#it’s hard to find things that would live up to this sort of artistry | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

jinkookspencil · 1 year

Text

unlucky in love

Your best friend Namjoon proposes a surprising, prolonged backup plan for the decades to come……

“Would….Would it be so bad?”

“You and me. You and me stuck with each other.”

tags/description: ~6k words / namjoon x (f) reader / angst / fluff / friends to lovers(?) / pining / no smut but alludes to sex possibly happening at one point / no triggers or warnings, except swearing / happy ending / slow burn within their timelines since this takes years…. / jane austen references, title is a reference to p&p but fair warning i might just change it to 'unlucky' in the future / three ‘chapters’ / age of namjoon in each chapter: 1: ~27, 2:~32, 3: ~36 / chapters are separated by little ✣ ’s / feedback always welcome!

author’s note: every time i say I’ll upload my jin fics another fic pops into and out of my head - this namjoon fic came out of nowhere and i just thought to upload it to celebrate the release of indigo. the jin ones are coming very soon though. </3 proud of this though, besides the jin wip series, this is my first longer work!

Namjoon was a catch. An ideal man. The perfect man, really. It wasn’t hard for you, one of his best friends, to see why practically every woman on the planet fell for him. It wasn’t just the people who knew him, either. You could see it in the barista’s eyes when you grabbed coffee together. You heard your friends’ countless gushes over him, even the ones that were taken. And you couldn’t blame them…. He was smart, a little goofy, respectful, manly, sometimes endearing, and he was pretty easy on the eyes too. Every woman’s dream. Practically a Jane Austen character come to life.

You could see it, understand it….you just never…. felt it. Namjoon was a close friend. Nothing more. Nothing less.

You always had to dismiss people who thought otherwise or thought that that’s how you knew each other. Work had made your paths cross a few years ago when you were both in your early twenties and taking your first steps into the world of art. When he walked into your job at the film institute one morning, he had wanted to find out more about the artistry of film, the one realm of art he didn’t explore as thoroughly as paintings, sculptures, and literature, which you had always thought of studying as well. A quick conversation about film turned into an hour-long discussion on art and passion; the rest was history. Whenever Namjoon came back to learn about film, you took the opportunity to ask him about literature and art, whenever he brought it up, and before you knew it a friendship formed. He was the only one that got you, on your passions, art, and, as you’d later find out, in life.

Movie nights at his place and your place were common, as were trips to libraries and bookstores to pick out different reads, which you’d begin at coffee shops over cronuts and pies, but you enjoyed your regular late-night therapy sessions just as much, talking about life and its complexities, sharing ideas and personal philosophies… He was the only one that ever cared about that sort of thing…. And even when it got to discussions on love, everything remained respectful - especially when the other was in a relationship. Boyfriends came and went, with only one ever getting “worried” about Namjoon, whose girlfriends came and went over the years as well.

You understood art, you understood each other, you just never understood love.

It was the main topic of conversation on your cold, December walk, trying to figure it out as you always did.

“Why are we just so unlucky?” you complained. “Do you think there’s something wrong with us? Are we attracting these weirdos?”

He giggles. “I wouldn’t say that. We’re just ourselves, aren’t we? And don’t be mean. People just play a role and live fake lives because they don’t know any better. What did that guy tell you once? Didn’t he say that he was an author but it turns out he paid someone to write some fake short story about a cloud or some shit? Didn’t they even write the good morning texts he sent you?”

“Oh god, don’t remind me of that lazy ass, Joon,” you shake your head. “As if you didn’t date that girl who said she was an art curator but couldn’t pronounce Monet.”

“Ay,” he sighs. “I just wish people were honest to themselves, you know. So what, if you can’t pronounce Monet and didn’t like art? That girl was fine, she was just a compulsive liar. I can’t have that.”

“Sincerity is dying, Kim Namjoon. It lives in you and me only. And in, let’s hope, a lovely man out there who proves me wrong. And in someone for you, too.”

“Let’s hope. Otherwise, we’ll be stuck with each other.”

“Oof, can’t have that,” you laugh, but a couple of steps later you notice that Namjoon had stopped walking, the bite of the hotteok he had taken from the dessert in your hands lingering in his mouth for a moment too long before he swallowed it.

Eyes squinted in a far off-gaze, with his head tiled, you knew Namjoon was in thought. As always, you stopped and stared at him until he came back to Earth, not to interrupt his train of thought.

“Would….Would it be so bad?” he finally speaks.

“Would what be so bad?”

“You and me. You and me stuck with each other.”

W- all of a sudden?!

“Namjoon?!”

“Listen, I know we’re friends. Just friends, right? For all these years? And even right now… like sorry, Y/N, but I don’t know if I feel so attracted to you… I think I know too much and we’re too alike but that’s not the point. Just… Would it be so bad?” he asks, but he goes on. “I guess you’re right, we’ve both just been so…. unlucky. I like to think there’s someone out there for me and for you but… I can’t deny that I’m losing hope, at least for myself. You are, too, you just admitted it. The new year is starting soon and I've been thinking about what I want in life... And… I want a wife. I want kids. And..”

“Namjoon, what the fuck are you saying?!,” you yell in the middle of the snowy park. “Kids?!”

“Not now!” he explains. “Of course not now. But… look they always say ‘marry your best friend’, right? Well, you’re my only ‘best friend’ that’s a girl. It’s not like I can ask Yoongi to marry me.”

You feel your head spin at the words spewing out of Namjoon’s mouth.

“Kim Namjoon! A wife, marriage, kids, what the fuck are you saying?”

He takes a deep breath and grabs your elbow, leading you to sit on a nearby park bench.

“Breathe, Y/N. I thought this through and we can scrap the idea and pretend like I never said anything, but just hear me out for a moment, with a calm mind.”

Looking at Namjoon, still confused, you take a couple of deep breaths before you nod at him to continue talking.

“I’m not saying this for right now. What I’m saying is… in years, if we’re still friends, if we’re still single, if we’re still unlucky in love, if we still get each other…. If, and if, and if…. Why don’t we… why don’t we give this a shot? Just as a backup? We can either try a relationship - but that might be too weird because you know,” he tilts his head, “As I said, I think you’re not… and I am not… at least right now, anyway… Anyway! We can do that or we can just… get married regardless. Maybe have kids some way or the other. I know you want that in life but not right now, and I feel the same. And who knows? Our ‘wants’ can easily change…. But if…. It’ll be nice to share my life with my best friend.”

You stare at Namjoon, taking in his… proposal. “When?”

“When should we do this?” he assumes is your question, staring up at the sky while he figures out an answer. “When I’m around 35, 36, 37? That seems good for both of us. That gives us plenty of time to find someone else, if that happens and…”

“No, I mean… when did you come up with this idea?”, you ask.

“Oh, just right now when we were walking over there,” he says, pointing to the place he froze.

“And you’re so ready to make this offer?!”

“You’re my best friend!” he exclaims. “Wasn’t this always a safe space for us to just say what’s on our minds?”

His tone couldn’t be more serious, even with the gentle expression on his face.

“Look, it’s just an idea. It’s just a backup. And hey if in the future you or I feel like this conversation was a bad idea we can forget it ever happened. Wouldn’t it be nice to spend our nights watching films everyone thinks is too pretentious, talking about life, then in the mornings visiting libraries and galleries, with hotteoks and coffee? And not have to worry about lovers who never gave a shit about all of that? It’s about more than that but…,” he pauses. “We can still do it as friends, but…. just in case we don’t find that with someone else….”

You stare at Namjoon. He was your best friend. He understood you more than any lover, or any friend, ever had. Would it be so bad? To marry your best friend?

“And what about the issue of attraction, Joon? We both think that’s important. I hate to break it to you, bestie, but I’m not attracted to you, either.”

“That’ll resolve itself,” he laughs. “We’ll probably be too old to care. Or.. we’ll see…. There are so many ‘if’s’ for this to happen and I don’t know what future Namjoon will think. It’s just an offer.”

You had plenty of time. Sure, you’d find someone…. Sure, he would too - if given the chance, hundreds of girls would line up just for the chance to date him. OF course, you’ll both find other people…. But for now…. Would it hurt to not completely disregard your best friend?

“I’m living every girl’s dream… getting proposed to under conditions, with the guy telling her she’s unattractive and saying he’ll be stuck with me.”

“Sorry, just think of yourself as a modern-day Elizabeth Bennett,” he smiles.

“Oh, don’t flatter yourself by insinuating that you’re a Darcy,” you say, making him laugh.

“So… when you’re 35?” you ask after a moment of silence, looking at Namjoon through your eyelashes, picking at the paper packaging of your shared dessert in your hands, his twiddling with the strings on his hoodie.

“Around?”, he answers.

You nod, smiling at your best friend.

“Okay. That gives me plenty of time to find an actual Mr. Darcy.”

“I’m sure he’ll bewitch you, you idiot….”

✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣

“Finally, it’s been too long.”

Those are the words you’d greeted Namjoon with the moment you spotted him waiting for you outside the cafe. It had been too long. Over the years, you kept in touch as best as you could, but with hectic work schedules and different careers, it was hard to see each other as often as you used to in your twenties.

“It has,” he smiles, wrapping an arm around you in a hug. “What has it been like 5, 6 months? How’ve you been?”

You catch up for the next hour over coffee and pastries, talking about life, the world, and art, as you always had, as if you’d just seen each other the other day. But, as the sun began to set and the cafe got too busy to relax in, you were reminded that your long-anticipated hangout day was slowly coming to an end.

“I don’t know if it’s our age or if that croissant ruined it, but how is this iced latte so sweet?” he wonders, taking a sip of the extra coffee he ordered to go as you watched the summer sky change colors in the park.

“Let’s switch,” you offer, handing Namjoon your iced americano. “You never liked coconut milk, anyway, why would you order it with your coffee? Dairy is still bad for you, huh?”

“Yep. I can’t power through the intolerance anymore,” he laughs. “Could it be possible that my girlfriend’s dairy intolerance made me even more intolerant?”

“The model, right?” you ask.

“Yep. She’s…alright. And hey, I’ve been meaning to ask you…. how’s that guy you’ve been seeing? How long has it been now? A year?”

“A year and a half,” you nod. “That’s actually the reason I’ve been rushing to see you…

I…uh.. I’m engaged.”

Namjoon’s pace slows. “Oh.”

Oh?

“Uhm, congratulations,” he says sternly.

“Thanks….” you murmur, side-eyeing Namjoon who just stares at his feet as you both continue to walk.

“Do you like him?”

“….Of course, I like him, Namjoon. Why else would I accept? Why else would I date him for a year and a half of my life?”, you snap.

But Namjoon remains quiet, merely nodding in the silence.

“I thought you’d be happy for me,” you say.

“I would be…. If you were happy.”

“I am happy,” you say, stopping him and standing your ground.

“Then where the fuck is your ring?”

You quickly hide your hands in your pockets in a feeble attempt at concealing the truth he just spat out. He had given you a ring. A diamond ring with a gold band. One he said reminded him of you. Even though you told him you hated diamonds, and only wore silver. It was the thought that counts, right? The gift…. The proposal. It didn’t matter that he didn’t bother getting one that fit either, it was too big and too…. not you. As he said, you should be grateful that he finally popped the question…..

“It was too big,” you say meekly, and Namjoon scoffs.

“Even so, why didn’t he get it resized? Why isn’t it on a chain around your neck? Is it fucking gold?!”

“I…”

“To this day… even if we don’t see each other as often, I’d still consider you my best friend,” he interrupts you softly. “I know you more than anyone, Y/N. If this is the same guy you talked to me about a year ago….,” he sighs. “I know the movies you find romantic, the books and characters you fawn over, the tropes you like, the art that affected you… and I know he isn’t.. he wouldn’t… He wouldn’t do all the things you wanted, all the things you deserved, Y/N. What happened to that hope you always had, even whenever we called ourselves unlucky? Where is my best friend? The Y/N I knew, who looked for a Darcy or a Knightley or whatever the fuck? That Y/N? She wouldn’t settle for someone like that.”

“I woke up. I was delusional. I realized that I don’t live in a fucking Jane Austen novel, Namjoon. There’s no one else, okay?”

He shakes his head. It stings more than anything, seeing the disappointment and…. hurt…. in his eyes. “Your reason for marrying a guy is ‘there’s no one else’? Y/N….”

“Don’t bring up that stupid ass deal now, Namjoon.”

“Did I?!”, he asks, and it’s the first time you sense anger in his voice. You rarely could… even over the years.

“Fuck the deal. Look at the guy you’re marrying,” he spits the words out, the last word escaping like venom, before rubbing the space between his brows. “How many times did you come to me because he never got you, huh? Because he never made any effort to do so?

I just want to see you happy, Y/N.”

“Well, open your eyes, Namjoon because that’s what you’ll see.”

But you walk away the moment he looks at you, knowing you’d be unable to hide another lie, nor the tears forming in your eyes.

He knew you too well.

✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣ ✣

“Did you hear who’s here?”

Looking up from your notebook, you see the excitement in your co-partner’s eyes… under all that blue mascara and funky makeup.

“Put that thing away! It’s a party. Guess who’s here?”

“Who?” you resign, putting your tiny notepad and pen in your purse.

“Only your FAVORITE film director, AND he’s looking to fund the film institute, AND he’s newly single.”

You contain your excitement, but she’d never realize it was there. “You talk like a teenager when we need to get down to business, ‘partner’. Is he really here and looking to fund it?”

“And he’s single,” she reiterates. “Oh, and the Kim Namjoon is here.”

…..Oh.

“He's so handsome, isn't he? And on top of all that talent? I think he’s looking to put together some pieces for an upcoming exhibition in his gallery… And word on the street is he's looking to get into film, too. Actually….," she pauses, "you two seem like a good fit. I’m sure you’ll work together one day.”

The thought of seeing Namjoon made your heart race, but really there was no reason for you to be surprised. The both of you had become prominent people in the art industry… It was more surprising that you hadn’t bumped into each other in all these years, dancing within the same circles. And you always promised yourself…

Still, you were there for work, you reminded yourself quickly. Sure, it was a party, but everyone networked at these things. And you had a film institute that needed funding….

The night went well, you mixed and mingled with so many people that were interested in film and the institute, and you can’t help but feel a rush when receiving your favorite director’s business card, complete with his personal phone number…. Where that’d go, you couldn’t tell, but his brief mention of funding and a collaboration idea was more than enough. Lost in the adrenaline, you forgot about Namjoon entirely….

“Y/N, there you are!,” you hear from behind you,. It was a partygoer you had just met….a familiar, looming figure was talking to someone else behind her. “We’ve been looking for you everywhere! Have you met Mr. Kim Namjoon?”

Of course. This was it.

The all-too-familiar figure turns towards you, his glaring eyes fixated on yours for a moment so long you missed the partygoer’s unnecessary introductions.

“….Miss Y/N here is a leading figure in the world of film,” you hear, “which I know you expressed interest in delving into, Mr. Kim.”

“You don’t need to introduce Miss. Y/N L/N to me. It’s good to see you,” he says with a smile, eyes still locked onto yours, but you don’t miss his fingers twitching around the glass in his hand before he outstretches his other arm.

“It’s good to see you too,” you reply, shaking his hand. Just as soft and big as you remember it to be.

“Oh! Have you… met?” the elderly lady asks from somewhere in your peripheral vision.

“We have,” you simply respond with a nod, but Namjoon elaborates.

“We… now.. we now know of each other.”

“Oh…. Well… why haven’t you collaborated yet?! I’ll leave you to it, figure it out and make it happen,” you hear the woman insist and briefly see her figure disappear into the crowd.

“It really is good to see you, Y/N,” he says, finally breaking the silence between you in the otherwise noise-filled room.

“Same to you, Namjoon….”

“I’m proud of you and all that you’ve done. I never got the chance to say that.”

“Thanks. I’m proud of you, too… ‘Mr. Kim’,” you laugh.

“Oh,” he winces with a chuckle, “It sounds even weirder coming from you. At this age and I still haven’t gotten used to it, to all of…. this,” he says, waving around to the party behind him and taking a sip of his drink.

“Don’t pretend like you don’t like a good party, Kim Namjoon, I know you too well.”

“You do, you do…..,” he says, nodding. “And I do, like a good party. But you know just as well as I do that this isn’t a party. This is just… networking and business.”

“Yeah… and you’re interested in film, all of a sudden….”

“Not all of a sudden, Y/N, you know that, but it is time for my foundation to step into film. We've neglected it for far too long, but… fuck I don’t want to talk about that…” he waves off. “You’re the only one here I can have a normal conversation with…”

You had both begun to hear distant calls of ‘Mr. Kim Namjoon!’

“….Can we step out for a while?”

Just around the corner from the gallery the event was held at, was a quaint yet artsy bookstore and bakery hybrid that was surprisingly still open at this hour. But at the employees’ silent acknowledgment of Namjoon, you suspected he was a regular… or the more obvious answer, they recognized him as famed writer and art philanthropist, Kim Namjoon.

“Sit, I’ll get us some stuff,” he says, before returning to you with two coffees and two pastries. “A lemon flavor and a dark chocolate one… Because we’ve gotten so old.”

You chuckle, taking a bite of the bittersweet dark chocolate pastry, the perfect cup of coffee in your hands, the beautiful bookstore you were in and wondering how you never found it, but most of all you were taking in the moment… Taking in the fact that you were sitting opposite Namjoon again. Taking him in. With his eyes wandering around in thought, and a smile on his face. Already, it was as if no time had passed at all. Except, age looked good a bit too good on him.

“Coffee, desserts, bookstores, and probably late-night conversations with Kim Namjoon… Takes me back.”

“Yeah…..” he thinks aloud, eyes still scanning above and below as he does…. “Yeah, I missed this.”

“…So have I…. I’m sorry I never reached out, Namjoon.”

“Don’t be,” he says, looking at you through his brows and taking a slow sip from his coffee. “I never reached out either.”

And…,” he starts, rubbing his hands together before continuing, “ I don’t know if I can take another year,” he says, breaking the silence. “Friends again?”

You don’t even have to think about it. “Friends again.”

“Good,” he sighs with a wide smile, his eyes still forming little crescent moons when he did so. “Phew. Finally, I’ll have someone that gets me. Maybe we both changed over the years, but even so, I’m just glad I’ll have someone to talk to about books and art again. Someone that doesn’t want something out of me or isn’t bored out of their mind when I do so like Yoongi. I made the funniest joke the other day and he just ignored me like I hadn’t said anything.”

“What was the joke?”

“What do you get if you cross a painter with a heavyweight boxer? ….Muhammad Dali.”

You scoff. “Seems like Seokjin rubbed off on you. Kim Namjoon, you haven’t changed.”

“Neither have you,” he says. “I saw you with your little notebook. Who brings a notebook to a party?”

“I was writing down information I knew I’d forget! Do you know how many people introduced themselves? I need to differentiate the flirting guy from the ‘kid faking that he’s in the industry’ from ‘serious collaboration potential’! They’re all in that sacred notebook, with a description of each person!”

“The flirting guy, huh? In addition to that too-good director? I saw him give you his number...” Namjoon chuckles, before going silent. “Whatever happened with… to the engagement?”

Despite having no contact with Namjoon over the past couple of years, there’s no way word wouldn’t have gotten to him. Despite everything, if you had made that mistake, he still would’ve been invited to the wedding.

“You know, Namjoon.”

He nods. He knows. He probably knows that he’s the one who woke you up from that nightmare too. But nothing needs to be said.

“Yeah,” you roll your eyes. “Whatever happened to that model by the way?”

“…Which one?” he smirks.

“Fuck off, Kim Namjoon,” you throw a flimsy napkin in his way, laughing while he explodes into his hearty, hyena laugh - the one he rarely lets out.

“Oh, it’s been ages since I heard that,” you say, pretending to wince at the noise.

“It’s been ages since it came out of me.....”

“Why? Seokjin’s not around? Too busy with his wife and kids?”, you ask.

“He’s around, still as funny, but… I don’t know, you make me laugh…differently…”

“It was your joke! You basically made yourself laugh, Joon,” you giggle.

“Oh, fuck,” he says. “…'Joon’…”

You search his face, trying to sense what he was feeling but you couldn’t tell what it was…

“No one called you that? Over the years? It seems like a… common, easy nickname for you….” you say calmly, wondering why no girlfriend or lover ever used the soft as summer nickname for the man who was the same.

“People tried to,” he shakes his head. “I never let them.”

“Why?” you ask, eyes narrowing. “Why, Namjoon?”

“Y/N…. I know I don’t have to explain sentimentality to you.” His gaze shifts from the paper cup he toyed with to your eyes, and again, you just sit in silence.

It was time.

“You know, Namjoon, I did a lot of thinking…. over the years… About myself, the world…. You know, we called ourselves unlucky but we’re really quite stupid.”

“I know,” he nods. “We are, but… go on.“

“It was stupid of us to attribute it all to luck and the world. Especially because… all these years, I don’t think either of us really knew what we were searching for. We chased the empty label of ‘love’ without defining how that’d look like to us. And that’s what I’ve been working on.”

“And?”

“And…. After countless movies, books, art, and a lot of self-reflection….. I finally have an idea.” Your eyes wandered as you talked, but you were determined to keep them on him, who listened intently, as you continued.

“I have an idea… of what love looks like to me. Whenever I thought about what I wanted, what I had and experienced… I realized that what I wanted was what we had. That friendship, that support, that empathy, respect, trust, honesty, and understanding… that… love.

I loved you, Namjoon. I love you.”

“And I loved you…and love you. I always did and always will,” he says immediately, calmly. “But…. what exactly are you saying?”

You knew he meant it as you did. You didn't need to define what type or over-analyze it and sub-categorize it as you would have when you were younger. It was love. Deep, true love. And it’s now or never...

“Is that offer still on the table?”

A chuckle escapes him, as well as the smile he tried so hard to contain.

“You needed to rewatch all those movies and reread all those books to figure it out? I could’ve painted you a picture years ago. But… you never even asked if I was single.”

“Are you?” you ask, hoping the quiet chuckle you let out concealed the bubbling feeling of regret in your chest. “Or is there another model? Some artistic muse? What did you call that one from years ago? ‘Alright’? ”

“The model, the curator, the.. whatever, they were all… alright but… wrong. No one ever… got me,” he admits, raising his eyebrows when he sees you nodding at his use of your words. You were on the same page. “I stopped searching for someone who did…. and then I went to that party.

I always wanted that for you, Y/N, but I never realized I needed it too…”

Namjoon was at his most vulnerable, and so were you, laying your honest truth out to the person who knew you best…. But it was easier to see it in his eyes. It’s something you hadn’t seen in him since your twenties, but he seemed more sure of himself than ever. So ready to be vulnerable, so ready to be honest, so…

“So…." you say, partly thinking aloud, partly hoping Namjoon could continue the conversation.

“So, you finally get why I made that offer, way back when?” he asks.

“How did you know? We were in our twenties… Wait… did you come up with this because you had feelings for me all along?!”, you say, mouth agape in shock and amusement. You’d never doubt your friendship was a sham, but what if…

“Don’t flatter yourself. I’m not the Knightley to your Emma, idiot, I wasn’t attracted to you then. It was just…. something that felt right. It still does. I didn’t know… much.”

“So, the offer is still on the table?”, you ask after a moment of silence.

“Of course it is.”

“Are you 35?”

“A little older,” he winces. "All this time and you're still bad at math, huh?"

You roll your eyes. “Well, you said ‘around 35’.... so, we’re right on schedule. And I still need to be wooed, Kim Namjoon. I know you have it in you,” you smile, feeling confidence return to your bloodstream like a rush of adrenaline after years without it.

“You finally know what you deserve,” he says softly. “You are getting bewitched, Y/N, whether you like it or not.”

“Bewitched and hitched?” you laugh.

“Hey, don’t come for my job. Or actually, a joint poetry book or short film shit would be nice, we should do that,” he thinks, “but yes…. bewitched and hitched.”

Staring at the man you knew so well sitting opposite you, you couldn’t wait.

“‘When you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible,’” you quote quietly.

“When Harry Met Sally…,” Namjoon nods. “You loved that film.”

“I do…” you nod. “so with that in mind, how soon can we make the wedding?”

He laughs, his hand reaching for yours across the table before he stands up and envelops you in a warm, soft embrace. Taking in his familiar scent of coffee and cologne, you don’t want to let go. In any way. But he does, only to kiss you on the cheek and giggle when you tip-toe to reciprocate.

“And if we fight?”, you suddenly ask Namjoon, your demons briefly popping in to ruin the moment.

“We used to. As couples do,” he shrugs, taking your hands in his. “All those ‘if’s’ worked out in our favor, didn’t they? It didn’t seem like they did….until today.”

He brushes a hair away from your face, fingers grazing your jawline. Amidst all the familiarity of the night, this was new…. His lips slowly meet yours in a kiss as soft as summer and sweeter than the chocolate you could taste on him.

Breaking away, his hand instantly finds his stomach. You don’t need to theorize what it means, but you can’t hide the shock you’re feeling. He could be so innocent at times, you remember thinking, whenever you saw him rub his belly button every time he got butterflies from a girl.

“Wow, do people our age still get butterflies in their stomachs?” You giggle, placing your hand on his. This was definitely new ground. “And to think I caused this.”

“I hate how I could never control it, it feels like a tickle," he smiles. "Doesn’t help that I haven’t felt this in a while, though... I wish my 'tell' was as subtle as yours.”

“I have a tell?!!,” you yell, immediately wondering if anything gave away that you were feeling the same way.

“You do. Not to bring him up but I never saw it with what’s-his-face and that's when I knew… But anyways, I think I’ll keep it a secret. So you don’t make a note of it,” he says while you roll your eyes, but in doing so a book behind Namjoon catches your eye and suddenly, you remembered your surroundings.

“Anyways, is this beautiful place magically open for us to have this moment?”

“Well, if you’d say that, then I’m the wizard.”

“What?” you laugh.

“Sweetie, I own this place.”

You momentarily ignore another ‘first’ in your life, Namjoon calling you a pet name, to take in the fact that he owned the most beautiful place you’d ever seen in your life.

“You OWN this place?! And you never told me about it? This is what I feel most betrayed about, Joon,” you huff, looking around. Of course it was his. Every inch of this placed screamed his name. No wonder you loved it so much.

“I guess I have to explain this one to you, don’t I? I saved this place from going bankrupt and completely revamped it. I thought of you every step of the way and… you know, I’m a romantic. I liked to believe one day you’d find this place by chance and just get that it was mine…. And that that’s how we’d meet. There’s even a screening room upstairs, beside the mini gallery, so I’m surprised you hadn’t found this place yet. There’s even a DVD section because you went on about the importance of physical media, which I now get. You didn’t even notice the name, huh?”

You look around, finding the minimalistic lettering and logo of the place on the far wall. “Unlucky - Art. Books. Coffee.”

“I love it, Namjoon,” you say, looking around in wonder… “And let me guess, you called it ‘Unlucky’ to defy the word itself?”

He nods, smiling as he walks over to you. “We were never unlucky. We were lucky… because we had each other.”

“‘Had’… I hate that we wasted those years in between,” you whisper.

“Don’t be. The years got us here. To when we could finally have each other… again. It’s not too late if it’s the right way, the right time....”

“Let’s go back to that party,, hmm?” he says after another hug, “I’m already excited to introduce you as my fiancé.”

“And then we'll leave and talk some more. I’m not wasting a single moment of my life from now on, Kim Namjoon.”

“Of course…,” he smiles. “We’ll leave and… talk. The talking that results in the other thing we said would come with this deal.”

You pinch Namjoon’s still squishy yet firm arm before taking it in your hands as you walked back to the party, anticipating what came next.

Whether it was talking, Namjoon’s new definition of talking, hearing him introduce you as his fiancé, working with him, or even just the next minute by his side. It was the rest of your life. He was the rest of your life.

And neither of you could ever let this go. This was the love you’d both been searching for.

179 notes · View notes

realhankmccoy · 1 year

Text

Conservatives have high levels of fear which leads to an almost childish inability to trust.

Constantly, they preach to me that I've got a lot to learn...

Basically the message being 'blacks and the government and everyone will eat you alive if you don't shape up and stop giving it all away so freely...'

Oh? and everything should be quid pro quo because conservatives are cynical, paranoid, and very naughty (shred you behind your back) pieces of shit?

It's truly not my problem that they're cowards and racists, and that thus their mind revolves around conservative, racist mantras that would never once circle my head (which is not a conservative toilet bowl, having flushed that water out of mine before I even hit my teenage years, I believe) like 'trust freely given will just get you in trouble'.

It is kind of funny to me how jumpy conservatism has made dad, Bruce and Boi. it's like some idiot who's angling for a crown losing his shit if he thinks for one moment that the person he's interacting with is half as fundamentally shitty and untrustworthy and two-faced as

himself

That's the real issue. You act half as bad as they do and they will LOSE their shit due to fear and the decision that you cannot be trusted and you are bad. They have nothing but an endless row of excuses for why themselves are bad. Namely, I WAS ABUSED whether by women or their parents or by Gen X or by a Mexican or a black and a bunch of crap like that.

It's a fundamentally royalist, parentally-spoiled and selfish mode.

remember kids, your abuse doesn't give you the right to abuse others. there will be some people who are sympathetic to Baby You tho who will enable it, just as people enable all sorts of abusers for various reasons. HE HAD IT HARD JUST LET HIM ABUSE.

I prefer to give em a number of chances until they make me the bad man in their head. There's a few advantages of that.

1.) I never have to put up with their crap as 'friends' anymore

2.) To seek revenge on me, they usually learn to be nicer to the people in their lives just to prove me 'wrong'.

so, it's win-win the way i see it... I don't have to put up with their assaults on me and I get them to act nicer to others.

ultimately, looking out for what socially makes sense and the greater picture.

the one thing i can't stop is these cowards do knuckle down on a lot of toxic conservativisms to sort of puff themselves up and make themselves feel more secure.

but the way i see it, they were already headed in that direction due to how most standard-issue Americans grow more conservative with age, and most of them sort of wooden themselves up into pufferfish territory where they may be monsters but they'll at least stay out of trouble. like Jordan Peterson isn't gonna go on a shooting spree, you know?

these people damage the sociopolitical fabric but I guess there's also the funny aspect of them wriggling their angry and 'toxic has value because' t-rex arms in ways that clearly show they are nothing life me.

i guess that's why I still (but much less so these last three months) look for whatever I could inject these people with to make me actually want to be around them / make them less egotistical pompous and bloated sort of rabid zombies operating as subsidiaries of the powerful forces that cucked em -- I don't even read ANY of Boi's boring long stories anymore because I know all I'm going to find in there is him being a cuck who finds himself to be very talented (Bruce also blatantly found himself to be an immensely more talented artist than me -- so does my dad, who also thinks even my brother is more talented because of the artistry of killing deer) and maybe his buried pain like some dumb treasure hunt of what Trump did to him vs. what's left -- but ultimately hey, in a free country -- which is what they want more than anything, typical and comfortable with a rat rat / dog pile as they are due to their own sense of being better than others -- well, freedom to be a cuck is also part of the equation and that's what they chose.

Anyhow, do i want to be in a room with them given their lack of maturity, lack of adult responsibility (they are *never* to blame or responsible in their Trumpian way)... only marginally human way they are? Let me type it in a language they can understand: FUCK. NO.

0 notes

stereostevie · 3 years

Link

When you think of grunge, do you picture a bunch of long-haired White guys in plaid shirts, singing about teenage angst and self-loathing? Time to expand that viewpoint. Standing above them all should be Tina Bell, a tiny Black woman with an outsized stage presence, and her band, Bam Bam. It’s only recently that the 1980s phenom has begun to be recognized as a godmother of grunge.

This modern genre’s sound was, in many ways, molded by a Black woman. The reason she is mostly unknown has everything to do with racism and misogyny. Looking back at the beginnings of grunge, with the preconception that “everybody involved” was White and/or male, means ignoring the Black woman who was standing at the front of the line.

Bam Bam was formed as a punk band in 1983 in Seattle. Bell, a petite brown-skinned spitfire with more hairstyle changes than David Bowie, sang lead vocals and wrote most of the lyrics. Her then-husband Tommy Martin was on guitars (the band’s name is an acronym of their last names: Bell And Martin), Scotty “Buttocks” Ledgerwood played bass, and Matt Cameron was on drums. Cameron would leave the band in its first year and go on to fame as the drummer for Soundgarden and Pearl Jam. But he paid homage to his beginnings by wearing a Tina Bell T-shirt in a photoshoot for Pearl Jam’s 2017 Anthology: the Complete Scores book.

“For some reason a couple of skinheads are up front, calling her [the N-word] And all of the sudden, Bell grabs a microphone stand and she starts swirling it around her head like a lasso… She swung that fuckin’ thing around her head and about the fourth time, she smashed that son of a bitch.”

Bam Bam’s sound straddled the line between punk and something so new that it didn’t have a name yet. Their music combined a driving, thrumming bass line; downtuned, sludgy guitars; thrashy, pulsing drums; melodic vocals that range from sultry to haunting to screamy; and lyrics about the existential tension of trying to exist in a world not designed for you. The band’s 1984 music video for their single “Ground Zero” is low-budget, but Bell’s charisma seeps through.

“She was fucking badass. That’s all there is to it. She was amazing as a performer. I’ve only seen one White male lead singer command the stage in a similar way that Tina Bell did, and that was Bon Scott of AC/DC,” says Om Johari, who attended Bam Bam shows as a Black teenager in the ’80s and who would go on to lead all-female AC/DC cover band Hell’s Belles.

youtube

Christina King, a Seattle scenester who was close friends with Bell from 1984 until the early ’90s, says the singer’s talent was obvious. But she believes a lot of people dismissed Bell as a gimmick.

Among those attending their shows: Future members of grunge bands like Nirvana (Kurt Cobain did a stint as a Bam Bam roadie), Soundgarden, Alice in Chains, and Pearl Jam.

“I remember one person saying to me that they didn’t get ‘the whole Black girl singer thing,’ it just didn’t fit whatever they were into,” says King. “They were too ahead of their time.”

Bam Bam came into being in an era when hundreds of underground clubs, taverns, bars, and social halls — anywhere that you could cram in a band — were within the Seattle city limits. Bam Bam played almost all of them, and often to big crowds: The Colourbox, Crocodile Lounge, Gorilla Gardens, Squid Row — just to name a few.

Among those attending their shows: Future members of history-making grunge bands like Nirvana (Kurt Cobain did a stint as a Bam Bam roadie), Soundgarden, Alice in Chains, and Pearl Jam. Not to mention all the other people, mostly White and male, who would become prime targets for music labels trying to market this new sound.

Bell “already possessed everything they were trying to attain. She had a truer rock and roll spirit than almost any of those guys in that town. Everything they tried to do, she naturally was,” says Ledgerwood, still a loyal bandmate.

One Seattle club, The Metropolis, became “like our fucking living room,” says Ledgerwood. It was also the site of an overtly racist verbal assault against Tina Bell.

“For some reason a couple of skinheads are up front, calling her [the N-word],” Ledgerwood recalls. “And all of the sudden, Bell grabs a microphone stand and she starts swirling it around her head like a lasso… She swung that fuckin’ thing around her head and about the fourth time, she smashed that son of a bitch… She nailed that fucker right in the temple of his head. Split like a melon. And the other guy next to him caught it too, they go down, and we’re like, ‘What the fuck?’”

Ledgerwood says that after going backstage for a while to regroup, Bell came back “and put out the most blistering set of our fucking career.”

This could easily be an anecdote about Bell’s power, her resilience, and willingness to fight back against oppressive forces. But it’s also a story about the cost of being a Black woman who does something that some people don’t expect or approve of.

“She’s being pulled out of her zone because somebody is acknowledging how the rest of the world can see her,” says Johari, empathizing with the star rocker. “And even to react to it by picking up a microphone and smashing someone in the face, that means that that incident cost her not only that moment it takes to get back into the song, but the whole [effects of her] action will last for weeks.

“She’ll replay that over and over and over and over again. And then the people she sees that were there when it happened, they’re gonna come up to her and they’re gonna forget everything that she’s saying, all the stuff that she had did, and they’re only going to focus on, ‘I was at that show where you knocked a dude in the head for calling you an N-word,’” Johari says. “It has nothing to do with her artistry. But it reminds her of the way in which she has to be prepared, just in case it happens again.”

King remembers Bell also felt that some of the other men in the band’s changing lineup failed to treat her as an equal partner: “She’s getting that from her own band members — what do you think audience people are like?”

A European tour in the late ’80s gained Bam Bam international fans, but ended after Bell and Martin split up, and Bell was caught in an immigration enforcement dragnet in the Netherlands.

When they returned to the Pacific Northwest, Bam Bam continued playing shows until 1990, when Bell abruptly quit as they were packing up to head to the studio in Portland, Ore.

“She had just had enough,” Ledgerwood says. “For almost eight years she had almost literally eviscerated herself for the audience.”

But that work never resulted in the national recognition they deserved.

“Grunge, whatever that means, is being identified as from your community, your colleagues, your sound that you were a participant in help shaping, and you’re not even mentioned in any of it.”

“Sometimes you need to be a little bit of an asshole to protect yourself. And Bell wasn’t much of an asshole,” Ledgerwood adds. “She was a pure-hearted person and had a really hard time believing that people couldn’t accept her over something as stupid as race.”

Bell didn’t just quit the band, she withdrew from music completely, says her son, Oscar-winning documentary filmmaker TJ Martin. Not out of resentment, he adds, but perhaps to escape the painful reminders that the music she helped pioneer was now earning other bands multimillion-dollar record contracts.

“Grunge, whatever that means, is being identified as from your community, your colleagues, your sound that you were a participant in help shaping, and you’re not even mentioned in any of it,” Martin says. “I can’t even fathom what that would feel like for it to be sort of spit back in your face with such frequency.”

Ledgerwood believes Bell died of a broken heart. But when Bell died alone in her Las Vegas apartment in 2012, the official cause of death listed was cirrhosis of the liver. She had struggled with alcohol and depression. Her son says the coroner estimated her time of death as a couple weeks before her body was discovered. She was 55 years old.

The things that could have told Tina Bell’s story in her own voice are lost. Martin arrived in Las Vegas to find that the contents of his mother’s apartment — except for a DVD player, a poster, and a chair — had been thrown away. All of her writings — lyrics, poems, diaries — along with Bam Bam music, videos, and other memorabilia — went in the trash without her family even being notified.

If you think you were in Seattle in the ’80s, in the grunge scene, and you don’t remember Tina Bell and Bam Bam, you probably weren’t really fucking there.

“I couldn’t help draw a parallel between her not being respected and seen in the first chapter of her life, as the front person of a punk band, and then even in death being disrespected and not being seen for the merits of the life she lived,” says Martin.

Bell’s death is also an indictment of the way she was written out of her own story. The way grunge’s almighty gatekeepers chose to look through her instead of at her. Grunge became the domain of alienated young White men in flannel shirts, and Tina Bell didn’t fit the narrative they were trying to sell.

“Black herstory can suffer immense amounts of erasure if somebody is not brave enough to ensure that women get counted,” Johari says.

To many of those who were part of the scene at the time, the amnesia seems intentional. Ledgerwood brings up the seminal history of Seattle’s grunge era, Everybody Loves Our Town. In it, the author refers to Bam Bam as a three-piece instrumental band mainly notable because Matt Cameron was the drummer. Tina Bell isn’t even mentioned.

“How in the hell would he have a recollection of how great Bam Bam and its drummer was, and not this unbelievably beautiful woman, this firecracker, this explosive rock and roll goddess?” Ledgerwood asks. “Even if he thought she sucked, to not remember the only Black woman on the whole fuckin’ scene is — well, it’s like that old joke about the ’60s: If you think you were in Seattle in the ’80s, in the grunge scene, and you don’t remember Tina Bell and Bam Bam, you probably weren’t really fucking there.”

You can listen to more of Bam Bam’s music on this Spotify playlist. A vinyl album with the band’s songs is coming out this year on Bric-a-Brac Records.

#Alice in Chains #Bam Bam #black history #black women #black women in rock #grunge #Kurt Cobain #music #Nirvana #Pearl Jam #rock #Seattle #Soundgarden #Tina Bell #women in rock #women's history #80s

300 notes · View notes

monstersdownthepath · 3 years

Text

Demigod Dossier: Velstrac Demagogues, part 1

Pictured: Aroggus, the Abbey-Maker

Lawful Evil Mad Artists of the Shadow Plane

The Complete Book of the Damned, pg. 120~121 Additional information is also present in Adventure Path: Return of the Runelords: The City Outside of Time, pg. 74~79

Our second-ever Demigod Dossier, now fully in-swing! The Velstrac Demagogues are the rulers of the Shadow Plane and all the lives within, though many of said lives within aren’t really fans of them. Natives to the Netherworld find the presence of the Velstrac an annoyance at best and a threat to their lives at worst, and would much prefer if they went back to Hell where they came from, but unfortunately for everyone everywhere they don’t appear too eager to throw themselves into the jaws of the inferno just yet. Instead, they’re busy throwing themselves into the jaws of one another.

The Demagogues represent the pinnacle of a specific subset of the Velstrac’s twisted senses of ‘art’ and ‘perfection,’ either because they’ve mutilated themselves into something wholly unlike anything else that can, did, or could exist, or they’ve pioneered a form of artistry that other Velstrac couldn’t even conceptualize in the first place and gathered a fandom. It takes some very twisted, alien forms of thinking to become a Demagogue and get others rallied behind you, even moreso because the Velstrac themselves are, putting it kindly, completely out of their gourd. When your audience already expects the insane and outlandish, you have to go even further, and many of the fiends you’ll soon see have.

We’ll only be covering four in this initial post, with the rest to be saved for later...

Demagogues view mortals as little more than primal clay to be shaped, and thus see little worth in investing true divine power into them, worshipers receive Boons that are are relatively simple: a trio of spell-like abilities, each of which may be used 1/day. Boons are normally gained slowly, at levels 12, 16, and 20, however entering the Evangelist, Exalted, or Sentinel Prestige Classes can see the Boons gained as early as levels 10, 13, and 16. Note that while they are Lawful Evil fiends originally from Hell, they are not devils, thus you cannot enter the Diabolist Prestige Class to obtain their Boons without DM fiat.

Aroggus, the Abbey-Maker

Demagogue of Possibility, Revenge, and Sanctuary Domains: Evil, Law, Protection, Trickery Subdomains: Deception, Defense, Fear, Tyranny

Obedience: List the names of those who have wronged you until the writing covers a page, then consume the parchment. Benefit: Gain a +4 profane bonus on saving throws to resist compulsion effects.

What a completely normal, sane, and healthy thing to do! As the first of the Demagogues to flee from Hell, Aroggus is EXTREMELY angry at the devils for locking them up in the first place. Angry enough to want revenge on the whole of the diabolic race, as well as the Asura... Angry enough that he hasn’t yet even started getting around to enacting his revenge, instead just constantly thinking about and refining it as if no iteration of suffering is perfect enough to match his fury.

True to form, he wants you to ruminate in your anger rather than doing anything to enact your vengeance, blacking out a page with the names (or just one name) of all who’ve wronged you no matter how petty or insignificant the inconvenience they may have caused. Unfortunately, no two ways about it, you’re going to look insane (in the literal definition of the term) doing this every day, especially if you only have one or two people who’ve wronged you enough to get onto your list. Scrawling their name, front AND back, until the page is filled and then eating it is behavior that will raise eyebrows no matter who you’re adventuring with. Best to keep this one behind closed doors. Make sure you have a glass of activated charcoal after, because all of that ink day after day (unless you write with, I don’t know, berry juice or blood) is going to do amazingly terrible things to your constitution.

The benefit is good. Compulsions are typically Save-Or-Suck effects, so having more Save means less Suck for you later on. It’s useful at any point in your adventure, so I can’t say anything bad about it! My only wish is that it was a little stronger, since some other gods give +4 vs compulsion and charm effects.

Boon 1: Nondetection Boon 2: Forcecage Boon 3: Imprisonment

Nondectection is a good spell for those times when you need to sneak by diviners, hide magic items from scrutiny, avoid the gaze of a Paladin who’s a little too judicious with Detect Evil, or to add another layer of shroud over Invisibility and the like. It’s a spell that’s a pain to prepare every single day, but useful to have when you need it... but you only have one casting of it per day, so using it wisely is paramount. Ironically, it combines well with your own Divination to find out if you’ll even need it later. More often than not you won’t be using it at all except to idly ward yourself when going into town or diving into a dungeon.

Forcecage is a completely different animal, the offensive and defensive applications of the spell simply mind-blowing, to the point that keeping this to just one paragraph to save space is going to take some herculean effort on my part! So, the basics: Forcecage has two versions, both of which halt all movement through them: A 20ft square of force bars that allow spells, projectiles, and line-of-effect through, and a 10ft cube that blocks line-of-effect and all forms of magic and supernatural abilities. A Forcecage is effectively invincible (having Hardness 30 and 20hp/level) and impossible to move, so anyone trapped inside without the ability to teleport is likely to stay there for the spell��s duration. Also, to put it simply, shoving enemies in the cage is the main point, but if you cannot, a 10ft/20ft square is an enormous roadblock to stop up narrow passages with.

Which leaves Imprisonment, a portable hole you can shove all sorts of problems into, which will likely create new problems down the line if the target had anything you needed on them. I recommend knocking out a foe, stripping them of their valuables, and then shoving them into their baby jail for all eternity! With the Freedom spell being the only means to undo Imprisonment (even Wish and Miracle fail), you’ll have no actual way to undo the spell against any target you cast it on for one or two more levels, if at all (depending on the party composition). Make sure to use it only when the villain has no MacGuffins, or is a powerful recurring threat. Imprisonment works on anything and everything capable of failing the Will save (take note, anyone wanting to fight Kaiju, Great Old Ones, or Spawn of Rovagug), which gets a -4 penalty if you know the target’s name and some facts about its life, so famous villains are even more vulnerable to being thrown into the Eternity Marble!

------

Barravoclair, Lady of the Final Gasp

Demagogue of the Elderly, Fatalistic Insights, Resurrection Domains: Death, Evil, Healing, Law Subdomains: Murder, Restoration, Resurrection, Undead

Obedience: Practice breath control, holding your breath until you nearly pass out. Benefit: Gain a +4 profane bonus on checks to resist drowning and on saves against inhaled poisons.

A hell of a step down in terms of unhealthiness in terms of Aroggus, and significantly less suspicious, too. Breath control is practiced by people of all stripes, from athletes to explorers to simple monks attempting more profound meditation. While ‘nearly passing out’ is skirting an edge most people won’t approach, it’s not exactly as dangerous for you as, say, inhaling water or eating poison every day. Without any materials needed, the Lady of the Final Gasp is one of the simplest and probably the single cheapest Obedience ritual one could ask for! There is a minor caveat in that races who can’t breathe can’t technically do this Obedience at all, but those aren’t the audience Barravoclair wants anyway.

Unfortunately, the benefit is as weak as the Obedience is easy to do. Drowning is unlikely to come up as a danger unless you’re physically dragged into the water by a monster (which means holding your breath likely isn’t an option anyway), and inhaled poisons are the least common poison type in the game. Against the odd Catoblepas or Green Dragon it will come in handy, but it’s protection from injury poison you really need, which the Lady of the Final Gasp doesn’t provide.

Boon 1: Speak With Dead Boon 2: Resurrection Boon 3: Soul Bind

Alright, let’s face it. Some days, you need Speak With Dead to keep the plot running smoothly. Whether your overzealous DPS kills everyone in the room, your Fireball-lobbing Sorcerer kills everyone in the room, or your summoner’s unchained beasts kill everyone in the room, chances are at some point in your career you’re going to save the party a lot of headaches by being able to pull answers from a corpse. Having Speak With Dead available every day will likely not matter 80% of the time (meaning you can typically use it at your leisure just before going to bed), but much like with Water Breathing and spells like Remove Curse and Neutralize Poison, having it for those 20% of times you need it can keep the wheels spinning and stop unneeded side quests.

... And speaking of side quests and things you’ll need once in a blue moon, Resurrection? For free? Even 1/day? With the hefty cost of 10,000gp for the normal spell, even a well-off party will feel the impact every single time they have to use Rez, but the removal of the cost ups the power level of the spell by a margin so enormous that it doesn’t really matter what Boon you get before or after this one; THIS boon rewards worship of Barravoclair enough to justify putting up with her empty benefit. Even without factoring in the ability to raise party members, you can now curry favor with people of all stripes and demand all forms of insane payments for your ability to raise centuries-old dead at no cost but time... or do your work for free and call in favors at a later date. Do note, however, that you’ll also need someone else on standby to remove the negative levels/stat drain caused by the resurrection process.

I said it didn’t matter what the third Boon was and I stand by it. Unlike with the free Rez above, Soul Bind’s enormous cost still makes its use as anything but a once-per-campaign finisher of an annoying enemy irritating and unfeasible. Spell-likes normally require no components, but Soul Bind operates in a gray area of the rules in that its focus component becomes the subject for the spell, meaning that a DM can very easily and very rightly say you DO require the gemstone whose value must equal or exceed the target’s HD x 1,000. Binding even a simple 5 CR creature requires the tall order of a 5,000gp gemstone, and if you want to use it on a target that’s worthwhile, it gets expensive fast. It’s way cheaper and easier to just hire a Cacodaemon.

------

Fharaas, the Seer in Skin

Demagogue of Experience, Murder, and Patterns Domains: Evil, Knowledge, Law, Repose Subdomains: Ancestors, Fear, Memory, Souls

Obedience: Study the interior of a freshly severed limb. Benefit: You are immune to bleed effects that deal 6 damage or less.

This Obedience is deceptively simple for what its implication is. You’d best get yourself a Sack Of Rats or have access to a lot of disposable prisoners (or the Regenerate spell)! But thankfully, there’s some wiggle room in the wording: ‘freshly severed’ means no cheating and using Gentle Repose on the same arm over and over, but it ALSO means you can carry around a single corpse and slowly slice it apart, as the limbs themselves don’t have to be fresh, just freshly cut off for the purpose of the ritual. Also, you can use the bodies of Undead, Constructs, and any other creature that technically has severable limbs! Though Fharaas, the Seer In Skin, will likely punish you if your ritual doesn’t involve the examination of actual flesh.

You’re going to look really weird, is what I’m saying. At least if someone barges in on you, you can claim you’re inspecting them for something or other. Infection, signs of magic, etc, whatever you can come up with to blunt the blow. You can cover yourself moderately well by being a butcher or a hunter in your day job, as the severed limb doesn’t have to be human, or even sapient (hence why I suggest a Sack Of Rats), letting you freely slice up and examine your kills.

Bleed effects are fairly uncommon in the grand scheme of things but are also a pain in the neck to deal with in the middle of battle, so this giving a +4 bonus aga--wait, sorry, hold on no, this isn’t a bonus to saving throws? Or skill checks to heal bleed? It just... Stops them if they deal 6 or less damage? You don’t even have to make a save?

Okay. Okay, alright. So you’re just immune to bleed, then?

More or less, really. There are very few monsters that deal more than d6 bleed damage with their attacks (be warned that higher-level ones can sometimes stack their bleed!), and this ability also works on the rare but dreaded stat bleed, and off the top of my head there are NO monsters that deal more than a d4 dice in stat bleed damage. My main problem is that it doesn’t reduce the bleed damage you take by 6, so taking even 1 more point of bleed damage makes this ability useless. Still, though it’s fairly narrow, being effectively immune to a dangerous and irritating status ailment at level 3 or so (when bleed is at its most threatening) is well worth taking up butchery.

Boon 1: Keen Edge Boon 2: Vision Boon 3: Foresight

Keen Edge is a spell you absolutely want to slap onto any vaguely pirate-y or hoity-toity party member you may have, as cutlasses, rapiers, and scimitars all leap from a dangerous 18~20 critical range to a terrifying 15~20, meaning they threaten to critically strike 1 out of every 4 attacks instead of just once every other fight or so. With a duration of 10 min/level, the enchantment will likely last multiple fights even if you only have it 1/day, but unfortunately it refuses to stack with any crit-boosting enchantments or feats the wielder may already possess, lessening its usefulness as your adventure goes on and your martial party members pick up increasingly fancy gear and pad out their collection of feats. Still, it’s useful for when you get it, and will remain useful for several levels after.

Vision is a whole different beast, and a dangerous one at that. It operates as the Legend Lore spell but vastly accelerated, allowing you to scrape the public consciousness for any information it may have on a specific person, place, or thing. I’ve complained about the general niche uses of Legend Lore before, but Vision grants the information in a much shorter time (a single standard action) at the cost of a potential for failure and a slap of fatigue whether you succeed or not. I don’t like 1/days that do nothing on a failure, but since Vision is purely a downtime spell (unless you need to know the boss’ weakness or info on the Evil Doom Artifact right now immediately), it’s not as much of an impediment to lose out on whatever information it could give you. That being said, the DM will likely have ways for you to do whatever plot-relevant research you need anyway, so Vision is more of a way to speed up the process than anything.

Which leaves Foresight, a spell whose main benefit relies intensely on DM cooperation, as I’ve ranted about here. Mechanically it’s fairly unimpressive, but if the DM reads the spell carefully, they should realize it gives whoever you cast it on a 6-second glance into the future at all times. Whatever horrors befall the victim 6 seconds from now should spring into your mind before they happen, making you the best trap radar on the planet, and the spell’s warnings for the best ways to protect yourself will urge the DM to grant you information about the enemy’s capabilities you may never otherwise know... but what do you expect from 9th level magic? It SHOULD be filling you in with details you’d never figure out!

------

Inkariax, the White Death

Demagogue of Preservation, Absolute Cold, and Solitude Domains: Evil, Law, Void, Water Subdomains: Fear, Ice, Isolation, Slavery

Obedience: Inventory your collection of hoarded knickknacks, reciting your unique name for each item as you do Benefit: Gain a +4 profane bonus on saving throws to resist effects that would petrify or paralyze you.

God, finally, someone normal. At worst you’ll look like someone with a few obsessive issues, but at least you won’t look like a menace to society as you lay out your, I dunno, marbles or bone dice or dolls or what have you and make note that they’re still there, cooing to them with names only you know. It’s fitting for Inkariax, of all the Demagogues, to have an Obedience that requires no self-harm, physically or psychologically; unlike all the rest, he was born perfect and doesn’t need to chase after it. Instead, he pursues finding perfection in others, freezing and collecting people and items he believes represent perfection in whatever unusual way he desires that day (having perfect posture, or a perfect scream, or a perfect pair of eyes, etc). Much like him, you’re encouraged to expand a collection of whatever you deem perfect and desirable, which you’re often going to do just over the course of normally adventuring. I’ve yet to see a player character that doesn’t start amassing all sorts of junk in their pockets the moment they get a Bag of Holding or similar.

Indeed, you can just pick up whatever catches your fancy, be it stones, sticks, or severed bits of an enemy, though I’m sure Inkariax will ever-so-slowly raise a disapproving eyebrow if you just pick up any old junk. Make sure to curate your collection now and then! Being able to perform this Obedience with anything you happen to gather is especially helpful if you’re ever separated from your collection (always a danger) and need to start again, but note that each item you gain in your collection must have a completely unique name. That’s only really a danger for especially RP-heavy campaigns, but in such campaigns Worship of the White Death isn’t for everyone who just names all their collected bird feathers Jeffery. Start getting in the habit of stretching out your inventory sheet with names for all your items!

The benefit you get from lovingly counting up all your stolen statuettes and dusty books is resistance to two of the worst status effects in the game. While petrification is relatively rare it typically appears in Save-Or-Suck form, which makes protection against it far more valuable than, say, protection against something like the far more common fatigue or exhaustion. Paralysis is an ailment just short of a death sentence by itself, costing the victim their turn at best and their life at worst, so even a +4 between you and that is something you need to cling to with your entire being.

Boon 1: Sleet Storm Boon 2: Sequester Boon 3: Microcosm

Sleet Storm is a very simple spell with a decent number of functions. Its Long range means that any enemy in your line of sight can potentially be a target, letting you lash out easily at ranged enemies or dangerous casters by creating a 40ft-wide and 20ft-tall area of concealing sleet that’s impossible for any vision to pierce (except the rare and niche Snowsight or Fogcutter Lenses). Anyone inside will have to rely on Tremorsense or Blindsense (though the jury’s out on if the splashing of the sleet would confound those, as well) to navigate it, and 40ft of difficult terrain can feel impossible to clamber through when you start right in the middle of it with no idea which way is the way you need to go. It’s one of the strongest vision-blockers in the game due to its immunity to common tactics that thwart lesser spells (Gust of Wind, True Seeing, etc), forcing enemies to either blow their valuable uses of Dispel Magic or suffer for its entire duration. My only complaint is that you only get it 1/day and that it screws over your party just as hard if you use it incorrectly.

Sequester is as niche a use spell as there ever was for players, requiring a bit of forethought about what or who you’d want to hide with it. The target must be willing or inanimate to be affected, so tricking an enemy via Charm or Dominate into accepting the spell can keep them fresh as a daisy for weeks at a time if you ever have a reason to do such a thing. More often than not you’ll use it to conceal items you seriously don’t want seen or detected, such as a Bag of Holding or similar loaded with your collection of knickknacks or emergency supplies, a particular hostage, an NPC you need to keep alive, or your phylactery if you’re a Lich. If you’re especially sadistic, using it on an item someone else needs and throwing it into a well or a hoard of other objects will keep them occupied for a while. If you’re a more martial character, using it to hide your armor is viable, making it seem as though you’re invincible when enemy blows bounce straight off, or even your weapon to confound your enemies who seem to be taking wounds from an unseen item. Your mime routine will be killer, literally! Just... Just don’t drop the thing, because in the heat of battle you’re never going to find it.

Microcosm is one of the best spells you can hurl into a crowd of commoners or a swarm of foes meant to gum you up instead of actually threaten you. Its 30 HD limit will mean it likely will only strike one or two creatures capable of actually threatening you, but it’s brutal even then. The spell is permanent, trapping your victims in an illusory world in which everything goes right for them even as their bodies starve to death in the waking world. Anything with less than 10 HD is automatically affected with no saving throw, the spell easily mopping up mobs, while anything with 11~15 HD escapes automatically after 10 min... per level you have. On a successful save. There’s Save-Or-Suck, and then there’s the immensely rare Save-And-Suck! No wonder Microcosm is ONLY on the Psychic’s list! Anything with more than 16 HD is unaffected if they succeed their save, but all their allies are likely in an everlasting dreamland now. The big issue is that the HD restriction is way tighter than you may think; creatures, especially at higher levels, usually do NOT have HD matching their CR, but if you’re mainly battling level-appropriate Humanoid or Monstrous Humanoid creatures, Microcosm is fairly reliable in such battles, as those foes typically have HD that roughly matches their CR. But if you’re up against, say, Dragons or Outsiders, good luck bud.

Side note: Microcosm and Sequester used in combination make for excellent ways to start your own morbid collection of living creatures, just like your icy master! Just make sure you have some non-Divination means of seeing them, as Sequester blocks even True Sight.

#Pathfinder #dungeons and dragons #Demigod Dossier #Spiritual Spotlight #Sinister Spotlight

31 notes · View notes

autumn-ginkgo-leaves · 3 years

Text

Yooha x Reader | fluff | kissing

A fic for nonny who asked for Yooha and MC caught in the rain! This is as fluffy as Yooha’s tails with some thorough kissing.

You meet Yooha at the convenience store counter with your can of iced tea and stop in surprise. Yooha has half a dozen cold drinks clutched to his chest and his eyes are glowing.

“Lemon tea. Raspberry kombucha. Sparkling peach. The human world is wonderful, master.”

The attendant gives you both a strange look. You force a laugh and quickly put all the drinks on the counter and pay for them.

Outside, Yooha goes through his bag of drinks like a kid on Christmas morning. “I don’t know which one to have first.”

You smile to yourself as you sip your green tea. Yooha would hate to hear you say it, but sometimes he’s just like a puppy. Other times, when it’s a sunny day and he drapes his long body over the sofa and dozes for hours, he’s more like a cat.

“I’ll have the sparkling peach,” he says, and pulls the tab. He stops walking as he drinks it, an expression of bliss on his face.

The day, which has been so sunny as the two of you have strolled around the neighbourhood, has grown overcast. It darkens further as a heavy cloud passes over the sun.

“Uh, foxy? Perhaps we should head home.”

Yooha takes another deep swallow and gazes at the can. “Even the packaging is amazing. Look at these peaches. They’re drawn with such artistry.”

Fat raindrops patter on the pavement and the top of your head. You grab Yooha’s hand. “Come on! We need to run.”

Between your sandals and Yooha’s bag of clanking drinks, you can’t run very fast. Soon your both soaking wet with your hair sticking to your forehead and your clasped hands wet with rain.

His strong hand holds yours all the way to the apartment, and he doesn’t let go until you’re inside the front door.

Yooha scrunches up his eyes and shakes himself all over, starting from his head and shoulders, and then right down his body.

“Yooha!” you squeal, putting your hands up and laughing as water sprays all over you.

Yooha opens his eyes. “What? Oh, sorry.”

He grins disarmingly at you. When you come back with a towel, he takes it from you. “Let me do that.”

Gently, he pats your hair down and dabs at your face. He’s standing close and you take the rare opportunity to drink in the sight of him, something you don’t allow yourself to do too often in case the others see.

Or Yooha notices.

“Do you ever miss being a fox?” you ask, mesmerised by his grey eyes.

He looks down at you with his head on one side. “But I am a fox.”

You don’t know what to say to that. It makes you feel weird that you sometimes catch yourself admiring how good he looks, and yet he insists he’s a fox.

“Master? Do you not like that I’m a fox?”

You chew the corner of your lip for a moment. “You…you said a few times that you, uh, like me. That you’re into me.”

He smiles and throws the towel aside. “You’ve never brought that up before. Yes, I am.”

“But then…”

“You want me to kiss you?” Yooha wraps his arms around you and draws you against him.

You push against his chest and turn your face away, blushing furiously. “You really are a fox spirit. Human men aren’t so forward.”

“They’re not?”

“No. Human dating is more like playing games.”

“Oh, I can play games.” Quickly, he leans forward and nips your earlobe with his teeth, making you squeak again.

“Not those sorts of games! Things like, if you take three hours to reply to a text message, then I’ll take six. Never revealing that you’re interested in someone. Trying to get their attention by flirting with other people.”

Yooha snorts with derision. “Those games don’t sound like fun to me. Humans are strange.”

You gaze up at him, the ethereally beautiful but very strong and solid man with entrancing cheekbones and mischief sparkling in his grey eyes.

“You’re strange,” you whisper, as his mouth draws closer to yours.

The brush of his lips is soft and questioning. Your chin drifts up, surrendering your mouth to his. He says he’s a fox, but to you he looks human. Gorgeous and human. You can’t help but love every second of him touching you, as strange as it is.

On the other hand, your other housemates are night goblins who are currently asleep in the other rooms. Nothing about this is normal. Maybe kissing a fox isn’t the strangest thing about your life right now.

He walks you slowly back until your back is pressed against the wall and his hand is planted by your head. So soft, so gentle as he kisses you, but with fox-like determination to keep you here now he’s got you here.

He tastes delicious, and it’s got nothing to do with the peach tea.

“We barely know each other,” you point out in a whisper, licking your lips.

He shakes his head slowly. “That’s not true. I heard your voice for so long while I was trapped within that scroll. I thought over and over again, say my name. Yooha. Yooha. I want to be with her. I ached to be with you.”

You recall all those weeks with the scroll hanging on the wall and the image of the entrancing man in a hanbok gazing out at you. His eyes gave you a fluttery feeling even then.

But that’s silly. You can’t fall in love with a painting of a man.

Yooha’s hand cups the back of your neck and draws your chin up to him, reminding you that he’s not trapped in a painting any longer, but instead he’s here, a living, breathing man.

He kisses like he’s tasting you, his tongue lapping against yours and then changing the angle of his mouth. Keeping you guessing. Keeping you gasping.

You open your eyes and see his tails fluttering behind him, and you smile against his mouth. “Are your tails wagging because you’re happy?”

“Hey, I’m a fox, not a dog. I just want my woman to see me as I really am.”

“All the legends say to beware of fox spirits. That they only want to seduce and eat you up.”

He snaps his teeth. “That’s right. Especially beautiful women who taste like honey and rain.”

Your hands slide around his neck, your heart pounding wildly. You feel so safe here, protected from the world by his body and cherished by his kisses, but somehow you can’t believe that it’s real. Or that it will last. “But what about when you don’t want to be here anymore? Or when you can’t? I’ll miss you so much.”

Yooha blinks in surprise. “Leave? Why would I leave my master?”

“I don’t know. Many reasons, probably. You might ascend to heaven.”

He shakes his head. “I won’t go to heaven. I’ve been a careless fox toward humans. I was trapped in that scroll for punishment, and now I continue my penance by serving you.”

You draw away from him in surprise. “I’m your punishment? That’s awful.”

He shakes his head and brings you back into his arms. “All my life, I wanted only to ascend and become a celestial fox. Now, I’m learning to be selfless and love humans, like spirits should.” He draws his fingers down a lock of your hair, studying your face. “One human especially, master.”

You don’t know what to say. Of all four of the men you’re living with, Yooha is the strangest of all. The goblins can at least think like humans, but Yooha acts purely on instinct. Desire. Need.

“And you chose me?”

“Yes,” he breathes. “Always you, from the moment I heard your voice.”

His honesty is so hard to take. No one’s ever told you how they feel about you. No one’s ever wanted you so much.

“You’re really weird, Yooha,” you whisper, your fingers twisting the collar of his shirt.

He smiles again. “Thank you.”

“Why are you thanking me?”

“Because…” he mumurs, planting slow, plush kisses on your mouth, “you tell me I’m weird as I kiss you, and hold you, and brush the rain droplets from your hair. Being human is weird, but I’m happy I’m learning how with you, master.”

You stand together in the shadowy hall for a long time while the rain patters against the windows, not speaking, but worlds of mean passing from your lips to his, and back again.

Thank you for reading! You can send requests for fics to my ask box. At the moment I’m writing for Wannabe Challenge and LoveUnholyc. Find all my finished fics here.

#wannabe challenge yooha #yooha #wannabe challenge

103 notes · View notes

touchmycoat · 3 years

Note

Oh I love the transformed into a kid trope - it's so much easier to be affectionate with a kid and I love it when it's a reversal and the strong protector is the one vulnerable. Do you have headcanons about what LQG was like as a kid?

YES ME TOO!! goodness, baby Qingge. Not to get dramatic but I think whatever his non-courtesy name is, specifically the character(s), would really influence his personality. I remember pondering this question (being 98% sure that he doesn't have a canon little name right???) and looking up chengyu for fun characters to use. Then I found Yǒng (from 吟花詠柳 and 詠桑寓柳) and being like omg, this is perfect, it means recitation, is linked to Liu/willow in a lot of literary ways, and would give an explanation for why his courtesy name gets Ge/song. Then I went, wait a minute, that sounds kind of familiar. SURE ENOUGH, Liu Yong is exactly the name the Incomparable Feynite's given LQG, though someone with a stronger memory should tell me if Feynite's ever given the exact character. I'd really lose my mind if it's 詠.

(by the same principle, maybe Liu Mingyan's small name is Liu Li, 笠 as in a farmer's straw hat, from 煙蓑雨笠, meaning to hide your identity and live a carefree life MISS PSEUDONYM)

So, Liu Qingge, small name Liu Yong, A-Yong, Yong-er. His parents get to be cute sometimes and call him Huahua 'cause yin hua yong liu. Growing up, he doesn't say much but not in an icy way. He's big brother, so a lot of principles about right and wrong get instilled in him. One of his parents though, is a little bit of a Fucker and likes to complicate his right/wrong binary, and as a kiddo, Yong-er would frown and think about a philosophical quandary for hours. You can totally distract him by sending him out to do physical tasks, but as he sweeps the grounds or re-thatches the shooting targets, you'll see his little brow start to pucker again as motion becomes rote and questions start forming again.

He's clever! It's just that all of his process is internal. Not that he needs to be alone to sort things out, it's just that he only ever verbalizes conclusions.

I don't think he was a prodigy right out the gate. I think he was really good at discipline and followed all dojo protocol, all martial rituals to a tee. He learned things point-by-point in a pretty mulish manner and sometimes fell behind other students because he couldn't let one unmastered thing go, because he couldn't move on without figuring it out.

(In comparison, LMY began her training with a lot more tendency toward creative flourish. LMY's journey was about learning the discipline while LQG had to find himself in the discipline.)

A-Yong was active all over the place, but as time went on, he began devoting a lot of his energy to martial arts & cultivation (in canon-verse). He started to win fights but also to lose them. Thanks to his parents, he's a very methodical problem-solver, and first approaches the problem in terms of "Oh, I'm not fast/strong/sharp/flexible enough" and works hard to improve those. But when that doesn't do the trick, he asks his other parent, who asks him in turn what he notices when he spars with LMY. Genius, is the first word he throws out because it's what he hears a lot, but both himself and his parent frowns because that's not concrete, and therefore not useful. Creative is what he says next. Parent tells him agreed. So what does it take to be creative?

Yong-er is both a smart cookie and very, very self-determined. he does trust and rely on his family to a degree, so consults them. A-Li says she finds it fun. Brother says I find it fun too and Sister says no, you like it, but you don't do it for fun. He asks his other parent who says when is Hua-er creative?

Liu Yong comes to the conclusion that "creative" can be applied to him, just in a definition closer to "creation" than Liu Li's "creative." And Liu Yong creates when he speaks. After immense gravitas of thought, he speaks his answer, and sometimes, parents and other adults express surprise at what he's determined. The answer to taking his martial skills to the next level (to elevate them to the point of martial artistry) would, then, be to run all the skills and moves he knows through his own reckoning. What does he truly think of them? How does he judge them?

That first time he takes all he knows and processes them through himself, he comes out a new man. His martial arts has notably ascended, and he's cracked through that barrier of creativity to completely take ownership of his form and body. He's comfortable forming his own moves on the spot, reactive and sharp and disciplined all at once.

(The internal processing is also where his qi deviations happen. Not that it's overly common with him or anything, but when there are mental and spiritual blockages, his mulish tendency to not move on bites him in the ass. He catches on something and doesn't move past it, determined to untangle it, which stifles his qi flow and fucks him up.)

In terms of mannerisms, I think he really hasn't changed much. He's still intently serious and action-oriented. He's still fairly gullible. He takes after Frowny Parent (the one he goes to first with martial issues) in subtle stickiness—he's not overtly social but in his downtime, he prefers to just be doing things in the same space as people he loves and trusts. He used to toddle after Frowny Parent all the time like a little tail; Smiley Parent (the one who's a little bit of a Fucker) likes to quietly gesture Frowny Parent out of the room, sit them in some other room to do some other thing, and see how long it takes for Yong-er to follow and find them. It's like playing hide-and-seek with the kid without even letting him know they're playing.

True to his name, Yong-er does really regal recitations. Not intentionally, but he comes off super dignified and his pacing is superb. Frowny Parent gives him classic poems to memorize and recite, Smiley Parent teaches him bastardized versions with one or two lines changed to really flip the whole meaning of the poem. Parents have Yong-er run back and forth reciting poetry and songs as combative flirtation. A-Yong knows the Adults Are Doing Something, but is a dutiful son who obeys instructions regardless.

A-Yong and Xiao Li get on very well, despite the difference in their ages. When Xiao Li was just learning to walk, parents said once, pretty casually, "watch out for your sister," and A-Yong took that to the very core of his being. For a long time, A-Yong would set Xiao Li down in the middle of a field with a bunch of toys and things, and just sit with his legs crossed not to far away to watch over her. He's a super serious kid, and once, when Smiley Parent lightly suggests that he doesn't have to sacrifice his own fun to watch A-Li, Yong-er just looks up confused. Sure, he's not having fun, but whatever, he likes watching over his baby sister just fine. He doesn't need to "have fun" when he can be doing this.

#asks #anon #liu qingge #it occurs to me that i should be writing about kiddo!LQG with bingqiu LMFAO #but all this backstory is necessary padding #next time next time #kid AU

15 notes · View notes

seventfics · 3 years

Photo

Blind Owl

Written for @witcher-rarepair-summer-bingo

Prompt: Temporary or permanent blindness Relationships: Triss Merigold/Philippa Eilhart Rating: M Content Warnings: None (Mild Gore, Blood and Injury) Summary: It's hard, but Triss finds a way to help Philippa.

Read on AO3

* * *

“Philippa.”

At the mention of her name the sorceress turns, her head held high. Too high, Triss notes, to be facing her directly.

The edges of the blindfold over Philippa’s eyes are stained red.

“Triss. I must say, of all the things that have happened today? I didn’t expect to meet you.”

Triss quirks a smile at her. “Disappointed?”

“No, never,” she says with a graceful wave of her dirtied hand. “Surprised. I overheard that all the mages had dipped from Novigrad. I should have known you would stay behind.”

“I wasn’t going to, to be honest. Geralt convinced me.”

“Yes, he’s good at that, isn’t he?”

Triss’ portal had taken them from Sigi Reuven’s bathhouse to her small room at the Rosemary and Thyme. It’s not her room, really, but a kindness of Geralt’s friends, and one she immediately took up. Better than the Bits, where she lived in tight quarters on a lopsided building. Now she has actual furniture she picked herself, a full bed that can support her weight without sinking, and a lock on her door. It is much more to her liking.

Philippa would hate her decor, if she could see it. They’ve always had different taste in furniture.

“Circumstances aside…I’m glad you’re with us, Phil.”

Philippa hums. She walks the room carefully, a hand tense with magic held forward to sense for objects. “And what are the circumstances, exactly?”

From her pocket, Triss brings out an agate.

“Geralt stumbled upon this, some time ago.” The stone glimmers from old traces of Philippa’s magic. “You want the Lodge back together. Well, so do we.”

“Ah. Our interests align.”

Though she is blind, Philippa props herself neatly on the lone bed’s edge as Triss explains the looming threat of the Wild Hunt. In all things she is flawless artistry. Her hands cross over a hip, as she lifts her legs to lounge over Triss’ bed—and oh, how familiar, the sight of her like that. It distracts her mid-speech more than once.

“In my state,” she drawls, gesturing to her blindfold, “I am not much help.”

Triss is less artful, but just as coquette with her lilting voice. “You are, Philippa,” and more seriously, she adds, “You were the best of us.”

“Quite. You understand that this is a matter most crucial for the survival of magic.”

After a moment’s pause, Philippa sits upright against the half a dozen pillows Triss hoards at the back. She presses a hand to her temples, sighing as if displeased by something.

It is the closest sign she’s going to give to her exhaustion. Her pain.

Triss’ heart aches to help. But Philippa is proud. She is strong on her own, and protective of that right. She would not accept an ounce of pity nor mercy, no matter how well-intended.

Years of her acquaintance have taught Triss how to work around that.

“We need you at your best. Phil,” she says, sitting by the weary sorceress to take one of her hands between her own.

Philippa tilts her head up then. Again, too high, and slightly left of Triss’ ear.

“Tell me what I can do.”

* * *

The wet stones under her fingertips harbor the cells of Philippa’s experiment. It’s grotesque, she knows. Some sections have grown beyond control, eye-masses with mutated pupils, multiple irises, some even larger than a megascope’s crystal. But as Philippa does her best rebuilding the Lodge, reforming allyships, and planning the Wild Hunt’s defeat, Triss must do this unpleasant work. For Philippa.

She nearly slips and falls down to her doom twice. The stones are at such a precarious altitude, at a precise distance from the cavern waterfall to promote cell growth without washing off the results. What was Philippa thinking? Growing eyes in such a dangerous place?

But here she is, carefully extracting the cells from the stone with her magic. She suspends them in a sterile magic seal, to store in her purse. For some reason, that makes her laugh, a sound that echoes back to her ears three times. She has Philippa’s eyes in her bag. Philippa’s beautiful eyes that had been gouged out by an angry and paranoid king. The amber of them is now indistinguishable from moss.

There is no time to rest between quests, and yet, once she is finished gathering the most that she can, Triss climbs to safer ground on shaky hands and knees, needing a second to breathe. Just a second. She cannot spare more than that to mourn, or cry, or remember how Phil used to tease her with just a stare and a raised brow.

It will be fine.

She will have new eyes. They won’t be the same, but Philippa won’t care. It’s just Triss who needs a second.

Back when they were a powerful Lodge of Sorceresses, and not the tattered survivors of imprisonment and war, Triss had mooned over the proud advisor to the crown of Redania. She didn’t make her attention obvious, but nothing goes under Philippa’s notice. The woman had made herself friends among spies and, like in all things, absorbed some of their skills.

They spent many nights in each other’s company. Sometimes, it was just to forget the cruelty of war, the greedy men who broke what they could not claim. Triss was lucky to be considered important. A sorceress has more worth as a power to be wielded than a woman to be abused.

And after the Battle on Sodden Hill, Triss had little trust in men.

Maybe that’s why she started this...liaison. And maybe it had been a shallow, poor excuse at first, but. Somewhere between disillusionment and distraction, her heart stole away in the owl’s nest of Philippa’s making.

“Do you think one day we could be happy?”

With a single candle to illuminate the room, Triss braves the words. This world is not made for them to find happiness, but they are powerful. They could make it so.

Philippa doesn’t move from her limp, careless spread over silk red sheets. The dim firelight paints her skin bronze. Nothing covers her, and it is beautiful.

“Happiness has never been my dream,” she says, her back to Triss. “My vision remains on the future of the Northern Kingdoms and the conservation of magic. A sorceress’ dream.”

That is Philippa. Sturdy. Focused. Her hedonist streak is a sparse creature, easily ignored.

Still, Triss hopes. That is who she is.

A long pause ebbs the nervousness buried in Triss’ chest. No one disturbs them, which is rare. No megascope call. No xenovox. No letter from either of the kings they serve.

Triss nearly dozes off, warm and content with things, when she hears a quiet, “Do you see me, in your dream of peace and leisure?”

“I do.”

She opens her eyes to the jostle of movement. Philippa has finally turned around to stare at her, her dark hair a wild fan over her shoulders and breast.

“Perhaps,” she says as she brings up fingers to play with the loose fire-red strands over Triss’ ear, “perhaps one of us should keep that possibility in our mind.”

* * *

“Ah, you’ve returned.”

The surprise lilt in Philippa’s voice tells her that she did not expect Triss so soon. She understood the hard undertaking of retrieving her growing eye cells from the deepest caves of her most secret hideout.

But where Philippa is clever, Triss is eager. Of course she would go as quickly as possible. The Wild Hunt does not wait. The witch hunters of Novigrad will not cease their chase. There is no time to be dallying.

“Well darling, hand them here," Philippa starts, her palms opened to receive Triss' hard-earned work, "so I can get to the matter of fusing them in.”

“Let me.”

She pauses at the plea. If she had eyes, Triss imagines she would have blinked.

But it’s only a short lapse in time, her mind running through a million scenarios.

Eventually, she nods, deeming the offer acceptable. “If you insist. But do not take too long, I hear our brave witcher is to return soon with our esteemed Cirilla, and I have much to talk with her about the future of our Lodge.”

Slowly, Philippa undoes her blindfold, unknowingly as Triss goes to kneel in front of her.

She does flinch at the sight. It is a nasty healing wound, dark and sunken where eyes should be. The skin around the sockets is black. But her own chest, glamored to hide snarled skin, bares worse scars from battle.

The cells take time to transfer from her purse, and they are not yet fully nurtured. They will have to grow into place. With Philippa’s magic to amplify sight, it would be enough to maneuver buildings and streets on her own. It is not by any means a perfect resolve.

Triss puts great care in choosing the healthiest cells. She tries not to cause too much discomfort—any sort of magical procedure that modifies the body would be painful, at the very least uncomfortable—but if it is unbearable, Philippa bears it.

When the last sliver of magic dissipates, Philippa voices a tense but honest, “Thank you.”

“You don’t need to thank me.”

There, still knelt between pale thighs and gazing up at the newly-healed flesh around mossy eyes, Philippa kisses her.

A wound Triss did not know she still had in her heart opens. Fresh blood pounds through her body like a blaze set free on a forest. It burns, the kiss like a match against her lips, and the world narrows down to them, now, together after everything. Her arms cannot hold onto Phil any harder as she kisses back with all her being. All her fire and pain and love that never waned.

When they separate, Phil whispers, “Do you still see me in your dream of the future?” like a secret that should not be named in fear of shattering it.

“I do.” They don’t have time to second-guess their dreams or the choices that got them closer to achieving them. Just a second is all they can spare, to doubt.

One day, Triss hopes they can finally stop running, stop fighting, scheming, surviving, and simply be.

It will be fine.

They stay in each other’s arms, breathing each other’s air. Philippa’s fingertip lingers above Triss’ lip, almost playful in its upwards tug. This time, when Triss stands up and Phil raises her head, it feels like she is looking at her.

“Well, then we better stop this world-ending business first.”

Triss gives her a smile through her eyes.

One day.

#merihart #triss x philippa #rarepair summer bingo #myfics #tt

17 notes · View notes

birdwonder · 4 years

Note

headcanon the joestars on how they would react to an artist s/o like always painting, drawing and giving them like a painting of them they worked on?? thank u 💕

|| I don’t do part 5 or further requests yet, and I’m taking Joestars as in the Jojo’s, but I think I know Giorno somewhat enough to throw him in ! Also, cuuute request.

Part 1-5 Jojo’s | Artist S/O Headcanons

Jonathan Joestar

- As one would expect, he is incredibly supportive of your talent! All of your family/couple portraits are hung up in the hallways and even a few landscape ones too to keep things looking lively. His favourite above all favourites would go above the fire place however, which is probably a painting of the two of you that you had gifted him on your anniversary.

- He cherishes it more than most possessions he owns, and when he’s warming up by the crackling flames, he can’t help but smile at it. That’s your hard work and your effort up there, and any house guests will know it as soon as he shows it to them.

- Honestly, he doesn’t want to request anything from you as he feels as though anything that you gift him that comes from your mind and heart alone is far more valuable to him. Besides, he wouldn’t really know what to ask for aside from another portrait of you to hang somewhere that wasn’t taken up.

- During the spring and summer seasons, you take the time to set up an easel, canvas and paint set in the garden to have some fresh air and gather new inspiration. Even if you haven’t even gotten far into the piece, Jonathan will eventually come out the house with two cups of tea and stand behind you, bending down to lightly kiss your temple as he’s afraid anything more passionate would interrupt your creative process or cause your finger to slip. He would then ask for you to take a break and sit with him at a table to enjoy the view together, so the two of you can talk about your future painting plans and how his studies in archeology are going. Mutual respect for each other’s interests is an essential ingredient in any relationship.

- “Oh, look at your hands! No matter, we’ll just have to wash them once we’re inside,” is something he says before you realise that a tea cup you were holding had been smudged with a variety of green’s and blue’s from your fingertips. You apologise profusely in which he shakes his head at with a chuckle. “It’s alright, my love. I think it makes them look far more unique now! No china set in the world could look like this.”

- Skip 100 years into the future and your paintings may be in a gallery with a small “to Jonathan” written in the corner.

Joseph Joestar

- Definition of “Paint me like one of your french girls.~”

- Definitely suggests a nude painting of him. Or you. Or the two of you together, whether it be a joke or he’s somewhat serious.

- He’s amazed by your talent! Including your patience. He probably wouldn’t be able to sit still for long enough to even paint an abstract tree, so he has nothing but respect for your artistry.

-If you were to ever gift him a drawing, he’d be stunned. Does he even deserve to own one of your pieces? Was this a declaration of love? Because he’s accepting it with a hard kiss to your lips and a string of ‘thank you’’s and compliments.

- One day, you had a serious artist block and had no idea what to paint leaving you stumped and staring at a blank canvas in despair. The lack of spark in your eyes that you usually had when painting hurt Joseph, so as a foolish attempt to help, he grabbed a bottle of one of your haunts and squirted it all over his hand.

- You gasped in response, about to scold him on the price of the paints when he suddenly slapped it smack middle of the canvas. “Joseph! Those cost a lot!”

- “Yeah but it’s fun! C’mon try it! Get your creative juices flowing or whatever you art folk say!” Taking your hand, he squirted a different colour onto it which made you giggle cutely as the cold sensation. He then guided it next to his bright hand print, pressing your palm down.

- It looked adorable and gave you an idea.

- With a smile, and a promise from Joseph that he’d buy you more paint later, the two of began to spread more paints onto your hands and continued to cover the canvas mindlessly with your prints.

- By the end of it, the two of who are laughing and even smearing paint on each other’s faces, leading to some squeals and hilarious facial features.

- Sure, it wasn’t want you had initially wanted to go for, but with a carefully painted on “Joseph and [F/N]” written underneath the first two handprints that were made, you knew that the sentimental value of the piece was far greater than anything else you could have made.

Jotaro Kujo

- He has no reason to be against your talent and doesn’t have enough words and facial expressions to his name to show how impressed he is with you.

- Though that slightly changes when you hand him your sketch book one day, a bashful look on your face as you fear for the worst reaction from him.

- Inside are a multitude of sketches and even fine lined pieces of him, some with and without Star Platinum if you can see him, all carefully and accurately drawn in your own style. You even remembered to add the pin on his hat and his earrings...

- Jotaro could only blush brightly and cough into his hand to compose himself. “It’s good... I like it.” An understatement really, because if you let him keep even a page, he’ll be sure to keep it safe somewhere but no where obvious so his mother or grandfather don’t tease him for it.

- If you ask him to pose for anything, he’ll want to decline and might even do so the first few times, though with some begging he may do some poses in your home, with the assurance that no one will barge in. Only casual ones though, so he doesn’t have to strain or embarrass himself.

- Buying presents for you is considerably easy as there’s always some sort of pen or paint set he can get to add to your wide range of media, all of which you are grateful for and gush over even though you tell him that buying them is unnecessary.

- “Have you considered doing an art major?” If you say yes, he supports you completely but warns you of the stresses and the harsh reality of the art world when it came to work.

Josuke Higashikata

- Ooh, is he going to show you off.

- “Yo Rohan Sensei! Sure you can draw that manga of your’s but can you draw THIS?”

- He might get killed or have his destiny rewritten by a certain stand user, but he knows it’s worth it when it comes to you. Have you seen your own art? It’s incredible !

- Most likely, he finds out by seeing you doodle in class and his jaw completely drops that your maths work sheet was instead covered in drawings of amazing bodies and plant life. If you insist that they’re nothing and “they’re just sketches,” he will personally shake you senseless and talk your ear off telling you that they are amazing.

- Gifting him any kind of artistic media makes him overjoyed. Josuke shoves it in Okuyasu’s face, much to the delinquent’s dismay, and hugs you to death for the gift. “Aw babe, you really didn’t have to!”

- If you’re ever stressing over the quality of your work, he reminds you that you are amazing at what you do and that everyone has their own style, so that comparing yourself to others just wasn’t fair on you.

- He plays a personal game where each day he tries to guess how much pen or paint you have your hand by the end of the day. Usually on weekends, it’s a lot more.

Giorno Giovanna

- There’s a good chance that you met because of your work.

- You’re in a particularly beautiful Italian city, either sitting on a stool or ledge with a canvas or book in front of you, your hand working away at the landscape before you.

- While he was on a relaxing stroll, Giorno stopped behind you and peered over your shoulder, his breath taken away by how accurate your piece was to every exact detail.

- “Bellissimo...” He whispered, causing you to jolt a little and quickly turn around to look at him, a flushed or embarrassed look on your face. Oh, you’re cute.

- Right after he apologised for startling you and praises you for your work, which only flusters you more that such a handsome boy was complimenting you, you offered for him to sit next to you. Perhaps for you to even draw him?

- He doesn’t refuse.

- Once you’re dating, he takes you wherever you want whenever he can so you can draw the scenery, and shows you more gorgeous places to draw and even suggests what sort of people to draw. He also supports you doing something out of your comfort zone, for example if you typically liked to only sketch, he’d suggest for you to paint or use chalk in another style to see if it improves your skill as a whole.

- When he’s a don, he asks for you to paint or draw him so that he can hang it somewhere in an expensive frame to make his work place appear more serious and clear that he was the boss.

- If you do so, he thanks you a hundred times and buys you anything you want and as much as you want. Giorno also makes sure to repay you physically with a night out and kisses with a goodnight cuddle.

- He might keep a small sketch of the two of you in his inside jacket pocket or draw so that every time he took it out during work, he’d be reminded of you and how you met, which motivated him to get the job done quick so he could go home to see you.

#jjba headcanon #headcanon #joseph joestar x reader #joseph joestar #jonathan joestar #jonathan joestar x reader #jotaro kujo #jotaro x reader #giorno x reader #giorno giovanna #josuke higashikata #josuke x reader #jojo's bizarre adventure #request

2K notes · View notes

scarlet--wiccan · 3 years

Note

your ideal billy/teddy duo comic (plot, character designs, artists and writers involved etc)

One thing that I've always wanted to see is a comic about Billy and/or Teddy that was produced entirely by mlm creators. Vecchio, Robles and Gracia are all gay artists who've worked with the characters on recent titles, and I'm eager to see more from them. While none of these artists have ever shown the characters in a way that exactly suits my wants, they've each demonstrated a clear personal vision of who Billy and Teddy are that I can respect. I find that Vecchio and Robles, as illustrators, both articulate a gay sensibility in their designs and are able to represent a range of gay identities and expressions with not only dignity, but real love, which is frustratingly hard to come by. Oh, also, Kevin Wada covers, because duh.

Writers are a little bit more difficult for me. I love Anthony Oliviera and I know that he's got a lot of ideas for the characters, so I'd be delighted to see anything that he might pitch. Vecchio also does write, and his creator-owned series, Sereno, is an urban superhero story in a modern fantasy setting-- something he describes as Batman Beyond meets Sailor Moon. Based on that, I think he'd do a great job telling a story about a witch and shapeshifter from New York. I know that Sina doesn't work for Marvel anymore, but I've always wished he could've done Billy and Teddy in a sweet little rom-com miniseries, or even just a single issue special. He's particularly good at writing tender, funny, and just unapologetically gay characters who signal authentic elements of our culture and community without making them cheap or laughable. That is a quality which I find essential for Billy and Teddy, and it's part of why I want more mlm creators to work with them.

If you had asked me this question last year, I would have had an easier time pitching ideas for these characters. I'm eager to see what the future holds for them, but "rulers of an interplanetary nation" was never part of my vision for how Billy and Teddy would be spending their early twenties. I did have this idea for an ongoing series about their "college years", wherein Billy would be studying magic with Wanda and Agatha, and Teddy would work part time with Carol or Alpha Flight while attending community college or learning a trade, like piercing or tattoo artistry. The idea was that they'd often spend time apart, as they'd each be focusing on their own careers and having individual storylines, but they'd always come home to each other at the end of the day and lend each other support, in ways both mundane and super-heroic.

I used to imagine that they'd stay in that nice apartment Sunspot got them, which would act as sort of a crash pad/base of operations for a revolving cast of their friends. They could convert one of the rooms into a magical sanctum for Billy, and another into a study room or art studio for Teddy. Tommy, America, Kate, or whoever could crash on their sofa whenever they're in town or need to do a team-up. Wanda could help Billy ward the apartment so that he and America are the only ones who can portal in and out, but then Loki would find a way to get around the wards and cause trouble, and there'd be a whole dramatic reunion. The whole idea could easily be adapted as a Young Avengers ongoing if you widened the focus from the main couple and treated it as an ensemble piece with individually chunked plot-arcs, much like the original series.

Unfortunately, that idea no longer holds as much water as I'd like because, for one thing, they lost that apartment and never explained why-- it seems like it was passively retconned out in between New Avengers and Death's Head. More importantly, they now live in space, with Teddy being a busy ruler of an interstellar Alliance, and Billy his prince-consort.

I would still like to explore the idea of them pursuing separate goals and working in separate fields while never being truly apart. Empyre introduced a clever plot device wherein Billy is now able to sense Teddy's location and teleport to him instantly, no matter the distance, which, I assume, works in reverse as well. This feat of magic is made possible by their marriage, which binds them symbolically and draws on the power of their love. They can go anywhere and do anything on their own, and still be together again at a moments' notice, which is super romantic and also affords them more flexibility than most superhero couples. I would still pitch a series about Billy doing magic work on Earth while Teddy does diplomacy in space, and one can always warp to the other when they need backup fighting a bad guy. They could even switch back and forth between staying on Teddy's throne-ship, and getting cozy at Billy's little Manhattan apartment when they want to get away from it all.

I guess my final answer is that I want the two of them to be fully realized, individual characters whose love is illustrated through mutual support rather than, like, being glued to each other's hips. The things that I want to see Billy doing are very far removed from the things that I want to see Teddy doing. Superhero characters tend to lose momentum when you marry them off, and superhero couples tend to fizzle when you keep them apart, but Billy and Teddy's unique strength is that they're never truly apart, and their relationship never seems to lose steam-- they've been a pair from the start, and... they're a little obsessed with each other.

The Billy story that I most want to see right now is a full Maximoff team-up. It could go in one of two directions: A) a quest to uncover Natalya's history and finally vanquish the Emerald Warlock, in which they're waylaid by Doom and other magic villains from their past, while teaming up with their magical friends around the world-- basically a sequel to Scarlet Witch; or, B) a showdown with Krakoa and a resolution of their relationship with Erik, which, best case scenario, partially reverses the Axis retcon and proves once and for all that the Maximoffs are mutants. If we got a longer series, we could actually do both plots-- they learn something about Natalya which leads them back to Erik, and the two arcs become a larger story.

The Teddy story that I most want to see is a Guardians-esque space romp with political elements featuring Teddy, Xavin and Noh-Varr as, like, a sexy-alien-boys version of the Gullwings from Final Fantasy X. Does that make sense? I don't have a great grasp on the political landscape of Marvel Space so it's a little hard for me to come up with details, but I know that the status quo has been totally upended, so there are going to be different factions and movements springing up, and likely no shortage of villains and space monsters rearing their heads when the dust of the war has fully settled. Teddy's a monarch now, but he's also been set up as this Arthurian hero-king, so I think there's still room for him to go on adventures and fight his own battles with his magic sword and, maybe, a crew of loyal space knights.

Having said aaaallll of that, I would absolutely die for a full-on fantasy adventure story with Billy and Teddy. I mean, Teddy's a king with a magic sword and his husband is a super-powerful witch. It's gotta happen. I'd actually be into them having a rematch with Mother, who is a pretty adaptable villain, in that her abilities and motives will differ depending on how she's been summoned. I'd also really like them to have a chance to go up against Sequoia directly, and on more even grounds. Quoi is such a great enemy for them because they represent the same generation of Avengers babies, and, actually, Quoi's origins are directly tied to Billy's-- their respective parents had a double wedding together. Sequoia and Teddy's arcs in Empyre paralleled and contrasted each other beautifully, but the two characters had no meaningful interactions. I want to see thems as arch rivals, and maybe, begrudgingly.... friends? Plus, I love that they're both alien princes who live in sci-fi stories, but whose aesthetics and powers are pure fantasy-- Quoi's a dryad wizard and Teddy is King Arthur, if King Arthur was a gay anthropomorphic dragon.

Anyways, that's my Wiccan+Hulkling pitch. The first arc is Billy and Teddy facing off against Sequoia in a magic forest that he's grown on his new planet, only to find out that they've been set up by Mother.

In the second arc, the three of them grudgingly team up against Mother while hashing out their shared backstories and giving Quoi, who's literally never had peers to relate to, a chance to fully come to grips with the way he was conditioned and manipulated by his father. Instead of conjuring dead parents, Mother seems to be able to summon dead children, which makes her particularly dangerous around the Cotati, Kree and Skrull, who've just emerged from a war and have countless recent dead.

In the third arc, Mother has freed R'kll and they've set their sights on Earth. Billy heads out with America and Tommy to ask Loki for advice on defeating her, while Teddy brings Sequoia before the Avengers as his charge in order to ensure that Quoi receives provisional immunity.

Loki is able to provide insight on how Mother might have been summoned and what the parameters might be for breaking the spell that's tethering her to Earth-616. It turns out that Mother is essentially holding Anelle's soul hostage and has been appearing to R'kll in her form. Mother's hold, at this point, has spread to the entire Alliance, and Teddy will have to defeat her or else she'll use it to destroy Earth and decimate his nation in the process.

Teddy recruits Wanda to help face Mother down. (side note, I'm desperate to see more of their relationship as in-laws.) Wanda agrees to work with Sequoia but insists on calling Mantis and making them talk.

The final showdown is the three boys, plus Wanda and Mantis, against Mother, R'kll, and an army of dead alien soldiers. Mantis and Wanda are able to pull Anelle's soul from Mother's grasp, but this doesn't banish her-- Mother's true anchor was R'kll, who'd been carrying Anelle's ghost in her heart ever since the destruction of Tarnax.

R'kll believes that she's always acted in the best interest of her nation, and she thought that bringing back Teddy's mother would finally make him see her way. Anelle and Teddy have a tearful reunion, but he admits that the only mother he's really mourned was the woman who raised him.

Wanda, Mantis, and Anelle, as a trio of mothers united with their lost sons, are able to reverse and seal Mother's power, which was based on lost children. They are not able to banish her, however, until R'kll steps forward and sacrifices herself, believing now that the best she can do for her nation is to rid the Alliance of the curse she brought upon it.

R'kll and Anelle begin to dissipate, but R'kll's sacrifice has called forth the spirit of Mrs. Altman, who is finally granted some closure and dignity in death by getting a chance to see how far Teddy's come and the peace that he's built in her memory.

Lots of crying! I made this sad. I'm sorry.

#young avengers #teddy altman #hulkling #wiccan #billy kaplan #empyre #robintext

38 notes · View notes

gffa · 4 years

Photo

Hi! I went through a similar phase as several of you--I never really connected the dots between my own aro/ace qualities and my gravitating towards the Jedi culture until someone else pointed it out and then everything just sort of clicked together in my head in a way that made so much sense. And I think it can be really useful to view the Jedi through this lens of aro/ace culture, not because people are obligated to agree to this interpretation (they absolutely are not obligated to do so!) but because it provides a framework of reference for why not being drawn to romance and/or sex is not a foundational flaw in characters. That there might even be an entire group of people who find that to be really satisfying and fulfilling--I mean, look at how many people gravitated to this discussion (or were already here) in just one day on one person’s blog on one social media platform. It’s not hard at all for me to think, yeah, I’m looking at us building aro/ace culture of our own, it’d be easy for an in-universe group of people to do the same, and the lack of romance and/or sex wouldn’t be them suppressing their feelings or lacking something fundamental about the human condition, either. That’s part of why the Jedi mean a lot to me--there are other things as well, I greatly value their “face the shit within yourself, acknowledge that shit, and then let that shit go, because holding onto it is poison that will hurt you”, as someone who came to the same conclusions long before I was ever a Star Wars fan. I love the worldbuilding, I love the psychic space wizards aspects, I love how goddamned extra they are about everything, etc. But a culture that not only doesn’t prioritize romance/sex, but actively values other things and finds meaning in those things? That we see they have friendships and connections all over the place, that they find joy and meaning in teaching their students (and learning from their students, just as much as they teach them), that they find joy in helping others and protecting others, that they love through different ways, that they love the galaxy around them, they love their brothers and sisters in the Force, that they love their community and their culture? That they just don’t seem to really want love and romance? Even those that do feel romantic feelings (setting Anakin aside, of course) still find the Jedi path to be a fulfilling one. Obi-Wan may have had romantic feelings for Satine (which was apparently fine, it’s about his commitment and where he places it, I’m pretty sure that was the whole point of the Obi-Wan/Satine relationship, to be a narrative foil for Anakin/Padme, where Anakin does prioritize his feelings for Padme over his morals and judgement, which results in disaster of epic proportions) but he is a fully realized character without them. He loves--we see that with Qui-Gon, Ahsoka, Luke, Anakin--that he cares deeply, that he’s a compassionate person, that he lives a life that he considers satisfying. He becomes a Force Ghost and we can see him looking out over Endor, at the things that have finally been set back to rights, and he’s happy. Even within canon, the Jedi that feel restless and like something is wrong in this galaxy, they’re not restless because they want romance/sex, but because they want to do more as Jedi. They want to help more people, they want to do more good in the galaxy, and do you know how much that means to me? That even those who are dissatisfied (setting aside those that leave the Jedi Order because they want to have romantic relationships, which are treated warmly by the Order and by the people who left, like Tula’s grandmother) don’t have to be shoved back into the same box so many mainstream properties shove the characters into? That it’s not about how, oh, they want traditional nuclear families, but instead that they want MORE of what the Jedi are--more love as shown through service to others, more love as shown through helping others. Do you know what a relief it is to have a group of people who find fulfillment in the same kind of things that I do? Friendships and helping others and learning/teaching about the galaxy around them and self-reflection/understanding and accomplishments the like? That these are treated, not just as valuable, not even just as valuable, but more valuable to these specific people? Without demonizing that they’re totally cool with other people wanting romantic love? DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH THAT MEANS TO ME? DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH IT MEANS THAT THE JEDI DON’T REALLY SEEM INTERESTED IN ROMANCE OR SEX AND INSTEAD FIND SATISFACTION IN OTHER THINGS? THAT IT’S NOT ABOUT SUPPRESSING YOURSELF, BUT THAT PEOPLE SOMETIMES JUST REALLY DON’T CARE ABOUT THOSE THINGS. SOMETIMES EVEN LARGE GROUPS OF PEOPLE. That the Jedi aren’t just “hey, this one Jedi can be read as aro/ace, that’s neat” but instead the Jedi said, “Hey, how about an ENTIRE CULTURE that vibes hard with aro/ace culture?” That it’s the one mainstream culture that I can think of that really can be interpreted to say, “You’re not just an outlier, but YOU’RE THE NORM in this fictional society.” Do you know what kind of value that has to me, as someone who only has the tiniest scraps of representation for this character or that character who maybe might be like me, but are rarely confirmed and are almost always The Different One? Do you know what kind of value it has to me that it’s not just one or two of them, but that THE CULTURE ITSELF is where I would fit in? That they built an entire society where nearly all of them seem to be Like Me? AN ENTIRE SOCIETY OF PEOPLE I WOULD FIT IN WITH? Which isn’t even getting into the worldbuilding specifics that are so much fun to play with--like, can you imagine what it would be like to have this psychic connection to this vast field of energy in the cosmos? To be able to sense the feelings of others around you, to feel their presence even when they’re halfway across the galaxy, to just know what they’re feeling? To be constantly surrounded by the lights of those souls that are gently nudging up against your own? The warmth and peace of the Jedi Temple that isn’t just what you see/hear/touch, but also what permeates your very thoughts, the soothing balm on your soul that it would be? Can you imagine what it would be like to have this in your head all the time?

A familiar sense of warmth, of belonging, of finding himself part of an endless lattice of connections that held him and everything else, each fixed in its proper place. A Force. Romance and sex can be wonderful. But they are not the sole defining qualities of what it means to be sentient or what it means to be fulfilled. The Force being described as an endless lattice of connections and warmth, that sounds incredibly wonderful and human to me, that sounds incredibly fulfilling and like everything I could possibly want. That is what the Jedi seek and have found. That is the foundation of their culture. That is the culmination of their lives. This is why their relationships are so wonderful and I’m so glad that the iconic Jedi relationships, whether we as fans turn towards shipping them or not, whether we joke about how much you can read into them or not, are ones that are all about other aspects that are just as epic and important. Obi-Wan’s most iconic relationships are with Luke, Anakin, Qui-Gon, Ahsoka. They’re all incredible ones and it’s not to disparage his feelings for Satine (I love them as a pairing, too!), but that his character is defined more by familial and platonic relationships being just as galaxy-shaking as romantic ones might have been in another story? That means a lot to me. Anakin is, of course, driven by his romantic relationship with Padme, but think about how important his relationships with Obi-Wan and Ahsoka are, ones that don’t have to be seen through the lens of romance. That the ultimate climax of the prequels was Anakin’s fight with Obi-Wan, a familial connection. That the ultimate climax of TCW was about Ahsoka’s relationship with Anakin, another familial/platonic connection. Ahsoka is a rising star in the SW franchise and her most iconic connections are with Anakin and Rex, both of which do not have to be interpreted through the romantic/sexual lens, that are complete just as they are presented. That even when she can no longer be a Jedi, even when that possibility is stolen from her, she still doesn’t need to be defined through romance or sex. Yoda has many important, iconic relationships and is such a central character to the mythos and mythology of Star Wars. His relationship with Luke is one of the most foundational of the OT, his relationship with Obi-Wan is important when you dig further into the supplementary material, his relationship with Anakin creates some of the most memorable scenes of the prequels. All without ever having him desire a girlfriend. Hell, the movies had Yaddle right there and you know what? She wasn’t Yoda’s girlfriend, he wasn’t her boyfriend, that’s not what they were to each other, because they didn’t really seem to have any desire for that. THAT’S ONE OF THE REASONS I LOVE THE JEDI. They show compassion and care and love all over the place, but they do it through George Lucas’ views on how people should strive to be, and they do it not through romance, but through friendship and helping others and seeking greater understanding of self-knowledge and artistry through the Force, and none of that should ever make them lesser, just as aromantic and asexual people seeking those same things does not make them lesser. We are people who love just as much as anyone else, we have fulfilling and wonderful lives, I don’t know any aro/ace person who would really even want to change themselves, we find ourselves to be perfectly fantastic the way we are. I don’t feel some part of me is missing, I don’t feel I’m less interesting because I’m aro/ace, I love being the way I am. I love how much my friends and family mean to me, I love how much joy I get out of caring for animals or helping other people or even simply yelling about Star Wars with them. My connections to people are just as wonderful as anyone else’s, regardless of how they’re not in the romantic/sexual category. And, so too are the Jedi.

#jedi order #meta #aro star wars club #long post

198 notes · View notes

malereader-inserts · 4 years

Text

broken crown | vi.

“A wand tells a lot about a wizard, you often get caught up in your head, in a book, in words that you forget who you are. You get lost in expectation.”

“Impossible expectation I have to live up to, I have to achieve.”

Word Count: 2,082

A/n: Two flashbacks here, hope it doesn’t get too confusing. I found a few wands on etsy with beech wood, and this is the one i like the most (so lets imagine that’s the readers wand without the engraving) Also, sorry for a late posting :)

< Previous | Next >

You’re not a God nor been sculptured by the Gods. You’re certainly not Merlin.

You’re you. Just a wizard. That’s all you wanted.

You remember when in your fourth year of Hogwarts, recently turned fifteen, you had sat in Dumbledore’s office for the past twenty minutes, staring at the target. Dumbledore was writing at his desk, looking up to notice you blankly stare at the object, hoping you wordlessly and wandlessly turn the object to stone.

You were getting frustrated, when you give up in trying to do one of Merlin’s old curses or charms to get into his powers, to control it and immobilise it. You start to practise other things, like wandless magic or non-verbal spells. You were getting quite good at non-verbal spells and slowly but surely, getting you skills up in wandless magic.

“My dear boy, please do not tell me you are trying to do something by staring at it,” Dumbledore rose from his seat, as you let out a huff.

“I don’t get it,” You mumbled, as he joins you at the stairs, “I’ll never be of his expectation.”

“Now, where did you get that from?” Your headmaster questions you as you shrugged your shoulders.

You placed your wand down next to you, as you leaned your head against your knees, shoulders down in defeat.

“I feel like I’m constantly trying to prove myself that I am worthy of his powers, his abilities, the whole world cannot understand what he’s written but me, and that’s a lot of responsibility. I often wonder why he has picked me, I’m nothing of the sort of special. I can’t be as extraordinary as he was, I could never be him, and when the world finds out that’s what they’ll want. I don’t think I am ready for it.”

“Well, no one ever is ready for that,” Dumbledore explains, looking at you, “May I see your wand?” You give him your wand, fashionable and suited you well, “May I ask-?”

“Beech Wood, dragon heartstrings, 12″, rigid,” You answered, remembering what Ollivander had said to you when you matched with the wand, “He never really told me what it means and I haven’t found a book to tell me about it.

“The flexibility of the wand shows the degree of adaptability and willingness to change possessed by the wand-and-owner pair. Rigid shows that you are not one to change your mindset, stubborn perhaps.”

You scoffed, “You can say that again.”

“Dragon heartstrings, if I am correct, produce the most power, and which are capable of the most flamboyant spells and they always bond strongly with the current owner. I am surprised that you don’t have a phoenix feather as your core.”

“They’re rare,” You nodded, shrugging your shoulders, “Produce the greatest range, would be fitting.”

Dumbledore continues, “The most important part is the wood, the true match for a beech wand will be, if young, wise beyond his years, and if full-grown, rich in understanding and experience. Beech wands perform very weakly for the narrow-minded and intolerant. The beech wand is capable of a subtlety and artistry rarely seen in any other wood”

“Fitting,” You bitterly say, as you look at your headmaster as he gives your wand back, “Why? Why tell me all that?”

“A wand tells a lot about a wizard, you often get caught up in your head, in a book, in words that you forget who you are. You get lost in expectation.”

“Impossible expectation I have to live up to, I have to achieve.”

“I would never expect you to do something impossible, because it's impossible, right? So why would you put impossible expectations on yourself? Son, all we can do, is the best we can do - and that's just it, isn't it?” Dumbledore had a twinkle in his eyes as you looked at him, “The best we can do, well... it's the best we can do. No matter how far you've come, there will always be things you will think you could have done better. But son, no one is perfect. It's alright to fail, it's alright to make mistakes. The best you can do is the best you can do - and the best you can do, is good enough.”

You looked down at your feet, you fiddle with your wand in your hand. You looked at your wand, spinning it.

“Really?” You asked with doubt in your mind lingering.

Dumbledore could see you weren’t convinced, something was festering in your mind and he’s not surprised. You were too humbled, it felt like an honour you did not deserve.

“I’ve talked to Merlin’s portrait, he tells me you visit him often,” Dumbledore asked as you nodded, meekly.

“For advice, for guidance, for answers.”

“And, in the books, Merlin had written, what does it tell you about him?”

You looked at him with knitted eyebrows, “He’s unpredictable but loyal, kind and caring. Though, there is a lot of second guessing in his actions-”

“Exactly, I’ve talked to him on many accounts, he has a lot of regrets, a lot of mistakes, a lot of second guessing. But, the one thing he didn’t second guess, was picking you.”

Dumbledore paused as he placed a comforting hand on your shoulder, your eyes soften as the good heart in Dumbledore did outshine your worries and doubts.

“I’m nothing special. I can’t be him.”

“You don’t have to be him, you just have to find what you are truly from his abilities.” Dumbledore pressed his index finger against your chest, “It starts from within.”

You looked down at his finger, watching it point towards your target, you looked at your professor, his eyes tells you to try again. You looked back at your target, taking a sharp inhale and a relaxed exhale. You stare intently to your target with your finger pointed towards it. After a minute or less, the target started to turn into stone.

Your lip curved upwards, as you faintly remember how Dumbledore laughs out loudly out of joy for you.

You’re not Merlin, you’re you. So, why is it so hard to get that in you?

“You’re up early,” You mumbled towards Hermione, who was reading, you sat up from the floor.

You scratched your head, running your fingers through your hair. Hermione smiles to herself, laughing how you look barely alive as you try to blink yourself awake. You had been upset for a few days since your fight with your father. Well, less of a fight and more of you shouting at him.

You’ve acted like as if it hadn’t affected you. But, it does, it kills you deeply. You don’t want your emotions to cloud up your judgement when Harry needed you, you’ve found yourself lying awake when everyone goes to sleep, just thinking about your dad.

“Ron drools in his sleep,” Hermione stated as you chuckled, looking at your ginger best friend with a smile as Ron rips a snore into the room, Hermione looks at you, “Are you okay?”

You looked at her, “Of course.”

“If it’s about your dad-”

You shake your head, waving your hand to dismiss her, “It’s fine, I’m just hoping my dad comes to his senses and goes back to her. There’s no use in being bitter when I’ve spent years having my dad’s back, defending him. He had mine and I had his. You know?”

“Remus is a good man,” Hermione hums smiling, “He’ll do the right thing.”

You huffed, looking at her, “I know he will.”

Hermione and you looked at each other with a shared smile between you, “(Y/n), want to explore the house with me? I’m sure the Blacks left some good books to read.”

“I can’t read?” You tilted your head, “Well, I can just not very good.”

“You’d think there would be a spell to correct spellings,” Hermione mused out as you stood up the stretch, “Or, fix dyslexia.”

“That’s too advance of a magic that no one has unlocked yet.”

“You can,” Hermione reminded you as you looked at her, “You said, yesterday, you’ve only mastered a fraction of Merlin’s power. I’m not Dumbledore, but there’s no time frame of you completely in your true element.”

“True element?” You teased, “I think the books are getting to you, ‘Mione, and I was exaggerating when I said a fraction, like maybe a half of his powers.”

“And I’ve heard you practising in other rooms,” Hermione mentions as you feel a blush in your cheeks, “I know you feel lost with Dumbledore, just like Harry, but if you were able to do it by yourself in our fifth year, you can do it by yourself now,” Hermione encouraged.

“You sound like McGonagall...” You mused out remembering your talk with her in your fifth year, “When we had a talk about future careers.”

“I never asked, it’s obvious that Harry will be an auror, but you? What do you want to do?”

You sat in McGonagall’s office defeat, Dumbledore had disappeared and you were alone in trying to figure out what the hell you were supposed to do. McGonagall offered her classroom for you to practise when she had no classes. But, when she was supervising, she noticed how down you were.

“Is there something on your mind?” She asked, sitting at her desk.

“No, nothing at all,” You responded as she narrows her eyes, she looks at you with raised eyebrows as you sigh in defeat, “What am I supposed to do when Dumbledore is not here? I can’t do it without him-”

“Yes, you can, Mr Lupin,” she had interrupted, pushing hot chocolate towards you. You give her a tight smile, lifting the mug to your lips allowing the steam to devour you, “That drink was cold and you automatically warmed it yourself. Intentionally or not?”

You looked at the mug, “Intentionally, I have a habit of setting warm drinks to a certain temperature I enjoy.”

“People your age would have used a wand, an incantation to produce what you have done. People beyond your years would struggle to find the perfect medium, and yet you do it like it is second nature.”

“Because it is,” You replied almost instantly.

“You are far beyond your years, and yet even if you struggle to control that power when you’re emotional, but can do anything else, that is progress. Believe in yourself. You are braver than you think, more talented than you know, and capable of more than you imagine.”

“But-”

“(Y/n),” You stopped as your head of house refers you to your first name.

She rarely refers to any student with their name, often by their last name. So, when you hear it escape from her, you sat up straight. Placing the mug on the desk, watching her carefully.

“Tell me what you have achieved.”

“I can control sixty per cent of the magic, it reduces to forty if I’m upset or angry. I’ve learned a third of Merlin’s spells, mastered them and can perform with confidence. I’m able to do non-verbal spells as if it is second nature alongside advance wandless magic.”

“Have you created your own spells?”

“Only offensive ones,” you responded, “Only if I am in great danger.”

“You don’t realise it, but you are fifteen, and you have done things many cannot. You have perfected the arts of basic magic we provide in Hogwarts, you put yourself down for things that surpass a person’s ability. You are trying, Success is not how high you have climbed, but how you make a positive difference to the world.”

“Thank you,” You sincerely thanked as she nods, looking at your predicted grades.

“Now, onto matters here,” She tapped her parchment, “What are the careers you look to.”

You tilted your head, “I-” You paused, “I never really have thought about that.”

“I’ve realised, you get caught up.”

“So I’ve been told,” You responded, “Part of me says follow Merlin. Find your destiny and stick to it. Lead an example, but part of me wants to be an auror or an astrologer.”

“Well, Mr Lupin,” she was back with the formality, a twinkle in her eye, “Whilst you are on the path of Merlin, I can assure you that you are also on the right path to be who you want to be.”

“But, I don’t know what I want to be.”

“That is okay to not know, but remember the fates can only do so much for you.”

Tagged

@carefulthatsharassment-sir @lanlanlan020202 @hanniejji @dumbssbtch @lea-the-foxe @stan-joonies @littertortilla

#Remus Lupin #remus lupin imagine #remus x reader #remus lupin x male reader #Harry Potter #harry potter imagine #harry potter x male reader #x male reader #broken crown

184 notes · View notes

non-stop-imagines · 4 years

Text

Party-Get Together-Thing (Request)*

Request from @twistedcharismaaa: Hi 🥰💕! I loveeeeeeee your stories 😩. So so much. I was wondering if you could write Peter Parker maybe a little older? Like 19-22? With the prompt “It’s two a.m., why are you next to me?”. Pleaseeeee tag me 🙏🏾✨

Prompts used (from Drabble List #2): #67: “It’s two a.m., why are you next to me?”, #20: “Shhh, they’ll hear us.”, #21: “Why are you laughing?”, #76: “You wear glasses?”, #86: “Where the hell did you learn to do that?!”

Pairing: 20+Peter Parker x 20+Black!Reader

Warnings: Some cursing, but I promise it's cute, it's fun, it flirty, and it's primarily SMUT, I ain't gon lie to ya

Word Count: 4.2k

A/N: So I'm just preparing y'all now, I was not expecting whatever this turned out to be.🤣 @twistedcharismaaa I hope I did your request justice and would like to thank you sooooo much for your patience. This was honestly extremely fun to write because it's been a looonnngg while since I have written smut and it feels good. Anyway, hope you enjoy! Love you allllllllll!!!!💖💛💖💛💖💛💖

UNIVERSAL TAGS LIST: @beautifulwisdom2001 @iamzion-therealhabesha @thottio @jetaimeamore @mixedfandxms @here-for-your-bullshit

Remember requests are open! It can be a specific prompt or from the Drabble Request list linked in the bio! Just ask to be on a tags list (or all tags lists)!

Masterlist

______

Saturday, 12:00 p.m. in the middle of June. What else would practically a floor of young twenty-somethings do except fill they’re idle time with some fun. A little drinking, a little smoking, the great possibility of hooking up with the cute, seemingly shy brunette boy that lives in the apartment 3 doors down from you. The one that waves at you when you pass by, even if he seems to be struggling with two handfuls of groceries. Thoughts move through your head as you move around your studio apartment, picking up stray clothes and tossing them in the hamper, unsure and uncaring of whether or not they have been worn within the past week. You pick up your phone and re-read the text from your neighbors, thinking about the consequences of the proposed idea.

Chilli 🔥🥵💃🏿🌶️:

Party, our place. 9:00. Your only job is to invite Peter. Your ONLY job. Don't fuck it up💅🏿.

Beth🤪💁‍♀️🌺🌟:

And, a couple bottles of cheap, high alcohol content liquor would be great too 🤪🤪

Peter. And cheap liquor. The two most simple tasks and yet it feels like you were just told to scale Mount Everest in 2 hours with no oxygen mask. You sigh and flip your long faux locs to one side of your head, staring straight at your reflection in the oval mirror that hung on your wall, gold paint chipping off.

“Hey, Peter. Party tonight at Chilli’s and Beth’s place. Make sure you come through.” You facepalm yourself and reset, pulling part of your hair back into a half-up ponytail style, hoping the change in visual will help. “Peter! Hey! How’s it going? Uh- my neighbors are throwing a party. Yeah you know those two crazy gals…” You stop in your track and let go of your hair, then flop down onto the beaten-up teal couch that sat underneath the mirror. Why was this so hard? He was the last person that you would expect to be nervous to talk to and yet here you were, contemplating whether or not you’ll even decide to leave your apartment for the rest of the day. That was until your stomach growled prompting you to stand from your couch, grab a hoodie to cover your upper body that was clad in a horrible DIY cropped cami. You pull on some slip on Vans, grab your wallet and keys that sat on the table next to your door and head out to your favorite lunch spot: a Greeks food cart with gyros that would make you murder a bitch. You pull out your phone from your hoodie pocket and begin to type out a short “Sorry I can’t make it to the party because I’m a little nervous bitch” text when in the middle of typing you bump into none other than the Peter Parker, the boy that had you prepared to become a hermit before even thinking of speaking to him. You look up to his eyes, not having to shift your line of sight too much since it was only a slight height difference, but still enough to make you feel sort of small under his gaze.

“Woah. Where are you running off too?” He finishes unlocking his front door and opens it but stops to turn to you, adjusting his backpack strap and then rubbing the back of his neck. His eyes were large and doe-like as his expression of shock stayed plastered on his face.

“Oh, uh, lunch. You know how it is.” You wave your hand still containing your phone around before quickly tucking it away then pushing a loc back behind your ear and beginning to annoyingly, or what you felt was annoying, play with the gold cuff that surrounded that specific loc.

“Oh yeah. I’m actually about to make myself some lunch too…” He points his thumb into his currently empty apartment, making curiosity consume you and forcing part of your gaze into the more than slightly disheveled apartment.

“Cool.” You place your attention back onto Peter and put your hands in you hoodie pocket, fiddling with your keys, your wallet, anything your fingers could find to calm you down. “I was just going down to that gyro cart a couple blocks down. I was craving one and once I start craving something, I NEED to have it, ya know...” You chuckle and look down at your shoes, widening your eyes for a moment at the insanity that were the words that left your mouth seconds ago.

“Well, don’t let me get in your way. I’ll see you later.” He begins to walk into his apartment but you stop him in his tracks, tapping his shoulder and quickly calling his name.

“Uh, are you doing anything tonight? Because my neighbors- you know Bethany and Chelsey, they live in 230? They are throwing some party-get together thing and just wanted to know if you could make it? There will be music and alcohol if that sounds fun to you.” You end your request with a slightly awkward smile that you only give someone that you’re trying to convince.

“That does sound pretty fun. What time- or does it matter?” He turns back around to you, trying to smoothly lean against his door frame, but greatly misjudging his distance and giving himself a small visible heart attack.

“It starts at 9, but I guess that’ll be more set up so show up closer to 11 just to be sure.” You laugh, calming down when you begin to feel the nervousness radiate from him.

“Thanks for the heads up. I’ll see you there?” He asks you as you being to walk to the elevator, pressing the button to go down.

“Of course! Who do you think is bringing the good alcohol?” The elevator doors open and you step in then turn back to Peter, opening your hands to him while keeping them in your pocket as the elevator door closes.

_____

You adjust your dress in the full length mirror that hung on your bathroom door, glad that you jumped on that 40% off sale on Fashion Nova last week. It was a short, satin spaghetti strap dress that was a beautiful powder blue and simultaneously hugged and hung off your body beautifully. You bend down and tighten the straps on your simple silver heels, your cutest but possibly most uncomfortable pairs of heels in your closet but you didn't mind because you knew right as you stepped through the threshold of your two neighbors apartment they were coming off. You sway over to the hanging oval mirror and admire your make-up, impressed with the job well done on your matching light blue eyeshadow artistry. Since the party was only next door you decided it was best for you to only bring your apartment keys, phone, and 3 bottles of liquor with you since anything else you would have needed was less than 30 seconds away. You take one last deep breath and one last once over of your reflection in the mirror, then head out your door, moving to the music that flowed out of the one bedroom next door.

“I knew we could trust you with the good stuff!” Chilli yells when she sees you walk through the door, time now almost 10:30. She was a pretty tall, 5’9��ish, brown skin that could rock a clown wig if she wanted to and eyes to die for. Barely ten seconds later, Beth, a short, about 5 '3'', fiesty girl with dirty blonde hair pokes her head from the bathroom, eyebrows just finished but still fully dressed in a black, strapless crop top and pink skirt and shoeless.

“I knew she could do it. Now lets just see if she followed through with the boo-thing situation.” She pops back into the bathroom to finish her make-up.

“Please, for the love of GOD, stop saying boo-thing.” Chilli takes the bottles from your arms and places them on the counter, currently covered with several other versions of alcohol and snacks that are commonly requested when a group of twenty year olds get together. You pick a bag of gushers from one of the bowls and flop down onto the still pulled out bed, quickly undoing and pulling off your shoes. “Don’t think I won’t say anything out white boy down the hall. Did you talk to him?” She picks up the blankets that covered the floor of their apartment and placed them in the whittled basket you remember her buying at a thrift store a couple of weeks ago.

“Yes, I did. After bumping into him, of course.” You pop a gusher in your mouth and lift your legs onto the bed allowing Chilli to straighten out the rug that sat beneath your feet. “After a bit of small talk I told him about the party-get together thing and he said he would come so, ha.” You stop your friend from moving for a second and swiftly pull the sticker tag that layed along her right buttcheek. The pants were regular black jeans that fit her perfectly and were a perfect complement to the pink stain crop that she had on.

“Well, good. Phase 1 done. Now for phase 2.” She turns around and crosses her arms, raising her eyebrow which pulls your attention to her sparkly and aesthetically pleasing eyeshadow. You stop your hand before placing a finger full of 3-4 gushers into your mouth, confused as to what this “Phase 2” entailed.

“Uh- what exactly is Phas-” Before you finished your words, Bethany come sauntering out from the bathroom, make-up pretty much finished but still a brush in hand. Almost as if they rehearsed this moment, they each grab you by a hand and begin to sway with you, matching the tempo of The Weekend by SZA playing in the background.

“You are gonna get dicked down.” Bethany sings and turns you around, giving you fully to Chilli who does a mediocre cha-cha with you.

“Because you need that more than a girl’s night Netflix binge right now...” Chilli sings, finally letting you go, allowing you to plop back down on the bed.

“Why am I not surprised by you two? Always thinking witcho pussy.” You finally place your much needed gushers into your mouth and roll your eyes.

“Because, darling, pussy rules the world. I don't make the rules, just simply follow them.” Chilli states with her best British accent then quickly turns on the charm when she hears the first group of guests knock on the door frame.

_____

11:30. You look at the door again, smiling at the familiar faces that file in but stay seated at the counter, slowly sipping on the beginning of your third concoction of blue raspberry vodka and lemonade, an original of yours. You look down at your phone for something, anything to tell you that the boy that you should not be all hung up about did not just appease you earlier today. Right as you were about to head back to your apartment for a moment you receive a tap on your shoulder, making you slowly turn around to see the owner of the hand, obviously surprised to see Peter, wavy hair tossed around as if he just finished getting ready a minute ago in a plain white t-shirt and black dress pants with a belt equipped with a gold belt buckle. You weren’t surprised that such a simple outfit on this boy had you trembling at the knees, but the cute smile he gave you as he looked you up and down had you pooling where you sat.

“Sorry I’m so late. I realized too late that I had no idea what to wear.” His words mixed with your slight intoxication had you laughing a bit more than necessary, but that didn’t bother Peter one bit.

“Well, you know how to improvise under pressure, don’t you, Parker?” The flirtatious inclination in your voice caught Peter off guard but not too off guard to quickly follow you to a part of the kitchen with a couple of stacks of shot glasses. You take two from the bottom of one of the stacks and fill them with the Crown that sat near the stacks. You hand one to him and smoothly lean against the counter, raising your glass to him. “To the promise of a very fun night.” You two toast the first of what will be half a dozen shots between you two and down the liquid, wincing at the burn then pulling him to the middle of the living room to dance in the midst of some already too drunk young adults knocked out on the couch.

_____

As predicted, six shots for you and six shots for Peter was enough to have you dragging him back to your place, lips locked and stumbling to your locked door. Your groan and turn around to the door, removing your key from the top of your dress as you allow Peter to continue to push past your faux locs to suck harder on your neck. After a couple of moans, you finally are able to push past your door into your place, drop your keys on to the table next to your door, and blindly move to your couch. You push him down onto the teal fabric and immediately straddle him cupping his face with your ring covered fingers as you pull him further into an exceedingly heated kiss. You feel his fingers tickle up your sides, slowly pushing your dress up above your hips to your waist, the movement becoming more and more unbearable the higher his fingers go. You couldn't help but push away and begin to crack up, earning the most confused puppy dog face you have ever received from him, only making you laugh even more.

“Uh, why are you laughing?” He continues to run his fingers up and down your exposed flesh, but you quickly place your hands on top of his, stopping the movement and slowing your laugh.

“You’re tickling me. I am unfortunately very ticklish on my sides.” You help Peter out by pulling your entire dress over your head, letting your unrestrained boobs pop as you finish pulling the dress above your head, having slight trouble when you reached your hair, but giving Peter a show as he runs his eyes down from your brown breasts with perfectly dark nipples to the black thong that hugged your hips. You throw the dress to the floor and finally rest your eyes back on Peter’s face, guiding his sight back to your eyes and giving him a confident smirk. “Liking what you see, huh?” He just says nothing and goes back in for another round of making out, his hands continuously making their way to your ass but slowly moving back up. You start to buck your hips on his lap, smirking into the kiss when you feel him grow underneath you. While keeping your lips glued together, you stand from his lap, guiding him over to your bed and slowly sitting down, breaking the kiss but not breaking eye contact as you go to undo his belt. The pace seemed to be excruciatingly slow for him because after a few seconds of letting you kiss down his “V Line” as you slowly undid his pants he pushes your hands away from his waist and quickly undoes his own belt, clumsily stepping out of each pant leg. You hold in your laughter at his goofy franticness but let a small grin grow on your face, breaking some of the sexual tension by making Peter laugh when he looks back up at you.

“What now?” He chuckles, pulling his shirt over his head, giving you a great visual of his surprisingly well developed muscles. Your eyes trail down his chest slowly, making you absentmindedly lick at your still surprisingly well glossed lips as you continued to look down his abdomen.

“Nothing, just loving the enthusiasm.” You grin up at him, watching as he hovers closer and closer to your face, kissing you again as he tugs down your thong, humming a response into your mouth. His kisses continue but start to move down your body, some extra attention ensuing when he reaches your breast, catching your right nipple in his mouth. He begins to suck and swirl his tongue around the nub and sneaks a look at your face, eyes closed arching your back into the feeling. He continues down your body, finally reaching your inner thigh, the closeness enough to have a groan drip from your lips. You feel Peter smile as he kisses up toward your pussy, but his now gradual ascent makes you perch up onto your elbows.

“Yeess…?” He raises his eyebrow as he looks up at you, continuing to kiss up your thigh.

“Oh, nothing. Just wondering where that haste you had a few moments ago went, that’s all.” You giggle, brushing his hair back from his face so you could have a full view of his sultry and and teasing gaze.

“Ohh. Oh, you mean this?” Right after he accepts your challenge, he dive right into you, sucking hard on your clit and licking streaks up your slit. The sudden onset of pleasure makes you let out a shriek, which makes Peter quickly stick his middle and ring finger from his unoccupied hand into your mouth which you instantly begin to suck on. “Shhh, they’ll hear us.” The tone of the words that seemed to drip from his mouth earned a complying hum from you as you nodded and looked into his eyes. He just smiles and continues on you, sticking two fingers into you, curling them and pumping them in and out slowly as his tongue continues to focus on your clit. His hum of satisfaction that he lets out against you runs a vibration through you, bringing you closer to a finish. Your moans on his fingers increase in volume before you lean back onto your bed, no sound able to escape your mouth due to the intense feeling of pleasure coursing through your body. Peter quickly catches on to just how good he was making you feel and stops in his track, keeping his laugh to a chuckle as he watches you squirm from the sudden loss of contact. “Can’t let you have all the fun.” He quickly shimmies out of his underwear and jumps next to you into bed, gently kissing behind your ear as you come down from your attempted climax.

“Fuck, where the hell did you learn to do that?!” You moan, leaning into his lips as they trail back down your neck. You feel his dick rub against your thigh, coming dangerously close to your pussy which clears your mind up a bit, making you push him away and look up toward your nightstand. “Go on. Pick your favorite. They’re newly stocked.” You smile up at his hovering naked frame before watching him roll off of you and crawl up to the nightstand drawer, opening it and pulling a condom from the still closed box. You wait for what seems to be a moment too long, occupying the ache between your legs by supplying friction from your thighs.

“So, you wear glasses?” Peter coos, circling your glasses in one hand as he sits up next to you. “You know what, I just realized I have never seen you in your glasses.”

“Because,” You reach for your glasses but groan when he pulls them away. “I just prefer to wear my contacts, that’s all.” Peter gives in and lets you have your glasses, but soon after a mischievous look plasters on his face.

“Model them for me. Please?” He goes back to kissing down your neck, knowing that of all the gestures he has tried tonight, this will get you naked in front of him modeling your glasses in no time, and boy did it work.

“Fine, fine. I just need to go take out my contacts.” You giggle then saunter into your bathroom loving the feeling of knowing exactly where his eyes were. Less than a minute later you were there, standing at the foot of your bed, glasses on as his hands began to roam your body again, slowly pulling you onto him, making you straddle his now protected dick.

“Oh, this was a great idea.” He pulls your face down to his, gently moving the faux locs that fell into his face to the side. Your hand begins to have a mind of its own as you lead his dick to your pussy, positioning it at your slit and letting your hips do the rest of the entering. All that comes from Peter’s mouth after this was a weak “Oh my,” before he grabs your hips and helps your hips move up and down his dick. You lean back down to his face, sticking your tongue into his mouth, fighting for as much dominance as possible as his surprisingly large size moves in and out of you, supplying the much needed and severely missed pleasure you were feeling minutes ago. You two stay in this position for a moment, reveling in the pleasure that you both were feeling before Peter rolls you two over, grabbing your right thigh and bringing it up to his shoulder. For a moment your reach up to cover your upper body, the new position making you feel oddly vulnerable, but Peter quickly senses your mood shift, slows down his thrust, and lowers his forehead to meet yours. “You okay? You need me to stop? I can-” You shake your head and kiss his concerned puckered lips, instantly feeling more comfortable.

“Please do not stop! That is all I am asking from you now is to please not stop!” Your words come out more as a grunt, letting a loud groan come from your lips as Peter quickened his pace again.

“Yes ma’am.” As his pace increases, the movement of his hips become sloppier, which you thank your lucky stars for because you would not be able to handle much more before reaching your hilt.

“Parker, I’m gonna cum,” You moan out, clawing at Peter’s back as he leans onto you more and more, movements becoming increasingly free.

“Me and you both. Fuuuu…” And after a few more thrusts his hips slow to a stop with you writhing from your climax beneath him. After you two take a moment to catch your breath you slowly move up to where your pillows were, recooperating from the incredibly fun sex you just had as Peter rolls the condom off of himself and tosses it to the trash can by the table at your door. He joins you underneath your blankets, turning to face you and giving you the sweetest kiss you have ever received then pulls back to simply look into your deep brown eyes.

“That was a… well, fun.” You giggle, kissing Peter again then laying your head on his chest, letting him run his hands over your hair, feeling a sense of ease when he stops to focus on certain locs that catch his attention.

“I don’t think you understand the number of times I have thought of that moment.” Peter’s playfully crude remark earns him a light slap on the chest but your hand placement left you defenseless for when he pulls you back into his chest, letting the silence that falls over you two and the sounds of light breathing rock you both to sleep.

____

You awaken slightly from the deep slumber that overtook you and Peter hours ago, and after taking a second to gather your wits you look over to your alarm clock on your nightstand. 2:23 a.m. You groan at the small headache that ensues after you turn over to your stomach and reach up to feel your unwrapped and slightly disheveled hair. You gently rock Peter until some movement comes from him, decreasing the strength of your push as he comes to, but still rocking him as you speak to him.

“Hey. Hi. It’s two a.m., why are you still next to me?” Peter grabs the hand that was doing the rocking and pulls you back into him, lightly feeling your hair before giving you a kiss on your forehead.

“Well, I guess that means I did something right because you didn’t kick me out after, so…” He shrugs and smiles down at your placement on his chest.

“I mean… you’re ight. Enough for me to let you stay over or wateva.” You front your real reaction about last night, smiling at the way his chest moves when he laughs. “I guess you can stay for a while longer, but it’ll cost you.” These words had Peter on top of you in no time flat, that familiar mischievous smile gracing his face again.

“I knew you couldn’t get enough of me.” He bends down and takes your lips into a heated kiss, but before anything continues you push him back, staring seriously into his eyes.

“Also any and all questions from Chilli and Beth will be rebounded to you because I cannot deal with those two today-” As you finish your words Peter dives back into you, peppering kisses along your favorite spot on your neck.

“Fine, its only fair.” and with that his head disappears underneath your blanket, and you were already raring for round two.

#peter parker x reader #peter parker imagine #peter parker #peter parker x black!reader #peter parker smut #18+peter parker #request #marvel imagine #marvel #spiderman imagine #spiderman

308 notes · View notes

x--daughters-of-darkness--x · 3 years

Text

Amy Lee Of Evanescence On Women In Rock, The Freedom Of Artistry & Finally Being Able To Say What She Wants To Say

Music Feeds: Amy, thanks for taking the time to talk to Music Feeds. We’re particularly excited to talk to you at the moment because you have a brand new album out. How is existence treating you?

Amy Lee: Awesome. Thank you for taking the time to talk to me too. We are all just SO happy to finally have it out there! It feels really good.

MF: It’s quite a sonic adventure, this record. It presents all of the elements that people are accustomed to hearing from Evanescence and blends them with a whole bunch of new elements, was this a fun and rewarding record to write for you?

AL: It’s hard to sum it up in a word like fun because it is, it is so deep. There was definitely pain involved and challenge and all those things that lead to making something great, you know? It takes a little bit of struggle and we went through a lot to get to the place where we could write this album. I think the word that sums it up is satisfying. It feels really good to get a lot of this off of my chest. For me, this is partially due to having things to say that had been building for a while and having a new perspective to write from, but also musically, with the band, it shows how far we have come as a band and displays what it is that these guys and lady, that I work with now bring to the sound and that connection deserves to be documented. I really wanted a chance to show what we’ve grown into and it feels really good to listen to that back.

I think everybody’s feeling excited for the eventual day that we get to go play this stuff live again because for so long, our live show has been about making a great collection of our big back catalogue of music, but it’s all old, you know? It’s been a while since we’ve been able to really go, okay, “this is who we are now”. So having this now it’s going to be hard to play anything, but the new songs.

MF: I’d imagine it would be, especially given how much of yourself that you’ve put into the record. Now I know that you all went through a lot of challenges, both personally and as a band in the writing process, with some personal tragedies, the pandemic and even having one member stuck indefinitely in Germany, do you feel like those challenges added to the emotional intensity of the record?

AL: Yeah, I think that’s a good way to put it. It made everything more important. The music has been like this life-giving thing for us all to grab onto and to connect us to each other. As people, we’ve been so isolated, so expressing yourself and being able to share in that with somebody far away, makes it feel like we’re not so far away, on an internal, on a soul level, you know, we are connected. It has been so healthy for all of us to be able to pull together and have something to work for, something to fight for and build a world that we can control.

That’s something we all want so bad in a time when it just has felt like so much is out of control. So I think for us, to have this thing to care about and to focus on, has just been such a gift. I don’t know what I would’ve done without it quite honestly, I think it would have really gone insane.

MF: All of these situations also made you have to be pretty innovative in order to complete the record, finishing songs and sessions for the album remotely and thinking your way around how to be a band, without ever really being in the same room. In a strange way did that challenge make the writing and recording process feel like a fresher and more interesting experience? Do you feel that adaptiveness and creativity added something extra to the record?

AL: Absolutely, I really do. I’m a believer in that. I really, really, really liked breaking rules, especially when it comes to creativity. I like making music, making art; to feel like making art, it needs to feel creative and inspired and excited. When we were making our first music, when I was writing Fallen, I didn’t know what I was doing. I didn’t have anything to live up to, or I didn’t have a method that I could rely on. It was just creating a way for the first time. The more that I think you can tap into that, where it feels like you’re just, a soul scratching at something trying to make it come to life, the better the art will be.

You can be surprised by how many different ways that can happen. I was pushing us in a little bit of that direction with Synthesis, making the band kind of find a new way to play their instruments, where it would fit into an orchestral setting without heavy guitars and big drums or anything that sounded like those acoustic instruments, pushing them to find a new way. Jen learned how to play the theremin a little bit and made that a part of her thing. I learned to play the harp a little over ten years ago, I’m a piano player and they’re related, I mean, a harp is the guts of a piano, but it’s being plucked. So there are similarities, it’s sort of like French to Latin or something but different, it makes you play differently, and I wrote songs during that time on the harp a little bit, because it forced me to play differently. It made me write differently also and because of that, we got songs that weren’t like the way they would be, if wrote them with a piano as my route, like I typically do.

I think it’s really good to work outside your comfort zone and outside the box and to be challenged, it makes it exciting too. I don’t want it to feel like a job. I want it to feel like the fun thing. I want it to feel like the secret project because that’s how it should be. Right? Like your job is your job, that’s the cubicle that’s filling out paperwork and doing your taxes to be a musician. To be a creator, to be an artist, that should be the thing that feels like your freedom, your release, the thing you’ll stay up all night for, not the thing that you’re supposed to do.

MF: That’s a very empowering message and an inspiring message to give people too and I feel like you can hear that fresh inspiration on the record.

AL: Good! You know, having to, having to think around the problems, this time a lot of it’s been about the promo. We did get to get back together and be in the studio, all of us, except Jen, last fall and do things in a fairly typical way, which was amazing, but it was more humble like we were eating ramen and stuff so that we wouldn’t have to do takeout a lot of the time. Everything was a little bit more like early days, which felt good. It made it feel like we’re doing this because we love this, not just because it’s a cushy job. Having to think about making our own music videos or even this right now, like setting up the stuff where I have to film myself, that’s a new experience.

We even did Jimmy Kimmel recently, and they essentially said, “do it yourself, figure it out and send it in, and we’ll put it on the air.” It’s like, Oh my God, well, we’re all over the world, but we don’t want to pass up this opportunity. So you just have to find a new way and it’s amazing, the feeling that you can get at the end of that after you do it, the empowering feeling that really does give you like, “Hey, I did it, I did it!”. It means something to know that I cared about it enough that I tried and I made it happen and in the process, I’ve learned a new skill.

MF: You learned a lot of new skills in the process, especially when you’re talking about the videos, the fact that you shot two video clips on your iPhones… did you ever think that would be possible? And was it hard to get into the performative headspace to make that look as organic and as awesome as it does?

AL: It was really fun! It’s hard to explain it, but it really reminds me of being in high school and having a dream and doing whatever I could with what I had to make it happen. Once we got the idea we realised that it’s not like we’re going to be able to do production, so let’s make it about the soul, let’s make it about the point and the heart of the message and see if we can get that across and let that be the leading thing. That’s been sort of the guiding mantra about this whole time through last year and in the process too, has been: let the meanings lead, not the tempo, not the style. Whether it is deciding which songs come first, or what’s going to be a single, all those things really have come about this time by answering the question of “What’s the message we want to convey? What are the words we want to speak into the world right now?” Because this music, as much as it is for us, it’s more than ever feeling like it’s for everybody. So what, where are we now? And what, what could the world, you know, relate to or need?

MF: The messages on the record, are particularly strong. The obvious one is ‘Use My Voice’ but overall it seems like a record with quite a lot to say, and I feel like that might differentiate it from what people might have come to expect when it comes to lyrical content from Evanescence. Is your focus as a musician and as a strong voice in the community to just say what you mean now? Was there ever a point in your career when you felt prevented from doing that?

AL: I think the biggest preventer of things like that is my own self. The music for me has truly, always been the one place where I tell the truth, not that I’m a liar in real life, but the music is the one place where I’m not holding back from saying what I really mean. The one place where I’m not just keeping my mouth shut because I don’t want to deal with the fallout. So whether or not that’s always come across clearly, because I have been vaguer in the past with the lyrics, I’m not sure. But if you knew my situation and you knew who I was talking about at the time, it would have been a lot more clear.

It’s funny because we’re on a level now, where it’s not just me and my family and my friends who know me, it is about something bigger on some of these tracks and ‘Use My Voice’ is definitely the biggest one that is that way. That’s coming from me, pushing myself. I have been really pushing myself over the years on every album and challenging myself to be more specific and to say what I really mean because it feels good. The more that I can really let off, the more of a release it is for me to let some of those things go. It felt good and felt like, there was a higher purpose with ‘Use My Voice’ because we knew that we were going to be able to use it, to empower other people, and make positive change in our country and in the world, in the fight for democracy. It’s so important. It’s huge. If rock can’t be the voice for power to the people, then I don’t know what we have to do that? That’s our job!

MF: That is awesome. It’s also good to hear to an extent that you feel like it was always you that has been holding yourself back, and that you’ve grown through that, rather than it being a case of industry folk, holding those elements back. Because I think there’s a bit of a belief in the music industry that particularly at the start circa Fallen, that people wanted you to be something that you’re not. Those people around you were trying to force you into becoming Linkin Park or something?

AL: That’s actually true, that part, but I still wrote about all of that, I still wrote those lyrics. So I guess that was the start of me pushing myself.

MF: It seems that you were a bit of a trailblazer in the modern heavy scene, in many ways. When Fallen blew up it inspired a generation of new performers and it seemed to also open industry eyes to what female and femme-identifying acts could bring to that space. With this in mind, it would be remiss of me not to ask how you feel about the state of the industry at the moment in terms of its attitude towards the female and femme-identifying artists in the heavy scene?

AL: That’s the question, isn’t it? It’s not about women not being allowed to be musicians. They always have been. It’s about how we see the summary. So often rock these days is not in the mainstream. It’s boiled down to a teeny, teeny, tiny piece of the pie, and there’s only room for one face, and it’s a picture of a dude. Because that’s how people that are not rock fans see the genre. People that are rock fans know that rock music has never gone away, that it has legions of fans and thousands of fresh acts and perspectives, but whether or not these big mainstream gatekeepers are going to let that through, and show that as reality, is a different thing altogether. I think to an extent that people who don’t know a lot about modern rock music, still see it as a picture of something ancient, like an artefact of when they were kids. They still see it like Bruce Springsteen, or The Beatles, or these other depictions of old rock bands, when the truth as you know is that it has changed so much since then.

I do think that they’re making an effort now, I’m seeing an effort being made. I mean this last Grammys was all women in the rock category, In This Moment was up for the metal award, and I know that it’s not just about the Grammys, but it’s good to see that happening. I think that the world, our society is aware that this is a moment for different perspectives to have a chance to show their face and to shine and to say, “Hey, here’s, here’s something from my perspective”. I think that’s really, really important that we all are able to kind of see things through more perspectives than just our own. I think that is really the road to helping a lot of the issues in our world, in our society. Not thinking only from your little perspective of you and your hometown and what you’ve seen, and there’s a lot more out there and it doesn’t need to be scary. We just need to be exposed to all kinds of differences. It’s happening. Rock is definitely a place for all things, all people, you know. But it’s just gonna take time, you know, for that picture to change, when all it boils down to a summary, they need to stop summarizing so much. I will say as well, rock music is huge. There’s so much of it. We need a little more air time, please!

MF: Yes, yes, yes, definitely. Definitely more time, more perspectives, more diversity, more respect, more rock! I’m actually a rock singer myself. So I’m just sitting here nodding thinking that it would be lovely to be considered a worthwhile genre again, in a mainstream sense. Now, I do want to know something about you as a person, Amy. The band has a very distinctive, visual aesthetic and I’ve always wanted to know if that’s something that’s inspired by your tastes, the other things in life that you enjoy, or if it is just something that fits the music?

AL: That’s an interesting question. I feel like it’s both. I’ve always had a huge interest in the visual. It is essentially important to me and I always have ideas like when the songs are happening, when I’m making music when we’re in our world of creating, I’m constantly just seeing things in my head and thinking about ideas about how to bring the song to life with visuals. I’ll sit there thinking “ooh if we do a video, I need to see this happening” you know? Or, for example, with the clothing you see me in, I designed my own clothes. So a lot of the time what I wear either on stage or in music videos, I’ve made specifically for that purpose. It’s about being able to create a whole world and have a visual representation of who you are from the production too, on stage, it’s so important, it makes all the difference. It’s honestly, you understanding and accepting and putting out there a further dimension of what you are for people to tap into and to get and to relate to and perceive.

It’s hugely important to me, but it has to do with the music. You can currently see toys against a white wall, on a couch, in my house, so you can tell that my house is not entirely full of like black wallpaper and chains, if that’s what anyone was expecting. But I wouldn’t say that Evanescence aesthetic is straight-up metal either. It’s more complex than that. So it’s the side of me that is that trying to summarize the music in a way, in a visual mode, where it’s kind of like got some Victorian elements that represent the classical for me, and it’s got weird atmospheric things that kind of represent the electronic world, and of course it’s got the distressed elements and the darkness and the heavy feeling of the band. The more layers you can use to express yourself, the better.

MF: That makes a whole lot of sense. I honestly hadn’t connected the Victorian imagery and the classical music background before, but it absolutely makes sense to me now. Speaking of visual arts, you’re doing a very cool thing within that spectrum on this record, by releasing a graphic novel anthology that’s inspired by Evanescence music. How did that come about? And as a lover of the medium, that must be the most awesome thing ever, right?

AL: It’s so awesome. It’s so awesome! I have all these really grand ideas that would take way too much time and energy to actually do, while also doing my music career and being a mum and everything else that goes on in life, but this is something that I’m able to do because it’s coming from heavy metal. They came to me and were like, “Hey, we’d like to do this with you”, so instead of me having to find artists and put all this stuff together and create this world, they’re like, “Hey, we got it, we have the coolest, the best graphic design artists in our works in our sphere and the best story writers and stuff, and we want to do something based on your music”. So they came to me about a year ago and it sounded like one of those ideas that are too good to be true, where I was saying, “I’m in, now let’s see if this is just a bunch of meetings or it’s really going to happen” and it’s really happening!

The first two songs are in the works right now, it’s just so cool. I want to make this clear to our fans, it’s not my idea and my inspiration of the meanings behind the songs, presented as a visual. This is different artists and different writers for each song, getting an idea and being inspired while listening to the song and turning that inspiration into a beautiful graphic novel, based on their individual interpretation of the song. It’s so cool because it lets the music just take on more forms, have more lives, more alternate realities. I love it!

MF: I look forward to looking at every single one of these! Have you seen any of the graphic novels yet?

AL: I have, I’ve seen some of the stuff already and it looks really cool and I’m very excited. I have a little hand in it, giving opinions like do this, don’t do that, but for the most part, this is other creatives, just taking it to another place. It feels really good to see that happen.

MF: That’s so awesome. I’ve got to let you go, so thank you for talking to Music Feeds. I must confess that as a heavy music-obsessed teenager when Fallen dropped, I was all about it, so it’s great to see and hear you and Evanescence in such a great place as you’re putting The Bitter Truth out into the world.

AL: Thank you, that’s lovely to hear. It’s good to be back! It’s been nice talking to you, thanks for taking the time.

#Amy Lee #Evanescence #2021 interviews

7 notes · View notes