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astroboots · 9 months

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Issue #11

Pairing: Miguel O'Hara x female reader

Summary: Miguel brings you gifts.

Word count: 3,600

Series Masterlist | Spiderverse Masterlist | Astroboot’s Masterlist | thirstworldproblemss’ Masterlist

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Stark’s courier service arrives at your hotel the following day, a crew of four brawny looking men dressed in overalls, carrying in some 13 boxes of equipment, which take up the majority of the floor space of your luxury suite.

It finds residence in the seating area of the hotel room. Fancy looking gadgets of shiny chrome and colorful LED lights that look like they were stolen from the movie set of Back to the Future.

Miguel sets up shop, turning the pink girly vanity dressing table into an impromptu workbench. It’s where he’s been seated most of the last 36 hours, hunched over the tiny little table tinkering with the watch and various futuristic looking mechanical gears at all hours of the night.

The laser scalpel he’s using might be soundless, but Miguel sure isn’t. Last night, you’d been constantly woken up by his growling as he trashes another expensive looking tool with an angry growl. Pacing the room for a few minutes, mumbling and complaining about the cheap quality of Stark tech and how primitive this world is. Then he's right back at it, sitting back down on the little pink velvet ottoman to continue tinkering.

Tonight is no different. You’re in bed, scrolling your phone to unwind before going to sleep, when you hear him grumble again then stab the laser scalpel into the surface of the table.

Peeling off the fluffy comfortable quilt wrapped around you, you make your way over to him before he destroys any more fancy furniture you can never dream of affording to replace on your modest salary.

“What’s wrong?” you ask, as you stand behind him.

“Bastard’s tagged the thing with a receptor that feeds information about any modifications made back to him. It’s booby trapped so that if I try to remove it, the whole thing will disintegrate.”

You lean over to peer at the desk over his shoulder, observing the arc reactor that's pulsing like a beating heart with a glow of blue.

“Does it matter? Let him have your technology.”

In the reflection of the vanity mirror, you can see the small muscle in his jaw tic with irritation.

“No,” he says flatly, picking up the scalpel again from where it’s wedged into the table. “We can’t risk him getting a hold of inter-dimensional technology. I don’t want Stark to be able to locate and come after you.”

Oh Jesus, not this again.

“I already told you, I’m not interested in Tony Stark." You resist the urge to roll your eyes at part two of Miguel's unwarranted jealousy feud with Stark. Didn’t the two of you have a heartfelt conversation about this?

“That’s not the problem.”

“Then what is?”

He's grinding down on his jaw with irritated anger at whatever it is he’s thinking but not sharing with you. “We can’t trust him.”

“He’s a superhero, Miguel, just like you. If we can't trust him, then I don't know who we can trust.”

Miguel's mouth pulls into a grim and tight line at your words. For a brief moment, you think you catch a hint of fear on his face, before he breaks eye contact and turns away, back towards the bench. It takes you by surprise because you didn’t think Miguel was scared of anything.

“Tony Stark is one of the good guys,” you try again.

You rest a hand on the edge of his shoulder, trying to help placate his unease. “He’s an Avenger, remember? It's their job to protect the world.”

It dawns on you when you hear the words from your own mouth. The reason why he doesn’t want Tony Stark to be able to keep tabs on you and come after you.

The Avengers are meant to protect the world from any threats, and right now one of the greatest threats to this world is… you.

“Oh,” the tiny sound punches out of you as a yawning pit of uncertainty and fear opens up in your stomach.

One in every 40 New Yorkers will have a run-in with Superhero in their time in the city.

You've just always thought that, if your turn to encounter the Avengers came, it would be as a grateful civilian saved from the clutches of evil. You never thought it would be because you were the danger the world needed saving from.

Miguel must sense the moment the realization hits you, because he sets aside his tools and takes your hand, gently stroking the palm of it with his thumb.

"You have nothing to worry about, it’s just going to take some time," he murmurs, and he looks up at you with such warmth it makes the anxiety in you thaw slightly. "I'll be done with it soon.”

He eyes the arc reactor, not letting go of your hand. "Try to get some sleep."

You fall asleep to the white noise of tinkering metal and Miguel’s frustrated murmured curses. The noises should annoy you, but they don't. You find it oddly comforting, being able to hear Miguel move around in the same room as you when you’re in bed. Know with every fiber of your being that his presence means you're safe and easily drift fast asleep.

You don't know how long you stay asleep for or how much sleep you manage to catch before you feel the bed dip beside you.

"Hey," a voice softly cajoles you. There's a warm palm on your shoulder, gently nudging you awake. But you're not prepared to wake yet. Too comfortable in the haze of sleep to give it up.

You bury your head into the pillow, hoping to shut out any interference that's trying to keep you from your sleep.

"Cielito," the gentle voice tries again. "Wake up."

Grumpily and with great resistance, you strain to turn your head, squinting your eyes awake to see Miguel's face filling your vision.

It’s dark in here save for a small lamp left on in the far off corner. In this muted light, his scarlet eyes are illuminated with an otherworldly brilliance. If you had been more awake, you would have wanted to take a second or two to marvel at how beautiful they are.

"I got something for you," he says.

There’s a barely contained eagerness in his voice as he speaks, and sleepy as you are, it peaks your interest. You blink your eyes properly open, adjusting to the dim dark to see two small boxes set next to your pillow.

"Miguel, it's..." you flick your wrist towards you, when you remember the watch is no longer there. It’s odd how naked you feel without Lyla as your constant companion on your wrist.

You awkwardly prop yourself up on an elbow with great effort to figure out time the old fashioned way, glancing at the alarm clock on the nightstand.

In a bright glaring LED, the digits announce: 01:00.

Past midnight?! Has he lost his mind?

"It's one in the morning! Why are you waking me up after midnight!?"

Unbothered by your outrage, he continues to lean across you to drag one of the boxes closer.

"I'm finally done modifying the parallel universe traversal device, so I got you something to celebrate."

You blink up at him in surprise. When he said he’d be done soon, you didn’t think he meant tonight.

“It’s from that place you wanted Stark to take you," he says, opening the box one-handed to reveal a gaudy looking golden donut waiting for you.

Then he drags the second box over, setting it next to the first and flips the lid open. Inside are half a dozen cinnamon-sugared donuts.

"And these are regular old donuts, from the Lower East Side for fifty cents each. We can do a comparison test. If that ugly golden donut is tastier, I’ll chop off my arm.”

You snort out a laugh. His one-sided feud with Tony Stark is alive and well you see. You don’t understand why this has become such a point of contention for him. Stark had never actually suggested he was going to get you golden donuts.

Before you have the chance to dig in, Miguel puts out his hand, palm up, on the mattress in invitation. "Give me your hand first," he instructs.

You oblige him, placing your hand in the middle of his, and he wraps the familiar watch around your wrist. Except it’s not as familiar as you remember it to be. It’s considerably chunkier now to accommodate Stark's arc reactor that sits in the middle and if anything it looks more like a cuff bracelet than a watch.

But you don’t mind, you’re glad to have the comforting weight of it back on your arm, wrist no longer feeling quite so naked.

“It’s bulkier than I would’ve liked. But there’s no helping how primitive Stark’s tech is,” Miguel snarks, clearly pleased with himself even though the man he’s bitching about isn’t even in the room to hear his clever insults.

In the gloomy light, the bright blue gem of the arc reactor shines back at you like a precious jewel. If you didn’t know better, you’d think you were wearing jewelry fit for royalty.

"I like this upgrade on the watch. It’s pretty.”

"Not a watch," Miguel corrects, but he's not scolding you. The fondness in his voice is plainly there.

Looking up you meet his eyes to see the open affection that's there for you. Your face warms under his unwavering attention, until you have to duck your head down, unable to hold his gaze anymore.

You reach over the bed, to busy yourself, bypassing the golden donut to pick up one of the plain cinnamon ones. In the corner of your eye, you catch his lips curve into a smile as you take a large bite of the regular-non-golden donut.

He would gloat about that, wouldn’t he, the overgrown childish brat. You grin around the mouthful, as the sugar melts onto the tip of your tongue and you moan loudly at the perfect warm cinnamon that floods your senses.

Miguel is still smiling at you warmly, face propped in his broad hand as he watches you eat, and the heat in your face reaches an almost feverish pitch under his gaze.

"So what's next?" you force yourself to ask him over a muffled mouthful to distract yourself.

"Get some rest, sleep in. We'll take this for a few test drives in the morning to make sure it works the way it's supposed to, and then I'll take you to my home world."

There's a jittery sensation. A mix of exhilaration, excitement and anxiety blending with the sugar in your stomach at the unknown that waits before you. Even though you knew this day was coming since your visit at Wong, now that the time has come you're nervous.

The only world you’ve ever known is your own. You’re hardly an intrepid traveler. During your gap year in Europe, the use of the metric system was a culture shock for you. You can't even begin to imagine what it'll be like to travel to another alternate reality.

But you’re going to have to do it—and keep doing it, if Wong is correct.

Will you need to get a whole new wardrobe to fit in with the fashion trends of each universe? Will you have to learn new languages? Will there be a thousand sets of unfamiliar customs and quirks you’ll have to learn to adapt to?

…Will Miguel be there for any of it?

Biting down on your lip, you try to stave off the tight knot in your stomach.

One thing that's become clear is that even if Miguel takes you to his world, you won’t be able to stay there for very long. You aren’t going to be able to stay anywhere for very long.

Even if he intends to give you Lyla for good or build you another device that allows you to jump from world to world... what then?

Will he come with you?

Or will you be left to travel by yourself from one unknown world to another?

The loneliness of that fate makes your stomach hurt. You’d be lying to yourself if you didn’t admit that you want him to come with you more than anything, but you have no right to ask that of him. Not after everything he’s already done for you.

Like he can read your mind, Miguel gives you an appraising look.

"Once we're in Nueva York, we'll stay there for as long as it's safe," Miguel says, leaning across your lap to snag a donut from the box next to you for himself, and you try to ignore the heat that goes skittering through your leg when his arm brushes past your knee. "Then we'll jump to the next location."

You watch him scarf the cinnamony treat down in two mouthfuls, barely chewing. Your heart leaps excitedly until it jumps all the way to your throat.

"We?"

He grins, crumbs of caramelized sugar dotted on the curve of his lips. "I can't leave you by yourself, can I?"

Your mouth opens and closes, then opens again and you leave it there, hanging in the air, probably looking incredibly dumb and speechless.

You don’t know what to say to him. Don’t think there are adequate words in the English dictionary capable of expressing how happy it makes you to know that you’ll have him by your side. 'Thank you' seems incredibly lacking.

Somehow despite that you are both sitting down, he still dwarfs you and from your seated position you barely come up to his shoulders. You don’t quite know why you do it, but you move before you think, getting to your knees to lean up and place a small kiss on his cheek.

A faint pink tinges his cheeks at the small contact. Then it’s his turn to duck down. He scoots over, bringing the smaller donut box closer to you.

"Eat your golden donut," he says.

You peer up at him. The way his mouth pulls into a tiny and almost shy smile, and happiness buzzes in your chest at the sight.

A dopey smile spreads across your cheeks as you watch him. The way he rubs one broad hand over his jaw to hide his reddening face from you.

Taking the box from him, you look down at the shiny pastry. If your words are failing you, maybe food can speak for you instead. You pick up the golden donut in your hand and hold it out to him.

“You go first,” you offer.

There’s not a second of hesitation from Miguel. He leans down and takes a large bite of the gilded pastry, fangs first, puncturing the soft, squishy dough.

The whole thing bursts, and you squeal with laughter as the champagne flavored jelly filling squirts across his bottom lip, onto your fingers and drips onto the sheets below.

“Miguel, you’re making a complete mess!”

You lick up the sticky jam from your fingers as you watch him. There’s dust of gold smudging against his cheeks and even on his nose as he takes another bite. You’re tittering with amusement at the sight of him.

“Here you got some–” you bring your thumb to help him wipe at the corner of his mouth.

For a man who doesn’t like casual touches, sneering even at the idea of handshakes as a greeting at work, he doesn’t seem to mind yours.

Miguel lets you rub off the flecks of gold from his cheek, eyes dropping half-closed in contentment. His jaw moves under your hand as his mouth drops open, then he presses his lips to the inside of your palm.

It’s a barely there touch, but it has warmth furl from the middle of your stomach and blooms outward, spreading to the rest of you.

In this gigantic Wyoming king-sized bed, Miguel is seated close enough to you that your knees touch. He’s close. So close that you can feel the heat rolling off of his big body.

Somehow that's not close enough, because you close the remaining distance between you, until your knee is pressed against the firm inside of his thigh, his broad shoulders brush against yours.

It wouldn’t take much now. If you leaned up at this moment. If you tilted your head upwards even slightly. Your lips would be on his.

You shouldn’t, the small voice in your head warns. Kissing him is probably not a good idea.

He might not feel the same. Kissing him might change something irreparably between you, and then who will you travel the outer limits of the universe with?

But... if you're going to die tomorrow or the next day or next week, then what does it all matter anyhow? What’s a little bit of rejection when the end of the world is hiding right behind the next corner.

You tilt up and press your lips to his top lip, then the full lower one. It’s chaste and brief, and only lasts for a second. But for a first time it’s familiar and intimate in a way that it can only be with you and Miguel.

His lips are warm and dry and slightly open under the press of yours and it sends a fluttering warmth from the tip of your nose to the end of your fingertips.

You pull back with the tiniest movement, nose still brushing against his, as you gather the courage to look up at his face and try to find out if you just made a terrible mistake.

Those scarlet eyes are staring down at you in that familiar way you catch him doing sometimes. When he thinks you're not paying attention to him and his eyes lingers on your face.

His thumb catches behind your ear, face inching closer, and then he’s kissing you back. It’s sweet and electric, the sensation surges through you with a giddiness that makes your toes curl.

Miguel presses his lips to yours and holds you there. Long consecutive kisses that don't let you pull up for air. His other hand gently cups your face, thumb stroking the apple of your cheeks like you’re the most precious thing his big hands has ever held.

You want this to last, that it could always be like this. You want it to be you and him.

This man who brings you cupcakes when you’re crying. Who saves you the best portion of the food that he likes even though he’s a glutton. Who folds you paper flowers and leaves them on your desk to make you smile when you’re having a bad day at work. A man who stays by your side through the end of the world and never asks you for anything in return.

You love him.

One large hand covers the back of your neck. He tilts you back, like he’s trying to shield and protect you as he holds you. Holds you like he’s never going to let go.

Then he stops.

Why is he stopping?

He stiffens above you, the whole of his back tensing. You chase his lips but he is already pulling back and away from you.

Your eyes open to the muted darkness of the room.

In front of you, Miguel is looking at you with an expression you can't pin down. Eyes wide, and distracted. For a terrifying moment, you think that the look on his face is one of regret.

Maybe he realized he doesn’t feel that way about you after all. Maybe he's trying to find a way to let you down gently.

You pull back and study his face.

No… it’s not that.

His expression is the same distant look he had two seconds before a helicopter crashed into your apartment. The same tension in his eyes that will have him hauling you into his arms to protect you from a rogue vehicle. The same pinch in his brow when he’ll stop a conversation with you mid-sentence because the ceiling is about to cave in and he needs to push you out of harm’s way.

Something is wrong.

A cold sliver of fear crawls up your spine as Miguel’s face turns, and he stares into the empty space of the room beyond the bed.

There’s speck of pink spilling onto the sheets on your lap like the color of the sun on stained glass from the outside.

You follow his gaze in the direction of the radiant dusk pouring in from the window.

It’s too bright for one A.M, enough to be blinding.

Pulling away the quilt from your body, you slide out of bed and walk towards the brightness pouring in from the outside until you’re standing in front of the wide glass panes of the balcony.

You look up at the sky, and it’s not the familiar calm midnight-blue. There are vivid streaks of fluorescent pink and glowing purple staining the sky. There are fractures in the sky like someone took a sledge hammer to it and cracked it wide open.

The cityscape looks like it is folding onto itself. Skyscrapers, bridges, and streets are contorted and warped like badly-folded origami. The impossible architecture reminds you of a M.C Escher painting you saw on a school trip at MoMA as a child.

Outside, the pavements of New York is mirrored where the sky is supposed to be. Silhouettes of skyscrapers spring out from below and above and the vast sky is wedged between. Up is down and down is up and nothing makes sense anymore.

You've seen this scene take place before, when you were under Wong's multidimensional spell.

Your universe is starting to collapse.

The end of the world is here. You’ve officially run out of time.

~ Next Issue

Dedications & Credits:

To @guruan for her endless kindness and incredibly talented. I cannot thank her enough for the art she gifts me with that constantly inspires my little squirrel brain and drives me to write like I am possessed.

And @thirstworldproblemss my babe, my bestie, my moose! Thank you for always being there with your pretty face!! I adore and love you, our friendship and time together brings me endless joy. Thank you for going on this ride with me.

#miguel o'hara x reader #miguel o'hara x you #miguel o'hara fic #miguel o'hara #miguel o'hara fanfic #miguel o'hara fanfiction #spiderverse #marvel #across the spiderverse fanfiction #spiderverse fanfiction #marvel mcu #oscar isaac #spider man: across the spider verse #across the spiderverse #miguel ohara x reader #miguel ohara #miguel ohara x you

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fanfic-obsessed · 1 month

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Th CodyWan Obsession

This one is about how CodyWan, the obsession, could be used to fix the universe.

It actually starts before Cody becomes Obi Wan’s commander. The 212th, with Alpha-17 as the commander, went to Kamino. This is still very early in the war, where Anakin is still a Padawan. Through some random set of events Anakin meets Cody, who is an ARC trainer, while touring the facility with Alpha (Obi Wan has some meeting or another and is not able to go with them). This conversation lasts all of 45 seconds before Anakin somehow divines or decides that Cody would be perfect for Obi Wan.

Thus an obsession is born.

Now Anakin has next to no subtly, but even he knows this obsession must be kept quiet at first. Because he believes he knows that, while Anakin is more than willing to break The Code to be with Padme, Obi Wan would not. So before Anakin starts matchmaking he wants a loophole in place. His Master loves loopholes.

So, on Anakin’s next leave he dives into the parts of the code that deal with attachment. His obsession is such that he even blows off Chancellor (He does at least call Padme, but spends no time with his new wife). Because he is looking for loopholes and different interpretations, h does not just dig into the actual wording of the Code (though he does that as well, and is surprised to learn that the interpretation he thought he knew- which he does realize later came exclusively from Palpatine- is wrong) but also into transcripts of the council meetings where that wording was was decided, an every meeting where it was rehashed.

Madam Nu assumes, as most people do, that this had something to do with his infatuation with Padme Amidala. She encouraged what he was learning, in hopes that it gave him a good direction.

Anakin learns a lot during this deep dive into Archives. He learns that it is not so much the marriage that is against the code, but vowing to put one being over the rest of the galaxy (he also realizes that the vows he took with Padme did not break the Code). He learns the reasons why the Jedi caution against romantic relationships (all of which are very good reasons), and the variety of ways that the Jedi had mitigated the dangers and been in a successful, healthy romantic relationship, of which he made a mental note to bring up with Padme so they do not fall into some of the same traps noted (of which Falling and killing everyone you loved is one of many bad reactions). He also learns a great deal about the Jedi Order as a whole, and dispels most, but not all, of the incorrect views he had of the Jedi Order (the views that Palpatine so carefully shaped for Anakin)

So Anakin, now armed with all the arguments for why Obi Wan should date Cody, finds his first of many obstacles. Obi Wan has no idea who Cody is. Anakin had not been paying attention to Cody’s ID number, nor did he catch that Cody was an ARC trainer, so has no idea how to find Cody.

He is not able to find out who Cody is before Cody becomes Obi Wan’s commander, which makes him both feel guilty (for the torture Obi Wan and Alpha-17 underwent) and vindicated (because clearly the Force agreed with him about CodyWan). Anakin then dedicates himself to being a matchmaker. He is not good at it.

Neither Obi Wan nor Cody ever figure out what he is doing. This is not due to any subtlety on Anakin’s part, this is because none of his efforts to match-make looks anything like traditional matchmaking. And while no one actually tells Obi Wan or Cody, everyone else in Anakin’s vicinity finds out within 15 minutes of his obsession with getting CodyWan together.

Every conversation Anakin has with Palpatine after Cody becomes Obi Wan’s commander devolves into the wonders of CodyWan. For most of it Palpatine has no idea that Cody is a clone (as he does not know the Clone names, only their numbers). Palpatine is split between wanting to help get CodyWan together (because Anakin is really compelling) and wanting to kill them both extra hard (because they had inadvertently derailed, and continue to derail, his corruption of Anakin).

And Anakin’s corruption has been entirely derailed. His research has given him a better view of the Jedi Order as a whole, and every attempt to besmirch the Jedi to him is met with actual concrete knowledge that the negative take is wrong. He has gone through all the requirements for listing his relationship and marriage to Padme, so when she does get pregnant they are able to go to the Temple healers, thus no need to be worried about her safety. Even the war is not pressing on his sanity in the right ways since about 40% of his brain is consumed with CodyWan at all times.

Padme, who is a romantic in her own right (and just as bad a matchmaking), also falls into the CodyWan obsession. She is aware that Cody is Obi Wan’s clone commander, so much of her focus is getting the Clone’s rights and ending the war so that the two can be free to be together. Her former handmaidens are watching this all with awe, horror, and amusement.

I know that CodyWan ends up together in this one. I feel like QueerPlatonic is right for them. I also like the idea that they get together in spite of Anakin’s and Padme’s matchmaking efforts instead of because of it.

Palpatine gets found out, by being a bit too heavy handed with Anakin, who has since stopped being corrupted by anything more subtle and is very oblivious. Somehow during this fight Palpatine finds out that Cody is the clone commander with the Jedi (which ironically makes him forget to activate Order 66) and announces Anakin’s wish for CodyWan to have a romantic relationship.

This is news to both Cody and Obi Wan. This is not news to literally everyone else. After Palpatine is defeated (not killed, in this one they manage to lock him up. The fight damages his vocal chords so he is not able to activate the chips) several bets were settled about CodyWan. Palpatine himself even managed to win some bets with several senators (there is some debate as to if they should be forced to pay out, and how, since Palpatine would be in a Force blocking cage for the rest of his life).

#star wars #star wars the clone wars #star wars au #obi wan kenobi #fanfiction prompt #anakin skywalker #codywan #sheev palpatine #anidala #bamf obi wan #Anakin ships Codywan #padme amidala #Padme Ships CodyWan #Palpatine is split about shipping CodyWan #Anakin does not fall

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burr-ell · 5 months

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Putting Terms on the High Shelf: Main Character Syndrome

As I'm watching C2, one thing I've noticed about Caleb's various sidebars to talk to different people is that he's still very much involving them—the conversations reveal various different priorities not just for Caleb, but for the people he's talking with. Liam's RP is often geared toward encouraging character work out of the other players at the table; it's something you see with Vax early on, and it's very present with Caleb.

So I find the accusations and warnings of Liam having Main Character Syndrome, which started during C1 but really ramped up in C2, to be rather shallow. Look at the contrast between the tables during this:

and this:

In C1x27, Orion adds pressure to the cast's already-frayed nerves with him, compounded from previous incidents of bad behavior, by taking up several minutes of time purely to himself—his only interaction with anyone else at the table is to ask Keyleth for help with alchemy mechanics (fun fact, early Keyleth was into alchemy!). This included:

An attempt to buy 1500 mirrors to build a light array;

A request to his father to send in his home country's army to Whitestone; and

An attempt to combine a fog spell and a sleep spell after being told point blank that it was mechanically impossible

This was all very obviously an attempt to make himself the hero in what is clearly set up to be a Percy-centric arc. (Worth noting, for the record, is that up to this point Percy had actually had very little focus and largely kept himself in the background, while Tiberius had been in focus for most of the show's run up to that point.) Laura snarks that he's like the giant eagles in Lord of the Rings and can just do everything, and if you actually watch the clip that I've giffed above, Travis's tone is genuinely aggravated. This, by the way, is all after Tiberius was notably not present for Percy revealing his backstory to the rest of the party in episode 24; while everyone else voiced concerns for him and went down to his workshop to check on him, Tiberius largely ignored this and went off to do his own business.

That is a selfish player. That is selfish behavior and a clear example of someone who thinks the story should revolve around them. There are several reasons Orion was asked to leave, not just because he fudged his dice rolls.

C2x62 is a completely different story. None of the conversations Caleb has within that episode are just a way for Caleb to gain information; he's engaging with what the other people are doing. When he asks Nott and Jester about the letter they wrote to Astrid, he reveals a little about himself—something he is particularly reluctant to do with Jester—and they are given an opportunity to respond. His conversation with Beau gives time for both of them to check in on each other and where they're at and lets Beau give her own perspective on the politics of the Empire, the Cobalt Soul, and Xhorhas. The discussion with Fjord lets them both level with each other a little and does more work for Fjord's character, letting him open up about his insecurities and issues, than it does for Caleb's. Caleb is still initiating these conversations and he still gets something out of them, but both the players and the audience still get the benefit of the other characters pushing and pulling against that in response.

Like many terms that get thrown around in this circle ("player agency", "manipulating", "metagaming", "going dark", to name a few), Main Character Syndrome has been so misconstrued and warped to fit a heavily biased perspective as to be almost meaningless. Main Character Syndrome is not when a character initiates a lot of conversations, even if you personally don't like the conversations for whatever reason. Main Character Syndrome is not when a character chooses to take a risk or push a big red button, even if you personally don't like the choice for whatever reason. Main Character Syndrome is not when a character has an arc or aspect of lore heavily focused on them, even if you personally don't like the character for whatever reason. (Particularly considering that arc focus is entirely out of the player's control; Taliesin, Liam, and Laura did not in fact force Matt to focus a significant portion of each campaign's lore on Percy, Caleb, or Imogen's backstories respectively.)

Main Character Syndrome is specifically about player selfishness—it's a player inserting their character into scenes or roles where they do not logically belong in order to make them the center of the story, as we see with the example of Tiberius. The camaraderie at the current table versus what was going on back in 2015 does not suggest that anyone currently sees anyone else like that; everyone is laughing at the jokes made at someone's expense, and everyone is getting something to do. Your favorite character may not always be flashy or in focus all the time, but then again, you wouldn't want them to have Main Character Syndrome, would you?

#also some of yall don't get background vs foreground character arcs and it shows #critical role #cr meta #long post

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twstgarden · 4 months

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❁ ❝ 𝗸𝗮𝗿𝗮𝗼𝗸𝗲 𝗮𝗻𝗱 𝗯𝗮𝗿𝗯𝗲𝗰𝘂𝗲𝘀 𝗮𝘁 𝗿𝗮𝗺𝘀𝗵𝗮𝗰𝗸𝗹𝗲 ❞

━ first years and gn! reader (reader can either be yuu or an oc/twstsona) ━ the weekend is finally here, and you and your dear batchmates have decided to make the best of it with a simple get-together. (f/n means first name)

this work does not contain spoilers for chapter 7, diasomnia's arc.

do not steal or translate without my permission.

knock, knock, knock

the obnoxious thumping on the door abruptly interrupted your blissful weekend nap. you groaned in annoyance as you sat up, rubbing your eyes and realising your accompanied creature with an abyssal appetite was nowhere to be seen.

you got out of bed and opened the door in a rather grumpy manner, preparing to show your frustration to whoever was knocking on your door on a weekend.

as soon as your eyes landed on a familiar group, your frustration grew even more, “what’s the big deal, guys?”

deuce was the first to apologise sheepishly as he spoke, “ah, sorry, n/n…” before he could continue speaking, however, a certain first year cut him off, casually draping an arm on your shoulder with that cheeky grin on his face.

“happy weekend, n/n~! remember the plan we talked about? also, it’s 3 in the afternoon, why are you still sleeping?”

ace’s words made you realise this weekend had some plans for you with your batchmates. it was no wonder that epel, jack, and ortho were standing by your bedroom door as well. however, there was one missing person…

“where’s sebek?” you asked, trying to get ace’s heavy arm off your shoulders, but he took it as a sign to tighten his hold onto you just to annoy you even more.

“he’s in the backyard, setting up the grill,” replied jack, and as soon as he said that, he excused himself and went to the backyard to assist sebek.

“the foods to be grilled are all prepared! go and dress up, n/n,” spoke epel as he smiled at you before walking away, presumably heading to your kitchen, leaving ace, deuce, and ortho with you. the Ignihyde child had a bright smile on, showing how excited he was to spend time with you.

“f/n-san! good afternoon!” greeted the child enthusiastically, causing you to smile as all your frustrations from earlier disappeared in the blink of an eye. you patted ortho’s shoulder as you replied, “good afternoon, ortho. well, i’ll make me look presentable.”

ace hummed as he replied teasingly, “you should. you look like you came out of a cave after a century has passed."

you were about to reply but he quickly left with deuce and ortho in tow, heading to either the backyard or the kitchen to prepare for today’s hangout. you sighed, shaking your head slightly before closing your bedroom door.

“grim! that’s my chicken!” yelled epel as he tried to get his barbecue chicken from grim, but it was long gone from his hands as it met the darkness of his stomach. you gave epel a piece of your chicken to make up for grim’s behaviour, “you should have guarded your food better, epel~”

the pomefiore first year huffed before trying to hand you back your meal, feeling embarrassed that you had to give up something of your own for him. your conversation was abruptly cut off by a loud voice from the microphone coming from the lounge.

“HELLO!!!”

the rest shrieked, almost dropping their food or drinks in the process before you looked at sebek standing by the lounge window with a disapproved expression, seeing him hold the microphone as he tested its volume. jack, who was beside him, was clearly annoyed from the loud noise, “sebek, don’t yell into the mic…”

“i was testing it!”

“you could just tap it…” mumbled jack before lowering the volume a little.

you chuckled at their dynamics before sipping on your drink. deuce and epel were busy grilling the marinated meat and potatoes. the aroma of the savoury meals reached your nostrils, filling you with delight as you felt your stomach rumble a little.

ace noticed you had been staring at the grilling barbecue meat and potatoes, and without a word, he grabbed a small plate and filled it with the recently cooked meals. he then approached you, sitting beside you as he handed the plate, “you did not eat yet and i could see how you were drooling at the sight of the grill.”

deuce quickly glanced at you as he continued grilling the potatoes while epel continued grilling the meat, grabbing your preferred sauce, and handing it to you as the heartslabyul first year smiled, “eat up, n/n. we still have plenty of food to grill.”

“thanks, guys, but this is a lot. i can’t finish this,” you spoke as you looked at the filled-up plate. ace grabbed some utensils and said with a teasing grin, “who says you’re eating that alone? now, scooch over.”

“the karaoke is all good!” announced jack as he and sebek stood by the window of the lounge with a proud smile. the karaoke machine was seen behind them as it was flickering colourful lights to indicate that it was on. “i’ve updated the song list, too!” added ortho, causing epel and ace to cheer in delight, feeling excited to just start singing with drinks and barbecues on the table.

“let’s eat first before we sing our hearts out,” recommended deuce as he continued grilling the potatoes. “more like annoy people,” corrected epel with a soft snicker as he continued grilling the meat.

as you all ate to your heart’s content, evening came rather quickly. laughter and light-hearted bickering filled the atmosphere as you enjoyed your drinks and meals with your batchmates. as soon as the sun had set, ace decided to use his magic to put up some lights in the area – to impress, perhaps, or to fish out compliments.

“oohh, that’s more like it. now, i can see if a certain paw tries to steal my food again,” remarked epel before grim huffed. “you were not even eating it, so i did the meat a favour and devoured it!” spoke the cat-monster as the rest of you chuckled.

after a few minutes, you were conversing with sebek about the books he lent you a week ago. he was seated beside you, the grill settled on his other side as it remained closed after having all your meals. your conversation was unfortunately cut short by a sudden loud singing.

(1) “🎶 YOU CAN RELAX MY FRIE—”

“not yet! the instrumental isn’t even playing yet,” exclaimed epel as he laughed, stopping ace from singing with no background music. deuce chuckled while ortho had a smile on as he spoke, “ace trappola-san is just excited to sing!”

“the lyrics he sang did not match his current demeanour, though,” remarked jack.

“ortho is right! come on, epel, play it already! i’ll show you all that i’ll get the highest points!” cheered ace as epel sighed, playing the instrumental as ace started singing. both you and sebek were already cut off from your conversation and listened to ace’s singing. as much as you wanted to tease him, he sings pretty well that you can help but sway to the beat.

after ace completed the song, the point system showed up and he got a perfect score, making him cheer, “WOOHH!!! told y’all so!” deuce sighed and stood up, snatching the microphone from ace as he spoke, “it’s too early to celebrate.”

deuce went through the track list, wanting to see which song he would start singing. it took a few seconds until he found the song he wanted to sing. as soon as the instrumental started playing, he started singing.

(2) “🎶 welcome to wonderland, we’ve got it all~ 🎶”

if you had a light stick, you would have been waving it. you enjoyed deuce’s performance, complimenting him once he was done singing as you liked how his voice sounded. he was bashful due to your compliment but remained calm as he thanked you.

as soon as deuce’s points showed on the screen, ace chuckled and said, “hah! you’re just 3 points lower than me!” deuce huffed as he retorted back in reply, “i-i didn’t give it my all, okay!” ace laughed in response, “nah, i’m kidding. there’s actually a trick in getting the perfect score during karaoke.”

and with that, the heartslabyul first year shared his trade secret, but of course, he wanted something in return.

once that was done, it was jack’s turn to sing, but he declined the offer, “no, i don’t sing… it’s not my thing, you know.” his words made the rest of you let out disapproving groans as deuce practically shoved the microphone to him, “it’s all for fun, man! don’t worry, we won’t tease you.”

“hehehe…”

“ace, stop chuckling.”

as the rest continued bickering and laughing about, you remained seated with your arms crossed and a smile on your face, eyeing each and every one of them as thoughts swirled in your mind, finding peace, comfort, and happiness from just being surrounded by them, by the people you call your friends.

‘you always make me feel included... like i belong here...’

lyrics are taken from: 1 – Open Arms by Jorge Rivera-Herrans, Steven Dookie, and EPIC Ensemble from EPIC: The Musical – The Troy Saga 2 – Welcome to Wonderland by Anson Seabra

184 notes · View notes

wasjustred · 1 year

Note

ahhh iloveyourworkssomuch!! 💖 i'd like to request something along the lines of sugar mommy!larissa (maybe with smut, who knows *wink*) 'cause she's all i can think about these days... anyways, happy early new years!!!

Easy Does It - NSFW Larissa Weems x f!Reader

Summary: Larissa spoils you beyond comprehension. Pairing(s): Larissa Weems x f!Reader Warnings: Smut. A lot of it. (Cunnilingus, fingering, strap-on — all Reader receiving) Word Count: ~4.7k

Author’s Note: I hope this meets your expectations, anon! I originally intended to make Larissa way more domineering, but once I began writing it just didn’t feel like her——I tried to stay true to her character where I could. As always, feedback is welcome ﹠. appreciated! ♡ (un-beta-ed as per usual!) ╱ AO3

The arrangement you and Larissa have has been smoothly gliding along for about six months now: you meet for dinner every weekend, in a town about half an hour outside of Jericho. You wear an outfit she’s picked out for you, she pulls your seat out, you share conversation and good - expensive - food and drinks, and you end on the stoop of your apartment, leaning into the kiss she places on your cheek, with a weekly allowance in cash in your purse. It’s the perfect set-up, nothing you’d dare protest, but sometimes you honest to god wish she’d just break her own rules and rail you ‘till the bed breaks.

Tonight you meet her at The Aviary, draped in a black satin dress with a deep slit up the leg––one of her favorites. Larissa helps you into your seat as she usually does, but before she takes her own, she places a long velvet box on your empty appetizer plate.

“Ooh, what’s this?”

“Open it and see.” A small, proud smirk turns her lips, eyes sparkling. You run your fingers over the velvet and lift at the seam, features going slack with surprise when you realize what’s hidden inside: a collar necklace, glittering diamond-cut, softening into a single falling arc of gems which ebbs, finally, into a small, shining teardrop. Light from the restaurant’s fixtures seem drawn to it, gleaming to and fro in a scattered stream of reflection. Your gaze snaps back to hers almost immediately, heart pounding.

“Larissa, I–”

“Do you like it?”

“I– Of course I do, it’s– it’s so beautiful..” Your voice softens and tapers off as you return your attention to the box before you. It’s probably the most beautiful thing anyone’s ever given to you, but you stop short of admitting this. “Help me put it on?”

Larissa’s smile grows as she gathers the box in her hands, lifting the necklace from its cushion. She moves to stand behind you and tenderly brushes your hair aside; her hands are as soft as anything, so gentle in the way they handle you, securing the piece around your neck. Your own hand raises to rest atop the new weight at your clavicle, and when she sets her palms along your shoulders and squeezes, you shift your hand up to capture hers.

“What’s the occasion?”

“Do I need one?” Larissa presses her lips to your cheek from behind before she retakes her seat, arching a brow in challenge. The answer is no, of course; this is how you work, special occasion or not. She always manages to keep you on your toes, though, far more thoughtful and intimate than any other ‘financeur’ you’ve ever humored in the past: Tennis bracelets set with gemstones which perfectly match your eyes, a new coffee bar set-up when you mentioned off-hand that Starbucks had discontinued your favorite drink, a signed first edition copy of your favorite book she ‘just so happened to come across’ while out of state. Much more than the simple, routine bank deposits and luxury brand pieces that were never quite you which you received from others. Larissa’s gifts have always been astoundingly personal.

You’ve never told her this, but you stopped dating altogether once your little dynamic began. How could anyone else compare? She makes you feel important without ever having to work for it ––– like you’re lovable, worthy, because you exist, and nothing more. You’re breaking your own rules, being so enamored with her, but you refuse to dwell on it.

“No, you don’t…” You trail off as your food arrives, ducking your head in thanks as the waiter sets everything out before you. Any discussion of her gift to you ends there on Larissa’s own accord, swiftly and advantageously moving on to a new topic as soon as the waiter has left you. The rest of the night is spent sipping expensive wine and musing instead on all of the high-culture goings-on you never get to discuss with anyone else: Art, ballet, classical music. Larissa’s a delicious trove of knowledge and opinions and she impresses you with each turn of a new topic. You often find yourself wondering - not just tonight, but many nights whilst basking in her presence - why she’s chosen you. You can hold good conversation, of course, and have an appreciation for the finer things in life usually reserved for those older and/or wealthier than you, but what’s always been curious, what’s always given you pause, is that she never asks for anything else in return. You have no choice but to ask yourself what it is you possibly have to offer to a woman like her––but you almost always fall short of a satisfying answer.

She’s talking you both through an analysis of the most recent play she brought you to when you take one of her hands in your own, tracing the lines of her palm as you listen. Larissa stumbles over her words at first contact, a rare occurrence for her, and blushes pink at the sensation. When you glance up at her in question she quickly averts her gaze and carries on, moving to smooth her thumb over yours as you continue. You love her fingers: they’re long, delicate, awfully reminiscent of the Greek statues she enjoys waxing poetic about. It’s an instance in which you’re reminded art, very often, echoes us in a continuous cycle of give and take.

You don’t say a word when you notice her face darken another shade as you press a kiss to the inside of her wrist before moving on to dote upon her other hand.

She’s not once explicitly told you, but Larissa’s never expected you to take a physical liking to her. She set the rules she did early on for a reason, knowing she could live with looking and not touching, taking care of you and watching your face turn alight with each gift or special night out without ever ending the evening by your side. No sex necessary, no physical affection expected. But here you are, fawning over her, and she’s never been more conflicted.

To assuage the feeling, she convinces herself it’s the wine that’s made you this way––a good bottle will go a long way, thus your touch must be the product of inebriation, not genuine affection. You’ve both long since finished off your meals when Larissa pays the bill and drives you home as she normally does, to an apartment she partly finances (not fully, at your own insistence that there are some things you should take care of yourself) and walks you to your door, stooping to kiss your cheek. Routine.

She is right about one thing, however, and that’s the potency of the house wine tonight. Not on your reasoning, but your self-control. You spent the car ride home admiring her profile in the passing streetlamps and traffic lights, studying the way each red light cast itself across her, how the passing headlights of opposing traffic bathed her in a cinematic glow you associated only, appropriately, with Vivien Leigh in A Streetcar Named Desire. Ghostlike, almost. Ethereal. And at that same wine’s behest, you lean further now into her goodnight kiss than you’d normally allow yourself.

It’s as she prepares to leave that you decide - anchored by the weight of the diamonds around your neck - that this is the night you’ll throw caution to the wind, fervently hoping it won’t backfire and end with her rejection and a ruined arrangement that you’d both worked to preserve over the past six months.

“Do you want to join me for a nightcap? I know we don’t usually, but.. I’d like you to. If you’d like to, of course. If you don’t that’s–––”

“Y/N,” she interrupts. You can hardly tell but her heart’s just about burst out of her chest. There’s an inner battle waging right on the precipice of her ribcage and your bright, hopeful eyes staring up at her aren’t making it any easier to parse out. Do you feel obligated somehow to pay her back for the necklace? She knows you know she’d never ask that of you, that your arrangement is not a traditional one, but has she unknowingly pushed the bounds all the same? Did you simply imbibe too much and don’t really have a clue what it is you’re saying?

Or, perhaps.. Most dangerously: Do you mean it?

“I don’t want you to feel as though you have to… ‘pay me back’ for tonight. That was never my intention.”

She volleys her own inner turmoil dead straight in your direction and stares down at you with what might be, if you squint hard enough, a nervous expression.

You lean sideways against the door and cross your arms over yourself, appraising her. Does she really not want you? What the hell does she get out of this if she doesn’t? You just can’t wrap your head around it, and while you insisted to yourself you’d never outwardly question the bounds of your relationship and why they’ve settled where they are, you’ve put yourself at a crossroads.

“Do you think I’m pretty?”

She balks.

“What? Of course I do. What does that have to do with anything?” Larissa’s expression is a mixture of incredulity and apprehension. You decide to bite the bullet then as she lingers uncertainly beneath the moonlight.

“I don’t understand what you get out of this. Am I not–– you think I’m pretty but you don’t want to touch me? You pay for my livelihood but you don’t want anything tangible in return?” You both purse your lips simultaneously and you’d laugh if the situation weren’t so dire all of a sudden. “You confuse me, Larissa.”

She shifts her weight from one foot to the other, a small cloud bursting forth as she sighs.

You fucked it, didn’t you? Fucked it right to hell, and now she’s never going to speak to you again.

“You’re an idiot, do you know that?” The air goes still.

…

It’s news to you.

Larissa suddenly pushes forward and traps you against the front of your door, hands leveled at your waist. “I’ve always wanted you,” she grits out, her arms tensing at your sides. “I just didn’t want you to feel as though you had to. Return the sentiment, that is. You’re too precious for that.” Her voice is low and rough in your ear, strangled. You grab hold of her forearms to keep yourself upright when her tone shoots right through you, breathing heavily. You gradually lift your gaze, poring over every curve of hers as you do, and meet her eyes. They’ve nearly gone black with lust, and a subtle quiver in her lip tells you everything you need to know.

“Kiss me.”

Larissa groans, which is admittedly not the reaction you’d expected, and presses further into you, her nose brushing against your cheek. You can feel the heat of her grow, ensnaring you in perfect contrast to the cool night air.

“You have to tell me you want it, darling. I need you to say it.” … Oh. A new wave of arousal surges through you as you turn your head ever so slightly, her lips hovering just out of reach. The shared breath between you has become fraught with possibility, with the overwhelming, unspent energy that’s been collecting over the last six months without either of you quite noticing. Of course this is what she needs: confirmation, not that you’re hers but that she’s yours, by choice and choice alone.

“I want you, Larissa. Please,” you whisper, squeezing her arms in an attempt to ground yourself. She says nothing in return, instead immediately closing the distance and engulfing you in a desperate, searing kiss. Your cheeks burn and it’s all you can do not to melt into her fully, sucking in a sharp breath as her tongue slides against your bottom lip. This, this, you realize, is exactly what you’d imagined: Feeling her against you, wrapped up tightly in her arms, being drawn in and freed all at once, struggling to contain the desire you feel pulsing within yourself. It’s like Larissa’s split open your mind and picked through every thought there, coming away with only the most indecent imaginings and putting them to use as her hips pitch forward and her hands grasp achingly at the roundness of your thighs.

“Open the door,” she husks, suddenly ripping herself away and turning you at the waist to face the door. You fumble for your keys as she scores your neck and shoulders with hot, open-mouth kisses, running the tip of her tongue along the muscle that pulls taut there.

“F-fuck.” The chuckle she gives in response to your whimpering, shaking when you can’t fit the key into its slot, only weakens you further. Larissa must know her effect well as she wraps an arm around you to hold you upright, the other grabbing the key from you and swiftly unlocking the door in one go.

“Trust me, I’m trying.”

Laughter follows you both as you take the stairs one at a time, pausing every few to take her tongue in your mouth and run your hands along her front. You bypass the living room once you reach the landing - a feat in itself - and lead Larissa straight to your bedroom, kicking one heel off in the hall and the other at the threshold of your room.

She stops you just before you reach the bed and holds you steady for a moment: “Hold on, I want to look at you..” You hair is mussed, curls losing their hold in the heat of your entanglement, chest heaving and red. Larissa steps forward to brush her thumb over your lips, searching your face for any sign of hesitation or doubt.

She doesn’t find any.

“Christ, you’re a pretty thing,” she hums. The pad of her thumb pulls at your bottom lip and you acquiesce, tilting your chin up before taking her finger into your mouth, rolling your tongue against its tip, watching her with wide eyes that imply an innocence you don’t possess. A hiss escapes her when your teeth come down around her knuckle and she scowls, gripping your jaw with an intensity that rivets the surrounding atmosphere as she rips her hand away, smashing your lips together once more.

In the next second the backs of your knees are buckling against the edge of the mattress and you squeak; Larissa had slipped a hand over your sternum and shoved, launching you down hard into the bed. Wet heat urges your hips forward as she crawls over you, but her hands swiftly come down to force them back into the mattress, trapping you there.

“Patience, darling.” You scoff as she begins the journey down your body, placing lazy kisses to your lips, cheek, jaw, chest while her fingers deftly work to pull your dress from you. You lift your back so she can snake a hand around and drag the zipper down to its end at the top of your hips, wriggling free and moving to pull at her own dress–––but she grabs your wrists, pinning them above you with a devious smirk.

“Ah, ah. Let me spoil you,” she murmurs into the crook of your neck, one hand traveling to cup the dampness between your legs. Electricity cracks against your spine at her touch; you’re sweltering and freezing all at once, watching her eyes rake over you with a hunger you’ve never seen on her before. Her fingers draw idle circles around your clit as she works her way down your body, leaving a trail of wetness in her wake where tongue meets flesh, nipping at the precipice of your hip bones, glancing up at you before she licks you through your panties. There’s no helping the whine you turn free when she all but purrs at the taste she gets of you from the soaked fabric.

“Larissa, please,” you huff, lifting your hips up to meet her mouth. She takes three steps then in quick succession: chuckles into the skin of your inner thigh; pulls your panties down and off of you; and presses a series of messy, teasing kisses to your bare sex. Your fingers clutch at the top of your duvet as she finally begins to devour you, breath hitching as her tongue circles your entrance and delves into you. In a moment of white hot desperation, you hook your legs around her, calves flexing against her back as you shudder into her touch. She’s ravenous, consuming you with long, uninterrupted strokes that ride on the flat of her tongue, lapping your slickness up and winding into you all at once. The coil is tight within you already, pulsing with every movement of her mouth. You’re almost worried it’ll be over before it scarcely has had the chance to start, but a quiet, bemused voice in the back of your mind ridicules you: Larissa is nothing if not generous.

“You taste divine,” she breathes, before returning her ministrations to your clit, sucking and popping with the filthiest fucking moan you’ve ever heard. The feeling of her tongue against that tight bundle of nerves prompts your eyes to roll back, eyelids fluttering, and imbues your hands with a mind of their own, working them swiftly into her hair and pulling her as close to your cunt as you can get her, hips lurching in an unsteady rhythm. You can feel her amusement at your desperation as distinctly as you feel her mouth, but it’s quickly forgotten when she slides two fingers into you with an ease that makes you lightheaded. The sound of your wetness is sinful, and you have to admit it only spurs you on.

“Fuck me, fuck me, pleasefuckme––” Larissa’s grinning against you as she pumps her fingers, curling into you with a startling accuracy that leaves you breathless and aching. You press your cheek to your shoulder in a feeble attempt to keep yourself above the threshold dividing pleasure and bliss, useless as she slips another finger into you and flicks her tongue against you, quickening her pace as she follows the mounting tone of your pleas. Every touch spreads a warmth through you impossible to ignore, stirring a frantic need beneath the surface of your skin.

“Cum for me, darling, cum for me, that’s right.” Larissa presses the heel of her hand into the space just below the swell of your stomach and the coil snaps suddenly, sharply, sucking all of the air out of you at the same time that you yelp and tense with equal force, clamping around her face as your orgasm tears through you. She continues to lap at you even as your hands push at her, holding fast to your thighs to keep her place. Your legs shake as she builds you up in the same breath that you’re coming down, a second orgasm already rearing its head.

“I can’t,” you keen, but Larissa shakes her head and unlatches briefly to disagree.

“Yes you can, Y/N––be a good girl for me.” It washes over you when she lowers her face again and wraps her lips around your clit, sucking with an unfazed firmness that shocks you to your center. You’re tingling over every limb, pacing your breaths to ride you through this second crest. “That’s it..” Larissa coos, running her hand over your leg comfortingly. You can hardly breathe as the shockwaves roll through you one after the other, and the darkness of the ceiling above you seems to double in size as you stare in a daze.

Your muscles melt into the mattress one by one, sinking deep as Larissa finally pulls her head away and crawls forward to kiss you; you can taste your slickness on her tongue, familiar and tangy. When you part, gasping for air, you wrap a hand around the back of her neck and press your foreheads together, gazing up into her eyes with the softest look you can muster after so thoroughly falling apart in her hands.

“My turn?” She laughs loud and heartily at your doe-eyed demeanor. You’re itching to touch her, to taste her, and she knows it.

“Mmm, maybe.” Larissa shrugs and rises up from her position over you, sliding off to the side of the bed where you can’t reach her––and not for lack of trying. A whine catches in your throat when she shoots a withering look over her shoulder, patting the space beside her. “Help me with my dress, darling.”

You waste no time in flipping over onto your knees, shuffling over to her and grappling with the zipper of her dress. You flush when she laughs both at your inability to get it down in one swift motion and the frustrated little growl that bubbles up from your chest.

“Not funny,” you complain, gritting your teeth as she shifts and the zipper gives, revealing the smooth, snowy expanse of her back. Instilled with a renewed sense of hunger, you push the fabric away from both of her shoulders and continue the journey down and around to her breasts, thrilled she’s forgone a bra tonight as you palm the supple flesh there and roll her nipples between your fingers. The sigh she expels is a ragged one, her hands dwarfing yours whilst her head falls back against your shoulder. You revel in the sight of her lip caught between her teeth.

“I want to fuck you.” You just barely catch it in between her labored breaths and your own thunderous heartbeat, but you do, and you turn to glance at her curiously before her meaning hits you square in the face.

“But––”

She cuts you off. “I want to destroy you, Y/N. You can taste me later,” Larissa mutters, pivoting without another warning and capturing your lips again. You wouldn’t complain if it weren’t for the utter distress you felt to get your hands on her. She doesn’t give you a chance to rebut, however, as she slips out of her dress and climbs over you, guiding your hands to grip her ass. “Later, I promise.” She pulls back to appraise you, taking a rigorous inventory that she’ll commit to memory if it’s the last thing she does: Your flushed skin, the way you can’t keep still under her touch, the unmistakable shine of desire in your eyes.

“In th-the nightstand,” you stammer. Suddenly the realization that Larissa is here, in your bed, and you, at her mercy, is too much at once. You’re trembling with need and anticipation. She tilts her head at you, one second, two passing before she follows your guidance and pulls the drawer open, grinning wickedly at what she finds there.

“Harness?”

You nod vigorously, propping yourself up on your elbows and directing her through another drawer of your dresser. The slow, methodical way in which she fastens the leather around herself surely burns itself into your brain, and you can’t help the shameless moan that seeps out when she smooths an indulgent layer of lubricant along the silicone from base to tip, a delicious sight between her legs.

Larissa approaches with an emphasized swing to her hips, bending at the waist to press a chaste kiss to your lips before she nudges you to scoot back into the middle of the bed, positioning herself above you with a hand on either side of your head. She dips her face down into the hollow of your throat.

Her voice vibrates against you despite her hushed tone. “Are you ready for me, darling?”

Your brain short-circuits at her words, imperfect timing. God, she’s fucking hot.

She lifts her head again to catch your gaze and smirks, nibbling on the tip of your chin. “Use your words.”

“Yes, yes, I’m ready,” you rasp, drawing your nails down the broad expanse of her back in anticipation.

The moment she slides into you is pure ecstasy: your toes curl and you haphazardly clamber for purchase upon her skin as she buries herself deep within you, stalling for a few moments to give you time to adjust. The way Larissa groans into the motion draws out an amusing - filthy - rumination about her being able to feel every stroke as with her own body, delighting in your wetness. She fills you seamlessly, snapping her hips against you before slowly drawing herself back, only to repeat the pattern and plunge into you as deeply as she’s able. It’s bruising and pleasurable all at once, how she brushes up against your walls and the ridges of the toy hit what your mind insists is every nerve-ending within you.

You rock together desperately, bodies moving as one as if you’d been doing this for centuries, mapping each other out and bringing each other to your peak. You savor the novel, tangled scent of sweat and arousal, a newly formed association with the sound of Larissa’s broken whimpers now frozen in your psyche.

A startled breath leaves you as Larissa abruptly anchors her weight to one side and pulls you on top of her, flipping your positions. Her arms wrap tight around you, looped at your back and around your shoulder as she fucks up into you at a crushing pace. You whine into the crook of her neck and realize you’re on the verge of tears, an overwhelming wave of pleasure and desperation wracking your body. Quiet grunts accompany her each thrust, slowing just so until it’s a steady pattern you can count to like clockwork, brutal and sharp at every buck of her hips. Your knees are aching, folded as they are, but the tight, coiling sensation within you overrides any and all discomfort, merely a quiet nagging in your brain; your focus is settled precisely on the angle of her cock and how her nails dig into your skin as you grind against each other. She’s close, too. You can feel it. It’s there in the shallowness of her breaths, in the urgency of her pelvis against yours, in the subtle arch of her back. You try to meet her where she’s at in your muddled state, pitching your hips backwards and down when she thrusts upwards––and you know it’s worked when she gasps and her hands scramble to lock together at the small of your back.

“Yes, that’s it darling. Just like that,” Larissa pants, using the leverage of her hold on you to help you fuck yourself. The only sounds permeating the room are that of your mingled breaths and her cock driving into you with a consistent, almost unforgiving rhythm.

“Pleasepleaseplease, ohfuck––”

“Y/N–––”

She tenses with you and cries out as your orgasms hit you both at once, ravaging you beyond reason. You’re hyper-aware of the way her breasts feel pressed against you, the way one of her hands flies up to bury itself in your hair as you ride her through your climax. Larissa’s hips stutter as she whines into your shoulder, sinking her teeth into you, and you marvel at the feeling of her muscles clenching around you, from the sinewy stretch of her arms to her thighs rested between your own.

Everything you’d hoped for. Fantasized about. Greedily deliberated again and again whilst watching her across the table in another fancy restaurant in another unfamiliar town.

Larissa is careful as she pulls out of you, slow and deliberate so as not to disturb the tenderness there. You remain curled on top of her but she doesn’t complain, rather rubbing your back in long, languid movements and whispering affirmations in you ear, a sweet mixture of ‘breathe darling, I’ve got you’ and more headily, ‘you did so well for me, you’re so good, you took me so well’. When you allow yourself to fall to the side of her, she shimmies out of the harness and tosses it somewhere off the edge of the bed, ignoring its clatter as she wraps you up in her arms. You burrow yourself further into her warmth and sigh at the feeling, content.

“Now is it my turn?” you ask, voice low and raked over with exhaustion. The belly laugh she gives is worth all the weariness in the world. “You’re incorrigible!”

#i also tried not to dive too deep into any specific kinks since there was no request for any #i think what i’m gonna do is add to my masterlist what kinks i will and won’t write and go from there!#that way ppl can request as they please :)#if anyone has any constructive/technique-specific comments on the smut pls send them my way!!#i have a tendency to be super explanatory/forward in a way that i don’t think always works for smth so intimate #so i’d love any help i can get!#ANYWAYSSSSS enjoy #larissa weems x reader #larissa weems x f!reader #principal weems x reader #larissa weems imagine #larissa weems x female reader #larissa weems x y/n #larissa weems x you #principal weems imagine #larissa weems reader insert #larissa weems smut #answered (request)#wasjustred

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lightwise · 1 year

Text

WHY MAYDAY IS A MIRROR OF REX (AND ALL OF CROSSHAIR’S BROTHERS)

AKA How Crosshair predicted his own redemption arc.

There have been many comparisons made between Mayday and Rex/The Bad Batch, but I have kept myself from ranting about The Outpost for too long and I figured I should get this out there before this week’s new episode hits.

Crosshair is cynical and snarky when we meet him in The Clone Wars (as is the norm for his personality, but there’s a special edge to it in S7 E1). The first words out of his mouth are “we don’t usually work with regs.”

(I am not sure who first posted this image set, so if you know who to credit please reach out).

Now in TBB E12, the episode opens with Crosshair watching regular clones being told about the retirement bill by an imperial officer. His helmet is off and they have no armor on. He’s face to face with them. He seems interested in their conversation but is still removed, separate. He still thinks this doesn't affect him.

Once he ships out to Barton 4, we meet Mayday by hearing his voice before he rounds the corner into our view. The immediate thought that flew into my mind was, “that’s Rex’s voice.” Other than Rex himself, we as the audience and especially Crosshair as a character have not heard that warm, snarky, calm tone that signifies that commanding officer’s “regular clone voice” much this season. Mayday’s voice is a little deeper than Rex’s, but he has the same commanding yet casual tone and demeanor. As weary and frustrated as he is at the lack of support from the Empire, Mayday chooses to express it with a level of snarkiness that would have made Tech, Echo, or Rex himself proud.

Or as Rex once said, "It's Captain, sir."

"Experience outranks everything."

Mayday and his squad are wrapped in mummified cloth strips, and he states that his men are all “dead. We’re all that’s left.” Three of them, to mimic the three troopers being forced into retirement that Crosshair had seen before arriving. They are dead men walking. And so are the rest of the clones.

Mayday brings the light to Crosshair. And starts talking to him, man to man, like a friend. Like a brother. He asks him his name. Crosshair’s first encounters with Rex were Rex going after Echo, pulling him free from mindless programming and reminding him what his name really was.

“What brought you here.” “Just lucky, I guess.” Luck isn’t a word that Crosshair typically uses to describe his experiences. He usually relies on and points out his superiority, his skills, his uniqueness. He knows he hasn’t engineered this meeting, and yet Mayday’s mannerisms are already starting to find the chinks in his metaphorical armor.

“I’ll give you the lay of the land.” Like Hunter would. “Conditions have degraded our equipment.” Like Tech could have helped with. “I’m not an explosives expert.” Wrecker is.

Mayday lays out the helmets of his fallen squad in a memorial, the same way Rex and Ahsoka do after order 66. Reverence and respect for the dead, even when it seems meaningless. Crosshair has let himself be deadened by the Empire, yet Mayday treats him with interest and respect, drawing him back out of himself. Mayday even shows the same respect for the raider who had been attacking his base, saying that he was bothered that his men had left him there to die.

Crosshair is still throwing up his shields, like he did at the end of season 1 when he tried to convince his brothers to join him. “We’re not like the regs, we never have been. We’re superior.”

And all of a sudden, Crosshair will die if Mayday doesn’t save him. If he doesn’t fully trust him to disarm the pressure mine he has gotten himself into. He has continued to choose to step in places that are a pressure mine waiting to go off, waiting to swallow him whole. And until now he has made enemies of anyone who has tried to help him.

Mayday saves his life, and now they’re working as a team, silently and in unison. They realize that all this effort and loss of life has been for mere equipment (that’s for their replacements, no less). Their lives really are worth even less than the epithet "used equipment" that Nolan spits in Crosshair’s face when they first meet.

Hunter had tried to tell him on Kamino: “Can’t you see they’re using you? We’re loyal to each other, not some empire.”

Crosshair: “YOU weren’t loyal to me. I was one of you. You may have forgotten, but I haven’t. I’m going to give you what you never gave me–a chance.” Only now, after Mayday gave him that chance, is he willing to admit that Hunter was right.

How many times have those words haunted Crosshair’s thoughts?

Now this was interesting to me. Crosshair incidentally causes an avalanche by targeting a group of explosives in order to end their shootout, cracks fissuring up the mountainside. Once before he was maneuvered into a situation not of his own free will (when his chip is enhanced on Kamino), yet he stubbornly pursued that scenario when he chose to stay on the platform at the end of season 1. Once again, he is put into a situation against his will by being brought to Barton 4, but this time, he ends up creating a scenario where his choices from this moment will now have the opposite effect.

Mayday shoves Crosshair out of the way, saving his life once again. A pile of snow rips Crosshair’s helmet off of his face, and as Mayday is buried, Crosshair re-emerges his true self.

“We have to move.” Rex’s words throughout almost all of their Clone Wars arc. Rex is selfless, telling Echo to go with the Batch if that was the best place for him. Letting Echo leave him behind, essentially. Mayday begs Crosshair to leave him behind and save himself. They both want what’s best for others. And their examples rub off on the men they save. Echo constantly does what he can to help his brothers escape the Empire. Crosshair’s sheer stubbornness that up until now has kept him tethered to the Empire, refuses to leave Mayday behind. He can’t watch another brother die in front of him. Not anymore.

"You're still their brother, Crosshair. You're my brother too." Omega's plea to him.

So Crosshair risks his life to carry Mayday back. A REG. He refuses to let go of him the whole journey. He lets him use his sniper rifle as a crutch. All of his defenses are finally down, and he not only cares, but is willing to show he cares, BEGS ON HIS KNEES to his commanding officer for help, to show that he DOES CARE.

Finally, this struck me. We almost never see Crosshair using a hand blaster. He’s a sniper. Yet both in his encounter with his brothers on Kamino in season 1, and his confrontation with Nolan here, Crosshair picks up a regular blaster. He’s not being the sniper, distant and removed, making a kill from afar with his own rifle. This is up close, personal, a messy choice. With a hand blaster, a regular clone’s weapon.

Crosshair’s conversation with Hunter on Kamino reads back as though he is pleading with himself to not make the same mistake twice, to stop running from his fears, to finally embrace who he is–a clone. To embrace his real purpose–protecting his brothers. He’s made his choice. He doesn’t expect to survive. The vultures are circling both of them. In season 1 Hunter stuns him and he falls to his knees and then to the floor, passing out. Here, he snarls “Lieutenant,” in a sarcastic tribute to how Mayday had first addressed Nolan, and becomes an Angel of Death. He avenges Mayday and redeems himself, and once again falls forward and passes out with the last of his strength gone.

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livingemkayde · 8 months

Text

ch vi. bruises

joel miller x f!reader x unrequited!tommy miller (no outbreak AU)

chapter six of chaser

warnings: 18+ minors please dni. ooof okay where to start, smut unprotected p in v, mentions of bruising from sex? fighting like actual real life fist fighting, rough but sweet sex, grinding, lowkey some cockwarming?? kinda unwanted kissing, tommy being annoying and somewhat overbearing, and unwanted touching, but not sexual. caroline. just, caroline. because she deserves her own warning for this one. no use of y/n.

summary: everything comes to a head at tommy's birthday party.

a/n: this is genuinely the longest part/chapter thing i've ever written so enjoy. tommy is really annoying in this one, im still deciding if he's going to have a redemption arc. sorry this took so long. as always, i love you all so much. MY TUMBLR LITERALLY SHIT ITS PANTS WHEN I TRIED TO EDIT THE TAGLIST SO IM SORRY IF YOU GUYS GOT TAGGED LIKE 400 TIMES.

if you would like to read more of mine: masterlist!

“What’s goin’ on?” Joel says, almost a whisper. You’re still not sure if he’s talking to you or Tommy. You can't take your eyes off Tommy’s gaze. From the looks of it, Joel’s question makes Tommy more angry and way more confused. “Joel,” you say, trying to look for any indication in Tommy’s face that he’s not going to go bat shit crazy. “‘S fine. We’re okay.” But Joel doesn’t listen. Because he’s Joel Miller and maybe you can’t see it right now, but you can hear the concern dripping off his tone—an indication that he won’t ever leave. Not now. So he stalks towards you both and you try to shake your head no, and he doesn’t listen.

You can almost remember it like it was yesterday.

A few weeks back, the first time you invited Tommy in for a drink after dinner. Sarah was asleep back at the house, Joel was doing — god knows what. The sun was set, the mosquitoes were probably out, and there was a quiet, even maybe too quiet silence when Tommy pulled up to your house.

He had asked what the rest of your plans were for the night.

You had said nothing much, not knowing it was an invitation — he stayed till 2 a.m. that night.

But it was okay. Because he made you laugh and you enjoyed his company. He was interesting. Tommy told you about how he never wanted to go into contracting in the first place. About his broken bones, his all time biggest regrets, how he was smitten with his old high school flame turned mean cheerleader until graduation.

It was the first time you ever realized he was — well — his own person in the sense. Not just Joel’s younger brother. But Tommy. Tommy Miller.

Maybe in another life Tommy might’ve even been good for you. A perfect pair — a match. He wasn’t mean and brooding and he certainly didn’t have 12 years on you.

And he made you smile. And he was genuinely—genuinely interested in your life. Your post grad prospects, college, books, and even how you played soccer just like Sarah when you were younger.

But when he leaned in that night, closer to you than ever before. You froze. Like genuinely frozen, and you couldn’t even dare to look down to his slowly approaching lips, let alone how his arms caged you in.

“First kiss?” you remember him asking.

You had just stuttered out nonsense, not wanting to breathe too hard and run the risk of pushing your lips flush with his.

“I — um —” you nervously laughed. You couldn’t even think—not in the way you should—not when the first person that comes to mind when Tommy says, kiss is his brother.

He had leaned in closer then—more tentative. Like you were a scared deer in headlights or a frightened kitten and he was inching forward, wanting to move closer.

But you didn’t really do — anything.

And he had pulled back a bit, gave you a teasing look and a ruffle on the head and continued with the conversation.

In all honesty you were scared that he might've been inching forward to kiss you. The small fear settling through a slightly erratic heartbeat and nervous laughs.

You were scared then, but can’t really remember the last time you’ve felt this kind of fear.

Hurt, discomfort, shock, maybe.

And although it was being quickly replaced with anger, you don’t remember this feeling — this kind of fear. Not even the kind you get from watching a scary movie — where you can feel the adrenaline coursing through your veins and then dissipating when the screen goes dark, and the lights turn back on and all you have to worry about is if the scary nun from the big screen will appear in your dreams.

You can remember all the last times you’ve gotten mad, sure. Mainly at the Miller brothers.

But never fear — well, not until right now.

Because whoever that Tommy was is definitely not the same guy staring back at you right now, with a bruised fist, an angry look swirled with hurt marked permanently on his face and one emotion that you can definitely place behind his eyes — jealousy.

Some hours earlier.

You spread colorful tablecloth over the mismatched tables in Joel’s backyard. The string lights are being hung up, Joel stands on a ladder towards your right, the sound of a hammer echoing through the small backyard.

You pick your phone out of your back pocket, checking the time. You also find it in you to check Tommy’s texts again, but no other messages have been sent since last night. You look down at your phone — at the messages — and sit against one of the tables.

Yesterday:

You: can we talk in person?

Tommy Miller: I’ll see you tomorrow at the party?

You hadn’t seen the text until this morning, when Joel and you found it in yourselves to get out of bed, have a shower, and start setting up for the party. So when you saw it, you would be lying if you said your heart didn’t skip a beat.

You’re a bit nervous at the prospect. You did not want to talk to him at his party—honestly just trying to text him so that the air would be cleared for the party.

But his words echo in your mind.

“Just think ‘bout it before you say no.”

You let out a cursed sigh.

Tommy had to know. Right?

If he knew the dreaded ‘no’ was already braced on your lips he had to know. That this thing between you and Tommy would never work out. That you’re way better as friends. That it would ruin everything — the dynamics of it all — that you were smitten with his brother and you guys had just slept together for the second time without Tommy’s knowledge and that—

“Alright?”

Joel stands in front of you, dipping his head to see a scowl marked on your face. You quickly — maybe even too quickly — forget about the messages, hell, forget about Tommy.

Because Joel looks handsome. He’s always handsome, you’ve thought since the moment you met him at the bar. There’s something intoxicating about him, his arms, the curve of his neck. His brooding nature does him justice — a uniqueness about him that makes you want to uncover more, learn more, see more.

You remember last night—very vividly through small ebbs and flows of sleep. The moonlight seeped into your skin as you both rolled around in gray sheets.

It makes your cheeks heat a bit at the thought.

You remember everything. Every little detail. You don’t think you’ll ever forget.

You tuck your phone back into your pocket.

“Yeah, sorry. ‘S just…” you trail off, he nods his head in understanding, coming closer to you.

He braces his hands on either side of your body, caging you in. Your faces study each other’s mere inches apart.

“Tablecloth givin’ you trouble?” Joel teases in a soft whisper, looking down at your lips, then back to your eyes.

“Funny,” you say with a grin and run your tongue over your lips.

“You need help, baby, all you gotta do is ask.” Joel’s small smile plays on his lips for a fleeting second. You miss it as soon as it’s gone.

“Duly noted. But I’m not the one who’s been hanging up string lights for the past hour.”

He pats your ass a bit, teasing you and pushing out a playful sigh.

“Perfection takes time.”

Joel’s beginning to dip his head to kiss you, but you find it in you to bite back.

“And yet the left side’s still lower than the right,” you whisper, pulling your head back slightly. He turns quickly to look at the fence, but gives you a harder slap on your ass when he realizes the lights are, in fact, straight.

Joel chuckles, pushing off from the table, you turn back around to continue fixing the cloths, and look back at him over your shoulder.

He’s looking back at you too.

“You’re killin’ me,” he says, and you smile to yourself when you turn back around.

You look around the backyard and check your phone for the millionth time since the party started. You can hear Sarah running around, screaming a bit while jumping into the pool. But your brows furrow when you find that Tommy still hasn’t texted you.

You spot a tuft of red hair swinging through your vision and spin to find Janet Baker squeezing through the crowd.

“Janet!” you say, approaching her quickly. You’re happy to see her—Tommy didn’t invite many people you’re familiar with.

“Hey, Doll. Thanks for the invite!” she says, pulling you into a quick hug, but when she sees the look on your face, her mouth drops into a frown. “Sweetie, you okay?”

“Yeah, sorry. I—Tommy didn’t…I don’t really know anyone here,” you reply while sheepishly looking around the small, bustling backyard. It’s the kind of feeling you try your best to avoid. Like everyone is in on some secret joke that you have no clue about. Or everyone knows each other and you can’t even put faces to names because you don’t know any names—like right now.

“‘S fine—I’m happy to see you made it,” you let out a defeated chuckle.

“‘F course, baby. Charlotte really wanted to see Sarah,” she nods towards the girls in the pool, Charlotte’s red hair looking strikingly similar to the woman standing in front of you. Janet seems to be on her second drink of the afternoon, you saw her tipping back a solo cup out of the corner of your eye earlier.

“What are you drinking?” you ask her, nodding at her cup.

“Someone brought a fancy lookin’ wine I popped open,” she says, giving you a sly smile. “Why don’t we get you a drink? You’ll like this,” she says, you don’t have much time to react, she’s already pulling you towards the drink station.

You both settle into a comfortable silence, looking around the backyard while Janet pours your drink.

“So,” she says, giving you a wink.

“So…” you echo, sending a nervous laugh her way.

“Who’s that girl,” she nods towards Caroline while passing you a cup, you take a big sip, Janet fills it back up to the top without a second glance.

“Caroline,” you say looking at her and Joel. They’re talking to some other people, a small group of them congregating by the barbecue.

“Caroline…” Janet tests out on her tongue, willing you to continue.

“Caroline—Joel’s,” you can’t help but chuckle. “date. I guess.”

“That bother you?” she says, finishing the bottle of wine while the two of you walk back towards the edge of the pool so she can watch Charlotte and Sarah.

“Nope,” you say, and it’s not a lie. Sure, it might be a little weird to see another woman clinging to his arm after yesterday. But you know now. And that’s all that matters.

“Joel can—” you laugh again, “—Joel can do what he likes.”

Janet stops walking suddenly. You tear your gaze away from Joel and look at her with a confused furrowed brow.

“Sweetie…” she says with eyes that look way too knowing for your comfort or peace of mind.

“Janet…?” you say, though her gaze just intensifies.

“You mean to tell me it happened since I last saw you?”

Your eyes widen, a shocked look crosses your face and you quickly try to replace it with a bad mask of confusion.

“W-what? I—”

“Don’t lie to me, doll,” she warns, and she looks like she really means it.

“Janet…” you say in a not as effective and halfhearted warning tone back.

“Don’t you dare,” she wags her finger—a final warning.

What has gotten into you and why can’t you find it in yourself to lie to this woman?

“Don’t te—” she gasps, “Janet, I mean it. Do not tell anyone.”

She shuts her half open mouth and makes the my lips are sealed motion across her face. You laugh while stealing a glance at Joel.

“I told you,” she whispers to you in a hush, joining your eyeline towards Joel.

You stay silent for a moment, just taking everything and everyone in—but at the same time just looking at Joel. when you finally break the silence you’re a bit shocked at your question. You’ve never talked about Joel like this with someone who actually knows him. Everything has always been a secret—like you were supposed to be ashamed or something. You never were.

“How did you know?” you ask, hushed. You’re not sure she’ll even hear you.

“Would love to say it was intuition, sweetie—but—it was him. It was written all over his face.”

You stayed with Janet for the better portion of the hour, all through silent peaks at your phone to see if Tommy had texted you. When it was getting to the point where people were getting curious, you’ve just about had your limit.

You approach Joel quickly, you don’t miss Caroline’s stunned face but you really can’t be bothered with—that—right now.

“Joel?” you ask, pulling at his arm a bit, he excuses himself from the group and follows you towards the backyard's edge.

“Where the hell is your brother?” you whisper.

“He’s not here?” he asks, the same hushed tone also pushing through his voice at your question.

“No! I called him, but he’s not responding,” you pipe back while pulling out your phone. Though the lack of notifications from Tommy—just as before—tells you enough.

You both look at each other for a fleeting second. But the same worried look is probably etched on both your faces — fuck.

“This fuckin’ guy,” Joel mutters under his breath while pulling out his own phone and then putting it up to his ear.

You pace around the small area you and Joel are in, observing the unfamiliar faces.

“Nothin’,” Joel grovels, taking a peak over the fence towards the street to see if Tommy's truck has pulled up. “I’ll try ‘im again — just — you should mingle,” he says, still looking down at his phone.

“‘S fine. I don’t really know anyone here anyways,” you say absentmindedly, looking through your phone for Tommy’s contact and putting your phone up to your ear.

You hear yelling and shouting from the entrance to the backyard. You slowly lift your head, reluctant to tear your eyes away from frantic texts.

You spot him, in all his glory. Tommy Miller. Two hours late to his own birthday party—though he looks like he couldn’t care less, hugging old friends and new ones. He spots your eyes in the crowd and you can’t even be bothered to smile, a frown is almost permanently placed on your face—Late to your own birthday party?

He nods his head toward the house, a silent invitation to talk when he’s done greeting the guests. You nod back and turn to Joel, Tommy turns to everyone else.

“He’s here,” you say, pulling Joel out of his own phone, he does a double take towards the entrance and huffs out a groan.

“Goddamn idiot,” Joel says, running his palm over his eyebrow.

“I’m gonna go—” you say, nodding towards the house, towards Tommy.

“Yeah. Alright,” he replies, though he looks a bit concerned and unfocused, looking towards Tommy, then back to you, “You need me, ‘m there.”

“‘M not telling him about us on his birthday and It’s Tommy, Joel.”

Tommy—harmless.

Though Joel’s look sends a sweat to your palms for some reason. You don’t know why he’s worried.

It’s Tommy. It’s fine.

Right?

You hope as much as you make your way through the crowd. You beeline for the house and slip past the sliding doors into the kitchen where cups and bags of chips lay open and equally sprawled.

You can hear the door slide open and shut again behind you as you try and salvage the mess.

“Baby,” Tommy says, rounding the corner and coming close to you, “‘M sorry. The concrete guy was supposed to drop off the shipment tomorrow but he came today and needed a signature—”

“Tommy, it’s okay,” you almost have to will yourself to say. You also have to remember it’s his birthday.

He looks down.

“‘S okay. It’s your birthday. Happy birthday,” you reassure with a small smile.

“Looks great out there,” he says, fiddling with his phone in his hand.

“Thanks.”

You’re suddenly a bit nervous. You hadn’t really thought about everything that had happened when Tommy being late to his own birthday party was blanketing all the drama. But he’s here now, and you have no idea what to say. Maybe it would be better to not say anything at all—not address the fact that he asked you out, or you and Joel. But that guilty gnawing feeling eats you alive the longer you stand in silence.

“Joel helped you?”

“Yeah. I went shopping yesterday and dropped off the stuff here then we set it up this morning,” you say, nodding towards the backyard and then your car parked out front.

“You went shopping on your own?” he almost sounds offended.

“I wanted to go on my own.”

Tommy doesn't look convinced.

“Really, T. ‘S fine,” you brush off, leaning back against the kitchen counter and crossing your arms. He stares at you from the other side of the kitchen.

“Caroline here?” he asks, a hesitant look on his face as he switches from looking at the ground to your face—almost like he’s looking for a reaction.

“She’s out there somewhere,” you nod, keeping a neutral face masked with a small smile. “You should mingle. Just wanted to make sure everything was alright.”

But he doesn’t move, he just keeps fiddling with the case on his phone again, looking down to the floor—his feet.

“I— you said you wanted to talk in person.”

Shit.

You both look at each other, waiting. A game of cat and mouse.

“It can wait, T. Enjoy your party,” you say, gesturing to the crowd outside.

“Is it about—is it about what happened Friday?”

“Tommy,” you say, almost warningly. This situation is shitty enough as is. You really don’t want to spoil everything—even if there’s nothing left to spoil.

He doesn’t say anything. His thumb fiddling with his phone is the only sound coming from inside the kitchen. He looks at you, waiting for you to continue. Almost unbearable. You crack way quicker than you’d hope to last.

If he wants it like this, at his own birthday party, then so be it.

“Fine. I just—I wanted to…” you scramble for words but they jumble in your mind.

“I’m—” you fall short again. “About what you said. What you asked me. I don’t think that it’s…something I want. I’m—sorry.”

“You don’t think it’s something you want? Or you know that—”

“Tommy,” you say, giving him an awkward stifled laugh. Like he’s being childish with his response. Because he is. “I don’t—I’m sorry.”

He turns away from you suddenly, towards the window above the sink and just stares at it for a long time. You can see his chest puffing. When he finally turns back around, it’s different. It’s the Tommy you know.

“‘S okay,” He says.

Maybe he’ll get over it quickly—you hope.

“Are you okay? I’m—I mean I hope that this doesn’t change anything since I’m still gonna be around—” you lift your arm up to run a ragged hand across your forehead and through your hair, you don’t even notice that your shirt riding up, “— I just don’t want it to like—”

“What is that?”

Your eyes snap to Tommy’s, confused. You think he might be looking out the window again but his eyes trail to you, but lower. Like he’s looking at your hips—because he is. You’re still confused for a second, before examining your shirt, looking for stains or anything out of the ordinary. But you don’t find anything, your top spotless.

“What? I don’t—”

“No—” he takes a couple quick steps forward, into your space, you try to find his eyes—yours blown out with confusion and shock but his are trained and laser focused to your waistline.

“What’s—” he tries to pull up your shirt, you shove him back out of reflex. “You’re hurt, what happened t’you?”

He almost pins down your hands to see your skin under your shirt, dipping his head to look at your waist and hips and you suddenly know. You know there are hand shaped bruises littered across the skin of your waist, turning it deep purple. Handprints that match Joel’s exactly—almost like they’re burned into you. You saw it this morning. It’s why you didn’t bother to put on a swimsuit and decided to keep a top on instead.

What’s even worse is you know Tommy saw it too.

“Tommy!” you’re yelling now, fighting his grip.

You slip up, unable to get a good hold on his wrist like he now has on yours and he pushes the shirt up to reveal the bruises.

“What the hell is that?”

“Fucking—get off!” he backs away with your second shove, a different kind of look on his face. “Jesus,” you huff out, yanking your shirt back down.

You both stand there. A pregnant silence between you. You can almost hear the gears turning, he stares blankly. Putting it all together. Like maybe you’re not hurt, but you wanted it—wanted it from another man. Somewhere in the back of his mind he might keep wishing someone hurt you so he didn’t have to feel so betrayed. So when he asks, it’s like he doesn’t want to admit that it’s true—the quiet possibility of someone else in the picture.

“Who,” he says slowly, pointing down to your waist, “did that?”

“Tommy—” you say, but footsteps cut you off, you both turn your head to the entrance of the kitchen as Joel rounds the corner. He looks out of breath and his eyes flicker from Tommy and his finger pointing down at your waist then back to you.

“We alright in here?” Joel stands, hesitant, his fingers play with the bottom hem of his shirt in an anxious way. Like he doesn't know what he’s just walked in on—you’re not entirely sure you know the answer to that either. You aren’t sure if he’s talking to you or Tommy so you stay silent, waiting for the man in front of you to respond.

“Yup,” Tommy replies, too angry to be believable.

Joel looks at you but he doesn’t say anything. Not out loud.

No. You try to say with your eyes. We are definitely not alright in here.

“Joel,” you say, trying to look for any indication in Tommy’s face that he’s not going to go bat shit crazy. “‘S fine. We’re okay.”

But Joel doesn’t listen. Because he’s Joel Miller and maybe you can’t see it right now, but you can hear the concern dripping off his tone—an indication that he won’t ever leave. Not now. So he stalks towards you both and you try to shake your head no, and he doesn’t listen.

He stands beside you, putting a flat sprawled palm on Tommy’s chest and silently tries to push him backward. But Tommy breaks first, pushing Joel’s hand off him, staggering back while looking at you and Joel.

And maybe he gets it then, you think. Because Tommy lets out a deep chuckle—like you’ve got clown makeup on. Like he’s never seen anything more funny. He’s a lot of things but he is not fucking stupid. So he looks past Joel to your eyes. To your face, almost covered—ridden—in guilt and he can see everything.

“Really?” Tommy says, not sparing Joel a glance.

“You put your fuckin’ hands on her?” Tommy says, almost at a whisper which makes it all the more intimidating. You can see Joel’s back puff, his anger rising. But you also know Joel would never hurt his brother. Not on purpose.

But you’re scared. You’re really fucking scared in this moment because Tommy is entirely too worked up and you know whatever excuse Joel is going to say won’t help.

“Easy,” Joel says, his voice cutting through the tense silence.

You’re sweating. The hot summer of July in Austin getting to you. They stare at each other for a long time. Like at the kitchen table, like when you all first met. But this time, Tommy breaks, and his eyes flicker to yours, he takes a tiny step to the side so he can see you better.

“Is this why? Is this why you’re fuckin’—jesus, fuck. ‘S this why he went to get you a tire?” you stand, you can’t really say anything, your stunned figure doesn’t move.

“He hurt you,” Tommy breathes out, his voice almost breaking if he wasn’t so angry. You shake your head.

You both know that the bruises aren’t from hurt. That they’re far from it.

“He didn’t,” you reply.

“No, no, baby. He’s—you’re—” Tommy almost looks like he can’t believe it, shaking his head, switching between you and Joel. The look you give him shuts him up, and makes him back away, until Joel unclenches his fists and relaxes his shoulder a fraction.

“I didn’t really want to tell you like this, I was—”

“Fucking my brother?” he bites back, interrupting you.

That makes you a bit mad. You’re not in love with his attitude, nor his tone. It’s not like he has any right. It’s not like either of them do.

Joel moves to speak but you do it first.

“Don’t give me that,” you say, almost laughing, though the situation is not funny, not in the slightest. “We’re not dating, Tommy. We never were.”

Caroline strides in at that, looking at the scene unfolding in the kitchen. She stops short of the three of you, her mouth slightly agape. You roll your eyes, fucking perfect. Let’s just bring the party in here instead. You’ll give it to the woman. She has impeccable timing.

“Needed some napkins…” she trails off, holding the empty napkin stand in her right hand up so everyone can see. “I—I can come back.”

“Did you know?” Tommy turns to her, gesturing to you and Joel.

“Tommy,” Joel says from in front of you, a warning. Tommy ignores him.

“Did you know?” he asks again, Caroline stares back shocked. But she does consider it, rolls the idea around in her head before speaking.

“Them two?” Tommy nods. “Her?”

Okay. You really don’t love that tone. You silently chastise yourself for thinking she was nice at the bar when your first instinct was that she was a bitch—because she is. You were waiting for her snarky undertones or spoiled takes to show. You knew it was coming, you just didn’t know when.

“No, ‘f couse not.” She’s almost laughing, like it could never be possible. It hits you harder than you’ll ever admit. “She’s — you’re…young,” she says, looking at you.

Tommy gestures to you and Joel like he’s saying, well believe it, because it’s true.

Joel moves faster than you can comprehend. He’s got a tight grip on Tommy’s arm. He probably doesn’t even have to say anything, Tommy knows what’s happening. But Joel warns him anyway—again.

“Quit,” he growls. You’d guess this might be the point where Tommy usually backs down. But this situation is far from usual.

“Or what?” Tommy bites back. When Joel doesn’t respond he continues. “You gonna mark me up? Leave me all black and blue?”

Tommy doesn’t stop there, you try to move past Joel but he stops you, turns his head to you slightly, a hardened look in his eye.

“Oh, I forgot you’d probably like that, huh?”

Joel remains frozen for a couple fleeting seconds before whipping around and pushing Tommy into the back counter. You’re rooted to your place, you don’t even care that Caroline is still in the corner, holding the fucking napkin holder in the air.

“What’d you say?” Joel barks in Tommy’s face.

“Look at her fuckin’ stomach, dude!” Tommy throws the words in his face, pushing him back slightly and making a vague gesture in your direction, it causes your feet to move towards the brothers before you can think.

Joel backs off then, sneaking a tiny glance at you out of the corner of his eye, like he really is thinking about the marks he left on your waist. He had seen them this morning, ran his fingers over them too, and saw how the notches matched the curves of his fingers perfectly. But you kissed him, and told him it was okay. That it was more than okay. Maybe even whispered that you liked it between muffled groans. So when a glint of guilt flashes in his eyes it makes your heart break more than it already has.

“She said no,” Joel says, looking back at Tommy. A tense silence follows—like you’re not sure if Joel is going to continue or Tommy is going to bite back.

“Get back to your party,” Joel growls after a while. You bite your lip.

Tommy looks at Joel with unwavering eyes. His glance turns towards the window where he can see the bustling crowd—can almost hear the laughter. Then he looks down to his hand, outstretches it, undoes his gnarly fist, and when it curls back up again, you finally bite.

“Tommy!” you say, moving closer. But it’s too late. Joel’s figure knocks to the side and his hand instinctively grabs his face, his nose, his eye. Maybe the worst part about it all is that Joel doesn’t even look remotely surprised, or that he wants to fight back—he just stays there, a little hunched over when you yelp in shock and Tommy groans, shaking out a now bruised fist.

“Fuck,” you almost yell, your body doesn’t know what to do between bending down to see Joel’s face and looking at Tommy—at his face—because you don’t recognize him.

Joel almost huffs out a laugh, and to shut him up, to get him to bite his tongue, you speak again.

“Okay. We’re done here,” you say, pushing Joel towards the entrance of the house, towards your car.

And Caroline is there, pushing Tommy towards the couches and for the first time, you’re grateful for her.

The ride back to your house is silent after a short and quick bicker about who can drive. You think Joel might want to sit in the driver's seat so you can’t see the quickly forming bruises on the left side of his face but you make a decent argument, enough to settle him in the passengers—looking out the window.

You send Janet a quick text, asking if she can watch Sarah for a few hours. Brother emergency. Janet replies back and says the girls haven’t gotten out of the pool since you left. It makes you smile a bit, despite it all.

When you park in your driveway, you hop out quickly, Joel following closely behind. He waits there, right behind you, when you pull out your house keys, and waits when you unlock the deadbolt and waits when you push through the door.

“Make yourself at home,” you say, nodding towards the couches and dropping your keys in the bowl.

You disappear into the kitchen and brace your arms on the counter, your head hanging between your shoulders. You let out a deep, ragged breath and try to control your heartbeat.

“Fuck,” you mumble, shaking out your wrists, grabbing two advil from the bottle on your counter, a glass of water, and peas from freezer.

Joel’s sitting on the loveseat, looking down at his hands. You don’t say anything. He doesn’t either. He just takes the water and pills from your hands and swallows it silently. You extend the peas to him, he thinks about it for a while and when you shake them again, huffing, saying—just fucking take them. He finally obliges.

You get a good look at his cheek when he turns to set the water down on the table and you have to stop yourself from gasping.

“Joel,” you murmur, reaching for him, bending down, he stops you, grabs your wrist, then grabs your hand. But he’s gentle. Not like Tommy. Joel’s gentle.

“‘S fine,” he says, and winces when the peas touch his face. “‘M fine.”

You settle in between his legs, looking down at him. He’s got one hand on his face, holding the peas, and the other, wrapped around the back of your thigh. He doesn’t even want to look up at you. It breaks your heart.

“‘M sorry,” you say quietly, his hand on your thigh trails upward. He plays with the hem of your shirt and lifts it enough to take a peek at the purple that lies there.

He doesn’t say anything, just sits there, running a gentle, ghost-like touch across the bruises.

“He — saw it. I don’t…” you look down to your stomach. You can see the shape of his fingertips so clearly. It’s no wonder Tommy reacted how he did. “It was an accident.”

He doesn’t nod. Doesn’t shake his head. He tosses the peas onto the table and pushes the cotton of your shirt up further, to where he can see all of it—all the black and blue there.

“Are you mad?” you whisper, hesitantly, as he stares at his own hands, his own branding.

“‘M sorry,” he mumbles.

“Don’t be,” you say, begging, “Please.”

“He did that cause—,” you breathe out, taking his chin in your pointer finger and thumb and getting your first good look at his cheek, “—it’s-’s my fault, I should’ve—”

“C’mon. Don’t do that,” he says, cutting you off, nipping your apology in the bud, “I should be the one who’s sorry, this is — I hurt you.”

You shake your head.

“You know that’s not—you know that I—” you stifle a short chuckle.

“That you what?”

You let out a couple hot breaths, looking down at him, the purple around his eye slowly taking shape.

“That I liked it.”

Joel bends forward then, and you gasp. The dull scratch of his beard is the only thing keeping your eyes open. He trails his hot breath across your stomach, and leaves gentle kisses on your sides, on your bruises.

“Joel,” you mumble, and you hate how your voice sounds so breathy, maybe even desperate. You tangle your hands in his hair, grasping at the nape of his neck he pulls you down, closer, so you’re slotted in his lap, straddling him. Joel pulls back and looks at your face, brushes the fallen hair from your eyes.

“I meant what I said,” you start, he furrows his brow, “Still—mean it.”

From the look in his eyes he knows what you’re talking about. The words you slipped into his ear last night.

‘S you, Joel — it’s-’s always been you.

“But if this is—if Tommy—” you cut yourself off, correcting your words, “If I messed it up—”

“Sweetheart,” he says. Your heart pulls, you almost put your hand on his cheek, but you see the rising skin and settle for his shoulder. “‘M not goin’ anywhere.”

“Are you sure?”

He pulls you down further, so you’re flush against him. He studies your eyes and rubs at your waist, your hips. It sends a little fire down between your thighs.

“‘M here—‘M…I’m right here,” he mumbles, and shakes his head. Like he’s telling you no to any silent thoughts of doubt that might be floating around your head.

And then he pulls your head down to kiss you.

It’s needy, and hot and everything you want at this moment. He’s everywhere and you can feel his growing arousal between your legs. You both needed this—you think. After everything, after—fucking—Caroline and Janet Baker and Tommy Miller. You both needed each other so bad that when you grind down onto him he lets out a little desperate groan into your mouth that spurs you on.

Joel slips his hand under your shirt and finds the hardened peak there. He pinches it and rolls it between his fingers, it sends your hips forward and suddenly he’s sitting up, and shucking your shirt off.

He grabs your hips and moves you against him, your most vulnerable spots grinding against each other. Giving you both blown out eyes and puffy lips and panting breath.

“Sh–it,” you gasp when your shorts catch on your clit perfectly.

“Pretty,” he says, grasping at your tits, at anything he can find while you grind against his length. “fuckin’—pretty like this.”

You claw at his belt and before you know it, he’s lifting you up so you’re on your knees and he’s pulling his pants past his hips. You get the memo and take your shorts off, tossing them behind you. When you sink back down onto his lap, you can feel his cock slip between your wet lips down there.

“Fuck, Joel,” you say, gliding along his cock, soaking it. You can feel all of him now—grinding along his hardness—the girth of him fitting perfectly between your swollen lips.

“Angel,” Joel pants out, through sloppy kisses. You look at him. He’s got a desperate look on his face. Like he couldn’t wait just like you. Not even to get upstairs to your bedroom or to get all his clothes off. Like he’s been wanting this all day. Just like you.

You move up and reach down, feeling the wet mess you’ve both made down between your legs. You find his cock, hard and wanting, and position it at your entrance. The head sinks past your walls, enveloping it somewhere deeper and you both groan at the feeling.

You sink down on him slowly, you’re by no means physically ready to take him. But you can’t wait any longer. He kisses you, and down to your neck, making it easier to ease yourself down onto him, and when you finally reach the end, and you’re seated fully in his lap, you both gasp.

Your walls clench around him, eliciting a quiet groan from Joel somewhere near your neck. Your eyes roll back in your head, your forehead drops onto his shoulder. You both just sit there, waiting for the other to make a move.

It’s kind of like a game.

See how long you can both relish in each other’s warmth — the first person who moves loses.

Your walls tighten again and he lets out another groan, “Jesus,” he mumbles, nipping at your neck. You’re slowly adjusting to him, relaxing around him. It makes you shudder.

You realize he’s not really touching you. He’s got his hands on your thighs, but they’re just resting there. Not squeezing or gripping your hips like you know he so desperately wants. Maybe he’s scared, you think. From everything that’s happened today. From the consequences his touch barred.

But you didn’t care about the consequences. You liked his touch, needed his touch, just as much as he needed something to hold him back down to earth, anchor him to you—in you. And afterall, you just want him to feel good. Feel better.

“Touch me,” you gasp out, reaching down to his hands.

“Am touchin’ you,” he forces out, panting near your ear. His thumb absentmindedly pushes down on the skin of your thigh a fraction harder and then eases up, like he’s saying this is the best I can do.

“No, Joel,” you moan, rock your hips a little, moving first, moving frantically and suddenly, “touch me,” you say into his neck, reaching down to usher his hands to your hips, your waist, you.

Joel gets it then, the silent permission. The it’s okay, and grips you harder, but not as hard as you know he would like. It’s good enough for you because he moves your hips, rocking you up and down onto his length—having enough of the senseless grinding.

“Fuckin’ good—” Joel groans, your hands fly to his shoulders, his hair. “You feel good.”

Your legs grow tired, he can tell. You try your best, but you’re sweaty and tired and fucked out, and when he hits a spot deeper inside you that makes you moan out, louder than before, and you almost collapse onto him. He ruts into you a little. Meeting you halfway. Fucking you deeper—maybe even a bit faster.

Your legs ache and you feel a sheen of sweat wash over both of you. And Joel’s eye is fucked up, his cheek too. Tommy is sitting back at the house—or god knows where—with a possible broken hand, Janet baker is watching Sarah instead of you or Joel, Caroline is still back at the house, and everything is a fucking mess, but it’s so right. He feels so right. He’s — he’s right.

You’re close then, the coarse hair on him inching you toward your climax. He knows, he can feel it from the inside. You don’t even have to say it this time, your question for his permission. He can see it already braced on your lips but he shuts you up with a kiss, a sloppy one, where he sticks his tongue into your mouth and your walls tighten around him again.

“Yes,” he says with a moan into your mouth, “yes, yes—ah.”

“Fuck,” you say tightening around him, becoming breathless and boneless, but Joel holds you up. He always does.

He grips you tighter, like how you know he wanted to, and you relish in the feeling. His thrusts become desperate and you brace yourself on the back of the couch so he can rut up deeper, chasing after his own orgasm. You can’t really breathe. Not when he’s everywhere.

“Shit,” he says, rocking into you.

Joel cums hard, holding onto you, wrapping you up in his arms as he groans somewhere near your temple. You let it spread through you, the mess of it all. He keeps you locked in his arms, even when you think he might pull away.

He finally pulls you off him, when he says it becomes too much and you sit on his lap, playing with his curls. When you both settle from your panting you can’t help but ask.

“What are we gonna do?” you say quietly to him.

“I dunno,” he grabs your hand and gives it a quick kiss. The bruise on his face is turning an ugly shade of purple. And the peas have gone warm, creating a small puddle on the coffee table. And your phone keeps buzzing from the entryway.

“We’ll figure it out,” he says, running a hand on your thigh.

taglist! comment or message me if you want to be added. kisses!

@going-to-californiaxx @gintheginger @daddy-din @earthtogrogu @rooney-verse @ratoonstown @skysmiller @pedritosdarling @lovely-ateez @pluzo @spongebobspooploop @ramblers-lets-get-ramblin @tsunamistorm123 @awhoreforalotofshows @disassociation-daydreams @violinchick @rhoorl

@yoongjennie88 @untamedheart81 @noisynightmarepoetry @joelsversion @vanillen @brujitafantomatico @cartoon-garbage04 @jpbplvr @whattownheadshake @beccerjune @pedrotonin @sen-mirjahaal @awesomebunnyqueen @bluetattoos

@siimiasoi @fandomscollide @lizzie-cakes @paleidiot @sunnywithachanceofjavi @koshkaj-blog @sunnysaphira @bbyanarchist @casa-boiardi @anavatazes @joeldjarin @l0vem3n @lmariephoto37 @turtles-all-the-way-d0wn @withasideofmeg @dinwifey @brinabees @sofiparallel @akah565 @defnotashifter @missgurrl @anoverwhelmingdin @rainbowcosmicchaos @pedropascalissofine @purplemechanics @suzmagine @hellaradd @josephine1837 @lawh0re @medic332 @lisaneedsbraces @angelmather1 @kirsteng42 @poodlebae @lunxramour

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bokettochild · 4 months

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Okay, so, working on a fic here, but does anyone remember when JoJo posted Shady Escape Part 4? The arc where the shadow first smushed Wind and opened a portal in front of them?

Well JoJo posted this with the comic

This would mean that prior to this point the Links have been in the same world the whole time (and the portals are apparently not portals, but "gates"!) and since Shady Escape, they've only traveled to one other era, the one we're still in in the Dawn arc.

Jojo originally never meant this story to be an actual story, just quick AU comics and sketches

So I understand that things are still a bit unclear as she shifts from having random ideas to having to create a cohesive plot, and honestly she's been doing a fantastic job of setting the stage for us and slowly introducing concepts, characters and other important pieces of the story, but it does leave us with one major question: do the original doodles count as cannon?

The Malon Arc, the Chain meeting Ravio, these things would have required the boys to shift worlds previously, or be in either Time or Legend's eras in order for them to have happened. They haven't been to both though. Thus far, they've been to two different eras, the second being one where none of them knew where they are, and it's only the conversation between Twilight and Four in Divine Dark Reflections that tells us they are even aware of the fact that they're traveling through time!

So, this would mean that anything that has to do with them being in any hero specific era until now has not yet happened! Other than perhaps Time's era, which is only supported by this panel from Deep Shadows part 2

Time knows the woods they're in, so his recognition would indicate that this is most likely his era. So, maybe they've met Malon at this point in the story, but that means anything else (Linkle, Ravio, anything fro the others' eras) hasn't yet happened, and considering the fact that the Malon arc isn't included with the rest of the official story, but instead with the early doodles, we can't even be certain that it has happened yet.

All this to say, fic writers technically have free reign with what they want to boys to know about the other eras, and who they want the to know about (other than the Ordonian people, who Twilight apparently can't shut up about lol). That, and, we have no clue whether JoJo is going to rehash old comics or cut them entirely from the story cannon.

#linked universe #linkeduniverse #linked universe timeline #ketto's analyses

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caligvlasaqvarivm · 17 days

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Granted the possibility that Eridan, Vriska and Aradia could be friends, by extension, could Eridan have the possibility to become friends with Tavros?

Unfortunately, no 😔 and what it comes down to is this: Eridan is REALLY STRESSFUL to be around if you aren't Karkat (even for people who like him, which is why such an important quality in his platonic friend group is an ability to set and maintain hard boundaries), and Tavros is REALLY BAD at dealing with stress.

Tavros often gets mischaracterized as being really sweet and kind, and I think that's a little south of where he actually is. His main character trait is avoidance, not acceptance. When the going gets tough, Tavros gets going, either physically (leaving Vriska to bleed out, or ghosting Gamzee after being put off by his offer to make out a little, or blocking Dave after getting scared by his sexual remarks) or mentally (his reliance on his imaginary friend, and the way he turns to them for comfort while being tormented by Vriska). He doesn't actually LIKE Vriska at all, and is actually pretty vocal about DISliking her, but he's too afraid of real confrontation to actually mount a resistance until well after it's too late, resulting in his death.

He's still a lot nicer than most of the trolls, but it's a low bar. And he deserved to be treated better, but that's also all of them. Let's not forget that once he really grows a spine after being combined with Vriska for a little bit, he flips her off. Even then, however, his response to things he doesn't like is still, like. Leaving. Growing a spine just lets him actually do that, instead of meekly expressing that he would like to, and then getting bullied into not.

And Eridan is just stressful to be around. He's basically a weeping geyser of emotional sincerity and neediness 24/7. Even the people in his life that like him need to set and maintain hard boundaries with him so they don't exhaust themselves, and this is even true of his romantic interests (with the exception of Karkat). Even Roxy gets stressed by him, even if it's good stress (excitement, fun).

And the thing is, even at his absolute best, most therapized, Eridan is still going to be the team's Murder Advocate. More intimately than anybody else, he understands the connection between sacrifice, duty, and the greater good. A lot of people seem to think Eridan's ultimate character arc should lead to him refuting violence, but I disagree; there are times where violence, and even murder, are necessary (for an easy example, killing Condy, and for a very personal example, killing lusii/trolls so his species/friends could stay alive). He's the teammate that reminds the rest of the team that violence and murder are viable, and sometimes the only, option; who offers to do the dirty work himself and shoulder that burden; and who has a powerful driving force of duty, responsibility, and - that most hopeful of qualities - CONVICTION.

His character arc doesn't lead to him refuting his prior beliefs, but gaining clarity on them: exactly what he believes in and why, disentangling it from his shitty society and the expectations it placed upon him. This inevitably leads to him having a very strong personality that clashes with a lot of his teammates, even post-character development, and unfortunately, Tavros is one of them.

So if we're talking Tavros before he grows a spine - they would definitely not be friends. Eridan would be able to trap Tavros into conversation, but if Tavros already doesn't like Vriska for being an asshole with empathy problems, there's no way he'd like Eridan, who's that turned up to eleven. I mean, let's be real, do you think Eridan "refuses to have fun and is also a hipster and also phrases things in a hostile and aggressive way as a default" Ampora would not wind up 1) insulting fiduspawn, 2) insulting tinkerbull/bringing up that he kills lusii regularly and that Tavros is really lucky tinkerbull is so small because it made them not a target, and/or 3) insulting Tavros for his spinelessness in an effort to pitch flirt, or even just as a factual observation?

And if we're talking Tavros after he grows a spine, all that would change is that he'd voice outright that he doesn't really like Eridan and doesn't want to talk to him. And then leave, probably.

And that'd be a problem for Eridan, before or after his character development, because he desperately craves attention, and Tavros's whole thing is avoiding the stuff he doesn't like. This is also why he wouldn't get along particularly well with people like Sollux or Equius; they don't really give him attention, good OR bad, and either tell him to fuck off, or fuck off themselves. Let's remember how Vriska ghosting him on accident led to him having an anxiety episode where he beats himself up for being SO STUPID!!!!!!! People who don't really like him and simply withhold attention from him are the people he feels the worst interacting with.

And that's BEFORE Gamzee gets added to the mix LOL

#eridan ampora #homestuck #tavros nitram

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cinnamon-girl-writes · 9 days

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scream queen !! . . . gojo x reader

one fall, geto and gojo team up to prank shoko and y/n for halloween. basically halloween inspired fluff!

fluff, gojo x reader, set during gojo's past arc, reader is a 2nd year student

by @cinnamon-girl-writes

OCTOBER, 2006

As the day drew to a close, the Jujutsu High gymnasium was abuzz with conversation.

"C'mon 'Ko, how can you not like halloween?" Gojo persisted, "Slasher movies and candy and staying up past midnight?"

Shoko scoffed. "You already stay up way too late, idiot." Geto chuckled softly at their antics.

You poked the girl next to you and she almost dropped her cigarette from between her teeth. "Are you at least going to dress up with me this year?" You asked.

Shoko rolled her eyes. "Not a chance."

Geto leaned in, joining the conversation. "Why do you hate Halloween so much?"

Shoko sighed, stretching her arms out above her nonchalantely. "I don't know, I just never really enjoyed it, y'know? Like, we see enough scary stuff every day, right?"

You collectively nodded at her words. There was no denying that she was right; your lives were plenty scary on a daily basis.

Just then, the bell rang, signalling it was time for your next class session to begin. You all gathered your things and headed to the main building, dropping the conversation.

The rest of the day went on as expected, after finishing your lessons and training for a few hours you all retreated around the campus. You and Shoko lounged in the common room with Nanami and Haibara. Gojo and Getou, however, were no where to be found.

"Do you think we should go look for them?" Haibara questioned. It had been almost two hours since you'd last seen them at dinner and it was starting to get dark.

"No, if they need us they'll call," Nanami answered quickly.

You intervened, "I'm sure they're fine, wherever they are. Probably off causing trouble somewhere."

"Yeah, they're fine. So, what are we watching?" said Shoko.

You collectively decided on Corpse Bride, a halloween classic but nothing too scary for late on a Tuesday night. You always found you were most happy in these quiet moments, curled up on the couch of the common room surrounded by your friends and not having to worry about techinques or curses or surviving.

That all went away, however, when thirty minutes into the movie, you began to hear strange sounds. It started out as a scraping sound on the floor, almost as if someone was dragging metal across the ground. Then you heard a faint laughing sound. You turned to Shoko who was beside you and a giggle from her confirmed she heard it too. You assumed Geto and Gojo had scuffled in from a night of mischief and were making their way to bed. You shook your head, smiling to yourself. Although you'd never admit it, you enjoyed spending your free time with them, chaotic as they may be.

Suddenly, you feel a tap on your shoulder. You glance at Shoko, who's dead asleep next to you, and then Nanami, who's resorted to reading a book that's settled in his lap.

You turn to see the looming figure of a masked man holding a chainsaw-- and let out a blood curdling scream.

Shoko jumped from her place on the couch, landing ten feet away; Haibara fell backwards off the edge of the couch; even Nanami leaned away and grimaced.

Startled, you tried to compose yourself, but it was hard to do so in the dark room with adrenaline coursing though your veins.

As you were coming to your senses, the lights flicker on and you see two people in front of you: Gojo, with a Jason mask resting around his neck, and Geto, holding a camcorder which was currently pointed at Haibara, who was still on the ground. Both of them were laughing their asses off, barely being able to breathe.

You hear a groan from Shoko behind you, "Ohhhhh, what the hell?" A "Come on, guys" is heard from Nanami, but you're still too in shock to respond.

Finally recovering from their hysterics, the boys gathered beside each other to review their footage. You hear the faint sound of your own scream and Shoko's yelp being played back on the tiny camera screen.

"You-- y-you should've seen your face!" Gojo says between breaths.

Standing up, you rubbed your face, trying to recover from the trauma you'd just gone through. Gojo notices the look on your face and pulls you in for a hug which you reluctantly accept since you needed the comfort.

Plus, getting a hug from Satoru wasn't that bad either.

"Aww, I'm sorry Y/n," Gojo said, gently stroking your back, "I could make it up to you with a kiss later?"

This caused you to shove his shoulder playfully, feigning digust. "Seriously? Gross."

You were interupted by Geto, "After that stunt, I don't think Shoko will ever like Halloween again."

You laughed, and Gojo behind you chimed in, "It was sooooo worth it though! We're gonna have this footage for life!"

The four of you settled on the couch, waving Nanami and Haibara goodnight when they decided they were tired (more like tired of this bs).

Everyone ended up falling asleep on the couch, so when the movie ended, Gojo shook Geto and Shoko awake, shushing them when they moved to wake you. Geto gave Gojo a wink and Shoko glared warning daggers at him as they made their ways to their own rooms.

Ever so gently, Gojo picked you up in his arms bridal-style and carried you to your bedroom, laying you in your bed.

As you were being tucked in, you stirred, blinking yourself awake.

"Satoru?" you questioned in your half-awake state, "Did the movie end...?"

He smiled to himself, pulling the sheets up to your chin. "Yeah, time to go to bed. Goodnight."

"Okay. Goodnight, Satoru."

Oh, and you did end up getting that kiss.

---

NOVEMBER, 2017

The fight had been going on for days at this poin. Everyone was on their toes, anxious and wondering what to do in the midst of all the chaos. It left you and Shoko in a strange position:

Gojo was gone. Getou's body was taken over long ago. Shoko had gotten word that Nanami was gone, too.

You had left the fight to go to you and Gojo's-- no, your apartment in Shibuya to gather supplies: bandages for the injured, water, food.

As you turned the key to unlock your home, you forced yourself to stare at the ground. You couldn't risk glancing at a picture frame and seeing the smiling face of your husband staring back at you.

You gathered the few things you came for and threw them into a bag, shuffling around the kitchen. You made your way into the living room, thinking you might grab some blankets to comfort the injured. As you were walking, you stumbled into a cardboard box, kicking it across the room on accident.

A stack of discs spilled onto the ground. You remembered, then, that Satoru had brought them out to show his students some footage of curses to study various cursed techniques. Of course, he had never gotten to show them.

Thinking nothing of it, you knelt down to pick them up. They were all pretty standard, marked with dates or the names of curses. One in particular, however, caught your attention.

You read your lover's handwriting, scribbled in black sharpie:

Scream Queen!!! '06 >;)

#gojo jjk #jjk x reader #jujutsu kaisen x reader #gojo x reader #shoko ieiri #Suguru Geto #satoru gojo #gojo satoru #gojo x you #gojo's past arc #jjk season 2 #jjk gojo #jjk #Satoru Gojo x reader

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butterflydm · 5 months

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restructuring the wheel of time into ten books

So a little while ago, there was a poll about people's favored choice for how many books should have been in WoT -- I voted for 'ten' and this is, I guess, my argument for a ten book series.

Books 1-5, I don’t really have any notes on when it comes to structure. Every book is complete in and of itself. While books 2 & 3 do have something of a repetitive structure, I think that works better in a book series than in a tv series.

The only suggestions that I would have structurally would be minor things like “tweak Rand’s power levels in the early books to keep him more in line with what he does later” (aka what the show is doing, lol) and maybe not having Ishamael present during the Battle of Falme and having that purely against the Seanchan, so that we don’t have super similar climaxes for Rand two books in a row (Rand could get his wound in Tear instead). And those are the sorts of things that I think it might be likely that Jordan would have done if he’d known exactly how long the series would end up being -- ex. he clearly backed down on Rand’s power jump when he realized that the series would be going for longer than he’d originally planned.

One minor plot change that I would do is put Perrin feeling Rand tug at him as the epilogue of TFOH or thereabouts. Just a little hint of Perrin in there, showing that he'll have a bigger role in the next book.

Book 6, though... I have some thoughts there.

Lord of Chaos/A Crown of Swords: this is the first book where the beginning really takes some time getting off the ground -- there are several Salidar chapters that could have been combined. This is really the first place in the books where characters hang around doing nothing (we're told more than once in Elayne & Nynaeve's PoV that they're barely being taught anything and that being there feels pointless), waiting for it to be time to actually Do Some Plot (the big Healing of severing) and it's just the beginning of a bad trend.

The other structural change that I would suggest is not doing the weird feint with Mat's character where he starts off doing a "Rand's general" storyline and then creakily transitions over to Salidar instead. Since Mat isn't actually going to Illian, he doesn't need to be marching south. He could just still be in Cairhien/Caemlyn and have Rand take him to Salidar from there. As it is, we end up spending several chapters on a storyline that gets abruptly terminated part of the way through the book so that Mat can do a completely different storyline instead and that really pads out the pages unnecessarily (this was a really bad trend that happened with Mat's character in particular more than once in the books; his storylines would just stop in their tracks and get shifted to something else entirely and never go back to his original storyline; ex. we literally never find out why/what the murdered caravan of Tuatha'an had to do with anything, because Mat never bothers to tell Rand their message because he spends the entire rest of the book series doing completely unrelated things and only ever sees Rand again for a brief conversation that is dominated by everyone catering to his slaver wife -- we never get payoff for the vast majority of Mat's storylines, even the minor threads). It really does feel like Jordan started writing the book, then went "oh shit, Mat needs to meet & marry the DotNM" and just abruptly changed Mat's story to yeet him to Ebou Dar without actually rewriting the earlier bits in the book.

Outside of that, the main change I would suggest being made in these books is improving Min’s characterization and Min and Rand’s relationship by NOT having Min change herself for Rand. Let Rand fall in love with Min as she is, not the dolled-up version of Min that she invents for Rand’s benefit (there are other characterization tweaks I would recommend as well, but Min is kinda the biggest issue imo).

The main ‘story arc’ for Rand that's set up in LoC is ‘defeating Sammael’ and it should take place over the course of a single book, not two separate books. Parts of ACoS would be saved for the next book but the Illian climax should happen in the same book that the story starts. I would title this book “A Crown of Swords” so that the focus is on Rand’s story, not the Forsakens' (and part of the oddness here is definitely due to Jordan changing his mind about doing the Taim-Demandred combo, so he sets up something that ends up going nowhere).

Inciting incidents:

Egwene is summoned to Salidar leading to Rand sending Mat there as well

Min arrives in Caemlyn, leading to The Box Incident

Turning point:

After the Box incident, Perrin and Rand stage a fight so that Perrin can go find Masema

Egwene sends Elayne, Nynaeve, Mat & co to Ebou Dar to look for the Bowl of the Winds and they actually take advantage of Mat being ta’veren right away instead of waiting around for a month (all the delays in Mat's various storylines had a knock-on effect in delaying everyone else's storylines, imo -- the Slog happens because everyone is waiting on Mat, whether they know it or not)

Climax:

Rand defeats Sammael

The attack of the Seanchan on Ebou Dar begins

A Crown of Swords/The Path of Daggers/Winter’s Heart: The Path of Daggers only needs some of trimming imo. Once that trimming is done, I think Elayne’s section of the prologue of WH could slid into it fairly neatly as a bit of an ‘upbeat’ epilogue, which would be a contrast to the darkness of Rand’s ending in the previous book and his defeat here when he tries to repel the Seanchan from Ebou Dar.

Also have Mat interact with Tuon throughout this book, essentially like he did in WH (Mat's interactions with Tuon in WH make sense with his previous characterization; it's in CoT & KoD when Jordan had him completely reverse on his moral outlook on slavery so that he would be willing to make out with a slaver - genuinely, how Mat goes from sympathizing with slaves in WH to sympathizing with slavers in CoT remains one of the most baffling writing choices that I've ever run across; especially with how limp and one-sided it made everything about Mat & Tuon feel in those books for me, because Jordan drained all the potential interesting conflict out of the pairing so that he could focus on Mat navel-gazing about his self-inflicted prophecy woes, making him just Min 2.0. *sigh*). This book I would choose to be named “The Path of Daggers” out of the available options.

Inciting incidents:

Elayne & Nynaeve use the Bowl of the Winds as Ebou Dar is invaded by the Seanchan and Mat gets left behind during the escape

Perrin & co find Masema, etc.

Egwene uses the rule of law to take control of the Salidar Aes Sedai

Turning point:

Mat first meets Tuon -- maybe give Mat & Tylin’s first meeting to Mat & Tuon instead, where he accidentally greets her using the Old Tongue, thus sparking her interest (cut out Mat & Tylin’s ‘relationship’ entirely, it was zero percent needed and is needed even less if Tuon arrives in the first wave of the attack, as I'm suggesting here)

Rand learns about the invasion by the Seanchan and goes campaigning

Egwene & the Aes Sedai jump to Tar Valon and begin their siege (since they no longer need to kill time to let Mat's plotline happen)

Climax:

Rand fails to defeat the Seanchan & gets attacked in the Sun Palace but kills the attackers here instead of us needing the Far Madding detour (which just felt like a less emotionally-impactful version of The Box to me and Jordan giving in to his desire to write a travelogue)

Faile learns Masema is dealing with the Seanchan and kills him, cutting off that entire path of slog by not getting kidnapped (we really only need one kidnapped wife imo)

Mat escapes Ebou Dar, kidnapping Tuon along the way (there's our allotted Kidnapped Wife)

Egwene is captured by the White Tower Aes Sedai when the rebels block off the harbors to Tar Valon

Winter’s Heart/Crossroads of Twilight/Knife of Dreams: All three of these books would have greatly benefited from being massively cut down to a single volume. This one also has a touch of TGS in it, mostly because Egwene had a lot more story left after KoD than pretty much any other character except maybe Mat.

Specific items to change or cut:

Cut out Far Madding entirely (Rand killed the attackers in Cairhien). Since Tuon arrived with the initial Seanchan invasion fleet in Ebou Dar, Nynaeve can be honest with Rand about Mat being left behind but Rand can see (in his color swirl vision) that Mat is no longer in Ebou Dar and has already escaped, filling that plot hole (the list of contrivances to keep Rand from knowing what happened to Mat frustrated and annoyed me so much when I was reading books WH-KoD).

Have the love confessions and Rand sleeping with Elayne, but don’t do the bonding yet. Have Rand leave Min behind in Caemlyn when he takes Nynaeve off to do the cleansing, so she can (emotionally) bond with Elayne & Aviendha. Since Min was just at ground zero for a terrible attack that was focused on Rand (which should, to Rand, prove his fears about being a danger to the people he loves to be correct!), it really is so bizarre that he keeps backpacking her around to dangerous place (Far Madding) after dangerous place (the Cleansing) after dangerous place (parlay with the Seanchan) and mostly shows that Jordan a) just had no more plot beats for Min until she played pregnancy test for Tuon in the epilogue and b) primarily saw Min as Rand’s Hero Reward rather than a character in her own right. But the whole affair mostly just undermined Rand’s character journey for me (he's so isolated! ...except for his live-in girlfriend).

Don’t do the Shaido plotline at all (have the Shaido scatter back to the Waste post-Dumai’s Wells); instead this should be where Perrin starts his wolf boot camp, so that he actually has a more appropriate amount of time for training before the Last Battle (and his emotional storyline would be a conflict with Faile over her killing Masema). I guess you can do the Whitecloaks storyline here.

Have Mat be the one to make a treaty with the Seanchan, and have Semirhage order the ‘airfleet’ against the White Tower instead of Tuon doing it. Instead of Mat accidentally giving himself away for nothing, have the Mat-Tuon marriage as part of the deal to seal the treaty, since Mat has figured out that she believes that he needs to be her husband, per prophecy, so he uses that to actually get concessions out of her. Because we aren’t trying to convince the readers that Mat is the sort of person who is capable of falling in love with a slaver in the space of a single month, we don’t need to spend two whole books wandering the Altaran countryside doing random shit and instead can get to the politics of it all. Let Mat actually continue to be smart and empathetic in this section of the storyline, rather than lopping off those parts of him and turning him into a zombie bootlicker yes-man. You can still layer in elements of Mat seeing potential in Tuon to be more than just a slaver, just don't have him toss his entire brain & morals away in order to kiss her ass.

Out of the available titles here, I think “Knife of Dreams” is the best one.

Inciting incidents:

Egwene undermines Elaida from within the Tower

Perrin starts Wolf Boot Camp

Rand & Nynaeve cleanse saidin

Turning Point:

Rand faces off against Semirhage and captures her

Egwene finds out from Verin about the extent of the Black Ajah in the White Tower

Aviendha leaves to go to Rhuidean to become a WO

Mat finds out that sul'dam (and thus Tuon) can channel and actually uses it as a negotiation tactic against her, please let this man use his brain during literally any of his conversations with Tuon, I am begging you. The way he reacts in the books to finding out that Tuon is a sul'dam and then that Tuon can channel is SO FUCKING BIZARRE. He just Does Not Care about slavery at all in CoT & KoD and is all Me Me Me about all of the Tuon revelations. In the previous books, Mat claims to be selfish even while constantly doing heroic/selfless things, but in CoT & KoD, he really does just come across as a genuine selfish bastard, someone who only thinks about himself and who doesn't give a shit about anyone else.

Climax:

Tuon and Mat agree on the terms of their marriage alliance and Say The Words

Elayne defeats her fellow claimants to the throne; maybe Min helps root out that Darkfriend captain in her guards, which would lend weight to her being able to do the same later for Tuon and also make it so that Min is at least as helpful to Team Light as she was to the Seanchan

The Seanchan (sent by Semirhage before she went to face Rand) attack the White Tower.

The Gathering Storm/Towers of Midnight: ToM has never made any sense as a title, so I would call this combined book “The Gathering Storm”. This section is more about putting things in a somewhat different order than they happened in the books, with a few tweaks.

Inciting Incidents:

Egwene defeats the Seanchan at the White Tower

Semirhage is freed by Elza and captures Rand, and (stealing @markantonys's excellent suggestion) Nynaeve is the one targeted when Semirhage forces Rand to her will, making Rand push Nynaeve away 'for her protection'

Rand and Egwene have a tense encounter that makes her doubt his sanity.

Turning point:

After taking the test to become full Aes Sedai, Nynaeve gets Lan's bond from Myrelle and then, since Myrelle was literally right outside the Black Tower at the time, Nynaeve and Logain deal with the Black Tower

Egwene deals with the assassins in the Tower (Gawyn subplot)

Perrin deals with the dreamspike and kills Slayer | Egwene deals with Mesaana

Aviendha returns from Rhuidean and reunites with Elayne & Min

Climax:

Rand attacks his father, leading to the moment on Dragonmount

post-epiphany, Rand actually goes to check in on his friends and loved ones, thus making his epiphany have an impact on the storyline -- he Travels to where Mat is and is the one who helps Mat get from Point A (Altara) to Point B (Caemlyn) and letting them actually have a real reunion, delivering Aludra to Elayne, where she is ready to make weapons. In Caemlyn, he talks to Elayne, Aviendha, & Min, leading into the bonding moment.

Mat saves Moiraine from the Tower of Ghenjei.

(epilogue) Tuon arrives back in Ebou Dar and takes control of the Seanchan forces, letting everyone know that there is now a treaty with the Westlands. Her going back with a treaty already tentatively in place would actually make the triumphant tone that the books try to take her with her return make a lot more sense than... readers apparently supposed to be happy??? that one slaver is taking over from another slaver, even though Tuon is just as willing to do awful shit to our protagonists as Suroth was, so it feels like a distinction without a difference to me. Technically, is Tuon marginally better than Suroth? Eh, maybe, but not by much.

A Memory of Light: Most of my changes here either follow from earlier ones (we already have a treaty with the Seanchan, so Mat can just go to Merrilor to start General’ing right away), but apart from that:

Let the Emond’s Field Five (plus Elayne) have a group reunion! (easier to do in this version where Mat's storyline isn't all about sucking up to Tuon, I admit)

Let Perrin and Mat be at Rand’s funeral! (genuinely so bizarre that Sanderson didn't do a one-sentence fix of this tbh; that would have been the easiest thing in the world to fix. One sentence is all you would have needed.)

Let Moiraine be the person who realizes that Rand is still alive, not Cadsuane.

The battle itself could have been cut down somewhat in order to leave more room for character interactions (we probably don't need three separate sword duels for Demandred; kinda excessive). This is a goodbye to people some of us spent over a decade loving; we should be given proper goodbyes to them.

I also feel like there's no need to have everyone and their brother know that Rand is in a relationship with three women? And it felt pointless to have people know that Rand is the father of Elayne's kids too. Have Rand tell his dad (and then have Tam actually act like he has that knowledge during his scenes with Elayne; it is genuinely bizarre how formal Tam and Elayne's interactions were in AMoL; she knows that he's Rand's dad! That's the grandfather of her kids!) but there's no need for a continent-wide memo about Rand's love life. I know this was likely all because of the epilogue where the whole world knows about ~the three~ grieving widows but this is all about a theoretical world of only ten books total, so some tweaking of the epilogue is happening regardless.

Inciting incidents:

Moiraine arrives (with Mat) to help heal the rift between Egwene and Rand

Darkfriends attack Caemlyn through the Ways

Climax:

Rand vs The Dark One

Everyone else vs the Shadow’s forces

So, that would leave us with ten books total (plus the New Spring prequel):

The Eye of the World: the journey begins

The Great Hunt: more important plot elements are introduced, like the Seanchan; Rand begins to learn leadership

The Dragon Reborn: Rand accepts being the Dragon Reborn & takes on a full-time leadership role; Mat now has his luck & Perrin has met Faile

The Shadow Rising: Perrin takes on a leadership role when he leads the defense of the Two Rivers

The Fires of Heaven: Mat takes on a leadership role during the Battle of Cairhien, creating the Band of the Red Hand

A Crown of Swords: Egwene takes on a leadership role by becoming Amyrlin Seat of the rebel Aes Sedai

The Path of Daggers: Elayne takes on a leadership role by putting in her claim to become Queen of Andor

Knife of Dreams: Rand & Nynaeve reverse the Dark One’s counterstroke and then Rand tries and fails to make an alliance with the Seanchan (fake!Tuon); Perrin goes to wolf boot camp; Mat makes a treaty with the Seanchan via marriage alliance to the DotNM; Elayne gets all ten Houses she needs to secure the throne; Egwene has all-but won over the White Tower as well.

The Gathering Storm: we all prepare for the Last Battle; Rand has his epiphany, in whatever form it takes; Mat saves Moiraine; Perrin defeats Slayer; Egwene and Elayne prepare their respective areas for TLB.

A Memory of Light: the journey ends (for this age)

I feel like this gives us a more consistent build-up to the ending, with each piece building upon the ones before, and not taking an excessive amount of time with subplots in the endgame. Each character also has a more consistent progression as well.

Rand

tEotW: worries about being a male channeler

TGH: told he is the Dragon Reborn but assumes the White Tower wants to use him as a false Dragon

TDR: goes on a journey to prove whether or not he’s TDR and proves that he is; taking control of Tear

TSR: becomes the Car’a’carn

TFoH: takes control of Cairhien

ACoS: takes control of Illian

TPoD: has his first major failure when he is unable to repel the Seanchan from Ebou Dar

KoD: succeeds in cleansing saidin but fails to make peace with the Seanchan

TGS: has rock-bottom moment and then his epiphany; he learns he doesn’t have to do it All On His Own

AMoL: re-seals TDO

Egwene

tEotW: sets off an adventure

TGH: experiences great trauma at the hands of the Seanchan

TDR: Black Ajah Hunter

TSR: Goes to the Aiel Waste to begin her training

TFoH: One of her mentors (Moiraine) dies

ACoS: is called to take on a leadership position

TPoD: takes control of the rebel Aes Sedai

KoD: besieges Tar Valon and is captured

TGS: become Amrylin of a united White Tower

AMoL: leads in the Last Battle and becomes an inspirational figure

Perrin

tEotW: discovers that he’s a wolfbrother

TGH: is first placed in a leadership position when Rand disappears

TDR: meets Faile

TSR: defends the Two Rivers (Slayer introduced)

TFoH: feels the tug of ta’veren and leaves the Two Rivers again

ACoS: saves Rand

TPoD: finds Masema; Faile kills Masema

KoD: Wolf Boot Camp

TGS: deals with Slayer in the Wolf Dream

AMoL: leads the wolves at the Last Battle (instead of it being Elyas)

Nynaeve

tEotW: sets out to protect the four kiddos

TGH: adopts Elayne as a fifth kiddo

TDR: Black Ajah Hunter

TSR: Tanchico & the SAD bracelets; Egeanin

TFoH: defeating Rahvin & capturing Moghedien

ACoS: Salidar & Ebou Dar

TPoD: using the Bowl of the Winds

KoD: cleansing saidin

TGS: the Black Tower plotline

AMoL: with Rand at the climax of TLB; being the Ultimate Protector

Mat

tEotW: finds the dagger

TGH: blows the Horn of Valere

TDR: discovers his luck

TSR: Rhuidean & prophecy

TFoH: the Battle of Cairhien & the Band of the Red Hand

ACoS: Salidar & Seanchan invasion in Ebou Dar

TPoD: meets & kidnaps the Daughter of the Nine Moons

KoD: forms a marriage alliance with the Daughter of the Nine Moons

TGS: saving Moiraine

AMoL: General of the forces of Light at the Last Battle

Elayne

tEotW: meets Rand, heads off to Tar Valon

TGH: gets a found family in Egwene, Nynaeve, & Min

TDR: Black Ajah Hunter (meets Aviendha)

TSR: Tanchico & the SAD bracelets; Egeanin

TFoH: bonding Birgitte; Circus storyline

ACoS: Salidar & Ebou Dar

TPoD: using the Bowl of the Winds & heading to Andor

KoD: becoming Queen (plot climax)

TGS: bonds Rand (emotional climax)

AMoL: powerful leader during the Last Battle

#wot #wheel of time #wot book spoilers #wot spoilers #wot amol spoilers #wot a memory of light spoilers #a memory of light #my wot meta #the wheel of time #sigh this was supposed to post tmorrow morning #but tumblr mobile hates me #so here we are

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