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tarjapearce · 10 months

Text

As My Own

Miguel O'Hara x Daughter'sRoomate!femreader .

Don't think I have forgotten about the requests 👀.

WARNING: Fluff. A tiny squeeze of angst, Rotting tooth fluff, daily snippets of life, anxious dad.

Summary: Gabi wants a mom. And who is Miguel to deny such wish?

Requested Here. Hope you like ❤️ Feedback is highly appreciated.

Sighing for the third time in a row, Miguel looked fondly at the pictures of his daughter through the years, until she grew out to be a lovely young lady, whose talents in soccer had earned her a scholarship in college.

Despite being terrified of the idea of Gabriela spreading her wings and soar into life itself, he knew the moment would come sooner or later, more like, right now. He was unpacking some boxes into the apartment Gabi would be staying, and if he was honest, the idea of her sharing a room with someone else didn't appeal that much on his trust issues.

If it wasn't for the house renovations needed to be done ASAP, he'd make sure to get Gabi a place for her own.

------

Emancipation had taken a toll on him and his mind, The once girly and colorful room filled with drawings, trophies and medals with a soccer player motifs, soccer star posters, some consoles and games, was now an empty space full of memories.

When Gabi gave him the news of her moving out completely, made his heart to shrink and break, but he knew that he had to let her go. Gabriela was 19 at the time, doing good at college, had found herself a half time job and a new roommate. The last one seemed the most preoccupying thing on the list. Was it a man? Did she eat well? Did she get along with them? Probably had gotten her a couple of fights, were they older? Was his Solecito safe?

It had been three years since she left home and pursue her superior studies and a professional soccer player career.

His mind was racing with the infinite questions and his stress gnawed at his chest, his phone buzzing interrupted his accelerating thoughts. He opened the message log and sighed in relief to see Gabriela's name on the screen.

He tapped at the message and his heart nearly melted at seeing Gabi with a goofy expression on her face, her hands making a V sign as she hovered over a small table set for two.

"Dinner time with Roomie~"

The caption read. The food looked delicious and esthetically pleasing at the eye. Nearly Michelin star awarded restaurant quality.

(Name) 's food is amazing! . Btw Im free next week, so come over, I miss you Papa.

Gabi had texted him some couple of hours later. (Name) ; at least he now knew that Gabi shared space with a woman. He didn't trust college guys at all. At least, he could sleep a bit better now. However, something had caught his attention, despite Gabi's competitive traits, she rarely loosened herself around others. And the picture only proved him right.

Gabi was unabashedly goofy and silly on the picture, with a genuine smile on her face. Whoever you were, he was grateful for making his most precious treasure comfortable and safe.

-----

The first time you met Gabi was quite the experience, you had just returned from work to find a lot of boxes loitering the entrance and part of the living room. Books, some baskets with soccer balls and equipment, Somw clothes and more books.

The burning smell immediately alerted you as smoke begun filling in the room. Rushing you opened the window and started to dissipate the smoke away with a towel.

"Oh my god! I'm so sorry!" The young and tall woman panicked as she came out of the bathroom, body wrapped in a towel, just like her hair. Skin still sudsy with soap.

The chaos was tamed, leaving one of your favorite collectible pots, charred and useless.

"I'm really really sorry! I'll get you a new one."

"Don't you worry. Just... be careful. Don't leave the stove on when you are away. You could've burn the place down"

Gabi nodded sheepishly and looked down, when she noticed your chef uniform, the logo of a prestigious place she could only dream to afford in a couple of months and a place where he wanted to take her Papa as a surprise, standing out in your chest.

"Im (Name), the other tenant. Nice to meet you." Your voice was firm, yet kind. The kind of kindness that could insult anyone and still sound charming.

"Gabriela O'Hara. Sorry for your pot. I'll get you a new one"

"Ah stop it. It was just a family relic passed on generation to generation that now will end up in the trash."

You couldn't help but laugh at her panicking and guilty reaction.

"I'm just messing with you, sweetie. I got Ceci on a promo back at the supermarket. Don't worry. It's just a pot. We throw at least one daily at the restaurant. What were you trying to make anyways?"

Gabi didn't know if to be shocked or be laughing at your attitude. She settled for confused.

"Cause it smelled like cheap Mac and Cheese"

Her cheeks flushed and you just chuckled knowingly.

"Freshman?" Gabi nodded and you smiled almost endearingly at her.

"Such a cutie! I remember my first semester at college. Such a mess, terrible food and a terrible roommate"

"You're graduated?"

"A long time ago, yeah, Culinary school is something else. Don't get in there if you like having perfect skin."You chuckled and rolled up your sleeve, showing a few shares of scars and burn marks.

"Anyways, let's have a couple of rules okay? If you follow them, who knows? it can take us places." You grinned.

"No boys after 10 pm on weekends, and if you do, keep it low. Thin walls. Same applies to me, but don't worry about it. Im way too tired to actually do something about bringing my libido back."

Jeesh

Gabi's cheek flushed as her stomach fluttered anxiously.

"You can use my tools for cooking with the only condition to leave them clean and back at their place. Got it?"

She nodded at every reasonable rule you gave her. You had warned her that sometimes you'd be out of town due work, and that left her on charge of the place. It was brought to her attention that despite the place being small, it was conditioned enough to make it almost fancy looking. The kitchen specially.

Of course things just grew from there. At first Gabi was shocked to find you were a couple of years younger than her Papa. And that you had been single for quite a time now. Couple of years to be exact.

But that mattered little as her growing fondness for you was borderline adorable. You had helped her through some really bad times, like getting her a part time job at your workplace after being fired from the college coffee shop, something she never had the guts to tell Miguel.

Then you of course helping her out in her cooking skills, to at least stop eating plain ramen and packaged food bags.

"You're an athlete, you must feed like one."

"But I can't... afford it-"

"Uh uh. Shh." You shook your head and taught her to buy the right sort of meals even under a tight budget. Sometimes she would even find meals prepped for her whenever she had run short on money.

You were there when she got her first college date, and also were there when the young man turned out to be a fuckboy and a prick. Wiping her tears and feeding her a freshly made creme brule. A favorite of hers. You had also Dropped her and picked her up in her soccer practices whenever time allowed you so. She seeked guidance in you

She was there for you when depression was making it's way into your head, she was also there when she helped you to recover from a hang over after another failed date, and nursed you through your terrible period cramps. Even though sometimes harmony seemed disrupted by external causes, such as stress, work and feeling particularly wistful and blue, you'd always find comfort in eachother.

You were amazed by the fact that you realized that she was like the little girl you always dreamed to have.

"How come you don't have children?" Gabi had asked carefully. Despite the trust you hsd built over the years, there was some things you still couldn't bring yourself to discuss so openly, until now.

"I..."

"Sorry if I'm overstepping"

"Nah. I think it's time I actually come clean about some stuffs."

"Are you sure?" You nodded and sighed

"I can't have them"

Surprise drawed into Gabi's eyes as she stared at you.

"Infertility?"

"Yup. But... It's fine. I've come to terms with it, so..."

You trailed and she swallowed as her hand was placed above yours.

"For all it's worth? I'm sure you could have been an amazing mother."

Could have been

" To me, you... you are."

Gabi mumbled as tears swelled up in her eyes, threatening to fall. You stared at her, heart leaping in your chest

"Like... You are like the mother I never had... My Papa is amazing, but sometimes I actually yearn for a different kind of love." She hiccuped and you frowned, holding her closer.

"Like a mom. I want... I want to go shopping and talking about boys and how stupid they are. I want... to be cheered on by someone else at my games and not only my Papa."

Your heart felt breaking bit by bit as Gabi broke before you

"Don't get me wrong, I love Papa to death but... It's hard, y'know?"

"Ah, cariño." An endearment term you had learn from her, "You are such an amazing kid. Im sure that whoever comes into your life to take that spot needs to be amazing, because you're such a special young woman. Look at you, bright future ahead, smart, so so pretty and brave"

But Gabriela didn't want a stranger as her mother figure. She wanted you.

Gabi hid her face on your chest as you held her close, consoling her as much as you could. She remained there until she looked up at you with a suspicious glare

"Maybe I can introduce you to my dad" Your cheeks flushed bright red and she gasped, a bright bulb of an idea popping in her mind, sadness remnants vanishing from her body almost instantly

"No, Gabi, cariño-"

"You can meet him this weekend!"

"That's too soon, I am not prepared! Plus I have work remember?"

"He's staying all weekend, don't worry."

You had seen her adoring Papa through pictures she had showed you. The man was attractive, and looked certainly way too out of your league but of course you never told Gabi about it. You just shrugged it off with a 'Oh, cute'. But now that her plan was on set, you couldn't say no to her.

"Besides, I think it's time for you to actually meet guys. And this time no excuses like Im busy or stuff like that."

"Okay, okay. But if things don't work out-"

"I know, I'll drop it." Gabi rolled her eyes.

-----

Even though the recipe for a certain disaster was cooking, you tried to be optimistic about it. A bit of positive thinking wouldn't hurt you from time to time. However, your shift turned out a bit trickier than usual, since the restaurant had been reserved for a main event for important people.

In the little chance you had, you sent Gabi a little video of how crowded it was, and apologizing cause you didn't know if you were making a double shift and wouldn't be able to meet Papa.

Gabi just sent you a picture of the both with a "Miss you! Dad just came"

------

3 am. 3 am and you were finally done, no more stuck up clients pretending to love raw fish and meats, people that were just actually there for the food pictures and to be able to brag about they were there. Your feet ached, and so was your headache. The good thing was that the company allowed you to take some food home.

Keys tinkered as you grabbed them to finally turn them in the keyhole and entering home and closed the door, angry and heavy steps alerted you as the hulking figure of a man stood in the dark, as the dim lit red iris flashed at you. You had to crane your head up to meet his deep eyes.

Now you wondered where Gabi had came out so tall.

"H-Hello..." You gulped and he sighed, hard expression melting slowly.

"Sorry for... the late hour."

"No, no. Discúlpeme I mean, forgive me. Though someone had broke in, until I heard the keys a bit too late. I'm Miguel. O'Hara." He offered you his large hand that easily engulfed yours.

"Oh, so you're... Papa" you shook it gently. He was warm, and chuckled. "Im (Name). Gabi never stops talking about you." You gave him an amiable smile and put your containers on the dining table.

"Nice to meet you" you began unpacking, aligning the recipients carefully on the table.

"How's... Gabriela doing?" His deep voice snapped your focus for a moment and your eyes darted to his form. Sweatpants in grey, a white fitting shirt that snugged his form a bit too nicely for a short stare. Hair slicked back, pouty lips, thick brows and his deep... red eyes? He certainly was even more handsome in the flesh than in the pictures.

"Oh, she's amazing. Her practice in soccer has improved even more. She has a final next week."

His brow arched at how much information you knew about her.

"I apologize, she fell asleep in your room, despite me telling her that the couch would be-"

"Ah don't worry about it. My bed is big enough for two, and she isn't a kicker in her sleep. So make sure to rest properly. Oh! And welcome for the weekend. Would you like something to eat?"

Miguel shook his head and softly smiled at you. You were pretty. So so pretty that his mind was almost in shortcut when you were removing your chef robe, in the kitchen exposing a bit more of skin. Your left arm was adorned with little burn marks and cuts, you poured yourself a glass of wine when you felt his eyes on you.

"Want some?" You offered the wine and he nodded, a bit reluctant at first.

"Has Gabi acted out of place while I'm gone?" You giggled as you poured him some wine.

"If by out of place means sleeping one hour later than she is used to, yeah. She has." Your hands gave him the cup and he leaned on the table. Gabi groggily came out your room, lured away by the delicious smell of food.

"Hey" She mumbled and hugged Miguel and then hugged you, and remained with her arms around your waist. You kissed her forehead and she smiled.

Miguel entered in spectator mode.

"Hey, cupcake. Want some food?"

"Can I have it tomorrow?"

"Got you a Creme Brule." She grunted happily.

Gabi smiled and went through the bags, popping a chocolate coated strawberry on her mouth.

"Still, I'm too tired to actually eat. Got Papa and I some takeout."

"Takeout?! The good sort of thing I hope" Gabriela groaned as she made her way back to your room.

"Don't steal the fluffy sheets!"

"Yes, mom. Take a bath first, you smell like garlic." she mumbled and went to bed.

Your whole face was as red as a strawberry not because your smell, but for how she had called you, you gulped down the wine and sighed. Miguel stared at you and his chest couldn't help but constrict a little more.

" I apologize for that, Gabriela is..."

"Quite receptive to smells? Yeah."

"And she called you mom." He was more surprised about it than anything else.

"Ah hehe. Yeah, she had been calling me accidentally that a bit more often."

"Does it makes you feel uncomfortable?" He sipped his wine

"Not really. I find it cute. She eh... talked to me about growing up and how things had been for her."

"I must thank you. You have fed her, taken care of her and now even protect her."

"She's a great kid." You nodded proudly. "Couldn't find a better roomie, and a friend. You did a good job raising her, Papa."

Miguel cleared his throat and gave you a small smile.

"I hope she hasn't-"

"Relax, she's been nothing but a good kid all these years. You gotta trust her a bit more."

"It's the people around her that I don't trust"

"Ouch..."

"I mean, not that I dont... just... carajo." you giggled at his cursing as his brows knitted together

"I mean, my daughter trusts you enough to sleep in your bed, call you mom even, so... would be kinda dumb to say that you're a bad person... And I'm not making any sense right?"

You gave him a bashful smile and it was your turn to clear your throat.

"She's been busy at playing cupid. She thinks she is subtle..." You bit your lip and poured yourself a bit more of wine as Miguel rubbed his face, tiredly.

"What about, today at 7 pm?"

"At 7pm what?" He coked an eyebrow to you and Gabriela poked her head out of your room, sighing with exasperation.

"Por Dios pa, Te está invitando a salir!" (My god, Papa, she's asking you out.)

You just laughed and put the food in the fridge

"If you're up for it, that is. It's fine if you don't-"

"Make it at 8. Traffic has lowered by that hour."

"Alright." You smiled and took your chef coat with you.

"Sleep well, Papa."

He downed the remnants of his wine and smiled to himself. He had a date.

------—----

And a second, and a third and a fourth and a fifth. You were such an enjoyable being to hang around. You shared little silly texts, learnt a bit more spanish thanks to him to slowly bring down your language barrier. Even though you understood some words here and there, you wanted to understand so you could also feel part of the secret and long conversations the two O'Haras shared when it came to you.

Miguel was the first in making a move and kissed you around the fourth date. Nervous as you were, you finally felt good enough to just allow yourself to indulge in his company and what he had to offer. Great company, laughs, delicious make out sessions you didn't thought possible at your age.

Gabi had found you both eating each other's mouth in the livingroom

"Get a room!" She'd yell as she locked herself, headphones up her ears, but a beam in her face. Her chest swelled in joy knowing her cupid stunt had paid off.

--------

"You sure about that?"

"Yeah, pa. Like... She's the best. She's so sweet and... makes me happy cause you are happy."

"You'd be the only child, you're aware of that right?"

Gabi nodded upon remembering your words and your condition.

"Having a little sibling at this point would be awkward anyways."

"That doesn't mean I can't try-"

"Oh my god stop..." Gabi shook her head and Miguel smirked

"Payback for not telling me you were fired." She grunted as Miguel held her tightly.

"I think it's time to try something new."

"You'll ask her to marry you?!" Gabi gasped excited with a beam on her face

"Relax, Solecito. We're still knowing each other. And we wanna make sure that things work out before thinking in something so important as that."

"If you let her go, I promise that I won't talk to you again."

"Ouch."

--------

Bit by bit you had small milestones in your relationship with Miguel, you visiting his home back at New York, you staying a weekend in said home, you being introduced to his friends, sharing carneada with his friends, and of course, being found by Gabriela about to have sex, none of you mentioned it during dinner.

To make things even more convenient and better, your restaurant had opened a second branch in New York. Gabi was about to graduate college and of course, you both were saddened that soon you'll part ways. The both were too enraptured enjoying your mother-daughter relationship you had created that forgot about the future.

It didn't help to her sadness when you told her about you and other crew members of your work were selected for a three months workshop in France.

Despite your own sadness, both O'Haras cheered you to go.

"Three months is gonna be torture without you, but time goes so fast. You'll be back sooner than we expect it." Gabi had spoken. And of course, after her graduation, and a kiss goodbye, you flew to France.

Communication wasn't an issue since you talked every day. And still, the gnawing feeling of not being with them made you wish time to fly. You spoke every night with Miguel, telling him how much you have missed him. Even though work had kept you both busy enough, you'd always find a way to talk or text.

And when you came back? It felt like floating in a dream.

"Mom!" Gabriela rushed to you and crushed you in her arms, sniffling and holding you tightly.

"I missed you soo much, cariño." You kissed her forehead, Miguel joined a bit later with a rose bouquet on hand. He pulled you in for a deep kiss.

"Missed you, preciosa".

What sealed the deal for him was seeing you sharing a moment with Gabi. You were brushing her hair as you caught up eith the things you learned in France and how excited you were for them both to taste them.

He asked you to move in with them. And god he loved the feeling of you being around. Gabi was happy, he was happy and you were as well.

Everything about you had captured his heart. Your personality, your way to carry on things, the subtle ways you guided Gabriela without imposing in her autonomy, How much love you seemed to have for them, the delicious feeling of your skin against his on bed.

He proposed a year after. He wouldn't let you go, no no. You were too perfect for him, and a perfect Mom for Gabriela.

#miguel o'hara #miguel o'hara x you #t writes✨#miguel o'hara x reader #atsv miguel #dad miguel o'hara #gabi o'hara #Fluff #miguel fluff #miguel o'hara fluff #fem reader #atsv fluff #astv fanfic

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cipheress-to-k-pop · 2 months

Note

Hello, Happy Holy Ramadan. I know your request box is closed, but when your request box is opened, can you make this request? if it doesn't bother you, could you do Long Ramadan headcanons for Damian Wayne and the reader? I saw your Damian wayne x muslim reader post before. And I thought it was appropriate to ask you this. If this request bothers you, feel free to ignore it. Have a nice day 🩷🩷🩷🤚

Ramadan HCs

Muslim!Damian Wayne x Muslim!Reader

hey there sweetheart and Ramadan Mubarak <3! firstly i'm so sorry that it took me so long to respond to the ask! im ashamed it took me a year honestly. requests are closed but i still wanted to be able to write for this because we obviously need more muslim representation and also the last time i posted the muslim hc for damian there were just so many of the readers who texted me or sent asks or commented saying that they really appreciated the representation

anyways i wasn't sure if i was going to respond or not because it has been a year but since it is currently Ramadan and it's going to end very soon I figured why not

Thank you for being so respectful in your ask, I really appreciate it and I hope you like it. Hope you have a very blessed Ramadan and wishing everyone a lot of health and happiness during this time. Even to my non-muslim readers, I hope you all are doing well and you're all healthy <3333

also i know that there is a very slim chance of this happening because all of you are amazing but i will not tolerate any hate of any kind. if you

your first Ramadan after being married to Damian was certainly a new experience

before being married, you were just used to your parents handling everything for you

by the time you wake up for suhoor, the table would be set

by the time you'd be home from university, your mother would be waiting by the door with a date and a glass of water

so now that you were married and you had to handle everything on your own, it took a little bit of getting used to

luckily for you, Damian is a very hands on type of man

he's the kind of person who'd just drink a cup of water or a glass of milk, maybe a couple of dates or a fruit and he'd be ok for the remainder of the day

but god forbid you even think of doing the same thing

he'd just about have a heart attack

absolutely not

initially, he'd request Alfred to make meals for you so he could bring them home for the both of you to have suhoor together

just until the both of you got the hang of it

after that damian would either help you cook before patrol so there would be food ready for the both of you

or he'd swing by some restaurant that was open and grab some takeout for the both of you

he'd heat up the food and set the table and making sure everything was absolutely ready before finally waking you up

practically carrying your sleepyass to the table and handfeeding you so he can make sure you're eating properly

since he handles suhoor, you handle iftar and keep the table set so you can eat together

you could always just stay at the manor so you wouldn't have to worry about the meals, like bruce or dick have suggested so many times

but you prefer living alone with your husband

no offense to them at all

but it's just easier for you to maintain your modesty at your own home

anyways

your marriage gets really tested during Ramadan

the two of you are barely getting any sleep and it's difficult for you both to get used to

the only time that you both spend together and are completely present is when he should be patrolling

the lack of sleep makes you both kind of cranky

and it's difficult to not snap at each other

eventually you both get pretty tired and exhausted and just slip into routine

but of course it's nothing some sleep and some time spent together can't solve

and since you've been trying to reduce watching movies and listening to music during the holy month, you end up playing board games together or going for long drives together where you just talk and talk and talk

you thought you were extremely secure in your marriage

that was until you saw damian pout and give you the silent treatment after losing a game of gin rummy

then claiming you shouldn't be playing a game called 'jinn' in the first place

not swearing or talking shit during ramadan was especially hard for him

especially with tim and steph yelling 'fi ramadan?' at him everytime he makes even the slightest snide comment

you find it hilarious but i digress

whenever you go to the masjid for nightly prayers, damian and you will go and find a new ice cream place to try out late at night

you mention in passing how the women's side of the mosque is so bland compared to the men's and damian immediately looks into getting the mosque refurbished so that you and other women can enjoy it

damian's shoes get stolen once and the great detective actually couldn't find out who it was

you hear him complain about it constantly

CONSTANTLY

this time is when you both really lean into the adorable muslim couple aesthetic

matching prayer mats with each of your names embroidered on it

matching tasbih

and other things you get the picture

you both go all out for ramadan and decorate your home from top to bottom

since you both don't really celebrate many of the western holidays, he really wants to make this a memorable time for the both of you

and so do you

you hold an iftar party at your place many times with all your friends and family

it started out with you just inviting everyone but eventually it became a weekly potluck, which you really appreciated

bro damian is more excited about Eid than you are

he literally has to keep reminding you to get your dress ready for Eid al fitr

because he wants to get a jubbah in a matching color and surprise you

you know how you have those cute texts of girlies asking their bfs for their opinions on their nails?

the exact same thing

except with HENNA

you send him like 100 different pictures a week, planning which design you want to wear for Eid

he responds to all of them with utmost seriousness

obviously, he's an artist

he knows whats the difference between arabic and indian designs for henna

but secretly he's wondering why you're sending him so many when you only have 2 hands

but um hello he's never going to tell you that

because it's ramadan and obv ramadan related stuff is going to be appearing on everyones fyp he has to deal with both you and dick sending him videos of the scholars being funny (iykyk)

hey guys let's start ramadan w a bang

also has to deal with jason asking him CONSTANTLY how he's still able to walk around when all the demons are supposed to be locked up for the month

plus he has to now deal with you watching mukbangs and restaurant reviews and crying to him about how you're starving

why on earth did silent asmr mukbangs of wingstop get so popular only during ramadan?

believe me every single prayer damian makes during this month, he is thanking god for bringing you to him and praying for your health and your happiness

when you found out, you cried in his arms for a good solid 5 minutes

he also secretly kind of prayed for kids on laylat ul qadr but you didn't hear it from me

not only is this month really special for the both of you, you take it as an opportunity to give back

damian has wayne enterprises run soup kitchens for the entire month and they serve all people meals as well as suhoor and iftar

you both volunteer there personally

you donate money of course and damian will tell you that everytime he does it, he feels fulfilled in a way he never has before

you honestly feel so proud of the man you feel blessed to call your husband

also, like the perfect husband he is, he sends gifts and food to your parents

who quickly begin to regard him as better than your own siblings

much to his secret pleasure

uk i wish i could keep going

honestly ramadan is such a magical and rewarding time of the year

and you are so happy to spend it along with damian

P.S.

while damian completely understood the point of sacrificing a goat for Eid al adha

he still cried about it to you the night before out of guilt

you definitely donated the meat that came out of that

Forever Taglist:

@simonsbluee

@notslaybabes

@superheroesaremyjam113263

@writers-whirlwind

DC Taglist:

@emmacata

@p--e--a--c--h--e--s

@sometimeseverythingsucks

@sokkas-honour

@unstable1902

@lostgirlheart

@missdisapear

@tadpole-san

@isawachickeninatree

@uxavity

@battlenix

@capricorn-stark

@evermoore580

@dumbbitchgalore

@fuckingjinkies

@some-lovely-day

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piratefishmama · 9 months

Text

Fake it till you make it | Part 11

“Be careful, Eddie” were Wayne’s words as he hugged his nephew goodbye, knowing he wouldn’t see him for a whole week and honestly still being a little worried about it “if you think even for one minute that something’s off, just… just get out of there, alright?”

“I know, I know, I’ll bolt through the woods and hitchhike my way home, I know the way, Wayne, I got this.” He could read a compass, he’d be able to get a map from any gas station and head home, he was resourceful, an adult, he could handle himself.

“Damn right you got this, son. But… be careful in other ways too, alright? Steve’s a charmin boy, but… remember this ain’t real.” Eddie had bitten his bottom lip at that one, brows furrowed in thought, those big brown eyes of his swirling in emotion, he never did hide his feelings well, it’d always be a little real for him. “Protect this” Wayne poked his chest with a gentle prod, right over Eddie’s heart “okay?”

“Mhm, I will…” he’d try to anyway. Steve really was… charming. An his kisses? God his kisses… but also... it really was the closest he’d ever been to what romance ought to be, what a relationship ought to be, he never thought he’d have that.

The world didn’t appear to be moving fast enough for him to truly experience romance as most people did.

He had to remember that he didn’t have that.

“Eddie! C’mon you’re in the back with me!” Steve called from the garage door, behind which the car was rumbling, their bags packed into the back, Steve’s parents already inside, ready to go. The longest Eddie had ever been away from Wayne since arriving in Hawkins, was three days during a weekend trip to Indy with the band to play at a slightly bigger venue than the Hideout as a one off.

A favour for his favourite gay bar when a live act they’d scheduled pulled out last minute. It hadn’t gotten them a lot of exposure, but it’d been a fun and enlightening night for the band.

“Best get on, son, I’ll see you in a week. Call when you can alright? Don’t care if you wake me up or about no damn time zones, just call, I’ll answer, an if I don’t, you know the plant’s number.” Tight lipped, strained smile, Eddie nodded quickly then turned on his heel and graced Steve with a brilliant smile, game on.

“I don’t wish to alarm anyone, but... did we miss a turning?” Eddie may have been unusually quiet for the first leg of their journey, nerves having hit him like a truck the second they pulled out of Loch Nora, but he was paying attention to his surroundings.

And those surroundings, were all too quickly, Fort Wayne International Airport.

“You don’t honestly expect rich people to drive the whole way to Canada do you?” Steve’s voice was amused and came from so very close to his ear that he actually jumped, quickly turning in his seat, back plastered against his side of the back seat, eyes wide as he took in and processed what Steve said. “Plus, what would you rather do, spend nearly two days in a car with my parents—”

“We’d make wonderful road trip companions, don’t be rude Steven” came his mother’s interruption

Steve ignored it in favour of continuing his point “—orr… around ten hours in one of those with a brief stop off in Chicago.” Steve leaned inward, uncaring of personal space as he pointed to a plane, ascending into the heavens from the runway.

“I don’t—” he didn’t know. He’d never been on a plane before. Trips like that, across country, they were the stuff of road trip legend, but Steve had a point…

Two whole days of a trip stuck in a car. Or just ten hours. Eddie’s eyes skipped to the window again, to the plane now disappearing beyond the overcast cloud cover.

“It’ll be okay, Eds, I’ll sit right next to you the whole time, you’ll be okay.”

“What if we crash? What if it falls out of the sky? What’ll you do?”

“My best to keep you safe.” It was so earnest, coupled with Steve gently taking his hands and giving them a squeeze, eyes so full of raw honesty, of understanding, it hit Eddie directly in all his soft gooey bits. “I’ll hold your hand through the whole ten hours if you want.”

“Even during the stop in Chicago?”

“Hah, yeah baby, even during the stop in Chicago.”

“They’re a lot more openminded in Chicago too!” Lynda spoke up without turning her head, allowing Eddie to not get stuck on baby for too long “might get a few looks from people passing through the airport but nobody will say anything, and if they do, they deal with us.”

“If we had enough time during the stop we’d have taken a trip around the city, let you boys see some of the sights we’ve seen, but alas, our connection gives us an hour at most depending on everything being on time, and that’s just enough time to get us from one gate to the next.” John added as he pulled into the long stay parking lot. “Maybe some other time, some other family trip, eh Eddie?”

Eddie’s wide eyes turned to the front of the car, then back to Steve again, lips parted ever so slightly in surprise. Not surprise over the words used, but the feeling those words caused. Family trip. They were including him on future family trips.

Steve’s eyes quickly snapped from him to the front of the car and back again, then a warm smile blossomed on his lips. He lifted his hand and ever so carefully brushed a stray curl back behind Eddie’s ear, and asked so softly as his thumb lowered to brush along his jawline. “Right, Eddie?”

“Y-yeah… yeah I’d… I’d love that.” He turned his head fully toward the drivers seat, he’d never been too good at hiding his emotions, so maybe he was just a little choked up when he accepted the offer “I’d really love that.”

“Great!” The car came to a stop in one of the many parking bays, ignition off, driver side door opened “It’s settled then.” Settled. Eddie would privately mourn the knowledge that it’d never come to fruition, but… on the surface he could pretend he was excited for a future trip for the sake of the ruse. “Now boys if you could get the bigger bags out the trunk that’d be a big help! This back of mine isn’t as sturdy as it used to be.”

“You’re forty-six and go jogging almost every morning, don’t be stupid John.” Lynda whapped her husband with her handbag in gentle, semi-amused admonishment before getting out of the car.

Followed by her husband who, in a hushed tone replied with “don’t tell them that, Lynda, save us the work.” Leaving the two boys to breathe soft laughs between themselves before they too joined the older couple out in the parking lot.

“Steve...” Eddie hissed as they neared check-in.

“What?”

“I have weed” said through his teeth.

“What?” Steve paused.

“I have weed… I have weed in my suitcase.”

“You have what?!” Steve rounded on him, sentence ended with a pointed hiss

“I didn’t know we’d be flying to Canada, Steve, maybe you should tell people when you’re planning on launching them into the troposphere in a death tube!”

“Why would you bring weed on a holiday with my parents, Eddie?!”

“SHHHH, be quiet. I thought I might need it to chill out if I was freaking out at some point during the week like right now, I could really do with it right now.”

“Oh my god.”

“Steven? Is something wrong?” Lynda’s voice had them both snapping to attention, eyes wide, caught in the act. Luckily she had no idea what that ‘act’ was.

“Nope! No, uh, Eddie’s just gotta… use the bathroom real quick.”

“Well, there’s bathrooms in the business class lounge he can—"

“No! It’s uhm, it’s urgent, can’t wait, he’s uh…”

“Nerves, it’s uh, it’s nerves, I think imma hurl” she looked between them with a small frown on her face, assessing them both, it seemed like whatever she found wasn’t worth arguing about though, because she waved them off with a quick flick of her wrist.

“Alright fine, hurry up. Steven you know where the closest ones are go on now quickly before we’re late for check in, we’ll double check everything here.” John was already pausing to check through all their documents like a regular airport dad, it was the third time he’d done it since entering the airport.

“Alright let’s go, Eds, lets deal with your little problem.” At least he was soft-handed when he manhandled Eddie to the nearest bathroom, patchy suitcase with a squeaky wheel wobbling away behind them. Once inside, he checked each stall individually, before quickly turning on a wide eyed Eddie. “Where is it?” Eddie pointed down at the suitcase, and Steve snapped to action, lifting, and placing Eddie’s suitcase down on the slightly damp row of sinks. “Did you pack any liquid soaps?”

“Uhhh…” Eddie was too busy staring at the flex of Steve’s arms as he just. Lifted that whole very packed suitcase in one hoist. Fuck.

“Any shampoo? Conditioner?”

“I—I feel like my answer is going to make you mad so I’m just not going to answer.” Which on its own, was a pretty damning answer, and Steve’s expression told him as such “I don’t have a twelve step hair care routine like you do, Steve! I just… I have drug store shampoo and conditioner and that’s really only when it’s on a two for one sale! Usually I just—"

“If you say you water it down to make it last longer I’m going to throw the first thing I find in this suitcase at you.”

“Shutting up. I just thought I’d buy it there if I needed it, or just borrow yours, I know you brought some, right?”

“Yes.”

“Well then, I figured that… if I borrowed yours it’d make it seem like I just… wanted… to smell like you?”

“You just made that up.” Eddie just smiled, all teeth and dimples, scrunching his shoulders inwards in an unfairly cute display of mischief. “You’re a menace, Munson. Get your stuff out of there for me. Don’t ever put weed in checked luggage.”

“But—”

“TSA does random checks on checked luggage all the time, an while they’re not usually looking for weed, it’ll get launched and you might get fined. Whereas you can hide weed in just about anything in a carry on, just shows up as vague blurred shit on the x-ray scanners. Just be cool when you shove it through.” Steve was rummaging in the front of his own bag now, “be cool, and act natural.”

“You sound like you’ve done this before.”

“Mn once or twice, Tommy was a dick, but his cousin worked for the TSA for a few years, gave us all kinds’a neat tricks to get things through the airport.” Tommy’s cousin had gotten fired and a year inside for attempting to smuggle narcotics out of the confiscated items lock up, but that was neither here nor there. “Gimmie what you have.” Hand outstretched, Steve waited until Eddie placed the single baggie containing three roll ups and a few loose buds “Christ Eddie.”

“I knew I’d be nervous! Stop being mean to me!” Steve rolled his eyes before taking the three roll ups out of the baggie

“Your smokes, give em.” Plenty of room in the pack to slot the three roll ups, and as for the buds, Steve emptied out his travel sized bottle of hand lotion into the sink and stuffed the whole plastic bag into the little bottle, then screwed the lid on tight. Nobody would look twice at a rich kids hand lotion. “Now wet the ends of your hair.”

“What?”

“Your hair butthead! Wet it, we told my mother you’d be in here hurling your guts up, so… you got some in your hair, it’s a good extra to add to the ruse, now do it.”

“So my own boyfriend wouldn’t even hold my hair back if I threw up? Where’s the romance, where’s the commitment, where’s the care and—”

“Dude you have a lot of hair, I doubt I could get it all in my hand at once.” Although now that thought was in his head… could he? Could he get a good fistful and hold it there? Not important. “I’d drop bits.” A flimsy argument, he wouldn’t drop anything.

“Uh-huh, sure you would, big boy.” Eddie quickly dampened the tips of his hair, and ran a wet hand through his bangs quickly in a bid to fake flop sweat, theatrics over and done with. “Zipper-up, let’s get this show on the road, shall we?”

Part 13

#PirateWrites #FakeItTillYouMakeItFiclet #Steddie #No Upside Down AU #Fake Dating AU #lmao this was getting long so i'm splitting it up

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zoesmp4 · 27 days

Note

hiiii i’ll throw my other hat in the ring and give you a thg req!!

angst to comfort fic because why not

but like reader is from district 7 and won the 73rd games, and much like lucy gray, used their wits and charm to win the games. and GOD FORBID SNOWS PAST COMES BACK TO HAUNT HIM they end up in the same room with finnick during the ring, and they grow closer and end up making a bond and falling in love

fast forward to the sewer, and reader sees finnick struggling with the mutts as katniss tries to usher them out of the sewer as reader is screaming and fighting to get back to him and eventually runs straight into the pile, almost dying

anyway they wake up losing an arm, but with finnick asleep at her side 🩶🩶

LOVE U BAEEEE

YOU’RE OKAY “look at me, you’re okay.” finnick odair x fem!reader

tags: blood, swearing, htc, violence, use of y/n

a/n: hii pooksters, i have retuned from the dead w/ my first thg fic!! req from my bae gracie, i changed up the losing the arm part because i didn’t really know if i could write it well, so im super sorry for that :( i don’t know how i feel ab this one, but i hope you enjoy!!

god, how you hated the hunger games. you weren’t expecting to be back, but here you were.

when you had won the 73rd hunger games, you thought that was the end. you thought you could just return to your district, and forget all about the mortifying experience.

but you were wrong. so wrong. all of that work, all of the trauma? useless. all of your efforts just didn’t matter. your charm and cleverness played a huge role in helping you to win the games. you thought you were smart, but you werent. you were stupid to think the capitol would leave you alone.

they would never ever leave you alone. they couldn’t give you a fucking break. here they were, trying to kill you, again.

them being them, they tried to make it different this time. they decided to make everyone room with tributes from different districts.

you knew they wanted to cause stuff between everyone. but you weren’t gonna let them get what they want. you told yourself you were just gonna have to deal with whoever you got.

to your luck, you were paired up with the “golden boy.” finnick odair, in the flesh. hooray.

you thought it would suck. back in the hunger games once again, and rooming with this guy? it seemed like hell. that was until you started to get to know him better.

finnick was surprisingly sweet. really sweet. he was also funny. and you couldn’t deny it, he was really attractive. “what are you looking at?” you said, noticing how his gaze was directed towards your lips.

“nothing, your smile is just really pretty.” he replied. you felt your cheeks start to heat up. “what, cat got your tongue?” he taunted, a smirk forming on his face. “you wish. goodnight finnick.” you said, trying to hide the fact that you were flustered.

little did you know, you and him would form quite a complex relationship.

“you win.” he said, while you two were perched in front of a tree, the leaves rustling with every slight movement. both of your partners had died by now. it was just katniss, peeta, you, and him in a truce.

you brought your head up and looked at him. you two locked eyes before you opened your mouth to speak, “huh?” what was he talking about? “you win.” “i win what?”

“my heart.”

that’s all it took. that’s all it took for you to realize how much you really liked him. you can guess what happened after that. that’s right, you and finnick started dating during the games.

from that moment on, you two swore to never let anything happen to the other. you both cared about each other too much to let that happen.

so when you were all fighting for your fucking life in that stupid tunnel, you were just trying to get back to finnick. katniss was trying her hardest to get you out, but you weren’t leaving until you knew finnick was okay.

“y/n, you need to go now!” she yelled, holding you back, trying to help finnick herself. she prioritized everyone over herself, which was something you admired about her. but you needed to get him.

“FINNICK!” you screamed, your voice echoing throughout the tunnel as you finally escaped from her grasp. you ran toward the pile of mutts, plunging your knife into one. “you shouldn’t be here!” finnick yelled, his voice strained with worry.

you ignored his pleading, continuing to fight with all your strength. as you clashed with the horrid creatures in the dimly lit tunnel, you felt fear and adrenaline pump into you. you thought it was going okay, until you felt a tug at your ankle.

“Y/N!” is all you heard before you were pulled down into the water by a mutt. you tried to fight back, but it was no use. suddenly, you felt sharp teeth sink into your stomach.

it was a type of pain you hadn’t experienced in a long, long time. in a matter of seconds, finnick was at your side, fighting off the mutt which leaned on top of you. he was livid.

you clutched your side, breathing heavily as a mixture of water and blood dripped down your body. finnick quickly took you into his arms, and eyed your protruding wound. he then reached out his hands to cradle your face.

“you’re gonna be fine baby, i promise won’t let anything happen to you. jus- just stay awake.” he said, trying to keep his voice from trembling as he tried his best to hurry to the ladder where everyone else was, you still engulfed in his arms.

“i-i can’t. i don’t think m’ gonna make it.” you struggle to get out, tears starting to stream down your face. he wasn’t gonna let this happen. “hey, look at me.” he said, trying to reassure you that you were going to be alright.

“look at me, you’re okay.”

that was all you could remember. everything else was a blur after that. you can remember faint yelling, but you can’t quite decipher what was being said.

you woke up beside finnick. he had his arm wrapped around your body, and your faces were inches apart. your wound was all patched up, but it was still painful. hey, look on the bright side though. finnick had kept his promise. he made sure things got better.

you were okay.

#the hunger games #finnick odair #finnick odair oneshot #finnick odair imagines #finnick odair x reader #finnick odair x fem!reader #the hunger games x reader #the hunger games oneshot #the hunger games imagines #sam claflin #finnick odair smut #the hunger games smut #finnick odair angst #the hunger games angst

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wilwheaton · 5 months

Note

Hi Mr. Wheaton. We met briefly at Ad Astra some years ago, and I told you that I really appreciated your columns in Dungeon Magazine. Looking back at them now, I have to say that I've only gained further appreciation - it's really meaningful to see someone talking about their experiences sharing the things they love with the people that they love. At the time, you seemed a little sad when I mentioned them, so I hope this is a net positive, but I wanted to tell you that I appreciate them all.

Oh thank you. I had fun writing them, but the subscribers HATED my columns, and were not shy about extending that loud and vicious hate to me. And nobody at the magazine pushed back or spoke up for me.

I mean, I was hired to write about gaming, to write columns about playing other games and living life against the backdrop and through the lens of D&D ... and when I did that, the readers were furious that a single page at the end of the magazine wasn't another page of monster stats.

And the editor who hired me, with that understanding, did not support me in public or even in private. I felt betrayed, left exposed and unprotected. I don't recall anyone, certainly not that editor, speaking up and telling these angry people that I was writing what he'd hired me to write, that he'd told me how much he loved every column I turned in, or giving me any support or defense.

That hurt me. I was still kind of a baby writer then, and being thrown to the wolves like that shook my confidence and made me question why I was hired in the first place. I concluded that it was a stunt to get attention, to draw on what was, at the time, my wildly popular blog, and to extract whatever they could extract from me.

In other words, it was shitty business being shitty business, but it was presented to me as something else.

I've never forgotten how bad I felt through all of that, how much it hurt and how betrayed I felt.

Oh, did I mention I got $50 per column? I did it all for about half a cent a word, not for the money but because I wanted to write and I loved (and love) RPGs.

Ultimately, it was a disappointing experience for me. I still think the stuff I wrote then was fine. It was the best I could do, it was what I was hired to do, and I wish I'd been more supported by the editors. I wish anyone at Dungeon had said a single kind thing to me when I quit the column, but I recall just feeling like the guy I'd been working with and writing for was just like, "oh thank god this is over now I can go back to be loved by gamers."

So, yeah, I was sad because the whole thing is sad and disappointing.

But, all these years later, it's really nice to hear from someone who enjoyed what they asked me to write for them.

May all your rolls be critical successes!

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writerscall · 6 months

Text

i cannot be your friend, so i pay the price of what i lost. and what it cost now that we don't talk.

because pushing her away was easier than having to stomach seeing her be with someone else.

author's note/s: 1k words. this is part one of a series. close friends to sad strangers to surprise college roommates is a trope, right?

Ignoring Hazel for the rest of the year wasn’t an easy decision or any easy thing to do. You two weren’t attached at the hip but you were such good friends that even the people who didn’t really talk to either of you eventually asked if you two had a falling out. We’re both just pretty busy at this time of senior year, you’d tell them; you had no idea what Hazel’s answer was to that, and you didn’t wanna know. It hurt you to ice her out but after what happened at the game, you just couldn’t be around her. Not when it was clear that PJ was in the picture like that.

Really, you should’ve been happy for her. You were one of the first people she came out to and even though she never explicitly said it, you knew she wanted to experience one relationship, or even a sort of fling, before high school ended. But your wishful thinking that it could’ve been the two of you in the end like some cliche really was just that — wishful thinking. That kiss and the way she and PJ acted around each other after said it all.

So you blocked it all out. Joined some clubs to fill up your schedule and actually make you as busy as you said you were, focused on academics like never before, got closer to other friends (for obvious reasons but also, why the hell not? It was senior year and you might not see some of them again). Overall, there were pros to what you decided to do about your crush on Hazel Callahan. You were making the most out of a sucky situation.

What you weren’t proud of was deciding to go out with the baseball team’s captain on a whim, and then agreeing to really date him after. He was nice and was a pretty good boyfriend, but you weren’t as into him as he was into you. But that was the least of your concerns throughout that relationship that inevitably came to an end as graduation neared.

You’ll never forget the complicated look on her face the day he greeted you with a kiss on the cheek at your locker. You’ll never forget the ‘Can we talk now? Please?’ text she sent that night, her last attempt at reaching out before she took to ignoring you too.

And that was it. Hazel wasn’t part of your senior year until its end and you assumed it would be the same for the rest of your life, or at least for a long, long time.

But the universe just loved playing cruel tricks sometimes.

“Okay, you’re sure you’ve got everything? Those new notebooks, your writing materials, enough bras and pa—”

“Okay, mom!” You cut her off with a nervous laugh, silently thanking god that your roommate and whoever was helping her move in hadn’t arrived yet. “I’ve got it all, I promise. It’s okay for you to go now.”

Your mother sighs as she reaches out to give your arm a squeeze, and after a few more pointers for your first day and about five ‘you can always give us a call for anything’ reminders, you were alone. You smile to yourself as you look at your fixed up side of the dorm, jittery in a good sense. Everyone said college was different from high school in the best way and you were determined to make it so. Even though you knew how much busier and hectic life would get with university level academics.

You’re so lost in your own thoughts that you don’t hear the door open. It’s only when that painfully familiar voice says your name that you snap out of it.

Hazel Callahan, practically the same as ever, standing in the doorway with her luggages and a duffel bag across her body. She manages a smile, small and hesitant. To your surprise, all you can say is, “You’re my roommate?”

Her face twitches in disappointment, smile faltering noticeably. You didn’t mean for that to come off the way it clearly did but the question escaped you before you could think. Of all the people in the world — or even just of all the people in high school, it just had to be her? You were over Hazel. You’d tried so hard and honestly haven’t thought about her much at all since graduation.

Only for all that effort to feel like it was undone within seconds. Fantastic.

“Trust me, I… I didn’t know this would be the arrangement. My mom’s got an old friend here who could probably do a room switch for one of us — I mean, for me I guess, you’ve already got your side of the room fixed up while I’m still all packed, so—”

You put a hand up to stop her. “Hazel, it’s fine. We can share this room. All that stuff from…” You let the sentence trail off and clear your throat. “I mean, it doesn’t matter anymore, it never really has.”

Though expecting her to brighten even slightly at your attempt at an olive branch, her expression stays the same. Complicated actually, like the one she had upon seeing you and your (short-lived) senior year boyfriend for the first time in school. You try not to think about it.

“Anyway, I’ve got some things to go check with the registrar’s office, so I’ll get out of your hair so you can unpack and all that.” There was nothing to check with at the registrar’s office, but you needed to find some place that wasn’t your dorm to pull yourself together. Or maybe scream.

There’s a look of understanding on her face but shakes her head at you. “You wouldn’t be in the way. We could use this time to catch up. It’s been a long while, you know?”

Well, you certainly weren’t ready for that, so you just say something about wanting to get to the office while it wasn’t too busy yet. You cast her a side glance with a smile that you really hoped didn’t look forced or fake as you watch her bring in her things, then make a beeline for the door.

But you stop when she asks, “Hey, um, maybe we can sit with each other at the orientation tomorrow?”

“Uh… yeah, sure.” And you knew that didn’t sound forced or fake with the way Hazel almost grins at you.

Yeah, you really needed to find a place to scream somewhere on campus.

#hazel callahan imagine #hazel callahan x reader #hazel callahan x you #hazel callahan fanfic #hazel callahan

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public-trans-it · 8 months

Note

i would love to hear your dark spore rant. i didnt even know spore had a sequel.

Oh anon. Poor sweet anon. I’m so sorry.

So, the thing about Darkspore is…

… it was a really REALLY… mediocre game.

Like, the moment to moment gameplay was… fine. Just fine. Not incredible. But not BAD! Really, it only had two major flaws:

The first, it was buggy as hell. One particularly nasty bug was present in the games launcher, and on certain systems the game would fail to install at all. They were unable to ever fix this bug, which I speculate was a major reason the game was abandoned by the devs so quickly and lead to it being taken down from every major digital distribution site. You could still install and play it if you already bought it though! If… it actually installed for you.

Which leads us to the second flaw. It’s right there on the box.

“Internet connection required”

The game has Always Online DRM. All the levels, enemies, loot, your entire account, was all stored server side. And servers are expensive. So, when the games bugs became unwieldy and not worth fixing, and they took it offline… it became a money sink. It was a game generating ZERO revenue, but had huge server maintenance costs. So eventually, they just shut down the servers.

It is now very difficult to obtain the game, requiring you to buy one of the few unopened physical copies remaining. And even once you do have it, it is IMPOSSIBLE to play. There is a project called Resurrection Capsule in the works, some fans trying to create a private server for it. But with so much info stored server side, they basically have to recreate entire subsystems from scratch. It’s… not going very fast, and to my knowledge hasn’t been touched in over a year.

Story

The story of the game is pretty basic. A progenitor race of alien super-scientists create a new, synthetic form of DNA, called Exponential-DNA, or E-DNA. This rapidly mutates to create new life, and can be guided to create specific, specialized organisms, condensing thousands of years of evolution to a few hours. It can also be injected into existing creatures to alter them and make them more powerful. However it also linked everything affected by it into a hivemind. So it was outlawed. The creator of it decided to respond by creating a E-DNA virus, called The Darkspore, infecting himself with it, and spreading it across the galaxy and conquering it, wiping out his own race.

You play as another member of that race, who has been in hibernation for 1000 years while that was going down. Your ship AI has woken you up because it has managed to stabilize E-DNA and also keep it disconnected from the hivemind, and needs you to go kill the guy who took over the galaxy. That is how the game starts.

…

And how the story ends. There is not really any more story past that part. You get a cutscene describing each of the games 6 planets the first time you visit it, and a final “Hey you won!” cutscene after killing the final boss which ends with the cliche “implication the villain isn’t really dead” trope, and… that’s it. That’s the entire story. Not really the selling point of this game. Its not even entirely clear if it takes place in the same universe as Spore! It’s just set dressing for “Run through these 24 levels and beat everything up”

Gameplay

Darkspore was created by Maxis. This alone was HUGE. This was a team of developers who only really made lifesims like The Sims and Sim City, taking a stab at making a diablolike game.

And I GENUINELY BELIEVE every single studio out there needs to do shit like this. Designing for something so outside your wheelhouse creates SOOOOO much innovation so quickly. You get fresh new ideas injected into the genre so quickly. The final product won’t be good! You don’t have any damn experience in the genre! But it will create something unique beautiful, and god damn I wish we lived in a world where that alone was enough and devs weren’t focused on chasing profits instead.

Genesis

Genesis is just a fancy way of saying ‘Element’. There are 5 of them: Plasma (fire and lightning), Bio (plants and animals), Cyber (machines), Necro (death and fear), and Quantum (space and time) and the way they interact is… certainly a choice I guess. Each Darkspore you face has a genesis it falls into, and each of your heroes has one as well. If your Genesis matches that of the darkspore you are fighting at the moment, you take double damage and they take half damage. If they don’t match, all damage both ways is neutral.

The system itself is kinda mediocre. The biggest part of it, however, is the Variant Skills. Each Genesis has 4 unique skills tied to it that represent the common elements of that type.

Heroes

There are 25 heroes in the game, which each have one Genesis and one Class (Sentinel which are the tanks, Ravagers which are the DPS, and Tempest which are the Casters/Support)

Each hero has 4 total variants, with the first one you unlock being Alpha, and as you level up your account (heroes do not have their own levels) you eventually can purchase their Beta, Gamma, and Delta variants, with each variant having slightly different stats, and a different one of their Genesis’ 4 variant abilities.

Each hero has a unique basic attack, which USUALLY has a little extra to it. For example Sage shoots a bolt that hurts enemies it hits, but heals allies it hits. Zrin alternates between two different punches, one of which has a short duration DoT and the other of which has a 10% stun chance. Stuff like that.

They also have a passive effect that is always active while you are playing them. Collect a soul from each enemy killed for a 5% damage boost, 10% damage bonus when attacking from behind, a stacking defense buff every time you take damage, stuff like that.

Finally, a character has 2 unique abilities. One that is unique to them and can only be used while you are playing that hero, and a second ability that is everyone in the squad can use if that hero is present.

Squad Decks

Which brings me to the first rant and something I am SO AUTISTIC ABOUT (positive). SQUADS. The game had you craft Squad Decks, collections of 3 heroes that you can swap between during your missions, for a total of 883.2k squad combinations (I think my math might be off on that). Swapping between them is on a cooldown of about 10 seconds, but otherwise is don’t instantaneously and as often as you want without penalty. You always have 5 abilities active:

- The unique ability of your active hero

- The Genesis ability of your active heroes variant

- Hero 1’s Squad ability

- Hero 2’s Squad ability

- Hero 3’s squad ability

The first two abilities change out every time you swap heroes, but the last 3 are fixed. So you have 3 abilities that you always have access to, and 6 abilities that are paired up and you can swap between which pair of those abilities is active.

Your heroes do NOT share a health/energy pool, but DO share healing pickups. Any time you pick up a health or energy restoration pickup, it refills a chunk of the respective health pool of your currently active hero, and a smaller chunk of each of your inactive heroes in the squad.

So the core loop of moment to moment gameplay becomes swapping situationally between heroes both offensively and defensively, to get access to your other heroes skills and also to mitigate damage from enemies based on their genesis or control where your healing is directed.

Loot

Loot in Darkspore is fairly standard for your average Diablolike. Item drops have 4 tiers: Common (Item Level=Account Level-5), Uncommon (Item Level=Account Level), Rarified (Item Level=Account Level+5), and Purified (Item Level=Account Level+10)

Items of higher tiers have more chances to roll on a table to gain beneficial modifiers.

Each item fell into one of a few different categories: Weapon, Hands, Feet, Offensive, Defensive, or Utility.

Each hero has one of each slot, plus an additional slot based on their class. Ravagers have an extra Offense slot, Sentinels have an extra Defense slot, and Tempests have an extra Utility slot. Any hero can equip any item you gain, with the exception of Weapons that are hero specific. Some heroes also lack Hands or Feet, in which case their weapon has extra stats and can get the same modifiers as hands and feet can.

The items you equip can then be added onto the Hero in the Hero Editor. The Hero Editor is often equated to the Creature Editor in Spore, which is BULLSHIT and was a pet peeve of mine the ENTIRE DAMN TIME THE FAME WAS LIVE. This is a FALSE EQUIVALENCE. It uses the outfit editor from the Tribal/Civilization phases of Spore instead. Importantly: this means you cannot alter the overall silhouette of your hero. It will always maintain the same basic profile and animations. However you can freely place the extra parts you equip anywhere on its body, and can also place multiple copies of them.

Additionally, old parts can have their stats stripped, converting them into ‘Detail’ parts with no stats, of which you can equip 6 different parts, each of which you can include 10 copies of on your hero. So you could get some pretty cool looks from it!

However all this loot is garbage and you likely would not use most of it outside of appearance. Which brings me to…

Cash-out Loot

Usually if you mention the word ‘cash’ in any sentence involving a game published by EA, it would be a call for concern. Luckily this isn’t that! It’s just gambling! Everything is fine!

The main progression in Darkspore comes from gear, and the best gear comes from how good your ships engines are. These come from account upgrades as you level up your account, determining how many levels you can do in a row. Every time you complete a level, you are given an option: Keep going, or ‘cash out’ and get a guaranteed piece of Uncommon gear, with a 10% chance of it becoming Rarified, as well as all the gear you picked up in the level.

If you choose to keep going, you have to complete the next level. If you die, you lose ALL the gear you picked up, including that guaranteed piece. If you make it to the end, you are given another choice: Risk it all again and go on to the next level, or stop here and get your TWO pieces of guaranteed uncommon loot, which each now have a 20% chance of becoming rarified and a 5% chance of becoming purified.

You can only go another of levels equal to the number of Engine Upgrades you have earned by leveling up your account. So at first, after the second level you HAVE to cash out. As you progress you can start to do many more levels at a time, getting a dozen pieces of gear that are practically guaranteed to be the highest rank.

But of course you have to play these levels in order, and you don’t get a chance to upgrade your character with all the cool new loot you found on the way, so you can’t just jump straight into this. You have to slowly build up to being able to push yourself this much, and once you can, you have a readily available source of some of the best gear in the game.

And that ties into my absolute favorite system of Darkspore:

Catalysts

Many diablolikes have a mechanic called ‘Sockets’. The gear you equip has its own type of equipment slot, and you put gems in there that give you small bonuses. Every game does it a little differently, but it’s kind of a staple of the series.

Darkspore uses a similar system, but utilizes it VERY differently. While you are running levels, enemies will rarely drop Catalysts instead of loot. These come in 5 colors: Purple (boosts your base stats), Red (boosts offensive secondary stats like damage or attack speed), Blue (boosts defensive secondary stats like health regen or damage resistance), Green (boosts utility secondary stats like movement speed or lifesteal), and Rainbow (can contain any of the bonuses of the previous categories) They also come in two sizes: Big and Small. This determines how big the bonus from them is.

You have a 3x3 grid on your HUD that the catalysts you collect go into. You can rearrange them however you want, and if you create a line of 3 of the same color (Rainbow is a wildcard and matches with all of them), it will double the bonus of all Catalysts in that line. This stacks, meaning if you create multiple lines over a single catalyst it could get a x3, x4, or even x5 bonus if it’s the center piece of the grid and forms a line in every direction.

However, you can’t save Catalysts. You can equip it to the grid or drop it on the ground and move on. That’s it. You have to decide now. Do you keep that Big Purple you have for the big buff to your most important stat, or do you trade it for that Small Rainbow for a mediocre stat you just found that you can plug in the middle and double everything else in your grid?

“Surely that only matters early game, and once you have good catalysts you don’t swap them out that much, right?” I hear the diablolike veterans asking, because that is how socketing works in most of those games. And normally you would be right. Except for one major change: All your catalysts only last until the end of your run. When you get to the cash out screen, and choose to keep going? You keep them. But if you choose to cash out, or if you ever die, your catalysts all vanish. Every new run you have to go through and collect them again, which results in you playing your heroes in new ways and adopting new strategies based on what catalysts drop for you each run.

It’s an INCREDIBLE easy to learn system that adds SO MUCH depth and replayability to the game. I love it so incredibly much. Each mechanic flows elegantly into the the next. The catalysts help you do better runs which gets you better gear which upgrades your heroes which lets you do better runs, the entire spiral being locked into your account level to give a quantifiable metric of how far this spiral is gone. It was so good!

And now, it’s gone forever.

Man that sure was a long post. Friends have heard me go on this rant SO many times. Thank god I never got into a second mediocre game filled with novel innovations that are ultimately lost to time and can never be experienced again due to Always Online DRM making it unplayable. Can you imagine if I didn’t learn my lesson and did that a second time? Ha!

… I never did that again. Right?

… right?

…

HEX: Shards of Fate

Hex was a digital TCG legal battle with TCG elements created by Cryptozoic. It was originally put up on Kickstarter, advertised as a digital card game with both PvE and PvP modes, a unique focus on the design space opened up by being a digital game, and gameplay damn near identical to Magic: The Gathering.

The thinly veiled truth was that this game was never meant to succeed. They had hoped it would, and it would be great if it did, but I’m fairly certain that was always a secondary objective. The first objective was to get sued by Wizards of the Coast over the similarities to Magic: The Gathering.

Now, that might sound strange to an outsider, but to anyone in the industry, they are probably nodding along and going “Yeah that tracks actually.”

You see, Wizards of the Coast is… bad. Really bad. They do everything in their power to choke the life out of the industry and have resorted to a lot of questionable tactics to do so. One of these is against anyone who develops any form of trading card game. You see, WotC has a patent on booster packs, customizable decks of cards, and turning cards sideways.

Literally.

U.S. Patent No 5,662,332 (A)

It is not a coincidence that the second two biggest names in TCGs don’t involve turning your cards sideways. Konami contested that Yugioh was different enough to not violate the patent.

WotC responded by suing them. They settled out of court.

Nintendo actually hired WotC to design the Pokémon TCG to NOT violate the patent in return for WotC getting to distribute the first few sets. WotC gladly accepted, distributed the game, got their cut of the sales, and as soon as that was over….

WotC responded by suing them. They settled out of court.

Every single other game out there ended up paying royalties to WotC. Because the cut of the sales to WotC was cheaper than going to court even if you won. WotC had their fingers in every pie, but was smart enough to make sure not to piss people off so much that refusal was ever a viable option.

Cryptozoic was a company that, at the time, was making several licensed TCGs. The big one that jumps out was the World of Warcraft TCG, which they were in charge of (though it was originally made by Upper Deck). Cryptozoic was begrudgingly paying royalties because having the WoWTCG license was too good and they didn’t want to give that up. Then Hearthstone happened and Cryptozoic was going to lose the WoWTCG license as it got discontinued.

So Cryptozoic set up their new game, Hex, specifically to bait WotC into suing them, so they could get the patent overturned.

See, the patent isn’t actually valid. You cannot patent a game mechanic. There are certainly aspects of the patent that ARE valid and CAN be enforced, but the parts about mechanics can’t actually be enforced. WotC uses it because people can’t contest it, but if it actually was used in court it would get overturned VERY easily, and WotC would be declawed.

So Cryptozoic created a game that was a clone of MtG, used a Kickstarter to build up a large amount of legal funds, and got sued by WotC! Yes! Exactly what they wanted!

… and then they settled out of court.

Sigh.

I guess I’ll talk about the game now.

Lore

The lore of the game was solid. Pretty typical fantasy setting. Humans and elves and sort of racist orcs (better than most other orcs I’ve seen at least) and extremely racist tribal coyote people make up the good guys. Undead, spider-orcs, dwarves, and also pretty racist samurai rabbit people make up the bad guys.

There are two types of magic in the world: Blood magic and Wild magic. Elves are adept at wild magic. Shin’hare (the rabbit people) are adept at wild magic as well. The Shin’hare tried to take over the world, forcing the Orcs, Humans, Elves, and Cyotle to ally together to drive them underground into the underworld.

There the Shin’hare met and allied with the Vennen, an all male race descended from Orcs. They were adept blood mages, and they procreated by kidnapping orcs and using them as incubators for spiders. I fucking love the Vennen. I’ll focus on them a lot in this. The Vennen taught the Shin’hare how to sacrifice their young for more power.

The two then allied with the Dwarves, a genderless race of sentient stone statues who excel at creating machinery, and who believe the world itself is a giant machine. Specifically, a weapon of mass destruction, and they are trying to set it off. They believe blowing people the fuck up to be their natural calling.

The underworld and overworld forces go back and forth a bit, with the Elves doing a large chunk of the work as the only overworld race that can use magic.

Then Hex happened. Hex is a massive meteor made up of Diamond, Emerald, and Sapphire. Hex punched clean through the world, scattering gems all across it, before stabilizing in orbit on the other side, becoming the worlds moon.

These gems were incredibly magical, allowing every race to now use magic. Diamonds were restorative, bringing life to things. Rubies were extremely destructive and burned bright and hot and quickly. Sapphire allowed finesse manipulation and control over water. These

Yes this is just the MtG color pie.

Eventually, humanity stumbled into one of their old crypts that was very close to the impact site of Hex, and found it CRAWLING with undead. They were taking the Diamonds from Hex and putting them into the eye sockets of human corpses, causing those corpses to reanimate. These were NOT actually undead, but an alien consciousness that existed within the gems that were using human corpses as a host.

The Necrotic sought a peaceful and symbiotic relationship with humanity as thanks for the use of the bodies. Humanity responded by getting really pissed off that the Necrotic were grave robbing, and went to war over it. Eventually the Necrotic retreated deep into the underworld and allied with the other races instead, eventually helping the Shin’hare with a second attack on the surface.

The lore has a lot more depth than that, but that’s the basic. I liked it a lot. The Orcs being good guys who just really liked tests of strength was a refreshing take on orcs. I liked them a lot. The extremely racist caricature that made up the Cyotle and the Shin’hare? Less so.

Digital Design Space

As for the actual gameplay… it was MtG. Like, almost 1:1.

Like…

Seriously.

Shards work similarly to Lands, with there being 5 basic shards, Diamond, Sapphire, Ruby, Wild, and Blood. You can only play one Shard per turn and when you do you get 1/1 Resource. 1 resource to spend on this turn, and 1 permanent resource. You spend that resource to play a card that costs 1, and you go down to 0/1 resources. Start of your turn, you would go back up to 1/1 resource.

Pretty straight forward stuff. Resources are a card type like in MtG, but once it’s played it acts as a perpetual resource like the Mana in Hearthstone, with no need to care about where the resource is coming from.

… wait a second though, this is a MtG clone. It uses the color pie. Caring where those resources come from is KIND OF a big deal in MtG.

Which is the first really cool difference between Hex and MtG! THRESHOLD! Each time you play a shard you gain 1 threshold in that color. To play a card, you have to have at least as many threshold as are displayed below its cost. See that purple dot below Murder? That means you need 1 blood threshold to play it.

Threshold is NOT consumed when you play a card, which DRASTICALLY alters deckbuilding and how feasible multi-color decks are.

For example, in MtG, if you had 4 swamps and 1 mountain in play, and 5 cards in hand that all cost R…. You can play 1 whole card this turn.

In Hex, if you have 4 Blood and 1 Ruby, and have 5 cards that all cost 1 and have a single Ruby threshold, you can play your entire hand that turn. This made it incredibly viable to splash colors in relatively smaller amounts. It also opened up cool new design space, like cards that cost 1 but still required 3 threshold in a color. Or cards that require 1 threshold of every type to activate a bonus effect (very common among Necrotic) or… for sockets!

HEY WE ARE COMING FULL CIRCLE!

Remember how I mentioned Diablolike games having sockets, but how Darkspore didn’t use it? Well Hex DOES. There was a pair of keywords called Socketable Major and Socketable Minor. Each set, there would be 10 gems (two of each color) that rotated out for Socketable cards. Cards with Major sockets could equip any gem, while minor sockets could only equip half of them. So for example the current rotation might have the Sapphire gems be “While you have at least 1 Sapphire Threshold, this card has Flying” for its Minor gem, and “When you play this card, if you have at least 3 Sapphire Threshold, target player draws 3 cards”

You chose which gem was in each Socketable card during deckbuilding. Different copies of the same card could have different gems equipped, or you could have the same gem equipped across multiple different cards. It was basically a way to go “This card was designed to be splashed in other color decks. You pick what that other color is.”

It opened up a lot of design space! This was something Hex did VERY well. They knew they were making a MtG clone, but they weren’t beholden to the same restrictions a physical card game did, and they THRIVED in those areas.

For example, REPLICATORS GAMBIT, a one cost card that creates six copies of a troop (read: creature) that just… could not exist in MtG.

Another example of this was in my favorite archetype in Hex: Mill. Now, I’m not normally a blue player. I’m not a big fan of the ‘you don’t get to play the game’ archetype. Even mill isn’t really my thing. But the way it worked in HexTCG? God I loved it. I wish I could see my opponents faces as they reached a trembling hand out to their bloated, grotesque deck, a cruel mockery of what it once was. They had started the match with only 60 cards, but now it held twice that number. Knowing every draw was more likely to bring their own skittering death out.

…

Maybe I should back up a bit.

Vennen are, in MtG terms, tribal Blue/Black with a focus on control. Specifically an aggressive form of control. Your wincon is still ‘beat your opponent to death’, but the means by which you do it is… spiders.

Lots of Vennen cards work by still allowing your opponent to do the thing that you blocked, but it now creates Spider Eggs in their deck. Lock down a creature as it enters play with ‘Everytime this creature becomes tapped, shuffle 3 spider eggs into your deck’ or ‘Whenever an opponent draws a third card this turn add a spider egg to their deck’ or ‘When this creature is destroyed add a spider egg to your opponent’s deck’ and when they DRAW a spider egg… well… the effect of a spider egg is more or less ‘When this card enters your hand or graveyard, draw/discard another card into that zone and destroy this one. Your opponent creates a Spiderling and puts it in play. “

Spiderlings are 1/1 Unblockable creatures.

The Vennen win con is to just fill your opponent with spiders and then shred them apart once the spiders start hatching. It was a DELIGHTFUL playstyle.

PvE

Hex also features a fairly robust PvE mode with a point crawl encounter map that was quite delightful. There were cards unique to PvE, but all PvP cards were also legal in PvE. In general, all your staples came from PvP and were the same core staples everyone uses to win (they were very generous with handing out common/uncommon PvP cards in the single player mode, which in turn also made Pauper a very popular format), however you also had PvE cards which made up your win cons. PvE cards weren’t balanced as tightly, and allowed to just be dumb overpowered bullshit just because it’s fun to use dumb overpowered bullshit sometimes!

There were also equipment slots that would modify the cards in your deck, turning PvP cards into PvE cards. For example, Replicators Gambit made it so that EVERY copy of that card gained that text.

PvE started with character creation. You would create a character that was one of the 8 races, and one of 6 3 different classes. Warrior, Cleric, or Ranger. I think there was a late update that added Mage but I don’t recall too clearly, and it isn’t document online anymore as far as I can tell!

Each class had a unique talent tree that you could customize and change how you played. Your race determined what colors you could play, and your level determined how many of each rarity you could play.

I played a Vennen Cleric. Cleric’s whole thing was that you would gain Blessings, 0 cost cards that would rise in your deck each turn, and could be played to draw a card as well as additional effects based on your build. My blessings put more eggs in the enemy deck, to the surprise of no one.

As you went from encounter to encounter you would earn new cards to modify your deck, swapping decks between fights. Then there were dungeons, long laborious streaks of a dozen or so encounters, with branching paths and decisions to be made, earning you tons of new packs and equipment and experience to boost your character. One especially fun encounter was crossing a desert with a pack of… I think it was gnomes? There were 20 of them that needed rescuing. The way you rescued them was putting them in your deck, and then leaving the desert through a single combat encounter. Except they were AWFUL. Like 3 cost vanilla 1/1’s level of awful. The more you had in your deck, the harder the encounter became. It was a really nice way to portray the logistical challenge of trying to fight while protecting all these useless tagalongs.

There were plans to even introduce Raids, 3v1 PvE encounters, but they fizzled out as the game got sunset.

The game was good. REALLY good. It relished in the digital design space in a way I haven’t quite seen since then. A few games, like Legends of Runeterra, have come close, but always fall short, and that’s so sad! I DESPERATELY want to play a TCG with this level of customization again!

Luckily that was the end of it. I finally learned the error of my ways, never touched anything ‘always online’ again, and now can live a life without regrets! … except Legends of Runeterra a little bit like I mentioned above but THATS IT! There are no other always online games I have regrets about!

…

ToonTown Online

Okay no, not seriously. I’ve never played toontown. But honestly it looked kinda silly and like a shitpost in video game form. I think it would have been fun to try at some point with a few friends. Not seriously, just to screw around in for a bit.

Never going to get that chance. Just like nearly everyone reading this will never get to play two of my biggest influences that shaped how I think about game design.

Always Online DRM is an insidious beast. It doesn’t just kill games, it kills *archival*. All we have left of these games is a relatively small number of gameplay videos. I was planning on having a lot more pictures in this post of all the interface elements I was talking about as I talked about them, but there just… aren’t any good pictures of them. Even these details are based on my own memory cross referenced with a couple of wikis, and even those were sparse.

Some games can’t feasibly avoid Always Online. MMO’s are a big example. But by adding it into a game that has a single player experience involved, and not making that single player experience a standalone thing on its own, you are destroying any hope that your game will be remembered. It will fade into obscurity. There will never be a cult revival. Your work will be discarded and forgotten and it’s… so incredibly sad to see.

I jokingly titled this section being about ToonTown, but really this section is about Kingdom Hearts: Union X. It was a mediocre and disgustingly predatory gacha. It was horribly managed with horrible issues around localization and it was just… a mess. But it was part of the world of Kingdom Hearts, and it’s story was important and mattered.

The game is no longer playable, but it’s also not entirely lost. The devs created a new version of it, as a gallery to view the cutscenes. The single-player side mode, Dark Road, is also included. The devs didn’t have to do this. They could have gone the same route as Darkspore and HexTCG, and had their work be forgotten. They chose to save it. Not in full, but at least the parts the deemed important.

It also makes me wonder how much this happens in other mediums. Ludology is a pretty new field, and it rarely goes into specific games and their impact on the medium, mostly just focusing on the impacts they have on humanity, rather than the mechanics themselves as these beautiful pieces of art. And it makes me wonder how often this happens with say… film critics. Are there any indie film makers who are deep in the paint of indie films and critique of not just the films themselves, but the very techniques being used, just sitting there going “It’s so upsetting that this big studio managed to do something this beautiful and all of us in the scene recognize it’s beauty, but no one else seems to, and now it’s gone?”

… as I’m writing this I actually realize that this does happen there. It’s how I found out about what became my favorite film of all time, The Man From Earth. It’s a small film that flopped horribly in theaters, and only gained any attention by being pirated by a lot by indies who wanted to talk about it. It’s a good movie, highly recommend. Not for everyone though.

I don’t know. I’m sure I had a point with all this but… seeing it happen again and again and now with streaming services taking stuff down it’s just… I can’t help but seeing not just more and more games, but more and more of EVERY artistic medium ending up in this area. How many digital artists entire portfolios have vanished off the face of the earth because their tumblr got deactivated? How many movies are going to be gone forever when Netflix eventually goes out of business? We can’t even rely on piracy! Many old pieces of media is just lost forever. Just ask the Doctor Who fandom. They probably know more about that than anyone else at this point.

But mostly I just really wish more developers would consider what parts of their games are important, and what kind of legacy they want to leave, instead of just what will generate a short burst of profit, with no care for what happens after.

… I should start doing video essays with how long this got. It’s like some kind of text based video essay. A text essay. Those are a new thing I just invented.

#Darkspore #Spore #Those are the only two tags on this post because those are the only games I talk about don’t worry about it. it’s fine. don’t read further.#HexTCG #Hex: Shards of Fate #Kingdom Hearts: Union X #Always Online DRM #The Man From Earth #I swear to god if anyone tells me I should just play Temo on LoR I will scream #YES I KNOW AND I DO #but also LoR sucks #and also that is missing THE ENTIRE POINT OF THIS RANT #the SAME THING IS GOING TO HAPPEN TO LEGENDS OF RUNETERRA #maybe not soon #but it WILL die someday #and be gone forever #because it isn’t being preserved #Text Essay

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malewifeharem · 3 months

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OHH HAIIIII!! SORRY THIS SI THE FIRST ASK IVE EVER DONE. CAN YOU DO BEELZEBUB OR DIAVOLO YANDERE ALPHABET LIST THINGY PLEABSE?!1 THABK YOU!!!1 >ᴗ<

~ MGᝰ.ᐟ

yandere!diavolo alphabet

彡- ,, yandere om! diavolo alphabet (template from @dear-yandere eheheheh)

cw ⁞ OMSWD CHAPTER 16 SPOILERS , mentions of babytrapping, violence, abduction, manipulation, just general yandere behaviour??? not proofread.

an ⁞ FIRST OF ALL THANK YOU FOR THE HONOR OF TAKING YOUR FIRST ASK??????????? i've never sent an ask cuz im too nervous even with anon mode on haha :3

Affection: How do they show their love and affection? How intense would it get?

his love for you is deep, sure, but you have to remember that he's a crown prince — he doesn't have the time to love you as much as he wishes. he tries to compensate for that by showering you with gifts originating from all three realms, all of them being worth more than your house.

Blood: How messy are they willing to get when it comes to their darling?

he doesn't get messy, no no. barbatos does! he just needs to say the word and his loyal butler will get it done, no doubt. there are probably dozens of bodies rotting in the dungeons below the castle, but that's not for you to see or worry about.

Cruelty: How would they treat their darling once abducted? Would they mock them?

i can see his duality switching up very quickly depending on his mood. he could either be gently cooing to you, almost begging for you to not cry. OR he could be really sadistic and cruel, taunting you to no end — reminding you that you are his for the rest of your life — both as a human and as a devil and angel.

Darling: Aside from abduction, would they do anything against their darling’s will?

he guilt trips you to noooooo end. what do you mean his gifts are too expensive for you? do you hate him? well, if you don't, you simply must accept them all! he gives you no room for negotiation, how could you anyway? his parents aren't around anymore, don't you feel sorry for him?

Exposed: How much of their heart do they bare to their darling? How vulnerable are they when it comes to their darling?

he doesn't like showing you his vulnerable side. he needs to be strong so you can rely on him, after all! thank god (is god the right word for him???) he's spent decades learning how to maintain his composure.

Fight: How would they feel if their darling fought back?

he would intimidate you into breaking your resolve. he would transform into his demon form and coerce you with threats like tying you up in the basement. i don't think he'd ever actually do that though — he knows human lives are fragile.

Game: Is this a game to them? How much would they enjoy watching their darling try to escape?

he takes his relationship with you very seriously. he expects you to rule next to him — he still needs to prepare you for that role, so don't you dare leave.

Hell: What would be their darling’s worst experience with them?

although diavolo would never keep you in the castle basement, he will throw you in there for a few minutes just to scare you. he did it once as a last resort after you threw a fit — locking you in one of the clean cells. you were quickly fished out though, he can't risk having you go around and finding the corpses of the people you know.

Ideals: What kind of future do they have in mind for/with their darling?

he wants you to rule devildom next to him so marriage is a given. having heirs is up to you but he will be very disappointed if you say you don't want any — he may even consider baby trapping you at one point. he probably gives you etiquette lessons too, making sure you know your role in the near future.

Jealousy: Do they get jealous? Do they lash out or find a way to cope?

he gets very jealous but doesn't want to admit it to you. he'll find excuses for getting rid of your close friends and family — you've heard some absurd reasons before but you don't dare question him.

Kisses: How do they act around or with their darling?

very very affectionate. he likes to keep you around him as much as he can. whether or not that means resting in his bedroom, lounging in his office while he works or sitting on his lap on his throne. he's shameless too, he'll initiate pda anywhere and anytime he wants.

Love letters: How would they go about courting or approaching their darling?

he cant decide if he should properly court you or just claim you as his immediately. he is the prince of hell, how and who are you to say no? he ends up choosing to court you instead but he runs out of patience eventually, and just abducts you with the assistance of barbatos.

Mask: Are their true colors drastically different from the way they act around everyone else?

although you'll most likely never see his true colors, he's literally insane. if it weren't for his amazing composure, he'd be lashing out at everyone and everything for even breathing the same air as you. you've noticed him tense up to the point where he's almost shaking from rage. (he's gonna pop and burst like a balloon eheh)

Naughty: How would they punish their darling?

if it's a light sentence, he lightly slap your face and remind you to obey. if you've done something horrendous, he'll lock you in his room till you've learnt your lesson. he's sick, while he carries on with his day, he imagines you clawing at the door, begging to be released from your confinement. (i dont think it wld get that far)

Oppression: How many rights would they take away from their darling?

you're not allowed to go out of the castle grounds. the gardens are still available to you but anywhere outside of the fences is a no no for you. you're not allowed to talk to any staff and angels except barbatos. he and the brothers are for you to use at your disposal, feel free to work them to the bone if that's what you wished.

Patience: How patient are they with their darling?

you may mistake him for being patient since he's quick to forgive you for your insolence but no. he's not used to not getting what he wants immediately, but he will forgive you easily. (aka he's impatient)

Quit: If their darling dies, leaves, or successfully escapes, would they ever be able to move on?

death isn't an escape for you, it doesn't matter if you're reborn as an angel or devil in your next life — he will have you either way. screw harmony between the three realms, he'll start another celestial war if it means he can have you.

Regret: Would they ever feel guilty about abducting their darling? Would they ever let their darling go?

he doesn't feel guilty at all. he has never been told no before in his royal upbringing and he feels entitled to have you to himself.

"only a fool would let go of a girl like you."

Stigma: What brought about this side of them (childhood, curiosity, etc)?

his mother passed early in his childhood and he hasn't seen his dad in decades or even centuries. no one around him is comfortable enough to talk to him normally till innocent you arrived in the devildom. you're too precious to him, he wants to know more about you. no, he needs to know — everything about you.

Tears: How do they feel about seeing their darling scream, cry, and/or isolate themselves?

he'll gently coo at you, telling you that everything will be fine as long as you're with him. what could possibly harm you when he's the future king? (you yourself, duh)

Unique: Would they do anything different from the classic yandere?

(skip... if someone cld tell me what a classic yandere is pls do)

Vice: What weakness can their darling exploit in order to escape?

if you could somehow get in contact with the angels, you could get them to rescue you. although, in doing so, you might just start a war between the two realms.

Wit’s end: Would they ever hurt their darling?

physically no, but he likes using fear to instill obedience in you. (read H)

Xoanon: How much would they revere or worship their darling? To what length would they go to win their darling over?

he quite literally kisses the ground you walk on, going as far as to collect some of your belongings to worship. he wouldn't build a shrine but he does secretly store all of them in a little safe in the corner of his room.

Yearn: How long do they pine after their darling before they snap?

after the events of the first game. he was really tempted to abduct you after belphegor almost offed you though. (do the calculations yourself ehe)

Zenith: Would they ever break their darling?

i don't think he would intentionally break you, but he also fails to realize that the fear and paranoia he puts you in is leading you down the same path. (so yes but unintentionally)

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jessecrust · 3 months

Text

We must stop being surprised

The studio that made one of the best games ever is currently imploding. ZA/UM, the studio that made Disco Elysium, is laying off 25% of their staff, including the last remaining credited writer for the hit video game. It's rare for a game to move me as much as Disco Elysium did, it's even rarer for the main creative forces who made the game to thank Karl Marx at their acceptance speech at The Game Awards. It is a breathtakingly beautiful and gorgeous work of art that made me laugh, slip into depression, cry, and smile so big my entire face hurt. After struggling through so many overlong, pretentious, AAA slogs like The Last of Us and God of War sequels, I never wanted to leave doomed Revochol. And it seems that, once again, the reward for surprise success and bringing something unique and wonderful into the world is misery and ruin.

The point of this is not really to document the facts of this sordid business, the legal battles, the documentary made about the studio, the drama, etc. All of that matters, and I'm sure others will cover it, but what matters to me about this is how unsurprising it is. We must stop being surprised that this keeps happening. We can no longer be surprised when the next surprise work of genius made by passionate, idiosyncratic people is slowly and fatally smothered by the financial criminals. There's a basic incongruity between creatives and financiers that, in the best of times, seems like a mutually beneficial relationship. But please understand that these soulless piles of money are all scorpions that will inevitably dig its stinger into your frog back the first chance it gets. Netflix was always going to charge you more to watch ads. The line on the graph must only go one way, the system proposes infinity in a finite world and tasks CEOs, HR departments, and mangers to make the impossible possible.

What I find the most grating is the inevitable reply: "profit is the only reason that these things exist". I truly wish I could experience life through the brain stem of the person who believes this. It must be fascinating to be so dull. Even worse, there's a non-zero chance that the person saying this has downloaded--for free--a PC mod for one of their favorite unoptimized, unprofitable to patch, forgotten games that fixed most of the major bugs and issues. The money, hustle, profit, business obsessed mind cannot comprehend the joy and pleasure of creation for its own sake. Nor, I suspect, can it comprehend art, preservation, aesthetics, history, etc.

I wanted to end this with the Jonas Salk quote about patenting the sun, so I looked it up to make sure I wasn't misremembering it: " There is no patent. Could you patent the sun?" And, sure enough, as if the universe reached out its fist to burying it into my gut, I stumble upon a Slate article titled "Jonas Salk: Good at Virology, Bad at Economics". The human race survived thousands of years without Economics, consultants, and private equity firms. If only we could go without them again.

#video games #disco elysium #capitalism

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cerastes · 3 months

Note

As someone who hasn't touched it yet- how does IS4 stack up? How's first impressions been?

Ok, let me give my thoughts on IS4, now that it's been a week!

TL;DR -> This Rocks, I love it.

IS4 is far, far more polished than IS3. I feel a bit bad blasting and slamming IS3 so much, but the bottom line with it is that it's just very very flawed in ways that really make it hard to revisit it in the same way IS2 is always a fun romp.

If I had to point out flaws with IS4, it'd be that, on a personal level, I wish it had a few more Normal Arknights Maps. The vast majority of maps in IS4 are pranks and checks of some sort. This isn't necessarily a negative, but I do like playing some Tower Defense more frequently than what IS4 allows, since it's always got me worried about "oh god my team lacks X, Floor Y's Map Z checks X, if I get it, I'll D I E " so I try to go for my super tried and true team instead of daring to experiment all that much. This will eventually pass, but it's been a Thing for me.

Besides that, though? I just have a lot of good things to say about it. The systems feel like they were thought out this time: The Fordartals (sp?) system allows for a lot of player expression, agency, and just in general fun in a way the Light system of IS3 can simply never hope to compare to. About the only thing the Light system did right was the way it worked thematically: If you wish to confront The Corrupting Heart, you really, really gotta go in the dark, and for the best possible chance against, Izumik, Mizuki must find the Light again and be filled with hope. Yeah ok sure, thematically, these work, but the gameplay component sucks ass, because Light exists almost exclusively as a form of punishment and in basically no way as something you can use. It opens some roads, sure, but that Rogue Trader and Wish Fulfilled node are not worth having 9 out of you 11 Operators with Metastatic. Speaking of Metastatic, the single worst thing Arknights has done, even if you are maxed out on Collapse in IS4 and are packing four fully upgraded maluses, THAT STILL DOESN'T COMPARE to how bad Metastatic was. Let that sink in.

The endings are no longer RNG! Absolutely wonderful!

Eik is the first IS 2nd Boss I can say I think is good! Frozen Monstrosity was just annoying, Big Sad Lock is incredibly static, and The Last Knight, in my opinion, is the single worst and most boring boss in the entire game, not even just the game mode. Eik is like if The Last Knight didn't suck: Same principle, but done in a way that is actually not snooze-inducing. Mind you, the principle of the fight is still not something I enjoy, but unlike The Last Knight, that's wholly a me thing, as opposed to being an objectively awful and boring fight (like The Last Knight, the worst and most boring boss in Arknights).

Even though I said I'd like some more normal maps, the maps are good, to be honest! I can't think of any Fire and Water Unions or Out of Controls.

IS4 is the Smash of Arknights: (Almost) Everyone Is Here! Brush up on your gimmicks from various events, because they WILL appear.

The Midboss philosophy in IS4 is lovely, in my opinion: It's low HP bosses who can quickly fuck you up in their own way, be it stun, immense conditional damage, or simply supporting their team so well that you get overwhelmed. The Variant stages for the bosses are entire new maps, so that's also cool.

Collapsal enemies are congruent with the map design: Collapsals can be very quick, with a caveat: Normal Collapsal mobs speed up after they get hit, Casters speed up after not attacking for a bit, Aerials are fast but always have many loops and never directly go to the point until after a while. Shattered Champions are the exception, and they can either loop a while or just go straight for the jugular, making them apt Elite units for the faction.

There's much more I could say more concisely, but really, just try the game mode, get your ass kicked a bit, learn it, and then you'll see how coherent the design of IS4 is in terms of systems, maps, enemies, and features. Sorry, IS3, but you got your ass absolutely kicked like I did on my Waves 15 runs when you'd give my 2 main DPS units Metastatic on Floor 5.

#arknights #bricelar

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azullumi · 1 year

Text

ayato, diluc, childe + alhaitham — playing horror games ☆彡

summary — you invited him to play a horror game with you to which he accepted. now, what will your experience with him will be?

characters — ayato, diluc, childe + alhaitham (w/ gender neutral reader)

tags — fluff, modern, multiple mentions of the word "game"; headcanons

word count — 1225

a/n — i hate the amount of times i used the word game because i couldn't find another word for it. nevertheless, enjoy!

KAMISATO AYATO

Apparently, there was a new game released and it captured the hearts of horror-games enthusiasts and you wanted to try it out, however, the game is hard to clear on your own so you had invited Ayato.

A horror game? Sure, he doesn't mind. He has played a few ones with his sister and Thoma before and it's been a long time since the last time he went through one.

At first, he's interested and curious but then when he starts playing, there's just confusion. He's just confused, not in a confused type wherein he doesn’t know what to do throughout the game but the type wherein he doesn’t know what is happening and is unaware of the events of the game. Are horror games really like this? As far as he can remember, these are supposed to be much scarier and frightening.

“Oh… Was that a jumpscare?”

He’s bored not until he witnessed your reactions so instead of focusing more on the game, his attention and eyes are all on you. He wants to see more of it so he purposely fails some parts of the game so you two could restart and have to go through it all again. Witnessing the change in your expressions and seeing the way you react is honestly so entertaining for him. Mans out here living the best life while you’re suffering.

Eventually, you’ll notice it. How he intentionally fails and suddenly becomes a bad player once you two get through the extreme parts. It took you quite some time to see through his tricks as you weren’t thinking much about it, however, he doesn’t admit it easily and will probably never do so.

“Are you trying to lose on purpose?”

“I don’t know what you’re talking abou— Ah, I died again. Looks like we’ll have to restart.”

DILUC RAGNVINDR

It doesn't take much persuading just to get him to play a game— a horror one to be exact— with you. He doesn’t mind it anyways and it’s not like he’s the type to get scared easily. It’s just some simple game with some scary components embedded in it.

At first, it was dead silence. You don’t know if he’s scared or just focused on clearing the game. However, the answer was the latter as he is unfazed by the jumpscares of the game and was more focused on the objectives. While you’re out there getting startled at every noise, whether loud or not, he’s focused on solving the puzzles and determining how to attain victory.

He guides you on what to do and even encourages you so that you won’t be scared. He doesn’t leave you behind and if ever you die at some part and you two have to restart, he’ll just say it’s okay and you two won’t have a hard time playing through it as you already know what you’re supposed to do. He’s honestly so sweet and gentle while playing and it just eases your mind knowing that you can rely on him.

“Are you scared? Come closer.”

“It’s okay, you can do this.”

He’ll let you lean on him though or hide yourself behind him. You’ll often block your point of view by using his arms as a cover whenever you feel like something scary will pop up on your screen and he will just let you be, looking at you with a soft smile on his face. He knows this isn’t the time for that but he just can’t help but think how adorable you are when you’re scared.

“You can open your eyes now, there’s no more jumpscare.”

Truly a reliable teammate.

CHILDE

He's the chatty type of person while playing, would often say remarks filled with confidence and would reassure you that you just have to follow him from behind and he can finish the game in no time. He's so confident and sure of himself that when you two started playing, you were relaxed because of the things he had said. God, you wish you didn't believe him.

He's the type to treat the game like it's some sort of comedy show and would laugh at certain elements of the game that are supposed to be scary. He makes fun of the “ghosts” and would challenge them to scare him. However, once he really gets to the jumpscare and intense parts, he becomes silent.

Then he goes back to being the normal chatty person that he is. He doesn't want to admit the fact that he is scared, especially after all that talk he did. He’ll convince you that he isn’t frightened at all and would attempt to regain his composure. It’s honestly cute how he tries his best to look strong and reliable.

You can’t help but tease him while playing, saying things that will scare him. Poke him for a bit and he suddenly jumps startled which also scares you.

"Archons above, (Name)! You just can't do that!"

"I just poked you."

After finishing the game, he'll just laugh and say, "that's all?" before asking you to watch a movie with him next. However, you shook your head and showed him the next game that you two are going to play and unfortunately for him, it’s a horror one again and it was a continuation of the previous one. He doesn’t have any choice but to play it with you.

“Don’t worry, if you’re too scared, you can cling to me.”

“Shut up.”

ALHAITHAM

He doesn't see the sense of even willingly playing horror games despite the fact that you'll just get scared, nevertheless, he still plays with you because why not. It’s not like he’ll die if he did. Maybe he'll end up seeing something interesting or maybe he just wants to see how you’ll react.

He’s the type to tease you by suddenly scaring you in tense and terrifying parts of the game then pretends that he didn’t do anything. At these times, the thought of how Alhaitham can be a little shit goes through your head and if you weren’t that scared right now and not leaning on him and using him as some sort of cover, you would have smacked him right on the head.

He’s expressionless, he’s unaffected by the horror factors of the game and would just continue on like nothing happened.

“It’s not that scary, (Name). It’s just a mannequin.”

“Look, there’s nothing terrifying here. It’s just the wind.”

You don’t know if you should be thankful for his comments because it was helping you to replace your fear with irritation. However, you can’t get mad at him because Alhaitham… Alhaitham was extremely helpful in clearing the game especially on the hardest parts and would tell you what you should do to avoid having to restart. Sometimes, he’ll throw in some words of encouragement here and there to further encourage you.

Despite the small yet constant bickerings and teasings, it didn’t take you long to finish the game. He thinks it was boring but if you were going to invite him to another one, he won't complain nor even hesitate in joining you.

“Let’s play another one.”

“Aren’t you scared already from the one we just played?”

He still doesn’t understand how you still want to play these games knowing the fact that you’ll just be frightened the whole time you’re playing though.

— navigation | masterlist

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commander-rahrah · 7 months

Text

Talking to the Moon: Part III

Pairing: Astarion x GN!Reader

Word Count: ~4450

archiveofourown: here

masterlist: here

part I: here part II: here

Summary: Set in Act II in Moonrise Towers, after meeting Ketharic and Araj the first time; Astarion finally comes to terms with his feelings for you, and takes a chance.

Notes: I love elements of both versions of Astarion’s confession scene, so I decided to combine them and add a little extra to them too! There is some dialogue borrowed from the game from Astarion's actual confession, but I added a lot more into it, especially with Tav/Reader's responses.

I love this pairing so very much. I know it is very soft, but I just think Astarion deserves someone soft and gentle and patient with him.

Thank you for reading and interacting! It means so much to me ♡♡♡

.·:¨༺ ༻¨:·..·:¨༺ ༻¨:·..·:¨༺ ༻¨:·..·:¨༺ ༻¨:·..·:¨༺ ༻¨

Bile was rising in Astarion’s throat. The scent of the room, the things that drow was doing to those vials of blood. It was wrong, all wrong. He thought he was a monster for the curse bestowed upon him. But whatever experiments were being conducted, they were monstrous in a completely different sense. His entire being had screamed at him to flee when she had turned her violet eyes onto him. He hated that she even knew his name. He wanted to get as far away from this miserable tower as possible. To go find the stupid artifact for themselves and never return. And the drow was still trying to convince him. Gods, he wished she would just give up. Maybe if he just gave in — it would be only a moment, and then it would be over. His body would still cringe as he remembered it, but he could just add it to the list. But then he glanced to you. You had shown him, the other night, the power of listening to yourself. Of stopping. Of saying no. Really, you had been teaching him that over and over during your little adventures together. When he first realized his new found freedom, all he could focus on was being away from Cazador. Being away from his looming, threatening presence — the pain, the anguish. What he didn’t realize was that freedom came with something else. Autonomy. A choice. Astarion had been making many of them, every day for weeks and he hadn’t realized. Sometimes they were tiny, insignificant decisions. And sometimes they were remarkable… or foolish. But they were his and his alone. And he felt like he could make them. That he wouldn’t be punished or gutted by the group. Betrayed or humiliated for it. And that was because of you.

When Astarion had decided to seduce you he had done it for his protection. He had seen your abilities and power those first few days and realized the threat you could pose to his master. He had done it to ensure you would be on his side, always — that you would never turn on him. What he hadn’t expected was how your protection would really feel, what it would entail. He knew he had your blade and powers now — just as you had his. But what you had given him was so much more than just your abilities. It was sanctuary. He felt shielded, secure. He could let his guard down, he had let his guard down with you. He could make decisions and mistakes and grow… Feel what he wanted, think what he wanted. So as he stared at you, his mind resolved. His red eyes narrowed as he gave his attention to the drow one final time, “I gave you my answer.” She scoffed, “Your control over your spawn has lapsed. Order him to do this, you will not regret it.” The alchemist spat at you, her arms crossed with irritation from his rejection. Even just the word spawn made the hairs on the back of his arms raise. And she thought you were his master. He knew exactly what Cazador would do if he were here. A bleak thought tried to surface in his head, but he forced it away. No, you weren’t like Cazador.

He trusted you. Your nostrils flared as you snapped your head to the mad alchemist, “He is his own person. And he gave you his answer.” “If you would just—“ “No,” You growled, stepping forward with your lips in a snarl. “He said no.” The group blinked at you — you had never been so short with anyone. You were usually flowery and lighthearted even when were outright rejecting someone. Even when someone had a blade pointed to your chest, you were at least civil. They had never seen you like this. Astarion’s red eyes flickered across you face, you seemed just as upset as he did. He could hear your heart thundering, your blood boiling. “Stay away from him.” Your tone was final, your jaw set. “I’ve had enough of this wretched place. Let’s get out of here.” You huffed, turning on your heel and marching out of the tower. Astarion trailed behind you and the rest of the group, studying you carefully. You were vibrating. He couldn’t recall ever seeing you this mad. He almost expected you to go into a rage like Karlach did. He knew you would often put on a mask — one that said everything was fine, everyone was good. You used it because you wanted to be a good leader, because you so often wanted to see the best in the world. He had seen it slip up before, had seen you remove it just for him. But this anger was something entirely new. And it was on his behalf? Astarion grasped that in defending him, not only had you revealed something about yourself, you had made him feel something he had not known in hundreds of years. Respected. Safe. Alive. Not a pawn or tool. A person. He realized that you were both just two people. And that one of you (and maybe if the gods were kind), both of you… stupidly cared for one another.

Fallen for the other. His plan had gone out the window much sooner than he wanted to admit to himself. He hadn’t been performing with you for quite some time. No, he had not been your plaything or object of desire. He had been… himself. A version of himself he had never known he could be. And the final step was to relinquish the thing he was harboring — control. To show you what he truly has to offer. To put his faith in you. And trust that in turn you would listen, and understand. And not immediately stake him through the heart. A thousand scenarios of how his confession would go began to swirl in his head. But his shoulders lifted as you all left the oppressive atmosphere inside. Even the doom and gloom of the Shadlowlands was appreciated over the dark energy swirling in Moonrise Towers. “Well, that was not what I’d expected.” Gale broke the silence first as the party finished crossing the bridge away from the imposing tower. You were about to begin the trek back to your camp. “Ketheric is…” “An abomination.” Lae’zel interjected, her teeth barred slightly as she spoke. Shadowheart let out a loud breath from her nose, “Agreed.” “Everyone in that place is vile.” Wyll grimaced as he looked over his shoulder, “That alchemist…” He glanced over to Astarion, worry plastered over his face. Though the vampire was sure it was for his missing father more than anything, not for him. “She was a little obsessive. But can you blame her?” Astarion put on his usual snark, letting out his fake laugh as he gestured at himself. “It wasn’t obsessive, it was disgusting.” Your voice was low — your distaste was clear. “She didn’t treat you as a person, only an object of her desire.” “She isn’t the first.“ He gave you a sad smile, before quirking his white eyebrows. “Well, she will be the last. And how dare she look to me, to try and get me to what—leash you? Control you? How dare she think of me as your master—“ “Darling,” Astarion grabbed onto your elbow, halting your rant and your movement. “You aren’t Cazador, trust me.” No, Cazador would have leapt at the opportunity. Not even for the potion. The sadistic bastard would make him do it just to get off on his humiliation. You were as opposite of Cazador as there could possibly be. The furrow in your brow softened, before you nodded your head. The pair of you looked around to realize you had stopped in the middle of the pathway, the rest of the party halted as well, watching your interaction. Realizing the sudden attention you cleared your throat, a blush creeping across your cheeks as you turned your attention back to the group. “Well, I think it’s best we get back to camp to strategize, right?” “Right.” Wyll nodded at you with a knowing smile, before you and the warlock started to lead the group again. Astarion’s red eyes trailed after you, a soft look tugging at his features. “You’re looking a little smitten lately, Fangs.” Karlach poked him in the ribs as she walked by, “Don’t worry, they look at you like that too.” She said over her shoulder, before taking extra long steps to catch up with you.

He fought the smile that stretched his lips, before trailing after you.

• • •

Astarion knew he was being anything but subtle as he sat across the campfire from you. His red eyes continually found their way to your figure throughout the evening. The different scenarios he had been imagining in his head were still swirling, consuming his every thought. When he told you his intended plan, but how he had fallen for you instead — how would you react? What if he told you and you laughed? Or screamed? Or attacked? His mind was a cruel, treacherous thing he realized. But his half-dead heart still thumped with the same tune of... hope. What if you had fallen too? Your laughter snapped him back to the present, the joyous sound something he had missed hearing lately. The shadowlands did not leave much time or room for happiness and lighthearted moments. But this evening seemed to be an exception. Gale continued his story, some tale of his about being a foolish boy with much too much time and magic on his hands. The group was hovering and sitting nearby as they listened. Even Shadowheart had joined, a small smile playing at the edges of her lips as she listened with Karlach’s arm slung behind her waist. “The hubris of wizards.” Lae’zel sneered with a roll of her eyes. “I do not understand how you have made it this far in life, istik.” “Dumb luck?” Wyll joked as he ruffled Gale’s brown hair. “Har har," The wizard rolled his eyes, before raising his finger in counterpoint, "But to be fair, the spell was transcribed improperly—" The group groaned collectively, but it was Karlach who spoke up, “Nooooooo, no more talk of proper etiquette and techniques. You’re the only one who cares for it!” He slumped, “Ugh, I miss Tara. She and I would have the most heated debates about proper techniques…” You placed an arm around his shoulders and gave him a half hug. “She is a much better companion than we are then.” You grinned at him, before finishing the last of your meal and placing the empty dish on your lap.

Envy coursed through Astarion at your casual touch with Gale. He wished... He wished he could touch that easily. Be touched that easily, so casually. Without a second thought.

“Are you done?” Shadowheart stood above you, with her small hand outstretched and gesturing to the empty dish in your lap.

“I— oh, yes,” You stumbled over your words before you held it out for her. She grabbed it gently, and you let out quiet words of gratitude. The cleric bowed her head bashfully, before grabbing the other dishes and heading to the river to wash up. Shock went through your face, your eyes shining bright and hopeful. It was the most interaction you’d had all week — and it had been soft and gentle. Remorseful, even. Karlach caught your eye and gave you a small smile — nodding her head in reassurance at you.

Eventually, the tell-tale signs of the camp beginning to wind down for the night started. Gale grabbed a glass of wine and his spellbook, before excusing himself to his makeshift desk near his tent. Wyll and Karlach were now playing cards, chuckling softly between hushed stories. Lae'zel had excused herself for an early night, and Shadowheart remained at the fire pouring over a book she had picked up today. You were kneeling in front of your tent, searching through your pack for something.

The vampire glanced around once more — if he didn't do it now, he didn't know when he would build up the courage to do it again. Standing up, he nervously picked at the sides of his leather pants as he tread closer to your tent. He made purposeful steps as he approached, alerting you of his presence.

"Astarion, hi." You sounded breathless as you stood up quickly, abandoning your belongings on the ground.

“Walk with me?” He quirked his eyebrow, his hands still twitching apprehensively at his side. “Sure,” You said with an easy smile, falling into step by his side as he brought you towards the sandy bed near the river. The sounds and sights of the camp began to get quieter and quieter as you walked away.

You both took in the sights around you, the dim evening light revealing the dark water that was flowing slowly and a quiet breeze that didn't snare in any of the bare branches. “Even with the curse — this place can be quite beautiful sometimes.” His red eyes glanced around before settling back on you, “You think so?”

"I do."

He thought that spoke more about you, then it did about the Shadowlands. Seeing the beauty in somewhere like this, was a reflection of your own. You made him believe that some good and beauty could really be found in such darkness. Clearing his throat, he spoke with his fingers twirling behind his back, “I brought you out here because… I think we need to talk.” You cocked your head, “About what?” “I— I, uh…," His steps stopped, then yours. "I want to thank you.” “For?” He turned to face you, “For what you said while I was in front of that vile drow. I spent two hundred years using my body to lure pretty things back for my master. What I wanted, how I felt about what I was doing, it never mattered. You could have asked me to do the same — to throw myself at her, what I wanted be damned. But you didn’t. And I’m grateful.” You winced, “I would never — You should never have to do something you don’t want to." “It’s a novel concept, I admit." He gave you a sad smile, "And a little intimidating… it would have been so easy to do it. Just to go along with what I was being told to do. A moment of disgust to force myself through. And then I could have carried on, just like before…”

But things were different now.

“That would’ve been wrong. How she treated you, how he treated you is wrong.”

"I know. I know that now. The entire reason for my existence was to seduce anything with a pulse. And every instinct I have tells me that nothing’s changed. That I’m still just a means to an end... But you made me see that I never stopped thinking like I was still his slave, even in freedom. But I’m more than that. More than a thing to be used.” The vampire stood up a little taller, his chin lifting.

"You are so much more, Astarion. You deserve so much more.” His mouth twitched as he tried to force down the swell of emotion climbing up his stomach and into his throat. “Are you all right?” “Oh yes, I’m fine. I just — feel awful." His throat bobbed as he swallowed, his eyes glancing down to his boots. "Look, I had a plan. A nice, simple plan — seduce you, sleep with you, manipulate your feelings so you’d never turn on me. It was easy — instinctive. Habits from two hundred years of charming people kicked in." He finally looked up at your face, studying intensely for your reaction.

"All you had to do was fall for it. And all I had to do was not fall for you… which is where my nice, simple plan fell apart. You… you’re incredible.” Your eyebrows raised on your face as you stepped a little closer, “Astarion… what are you saying?” “I'm saying... That I’ve fallen for you.” He finally admitted.

A look of astonishment crossed your face, before your lips pulled into the most beautiful smile he had even seen. If you were about to stake him — at least it would be a sweet death.

“And I you.” You whispered back. His mind went berserk, the thudding in his ears amplifying even more. “You — you have?” He sputtered. “Absolutely. Astarion, you are wonderful, you are… My parents paid for some of the best tutors you can find on this continent, and I still can’t think of the words to describe you.”

You both let out breathy nervous laughs, both of your eyes darting across the other's features with grins on your face.

The corners of his mouth turned down as he got serious, his voice thick with emotion. “You deserve something real. I want us to be something real.” “So do I. More than anything.” You admitted, your eyes sparkling with hope and maybe something a little more. “I just don’t know what real looks like. Not after two hundred years playing the rake. Being close to someone — any kind of intimacy— was something I performed to lure people back for him. Even though I know things between us are different, being with someone still feels… tainted. Still brings up those feelings of disgust and loathing. I don’t know how else to be with someone. No matter how much I’d like to.”

Because he did want to. There had been moments with you that had brought him such unexpected bliss, touch and pleasure more euphoric then anything he could have imagined. And he wanted to experience that again with you, all of it with you. But he wanted to experience it without it being marred from his past. “I care about you — deeply. For longer then I should admit… My feelings for you have been about more than sex and attraction for quite some time now.” He knew what you were saying was the truth. He’d seen the look on your face in the Last Light Inn — the hurt and pain etched into it when you thought he only saw you for sex. That in the last few weeks you too, had been stepping away from the physical — and yet, you still spoke to him, protected him, cared for him.

But he couldn't stop the little voice in the back of his mind. "Really? You're sure?"

"I've never been more sure. May I hug you?” You asked carefully, your brows furrowed ever so slightly.

Uncertainty flooded through him. No one had asked his permission like this before. No one had offered affection without some end in sight. But he remembered your previous soft touches, and noticed how cautious you were being now. He nodded his head, convinced. He awkwardly moved his arms out, unsure of how to do this.

You wrapped your arms around him slowly, giving him ample time to change his mind or pull away. He felt your fingers bunch the material on the back of his shirt, tugging at it gently. Your scent filled his nostrils, your warmth seeping into his cold body. No one had very touched him like this, comforted him like this. He choked back the sob that almost escaped him, his mouth puckering before he wrapped his own arms around you — burying his head into the side of your neck and pushing into you more.

Astarion wasn’t sure how long you stood there like that — but he didn’t really care. He hadn't realized how long he had yearned for this, for you.

It took every fiber of his being to pull away from you, but he caught your hand before you could fully pull away. "Honestly, I have no idea what we're doing... or what comes next." He placed his other hand on top of yours, enveloping them with what he hoped was a tender touch. "But I know that this? This is nice."

You gave him another life-changing smile, “It is. Isn’t it?”

He couldn't stop himself from matching your expression, “Gods, I feel so foolish — I don’t know how to do this, to be romantic or anything without—“

You interrupted him softly, “We will learn together. And take our time doing so.”

“Ugh, why do you have to be so patient and kind? It makes me like you even more.” He said exasperatedly, staring at your now intertwined fingers.

You looked up to the now inky black sky, “It’s getting late,”

He chewed the inside of his cheek, “I don’t want to turn in yet. I just got you to myself…”

“There will be more nights, I promise.” You assured him.

His eyebrows rose as he had an idea, but the worry of rejection flooded through him, “Would you, if you wanted, you can say no—“

“Starry.” You gave him a reassuring nod, your eyes telling him to speak up for himself.

“Stay with me tonight?” He asked in a hushed tone.

You quirked your lips, “Perhaps you need more time before we share a tent — even just to sleep. I do not want to rush you.”

“I—I must admit I quite enjoyed having you next to me while we just slept at the inn." He confessed.

“You would be comfortable with that?”

He nodded, “Yes, I believe so.”

“And if you change your mind?”

“I will tell you. I promise.”

“As you wish, love.” You squeezed his fingers once more, before beginning to lead him back towards the camp.

He stumbled behind you for a moment, slightly dazed.

Love. The name made his heart swoon and flutter. Gods, his name on your lips had made him come alive again, but that single word made him feel like he was the only person in the world.

• • •

Thankfully the rest of the party had retired to their tents by the time you two returned. The campfire snuffed out, and supplies tucked away. Scratch had lifted his head from his watch on a rock as you approached, but settled quickly as he saw who it was.

You had changed in your own tent, insisting on that boundary until more time had passed. You had been shivering in your nightclothes as you slipped into his tent and immediately hid under one of his blankets. Astarion had chuckled before joining you, leaving a respectable amount of space between you. A comfortable amount for him, as you insisted.

He couldn't help but look at you laying next to him. When he had laid next to you in the inn he had to force himself to look away, but he allowed himself to now. Your face and hair glowed in the soft light of the few candles he had kept lit. His eyes focused on your lips as you licked them before speaking.

“You are much braver than I am.” You whispered, keeping your voice low so as not to wake your sleeping companions.

The vampire scoffed, “Me? Brave? Darling, don’t make me laugh. I made Karlach wear me like a backpack today to cross over vines.” “To say what you did tonight first… I had been trying to work up the courage but I… I think I care about you so much it just terrified me.”

He had seen you stand up to cambions, run through burning buildings. But that is what terrified you? “Why?” Your brow instantly furrowed, your eyes flashing down. “I… I never thought you would reciprocate. I was happy to take whatever scraps you gave me because I just assumed… I’ve been told I’m hard to love most of my life. Too loud, too much.” “I could never have enough of you.” The words left Astarion’s lips without a second thought. Instant tears formed in your eyes, turning them silver in the glowing candle light. You clutched your chest for a moment, before brushing the tears away, “Oh, you can’t just say things like that.” “Even if they are true?” He asked, tilting his head.

“Astarion… I don’t know what I did to deserve you.”

He scoffed, "If anyone should be asking that it’s me.”

You shook your head at his intended self-deprecation, before settling onto the bedroll as you prepared yourself to sleep.

He watched your eyes flutter open and closed for a few times, before he spoke again quietly. “Would you tell me one of the things?”

“Hmmm?” You asked with a hum, your eyes still closed as you rolled slightly closer to hear him. “A few weeks ago you— you said that you wished I could see myself the way you do… How do you see me?”

Though he was overjoyed with you reciprocating his feelings, he couldn’t help but be bewildered by them. Why him? Out of all the people you had met and befriended, why in the hells had you picked him? He was violent, arrogant, traumatized…

Your expression softened as you opened your eyes, a happy sound escaping you as you thought. “I love the way you act when you think no one is looking.” He blinked. “What ever do you mean?” “Oh, when you hum around camp when doing chores or… oh, that cat at the inn. You were so delighted, petting that the little thing.” You smiled at the memory, “Everyone is afraid of being perceived, I know. And with the walls you built around yourself… it is such a lovely sight to see when you let them down for a moment.”

He stared at you in disbelief. You had been seeing him for longer than he realized.

He whispered your name, before choking out. ”I— Thank you.”

You looked over at him like he was the stars in the sky. “Goodnight Astarion.” You said sleepily, your eyes fluttering closed as you began to doze off. “Sweet dreams, darling.” He rolled over onto his back, his eyes moving from your form to close and see you in his dreams instead. A smile tugged on his lips as he fell into his trance.

And so began the nights of you joining him in his slumber.

Even just laying next to him, your presence was a gift. Blanketing him with safety and companionship — granting him a peace he had never known.

The deepest intimacy he had ever experienced. And he wasn’t afraid of it. It wasn’t painful.

And perhaps that is why the moon came up every night — so that the stars did not feel so alone.

Part IV

#bg3 fanfic #bg3 astarion #astarion ancunin #astarion x reader #astarion x gn reader #astarion x tav #astarion/tav #astarion/reader

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the-fiction-witch · 5 months

Text

The Magic Of Men

Media The Artful Dodger

Character Jack Dawkins

Couple Jack X Reader

Rating Smut Discussions

Requested: Could you do a Jack Dawkins one where she has no experience and doesn't really know how men work (because it's 1850s and she isn't married lol) but she's curious? Up to you what you do with that :)

I felt insanely awkward about doing this, but... not like I had many other options. I headed up the stairwell of the hospital and up to the little room I knew well. I gave the door a tap, and soon enough his voice answered.

"Come in,"

So I held my breath and headed inside the little room, seeing the usual objects littered about and two figures, Fagin sat in the chair fiddling with something not sure what, and then Jack stood by his wardrobe changing his shirt. Immediately I blushed and looked away, "Hi,"

"Hi Y/n, Just a sec I'll be down." Jack smiled as he got a clean shirt on, "Sorry had to change we had a bloody nightmare of surgery. You ready to go?"

"Actually, I was thinking... Maybe we could stay here tonight?"

"uhhh right, Why?"

"Well given everything with Darius, I figured maybe we could just stay and play cards here tonight. I brought us some cookies to bet with?"

"Aww you're sweet, that's great actually I can't spend any money." He laughed, "Alright piss off Fagin."

"Ohh lovely, I see when I'm not wanted." Fagin complained getting up and shuffling to the door, "Bloody sweet talk to the man who raised you!"

"Out Fagin," he told him again,

Fagin then left leaving Jack and me alone,

"You alright?"

"Yeah sorry uhh long day is all..."

"Alright, well get comfy."

"Thank you," I smiled taking a seat setting my basket down and unpacking it,

"Ohh did you make pie!?"

"I did,"

"Can I have some?" he asked sheepishly

"Of course," I smiled cutting him some pie,

"Ummmm! you are an angel you know that."

I blushed but we started our card game as usual, we played for a good while the whole time I was eager to ask but I didn't want to just jump out the gate with things. But I knew I couldn't wait much longer.

"Jack?" I spoke up breaking the flow of our gentle conversation,

"Yeah?"

"Can I... Can I ask you something?"

"Sure," he shrugged,

"Could you tell me, about- Men?"

He froze a moment his eyebrows lowered, his eyes looking at me questionably, "What about men?"

"...Everything,"

"Right..." he began, "why?"

"Well, It's just..." I began, "My mother is getting, insistent on me starting to court, starting to look into me getting married and I know so little about men, how they work, what they like, I have no idea and I'm very confused."

"Men are a mystery" He chuckled,

"I know, But I just want... some knowledge."

"All right."

"Really?"

"Yeah, can't leave you completely clueless." He smiled, "You're such an innocent little thing, the first man who realizes just how innocent and... naive you are, will take advantage of your lack of information." He explained,

"They will?"

"Ohh yeah, the first man figures out you don't know what you're doing there's no telling what he'll make you do." He chuckled, "But why are you asking me?"

"Becuase I trust you."

"Do you?" he shot me a look,

"I trust you enough."

"Thanks,"

"Also you know… you're a doctor I imagine you're able to explain it better than the average man”

"Good point, So? You wish to know the magic of men?’

“I do”

“Alright then… Well, how much do you know?"

“Well… I know on the wedding night the lady must lie on her back and open her legs for he husband. And then he will make babies.”

“...that's it?”

"more or less”

“Ohh my god- how does anyone expect you to know what you're doing with that, you sure you aren't told anything else?"

"that if I raise my skirt too high or too low men will be excited”

“...I mean, yeah that kinda is true.” He nodded, "There's more to it but on a basic level I guess... anything else?"

“Uhhh my mother said if you let a man put his baby goo in your mouth and swallow it you'll have babies growing in your tummy”

"…What!”

“If you let a man-”

“I heard you! I'm just fucking astonished!”

“Is that not true?"

“No! You can't get pregnant like that!”

“Ohh I see… why would my mother like to me?"

"I assume to stop you putting men in your mouth… she tell you anything else?”

“The female orgasm is a myth”

“WHAT! your mother is fucking nuts!"

"Is that not true?"

"No! I am very VERY sure about that!"

"Ohh..."

"Ohh you poor little thing..." He said,

"Why?"

"You need an education." He said, "So when a man and a woman love each other very much..."

"Yes?"

"They start to kiss, and cuddle, and tell each other how they feel. And then they may decide to be... Intimate."

"I see," I nodded very eager to learn,

"And yes when a man sees under a lady's dress he may get... excited." He smirked, "A woman's body is often very exciting for a man to look at, and if he gets excited enough he'll get hard."

"Hard?"

"His... you know."

"His what Jack?"

"you really are innocent aren't you," He chuckled, "Well a man has a cock. most of the time it's just soft and not really anything all that important but when a man gets excited his cock gets hard, It'll stand up and kinda make itself stiff."

"Ohh... Why?"

"It's all the blood rushing there and causing it to expand and stay stiff, so he can use it for sex."

"Ohh Okay, so it gets hard for sex?"

"Yeah, it gets hard when he's excited and aroused."

"Okay, then he makes baby goo?"

"Baby goo?"

"Yeah, he gets excited until baby goo comes out."

"... It's called Jizz. or ejaculate. but yeah it makes babies."

"Jizz. makes babies. But not in mouths?"

"No, only in your pussy."

"Pussy?"

"The ... hole between your legs y/n."

"Ohh my special place."

"Yeah, you lay on your back, or your side, or you can sit up too there's a lot of options but the main point is he puts his cock inside your pussy, and it feels amazing for both involved and yes you should get an orgasm you both should and when a man orgasms then yes he will Jizz and if it is inside of your pussy there is a RISK not one hundred per cent just a risk that you may get pregnant."

"Hu... Thank you, Jack,"

"You're welcome. See men aren't all that magic and mystical... we are pretty simple, to be honest."

"What about other than sex?"

"Other than sex? Well yeah if you put a man's cock in your mouth it will also give him an orgasm but you can't get pregnant,"

"Do women get orgasms other than sex?"

"Yeah, they can, a man can use his mouth, or his hands, or even women can do it themselves."

"That's possible?"

"Very possible."

"Can... men do it to themselves?"

"Yes."

"Hu... Then why do you need a wife at all?"

he looked at me and laughed, "Because it's not the same having sex and giving yourself an orgasm isn't the same feeling,"

"Ohhh..." I nodded, "That makes sense,"

"You alright now? Anything else you wanna know?"

"Uhhh... Kinda,"

"Go on then,"

"What does a cock look like?"

"Uhhhh are you serious?"

"I've never seen one before... I'm curious."

"Yeah, I don't exactly have pictures of dicks laying around y/n."

"This is a hospital if anywhere has pictures and diagrams of dicks it's here."

"No, I don't, sorry Y/n," he chuckled going to lay on his bed for a moment, "I'm rather tired after all that explaining" he yawned,

"Sorry Jack," I smiled sitting on his bed with him,

"It's fine, I'm happy to explain to you, at least now you're not so naive,"

"I guess now, I'm thankful to be less naive."

"Good, I'm glad I could help."

For a moment we just sat enjoying one another company as we often did, before I little spark of a whisper popped up in my brain, and I giggled.

"What?"

I smiled and held the skirt of my dress lifting it a little to show my leg all the way up to my knee, Jack's eyes met my skin and a smirk grew across his lips,

"what are you up to y/n?"

"Just curious."

"Curious?"

"Umm, I wanna see the magic of men."

"Do you know?"

"Mhm, so? Are you excited?"

"...A little." He smirked, "This what you want?" he asked sitting up and I nodded excitedly, "Alright Y/n, Come on I'll prove to you about the female orgasm" He smirked tugging me into the bed with him,

#tbs smut #thomasbrodiesangster #tbs imagine #thomas sangster imagine #tbs imagines #thomas brodie sangster imagine #thomas brodie sangster #tbs #thomas brodie sangster smut #thomas sangster #jackdawkins #jack #jack dawkins #theartfuldogger #thearttfuldodger #the artful dodger

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