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jq37 · 3 days

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FH Junior Year Post-Season Thoughts

With another season of Fantasy High in the books and my recaps all finished, I wanted to do an overview of my thoughts on the season as a whole. Even though I feel generally positive about my experience with the season, there are a few things I think maybe could have been done differently narratively or mechanically. This isn't to criticize the way the season went down or to backseat DM/Play. More my combined ten years of college for textual analysis and storytelling bleeding through, haha.

I first want to start with the things I thought worked really well.

Fantasy High has "High" right in its title but, in past seasons (and especially Sophomore Year), not as much time as you'd think was spent actually at school and even if it was spent at school, there wasn't much time spent in class or engaging with the realities of being a student. This season really dug into the academic consequences of skipping your classes all the time and the realities of needing to do a ton of extra stuff to try for a scholarship and I think that was a refreshing thing to highlight for a change. Being more scared at flunking out than the dragon that's trying to eat you feels very emotionally resonant. Real "High School Is Killing Me" vibes for anyone who's a fan of NPMD.

Even though Fantasy High is a show that has some deep emotional beats and strong character arcs, it's first and foremost a comedy show. From the jump, everyone was generating bit after bit that had me cracking up as usual. "Little girly dog collar" is one of the funniest combinations of words I can think of. I think it was Siobhan who said that this was the goofy season and, having seen it, I'd have to agree with her. It never failed to make me laugh and it was always a highlight of my week. The cast just has great table chemistry that I love to watch no matter what they're doing.

Watching some of these high level combat encounters is as close as I'll get to understanding people watching sports. Even though combat is generally my least fave part of D&D, I think the cast really killed it this season with how cleverly they played and Brennan came up with some really great combat encounters. Special shout outs to Baron's Game and The Last Stand for their unique mechanics.

This is going to be one that's on the other list as well because my feelings are mixed, but I genuinely do like the downtime mechanic and how it forces hard choices. I think it's an interesting way to connect a mechanic to the story and cultivate stressful atmosphere for the season.

I have problems with the execution but I love the Rat Grinders in concept. I think as early as season 1 I was hoping that we'd meet a party that was like the Bizarro Bad Kids and the idea of a party that's farming XP instead of going on crazy adventures is a strong concept. Likewise, I think a character that's jealous because of your "cool" (read: tragic) backstory is also a fun trait for an unhinged antagonist in this kind of setting.

This is me absolutely showing my bias but I adored the Abernant Sisters content this season. I dunno if Siobhan specifically asked Brennan to not put her on a bus with the other beloved NPCs or what but I'm so glad she stuck around and we got the development we did. It was almost entirely ancillary to the plot but there was this clear pattern of Aelwyn getting softer and sweeter towards Adaine over the course of the season, from the guarded, "Enjoy the nemesis ward," to, full I love you's and, "I'd take them to get you." It was way more focus than I expected considering that Aelwyn completed the bulk of her arc last season and a lot of the time, a redemption arc basically ends after the big gesture (in this case, Aelwyn taking a magic blast for Adaine in Sophomore Year). So the fact that we got to see all of these sweet moments of them reestablishing their relationship outside of do or die moments was such a pleasant surprise. Again, I fully admit I am extremely biased, but this was my top wishlist item and the season overdelivered so there's a baseline happy I'm always gonna be with Junior Year.

OK, so moving on to things I things I think could have been tweaked.

Even though I liked the downtime system and the pressures it created, it also squeezed out the chance for more casual PC to NPC interactions that would usually be more common because they were semi-locked behind the relationship track and there wasn't an obvious benefit to roll for Relationships (as opposed to something like Academics which was crucial for not flunking out). Making the mechanical benefit more clear would have helped that (even if it meant Brennan didn't get his reveal--which he ended up just telling them anyway so might as well do it early). The other thing is that the consequence of a rage token was so bad that of course they spent all season avoiding getting one. Things might have gone differently if the consequences had been a bit more obscured, like in Neverafter. And it could have been a nice parallel to the Rat Grinders to take this unknown resource that makes things easier for you but is also having this negative effect. Then it could be like dang we did the same thing they did unknowingly.

I mentioned this in my recap but I'll talk about it again. It is a little confusing to me that we did the Ankarna subplot right after we did the very similar Cassandra subplot. It took up so much time this season which I don't think is an issue in and of itself, it's just that we literally just went through some extremely similar beats last season. Why double up on this same storyline when there's so much new ground to cover? Or if we're going to raise a god, why not make it a different kind of god? One theory I had early on was that the Rat Grinders were trying to raise their own god to one-up the Bad Kids but instead of raising a chill, misunderstood Cass type, they accidentally raised a god who was erased for a good reason and got in over their heads.

It's fun for there to be connections between seasons but sometimes it's like, OK that's a *lot* of coincidences. Like the god who your rivals is trying to raise *happens* to be the wife of your cleric's god and also *happens* to be the god of the fiend trapped in your friend's mom's chest and that fiend *happens* to be the relative on your bard's dad's side which is *also* the reason she is randomly cursed? That's a LOT of red string connecting plot points. As unhinged as Kipperlilly is about coveting Riz's backstory if I saw that go down I'd be like you have *got* to be kidding me.

The mystery elements didn't feel like they clicked as well as they did in other seasons. I think that's partially because Porter's plan was so convoluted (seriously, I made another post about how haphazard his plan was) and had all these moving parts and we didn't get clear answers for a lot of mechanical things like how the rage crystals actually work and when they were implanted and stuff. You had stuff like Devil's Honey which I think is super cool as a thing that exists in the world but ended up being an element that just led the players down the wrong path and had a relatively small payoff (that Porter was using it to lie to Ankarna). I think it's plausible that a forgotten god would be willing to listen to anyone saying the right things without introducing this element. (As opposed to, for instance, Ambrosia which has a very clear connection to what's going on and is a solid clue that someone is flirting with aspirations of godhood.)

The Porter reveal came so late in the season that even though it was a fun/challenging fight, there wasn't a lot of emotional weight behind killing him. It was basically just dunking on a teacher Fig has always hated who was also mean to Gorgug so screw him. Which, valid of course. But the Bad Kids were never going to react as strongly to Porter as they were to the Rat Grinders so putting Porter in the prime villain spot isn't necessarily what I would have done if I wanted the fight to be more than just a brawl--especially since we've done "School admin with student minions" already in S1. I don't mind the full circle callback but it would have been nice to pick something else for the sake of variety. We haven't had a child mastermind yet and I think Kipperlilly could have been a great candidate for that. My friend suggested that it would have been fun if Kipperlilly was trying to become a god instead of just being Porter's underling and I agree. "I'm not anyone's chosen one so I'll choose myself," is still within her established jealousy and Type A tendencies. If we want to keep Porter involved since that was Brennan's gift to Emily, maybe have it be that instead of Kipperlilly working for him, he's working for her. Like Artemis Fowl vibes! And the Rat Grinders can be varying levels of on board--from true believe to redeemable. I don't think Brennan planned for the Bad Kids to ever redeem her so might as well go full megalomaniacal mastermind with her and make her The Villain if she's not gonna be nuanced anyway. If My Little Pony can do it and send a literal child to Tartarus for pony treason (or whatever Cozy Glow did), Fantasy High can too.

Continuing from the above, if we have the Porter fight in place of the Grix fight (a la Daybreak) and don't use Ankarna, that gives way more time for the Bad Kids to investigate the Rat Grinders throughout the season and it would mean that they would have their personalities developed a lot more. With the limited downtime, they Bad Kids didn't have a lot of time to spend on these kids who were just hating on them for no good reason (valid). But if you cleared their plate of the god hunt stuff, they'd have more time for this. And if they weren't all rage zombies to varying degrees, it would be easier to see them as characters. Besides Kipperlilly (and, funnily enough, Mary Ann) we don't really have a good read on what these kids are actually like. The little time we spent with them all season was kind of a wash if them breaking out of rage means their personalities got laundered too. Anyway, regardless of how their loyalties ended up shaking out, it would have been fun for them to be more than the minions that they were in canon. As funny as it is for them to just kinda be XP farming losers, they did have the potential to be more interesting in their own right if they weren't just Porter's minions. And again, we've done adults forcing or coercing children into being minions in Freshman and Sophomore Year already. Lemme see some self-created child maniacs! (Or, peer pressured child maniacs. That's cool too. The Lucy/Kipperlilly dynamic is way more interesting to me if it's like girl, I would take a bullet for you but I CANNOT walk this path with you any further in response to *I* will be a god and you can be *MY* champion.)

Anyway, those are my thoughts! Like I said, I have my points that I think could have been tightened, but overall an enjoyable season and I will be glued to my screen if they decide to close out with Senior Year!

#dimension 20 #d20 #fantasy high #spoilers #I had so much fun with this season but the overall plot makes my brain throw up question marks if I map it out or think about it too hard #but then I think about adaine and aelwyn at basrar's and it's like wow 10/10 flawless execution #I don't know if I've been clear enough about this over the season but I LIKE kipperlilly as a character #I think she sucks and that's great #I think she should be worse actually #like own it #don't be a pawn in some loser's plan be your own girlboss #grind those rats chug that ambrosia #be the teenage demi-god you think you deserve to be and drag your friends into your plan with the sheer force of your personality #make it 100% sure that there's a spot in hell waiting for you when you get sent there #imagine the level of vitriol they had towards kipperlilly as is and then imagine she has legendary actions #I think her going down to riz like a chump is such a huge W for riz and fitting for how the narrative played out #but to use wrestling terms for a second #it was a waste of a LOT of heat #Porter didn't have NEARLY as much heat as she did

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my-thoughts-and-junk · 2 months

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been thinking about what i'd do with rick and morty if i got my grubby little hands on their IP

#random thoughts #guess what motherfuckers it's blue man time #okay so im not gonna get into like. worldbuilding and character choices and plot rn #im just gonna mention one thing i think is cool #i think it'd be cool if every member of the smith family had a designated literary theme?#like how in the early seasons there was a little bit of a focus on morty liking fantasy as a contrast to rick's sci-fi bullshit #and i think this would be a good basis for episodes focusing on one particular family member #so morty's obviously soft fantasy and folklore. jerry would be hard fantasy as a true counter to rick's sci fi bullshit #beth i think would be thrillers? not slashers necessarily but mysteries and crime noir #specifically as a contrast to the drab life you would expect from a working mother #also drama. medical dramas specifically but maybe a bit of romance in there?#summer's a blend of teen movies and young adult sci fi (when she gets more into adventuring)#also slasher. girlie is final girling it UPPP #and then rick! who you think would be science fiction until you see the central finite curve and realize #oh. he's eldritch horror.#i want to think more on beth and summer because i want to find genres which really CLICK with them

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ktgoodmorning · 2 months

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The Wall

Mapi Leon x Teen!Reader

Inspired by the song "The Wall" by GroupLove

“Just sitting on a wall, always trying to do it all” “Really wanna get away, to where I couldn’t say” “Yeah we got lucky, fell into place” “We found some friends, some stayed some passed away”

A/N: The timeline is a little funky, I know Leila didn't leave in the middle of the season but we're gonna pretend for the sake of the story. Even though I posted the lyric, nobody dies, just overall angsty, more parts to come.

Masterlist

“You ready to go, amiga?” Mapi shouted across the house at you even though she already knew the answer. You were always ready long before she or Ingrid ever were. It wasn’t unusual for you to be up extra early to start your day with a run or at the very least, a long walk. At only 19, you hadn’t been playing with the senior team long and wanted to do everything you possibly could to prove yourself, even if it meant getting up at four in the morning.

When you’d been called up to the senior team, Mapi and Ingrid had insisted that you move into their spare room to help you get adjusted until you settled in better. Originally, they had pitched the idea in order to make sure you were taking care of yourself and doing everything you needed to to be successful with the team. They had no idea how prepared you already were. Still, many of the older girls had taken you under their wing, Mapi more than anyone. She was highly protective of you and was always making sure you were doing okay, even if you didn’t normally need it. They rarely had to do much, as you were one of the hardest working members of the team.

Some might call you a perfectionist, type A, or maybe a bit obsessive, but what you were doing was working. You would do anything it took to be the best footballer you could possibly be. Getting up early was just the start. You were always eating as healthy as possible with very few cheat days. You had done plenty of research on nutrition and everything you needed to eat (and not eat) to perform at your best so you always stuck to that. You often watched film from each game at least two to three times beyond what the team watched in training. That was your favorite way to improve yourself when your body really needed a break from training. It wasn’t a lot but it was everything you needed. Everything you needed to be enough.

You grabbed your bag and joined Mapi and Ingrid in heading to the car to go to training. Ingrid sat down in the driver’s seat while Mapi plugged in her phone to play some music that you didn’t even recognize. As you sat in the backseat, you were slightly lost in thought, thinking of what you needed to work on today. Speed and endurance were always something you tried to improve but maybe it was more important today to focus on your passing accuracy but also you needed to work on your shooting or maybe-

“Hey did you hear me?” Your thoughts were interrupted as Ingrid snapped you back into the real world.

“Hmm? Sorry.” You mumbled as you gathered your thoughts back to focus on the two girls in front of you. “What’d you say?”

“Leila said you were going with her after training? Is that right?” Of course you were forgetting something- your dinner plans with Leila. You sighed gently, trying to straighten out your schedule in your head.

“Oh, umm, yeah. We wanted to go to this new restaurant. I guess I forgot.” Because she was sitting in front of you, you missed the way Ingrid’s brow furrowed at the lack of enthusiasm in your response. Leila had become like a fun older sister to you. The two of you got dinner together at least once a week and were typically causing some sort of trouble during training. She kept you from taking yourself too seriously, worried that if you went unchecked you’d spiral under the amount of pressure you placed on yourself. Like many of the older girls, she had taken it upon herself to protect you. It was different with Leila because she treated you as more of an equal rather than a child. Because of this, everyone knew how much you cherished your time with her.

Mapi took the opportunity to lightly tease you for your weird behavior, “don’t get too excited there, chica.” She turned to look at you, trying to gauge your reaction to her comment.

It didn’t offend you, although you still didn’t laugh. You just weren’t really bothered by the comment at all. “Sorry, just thinking about other stuff.”

The older two girls had let it go, changing the subject as you got closer to the training grounds. You missed the look of nervousness shared between the two of them as you got lost in your thoughts once again.

You remained focused all throughout training, focusing on the things you needed to improve- speed, endurance, strength, passing, shooting, accuracy- the list in your head was miles long. Anytime the other girls would joke around, they knew you typically needed some coaxing to join in. However anytime one of your closer friends would get you in on it, that’s usually all it took. Leila was your weak spot, sometimes Pina too. They were always able to break down your walls of focus and seriousness and allow yourself to have a little fun. If it weren’t for them (and the rest of your team’s antics), everyone knew you’d sink into your perfectionism even further.

As you walked off the field at the end of the session, it was Pina that spoke to you first. “Hey, some of us are going out tomorrow night, you’re in right?”

Your face contorted with uncertainty, torn between the idea of having fun with your friends for a night and knowing you could use the sleep to prepare for Sunday's match.

Suddenly, an arm wrapped around your shoulders and you instantly recognized it as Leila’s, “Si, she’ll be there. Even if I have to drag her out myself.”

Well there was your answer. You gave the two girls a shrug, knowing you’d enjoy the time out with them. A little relaxation couldn’t hurt, right? You deserved it after how hard you had been working so far this season. And just because you went out didn’t mean you had to drink yourself into oblivion. You’d still be plenty prepared for the next match. As you all got ready to leave, Claudia filled you in on the plans, making you look forward to the night even more.

There was a newfound lightness in your step as you followed Leila to her car and went to the restaurant for dinner. You were excited for tomorrow night with everyone. It had been awhile since you’d let your guard down and just had fun for a night so you knew it’d be good for you. You knew how much you needed it and were thankful your friends were able to give you the little push you needed to agree. You were thankful for your friends until you got to dinner with Leila and learned the true reasons behind the night out.

You were sitting across from her, in the corner of the small restaurant when she broke the news to you- she’d be transferring to Manchester. The party tomorrow night was to have one last celebration together before she left. Instantly your chest tightened. She continued talking, explaining why it was a good decision and that she’d always be there to support you no matter how far away she was. However none of this registered to you. The second she said the words, you quit processing anything else.

Manchester? Why Manchester? How could she leave Barcelona? How could she leave you? She always said you were like family but you don’t just leave your family behind. Was Barcelona not good enough for her anymore? Or worse yet, did she not think she was good enough for Barcelona? If that was the case, how could you ever be good enough for Barca? Or for Leila for that matter? If you were a good enough “sister” to her, she would have no reason to want to leave, to go so far away.

Leila managed to pull you out of your thoughts when she reached across the table to hold your hand. “Hey, take a breath, it’s okay. You can still call me whenever you need anything, I’ll still come visit. You’ll be okay, I promise.”

She squeezed your hand tightly, trying to get you to meet her eyes, but you just couldn’t do it. You knew she had talked about not renewing her contract but you clearly had been too naive to think it could actually happen. Suddenly it hit you that other people must have already known. If Claudia had already had the time to plan a party, when did she find out about this? Had you been the last to find out?

“(y/n),” she squeezed your hand again, tighter this time, getting concerned at how you still had yet to respond.

Suddenly you were snapped back into reality, shaking your head quickly, “I’ve gotta go, I’m sorry.” Leila could hardly hear you as you mumbled, barely coherent. Frantically, you had pushed away from the table and made your way towards the door. You were almost running as you finally made it outside.

The cool evening air hit you hard. It helped you steady your breathing slightly, feeling less choked by the air of the restaurant. You didn’t notice how much your hands were shaking until you grabbed your phone to call Mapi, hoping she could pick you up.

In the time it took you to unlock your phone and pull up her contact, Leila appeared next to you. “Don’t be ridiculous, chiquita. I will drive you, come on.” She grabbed your hand before you had the chance to argue and led you to her car. Her silence was unusual but you hardly noticed, consumed by your thoughts.

Her heart broke when she saw your reaction. Obviously Leila knew you’d be upset but she couldn’t have imagined you’d take it this hard. The Spaniard was consumed with guilt as she tried her best to focus on the road ahead. It had crossed her mind that maybe she should have told you sooner but she wanted to make sure it was completely finalized first. You’d have other people that could step into her role when she was gone, people that would make sure you’d be taken care of. And like she said, she’d still be just a phone call away. Hopefully you just needed a night to let the shock wear off so you could both enjoy your time together before she had to leave.

You hardly realized that you had arrived in front of Mapi and Ingrid’s, the entire care ride being completely silent until now. “Chiquita, can we please talk?” She was still met with complete silence from you, taking it as an invitation to continue on. “Listen, I’m sorry. I should have talked to you sooner but I just-”

“It’s fine.” you shrugged her off, her face full of confusion.

“But, I should’ve-”

“Leila, it’s fine. I’m fine. I’ve got to go.”

“But (y/n), I-” and you were gone. Leila let out an exasperated sigh when you slammed the car door shut, mid sentence. So much for talking to you. The older woman texted Mapi, hoping she’d be able to talk to you in a way that was more successful than what had just happened.

Mapi had just read Leila’s message when you trudged through the front door. She decided not to let you know what Leila had told her, trying to see how much you’d be willing to share on your own. Committing to her plan, she greeted you, just as chipper as always, “Hola, Amiga! How was Leila?”

You responded with a shrug, doing your best to push your feelings down. If you just pushed them away, you’d be fine, right? “She was fine.” Mapi and Ingrid shared a look of concern at you making a beeline for your room. Once you made it to your room, then you could handle whatever you were feeling, but you weren’t about to do that in front of them.

Your plan would’ve worked out if it weren’t for Ingrid making one last attempt to get you to talk, “Hey, did you want to join us for a movie night?” You were so close, your door right in front of you. You pressed your forehead against the door, taking a strangled deep breath in an attempt to keep your emotions at bay. “(y/n)?” They shared another glance, concerned by your reaction.

Almost in slow motion, you turned silently to face the pair. “Did you know?” You choked over your words. You didn’t plan on talking about it tonight. You didn’t know how to face this news but you had to know the answer. Did Leila really tell everyone but you? The silence from Mapi told you everything you needed to know. All you could do was turn and take refuge in your bedroom.

As soon as the door shut, you pressed your back against it and slid down until you met the ground. Knowing you well, Mapi knew you’d want some time to handle it yourself. You were fiercely independent, always acting much older than you were. Sometimes Mapi had to remind others how young you were, making sure nobody went too hard on you. At times she had to remind you of that as well. Remind you that you were still learning, still figuring out life. Mapi admired your maturity but was also terrified that it would end up breaking you. She knew if she tried to follow you know, you’d push her out even further and want to try to fix it yourself first.

If only she could see you- sitting on the floor, tears rolling down your face as you choked down sobs. Your whole body shook, filled to the brim with emotions that you were too scared to let out. Your cries continued, much longer than ever before.

At some point during your crying, you had made your way into bed. The blankets and pillows provided you little comfort from the world inside your head. You didn’t even realize you had cuddled up with a sweatshirt of Leila’s. You borrowed it once when you were chilly and she let you keep it after she saw how much you loved it. It was instinctual for you to reach for it in times of stress so of course you hugged it tightly as you cried over the idea of her leaving you. Eventually, your cries seemed to tire you, succumbing to the exhaustion and falling into an uneasy sleep.

When Mapi and Ingrid had finished their movie and you were still yet to emerge from your room, they knew they needed to check up on you. Mapi being the closest with you, always took it upon herself to play the role of mother when you needed it. She knocked on your door lightly, expecting some sort of response. When she was met with none, she pressed her ear against your door, hoping to hear something that’d give her an idea of how you we doing. With still no response, she gently pushed the door open.

Upon seeing you, Mapi let out a breath she didn’t realize she was holding. You were curled up on your bed, fast asleep. She quietly sat down next to you, taking in your stressed appearance. Your face was still stained from tears, your eyes puffy and red. The older woman pushed some hair away from your face and ran her thumb over your eyebrows, hoping to relax the crease that remained on your face. It was clear to her who’s sweatshirt it was that you were gripping tightly. Mapi realized that while you were clearly sad, you must not be too angry at Leila herself. You wouldn’t be snuggled into her sweatshirt if you were mad at her.

Mapi pulled up your blanket around your shoulders and pressed a light kiss to your forehead, assuming that you’d be feeling better in the morning. Of course it would be hard on you to see one of the closest people in your life move away but Mapi knew she and Ingrid would be with you to help, no matter what it took. You were a hard worker, resilient in nature. There was no reason for anyone to expect you to be anything but that.

The next morning, Mapi was surprised when she entered the kitchen and didn’t see any trace of you. Sometimes you’d be up, cooking breakfast or at the very least, she’d see your empty mug in the sink which communicated that you’d had your coffee before going on a run. When she looked closer, she noticed your shoes and training bag already gone. Intending to call you, she opened her phone just to notice an unread message from you:

Wanted to train early. Used my run to run here. See you later.

Mapi’s face contorted as she read your message. How early had you left? The training grounds weren’t exactly close and would’ve taken a long time to run there. You were probably exhausted after being so upset the night before but maybe you wanted that run to clear your head and would talk with her afterwards.

Mapi and Ingrid arrived to training early, hoping to catch you before the rest of the team showed up. They stopped in the locking room first, thinking you’d be taking a break there and waiting for everyone else. When they didn’t find you there, they went on to the gym, the physio rooms, and the cafeteria- all of which remained empty. They hesitantly decided to check the pitch, confused as to why you’d be willing to spend more time in the sun on top of the time you’d spend outside for team training.

Of course that’s where they found you- on the side of the pitch running sprints. You didn’t notice them, fully lost in your own head, running as fast as your body would take you. Your lungs were burning. At this point, you had no idea how long you’d been running, definitely over an hour.

But you needed to. You had to get faster. You had to work harder. You had to prove that your spot on the team was not from getting lucky. You had worked for it. You were still working for it.

Maybe if you ran fast enough, you could run away from all your problems. Run away from here. Run away from being lonely. Or stressed. Or tired. Or insecure. Or not good enough. You didn’t need anyone’s help- not Leila’s, not Ingrid, not Mapi. You had to do this yourself. You had to work harder.

Mapi froze- watching you run yourself to exhaustion. She had never seen you like this. She’d seen you struggle but she’d never seen this. How would she even begin to help you? Clearly you couldn’t continue in this headspace but right now your friend was completely lost as to where to even begin with you. She sent Ingrid back inside, knowing her best chance at getting you to open up was if you were alone.

“Amiga! Come on! Come take a break before training starts!” Her shouting across the pitch at you was the first you were made aware of her presence. You shook your head at her and continued your sprints, not bothering to look her way. Your lungs didn’t have the capacity to use your voice at the moment. “Si, vamos! It was not a suggestion, you have to be done out here!” Once again, you ignored her.

The older woman let out a heavy sigh, knowing she was going to have to stop you herself. She did just that as she lightly jogged towards you, intending on intercepting your path. You didn’t even notice what she was doing until you suddenly struggled to avoid running into her. You stumbled over your feet while she grabbed at your shoulders, hoping to help steady you. With how fast you had been going, it was difficult trying to stop your momentum so suddenly- something she should have known before trying to get in your way. As soon as you had steadied, you were filled with anger and Mapi’s hands holding onto you tightly were not helping. The Zaragozan had no idea the amount of rage you were about to unleash onto her.

Part 2 Part 3

Masterlist

#barca femeni #barcelona femeni #woso imagines #fcb femini #woso one shot #woso #woso x reader #woso imagine #maria leon #maria león #mapi leon imagine #mapi leon #mapi león #mapi leon x reader #leila ouahabi #woso fanfics #wosoreading24/7 #wosoreadingmapi

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pickingupmymercedes · 1 month

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Whispered fairytale - Lewis Hamilton

request: "hi can i have a request about moments of fluff when reader's pregnant? with lewis of course <3" - anon

pairing: Dad!Lewis Hamilton x Reader!

warnings: fluff, like a lot of it

wordcount: +2K

a/n: I am not sorry for the sighs I was letting out as I was writting this. You guys have been warned, it's dad Lewis after all.

As always, I'm open for feedback, come say hi!

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Monaco shimmered beneath the fading sunlight, a familiar scenery for Lewis and Y/N. This time, however, the champagne flowed with a bittersweet undercurrent as nestled in a drawer, a positive pregnancy test hummed with a quiet revolution. No elaborate pronouncements, just a single pink line etching a new chapter onto their shared story.

Their path to parenthood hadn't been meticulously expected. Discussions about starting a family had danced between them, unspoken agreements carried on the wind of their non-stop lives. Lewis, now an eight-time champion, a feat achieved under the scarlet banner of Ferrari, still felt the fire to chase another title. Yet, amidst the celebrations at the end of season, a quiet voice whispered that perhaps, the timing might have been just right.

As the celebratory roar began to fade, replaced by the clinking of abandoned champagne flutes, Lewis found himself gazing at Y/N, her smile hesitant yet imbued with a radiant joy, although the reason behind it hadn’t been revealed.

Their planned racetrack of a future had morphed into a sprawling unknown, but as Y/N's hand met his, a quiet certainty bloomed within him. This unplanned detour wasn't a wrong turn. It was a victory lap of a different kind, perhaps the starting grid for their greatest adventure.

A Dream

Sunlight speared through the sliver of uncovered window, painting a warm stripe across Lewis's features. Y/N stirred beside him, the weight of sleep clinging to her eyelids. Disoriented for a moment, she blinked, the room slowly coming into focus. Lewis, sprawled on the plush white chaise lounge next to his driver’s room sofa, was the first thing that registered.

Except, he wasn't really by himself, not mentally anyway.

His gaze was fixed on a spot above her stomach, a soft, almost reverent smile playing on his lips. He spoke, his voice a low murmur that sent shivers down Y/N's spine.

"Alright, little one," he was saying, "I know you can't hear me yet, but listen up. This whole thing...it's a bit overwhelming, you know?" He chuckled, a nervous sound that tugged at Y/N's heart. "Honestly, I don't have a clue what I'm doing. But your mama here," he glanced at Y/N, his eyes warm, "she's a trooper. We'll figure it out, together. As a team."

The sight of Lewis, ever the composed champion, confessing his anxieties about fatherhood sent a wave of tenderness over Y/N. Carefully, she reached out, her fingertips brushing against the dark braids of his hair.

"Lewis," she croaked, her voice thick with sleep.

He turned, his smile widening as he met her gaze. "Hey there, beautiful.”

"Just getting to know the newest member of the team," he continued, his eyes flickering back to her stomach. "We were having a little chat."

Y/N couldn't help but laugh, a soft sound that echoed in the quiet room. "It can’t really hear you" she said, her smile fading slightly. "It's still early days, remember?"

Lewis's smile softened. He reached out, his hand hovering just above her stomach. "I know," he said, his voice gentle. "But that doesn't mean I can't try, does it?"

Lewis, ever the believer in manifestation, ever the optimist. She scooted closer, making room for him on the sofa. He settled beside her, his arm wrapping around her shoulders, pulling her close.

"How was your nap?" he asked, his lips brushing against her temple.

"Good," she mumbled, nuzzling closer to him. "But you woke me up with your…pep talk."

"Just some heart-to-heart, you know?!" he said with a wink. "With the little one, of course."

Y/N rolled her eyes playfully, but a smile tugged at her lips. The past few weeks had been a whirlwind. The surprise of the positive test, the initial shock, the overwhelming joy – it had all been a blur. Lewis, ever the supportive partner, had taken it all in stride. Sure, there were moments of worry, of panicked glances exchanged in stolen moments, but mostly, there was a quiet excitement that simmered between the couple.

Out of the blue, as it tended to be, a loud growl echoed in the quiet room. She winced, covering her eyes in shame. "Hey, hey, it's okay," he soothed, his voice laced with concern. "This little one needs some food, right?"

Y/N nodded, the growling easing down "Yeah," she mumbled, leaning her head against his shoulder. "Sorry, I..."

"Don't apologize," he said firmly. "This is all part of the journey. We're in this together."

His words held a quiet strength, a comforting confidence that calmed the churning in her stomach. It was more than just constantly being hungry; it was a reminder of the tiny miracle growing inside her.

They lay in silence for a moment, the only sound the rhythmic rise and fall of their breathing. Outside, the world buzzed with activity, the roar of the racetrack a distant rumble. But here, in this quiet haven, a different kind of race was about to begin – a race against time, against uncertainty, but most importantly, a race towards a future filled with the promise of a tiny miracle. And that little one, even though they were still just a whisper of a dream, was already so loved. More than Y/N could ever imagine.

Your scent

The crisp scent of Lewis's signature cologne, a heady mix of citrus and spice, usually sent a wave of warmth through Y/N. Today, however, it was the trigger for a rebellion in her stomach. A wave of nausea crashed over her, sending her scrambling out of bed towards the bathroom.

Lewis, stirred by the commotion, sat up, blinking away the remnants of sleep. "Y/N? You alright?" he called out, concern etching lines on his forehead.

Y/N emerged from the bathroom, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. "Yeah," she mumbled, her voice weak. "Just a little…" she trailed off, the metallic tang of bile rising in her throat.

Lewis was by her side in an instant, his hand rubbing soothing circles on her back. "Morning sickness again?" he asked gently.

Y/N shook her head, forcing a weak smile. "Second trimester was supposed to be smooth sailing, they said" Her voice held a hint of sarcasm, even to her own ears.

Lewis chuckled softly. "Maybe smooth sailing is a bit optimistic," he admitted. "But hey, at least you're keeping food down" Y/N grimaced. That particular phase had been brutal. She rinsed her mouth in the sink, the minty freshness a welcome relief.

"Actually," she started hesitantly, Lewis's brow furrowed. "What is it?"

Y/N hesitated, then took a deep breath. "Your cologne," she began, gesturing vaguely towards the bottle on the dresser "it's making me sick."

The surprise on Lewis's face was comical. He stared at the bottle, then back at Y/N, as if trying to process the information. This was the cologne he'd worn for years, his signature scent. It was practically an extension of him.

"My cologne?" he finally managed, his voice a mixture of disbelief and amusement. "But it's…" he trailed off, searching for the right words. "It's me, Y/N. You love me, right?"

Y/N couldn't help but laugh, the sound shaky but genuine. "Of course, I love you, silly," she said, reaching out to cup his face. "But right now, your child doesn’t really enjoy your 'you-ness'”

A slow grin spread across his face. "Alright, then” he declared, picking up the cologne bottle. "Operation: Find a pregnancy-safe scent it is."

Y/N watched, a smile playing on her lips, as Lewis rummaged through his extensive collection of grooming products. "How about this one?" Lewis asked, holding up a small, unassuming bottle with a label that read "Lavender Serenity."

Y/N wrinkled her nose playfully. "A bit too…serene for you, wouldn't you say?"

Lewis chuckled, tossing the bottle back onto the dresser. "Maybe. But hey, at least it won't make you puke."

Whoever they are

The air crackled with anticipation as Y/N's mother hoisted a heavy bag of groceries onto the kitchen counter. Lewis's dad, Anthony, hovered beside her, peering inside with a mischievous glint in his eye.

"Alright" Anthony announced, brandishing a head of cabbage, "let's settle this once and for all. Boy or girl?"

Y/N chuckled, her belly, now a prominent dome beneath her maternity clothes, bouncing with laughter. "Lewis and I have already agreed, no peeking!"

Across the room, Lewis, ever the competitor, mirrored Y/N's amusement. "Besides," he added, winking at Anthony, "I have a feeling your cabbage test is about to be proven wildly inaccurate."

Anthony scoffed playfully. "Don't underestimate the power of tradition. Now, hand me that measuring tape."

As the pregnancy had unfolded everyone had made the bump a target to old wives' tales and lighthearted debate.

Y/N's mother, a firm believer in the "pregnancy glow" theory, insisted the baby was a girl based on Y/N's radiant complexion. Anthony, armed with his cabbage test (apparently, a high, round shape indicated a boy), remained stubbornly convinced otherwise.

Lewis, however, held a quiet confidence in his prediction of a girl. He couldn't explain it; it was just a feeling, a deep one that resonated within him.

The rest of the family, friends, and even Ferrari staff, seemed convinced it was a boy. The sheer volume of blue onesies and miniature race car toys accumulating in the nursery was a testament to that.

Despite the overwhelming "boy" camp, Y/N found herself drawn to Lewis's quiet certainty, her mother's unwavering belief and Leclerc’s claim that Lewis was a girl dad and he wouldn’t believe in anything else. There was a subtle shift in their preferences, a secret language of pink frilly socks and delicate stuffed animals tucked away in the corner of the nursery.

As the due date came ever closer the playful arguments gave way to a more sentimental atmosphere.

Anthony surprised everyone one evening by pulling Y/N into a tight embrace. "Girl or boy," he said, his voice thick with emotion, "you're going to be incredible parents. And that little one," he patted Y/N's stomach gently, "they're already so loved."

A tear escaped Y/N's eye, mirroring the glistening in Lewis's. The truth was, the gender didn't matter. They were about to embark on the greatest adventure of their lives.

As Y/N snuggled against Lewis on the couch, just days before their little one arrived, her hand resting on her swollen belly, a wave of peace washed over her.

"You know," she whispered, "maybe the whole point isn't about knowing the gender."

Lewis turned to her, his eyes reflecting the soft glow of the lamp. "What do you mean?"

"Maybe," Y/N continued, a smile gracing her lips, "the point is in the surprise. The joy of meeting them, whoever they are, for the very first time."

Lewis's smile mirrored hers. He squeezed her hand gently. "We're ready, whatever comes." he said, his voice filled with an unshakeable certainty.

Their shared ritual

Exhaustion clung to Y/N like a second skin. The past three months had been a parade of sleepless nights, endless diaper changes, and the constant, gnawing worry that comes with being a new parent.

But nestled in the crook of her arm, a tiny miracle slept soundly. Her daughter, in a quiet moment of shared hope, was a testament to the love that bloomed amidst the chaos.

She was a symphony of soft sighs and the occasional gurgle, her tiny fists clenched in a peaceful slumber. However, the moment Lewis's voice cut through the quiet of the room, her whole world seemed to shift.

"Hey there, my little champion," Lewis cooed, his voice a low murmur as he entered the nursery. The infant’s eyes, a pitch perfect copy of her dad’s brown ones, snapped open. A wide, gummy grin split her face, and a high-pitched squeal erupted from her tiny lungs.

Y/N watched the scene unfold with warmth washing over her. Lewis, ever the prodigy, had taken to parenthood like a natural. The same gentle persuasion he used on the racetrack was now employed to coax a smile from their daughter, his voice a soothing melody that calmed her fussy cries.

The transformation was remarkable. Y/N vividly recalled the first trimester, Lewis sheepishly confessing his anxieties about fatherhood to their unborn child. And throught the months a routine was created as every evening, he'd spend a quiet moment by Y/N's side, whispering words of encouragement and promises of love to the tiny bump.

"Alright, little one," Lewis would say, his voice barely above a whisper, "we're going to face whatever comes our way, as a team, okay?"

Those nightly pep talks, once a source of amusement for Y/N, now seemed almost prophetic. The kid, it seemed, recognized Lewis's voice as a source of comfort, a familiar sound that echoed the evenings spent nestled safely inside Y/N, bathed in the sound of his love.

Lewis, oblivious to the internal monologue playing in Y/N's head, scooped the baby into his arms, his face alight with a radiant joy. He bounced her gently, singing a silly, made-up song about a race car driver and a tiny princess. Captivated by her father's performance, the infant cooed and gurgled in response, her tiny hand reaching out to grab a lock of Lewis's dark braids.

Watching them together, a lump formed in Y/N's throat. The exhaustion that had threatened to consume her throughout the day had faded away, replaced by a fierce and overwhelming love. There, in the quiet sanctuary of the nursery, their team flourished – united by an invisible thread of shared love, a love story whispered before their daughter ever entered the world.

______________________________________________________________

TAGLIST - @saturnssunflower @xoscar03 @chocolatediplomatdreamerzonk @happy-golden-hour @vicurious28

@0710khj @thecubanator2 @neilakk @bigratbitchsworld @adriswrld

#lewis hamilton x reader #lewis hamilton x you #lewis hamilton imagine #lewis hamilton #f1 x reader #f1 imagine #formula 1

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theemporium · 7 months

Text

It was meant to be a cute date day out on the yacht during summer break.

You had dedicated a week of the summer break to spend in Monaco, to just relax and spend time with each other without the concerns of flying anywhere around the world (though you knew your boyfriends would have probably booked a few getaways for you to ‘surprise’ you with in the following week). And it had been perfect.

You had spent some time with friends you missed during the first half of the season. You shared a few meals with the Leclerc family. You basked around your shared apartment and enjoyed being lazy after such a hectic schedule for the last few months.

It was Charles’ idea to take the yacht out on the water, and you and Lando had eagerly agreed.

Charles just didn’t really think it through. Between the hectic schedules, jet lag and hangovers that hit their bodies a little harder than not sometimes, it was rare to find moments to fully indulge in you and Lando without having some sort of stressor over your heads.

Whether it was late nights with the risk of missing early morning meetings, or the fans spotting you as you stumble around a club together. Whether it was exhaustion taking over your bodies through work and travel, or even just one of you not being in the mood. It was harder than people assumed to just sleep with your two partners.

And it seemed like the weeks had built up for the Monegasque.

His thoughts were anything but innocent when the three of you boarded the boat, waiting until you were a few minutes away from the dock before you shedded off some layers. His mind was spinning when Lando pulled his shirt off, the low-rise swimming trunks giving him the perfect view of his tanned torso, chiselled abs and v-line disappearing beneath the waistband of the trunks. His head was going to explode when you pulled your cover-up off, exposing a little red bikini number he had never seen you wear before as you pranced around the boat without a care in the world.

Charles Leclerc was losing his damn mind, and it was purely his partners’ faults.

It took an hour before either you or Lando noticed how touchy and clingy Charles was. It wasn’t something completely out of the ordinary for Charles’ hands to linger or for him to place a few chaste kisses here and there—but this was something else.

You noticed the way his fingers would always trace along the waistband of Lando’s trunks whenever he was within arms length. You noticed the way his gaze would always drop to his stomach and wander lower. You noticed the way his fingers playfully tugged on the strings of your bikini top. You noticed the way his focus always seemed to be on your lips whenever you spoke to him.

You noticed the bulge in his swimming trunks, but he wasn’t doing much to hide it either.

“Is this what you wanted, Charlie? Wanted to see our pretty girl on her knees?”

Charles let out a groan as his head fell back against Lando’s shoulders, his hands reaching back to hold the boy close to him as he tried not to come in seconds. Because he could have. He could have done so far too easily and he didn’t really want to deal with the embarrassment of it. Nor did he ever want this moment to end.

“Look at her,” Lando murmured, his voice a little breathless as his eyes locked on you. “She’s so good for you. Fucking lucky too.”

“Wanna be good for both of you,” you murmured, the fabric of your bikini top abandoned somewhere by one of the deck chairs as you squeezed your tits together. You leaned forward, bouncing up and down as your tits enveloped Charles’ sensitive cock.

“You’re so good, cherie,” Charles mumbled breathlessly, his chin tucked against his chest as he looked down at you. He bit down on his lower lip, a muffled moan leaving his lips as he watched the way his cock slid between your tits, the way your tongue darted out to tease his tip, the way your eyes never left his. “Feel so fuckin’ good too.”

“She always looks pretty with your cock,” Lando murmured, trying not to sound too whiny but Charles read right through him as he turned his head, his lips pressing against the Brit’s in seconds. “Mphm.”

“Don’t be jealous, mon cher,” Charles murmured as his tongue darted out to tease the Brit who whimpered in response. “M’gonna take care of you too.”

“Yeah?” Lando whispered, blinking a little dazed.

“Yeah,” Charles groaned as his hand reached back to tangle his fingers into Lando’s curls, keeping his lips close as he playfully nudged their noses together. “Need you to be a good boy for me too, gonna need you to clean up the mess I make on her tits, okay?”

Lando whined, nodding his head.

“Mes amours,” Charles groaned proudly before kissing Lando senseless, letting his other hand gently caress your head as you continued to squeeze his cock between your tits until he blew his load all over you.

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doobea · 8 months

Text

WHEN THE SUN RISES - SAE ITOSHI

synopsis: You have doubts about your relationship. Sae provides reassurance.

contents: early established relationship, gn!reader, fluff, reader is a tad insecure, mentions of other couples and pda, talks about all things mushy with love word count: 1.1K a/n: waaahh cant believe i didn't post anything for my husband on his birthday im so terrible - this is something short and sweet ;-; i haven't posted anything in a bit bc I've been so tired lately LOL

You have doubts.

Doubts about your work performance, test scores, your friendships, and sometimes the future — you know, the less important things.

Your least favorite doubts are the ones about you and Sae.

He’s not a bad boyfriend by any means. You’ve been dating each other for a while now, just shy of six months, and it’s been going well. Like any other college couple, you spend your free time together either marathoning a shitty reality TV show, studying, or eating at the local diners near campus once in a while for a ‘fancy’ burger and pizza date night (which Sae hates, by the way, but he goes because there’s nothing better around). You don’t blame him for these doubts because it’s just the way he is. You’ve always known this, along with everyone else around you.

“Itoshi Sae? Yeah, he’s pretty cold and blunt.” They’d say in a hushed whisper.

Another would agree, followed by an exaggerated shiver. “I heard even professors are scared of him.”

They’re annoying rumors and passing comments you've gotten somewhat used to. So you don’t blame the gossipers at your school either. Who you do blame are all the couples you would see, whether it’d be at school, at the grocery store, and sometimes even your own parents. Seeing things like holding hands, hugging, and even kissing each other goodbye sets something weird off in your chest.

And, well, you’ve known Sae for a while. You know that maybe he isn’t the type to be comfortable with these things, especially in public. And maybe you’re not going to guilt trip him into doing things that are out of his ordinary. But here’s the problem.

You do want to experience all of it.

“Sae?”

“Hm?”

“Do you like me?”

Your question throws him off just a tiny bit. He fumbles slightly with his flow of writing before catching himself and throws you a questioning look from across the table.

It’s the midterm season so every floor at the university’s library is packed. All but the top floor, which is mainly reserved for graduate students, who are rarely even on-site. So you two manage to snag a booth in the corner by the bathrooms and water fountain. You’ve been studying for about two hours straight and the thought of going over the rules of the Krebs cycle again haunts you so you let your doubts take over. Hence, why you blurted out the question that’s been burning on your mind for the past week.

“I do, why do you ask?” He doesn’t sound bothered by it, so you take that as a good sign.

But how do you go about asking him to show that? Maybe asking upfront would be too demanding right now. You decide to dance around the subject a little more.

There’s a moment in silence, your eyebrows creased in deep thought before you finally speak, voice clumsy and almost rough sounding. “When did you realize you liked me?”

He answers without missing a beat, eyes never leaving his notebook. “Dunno.”

Well, that wasn’t the answer you were expecting.

“Huh?”

“What?” Sae breaks his focus and stares at you, as if you were the one who had said something weird. “You asked and I answered.”

“You have to explain with that sorta question, you know?”

In just the tiniest of motions, Sae frowns. He’s holding his breath for a few seconds in preparation and his eyes soften. “I’m not sure when I fell in love with you.”

Woah—wait love? This is also not what you were expecting out of this conversation either. Is it too late to go back to studying now?

Sae picks up the worried look on your face and manages a soft chuckle. “You know when the sun rises?”

You’re patting your face with your hands now, hoping to eliminate the burn on your cheeks. The sweat forming in your palms doesn’t help at all. And, frankly, you’re confused by his question. “Um, between six and seven?”

“Well, yeah,” he laughs again and you’re not sure if that was the answer he was looking for. “But it always rises, right?”

“Right,” you say slowly, still confused by what he’s trying to get at.

“I’m not sure when I fell in love but whenever the sun rises, it reminds me of you,” Sae explains with a leveled expression, ignoring the little surprised squeaks from your direction. “It’s been like that for a while now and brings me comfort whenever I do wake up early to see it rising.”

“Did you get that line from a K-drama or something?”

He rolls his eyes and fake scoffs. “Thought you wanted an explanation?”

“Well,” you bite back a giggle and continue, “you never struck me as a metaphor type of guy.”

“And you never struck me as the jealous type.”

You grow hotter because wow guess you haven’t been that great at hiding away your feelings—or maybe your boyfriend is just that good at being perceptive as he is being a top honor student. “Was it that obvious?”

“When you’re looking at other couples and grumbling right after then yeah, it’s pretty obvious.” Sae’s tone doesn’t carry any ounce of tease and he gives you a fond look. It makes you feel slightly guilty and embarrassed.

You shrink deeper into the booth, holding your textbook up to your face. “Sorry…”

The seat next to you dips and a familiar pair of hands gently snatches the book away from you, revealing Sae’s rare soft expression again.

“Don’t be,” He reaches over to ruffle your hair before moving his laptop and notebook over to your side. “Plus, you shouldn’t worry that much, I’ll always be with you.”

A pause and then you decide to blurt out your other burning question because things are already out in the open at this point. “Would it be alright if we start doing more couple-ly things together?”

“Mhm,” he’s about to dive back into studying but stops, humming in thought. “What should we do more?”

“Well, aside from me,” Sae deadpans and you straighten your posture. “Sorry, sorry, what I meant to say is I guess more PDA? Holding hands would be a good start.”

“Okay,” He says quietly and drops his pen, carefully interlacing his fingers with yours.

Sae’s hands are warm, maybe even sweaty if you’re not mistaken. You look up and oh — his cheeks have the tiniest amount of red on them. Probably no different from the resurgence of warmth you’re currently feeling too.

“Better?” Sae asks and squeezes your hand.

“Yeah, better.” You squeeze back.

#blue lock #bllk #blue lock imagines #bllk x reader #blue lock x reader #doobea writing #sae itoshi x reader #itoshi sae x reader #itoshi sae #sae itoshi #blue lock fluff #blue lock x gn reader

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tip-top-cloud-surfer · 6 months

Text

I'll Be Home for Christmas - Bob

Pairing: Bob / Female!Reader

Word Count: 1.4k

This work, all my works, and my entire blog are 18+ Only

Warnings: Some Crying and Slight Angst; No Physical Descriptions of Reader; Reader is a Teacher; Use of "You" but No Y/N

Summary: Bob promised you that he would be home for Christmas.

Master List

Dating a naval aviator wasn’t easy. Bob's schedule was erratic and never usually worked in their favor. He could be in one place one day and a completely different continent the next or out in the middle of the ocean. And it wasn’t easy to communicate with him when he was deployed. Emails and letters were about all you could usually manage.

For Bob, you would do it all over again to keep him in your life. But that didn’t make the holiday season any easier.

Bob, along with the other Daggers, had been deployed for the last six months. Somewhere in the Pacific, that was all that you knew. He told you that they would be docking today and so you waited outside the school where you worked, anxiously waiting for his call. The call about whether or not he would be home in time for Christmas or not.

Fiddling with the necklace that he bought you for your one year anniversary nearly three years ago now, you sucked in a breath when your phone started to ring. The photo of you and Bob on the hike you took on his birthday last year.

“Bobby?” you called softly, answering the call.

“Hi, honey,” he returned, his voice sounding clearer than it usually did on these types of calls. “How are you?”

“Better now that I’m talking to you,” you replied, smiling bashfully. “What about you?”

“Exhausted.”

“What time is it over there?”

“Pretty late.”

“Well, thanks for staying up to talk to me,” you stated, a bit concerned about Bob. He was uncharacteristically short with his sentences. “How’s Phoenix and the boys?”

“We’re all good.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“Did you get the care package that I sent you?” you asked softly, fiddling with your necklace.

“Oh, yeah, I did, Honey. Thank you for sending it.”

“Did you send a video over to Leslie? She was putting a movie together for the kids.”

“Yeah, I did, Honey. She’s got it.”

“Thank you for doing that. The kids will really appreciate it.” After a moment of silence on the other end of the line, you asked, “Are you okay, Bobby?”

“I’m fine,” Bob replied, his voice cracking a bit.

“Bobby.”

“Honey, I’m . . . I’m so sorry.”

“Sorry for what?”

“I'm not sure that I’ll make it home in time for Christmas,” Bob revealed, causing your heart to shatter in your chest.

“It’s okay, Bobby. It’s not your fault. There’s always other holidays.”

“I’m so sorry, Honey. I’ll make it up to you. I promise.”

“Don’t worry about me. Just focus on coming home safely. Whenever that is.”

“I will. I love you so much.”

“I love you too. And I really miss you,” you replied, your voice breaking at the end.

“I really miss you too. And I’m so sorry, Honey.”

“Stop apologizing, Bobby. Just come home safe and that’s good enough for me. I love you.”

“I love you too. Bye, Honey.”

“Bye, Bobby.”

Hanging up the phone, you sniffled and wiped your tears away. You let out a steadying breath, trying to calm yourself down, before grabbing your bags and heading inside the elementary school where you worked.

It was the last day of school before Christmas Break and so, it was your class’s Christmas party. You got to school early to set up, but now you might need to use the time to gather yourself. Opening the cabinet, you smiled sadly at the photos of Bobby that you put up. Hanging up your coat, you wiped your tears away and quickly moved to start setting up.

~~~~~

Meanwhile, just a few miles away from your school, Bob was holding his head in his hands, looking like he was going to be sick. The other Daggers were gathered around him, all having returned home just a short while earlier.

“He’s this beat up about it?” Hangman sighed, leaning on the car. “All he did was a little lie.”

“It’s a wonder that you’re still single,” Phoenix replied dryly, shooting him a look.

“I made her cry,” Bob whispered out quietly as Fanboy patted his back.

“She’ll get through it, Bob. And you only had to lie to her for a couple hours,” Fanboy reasoned, motioning for the other Daggers to speak up.

“She’ll forget all about it once she sees you,” Phoenix replied, looping her arm under Bob’s and pulling him to his feet. “Now, come on, we’ve got some shit to do before the big reveal.”

~~~~~

“One, two, three, eyes on me!” you called, clapping on the numbers and then pointing at yourself. When you saw that all of the kids were looking at you, you added, “Alright, do you guys remember when we made those care boxes? For the service men and women?”

Various kids shouted out that they did remember, causing you to nod and smile. Since you worked in a Navy town, many of the kids in your class had parents or other family members in the Navy. The care packages had been a personal project that you decided to bring to your class, since you knew that a lot of the kids would be in a similar position as you—wishing that someone that they loved so much came home for Christmas.

“Alright, well, Ms. Sullivan put together a video of them opening the boxes that we put together. So, if everyone could sit in their seats quietly, we’ll start the movie.”

You dimmed the lights before the video started up and slowly sat in your seat, waiting for Bob’s video to pop up. Kids in your class would yell out when they saw their family member, which made your heart both swell and break at the same time. The video continued on until Bob’s familiar face appeared on the screen.

“Hi, everyone,” he called, waving to your class.

“It’s Mr. Bob!” one of your kiddos yelled out.

“Yeah, it’s Mr. Bob,” you mumbled sadly before you paused, frowning slightly as you examined the video more closely. “Is that the cafeteria?”

“What?” Ms. Sullivan asked, trying to hide her smile.

“That’s the cafeteria,” you stated, getting to your feet.

Walking up to the screen, you scrutinized the image of your boyfriend as he pulled out the items from the box, including ones that you definitely didn’t put there. Confused, you turned to Ms. Sullivan when the door opened and the lights turned back on.

Looking at the door, you spotted Bob standing there in his flight suit, beaming at you with such a loving smile that your knees wobbled. Choking out a sob, you sprinted over to your boyfriend, causing your kiddos to scream and cheer. You wrapped your arms around him, sobbing tears of joy as he pulled you to his chest.

“It’s Mr. Bob!”

“He came from the video!”

“What are you doing here?” you cried, fisting the back of his flight suit. “I thought that you couldn’t come home.”

“I’m sorry, Honey, but I lied. Can you forgive me?” Bob asked, rocking you back and forth.

“Of course, I forgive you,” you choked out as Bob wiped your tears away. You snuck a chaste kiss before straightening up. “I love you so much, Bobby.”

“I love you too, Honey. And I’m really relieved that you forgave me because otherwise this would be really awkward.”

“What are you . . .”

You held a hand to your mouth as Bob slowly got down onto one knee, pulling a small velvet box from his pocket, causing your kiddos screams to reach new heights. Bob opened the box and you swore you almost fell to your knees. He looked at you with those big blueberry blue eyes, which were filled with so much love and devotion.

“Will you marry me, Honey?”

“Say ‘yes’!”

“You have to say ‘yes’!”

“Of course, I’ll marry you, Bobby,” you replied softly.

He stood up and you pulled him in for another chaste kiss that promised more when there weren’t thirty-five six-year-olds staring at you. He slid the ring onto your finger, where it would stay forever. Turning to your kiddos, you laughed and tried to wipe your tears away as they raced towards you guys. Bob squatted down again, accepting high fives and a few hugs, which only made you fall more in love with him.

As if that was even possible.

School was released shortly afterwards and after cleaning up the Christmas decorations and Bob hauling stuff out, the two of you walked out to your car. The Daggers told you that everyone would celebrate your engagement tomorrow, but tonight, it was just you and Bobby.

“I told you that I’d be home for Christmas,” Bob replied, opening your door for you.

“You did,” you agreed, pressing a less appropriate kiss to his lips. “And I think that the only time you’ve ever successfully lied to me.”

“And the last,” Bob promised, pressing another kiss to your lips. “Merry Christmas, Honey.”

“Merry Christmas, Bobby.”

#top gun fanfiction #top gun maverick #top gun: maverick #top gun #tgm #tgm fanfiction #bob x reader #bob fluff #bob floyd #bob #robert floyd x reader #robert bob floyd x reader #robert bob floyd #robert floyd #bob floyd x reader #bob floyd fic #robert bob floyd x you #bob x you #bob floyd x you

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the-writer-arrived · 10 months

Text

(Arranged) Married Life with Jing Yuan

Synopsis: you became jing yuan's spouse! but it was through an arranged marriage... how do you and him navigate through your married life?

Character: jing yuan.

Warnings: gender neutral!reader, long post, mix of headcanons and drabble, a sprinkle of angst here and there, there will be a nsfw part but it will have a warning, no mention of reader's genitals.

A/N: finally caught up with hsr main story and this man suddely got me into a chokehold... and now i'm sad i don't have him ):

also, i know there are tons of fics with this prompt with him, but i wanted to make my own version hehe.

SFW

Early Stages

Due to many reasons, you got into an arranged marriage with Jing Yuan, the Arbiter-General of the Xianzhou Luofu's Cloud Knights.

You weren't exactly experienced in the field of dating, preferring to focus your attention and interest in the field of your liking.

So, to say you were thrilled to be kind of forced to become someone's spouse is quite far from the truth.

Not that you dislike the general or anything! On the contrary, you have high regard not only for his incredible achievements in the battlefield throughout the many centuries, but also for the fact that he hasn't succumbed to the mara to this day.

What you don't understand is why were you chosen to be the spouse of a man so incredible? In your opinion, you don't have any outstanding qualities or stand out in your workplace and you consider your appearance to be nothing extraordinary for a human of the long-life species...

Well, your opinion is wrong, you beautiful, handsome, pretty, outstanding and amazing person!!!

TLDR: you believe that you are unworthy of being by general Jing Yuan's side, so you decide to keep your distance and naively think that he wouldn't notice nor be bothered by that.

Again, wrong!!!

After the wedding cerimony, which was barely a cerimony at all due to the true nature of the union, Jing Yuan noticed how you always found an excuse to be busy with something and spent the least amount of time with him.

And when you do... You don't act rude or anything, you engage in conversation when he attempts to start one, but he can feel a wall between you two.

Despite the circumstances of your relationship, Jing Yuan truly wishes to get to know you, to become closer to you... However, if you don't share his sentiment, then he shall respect your decision.

You are strolling around the streets of the Exalting Sanctum after basically being kicked out of your workplace for the day, the reason being that "you spend way too much time here, go live your life a little!" (words said by your boss earlier).

What should you do with this unexpected free time...?

You remember it's been some time since you have last seen Jing Yuan (one thing he had asked you to do is to call him by his name, instead of 'general' and you complied, even if you feel a bit awkward), so you decide to head to the Seat of Divine Foresight.

When it comes to the seasoned general, one would rarely find him in his office and, if you do, it'd just be his hologram... So, imagine your surprise when you not only find him there, but also it's Jing Yuan in the flesh!

He dismisses Qingzu, who gives a polite bow to the general and you, and offers you his full attention.

"What a pleasant surprise. What brings you to the Seat of Divine Foresight?" He asks you with a smile.

"I, um..." You're momentarily distracted by his face, but you recover soon, clear your throat and try again. "I was wondering if you were free for a little bit and if you would like to... spend some time with me?"

You mentally curse yourself for making it sound like a question, rather than an invitation. Why is it so hard for you to act normally with him?!

Jing Yuan, either unaware or not bothered by your nervous behavior, answers you.

"Ah, what a great timing you have. I do happen to have the afternoon free today and I'd love to spend it with you..." He lets his words trail off for a second, before adding one more thing. "...But only if that is something you also truly want."

"I got a day off, so I thought I should spend it with you in case you had the time. After all, it's expected for spouses to do that, right?"

The general closes his eyes, humming in thought and your stomach flips in an unpleasant way. You suddenly regret your words.

"I see... The last part is exactly why I had to ask you. I don't want to force you to do anything you don't want to, just because it is 'what's expected' of us."

"N-NO!" You cringe at the high volume of your voice, mumbling a small sorry. "I-I mean, it's not that I don't want to! It's just... I..."

Seeing that their conversation is taking a more serious turn, Jing Yuan gently guides you to a more secluded room, where you don't have to be self-conscious about other people hearing what you have to say.

In there, you fumble a bit more with your words, but you decide to be honest about your feelings for the first time. You tell Jing Yuan about the true reason you kept your distance from him, how inadequate you feel to deserve to be called his spouse, your lack of romantic relationship experience, your fear of doing or saying something that might affect his reputation and many other things you've been holding in.

Jing Yuan listens with a heavy heart. On the one hand, he's glad that you don't dislike him, but on the other hand, he feels sad that the true reason for your distance is that you believe you are 'unworthy' of being with him...

The general knows that isn't something that can be changed with just a couple of reassuring words, however he wants you to know that you can confide in him. With that in mind, he also shares the worries he's had this whole time regarding your relationship and how he has been a coward for not reaching out to you earlier to clear up this misunderstanding.

After this much needed heart to heart, you feel tired but oh so lighter now. And when Jing Yuan asks you again if you want to spend the rest of the afternoon with him, you gladly accept it.

Warming Up to Each Other

After that talk, the relationship between you two improved by leaps and bounds.

You were worried that you wouldn't have much to talk about with Jing Yuan, but, once again, you were wrong!

You two spend a lot of time chatting, getting to know each other's likes and dislikes.

Jing Yuan often invites you to his starchess matches with Yanqing. Whether you play with them or just observe, it is very fun to watch the general and his retainer interact.

Both you and the young lieutenant were a bit awkward in the beggining, but you bonded soon enough.

The biggest proof of that is that one time you and Yanqing challanged Jing Yuan to a match of chess, confident that two minds will be enough to defeat him!

Spoiler alert: you both lost :D but there were moments when the general almost made some terrible moves because he was too distracted observing his retainer and his spouse working together with a fond look in his eyes.

At some point, being referred to or having to introduce yourself as Jing Yuan's spouse stopped being a cause of discomfort and became somewhat natural.

(Something he always reminds you is that you are your own person, first and foremost, so when he introduces you to someone, he never defines you as just his spouse).

And Jing Yuan, like a good general that he is, saw that as an opportunity to capture your heart.

This guy I swear... He uses any and every chance to charm you.

I'm sorry but I refuse to use the word 'rizz'.

You may not have much first-hand experience in relationships, but you're not that oblivious to his advances.

Genuine compliments, surprise gifts because 'he thought you'd like them', hands 'accidentaly' bumping frequently during your walks...

Really, he's almost acting like those videos of a male bird trying to impress the female one.

And it's not that you want to reject him! You just feel a bit embarrassed... Until you remember you two are literally MARRIED.

Aeons save this pair of dorks.

The first time you hold Jing Yuan's hand after he kept brushing it against yours, the general doesn't even try to hide the happy smile blooming on his face.

You'd seen him smile many times before, but that particular one will forever be integrated in your mind forever.

As for your first kiss... It happens as an accident.

You are in the Seat of Divine Foresight, sitting next to Jing Yuan while he goes through his endless pile of scrolls, reports and other types of paperwork he has to deal with. He really couldn't put them off anymore, but he also didn't want to completely cancel his plans of seeing you, so here you are...

It isn't what you had expected for the day, but you don't mind all that much. After all, it is a bit amusing to watch the general frowning like a child being forced to sit down and do his homework.

After some time mindlessly scrolling through your phone, you receive a message from your coworker, saying that something urgent came up and asking if you could come early to help.

"Sorry, I have to leave now. Something came up in my workplace and they need my help." You speak quietly to not interrupt too much of Jing Yuan's concentration.

You feel a bit bad for cutting your quality time together like this, so you lean closer to the general's face to give him a peck on his cheek as a farewell kiss.

What you don't expect, however, is for him to turn his face at the last second, probably with the intention to complain about you 'abandoning' him, which is quickly forgotten the moment your lips meet.

It... honestly isn't a nice kiss or a kiss at all. Mostly two pairs of lips mashed together and eyes blown wide in shock (you) and surprise (him). To make this whole thing even more mortifying (to you), you both are brought back to reality at the sound of an embarrassed Yanqing exclaming how 'the Seat of Divine Foresight isn't the place for PDA!!!!'

Daily Life

After you managed to recover from that marvelous and incredibly romantic, not at all cringy, accidental first kiss and gave Jing Yuan the green light... Well, your life has never been the same.

In the good sense of the phrase.

Congratulations, you now have a clingy husband!

Not that Jing Yuan wasn't clingy before, but he's been holding back quite a lot to not cross your boundaries with his touches.

Now that he can, though, good luck living without your personal space!

Whenever you two are out together, your husband always has to have some sort of contact with you: hand on your lower back, holding your hand or your pinky, arm wrapped around your waist if he wants to send a clear message that you're taken.

When you're in private, however, smooth Jing Yuan loses his place to clingy koala or lion? Jing Yuan.

The rare chances when the stars align and you both have a day off, don't expect to get out of bed in the morning and it's not even for nsfw reasons.

That man will trap you in a bear hug and will refuse to let you go... Unless you need to use the bathroom, but expect to be dragged back to bed the second you step out of there.

Jing Yuan will also use any and every opportunity to get a kiss from you: waking up? Kiss. Cooking? Kiss. Going to work? Kiss. Returning home? Kiss. You simply went to another room and came back to him? Kiss.

As much as he loves kisses on the lips, the general melts into a puddle whenever you brush his bangs away from his face, uncovering his other golden eye, to leave a gentle kiss on his forehead.

Another thing that makes Jing Yuan weak is hearing you call him your husband. It may be a bit weird to others, but considering how far you two have come since the awkward start of your relationship, it shows that your marriage feels genuine now.

Much like in any relationship, you two also have your ups and downs.

On the days you are in low spirits, please don't be afraid of saying what you want. Do you want him near? He'll hold you and lend a shoulder to cry on while you pour your heart out. You'd rather be alone? No problem at all, he'll give you space for as long as you wish, but he'll also buy your favorite snacks, a book you mentioned you were interested in, send Mimi your way in case you want to cuddle with the lion.

When Jing Yuan is the one feeling sad, that's when things get a bit tricky, because he'll try to keep it to himself and pretend that everything is fine to not worry you.

You know when Jing Yuan does that little thing of closing his eyes as if he's in pain before smiling? THAT SHIT BREAKS ME MAN.

You have to remind this silly man of yours that he doesn't have to hide his uncertainties and fears from you, since you are his spouse and not a soldier that will lose morale at the sight of the Arbiter-General showing 'weakness'.

Jing Yuan, general of the Cloud Knights for many centuries, had received training to withstand pain on the off-chance of being captured by the enemy forces and possibly tortured in an attempt to extract information about the Xianzhou Alliance. Due to that, any and every secret and relevant information shall never escape from his tightly sealed lips.

...But then, how do you manage to do it?

With a single pull of his shoulder, you have him laid down on your lap, your defty fingers freeing his hair from the red ribbon and untangling the stubborn knots of his white locks...

When Jing Yuan realizes it, it's already too late. Feelings from deep inside his heart are pouring out of his lips before he can stop it. His worries, his fears, the nightmares that plague him, the sadness of reuniting with old friends just to find out they aren't the same as he remembers...

He doesn't understand how you do it.

"I will be by your side in sickness and in health, for the good and the bad. So, please, my love... Don't carry it all by yourself. Don't shield me from your pain, let's face it together. I shall do the same."

That is what you had said to him one time.

Jing Yuan has a high pain tolerance, but all it takes is a single touch, a single word, a single glance from you for his defences to crumble down.

He now understands that your secret technique to make him talk is to show your love.

The content ahead is about sexual themes and is not suitable for minors. If you continue reading, I am not responsable for any discomfort you may feel with this. You have been warned.

NSFW

Your Sexual Lives

First of all, I am a firm believer that our Jing Yuan here is a big switch.

There are days when he's the dom and will make you lose the hability to think of anything else aside from him. And there are days when he's the sub, completely at your mercy to have him roll his eyes back in pleasure.

For your first time together, it is more of an exploration and getting to know each other's bodies. Even if you've had sex before in your life, it is always a new experience with a new person.

There isn't much that Jing Yuan isn't down to give it a try in the bedroom. However, he draws the line with things that can cause you serious pain like knifeplay or hardcore BDSM practices, and the more unsanitary kinks.

He isn't against degradation per se, but he can't bring himself to not mix it with a few praises.

Phrases such as "My slut is doing so well, taking my cock all the way in." or "What a pretty little thing you are, darling... Don't even look like your mouth is my favorite cumdump." make you moan so loud it's embarrassing.

When your husband is in a dom mood, he muffles his sounds the best he can by biting down on his lips or burying his handsome face in the crook of your neck, not because he's ashamed of them, no no no. He does that so he can listen to your cries and moans and babbles, while the bullies your hole.

It's just so hot for him to know he can turn you into a mess, speaking nothing but his name and how good it feels and how full you are.

Speaking of full, my man here causes quite the stretch, so thorough preparation and lube are needed for you to have the least amount of pain when being on the receiving end of the penetration.

He may end up making you cum on his fingers alone during prep tho, but you don't consider that a bad thing anyway.

When Jing Yuan is in a sub mood, by the Aeons, one may think he wants all the Xianzhou ships to know how good you're fucking him.

I'm kidding he's not THAT loud, but he doesn't make any effort to be quiet either. You wouldn't want him to anyway.

Gosh his groans are just hhMMMMMM SO DAMN HOT.

Do you see that white mane of hair he has? Give it a good pull, especially when you're taking him from behind, and marvel at the delicious sounds he makes.

Regarding his stamina, it's one or one hundred, there's no in between.

There are days when he can fuck you the whole night long (rip you in the next morning) and there are days when he can only take two rounds at most, before he's snork mimimimi next to you (he's not known as the 'Dozing General' for nothing).

But don't worry, he would never forget about aftercare! Water, a clean towel, snacks and anything else that you mind need or want after sex will be prepared before you guys start.

One of Jing Yuan's favorite ways of waking up is with you slurping on his slowly-hardening cock (all consensual of course, we don't work with non-con in this household!).

You don't know which one has the best POV during this moment: you, with the sight of him a bit dazed from sleep, brows furrowed with cheeks colored pink and hair all messy; or him, seeing you between his legs, licking and stroking his shaft, lips glistening with your own saliva and his pre-cum and pupils blown wide with lust that makes his hips buckle forward as a way to beg you to swallow him whole.

On days he doesn't feel as tired after making love with you, he enjoys taking a bath with you to relax, massaging any parts of your body that may be sore and giving sweet kisses on the hickeys and marks he left on you.

You feel so relexed, so safe, so loved that you can't help resting your eyes while he cleans you up...

The sound of a deep, gentle voice calling for name, along with a caress on your cheek stirs you awake. You blink a few times, your head turning to the source of the voice that is now chuckling. You see a pair of golden eyes staring at you lovingly, but with a hint of amusement too.

"Sorry for interruping your beauty sleep, my love, but you might catch a cold if you fall asleep in the bath."

"I wasn't sleeping. I was just resting my eyes for a bit..." Jing Yuan chuckles again, noticing the way your eyelids struggle to stay open.

Despite his previous words, he doesn't make any effort to keep you awake. Instead, he begins to hum a tune while he continues to wash your body.

You let out a sigh of bliss, leaning your back further on his strong chest. Your senses are engulfed by him: his touches, his warmth, his voice...

You love being surrounded by him, be it like when he was pounding you mercilessly earlier or taking care of you softly like right now.

"Dear?" Your husband shifts his attention to you, stopping his singing to hear what you have to say. You cup his cheek and give him a peck on the corner of his mouth. "I love you."

Jing Yuan's eyes widen in surprise for a second, before they soften with a smile gracing his lips.

"I love you too, my beloved." He gently holds your chin to give a proper kiss on the lips.

You thank the Aeons for allowing you to cross paths with the man before you. All the difficulties and challanges in the beggining were all worth facing, now that they have brought you to this moment.

To love and feel loved like this... You hope to hold onto these feelings for the rest of your life as you walk towards the future with Jing Yuan.

thanks for reading! likes, reblogs and comments are very appreciated <3

heart divider made by @/cafekitsune

pink jing yuan banner (fluff) made by @/the-writer-arrived aka yours truly ;)

#blue.writes: honkai star rail #blue.writes: jing yuan #blue.writes: fluff #blue.writes: smut #honkai star rail x reader #jing yuan x reader #jing yuan smut #honkai star rail smut #minors dni #not suitable for minors

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eriexplosion · 3 months

Text

Tech Lives: An Ungodly Long Essay

(AKA: Turns out that my Tech Lives compilation post comment was actually a threat.)

There have been hundreds if not thousands of posts since Plan 99 aired wondering if Tech might have made it after his fall - it's probably been brought up more than any other hanging plot point, even after season 2 scooped up Omega and left us on a massive cliffhanger. Now that season 3 has started, though, Omega and Crosshair are home (for now) but we have received an almost aggressive lack of Tech info. So, I've gathered up some of the stronger Evidence for why Tech might be fashionably late but still on his way back from The Void!

THE LEAD UP

So to start, let's go back to what came before the whole Incident. This will focus mostly on season 2, seeing as that was definitely Tech's season to shine, but with bits about plotlines in season 1. Which brings us to our first bit, that's not really evidence so much as some gentle push-back on a common argument.

Doomed By Character Development?

We've all seen this particular situation before - a character is slated for a tragic death, so just before it happens the writers gives them a little extra relevance to the plot to make sure the audience really feels it when the time comes. The Clone Wars was especially good at this, giving characters like Fives an arc of his own that ended in his tragic death. Season 7 gave us a better look at Jesse, first in the Bad Batch's intro arc and then again through the Siege of Mandalore, all to bring us to the chip activation that led to his ultimate death.

When season 2 started off with one of the two intro episodes spotlighting Tech and our first breather episode of the season also spotlighting him, people started to get worried. So is it fair to say that his spotlight in season 2 was setting him up for a permadeath?

Looking at it, I don't think so, for multiple reasons. For one, Tech didn't just get a spotlight episode, his development dominated a good chunk of the whole damned season, often taking priority over the other characters that wouldn't be dropped into the mists. While giving a little bit of character development to a doomed character can be a good move, giving ALL your development to a doomed character ends up feeling like a good portion of your season was actively pointless.

The Bad Batch is not an open ended show. It seems to have been planned for the three seasons it got, and they would have gone into it knowing they had a set amount of time to work with. Dedicating so much time to developing Tech in preparation for a character death takes away all of their opportunity to develop, well, anything else.

But, along with the amount of time that was dedicated to Tech as a character through season 2, they also didn't develop him in the ways that most often get used for a doomed character. Namely...

That Sure Is A Lot Of Open Plot Lines

And not one of them got tied up. Currently, Tech has two open plot lines to himself, both started in season 2, as well as a key place in the overall show narrative arc. As the overall show narrative arc takes precedence, we'll start with that.

The Bad Batch sets up a few different narrative arcs very early. One is if clones can be more than soldiers - this is the central thing that we see them struggling against from the start, they've been created to be soldiers and don't know much else about how to function in the world. Theoretically this arc can be fulfilled with one or two of them still dying as soldiers, as long as a few of them make it to find a new life for themselves.

The arc that can't be fulfilled without everyone though is the ongoing thread of reuniting the batch. Much of the show is geared towards making the viewer want this specific end result, as soon as they talk about Crosshair, Omega says they'll just have to get him back and complete their family. The end of season 1 teases us with this only to pull it away at the last moment, then season 2 teases us with it again only to yet again pull it away, this time seemingly permanently.

Ending one of your key narrative threads you've been using to draw audiences in only 2/3rds of the way into the show and without ever resolving it... well it would be a choice. If Tech is gone for good then the last time we saw everyone together would be the end of season 1. Rewatches would lack impact because something that was made to seem so vital ended up going nowhere, and the series finale would never quite reach the height that hearing the full batch theme kick in over the team fighting droids together did. It absolutely destroys the central narrative to leave him gone without ever having reunited the family.

And then there's his personal plots.

Let's start with the obvious one. Tech got a whole potential love interest this season and they absolutely did not resolve a damn thing about it.

Again, this takes a trope that we all know - the young army man that's going to go home and finally marry his girl, who has his whole life ahead of him, but dies tragically in his final mission - and seemingly intentionally subverts the beats. Because what makes the trope work is that the plot line is resolved as soon as that young man decides how he's going to move forward. He can't die uncertain of if he's going to marry his girl, he has to make a decision, and the longer we spend on the relationship to his girl the stronger the decision has to be to consider the narrative line resolved and free him up for some tragedy.

Tech/Phee is a tentative little 'will they or won't they' romance. They're flirting, they're feeling each other out, they're seeing if they're compatible. To tie up this narrative line we would have to find out if they are or not, get a yes or a no on the question. Will they or won't they? We simply don't know because the writers didn't put a resolution in.

We do get the traditional pre-mission scene with them, which would normally be when we get the first kiss or perhaps the promise of a date, either of which would have had me digging Tech's grave for him to fall into from the second it happened. Or even a 'we can't do this right now, but maybe some day it will be the right time' which would have been a kind of lukewarm resolution but would have at least represented a decision.

Instead we get a scene that almost aggressively refuses to resolve anything. They have an awkward interaction, but not one that says they won't get together, no promises are made for the future, no decision point is reached, and the plot line is still dangling wide open when Tech falls to his supposed death. If we truly leave it off here, well, what was the Tech/Phee subplot for? Why did we spend precious time on it when it could have been spent on something else, if it was meant to make Tech's death hit harder why did it not go further?

A second subplot with Tech is that he certainly made the most progress on seeing options outside of the Empire - it starts early on in Ruins of War when he meets Romar and gets his eyes opened to the idea of cultures that existed unconnected to the war. Serenno existed before the war and before the separatists, and Romar introduces Tech to that idea of an ongoing culture. He gets a taste of racing in front of a cheering crowd, leans further into his teaching of Omega and gets new insights from her regarding their lives as soldiers, his relationship with Phee picks up right when he finds out that she is interested in the preservation of cultures. It's a quiet little subplot, but Tech was seeing the full scope of what the galaxy contained beyond being a soldier in a war.

But, like the Tech/Phee, it never resolves. He never decides to settle down, he never chooses to stop being a soldier or even openly discusses the idea of what life will look like after. Rescuing Crosshair isn't positioned as a final mission that they have to complete in order to give up their lives as soldiers. Without that decision point being reached, the plot stays open, we never find out what he Would Have Done so we don't get a sense of the future that he would lose by dying, which is what the purpose of these types of plots is for a planned permadeath.

The Kaminoans don't create without purpose and writers working on a three season timeline don't typically write without it either. So if we spent the time on Tech/Phee but Tech is dead before it ever went anywhere, if we spent time on Tech's relationship with being something other than a soldier but he never really pursues it, what is the payoff?

Too Much of a Survivor To Die?

There's also the matter of how they chose to build Tech's character this season. Namely they beefed that man's skills up incredibly high making it intensely unbelievable that he's dead without seeing some sort of concrete proof. Things we know about Tech as of the end of season 2 include:

Incredible pain tolerance - Tech fractures his femur in Ruins of War and seems shockingly unbothered by it. The femur is frequently listed as one of the most painful bones to break. This is not a broken toe the man is hobbling around on, he fractured the strongest bone in the body and kept going through the woods. He physically fought and killed a man with that busted femur.

Lightning fast mental processing - this is of course on display nowhere so much as Faster where he's put up against droids and wins by taking calculated risks that no one else is willing to try.

A cool head in stressful circumstances - this one is hilarious because he outright says it, but Tech does demonstrate time and time again that when it comes down to it, he's able to keep calm no matter the circumstances.

Essentially, we spend the entirety of season 2 setting up why Tech is the perfect person to drop out of the sky and have him survive. He has the ability to keep calm and come up with a plan in seconds and he has the grit to keep moving even if he's grievously injured once he hits the ground. When you set a character up like this, you can still kill them, but you have to work harder to do it convincingly. Leaving Tech not at the moment of death but with probably at least a minute to act in and then not showing us the body is the exact opposite.

We have a moment in The Crossing showing us Tech's precise aim, and it comes up again to brutal effect when he shoots out the connection on the rail car. If moments through the season were used to set up that particular instant of the finale, then we can't discount the numerous scenes demonstrating his survival skills as being irrelevant to his chances.

Plus, looking back at Ruins of War - one of the big moments in the episode is towards the end, where Romar tells Tech, "I'm a survivor. Remember?" The camera then lingers on Tech for a long moment. It's not the kind of action that demonstrates his capabilities as above, but it works to associate the words with Tech in the viewers mind. Romar is a survivor, and Tech is a survivor too. And when you intend to kill someone off, it's kind of an odd choice to spend that whole season setting them up as a survivor.

THE FALL

Which brings us to the scene itself. Plan 99, implied to be one of the last ditch plans that they have. It's absolutely a heartbreaking scene, and one that can be tough to analyze when it's so well done, because it's rough to watch repeatedly. But, it's worth doing, because the scene itself is FULL of questions, some structural others more based in the visual presentation.

What is Plan 99?

Well, that's just it, we don't actually know.

We know what it's implied to be, a self sacrifice plan where one of the batch gives their life for the others to get away. But in show it's never actually defined, leaving the full meaning of Plan 99 up to interpretation. It could be as simple as what it's implied to be, but that brings up questions like 'why not provide any lead up or foreshadowing for it?' and 'does killing yourself actually count as a plan?'

Removing the assumptions from it gives us room to speculate. Is the plan actually that they leave him behind, dead or alive? Hunter ordered them to do so without a plan number in season 1, but he is the sergeant, so plan 99 could easily be something that bypasses his authority - if a batcher calls a plan 99, you go and you don't question his decision. It's certainly closer to a plan if there's something they are supposed to be doing from their end rather than just an announcement of intent.

It's not strictly evidence one way or another, but it is something of note when Tech's entire sacrifice is based around a plan that we're not privy to the details of. TBB has hidden its twists in ambiguity before, so it would not be the first time that it let us assume something only to pull the rug out later. But ambiguity is not the only thing that makes this scene stand out in the raising questions department.

Pacing Goes Out The Window

Generally speaking, a self sacrifice is the climax of an episode. Think Kanan, Hardcase, Gregor, Hevy, etc - Even a minor character sacrificing their life tends to make up the most climactic portion of any given episode, let alone one of the characters from the title squad. It gets to be the big central moment, the big rush of music and feeling, the pinnacle of the viewers attention.

Tech's sacrifice is not. It happens around 5 minutes into the episode, is rapidly moved past with barely a moment to think, and then the actual climax is Omega's capture on Ord Mantell. They even repeat the music when Omega is captured, except much stronger this time, making it clear that this is the emotional crux of the episode, this is the scene that is supposed to stick with you.

The opportunity to make it the climax of an episode was certainly there. The storyline could have been adjusted to put Tech's fall at the end of The Summit, allowing more time in Plan 99 for processing his loss and making it feel final. The pacing choice is one that doesn't allow the viewer to process the loss, only giving us maybe a couple minutes of time with actual emotional reactions before we're barreling off to the next plot point. Why was Tech's death de-emphasized within the episode if it is indeed our last moment with this central character?

Tarkin, Eriadu, & Saw Gerrera

A lot goes into the set-up for Plan 99. We have Tarkin's base on Eriadu as the setting they're working within, going up against Tarkin for the first time since early season 1. This is the big leagues, and something that's come up in multiple interviews is that when going into the den of one of the franchise's big bads we have to have consequences, something to demonstrate that Tarkin is not to be trifled with.

Sounds reasonable enough. Except Tarkin doesn't actually do anything in either of these episodes. The thing that actually threw them off was Saw's planning mixing in with their own.

All Tarkin does upon finding out that the batch is stuck on the rail is order an air strike and ignore that this would kill many of his own men. This is certainly evil, but it's standard Imperial evil. Rampart would have given that order. Hemlock would have given that order. The guy in Tipping Point that we know for 5 minutes before he fried himself would have given that order.

So if the point of this finale was to demonstrate Tarkin's power, then bringing Saw in both complicates the plot and devalues what they're claiming they are trying to show. So is the point to get them to Tantiss? No, because they fail in that. They don't plant the tracker, they're no closer to finding Crosshair than they were before.

By all accounts the point of the whole endeavor is in fact just to drop Tech off a sky rail for reasons unknown and injure Omega to force them to go back to Ord Mantell. These two things could have happened anywhere in any way of course, so why choose Eriadu and why choose to complicate the plot by introducing Saw rather than letting Tarkin handle the job?

They're questions we don't have answers to yet, but they're very hard to get answers to if Tech is dead and completely out of the picture. Having a dead body on Eriadu is fairly useless to the plot, having a living Tech on Eriadu though? That has potential to move them huge leaps forward in a very short amount of time once we bring him back in. Especially given his conversation with Saw prior to everything going downhill - Tech was in favor of gathering intel from the facility rather than destroying it.

And what about Saw, anyway? If he was genuinely there to cause problems and fly away, again, that's a plot wrinkle that isn't needed and took time away from everything else. If he's there because they needed someone to pick Tech up though? There's potential there.

Did Tech's Sacrifice Mean Anything?

In universe, Tech's sacrifice means everything, of course. It's a decision made in the moment to risk everything to save his family. It's a noble deed and one he does without hesitation. But pulling away from that narrow scope of an in universe perspective, what did we accomplish narratively with his fall?

Well... not much actually! They got over the bump in the road that they encountered all of five seconds ago and promptly crashed headfirst into another, different bump in the road. Tech's dramatic sacrifice didn't allow them to escape unharmed, it didn't allow them to find Crosshair, it just allowed them to move a few steps forward, after which Omega is almost killed and then captured, which is a fairly weak reason to sacrifice a whole major character.

But not every character death is exclusively about narrative, sometimes it's about the character arc itself. So does this close out anything for Tech's character development? Again, not really. Tech has always been completely loyal to the squad and would have risked anything for his family. He never had a choice not to fall, it was either just him or the whole team, and he is an endlessly logical actor. The action would have played out the same had it happened in the series premier or the season 1 finale, or any other time in the show. If anything it's a backtrack on his character by putting him solidly back into the soldier box that the show is trying to let the clones grow out of.

Maybe it's not about Tech's character though, maybe it's about everyone else's! Does his death change anyone's trajectory? Again... no, not really. We'll get into season 3's lack of mentioning Tech later, but in the immediate aftermath of his fall, no one's course or actions is majorly changed because of his loss. Hunter wants to go back to Pabu where it's safe, the same thing he wanted to do before they ever left for this mission. Omega puts herself in danger to save her brothers, which has been one of her defining traits since season one. Wrecker is following Hunter's lead, same as he always did. (We get very little of what Echo hopes to do, but the opening of season 3 reveals that they went back to work with Rex, exactly like they were doing before.)

So narratively nothing required him to die, the character's arc isn't completed, and the other characters aren't motivated to change. If Tech dies here, it's the picture of a shock value death. It doesn't complete or inform his character, it doesn't need to narratively happen in order to put Omega on the path to being captured, and thematically it exists just to give the viewer an unnecessary gut-punch when just the failure to rescue Crosshair and the loss of Omega would have been enough.

Framing is Everything

In a death scene there's nothing more powerful than our final shot of a character. The very last we'll ever see of them, the image that will linger in our minds when we think of that character from then on. This is especially important in animation where everything has to go through several iterations before deciding on what that final look will be. You want it to be impactful, you want the audience to have one final connection to the character before they're gone for good.

So why does Tech die with his helmet on?

If there's one thing TBB is good at, it's their expression work, and a death scene is a perfect place to show off their full range, which is why most deaths meant to have a heavy impact occur with faces unobscured. Crosshair loses his helmet and takes Mayday's off so we can see both of their faces as Mayday dies, Slip, Cade, even Clone X and Wilco, all die helmetless. Looking into older series you have Kanan dying without his mask, Fives, Hardcase, Waxer all dying helmetless with one last good look at their faces and expressions.

And while Tech's helmet gives us a good look at his eyes, the rest of his face goes unseen, and Wrecker's face as he watches this happen is completely obscured. We're denied a look at a lot of their expressions as the decision is made and Plan 99 is executed, rendering it less personal than it otherwise could have been. Tech could have lost his helmet in the blast that knocked him from the rail, Wrecker could have had his helmet knocked off at some point to give us a good look at his expression. TBB isn't known for pulling its punches, so why leave our final look at Tech's face back in The Summit and not here?

Then there's the framing choices. We get some absolutely amazing shots of Tech during the fall, from taking the shot to falling backwards towards the cloudy cover - but here's where some interesting choices are made. Rather than letting our last shot of him be a face up shot that keeps eye contact with the camera as he falls, they make the choice to have him flip over, and we hold the shot as the rail car goes down after him, partially obscuring him.

Which means instead of our last glimpse of Tech being something like this.

We end up with something closer to this.

Which, while we all love those Tech crotch shots is somewhat less impactful emotionally. These frames go through multiple departments and get multiple eyes on them before going through final animation, and no one thought that leaving him face up and unobscured until he disappears into the fog would stick more firmly in the viewer's memory?

The Flip Might be Intentional

And I don't just mean out of universe, as every detail of animation is often intentional, but in universe as well. If you look closely at Tech as he falls, he seems to roll his shoulders back in order to begin flipping over. It was a specific enough detail to send me searching for a reason and I found it in instructions on how to survive a long fall - the first thing that you're supposed to do? Get into the arch position like a skydiver to slow and control your fall.

The flip was important enough to not only include but to include the small detail of Tech intentionally flipping himself over into said position. It's not a confirmation but it's an interesting detail, and one that has very few other reasons to exist.

THE AFTERMATH

Image chosen because even thinking he's alive I didn't want to pull from Omega reacting to the fall on Ord Mantell. Looking at her makes me Sad. So the fall has happened, the rail car has rushed forward and crashed, and Omega fades in and out of consciousness until finally waking up on Ord Mantell to the bad news.

"What if he's hurt?"

Omega is our POV character for the show. We may sometimes see things she doesn't, but emotionally she remains the center of the narrative, the character that the target audience will see themselves in. Her ultimate thoughts on a situation are the closest we have to a clear indicator of our intended takeaway.

So it's interesting that the first thing we hear out of her, having heard that Tech 'didn't make it,' is a firm denial. He can't be gone, he might be hurt, he needs them and they need to go back for him. And, despite Hunter continuing to talk with her about it for a bit, we never actually hear Omega explicitly take it back or verbally acknowledge Tech as dead. The closest we get is 'lost' which she also uses for Echo in The Crossing.

Now, here's where the interpretation between the adult and child audience will likely differ. From an adult perspective, this is a reasonable reaction for a child her age. It comes off as very natural that she doesn't want to accept it and that she doesn't have time to really process that it's true before the scene moves on. It makes sense from an in universe perspective.

However, the main audience is still children who actually are Omega's age and who are being presented with her as their window into this world. And their takeaway, seeing that same scene, is likely to be that Omega is correct. They don't know that Tech's dead, just because an adult says it doesn't make it true and just because Hemlock says it DEFINITELY doesn't mean it's true, they have to go back and check.

If they wanted the main audience to think that Tech is dead for sure, they could have had Omega be the one to say that he's gone, with Hunter simply confirming it for her. Alternatively, Omega accepting it when Hunter tells her would also function in the same way - ultimately, as the POV character, if Omega doesn't accept it there's a strong possibility much of the audience won't accept it either, especially without other evidence.

No Body?

And, as we all know, we simply don't have other concrete evidence. Not only are the batch given no time to look for Tech's body or any confirmation that he died, but we get a whole scene with Hemlock and the goggles where he also confirms verbally that he doesn't have a body either. There's very little reason to have him say this outside of putting a bug in the viewer's ear that he might not be gone for good.

Not only do we have that verbal confirmation, but we have multiple places where a body could have been included or implied without adding much to the runtime.

Easiest place would probably be when Omega passes out - there's a trooper's corpse right there in front of her, and it would have been very easy to make that identifiable as Tech. Have one of the boys check his pulse like Crosshair did with Mayday and then be forced to leave after confirming he's dead. Would it require a little bit of fudging the details of how he landed so close to them, sure, but it would have been narratively streamlined and easy.

Have Hemlock bring his helmet rather than his goggles (and damage it in a way clearly incompatible with survival) or confirm that he did find a body but has no use for the goggles.

Put the body in Hemlock's lab when Omega is brought there at the end of the episode. Have a sheet covering him even if you want and just one of his hands hanging out, especially the one with the distinctive light on the back of it. Give us her reaction to that.

These are just the ones that don't involve adding scenes or making major changes - instead, in a franchise known for bringing back everyone and their grandmother especially if there's no body, they chose to leave it extremely vague.

Reused Score

The soundtrack for Tech's sacrifice is fantastic, I don't think anyone can argue that. In fact it's so good that it's used occasionally used as a reason for why he's dead for real. If it's a fakeout, why go so hard on the music?

It almost sounds like a reasonable argument, except that the music isn't even unique to Tech's fall. We get the same motif later in the episode with Omega's capture, and it actually comes in even harder and more impactful there than it did with Tech falling.

Reusing bits of the music has two results. It lessens the impact of hearing it with Tech if it is in fact his Death music, because it makes it clear that he is not the central feeling of the episode but rather, Omega's capture is. As mentioned before, deaths are usually the climax of their own episodes partially to avoid them being upstaged by any other plot points, but here Omega's capture is fully prioritized over the loss of one of our central characters.

The second result is that it changes the meaning of the music. It's no longer meant specifically to underscore a tragic death, but rather a more general one of loss and separation. And if it's simply about that separation, then it no longer requires Tech to be dead to have that same impact. They're apart from each other, and that's painful enough.

SEASON 3 SO FAR

Which of course finally brings us to season 3! We're five episodes in as of the posting of this, so a full 1/3rd of the season down, which gives us a good idea of how they're handling the whole grief aspect of this scenario.

They Aren't!

That's right, we simply have not directly acknowledged or dealt with the whole 'watching your squadmate fall to a presumed horrible death' thing even once in five episodes. Tech has been mentioned by name twice, we've seen his goggles once, and Wrecker makes one sideways reference to him having not made it back.

In universe, there is a several month timeskip and it seems to be implied that the majority of the grief milestones happened in that gap. For example, we don't see Crosshair finding out from Omega, we don't see Omega grieving her brother, we don't see Phee finding out (more on her in a bit) despite her fledgling romance. Months of grieving and processing skipped over and what comes out the other side is single line mentions that go by in seconds.

This is especially apparent after episode 5, where we got something to compare it to. Crosshair has a long, painful moment of grieving with Mayday's helmet when they return to Barton IV. It's deep, personal, and intimate and we take a minute with him gathering up the helmets of Mayday and his men to set them up on the crates the same way that Mayday had honored them.

Mayday is a one episode character that was important to only a single character, Crosshair - Tech is a core member of the team present through two full seasons and shown as close to every member of the squad. Yet the single scene grieving Mayday is longer and more emotionally gripping than every short mention of Tech so far in season 3.

Narrative Grief

Seeing characters grieve their loved ones onscreen is about more than just the characters themselves. It's also part of the viewer experience - through the characters' grief, we're able to process our own grief at the loss. It makes it feel real, it makes it feel personal, and the amount of grieving needs to be proportionate to the character's importance in the story.

This is especially true in a show written for children like The Bad Batch. Kids don't typically have the same experience with death as adults, and a well written main character death within a children's show will need more time and energy spent towards making the loss feel real. We see this with deaths like Kanan's; it wasn't Jedi Night that told the viewer that Kanan was really, truly dead, it was Dume, where the characters mourned him and dealt with the aftermath.

Currently, with Tech, we do see holes in the team that make us miss Tech but they remain completely unaddressed by the characters. We see Tech's goggles, but Hunter isn't looking at them, he's looking at Lula. Omega mentions Tech having taught her all the plans, but without any real sadness on her or Crosshair's part. The closest we get to actually bringing it up are Wrecker saying 'not everyone came back' and Echo mentioning the datapad would be difficult without Tech, and both of those are only seconds long before moving on. They don't serve as any kind of catharsis for the viewer, relying more on gut punch impact and keeping the wound open rather than allowing it to heal. The difference between the treatment of Tech's death and Mayday's just makes it more stark.

How Do You Like Yearning?

Interestingly, though, it strongly resembles the writing team's handling of another situation: Crosshair's departure from the team in season 1 vs Echo's in season 2. The show even drew a lot of flack for the lack of discussion on Crosshair's betrayal, as outside of a couple conversations the matter often went unremarked on. Echo leaving, on the other hand, got a whole episode dedicated to processing the loss immediately after it happened.

So what was the difference? Crosshair's departure is part of a long term plot point. We're supposed to want him back, we're supposed to want the team to talk about him, anything that would ease the tension. The writers on the other hand want that tension to remain until it's time to actually resolve the plot. So we get those slow drips in between bigger encounters, we get opportunities for Crosshair to come home that he doesn't take, and we don't get the catharsis of the team actually talking about any of it. We're left to want and imagine it, using the yearning to keep it on people's minds more than anything.

If Crosshair had been discussed on screen long enough for the characters to actually come to terms with his absence, though, that would have made the plot feel more settled and resolved early on. It might be conversations we want to see, but it doesn't keep the viewer on edge and craving a resolution. Best case scenario we're just not as desperate for Crosshair to come home - worst case scenario we accept that he won't be returning and find the fact that he eventually does to be unrealistic.

Echo on the other hand gets their absence processed immediately, because their absence from the team is not meant to be a huge plot point. It's something the team has to deal with, yes, and the viewer wants to see them again just like Omega does, but Echo returning isn't meant to be a maybe, and it's not supposed to keep the viewer wondering and worrying. It's a when, not an if.

Similarly to Crosshair, Tech has never felt like a resolved plot point. We don't get confirmation on his death, we don't get any long term grieving, and we get drip fed acknowledgements that pry the wound back open. If we actually see the team discuss and come to terms with their grief and loss, the plot point closes, the wound closes and we begin to fully accept a team without Tech in it, which makes it harder to reinsert him into the storyline if he is in fact alive.

If he's truly gone for good, what is the point of denying closure to the audience? We know that they are capable of writing an intense mourning moment that feels completely in character for otherwise emotionally repressed men such as Crosshair, so why not give us that with the team mourning for Tech? A memorial, an intimate moment with the goggles, a short scene of Crosshair finding out about the loss, or anything at all really? Once again it's something that makes sense if he's alive and we're simply not being shown yet, but makes very little sense to not capitalize on if he's dead.

What's to Come

We have ten episodes of season 3 to go, and a lot to cover. Reviews have indicated that Tech is not explicitly brought up in the first eight, so the earliest we could possibly have a survival reveal is in episode 9. Will it actually happen? Maybe, maybe not. Though interestingly episode 9, The Harbinger, is almost exactly one year after Plan 99, just like The Return aired almost one year after The Outpost. Could mean nothing, but they do enjoy their anniversary dates.

One thing we do know for sure is coming up is Phee's inclusion - she's seen in the official trailer, as well as briefly in a recent twitter spot. This is interesting as Phee is, of course, Tech's teased love interest, and her connection to Tech has been emphasized multiple times, including on her Databank entry and the official 'what you need to know about season 3' guide. When she comes onto the scene, it's very likely that more information about Tech will too.

MARKETING, INTERVIEWS, & SOCIAL MEDIA

I wanted to keep this mostly focused on what can be seen within the show itself, but it's impossible to talk about whether or not Tech is alive without pointing to the absolutely bizarre messaging from the cast and crew, as well as the marketing choices surrounding his sacrifice. (Example: the Instagram Mourning Filter they layered over him in the official trailer, as seen above) I won't get quite as detailed here as in the above, but it does have to be mentioned.

Constant Focus

In between the end of season 2 and the posting of the season 3 trailer in late January, there were several posts on various official Star Wars media. The majority of them were about Tech and Plan 99. In fact, I don't think I ever saw anything mentioning the giant 'Omega's been captured' cliffhanger, just Tech. Over and over again.

Once a character is dead, marketing generally stops caring about them. They're forward focused after all, they want you coming back for what's to come not lingering on what won't be relevant again. So why the constant focus on Tech?

And it wasn't just the social media either - a huge portion of the trailers and reels included old footage of him too. For the most part this was from Plan 99 and bringing up his fall again to rip open those old wounds, but in one case they included action footage from The Summit. This was an interesting case, because the majority of people watching wouldn't have recognized it immediately. Fittingly, the entire comment section was full of nothing but 'Was that Tech?' style comments, which they would have known was going to be the case to start with.

So why are we so focused on a man that's supposedly dead? If he's genuinely never going to show up again why keep putting him in? Everything? While not even bringing him up all that often in the show? If he's dead, this is a truly bizarre marketing decision.

Never Say Die

In interviews or in official material. For several months the word 'dead' was never used for Tech anywhere, not in interviews, not in official material, nowhere. It took until January 23rd for all of the databank entries to be updated, and among all of the main cast he's only referred to as 'killed' once, and it's on Hunter's page not even his own. Then, the Friday before the premier, an interview came out referring to him as dead - on the part of the interviewer, not the creators themselves.

Everything else seems to use a variety of euphemisms. His sacrifice, his absence, his loss, he 'plummeted out of sight', he 'fell from a tram car', he did absolutely anything it's possible to do except outright die apparently.

It's an odd choice when there's known controversy over if he's dead or not. The standard operating protocol of course, in a planned comeback, is to refer to them as dead anyway and allow fandom to fuel its own speculation, but with a fandom as devastated as TBB's was, it's quite possible that the odd behavior had to be introduced just to keep speculation going. The only interviews that sound remotely final came out right before the episodes started coming out - if they had done that from the beginning, the chances of people outright refusing to come back to the show likely would have been higher.

Much like the marketing, this is not necessarily proof of anything - but in combination with the multiple odd things in the show itself, it's certainly suspicious. Speaking of suspicious...

What an Odd Thing to Say

The cast and crew themselves have not been skimping on making strange comments when it comes to the Tech situation.

There is of course the well known Joel Aron (lighting director for the series) tweet that came out the day of the Celebrations panel (AKA when the Tech trauma was at an all time high) and in direct reply to a fan that was having a hard time with Tech's death. It's hard to take it as anything but a reference to Tech given the timing, and it was certainly taken as being about Tech in the quote tweets. If it's not about Tech, why tease the fandom with it? And the specification for it being a mid s3 episode as well...

Also from the day of Celebrations, and from the panel itself, we have Michelle Ang saying in front of God and everybody, that Tech "doesn't come back... in this episode, at least." At the time there was a possibility she didn't know and was just leaving it open, but with that only being ten months ago and the extremely long timeframe of animation, it's almost certain that she would have been done with all primary recording by that point. If you know he's not coming back, how do you accidentally imply that he is with no one correcting it?

Dee Bradley Baker, when asked for a farewell message from Tech at a con, came out with "the life of a soldier is fulfilled by fulfilling his mission and supporting his brothers. And this was the end of mine. And that's a good thing." Which was a perfectly serviceable goodbye right up until he said that the end of Tech's (life? soldier's life? mission?) was a good thing.

During an instagram interview we have Deana Kiner, one of the composers, in response to the interviewer talking about the final episode containing a major loss, saying, "It's kind of a loss... It's complicated." The claim on twitter was that this was about Omega, because everyone knows that when someone mentions the major loss in Plan 99 they're definitely talking about Omega.

So is Tech alive? Is Tech dead? We still don't know. But while one or two of the above might be a coincidence, having all of them at once coalesce around this single character death is a lot to chew over. The Bad Batch team has shown willingness to address grief and loss prior, as well as a willingness to show us death onscreen and front and center. So why, with such an important character, sidestep it all in order to keep it vague? Why keep it from sounding final for so long, if the intent the entire time was for him to be dead for good?

We won't know until he either shows back up or the show ends. If Tech's alive, all of the above starts to make sense. If he's dead... well a lot of things will just never quite add up. I feel that this team has shown enough willingness to follow up on their trailing plotlines that they've earned my trust. Fingers crossed for a satisfying resolution for all of us, and for our boy Tech, whatever that resolution may be.

#the bad batch #tbb #tbb tech #the bad batch spoilers #tbb spoilers #the bad batch speculation #this thing is some 7500 words i might have an obsession problem

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lyak12 · 3 months

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Lucy bronze x reader. They just had a tough game and reader had a lot of back pain and Lucy helps her and massages her and takes care of her. Some fluff :)

I have your back

A/N: This was just so cute. Again it's not very long, only about 1k words, and I'm honestly half asleep right now so I don't know if this is any good but I couldn't help but see how Lucy would see right through readers facade at this req. Not proofread, and again, I'm a bit rusty, but still, I hope you enjoy!

Warnings: None I can think of, if you see something lmk:)

It's your first season playing for Barça and you love it. Especially since you're reunited with your girlfriend again. Lucy and you play both for the English national team and have been dating for over two years now.

As Lucy had moved to Barcelona about a year into your relationship, you had been scared that your relationship wouldn't last, but you quickly realized that your love had known no distance.

Nevertheless, as the opportunity arose for you to join her in Barcelona, you had jumped on it, and it's been the best decision you made.

Life with Lucy in Barcelona is great. The weather is unbelievable and the food to die for.

-----------

It's is your second time starting for Barça and since you were one of the best teams in the league, you hadn't expected the game to be so rough. Not rough in the team is super strong, but rough in you felt like you're playing rugby.

It's around the 70th minute, Barcelona is in the lead with 6:0 as you jump up for the header. It's a beautiful pass from Lucy and it finds you perfectly. However, before you can even head the ball in, you feel a player from the other team jumping in your back.

You fall to the ground without being able to really catch yourself, landing mostly on your back, which causes the wind to get knocked out of you.

You groan as you try to catch your breath. For a moment, everything is black. As you open your eyes again a moment later, the first thing you see are your girlfriend's worried eyes.

"Are you okay y/n/n? That was an ugly fall", Lucy asks, worried, her northern accent coming out thickly when she's worried. "Yeah, I think so", you say and try to sit up. Your back is killing you.

The medics come running towards you to make sure you're alright and didn't get injured in the fall. They notice you're still breathing a bit shallow, but from what they can tell, nothing is seriously wrong. They help you up, and you stretch your back slightly.

You stay on the field, partly because you are too stubborn to admit you are in pain and partly because you feel like you need to prove yourself on the new team. "Are you sure?", Lucy asks, worried but you just nod.

Your back is in agony the rest of the game, but you push through. As the game is over and you win 7:0, you can't help but celebrate with the others on the team. However, Lucy can look right through your facade.

She keeps a hand on your back gently and makes sure you take it easy without causing much attention. After a nice hot shower, all of you get dressed and get back on the bus to drive back.

You wince slightly as you sit down, the bus seat certainly not helping your back. Lucy just smiles sadly before patting her lap. Normally, she's a bit more reserved in front of the team, but right now, her whole focus is on getting you as comfortable as possible until you're home.

You curl up on her and end up dozing off a little. The drive back luckily wasn't that long back to the headquarters. Once you all got off, Alexia and a few others asked, "Do you guys wanna get some food with us?".

Lucy knows you'd never tell your new captain no, so she's quick to answer, "Not tonight, I think we'll call it an early night and get some well needed recovery done. Thank you, though. You guys have fun." Alexia just nods with a smile, knowing how important recovery is for Lucy's knee.

That Lucy is feeling completely fine is beside the point.

"Why did you turn them down?", you ask softly, trying to appear tough, but Lucy sees right through you. "Because you're in pain, love. And I'd rather spend the rest of the night to make you feel better than going out to eat", Lucy says as she kisses your forehead, and you just smile softly.

The way home is not far, thankfully, and once you're in the privacy of your apartment, you can no longer keep the facade up. "Bloody hell, this hurts", you say as you lean on the kitchen counter. "Yeah, that was a pretty rough fall. I can't believe you kept playing after that", Lucy says, gently rubbing over your shoulder.

"Don't act like you wouldn't have", you say with a raised eyebrow as you look at your girlfriend. "Guilty, but we both know I would've gotten an earful from you as soon as we were home", Lucy says with a chuckle, and you just laugh slightly before you wince. Laughing hurts.

"Come on. Let's get you on the bed so I can massage your back", Lucy says, gently ushering you to the bedroom. "Luce, you don't have to. You must be tired and.. ", you try to argue, but Lucy interrupts, "Close that cute mouth and lay down on the bed, take off your shirt. This is not up for debate."

You know that tone, so you do as you're told and lay down on the bed on your stomach, top less. Before you know it, you feel Lucy straddle your thighs as she spreads some oil on your back and starts massaging.

You normally love Lucy's hands on you, but at the beginning, with your muscles being so tense, it's just painful. You can't help but groan a few times, and Lucy says gently, "I know, I'm sorry. Try to relax, baby."

Eventually, you do relax, and your tense muscles are starting to loosen up. By the time Lucy feels accomplished with her massage, you were fast asleep. This game took it out of you, and Lucy can't help but smile at you.

Kissing your head a few times, she gets ready for bed herself before crawling in with you and tucking you both in. You instinctively cuddle into her chest, and she just pulls you close, pressing a kiss on your forehead before mumbling, "I love you, sleep well, Baby."

#lucy bronze x reader #lucy bronze #woso x reader #woso fic #barça femeni

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yamujiburo · 8 months

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POKEMON SERIES RANKED (IMO)

I get this question a lot and haven't made an updated list with Journeys

Original Series (S1-S5)

Sun & Moon (S20-S22)

Chronicles (S0)

Diamond and Pearl (S10-S13)

Advanced (S6-S9)

Journeys (S23-S25)

Black & White (S14-S16)

XY (S17-S19)

Original Series (S1-S5)

OS had that first season charm. Very unpolished, still finding its footing but super enjoyable for those reasons

Probably the strongest series comedy-wise

That GORGEOUS 90s anime style

Main character dynamics were REALLY strong

Ash's personality felt much more like a shitty little 10 year old which was entertaining

Dub writing was also the best hands down

Sun & Moon (S20-S22)

Honestly tied for first with OS for me

REALLY fun ensemble cast! They do a fantastic job giving each character enough time for you to get to know and care about

Excellent modern anime style that perfectly fit the vibe of the season and allowed for some of the best character animation of the show's run

Finally figured out how to write Ash like a 10 year old again (but in a kind/sweet 10 year old way as opposed to OS)

Very different from previous series in terms of the formula they'd follow. Doing a school series instead of another "8 badges to championship" plot felt new and fresh!

This series genuinely made me cry the most (MEMORIES IN THE MIST!!!!! LIKE ARE YOU KIDDING ME)

Chronicles (S0)

Fun concept! It was really nice to see more of the side characters without Ash there. We get to see more of Misty, Tracey, Daisy, Brock, Ritchie, Oak, Delia, Butch, Cassidy, Jessie, James and Meowth!

Stylistically really nice. Just solid drawings all around and it retained the 90s anime style in digital form more successfully than other digitally done series imo

BUTCH AND CASSIDY!!! Team Rocket centric episodes!!! Training Daze!!!!!!!

Idk how possible it would have been (seems like a TON of work) but it made me want one of these in between each season, where we'd follow the characters that Ash had just said goodbye to for the next region.

Diamond and Pearl (S10-S13)

Series I grew up with! Honestly I was kinda a hater as a kid but having watched it back, I love the series

Love that Ash and Dawn were bros. They had a really fun dynamic.

Debatably peak Team Rocket. They had some of the best Team Rocket centric episodes this series.

Contests were really fun and a bit more figured out compared to the Advanced series

Fun, memorable rivals for Ash (Paul and Barry) as well as Dawn (Zoey, Kenny and Jessilina sometimes)

This is unfortunately where I stopped caring about Ash as much. He feels kinda watered down for the next couple series.

Advanced (S6-S9)

Pretty tied up with DP for me

Really fun series! Still had some of that early Pokémon charm

I appreciated that they put Ash in more of a mentor role for May (but he still had a lot to learn himself).

Ash and May constantly butting heads was really fun

May was a very compelling character to me, being very clumsy, kinda lazy, directionless, not really into Pokémon, etc. But then over time, she comes around and finds something she's interested in!

Journeys (S23-S25)

I love the episodic take as well as the way they let the characters jump around from region to region at random

Goh was a GREAT travel companion to Ash. They contrast each other nicely, have moments where they get on each others' nerves but still get along and have a mutual admiration for one another.

It was fun that they made Goh's thing catching every Pokémon (the motto of the entire series) so they could focus on Ash just training and prepping for Worlds.

Amaaaazing style. Took the great parts of classic Pokémon, roundness of SM and blended em together for a really fun look.

Black & White (S14-S16)

I don't think it's that controversial to have BW this low haha

I did enjoy Iris and Cilan but it felt like the writers didn't reaaally know what to do with them? Also this was their first time in a while not having Brock and it shows. I feel like Brock was successful because he was grounded and lower energy compared to the rest of the kids. Having 3 pretty eccentric characters is kind of a lot. No hate to the characters in the slightest, there was just not as much balance.

I think maybe they leaned on Cilan and Iris for more comedic relief because they killed the comedic relief that was Team Rocket this series. I appreciate them trying something new with Jessie, James and Meowth but I don't think it worked very well lol

XY (S17-S19)

I've ranted about this series a lot LOL. I get the appeal of it, but it just wasn't for me. I felt like it was the weakest comedy-wise and took itself a bit too seriously for my taste

My main gripe is that Serena, Clemont and Bonnie all like,,, worship Ash. By doing so, Ash begins to feel like a side character because we're constantly looking at Ash through their eyes. There's so little conflict within the group so their dynamics feel really flat. I think this dynamic could have worked if they leaned waaay more into Ash being a mentor and maybe feeling the pressure of having to be a role model for the people around him.

Team Rocket very much feels like an afterthought in this series. They did in Journeys as well, but at least in Journeys they were doing something silly and also had a handful of episodes dedicated to em.

Outside of that, the episodes weren't super memorable for me

I think it's just frustrating because there was sooooo much potential character-wise

#long post #ranking

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vscabarca · 2 months

Text

strangers again - pablo gavi

summary: gavi breaks the situationship off after realizing he fell in love with you.

genre: sad fluff? angst? but not really

———

July 23‘

pablo gavi. A charming, polite and good looking guy who had nothing else in his mind exept for football. That was until he had met you. A shy, yet outgoing girl with a good heart.

Fermin brought you once along to a party even though you weren’t very pleased with meeting his footballer friends. The stories he had told you were anything but comforting to you, their hookups didn’t interest you one bit. Yet, your mother urged you to go out, „meet new people in a new city“, as she called it. Moving to Barcelona was a big step, but something you‘ve always dreamed of doing when you finally turned nineteen.

There you were now, awkwardly standing in the kitchen of a stranger’s home next to Fermin, sipping on some alcoholic mixture he had made you.

Suddenly, a guy bumped into you and his drink spilled all over your shirt.

„Shit, I‘m so sorry.“ He apologized, already looking for some napkins to get you cleaned up.

Annoyed, you looked down onto your drenched shirt, already fed up with this stupid party.

„Here you go.“

It was then when you looked up, seeing chocolate brown eyes wander over the mess he‘d made.

He was a bit taller than you, brown hair slicked to the side and an awkward little smile plastered across his face.

„it’s alright. it will wash out, I hope.“ You grimaced. The white top had now an ugly brownish stain on it, so napkins wouldn’t help much.

„Wait I‘ll give you my hoodie.“

You wanted to decline his offer but he already pulled the sweater off.

„Thank you. I‘m Y/n by the way, Fermin’s cousin.“ You pulled the hoodie on, introducing yourself to the pretty boy opposite you.

„Pablo, nice to meet you.“

September 23‘

The last two months you’ve spent more and more time with Fermin and his friends, only for one reason. The Andalusian caught your eye since the party as you two hit it off that night.

Pablo and you became extremely close, so close that there had been a night where he’d kissed you. Since that evening, you couldn’t stop thinking about his lips and how his fingers left a hot trail behind where he had touched you.

Pablo looked for the stupidest excuses to be around you, was it tracing his fingers innocently on your waist while passing you or giving you a kiss on the cheek when he left.

October 23‘

It all happened very quickly. Pablo had brought you home from a dinner with his friends, but you invited him inside for a glass of water. He of course accepted, wanting to spend as much time with you as possible. Pablo was confused, he had never felt such things, especially not during the season. His whole focus was usually on football, but with you sitting on his lap that october night, it became rather difficult to think about other things.

One thing led to the other and you two were tangled in the white bedsheets, clothes littered around your bedroom floor, savoring the early morning hours together.

November 23‘

it was confusing to say the least. Pablo and you fooled around, hooked up but still acted like you two were in a relationship. It was nothing official, you never talked about what you two were.

But, you really started to develop feelings for the hot-headed midfielder. It didn’t make it any better that he bought you flowers, called you almost every day and took you out on romantic dates, ending them in the most pleasurable way.

All your friends knew about Pablo and were happy for you, yet didn’t understand why there was never a talk about a possible relationship. You were scared, scared it was nothing serious for him. Still, you just enjoyed the moment having Pablo by your side.

December 23‘

Pablo fell in love. Your laugh, your beautiful eyes, the light brown hair scattered across your face when you woke up next to him. You were his favorite person to go to if he was stressed about something, because as soon as he was in your arms, he felt at peace. It was like you had a magic spell on him.

But over the month of December something changed. Not his love for you, but his unsure feelings about the whole situationship.

Pablo never had a girlfriend, only quick flings. He felt like he knew nothing about how to treat a woman. You were such a special girl who deserved nothing but love and respect. Could he really give that to you? He felt like he wasn’t ready, he couldn’t treat you like you deserved to be treated. Pablo wouldn’t even be able to get to see you much because of his packed schedule. He wouldn’t be able to take you out to a restaurant in the middle of Barcelona without people bombarding you two. And, he wouldn’t be able to defend you from the hateful comments made about you on Social Media.

It all felt so difficult to handle, so a week before Christmas, he asked you to come over and talk.

„I can’t give you what deserve Y/n.“ He said with tears in his eyes. You didn’t understand what he was rambling about. It all was going so well, you already imagined a future with him.

Ironically enough, as you left his home it was pouring down. You couldn’t even tell if it were your tears or raindrops rolling down your face. Pablo wanted you to stay, at least wait until the rain was over, but you couldn’t handle seeing him.

He just ripped your heart out of your chest.

February 24‘

the last two months have been rough. As much as you loved Fermin, you couldn’t stand seeing him because you knew Pablo lingered around somewhere too. You didn’t talk with him since that night, but he tried to call you several times. You never picked up, your heart hurt enough by only seeing his name pop up on your phone screen.

Pablo on the other hand only wanted to hear your voice, to see how you‘ve been doing. But what could he expect? He broke your heart not too long ago.

April 24‘

April rolled around pretty quickly - Barcelona got warmer, the days became longer. You had moved on fairly well, only having nostalgic memories when thinking about Barça‘s number six. You didn’t hold any grudges against him, you somehow understood what he had said. Still, you strongly believed you two could have worked it out if you really wanted.

Fermin pleaded now for weeks for you to accompany him to Balde‘s birthday party, and to make him shut up, you decided to go with him.

A feeling of sadness spread through your body as you stood there, at the exact spot like nine months ago, holding your drink in one hand, occasionally taking sips from it.

Your eyes roamed around the room, trying to see if Pablo was lingering around somewhere. You didn’t find him at first, but he then emerged from the crowd. Your eyes met his and he abruptly stopped, eyebrows raised slightly in surprise. His surprised state quickly changed into somewhat calm, a genuine small smile made its way onto his face. You reincorporated the smile, then pushed yourself off the counter to head to the door. With a last glance back, you saw him standing there, his gaze never leaving you. But after all, you two were nothing more than strangers again.

#pablo gavi #gavi #pablo gavi x reader #gavi one shot #gavi x reader #football one shot #fc barcelona #barça #football x reader

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violetarks · 1 year

Text

visitor

show: alice in borderland

character: chishiya shuntaro

summary: you visit your idiot brother at the while he's injured and in the process, meet someone new. you caught his eye and now you have another reason to visit so often.

warnings: g/n! reader, they/them pronouns used, spoilers for season 2 episode 8

"you're so dumb!" you call as you walk into the room, a doctor flailing behind you in worry. but you only focus your eyes on your brother, who lays in the bed fully, glancing back with you. an annoyed sigh leaves his lips before he closes his eyes. "i told you i'd pick you up! and then i get a call saying you were already there? and you were in an accident!"

niragi knew you'd be the first to come. the only, actually. but he could never deal with your shouting, especially not when it happened so frequently. it's been a day since the accident, and he has finally woken up.

you put your bag on the floor against the bedside table. "you could stand to listen to me at least once! this is why you're always getting hurt and i'm always the one checking up on you."

you made it sound like a hassle, but the both of you know that no matter what, you would stick by. you made a promise to yourself to make your brother a better person, and niragi vowed to protect you from the bullies in life. you needed each other.

"yeah, yeah, i got it. god, you're so fucking loud." he grumbles back to you, "can't you see i'm in pain?"

you hold your angry gaze before a bit of sadness falls in. you stand at his side, pressing a gentle hand to the bandages on his arm. "you look like shit, suguru." you mutter out under your breath, "the hell were you doing there so early? we were supposed to meet at 2!"

"i got tired of waiting! i was calling you to tell you to hurry the fuck up!" he exclaimed, making you drop your jaw, "how about you answer your phone next time, huh?"

you retract your hand, pointing an accusing finger at your brother. "i told you, moron, i was in a meeting! 2 was the earliest i can do!"

"ah, please... there are other patients in this room..." the doctor says, waving his hand to dismiss the situation, "we don't want to cause a ruckus..."

you look back to the doctor. "sorry, i forgot..." you say in a quieter tone. your eyes gaze upon the two other occupants in the room, both staring right back at you in frozen shock. you give a little bow. "i apologise, i just needed to talk to this... dumbass... but i promise, no more yelling."

"thank fuck."

"suguru."

"it's alright." the furthest one, in the corner near the window, says to you. he has a bandage on his cheek, and grins to you softly.

the one beside your brother, notably taking his eyes off of you and on your brother. "don't worry about it. this guy your boyfrend or something?"

"oh, hell no." you laugh, the doctor then leaving the room, deeming it safe, "he's my older brother."

suguru glares back at the man beside him. "are you stupid?"

in response, he raises his brow at the stranger's words. you widen your eyes and slap your brother's shoulder. "shut up, suguru!" you scoff, turning back to the strangers, "sorry about him, he can't read social cues... my name is y/n."

the black-haired man in the back sits up, throwing his legs off the side of the bed. "i'm arisu. it's nice to meet you." he says.

the blonde speaks up, "chishiya. it's a pleasure."

arisu stands up, holding his back a bit. "i'm going to go get a drink." he states, leaving the room.

chishiya keeps his eye on you. you were obviously so caring of your brother that you would berate him this much. but your tone conveyed an annoyed feeling. your face showed that you were stressed, but relief had washed over you when you realised he was as good as he could be.

"there's a chair here, stop standing there." suguru tells you, nodding to the space in between him and chishiya at the ends of their beds. you walk around, taking the spot, ignoring his ignorant voice.

"the doctors said they wanted to run you through a couple more tests." you say, your voice sounding softer now as you stare at your brother, "they're going to come in soon."

"more tests? fuck, they won't let me go." suguru grumbles, leaning his head back against the pillow. he hated the stares people gave him because of all the bandages on his face. he hated being small in their eyes. "whatever... you staying? or heading out after i leave?"

you think for a moment, tapping your knee, before you respond, "i'll stay. i want to talk to you some more before i leave."

as if on time, the doctor from earlier comes in, holding a clipboard with quite a few papers on it. "mr niragi, we've set up the rooms for testing." he claims, looking at the both of you, "although, there are many. this would take at least an hour."

suguru looks back at you as nurses come in, ready to transport him to the first test. "you still gonna' stay? you'll be lonely, like a loser." you give him a look.

"they won't be lonely." chishiya speaks up, leaning comfortably against the bed. he smiles at your brother, with some teasing hint behind it. "i'll keep them company."

"i already hate you." suguru claims, beginning to move out of the room while he hears your chuckle at chishiya's claim. soon enough, he's gone and the door is closed. just you and chishiya.

you rub the back of your neck with a big sigh, "he's going to be the death of me... i can't help but worry for that guy."

chishiya sits up, leaning away from the bed's support. "he does seem to be a bit of a handful." he says in response, "you have it all together for the both of you, hm?"

you shrug your shoulders, staring back at the guy. it was strange, he didn't look to be injured. "so what happened to you? if you don't mind me asking."

chishiya smiles, placing a hand over his stomach first. "impaled. twice, what are the chances?" he says, "missed any vital organs, so that's a plus."

"you sound weirdly fine with being impaled twice." you say, smiling awkwardly. chishiya shrugs. he grins back at you softly, and you can't help but stare for a few more seconds. he sure was pretty. "so... job?"

"is this a first date?" he raises his brow.

"i would hardly call this place suitable for a first date." you joke, shaking your head, "maybe when you're out of here."

chishiya stops, his brows lifting a little more and his lips parting. you were confident, he could give you that, it was obvious that you and suguru were related. the way you smile at his silence makes his chest squeeze, and he sits up straighter under your heavy gaze.

"i should be released in the next few weeks." chishiya states, tilting his head at you, "and to answer your question, i'm a medical student."

"smart." you say, impressed. chishiya nods his head, asking about your job. "i'm a part of a publishing firm."

"creative." he compliments.

the both of you talk for the hours that your brother is busy doing tests. usually, chishiya wouldn't spend all this time just speaking to a stranger. but you were kind and didn't make him feel uncomfortable in silences. you would fill them with questions or simply just explaining things about you and your brother. chishiya was glad you weren't the nervous type.

you began to come over more in your spare time, dropping off supplies for your brother and talking to him for a while with chishiya in the background listening. sometimes, suguru would be out on his walk or in physical therapy (without telling you so you couldn't follow) and you'd be in the hospital room waiting for his return. but it was okay, chishiya was always there to keep you company. he'd tell you all the things that the doctor's were saying about your brother, what it meant, and most importantly, his progress.

you learnt from what he told you that your brother would be sent home after a month. relief washed over you and you thanked him. chishiya was more than happy to help, especially seeing how glad that made you.

"do you know when you'll be released?" you questioned that same day he informed you of suguru's last day.

chishiya, who sits across from you in the open hospital yard at a coffee table, watches as you stir your drink. it was his idea to leave the room today and get some coffee or tea, feeling stuffy in that room (and quite lonely since his only friend arisu was occupied by some girl he heard named usagi) and you just happened to drop by as he was getting ready to leave, your brother out of sight. so he asked you to come along, enjoying your smile as you accept.

"itching for that first date?" he mutters to you, leaning back in his spot.

you chuckle, "that wasn't the point. you know, after suguru comes home, i won't have a proper reason to visit the hospital anymore. they only allowed family to come see the patients, with how many there are."

you made a good point there. chishiya doesn't think he's seen anybody other than you or arisu's father or brother come around to visit them. and judging by niragi's personality, he was surely stringing some girls behind, no?

"so, yeah, we can go out on a date when you're released. or we can just continue talking casually." you offer him, holding your drink, "i don't mind."

chishiya raises a brow. he's a bit suspicious. why would you be so willing to spend time around him? some sort of game? he hums, "you don't mind? really?"

you shrug your shoulders as you sip from your cup. when you place it down on the table, chishiya eagerly awaits your response. "i really don't. you know, i like spending time with you, chishiya."

he's only known you for a good two weeks. is that long enough to develop feelings?

he's heard stories from people he worked with and around. proposing on their anniversary, chasing them to the airport before they board, dating since they were fifteen. he's even heard of some couples who move in together mere months after dating. he used to think it was all too fast.

but was it okay for someone to fall in love that quickly?

he decides to test the waters, overturning his hand so his palm is presented to the person in front of him. "i like spending time with you too, y/n."

you reply with a simple grin, resting a gentle hand in his. "that's great. then we can hang out more once you're out of here."

"i'll be released next week. thursday, 9 in the morning." he states, confident that your hand was the only thing keeping him warm in the spring weather. you blink at him, making chishiya nervously tilt his head with a grin. "too soon for you?"

you shake your own head and say, "no, it's not that, it's just that you made it sound like i'd have to wait another fortnight for you to be out of the hospital." you squeeze his hand ever so gently. "i'll spare some time."

"did you want to get breakfast with me?" he asks, nearly too fast for his liking.

you mumble, "what day?"

"thursday." chishiya is confident he is coming off too strong. but who was around to tell him off?

you laugh in response, "now it sounds like you're the one who can't wait." he wants to crumble into the ground. "but sure, i can do thursday. have a spot in mind?"

a loud huff interrupts the both of you. suguru, in crutches, lands in the chair beside you as soon as chishiya goes to answer. he's almost like a bad luck charm. your brother is breathing heavily, leaning his crutches against the table as he lets out a hefty sigh.

"god fucking damn it, i hate these things." he tells you, throwing his head back. the nurse helping him before standing a few feet away to give you privacy, but it was obvious that they were trying to get your brother back to his room. "remind me to never break my leg ever again. this fuckin' sucks."

"i would think so." you murmur to him.

that's when his eyes suddenly go down to your hand, linked with chishiya's on the table. and now, he's confused.

"what the fuck is this?" he questions, furrowed brows. he stared stupidly at you two as you noticed your hands and pull away at the same time. his gaze turns to chishiya first. "you gotta' be messing with me. no way you fell for this smart-ass, y/n."

chishiya places a hand over his heart. "you wound me, niragi." he sarcastically says, finishing off his drink as he stands up, "i'll let the two of you talk. if you need me, i'll be in the room."

he doesn't get very far before you call his name again. chishiya turns around, watching you scribbling something on the spare napkin you brought took you with the pen the nurse so kindly provided. he can already guess what it is, and now he's even more sure this isn't real. nobody would actually write their phone number on a napkin, right?

"feel free to text or call me whenever." you say, handing it to him. and sure enough, it's the digits to your cell. accompanied by your name and a smiley face, as if he was one to received many numbers from pretty strangers such as yourself. "i'll see you before i leave."

chishiya pockets the napkin securely in his pocket, holding his hand there for safe keeping. "i'll keep an eye out. see you, y/n."

"bye, chishiya." you respond, watching as he walks back towards the main building.

suguru is going to throw up, is what chishiya hears him say. you two speak loudly that he can still catch what you are talking about.

"why him of all people? i woulda' accepted even arisu over that guy." suguru scowls, making you roll your eyes.

you mumble back, shaking your head, "don't be mean, you barely talk to him."

"that's a fucking lie, he belittles me when you're not around." he points out, glaring holes in the back of chishiya's head. he can feel them.

"well then, soon you'll only have to see him when i'm around." you claim, holding your chin in your hand as you smile to yourself, "so no problem."

suguru gets one look at you and sees that you're being dead serious. he groans, eyes up to the sky, "what do you see in a guy like him?"

you trace the rim of your mug. "i like him a lot. he's smart."

chishiya is out of earshot as soon as that's said, and he's almost glad. he doesn't want to walk around the hospital with some dumb smile on his face.

#chishiya shuntaro #chishiya shuntaro x reader #chishiya #chishiya x reader #alice in borderland #alice in boderland x reader #aib #aib x reader #alice in borderland chishiya #alice in borderland chishiya x reader #aib chishiya #aib chishiya x reader

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reverie-starlight · 9 months

Text

fluffy hawks drabble-turned-mini-fic because i love him. if you think the feather necklace trope is overused, this is probably not the place for you. also important to note: let’s say for the sake of my sanity that this takes place before seasons 5/6, okay? I know what's up in the manga, I'm just ignoring it to be happy :)

fem!reader, no physical descriptions aside from wearing dresses + enjoying it and reader could be perceived as chubby, but no explicit mentions of body type!! shopping for clothes is just hard and it’s briefly reflected on in this. lots of soft fluff. pet names (baby, sweetheart, pretty girl, etc) I just got a bunch of cute dresses and now I'm gonna make it hawks' problem. this is like. disgustingly soft and so incredibly self indulgent avert your eyes. please. very smiley and giggly. a bit suggestive at the end bc I have no self-control.

soft laughter and the sound of rustling sheets were the only noises heard in your shared bedroom that afternoon. surprisingly enough for both of you, keigo had finished his patrol early and caught you on the way up to your apartment. almost immediately after walking in and getting your shoes and coats off, he had grabbed you and sped off to your room, dropping you on the bed and launching an attack.

you were both so happy to have some extra time together that it boosted your energy immensely, resulting in a impromptu play fight. it wasn't very often that you got to be so playful anymore with things picking up for him at work. you were both still young, so when you got the chance to act like it, you definitely took it.

"keigo!" you shrieked as he pressed a slew of quick, light kisses over your face and down your neck. a ticklish sensation was left in their wake, even more so because of his facial hair. he just chuckled and rubbed his face against your skin to draw out more laughter. feathers flew around and brushed against your cheeks and other places he couldn't focus his attention on.

his arms were wrapped tightly around your waist to limit your movements, but you still squirmed around to try and get the upper hand. eventually, after a few more kisses to your chest and stomach, he loosened his grip to give you a fighting chance and you flipped on top of him, making sure not to hurt his wings, which ruffled in excitement.

"so what are you gonna do with me now, sweetheart?" he grinned up at you, eyes positively glowing with mirth.

you felt your own gaze go soft and cupped his face with your hands, rubbing your thumbs over the apples of his cheeks. "I dunno," you murmured, keeping your voice low in volume and sweet in its delivery.

your eyes wandered over his features, admiring him in the golden rays of sun coming from your window. "you're so pretty, keigo..."

he went a little red but smiled softly. "that's my line, angel," and then he leaned up to steal another kiss from you.

eventually you both settled down, laying in bed together and talking about your days. keigo told you about having to chase down a bank robber and some purse snatchers, and how a little old lady asked for help getting her cat down from a tree. you snickered at the thought.

the atmosphere turned serene as you both laid there. you were close enough that your breaths mixed and your foreheads touched, his hands absentmindedly running over your soft skin and the curves of your body. "so how was your day?" he whispered.

"it was okay. I had a shorter day at work, so I went shopping and I got some new clothes..." you sat up and walked over to where the bags were discarded before he tossed you on the bed. "want to see them?"

he whined a little when you walked away but quickly sat up as well, nodding his head at the second part. "I'd never pass up the chance to see you trying on clothes, baby, who exactly do you take me for?"

you smiled and shook your head fondly. "alright, alright. sit tight, I'll be back," you said and headed to the connecting bathroom, ignoring his grumbling about how you were depriving him of getting to see the best part.

and when you came back out, in a pretty little sundress, twirling so he could get the full effect, he stared at you in awe.

he knew from past shopping trips and many teary conversations with you that finding clothes you actually felt confident in could be… difficult. of course he thought you looked amazing in everything, and if he had it his way, he’d buy every single outfit you even glanced at, but there was just something so alluring about seeing you happy and proud in clothes you felt good in.

“such a pretty girl…” he murmured to no one in particular. it looked a bit like he was in a trance as he took in your figure. attempting to hold back a shy smile from forming at his words, you looked down at the ground to keep yourself from getting too flustered.

he grinned and held his hand out for you once your eyes met his again. taking it, he gently pulled you towards him to stand in between his legs and rested his chin on your sternum, not once breaking eye contact. his hands moved to toy with the hem of your dress.

“I mean it, you’re absolutely stunning. the prettiest girl I’ve ever laid eyes on... my pretty girl.”

you couldn’t hold back your smile this time and he adored the way your lips curled upwards, how your eyes flitted around the room, staring at anything but him, clearly affected by his words.

he sent a feather out to tilt your chin back towards him and he was suddenly reminded of something.

“ah right- I have something for you,” he dug something out of his pocket and proudly presented you with what looked like a thin brown faux leather string…

with a bright red feather attached to it.

you gasped and took the item into your hands, closely inspecting it. you treated it with the utmost care, as if it were your most prized possession. it very well might’ve been.

the string had a clasp at the back to make it easier to put on and remove, and it looped around the... stem? bone? (you made a mental note to clarify with keigo later) of the feather multiple times. it was secured with a thin silver wire to ensure it wouldn’t slip out before the rope continued on to the other end of the hook.

he actually had one of his feathers turned into a necklace for you.

“keigo, I… this is incredible, oh my goodness!” you beamed at him and leaned down to properly hug him.

he was incredibly perceptive. of course he knew that all those times you had jokingly asked him about keeping one of his feathers with you were actually silent requests. even if you’d never outright ask him, he could tell you longed to have a piece of him with you. especially when he had to wipe your tears before a long mission and you stared longingly at his wings. he took pride in the fact that you found comfort in them.

who was he to deny the love of his life? what’s one feather from his arsenal gone, anyway? it was going towards the cause of making you happy, and most importantly, there was the added bonus of keeping you safe.

“here, let me put it on for you,” he said, gesturing for you to sit on his lap and hand him the necklace.

you got settled and he happily clasped the ends of the string together at the back of your neck. the bottom of the feather rested just above the neckline of your dress and you touched it gingerly.

as soon as it rested against your skin, he took control of it and ran it across your cheek, making you giggle and pull away a bit.

“thank you, keigo, I love it.” you turned around on his lap to face him and pressed your lips against his.

he hummed into the kiss and pulled away with a sly smile. “of course, baby. besides,” he toyed with one of the straps on your shoulder. “it goes with your new dress, don’t you think?”

you put your arms around his shoulders, gently stroking the arches of his wings and nodded in agreement. he placed his hands on the tops of your thighs and gently squeezed. “wanna see if it goes with my other dresses, too?”

“oh, absolutely. but..." he shifted a bit and pulled you closer, so that you were fully pressed against him. "I don't think I've appreciated this one enough... what do you think?" he slowly trailed his eyes up from your legs to meet yours.

you tilted your neck forward to rest your forehead against his. "I think that you'll find some of the other things I bought more interesting than a sundress, keigo."

his sly smile turned into something more eager and you laughed when he dramatically flopped backwards on the bed with a groan. "you're too good for me, angel, seriously. what did I ever do to deserve you?"

you offered him a shrug and a tiny smile of your own. "exist."

his eyes widened a fraction and you could tell that your words deeply affected him from the way they welled up. he cleared his throat to cover up any emotion in his voice and sat up again to cup your cheek, murmuring "sweet girl, you'd better hurry up and try on those other dresses, because if you're not off my lap in three seconds, I'm gonna pounce, and we're not leaving this room 'til we're both spent."

butterflies erupted within you and he watched fondly as you gasped and ran off to keep your little fashion show up and running.

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BONUS:

the following days after receiving his gift were... not surprising in the slightest.

you always knew when keigo was taking a break or in his office doing paperwork because he took every opportunity to bug you with his (your) feather.

every. single. one.

and you also knew before he even had the necklace made that if he were to ever give you one, this would likely happen. he was a menace, after all. part of his charm, he always said.

at first it was a bit embarrassing having to fight with a feather in front of your coworkers (who weren't aware you were dating a pro hero, so they probably thought you were some fangirl who bought faulty, cheap merch of his), but it very quickly became endearing.

cause yeah, if he knew you were going to be around people he'd make life difficult for you and then take all of your whines and complaints with a mischievous grin when he walked through the door, clearly lying when he said he'd take it down a notch.

but when he knew you were alone? or having a particularly stressful day? all you had to do was lightly tug on the necklace. upon your signal, he'd immediately take control of the feather and bring it up to caress your cheek, run along your neck or tap your nose.

honestly, you wouldn't have it any other way. you adored his playful side, and he knew he could get away with most things via feather necklace. even if it was only because you were too flustered to scold him for anything anymore by time he got back. complaints soon turned into requests for cuddles and wanting to return all the affection you received.

the feather necklace was a gift for you, sure, but it definitely benefitted him as well.

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I edited this super quickly, so apologies if there's any mistakes! I'll find them eventually when I look back at this fic and end up contemplating my choices to post without properly editing :')

hope you enjoyed!! <3

#hawks x reader #hawks x fem!reader #hawks x reader fluff #keigo takami x reader #hawks fluff #keigo takami x reader fluff #bnha x reader #mha x reader #bnha x reader fluff #mha x reader fluff #fem!reader

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