#anyway. guess who lasted all of two days in the thread
Note
Hi again. I've continued to read through... well, whatever the almighty algorithim feels like suggesting (searching here is hard even when you have an idea where to start, which I don't), and my mental state can be best represented by this little gem: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pZWK5IBuVMM&t=298s (Is this necessary? No. Do I think it's funny and worth sharing? Yes, and to an extent that's kinda what this site is all about)
Anyway, a pretty common thread I've noticed in your theories is "Summer is an up-to-now-offscreen agent of Salem by choice." While you definitely make a good case even from the limited amount I've seen, I have to ask: when and where did these thoughts originate from in the first place? I mean, I can *kinda* see where you connected some of the dots, but it's still a huge leap compared to the initially perfectly sensible conclusion of her being dead or otherwise incapacitated.
(Oh, and if this could be answered similarly to my last question, then I can at least say that I have loose plans for a thorough notepad-and-magnifying-glass rewatch of the whole series over the imminent summer after a warmup with Spirited Away, so we'll see how that goes. Maybe I'll look back at myself a few months from now and laugh at my relatively foolish ways; wouldn't be the first time, anyway)
i’d joke that it’s about the Vibes TM but what it comes down to really is the way rwby handles foreshadowing. as for the "when and where" part i couldn’t remember so i went looking.
let me take you on a little journey
these messages on 7/27 are my first direct reference to the idea of summer joining salem but i think (based on my phrasing) that i must have had it in mind for a while prior, which given that this was eight whole days after i’d finished watching the show at all. well. if i had to guess i’d say i probably went "okay so yes but also no" after ruby went "that’s what happened to mom" in 8.11
and the reason for that is pretty simple:
there is a lot of build up in v1-8 to summer’s fate being a Big Fucking Deal; this, in combination with the careful phrasing the narrative always uses regarding her disappearance—she "never came back” or she was "taken," it’s never said that she died—means she’s still alive.
salem met summer rose 12-14 years ago. the hound is a novelty to everyone, including salem’s own inner circle, and salem herself describes him as an "experiment." ruby jumps to a conclusion that doesn’t add up with information the audience knows that she doesn’t.
but, it’s unlikely that ruby is entirely wrong: think about tyrian waxing poetic about his "goddess" and ruby with no hesitation saying "cinder." she was both incorrect (his "goddess" is salem) but partially right (cinder is salem’s protégée and tyrian is here at all because cinder asked salem to deal with ruby).
in v4 we get a look at salem’s evil boardroom (there are two seats conspicuously left empty) and then see salem receiving a seer call from someone stationed at beacon, after it’s been firmly established that none of the agents we know about is there. we don’t see who is on the other end of this call, and we only hear salem’s side (note the incongruity with how seer calls are depicted in every other case; the identity of the beacon agent is withheld from the audience deliberately).
in v5 raven is so scornful of summer rose that she decides "you sound just like your mother" deserves an immediate fireball from cinder fall to the face. in v9 she was big goofy grins at summer. SOMETHING REALLY BAD HAPPENED. and i don’t think this dramatic change is explicable by raven simply watching summer fail and die or be captured; else she’d just be calling summer a fool the same way she does qrow and tai. that says betrayal.
so we know that summer met salem. we know that she did not die and cannot have been made into a hound-like creature (because he’s a new experiment). summer being alive probably rules out her being a ‘failed’ experiment, since that would undoubtedly have been fatal. ruby’s assumption that summer was twisted into a grimm-thrall by salem is incorrect but likely not too far off from the truth, and we know SOMETHING happened during that last mission that shattered raven’s trust in summer, and the simplest answer there is that summer is with salem but willingly.
and salem has a Mystery Lieutenant who’s been stationed at beacon since it fell. math! to my mind the only real questions are why and if summer might have been partially grimmed a la cinder, because in v8 the narrative starts telegraphing "summer is with salem in some not-enslaved-or-imprisoned capacity" without any subtlety at all.
now if we add in to the mix certain things v9 did ("an invincible monster who took your mother!" OH BOY) ("she lied, she left with raven! why would she–?" OH BOY!!!), there’s a clear narrative trajectory developing in the direction of summer rose not having been the Perfect Martyred Fairytale Paragon that everyone has put on a pedestal for the last 12-14 years; like anyone else she was a real person with flaws, and narratively the strongest way to drive that point home is to present to us (and to the characters who’ve been mythologizing summer as a flawless hero for more than a decade) a summer rose who decided that siding with salem was the right thing to do and then exploring why she did it.
summer being with salem of her own volition also makes it a lot easier to get to the narrative turning point of negotiating with salem; summer is the bridge, someone who has people she cares about on both sides. it is much harder to form a truce with salem if she tortured two of the main characters’ mother to death and/or enslaved and/or imprisoned her (because then you need to have an arc about saving the mother and that pushes further down the dead-end road of trying to defeat salem, who can’t be meaningfully defeated). but if summer chose to side with salem she can open that door to "maybe we can reason with salem."
so thinking about it just from a writer perspective… if i were the one writing this story and making these creative decisions with regard to the summer rose mystery, the reason i would set things up in this specific way is to develop toward a twist that summer freely chose to join salem with the intention that this precipitates the negotiation. that was true in v1-8 and then v9 ticked off literally every box on my mental checklist of things i would expect v9 to do if this was the direction they were headed—another hint about salem "taking" summer in conjunction with a reminder that salem is "invincible," surfacing ruby’s self-identification with The Idea of summer rose and how very harmful this is, a peek through the looking glass at The Person summer rose who is flawed in ways that shock and distress ruby, and an explicitly-stated "who knows why?" in reference to summer’s flaws and her final mission.
shrug. it’s just the explanation that makes the most sense taking into account all the clues that we have.
as a further point of interest, neither summer nor tai have an obvious ozian allusion (in contrast to qrow and raven who are the scareqrow and the woggle bug respectively)… which by process of elimination with the cast of marvelous land of oz, probably makes them general jinjur and jellia jamb. jinjur conquers the emerald city and occupies it for most of the story; jellia is a serving girl in the emerald city’s palace who remains with jinjur until very near the end when she gets roped into mombi’s schemes. which tracks with the idea that summer is holding beacon on salem’s behalf and tai is…there.
and i am kicking myself for not clocking tai-as-jellia until B4 dropped because it’s so. obvious. in hindsight. lol
(bonus first time reaction to 7.2
because it made me snort)
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Thinking So Hard about my silly OCs rn it's generating enough energy to send me vibrating into the stratosphere--
#dizzyisms#do I Finally talk about this here after sitting on it for Weeks on end-#fuck it it's my blog I get to choose the hyperfixation n when to post abt it fuck you#so I ended up tripping and falling into fuckin. Pizza Tower#pretty solid game right. Tasty crunchy visuals gameplay is SO satisfying to watch absolutely BANGIN soundtrack#but not quite Fixation material for me for whatever reason#...at least.........not at *first*#but *then*#my friend gets Big into it#starts posting about it nonstop#talkin abt a fun AU Discord they're in#...someone made. a fucking *Weretoon AU*#and of COURSE#OF *COURSE*#THAT SHIT HITS EVERY SINGLE ONE OF MY BUTTONS#IN MY BATIM-ROTTED BRAIN#SO goodbye BatDR for now- hello tiny niche viddy gaem AU that spawned in a Discord thread and has some fuckin STELLAR fanfic#+ a fuckin mini Bible's worth of Lore#probably the warmest welcome ive ever gotten from joining a new server JDBDKCJCLX#anyway. guess who lasted all of two days in the thread#before Caving and shoving her One Goddamn OC into the universe#to let her mutate into an almost-new version of herself#.....I literally just transplanted my BatIM OC into the Pizzaverse HDKDBFXK#Dorothy is a weretoon now and I am having Way too much fun writing a whole silly backstory for her#tho thankfully it doesn't involve anyone getting Murdered in order to become a toon this time around!#just some#very contrived circumstances and contaminated party appetizers cbjddbdn#this is probably so fucking incoherent but im too tired to Apologize for it rn#I am Cringe but I am Free and I will continue to bounce off the walls in my little corner until I explode from sheer undiluted Autistic Joy
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🌊 characters/pairings: itoshi rin x reader
🌊 warnings: fluff. just fluff.
note: this is based off of that one tiktok btw. if you know you know 🫶🥹 it was so cute, just had to do it here with rinnie. likes & reblogs are appreciated! <3
summary: saying your first 'i love you' to itoshi rin in a photobooth might just be the best idea you've ever had.
"wait— how the hell does it work?"
"i don't know. just pose, i guess."
"no, i think it should be counting down or something."
"just wait," rin huffed, arm going around your shoulders as he pulled you closer, your bodies pressed together so the both of you would make it in the picture without it becoming a mess. "you're so impatient."
you were impatient.
because this was a part of your grand plan, the most important part of your date today. you were not going to let this get out of hand. just before you could say anything else to convey your worry and impatience like your boyfriend said, a voice sounded out from the booth itself, counting down as you had expected it to a few minutes ago when you first entered into the compact space.
"oh, good," you breathed out in relief, and rin surprisingly did not find it weird that you were so worried. that was a good thing.
four pictures.
you had to make sure you said it at the right time.
oh god. your hands were getting cold from anxiety.
"three," the feminine, robotic voice counted.
you pretended to be as normal as you could, settling on just resting your head on rin's shoulder for this one. he stayed the same, feelling your hair tickle his neck— a small smile on his face.
"two,"
you both struggled to find where to look at first, and quickly figured it out just before the final number.
"one."
the first picture was clicked.
"what else can we even do?" rin asked, earning a soft laugh from you.
"let's look at each other for this one." you replied, turning to face him and he did the same.
you were just a few inches apart, even though there could have been more space between the both of you.
you gulped, and rin blinked, waiting patiently for the second countdown.
"three,"
you straightened up a little.
"two,"
rin kept his eyes on you. there wasn't anything else he wanted to do, anyway. he started thinking about how your lipgloss is almost gone, yet how kissable you still looked. how your eyes still glowed bright even after your long day of roaming around the city together, hand in hand.
"one."
the second picture was clicked.
your heartbeat rose.
one more picture, where you were going to tell him something that you had never said to him before, even though you had been saying it in your mind every single time you saw him in the span of these last few months.
the countdown for the third picture began. you hesitated at first.
"three."
you stared at rin. he looked confused as to why you weren't posing, eyebrows furrowed. "what? you're not posing this time?"
"two."
you sighed, resisting the urge to kiss him on the lips. he was all you ever wanted. and you needed him to know that— right in that moment.
"rin, i love you."
"one."
the flash almost made you blink, because you weren't ready for it. you were too busy trying to focus on your boyfriend, who looked so damn lost that he wasn't even sure the photo would come out right.
you both continued to stare at each other, rin registering the words that had come out of your mouth just two seconds ago, his mind flooded with a million thoughts in one moment. he didn't say anything.
and you couldn't stop smiling.
the fourth picture.
"three,"
rin blinked slowly, almost as if he didn't want to stop looking at you for even a millisecond. he couldn't comprehend a single thing, even the countdown, until you physically broke him out of the trance by threading your fingers through his hair, sweeping his bangs to the side so his face was more visible.
"two,"
fuck it, he thought.
his hand went from your shoulder to the back of your head, and he brought you closer all in the next second— his lips finding their place on yours. you smiled against him.
"one."
flash.
and then he still kissed you like his life depended on it— fingers tangled in your hair and soft lips pressing into yours so messily that you would have almost tipped backwards if it wasn't for his hand behind your head, pulling you in until the both of you couldn't feel the air in your lungs.
you gasped for breath as you pulled away, hazy eyes fluttering open and close in an attempt to awaken from this sudden feeling that was bubbling up in your stomach. "we— uh, we have to get out. t-there's people waiting outside."
rin's chest heaved slightly as he ignored what you said, almost seeming like he hadn't even heard it because actually, he could only hear his heartbeat. his half-lidded eyes couldn't look anywhere but at you.
"i love you too."
taglist: @hyomagiri @beanxiv @yoimyas @hqfeatbetty 🤞💋 (taglist is open!)
#blue lock#blue lock x reader#blue lock manga#blue lock headcanons#bllk#blue lock fluff#itoshi rin#bllk x y/n#itoshi rin x reader#itoshi rin x y/n#itoshi rin x you#rin itoshi x y/n#rin itoshi x you#rin itoshi x reader#val.talks#rin itoshi#itoshi rin fluff#itoshi rin imagines#blue lock rin#bllk x reader#bllk rin#bllk x you#bllk itoshi rin#itoshi brothers
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Tell Me All About The Dark Places You Hide ~ Part Three
➥ in which the reader figures out that their best friends are the infamous Woodsboro Killers and decides to help them rather than turn them in. {ft. Mentions of murder, language, stalking}
Part One; Part Two; Part Four || Word Count ~ 807 words
Taglist ~ @wasawattpadkid @itzlovelyautumn @katie-tibo
“Yes?” You answered sweetly. “You call back cause you forgot to ask for my name?”
“No, princess,” Ghostface said lowly.
“Then what do you want? And make this pretty short because my friend is here and I don’t want to keep her waiting. Actually, you have until this popcorn is finished.”
Billy was taken aback at how much colder you were tonight than before. Last night you’d been bubbly and friendly, ready to answer his questions and counter with your own. But right now you were closed off and hostile. Did you know something?”
“Ah yes, we wouldn’t want to disturb…” he pretended to think, humming for good measure. “Tatum, I think her name is?”
“Okay, Ghostie,” you bit back, throwing venom into your woods. “You’re either in my yard right now, or you’ve been stalking me for a while. And that means you’re planning to kill me, right?”
Billy nodded, then realized you couldn’t see him. “Yes…?” He had no idea what was going on.
“Well, I invite you to try,” you put emphasis on try, not even attempting to keep the disgust out of your voice. “But first, Tatum is going home.”
Billy tried to protest but you cut him off. “I’m giving you a free pass at me. Not Tatum. Me. So shut up and wait a few minutes.”
Billy grumbled and hung up, watching you usher Tatum out. He had no idea what you said to get her out so quickly, but he could feel the excitement thrumming through his veins. Suddenly, all the lights in the house were off and he lost sight of where you were.
He frantically called your number again, grinning stupidly when you picked up. When you spoke, your voice was low and dangerous. Completely different from how you were in school. “Who am I speaking to? Leader or accomplice?”
Billy was taken aback, the question he was going to ask dead on arrival. “Excuse me?”
“There’s two of you. One of you is going to be the leader, probably smarter and darker then the other; and one you is going to be the accomplice, probably more outgoing and eccentric.”
Billy shrugged. “I guess I’m the leader then. But why would it matter to you? You’re going to die anyway.”
“I just wanted to know who I was talking to, Billy Loomis.”
His heart dropped. There was no other way to describe the sudden panic in his ears, no other way to describe the sudden lurch of his stomach. The only thing on his mind was that he must kill you now. Any hesitation was extinguished like a flame in the wind.
“What?” How’d you know? Was it that obvious?
“Oh relax, Loomis. It’s not obvious to anyone else if that’s what you’re wondering. Did you really assume that I would think it was a mere coincidence that the day after you call me you come up and invite me into your friend group? That as soon as Stu began talking about how to gut someone, you tell him off for fear of you getting caught? That the day after I apparently ‘prove myself’ to you, you come to kill me?”
“Damn,” Billy was impressed, there was no other way to put it. You’d figured all that out in a day? He was still going to kill you — he didn’t want you spilling his secret to anyone — but he was impressed.
“Oh, I’ll still let you attempt to kill me,” you smirked. “But I just thought I’d provide that extra incentive.”
Why weren’t you scared? There wasn’t even a hint of a quiver in your voice. He felt the first inkling of anxiety buried deep in his chest. He didn’t have Stu to pull him out if this went sideways.
You tapped the knife against your lower lip, waiting for him to speak. You smiled to yourself as you threaded the rope in between the fingers of your other hand. This was going to be fun.
Without warning, the window in your living room was shattered, and you assumed that was Billy. Silent as a wraith, you slipped into the hallway, knife held behind your back.
Billy spun around, searching the shadows for you. Fortunately, his eyes were already adjusted to the darkness. He heard a sound across the room and spun, Ghostface mask heavily restricting his vision.
You smiled as Billy fell for the oldest trick in the book, tapping his shoulder. “Boo!” You whispered, slipping the rope around his neck and plucking the knife out of his hands in the same fluid, practiced movement.
Billy wheezed out a curse, scrabbling at the rope frantically. You ripped the mask off his face, tracing his jaw with the knife. “Oh Billy, haven’t you learned? Don’t mess with someone who doesn’t fear death.”
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the gang on a road trip :3
i love this request sm!! LETS GO👇
ponyboy:
i feel like he’d try to read but when they’re all in the stupid MINI VAN TOGETHER HE CANNOT GET PEACE
also like reading on a drive can kinda make you carsick
and pony seems the type to get carsick i’m sorry😭💀
BUT i myself get carsick so it’s not bullying🫶
anyways he’s probably chill until someone mentions playing some roadtrip game like I Spy or smth LMAO
he seems the type to get actually triggered and annoyed during that game cause people *cough* dally *cough* choose stupid stuff (more on this later🙏)
johnny:
probably sleep or smth low maintenance
i just feel like johnny doesn’t need constant attention to feel appreciated yk
anyways he’d also just seem the type to carry on a goofy convo throughout the drive
like just RANDOM and it lasts for like hours LMAOO
people probably voluntold him to sit in the middle seat 😔😭
sodapop:
he the type of kid to yell the most random stuff out of context in the back of the bus😭😭😭
so that kinda translates to this
his brain goes like a billion miles per hour so if you aren’t steve or two bit chances are you don’t even know what they’re doing at this point
finds ANY source of entertainment
usually bothers darry with steve LMAOO
darry:
darry drives cause no one else is trusted😔
maybe lets steve drive cause who else is gonna take over at night🧐
DALLY? AW HELL NAH
anyways he drives and definitely gives the annoyed dad
like
”if someone kicks my seat ONE MORE TIME IM TURNING THIS CAR RIGHT BACK AROUND”
and then everyone’s good til dal loses a game of travel uno and punches his seat out of anger
and everyone goes quiet like 😟
and darry’s tweaking but ITS OK THEY STILL MAKE IT
dally:
rides shotgun
just a menace honestly
i feel like he dislikes being cooped up and bc of that he just is even more of a jerk
like pony thought itd be fun to play i spy and dally’s like “what a stupid game 🙄”
and then says “i see something….blue”
and everyone’s like “uhh the sky”
and just guessing EVERYTHING and dals like
“nope😼”
eventually he says “it’s the blood in everyone’s veins rn😀because blood is actually blue before it hits the air and oxidizes and then it turns red🤷♂️🥰”
and everyone’s like 😐
and he is just like “well last week pony had a bio test and he wouldn’t SHUT UP ABOUT THAT FACT SO”
two-bit:
honestly just doesn’t stop. talking.
which is ok cause my guy is funny ASF
BUT for people on their last thread like darry he’s just like 😤
anyways two is just making fun of EVERYTHING
like isn’t it funny that pony’s seatbelt still has the child lock on it
and that dally is getting found out for actually caring about what people talk about (ie the random fact he remembers pony talking abt)
honestly a blast
he suggests a lot of games and lowk destroys
steve:
just goofs off w soda CONSTANTLY
which is really funny
i feel like we underestimate how funny they are together
probably talks abt cars the majority of the way there to no one in particular LMAO
it’s ok cause when the curtis car inevitably breaks down halfway there he goes into
MECHANIC MODE
and saves the day🫶🥰💞
TYSM FOR REQUESTING!! my requests are opennn🫶🫶
#dallas winston#the outsiders#the outsiders sodapop#johnny cade x reader#ponyboy curtis#darry curtis#sodapop curtis#two bit mathews#steve randle
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| Upcoming: Dear John Sneak Peak
Paris, April 1945 💌
…
Julie watched Marge as she watched Gale at his bath and she wondered if this is what it was like in fairytales when the gates of the kingdom are thrown open, everything wanted and wished for is there. The protagonists never know what to do with a dream come true: do you eat it? Fondle, crush, preserve it in a glass case? Such a cruel kindness, dreams come true; Marge’s twitching fingers and gasping lips suggested a torture going on inside her, heavy lidded love and belly hot want.
Julie swore to herself then, she’d feel it too. Soon, she’d be watching the man who owned the jacket as he showed her himself, just as he’d written his heart out for her eyes alone, one day soon he’d be naked and hers and she could watch him and do what people do with dreams.
Perhaps feeling vindictive for being ignored, or perhaps merely thirsty, Spangles suddenly made a series of determined little hops across the suite floor, threaded the blockade of the girls’ feet with ease and, perhaps seeing his chance, nudged open the crack of the bathroom door only to bounce along the marble floor in a cacophonous clatter of little paws that even Gale could hear over the faucet’s roar. Like a slippery fish, he skidded to his side along the bottom of the wide tub, a pink bath warmed hand clutching at the edge and hauling his sopping golden head above the lip to observe his long eared visitor -and the guilty little audience of girls in their night clothes at the threshold.
The look he leveled Marge made Julie’s toes tingle and second guess how chaste these two’s reportedly tame trysts pre-war had really been. “We merely wanted to make sure you didn’t-“ Marge clasped and unclasped her hands, “-drown.” it was a deflated little excuse by the time she got it out.
Spangles had begun to sneeze, ever sensitive to steam and Yardley’s lavender soap, his poor little legs skidding apart further and further on the damp floor. Gale bit his lip from laughing at the cute little creature’s plight.
“Oh laa!” Julie gave up all pretense and entered to save him -the bunny, that is- causing Gale to flail a little harder as if there was a deeper level to the bottom of his tub where he could take refuge. “Add in the bubbles, Major,” Julie always had a remedy, “it’ll hide everything nicely. Don’t ruin poor Marge’s first evening with you by being a prude, she misses you. It’s been years, you know.”
They spent much of that evening in the following way, Gale in his topped off frothy tub, Marge with a mostly useless cloth beside him on the ledge, and Julie primly sat with Spangles in her lap on the closed toilet seat.
“Bucky’s confirmed as best man.” He told Marge, sheepish grin breaking out until both girls laughed at the thought of the boys indulging in their own wedding planning.
He tells them about the radio he built, about the first time they heard her broadcasts, of the photo she’d sent which Bucky and him divided in half each keeping their girl in their pocket, about Brady and the liturgy of devotion he made up for Egan to recite to Julie’s printed picture on the combine wall. The particulars were left out, Gale being a gentleman to the last, but Julie glowed and wept under the obtuse assurance anyway.
“I trust you kept him warm.” Julie demands, “Seeing as how it’s your fault he didn’t take his jacket.”
Gale tells her of Egan’s presumptuous bunk sharing, how strange things were happening every day and that grew to be commonplace. At her inquiring look he only blushes and stares down at the water, the bruise on his throat blooming under the flush, and for once Julie thinks she knows Gale Cleven better than his Marge.
#💌asks#blurbs#mine#dear John#masters of the air#mota#john egan fanfiction#Gale Cleven#Gale Cleven fanfic
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Sweet Like Candy Pt. 3
Warnings: cheating, kissing, fingering
One
Two
Tears blind me as I make my way through the massive house where the party is still in full swing, inside and outside. It's not until I've made my way to the long driveway that I realize Sarah brought me and I just ditched her. A frustrated sob leaves me as I try to think of the way back to Tannyhill if I stopped when a familiar buzzed head slides out of a blacked out Range Rover and makes his way over to me with a sour expression. Or concern? Curiosity maybe?
"Why are you crying? What happened? Did someone hurt you?" Rafe demands, his brows narrowed. I can't tell if he's angry or annoyed but judging by what Sarah has said about her brother, I shouldn't tell him about JJ. Especially when everything JJ has told me points to the face that they're enemies and the last thing I need is a reason for Rafe to attack him. My mind drifts back to JJ's mouth on mine and I shudder, feeling my body heat in a delicious way. I blink up at Rafe, trying to clear my mind and push thoughts of JJ away.
"No, I'm fine. Just a little overwhelmed, I guess." It's not a total lie. I can't cope with the fact that if Sarah hadn't caught us, JJ would be inside me right now and I'd have begged for it.
"Me too," Rafe sighs, running a hand over his buzzed head. "This wedding is freaking me out. Are you freaked out too? I mean who offers up their kids for a business deal?" Rafe grumbles, shaking his head as he looks past me and at the party. He thinks I'm overwhelmed about our engagement. To be honest, I'd forgotten all about it after walking into that laundry room with JJ and now that familiar feeling of dread was sinking in. I had a whole new reason to cry now.
"You don't want to?" I ask. Rafe chuckles, his blue eyes finding mine as his face softens.
"Do you?" A laugh bursts out of me from nerves and Rafe laughs too, the smile looking too good on him. But I remember all the things JJ told me about my husband to be and my smile falls.
"Let me take you home. You shouldn't be here anyway." Rafe takes my hand and I let him lead me to the passenger side of the Range Rover.
Just as he shuts the door and I lock the seat belt, I see JJ watching in front of the garage doors. His nostrils are flared and he chugs a beer before tossing it down and turning to go back inside. My heart aches in my chest as Rafe climbs in and backs out of the driveway, taking us back to Tannyhill.
I hide in bed as long as I can but Sarah ends up dragging me out to go shopping. After I got home last night, Rafe and I had a late night snack in the kitchen and he was surprisingly very sweet. Making me wonder all day if JJs intentions are true or just selfish. Now I feel like I should give my brooding fiancé a chance. The wedding was just around the corner.
“Here. These are all your color and Rafe will love them.” Sarah dumps a load of hangers in my arms and points me in the direction of the dressing room.
I just get undressed when the handle jiggles and the door opens. I open my mouth to shout when JJ emerges, shutting the door behind him and silencing me with a kiss. I instantly melt, my knees nearly giving out as he scoops me into his arms and sits on the bench.
His arms band around my waist, pawing at my ass as I thread my fingers through his hair. I was burning up everywhere, needing more. Everything else seems to fade away as I start to shamelessly grind on his lap, his erection nudging my clit even through layers of fabric.
“Touch me.” I whisper, raising up on my knees as he groans into my mouth.
“I just wanted to kiss you one last time.” JJ rasps, slipping his hand between us and between my thighs. He cups my pussy, caressing me with his fingers while pressing his thumb to my clit.
“I want you to touch me and kiss me everywhere.” I plead, making him squeeze his eyes shut like he’s in agony as his fingers dive past the barrier of my panties.
“Sarah is going to catch us again.” He pants, sliding two fingers inside me without warning. I gasp against his lips, his tongue licking along my lips as he strokes me from the inside. God, if I think his fingers are big how will I take a cock?
“I leave my bedroom window unlocked.” I murmur, biting his shoulder as my body begins to tremble with the rapidly approaching release. I was so wet I could hear it. I was no doubt making a mess on his lap.
“Is that an invitation?” JJ taunts, moving his hand harder and faster until I nearly black out as I cum, collapsing against his chest as my body quakes. His mouth on mine is all that silences me as I gush on his hand.
“Yes.” I whisper, my body relaxing against his as I ride out the last of my orgasm. I pull back to stare into his ocean blue eyes, the haze from pleasure fading away and allowing me to think clearly. I scramble off his lap, smoothing my hair down in panic.
“No. No, we can’t do this. Not again. I’m marrying Rafe.” I rasp, slapping his hands down as he reaches for me.
“Stop it.” JJ hisses pulling me back down on his lap and stealing my ability to breathe as his erection rubs against my sensitive clit.
“Do you feel what you do to me? What your body wants from mine?” JJ whispers in my ear, holding me tight with a fist in my hair and the other on my ass. I whimper against his lips, wanting nothing more than to sink into him and just let go.
“You’re not married yet.” JJ breathes, his voice husky and thick with need. My fingers find his belt buckle and I slowly undo it, feeling him shudder against me. His erection springs free yet still confined in his boxers, a wet spot formed in the fabric from his need.
“You’re killing me. I need to be inside you more than anything.” He groans between kisses, his entire body jerking when I wrap my hand around the smooth flesh. I open my mouth to tell him to just do it, just sink inside me, when there’s a knock on the door.
The car comes to a stop and Sarah turns to look at me, her face soft with concern. There’s nothing that gets past her. Aside from JJ leaving the dressing room. There’s no judgement either. Like she gets it. The rich girl getting caught up in the poor boy. The girl who doesn’t know what she wants or what to do. To do right by her family or follow her heart.
“Y/N, I’m not sure if this JJ thing is just something you need to get out of your system, an act of rebellion, or what, but you should know that JJ and his friends hate Rafe. Hell, I do too but I’m looking after you as a favor to my father. Not for Rafe. So the two of you need to be more discreet with whatever is going on with you two.” Sarah says softly. I trust her and I know she’s only looking out for me. I could tell from the beginning that she didn’t care much for her brother.
“But I’m also going to keep telling JJ to stay away from you. My brother will hurt him if he finds out.”
I release a breath I didn’t realize I was holding, nodding in understand as Sarah smiles softly.
“I’m terrified.” I admit, suddenly feeling the wetness on my cheeks at my confession. I chose to come here for my family. To honor their wishes and hopefully have my own life. So far I’ve had that aside from a forced marriage with an absent fiancé.
Sarah doesn’t get the chance to answer because my door is suddenly opened and Rafe is there. He’s smiling, relaxed even, until he sees the tears on my face and his face drops.
“Are you okay?” He asks softly, taking my hands and pulling me from the car. Sarah quietly goes inside, leaving me with her brother and all my confusion.
“I’m just so—.” The tears fall freely and Rafe quickly wraps me into a hug, cupping the back of my head and making me inhale his expensive cologne as my face is pushed into his shirt.
“Shh, I know. We will figure this out. It’ll be okay. We have the rest of our lives to get to know each other.” Rafe soothes me, his free hand rubbing my back gently. I brace my hands on his chest to push back as I look up at him, opening my mouth to agree when his lips suddenly meet mine, ruining any chance I had at making this easier on myself.
#smutwarning#outer banks smut#jj maybank smut#jj maybank fic#obx2#jj maybank imagine#rudy pankow#jj maybank fluff#jj maybank x you#jj obx#outer banks x reader#rafe cameron smut#blueicequeen19#rafecameron#outer banks fanfiction
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Ruben Dias/Trent Alexander Arnold x Reader - Dark Rivarly Part 6/15
Here we go, part 6. Featuring a very cute scene where Ruben worries about reader because she is drunk.
18+
Part 7 and 8 are already out on my Patreon for FREE!
Reader is Trent Alexander Arnold's twin sister. The two have been inseparable since childbirth, more so now when Reader is fresh out of university looking for a job, crashing at her brother's place whilst doing so. One day Reader gets a job offer that she cannot refuse, however it would mean working for her brother's biggest rival in football, Ruben Dias.
Enjoy!
"Grandma, you stabbed me!"
"Then hold still." She grunted.
Trent was right, she had been happy to get rid of you. Telling Grandma that you got fired from your new job earnd you nothing but a thirty minute tongue-lashing and a stab with a needle. You were at the shop, making last minute corrections to your pencil skirt. Your job interview attire.
"What kind of job are you interviewing for anyway?" Jennifer asked, as she helped Grandma take your measurements.
"I dunno, some assistant job at a law firm in town."
"Fancy."
"Not really. It won't have anything to do with marketing. I'm probably just gonna run coffee errands all day."
"Then why apply? Aren't you free to go back and live with your brother again now that the two of you have made up?"
It was true. You and Trent are good now, however your time apart has taught you a valuable lesson. A lesson that independence was key to a less stressful life. At least until you could find a hubby to provide for you in the future.
"There." Grandma said, having fitted the skirt with its finishing touches.
You were taken aback. The fabric felt coarse and scratchy against your skin, and the seams were uneven and puckered. You looked in the mirror and saw that the skirt was much shorter than you had requested, revealing your legs in a way that was not appropriate for a job interview.
"Grandma, this is not what I asked for."
She looked up from her sewing machine, a look of confusion on her face. "What do you mean? This is the pattern you gave me. I thought you wanted something simple."
You sighed. "I did want something simple but not one that looks like it was made by a blind person."
"Come again?" Grandma's face reddened, as she set down her needle and thread. She looked ready to jump you.
Then came Jenny.
"A coat!" She exclaimed, popping up between the two of you. "I'll lend her my coat. Okay?" She gritted her teeth at you.
You rolled your eyes. "Fine."
Grandma fell back on her chair. Lucky for you.
The job interview went well, perhaps because the owner of the law firm was a man in his fifties, who's eyes wandered freely to your leg set over the other, not at all minding the length of your skirt.
Afterwards you texted a friend to meet you up for drinks, since returning to Grandma's apartment was more depressing than getting drunk on a Tuesday.
"I'm surprised you reached out." Your friend Ashley, said. "We haven't heard from you since you moved from London back to Liverpool. You should have told me you're staying in Manchester with your nan."
"Grandma." You corrected.
"Right, how are they, your grandparents?"
"Well, my granddad has been dead for years, but I guess he was great before that."
Ashley looked stunned. "Right, I'm sorry."
It was depressing, how far away you had drifted from your university friends, if you could even call them that these days. They didn't care about you and you couldn't care less about them. Ashley had only agreed to meet up with you because her cousin was in town and she wondered if you could hook them up with tickets to Liverpool's next fixture.
You left the bar having gotten what you wanted. However you only made it halfway home, walking unsteady on your heels. You settled on a park bench to call for a taxi, but accidentally dialed the wrong number, a familiar voice sparking through the phone.
"Hello operator?"
"Y/N?"
"Yes, who's this?"
"It's Ruben."
"Ruben?" You hadn't heard from him since he fired you two weeks ago. "What do you want?"
"Um, you called me."
"I did?"
"Yes."
"Oh."
You pulled back the phone, squinting at the screen, confirming that you had indeed dialed the wrong number.
"Are you okay?"
"What?" You pressed the phone to your ear.
"I asked if you're okay, it sounds like you're shivering. Are you outside?"
"I am. I just came from a bar. I was actually trying to call a taxi, not you."
"Are you drunk? Do you need me to pick you up?"
"What, no." You frowned.
"Your not drunk?"
"Drunk, yes. But I don't need you to come and get me."
"Why not?"
"Why not?" You chuckled. "You fired me Ruben, remember? Besides, I'm not too far from my grandmother's shop, I can warm up in there."
"Great. Wait for me, I'm coming."
"Pardon?"
"Stay put Y/N, I'm coming to get you."
You thought it was a joke, or at least that you had heard him wrong. However, ten minutes after arriving at Grandma's shop, a car pulled up outside of it, with Ruben stepping out onto the street.
"Well this is awkward." You said, as the door shut behind him, the two of you reunited in the exact same place that you first met.
"Are you okay?"
"I'm fine, Ruben. Why are you here?" He was dressed so casually, wearing sweatpants. You started following him on Instagram after your first encounter and there was not a single picture of him where he didn't look pampered up by a professional or dressed to perfection.
"Y/N." He sighed. "You told me that you were drunk, what was I supposed to do, not come?"
"Yes, you don't owe me anything."
"What does that have to do with anything? I'm here because I want to help."
"Why?"
He smiled. "I don't know? Maybe because I like you."
"If you like me, why did you fire me?"
"I...." That got him. He fell quiet.
It was hard for you to admit how much it had hurt you. Those three weeks working as a stylist for Ruben had brought you more joy than any other occupation you've ever had. You never wanted to study marketing, or become a seamstress. Those were someone else's dream, forced upon you. You weren't like Trent, you weren't destined to do anything. You had no talent, or so you thought. Being a stylist, it was different, it brought you joy.
"Hiring you in the first place was a mistake." Ruben said, hands in his pockets.
"Then why did you do it?"
He smirked. "Like I said, I like you. But I knew you would be trouble."
"Trouble?" You frowned, more than insulted. "How am I trouble, you don't even know me?"
"Well that's the problem then, don't you think?" Ruben stepped forward, closing the already small gap between you. "You're some random girl I met in some old lady's shop. I don't even know you and yet you're the only thing on my mind."
You drew a breath, stunned by his words.
Ruben shook his head, eyes looking to the floor boards. "I fired you because I couldn't stand the thought of not knowing where you are and with who. Hiring you again would mean trouble."
"For who?"
You regarded him thoughtfully. Despite what you told his assistant she was right to warn you, warn you that getting involved with someone like Ruben could only mean trouble for you. But there was no denying it, the strength of your attraction for him.
"I need you, Y/N." Ruben shuffled his steps. Brave enough to reach out and caress the sleeve of your coat. "In more ways than you know."
"Ha!" You blurred out. "Why don't you get down on your knees and beg while you're at it."
"Fine."
You let out a low shriek, seeing Ruben do exactly what you told him to do. Stepping up to you, standing really close. It aroused something within you. He crumpled to the floor, getting down on his knees, only to find himself level with your stomach.
You looked down at him. "You're crazy."
He grinned. "Crazy about you."
His hands grabbed your waist, forcing you to take a step forward towards his satisfied face. You stiffened.
"Ruben?"
His chuckle was heard beneath you. "Don't back out now, querida. Isn't this what you wanted?"
"No." You attempted to fight him off with your hands, ultimately failing as your hands got tangled up in his hair, his thick brown hair. Ruben tilted his head back, closing his eyes as your hand ran through it. "You sure?" He grinned.
Your heart was beating violently in your chest. Your breasts heaving up and down.
"Just know that I want you so bad right now." Ruben's hand slipped down from your waist, cupping your ass. "So fucking bad."
His eyes opened, staring intensely into yours, challenging you.
"What's it gonna be Y/N? I'm on my knees for you."
You crumbled. "Just shutta fuck up and finish me off."
With one tug from Ruben, your coat dropped to the floor. He then got busy with your skirt, pulling down the zipper with one defying motion.
"Fuck." You let out a gasp, loud enough to echo throughout the room. There was nowhere to go, nowhere to lay down. Ruben had you back up against a wall, panties pulled down to your ankles as he licked you clean. You pulled his hair, wanting him to stop. The pleasure was too intense, spilling you over the edge too fast.
"You don't like this?"
You looked down to see Ruben frowning like a puppy dog.
"I haven't shaved. Isn't it better if a girl is shaved?" You replied.
The look that came across his face was profound and questioning. Ruben's hands traveled down your thighs, rubbing them up and down. He leaned forward, kissing your leg before he spoke against the skin. "I want you like this." He whispered. "Any man should want you like this."
Ruben stood. Your shoulders fell back against the wall, eyes now level with his chest. He tilted down, kissing your lips, your first kiss. Your hands wrapped around his neck, fingers finding their way through his thick hair. The smacking of your lips was loud, interrupted by the occasional gasp for air. Ruben had your legs wrapped around his thighs, lifting you up like you weighed nothing. By now your trail of thought had vanished, leaving the regrets for tomorrow. Your skirt was already rolled up to your waist, with Ruben's erection pressing hard against your belly. Once he pulled down the hem of his sweatpants you were already trembling, eager to have him inside of you. He came with force, pressing into you deep. He held your body against him, fucking you against the wall, the loud pounding increasing with every thrust.
"Ruben, I'm....I'm gonna..."
"Yes, come for me Y/N. Scream my name."
It was embarrassing, how fast he made it happen. How hard your grip around his waist was. It was terrible, the noises you made, moaning and groaning against the crook of his neck.
"Ruben."
"Yes, baby. Let yourself go, come for me...." You grip around him tightened, the clenching of your walls. Ruben was right behind you, trembling with the next sloppy thrusts. You slumped down against the wall, plotting down on the floor like the heavy bodies that you were. You were still breathing heavily, with Ruben's head resting gently against your heaving chest. With hearts slowing down he lifted his head, looking at you with the hint of a smile. "I guess this means I've got you back?"
You chuckled. "I'm back, but you don't have me, Ruben."
He frowned. "What do you mean?"
"I'll never be yours. If I'm gonna work for you this can never happen again."
#fanfiction#football imagine#ruben dias#man city#manchester city#footballer imagine#footballer x reader#ruben dias x reader#football angst#ruben dias imagine#trent alexander arnold x reader#trent alexander imagines#trent alexander arnold
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I was thinking about how in the past I have tried to describe my writing process as a sort of weaving or braiding as I try to keep various plot threads woven in and not dropping any of them. But it never felt quite right because there is still a linear quality to both of those activities, and I so far from a linear writer.
But the other day I was doing a jigsaw puzzle and I was like, no, no, THIS is the metaphor for my writing process. Like, a giant jumble of stuff (vague ideas, snippets of dialogue, character beats, plot), all in a giant mess (possibly all from multiple projects all in one box). And I don't know how other people do jigsaw puzzles, but the first thing I do is find the bright, obvious, easily distinguishable areas with maybe weird texture or a vivid color and go through and collect the pieces that might be part of it in various piles. And then I try to put each pile together into something recognizable and guess where it might fit in the larger frame. Like maybe the frame and then four or five very distinct areas. Until you've got something like this:
Like maybe some areas are big, and some are just two pieces together. And sometimes after a while you realize you have a part that's in the wrong place entirely, or upside down! Or, shit, that's from a different puzzle! (okay, that rarely happens. I am careful with my jigsaw pieces, but I am not with my writing.)
And slowly you add more pieces to connect them all, one at a time. Slowly, slowly. A few pieces a day. Here and there. Maybe adding one more piece to one clump and then pieces to a different clump until they connect. Maybe I leave it languishing on the dining room table for a while to collect dust and get trampled by cats. Maybe I go start a different one. (Nope, I don't do that with puzzles. I don't have the space.)
But the puzzle slowly starts to take shape! The pieces go in faster! Only then... At some point I am left with tons of little spaces and a pile of pieces that are all the same uniform color, but are all funky, different little shapes. And it feels like a drag to figure those out (these are the transitions and small filler bits I have just put off over and over again). Sometimes this is where I literally go back and sort all the puzzle pieces by shape and then try them all one by one until they find a place to go. Tedious. Not the most exciting. Easy to get wrong. But we're So Near The End.
And, sure, it doesn't really happen much when I'm doing a puzzle, but if I stretch the metaphor, in writing I can also find pieces that just don't fit and have to go back to the box.
But what TOTALLY tracks in this metaphor is the euphoric feeling of putting the last goddamn piece into place. And you sit there for a moment being like, "oh my god, it's actually done. It's actually freaking DONE!" And you don't know if you need to get up and run around in a circle or just stare in disbelief. Possibly take a nap.
But it is definitely, finally ready to send off to beta. Ah. So lovely. (Not that I have experienced this in a long while. YEARS.)
Anyway. That is a more apt metaphor for my writing process, for those of you who have asked over the years.
It's probably too early for 2024 resolutions or wishes. But I hope to feel this even ONCE in 2024. Yeah, that would be great.
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Shades of red
Pairing: Fem Tav/Ascended Astarion, (unnamed tav)
Tags: 18+, smut and angst, biting (whole lotta biting), blood, choking, P in V
Word count: 6K
Summary:
She sees the blood smeared like rouge on his lips as he lifts his head. A beautiful colour. Their colour.
She isn’t sure the last time she hasn’t thought about her life in shades of red: dripping from her hands, hot in her mouth, shining sharp and violent in his eyes.
She looks down at those same eyes now, burning intensely as he works her. There’s an image she hasn’t been able to get out of her mind for a while, more faded than a dream. She’s sure they were softer once, rich like apple skin, fresh as autumn hues. Now if she stares too long it feels like she’s looking down the lit barrel of a cannon.
***
Forever gives one ample time to think. Was the man she once knew ever even real or just another mask to be dropped once 7000 souls had been burned through her eyes?
Read on AO3 or below
How long can eternity truly be? It’s a question that’s been turning in the back of her mind with numbing regularity for a while now. The very idea of time seems to wear away when she has forever at her fingertips, stretching on and on into a grey horizon. It’s not really a concept that exists between the dark walls of the palace anyway. She couldn’t tell you how long she’d been here with any more accuracy than guessing the number of pebbles lining the streets of Baldur’s Gate beyond. Years seem to melt past with unknowable speed but the turning of days drag slower than dripping molasses.
Never is that thought more pressing than the nights Astarion feels charitable enough to acquiesce to audience requests.
The ballroom is draped in half darkness, his preferred atmosphere for these meetings. Long shadows shift in flickering silence from the high ceiling, the wrought iron candelabra standing stiff as they throw their orange glow over both the polished tile and his quaking guest.
He’s reclined in the throne at the end of the room, the lack of furniture only serving to make the space between him and the visitor seem that much longer. She stands behind him as usual, one hand at her side, the other gripped to the top of the chair just behind the crown of his head. It’s her place - looking every bit the beautiful weapon she’s been polished to be. Cold. Sharp. Sheathed.
Astarion’s head inclines as they continue to speak, a clear sign he’s only half paying attention to whoever this poor soul is. She never needs the details but from a glance she can glean he’s some elven noble who’d drawn the short straw to come and beg at his feet.
Before, these meetings had almost made her smile. Those with status always wear their fineries like armour but golden threads do little to hide their true nature once they cross this threshold. Tonight is no different. The elf’s words are steady but his eyes shake madly in their sockets, never landing on either of them for too long.
It’s not exactly surprising. It’s an open secret as to the nature of those who dwell here. Whispers of power, blood and darkness float throughout all of Baldur’s Gate and beyond, working their way into every rotted inn and polished mansion. If the palace is where this elf has ended up then all brighter roads had obviously crumbled under his feet.
She keeps her gaze fixed just over the elf’s head to the door as he continues- something about debts or an ongoing feud. He could have come with tales of great gold dragons circling the palace or a portal ripped open at the centre of the city and she still doubts it would be enough to cause her expression to break. Astarion’s either.
There’s the tiniest sigh from his lips and she instantly draws her gaze back to the pale sweep of his profile. She’d call him beautiful but the word doesn’t taste right when she’s used it to describe the same perfection for Gods-knows how many years now. The only change is the colour of his clothes. Today’s ensemble is wrapped by two grand peacocks, immaculately stitched in scarlet and black. She can’t even say that it’s one of the more resplendent outfits when every garment in his wardrobe is equally fine.
Her own dress matches - naturally.
It only takes a few more seconds before he slightly raises his index finger. The signal that this conversation is decidedly over.
She’s on the elf instantly, her hand slamming clean through his chest to the other side. The rest of his sentence gargles in his throat and his body crumples to the floor in a pathetic heap. Blood pools sticky and savoury from the wound until there’s an almost perfect disc reddening the tiles. Her stomach clenches at the scent. Hunger, ravenous as an unquelled blaze snarls within but she resists the urge to feast. She stares at the gore dripping down her arm instead as she catches her breath.
Astarion’s feet are silent behind her but she sees him approaching in the blood, his own eyes fixed to the spot where her reflection should be.
“Slower than usual. You haven’t been eating,” he comments dryly. It’s not a question.
She keeps staring at her wet hand. It quivers at her overwhelming urge to suck it clean and then the floor.
“I will when you do. I’m not hungry,” she answers without turning to him. They both know it’s a poor lie. She’d been in a constant state of starving since the second she opened newly reddened eyes, something she’d never quite acclimatised to.
He raises her stained hand to his lips and licks a stripe from her palm to her wrist. He doesn’t tear his eyes from hers as he audibly swallows. She does too but for a decidedly hotter reason.
“Not the finest fare I will admit but it’s better than hunting for whatever wastes are wandering the lower city,” he says calmly, a red drop staining the corner of his mouth like a bloody kiss. “And you know I’d never let that dreck anywhere near your lips.”
Some nameless spawn shuffles forward and drags the body back into the shadows, their gifted feast for the night.
Her eyes stay fixed to the smear. She wants to lick it. She wants to bite his lip and taste him properly, drink something that sings for her, something to drown the other thoughts forever clawing at the flat wall of nothingness wrapped around her mind.
His fingers flex harder around her wrist. “What’s the matter?”
She sighs - the question with a thousand answers, and so many of them so so stupid. She wants to leave and see every corner of this Gods-forsaken continent. She wants to stay and never leave their bedchamber. She wants to feast until she rips apart at the seams. She wants to starve and see how far she can push herself as a spawn. She wants more.
She holds his gaze, waiting for him to relent.
Above it all, she wants one thing. The one thing that’s slowly pushing her to dull foggy madness as she waits.
“It’s nothing,” she answers softly. She doesn’t want to have this fight again and she’s fairly certain she doesn’t need to answer anyway. His stare is so intense she’s sure it can see through to the very back of her skull. His own expression is as impassive as an ivory mask, perfectly carved and cool. What she’d give to crack through and unspool that beautiful, maniacal mind and understand his whims for just a moment. She’s sure she could once upon a time- a lifetime ago, perhaps when the word lifetime actually meant something.
His tongue suddenly flicks out and catches the drop at the corner of his mouth. Her own tongue mimics the movement behind her teeth, a jealous breath rushing from her nose. She isn’t sure how long it’s been since he’s actually touched her- perhaps days. Maybe months. She can’t quite remember the number of moons she’d watched rise and fall from the balcony, throwing a dagger in the air and catching it bladeside again and again until it finally left a scar.
He slides his free hand up her neck and cups the side of her face. “Perhaps I’ve been neglecting you of late,” he murmurs, lightly tracing the contour of her jaw, then her ear until she shivers slightly. It’s a small thing- the sweet reminder of exactly who she is to him.
His right hand. His treasure. His precious thing.
She remembers the first time someone had dared question that fact, years back. She’d heard the whisper from the dark of their library- a jovial tone and one far too warm for these halls.
“I guess there’s no thinking blood required, eh?”
She’d ripped the head from the spawn’s shoulders and tossed it towards another before the words had cooled in the air. She almost wishes it was the only time.
He tugs her towards the door, the lights snuffing out with every step as they go. “Come.”
He leads them to the other end of the palace and into her bedchamber. Their bedchamber really though she can’t recall the last time he’d used it… or slept at all. To be fair she hadn’t for at least a few days, exhaustion just another pain she’s found she can put up with.
The room is grand but mostly empty save for the ridiculously huge bed he’d had installed. He’d clawed away anything in the palace left by its former master, even his name forbidden to be said aloud. She’d seen all too many messes left smeared for days on the new carpets when anyone had forgotten that particular rule- a warning few had forgotten since.
Besides a few drapes the only thing she’d added was a painting, the one staring down like a great round eye opposite the bed. Both of them had been captured in a similar pose to when they'd received their unfortunate guest- pale faces stark against the dark backdrop, his hand resting over hers. It's her only real reminder of how she looks or at least some overpaid artist's interpretation of her. She’s as beautiful as temptation itself but it’s hard to imagine such grandeur when her face hardly feels the same. She’ll never age, never wrinkle or shrink but it’s like she can still feel the hands of time slowly pulling more of her away under her skin.
He closes the door and then the distance between them. Even at the same height he still seems to tower over her into infinity like some dark God. She can’t remember if she had any faith before this, but there can’t have been a being divine or otherwise that she’d loved with such fervour. Worshipping with bloody hands and eager parched lips.
“No audience here. Now-” He tilts her chin up, his thumb resting against her bottom lip. “Tell me what you want.”
She feels a lie rolling on her tongue but she can’t quite spit it out. “You know what I want.��
“Say it.”
“Make me a true vampire.”
He releases her face, shaking his head. “Gods. This again.” He doesn’t seem as irked as the last time she’d pressed this, but her gut still twists when he turns away. It’s the same cool brush off as always, the way one would to an errant pet that’s not quite trained yet.
“I really didn’t want to discuss this now,” she admits quietly. Last time her frustration had gotten so loud she’s surprised her voice hadn’t cracked the windows.
Her fist had instead after he’d stalked away from that conversation.
She takes a risk, palming a hand to his shoulder and slowly turning him back around. “I know you promised. It’s just been so long,” she starts carefully, keeping her eyes to his chest. She cups his other shoulder when he doesn’t pull away, letting herself feel the strength hidden under the dark cloth. “I want to be stronger. For both of us.”
It’s a half truth. She does want it for them- the power being full vampire would give her coupled with his extra gifts would be everything. They could take more, do more, finally see more of the world in bright and dazzling splendour.
Her lip quirks up at the thought. Perhaps even feel more too.
He sighs and runs his finger over the crest of her hand. “Your strength is already quite the feat to behold. You change any more and you might destroy a wall.” He holds it firm as she starts to step away, his chuckle soft.
“I said that I will. You know that I will. But the timing has to be perfect.” He brushes a stray hair away from her face, winding it around his finger and letting it fall back against her shoulder. “You’ve tasted me enough, you must know being sired by the Ascendent will take a little more preparation than your standard vampire. But when I do, I’ll be able to give you so much more, more than you even have now.” His hand leaves hers to grasp her chin, fingers lightly pressing into both cheeks until she’s pinned under his gaze. “I’ll not waste such a gift on any regular night. It requires proper celebration. And time.” He leans in until each word kisses over her lips in a long low whisper. “Time for me to properly indulge you. Pleasure upon pleasure upon pleasure.”
It’s a heady promise and one she’s heard before. That doesn’t stop it being so easy to let herself sink into the words - the sweetness of such a beautiful tale.
She closes her eyes, waiting for his kiss.
He chuckles again when she finally opens them, his smirk perfectly pointed.
“Until then, you still share in immortality with me. So tell me, what else can I possibly give to you?” He squeezes her face again before releasing her.
She rubs her cheeks. “You have so many other spawn. They all share it too.”
His hand lashes out and grabs her wrist, a little harder this time. “All this time and you still believe you’re just some spawn? Like the rest of them?” He jerks her closer, folding her into the circle of his arms until their bodies rock together with her every breath. “How many times must we go through this?”
She clings to the sides of his jacket, pressing back harder.
“Have I extended any of my talents to anyone else?”
She shakes her head.
“Do I make you do such grunt work?”
“No, but-”
“Then how can you possibly think you’re the same?”
Her answering protest vanishes as he slips a hand under the back of her dress. He curls his fingers over the skin of her waist, cradling her in a way that has something prodding below the surface of her mind, smudged memories too worn to pull into focus.
“You will always be my first. My first spawn. My first thinking blood. The first person I told everything to.” He lightly scrapes his teeth down her neck until she shudders in his arms, the memory quickly disintegrating. “200 years of nothing and I finally had something that was mine. No power on this or any plane is going to take that away from me.”
He tilts her head back and finally crashes their lips together in a firm, desperate kiss. It’s as messy as a storm - every movement taking more like he’s drawing the remaining life from inside her. She can taste the wine on his breath, the blood on his teeth- tart and rich and maddening.
Something stirs within her again, something larger and familiar. Even under the fog, she has what feels like aeons of love for this man inside, swelling and gnawing, threatening to burst and consume her whole with its painful teeth. It’s the only feeling she can fathom with any clarity, equal parts sin and sanctity.
She holds him, her arms clamping round his middle with all the strength she can muster.
She’d be less than nothing without it, drained to dust. So she’ll let herself be devoured by the pleasures of hell’s flames with a smile on her face and tears on her cheeks.
“You could have anyone,” she breathes against his lips.
She yelps as his hand digs into her thigh and roughly hitches it to his hip.
“I want you,” he murmurs, kissing her again. Satisfaction blooms under her skin as he opens his mouth, her body already on fire for him. She knows it. Of course she knows it. She wanted to hear him say it, hear the words as sweet as a siren’s trill to drag her back to the present.
“But perhaps you need reminding.” He pushes her until the backs of her knees hit the bed. “I will see you living the best life. Even if you won’t take care of yourself, I’m not letting either of us go hungry.” His fingers brush from her face down to her chest, blood from that elf still shining against the fine material. He pinches the fabric and tugs, red smearing over his thumb.
“What a mess,” he observes quietly.
Before she can apologise, he grabs two fistfuls of the fabric and pulls, tearing it and her undershirt apart until she’s all but nude before him. He turns her and pulls the remains of her outfit from her body, pressing his hand against her bare stomach so her back curves against him. She shivers slightly as his fingers rip through the seams of her underwear and leave her fully naked. He sweeps his hand up over the curves of her torso and slips his thumb into her mouth, the cool taste of the elf’s blood igniting the fires in her stomach.
Her restraint snaps immediately and she sucks, desperate for more. She moans as he adds a second coated finger, the frustration in her gut only matched by the one growing hot and frenzied between her legs.
“That’s it,” he says quietly as she licks them clean. “Don’t deny me. Don’t deny what you are.”
His hand moves from her lips until she feels it close around the sides of her throat, his thumb resting over the twin scars there. Their matching pair he’d said when she’d awoken that first day. She can’t see it in a mirror but she can feel it, still aching like it’s a fresh wet wound.
He touches his mouth to her ear. “No more doubts. You are mine. Say it.”
Her words dry to a sigh as his thumbnail scratches across the hollow of her throat.
He squeezes harder at her silence until she throws her head back against his shoulder.
“Say it.”
“Yours,” she gasps out.
His other hand wanders down her body to cup her breast and she arches into his touch.
“That’s better,” he whispers, rolling her nipple between his fingers until she keens softly. He pinches harder, drawing a louder gasp, her back slamming back against his torso.
She presses her free hand to her neck so their joint touch encircles her throat in a makeshift collar. His smile grows against her ear.
They both know it'll only ever be a symbol. She’ll bow her neck for one without him even having to say, but it’s so much more for him to not need to. Where could she ever run to where he wouldn’t find her?
Bound in blood and flesh for eternity.
He brushes his mouth down to the base of her neck and bites down hard. White hot pain melts into pleasure as he does it again, his tongue laving over the fresh marks. She moans and grabs the back of his head to press him down harder. The caress of his lips, his tongue- it’s her bloody paradise. She barely registers his hand move from her neck and down over her stomach, seeking its prize.
He cups her between the legs and her mind starts to spin. He spreads her, her breath hissing between her teeth as he fingers tease a familiar path through her folds, so achingly close to where she needs to be touched.
He holds her upright as he pulls off her neck, kissing the shell of her ear. “Delicious.”
She presses down, grinding her clit against the heat of his palm. He’d mastered the command of her body long ago, what it takes to make her beg, gasp, to drown out any needless thoughts in red wet screams.
He spins her round, one hand sliding up her spine and leaning her backwards. He lowers his mouth just below her collarbone, lips and teeth dragging further down until he bites again over the swell of her left breast. She moans again at the sensation as his tongue traces over the wound and then against her nipple in a slow circle.
She sees the blood smeared like rouge on his lips as he lifts his head. A beautiful colour. Their colour.
She isn’t sure the last time she hasn’t thought about her life in shades of red: dripping from her hands, hot in her mouth, shining sharp and violent in his eyes.
She looks down at those same eyes now, burning intensely as he works her.
There’s an image she hasn’t been able to get out of her mind for a while, more faded than a dream. She’s sure they were softer once, rich like apple skin, fresh as autumn hues. Now if she stares too long it feels like she’s looking down the lit barrel of a cannon.
There are other moments too, touches that almost felt tender, maybe even unsure. They’re all wrapped in his same face but somehow different. Different enough for her to wonder if the man she knew before the ascension was even real or just another mask. One he could finally drop when she let 7000 souls burn through her eyes.
She pushes the thought away, angry it could still worm its way back to her when she’s in his arms. She could live long enough to watch the oceans boil and the skies crash down and she’d still stand steadfast as bedrock knowing that she’d never have made any other choice.
She cradles the back of his head, keeping his lips right above her cold silent heart.
Of course she’d burn the world if it kept him safe. And she’ll stand next to him as king of the ashes knowing there’s nowhere else where her broken parts would ever feel even close to whole.
A sliver of moonlight cuts through the curtains and over the portrait in front of them. The lacquer shines coldly, Astarion’s painted eyes staring at their bloody pleasure with the unyielding intensity of the sun. The eyes of a killer to so many fools, too scared to look past their scorching surface. She knows better. Knows that the true eyes of a killer watch from next to him, as flat and dull as a red sheet. Numb. Trained. Obedient.
He softly bites her nipple and her fingers tighten in his hair. “Please.”
He languidly moves on to her other breast, sucking and nipping in a sharp tease.
She tugs harder. “Gods, please.”
He lifts off of her with a sinfully wet noise. “You know as well as I that the Gods fear to tread these halls. Not even the divine would dare intrude on a night like this.” He kisses the tip of her nipple, dragging his lips down over the new fresh marks until she groans and shivers. “So, who’s name should you be saying?”
Her hips rock against nothing but cold air. Gods she needs to feel him. Feel something.
“Astarion,” she cries.
He nips harder and pushes her onto the bed below.
She slides up the sheets, blood from her last meal still splattered around her like a handful of rose petals on the silk. He ignores it, roughly pushing her thighs apart and licking one firm stroke through her folds until her hips arch off the mattress. He does it again, then again, lingering against her clit before twisting and biting the soft flesh of her inner thigh.
She cries out again. She isn’t sure how many more places he can mark her before she all but melts away from this reality.
She lifts herself onto her forearms as he spreads her wider, swallowing another embarrassingly loud noise as he tongue dips inside her with a shallow thrust. Blood beads from the fresh bite and trickles down the slope of her leg, heading towards his shoulder.
She quickly pulls her thighs away and scrambles towards him.
“Wait.” She wipes his mouth when he looks up, then unlaces his shirt as carefully as she can. His trousers follow so she can finally see him. All of him.
“Better,” she breathes, tracing the slope of his shoulder. He catches her hand before it can go any further and turns it slowly between his fingers. She expects him to bite again. Her wrist is already dotted with so many tiny marks that she isn’t sure there’s any virgin skin left to taste. The ghost of a blush runs through her instead as he skims his lips from her forearm to her palm, scraping the skin but not letting it break.
Through half-open eyes she quickly catches his, the way they study the veins on her wrist like the secret to the universe is tangled in them. They’re open wider now, like some gaping red maw. It’s so much. Too much. She blinks and the look is gone, his eyes now closed and his mouth back on hers.
He pushes her down onto the bed and climbs over her. She grabs the back of his head but he quickly pulls her hands away, pinning them above her. She doesn’t resist, letting herself be claimed again as he pushes inside.
Gods, she needed this. She’d almost forgotten what it felt like to be wrapped up in darkness and in him. She hooks her feet around the small of his back to pull him deeper, revelling in every near silent breath he pants against her ear.
He sets their pace. Fast. Fucking her into the mattress below until she’s crying out his name with every precise movement. She gives back in kind, thrusting with him until he finally releases her wrists to find better purchase by her head. She immediately grabs his back, one hand sliding down and stroking over the familiar ridges of his scars. It’s a jagged reminder of the past, one he refuses to speak of again. As cold as it sounds in her head, she knows why he doesn’t. What power could truly be so impenetrable if people knew he could feel pain once, fear- terror even.
So it stays locked away behind both their mouths, same as anything that ever brought them such sadness. His own kindness in a way, she reasons. Why exhume those parts of the past when they’re much better off laying with the rest of her mortal affairs. Buried.
He moves harder and her nails dig in. She hopes they leave marks, scarlet crescents sore enough that he might feel how deep her own claim to him runs.
She tightens around him, desperate to come. Desperate to pull him with her too. But he stops suddenly, letting her waver on the very edge of that little death. It feels like she’s dancing on some taught cusp, pulled so tight like a bow string and begging to be released.
She reaches down to touch herself but he grabs her hand again.
“Bad girl,” he whispers in a tone so low it almost pushes her over that edge. He flips her over, clamping his hands over her hips as he pushes back inside. He wastes no time setting a faster rhythm, ramming into her mercilessly until she’s screaming into the silks below, loud enough to drown her doubt and that of every wretched spawn in this place. It’ll only be her. Forever.
His fingers dig in hard enough that she knows there will be a pretty set of inky marks there, painful to the touch for days. The hurt doesn’t matter anyway- not when she knows what true torture feels like. She can still remember the night she was changed, perhaps more vividly than anything else. The way her body snapped and convulsed as every part of her died and then roughly reshaped into something new. Something that was his.
“He’ll ruin you.”
The warning calls from somewhere dusty in the back of her mind. She can’t quite place where it came from. Probably the same closed door where every half faded image and whispered concern hid and occasionally slipped through when her nights alone were so utterly silent she could almost hear her brain churning. There’s a shadow of a half elf’s face, mismatched eyes, the fading melody of a wizard’s warning. She can’t grab them and pull them into focus, the words buried too far below the surface of her mind.
She turns her face into the silks as if she could rub the thought away. Perhaps she’s scared to dig too deep and remember what it is she might have wanted before every moment was about their shared dream. Bright and bloody and beautiful.
Astarion’s hand finds her clit and everything else melts away. There’s nothing else now, just their sweat on the sheets and the discordant slap of his body on hers.
So let them sin, feast, burn. She’s already ruined anyway - punctured with so many holes that whatever there was of her mortal life had trickled out long ago.
She finally comes against his hand and collapses in a sticky, spent heap under him. He slowly traces his finger down the length of her spine as she catches her breath, every inch of her body heavy and useless. She barely registers herself being heaved into his lap, her head falling against his shoulder with a gentle thud.
The haze of her orgasm parts a little when she smells something fresh above her. Blood, his blood. It starts to drip in a slow mess over her mouth like thick hot rain. Her body moves on pure instinct, surging up to clamp down on his cut forearm, but he holds her steady by her hair. She swallows the offering, her hunger only growing at the tease of something so decadent. He guides her head back further, letting a few more drops fall messily over her face before finally lowering it to her waiting mouth.
He doesn’t flinch as she drinks desperately. It’s exquisite, like cool wine to her parched throat. She’s sure she could drink him dry or until her stomach bursts open and she’d still not be satisfied. She sucks harder, flitting her gaze up to his as he watches with clear amusement. There’s still one more thing she wants. One thing she’s not sure he’d ever let her do even if she still had a soul to offer him. She wants to sink her own fangs into his neck, the one place she never has. She wants to cover those ugly punctures just for her own pleasure.
“I love you,” she whispers as he pulls back. It might be these moments when such love swells the most: clothes shed, scratches still fresh on his skin, hair curling out of place against his forehead- a reminder that the ritual can’t keep him quite so perfect for every moment of forever.
He wipes the remaining blood from her lips, his thumb resting there a moment longer. “And I adore you, terribly.”
She narrows her eyes and digs her nails in harder, enough to draw blood. “Say it properly. Say it.”
He raises an eyebrow, but his smile doesn’t waver. He presses his arms back to her mouth, squeezing the back of her head as she sucks again. “I love you.”
She bites down harder at the words. They’re what she wants and yet she doesn’t understand why it doesn’t feel like enough. The fog in her mind clears a little as her hunger quietens but she can’t think of even a moment when something was enough for either of them. They have almost everything this realm could offer and it still feels the same.
How big will the pile of gold and corpses need to be before either of them can remember what joy actually tastes like?
He pulls his arms away and kisses her again, slower this time. She keeps her eyes closed as he stops, trying to centre herself.
“Are we bad people?” she murmurs.
He drops her from his lap, eyeing her curiously. “My, what a question.” He looks past her to the mirror on the bedside table, brushing his fingers through the mess she’d made of his hair. “Good and bad are such trivial concepts to us. Darling, you need to think bigger than that. We are everything. Beyond such unimaginative definitions.”
“Right.” She pulls the sheet over her torso. The room feels colder somehow, like the darkness itself is judging her nakedness.
“None of that,” he says, rubbing her cheek. “Besides, thanks to me you’ve become one of the finest killers, dead or alive. Nothing can stand in our way.”
“The only one who could kill you I suppose,” she mumbles, leaning into the touch.
He quickly nips her chin, then her throat. “Oh my love. Now that’s something I’d like to see.” He pushes her back down and crawls over her, sliding his hands over both of hers. “So tell me, how would you do it? How would you defeat the most powerful being alive?”
“Who else could get close enough?” She leans up and kisses directly over his heart. “One thrust with the right weapon is all it would take.”
“And then what would you do? You’re mine- always.” He moves a fraction more until his legs trap her thighs, the hands so gently wrapped around hers now pinning them into the mattress. “No direction. No love. No power. Without me your life would be a shadowed path. Pure nothingness.” Every word wraps around her like velvet, his hands the softest chains she could be caught in. “You must know it hurts me to even think of you like that,” he continues, dipping down and running his nose against hers.
He squeezes her hands harder as he does, walking her along the very edge of pain before letting go. She flexes her limbs slightly, letting the soreness settle along with her mind.
He kisses her forehead, each wrist then her lips again. “But we need not worry about such awful things.”
She cradles the back of his neck, idly wondering just how hard she’d have to press to snap it. “Of course not.”
His eyes drift up and down her body as she answers, before his hand works its way between her legs again. She lets him, her hips bucking with needle-sharp pleasure as he presses against her over-sensitive clit.
“Until the world falls down,” she says, throwing her head back and grinding her core against his fingers.
He leans forward and muffles her exhausted moans with shining, brazen lips. “And even after that.”
Perhaps that’s how long eternity is, she thinks and surrenders herself to him again.
It’s almost dawn when he rolls away from her. He leaves a promise of tonight against her shoulder as she stares at the ceiling, thinking in circles.
One day, when she finally drives a stake through his chest, she’ll weep. He’s more than everything to her, his arms as tight as a cage, as comforting as salvation. The only person with a heart as black and silent as hers and yet she’d still rip it out and give it to him on a sharpened skewer if he asked.
It’ll break her, but it's still her task and hers alone. One she can do with deliberate and devoted hands, away from any angry mob or pack of ravenous spawn.
She surges up and captures his lips before he goes, kissing with every ounce of passion still warm inside her.
Until then they’ll stay like this, wrapped and writhing in bloody matrimony. Frozen. Perfect.
Red.
***
I'm mainly bummed I couldn't work out a way to get him to turn into a bat during this. Perhaps another time...
#bg3 astarion#astarion#ascended astarion#vampire ascendant#astarion fic#baldur's gate 3#bg3#bg3 fic#astarion ancunin#my writing#mywriting
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Green
Set during Act 2. Karlach needs help fixing her teddy bear and wants to air some grievances about Astarion's deal with Raphael.
He smells hot leather before he smells her blood. As if he needs either to detect her approach; she has the loudest footsteps of any of them. But soon the scent wafts verdantly in through the pinned flap of his tent, bright, grassy, and puckering. Citrus and something young and vegetal, intermingled with the tang of the infernal iron that drives it all. Completely antithetical to the tiefling’s fiery appearance: green.
Karlach clasps her hands behind her back and squats in front of the opening, blocking the heat of the fire he had been basking in. Annoyed, Astarion lays the book he's reading across his chest and looks quizzically at her.
“Hey, fangs! Oh–” she says, noticing his book, "Sorry, am I bothering you?”
"Yes.”
"Haha! You're a funny one. Anyway, um. Listen, I was wondering if you could do me a solid? Tav tells me you're not bad with a needle. Not surprising, I guess, given your propensity for pointy objects."
How could Tav have– Oh . His underwear . Well. Ignoring the means by which his embroidery skill had been revealed, Astarion raises one silver eyebrow at Karlach, bidding her to continue.
“Okay. Promise not to laugh. But do you think you can fix him?" From behind her back, she produces a threadbare stuffed toy; a bear. It's made from a thick-weighted brown knit, worn fuzzy with age, and has two glossy black buttons sewn in for eyes. The lighter colored thread used to attach them gives the impression of Xs for pupils, a dead-eyed stare, which is accurate enough to its current condition: there is a large tear partially beheading the beast, its stuffing leaking out the busted seam.
"His name is Clive,” she says morosely. Clive and Karlach turn their pleading glances on him, and Astarion can't decide who looks more pitiful.
“Where did you even get that thing?"
“I found him," she declares proudly, holding it aloft. "He got left behind in my room at Last Light; all alone, poor little bugger. So I nicked him. Figured his last friend might not be coming back any time soon.”
“Looks like it might have been better off where it was. What happened?"
She rubs at the back of her neck sheepishly. "Well, now that I won't burn him, I was. You know. Hugging him. And then Scratch walked up and wanted to play, and– Scratch is so soft , did you know?– so I was teasing him, which probably wasn't the nicest thing to do to either of them, and Scratch is really fast. And unfortunately for Clive, Scratch’s teeth aren't as soft as the rest of him." She lets out a nervous laugh. "So do you think, maybe, you could help him out?”
“I could ," he replies, propping himself up on an elbow. "I'm just not sure that's the best use of our resources while we're stuck in this… accursed wasteland. And I'm tired of cleaning up that mutt’s messes."
Karlach’s eyes shine beseechingly, lower lip jutting out. Clive bobbles miserably. Astarion grimaces, sits up, and abruptly snatches him from her hands.
"Yay! Thanks, fangs!”
He sighs, digging through his pack for his sewing kit. This is stupid. He's getting a new slash in his overclothes damn near every day, and he doesn't have the materials to spare on a toy .
And yet.
He's not able to find a similar colored thread. “Red is the closest I have," he says, crossing his legs and threading the needle through with crimson.
“That's okay. He'll have a bit of a rugged look– a cool neck scar, like someone else I know."
Astarion frowns and glances up at her. " ‘ Rugged ’ isn't exactly the image I strive to portray.”
“Oh. No, I know. I just meant your scars look cool," she clarifies awkwardly. Somehow, he doesn't think she's talking about the ones on his neck.
Earlier that day, when they'd set out from Last Light, a certain infernal visitor had been waiting in the parlor. Raphael had stripped him bare with a snap of his clawed fingers, revealing the malevolent latticework of scars encircling his back to the entire room. The whole thing had been rather violating– hence why he’s hiding in his tent instead of soaking up the heat from the fire. He curls in on himself and pierces the soft yarn through.
He's quiet as he works, deftly stitching the fabric together as he presses the bear's innards back where they belong. Karlach doesn't seem to know how to cope with silence, bouncing a leg with pent energy, practically sizzling like water boiling in a pot. Eventually, she spills over.
“So how did you get so good at that?" She peers in closer from where she's settled at the threshold of his tent, observing the fine needlework.
He pulls the needle high, closing a stitch. “I've picked up a lot of little skills over the last few centuries. This one has been particularly useful."
“Huh. I always figured you had a tailor or something, with your whole Upper City accent and, well, everything. Who knew you could get your hands dirty.”
The problem is that she really has no idea how dirty they are- or, rather, bloody. Nobody knows about that. Hells, only Tav knows about Cazador, and even then he's spared most of the… finer details.
"Yes, well. I'm full of surprises, aren't I?” he replies cryptically. He's had enough of his secrets revealed today already. “Why do you even keep this thing around?" he asks to change the subject, adjusting the bear on his lap.
"He kinda reminds me of one my mum got me when I was a kid. I was weak to nostalgia and his cute li’l face. Ain't he adorable?” She leans in to poke at the bear’s overstuffed cheeks, and Astarion swats her out of his working space.
"He's a liability, this one. Falling apart at the seams.”
“Aw, c’mon. Like you've never kept anything around for sentimental reasons?"
The scant belongings in Astarion's tent are answer enough; mostly just pillows and various rags from the road, with a few books and pilfered trinkets scattered among them. A useless silver mirror, a few chalices for wine. Nothing sentimental. “No. Not a lot to be sentimental about. I don't remember my childhood."
"O-oh. I'm sorry. I guess it was so long ago, anyway, it would be hard to remember.”
He's pretty sure that's not the reason. "Are you calling me old? I may be immortal, but I'll have you know I'm a very reasonable age for an elf. I'm certainly no relic like Halsin .”
She puts her hands up, seeing that she's dug a hole for herself. "No! Mate, I would never. You look very good for your age. Or, no, not for your age because you're not. Old. It's just. You're, what, two-hundred and fifty? That's older than I'll ever be, or, not me specifically, because, well…”
The words die on her tongue, but what's been left unsaid hangs heavily between them: She doesn't have that much time left . Dammon had given her the news shortly after turning her temperature down from scorching to sweltering . And that's why Astarion is wasting his precious floss on this ridiculous bear, because he knows how awful it would feel to be given pity, but at least he can oblige her the favor she asked.
All of the stuffing has been sewn back inside the bear’s head. Astarion begins to double back to strengthen the new seam, and he looks very intently at his work as he knits his eyebrows together and asks, “How do you do it?"
“How do I do what?" she says, pulling her knees in with her arms and resting her cheek on her bicep.
“You are so… alive . Despite everything. Despite what you've been through.” Even her blood smelled like life, lush and blooming.
"Ha. I dunno. I just can't believe that I've really made it out of Avernus, so, you know, carpe dime or whatever.”
"I just… don't understand. You're going to die.” It's not pity when he says it, only hard truth.
She hugs her knees closer and lets out a shaky breath. “I don't really want to talk about it. Better to just enjoy things while I can. Otherwise I'd just be a ghost already."
He knows all too well how it feels to be a ghost.
“You're not angry? At Gortash, at Zariel?"
Heat flares in her chest, exhausting from the vents on her shoulders and filling the tent with the inferno of her emotions. “Of course I am! I'm right pissed. And if there's anything I can do about it, then both those fuckers will get what's coming to them.”
"Good.”
"I just… have to take every good thing that comes my way for now. I’ve done some not great things in my past. I regret just standing by when Elturel fell. I hurt a lot of people for Gortash that, looking back, seem like maybe they didn't deserve it. But right now, I'm finally more than just a weapon for causing destruction. For the first time in way too long, I can touch people again. And I've got a lot of good people around me who deserve some hugs.” She offers a small smile, but Astarion shifts away minutely.
"Bear’s done,” he says, holding it out for inspection. A vermilion scar marrs the seam between its head and body; it really does look like an injury.
"Aw, Clive, you look great! Glad to see you back with the living. Hey, Astarion, what do you think about adding a detail– giving him his own vampire bite? You did bring him back to life, after all.”
He knows she's trying to make him feel better, but it's doing anything but. "I wouldn't curse him that way,” he says softly, packing up his supplies.
Karlach is uncharacteristically quiet as she fluffs Clive to redistribute his recently reintroduced stuffing, pursing her lips.
"About your master–"
“We don't have to do this." His back is to her, hands in his pack, and he can feel her stare pricking through his clothes where she now knows the scars hide.
“No, that's not fair. Nothing is fair about anything right now. But you talked to me about my shit and I'm returning the favor whether you want it or not."
"I–”
"Mama K is talking now. You can just listen, you don't have to tell me anything if you don't want to.”
Astarion is silent, but he turns and sits back down, eyes downcast like a chastised child.
Karlach continues. "Listen, I don't know anything about your master or how he treated you. But I do know what it feels like to have to serve someone you don't believe in, and to have them fuck up your body without asking. To mark it as their own. I didn't know how to bring this up earlier, but… your scars. The ones on your back. They're in Infernal, aren't they?”
He nods; Tav had been able to identify that, at least, after their… tryst.
"I picked up a little, in the Blood War. Why didn't you come to me? I'd gladly help you out as best I can. You don't have to take this deal, Astarion. You can't trust a devil.”
The thought hadn't escaped him; he figured she might be able to read it. But he wasn't sure she'd be able to decipher the full context, and if he wanted any chance at killing Cazador, then he needed to know as much as he could. And, equally as important, he didn't think he could suffer the shame of anyone at camp knowing the full story. Asking Raphael just seemed the safer option; a fair trade.
"As much as he puffs himself up, he's a cambion, not a devil. And I'm sure he'll respect his end of the bargain. I'm prepared to pay his price, whatever it may be."
“He's a creep who's preying on you because he knows how badly you want it. He's gonna demand something that will just come to bite you in the ass later. That's how it always goes. Please, just let me try. If I can't make sense of it, then go ahead and accept the deal. But let me try."
He’s frozen in indecision, unsure if he can trust her with this. "I’m not sure–”
"You want a sample?” she interrupts, gesturing to the tattooed runes peeking out from under the shoulder strap of her top; it's easy to make out, dark ink contrasting against the sudden glow from within her chest. “This one says fucking Zariel ."
Maybe she understands, he thinks. Maybe he can trust someone else with this. The thin weight of his shirt on his back feels heavier knowing that it and one word are all that stands between him and naked vulnerability. He could just say yes; he could let her look, close himself off to the fear and let himself be lulled by whatever altruistic reasons she claims. But doubt whispers from the back of his mind: she's backed into a corner just like him, if not moreso, and that makes her dangerous . They both want to live, and they're clawing at scraps with all they've got. If she needs his help someday, she'll demand it of him in return. At least the terms of Raphael's deal will be predictable. The cambion’s words echo in his mind: What's better than a devil you don't know? A devil you do.
And there's also the other thing. Astarion is a shitty person and if Karlach truly expects nothing in return, then he doesn't deserve her help. She doesn't even know the depths of his depravity, and he doesn't really feel like sharing. He's ruined, and she's not.
And so, for the first time he can remember when someone was trying to get his clothes off, Astarion says: “No."
"Okay.” She's crestfallen, but to her credit, she doesn't push it.
He expects her to get up and leave now that his task is completed and he's outright rejected her in favor of a devil, but she doesn't. She sits with him a while, her steady warmth radiating over his skin. It feels nice, if he lets himself enjoy it. Clive’s dead eyes peer dolefully at him from within the safety of her embrace.
“If he takes something that hurts you… just know that I'm always down to give a devil a good smack-down. It's kind of my specialty– this tattoo says ‘demonsbane’. Just say the word.”
Astarion thinks the words ring a little hollow, because, from his perspective, taking on Raphael in combat seems like a death sentence, but he appreciates the thought nonetheless. “I can't believe you're sitting here offering up your demon-slaying services while hugging a teddy bear."
"It's only what Clive would want for the person who patched him up.”
"He'd be more useful if he stayed well out of the reach of foul canine beasts in the future.”
"Yeah yeah, I learned my lesson. Thank you Astarion, though, really. I don't have a lot in this world aside from him and you lot so… just doing my best to keep it all together.”
She sets Clive aside and pivots to her knees, moving slowly so as to give Astarion opportunity to escape if he wants to; her tadpole broadcasts her intentions. He warrs briefly with himself but is ultimately unable to convince himself to push her away, and he winds up wrapped in her arms. He knows she's been cooled to a reasonable degree, but he still flinches, because the difference between them is so stark . Her skin blazes against his, even through his shirt, and when he finally brings himself to relax slightly, his cool cheek on her shoulder prickles from the contact. The whirr ing of her mechanical heart is strange in his ears, and all at once, he brings his own arms to grip tight to her shirt; that beating, this warmth could vanish at any moment. She was his only proof that you could go through hell and not come out completely chewed up and broken and bitter, so of course the universe couldn't allow her to slip through unscathed. It wasn't fair– but nothing ever was.
“My… master,” he starts as she pulls away, leaving him feeling bitterly cold from the loss of her. "His name is Cazador. Cazador Szarr."
“Huh. I think I've heard that name before."
“I'm not surprised– the bastard has his claws sunk all over Baldur's Gate. He prefers to exert his influence from the shadows, but he's too ostentatious for it sometimes."
“You know," she says, thinking aloud, “he sounds like another evil arsehole I know. Gortash was always trying to expand his political influence through various shady dealings. Hey, listen. If you won't let me talk you out of that deal with Raphael, then let's make a deal of our own. You help me get revenge on Gortash, and I help you take down Cazador. I mean, I'd probably help out anyway ‘cause it just makes me fume thinking about any of my people getting hurt, but solidarity, yeah?"
Astarion flashes a fanged grin. "Now there's an agreement I can get behind. Blood for blood.” He holds out a hand cordially, and she takes it up with such force that his arm is nearly removed from his shoulder.
"That's what I'm talking about, soldier! Hah– sorry,” she says, noticing the way his face twinged at the power behind her handshake. "Been a long time since I've gotten to do that. Feels nice.”
"It does.”
There's a loud snorfling sound from behind her– she whips her head around. "Scratch! No! You leave Clive alone.” She pulls the bear out of reach of the dog’s curious nose and makes to leave the tent. "Astarion, will you throw the ball for him? He's got too much energy.”
His first instinct is to respond with a resounding No, I won't have anything to do with that filthy creature , but something within him is stirred by his conversation with Karlach. If he had to put a name on it– hope. He decides that he's going to try not to be a ghost any longer. So he throws the ball.
#baldur's gate 3#bg3#astarion#astarion ancunin#karlach#karlach cliffgate#astarion x karlach#jupyt3r writes
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Last of the claimed febuwhump fics! This one is for @breakfastteatime who requested solitary confinement for Jedi Fallen Order. Hope you enjoy!!
Words: 2,099
Tags: whump, hurt no comfort, pre-Jedi Survivor, Claustrophobia warning
ao3 link
seven thousand, nine hundred and twenty minutes
Four thousand, three hundred and fifteen minutes. That’s how long Cal had been trapped in the little durasteel room. Four thousand, three hundred and fifteen minutes. And sixteen minutes, actually. He wasn’t sure if that was correct, he’d only started counting when he was bored enough, and he’d slept a few short stints somewhere between the counting.
The room itself was small and empty. At Cal’s best guess it was a roughly six foot cube of plain grey durasteel, with no visible door anywhere in the smooth plating and two bright, buzzing lights overhead flush with the durasteel around them. He had no memory of being put in the box. The last thing he remembered was being out in some small spaceport town picking up some supplies for Greez. He had a vague recollection of fighting someone, flashes of running through a street, sending BD-1 for help, but not much else. When he’d woken up it had been with a pounding headache and a very tender spot on the back of his head, but after three days’ worth of minutes he was starting to string his thoughts together in a more organized fashion.
Now Cal was just bored. And worried. What had happened to the others? He can’t quite remember if they were on the ship or out in the town with him. He could remember that Merrin had insisted on making breakfast and it had been something spicy with eggs and sausages and some kind of plant she’d picked up somewhere that Cere and Greez avoided, but he couldn’t picture if she was with him when whatever happened to get him locked in here. He hoped that she wasn’t. Ideally the others were mounting some daring rescue and he just had to wait for them. Too bad he’d never been good at waiting.
Cal paced the room. There was nothing better to do. The only thing he had to avoid in it was the small toilet in the corner of the room. There was no other furniture. He ran one hand along the wall as he went, searching for any kind of crack or crevice that could show signs of an exit. Four thousand, three hundred, and thirty six minutes, and he still couldn’t find anything.
It took him a long time to notice that he could’t feel the Force either. It was around him in the room. He could feel the space of it through the Force, the corners, the sad little toilet, but he couldn’t feel beyond the durasteel perimeter. Once, when he was young and small and impressionable, Master Tapal had sat him down and discussed methods of keeping a Jedi captive.
“Firstly, I must impress upon you that this is all for a worst-case scenario. As long as I, or Commander Gamut, are around we will do our utmost to protect you,” said Master Tapal.
“Then why bother teaching me about it? You hardly let me go on missions anyway,” Cal whined.
“Because knowledge will help you overcome your fear and give you the tools you need to escape.”
Cal huffed. He preferred physical training to the lectures from Master Tapal. This was boring. Besides, Master Tapal almost never let him out into the field so it wasn’t like any lectures on what to do when captured or behind enemy lines was ever going to be useful. He wanted to learn fun things, like how to wield a dual-bladed ‘saber like Master Tapal.
“To begin: when a Jedi is captured, they are likely to be known as a Jedi immediately. We wear our robes, and we have our lightsabers. Both identify us as who we are.”
“Then why don’t we dress like other people? The clones and the other soldiers all have uniforms.”
“Because, Padawan, we stand at the end of a long thread of tradition, and that is not a tradition of war. We are peacekeepers, not soldiers. We must remember that we are trying to end this war, not fight it.”
Cal thought that it felt very much like they were fighting a war. Nobody on the holonet talked about peace or an end, just what battles were going on and what the Hero With No Fear was up to.
“If you are caught, they will take away your lightsaber. This does not disarm you, as you will always have your connection to the Force. But, if they are prepared, they will have special binders on hand to dampen the Force to us, make us as any other person in the galaxy.”
A cold chill shuddered down Cal’s spine. He couldn’t imagine not being able to feel the Force. “Then what do I do?”
“Well, hopefully, I come get you. But if not, Commander Gamut and Sergeant Twitch will show you various methods you can use.” Master Tapal leaned back with a smile. “Though I imagine I will regret this lesson very soon.”
Cal had never heard of Force-dampening walls before, but perhaps either bounty hunters or the Empire had gotten creative sometime in the last six years. He can’t think of anything else it might be. He wished whoever was holding him had just gone for the binders, it would’ve made this whole situation much easier to handle as he could’ve picked them and been on his way.
As Cal paced he could almost hear the accented voices of the clones walking him through the steps to pick the lock on a set of binders. How to turn the locks, the feeling when you knew part of it had sprung. He turned the corner of his tiny prison and saw a flash of yellow and white out of the corner of his eye.
He couldn’t help it. Cal jumped backwards, tripping over his feet and falling into the wall behind him. The tender spot on the back of his head throbbed with a new ache. With a groan he picked himself up and reached back to touch the sore spot. His hand comes back bloody. Just what he needed, an upgrade from probable concussion to definite.
As Cal stared at the blood on his hands he couldn’t help but feel a little foolish. It had been years since he had seen a clone, and more since he’d seen one in 13th Battalion yellow. There was no reason to be afraid of them now, so many years later and with clones phased out of the Imperial army. No, what he should really be afraid of was what could lie beyond the durasteel walls of his prison.
-
Five thousand, seven hundred and sixty minutes. At least, by Cal’s reckoning. He had slept for a while, but unlike the last few times he’s curled up on the hard floor under the harsh lights of his cell, this time when he woke there was no water waiting for him. Maybe they forgot about him, or they were moving him, but Cal didn’t sense any vibrations through the metal that would betray being loaded on some kind of transport. The durasteel was still and unmovable. Yet he could not shake the thought that maybe he had been forgotten. Without water he was going to die in this tiny box. A rather unfitting end for his adventures so far, but maybe not so far off an ending for him, alone and scared and trapped.
“Hello?” called Cal. His voice was dry and cracked. “Hello?”
There was no response.
“Hey! I’m still in here, you know.”
With the lack of an answer it wasn’t hard to picture that his captor had simply decided he wasn’t worth the effort of selling to the highest bidder and was simply waiting for Cal to die in order to dispose of him. Probably decided it was less barbaric or something than just doing things the easy way and shooting Cal in his sleep. Cal would’ve preferred the blaster bolt, thank you very much.
He could feel himself starting to panic. Trying to squash the feeling down, Cal tried to think of what he could do that he hadn’t tried yet and the answer was simple. Trust in the Force. So he stood in front of a wall and put his hand on the cold metal. He took a deep breath in, and as he exhaled he pushed with the Force. Still the wall remained still and unmovable. There must have been something on the other side of the walls or they were thicker than anticipated. He tried again, with a little more Force. Nothing budged.
“Hey! Come on, let me out!” yelled Cal.
Not waiting for an answer he threw a punch at the wall, putting as much of the Force behind it as he could. The durasteel groaned, but didn’t give. With a wordless scream of rage he threw his whole body at the wall shoulder first. His shoulder crunched against the wall and gave an awful wet, popping noise. Biting back a scream Cal slumped down to his knee with his hand clutching his shoulder. Under his fingertips he could tell that it was dislocated, and though Cal had grown up in a scrapyard full of stupid injuries, he didn’t know how to fix his own shoulder.
Five thousand, seven hundred and eighty-four minutes, and at last Cal broke.
A sob built in his chest as hot tears stung at his eyes. He didn’t want to die here. He wanted his friends, his family really. He wanted to listen to Greez ramble about his latest recipe, he wanted to watch as Merrin discovered the secrets of a new planet, he wanted Cere to stay up with him in the middle of the night and tell him about the Jedi, and he wanted to keep on adventuring with BD-1. Yet here he was. Trapped and alone and hurt.
Beneath his fingertips Cal could feel the bone of his shoulder and the awkward angle it sat at. Already his hand was starting to tingle with oncoming numbness. His head still pounded from its meeting with the wall as well. He must look a mess. There was dried, tacky blood in his hair and his hand was purpling across the knuckles where he’d punched the wall. He couldn’t quite see what sort of strange silhouette he made with his dislocated shoulder but he was sure it wasn’t good. He choked a breath down around his sobs. Crying wasn’t going to do him any good. It wasn’t going to magically fix his arm or summon Cere with a medkit in hand. It didn’t do him much good. The deep breaths failed to work. Apparently his body needed to cry itself out, and he was going to let it.
-
Seven thousand, two hundred minutes. Cal had never actually counted this high ever. He’d never had seven thousand credits to his name to count with, and that was the only thing people regularly had that amount of anything in. He idly tapped a finger on his good hand on the ground in one second intervals. There wasn’t much else he could do. His arm was so numb he hadn’t been able to lift it for hours, and his mouth was so dry he swore Jawas were about to move in.
He was going to die here. Somewhere in the last few hundred minutes Cal had calmly accepted that fact. He shouldn’t, but there was no hope of him escaping on his own, especially now with only one good arm and having no food or water in days. He was too weak to do much more than shift a little when his legs started to fall asleep. When he did go, he hoped it wouldn’t be Cere and the others who found him, if anybody ever did. It wouldn’t be pleasant. He’d probably become some kind of misshapen, desiccated, mummy-like body. Definitely not the end Cal had ever envisioned for himself. Most of the time he pictured long uninterrupted falls or scrapping machinery. But he could feel himself getting heavy, like his body was weighed down by stones. For a moment he thought about fighting it, but really, what was the point. Nothing he did would change anything except make him suffer a little longer. He’d had a good run. Six years longer than he thought he’d have after the Purge. He’d even found a family and a home on a luxury yacht, and that wasn’t too bad for a scrapper nobody. No, it was okay. He had done enough.
-
Seven thousand, nine hundred and twenty minutes later, a small hatch in the ceiling dropped open.
#j:fo#jedi fallen order#febuwhump#fic#fanfic#fanfiction#this one got away from me#and i kinda sorta started part two#oops
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A Stitch in Time
Elrond, Caranthir's wife, and a Fëanorian heirloom. Rated G.
The quilt had been added to the twins' bed during their first winter at Amon Ereb, after two nights spent curled together for warmth. Clearly their captors — caretakers? Already the lines were blurring — had noticed, and had taken steps to remedy it. It smelled of cedar and gave their room some much-needed color. Large enough to cover the bed of a full-grown man, it was more than sufficient for two children, and could even be folded in half for extra warmth on particularly cold nights.
And it was utterly unlike the other quilts they had seen, with their neat, regular blocks and clear patterns. This one was a rich riot of reds, golds, and browns, with different fabrics cut into asymmetrical shapes and quilted in winding, stylized, visible stitches. It quickly became a comfort, something that could hold Elrond's attention when he was ill or injured and confined to his bed. There seemed to constantly be something new to discover — here a sliver of fabric soft as lamb's wool, there a quill picked out in neat, tiny stitches. Tiny brass bells hung at three of the corners; the forth was adorned with a slender gold ring sewn on in blunt stitches of crimson thread.
And yet, somehow it never occurred to either of them to ask about it, not until they were half-grown and fast becoming too large to comfortably share a bed. It was Elros who gathered up the nerve to speak, after he had helped Maglor move a second bed into the room and begun to take his share of the blankets.
"You can keep using the quilt," he said to Elrond. "I know how much you like it." And then, turning to Maglor, he said, "Who made it, anyway?"
"Our sister-in-law," Maglor said after a moment of silence. "Caranthir's wife." And then, before either of them could ask, he added, "She stayed in Aman."
Caranthir, Elrond knew, was the brother who had built the keep, and one of the three who had fallen in the attack on Doriath. He wondered, sometimes, about those brothers. What had they been like? Did they have Maglor's gentleness or Maedhros' wry humor? Were they as tired-eyed and worn as Fëanor's remaining sons, at the end? But the topic was clearly closed, as Maglor folded down the last blanket, clapped Elros on the shoulder, and left the room.
And so the quilt stayed on Elrond's bed, always there to greet him when they returned to Amon Ereb each winter. And when Maedhros and Maglor informed them that they were being taken to King Gil-galad, after their protests had broken like thrown dishes against the wall of Maedhros' will, when they had given in and begun packing, Maglor had folded the quilt up and placed it in Elrond's bag, just on top of Maedhros' herbal. The corner with the ring rested face-up, and he traced it with his long, strong fingers.
"It's his wedding ring, isn't it," Elrond said. It wasn't really a question; he'd guessed as much years ago.
Maglor nodded. "It feels like I'm sending a piece of my brother away with you," he said with unusual candor.
"You are," Elrond said. "And I won't forget them. Or you."
The Sons of Fëanor were not good men, but neither were they wholly evil. Someone needed to remember that. Maedhros was grim and deadly and cooly logical, but he was also a patient teacher, prone to unexpected dry wit but never mocking his students. Maglor was equally deadly, but he had soothed their nightmares with his gentle voice and taught them all the lore he knew.
And the others…he'd learned about them, slowly. Celegorm, who had spent half his childhood sneaking his dog into his bedroom or running wild in the woods. Caranthir, who had liked numbers better than he liked most people but who had spent nearly every waking hour at Maedhros' bedside while he recovered from his torment on Thangorodrim. Curufin, whose own son had denounced him but who had spent a full day designing Himring with one hand tied behind his back, making certain that his brother could live there without hinderance. Amras, who had dragged his twin into trouble at every opportunity. And Amrod, who felt such kinship with the Green-Elves of Ossiriand that he had nearly abandoned Quenya entirely for Sindarin.
Someone needed to remember those things, after Maedhros and Maglor were gone.
"You know that we knew Gil-galad's father well," Maglor said, dragging Elrond's attention back to the present. "If they're anything alike… You'll be in good hands."
Elrond didn't answer, but wrapped his arms around Maglor in a last, unspoken goodbye.
continue reading on AO3
#elrond#sons of fëanor#sons of feanor#caranthir's wife#parmacundë#my ocs#quilting#grief#the silmarillion#silmarillion fanfiction#silm fic#silmarillion writers' guild#silmfic#tolkien fanfic#tolkien#silmarillion
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So the Ahsoka show happened, right? It was certainly...a show of all time.
But anyways, I'm interested to know what concepts about like Ahsoka and like her character you would want to see. If there was a Ahsoka show catered to you specifically. Like what arcs, what explorations of her past, what characters that are important to her would make a return? I'm just curious to see how different people on here that are super into Star Wars stuff have like different interpretations of what they would want her character to go.
*shrug* It's not like I hated it. My expectations weren't all that high (I'm well aware of filoni's limitations. I've been rewatching tcw lately and getting whammied all over again with how lazy the world-building and characterization of secondary characters can get. + the stuff I disagree with. and yet here I am!)
It's sort of difficult to say what a show catered to me would look like because a lot of what would be fun to see can't happen- everything has to comply on a basic level with the OT and with the sequels, so... there are so many things she can't do, places she can't go, people she can't see, goals she cannot achieve. She is doomed to exist on the margins and there's just more tragedy on the horizon. And I find myself disinterested in the build up to the sequels. In general but also specifically based on what I've seen in the mandalorian and in ahsoka. It hasn't grabbed me.
I guess I would have liked a continuation of her and Rex in the early rebellion? I didn't really want the bad batch, I wanted a tcw sequels about tcw characters >: |
Even if we skipped a lot, I do like that we see her take on her own apprentice and how learning that her Master was vader affected her. Mortis was never my favorite arc of the clone wars, but it is a dangling thread and it is a way to do something with her story that takes her away from the movies narrative, and I am interested to see what the hell is going to happen there.
Ahsoka has a lot of compelling elements, story-wise. There's being Anakin's apprentice of course, with him being halfway to the dark already, and all the ways she saw the best of him, but also did not escape his shadows. There's being a wartime padawan, a casualty, coming of age in a crumbling house. There's her leaving the order, and there's her losing them... tcw leaves her in such a place, she is not allowed a single victory.
In the end I suppose what I would want for her is to be a jedi. I was thinking the other day about how unlike Anakin, who was torn between two paths, Ahsoka never really wanted to be anything else, never really wanted to do anything else.
Edit: Oh, I have to admit, if we ever got more Obi Wan, I would like to see Deborah Chow take on her and obi wan together. Their last interactions were so juicy, and while I've decided they don't leave things in a terrible place I still want moar
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let's talk some facts because we don't stand for rude anons here. following on what mari was said per an anon she received. and i promise this is the only thing i will write about it because the anon clearly has beef with me too for having friends. as she said in her response, we had been friends for +4 years, more if you count the months we lurked around in a fandom.
she was one of the very first people who convinced me to watch cobra kai and it became one of my main fandoms and we built most of our interactions there. she had always been honest with me with how she feels and in turn, i had done the same, we built a friendship and trust, and we started step by step. first a meme or two, then a starter call and then, to talk. like she said, this is how i approached her out of a random joke we were doing on the dash:
one of the few reasons why dash interaction is important? this. i have met a few people here who had the same and i been writing and plotting. but the number of people who approach versus those who follow me? stagging low. but i don't complain. life is busy, i myself sometimes get dragged on and only last year i was diagnosed with chronic depression, generalized anxiety disorder and s*icide idealization. so yes, i have my bad days, and those days, my energy goes to those that make me happy. here is a nice little photo of all the meds i take:
and at this point in my life? she is my best friend here. she been there for me for the days I have panic attack and anxiety issues, as well one of the few people who knew of my attempt last year around my birthday. there is friendship, there is a bond there. but regarding roleplay? in the end, we are two people who often prefer to start things with memes and starter calls, even meme calls.
she has 40+ muses of ASOIAF, and guess what? me? in this multi 139 + my single blogs, so there is no lack of muses for you to get and send memes randomly. or send me a dm, or even better, add me on discord where it's easier to interact because I blog hop a lot.
meme calls, starter calls, meme reblogs, I always post those everywhere, memes i reblog here are welcome to be send to my other single blogs too. clearly, you have beef with me and you are taking it with mari for some odd reason when things are as simple as sending a meme. and guess what, we interact so much because i spam her with memes (across her blogs, and to her multi i send MULTIPLE choices so she can pick and grab and sometimes test new interactions). she does the same with me. sometimes, the only things i have in my drafts is her.
regarding exclusivity? we might have exclusivity regarding ships (for example, i might only ship my robb with her dany because of how we have plotted and ramble about it), does not mean either of us are closing interactions of those characters. you can have many dynamics regarding the same characters, that's what makes roleplay fun and dynamic. but again, it's a few dynamics, exclusive to maybe a verse in speciality. i'm open world, meaning i have loads of verse, not all written down but i take threads to be independent unless plotted.
I interact with mari's dany, bianca's dany and both are unique takes and beautiful portrayals of the same character and i can see it through my own characters. my own dany is also different than theirs, as i made modifications and i ship something that some usually don't (jorah x dany show version) and that's okay. to think you have no place in interacting with her (or me really) i think is more how you might feel that in a day, we reply to one another 4 or 5 times in different blogs, but that's because we took the risk.
that's how many of my interactions start; i take a risk, or someone takes a risk and sends a meme. plots and dynamics and verses.
anyways this is just a way to say that perhaps, just perhaps, you should've approached this via DMs or discord if you have her and ask for plots, but its a two way street buddy. you offer, i offer, we contribute, we modify, we create together, that's roleplaying. I will not let you guilt trip mari or me for creating together and having fun, which is the purpose of roleplaying.
so this is a long winded ramble to resume like this and perphaps a public announcement to those who read this: me and mari? spam us with memes, to the point tumblr tells you you gotta wait an hour. send a meme and then send a dm saying if it's okay. that's how we started and look how long we reached to the point friendship trascends the screen. and one day i will go to usa to visit her and probably die for saying vodoo outloud where she lives. but that's friendship.
anyways: be kind, don't send anons if you are not going to say something nice, spam your mutuals with memes (yes even in multis, just shoot your shot like nick cannon does with his baby mama's) and you will be surprised. that's what we call here:
#out of character ╲ when you play the game › mun.#long post tw#suicide mention tw#this will be the only time i post it but that anon involved me too so you get double dip but the bad one hun
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how do u think springer is doing in his time travel adventures? also writing that made me remember that verity & springer split and it made me unbearably sad again..
this is always a question that is so... like there are two answers i have for this.
one is that the end of wrequiem is the whole 'when a story ends, the characters are doing what you last saw them doing forever' thing. like. the only reason the end of wrequiem doesn't collapse in under a bunch 'wait, but then-' bits of fridge horror is that. well. the story ends there! it's an ending that makes thematic sense. it works as a kind of emotional end statement to the whole thing, petty logic aside.
but also... i mean... idw is a continuity that has multiple extended stories about time travel. and it establishes really clearly how time travel works. time travel works by default as a closed loop/solving the paradox type deal. and it's really hard to resist the temptation to pull on the thread a little! because the whole thing is so obviously futile from an in-universe perspective when considered more pragmatically; and you run into some messaging too about the entire idea of feeling like you can change the past rather than live with what you've done and experienced. and it would feel very disingenuous, i think, to read the actual story that way. but if i think about the idea of it continuing past that...
anyway. i don't think it necessarily goes well if you take that route, is what i'm saying. i wonder to what extent springer is being honest about his stated motivation being to stop the war, though. like i think he does want to do that, but there's also this whole element you could poke at i think where... springer has never lived in peacetime! springer was built during and as a product of the war, he was handed off to kup as a mentor figure who was explicitly there to teach him how to be a soldier and took him out to fight. he has never interacted with someone outside the framework of war until he meets verity. so do i think springer is going to be able to do what he says he wants and somehow avoid the war? no. but i think he will probably be able to admit to himself, eventually, that he kind of wanted to just see what it would be like to live pre-war at least as much.
but i think that would be hard. imagine going back to before one of the most destructive events in your and many other species' history and trying to live knowing that if you can't change it then everyone's fucked. not that much of an escape really, psychologically speaking. you'd second guess everything. i feel like eventually you would just lose it.
there's a couple routes you could take, i guess.
springer going back in time is a closed time loop that is in some way linked to the start of the war. this is very mean and i don't want to do this to him, even though springer's ultimate goal turning out to be 'oh wow, the fifth dad was ME' is objectively very funny as a capstone. i cannot lie.
springer going back in time is just... it's irrelevant. and he has to try and come to terms with the fact that he cannot Main Character Syndrome his way into making the myth of a single hero saving everyone true. this option feels better to me because it gives Springer an arc that engages with the real problem of a time travel story about fixing things: the degree to which it assumes the course of history is a story, not something we turn into a story later. i think you could do a lot with a Springer who was born into a war going back to a pre-war era and coming to terms with that.
i do like to imagine that maybe one day he would find himself back where he started. i think a Springer who went through all that would have a lot to talk about with Verity, who was the first chance he had to make a friend outside wartime in the here-and-now, no trying to erase old mistakes needed.
(sidenote: i went this WHOLE THING and didn't even mention the obvious. imagine his reaction to young Impactor. man.)
#i know this makes me sound like i like the latter option better#but i actually spend a lot of time thinking about the former#however this is because i am Mean and like Sad Things as is known
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