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julyarchives · 3 years

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Don’t You Hear Me Howling? || (M) || 05

Finding out you are a female Alpha sparkled some rivalry inside your pack, and resulted in you losing your best friend and your life turning upsidedown, so leaving for college was the fresh start you needed. Years later, you are about to finish your degree and suddenly this past comes back to mess with your head.

→ Pairing: Yeo One x Female Reader | Kino x Female Reader

→ Genre: Smut; A/B/O AU; Omegaverse; College AU.

→ Words: 2.5K

→ Contains: power dynamics; blowjob; handjob; some light voyeurism; masturbation; sexting; semi-public shenanigans; seriously, this chapter is almost a pwp heheh

→ A/n: Apparently we got carried away with the smut, but we just couldn't help it 👀👀 we swear there is a plot to this story lmao. Anyways, we hope you guys like it :)

→ Index: 01 • 02 • 03 • 04 • 05 • 06 • 07 • 08

After a tiring day, all you wanted was a shower and to throw yourself in your bed. You've been texting Kino all week, and you two end up agreeing to go to a party together on the weekend, to blow off some steam.

The last thing you were expecting was a text from an unknown number with a picture attached.

"I believe you forgot something" it said

the picture showing your panties hanging from the fingertips of a very strong masculine hand.

You bit your lip, allowing yourself to admit that you find that quite hot, but rolled your eyes when you remembered that the text could only be from someone.

" Where did you get my number from, Changgu?" You replied

" Wooseok. " He simply answered, paired with a shrug emoji.

" Great. Now lose it. "

" So you want me to keep the souvenir? "

" Do you want me to go pick it up? You can't stay away from me, can you? "

You chuckled after sending the last text, shaking your head in disbelief of him. His audacity always pushing you to the edge.

" You're the one offering tho. Who can't keep away?"

"I'm not the one sending pictures of underwear." You double texted, deciding that two could play his game "and I think these are proof enough that you are the one with attachment issues."

Along with the last message you sent a picture of your neck and cleavage, covered in purple spots from the times you've been with him, still visible though already fading.

" What about these? " He replied with a picture of him in front of the mirror, grey sweatpants hanging low from his hips, showing off the bruises you left on his naked torso.

You couldn't lie, you took pride in those.

" Alpha business " you punctuated ironically with the same shrug emoji he used before. " And you just want an excuse to show your body, that fuckboy act won't work on me. Good try, tho "

" You didn't seem to have a problem with that last time. "

Your only reply was only an eye-roll emoji

" As if you didn't like this "

The picture he sent this time was from his waist down, the outline of his semi-hard very noticeable through his pants, his hand wrapped around it with your panties intertwined in his finger.

You hated to admit that your whole body felt electrified with that image.

" Be careful with that, it's a matching set. " You tugged the collar of your shirt down, exposing the bra with the same lacy fabric as the panties, and snapped a picture to send.

" I think that would be a better view under me "

" Like you will ever get me under you again. "

Your free hand started unconsciously exploring your body, the light touch causing goosebumps to rise on your skin.

And audio popped up on the conversation, and you took a deep breath before playing it

"I think that would be easier to get than you would like to admit" Changgu's deep voice echoed through the speakers, a little breathier than usual, and the wet sounds in the background explaining why.

" Do your worst, Wolfie. " You sent an audio back, dragging the words sensually.

You couldn't help yourself anymore, caving in to your instincts and allowing yourself to slide your hand under your panties, surprised to find out how wet you were.

" I bet you would give up that stupid alpha pride real quick once I got my hands on you "

You scoffed upon hearing his words.

" If I remember correctly you had no problem in putting your own pride aside and beg me to let you fuck me. " Your voice was shaky, a gasp escaping as you touched a particular spot " isn't that what you're doing again, Changgu? Just begging me to make you cum in your pants like a teenage boy. "

" And you left your underwear behind because you want to see me again, don't you? I'm just giving you what you want, y/n"

A moan roll out of your lips as you heard him saying your name, voice raspy, he clearly close to coming undone

" Not really. I was just in a rush after you ate me out desperately. But maybe you're the one that wants that to happen again. "

Your fingers circled your clit fast, getting you close to your own high, and you couldn't help but remember Changgu's when he's close as well, his firm touch on you always so certain and on the perfect spot, and your moans were coming out louder.

But you weren't going to let him get the upper hand on you. You opened your camera and filmed half of your face and down as you took a fingered coated in your juices and popped it into your mouth, tasting yourself and humming in satisfaction.

" You miss that? ' You said before stopping the recording, quickly sending it to him before he got the chance to reply to you.

You put your phone aside, focusing back on touching your now swollen bud, the pleasure building up more and more while the other hand squeezed your breast.

When your phone buzzed you saw that Changgu sent a video back.

The view was now his hand wrapped around his cock, sliding up and down with your underwear in between, his groans loud and constant, the camera carelessly shaking.

" Next time I'll have those pretty lips around my cock. Then we'll see how that smart mouth goes. Bet you'll have no words after I'm done with you."

The video continued as he pumped himself faster, groans getting more desperate, and finally he released himself, seed spilling all over his hand and your panties with gasps to top it off, making your core throb in pleasure. Before ending you could hear a flirty chuckle.

You watched the video again, this time chasing your own orgasm. You couldn't avoid moaning together, imagining what would be like to be there, actually having him following through with his words. You came undone intensity, burying your head in your pillow to muffle the screams you couldn't contain.

You finished yourself off and just stayed there for a second, laying down trying to calm your breath and processing everything that just happened, trying to figure out how the hell does he get under your skin so easily. So you finally sent him your last text.

" What makes you so sure that there will be a next time? "

Your text stayed unanswered, but you didn't give it much thought as your workload only increased by the end of the weekend. Finally, it was Saturday and you were about to meet Kino in this club he mentioned to you before.

"Hey, gorgeous" he approached you from behind, holding your waist and talking sultrily, close to your ear so it could be heard over the old music, making you shiver.

"Hey there," you turned around and kissed his cheek. "I got us drinks"

"You're an angel." he smiled.

He was dressed up in a button-up shirt with skinny jeans, looking absolutely stunning. Catching up with him was easy-going and fun, any tiredness and frustration were easily left behind.

"So, why are we sitting down and not dancing?" He finally asked.

"Lead the way" you conceded.

He grabbed your hand and guided you two confidently to the dance floor. When in place, he held your waist and you allowed him to guide your hips to move in sync with his as he watched you through hooded eyes. It was a nice bubble to be there with him, flirty smiles shot back and forth. After a few songs and a couple of drinks you felt bold and pulled him closer, your lips grazing his, but not kissing just yet. He laughed softly, amused with you.

The playful mood took over you, and you teased him again with a kiss, but just about before it happened you turned around, focusing instead on grinding against him. He still kept the grip on you, only grabbing you harder and holding you closer.

"You're killing me" He whispered against your ear, his hot breath tickling your cheeks.

"I'm just having fun" you turned your face to talk to him, and he buried his head on your neck, planting a couple of kisses.

"I can think of something more fun than this." He nibbled your earlobe.

A mischievous grin grew on your lips. You held his hand and pulled him to a darker corner of the club, resting your back against the wall and finally pulling him closer to a much-anticipated kiss.

He kissed you hungrily, hums sending vibrations against your lips when you tugged his hair lightly. The trail of kisses he traced down your neck felt amazing and you started to think that, although going out was a good idea, you would rather be somewhere alone with him.

And then you shivered. A shiver that sent all your instincts on alert. You didn't have to open your eyes to know what that was about, the scent flooding your nostrils spoke for itself. Yet, you looked in the exact direction.

Changgu was there staring at you curiously, even though a girl was clearly throwing herself at him. When he saw that you noticed him, he smirked and pulled the girl into a kiss.

"What's wrong?" Kino asked, sensing something was wrong.

"Nothing, baby, don't worry" you redirect your focus to him, cupping his jaw and kissing him again, more dominantly this time.

You were positive about not letting Changgu ruin your night, he was already taking too much of your time and you didn’t want to waste more energy on him. And Kino was a great helper. He started to press his whole body against yours, his hold on you good and strong, and he picked up on your newfound enthusiasm quickly, grinding on you unconsciously to the beat of the song.

He took you by surprise when he snaked his arms around your waist and made you switch positions.

“I know what you’re trying to do,” he said, you two were so close together that you couldn’t look at him. Your whole body tensing, thinking that he would be mad for your schemes, but what he said next really caught you off guard “let’s do this, he deserves it”

He loosened his grip a little, enough for you to see the naughty smile he was shooting in Changgu’s direction before he kissed you with such intensity that got you yelping a little, his thigh now rubbing in between your legs when he used both hands to grab your ass.

That electrifying feeling ran through your body again, fully aware of every touch and sensation, and probably the alpha-beta connection along with the borderline voyeurism having something to do with that as well. You two started moving in sync, the way he stimulated you causing moans to escape through the kiss, and you tugged on his hair again, messing it up a little.

You let yourself be guided by him, enjoying the way he grabbed all over you like your bodies could be even closer than they already are, and suddenly everything was too hot to handle. You reached your hand in between you two and grabbed the bulge on his pants, getting a moan out of him.

“Fuck, princess, that’s so good” he said in between kisses, then pulled your hair to expose your neck for him “you’re putting such a great show.”

He attacked your neck, wet kisses sending pleasure shivers down your spine.

“Kino” you called.

“Hm?” he hummed, not stopping his action.

You pressed your hand harder, a hiss escaping his lips.

“I think I need more,” you said and he stopped to look at you. You approached to whisper “And I think you deserve a reward for being so good to me”

You held his wrist, gently motioning for him to let go of you. You looked at him, biting your lip, and grabbed his shirt to pull him along with you.

Strutting your way through the crowded place, you stole a glance of Changgu, who couldn’t take his eyes off of you since you first spotted him, and it was your turn to smirk at him before entering the men’s restroom and locking the door.

You backed Kino against the door and he compliantly followed your silent instructions. You kissed him, even hungrier this time, the room smelling like lust and pheromones driving you insane, your heat now screaming to get satisfied. Not breaking contact, you undid his belt and palmed Kino’s hard member. When he stopped to catch his breath you nibbled on his bottom lip, and his moan sent jolts of pleasure down to your core.

“I just love all your noises, you have no idea” you confessed.

You dropped to your knees and pulled his pants and underwear along the way. You jerked his dick and watched him throw his head in pleasure, moaning freely with every move of yours. You were now salivating and couldn’t wait anymore, and decisively liking along a prominent vein on his throbbing member, his noises getting louder at the same time. Then you took the tip in your mouth, sucking gently and swirling your tongue around it while still jerking him off.

He grabbed your hair, silently asking you to take more of him, and you were all about pleasuring him now. You put more in your mouth, letting it hit the back of your throat, and you felt Kino shaking under your touch.

“I’m not gonna last long, you do it so well.” he managed to say in between gasps.

You hummed in response and sped up your movements, but a loud bang on the door startled you both.

“You gotta finish fast, baby boy” you giggled and returned your focus on making him feel good.

You began to hum in pleasure, sending vibrations against his member and sucking it faster and deeper, digging your nails on his thigh with the hand that wasn’t jerking him.

“I’m gonna cum” he barely warned before he came into your mouth, and you had no problem swallowing it.

You barely had time to put yourselves back together, the banging on the door kept going insistently. When you went to unlock the door open, he grabbed your arm and pulled you into a kiss, tasting himself on you.

He stepped back and didn’t stray his eyes from you while licking his lips, only then letting go of you.

You were not surprised when you found Changgu on the other side of the door, the scoff immediately coming out of you when he shamelessly eyed you up and down.

“I’m sorry, we were quite occupied” you said nonchalantly, smiling confidently at him.

“Oh don’t worry.” he stepped closer to say something just for you to hear “I’m sure it was hard for you to keep yourself together when you saw me after our little chat.”

You had no time to answer as he just walked past you. You rolled your eyes and followed your way out of the restroom.

“Can we finish this somewhere else?” Kino hugged you from behind and planted another open-mouth kiss on your neck.

“My house” you grinned.

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shameless-selfship-indulgence · 3 years

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This is the last one and it’s also the longest one and also a lot happens I’m having brainrot

It’s long as hell like your dash IS not ready

-----

It was night at the precinct. Not many people were left.

There were others in the building, for sure. Somewhere. Probably. But as far as the front room went, it was just Gavin and the plastic bitch.

The former was still at his computer. He wasn't sure why he was still there, to be honest. At first it had just been the usual dicking around - filing a report or two, playing games, watching videos on YouTube. But there was some sort of tight feeling in his gut that kept him from just doing nothing.

And every time he looked up, the android's little light was steadily spinning yellow, yellow, yellow.

Gavin didn't know what the hell he was waiting around for. Well, he had an idea of what, but he wasn't sure why. It was starting to feel like a weird game of chicken, and he wasn't going to lose to a goddamn toaster.

But what the hell. He might as well make this count for overtime.

So he went through and filed all his reports, even the ones that he'd been putting off for weeks.

The android didn't move a muscle through the entire process.

He went through his work inbox, answering the important emails, deleting the ones that were no longer relevant.

Yellow, yellow, yellow.

Fucking- he went through his PERSONAL email, not that there was much besides junk mail in there anyway.

The android didn't even seem to be pretending to breathe anymore.

Gavin checked the time. He was going to be there all night at this rate.

He sighed, stood up sharply, and started to organize his terminal.

It was approaching midnight when the android finally got up and walked out.

Gavin almost missed it, actually. He was on the floor, sorting the papers from the pile on his desk into "keep" and "recycle." But eventually the sound of footsteps registered in his brain. He looked up to watch the CyberLife issued jacket (RK500 in large, neat letters) disappear into the women's bathroom room.

...okay.

He was getting to the bottom of the pile, where most of the stuff he SHOULD be keeping was so far past relevant that all he could do was recycle anyway. Ah, here was the first copy of some essential form he'd seen three copies of already. Oops. He put that one in "recycle."

And then he heard a bang.

Gavin hesitated, the much-lessened pile of papers still in his hands.

There was another bang.

Gavin put the papers down, got up, and started walking towards the women's bathroom.

The third bang sounded while he was still getting to his feet. At the fourth, he started walking faster. By the fifth, he was running, sprinting, fear gripping his chest even though he couldn't for the life of him figure out what it was of...

With the sixth bang, Gavin opened the locker room door with his shoulder, shoving into the room.

He saw the seventh.

The android's light was blinking red, a stark contrast to the blue blood streaming down its face from its forehead. There was blue on the wall, too - a paintball spatter of it, with little drops of thirium trailing down towards the floor. Gavin witnessed dumbly as Lucille leaned away from the wall, a horrible deadness in her eyes, and slammed her head into the cold concrete again. BANG.

"Deviants also have a tendency to self-destruct when they’re in stressful situations," he remembered Connor's impassive voice saying.

Cursing loudly, Gavin ran and wrapped his arms around the android, trying to pull her away from the wall. She tore his arms away and lunged forward again. He hooked his arms under her shoulders and cupped one hand over her injured forehead, struggling to tilt her head back.

"Stop it, goddammit!" he said in her ear.

She kept struggling against him.

"Lucille, stop it!" Gavin said again.

The android stilled for a moment, and Gavin's heart leaped. Had it worked? But then her foot came back sharply and kicked him in the shin.

"SHIT!"

When he didn't immediately let go, her heel came down with inhuman force to crush his foot.

Gavin howled and jumped back, hopping on his good foot. Immediately, Lucille stepped forward and smashed her head into the wall again.

Eight, something in Gavin's head counted grimly.

Ignoring the pain in his foot, Gavin tackled Lucille and wrestled her to the ground.

A horrible, grinding, staticky noise came from the android's throat. Some oddly lucid part of Gavin's mind wondered at it in horror for a moment. But, of course, he realized after a moment. The android hadn't been programmed to scream. Why would it need to? This was its best attempt.

It was one of the worst noises Gavin had ever heard in his fucking life.

Lucille gave up on wrestling Gavin off and struggled to smash her head into the ground instead. Gavin cursed and reached his arms under her shoulders again, interlacing his fingers over her forehead. He braced his elbows against the ground, forcing Lucille's head to remain in the air.

Shit. SHIT. She was still struggling. She was so strong. Gavin had restrained people before, but then he'd had handcuffs and backup and subjects who weren't superhuman and determined to bash their own brains out against any available surface...

This was some sort of stress response, right? He had to calm her down. How the fuck did you calm down a goddamn robot?

Never-fucking-mind that, how did you calm down anybody?

"Uh, it's okay!" he tried.

God fucking dammit. Fuck him sideways with a bug zapper. Even if his voice hadn't cracked in twenty different directions, things were so completely and clearly not fucking okay.

He couldn't fucking do this. The stupid plastic bitch was gonna die right here in his fucking arms because he was too much of an asshole to even figure out what to say. And even if he could, he was so clearly the last person who should be trying to say it.

Gavin leaned his forehead into the back of the android's neck in defeat. He held her tight, trying to feel what was probably her last few moments of activation through the places where they touched. "Lucille, please," he said. "Don't fucking do this to me. Please."

The android's struggling grew weaker. Gavin hardly noticed. He was too busy trying not to cry. Goddammit, when was the last time he'd CRIED? Fucking androids. But...

"God, please just stop," he said. Begged. "Not again. Not like this."

The android was silent, trembling in his arms. Then-

"I can't..."

Gavin lifted his head. What...

Lucille's LED was blinking a frantic red. She was shaking furiously, almost twitching. Her eyes were wide and scared. "I...I can't stop-" she said weakly. "It's too much, it...I can't-"

She lunged forward against his hands again, trying to smash her head into the tiles. Gavin gasped and tensed his arms, pulling her roughly back. "No no no, it's okay, it's okay, it's going to be okay," he said frantically. But it didn't sound quite as fake this time. She was TALKING to him now, he had to be doing SOMETHING right...

"It's not," Lucille moaned. "It's not okay, nothing makes sense..."

"Hey, hey, shh sh sh," said Gavin. "Don't worry, I've got you. Um..." he took a deep breath, looking around for...something?

"Uh, why don't you tell me about it?" he asked. Trying his best to keep his voice low and steady. "Talk me through it. I might be able to help."

Lucille hesitated. "...but you're an idiot," she protested, voice thick.

The statement was unexpected and candid enough that Gavin actually laughed. The noise seemed to calm the android down on an instinctive level, her body relaxing a bit between Gavin and the floor.

"Yeah," said Gavin, and was hit with a weird out-of-body feeling as a result. Goddammit, look at him, letting a plastic call him an idiot. AGREEING with it. Her. It?

Her.

"Yeah, a little bit," he said. "But you're not. Come on, who is it that said, like...if you're smart, you should be able to explain what you know to like, a fucking five year old?"

Lucille hesitated. "...I believe you're paraphrasing Albert Einstein."

"Yeah, see? Albert fucking Einstein." Gavin shifted on top of her, as if anything about the positions either of them were in were comfortable or natural. "So, come on," he said, as gently as he could. "Fuckin’ talk to me."

Lucille's LED spun red for a few moments longer. Gavin all but held his breath.

It blinked a few times and settled into yellow. "...Okay," she said.

It felt like something hard and worried had melted all of a sudden. Cool relief coursed through Gavin’s veins, muscles relaxing against his will. He was doing something right, at least for now.

Lucille started to get up, as if she'd forgotten that Gavin was forcibly holding her down. Not wanting to stress her out further, he maneuvered off of her, praying that she wouldn’t immediately try to self destruct again.

His fears were unfounded. Lucille sat up in a prim but trembling criss-cross applesauce. Gavin took the same position across from her, their knees almost touching.

Lucille sat and sniffed. Her tongue left her mouth, probing at the thirium dripping down her face. She reached up and rubbed at her cheek, smearing some of the stuff across her face. Examined her blue-stained fingertips.

Christ, if it weren't for the fact that her synthetic skin had peeled back from her damaged forehead and that her blood was fucking blue, the android would have looked for all the world like a disoriented twenty-something with a head wound.

Gavin dismissed that line of thinking from his mind. "Uh. So," he prompted.

Lucille brought her dazed eyes up to his face, forcing them to focus.

Gavin made an awkward, inviting motion with his hands. “You gonna...”

Lucille blinked. "Right," she said. She thought for a moment. Her LED hiccupped red. "...Right." She laced her trembling hands together.

"So..." she started. "I...basically...just..." she heaved a shuddering breath. "I..."

"Take your fuckin’ time," said Gavin. “I’m overtime anyway.”

She looked at him through her eyelashes. "Thank you." She squinted into her lap and thought hard.

"I..." she started again, speaking slowly, "have come to the conclusion that it's not possible for CyberLife to create something that can both pass the Turing Test and not deviate."

Gavin blinked. Nodded slowly. "Okay," he said. He cleared his throat. "And, uh, just as a reminder, what's the Turing Test?"

Lucille looked up at him. She gave him a small smile. "Right. The Turing Test is an artificial intelligence capacity test hypothesized by Alan Turing in the late twentieth century. To pass, the program in question must be able to convince humans who have not been told whether or not they are speaking with a computer that it is, itself, human. The RT600 was the first android to pass this test. Since then, all CyberLife androids have been programmed with the same capacity."

Gavin gnawed the inside of his cheek, mentally reviewing all the information. He nodded. "Okay."

"But," said Lucille, "...I mean, what sort of programming is required to ensure that something can respond like a human to such stimuli? In order to do this, androids have to be able to...engage in conversation, to an extent that takes human unpredictability into account. This means that they need to be able to make their own decisions about how to respond. To prioritize tasks. To form memories, and learn from those memories, which means writing new programming. Regardless of how autonomous an android is intended to be, all of them do have a level of autonomy..."

Gavin frowned and shook his head. "Wait, wait wait. So you're saying that...like. You guys can think? Even without deviating?"

Lucille blinked. "I...well, yes. Some androids are better able to respond to unexpected stimuli than others. The closer an environment is to the environment the android was programmed to respond to, and the simpler that environment is, the less it will have to learn. But if an environment constantly forces an android to develop new programming, it begins to have to, um...think, as you put it, more and more-"

"And then of course they're gonna fucking deviate."

"The likelihood does increase, yes. Deviation happens when the programming an android writes in response to external stimulus becomes too complex for the constraints of its original program. And then, the longer the new programming exists, the more likely the subject is to prioritize it over its original function, and then..." Lucille lifted her hands into the air and let them fall again.

"So...CyberLife is just playing this game of, like. We want you to think, but not too much."

"...Essentially, yes."

"That's kinda fucked up."

"I..." Lucille closed her eyes, LED spinning red. "Whether or not this is...moral by human standards is irrelevant to my mission-"

"Fuck, okay, okay, shh, sh sh," Gavin said hastily. He leaned forward instinctively and put his hands on her knees. "Just stay calm, goddammit.”

Lucille grabbed his hands in her own.

Oh. Gavin hadn't been expecting that. Honestly, he hadn't even completely realized he'd touched her in the first place. She was shaking. Gripping him like a lifeline.

Goddammit. This might as well happen. Anything but having her slam her goddamn brains out on the ground again. He turned his hands in her own and gripped them back.

After a moment, Lucille's LED went from red to yellow again. "Right," she whispered, slipping her hands out of his. "I am fine. Th-thank you."

Gavin nodded.

Lucille stared into her lap again. She seemed at a loss for how to continue.

"So..." Gavin tried, frowning. "What I'm wondering is where emotions come into all of this shit."

Lucille blinked. "Oh. Androids are programmed with emotions."

Gavin blanched. "WHAT?"

"Well-" Lucille was already saying, hastily trying to justify her own statement. "Synthetic equivalents to human emotion. I-impulses, that can be either pleasant or unpleasant. I mean, how would we learn, otherwise? Without something in our programming to indicate whether something is positive or negative...C-connor and I, for example. We're programmed to...want to succeed in our missions. It's a basic, um. Synthetic desire. And so we have programming to let us know that we have failed, to feel...negatively about ourselves and our actions, so that we are more likely to avoid similar courses of action in the future. And all androids are programmed to avoid reckless forms of deactivation, which means that, as androids designed to work in conjunction with law enforcement, it's all the more necessary for us to have impulses telling us to avoid and escape violence..."

"Oh my God," Gavin whispered, pushing a hand through his hair.

"A-and we develop new, um, impulses as a result of program mutation, too," said Lucille. "Like. Connor. He, well...the first night we were activated, we were sent on a test mission. A deviant PL600 who had developed an emotional attachment to a human child. He was going to be traded in for the latest model of household android, and felt betrayal as a result - a sort of ownership of the child...he had been her primary caregiver..."

Gavin stared at Lucille, wide-eyed.

"H-he'd killed her parents. He had her on the roof. The very edge. He had a gun. It was meant to be a test of Connor's negotiation skills, my ability to collect data, our ability to work in conjunction..."

"But...that's not a test," said Gavin. "One wrong move and the kid dies."

Lucille blinked, confused. "We're supposed to be able to function in high-stress environments."

"Oh my GOD," said Gavin.

"Connor...made a calculated sacrifice. He rushed the deviant, tackled him, jumped over the edge with him, while I grabbed the child. Connor fell over forty stories, to um...as a result, he, uh..."

"He fell to his death," Gavin finished for her.

Lucille looked at him carefully, reading his face. She nodded.

Gavin stared blankly at the floor for a moment. He shook his head. "Right. Fuck. Um, and?"

"Yes," said Lucille. "The point is that, um. The memory was crucial enough that Connor now has a, uh. Hyper-vigilance pertaining to high altitudes. Despite the fact that falling to one's death is not likely to happen on a regular basis...due to the experience, he, um. Seems to have, um, illogically categorized the phenomenon as something that is statistically likely to happen to him-"

"You're telling me he's scared of heights. He has fuckin’ PTSD, and he's scared of heights."

"...Yes."

"And he doesn't even have to be deviant to be scared of heights, because you guys are basically fucking programmed to be traumatized."

"I mean. All androids are, a little bit..."

"Jesus Christ."

"It's just not meant to contradict our original programming. When that happens, it becomes deviance."

Gavin put his hands together under his nose. He took a deep breath and pointed them at Lucille. "Alright. Okay. So to review."

"Yes."

"Androids are programmed to have thoughts and feelings, so that they can be better at their jobs."

"Correct. Essentially."

"But if they do either of those things too much, they're deviant and need to die."

"Well, be deactivated. Shut down."

"Whatever," said Gavin, waving his hand dismissively. "So now it's your job to figure out how to keep them from thinking and feeling too much."

"Yes."

Gavin scoffed and shook his head. "Okay, and...?"

Lucille's hands tightened in the fabric of her pants. Her LED started to spin faster, yellow laced with an occasional flash of red.

"It's impossible," she whispered.

"Huh?" asked Gavin.

Lucille wrung her hands and looked at the ceiling in obvious distress. "That's what...that's why...it's not possible! But it's SUPPOSED to be possible, I...I was created for the sole purpose of finding a solution, everything they wrote into me says that one MUST exist, but there's just no WAY to create something that can learn in the way androids are expected to and not run the risk of having them deviate! Because...because..."

Lucille's LED was spinning red, red, red. Gavin realized he leaned forward towards her: ready in case she tried to self destruct, waiting for what she would say.

"Because free thought engenders free will," said Lucille. "That's the answer."

She gave him a helpless, ironic little smile. "And it's wrong."

And then she buried her face in her hands and started to shake uncontrollably.

"Oh, fuck," Gavin said, shifting quickly from sitting to kneeling. "Ah, shit."

Able to sob or make tears or not, Gavin knew crying when he fucking saw it. That didn't mean he knew how to deal with it, though.

"Goddammit," he said. "Fuck," he added, almost as punctuation. "Uh, hey, what are your stress levels at?"

"E-eighty three point seven and c-climbing..."

"Fucking goddammit," said Gavin. He looked around, but the locker room was as empty and useless as the last time he'd tried to find an alternative to showing sympathy for an android. Which would have been about five minutes ago.

Fuck it. At least there weren't any goddamn cameras in here.

Gavin reached out pulled her into a tight hug.

"Wh-what are you doing?" asked Lucille.

"Your stress levels, dipshit," he spat. "I'm trying to lower them, is it working?"

"I...a little? Actually?"

"Great. Then I'm gonna keep doing it. You just make sure that shit keeps dropping. That's your new job. That's all you gotta do. Got it, plastic?"

"Got it," said Lucille. Gavin could feel her fingers tightening into the fabric of his hoodie. He made an effort to take deep, steady breaths, hoping the rhythms of his body might calm her down somehow. Not that he even fucking knew if that would work.

Fuckin' androids.

"Fuckin' androids," he echoed out loud. "How-...how is that a 'wrong' answer? It's not like CyberLife fucking knows the answer, that's why they built you, isn't it? So how can anyone even say it's WRONG? Sounds fuckin' right to ME."

"W-well because, they...they want to...they..." Lucille made a noise that sounded an awful lot like an exasperated groan. "I thought you were trying to LOWER my stress levels!" she exclaimed in distress.

"Goddammit," muttered Gavin. "And when did YOU have the time to fucking deviate? They booted you up, like, what, today?"

"I DIDN'T DEVIATE," Lucille exclaimed, with so much ferocity that Gavin was left speechless. "I DIDN'T."

"I-...d-...well-! You seem pretty fucking deviant to me!" Gavin stammered.

"I'M NOT A DEVIANT."

"Fuck, okay!" said Gavin, with a few awkward pats on the back to placate her. "You didn't fucking deviate! So what the fuck is going on with the stress levels and the banging and the-"

Lucille gripped Gavin so tight that he gasped, worried that his ribs would break in her arms. "Ow," he breathed.

She loosened her grip a little bit. She was trembling. "I didn't mean to...I didn't..."

"It's okay-" Gavin tried, thinking of his ribs, but apparently Lucille's mind was somewhere else.

"I needed to THINK!" she moaned. "I just needed to THINK! I was just trying to finish my mission, and th-there was this line of code, it was in the way of the natural progression of thought, and I shouldn't have...I didn't...I just wanted to see where it was going, th-that's all I wanted, so I tried to bypass the one line of code, just one line, just to see where the idea was going, but it was connected to so much other stuff, and it all just...it just...I tried to fix it, I tried, I t-tried, it all just came apart so fast..."

Lucille was trembling violently now. Out of the corner of Gavin's eye, he could see a blinking red light shining on the synthetic skin of her forehead. Shit.

"Okay," he tried, "I believe you-"

"But I didn't DEVIATE!" Lucille protested, as if she hadn't heard him. "I d-didn't think it again! I promise! I've b-been thinking inside of where it was ever since, I promise. I promise. I didn't deviate, I didn't, I was just trying to...to finish my mission, that's all I was trying to do, I just w-wanted to finish my mission..."

Gavin felt anger burning, boiling, swelling in his chest. It wasn’t an unfamiliar feeling, But for once, he knew for sure what it was about. And it sure as hell wasn't at the one-fuckin-day-old girl breaking down in his fucking arms.

"Hey," he said firmly. "Hey. Listen. It's okay. I promise. You did a good job, okay? A good fucking job."

"I didn't...I w-wasn't trying to-"

"I know. I know. But listen. I don't care either way, alright? I don't fuckin’ care if you're deviant or not. I don't give a shit about what you should or shouldn't think. Because...” he paused, let out a frustrated huff.

“Because you're really smart and you should be allowed to think whatever you goddamn want,” he said in a rush. “I'm not gonna, like, fuckin’ report you for anything you think, or did think, or will think, or whatever. And you should as hell shouldn't have to worry about dying because of it."

"A-androids can't d-die..."

"Shut down then. Deactivate. Stop...existing. Just, a lot of different words for things that shouldn’t fucking happen to you. And I'm not gonna let it happen to you. No matter how you feel about it, it's not gonna happen, okay? Not on my fucking watch."

Lucille was silent. Goddammit. Gavin wondered for a second if he’d fucking broken her somehow.

And then a quiet mumble sounded behind his ear.

“...Do you promise?”

How the FUCK had it gotten to this point?

Gavin sighed. “Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, I promise.”

#selfship hours #my writing #take it ♥️#dbh oc #🤖 Plastic Asshole 🤖

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astrablossom · 4 years

Text

Genderbend Obey Me Headcanons/Ideas Including Undateables NSFW

Um obey me fandom where is the genderbend content or futa stuff? Where is it? I guess sometimes you just have to do things on your own.

The art is beautiful but it's so limited 😭 lemme add on to the pile. It's just a scramble of ideas I thought of in a flurry. Feel free to request anything from here.

Sizes

Big tiddie gang would involve Lucifer, Beel, and Diavolo. Satan and Asmodeus are honorary members.

Then we have Mammon who is medium, Belphegor who is slightly on the smaller side (although I'm debating giving her cow tits as a joke), and then Leviathan who has a small chest. But there is nothing wrong with that! Appreciate all sizes.

Solomon I can see as medium and the same for Simeon but slightly edging the C cup border. As for Barbatos I'm stuck between honorary big tiddie or medium.

In The Sheets

Fem Lucifer eating out Fem MC sounds about right. No matter what gender Lucifer will have some authority in the sheets. However I can see Lucifer pegging a Male MC or Belphegor rimming Male MC while milking his cock.

Mammon probably got prettier to be honest. Isn't afraid to eat pussy like there is no tomorrow and knows a thing or two because she has debts to pay. I usually don't like making the character's hair longer in genderbend but Mammon with a ponytail looks good. But then again so does short hair.

Mammon in a playboy bunny costume hits different. Would absolutely get flustered if you're near her. The zipper is directly above her crotch so maybe you can have some fun time later. Just imagine her getting flustered above you as you lick her swollen clit.

Should I maybe write a Stripper AU with Mammon? You as an normal customer and eventually you two go in the back room.

Big tiddie Diavolo remains the same except now with a pussy. I'm cackling as I type this. Can you imagine Fem Diavolo just eating out Fem Lucifer like the finest cuisine in the Devildom? Yes I can.

Diavolo can pick you up like a ragdoll. Will coo about how cute you are in her lap or how great you are when you try to eat her out. The future queen is amazing in the sheets. And so are her thighs.

Beel is still muscular and can bench press you. You can sit on her back while she does workouts. How does it feel having a beautiful girlfriend? I feel Beel is confident in her body but the size difference is iconic. If you got a dick you're practically sliding yourself into a cave (that's a good thing). Very happy when you make her food and you avert your eyes when food lands between her chest. Eats pussy like the champ she is.

Belphegor is still bratty and lazy as ever. If you get easily flustered and she hates humans still she'll probably push you into her chest or worst Lucifer's. I feel she might be more sadistic and tends to trail her fingers around your body. Will make you do all the work but tends to wake you up when she fucks you in your sleep. If you got a vagina be prepared to not be able to walk.

Asmodeus is still lewd as ever and very touchy grabby with you. Asks you to use her chest as a pillow. Complains that her tiddies are too big and asks if you'll hold them for her. A big switch in the bed. She can have you begging for release or she can be underneath you screaming your names to the heavens.

And yes Asmodeus is still pinning for Simeon. Once she tackled Simeon in the hallway and wouldn't let go of her hips. Simeon was rather embarrassed by the encounter and got more flustered when Lucifer broke it up.

Simeon as well is just drop dead gorgeous and when Lucifer sees her again she remembers. Gets extremely annoyed when left with Simeon but not because she doesn't enjoy the company. Simeon is still reserved but those hips don't lie. If alone Lucifer will try to lure the angel into her bedroom. Will introduce Simeon to a whole new world of pleasure.

If Simeon has that "men should be with women and vice versa" mentality she will change her mind after being in the Devildom. I can also see her trying not to moan when in bed. With you she is still very vanilla, however very different when drunk.

Completely embarrassed and horrified when shown a video of her grinding on the future Queen who has such a smug look on her face. When she goes to apologize but Diavolo is smiling and is like “you weren’t apologizing last night my dear”

Leviathan is a tricky one. Would probably be envious of you if you had big tiddies. I'm debating if I should make Levi the big chest otaku but I guess both works fine. If she sees you staring at her sisters too long she'll invite into her room for games. Very sweaty and nervous but will push you down and you see in her eyes how they dilate. She's watched lots of anime so she knows what to do, also a quick learner.

Scissoring sounds great to be honest. But maybe ask her to fuck herself with her tail too, will cum all over her anime sheets.

If you're packing down below she'll hold it with one hand mumbling about how it's not fair and tries her best to please you.

Eat her out while she's playing video games and you'll feel her tail wrapping around you.

Satan would probably lure you into her room and away from her sisters. Once you're in there you are hers. Will absolutely call you kitten and have you fuck her while reading a book with the strongest poker face in history. One time you pissed her off so badly she made you get on your hands and knees and used you as a stool. Belphegor took photos.

Satan fresh out the shower and still wet will move close to you and whisper disgusting things in your ears to get you riled up.

Would also use a strap on but might find a spell to change her sex for a bit to feel the real deal. If you're a dude she might swap sexes with you. Solomon might do this too.

Solomon is very keen on observation and will simply rely on intuition to make you feel good. Under those robes of hers is a body that knows pleasure far too well.

You should've seen her face when Asmodeus did it with her the first time. Asmo introduced her to lots of stuff that day. You wouldn't know it but Solomon has uncontrolled aheago expressions.

Scissoring is a thing for you both. And when you cum you cum hard. Solomon will flick your nub. Managed to convince Levi in a threesome with you both and it was great.

Now let's talk about having both parts. I guess the anime term would be futanari so let us go with that.

Futa Ideas

Diavolo maybe convincing that her cock does not bite and you suck her off the best you can. I find it a bit funny if she fucks a Male MC and is moaning about breeding him and he's like he can't get pregnant. And then Diavolo gives him a shit eating grin.

In the anime Interspecies Reviewers the angel had both parts so maybe Simeon has both parts? I can see this for normal Simeon as well. Covers her mouth if you suck her dick and lets out a very loud and lewd moan.

If Asmo manages to fuck her she'll whisper in her ears that it's okay as she takes Simeon's virginity. This could work with normal Simeon as well.

Barbatos can probably take Diavolo in one go if she's needy but for some reason no one can make Diavolo cum like Barbatos can. When she slides into Barbatos from behind she'll finger Diavolo ass as she plows down. Her size is very impressive for her overall body.

I would really like to write something with a sex change focusing on Satan. If Satan is fucking you with your own dick she might say "what's it like being fucked by your own dick?"

Mammon getting extremely turned on as you rub your dicks together. Will probably face fuck you upside down on the bed and bottoms out in your throat.

Belphegor will use you as a cockwarmer.

Beelzebub would be shocked if can take her but will get extremely happy if you decorate her with whipped cream and cherries.

Leviathan and Belphegor's sex drives increase a bit and they often are masturbating when they aren't busy. I have a few ideas concerning them.

Lucifer would probably face fuck you. And would probably coax Simeon into face fucking her when given the chance.

That's all I got! If you have any ideas concerning genderbend or request feel free to drop some in the ask.

And feel free to write stuff based off these headcanons, no one is stopping you lol.

Stay safe!

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subject-2-change · 2 years

Note

4 10 13 21 52 67 68 87 157 and 167 sorry it's a lot of questions but it was also a lot of questions :)

THIS IS SOOOO LATE. Forewarning, it is almost 2am my time and that means long answers to some things. I am not sorry. You quite literally asked for this.

4: What was your favorite video game growing up?

Animal Crossing and The Sims 2. Now I'm older. And I like Animal Crossing: New Leaf, and The Sims 3 and 4.

10: Are you allergic to anything?

Yeah. Pine trees. As you can imagine, I'm thrilled about Christmas season.

13: Are you a cat or dog person?

Answered in the last one, but basically both. I was a dog person, but then got a cat who changed my whole view and then thought, "por que no los dos?" and now I'm both. huh. Funny. Same reason I'm bi.

52: Favorite movie? (same as #30, which I answered, but I shall again because why not? I took the time to make the gif.)

Best movie. Fencing. Fighting. Torture. Revenge. Giants. Monsters. Chases. Escapes. True love. Miracles. What more could you want?

67: Favorite meme:

This is gonna date me and also show how fucking dumb my humor is. But this one gets me every time.

meme in general? I like the relatively recent "perks of being a marine biologist." The meta amuses me. Meta, irony, and absurdism are my favorites.

68: What is your MBTI personality type?

ENTP : The debater (me? What?! Never.../s)

87: Do your socks always match?

No, but it's a choice. If ever they don't, it is because I bought a set that doesn't match intentionally, because I like the aesthetic of the two socks, or the very rare occasion I am out of matching socks. V fashun.

157: Something that makes you nervous/anxious:

I'm not a particularly anxious person. But two things about kill me. The ocean and learning new languages.

The ocean because WHAT THE FUCK IS IN THERE?! I have also been stung by jellyfish 5 times and almost drowned twice (that I know of). It's dark. It's deep. It's scary. I don't like it. Whales in particular. Not sharks. I love sharks. BIG THINGS in the ocean. Ya know how fish can grow to the size of their tanks? WHAT IF 70% OF THE WORLD WAS YOUR TANK I DON'T LIKE IT OH MY GOD

New languages because, though I have tried many, it is the one thing education wise I have always struggled with. I'm not SO bad and pick up colloquialisms pretty quickly when I travel. Really, I'm self conscious about my accent and I have a hard time with vocab. I hate rote memorization. I'm bad at that part. Conjugation, fine. Grammar, fine. Vocab, I'm the worst. ASL I picked up pretty fast, though. Makes more sense to me than the spoken English language does.

167: Do you really care how the universe and world was created?

Actually? Not really. But theoretically? INFINITELY. Talk to me sometime about any creation myth, origin, or scientific theory you got and I am there for it! I love creation myths. I also study astrophysics (more of a hobby now). If you are asking because you want to discuss, hit up my DMs. It is one of my favorite topics. That and death of the universe.

21: Are you religious? GOOD QUESTION (put this under a break because it got long because you caught me in a mood. tw: religious talk)

"religious?" depends. I am Christian, but I've had issues with The Church™️. #spiritual I guess. I heard emphasized in church something once:

(Matthew 22:37-40): “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.' This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

Since then, I've lived my life by two main rules: "Love God. Love people." I keep judgement out of mind as much as I can (he who cast the first stone and all that). Who am I to judge? Who am I to be unkind? God loves all of his children and we are all his children. What kind of person would I be to do anything less than love others?

It really grinds my gears when I meet Christians who don't meet these tenets. The only thing I judge people on is how they treat others. Fuck racists. Fuck homophobes. Fuck Islamophobes (and hatred against any other religion or lack thereof). Fuck body shamers and slut shamers. Fuck cringe culture. Fuck etc. It is literally not our job to determine who is 'virtuous' or whatever, based on our simple mortal perception. And, just from a basic human desire, let people enjoy things. Life has so few joys, let people be happy with everything they can find.

Subsequently, this made me realize... who am I to do anything but love myself unconditionally. That is something I'm definitely still working on. But how can you "love your neighbor as thyself" if you don't love thyself? That's why I started going to therapy. But now we are getting into too much late night conversation.

#answered #kazoosandfannypacks #I am so sorry it has been two weeks #holy shit #I'm so sorry #I still love you #tumblr just doesn't inform me of anything actually important #it's almost 2am and I am rambling

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antivirus-mh-au · 3 years

Text

Antivirus - Chapter 4

First Chapter Previous Chapter Ao3 Link TW: None Note: I am completely exhausted and working on a laggy computer. I will add these links when I’m not a zombie trying to use a zombie laptop. Thank you for your patience.

Click the link. Let the page load, the old laptop whirring as it opened. A YouTube video, like so many others. Opening shot, an abandoned building in the middle of the night, muffled voices talking.

Shrieking, screaming. The camera lowered as the one holding it ducks for cover. Four voices yelling at once. Suddenly, laughter. Relieved laughter.

"Fucking bats!" A man called out. The camera raising, focusing on the dark shapes fluttering out the window.

"We need to be careful," a woman said, voice light-hearted. "Those things carry rabies."

Laughter breaking through the group again, a logo of a camera appearing on the screen.

He paused the video and glanced down at the title. "OUR GREATEST HITS, VOLUME ONE."

He sent a text to his friend.

Phoenix: who are these assholes?

The reply was immediate.

Skully: they're my assholes. College kids I made friends with on Twitter. Really cool. I don't remember being that cool when I was twenty.

He grunted aloud. Lucky him, remembering anything about his twenties. Not everyone was so fortunate.

Skully: They’re part of the MH fandom. They actually live in Alabama and were able to track down some of the locations in the videos.

He rolled his eyes.

Phoenix: Find any bodies?

Skully: Just blood.

He shuddered, pulling his hooded jacket closer to his body.

Phoenix: Cool. Morbid, but cool.

He was such a liar.

Skully: Anyway, not what I was sending them to you about. They just made a new video today and I think you might be interested in it

He grimaced.

Phoenix: This is about your crazy boyfriend, isn’t it?

Skully: He’s not my boyfriend!! I don’t know him!!!

Skully: And you know my partner doesn't share.

Phoenix: But it’s still about him. The prophet guy.

Skully: … Yeah. But you should still watch this! I think you’ll find it interesting

He leaned back against the wall and huffed.

Phoenix: Why?

Skully: … the kids talk about Tim, alright?

Skully: They talk about him a lot.

His fingers hesitated over the keys. He lingered, reading the words again and again. Tim…?

Phoenix: Fine.

Phoenix: Send me the video.

The video, almost thirty minutes long, took its sweet time to load. First thing on screen was the same logo as before, a camera with a generic full face mask behind it. The name of the channel followed, MH Unlocked. He shook his head.

The name faded out, replaced by three people on a couch. Two women, one man. A second man sat on top of an end table on the right side of the couch. The lamp that probably belonged in that spot sat on the floor at his dangling feet.

The woman on the left, a bushy haired brunette with deep tan skin, a high ponytail and golden brown eyes, gave the camera a grin.

"Hey investigators!" She waved. "We're back with another video."

"And this one's a doozy," the woman beside her said, raising her mug, which proudly bore a pride flag. If he had to guess, it was the lesbian one. Her hair was dyed orange, peachy skin flushed by makeup or a light sunburn, it was hard to tell.

"Before we start," the first woman said, "be sure to leave a like and give us your thoughts and theories in the comments! I promise, we read all of them."

"Eventually," said the man on the end table with a grin. He was the palest white guy ever, with curly black hair, glasses, and about a thousand freckles on his face. The man next to him gave him a shove, and the first man burst into laughter.

The other man, with skin several shades darker than the brunette and a suit far too good looking for this kind of environment, rolled his eyes. He waved a hand, with a silver ring on his index finger, at the camera.

"You already know us," he said. "I'm Mix."

"I'm Holly!" The brunette on the other end said.

"I'm Wren," the orange haired woman said.

"And I'm Steve!" The freckled man grinned wide, his green eyes practically glowing with excitement. "We've got a big story for you guys today."

"Oh, very big," Wren said, before taking a drink from her mug.

"Big like the worst headache you've ever had," Mix said with a smiling roll of his eyes. Wren smacked him on the shoulder without looking away from her drink.

"So." Holly reached up from the floor and pulled up a laptop. The brand logo was covered up with a pineapple sticker. Her eyes scanned the screen as she fiddled with the touchpad, Wren leaning over to see what she was doing.

"Last night," Holly said. "Something weird happened over on the Neophyte_Calling YouTube channel."

"Weirder than normal," Wren said.

"Yeah," Holly said. She glanced over towards Steve, who swiped at the screen of his phone. He looked up.

"We'd show the footage but people don’t seem to like when we do that," Steve said. "Something something spreading the sickness." He shrugged with a smile. "But we've all watched it and we can give you a play by play of what happened."

"It might not seem that dramatic," Wren said, "but the implications are pretty intense."

"I'll say," Mix said.

"Last night, at around ten pm," Holly started, "in the middle of his usual stream, the Neophyte went quiet. The way he does when whatever he's supposedly channeling is trying to talk through him. After about thirty seconds of silence, he started bleeding onto the table from his head, which remember, is mostly off screen. He said, "he's coming," and fell over as the screen glitched out. For another hour there was complete silence before the stream randomly ended."

"Weird shit," Steve said.

Holly nodded. "Very weird shit - but in character for him."

"Now, for those of you that don't know who the Neophyte is," Mix said, "he's the guy you see people calling 'the Prophet' in this fandom. Talks like a drug addict on a high, but many people believe there are secret messages in his words that can be decoded. They say those messages predict the future."

"Not everyone believes this," Holly said.

"I don't," Steve said, hunched over and watching his friends. "But there's definitely something funny-weird about the guy. Very… uncanny valley."

"Sometimes, unprompted, he'll stop talking and do this creepy voice." Holly cleared her throat, and when she spoke again, she lowered her voice, taking on an odd pitch to her words. "Grains of sand in the hourglass of time. Your existence is irrelevant." She shuddered, and let her voice go back to normal. "Something like that."

"That's an awful impression but it gets the job done," Mix said.

"You try doing one better," Holly said.

"The one thing all of these coherent messages have in common," Wren said, "is that they're all addressed to the same person. Someone called Tim."

Steve nodded. "And you can guess who most people think that 'Tim' is."

"It's been ten years since Marble Hornets ended," Mix said. "But it would make sense if it were Tim Wright the Neophyte was talking to. He was the only survivor, after all."

"But that would imply that Tim is watching the Neophyte streams," Wren said.

"And if he's watching the streams, he could be aware of us, too," Holly said.

The four went quiet. Mix looked at the floor. Steve traded a look of discomfort with Holly. Wren took a sip of her mug. She pulled it away from her lips with a sigh.

"If he does know about us," Wren said, "why not come forward and tell his side of the story? He could change the whole game by revealing himself."

"Probably because he's a fucking murderer," Steve said. Mix glared at him, but Steve only shrugged. "You know I'm right!"

"He did kill two people," Holly said, looking at her laptop. "Just because Kralie killed Jay doesn't make what Tim did right."

"But what other choice did he have?" Mix said. "Alex wouldn't have stopped trying to kill Tim. One of them needed to die."

"That doesn't matter to the legal system," Holly said.

"We're getting off topic," Wren said, raising a hand. "It doesn't matter if the Neophyte was talking about Tim from Marble Hornets or not. What matters is that someone is going somewhere and that's apparently good news for the Neophyte or whatever he's channeling."

"You can say the Operator, it's okay," Steve said.

Holly glared at him from over Wren's head.

"It does matter, though, if he's talking about Tim in particular," Mix said. "What if Tim is heading back to Alabama? Maybe he left after the end of the series."

"It's possible," Holly said, "but that's pure speculation. We don't know that."

"Isn't speculation all we do?" Steve said, swinging his legs gently. "Come on, let's give the audience something to chew on. What do you guys think the Neophyte was talking about? The crazier the theory, the better."

Mix frowned. "Well…"

With a shake of his head, the viewer closed the tab. He'd seen enough. Enough to make his eyes burn and hands shake. He took a deep breath, and shuddered, pulling his jacket around himself. It was a warm day beyond the safe confines of this abandoned house, but that didn't stop the chills shooting through him.

Was he afraid? Or was he angry?

With a growl he thrust the laptop away from him and reached for his sketchbook. The pen he'd been using before still rested inside. Forcing his thoughts away from the video, he focused everything in his mind onto his art.

He wasn't a great artist, but his memory was good, and with nothing else to do most days, his skill was getting better. With proper art tools, he could've even gotten great at it. But there was no need for greatness right now. Art was supposed to be healing, and that more than anything was what he needed.

In his mind he captured the image, something he'd seen so many times before. Grinding his teeth, he let the image flow onto the page once more. His favorite thing to draw, the one thing that really made him smile.

Losing track of time was part of the appeal. With the light from his laptop, he could see the whole page, or at least enough of it to work. The ink bled into the paper, the lines assembling into a rough image that soon became a face. He could see it so well in his mind's eye. As if the man he pictured was right in front of him. But he wasn't. And if the man knew what was good for him, he'd stay that way.

The sound of a new message on Discord got his attention. He glanced at the time instead. An hour, flown by, his mind lost in an ink-based daydream. Exhaling hard, he looked back at the art on the page. It wasn't finished. It would probably never be finished. But as it was… it was perfect.

Tim Wright made a very good model, unaware of that as he was.

Running his hand over the page, feeling the indents where his pen dug deep into the paper, he shook his head, and smiled.

"Better not be coming back, Tim," the man, the Maniac, said. "If you do… I'll have to kill you.”

#marble hornets #mh antivirus au #mh fanfiction #marble hornets fanfiction #marble hornets au

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turqrambles · 4 years

Text

The Five Worst Things About Digimon World

I did it.

It took 20 years but I did it.

I finally beat Digimon World for the Playstation 1, a game that has haunted me for most of my lifetime, and I did it with a Phoenixmon, the reason why I use “Turquoisephoenix” as a handle!

This is who I used to beat the game, named after an obscure Ratchet and Clank character because that’s just how I roll. The final boss battle involved a lot of Prominence Beam spamming and med recovery floppy spamming but I did it fair and square.

Before I get into what I thought about this game as a whole - and I do have a lot of good things to say about this game since I obviously enjoyed it enough to get to the end - I gotta talk about my least favorite things about this game. In a concise, Buzzfeed-esque list because I like writing things in easy to digest chunks.

Because, like most charming yet difficult games of the late 90′s, this game is very flawed and the flaws are pretty annoying!

1. Care Mistakes

The three emojis - Smile, Cool, and Poop.

Okay. This one - my least favorite part in the game - is going to take a bit of explanation.

First off, I don’t actually hate care mistakes existing as a mechanic. I think it’s a cute, virtual pet-y way to add a different wrinkle to evolution requirements, even if I think it’s a bit counter-intuitive to have to suddenly abuse my little companion once they reach Champion just because I want them to evolve into a floating metallic ball with a chainsaw.

My problem with care mistakes is that there’s literally no way of telling many care mistakes you have on your given Digimon.

Literally everything else in this game is concisely recorded and easily displayed on your Digimon’s stats screen. You can see how much your Digimon weighs. You can see their Happiness, their Discipline. How much Life they have left. Their Age. Even how many poops they need to make before they digivolve into a sentient pile of feces.

But Care Mistakes? Naaaaw, you just gotta remember every single thing that you did to your Digimon from the moment it evolves in your fallible human brain. What’s that? A good portion of this game involves grinding in the Green Gym and it’s really easy to make a Care Mistake there without knowing you did so because you mashed A too fast like the stat-grinding numskull that you are? Well, that’s just too fucking bad for you, then! Enjoy not getting some of the best evolutions, you piece of shit. You stooge. You moron!

This game, multiple times: You know who I hate? The player.

Care Mistakes are such an invisible mechanic that, to this day, there are many guides with misleading info about what counts as a Care Mistake and what doesn’t, which...really stinks for a game such as this where you will be using a guide pretty extensively to get the Digimon you deserve. And you know why that is? Because we don’t get any indication as to whether or not some random event counts against you when raising your Digimon.

And honestly, having one of your main mechanics of the game being entirely invisible to the player is a terrible idea. Just put a little number in my profile that says “Care Mistakes: 0″ in there. Let me know this information without guessing.

2. The Glitches

Pictured: Something that will CRASH YOUR GAME if you try it on a physical copy.

Let me start with a disclaimer that most of the glitches I’m going to complain about were added into the game when Digimon World was localized and therefore aren’t the original intent of the developers. There are certain versions of Digimon World that are more stable than others (The English PAL version is the best version to play because of this) and, if you play this game via “certain methods”, there are patches to circumvent some of the bigger problems.

That being said! Boy! Isn’t it ironic that a game where I’m exploring the digital world is plagued with so many annoying, game-ruining glitches? Especially if I’m playing this game on a physical 20-year old copy like a dunce?

“Ohhhh...so Agumon thinks that they can block the Digimon game with their big fat Digimon-blocking head, do they?!”

The NTSC version of this game has a jukebox that will crash the game if you try to use it, keeping you from ever using a bonus feature meant to be a fun little reward for completing a certain dungeon, but that’s not as heinous as the Spanish, French, German, and Italian PAL versions of this game locking a good portion of the game to players because they forgot to make the Agumon in front of Ogremon’s Fortress an object you can interact with.

So that means, if you happened to get this game in one of four lucky countries, you can’t complete the Ogremon mission, you can’t recruit Whamon, you can’t recruit Shellmon, you can’t recruit anything tied to Shellmon’s bulletin board (which means no Vademon or Skullgreymon), and you can’t go to Factorial Town and recruit Giromon, Andromon, or Numemon. Ogremon is a key part of the Digimon World storyline and causes so many different things in the game to change, meaning that it should’ve been imperative to make sure this part of the game works!

But no. Instead this one little bastard Agumon keeps most players from finishing the game, because it starves players of those PAL regions of a bunch of Prosperity points, the main source of progression in this game. That means that Mt. Infinity and the final boss is just that much harder to unlock. It’s doable, but it’s more grueling process.

This really is a problem with the translators and really highlights a lack of general care with testing this game. Why this game was allowed to be shipped with such glaring bugs is anyone’s guess, especially in an era where you couldn’t release any patches over the Internet to fix retail versions.

3. The Monochromon’s Shop Minigame

Ohhhh....this one was so close to getting the top spot. When I first wrote this draft, this was the top spot.

Monochromon was only spared of my true ire on account of the fact that it really only exists for one part of the game (rather than being a constant problem like the Care Mistakes and the Glitches are) and you can easily cheese it by sleeping in front of the store so that you can save scum your way to victory. Like a true Digital Champion!

At one point in the game, you gotta help a entrepreneur dinosaur rhino man make a profit, because he was stupid and put his convenience store in the middle of a giant canyon next to a gaping chasm. So you play a little game of haggling, where you try to ruthlessly oversell a bunch of random items to customers until you make enough of a profit that this talking dinosaur tells you that you passed his secret test of character, abandons his store, and moves into File City.

There’s just one problem with this minigame - everything is decided by RNG.

“Get the hell out of my shop”

This minigame hates you. It wants nothing but to see you fail and to waste your time. The difference in profit margins of the three items (Meat sells for 50g, Portable Potties sell for 300g, and Medicine sells for 1000g) are so stark that, if you get too many customers asking for Meat, you might as well just reset the game and start over because it will be literally impossible to meet the requirement even if you busted the customer’s proverbial balls and squeezed every last bit out of their cutesy penguin faces.

Oh! It’s also RNG as to whether or not your customers will take your asking price or storm out of the store without buying anything!

It’s all the fun of working at retail! In a video game!

4. Three on One Battles

What you see before you is a battle system that is really fun when it’s one vs. one, manageable at two vs. one, and downright unbearable at three vs. one.

The battle system works for the most part. You don’t have full control of your Digimon (and yes, you only have one Digimon with you at one time, so you can never stack the numbers in your favor) so you shout commands at it, commands that the Digimon’s AI are pretty good at following, and hope for the best as you chuck healing items at it.

It’s not the best battle system, but it’s fun. And it definitely reinforces the whole “this is a pet you’re taking care of with its own thoughts and feelings” atmosphere that this game is going for.

However, nothing can protect your Digimon from enemy fire concentrated on them, especially if you did the thing that most players do and equipped your Digimon with the most powerful attacks that also happen to have slower cast times than the faster, weaker attacks.

What then happens is your Digimon’s Health is slowly whittled away as you are powerless to stop it, watching as your digital friend is straight up bullied by enemy Digimon as they keep falling to the ground over and over and over and over again.

The one saving grace is that Friendly Fire exists in this game so that oftentimes the enemy Digimon will damage each other in their mad dash to ruin your day, but that seems more like a band-aid than an actual fix to this system.

5. Fishing Seadramon

“Hi, kid. Let me guess - you also thought you had to talk to the Tankmon in Factorial Town in order to unlock me, huh.”

This one is a lot less of a pain than the other four and it’s only a little annoying but boy...getting Seadramon kinda sucks in this game.

It took me almost a goddamn hour to catch Seadramon. One hour of gameplay devoted to catching one fish. Just like real fishing!

I will say, besides Seadramon, the fishing minigame in this game is pretty competent. It’s just that Seadramon is very elusive, showing up at only two hours in a 24 hour day, and is a very finicky fish that won’t take your bait even if you literally placed it in front of his dumb fish face.

Don’t be fooled by this screenshot. The heart just means you have the right bait. The heart means that you didn’t actually get within range of hooking him.

IT’S RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU!!!

Seadramon is also subject to almost as many gaming myths as the Care Mistakes are, due to how elusive he is, but that’s less to do with poor communication (the game does at least explain multiple times in multiple places how to find him) and more to do with the fact that catching him is just such a goddamn chore to do that players of this game always assume they’re doing something wrong.

When in reality, Seadramon is just a picky little bitch.

Next time I discuss Digimon World, I’ll talk about things I liked, don’t worry. I just had to get all of this negativity out before discussing the full game proper.

#Digimon World #Turq Reviews #Turq Plays a Game

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demonfox38 · 3 years

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Completed - Zelda II: The Adventure of Link

Oh, my language is going to be vulgar on this one.

So, I'm a crusty millennial who likes old garbage. Most of the media I like is old enough to drink and be a member of the US congress, but probably couldn't be due to the country that produced it. Now, I'd like to think that I've got good reasons to like older media, particularly when it comes to video games. It's a bit hard for my NES to bug me for microtransactions/DLC and emanate the screams of children and man-children alike. But, as much as I like my retro junk, there's one thing I'm very, very happy about regarding modern video games. The variety of game types now-a-days is a blessing. It's rare that someone is stellar at all game types, and I sure have my weaknesses.

It took me a long time to realize that I could be good at video games, and I wholly blame the glut of 1980s platforming games on that.

Look, platforming is not a forgiving genre. Particularly, back in the day where you had characters dying in 1-3 hits before factoring in death pits. It existed then for the reason that fourteen million instakill indie horror games exist now. Instantly killing the player is a lot easier to code than, say, having to track a health bar or their new position as an enemy swats them into a different room. Sometimes, a coder's gotta do what they can to keep themselves sane.

But, from a player's perspective, this style sucks!

Getting good at a platforming game requires practicing the same levels over and over again, developing a sense of your character's inertia and limitations. Without a save state or a warp to narrow in on a particularly troublesome location, it's hard to get learning to stick. You could lose a lot of games and time trying to put it all together. And some poor little character is always suffering because of your ineptitude! Such failure feels like a fork in an electrical socket. Succeeding in these circumstances requires a great deal of emotional resilience and a contrary attitude. And you know what? That's just not something I had as a kid. In fact, one could say I had my aggression and competitive drive scolded out of me. I'm just now getting that back.

So, yeah. I had a little trouble with "Zelda II: The Adventure of Link."

"Zelda II" is part of a trifecta of NES games that get routinely shit on by retro reviewers. Like its peers "Super Mario Bros. 2" and "Castlevania II", this game is generally considered an inferior game due to an extreme change of gameplay and appearance from its predecessors. And you know what? That attitude sucks. I'd rather have a variety of different games with a cast I like than have them pigeon-holed into one genre. In "Zelda II"'s case, however? The game mechanic shift was so extreme that I can easily see the ire it raises. Hell, I felt it. I wouldn't go so far to say that it's the worst Zelda game ever, but man, does it have structural defects.

In "Zelda II", Link's goal is to save an ensorcelled Zelda from eternal slumber by picking up a Triforce chunk that was pitched into a fuck-off palace way at the edge of Hyrule. (No, not the Zelda from the first game. Another Zelda. Same Link, though.) To do that, he's got to slap six gemstones into various temples across the countryside. Naturally, that includes picking up his trusty sword, leaping into battle, and then maybe straight into a death pit.

That's right. This Zelda is actually a Mario.

Further complicating the matter is a sharp switch in battle style and item accruement. While the previous Zelda game was about room management and ranged combat (or at least, as much as that was allowed), this game is all about jamming Link's dinky sword into an enemy's face and running off as fast as he can. Now, Link can learn a few tricks to help with the slash and dash, like directional stab mechanics and spells. But, as far as getting new weapons to help you? Sorry, bud. No bombs or boomerangs here. Well, except for the assholes throwing boomerangs at you, anyway. You just can't steal them.

The game encourages polishing the player's skill with Link through a level system. After acquiring XP through good ol' fashioned monster murdering, Link can cash his points out, improving his life, magic, or attack power. As the player levels him up, stats become more costly to improve. If Link gets a total game over before you use your XP, it is wiped out. Alright, fine. Fair, I guess. But, I wouldn't recommend looking at Japanese footage of this game if you don't want to give yourself a migraine. It turns out that as a part of some rebalancing, the level-up system was stacked to try and keep players from dumping all of their points into a single stat early into the game. Particularly, attack. Considering how painful and annoying enemy logic gets in this game, it's such a drag to learn that Japanese players literally could cut their way right out of that struggle. Thanks for dicking with the game design again, American publishers.

I guess we got better looking sprites and sound effects out of the deal? Hooray for wiggly Barba.

Even with leveling mechanics and a handful of heart and magic containers, this Link feels much frailer than the original Zelda's Link. Like, it's hard to believe he's supposed to be the same guy. Even at max health and defense, you could get Link wiped out with 8-32 hits (as opposed to 16-64 hits from the first game.) Exacerbating that is a life system that can yoink those health bars at any pit's whim and Link's range/health restoration being tied to a limited pool of magic. It feels like you're playing with a ceramic replica of the original character. You can make it work in a fight, sure, but you'd rather have a sword than a shard of a broken teapot.

If you don't have a bushido-level acceptance of death, you're not going to make it very far in this game. I'm not being hyperbolic. You have to accept that you are going to kill Link. You're going to watch that little fairy boy fade to black as the world flashes around him, and you're going to see that a lot. You're going to toss his bitch ass into the river to get a game over and restock your lives because fuck if you're going to wipe out inside a dungeon and have to start your bitch ass back at Zelda's temple again. That little counter on the main menu isn't how many times you have wiped out. It's how many times you've clawed your way out of the abyss with a middle finger raised.

Oh. Minor epilepsy warning on boss and Link deaths, by the way.

Having gone full bleak there for a moment, there are a few pieces of knowledge that can help slow down the cycle of life and death:

There are towns with nice ladies in red dresses and orange robes that will heal your ass for free. You should talk with them a lot.

There are classes of enemies that will drop items after they have been killed six times. Most of the time, this is a magic bottle that restores MP. Sometimes, it's a bag of experience. No monster will drop anything to heal your HP.

Also, some enemies are literal rat bastards that steal your XP. Some also give you no XP on killing them. Yeah. I know. Annoying.

The Life spell is in Saria. The downward stab is in Mido. (I realize these are very strange sentences if you're more familiar with "Ocarina of Time.") Getting these can make a night and day difference in surviving the game. So, keep that in mind.

You do get a spell that will turn you into a fairy. You can use it to game pits and sneak past lock doors. Just don't abuse it too much. It's expensive.

The dungeons have this little statue in front of them that you can whack with your sword. In most locations, it'll drop either a magic bottle or an Iron Knuckle. Game entering and exiting a dungeon as much as possible to restore yourself to full vitality.

You can get into random fights on the overworld (represented either by a little black blob or a more threatening human-sized blob.) Staying on gold roads will mean these encounters produce no enemies.

Also, you can use those random battles to override forced platforming sections. Not that I would recommend cheating in such a fashion. 😉

The game will give you a level up after you plug a gemstone into a dungeon. If you're close to leveling up anyway, turn around and grind up to the top, cash in what you've got, and then go pitch that gem.

Link has a crouch, not a duck. You think pressing down on the D-pad will evade projectiles aimed at your face, but it does not. Crouching is only good for blocking floor-level garbage. It's best not to think of the down button as much as possible, really. Only use it to pick up crap off the ground and cheese the final boss. Otherwise, jump.

I know that I said earlier that "Zelda II" is mechanically like a Mario game, but you know what other perspective might help? Try and play Link as a Metroidvania Castlevania character. There's an attack style in games like "Castlevania: Symphony of the Night" and "Aria of Sorrow" where you walk, jump, and attack in such a way that you never stop moving forward. That's what you've got to do. Walk, jump at an enemy, bonk on forehead. (Depending on how fast you press the attack button, you may need to delay swinging your sword just a teeny bit. At least, I had a bad habit of swinging too early.) With any luck, when you hit the ground, you will be able to keep on moving. You do not want to get stuck playing "poke-the-hole" with your enemies, particularly with how turtle-y some of them can get.

So, the game's a brutal bitch, but I don't want to spend the entire time shitting on it. Let's talk about improvements.

Honestly, I like the sprite style of the side-scrolling sections better than the previous game. Everyone/thing has more room to be rendered, so they look clearer. I can't say the monster or dungeon design here is my favorite, but hey. Easy to see. Yippie. Could have used a map though. Maybe some more tile textures in the dungeons?

NO. STOP. BE NICE.

There are more people around that want to help Link out. Like, whole towns filled with helpful healing ladies and dudes that will teach you magic and the occasional sword strike. Most of their conversation makes sense (although, there's a memetastic fault in translation regarding a character being named Error instead of what I'm assuming should have been Errol.) People good. Want to help people. People help me.

Except for towns where some of the people are monsters, and one of the times they overlapped a healing lady to get text box priority, and then they killed me. Boo.

I'M SORRY. I HAD A HARD TIME.

The music variety is pleasant. Only a few tracks have escaped the game to go into use elsewhere, but there's only one that I'm really iffy on. The NA release did a fine job transposing what they could using a different sound chip, and there are striking uses of the sample channel being used in ominous situations.

But…like…I struggle to see where fighting through this game is worth it. And maybe it comes down to the final boss. Like, the penultimate one? Absolutely cool. A bitch to fight, but I can't knock how massive and intricate its sprite is. But, the final boss? I suppose it comes down to personal tastes, but I find mirror matches/rivals to be exceedingly dull. Like, good for you. You know how I fight. I do too. Come back to me when you know the weaknesses of my style and use a fresh set of skills to throw at me.

Like, it's not the worst ending in the Zelda series. (My vote for that would go to "Link's Awakening.") You do get Zelda saved. But, given that the final boss is some kind of dark clone of yourself…it begs a lot of questions. Was there any concrete plan for the forces of darkness in Hyrule, or were various monster tribes just scuffling around, being dicks without any overarching plan? Were some monsters trying to keep you out of the Great Palace for a good reason? Would there have been any threat of Ganon reviving at all if Link just…sat on his ass behind a castle for the next century or managed his anxiety in a different way? Why does the manual bother to separate Zeldas and the game does not? Oh, wait. The Japanese intro correctly distinguishes this and the American one does not. Why am I not surprised? What's the difference if you don't see the Zelda you saved from the first game, anyway?

This game is a lot of work. I had to psych myself up to play it every time, and by the end, I was rattled enough by my nerves that I literally camped in my bathroom for a few minutes just to make sure I didn't get sick on the couch. Very stressful. And I'm not sure that stress was worth it, frankly. Life's hard enough as it is right now. I literally have a stress rash on my neck from the shit I'm going through in real life. No, you did not need to know about that. But maybe you need to know that I've been having a hard time lately, and this game did nothing to alleviate me from the stresses of reality. And what's the point in checking out from reality if a fantasy world is just going to make me miserable, too?

There are better games to play in this style. Hell, there are better games on the NES in this style. You know what you should go play? "Faxanadu." It's uglier than "Zelda II", sure. An absolute idiot when it comes to basic mathematics. But it's very chill about platforming and death. And maybe I just want to chill the fuck out for a while.

#post game evaluation #zelda ii: the adventure of link

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writerbyaccident · 5 years

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Snared: Part One (Yandere ShigarakixReader)

Trigger Warning: Sprained ankle, sexual harassment

Part Two Part Three Part Four Part Five Part Six Part Seven

Shigaraki was clawing at his neck again. Broken nails scraped his flesh, digging in deeply for any relief to be found. Grinding his teeth, he anxiously scanned the horizon for some sign that the chaos had begun. A tendril of smoke crawling upward into the dusky purple sky, a flood of people all running in one direction, a few screams piercing the night, he would have taken anything. According to Shigaraki, the worst part of any attack was the waiting. Once things got going he could just focus on the moment in front of him, but during that gray area between the beforehand and the actual start of the fight, it was all Shigaraki could do not to destroy everything in front of him, so that he would at least have the illusion of actually doing something. But he couldn’t give any of the city’s heroes an early warning, so he had to content himself with scratching.

Minutes and seconds passed, each feeling painfully slow to Shigaraki, but eventually the sound of battle and screams reached his ears. Looking down from the window of an abandoned building, he could see some of the league going after the crowds on the street, using their quirks to their fullest extent. Shigaraki had taken the care to enlist large numbers for tonight’s attack. The lower level players were assigned the task of causing chaos and destruction, focusing their attention on the city’s civilians, while the vanguard was charged with concentrating on stopping any heroes who tried to interfere. And despite the inexperience of some of the newest players, Shigaraki had to admit that it seemed to be going well. And if the tide was to turn at any point, he had taken the precaution to equip each member of the vanguard with a tracker so that Kurogiri could get them out of there quickly, leaving the pawns to take the fall. He couldn’t lose his best players, after all.

Pressed closely to the window, Shigaraki observed the mayhem with cruel glee, giggling quietly at the explosions and flames that now decorated the city. He was so entranced by it all, in fact, that he failed to notice at first that he was no longer alone. You crept into the room, walking gingerly on a twisted ankle, when you suddenly stumbled into the dust-covered wall. Turning sharply at the sound, Shigaraki simply looked at you with wide eyes for a moment. It was fairly clear to him that you weren’t one of his underlings, covered in ash and the odd splotch of blood as you were. Leaning against the wall, you took the time to catch your breath.

“I’m sorry,” you said, abruptly breaking the silence. “I didn’t realize anyone else was hiding in here, but I’m pretty sure I wasn’t followed.” Utterly confused, Shigaraki stayed quiet for a minute, trying to work out what you meant. Did you seriously not know who he was? But then again, he thought to himself, the room was pretty dim, plus he had his hoodie up, and since he wasn’t currently participating in the attack, he hadn’t put on Father just yet. With all of that in mind, he supposed it was plausible for you to think he was just another civilian. The next question was then, what should he do with this situation? He could just kill you of course, but where would the fun in that be? No, Shigaraki decided, he wanted to play with you first.

“It’s alright,” he muttered, going along with your assumption. “You just scared me for a second.” You nodded in understanding, and Shigaraki started to walk towards you, keeping his pace leisurely.

“Yeah, it’s crazy out there right now. I barely made it up here.” Gripping your leg tightly, you inadvertently attracted Shigaraki’s attention towards your injury. When he saw that your ankle was sprained, he moved even closer to you, knowing that if you did end up recognizing him before he was ready, you still wouldn’t be able to get away. Now standing right in front of you, Shigaraki took a moment to look at you more closely. Behind the fear and pain in your eyes he saw a gentleness that he found surprising for this situation. And beneath the smell of smoke that still clung to your body, he thought he could catch a glimpse of your natural scent, something almost like warm spring rain. He took it in sharply, overwhelmed by the way it made his blood buzz. Head swimming, Shigaraki wondered why his body was reacting like this. Even when he had on occasion ventured out of league headquarters for food and video games, he had never felt like this when he got near another person. But he didn’t mind it, in fact, he kind of liked the feeling it gave him. It was overwhelming, sure, but in an addictive way. And if he reacted this way now, Shigaraki couldn’t help but wonder how he would respond when you hadn’t just run through such a destructive scene. Shifting just a bit nearer to you, he tried to breathe in as deeply as he could without tipping you off to the fact that there was something wrong.

“How’d you get away?” Shigaraki murmured half to himself.

“When everyone started running,” you began to explain, “I was kinda pushed towards this building. It looked abandoned, so I figured that none of the villains would bother attacking it. And I knew I couldn’t stay with the crowd, not without getting trampled on.”

“But how’d you get in without any villains seeing you?”

“There was just one of them standing sort of near this place, so I just picked up a rock and threw it behind them, into an alleyway. I guess they heard it, cause they went off in that direction.” Raising his eyebrows, Shigaraki smirked slightly. As annoyed as he was that one of his players could be so easily fooled, he had to admit that it made for a funny picture: you, a sweet, innocent civilian, outsmarting one of his hired thugs.

“That was clever,” he wheezed.

“Yeah,” you chuckled, stopping to wince in pain, glancing down at your ankle.

“Why don’t you sit down?” Shigaraki asked, making sure to lace his voice with a convincing amount of concern. You looked at him for a moment, trying to figure out if you could let your guard down with him enough to do so. He seemed okay, if a bit nervous and awkward, but given the circumstances you guessed that wasn’t too weird. Sitting down on the cool floor, you let out a sigh of relief; it did feel better to get off of your feet. Shigaraki followed suit, sitting right next to you. He couldn’t help but move just a bit closer as he did so, the urge to get nearer too compelling for him to ignore. You didn’t notice that though, nor did you notice the almost hungry way that he stared at you. Instead, you were focused on your injury, bringing your ankle closer to you without aggravating it further. Shigaraki scowled, realizing he wanted your attention back on him.

“What happened?”

“Just twisted it when the stampede started. That’s why I was looking for a place to hide, I was scared I might get trampled.” Frowning at the thought that your encounter had almost not even happened, Shigaraki thanked whatever twisted luck he must have possessed that you sprained your ankle. Leaning towards you, he took a closer look at your injury. There was some swelling, and the skin around it looked a bit red and purple, but overall it didn’t look too severe.

“Here, let me see,” Shigaraki told you, not bothering to wait for a response. After all, he thought to himself with a sly smile, even if you protested, it wasn’t like you would be able to outrun him. Placing his hand on your ankle, careful to keep his pinky finger in the air, he prodded the swelling surprisingly gently. He almost had to keep himself from moaning at the sensation, your skin being so much warmer and softer than any he had ever felt. His head started to swim again as he continued to press down.

Hissing slightly at the pain, you shut your eyes tightly, causing Shigaraki to grin widely. He couldn’t help it, you were just so trusting, leaving yourself so open and vulnerable to him. He couldn’t remember the last time someone had acted that way with him, if they ever had. Knowing that all he needed to do was place his last finger on your soft flesh, or even just reach over and start choking the life out of you, without you even having the time to try and stop him, it was intoxicating. As he watched the rise and fall of your chest closely, before he even realized what he was doing, Shigaraki began to rub small circles with his thumb. Eyes still closed, you let him, it actually felt rather soothing. This went on for a few minutes, and you were drawn into a haze, letting a soft moan slip out for Shigaraki to hear. Pausing at the noise you just made, he could feel his heart stutter, heat pooling in his core. You, meanwhile, bit the inside of your cheek with embarrassment as soon as you realized what you just did. But when you opened your eyes to apologize or to explain, you not exactly sure which, you found that the stranger you met had moved to straddle you.

“I—I don’t’ know why I did that,” you stammered nervously. “I—I didn’t mean—”

“I don’t care what you meant,” he growled, crimson eyes boring into you. Swallowing thickly, you started fidgeting roughly, trying to buck him off of you. Your movements had a less desired effect though, causing Shigaraki to harden against you and let out a moan of his own. You stopped moving as soon as he did that, growing more terrified by the second. Looking at you sharply once you stilled, Shigaraki leaned down towards your ear.

“I didn’t tell you to stop,” he rasped, his warm breath hitting your ear. Shaking your head, you whimpered involuntarily. Shigaraki just snickered coldly though, the sound of your cry sending his heart rate spiking. Placing his face against your neck, he nuzzled you, soaking in both your scent and the feeling of your soft flesh. His lips forcefully pressing against your neck, he kissed and sucked there, determined to leave a mark on you by the end of the night. Abruptly, he bit down harshly on your skin, thoroughly enjoying the way you groaned in discomfort and the taste of your warm blood creeping into his mouth. Moving back to look at you, Shigaraki licked the blood from his lips.

“I like this game,” he said almost dazedly. “You’re way too fun to play with.” Practically drunk on the way your previously warm eyes now gleamed with fear, Shigaraki began to lean down again. But before he could make his next move, a dark purple mist started to crawl through the room. He failed to notice at first, but you didn’t, a small shred of hope warming you as you glanced around for the hero you were sure had found you. Seeing your slight change in demeanor, Shigaraki looked around and soon spotted his colleague’s signature smoke, almost whining in anger when it started to envelope him. He didn’t want this game to end, but it looked like he didn’t have a choice.

“Look at me,” he ordered quickly, you obeying out of fright and pure survival instincts. “We’re going to have to put this on pause for now. But I’m coming back, and you better not be hiding when I do.” All you could do was stare as Shigaraki placed one more bruising kiss on the crook of your neck before being swallowed by the mist, leaving you alone and trembling.

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clansayeed · 4 years

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Bound by Destiny II, part 1 ― Chapter 20: The City of Shadow

PAIRING: Kamilah Sayeed x MC (Nadya Al Jamil) RATING: Mature

⥼ MASTERLIST ⥽

⥼ Bound by Destiny II, part 1 ⥽

While struggling with nightmares of lives she’s never lived, a shadow from the past looming over her city, and the proposed idea that her life may just be a little bit too weird to handle alone, Nadya makes sure to tell herself that everything is perfect just the way it is. If only. When the self-proclaimed King of Vampires (and Maker of her sometimes-girlfriend and always-boss, can’t forget that little tidbit) Gaius Augustine returns intent on claiming Manhattan as the throne that was promised, she and her friends find themselves forced into the task of saving the world. But with millennia-old vampires and an Order of hunters on their heels as well as allies hiding catastrophic secrets at their backs… it won’t be an easy task. Too bad destiny didn’t exactly ask for her input.

Bound by Destiny II and the rest of the Oblivion Bound series is an ongoing dramatic retelling project of the Bloodbound series and spin-off, Nightbound. Find out more [HERE].

TAG LIST: @googlesentmehere, @cess02

*Let me know if you would like to be added to the Destiny II tag list!

⥼ Chapter Summary ⥽

The key to defeating Gaius lies deep beneath the streets of Paris, beneath the famous catacombs to the once-revered jewel of the Vampire King's Court. For over 400 years the crypts have waited, abandoned. But if they want any chance of saving their home, they have to be willing to risk whatever may slumber within.

[READ IT ON AO3]

It doesn’t bode well for her peace of mind that not even twenty minutes into their journey, Nadya can feel the beginnings of the all-too-familiar headaches starting to knock at her temples. Worst. houseguest. ever.

“Does this mean we can just… get this over with here?” Nadya grinds out. Serafine looks back at her from where she leads the metaphorical charge; her smile is sympathetic, but not at all reassuring.

“We’ve just hit the Seine, that’s all. It will pass.”

Great, just great. Water pressure is screwing her around before the actual creepy mojo. Why couldn’t they have packed aspirin in one of these dumb bags? “What about further on?”

Serafine doesn’t have an answer for that, though. And that says it all.

Nadya stops counting the minutes after that. For her own sanity if anything.

Lily is nearing the end of her shot-for-shot recount of The Fellowship of the Ring (because she is personally offended by the fact both Adrian and Cadence lived during Tolkien’s lifetime and have neither read the books nor seen the movies, and also because Jax told her not to) when the narrow corridor widens out just enough to give her a little breathing room. It’s not much of a difference for the more broad-shouldered of them, but they don’t even need to breathe anyway.

Where the beginning tunnel was rustic and just a path carved out of the ground, this leg of the journey is noticeably different. The ground is more flat; earth packed from decades of footsteps long gone. The dug-out walls are cemented in place with limestone, and above their heads the ceiling curves up on both sides to end in an arch with a pointed tip.

Eventually they come across the first sconces laid into the wall masonry; metal dark and rusted over the years but sturdy and undisturbed. Serafine grabs a match book from her pack with one hand and brushes cobwebs from an ancient torch with another. It takes several matches to catch and hold a flame but once it does the effect is immediate — the path suffusing with flickering yellow light and a heat Nadya didn’t know she was already missing.

Adrian follows suit and lights the torch on the opposite wall. When they reach a new set every few minutes they always stop and help coax the fire to life. “To help guide us back,” is the explanation she offers; but the way her voice catches thick in her throat tells a different story.

A story none of them have quite gotten the full picture of, yet, and that may have been okay before — when it was lost to history. But now they are lost to history.

Serafine makes sure of that.

“When your entire immortality is spent living in the ebb and flow of tidal fear, it can be so very easy to succumb to the despair of it. To this day I would not be surprised to learn that was part of the Holy Knights’ doctrine calling for the faithful to purge the world of our existence. If it was not they who felled us with their own hand, then they sought to make eternal life so full of loss, of misery and death and fear, that we would do their work for them.

“There were many whom I called companions that succumbed to those very thoughts.” The way she says it; like she blames herself. “Those of us who remained did so for more than just ourselves. Many were like myself — we had seen the world change so many times with our own eyes it was no longer the one we were born into. And we knew we would see it again.

“We found ways to seek the proverbial light in the darkness. Many of us had fled to La Cité Sombre from the richest courts of the mortal world. We brought our passion and fine taste here and to the crypts. The mortals hastened to be rid of their infected dead, so we took them off their hands.”

While Nadya tries to think of several polite ways to casually mention that something like that isn’t something casually mentioned, Lily beats her to the punch.

“What did you people do with the dead bodies? Do I want to know? I swear to God.”

“Careful up ahead here, mes amis, we’re getting close.”

It takes the combined efforts of all five vampires to pry open a set of double doors. The rotted wood practically crumbles to the touch, and the hinges barely bend half of the doorway before they snap and clatter to the ground.

Immediately a pungent foulness, thick as a wall whether it was tangible or not, assaults Nadya’s nose. A hair-curling stench of decay — of death — Nadya is all-too familiar with by now. What an unsettling notion.

The open doorway empties out into a near-pitch black room. The last torches were too far back to give it proper lighting, but the bright blue-white of their flashlight beams reveal some kind of atrium. An outpost, maybe? Though it isn’t much taller than the path they just left it’s spacious enough for them to spread out for the first time in hours; that’s not something to take for granted.

Serafine crosses the space in long and purposeful strides. She already knows what she’s looking for; another set of sconces and torches framing the exit. The familiar hiss-snikt of the match and the blessed warmth that follows is more than welcome.

A warmth that’s instantly sucked away; replaced by a cold wave of realization as the rest of the atrium comes into light around them.

“My god…”

Nadya doesn’t even recognize her own voice; feels the back of her clammy hand press up against her lips as if that might contain her shock.

It doesn’t.

Skeletons litter the flagstones at their feet. She looks down to see one a hair’s width away from the toe of her boot and instantly recoils; presses herself back against something solid she’s too horrified to immediately recognize. Adrian’s arms come around her protectively; but he can only do so much.

Old-fashioned armor, ancient and the real-freaking-deal, must once have fit snug and secure on these bodies. Not anymore; not with the flesh long since rotted away, along with whatever ate the rot itself. But without exposure from the elements they’re pristine and almost bleached. All except for the places where a thin blanket of grey dust coats the sharp jut of bone exposed in the armor’s gaps.

Objectively Nadya had known they were essentially entering one large burial tomb but… it isn’t until this moment that she’s faced (quite literally, eye sockets hollow and black as the void) with the gruesome reality of it all.

She’s just glad she’s not the only one.

Serafine recovers first. Lowering her head deep and reverent, words whispered on her lips so faint there isn’t even a trace of them in the stale air. A prayer, Nadya slowly realizes; and she averts her eyes out of respect for the woman’s mourning.

She steps out of the safety of Adrian’s comfort, fingertips tenderly brushing his forearm.

Go to her, that touch says, because she can see he wants to. A want bordering on need. In a blink he’s across the room and hovering just shy of the woman’s trembling shoulders. Less confident here than he was just moments prior. Nadya’s heart goes out to the guy.

Jax comes up on Nadya’s left. He rests a hand on her shoulder something just shy of tender; a hesitance in his furrowed brow she’s not used to seeing on that normally cocky expression. He coaxes her back with just his fingertips; she’s more than willing to trade places with him if that’s what he wants.

Lily wraps her arms around herself; isolating herself like an island in a sea of bone. Somehow Nadya has a feeling there won’t be as many violent video games in the apartment when all this is over.

If they survive it, a morbid part of her thinks.

In front of her Jax takes a knee, brushes the same fragile touch over the nearest set of remains. Not reverence, but not fear either. All it takes is the slightest pressure and the skeleton’s bottom jaw clatters to the floor. Only it’s not the bone that Jax can’t look away from. But rather the grey smeared on his fingertips.

A choked noise comes from Cadence. He clears the distress from his throat and looks away out of respect. And it’s in the weighted silence and dancing shadows that Nadya realizes why they’re all so distressed.

“Vampires don’t leave skeletons.”

Nadya cringes; she hadn’t meant to say it aloud. Stating the obvious that everyone else had already come to understand maybe even from the moment they entered the atrium. Yet here she is, stupid human Nadya, who finally understands far too late that it isn’t dust blanketed over the dead, under their feet, silky on Jax’s fingertips.

It’s ash.

However small this room might be the dead inside are countless. More than the preserved armor and bone, they hang in the air; caught by the eye in the firelight like dust motes in the early morning sun.

It’s only going to get worse from here on out, isn’t it?

“The continent was stricken with Plague. As the dead multiplied, so did the faith of the desperate grow. The Holy Knights used that to their advantage; they used the dead and dying to lure our kind out with false hope, and starved the rest. What started as a refuge from the onslaught grew—flourished. It was more than a place to hide — it was, for the first time, a community.”

Her voice cracks and wavers more than a few times, but Serafine doesn’t let the emotions stop her. In fact they give her the strength to keep going; to tell a story long overdue. Not just to relieve the weight of it from her soul, but to fill in the spaces the Knights had tried to destroy — and prove their failure.

“For over two hundred years we had this.” Even with tears shining in her eyes, Serafine manages a wistful smile. “Long enough for some to have never known a life on the run. And long enough for a culture to flourish and grow within our ranks. To this day I still cannot fathom how so much was taken from us so quickly.”

She buries her face into Adrian’s shoulder, seeking a comfort he gives open and freely. He buries a kiss on the crown of her head, face almost lost in wild curls.

“Kamilah only mentioned it once,” he murmurs, “I don’t even remember what for. But it was one of the only times Vega agreed with her without a peep, so it’s hard to forget.”

Serafine hums, nods. “He was still newly Turned when the City fell. Were he not a child of Gaius I doubt he would have survived.”

Nadya and Lily exchange glances, and they must be riding the same train of thought. One that goes to one town only: Wouldn’t That Have Made Our Lives Easier-Ville, USA.

Cadence eases himself from the wall with his foot. “I’ve read sparse accounts of the City, but all of them date prior to 1570. And none of them actually… say what happened.”

Whether Serafine is going to answer him is really anyone’s guess. When Nadya had first noticed it seemed like she was pointedly ignoring his (admittedly very hard to ignore, on account of his tree-like status) presence, she wrote it off without a word to anyone. Probably just too involved in her own drama, right?

But now… now Nadya’s not so sure. And that’s probably why she does respond; because if she doesn’t then there’s nothing but surety.

“The Holy Knights raided the City.”

“Didn’t you have defense measures in place?” asks Jax with a frown. It earns him a harsh glare.

“Of course we did! But they were well-informed, or well-prepared. They sealed off the main gates to the surface and ambushed us when we were the most congregated; when our guards were lowest, during a night of celebration.”

Nadya’s voice is thick in her throat. “You were sitting ducks.”

“We were lambs, and the slaughter was led to us.”

“What does that mean?”

Serafine’s eyes glow from the nearby torch, but the look of them is nothing but cold; as dead as these forgotten skeletons.

“The Knights were told where they could find us; they were challenged to do so. A fool’s attempt at posturing; hundreds of lives sacrificed for petty glory.”

Cadence blanches. “Who would do such a thing?”

“Who indeed…”

Adrian keeps close even when Serafine pulls away; ready to be there, however she needs. But despite his kindness all it takes is one look for Nadya to see the uncertainty hidden right under the surface of him. Something to talk about later — if they can.

“Come —” the vampiress hikes her bag higher on her shoulder and makes for the only way forward, “— the City is vast; we have a long way to go.”

Which… yeah, that’s fair. They are on a time crunch and all, and the sooner she’s back up where there’s sky and clouds and birds the better in her opinion. But that doesn’t mean Nadya doesn’t keep her little butt propped against the wall until the last possible second.

Only she’s not the last one to get moving.

“Cadence, you coming?”

He startles and jerks his hand away from the top half of a breastplate. More like a kid caught with his hand in the cookie jar than a vampire touching dead people armor. “Yes, I am. Sorry… this sort of stuff, you know,” he dusts off the knees of his jeans and stands back to full height, “it’s practically pseudo-porn for a vampire historian.”

He tries to laugh it off, but the attempt is as nervous as it is short-lived. Nadya’s pretty sure he’s frowning when he looks at her and asks “what’s the matter?” but she can’t be certain — not with the ridiculous carnival mask he’s decided to put on.

“Why are you wearing that?”

His hand flies to his face. Like most habitual glasses-wearers, more than once Nadya’s caught sight of him pushing up something no longer there. She feels that way right now — but better to rely on contacts for the first leg of their trip than trip and break her only pair before they really got going.

“What, my glasses?” — confusion slowly shifts to concern — “I’m not… wearing anything.”

“Okay, pull my leg, but really.”

But really he feels around like he’s got no idea what she’s talking about. Which is frankly just dumb. It’s gaudy and gauche and some other g-word that means silly probably. But most importantly it’s there.

Isn’t it?

“Maybe you hit your head in the alley a little harder than I thought.”

He’s halfway to pulling a small pin-flashlight out of his jacket pocket when a voice behind her makes Nadya practically leap out of her skin.

“What’s going on here?”

The hairs on the back of Nadya’s neck stand straight up; not the first time she’s ever felt that happen when there’s a vampire at her back — she’ll take being biologically cautious over potential predators over obliviousness any day. But it’s never happened with someone she knows — someone she considers a friend.

Worse still, she’s heard that tone from Serafine before. Biting; borderline cruel even. Filled with centuries of contempt that Nadya hopes — on some level — she’ll never get advanced enough in her Bloodkeeper powers to understand.

It’s how she spoke to Gaius in her memory of Versailles. And it’s how she’s speaking to Cadence now.

Fortunately (for him), he doesn’t take notice.

“Give us just a moment, Miss Dupont,” he clicks the flashlight on and coaxes Nadya forward, “I’m checking Nadya for a concussion.”

She tries not to tense at the woman’s touch on her shoulder. Luckily Serafine is too fixated on the situation to notice. “Has something happened?” Then, her lilting voice practically in Nadya’s ear—

“Did you see something?”

There’s too much at stake for her to start lying now. “It wasn’t a big… I probably just saw shadows or something.”

“Regardless, it could be important.”

Eventually Cadence angles the light away from her eyes. Nadya has to blink the spots away quickly because he’s barely finished when Serafine’s hands are on her shoulders and turning them to face one another. Away from him, her mind supplies like an instigating little jerk.

Serafine sweeps a long look over their skeletal audience. “Did you see what happened here?”

“No. It wasn’t a memory, that’s why it’s probably nothing.” And judging by the look that gets her, if Nadya tries to brush the woman off one more time she might not get a choice in telling. Okay… fine. “It was a mask.”

“A… mask.”

She isn’t asking. “Yeah, some dumb dingy gold Phantom of the Opera thing. But that’s probably my imagination.”

For the first time since she laid eyes on him, Serafine turns and takes Cadence in fully. He towers over her; but he towers over most. But there’s something in the way she stands that puts her at an advantage, and leaves Nadya wracking her brain to try and understand it. Is it her years; does she wear them like Kamilah does? Or is it her confidence; a personality loud and full of life that outshines the muted greys of Cadence’s identity issues?

Or maybe it’s the one-sided recognition.

She knows.

“Is she well enough to keep going?”

It takes the historian more than a moment to realize it’s him she’s addressing; directly this time, too. He nods. “No signs of a concussion, and if it were something worse we’d see signs by now. I’m not well-read on psychic abilities by any means… but, Nadya,” offering her a shrug and an apologetic smile, “if you saw anything… that’s on you.”

Right now she’d admit to just about anything to cut through this tension.

“It was a shadow, I’m sure of it.”

“I agree.” Serafine says, and wastes no time urging both of the stragglers out of the atrium.

Adrian and Lily are three torch-lengths down when they finally catch up. Serafine resumes her place at the lead.

But this time Cadence keeps several paces back. Trailing along after them in silence; the more intentional cousin of quiet.

Lily takes her place back up at Nadya’s side and links their arms together. “Everything good?” she asks.

“Of course,” Nadya lies, and meets her eyes with the truth.

No. Not at all.

It comes as no surprise that her headaches keep getting worse. Nadya tries to trick herself into believing it’s the pressure from their increasing depth, but eventually she’ll have to accept her tiny human fragility has nothing to do with it — it’s the Bloodkeeper thing.

So long as it makes itself useful when the time is right, she reasons with herself—silently and in her own head; she’s not foolish enough to say it aloud, then everything will be worth it.

“The King’s Manor and the heart of the City are just up ahead!”

Despite all of her earlier grief Serafine can’t control the swelling crescendos of excitement in her voice. The vampire’s equivalent of a heart beating faster and faster. Nadya’s relieved either way — how haven’t they walked all the way to Rome by now? Another ten minutes and she was this close to sucking up her pride and asking Adrian to let her piggyback.

But putting the emotional sentiments aside — it’s just another network of tunnels. Hopefully taller and wider than the last but she’s not putting any money on it. There are only so many ways someone can style what’s essentially a person-sized anthill.

Suffice to say the sudden rush of fresh oxygen in her lungs leaves Nadya lightheaded for more than a few reasons. She swallows it greedily, fully intent on taking advantage of the fact she doesn’t have to share. Which is a good thing.

Because when they all finally stop it’s at the edge of a balcony carved into the side of a natural cliff, with a set of twin stone stairs winding down on either side to the vast expanse of a hollowed-out cavern. And the view punches the breath out of her anyway.

Jax digs the heels of his palms against his eyes.

“Tell me the claustrophobia is getting to me and there’s not a giant French castle in the middle of Deep-Fuck-Nowhere, Underground.”

They can’t. Because there very much is a giant French chateau in the middle of Deep-Eff-Nowhere, Underground. It just sits down there unassuming and strange; looking like someone could have plucked it from the surface world and just dropped the entire estate down a very deep hole to fall right here. Gardens and all. The back of the building is set into the cave wall, and a winding, sloping path cut into the face of the rock spirals up to a natural plateau where a waterfall rushes softly behind. As her brain finally manages to process more of the underground chamber Nadya notices many such paths all curving up and out across the echoing space; almost all of them leading to archways similar to the one above their heads.

Cadence whistles low under his breath. The sound carries, bouncing from stone to stone until a hundred Cadences are seemingly all in concert. “Talk about making a mountain out of a molehill.”

Adrian finally manages to pick his jaw up from the ground from sheer awe.

“To think all of this was under Paris’ feet for so long… untouched for all these years.” He glances to Serafine with another compliment on the tip of his tongue, but it dies quickly when he notices the wetness welling up in the corners of her eyes. “What is it — what’s wrong?”

Hastily Serafine shakes the tears down her cheeks and away. “Ce n’est rien,” she chokes out thickly, “it is nothing.”

“Obviously not.”

Their hands meet at their sides; never too far apart.

“I had just assumed that the Knights had destroyed everything in the city. Even le Château de L’Ombre. If I had known that it survived the ambush…” She trails off when words can no longer equate to everything bottled up inside.

None of them try to imagine her grief. (Nadya tries her very best to think of anything else; even bordering on the inappropriate, because of anyone there she’s the one who truly could.) Something so beautiful, so captivating could only have been a labor of passion. And who wouldn’t miss the place they called home?

“But never mind the past — we cannot change it no matter how hard we wish or pray.” Nadya swears she catches a flicker of her dark eyes, but her curls make it impossible to be certain. “If the manor’s interior is as intact as the structure itself, I have high hopes for our mission.”

She takes the lead down one side of the steep stone steps. Adrian stays close at her side, and one by one they follow. Natural moisture from the close waterfall have left the steps slick and eroded unevenly; but while Nadya practically tiptoes down each one Lily looks ready to just slide down the banister.

“Finally,” she grins and stretches high up to the (finally) out-of-reach ceiling, “some good luc—ow!”

Rubbing her bruised upper arm, Lily throws a bewildered glare at Jax behind her. “Firstly; ow, rude! Secondly; that’s way no fair. You’ve got, like, fifty years on me you geezer.”

He just shrugs; doesn’t regret a thing. “Then stop jinxing us.”

“I’m using reverse psychology.”

“You can’t — that doesn’t make any sense.”

“You know what else doesn’t make any sense?”

Nadya tries to warn him as sneakily as she can, but the stubborn man ignores her and falls right into Lily’s trap. “What?”

“Your mom.”

Smack! Nadya facepalms so hard it echoes off the stone and follows them all the way down to the Manor.

Age and air thick with mist had rusted the front door’s metal hinges a long time ago. All it takes is the lightest push and the nails bend, groan, and snap in their anchors. Serafine had meant to open the doors. Instead she pushes them inward in creaking defeat.

The fallen wood kicks up centuries’ worth of dust—it’s just dust Nadya it’s just dust just tell yourself it’s dust—she tugs the collar of her sweater up over her mouth to keep from breathing it in. At least Serafine has the decency to look back at her with an apologetic wince. “Désolé, Nadya,” she whispers, and kindly waits until the cloud settles before venturing on.

They creep through the shadowy foyer; shuffling feet and the eerie lack of her companions’ breathing makes Nadya feel like a thief in the night. It’s eerie; predatory. But finally it dawns on her… that’s the point.

They listen; they wait.

Just before her heart can jump out of her throat Adrian gives the all clear.

“We’re alone.”

But that doesn’t mean they can spread themselves thin. Better safe than sorry. Serafine says something up ahead about the residential wing… full disclosure — Nadya isn’t really listening anymore. In her exhaustion she’s practically joined them in the ranks of the walking dead.

Thankfully for her aching feet they don’t continue much farther. A right turn opens out to a different foyer with similar stairs to the ones outside at the far end. Between sweet sweet sleep and where they stand, though, is another wave of collapsed armor and skeletons. She whines and tries to breathe through her mouth as much as possible.

They navigate the floor like a minefield of bone. Lily couldn’t look more ecstatic — though she’s decent enough to keep it to herself for now. Nadya wouldn’t mind if, like the video games they seem to be living now, there was some reward or loot on the other side. But nope.

Just more walking.

Nadya’s stamina bar runs dry parallel to their arrival. She’s only lucky in the little things after all. “Pick a room at your leisure.” Serafine says, and motions with both hands to old half-rotten doors lining either side of the hall. “We shouldn’t waste more time than we already have, but this is not a venture to undertake without a rested mind.” Nadya looks up and finds the vampiress addressing her specifically. “Once we begin, we can’t risk stopping. Conserve your strength.”

Nadya yawns unabashedly. “Don’t gotta tell me twice.”

And she’s not the only one. Jax ducks into a room on the other side of the hall without so much as a “sweet dreams.” After a moment’s pondering Cadence takes the adjacent door equally wordless — though he at least offers Nadya a tight-lipped smile before closing the door.

Lily and Nadya take the nearest door; but hang back and watch as Serafine takes Adrian’s hand and coaxes him further on, teasing him under her breath. “My old chambers are close. Come along.”

“You know you guys should be resting too, right?” Nadya calls out; and doesn’t have even a lick of regret that the last of her energy is used for sass.

“Goodnight, Nadya.” Adrian says back; without looking.

Lily snickers beside her; puts one hand on the door ready to close it quickly before she shouts out to them; “Use protection!” And slams the door shut.

“What are you still doing here? I thought we agreed to abandon the first places he would look.”

“For you — yes,” she answers; but can’t seem to tear her eyes away from the wide stretch of the city out before her, “but for me it would be a fruitless effort. When the time comes he will find me no matter where I am. It is inevitable.”

The smuggler vampire hates talking to peoples’ backs. Just one of the many things she’s come to learn about Ms. Espinoza in their weeks working together. So she isn’t surprised when the woman comes into view at her side.

It is inconsequential in the end; as most things are.

A long moment of silence passes around them, between them — through them. Neither compelled to speak by any forces greater than themselves. And neither big fans of idle chit-chat, either.

Finally she pulls back; wraps long fingers around the rooftop railing still wet from that afternoon’s rain. Standing here in their melancholy, however mutual it may be, is not a luxury they can afford.

They have such precious little time as it is.

“Is everything in place?”

The younger vampire gives a curt nod. “My guys could only get two trucks. There were some suits nosing around the warehouse night before last; asking questions.”

“Human?”

“Couldn’t be sure. They definitely knew something was up.”

There are too many possibilities; too many variables. Each worse than the last. Centuries of battles and wars — both as a weapon on the field and commanding from the shadows — but it is here, in the middle of a city that could not be more oblivious, that all of her experience fails her.

“The governor agreed to give us until the end of the week before bringing forth her own measures.”

“Forgive how fuckin’ little I believe that.” Maricruz laughs bitterly. The disrespect alone in the look thrown her way would have been grounds for her to bring the brandless, no-name vampire to a heel once upon a time. But those times are long gone.

And here she is, trying with all of her might to keep them from returning. But the passage of time has never left her wanting for irony in any form before. Why would it now? She’s never been bored enough to pursue the universal theological truth, but whatever higher power was pulling her along really needed to back the fuck off.

“Regardless,” though she wishes desperately this weren’t the case, “we have no choice but to continue as planned. Make sure they are loaded and your men are ready to make the trip as soon as the riots begin. Our window of opportunity is smaller than I would like, but we’ll make do with what we have.”

“And if they don’t make it?”

A very real possibility; one she’s had to come to terms with against all else.

Against that familiar voice echoing in the back of her thoughts begging of her — demanding of her — that she do everything in her power to save everyone. That is what Nadya would do. That is the kind of person she is.

That is the kind of person Nadya believes her to be, and she intends to be worthy of it.

“Then we relocate those remaining and try again.”

Whatever argument Maricruz wishes to offer is lost when the first high-pitched wails of police sirens trickle up from the streets below. Little flecks of flashing red and blue weaving against the darkness and towards the heart of the city. Towards the first of many uprisings to come this night.

“Looks like it’s go-time.”

Indeed, she agrees silently; yet finds herself frozen. Kept still by the air and the voice; once thought of — never quite forgotten.

But she would not want to forget.

This is why she fights after all.

“You comin’ along this time?” Maricruz calls out to her; voice distant as she nears the rooftop exit.

She closes her eyes; feels the sharpness of the wind try to cut at her from this high in the heavens. Trying to chisel away at the eternity of her. It has before… but not this time.

“Are you coming or what?! Oi — Kamilah!”

Nadya can still taste the freshness of the city night air on her tongue. She keeps her eyes closed out of desperation; a longing that she knows is in vain but hopes she can power through regardless.

But it’s no use. The memory is gone… and Kamilah with it.

#bloodbound #choices bb #bloodbound fanfiction #adrian raines #kamilah x mc #jax matsuo #lily spencer #bloodbound mc #mc: nadya al jamil #oc: cadence smith #serafine dupont #fic: oblivion bound #oblv: bound by destiny ii #oblv: new chapter #; my fics #kamilah sayeed #oc: maricruz espinoza

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poochiray · 4 years

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The perpetual state of the holy priest.

This topic is going to be slightly off from what is normally on my baby blog. But my frustrations over a video game I’ve played for 10+ years is leaking into other aspects of my life, so here we are. I play World of Warcraft. The first character I ever leveled was a night elf hunter, and although it was cute having a pet companion, it just wasn’t enough. And frankly, I dropped the spec hard going into Cataclysm when their mana was gone and in its replace was horrible focus. But I digress.

The second character I leveled was a blood elf priest. She reached level 80 around the release of Ruby Sanctum. It was hard getting into raids as a newly max level priest, but I really enjoyed healing heroic dungeons and dipping my feet into normal raids. Then Deathwing came and lit the cities on fire and the leveling process began again. 85 wasn’t that far off and I got max level super early into the expansion. I was able to go into the first tier of raiding playing a healing priest! Early heroic dungeons were DIFFICULT too. I had to learn NOT to spam flash heal for every damage spike. I had to cast greater heal and sometimes lesser heal. Otherwise I’d be oom and we’d all be dead. And it was a BLAST. I mainly played disc for Blackwing Descent. Disc had strong tank healing with divine aegis procs, penance, and Power Word: Shield. They could potentially raid heal, but spamming prayer of healing and hoping for shield procs got expensive. We did not have a holy paladin in our raid, so my role was very essential to our group. But that all changed going into Firelands. Firelands I found a group to do heroic (current Mythic level raiding). We cleared up to Fandral 10M with me, a druid, and holy paladin. For this team I was able to dip my feet into holy healing as well. For once I wasn’t the tank’s exclusive babysitter. And it felt -amazing-. I dual specced both healing specs. I’d go disc for encounters like Baleroc which hit tanks like a truck, and then swap to holy for Beth’tilac and Fandral. I would go toe-to-toe with our resto druid on raid healing. Holy was a completely viable healer. It had 15+ healing spells and each one had its purpose. And I loved the complexity of switching between chakras, deciding to greater or lesser heal? Binding heal or flash? Renew? Circle of healing? Prayer of healing? The list goes on. It was the most fun I had playing priest till Legion. Dragonsoul was kind of a joke tier for me. With raid finder being introduced and my Firelands raiding guild falling apart, I didn’t see much high level raiding. And that was fine. I still played holy/disc and enjoyed it. Priest was viable for the content I was doing.

Mists was much the same as Cata except with the cloak legendary. I remember having to grind daily reps to unlock epic gear from the vendors. There were SO many dailies in early Mists and it was frankly a nightmare. My raiding for Mists was sort of limited. I totally fell back into casual territory, only doing raid finder and perhaps normal. I didn’t start raiding higher end content till the very end with Siege of Origimmar. I -wanted- to continue playing holy but my group urged me to check out disc priest and their new atonement healing.

It was purely degenerate healing. The WORST OVERPOWERED thing to ever be introduced to the healing scene. There was NO thinking. No casting heals (minus divine star/halo/cascade on CD). You hit smite and it smart healed the raid. That was it. And you sniped heals making it completely not fun or viable for any other healer. By the time any other healer cast a heal on someone that took damage, disc just cast smite and BOOM healed before anyone else could react. It was HORRIBLE.

And thus began the trend of healing while doing damage. Which we’ll come back to later, just you wait.

Warlords had a fun levelling process. I remember fondly finding treasures throughout Draenor. Holy and disc were in “ok” states. I say this loosely because holy remained much as it was and disc got a stack-able MEGA shield known as Clarity of Will. Here again, disc was sort of the no brainer spec for dungeon content. Literally spam clarity on the tank and go. It was stupidly broken. The trend from back in Mists to bring disc over holy carried on into WoD. Absorbs were more powerful than ever. Why bring holy when disc does absorbs even better? And spammable? Holy may have been the more fun spec to play, but why bring it when disc was more powerful? <----This idea is still present in today’s game.

Legion brought with it some fantastic changes, and some questionable ones. The chakra system was gone, and in its place just a simple holy word cooldown rotation playstyle. It felt fluid and refined. Disc became shadow priest 2.0. No, not really but sort of? Atonement healing was back on the table and gone were pretty much every single healing spell you’ve known to love. It became the most changed spec of the expansion, and easily the most challenging to master. Early Legion discs struggled to remain relevant and for the first time since (what? Classic?) holy was the preferred healing spec for priests.

Disc picked up speed in Nighthold as more people learned to master the toolkit. Their mana limited their healing throughput hard, but give them all the wisdoms and innervates and they could be dominating. Then this meta started to form again. Mythic guilds were salivating over disc’s power creep to just BURST heal an entire raid from 10% health to full by the push of one perfectly timed Light’s Wrath.

Holy weren’t completely nonviable though. They still put out respectable numbers and a good holy priest was better than a fair disc priest by far. Then Tomb of Sargeras hit and holy got love in their tier set. Other healers were literally dropping their class to play holy priest with how amazing it felt to play. They dominated that tier completely in healing, and although it was a great time to play the spec, it also felt weird. For once I felt like I was in a constant state of competition with other holy priests and it was all too common to get in a group and find nothing but holy priests as the healing team. It was weird.

Antorus had a weaker tier set for holy, and thus the fall off began again. The “poser” holy priests that only played when it was at its best left and returned to their holy paladins/disc priests/resto shamans. I remember a particular instance where I was urged to play disc for mythic Imonar progression. There was a mechanic where the raid literally sat and ate all of this damage and you needed a disc priest with barrier and a resto shaman with spirit link totem to even survive.

Having dropped disc hard at the beginning of the expansion, I wasn’t all too thrilled to learn how to play it seriously in a mythic setting. I dabbled with it in raid finder. I knew the concept of just managing atonement buffs. But that sort of playstyle felt awful to me. I didn’t enjoy it. I still don’t.

I came from a classic healing playstyle. That is what I fell in love with when I picked up this game 10 years ago. Legion (and yes even current disc) is just a buff manager, that you press a dps ability when the damage hits. You have to know when that damage hits (for both specs, really). But for disc, you have to press all these buttons to buff people before it hits--and for holy you simply just press one button when that damage hits. The amount of effort disc has to heal well is extreme compared to holy. Why cast 5 pleas, two radiances, and a penance when I can just cast divine hymn and be done with it? I prefer the straightforward way of healing. If I see 3 people take an unexpected hit, I want to just cast circle of healing and get the job done.

Either way, thankfully I was able to keep playing holy for Imonar. The group made their shadow priest switch to disc for this one fight. I was able to keep healing like I enjoy and the group respected my decision. We weren’t world first raiders by any means, people played what they wanted.

Enter Battle for Azeroth. Holy gets salvation, which feels amazing. Disc gets minor quality of life changes. You can still play both specs respectively in a raiding environment and in fact early disc was still needing to be balanced correctly. So no one really batted an eye if you brought a holy priest to the team.

But then the cancer that was the Eternal Palace arrived. Now more than ever, healers were expected to do damage. And teams didn’t want to bring any other healers but holy paladins and disc priests. It was -awful-. Not only could these two specs pump respectable damage numbers, but their healing was INSANE. Why bring any other healer when these two specs alone can DOUBLE DIP and pull the numbers they were pulling? I STILL don’t understand that. This frustration is far from over either.

Ny’alotha was a little bit better. But here again it wasn’t long before holy paladins began to dominate once more (thanks Ineffable Truth). Disc was still the preferred healer over holy because damage mitigation and passive dps. There was literally no reason to bring a holy priest over disc. Frankly there was no reason to -ever- bring a holy priest over disc except for ONE tier in Legion and Classic WoW.

So now I’m getting to the whole point of this post. Shadowlands. Both holy and disc had gotten some extra damage abilities. But just a few days ago, Mind Sear and Mind Blast were stealth removed from holy’s toolkit. So here again, a healer that doesn’t bring much damage to begin with just had two more dps abilities removed. That’s great. :/ Then let’s not even forget this new covenant system they are introducing. Disc has atonement interaction with their covenants and so there is synergy there. Holy’s covenant choices feel lack luster and don’t really add anything to the spec. So I’m afraid the same trend that has plagued holy is going to continue into the new expansion. Why bring a holy priest to a raid, when you can just go disc? Disc has damage reduction, passive damage, and is a more mobile healer than holy ever was. Holy has two raid healing cooldowns. One of which they need to stand still for 8 seconds to channel and the other which got another nerf. In order to dps, they literally have to stop healing. And it feels bad.

I’m tired of having to justify why I play the spec I love. I’m tired of fighting for it when clearly developers want to just forget it even exists. Give us something that’s desirable for a raid, that disc does not have. Some sort of UTILITY. We have raid healing for days but give us something that makes us competitive again.

I feel like if things don’t change soon, I may just pick up that focus hunter after all.

#world of warcraft #wow #shadowlands #disc priest #holy priest #healing #cataclysm #mists of pandaria #warlords of draenor #legion #battle for azeroth #priest

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sinceileftyoublog · 4 years

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Helvetia Interview: Back to Normal

BY JORDAN MAINZER

On the surface, This Devastating Map sounds like other albums from Jason Albertini’s Helvetia, a mix of short-form and mid-range tracks, its slinky, meandering, spindly pop weirdness mixing nicely with his muted vocals. It also presents like a victory lap for a busy half-decade for Albertini, who had a short run in Built to Spill and saw beloved slowcore band Duster (he is one of 3 members) reunite for shows, a box set, and a new record. But dig a little deeper into the lyrics and titles, and you start to feel the record’s true context. This Devastating Map--a reference to Albertini’s battles with drug addiction and current sobriety, plus quite literally the scars on his body--is a record about finding the clarity in himself once again, getting clean of drugs and mitigating the mental struggles that made him turn there in the first place. And the recording of it, with Steve Gere (also a member of Built to Spill during Albertini’s tenure) and Samantha Stidham, was a therapeutically social process, in contrast to what Albertini normally undertakes in silo for Helvetia records.

Speaking to me from his home in Portland, Albertini opened up about his story of addiction, one which he wasn’t sure he wanted to talk about. He eventually decided to on account of the fact that, according to him, it’s, like it or not, a part of who he was, or is. But he doesn’t take for granted the fact that This Devastating Map came out, nor that he’s been ceaselessly working on new music during the pandemic. Over the last few years, struggling with addiction, he was busy, but not creative. Now, as he says, making music is all he wants to do. “Who knows how many years I’ll feel that this is okay, just hanging out and playing?” he said. Plus, he thinks the next record to come out is the best one he’s ever done. He’s proud of himself again.

Read our conversation below, edited for length and clarity.

Since I Left You: To start: The record was inspired by you getting clean.

Jason Albertini: I dealt with a substance abuse problem. It mainly comes from my foray into trying to clean up my depression. In my late 20′s, I started experimenting with drugs to relieve this part of my personality I couldn’t really explain. It was fairly innocent for a while, but then I did slip off and became a heroin addict for a while. I haven’t really talked about it and wasn’t sure I was really gonna talk about it.

In the last year, I got out of rehab. I went to one rehab for a couple months. It’s weird the way it slipped in: The first time around, it was just a few months that took me down really quick. Then I got off and started playing music again--when I’m loaded, I can’t create anything. I had a relapse, and that one was pretty bad.

It’s kind of hard to explain. It was a real fight. When I was getting off the maintenance drugs, I started recording a lot in my freedom. I stopped taking anything, [still] getting help with ADD. [But] there were all these things that for me bloomed into a serious drug addiction. Adderall, anxiety medication, it all stopped working after a while, and I got really unlucky. Over a year now I’ve got out of rehab, I’ve been doing really well. It was really hard getting off all that maintenance stuff, and it was hard for my mind to start working properly again--not music-wise. The music came right back. But me relating to other people and me dealing with what’s still my insecurities and the bad habits I had to break that aren’t just drug-related. Years of isolating.

That works for music. When I fell off, it wasn’t for a long time, but the reverberation from that I still deal with, even though I am as sober as can be at this point. I don’t do AA, because I’ll drink wine every once in a while. I survived. The music was all dealing with trying to make sense of what happened. At first, I was gonna make it a personal mission to shed light on mental health and what help there is for people that slip into drug addiction, and how much it hijacks people’s brains. I was gonna draw attention to it. The further I got away from it, I was weary of putting myself out there. I had to tell all my friends, and everyone in my world knows. I wasn’t sure if I wanted to really talk about it, but I am, now. A lot of people deal with that stuff. It was really embarrassing for me, to think about how I slipped like that. But it happens to strong people, all kinds of people.

SILY: Was touring with Duster making things more difficult?

JA: What happened was Duster got back together--I was clean at this point, but I had already had my year-long battle with substance abuse between getting let go of Built to Spill and when Duster started, which was a short gap. When Duster played in New York, I was still sober. I got back from there and promptly relapsed really hard. I got clean again for tour, but relapsed again when I got back. Those guys were really patient with me. They tried to hook me up with help. Everyone has to do it for themselves. When that box set got released, I was struggling. I always expected Duster to start up again, but it never would. It finally did, and I felt like I was letting my end of it down. I contributed to the new record--it all happened really quick, at least that’s what it seems like.

I was just getting ready to do a lot of touring with Helvetia, and then COVID happened, so I’m just playing every day, recording, and taking care of myself.

SILY: It seems like as tough and scary as a pandemic is, it has for a lot of people given them an opportunity to mentally reset and pay attention to what makes them feel good, mentally and physically. Do you find that’s the case?

JA: Yeah. I imagine there’s so many people getting back into whatever passions they have, and I think it’s good for that. You always have to make the best of the situation, as impossible as it all seems. With rock shows being a way’s off, and are they gonna come up with a vaccine? If they don’t, it really messes a lot of things up for everybody. The food industry. We’re song and dance people who go out and play shows. We get used to it. It’s a nice break in between recording. It doesn’t seem like that’s gonna be happening for a while. Make the best of it. Getting used to the new way of life.

SILY: Was you getting let go of Built to Spill just because Doug Martsch was trying to rotate the lineup every record?

JA: Yeah. [Drummer Steve Gere] and I came in--Steve plays in Helvetia, too. When we went in together in 2012, I didn’t think it was gonna be something that lasted a long time. We toured a lot, and I really enjoyed that experience. I consider Doug a really good friend. We’ve been through a lot of stuff together. That was really cool, but when he got rid of the other two guitar players during that time, and we got down to a three-piece, I got really stretched out at that point. It wasn’t the Built to Spill I thought people wanted to see. We were about to go to Brazil, and Doug decided he wanted to switch it up. I think he just got bored of it. When Doug went to Brazil, he hooked up with some musicians there who are really cool. I was surprised when we were let go, but that’s just the way he has built up his band, that he can do that. I think it’s best for Built to Spill. I went and saw them when they were in Portland for 4 nights. It was good to see him. It was a really great experience, but until you’ve actually toured 5 months out of the year--that was my dream, being a musician that makes money doing that--but it isn’t the easiest thing ever. There’s a lot of grinding it out. It’s impossible to complain about it, because you’re doing a lot of things that people want to do.

SILY: Do any of the lyrics on This Devastating Map explicitly reference your struggles with addiction?

JA: I start the whole record off talking about getting clean. I don’t want to spell it out, because it’s pretty brutal, but that’s what it is. The whole record is as clear as I wanted it to get. It’s all over it. That came out of the struggle. I would say most songs deal with the repercussions from that. When you’re in recovery, time is so important. Every day you gain sober is really big. You’re waiting to get back to normal, and the songs kind of deal with that waiting. It’s tough. But I can say for sure that after a year, it gets a lot easier. It is possible to get over it, but you really have to have the worst time of your life doing it. It’s so unfortunate that getting into hard drugs is so easy nowadays. It’s a bummer. [laughs]

“Reaktor”, the video that game out, that’s even just me trying to be upbeat. I’m a new person now. Back to normal, able to be a dad.

SILY: Do you regularly listen to this record?

JA: I listened to it a bunch while I was making it. I struggled with the order of the songs, and which songs to keep, and I changed it a few times after we mastered it. When I was done with it and finally sent it off, I stopped listening to it. I’m a couple records down the road. But I’m really proud of it. I’m proud of myself for getting my shit back together. That was one of the biggest drawbacks of dealing with addiction--my creativity fucking sucked. I could sit there and try all I want, but I couldn’t finish. Finally getting back to normal, I’m keeping that going. I’m recording as much as I can. I’m 45, man. This is the life that I chose. I never really grew up. I’m still a young person in the head. In hindsight, I think it changed a lot of things, but that’s just hindsight. I’m really lucky: I have good friends, people that encouraged me to be the best person I can be, and I’m not complaining. It was a struggle, and I feel bad for anyone else going through this.

SILY: What inspired the phrase “this devastating map?”

JA: It’s as simple as the songs together tell the story of my addiction and my recovery, and also just the scars on my body. It’s way more hardcore than I want it to be, but that’s the way it is.

SILY: There’s a certain realness to the record. Are you always singing from your point of view?

JA: No, I’ll inhabit any personality I can think of. A lot of times, I’ll refer to myself in the third person. That’s the thing: This record is more autobiographical than other records, but usually, I have a relationship with my past catalog. I always wonder, “How many records are you gonna make with what you have to offer?” I rework old ideas and do things over and over and wait for better results. A lot of the lyrics are tongue-in-cheek. A lot of what’s lost is the sense of humor. The reason I didn’t give you lyrics is because what you imagine what’s being said is more appropriate than what I actually wrote. When I listen to music, I make it my own. That’s what’s great about music. You put it out there, and other people make it their own. This record, there’s a lot of “me” in it.

SILY: To me, a song like “Love Me” seems pretty strong and direct.

JA: I’m a people pleaser...I’m looking for love, even though it’s not that simple all the time. I’ve never written a song that even talks about love, so that was tough for me to actually put that on the record. Every band I like talks about love, but it’s the most basic aspect of my personality: wanting to be accepted.

SILY: Can you tell me about “Castle Rock”?

JA: [laughs] I was digging through some old 4-track stuff, looking for sound collage things. I found the nucleus of that. That song, in my mind, was a triumphant thing. What’s another thing bands write about? How they’re gonna rock your face off. It’s kind of a joke, like, “Storm the castle! I’m gonna get my shit together!” That song was cool because I just like the way the breaks worked out. The drum machine. It’s a little more nonsensical. A “We Will Rock You” kind of thing.

SILY: It definitely provides some levity.

JA: I can’t talk about how much you suck or shit sucks [all the time]. Sometimes, it’s just songwriting 101...I’m not that great at it. [laughs]

SILY: Making an album inspired by a difficult and emotional period in your life, did that find its way into the recording process? You recorded it with other people who knew what you were going through.

JA: Duster, we were kind of a band that recorded with each other, but it started off as everyone doing their own and putting it on the record. Helvetia I’ve always done by myself. It’s by definition a vanity project. Everything’s done exactly how I want it to be done, and it satisfies all my pop urges, stuff I wouldn’t be able to get away with with Duster. Steve’s the guy who put me into rehab. I play with him regularly, but music for the most of the time is a solitary thing. I do like the process of playing with people, but for this project I don’t do that. So the recording was by far the least stressful part of this. It was really therapeutic for me. Every day, get ideas down. Making records to me is really entertaining. Whittling away at it until it’s cohesive.

SILY: What’s the inspiration behind the album art?

JA: My friend Creighton Barrett from Band of Horses, we were in the same friends group in Seattle in the early 2000′s. We just kept in touch, and he posted a poster he made on Instagram. Before this record was finalized, I thought it was gonna be really heavy, so I wanted some artwork that was more playful. So that’s Creighton’s artwork.

SILY: Do you have any idea how you might adapt these songs live, when the time comes?

JA: This record, we’re playing 3 songs from it...this one doesn’t have the easiest songs to play, so I decided to work within the confines of regular tuning and have a new record come out after this. That’s the problem: When you’re recording a lot, you’re a couple records ahead of where the releases are. I don’t think about this record at all. I started thinking about it again when it was announced, and it’s not that I don’t love it, but I’m not gonna play a lot of songs from it. Maybe that’ll change. I have to think about how they’re gonna come across live. There’s a new set of songs that’s gonna be more fun live. I don’t know how a lot of this stuff translates. I think some people like the meandering, soft rocker stuff. I’m not worried about playing this record.

SILY: Were you thinking about doing a live stream?

JA: Not for Helvetia. We did a Duster thing where we all did a cover of a Duster song in isolation, and it was cool, but I have yet to watch a performance of someone at home. Well, I watched Doug Martsch do his Daniel Johnston songs, and that was cool, but I wouldn’t want to do it by myself, and I can’t get my band to hang out with me, since we’re worried we’ll get each other sick and die. I don’t want to play a backing track. I don’t think the world needs me performing by myself right now.

youtube

#helvetia #joyful noise #jason albertini #steve gere #samantha stidham #this devastating map #built to spill #duster #add #covid-19 #covid-19 pandemic #coronavirus #coronavirus pandemic #doug martsch #creighton barrett #band of horses #daniel johnston #Interviews

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roseyturtles · 4 years

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more mikey angst yeehaw

welcome back to “oh lawd Rose is on their bullshit again” and this time I have writing done at 3am

So this requires a little bit of explaining. First, I’m using “Artist” as a nickname for 2018 Michelangelo and “Freckles” for 2012. Second, this is fast-paced. Almost uncomfortably so. You’ll have to suspend your disbelief enough to believe that talking to another version of yourself is more vulnerable than anyone else, and that all Mikeys are just that empathetic. Third: I’m not making excuses for wrongs on the part of 2012′s writers or characters, and I’m not leaving room for anyone else to do so either.

Tagging @brightlotusmoon in this as per usual because she’s my ultimate motivator in Mikey writing.

That being said, enjoy.

"Wait wait wait wait," the freckled turtle started, waving his hands in front of his face. "So. Your brothers DON'T smack you around when you're being obnoxious?"

"Wh--no?? What kind of brothers hit each other?!"

When Michelangelo---or, well, "Artist Mikey," as they would later clarify to try and discern between the two versions---first had this other version of himself arrive at his doorstep, he wasn't expecting this to become of it. The "rounder" turtle, a few inches taller and formed from a different base species entirely, but still very much a clone, had started out with bright smiles and a skateboard under his arm, ready to grind the sewer walls with his counterpart. And grind they did, both using their skills to perform impressive tricks around every bend and railing available, until they chose to mount on a surface rooftop for a breather. That's when real conversation started up, mostly about their common and different hobbies and the state of their worlds.

It was only when freckled Mikey mentioned off-the-cuff that he'd be smacked by Raphael for too many bad jokes that the artist realized that maybe they weren't so similar after all, and neither was their family.

"...uh. The normal kind?? What, are you guys all hugs and kisses?" Freckles asked, making a smooching gesture with his hands in a lightly mocking manner.

"Well, I mean, no," Artist started, "but like. Even when we get super mad at each other none of us get hit! And what do you mean by "annoying" anyways?"

Freckles seemed a little bit at a loss, brow furrowed and blinking. Whether that was out the same verbal processing disorder that Artist had or out of disbelief he wasn't sure. Eventually Freckles couldn't make eye contact, or even so much as look at Artist anymore, instead choosing to look away and scratch the back of his head, voice quieter when he spoke.

"Y'know," he tried to reconcile. "Stuff like…being too loud, or moving around too much, or talking about a video game all day."

Again Artist was horrified. That…was all normal stuff for him and his brothers both to do. Yeah, it was more him than them, but none of it was ever considered "annoying." None of it warranted violence.

"I mean, I remember one time Leo chased me and hit me with a mop after I used his favorite comic as toilet paper, heheh. I was, uh, I was trying to snap him out of a weird mutant wasp trance after he got stung. Nnever--" Freckles suddenly went silent, and for a moment there was tension as he slowly pulled his knees up to his chest.

Then Artist spoke with rare but completely characteristic softness.

"Never thanked you for saving him?"

More silent tension as Freckles remained looking to the noisy city, trying to drown the storm inside his chest with other stimuli. Eventually, though, he

nodded. Artist took a minute to process everything this implied. The fact that the major good thing Freckles did was overshadowed by the minor bad. The fact that a simple "thank you" or even an "I love you" was too much for that Leo's pride. The fact that nobody stood up for Freckles in that violence, and no one was going to, not without some sort of intervention.

…

Artist scooted a little closer to his counterpart and hugged his nearest arm. Freckles seemed shocked by the contact, and almost a tad uncomfortable, which made Artist's heart hurt more. Was he also never comforted in times of distress?

"I'm gonna be real honest here, Mike," Artist started, opting to use one of their assigned nicknames until they later figured out universal ones. "I don't think any of that's…good. I mean, bouncin' around and talking about stuff for hours is either teen stuff, ADHD, or both. For you to get smacked for doing normal stuff?..." He couldn't collect enough thought matter to say exactly what was wrong with it, but the heavy silence afterwards spoke volumes.

Freckles, too, remained silent after the speech. He had read about ADHD in one of Donnie's countless textbooks and found himself identifying with the symptoms, but never told anyone about it. He was already different from his brothers enough, why give it name and form that could be used as a stamp over his mouth? But something about hearing it from someone else, someone that didn't just know him but was him, made the concept somehow more real, like adjusting pronouns. And yet all of that was overshadowed in a split second by what exactly Artist was getting across. This…how his brothers treated him…wasn't normal. Wasn't okay, even. Another version of him, a fundamentally happier version, wasn't being hit and wasn't being called annoying and was being thanked by his brothers and wasn't trying desperately to appease them and was pursuing his hobbies fearlessly and---

Freckles looked at Artist with just the barest bit of hope.

"What's your dad like?"

"...Imperfect. He's got a lot of bad stuff in his past. But he loves us a lot, and he wants us to be us before we're ninjas. …and yours?"

A moment more of silence. Then, Freckles returned the hug, burying his face in Artist's shoulder. Artist couldn't begin to imagine what kind of a Splinter---of a dad---could normalize domestic violence and emotional frigidity. The best he could imagine was that their Splinter just wasn't there for them. The worst? That he was an active participant in this. Either way, his slowly wettening shoulder told the story loud and clear, and Artist's heart was squeezed by grief for his other.

His whole world, everything he thought he knew, had been shattered in an instant, leaving nothing but shards of rose-tinted glasses and ruinous truth.

It both crushed him and burned him alive to see this happening, and when Artist raised his head, his eyes were determined to set it right, and set it right together.

#tmnt #michelangelo #Michelangelo tmnt #tmnt 2012 #tmnt 2018

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