#norm maclean imagine
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What Did You Say?
Relationship: Norm McLean x Reader
Fandom: Fallout
Request: Yes by @fallout-girl219
Warnings: Fluff, Brief Angst, Pregnancy
Word Count: 1,406
Main Masterlist: Here
Fallout Masterlist: Here
Summary: The whole reason they got married was with the goal of repopulation. That is why anyone in the Vaults gets married. Being married to Norm is a challenge all on its own.
Norm was speechless. That alone was highly unusual for him as he did not get speechless, simply he did not voice every thought that pops into his head. But here he sat, without a thought to voice, and a mouth with which to do it. He did not process the fact that his wife was slowly loosing her smile, and instead of excitedly bouncing, she was shifting nervously.
“What’s going on in your head, sweetheart?” She asked, concerned for her husband’s wellbeing. In the entire time that they had been married, or even had known each other, she had never known him to be this paralyzed.
“Are you sure?” Sure, it was not the best thing to say, but it was the first thing that came to him.
“Of course I’m sure. The doctor checked me a couple days ago,” she moved to hold his hands. “Norm, we’re having a baby.” While she held out hope that at some point he would get excited with her, that hope was draining by the second.
“And it’s mine?” Again, it was not the best thing to come out of his mouth because her look turned sour really quick.
“Are you accusing me of something, Norman?” Her voice was no longer sweet; this was a dangerous growl.
“No, no. I’m not. I’m sorry. I’m just- we’re having a baby?” He was still not on the same plane of existence as her.
“Yes, Norm. We’re having a baby. I thought you’d be excited, or joyful, or even able to crack a darn smile. What is going on with you?” She was starting to tip over into yelling and their vault doors could only do so much sound proofing.
“No I’m- I mean, yes I… just,” he stammered, “I’m just not sure this is the best time.” He murmured, and began to fiddle with his hands.
“Well, it’s apparently a perfect time according to our bodies. Ever heard the expression, ‘it takes two to tango’? I didn’t make a baby by myself.” It felt like such an obvious observation, and yet, she felt like she was trying to talk to a child.
“I know that, I’m just. I’m not sure I’m fit to be a dad. I’m just gonna-” and he took off. Opening their door, Norm left their little humble home to go off to who knows where. Slouching to the floor, she held her stomach and cried. Sure people got scared to be parents but they did not run out on their pregnant wives while doing so? Thoughts ran wild in her head with Norm gone. Would she end up being a single mother? She knew that divorce was a thing but no one in the last two hundred years had one in the vaults. If someone was a single parent, it was because one parent had died.
Her sobs continued well into the night. Even when dinner time came, she ate alone; staring at the empty seat but a full plate where Norm would sit. She went on with her nightly routine as if nothing was wrong, as if half of her world was not missing. The bed felt too big now without her husband. As she lay in bed, she could not help but to let the tears come once again. She cried herself to sleep without even realizing it, and was only awoken by the morning bell. Her husband’s side was still together, even if she had taken his pillow to provide some comfort for herself.
She went about her breakfast routine, but was quickly sent to vomit when she smelled the eggs and bacon she had prepared. Coming out, nothing looked amiss, and she set about making toast. Toast would be safe to eat.
An executive decision was made for her, by her, to stay in for the day. She could afford a day off with the evening she had. A lot of her time was spent reading, or staring at the door. As much as she did not like him right now, she still loved her husband and wanted him by her side. The notification came through her pip-boy from the doctor about her ultrasound appointment today. It almost felt bittersweet. On one hand, she did not feel like inviting Norm to the appointment with how he was acting. But on the other hand,he was still her husband and the father of her child. He deserved the choice at least.
The forwarded message came across the gear that was on Norm’s arm, and he was shocked. After he ran away last night like a coward, he did not expect this from his wife. Norm saved the appointment onto his pip-boy for later use and scrubbed his hands over his face.
“You alright, son?” Hank asked of his boy, bringing over two mugs. The one with tea was set in front of the younger MacLean, while his dad drank his allotted amount of coffee.
“Just grappling my thoughts. She sent me a notification of a doctor’s appointment this evening, but I don’t even know if she really wants me there.” Norm admitted, fiddling with his hands underneath the table.
“If I remember one thing about your mother, is that during both of her pregnancies, her hormones made her a ball of emotions. You could say the grass was green and she would burst out crying.” Hank chuckled, and took another sip while his son just sat there.
“There was a time where she was so angry with me that I didn’t like the name that she picked for her top name for you, that I was kicked to the couch for two days.” This made Norm perk up.
“So what did you do? How did you fix things with her?” He asked, eager to hear the rest of the story.
“I went with her to your final ultrasound. Didn’t hold her hand or anything, but once we say you fully formed, she reached for my hand and said, ‘Norman, that’s what we’ll call him.’” His dad chuckled as he finished the story, and gained a sad look in his eyes.
“So what should I do?” Norm asked, finally taking a sip of his tea.
“If it were me, I’d go to the appointment. No matter how mad she is now, she’ll be worse if you miss that.” A timer dinged and as they looked for the source of the sound, they realized it was Norm’s pip-boy. Hs reminder for the appointment came up and he dashed out of the door without another word. Norm walked briskly to the doctor’s office, and tried not to run; no matter how much he wanted to.
By the time he got there, he saw her head dip into a room, that he somehow managed to catch. Norm saw her unzipping her vault suit, and rolling up her white shirt when he opened the door. He let out a breath that he did not realize he was holding and came over to help her.
“You came.” She stated, resting her hands on his face.
“I came.” He repeated, holding her body close to his in a crushing hug.
“I’m ready to be a dad.” Norm whispered, just loud enough for her to hear. It made her heart swell to hear those six little words come from his lips. The couple pulled away right as the doctor came in.
“Oh, hello Norm. Here to see the missus and the kiddo?” She spoke jovially, setting down her equipment to get started. Rubbing the cold gel on the mom-to-be’s belly, she held the wand against it to start looking inside. norm remained silent as he stared at the screen with a little black and white mage starting to emerge.
“There they are. That’s their leg, and arm. The beginnings of their head and organs and, oh wait. There’s their head. No, wait.” The doctor spent a minute looking intensely at the screen which freak the MacLean’s out just a little bit.
“Oh, okay. Not to worry.” She spoke finally.
“Why? What’s going on?” Mrs. Maclean was confused and concerned as she tried to sit up, only to be held down gently by her doctor.
“No, everything is okay. There are two heads. You’re having twins. Congratulations.” Once more, she held a happy tone as she went back to the screen. Yet again, Norm spoke without thinking it through.
“What did you say?”
#rebelliousstories#writing#fallout imagine#fallout#norm maclean imagine#norman maclean x reader#norm maclean x reader#norman maclean x oc#norm maclean x oc#norm maclean
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When Fallout Characters Fall In Love... (Fallout Show Request)
Pairings: Cooper Howard/The Ghoul x Reader, Maximus x Reader, Norm x Reader
Author's Note: Thank you to everyone who has sent in a request for the Fallout show, please keep them coming as this is definitely the show that I'm thinking about the most at the moment! Also let me know if you want a part two of these headcanons or something similar :)
The Ghoul:
- Cooper Howard couldn't put his finger on exactly when he had accepted that the life he now led would be one devoid of love, but it was a hollow feeling he carried in his chest wherever the wasteland took him. Maybe it was in the decades he'd spent wandering and gaining a reputation as a heartless cowboy without an ounce of mercy. Or the fact that he hadn't met anyone that had stirred up a single emotion inside him, fearing the aching betrayal of his wife would haunt him even as lifetimes passed. Maybe it came to him in the way he flinched each time he caught his reflection in the few unbroken windows he passed, flesh slowly forming caverns and creases where once there were only the faintest of lines that showed endless signs of life. The wasteland was no place for love. That's what he had decided.
- But even in the fall of civilization there's room for a surprise, and you were certainly one of those..
- He heard rumour of you before your bounty crossed his desk, a runaway scientist from a mysterious body known only as The Institute, a target to everyone for the sheer volume of classified knowledge you might possess.
- A life on the run was no easy one, and Cooper knew that better than anyone, so it didn't take long for him to track you down to a small town just on the outskirts of the radiation's no man's land. His gun was cocked as he strutted towards the half open door of the rundown house he'd narrowed your location down to, glancing at the poster in his hand one last time before he burst inside. Even from the poorly illustrated version of you, he could see your eyes were kind, almost hopeful, like you still believed science could make right what had gone so wrong in the last 200 years. He almost felt a tinge of guilt as he steeled himself for a fight, saying a silent prayer that you wouldn't be behind the walls in front of him.
- Stepping in carefully he expected traps, or an army of robots to jump to arms, but instead he found you travelling alone, a small satchel of papers clutched in your arms as you stared him down with a calm resolve that caught him more off guard than any weapon.
"Do you still believe there's hope for this world Mr Howard?" Your voice was soft, not the trembling fear he was so used to hearing. You stared up at him without a trace of disgust in your expression, your eyes locked on his as he considered your question, and then lowered his weapon.
"And what if I do?" His heart ached at the question, so hardened by years of cynicism that even the idea of hope and goodness were almost too heavy to bear. He felt more human than he had in years as you slowly inched towards him, the creaking floorboards beneath you cutting through a tense silence that had The Ghoul feeling like he was back on a movie set, everything so perfectly orchestrated to have his stomach in knots. And then you extended your hand to him and gave him the most genuine smile he could remember receiving in this whole sorry chapter of his after-life,
"Then I think we could really make a difference. Together." Your pip-boy screeched as his irradiated hand stretched out to reach yours, but you didn't flinch, gently squeezing the twisted flesh as you shook on what you bought felt in the depths of your souls was going to be a meaningful partnership.
- It would be a straight forward life trying to use your research to get the world back on track for there to be joy and peace again. But with The Ghoul by your side you can expect; a personal bodyguard who cares more about your safety than his own by far, a gleaming look of pride in his eyes any time you tell him which Cooper Howard film was your favourite, the slow and steady acceptance that he is still worthy of love even in his new twisted form, and Cooper being endlessly grateful that you are the person who wants to give that love to him.
Maximus:
- All Maximus had ever wanted was to be a knight of the Brotherhood. He wakes up every morning and does his best every day just to try and earn his spot in this family of welded metal and unflinching loyalty. It wasn't until you arrived on the base that he started to realise there were other ways he might form a family.
- A nearby village had been half destroyed by raiders until the Brotherhood stepped in, clearing out the violent scavengers and bringing anyone with skills they could utilise back to base for assessment. Maximus was sitting alone, nursing the most recent wounds inflicted by his so-called brothers when he watched you march in alongside two soldiers, the final evacuee of your faded community, a distance in your eyes that he felt akin with from his own home's destruction. You could feel his eyes on you before you spotted him, a rag damp with blood pressed to his nose as he sat huddled against a corrugated iron shack.
- Despite the sheer joylessness of the situation, Max couldn't stop himself from sporting a smile, waving at you like you had locked eyes across the schoolyard not some barren military base. Whatever he hoped for in that moment seemed to pay off as you waved back, a small laugh escaping your lips at the absurdity of his blood soaked grin. He watched as the knights around you escorted you to the medical tent for a check up, waiting until they left their guard posts beside you to sneak behind the off-white fabric, following some unknown instinct he'd never felt call to him before. You bolted upright where you perched on one of the medical beds as he appeared, visibly relaxing when you recognised him from outside and once again waving in his direction. His mouth worked faster than his brain in that moment, heart hammering in his chest as the words gushed out with his new found affections,
"I used to live in Shady Sands. I know what it's like to have your home destroyed, your family hurt, everything changing all at once. But you're safe here with the Brotherhood, and even if it doesn't feel like it today, things are going to be okay eventually. Also I'm Maximus and if you ever need to talk to someone, I'm, like, around all the time, and no one else really wants to talk to me so I'm probably going to be available... " He trailed off as he tried to recover what had ended up a far more embarrassing sentence than he'd hoped, his lungs burning as he realised he'd forgotten to take a breath through his whole winding spiel. But when you smiled at him any shame seemed to float away, and as you patted the bed and nodded for him to take a seat beside you, the once lonely squire suddenly felt much closer to finding a family than he had surrounded by his brothers.
- As you settle into life on the base, you and Maximus only grow closer. Expect; late nights of sneaking out of your dorm so you and Max can stare up the stars and plot your escape from this life, fantasising about what a life beyond these walls and this world could be like for the two of you, someone who has your back no matter how bad things get and how low you feel, and truly some of the most god awful flirting you will ever hear.
Norm:
- Growing up in the Vault, Norm had always been told the value of belonging to a community, and how everyone in the vault was just a big happy family. But none of that stopped Norm feeling like an outsider, like he didn't quite operate on the same wavelength as the rest of the cheerful strangers he shared his deep underground walls with. After a few of the annual exchanges between vaults, he had all but given up on hoping to meet anyone he felt he could actually feel close to.
- When his overseer father had finally decided it was his turn to continue the vault's legacy and be part of what Norm considered an archaic tradition of arranged marriages between the linked vaults, Norm couldn't have been more resistant. He pleaded for the council to reject his nomination, begging them not to force some young hopeful to be subjected to his notable lack of enthusiasm for the rest of their life in this dutiful swap, but with limited options of eligible young men, he soon found himself staring down the doors of your vault. The suit previously used by his fellow bachelors had been tailored to within an inch of its life to try and fit his slight frame, the shoulders still feeling like they hung off him, threatening to swallow him up along with ground as he watched the round door slowly start to roll open.
- He thought this whole thing was stupid and outdated, and he knew there was no way he could actually find someone to love and love him in return behind those doors, so why was his stomach so full of butterflies as slowly your face started to appear in the artificial light of Vault 33. He waited to see you throw him a false smile, going through the motions as much as he had planned to, or even a look of disappointment that he was not the man you had been picturing as the door crept open. Instead he really thought he saw sincerity in your eyes, a thoughtful understanding as he choked out his name, his stammering not going unnoticed by his sister who quietly chuckled behind him.
"It's really nice to meet you, Norm." You spoke each word with intention, like it wasn't just a rehearsed greeting but an honest confession that sent sparks flying in the air between you.
- Suddenly the pressure of matrimony didn't feel so all consuming. And maybe this system was more advanced than he had appreciated. And there might be a small chance that he wasn't destined to spend his life feeling like he was on the outside, that he might finally have someone that could take him as he is, darkness and light, for better or for worse.
- Whether you stay in the vaults, or make your move to the surface world, with Norm by your side you can expect: Sarcastic comments muttered under his breath at inopportune moments just to see the way you fail to contain your laughter, being the sounding board for all of each other's thoughts and feelings no matter how serious or silly they might be, Norm clinging to your side through everything knowing that he only feels himself when he's stood in your light, and being the one person Norm would do absolutely anything for, bringing out the bravery and intelligence that was always just below the surface of this sweet man.
#writing#fanfiction#requests#one shot#falllout#fallout#fallout prime#cooper howard#cooper howard x reader#cooper Howard headcanons#cooper howard one shot#cooper howard imagine#fallout the ghoul#fallout show#fallout headcanons#the ghoul#the ghoul x reader#the ghoul imagine#the ghoul headcanons#maximus x reader#maximum headcanons#norm x reader#norm maclean#fallout norm#norm headcanons#norm maclean headcanons#norm mclean#fallout requests#fallout prime requests
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Idk if you’re making anymore Norman maclean fics recently but if you are could you use this prompt
“Is this ok?” As they stare up at you from in between your legs.
IM BARKING AT THIS REQUEST !!!! I'm working on a couple different long fics atm but this truly speaks to me, so I wanted to whip something up for you real quick!
Summary: Norman finds himself between your legs. Being inexperienced, he also finds himself questioning how he's doing.
Warnings: 18+, MINORS DNI, Oral (f! receiving), PWP, slight hair pulling.
A/N: From this prompt list! Also, with AFAB!Reader, if y'all want an AMAB!Reader, let me know! Will definitely be expanding on this fic/writing more for him, because I have Ideas for a Norm/Reader where reader is from the surface...
Norm's hands grip your thighs, his mouth doing all the work. You're lying on his bed whining and covering your mouth. Your thighs tense and Norman's nimble hands gently keep your legs pulled apart.
"Norman-" You suck in air through your teeth, eyes screwed shut. "That feels- Ngh-" You're cut off by your own moan.
Norm, on his knees and in front of you, stops momentarily. You look down at him and find him staring at you. His chin slick. Your stomach flips. You're sure your eyes turn wild, because suddenly Norman seems apprehensive.
"Is this okay?" He asks, his head cocking to the side ever so slightly.
You cannot answer fast enough. "Yes!" You are nodding violently. "Please continue, I need it!"
Norman smiles at you and your heart jumps into your throat. "Ok," He doesn't hesitate to dive back in. His 'ok' sounded more enthusiastic than you had ever heard before, causing you to feel ever stronger about him.
Norman's tongue sloppily licks a stripe up your pussy, and his nose bumps your clit. Your head lulls back and one of your hands grips his hair. Your hips rock upwards as Norm moves back to breathe. You are chasing after him. He smiles, placing a soft kiss to your thigh. You begin to beg.
"Please, I'm close- So close!"
Norman can't leave you hanging. So, he obliges. He messily eats you out, continuing to do the things that seem to elicit a good reaction from you. Suddenly, a scorching heat is building inside of you. Your core burns and your toes are curling. You pull at his hair and Norman moans. You let out a loud, sharp cry. Norm's name falling from your lips, the only thing you can say.
Your legs tense around him and Norman doesn't slow down. He continues as you ride out your orgasm. Your hips bucking into his mouth and then rocking back.
Your legs release him, and Norman lies his head on your thigh, looking up at you until you open your eyes and look back at him.
"Was that okay?" Norman hums.
You let out a soft laugh, "That was... Amazing! I don't think- I don't think I wanna leave this room for a while..."
"I don't think they expect to," Norm shrugs. "Might as well enjoy each other's company until they actually need us."
"Sounds perfect," You inhale slowly, still coming down. "I could- Uh, I could return the favor now?" You sit up and bite your bottom lip. "I mean, you didn't stop 'til I came, and I'd hate to be the only one feeling good..."
Norman blinks at you, registering what you're saying. "You sure?" His hand traces your hip. "I think I could sit here all day if it means getting to taste you."
You face scrunches, "I mean if you insist," You laugh.
You initially weren't sure about your new vault life, but now? You don't think you'll ever leave.
#fallout smut#fallout#norm maclean#norman maclean#norm maclean x reader#norm maclean smut#fallout x reader#fallout imagine#fallout prime#fallout 2024#fallout tv series#x reader
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Can I say for as much as I love Fallout Prime, I have one small criticism. One that a lot of shows do regarding sibling relationships. Speaking as someone with 8 little sisters and 1 littlest brother.
Lucy doesn't mention Norm once when talking about the Vault. It's always her dad, or her mom, never her brother. Which I find unrealistic. I never shut up about my siblings. I think about them all the time.
The amount of dumbshit siblings can get up to when unsupervised. Holy shit. Especially when one is reckless and brave (Lucy) and the other too smart for their own good(Norm). You're telling me Lucy doesn't tell Maximus one damn thing about something stupid they've done growing up? Hiding spots, passing veggies on one another's plate, teasing about crushes. Nothing?
(Could she have done so off camera. Sure, but unless I see it, it didn't happen.)
And it can't be because they aren't close. Watch episode 1 again, Lucy and Norm are best friends, and you can't convince me otherwise. But like all shows, as soon as the siblings are out of sight, they're out of mind.
Lucy didn't ask herself 'what would Norm do' for a complicated problem? Norm doesn't sike himself up to be as brave as Lucy when things got scary? Unrealistic.
The second Lucy found out what was really going on in the Vaults she should have hightailed it back to 33 to pick up her little brother cause no fu@king way I'd let my sibling stay in there by themselves. Nope. Couldn't be me.
Plus sibling solidarity. Norm deserves one good punch to Hank's nose. That was his mom too.
#fallout#norm maclean#lucy maclean#guys i just really want Norm on this road trip#can you imagine the sibling hijinks?#Cooper will turn this caravan around he's not playing this time.
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Okie Dokie (Norm MacLean)
Pairing: Norm MacLean x Cassandra "Cassie" Lang (Original Character/Reader)
Trope: Rivals to Lovers
Ideas for writing for Norm
Character: Cassandra ‘Cassie’
Affirmation: Vault 33
Occupation/Hobbies: Nurse and teaches Sex Ed Class
Volunteer: Kitchen Duty, Cleaning Duty, Food Delivery,
Computers and Information Maintenance
Book Club w/ Lucy and Sometimes hosts
Sewing/Crocheting/Embroidery Club, Young Pipefitter's Association with Lucy and Steph, Gymnastics club, Dance Club, Intermediate Phys. Ed., and Riflery, Enjoys watching and reading with Lucy, Secretly plays Pip boy games
Friends: Lucy, Steph, Chet, Norm (Rivals, Love Interest? Frenemies)
Personality: Good Hearted Caring and Kind, Creative, Sassy, Fun and as cheerful as Steph and Lucy, Stubborn, Competitive, Teasing, Willing to fight what is right and is a head strong fighter, Had a feeling Vault 32 is suspicious and somethings not right and not adding up, Investigator, Speaks her mind, Wanted to go into the surface with Lucy and curious what’s it like up there. But isn’t as naive as Lucy. Doesn’t believe in the death penalty and that the Raiders should go back to the surface and they could possibly plot killing them again. She's patient but shows the most anger and frustration towards Norman.
Physical Appearance: Simple Makeup Simple curled Lashes, Blush, Lip Gloss, Brown Eyes, Long Black Hair, Curtain Bangs and strands Voluminous Curls and likes to change the hair style, Curvous/chubby figure, Height short around the same height as Norm. Wearing the Blue and Yellow Vault Jumpsuit.
Norm and Cassie being the smartest in class. Which causes them to have a rivalry and Norm getting angry and frustrated since Cassie is good at almost everything. But it is mostly one sided in Norm’s side which comes to Cassie thinking. Norm doesn’t like her due to his coldness and endless amounts of teasing and anger towards Cassie. They bicker.
Norm lacks enthusiasm and what do the vault 33 council members Reg McPhee, Woody Thomas, Betty Pearson, and Hank MacLean do? They always pair them together as punishment as a way for Norm and Cassie to get along.
Hank and Lucy tease Norm how he could have a possible crush on Cassie. Chet always being clueless and Stephanie knew there was some sort of sexual tension between them.
Idea 1: Steph and Cassie gushing over Montey and making comments Cassie, "Wow he is a looker isn't he wow. He's so Handsome!" Steph, "Lucky." And Norm made a face like Bert. Norm was Confused more Jealous. And he proceeds to tease that he isn't much of a good guy and could have red flags. Norm, "Like I said he could have a tumor!"
Idea 2: Cassie Showing off to Steph and Lucy the corset, skirt, dresses she made were vault colors Blue and Yellow. And Norm said wearing it everyday would be against the rules.
He gets turned on by the thought of Cassie wearing the corset and skirt that he gets an erection.
Idea 3: Cassie and Norm being the smart ones, the investigators figuring everything about the history behind the vault. To make sure they both don’t get caught. Cassie kisses Norm as a distraction.
Idea 4: Cassie was this close to join Lucy up on the surface to help save their dad. But Norm stopped her. “Norm what the hell was that for? I was this close. this close to go with Lucy. What, you don’t want me to help save your dad? Is this your way to come back at me?”
“You care about me? Bullshit! When did you ever care about me? You care about me more than your sister?”
Idea 5: They are bickering than they kiss from sexual frustration. And do the deed together.
Author’s Note: this will be posted on Wattpad & A03 @mochminnie
What do you guys think about Cassie and Norm? Do you like the title ahaha I love Lucy’s Catchphrase “Okey Dokey😄”
#x reader#reader insert#original character#comedy#plus size reader#oc#imagines#fanfiction#wattpad#rivals to lovers#tension#norm maclean#norm maclean x reader#norm maclean x oc#norm maclean x original character#fallout#fallout series#fallout amazon#fallout prime#fallout amazon prime#family#friendship#vault#fallout tv show#fallout fanfic#fallout fanfiction#fallout x reader#fallout x you#fallout tv series#teaser
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・﹒・ from vault 32 [2]
Summary: You got approved for a marriage partner from Vault 31 after not finding a suitable boyfriend in your own. After meeting your future husband, and standing ready to saw your vows, you both agree to call it off. But they couldn't not have a wedding- so you chose his cousin.
Warnings: 18+, arranged marriage
Pairing: Norman MacLean x GN!reader
Parts: Part 1
"No" Everyone gasped as they heard you deny your marriage, however it was a pathetic denial. So you spoke again, properly speaking to everyone.
"No- this won't work out. He doesn't want to marry me, I don't want to marry him. I-I thought this was going to be the happiest day of my life but...it isn't exactly how I imagined it...ha" Everyone went into a frenzy, talking to each other on what to do since this never happened. Your heart was beating out of your chest as you looked back at Chet, he was sweating bullets from how nervous he was.
"Y-yeah. We should just call it off, ya know?" He smiled awkwardly as he turned to finally speak, but they still all spoke with each other. A minute passed before the overseer- Lucy and Norm's dad- told everyone to hush as he stood up.
"As this has not happened before, we had to discuss what to do. And we have come to a conclusion. We can call this off for you Chet, but for you ____, we can find a more suitable husband for you and reschedule" A few people sighed and groaned, claiming they didn't want to leave without going through a wedding today. Well- you would give them a wedding today. Looking at Norm, you knew this was going to work out.
"We don't have to reschedule- I'll just marry him" You nodded your chin forward to further clear up that you meant Norm. Everyone gasped again as they couldn't believe it was him, he also looked slightly alarmed as he pointed to himself to further confirm. But everyone started to push him up out of his chair and to the stage and didn't stop until he was in front of you, consequently pushing Chet off and onto the grass.
"If you don't want to do this, you don't have to, I didn't mean to put you on the spot like that" You cringed as you realized that you didn't give him much of a choice and laughed weakly.
"No, no, it's ok...I actually think you're really cute" God he was so adorable your heart was going to explode as pink dusted his cheeks.
"I think you're really cute too" Biting your lip, the officiate restated the vows. Your heart was beating fast again, but this time it was from excitement. Well- it was equal excitement and anxiousness.
"Norman MacLean, do you take ___ to be your lawfully wedded spouse?" Norm just looked at you for a few seconds before saying his final confirmation about this.
"I do" Why did that make your heart flutter so much? Sure- you had hoped your wedding day with your future husband would make you happy, but even if you didn't know him much yet, you chose him, and he chose you back.
"And do you, ___, take Norman MacLean to be your lawfully wedded husband?" This time, you didn't say no.
"I do"
"You may now kiss" You wasted no time pulling him in, kissing him passionately as he kissed back. He wasn't fully prepared for how aggressive you were, but his hands made their way to your waist as you heard everyone whop and cheer. After a bit, you pulled away panting but not all the way as you leaned up to his ear and made sure he heard something only you wanted him to hear.
"I can't wait to take every piece of clothing off you tonight" At that- his already red face grew redder as he stared at you with wide eyes. You saw his father throw his arm around his son who was still processing everything and what you told him as the man congratulated him and Chet thanked him for saving him from a marriage he didn't want. Your parents then came up and hugged you, mother crying and father failing not to cry. However, you couldn't stop staring at your now-husband. You then saw Lucy as she came up to you and she had on a soft smile.
"I know you'll take care of him, but if you hurt him-"
"I know, I know, I won't. Don't worry Lucy, I'll take really good care of him" You reassured her, finding her protectiveness so sweet, and looked at Norm as he looked back at you. Your new life had just started and it was with a man you had a feeling was the right choice.
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Maybe pt. 8
Pairing: Norm MacLean X Female Reader or OC if you squint
Former friends to a relationship?
Life is pretty easy in Vault 33 until you're trying to rekindle a former friendship and Raiders attack. Now, our main characters are trying to navigate newfound feelings, all while undercovering the mysteries of Vault 33. Stay tuned. Follows the main storyline of season 1; some events may be reordered for plot.
Following the council meeting and Norm's reassignment, the two of you are enjoying a quiet evening together when a single question threatens to dredge up a whirlwind of emotions.
Part 1 Here. Part 6 Here
Part 2 Here Part 7 Here
Part 3 Here
Part 4 Here
Part 5 Here
Norm was convinced you thought he was a lunatic.
One minute, the two of you were relaxing on the sofa. Norm‘s head resting against your lap while you read. The occasional brush of your fingers through his hair threatens to lull him to sleep. The next, he found himself unable to stop ranting and raving, all because of a simple question. How did everything go today? The book you were reading was long since discarded to the side as you gave him your full attention. He went on detailing the events of his day, from his “reassignment” at the council meeting to his first interaction with the raiders locked in the vault reading room. You didn’t interrupt, though he wasn’t sure he could have stopped even if you had. His frustrations with the council and whatever happened in the Vaults were not subtle. Norm always appreciated the candor you two shared when it came to communication. Still, he couldn’t help feeling some unease divulging all of these feelings, unsure of how you’d respond.
“I’m sorry,” he apologized, putting his hand on his forehead and moving to sit upright. “Seeing how we treated them today, with food and kindness, just sent me over the edge.” Nothing about this situation with the Raiders felt right to him. Four square meals a day and a soft bed weren’t exactly punishment; how was no one else seeing it?
“Cause it feels like the opposite of justice…” you validated after listening to everything he had to say about his punishment from the council and the situation he experienced with the Raiders.
“Yes,” his tone laced with utmost seriousness. “We watched people commit some of the most heinous acts we could imagine, and now we’re expected to be the bigger person and move on?”
You felt the weight of the shared resentment settles between you, the reality of the situation pressing heavily on your shoulders. Memories of recent events resurfaced with a vengeance, emotions that had been buried away over the last few days trying to escape. You took a deep breath, trying to steady yourself, but the feelings of pain and anger were already seeping out uncontrolled.
“For god’s sake, I had to kill a man with a pipe wrench the other day, and the council just wants to…” you stopped short, your words hanging before you like a poison in the air. You had avoided saying it out loud since that night, hopeful it would help you forget having to come to terms with the actions you took.
Norm’s eyes widened with surprise. You had implied what had happened after the two of you were separated down Vault 32’s corridor, but he never pressed you for details you weren’t ready to share. He figured you were still processing your actions from the night of the raid but taking another life to save your own- a decision forced on you because of someone else's actions. He knew this was your nightmare scenario. Of course, you both had been reeling this entire time; how had he not noticed until now? He copied your gesture from the days before, offering his hand and intertwining it with yours with a squeeze. You took another deep breath, your eyes locking with Norm’s, raw with shared pain and anger.
“You shouldn’t have been there alone, and I’ll always hate that part of myself for that.”
“Don’t, you know full well how rushing into that situation would have gone. We’re here now.” You leaned in, pressing your forehead against Norm’s, a gesture of solidarity and unspoken promise. “We’ll get through this, Norm. One step at a time, together.”
The two of you continued this way throughout the evening, seamlessly shifting between playful banter and serious discussions. There were moments of shared laughter and tears, with deep emotions surfacing. As the hours passed, you both gradually moved from the couch to sprawling across the living room floor. Norm ended up lying on his back, staring at the ceiling, while you found a comfortable spot on your stomach.
“Your turn,” Norm says, encouraging another round of the question game you’ve been playing.
“Hmmm, if you could go back to before and experience one thing, what would it be?”
“Come on,” Norm groans, “there’s no point in...”
“Oh, please. At least try to be a little fun,” you tease.
He laughs and puts his hands up in surrender. “Fine, fine.” He couldn’t help but give in to you. Norm ponders for a minute. “Maybe getting to experience an arcade or comic shop in their heyday, the way they’re portrayed in movies at least. Atomic Command on the Pip-Boy is only so entertaining; something new would be fun. Plus a day to do something I enjoy, with no obligations, maybe meet people who like the same things as me. What about you?”
“The national parks,” you answer immediately, without needing to think. “All of them, any one of them, wouldn’t matter. Even just sitting there to experience them with all my senses, that would be my day,” you say, conjuring up images from the picture books you read as a kid.” It’s heartbreaking seeing how we just squandered... never mind, we don’t need to end tonight on a sour note.”
Norm nods, a thoughtful expression on his face. “Yeah, well, at least we’ve got these moments now. I guess that counts for something.”
You smile, feeling a sense of connection. “Yeah, it really does.” You stretch and move to stand while announcing, “It’s getting late; I should probably head out.”
“I’ll walk you you back.”
“Such a gentleman,” you gush, heading out the door. Norm laughs. “I think that’s a sentiment only you and my mom would share.”
“Well, your mom and I have excellent taste,” you reply with a wink. “Aside from your wit and charm, you’re an incredibly thoughtful and caring, Norm. One of the many reasons I enjoy spending time with you.”
He grins a hint of bashfulness in his eyes. “Thanks. You know, you’re pretty amazing yourself. You have this way of making even the simplest moments feel special.”
You feel a warmth spread through you at his words. “That means a lot, Norm.”
As you both reach the door of your living quarters, you turn to face Norm, a smile resting on your lips.
“Well, here we are,” you say softly.
“Yeah,” Norm replies, a hint of nervousness in his voice. He hesitates for a moment, then takes a deep breath. “Can I... can I kiss you?”
Your heart flutters at his question. “I’d like that,” you whisper, your voice barely audible.
Norm steps closer, his eyes searching yours for any sign of hesitation. Seeing none, he gently cups your face with his hands and leans in. The world seems to slow down as his lips meet yours in a tender, lingering kiss. It's soft and sweet, filled with the promise of more shared moments.
As you pull back, you both smile, your foreheads resting against each other for the second time this evening. “That was nice,” you say, your voice filled with warmth.
“Yeah, it was,” Norm agrees, his eyes shining with happiness. “Goodnight, (Y/N).”
“Goodnight, Norm,” you reply, feeling a contented glow as you watch him walk away.
—------------------------
Norm is lost in thought, walking home with a faint smile on his face. He rounds the corner of the hallway leading back to his living quarters and nearly collides with Betty Pearson.
“Whoa, Norm! Didn’t see you there,” Betty exclaims, steadying herself.
“Sorry, Betty,” Norm replies, snapping back to reality. “I didn’t see you either.”
She raises an eyebrow and glances at her Pip-Boy. “It’s pretty late to be out for a walk, isn’t it?”
“Yeah, I was just, uh, walking a friend home,” Norm says, trying to sound casual as a faint blush creeps up his cheeks.
Betty’s eyes narrow slightly, a knowing look crossing her face. “I’ve noticed you and (Y/N) have been spending quite a bit of time together lately.”
Norm shifts uncomfortably, not wanting to reveal too much. “Yeah, we’ve been hanging out. She’s good company.”
Betty smiles, but there’s a hint of something more in her expression. “That’s nice to hear. It’s important to find good company these days. Just remember, people are always watching. It’s easy to lose track of time when you’re with someone special.”
“Thanks, Betty. I’ll keep that in mind,” Norm replies, feeling a bit uneasy as he continues down the hallway, Betty’s words lingering in his mind.
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Omggg I’m so glad someone else agrees with my Norm x dommy mommy thoughts 😭
Sorry, I read this as "please post NSFW Norm MacLean headcanons". That's what it says, right?
Norm MacLean NSFW Headcanons
- We've seen that "casual sex as a way to combat boredom" is obviously on the table for people in Vault 33. Norm might not be the most popular guy in the vault, but hey, surely for every sexually active person in there, there's only so many available dicks you're not directly related to, so I imagine he's fairly experienced and confident in himself in terms of sex. He just sucks at getting over the "seduction" hurdle because he's so used to people rejecting him/not taking him seriously/thinking he's weird.
- Has an average-sized penis, but it looks pretty impressive on him because he's a below-average sized man in most other places. Doesn't hurt him in the confidence department.
- I'd describe him as a switch; how dominant or submissive he'd be would be would depend on his partner. But I think if he found himself someone that he really trusted and was comfortable with, he'd lean sub. I think he'd like to have someone to take care of him like that, to want him enough to want that too.
- Loves being marked up; hickies, scratch marks, little love bruises. He's crazy for them all. All the better if they're visible to others.
- This man is such a sucker for having his hair pulled. Like, the kind of pulling where you thread your fingers in and tug at it from the roots. Pull his hair to hold him on your breast, hold his head in place while he eats you out, tug at it to make him look at you while you fuck him. It drives him wild.
- Three words: face sitting fetish. He wants your entire weight on his face and chest, and if it isn't, he's yanking on you until it is. He knows how to put that nose to use!
- Obviously loves being ridden, but I think he'd also really enjoy missionary...especially if his partner is a lot bigger/taller than him.
#Norm MacLean deserves someone to carry him bridal style to bed#norm maclean#norm maclean smut#fallout tv show#fallout prime#norm maclean x reader#norm maclean x you#submission#non ghoul post
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If any of my lovelies out there would be willing to do me a massive favour and send in a request so I can write a shorter 1.5k ish imagine to kick myself into writing again I would really appreciate it!!
For Cooper Howard, Eli Moskowitz, Sanji, Zoro, Luffy, Koby Astarion, Delsin Rowe, Scott Lang, Bucky Barnes, Ezio Auditore, Leon Kennedy, Ellie Williams, Joel Miller, Abby Anderson or Norm MaClean!!
I have time to write tomorrow, so please send in by the end of today!
Ily!! :)
#fallout#cooper howard#norm maclean#one piece#sanji#zoro#monkey d luffy#delsin rowe#Scott lang#Bucky barnes#astarion#leon kennedy#ellie williams#joel Miller#abby anderson#Koby#opla
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Kinda a weird q, but any idea when and why the trend of punny titles for romance novels started? They range everywhere from clever (the rogue not taken for a travel story was kinda adorable) to obvious to downright terrible (how the duke stole xmas just makes me think about fucking the grinch... im sorry). Im curious if you know how it got started and any thoughts you have on it? Would you give your book a punny title?
Sorry for the delayed response, busy couple of days! (Busy couple of weeks.)
I'm not really sure exactly when the trend began, but I know it existed around the late 90s/early 2000s because that's when the Bridgerton books were published. The Viscount Who Loved Me isn't super obvious, but it's also obviously connected to The Spy Who Loved Me, arguably one of the most iconic James Bond movies. In the 80s and 90s I think we saw more epic titles--things like The Fires of Winter, A Kingdom of Dreams, the iconically quick and to the point Julie Garwood titles like The Secret or The Bride. A lot of 90s era Kleypas titles were kind of like... Romantic but not very related to the plot--Dreaming of You, where nobody dreams of anyone, comes to mind. Suddenly You, which was published later, is similarly vague.
Punny titles seemed to have grown over the 2000s, and by the time Sarah MacLean hit it big they were the norm, as evidenced by her Rules of Scoundrels series (A Rogue by Any Other Name, No Good Duke Goes Unpunished, etc).
I think they're catchy and easy to remember, so I'm not against them (though some definitely go a bit too far). But I really like the most recent/upcoming MacLean titles as an example of where trends are going--Bombshell, Heartbreaker. I know they're meant to evoke the old Amanda Quick titles, like Ravished, and I love that. Very dynamic and dramatic. While punny titles work for like, lighter books, for novels like MacLean's which tend to b a bit heavier and more dramatic, they seem a bit off? I imagine this is why you see them less with Kleypas titles, which are similarly kinda dark at times.
I don't know if punny titles would really work for the historical romances I want to write. I really tend towards like, heavy angst, not without humor but more in a "this is batshit bananas" type of way. In the vein of Lorraine Heath (I hope) more than Tessa Dare (though I love Tessa's books, don't get me wrong--I just don't think I could write what she writes). Honestly, I'm all about bringing back the over the top 80s titles like Velvet Promise or Gentle Rogue.
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Speak Now
Relationship: Norm McLean x Reader
Fandom: Fallout
Request: Yes by @fallout-girl219
Warnings: Fluff, Angst
Word Count: 1,250
Main Masterlist: Here
Fallout Masterlist: Here
Summary: On what is supposed to be the happiest day of her life, she cannot help but feel Norm is hiding something.
“Oh, I just love a wedding. Well we haven’t had one in a while but still.” Lucy gushed as she helped get her friend ready for her special day. Her hair was being pulled every which direction, while Stephanie tidied up her nails.
“How are you feeling?” The blonde at her hands asked, looking up briefly. The woman in the chair took a deep breath, and blew it out hard while she thought.
“Okay. Nervous, I guess.” She stated. Stephanie, having just gotten married recently, was still in her honeymoon phase and reminiscing.
“I get what you’re feeling. But once you see him in front of you, you’ll know. That’s the one. Like Bert,” her eyes held little clouds in them, “I just knew he was the one for me when we were set up.” Lucy looked towards her friend like she was eagerly taking in the story, but the same could not be said for the woman in the chair.
“I don’t know. Just… the idea though. Of marrying a complete stranger that I’ll meet at the vault exchange. It doesn’t feel right.” She lamented, expressing her concern with the practice.
“You’ll change really quick when you see him. Why I just knew that Bert was going to be the best man for me the second I saw him.” Stephanie said softly once more. They quieted their chatter as the two women began to work on the bride-to-be’s makeup. All the while, she sat there, running through every possibility.
Nothing her mind came up with helped her current predicament. A figure passed by the window into her room, that stopped just for a second to long. It was Norm. Her neighbor and life-long friend, even if he was a bit peculiar. Their eyes locked and she swore that she could see an upset look in his eyes. That was, until, it was broken off by Lucy standing in front of the bride to apply her lipstick.
She had no idea why Norm would be upset over her getting married, even to a stranger. They were just friends. Nothing more. Nothing less. Although, she had tried to get him to notice her. Taking up a new hobby to show him, only to be met with a disinterested stare while she spoke about it. Styling her hair a different way just to have him ask if she was feeling alright. Trying to find out his hobbies and having him wonder what she was doing there.
But to no avail. There was nothing to suggest that he thought about her in any other fashion than that of a friend. And even that was a maybe, if he even considered her one. She sure considered him a friend of hers. By the time she could see through the window again, Norm was gone. Her heart hurt a little bit. She should be happy. Not pinning after her friend. How could she be happy though? She was not excited to be marrying a stranger from Vault 32. That was not what she wanted. But she had to. For the good of society.
As the two women finished up their beautification of the bride in the chair, she was presented with a mirror. She had to admit; they did an amazing job. Presented with a white dress, she took the offered pen and hesitantly signed her name with the date on the inside panel. Getting dressed, her heart was speeding up considerably. Her nerves were getting the better of her. The walk down to Vault 32 was terrifying. Faces passed and all she wanted to do was scream and run. Her mother and father greeted her as she made it to the spot in front of the door to Vault 32.
“How are you feeling, honey?” Her mother asked, voice airy and sweet.
“Fine.” She replied. Her voice was cut short as a lump formed in her throat. The vault door seemed larger and more daunting now as they stood in front of it. A crowd of people came around the door to watch the exchange happen. Amongst those people, she scanned for one person, who stood at the back of the room. Norm was there. It made her feel better to have him there, but not as good as she should have been.
Hank MacLean came up to her and held her hand while pulling her towards the door. Even she could feel the sweat beading up on her, and her heart beating out of her chest. Before the door could be open though, a voice shouted above the commotion.
“Wait!” Norm pushed his way to the front of the crowd. “Wait, wait, wait.”
“What are you doing, son?” Hank whispered, about to scold him.
“She can’t get married to someone else.” He stated, looking towards the woman in a wedding dress, standing before the vault door.
“What are you talking about, Norm?” His father, once again, tried to keep a lid on the situation.
“Because I won’t allow you to marry her off. We can trade something else, but I will not have her marrying anyone else. There’s no direct bloodline between us, which means that our children won’t be directly related to anyone except our direct relatives in this community.” He finished his speech, and finally took another breath. Norm looked at his father, his friend, and back to his father. She looked relieved, and a little scared.
“You wish to marry her? Right now?” Hank pressed, waiting to see how this is going to play out.
“Yes. I’ll do it right now.” Norm stood up straighter, looking usually sure of himself as he faced the situation with conviction.
“Alright then. We’ll inform Overseer Jackson we no longer need a match. We’ll find something else of value to trade. I’ll go inform him.” Hank let go of her hand and waked out with his council. Her parents walked out as well, still confused as to what was happening. Soon, it was just the two kids who were looking down at their shoes.
“So… what was that all about?” She questioned, peeking her head out from her lashes.
“I just didn’t want you marrying someone who you didn’t know. I figured you would be more comfortable with someone you know.” Norm murmured.
“Is that all?” Once again, she pressed her friend for answers.
“Well-” he started, “maybe. Not really. I just, just…”
“Norm?” A call made his head peak up. She stepped closer and closer until they were toe to toe, and chest to chest.
“Yes? You are very close to me.” That was the last thing he was able to say until her lips pressed softly against his own. They stood there, finding their place in the moment. Unfortunately, the need for air came about which led for the pair to draw away from the other.
“I think we’re supposed to do that at the alter.” Norm whispered, which sent her into a fit of giggles. He giggled along with her and moved to hold her hand. She grasped his hand tightly and felt the sweat disappear from her palms. Norm felt a surge of confidence as he looked her in the eyes once more.
“Shall we go get married now?” He suggested, looking back into their own vault.
“Let’s go get married.” She agreed, beginning to drag him along with her. Norm followed willingly, and even ended up dragging her a little bit in his excitement to finally have the girl.
#rebelliousstories#writing#fallout imagine#fallout#norm maclean#norm maclean x reader#norman maclean#Norman Maclean imagine#Norman Maclean x reader#norm Maclean x oc#norman Maclean x oc#norm maclean imagine
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When Fallout Characters Have Their First Kiss...(Fallout Show Request)
Pairings: Cooper Howard/The Ghoul x Reader, Maximus x Reader, Norm x Reader
Author's Note: Thank you to everyone who voted on my last poll! It was so fun seeing the votes come in so I'll definitely do that again! Please keep sending in Fallout requests, or for any of the other poll options :)
The Ghoul:
- Life in the wastelands has always been tough, and Cooper Howard's skin has had to grow even tougher, literally and metaphorically. His defenses have slowly steeled themselves over the last two hundred years, every awful encounter and exchange adding another barricade around what was once a warm and friendly heart. He thought that tough exterior was what had kept him alive that long. He also thought your purpose in his life must have been to prove that thought wrong.
- From that first surprising encounter the ghoul found himself drawn to your gaze, your touch, your presence. The way you gave him all three so unflinchingly. Your eyes could look into his without disgust or pity, your hand never snatching away as if the slightest graze could curse you to the same cruel fate. Cooper tried to tell himself the kindest thing he could do for you was to keep your partnership of survival a strictly platonic one, but as nights in each other's company passed one by one he could feel himself inching closer and closer to the warmth you seemed to radiate towards him.
- So used to being in control of every situation, it only shook him more to feel so uncertain of your feelings and if he should act on his own. He feared you being the first person in a century to show him kindness had turned his brain entirely to confetti, that his heart had no choice but to hope you'd take it from his cavernous chest. But your kindness was who you were to everyone, regardless of what they deserved. It didn't mean anything about how you felt about him. So why couldn't he stop himself having that most dangerous hope that maybe his heart wasn't the only one aching with every step you passed side by side, hands hanging just shy of touching, so easy to grab and finally embrace that deep seated truth that this was becoming something more.
- Cooper prided himself on taking the brunt of any danger the world seemed to throw your way, happy to be stitched back together by your soft and caring hands. That day though, he'd been thrown from your side a moment too long and watched helplessly as a half-crazed raider slashed at you with some clumsily wielded machete. You did your best to hold them off, but before Cooper could rise to his feet and grab his pistol you'd taken a hit to the arm, blood dripping from the tip of the blade and red spreading across the tattered fabric of your shirt. The ghoul had never felt such rage encompassing him, ripping through the gang in a violent frenzy that he would have worried would frighten you if he wasn't so focused on his need for overkill.
- He's uncharastically quiet as he practically carries you back to camp, ignoring your insistence that it's just a scratch until he's been able to examine you himself by the familiar glow of your campfire. He kneels beside you and scrutinises your arm, always slightly captivated by how soft your skin has remained in this unforgiving wasteland. Once he realises that you're right, and you'll be just fine, he can feel the swell of relief and terror hitting him all at once, the awful realisation that he could have lost you without ever getting to try and be as close to you as he craves. So he stills his gaze on your face, eyes flickering down to your lips as he inches closer, bracing himself for the rejection of your retreat. Instead you meet him halfway, your lips more warm and soft than any he could remember. In that sweet moment Cooper Howard feels more alive, more human, more safe than he ever did before the bombs hit. He feels like his body is warming from the inside out, a rush of blood bringing him back to the man he once was.
- He may not look any different as he reluctantly pulls away to let you breathe, but he is a changed man inside from your kiss. He realises that it's not his callous cynicism that's kept him alive this long, but his once soft heart, desperate to find hope again. Hope that he's now found, with you.
Maximus:
- It was hard for Maximus to put his finger on exactly what he felt when he was around you. He knew his entire being ached to be near you, and even when he was, it somehow wasn't close enough. He knew that when you smiled it made him smile, no matter what the context or motivation. He knew that the longer he went without seeing you, the dimmer the world seemed to be, like you were his lens to all the joy and colour around him and he was lost in grey oblivion about it. Maximus felt a lot of things around you that he'd never felt before, but he didn't really know what to call it. And he certainly didn't know what to do with all those feelings.
- The Brotherhood wasn't exactly the best place to learn about feelings growing up, everything complex and difficult hidden behind a layer of steel and obedience. Thankfully if you put enough young people together, eventually gossip will reign supreme. And so Max heard about the idea of a crush from two tables over as he sat eating alone in the canteen. He strained to pick up the conversation between two of the older guys who'd been out on more missions, setting down his cutlery and shuffling closer as he heard one of them talk about the way his stomach was in knots every time one of the new recruits looked at him. By the time they'd described the hot flush in their cheeks when the object of their affections smiled, and how they plagued their every thought, Max was sat with his mouth hanging agape and a renewed sense of purpose for the next time you came knocking on his door to sneak out to see the stars.
- In fact he couldn't wait for that moment to come and instead you found him breathless and fighting with the opening of your tent when you came back from your latest supply run. Upon spotting you he quickly unravelled himself from the ropes that had captured his limbs in his stealthy attempts to sneak a peek inside, and offered his hand to you in such a matter of fact motion that you had to stifle a laugh at the serious expression on his face. He leads you to the quiet corner of camp the two of you frequent, a tarp tucked against a loose fence panel that almost feels like a loveseat made just for you.
"Do you know what a crush is?" Max looked equal parts concerned and excited as he tried to read your puzzled expression.
"Yes Max, do you?" You knew there was something growing in the way you and Maximus had come to rely on each other, and pass every free moment tangled in each other's company, but you also knew he didn't have the best understanding when it came to the more human parts of his life and didn't want to risk misreading the delicate situation.
"I think so, but what should you do when you have a crush on someone?" He looked up at you starry-eyed and hopeless, desperately wishing that you two could be far away from here and working all of this out without the horrors of war hanging over you. You could see the straining heart behind his wide-eyed gaze, his hand still nervously clinging to yours, and decided to take pity on the young soldier.
"Do you want me to show you?" You ask softly, inching closer to his face almost feeling the heat rising in his cheeks as he frantically nodded. Lifting the hand he hadn't claimed, you let your palm rest against his cheek, feeling his body start to tremble in anticipation of what might come next. You leaned in, eyes focusing on his soft full lips until they met yours, pressing gently into him until his brain caught up and finally he started to reciprocate. Unsure and desperate, his free hand found the small of your back, pulling you closer and making sure you wouldn't stop this wonderful feeling in a hurry. As your lips moved slowly against his, he found a rhythm with you, drinking in your sweet warmth and praying this moment would never end, because somehow this strange and overwhelming feeling was still so much better than the years of emptiness that had stretched before it. Finally you pull away from him, searching his eyes for some insight into how he's feeling after such a pivotal first for him. You're met by the widest smile you've ever seen, and a simple question, "Can we do that again?"
Norm:
- Norman Maclean couldn't help the overwhelming cynicism that flooded through him every time it was the day of another vault-exchanging wedding day. He wanted to enjoy the delicious array of food, without thinking about how insufferable it must be to suddenly live with a perfect stranger. He wanted to enthusiastically navigate the dancefloor like everyone else, without thinking about how the new couple must be feeling so uncomfortable despite how happy they looked. He wanted to be able to soak in the joy of that magical first kiss without feeling this strange hollow ache inside himself that he tried to write off as an aversion to the falseness of this whole charade. But as he watched yet another 'happy couple' lock lips or move intertwined across the dancefloor, a small part of him knew that his distaste for the day was down to one much more simple feeling: Envy.
- There wasn't even anyone in the vault he wanted to share those kinds of embraces with, but that knowledge did little to assuage the aching loneliness that was nestled deep under layers of logic and intelligence that he let guide him instead of his heart. Or at least there had never been anyone in the vault that had made him feel that way by the time the council decided it was his turn to take part in their little tradition of arranged marriages. And in a most pleasant surprise to the slight young man, he felt a touch of optimism as his wedding day rolled around and he found himself face to face with you. And in a twist of fate that had Norm quite unable to believe his own luck, he was destined to wed someone that stirred those same desperate, longing feelings inside him with no sign of relief.
- The short-lived, perfunctory kiss with which the two of you had sealed your vows had been enough to set his heart ablaze, even with the eyes of the vault on him, even though it only lasted for a split-second, even though he wished the circumstances were entirely different. And as the two of you found common ground and shared secret jokes as the night went on, Norm only found himself falling deeper under your spell and praying when the night was through that you wouldn't resent following him back to a room that might finally feel like home.
- As the music from the old record-player swelled you threaded your fingers through his and pulled him over the sparsely populated dancefloor, most of the Vault 33 having long given up on seeing Norm dance and retreated to their own private quarters. As the lights grew dimmer on the projected skyline you seemed only more beautiful in Norm's eyes, his slender arms finding your waist and holding onto you like he feared he might drift away in an ocean current that threatened to pull him back to reality. He watched the soft smile spread effortlessly across your face, the ease with which you swayed to the music making him dance before he even realised he was moving. His mind replayed the briefest touch of your lips and suddenly he found himself unable to concentrate on anything but closing the distance between you, every nerve in his body sending electricity through him that finally promised to illuminate the dark, aching loneliness that had resided in him for as long as he could remember.
- He prayed your smile was genuine as he stepped ever closer, taking a visibly deep breath before finally taking the plunge and landing what he hoped would be the first real kiss of many in your marriage. His chest pressed firmly against yours as he tried to remove all space between the two of you, every ounce of hope and affection pouring out into a kiss that had your head spinning, pure dedication from your new husband clear in his every touch. It felt all consuming to finally be so connected to another person, a feeling Norm feared would never find him but now seemed a tangible part of his present and future. By the time he pulled away his lungs ached and he worried his eyes would well up if you kept staring at him with such intensity. He felt himself freeze on the spot as he awaited your verdict; on his kiss, on the marriage, on him. A moment that stretched out an eternity passed before finally he watched a smile grace your lips, feeling your hand find his again as you said softly in his ear, an unfamiliar gleam in your eye,
"Which of these rooms is ours, husband?"
#writing#fanfiction#requests#one shot#fallout prime#fallout headcanons#fallout show#fallout#cooper howard one shot#cooper howard headcanons#cooper howard imagine#cooper howard x reader#cooper howard#the ghoul headcanons#the ghoul imagine#fallout the ghoul#the ghoul x reader#the ghoul#norm maclean#fallout norm#fallout norman#norman maclean#norm x reader#maximus x reader#fallout maximus#maximus#maximus headcanons#fallout headcanon
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Desperately need more norm fics, I’d die for a norm smut or smut headcanon.
Gonna stick with headcanons for now, as I have a smut fic planned!
warnings/info: 18+ minors dni! mentions of overstim(?), gn!reader (no mentions specific body parts), dry humping (of course let me know if i missed anything!)
Let's hop right in!
Norm is not a super enthusiastic individual, that is known. BUT! I feel like he can be enthusiastic when it comes to sex.
LOVES to cuddle up close to you. Usually that turns into him (or you) dry humping the other and whining.
Head game is strong.
Very enthusiastic about going down on you. Maybe he isn't too experienced at first, but he is very willing to learn when it comes to you.
Can and will sit between your legs for as long as you'd like. Usually, until you're a whining messing, begging for more than just his tongue.
While he is happy to have sex with you, most of the time it isn't a quickie or super quick/rough sex.
Likes for it to be drawn out. Especially in the beginning of your relationship. He wants to know you. Really know your body.
VERY attentive. Takes all the time he can to learn everything that gets you going and is mindful of the things you don't like.
Is going to love his partner regardless, but definitely does not mind at all if you are taller than him.
Would definitely use a height difference to his advantage.
I see him loving to be little spoon. While he doesn't mind holding you, he's stressed please hold him too.
I feel like my man has never received great head, so is sort of indifferent towards it. As soon as he learns how great it can feel though? BRO IS BEGGING. HE IS NOT ABOVE BEGGING.
Not huge on PDA but will hold your hand and give you sweet little kisses if you're just around the vault.
If you tease him, at all, anywhere but the bedroom he gets flustered and will tell you he is going to handle it (you) later.
This consists of going down on your until you're sensitive and a crying mess. Which in turn leaves you continually teasing Norm... Poor guy can't catch a break.
I have soooo many ideas about so many different things with Norm (and like most fallout 2024 characters tbh) but so little time... If there is anything specific y'all want touched on let me know! Thanks for the request!
#fallout#fallout smut#norm maclean#norman maclean#norm maclean x reader#x reader#anon#ask#answered#fallout 2024#fallout tv series#fallout prime#fallout imagine
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How L. Ron Hubbard and Robert Heinlein influenced the murderous cult of Manson.
Charles Manson’s Science Fiction Roots
New Republic by JEET HEER November 21, 2017
In 1963, while a prisoner at the federal penitentiary at McNeil Island in Washington state, Charles Manson heard other prisoners enthuse about two books: Robert Heinlein’s science fiction novel Stranger in a Strange Land (1961) and L. Ron Hubbard’s self-help guide Dianetics: The Modern Science of Mental Health (1950). Heinlein’s novel told the story of a Mars-born messiah who preaches a doctrine of free love, leading to the creation of a religion whose followers are bound together by ritualistic water-sharing and intensive empathy (called “grokking”). Hubbard’s purportedly non-fiction book described a therapeutic technique for clearing away self-destructive mental habits. It would later serve as the basis of Hubbard’s religion, Scientology.
Manson probably didn’t delve too deeply into either of these texts. But he was gifted at absorbing information in conversation, and by talking to other prisoners he gleaned enough from both books to synthesize a new theology. His encounter with the writings of Heinlein and Hubbard was a pivotal event in his life. Until then, he had been a petty criminal and drifter who spent his life in and out of jail. But when Manson was released from McNeil Island in 1967, he was a new figure: a charismatic street preacher who gathered a flock of followers among the hippies of Haight-Ashbury in San Francisco.
Manson won them with a doctrine of communal bonding: They would be a family and share in all things, including love. Manson’s made-up religion was a cut-and-paste invention that borrowed from many sources. As The New York Times notes, Manson’s philosophy was “an idiosyncratic mix of Scientology, hippie anti-authoritarianism, Beatles lyrics, the Book of Revelation, and the writings of Hitler.” But the sci-fi component was pronounced. Stranger in a Strange Land provided the Manson family with its rituals (water-sharing ceremonies), terminology (“grokking”), and promise of transcendence (Manson’s followers hoped that, like the hero of Heinlein’s novel, they would gain mystical powers). The dream of mind triumphing over matter was also the sales pitch of Dianetics.
The Manson family, of course, had a twisted definition of love, which they wanted to keep for themselves. For the outside world, they wanted a violent race war, which would end with them ruling over the survivors. Towards that end, the Manson family went on a killing spree in August 1969 that left nine dead and earned them a notorious place in history. ...
Manson went to jail, and remained there until his death on Sunday at a hospital in California’s Kern County. Amidst an ongoing assessment of his historical relevance—the Manson family killings have been popularized, by Joan Didion and others, as the death knell of the 1960s—it is worth revisiting how two books, steeped in utopian ambitions, played a role in a country’s unraveling. It was hardly an accident that Manson borrowed heavily from both Heinlein and Hubbard. No two writers better illustrate the tendency of science fiction to generate cults.
Heinlein and Hubbard first met in 1939 and immediately hit it off. To his wife Leslyn, Heinlein described Hubbard as “our kind of people in every possible way.” (The friendship between the two men is described in William Patterson’s two-volume biography of Heinlein). They were both prolific pulp writers, contributing heavily to Astounding Science-Fiction, which was revolutionizing the field under the editorship of John W. Campbell. Astounding’s major claim to fame was that it specialized in “hard science fiction,” which was rigorously based on extrapolations from actual science. This claim was a bit self-serving since Campbell always had a taste for pseudo-science, but it’s undeniable that Heinlein’s own work, grounded in his education as an engineer, brought a new level of plausibility to the genre.
Heinlein was in an open marriage with Leslyn, a poet and script editor. He had a habit of encouraging his close male buddies to take Leslyn as a lover. As Hubbard would later marvel, Heinlein “almost forced me to sleep with his wife.” Sharing his wife’s body was a form of male bonding for Heinlein, and it served as a precursor to the communal orgies that he imagined in Stranger in a Strange Land, which helped the members of his imaginary religion form group solidarity.
Hubbard and Heinlein also shared an interest in the supernatural. Together with their friend Jack Parson, a rocket scientist, they investigated the teachings of the occultist Aleister Crowley and tried their hand at black magic.
Hubbard may have suffered from some form of post-traumatic stress disorder following World War II. (He served in the Navy, and later made up stories of his wartime adventures; in reality, military records show that Hubbard’s wartime service was “substandard.”) His attempts to create a new science of the mind, culminating in the publication of Dianetics, can be understood as an attempt to self-medicate. The first article about Dianetics appeared in the March 1950 issue of Astounding Science-Fiction. Campbell was an early enthusiast, crediting Dianetics with helping him cure his chronic sinusitis. (The cure was psychosomatic and temporary.) Many science fiction writers in Campbell’s orbit, notably A.E. van Vogt, Katherine MacLean, and James Blish, got caught up in the Dianetics craze.
Campbell eventually became disillusioned with Dianetics, but moved on to becoming an advocate for other forms of pseudo-science...
Unlike Campbell, Heinlein kept clear of Dianetics. But Heinlein was nonetheless fascinated by the way his old friend Hubbard had created a pseudo-science that eventually became the religion of Scientology. This planted the seeds for an idea: What if someone created a religion like Scientology that actually worked—that did give people transcendent mental power, such as mind-reading and levitation? The result of this thought experiment was Stranger in a Strange Land, which remains Heinlein’s most famous novel. One of the heroes of the novel, Jubal Harshaw, a polymathic pulp writer who is very successful in seducing women, is clearly an idealized version of Hubbard.
Heinlein meant Stranger in a Stranger Land to be a jape, a satire on religion. While Hubbard had turned science fiction into a religion, Heinlein was trying to turn religion into science fiction. But many readers took it all too seriously. In March of 1969 at a film festival in Rio, Heinlein met a charming actress named Sharon Tate. A few months later, she was murdered by a cult that took inspiration from Heinlein’s novel.
No literary genre has been so fertile at generating religions as science fiction. Heinlein’s work was the springboard for many competing sects, and he called himself “a preacher with no church.” Rare among the many intellectual gurus whose fame mushroomed in the 1960s, Heinlein was a beacon for all kinds of people: hippies and hawks, libertarians and authoritarians....
Heinlein’s ability to excite cultic faith among all sorts of groups speaks to the power of science fiction as a literature of ideas, especially during utopian moments like the 1960s, when the future feels open. Heinlein’s book was not alone in gaining a cult following, it was joined by J.R.R. Tolkein’s Lord of the Rings, Herbert’s Dune, and Ursula K. Le Guin’s The Left Hand of Darkness. Each of these books spoke to a desire for an alternative reality, just as older social norms were breaking down.
As vile and sociopathic as he was, Charles Manson did have a gift for absorbing the zeitgeist, which is one reason he held such a powerful sway over the cultural imagination. Manson picked up Stranger in a Strange Land in the same spirit that he learned to strum a guitar and offer exegeses on Beatles lyrics. It was a way for him to ride the wave of cultural change. Manson remained infamous all these decades not just because he inspired mass murder, but also because he did so by manipulating some of our most powerful myths.
Jeet Heer is a senior editor at the New Republic.
https://newrepublic.com/article/145906/charles-mansons-science-fiction-roots
“In Korea, one even senses a fear, like one induced by the Mafia, among the opposition to the Unification Church, and … outspoken opponents speak of death threats.” Prof. Sontag, 1976
Tahk Myeong-hwan was murdered four weeks after Sun Myung Moon spoke about him as an opponent.
Tahk Myeong-hwan was attacked with car bomb
Tahk Myeong-hwan was offered a bribe of $450,000 to discontinue research into the Unification Church
UC members sent more than 200 text messages to Cho’s cell phone, saying, “We’ll kill you.”
Abducted and beaten up by the Unification Church in Korea
1. Freedom of the Press in Korea – Unification Church style
2. Freedom of the Press in Japan – Unification Church style
Prime Minister Kishi of Japan, organised crime and the Moon involvement in Japanese politics gained protection for the UC
The Mysterious Death of Robert Boettcher in 1984
Donald M. Fraser’s house was attacked by an arsonist just after his investigation into the Unification Church. It was only saved by good fortune.
Moon’s followers poured a pot of urine and feces on the head of a Seoul University Professor of Religion.
In 1975 Korean Unification Church members physically attacked many Christian pastors
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Ten of the best British inns
When travel can recommence, book into one of these great British inns and treasure that long overdue weekend away
The British public house has evolved over the past few decades, with old spit-and-sawdust boozers either forced to close or re-imagined into ever-more stylish, truly hospitable places to stay. Impressive menus and first-rate accommodation are now the norm. Here are ten of the best, chosen by The Good Hotel Guide.
THE ROSE AND CROWN, SNETTISHAM, NORFOLK
Roses romp over the whitewashed façade of this 14th-century village pub, created to accommodate workmen building St Mary’s church. Bedrooms are decorated in seaside colours (the unspoilt coast is two miles away) and supplied with books, magazines, posh toiletries. Dogs and children are welcome. You can drink real ale by a log fire in the cosy bar, raise a glass of Pimm’s in the walled garden. The menu runs from pub classics to more imaginative dishes. Maybe flat-iron chicken, sweet potato mash, corn of the cob, Boston beans, okra tempura.
B&B single £100, double £120. À la carte £30. 01485 541382, roseandcrownsnettisham.co.uk
ROSE AND CROWN, ROMALDKIRK, CO. DURHAM
Guide readers love this 18th-century coaching inn beside the Saxon church in a quiet Teesdale village, the perfect blend of friendly local drop-in, restaurant and hotel. The owners have farmed in the area for four generations and are passionate about local produce. Chef David Hunter’s eclectic menus, in the bar and oak-panelled restaurant, include such dishes as outdoor-reared pork loin chop, colcannon, alliums, crackling, rosemary jus. Inn bedrooms have exposed beams, antiques and locally made furniture. Annexe rooms are more contemporary, with an outdoor seating area.
B&B £120–£205, à la carte £40. 01833 650213, rose-and-crown.co.uk
THE STAR INN, HAROME, YORKSHIRE
An ancient thatched pub lies at the heart of this characterful village hostelry on the edge of the moors, with a lovely garden, and accommodation in a rustic building opposite. Bedrooms have some quirky features – a snooker table, a piano – but style and comfort are not compromised. Owner Andrew Pern holds a Michelin star for his ways with local and home-grown, shot, farmed, fished and foraged ingredients, with plenty of veggie options. A typical dish: marmalade-glazed Swaledale mallard, pickle, clove-studded ham hock tartlet, smoked apple, Yorkshire sauce. Or just order a pint and a ‘posh ploughman’s’ at the hand-carved oak bar.
B&B £150-£240, market menu £25, à la carte £60, tasting menu £85. 01439 770397, thestaratharome.co.uk
MONTAGU ARMS, BEAULIEU, HAMPSHIRE
This tile-hung, wisteria-draped, Tudor-Jacobean-style hostelry was newly built when Sherlock Holmes’s creator, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, stayed here in 1889. In the lovely setting in the New Forest, the inn looks across Beaulieu (pronounced ‘Bewley’) water to Palace House, seat of the Montagu family since 1538, and home to the National Motor Museum. Hotel bedrooms are smart, most with a hand-made king-size bed. There is high-class cooking in the Terrace Restaurant by local man Matthew Whitefield, back from a stint at New York’s Michelin-starred Eleven Madison Park. Excellent, cheaper fare and real ales are served in Monty’s Inn.
B&B £219–£399. Tasting menu £90, à la carte £60 (restaurant), £30 (Monty’s Inn). 01590 612324, montaguarmshotel.co.uk
THE SUN INN, DEDHAM, ESSEX
Lovers of John Constable can borrow a bike or walk along the River Stour to explore his native Dedham Vale, from this yellow-painted, 15th-century coaching inn. The locals’ bar, lounge and beamed dining room exude comfort and bonhomie. A changing menu brings such dishes as pasta, risotto, Merrifield Farm chicken breast, leg and ham hock pie, chanterelles, creamed spinach. Individually styled bedrooms vary in size. ‘Constable’ has a half-tester bed and a view of St Mary’s Church, home to Constable’s ‘The Ascension’ and a pew dedicated to the people of Dedham, Massachusetts, whose forebears set off from here.
B&B single £90–£135, double £150. À la carte £28.50. 01206 323351, thesuninndedham.com
ACORN INN, EVERSHOT, DORSET
In Thomas Hardy’s Wessex, this 16th-century coaching inn appears in Tess of the D’Urbervilles, thinly disguised as the ‘Sow and Acorn’. Individually styled bedrooms range from snug to suites. ‘Hardy’ has a carved antique four-poster. An eclectic menu includes such dishes as rump of Dorset Horn lamb, textures of onion, roasted rosemary potatoes, ewe’s curd and buttered cavolo nero, alongside a signature burger, fish and chips, Thai red chicken curry. Tess chose not to breakfast at the inn. The modern traveller should not make that mistake, when local sausages, Dorset ham, and bread from the village bakery are on offer.
B&B £105–£230. À la carte £35. 01935 83228, acorn-inn.co.uk
THE LORD POULETT ARMS, HINTON ST GEORGE, SOMERSET
Residents of this picturesque village have the UK’s highest life expectancy. With the gentle countryside all around, and this 17th-century thatched inn on their doorstep, they clearly can’t bear to leave. Picture flagstone floors, wooden settles, long-case clocks, quirky artworks. Bedrooms vary from the bijou with separate tiny bathroom, to spacious, with an in-room slipper bath, but all have a king- or super-king-size bed and hand-made toiletries. Local produce shines in pub classics (fish and chips, burger, steak and chips) and such modern dishes as cauliflower steak, south Indian sambar dhal, mango chutney and relish.
B&B double £85–£110, family £160. À la carte £35. 01460 73149, lordpoulettarms.com
THE KING’S HEAD, BLEDINGTON, OXFORDSHIRE
Ducks bob about on the stream that runs through the green in a quintessential Cotswold village, overlooked by this 16th-century inn. In a cosy bar with exposed beams and high-back settles, locals chat over pints of local ale. Bedrooms – in the main building and off a landscaped courtyard – are prettily styled, some with a pleasing Provençal feel. The food is hearty and traditional, with pub classics such as burgers made with beef from the family farm, and haddock and chips, and more imaginative fare (maybe loin of venison, crushed new potatoes, red cabbage, kale and jus).
B&B single £80–£105, double £110–£140. À la carte £35. 01608 658365, thekingsheadinn.net
CREGGANS INN, STRACHUR, ARGYLL AND BUTE
Sir Fitzroy Maclean, soldier, diplomat, probable inspiration for the character of James Bond, was once licensed to sell alcohol at this whitewashed 19th-century inn on the eastern shore of Loch Fyne. Bedrooms are traditionally styled, with designer fabrics and wallpaper, a view over the loch or the woodland garden. Log fires burn in bar and bistro, where the menu offers dishes from ‘land’, ‘sea’ and ‘garden’ – maybe fillet of estate venison salt baked beetroot, fondant potatoes, rosemary jus; pan-seared monkfish cheeks, chive potato cake, curried whitebait and mussel broth; vegetable risotto. Breakfast brings Loch Fyne kippers – of course.
B&B £130–£200. À la carte £30. 01369 860279, creggans-inn.co.uk
THE BONNIE BADGER, GULLANE, EAST LOTHIAN
In a coastal village closed to Muirfield course, the old Golf Inn has been transformed into a gastropub by Michelin-starred chef Tom Kitchin, and his wife, Michaela, to showcase locally grown, fished and farmed produce. Smart bedrooms are styled in colours reflecting the East Lothian landscape, each with a marble bathroom with walk-in shower and handmade toiletries. You can eat in the Broc Bar or in the stone-walled, beamed Stables dining room, where head chef Matthew Budge creates a modern take on pub classics. Perhaps Highland Wagyu beef burger; Borders lamb rump, haggis and potato terrine; spelt and lentil burger…
B&B £195–£470 (£225–£595 around key golf event days). À la carte £45. 01620 621111, bonniebadger.com
The post Ten of the best British inns appeared first on Britain Magazine | The official magazine of Visit Britain | Best of British History, Royal Family,Travel and Culture.
Britain Magazine | The official magazine of Visit Britain | Best of British History, Royal Family,Travel and Culture https://www.britain-magazine.com/features/ten-best-british-inns/
source https://coragemonik.wordpress.com/2020/05/01/ten-of-the-best-british-inns/
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How Libertarian Democracy Skepticism Infected the American Right
In her book Democracy in Chains: The Deep History of the Radical Right’s Stealth Plan for America, which has been shortlisted for the National Book Award, the Duke University historian Nancy MacLean advances the surprising thesis that the hidden figure behind the contemporary libertarian-leaning political right was the economist James M. Buchanan . Buchanan is far from a household name, though he has been influential in economics and political science, and was awarded a Nobel Prize in 1986 “for his development of the contractual and constitutional bases for the theory of economic and political decision-making.” MacLean argues that Buchanan, animated by Southern segregationist impulses and backed by dark Koch-brothers cash, quietly and effectively sought to undermine democracy — to put it “in chains” — to keep America safe for white supremacist plutocracy.
Scholars sympathetic to Buchanan’s project have swarmed. They say MacLean’s book is a slanderous, poorly argued, thinly sourced, intellectually shabby conspiracy theory. MacLean is overly fond of Infowars-style dot-connecting, but I’m not going to pile on. Instead, I’d like to focus on a couple of big things MacLean gets right: the libertarian-influenced American right is hostile to democracy, and it is a big problem.
The fact that MacLean’s pretty badly wrong about why (she’s a stranger to the right, with a hostile agenda) shouldn’t keep us from grappling with the significance of the small-government, free-market right’s antipathy to democracy. I’d like to offer a more sympathetic, if not much less critical, account of the libertarian-leaning right’s grudge against democracy.
Republican electoral hardball and libertarian anti-democracy
A fair portion of the conservative wariness of democracy is probably best accounted for by ordinary opportunistic partisanship. There are more Democrats than Republicans in the United States. Though the Electoral College and the rules for Senate representation are rigged to favor thinly populated rural states, which tilt heavily Republican, the demographic trends over the medium term nevertheless augur ill for the GOP, as it is currently composed. That makes it seem critical to Republicans to find ways to keep Democrats from voting, and to minimize the electoral impact of the Democratic ballots that are cast.
I think this explains some of the right’s enthusiastic drive to rig future elections through congressional redistricting, disenfranchise voters with strict ID requirements (justified by specious panic about voter fraud), keep released felons from voting, and constrict the flow of immigrants likely to become or produce Democratic voters. But I don’t think mere hardball partisanship explains all of this. And it certainly doesn’t explain the shamelessness with which Republicans routinely stomp on civics class ideals of democratic participation and representation. The right’s unruffled conscience about grubby electoral realpolitik requires a justifying ideology. Some of this is bad, old-fashioned American racial ideology, of course. The Republican Party these days is more or less the party of older white people, especially white men, who don’t live in big cities. And the history of American democracy is not, to put it delicately, a history of country white folk insisting on democratic equality for others. But there’s more to it than that. As MacLean suggests, some of the right’s enabling anti-democratic ideas have distinctively libertarian roots.
But the specifically libertarian beef with democracy isn’t exactly the dark secret MacLean makes it out to be. This year, Jason Brennan, a libertarian philosopher at Georgetown, published a book called … guess what? Against Democracy. Ilya Somin, a libertarian law professor at George Mason, is the author of Democracy and Political Ignorance: Why Smaller Government Is Smarter, published in 2013. In 2007, the libertarian economist Bryan Caplan published The Myth of the Rational Voter: Why Democracies Choose Bad Policies.
It’s right out there in the open! The influence of James Buchanan and the “public choice” school of political economy certainly plays a role in this latest scholarly wave of libertarian democracy-skepticism. But this isn’t really the stuff that feeds the anti-democratic instincts of the American right, and it’s not driven by the sinister motives MacLean imagines having driven Buchanan.
The true story of the libertarian-leaning right’s distaste for democracy is simple on the surface, but complicated in the depths. The simple story is that libertarians generally think that voters tend make a lot of bad decisions at the ballot box, constantly harming their own interests and violating basic rights. The beginning of the complicated story is that libertarianism, as a political stance distinct from 18th and 19th century “classical liberalism,” evolved to serve as a radical ideological antidote to socialism in both its fascist and communist guises. Fascism and communism were tyrannical and murderous. And they were alarmingly popular throughout the 20th century. This made simple, majority-rule democracy look like a loaded gun with which liberal societies might shoot themselves in the head.
Problematizing popular faith in the moral legitimacy and practical efficacy of unconstrained, majority-rule democracy thus came to seem like a matter of survival to the libertarian vanguard of the anti-socialist right. Antipathy to democracy, ranging from uneasiness to outright hostility, became part of the right’s DNA, and it still is today.
How classical liberalism became weaponized anti-socialism
The history of 20th century libertarian thought comes into focus when you view it as an attempt to preserve the humanitarian blessings of the liberal, capitalist market order against the illiberal depredations of encroaching socialism.
F.A. Hayek saw the Nazis and Soviets up close. In the early 1940s, when Hayek began writing The Road to Serfdom, the Nazis (who ruled his native Austria) were locked in a death-match for control of Europe with Stalin’s totalitarian communism and the scattered remnants of the old liberal order. Capitalist liberal democracy looked like it really might be doomed. Hayek believed that 18th and 19th century arguments for “the liberal creed” had grown stale, no longer inspiring allegiance. So he took it upon himself to restate and defend the argument for liberalism in contemporary terms against the specific threats to freedom in the age of the Soviets and Nazis.
Hayek saw democracy as a safeguard — a weak one — against the threat of authoritarianism. In The Road to Serfdom, he argued that central economic planning—an idea then much in vogue among intellectuals—requires highly concentrated political authority. This concentration of power endangers the economic institutions known to produce rising prosperity, and can easily devolve into tyranny. The advantage of democracy, as Hayek saw it, is that it disperses authority widely. The democratic representatives of the economic and political interests most likely to be directly harmed by central planning are unlikely to support it, which creates a firewall against the trend toward dangerously concentrated power.
But Hayek realized that democracy’s dispersion of authority can’t supply robust protection against the authoritarian risks of central planning if sturdy majorities persistently demand it. To serve as an effective bulwark against centralization, democratic institutions need to be governed by implicit and explicit liberal norms that constrain the scope of democratic decision-making in a way that effectively takes the central management of the economy and society off the table. Hayek believed that if “the liberal creed” is supplanted by “a collectivist creed,” which tends to demand central planning in the name of egalitarian economic justice, democracy will eventually collapse into the concentrated form of authority centralized planning logically requires. “When it becomes dominated by a collectivist creed,” Hayek wrote, “democracy will inevitably destroy itself.”
Hayek sought to mitigate the risk that democracy would destroy itself, and the golden goose of liberal capitalism, by advancing arguments for limits on the sovereignty of democratic legislatures. Like America’s classical liberal founders, Hayek championed a constitution that divides authority and limits the scope of legislative power. He also promoted the prestige of the common law—which had evolved over centuries to grease the wheels of beneficial commerce—as an independent source of authority that ought to be given serious weight by policymakers and judges.
According to Hayek, the domain of authoritative law is not exhausted by the statutes promulgated by elected officials. Legislatures don’t have the authority to rewrite all the rules from scratch. A congress or parliament is brought to life by the breath of constitutional rules, and those rules inherit their meaning and authority from a background of authoritative conventions, including ordinary social morality and the common law. A legislator who denies the authority of constitutional constraints or the background web of moral norms saws off the branch she’s sitting on. Political cultures that honor these legal rules and social norms produce voters and policymakers comfortable with limits on the scope of democracy.
For Hayek, there’s nothing otherworldly about the authority of morality, the common law, or a constitution. These things do have authority—do win our allegiance and obedience—but only insofar as we see them as legitimate and treat them as authoritative. That’s all there is to it: people following the rules because they think they should. Liberal social order is a rare flower that springs from the soil of liberal belief. But these beliefs are historically contingent, implicit in our practice, and rarely explicitly articulated or defended. This leaves liberal political and economic order, and the transformative creative freedom that it unleashes, inherently fragile and vulnerable to shifts in ideological fashion.
Classical liberalism and libertarianism: trigger locks versus disarmament
In effect, Hayek was saying that there’s no stopping a guy dead-set on suicide. But you’re less likely to shoot yourself in a fit of despair if first you have to scrounge around for the slip of paper with the combination to the gun safe, dig the trigger lock key out of the junk drawer, and climb a ladder to reach the bullets on the top pantry shelf. An ethos of individual rights, constitutional tradition, and respect for the common law works like a trigger lock on democracy. It makes it harder for a democratic majority caught in the grip of a transient ideological mood to blow the brains out of a successful liberal society.
But if democracy is a gun we might kill ourselves with, what’s so great about it? Why not just take away the gun? That’s a decent way to sum up the difference between the classical liberal and libertarian approach to democracy: gun safety versus disarmament.
Democracy, like a gun, is a tool that can be used for good or evil. James Madison, Friedrich Hayek, and James M. Buchanan were all trigger-lock democrats—as is anyone, left or right, who wants to take some issues off the table of democratic negotiation by constitutionalizing certain rights. A basic theme in the thought of market-friendly classical liberals is that robust economic rights are critical to a just, prosperous, and stable social order and deserve the same kind of democracy-constraining legal protections afforded to civil and political liberties. Hayek and Buchanan put a lot of thought and energy into tinkering with various constitutional trigger lock mechanisms that might, for example, check the unfortunate tendency of majoritarian democracies to wreck their national economies through inflation after voting themselves into unsustainable debt. Buchanan in particular probed democratic systems like a structural engineer looking for weaknesses, not because he wanted to bring them down, but because he thought democracy was indispensable, and wanted to make it work better.
At first blush, hardcore libertarians can look like classical trigger lock advocates especially concerned to keep democratic majorities from infringing property rights. But the radical libertarian conception of property rights is incredibly rigid and all-encompassing. Protecting property rights, so conceived, at the level of a constitution is lock to a trigger lock that won’t release, and a gun that can’t shoot.
Hey, but that’s great! You can’t kill yourself with a gun that won’t fire. And if you’re worried about the danger that democracy will obliterate the freedom and abundance of liberal capitalism, a constitutional political order that builds in libertarian property rights at the ground floor takes care of the problem. It’s a lot like not having a democracy at all.
Hard-core libertarian property rights leave no space for democracy
Ayn Rand’s characteristically vivid formulation faithfully captures the democraphobic view of many — maybe even most — libertarians. Democracy, she says, is “a social system in which one’s work, one’s property, one’s mind, and one’s life are at the mercy of any gang that may muster the vote of a majority at any moment for any purpose.” Robert Nozick, was a better philosopher, but not much friendlier to democracy, which he wittily called “ownership of the people, by the people, for the people.”
The popular version of libertarianism promoted by the likes of Nozick, Rand, and Murray Rothbard is based on a theory of ironclad “natural” property rights vaguely inspired by the 17th century English philosopher John Locke. This sort of hard-nosed conception of property rights implies that most of what governments actually do is morally dubious, if not outright illegitimate. Governments need resources to raise armies and pay old-age pensions. But if “taxation is theft,” it’s hard to have a government at all, and democratic bodies will be left without much to make decisions about. Libertarians of this stripe tend to see democracy as mechanism for some people to gang up on other people, press them into servitude, and steal their stuff. It’s institutionalized theft, two wolves and a sheep deciding what to have for dinner.
This is the basis for most libertarian hostility to democracy, but there’s very little critical insight about democracy in it. The gist is really that if government isn’t legitimate, then democratic government isn’t legitimate either. For those, like Rand and Nozick, who warily endorse minimal government — a sort of night-watchman state — majoritarian democracy poses an obvious and immediate threat. If we’re going to have a minimal government, and it’s going to be democratic, then what’s to keep “the people” from voting to make government more than minimal? If you give democracy an inch, won’t it take a mile?
This the worry behind the Holy Grail of minimal-state libertarianism: a self-enforcing constitution that somehow rules out the possibility of more-than-minimal government—even if absolutely everybody wants it. We can’t vote our way to authoritarian socialist ruin if we can’t vote our way to publicly funded sidewalks.
There’s no end run around politics
But this can’t really solve the problem. Hardcore property-rights libertarians are chasing a fantasy—a legal perpetual motion machine capable of reinforcing and protecting the institutions of liberal capitalism by keeping politics from happening. A theory of rights that shrinks the scope of democratic choice to nearly nothing might seem like a clever way to resolve the worry that we will vote our way into serfdom. But it doesn’t resolve anything, because there’s no escape from politics. We don’t get to decide not to have it. The contingency and fragility of the liberal order, which so worried Hayek, never go away. It’s symptomatic of an ineradicable condition of political life. If most people don’t buy into the system, won’t accord it legitimacy, and badly want something else, then by hook or crook they’ll toss it over and replace it with something else.
Liberalism was forged in the crucible of the wars of religious toleration as a practical tool for accommodating and managing disagreement and conflict over the nature of God’s law. Liberalism is an answer to a political question: how can we possibly live together when we disagree about how to live? Representative democratic government eventually emerged as the critical liberal institutional mechanism for negotiating our differences in a way that sustains the legitimacy, stability, and peace of the political order. A theory of pre-political rights that answers all the important questions before the hurly-burly of politics can even get started denies the gravity of the problem of disagreement and ultimately undermines liberalism by forgetting the problem it solves.
Hayek saw that liberalism’s challenge lies in maintaining the perceived legitimacy of liberal limits on democracy in the face of inevitable challenges from alluring, popular, illiberal ideals. Radical libertarianism tried to meet the twin challenge of nationalism and socialism by offering a powerful, anti-collectivistic counter-ideal. However, as I argue in an earlier
from nicholemhearn digest https://niskanencenter.org/blog/libertarian-democracy-skepticism-infected-american-right/
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