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miguel-ohara-lover · 7 months

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Kinktober day 10 - Ghost!Miguel

Prompt list

CW: nsfw, ghost, ftm!reader, kinda creepy, “pussy”/“cunt” used, squirting, eating out

Note: Tonight is gonna be a bit short because uh yeah depression fucking sucks ass… anyway- I like ghosts :] (🎶if you have ghoosssttt you have everythiiing-🎶)

Ps don’t question it it’s fictiooooonnnn…

Creepy stuff never bothered you before, and hey creepy generally meant cheaper. So when you heard of this really nice house that was half price do you a murder that took place, fuck yeah you wanna buy that shit. A little murder didn’t hurt especially when it meant you get cheap shit and it’s not like you committed the crime sooo…

The random noises and random moving objects was all easy to explain away. You probably forgot you moved it or it was probably the wind. Easy shit to explain. Though… seeing a figure of a man in the hallway was weird… You thought someone had broken in but as you got closer he disappeared.

This started happening more often, you’d see him, try to approach, and he’d vanish. He didn’t run and hide, he just went poof. Eventually you learned to not approach him, and instead would wave. After a few times he waved back, and that surprised you. Before it didn’t seem like he knew you were there, and know he’s acknowledged your existence.

He started sticking around more, started to acknowledge your presence more. He was very handsome for whatever the fuck he was. You figured he was a ghost, a spirit trapped in the mortal realm after his untimely death.

You noticed he would hang around more often, watching what you did or what you had on the tv. It didn’t bother you, and it was kind of nice knowing you had friendly eyes on you. At least you thought he was friendly, considering he hasn’t tried to possess and or murder you by now.

Some quick research told you what you were curious about. His name was Miguel O’Hara, his murder was unsolved. Perhaps that’s why he hung around, unfinished business and all. You tried to get him to open up to you, but he never spoke a word to you. He would just watch you and vanish before any progress is made.

One day, you were getting dressed in the morning when you noticed out of the corner of your eye he was standing in the doorway. He was watching you, but you didn’t feel unsafe.

“You have scars. Did someone hurt you?” He spoke for the first time since you met him. His voice surprised you. It sounded soft and distant, almost an echo to it.

It took you a moment to realize what he was referring to. “Oh.” You looked down at yourself, then back at him. “No, they’re just from surgery.”

“Ah. Okay then.” He nods and looks around your room.

“Do you have to stand there while I get dressed?” You chuckled a little. You didn’t entirely mind, what could he do he’s dead. He didn’t respond, and instead stood there like he had been.

You shrugged and continued changing, removing your pants and underwear. You bent over looking at your dresser for some panties. He looked over and would have blushed if he had blood. Your pussy looked so perfect to him, so wet and just asking for his attention.

“I can feel you staring.” You spoke up, still bend over. Suddenly, cold hands grabs your bare hips. You let out a small gasp as the freezing touch. He moves a hand from your hip to your pussy, dragging a cold finger through your slick folds and sending shivers through your body.

He stayed silent as a finger slipped inside you, making you shudder and moan. Part of you wondered how this was possible, how was he able to touch you if he’s dead. You weren’t complaining, but the wonder was still there. The thoughts were immediately forgotten, however, when you felt another finger circle your clit, drawing louder moans from you.

Miguel seemed pleased with, and pulled his hand away. It was silent and still for a moment, and you started to wonder if he had walked away. That was until you felt something else against your cunt, something hard.

You bit your lip as you felt his cock push into you, stretching your already tight pussy. Fuck he was big. How could anyone wanna murder a guy with THAT in his pants. He held onto your hips, guiding you down his shaft until your pelvis was against his. Miguel’s hands moved upward, under your shirt as he felt your body, his fingers eventually finding your scars and touching the flesh.

He turned his attention to your nipples, lightly tugging and teasing, earning little grunts of pleasure from you. He enjoyed that sound, it made his dick twitch. Your pussy contracted around him and he groaned slightly, starting to thrust his hips slow at first.

Miguel steadily picked up the pace until he was slamming into you at an inhuman speed. You cried out and moaned into the palm of your hand as this spirit ravaged your cunt. You were dripping wet just from the initial touches to your pussy. A hand went back down and played with your clit, gently tugging and rubbing circles as you whined.

It was so overstimulating, everything was pulling you closer and closer to the edge. The warm knot in your gut formed quickly, with all this pleasure it wasn’t hard. He was eager and ready to please, ready to pleasure you in any way he could, you were gorgeous to him.

You let out a loud moan as you came from his fingers and cock. His pelvis and lower torso were drenched from you squirting on him. The sight made him unravel immediately. He groaned and grunted as he spilled inside you, ice cold cum filling your pussy as his fingers moved faster, drawing more squirt juices from you and making you cry out.

He pulled out and released your clit from the torment. You panted and leaned against your dresser to stay upright, clit twitching from so much stimulation. He couldn’t help but admire you even more, so soaking wet from cumming, it drove him made

Miguel moved onto his knees and licked your pussy, making you moan and whimper slightly. He loved those sounds so much. His mouth wrapped around your clit and he sucked gently, making you cry out once more. He was so eager, happily pleasuring your clit all over again. He pushed his cold fingers into your pussy and finger fucked you roughly as he licked and sucked your clit, hoping for another shower.

You whined and rocked your hips a little, rubbing your pussy on his face as the pleasure overtook you. You saw stars in the air as reality melted away, and all you could think of was Miguel’s mouth, pleasing your cunt so perfectly. He wrapped his arms around your thighs, holding you against his face, eating you out as if it were his last meal.

His grip tightened and you could feel another orgasm building up inside you. It wasn’t long before you came a second time, squirting once more and giving Miguel that shower he wanted. He didn’t stop going to town on your cunt, however. He just couldn’t get enough, holding your trembling legs as he feasted.

Eventually he did stop, after making you cum a third… fourth… and fifth time. By then you were gone, thoughts incoherent and words just a mumbling mess, unable to keep yourself up anymore. He helped you into bed, wiping up any mess left on you and tucking you in.

“That was fun.” He spoke up. In your sleepy mindless state all you could manage was “mhm”. He didn’t mind, smiling down at you as you drifted off into a peaceful slumber.

He’d watch over you of course. Always.

———

Tag list(feel free to ask to be on it):

@6thhokageswife @zaunsin @famouscattale @m4dyy @thedevax @migueloharastruelove @queerponcho @lynnxnnyl

#miguel o'hara #across the spiderverse #atsv #atsv miguel #miguel o’hara x reader #miguel o’hara smut #miguel o’hara kinktober

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yorshie · 7 months

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Burnt Out

Bayverse Leo x Fem reader - Part 1

Part two

summary: SFW, After confessing your feelings for the Leader in Blue, he makes a decision that challenges your relationship with all four turtles. (warnings for relationship based arguments, yelling, and an altercation with some drunken men) set in 2023 so turtles are 24-25

You paused on the stoop to the employee’s entrance, hand dipping automatically to palm your phone in your coat’s pocket. It was dark, far darker than you expected. You gave yourself a little shake at the instinctual hesitation, annoyed that you didn’t factor in how fast night fell in the winter before taking this last-second shift.

But you needed the money, and walking at night had never been a problem before… well, before you could always count on someone waiting for you, because you always let someone know your schedule. But now-

You huffed, annoyance seeping deeper as you weighed your options.

You didn’t necessarily feel unsafe, walking home at night but…

Maybe it was always hearing about the crimes being committed and thwarted through your friends’ grapevine, but something about being alone seemed a little more ominous tonight.

You pulled out your phone, tapped the device awake, and pondered the short list of contacts on your favorited screen.

April was working. Casey was on an away trip, training for his new promotion. Vern was-

Vern was a no go.

You were stalling. You knew you were, but you still grimaced, bit your lip as you read over the last four names. They should’ve been your first choice, would have been your first choice, if things didn’t still feel stilted whenever you thought about him.

You purposefully skipped over the first name. Shuddered away from the echo of shame and the low pang of sadness that came with the memory of your last conversation, and went stubbornly to the next option.

Donnie was probably working on the shell-raiser. Last time you’d called Raph, he’d been in the background while the red brother had been tinkering with his motorcycle. You could clearly recall not only his excitement, but the non-stop barrage of information he was dumping into the conversation he’d butted into, ecstatic about some new fangled what-cha-ma-call-its and doo-hickey-ma-things that he was apparently installing.

So, no on the Donatello front.

Raphael was in the ha’shi, which meant no phones. He’d taken the time to let you know at least, earlier in the day, and while you had hinted for a reason why, he kept whatever he’d done silent. Getting sent to the ha’shi wasn’t new, but it was odd that only one brother was being punished, and usually Raph would at least give you an overview on who was to blame for the sentence.

Which left Mikey. You knew he would make time for you, he always did, but it still felt like running away. Still felt like you were creating- being- a problem. Your finger hovered over his name, letting your lip escape your teeth before you breathed out and hit the button.

It rang twice before he answered, singing the last few words of your personalized ringtone before breaking off to greet you, “well heeeeellllloooo, babycakes! What are you up to on this fine evening?”

You smiled despite yourself, caught up in the shine that glinted off him even over the phone, and took a step away from the stoop, heels clicking in time with your words. “Hey Mikey, not much, just wanted to talk while I walked home from work.”

He made some low sound at that, half confirmation and half question. “Didn’t know you were working a late shift tonight- Need me to come get you? I can give you a lift home?”

You shook you head, already at the corner, mentally counting down the streets until you were home. “Naw, it’s alright, just- will you talk to me for a bit?”

“Sure thing, babes. I always got time for you.” He sounded like he was parked in front of the tv. You could faintly hear the rolling music of that new game he had gotten, likely paused while he entertained you. Beyond that however, it sounded like the Lair was relatively silent, and you felt a stab of curiosity if he was listening in to the conversation.

Best not think about that.

“Tell me what’s been going on? Has Don got the shell-raiser up and running?” You asked to distract yourself.

“Dude, he’s made the biggest mess in the garage. It’s a good thing sensei never goes out there, because he’d have a conniption over it. Leo’s already had to remind him to clean up twice.”

You gave an annoyed hum, heart spiking at the mention of the someone, but you squashed the feeling, “yea, bet Dee just let that go in one ear and out the other.”

Mikey snorted. “You know it. And now that Leo and Raph are both in the ha’shi, Donnie’s got free-”

“Hang on,” you interrupted him, foot scuffing the sidewalk as you jerked to a stop. “Le-They’re both… in the ha'shi?” That- that made it sound like they were fighting again.

But- surely Raph would have mentioned tension with his brother? Between you and April, it seemed like at least one of you knew when the two were butting heads, and as far as you knew it’d been quiet on that front.

I… guess not?

“Uh… Yeah?” Mikey sounded a little further away, like he was looking at the phone instead of speaking directly into it. You got the distinct impression he felt he had said too much, and hurried to try to get a read before he could clam up:

“Raph wouldn’t- he didn’t say-”

“Yeah, neither of them are in the mood to explain much.” That didn’t sound like something Mikey would normally say, and you were about to push him on that, make him explain, when suddenly the hair on the back of your neck stood straight up, and you stiffened.

“Um.”

Mikey sensed the change immediately. “Woah, what’s up, angel? You ok?”

“Um.” You repeated the word, fighting the urge to glance around, wincing as you heard a commotion at the end of the street. A small group of drunken men spilled out from a bar, and normally it wouldn’t be cause for alarm-

But they’d straightened at the sight of you, had gone from stumbling and leaning against one another to a pointed fixation that did not bode well.

You could hear Mikey on the other line as you abruptly turned and crossed the street, fighting to blend in and not draw anymore attention to yourself. You heard a clatter over the phone, something yelled, then Donnie was on the line, voice clipped high and tight:

“Where are you?”

“Um.” You repeated the word for the third time, voice tightening and pitching up, trying to make out the street sign at the corner, but it was too dark, and you were too panicked, opting to speed walk past instead of slowing. The lights of passing cars and the blinking neon hum of signs melded together, overlayed with the drunken whoop not far behind you.

More clatter over the phone, the distinct sound of something being knocked over followed by a frazzled cuss word. You could tell Donnie still had the phone, because he was breathing heavily into the speaker, too preoccupied to regulate his breaths in what you assumed was a mad dash to his computer.

You turned a corner, dodged across another street, flinching as a rock skipped past your ankles, obviously thrown. You knew now, without a doubt, that you were being pursued.

You could hear the click clack click clack of Donnie’s keyboard, and your phone chirped in your hand, informing you he was pinging your location. Your relief was short lived however, when a heavy arm looped over your neck.

You gasped, feeling the bite of whatever buckle was on the side cut into your cheek, and the man next to you drew you upright, until your spine protested at the movement.

“Babes, take the next right, we’re on our way.” Mikey at the phone again, but you could only whimper, hoping he understood.

A second man took your phone, terminated the call, and you had half a beat to wonder how you hadn’t heard them get closer, loud as they were being now, carousing and laughing as though you were a part of their group.

You couldn’t see your phone anymore, but the tight hold on the hand that had been holding onto it kept you from looking too much. A touch low on your back made you up the number of people surrounding you, as the man with your head still pulled close to him jerked his head into your space, tone slurring:

“Hey beautiful, how ‘bout we buy you a drink?”

You didn’t bother replying. You dug your nails down into the meat of the hand holding your own, while simultaneously biting into the jacket pressed against your face, determined to put up a fight.

Hindsight was flashing in your mind’s eye next to the scant self-defense information you’d let Leo drill into your head. You hadn’t taken the lessons very seriously, too preoccupied with keeping your budding feelings under leash. His calm tone washed over you now, but the words were garbled, proof you’d been too busy staring at him to pay attention.

Always create space, if you can.

You rocked a foot backwards, seesawing in their grip, dropping low and jabbing an elbow to the side in order to create some space. You counted your blessings that your coat was unzipped, as you pulled your arms through the holes, dropping your purse in the process.

Forget your purse/bag, it’s not more important than you.

Only one man still held on, but you realized halfway through pulling your clasped hands through your bulky coat that you were, in fact, holding onto him. You let go at the revelation, pushed your coat into his face, and pivoted, taking off in a run down the street.

If you can get away, do so. Fighting is a last re-

A hard grip on your arm brought your internal dialogue short. You were moving too fast to stop, barely bringing your hands up in time to stop from slamming head first into the wall you were pivoting towards. Your palms scraped against the worn brick, and you hissed at the pain.

The three were ringed around the opening to the alley, and you almost flinched at the echo of another night, another time you had to be rescued.

“You really don’t want to do this.” You promised them, voice breathless, and the closest one laughed.

“All we wanted to do was buy you a drink, but I guess you’re too good for-”

His words were cut off, something big and bulky dropping from the roof to land between you and your attackers. He hit the concrete with a low thud, and you sagged in relief, taking in the chipped blue paint across the shell suddenly facing you.

Slowly, Leo straightened, and the growl coming from him rattled your bones, the sound all but drowning out the thumps of the other brothers cutting off the mens’ escape.

“I think there’s been a misunderstanding here.” His voice was low, dangerous, and you almost shivered in sympathy for what was about to happen. “When a lady says no, she means no.”

You covered your eyes, knowing it wasn’t going to be pretty, having no stomach to watch the men be apprehended. The sound of flesh hitting flesh was bad enough, though you were relieved to not hear the hiss of steel being drawn.

You stayed against the wall, counting to drown out the wait, until a soft hand touched your arm, and you dropped your arm.

Mikey peered back at you, concern crowding his sky blue eyes. “Hey, babes. You ok?”

You shot to him, hitting his plastron hard, pulling a puff of air from him before his arms wrapped around you. You shuddered against him. He held you, one hand smoothing up and down your back in a rhythmic motion as he cooed into your hair:

“Hey, you’re ok, you’re alright, don’t cry-”

It took you a few moments to become aware of your surroundings, sounds filtering back in slowly. Donnie was on his hologram, co-ordinating pick up with police, hands moving fast as he tracked over vitals and communications. You became so dizzy at the small glance towards the scrolling data that you burrowed back into Mikey’s chest before another noise pulled you back up.

Raph was cursing low under his breath, sulky and frustrated. He looked up from where he was securing the men to a heavy metal dumpster, and something complicated chased over his expression. You pulled in a breath, knowing you were crying, knowing he hated it when you did, but his mouth compressed, eyes all but darting to the side as though begging you to follow.

Your eyes flitted in the direction he indicated, caught on the sway of swords over shoulders, and you stubbornly returned to the red banded brother. You knew your face was pale, set in a scowl, but he matched it, jerking his chin at you in clear reprimand.

You took in a deep breath, turned away, clung to Mikey as though that would dismiss the problem. But the problem was still growling, the sound low and ominous, a rumble at the bottom of your auditory register that wouldn’t let you settle, that kept you on edge.

It was getting closer, and you felt your shoulders tighten, Mikey’s hands coming up to give them a squeeze before he shifted you back.

“Are you alright?” Came the question, and you turned to stare at Leo's plastron, watched it rise and fall underneath the straps of his harness. The little camera across his chest winked at you, and you reminded yourself that Donnie recorded everything.

“I’m fine.” You whispered the answer, conscious Mikey was moving away, giving you space. The tightness in your shoulders doubled as Leo swayed closer.

Apparently your answer wasn’t good enough, because a strong hand cupped your cheek, tilted your head back until you met narrowed blue eyes, crystal clear and angry as he smoothed a digit over the imprinted divot on your cheekbone.

Leo’s other hand engulfed on of your wrists, held it upwards to take in the scraped skin, and with his head bent over your hand you had a vivid flashback to the last time you two had talked.

His words from then buzzed in your ears, professional and precise, calm and confident in his verdict. Faced now with that same bowed position, an echo of that nauseous feeling bubbled up, and you closed your hand without thinking.

Leo looked up, eyes locking on your own, and whatever he saw ticked the frown deeper across his face. His hands lingered, his eyes catalogued, and you saw the exact moment his need for control won whatever silent argument he was having.

“Mind telling me what happened?” He dropped your hand, stood to his full height, and you felt the retreat as keenly as you did the last time, the hand at your cheek suddenly cold.

“Yes.” You answered, tugged your face from his grip, watched as the appendage fisted in mid air before he let it drop to thump against his thigh twice.

“Why’d you hang up?” He tried again, and you relaxed a little in the face of a question you had the patience to answer.

“They took my phone.” You gestured the mime with your hand and he jutted his chin towards Raph, silently ordering him to preform a pat down and find the stolen device.

You lifted that same hand to your temple, feeling the beginnings of a stress headache start. His hand raised in tandem, fingers gliding against yours before you pulled your whole head away with a jerk.

That growl spiked with the movement, and you saw him stiffen, hand falling once again.

You sidestepped to face him, squinting as the sound didn’t dissipate. “L- Are you growling?”

He blinked, surprised for half a beat, before his fist pressed to his plastron, and you watched in real time as he processed something. The growling dropped off, a bare thrum of sound, until he took a deep breath and seemingly wrestled it back under control.

You watched the entire time with wide eyes, but when you went to ask what the hell that was he beat you to the punch:

“We’ll take you back to the lair, let Donnie patch you up-”

“I’m literally three streets from my apartment.” You interrupted him, conscious that it was something you would normally never do, but he only turned expectantly towards you, eye ridge up in a firm contradiction.

And anger flared up at the I know better clear in his eyes. You admired his ability to command attention, to lead his brothers, but the order in his gaze rankled up your spine in such a way that you couldn’t contain your next words.

You jabbed a finger at him, before turning it to sweep up and down your person. “You don’t call the shots for me, buster.” Defiance, words unspoken: You made it clear you didn’t want responsibility for me.

That growl kickstarted up again, though this time he seemed aware of the noise, snout curling back over his teeth before he forced his lips flat.

A hand appeared at your back, Raph softly pushing you to the side and away from Leo. “C’mon, sweetheart, just come hang out for a bit. Let Don fuss over you, let us call in pizza. I’ll even carry you.”

“I’ll carry her.” Leo interjected, and you sensed a different tension in the quiet that followed, silence thick enough that you stepped back all on your own.

The two brothers were clearly not getting along, and the fact made you even more wary of going with them. “I’m not going if you two are going to be at each other’s throats.”

Leo jutted his chin towards his brother, clearly a challenge, and you watched as Raph scoffed, held his gaze for a long minute before letting his gaze slide to the side in acceptance.

Leo tilted his chin up. “Move out, Raphael,” He ordered, swinging his head toward you expectantly, hand held out in what would have been an instinctual move to scoop you up a month ago.

“Mikey can carry me.” You said it low to him, kept your voice calm and even, as you passed his outstretched hand. The last thing you needed right now was his arms around you, and he was being weirdly territorial.

Maybe it was just to get under Raph’s skin. Maybe it was his odd way of trying to make up for the distance he’d imposed. Either way, you really weren’t in the mood.

#tmnt bayverse #tmnt bayverse fanfiction #tmnt bayverse fanfic #bayverse leonardo #bayverse leo #bayverse leonardo x reader #bayverse leo x reader #bayverse raphael #bayverse michelangelo #bayverse donatello

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raz-writes-the-thing · 6 months

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Confessional Feelings

Alec Hardy x GN!Reader

Summary: You find your feelings for Alec exposed after running into him after his date.

CW: serious pining, angst, eventual fluff tho

Broadchurch tag list: (send an ask to be added to a tag list!)

___ ___ ___ ___ ___

You shouldn’t be out here, you know. You know this. Alec had requested that everyone take safety measures when there’d been yet another predator marked as on the loose and actively looking for crimes to commit. And yet here you were.

Alec was on a date. You’d thought that maybe if you were great at your job and made yourself available to him for whatever he needed, he might get a clue and ask you out. That would be nice. You’d had feelings for him since he’d arrived in Broadchurch. You’d seen right through his irritable surface to the soft gooey centre. Not that you’d told him that you’d taken to calling him a Mars Bar or anything. You don’t think he’d care for that.

But he was on a date tonight, and you just needed to go for a walk to clear your head about the whole thing. You had to at least try and get him off your mind. For a few hours, anyway, until you saw him at work in the morning. At least he wasn’t the chatty type. You weren’t sure if you would have been able to handle hearing him talk about his date all day.

Turning the corner, you walk right smack back into someone coming the other way. You yelp, and the person shouts. Though it sounds distinctly familiar. Pressing your hand to your chest, you blink a few times to try and wash the shock away. When your vision clears, you see none other than the object of your feelings and the reason for your very late stroll standing before you.

“Jesus, what’re you doin’ out here so late?” Alec asks shortly, still getting over the shock himself. He looks angry, but you think that’s just because you’ve scared each other half to death. “Och, what have I said? There’s a- a killer!”

Your mouth gapes open and shut a couple of times, trying to find the words.

“Going for a walk,” you settle, waving your arms as if that was obvious. Alec blinks, and before he can open his mouth, you blurt, “how was the date? I- uh, your date, I mean. That you were just on. That you’re coming from.”

“Fine,” is his response. “It was fine, yep- good.”

You cock a brow in silent question. Alec sighs and pinches his nose.

“Just, not- Oh, I don’t know. Y’ken what I mean,” he attempted. A flush was creeping up his cheeks. You shook your head, no. “Oh, look, we just didn’t click.”

“Right,” you trailed off slowly, a blush creeping up your own cheeks now. That meant there was still a chance. Possibly. Of course, for there to be a chance, Alec had to be interested.

Alec chewed on his lip awkwardly for a moment.

“Can I walk you home, then?”

You nodded without hesitation. Alec gestured for you to lead the way. You turned around to go back the way you came. Maybe this was your chance to confess how you felt.

“So, why didn’t you click?” You asked. “With your date.”

Alec sighs, shoving his hands in his pants pockets. It’s something he does when he’s nervous, you’ve noticed.

“I dunno,” he replies at first, as though thinking about what to say. “Sounds horrible to say, but, she just didn’t interest me.” Alec seemed to be growing more anxious by the second.

“I get that,” you comfort quietly, kicking at a pebble on the path. The cool night air makes you shiver, and Alec shrugs out of his jacket to place around your shoulders. He averts your gaze when you pull it around yourself tighter. It doesn’t fit the whole way around, what with him being a complete beanpole, but the warmth seeping through the coat into your skin was heavenly nonetheless.

You snuggle tighter into the coat. You swear Alec smiles to himself, but when you look to check it’s gone. Almost like he’s hiding it from you.

You walk in silence for a couple more minutes, hands almost brushing as you do so. He’s straying closer to you than usual. Maybe it’s the cold, maybe he’s subconsciously moving closer for warmth now you’ve unintentionally stolen his coat. But the way his forefinger brushes against the back of your hand tells you otherwise. Oh, this might be your time to shine.

“Can I-”

“Look, I-”

You both speak over each other, and you purse your lips shut, forcing yourself to stay quiet and let him go first.

“Sorry, erm- do you mind if I?”

You gesture to go ahead. The pace slows as you get closer to your house, only a few numbers up. Alec looks like he’s fidgeting on the spot, nervous energy fizzling out of him like a shaken soda.

“So, this date, erm-” the man rubs at his cheeks as if trying to give himself strength. “It didn’t work because, well…”

You’re trying to dissect him with your eyes, whole being hinged on the hope that he’s about to say. He stumbles over his words for a few more moments before you put him out of his misery.

“I- are you trying to say you have… feelings for me?” You’re almost too terrified to hear the answer, your heart feels like it's lodged in your throat, chest swelling like a balloon.

Alec looks at you, looks away and then chews on his bottom lip for a moment.

“S’pose that’s what I’m tryin’ t’say, yes.”

You cannot help the splitting grin that spreads its way across your cheeks. Alec looks embarrassed as he rubs the back of his neck. You haven’t been as overjoyed as you are at this moment for a very long time.

“Are you joshing me right now?” That would not be cool.

“I-no, sorry- I shouldn’t have said that.”

“No,” you say, holding a hand up to stop him right there. “I-I’m glad you did. I, uh,” a nervous giggle bubbles out. “Have feelings for you too.”

“Oh, y’do? Wasn’t expecting that,” a small smile is spreading over his face too now. A pretty thing.

You stop in front of the gateway to your house. Alec hovers as if not sure what to say.

“I do,” you reiterate, blush flushing up your skin. “And I’d really like to, um, kiss you. If you wanted?”

Alec doesn’t waste any time, surging in to press his lips to yours. One hand raises to brush against your cheek, the other to hold you by the back of the neck, keeping you locked together in your embrace. You melt into him, lips moving back against his own.

The coat falls from your shoulders and Alec breaks away with a smile. A real, genuine smile. He reaches down to pick the coat back up.

“Would you, uh- wow- I can’t believe that just happened,” you giggle uncontrollably. “Would you like to come in? Just for a cup of tea? Oh, please say yes.”

“Oh, I’d love to. Come quick now, let's get you in out of the cold, eh?”

You nod agreeably, bounding up the steps and unlocking the door. Alec follows, folding the coat over his arm.

You get about halfway through making that cup of tea before the both of you are making out in the kitchen, Alec having you pressed up against the counter. After months of pining, you really can’t believe this was happening.

It really made you wish you’d cleaned your bedroom this morning. Not that Alec seemed to mind, given that both of your clothes ended up all over the floor anyway by the time midnight rolled around.

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the-badger-mole · 5 months

Note

How about a prompt with Zutara meeting doing some kind of volunteer work?

"There must be something Dad can do to get us out of this." Zuko rolled his eyes as his sister complained for what had to be the tenth time in as many minutes. He wasn't thrilled, either, but he'd chosen to have a more philosophical attitude towards their court mandated community service. After all, as his uncle always told him, it was good for the soul to give to those in need. That, and he hated talking to his sister and her friends.

"It won't be so bad," Ty Lee, ever the optimist, comforted her friends. "I bet there'll be some interesting people there."

"Doubt it," Mai mumbled. She had said it low enough so Zuko was pretty sure he was the only one who heard her. She met his eye and rolled hers, inviting him to join her in her quiet derision of one of her oldest friends. Zuko managed a half-hearted smirk, but kept his thoughts to himself. At least Ty Lee was trying to make the best of things.

"As if I have nothing better to do with my Saturday then spend it passing out food to people who are too lazy or stupid to feed themselves," Azula snorted. She put her foot up on the back of Zuko's seat.

"Get your foot out of my back!" Zuko snapped. Azula huffed and gave his seat one solid kick before she put her foot back on the floor.

"I don't know why you're complaining so much," Mai said, looking at Azula in the rearview. "It's mostly your fault we're in this mess in the first place." Azula scowled at her.

"I didn't twist your arm to break into that warehouse," Azula reminded her. "I didn't force any of you to come with me. It wasn't my idea to bring booze, either, Mai." Mai just shrugged, keeping her eyes on the road. It was true enough that Mai had been the one to bring the vodka and whiskey she'd stolen from her parents' collection, but the four teens would probably not have been caught if Azula hadn't decided it would be fun to set a fire and burn several boxes of very expensive imported teas. Had the owner of the company not been Zuko and Azula's uncle, they would probably have all been tried for arson, instead of given probation and community service. Zuko shut his eyes and tried to think of anything but the disappointment on Iroh's face when the cops had led Zuko and Azula out of the still smoking building in handcuffs. It had been three weeks since the incident, and aside from a brief appearance to speak at their hearing the week before, Zuko hadn't seen his uncle since.

"We're here," Mai announced. She turned into a parking lot and found a space near the exit. The four piled out of the car and headed reluctantly towards the entrance.

Hama's Haven for Families was a slightly run down brick building that used to be a school. It had been shut down almost two decades earlier and used as surplus storage for the school district for a while. Then eight years earlier, someone had bought the building from the city and converted it into temporary housing for women and families with children. They provided meals, counseling, and for the youngest residents, daycare until the adults could find work and permanent housing. Why this was chosen as their service project, Zuko wasn't sure. It wouldn't have been his first choice of project, and he was certain his companions wouldn't have even put this place on their list. But the judge had given Iroh the right to decide what punishment he thought would fit the crime his family and their friends had committed against him. Zuko figured the least he could do was not whine about it.

"Ugh!" Azula's face contorted in disgust. "I can smell them from here. Don't they get showers?" Zuko gave the air a subtle, experimental sniff. Immediately, he identified the pungent scent his sister was complaining about as manure, probably from the community garden behind the building. It wasn't his favorite smell, but Azula was way overreacting.

Inside the building was bustling with activity. There was a cheerful energy in the air, which shocked Zuko, considering why they were there. A few people wore light blue t-shirts with Hama's Haven across the front in graffiti block. On the backs, the shirts read either Volunteer or Staff. A man stood at the front desk, expectantly. He was tall and muscled in a way that suggested a lot of physical labor, rather than spending hours in the gym. He wore his chin length brown hair half up. He didn't seem to be much older than Zuko and Azula's father, though his dark blue eyes had a weathered look. As if he'd seen a lot and had learned stoicism in the face of it. He looked familiar to Zuko, but he couldn't place the man's face for the life of him.

"I'm Hakoda," he greeted them politely, but not with much warmth. "Are you here for the mandated service?"

"What was your first clue?" Azula snorted. Zuko felt his cheeks flush with embarrassment.

"We are," he said quickly, trying to mask his sister's rudeness. He stepped forward and held his hand out to Hakoda. The older man eyed Zuko's hand hesitantly for a moment, before grasping it in his. Hakoda had a strong, firm hand shake. Zuko could tell he was holding back, but when Hakoda let him go, Zuko felt the blood rush back to his hand with a throb.

"Nice to meet you," he said, turning his attention to the clipboard in his hands. "I see we have you for one hundred and fifty hours. You have to be here once a week for four hours a shift, so that'll take you about nine months. But if you'd like to get through your mandatory hours quicker, you're welcome to contact me for opportunities during the week. We have tutoring and after school activities, along with an upcoming food and clothing drive. We could always use a few more hands.

"Sure," Mai scoffed. If Hakoda heard her, he ignored her. He turned to the desk and reached down on the other side, coming back up with four t-shirts, light blue with the shelter's name on the front. Azula and Mai regarded them distastefully. Despite the instructions to come to their shift in comfortable clothes they didn't mind getting dirty, the two girls had come in the same chic, dark clothing they would wear any other weekend.

"No thanks," Azula said with a sneer. "I'm fine with what I've got on." Hakoda raised an eyebrow at her and Mai.

"I'm afraid it's not optional," he told them. "This is the uniform that staff and volunteers wear. You're expected to be in them for every shift you have with us."

"I'm not wearing this cheap, tacky thing!" Azula insisted.

"Ditto," Mai said, folding her arms across her chest.

"That's fine," Hakoda said with a shrug. "But you won't be permitted to stay and work. You're welcome to take that up with Judge Jeong-Jeong."

"Guys, we won't get the hours we need," Ty Lee whispered nervously to her friends. "The judge said we could still be sent to juvie." Azula and Mai shot Ty Lee the most scathing looks, and Ty Lee shrank back a bit. Zuko turned his head to roll his eyes. He wondered, not for the first time, how someone like Ty Lee had ended up in his sister's inner circle. He took his t-shirt and slipped it on over his clothes. Then he looked at the three girls expectantly. Ty Lee hurried to get hers on over her long-sleeved pink shirt. Hakoda favored them with a smile and approving nod before turning back to Azula and Mai.

"I'm not putting that on." Azula's jaw was set mulishly. Mai didn't say anything, but she fixed Hakoda with a cutting scowl.

"Your choice," Hakoda shrugged. "Either put the shirts on, or get out. I'm sure if you ask really nicely, Judge Jeong-Jeong will get you on highway clean up. Maybe orange jumpers will suit you two better."

"I'll tell my father about this," Azula hissed at him. "He can buy and sell you. He can have this dump turned into a parking lot."

"Do what you've got to do," Hakoda scoffed at her. "In the meantime, you have your two choices. So what's it going to be? I don't have all day." Azula and Mai glowered at Hakoda. But in the end, they didn't have much of a choice. Mai snatched a shirt from Hakoda, and after a moment, Azula took the last one. Hakoda's eyes gleamed smugly as the girls yanked the shirts on over their dark, designer blouses.

"Now that that's over with-"

"Dad!" Hakoda was interrupted by a girl running up to the desk with an exasperated look. Zuko suddenly realized why Hakoda looked so familiar. His daughter bore a striking resemblance. Katara Imiq was in Azula's class, the year below his, but she was in a few of his advanced placement classes. She was also on the track team with Azula, and in drama with Ty Lee. He and Azula both seemed to be in constant competition with the over achieving Katara in some form or another, though Azula was far more antagonistic about it than Zuko was. Beside him, Azula went rigid and shook with quiet rage at the sight of her chief rival for grades, athletics and popularity. Katara, though hadn't even seemed to notice them yet.

"What's up?" Hakoda asked.

"Sokka can't get the dryer to work," Katara explained with an annoyed huff. "It turns on, but it won't heat up. He put the last load in an hour ago and it's still soaking wet!"

"Can you get Bato to handle it?" Hakoda asked.

"He's not here today, remember? His niece's dance recital."

"Right." Hakoda sighed and rolled his eyes. "I'm on it. Can you take over for me? These are the new volunteers. They need their assignments." For the first time Katara seemed to realize that there were new people there. She froze when she saw Zuko and Azula, but before she could say anything, Hakoda had passed her his clipboard and jogged off to the laundry room. Katara's jaw clenched, but she took a deep breath and greeted the four with a cordial, if clipped tone.

"Did you get to look at the list of jobs that need to be done?" Katara asked them. She was met with stony silence, but it didn't seem to bother her. "Did you have a preference for where you wanted to work?"

"As far away from these disgusting beggars as possible," Azula said snidely. Katara's mouth pressed into a thin line and she glowered at Azula.

"Fine," she said. "You can sort the recycling."

"What?" Azula gasped.

"The residents also volunteer here," Katara explained with a saccharine smile. "Recycling sorting is the only job where there are no disgusting beggars currently signed up to work."

"I'm not touching garbage," Azula snarled. Katara met her with a feral looking grin of her own.

"You can leave if you want," Katara said. "I'm sure the judge will be happy to give you the poshest cell on the block." The four balked in surprise. Katara smirked smugly, assuring them that she knew exactly why they were there.

"Whatever," Mai snorted.

"Is there anything left in the kitchen?" Ty Lee asked shyly. "I-I'm pretty good at cooking." Katara's face softened a bit and she even smiled a little at Ty Lee.

"We actually have chefs who do the actual cooking, but they could use someone to help prep and wash."

"Perfect!" Ty Lee agreed with alacrity. Then Katara turned to Zuko. Her lip curled as if she smelled the manure from the garden.

"I don't have any preference," he told her. "I'll go wherever." Katara blinked in surprise. She had been expecting the same attitude from him as from Azula. Zuko was glad to have proven her wrong. He bit back a smirk as she went down the line of duties to be done.

"The maintenance crew is painting the stairwells," she told him. "They need another set of hands."

"Fine," Zuko nodded. Katara looked at him appraisingly for a moment. Zuko stood straight under her scrutiny. Azula was determined to make this as unpleasant for the people running the shelter as possible. Zuko was just as determined to prove that not every member of the Kaji family was as obnoxiously snobbish.

Part 1, Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5

#atla #zutara #ask box prompt #volunteer work au #THE YEAR OF CONTENT!!!!#this isn't strictly where katara and zuko met #but they don't really know each other so...#count it!

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dread-doctors-apologist · 1 year

Text

quarantine headcannons

- Boyd Erica and Isaac are the "time isn't real" household

- Isaac is making an omelette at 4pm and it's simultaneously Erica's brunch, Boyd's dinner and Isaac's midnight snack

- everytime they enter a room with one of the others in it they say good morning, they don't know if it's morning, they don't care, it's all perpetually morning

- Scott, Stiles, Lydia and Allison are all stuck in their three bedroom apartment,

- Scott still hasn't seen all of starwars, (he's stuck inside with Stiles, of course he's seen at least one)

- Scott and Allison have absolutely given each other COVID once or twice...

- Lydia keeps accidentally getting into arguments with strangers on the internet while trying to debunk COVID myths

- it was not long before Stiles joins in.

- they hold stupid competitions like 'how many masks can you fit on one face'

- this ended with an debate on whether bandanas can be considered masks,

- the only way to settle the argument was the call the rest of the pack,,,,,

- this then started a tradition of calling the pack over zoom once a week to play dumb games/among us competitions

- Liam keeps forgetting to take his mask off when he gets home,,,

- after about two days his roomates (Theo, Hayden, Mason and Corey) stopped telling him

- instead they'd see how long he could go without noticing, (he once left it on for four hours)

- mason gets them to play monopoly sometimes

- an abbridged list of crimes committed while playing monopoly

1. Theo blatantly stealing cash from the box (not even trying to hide it)

2. mason skipping liam's turn while Hayden or Theo distracts him

3. Corey giving rent discounts to his boyfriend

4. Corey raising rent for everyone else

5. Hayden making go to jail cards (a piece of scrap paper with the word jail written) and putting them on the top of the chance card pile.

6. Liam calling scott to ask for advice in the middle of his turn.

- they've never actually finished a game

- Erica, Boyd and Isaac all try to learn how to cook

- collectively they can cook enough to survive

- but they don't really know much more than eggs and pasta

- half the time they give up and get frozen pizza

- their apartment is only one bedroom so occasionally one of them will lock themselves in the bathroom to be alone

- problem is it's also a one bathroom apartment.

#teen wolf #teen wolf headcanons #scott mccall #isaac lahey #vernon boyd #erica reyes #mason hewitt #corey bryant #liam dunbar #lydia martin #stiles stilinski #theo raeken #allison argent #boyd x erica x isaac #liam is dating hayden and theo #corey and mason are together #and stiles scott allison and lydia some weird bestfriend/qpr/polycule thing

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thefanficmonster · 1 month

Note

hii would love anything with sydney adamu x reader if ur still taking requests!! or even just headcanons honestly just need more syd content on here

Hi hun! Oh I'm always delighted to write for Syd, I'm obsessed with her 🙈 Hope you enjoy the fic darling 💌

Pairing: Sydney Adamu x Reader (Gender Neutral)

Warnings: SPOILERS for The Bear S2, Swearing

Genre: FLUFF

Summary: When Sydney's left to do menu research duty on her own, she comes to realize a few things.

Her calls are going straight to voicemail, it's half an hour past their agreed upon time to meet up and she's frankly fucking tired. She's used to doing things on her own, knowing not to expect much from other people. But still she's astounded by how shitty this is. It's not like they have all the time in the world - quite the opposite actually. Every second counts. And Carmy just wasted 1800 seconds of precious time Syd could've used for menu research.

She's given up hope and is now waiting for the train to the first restaurant on her list, puffs of smoke escaping her mouth as she periodically sighs in continuous disappointment she can't suppress no matter how hard she tries. The momentary tranquility she finds from the chaos of the restaurant is time she cherishes, until it's interrupted by her ringing phone.

She's not even surprised to see it's not Carmy who's calling. She is, however, surprised to feel a wide smile stretch across her face when she sees your name on the screen.

"Hello?"

"Yeah, hi." She hears the exhaustion in your voice, the yelling in the background explains the reasoning behind it. "I know you and Carmy are probably eating some wonderful food right now but I really need to talk to someone sane or I'll commit a crime."

A laugh rattles Sydney's chest, a genuine, wholehearted laugh, "Nah I'm actually bored out of my mind waiting for the train. Alone. I'm more than happy to keep you sane for a sec."

"Wait, alone? Why are you- Richie for fuck's sake put the hammer down!!! - Sorry about that. Why are you alone?" Syd hears the click of a lighter on your end, signaling you're out for a brief smoke to prevent the aforementioned potential crime. Possibly a murder. Possibly of Richie.

"Because Carmy has dropped off the face of the Earth." She sighs, stepping onto the train that's finally arrived, rescuing her from the Chicago cold.

"That's unlike him. I'd be concerned if - Fak, honey, you're gonna wreck the fucking pipe! - You know what, never mind that. I'm sure he's fine. You wanna....not be alone maybe? I wanna be anywhere but here right now."

Syd could use some alone time, or at least that's what she was telling herself before you called. Now, she couldn't imagine spending her afternoon any better than visiting different restaurants and doing menu research in your company. "I'd love that. I'll be at The Montgomery."

"Cool, cool. It's a date."

Sydney playfully rolls her eyes as she hangs up the phone, the dory smile refusing to leave her face.

The two of you have been essential for each other's survival and sanity ever since this whole restaurant fiasco started. Her with her brutal realism and you with your unconditional optimism, it's safe to say you balance each other quite nicely, bringing you close and forming a strong bond between you.

Somewhere along the way, flirting started being sprinkled throughout your interactions, mostly from your end. But it's not like it's one sided. You both have fun toying with the potential of there being something more. Just as a joke, of course.

But in every joke there's a half-truth. One half from her and one half from you forms the whole truth - that you're both idiots that should stop hiding behind teasing and sarcasm and just say what you're feeling.

There hasn't really been much time for that though, not among the dust, mold and other substances currently littering the restaurant-in-the-making. You're a little too busy knocking down walls to build bridges.

You make it to The Montgomery half an hour later only to find Syd nose-dived into a notepad, jotting down impressions and ideas. You're not nearly as well-versed into the culinary world as she is but you're still more than willing to endure her long rants about each menu item and how it can be made better and incorporated in their own.

She's been sending you ideas, even cooking a couple of them for you to try these past few days. You don't have the heart to tell her you have the palette of a broke college student - you're not crazy to turn down free and fancy food. But it's not like Syd doesn't know that though. She does it more as an expression of what she cannot say with words. As her very own love language, curated just for you.

"Is this seat taken?" You smile down at her, motioning to the chair across from her.

She looks up, her whole face lighting up when she sees you. "I'm sorry, it's reserved."

Chuckling, you sit down, shrugging off your jacket, "Well, they clearly don't deserve it if they have you waiting here all on your lonesome."

You receive a playful eye roll in response. You get that a lot from her. And you find it adorable.

Syd pushes one of the plates towards you, handing you the second fork, "Try this, it has potential."

With some analysis of the layout of plates and bowls on the table, you quickly gather that what she's offering you is a concoction of two different dishes. You can't pick out what the individual dishes might consist of so this collaboration of the two is a complete mystery to you.

But if Syd says there is potential, you'll be damned if you don't believe her.

You pick around the plate, getting a little something of everything on your fork. The flavor is so full and different, almost overpowering. However, you can clearly see that potential Sydney was talking about.

"Thoughts?" She prompts you, waiting for your rating.

You tilt your head to the side, furrowing your brows, trying your hardest to gauge what ingredients have been used. Unfortunately, to no avail. There's no denying that it's good though. "It's something." You eventually say, causing Syd to scoff and shake her head, "However..." This grabs her attention and her gaze is back on you instantly, "...it's too overpowering. Heavy, even. If we serve this we'll need to plate it with some lemon slices or something to freshen up the flavor. Lighten it up, you know?" Seeing the grin on her face, you find yourself getting a little flustered, unsure if you just made an absolute dumbass of yourself. "Did that make any sense?"

"My thoughts exactly." She laughs, reaching to switch out the plate in front of you for a different one, "Oh and also, I pulled some strings and booked us a kitchen to test some stuff out tonight."

Your brows perk up, the corner of your lips pulling up in a smirk, "Us?"

"Mhm..." She hums in response, avoiding your gaze briefly as she grows slight flustered. Look how the turn tables. "I mean, if you're free, of course."

"I'm always free for you." You contain any flirtier remark from escaping your mouth. Because this is sincere. This is nothing short of the whole truth. You're always free for her. Even if you aren't, you're willing to drop everything for her.

And little do you know, she feels the exact same.

Syd nods, finally meeting your eyes again, "Cool. It's a date."

Fucking dorks

#the bear #the bear fx #the bear fic #sydney adamu #sydney adamu x reader #sydney adamu x you #sydney adamu imagine #syd adamu #sydney adamu fic #sydney adamu fanfic #sydney adamu fanfiction #carmen berzatto #carmen berzatto x reader #carmen berzatto x you #fic #fanfic #fanficiton #reader #x reader

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xplrvibes · 3 months

Note

some people on twitter are getting really mad at colby for apparently ‘ditching’ shea for his new girl saying shit like oh he led shea on and now he’s pushed her away lol

they’re fully acting like he’s committed an awful crime like why are they cancelling him 😭

(side note - i’m actually, whole heartedly convinced that half of the fandom genuinely hates colby and everything he does fills them with rage lmfao)

This is going to be a one and done, on this topic. I don't like Shea, don't like what she's doing. Never did like her, as you all know, because she has been an absolutely awful and manipulative bully and generally trash person over the years and I don't want her taking up too much space on my blog because of it.

But I felt the need to just put this out there before I move on, so here we go, behind a cut for anyone who doesn't want to hear it lol.

You know, I find this whole "taking Shea on her word all of a sudden" thing interesting.

According to Shea, they had a 10 year (even though he was still living in Kansas 10 years ago) "on-again, off-again thing" that was "mostly just talking" and was "never official," although it was "almost dating, but not official" for 2 years (even though there hasn't been a 2 year period where Colby hasn't been at least seeing someone, if not hooking up).

She doesn't seem to know any of his friends and not a single one of them follow her on socials - in fact, most of them unfollowed her several years back. Of particular note is the fact that Sam, after all these years of her being Colby's future wife, still hasn't followed her back...but has followed several of the other girls Colby's been linked to over the years, including M.

She never seems to have a clue about what is going on in his life and has been promising (and not delivering) fans content with Colby for years now - including her telling everyone that her and Colby were going somewhere to film a documentary in January of this year when Colby had already told everyone on xplrclub that he and Sam were going to be in Vegas or in Texas filming in all of Jan and then in Australia for most of Feb. She promised to have him on one her streams on a day when he was actually in Hawaii, then another day when he was actually in Kansas visiting family.

She hasn't been invited to a single party or group gathering of theirs since 2019, save for one time when she visited Colby and Sam in Las Vegas - which came across as very awkward, given the above.

She complained about never getting invited to snc's Halloween parties - you know, the ones that have 500-1,000 invitees and snc have claimed include an invite to every single person they know and are friends with? Yet Colby's soul mate gets left on the list somehow, 6 years running?? (One year he had four different past flings there at once. But the future Mrs. Shea Brock just didn't make the cut somehow)

Oh, bonus: she once told a gc full of her fans that Colby asked her out, but she turned him down because she valued the friendship too much. Funny how those turns tabled.

Colby meanwhile, has never hidden that he considers himself single, does not think he's met "the one," uses Raya to find dates, hooks up and has flings....he's not just pretending to be single, he IS single.

So. to recap: They have had a 10 year friendship and emotional bond that Shea deluded herself into thinking was more. Colby comes around her again after having had a cancer that could've easily rendered him unable to have children, and her grand idea is to tell this guy she freely admits she was never even dating that she wants to cash in on some vague promise he may or may not have actually made to her about getting married and having CHILDREN???

I'd have left her ass, too.

But sure. He's the bad guy. By the way, to hear Shea tell it, Colby did the same thing to her that Sam did to Kat. But all the people trashing Colby were the first ones in line to defend Sam from big bad mean Kat and her hurtful words because "he wasn't ready" and wah wah wah. Isn't that funny...and on par.

So yes, lol. Most of the people pissed about this are using any excuse put in front of them to trash Colby cause that is the only enjoyment they get out of life. Trust me when I say they are backing the wrong horse with Shea. She's not the hero victim y/n sainted good girl she pretends to be.

#asks #and now I'm done with her and the trolls of the other corners of the internet thanks!

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ewingstan · 2 years

Text

Worm and Costumes, pt. 1

(pt. 2 here!)

I’m really starting to admire how well the costumes in Worm say so much about their characters. You’d obviously want this, since a good superhero/villain costume is always supposed to represent a person well, but this can often get lost due to aesthetic trends or demands for matching outfits or a need to have a level of asthetic cohesion for a group. Worm uses its “no themed teams” rule to let costumes’ symbolic meanings shine, giving us a masterclass in how to use costumes both for blunt metaphor and subtle characterization.

Looking at each of the core Undersiders’ in turn: we have Brian’s motorcyclist outfit, almost unrecognizable as a costume if not for the sculpted skull visor. This makes it feel almost ad-hoc; you could picture Brian starting out his criminal career, not having anything to protect his identity, so just putting on his helmet and calling it a day, modifying it with the skull once he had enough money from jobs. It helps sell how the Undersiders started out as something approaching goons-for-hire, with its leader looking like the souped-up version of the comic book henchman wearing their usual duds plus some clown makeup/animal mask/whatever they need to nominally fit their boss’ theme. At the same time, like Brian, it’s incredibly practical—it protects the head and provides great anonymity while still being intimidating. The way it seeks to intimidate, too: the intense machismo of the outfit, motorcycles and skulls and darkness, all of which is ultimately just hiding him, is really indicative of his specific damage. Grue’s outfit is the most imposing, but it also is the most covering, the most padded, the one that reveals the least of its wearer.

Then we have Tattletale’s domino mask and purple/black skintight bodysuit. Its probably the most stereotypically “comic book”-looking costumes of anyone, just loud and colorful and completely impractical for crime, which works with how much she commits to the cops-and-robbers theory of capedom. The out has very little obvious utility—it doesn’t even seem like it would do a good job at hiding her identity!—but that itself is a statement of confidence. It says “I know you’re not gonna do any lasting damage, and you know I don’t need to get physical to hurt you.” And the seeming failure to protect her civilian identity is misleading: yeah, she only has a domino mask, but its specifically designed to highlight parts of her face to suggest a whole different structure (not to mention her being meticulous about keeping different hair styles for her cape and civilian identity). It’s much like how Lisa’s seeming openness is a steel trap: she’ll delight in giving you all the details, and then you’ll end up blindsided learning “oh she’s only been letting us think she’s a psychic” or “oh Lisa Wilbourn isn’t actually her real name” or “oh she knew about my plan to betray her from the beginning.”

On the other end of the spectrum, we have Rachel’s incredibly minimal costume: just a cheap dog mask from the dollar store bin, worn with her civilian heavy coat and boots. Its brash, its crude, the effect worn together is more a slasher villain look than a supervillain ensemble. Its a nominal costume, less a nod to the rules than a thumbing of the nose towards it, which is appropriate: Rachel has no cape/civilian identity split, what with her identity and background being public knowledge, and she has the least patience for the cops-and-robbers game than any of the Undersiders. If she wasn’t reigned in by Brian and the others, she probably would have been in the birdcage or on a kill list by the story’s start. Its no wonder she doesn’t bother with the mask half the time; she has little understanding and no patience for the unwritten rules of the game they’re all playing. For her, its not a game at all.

In contrast, its clear from Regent’s costume that its all a game to him. He wears the carefree dress of some young prince out of a story book, what with his loose white shirt and silver diadem. His Venetian mask makes it seem like every caper may as well be a trip to the masquerade. It suggests a spoiled demeanor, undue confidence built from a privileged upbringing, while also hinting at a cruel and hedonistic streak often seen in the wealthy and aimless. At the same time, we find out quickly that his costume has a purposefully misleading exterior: his mask is padded, his loose shirt hides a bulletproof vest and his scepter doubles as a taser against the unsuspecting. Jean-Paul himself narrates for us how his tuned-out, playful demeanor lets him hide the more horrifying things he gets up to, and his costume similarly is used to paint over a man with more skin in the game than he lets on, ready and eager to strike out against the unsuspecting.

Most tantalizing for analysis, we have Taylor’s costumes. The way its initially presented (ooh, its grey because I haven’t gotten better dyes yet, I mostly just worked on it in the garage during my free time, I haven’t actually worn it out on patrol or anything) makes it seem slightly dinky and novice-level, and it is—as a hero costume. As a villain costume, it ends up working perfectly. It’s shortcomings as a hero costume just create more opportunities for it to work as a statement for the Warlord of the Boardwalks; just like Taylor’s shortcomings do the same. Her costume is too dour to be light or inspiring, so she uses it to seem inhuman and frightening. Her powers don’t lend themselves to easy takedowns of her opponents, so she opts instead for ruthless takedowns. Her costume can’t let her mimic the beautiful, statuesque features of heroes, so she leans in the other direction and becomes as unsettling as possible, covering her gangly body in an always-writhing mass. She’s not a great public speaker, so she speaks through her minions, or through a jittering mass of bugs in her vague silhouette, or she gives patient, logical-sounding explanations that make you hate her even as her arguments sit in your head like a tick, growing larger as you feed it your doubt.

The match between appearance and methods only grows once she adopts the Weaver persona. The grey-and-electric blue color palate is supposed to signal her adoption of heroism, and while the color scheme is certainly more approachable and familiar, it also lacks the warmer colors of the old costume’s yellow goggles. And one of the aspects of Weaver that make people want more time devoted to this portion of the story is how despite now working for the “good,” Taylor is at her coldest, holding her new teammates at arms length while working them to the bone. At the same time, she has her fingers in more pies than ever: she is taking on dozens of criminal operations and wearing them down with attrition, confronting new and terrifying endbringers on a much more frequent basis, and trying to line up as many pieces as she can for the prophesied doomsday. What better way to symbolize how much she’s juggling than literally giving her more arms?

And then there are the parts that just scream their meaning at you. How she finds the initial version of the weaver costume ill-fitting and generic. How she now has a beetle emblem facing towards the sky, but it’s actually turned upside-down from its old orientation. How she goes back to the Skitter costume whenever she has something personal to fight for, when the undersiders are with her in the fray. Its great. It’s loud, it has no trace of subtlety, it is yelling what it want’s you to take away. Just like the best costumes do.

(pt. 2 here!)

#worm #wildbow #parahumans #this might be pretty surface-level analysis #but it was fun to write about all the same #leo says #leo reads worm

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gizkasparadise · 4 months

Text

2023 wrapped: kdrama edition!

taking a page from @dangermousie, here's a list of all the kdramas ive watched this year, in order from least liked to most liked! because i dont have a spotify wrap-up to share :'D

cdrama one here!

and i'll do a webtoon one too /o/

overall i didnt watch too many kdramas this year, and finished less. kind of a "meh" kdrama year for me overall (with 1-2 exceptions). with that in mind, full disclosure that i didnt love a ton of what i watched this year in kdramaland:

we barely knew ye: ones i dropped only a few eps in

sweet home 2. dropped after ep 2. direction it went in is v much not my thing, my fave surviving characters were either killed off or put on the bench, and im not that motivated to see what happens next. might jump back into the franchise if word-of-mouth on s3 is good, we'll see

moon in the day. first ep was actually great and i enjoyed it a lot!! but im not doing cancer storylines rn so that killed momentum. may try this one again later

king the land. watched the first ep. simply did not vibe.

death's game. ditto ^

black knight. i LOVE a good dystopian scifi. this was not that. i was really bored after the first ep and didnt bother with the rest

my dearest. i watched the first ep and liked it, but just wasnt in the mood/wasn't immediately hooked. i'm going to give this one another try when i hit the Angsty Sageuk craving again

dramas i watched at least half of

6. twinkling watermelon.

it's pretty wild to put what i believe is the current #1 show on mydramalist as my bottom pick for the year, especially since it's written by my favorite screenwriter, but here we are. this one is far from objectively the worst drama but it's here because it made me the most mad!! the female lead and second male leads were both off-putting and selfish to me, and the whole drama i was actively rooting for ryeoun's earnest and endearing male lead and shin eun soo's underwritten second female lead to escape and have mother/son adventures on their own away from the rest of everyone else

5. arthdal chronicles: sword of aramun.

sigh. i was a big believer/supporter of this season, even with all of the recasts. but despite a few moments of brilliance, it was overall a slog to watch and just kind of joyless. too much time spent on the ago tribe, too many nonsensical victories and deus ex machina coincidences, and the bag was very much fumbled with some of the characters (particularly saya, who was to me the most interesting character in s1 and you KNOW ljk could have rocked that ruthlessness). positive standouts were kim ok bin flawlessly scene-chewing as taealha and lee joon ki working what he was dealt

4. worst of evil.

adored this drama for the first 2/3rds! it was gritty, neo-noir that reminded me a lot of the old school hong kong crime films like infernal affairs. lots of style, great acting, messy and flawed characters. but the last arc/ending was a boring dud for me. still very much enjoyed the ride up to that point though!

3. perfect marriage revenge.

so! much!! fun!!! just. full commitment to making a show as gloriously makjang/soap operay as it could get and it was a blast watching because of it. made on pocket lint for a budget but it rocked what it had and a special shoutout to lee min young's absolutely fantastically camp evil stepmother. the excitement died down a little toward the end, but still a good time overall

2. the glory, part 2.

a satisfying ending to a really excellent first half. love that the female lead just got to execute revenge and there was no moral or sanctimonious hangups about it. enjoyed the way the ending was set up as "the adventure continues," and all in all this was a really solid and enjoyable dark drama! only thing that was kind of a bummer is that the time split between airing the first and second halves killed the momentum a little, but that's entirely netflix fuckery and not the fault of the show

moving

hands-down the best kdrama i watched this year, and possibly my favorite kdrama ever. i didnt plan to watch this one because im sick of superhero everything, but the cast got me wanting to at least try it and omg im glad i did. great acting from literally everyone, wild action scenes, and just beautiful characters and dynamics across every level. the family narratives are so, so good and the whole show is expertly grounded in the concept of planting seeds so your children can see flowers. please give this one a try if you're on the fence about it!

2023 kdramas that i plan to watch (but didnt get to yet!)

my lovely liar

a good day to be a dog

my perfect stranger

revenant

mask girl

bloodhounds

my demon

AWARDS

Favorite ship: juwon and jihee from moving absolutely destroyed me in the like 3 eps they were in, so they win this one. he's a gangster who gets the shit kicked out of him for a living and loves stories with happy endings. she's a weary but always brave sex worker (coded, but still) who decides to trust a lonely man crying in the street. i never thought a motion-sensor light could wreck me the way theirs did. "you have worth to me, and i have worth to you."

Favorite FL: song hye kyo's dong eun in the glory just barely edges out han hyo joo's mihyun in moving. song hye kyo needs to play, like, all the villains and anti-heroes ASAP because that's been the most fun ive had watching her. she took on a dark character and rocked it

Favorite ML: juwon from moving, definitely. to quote my older post:

Moving really said hi this is Juwon. he has scars from gunshots all down his arm. he opened a chicken restaurant. he’s a gangster. he loves pro wrestling because the good guys win. he tried to rip out his own galbladder to prove a point. he’s a proud girl dad. he is unkillable. he stands in the street and cries.

Favorite 2FL: lee min young's incredible, over the top, villainous camp queen lee jung hye from perfect marriage revenge was just so much fun to watch and she ate every single scene she was in. 10/10 would watch her throw lawn chairs in a ballgown all day

Favorite 2ML: i would die for bongseok from moving. precious sunshine child who deserves only the best

Best Cast: im a broken record, but moving. so many characters with such great depth given to them and this was truly an ensemble show A+++

Best WTF: yura eating her paternity results in perfect marriage revenge!!

#kdrama #gizka 2023 wrapped

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stormyoceans · 21 days

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Do you have any other wishes for GMMTV part 2 aside from the mandatory slow burn?

[TAKES OUT HER WISHLIST] ANON HOW MUCH TIME DO YOU HAVE

all jokes aside, i honestly do have way too many wishes when it comes to what i want to see from GMMTV and most of them are very hyperspecific, so instead of giving you just an endless list of whatever random ideas or pairings i’d like to get (which is maybe more appropriate for a bingo card or something like that), i kinda condensed it all into some more general categories (sort of. a couple fo these are still pretty specific ;;;;;;;;)

anyway, here we go!!!!

1. WOMEN. literally my top wish after anything jimmysea related is MORE. WOMEN. like srsly give me viewjune as the main pairing in a GL!!!!!!!! give me sizzy in any combination!!!!!!!! give me women centring shows where the women actually get treated as the main characters!!!!!!!! give me the GL version of series like only friends and we are where the women get to be silly and nasty!!!!!!!!! give me jamie kissing women as a treat to me specifically!!!!!!!!! GIVE. ME. WOMEN.

2. historical QL. after the success of i feel you linger in the air and with both idolfactory and domundi working on releasing historical QLs in the near future, i think it’s about time GMMTV also gives us a proper one. possibly with no time travel or reincarnation involved, for once

3. plot driven QL. this is kinda tied to my wish for an actual slow burn and partly to the following point as well, but i do desperately wish we could get a QL series where the romance is obviously still there, but it’s not the main focus of the show, or at least not the only one. something like manner of death or triage, where the romance just happens along the way as the story unfolds. i think the closest GMMTV got to it was with not me, but it would be nice to get more, even if i know this is not everyone’s cup of tea

4. some variety please for the love of god. look, i know we’re never gonna get rid of school settings and office romances, so it’s pointless to wish to have none of those, but i do desperately need a bit more diversity. of the fifteen series announced in part 1, seven of them are set in school. SEVEN. that’s basically half of the offer they’re giving. and okay, if we consider only the QL shows then the ratio is better (3 out of 9), but still. give me thriller shows, give me horror shows, give me fantasy shows, give me sci-fi shows, give me jobs that aren’t just office workers or chefs, give me mystery, give me crime, give me cashiers and doctors and detectives and firefighters and taxi drivers and teachers and librarians and waiters and bartenders and mechanics and lawyers and flight attendants and therapists and farmers and hairdressers and reporters, JUST!!!!!!!!! explore something new!!!!!!!! take some risks!!!!!!!! i know GMMTV as a company is not as big as we think it is and that it focuses on teens and new generation audiences, but i don’t think younger people want to see students and office workers exclusively……

5. QL exploring other sexualities and gender identities. just give me ace main characters, trans main characters, non-binary main characters, ALL THE DIFFERENT QUEER MAIN CHARACTERS!!!!!!!

6. pepper/papang/guy/podd in any combination as a main pairing in a QL. love and light to all the rookies but if GMMTV doesn’t give these men some main roles im gonna start committing grand scale larceny to cope

#i left out stuff like 'ALL THE JIMMYSEA SERIES' because you know #i'd say that's pretty obvious ;;;;;;;#but i can definitely be more specific if you want just let me know!!!!#in the mean time thank you for asking this anon!!!! hope you're having a wonderful day 💜#gmmtv 2024 part 2 #wishlist #m: ask

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nihilityart · 3 days

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Space Riders AU belongs to @onyxonline

-Loading Information-

——————————————

:Log Entry 38:

(Warning: Highly Classified)

(Space Riders Special Operative Unit)

Octagram

(The Eight Star Demon Lords)

Unit Information:

Octagram is a Unit of powerful magic users who are all leaders of their own planets. They are called “Demon Lords” because each member has committed some sort of sin/crime.

While they follow the same ranking system that normal space riders do. They have their own little internal ranking system. Demon Lords are considered to have the least amount of sin, True Demon Lords have committed the most devastating crimes, all though for some these crimes are justifiable. Great Demon Lords have at least 3 subordinates who can be considered Demon Lords.

:File 1/8:

Unit Member: Guy Crimson

Codename: Betelgeuse (The First Star)

Alias: Lord of Darkness

Age: 60,000 years old

Rank: Captain

Species: Demon (Primordial Rouge)

Birth Planet: Planet Hell

Current Home World: Eternal Winter

Power Information:

——————————————

Celestial Power: Nodens

Main Ability: Manifestation of Weapons

The ability to manifest weapons out of dark energy, the weapons can be either melee or ranged. While these weapons are powerful they are also unstable and can harm Guy or his allies if not used correctly.

Passive Ability: Abyssal Aura

Abyssal Aura is an ability that instills Terror in enemies. However it does not do physical harm to the targets.

——————————————

Misc. Information

——————————————

Guy comes from a species that lives on the World of Everlasting Darkness called Demons. These ‘Demons’ are mostly battle hungry mercenaries that will fight for anyone as long as they make a contract. Normally they can’t survive for long outside of their home planet since they are made out of the magic that comes from the planet. On the upside, this means they are impervious to physical attacks, one needs magic or celestial powers to kill them. In exchange, most demons are extremely weak and can be killed by powered space riders easily.

They can only permanently survive outside of their planet when they get a physical body. However, the downside to this is their normally physically invulnerable bodies become vulnerable to physical attacks. But this also makes them stronger than their disembodied counterparts.

These Demons while able to live for a long time, normally only get to live up to 100 years before they are killed by either Space Riders, Cult Members, or other stronger Demons.

Many Demons are known to serve the Prototypes Cult since the deals he makes normally pay well. Guy Crimson is one of the only demons to be a member of the Space Riders.

In Demon culture, it is widely known that demons aren’t named until they proved their power to others. Because of the high standard, most Demons are nameless.

Many demons of the lower class known as “Lesser Demons” are not intelligent and are treated more like animals than people.

Greater Demons are the Average citizens on Planet Hell and have the vastest range of power, they can either be really weak (One Rider could defeat them) to being really strong (More then one rider would be needed).

Arch-Demons are the nobility of Planet Hell and are known for being powerful. Unfortunately though, they are not invincible and most of them were killed by the Cult.

Demon Peers are the highest ranking nobility in Planet Hell, each on is so powerful that it would normally take half a squad to defeat one.

Devil Lords are the Kings and Queens of Planet Hell, the highest ranking and most powerful. It would take a whole squad of normal space riders to deal with one. Famously Captain Dogday Solaris managed to beat a Devil Lord by himself without help, this action got him recognition from General Ludwig. (And got him a promotion and a medal.)

Demon society is a strict Caste system based on the amount of years a Demon has lived and on how powerful they are. The list goes from lowest to highest.

Chevaliers (Late Modern Rank) (0-30 years old)

Baronet (Modern Rank) (30-100 years old)

Baron (Early Modern Rank) (100-400 years old)

Viscount (Medieval Rank) (400-1,000 years olf)

Count (Ancient Rank) (Above 1,000 years old)

Marquis (Late Pre-Historic Rank) (Over 3,000 years old)

Duke (Pre-Historic Rank) (Over 4,000 to 9,000 years old)

Arch-Duke (Early Pre-Historic Rank) (10,000 years old or older)

Kings (Primordial Rank) (50,000 years old or older)

Guy Crimson’s Sin:

When Guy was first born, a village of a planet had contracted him to destroy the village they were at war with.

Guy agreed to destroy the village, but once he was done he destroyed the village that hired him as reparation for his services.

It was this act that got the Demon his name.

“Guy” (pronounced: “Guh-ee”) after the screams of the dying villagers, which he though sounded nice.

“Crimson” after the blood that was spilled in his wake.

——————————————

-End of Log-

———————————————————————————

OP notes: It took me forever to figure out how to nerf the demon species from TenSura to fit into this AU. To make them strong, but not too strong to be unbeatable.

I think I did a good job at balancing them out, but I might change some stuff to keep them in line with this AU.

Look at that, it turns out Dogday isn’t just some Bisexual disaster that you can push around in this. One might say that he….

…has that…

..DOG in him!

#tensura crossover #crossover #guy crimson #poppy playtime #space riders au #poppy playtime crossover #I worked really hard on balancing these characters #but it so hard to do it when their so OP in their own series!#octagram logs

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characteroulette · 7 months

Text

A study on prosecutors -- (previous) (next)

Let's get into the weeds of the Investigations games.

Judging any of the prosecutors in the Investigations games, Edgeworth included, is a difficult thing to do. We're not privy to their style of prosecuting, after all, since the whole game takes place outside of any trials. I guess this shows how much stock I take from said trials, but it is a core mechanic to the Ace Attorney series, so I feel justified on that one. Judging a prosecutor from half of the usual info makes things a bit of a harder sell to me, they really missed an opportunity to get us into the courtroom properly.

But I digress. Let's go down the list.

First off, Jacques Portsman. He's a first case villain for sure, as we know he committed the crime and his over the top performance is really grating. I kinda never believed him when he claimed to be a prodigy or some up and coming star because of that, though. Like, sir, you're a first case murderer. You're not that hard to crack, especially as the game has to tutorialise everything for us.

His being pretty awful is kinda the point, however. Here is one of many prosecutors whom Edgeworth has to work alongside in the office. He's as corrupt and ruthless as anyone else, he's another in the many who believe that winning and making a name for themselves is all that matters in the world of the law. He's a symptom of the way the law operates in this world, far from the cause. That's at least one fascinating aspect to him.

It's yet another show of how Manfred could have gotten away with his forty year streak without anyone so much as batting an eye at it.

Speaking of, let's dig into Manfred a bit deeper, seeing as he's the only other prosecutor we really meet in the first game. (Faraday gets like one line before he dies, so I can't really count him.) He's acting Edgeworth's superior here, no matter how much Edgeworth refers to him as his mentor. This is a disconnect that always struck me about what we get to see of their interactions; Edgeworth really does respect Manfred from the bottom of his heart. He sees Manfred as someone who helped him find structure and strength in his life after what happened to his father. But Manfred doesn't return that respect at all. Really, a lot of how Manfred speaks to Edgeworth here reads as condescending, and that's before he goes off about how worthless Edgeworth is. His promise of an hour of recess is also one that stood out to me; he expects Edgeworth to partake in some of the dirtier tactics that he (and Franziska) might. He's leaving that option open for Edgeworth to do whatever necessary to get his guilty verdict, to prove himself a perfect von Karma. It doesn't end up happening because we have to preserve continuity -- I mean, the trial gets cancelled due to murder shenanigans, but it's a detail that's always stood out to me.

We get a lot more intriguing a look into Manfred's character in the second Investigations game. He adores his wife to the point of proclaiming her the best chef in the world. That's weirdly humanising for him!! And he loves his daughter, too, even if he's not very good at showing it. He may be a wicked man, but it wasn't actually by his own hand that he had to tamper with evidence. Hell, maybe that's why Gregory was able to call him out. (He forged a WHOLE BODY and that'll forever be hilarious to me.) (Well, an autopsy report. Same difference.) What I would GIVE to be able to see the actual trials between Gregory and Manfred, with Gregory struggling to find any hold and Manfred acting composed while also hoping his evidence doesn't get called out. It had to be one hell of a battle, Gregory isn't one to go down without a fight.

Anyway, Byrne Faraday. I figure I might give a bit of a thought on him from what we can extrapolate.

Kay loved him dearly and he was definitely doing his best by her. That promise notebook they had between them is so sweet, the man was trying his best to be a good dad. He had some level of corruption, though, considering he was one foot to the Yatagarasu. Sure, it was more for justice than our usual prosecutor fare, but he was still cheating to get guilty verdicts. Even if his corruption swung the other way than where we're used to seeing, it shows he was willing to get his hands dirty for his justice. It shows his lack of faith in the legal system he was a part of, another symptom to this dark age. (As an aside, these two games are the true lead-in to Dual Destinies. Not Apollo Justice. You want the themes and points of DD to ring stronger or truer at all? Play the Investigations games before going into DD, it'll all make more sense that way. Or, as much sense as it can make.)

It is fun seeing how much they have to strain to get us to like Faraday, though. At least, I feel he's supposed to be likeable, since they focus on him being a good dad and not the fact that he was working behind the scenes to help rig his trials. A perfect contrast to Manfred, whom the games don't even try to make likeable since we all know what becomes of him in the end. And yet they put in just enough to get you to see him as less a monster than you might have. (The Inga solution! It works on me every time!!)

Also funny that there are only two new prosecutors introduced in the first Investigations game and they're both basically bit parts. Because then we get into the second game and meet our more traditional opposing prosecutor, Sebastian Debeste.

Ahh, Yumihiko Ichiyanagi. A mess of a child. Starts out pompous and believing he's always right because that's what everyone around him is forced to say to him. He's a nepotism baby, his dad's the Chief of the Prosecutorial Investigation Committee, after all. He's a brat and a pest and he's also so stupid you find yourself wondering how the hell he managed to get his badge in the first place.

Well, this is a world of dumbasses, you suppose. How else could simple logic be a superpower? You move on and concern yourself more with whom you suspect to be the true villain pulling the strings here, Justine Courtney.

Her subtle pushes and buttering Sebastian up are near sinister. It's like she's using him as a mouthpiece at times, a way to get her own goals and work done here. She wants to seemingly destroy Edgeworth, nearly singularly focuses on this goal at times, and you can't help but find pity for Sebastian being caught up in her scheme. He's seventeen and it shows far more on him than it does on Klavier or Franziska. He's floundering while everyone simply congratulates him on a job while done, unable to save him from those depths, that darkness.

What is the point of using this boy as a smokescreen, you wonder. How can parading him around be worth any of his foolishness?

Then we meet Blaise and realise, oh. He really was just a pawn in the grander scheme. He was a way to get closer to the true villain. He was merely getting in the way, being a foolish and stupid child, of everyone's true goals.

Franziska whips him and he doesn't even protest. He shouts out in pain like everyone else, but he never once tells her to stop. He just takes it, doesn't think of his usual profession of being the best.

He just takes it.

From that small detail alone, I couldn't help but immediately worry for him.

Justine shows her hand at last. Even if she had come to care for Sebastian, she's out to strike Blaise down no matter what. Blaise is the one behind that one strike against Manfred's reputation, he's behind this whole smuggling ring, he's everyone's antagonist as we all converge on this one point. Sebastian tries to stick up for his father, but even that lends to our favour. He gets in the way once more, he slips up just enough to give us what we need, and his father reveals to him in the cruellest possible way that everything he thought he's accomplished has been a total lie. He couldn't even be a worthy pawn to his father. He's a failure, through and through.

And Edgeworth gets to be the one to help him stand back up on his own two feet.

I cannot stress enough just how excellent an idea it was to have our final logic chess game be against Sebastian. How we have to use it more as a way to break through all that despair and anguish instead of for our own gain. Edgeworth being able to be a voice of strength for Sebastian, being able to offer this boy you thought your enemy for most of the game a spot of hope, is so good. It's exactly taking the lessons behind what made Edgeworth himself so good in the first game, at least in my opinion.

And we get to see bits of an actual trial!! We get to play assistant as Sebastian stands up to his father in one of the most hype scenes ever!! I'm so proud of this fail boy who came such a long way. A crybaby who, with the help of those actually willing to back him up and show him the right way instead of propping him up with false praise, is able to stand his ground and prove his father the villain he is.

He breaks that chain of legacy tying so many of our Ace Attorney characters down. Holy shit we were robbed this game, actually, huge shout out to the translation team who allowed us all to experience this cathartic moment.

#Momo writes stuff #aai1 #aai2 #aai2 spoilers #Ace Attorney Investigations #Ace Attorney Investigations 2 #jacques portsman #byrne faraday #Manfred von Karma #Sebastian Debeste #Yumihiko Ichiyanagi #Justine Courtney #Spoilers #Essay time for Momo #Blaise Debeste #Woof #I love Sebastian so much...#Lot to get through here

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luthwhore · 9 months

Note

HI! Okay. I know you already got a question about fic recs a month or so ago, but I've gotta ask. Do you have any Clex fic recs that aren't super Smallville-centric? I could never get into Smallville and am thus the most oppressed clex shipper ever /j

But! Yes! Do you happen to have any suggestions for stuff like that? I super don't mind if Smallville is canon to the fics, but stuff where it's not the main centerpiece is soooo slay *twirls hair*

you've got me operating on hard mode here because, as you said, most clex fic is pretty heavily based on smallville, but i think i at least have a few set post-series where the comics influence is a lot more prevalent, so hopefully some of these will be to your taste!

Looking Glass County by Astolat

this one is a universe swap fic where the smallville version of lex (post-series) gets switched with his comics counterpart. i don't think it necessarily takes a lot of smallville knowledge to follow it, since it's not super canon-compliant anyway, and it's really interesting to see how the characters bounce off of each other. if you like astolat's writing style, you might also like Revenge, Moving On, and/or Reconcilable Differences, all by the same author and all with mixed comics influences. (to the best of my memory, all of them are comics-y enough to follow without watching much smallville.)

Useful Arts by rivkat

this one is technically a sex pollen story but it's a very plot-heavy one and the sex pollen elements are really only present for the first half of the fic. rivkat's stuff is some of my favorite and i love their characterization for lex. most of their other fic (to the best of my memory) is more obviously based off of smallville, so this is really the only one i can rec for someone looking for comics-inspired characterization.

Counting the Days by tasabian

lex goes to prison for a crime he didn't commit. clark goes undercover to investigate. the premise is very fun, and it doesn't really lean on smallville lore too heavily. their fic tends to pull a lot from the comics as well as the DCAU, so even though all of them are labeled with smallville exclusively, they really use more of a blend of canon from various different sources, so i'd rec pretty much any of their works.

An Alienated Property by Kantayra

lex and clark trapped on a red sun planet together. this one was on my other fic rec post as a "comics" fic (even though it's tagged with smallville) but i wanted to include it here too because i just love the whole "red sun planet" trope that much. to my memory, all of their fic except for "Clark's Secret" are set post-series and can be read as comics-based.

Wien's Law by obscureshipyard

this fic is mostly a series of one-shots that are mostly a mix of character study and smut, so there's not a lot of plot to summarize, but notably, the lex in this fic is a trans man, which does feature pretty prominently, if that affects whether or not it interests you. this is the only fic on this list that is exclusively comics-based, specifically not using the backstory of lex growing up in smallville. this author's other stuff is a mix of smallville and comics-based, but i haven't read any of the rest of it, personally.

i'm sure there's plenty more out there because god knows i've only scratched the surface of their ao3 tag, but from a quick look through my bookmarks, these are the main ones that jumped out at me as being divorced enough from the events of the smallville to be enjoyable for a comics-only fan.

#briar answers #clex #fic recs #i do welcome people reblogging and adding their own recs if they have anything though #comics clex fic is very rare #and when you filter out fics tagged 'smallville' you're basically left with nothing but batfam fic that uses them as a side/past pairing lo

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olderthannetfic · 2 years

Note

Full disclaimer, I'm a monolingual American from a privileged background (though I suspect that much would be pretty obvious frim reading).

I think part of the reason Americans always act like everything should be translated not just to English, but to American English is because up until very recently, almost everything WAS "translated" for us.

We Americans are so babied about language & culture, it's embarrassing. The Harry Potter books had to be "translated" because apparently we couldn't be trusted to figure out that a jumper was a sweater. I heard about an author of a true crime book just last year complaining about how "mum" had to be changed to "mom" for US release.

Then there's the American idea of exceptionalism which shows up not just as "we're the best, why would you want anything else?" but also as "wow, how weird are you for liking something that's FOREIGN?" At least when I was growing up, if you watched or read stuff in any other European language you're a snob. If you like anything from Asia you're a weirdo. (Of course, during my formative years, I was implicitly taught that Africa and South America did not produce any media worth consuming. If they had, clearly it would have been on TV because American TV had the best of everything /sarcasm)

Like when I got into anime in the 90s, Sailor Moon episode sequences had to be mirrored so american kids wouldn't get confused about the cars driving on the wrong side of the road, half the characters in anime were constantly eating "jelly donuts" because we apparently had no chance of comprehending rice balls. I was freaking astounded when Netflix started hosting K dramas with only subtitles, no dubs. Just the other week I was watching an anime that actually kept the honorifics in the dubbed version and my jaw dropped because I remember my friends and I (pre-speedy internet) trying to parse mysterious words like "chan" and "kun." My well educated and generally liberal father reacted to my announcement that I was going to study Japanese in college (10 years ago) by listing the war crimes committed by Japan in WW2 (tell me you have a white American dad without telling me you have a white American dad 🙄).

It's also the way foreign languages are taught in US schools. Not just the fact that we start late, but that it's rarely viewed as a priority. I distinctly remember thinking "why am I learning French? Even if I ever go to France I'm only gonna visit for like a week, definitely not enough to need a whole language." There was almost no effort made to explain that 1) there are other countries that speak French, 2) there are people IN THE US who speak French as a first language and 3) you'll have a much better time overseas if you don't come off as a dumb American tourist. Culture being tied to language was never addressed at all. And I went to a well funded private high school where half the teachers held PhDs with language teachers were native speakers. (Actually I think it was one of my French teachers who explained that we 15 year olds were too old to really learn a language successfully, so that's awesome)

Do not get me wrong, this is not an excuse for Americans being, ya know, American about language and cultural literacy. But this is not an easy mentality to shake and pointing it out to a lot of your fellow Americans will get you a rant about how ungrateful you are for "attacking" the best country in the world. Sometimes I look back on the kind of cultural censorship that is so damn prevalent even now and it gives me a headache because this whole country feels like a cult sometimes. I wish I could have studied language earlier in life, I wish I would have seen it as more than just a graduation requirement, and I wish I had the time to prioritize it now, but I didn't and I can't.

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