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#funniest ever implications though.

transfemlogan · 1 year

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Idk if you’re taking suggestions related to the tss world building polls you’ve made…if not feel free to ignore, but your polls got me thinking of a couple of stuff:

Also I apologize in advance if I got anything wrong or there’s spelling errors if you are reading, I am very tired but wanted to send this in cause excitement

Just first example that came to mind but we saw Logan interact with a frame at the beginning of DWIT, how was he able to interact with a real object given he’s supposed to be imaginary? [Was the frame actually also imaginary, Thomas himself got up to move it at some point but it’s portrayed to have been done by Logan, the frame never moved it was just imagined by Thomas to have been moved, ect.] Essentially how are the sides able to interact with the real world

Given Thomas claims to not know spanish, how does Roman’s spanish actually sound like? [It’s actually proper spanish…somehow, he’s speaking bits of spanish Thomas has heard and learned over the year but mashes into sentences that would not make sense translated, he’s speaking pure gibberish, he’s still speaking english but makes it sound like to the other sides and the audience he’s speaking spanish, ect.]

How does it look like when a side sinks out full view not the half-body shot shown [do they sink directly into the floor, they sink just out of frame then walk off, do they sink out of frame then disappear into thin air, ect.]

Back in Making Some Changes, it was established there were these invisible walls/columns between the sides, and as shown by Patton they aren’t able to cross it unless they changed their appearance to not look like Thomas. Why might Thomas’s brain not allow the sides to interact as their usual selves? (Don’t have any possible solutions as to why, I know from a production stand point obviously Thomas can’t physically interact when he’s playing all the characters but yk I always wondered how the interacting thing worked within his mind)

What is Thomas saying when he is talking to the sides, aka himself? [He talks outloud as himself and the sides respond within his mind, he is saying the full convo outloud as both himself and the sides, he says outloud only bits and part of the convo as both himself and the sides, or he stays quiet while talking to himself- the one moment of him shown in SVS talking to himself was only done for a comedic moment]

We know Roman and Remus have weapons (technically Janus??), but do the other sides have weapons [Yes but they choose not to use or show them, yes but for whatever reason as his Janus or Thomas himself doesn’t allow them to use/show them, no they don’t have weapons]

I KEPT 4GETTING 2 ANSWER THIS SO IM ANSWERING NOW

Also i am taking suggestions 4 everything always 🧡

#ALSO 4 THE ROMAN 1 .#ok i cann9t rmbr urls #someone said roman speaking spanish was likr when u imagine someone speaking another language in ur head #& it sounds Perfect but in real life itd b gibberish #ask #& i thought it was cool.#also 4 the sinking out 1 im like 100% sure its implied they sink in2 the floor #though the implication of them sinking down & then crawling out of frame is genuinely. the funniest thing ever #edit: logically-asexual said the roman thing!

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kindlespark · 28 days

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Do you have any Jace/porter head canons? The angst potential after last episode is crazy. Like did he know porter was going to kill him or was he blindsided by that?

ummm. well seeing as i just spent three hours typing furiously with the groupchat about my toxic jaceporter yaoi thoughts.... yes where do i begin

i genuinely think jace just accidentally walked into the worst and quite literally inescapable toxic situationship of his life 😭😭😭 guy who was hooking up with porter because he was bored and they had chemistry but wasn't going to get invested because fucking your co-worker is not a good idea and also porter? keeps asking him for weird favours? so he really shouldn't get involved. but then porter KILLED AND SHATTERSTAR'D HIM and now jace is roped up in the craziest evil scheme ever where he has to worship the guy who forced him into it as his new god of rage for eternity and luckily he REALLY IS so fucking mad about it but the only thing he can do is hatefuck the guy who did it and also yell at six children 😭😭

like i think porter pegs that jace's moral backbone/decision to step away isn't out of some noble cause, he just hates to implicate himself and will do anything to save his own skin. ideal person to manipulate! i think porter enjoys the power play/the reactions jace gives him but does not actually care about jace as a person

also you'd THINK that jacehop is over now but actually this whole reveal made it even realer to me 😭😭 like this is literally why jace snaps at henry imo i think it's to experience just a sliver of the power that porter has been holding over him this whole time

sorry i've seen some rly good headcanons where jaceporter are in corrupted fucked up love and stuff but i think the situationship concept is the realest (and funniest) to me. jace is so fucking angry and hates porter to hell and back he WILL fuck him though. have you seen this art by anna wyrmwright bc it's literally the dynamic to me

#jaceporter #d20 #they're deeply fucked up i think sorry #fantasy high #starbreaker #is that what we’re calling it now… too poetic i dont think they deserve it but for tag reasons sure

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archerygun · 2 months

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Was anyone else disappointed as a kid after watching the prequels? (But not for the reason you think. Read further.)

The answer, broadly, is yes, I know. But not for the reason you’re thinking. Just for one, hyper-specific reason that has little to do with the quality of the films.

Owen and Anakin weren’t actually brothers. Owen and Anakin met like… once. ‘Too much like his father’ the fuck you mean Mr. Lars, the man you met ONCE?

You mean to tell me we were robbed of what had the potential to be the funniest sibling dynamic in ALL of Star Wars? Angry old dirt farmer vs the Chosen One/Dark Lord of the Sith? Objectively hilarious. The implication (in the og film and book) that Anakin just fucked off one day to become a jedi starpilot, leaving Owen at home thinking “What a fucking nob.”? Peak comedy.

Can you imagine if these two were actually siblings? Owen watching the look in Luke’s eyes develop into the wild, idealistic look that cost him his brother. Telling Luke his father was a drug smuggler on some old cruiser because that was an easier story for Owen to tell than the reality of it, and after a while Owen himself starts half believing it. Despising Obi-Wan for both taking his brother from him, and then in his eyes causing him to become a monster. The tragedy of Vader ordering the death of his brother.

Say what you want about the brotherhood between Obi-Wan and Anakin, it’s a brilliant dynamic. But the idea of Anakin and Owen coming from the exact same nowhere, same family, same upbringing and everything… it hits me in the feels. Because they represent two polar opposites that ended up with a sort of reverse parallel fate.

Anakin wanted adventure in the stars and he got it, at the price of everyone he loved and never getting to see his kids. Owen wanted a simple life minding his farming and he got it, at the price of dying without ever seeing the stars and becoming alienated from his son. If these two men had been brothers, the TEARS THAT WOULD HAVE COME OUT OF MY EYES-

It would have humanised Owen to the audience long before Kenobi (which I do still basically consider non-canon even though it was a fun ride) did him the - admittedly a little bit over-the-top/ridiculous - justice he deserved. There have always been appreciators of Owen Lars but a lot of people see him as just a bastard. Give him some real PAIN behind that exterior. Give him a VERY good reason, an even better reason than the one in canon, for being the way he is.

Plus, the idea of Owen partially having the force is objectively the funniest concept ever (although I’d still go for the whole “Anakin had no father.” thing and have Owen be normal).

Sorry for the incoherency of my ramblings, I love Owen Lars.

#star wars #a new hope #star wars anh #anh #star wars a new hope #owen lars #beru lars #anakin skywalker #darth vader #luke skywalker #star wars ot #star wars original trilogy #star wars what if #tatooine #anchorhead

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weirdmageddon · 9 months

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ur davejade posting has me Remembering and goddddd. theyre so good. thank u

i want to make a davejade analysis masterpost but the funniest thing with these asks is that theyre the ones that really prompt me to put my thoughts together in some direction and i ALWAYS find a new implication or connection to talk about. like while i’m writing the connections will just make themselves known. if i made a masterpost i’d have to update it every time i think of something new which defeats the purpose of a masterpost because it’d never be finished. so i just like to spitball into separate posts and just shove them in my davejade tag. i was NOT expecting to get back into homestuck with davejade at the forefront but i can see things now i didnt then

im gonna go off again because it’s so obvious to me on this jumpy scrambled “reread” that dave has a fat fucking heart-on / affection erection for jade. hes tryin soo hard to be cool but hes like this with jade actually behind the screen and she knows it

words and deeds of a court jester dude who totally has a crush on his childhood internet friend and doesnt acknowledge it (btw this is woefully incomplete for the sake of brevity but i could elaborate in another post. i actually have a draft (edit: posted) with a shit ton of more analysis stuff in it on why he acts differently with her than other characters):

the next day (chronologically) when jade messages him:

hussie commentary: “Dave's one-pixel-smile there means that there are literally more than ten thousand drawings on the internet of Dave and Jade kissing. That pixel literally made that happen.”

i mean … it sure is easy to assume how he feels about jade based on the way he talks to her and when his sprite only ever smiles one other time in the entire fucking comic and the reality of that other one was arguable since it was during [S] Karkat: Mental breakdown and its likely karkat was hallucinating it based on the content and context of the flash

nah this one was real. and it was from the first conversation we saw between dave and jade in the comic and thus set the standard for their dynamic. and remember old school 2009 dave was kind of a menace so it says a lot

this girl was special enough to him to warrant that pixel

jade calling dave a “huge baby” for him getting nervous about a piss while she’s his server player. he makes such a big deal about it while shes like oh my god just go:

and the absurdity of the situation being one of his favorite memories

i know pesterquest isn’t “canon” canon but it passes my character essence check and still contributes something of substance to my argument. like i can say this is not at all out of place if these characters were plopped into these scenarios. remember this takes place on the same day as the above, 4/13/2009. theyre the same age as above and have the same relationship as they did above, just in a different scenario that wasn’t possible in canon wherein they didn’t play sburb

Jade wanders away from that window and toward another one, whose view is exclusively centered on the rolling blue. She presses a hand against the misty pane and sighs. JADE: you know, dave talks a lot about coming to visit me here. i mean, all of my friends do but dave especially JADE: in his usual davey way of course, which means making lots of jokes and not sounding very serious about it JADE: "yeah im itching to put on my safari hat and come traipsing down to doomdeath archipelago to get my ass murdered by infinidog the eldritch retriever," stuff like that JADE: i know he really means it though! he wants to see me, just like i want to see him JADE: but its just wishful thinking

anyway daves reaction to seeing his isolated online friend for the first time irl cry because she has guests. its even better with the character sprites

JADE: we can play with all my toys and jam out to some music and stay up all night chatting with each other and oh my god oh my god youre here youre all here this is really happening!!!!! Jade's next laugh verges on hysterical and she's got tears streaked down her cheeks. Dave looks a little perturbed. DAVE: wow holy shit uh DAVE: its cool jade no need to get so DAVE: like this DAVE: kind of fucks me up seeing you cry DAVE: not that im trying to make this all about me DAVE: i mean uh

and so after mspa reader’s intervention, who do we see with jade the next time we see her?

dave. and hes goofing with her squiddles while grinning

DAVE: okay so lets see what we got here Jade's room is bright and cheery, fresh flowers in the hanging pots, curtains pulled open wide to let in the afternoon sunlight. Jade sits on her bed while Dave paces in front of a line of squiddle toys, carefully assembled in neat ranks. DAVE: this blue one is clearly in charge look at his dominant posture DAVE: also hes the only motherfucker not tentacle deep in his homie DAVE: hes an untangled buddy that is some shit really cuts to the core of like DAVE: DAVE: emotions JADE: its actually because the magnets in him are messed up, and always have been!! DAVE: harley you are ruining the magic come on

basically what im putting together is that dave was REALLY fixin to spend some time with jade. extending into her sphere of interests that he doesnt express much with anyone else; you can tell he really wanted to engage with her in a less irony poisoned way. he’s softer with her than his other friends and god forbid the trolls, he is much less skeptical about things when talking to her (he even questions why he just seems to go along with her eccentric precognitive statements but he doesnt change his attitude about it), he showers her with his music and raps to the point where jade is expectant of getting poetry from him. rap IS poetry. please realize that dave is sending her his poetry, regardless of how goofy it may be. this is the level on which im viewing this at and once you realize this theres no going back. there comes a time in every homestuck’s life where they have to see how dave interacted jade and conclude that he had a cute little puppy crush on her unbeknownst to either of them. and it was adorable. and now, in the year 2023, it’s your time to realize this too. no going back.

and btw it all came back around…………………nimblest son of a bitch who had the gumption to glue a nasty pair of latex cat lips to his face

for a reason that wasnt a joke anymore

don’t think ive seen anyone talk about this parallel at the end to one of their first conversations in the comic. maybe somebody did back in the day but i never saw it

#davejade #homestuck #dave strider #jade harley #hs

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marydoll-14893 · 8 days

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Kai didn't trust Sara. It's true that he "stalked" her but he didn't know her.

This was evident in the Russian Roulette minigame. Kai didn't trust Sara in the sense that he didn't believe that she would be emotionally strong enough to be the Challenger.

We know from the letter he wrote on his laptop. He only saw her as some poor innocent child who was tragically dragged into the hands of ASU-NARO.

Furthermore, Kai could have possibly seen himself in Sara, particularly from her innocence. He knew the happiness in innocence in childhood (at least a little bit), he knew the cruelty of ASU-NARO, and he knew what it's like to have a person die right in front of him.

Imagine if that person's death had come from your own hands. Kai couldn't, and he definitely didn't want Sara having any of it.

(Additionally, maybe it's possible he was aware of the simulations where Sara was that bloodthirsty teen. I highly doubt it though, considering ASU-NARO's cultish hierarchy and how Kai ranked low, and considering his development that sort of conflicts with this notion. But if he did, he definitely did not want ASU-NARO to get their way with her. He did not want them to have their "star".)

That's why he'd rather have Q-taro be the challenger. True, it was risky to put so much trust on a complete stranger who was very open about his distrust. But Kai prioritized Sara's safety (from accidentally taking a life) much more.

(This also brings up the implication that Kai would rather have Sara get shot than have her kill someone. Might be a sneak peak into this guy's values.)

But of course, a major part of Kai's character was the development of how he perceived Sara. After beating the Russian Roulette minigame, Kai learns that Sara was much stronger than he thought.

This development completely pulls through when he literally kills himself in front of the already shocked and grieving Sara, giving up all his hopes for her, knowing she's capable. He spoke positively, he wanted to encourage her and everyone else, but it's undeniable that he also hurt her that way.

Post could end here but let's relate Kai to Keiji. Kai and Keiji are the same considering how they have their own perceptions and expectations for Sara, but their opposites in terms of how they view Sara. Kai saw her as a victim he needed to save while Keiji saw her as his escape ticket. Both characters eventually learned to see Sara the other way, with Kai doing That (and also confusing Sara at that time, funniest shit ever) and Keiji putting more effort and consideration on who he should trust for his survival.

#Keiji's arc is not yet done but he learned that Sara could only do so much and that he should grow balls #Kai is the mom. Keiji is the dad. Sara is their child. Do you get me.#keikaisara propaganda #your turn to die #kimi ga shine #yttd #kgs #spoilers #kai satou #sara chidouin #keiji shinogi #dolltalks #inane ramblings

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cookie-de-baunilha · 27 days

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I love how John firmly and wholeheartedly believes that Jamie is the only person that knows about his relationship with Percy, when in reality there’s about 1% chance of that being the case.

There were a lot of people who probably suspected/knew about them. Maybe not before Percy’s exposure, but after that situation? Oh boy. They would look at their close friendship in hindsight + John being miserable after everything that happened and just put 2 and 2 together.

Especially the ones closer to John, but other people in his social circle too. People talk. The gossip would be wild. Before going on campaign those two were going out and about in London together, having dinners, attending plays, going to gaming clubs etc. At the time, no one would pay much attention to it. But that would drastically change after the incident with Percy.

Let’s not forget about the “near scandal” John was involved in with George Everett that had him exiled to Ardsmuir.

So… everyone kinda knew about them?? Ok not everyone, but a bunch of people. And it’s funny how John is delulu about it. Let’s see:

Hal

First of all, Hal knows John is gay. They just don’t talk about it openly.

Hal would notice John’s behavior after Percy was caught. He knew John would be a witness in Percy’s trial and was afraid of what could happen in that case. He knew John felt betrayed and tried to manipulate John’s anger towards Percy to get Percy killed. John couldn’t do it — if Hal still had any doubts, they ceased to exist the moment John came back from his conversation with Percy with that gun.

Not to mention the fact that Hal read the letter that Percy sent to John. The very first paragraph of that letter is basically Percy using pretty words to say that he would die for John. And at some point in the letter Percy writes that John told him about his father’s murder. Like??? It took 17 years for John and Hal to talk about it, and suddenly John would be openly discussing his family’s secrets with his new stepbrother? And you expect me to believe that somehow Hal thought that it was a normal friendship?? Nope.

Also, Hal’s advice to John in MOBY:

Hal merely snorted. "Men like that never die so conveniently. Why the bloody hell is he telling you this, do you think?"

Grey suppressed the vivid memory of bergamot, red wine, and petitgrain.

"I don't know. But I do know he's deeply involved with French interests, and-"

"Wainwright's never been involved with any interests other than his own," Hal interrupted brusquely. He gave John a sharp look. "You'd do well to remember that."

"I doubt I shall ever see the fellow again," John replied, overlooking the implication that his brother considered him gullible — or worse.

It’s impossible that he doesn’t know.

Benedicta

Mothers just know ok?

But seriously, Benedicta is really smart and she definitely knows that John is gay. In fact, if anyone suspected anything before the incident, I would bet on her.

Minnie

She knows.

Olivia?

I’m not sure about her, tbh. Maybe she was clueless. But then we have this conversation between her and John and it’s kinda sus (mind you, John is depressed af at this point):

Lucinda Joffrey and her husband

Firstly, both John and Percy running away from Lucinda’s arranged marriage plans like the plague might have made her a little suspicious. She might have suspected about John way before Percy came into the picture, in fact.

And she notices how bad John is after everything. She gets really concerned with him:

She goes as far as tricking John to see a doctor for his mental health, with the help of Horace Walpole:

Ally queen!!

Her husband not so much though, side eyeing John like Whitney Chewston, the homophobic dog:

Sir Richard be like 🤨🏳️‍🌈?

Horace Walpole

This is the funniest one to me, but also the sweetest.

First of all, Horace sees how shitty John is and works in cahoots with Lucinda Joffrey to trick John into going to the 18th century version of a therapist.

And then:

What I love about this interaction is the way that John knows that Horace is queer, but refuses to admit that Horace would know about him too.

The way Horace hesitates because HE DOESN’T KNOW HOW TO REFER TO PERCY. He wants to say lover (or ex-lover) but he knows that he isn’t that close to John and that it would be weird to be so open about it — and he also doesn’t know how John would react. Even if he is 100% sure that John is gay, he can’t be sure that John wouldn’t feel offended or react in a violent way.

But he also doesn’t want to say “friend” or “stepbrother” because he KNOWS THEY WERE SO MUCH MORE TO EACH OTHER. He knows those are not the right words to use. So he hesitates until John makes it simple.

HOWEVER. He knows that Percy being caught with another man must mean that John was betrayed. He knows John is hurting, not just because of the betrayal, but because of the brutality of it all — after all, betrayal notwithstanding, Percy got arrested and could get executed for being gay; for being just like them. That’s something that affects all of them as queer people.

So even though he can’t be open about it, you can feel that he wants to bring that comfort to John, because he knows how bad the whole thing is and how lonely John must be feeling. He wants John to know that he will do whatever he can to save Percy’s life. He wants John to have hope.

It’s sad, but also so sweet?? That silent solidarity.

AND JOHN “DOUBTS” WALPOLE KNOWS!!! MY DUDE!!! YOU. ARE. NOT. THAT. DISCREET.

A bunch of people in Hal’s regiment would be suspicious of John just because of their family connection — due to, you know, homophobia (and John being unmarried, unlike Hal)

TL;DR: John and Percy weren’t that much of a secret tbh, everyone close to them (or not that close) kinda knew. Everyone except General Stanley. That dude was clueless.

#outlander #lord john series #lord john and the brotherhood of the blade #brotherhood of the blade #lord john grey #john grey #percy wainwright #percy beauchamp #john x percy

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transingthoseformers · 7 months

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Funniest Possible "Parents" for Tarn/Damus/Glitch that ignores timelines and ages and reproduction for amusement.

MegOP, classic, divorced, Optimus originally had custody until Megs got him and he wound up hating both by the end. Especially in TFP.

ShockOP, tragic, Orion Pax got custody his sugar daddy's kids when he mysteriously vanished, and one of them decided to join a group dedicated to destroying the government that erased Shockwave. The "your aren't my dad vibes are imaculate".

Rodiclash, the absolutely funniest reason for Damus to have originally been those colors. Also, making him younger and the baby of the DJD is hilarious conceptually. Also he's personal grudge against Thunderclash is a mistaken thought on Hot Rod's part that Thunderclash ran out on them when in reality his eveil second in command hid it leading to the break up and Roddie becoming a single parent. If he's father is "the Greatest Autobot Ever" clearly being and Autobot isn't worth much. The Lost Light is the Daddy Issue onion.

Minimus x OG Ultra Magnus, the absolute regency drama aesthetics of this and the shock and reveal would be great, and both Tarn and Minimus would be hilarious to deal with this emptionally strained revelations. Dominus pegging Tarn as his nephew and kidnapping him because he did the math and "who fucked his little brother, ran out on him, and lead to this"? Suddenly that summer abroad makes sense. Funnier if original Ultra Magnus is alone and Dominus highjacks the DJD to track him down and have a family reunion while the DJD awkwardly tries to be supportive and are confused why Vos is so murderous. Minimus, meanwhile, is having a tearful reunion with the child he gave up for adoption, thinking he'd have a better life only to find out his life wasn't great while Tarn is going through all sorts of emotions and tears up as well. Vos meanwhile has cornered Ultra Magnus saying "he just wants to talk." Adds an interesting layer to Minimus's thing with Ultra Magnus.

Ultra Magnus x Hot Rod, TFP, Ultra Magnus showing up with Hot Rod and their mildly evil baby.

RodiSound, Cyberverse. Everyone trying to figure out how to tell the mourning Rodimus, he's widow baby with Soundwave looks just like a miniature version of the guy who tried to take over Cybertron.

G1 GalvRod. Hilarious.

You're so right though

Megop divorce child Damus is always interesting yep yep

OO ON SHOCKOP WITH GLITCH BECAUSE THAT'S BAAAAASICALLY CANON. It's basically canon. Basically.

OWO on rodiclash baby Tarn, because that would have all the implications considering Tarn. Just... Considering Tarn.

The Lost Light is the Daddy Issue onion

Indeeeeed

The idea of Minimus having known the original UM has interesting implications and symbolism considering what goes down later on, and I am also gifted the idea of beastformer!Tarn who would be beautiful. Dominus would have such an interesting role in it too. Yesss.

IT WOULD BE HILARIOUS FOR TFP MAGS TO SHOW UP WITH A SILLYGOOFY BOYTOY AND A MILDLY EVIL BABY.

Having Damus/glitch/Tarn as a Cyberverse Soundrod baby would be mildly hilarious because you can argue he explicitly named this kid after the guy who tried to kill them all out of spite. You can argue for reincarnation here considering how it was Soundwave that took Cyberverse Tarn out of the world, and you can argue that it was Soundwave and Rodimus who proceeded to bring him back into it. raise him right this time.

Another suggestion: tfp wavewave child Tarn. He's their passion project in so many ways of the word.

aNOTHER SUGGESTION: earthspark Glitch/Damus who was adopted/fostered by Megatron for a while. We follow with my one idea where his design is more like his "Glitch" era design but a little more eldritch

#maccadam #transformers #mtmte tarn #tarn #Cyberverse tarn #glitch #damus #<varying degrees of similar/same guy

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theabyssgazesalsointoyou · 28 days

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12, 15, and 16, if you're still doing the fandom asks?

12. What's the funniest or craziest AU idea you've ever come up with?: i don't think i have a lot of those honestly? yeah no i thought about it and i can't think of anything. have a funny headcanon though: michael collects the frog villagers on his animal crossing island and bullies anyone else out and he and rich have an inside joke about the fucked-up political implications of that

15. Have you noticed your style change over time?: oh yeah definitely. it's very obvious with my art (duh) but you can see it in my writing too. just compare my oldest fic with my most recent one wait no actually don't do that don't read my older fics i hate them

16. Do people irl know you participate in fandom?: NOPE and i plan on keeping it that way 😇 as far as the people who know me irl are concerned i am a totally normal and respectable well-adjusted human being.

#orca answers #rich: michael is a frog supremacist #jeremy: what #michael: yeah i'm running a frog ethnostate #jake: what #bmc #be more chill #michael mell #rich goranski

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magicshopaholic · 2 years

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About You (Namjoon x OC)

Summary: There's something Namjoon isn't telling you. After finally getting out of him, though, you find yourself wishing you'd never asked.

Pairing: Namjoon x OC, minor Taehyung x OC (different OCs)

Genre: Angst, hurt/comfort

Rating: 18+

Word Count: 10.1 K

Warnings: language; arguments; implied mentions of past trauma, particularly SA; mentions of campus assaults

Additional warning: This fic contains discussions of triggering topics centering around SA and r*pe, so please do NOT read this if you are not comfortable. While there is no description of any kind and no member of BTS is involved in it, the fic is meant to depict realistic conversations and implications of past trauma which may be difficult for some to read. This fic is extremely personal, not to mention important for characterization within the series, but please do exercise appropriate discretion before reading.

A/N: This fic is set around six months after Suburbia, on the same day as You Make Me Live. It also consists of important plot points for Taehyung and Dilara, a couple of months before the events of Los Angeles.

Tagging: @kflixnet @k-radio @bbl32 @dreaming-with-happiness, @sweetieguk, @ggukkieland (if you want to be added to the taglist, drop me a message)

Listen to: "nothing's gonna hurt you baby" by cigarettes after sex

namjoon masterlist | main masterlist

“Milk?”

“None.”

“Okay. Sugar?”

“Only if you’re giving it to me.”

Namjoon snorts, spilling a few drops of the Americano he’s stirring. “You mean right now?”

“Depends on how interesting the movie they’re all watching out there is.” Kaya leans against the kitchen counter of the dorm and folds her arms across her chest, watching him sheepishly wipe the spilt coffee. “Any chance we’ll be interrupted?”

“I would rather get caught by paparazzi than by any of the guys,” he says seriously, shuddering. “They’ll make it a whole thing and ten years down the line, they’ll still act like it’s the funniest thing that’s ever happened.”

Kaya frowns. “So none of you have ever walked in on each other, in all these years?” she asks sceptically. “I find that a little hard to believe. Seokjin told me you all lived together in one room or something. You had to have, you know… interrupted each other, some time.”

“Sure we have. It’s why Jimin, to this day, calls Hoseok The Closet Hyung. Or that’s the closest translation, anyway,” he amends.

“Was he… in the closet?” Kaya asks, with a bit of trepidation, biting her lip as Namjoon shakes a small sachet of sugar into his glass.

“No, he was in a closet, with another trainee, and his pants were, well -” He breaks off and winces, shaking his head. “Not something I want to relive.”

She laughs. “How dramatic.” She watches him for a moment, his tall frame next to her, as he takes a sip of the second glass he’s stirring, this one most likely his. “Are you going to put yours in there, too?”

Namjoon chokes. “Put my - what?”

Kaya grins, nudging him as he coughs. “Sugar,” she says, enunciating every syllable.

“You called?” Yoongi’s dry voice enters the kitchen before he does, strolling in and stopping on her other side to look inside a couple of cabinets.

“Here,” says Namjoon, sliding the first glass of coffee carefully across the counter to him. “One sugar.”

“Thanks.”

“Yoongi, you tell me.” Kaya turns to him, resting her palm on the counter. “Have you guys ever walked in on each other in the dorm?”

It takes Yoongi seemingly a second to process this, before he chuckles dryly and glances over at Namjoon. “I don’t know, have we?”

Behind her, Namjoon sighs. “Oh, come on, that doesn’t count.”

“Really?” Kaya turns back to her boyfriend, thoroughly amused. “When was this?”

“Never. We didn’t get caught.”

“It’s true. We just found him sneaking her out of the dorm when he accidentally closed the door on his own hand.”

Namjoon winces, sipping his coffee. “Still hurts.”

“Oh, is this the girl you were telling me about? The hashtag-dangerous one, with the whole bad girl thing going on?” Kaya asks curiously.

Yoongi raises his eyebrows. “You two really talk about your exes, huh?”

“Well, it’s not dinner table conversation,” she says reasonably. “But we know about our exes. It’s healthy.”

“I happen to agree.” He looks up at Namjoon, raising his eyebrows. “She’s a wise one.”

“It’s the Ph.D. On the downside, I have no bad girl thing to speak of.”

“You really don’t,” agrees Namjoon, grinning when she mock-glares at him. “And in any case, if serious exes are what we’re counting, then I only really have Yu-jin.”

“And I only have Nick. College boyfriend,” she adds for Yoongi’s benefit as they start walking outside to the living room, Namjoon slightly behind them. His free hand brushes her waist as they take a seat on the couch, him on the edge and Kaya next to him, with Jimin on her other side. The rest of the group is spread out around the room while a political drama plays on the television. The early evening sun is warm and dim, the last rays skimming the back of the sofa before it disappears over the horizon.

“Nick was much more recent, though,” points out Namjoon, continuing their earlier conversation. “You have to count him.”

“Five years is a lifetime ago. And duration doesn’t matter,” she adds, holding up a finger. “It’s the nature of the relationship that determines its seriousness. So Yu-jin was just as serious,” she concludes.

“Wait, we’re talking about Yu-jin?” Jungkook pipes up in English, and both of them turn to see him grinning from his place on the floor, a can of beer precariously balanced between his knees. “Your Yu-jin?”

“I wouldn’t say my -”

But Namjoon is cut off by a smattering of Korean, Seokjin snorting into his cup of ramen and Jimin laughing out loud at something. Hoseok simply goes “no, no, no” in Korean while Namjoon sighs, and the former notices Kaya and shakes his head.

“He’s saying she was -” His eyes flit to Namjoon for confirmation “- badass.”

“That’s… that’s stretching it a bit,” says Namjoon weakly, but Seokjin waves him off.

“No, no, he’s right,” he says quickly. “Not badass, but like…” He struggles for a bit and finally says a Korean word, and Kaya dubs it in her head as ballsy. “Didn’t she also have a motorcycle?”

“That was her brother’s. Can we -”

“Oh, yeah,” interrupts Taehyung, ignoring Namjoon entirely. Kaya’s once again taken aback by his casual elegance from his spot next to Jungkook, unashamedly sprawled on the ground with his hands behind his head. “She drove us home in her car once, remember?” he asks, looking at Jimin who nods. “She drove so fast, I almost threw up.”

“Doesn’t Dilara drive faster?” Jimin asks innocently, grinning when Taehyung bites his lip.

“Much faster,” answers Jungkook, taking the ramen Seokjin offers him and scooping a mouthful into his mouth. “Explains why she has all those guy fans,” he adds, slurping the noodles.

There are snickers around the room and even Namjoon chuckles, but the name finally clicks in Kaya’s mind. “Wait, Dilara? Dilara Komyshan? You - you guys know who she is?” she asks, not suspecting Formula One was popular in this country at all.

Jungkook’s eyes go wide and Jimin turns to her, comically shocked. From her other side, Namjoon nudges her. “How do you know her?” he asks, a bit incredulous.

“I mean, I know of her. I live in Amsterdam. The whole country is a shrine to Max Verstappen, especially now that he’s started being in the running for world champion… anyway, she’s his teammate.” Kaya waits for him to nod slowly in confirmation. “They’re a legendary pairing. I saw them race in Zandvoort last year. I told you, remember?”

“Oh, yeah…”

“When did you guys meet her?”

There’s silence until Namjoon speaks up again. “We met her in - in Japan last year. We were there for Honda.”

“Oh, yeah, you told me. Did you get to meet Alex Turner, too? Actually, no, they probably weren’t dating back then, but -”

“What?”

Kaya breaks off, realising Taehyung’s spoken in Korean. “Uh, yeah, I don’t think they started dating till earlier this year, actually - or, at least that’s when they became public -”

“Um… Alex Turner?” Namjoon’s spoken this time, and there’s something too deliberate in his tone.

She hesitates. “Yeah… from the Arctic Monkeys,” she says slowly. “They were performing at this club in London and my friend Marianne had an extra ticket because her girlfriend couldn’t make it…” She realises she’s rambling and pulls herself together. “Anyway, Dilara Komyshan was there and… well, it certainly looked like they were a couple.”

There’s not too much ambiguity in the way she says it, despite her refraining from detail as much as possible. The silence is clear now and it’s starting to make her uneasy, as though there’s something everyone but her is in on. She almost jumps when Jimin speaks from next to her.

“Are you sure it was her?”

“Yeah, pretty sure… wait, I have a selfie with her,” she mutters, reaching for her phone and swiping through her gallery, relieved for something to do. She finds the picture and both Namjoon and Jimin lean in from the other side to look at it. It’s in a dimly lit area, with all the members of Arctic Monkeys, her friend Marianne, Kaya herself, and Dilara Komyshan, with three people separating Kaya and Dilara.

Jimin moves away, sighing, while Namjoon leans closer and zooms in. She catches a whiff of his woody cologne and her toes curl automatically on the bare floor.

“Oh. Crap.”

Kaya looks up at him curiously to see him looking in the opposite direction before he closes his eyes, as though just spotting a problem. She turns to see Taehyung stalk out of the room, too conspicuously for it to be a coincidence, and something suddenly falls into place, something so obvious that she can’t believe she didn’t catch it the moment he interrupted her the first time.

“Oh, God,” she whispers, cringing and turning back to her boyfriend, “are they -”

“Something like that,” he mutters, sighing.

“Shit. I had no idea. I -”

“Don’t worry about it,” he says, putting an arm around her shoulder. “Even we don’t, really. We just know they met in Japan and… got close.”

There’s an awkward silence for a moment, the movie playing uselessly in the background, before Jimin gets to his feet. “I should…”

“Oh, of course,” she says immediately, shuffling her legs so he can step out from behind the coffee table. “Tell him I’m sorry,” she adds uneasily, sighing when Jimin nods reassuringly before disappearing into the hallway.

The embarrassment doesn’t disappear, though. It takes a backseat for a while, once the movie is over and there’s some general chatter about dinner and what to watch next. Seokjin leaves midway once he gets a phone call, already pulling on his shoes before the call even ends.

“It’s Nari,” is all he says, in Korean, before ducking out. They carry on from where they left off, Jimin eventually rejoining everyone but making some thin excuse for Taehyung that absolutely nobody believes. Namjoon, preempting her reaction, hugs her to him a bit more before telling her to let it go.

Even two hours later, once they reach Namjoon’s apartment, Kaya isn’t able to.

“You think he’ll be okay?” she asks, stepping out of the car.

“Yes, Kaya, he will,” says Namjoon, sighing and closing his door shut. “I told you. Let it go.”

Kaya frowns. “I just can’t believe I didn’t figure it out,” she mutters after a moment. “I’m usually a lot better at reading people,” she adds, glancing at him out of the corner of her eye.

If he catches on, he doesn’t respond. Kaya bites her lip, deciding that she isn’t imagining his aloofness after all. It had started a little while before they’d left the dorm, but in the midst of five other men talking and laughing in Korean, she couldn’t be certain and it hadn’t been that obvious either.

The walk to the car had been quiet, something she’d chalked down to tiredness, but the actual car ride had been strange, too. They had a running joke ever since he’d gotten his licence last year where she’d give him a dramatic pep talk as he started the car, keeping it up until he hit the road, and making a big show of it once they reached their destination. She’d been about to start tonight as well but before she could even get a word out, he’d reversed out of the parking lot, his jaw harder than usual.

Now, she follows him silently into his apartment, frowning and trying to recreate the night in her mind to guess what might be bothering him. They enter and take off their shoes by the door, Namjoon turning on the light behind her.

“Do you want a drink?” she asks, taking off her jacket and walking inside, stopping near the kitchen island.

“Didn’t we just have a lot to drink?”

“Not really. You drove home.”

Namjoon seems to consider this. “I don’t want a drink,” he says finally, opening the fridge behind her and retrieving a bottle of water.

Kaya is dumbfounded for a moment, noting belatedly that this is the first time he’s ever iced her out like this - if that is indeed what he’s doing. She watches him walk over to the bookshelf and scan the spines, quietly drinking the water. Her guess is he’s already finished the book he started yesterday, but the way his back looks stiff and his jaw is still hard, she doubts he’s actually looking for a second book right now.

Normally, her instinct would be to let him be, knowing he’ll talk to her when he wants to. It was one of the most important aspects of their relationship she’d seen change over time: his reluctance to confide in her, as though afraid he would demotivate her by venting to her. She’d had to remind him more than once that he wasn’t her leader, that he absolutely could vent to her if he needed to. It had been hard for him, but once he’d consciously started opening up to her, their relationship only felt stronger.

But this feels different. She can’t fathom what, but something about this feels directed at her. She’s not one for mind games, though, so she simply sighs. “Okay, do you want to tell me what’s wrong?” she asks softly.

Namjoon’s hand holding the bottle momentarily pauses halfway up to his mouth, before he continues. “Nothing’s wrong.”

“Really?”

The pause is longer this time, as he continues drinking. He’s definitely not focusing on the books anymore. Finally, he swallows a mouthful of water and exhales. “We don’t need to talk about it.”

There we go. “I don’t even know what it is,” she says, somewhat relieved he’s at least responding. “Why can’t you just tell me? If something’s bothering you, I want to know.”

“It’s nothing.”

“It’s not nothing,” she states. “Did you want to stay back and watch the movie? Did I make you leave too early?”

“I wanted to leave before you did,” he points out, turning around to face her and leaning against the bookshelf. His eyes flicker towards hers before looking away, and he crosses his arms loosely against his torso. “And Pulp Fiction is not very high on my list of movies to watch.”

Me, neither. But he already knows that, and he knows why. Kaya moves on without dwelling on it. “Then what? Is it the joke I made about Nick?” she guesses, referring to a throwaway line about her ex-boyfriend she’d made when the boys had been arguing over which movie to watch. It had seemed harmless, but she also knew that Namjoon, for better or for worse, had a jealous streak he wasn’t proud of.

“No,” he mutters.

He’s also proud. Kaya shakes her head. “If it is, I apologise. I didn’t think it would be a big deal, but I can understand if you didn’t like it. If that’s what it is, then I’m sorry.” When Namjoon doesn’t respond and simply looks in the other direction, she sighs in frustration. “What is it?”

His tongue is poking into his lower lip, and his jaw looks as hard as rock. She’s never seen anything bother him so much and the fact that she doesn’t know what it is doesn’t sit well with her at all.

Finally, he speaks. “I don’t want to start a fight,” he says quietly.

“Well, I don’t want to spend the rest of the night wondering what’s bothering you so much that you can’t even look at me.” Her eyes bore into him but he still doesn’t turn. “If it becomes a fight, we have a fight. And then we move on from it.”

“I don’t…” Namjoon trails off, clicking his tongue in what she takes to be annoyance. His eyes flicker to her again before averting. “Can we drop this?”

“Not now that you’re making such a big deal about it.”

“I’m not making a big deal about anything. You’re the one who won’t stop talking about it.”

Kaya scoffs incredulously, her heart already starting to race painfully. “You’re the one being evasive,” she says tightly, trying not to raise her voice as he runs a hand over his face. “Namjoon, you’ve never been like this,” she adds in a smaller voice. “Can you just tell me?”

It seems to give him pause, too, for he closes his eyes and exhales slowly. “I don’t want to upset you,” he says quietly.

There’s a strange and uncomfortable sensation in her stomach at his change in tone. This is bad. “I appreciate that,” she murmurs steadily. “But I’m a big girl. I can take it.”

Namjoon simply looks at her, observing, before pursing his lips and turning away. The dimple appears faintly in his cheek, the one that had popped as he’d grinned down at her in bed this morning, and in the kitchen at the dorm, and on the sofa when they’d been watching their debut music videos.

She shakes her head in disappointment. “I’m sorry, I can’t think of anything that would piss you off this much except for that joke about Nick, which was about something that happened five years ago but if that’s the case, then I -”

“Why didn’t you ever report him?”

Namjoon’s words cut through her sentence, voice deep and steady, yet seeming louder than anything she’s heard him say all night.

“What?” she asks in a low voice, wondering if she could’ve possibly misheard his words.

He’s looking right at her now, finally, and she suddenly wishes he wouldn’t. “Five years,” he says slowly, his voice trembling with barely concealed emotion. “It’s been five years, and he still has a hold over your life. Why didn’t you report him?”

Her breathing feels loud to her own ears. “Please tell me we’re still talking about Nick,” she says quietly. Namjoon doesn’t answer, and Kaya takes that as a confirmation.

“I guess,” he begins after a moment, as though choosing his words carefully, “I can’t understand that after everything that happened, after everything he did to you -” His voice breaks and he bites his lip. “How could you not report him?” he asks softly, shaking his head.

“For starters,” she answers, voice oddly toneless, “I couldn’t see his face.”

“I - I know. But… there are ways for the police to do this stuff, to find people based on evidence…” It’s clear from his words that he’s thought about this before. “You didn’t tell anyone, though. Except -”

“Marianne and Nick,” she finishes. “Yeah, I told my closest friend and my boyfriend. That was enough for me.”

“And they didn’t tell you to go to the police?” Namjoon scoffs softly, but it doesn’t sound directed at her. “Not even your boyfriend?”

“He - he wasn’t my boyfriend anymore at the time,” she stutters, feeling rather like they’re about to digress. “And you know that. Why would you bring up -”

“Because it’s been five years, Kaya!” he exclaims, looking truly hassled now. “It’s been five years, and you still can’t watch a movie without being affected by it! And he’s just - he’s just free! How is that fair?”

She bites her lip, her heart racing. Iconic dialogues of an iconic movie, floating out through a loudspeaker in the common room hours before dawn, all the way into the empty streets of a university campus… her stomach churns.

“I thought you didn’t care about watching Pulp Fiction.”

“I don’t care about - come on, you know that’s not my point.”

“I can watch it whenever I want,” she states, hearing the tremor in her voice. “I have watched it, since then. I can - don’t you dare walk away, Kim Namjoon!” she says loudly, as he begins making his way into the living room.

He halts immediately, however, turning around. “I’m not walking away,” he promises, taking a seat on the cream-coloured couch. She takes a step back and feels the back of a chair dig into her spine. She’d told him about the worst night of her life at this kitchen island nearly a year ago, coming up behind him as he worked on his laptop and wrapping her arms around his broad shoulders, whispering calmly to him that if he had a minute, there was something important she needed to talk to him about.

They’d been together officially for six months by then, even though they’d been hovering back and forth for a few months prior to that. A level of trust had been established by then, though, not to mention a profound sense of safety she felt with him, even when he was halfway across the world from her. Later that night, after she’d told him and he’d expressed both anger and support but mostly shock, they’d cuddled on that very couch as they watched Cloud Atlas.

Sharing her secret hadn’t been easy, but no part of her regretted it. As she watches him rest his elbows on his thighs and run his fingers through his hair, she wonders if she’s finally about to.

Namjoon sighs like he’s bracing himself. “I’m not saying you can’t watch the movie, Kaya. I’m saying you don’t, for a reason. And that’s his fault.”

“A lot of things are his fault. Reporting him wouldn’t have changed that. Even if I knew whom to actually report in the first place.”

“You weren’t even drinking,” he reminds her. “Even if all you remembered was the colour of his jacket, they could’ve at least narrowed it down to -”

“No, they couldn’t! It was dark, it was - I could’ve been mistaken,” she stammers, starting to feel anxious now as the edges of her mind start letting in scraps of memories from that night.

“You were not mistaken. You’re the most detail-oriented person I know.”

“Well, unless you were there that night, I don’t see how you could possibly have an opinion on that.”

Namjoon sighs. "This is why I didn't want to bring this up, Kaya.”

“No, please, I’m glad you did,” she says immediately, scoffing. “I’m glad I know what you think now. Have you been judging me for this ever since I told you last year?”

“I am not judging you - how can you say that?" he demands, looking stung. "I care about you. I love you, and I hate that you still have to make sacrifices and compromises, even if it is just over a movie. You’re still haunted by it, and he’s roaming around free!”

“And you think reporting him would’ve helped that?” Kaya exclaims. “Do you think we’d be back at the dorm watching Pulp Fiction right now if I’d gone to the cops? If I’d been neck-deep in paperwork, being asked to recount the incident a hundred times to a hundred different people about a guy whose face I couldn’t see and voice I could barely make out, only to be asked why I was walking alone around campus while wearing shorts?”

“I - I don’t know. I’m not -” He drops his head in his hands, breathing slowly and deeply. “I just… I fucking hate him, Kaya,” he confesses quietly, as though letting her in on a secret. “I hate him so, so much. I want to hurt him - I want to kill him with my bare hands.”

Kaya exhales shakily, never having heard him speak this disdainfully before, with this much hatred, about anyone or anything. “I hate him, too,” she murmurs after a moment. “Of course, I do. But I also had finals in two weeks and believe it or not, I knew my priorities.”

“I’m not saying you didn’t, I’m saying -” He sighs in frustration, his tongue poking into his lower lip again. “I just wish he would have suffered the consequences. Or just suffered.”

The fury in his voice is evident now, and is now starting to show on his face, but Kaya tries to hold her ground. She has to. “I told you: I had finals. I had a masters’ seat in the balance waiting for me in London, I had graduation - I had a million other things that I thought were more important for me. I couldn’t report him,” she adds after a moment, hearing the desperation in her own voice. “I couldn’t afford to get caught up in it.”

“You… you could report it,” he corrects her in a low voice. “You chose not to.”

“Yes, and that was my choice to make.” She grits her teeth, feeling her eyes start to sting. “I didn’t think this far ahead and anticipate that five years down the line, my boyfriend would be making me defend that decision to him.”

“That’s not what I’m doing! I care about -”

“Then listen to me! Listen to what I’m saying! It didn’t matter to me that -”

“How could it not matter? Kaya, he got away with it!” Namjoon stands up now, and his height is suddenly looming, even from across the room. “He’s out there, still, and he’s living his life while you’re -” He breaks off.

Kaya forces herself to breathe. “While I’m what?”

“While you’re still hurting.”

There’s no stopping it now; she feels her vision blur. “I’m perfectly happy with my life,” she says, her voice trembling.

“I’m not saying you aren’t. I just wish you’d -” He breaks off again and sighs, while Kaya turns around and lowers her head, unable to look at him any longer. Her chest feels constricted now, and she realises after a moment that it’s because she’s holding her breath. Letting it out seems dangerous, though, like she’s setting herself up to break down.

It’s a tall order for her to cry in front of anyone; it makes her feel uncomfortable and she avoids it at all costs. She wonders for the first time if it’s got anything to do with this incident, and acknowledges with a heaviness that any comfort she might have had in succumbing to tears in front of Namjoon has disappeared, at least for tonight.

“I just wish you’d see how much more you could’ve done,” he says, his tone taking on a different quality, something that reminds her inexplicably of Nick for a moment. It makes her feel inadequate and her heart hurts, even as Namjoon continues. “Even if he didn’t end up behind bars, you could’ve called him out publicly. You saw his varsity jacket - that college could’ve been made aware that one of their students is a -”

“Stop,” murmurs Kaya weakly, but he doesn’t hear her.

“It’s a world of things, and it only takes one to create change. I mean… how do you know he hasn’t done this again, to someone else?”

It’s the straw that breaks the camel’s back, and Kaya feels her chest finally unclench as she swallows a sob. Her face and throat burn in discomfort as she tries not to make a sound, her hair falling down the sides of her face and shielding it from his view. Namjoon has fallen silent; whether it’s due to her reaction or because he realises the implication of what he’s said, she doesn’t know. At the moment, she can’t bear to be around him for another moment to find out.

She opens her eyes to see a tear fall onto the white kitchen island and hastily wipes it, taking a shaky breath as quietly as she can. “I’m, uh -” She breaks off, cringing when she hears the tremble in her voice. She turns slightly in his direction, not looking at him. “I’m going to sleep in the guest room tonight, if you don’t mind.”

Namjoon watches her turn and leave with a sinking heart, her smaller figure padding quietly down the corridor and passing his bedroom before she disappears from his view. There’s no point in going after her right now; it won’t be a fruitful argument, if that’s what they’re indeed in the middle of.

There’s a twinge of regret taking form in his chest that stings when he hears the door to the guest room open and close. He sighs; he knew he shouldn’t have initiated this topic.

He’d had no intention of doing so. After she’d confided in him about it, it had probably come up once, and only when she’d brought it up. The night she’d told him, he hadn’t dreamed in a million years that this was the important thing she wanted to discuss. He hadn’t been able to process it past a certain point initially; he’d listened in stunned silence as she recounted that night, skipping the most horrific details (for whose benefit, he wasn’t sure, but he was thankful) and ending it with a short yet heartfelt declaration of how much she trusted him.

Kaya had seemed relieved after that, almost like telling him had been a catharsis of sorts. She’d been just as affectionate as normal after that, and Namjoon had silently gone along with it in a daze, his mind replaying her words and expressions the entire time, including when they were watching a movie on the couch later. It wasn’t until they’d gone to bed that the shock had finally worn off and he’d been able to register everything she’d told him, and the white hot anger at a faceless stranger had coursed through his body in a way he’d never felt before.

Namjoon drops his head in his hands, the living room suddenly feeling far too big and empty. He closes his eyes, trying half-heartedly to search for an apology or words of comfort but nothing comes to mind, not now that his mind is occupied with this.

Earlier this evening, when Yoongi had suggested Pulp Fiction, Namjoon had immediately expected Kaya to say no. But she hadn’t, and one by one the members had voted and before they knew it, the opening credits were playing. He’d nudged her gently, asking her silently if she was really okay with this, and she’d shrugged and given him a small smile before settling into his side.

Even after the movie began, Namjoon’s attention remained on Kaya, observing her for any movements that might signal her discomfort. It was an odd detail that had made it through the incident, the loud volume at which the movie was playing inside the campus common room, the dramatic and aggressive dialogues that floated out being the only thing her mind had been able to process.

She’d given nothing away today, though, not until halfway through when John Travolta, Samuel L Jackson and Quentin Tarantino’s voices had blared through the television amidst gunshots and male voices yelling, and Kaya’s face had suddenly crumpled.

It had been brief, a moment of heartbreaking agony that Namjoon had been powerless to stop, before she’d immediately straightened her expression. But he wasn’t fooled, and he’d taken it as a cue to casually say to everyone else that they were going to be heading out. Kaya hadn’t protested, for which he was glad, because the fury at her assailant was returning swiftly and Namjoon’s only focus from here on out was to ensure he drove them back safely to his apartment.

There’s a soft rattle, like an ominous rumble. Namjoon peeks out from behind his hands, wondering briefly if it’s an earthquake before he realises it’s him. His leg is jerking up and down, as though of its own accord, and the movement is making the wooden coffee table shake.

Just… just a jacket. Looked like a varsity football one. Yellow, I think… there were too many people from too many colleges on campus that week. So I don’t know.

It feels like his limbs are moving with a mind of their own, making him stand up and walk over to the kitchen island where Kaya had been standing a little while ago, his hands reaching for the sleek, silver laptop he’d left there this morning. He’s opened the screen and switched it on before even returning to the sofa, and the moment he’s logged in, he goes straight to the browser.

Here, Namjoon’s stuck. Watching the cursor blink, as though waiting for him to show what he knows, he chews on his lower lip. Finally, he types Colleges in New York, only to get almost a hundred results. He combines it with football team, before realising he doesn’t know if she meant American football or soccer, so he replaces it with sports team.

The results go into the hundreds now, with the swim teams and water polo and chess players popping up on his screen. He sighs, suddenly feeling ridiculous, when he spots a picture. Frowning, he clicks on it until it fits his screen: it’s of a Caucasian male, early twenties, with dark hair and dark eyes. He’s smiling straight into the camera, tall and confident - and wearing a yellow jersey.

It’s like a dull punch to his stomach, for even though Namjoon knows neither head nor tail about this individual - his eyes flicker to the name in the caption to see Mark Rivers - it occurs to him that the person who attacked Kaya, who hurt her all those years ago like a coward in the dark - that person could be Mark Rivers.

Namjoon forces himself to take a deep breath before slowly scrolling down, begrudgingly noting that nearly every male he comes across could have been him. He’s in no mood to back down, though. The image of Kaya all those months ago, her face carefully calm as he told him about that night, her face earlier this evening when Pulp Fiction had been playing, every single scene in Namjoon’s imagination that reveals itself in the darkest of times when he thinks about how it might have played out five years ago… He shakes his head, resolutely opening multiple tabs on his browser, each with a different college and its sports teams on the screen.

He doesn’t know how long he sits there, scrolling from picture to picture, eyes skimming over the names and the sports. At some point, in order to narrow it down, he makes an executive decision to filter out sports that aren’t high intensity, for while she hadn’t ever said it explicitly, she’d implied a level of strength that she hadn’t been able to fight back against.

Swallowing the bile in his throat, he moves on quickly. It also occurs to him soon enough that just because NYU was in New York, it didn’t mean that every college team that had landed up there was also from New York, and Namjoon is thus forced to expand his search to outside the city as well. He restricts it to the tristate area, however, and continues looking for links in the college websites about alumni and galleries with pictures of their sports teams.

He combs through the links, looking for teams or graduating classes that would have overlapped with Kaya’s senior year. Some of the links have members listed by name and Namjoon pounces on them with a vengeance, flipping through picture after picture of former students who eventually start to blur into each other.

There are some faces who, for some reason, just strike Namjoon as suspicious. He starts bookmarking the names, copy-pasting them onto an Excel sheet to maintain some kind of list, some kind of indication that this unorganized exercise he’s conducting in this frame of mind isn’t a waste, that there’s actually something fruitful coming out of it.

Namjoon pauses, his mind still working amidst the tiredness and a dull pain between his eyes that he knows is the onset of a headache. He needs to narrow the search down further - it’s the only way. His fingers fly across the keyboard, the typos increasing both in number and his irritation, and he starts searching for known college campus assaults in Kaya’s senior year, along with two years before and after. He’s mostly met with newspaper and magazine articles about campus safety and the like, but names elude him.

Somehow, he starts getting directed to chat rooms and message boards that have been inactive for years, and while he wishes to interact with none of them, he scrolls through the hundreds of messages, pausing every time he sees a name mentioned. Finally, in what seems to be the fifth or sixth message board started by a former sorority girl half a decade ago, he sees a name that makes his heart leap weakly.

He can’t understand why at first; it doesn’t sound too common but something about it stands out to him. The message doesn’t even mention a school associated but after a moment, he thinks he knows what it could be. Vaguely seeing the pieces in his mind, about to fall into place, he goes back to the Excel sheet, and searches for the name, gasping softly when the name matches.

It’s at that moment that he spots two numbers: the time, showing him that it’s nearly three am, and the row number of the name he’s just searched, showing him row two hundred and thirty-six. He squeezes his eyes shut, unwilling to acknowledge how far gone he is.

It was… it probably didn’t last more than fifteen minutes. It just felt like a lifetime. But turns out it was just one long scene of Pulp Fiction.

Clenching his fist on the keyboard so he isn’t tempted to throw the laptop against the wall, Namjoon tries to gather himself. In a desperate move, he enters the first name into Naver to find a LinkedIn profile. It’s him; it’s the same person, but his profile picture is no longer of a college student with a cocky grin and bangs, but an older version in a suit and tie, gazing calmly at Namjoon through the screen. A half-hearted scroll shows him that this person - Geoffrey Dominic - is currently residing in Dubai and working for an airline company.

Something about it makes Namjoon’s throat close up in frustration, and it takes him a moment to realise it’s the fact that any of these men, or all of them, could be anywhere in the world now. The way Kaya was in London less than three months after the incident, any of these men could be anywhere else, across the world from her or even in the same building as her in Amsterdam, and they would have no way of knowing.

Namjoon runs his hands through his hair, his fingers trembling, and feels a sense of such helplessness that it makes him want to scream. It occurs to him with some regret that Kaya might have been feeling the same, only magnified to proportions he would never understand. He suspects now - or, rather, he’d suspected all the way back then but didn’t want to admit it - that she was probably driven to tears before she’d quietly declared her intention to go to bed, effectively ending their argument.

Keeping the laptop aside, he stands for the first time in hours and winces when his knees cramp. Stretching his legs and making his way inside the apartment towards the bedrooms, he passes by his room; not only is his mind too cluttered to sleep right now, he also can’t imagine doing so in his bedroom, without Kaya. He stops in front of the guest room, his heart hammering when he imagines her in there, at her choice to actively be apart from him for the night.

They need to talk about this. He’s willing to concede that he might have been too harsh, that he may have brought up the topic too suddenly - but he cannot let this argument fizzle out and have them pretend to have moved on from it in the morning. Not this particular discussion, not after the way they left it tonight, and not with how Kaya left.

Namjoon stares at the door, hoping something will knock on it for him. His hand won’t move and with each passing second, his tiredness and frustration with his unsuccessful investigation turns into regret and something that resembles guilt.

He wonders if she’s crying in there; the thought makes his heart twist. If it’s true, if that’s what she’s doing inside, he has to go in there. Maybe he’ll apologise, maybe they’ll agree to pick it up some other time under calmer circumstances.

The moment his hand goes up to the door, however, he realises it’s been hours since their argument; she’s most likely asleep. It occurs to him, out of nowhere, that all her things are in his room. He pictures her, alone in bed amidst the covers, still in the jeans and top she’d worn today. It’s one night out of the ten they have during her stay in Seoul this time, and they’re sleeping apart - and it’s seeming more and more clear by now that it’s his fault.

The fist that’s resting against the door, about to knock, becomes flat. Namjoon leans against it, suddenly exhausted, feeling like it’s the closest he’s going to get to her tonight, wanting to let her know he’s still here. He can’t go inside now, though, even if she is asleep. As much as it may kill him to be out here, on the other side of the door that she closed on him, he can’t not respect her wishes, especially tonight. He doesn’t want to leave either, though, so after a moment, he turns around and slides down against the door until he’s sitting on the floor, knees bent and feet flat on the ground.

Namjoon hasn’t a clue what to expect in the morning, how they’re ever going to move past this. If it becomes a fight, we have a fight. And then we move on from it. He closes his eyes as he replays her words in his mind. They were rational and pragmatic, just like everything about her he’d known he needed in his life from the day he’d met her. This probably wasn’t what she had in mind, though, a small part of his mind chimes in. It’s true, and he simply hopes she’ll remember her own words tomorrow.

He sits there for a while, contemplating more than once if he should quietly step inside. He could slip into bed with her, maybe gently hold her to him, possibly kiss her shoulder in the dark and ensure she doesn’t wake up alone. The thought makes his chest hurt but he knows he can’t, so in a pathetic attempt to distract himself from it, he picks up his phone and scrolls through it for a while, remembering with a dull sort of victory that he’s a day away from his credit card bill being due for payment.

His wallet isn’t in his pocket, though, and when he trudges into the living room, he finds it’s not in his jacket pocket or anywhere else on the coffee table or the kitchen island. Mildly panicking, Namjoon shuffles between both rooms, the only places he’s set foot in all night, and searches behind jars and under the sofa, until he’s forced to conclude - and hope to high heavens - that it’s probably in the car.

It feels like the longest distance, from his penthouse to the building basement, but he takes his keys and heads out anyway. He locates the wallet in between the driver’s seat and the gear shift, lodged in the gap and peeking out apologetically when he reaches over to tug it out. Shutting the door and turning the car off, he rubs his eyes, wondering briefly that if he isn’t able to sleep, if he should head to the studio for some late night editing.

Only somewhat intrigued by the idea, he exits the building on foot, deciding that the solution to being stuck in his living room with the results of his deep-dive into the worst night of his girlfriend’s life probably isn’t another tiny room with a laptop. He walks along the pavement outside, shivering slightly in the chilly air in the absence of a jacket, in nothing but the white t-shirt he’s been wearing all day.

It was late… really late. I went back to my room. I didn’t want to be anywhere else. I just wanted to sleep, possibly forever, but by the time I got into bed, it was already dawn outside.

Around this time of the night, then. Out of nowhere, Namjoon feels his face twist, the memory of her words and her voice feeling like a punch to his stomach. He stops in his tracks, dropping his face into his hands and squeezing his eyes shut, as though hoping it will get rid of everything, every memory of that night she’s recounted to him in the tamest fashion, every horrifying image that his imagination has ever created in his mind, bringing back the particular kind of rage that’s only ever shown its face when he’s thought about how a tall, faceless man had hurt Kaya.

Another cool breeze forces him to snap out of it, and he immediately crosses the street, hearing vague honking and blurred yelling but able to focus on none of it. He enters a coffee shop, a dimly lit one with fluorescent lighting that makes his sleep-deprived brain shirk away uncomfortably, but he rallies, going over to the counter and ordering a plain Americano to go. The moment he picks it up and turns towards the door, he realises he has no desire to go back into the cold.

Taking a seat at a single table in the corner and reasonably sure no one here will recognise him, he takes a sip of his coffee and turns on his phone, his fingers automatically going onto Naver and waiting, once again, for the fury in his mind to tell him what to do. It does no such thing, though, and eventually Namjoon half-heartedly enters in the same search he’d last put in at the apartment, regarding known culprits in New York campus assault cases.

He finds he has no energy to scroll anymore, though, none of that adrenaline that pushed him to search college websites, sports teams, cross-reference them with age and whatnot. His mind is awake, but his anger isn’t as easily in his grasp anymore, not when he’s aware of Kaya back in the apartment, alone. She’s safe, of course; his building has some of the highest security in Seoul’s residential areas, and his floor is only accessible by a select few who possess key cards. Additionally, the only person in the world who has a key card to his own apartment, apart from him, is Kaya.

Namjoon hopes she’s sleeping. She’d been working unbelievably hard in the weeks leading up to her visit here so she wouldn’t have to work as much on the trip; coupled with the lingering jet lag, he’s reasonably hopeful that sleep would have caught up to her by now. His chest aches when he thinks, once again, of how she left the room in tears at the end of their argument. At the moment, he’d let her go because not only had it been evident that he’d possibly pushed her too far, but because a part of him was also frustrated that he would never be able to express to her just how much it hurt to see her hurting, and how much he wished he’d be able to give her the justice she deserved.

His stomach churns uncomfortably when he pictures her again, alone in the penthouse. Despite the security, the fear of her being hurt again, in absolutely anyway, nauseates him. It was the hardest part when she’d told him about that night, the part where she’d made him promise that he wouldn’t look at her differently and wouldn’t treat her like a victim.

Namjoon hadn’t done either, to the best of his abilities; his worry for her safety and security while she lived alone in Amsterdam pre-dated his knowledge about her past. He’d tried never to impose on how she lived, however, apart from reminding her every night to check if she’d locked the door or to let him know when she made it home after a late night in the library. It’s the one thing, even now, that gives him some comfort all the way in a different timezone, but he doubts she’ll ever know the intensity of his desire to keep her safe.

He scrolls down the screen once, the words now truly blurring into each other, until something catches his eye. You’re Not Alone: Supporting a Survivor, with further text undereath. Namjoon hesitates before opening it, spending the next ten minutes on each and every word of the article until he reaches the end and lets out a breath he didn’t even know he was holding.

He clicks on the next suggested link, and the next, and the next, until they’re all basically saying the same thing. A soft ding catches his attention and he looks up to see the last customer besides him leaving the restaurant. The waitress smiles politely at the older man before surreptitiously glancing at Namjoon, and he takes the hint, realising also that it’s half past four now and Kaya’s still alone in his apartment.

After leaving a generous tip, he heads out, the tiredness of the last twenty or so hours finally sinking in. The walk back is cold but the coffee helps and by the time he reaches his building, all he can think about is his comfortable sofa and the stacks of ramen cups in his pantry.

Over an hour later, after two cups of ramen and a small cup of chocolate ice cream he’d had no intention of eating, he finds himself watching a mediocre episode of the latest k-drama. It’s on mute, for any sound right now might make his head explode, but the subtitles work well enough. He wills sleep to find him; he can’t bring himself to get into his own bed right now, but a few minutes of sleep on this couch would suffice for a bit…

His eyelids start getting heavy just as the first rays of light start peeking in through the curtains, but he’s jolted awake by a sound that he realises a second later is a door opening and closing. His heart racing, he straightens up to see Kaya step gingerly out of the hallway, her long hair slightly dishevelled from her sleep. She’s in nothing but one of his white t-shirts, hanging loose on her smaller frame and reaching the middle of her thighs.

She stops at the edge of the kitchen island, close to where she’d been standing last night, and clears her throat. “Did you sleep at all?” she asks, frowning.

“Not really,” he answers softly, hearing the hoarseness in his own voice. “How - how did you sleep?”

“Late,” she says, and offers no further explanation. After a moment, she bites her lip. “I thought you…” She licks her lips and looks at the ground, folding her arms tightly across her chest. “I heard the door close.”

“Yeah… I dropped my wallet in the car.” He watches as she nods, and it takes him a second to realise she was probably thinking something else when she said it. “And went to get a coffee, down the block.”

She raises an eyebrow. “You went to get coffee at four am?”

“I couldn’t sleep.” Namjoon sees her eyes dart to the plastic coffee cup on the table, and a pang goes through his heart. “Did you - did you think I left?”

Kaya doesn’t answer, and it suddenly makes him want to cry. Need to start somewhere. He clears his throat. “Kaya, I want to just -”

“No, wait.” She holds up a hand, her gaze still on the ground. He sees her swallow and take a deep breath before looking up, this time straight at him. “I think there are some things I need to say. I don’t think I was really very clear the last time we spoke about this, but… I don’t regret anything.” She pauses, as though waiting for him to contradict her. When he says nothing, she continues.

“I’ve thought about this more than you know. I’ve thought about every single moment,” she says. “I’ve wondered why I had to have been walking alone on that street on that night, or why I went to NYU or why I didn’t scream louder so that someone would hear me. But it’s pointless. I was walking back from a committee meeting where we were making posters for an adoption drive at a dog shelter, which I don’t regret. I lived in one of the most amazing cities in the world and made friends for life because I went to NYU, and I can’t regret that.”

She pauses again, and this time Namjoon nods, if only to let her know he’s listening to every word.

“I chose not to report him because I was scared, and because I had next to no description of him. I know women have pressed charges with less, and I respect the hell out of that kind of courage. But I had finals, which my masters’ admission in London was contingent on. I had graduation, where I had to make a speech to my entire class. I had an internship to finish up which would round up my entire resumé - I had a world of things waiting for me.”

Her voice is trembling now, and Namjoon has to make a conscious effort to not walk over to her right now and pull her into his arms. The words are tumbling out of her mouth as though she’s been thinking about them all night, with a fear and defiance he’s both sad and proud of.

“I didn’t want to get caught up in - in spending hours at the police station, in having my classmates talk about me behind my back…” She takes a shaky breath. “I’m not saying it was easy to choose not to do it. It haunted me every day for years, but I - I had to choose me. Who else would? I had to choose my future - and I was not going to let him or what he did define me or make my decisions for me.”

“Every single day I’m glad I chose me because five years in, I’m living in a beautiful city, I’m the youngest doctoral candidate in the university, I’m working on a world famous research grant under Professor Woodstock who is a scholar -” She scoffs in mild disbelief, just as she had the day she’d secured the research project, and Namjoon can’t help but smile a bit “- I have good friends, I have a boyfriend who loves me, I have… I have a life. I have a good life, and I have it because I made a decision. You can - you can judge me for it… but I don’t regret it for a second. I just hope you understand that.”

Kaya bites her lip, feeling her vision blur again just like last night, as she watches him nod slowly, as though processing everything she’s just said. She makes no further motion, leaving the ball in his court. It feels like the most vulnerable she’s ever been before him, for she knows it’s a sliding scale. Either he does what the man she fell in love with would do, which would be to instantly understand her… or she finds out something new about him today, and they acknowledge the fundamental differences in their outlooks.

Namjoon rests his elbows on his thighs, running his fingers through his hair. The platinum blond looks slightly darker - or maybe it’s the light - as though making it clear that he hasn’t slept all night. He looks straight at her, though, and for a moment she’s comforted with the expression in his eyes.

“I, uh -” He sighs, his gaze flickering to the floor. “I tried to look him up last night.”

Her heart stops. “You did what?”

He immediately holds up both hands. “I know, it was a - a violation of your privacy, and I’m sorry. It’s not like I found anything,” he adds after a moment, and she doesn’t know if she’s imagining a note of defeat in his voice. “I don’t know if I actually thought I would, but it felt like I wanted to. Looking back, though, I don’t even know if that would help.”

“Kaya, I -” He exhales, and the look in his eyes becomes even more pronounced. “I worry about you,” he says after a moment. “I worry whenever you’re alone in your apartment, when you tell me you’re staying late in the library, when you’re drinking with friends… even last night, when I was twenty minutes away from you, I - I worried.”

She doesn’t know what to say to that. “I can take care of myself. You don’t have to -”

“No, I - I know. You’re more than capable of taking care of yourself. It’s one of the things I love most about you.” He’s quiet for a few seconds, his gaze not moving away from her, like he’s seeing her in the flesh after a long time. “I still worry, though. And it’s okay - I like worrying about you,” he adds, a playful smile flashing in his eyes momentarily, almost as though he can hear her heart flutter.

“It’s got nothing to do with your capabilities. I just worry because - well, partly because it’s the only thing I can do from here - but also because…” He sighs. “God, Kaya, it would kill me if something ever happened to you. If you ever got hurt.” He finally lowers his head, and she feels her heart ache. “To know that you did get hurt and that I can’t do anything about -” He breaks off, sniffing and looking up at her.

“But that’s my problem. Worrying about you, dealing with that anger… I guess somewhere in that manic searching I did all night, something pointed me to the fact that it doesn’t matter how I feel about it. It’s not about me. Or him.”

Kaya nods, not knowing what to say. She doesn’t know what he spent all night searching for and it’s too overwhelming to try to understand, even as her brain automatically begins dissecting the various demographics and data he could’ve started slicing and dicing. “Thank you,” she whispers finally.

“Did you ever consider it?” Namjoon asks after a few seconds. “Therapy? Or counselling?”

She bites her lip and nods. “I tried it for a bit, in London. I stopped because I moved to Amsterdam,” she says, anticipating his silent question. “Finding a new person, telling them everything… It seemed like a lot. We can talk about it,” she offers softly after a moment.

Namjoon stands up then and walks over to her slowly, as though giving her enough time to back away. She doesn’t, though, for his height feels comforting again unlike during their argument last night. He stops in front of her, almost a foot’s distance between them.

“I hope you know,” he begins, his voice low, “that I would never judge you. Definitely not for anything to do with this.” He purses his lips before sighing, his dimple appearing briefly. “I’m sorry.”

Kaya nods. “You should get some sleep,” she murmurs, reaching up to touch the bags under his eyes, his fingers ghosting over his skin.

“I will.”

A few moments pass, and Kaya feels like she needs to say it again, just in case. “You can’t treat me differently, okay?”

Namjoon doesn’t answer right away. He brushes her cheekbone with his knuckle and she feels her toes curl on the bare floor. “Kaya, I’ll always be protective of you.”

It’s not an answer, but it feels like the thing she needs to hear right now. “I’ll allow it,” she murmurs, tugging at the bottom of his t-shirt. It’s almost identical to the one she’s wearing; she’d found it in the closet of the guest room and didn’t imagine he’d have a problem with her borrowing it. Sleeping in his oversized t-shirt, smelling of his detergent… it was the closest thing to comfort she’d gotten last night.

Kaya feels her throat start to hurt uncomfortably. “I need you to understand my decision, okay?” she whispers in a small voice, looking up at him, more vulnerable than she can remember. “I need you to be in my corner.”

As though he’s been waiting forever to do it, Namjoon immediately pulls her into him, kissing her forehead and wrapping his arms around her. “Of course, I am. I love you,” he whispers into her hair, and she feels him inhaling. Coconut and vanilla. Kaya buries her face into his shoulder, having missed his broad chest and strong arms so unbearably last night. “I’m always in your corner. No matter what.”

Thank you for reading. Don't forget to leave a review :)

#namjoon x oc #namjoon x reader #namjoon fanfic #btswritingcafe #ficscafe #thebtswritersclub #btshoneyhive #bangtanbathhouse #bangtaninn #bangtanwhq #houseofddaeng #52hertz #rm x reader #rm fanfic #bts rm #hyunglinenetwork

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daresplaining · 2 years

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Is it ever explained what happens with Matt's middlename after Mike becomes a real boy? Is he still called Matthew Michael or did Mike take his middle name? Or, my personal favourite, are they now a pair of twins called Matthew Michael Murdock and Michael Matthew Murdock for maximum chaos?

This has not been addressed on-panel, and I'm dying for it to be because one of the funniest side-effects of Mike inserting himself into Matt's past is the fact that this guy's first name is now actually, literally his brother's middle name, implying that Maggie and Jack were just...not very creative about naming their kids. I could hypothetically see Matt maybe having a different middle name now just to avoid that goofy implication, but I would be disappointed, and it would be up to a DD writer to actively make that choice.

And yes, I'm a huge fan of Mike's middle name being Matthew to bring the joke full-circle (though I asked Chip Zdarsky about this a few years ago and I like his version too).

#Daredevil #Matt Murdock #Mike Murdock #Asks #Mike Murdockalypse

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vellichorom · 1 year

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I don’t know if someone has asks this before, but what is your favorite ending from The Stanley Parable?

nobody's actually asked me that before, so thank YOU for being the first!

i think there's something to like in EVERY ending, so this was. hard. HOWEVER, my's indisputable, all-time-favorite, you-can-quote-this-in-my-biography TSP ending is... 🥁

The Countdown Ending.

( closely followed by the elevator / confusion / apartment ( w/ the bucket ) / any games ending / the vent ending / the sequel/new content ending + pretty much any ending regarding the sequel )

& let me tell you why!

this ending HITS in EVERY way.

this ending is such an immediate SWERVE from what a newer player might expect from the game, especially since THIS ending stems from one of the first you can get just by playing as you're told to. in fact, though dependent on how one chooses to play, this could be your introduction to the underlying plot of what's ACTUALLY going on here, & it's very much- at least to me, the best way TO introduce it all.

you do the menial thing of deviating from the path at the last minute, devastatingly deciding on stanley's behalf that he wants to take control of everything, & you get RIPPED TO SHREDS for it, the world unravelling at your feet, you are punished & laughed at for panicking; you are CHASTISED for trying to act on your own accord, first treated like a sin ( because of the implications of stanley activating the facility ) & then having it rubbed in your face that you don't even HAVE control & your choices seemingly don't matter.

& the best part? new players wouldn't know this, but the seasoned ones would: the narrator is JUST as helpless as you are beyond being able to direct the game. it's chilling to figure that, look back, & simply realize.

speak of the devil; this introduces a WHOLE new light to your trusty narrator, him going out of his way to teach you a lesson, executing your character, explicitly, DELIBERATELY making you sit there for every painstaking second of this ending - rather than nullifying it to a cutscene, for his own enjoyment in milking your horror, at that.

i don't think we talk about that enough. & i don't think we realize how shocking that must be to someone just getting into this game blind.

i remember LOSING MY MIND seeing this ending for the first time, & to this DAY i'm still chilled each time i watch it, especially the more i think about the ever-expanding list of implications.

BEYOND said list of implications, as well as the plot itself, the environment & visual setup GETS me; running around a darkening facility, desperately trying to find anything to reverse the clock while everything starts shutting & breaking down around you. you are alone, nobody's coming to help you & you are assured of this fact SO many times over. everything is a reminder that you have a limited time left to play. oh my god i'm dying thinking about it

not to mention, you've got red lights of doom swirling around the room, harmonizing with the music- WHICH HEY, I COULD TOUT THIS AS MY FAVORITE ENDING BASED ON THE MUSIC ALONE. the ' countdown ' track is DAMNING, a haunting melody that feels like you're waltzing with fate itself, glimmers of hope in the belting choir, only to fail & die by it's unforgiving, cold hands. you are aweing at the scene as the helpless player, & the music will highlight that MERCILESSLY. it's so good. that's one of my favorite tracks in a game ever.

...........& yeah the narrator's growl here is something but i feel like this ending gets hyped up TOO much just for that / the narrator being seen as wildly attractive for trying to kill you. YES, he is, we know, that's not the point though, i'm gayer for the music

I COULD GO. on & on, but I'm going to stop myself here, because I think you get the idea.

& i think the funniest thing here is, i love the countdown ending for being such a massive nail in the coffin of the narrative here, but the rest of my favorite endings are much more silly, dare i say domestic, even. my range. is immense. feel free to ask about those too if you like!

BUT YEAHHH i really like the countdown ending. 10 cookies out of 9!

#anonymous #inbox #TSP blogging #ough it's now i realize how little i actually get to talk about the base game.... u should ask me more opinions about it hee #ALSO IT'S SO HARD TO PICK A FAVORITE ANYTHING IN THIS GAME BECAUSE I LIKE EVERYTHING ABOUT IT #but for you i must try <33 #dances cutely as i give silly opinionated analysis

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omgkalyppso · 5 months

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sylvix 1 5 6 and 7 :)

(ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧ hello!! thank you for the ask!

1.What were the first gifts they gave to one another? What sort of gifts would they exchange on a fifth anniversary?

They're the funniest couple for this question.

I am unfortunately full of words / headcanons so here we go.

If you ask Sylvain what the first gift he ever got for Felix was, he'll say it was his horse, Cinnamon Brambleberry Racer when Felix turned thirteen (Sylvain would have been fifteen). He remembers this vividly and it stood out among the rest because it was the first birthday / event where trans Felix went by his chosen name, and also because like most (perceived?) Sylvain milestones, it was a little traumatic for him. Perhaps for some months ahead of this, Sylvain was having a dagger commissioned for Felix's birthday, an appropriate gift for a coming of age, if a tad suggestive by Faerghan custom, which was not lost on the Gautiers and wasn't an issue until Felix's announcement -- but it wasn't until they were in Fraldarius that Matthias announced that a dagger was an inappropriate gift and ordered Sylvain to gift the horse to his friend. When cornered by his wife, Matthias told her that with so many changes on the horizon in their teenage years that there's no need for either of the boys to be embarrassed by the implication of a more permanent declaration, and if they were truly friends that they would not suffer for the gift of a horse. He expected Sylvain would be confused anyway, which he probably was, but more than anything he was distressed at relinquishing Cinnamon, only five years old and his among a household of things that belonged to his House. Felix knew there was something wrong with the gift, "You love that horse?" But he was also thirteen and too busy to dwell on it, carefree and taunted by his older brother about becoming a man.

If you asked Sylvain what the first gift he got for Felix once they started a relationship was, he'd say it was a new belt, sturdy and well made to hold up as many swords as he'd require (or at least four). The leather is pressed with patterns that meant Protection.

If you asked Felix what the first gift he got for Sylvain was, he'd insist he didn't remember, but he'd know that it was an embroidered shirt of fine make. He knew Sylvain would appreciate if they looked like a couple, and so had a complimentary vest made for himself to wear so he could still wear a plain white or black shirt of his usual fare underneath, not sacrificing his sensory comfort for the sake of stealing the reins from Sylvain on what a night out might look like if he was already giving up a few hours of the training grounds.

If you asked Felix what the first gift he received from Sylvain was, he'd never tell you, but one day he and Sylvain are going through things in Fraldarius and find a blanket patterned with beads and fabric that Sylvain remembers, but not from his time with Felix. Sylvain remembers working on this blanket with his mother when he was only about four years old. It's so long ago that it's like a forgotten dream: her quiet warmth as she confided the importance of making friends -- likely her own insecurities in joining the elite circles of the nobility as Matthias' second wife, wanting to resolve any awkwardness and cement any goodwill between herself and House Fraldarius. Still, Sylvain had boasted of his work on the corners of the gift, noticeably questionable in quality, to Felix's mother, and so Felix had known the thing as being from Sylvain and Sylvain's mother both since childhood, though it hadn't seen the light of day since he was about seven; a few months before of their death pact, and a gift of a different kind.

On a fifth anniversary? These guys?

Each became known for making surprise visits to the estate of the other, in order to deliver the latest taunting in a friendly but relentless game of one-upmanship.

Felix gifts Sylvain a collection of statues and paintings to fill a room of a museum / gallery.

Sylvain gifts Felix a tournament. The chance to challenge champions from beyond their borders and from across the seas, though not in the event itself, but, if he likes, he can fight the victor publicly.

5. Where was their first kiss? What kinds of emotions were tied up in the moment or aftermath?

Apologies if I've told you this before, but I had a sylvix fic I thought I'd never write but now that it's been a few years I might put it at the bottom of my pile again, now that I don't feel like I'd have to compete with everyone else making content for this ship. Anyway:

Their first kiss was in a medical tent during the timeskip, probably just before post-skip when they're en route to Garreg Mach. Sylvain was almost killed in the sense that he avoided a lance to the face, but not in the sense that he was seriously injured. He'd be so dismissive "Again, avoided impalement. Besides, you're way more valuable to—"

And Felix was so angry, with Sylvain's lack of care, with his own lack of strength, with so many others for their parts in putting them in the middle of the war and this battle, and here. Felix is still full of the adrenaline of the fear of loss when he pulls Sylvain into a kiss. It doesn't feel tender but it expresses vulnerability. It doesn't replace a conversation that isn't coming until post-canon, but it offers insight, context and honesty.

When they break apart Felix holds up a finger to "threaten" Sylvain because he knows that if Sylvain has the wrong reaction that he (Felix) is going to run. "Don't. Say. Anything."

Sylvain's terrified. He both has and hasn't been a little bit in love with Felix all his life. He would have been fine if things had gone another way. He loved him as his friend. But the joy and relief of being wanted by someone he loves, of the whispered promise of being able to confide and be bare and be true about Anything with Felix, his best friend. It's threatening to bubble past his lips in questions and exultations, laughter and dismissal, accusations and declarations.

He gestures zipping (sealing?) his mouth closed and throwing away the key.

6. Are they sexually intimate? If so, was their first time planned or spur of the moment? Was it indicative of their future dynamic?

Yes. Their first time was spur of the moment but it wasn't "hot passion," it's only an hour or two after their first kiss and some time making out. It wasn't really indicative of their future dynamic which I think is far more playful; though just as passionate.

It's mostly quiet, until Felix expresses hesitance. "Wait." Stopping Sylvain's heart for a moment. "I don't. I don't want—"

And Sylvain is so, so, so relieved. He keeps his distance while Felix sounds out his boundaries. "You don't even have to tell me what you don't want. Tell me what you do want and I'll do that. I only want to do what you want to do."

And in that way it has some semblance of what would be, because I think helping either of them figure out what actually feels good compared to what they think "should" feel good or what doesn't always feel good, is such an eternal conversation for them.

7. If one partner was preparing another partner a bath, what scents would they choose? Would they get the temperature right? Would they leave them to their own devices or offer to wash them (or just their hair or their back)? Would they also undress or join them in a tub?

If Felix was in a state to choose, Sylvain would offer him something inoffensive and light like vanilla vs something fruity and soothing like Noa fruit and pomegranates. If Felix was incapable of a decision (grief, overstimulation, whatever), then he'd get vanilla. Sylvain would always think he finally got the temperature right but it'd be just a little under as hot as Felix would have set it independently. Sylvain would offer to wash Felix, but I even have Sylvain wash / massage Dimitri in casual (/platonic) nudity as part of Faerghus hot spring behaviour in a fic (Felix is also present). With this in mind, Sylvain would at least dress down to his underclothes, if not entirely. He'd expect that he was going to get wet / stick his feet in the tub as part of his own moving around while bathing Felix.

#long post #fire emblem #fire emblem three houses #sylvix #ask to tag

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jorisjurgen · 7 months

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reasons crepinlore studies are fascinating, with citations

>"I, kerubim crepin, am the only crepin remaining alive to this day! and that is funny. please laugh, yechti. my brother is dead to me." (aux tresors series)

>"MR PRIEST WHEN I GROW UP, I WANT TO BECOME A SUPPER HUPPERMAGE TO RESSURECT MY MOMMY DADDY SISTERS AND BROTHERS! and if nobody likes me and leaves me alone again i will kill myself for real. anyway orphans (me) are the most specialest most important people and i will help them forever. my heart goes out to all the orphans out there. amen." (dofus heroes comic)

>"atcham crepin aren't you tired of this shit. arent you tired of your piece of shit older brother. don't you want a dofus. don't you want to use my dofus for evil haha." (julith movie)

>"DID YOU SSSSEND MY FAMILY HEIRLOOM SSSWORD TO THE FUCKING MOON, KATAR?!?!?!? THE FAMILY HEIRLOOM SSSWORD WHICH HAS BEEN PASSSSSED IN THE CREPIN FAMILY FOR GENERATIOS?!?!?!?" (dofus manga 26)

>the oropo game implies that crepins have been selling shit for generations i can't do this anymore. kerubim started a store because he grew up in a store and then everyone died and he fucking returned home metaphorically and he taught his ORPHAN son how to be a salesman. while being an orphaned old man. is ankama trying to fucking kill me. (one more gate)

>"kerubim i will be real with you, as your god i may be manipulating you into hating your ugly ass brother. like he looks like a fucking rat right? and you understand that if you don't love me everyone will hate you as much as they hate his uggo 10yo mentally ill psychotic ass, right? with that out of the way, omgggg i love you so muchhhh sonny can you give me a hug." (wheel of destiny)

>"ngl you had it better than me becasssse at leasssst ecaflip cared enough to manipulate you. while he jussst kinda thought it was funny when i got beat up or fell down the stairs or whatever. and brother, for the sssin of him liking you enough to ruin your life, i am going to beat you to death forever and ever." (aux tresors)

>atcham meets an orphan and learns intersectionality by gaining the desire to kill the orphan's family for throwing him out for being too hairy (dessous de dofus)

>atcham draws a crayon doodle of himself beheading kerubim (in a costume) with hearts around and shit. he doesn't know it's kerubim because of the costume. he just hates people that much on average. (dessous de dofus)

>atcham chased katar through fields and countries and continents to kill him for sending the crepin family sword to the fucking moon.

>trying to kill kerubim is like a habitual hobby and something he returns to once in a while

>"bur yeah i do underssstand this is kind of deranged and will bring absssolutely no peace to my life. i just kind of want to kill you for the fun of it. i don't know man. i do know you didn't actually hate me and i know you're a decent perssson, at least i know that enough to lisssten to your weird kid you didn't make fun of like you did with me when we were kids. but like. i do wisssh i could beat you to death... or do i??" (julith movie)

>"my brother is a bald mentally ill twisted psychopath. i hope he dies. he definitely doesn't live in my head rent free. he's the ugliest motherfucker ever. he wants to kill me. but if he dies i will cry instantly and scream in despair." (dessous de dofus + julith movie)

>atcham's habitual nightmares of being bullied and belittled as a child by kerubim and ecaflip (dessous de dofus)

>"papycha would NEVER do something bad to you, i know that, he's not that kind of person :(" [Dessous de Dofus and Wheel of Destiny flash behind Atcham's eyes] "even though you're wrong you're actually completely right. he'sss too sstupid to be a real hater." (julith movie)

>ecaflip demigods retain their memories after death?!? (dofus mmo's explicit canon + remington comics and ovas implications)

>"...kerubim can you lend me your fur" is the second funniest crepin-jurgen family injoke about traumatic events after calling joris their dad.

#ro.txt #dofus #krosmoz #crepinposting #wakfu #they're like two birds on a wire. one tries to fly away and the other—#kerubim crepin #atcham crepin #if this post is incomprehensible...#don't worry. i don't understand it either.

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esrah-rah-rasputin · 3 months

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Going through movies from the past that were set in the future, except that future is now our past (2001: A Space Odyssey style)

This is going to be a longish series so I'm going to make this a reblog chain, here's the current list I've made using IMDB. Here's the list lol

2019: after the fall of new york (1983) Defcon 2012 (2010)(edited) 2012 Ice Age (2011) 2012 (2009) tamala 2010: a punk cat in space (2002) 2010: the year we make contact (1984) 2009: lost memories (2002) 2002 (2001) 2001: a space travesty (2000) 2001: a space odyssey (1968) Equalizer 2000 (1987) Fantasia 2000 (1999) Death Race 2000 (1987)(edited) Cherry 2000 (1975) Blues Brothers 2000 (1998) Summer vacation 1998 (1988) Class of 1999 (1990) 1984 (1956) Class of 1984 (1982)

I've already watched Death Race 2000, and Defcon: 2012, so I'll put those first. I'd be lying if I said these were in any particular order

Death Race 2000

rating: 4/10

If you're going to watch this and enjoy it you need to know that it's a political satire from the start, and bizarrely funny. Unfortunately, it doesn't really make its point clear until the last five minutes, which is "America is gratuitously violent and there's no fucking reason for that" and "if anyone disagrees with that, hit them with a car"

The actual premise is "What if in the year 2000, America turned into a gratuitously violent, near-global state that celebrated each year with a cross-country race where racers try to hit as many people as possible. And also, what if there was a group who didn't like that and tried to stop it by matching a rebel leader's granddaughter in shotgun with the only two time winner of the cross-country race?"

Interesting notes:

there is a nazi flag in the first five minutes, and a character duo who have nazism as their motif. Because it's a political satire and it's a mile marker to show the level of issues involved. However they do end up driving off a cliff and there's an extended explosion scene

disappointingly, the guy who's supposedly gotten in multiple car crashes and has several prosthetics has no physical evidence of that

surprisingly, he DOES look like he designed his own (fake) leather dom outfit, cape included, with only vague descriptions of what one looks like

there's the funniest fight scene ever about an hour into the movie between this guy and another guy (played by Sylvester Stallone) dressed like a 30s gangster, while sax plays

Defcon: 2012

rating: 2/10 generally, 7/10 if you're genuine about enjoying it

I'm 100% sure this was someone's film school project, and if you like the idea of a 2010 emo dystopia movie filmed almost entirely in an abandoned mall, with three out of *maybe* eight characters voiced by TTS, you'll like this.

The actual premise is "local tormented teen and co. go to a supposedly abandoned Earth to go scavenger hunting, but discover an underground human community, and the real way Earth was taken over (it involves imperialism)"

Interesting notes:

Pretty much every single scene without talking is overlaid with EDM and 2010 metal. The soundtrack's pretty good actually

One of the characters wears a CGI'd helmet, and I'm honestly impressed by the amount of effort put into editing it

I'm 90% sure the person who made this watched Battlestar Galactica from the filters over every scene

It's written like the person who made it has just learned they can say the fuck word and not get in trouble

I'm also pretty sure one of the cast members is the mom of another one of the cast members. Good for her

Shoutout to a couple throwaway lines about how colonization is bad and how in the story, the 2012 Mayan calendar thing actually has nothing to do with it (even though it seems like it initially). Surprisingly anticapitalist implications overall, I wish this was focused on more

Only problem I have with the movie is that I think it wrapped up too quickly, which seemed beyond the control of the people who were making it so I can't fault them for that really

#Esrah talks #Esrah watches movies #<- tag I'll use I guess as I go through this idk #death race 2000 #defcon: 2012

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