And that's just one example. (From northern Queensland)]

We coupled this with direct observations and records of coral reefs from over 400 individuals and organizations in countries with coral reefs from all regions, such as the Maldives, Cuba, and Australia.

To produce the maps, we used machine learning techniques to chew through 100 trillion pixels from the Sentinel-2 and Planet Dove CubeSat satellites to make accurate predictions about where coral is – and is not. The team worked with almost 500 researchers and collaborators to make the maps.

The result: the world's first comprehensive map of coral reefs extent, and their composition, produced through the Allen Coral Atlas. [You can see the interactive maps yourself at the link!]

The maps are already proving their worth. Reef management agencies around the world are using them to plan and assess conservation work and threats to reefs."

-via ScienceDirect, February 15, 2024

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radioactive-earthshine · 1 year

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NGL I have STRONG opinions about digital releases omitting the letters to the editor section of older comics. I feel like the letters are a part of comic history and should be aggressively preserved.

#look i was a weirdo and loved the letters so much #so much #so fucking damn much #i still to this day mourn that we don't have them #sometimes the editors would publish blatant aggressive criticism and promise to do better on some things #it was rare but it did happen in a handful of things involving stereotypes #also there is queer history in them such as in superboy and the ravers where people wrote in about hero #asking WHY he was not interested in women and this editor had to so professionally explain that he was GAY and where they stood on it #you also got to read queer readers writing in about these queer characters and the JOY in their words is priceless #also sorry but geoff's letters are fun and stupid at the same time and are a huge insight to what his hcs were #he LOVED tiny krypto so much it likely inspired him making dex starr bc he loved the idea of a small overly powered animal #not saying that was the main reason why ofc but it is interesting that he created dex after praising that mean little mutt #i say with the most love #my venting #my rambles

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crybaby-bkg · 9 months

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cw: Bakugou dies but comes back to life, “comes back wrong” trope, implied fighting, angst

When Bakugou died, you’re not sure how you went on living. Grief had taken over your life, sat you in the passenger side while it cruised off the highway into icy waters. And even then, you couldn’t find the energy to drown.

It’s why there’s a sudden uptick of energy when you’re promised to have him back. Some top scientists contact you months after his death, tell you to hurry down to the headquarters labs, come and rejoice for what you’re about to witness. And you’re horrified, to say the least.

“This isn’t my husband.” Are your first words when you walk in, watch the figure on the other side of the glass examine its own hands. It looks like your husband but—but his hair isn’t the right shade of blond all over. His nose bridge had a slight bump after a scuffle with a villain. He had a scar on his hand but—but it never looked like it was to sew a pinky beside the other fingers.

“Is that really my husband?” You ask next in disbelief, slowly entering the room. Bakugou’s head snaps up, his eyes a little brighter than you remember but—they hold so much emotion. So much memory, so much panic, so much guilt.

“I left you.” He mutters, his voice raspy and ragged, and you wonder if it’ll always be like this now. It makes you cry a little harder than it should, but you only embrace each other. He’s cold and his shoulders don’t hold the same mass and his back doesn’t carry the same scars. There’s one, jagged and rough, running down his back, and you think, you think that’s where they slipped a new spine in.

“Welcome back home.” You tell him, weeks after meeting him again, new and not totally—Katsuki. He’s stiff and he doesn’t immediately take off his boots when he enters, and it worries you. Makes you think if you’ve just let a stranger into your home, one that has stolen your dead husbands face. Makes you wonder if he’ll be as loving as Katsuki once was, or if he’ll become your monster looming over you with the guilt of not being able to rest anymore.

“I’ve missed you so much.” You whisper against his mouth one night, a little while after he’s moved back. You don’t know why you lay under him, why you let him nestle himself inside of you, why you let him hold you against his chest. Katsuki always ran his hands over your cheeks and neck whenever he held you like this, but this…man, only holds himself up with his hands resting beside your head. It’s alien, how he looks at you, how his hips are methodically measured with every thrust, how he kisses you every 8 seconds. You wonder if he’s more robot than Frankenstein monster.

“Why did you come back to me like this?” You ask him one night, barricaded in the bathroom away from him. You can hear his sobs on the other side, his pleading to be let in. He tells you he never wanted to come back if he had to be like this, that he’s sorry, please let him in, he misses the warmth of your skin, he’s never been so cold before, he’s never liked the cold.

“Is this considered cheating?” You ask yourself aloud one night, when Bakugou is forced back to the lab when he becomes too…un-Bakugou. To sleep with a man that is your husband in every way but? Your husband has been dead for a year now, and yet you stroke the chin of the man that tries so hard to be him everyday, but fails so miserably at it every time.

“I’ll come back to you right this time.” Bakugou promises to you when he’s strapped down to leave for the lab and before he’s sedated. But you don’t believe him—you never did. Your husband is dead, and this animated corpse has been nothing but a cheap mockery of everything you’ve lost and something you will never truly get back.

#I was writing this and then checked my dash and saw another post about this #and felt so guilty and almost didn’t post it aidjdkfj #but I love this trope too much to delete it!!!!!#I’ve written about this in my published book before and it’s one of my favorite things I’ve ever written #there’s just such a deep heartache about having to grieve someone #and then the grieving process being interrupted by the one you lost #and battling with their death even though you still look at them everyday again #but it’s just not right?? it’s not the same??#they have the same face (kinda) but it’s truly not hem #not them* heck #it reminds me of a convo I had in a psych class about making a new cloned version of yourself #where the question was ‘is the clone/new version still you? or are they an entirely new person now?’#and at first I said they’re still me you know? they have my face n body n memories #but my prof told me no!! after they have been cloned they are sentient and are now their own person making new memories apart from you #and I thought that was soooo interesting and it makes me fall in love w this trope every time #you’re my person but only a version. you’re who I love but a newer person. you’re not them. you’re everything I’ve missed about them #so heartbreaking I LOVE ITTTT #sorry I’m rapping it’s the sleep meds kicking in #okay bai #bakugou treats! 🍬#—new treat in the streets! 🍫

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stuckinapril · 5 months

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me stoically navigating my way through drama bc bigger things are ahead and it’s not my fault people are dumb

#kissed a guy at a kickback and thought we caught a vibe only to find out he just wants to fuck me. next #friend’s bf of 7 years drunkenly hit on me at the same kickback (I was not ok w this). they ended up beefing over me. he denied everything.#do I want to be involved in this? no. and so I simply ignore it and keep it pushing #and the guy I kissed is cancelled. like he is dead to me. so that’s also taken care of #it’s back to studying full-time for the mcat #going to the gym/taking walks daily #volunteering at the refugee center + clinic #getting published in orgo research papers #and trying to snag the opportunity to shadow doctors at a massive cancer research center. like I’d kill for it #december was such a mess but I’ve finally made peace w the fact that most of the stuff that happened I couldn’t prevent #but I’ve mourned it enough !! whatever drama comes out of it I’ll handle just fine #i literally want to be a multitasking academic weapon everyone is intimidated of this year #i am not letting something as puny as a dumb man (both of them btw) stop me. goodbye #also everyone involved is older than me (they’re both 23) but it all just feels like such high school behavior #this is not a euphoria episode like I’m literally just not entertaining any of this #had to get this off my chest. i feel better #p

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thesims2comics · 3 months

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The sims 1 🤝 the sims 2

2 years after the release of the main pc game (that has overwhelming positive reviews,) ea decides it's time for a flop era and releases something(s) that mostly gets negative reviews

#this is about the sims online and the flop era that are the garbage ts2 pets spinoffs #i will never forgive ea for publishing those atrocious games and forcing ppl to make them in the first place #<- forcing is a harsh word but there was clearly not a lot of love put in the game most likely due to time constraint #i love ts2 with all my heart and it hurts that there are games with the same name that are SO bad :(#i dont know too much about tso but i read the wikipedia page and it seemed like it was received pretty badly #delete later #not art

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sysig · 4 months

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Just take things at your own pace, there’s no need to rush (Patreon)

#Doodles #SCII #Helix #ZEX #Dexter Favin #Mostly spacefillers but I like them <3 Continuation!#Following up on the Dex and ZEX kiss and then Dex runs away scenario lol - one of those rare times that Dex hopes he drops it #He's not dropping it! Time to talk about this! Goes about it too excitedly and overstimulates him poor thing <3 #Don't turn his head suddenly! Don't shout! Don't expect him to remember all at once! Goodness me #One step forward two steps back #The middle one lol I was thinking about tools that might help ZEX feel more comfortable engaging with the world around him #I was thinking he'd enjoy an iPad or similar device - though Helix was published before the first iPad came out! :0 Hmm hmm #But anyway - that he'd enjoy a touch screen and getting to use one with his hands :) Either playing tactical games or just looking up facts #Gets one of those 3D solar system model apps and zooms in and out - very distressed when it doesn't go farther than Pluto :(#I've also been thinking about ZEX's ability to read I keep going back and forth on it I can't decide ahhh #He loves humans but would he have studied English specifically?? It's pretty different from VUK ZIX #Does the Captain speak English? Have any of the human languages survived in the same form that we currently speak???#But he's also incredibly intelligent and interested in humans - weeb equivalence of learning Japanese to read untranslated manga lol #I can't deciiiidee urrggghhh #The rest are age comparisons haha #Dexter was probably at least of legal employment age when he started working for the Vyers when Max was 16 if I remember right?#Unless Dex was one of those family-employment situations of like - when rich people have caretakers that are close to their child's age?#Is that still a thing lol hired playmates #And then ''At least 10 years younger'' might be a slightly high estimate lol but ZEX is definitely older than DAX #Odd to be put in such a young body! Oddly feels more out of shape than his VUX body (lol)#With how much he's gone through even without literally being older he's definitely ages years in such a short time #Especially to be younger than his DAX-equivalent that'd have to feel weird #Has difficulty saying ''me'' when referring to the body he's in :(#Just one more oddity of this human experience

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sophiethewitch1 · 20 days

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theres currently 194 chapter ideas for www. i need... i need to condense... urgkjfdbkjgf

#sophie speaks #sophie answers #series:www #realising that i am both the writer who writes too much and too little at the same time #HELP me #thatd be like... 7 full books if i fleshed them all out #keep in mind www wip has 63k words in it compared to the 37k published like #thats almost double what am i DOING #head in my hands. i need a drink (does not drink)#like WHAT. WHAT IS THE SOLUTION HERE #i mean i know what the solution is the solution is be healthy lmfao #idk if id ever be able to be those authors who do rapid releases and are like 'i write about 5k a day' but yknow i could really do better #if i didnt get regularly shot in the foot #we're gonna do a radiology thing soon tho... maybe thatll help somewhat?? more pills yayyyy #chronic utis i hate you kill yourself #me: im gonna do some writing :)#me: immediately goes straight to tumblr to complain about the hole ive dug myslef in #oh who cares if it takes me ten years to finish this the time will pass anyways

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aquitainequeen · 1 year

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Applicants for the Editorial Assistant position: I love reading and literature! I spend a lot of time on BookTok! I'm passionate about exciting narratives!

Me, alternating between assessing candidates and scrutinizing a manuscript to make sure there are no nasty permission surprises: Oh, you are applying to the wrong department, my friend.

#my life #my job #no part of publishing is glamorous but this section is especially un-glam #Also in this job you will not enjoy reading for long #Some advice for anyone wanting to get into publishing:#what's most desired in a candidate is time management (because you will be juggling MULTIPLE tasks in a heavy workload)#communication (with your team; with other departments; and with authors/editors)#(in editorial especially we are the authors' first point of contact. their travelling companion; their taxman #their confessor; their therapist and their punching bag)#admin capability (you're going to be using Word Excel and Adobe a lot; along with any database the company uses for their records)#and actually knowing what the company publishes #show us that you've done your research!!!#go on the website. find a few books that you like. mention them.#or just do your research on us and say what you like about us!#The sort of things that we publish and the direction we're going #I KNOW it's horrible applying for jobs and you're often applying to lots of different places at the same time #but you have to tailor your application to fit #You have to show that you understand the sort of company or imprint that you want to work for #and yes previous publishing experience is very desirable as well #that's always been much harder to get though

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blackberryjambaby · 6 months

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apparently the governing body has decided men are allowed to grow beards because there's no scriptural basis for the ban. which of course begs the question: then why the fuck did you ban it in the first place

#rj speaks #$20 says that within five years they'll be like we never banned them! it was just some witnesses taking our directions a little too far <3 #as if they didn't publish article after article saying men weren't allowed to grow them #they'll find a way to flip it the same way they flipped telling everyone that the world was gonna end. TWICE #or was it three times?#it doesn't matter #ex jw #tw cult

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shima-draws · 1 year

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GAMEFREAK WHAT DO YOU MEAN THE PARADOX POKEMON WERE ROAMING AROUND IN AREA ZERO WAY BEFORE THE PROFESSORS EVEN MADE THE TIME MACHINE

#Pokemon #Pokemon Scarlet and Violet #Pokemon SV spoilers #Pokemon SV #Pokemon Scarlet and Violet spoilers #I guess that’s why they’re called Paradox Pokemon huh 😳#I only unlocked that dialogue with Arven recently where he’s like #’Wait. If my parent MADE the Time Machine recently to bring all these Pokemon here…why are there records of them from years and years ago?’#I’M WONDERING THE SAME THING.#All of the Paradox Pokemon are recorded in the Scarlet/Violet book 🤔 Which was published AGES before the professor built the time machine 🤔#Gamefreak. I DEMAND answers #Shima speaks #I really REALLY hope we get a DLC that will uncover more of this #I still have so many questions

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thatonecrookedsmile · 2 months

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["So what can you expect in the coming months?"] ["…you never know!"] ["He’s always watching me..."] ["-I saw Mister Drew the other day…was meeting with that Connor fellow, holding some papers."] ["I think they saw me looking though…"] ["Just too many secrets being cooked up in the kitchen!"] ["If I didn’t know better, I’d say there was magic there."] ["A well calculated understanding between creation-"] ["-big things are coming!"] ["-and creator."] ["Massive things!"] ["That smile…"] ["..you just learn to go with it."] ["He’s always watching me..."] ["You just watch…"] ["I’ve got a good feeling something great is going to happen…”]

...

…How very interesting,such… knowledge.

{A message from Wilson Arch}

-----

Yoooo, guess who is having a birthday today. Me,obviously. :D

Oh, and Wilson too, I guess. If you wanna be THAT guy.

Remember when this video came out there were people who heard the voice at the end and thought the voice was either Sammy or the Ink Demon? Man, those were the days. However with all due respect, I'm glad neither case was right in the end lol.

On this day 5 years ago, "Unknown - April 14th" was posted on YouTube, which means it's been 5 damn years since we first heard from Wilson...

man, what a damn BABY MAN, am i right folks

It's interesting to think that even though it's been 5 years, we've only known who Wilson really is for 2 years now (or more appropriately, 1 year and 5 months of those 5 years). Of course, now, after BATDR was released, we know who he is and what his place is in the Bendy universe. But between April 1, 2019 and November 1, 2022, all we knew about him was that he…existed. He was someone - someone bad apparently - who sounded old and who would have some relevance in the plot of Dark Revival. And that's it. We had no name, no appearance, nothing. He was someone, but we didn't know who.

It's no wonder he was only referred to as "Unknown" by fans during these 3 and a half years.

In the end, I would say that this drawing is a mix of 2 things. The first being the result of an idea I've had for a while, which is basically making a drawing in relation to the original video/"unknown" tape, but this time with Wilson, since now we know it was recorded by him. Plus it's been 5 years since the original upload,5 years of Wilson. I think this would be the perfect time to do this.

And second, a strange kind of redux/homage/"final chapter" in this kind of "collection" of drawings I did between 2019 and 2022 all based on the idea of "the unknown weirdo from BATDR saying How Very Interesting Such Knowledge" and so on. All of them having other characters in mind in the role of the Unknown. And now, here I am, redoing this idea again, only with The Man Himself this time. The real Unknown. Now as the Known, so to speak.

Going back to what I said before, you can see this drawing as a kind of farewell to this particular idea that I've kind of repeated over the years, as I've now done it again only with Wilson this time. (Does this mean I'll never draw this concept/line of thought again? I mean, I assume so. But there's no guarantee I can't make something similar again down the line. Who knows what the future holds. We will see what happens in the next 5 years.)

But,yeah. 5 years of Such Knowledge™.

Have a good April Fools' Day.

(Also, there are still a few hours until the day ends where I live, so for me it's still April 1st, so yeah, this still counts)

#bendy and the ink machine #batim #bendy and the dark revival #batdr #wilson arch #crookedsmileart #I'm going to start headcanon that Wilson's birthday is on April Fools. It fits him 😌#yo perspective SUCKS; who created this;i'm gonna beat them until there's no more.#also;lighting is so. hard;how do you all do it #Does anyone have tips for lighting; it would be a huge help /gen #also also;drawing the audio logs was a BATTLE. It was sooo boring; why do I do this to myself #so many details and I had to do it in 7 of them; and it's because these are the DR models;which have more details;#if I had to make them based on IM models I would probably make them simpler. But I wanted to be accurate :-)))#since we are on this subject (and I'm 99% sure of this)#Did you know that the textures in the audio log models used in the final game #are different to those used in the videos published between Feb and April 2019? and a little less detailed?#I realized this when I was looking for references for the drawing #the audio logs in those videos and the audio logs in the final game are not the same thing (at least in terms of texture)#Next time you play BATDR; think about this lol /hj #in retrospect; I don't think those audio logs published at the time would really be relevant to the game's plot #and I think that in the end their purpose was (besides worldbuilding i guess) just to tease the existence of Wilson #I still think that Joey's audio was supposed to be more of a meta thing since the real JDS was actually growing during that time #in my head; that at least makes sense (referring to the last 2 tags)#anyway;happy birthday Wilson;you old bitch #ok i finally post this;now back to the HOG

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