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i-smoke-chapstick · 1 month

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Hi! Plz may I request smth super smutty and likely weird with the Valeska twins and a dom reader? (Hell, make it poly if you want!😏😉 if not, separate is also fine🥰 ) I just love the thought of those two getting fucked senseless, they'd be so pretty 😘 maybe including but by no means limited to: pegging, slight mommy kink, edging, over stim, bondage... etc... and followed up by some really fluffy aftercare 🥰

As for a song, my brain keeps going back to Mz. Hyde by Halestorm. So that, I guess!

‘MZ. HYDE,

-GOTHAM!VALESKA TWINS X READER-

⋆ 𝐒𝐘𝐍𝐎𝐏𝐒𝐈𝐒 ; The Valeska twins meet their match ;)

⋆ tags/warnings. GOTHAM!valeska twins x female reader. SMUT!!! wrote hcs ahh!! FemDom!reader, readers a brat tamer. THREESOME!! Bondage, pegging, overstimulation, mommy kink, and more!!! some incestous undertones on jerome’s part but not really. I love dom!reader sm <3 ty for this request gave me a random burst of motivation. Fluffy aftercare ofc <3 our boys need love !!! after getting their brains fucked out

♫ “I will gently violate your mind, before I tuck you in / my poison is your remedy.” Mz. Hyde by Halestorm

⋆ Taming these boys is hard, but boy is it worth it.

⋆ First and foremost, how you ever managed to get them to share you is a miracle. But, reader, you have the both of them wrapped around your finger.

⋆ They are both completely two different types of subs, but both brats in different ways. Jerome especially.

⋆ Starting off with Jerome, he practically feeds off everything you say. He vies for your attention so desperately, and your degradtion; for both him and his brother alike. Every word you say, he’s hanging off of. He’s so desperate to be punished, it’s hard to resist.

⋆ Jerome is definitely a lot more teasing. He’ll stretch out on the kingsized mattress in all his glory, preening like a cat, ready to be taken. His eyes light up in a crazed expectation, excitement filling him. His cock is throbbing at your words. Every single “You’re a sick fucking animal.” You utter to him while he writhes below you, he loves. He gets drunk on being degraded.

⋆ Speaking of which, he wants to be fucked like an animal in heat. If you two are fucking, he’ll want to grab your hips, whining loudly, trying to control your movements. You’ll have to slap his hands away, and he’ll pout and growl. If you’re pegging him, he’s grinning and giggling like a maniac, trying to spew out vague jokes and insults, only for you to shut him up with each thrust. When you hit that sweet spot inside of him, his eyes are rolling back, and he’s pausing in his speech- faltering under your touch.

⋆ He also loves watching you peg his brother; it’s thrilling for him to see his typically always-in-control brother who typically ruins his fun be shut up for once and just take it. He’ll laugh and point as he watches, 100% getting off on the degradation of his brother.

⋆ “How’s it feel, brother?” Jerome is taunting, palming his cock in his hand, making fun of Jeremiah. Jeremiah isn’t pleased in the slightest, but it’s hard to snarl something back when he’s getting his hole fucked deep and senseless.

⋆ I’ve mentioned before, Jerome never shuts up. So you’ll have to make him. Make that ginger CHOKE on your strap-on, shoving it down his throat. Watch him wildly gag and look up at you with big almost innocent eyes. His spit will dribble down onto the make-shift cock, making a sloppy mess of his mouth.

⋆ Jeremiah is much more composed, but also gets a kick out of finally seeing his brother shut the fuck up for once in his life.

⋆ Unlike Jerome, Jeremiah is much more hesitant to be dominated, pegged, or tied up. He’s a bit of a narcotic control freak- he’s spent his whole life trying to be in control, so it’s harder to get him to cave.

⋆ You’ll have to be more methodical in your approach. It will take awhile for him to to want to be pegged, so you start small- with slow and sopping blowjobs, feeling him trying to thread his hands through your hair. Everytime he reaches out for you, you’ll remove your lips from his cock, and his lip will curl with annoyance. At first he’ll be angry, constantly trying to give you commands, but it’s useless unless he wants to cum. By the end of it, you’ll have the man begging for your mouth back on his member, through raw tears from being edged hours on end.

⋆ Jeremiah will beg, and that level of submission will break him. From then on, he’ll trust you more, and realize his brother might be right- it is fun to let go. From then on, the two of them will practically worship you.

⋆ They are both big fans of being overstimulated. Jerome will be whining, rolling his head and eyes back, tongue out his mouth. You’ll watch his chest heave with each stroke, sticky cum staining your hand and sheets. Restraints holding him firmly in place. Jeremiah will be murmuring senseless pleads for you to stop, but when he cums over and over, he can hardly complain. He will thrust up into your hand, trying desperately to pull against the ropes around his wrists and legs.

⋆ Jerome has more of a mommy kink then Jeremiah does; and it’s a sore subject for him. It slips out randomly during one of your sexcapades, and Jeremiah will look at him incredulously before laughing. It’s his turn to taunt Jerome now. THIS will get under Jerome’s skin, and he’ll go red in the face, lip trembling while he struggles not to cum right then and there from the sheer humilation.

⋆ In terms of aftercare, PLEASE take care of these boys. Jerome will be overtly clingy, and Jeremiah overtly embarrassed. Jeremiah will insist he takes a shower first, and Jerome will be glad to have your sole attention in the mean time.

⋆ Both of them aren’t used to being taken care of. And both of them feel infinitely grateful. When I say they would do anything for you, I mean anything. Que Jeremiah watching you clean him up, looking at you like your the only pure thing in the world from lidded eyes. Jerome is equally as intrigued, never being treated with a soft touch before you.

⋆ Expect playful banter by the time you clean them up, mostly from Jerome. You’ll be cuddled up together in the sheets, Jerome’s head laying on your thighs, and Jeremiah’s head laid between your breasts.

⋆ “So…Y/N, which one of us has the bigger dick?”

⋆ “You two are literally identical, Jerome.”

⋆ “She just doesn’t want to hurt your feelings. It’s obviously me.” Jeremiah will snidely chime, small smirk on his face.

⋆ The sibling rivalry continues to persist, Jerome sticking his tongue out at him and blowing a raspberry on your thighs, which tickles.

⋆ Like I said, you have these two boys wrapped around your finger.

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dropthedemiurge · 2 days

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Some language comments for Gray Shelter [Episode 5], just like I promised!

"Do whatever/however you want to. (literally: 'Do it the way your heart desires') You do things how you want to anyway."

"I'm sorry" - the translation is correct, it's just it's funny how Yoondae's level of apology to his friend he just lashed out at last time + he wants to ask him for HELP, and all he says is: 미안 (mian). The most informal and short way of apologizing possible. He's so teenager-minded still.

Even when he asks "Can I leave my stuff in your dad's warehouse?" it comes out grammatically more of a demand, like 'Let me do that'. Yoondae is talking like someone who has a lot of walls and doesn't reach out to people, he doesn't talk kindly but he's honest and straightforward and he cries easily but he's very angry about it.

I especially love his facial expression, even when he's at his most miserable, he'll make it everyone else's problem, as if being pitiful is the worst thing that could happen to him. "I have no one else I could ask for help but you >:(("

Fun fact about Korean's sentence structure, when you quote someone or express your thoughts, you put your sentence this way: "quoted phrase" and then + "that's what they said/what i thought/etc". So oftentimes, I see Kdramas use that trick when characters say a phrase... and then take it back with "that's someone else's thoughts" or "that's what you thought I'd say, right? LMAO". It's funny how the translators' way of transferring this was using the word "Sike!" xD

"It wasn't a mistake to me." "If it wasn't a mistake, then [what]? Since you started talking [about it], let me ask you. So what if it wasn't a mistake? What do you want to achieve with me?" "Can I do anything about it? In the past or now, you're the one who runs away and avoids me. I asked you, can I make a decision (do I have any choices)?" "You made the move but you want me to decide? Fine, then. Let sleep together once and end it once and for all. Go wash up first. I don't have time, I only left office for a short time."

The way they both care about each other but their dialogues and words are very sharp and bitter almost all the time, especially here, aaaah. That's the contrast that hooked me for all these 5 episodes. Soohyuk doesn't swear but he's talking to Yoondae very harshly and emotionless here, and for Yoondae harsh talk is the default, it's like Soohyuk is lowering his manners to talk on his level, to provoke him (or maybe that's also how he distances himself from the discovery that Yoondae has feelings for him).

And Yoondae is holding back his frustration and tears, but he understands the way such words were aimed to hurt him, so instead of lashing out back at Soohyuk, as he probably wants him to, he swallows and unusually calmly, almost softly says: "Let's talk when you can be honest. Because I will shut up and wait for you."

And it makes Soohyuk stand there in shock and contemplate.

I'll add next scenes in READ MORE since this post is getting long!

Here's the moment when the boss asks their youngest employee to write something more 'trendy' for their marketing text xD It's very true that trends in Korea come and go very quickly, they also love to invent new terms and phrases all the time. Like "MZ slang", there are many phrases, and the one trendy phrase the boss uses as the example is 킹받네 (king-pad-nae) which literally written as 'receive the king' but means "I got angry" - but with a teasing/playful subtext, like friends could say each other 'ah you're so cute, it makes me angry'.

If I'm not wrong, this phrase was widely used like 1-2 years ago and not really in its trendy peak as well right now but kudos to boss to even learning it xD And it's funny how translator chose to (I assume) use "[living in my head] rent-free" phrase as a substitute. Another fun fact, they ended up using some trendy lingo in their ad that translator gave us as "no cap!" but that part of phone msg was so blurry, I couldn't see which exact Korean phrase they ended up using x)

"Hyung, if you have any ask for help, say so. For you, 2 million... No, I'll try to give you until 3 million won in any way."

Can I just say that we had this character for one moment and I'm so not ready to let him go, I want Jeongwan to have his own storyline and everything and he's too sweet and also caring for strangers/his colleagues, and so he stole the spotlight for me xD

Yoondae said there's no food at home. But also, as you can see, there is: beer, water, rice that you can cook in the microwave, kimchi for a side dish and some other microwaved food. According to my Korean friends, typical Korean person (poor like student) can survive if they have rice, kimchi and also ramyeon. That's their the most basic food. Just a fun fact. xD

Also he was on his third can of beer, and he already made a drunken longing call on the verge of tears to Soohyuk, lying about being hurt and bringing trouble just so he'd return home. "Is that okay with you?" - just shoot me, please. :')

"I called [the cleaning service/you] to tell you to stop it [sleeping outside of home]" "Let's have that dinner [that I promised you] today. Wait for me."

After days, Yoondae was ready to give up, he "tricked" Soohyuk to return home just so he could tell him he'll move out and stop pushing any talk. And then, Soohyuk brought up the dinner (the feelings) that he kept avoiding. No wonder Yoondae looked so struck and confused. It just gave him his hopes back (and viewers too, but we probably should've known better with this kind of series haha)

Interesting cultural context: they are getting samgyeopsal - grilled meat, chosen by Soohyuk because Yoongdae said there wasn't anything he wanted to eat. And usually, the youngest one has to set the cutlery and grill meat, out of respect for the seniors. And here we see that Soohyuk is the one choosing the place, menu and even grilling the meat and pouring soju for Yoondae.

Once again, it shows that despite Yoondae's emotions and pleads, he is not mature enough, he is not ready to focus on other people. We know he can't plan his own future, he doesn't know what to do, and we see where their relationship stands now - Yoondae is still more of a burden than an equal partner to Soohyuk, and Soohyuk is more of a parent.

Even when they drink soju (in Korean drinking etiquette usually you don't drink alone, you toast together and drink together), notice how they don't even clink their glasses together, then Soohyuk is the only one drinking and Yoondae wants to follow him but puts the glass back. He's taking a shot later, when Soohyuk grills the meat again. They are totally unsynchronized at this point of their lives, and it's painful to watch.

"I said he [my father] was dead because that's the truth/reality for me. There was no other [hidden] meaning. I didn't plan to lie to you."

"I moved out completely. If I don't organize my life starting from doing this, then I don't think I'll be able to live like all the other [normal] people."

The fact that Yoondae started thinking about improving his life (the word 'organizing'), immediately made Soohyuk stop in surprise. So he started asking what does the normal life like others mean to him, hopeful to find that equal adult footing from Yoondae... but Yoondae's thoughts stopped there. And Soohyuk offered his own goal and life meaning: "to have a place to go back to, that's enough for me".

Here's when Yoondae thoughtfully agreed with him: "It's important to have a home", and took the meat tongs from Soohyuk, saying how high-maintenance he is. Yoondae embraced that realization, he took the responsibility (even a small cultural gesture) and even though Yoondae nagged him, Soohyuk smirked. Because it wasn't a completely hopeless situation. And Yoondae proved it, by saying how eating like this and going home together is his normal life as well. (and yet they were still unsynchronized until the very end! we can't have happy ending yet)

AND HERE IS WHERE I HAVE TO MAKE A SECOND POST! Because tumblr only allows 30 images in one, and I can't stop screenshotting the last conversation so I'm going to make another post that you can find in 'gray shelter comments' or 'dropthemeta' tags (upd. or here's the link to the post!)^^

#gray shelter comments #gray shelter #gray current #dropthemeta #kbl #korean bl #kactors #grey shelter #bl series #soohyuk x yoondae #language details #language #korean language #korea #korean culture #things you didn't notice

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ghastlytofu · 7 months

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I listened to Kamina's "All The King's Horses" while writing this. If you feel like crying about Wyll today. :)

Titled 'joke's on you i'm into that shit' while it sat in my drafts and you know what..? Still applies. Consider this chapter one of at least two, prompt courtesy of @hiriaeth: "Wyll offering Astarion to feed but feeling guilty bcse it's not just about keeping Astarion healthy it's cause he's really into it for sexy and deeply personal reasons" and @mz-elysium's replies positing masochist Wyll. I can only hope I deliver.

This ended up being very introspective and soppy, slightly gory? And probably only sexy if you're an unholy but SOFT monsterfucker like me, so. Fair warning.

(Still working on my other prompts!)

They are knee-deep in gnolls, which is one thing - but the next, oh, before they've cleaned the blood off their blades they're set upon by what appear to be human slavers. Thayan, perhaps, though Wyll can't say for certain. Normally not much of a challenge for adventurers of their ilk - there are no Red Wizards among them, only the grunts and thieves that make their lives easier, but they are fresh off a much harder fight and haven't had time to rest when the first strike comes.

He keeps the location of his companions in mind as he casts Arms of Hadar, sending necrotic power surging menacingly towards his target. It finds it, he notes grimly as the man screams, and Wyll ducks and takes him with his rapier, bloodspray hitting the soft soil like rain. A few paces behind him Shadowheart's mace crushes the skull of an unfortunate rogue and she's rushing to aid Lae'zel, casting quick healing spells to treat what looks like a sprained or broken ankle and - he winces - some kind of acid burn running up her leg, effectively taking them out of the fight, at least for the moment.

Wyll moves to cover them. Successive eldritch blasts slam into the only archer left, felling him. There are at least three more melee combatants on the field, and that's if they don't have reinforcements. They have to move quickly. Lae'zel stumbles to her feet with Shadowheart's assistance, already swinging her greatsword and Astarion -

He hasn't seen Astarion, until now. Hasn't needed to; knew that he would've slipped into cover of darkness when first the fight began, and that he has. He takes one of their foes by surprise, his whirling daggers at their wicked work as one plunges into her heart, the other arcing across her throat. She falls.

There's screaming, and burning. Someone is on fire to his right - another of their enemies, and over the noxious stench of burning flesh and the rising smoke he sees their suffering ended with a swift strike of Lae'zel's massive sword.

There was one more, wasn't there?

He turns, but it's too late. The enemy is upon him, driven by desperation and fear at witnessing his fellows' violent deaths to strike wildly and carelessly, but it's enough at this range. He can't avoid the blade, can't think fast enough to make the mortal wound a minor injury, steels himself against the impact -

It doesn't come. Not like he expects. The blade bites through his armor and grazes his flesh, but he isn't skewered. He turns to see - Astarion, backlit by the afternoon sun, one hand gripping his would-be killer's hair and the other grasping his shoulder. Faster than Wyll can think, he's plunging his fangs into his attacker's strong neck.

Astarion has kept to his word all these long weeks. Animals and hostiles only, he'd promised, hand over his unbeating heart. And when those bodies inevitably fell in the heat of battle - throats torn, blood burbling through gaping wounds and into Astarion's eager waiting mouth -

Wyll watches the slaver struggle, watches his struggling cease. Astarion is - Astarion is drinking deeply, hungrily, Wyll can hear him swallowing greedily as he devours the man before him. A wicked man, a man who'd every intention of ending Wyll's life just moments ago. He has never seen it. Like this, before. It's too intimate. Through the faint sucking sounds, Wyll's - he finds himself staring at those teeth, and after a moment his one working eye meets Astarion's two, catching over the almost-limp body of his. Food.

He knows it's a mistake as soon as it happens - his head throbs with psionic energy, and Astarion's eyes go wide. He is still drinking as he sees-feels Wyll's morbid interest through their tadpoles: something beyond simple gratitude for thinning their enemies' ranks (as had happened in the past: with all professional gravitas, of course, "I appreciate you doing your part to ensure our little group lives to see another day," he'd say. "One hunter to another.")

But underneath. His tadpole squirms - underneath lies the heart of his fascination, and he knows Astarion is consuming it as surely as he's consuming their foe: for every time he's witnessed an enemy die in Astarion's arms, Wyll is alight with pity and envy in equally terrible measure, a heady concoction that flies in the face of everything The Blade of Frontiers stands for: Gods, I wish it were me.

The body falls. The spell breaks.

They return to camp.

There is no use beating around the bush.

With their illithid connection, he knows he's been had. There is no point denying it. He'll have to explain himself or risk being subjected to endless teasing - has to hope that Astarion is feeling particularly magnanimous tonight. Because.

He does want to help. He always has. He feels earnestly that Astarion shouldn't have to go hungry - that no one in their camp ought to go hungry - wading through uncertain days and nights when there was a ready supply of fresh food available. It was only practical.

And yet...

It gnaws at him, how much he wants it. How easy it is to get lost in the fantasy of those sharp canines penetrating his skin, his flesh and blood yielding to hungry ministrations. He imagines his own hot blood coursing through Astarion's body, warming him up. Of being the flush in his cheeks, the throbbing in his loins -

Well.

It's a recurring thought, suffice to say.

It burns within him - something hot and hungry that was stoked inside long before the Hells got their hands on him. He expects Astarion's face to be mocking when he confronts him at camp that evening, perhaps just this side of cruel - the man takes his petty pleasures where he can, and following the life he's lead Wyll can hardly blame him - but instead the rogue's looking at him thoughtfully, tapping his chin as he saunters forward. Considering.

"You know, dear," he says, keeping some distance between them. But not much. "This could be quite fortuitous for you and I," and he gestures between them, easy and graceful, as if there could be any doubt about whom he speaks.

Charming bastard. My, but he is in deep.

Astarion's voice hasn't fallen into a seductive register, as one might expect. The tone one supposes he would've - might've - used to entice innumerable patriars of the past.

Not that Wyll's thought about it.

But he does sound hungry. Underneath the civility, there's an edge. And Wyll is intensely aware of that gaze on him - of his own heart hammering away in his chest, a bird beating against the bars of its cage.

It's almost worse because he trusts Astarion. It would be so much easier if he didn't, if the vampire spawn were just another monster to slay. He could be righteous then, and not want, and not wonder.

But wonder he does, and Astarion's incessant teasing doesn't help. Oh, not that Wyll minds as such - finds him more charming than not, by and large an agreeable menace - but some words rattle in his brain more than others: Astarion admitting within three feet of him, bold as day that he'd favor a taste of Wyll's blood above all others. No question, he'd said, and hasn't that thought kept him up countless sweaty nights.

Perilous were the waters of flattery when the source was such a danger. And Astarion was dangerous - is dangerous, deadly even. And catty, and brave. Surprisingly sweet under all the bluster and defensive sarcasm. He's proven a steadfast ally and delightful company to boot, if a tad knife-happy. And even were that not the case, Wyll thinks. He's of no mind to condemn any creature that isn't actively preying on innocents.

He's not sure if he counts himself among them.

He's struck by the memory of a book he once read, tucked away in his father's study. Certainly not meant to be seen by his young prying eyes, The Salty Mermaid was as debauched as it was dramatic, the salacious and harrowing tale of the mermaid Allura, a beautiful and brave battlemaiden of the sea, and the hapless half-elven fisherman that loved her.

Descriptions of desire and alien anatomy - the salt spray painting the scales of the mermaid's tail, running in rivulets down her iridescent body, slick in secret places. Her lover's tongue tracing them tirelessly, feverish in his devotion to her pleasure. She was known. She was heeded.

To this day the memory of that damnable book inevitably has him swelling in his smallclothes, clenching his thighs in a hopeless attempt to alleviate the arousal that builds in him. He's never thought of himself as a man of peculiar tastes - has always considered himself rather old-fashioned in love, if he's being honest - but it leaves an imprint on his memory that's tied directly to the fire within him - a chord that resonates in every nerve of his body, plucked by Astarion's knowing smile.

He can see his fangs.

Drivel, his father had called it. But still Ulder kept it in his drawer, a shameful but coveted secret tucked away like so much hoarded treasure. An action that befuddled young Wyll at the time.

He thinks he understands it better, now.

He doesn't want to. Use. And that is the crux of it - this mad desire to be bitten feels at odds with his sincere desire to see Astarion well-tended to, however symbiotic they may seem on the surface, and this is the why of it:

Motive is important. He's always argued - staked his very soul on the principle - that intent matters. It's how he's justified seven years in Mizora's service. He signed that contract for the people, and that has to matter, because if it doesn't. If it doesn't, and his soul is damned for naught -

That thought threatens to consume him, or it would if given any chance of flourishing. Wyll does not let it see the light of day. He cannot afford to dwell on such things. So he doesn't.

What does he have that's his? His heart for the Gate, laying there at his father's feet. His soul to the Hells, and now his body: Mizora has taken them both. All he has is his duty to the Coast, and here is someone who needs him, plainly.

He steels himself. Swallows around his shame, and speaks. He owes his friend an explanation - and Astarion is his friend, despite the odds.

"It isn't- I don't want you to think that's why," he starts.

"And whyever not?" Astarion interjects, voice honey-tempered and calm. He is very still, and Wyll feels clumsy, inadequate. He is twenty-four and feels like a foal, stumbling and uncertain. He has never had this conversation before. Hardly understands that which he's so desperate to communicate.

"I want to help you," he says, somewhat helplessly. It feels pathetic. He feels pathetic. But it's-

"But you want it," it's not a question. Astarion's tone is sharp, leaving little room for doubt though his face is not unkind. He nods thoughtfully without waiting for Wyll's response, seeming to have come to some conclusion within himself.

"Yes," Wyll says anyway, because he owes the man an honest answer. It would not do to lie now. He doesn't squirm, but only because he's had a lifetime of uncomfortable confrontations eerily similar to this: he's six years old standing stock still in front of his father, fighting against his trembling legs. He's ten, he's fourteen, he's -

He's seventeen, and Ulder Ravengard says go.

Wyll banishes the thought from his mind, but not before Astarion shoots him a knowing look, surely experiencing echoes of his unwelcome ghosts via the parasites nestled in their heads. He sighs.

"What do you want from me, Astarion? Yes, it's tempting. I don't- it isn't a consideration I want you to place above your own needs. It doesn't matter. We can drop it," he offers.

There is a lengthy pause. He hears only insects in the distant night, his own blood rushing in his ears. There is the faint whisper of his breathing; Astarion's chest is still.

"Or we could not drop it," Astarion responds evenly. Steady. It is a second option. Astarion is giving him a second option.

Something in him buckles, and he takes a step forward. Astarion grins victoriously - excited, gleeful even, the prospect of what's to come lending to his countenance a certain joie de vivre seldom seen on the road. "My dear," he coos, fully stepping into Wyll's space now. "Consider how we might take care of one another." One hand winds about the back of his head, caressing a horn. The other lands on his shoulder and Wyll relaxes into the touch, a familiar gallantry, his arms coming up tentatively to rest on Astarion's waist, earning him a brilliant smile.

It is a peace offering, Wyll recognizes. A familiar script he can follow, and he sighs with relief and gratitude. He has the distinct impression that the other man is indulging him with such pageantry, letting him play the strapping hero come to this poor vampire spawn's rescue in his time of need, offering selflessly of his body, his blood, though it's clear to him now - in his honest heart - that the two of them are offering of one another.

Ebb and flow, he thinks. Like the sea, sure as the steady thrum in his veins.

He feels... quiet. Perhaps it's the thought that if he says it quietly enough, no one but Astarion will know. "Will it hurt?"

Astarion's cool lips are close to his ear. "Only a little, my sweet," he admits, voice soft. "But you may well enjoy that."

Wyll shivers.

"Worry not, O Blade," he says, nosing along what part of Wyll's jaw he can reach from where they stand. "I like that you like it. Do you think I'd rather be where I'm not wanted?" It's not quite a pout in his voice, but something like it. Wyll can hardly argue, so he nods, feeling discordantly shy.

Astarion steps back. Wyll feels suddenly bereft - cold, though his companion's body is not warm by any measure. But he only takes Wyll's hand, leading him out from under the awning and into his tent proper, pulling him down so that they're kneeling together in the faint light of the hanging lantern. Softly instructing Wyll to lay back, sweetling.

He does as he's told. His breath catches. Some monster hunter, he thinks, in a voice not unlike his father's. Considers this moment, considers countless others in his recent and not so recent past. Thinks of the horns on his head and the fork in his tongue.

The tent smells like Astarion. Blankets and pillows especially, but the dusty tomes, the neatly arranged bottles on a shelf are all evidence of his presence. It's not unpleasant. Faint jasmine perfume, and underneath, traces of blood-iron seem to permeate the air and every surface. Evidence of the not-quite-living. Or... no. Perhaps a different, but equally valid form of existing. It makes him shiver.

Wyll's glad they're not doing this in his tent. He can't bear the thought of laying awake every night in a puddle of his own desperate sweat, triggered endlessly by the inescapable scent-memory of this moment. Such occurrences happen often enough already.

He's splayed out like a meal, and with a dull sort of shock remembers he is one. Astarion's leaning over him now, haloed by the glow of the lantern, shadows cast against the canvas walls of their shelter. His pupils are wide and dark.

He's looking at Wyll like he sees him. Wyll meets his gaze, and with a sort of courage that doesn't remind him at all of the Frontiers, tilts his head back to bare his neck.

"How very considerate of you, darling," his companion murmurs. He draws one hand across Wyll's face - across his day old stubble, his chin, down the scarred line of his throat - pausing significantly at his pulse point, which thunders like a war drum, riotously loud in his ears, he can't imagine what Astarion hears - before continuing his trajectory downward to better brace himself against Wyll's shoulder.

Astarion gives it a squeeze before catching Wyll's eye once more. Seeking confirmation - assurance, perhaps, that Wyll is here with him. That he wants this.

He does, desperately. It is too late to play coy; he owes it to Astarion not to attempt such a thing. So he swallows, and nods, and lays an encouraging hand over Astarion's where it rests on his shoulder. For a moment he worries it's too much. Too tenuous a path to tread in this fragile moment, but Astarion does not pull away. The look that it earns him - Wyll cannot put a name to it. It feels tender and put-together, furious and fraying.

"Thank you," Astarion says, simply.

He leans in, and Wyll closes his eyes.

tbc

#they've invaded my brain like mindflayer tadpoles. i grow wyllstarion tentacles as we speak #baldur's gate 3 #baldur's gate iii #wyll ravengard #astarion ancunin #wyllstarion #bloodpact #bloodfrontier #wyll ravengard x astarion ancunin #fanfiction #fic

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arcadekitten · 7 months

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How I created a dress-up game in RPGMaker!

At least one person asked me to make a guide for this and that’s enough for me! Though, bear in mind, I may not be the best at explaining things and I used an example from assets I already had.

I made the dress-up game pictured below using RPGMaker MV, but I’m sure this method is applicable to versions above MV as well. I will be writing this post specifically through the lens of using MV (You’re also going to need some plugins, but not a lot!). At the time of typing this post, all RPGMaker engines are on sale until October 5th (just to let you know!)

(Please note: This method does not account for a game where you can freely change the colors of characters hair/clothes)

(Please note x 2: this is not a tutorial for learning RPGMaker, but a tutorial on how to make this specific type of game within the engine. Prior RPGMaker experience and familiarity is required when following this tutorial!)

I’m not the best at explaining things, but I’m sure going to try my best!

List of things we’re going to need:

-An RPGMaker Engine, preferably MV (or MZ) since they already come with mouse support.

-An art program

-A tileset consisting of words and arrows

-All your dress-up accessories as PNG images

-A blank PNG image

-2 plugins

First things first is you’re going to want to decide on the canvas size of your game. Keep in mind with the way RPGMaker works, there’s a high chance you’ll wind up with black bars on the side of your screen. If your game is intended to be played in browser on itch.io, it shouldn’t be much of an issue as you can choose the display size on the game’s page to match the visible game. (I also just personally wasn’t concerned about the black bars for a dress-up based game anyways) The canvas I chose to work with for this game was 1152 x 864, but you can choose whatever size you feel will help you draw most effectively(just keep in mind how it might appear in browsers or if the player will have to zoom out!) If using MV, you change your canvas resolution by going into the plugin list and selecting “Community_Basic”

When making the assets in your art program, I find it easiest to have your canvas match the canvas size of the game. We’ll use Nova as our example character for everything. I drew them and all their assets in the center of the screen (for easier mirroring). The position of all the items can be adjusted later in the engine

I would start by doing a few test assets and putting those in the engine to make sure you get the hang of the whole thing, but this is where you’ll be making all your assets for a given character! (So if you wanna make some test assets and then move down to the “Putting it together in the engine” section, that might be a good idea!)

Here I create and separate every asset into their own folders(categories) and subfolders. For example, hats get their own folder labeled “hats”, and the subfolders “hat 1” “hat 2” “hat 3”, etc, each containing their own individual hat asset.

You can make as many or as little categories for clothing as you like. When you have everything you need, make at least one asset from all your categories visible, and make sure all the categories are ordered in the way they are meant to appear in game. This way, you can make sure nothing is overlapping in the incorrect way(at least for what your intentions are). When your categories are properly ordered, keep them in that order, as you’ll use it for a basis later when importing the assets into the engine.

Alright, this next part is a little tedious. Now you’re going to save every asset individually by hiding every other folder/layer except for the one you’re saving. It might help to have a naming convention for your assets, for example all of Nova’s assets follow the scheme of “dressup nova-shoes 4.png” “dressup nova-shoes 5.png” “dressup nova-shoes 6.png” etc etc.

NOTE: In addition to these files, remember to include a BLANK png image with nothing on it! This will help later!

Once this is done, we can start importing them into the program!

Putting it together in the engine:

Open up your RPGMaker project’s file directory. Find the folder named “img”, and in that find the folder named “pictures”. Drop all your clothing/hair/face/etc assets into this folder.

Now we need to set the scene. The scene being…a map! I used multiple characters so my game has a different map for each one.

Since Nova is our example character, let’s focus on Nova’s map.

Make sure the width and height of your map is large enough to cover the whole screen (sans any black bars you might have on the sides). You can fill in the back with tiles, or you can do what I did and add a small parallax backing that loops across the screen. I made a small one with two hearts in the corners for a nice scrolling effect!

To start this map, let’s put in some of the categories to choose between. I did this by laying out the words on a tileset, and drawing that tileset onto the map. The order of categories I chose does not reflect the layer order of clothing items, but rather was organized by what I felt was a natural start-to-finish order progression in a dress-up game.

Don’t worry about putting the choice arrows next to the categories yet, though! We’ll do that in a little bit.

Now we’re going to start with actually putting your character and their clothes/hairs/etc into the map. Double-click anywhere on the map (where you won’t put any other buttons) to create an event.

We are going to set this event to autorun. In this event we are going to set up all your layers, even if nothing needs to be presented on them yet. To start, I added some comments to help me keep track of them. For context, when you choose to show an image in RPGMaker, it asks you for the image number. The image number is essentially the image’s “layer”, with 1 being the bottom-most layer and 100 being the top-most layer. Up to 100 images can be displayed on an RPGMaker screen at any given time. Even though 1 is the bottom-most layer, I chose to start at 10 just in case I wanted to add more layers underneath later. So layer 10 is my bottom-most layer, and layer 24 is my top-most layer.

Let’s start with our bottom-most layer, the background asset.

The background is this pink rectangle behind Nova.

Even if you change its appearance, this background itself is always visible. So we are going to show the first background on layer 10 with the Event Command “Show Picture”.

(Note, because I wanted all the dress-up assets to be on the right side of the screen, every picture’s X position is offset by 200. You may want to offset your game in another way, or keep it centered.)

Because this is an asset that is always visible on the screen, we are also going to set up its variable. Select “Control Variables” in your event commands, set it to a constant of "1" and add it underneath the "Show Picture" command,

Don’t worry about the #number of the variable, all that matters is the number of what the variable equals. As you can see we are showing “dressup nova-BG 1”, so our variable should equal 1 to correspond to this.

The next asset up from that is our back accessory on image layer 11. (Nova can have fairy wings or a yoyo accessory, for example.) The back accessory doesn’t always need to be present, so we will simply set this image as being our BLANK png asset.

We will continue going down the column like this! Any asset that doesn’t need to be present will be set as a blank, and any asset that does need to be present (like Nova’s background, Nova’s hair in the front and back, Nova’s face, and Nova’s base) will be set as the corresponding image and have its variable set to “1”.

(Note: The base does not require a variable as it does not change)

And because this is an autorun event, we have to close it off. Add a control self-switch A, and then add a new event page. On the 2nd event page, merely click off self switch A in the conditions box

Doing this will ensure that the autorun event won’t keep trying to show the images in an endless loop.

Go into your database tab and under system, check that your starting position is on the correct map (if you have more than one) and start your game. Your autorun event should show all the images you asked it to. (I was gonna have a pic here but I'm limited on pics so)

Now, using our category list that we placed as tiles onto the map, we are going to be adding the arrows next to them to make them function.

Even though it's at the bottom, we’ll start with the category Background as an example since that was the first we implemented.

Create an event on the left side of Background and make its event image a grayed-out, left facing arrow, to communicate that the player cannot click anymore in that direction. Set its condition to be variable activated, with your Background variable being greater than or equal to 1. Leave the event page contents blank.

Create a 2nd event page on this event. On this 2nd page, replace the grayed-out arrow with a colored arrow, and set the Background variable to be greater than or equal to 2. This means that as long as the variable is 2 or above, the player can press the back button and go back to see the previous Backgrounds.

This time, we WILL fill up the contents on the event page.

First we are going to put a control variable command. Set your Background variable to subtract a constant of 1. This means that every time the event is clicked, it will subtract 1 from your Background variable (since this is your “Back” button).

Next, we are going to include a conditional branch command like so!

Under this Conditional Branch we put a Show Picture command, where we show an image on layer 10(the same from our autorun event). We can see that if Nova’s Background variable is equal to 1, then layer 10 is going to show the first background–that pink rectangle from before.

Let’s copy-paste this conditional branch and edit it slightly!

Repeat this for every asset you have for a specific category. (In this case, Nova has 5 different backgrounds, with one background needing to be visible at all times.) So our 2nd event page should look like this:

This button event is now ALMOST complete–but we’re missing something!

We need this event to activate when we click on it! Normally in an RPGMV game, when you click on an event, the player character will walk to the event before it can activate. But for a dress-up game, we want the event to activate as soon as it’s clicked on!

Therefore, we need a plugin! You’ll need a plugin that makes events activate based on a click trigger. For me, I downloaded the “TDDP_MouseSystemEx” plugin for MV found here: https://forums.rpgmakerweb.com/index.php?threads/mouse-system-ex.46511/

(Remember to follow the terms of service for whatever plugins you use!)

After adding it to my in-game plugin list and turning it on, I added the “click_activate!” notetag to the event (as instructed by the plugin) and now it works as soon as it is clicked on.

Next, we have to make the Forward Button! This is easier now that we have the Back Button as a base.

To make your Forward Button, we’re going to copy the 2nd Event Page of the Back Button event, and make it the first page of our Forward Button event. We are then going to change three things:

-Remove the condition variable

-Change the image to a right-facing colored arrow

-Change the control variable from a “subtract constant of 1” to an “add constant of 1”

So your first Forward Button event page should look like this!

For the 2nd event page of your forward button, remove all the contents in your content box. Change the arrow to gray-right-facing arrow, and add a condition variable equal to your number of assets for the category.

Because Nova has 5 Backgrounds, our number is 5. If Nova had 7 Backgrounds, this number would be 7. If Nova had 3 Backgrounds, this number would be 3, etc.

This ensures that when a player has clicked to the last asset, they can’t continue increasing the variable past what is needed.

You then continue making these types of Back Buttons and Forward Buttons for every asset, until you have everything you need!

But WAIT!!

For objects that don’t always need to be present, we add one extra conditional statement!

Let’s use socks, for example. Nova does not need to wear socks to complete an outfit. So for the socks’s back button, we make sure to set the variable condition to 0.

After that, under the event contents of our sock buttons, we make sure to add an extra conditional statement for the sock variable. When the variable is zero, we show the BLANK image–so there are no socks to be seen! (Remember to apply this extra statement to both the back and front buttons!) Do this for every asset that doesn’t always need to be present such as socks, dresses, hats, etc etc.

That’s pretty much the basics of all the mechanics you need to get it to work!! I won’t be going over other things like the reset game button/disabling menu access/hiding the player walksprite, as those are things you probably know how to do already if you’re familiar with the engine.

But I WILL share one last piece of optional advice that I feel makes a big difference.

While testing things out you might notice that there is slight lag between changing images, a blip between pictures. This is because RPGMaker doesn’t preload images, and loads in an image as soon as it’s called.

In a downloadable version of a game this slight lag is negligible. However, if you intend for your game to be browser-based, this lag will be significant and noticeable. In order to fix this problem, I’d recommend downloading Galv’s Image Cache plugin found here: https://galvs-scripts.com/2017/04/26/mv-image-cache/

This plugin will help pre-load images so there’s no lag!

However, you will have to write the name of all your assets manually in its plugin menu. If you have a lot of images (which you will, for a dress-up game) this could take a very long time.

My advice is to go into your game’s picture folder, select all, and select “copy file path” from your folder options. Paste this list into an excel sheet, remove the directory name and file extensions, and then paste it into a google doc.

Edit the names together until there is no spaces between image names and they’re all separated by commas. Then, select all and paste your list into the Image Cache plugin’s settings. If you spelled something wrong or placed a space incorrectly, the game will not start and will tell you what image it was struggling to find. So having this to refer back to is very helpful and also means you don’t have to retype everything in the event of an error!

(Below is just a preview of how my list of image names looks for my dress-up game and what i copy-pasted into the plugin settings for the Image Cache plugin)

And thaaaaat should be everything! I hope this wasn’t too hard to follow, or messily formatted! But I tried my best and will try to answer any questions one may have about it!! Good luck creating your dress-up game!

#im so sorry i feel like this is so hard #but i hope it makes at least a little sense!!#i also apologize for the combo images tumblr doesnt let me have more than 30 #guide #rpgmaker #rpgmaker mv #dress up #dress up game #dress up guide #game guide

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marvelavengers74 · 5 months

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Important (for me atleast)

I recently watched the series once upon a time and fell in love with Captain Hook/Killian Jones. Mz problem is that there are not many fics of him(it is a shame). Wattpad has some but they follow 75% the storyline of the series and the rest is just added creativity. But I NEED fics with betrayal/hurt/angst/ lots of fluff/ smut and a happy ending wit Killian Jones. Not just a little fic with 600 words but a huge one. So my question ist... does anyone know a really really good fic with him and OG reader? Or does anyone wants to write Killian jones one shots with many words. I don't think I have the ability to do it myself.

I know it's a lot to ask for but please help a girl out that loves Hook.

#killian jones #ouat #once upon a time #captain hook #killian jones x reader #captain hook x reader #ouat x reader

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ragingbookdragon · 8 months

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The Strange Case Of Dr. Jekyll & Mz. Hyde

Task Force 141 x Reader

Word Count: 740 Warnings: Explicit Language, Archaic Medical Tools (and explanation of lobotomy)

Author's Note: Everyone wanted a part two to this so here you go :) Enjoy! Thorne

**********************************************************************

She smiles when the Lieutenant walks into the clinic, no doubt a scowl on his face beneath the mask, but he says nothing as he stands before her desk. Her eyes crinkle at the edges as she says, “Thank you for coming in, Lieutenant Riley.” She looks to the nurse beyond, watching with interest. “Simone, be a dear and lock the door on your way out, yes?”

The woman nods her head and practically skitters out and she rises from her seat, grabbing a rather large black bag; the thing looks like it’s from the sixteen hundreds. “Sit on the exam table, please.”

He does as she asks and takes a seat, watching the wall as she lifts his shirt and examines the bullet wound beneath the gauze.

“Lieutenant, do you recall my one rule I left you with before your mission?” she pauses and looks him directly in the eye.

“Don’t get injured.”

“Correct!” she smiles. “And if you were, what was the next rule?”

“Apply first aid.”

She tuts and pokes the stitched wound, delighting in his hiss of displeasure. “You seemed to have forgotten my second rule. Never mind that, I shall remind you.”

Her hands drift to the bag and she unlatches and opens it, and the man nearly shits his pants at the archaic surgical tools.

“Did you know that my legally given maiden name is Jekyll? Dr. Jekyll asks. “Some think there’s an ancestor of mine that was actually the basis of the novel with the same name.”

She picks up a tool, a drill and turns it.

“I do so love old medical tools. This one was used to drill into skulls. Mostly to relieve headaches or remove stagnant blood from brains. Sometimes even to treat hemorrhages.” She smiles fondly. “It takes a rather tremendous amount of strength to crank this into someone’s skull. I can only imagine what it was like without anesthesia.”

Putting it down, she picks up a mallet and what looks like an icepick.

“Now these are my favorite.” She holds the mallet in one hand, the pick in the other. “These were used to lobotomize people. One would insert the pick behind the eye socket and break through the little barrier of bone by hitting it with the hammer until it was lodged into the frontal lobes.” She does the motion near the side of his head, his eyes on hers as the pick sinks past his ear. “Then you would jiggle it back and forth until the frontal lobes separated from the thalamus! Thus rendering the patient completely catatonic!”

She puts them down and sighs wistfully.

“Did you know I once worked at a mental asylum where lobotomy was still legalized? I was allowed to sit in on several during my stay in medical school. An archaic but rather interesting process.” her smile is anything but sweet, instead it sends shivers up his spine. “I’ve always wondered what it would be like to administer one myself. Perhaps one day I’ll get such an opportunity? Maybe on someone who disobeys my rules?”

He swallows hard, a man whose entire family murdered, himself buried alive, seen death a million times, and even delivered it, scared shitless of the woman before him.

He understands now why they call her Misses Hyde when she’s angry, no, infuriated and seething.

“Lieutenant? Are you alright?” she repeats, and he shakes himself, abruptly standing before her.

“I, uh, have to go, Doctor,” he says, and runs for the door like his head is on fire and his ass is catching.

“But I didn’t even show you the electro-shock therapy tools I have!”

“No need!” he shouts, unlocking the door and swinging it open. “I won’t disobey rules again!”

He’s out of the door before she can say anything else and the nurse returns moments later with two cups of coffee.

“Did Lieutenant Riley leave, Doctor Jekyll?” she asks.

“He did,” she pouts and latches the bag back, setting it down behind her desk. “And I have a feeling he won’t be back for some time. I was simply telling him stories. They weren’t even true.”

“Such a shame,” the nurse replies. “He’s awfully handsome.”

“If you like masked men.”

“As if you don’t like the Phantom of the Opera,” the nurse grins, handing her a cup. “You know he’s handsome.”

“Perhaps, he is,” she says back, sipping her coffee with a maniacal grin.

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absolutebl · 2 years

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Asian Honorifics & BL - a quick & dirty guide, with examples

You ready for another one of my long broad brush linguistics in BL posts? (As always check the comments for people better than me correcting or adding content. Also I will be updating this post as long as Tumblr lets me fiddle with it.)

Codicil: I’m a dilettante who loves the cultural side of linguistics, and loves to help people understand BL better via language. I attempt to explain things using very simplistic terms and an anthropological approach, I am aware that it’s a lot more complicated. But I’m doing my best.

Codicil 2: This is meant to help BL watchers, not to guide tourists who in intend to travel to these countries.

Honorifics in General - the concept

Honorifics = a title or word implying or expressing status, politeness, or respect.

Many Asian languages employ honorifics in a filial manner (distinguishing status along generational lines with regards to birth year, professional relationship, and parental state). Basically calling someone who is NOT an actual blood relation “older brother” (e.g. Korean hyung or oppa) or “younger sibling” (e.g. Thai nong), or auntie (see many Indian or Latin American cultures). These can also be a kind of endearment in romantic relationships.

The closest most westerns can think of this is that the honorific is used as a way to delineate an intimate relationship/friendship across an age gap, but its implications are not always intimacy. (Except when they very much are, see oppa.)

You may be familiar with a phrases like “we’re so close she’s like my sister” or “he’s like a brother to me.”

However, because most westerners exist in relationships to peers only under the broad umbrella term friend, we will only use “like my sister” or “basically my brother” when someone is particularly dear to us but not sexually.

In most Asian languages, honorifics are more codified. So there is a status conferred by age which dictates honorifics be used. They’re mandatory for communication. Intimacy levels between individuals CAN impact this, but are not the primary decider on what honorific is used under most circumstances. Position in society is.

So these terms are often defined (or even translated) with sibling language. See early Thai BLs translate phi as bro, but that’s not strictly correct.

There are also often honorifics for larger age gaps (so more like auntie or uncle, delineating relationships like adult neighbors or a friend’s parents, or parents’ friends).

And there are honorifics for people in authority positions (like doctors, teachers, bosses) who are usually older (but not always). These honorifics are employed in the arenas of education, hobby activities (like ceramic classes or martial arts) and the workplace.

For many, informality of older to younger will be characterized by use of casual (or rude) language and lack of honorifics (from the older person to the younger one). So the older character will have one mode of address and way of talking, while the younger character exists in a more formal register when they are speaking back to someone older.

In other words, an older person can speak informally to a younger one, but not the reverse. (Yaja time excepted...)

Complexity of Honorifics as Elements of Language

Honorifics can function as titles:

Honorifics can be translated as/like titles. This is is the kind of thing we are most familiar with: Mister, Mrs, Mz, Miss, Master, Mistress, Sir, Madam, Ma’am are all, technically, honorifics. So are certain forms of address and royal titles, “The honorable” for example. Anything you might put in front of a name to add formality in English probubly qualifies as an honorific.

Honorifics can function as pronouns:

Or modes of address. For example the title boss, in English can also be used to call or refer to someone directly. “Hi, boss!” or “my boss” or “the boss says.” Honorifics serve the same function. In this way they can become pronouns. You can, in Korean, just call someone “hyung” it acts as the you pronoun for direct address. And often they can also be used in the 3rd person. So my “hyung” did such and such. This is why hyung = brother in a lot of translations. Because English uses brother in much the same way, it can act as both a 2nd or 3rd person pronoun. (Rarely first, but that’s an issue with English, that our first person pronoun is so inflexible.)

In Thai you can refer to a friend as phi (you pronoun in direct address, or use it as a she/he/they pronoun in third person) or you may refer to yourself as phi (using it as an I pronoun). In other words, phi can entirely replace a person’s name in all linguistic uses.

He/She/They goes to the store = phi goes to the store (when talking about my older friend to someone else)

I go to the store = phi go to the store (when talking to a younger person about my own actions), and

you go to the store = phi go to the sore (when talking to an older friend about something they are going to do - direct address)

Honorifics are also suffixes:

In Korean and Japanese honorifics are also attached to names in the form of suffixes. See the Japanese section. (Also sometimes prefixes, argh.)

Honoring is also attached to particles:

In Thai, polite particles confer respect levels as well, which means they also contain within them certain aspects of status and honorifics. See the Thai section.

The best way to understand honorifics in BL is by example.

Ready?

Korean - Honorific titles: Hyung, Noona, Oppa & Beyond

I’m starting with Korean because it is the most spoken and understood by westerners these days. I can only address this as a layperson who watches too many Kdramas.

Korean names in brief:

In Korea names are said family name first (what we call surname or last name) and then given name second (what we would call first name). Usually the family name is single barreled or one syllable, but the given name is double barreled or two syllables. So: Chu Sang Woo = Chu (family name) Sang Woo (given name, always said together). This is why I will usually refer to BL characters by their first name as a combo, e.g. SangWoo. In formal address, however is would be Chu SangWoo-ssi. Usually the entire name is said (see comments). Even when JaeYoung is being rude he usually says “Chu SangWoo.”

Korean honorifics you’ll hear:

Hyung | hyeong 형 - is said by a younger male when addressing an older male. I will use the term Hyung Romances for BLs that feature a younger seme pursing and older uke because...

Noona | nuna 누나 - is said by a younger male when addressing an older female and is responsible for the accepted series category “Noona romances” which are dramas that feature a younger boy pursuing an older woman.

Oppa 오빠 - is said by a younger female when addressing an older male. Also used by girlfriends addressing their boyfriends, or wanna-be boyfriends. Under a romantic context oppa is considered somewhat cringe/cheesy/cutsie.

Unni | eonni 언니 - is said by a younger female when addressing an older female.

Sunbae | seonbae 선배 - is said by a younger person to an older person (gender neutral) and is more formal. It can be used in the workplace and it mostly about seniority and less familial.

Hoobae | hubae 후배 - is said to/of a younger person, either across a generational gap, or within a workspace environment, again this one is about seniority and less familial.*

Although an older person’s filial and social responsibility to a youngster is always in play.

In Kpop you’ll hear sunbae used a lot by younger (say 4th gen) groups when referring to older groups within the industry. Or when talking about Kpop idols who they don’t personally know (or are so big they’re nervous about any assumption of intimacy). On reality shows like Queendom or Kingdom it’s particularly telling. Some of the funniest moments of Kingdom Legendary Wars is any time Penal (an American from BTOB - an older v established group) tries to convince the youngsters, some of them 10 years his juniors, to use casual language (drop honorifics). The poor things get SO confused.

BL Deeper Meanings behind Hyung

Okay so the best show to watch for this one is Semantic Error.

SangWoo starts out calling JaeYoung sunbae and rarely goes less formal. Technically sunbae is polite, but also slightly insulting in a university narrative of this type. Let me try to explain. Because as they become more intimate, combative or not, friends or frenemies, SangWoo should switch to using hyung, but he pointedly does NOT.

JaeYoung, on the other hand, always uses extremely informal (to the point of rude) language with SangWoo. (Culturally, he allowed such informality as he is SangWoo’s senior both at university, and in age). But you can watch him get annoyed that SangWoo insists on sticking to sunbae, to the point where he demands SangWoo use hyung.

Then after that, anytime SangWoo does use hyung JaeYoung totally melts for it, because it was hard fought and won, and it means something powerful and significant is shifting in their intimacy as a result.

During the mutual kissing at the bar scene, Semantic Error drops yaja time on us. Yaja time is a sanctified reversal of honorifics that essentially allows for a younger person to speak their mind informally and without repercussions (or supposedly so). It’s a kind of way to flirt and tease, but also somewhat taboo and titillating as a game to play when tipsy. You get yaja time in bars/clubs sometimes, like happy hour. If you watch the final episode of Kpop reality show I-land you’ll see a real word example of yaja time in action amongst the contestants, it’s adorable and very funny.

Semantic Error uses yaja time as an opportunity for drunk SangWoo to finally talk about his real feelings, without the pressure of linguistic formality.

They also use it for JaeYoung to drop the sluttiest most flirtatious hyungs in the history of all hyunging. Seriously, the boy is dripping seduction with that one world. Why? Because HE CAN. He is making the formality itself a kind of kink.

You can watch these two on the promo circuit attempt yaja time and even though they have an easy brotherly relationship, you can still see how uncomfortable it makes Jae Chan in particular.

Other honorific play in Semantic Error:

The girl who is interested in dating SangWoo calls him oppa, and ALSO requests to use a nickname+oppa with him (the nickname means lettuce). That is pretty blatant flirting. But note she specifically asks if she is allowed to do so?

Later when JaeYoung confronts her and stakes his claim, notice the thing he really wants corrected is her language with SangWoo? He wants her to go all the way beyond sunbae to formality by using the honorific suffix 씨 (ssi). But there’s also more lettuce wordplay here (I think) because he isn’t insisting she use SangWoo’s full name.

“You should call him Chu-ssi” which is translated into English as “Mr Chu.”

A word on oppa and queerness.

Because the implication is that the person saying oppa is female, you will rarely hear boys use this term for their boyfriends (even if they are out gay, unless they are femme and/or cultivating the association for a very specific and culturally subversive of kinky reason).

Exception: non native speakers who are happy to fart around with us and the Korean social structure. So early on, NCT’s (Kpop monster group) Mark (Canadian) would refer to Yuta (Japanese) as oppa. I’m not gonna unpack their relationship, but trust me when I say, no native Korean idol would have ever done this, not right now in Korea’s current social state. Well... maybe Holland but that’s a whole other discussion.

To complicate matters Korean also uses honorific suffixes, but I’m not gonna go into them here. (Read more about Korean honorifics.)

Instead I’m gonna use Japanese to talk honorific suffixes. Ready?

Japanese - Names & Honorifics: suffixes & titles

Like Korean, Japanese uses both suffixes and title honorifics. But I find the suffixes much easier to hear in Japanese than Korean, probubly because I’ve more experience with the language.

Note: As a foreigner in Japan I’ve alway found it best/easiest to refer to someone using surname-san.

Japanese names in brief:

Names are said family name first and then given name. But actually, given names are rarely, if ever, said AT ALL (after an initial introduction).

In BL dramas almost all character’s names and everyday use name will be the family name. (Children are different, but not many of those in JBL.) Teachers may refer to their students by given name-kun.

So in Old Fashion Cupcake Togawa is his family name (not given name). Nozue (also a surname) who is both older and Togawa’s boss, refers to Togawa simply as Togawa, with no honorifics, probubly because they are both adult characters and have been coworkers for so long, Togawa-kun would be... odd.

Togawa on the other hand, ALWAYS refers to Nozue as Nozue-san. Even in times of EXTREME intimacy the honorific -san is ALWAYS used.

We have no idea what the given names are for these characters because we never got to that point of intimacy in their relationship. In Japanese romances the given name is usually the ultimate intimacy and is not exchanged until well into a relationship, sometimes after sex or even after marriage. You can watch the delicate maneuvering around this aspect of intimacy in the kinky het drama Sweat & Soap (it’s not BL, but I still love it, on Viki.)

Japanese Suffixes you hear the most in BL:

-chan = is intimate and cute for children, or amongst female friends, or female family/intimates (like your grandma)

-kun = is for respected juniors, younger or junior co-workers, or young boys, and amongst friends

-san = is formal/polite and for general use, amongst friends, equals, strangers, and acquaintances

The best BL to watch to hear all three of these in constant use is Minato’s Laundromat.

Shin always calls Minato, Minato-san and gets very annoyed when anyone doesn’t do this who should (he want’s his man properly respected). Note that he puts Minato-san into his phone as Akira, tho... daring boy.

Asuka calls Minato: Akira-san, which he shouldn’t as a kid a generation younger than Minato. He gets away with it because he and Minato are from the same neighborhood and have similar open, friendly natures.

Minato, on the other hand, struggles with what to call Shin. Technically he should use Katsuki-kun or even Katsuki-chan (which is what he uses on Shin’s sister). Which is Shin’s surname + the suffix for a junior. But Minato is a causal person, so he never bothered with a suffix even at first. Now, informal language is fine from an older person to a younger one, if they have the right personality. But under BL circumstances, Minato’s lack of honorifics kind of gave Shin license to flirt. The moment Minato asked if he could use the nickname Shin he was a goner.

As Shin becomes more aggressive in his pursuit, Minato hops desperately between different suffixes to try to control the situation:

Shin (informal and friendly),

Shin-chan (diminutive, under this context = somewhat demeaning, considering what Shin wants from him), Minato is intentionally lowering Shin’s status and emphasizing his youth when he applies -chan,

Shin-kun (when he thinks Shin is mad at him, or in public, or when he is annoyed and wants to add formality and distance)

I talk quite a bit about this in my squee watch of this series.

Putting someone who should be (or is usually) address by one combo of name (first or last) + suffix into another, by changing either the name of the suffix or both, always has narrative significance for character development or plot or both in Japanese romances. Which is why you get more from the story if you train your ear to listen for these.

In the picture above, Takara is using -san for sarcasm and to gently chide Amagi. Usually he just uses Amagi with no honorific (they are the same age, and he is a curt characters) or Amagi-kun in public of for call/response address. He has moved to a higher level of formality for emphasis and to make a point in this scene. Communicating properly and avoiding conflict is a hallmark of his character, also (as the seme) he wants to control Amagi. This is all wrapped up in that personality and attitude. He is being teasing and sarcastic, but he is also stressing that this dialogue is important to him.

Read more on Japanese honorific suffixes here.

Japanese honorific titles you hear the most in BL:

Senpai (先輩��せんぱい) - senior colleague or classmate, roughly equivalent to the Korean sunbae or Thai phi

Sensei (先生、せんせい) - refers to teachers as well as people who are experts in their respective fields, like doctors, artists, professors, martial arts instructors, or lawyers

The best BL to watch for use of honorific titles in Japanese is... bet you thought I wasn’t gonna manage to shoehorn it in.... Seven Days!

*insert wild cheering*

Sereyo (younger) seems to relish and very much enjoy and flirt by using the honorific senpai with Yuzuru. It’s hard to explain, but the way Sereyo says "senpai” whenever they meet is very very... cute.

You can hear these characters use sensei when in archery practice. And you can hear use of some family suffixes and honorifics since we follow both characters back to their respective homes.

Sereyo calls Yuzuru, Yuzuru-san, which is Yuzuru’s GIVEN NAME + the honorific. This is unexpected because Yuzuru is his senior. He should call him by his surname + honorific: Shino-san.

But Sereyo has an issue, which is that Yuzuru has the same last name as his ex-girlfriend, who was also older. So in his previous relationship, Sereyo called his lover: Shino-san, and he doesn’t want to use the same exact name with his new lover, Yuzuru. So despite Yuzuru being his senior, he asks to use Yuzuru’s first name as a mode of address. Yuzuru being the kind of casual blunt personality he is, doesn’t mind the inherent informality and permits this right away.

More on Japanese honorifics here.

Mandarin Chinese Honorifics

Ho boy am I not going to climb into this one. But I will point out that to confuse matters many Chinese honorifics are actually also blood relation titles - 哥 ge (older brother) 弟 di (younger brother) - (like phi/nong, par/ar, hia/jay in Thai). In other words, the honorific actually is both brother (honorable title) and brother (actual word) AND will be applied to cousins. As in: the word for cousin is ALSO the same word as brother.

In Thai to clear up this relationship a character will often have to state it blatantly: "my real actual older bother, by blood, and not an older male friend” (since phi means both) and not a lover. See this grappled with as a jealously plot point in Star in My Mind.

But in some Chinese BLs they will also have to explain and distinguish actual blood relationships as different between cousins and siblings. You can watch Addicted deal with these nuances.

It should be noted for the BL crowd that Mainland Mandarin and Taiwanese Mandarin are ALSO different. So there are language nuances to Taiwanese BL that do not exist in Mainland BL (when it was around) and vice versa. And because Taiwan recognizes equal rights, there is also a whole adapted Chinese linguistic set around queerness.

I’m mentioning Chinese in this post mainly because it will come into play with Thai honorifics: hia & jie/jay 姐. Personally I struggle to even distinguish names let alone honorifics, I find Mandarin a particularly difficult language.

Thai - Honorifics, Pronouns, Particles & beyond phi/nong

I have quite a bit on Thai honorifics and their complexity plus how it relates to BL.

Thai Honorifics Between Ages in BL and real life

More on Thai Linguistic Registers - Particles & Honorifics

Thai Pronouns & Honorifics when Seme/Uke is Flipped

Sarcastic use of honorifics & polite particles in Thai

Linguistic Fun In Thai BL - couples

The Nu Diminutive in Thai

Touch & Daisy in Secret Crush On You - Queer Coded Language and 3rd Gender Identity

The most important thing to know, and how it’s different from Korean, is that phi & nong are gender neutral.

Also honorifics and politeness in Thai plays into both pronoun use and polite particles. Thailand does not have honorific suffixes like Japan or Korea, instead particles (which are kind of like spoken punctuation) come into play.

It’s complicated, in that there are a lots of ways to indicate relationships in Thai. But less complicated in that, at heart, gender doesn’t impact it as much as in Korean or Vietnamese. Instead, like Japanese’s -san, you can default to formal register by remembering to use khun (+ polite particles).

Loosely?

Phi = hyung, noona, unni, oppa, sunbae, or senpai, and its gender neutral.

Nong = hoobae or -kun or -chan, but is rarely used in direct address. Instead, informality in Thai is characterized by use of casual (or rude) language and lack of honorifics (from the older person to the younger one) + rude or informal particles. Nong is also gender neutral and can be used as you pronoun (rarely as I), or as a third person pronoun to refer to pets, or as a diminutive attached to a name, it’s... complicated.

Actually episode 10 of Love Mechanics plays with this. Vee whispers in Mark’s ear the equivalent to “Phi’Vee loves cute nong Masa.” Masa is Mark’s given name and it is Japanese because Mark is half Japanese.

But then, to tease him, Vee lowers his voice (Japanese men speak from low in the chest) and says: Masa-kun. Kind of the Japanese rephrase of the above.

Hia = hyung/oppa (it may be used by a younger male or female but is only use on an older male) and specifically ties to Chinese heritage.

Jie/jay = noona/unni (it may be used by a younger male or female but is only use on an older female) and specifically ties Chinese heritage. It has also been coopted by the queer community and may be translated as “sis” under those circumstances. More about hia here.

Khun = -ssi or -san, and is a gender neutral formal address. It can be a title Khun + Name (first or last), an I/you pronoun, and also a proper name (ya, know, just for s&gs). Also in families that are more formal it is a mode of polite address for parents, Khun Maa for mother, Khun Paa for father.

Vietnamese Honorifics

Vietnamese honorifics and modes of address are not my bailiwick but the amazing @squeakygeeky has been blogging a series around VBL linguistics and it’s queer struggles with pronouns because of bifurcation around gender.

Oh boy was this a lot. And I am sorry to @timelesstoothfairy who originally asked this question, I don’t think they realized what a can of worms it opened up.

Language, how is it SO MUCH FUN?

(source)

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ok-boomerang · 1 year

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what casual viewers take away from ATLA

My partner finally watched ATLA with me, and I kept mum about my Zutara shipping until the very end because I wanted to see his reaction.

When Zuko saved Katara from being crushed by rocks, he said, “I think they’re gonna get together” (because we’re soulmates 😭❤️).

Then, when Zuko and Mai hugged during the finale, he was legitimately mad. He went off about how the narrative set them up to be terrible for each other and how them getting together made no sense, and how Mai was mean while the whole point of Zuko’s redemption was that he was not. Please know that he didn’t remember Mai’s name and was just calling her “the bored girl.”

And when the KA happened during the finale, he was really confused. (“She clearly didn’t like Aang back!”) But mostly he was still mad about Mai.ko, because he felt it undermined Zuko’s redemption—a redemption he had called since s1, as the narrative made clear even to casual viewers that there was more to Zuko than being a bad guy. This was pretty interesting to me, because at the time KA made me angrier than MZ, because Katara was my priority. But my partner was frustrated that the show had gone to such lengths to show us that Zuko and Mai were wrong for each other and then ended with them together. It’s lazy writing; it’s insulting to your viewers.

I love hearing reactions of the ATLA finale from casual viewers (at least those that I respect lol). It’s one thing for us big fans and shippers to analyze the scenes and storylines but it’s another entirely to see what a casual viewer notices, someone who’ll forget the names of the main characters in a couple weeks but won’t forget how the ending left them unsatisfied, even if they don’t have the words like meta writers do to explain why the canon ships don’t work. What casual viewers do have are understandings of the implicit themes of the show, the major characterizations, the big plot moments—you can’t let the casual viewer be surprised—you can’t merely rely on major fans to pan the show for crumbs, like what one would have to do for any evidence that Katara returned Aang’s feelings. To my partner, Mai was "the bored girl"—that's what stuck out to him from her characterization. But Zuko is anything but indifferent—he is defined by his passion, whether we're talking about s1 Zuko searching for the Avatar or s3 Zuko joining Team Avatar.

Meanwhile, Zuko and Katara’s relationship arc fits the big themes of the show (e.g., harmony and balance between things that seem to be opposites but have much more in common than we realize) so their relationship development is not surprising. It makes narrative sense—it’s natural. It would have made sense to the casual viewer.

This post was inspired by this beautifully titled post, THE DUMPSTER FIRE OF MAI.KO, by @burst-of-iridescent

#anti maiko #anti kataang #zutara #zuko x katara #atla critical #Sure my partner is one person but I respect his opinion especially as a nonshipper and casual fan #Also I asked my partner while writing this if he remembered 'the girl Zuko ended up with' to see what traits he could recall #and he said 'the bored girl? I don't remember her name but I'm sure you could look it up'#I love him #that's right baby i forgot her name #I'm normal about children's cartoons #just like you

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concerningwolves · 11 months

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Beta reader call

The Blood Enigma is a contemporary paranormal fantasy novel featuring folklore in a modern setting, found family, not-actually-vampires, and the fallout from political intrigue.

Remy Ekhart is a bitterblood: once human, now transformed by vampire blood into something neither dead nor alive. His status as a dead man walking was further cemented seventy years ago when he faked his own death, withdrawing from the world of vampire politics for the sake of his loved ones and his own sanity.

It's a status he should keep, but urged by his sister Thea's pleas and a guilty conscience, Remy agrees to be the getaway driver in a rescue mission. It was never supposed to be a high-risk job, but he suddenly finds himself on the run and in sole charge of Elodie, a child of mysterious origins and even more mysterious abilities. Their one ally is the enigmatic Darren Bell, whose strange faerie magic and dimpled smiles are threatening to break down every barrier Remy has put up to shield himself. With the merciless beast of supernatural politics nipping at their heels, Remy soon realises he is Elodie's one hope at safety – but without access to more vampire blood to sustain him, his time is fast running out.

About the Beta-Reading Process

Novel length: 111,265 words (for reference, that's a little shorter than Northern Lights by Philip Pullman or Twilight by Stephanie Meyer, and a little longer than Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban)

Applications close: Sunday 28th May

Beta Reading starts: Thursday 1st June

Deadline: Friday 30th June, with an extended deadline of Friday 14th July for those who need it.

The purpose of this beta-reading round is to assess strength of large-scale story aspects like:

plot

pace

characterisation

worldbuilding.

(Or, to put it another way: I'm not currently interested in critique on the prose, spelling, or other "small-scale" technical aspects).

The process will work like this:

Applications close on Sunday 28th May

Everyone who applied will hear from me on Tuesday 30th May

Accepted applicants will receive a link to two Google Docs (split the novel to prevent Docs from lagging), and then they can provide feedback in whatever way they like.

(Currently, there will be options to fill in feedback forms, make in-line comments, or leave notes.)

Access to the document will be closed on Friday 14th July.

If you're in interested in beta-reading, here's the beta reader application form

You can also read TBE's first chapters for free, if you'd like to get a taste for the story beforehand.

(taglists under the cut)

@sleepy-and-anxious @theguildedtypewriter @pheita @dareyoutoread-blog @gingerly-writing @danafaithwriting @d-b-rayne @anaestheticdisaster @siarven @thewritingcaddy @purpleshadows1989 @wortfinder @kayemoriarty @prettylittlelyres @kriss-the-writing-nerd @rainy-rose @magicalwriting @shayberri789 @alternativeforensicscientist @beanenigma @cometkov @lovelycarose @mz-elysium @sorcerersage

@an-elegant-void @weaver-of-fantasies-and-fables @zenithsys @horrormama

#beta readers #writeblr #writers on tumblr #urban fantasy #contemporary fantasy

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uenodivision · 5 months

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Hypnosis Mic Shuffle Team, Vol. 3 (Part 3)

Six Pack

Starlight Specters:

Lana "Facade" Alarie

Itsuki "Tsuki" Kamiko

Kanade "Spooky" Alarie

Sakurai Clan:

Aranai "Ride or Die" Norikoru

Shisuta "The Saint" Heisha

Kisouna "Verdict" Yuzairu

Strange Magic:

Aoba "Guinevere" Yamamura

Kunio "James Moriarty" Chōten

Natsume "Wanderer" Kurome

MIHANASA:

Sanyu "MC Rogue" Inouye

Tasuku "Katame" Kawanoe

Ming "Miss Ming" Kawanoe

Femme Fatale:

Sayaka "Rhopalocera" Miyuki

Lola "Aphrodite" Takahashi

Kureha "Eclipse" Koizumi

Silent Tragedy:

Kanon "Mz. Hyde" Hojo

Reika "Belladonna" Aichi

Sakura "Renegade" Kito

RISE FROM DEAD

youtube

Chuohku’s Jinchū

Ritsuko "Strychnine" Okada

Kira "Huntress" Chinen

Keiko "Mangaka" Yumi

Chuohku's Justice

youtube

Boss Lady

Miho "Iron Maiden" Kobayashi

Kisouna "Verdict" Yuzairu

No Words, Just Action

youtube

The IIconics

Lola "Aphrodite" Takahashi

Aika "VeeXn" Yumi

Far from Where We Once Were

youtube

Free Spirit

Evelyn "SPIRIT" Rose

Kanade "Spooky" Alarie

Fly High, Baby!

youtube

Renowned Explorers

Criss "Paradox" Hiromi

Shian "Ready or Not" Meizono

Japan's Geek Mecca

youtube

Yummy Center

Sayaka "Rhopalocera" Miyuki

Kanra "D. Vil" Akemi

Cooking Lessons 101

youtube

The Fuzz

Wataru "Overseer" Sasaki

Seiji "Avenger" Tsukimoto

After a Long Day's Work...

youtube

Kawanoe Siblings

Ming "Miss Ming" Kawanoe

Tasuku "Katame" Kawanoe

Just Another Day in Fukuoka...

youtube

Yamamura Bros.

Aoba "Guinevere" Yamamura

Eden "Ember" Yamamura

Respect Your Brother

youtube

@kyoto-division @kumamoto-division @fukuokadivision1 @saitama-division @shizuokadivision @shinagawa-division @ota-division @akihabaradivision @minato-division01 @okinawa-division @akihabara-division03 @edogawa-division @kanazawa-division @niigata-division @fukuokadivision1 @hamamatsu-divison

#hypmic #hypnosis mic #hypnosis microphone #hypmic oc #hypnosis mic oc #shuffle album #shuffle team #collab event #Youtube #hypnosis mic shuffle team 2023

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high-functioning-lokipath · 1 year

Note

Bucky x reader is an assassin avengers are after reader finds an apartment with bucky. Don't know who they are. Bucky notices her wounds and comments on it.

Possible ending bucky puts two and two together. And asks are you this person and potential fight insues.. and reader realizes they like bucky and don't want to fight him

A/N: This was inspired by a random post that I cannot refind. Nonetheless! Here it is! Words: 1,961

"Okay, Mz. Y/L/N," Your boss says darkly. "I'll give you one last chance on this mission. You have 3 months. If the Winter Soldier isn't dead by the end of those 3 months-" He cuts off in a menacing chuckle. "Well, you understand."

"Yes, sir. I won't disappoint you." With that, he hands you a bundle of money, holding onto it firmly.

"You'd better pray you don't," He says, getting the final word before letting you go. You gulp and nod, gathering your things and hurrying out. Your parents had moved out of the country when you were very young. You only remembered a little about your hometown back in the states. When you became a teen, you realized that your ‘Uncle’ that visited your Dad every week was actually a mob boss. You never understood how, but somehow your Dad had gotten into deep debt when he moved to this country and the only way he could pay it off was by working for the mob. Once you turned 18, your dear old ‘Uncle’ hired you too as a way of helping to finish paying your Dad’s debts. You wanted to move back to the States but the only way your ‘Uncle’ let you go was if you agreed to do something for him. That something was taking down his enemies. He trained you to be a master assassin and sent you on missions throughout the States. This one was different though.

Usually it was quick in and out jobs. This one was going to be longer. Your ‘Uncle’ told you that this target would need a different tactic. You’re not familiar with the background of your target outside of the fact that he is a wanted criminal in the country your ‘Uncle’ lives in. You were instructed to rent a small apartment near something called ‘Avengers Tower’ in NYC. Your ‘Uncle’ told you that this would be the best way to monitor your target without getting too close.

Unfortunately, the money he had given you wasn’t enough to cover rent, food, and other general expenses and you were afraid to ask for more. As you roamed the streets, wondering where you’d spend the night, you saw an ad in a window for an apartment-mate. Deciding that if the person was a murderer you could kill them first, you go to the address and knock on the door.

“Hi, I’m here about the apartment share?” You ask the man who answers.

“Um, yes, of course,” He replies, hesitantly. “Are you still interested?”

“Seeing now that you’re a man asking for a roomie? Yeah, I’m still interested. As long as you don’t make a habit of walking around naked, I couldn’t care less. May I come in now?” You ask. The man steps aside and lets you in, an astonished look on his face. “My name’s-um, Y/A/N Y/A/L. Yours?”

“My-” He gasps, stepping in front of you again. “You don’t know who I am?”

“Um, no, am I supposed to?” He chuckles softly and shakes his head. “Sorry, I’ve been living out of the country for a long while.”

“Oh, well, I suppose you don’t have to know me,” He smiles. “Are you alright with the price?” You nod and hand him the first month’s rent.

“Does that answer your question?” He grins and nods, shaking your hand. “Well then its a deal!”

A couple weeks pass, neither of you questioning the other’s schedule. You do surveillance on the Winter Soldier, seeing him come and go from the tower, but you never get a good view of his face. Meanwhile, you and your roommate, Bucky, have been getting closer. To your great surprise, he’s an old fashioned type guy. After the experience you’d had dealing with your ‘Uncle’ and his cronies, you found Bucky’s style refreshing. He was such a gentleman.

One day last week, while watching the Soldier, you finally got a shot but unfortunatly he moved at the last second and it only grazed him. You cursed under your breath and thought nothing of it when later Bucky came home with a bandage on his arm. After all, he did say he was clumsy. Now today, you managed to catch the Soldier alone in an old, dark, smelly warehouse and you’ve found yourself physically fighting him. Both of you wielding your respective knives, lunging at each other. He catches your leg, you catch his side. It ends suddenly, both of you hurrying away before you can see him well.

That night, you’re back at the apartment eating dinner and watching a movie when Bucky finally comes back. “Sorry I’m back so late. Uh, work kinda, well, today was unexpected.”

“No worries. There’s leftovers in the fridge if you want. I just got takeout today. I hurt my leg this afternoon and didn’t feel like standing and cooking.” He hums an agreement and gets the leftovers, sticking them in the microwave. He leans in the doorway, checking out what you’re watching. His eyes wander to you and he notices the bandage you have on your leg. He frowns softly, remembering the fight earlier. He didn’t get a good look at his attacker but he remembers the fighting style seemed distinctly femanine.

“It couldn’t be,” He mumbles to himself. The girl he’s come to know the past few weeks is the complete opposite of the assassin fighter he faced today. “Hey, Y/A/N, how did you hurt your leg?”

"What? Oh I was just," You pause, trying to find a good excuse. "I fell." You sigh, knowing the excuse is lame, but you're not used to working so closely with people on the job.

"Oh, okay. Just, um, be careful? Alright?" He goes back to the microwave, chewing on more than just his food.

Over the next few days, he keeps a careful eye on you hoping to disprove his suspicion. He only gets more and more evidence that you are indeed the assassin after him. The final straw is when he catches you right outside of the tower. You don’t recognize him, but he sees you.

When you finally come back home, you’re angry. Your ‘Uncle’ called you again demanding an update which you didn’t have. You yell and throw your bag on the floor, punching the wall for good measure. “Hey! This is my apartment!” Bucky yells, coming out of his room at the commotion.

“And I pay for half the rent so you can-”

“Really? Really? I can what?” Bucky yells, interrupting your own screams.

“Just forget it. I had a bad day.” You try to push past him but he doesn’t let you. He grabs your arm and for the first time you realize who he is. “Y-you have a metal arm.”

“That’s right. And you have a contract. Now why don’t we have a little chat, hm?”

“I don’t know what you mean!” You cry, panicking. Your mind is scrambling, trying to reconcile how the man you’ve grown so close to could be the man you’re trying to kill.

“Oh don’t give me that bull! I saw you today outside the tower. And that leg injury? You didn’t fall. Now who are you working for?” You stare at him and find yourself unable to see the criminal you were sent to kill. Even though he’s angry, all you can see in his eyes is the man you’ve come to love. “Love?” You think to yourself. You lose all fight in you at that realization.

“Hey, look, I’m sorry I yelled,” Bucky says, seeing your face fall. You slump into his arms, sobbing. “Woah, okay, I-” He doesn’t quite know how to react.

“I’m sorry. I-I don’t know how to get out of it.”

“Okay, let’s just sit down and you can explain everything.” You follow him to the sofa and tell him your whole story.

“I didn’t know. I mean, I knew he was not a good guy, but I figured his motives were valid.” Bucky nods slowly, hesitnetly reaching out for you.

“I can help if you want. I know people who can get you out of this. But you’re going to have to trust me.”

“I do, Bucky. You’re not the man he said you are. Even if you were at one point, I mean,” You chuckle dryly and shale your head. “Look at me.” He smiles at you and nods again.

“Alright, let’s get started.”

The process is slow and painful but eventually, with Bucky’s help and the rest of the Avengers, you have your freedom. Tony throws a party for you, small but nonetheless a party. “Congratulations on your new life, Y/N!” Bucky says bringing you a drink. You gratefully accept and drink it down quickly.

“Yeah, I guess so.”

“Don’t know what to do?” He asks knowingly. You laugh and sigh.

“Yeah. It’s been so long.” He finishes his own drink and holds his hand out to you.

“How about starting with a dance?” You smile.

“Yeah. That sounds good.” You take his hand and the two of you dance for hours it seems, your mind wandering. “So, um, I guess I should pack my things. Now that my job is done, you’ll probably want me out of your hair.”

“Um, I mean, if you want to leave but-” He struggles to find the right thing to say. “Don’t.”

“Don’t?”

“Well, I did have that ad out in the first place. So, I kind of need you around. Being a superhero doesn’t always pay the bills. And it’s such a pain training a new roommate.” He gives you a face, a goofy grin you’ve come to know well.

“Mm-hmm, sure. I think you’re just too attached to my pretty face,” You tease.

“That is also very possible,” He replies, his voice dropping as he pulls you in closer. “Would that convince you to stay?”

“Are you sure? After all, I am a dangerous woman,” You smirk.

“And I’m a dangerous man. I think I’ll be okay,” He replies with a wink. You smile and lean on his shoulder contentedly.

“Is this alright?”

“Perfect.”

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