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angelplummie · 3 years

Note

Okay so like for starterssssss, I love getting represented as a chubby gal 🥺🥺 so I love you for writing that last Oikawa imagineeeee 😩😩😩

Soooo, I was wondering if I could request a plus size reader that really likes Kuroo, (and he’s like a super cliché bad boy🤰🏽) but he’s too embarrassed to be seen with Y/n. So she starts to hit on his friend or try to make him jealous. (I want you to add your own little idea here! But likeee, make her a baddie 😘😘)

Thanks baby 😚

HE’S A SCUMBAG DON’T YOU KNOW

KUROO X CHUBBY F!READER

Angsty?? kinda, a pinch of suggestive stuff

masterlist

post girlboss was referring to

a/n:i decided to go for emo / anger issues / definitely has punched a hole in his wall kuroo, just cuz i love writing losers, and i love seeing grown men cry. reader is like 20/21 just like college age yk, kuroo is 23 as stated in fic. p.s where my artic monkey hoes at

warnings: swearing, mentions of sex n specific sexual acts, suggestive stuff, uhhh bad boy but he’s not a (bad boy) he’s just a (bad) (boy) he’s just no good, like no fr never date guys like this, he may SEEM COOL and give you the dick but girl you will be so embarrassed once u realised u gave up the kitty for a man that genuinely believes tame impala and mac demarco are unheard of and calls himself an empath even though he’s mean to his mum every time she comes over to help with the laundry and has manipulated every girl he’s ever been in the vicinity of but i digress! on with the story!

“Kuroo-!” you yelped in surprised, bed bouncing beneath you. The second he had thrown you down, he ripped off his shirt and made a noise of frustration when he couldn’t shed his skinny jeans fast enough. Brows furrowed, he began hopping furiously to yank them off.

You laughed, much to his annoyance.

“You’re gonna hurt yourself if you keep up with that. What’s the rush?”

He sighed, and carefully pulled them off his ankles. Standing up straight, he seemed to have composed himself, with that cocky smirk on his rugged face. Your eyes trailed down his lean, long body. It was all you could do not to scream, he was so gorgeous. He took a few sweeping steps to where you lay, and got right on top of you, hands either side of your head. His eyes bore into you, it made you squirm internally, not that you would ever admit it.

“Just want you so bad, kitten.”

You barked out a laugh as if your heart didn’t jolt at his stupid pet name. It was such a stupid name, but coming from him it made you melt. Again, not like you’d ever admit it.

“Ew, Tetsu don’t call me kitten, it’s cr-“

He cut you off by leaning down and kissing you, you could feel his snake bites against your bottom lip. He groaned softly, shoving his tongue down your throat. He tasted like his sour apple vape, and his hair was soft when you ran your fingers through it. You could barely contain your butterflies, eyes squeezed closed.

“Come on babe, you know you like it.”

No matter how many times you and Kuroo hung out, it always felt so fresh. Maybe it was because he was exciting, or because he was a little bit wild, you didn’t know.

He leaned down closer to you, getting on his elbows, deepening the kiss. He pulled away and smirked at your breathlessness. With a slender, ring adorned hand, he reached beneath your top and cupped your tits over your bra. He gave them a sharp squeeze and started placing chaste kisses on your neck. He was considerate like that, didn’t leave hickeys because he knew they’d be hard to cover for you. He groaned as he jiggled the fat of your boobs in his hands,

“God, you have the nicest tits, babe.”

You had been dating for nearly 3 months now, if that was what it was. To be honest, you weren’t really sure what you were. You hang out all the time at his or your place, there was rarely a time when you didn’t have an ache between your legs, one way or another. He didn’t really take you on ‘dates’ but chatting to him was fun in itself, you didn’t need to go out to do that. He didn’t necessarily say romantic stuff either... but he didn’t not say romantic stuff either? He beat up your ex at a party one time! That had to mean something right? He exactly wouldn’t tell you how he felt but he showed you, kissing your cheek or tilting your chin up to look at him or kissing your neck or feeling you up. But that usually led to sex, so you couldn’t be certain. It wasn’t like you only screwed though, you watched your favourite movies together... although the last couple times he just started fingering you. You showed him your playlists? No no, he showed you his playlists, his sex playlists. There seemed to be a common theme here. But... there were times, afterwards, when he would pull in you so tight, tell you how good you were for him, how well you did, how pretty you looked. Any doubts you had were gone after a few hushed words on his tobacco reeking rickety old bed. You’d never really had a relationship like this before, but you assumed it was just because Kuroo was so chill. You were probably boyfriend and girlfriend, he just didn’t feel the need to announce it, he was laidback like that. So what if you guys had a lot of sex? Weren’t you a new couple? Wasn’t this just the honeymoon stage were you can’t get your hands off each other? You didn’t want to seem high maintenance and nag, so you let it be. He was sweet enough to you, right now everything was good.

Until it wasn’t.

A clatter sounded downstairs, the door slamming open against the hallway wall.

“Kuroo! Hey man, I brought some California!”, a voice called from bellow.

Kuroo broke away immediately, spit trailing from your neck to his pink lips.

“Shit, shit, shit, shit,” Kuroo mumbled, pushing off the bed and scrambling the pick up his discarded clothes and shove them back on.

You sat up, disgruntled, rearranging your bra strap from were he’d kneaded at it.

“What’s wrong? Who is that?”

He shot you a glance before continuing to yank back on his jeans.

“Uh, so change of plan, I can’t do tonight. I need you to go home. Discreetly.”

What?

“What? Tetsu, I’m already here,” you scoffed.

What was going on?

Why was he acting like this?

You had never seen him so... frantic.

“I know babe, and I’m really sorry about that, but my friends are here early than I said.”

“So? Can’t I meet your friends?”

He didn’t reply for a moment, just let out an exasperated breath, zipping up his fly.

“Well, yeah you can meet them, just not with me. I don’t want them knowing that I-“

He cut himself off, but you had heard enough to understand.

There was a beat of silence, only disturbed by Kuroo’s friends calling for him.

Your mouth hung open, and you scoffed in shock.

You shouldn’t be surprised really. It’s so obvious now that you think about it. So that’s what this was. That explains everything. He didn’t really like you, he was just using you. That’s why he didn’t take you anywhere, or why he didn’t show you he cared. It was because he didn’t. He wasn’t “afraid of getting close to people” or “emotionally distant”, he was just upfront about not giving two shits about you aside from your vagina. I guess he didn’t want his friends to know he was furiously screwing a fat girl any chance he got. He was embarrassed of you. You were something to be ashamed of. Your stomach jerked as you got to your feet. You were pissed, but that didn’t mean it didn’t really hurt. You had liked him. A lot.

“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?”

You could see the panic in his eyes, it was quite funny actually. Of course you new what it meant, but it still made you feel a little better to watch his eyes widen like that, to hold a shred of power over him.

“I mean- well I didn’t- come on babe you know I didn’t mean it like that-“ he laughed nervously, not noticing the footsteps in the landing. You rolled your eyes. You may have been naive, but you certainly weren’t going to fall for his shit again. Whatever he spouted.

“Don’t give me that bullshit. Just say it, your embarrassed of me.”

“Y/N, please, don’t you think-“

Two men burst through the door, one with spiked grey hair and one with fluffy black hair.

“Kuroo! What the hell are you doing up here we’ve been-“ the grey haired one, stopped when his eyes went from a shirtless Kuroo to you.

Your eyes flickered to Kuroo, he looked mortified.

“Ah. I see. Well, Akaashi, we better give these two some time, we can just-“

“Oh no, I was just leaving,” you grabbed your jacket from on top of his chest of drawers and turned back to the two men, putting on a big smile, adrenaline and fury spurring you on.

“I’m Y/N, by the way.”

Your eyes shot to Kuroo, who looking like get was about to shit himself.

“You probably haven’t heard of me, me and Kuroo have actually been having sex for three months. He kept it a secret because he’s embarrassed of me. We should hang out soon though!”

“Y/N-!” Kuroo yelled, exasperation clear in his tone, but you were already descending the stairs.

He came into the hall, hands rubbing his temples.

“Y/N just come talk for a second, I can-“

But he was cut off by the door slamming.

You got in your car parked outside and sped away.

The whir of the engine and the monotony of the roads cleared your mind a bit, a mist of anger still remaining.

You can’t believe you let yourself be tricked. you were a fully grown woman, but you had been reeled in hook, line and sinker. Not only had you been reeled in, you have been reeled in by a man that still had tik tok LED lights in his room and a fucking monster can collection at the age of 24 fucking years old. The more you thought about him, the more you realised how much of an emo loser he was. Of course you were still hurting, but it was more of the angry hurt you feel when it turns out your crush is homophobic or something (been there done that, don’t ask). He was a waste of oxygen, you had decided by the time you made it back to your apartment. A waste of perfectly good space that could most definitely not get the kitty anymore. You got inside your house, pulled on some comfies and got on facetime with your friends.You told them all about what happened, and they passionately bitched about him with you, confirming your suspicion that they never liked him in the first place. They also told you to forget about his existence, he wasn’t worth a slither of your brain power, he was dirt compared to you. All in all, you felt marginally better, saying goodbye to your friends while they still giggled about how stupid Kuroo’s hair was.

This was just a speed bump, you thought as you tucked yourself into bed, you would get over this.

Fast.

“Who’s Bokuto been talking to all night?” Yamamoto leaned over to ask Lev, shouting over the blaring music.

It was a week after you had thrown Kuroo to the curb, and he was out with a couple of volleyball friends, some from Nekoma, but there was also Bokuto with them.

“I’m not sure. I think it’s Y/N something? She’s in class. She’s pretty chill.”

Kuroo’s ears perked up, and he turned around to face his friends up against the bar.

“Bokuto’s talking to who?” he said through gritted teeth.

“Y/N. She goes to my-“

“I know who Y/N is,” kuroo snapped, taking a swig of the beer in his hand and scanning the dance floor for either one of you. He found bokuto first, shoulder against the wall, holding a drink as he leant down to have you whisper something in his ear. That’s when Kuroo paid attention to you. You looked... you looked gorgeous. He felt jealousy creep up inside him. How many times had you been out looking like that since you broke things off? How many guys had you slept with since? How dare Bokuto chat you up when he knew you two had been a thing? Wasn’t he meant to be Kuroo’s friend? As Kuroo wound himself up, you and bokuto continued your extremely pleasant conversation.

“I just wanna say, sorry about Kuroo. He’s a real bonehead, but we’ve been friends since high school so I can’t ditch him.”

You snorted into your cocktail.

“What?”

“Bonehead?”

He frowned and straightened up indignantly.

“Yeah, and? What’s wrong with bonehead?”

“No no, nothing, it’s just very Legally Blonde.”

He beamed down at you.

“I love Legally Blonde!”

“You do? Me too!”

This big beefy man was very cute, you had been talking for nearly three hours now, but you never ran out of things to say. And, aside from the obligatory introduction compliments, he had not made any move to try and get you into a wendy’s bathroom as quick as possible, which you couldn’t say of yours and kuroo’s first meeting.

He had dreamy eyes, you noted as he smiled for the nth time that night.

“Whose your favourite-?”

“What the fuck are you doing man?”

You glanced scathingly over to the familiar face of your old fling.

“What?” Bokuto asked back, clearly done with his friends bad boy shtick.

“Why are you talking to her when... when you know?”

“What’s there to know? I’m talking to her because I want to, and she wants to.”

He looked over to you for approval.

“Right?”

You nodded, a little nervous. You hated Kuroo’s guts, but you knew how weirdly possessive he was, you didn’t wanna cause trouble for Bokuto.

“See? Now I don’t think she wants to see you, right?”

He looked at you again. You nodded again.

“Ok? You guys are over, now are we done?”

Kuroo huffed. His eyes flitted from Bokuto to you, remembering you were there most likely, and he scowled.

“No, we aren’t done, what are you trying to pull anyway? Trying to piss me off by talking to someone I know? Are you really that petty? Well, your little plan is working, so just-just stop, ok?”

You felt like screaming. You had just come out here to have a nice time, not listen to Kuroo’s narcissistic whining.

“Can you just fuck off? Was I not clear enough or something? You’re dead to me, Kuroo. I’m just trying to have a nice night.”

Kuroo’s mouth gaped open. He had never been spoken to like that, never. He clenched his fists at his sides and his glare intensified.

“You’re lucky I gave you the time of day, fat ugly slut.”

He grabbed Bokuto’s shoulder roughly, turning him to face him completely.

“Hey man, thanks for clearing up my sloppy seconds, really good of you. Good to know I’ve got great friends like you.”

Those were the last things out of Kuroo’s mouth before bokuto landed a punch on his cheek, knocking him to the ground.

“You’re a fucking asshole man,” Bokuto grunted.

He stepped over where Kuroo lay, and held out a hand for you to step over too. You took it quietly and trailed along behind him to the door, fingers still locked. His hands were warm, and big. Kuroo’s face must hurt right now. The thought made you smile. He held the door open for you before sighing, resting his back against the wall. You stood in front of him, twiddling with your fingers.

“I am so sorry about that,” You apologised, embarrassed and shaken by the scene Kuroo had made, “I shouldn’t have wound him up, and I shouldn’t have talked to you after I knew you guys were friends, I promise I didn’t mean to start anything.”

“Don’t be, if anything I’m sorry for not making him leave right away. And either way,” he gently reached for your hand again, and you let him take it,”I’m glad you talked to me. I’d like it if you talked to me even more.”

DISCLAIMER FOR KUROO STANS!!!! I DONT THINK HIS HAIR IS STUPID!!! it’s just when ur bestie is going thru a break up or anything entailing a male you shit talk everything about him to high hell, doesn’t matter if he’s the most beautiful man you’ve ever seen. also i have no ill will towards kuroo nor any of the characters i write shit bag fan fics about i just like to complain any way i hope you enjoyed! reblogs and replies always appreciated!!!

#haikyu x reader #haikyu x y/n #haikyuu fanfiction #haikyuu!!#hq x y/n #haikyu angst #haikyuu angst #hq angst #hq x reader #angst #kuroo x reader #kuroo smut #kuroo angst #kuroo tetsurou #bo x reader #haikyuu x chubby reader

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fruitcoops · 3 years

Note

hii would you write a coops fic that takes place before they’re out when they’re still sneaking around but have like a sweet date night at remus’s apartment

Of course! This is a continuation of Newcomers and Nargles, where Remus babysits Luna Lovegood. Hope you enjoy! SW credit goes to @lumosinlove <3

“Thank you for having me over,” Sirius said quietly as he pressed a kiss to the corner of Remus’ mouth. The only light came from his kitchen, which was far enough away that they were left in soft shadows on his couch. “Really, Re, this is wonderful.”

“There’s no need to be so formal,” he laughed, though Sirius could see the pink flush spreading to his ears. “It’s just pasta and my apartment.”

“I love your apartment.”

The flush deepened. “Moody calls it my hamster cage. You had to duck to get in the door.”

“Details.” Sirius leaned forward for a proper kiss to his lips; they had set a timer for the pasta and had a while yet, if his memory was correct. Plenty of time to settle himself more comfortably in Remus’ lap and kiss him until he got the glazed look in his eyes that Sirius adored.

He wanted this all the time. To come home with Remus every night, without fear of the wrong person (or anyone, really) seeing them. He wanted to kiss him in public and keep his hand in Remus’ back pocket like a cliché movie couple and watch Remus light up when he held his hand. He wanted.

Remus made a soft noise and slid his arms around his waist, holding him light and cozy while he traced small swirls on the small of Sirius’ back. It sent goosebumps racing along his spine—Sirius cupped Remus’ jaw in his hands and hummed his approval. The room was so wonderfully warm, filled with the smell of cooking pasta and sauce on the stove. They had made it together; shoulder-to-shoulder, hip-to-hip, trading kisses in the steam.

God, he wanted it so much it ached.

Remus trailed light kisses along his neck, taking pauses to nuzzle Sirius’ skin and nibble his collarbones. Sirius buried his face in honey curls and let himself believe this was his everyday life. Their everyday life.

A quick knock at the door shattered the illusion. Sirius felt the blood flee his face as they both froze. “Who is that?” he managed.

“I don’t know,” Remus whispered. His pupils were dilated with fear and, with a pained look, he guided Sirius off his lap so he could stand and turn the rest of the lights on. His slender hands smoothed his sweater and jeans in methodical movements, but Sirius saw their tremors.

He distracted himself from panic by looking around the apartment and all its knickknacks; the feeling of being surrounded by Remus in his most distilled form was unparalleled. A little granite wolf figurine sat with its wooden counterpart on the table by the door; dozens of pictures of family and friends scattered the walls with no rhyme or reason to their placement. It was cluttered in the best possible way, and Sirius wanted his whole life to look like it.

The door clicked open. “Hello?”

“Remus!” a woman’s voice exclaimed. “I’m so glad you answered.”

Sirius glanced over and saw Remus’ whole body relax as he opened the door further with a smile. “Hey, Pandora, how are you?”

“Doing fine, doing fine. It’s Phil and I’s anniversary and we’ve got dinner at 7:18, but Luna’s babysitter came down with a cold and can’t make it. We just got the text an hour ago and we were hoping you could watch her while we’re out.”

“Oh.” Remus’ eyebrows shot up. “I—well, I have a friend over for dinner, but we made plenty of pasta for one more, I s’pose. Sirius, is that okay with you?”

It took him a moment longer than was prudent to get over the fact that Remus—kind-hearted, friendly, beautiful, so beautiful—was asking his opinion on letting a kid join their date. Their top-secret, possibly-life-ruining-if-discovered date. “Yeah, that’s fine.”

“Oh, I’m so rude!” the woman gasped. She poked her head around the doorway and waved to Sirius—her long blonde hair cascaded over her shoulder in a messy plait, and her dress seemed to be made of a variety of beads. She was pretty, with a combination of angular features and a heart-shaped face that nudged a memory in the very back of his mind. “I’m Pandora Lovegood, from 7A. It’s so lovely to meet you.”

“Nice to meet you as well.” He padded over and held a hand out to shake, but to his surprise she took it turned it over, furrowing her brow at his palm.

“Well, that’s quite the love line!” She smiled and patted his cheek. Her eyes were glacial blue, but somehow still as warm as a crackling hearth. “Good for you. Your life line isn’t bad, either. I’ll be back with Luna in a moment!”

“Have a good night, Pandora!” Remus called as she fluttered away. “Say hi to Phil for me!”

Sirius was still standing in mild shock when the door closed. “Pandora, Luna, and…Phil?”

“Xenophilius,” Remus said. The corners of his mouth twitched. “Her husband, and Luna’s dad.”

“Hell of a name.”

“We can’t really judge, can we?” Some of his amusement dimmed and he ran a hand through his hair. “I’m sorry for ruining our date. I shouldn’t have done that.”

“No, it’s alright,” Sirius said quickly, kissing his cheek until he smiled. “You didn’t ruin anything.”

Remus looked a bit sad as he looked up despite his smile. “Yeah, but this is our only time together.”

“It’s not the last time I can ever come over to your apartment,” Sirius reminded him as he ran his hands up Remus’ arms. “I think it’s great that you’re doing this for your neighbors. It shows how caring, and sweet, and wonderful—”

“Alright, alright, I get it,” he laughed, cutting Sirius off with a vivid blush.

“Besides, I agreed to this.” He nudged their noses together. “I’m pretty sure my impressive love line can handle another date sometime soon.”

Remus grinned as he leaned in. “Don’t get ahead of yourself, Black.”

“Are you going to stop me?”

A tumbling sound came from outside, followed by a peal of giggling and a sharp pattern of knocking. “I did a cartwheel!” a tiny ball of blonde curls announced as it launched itself at Remus’ legs the second the door opened. “Hi, Remus!”

He caught her with a slight wince as Sirius tried to calm his pounding heart. “Hey, sunshine, are you ready for some dinner?”

“Oh, yes, please.” She wriggled down from his arms and gave her mother a bear hug, beaming when her face was covered in kisses.

“Be good,” Pandora said as she set Luna down and brushed her hair out of her face. “Listen to Remus and his friend. We’ll be back by ten at the latest. Thank you both again for doing this. I’ll bring over some cookies tomorrow, Remus.”

“That’s very sweet, Pandora.” Remus’ eyes tensed at the edges, as if he was in pain at the very thought. Pandora whisked herself toward the stairs again and Sirius shut the door behind her. “Luna, do you—”

“I remember you!” Sirius turned and found himself staring into the biggest pair of blue eyes he had ever seen. The memory came rushing back in a flood—Remus, frazzled and fluffed at the edges, with a little girl balanced on his hip. Luna stood on her tippy-toes and he leaned down so she could take his face in her hands. After a moment, she nodded. “You’ve done an excellent job of keeping the nargles away, Mr. Sirius.”

“Thank you.”

“Mama said you and Remus were making pasta. May I have some, please?”

“Of course you can,” Remus assured her, ushering her into the kitchen with a sweep of his arm. “After you, my lady.”

Sirius waited until Luna had safely skipped out of earshot before bending toward Remus’ ear. “Why does she…?”

“Talk like a normal kid and then a Victorian orphan?”

“Yeah.”

“Dunno. I guess that’s what happens when your mom’s a chemist and part-time psychic and your dad owns The Quibbler.” There wasn’t a trace of judgement on Remus’ face as he raised his voice by a few degrees. “Be careful by the stove, honeybun.”

“I will!” Luna chirped back. Sirius couldn’t place why, but he held undeniable affection for the little girl, even after only two meetings. She was unapologetically odd; he was sure he could never get bored of talking with her.

Luna sat on the countertop while they served up dinner, happy as a clam as she recounted her and her father’s hunt for Fizzing Whizbees at the candy store. They were her mother’s favorite, apparently, but Luna had yet to see one in real life. Her conversational skills came to a sharp halt during dinner; it was so startling that Sirius grew concerned after two minutes without her high-pitched contributions.

“Luna? Are you alright?”

“Hmm?” She looked up from her plate with a curious glance between them and gave Sirius a bright smile. “I’m making an octocapus.”

“An octopus?” Remus leaned over to look. “Wow, you got all the legs with your noodles! Way to go!”

“You’re a great artist,” Sirius agreed as Luna continued working on her masterpiece.

“Yeah, I know.”

He bit his lip to keep in his laughter and met Remus’ eyes; at first, he had been a bit worried about babysitting during a date, but he couldn’t imagine a better way to spend the night. When their plates were clean and Sirius was warm and drowsy from carbohydrates, Remus collected the dishes and headed back into the kitchen despite Sirius’ offers for help.

Luna gave a wide yawn with her head propped on one hand and turned to Sirius the moment Remus turned the sink on. “Do you give Remus kisses?”

It took all of Sirius’ self-control not to accidentally spew water all over the literal child sitting across from him. Instead, he coughed and spluttered into his napkin while the alarms in his brain began to blare. Remus showed no sign of hearing their conversation while he rinsed out the large pasta pot. “What?”

“I’d like it if you did,” Luna continued with nothing but her usual dreamy expression. “Remus needs friends, and mama says he could use some kisses.”

“I think everyone could use some kisses,” Sirius said evasively. His heart galloped in his chest.

“Hmm. Yeah. How long have you been friends?”

“We’ve known each other a little longer than you’ve been alive, but we’ve only been friends for about two years.”

“That’s a good amount of time.”

“Oh?”

She put her chin in both palms, suddenly looking much older than she was. “I’ve been alive for four whole years. That’s a long time. If you’ve known someone for four whole years, you should give them kisses.”

Sirius stared at her. “That’s quite the philosophy.”

“What’s that?”

“An idea.”

“Why didn’t you just say ‘idea’?”

“I…don’t know.”

She hummed a little under her breath. “Will you color with me?”

“Yes,” he answered as relief coursed through him. He had no clue how she had gone from blunt questions that could turn his whole world upside down to coloring, but he didn’t care. “Yes, I would love to.”

Luna slid off her seat and hopped over to Remus’ desk, then dug around in the drawers and emerged with a few sheets of blank paper and some pens. “I’m bad at outlines. Will you draw them for me?”

“Absolutely.”

------------------------

Luna fell asleep halfway through coloring a Kneazle with Remus, which as far as Sirius could understand was just a cat that had its face squished. But it made her happy, and he would draw a million squishy cats to keep her questions about Remus to a minimum.

As soon as Remus finished tucking her in beneath a heavy blanket on the couch, he turned and crushed his lips against Sirius’ like a man dying for air. The kiss lasted long enough that Sirius was staring to get lightheaded before finding himself the (quite enthusiastic) recipient of a rib-crushing hug. They held each other for a few minutes, silent and swaying, before Remus let him go with a final kiss and they began to clean up the mess.

True to her word, Pandora returned just before ten pm with a blond man at her side and a big hug for her daughter. “Goodnight, Luna,” Remus whispered. They received a sleepy wave in response and then, finally, they were alone. “You are the best person ever.”

Sirius wound his arms around Remus’ waist and melted a little when strong hands combed through his hair. “Funny, I could say the same thing about you.”

“I didn’t know you could draw.”

He shrugged one shoulder. “I can doodle. It’s nothing fancy.”

“You drew imaginary monsters based on descriptions from a four-year-old.” Remus cupped his cheek and rested their foreheads together. “You’re amazing.”

“This was a pretty awesome date,” he mumbled, closing his eyes to bask in their little bubble.

“We should do it again sometime. Preferably without the child, though.”

Sirius’ smile came all the way from his heart as he buried his face in the slope of Remus’ neck. “As long as I get to be with you, I’m happy.”

It was the closest thing to ‘I love you’ he could bring himself to admit, but for now, it would have to do.

#sirius black #remus lupin #coops #luna lovegood #pandora lovegood #sweater weather #lumosinlove #my fic #fanfic #babysitting #date night

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heliads · 3 years

Text

Forever Separated

Based on this request: “Reader is Luke’s girlfriend in the 90’s and is at the gig at the Orpheum and hit by a drunk driver and dies instantly. She and the boys come back as ghosts 25 years later. She’s there for everything that goes down with Julie, Willie, and Caleb.”

masterlist

Your fingers tap absentmindedly on the steering wheel as you careen through the streets. It’s late now, the beacons of headlights guiding you down the asphalt. There’s a grin on your face that won’t seem to go away- your boys are playing at the Orpheum tonight. The Orpheum. That’s been their dream for what feels like forever. It doesn’t even seem true.

By your boys, you mean Sunset Curve, of course. The motley collection of four teenage boys with dreams bigger than the world and the need for a chance to prove themselves. You stumbled across them at a small jazz club, at what had been one of their first performances. It hadn’t been long after that when you had become a friend of the bandmates, and an even shorter time before you fell in love with Luke. When you started dating, it felt like everything was finally falling into place.

You had always known that they would make it, even when they seemed to doubt it themselves. You knew they had gathered regrets over the years- Reggie with the fracturing of his family, Alex with his parents’ lack of acceptance of him, and Luke with the way he’d run out on his mother. You had seen it in their faces- if their band never got off of the ground, they would continue to doubt themselves for the rest of their lives. There had been times when you thought that it might be over for good, that they’d be done for before they even got the chance to get started. Yet here you are now, driving towards their gig at the Orpheum.

You’re only a couple of streets away. You’re practically shivering with anticipation at the thought of it- all of their dreams and hopes, finally come to fruition. You, however, are running a little late despite your best interests, and so your foot involuntarily presses down on the gas. You’re not speeding, always careful to follow traffic laws, just making sure you’re not going to be as late as you fear.

It only seems fitting that something would go wrong on this night of nights. Thinking back, you’re almost glad it happened to you and not someone else. You had this awful feeling that something was going to happen to ruin this gig, and maybe if it happened to you it would protect the boys and let their show run on uninterrupted. When you pass through the intersection, this thought may have protected you.

When you see the truck out of the corner of your eye, you continue driving. You know it will stop, it has to. Maybe it’s the way you’re eager to see your boys again, or the fact that the light has been green for a long time now and there’s no way the driver could miss the glaring red in front of him. Maybe it’s just because you feel sheltered by this bubble of hope that comes with seeing the boy you love play at the Orpheum. Regardless, there is nothing you can do to avoid the truck, and you keep expecting that it will stop until it is inches away from you. Then you finally realize that there’s no getting out of this, and it is only then that it is too late to act.

You’ve seen car crashes in the movies. They’re always a blazing whirl of headlights and screeching tires, a hailstorm of broken glass that reflects the light in the most beautiful arc around you. It will be slow, like time itself crawls to a stop, just in time for your head to fly back in a graceful motion. Then it will speed up again, and just like that it will be over.

This is nothing like that. It is over an instant, no beautifully devastating moments. You’re not a marionette to be hung delicately in the air, your strings are cut within seconds. You do not have time to see the poetry in your last moments, they’re already over. All you manage to see is a quick glimpse of a bottle resting in the driver’s hands, a tremendous impact like the very shaking of the earth, and then there is nothing at all. No orchestras reach a momentum, no lens flares pierce the night. There is everything, and then there is nothing. It is painfully ordinary.

There is one feeling that seems to surround it all. A pain, numb at first and then growing to a fever pitch. You don’t know when you wake up, only that it is much later. There’s someone dressed in a paramedic’s uniform standing over you, the piercing din of an ambulance somewhere behind you. You want to form words together and ask who it’s for, but the answer comes to you the second you realize you can’t move a muscle. It is for you. You are the one in need of saving.

The paramedic is standing over you, shouting something about a drunk driver and two casualties, the driver and the girl right here. You want to stand up, to shout to the world that you’re alive and fine. But for some reason, you can’t move at all. You can’t say anything except feel the last of your pulse die from your veins. Distantly, you feel a raw anguish creeping up in your throat. Luke and the others are still waiting for you at the Orpheum. Who will tell them that you’re gone?

It should have been over then. You died, certainly. You bled out on the streets and ceased to draw breath. Indeed, you had the classic fading of color and acceptance of the darkness just like everyone else. It appears that you will only have access to the clichés of the stories in death. It’s oddly fitting. Regardless of the beauty of it, you died. End of story.

Or at least, it should have been the end. Yet, you find yourself standing again, waiting at the back of a crowded room. You stare at your hands, at your body, which appears unharmed. Your eyes travel from yourself to the people in front of you. Your parents sit in chairs, their backs to you. They’re looking over a photo album, crying softly. “She was so young. She could have done so much more. I miss her, even though it’s been so long.”

You step forward, but the ground makes no sound underneath your feet. “Y/N wouldn’t want you to be sad. She would want you to remember her with happiness, not with tears, right?” Your mother nods sadly. “I can’t seem to help it, though.” An icy chill runs through your veins as you realize what’s happened. All you can think about is that you need to get away from here, somewhere where you won’t be surrounded by people mourning your death.

And then you’re gone. One minute you’re in your home, the next minute you’re standing on the sidewalk outside. Although you look around frantically, no one notices your sudden appearance. No one, that is, except one boy. He’s riding a skateboard, long dark hair tucked underneath a helmet. He stops suddenly, staring at you. “Hey, you just poofed here out of nowhere. You’re a ghost?”

You stare at him. “You can see me?” He nods. “You must be new to this ghost business if you’ve got questions. I’m Willie, by the way.” You smile weakly at him. “Y/N. I guess I would have to be a ghost if I died in the accident.” Willie winces. “Ooh, accidents. Those hurt. I died around the early 80s, a couple of decades ago, so I know what you mean.” You stare at him. “The 80s weren’t a couple of decades ago. They were recent.”

Willie shakes his head. “Sorry, man. You must have only been brought back as a ghost recently. It’s the 2020s right now.” You shake your head slowly. “That means it’s been 30 years since I died. How is that possible?” Willie places a hand on your shoulder, and for some reason the gesture is surprisingly comforting. “Hey, not a whole lot about the ghost stuff makes sense. If you want to talk about it, though, I’m here.” You smile at him. “I’d like that a lot, actually.”

Willie ends up becoming a fast friend. He explains everything there is to know about ghosts, and the two of you have fun messing around with your ghost abilities, whatever those are. It’s nice to have someone who understands about the ghost business, and you find that in leaps and bounds with Willie.

One day, you’re lying on a grassy hill admiring the clouds when Willie poofs into existence next to you. For some reason, he looks almost flushed with excitement, cheeks pink with thrill. “You won’t believe who I met. The cutest guy. He’s a new ghost, too.” You grin over at him. “Already making moves? You’re unreal.” Willie rolls his eyes. “I played it safe. We had a nice chat. He seems very cool, in a band or something. I think he plays the drums. Alex, was in a band called Sunset Curve. I think that’s a good name for a band, and I’ve heard a lot of bad ones.”

You sit up suddenly, all thoughts of the bright afternoon sun quickly abandoned. “What did you say? About Sunset Curve?” Willie frowns. “That’s the guy’s band. Or, it was until he died. He’s about our age, played in a band called Sunset Curve.” You shake your head slowly. “That makes no sense. They should have grown up a long time ago.” Willie still seems confused, so you clarify. “I know Alex, and I know the rest of his bandmates. I was friends with them until I died.” You fix him with a sudden purposeful look. “I need you to bring me to meet these guys.”

Willie has to ask around, but eventually he finds Alex and discovers that they’re staying in their old studio, now inhabited by the Molina family. You thank him, setting off as soon as you can. As you stand outside the doors to the studio, you find yourself suddenly nervous. Will they want to see you? Will they understand what happened?

The faint sounds of music drifting out from the doors is what convinces you. It sounds just like them, like this is another afternoon from the 90s when you’re meeting up with Luke and the others. You gather your courage and knock twice on the doors, then push them open. You stand for a moment in the doorway, staring. The boys stare back at you. It’s funny- everyone looks the exact same, even though everything has changed.

Then there’s a voice from the back of the room. It’s quiet, as if he’s afraid to say anything lest the moment be fractured away into nothingness. “Y/N?” Luke steps forward, disbelief warring with hope in his eyes. You nod slowly. “Luke?” Luke stands still for a moment longer, then runs forward, wrapping you in his arms and pulling you close. You tuck your head into the space between his head and his shoulder, letting yourself relax once more.

After what could be ten seconds or ten minutes, Luke reluctantly pulls away. He cups your face in his hand, just staring with awe. “How are you here? We died- you weren’t at the Orpheum-” You laugh bitterly. “I died too. There was a drunk driver on the road, he hit me when I was just a couple of blocks away. I was so close, that was the worst part.” Luke nods slowly. “I remember hearing sirens. I didn’t know it was you.”

Something like guilt passes over his face, and you hurriedly shake your head. “It wasn’t your fault. You couldn’t have known. I guess you died some time after that?” Luke nods. “Just before the show. We never got to play.” A sad sigh rips from his chest, and you pull him close again. It isn’t fair, not at all. He shouldn’t have died, you shouldn’t have died. He should not have been robbed of this chance to live the dream he always wanted.

There’s the sound of a throat clearing from across the room. “You know, we’re here too. Not just Luke.” You look up, laughing. “Sorry, Reggie, Alex. Love you guys too. I’m glad we can all be dead together.” Alex flashes you a thumbs up from across the room. “Me too, Y/N. Me too.” Luke laughs now, albeit reluctantly. You squeeze his hand one more time, then step into the room, greeting the other boys.

Your gaze falls upon a figure you don’t recognize- a girl, about your age if not a year younger. She has dark, curly hair and a fascinated smile. “Hi, I’m Y/N.” The girl startles. “Julie. Julie Molina. It’s nice to meet you- you must be the girl Luke keeps talking about.” You toss a grin Luke’s way. “You’ve been talking about me?” Luke moves to deny this, but Reggie speaks up loudly. “So often. You have no idea. He’s been very sad.”

Luke glares at his friend, but you just grin, pressing a kiss to his cheek. “Well, it’s nice to feel wanted.” Luke beams at you, still thrilled that you’re here again. “Trust me, you are. I can’t believe you get to stay with me.”

Neither can you, actually. Somehow, despite the fact that you died and came back again, Luke did the same, and you can be with him again. You’ve lost everything- your family, your future, your life, but you still have him. It feels impossible, but it’s true.

This isn’t to say that life is smooth sailing from here. It turns out Luke, Alex, and Reggie have gotten themselves tangled in the mess that is Caleb’s club, and they’ve got the stamps to prove it. You find yourself holding Luke close while he spasms from jolt after jolt, forcing smiles to pretend like it doesn’t kill you every time he’s in pain. You also have to defend Willie to the rest, as he’s been your friend for a while and would never knowingly betray them. You have a feeling that Alex is pretty happy to hear this.

At last, you find the way to save Luke and save the boys- another performance at the Orpheum, this time as their unfinished business. Standing outside the building, staring up at the blinking neon signs, you can’t help but feel some strange feeling in the pit of your stomach. This feels like a sick twist of deja vu. This is how you died- waiting for the boys’ performance at the Orpheum. Staying here now, in the same position but after you’ve died, feels somehow wrong.

You try to shake the thoughts from your head, slipping inside the building to go find Luke, Julie, and the others. This isn’t like that night, you can’t die twice. Everything is going to be fine. Yet when you walk in the dressing room and catch sight of a panicked Flynn trying to calm a visibly shaken Julie, you have a feeling that things aren’t exactly smooth sailing.

Julie looks up when she sees you appear in the room. “Y/N, it’s good to see you. Have you seen Luke and the boys?” You shake your head, a crease forming between your brows. “No, not since I left the studio to let you say your goodbyes. Have they not shown up?” Julie sinks back down in a chair, hands pressed to her temples. “Not at all.” You slump against a wall. This feels like history repeating itself again- you dead, the boys not showing up to their performance at the Orpheum. No matter how many times you tell a story, it tends to end the same way.

Distraught, you wander back through the building to attempt to find the boys, but your search is to no avail. They’re nowhere to be found. You stumble through the auditorium just to see Julie taking the stage. You have a brief, wild hope that she’s managed to find them, but then you see the red rims of her teary eyes and hear the goodbye she issues to the crowd. If they haven’t shown up, then that means-

You try to distract yourself by listening to Julie sing. It brings a smile to your face in spite of yourself. Julie is a bright firecracker of a girl, and it’s been wonderful to get to know her. At least you know you have her at the end of this. Yet when the beat drops, Alex appears in a flash of sparks. You stand up, pressing forward through the crowd as if your proximity will do anything more to bring them back. Yes- there goes Reggie, and there’s Luke struggling to flicker back into existence. You send out a silent plea: bring him back, please. You can’t do this without him.

Then he’s back again, and you feel like your heart might burst. He flashes you a grin, as if to promise that nothing could separate you again. You smile back at him, finally letting yourself relax. He’s here, it’s okay. It’s all okay. When the song ends, you watch through joyful eyes as the boys stand next to Julie, clasping hands before taking a bow. There’s something wrong, though, something wrong when they disappear. Usually, you can loosely sense them when they poof away, but this time there’s nothing. Nothing at all. It’s like they’ve been erased away from the song of their lives.

There’s something pounding in the back of your heart, and you poof away to Julie’s rooms backstage. She appears there seconds later, as if she’s been expecting you. She runs over to you, stopping a few feet away as she remembers she can’t touch you or hug you as a ghost. “Tell me they’re still here. They didn’t just cross over.” You shake your head slowly. “I can’t feel them. They’re not in the building anymore. Julie, I think they’re gone.”

She nods slowly, fighting a losing battle to keep the tears at bay. “I’m so sorry, Y/N. So sorry. You just found Luke again, and now he’s gone.” You force a smile. “It’s alright. We’re just ghosts, remember? We’ve been running on borrowed time all along. I’ll meet you at the studio, alright? We can say our goodbyes.” Julie nods. “I’ll see you then.” You give her one last wave, then poof out.

You reappear outside the doors of the studio. You can’t quite bring yourself to go in, to face the empty stillness of the studio and know that the boy you love isn’t there. What are you supposed to do now? You have no idea what your unfinished business could possibly be. Most likely, you’re going to live out your endless days as a ghost, not noticed by anyone except Julie and Willie and whatever other ghosts you manage to find, forever haunted by the knowledge that the one person you’re looking for the most will never appear around the corner, never be waiting for you again. It’s like you’re back to that car crash, knowing you’ll be separated by death once more.

You hear the sound of a car pulling into the driveway and straighten up. Seconds later, Julie appears down the path, and you nod at her slowly. “Are you ready to do this?” She sighs. “It seems fitting to say goodbye, even if they aren’t here.” She pushes open the doors, letting the darkness wash over the two of you. She looks over at you. “I don’t know what to do.” You smile gently. “There’s no script. I have a feeling they’ll be able to hear you. Just say what you wish you got to say before they left.”

Julie nods. “I��m glad I got to meet you guys, and grateful to you for everything. You got me back into music, and I’ll never be able to let go of it again. I thought I’d never play after my mom, but you convinced me that I could. Thank you.” There’s a muffled voice from the back of the room, one that’s quickly shushed by two annoyed boys. “You’re welcome.” You stare. “Reggie?” You’d know him anywhere- you’ve heard that voice in band practices for the last couple of decades, even if it doesn’t feel that way.

Julie runs over to turn on the light, and your hand flies to your mouth as you see the boys crumpled in a heap on the floor, in obvious pain. “Did it not work? Did you not cross over?” Luke shakes his head, gently extricating himself from the heap of band members on the ground to stumble over to you. You catch him before he falls, holding him upright. “We won’t play with Caleb, that’s a promise. It’s not worth it like that.” You cup his face in your hands. “I don’t want to let you go. Not yet.”

Luke laughs quietly. “I’m not sure we had a choice. I love you, Y/N, no matter what. You know that, right?” You nod, letting your head fall against his shoulder. “I know.” You feel one last jolt rack his body, and somehow you know that this will be the last. This is it, the moment when he truly dies. You fling your arms around him, holding him close one last time. If you can’t have the future with him you had always planned, you can at least have this moment.

Your eyes are squeezed shut, waiting for the moment when he disappears from you forever. Yet it doesn’t come. You open your eyes carefully, then stare at him. “Luke, you’re- I think you’re glowing.” Sure enough, he’s surrounded by this golden haze of light. He smiles at you, chuckling slightly in awe. “I feel good. Strong, like I haven’t felt in a while.” Alex stands up too, as does Reggie. “Actually, I feel better too. I think you saved us. Both of you.”

You laugh incredulously. “Really? You’re not going away?” Luke presses a kiss to your cheek. “Never again. I’m not leaving you ever again.” You beam at him. “Good. I don’t intend to be with anyone else.” He laughs at that, pulling you in for a kiss. For once, you know that he’s here to stay.

#luke patterson #luke patterson imagines #luke patterson x reader #luke patterson oneshot #jatp #jatp imagines #jatp x reader #jatp oneshot #julie and the phantoms #julie and the phantoms imagines #julie and the phantoms x reader #julie and the phantoms oneshot #jatp luke #jatp luke imagines #jatp luke x reader #jatp luke oneshot #julie and the phantoms luke

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igotanna · 3 years

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괜찮아, babe - it's okay

Summary: Jinyoung always knows what words to use. You're feeling stressed, nervous, facing smth big and doubting if you can make it.

Genre: drabble, fluff, angst

Pairing: jinyoung x you

A/N: Gif is mine, 괜찮아 (geaenchanha) dedicated to @jeongjaehyum bc I can't express myself enough other way -- I support you girl, anytime. Always. ❤

The car travelled down the road like stream of a river. Smoothly, quickly and without any passenger noticing it.

You were sitting in the back, palms pressing together. Mood inside completely reflected yours. Cold metal aftertaste of nervousness bore you all down like an iron fist, pushing itself on the roof of the car. Like if it kept shrinking and the walls got closer and closer.

Your own nails left red prints on your skin. You heard as the front seat passenger turned to face you.

His black hair was covering his forhead, his beautiful forhead. Under given circumstances you didn't even make any remark for that matter. Normally you'd tell him to stop combing his hair like some stupid movie star. But this time you had no desire in saying anything- your stomach was squirming, moving from side to side and you couldn't say whether you're gonna throw up in a minute or not. Clearing your throat a bit you shook your head to pick up your thoughts.

"It's okay." he interrupted your effort. It sounded so different in korean.

Jinyoung knew you like certain phrases better in korean and by this small gesture he showed you how much he wanted you to take his words seriously and how much he remembered your preferences. You knew he's perfect at this - seemingly indifferent and oblivious - he was aware of everything. How to cheer you up, how to make you laugh, how to hype you up.

These were no intentions of his at the moment. He simply wanted to comfort you. Knowing the cliché words or saying "I believe in you" would only make you insecure and more nervous. You didn't need more burden to be put on your back. You wanted to be assured, loved, hugged.

Jinyoung knew all this before you did. He deeply looked in your eyes. He saw you coming up with an objection in your head and stopped you with "I don't care how it's going to end up. Be gentle to yourself."

His words took you by surprise.

"You did everything you could. That's already a success."

Jinyoung was a minimalist. He never used too many words and never expressed himself more than necessary. You knew he's trying his best to say the right thing, as sencere as he could be, not exaggerating. His statement was clear - he will always be there to support you, no matter the circumstances or your achievments.

The words became even more ardent by the fact he'd normally try to make you face everything, to be mature and ambitious. But now his big chocolate eyes were so full of true respect and love your heart fluttered.

This sudden realization snapped you out of the nervousness. He pushed some button in your head and you suddenly knew he's right.

"You already did well." his voice thick, low, convincing. He wasn't asking or waiting for a response. He pointed out a simple fact like if he said that the sky was blue.

Still dumbfounded you only gave in to bow your head down as he reached for the nape of your neck to put a long warm kiss on your forhead.

#got7 scenarios #got7 imagines #park jinyoung #jinyoung x reader #jinyoung x y/n #jinyoung x you #got7 fanfic #jinyoung comforting #jinyoung fluff #got7 fluff #got7 angst #jinyoung imagine #jinyoung scenarios #jinyoung drabble #got7 drabble

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pair-annoyed · 3 years

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Anime I Watched This Fall

My first semester of college is officially over and the December holidays are upon us! I hoped to make one of these posts sooner, but I have been incredibly busy with schoolwork. Now that things have slowed down, let’s take sometime to reflect on things I’ve watched.

These anime are listed in chronological order and encompass everything I’ve watched from 9/1/2020 - 12/15/2020

Like always, they will be rated on a 1-10 scale; 1 meaning complete garbage, 10 meaning masterpiece. I will offer my thoughts on what I did/didn’t like about each show!

1. The God of High School - 6/10

Despite the stellar animation from MAPPA and my high expectations, I was really disappointed by how this series was treated. Most of the story’s crucial elements were handled poorly. I finished this series feeling more confused about the plot than when I first began. The power system is really cool, but poorly explained. More time should have been spent on exposition and world building for this series, instead the fights were given the most screen time.

2. Doukyuusei - 7/10

I really liked the style of Doukyuusei. Granted, this was another movie I chose to watch primarily because of the hype surrounding it. The dynamic between Kusakabe and Sajou is an interesting one, and I also enjoy how the movies different acts were separated by the seasons. However, there's nothing that really sets Doukyuusei apart from other romance movies, its a little generic. Still, I enjoyed it nonetheless.

3. Re:Zero kara Hajimeru Isekai Seikatsu 2nd Season - 8/10

My opinions on Re:Zero’s second season are biased. This was, by far, the sequel I was most hyped for during the summer/fall anime season. I was so happy to see the story’s continuation and I’m looking forward to the season’s second part coming sometime in January. Re:Zero is one of my all time favorite series because of the way it handles it characters and power dynamics. I also really enjoy the show’s psychological aspects. If you haven’t already, give Re:Zero a try!

4. Saint☆Oniisan (Movie + OVA) - 8/10

This was a wonderful comedy. I wasn’t sure how the subject of Jesus and Buddha living together would be tackled, but it was handled wonderfully. I was laughing for pretty much the entire movie. I love the art style and little references to both Buddhism and Christianity, plus the incorporation of Japanese culture. Saint Oniisan is a bright comedy, with two eccentric main characters. If you like a show that doesn’t take itself too seriously, and need a good laugh, I can’t recommend this more.

5. Clannad: After Story - 10/10

Never, while watching anime, did I cry as much as I did while watching Clannad: After Story. I didn’t realize how much I related to Okazaki until I saw him grow up in After Story. I was left sobbing, especially after episode 18. I still, to this day, cannot listen to the Dango song without tearing up. The original Clannad is nothing special, but the continuation of its story its something heartfelt, emotional, and down-to-earth. I love Kyoto Animation with all my heart, and Clannad made me appreciate everything the studio has done just a little bit more. Thank you Clannad, for reminding me about the kind of person I strive to be.

6. Nakitai Watashi wa Neko wo Kaburu - 5.5/10

The art in A Whisker Away was beautiful. The story itself, however, is nothing too enjoyable. I found it difficult to like our protagonist or her love interest. Nothing about this movie is inherently memorable. The emotional climax came far too early which made the second half of the film seem long and drawn out. All in all, the movie has a wonderful concept, I just believe it could have been so much more emotional than it was. When I watch a move, I like to empathize with the characters. It’s difficult to do when the characters aren’t given the proper exposition to be empathized with.

7. Shikioriori - 6/10

This is less of a movie and more of a collection of short stories. Flavors of Youth is something you shouldn’t watch on an empty stomach, all of the food looks incredible. The same cannot beside for the rest of this feature. The stories themselves seems heavily clichéd. Much like A Whisker Away, the initial premise is intriguing, but the execution results in something that comes across as trying too hard and carries no emotional weight with the viewer. If you plan on watching, pay more attention to the artwork and animation than the actual plot. You won’t be missing anything.

8. Vinland Saga - 7/10

Vinland Saga helped me get out of the rut that Clannad: After Story. Not only does this show have a great story, its action packed with lots of interesting fights. I especially enjoyed all the Nordic history embedded within the show. Its really unlike any of the other historical anime I’ve watched. I will say, it’s gory. But, compared to all the other things I watched this time around, I finished this series the quickest. Its good, its graphic, its fast paced!

9. Mononoke Hime - 7/10

It’s ironic considering how much anime I’ve watched that I have yet to watch all of the most classic Studio Ghibli films. Princess Mononoke is grittier than most other Ghibli films I’ve seen, but it’s message is positive and its characters are wonderful. I can’t really speak ill towards classics like these. I guess maybe my one complaint is that this movie could’ve been a faster pace. Other than that... I really enjoyed everything Princess Mononoke offered! I understand why it’s so popular.

10. Howl no Ugoku Shiro - 8.5/10

Can you believe it took me this long to finally watch Howl’s Moving Castle? Me neither!! This movie is so endearingly beautiful. I loved every second of it, from the characters to the soundtrack. So many iconic things come from just this one movie. I would like to take this time to thank my best friend for reminding me that Studio Ghibli films are wonderful! Thank you for watching this with me, I loved it! All in all, I regret not watching this sooner!

11. Toradora! - 6.5/10

Toradora took me a while to finish, just because I lost interest about halfway through. But, I powered through it, and ended up really enjoying the show! I’m not the biggest fan of the ending, but that’s just a personal preference. Somehow, this show also made me cry? I’m not entirely sure why because Toradora! is probably the thing farthest from sad. Apart from the show’s dull slice of life moments, it was super cute! A much needed light-hearted romance.

12. New Initial D Movie: Legend 1 - 5/10

Full disclosure, this is the only thing related to Initial D that I’ve ever watched. My band and I watched this expecting to hear some of that iconic Initial D music, itself all we got was a mildly confusing story about different types of cars. It was cliché and frankly a little boring. Although, I am still considering watching the original Initial D just so I can hear the music in the way it was original intended. I’ve got no other opinions on this movie. It’s best not to watch these movies without the context from the rest of the franchise.

13. Uchuu Patrol Luluco - 7.5/10

I didn’t really understand why people enjoy studio Trigger so much until I watched Space Patrol Luluco. I loved all the fun references to other studio Trigger works. I loved the humor, and I loved all the bright colors. The animation was extremely high energy, and the art style fits the show’s premise. Each episode was only 12 minutes long so it was a super quick binge. If you’re looking for something quick, light-hearted and comical, this is the perfect show to watch.

14. Orange - 7/10

I owe a big thanks to a tumblr mutual for recommending this show to me! This holds the honor of making me cry by episode 3! I honestly did not expect the subject matter of this show to be as dark as it was. Usually when I see the genre ‘shoujo’ I do not associate it with a love story like that of Orange. The heavy subject matter made it a little too close to home for me, but I still really enjoyed this series. It reminds me off all the good times I had with my friends in high school, and of all the regrets I carry with myself to this day.

15. 3-gatsu no Lion - 7.5/10

March Comes in Like a Lion is another show that was a bit of a slow burn for me. Each episode left me feeling emotionally drained, so I had to take a lot of breaks while I was working on watching this series. Shaft, the studio behind this anime, holds a special place in my heart because I loved their work on the Monogatari Series. March Comes in Like a Lion is a little different. It’s driving force it is characters, and it was cathartic to watch our main character transform through the entire duration of the first season. I know the show’s second season is much better, so I’ll be starting that soon!

16. Yojouhan Shinwa Taikei - 8/10

I loved how artsy and smart The Tatami Galaxy is, but honestly I couldn’t watch too much at once cause it would hurt my head. I also couldn’t watch this show while I was tired because the speaking rate is much faster than typical anime. The Tatami Galaxy is so unique for its medium. I loved the different time loops and the crazy animation. The characters were fascinating. The dialogue, although very fast, it also fantastic. There’s an element of humor to this unique story telling, and I enjoyed ever minute of it!

Currently Watching:

Hunter x Hunter - 6.5/10 (As of Episode 30)

I pride myself in having watched a lot of shounen anime, but I was reluctant to start Hunter x Hunter for years because I thought I would find it boring. I was oh so very wrong. Considering great shows like Naruto and Fairy Tail that fall under the same category, I expected Hunter x Hunter to be subpar in comparison. It gets a low score for two reasons. One, the power system was introduced a little too late and now I’m wondering if all the fights post episode 30 will involved nen in some way, shape, or form. Two, its still on hiatus.

Two Cursed Additions For This List

Please to do not let these be representative of my anime taste.

1. Yarichin☆B*tch-bu - 4/10

I am a CLOWN for not knowing this was 18+. The only reason I watched this was to see why everyone was talking about the pink-haired boy with the glasses and tongue piecing. I know why now, and I regret it. This was a massive mistake on my part. But hey, at the least the art and ending song kinda slap?

2. Euphoria (Dropped After 1 Episode) - 2/10

If you know what I’m talking about when I say Euphoria, I am so sorry. And no, I am not talking about the HBO series. Seriously, don’t google this. Don’t watch this. Don’t interact with anything related to this. You’re probably wondering, “Then why did you watch it?” I did not watch this willingly. You see, I have a very bad habit of starting anime and then taking months to finish them. I made an ultimatum with a friend, lost, and then was forced to watch this a punishment. Not a fun experience. I’m very glad there are no GIFs of this on tumblr...

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shezzaspeare · 3 years

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Pilot/Episode 1: Patching Things Up With Pastiche & Fanfiction

Hi, hello, and the wait is finally over! My name is Blessie, and welcome to the first episode webisode log installation I've decided to call these things an episode for now because why not also let me know what do you actually call these things episode of The Science of Fanfiction, where we take a closer look into our beloved works of fanon because we've all got plenty of time to spare till Season 5. Before I continue, I would like to thank everyone who's liked and reblogged the last few posts before this one. It means a lot for a small and growing Tumblr user like me, and your support is something I cherish more than my modules. You guys rock!

Anyways, like with most things, we have to talk about the boring and bland stuff before we proceed with the fun stuff. For today, we are going to settle the difference between a couple of things: first being the confusion between pastiche and fanfiction; then the distinctions between tropes, clichés, and stereotypes, which we'll tackle the next time. It's important for us to establish their true meanings in order for us to really understand what fanfiction truly is, even if it's merely just a work done for the fandom. I know – it's boring, it's something that shouldn't be expounded that much, but I believe that all forms of writing (unless it's plagiarised) is a work of art — and fanfiction is not something we always talk about. I hope that by the end of this, you'll learn about what they really are as much as I did. Let's begin to talk about the—

[Image ID: A flashback of John (left) and Sherlock (right) finding an elephant (not in the screen) in a room in The Sign of Three. End ID]

. . . I did say that this GIF will always have to make an appearance here, didn't I?

So, just as with Sherlock Holmes, all other works of fiction have their own pastiches and fanfiction, and many more original works out there have taken inspiration from them to create their own books. Although they've gained popular attention, this will not be possible if they did not have taken inspiration from the materials their writers had at the time.

[Image ID: Various actors as Dracula. Jeremy Brett in 'Dracula' (1978) (upper left), Adam Sandler in a voice role for 'Hotel Transylvania' (2012) (upper right), Gary Oldman in 'Dracula' (1992) (lower left), and Bela Lugosi in 'Dracula' (1933) (lower right). End ID]

For instance, Bram Stoker's 'Dracula' (the second most adapted literary character, next to the consulting detective himself) has been portrayed on the screen over 200 times — from Gary Oldman to Adam Sandler — and has spawned off numerous books and pastiches of its own such as Stephen King's 'Salem's Lot'. Its cultural impact served as a basis of how we see vampires today, since some characteristics of the Count were made by Stoker himself. Stoker's creation is the brainchild of his predecessors and inspirations.

[Image ID: Vlad the Impaler (left) and a book cover of 'Carmilla' by J. Sheridan Le Fanu (right). End ID]

Other than the ongoing hysteria over dead back then and the existing vampire folklore, Stoker also took his inspirations from the published books on vampires he had at hand. He is said to have taken inspiration from Vlad the Impaler, a Romanian national hero known allegedly for having impalement as his favourite method of torture. He is also said to have been inspired by the J. Sheridan Le Fanu's 'Carmilla', a Gothic lesbian vampire novella that predates Dracula by 26 years. I could go on, but hey, we're going back to Sherlock Holmes now before I deviate any further. However, if you want to know about Dracula's literary origins, I suggest you watch Ted-ED's videos about the subject matter such as this one or this one.

Very much like Stoker, ACD didn't just conceive Holmes on his own. He took his own inspirations from what he had available at the time.

[Image ID: Dr Joseph Bell (left) and Edgar Allan Poe (right). End ID]

As we all know, ACD's biggest inspiration for Sherlock Holmes was one of his teachers at the Edinburgh University, Joseph Bell. He was famous for his powers of deduction, and he was also interested in forensic science — both characteristics which Holmes is greatly known for. He also drew inspiration from Edgar Allan Poe's sleuth, C. Auguste Dupin ('The Purloined Letter' & 'Murders in Rue Morgue'). As ACD himself has said at the 1909 Poe Centennial Dinner: "Where was the detective story until Poe breathed life into it?" Some other writers he took after are Wilkie Collins, Émile Gaboriau, and Oscar Wilde.

Now, what does this say about us Sherlockians/Holmesians (depending if you're the coloniser or the one that was colonised)? Basically, ACD laid the groundwork for us with Sherlock Holmes: his humble abode 221B that he shares with his flatmate Dr. John Watson, his adventures, memoirs, return, casebook, last vow, and all that. Now that we have this material at hand, we can now make our own versions, takes, or even original stories featuring the characters of the Canon. Our inspiration comes from ACD's Sherlock Holmes, and we now get the chance to make our very own stories/conspiracy theories about them.

As I have mentioned earlier, Sherlock Holmes is the most adapted literary character in history. He has been adapted in over 200 films, more than 750 radio adaptations, a ballet, 2 musicals; and he's become a mouse, a woman, a dog, even a bloody cucumber. On top of all that are numerous pastiches and fanfics, and finally, we have arrived at the main topic of our post!

Fanfiction and pastiche are often confused together since they have three common elements: they take after the original work, they usually use the characters in that original work, and more often than not do are they set in that same time frame/period or not long after that. The common misconception is that pastiche are printed fanfiction, which is only partly true. While pastiche is definitely fanfiction in some ways and vice versa, there are fanfictions out there that aren't necessarily classified as pastiche that have been published.

Let's get on with our definition of terms to clear up the confusion a little more. Pastiche, according to Literary Terms, is:

. . . a creative work that imitates another author or genre. It’s a way of paying respect, or honor, to great works of the past. Pastiche differs from parody in that pastiche isn’t making fun of the works it imitates – however, the tone of pastiche is often humorous.

A good example of a pastiche is Sophie Hannah's 'The Monogram Murders', which is her take from Agatha Christie's Hercule Poirot.

[Image ID: A book cover of 'The Monogram Murders' by Sophie Hannah. End ID.]

Although this was a commission from Christie's estate, it's still considered as a pastiche as:

It's takes after Christie's writing style;

It is set in the early years of Poirot's career (1929), which is still within the time frame that the author wrote him in;

It features Poirot and;

It pays respect to Christie in a sense that it stays true to her (Christie) characters and way of storytelling.

Meanwhile, our good and slightly unreliable friend Wikipedia defines fanfiction as:

. . . is fictional writing written by fans, commonly of an existing work of fiction. The author uses copyrighted characters, settings, or other intellectual property from the original creator(s) as a basis for their writing. [It] ranges from a couple of sentences to an entire novel, and fans can both keep the creator's characters and settings and/or add their own. [ . . . ] [It] can be based on any fictional (and sometimes non-fictional) subject. Common bases for fanfiction include novels, movies, bands, and video games.

To avoid any copyright infringement issues if I ever use a popular fanfic in the fandom, we'll use my (unfinished and unpopular) Sherlock Wattpad fic, 'Play Pretend'. You can read it here.

[Image ID: The second self-made book cover of Blessie/shezzaspeare's 'Play Pretend'. End ID]

Why is it considered a fanfiction and not a pastiche?

It takes after an adaptation of Sherlock Holmes (BBC Sherlock) which is a TV show, not the ACD canon itself;

The author (in this case myself) uses her own writing style and does not take after the original story's style;

Although it is set well in modern-day London and after Season 4, it also features scenes decades before the actual fanfic is set and outside of London;

I added a considerable number of characters, i.e. siblings to canon characters;

I had my own take some of the canon characters' personality especially after the events of Sherrinford;

It is written by a fan – myself. It is a work of fan labour and;

It is only a work of fanon, and isn't likely going to be considered by the show as its writing style is different from the actual show.

To put it simply, you can have more freedom in a fanfiction as it does not necessarily restrict you to follow or take after the original stories. Alternate universes (AUs) such as Unilock and Teenlock are perfect examples of this thing.

So can a pastiche be classified as fanfiction? Yes.

Can a fanfiction be classified as pastiche? Not all the time.

What's the difference? While yes, they share the basics, pastiche is technically leans more onto the original work's fundamental elements whereas fanfiction is a broader range of works inspired by the original work but doesn't necessarily follow all or any of its fundamental elements.

In order for us to understand it more, I'll give another example.

[Image ID: The 'Enola Holmes' title card (upper left) and Henry Cavill as its Sherlock holmes (upper right). Underneath it is a a scene from the opening titles of BBC Sherlock (lower left) and Benedict Cumberbatch as Sherlock Holmes in A Scandal In Belgravia. (lower right) End ID]

Most of you are familiar with these 21st-century adaptations of Holmes: the 2020 adaptation of Nancy Springer's Enola Holmes books and BBC Sherlock, which needs no further explanation – but for those who don't know, it's basically Holmes and the gang if they were alive today. I specifically chose these two as they are the ones that I believe would get my points across best. Though both are considered as wonderful pastiches with a well-rounded cast and awesome visuals, if we break them down bit by bit, we'll see which one is more of a pastiche and which one is more of a fanfic. (Yes, I know they're both screen adaptations. However, as Enola Holmes was based on the books and BBC Sherlock's fanfiction has the show's scenes written out in most fanfics, hear me out.)

They share these characteristics of a pastiche:

They feature characters from the Canon (Sherlock Holmes, Mycroft Holmes, and Lestrade);

They have additional characters added by the writers (Including but not limited to Molly Hooper, Eurus Holmes, and Philip Anderson for BBC Sherlock while Enola Holmes has Lord Tewkesbury, Eudoria Holmes, and Enola herself) and;

They pay respect to the original Canon as their stories are based on the cases (BBC Sherlock) or simply what was going on around them (Enola Holmes).

They also share these characteristics of a fanfic:

They are made by enthusiasts of Sherlock Holmes (Moffat has called himself and Mark Gatiss 'Sherlock Holmes geeks', while Nancy Springer's Enola Holmes books are not just one or two but six);

They follow a common trope (we'll discuss these tropes in the following episodes) that goes on in the fandom (Sherlock's Sister & Modern AU)

They are based on a fictional subject (Sherlock Holmes);

They used characters and story elements that are copyrighted by the author/author's estate (fun fact: prior to the production of Enola Holmes, the Conan Doyle Estate filed a lawsuit against Springer & Netflix over Sherlock's emotions since he was more 'sympathetic' than he was portrayed in the Canon – this was later dismissed by both parties) and;

Their writing styles don't necessarily follow ACD's.

Despite these similarities, there are very obvious differences between the two that separates them from being a pastiche and a fanfiction.

Enola Holmes embodies pastiche more as it doesn't stray far away from the original elements of the Canon. It's still set in Victorian England. While Springer added characters of her own and definitely twisted the Canon to suit her series, she didn't necessarily place them out of the social construct that was going on around the characters. It follows ACD's writing style more as Enola Holmes' setting still remains within the Canon's original setting.

Meanwhile, we can safely say that BBC Sherlock is a work of fanfiction. While it did give us The Abominable Bride, the main series focused on Holmes and Watson in 21st-century England, which is drastically different from Victorian England. There are phones, black cabs, and cellphones — things which ACD Sherlock Holmes doesn't have. It also diverted from the Canon in the characters themselves, which is mostly seen in the names: Henry Baskerville became Henry Knight, Charles Augustus Milverton became Charles Augustus Magnussen, the H in Dr Watson's name stood for Hamish and Sherlock's full name is actually William Sherlock Scott Holmes. They also changed the personalities of some Canon characters: Mary was actually an ex-assassin, Mrs Hudson was an exotic dancer who drove a kick-ass sports car, Irene Adler is a dominatrix, to name a few. Moffat and Gatiss created a world of their own featuring the characters of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, which is really what most of us fanfic writers do with Mofftiss' rendition of Holmes.

In conclusion: while pastiche and fanfiction could have been the same thing, they're actually not. There's more to them that just printed fanfiction or pastiche e-books, and we all should take some time to see and observe them in a closer perspective.

And that's it for our first episode! I hope you enjoyed it. It was a lot fun for me to write this, especially now that I'm only starting. I would also like to note that while intensive research has been done on this series, some parts of this comes from my own observation and opinion, which may vary from yours. I am very much open to criticism, as long as it is said in a polite and civil manner. I'm still young, and to be educated as I go is something that could really help me with this series.

Like and reblog this you like it. It helps out a lot. Be sure to follow me as well and the tags underneath if you want to see more of TSoF.

See you soon!

Blessie presents – The Science of Fanfiction: A Study In Sherlock (2021) • Next

Follow me! • My Carrd | My YouTube Channel

SOURCES • Pinterest, Google Images, Wikipedia, Literary Terms, Conan Doyle Estate, Definitions, The Sherlock Holmes Book, and Google

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usergreenpixel · 3 years

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JACOBIN FICTION CONVENTION MEETING 1: La Seine no Hoshi (1975)

1. Introduction

Well, dear reader, here it is. My first ever official review. And, as promised, this is one of the pieces of Frev media that you have likely never heard of before.

So, without further ado, sit down, relax, grab drinks and snacks and allow me to tell you about an anime called “La Seine no Hoshi” (The Star of the Seine).

“La Seine no Hoshi” is a children’s anime series made by Studio Sunrise. It consists of 39 episodes and was originally broadcast in Japan from April 4th to December 26th of 1975.

Unlike its more famous contemporary, a manga called “Rose of Versailles” that had begun being released in 1972 and is considered a classic to this day, “La Seine no Hoshi” has stayed relatively obscure both in the world of anime and among other Frev pop culture.

Personally, the only reason why I found out about its existence was the fact that I actively seek out everything Frev-related and I just happened to stumble upon the title on an anime forum several years ago.

So far, the anime has been dubbed into Italian, French, German and Korean but there is no English or even Spanish dub so, unfortunately, people who do not speak fluent Japanese or any other aforementioned language are out of luck ( if anyone decides to make a fandub of the series, call me). That being said, the series is readily available in dubs and the original version on YouTube, which is where I ended up watching it. The French dub calls the anime “La Tulipe Noire” (The Black Tulip), which could be an homage to the movie with the same name that takes place in the same time period.

Unfortunately, while I do speak Japanese well enough to maintain a basic conversation and interact with people in casual daily situations, I’m far from fluent in the language so the version I watched was the French dub, seeing as I am majoring in French.

So, with all of this info in mind, let’s find out what the story is about and proceed to the actual review.

2. The Summary

(Note: Names of the characters in the French dub and the original version differ so I will use names from the former since that’s what I watched)

The story of “La Seine no Hoshi” revolves around a 15-year old girl called Mathilde Pasquier - a daughter of two Parisian florists who helps her parents run their flower shop and has a generally happy life.

But things begin to change when Comte de Vaudreuil, an elderly Parisian noble to whom Mathilde delivers flowers in the second episode, takes her under his wing and starts teaching her fencing for an unknown reason and generally seems to know more about her than he lets on.

Little does Mathilde know, those fencing lessons will end up coming in handy sooner than she expected. When her parents are killed by corrupt nobles, the girl teams up with Comte de Vaudreuil’s son, François, to fight against corruption as heroes of the people, all while the revolution keeps drawing near day by day and tensions in the city are at an all time high.

This is the gist of the story, dear readers, so with that out of the way, here’s the actual review:

3. The Story

Honestly, I kind of like the plot. It has a certain charm to it, like an old swashbuckling novel, of which I’ve read a lot as a kid.

The narrative of a “hero of the common folk” has been a staple in literature for centuries so some might consider the premise to be unoriginal, but I personally like this narrative more than “champion of the rich” (Looking at you, Scarlet Pimpernel) because, historically, it really was a difficult time for commoners and when times are hard people tend to need such heroes the most.

People need hope, so it’s no surprise that Mathilde and François (who already moonlights as a folk hero, The Black Tulip) become living legends thanks to their escapades.

Interestingly enough, the series also subverts a common trope of a hero seeking revenge for the death of his family. Mathilde is deeply affected by the death of her parents but she doesn’t actively seek revenge. Instead, this tragedy makes the fight and the upcoming revolution a personal matter to her and motivates her to fight corruption because she is not the only person who ended up on its receiving end.

The pacing is generally pretty good but I do wish there were less filler episodes and more of the overarching story that’s dedicated to the secret that Comte de Vaudreuil and Mathilde’s parents seem to be hiding from her and maybe it would be better if the secret in question was revealed to the audience a bit later than episode 7 or so.

However, revealing the twist early on is still an interesting narrative choice because then the main question is not what the secret itself is but rather when and how Mathilde will find out and how she will react, not to mention how it will affect the story.

That being said, even the filler episodes do drive home the point that a hero like Mathilde is needed, that nobles are generally corrupt and that something needs to change. Plus, those episodes were still enjoyable and entertaining enough for me to keep watching, which is good because usually I don’t like filler episodes much and it’s pretty easy to make them too boring.

Unfortunately, the show is affected by the common trope of the characters not growing up but I don’t usually mind that much. It also has the cliché of heroes being unrecognizable in costumes and masks, but that’s a bit of a staple in the superhero stories even today so it’s not that bothersome.

4. The Characters

It was admittedly pretty rare for a children’s show to have characters who were fleshed out enough to seem realistic and flawed, but I think this series gives its characters more development than most shows for kids did at the time.

I especially like Mathilde as a character. Sure, at first glance she seems like a typical Nice Pretty Ordinary Girl ™️ but that was a part of the appeal for me.

I am a strong believer in that a character does not need to be a blank slate or a troubled jerk to be interesting and Mathilde is neither of the above. She is essentially an ordinary girl with her own life, family, friends, personality and dreams and, unfortunately, all of that is taken away from her when her parents are killed.

Her initial reluctance to participate in the revolution is also pretty realistic as she is still trying to live her own life in peace and she made a promise to her parents to stay safe so there’s that too.

I really like the fact that the show did not give her magic powers and that she was not immediately good at fencing. François does remark that her fencing is not bad for a beginner but in those same episodes she is clearly shown making mistakes and it takes her time to upgrade from essentially François’s assistant in the heroic shenanigans to a teammate he can rely on and sees as an equal. Heck, later there’s a moment when Mathilde saves François, which is a nice tidbit of her development.

Mathilde also doesn’t have any romantic subplots, which is really rare for a female lead.

She has a childhood friend, Florent, but the two are not close romantically and they even begin to drift apart somewhat once Florent becomes invested in the revolution. François de Vaudreuil does not qualify for a love interest either - his father does take Mathilde in and adopts her after her parents are killed so François is more of an older brother than anything else.

Now, I’m not saying that romance is necessarily a bad thing but I do think that not having them is refreshing than shoehorning a romance into a story that’s not even about it. Plus most kids don’t care that much for romance to begin with so I’d say that the show only benefits from the creative decision of not setting Mathilde up with anyone.

Another interesting narrative choice I’d like to point out is the nearly complete absence of historical characters, like the revolutionaries. They do not make an appearance at all, save for Saint-Just’s cameo in one of the last episodes and, fortunately, he doesn’t get demonized. Instead, the revolutionary ideas are represented by Florent, who even joins the Jacobin Club during the story and is the one who tries to get Mathilde to become a revolutionary. Other real people, like young Napoleon and Mozart, do appear but they are also cameo characters, which does not count.

Marie-Antoinette and Louis XVI are exceptions to the rule.

(Spoiler alert!)

Marie-Antoinette is portrayed as kind of spoiled and out of touch. Her spending habits get touched on too but she is not a malicious person at heart. She is simply flawed. She becomes especially important to the story later on when Mathilde finds out the secret that has been hidden from her for her entire life.

As it turns out, Marie- Antoinette, the same queen Mathilde hated so much, is the girl’s older half-sister and Mathilde is an illegitimate daughter of the Austrian king and an opera singer, given to a childless couple of florists to be raised in secret so that her identity can be protected.

The way Marie-Antoinette and Mathilde are related and their further interactions end up providing an interesting inner conflict for Mathilde as now she needs to reconcile this relationship with her sister and her hatred for the corruption filling Versailles.

The characters are not actively glorified or demonized for the most part and each side has a fair share of sympathetic characters but the anime doesn’t shy away from showing the dark sides of the revolution either, unlike some other shows that tackle history (*cough* Liberty’s Kids comes to mind *cough*).

All in all, pretty interesting characters and the way they develop is quite realistic too, even if they could’ve been more fleshed out in my opinion.

5. The Voice Acting

Pretty solid. No real complaints here. I’d say that the dub actors did a good job.

6. The Setting

I really like the pastel and simple color scheme of Paris and its contrast with the brighter palette of Versailles. It really drives home the contrast between these two worlds.

The character designs are pretty realistic, simple and pleasant to watch. No eyesores like neon colors and overly cutesy anime girls with giant tiddies here and that’s a big plus in my book.

7. The Conclusion

Like I said, the show is not available in English and those who are able to watch it might find it a bit cliché but, while it’s definitely not perfect. I actually quite like it for its interesting concept, fairly realistic characters and a complex view of the French Revolution. I can definitely recommend this show, if only to see what it’s all about.

Some people might find this show too childish and idealistic, but I’m not one of them.

I’m almost 21 but I still enjoy cartoons and I’m fairly idealistic because cynicism and nihilism do not equal maturity and, if not for the “silly” idealism, Frev itself wouldn’t happen so I think shows like that are necessary too, even if it’s just for escapism.

If you’re interested and want to check it out, more power to you.

Anyway, thank you for attending the first ever official meeting of the Jacobin Fiction Convention. Second meeting is coming soon so stay tuned for updates.

Have a good day, Citizens! I love you!

- Citizen Green Pixel

#review #french revolution #anime #history #television #frev media #Jacobin Fiction Convention #marie antoinette #French Revolution anime #la seine ni hoshi #la tulipe noire dessin animé #la tulipe noire

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myelocin · 4 years

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The Gratitude in Endings | Miya Atsumu, You, Kuroo Tetsurou

Synopsis: What follows endings always were the most beautiful things. In this case, after Kuroo Tetsurou, came Miya Atsumu--and for you, nothing could truly be better.

**This is the epilogue to Redefining You (Part 1) and To Us, A Love Story Unwritten (Part 2)!

Characters: Miya Atsumu, You Kuroo Tetsurou

Genre/Tags/Warnings: No warnings! Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Bestfriend!Kuroo, Reader/Atsumu, Kinda a love triangle i guess lol

WC: 2.8k+

a/n: i,,,, have not let go of this AU and will probably not let go until a long time. i’m planning on writing drabbles in this certain AU soon, but for now enjoy this epilogue!

You suppose happy endings is the sort of cliché you’ve been wanting to avoid this whole time. After all, you’re still only in your late twenties and even if you’ve crossed some things off of your bucket list—there were still pages you’ve yet to even flip through.

Life, to you, is a constant work in progress; all you’ve known were only beginnings but the reality is there is still never an end. From the second you opened your eyes and sucked in your first breath of air, day by day you continue to leave a mark in the world.

The stories you’ve scribbled in paper, the secrets you’ve whispered to willing ears, photographs of your claim in that snapshot of the world, and the connections you’ve made—those are the things that last and remain even after you’ve gone to cross new horizons.

Life—much like yourself will always just be a work in progress.

Whether it be the ink on your skin that’s yet to be connected to another work of art or waking up to a new morning wondering how differently Atsumu’s hair will look curled around your fingers this time.

Every day that you spent watching the sun rising and setting in his eyes never failed to leave you breathless.

It shouldn’t have surprised you when Atsumu adjusted himself with the beat of your life quite naturally. After reconnecting in the airport, Tetsurou didn’t even have to sit you down to talk to you about his reappearance in your life.

Literally, after Bokuto landed, he left the airport that day without you and texted you that this was your chance to go home with, as Tetsurou said in verbatim, your “long lost love.”

According to him, after showing up in your weekly dinners at Kenma with Atsumu trailing behind you—that it was all part of his plan for he was the best wing man you could ever ask for.

After that self-proclamation, you and Kenma responded to his statement by simultaneously rolling your eyes. Atsumu, beside you, was apparently polite enough to laugh. Tetsurou was quick to stride over to him, clap him on the back of the shoulder and declare, “You both suck, but at least Miya-san has enough taste to recognize my genius work.”

“Please,” Atsumu laughed and clapped Tetsurou on the shoulder, “Atsumu is just fine.” From your place in the table, you smiled at Atsumu beaming up at Tetsurou, with your best friend returning the same energy.

“I think they’ll get along.” Kenma says and you smile, feeling your heart swell.

“They will,” you reply, and in return Kenma smiles because the both of you truly believe your words.

There were still moments you see Tetsurou break down. Eventually the ink climbs up higher and higher on his shoulders until you eventually see it peeking above the collar of his shirts. You have half the mind to ask, but at the same time, when Atsumu drapes his hands over your shoulders and you spot Tetsurou look away and bark out another joke—you decide against it.

“Are you happy?” Tetsurou asked you one day and you could almost laugh at how ironic the setting was. The two of you, along with Kenma had gone with Atsumu and the rest of MSBY in their team trip to a lake house ways from the city.

He asked that question when you joined him on the balcony one morning, a mug of coffee outstretched in offering to him. If it wasn’t for the morning fog clouding your hazy thoughts, you figured you would have caught on a lot quicker than you did—but at the moment, all you could think about was how warm Atsumu’s jacket was wrapped around you and how the roots of his natural hair were starting to peek through from what you observed earlier that morning.

Tetsurou smiled a thank you at the mug of coffee you offered him and motioned for you to take a seat next to him. He doesn’t ask the question again, but you spend the next few minutes of silence mulling about how the morning air brought bouts of nostalgia.

“I’m really happy, Tetsu.” You say and look at him, and you suddenly feel a little choked up. You blame the cold air for the blur in your eyes because when he smiles and wraps the blanket around him tighter while taking slow sips of his coffee you suddenly remember the moment you fell in love with him all those years ago.

In the solitude of the early hours, you’re brought back to the world from more than ten years ago and see the boy who spent his mornings with you through the pixilation of a computer screen. Your heart still beats with a fondness only attributed for him, but you suppose even the rhythm doesn’t flow the same way—you still love him.

And when he opens his eyes, red and teary and cheeks flushed, the fondness in his voice is as familiar as it had always been, “I’m glad, (y/n).”

You sniffle because even if you only exchanged the minimal words, you know the both of you understood everything lingering in the unspoken.

“Are you happy though?” you ask and knock your shoulder against his.

“I am, for you, I always am happy.” He says and laughs when you smack his shoulder a little harder this time in retort. “I meant you, dumbass. Are you happy?”

He laughs, sniffling and turning away from you.

“I love you.” He says, and before you could voice out your confusion he turns to you with a teasing glint in his eyes, “I began to tell myself that every day.”

You roll your eyes remembering your words from the balcony that one night. “Oh god, don’t just quote me.”

“I mean it!” he says and laughs along with you.

You think the two of you must look a little silly, crying at seven in the morning and laughing over your heartaches you endured some years ago, but your relationship with Tetsurou ran deeper than the norm, so you guess you don’t mind.

“Tetsu, I really want you to be happy.” You finally say, and you hope the softness in your tone reaches him.

Tetsurou looks at you in the way that’s sincere because he sighs into the air with a smile and wraps a hand around your shoulder—pulling you in for a half hug. You set your mug down to the side and wrap your own arms around his frame, burying your face in his chest.

He feels warm and you don’t come to mind his chin resting on top of your head.

“Happiness is a work in progress, I’ll get there in time. But I’m always facing to walk in that direction.”

“Promise?” you ask, and he pulls from you to look you straight in the eye.

Though before he opened his mouth to reply, the finality in his eyes quelled your worries.

He didn’t need to say promise because you were more than sure he was going to get there.

Miya Atsumu was someone who came into your life in a whirlwind of all the things you considered to be the most beautiful.

He’s a human being; far from perfection just as you were, but then again, the word perfection had always been subjective. Not a day passed by where you didn’t tell him thank you for always being patient. He dealt with his demons just as you had but like the certainty of those very demons coming and going in your life, the grip in his hand holding yours was just as steadfast and un moving.

Atsumu would be the one to tell you to bite your hand and push through it when you had no other option but walk through hell itself, but also in contrast, he would be the one to lay with you in the silence and rub circles on your back telling you to cry out whatever was hurting you.

He’d crack a couple jokes in between your sobs, and kiss your eyelids despite you telling him no and that your tears will taste gross.

You, on the other hand was always the one he came home to and your arms being opened was a constant whether he celebrated a victory or a loss.

Whether he’d cry because his service ace was the winning point, or cry because he felt second best, time and time again Atsumu would tell you his thank you for the presence through it all.

And when he tells you an I love you every day with the sun rising and setting as the witness, you know he means it just as he knows the sincerity he’s always found the comfort in with yours.

“Are you happy?” he asked you on your third year together and you could almost laugh at the parallels you’re begging to see with the conversation you had with Tetsurou some time ago.

“Really happy.” You reply and lace your fingers through his.

“With me?” he asks and smiles when you swing your joined hands back and forth. “With us.” You reply and lean forward to kiss his cheek.

Atsumu laughs and tugs you to walk with him ankle deep in the water. “This kinda feels familiar,” he comments and you laugh because it does. You mean it’s familiar because déjà vu is nudging at you and also because the both of you had found yourselves in a quiet stretch of beach along the coasts of Okinawa.

It wasn’t Siargao in the Philippines this time, and you could understand the distant chatter of Japanese in the background opposed to the dialect spoken in the Philippines those years ago, but it was the light of the setting sun peaking in Atsumu’s eyes that had you grinning ear to ear because this was your favorite part of the day.

When the both of you are a little over ankle deep in the water Atsumu releases your hand and points to the horizon on the western side of the world.

You turn and smile because he’s pointing to the sunset. Closing your eyes you, breathe in and breathe out—then smile because it wasn’t shaky. Briefly, you think of Tetsurou and what he could be doing this time in Tokyo—and smile again because he’s probably over at Kenma’s for movie night yelling into a TV and chucking popcorn in the air. You think about the new dating app he downloaded on his phone that he showed you the other day and chuckle to yourself in a way that had you feeling giddy. He was putting himself back out there and for that, you were always happy for him.

And so when you open your eyes and look at the western horizon, you shift your body to turn to Atsumu; you prefer looking at the setting sun’s painting from his eyes, anyway.

But you stop in your tracks because he’s grinning at you and then biting his lip in nervousness. You laugh, automatically choked up because he’s down on one knee with a ring in his hand.

“(Y/n),” he begins, but you don’t let him finish because as you’re staring into his eyes and see the sparks of orange and red reflected you’re suddenly throwing your arms on his shoulder and kneeling down with him.

“W-wait!” he protests, but laughs along with you, “—for god’s sake let me propose properly.”

You continue to laugh, even as you feel streams of tears rolling down your cheeks. Pulling away from him you grab his face in between your hands and wipe the tears rolling down his cheeks with your thumbs.

“Will you marry me?” he asks, but you know it’s not much of a question because he doesn’t wait for you to answer since he’s kissing the palm of your hand and sliding the ring on your finger before you open your mouth to speak.

“I had a whole speech prepared,” Atsumu whines, sniffling when you laugh at him and hold his face in between your hands again.

You could cry because it truly does feel like déjà vu, because the sunset reflected in his eyes look just like that very sunset you could still remember on that day you fell in love with him all those years ago.

The water in Okinawa is not as warm as the water in the Philippines, and the water soaking your dress is a little uncomfortable like the sand digging in your knees, but with Atsumu being in front of you crying along to the comments you’re sharing back and forth with him—you know you wouldn’t have it any other way.

“You know if I closed my eyes and this playlist wasn’t shitty, I could just pretend this our wedding.”

You roll your eyes, biting back a comment and let out a laugh instead. “Atsumu was in charge of the playlist. I told him to make the vibe uniform but he probably ignored everything after Atsumu make the playlist.”

Tetsurou snickers and squeezes your hand in his, while the other that’s resting on the back of your waist pulls you along to the sway of the music. You smile and lightly knock his chest with your hand that’s resting on his chest.

“Don’t tell him I’m trashing your wedding music.”

“He’ll laugh along with you,” you reply softly.

“Oi, Tetsurou!” Atsumu calls from the background; the two of you turn to face him, you greeting him with a slight wave and a wink while Tetsurou opts to shoot him a thumbs up and a smile.

“Stop tryin’ to steal my wife.”

Tetsurou laughs at your husband’s halfhearted warning, “She’s not really my type!”

“Damn straight.” Atsumu laughs, then turns towards the conversation he was having with Osamu.

“Why did it feel like my husband is trying to devalue me?” You snort and Tetsurou laughs because he knows you’re only joking.

“He trusts you and knows he can’t get rid of me that’s why.”

“Fair point,” you smile, agreeing.

“Hey Tetsu,” you say slowly, looking at him. He hums in response and looks at you with a smile mirroring your own.

“Thank you.”

He doesn’t ask you what you mean by the thank you and you smile in appreciation because you know the message was delivered without a hitch. So the two of you continue to dance in circles, with Tetsurou snorting every time the music in Atsumu’s playlist got progressively more “country” as he dubbed it.

“We should write a book about this someday.” You quip and he nods, “Hell yeah, as long as I’m written as a super buff guy.”

Thank you for being my first love.

“I mean sure,” you reply, “but when Atsumu comes into the story he’s obviously more buff. It’s just canon like that.” Tetsurou huffs, turning his head away in exaggeration.

Thank you for breaking my heart but still leaving breakfast for me that morning.

“My character needs to have some really cool quotes though,” Tetsurou negotiates and you laugh out a sure, what do you got, before he replies, “If your goals don’t scare you, they’re not big enough.” You throw your head back and laugh. “That doesn’t even make sense, but sure, we can work that in.”

Thank you for being my best friend above everything that’s happened. Thank you for accepting Atsumu.

“Wait I have another quote,” he offers and you nod for him to continue. Tetsurou smiles at you, his eyes dazzling under the night sky’s stars and the venue’s fairy lights. “He loved her enough to let her go.”

You fall silent and the urge to suddenly cry hits you. Tetsurou smiles and spins you around until you’re face to face with Atsumu, who’s staring at you with a knowing and gentle smile from across the room.

You turn to face him and the tears well up even more at the feeling of déjà vu gnawing at your chest. It doesn’t hurt in a bad way because you know the both of you are heading in the right direction this time. Tetsurou smiles and tells you, “Love you, dumbass.” before you feel Atsumu’s hand take yours.

“I’m proud of the both of you.” Atsumu whispers, kissing the corner of your temple.

“Aren’t you supposed to be the protective husband?” you laugh.

“I know he’s a special person in your life, and I’m thankful for him everyday too because him being dumb enough not to love you led to us.” Atsumu replies, laughing along with you.

“Tsumu!”

“Kiddin.”

Resting your cheek on Atsumu’s shoulder, the two of you continue to move in slower circles. You meet Tetsurou’s gaze from your spot in the room and smile when he flashes you a thumbs up.

Thank you, Tetsurou thinks when he feels déjà vu nudging his heart. The dull of his heart thrumming doesn’t ache this time so he smiles towards you again and thinks of the baby’s breath tattoo he got the night inked on the left side of his chest.

When you turn and Atsumu meets his gaze, he gives the blonde a solid nod and another thumbs up.

Thank you for letting me love and let you go, (y/n).

514 notes · View notes

timextoxhajima · 3 years

Text

GEN Z SERIES, HYUNJAE: The Third Eye

"Will you choose to believe what you see or what you feel?”

Member: Hyunjae

Genre: Fantasy / Slice of Life / Supernatural / Angst / TW

Trigger Warnings: Rape, Self-Harm

Word Count: 5.8k

Taglist: @yn-am-pm @fleurseoul @sunwoowuvbot

The first time I knew I saw something that wasn't there, I was scared. How was an eight-year-old supposed to treat an elderly man who looked closer to a skeleton than a human being standing in the corner of the room... of an elderly's home?

I remember my mother combing my grandmother's hair while my father was helping me pick up my crayons off the floor when I saw him. Nurses were walking down the corridors in a hurry. I remember nobody noticed -- or at least, unlike the conventional way of death that has been portrayed in movies and books by the very cliché usage of the flatlining on the monitor. He had a good amount of hair for an old man in his nineties.

Then again, it might've been his deteriorating health that made him look older than he actually was when he died. Time seemed to pass a lot slower when they let me see them. Unlike the way his skin seemed to sink in between his ribs and wrap around the bones of his arms, his eyes were full of light. The kind that I recognised when I was at school. I didn't know then, because I was just a child he realised could see his soul. But I will never forget the blessing he placed on the top of my head. Every single word etched into my mind like carved into stone.

I told my grandmother about the man I saw earlier that day when my parents went to talk to the nurses of the elderly home. She was scared at first, when she realised her grandchild had abilities that not many had. Yet, she never told my parents, because she knew they would convince themselves that they could do something about it -- as if one could really remove the powers of a third eye all so easily.

Angels are not beings with wings or halos but instead, a bright orb of gold and white. The old man waved so dearly to me, after giving his children and grandchildren a kiss atop their heads though they couldn't feel it. He was 88, auspicious numbers in many cultures. Then when the orb of light drifted in through the window, I remember I could almost hear the sounds of kittens and puppies. But just as it neared him, I heard the familiar sounds of laughter from his children and grandchildren, then static sounds of radio and music I didn't recognise. I will later find out that the music belonged in the 40s.

The orb presents you with everything you've loved and enjoyed and held close to your heart in your life, and should you be content with what the orb has to offer you, then it must be time for you to go.

But where there is light, there is darkness. Where there are orbs of smiles and flowers, there are daggers of blood and evil lurking in the shadows. I was 13 when I saw evil in one of its many forms. I had a headache the entire day, a sign to tell me that my third eye is in close proximity with something that did not align with my believes and morals.

I had expected something to jump out at me through the reflection off the mirror, or a hand to burst through the ground and grab me by the ankle. But no, evil in one of its many forms does not need it to be horrifying and scary.

Her hair was long, and her face was covered in what looked like burn marks.

Does Hell burn through you so quickly?

She looks human, but her fingers were split down the middle, thorns sticking out every finger, in which on each hand she has ten.

As she graced the corridors of school, she sheds these thorns that drop like nails to the floor, waiting for someone to step on those facing upwards. Have you ever gotten a sharp ache or pinch in the soles of your feet when you're walking sometimes?

If you have, then you would've probably stepped on a Hell's Thorn, or at least, that's what I called it. I never found out if she could see me, but when I realised I could touch the thorns and kick them out of sight, they'd roll off into some corner before dissolving into red ash.

Over a decade of being stuck between two worlds. I've done enough reading to understand the dangers of prancing along this line, not being able to shut one side off completely. So, when the ghosts, demons and spirits hide in the shadows of my room, or stare at me point-blank in the middle of the day like a normal human being would, it becomes normal.

They are everywhere, even when you cannot feel them. It gets confusing, when they look more human than some human beings.

Just how much longer... or how much more can I stay like this?

"I don't know where your diary is. If you're telling me it's here, then I'm telling you it's gone."

You are standing right smack in the middle of the school field, afternoon sun beaming down onto your hair. Squinting your eyes, you look around the large space of artificial grass and beyond that, the tracks, where students were finding some fun in running laps in the summer heat.

"But..."

"Lee Eun," Your heart breaks, more than necessary, because this is not the first time you've done it. "What you're looking for isn't here. The building your locker was in was torn down 20 years ago and if it was there, it's gone now. Or at least..." She watches you turn around and stare at the ground beneath your feet. "It's not here anymore."

Lee Eun was a student from your school that graduated in 2000. But she lost her life the day she graduated, only because she hadn't seen the brick falling from the nearby construction site where the school building you attended now was being built.

The silence becomes unbearable so you look up, but you only see the two male students jogging along the track and nobody else in sight. The orb did not come to collect Lee Eun's soul; this is not over.

The sweat has stuck your uniform to your back when you return to class, and it becomes apparent to you that a particular shadow has not shifted an inch since you've stepped into the classroom. You weren't in pain, so this entity is not a demon. Yet, you cannot identify its gender. It had no face, no hair, just... a volume of shadow and darkness and if the girls sitting before it knew it was there, they'd probably scream their head off.

You know its staring at you with every intention in its spirit, though you cannot see its eyes. And it stays when the teacher enters the classroom with a new student trailing behind him. For a moment, your attention is diverted to Jang Jun Hyuk, hair brown and skin fair. The girls in the class were already ogling over him, it's not a surprise anymore. But the shadow turns to look at him, then at you, and the darkness dissolves into the beige wall behind it, vanishing as Jang Jun Hyuk bows and introduces himself.

Then the king of the class speaks at a volume you know you weren't supposed to hear, but consider it a special talent now that you've honed the skills of your third eye.

"Strange vibes," Lee Hyunjae was probably talking to Younghoon. "Don't you think there's something off about him?"

"Are you sure you're not just threatened that there's someone who rivals our popularity?"

Jang Jun Hyuk bows to the class, then is instructed by the teacher to take a seat diagonally behind you, right in front of Lee Hyunjae.

"Hey, new kid."

A frown gently presses itself into your forehead when you can hear Younghoon give Hyunjae a gentle whack on his shoulder.

"Where did you move from?"

"Ah, I moved from another city. My father was transferred."

The shadow was now standing by the door of the classroom, watching the teacher scribble on the whiteboard.

"Cool," Hyunjae offers a friendly laugh. That's more like him. "Join us at lunch, provided you don't have a crowd to hang out with yet."

“Uh, sure.”

The shadow turns to look at you -- even without eyes, you know it’s watching you.

By the time you have been dragged to the cafeteria by your friends (though most people tend to think you’re weird for talking to yourself sometimes), Hyunjae has doubled over on some bench cracking up at a joke Jun Hyuk made.

Your friends can’t help but to draw your attention to the new addition to the group of popular males.

“Man fits right in, doesn’t he?”

“At least he looks like one of them.”

“y/n,” One of the two call out to you. “What happened to... what was her name?”

“Lee Eun.”

“Right, the ghost from twenty years ago. How is she?”

The two look at you with wide, glistening eyes. Most people aren’t as accommodating to your abilities, so it’s a blessing to have them by your side.

“I haven’t seen her since earlier today. She said she had a diary in school but she never found it.”

“Well, maybe it is still in school somewhere, locked up in some lost and found box or lost in some locker. Why else would she still be here and can’t... you know, move on?”

You shrug. I wish I knew.

The library was always comforting. The silence, the sound of pages being flipped and the occasional clicking of someone’s keyboard. And strangely enough, the library’s never really a hotspot for other beings except humans.

The peace was, unfortunately, disrupted though, when Jun Hyuk shows up with his backpack and tie neat around his collar. You greet him subtly before returning to your notes, but he sits down opposite you and renders your desire to be alone useless.

“Hyunjae and Younghoon told me you would be here.”

The pen in your grip gets lowered into the ivory sheets, gaze travelling up to look at him through your lashes. “Lee Hyunjae and Kim Younghoon? Why would they tell you where I am?”

Jun Hyuk offers a shy smile, diverting his brown irises away from you for a second. “Because I asked.”

The cold air stings your nose when you suck in a deep breath. “Why, do you need help with work? Because I’m literally the worst person to ask--”

“No, I just needed to know where I could find you so I could spend time with you.”

Your heart begins to thump madly, because it’s not everyday that a guy is so straightforward with his intentions to someone he just met.

“Uh--” You purse your lips in a bid to form a coherent sentence. “That’s really... honest of you.”

Jun Hyuk grins sweetly, eyes halving into crescents and creasing his skin around his lids. He has a dimple in his left cheek, a detail that you wouldn’t have noticed if he wasn’t sitting directly opposite you.

“So, can I?”

Confusion strikes you, only because assumption is a dangerous thing we like to do.

“Can you... what?”

“Hang out with you.”

The whir of the air-conditioner in the library becomes a little louder alongside the thumping that was now difficult to ignore in your head.

The blood rushes up to your cheeks and you can feel your face catching fire, so Jun Hyuk eases it by restarting a conversation.

“Anyway, have you done the work from today?”

“I--” You look down at the worksheet he was taking out from his bag. It’s barely filled. “I’ve been staring at it for awhile now--”

“Not good at Math?”

“I’m better at...” Jun Hyuk takes the worksheet and gets up, scooting over to the seat next to you. A gulp finds a way down your throat. “...English and Literature...”

“Well, it’s your lucky day because I’m great at Math.”

Up close, Jin Hyuk smells like fresh linen.

Not a great sign. He knows what makes a girl tick.

Jun Hyuk spends the rest of the afternoon helping you with the worksheet, and the glimmer in his eyes...

“Are you listening?”

Your jaw slacks in surprise, blinking your attention away from staring at him. A chuckle sounds from Jun Hyuk, who looks away with the slightest hint of pride.

Jun Hyuk makes you feel like you are prancing on clouds for the next few weeks. The little notes he passed in class that earned the attention of his new friends, Younghoon and Hyunjae. The sweets and treats that he’d leave on your desk before school and the after-school study sessions were your favourite part of the day.

He’d expected you to be calm and collected when he took the initiative to hold your hand under the table, but he could read how nervous and anxious you got, so he thinks it’s a good idea to ease that anxiety with a kiss on your cheek.

Lee Eun was no longer around to ask you for her diary, but the faceless shadow was still tailing you when you were in the classroom. It’s never interfered with your daily routine though, thus you choose to leave it be and enjoy being a normal teenager for once.

Three months after you met Jun Hyuk though, you could tell Hyunjae was deliberately steering away from him, dragging Younghoon along with him. You can’t help but wonder if it was because you and Jun Hyuk were now romantically involved and that Hyunjae had probably caught wind of the fact that you could see things that weren’t there, leading him to ostracise Jun Hyuk.

Not that it had that much effect anyway, Jun Hyuk was a charming boy on his own; he didn’t need Hyunjae’s help to ‘make it’ in school.

The day carries on as per usual with Jun Hyuk staying in school to study with you. Hands busy scribbling away and eyes darting across worksheets, you’ve always admired how focussed he gets when he does his work.

In attempt to pull him out of his stress-bubble, you cap on your pen and lean into him, resting your head on his shoulder after making sure there was nobody else left in the library.

“Do you want to take a break? You’ve been going at it for quite some time now.”

“I’m just about there, just hold on a minute, would you?”

A pout surfaces on your lips. “I know. I just... do you ever feel bad that Hyunjae and Younghoon aren’t as close to you as before?”

Jun Hyuk finishes the line he’s writing and looks up at you. “Why would I?”

“I don’t know, I just... you must’ve heard the rumor that I can see ghosts. Aren’t you upset that they might be leaving you out because of that?”

“You can see ghosts?” He scoffs. His attitude feels strange today, though he hasn’t said anything wrong. “That’s just stupid. And no, I don’t really care.”

“Oh,” A pause halts you, so you can think of an appropriate response. “You don’t... believe in ghosts or spirits?”

“No, that stuff is for kids.”

The thought of Jun Hyuk not believing in something you were known to be able to see was strangely more discomforting than not.

“Why’d you ask about Hyunjae and Younghoon? I thought you weren’t close with those guys?” He’s placing his pens into his pencil case and keeping his worksheets in his file. You start doing the same.

“I-- I’m not, I’m just asking for your sake.”

“My sake?” He clears the table of his items and leans back in his seat. “Why would it bother me? Is it because you don’t get to talk to them anymore?”

“What? Why would that matter to me?”

“I don’t know, you were pretty smitten with Hyunjae just a few weeks ago.”

“Since when?”

“You think I didn’t notice when you were smiling at him when he was making those jokes-- they weren’t even that funny?”

A frown has finally cemented itself between your brows. “I’m sorry, where is this jealousy even coming from? Why didn’t you just tell me when you saw it?”

Jun Hyuk goes silent, and you can tell he’s upset just by thinking about it. Sighing, you rest your head on his shoulder again in a bid to appease his anger.

“Alright, I’m sorry, okay? I was just concerned that you might feel left out or anything. And rest assured, I wasn’t flirting with Hyunjae.”

Jun Hyuk hums in response, reaching your chin to pull you closer. Your heart starts to pound in your ear when he doesn’t hesitate to press his lips against yours, the sudden intimacy catching you off-guard and sending chills down your spine.

Something doesn’t feel right.

“Jun--” You manage to cough out, just as he starts to bury his nose and lips into your neck. “Jun Hyuk, not here.”

“Come on, there’s nobody here. Isn’t it exciting?” He smirks into your skin but it makes you feel dirty.

“Jun, we really shouldn’t. I’m tired today so...” Gently pushing him off, his eyes are now filled with the ache of rejection. Somewhere inside you, you hope that he understands. But you also hope he knows he’s being an asshole.

“I... I think I’m going to go,” Backing away, you can hear your heart in your ears as you reverse, returning to the table to clear your stationery. His footsteps come dangerously close behind you before you are yanked around violently, each of your elbows coming into tight restraint in his palms.

“Where do you think you’re going?”

“I’m going home,” When your eyes meet his, they are dark under the lighting. And even then, it seems like the man you trusted had turned to dust and blown away in the wind. “Please, let me go.”

“But don’t you trust me? Didn’t you say that you didn’t know what you’d do without me?” It’s horrifying when his nose comes dangerously closely to yours, his lips that were once part of a daydream now slowly being torn to shreds, forming an idea of a nightmare in your mind.

If you could feel darkness, you were sure you could hurl out nothing but black masses, when he aggressively pastes his lips to yours. There’s a stark difference being in love and being trustworthy... and being this person who was cutting off the blood supply from your face to your mouth now.

“Let me go, please!” Your strength is rendered useless in his tight grip around your wrists, and now he decides to shift his tongue to your neck, harshly sucking on the skin and flesh and making you want to hurl and sob instead. The struggle you offered was of no use to Jun Hyuk, not when he is able to shove you backwards and plaster your back to the study desk with all your pens and pencils under your back.

“Do you know what you’re getting yourself into?!”

“You should’ve thought about that before you kissed me first in the garden the other day, no?”

The tears finally stream when the betrayal sets in. Not even prayers would work anymore, would they?

Using his upper body weight to hold you to the table, the metal clinking of his belt comes like a warning when you can feel the tears wetting the strands of your hair.

“Jun Hyuk, please...”

“Shut up,” Ice cold fingers run up the length of your thighs and around your hips under your skirt, scratching your skin as he removes your underwear. “Isn’t this how much you trust me?”

Sobs run through gritted teeth as your chin tilts to the ceiling, his body absorbing every ounce of struggle and force you were exerting on him. But, it was so easily drained into him that you were gradually turning limp and lifeless. Hearing him undo his zipper while he wets and marks your skin with his tongue and teeth shuts off all your senses. Your eyes flutter shut with resignation, the shivering and trembling seeping away with your need to escape.

Help me.

Something fuses loudly. The lights go off.

“Who’s there?! Motherfucker!”

The zip goes back up, and the weight on you shifts away.

“I’m going to kill you!”

His voice wears away, getting softer with his footsteps.

Still crying, you pull up your underwear that was dangling at your ankles and push yourself off the surface of the table. Everything on the desk gets swept into your back before you stumble out of the secluded study area, the light of the late sunset greeting your tear stained face.

Reaching home feels like reaching the end point in a marathon, just that instead of feeling pride and glory, you were feeling nothing but worthlessness.

The lukewarm water feels like a gentle hug around your body when you sink into the cold marble, knees propped up and surfaced with your feet flat against the base of the bathtub.

Swollen eyes from crying but too tired to cry somemore, and you find difficulty in even remembering why you even fell for Jun Hyuk in the first place.

It was my fault for bringing it up. I shouldn’t have brought it up.

Maybe if I didn’t have this gift then I didn’t need to ask or worry about Jun Hyuk being ostracised. Maybe it shouldn’t be called a gift after all.

This pain is temporary, right? This small blade can do more than ease the pain. This blood that colors the water can do more than dry the tears from my eyes.

I wish I wasn’t born with this gift.

You close your eyes and let yourself sink into the tub, under the surface of the water. The water starts to feel thicker, and before you can count to five, it starts going up your nose.

But then it feels like you’ve been sucked into another dimension and thrown back onto your bed when you gasp, sitting up and choking out what feels like water in your throat.

Your hands fumble around yourself, and you wince when you look down at your wrists. The vertical cut looked more like a scar that’s already healed, rather than an injury you had chosen to inflict on yourself just hours before.

The clock strikes 3.33am, and while you would usually be kind of freaked out because 3 is not an auspicious number, you can’t help but to feel some kind of relief when you realised you were still alive.

The next few days you spend in the shadows. Jun Hyuk tries to apologise to you on more than one occasion, but when you glitch and nearly break down when he gets anywhere near you, your friends start to understand that something had happened.

Why would you want to take your life all of a sudden?

Mr. Shadowman doesn’t leave you alone though. Instead, it starts following you more aggressively, showing up in the strangest of places and in the most horrendous positions. You had seen it standing with its feet planted to the ceiling of the cafeteria, then again standing perfectly still behind the classroom door when the teacher closed it.

Then it finally follows you into the bathroom after school. You’ve changed your studying location to your classroom, so you wouldn’t need to worry about being alone.

But no matter how many times you see this shadow, seeing it curled up under the sink in the female’s toilet makes you yelp and jump backwards, not even enticing a reaction from it.

“You...” Gripping the edge of the sink, you squat and stare at it. “What do you need from me?”

“I wouldn’t go anywhere nearer to it if I were you.” Your eyes dart up into the broken glass above the sink. Seeing Hyunjae staring at you through the reflection, with the pillar hiding the rest of his body was surprising.

It dawns on you that whatever you were seeing, Hyunjae could see it too.

The shadow remained still under the sink, crouched into a mass like someone holding its knees to its chest. The water dripping from under the sink slips through the mass like it wasn’t there. Hyunjae spares you a few seconds to stare at it some more until he grabs your arm and pulls you out of the toilet.

“What the-- don’t touch me--” Yanking your wrist out of his hands, you jerk away from him. The impact pulls your sleeves upwards, revealing the bruises that Jun Hyuk had left on you just a few days ago -- and the scar of the cut down your forearm.

His attention is stolen by the marks, cuing you to nervously pull your sleeves back down as you steal a glance at Hyunjae’s face.

“Don’t interact with that thing,” He advises after a few moments of silence. “It’s been following you.”

Looking up with a harsh frown on your face, confusion and anger starts to seep through your bones.

“You mean to tell me you could see these things all this while?”

Hyunjae’s eyes fill with a tiny pinch of guilt, but he doesn’t look away.

“That thing is harmless,” Your thumb brushes across the area where the bruise was hidden under the material of your sleeve. “It saved me.”

“If it’s harmless or any bit human then why doesn’t it have a face? Or eyes or hair or a mouth?”

“So, you can’t see what it is either. Have you seen others? Ghosts, the angel orbs, demons--”

“Get this clear in your head, I am not here to discuss what you can see,” Hyunjae takes a step closer and looks at you with an expression you can’t read. Was he angry? Frustrated? Worried? Concerned?

“But do not engage with whatever that is. They only stick around if you entertain it, and right now, you are just short of becoming friends with it.”

“You make it sound like you know everything about that other world.”

“And you make it sound like you haven’t seen a demon and that there are no dangers of it.”

The proximity starts to make you anxious; his build is similar to Jun Hyuk’s and the physical confrontation starts to knock on your skull is all the ways possible. Hyunjae retreats when he notices your eyes are unable to meet his now, and he walks away with his fists clenched.

That night, you are unable to fall asleep. Not with the new revelation that Hyunjae can see the same things you do. Or was it just the shadow that he can see?

Has he seen the orbs or angels or demons?

You sit up in your bed, eyes adjusting to the darkness when a thud wakes you up. The crickets outside are loud in the silent night, but it takes you just a split second to recognise the shadow standing in the corner where the door meets the corner of the room.

Keeping your eyes peeled, you fumble around at your nightstand, searching for the button of the lamp. It doesn’t disappear though, when the amber light illuminates the cream-pink room.

“What do you need?” The query comes out more like a whisper, because most spirits you meet are ghosts who need your help or are willing to talk to you -- most of them have faces and eyes and have some resemblance to being human at some point of time in their life.

The shadow pulls itself off the wall, and turns from a flat, regular shadow into a mass of darkness; the same way it was in the classroom when you first saw it, then later under the sink in the bathroom.

This is the first time this has happened -- a shadow that was very obviously a being and yet you cannot decide if it was something harmful or something that once walked the Earth.

By now, the shadow is just about two metres away from your bed, yet you find yourself inching backwards because you cannot predict what it would (or could) do to you.

Then it lifts an arm that reaches out to you, darkness flowing like steam off its limbs as it gets closer to you. But just before it can touch you, a flash of brightness interrupts your interaction.

“Stop.”

Your room is brightly lit up for a split second, blinding you from seeing the shadow. So when your eyes come back into focus, your eyes are about to fall out of your skull when you recognise the back of someone you know.

Hyunjae was standing right next to your bed, between you and the shadow, now visibly a physical blob of darkness.

“You have no business here with her. You don’t even need to be here.”

Silence.

Hyunjae looks at the shadow intently. He is listening to it talk to him, but you hear nothing but the crickets chirping outside.

“Jang Jun Hyuk will be mine to deal with, not yours. You do not need to be here.”

Lee Hyunjae... just what are you?

“Seer but is she a...”

“What did you just say?” You blurt out when the strange croak gets to your head. Hyunjae flinches and turns around to look at you, eyes flickering with worry before turning back to the shadow.

Now, you can see blue orbs for eyes and skin pulled and stretched like it had been worn out through hundreds of years. It was neither a ghost nor human.

It didn’t look like Lee Eun or the elderly man you saw when you were 8, nor did it look like the female demon you saw at 13.

“Leave, you do not belong here.”

“To deserves she know.”

“Know what?” Impatience and fear was getting the better of you, and if Hyunjae was more than human, he would know. “...That I can see you?”

“No, she cannot know!” Hyunjae tries to block you from the ghoul. “That is not your place to tell her!”

The ghoul proves more powerful than Hyunjae and reaches right through him, creating a bright outline of his limb through Hyunjae’s chest.

“No!”

That was the last thing you hear just as the shadow touches your forehead, snapping your neck backwards and sending your memory into a dimension you cannot recognise.

“You will be blessed with eternal protection.”

That was the blessing the elderly man offered you when you were eight. Little did you know that he was merely reading a blessing pinned to your existence on its own.

"The son of Saint Michael had fallen in love with the fairy of the mortals. Saint Michael hadn’t offered the tiniest bit of worry or concern over his son becoming star-crossed lovers. Angels were meant to be with angels and fairies with fairies... Granted that even if you did know about his son’s feelings, you would eventually realise that it was against the laws of the world, for you were a gateway for the Good to seep into the mortal world. But what Saint Michael did not know was that the fairy his son had fallen in love with had stored the same amount of love he had for her in his heart.”

“The Heavens forbid star-crossed lovers between the two breeds of beings. Saint Michael himself couldn’t believe it when his son caved into his feelings right after you did. Fairies were fickle-minded; the only beings of the world of immortals that once walked the Earth as human beings. It was expected that you would provide the same love to the Archangel’s son -- but when he decided to embrace you in his all-gold halo of light... Saint Michael knew he could not afford losing the bearings of his son. He had decided that mortalising you would be a smart decision; keeping you close by letting you protect your ability to connect with this world but restraining you from ever returning to Hyunjae’s side.”

“Yet, like mortals, even immortal beings are unable to fight the strength of love. Hyunjae had decided descend to the world of the Humans and Mortals... to protect you by your side in your second life, allowing you to see him, touch him.”

The day you were reborn was the day Hyunjae had decided to humanise himself, albeit the process was draining and set him on a ticking clock from returning to the other world.

The ghoul looks at you, his blue eyes now revealing himself as a fairy who had disguised himself, in a bid to warn you before you had sold your heart to Hyunjae, something you cannot be with.

“You are paying the price for a fault that was his, do you not bear any resentment?”

The memories return. Flashes of Hyunjae smiling at you because he knew you could see him. The kisses that stained his skin because you were a mere mortal with abilities, and he was a being that was meant for more.

“How is this his fault?”

The fairy is silent, thinking of the words to say.

“Had he lived up to the responsibilities of being the son of Saint Michael, he wouldn’t have caved in.”

Your hair feels light around your shoulders, watching the fairy slowly morph into something less ambiguous.

“What would have happened if we didn’t fall in love in my first life?”

The fairy had grown wings that looks like glass, reflecting light into seven colors into the abyss beyond you. He looks at you, blue eyes never faltering.

“You would’ve become an Undine Fairy, and Hyunjae would’ve had to return to the world of the Skies--”

“And I would never see him again.”

He can see that you’ve had a glimpse into your past life; the forbidden love you had for Hyunjae now buried deep inside you. It feels like someone had just stuck a shovel 6 feet into your heart and dug out every remnant he could find.

“Would you have let him go, had he been true to his existence and you had become an Undine?”

“There’s no way I can answer that, can I?”

The fairy blinks and starts walking backwards. “The rules between the two Worlds are forged in stone, but everybody knows that the matters of the spirit and soul cannot be bound by tangible logic. Your choice depends on what you believe: will you choose to believe what you see or what you feel?”

The question echoes inside your head, and the world around you flashes brightly like you had just died and walked into heaven.

Your consciousness returns to current time, eyes fluttering open as your alarm clock rings you awake. Sitting opposite you, eyes closed as you watch him snoozing lightly despite sitting in a chair, you feel a pinch in your chest.

It’s not his fault, and never will be.

#hyunjae imagines #the boyz #the boyz hyunjae #hyunjae #the boyz imagines #the boyz fanfic #the boyz scenario #tbz imagines

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lsobelevans · 3 years

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Horror tropes? In my Roswell, New mexico? It’s more likely than you think!

In this essay I will...

...be mentioning a few horror/thriller movies and while nothing explicitly gory or scary will be shown in this post, those movies definitely contain scenes and themes that can be disturbing/scary/triggering, do your researches if you’ve got doubts!

...be focusing on the Maria and Alex road-trip, from the moment the car breaks down to the last scene with Travis’ twin. I’m probably going to be led to briefly mention the other scenes that are intertwined with this arc (the echo date and the Planet 7 Kyle and Isobel scene, as well as the marlex car drive when I feel like it is relevant).

...be approaching specific themes that are used in the scenes that compose this little arc and also more general ones like sound, editing, cinematography and color.

... be reaching a lot. I do not think everything I will be mentioning is 100% thought-out and voluntary (although you never know). But I’m a firm believer that in filmmaking, yes even inside a CW show, the symbolism comes through subconsciously. So like, maybe they didn’t mean to use corn field as a mark for transition, but it doesn’t take away from the fact that this symbolism works with the story they’re telling and for the journey the characters are in that moment. Additionally, lighting, decor and costumes are always a choice, just like the camera doesn’t position itself randomly, someone’s behind and thinking of the composition of shots that, even if it’s in a basic way, has meaning.

... be starting chronologically but I’ll also make jumps backward and forward, grasping on themes when they come up. Ok, then, let’s dive in!

This episode references and uses a lot of the iconic mechanisms of the horror movie genre. Alex and Maria’s comfortable road trip atmosphere, open hearted conversation in the car, breaks at the same time as the car itself breaks. The camera, steady so far, the shots following a well known pattern of shot/counter-shot, becomes more unpredictable and shakier and suddenly we’re out of the car, and bam, large shot.

From the moment they’re out of the car, you won’t be able to see the horizon. Maria and Alex are stuck in a corn field, and they’re stuck in the frame.

Then poof, Travis appears out of nowhere, accompanied with a pang of music, frightening us and them. Well, more exactly, it cuts on a shot that we’ve seen before without Travis, now with Travis, which gives us the appearing out of nowhere effect.

Alex says it best.

Well now they’re stuck with a strange guy with an axe, and in a corn field 😬

Hey, have you seen he’s got an axe??? or do you need a close-up???

Okay, this scene ends there. So, let’s take a break and talk about cornfields. There’s many examples of horror movies making use of a field of corn as a location, famously Children of the Corn (1984), Dark Night of the Scarecrow (1995) Signs (2002), that last one also involving, you guessed it, aliens.

Screenshots from the Signs trailer.

Corn fields are strongly associated with rurality, especially rural America. More largely, they can represent renewal, fertility or abundance. In the contrary, they can be seen as a very ominous location due to their immensity, a labyrinth in which you can’t see very far away and from which you’ll have trouble coming out.

Although I’m pretty sure Maria’s chase in the cornfield is more of a reference to The Shining (1980) it reminded me of one of my favorite scenes from one of my favorite movies Tom à la ferme (2013), in which Tom is basically held hostage in rural Canada. The corn field chase is a turning point, the last of Tom's attempts to escape.

Cornfields apparently also often imply scarecrows, which are inherently scary in my opinion but we’ll talk about it more later.

The next scene takes place inside of Travis' cabin.

The lighting here is pretty low, the light coming from a few small sources, creating a lot of shadows. The main color is a greenish/yellow which can be associated with nature and earth, rurality, dirty, suffocating. If we look at it, the color scheme of the entire road trip is very much following this pattern of browns/yellows/greens because of the cornfield and the color of the characters costumes (the exception being Maria’s truck which is a bright red). In opposition, the scenes that are intertwined are either blue and orange for Max and Liz or a lot of pink/blues/purples for Isobel and Kyle in planet 7 (bi bi bi).

The cabin is messy, supposedly reflecting the state of the owner’s mind. We get a nice close-up on meat + a knife and all of the creepy skins on the walls. Also, it’s noticeable that from this moment on, the camera is shakier, we experience different angles too.

We are given many visual clues that something is wrong.

I’m gonna pass on the sound of the sound of the cow parodying a werewolf + the vampire diaries inside joke.

Btw, if the fact that Travis names his cows -- that he skins for a living -- like human women isn’t enough for you to think mmmm. we are in danger. Well, don’t worry. The cw spells it out for you!!

We know Alex! We got contextual clues!

Right after this, Alex and Maria make another direct reference to being in a horror movie situation.

ALEX: This is why I don’t like horror films. The gay guy always dies first.

MARIA: ????

ALEX: Or... second. Okay, that’s fair. That look, that’s fair.

I think this bit is interesting, because not only does it denounce an horror movie cliché (the black person of the cast dies first, the queer person is second) but also in this situation I believe it can be see as kind of a callout on the fandom’s behavior that i’m not gonna spell out for you but yeah. Fellow queer people, don’t forget you’re not the only one who is sometimes badly/unfairly represented.

Moving on. In the next scene, Alex is searching the cabin for clues, and we are also given some about Travis.

Either he has a twin brother or he’s got a framed picture of himself on his wall. Oh, and he’s military.

Then Travis startles Alex and plays a little bit of banjo, which is a good excuse to stop and talk about music. The show uses a lot of diegetic music aka music that is present in the universe of the story, that the characters can also hear. It justify the use of said music and it ties the audio with the picture.

The banjo already is heard at the very beginning of the arc during a cut from the planet 7 scene to the road trip scene. We get a few notes that indicate a change of scenery and that helps smooth up the transition, and I’m pretty sure it was also supposed to be diegetic music coming from Maria’s radio. The banjo, like the corn field, is super linked with rurality and rural America (again!)

Another reference of the banjo in horror/thriller would be Deliverance (1972).

youtube

I can’t not think of this movie when I hear banjo unfortunately.

The way Travis plays, aggressively bad, and while singing I Think We’re Alone Now, is supposed to make you think about that scene in The Umbrella Academy be quite unsettling, another point for isolation horror.

So sweet of Travis to attack Alex with a guitar, and then a smol knife, and not with the axe <3.

Then we’ve got a traveling zoom-in (or equivalent I’m not sure it isn’t a steady-cam here but the effect is the same) on Maria. This kind of effect can feel a little bit over-the-top and dramatic, in a old genre movie kind of way. It is usually used to bring the audience in, make it feel like you’re evolving in the same universe as the characters (here you’re walking toward Maria). In a scene where you should feel scared, it can be a mean to make you feel more engaged, as well as underlining Maria’s expression, her fear. In my opinion, this is also a way to tell you that from now on, Maria is the main character of this arc, the one that you will be following after the commercial break (that occurs right after) and making it more suspenseful.

The scene after the break is the start of the corn-field chase. Travis steps out of the cabin, the cuts are faster, many close-shots, some even out of focus, that accelerate the rhythm, and a long fade-in of a new song: a modern, electronic song (Kim Petra’s Close You Eyes) completely in opposition with the acoustic banjo and with the atmosphere of the scene, which makes it strange and makes you think oh, what a weird choice! (at least it did for me lol). The lyrics, however, go very well with the scene.

I feel it coming on You've got nowhere to run There's no way you'll make it out alive

Yep.

We find out right after that the music is in fact diegetic but for Isobel and Kyle, it’s another use of music to ease a transition between 2 scenes that are different in every possible way.

Now, the corn-field chase. As I mentioned before, I believe it’s a direct reference to The Shining’s ending chase scene where Jack Torrance chases his son Danny through a vegetal labyrinth with an axe.

From the shots to the lighting (from behind or on the side, making the characters look like silhouettes) both scenes are very similar. Also, Travis is styled like Jack Nicholson ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Oh look, Michael’s here to save the day!

Oh well, guess not.

Yeah, in this scene, and like we’ve been shown before, Maria is going to be the one that saves everyone. The racist cliché of the black character dying first in a horror movie is reversed, Maria is the last one standing. The scarecrow (that looked conveniently a lot like Maria) is supposed to play in favor of the bad guy, it’s a scary element, creating confusion and unease, but here the character decides to basically take it into her own hands and bend the rules. This character says i’m not that archetype, and she’s going to be using the horror movie tools against itself.

Lastly, the final horror movie recurring theme that I’m going to talk about is the twin/the double.

Yes, twins is a spooky tool used in horror movie because their similarities make them unsettling, uncanny.

There’s also the idea that if one were to replace the other, you wouldn’t be able to tell. The impostor is a very scary concept that Roswell has also dealt with before.

I can’t be the only one that has been traumatized by that halloween special of the Simpsons where Bart has an evil twin...

It’s the last twist of the arc, there is a bad!Travis and a good!Travis. The bad one kept the other locked-up somewhere and had taken his place.

It’s particularly interesting for Roswell that has a history with twins/doppelgänger, and that since the original show. It is a clear instance of in-world foreshadowing here! (howdy)

My conclusion about all this is that the people who worked on 2x06 had a great time building the episode and it shows, while also making it enjoyable to watch and yeah, we love to see it!

#roswellmarchformeta2021 #rnmmarchformeta2021 #meta #or whatever this is ahah #tw violence #i'm so sorry i'm late for this ;___;#mine*

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petri808 · 3 years

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Bakudeku canon divergent, vampire quirk AU

1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24

When Bakugou finally woke up in the Ena City Hospital, his head was splitting worse than a punch from Kirishima in full quirk, and ears rang with the force of all 108 New Year’s bell tolls. If he’d had no memory of the night before, Bakugou swore he’d just survived the worst hangover in history. Even his eyes hurt from the bright, piercing fluorescent lights and they weren’t even open! He turned his head to the side, noticing how much effort it took just to shift in such a small manner. It was as if his body was drained of... “Ugh, that bastard,” he groaned. ‘Fucker bit me.’ And as if to add insult to injury, a pin-prick pain in his neck revealed itself in that revelation.

His arm flopped up, hand straining with jerky strokes, reaching to touch the fresh bite wound located at the junction of his neck and shoulder. He flinched at the tender, bruising pain that sent a shock down his spine. Son-of— This just in! Pro Hero Dynamite cast in one of those cliché vampire movies that went straight to video. Definitely not the career start he’d envisioned.

“Oh, good you’re finally awake Mr. Bakugou.”

“Who the fuck are you?” he spat at the male voice. “And can someone turn the fucking lights off?!”

“I am Doctor Ishihira, and my apologies,” the doctor flicked off the overhead light. “Is that better?”

“Yeah,” he grumped.

“Mr. Bakugou, you were found yesterday morning and brought in suffering from hypovolemic shock due to severe blood loss and dehydration. We’ve treated you with 3 liters of IV fluids and blood plasma to bring your numbers back up, however you’ll still be groggy until your body replenishes the nutrients you were stripped of.”

Over a day had passed! At hearing he’d been out cold for so long, Bakugou immediately clenched his fists, swearing up and down about being released until they threatened to sedate him for longer. Longer?! He begrudgingly relented and settled down, but damn it! That meant Midoriya had another head start on him again! And now that the man knew he was on his trail, finding him would be a lot more difficult!

“What the hell is hypo-whatever shock?” Bakugou questioned.

“When you were found, you were in and out of consciousness and rambling incoherently, all signs of severe blood loss. The fatigue you’re still feeling is also due to the effects of it. Luckily the amount of loss wasn’t enough to start shutting down your organs.”

The doctor continued explaining a few more details regardless of the tantrum like a robot. Minor injuries he’d been treated for. The obvious puncture wounds in his neck, questioning Bakugou about any description he could provide of his attacker. He wasn’t about to tell this doctor or any authority figure who the true culprit was, so he feigned a temporary retrograde amnesia. Based on a raised brow, peering over his glass’s expression, the doctor didn’t look very convinced. Oh well, Bakugou really didn’t care about the man’s opinion.

“Mr. Bakugou, we also called you parents…”

“You what?!” Bakugou tried to jump off the bed, but his body absolutely refused to respond and ended up flopping like a dying fish. Ugh! He really was worse off than he’d thought.

“I’m sorry, but you are a minor, so we were obligated to do so. However, they did give us permission to treat and release you on your own recognizance once we felt you were better.”

Well, that was good news. ‘Sounds like mom actually listened to my letter.’ Or the authorities surely would have shown up by now. “Ugh! So, how much longer am I stuck here?”

“If you continue to recover well, tomorrow morning.”

Fuck! Now a three-day head start! Just great, he groaned. Midoriya could get far away with that kind of a jump start. “Fine, whatever! Now go the fuck away.”

The doctor left the room after explaining how nurses will be monitoring his progress, but to also let them know if anything started to feel worse. They needed to know if he developed any lasting effects from organ damage. Once he was alone again, Bakugou rolled gingerly onto his side as his mind processed the new information. Whatever Midoriya had been hit with must be the cause of this weird blood thirst that resembled a goddamn vampire plot line. Perhaps the significance of the blood coloring in his eyes was a sign of that thirst taking hold? That’ll be a handy tell, too bad it seemed to appear within seconds of the next step.

But if Midoriya had just fed on a victim, and history showed at times, a span of days before the next incident, what had caused his friend to attack him so fast? Was this thirst like a hunger? And what happens when you exercise or exert yourself? You use up energy. ‘Duh, Katsuki.’ Fighting and expending all that energy must have triggered the attack. ‘Wow, it burns fast.’ That meant Midoriya probably struggled to control this thirst, and that’s why he was pleading for him to leave him alone. But sorry, he couldn’t do that. ‘Fucker shouldn’t have run!’ One way or another he is getting his friend back home where he belonged. In fact, this only made his drive to find Midoriya stronger because he felt like he was partially to blame for the predicament his friend was in. The guy had to be scared, freaked out, and lonely. Bakugou’s heart clenched at the thought. He knew his friend was a social person by nature who loved being around friends and family. To be stuck out here all by himself and too frightened because of whatever this new quirk was had to be horrible… and utterly not fair. Of course, he did have a tendency to isolate himself when he feared…

Bakugou groaned. “Kami, not again with this shit!” When was Midoriya gonna learn to stop running away!

As his eyes relented to the fatigue and his mind slipped back into unconsciousness, Bakugou could only pray he’ll get a lead as soon as he got out of this hospital. This strange new quirk, if that’s really what it was, posed a serious danger not only to Midoriya, but the public. The reputation of pro hero’s had taken a major hit already because of AFO and the league, so if the public found out about a blood drinking hero attacking people… ‘I gotta get you out of here…’

After his encounter with Bakugou, Midoriya had rushed out of town as quickly as possible. Tears poured down his cheeks as he took off into the sky from having given in to the lust of this uncontrollable quirk. But he couldn’t stop it even if he’d wanted to. He’d learned the hard way right at the beginning that once it took hold of his mind, the only thing he could do was give-in or succumb to an even worse ravenous state that literally hurt. The pain of holding out on the hunger made him feel like a starved predatory animal that tore at his insides until he relented. In this state, the blood of any creature that came too close became a meal. But it was never enough. Animal blood didn’t satiate him in the same way that human blood did. Plus, he worried that if he let it get completely out of control, he might just end up killing someone. So far, he’d been lucky to leave them all unconscious but alive.

It was obvious that the light AFO had hit him with contained this strange quirk. How ironic, to take down a villain, only to be turned into one. That’s how Midoriya felt. How else could he feel? A hero wouldn’t hurt other people, so by taking the blood of others for sustenance, that made him a villain. Therefore, he couldn’t be a hero anymore. It must have been AFO’s plan all along once he’d realized he was losing. The villains end goal was to ruin hero society and this was definitely one way to do it. Take out his primary rival. The man poised to carry on a torch of safety and security, and snuff out any who chose to do harm… The whole situation with Bakugou really turned this into a nightmare out of body experience. To see his friend’s eyes suddenly show fear, then fade away the more he drank… his mouth clamped to the man’s neck… it was a horrible imagine that was sure to haunt him. He could still smell the burnt cinnamon from such a close encounter. If only he had clothes to change into or even a pond to bathe in, because that lingering scent was gonna drive him mad!

Midoriya curled up and clenched his eyes shut tight in an abandoned and overgrown castle he’d found outside of Ena. It didn’t look like it’s been maintained for a very long time, so the likelihood of a human showing up seemed low. He knew he should have travelled farther away, but he was too tired, too upset and just wanted to quit. All the years of growing up quirkless, to gain OFA and become the very thing he’d dreamt of, only for those dreams to be dashed again. It was as if life just didn’t want him to be a real hero. Maybe he should just put himself out of his misery, and yet— he couldn’t do it. To die out here alone where no one knew where he was or what had become of him, that wasn’t fair to his family and friends…

They must be so worried about him right now. His poor mother didn’t deserve any of this. Would his friends look down on him now? And All Might, his idol, who’d taken him under his wing, was he disappointed? And that just left Bakugou. He’d said the truth in answering the man’s question. No, Midoriya never would have expected him to come looking. Katsuki Bakugou giving a damn about him? Yeah, right. Bakugou wasn’t doing this because he cared. There was always a selfish reason behind his madness. Fear. Anger. Jealousy. Shouldn’t big bad Dynamight be thrilled that his biggest rival was gone?

Okay that was a big, fat white lie he’d been telling himself for the last two years. He knew Bakugou had moved past those pettier behaviors, but it was simply easier to believe and keep their relationship as rivals than to hope his childhood friend would ever see him as something else. And yet… ‘Kacchan was genuinely surprised by my answer. Did he really come looking for me because he cared that much?’ Yet in what way? Why was the man trying so hard? Did he… ‘miss me?’

Midoriya shook his head violently of those thoughts. No, no, he didn’t want to believe that because it would make this situation even more unbearable than it already was! He’d already given up everything he’d ever loved. His hopes and dreams, a future and losing an affection he’d craved for years would just simply be too much.

#bakudeku #bkdk #katsudeku #bakugou katsuki #midoriya izuku #bakudeku canon divergent au #blood quirk #vampire quirk #bakudeku au #bakudeku fan fic #bakudeku fan fiction #decchan #ktdk #ch 6 #bloody passion #petri808

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zims-left-shoe · 4 years

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Hi, I absolutely adore your stuff!!! Its my birthday soon and I would be forever grateful if you could write me something for Zim? I dont really mind what it is or what it's about. I'd just be happy for cute headcannons. Thank youuuuuuu!!!!💞😘

Sure!! I finally got to this. I’ve been wanting to write some headcanons anyway, but I have a lot in my ask box so I just haven’t gotten to it yet. This is basically a list of various headcanons that are cute (in my opinion), they don’t really have a specifc theme!

Cute Zim relationship headcanons (all are my personal opinion)!!

Irkens are touch starved, since the entire empire is basically one big military. Love within Irken society is incredibly taboo, as is physical affection. Most forms of physical contact between Irkens tend to be painful (i.e punches, kicks, strikes). The whole concept of romantic relationships was a bit of a culture shock to Zim.

That being said, the very first time you had attempted something in that vein (even if it was something as simple as a hug or taking his hand), he wasn’t quite sure how to react. At first he was very jumpy. However, if you would pull away, he would immediately bring you back in.

In the beginning, you would have to be the one to instigate anything romantic. It wasn’t necessarily that he didn’t want it (he was pretty much hooked on physical affection the first time you held his hand), rather he was too proud to ask for anything. He didn’t want to be seen as weak, begging for attention. He was Irk’s finest soldier after all!

Eventually, he had stopped caring about that. Once he gained confidence with the whole thing, he would make the first moves quite often. Because if he wanted it, he would take it (within your comfort level of course).

Zim is a clingy bastard. Too conceited to admit it, but clingy nonetheless. If you ignore him for too long, he will begin to bug you in the most obnoxious ways imaginable. Trying to work or be productive? He’s basically the equivalent of a cat, he’ll just lay right across whatever you’re trying to do, or right on top of you to prevent you from accomplishing anything. If he can’t do that, he’ll bitch and moan until you acknowledge his existence. If you somehow manage to ignore him after all of that, he’ll get all schmoopy and lay on the ground all depressed like (basically that one scene from ETF) until you go convince him you still love him.

(more under the cut)

Despite being cautious with hugs at first, he learned to love them. Again, he would never say this aloud, but they make him feel warm and safe. Zim would never verbally ask for a hug, rather just slither his way into your arms. This happens often, especially when he’s unhappy. Sometimes he’ll even use his PAK legs along with his arms, although he’s very careful when he does this since they can be sharp; this usually happens if he thinks you need to be protected from something, even if it’s not a physical threat (breakdowns worry him, he believes you to be in danger from something he can’t fight).

Holding hands is something Zim likes a lot. Not only does it feel nice, he’s discovered it to be a very effective way to show the world that you are his, and that he is yours. He tends to be a bit jealous and overprotective, so if he feels that there is even a minor possibility of your relationship being threatened, his clinginess goes up a thousand percent. Anytime you walk anywhere together, you better believe your hands are linked.

Cuddles are also a thing he loves dearly. Once he gets comfortable, Zim is definitely a cuddle bug. It’s like a hug but better! And if you’re at his place, there is a ninety percent chance GIR is joining in. Just like one happy family! Again, if he initiates it, he won’t ask for it. You could just be sitting on a couch and he’ll slowly curl himself into you, gradually latching a limb at a time onto you, until you’re both just a mess of tangled arms and legs. But, oh, if you even make the smallest remark about him being cute, he’ll throw a hissy fit and say that he’s just doing this for your sake, not his own enjoyment (and then two seconds later he’ll be purring and chirping in your arms, content as can be).

Zim is competitive as hell. He’ll turn anything into a competition if you let him. If you remain passive and assure him that, yes, he is the best, he’ll leave it at that. However, if you don’t back down and try to give him a run for his money, expect an all out war. You can use this to your advantage. For example, want him to be overly-affectionate for the day? Challenge him to see who can do the most nice things for each other. Even if he says that’s stupid, he’ll still accept the challenge and suddenly you have the sweetest alien in the universe. He will never back down. Ever. So these little games will be drug out for as long as you let them. It’s best just to let him win after a day or two.

Dates with Zim are either the most outlandish thing you’ve ever done, or the most charming and romantic. There’s no in-between. And they can go from zero to a hundred real quick. Typical Earth dates make no sense to him in the slightest, so even if he does try to take you on a cliché date (dinner and a movie, stuff like that), it will most likely go horribly wrong as a result of poor planning. Those dates tend to be the funniest, but they frustrate him to no end since he clearly can’t get them right. He tends to be more successful when he stops trying to think like a human, since he really can’t. Lots of dates in space ensue, which tend to be both exciting and amazing. Although everywhere he takes you isn’t anything special to him, he can tell you’re having the time of your life, which is enough to satisfy him. GIR probably tags along a lot (not only is he a great robot son, he makes an excellent wing man).

Kissing is a very strange experience for him. Zim has never understood the act itself or its appeal, and at first found it rather disgusting. Eventually he gets used to it, but he’s still completely confused by it. It’s not his favorite thing, and he definitely has to be in the mood for it, but he’s more willing to take part in it. Especially if it becomes competitive; pray for yourself then, because you have a monster on your hands. And if someone just won’t get the hint, kissing is his way of telling them to step off before they lose a limb; he’s a jealous little devil when it comes to you.

As time goes on, you’ll begin to notice that several articles of clothes of yours have gone missing. Zim likes to take jackets he thinks you won’t miss anymore, because as previously mentioned, he’s a clingy bugger, and so when you can’t be around him, he’ll put one of those on while he works down in the lab or is doing repairs. If he gets it dirty, he’ll sneakily throw it with the rest of your laundry and take another one.

Zim is extremely proud to have you. He will show you off to anyone and everyone who will listen, including his Tallest (who seemed rather confused). At first it was embarrassing, but you had just learned to roll with the inevitable.

If you ask very nicely (i.e. offering cuddles and feeding his ego), Zim could be convinced to give you a lesson on flying the voot cruiser. Does it go well? Well, Zim’s piloting skills are...not consistently amazing, his teaching skills even less so, but you didn’t kill yourselves. You would have thought he would be pissed after the ship was docked in the hangar in worse condition than it had left, but surprisingly he was even more motivated to teach you to pilot an Irken ship. Mainly because it was a way to spend time with you in a way that he could understand, but nonetheless he made flying lessons a regular thing.

Expect gifts constantly. Despite his evil plans going horribly wrong all of the time, Zim is actually incredibly skilled when it comes to tech. So, he makes you things. A lot. They tend to be things that are actually useful, with far more advanced technology than anything available on Earth. Plus, Zim is a million times more helpful than an IT guy. Your phone or laptop not working? You can take it to Zim and within five minutes not only is your original problem fixed, but the device itself has been completely upgraded with Irken tech to give it more functionality and efficiancy than you could have ever dreamed of.

Overall, despite his flaws and being a massive pain in the ass, Zim is a cutie in his own right. :)

#invader zim #headcanon #invader zim headcanons #zim x reader #invader zim fanfiction #invader zim fic #request #fanfiction #fanfic

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daisylincs · 3 years

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Soulmates can be romantic or platonic, met early on in life or well into the grey years, male or female, few or many - the only thing Skye has always known for sure is that she doesn't have any.

Most people have two, or even three or four or five, right from the moment of their birth; denoted as different-coloured lines shimmering on their wrists.

Skye might have had lines there when she was a baby, but by the time she's old enough to understand what their absence means, they're long gone.

(Soulmate lines, they say, can only fade for two reasons - one, if the person the bond represents passes away, or two, if they change so completely that the bond doesn't recognise them anymore.)

Skye doesn't know why her lines faded, and she doesn't really want to. What she does know, though? She desperately wants more.

There is no feeling more lonely than a bare wrist, than the knowledge that nobody cares enough about her to even think about loving her - because no matter how despairingly she wishes for it, none of her many foster parents or siblings show up as lines on her wrist.

Eventually, she starts thinking it's her fault - because how can't it be? Even some other orphans have lines on their wrists.

She starts to accept it, eventually. She's broken, unlovable. Nothing to be done about it.

So she runs away, joins a band of people who'll never see her face, and tells herself she believes in their mission.

(She even meets a boy there, and he's as broken and distanced as she is - more, even. Still, she can't help hoping that they might find something in each other...

When nothing shows up on either of their wrists, she persuades herself she isn't disappointed.)

She has all but given up hope on soulmate lines, whatsoever, when the door of her van is pulled open mid-speech, and her whole life is thrown upside-down.

Her first soulmate line appears not long after, when she rushes into the arms of the little British scientist who would have thrown herself off the plane to save them all - a slight burn on the inside of her wrist as she is hugging Jemma tight, and when she glances down a moment later, there is a single line there.

It's a warm hazel colour, like Jemma's eyes, and when Jemma feels the matching sting on her own arm, she glances up at Skye, her eyes crinkling in a smile.

Her line, she is shocked and deeply pleased to note, is a deep purple on her friend's skin.

A couple of weeks later, when she and Fitzsimmons are singing Moana at the tops of their voices one movie night, she feels another small burn on her wrist.

This line is light blue, like Fitz's eyes.

She receives her next line the first time she hugs Coulson - there are tears in her eyes, tears blurring her entire soul as he confirms her worst childhood fears.

But she doesn't miss the slight burn on the inside of her wrist.

When she looks down, the line is the same dark blue colour as his favourite suit.

The next soulmate line catches her completely by surprise, though, in retrospect, she doesn't know why.

Before she is shot, she has three lines on her wrist; blue blue hazel.

When she wakes up, there is another there, deep black and somehow steady and reassuring.

She doesn't have to look to know that there will be a purple line on Agent May's wrist.

She never receives Ward's line, though she tries, working to get as close to him as possible.

(Later, after the reveal, after the fall, she's glad about that, and disgusted at herself.

Ward's line, she thinks, would have been the same sickly grey as his prison suit.)

The months pass, and she is content with her life at SHIELD, with her four soulmate lines - four more than she ever thought she'd have.

Then one morning, she wakes up to another, bright and golden as daylight.

She knows immediately who it signifies - only Trip, after all, could be behind something that was so essentially sunshine personified.

(When that line fades, she spends many a cold night in her quarantine cell waking up and reaching for it, then breaking into wracking sobs when she inevitably found its comforting, warm tingle missing.)

She almost misses it when her next line burns itself onto her wrist - she is readying herself for her first jump (her first non-Lola jump, that is) and Hunter, bless his secretly sweet soul, is helping her with her parachute’s straps.

When he steps away with one of his signature quippy remarks, there is another line on his wrist, this one a warm, rich amber.

Skye wonders where that colour comes from, but that night, when Hunter toasts to their successful mission with a bottle of Bendeery’s, she realises.

She’s amused, but also touched, oddly - because the little lighter flecks in the amber of the line are a very similar colour to Bobbi’s hair.

(She thinks that everything about that line suits Hunter, really - sarcastic, standoffish and rebellious at first glance, but compassionate and deeply caring once you got to know him.)

Bobbi’s line makes itself known at a much more dramatic time - Skye is terrified, her body shaking from the inside out, and holding onto the steadiness of May’s black line on her wrist for strength as she fights this not-her-SHIELD agent.

There is a shot, Bobbi screams, Skye holds up her hands and somehow blocks it - but as she does, she feels a burn on the inside of her wrist, in time with the genuine no!! that flashes in Bobbi’s eyes.

It is a long, long time before she gets to look at that line, but when she does, it is a deep emerald green - stately and beautiful, but with echoes of great power behind it.

Much like Bobbi, she thinks.

(Later, in colder years when she can’t hear Bobbi and Hunter’s laughter and bickering anymore, she likes to sit down in the quiet of the common room and brush her fingers over their lines, side by side and still strong against her skin.

They’re still out there, she knows, and it is a comfort.)

But before that, she is in Afterlife, and she wakes up to a deep red line on her wrist one day - red like the reddest roses, like love immediate and ever-persevering.

She thinks it’s her mother’s line, and her heart has never felt happier.

(It is only later, hugging him in a cold SHIELD corridor before sending him off to be lost to her forever, that she realises it was her father’s line all along.

The line fades when his memory does, but on particularly good days, she thinks she sees the faintest shimmer of a rose-coloured line there, as though just a hint of love was carried through despite the TAHITI program.

She loves him all the more for it.)

Mack’s line comes somewhere in those trying weeks, when both her parents are gone and she just needs a partner - he is there for her.

And one night, so is his line, a gentle forest green.

(She doesn’t get that particular cosmic joke until she meets Yo-Yo and Turtleman becomes a thing, and then she laughs so hard that she nearly splits her sides.)

Lincoln is the first romantic soulmate she gets a line for - and she notices it, cliché as it is, right after their first kiss.

It is apt, though, seeing as she’s trying to protect him, and he’s trying to protect her, and they’re full of grand announcements about how much they mean to each other and... yeah, it’s kind of a mess.

But when he’s with her again, and times are happier, she teases him mercilessly about the colour of his line - a crackly yellow-white, like lightning according to him, (according to her, it’s like popcorn, as an eternal cosmic punishment for that terrible popcorn joke he had to go and make when they first met.)

She even gains a shiny silver line in the middle of a mission when Joey jumps in front of a stream of bullets for her.

Things are good. Things are so, so good.

Then, Hive.

When Lincoln’s line fades from her wrist, in perfect time with the flicker of the little dot of the quinjet on her screen, it is like her entire world fades to grey.

Everything she’s always believed? It’s still true, only worse than even she ever thought.

It’s not that she’s unloveable - it’s that she should be.

(Just look at the deaths she’s caused, so shortly after their lines appeared on her wrist! Just look at all the danger she’s put her friends, her team, her family in -)

She leaves. She leaves to protect them.

And as she crouches in her van, or in dark alleys, she screams at the lines on her wrist, “go away go away go away! Stop caring about me, I don’t deserve it.”

But they never do, and slowly, slowly, she returns back to their source.

Elena’s is the first new line she receives - as bold and bright an orange as that favourite striped sweater of hers she used to love wearing around base.

Daisy hasn’t seen it in a while, but when the line appears on her wrist, it feels like a tangible reminder that she hasn’t lost everything. Not yet.

She returns, and though they are forced to live through the two living hells that are the Framework and the Kree-ruled future, they get through it.

(They are a soul family, after all. They have to.

And whenever she fears for any of their safety, Daisy just has to touch the lines still standing out against her skin to know that they’re still okay out there.)

Then Coulson’s line starts to fade.

She doesn’t notice it at first, since it’s just a slight blackening at the edges, but after he collapses on them, she does, and it's shattering. He won’t even let them try to save him!

But she won’t accept that. She will not lose another soul line.

Instead, she... gains another?

She isn’t even sure when exactly it happened, when his stupid jokes started to become endearing instead of just dumb, when his ridiculous fascination with everyday things became almost sweet - but when they’re on a spaceship shooting up to meet the Kree together, she reaches for his hand.

And she feels the now-familiar burn of a line on the inside of her wrist.

To her amusement, his line is bright yellow - lemon yellow. He blushes furiously at that, but she laughs it off.

Her laughter fades fast when not one, but two lines disappear within a few days of that.

Fitz’s is first, and her heart stops as she clutches onto her wrist. Yes, a lot has happened between them lately, but she never wanted him dead, and he... he was her second line -

Then his line reappears.

It’s faint, and pulsing in and out, but it’s there.

(She and Jemma both cling to that in the year that comes, searching through the dark, lonely depths of space in a desperate attempt to find him and steady that line.)

When Coulson’s line fades, she thinks it might be the worst pain of her life - but she watches May’s line, and how it stays ever-steady, ever-strong on her wrist.

She draws her own strength from it.

And they get through it, until eventually, they are there: one final mission.

She never does get a line for LMD Coulson, despite the hell of an emotional ride it was to see him again.

It’s fitting that way, though. He agrees.

(That doesn’t stop her from signing her name in purple ink onto his wrist when they send him off on his world travels - because even if it isn’t quite the same, she will always care about him.

He stares at her name for a long, long time, then pulls her into a tight hug. And she understands.)

The next line she gets surprises her almost more than its timing does - it’s a time loop, for crying out loud!

But she wakes up after the umpteenth repeat, and it is there, solid and blue and so unbelievably Sousa that she could kiss him.

(She does, actually.)

The line that hurts the most of any she’s ever received is one that fades mere moments after she receives it, though. It is a regal, midnight blue, and it appears in a fierce burn when Jiaying steps in front of Malick for her.

She watches the line fade as she cradles her mother’s hair, and through the tears that blur her world, she manages to be grateful that she got to see what her birth line would have looked like, at least.

She knows that Jiaying did love her unconditionally now, at least.

And eventually, eventually, a new line appears where Jiaying’s was once cradled - this one is orange and fiery, with all the force of its owner’s powers, and with all of her natural love for the nebulas she explores so keenly.

It isn’t a replacement - it won’t ever be.

But it’s a blessing of a different kind.

And - the Daisy Johnson who watches the stars with her sister and her new love is a far cry from the one who believed she was unloveable all those years ago. She has a whole ream of soulmate lines now (including those three, lemon amber and green, that she still checks every night before they turn out the lights, just to make sure they’re still alive and well.

They are.)

Watching those stars, Daisy thinks that, ultimately, soulmates aren't born, they're made.

And she’s made herself the best soulmates she could ever have dreamed of.

(Daisy Johnson Soulmate AU headcanons for the @agentsofchallenges AoS March Madness challenge! <3)

#daisy johnson #soulmate au #daisy johnson soulmate au #headcanons #soulmate au headcanons #ghsjdhfkjhsdfkjsdhfk these got SO out of control; oh my WORD #but I... I kind of freaking adore them #😭😭😭😍😍😍#daisy is just the best okay #and i LIVE for her relationships with everyone else on this show #THE BEST 💜💜💜#lily's headcanons #lily's march madness

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