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planet-dusk · 7 months

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yunho princess treatment 🤭

🏷️ jeong yunho x fem!reader. cw ; fingering, choking, praise, slight size kink, pet names: love, princess, good girl ( 587 w. )

minors dni. for mature audiences only !

“tell me what you need, love.”

yunho’s breath tickled the side of your face. his fingers burned hot on your bare thigh, inching closer to the apex.

“n-need your fingers inside of me, yuyu, please.” you knew you didn't have to beg; he’d give you the moon and the stars if he could. still, it came natural to you.

yunho chuckled, then hissed when his calloused fingertips came in contact with your soaked panties. “this wet for me already, princess?” he swallowed your moans when he sank two long fingers into your aching hole, “can’t wait to feel this tight pussy around my cock.”

he found the right spot with ease, fingers curling and his thumb drawing firm circles over your clit. “that’s my girl right there,” he muttered when your eyes rolled back in pleasure. “will you cum for me, love?”

you nodded dumbly, eyes already glazed over and fingers curled tight around his biceps. “choke me,” you managed to get out between moans, and yunho wasted no time in wrapping his large hand around the column of your throat. he kept his touch light, only applying dizzying pressure on the pulse points at the side, the effect immediate.

your legs fell open wider and yunho’s eyes trailed from your puffy cunt back to your blissed out face. “you look so pretty like this, love,” he mused, tightening his grip. “all spread out for me. greedy pussy’s sucking in my fingers like you haven’t been fucked in days.”

in truth, it’d only been two nights. it was impossible to go for long without yunho, and he knew it. he always gave you exactly what you wanted. he’d tease you about it first, sometimes, but he was just as quick to give in. you were his princess and he treated you accordingly.

“i’m going to make you cum on my fingers, love, and then i’m going to fuck you.” yunho’s voice sounded low and determined, “any way you want, for as long as you want. how does that sound?”

you tried to answer, a pathetic choked-off whine leaving your throat, his hand still wrapped tight around it. yunho knew you were close; the telltale signs as familiar to him as the back of his own hand. that same hand he now watched pumping in and out of your soaked pussy, your juices dripping down his fingers and pooling in his palm.

“you need to cum fast, princess, before i fold you in half and fuck you full,” he groaned. “i can’t wait much longer. look at you —” he flexed his fingers around your throat before tightening them again “— you’re such a vision, love. prettiest little thing i’ve ever seen. tiny pussy’s taking my fingers so well, need me to add a third? get you ready to take my fat cock?”

the stretch made you keen, your hips bucking up into his hand. he rolled his thumb over your swollen clit and watched you fall apart under him, pinned to the bed by his hand around your throat. “that’s it, you’re doing so well love, just a little more.” he slowed down his movements, dragging out your high until you began to squirm underneath him.

“my good girl,” he brought his fingers up to your mouth and you latched on eagerly, moaning around them when you felt the head of his cock bumping your clit, “don’t worry, i’ll give you what you want, you know i will.”

you knew, and you’d never get enough of him.

#ateez smut #ateez hard hours #ateez imagines #ateez headcanons #ateez x reader #ateez fanfic #yunho x reader #yunho smut #;ateez blurbs

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genericpuff · 11 months

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You mentioned multiple times that Persephone is a self insert of Rachel, how is that so?

Also, I love Lore Rekindled

So obviously it's not like Rachel herself has outright stated that Persephone is a self-insert, but there's a lot of narrative and visual evidence that points to this being so.

Disclaimer before I continue: a lot of this is speculation, take it with grains of salt, but understand that all of the following evidence is why so many people subscribe to the idea that Rachel is using Persephone as a self-insert power fantasy, myself included. This is going to be a long post.

First, the most obvious - Rachel and Persephone look virtually identical, especially when Persephone's hair is short. In a way that's not even reaching at this point, like there are times when Persephone literally looks like she was traced directly off Rachel's face. It's panels like these where you don't even have to squint or fill in the blanks with your own interpretations, Persephone literally looks like Rachel.

There was also that time she dyed her hair pink and her own audience called out how she looked like Persephone (unironically for the most part, which goes to show how much the implications of Persephone being a self-insert of Rachel has gone over their heads, sigh)

She's also made absurd claims in interviews that Persephone and Hades were her "muses" since all the way back in middle school.

I say these claims are 'absurd' because frankly I just don't think that's true, there's nothing from her early-mid 2000's online presence (which is still accessible via the Wayback Machine) that suggests she was into Greek myth content, most of her stuff from back then was medical fetish and lolita art and not a single piece of Greek work is mentioned on any of her profile bios, favorite book lists, or interests, not even once you get to the 2010's when she started shifting away from blatant medical fetish art and more towards marketable storybook-style art.

(she definitely mentions Lolita though 😒)

I firmly believe she's just making up that whole "Persephone and Hades were my muses" thing the same way she's made up her 'folklorist' label to hide the fact that she has no connection to Greek myth whatsoever and was just creating LO on a whim during the era of Hades x Persephone shipping prompts that were popular on Tumblr at the time. It just so happened to become massively popular so she stuck with it and tried to pretend like she always loved Greek myth as a way to justify her success when really it was just luck and circumstance.

But we can go further back than that.

You see, Rachel also really... really likes Mads Mikkelson. Like, beyond just enjoying his work and entering teenage girl obsessive cringe territory. I wouldn't be calling it out if she was a teenage girl or even a young adult, but she isn't - she's thirty seven years old.

Mads Mikkelson is, of course, her dream cast for Hades, and when you see how she views Mads Mikkelson, the rest practically writes itself.

But we can go even further back than that.

Because, you see, Rachel has old art accounts from long before Lore Olympus. Normally I try to avoid posting a lot of this stuff because it's very much old skeletons that we usually understand to leave buried, but this particular piece is very relevant to this discussion.

'Madame issue' was the screenname of her account where this drawing comes from. You may also notice this is very likely where the name 'used bandaid' came from. This character is meant to be Rachel. It was very common for her to draw herself with short pink hair back then and it seems that's barely changed now.

Just wanna also throw it out there real quick that Rachel's birthday is March 21st. Guess what date Rachel chose to make Persephone's birthday? Oh yeah, the first day of Spring, literally March 20th. Which shouldn't even exist yet as Lore Olympus is based on The Hymn to Demeter which outlines the creation of the season. But I digress.

Now, this may be a little irrelevant and nitpicky, but to circle back around to the point I made earlier about her not having any genuine connection to Greek myth, Rachel seems to have always behaved like this, in a way that tries to 'hide' the fact that she's not 'legit'. There are old FAQ's from her art pages that answer questions she's asking herself in a very arrogant "how dare you ask me this" kind of way. Like, she claims to have imposter syndrome, which I'm not saying is a lie, but if she does, she definitely uses blind arrogance as a way to cover up for it. It reeks of early 2000's 'mean because it's cool to be mean' energy and that seems to be an attitude that she hasn't left behind in the early 2000's where it belongs - she's just channeled it into 'girl boss' Persephone instead.

It's become abundantly clear after going through old LO asks/livejournal/flickr/etc. posts that Rachel herself 1.) romanticizes purity culture (again, like the Greek myth 'self-proclaimed folklorist' thing, she's trying to claim she's 'deconstructing' purity culture when her actual beliefs are the exact opposite), 2.) values naivety and youthfulness vs. experience and wisdom, especially with how she talks about Persephone and 3.) constantly tries to act like a 'boss babe' similarly to Persephone.

There's also the fact that the time skip perfectly aligned Persephone's age to be in the same range as Rachel - she's now 30 to Rachel's 37. The time skip didn't have to be exactly ten years, if it was purely to retcon the age gap problems then she could have made it far longer, but she made it specifically 10 years and I feel like it can't be a coincidence when we consider how close in age Persephone and Rachel now are. Recalling that earlier point that Rachel seems to be obsessed with naivety and youthfulness, she probably didn't like the idea of making Persephone 40 because that would be too "old".

That's not even getting into the actual way that Persephone is written. This is the part where I say there's nothing inherently wrong with writing self-inserts, even famous authors do it, but the issue lies in authors writing them as power fantasies and not actual fleshed out characters. Persephone is not a fleshed out character. She does not have flaws - at least none that are recognized as flaws - and she never loses. She does whatever Rachel wants her to do on a whim even if it contradicts previous actions or information we've been shown. Sometimes she's an inexperienced "uwu" teenage girl, other times she's attempting to be a 'boss babe' (but really it just comes across as her acting like a Karen.)

All that said, it's not uncommon for poorly written self-inserts to lack consistent characterization because the author is too hopped up on writing them to fulfill their fantasies, even if those fantasies don't align with pre-existing information. There's also the fact that Persephone herself never suffers any consequences for her actions, even when she's in the wrong, and terrible things that happen to her are more for the sympathy of the audience and less for actual character development, depth, or underlying meaning. The comic's universe and the characters that reside within it bend around Persephone and her wants and needs, and this is something that happens with poorly-written self-inserts a lot especially when they're being written purely as power fantasies and not actual character studies or reflections. Nothing bad will ever happen to Persephone, she'll never suffer real consequences for her actions, and she'll never make any real sacrifices, because Persephone is Rachel and Rachel can't write Persephone separate from herself.

This kind of goes hand in hand with the whole "she didn't make Persephone 40+ because then she'd be too old" thing, but I'd also like to mention real quick that Rachel has never written a female character who isn't like this. All of her main characters from all of her works are women, which is perfectly fine in isolation, but they're all written as the exact same woman, sharing traits of naivety, inexperience, youthfulness and innocence. None of her female characters are over the age of 21. Making Persephone a "doesn't know she's sexy" 19 year old who's often drawn very childlike was very intentional as it's the exact same kind of character she's been drawing for years now, and the fact that she's 30 now is simply Rachel trying to retcon the problematic age gap that she got called out on; with the added bonus that it makes Persephone even more like Rachel.

No, Rachel has never directly confessed to Persephone being a self-insert, but I don't think someone like Rachel - who already speaks with a veil of disingenuous arrogance - would admit to it anyways. The writing is on the wall: how she's written Persephone and every female protagonist who has preceded her is a deliberate choice based around Rachel's own beliefs and values - that women are only desirable when they're young and thin, that the "ideal man" is someone who's above everyone else in power, wealth, and status and will and should use that power, wealth, and status to get what they want, and that women should be as cute and innocent as they can be until any degree of opposition or questioning comes their way, in which they are justified in exercising outright cruelty and abuse towards those in their way, with no in-between.

And that's all I'm gonna say on that.

#lore olympus critical #lo critical #antiloreolympus #anti lore olympus #ama #ask me anything #anon ask me anything #anon ama

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ikeromantic · 11 months

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Kyubei - Secret - 🤭

Alas, poor Kyubei. The suitor that deserves to be! Approx. 1700 words.

Kyubei had a secret. In the grand scheme of things, it wasn’t an important secret. No fortunes would be made or destroyed by it. No lives irrevocably changed. If it got out, there would be no wars fought over it or assassinations because of it. The secret was small and his and he held it in him like a child’s lantern held candle-light. The warm glow of knowing it made his life more bearable.

“What are you smiling about?” Mitsuhide’s sharp gold gaze landed on him as he brought in the night’s reports.

“Am I smiling?” Kyubei drew his mouth into a firm line.

Akechi’s own mouth spread in a grin. “You were.”

“Then perhaps I am learning from you.” Kyubei did his best to imitate the razor sharp smile his lord was known for. And then, before more questions could come, he set his bundle down on Mitsuhide’s desk. “There are two missives from Kasugayama, one from Kyoto, and a full report from one of our eyes in the south.”

News would draw away the too-perceptive eye of his lord. And it did. Mitsuhide opened the bundle, long slim fingers graceful as they plucked the important papers from the rest that could be read later.

Kyubei did not wait to be dismissed. He was already backing out with a bow when Mitsuhide glanced up. “Stay. I may have need of you yet.”

“Yes, my lord,” he replied. Because what other reply could he give? Kyubei settled in, watching Akechi read through the urgent reports. He already knew what was in them, and had a fair idea of what his lord would request done. Another agent sent south, some letters and payments to certain merchants that traveled through Kasugayama, and for Kyoto . . .

His musings cut short as the door opened. The chatelaine stepped in with a tray of tea and some food. “I know you don’t break for lunch but I thought -” she paused as she noticed Kyubei standing there. “Oh! Hello!”

“Princess.” Kyubei bowed, hoping the movement would hide his face long enough to subdue the sudden rush of heat in his cheeks.

The chatelaine smiled at him shyly and tucked her hair over her ear. The tray wobbled in her remaining hand and he darted forward to take it from her. “Thank you. It would be just like me to make a mess when I’m trying to be helpful. I’m so clumsy.”

“You are as graceful as a deer, princess. Next time, ask me. I am pleased to help.” He couldn’t take his eyes off her face. She was so beautiful.

“Ahaha, no - omg - no. No one has ever said I am like a deer.” She wasn’t laughing at him or his words, but at herself and it made Kyubei’s heart feel full to bursting to share this moment with her.

Kyubei returned her smile with one of his own. “Then I am lucky to be the first. Though I am surely not to be the last to notice your beauty.”

And then Mitsuhide cleared his throat, reminding them both that he was there and an unwilling audience to this awkward, inappropriate moment.

In just a heartbeat, Kyubei came crashing back to reality. To the world in which he was a vassal, a man that should not even look above the feet of an Oda princess. The warm glow of his secret fluttered in his chest, buffeted by the cold truth. He turned from her and set the tray on his lord’s desk without another word.

“S-sorry to distract you two,” the chatelaine told them. “I just wanted to make sure you ate something today. Besides whatever crumbs are in your pockets.”

Mitsuhide gave a wry laugh. “I promise you, I eat when I am hungry. I do not need you to look after me. You or that meddlesome dragon.”

The chatelaine blinked in surprise. “I didn’t say anything about Masamune!”

“You didn’t have to. This has his mark all over it.” Mitsuhide sighed. “I suppose now that you’ve brought it, I must appreciate the effort appropriately. But you will stay and enjoy it with me.”

Kyubei saw his exit and gladly took it. “Then I will leave you both to -”

“No. Kyubei, why don’t you stay? Have a cup of tea.” Mitsuhide’s smile was relentless.

“As you command.” He poured three cups of tea, tense and reluctant but determined not to give anything else away.

The chatelaine watched him with interest. “You’re so good at that. The perfect pour. Have you practiced?”

“Yes, have you?” Mitsuhide’s grin grew wider.

Kyubei swallowed. “Yes? I am always seeking to improve my service to the Akechi.”

She laid a hand on his arm and the light touch sent heat coursing through him. “Maybe one of these days we can hang out and you can show me your technique.”

Which was exactly the sort of offer Kyubei dreamt of. Time alone with just the chatelaine. Spending time with her, listening to her. But he couldn’t say yes because he was only a vassal and she -

“I’d be happy to lend Kyubei to you for whatever you like. In fact, he’s an excellent instructor for many subjects.” Mitsuhide gave a nod. “You could start this evening.”

“I must - what?” His polite refusal halted as his lord’s words sunk in.

The chatelaine clapped her hands excitedly. “That’s great! But . . . only if he wants to. You can’t loan him out like a bike, Mitsuhide!” She turned the full force of her gaze on Kyubei. “So, would you be willing?”

And of course, he couldn’t say no to her. Not when she looked at him like that. “I would be glad to,” he replied, which was the simple truth.

Mitsuhide picked up his tea and took a sip. “Then that is settled.”

The break felt to Kyubei like a fever dream. Each time a subject came up, Mitsuhide would look at him and say, “Kyubei can tell you more about that.” Or, “Kyubei is an expert in -” Or even, “What are your thoughts, Kyubei?”

And the chatelaine’s eyes were on him and he felt as if his whole body might catch on fire. He fought the heat down from his cheeks but feared his expression made his feelings too clear.

When they finished with the tea and snacks, the chatelaine stood up and picked up the tray. “Sorry again for interrupting. But I hope you enjoyed the food.”

“Certainly. And the company as well.” Mitsuhide grinned. “Feel free to stop in whenever you like, little mouse.”

“Yes, thank you for coming by,” Kyubei bowed low, reminding himself again that she was a princess and he was a vassal and this was a favor to his lord. Not to him. Not for him. Not about him.

His secret flickered, wavering, but held steady. It was alright, he told himself, to hold this one-sided love. So long as she never found out. When he straightened, his expression was appropriate. Only polite. Nothing more.

The chatelaine grabbed his hand and squeezed it. “I am glad you were here when I did! I’ll see you later. Tonight.” She smiled. “It will be fun.”

And he couldn’t help but smile back, genuinely looking forward to it. “I am looking forward to it.”

She let him go and left, and when she was gone the office felt so much emptier. Kyubei took a deep, slow, steadying breath before turning back to work.

Mitsuhide studied his expression and then sighed. “You will have to work on that.”

“On what?”

“Hmm. On what indeed.” He picked up one of the reports he’d been reviewing before they were interrupted. His eyes returned to the text. Kyubei thought he was in the clear until a few minutes later when he spoke up again.

“She’s quite pretty. Not a court beauty, of course. But pretty.” Those piercing gold eyes found him again.

Kyubei chose to play dumb. “Who are we speaking of?”

Mitsuhide’s knowing smile was his answer. Then, a few minutes later, “She isn’t a princess either.”

“The Oda adopted her.” Kyubei’s back tightened as he realized his lord was not going to let this drop. He buried his secret further down, hiding it under the proper words.

Mitsuhide nodded and his gaze returned to the page as if that was the only point he needed to make. But this time, Kyubei didn’t relax. He knew what his lord was like on the hunt. And he was surely hunting now.

“There is more than one tale in which a commoner marries a princess.” Mitsuhide didn’t look up this time, and Kyubei was glad for that because he wasn’t sure what face he made right then. “And those were women born into it. She barely knows what her title means.”

He took a moment before replying, calming the part of his heart that leapt in response to that idea. “Perhaps. But most of those tales end in tragedy, too.”

Mitsuhide scoffed. “Because they were ill-considered.” He did look up then, and there was something in his gaze besides the usual calculation. An unexpected kindness. “I know you are many things, Kyubei. My most trusted assistant. My friend. But you are never careless.” He smiled and it was a gentler expression than his cutting crescent moon grin. “Should you - and I am not saying you are - but should you ever find yourself in love with any kind of princess, take hold of that happiness while you can.”

Kyubei nodded. He understood the fragile hope he was being handed. The gift, given with intent. “I will take that under consideration, my lord.”

“Good.” Mitsuhide’s eyes sparked with mischief. “And when you do, please do me a great favor. Moon after her out of my sight? I think your passionate gazes left syrup on my reports.”

“At your command,” Kyubei chuckled. “But surely it wasn’t that obvious.”

“I could have scraped sugar from the walls, watching the two of you dance around each other. She was about to crawl into your lap.”

“No. She was not! And I was holding back! Trying to be appropriate!” Kyubei protested.

Mitsuhide shook his head. “If that was your best attempt to pretend not to like a girl, I’m going to have to reconsider sending you out to spy for me.”

“You are as cruel as they say,” he sighed and put a hand to his chest. But inside, he was aglow with hope. Delicate as it was, as improbable and unlikely as anything, he was in love with a princess and maybe - just maybe - that was alright. She might even like him back.

#ikemen sengoku #ikesen kyubei #kyubei #fanfiction #fanfic #otome #otome guys #fluff

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arctic-shard · 4 months

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scp-012 causes whoever saw it to continue the notes using their own blood and if that person were to finish a section of the sheet, the person will kill themself declaring the piece is impossible to finish, I just thought it would be interesting gift for the Yellow Lord.

Bumping this up the queue because the furnace is broken and my office is too cold to work in, so drawing is out for now ( I can set my laptop up anywhere, but hauling out the peripheries like the scanner is Too Much Effort and I have no space for it in my temporary workspace. ) But I can write, and while I could just do a little illustration for this, the idea intrigues me too much to leave it at that anyway.

Dunno how old you are @randomlbirdo, so here's the warnings: No sex happens but there's a couple mentions of Odious as a sexually-active being. Self-harm, sort of, does it count when you're not doing it to hurt yourself, you just need to feed blood to a cursed artefact?

----------

The Unending Crescendo

The Yellow Lord Odious has an anomalous object stolen from the Foundation. It can resist the curse, but it can't resist a challenge …

---

The Lords of Alagadda, much as they considered Earth a backwater world, still kept an eye on it with their agents and cults. It was a wild place, full of emotion and stories and creativity and Alagaddans craved those things.

The Earth also contained the SCP Foundation - not a threat, but something to keep tabs on. The Foundation meddled with Alagadda occasionally, which was what initially drew the attention of the lords, but what kept their attention were the artefacts the Foundation had hidden away in storage. In their attempt to keep anomalies out of the hands of their fellow humans, the Foundation had gathered them up into convenient boxes that a determined Alagaddan Lord could borrow whenever it pleased.

There were ways to smuggle things in and out of Alagadda unchanged. They involved complicated alchemical wards and rituals, but it was doable.

This was not what the Yellow Lord, Wearer of the Odious Mask, was thinking about at the moment. It had put such plans into action weeks ago. It was busy in its study, sketching out musical notes as it played them - primary hands on the violin, secondary to write. The wastebasket nearby was overflowing with torn and crumpled sheets. Aside from the desk, the room contained dozens of musical instruments, including the organ it used for practice. The grand pipe organ of il Palazzo dell'Ira was in the audience hall.

Odious snarled as a knock on the door distracted it. Not that it was making any more progress than usual, but what if this time the notes were correct? It set down the violin with uncharacteristic gentleness, crumpled the sheet and threw it in the general vicinity of the wastebasket, then stalked to the door and flung it open.

A servant stood there, struggling with the weight of a gold case covered in alchemical symbols and the Yellow Lord's brand. The servant tried to lift the case to present it, but the gold was too heavy. "My Lord, I have the artefact. But do be careful with it."

The servant flinched under Odious' glare, the Yellow Lord not deigning to answer vocally. How dare this lesser being be concerned for it and not hateful? Odious was no apprentice alchemist who needed warnings, Odious was one of the great powers of Alagadda. But it did note how reluctantly the servant parted with the case, not because it wanted to protect Odious but because the artefact inside pulled at it. Odious had prepared for that - once the case was locked, only Odious could open it again, protecting its lessers from the artefact's curse. Odious needed the servant alive to deliver it, after all.

Odious chased the servant away, locked the door, and set the gold case on its desk.

It was one of the contradictions of Alagadda that Alagaddans were not themselves creative. The Humours were muses, sparking creativity in lesser beings but incapable of true creation themselves. Mirth was too stupid to care about this and Diligence even seemed to prefer copying, but Odious was different. Its role to be discontented, and one of those sources of discontent was that it was unable to compose its own music. Every time it tried, it only heard other composers - not mere influences but the core of the work. Nothing in its own compositions was Odious.

Deep in its twisted heart, Odious longed to be heard. Perhaps the only one who truly knew Odious was the Hanged King itself as it plundered Odious' mind for new sensations. But did the King really know it? Was it only interested in the hate Odious was created for and ignored its soul?

Odious could scream and use telepathy and fuck and torture, but these were all crude methods of communication compared to music. Music was pure. If Odious could just compose something of its very own, if it could write its Self in musical notation, maybe it would finally reach someone. Maybe someone would finally understand.

Maybe the King would be proud.

Millennia of failure had left it desperate enough to dabble in unknown magic. It drew a key from one of its pockets, licked the teeth to coat them in its bile, and opened the gold case.

Inside was a single sheet of music, penned in blood.

Perhaps it would accept Alagaddan ichor as a suitable ink.

Odious could feel the pull of the artefact. The page wanted blood. Odious denied it for now - no mere artefact could usurp the will of a Humour. Instead it set it on the desk. It hummed the melody as it read the score.

An interesting piece. Bold and jarring, but Odious quickly determined that this artefact wouldn't solve its problem. The score didn't change with each new blood donor, the music was using the blood to complete itself. Odious could add nothing to it but ink.

Odious lifted a hand to rip the paper to shreds in frustration, but changed its aim at the last instant to tear scratches in the table. It had put in an effort to claim this artefact. It would be more of a waste to destroy it immediately. Perhaps Odious could figure out the mechanism of it, to craft a page that it could wring out its heart over and write its own soul.

The melody had intrigued it. How would it sound with more parts played? Music was the purest language, playing the score would help Odious understand the artefact. It set the page on a music stand, settled itself beside the organ, and picked up the violin again.

Odious played perfectly. It always did. It had a passion for instrumental music from its awakening and had practiced for millennia. Two hands for the violin. Six on the organ - it didn't need to look at it to hit every note and pull every stop correctly.

The music was a discordant cacophony, mere noise to someone without Odious' experience. There was something in it, a pattern just at the edge of understanding. And the music just kept building. It shouldn't have been possible - a crescendo can't build forever, there needs to be a release or at least lessening of tension, but it never came. The single page somehow held thousands of lines of music, and the music swelled and built up and up for hours, frustrating and leaving Odious desperate for a conclusion, like an orgasm that just wouldn't come off …

The score ended so abruptly that for an instant Odious thought it had died. But it couldn't be dead, it had been dead before and its dead husk's hearts didn't hammer like this, its lungs didn't heave like this when it was dead. With shaking hands, it lowered its violin.

The violin had a chin rest made of Alagaddan porcelain-chitin, one of the few substances that Odious' bile couldn't destroy. It hadn't helped - Odious had leaked so much from its eyes and mouth that the bile had overflowed and scorched the instrument. Odious threw it aside and glared down at the music sheet.

"Where are you going with this? How do you end?" it hissed, taking the glove off one of its secondary hands and slicing the soft palm open with a talon. Thick, black ichor dripped onto the page and formed more notes.

Odious read the new lines. No conclusion, just more build-up. But it had to be near a resolution. It had to end. Odious ruptured some inner chambers in its body to send more ichor out of the wound.

The notes continued to form.

Odious wasn't going to let a piece of paper defeat it.

It picked up a new violin and readied itself beside the organ. There was no place to start from but the beginning - to begin in the middle would be an insult to the piece.

Odious could focus on regenerating its ichor to drip on the page and play the violin and play the organ. And, just to show the page who held the power, it sang the melody as well, a sharp, wordless soprano. It was the greatest musician in Alagadda, in all the lands of the Nevermeant, possibly even the multiverse. It was going to play the piece perfectly and to the end.

Hours later it reached the part written in its own ichor and kept playing. Odious was going to make it to the end. It was going to find the conclusion.

---

Odious woke up stiff and aching, staring up at the ceiling of its study. It tried to strech but couldn't move.

Finally awake, my lord?

The Ambassador. Odious managed to turn its head to find the hateful creature delicately unfolding the crumpled balls of paper from the wastebasket. It had no face, but Odious knew it was sneering at its attempts at writing music. Odious flexed its arms, recognising the feel of rope around them. "What are you doing here?"

Amusing myself by reading your pitiful efforts to create, my lord.

"Fuck you. You interrupted my practice."

The Ambassador huffed. Practice? You allowed yourself to be possessed by a mere artefact. I had to bind you to pry you away from it, all while you screamed that you had to finish the song.

While the Ambassador prattled, Odious managed to curl around to drip bile on some of the ropes to burn them away. With a few arms free, it began untying itself. "Where is the cursed music sheet?"

Back where your stooge took it from.

Perhaps the artefact was more dangerous than Odious had given it credit for, if the Ambassador itself had deigned to remove it from Alagadda. It was the humans' problem again. "What do you care what I do?"

I do not.

Which meant that it had been ordered. Which meant that the Hanged King had sensed something wrong with Odious and sent its servant to sort things out -

Odious' thoughts were interrupted by the Ambassador's laughter. Is that sentiment I sense in you, my lord? Does the Seething Prince long for daddy's approval? For shame. Our King will be most disappointed.

Finally free of the ropes, Odious lunged for the Ambassador. It stepped out of the way and Odious ended up tackling its own desk.

When Odious untangled itself from the furniture, the Ambassador was gone. Odious howled in rage, at the loss of its prey, at the Ambassador's taunts. You twist my thoughts! I don't want love and approval! I don't want softness! I am everything I am meant to be - I am hate and anger and passion and violence - and I am the best at it! I play my role perfectly! I want -

Odious needed to be perfect. Nothing less was enough. It had to be so perfect that no one could ever find flaw, not even itself. It was a hard way to live, a crescendo without end. If it was perfect, then people would finally notice all it did for Alagadda and appreciate it, instead of taking the rituals and concerts and efforts for granted. It did what it was meant to do but nobody cared that it did it well, they only noticed when Odious made a mistake, so Odious had to be perfect, perfect, perfect …

I want …

The ending Odious craved was to become so hateful, so despised that the Hanged King itself grew angry enough to blast it out of existence. To be seared into oblivion by the hate of a god … glorious. Perfection.

But Odious also wanted to lay its head in the Hanged King's lap, feel the desiccated fingers stroke its hair, and know its efforts and work were seen and appreciated. To know that it had succeeded at being the Yellow Lord, at being Odious. To know that the King was proud of it. To be able to rest, just for a little while.

Triumphant fine or quiet diminuendo, there could be no applause, no rest, until the play was over.

I want to know how it ends.

#alagadda #yellow lord odious #yellow lord alagadda #scp-2264 #scp-012

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sunlightandsuffering · 3 months

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https://www.tumblr.com/sunlightandsuffering/743958271343427584/i-actually-tried-to-read-the-comments-but-past

I don’t deserve you 😭❤️ I actually just commented on your newest drabble on the dark blog!! My guilty pleasure would be under the table shenanigans during the dinner double date in MM but I know you haven’t written that yet so don’t worry!! I’m just curious about your ideas 👀

BABY ILY U DESERVE EVERYTHING! I HAVE TRIED LIKE 1000 TIMES TO WRITE THIS FOR U I HAVE LIKE 6 ITERATIONS SO ILL GIVE U MY BEST ONE SO FAR 😭😭 I’m having trouble with the tension or something it just keeps turning into a meme instead so I think after this scene where like they fight that Eren is gonna pull out the big guns under the table! HES GONNA STEAL COLTS CHAIR NONCHALANTLY !! AND THEN THE HAND ON THE THIGH ACTION WILL START! And after that it’ll be all magic 😈😈 and Mikasa will be forced to react but we’ll see my writing usually gets away from me 😂😂

“I hear seafood can be a real aphrodisiac,” Hitch says breathlessly as Eren hands her another oyster, her face flushed and Eren smiles wickedly at the change in conversation.

“I guess later on we’ll find out.”

Mikasa restrains herself from reaching across the table to stab Eren with her fork. Their plates are thankfully cleared before Mikasa can follow through on the desire.

Because Eren’s hand is grasped in Hitch’s, and she’s smiling up at him with such adoration, Mikasa can barely take it. The entire restaurant suddenly seems too suffocating, and she stands abruptly before she can do something stupid like strangle the blonde girl.

“I’m going to wash up before dessert,” She excuses herself and without another word she’s gone, off towards the bathroom without a look back.

Even the women’s washroom seems too cramped, and she bypasses it entirely to head out the large fire exit a little past the kitchen where chefs are barking out orders. The cold air is a relief as she steps outside into the brisk winter air, she hadn’t realized just how hot she’d been inside.

Mikasa fans herself lightly, flushed from emotions other than just her raging jealousy, fuck her stupid sex magic, fuck all of it.

Her musings are interrupted by none other than the problem himself, the back door slamming shut behind him, and immediately she greets him with a murderous glare.

“Antagonizing me during dinner, really, Eren?”

Eren shrugs casually, unphased by the accusation, “It’s not antagonizing, I was trying to make you jealous.”

Mikasa scoffs, looking away from him to stare out into the dark alley, a few dumpsters and a stray cat their only audience.

Before she can respond she can feel Eren’s dark presence looming behind her, his breath at her pulse, “And it’s working.”

Mikasa refutes this vehemently, “It’s not–”

She is cut off by a kiss that goes straight to her head, so ruinous that all protests leave her mind at once, the harsh possessive grip of his hands at her hips, lips bruising her own.

He’s walking her back towards the wall of the alley, and she’s sealed between cold brick and the addictive warmth of Eren’s body, caging her in. He kisses her like he’s trying to convince her of something and fuck it whatever it is she’s convinced, her hands knotted in his hair, yanking him closer.

They go blow for blow, he squeezes her ass, hauling her up into his arms, she pulls his hair, pulling it from its tie. Let him explain that to Hitch, the hair she’s been covering all night, she was the one who got to touch it first, mess it up.

They kiss like they fight, with more passion than she’s ever felt in her life and probably more aggression than is appropriate.

He slams her back into the brick wall so harshly that for a moment the breath is knocked out of her but there is no reprieve, Eren stealing the air from her lungs as he follows her with kisses.

But she’s not to be outdone, bites his bottom lip so hard she draws blood, digs her nails into the firm muscles of his shoulders.

“Fuck Mikasa,” he grunts shoving the hem of her shirt up, rough hands hungrily exploring soft curves, mapping out every inch of smooth skin

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builder051 · 7 months

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Ask me no questions and I’ll tell you no lies

—————-

Chasing Ghosts. Warning for drug mentions/implied drug use. Meant to be stupid and funny.

—————-

James sits at the table. He presses his cheek to its cool surface and wraps his arm around his head. He should go, he thinks. Somewhere. Not here. Or at least turn off the light.

The logical thing to do is plant himself in the bathroom and wait out his seasick headache. The thought of the bathroom sends James’s throat up to throb behind his clenched teeth. He won’t be turning off the light. He won’t be moving at all.

“It’s bad?”

Steve seems to have materialized in the kitchen. James doesn’t know how long he’s had an audience. He’d taken his hearing aids out a while ago. With his echolocation gone and his eyes hidden, James knows he’s a sitting duck. Not that Steve would ever hurt him. Well, not on purpose. He sometimes gets a little rough when administering first aid.

“Eh,” James says to the inside of his elbow. “You probably know better than I do.”

“Mm,” Steve muses. James imagines him stroking his chin in contemplation. “You have a headache and feel like you want to hurl?”

“Yeah…” James pauses to draw in a shaky breath. “I don’t know. When, I mean. If.”

“You never do know.”

There’s a scraping sound and a vibrating sensation as Steve pulls up a seat. James bites his lip. He’d rather taste blood than bile.

“I mean, I can guess. I can try to help. Hold your hair. Or a mop.” Now that he’s close, James hears the uncertainty in Steve’s voice.

“Yeah. Try consulting your magic 8 ball or something. ‘S as good as anything else.”

Steve gives a quiet laugh. “I would if I could.”

“Wait, what?” Tasha’s running up the hallway, her words going from muffled to sonorous. James pretends he doesn’t suppress an instinctive swallow. He can’t acknowledge what doesn’t exist. Logic bends as James’s head makes a particularly strong throb. He’s losing his grip on reality. He must be. Tasha awake and moving at this hour on a Saturday morning? James assumes it’s still morning. It was morning when his mild headache turned to extreme vertigo and sent him tilting toward a chair.

“Oh, hey, Tasha.” Steve says.

James forces out his own sound of greeting.

“Who has an 8 ball?” Tasha speaks quickly, tripping over her words. She’s probably on an upper already. Hopefully her very own, very legal Adderall. She has absolutely no need for cocaine.

“Nobody,” James groans. He lifts his head just enough to give his sister a scathing look. Her hair is piled on top of her head, and she’s wearing a bathrobe that hangs far to low in the front.

“I heard you—“ Tasha starts.

“No.” James shuts his eyes and bows flat to the table again, this time cooling his aching forehead.

“It was, you know.” Steve sounds slightly embarrassed. Maybe because he won’t leave the bedroom in just boxers. Whose dignity he’s still pretending to protect, James will never ask.

Steve clears his throat and goes on. “Like, the toy kind? Where you ask it a question and shake it?”

“Oh.” Tasha’s disappointed. She recovers in a beat and says, “I had one of those once. As a kid. It was dumb. It wasn’t right about anything.”

“I was thinking about ordering one on Amazon.” Steve puts too much positivity into his tone. The man will do anything to avoid a confrontation.

“If you really want one, just give me a few bucks. I can have it by tonight.” James sincerely hopes she’s joking. Well, not joking, exactly. He hopes she won’t do it, whether to spite him or any other reason.

“That won’t be necessary.” James sees Steve’s gluey smile projected onto the backs of his eyelids.

“Might help your headache.” Tasha pokes James in the shoulder. He grunts and swallows frenetically, determined not to lose control.

“Tash…” James sighs. “Just leave it.”

“If you say so.”

Silence briefly ensues, then a cabinet opens and the sink starts running. Then the table jiggles again as Tasha joins them. She sips her water, then casually asks, “What question were you going to ask, anyway? The 8 ball?”

“Oh.” Steve laughs.

“You can tell her,” James says, then breathes deeply and focuses on the feeling of his nose squashing as he rests his forehead directly against the hardwood.

“It was, um,” Steve warms himself up. “We were going to ask, uh, whether or not James is going to puke.”

“Hm.” Tasha sets down her glass. “Well, duh. You could’ve just asked me.”

“What sayest you?” Steve gives James the floor. Which he may or may not be about to soil.

James has reached his limit. If he speaks, if he so much as acknowledges his turn in the conversation, his jaw will unhinge and everything will fall to pieces. He steels himself and clenches his abdominal muscles as much as he can. “Yeah.” It comes out in a gasp that’s probably inaudible as he takes off in a rush toward the bathroom.

#fanfic #fanfiction #marvel #mcu #captain america #steve rogers #winter soldier #bucky barnes #black widow #natasha romanoff #natasha romanov #chasing ghosts #college AU #sickfic #emeto #tw drug use #tw cocaine #this is stupid and funny

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ratsandfashion · 10 months

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Just left an RP blog I'd had for seven years, the fandom it was for, and the Tumblr RPC in general. Don't want to name it, but while I loved my mutuals and the character, the canon around the character had changed in a really negative way and fandom had reacted in kind, and slowly but surely it just made me more and more unhappy. Not only did I no longer engage with the source material because it was so shitty, but I started getting upset and jealous when I just saw things of other characters who had nothing to do with it, simply because I was envious they hadn't undergone this treatment, that even if they had a rough patch of writing they could come back from it in a way my guy couldn't, that people who were fans of them weren't alone and had entire sub-communities of support who agreed canon was being shitty. . .I just got upset at smaller and smaller things in ways that weren't healthy at all, and my misery started outweighing my good experiences. It wasn't healthy at all, and it was absurd if I'm being objective because holy shit this is just FICTION some people have REAL problems, but that's autistic hyperfixation and obsession for you. It just mattered way too much for me. I'm really sad to break away from something that brought me so much joy and connection with others, but I'd been strongly considering it since last year. Looking forward to it, even, fantasizing about being free from my own stupid overreactions having such a hold on me. I am staying in touch with friends I made there, but tbh I don't think that's going to last. Not because we're not real friends but because that's just been my experience with leaving places but staying in contact with folks from them. You don't mean to, but you drift apart sooner or later. My time in the fandom did really improve my art because it drove me to work out it, since my mutuals gave me an audience, no matter how small, and my muse gave me so many ideas and pushed me to work on things I never would have pursued drawing on my own. So I am worried about not keeping up practice and making stuff, but I'm going to do my best. Some part of me wishes I'd stayed and roughed it out longer but I know this was the better decision for my own good. I just regret that it wasn't due to simply losing interest on my own, I still love this character, but due to external circumstances making that enjoyment more of a burden than a delight. I think I'm just gonna go back to fandomless OCs for a long time after this.

#my life

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deathfavor · 5 months

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@ashrifts said: "3, 2, 1..." for serpent <3

Send "3,2,1..." for a new years kiss from my muse

One year dies and another is born, and such an event calls for only the most exuberant celebrations as if to appease the new year. The club is full of dazzling lights, glittering chandeliers and the finest of decorations served alongside phenomenal food that is more art than food. ( Some people seem reluctant to destroy such beauty but ultimately cave for the exquisite flavors that burst upon their tongues. ) It is to be expected, when the underworlds greatest and society's elite are the guests of the exclusive club. More often than not, they are one and the same.

It was no surprise to Serpent that her presence was requested. Something dangerous and beautiful always gets hearts racing, and the rich are gluttonous for such catered shows. ( But they are happy, Serpent can taste the happiness in the air. ) So she appears with her venomous snakes, with her magic that no one seems able to comprehend ( how do airy bubbles turn into vibrant blue butterflies? how do flames become snow sprinkling from the ceiling ? Secrets she shall not divulge. ) They laugh and clap and look as enraptured in her shows when she's on the stage.

It is different the moment she steps off. People like dangerous things then they're protected by glass cages or seated in the audience, not when it can walk among them. Serpent is used to it, the mix of fear and awe. But no one dares approach. Certainly not as midnight draws near and traditions come to mind.

Then, Serpent sees Ran, and her pleasant enough smile becomes little more genuine. She hadn't known he would be here. Serpent makes her way easily through the crowd to him, a bright smile on her lips. " I didn't know you'd be here! Aw, if I'd known, I could have gotten you something extra. " Maybe another time. " Are you having a good time? Did you like the show? " She asks, while Vesper lifts her head from where she's been laying draped against Serpent's throat to flick a tongue in greeting towards Ran.

A cheer from the crowd draws her attention away briefly from the man. Displays flick on to show a timer, and the energy in the building becomes a buzz in the clamor to get celebratory drinks or conveniently find someone to happen to stand by. Serpent observes - she's always been alone at this time, a monster among humans. But Ran doesn't cower away from her or Vesper seems unfazed by her own serpentine visage. It'd be fun to try this tradition, at least once. Maybe she'd finally taste the happiness she brings others.

Serpent turns her hand and two cards appear in her hand, and she offers a playful wink towards Ran when they seem to dissolve into flower petals, just for her to suddenly be holding two glasses filled with blue. One she keeps for herself, but the other she offers to him with a smile. " On the house, of course. " It's sweet on her tongue when she takes a sip, no surprise to herself.

The buzzing grows louder as the countdown gets louder.

10...9...8...

Serpent blinks and then turns to Ran, till purple eyes and serpentine eyes meet.

7...6...5...

He doesn't seem opposed, so Serpent stands up on her tippy toes, cool fingertips resting gently against his cheek.

4...3...2...

Thankfully, he bends down so the strain is not so great.

1 !

Serpent leans forward and presses her lips against Ran's while cheers erupt in the room by those not participating in the tradition. It's silly, but it's all in good fun. Serpent's kiss is gentle, sweet like caramel rather than bitter like a snake's venom. Her kiss is soft and demands nothing, and she pulls back after a moment, leaving the sweetness to linger upon his lips even in her absence. She offers a cheerful giggle, sinking back into the flat of her feet again.

" Happy new years! " She offers him, turning her head a fraction to take a sip of her drink.

#ashrifts #congratulations you get the very first one of me answering #serpent just c: and then sees Ran and then is !! :D #hes not a coward like everyone else #᛭ — [IC] happiness evades the longing heart [SERPENT]

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dragonsinkwell · 9 months

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Hihi, Rae! I'm here to ask you the following: #1, #4, #8, #11, #12, #14, #20, #21, and #23, please and thank you! Cheers, hon! ☕

Do you prefer writing one-shots or multi-chaptered fics?

I can't say I prefer one or the other, I just rarely have the drive these days to consider a multi-chapter. My heart's a little dim because the audience is so quiet that I don't even know who I'm writing for, and why bake a cake when there's no one to eat it? But I wish I could and had written more chaptered pieces over all my little one-shots.

Link your three favorite fics right now

Control - by you, b/c it slaps and it's never leaving my top 3

A Warlock's Magic by @aunclassynerd b/c it also slaps and has sat in my head recently

distraction - by one flintstrike on Ao3 (@suguwu) and damn, got me thinking Things for the first character in a while to have me thinking

How does receiving or not receiving feedback/support impact you?

Honestly??? It's not like no feedback sends me into some spiral but like, go out and make things you think are nice and take some considerable work and have no one bat an eye at any of them. Do it for days, weeks, months. It's hard and it's not very fun any more. I can just daydream my ideas to myself with no effort at all, it's not as much but why bust ass for something that honestly feels unwanted?

Everyone talks about that 'two cakes' comic but like, what good is a cake when no one wants it? I can go buy a cupcake at the store instead and not have to clean up a whole bunch of dishes if it's just myself. No one ever giving back feedback just sounds like the work's not worth it and I'm best just daydreaming and giggling on Discord with the two people tops who have any interest in it.

If you want cakes, then you have to buy them and convince the baker that the work is worth it for them, and all it costs is a little feedback from enough people, aka entirely free.

How do you write emotional scenes? Do you ever feel what the characters feel? Do you draw from personal experiences?

It's hard to explain, I feel. In the age old 'Architect/Gardener' split I'm at least 90% gardener and just sorta... let things happen. I let the story speak to me, let the characters act as they would and I simply polish up what is given to me by the muse.

I can't say I directly feel what the characters do, but I know the feelings are there in most every case in one way or another, and I try to draw on those to help ensure some level of empathetic accuracy, so that the readers can feel at least some of what I hope to convey.

Have you noticed any patterns in your fics? Words/expressions that appear a lot, themes, common settings, etc?

I can't say that I have? But then I also don't super re-read a ton of my own pieces, either, so perhaps therein lies the issue.

Would you ever collaborate with another writer for a story?

Oh my gosh yes. I know I tried here once, many moons ago for a Spooktober collab, and I'd so gladly try again. I'm one to really love working with people, even just as someone to bounce ideas around with.

Best writing advice for other writers?

Find yourself an honest audience. Obviously, you ought to be in it as Numero Uno, but the outside voices help more than you know, especially if you want to improve. Find yourself co-conspirators who can give honest critique in the voice that helps you the most, people who can point out what your style is lacking and needs, where its slips are, but also what it has to its benefits, what your strengths are and where you're hitting all your home runs.

Critique isn't always this list of failures, it ought to also be laced with its praises too, so you can compare the two and see, yes, what you need to improve upon, but also where you're ahead of the game. It's good company for that, people who can give you both while enjoying your work that are worth more than their weight in gold.

#chatter #thehuggamugcafe #thank you for asking dearie

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aboutanancientenquiry · 9 months

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Herodotus, Samos, and Athenian democracy and imperialism - II (the last sections of the lecture of Pr. Christopher Pelling on Herodotus and Samos)

“VII

So Samos looks forward. Let me end by thinking about the ways it looks forward to Herodotus’ own day. In those earlier cases we saw how Samian sequences leave questions hanging for the later narrative to take up; this last sequence has left questions hanging after the narrative ends, questions to be answered in the light of later events. Is this, then, a concealed commentary on contemporary affairs? Is it for instance a case of ‘Herodotus warns the Athenians’, the title of a well-known article by John Moles? 47 My own emphasis would be on this as more of a two-way affair, with contemporary events often deepening the audience’s understanding of what had gone on in the past, in 480 and 479 and before; if, after all, one is looking for recurrent patterns in human experience – and I am sure Herodotus is, just as Thucydides is – one is bound to compare past and present in some such way, noticing those elements that recur in one’s own experience just as in Herodotus’ own narrative one sees patterns recurring from one phase to another. Carolyn Dewald has made the attractive suggestion that Herodotus can be writing for an audience in the future who will know the answers to some questions that he cannot yet answer himself. 48 Will Athens’empire end by falling into the same pattern as Persia’s, as the end of Herodotus’ narrative may seem to be suggesting? Or will Athens turn out to be different, perhaps because it is democratic, perhaps because it is simply more Greek, just as the mainland Greeks were more Greek than the Samians and put up a better show? Herodotus cannot yet know the answer to that, whenever he wrote; but he knows that many of his audience will, in that timeless future that he makes clear in his first sentence that he is envisaging.

‘Whenever he wrote…’: yes, it would be interesting to know when Herodotus published his History, and there is no space here to go into that; of course we are over-simplifying byeven putting the question like that, as in this world ‘publication’ was not a single once-for-all thing. (I will just say again that the traditionally favoured date of around 425 seems to me to rest on a total misreading of the relation of Herodotus and the Acharnians. 49) But let me play with how Herodotus might be read or heard at two particular junctures twenty years apart, first in 432 or so – a date when Herodotus was clearly still alive and it is likely that the Histories had not yet reached their final form, though doubtless many were hearing them in lectures – and a second around 411, when the work was probably but not certainly ‘finished’,and so – probably but not certainly – was Herodotus himself.

So let us recreate three friends, all very familiar with Herodotus, who meet up every now and again to muse on what they see around them. Let us call them A, B, and – T.

We catch them first in the late 430s, with Samos heavily on the mind. A is very indignant: does not that brutality in Samos show Athens to be the new Persia, the new big bully infringing Greek autonomy? What has happened to all that freedom rhetoric of 480? That man Herodotus knew a thing or two, pointing us to all those suggestions of what was coming next, Greek against Greek taking the place of Greek against Persian; and he was right to draw attention to Athenian atrocity at the very end of that last logos of his, withthat torturing and execution of a Persian Artayctes and the killing of his son before his eyes – not quite in the Persian manner (not enough mutilation for that), but quite enough to be going on with. Why, only last week I saw a group of Samians with samaina stamped on their foreheads. Not nice at all. Well, thank God for the Spartans, that’s what I say.They’ll come, soon enough: they after all were the ones who made all the difference in 479. And in the war that’s going to come, I wouldn’t be surprised if most of Greece were to be on Sparta’s side, talking as they will about their role as champions of freedom.50

To which B replies: hah. HAH. Talk, indeed: that’s what the Spartans do, and they don’t even do a lot of that. They talked about intervening back in 440-39, but that didn’t come to much; and you’ll remember from Herodotus that they couldn’t wait to get out in 479. They’re really the ones who landed us in this: it’s their fault, letting the Athenians getting to be as big as they are.51 And if it’s not their fault, then it’s the rest of the ‘allies’: they were the ones who couldn’t be bothered to provide ships – just like those toil-shy Ionians back at the battle of Lade (remember?), so they’ve only themselves to blame.52 Not that the ones who do provide ships rather than money have done themselves all that proud, either; after all, the Chians and Lesbians joined in back in 440-39 – but on the Athenian side, not the Samian.53 So much for all that Ionian unity that they talk about in the Panionian festival: hah! And freedom? Well, I’m not sure if this new-fangled 54 talk, linking freedom and democracy, will really catch on: it seems a bit simplistic to me. If it does come to war, I’ve even heard that that Spartan king Archidamus is talking about looking to Persia for help. 55 Couldn’t rely on Spartans in 440, can’t rely on them now. At any time we may need a strong front against the real tyrant, the one in Persia. Athens was the real saviour of Greece then: Herodotus was right (7.139). And now too Athens is our only hope.

And T? He is quietly taking notes. Whatever the rights and wrongs of Athens’ actions, he knows that Athens realistically couldn’t afford Samos to get away with secession – that would be as unreasonable as to think that a tiny city like, say, Melos could afford to defy Athens, and he knows that’s just not the way empires work. It’s not the way Herodotus’ Persian empire worked either: if Ionian states don’t dance to the imperial tune willingly, they’ll dance unwillingly (1.141), and they might have remembered that. And will there be war? Yes, I dare say: I remember from various stories of Herodotus that Sparta was willing to be roused when they felt it necessary, and had had their eye nervously on the rising Athenian democracy since way back – since what will one day be Herodotus Book 5, in fact. 56 And it’sgoing to be a big one. But I’m also wondering about the cost of it all: I’ve seen an inscription that put the cost of the Samian War at over 1400 talents. 57 True, Athens is getting some of that back in reparations, but that’s quite a big fraction of the money Athens might have for a full-scale war, and Samos, however big, is still just an outlier. Why, if it comes to war and I were going to put words in Pericles’ mouth, I think I’d make him explain exactly how the Athenians are going to afford it. 58

VIII

Time fast-forwards. Now we are in 411; this time our three friends are meeting in Thrace, owing to an unfortunate blip in the career of T. The Sicilian catastrophe has been and gone; the Ionian War is getting underway; we are now in the throes of the revolution in Athens itself. Meanwhile Samos has acquired a new significance, as the base for Athenian operations in the Aegean.There has been stasis there again, of a sort that is quite hard to pin down. The demos has risen against the dunatoi, but it looks likely that those dunatoi were not in fact an oligarchy but the big men within a pre-existing democratic constitution; and there has been a further twist, with the new powerful clique, hitherto thinking themselves the demos, now forming a group of 300 and attacking others, designating those others as the demos (Thuc. 8.21, 63.3, 73.2). Now that has settled down as well, and Samos is a democracy again; the Athenian troops themselves there, after flirting themselves with oligarchy, are now at odds with the city, a sort of democracy in exile, and what they are now flirting with is Alcibiades. There is a lot going on.

A again goes first. Told you so: those Athenians just can’t help overreaching, and look what’s happened to them in Sicily. It’s just like the Persian empire in Herodotus – that step westwards too far. And I told you too that those Spartans would finally get their act together, just like they did back then, and get on with that liberating. True, these islands have taken their time to start asserting their liberty, but then they did the same back in 479. It’s just a matter of time; Athens’ days are numbered. And as for Samos! They couldn’t get their act together then to be free, now they can’t even manage their stasis properly. You’d think they could at least work out which side was which.

B: well, there’s something in what you say. But I shouldn’t write Athens off just yet, nor their democracy.59 They haven’t lost all their self-belief: you should just listen to how upbeat they’re being at Samos, talking as if they don’t need the city at all and can go round as kings ofthe sea, imposing their will wherever they go. 60 And you know, all this business of an Athens-across-the-water at Samos reminds me of something else: way back in our finest hour, wasn’t the whole point that Athens was prepared to move en bloc to Salamis and Troezen? And this Alcibiades chap reminds me a lot of Themistocles too: has his ups and downs with Athens, has a suspicious tendency to be found whispering in corners with Persian friends, but he has the look of someone who might be their saviour. Mind you, that might end in tears, too. And I can understand what you say about Samos, couldn’t organize a decent bit of simple stasis even after a Manchester derby; but then, that’s partly because they’re so used to complex pieces of stasis, with exiles just over the water in their own peraia for thirty years stirring things up. 61 If T over there ever writes that book of his and tries to give a clear-cut picture of stasis, I think he’d be quite wise to go for one of the early, rather simpler cases, some other island – Corcyra might do. But one thing’s clear: the way that Ionia and the islands are finding it as difficult to get a coherent act together now as they did then, and lots of them keep changing sides. God help the person who ever tries to write a proper narrative of that.

That last point seems to be making T oddly uneasy: why, it is almost as if he has already got a half-finished manuscript in his closet. He is certainly struck, though, by this business at Athens. It really was quite something to finish off democracy after 100 years .62 But you remember the way that Herodotus talked about the inspiring power of democracy, the way people fight all the better when they’re fighting for themselves, and you can tell that by the way that the Athenians started dominating others as soon as they’d got rid of tyranny themselves (5.78)? Well, this is all turning that on its head, isn’t it? They’re not dominating others so easily any more, and so they’re less full of their democratic selves as well; it’s the inverse, they’re losing that can-do confidence. In fact, it’s something of the same again, because the people who are really doing all the work are now the ones who are seizing power in the democracy, to make sure that they’re doing it all for themselves and not for anyone else (Thuc. 8.63.4). Interesting, isn’t it, the way that these democrats always turn out not to be so different from people you’d expect to be their exact opposite? And that’s another thing that Herodotus knew, with all those hints of Athens as the new Persia …

So T[hucydides] might have learnt quite a lot as he mused about this war with his Herodotus in his hand and his heart: Thucydides, the man who was said to have left a lecture of Herodotus in tears, presumably tears of joy. 63 I am certainly not suggesting that we should be chary of finding contemporary indications in Herodotus, because they can point in so many different directions at once: anything but. Whenever he wrote, even if it was as late as 411 and it probably was not, there was much in the contemporary world that resonated with whathe was describing. What is more difficult is to make that resonance simple or single,‘Herodotus warns the Athenians’ or anything else. Exactly what the most telling analogies would be between Herodotus’ theme and the present was still uncertain – whenever the present might be, including (as Carolyn Dewald said) the present that was not yet foreseeable by the historian but would be known to readers, including perhaps those readers in 411. What could be foreseen was only that there would be analogies there; and thinking about the past would be a very good way of thinking about the present too, and – importantly –vice versa as well. It is not a monologic text. Each of us can pick his or her own resonance, our own lesson, and those lessons can change as the present changes.

And if I feel my lesson is better than your lesson? Why, we can sit down and talkabout it, probably heatedly, much like A, B, and T so many years ago. 64 “

On line source with the whole lecture: https://www.academia.edu/42060635/HERODOTUS_AND_SAMOS

Professor Christopher Pelling, Regius Professor of Greek emeritus, Christ Church. Emeritus Professor; formerly Regius Professor of Greek, 2003-15, and McConnell Laing Fellow and Praelector in Classics, University College, Oxford, 1975-2003. Fellow of the British Academy; Fellow of the Learned Society of Wales.

Source: https://www.classics.ox.ac.uk/people/professor-christopher-pelling

#herodotus #samos #athens #thucydides #christopher pelling

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sigmadolos · 1 year

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@guiltscorched said: My muse takes a hit to protect your muse from a fatal attack, how does your muse react? / fyodor sees the angel fall as if in slow motion, and staggers. this was not the plan. this was not how he foresaw it; this was not supposed to be. sigma, with all his foolish fits of emotion, was supposed to stay on the chessboard where fyodor had placed him. yet here, he leaps from it, directly into an attack intended to kill.

the demon is cold and methodical as he acts now, plans re-forming and crystallising in the grim chambers of his mind. he draws the gun hidden in his coat and shoots their assailant, disregarding his previous intent to press them for information. instinct now demands that he attend to sigma and so he does, weak arms dragging the prone - but alive! - form into their hold. "foolish," he mutters, as he begins to walk: carrying sigma, slowly and carefully, back where fyodor may tend to him. he is not permitted to die just yet. "things like this will be your undoing, sigma."

MY MUSE TAKES A HIT TO PROTECT YOURS FROM A FATAL ATTACK, SEND YOUR MUSES REACTION

Everything had been going to plan until it wasn’t. It wasn’t a big display, the shift in the man’s body language. It was a CASUAL gesture as a matter of fact, ordinary. Except it immediately set alarms up to Sigma because in all the behavior he’d been observing, the man did not display such body language. Instinctual dread kicked into high gear, an awareness that SOMETHING was wrong. It crawled like a spider down his spine, a gut feeling that Death was looming and Fyodor was in danger. It was an instinct he trusted because it’d helped him survive his own darkest times. He didn’t hesitate to throw himself in front of the russian mere seconds before the first gunshot rang out, loud and clear.

It’s fast and slow at he same time. The millisecond of shock before the pain claws into his chest with razor sharp talons and macabre flowers blossom on his chest as red stains his suit. It must’ve only been a few milliseconds, before Sigma finds himself falling slowly like he’s sinking through heavy water. He doesn’t feel the pain when he hits the ground or hear the second gunshot, everything feels muted and far way. Everything except the pain that tears at his mind nd the garden of red that grows from his chest with each passing second.

A weak, faint noise leaves his wounded chest when he feels arms grab him, and for a moment he struggles between the present and the ghosts of past, but it’s gone in a moment when he feels himself be drawn closer to the warmth of someone else, when he hears the familiar voice in his ear. He blinks, dull eyes lifting to look towards Fyodor at the comment.

“ No. “ It hurts to speak, the words claw at his throat, but still Sigma speaks, shaking his head slowly in disagreement to the assessment. “ Not to me at least. Not when your life was in danger. “ Fyodor’s life has value to it. But Sigma’s . . .

His head weakly tucks itself against Fyodor’s shoulder. He didn’t expect to be LIFTED, but he doesn’t complain. He doesn’t cry or whimper at any step that send jolts of pain through overactive nerves. The angel stays muted in his suffering, speaking only in his thoughts on his acts. He endured his suffering in silence as he always has. The words give him something to focus on, to help with the lightheadedness even as his eyes half-close. “ You’re okay though . . . that’s good . . . “ A absently mumbled comment, though if it was intended for Fyodor or Sigma to himself was an impossible task to tell without the man himself confirming its intended audience.

“ Probably. “ Sigma smiles a sad sort of knowing smile, whispering his agreement as he remains tucked against Fyodor’s body. “ But I should think that I would not regret it, if there is at least meaning in it. ” His eyes squeeze shut for a moment when wave of white hot pain seems as though it will override his sense. “..I- I’m sorry for having to change plans. “ He adds, voice growing softer, lifting his eyes up to catch a glimpse of the other. “ I can...can try to grab the information from the corpse..” He mumbles in offering, one hand clutched over the wound to apply at least some pressure to help slow the blood loss. THAT is perhaps the foolish aspect of this - to offer when he’s certain Fyodor will not accept.

How the angel loathes to be an inconvenience! But he would relive it again a thousand times over and change nothing if it meant to save Fyodor the pain of injury or from Death’s hungry jaws.

#guiltscorched #perHAPS HES A FOOL BUT HE REGRETS NOTHING #only that the plan had to change #he does feel bad abt that #nevermind bleeding out time to apologize #sir your priorities should be elsewhere but alas here we are #ic || the angel of the aerial casino #blood tw

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cursesavior · 4 months

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✉ @chaoslulled said: It's a small thing, really, a foolish little box. He doesn't even know if vampires still celebrate their birthdays. But still, if he didn't get Suguru something it would drive him nuts. So instead he holds out the box, sheepish look on his face; inside rests a little plush toy of a bat of all things. "I figured a blood cake would be really gross."

Birthdays and vampires were two things that didn't exactly... Mix well. It's not that there weren't any vampires that celebrated things like that, it's more the lack of a general consensus that's the issue. Some vampires still celebrated their birthday, some celebrated the day they were turned instead, and some found the notion of celebrating either of those things ridiculous. So, to say the least, Suguru isn't sure what to expect. Most of his cult remained unaware of the personal details of his life, so there certainly wasn't going to be a huge celebration from them - he wouldn't want that kind of attention from such a massive audience, anyways. Aside from the birthday wishes from Mimiko and Nanako at the beginning of the night, all goes as it normally would, another long night of strategizing and planning their next moves and making sure all his running smoothly at the temple... So to open his bedroom door at the end of it all and see Satoru waiting for him inside is a breath of fresh air, not even noticing the box he was holding at first.

"Ah, Satoru, there you are." He breathes a sigh of relief, already drawing close to him - he'd rarely admit to missing him, he didn't need to feed his ego like that, but it's clear in the way he immediately seeks his touch, expecting to throw himself right into his embrace until his gaze drifts down and he realizes he's holding something out to him. There's a split second of confusion before his expression splits into a fond smile, feeling all warm despite his lack of body heat at the fact that Satoru had remembered, after all this time. Not to mention that sheepish, almost shy look that he so rarely displayed - Satoru is just too damn cute when he looks at him like that, it's a gift in itself. He gives a curious little "For me?" before he's taking what's offered to him into his own hands, tilting his head as he wonders what he possibly could've got for him. Maybe it's some kind of prank, and he'll open the gift only to be met with the unpleasant sight of a rosary or the smell of garlic...

An amused snort leaves him once he opens the box and sees what's inside - a plush bat? Seriously? It's so childish, the kind of thing he'd never buy for himself, but he can't help but love it all the same when Satoru was the one giving it to him. It's funny to imagine him running around town, scouring the shops along the street for something he'd like... He's more thoughtful than he lets on sometimes. "Heheh - how adorable." He muses, taking it out and setting the box aside on his nightstand, before placing the plush right in the middle of his - their - bed, nestled up against the pillows. "There, he can sleep right in between us." He decides, before his comment about a blood cake gets another laugh out of him, shaking his head dismissively.

"That does sound pretty nasty..." He agrees, before he comes close to Satoru once more, wandering hand trailing his fingers along the pale skin of his neck. "Good thing your blood is sweeter than cake~" He teases, tongue flicking out to wet his lips - he doesn't usually just assume someone will let him feed on them, however, with Satoru... Well, at this point he's sure that the other enjoys it just as much as he does.

#— i get dark only to shine / IN CHARACTER.#— don't you dare forget the sun / V; VAMPIRE.#— i should have told you everything / ANSWERED.#chaoslulled #he already wants to bite him LMFAO

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rookie-critic · 1 year

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Tár (2022, dir. Todd Field) - review by Rookie-Critic

Tár sees Cate Blanchett at what is, in this reviewer's opinion, a career best. Her performance as the titular composer/conductor Lydia Tár is quite phenomenal, even if the film itself tends to get bogged down under the weight of its own philosophical musings at times. A conductor on the cusp of achieving her career-spanning attempt to play and live record all 10 of composer Gustav Mahler's symphonies. Tár is clearly well-versed and incredibly well-respected in her field, and a lot of the movie is taken up by the character's musical psuedo-monologues and conversations had with colleagues and friends, but, of course, things aren't as rosy as they seem, and before long pieces of the veneer start to chip away. In a lot of respects I truly applaud this movie for tackling the question of "should the art be separated from the artist? Should the work, or the career, bear the repercussions of the individual's actions, wrongdoings, or moral failings, or should the art be considered away from those repercussions, and be allowed to be judged on its own merits? Can it be?" It's a question that I feel gets discussed a lot by artists and people the world over all the time, but rarely is it discussed within the art itself. It's a question I have even been on both sides of at one point in time or another. In regards to if the film succeeds in presenting this question, I'd say the answer is a resounding yes.

Field doesn't really tell the audience how they should feel (although I think his stance is fairly clear), but rather presents the story in as calculated a way as possible as to let the audience take in the story and leave the theater deliberating, fully able to come to their own conclusions based on what they had just seen. However, as I stated at the beginning of the review, the movie tends to lean heavily into waxing poetic on its topic, which would be welcome once, twice, or even a handful of times, but it is almost literally what accounts for the film's 2 hour and 28 minute runtime. This length was not entirely necessary and I feel like a lot of the scenes of rambling could have been cut down. On another note, there were a couple of things the film was getting at that I don't feel it fully delivered on. Strings were tugged, but not fully unraveled, and you leave the theater thinking about what those moments were trying to say, or if they should have done more to say it, or if they even should have been included at all. The film is good, great even, but it did have a few cracks in the armor. Blanchett's leading performance and the film's story, which plays out wonderfully and presents the film's central question well, are the big draws for this one.

Score: 8/10

Currently available to rent or purchase on digital (iTunes, Amazon, Vudu, etc.) and on DVD, Blu-ray, and 4K through Focus Features/Universal Studios.

#Tár #Tar #Todd Field #Cate Blanchett #Nina Hoss #Noémi Merlant #Sophie Kauer #Mark Strong #Julian Glover #Allan Corduner #Sylvia Flote #Mila Bogojevic #film review #movie review #2022 films

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samstree · 3 years

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Just a Little Pretense

Jaskier and Geralt stage a fake breakup. Someone’s feelings get hurt for real.

The reverse trope series: [1] [2] [3] [4] [5]

AO3

“… It would be to take you off my hands!”

Geralt’s voice echoes in the ballroom, between the tall walls and the high ceiling. Everyone on the dance floor has fallen into silence. Even the band has stopped playing, their lead singer gaping with round eyes.

Jaskier blinks, impressed.

All the eyes are on the two of them. Jaskier’s back prickles with the gazes. As the fight escalated, more and more guests have stopped dancing just to eavesdrop on the witcher and the bard, the most peculiar couple in the room.

Which is just perfect. The more people witnessing their breakup, the more awkward it will be afterward, and the easier it will be to get out of this tedious party. And here Jaskier is, regretting ever having doubted his dear witcher’s ability to perform.

Who would have thought Geralt is a method actor? Drawing inspiration from a past argument is ingenious.

His old acting professor back in Oxenfurt would approve of this. The show is going swimmingly and he is pumped with adrenaline—maybe he should go back on stage one day, do a play or two.

But alas, he can muse the idea later. The show must go on.

“Really? Just like that?” Jaskier croaks, seemingly on the verge of crying. He’s not so bad himself, classically trained and everything. “Thirty years, Geralt. I followed you for thirty years, and just like that, you will kick me out of your life? Did I ever—” he breaks off with a whimper. “Did I ever mean anything to you? Or were you ready to cast me aside this whole time?”

A tear rolls down. His lips wobble. The crowd erupts in hushed murmurs and sympathetic sighs. The set-up, the build, everything has been perfect. Now the only thing left is for Geralt to break things off, and the two of them can ride into the metaphorical sunset and never see this court again.

Jaskier waits in anticipation, but his witcher opens his mouth.

And closes it.

Geralt looks as upset as he should, angry and torn and equally shocked, his golden eyes wide and his jaw clenched tight. It’s a nice picture to paint for the audience. They are supposedly having the biggest fight in their lives and his body language is very convincing.

More than convincing.

Except, it just might be … too convincing.

Wait—

Jaskier focuses on Geralt, who looks as if he wants to shrink into himself, his shoulders slumped and arms drawn in. He looks as if he’s waiting to be struck. Wait, something’s not right.

“I can’t do this.” A whisper leaves Geralt’s lips, small and achingly sad.

It’s not the line he’s supposed to say.

Geralt’s eyebrows droop ever so slightly, and there’s a flash of distress behind the molten gold. It’s gone in a second, hidden behind a façade of indifference.

The tells are subtle, near imperceivable to the untrained eye, but to Jaskier, they are clear as day—Geralt is hurt. For real.

Oh.

Fuck.

“Geralt,” Jaskier tries, instantly snapped out of his character.

And yet, there’s no reply. Geralt lowers his head, turns around, and flees the scene within one heartbeat and the next. The crowd is too eager to make way for him.

“Shit,” Jaskier curses, ready to chase after Geralt, but the Countess de Stael appears out of nowhere with a flock of maids and positively blocks him in all directions. She’s eager to lament the loss of love and companionship, and to offer Jaskier a place at her court once again. Oh, shit.

Jaskier brushes her off, all the while painfully remembering he and Geralt’s goal from the beginning—to use the breakup as an excuse to get out of this place.

Well, the plan is shit. Is it too late to notice?

Weaving through dozens of nobles is a lot more difficult when they all want to extend sympathy, and Jaskier is only placating them absent-mindedly, faking regret and heartbreak. His mind is full of his witcher, who is either brooding or spiraling over the venom he spewed earlier.

The truth is, Jaskier has long forgotten about the mountain—not because it didn’t hurt. To be shunned by Geralt, blamed for everything, and denied friendship, was the worst thing to have happened to him at the time. It’s just that Jaskier has forgiven it, so long ago and so completely.

Jaskier cannot get to their room fast enough, and when he pushes open the door, the sight of Geralt’s dejected face is a stab through the chest. The witcher is perched on the bed, somehow looking a lot smaller than he is.

Jaskier never should have come up with the stupid fake breakup thing, never should have inadvertently reopened the old wound. They healed, together. They shouldn’t be hurting anymore.

“I explained. We can leave now,” Jaskier tires, but in fairness, he doesn’t remember what he said to the Countess. “Geralt?”

The witcher himself crosses his arms, hugging his midriff and avoiding Jaskier’s gaze. “Good,” he answers curtly, shoulders still tense.

He looks angry, and when Geralt is angry, it’s most likely with himself. Oh, whatever heartbreak Jaskier acted out earlier, it’s not a match to a fraction of what he’s feeling now. It must be the one millionth time Geralt’s self-loathing has broken Jaskier’s heart, and it never gets easier, not when Jaskier caused it himself.

“Hey.” Jaskier desperately wants to wrap his arms around Geralt. So he does. He sits down on the bed and pulls his witcher into the biggest bear hug, which is returned immediately and so very tightly. “Hey, it’s okay. It’s okay. I’m sorry. I fucked up, Geralt. I’m—”

“Don’t be.” Geralt buries his nose into Jaskier’s neck and shakes his head. “I never should have said those things, Jask. I should be the one apologizing. It was wrong and untrue and I would never abandon you. You are my best friend. How can I ever? Please, believe me…”

Geralt trails off, his hands rubbing circles into Jaskier’s back. Although it’s unclear who he’s trying to soothe.

“I know. It’s okay. I know,” Jaskier murmurs, over and over again, sealing each reassurance with a kiss pressed into silver hair.

“I never meant it, Jask.”

“I know. It was fake. We were pretending.”

Geralt pulls away, golden eyes dead serious, pausing between every word. “I never meant it.”

Jaskier meets his gaze unwaveringly, with not an ounce of doubt. “I know.”

They stay there for a while, just holding each other. Geralt keeps sniffing Jaskier’s scent the same way he always does to check for injury or distress. He thinks he’s subtle, the sweet man, so Jaskier never mentions it.

Despite what an outsider might assume, Geralt is the sensitive one between the two. He’s so careful when it comes to their relationship, especially after the mountain and sometimes to his own detriment.

He’s so scared of hurting Jaskier again.

“I was an idiot for suggesting it,” Jaskier breaks the silence, nudging Geralt in the knee.

Geralt hums, lips pursed.

“Fake breakup is a terrible idea. Next time we’ll just grit our teeth and sit through the month-long party.”

Still, no smile.

“Alright, you win. Next time I won’t take you to a month-long party to start with.” Jaskier gently pats Geralt on the cheek. “For your delicate sensibilities, darling.”

Finally, finally, Geralt’s lips turn upwards, just a smidge.

“You are an idiot,” Geralt says, the crease between his brows fading. “Just…don’t make me make you cry again.”

Melting into the warmth welling up between his ribcage, Jaskier leans forward and presses a tiny kiss at his witcher’s forehead, so softly as if he’d break with any more force.

“Yes, dear.”

Being careless with Geralt’s heart is a mistake that Jaskier never wants to repeat. As he put a hand over his witcher’s languid heartbeat, Jaskier feels the soft thrumming against his palm, and realizes just how terribly he needs to guard it with the same care too. Against his frivolous self, and against the past that never seems to stop haunting them.

Because Jaskier needs this thing between them to work. If a faked breakup already seems unbearable, he shudders to imagine a real one.

A witcher’s life is already riddled with pain and sadness and could-have-beens. A poet would hate it if he added himself to the list.

---

Tagging: @wanderlust-t @rockysstupidity @flowercrown-bard @alllthequeenshorses @mothmanismyuncle @percy-jackson-is-sexy- @constantlytiredpigeon @behonesthowsmysinging @kitcatkim3 @endless-whump @rey-a-nonbinary-bisexual @llamasdumpsterfire @dapandapod @kuripon

Please feel free to tell me if you want to be removed or added to the list <3

#geraskier #geraskier fic #reverse trope #fake breakup #geralt x jaskier #post mountain #hurt/comfort #geralt of rivia is a sap #soft jaskier #jaskier is an idiot #don't mind him #established relationship

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foxgloveprincess · 3 years

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Pairing: (Soft Dark/Dark) Steve Rogers x Female Reader

Word Count: 2,336

Summary: The duties of a princess are exacting, yet your guard offers you protection and, more than that, love. Yet one conversation with your father, the King, leaves devastation in its wake and you will never be the same.

Warnings: Dark, Non Con (Rape, including being restrained, light fingering, penetration, virginal blood, and creampie), Royal AU, Guard/Princess Romance, Coercion/Threats, Betrayal of Trust, mentions of Arranged Marriage, Jealousy, Possessiveness, Pet Names and Royal Titles (my love, your highness). Minors do not interact (18+).

A/N: For @writing-in-the-dark-bingo filling royal au and creampie. If I miss a tag, please let me know.

Writing in the Dark Bingo Masterlist

I love feedback, so go ahead and reblog if you want. No permission given to copy, translate, rewrite or post my work, at all. I cross-post to my own AO3 account.

This is not Beta’d, so all mistakes are my own.

Please DO NOT click ‘Keep Reading’ if you are under 18 years of age or unwilling to read/consume dark content, thank you!

The sun shines delicately through the leaves of the large oak, the tall grass dancing around you in the gentle breeze. Birds chirp and sing their songs while bees buzz from flower to flower. You soak in the fresh air, humming happily as you lay back in the grass. Smiling up, your thoughts drift, musing over the perfection of the day.

“You highness,” a sharp voice calls off in the distance, one you don’t recognize.

Before you can properly sit up from your reclined position, another figure blocks your view and draws his sword.

“Tell me your purpose,” Steve spits through gritted teeth. Though his back is to you, you have seen anger mar your guard’s face and know it is quite the intimidating sight to behold.

“C-captain,” the other voice squeaks, stopping in his steps and saluting the Captain of the Royal Guard—and your personal protector. “I have orders to bring the princess to her father, the King. He has urgent matters to discuss.”

“He is here?” Steve questions, head tilting in curiosity.

“Yes, His Majesty has just arrived with his carriage and retinue,” the low-level guard explains, “I was sent to find and fetch her highness for an audience.”

Though Steve nods, sending a glance over his shoulder in your direction, he doesn’t sheath his blade.

“Go,” he commands gruffly, making no attempt to conceal his ire, “tell His Majesty that the princess will meet him presently.”

The guard’s hand shakes as he salutes before rushing off, back in the direction of the summer palace. Your eyes follow after him, looking at the vast structure—one which you had been sent ahead to prepare for the start of your family’s progress. A sigh rushes past your lips, bones feeling heavy knowing that your family awaits you within.

“I thought we had more time,” you lament softly, wrapping your arms over your knees and resting your cheek against them.

Steve steps forward, holding out a hand to assist you to your feet. You easily accept his help, your gaze dropping to his long fingers and callous-worn palm so perfectly fitting with your own.

“I know, your highness.” Steve breathes your name in a whisper, just between the two of you before pressing his forehead to yours. “It seems we never have enough time.”

Tears well in your eyes, wiped quickly away by your sleeve. Though you know Steve notices them—he notices everything about you. You press your lips together, searching for the words which will comfort him, but find none. Simply looking into his eyes, his pain reflects back at you, deep pools of longing that you know are mirrored in your own.

“How awful it must be for you to love me,” you whisper, aching to touch more of him, to press your palm above his heart and feel the beat in sync with yours.

“I will never regret it a day in my life, you highness,” he mutters, gaze dropping to your lips.

With a deep breath drawn into his lungs, he steps back from you and straightens himself to his full height, transforming from your loving protector to the proper Captain of the Royal Guard, sworn to uphold his duty to the crown and prepared to sacrifice anything for that purpose.

“We must return to the palace before your father begins to worry,” he states, gesturing you forward with a jut of his chin.

You inhale deeply and close your eyes, gathering your strength in one last moment of peace. And when your eyes open once again, you are the Princess of Aetheria, gliding toward the palace, face a calm mask.

You don’t glance over your shoulder to check if Steve follows you—already knowing he will shadow you anywhere. There is no more time for romance and gaiety. You have your own duties to perform as the princess of the realm.

Two hours later you emerge from your father’s study, reeling from your audience with the King. Steve greets you outside the door, having stood sentry from without while you discussed delicate matters with your father and his newest wife.

Your footsteps hasten the further you walk from your father, winding their way through corridors toward your own suite of rooms.

The door slams shut behind you, Steve left on the other side.

Leaning against the door might be the only thing keeping you on your feet at the moment. Your mind races, despair threatening to overwhelm you. Breaths harsh, panting things that cannot manage to find the air you need.

“Your highness,” Steve calls, banging on the door, “let me in.” The bite of his words, his anger over you locking him out, doesn’t faze you—far too focused on setting your mind at ease. His fists ceases their pounding, a heavy sigh barely audible through the thick wood. He whispers your name, “Please.”

Your heart shatters in your chest. It was inevitable, this day. One you’d hoped to never see. But you knew, no matter how much you tried to deny it.

It has always been difficult, gathering your inner strength and filling the role of the princess. Always too strict, too ill-fitting. This time, it turns your gut and bile climbs in your throat as you straighten your shoulders and step into the room.

The door crashes open against the wall, Steve barging in, brow pinched with worry. Long strides lead him right to you, but you step away, evading the comfort he wishes to bestow.

His muscles tense, jaw ticking with irritation. Eyes quickly scanning the room, he searches for a witness to explain your distance. But only the Gods watch the scene unfolding, leaving him more perplexed than before.

“What did your father wish to discuss?” Steve asks, frozen in place, anticipating some sort of attack or dilemma.

“My engagement,” you reply cooly, unwilling to look at the guard in the eye, lest you break just like your heart. “It seems my father thinks I am ready for matrimony and is unwilling to waylay my marriage any longer.”

Steve’s brow furrows, mind working to parse out this new information. “So,” he questions, halting over each word, “you will be entertaining suitors soon?”

Your head shakes, back turning on your protector—the man you love—to stare out the window at the garden beneath.

“I will be entertaining my betrothed,” you correct, tone dull and lifeless. “The king has already settled upon my future husband, a very rich Baron whose enterprise will keep my father’s coffers filled quite adequately.”

Familiar hands land on your shoulders, spinning you around and reaching to cradle your face. Steve’s expression flashes with a whirlwind of emotion—confusion, pain, anger, betrayal.

“And you agreed.” His voice low, fingers digging into your skin, near painful.

“I have no choice,” you reply meekly, attempting to break away from his fierce hold. You close your eyes, breathing deeply to smother your sorrow and step away.

Steve’s hand grasps at your forearm, keeping you close, pulling you back into the circle of his arms.

“But what about us?” His wide blue eyes stare at you, searching for answers in your gaze. “You said your heart belongs to me.”

“Steve,” you whisper, lip trembling before you can stop it. You grit your teeth and swallow around the lump in your throat. “We both knew this couldn’t last. I have a duty to Aetheria. There is no way to refuse.”

Steve’s gaze drops, his grip falling slack from your arm. His lips part and close, trying to find the words to express himself. You give him time, stepping toward the fireplace and sitting in a plush armchair.

He paces across the floor toward the door, but turns on his heel and storms over. Leaning down, his hands grip the arms of the chair, pinning you in place and leveling your gazes.

“Give yourself to me,” he begs, voice low and a dark flicker smoldering in his eyes. “Your husband doesn’t matter. You’ll still be mine.”

For a brief, shining moment, you think of agreeing. But your head shakes in denial. It’s not right. You cannot commit to something not your own.

“My maidenhead will be delivered to my husband’s hands,” you declare into the still room. “You’re everything to me, but what you’re suggesting is-is impossible.” You choke on the word, shaking your head and pushing up from your seat, gently shoving Steve away.

The silence settles for only a moment before he breaks it, voice strong and determined. A sharp, steely glint flashes as his eyes turn to you.

“If you don’t, I’ll say you did.”

Your hands drop to your sides, shoulders sagging and heart plummeting to your feet. Your lips part around a gasp. A new light shining on the man you thought you loved.

“You can’t,” you mutter, shock keeping you frozen in your spot, wide eyes searching Steve for some indication jest. Yet nothing stares back at you except an unyielding gaze.

“What’s your choice,” he asks, stepping forward, the movement decisive, menacing.

Your head shakes in disbelief, tears pricking at your eyes. Finding the foot of your bed, you fold over and grasp your head in your hands. Your mind volleys between each option, tormented by the heartbreak and betrayal roiling in your guts.

“Either way, I will be ruined,” you conclude, numb at the thought, your whole life slipping through your fingers and falling at Steve’s feet.

“Either way, you will be mine,” Steve corrects, advancing on your crumpled form and gathering you into his embrace. He guides you toward the plush mattress and pillows of the bed.

“No, please,” you protest, pushing away from him, pleading with the single-minded guard. “Steve, if you ever loved me—”

“This is because I love you,” he interrupts, wrestling you down and capturing your lips in a needy kiss.

Never in your life have you been kissed in such a manner—desperate, brutal, consuming. Steve’s teeth nip at your lower lip, licking into your mouth with his tongue as his hands begin to wander. One keeps your wrists anchored over your head, the other trails over your bodice, squeezing your breasts within your stays. It continues venturing lower, rucking up your skirts.

Your legs kick out, squirming away from his persistent touch. You whisper into the kiss, a constant chant of “no, no, no,” mumbled into his lips. But Steve doesn’t pay you any mind.

“It’s going to be alright, my love,” he responds, dragging his lips over your cheeks with a heady sigh. “You’ll understand once we’re through.”

A squeak of surprise jumps from your throat at the first brush of his fingers against your sex. Your hips buck in response, jolting away from his explorations. But he continues to toy with you, pinning your hips with his own, slickness forming on his fingertips the more attention he pays.

Relief floods you when he withdraws his hand from betwixt your thighs, but it is short lived as he reaches for the ties of his britches and begins to release himself.

With his weight atop you, there’s nowhere for you to go—no way to fight him off. He fists his member and slots himself between your thighs. The hard length of him nudging up against your most intimate place before he spears into you.

The pain of it shoots up your spine, his brutal thrust feeling as though it will split you in two. Your lips part on a pained gasp, hands flexing in Steve’s grasp.

He moans above you, forehead resting against your own as a triumphant smile spreads his lips. “Forgive me,” he murmurs with a sweet kiss.

His hips begin to rock, the drag and pull of his member within your walls a burning glide. Your head shakes, eyes squeezing shut, hoping to block out the experience—your deflowering nothing like you ever imagined.

Steve continues babbling words of love and reassurance, even as he claims your body like a beast. His teeth bared in his exertion. His grip on your wrists tightening until your bones creak beneath his hand. His hips clapping mercilessly against your own. The sound fills the room accompanied by his grunts and your whimpers.

Through the pain, a tingle of something else, something pleasant, begins to build—the only grace the Gods grant you. Yet you grit your teeth against it, breathing heavily as the sensation builds. It is of no use. The more Steve uses your body, the higher you climb until you reach a peak and fall off the edge, plummeting into pleasure with a sob wrenched from your lungs.

Steve moans as your walls flutter around him and milk his length, spilling his seed into the deepest part of you. A chuckle pushes past his lips, head resting against the crook of your neck as you both catch your breath.

“I hate you,” you whisper through your tears into the suddenly quiet room.

His head raises abruptly, glaring down at you. His hand releases your wrists and grasps your chin, tilting your head until your eyes meet.

“No, you don’t,” Steve snarls, a tinge of desperation lacing his tone, “you don’t say that.” He captures you in a bruising kiss, nipping at your flesh before pulling away. “You love me. Promised yourself to me.”

His hips shift and he withdraws slowly, his softened member slipping from within you. The emptiness leaves behind an ache unlike any other and you mewl pathetically at the feeling. Steve simply busses a trail of kisses down your body, over your dress and toward your folds. His fingers follow the path, delicately spreading your tender and tormented flesh to his gaze. His spend drips from you, mixing with your virginal blood and staining the sheets.

The guard—your sworn protector, your most demoralizing transgressor—sighs in relief, resting his head upon the plush pillow of your thigh, transfixed by the sight of your debauchery, “And now, no one will take you away from me.”

#steve rogers x reader #royalty au #dark fic #tw non con #tw rape #rape #non con #tw blood #writing in the dark bingo #18+#minors dni

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